Happy Birthday...oh no, not to me, to Agent Pointless! Go put a review on his Lord of Fire UYA story along with a note wishing his life lets him have free time so that he can work on it again. Oh and Happy Birthday as well, ha ha. Alright well, just to let you know, this chapter it shorter, quite a bit shorter then my more recent ones. That's because I wanted to focus on Sasha's story for a moment, to show how she ended up where she was at the end of the last chapter. By the way, I found that gremlin and beat the stuffing out of him, that will teach him. Then I remembered that I had changed the story anyway, and apologized. Anyway, again, sorry it's short, but here ya go:
Chapter 26: Sasha

/-/ Approximately 2 ½ months ago /-/ Marcadia Orbit /-/

Sasha reached down and opened a spreading frequency channel "This is Lt. Commander Sasha on the space station Marc1. Invading force, you are in violation of Marcadia Space, please identify and then remove yourself from this area."

There was nothing but static for a moment and Sasha couldn't help a glance behind her shoulder at her daughter. Stella was holding onto her wrench and was staring through the view port at the ships beyond.

Sasha turned her gaze back to the console as there was a click in the static vanished. "Commander Sasha, how pleasant, I thought you and your husband might be here today. Believe me, you won't get away so easily this time."

Sasha blinked and her eyes widened with a small gasp as her brain rewound almost twenty three years in the blink of an eye. Flashing back to that scouting trip: Earth, Slade, False Accusations, and... Sasha felt her face curl into a frown and a growl sneak out of her throat. "Zen." her voice growling around his name.

Zen's voice echoed back out of the speakers with a cold chuckle "Ah, you remember me, its been so long, I was afraid I was forgotten. On that note, you know now that I owe you a few things, and I plan on delivering in kind. Please do not fight back, you'll just draw this out."

Sasha felt her eyes widen again and she quickly cut into the combat channel "All units, the force is hostile! I repeat the force is hostile, all ships open fire! Weapons free! Repeat: Weapons free!"

Sasha and Stella watched as the three cruisers that had moved in front of the station locked their guns onto different ships, confident in their power. Each cruisers cannon glowed with its pent up energy and let it fly onto Zen's fleet. Sasha watched as all the beams impacted on their target ships and spread their lethal energy across shields that didn't even blink against the onslaught. The cruisers kept the fire up for a full minute before the cores had to be reset, and never once did any of the enemies shields falter in their defense.

Sasha and Stella were stunned. Sasha dimly heard Zen's voice, his dry chuckle before he spoke "Cute...My turn."

Sasha snapped back into action at Zen's ominous words, she slapped her hand down on the PA override for the station and yelled into the microphone. "Everybody left on this station! Brace for impact!, I repeat: Brace fo-"

Sasha never got to finish her shouted command as Zen's ships opened fire, hundreds of angry blue beams buzzed across the short space in between them and the cruisers guarding the station. The beams slammed into the defensive net of cruisers and quickly ate through their shields before spearing the ships themselves with their deadly light.

As the cruisers each exploded the rest of the beams splashed against the shields of the station, which were quite a bit stronger than the cruisers, yet still ended up falling to the massive barrage. The impact bodily threw Sasha away from her console and slammed her roughly against the far wall. Stella was also thrown, but landed on the floor not to far away. Sasha cried out as her shoulder met with the wall and she felt a popping sensation and pain spread down her arm.

Sasha sat up and hissing against the pain, pushed on her shoulder against the wall until it popped back into place. As Sasha blinked her eyes clear of the tears she was aware of the red lights that flashed throughout the room, warning of the hull integrity leaks and breached sections through out the station. Sasha ignored the numerous damage reports for a moment as she stood up and looked around the room for Stella.

Stella was just picking herself up from the corner she had been thrown and was moving towards her wrench. She picked up the wrench and turned to face her mother. "I need to get to Tran." she said before Sasha could speak up.

Sasha who had been about to tell her to do that anyway nodded. "I understand, I'm beaming to the Phoenix when it gets here. Let me know when you got him, I'll beam you guys up."

Stella nodded to her mother as she called up a line to her squad. Sasha turned back to overlook the battle, she heard Stella talking to her team-mates as she left, but Sasha had bigger things to worry about. Like the energy gathering on the ends of the cannons currently pointed at the station. She stopped worrying as much when the Phoenix dropped into the edge of the battle zone with a flash, along with several other ships on the other side.

With the battle on much more even terms, Sasha pulled her communicator out of her belt. "CR-3! Lock onto my signal and beam me up to the bridge! Start charging the Waver while your at it!"

Sasha felt her body tingle ten seconds later as another barrage of lasers leapt across the short expanse, most of them targeting the command room she was standing in. Her vision turned orange and she closed her eyes as her body was deconstructed and whisked over to the Phoenix.

Sasha opened her eyes and stepped out of the flashing orange light that announced her arrival on the bridge of her ship, she instantly took command from CR-3. She stepped out onto the overlook as she spoke up, her voice automatically echoing through out the ship "All Personal, we are in Battle Mode: Waver. Deploy our fighter net to protect us while we charge, and divert all rear shield power to the front shields." She glanced over at CR-3 as she stepped back "Also, we need to work on the warp, ten seconds is too long for a lock."

CR-3 nodded "Yes Ma'am. Ma'am, if I may, I would like to go out and support Commander Rat-"

Sasha raised a hand, cutting off CR-3 and nodded "Say no more CR-3, take your squad and go, I bet Ratchet's going to need all the help he can get."

CR-3 saluted and ran off the bridge, three Galactic Rangers that were waiting besides the door following him out and heading for the hanger. Sasha turned back to the bride and called up the display of the waver cannon and its charging process. She paid vague attention to the battle channel as she muttered to herself. "Glad we upgrade the charging system."

She heard Ratchet and Sky talking about keeping the enemies attention on them, as the Waver's red screen changed to green. She tapped the approve command onto the display then spoke up. "Speaking of guys, if you would pull away from that ship, I'm ready to fire."

Sasha felt the bridge shake slightly as the Waver's massive barrel unfolded from underneath the bridges armor plating. Already sparkling with eager green lightning across most of it. Sasha nodded to herself and spoke up. "Fire the Waver! Target the lead ship in Zen's fleet!"

She watched as the green beam jumped out from below the bridge and slammed right into Zen's lead ship. She felt shock pass through her system as she realized that the shield on the ship was actually holding out against the waver. It shouldn't have been possible, the amount of power the Waver had at its disposal should have ripped right through that ship, not spread over its shield.

Just as Sasha began to doubt their chances of victory, the shield collapsed underneath the flow of energy and the Waver blasted right though the side of the enemy ship, and out the other side, leaving the lead ship crippled and sinking into Marcadia's gravity well. As she worried about what would happen when the massive ship would impact she saw it suddenly explode and could have sworn she saw another ship make a bombing run along side it.

Shaking that thought from her head she tapped a button on the Waver's controls as she spoke up "That's one down, recharging the Waver."

She looked away form her controls to see Zen's fleet had re-targeted and were focusing fire on her and the Phoenix. She felt her eyes widen as the beams leapt across space and slammed into the ship. She was flung against the guard rail on the overlook and had the breath knocked out of her.

She heard Ratchet shout her name and she spoke up, getting her breath back as she took in the damage reports. "I, I'm okay Ratchet, our shields held...barely." Sasha pressed a button that activated a massive teleport system through out the ship, transporting people to near by escape pods. "I'm evacuating the crew. We can't take another hit like that." She frowned as she saw that the teleport system had failed for her section of the ship. She gulped and started playing with the teleport system, trying to reconfigure it, she glanced out at Zen's fleet which was charging for another shot, and spoke up. "Ratchet, there's no time, look, I love you and if anything-"

Ratchet cut her off vehemently. "Sasha, don't talk like that, you'll get out and-"

Sasha finished with her changes and noticed dismally that the system was flashing that the system could not lock onto a safe location to warp. Sasha slapped her fist again the activate button anyway and spoke up as the crew around her was whisked away, her vision turned orange as she spoke up. "Ratchet, take care of our children." she closed her eyes as the beams impacted on the bridge of the Phoenix. Sasha wasn't complete warped away so felt the intense heat of the light which made her landing that more unpleasant.

She tumbled out of the lights and laid on the floor gasping for breath with her eyes closed. Her ears refused to work properly, but she could make out various computer sounds that could be associated with flying a cruiser. After a moment she forced her eyes open and pushed herself off the floor with weak arms. She only made it to her knees before her vision cleared and she looked around realizing where she was at.

Terrans. She was surrounded by Terrans...that meant. She gulped hard and leaned back on her legs, lifting her body up and raising her arms slowly. The universal sign for surrender. She saw what looked like that captain of the ship glance at one of his subordinate's and nod. The man gulped and took the black and brown rifle that was slung over his back and pointed it at her, moving slowly closer, as if she might attack.

Sasha opened her mouth to tell them that she was unarmed when the solider approaching her shifted his grip on his gun and slammed the heavy butt against the side of her head, right below her ear, splitting the skin and causing blackness to eat at her vision. Sasha blinked and cried out in pain as she grabbed the injured area. Before she could recover though, another hit from the butt of the gun drove her face down into the deck. She turned her head to the side as her thoughts deserted her, while blackness made up the most of her vision. She could still make out the captain who nodded at his subordinate again before Sasha felt another blow strike the back of her head, slamming her skull sharply against the deck plates again and allowing the darkness to finish eating her vision and pull her into unconsciousness.

The next time she was aware of conscious thought, she was dimly aware of the feeling of bands that were tied around her wrists, waist, and legs. She shuffled her hands a bit and felt a tug on the other two, revealing that they were all chained together. She moaned softly against the lingering headache and cracked her eyes open a slit. As she stared out into her tiny surroundings she realized that she was being transported somewhere, she could feel the vibrating hum of a large engine against her back and there were two Terrans who must have been her guards sitting across from her.

She noticed that they were dressed in full out dark green combat armor, complete with helmets and had masks strapped over their faces, with tubes running over their shoulders to tanks each one wore. One of them nodded and pressed a button on the wall. Sasha wondered for a moment what was going to happen, before she realized that it already was. The sickly sweet smell...She held her breath hoping that she wasn't about to gassed to death, but before her lungs could even begin to demand air. One of the guards leaned forward and delivered a punishing hit to her stomach, causing her to gasp and take in a large breath of the air. As her brain once again tumbled into darkness, Sasha hoped she would wake up again.

She would awake, but not until a month later.

When she opened her eyes again, she immediately knew she had been out for a long time. She could hardly move her muscles, and it felt like she hadn't moved in quite a while. As she fully regained consciousness, she realized she was staring up at a ceiling, while strapped down to a table. She felt metal bars running across her wrists, ankles, and her upper chest, just below her breast, she could also feel bars running over her shoulders and underneath her armpits. She blinked and started focusing on breathing, trying to calm her racing heart. This wasn't helped when whatever she was laying one suddenly moved and rotated so that she was in a standing up position. She glanced down to see Zen sitting there with a smug grin on his face. The man looked different from last she had seen him. Older, obviously, while his face looked the same, with perhaps a few more lines than last time on it. His hair was a shocking white, if that was from age or a dye job she couldn't tell. He was dressed in a fine black suit and tie, on his shoulder was the mark of the president she had last seen on Slade. Overall, he had lost the cowardly look he had last time she was face to face with him, and instead stared at her with a leery grin of victory.

It was at this point that she realized she was naked.

"Hurv" she whispered, her voice lost from not using it for so long.

Zen laughed at her glare and stood up. "I'm sorry my dear, you'll have to speak up." he chuckled again as he moved closer, Sasha staring daggers at him.

"Perv." She said again her voice stronger. Zen laughed again, and Sasha came to the conclusion that he was trying to unnerve her. Deciding to stick a pin in his ego she waited while he circled the table. When she was sure he was behind her she took a quick look around, aside from the white lights in the ceiling, she was in a dark room, she couldn't tell what the walls were made of, but it almost looked like stone. The floor was cold gray metal and all that was in front of her was that chair that Zen had sat in earlier.

Speaking of, Zen walked around the side of the table and Sasha watched with narrowed eyes as he leered at her some more. She waited till he was standing in front of her, before she stopped glaring at him and smiled. "Is the only way you can look at a woman naked is by strapping them to a table?" She paused as he lost him smile. "Or did you do that to me, because nobody of your species will even so much as entertain the thought?" he frowned and glanced at the ground, making a tsking noise with his mouth and shaking his head.

"Here I was thinking we could do this the easy way." He sighed and shrugged "Well, this is more fun anyway."

Before she could ask, Zen delivered a crushing hammer fist into the side of face, causing her head to snap sharply to the side and blood to fly out of her mouth. For a seemingly weak man, the guy could punch. Zen looked at his bruised knuckles and noted the Sasha's blood on them before turning his attention back to her. Sasha meanwhile blinked away the pain and turned back to Zen to see him smiling at her again.

"Well, have we learned our lesson?"

Sasha smiled through her cut lip, "Nope, and somebody needs to teach you how to properly follow through with a punch. I've fought tougher school kids in my galaxy. Aim higher next time"

Zen huffed out and this time struck her in her left arm. Sasha felt something crack, but ignored the pain. "Ha, that's all you got, bring somebody with some real muscle in here."

Zen went to hit her again, then stopped. He blinked and nodded "Very good. You almost had me there, but you over played your hand just a bit." He stepped back and settled himself back in his chair. "I should have realized the first comment was a shame from the start, you're just trying to get me distracted."

Sasha shrugged using only her head, before raising an eyearch at him. "Well, it was worth a shot."

Zen raised an eyebrow in return. "Indeed." he said dryly. "Now, about my questions."

Sasha counted "About my freedom."

Zen shook his head "My dear, freedom is the last thing you need to worry about. Now, care to explain what that large cannon that you used on my fleet was. It seemed to be the only thing that was effective against us."

Sasha said nothing just laughed. "Oh man, your screwed then, every single on of our cruisers has one of those guns."

Zen shook his head slowly. "Lies and bluffs will get you nowhere" he said as he made a gesture with his hand. Two guards that had so far been standing out of Sasha's sight stepped forward. One of them was holding pliers and the other was holding some sort of metal contraption. "Now before these two get to work, let me fill you in on a few things. As of yesterday, we have managed to sweep aside the defenses on six of your planets. We have also pushed back many of your puny retaliation attempts If they really did have theses weapons, they would have used them by now."

Sasha glanced at the two men as they received some signal and reached for her mouth. Before they grabbed her, she got one last thing out. "Then Ratchet hasn't attacked yet."

Zen held up a hand and the two men stopped. "Explain."

Sasha smiled "I've seen Ratchet decimate an entire fleet before by himself, then take apart ground armies to relax. Since you appear to be winning, I can guarantee you that he hasn't started his own counter attack yet, and when he does...Well, I'm willing to bet that you'll start losing control over your planets."

Zen nodded thoughtfully "I suspect that would be true, if he was alive." He grinned at Sasha "We haven't seen any sign of Ratchet since the attack a month and a half ago, its widely presumed he's dead." Zen sighed dramatically, shaking his head while looking at the ground "Trying to save you of all things apparently. It was really foolish of him to rush onto your ship right before it exploded. He must have had no idea that you had gotten off." He glanced back up at her "Speaking of, how did you managed to find yourself on the bridge of my ship? My men reported an orange flash or light and heat then you were there."

Sasha shook her head, her mouth automatically feeding Zen some false information while inside she thought hard. Ratchet couldn't be dead, he can't, who would save the galaxy otherwise? She then thought of Sky and Stella, who no doubt would be crushed to find both of their parents dead. This only hardened her resolve to survive, and as an added bonus, she now knew how long she had been Zen's captive.

Zen nodded and the two men continued their reaching, one grabbed her mouth and shoved the metal contraption in and cranking some bolts. Sasha found herself having mouth force open to its widest point. The other man with pliers reached into her mouth and grabbed one of her rear teeth, and began pulling. It only took a moment in which tears ran down her cheeks and she whimpered, but never screamed, before the tooth was pulled fully out and dropped on the floor.

Zen shook his head "You are tough, I'll give you that. All that pain you must be feeling, and you only moaned, bravo." He paused "Again."

Sasha attempted to speak "wasa"

Zen raised an eyebrow and nodded, the contraption was moved from her mouth and Sasha worked in open and closed a few times, feeling for her empty tooth with her tongue.

Zen grew slightly impatient "Well?"

Sasha grinned at him "Just wanted to let you know that I've been torture before, and they were way better at their job than these two goons. So try harder, and make sure you really mean it. Otherwise you might as well just let me go."

Zen closed his eyes. "Very well, begin waxing her, I'll be back in a few hours to see if shes lost some of her resistance." He stood up and the walked by the men. Sasha let one last thing fly at him "You can't even stomach watching your goons torture me? You'll never make it as a leader Zen!" The door closed and she turned her attention back to the two goons in the cell with her. "Well, Boys, who first?"

This is how it went for months, at least, by Sasha's measurement, she wasn't allowed much sleep and never knew the time. All she knew, was that with each session, her will got just a littler weaker and her fear for her unborn child, got just a little stronger. At least until that day, when Zen proved he knew.

Sasha hung limply in her bonds, naked, cold, and furless, all of her will was gone. She felt it must be obvious now, her belly, had to have been sticking out a bit. She glanced up at Zen who was sitting across from her. "Now Sasha, my answers please."

Sasha struggled limply "The Waver was a prototype, you won't find it on any other ship than the Phoenix as far as I'm aware."

Zen nodded at her willing "Very good, Now, about your weapon systems and robotics, they are quite advanced."

Sasha attempted a shrug "Can't tell you much, you would need to talk to a weapons expert for that."

Zen nodded "Fair enough, I thought that might be a little bit above your pay grade." Sasha let the comment slide, willing to put up with anything, as long as he didn't hurt her child. She glanced at Zen as he stood up "Well Sasha, I didn't lie earlier, as long as you keep up your usefulness, I'll let you live, I'll even let you rest. I'll be back in a few days, enjoy your break."

Sasha couldn't believe it, after all that, two questions and he was done? As she was left alone in the room, her mind began to crank out theories for what Zen was planning, none of them were good. She whispered one thing, before she let her mind fall into unconsciousness again. "Ratchet...if you're alive...hurry..."

Also, this is my first official chapter going through a Beta again! So expect an improvement in the grammar flow at least. Also, I'm sure I missed a lot of Grammar mistakes even with his help, so I'm sure I'll see more of that in the review, eh Geek?
Okay, so three notes for you all today:
I'm going to be opening a Fiction Press account, or rather start using the one I created a while ago, to start hosting some of my original stuff. So if you like my writings and ramblings, feel free to drop by and see me underneath the same pen name of Emile the Watcher.
Next is that I posted my Star Fox fic, and it instantly got torn apart in a review for poor grammar and all sorts of fun stuff. So, if you want, you can detour through my profile page and check out Star Fox: The ReArmed Conflict, but just know, that it's getting reworked, in fact I'm going back to that right now.
Lastly, since nobody seemed to care about the Loyal reader Edition, I'm just going to drop that, as it required a crap load of work on my end, and since nobody seemed excited for the loops I was jumping through to give it to you...well...yea. Also, I would hope I need not ask at this point, but seriously drop a review. I'm not sure how many of my readers also write, but I can only begin to describe that great feeling that always graces every review. As an added thing for me personally, anytime a chapter goes for a bit with out a review, it seriously crushes my moral and really make me wonder if my writing is any good which leads me to pretty much drop a story. so please leave a review, I enjoy getting them and reply to every. damn. one.
Anyway, that's all I got for you today, so, see ya next time.

Edit 11/23/2011: I'll be blunt here, no reviews, no update, simple as that, I can look at hit counts all I want, but if nobody leaves their thoughts, I don't feel the need to progress the story. Sorry, that's just the way I am.

Peace,

-Emile