AN: Here's the next chapter re-written for your viewing pleasure, I would thank everyone on my discord but sixty percent of you are arseholes the other forty percent are arseholes who do nothing but shit post and bully me into writing superfluous nonsense, especially you Menial! I hope my loyal readers have had a brilliant Christmas and a less than shit new year.
Here's to my new years resolution that will go straight down the toilet the first day of 2021, where I promise to drink less booze and spirits. Like hell.
October 7th 2206 EMC [Earth Military Calendar] 2150 CE [Common Era].
Human Systems Alliance Space, Frontier Colonial Systems.
Ragnar-Alpha Sector, Ragnar super gas-giant.
SSV LION R-106, En-route to the Combat Information Centre [CIC].
[Play: Hollywood Undead: Notes From The Underground Unabridged – Lion.]
Making his way from his personal ward room towards the Lion's CIC Liam traced the path he had done for years now, saluting crewmen as he passed them by with his ever present morning tea in his personal Darth Vader mug in his off hand, his pace was measured uniform pressed to perfection.
The tell-tale vibrations under his feet of multiple munitions trams rattling down the tracks that ran the length, breadth and depth of the ship underneath the Lion's deck plating, carrying pallets of munitions and supplies to wherever they were needed.
It was hard to explain the feeling the Lion had, with her older but far from obsolete systems running smoothly on his daily trek, it's kind of like that nebulous feeling when you just knew somehow you were going to have a good day.
The crew had a similar energy, ecstatic that the Lion was officially being pulled from the reserves back into full service, especially the older hands who'd previously seen service operating the Lion's often forgotten about torpedo room at the bow of the vessel which had seen some light conversion into a bar for the exclusive use of the Lion's TOG's or "The Old Gangers".
They were now finding themselves re applying their trade overseeing the re supply and re-activation of the four massive stacked magazines and the torpedo tubes themselves, as well as securing the most powerful non-nuclear weapons systems the systems alliance had to offer, the BAE Spearfish Superheavy Disruptor Torpedoes.
Besides the Lion herself being brought up to and often times beyond fleet standards, the Marines and Special Orbital Infantry Service (SOIS) members weren't being left out either, The dozens of primary and secondary armouries throughout the entire ship had been fully stocked and given some unique toys.
Most of them surplus last generation weapon systems like the vaunted SA-99-A3 (L2099-A3) rifles chambered in 10mm caseless Armour Piercing Explosive (APE) round, the unique recoil dampening system as well as the 31 inch barrel that came in the compact form of a Bullpup rifle with then state of the art smart scope systems made them some of the most accurate firing weapon systems ever produced for the Systems Alliance Army and Marines.
Only issue was the weight of the weapons systems causing arm fatigue, not that the Marines aboard the Lion would ever be caught complaining especially in front of their sergeants or even worse their Sergeant Majors, another oldie but goldie addition to the armoury was the addition of M57-D1 Section Support Weapons, also known as the Dirty Smart Gun.
It had been the cause of some great controversy with future talks of even banning the thing entirely, it could be utilised with either a 200 round lead lined drum magazine or a 5000 round lead lined backpack with an insulated rubber feed, the rounds themselves were the controversial part, 10mm caseless APE-D rounds, they were given enough polonium-210 to kill a grown man from radiation poisoning if the poor bastard was stupid enough to get hit.
The Lion's deck hands and grease monkeys were no doubtedly scouring and familiarizing themselves with every single quirk and trait with every new viper aboard, with a liberal helping hand of the viper jocks assigned to them to make sure they were both customised to the pilots preferences and to get the absolute most out of the machines as possible.
With every chance they could they'd push the vipers to the edge and beyond it flaunting god knows how many regulations and safety procedures in the process.
Alongside the new vipers, we had a slew of reserve Pelicans brought in to replace our far outdated Cobra troop transports, the amount of customisation the Pelicans brought to the field was a game changer for the Lion's shuttle bus drivers.
As standard the Pelicans came fully decked with MLRS rocket pods, ATGM's, 30 calibre gun pods, a nose mounted state of the art link less fed 40mm auto cannon and remote controlled pintle mounted 10mm Gatling guns, The blood try was given a choice of either a deployable 50 calibre Ma Deuce, 30 calibre minigun or a 30 calibre General Purpose Machine Gun.
These Glorious workhorses could ferry sixteen marines and one of sixteen 60-metric ton challenger 'Longbow' main battle tank, armed with a 140mm gauss linear cannon, a 50 calibre MA Deuce co-axial machinegun and two remote operated General Purpose Machineguns, with Street Fighter applique armour packages and Iron Fist Anti-Missile hard kill system.
Alternatively, the Pelicans could carry one of any of the stored Jackal infantry fighting vehicles a 4x4 all-terrain vehicle capable of carrying 6 troops armed with either a Ma-Deuce, 40mm grenade machine gun, with a secondary GPMG for the front seat passenger to utilise.
Or, they could deploy the Coyote Infantry Support Vehicle which were 6x6 lengthened versions of the Jackal geared towards troop transport rather than infantry fighting, not that they were defenceless by any stretch of the imagination utilising two GPMG's for vehicle defence.
Shaking his head to clear his thoughts Liam approached the four marines standing guard outside one of the four hatches securing the CIC of the Lion, the four marines quickly snapped to attention with Liam briskly snapping a salute in return.
"Anything from the rumour mill lads?" Liam asked, dropping his salute.
"Well sir, some of the tech's keep yammering about some crazy shit showing up in our manifests and that they're to keep shtum about it, but you know that lot they're like gerbils on a caffeine high." One of the marines said.
"Then there's the fact one of the tertiary cargo bays has been converted into another ice box for some 200 cryo pods." Chipped in another marine.
"Anything else lads?" Liam asked, with a small smirk.
"Well, Tango and Whisky platoons were drafted into organising a couple of armouries, Jenkins was telling me half of the shit that's been stored in there he hasn't even seen before, then there's the fact Lucy told me part of hydroponics was cordoned off for some strange ass plants." The third of the four marines chipped in.
"Also, the rat-packs that were shipped in late yesterday. What the hell is going on sir?" the last stated before asking.
"I'll be briefing the entire crew at oh-seven hundred hours, so keep an ear out yeah, all you need to know is that the mission is a Two-Alpha, for up to five years on an endurance deployment." The marines eyes widened just a touch at the news.
"I know this'll be cheeky sir, but where are we headed?" The first marine asked.
"For now, we're deploying beyond known space, hopefully everything going well this'll be a three year round deployment top, after five years we'll be declared missing with all hands, after year six we'll be listed as presumed dead." Liam replied.
All the marines nodded in response. "Understood sir, we'll get it done." The other marines muttered a quick oohrah between them.
"Just keep what you know to yourselves lads, briefs in fifty mikes so heads down arses up till then yeah." The first marine quickly typed his access code allowing the hydraulic locks to disengage before pulling the hatch open allowing Liam to step through the threshold into the CIC proper, one of the junior officers looked up from their post, seeing the Lion's OIC he stood before bellowing.
"Captain on the deck!" The entire hive of activity came to a sudden stop as every officer stood from their posts.
"At ease ladies and gents, I want the usual daily reports delivered to myself as our dear exec has no doubtedly found an e-mail on her personal computer or pad that she's been accepted for promotion and is probably rushing around like the irate red head she is to pack all of her gear up." Liam announced to the crew.
The CIC broke out into a fit of laughter at the jab. "She's not the only one as nearly 400 of our crew have been slated for promotion or reassignment, they'll also be rushing around like headless chickens to pack up and fuck off to greener pastures on vessels far more deserving of their winning personalities." Liam continued causing a second round of laughter to break out in the CIC.
Liam turned towards Lieutenant Smollet the Lion's senior communications officer and his unofficial personal assistant. "Remind me at oh six fifty-five hours to brief the crew."
"Aye sir." She replied.
Taking his place at the Lion's war table situated dead centre in the CIC, Liam tapped the touch screen interface quickly switching to a diagnostic interface that brought up a 3D wirework of the Lion, before picking up his personal wireless from its base.
Pressing a single button marked MNENG for Main Engineering, Liam waited for the line to connect. "Scotty you mad Scottish bastard, give me the good news."
The Lion's Scottish chief engineer used his personal uniform mounted wireless to reply. "Well th' good news is tha' I knae th' old girl like th' back of me hand, I managed ta shave two days off o' th' refit cap'n, we'll be ready ta get underway ahead o' schedule."
"Good man, keep it up and I might give you a bottle of whiskey." Liam chortled at the Scotsman's snarky reply.
"Aye sir." He finished cutting the line on his end, looking up from his position beside the war table Liam spotted the Lions chief gunnery officer, the caucasian blonde male looked just a bit agitated whilst he was busy jotting down notes, probably some quick calculations on the Primary, secondary and tertiary magazines, the frown on his face once he finished told Liam all he needed to know, something was up. "CGO have we got an issue?" Liam asked as he moved from his post to the CGO's own post next to a vertical plotting table.
"Sir, I've checked and triple checked the tertiary magazines we're shot some ten million rounds for the AF-AM batteries."
"Human error on our end?" I asked, it was very easy to sign paperwork stating x-number of pallets delivered when they were one or two pallets shy especially when they were dropped onto us in bulk, it wouldn't be the first time, it certainly wouldn't be the last.
"No sir, I've gone through our transfer sheets we're showing ten pallets short, I've gone as far to pull the Demeter's deliveries documentation, paperwork's either not been filed properly or has gone completely missing." Liam rubbed the bridge of his nose at the report before asking.
"Did you find any word of this being passed up the chain at all?" Liam was still rubbing his nose.
Lion's CGO took to scrolling through the pad in his hand, doing his due diligence, he checked and then double checked each and every report. "There's not a single word being passed up the chain sir."
"Alright I'll contact Admiral Cutter directly, I'll put in an urgent request for your missing ten million and see if he can't get his MP's to do their fucking jobs and investigate to get to the bottom of this." Liam stated.
"Understood and thank you sir." He replied.
"Wouldn't be doing my damn job if I didn't, come to me if there are any other discrepancies." Liam called back as he made his way back to his post.
"Aye sir."
A solid twenty minutes spent fixing the CGO's problem by calling old man cutter to pass the problem directly to him, Liam could just feel a migraine coming along. "Sir, it's oh six fifty-five you asked me to remind you." Smollet called.
Picking up his wireless whilst nodding to the Lieutenant. "Thank you, Lieutenant, patch me though ship-wide." At the press of a button Liam's wireless connected to every speaker on board the Lion, a three tone whistle alerted to the crew to a ship wide announcement.
"Ladies, gentlemen, this is your Captain speaking, yesterday I'd just been briefed by the old man in charge that we are going to deploy on a mission that will on best predictions be around three years long, this mission is classified top-secret, any word of this leaks and your ass is mine to throw out of the god damned airlock for treason…."
Crewmen stopped in their tracks to listen more keenly to the coming brief. "Two months ago, Humanity made first contact, the how's, what's and why's don't matter…. what does matter is that we the crew of the navies most auspicious Battlestar Lion, have been selected by the Civilian and Military higher ups to return a wayward crew home, to put Humanities best foot forward so to speak and to make allies with the wider galaxy…. we will be going further than any Human ship in history, we'll have nothing but our fellow crewmates to rely on, as a bonus the higher ups have been gracious enough to up our monthly pay for up to five years to Two-Alpha status…."
A few of the crew of the Lion broke out into small celebrations at the news of the increase in pay.
Liam continued. "I don't need to tell you how bloody important this mission is, so I want everyone giving nothing but their best throughout this mission. I want our additions to be treat as any other crewman, earn their respect as fellow sailors, I get one serious infraction reported to me that isn't a case of cultural misunderstanding I will personally make your lives living hell. Is that understood."
With that out of the way Liam took to issuing orders to those who had upcoming special duties, readying the ship for a personal transfer from the Two For Flinching via the Cradle and her Umbilical's, teams of technicians were put on short call to receive cryo pods that would be EVA transported to several of the Lion's secondary airlocks closest to the newly converted ice box that was one of the tertiary cargo bays.
All the crew of the Lion had to do now was wait for the Two For Flinching to arrive sometime today.
Liam looked up towards the various monitors hanging above the war table, muttering to himself. "May we live in interesting times." Out of the entire crew manning the Lion's CIC only the Lion's Chinese helmsman caught what Liam had muttered causing him to chuckle at the good captains expense.
October 7th 2206 EMC [Earth Military Calendar] 2150 CE [Common Era].
Human Systems Alliance Space, Frontier Colonial Systems.
Ragnar-Alpha Sector, Ragnar super gas-giant.
SSV Two For Flinching BC-306, Ten-Forward Observation.
[Play: Kasabian: West Ryder Lunatic Asylum – Vlad The Impaler.]
When the call had gone out that the Two For Flinching was on final approach, most if not all of the Invictus's crew were assembled in the Ten-Forward to catch a glimpse of the homeport of their new home, needless to say the clashing of blue hues with swirling greens of the super gas giant were incredible.
Nature after all was the universes greatest artist, what the crew of the Invictus hadn't expected was for the Two For Flinching to continue its course heading directly into the cloud layer of the super gas giant a general call to brace for turbulence was given as the support ship ploughed through areas of high and low pressure.
The journey took a couple of minutes but soon afterwards the two kilometre long vessel found itself in the presence of a five-kilometre 'tall' station, three concentric rings separated by a couple of hundred metres rotated around the central spire that formed most of the stations mass.
Twelve berths were placed in three groups of four each layer offset from the last, all twelve of the berths had a vessel of some description in each of them each of them following function over form while the rest of the reserve fleet stationed here were in individual ribcage like structures some large most of the others small.
The Two For Flinching had greatly reduced its momentum by firing its reverse thrusters, making micro adjustments as it manoeuvred between the structures, those Turian's with keen eyes could spot the multitude of defence satellites surrounding the Anchorage in a protective bubble the sight was something familiar to the Turian's as their own equivalent fleet stations offered a similar defence system in case of a potential attack.
It was nice to see another race taking their personal security seriously, much like the Hierarchy had done in the decades passed, but what caught their attention was the SSV Lion itself her 1.4 kilometre length with her alligator head with the Human gun metal grey Titanium Battleplate armour, bristling with fifty 'three-gun' batteries a ludicrous amount of point defence batteries and whatever other missile and torpedo systems that had to be hidden from view, it was a sight to say the least, with quite a few of the younger crew openly gawping.
"All hands, all hands prepare starboard docking tubes for personal transfers to the SSV Lion via the Cradle, technicians prepare the cryo-pods for shuttle transfers via our secondary and tertiary shuttle-bays…. This is a general call for all Invictus crew please assemble at the Starboard docking tubes in two hours to begin transferring to the SSV Lion." A feminine voice announced.
Ka'mara watched as her crew disbanded to begin finishing packing up their personal effects from their temporary cabins. "This is a general call for all Turian Marine Personal, please ensure your personal equipment is retrieved from the armoury, quarter masters will be present to issue a disclaimer that all of your personal arms have been returned, please ensure everything is accounted for before signing. Thank you." The same feminine voice announced.
Ka'mara had served on the Invictus for multiple years, it still gave her some pride that in less than one and a half hours every active member of her crew had assembled and stood to one side of the hallway in a Turian textbook ready-line to transfer to their new home, after all first impressions counted for everything.
Flicking her wrist to activate her personal omni-tool for a quick second she typed in a few quick commands before pressing one of her two taloned fingers to her right ear, opening her personal comms to her crew. "This is Leftenant-Commander Nyx to all Invictus crew, roll-call." Within seconds her omni-tool lit up with notifications of all of the active crew in attendance.
Half an hour would pass with human crewmen passing them by paying little attention to them, until a female black skinned officer dressed in an olive dress uniform with grey accents and gold trims stepped towards them.
"Commander Nyx, though my duties have kept me from interacting with you and yours for any long periods of time, I wish to say that it has been a privilege and a pleasure to have been the ones to deliver you all to Demeter, I can only wish you all the best of luck from here on out you're all in it for the long haul." The Two For Flinching's captain addressed her.
"Thank you, Captain." The female human officer held her hand out in the typical manner to shake a hand, offering her own both females shook hands before offering the other their equivalent to a salute. "Permission to depart Captain." Ka'mara asked.
The female officer smiled. "Permission granted." Without a word the Invictus crew picked up their issued duffel bags in a uniform manner, before departing through the open airlock to transfer through to the Cradle and then to the Lion proper.
Within two minutes the uniform line of Turian's were ushered into one of the umbilical's attached to one of the Lion's multiple airlocks, the door sealed and locked, until a few seconds later when it opened with a pressurised hiss. "Commander Ka'mara Nyx I presume."
"Yes-sir!" She replied somewhat enthusiastically. "It's an honour to be serving under you Captain Spruce. Permission to come-aboard." Ka'mara asked.
Liam nodded. "Permission granted commander." He replied, now Ka'mara could inspect the good captain, he was donning a work-dress uniform with multiple coloured ribbons adorning his left breast just below his name tag, on the opposite breast sat the uniform patch for the SSV Lion R-106 the words Belli Dura Despicio embossed just below.
His pale white skin contrasted sharply with the auburn short but well-kept beard on the lower half of his face, his military cropped hair was well-kept too but a scar cut across the right side of his head just above his temple where the tip of his right ear was missing.
Liam continued. "Unfortunately, we'll have to take a trip to the central garage before I dismiss you and your fellow crewmen to your readied quarters." Once Ka'mara stepped through the threshold she could see human naval crewmen lining both walls intermixed with the odd human marine and some black clad variant holding their various weapon systems in a textbook salute.
Following the Captain for a solid couple of minutes marvelling at the sheer number of crewmen acting as the vessels' honour guard, till they had eventually arrived in a cavernous room filled with ground vehicles often found aboard dedicated Turian troop-ships, a semi-circle of rows of chairs were before the Invictus crew.
"Please everyone, take a seat." Following orders every Turian took a seat their equipment tucked under their chairs, with a few minutes spared to get comfortable, the Lion's Captain took to a podium set up before them on a temporary stage.
Liam waited a couple of seconds before addressing them all. "Welcome one and all to the SSV Lion, I'll be your commanding officer during this, shall we call it expedition…. I'm going to lay down the rules here and now to get them out of the way, You have a problem with anyone or anything up to and including your assigned duties please pass the word up the Turian chain to Commander Nyx who will then inform myself and I will deal with the issue once I have a free moment in my schedule."
Liam paused for a second before continuing "Please do not abuse this I have a damn ship to run, if anything is going to escalate to blows with any crewmen every Sunday at 17:00 hours a boxing ring will be rigged in here, a bowl will be presented where you will throw your issued dog tags…." Liam paused paused showing the two metal disks around my neck.
"You settle your slights or grudges in the ring, this is the only time I permit anything coming to blows, so leave it for the ring to settle things. Understood." A chorus of 'yes-sir' told Liam what he needed to know.
"Personal weapon systems such as sidearms will be permitted to be carried, any rifle systems and the like will be stored in armouries throughout the ship, attached to these armouries are shooting ranges, marines are permitted priority use of these facilities whilst navy personal will have to book use in advance, each and every one of you will be trained on our weapon systems during your off duty hours, understood?"
Another chorus of Yes sir told the good captain that the new additions to the Lion's crew were listening. "Now onto your duties, everyone contributes in keeping this ship in top condition including the ships cleanliness, no one is to slack on these simple light duties unless illness or a medical emergency is preventing you from doing so, each of you will be divided into your departments dependent on your credentials, to the naval personal our technology is independent of Eezo based tech, so you are not expected to jump in and know how everything works, what you are expected to do is learn, by the end of our journey I want you to be able to operate any system in any situation, additionally all of you will treat any drill as if it was an actual emergency, if one of you fails to perform you all fail to perform and your privileges' will be put on probation until your performance improves to a high enough standard."
Taking a breather for a couple of seconds Liam collected his mental check list, before nodding to himself. . "A word of warning, cultural and operational differences are to be expected, I have the personal belief that if you're fighting hard, you're wasting your energy, the Lion and her crew fight smart, conserving our strength whilst looking for weaknesses to exploit please don't be offended if my crew isn't working to Turian regulations."
All of the Invictus crew nodded in understanding, especially those who have previously cross trained with either the Salarian Navy or the Asari Navy, the fresh perspective on how Human vessels could operate would be an eye opener for sure given the rigidity of the Hierarchy.
"Alright with all that out of the way, if the right most Turian's could look to their right on the floor you will find multiple pads, please pass them along to your fellow crewmates before taking one for yourselves, on the pad is a full map of the Lion with a programme set on it to direct you to your barracks with the input of your name, additionally it can direct you to your muster point for your assignments tomorrow, the closest restrooms, the nearest aid station and the services rooms to wash and iron your uniforms and waste disposal, the common areas presented will be given once your rank or rank equivalent is provided to the pad so please don't lie and a final point inside your Barracks you will find several patches for your uniforms, please wear them as each patch has a purpose aboard the ship alongside two dog tags much like my own, wear them at all times, as they have emergency information on them for the trauma teams to utilise when providing medical aid." Liam finished addressing everyone assembled.
Liam turned to address Ka'mara directly. "Commander Nyx I'll be personally walking you to the Executive Officers quarters as it is opposite my own across CIC, all of you are dismissed until 08:00 muster tomorrow morning ship time so please ensure you have updated your Omni's with the correct time."
With all that said and done the Invictus crew chatted amongst themselves working out which of the crew had the same barracks to make their treks a little less daunting, Ka'mara grabbed her personal duffle and fell into step with Liam as he stepped from the stage. "Lead the way Captain."
To be Continued….
AN: Hopefully the next one won't take too long to update, no promises are made, as always stay safe, praise the Man-Emperor of mankind twice daily, least an Inquisitorial Representative comes knocking on your door, and you will be happy to know I was mostly sober for this chapter.
GLRS signing off...