Well, here we have chapter 7. its smaller, like I promised, and its also split into three easily broken down parts, for the readers convenience.

I am still looking for a beta reader if anyone would be interested. If you need some incentive, I actually have up to chapter 10 already done, so you could get early access to them. Also, I have a chapter from way later, think of it as chapter 50 or so, that could also be viewed.

Chapter 7

September 23rd, 2045, Freedom Maker, New ASN Flagship. 21:44 UDT

The throbbing was mercifully receding, allowing Craig Wilds a small respite from the headache that had plagued him for the last several hours. With the meeting finally concluding, and without an audience or a need to keep up appearances, Craig had immediately retreated back to his offices and order up some very effective painkillers.

That was about five minutes ago, and while the medicine had run its course, Craig had leaned back in his chair, the lights dim, and just, blanked out. There was a lot to do, a lot to think about, but he needed the break. It had been at least twenty four hours since he had slept last, he hadn't eaten well, and then there was the stress. Oh, was there a lot of stress.

And then there was that meeting from hell that had just let out. That had gone on for a good fourteen, maybe fifteen hours, and that was just a long drawn out, painful death.

There was also that video clip that had shown up at the tail end of things, that had sent his mind wandering off in direction that were best left unexplored. Unfortunately, he found that once it had been there once, his mind kept going back to it, and that was creating a slew of personal problems for him.

But the highlight of it all, was the TSAB Admiral, or more accurately, her surrender proposal, and the information she had brought. Not that the Admiral herself wasn't interesting or noteworthy, she definitely was, it was just that the other aspects were just much more interesting and noteworthy. The knowledgeable that the TSAB wasn't conquering the Allied States, but was in fact just obliterating it tends to overshadow things.

So yeah, there was a lot of stress that he was dealing with. And although he could be using his time to analyze the Admiral, or to go over his report on the Combat Cyborg/ Mage pilots, or to browse through the various reports that littered his desk, there were several data pads left around, his terminal showed he had several new messages, and there was an oddly out of place stack of papers in the corner, yes there was a lot of work to be done. He also had personal issues to deal with, but that was a can of worms that he just couldn't bring himself to deal with at the moment.

Instead, he sat there in his comfy chair, eyes closed, and did the closest thing to sleeping he had done all day.

And it was great. Time just melted past him. He had no idea how long had passed, minutes? Seconds? Hours? He couldn't tell, and that only made it better. It was a weight lifted off his shoulders; to just sit and relax like this. He was happy, content, and wanted nothing more than to let it continue for days.

Then his terminal chimed, the signal that he had an incoming transmission.

He ignored it.

It chimed again.

He continued to ignore it.

It continued to chime.

Unfortunately, he knew he wouldn't win this, it would keep going with all of the efficiency of a machine, and his ability to continue ignoring it was steadily dropping. So with a deep sigh, and a few choice curses, Craig leaned forward and connected the transmission.

"Deputy Secretary Wilds, I hope I am not bothering you?"

"Not at all Madame Vice-President, what can I do for you?"

Craig had intended to chew out however had bothered him, but when the transmission connected and the face of the Vice-President, Brenda Howl appeared on his screen, he quickly dropped the plan and replaced his angry and annoyed face with his usual suave and unconcerned one.

"I would like to ask your opinion on something."

"Would that something have to do with a certain Admiral perhaps? I believe her name was... what was it again? It was quite long."

"Admiral Lynnesis Sanjuyon Gallardo."

"That's it. So I assume you wanted my opinion on something pertaining to her?"

"I do."

"Well I would be more than happy to help, although I am surprised that you're asking."

For a moment the Vice-President's face scrunched up in thought, but then it went right back to normal.

"What's your take on the Admiral? Do you think she is telling the truth?"

Craig paused and mulled over his thoughts. He really hadn't spent much time on this before now, his moments of relaxation coming back to bite him.

"I think... I think that she meant what she said. I got the feeling that she wasn't taking use seriously, that she thought we were bellow her. And I don't think she would have made a bluff in regards to... That... in the way that she did."

"So then... you are of the opinion that they have been... destroying... the worlds that they control then?"

"It fits. Logically, the TSAB couldn't have been conquering planets that fast, and I find it hard to believe that they had enough ground forces to fight, what, one hundred? two hundred? maybe more? planetary invasions at once? Ground battles go much slower than space battles, in space the ships don't hide. But on the ground you can spend weeks searching for hidden enemies or laying siege to defensive positions. From a purely numerical standpoint, the TSAB would have had to conscript their entire population, and it still might not have been enough to keep that many battlefronts open at once. We had been running under the assumption that they had made some breakthrough for the ground forces, just as they had with their naval forces, but it seems that that wasn't the case."

"So...it all fits together then?"

"Yes, and she had no reason to be lying either. Unless they had exhausted themselves and were trying to bluff us, but I find that hard to believe. Plus, if they were trying to bluff into a better situation, they would have offered reasonable terms, and that was not anything close to reasonable."

"That is what the military concluded too."

"I figured as much. I may not be an actual soldier, but I can use knowledge to compensate. Plus, hang around the military types long enough, and they start to rub off on you."

"Hmm..."

The vice-President mumbled out a reply and then sat back in thought. The silence stretched on and Craig was unsure whether or not he should say something. But before he could decided, the vice-President sat forward, bringing her face closer to the screen.

"You said the terms were unreasonable. You think we should reject them?"

"I don't think we have a choice, but yes, that was my knee jerk reaction."

"Knee Jerk? No Choice?"

"Well... we can't accept those terms regardless. The public would never have it, and for those who wouldn't get picked, there is nothing to stop them from continuing to fight anyway. She only offered the terms so that she could get the battle station intact, and even if we tried to give it to her, it would almost certainly never happen. No, I don't think we can accept."

"But, if we could...?"

"Then I think we should."

"Why?"

"Eh, well honestly, everyone knows we can't win at this point. It's only a matter of time. And if the TSAB is killing everyone, then this is the only option to save at least some of the population."

The vice-President fixed him with a stare and silenced once again filled the space between them. And this time, Craig decided to keep the initiative, he'd already picked his stance and laid it out, if she had problems with it he would be unable to back track at this point.

"Also, the meeting there didn't exactly end in the best way possible, but he could try to negotiate different terms with them. If nothing else, we should try to negotiate, we can always switch tracks later. And, if the negotiations seem to be working, we can also stall for time."

"The Senators want to reject the terms and refuse any contacts."

"I expected that from them."

"And the military also wants to reject them."

"Also, not unexpected."

"The Deputy Prime Minister wants to stall for time, but ultimately reject them."

"That makes sense."

"The Secretary of State wants to surrender."

"Does she? That is unexpected."

"As do Deputy Secretary of Security Hamash and Deputy Secretary of Intelligence Hemming. They both think surrender is a better option."

"And what do you think?"

"I haven't decided yet. Surrendering in general turns my stomach, and to surrender to those terms..."

"But?"

"But... wouldn't it be better to save some versus letting every one die? Or should we gamble on the chance that we can at least hold out?"

"That, realistically isn't going to happen, but I understand the sentiment. Bet it all on a point zero, zero, zero, one, chance of victory, or fold and accept a ninety nine point nine, nine, nine, nine loss. That's barely a better option."

"True... very true. We also have another problem we need to deal with, we need to decided on one option and stick to it. And we all have to agree."

"That is the hard part about politics, getting everyone on board. Luckily, that isn't my job."

"Technically, it's not really my job either, remember, Vice-President? Not actual President. This should have been the President's place. She was better at this than I am, she always was able to turn opinion the way she wanted. Always made good decisions too, she always knew what was best."

"Not that I don't respect the former president, but perhaps refusing to leave Alliance Prime wasn't really the best decision?"

"Well, it was as good as any other way to go, plus, she doesn't have to deal with this now does she?"

"Hah, good point, maybe it was the best decision if you put it that way."

"Maybe it was... well Deputy Secretary Wilds, I thank you for your time. You helped me sort out my thoughts. Somewhat at least."

"Glad to have been useful, I hope you decide on something soon."

"Yes, so do I. I have a small meeting with the Secretary of State over lunch...dinner...i have no idea what time it is. But a small meeting none the less. I'll hear her out, and then listen to the Deputy Prime Minister, and maybe have a talk with Curtis and Kamal, then I will see where I stand. Well then, I will let you get back to whatever it was you were doing."

"Relaxing."

"Hah, well enjoy."

And with that, the connected was cut and the transmission ended. His terminal faded to the flag of the Allied States before going black completely as he put it into standby mode. Craig leaned back into his chair and considered his options.

He should have checked the messages on his terminal, they were probably the easiest issues to work through, but they were also just mindless busy work, and he just couldn't bring himself to deal with that at the moment, plus, he had already put that into standby. He also had those reports to look through; a quick glance at his desk revealed that there were four of them, plus that stack of papers. The papers would be last, just as a matter of principal, which left the data pads.

With a groan he reached out and picked up the nearest, flipped it on, and read the title out loud to himself.

"Reassessment of the Ern system ambush. By Rear Admiral Condel."

The data pad made a clattering sound as he dropped it back onto the desk. That one was unnecessary to read, even if there was something in it, it didn't matter to him, probably, also, he just didn't want to read something from the old man right now.

Next was a the results from the research station's scry on the TSAB fleet, which also meant nothing to him. Underneath that one was a copy of the video showing the attack on the asteroid belt. That one went back down. And then finally, there was an update to the report on the pilots. This one was unfortunately important enough to warrant his attention.

Craig idly flipped through it, spending time at the table of contents and getting a feel for it's size. It was mostly just small updates and a few things that were left out, nothing seemed important, but still, he needed to go over it, and it was only twenty pages long, so it shouldn't be that difficult.

-Break_

Five minutes later, Craig had revised his opinion.

The text itself wasn't that hard, but for some reason he just couldn't focus. He must have just read the same line ten times, and he still didn't know what it said.

He was clearly too tired for this right now, but he really needed to deal with it, if not now, then soon. And based on how he was feeling, if he went to sleep now he wouldn't wake up for at least twelve hours, which was far to long.

Instead, he compromised with himself, he would go back to the whole, "mind blanked out while relaxing," thing he had been doing before being interrupted. That had made him feel better, so there must have been some value in it. So he temporarily abandoned the data pad, kept the lights low, and leaned back into his chair, propped his legs up on his desk, and relaxed.

-Page-

September 23rd, 2045, Freedom Maker, New ASN Flagship. 23:56 UDT

Turned out that had been a bad idea.

Craig awoke with a jolt, springing forward in a panic and almost falling backwards out of his chair. He was still tired, maybe not exhausted, but still tired and groggy, and now he was also irritable. He could tell, because after almost falling out of his chair his first reaction was to attempt to hit it, so he threw some backwards elbows into the back cushion, knocking the chair back and forth until he messed up and slammed his elbow into the arm rest; the hard plastic arm rest.

As he leaned forward, propping himself up on his desk and cradling his now bruised arm, he came face to face with what had woken him in the first place. And also a clock, which informed him that he had drifted off for almost two hours. But he immediate concern was the same annoying chiming coming from his terminal, the same one that had ruined his last little bout of relaxation when the vice-president had wanted to talk. Without any thought to his current appearance, Craig angrily hit the connect button.

"Deputy Wilds, we have a... are you alright?"

The image of Craig's face, scrunched up in pain, and much to close to the screen had given the Deputy Secretary of Intelligence cause for concern, which coming from the emotionless spy/analysist, was probably a good indicator of what Craig was currently looking like.

"I'm fine. Banged my arm getting into the chair."

"Are you sure you OK? You look quite... distressed."

"I said I am Fine."

The Deputy Secretary's expression of concern immediately faded, going back to his usual stoic look, and making Craig realize that he might have been overly curt when he spoke. He took a second to straiten himself, reposition his now very sore arm, and then address the Deputy Secretary again.

"Sorry about that, I was sleeping in my chair when you called, and woke up a bit to fast and hit my arm."

"I thought you hit your arm getting into the chair?"

"It...yeah...no...i was in the chair and... you know what, it doesn't matter. What were you calling about?"

Not one to focus on things like that, the Deputy Secretary immediately dropped the subject and moved on.

"We have a small situation. Secretary of Industry Jeff Dorran passed away about an hour ago. One of his aids found him dead in his offices."

"Oh...oh, was it the TSAB or..."

"No, we are still waiting on a preliminary medical report, but the Secretary had been very sick and he seemed to have worked himself to death. There is no indication of anything else. As I said, we are still waiting on a more detailed report, and we will also be conducting an autopsy."

"OK...so what happens now?"

"For the moment, nothing. As a precautionary method we will be increasing security. Deputy Secretary Hamash is working with Major General Trihzen to double patrols around the ship and to provide each of us with a marine for protection, but his is just a precaution. Once we get the preliminary report we will relay and relevant information, and possibly call a meeting. For now you may continue what you were doing."

"OK...Alright."

"Then that is all. Also, I suggest you get a medical tech to look at your elbow, it is bruising."

"Yeah, I'll do that. Wait!"

"Yes?"

"Do you...Did you know the Secretary?"

"Not personally, no. Our department's don't have a lot in common, and until recently I was only the Deputy Secretary. I know of his reputation however, he was known for being a hard worker and extremely dedicated to his job. He has always been a bit frail of health however, and I know his family was on Alliance Prime when it fell. He himself just happened to be away trying to bring an old factory online at Banspil II when the attack happened. He didn't let it affect his work, but it probably worsened his condition. I have a full dossier on him if you want"

"No, that's OK, thank you for your time."

"As you wish."

The second he had stopped talking he had ended the transmission, the Allied State's flag once again appearing on Craig terminal screen, and this time he just left it there. He leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes, but this time relaxation was farthest from his mind. Not that he was concerned about the Secretary of Industry's death, he had been concerned that he might have been assassinated, but that fear was laid to rest. No, the death of the man didn't concern him, right now at least. What did concern him was the fact that he HAD been concerned for a moment. He had asked Deputy Secretary Hemming about the Secretary because he had been genuinely concerned at that moment. He no longer was, but that weird lapse moments ago was an aberration, and that was cause for concern.

Why had he cared enough to ask? Just like the Deputy Secretary, Craig barely even knew the Secretary of Industry, they weren't friends, they were barely even acquaintances, so why had he cared? Because he was a co-worker? That couldn't be, almost all of his co-workers had been killed in the past weeks, and none of them had made him even bat an eye, well except his boss, but that had more to do with his promotion than anything else. Was it because he had died, where as his other co-workers had been killed? Did that make enough difference?

The riddles and their possible answers danced around in his groggy mind, but he was too tired and irritated to catch them, instead they just floated out slightly out of reach, beckoning from him to try, but then bouncing away.

It was infuriating, and the fact that he had accidentally slept for two hours, wasting valuable time, was only exasperating the problem. He still had the reports go go through, his elbow hurt, nothing, nothing at all was going well.

He had so many problems, so many questions that needed answering, and he had nothing.

He should go and get something for his arm, but the pain was there, feeding into his anger, and that anger was all that was keeping him going at the moment. Instead, he decided to just give into the anger.

With a strained yell he threw his hands across the desk, scattering the data pads and sending the stack of papers flying. He stood up abruptly, kicked his chair back, the wheels allowing it to fly backwards and smash into a end table and go tumbling. He sent his coffee flying into the wall, the cup shattering and the light brown liquid staining the wall.

He gave one final yell, and then collapsed backward into his chair, only he forgot he had just sent that flying and instead fell back onto the floor.

His anger, now released, gave way to relief, and he just sat there, spread out on the floor and laughed. The stress, anger, fear, confusion, all of it from the last few days had just boiled over right then, and now that it was gone, all he had was... nothing. He was empty, gloriously empty. A sense of satisfaction had taken hold and he just kept laughing, light tears running down his face as he just kept on laughing.

September 24th, 2045, Freedom Maker, New ASN Flagship. 01:29 UDT

Craig awoke with a start, he eyes just snapping open. His back was sore from sleeping on the floor, his sides still hurt from his bout of laughing, and his elbow was now a nice brown and blue, but he was refreshed, even happy. Everything he had been keeping inside had just spilled out, leaving him in a much better mood, and unlike his last little nap, this one had ended naturally, instead of being interrupted, which had the nice added bonus of allowing him to actually feel better, instead of just groggy and irritated.

Craig slowly got up, reluctant to leave the soft padding that was the synthetic carpeting of his office, but none the less, he needed to move. Once up he surveyed the collateral from his new state of mind. There were shards of coffee mug scattered about around the door to the hallway and the drink itself had left a nice spot on the wall, one of the two end tables near the sofa in the back was knocked over, his desk chair leaning on it, with one of the arm rests, the one currently responsible for his elbow, broken off. Three of the data pads were laying on the floor in front of of his desk, the fourth had fallen into a potted plant and was now covered in dirt. And there was paper all over the place. He would need to figure out how had sent him a fifty page report in paper form, that person was going to get a good chewing out.

That however, was an issue for later, now, he needed to clean up his office. He could just ask for a maintenance crew, or a cleaning person, but he didn't really want anyone else to see the aftermath from his small breakdown, at least not until he got it somewhat under control.

Deciding that the coffee was probably the most important issue, Craig went into the adjoining bathroom, grabbed a hand towel, wet it with water, and then went back out and tried to soak up as much of the coffee as possible. Unfortunately, it had already dried, and is attempts were really only making the wall wet, and not actually cleaning much. After a few minutes, and very little progress, he gave up on that one. Instead he used the now dirty towel to pick up the shards of mug that were scattered about. He threw the bigger pieces into the trash can and left the small ones in the towel. Once he was confident that he had gotten all he could, the towel also went in the trash. The data pads were next, and after blowing the dirt off the one, were quickly straitened out on his desk, nothing out of place there.

Then he had to deal with the papers, which made him cringe. Being a man who does what every he wants when ever he wanted tends to make one strongly dislike certain things. Craig had a lot of dislikes, hates, and pet peeves, and paper was one of the more prominent ones, he just hated the rough feel of the stuff. To that end, he made every one send him reports in digital formats so that they could be uploaded into data pads or into his terminals. For the few people who wouldn't, or couldn't, Craig's secretarial staff would convert it to the appropriate format before passing it on to him. Since they hadn't, that meant that the conversion was impossible for some reason, most likely because the paper contained a For Your Eyes Only spell, which would prevent anyone besides him from reading it, and that also included machines.

Which meant that right now, Craig had to pick up over fifty loose sheets of paper, and each time his fingers touched one he had to suppress a slight chill that ran up his spine.

And with the worst task now completed, Craig moved on to the last thing, he quickly straitened out the end table, picked his chair up and wheeled it back to his desk. Luckily, sort of, the arm rest hadn't broken off completely, part of the support had snapped off, but the majority of it was still there, and it was probably still usable, which meant he didn't have to go through the hassle of requesting a new chair from the ship's supply.

Now, with the room looking significantly better, Craig finally decided that it would be OK to call a cleaning person, and logged into his terminal to do so.

-Break-

Five minutes later, Craig was once again leaning back in his chair, this time however, instead of relaxing, or passing out, he was again reading through the update report on the cyborg pilots. In the time since he had finished asking for a maintenance team, and the time they had arrived, Craig had already gone through the other three reports, and discovered nothing he needed to know.

And the arrival of the two maintenance people had also slightly distracted him, not because they were unique or anything, in fact they were two completely ordinary men, but just the fact that they existed had slightly surprised Craig, he sometimes forgot that despite being warships, they were still crewed by people, and people make messes. But the idea that a state of the art warship required a janitorial staff was something that would always slip his mind and he would always be surprised to see routine mundane things being done on warships.

In fact, this ship, the Freedom Maker, had a huge janitorial and maintenance staff, about one hundred people, and temporarily, that number was actually almost doubled.

The Freedom Maker, the new flagship of the ASN after the God Hammer had been destroyed, was a Gravel Class Super Dreadnaught. The ASN had only ever fielded two classes of Super Dreadnaught, the old Gravel Class, and the much, much older Bedrock Class. The Bedrock Class had been out of service for almost three hundred years, and the aging Gravel Class was on it's last leg. The ASN had only ever commissioned ten of them, and before the war had started, only five had remained, now that number was down to three. Unfortunately, the upkeep on ships this large was just unfeasible during anything less than all out war, and during the long stretch of mostly uninterrupted peace that had been the last century or two, the Gravel Classes had just become a drain on the Navy's Treasury. Two of the Gravel Classes were destroyed in battle, but the other three were just decommissioned. One was striped of it's weapons and armor and converted into a civilian cruise ship, one was stationed at Alliance Prime as a honor guard of sorts, another became a museum, and the remaining two were converted into Mobile command outposts. Their overall combat potential was reduced and instead they received larger living quarters and more command, sensor, and communications equipment. They were sent out to the farthest reaches of Allied State's territory to act as temporary command outposts, where they would fill that role until a more permanent station could be built.

When the TSAB had attacked, and it became apparent that the ASN would need every available ship in service to even have a chance, the remaining Bedrock Classes were called back into service, to much disappointment. The one that had become a luxury liner had almost zero potential as a war ship. They wouldn't have even been able to just strap random weapons on it because it's power generators had been replaced with less powerful, but cheaper ones. Getting that one combat ready was nearly impossible, instead it was used as parts for the other four.

Fleet Admiral Weurkin, along with Secretary of Industry Doran spearheaded the process to rebuild the ships, and met with initial success. The first ship upgraded was the Land of the Free, the former honor Guard of Alliance Prime, she served in the first major fleet battle of the war, which ended poorly, and she was lost there. The Second and the third were finished almost simultaneously, the Freedom Maker, which was one of the two mobile outposts was rebuilt, she kept her enhanced sensory and command capacity, and was built as a slow moving long range command ship, and after the Battle at Teleron, she was officially predesignated as the Fleet's Flagship.

At the same time as the Freedom Maker was being rebuilt into the Flagship, the museum ship, the Life for Freedom, was rebuilt as a short range heavy attack ship. Because the museum ship kept all of its old equipment, she had to be upgraded the most, but with the spare parts from the luxury liner, they were able to make it all work out.

And Unfortunately for the final outpost ship, the Fight For Freedom, the only shipyards that remained able to work on Super Dreadnaught class ships, was attacked by the TSAB, and the ship was lost while still being upgraded.

Now the Freedom Maker, along with its new escort ship, the Life for Freedom, and their escort fleet, were heading towards Vol IV to join up with the fleet there. It was the biggest build up of naval forces that the ASN had every seen, over five thousand ships, of which about three thousand were actual war ships, and about one thousand were battle-cruisers or larger. The rest were civilian ships, seized and commandeered for the war effort, what ever weapon systems were on hand were haphazardly strapped on and the ships were pressed into service. Sure, it wasn't the most impressive looking fleet ever assembled, nor was it as powerful as a truly dedicated war fleet, but it was still the largest armada ever assembled within the ASN.

And, the Fleet was only half the picture, the other half was the Battle Station. Built around a Massive Linear Cannon that could crack planets in half, the Battle Station was one of the most impressive, and heavily fortified structures in existence, second only to the TSAB's own Naval Headquarters. While the Linear Cannon would have little worth in a fleet battle, despite their best efforts at the contrary, the Station that housed the mighty cannon was still almost the size of a moon, and was bristling with hundred, even thousands of super heavy weapons, tens of thousands of point defense and lesser weapons. The Armor was thirty meters thick at the strongest points, and went down to around twenty at the weak points, it had enough shield generator arrays to cover its entire surface, and it's multiple barrier generators were capable of making walls that can, and did in the past, protect it from asteroid strikes. And since the Cannon itself wouldn't be used, the parts that made up the cannon, or it's ventilation system, didn't need to be maintained, instead, they were covered with automated missile platforms.

There was also the Station's collection of sub stations, all the size of small outpost stations that had their own entourage of defensive satellites. There were twenty in all, all placed equal distance from each other in a spherical formation around the station to protect it from quick attacks or suicide runs from enemy ships.

Yes, it was impressive, and if you compared pure combat potential in an level playing field, it came out ahead of the TSAB's Naval Headquarters, in fact, the TSAB's main advantage was the small dimensional that their Headquarters occupied, which limited where an enemy could attack from and greatly reducing maneuverability. Without that advantage, the Battle Station was actually stronger.

Yet Craig was convinced it wouldn't matter. He had complete faith in the TSAB admiral's words when she had said that she was confident that she could beat them, but not without damaging the station. Implying that she still thought they COULD do it, but the odds were low enough to try alternatives, and it also implied that if those alternatives fail, they might still try to capture it instead of outright destroying it.

If the Station were to fall, and if the fleet were to be destroyed, that would be the end of the ASN. They were putting absolutely everything they had into this final last stand. If it went poorly, there would just be no naval assets left to even attempt token resistance, or to even attempt to evacuate the remaining planets. Although, if the Station were to be attacked, that would mean that the TSAB had already reached the border of the Allied States, so at that point they would already be on top of the remaining planets and systems, and evacuation would be impossible.

And now that Craig thought about it, the military must be wracking their heads with another issue; the plan to use Vol IV as a last stand point was a two part plan. The second part, was a huge build up of Marine forces on Solesta I. Solesta I was one of two livable and inhabited planets in the Solesta System. The entire system was ravaged by the Belkan Hegemony before the war had ended; Solesta I and Solesta III were the only two planets that emerged usable. Solesta III was doted with hundreds of small islands, that were, and still are, useless. The slightly acidic waters, caustic atmosphere, and extreme cold made any form of plant life beyond basic molds too scarce to support any animal life. The islands had almost always been uninhabited, however, the oceans were calm, and shallow, so huge underwater cities were developed under the water's surface. And life actually flourished there. Unfortunately, the dome cities were fragile, and couldn't stand up against and kind of dedicated attack, which often resulted in the dome being breached and the entire city being flooded. The war lead to almost every single person being forced to flee, or being killed. Since then, the cities had been rebuilt and new inhabitants had moved in. They had hoped that the TSAB would ignore the dome cites, since they were impossible to defend and since they had no military forces stationed in them. Which was why they had relocated most of the refugees into those cities, and now knowing that the TSAB would almost certainly bomb them, in hindsight that was a rather large mistake.

As for Solesta I, that planet had one single main continent that was all large mountains and volcanoes. Solesta I, perhaps due to it's extreme geological situation, had a ton of rare minerals hidden within it's surface, and mining the mountains, despite the hardships, was an extremely profitable venture. And as a side note, the mountain top cities were also defensive gold mines. The topography would make attacking and moving an army a major headache, even to the TSAB, and the cities were all super fortified.

The second part of the plan had involved moving all of their remaining Marine forces, and any soldiers the could conscript from the population, onto Solesta I and to build a ground based last stand point, just like at Vol IV.

That plan got shot straight to hell when they found out that they had moved over one hundred million soldiers, along with almost all of the Strikers and Ace forces, and anything else that could be used in a ground battle, into one giant bull's eye, all so that the TSAB could bombard them from orbit.

The worst part about that, was that there was really no solution. Ground forces need to stay on the ground, and anywhere on the ground would translate into instant death for them. What would they do with them, release all of the tanks in space? Not only was that concept ridiculous, but also impractical. Ground based weapons are designed to be used within an atmosphere, and wont work quite as well in space, and since they are designed to be used on a planet, without destroying the planet, they are nowhere near as powerful as naval grade weapons. There was a reason why attacking a planet with a ship was a major war crime, and a reason why shooting the same planet with a tank was not worth even mentioning.

"Sir... Sir are listening?"

Craig was brought out of his musings by one of the maintenance guys standing in front of his desk trying to grab his attention. Apparently he had been lost in thought for a while, again. This was not a good habit to get into.

"Sir, we have finished the cleaning and replaced the wall panel that was stained."

Now that he was paying attention, Craig noticed that they had finished up. The old wall panel was leaning up against the doorway next to the other man, the new wall panel was slightly cleaner than the adjacent ones, and when Craig actively looked for it, he could see the seams that divided them.

"Good, thank you. Did you get the ceramic shards too?"

"Yes sir, we got vacuumed the area twice, a scan result shows nothing but synthetic fibers, so it should be fine. You should be more careful not to trip, you might have hurt yourself."

"Yeah... I'll do that. Next time I'll make sure I keep the light on so that I don't trip over that plant."

"We also replaced to soil that was lost from the pot, the plant itself was undamaged."

"OK good, well if that's everything, I assume you guys have a lot to do, so I wont hold you up any longer."

"Thank you sir, we will be going then."

The two men packed up their tools and cleaning supplies, loaded them up on a cart that they had brought in, and then also loaded up the old stained section of wall. They were halfway through the door when the one turned back again.

"Sir, I forgot that I also noticed that your chair's arm rest was damaged, would you like u to pick you up another one? We can bring it around later."

"Oh, I hadn't even noticed, it must have been like that for a while then. Yeah, sure, if you could bring me a new one whenever you get a chance."

"No problem Sir."

And with that, the two men pushed the cart out into the hallway, turned and gave a small wave, and then shut the door and were gone. Craig idly rubbed his bruised elbow as he watched them go, glad that he had put his jacket back on and had hid the splotch of injured skin, that being visible would have raised some doubt in regards to his explanation.

Craig was still watching the door absentmindedly while gently trying to sooth the pain in his arm when the door bell rang. A small standard beeping sound that was similar to his terminal's chime, but different enough that you would never confuse them.

"Come on in."

Craig figured it was the maintenance guys back because they forgot something, although Craig couldn't tell what they could be. Instead the door open and Senator Evina Holyhand stepped in.

"Senator, to what do I owe the pleasure of your visit?"

Craig hadn't been expecting her, not at all, but he wouldn't let her see him caught of guard. But while he was determined to appear normal and on top of things, the Senator seemed uncharacteristically sullen.

"And now you're back to using the correct titles?"

"I am sure I don't know what your talking about."

For a moment she looked around surveying his office while still standing in the open door, she seemed unsure as to what to do next.

"I saw a maintenance crew leaving here, what happened?"

The change of direction was unusual and Craig found it hard not to let his own confusion at the situation show through, hard, but not impossible.

"Oh, I was getting myself something to drink and left the lights off. I tripped and spilled coffee on the wall. They needed to take the panel out."

"It must have been quite the spill for them to need to remove the panel."

"I uh, tried to clean it up myself, and just made things worse."

"Oh..."

Craig could tell that she doubted the story somewhat, but she didn't seem to care much. Instead she continued to stand there, indecision showing on her face.

"Well... would you like to come in and sit down?"

"...I, uh... I don't... yes... yes I guess I will."

Craig motioned to the chair in front of his desk with his hand, and after a small hesitation, she pulled it out and sat down.

She crossed her arms and legs, and then leaned back, not far enough that the chair rocked backwards, but enough that she was putting as much distance between the two of them as possible.

"So then, to what do I owe the pleasure of this visit? Would it have anything to do with the meeting from earlier? Or perhaps the late Secretary of Industry?"

"No"

One word, that was all he got from her, and then a really awkward silence. Craig studied the Senator across from him. She wouldn't look at him, she was curled up into a defensive posture, she was keeping away from him, all of it made him think that she wanted out of his presence as soon as possible, but she was the one that had came here in the first place, and she was the one that was stalling.

The silence was interrupted not by words, but by the Senator beginning to tap out a song on the arm rest. It was a simple rhythm that Craig didn't recognize, but she kept repeating it over and over again. Finally, he gave up and decided to break the deadlock.

"Well, would you like something to drink? I have tea, coffee, water..."

"Yes... Thank you."

"Um...which one do you want?"

"Alcohol. What kind do you have?"

"Majority of the ones that exist. Do you still drink those tequila sunrises?"

Craig had already gotten up and made his way over to his little bar that he had set up in his office. When he mentioned the tequila sunrise he had looked over his shoulder just in time to see the Senator give a small smile.

"I haven't had one of those in ages."

"One tequila sunrise coming right up. It wont be perfect though, citrus fruits are hard to come by, especially oranges, so I only have some tangerine juice, but it should work."

"Hmm"

Craig went about making the drink, using a bit more flair than what was really necessary, pouring the juice into the cup from a foot above and such. He did this both to calm his nerves, and too buy himself some time to observe the Senator.

Before the war, they had had almost no contact, him being a subordinate of the Secretary of Defense, and she being, well, a Senator. Their fields rarely if ever came into contact. The situation remained the same even after the war had started, it was until he got promoted due to the death of the former Secretary that they started coming in contact with each other, and then it was really only at meetings. None of the work she did went his way, and none of his reports were sent to her, or any of the other Senator's offices for that matter. And as for those meetings, they were at best cordial to each other, and at worst openly hostile.

Although, now that he thought about it, that wasn't exactly true, she had delivered that nice set up before, and he had alerted her about the lip biting thing, although that was more of an effort to poke fun at her than anything else. In fact, now that he thought about it, they weren't really hostile to each other, instead they more or less acted like bickering children, a thought that he found both funny, and kind of concerning.

"Here's your drink, I hope it's up to your standards."

He flashed one of his more dazzling smiles and went to hand her the drink, but she had already reverted to the more reserved and defensive personality she had shown. He held the drink out for a moment while she refused to look at him, and then gave up and put it on the side of the desk within her reach before making his way back around the desk and into his chair.

When he got comfortable in the chair and looked back across the dark plastic desk, he found that while she had stayed back in her own chair, she had at some point reached out and grabbed the drink. She was currently slowly stirring it while watching the colors separate into distinct bands of yellow, orange, and red.

This whole encounter was way out of character, and Craig was at a loss. He had no idea how to respond to her and it was putting him more on edge than he needed to be. He considered prompting her again for some kind of response, but instead opted to let her begin the conversation. He picked up his update report and continued reading from where he had left off.

Or he attempted too, in truth, he was way to distracted for that. Instead of actually reading it, he just stared at it for a few seconds, not absorbing a singled word. Well, at the very least he could act like he was doing something, so if all he could do was stare at a pad absentmindedly, then he would do so intently.

After starring at it blankly for a few seconds, he noticed a clinking sound from across the desk, his curiosity got the better of him and he peeked around the data pad to see what had made the sound.

He felt stupid for a moment, because there was really only one possible cause for the sound, the Senator putting the drink on the table, and the fact that he needed to confirm that was a slight embarrassment. But he did it anyway, and looked around just in time to see her retreating back into the chair, the empty glass resting on the side of his desk.

He was both surprised and a little impressed, he had probably put slightly less alcohol in the drink that what was customary, but he had still made a larger than usual drink for her, it was probably around 600 milliliters, and she had finished if off in about a minute.

"Would you like another?"

"No.."

"OK"

"Yes."

"So... you do want one?"

"Yes, please."

"Coming right up. Again."

Craig put his data pad down and got back up to make a second drink. This time, instead of waiting for her to start talking, Craig decided to start things.

"Did you hear anything new about the Secretary of Industry?"

"No."

"Are they still waiting on the medial report?"

"Yes, they said it should be done at around 400 hours."

"I was concerned it might have been a TSAB assassin. Since they were able to send a Holo-transmission directly to the ship, they have to know where we are."

"Mmm..."

Well this topic was going nowhere quickly. Time to change lanes.

"I was talking ti the Vice-Prez, she said you guys want to refuse the surrender terms."

"That is what we decided."

"But?"

"I am not so sure anymore."

"Why's that?"

"I've always believed that if a minority had to be sacrificed to save the majority, then it was worth it. That's why we do Cost Benefit Analysis all the time. If we were just sacrificing a small group to save a larger group I would be behind it, instead..."

"Instead you would be sacrificing almost the entire majority to save a super tiny minority, right?"

"Yes... But, that might still be best. I don't know."

Craig was pleased that she had finally started to talk. He finished with her drink, and poured himself a quick glass of wine before making his way back to the desk. He handed her her second drink, and this time she reached out and took it, before sitting back into his chair.

"Red win, I thought you liked white?"

"I do, white is my favorite, but I already ran out of it."

"Oh... do you still get that drink, what was it called again?"

"I have no idea."

"A Bay Breeze right?"

"No, I don't drink those, never have."

"I thought you did, weren't they your favorite?"

"No, I am pretty sure I have never even heard of that drink."

Senator Evina Holyhand had this ability to keep a perfectly strait face during almost any circumstance. She rarely used it, but when she did she was impossible to see through. This was one of those times, Craig couldn't tell whether she legitimately was not sure what he drank, or if she was making fun of him. He suspected it was the latter.

To his great shame, his favorite drink had been the Bay Breeze at one point, and although he hadn't had one in years, is suspected that it probably was still his favorite. Craig had first tried it at a post exam party one night. One of the girls he had been after had been drinking it, and when he had "Lost" his own cup, he had moved over to hers, and found that what ever he had been drinking was really, really good. He had practically left the girl standing while he went over to the bartender to figure out what he was drinking. Craig wasn't sure exactly how many of those he went through that night, but he knew that it was a lot. And from that point on, for the next couple of months he nearly doubled his alcohol intake almost entirely on Bay Breezes, right until some one told him that they were notoriously Chick Drinks. To everyone's great amusement, Craig had become the guy who couldn't handle Real Liquor, and his friends had made fun of him until basically the day they had graduated.

"Well after I finish this, I would like a Bay Breeze."

"Why don't you finish what you have before you start ordering a second... never mind, I'll get you a Bay Breeze."

As Craig had started talking, she had grabbed her drink and downed it in one go, then tapped the empty cup on the side of the desk before handing it back to him. Craig caught a small smirk peeking through as she did.

"Well, since your having one, I might as well try it. I don't really like girly drinks like this though."

"I though you had never heard of them before."

Craig moved back over to the bar, leaving his wine untouched on the desk, and not giving her the satisfaction of an answer to that. After a moment back at the bar, Craig came back with two Bay Breezes.

"Now that you've made me make a drink that I hate, twice might I add, why don't you tell me why we decided to drop by, not that I don't enjoy your company or anything, but well, you know..."

All at once, the semi-playful expression on her face disappeared and was replaced with the original sullen one from earlier, but at least she didn't retreat back into the chair.

"My parents are on Divina Prime. There weren't enough transports to evacuate everyone, in fact there were almost no transports at all."

"Ah. So..."

"So, they want me two have a military ship pick them up."

"OK."

"I asked chief Gold and she said she could get a small scouting ship to pick them up then."

"OK, well I don't really see a problem then."

"Were am I going to take them to then? The Panther System is the closest, but once the TSAB hit Divina and the research station, that system will be cut off from the rest. And as we just found out, no planet is safe at all."

"There really isn't much that anyone can do at this point, we no longer even share a border with the Irlians, it would require going through TSAB controlled space to try to make it there. And the Belkans..."

"Chief Gold said that she could send the scout, but that it wouldn't be able to rejoin with the other ships then. I would be temporarily saving my parents, for what, maybe a week? And to do so I would be weakening the overall defensive effort."

Craig wasn't really sure what to say in this situation, or what she wanted to hear, but remaining silent didn't seem like a good idea either.

"My parent's, well my father and step-mother, were part of the observers on day one. When the TSAB emerged and attacked, they were killed. They were some of the first people to be killed in the war."

"Chief Gold said that there is only a small window of opportunity to safely divert the scout and pick them up. I couldn't decided what to do then so she said she would hold off as long as possible..."

"When does the window close?"

"What time is it now?"

"About one-forty five."

"It closed five minutes ago."

"Oh..."

Craig had no idea what to say or do now. The Senator was a rolling ball of emotions that Craig couldn't even begin to decipher, and even if he could, he wouldn't know how to handle it. She was clearly torn about her decision, but Craig wasn't sure what to say to make her feel better about, or even if she would want him too, or for that mater, if that was even a good idea.

"I'll get you another drink."

For the fourth time, Craig got up and went back to the bar. This time he didn't bother being dramatic and instead just quickly made her another Sunrise before putting it down on the side of the desk.

"Here, I made it a little stronger."

"Thanks, I don't know why I am bothering you with this, but for what it's worth, Thank you Craig."

"It's no problem at all, I believe we are still friends right?"

"I'm not sure. Legally or otherwise. "

"Well... you know, I-"

"I should go. I have a lot to do. And it's late, I should probably get some sleep before the TSAB Admiral calls back to get an answer. And from the looks of things, you still have this stack of papers to go through."

She downed her drink in one go again, and then got up to leave. She was just slightly wobbly due to the excessive amount of alcohol that she had drank in a short time, but Craig new from experience that she could hold her liquor, even better than him sometimes.

"I hate paper."

"Hah, you still haven't gotten over that? You need to grow up, it's just paper."

"Its rough and uncomfortable to hold, and it gives you paper cuts. I can't stand holding any kind of paper unless it is treated. That's why we use data pads."

"Then some one must dislike you to have sent that stack of papers."

"Yeah, well, I uh, good luck Evina."

"Thanks Craig."

She had barely even finish speaking when the door shut, leaving Craig alone in his office with his thoughts. He hadn't mentioned it, because he knew that she had to have been aware, but once she had stood up to leave, Craig had seen small tears running down her face.

He still had some work to do, but he knew he wouldn't be able to focus. His thoughts of family from much earlier during the meeting were back, and he wasn't happy about it.

The update and stack of paper would come later, now he had personal things to work out.