Welcome back! This would've been out a little earlier, but I've been working on some other things as well! I'm going to try to update Andromeda every 2-3 weeks, and keep the chapters at least an average of 5000 words long. Sometimes they'll be longer, sometimes they'll be shorter.

Enjoy this, for now! Be sure to leave a review if you enjoyed it!

Year: XX
Date: July 23
Time: 14:52:12
Command Log #: 2049

The most recent deployment of SED shuttles left today, with the same taut, discouraged expressions as usual. I wish I could say it was difficult to send them out into whatever happens to be lurking in the darkness between stars, but I know the necessity of their deployment just as much as they do. The supplies and information that are brought back from the nearby star systems and the local intelligent life is crucial to our survival. Despite the support that the SED has been giving Konoha thus far, our supplies are still dwindling, slowly. Local space will only be so generous for so long.

The situation here at home is favorable, at least. The highest class of cadets this year is only a short week away from graduating into full-fledged armada marines, just in time for a few newly-built ships to be christened and cleared for flight. I've been monitoring the progress of the cadets, and they're taking very well to the xenotech. Even though they're working with alien concepts, they recognize the human identity we've given them, and aren't nearly as intimidated as the previous line of soldiers who didn't have other humans to tell them exactly how to work them.

I'll be personally observing their progress during this week of finals.

HC-1 SASUKE UCHIHA

On a SED shuttle many parsecs away from home, Konohamaru Sarutobi stood alone in a quiet cylindrical chamber, his eyes wide open, his arms and legs separated, his entire nude frame immersed in silvery, tingling not-liquid, trying to keep his mind clear and not think about how weird this was.

He knew the process, and had gone through the steps of suiting up on a consistent basis for the past two and a half years, and he expected to continue to do so for the foreseeable future. But as familiar as he was with this process, and as much as he mentally prepared for it, he was never ready for the sensation of the nanite bath.

What looked like liquid silver to the naked eye was actually a swarm of billions upon billions of active nanomachines. As they filled the chamber and surrounded Konohamaru on all sides, the excited little robots sought out the pores and openings of his skin, flowing around his, competing for the opportunity to infiltrate his flesh, burrow tenderly into his soft, dark eyes, and flow into the channels of his ears, in order to cling to his muscles and sensory nerves. Every inch of his body hummed with discomfort, and every bath felt just as odd as the last.

He sighed with relief when it was over. He could hear the harmonic hiss of what seemed like disappointment from the unlucky nanites who didn't manage to find a home today, as they were drained into the gutter of the immersion chamber and turned back into inert sand, stored away until their next potential host arrived.

The chamber unsealed itself with a hydraulic puff, and opened up to free him. Konohamaru lingered for a few moments to take a breath and put the experience behind him, before stepping back into the bright, long room, lined from door to door with several other opening chambers.

The overhead lights seemed different, somehow. The cool tiles beneath his bare feet felt odd, somewhat. He felt more naked now than he did before immersing himself, for some reason. The worst part about the nanite bath, for Konohamaru, was that feeling that it had changed him. Not enough for him to notice, but just enough for him to know.

His turned his attention toward the chamber across from his as it also opened up, and the toned, female form of his longtime friend and teammate, Moegi, stepped out with a sigh.

"Mo, you know you're not supposed to rub or scratch right after a nanite bath," Konohamaru reminded her, keeping his gaze steadily on her face.

Moegi gave Konohamaru a brief, pointed look before rolling her eyes. "Oh, please. It's not like they'll come off," she scoffed, before looking around the immersion room.

Moegi's gaze locked onto a man a few chambers down from hers, who was subtly appraising her curves out of the corner of his eye, and her lips pulled into a scowl.

"What are you staring at, marine? Like what you see?" she snapped loudly at him. Her tone immediately cowed the peeping tom, who flinched and looked away before hurrying away into the next room over, and had drawn enough attention to dissuade the rest of her male colleagues to even risk looking in her direction as they slowly ushered themselves into the next room over as well, leaving just her and Konohamaru.

Moegi sighed and shook her head. Konohamaru chuckled and crossed his arms as he moved ahead of her toward the next room as well. "Glad to see that your tongue is still as sharp as your blade, Mo. Try not to scare the others too much, though; we're all marines here."

He heard Moegi scoff again behind her. "Since when were you the one keeping me in check, Konohamaru? You just make sure I don't catch you checking me or anyone else out."

Konohamaru laughed again as they followed all of the other marines into the next room, a hallway of marked doors. He paused at his own, appropriately marked KONOHAMARU SARUTOBI, and Moegi stepped up toward the next one over, marked MOEGI SHITAYA.

"I have a wife. And she's way prettier than you are," Konohamaru teased as he palmed the scanner beside his door, shivering at the small hum of the nanites in his hand resonating with the electronics of the scanner.

"The fact that you're married with a child makes it doubly, no, triply important for me to keep your perverted ass in line. The last thing Hanabi and Matsuro need is to find out that you've been fraternizing with other marines, or worse, aliens."

It was Konohamaru's turn to roll his eyes as the scan concluded with a low beep, and his door opened to reveal the intricate workings of the suit-up rig inside. "Well, I haven't, and I won't ever. My family means too much to me, and it kinda hurts that you don't have enough faith in me to trust that I won't cheat on my wife."

Moegi smirked, turning for a moment to look at Konohamaru as her own suit-up rig opened up. "I feel a little better that you got offended by that. It gives me a little more faith in your commitment. Just a little. Seeya in a minute."

Konohamaru watched the back of Moegi's head as she stepped into the apparatus to complete the process of suiting up, and once the door was closed behind her, he turned toward his own rig, shaking his head before stepping inside as well, fitting his arms and legs into their proper slots and trying to relax as he was once again enclosed in a small space. The machinery around him awoke with low, welcoming hums and whirs. Understanding that time was usually of the essence, unlike the curious nanomachines, the apparatus made quick work of pulling and shaping the dark grey fabric of his cyberweave suit around his body. With a warm hiss, a laser sealant raced up the front of his suit, to completely close it around him, and finally, with an airy puff, the suit pulled tightly and securely around him, like another layer of skin.

After several more clicks and snaps as light metallic vambraces, shinguards, and his helmet were attached to his person, his suit-up concluded with a sudden electric sensation as the synthetic armor resonated with the nanites in his skin and eyes, boosting his strength, sharpening his senses, and magnifying his potential at large. The rush of energy that raced up his spine never failed to motivate him and he stepped out of the apparatus feeling as if he could take on anything.

Moegi emerged at the same time he did, wearing her own form-fitting plum-colored cyberweave suit. Her helmet was formed a bit differently, with the same solid metal frame, but with two thick polymer tendrils attached to the back of the skull and extending down to her shoulders, a style choice to hold her giant pigtails.

One by one, other suited-up marines stepped out of their rigs as well, and when they were all accounted for, they made their way further down, from one hallway to another, moving toward the bridge.

The main walkway of the shuttle was lined with tall windows, all looking out into a vast multicolored sea of stars, distant planets, and gaseous nebulas, with infinitely deep stretches of blackness between each twinkling light. It took Konohamaru a few moments to tear his eyes away from the sight and look where he was going.

Andromeda was an incredibly beautiful place, everyone could agree, which was why it bothered Konohamaru, and many others of Konoha, that such a pretty, vast galaxy could be so disturbing and host so much danger, an anomalous degree of danger when compared to the much tamer Milky Way and Triangulum Galaxy.

As he and the rest of the team approached the doors to the bridge, Konohamaru gave his head another small shake, a habitual gesture to empty himself of his trivial thoughts and focus on the matters at hand, and the details of the mission they were about to receive and undertake.

The bulky double doors separated with an electronic hum, and the soothing beeps and clicks and muttering voices of the active bridge met Konohamaru's ears. To his left, right, and at the very end of the large, trapezoidal space, several members of the SED shuttle staff sat busy at their consoles navigating the shuttle, managing and monitoring the shuttle's conditions, and surveying the nearby area. Large, long windows offered a breathtaking view of open space.

Commanding the center of the bridge was a raised circular platform, where the shuttle captain, Ebisu, and the chief intelligence officer, Udon, stood and waited for the rest of the marines to file in and line up. Konohamaru and Moegi noted with some pleasant surprise that Udon was also suited up.

"Ears open, marines. We're closing in fast on our target, so I'll try to make this mission briefing as brief as possible," Ebisu started, adjusting his round, dark frames. "A little over an hour ago, a routine scan of the immediate area came back with something interesting: a cargo vessel, crashed on a large asteroid in a nearby star system's belt. Bring it up, Udon."

With a nod and a few moments typing at a command console, Udon summoned several holographic images, of the target asteroid, the location of the crashed ship, and a 3D schematic of a similar-looking ship.

"It's a vessel of Dhuuman make," Udon observed. "From what I can tell, there's no active life support, and no indication of exactly what it was carrying, or the cause of its crash. Hull temperatures are cool, so it wasn't very recent, and we can't establish any kind of radio or psionic connection to the vessel. We don't know what that means in terms of survivors, but the chance of anything being alive down there isn't favorable at this point."

Ebisu nodded as the holographic images disappeared. "As you're all aware, the Dhuuman race is somewhat notorious for their interstellar piracy, and in the five years we've spent discovering and parleying with the intelligent life in this part of Andromeda, Dhuumes have been the most aggressive, and the least tolerant of diplomacy. With that said, I have no qualms about the mission I'm about to ask you to undertake."

Ebisu took another moment to look upon the faces of the eight marines standing before him, and Udon beside him. "Your mission is three-fold, and I recommend the nine of you divide yourselves into three squads of three in order to accomplish them efficiently: recover the ship's command console, confirm that the ship is completely clear of hostiles, Dhuuman or otherwise, and investigate the ship's cargo hold to ascertain what it was carrying and how much of it is still intact. We'll should be arriving at the target asteroid within the next thirty minutes. Arm yourselves and prepare for landing."

In unison, all nine of the present marines stood at attention and saluted their captain, and once Ebisu had mirrored the gesture, Konohamaru was the first to turn and lead the way as they filed out of the bridge again.

Meanwhile...

There is a long hallway lined with sealed, dark rooms on the first basement level of Konoha's Armada Cadet Training Academy. In each sealed, dark room is a simple chair, a simple table, and an array of advanced equipment taped and wired to the forehead, the temples, and the back of the neck of a cadet, seated calmly in their simple chair, breathing steadily as instructed.

"Nod your head if you can hear me, and the interview will begin," an instructor's voice spoke into every dark room, through an overhead loudspeaker.

In every room, each cadet did as instructed, and after a moment's delay, the voice spoke once more.

"In the spirit of this week of final tests and examinations, this exit interview is meant to ensure your mental wellness and ascertain your motives and motivations in training here to join the Armada. How you answer these questions may or may not determine many factors in relation to your graduation and placement within the Armada thereafter. Answer carefully and truthfully. There is no time limit. Start by stating your name."

All at once, and deaf to everyone but themselves, the cadets answered…

"Inojin Yamanaka."

"Tenshi Hyuga."

"Shikadai, dad…"

"Uh, Mitsuki."

"Boruto Uzumaki."

"Chocho Akimichi."

"…Sarada Uchiha."

"Lee. Metal Lee."

"Arufa Inuzuka!"

…along with the names of several more promising fourth-class cadets in other dark rooms. The equipment attached to the cadets' heads hummed lightly against their flesh, almost as if in approval, and after a moment, the instructor spoke once more.

"And why do you want to become an Armada marine?"

oOo Mitsuki oOo

"It seems like it'd be fun."

The finals version of the target practice exercise wasn't much different from the others. Even though instead of bullseyes or holographic simulations, there were real training droids rushing toward him, the first target always showed up directly in front of him, meaning that Mitsuki didn't even have to bother paying it any mind.

Without even looking, he drew his sidearm and fired a single laser round. The dying whirs of the terminated droid crashing to the ground assured him that he was on point, and his eyes scanned the area around him for any sort of motion.

He heard the next target before he saw it, so when he turned to his five o'clock and aimed the blaster pistol once again out of reflex, there was a slight delay between aiming and firing, taking out the second droid as cleanly as the first. That delay, hesitation, could have easily cost him his life in a real combat situation. He knew he could do better.

"Trust your gut, Mikki. Just trust your gut…" he murmured to himself as he looked around again, listening for the next target, but hoping he'd see it first.

No such luck. Once again, he heard the aggressive, excited whirs of machinery and once again turned and aimed. The third target wasn't humanoid, however, but a sleek quadruped droid that had lunged forward for a pounce. Mitsuki thought quickly and rolled forward underneath the pounce before taking aim as soon as the bestial droid landed, firing two quick shots that ripped through its back and felled it quickly.

He let out a sigh and smirked, twirling his pistol in his hand before securing it in the holster on the hip of his light blue and grey cyberweave armor. "Ha, no sweat."

Mitsuki noticed the barriers rising from the floor around him, artificial cover. In the few seconds he knew he had, he drew his primary weapon, an Armada-standard assault rifle, from his back. With his last available second, he confirmed in the corner of his vision that it was set for physical fire, before raising the weapon and gunning down the first droid that appeared as it tried to run to gain cover. The solid rounds ripped straight through the droid's low-energy shields and terminated it before it even had a chance to raise its own weapon.

Mitsuki couldn't keep the confident grin from blooming on his face. He was almost halfway done, in record time, with total accuracy. The next droid to emerge in the testing field was already behind cover, forcing Mitsuki to lunge and duck for cover himself behind one of the raised walls as it fired its barrage of tranquilizing laser beams.

With a moment to breathe now that he was protected, and plenty of time to spare, Mitsuki spared a glance up toward the windowed observation deck high above the ground, where a few instructors and several students were watching his performance. His amber eyes caught sight of one of his classmates waving at him and cheering him on with a giant, toothy smile on her painted face. Mitsuki shot the brunette a quick wink before rising suddenly when the assaulting droid ceased fire, returning a quick burst of bullets that once again tore straight through the droid's shields.

Mitsuki searched the other side of the field diligently, waiting for the next target to rise, but gasped in surprise when he felt energy shots against his back. Luckily for him, his armor's own energy shields dispersed and nullified the blasts, leaving him unharmed, but Mitsuki was still shaken.

He quickly vaulted over his cover to the other side, sighing to calm himself before peeking over the barrier. "Like I'd really let an enemy get behind me that easily," he jokingly scoffed to himself before ducking again as he saw it aim. It was closer than he thought it was, and Mitsuki briefly wondered whether he should fall back to further cover and sacrifice time or be a little ballsy and sacrifice accuracy.

After a moment of thought Mitsuki decided to sacrifice accuracy. Without looking, he raised his hands and lifted his weapon over the barrier, firing blindly in the enemy droid's general direction until he heard it crash to the ground and wheeze its dying whirs.

"Six down," he counted to himself. "Should be four left, right?"

Mitsuki spared a peek over the barrier he hid behind, spotting a trio of floating spherical droids circling each other. When they stopped in the air and began flying in his direction, Mitsuki swore under his breath as he realized they had spotted him, too.

He moved quickly, just as the three droids began to rain their laser fire on his location, and scrambled to keep as far away as possible while he recalibrated his weapon, yanking out the magazine and quickly replacing it with a plasma battery from the pouch on his hip opposite his sidearm.

Mitsuki grinned and turned quickly toward the three pursuing droids, just as a bright bolt of energy whizzed past his head. Amidst the hail of laser fire falling around him and wearing down his armor, Mitsuki drew in a breath and held it, steeling his focus and firing three of his own energy shots, boldly staring his targets down out in the open as he blasted them apart one by one.

'Seven. Eight. Nine…' he counted in his head, all of his senses alert as he sought out what he assumed to be his final target.

A presence behind him suddenly made the hairs on the back of Mitsuki's neck stand on end. Instantly, he drew his sidearm and whirled on his heel to take aim, only to stare down the barrel of a similar pistol, wielded by a droid that was cloaked to look exactly like him.

Mitsuki's brows rose in surprise, before his lips spread in another wide grin as he understood almost immediately.

"Well, well. Hey, handsome. So that's how this is going to be?" he said aloud, disappointed that the doppelganger didn't mirror his words.

Mitsuki took a few moments to think as he and his copy took aim at each other, and when he was ready, he tilted his head quickly out of the line of fire of the hologram's pistol at the same time he fired his own. Unsurprisingly, the copy did the same, causing the both of them to miss. Expecting as much, Mitsuki changed the angle at which he held his pistol, and noticed just in time that his target did the same. They ducked their heads at once, again dodging each other's bullets of energy, just barely.

Mitsuki realized he couldn't keep this up, and was amused to also see that his doppelganger shared the sentiment. They both fell back, each covering their own retreat by firing over their shoulders until they reached cover.

'I know that defeating an opponent 'of equal skill' is supposed to be the greatest challenge I have to overcome,' he considered thoughtfully to himself as he sat cross-legged behind his cover while blaster fire whizzed over his head and struck the barrier he was sitting behind. 'But it's hard to be intimidated by machines. Especially ones like this. It may look like me, but it's just another array of parts and algorithms. People write stories about how scary robot clones like this are, but it's really not difficult to defeat an opponent that knows every move you've ever made.'

Mitsuki looked at his blaster pistol before simply trading it from his right hand to his left hand. He rose from his cover after a break in fire and took aim as well as he could. When the droid rose as well, and saw that Mitsuki was holding his weapon in a way that he had never held it before, there was a delay in its action, a slight hesitation, almost, as it processed the anomaly.

That hesitation cost the droid its functionality, and with two quick, clumsily-aimed, slightly lucky shots, he blasted the droid in the chest and neck, disabling its disguise as it crumpled to the floor.

'Just make a move you've never made before,' Mitsuki finished his thought, pressing a small button near his collar than caused the headset of his armor to separate and fold into itself against the plating on the spine of his suit, before holstering his weapon and walking proudly toward the exit elevator as it opened on the far side of the large, white-walled shooting area and carried him up to the observation, where the approving nods of his instructors and light applause from most of his fellow cadets awaited him.

Mitsuki didn't have to take more than a step before he met almost nose-to-nose with the excited admirer he noticed before, still grinning from ear to ear. She was clad in form-fitting cyberweave armor just like he was, though he noticed that her brown-and-grey fabric held closer to her slim form than most others, was stripped of its vambraces, and had lighter, modified shinguards, tailored particularly for speed, he could tell. Mitsuki's eyes eventually traveled back up to the cadet's face, which had pinkened beneath the red fang markings on her cheeks. She bashfully moved her long, tousled brown hair away from her face as she spoke.

"That was so amazing, Mitsuki! Where did you learn to shoot like that?" she cooed in admiration.

Mitsuki tilted his head and lifted a brow before laughing lightly. "Here at ACT Academy, Arufa. Where else?" he answered with a witty smirk.

The girl blinked and blushed even brighter at her own silly question, rolling her eyes away. "O-Oh, yeah. Duh, I wasn't thinking. I guess it's because I'm not that great with guns like that. I'm more of an up-close-and-personal kind of girl."

"I can tell," Mitsuki commented, turning away from her briefly to hand off his rifle and pistol to one of the instructors. Before he could turn back to look at her again, he grunted in surprise as she pounced and wrapped her arms around him, rubbing her cheek affectionately against his shoulder, almost like a cat.

"But because I'm not so great, when I see someone like you who's so, so skilled, it just gets me so, so excited! I'm sorry if this is bothering you, but I can't help it! You're so…"

"Slick? Clever? 'Skilled' wouldn't have been my first word choice."

Both Mitsuki and Arufa turned their heads to the new voice, and Mitsuki gave a curious eye over to the masked cadet standing closer to the window looking down into the practice zone, her short, thin brown hair framing the lightly-tanned upper half of her face, with pale lavender eyes giving him a searching stare.

Arufa, still casually clinging to Mitsuki, regarded the squinting woman with a look of familiarity. "Oh, hey, Tenshi!"

Mitsuki smirked and set his hands on his hips, coiling his right arm around Arufa in the process, making her blush brighter and making Tenshi seem that much more irritated. "Those bandages still don't suit you. You shouldn't waste fabric covering up your face when it doesn't deserve to be hidden."

Even though his words were sincere and phrased as a compliment, Tenshi wasn't appeased. "Did you think no one would notice you blatantly exploiting the final droid's AI, to confuse it and secure an easy victory instead of tackling yourself head on like you were intended to? Or recklessly firing blindly without looking where you were aiming, twice, I might add, just to save time?"

Mitsuki shrugged his shoulders and shook his head. "I guess I figured you'd notice, Tenshi. You notice everything. But I don't see what the big deal is. Droids are fun to mess with like that during these training exercises. And even if I did take them seriously, it's not like they're at all difficult to beat."

The arm Mitsuki had around Arufa's waist rose to her shoulder. "But hey, maybe out in the field when I'm facing an enemy I can actually exploit an advantage I have over, I'll keep your advice in mind and give them a fair shot."

Tenshi sighed with annoyance. "You know that's not what I meant. But that's your prerogative; that kind of reckless attitude and penchant for taking shortcuts will reflect on how you perform in the field, even if you just smugly insist you're holding back and playing around, while outperforming the majority of the class. Star student or not, I feel bad for whatever SED team you're put on. Your shenanigans will get someone killed. But I'm sure you'll laugh that off, too."

Mitsuki lifted a brow, but said nothing in response. With nothing else to say to him, either, Tenshi turned to leave the room. "Come on, Arufa. You wanted to watch the blade fights, right?" she called over her shoulder.

Arufa's head turned back and forth quickly between Mitsuki and Tenshi, before she called out to her. "Y-Yeah, Tenshi! Don't worry, I'll catch up!"

Arufa reluctantly pulled herself from Mitsuki's side to stand in front of him again, her expression different now. Much of the vivacious excitement in her eyes had calmed into bashful admiration. "I hope you don't let what Tenshi said bother you, Mitsuki… She-"

He patted her on the head, and the gesture cut her off and made her ears twitch and her cheeks warm yet again. "I know she's a critical person; I don't worry too much about it. She's been arguing at me on and off since the beginning of this year, almost," Mitsuki responded.

He chuckled inwardly at the memories he'd collected throughout the year, of Tenshi bluntly scolding him over his relaxed behavior. She'd become something of a rival to him, in some regard or another, but Mitsuki couldn't remember her ever firing on his character that coldly, to imply that he was so blasé that he'd shrug off a comrade's death. He decided he'd ask her about it later, seriously.

Arufa nodded understandingly, looking away for a moment before staring him in the eyes again and giving him another one of her signature wide and toothy grins. "Despite what she said, I still think you're amazing! And before I go, um… you know about the banquet and dance that's being held next week for the graduating cadets, right? I, uh… wasn't sure when or how to ask, and I've been meaning to for a while, but uhm… assuming I pass-"

"Sure, I'll go with you, Arufa," Mitsuki chuckled, giving her a nod and a warm smile.

The biggest grin yet spread across Arufa's blushing face, and she pounced forward to once again hug Mitsuki tightly. "Thank you, thank you! We're gonna have so much fun, I know it! Meet you there?"

Unable to speak clearly with her constricting him so, he simply nodded at her, waving and silently catching his breath as she ran from the room to catch up with Tenshi.

Mitsuki followed behind her at his own pace, laughing lightly as he stepped out to see that Arufa had already cleared the length of the long hall in just a few seconds. Her energy was boundless, certainly a welcome change from the tense, melancholy air that seemed to linger around Konoha, particularly the Armada, who made it their job to poke around the galaxy around them, which has consistently proven to be physically and psychologically hazardous.

Mitsuki found himself preemptively envious of whatever ship Arufa was eventually assigned to following graduation. Besides being adorable, Arufa's upbeat demeanor would be a much-needed morale boost for her fellow marines. She might not have had the best aim, but she was one hell of a cheerleader. There was something about her smile that just refused to leave his memory, and he could tell from the people she was around that others felt the same.

He shook his head as he walked casually past other cadets shuffling quickly around the halls of the Academy, making his way toward the gym, hoping that Boruto hadn't had his match yet. He was really looking forward to seeing what he could do.

Hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it! The next chapter will feature Boruto's POV, and another action scene which I hope will be fun to write (and read). Again, be sure to review!

~M.H.C~

Till next time!