Before the Storm by Unknown
Published on Kiith Iopia date Unknown.
Another day in hyperspace. A bluish tinted light filled the tiny viewport in his quarters. Soon the engins would need to be refueled and overhauled. Hopeing the rest of the fleet could keep up with his flag ship and his squad he sat on his bunk and took a rag from a cup of clear liquid and placed it along his forehead. Sighing as the cool fluid came out of the rag. He got into his officers uniform and took a quick look in the mirror, "Are you a man today?" he asked himself in his thoughts then left the tiny quarters and headed to the bridge. Entering the bridge he was met by the smell of warm coffee. Taking a deep breath he walked forward into the partially lit room. The officer, a lieutenant, was dozing off in the head chair just as the the commander walked to it. The Lieutenant saw the shine of the shoes and immediatly jumped up and saluted. Startled he said
" Good morning sir, uh we uh, are uh ten minutes to the 6th squad, and uh I uh ummm recieved word from the Saurus that the 9th and 11th Companies were joing us at Hapinsellus." The Commander looked at the young man who was now sweating and said in a raspy low voice
"Good work, dismissed." and with that he dismissed the night crew. Right as the Lieutenant was leaving the Commander turned and said "Oh leutenant?" the leutenant turned "The next time you decide to dose off, don't do it on this ship or we will all be sleeping with the asteroids." The stunned lieutenant turned and quickly left the bridge. The Commander grining to himself as he looked out the main view port thought back to his junior officer days and how scared he was of his Commander when he caught him sleeping while on patrol. "Helm," he said ," what is the status of the Karum and the rest of the fleet?" The young woman at the helm controls responded
"The Karum and the 4th company are all green but the 2nd squad has fallen behind due to Astrogation troubles and will be 2.2 shifts late." The Commander frowned and said to himself "We can't even get through a jump with out having people fall back and be defenceless." He turned to the helm.
"Are the 2nd's still able to get to the meet point before the enemy spots us?" The helmswoman looked at her console then tunred back and shook her head, "If they have a miricle they will make it for middle of the harvest transfer." The Commander sat up in his chair
" Open the com the the 2nd's lead ship." With a flicker the viewscreen went from blue to black and a hum began. Then a humanoid face appeared, the Commander said "Report Commander." The oldman said
"We have sustained a malfunction in our navigational sensors and will be a bit late for the party." The Commander looked back at the older Commander and said
"Sir you know we need all the ships we can get so step it up alittle more, I didn't drag the rest of the fleet out here to get shot at. Now please you have 1.8 cycles to get to the meet point. Fleet Commander out." With a gentle hum the humanoid figure left and the bluish tint came back to the window. With that the Commander sat back down in his chair. An alarm went off. "Dropping to normal space in 2, 1," There was a sharp jolt then the bluish light went away and now the viewport filled with stars.
"Helm move us away from the drop point, I don't want to get hit by the rest of the fleet." The viewscreen came back on with a woman's face, The Commander turned to see the screen
"Commander" she said softly "We are almost to the resource site, permission to deploy harvester units?" The Commander looked back at his personel data unit and said
"Deploy harvestor units in .03cycles, we are not yet a complete fleet and have yet to establish a defence perimeter." The viewscreen went back to open space. The Commanders own ships were taking position around the asteriod feild. Then something caught his eye to the right of the screen he saw dozens of tiny objects. An alarm went off just as he realized what they were. "Battlestations" he barked, a whining alarm came on and emergency lights came on. "1st Squad evade and deploy countermeasures, all fighters engage outside the defence perimeter." Just then an explosion could be seen as the ships on the outter perimeter were obliterated. "Sensors! Give me a reading on what hit ships 5 and 7!" A young man's voice yelled out "Sir Missle destroyers heading straight for us!" The Commander sat down. "Open fire, all batteries." The ship was bombarded with a light spectacle as small fighters erupted into balls of fire. Then the Commander saw it along with the bridge crew, the missle destroyers had fired a full volly of warheads straight at them. "HELM....."