Fort Ticonderoga - Episode 1 : Adrift

dramatis personae of Characters ;

***

name : Phillip Washington Irving Graves

rank and file : Captain - commanding officer

birdcall star sign : Pig

history : He was born on old land in the area known as the western sandwich district of due north America. As a youth he was a trouble maker this, being virtually unheard of in his century, forced the military to deal with him. He was given a choice. unite the United Planets serenity keeping and enquiry force or be remanded for mental conditioning to fix his behavioral trouble. His career in the military was a great case of how not to advance. After twenty years he was still only a petty officer third class. That was when he was caught pulling off his worst infraction yet. Fleet full admiral Tigrat caught him in bed with his wife, and both of his daughters, at the same time. Phillip was doomed to go back to base rank again. But instead the full admiral made him an fling. bump a wife, get promoted to captain, with a ship, and go deep.

Description : He is six base tall, with jet fateful hair and Brown University eyes. His torso type is slim and hefty with tan skin tone.

partner : Mrs. Millishia Jaunu Steppen-Graves

***

Name : Mrs Millishia Jaunu Steppen-Graves

social station : Commander - Ships science officer and fourth in mastery

Call Sign : Marijuana

chronicle : She was born a bare farm fille in the Midwest Territories of North U.S.A.. She led an model life, with no problems, until she came of age. Then she found she had a taste perception for bad male child. To try and hold in her appetence for self destructive doings, she joined the armed service. Her career was in good monastic order and she was felicitous after five years but she longed to go deep. The only job was you had to be married and no one was asking. There was also the problem of Phillip ; she thought he was just dreamy. He was everything she wanted in a bad boy, but his career meant he would never even manage to arrive at it into space. She only had one More social rank to go then she could go. That would exact another six months. Then she was broadsided by a interrogative she never thought any man would ask."will you marry me I need a wife before I can go deep ?"

Description : She is a five foot six inch tall, blond haired, blue eyed beaut, with medium sized knocker. Her physical structure style is sylphlike and athletic.

Mate : Phillip John Irving Steffi Graf

***

Name : King James Billy Mitchell Penzo

social rank : Master honcho Petty Officer - foreman engineer and mechanic.

Call Sign : Jazz hands

History : He was born on the emerald isle of Europe. He was a skillful kid and went to college. After school he joined the service to set up a little nest egg. There he met his wife and fell in love. He had a hopeful life history ahead of him, and then everything hit the fan. He discovered the medicative core of the engine solution. Just a picayune nip of it could make any man glad. He stayed glad a lot after that. When he was found out, he was offered a alternative, war machine legal separation or he and his married woman go deep.

Description : He is five foot eight inches tall with blue unripe eyes and brown hair. His trunk eccentric is boneheaded with just a slight spare tire.

Mate : Leafa Tiski Mikia-Penzo

***

figure : Mrs. Leafa Tiski Mikia-Penzo

Rank : elder gaffer Petty ship's officer - tribal chief of off ship security.

birdcall signboard : Demoness

History : She was born on her indigene humanity of Liskia. She is strong and immobile and excelled in her career as military constabulary, until her married man introduced her to the answer. Everything still worked well for them until she was called out on an emergency while she was extremely happy. Six weeks later she boarded her new vessel, The UP Ticonderoga.

description : She is six ft two inches marvelous. Her airstream has red tegument and hair with light grey eyes. Many people say they look like the mythical demons, right down to the two tufts of fuzz on their brow that resembled horns. Her body eccentric is thin out and lithe with a well defined brawniness tone.

Mate : St. James the Apostle Mitchell Penzo

***
Name : Malcolm Leroy Libbshitz

social rank : police lieutenant Junior level - xeno-biologist.

Call augury : Buster

History : He is a native of Ling, a human colony, joined the service to go deep, he wanted the life of an Explorer, he was also married and his wife joined at the same time looking to embark out with him. He is an expert in xeno-botany and xeno-zoology and loves to study new species of both industrial plant and brute.

Description : He is five animal foot eight inches magniloquent with mousy blonde hair and gamy eyes. His eubstance type is slight and non muscular.

better half : Melonie Michelle Russel-Libbshitz

***

Name : Melonie Michelle Russel-Libbshitz

social status : Lieutenant Junior grade - ships doctor.

Call Sign : melon vine

chronicle : She is a native of burbot, a human colony, and was married to her college peach. She joined the armed service to go deep with him.

Description : She is five foot six column inch tall with platinum blond hair and very large boob. He body eccentric is voluptuous.

Mate : Malcolm Leroy Libbshitz

***

gens : Lorka Dumont Willock

Rank : Commander - security measure officer, irregular in command.

birdcall Sign : pile

History : He is a Tithian warrior. Born on Tithia and joined the service to get a hazard to do engagement in this time of peace. He is very popular with the madam because his backwash believes that love playing period should be as stamp as war is violent.

Description : At well over seven feet tall and four hundred and fifty pounds of solid muscle he is by far the largest appendage of the crew, except for his married woman. His opprobrious hide looks like a trace come to life. The only break in his wickedness is his red eyes.

Mate : Tanka Lundt Cravis-Willock

***

Name : Tanka Lundt Cravis-Willock

Rank : Commander - Weapons officer, one-third in bid

phone call star sign : Mt. Everest

History : She is a female person Tithian warrior. She joined the service with her hubby, in the Leslie Townes Hope of finding struggle. She is a fundament taller than her hubby, and a hell of a lot meaner.

Description : She is eight feet four inches tall with shadow black skin and red eyes. Her eubstance character is extremely muscular.

first mate : Lorka Dumont Willock


-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -

I stared at the blank view projection screen in front of me. My ship had been adrift for three days. There was only one problem when you were deep ; there was no one to avail when you hit trouble. The nearest ship to us was two months travel away. It had taken us two days to get this far out.

"Going recondite"is a euphemism for getting lost. We were sent out here to find habitable planets that we could colonise or imagination we could mine for. The fun component, the rules say the foremost crewman to set foot on a planet gets to name the major planet.

The united slipstream had managed to colonize or mining camp every rock-and-roll for sixty light years around earth. We were one hundred and twenty out. It took about a year to travel lx easy years with the snort drive as it was called. It got its name because the matter and antimatter explosions inside it made it sound like it was snorting. We could put up with the annoying phone to travel at sixty sentence the speed of light. The problem right now is our snorter had a stopped up nose.

I thumbed the communicating control board on my professorship to spirit."malarkey hands, What the inferno is taking so long down there ? If you are nipping at the solvent again I'm going to take you off of easing rotation for two calendar week."

"Not a chance, Pig, I am trying to repair the hoot price those cockbiter rats did to the locomotive engine wiring. The fuck little beasties chewed through every light conducting wire in the main fire dominance cabinet."

"How long before we have engine power again ?"

"Another day at to the lowest degree, we have over a thousand wires to replace in this cabinet."

"That is what you said yesterday, the day before, and the day before that, damn it, I want this ship moving by the end of this rotation !"

"master, even if I get this repaired that is no guarantee we will be able-bodied to move. We have no melodic theme what else they damaged before we could pop the little son of a bitch. Go take a relief break and let me do my tinker's damn job."

I stalked off of the bridge. The damn lifts were down so I had to climb down the admittance run to get to the crew decks. I guess we could bid ourselves favorable ; those niggling varmint had not reached the sprightliness sustenance equipment yet. twenty cockbiter rats had managed to masticate through our independent mogul control, cabbage control systems, helm ascendance interlink, navigation, and locomotive flaming control condition in lupus erythematosus than twenty four hours. XX rats had crippled a ship, with crew of one hundred people on display panel. Only fate knows what else was damaged. malarky Hands was aright I needed tension respite ; it was time to lead to the crowd lounge.

There is a major set of formula about going deep. The first one is all work party extremity must be mated couplet. The arcsecond linguistic rule is all family relationship are open on the ship. When off duty personnel need stress relief any off tariff person of the opposite grammatical gender is available to them, unless they are in their sleep cycle. Any same sex contact are not interdict but are open to be refused. Your living quarters were kept monogamous, only you and your spouse enjoyed that fix. The sofa is where you go to arrange liaisons with other crew members. That is also where the"training"room are. There is one for just about every predilection, from the pleasant to the downright kinky.

Rank has its privilege as well. Command officers are allowed to use up tension breaks during duty if there is no pressing need for their attentions. As of right now, there was no pressing indigence for me. I could not command this ship to move if I were a god.

I no Oklahoman walked into the waiting room when Melonie saw me and came over. I knew what she was after, she loved my oral proficiency."pauperism some stress embossment, police captain ?"

"At least a week's worth, Melons."I said as I took her by the arm and guided her towards the bar."I believe the ma'am is drinking a cobalt circuit breaker, and I would bask a calum tea."I told the barkeep as I caressed melons stomach. I always enjoyed her very with child breast and today would be no exception.

When we received our swallow, she took a sip from hers then asked,"Floaty ?"

"That sounds like a marvelous idea,"I nodded towards the one of the zero-G rooms. When we entered the room I adjusted the ascendancy on the holographic display to make it look like we were in the clouds. I had seen enough stars already today. All of them stars I couldn't reach. We attached the lids to our glasses so our drink would not float out and then I touched the activate button. Watching her breasts suddenly float upward as the gravity stopped was an amazing treat. We floated in the air together as I started to disinvest her. As was monetary standard when in the waiting area, her article of clothing was elementary and easily to absent. She wore a pullover shirt and miniskirt with no step-in on underneath. Her shoes were simpleton skidder very comfortable and quite attractive. The slim static charge caused by pulling her shirt over her foreland caused her hair to stand out like a hallo of platinum blonde silk. By a lot of standard this woman would be considered overweight. She weighed about XX Cypriot pound over idealistic weight for her five foot six column inch frame. To me the extra fuzziness just made her voluptuous.

Once her dress were floating around the room like cast off feathers, she started to undress me. My uniform was a little more complicated to take away. It was a yob push button up pants and shirt, with a jacket over it, all in black. The place were polished ne plus ultra in black lifelike leather. Underneath it all was my rule underclothing, also black. Add the disconsolate gray rap and thorax bandolier as well as my senior pilot's hat to the whole matter and I looked like a cultivate monkey. Soon all of these apparel were floating around the room as well.

I pulled Melons to me and began to kiss the cutis of her neck and chest. This elicited several moans of delight. Her legs wrapped around my stomach and squeezed me hard enough to be slightly painful. She began to flex her hips rubbing her pert nates on the top of my peter. I was very influence to take what she was offering correct then but I had other estimation. Zero-G has one real reward to making love on any surface. I guided her legs out from around me as she pouted with those total lips that were just made for what I had in judgment. Once she was free I spun her in the air and brought her wooden leg around to my face. There in front of my eyes was a small landing strip of Pt blond hair that pointed right to the object of my desire. I moved my head forward and inhaled the fragrance of her arousal. With deliberate mental retardation I extended my tongue and began to score small circles through that Sweet landing strip.

I felt her sass as she started to work out and kiss along the cock of my stopcock. Her mouth and mouth were delicious lovingness on my skin. The trembling of her moans made my stopcock jump and twitch as I touched the tip of my tongue to her clit and flipped it quickly back and Forth. I nearly forgot what I was doing when I felt my putz slide down her throat. She was so smooth and hot on the inside. I moved both of my custody around her delicious ass and started wetting my fingers in the dearest flowing from her tight cunt. When I felt her legs starting to tighten around my head, I slid two fingers from one hired man into her tight pussy. My middle finger of my other hand pushed into her silken asshole. I started pumping my fingers in and out of her at different speeds. Sometimes they would be moving in and out together, others they would be in a counterpoint rhythm.

I felt her stomach begin to tighten and vibrate against my chest of drawers. Then her legs slammed shut on my head like a clinch. Her flow was floating in droplets around my head as she orgasmed. While she was still vibrating and shaking through her sexual climax I spun her through the air until I was behind her. I plunged the length of my rock hard tool into her from rear. She let out a groan that was bordering on a scream. I began to pound with all my might as we floated in the air. Then we both arched our backs as we thundered into our climax together.

Ten minutes later we left the floaty room freshly showered. As we exited the room, I set the controls to clean and sterilize the elbow room. I kissed melon vine and left her boozing and smile at the bar. As I was walking out of the bar, the whole ship lurched and then vibrated with a moan that sounded like it was dying.

I slapped the communication gore at the doorway."Jazz Hands, are we moving ?"

"Yes sir, but not under our own power any more."James I answered.

"What do you mean any more ?"

"We got the organisation online, and fired the engine up. They immediately shut down. It seems our inactiveness ascendance system is down as well."

"security measure I want every one of those damn rats killed again."

"Sir, we have no weapon control, would you like my wife and I to confound rocks at their floating corpses ?"Mountain said back facetiously.

"No, bewilder buster at them ; he's the whoreson that brought those fucking rats on my ship."

"How soon, idle words paw ?"

"We are looking at the price now but I say at least a day."

"You always say a day. I want this darn ship moving under its own power by end of oscillation or I am going to give you to Everest and Mountain as a prey dummy !"

"Yes sir. Have you gotten that stress rest yet ?"

"No, and I am looking for your wife right now, so move it."

As I moved back to the bridge my nous wandered back to the issue that led up to this site. We had found a major planet with no beacon fire on it. It was unexplored. scan showed it to be a lush atomic number 8 rich satellite with plant and animate being life-time abundant on the aerofoil and in the sea. I organized a landing party to investigate the surface.

***

The party, consisting of Marijuana, Demoness, buster, Melons, pile and myself, left the ship in a shuttle. various orbital qualifying and scans later we determined a copious area to solid ground and investigate.

It was a voiced touchdown naught at all out of the average. There was the shinny for view to see who could make it through the door first. I had to laugh as the door slid back and my married woman muscled Mountain out of the way. I walked down the incline to see my wife dancing in a force field of penis. Yes I said that right, all of the works in the domain were short circuit maybe twelve in improbable and shaped like that portion of the male person anatomy.

I looked around to see the trees, thank god they looked more like Tree, and they even had beautiful blossom growing on them. A closelipped look at the efflorescence made me call up I had lost it. They looked like pink penis with two balls hanging underneath them. I thought it was pretty seize that my wife would get to advert a world covered in member shaped plants.

"My god it is a cosmos of cock !"my married woman exclaimed as she looked around.

"So flora the beacon, dedicate it a name and cash register it. The beacon light will send back the info via poor space."I said as I walked down and resisted the urge to smell any of the flowers.

My wife set up the pharos station, as the rest of us looked around.

"I don't want to bend over on this planet."Mountain said quietly beside me, making me laugh.

"It does throw a sure menacing presence doesn't it ?"

broncobuster was the first one to see an beast. It was floating gently on the breeze towards one of the Tree. It had large flat offstage with bladders underneath them. These vesica probably contain some gas lighter than the air around us. By paddling its feet it would actuate through the air like a duck swam across the water. As we watched it swam up to one of the trees and put its mouth around one of the flowers. A few seconds later it left the heyday hanging limply from its base and moved to another bloom. One by one it drained the"nectar"out of the stiff blossom leaving them flaccid.

"We need a duo of those birds on the ship,"Buster said as we watched."I bet we could fill them back to UP space and deal them for a fortune."

"Get some samples for study, we will stay overnight and have everything back in the morning."I told Buster and his married woman. They set about collecting plant and animal sampling. They caught one of the birds but it died in less than an hour in the cage. They must need to eat constantly.

Buster gave me a account a mates hours later. The flush on the trees produced nectar that made the shaft stiff. When the vesica Winged Cocksucker Birds would nurse at the flower they would abandon out the nectar and get hold of some of the pollen away on their mouthpiece. Those moving from flower to blossom accomplished fertilization for the works. The hitch flush would engage about an hr to generate a full burden of nectar again. There were several other animals and industrial plant that he reported on.
My wife had decided to scream this place, appropriately enough, tool's World.

As evening started to darken the skies we saw several, rat like, creatures come out of holes in the ground. They started to climb up the tree diagram. We watched as they moved to the ends of the limbs and bit the blossom off the Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree and ate them. Every man in the radical cringed watching this. I think Mountain even turned a lilliputian pale. These animals quickly became known as cockbiter betrayer. Buster thought they wouldn't sell well.

Our sensors could not observe any animal bigger than the shuttlecock within five century mouse click of us so we bedded down in the shuttle for the night.

I awoke the adjacent morning and shook Demoness awake succeeding to me. She smiled as I retrieved two cups of coffee tree from the vigour solidifier. I looked around and noticed all of the others had already moved outside. Buster must have awoken my married woman when he got up to break his traps.

We got dressed and moved outside. Buster was studying a cage of twenty of the cockbiter rats he had captured during the night. They seemed a bit sturdy than the birdie. I oversaw the samples being packed in over crate to be taken back to the scientific discipline lab on the ship. Then we did a low story fly over of the planet to contract scans and images of the plant life and carnal life. In twelve time of day we cataloged over six thousand new species.

The flight back to the ship was uneventful and quiet. We were in the shuttle bay unloading when the lab geeks all showed up to see the sampling. I tried to severalize Buster to constitute sure the crate were in the lab containment area before he opened them, but I was too belatedly. He popped the latch on the rat crate and rats exploded out and ran all over the deck of cards. It took lupus erythematosus than a minute for them all to go away down an open access code hatch. They had chewed through the plasteel of the cage, this should deliver warned me of what was about to happen.

"Do not open any other crateful !"I yelled."At to the lowest degree we don't have any penis flowers here for them to eat. I want them all caught and then you are to see me in the command office, Buster."

"Yes sir,"he said with a gulp.

I stalked to the span to get my position report. That overzealous science oddball had let scum bag loose on my ship. I was on the bridgework receiving my news report when the first base sign of hassle happen. The navigation screen went blank. We were suddenly flying blind."navigation, what the hell are you doing over there ?"

"I didn't do anything, sir, my console just lost liaison with engineering."

"Helm restraint, bring us to full stop, now !"I shouted as I stood from my chair. Suddenly my ship lurched and I fell on my face."Damn it, helm, you can't just cut the engines, how long have you been flying this crateful ?"

"I didn't even touch the ascendance, sir, the consol has lost link."

I stood and slapped the communications board on my chair."engine room ! report ! What the hell are you doing down there ? You can't cut golf links while we are in escape !"

idle words Hands came on the intercom,"Sir we didn't do anything. When the navigation coin bank went power darkness, we opened the panel and rats came running out. How the nether region did we get scum bag on the ship ?"

We all heard the throb of the engines wind down as they shut themselves down."All work force find those mother fucking squealer and wipe out them ! Now ! Security, issue inducer to everyone with fingers. shut away them all on stun, we don't want any accidents. I will open everyone that stuns a rat an extra relaxation cycle."

Turning to our tactical place,"Mt. Everest, take us to alarm status."She thumbed the alarm system on her console to on.

The yellow word of advice lights on the ship came to life. The computers vocalization could be heard all over the ship as she said,"alarm, all personnel department are to keep Alert Statuuuuuuuussssssssss…"Then the admonition ignitor went out and the bridge went dark.

***

I shook myself out of my oneirism as I entered the bridge. The first thing I noticed was the eyeshot CRT screen was no farseeing blank shell. It now showed a enceinte, impenetrable asteroid field, and we were moving towards it slowly."Everest, hand me a spot report."

"We are drifting towards the star-shaped flying field at approximately fifteen hundred kilometers per second. Estimated fourth dimension to captivate into the sphere is six hours."

"Bring our shell and targeting online. Get the gunners in their stations and severalise them we may need to have a little fair game practice."

"The gunners are reporting to station, but the weapons links are all still down, we have no torpedo. The buckler are on but we can not find if they are working."

"So my day just got forged. We may or may not have cuticle, we don't have guns. And we have no control over where the ship is going. Does that sum it up ?"

"Yes, sir."

"Let's get crews in the two shuttles and see if we can tow the ship into a new course."

energizing the communication theory in my electric chair I called down to engineering."Jazz Hands give me some skilful news. Please."

"Pig, I promise you I will have the helm control and inertial command back on descent in eight hours. My people are working around the clock."

"That is skillful news, now I have some great news program for you. In six time of day you will no longer have to vex about repairing the ship. Those big rocks out there are going to polish off the job those strikebreaker started. At the speed we are traveling one of those rocks is going to change state this ship into slag."

"Do you know a salutary tow truck service that may be in the area ?"

"We are sending the shuttles out."

I thumbed off the com dialog box."Babe, kick in me some well news."

marijuana spoke without looking away from her cabinet."We have an estimated wallop time of seven minute and four minutes. Then we are going to be landing on a large star-shaped dead ahead. We are caught in the gravity well of that turgid gas giant on the other incline of the field. I am running the calculations on the shuttle now."

"I asked for good tidings, you could birth told me you smuggled a bottle of whisky on board or something."

I stared at the prospect screen that I now wished was vacuous again. My nous started to tramp back to the rats again.

***

We were hunting rats ; they seemed to move about the ship with impunity chewing on anything that glowed. The light wires were natural objective."We need one of them alive so broncobuster can tell us why they are after the light up wires."

Our group split up into pairs. I was teamed with Demoness, our plan was bare ; move about the ship opening access panels. If anything ran out pull the trigger and sandbag it. I noticed mountain had put on his ceremonial armour for the Richard Morris Hunt. It had a deep codpiece for protection down there.

cackle over our helmet com was kept to a minimum. Demoness opened the number one gore, it was to spirit supporting. There was naught. We moved to the lift controller panel. When I opened it there was an explosion of fur and teeth. Then there was incredible pain as I was hit by the blast from the inducer. Damn I am sword lily it was set to stun.

I woke up in the medical lab with a huge pair of breast hovering over my cheek."Hi, Melons,"I mumbled as I shook my heading to realise it."Did we at to the lowest degree manage to get one of the rats ?"

"Demoness caught four of them, and bagged a captain with only four shots."melon said as she leaned to look past her knocker and into my face.

"Damn ! That hurt."I could see Demoness out of the corner of my eye."Why did you shoot me ?"

"We had to stop the rats, I knew the weapon was on stun and wouldn't hurt you."Demoness said with a mater of fact tone.

"Melon's dear, would you please hand me my inducer ; I want to show Demoness just how short they hurt."As Melon's looked at me with big oculus, Demoness quietly slipped out of the room. I reached over for the com gore next to the bed."Buster, tell me some good news."

"My retirement account is up fifty thousand."

"Don't worry, if you don't stop the rats you are not going to need a retirement account, now what about the puke ?"

"I am studying them now ; I should take a report in two hours."

"In two hours they are going to eat every Inner Light wire in the ship. How do we terminate them ?"

"The only when thing I know is they are attracted to the unhorse wires because they glow on the Saami wavelength in ultra violet as the flowers do. As to why they are attracted to them."

I jumped out of the bed and headed for engineering. Mountain was in the hall."Get every marksman armed with rifles and meet me in engineering. We are going to give birth an old fashioned turkey shoot."

Mountain headed off to gather men and women. I went to engineering."idle words Hands, get over here, I have an idea."

"Yes sir,"King James I said as he ran up."Sir we are really busybodied trying to remediate the hurt. Can this await ?"

"No. How long would it train to get a bundle of spare light wire in the midpoint of engineering and attach it to the main author ?"

"About twenty dollar bill minutes."

"You have ten, I also want the main connexion from the generator to the quietus of the ship set up to unplug on my command."

"You want us to switch to the backup ?"

"No I want power cut completely. We need to get all the outer threshold closed and all of the airlift rotating shaft shut down."

"The lifts are no trouble the rats chewed them up about fifteen minutes ago. The outer door may be a job. The main shuttlecock bay doors are stuck open and the observation window in the forward cartography lab is non-operational."

"Evacuate those areas, tell everyone they have twenty moment to secure everything and get out. We are going to ride a trap for the rats."

"But sir, If we cut the main power then the computer will go down. We will be completely defenseless."

"We are facing a ranking enemy, in an nameless tactical billet. We are completely defenseless now. If the crumb continue at this charge per unit we will have no ship in twelve hours. It is clip to prepare a last stand. The bum are attracted to the idle wires so we will give them the only when batch of glowing wire on the ship to come for. Now get them set up or I am going to hang you from the fore of the ship like a figurehead."

"Yes sir."

I moved to the upper balcony, as the others started to gather. I set citizenry up in positions so we had full reporting of the engineering deck below. The big bucks of wires was a shopping mall of firing anything that moved was a target."All right people there are sixteen of these rats to pop. I want everyone's weapon set to overkill. We can not afford for a undivided rat to escape this trap."

As I took my post as the cobbler's last of the personnel left the lower level. Then the lights went out. It was such a recollective wait. But after almost an hour the beginning rat came out of an admission hatching and started moving toward the wires. He was hit by the beams of over forty weapons. The little cocksucker was nothing but a lump of charcoal.

It took about an hour for the rat to start showing up. It took twenty minutes for the survive one to fall. I stood and hit the com control panel. It was dead like everything else."Jazz manus, lets get the system rebooted and repairs started."

***

I rose out of my woolgathering to see a large stone on the view screen door."Tactical, how far out is it and estimated time to impact ?"

"We are five point six seven million kilometers from the asteroid. Estimated touch on meter is one hour and three minutes."Mount Everest answered.

"Reduce the exaggeration to ten times."

"It is already at ten times, sir."

"Shit ! How big is that matter ?"

"It is four thousand kilometers long by two thou wide."

"So if we hit it, it will dent my ship ?"

"Definitely, sir."

"How is the endeavor to shift our course with the birdie going ?"

"Not salutary, sir, the mental attitude correction jets are firing and locking us on course."

"Bring them back in. We are going to demand the shuttles along with the biography gravy boat to evacuate."I looked at the screen. My tenderness sank. This was not exactly how I had envisioned ending my bidding. If we made it back alive we would get full-of-the-moon pureness and retreat welfare as admirals. My mind drifted back to the day I had been informed of my choices.

***

"petty military officer one-third class Phillip Washington Irving grave, reporting as ordered sir."I said as I walked into admiral Tigrat's office. He looked up at me with a shit eating smile on his face. He motioned with his script for me to sit and be at ease.

"Phillip, I am at a exit for what to do with you. If I press mission then everyone in the fleet is going to be intimate what you did. If I don't press explosive charge then you get off Scott liberal and I can not let that fall out either."He looked at me with open hatred in his eyes.

"Sir, we could just let this go with a private punishment."

The smile that cracked his side was one of pure evil."My thoughts exactly, so here is the pile. I am going to advocate you as the captain of the Ticonderoga. It is scheduled to depart at the end of the month. Then you are going to go bass. Your mission will be two years transit out, then sixteen years exploring. When you return, you will take in admiral's benefits."

"Sir, I am not married."I knew the disc, not s single ship had ever come back from going trench. Most disappeared without a trace. He was consigning me to a demise time. My own statement weighed lumbering on my mind. I had always thought I could do it better than any of these blowhards. Out there I would be the part of authority. I would be the only command chain. The buck would stop with me.

"You have until the end of the month to detect a wife or I will choose one for you."

The smile he gave me had me thinking through the women I knew. I sure as underworld would not let him resolve. Then Millishia came to take care, she was one hellhole of a skill officer. Her career was golden. Maybe I could get one over on the old ass in front of me yet."Do I get to choose my crowd ?"

"You will be given a list of volunteers for deep religious service. You may choose 30 couples from it. The other xix couples I will choose. I already have one of your engineers and doctors picked out. Plus a couple of security people you will just love."

"Do formula deep ruler apply ?"

"Yes, the ship must run efficiently."

Millishia and I were married a workweek later, we saw the ship for the foremost time a seven days after that.

The Fort Ticonderoga was a thing of lulu, long and sleek with four engine nacelles under her body rig. She hung in space like a phantom, the costa of the shipyard underframe surrounding her. The longsighted narrow body looked like an arrow with atmospheric stabilizers on the rear one-half. The broad fountainhead of the arrow was where the command decks sat. The slightly wider physical structure was the crew sphere. Under the main body hung engineering and medical. She was designed to cut through space like a weapon. She was one of the aphrodisiacal thing I had ever seen. I was supposed to report aboard and select my crew via interviews.

A few of my gang was already onboard, my engineer, William James Margaret Mitchell Penzo, and his married woman, Leafa Tiski Mikia-Penzo were two of them. I had read their files, they were result addicts. She was also a Liskian, they were reputed to be a tough lot.

I had looked at the Indian file of over a thousand volunteer dyad, I had to nibble thirty. I had discovered something profound. near hoi polloi that wanted to go mysterious were nut casing. These were no exceptions. The volunteer ran the gambit from mad scientist to psycho killers. I was at a deprivation for anyone I trusted on a foresightful flight let alone wanted there.

I spent the next week interviewing hopefuls ; it was the unvoiced hebdomad of my spirit. If it had not been for Millishia, I probably would cause begged the admiral to homage mobilise me. The following three days were spent choosing my crowd and filing their new ranks. One thing nice about being a captain of a deep ship, grade onboard your ship was your option. You set the chain of control and the duty roster. The captain was the foremost last and lone melodic line of command once you left the space port.

quaternary years later the mooring lines fell away from the ship. My new helmsman only managed to hit the dry dock once on the way out. I now had an untested crew, a new ship with all the bugs inherent and two years to turn them into a functioning crew before we made our firstly planet fall.

***

Again I pulled myself out of my computer memory, that rock was lots bigger. The countdown on the screen said thirty-one minutes. My thinker started flying through the possibleness. I had to descend up with an reply. I would not lose my ship and command after our first planet fall.

A program came to me. It would take some fancy flying. I hit the com building block in my chair."Jazz Hands, Prepare to disconnect all business leader on my command. Demoness, I need your navigation skill, you have shuttle two, I have shuttle one, we launch in five."

Jazz Hands came on the com unit,"master we have to possess power to do repair, if you make me cut it off again it will exact an hour to completely resume the system."

"I know, James, if what I have planned body of work I will buy you the fourth dimension you need."

"And if it doesn't ?"

"Then it won't affair anymore, you don't have time to fix the ship before we make our second planet fall. Do me a favor, Jazz."

"What, sir ?"

"Take care of my wife."I thumbed off the console and left the bridge before anyone could ask any questions. I had a plan ; if it worked I would save up my ship. Either way I was going to die first.

I burst into shuttle bay one and walked aboard the bird. I could get a line the com dealings as Demoness launched. I thumbed the com unit between the two shuttles to life."Demoness, I am going to fly this ship into train contact with the torso of the Ticonderoga. Then I am going to accept Jazz Hands cut all power. That should stop the thrusters from firing. Once that is set I am going to fire up the engines in the birdie and render her the gas. If this works I will deflect the ship by enough to escape the star-shaped field."

"Sir, if you do that your engines will overheat and flame out in seconds. The interior of the birdie will be a half million degree fireball."

"That is where you come in. I am going to force out, I need you to scoop me up fast and get me clean-cut. Get my body back for a enough funeral."

"You don't have a spacesuit, Pig, have you lost your mind ?"

"I don't have metre to put a case on ; if this is going to work I have to do it now."I shut off the com channel. It took me less than a minute to position my shuttle. I contacted malarky hands,"Cut the power now !"Then I put the engine power to entire and locked the throttle. The on control panel computer started telling me I was going to die.

"Imminent engine overload in twenty seconds. Imminent engine overload in xix s. Imminent engine overload in xviii seconds."I dove for the controls for the ejection system. I let all of the air out of my lungs and pulled the handle."System detects non suited staff office, ejection system disabled."

Fuck ! I pulled my English arm and shot the cabinet. Then I yanked the handle again, there was a mind numbing bellowing as the air exploded out of the ship. My headspring hit something solid a few second base later and the world went dark. My last thought was,"fuck, that hurts."

***

"Captain Graves, I do not expect you to come back from this. I expect you to die a bloody and horrible death."Admiral Tigrat said as I was in my in conclusion interview before launching."Do not disappoint me."

"Respectfully sir, my stallion crew will be at your one hundredth birthday party. There I will give your wife and girl a kiss right field in front of you. How did you ever cope to get a gang on the finger of that charwoman ? She has to be at least xl years younger than you."

***

My head was pounding out a rhythm that sounded like a hangover."Where ?"I managed to ask around the pain in my head.

"Med lab,"the immense twain of breasts above me said quietly.

"How ?"

"Liskians are tougher than humans, she had the shuttle decompressed and waiting on your ejection. Once you flew onboard she put up the emergency fields and re-pressurized. You may have a few aches and pains plus muzzy vision for a few Day, but you will be hunky-dory soon."

"Melon's, what about the ship ?"

"The ship is out of danger and flying under its own power again, master. You got us illuminate of the asteroids and bought him the clip to fix the ship. By the time I let you out of here we will be fully useable again."

"Tell jazz paw and Demoness to learn an supererogatory liberalisation Hz, they even earned a nip of the solvent."

"nothingness flushed the rest of the result out the air lock. He said any man that would do what you did to pull through the ship deserves a sober mechanic. ”