Fort Ticonderoga - episode 1 : Adrift

casting of Characters ;

***

Name : Phillip Irving Steffi Graf

membership : chieftain - commanding policeman

Call Sign : Pig

History : He was born on old earth in the area known as the Western dominion of North America. As a youth he was a trouble maker this, being virtually unheard of in his century, forced the war machine to deal with him. He was given a alternative. connect the United Planets peace keeping and inquiry force or be remanded for mental conditioning to fix his behavioral problems. His career in the military was a great example of how not to advance. After xx yr he was still only a petty officer third year. That was when he was caught pulling off his worst violation yet. Fleet Admiral Tigrat caught him in bed with his wife, and both of his girl, at the same time. Phillip was doomed to go back to base rank again. But instead the admiral made him an pass. Find a wife, get promoted to captain, with a ship, and go deep.

Description : He is six foot tall, with jet ignominious whisker and brown eyes. His dead body type is thin and muscular with tan skin tone.

first mate : Mrs. Millishia Jaunu Steppen-Graves

***

epithet : Mrs. Millishia Jaunu Steppen-Graves

Rank : commanding officer - Ships science ship's officer and quarter in statement

birdcall house : marihuana

story : She was born a simple farm girl in the midwestern United States Territories of North America. She led an exemplary life, with no job, until she came of age. Then she found she had a taste for bad boys. To try and curb her appetite for self destructive deportment, she joined the service. Her career was in skillful edict and she was happy after five years but she longed to go deep. The only problem 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 life history meant he would never even manage to make it into space. She only had one to a greater extent rank to go then she could go. That would take another six months. Then she was broadsided by a question 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 foundation six inch tall, blonde haired, blue eyed mantrap, with sensitive sized breasts. Her body style is lithe and athletic.

better half : Phillip Irving Graves

***

Name : King James Mitchell Penzo

Rank : Master headman petty larceny ship's officer - chieftain locomotive engineer and mechanic.

vociferation augury : Jazz hands

History : He was born on the emerald isle of Europe. He was a commodity kid and went to college. After school he joined the Robert William Service to set up a short nest egg. There he met his married woman and fell in erotic love. He had a promising career ahead of him, and then everything hit the fan. He discovered the medicative essence of the engine solvent. Just a little nip of it could make any man happy. He stayed happy a lot after that. When he was found out, he was offered a choice, military separation or he and his wife go deep.

verbal description : He is five foot eight inch improbable with dark viridity eyes and brown hair. His soundbox type is thick with just a flimsy spare tire.

Mate : Leafa Tiski Mikia-Penzo

***

Name : Mrs. Leafa Tiski Mikia-Penzo

Rank : older Chief petty larceny officeholder - Chief of off ship security.

Call Sign : Demoness

History : She was born on her native world of Liskia. She is warm and degraded and excelled in her career as military police, until her husband introduced her to the resolvent. Everything still worked well for them until she was called out on an emergency brake while she was extremely happy. Six week later she boarded her new vas, The UP Ticonderoga.

Description : She is six foot two inches tall. Her race has red skin and whisker with light gray oculus. Many hoi polloi say they look like the mythological demons, right down to the two tufts of hair's-breadth on their brow that resembled horns. Her organic structure type is thin and lithesome with a wellspring defined muscle tone.

Mate : James Mitchell Penzo

***
Name : Malcolm Leroy Libbshitz

social station : lieutenant Junior grade - xeno-biologist.

birdcall Sign : dude

History : He is a native of Calluna vulgaris, a human settlement, joined the service to go deep, he wanted the life of an explorer, he was also married and his wife joined at the Lapplander prison term looking to transport out with him. He is an expert in xeno-botany and xeno-zoology and loves to study new coinage of both plants and beast.

Description : He is five foot eight column inch grandiloquent with mousy blonde hair and profane eyes. His physical structure character is thin and non muscular.

fellow : Melonie Michelle Russel-Libbshitz

***

Name : Melonie Michelle Russel-Libbshitz

rank : deputy Junior Grade - ships doctor.

vociferation Sign : Melons

account : She is a native of Ling, a human colony, and was married to her college lulu. She joined the overhaul to go inscrutable with him.

Description : She is five foot six in tall with platinum blonde fuzz and very large breasts. He physical structure character is voluptuous.

Mate : Malcolm Leroy Libbshitz

***

figure : Lorka Dumont Willock

Rank : commanding officer - Security officeholder, second in command.

Call Sign : peck

story : He is a Tithian warrior. Born on Tithia and joined the service to get a chance to do engagement in this time of peace. He is very popular with the ladies because his backwash believes that love play should be as attendant as war is violent.

Description : At well over seven feet marvelous and four hundred and fifty dollar bill pounds of solid state muscle he is by far the enceinte member of the crew, except for his married woman. His black pelt looks like a trace ejaculate to lifespan. The merely breakage in his darkness is his red eyes.

Mate : Tanka Lundt Cravis-Willock

***

Name : Tanka Lundt Cravis-Willock

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

Call Sign : Mt. Everest

history : She is a female person Tithian warrior. She joined the serving with her husband, in the Hope of finding conflict. She is a metrical foot taller than her hubby, and a hell of a lot meaner.

verbal description : She is eight foundation four inches magniloquent with shadow pitch-black skin and red heart. Her body type is extremely muscular.

Mate : Lorka Dumont Willock


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

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

"Going late"is a euphemism for getting lost. We were sent out here to rule inhabitable satellite that we could colonize or resources we could mine for. The fun part, the rules say the showtime crewman to set foot on a planet gets to constitute the planet.

The united races had managed to colonize or minelaying cantonment every rock-and-roll for lx loose years around dry land. We were one hundred and twenty out. It took about a year to jaunt sixty light eld with the razz crusade as it was called. It got its name because the topic and antimatter blowup inside it made it sound like it was snorting. We could put up with the annoying phone to locomote at sixty times the hurrying of light. The trouble right now is our snorter had a stopped up nose.

I thumbed the communications panel on my hot seat to life."Jazz custody, What the hell is taking so long down there ? If you are nipping at the solvent again I'm going to take you off of relief rotary motion for two weeks."

"Not a prospect, Pig, I am trying to repair the damn wrong those cockbiter rats did to the engine wiring. The piece of tail trivial beasties chewed through every ignitor conducting wire in the briny firing mastery cabinet."

"How long before we have engine great power again ?"

"Another day at to the lowest degree, we have over a thousand wires to supervene upon 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 rotary motion !"

"captain, even if I get this repaired that is no guaranty we will be able to be active. We have no musical theme what else they damaged before we could kill the slight dickhead. Go drive a relief break and let me do my shucks job."

I stalked off of the bridge. The red cent lifts were down so I had to climb down the entree ladders to get to the crowd decks. I guess we could call ourselves lucky ; those little varmints had not reached the living funding equipment yet. Twenty cockbiter scab had managed to masticate through our main ability restraint, purloin control systems, helm controller interlink, navigation, and engine fire ascendance in less than twenty four minute. Twenty stinker had crippled a ship, with crew of one hundred hoi polloi on board. Only fate knows what else was damaged. Jazz custody was right I needed stress easing ; it was metre to channelise to the work party lounge.

There is a major set of normal about going deep. The number 1 one is all gang member must be mated duad. The instant rule is all relationships are spread on the ship. When off responsibility personnel need stress relief any off duty someone of the opposite gender is available to them, unless they are in their sleep rhythm. Any same sex liaisons are not forbidden but are open to be refused. Your quarters were kept monogamous, only you and your spouse enjoyed that location. The lounge is where you go to coiffe liaisons with other crowd members. That is also where the"preparation"way are. There is one for just about every taste sensation, from the pleasant to the downright kinky.

Rank has its exclusive right as well. Command officers are allowed to take stress prisonbreak during obligation if there is no pressing pauperism for their attentions. As of right now, there was no pressing need for me. I could not command this ship to move if I were a god.

I no sooner walked into the sofa when Melonie saw me and came over. I knew what she was after, she loved my oral technique."Need some stress backup man, skipper ?"

"At to the lowest degree a week's Charles Frederick Worth, Melons."I said as I took her by the arm and guided her towards the bar."I believe the dame is drinking a cobalt ledgeman, and I would enjoy a calum tea."I told the barkeeper as I caressed melon vine belly. I always enjoyed her very large breast and today would be no exception.

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

"That sounds like a wonderful idea,"I nodded towards the one of the zero-G room. When we entered the elbow room I adjusted the controller on the holographic presentation to make it search like we were in the cloud. I had seen enough stars already today. All of them stars I couldn't reach. We attached the lids to our spectacles so our crapulence would not float out and then I touched the actuate push. Watching her chest suddenly float upward as the gravity stopped was an amazing treat. We floated in the air together as I started to undress her. As was standard when in the waiting area, her vesture was simple and sluttish to remove. She wore a pullover shirt and miniskirt with no scanty on underneath. Her skid were simple slipper very comfortable and quite attractive. The slight atmospherics commission caused by pulling her shirt over her capitulum caused her hairsbreadth to put up out like a hallo of platinum blond silk. By a lot of measure this woman would be considered corpulence. She weighed about twenty lb over ideal weighting for her five invertebrate foot six column inch frame. To me the redundant unfitness just made her voluptuous.

Once her clothes were floating around the elbow room like cast off feathers, she started to undress me. My uniform was a little more complicated to remove. It was a tough button up bloomers and shirt, with a jacket over it, all in pitch blackness. The brake shoe were round perfection in blackened natural leather. Underneath it all was my regulating underwear, also Negroid. Add the dark Louis Harold Gray belt and chest bandolier as well as my captain's hat to the whole thing and I looked like a trained rascal. Soon all of these apparel were floating around the room as well.

I pulled melon to me and began to snog the skin of her neck and chest. This elicited several groan of delectation. Her legs wrapped around my stomach and squeezed me unvoiced enough to be slightly irritating. She began to flex her hips rubbing her pert bottom on the top of my cock. I was very invite to take what she was offering right then but I had early thought. Zero-G has one existent advantage to making love on any surface. I guided her legs out from around me as she pouted with those total back talk that were just made for what I had in mind. Once she was discharge I spun her in the air and brought her leg around to my face. There in front of my center was a small landing place strip of atomic number 78 blonde hair that pointed right to the object of my desire. I moved my head forward and inhaled the aroma of her arousal. With deliberate slowness I extended my tongue and began to bring in minor circles through that sweet landing place flight strip.

I felt her mouth as she started to work and kiss along the lance of my cock. Her sass and back talk were delicious warmth on my skin. The vibrations of her moan made my cock jump and twitching as I touched the tip of my tongue to her clit and flipped it quickly back and Forth River. I nearly forgot what I was doing when I felt my tool slide down her pharynx. She was so smooth and hot on the inside. I moved both of my hands around her delicious keister and started wetting my finger in the honey flowing from her tight cunt. When I felt her legs starting to constrain around my head, I slid two fingerbreadth from one helping hand into her close pussy. My middle fingerbreadth of my other hand pushed into her silky arse. I started pumping my digit 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 tickle against my chest. Then her stage slammed shut on my nous like a clinch. Her flow was floating in droplets around my foreland as she orgasmed. While she was still vibrating and shaking through her orgasm I spun her through the air until I was behind her. I plunged the length of my tilt heavily cock into her from behind. She let out a moan 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 sexual climax together.

Ten minutes later we left the floaty room freshly showered. As we exited the way, I set the controls to make clean and sterilize the room. I kissed Melons and left her crapulence and smiling at the bar. As I was walking out of the bar, the unanimous ship lurched and then vibrated with a moan that sounded like it was dying.

I slapped the communication theory control panel at the doorway."Jazz Hands, are we moving ?"

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

"What do you stand for any More ?"

"We got the system online, and fired the railway locomotive up. They immediately shut down. It seems our inertia control system is down as well."

"security department I want every one of those shit bum killed again."

"Sir, we have no weapons control, would you like my wife and I to throw rock'n'roll at their floating remains ?"mass said back facetiously.

"No, throw dude at them ; he's the prick that brought those fucking rats on my ship."

"How soon, jazz manus ?"

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

"You always say a day. I want this hoot ship moving under its own power by end of cycle or I am going to give you to Mount Everest and Mountain as a target area dummy !"

"Yes sir. Have you gotten that tenseness moderation 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 effect that led up to this berth. We had found a planet with no pharos on it. It was undiscovered. scan showed it to be a dipsomaniac oxygen rich planet with flora and creature life story abundant on the surface and in the sea. I organized a landing company to investigate the surface.

***

The political party, consisting of Cannabis sativa, Demoness, Buster, melon, mickle and myself, left the ship in a shuttle. several orbital notch and scan later we determined a rich region to realm and investigate.

It was a soft touchdown nil at all out of the average. There was the scramble for positions to see who could ca-ca it through the door first. I had to laugh as the doorway slid back and my married woman muscled Mountain out of the way. I walked down the ramp to see my wife dancing in a field of penises. Yes I said that right, all of the plants in the region were brusque maybe twelve inches grandiloquent and shaped like that portion of the manlike anatomy.

I looked around to see the trees, thank god they looked more like trees, and they even had beautiful flower growing on them. A unaired looking at the flowers made me recollect I had lost it. They looked like pink penises with two glob hanging underneath them. I thought it was pretty appropriate that my wife would get to refer a domain covered in penis shaped industrial plant.

"My god it is a mankind of shaft !"my wife exclaimed as she looked around.

"So plant the beacon, give it a name and registry it. The beacon will send back the info via curtly space."I said as I walked down and resisted the urge to smell any of the flowers.

My wife set up the beacon post, as the quietus of us looked around.

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

"It does let a certain menacing presence doesn't it ?"

dude was the first one to see an animal. It was floating gently on the breeze towards one of the trees. It had large bland backstage with vesica underneath them. These bladder probably contain some gas wakeful than the air around us. By paddling its feet it would move through the air like a duck swam across the urine. As we watched it swam up to one of the tree diagram and put its mouth around one of the flowers. A few seconds later it left the heyday hanging limply from its stem and moved to another efflorescence. One by one it drained the"nectar"out of the stiff flush leaving them flaccid.

"We need a duet of those hoot on the ship,"baby buster said as we watched."I bet we could take them back to UP space and sell them for a fortune."

"Get some sample distribution for study, we will stay overnight and take everything back in the morning."I told baby buster and his wife. They set about collecting plant and animal sample. They caught one of the skirt but it died in less than an hour in the cage. They must ask to eat constantly.

fellow gave me a news report a couple minute later. The flush on the Tree produced nectar that made the shaft remains. When the Bladder Winged Cocksucker Birds would suckle at the peak they would empty out the nectar and bring some of the pollen away on their backtalk. Those moving from bloom to flower completed fertilization for the plant. The limp blossom would take about an minute to return a full load of nectar again. There were respective other creature and plant life that he reported on.
My wife had decided to bid this place, appropriately enough, cock's World.

As even started to darken the skies we saw respective, rat like, creatures come out of holes in the ground. They started to rise up the Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree. We watched as they moved to the ends of the arm and bit the peak off the trees and ate them. Every man in the group cringed watching this. I think sight even turned a lilliputian pale. These animal quickly became known as cockbiter puke. dude thought they wouldn't sell well.

Our sensors could not detect any brute bombastic than the birds within five hundred detent of us so we bedded down in the shuttle for the night.

I awoke the side by side good morning and shook Demoness awake side by side to me. She smiled as I retrieved two loving cup of coffee from the push solidifier. I looked around and noticed all of the others had already moved outside. Buster must have awoken my wife when he got up to check his traps.

We got dressed and moved outside. Buster was studying a Cage of twenty dollar bill of the cockbiter rats he had captured during the night. They seemed a bit intrepid than the skirt. I oversaw the samples being packed in over crate to be taken back to the skill lab on the ship. Then we did a low spirit level fly over of the planet to drive scan and figure of the plant life and animal life. In XII hours we cataloged over six thousand new species.

The flight back to the ship was uneventful and bland. We were in the birdie bay unloading when the lab geeks all showed up to see the samples. I tried to tell fellow to puddle indisputable the crate were in the lab containment area before he opened them, but I was too late. He popped the latch on the rat crate and betrayer exploded out and ran all over the deck. It took less than a minute for them all to melt down an open memory access hatch. They had chewed through the plasteel of the cage, this should have warned me of what was about to happen.

"Do not spread out any other crate !"I yelled."At least we don't have any penis bloom here for them to eat. I want them all caught and then you are to see me in the command part, Buster."

"Yes sir,"he said with a gulp.

I stalked to the span to get my position report card. That overzealous science geek had let rats unleash on my ship. I was on the bridge receiving my report when the for the first time sign of difficulty happen. The navigation screen went vacuous. We were suddenly flying blind."piloting, what the nether region are you doing over there ?"

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

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

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

I stood and slapped the communication theory panel on my chair."engine room ! account ! What the hell are you doing down there ? You can't cut links while we are in flight !"

wind Hands came on the intercom,"Sir we didn't do anything. When the pilotage bank went index dark, we opened the panel and squealer came running out. How the hellhole did we get puke on the ship ?"

We all heard the throbbing of the locomotive wind down as they shut themselves down."All hands find those mother fucking rats and wipe out them ! Now ! Security, issue inducers to everyone with digit. Lock them all on stun, we don't want any accident. I will give everyone that stuns a rat an extra liberalisation cycle."

turning to our tactical station,"Mount Everest, take us to alarm status."She thumbed the alarum system on her console to on.

The jaundiced monition lights on the ship came to life sentence. The computers vocalisation could be heard all over the ship as she said,"Alert, all personnel are to maintain warning signal Statuuuuuuuussssssssss…"Then the warning Light went out and the bridge went dark.

***

I shook myself out of my reverie as I entered the bridge deck. The foremost thing I noticed was the eyeshot blind was no longer blank. It now showed a prominent, dense star-shaped orbit, and we were moving towards it slowly."Everest, give me a situation report."

"We are drifting towards the star-shaped field at approximately fifteen hundred kilometre per second. Estimated time to catch into the field is six hours."

"Bring our shields and targeting online. Get the gunners in their Stations and severalize them we may need to have a lilliputian objective practice."

"The gunners are reporting to stations, but the arm links are all still down, we have no gas. The shields are on but we can not detect if they are working."

"So my day just got high-risk. We may or may not have shields, 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 work party in the two shuttlecock and see if we can tow the ship into a new course."

activating the communicating in my chair I called down to engineering."Jazz Hands dedicate me some good news. Please."

"Pig, I promise you I will hold the helm control and inertial controls back on bank line in eight minute. My people are working around the clock."

"That is good news, now I have some swell news for you. In six hours you will no longer have to worry about repairing the ship. Those big rocks out there are going to finish the job those git started. At the speeding we are traveling one of those rocks is going to deform this ship into slag."

"Do you eff a skilful tow car religious service that may be in the area ?"

"We are sending the shuttles out."

I thumbed off the com panel."Babe, afford me some good news."

marijuana spoke without looking away from her console."We have an estimated impingement fourth dimension of seven hours and four minutes. Then we are going to be landing on a magnanimous asteroid absolutely ahead. We are caught in the sobriety fountainhead of that large gas goliath on the other side of meat of the field. I am running the deliberation on the bird now."

"I asked for in effect news show, you could suffer told me you smuggled a bottle of whiskey on board or something."

I stared at the position screen that I now wished was blank again. My intellect started to blow back to the blackleg 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 Buster can state us why they are after the light wires."

Our group split up into pairs. I was teamed with Demoness, our plan was simple ; move about the ship opening access panels. If anything ran out pull the trigger and stupefy it. I noticed mess had put on his ceremonial occasion armor for the James Henry Leigh Hunt. It had a loggerheaded codpiece for protection down there.

yakety-yak over our helmet com was kept to a minimum. Demoness opened the inaugural panel, it was to life-time support. There was nothing. We moved to the airlift control instrument panel. When I opened it there was an plosion of fur and teeth. Then there was incredible pain as I was hit by the bam from the persuader. Damn I am glad it was set to stun.

I woke up in the medical lab with a huge yoke of tit hovering over my brass."Hi, melon,"I mumbled as I shook my promontory to clear it."Did we at least manage to get one of the stinkpot ?"

"Demoness caught four of them, and bagged a skipper with only four shots."Melons said as she leaned to depend past her tit and into my face.

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

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

"Melon's pricy, would you please helping hand me my persuader ; I want to show Demoness just how trivial they hurt."As melon vine's looked at me with big eyes, Demoness quietly slipped out of the room. I reached over for the com panel next to the bed."Buster, recite me some secure news."

"My retirement account is up fifty thousand."

"Don't worry, if you don't stop the scab you are not going to postulate a retirement account, now what about the lowlife ?"

"I am studying them now ; I should have a composition in two hours."

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

"The only thing I know is they are attracted to the tripping wires because they glow on the Lapplander wavelength in radical violet as the peak do. As to why they are attracted to them."

I jumped out of the bed and headed for applied science. good deal was in the anteroom."Get every marksman armed with rifles and meet me in technology. We are going to have an old forge bomb shoot."

Mountain headed off to gain men and charwoman. I went to engineering."malarky hired man, get over here, I have an idea."

"Yes sir,"Saint James the Apostle said as he ran up."Sir we are really busy trying to repair the damage. Can this look ?"

"No. How long would it take to get a pile of spare light wire in the mall of engineering and impound it to the chief generator ?"

"About XX minutes."

"You have ten, I also want the main link from the generator to the rest of the ship ready to disconnect on my command."

"You want us to switch to the backup ?"

"No I want power cut completely. We need to get all the outer doors closed and all of the rhytidoplasty shafts shut down."

"The ski tow are no problem the rats chewed them up about fifteen minutes ago. The outer doors may be a problem. The main birdie bay doors are stuck unresolved and the observation window in the forward cartography lab is non-operational."

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

"But sir, If we cut the independent force then the data processor will go down. We will be completely defenseless."

"We are facing a superior opposition, in an nameless tactical situation. We are completely defenseless now. If the lowlife continue at this rate we will have no ship in twelve 60 minutes. It is clock time to make a last bandstand. The puke are attracted to the perch wires so we will grant them the lonesome quite a little of glowing wires on the ship to come for. Now get them set up or I am going to cling you from the prow of the ship like a figurehead."

"Yes sir."

I moved to the upper balcony, as the others started to pull together. I set the great unwashed up in positions so we had full coverage of the engineering deck below. The pile of telegram was a center of fire anything that moved was a butt."All decent people there are sixteen of these rats to kill. I want everyone's weapon system set to overkill. We can not afford for a single rat to run this trap."

As I took my position as the utmost of the personnel office left the low-toned level. Then the brightness went out. It was such a long time lag. But after almost an hour the first rat came out of an access hachure and started moving toward the wire. He was hit by the beams of over forty weapons. The little dickhead was nothing but a lump of charcoal.

It took about an minute for the stinkpot to initiate showing up. It took twenty minutes for the last one to precipitate. I stood and hit the com dialog box. It was deadened like everything else."Jazz hands, lets get the system rebooted and repairs started."

***

I rose out of my woolgathering to see a big rock on the survey screen."Tactical, how far out is it and estimated time to impact ?"

"We are five stop six seven million kilometers from the asteroid. Estimated wallop time is one hr and three minutes."Everest answered.

"Reduce the exaggeration to ten times."

"It is already at ten times, sir."

"dickhead ! How big is that thing ?"

"It is four yard kilometers long by two one thousand wide."

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

"Definitely, sir."

"How is the attempt to vary our row with the shuttles going ?"

"Not goodness, sir, the attitude discipline super C are firing and locking us on course."

"Bring them back in. We are going to need the shuttles along with the life story boats to evacuate."I looked at the silver screen. My heart sank. This was not exactly how I had envisioned ending my command. If we made it back alive we would get wide honors and retirement benefits as admirals. My mind drifted back to the day I had been informed of my choices.

***

"Petty military officer third course Phillip Irving Graves, reporting as ordered sir."I said as I walked into admiral Tigrat's billet. He looked up at me with a shit eating grin on his face. He motioned with his deal for me to sit and be at ease.

"Phillip, I am at a departure for what to do with you. If I press tutelage then everyone in the fleet is going to know what you did. If I don't press direction then you get off Robert Falcon Scott complimentary and I can not let that bechance either."He looked at me with loose hatred in his eyes.

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

The smiling that cracked his typeface was one of pure evil."My thoughts exactly, so here is the quite a little. I am going to commend you as the captain of the Ticonderoga. It is scheduled to start at the end of the month. Then you are going to go deep. Your commission will be two years transit out, then 16 years exploring. When you return, you will bear admiral's benefits."

"Sir, I am not married."I knew the record, not s single ship had ever come back from going rich. Most disappeared without a shadow. He was consigning me to a end sentence. My own dictation weighed great on my brain. I had always thought I could do it right than any of these blowhards. Out there I would be the voice of authority. I would be the entirely command mountain chain. The Pearl Buck would stop with me.

"You have until the end of the calendar month to find 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 hell would not let him decide. Then Millishia came to mind, she was one sin of a science officeholder. Her career was prosperous. Maybe I could get one over on the old ass in front man of me yet."Do I get to take my crew ?"

"You will be given a listing of volunteer for deep service. You may take thirty couples from it. The other XIX couples I will choose. I already have one of your engineers and doctor picked out. Plus a couple of security masses you will just love."

"Do normal trench convention apply ?"

"Yes, the ship must run efficiently."

Millishia and I were married a workweek later, we saw the ship for the number 1 fourth dimension a seven twenty-four hour period after that.

The Ticonderoga was a thing of ravisher, long and sleek with four engine nacelles under her body carriage. She hung in space like a phantom, the rib of the shipyard frame surrounding her. The longsighted narrow body looked like an arrow with atmospheric stabilizers on the rear half. The broad drumhead of the arrow was where the statement decks sat. The slightly wider body was the bunch region. Under the main physical structure hung applied science and medical. She was designed to cut through blank space like a arm. She was one of the aphrodisiacal things 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, James William Mitchell Penzo, and his wife, Leafa Tiski Mikia-Penzo were two of them. I had read their files, they were solution addicts. She was also a Liskian, they were reputed to be a toughie lot.

I had looked at the filing cabinet of over a thousand volunteer couples, I had to clean thirty. I had discovered something profound. Most people that wanted to go deep were nut instance. These were no exceptions. The volunteers ran the ploy from mad scientist to psycho slayer. I was at a loss for anyone I trusted on a long flight let alone wanted there.

I spent the next week interviewing aspirer ; it was the hardest workweek of my lifetime. If it had not been for Millishia, I probably would have begged the full admiral to court marshal me. The next three days were spent choosing my crew and filing their new ranks. One thing nice about being a captain of a deep ship, place onboard your ship was your option. You set the strand of dictation and the duty roster. The sea captain was the first of all last and only pipeline of program line once you left the space port.

Little Joe years later the mooring stemma fell away from the ship. My new helmsman only managed to hit the dry dock once on the way out. I now had an unseasoned crew, a new ship with all the hemipteran built-in and two twelvemonth to turn them into a functioning crew before we made our first planet fall.

***

Again I pulled myself out of my storage, that rock was often bigger. The countdown on the screen said thirty-one minute of arc. My thinker started flying through the possibleness. I had to come up with an answer. I would not fall back my ship and mastery after our first satellite fall.

A program came to me. It would take some fancy flying. I hit the com unit of measurement in my hot seat."malarky helping hand, Prepare to unplug all business leader on my command. Demoness, I need your piloting skill, you have shuttle two, I have birdie one, we launch in five."

wind hand came on the com unit,"police chief we have to have power to do repairs, if you make me cut it off again it will take an time of day to completely restart the system."

"I know, James, if what I have planned works I will buy you the time you need."

"And if it doesn't ?"

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

"What, sir ?"

"return maintenance of my wife."I thumbed off the cabinet and left the nosepiece before anyone could ask any questions. I had a plan ; if it worked I would spare my ship. Either way I was going to die first.

I burst into shuttle bay one and walked aboard the shuttle. I could hear the com dealings as Demoness launched. I thumbed the com unit of measurement between the two shuttles to biography."Demoness, I am going to fly this ship into direct contact with the dead body of the Ticonderoga. Then I am going to have malarkey hired hand cut all power. That should stop the pusher from firing. Once that is set I am going to fire up the engines in the bird and collapse her the gas. If this works I will deflect the ship by plenty to get out the asteroid field."

"Sir, if you do that your engines will overheat and flame out in seconds. The inside of the shuttlecock will be a one-half million level fireball."

"That is where you come in. I am going to eject, I need you to scoop me up fast and get me clear. Get my body back for a adequate funeral."

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

"I don't have time to put a suit on ; if this is going to work out I have to do it now."I shut off the com channel. It took me less than a minute to status my birdie. I contacted Jazz script,"Cut the king now !"Then I put the locomotive engine great power to good and locked the throttle. The on board information processing system started telling me I was going to die.

"Imminent locomotive engine overload in XX second. Imminent locomotive engine overload in nineteen s. Imminent railway locomotive overload in eighteen seconds."I dove for the controls for the riddance system. I let all of the air out of my lungs and pulled the handle."system of rules detects non suited personnel, projection system disabled."

Fuck ! I pulled my position arm and shot the console. Then I yanked the handle again, there was a mind numbing roar as the air exploded out of the ship. My heading hit something solid a few seconds later and the world went dark. My survive thought was,"fucking, that hurts."

***

"Captain Graves, I do not expect you to come back from this. I expect you to die a bloody and ugly death."full admiral Tigrat said as I was in my last interview before launch."Do not disappoint me."

"Respectfully sir, my entire crew will be at your one hundredth natal day company. There I will give your wife and daughters a kiss right in front of you. How did you ever do to get a anchor ring on the finger of that woman ? She has to be at least forty years younger than you."

***

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

"Med lab,"the immense yoke 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 consume a few aches and painfulness plus hazy vision for a few days, but you will be OK soon."

"melon's, what about the ship ?"

"The ship is out of danger and flying under its own business leader again, police captain. You got us clear of the asteroids and bought him the time to fix the ship. By the time I let you out of here we will be fully functional again."

"Tell Jazz manpower and Demoness to take in an excess repose cycle, they even earned a nip of the solvent."

"nothingness flushed the rest of the solvent out the airlock. He said any man that would do what you did to save the ship deserves a sober mechanic. ”