Life on a Battlecruiser is akin to that of a small town, as Henry would find out following his 'graduation', though everyone had a defined job and clear duties, many worked on the side as tattoo artists, musicians, even barbers, though the Navy had some of them already, only not as talented.

Any unused space aboard, be it hangar bays or dormitories, were filled with off duty sailors looking to lose or earn some credits. Gambling was forbidden aboard military vessels since long before mankind took to the stars, but there were many other ways spend time.

And you could always find a friendly poker table...

Henry observed a game for a minute, but decided against it. He'd just received a month's wage, but felt no compulsion to just throw it away at the first chance. He only made his way through C-deck from the aft elevator, a whole section of the ship filled with off-duty marines and nurse, chatting, fighting drinking and yelling at one another.

There was nothing down there that attracted him, nothing worth his time, it seemed, so he just walked on, taking in the view of decay and decadence the Dominion Navy offered.

No… Not the Navy, many of the ruffians were marines, some Reapers… An armored corps tank driver snored lightly near a dozen piled up mason jars, right in Jackson's way.

He stepped over the sleeping man, his foot brushing against the precarious pyramid. His heart skipped a beat when the whole thing came crashing down and brutally shattered his train of thoughts. The sleeping man woke up yelling confusedly and grabbed Jackson's belt, apparently trying to pull him down and pull himself up.

Though he now wore Third Class Ensign pins, Henry's behavior had been hypnotically altered to make him a Marine. Without thought or pause, Jackson proceeded to beat the stupid out of his drunk companion, who soon sunk back into an alcohol and trauma induced coma.

"Fuck you!" Swore the young crewman, massaging his bloodied knuckles before resuming his walk.

Nobody took notice and if anyone did see him smack a superior officer's skull in, no one mentioned it to him. The corridor was rather narrow, but interrupted every ten paces by massive bulkheads and smaller hatches, all kept wide open and seeing more people through than a Dead Man's port whore. At least a hundred people had been within earshot of the one sided fight, half as many could easily have seen it from where they sat and two thirds of these were sober enough to realize the implications.

"Fekkin' disgraceful." Spat someone from a dark corner, tucked in between armament crates. The voice was familiar and Henry looked back, squinting to see who had talked.

A man, sharply dressed and exposing Death's Head division colors, stepped out in the harsh electric light. His bottom lip had been split open and now wore a thin scar on the right corner, mirrored by a pale line in his dark eyebrows, beyond that, Sergeant Jan Neeson looked just like the next guy.

"You're that kid from the dropship, huh? From Ulman's squad?"

Henry nodded, still trying to remember where he'd seen the sergeant before. His name, proudly displayed over a flock of battle ribbons, rang no bell whatsoever… Then, it clicked in the boy's mind, a little late, granted, but he had been in mildly traumatic state back then; that was the Reaper sergeant Ulman had spoken to in the dropship, the one who'd been so hostile.

He seemed oddly friendly as he encompassed the whole deck in a dismissive wave, "I did some back-check on you, when I saw you were in Ulman's team." His lips tightened and an eyebrow twitched, but there was no further display of emotion, "This isn't Bacchus, Jack, one word from me, and your career is done..."

There was more to come, but Henry didn't care for it that much, he grabbed Neeson's clean uniform collar and pushed him back in the corner, pinning the commando against the wall with a snarl. "You threatening me, you shit-stain? Think I'm that easy to scare? You're down here too, maybe I should re…"

Jackson smacked face first against the neo-steel wall, blood filling his mouth in a heartbeat, and he could feel something in his back crack when the Reaper punched him in the ribs twice.

He tried to kick himself off the wall and unto his attacker, but Neeson responded faster than Henry could register and threw the kid upside down against the opposite wall. At least the confused crewman reacted fast enough to not break his neck on the floor, though he did pop a shoulder in his fall.

Neeson pulled him back up without a single word, brushed dust off both his and Jackson's clothes and took a quick look at the damage he'd inflicted.

"This is what I'm talking about, Hero, you're out of your depths, just a fekkin' grunt dressed fancy, a trained monkey…" Henry kept quiet, eyes watering and cheeks burning in shame, not only over his crushing defeat, but also because, deep inside, he knew the sergeant to be right. His eyes never left the tip of his boots. "Listen to me, I sound like the bad guy from some teenage angst show…"

Expert hands settled on Henry's shoulder and, with a blinding flash of pain, Neeson popped it back in place. The kid yelped and just barely repressed the urge to give the Reaper another go.

"My point here is that you'd better get your act together, this isn't no side job for some shady bar, you're Dominion Intelligence now, you make a mistake, read a number wrong, and people die…" He nodded to the passed out tank driver, "You pull shit like that too often, get caught with rejects like this one time too many, and you're out of business, people who learned to trust you, your friends, end up with yet another spook in their headset, one they don't know as well, who'll make mistake and get your team killed…"

Confusion and shame danced a tense waltz in Henry's skull as he considered the Sergeant's words. "What team? I'm an analyst, I… Hell, I don't even have an assignment yet, what do you want from me?" Pleaded the young crewman, his eyes never meeting the Reaper's.

"Can't talk about that, let's just say I have a personal interest in you not screwing this up… You see, right now I have video footage of you committing violence on a superior officer, not only enough to end your career, but to send you in New Folsom for a little while.

-What do you want, then?" Snapped Jackson, his stomach suddenly filled with ice and shivers shooting up his spine. He had never thought just wandering around the ship could get him in trouble that way… He tried to think his way out of this, but pain radiating from his shoulder and back drowned any line of thought in blinding waves.

"It's real simple, you go back to your cabin, open these books of yours and make real sure you do your job right." A reasonable request, at first glance, but Henry would soon get an assignment and he had not been given a single day's rest since… Hell, before boot camp! A human being simply could not simply go one for half a year without a single day off… He told the Reaper that, but Neeson just sneered in apparent disgust.

"Then resign, you don't have what it takes to serve the Dominion." He stepped away, "Go back to daddy, he'll get you a nice job, won't he?

-Don't bring my father into this…" Jackson's eyes darted from his boots to drill into the Reaper's skull. Jan had done his homework; Kyle Navarro, owner of the Sierra Navarro casino on Bacchus, was one sick motherfucker with his own harem and his little personal dynasty. Henry was not top of the succession line, but, had he just played along, would have lived a wealthy and sheltered life in the shadow of his father.

Neeson hadn't found out why or when Jackson and Navarro grew to despise one another, but Henry had once told his father that if he or any of his men tried to contact him or his mother, Gabrielle Jackson, he would, and that was quite inspired, coming from a fourteen-years old, "Melt your skin with industrial acid, let you watch as gangrene chews through the rest and bring you to the hospital once it's settled in, so you don't just die outright."

Most people would just threaten to beat them with their own skull, extra points for imagery.

"That's right, who's going to keep him away from Gabrielle if you get locked in?" He'd obviously struck a sensitive nerve, now, he had to use it. "You didn't have the balls to be a Marine, you don't have the brains for DNI, you're a waste of the Dominion's resources, you'll just give up as soon as things get rough…" He discretely dropped back in a fighting stance, "You're no better than your father."

In twelve years of military service, Neeson had only met two being who could provide him a decent challenge; one had been a Protoss, the other a Ghost. Jackson had a long way to go if he wanted to be number three.

Neeson blocked his wide hook easily and threw a lightning quick jab at the kid's jaw, dazing him long enough to ready a finishing blow to the nose, which Henry side-stepped before attempting a sloppy arm lock. It did not work, but it forced Neeson to back away a second and allowed Jackson to throw another offensive, which ended with a boot in his stomach.

Now wheezing on his knees, Jackson once again felt shame burn its way through his face, top to bottom.

"Maybe one day you'll be good enough." The sergeant kneeled next to him, "But right now, get your ass in that cabin and start booking."

Jackson took a few wheezing breaths in and nodded, leaving C deck by the first elevator.

Neeson waited for him to be out of earshot, then made his way to a makeshift distillery, built inside an unused cantina.

"That'd be the third or fourth today?" Asked the man manning the illicit laboratory.

"Fifth.

-Well butter my biscuit, DuPont's one cruel lady, ain't she?"

The other man wore a baseball cap and had a cigarette stump stuck in the corner of his mouth. He handed Neeson a mason jar full of clear liquid, which the sergeant sampled once before leaning on the stainless counter.

"These kids need motivation, they're not brain-panned and we barely even pay them, DuPont's got the right idea; find what makes the troops tick, use it well and they'll follow you to hell and back.

-Nah, I mean she's got ya snoopin' around records all day, just to give some papered squids a spanking… You's a killer, Neeson, but she's got you babysittin'…

-I'm a psychologist, Bob, that's precisely what I'm trained to do.

-That's nonsense, you're Death's Head!

-That makes me an NCO in the meanest bunch of killers and psychopaths outside Raynor's Raiders; you think I can just yell these guys into submission?"

The other just shrugged and Jan threw a quick look at his data slate; John Higgs, a Sniper, hypno-trained to pilot an Interceptor, he still had a lot of simulated flight time to go before getting his wings, yet preferred to hang around his old squad.

The kid had not been exactly thrilled by his transfer to Naval forces, so it would be Neeson's job to make him get the fekk over himself and his ass in that simulator. A simple one; he would make it clear to the kid his squad was one man short, which allowed them some well-deserved R&R, but as soon as a new sniper was found, they would be sent right back into the meat grinder, and things looked real ugly down on the surface.

If Higgs were to re-join his team as a result of failing his pilot test, he would pretty much spell their (and his) death sentence.

With one last sip of the low grade Vodka, Neeson went back to work.