by

Yanick Champoux (38%)

Lee Watts (18%)

Josip Nað (17%)

Michel Lacombe (16%)

Dorian (4%)

goldkngt55 (3%)

Andrew Avila (2%)

Marten (1%)

Oliver (1%)

Part 25

Lee Watts (11/01/2002)

Captain Al-Mal sat in his ready room, reviewing the logs for the past day of transit into and out of the system. A few diplomatic envoys, a returning frigate from the Stigmata front, two freighters of grain and miscellaneous food stuffs and an avesti scout ship. The captain pulled up the details of the avesti ship. A three member crew, low yield weaponry and they had allowed the ship to be inspected without complaint. Must unusual. He was beginning to review the data files of the three priests when the door buzz sounded.

"Enter."

The blast resistant door parted. An ensign, dressed in Li Halan dress uniform with matching charcoal turbine and polished knee books entered and saluted the captain.

"At ease, Ben," said the Al-Mal as he put down the datapad that he was reading.

"Captain, I bear an urgent message from Central System Command." The ensign stepped over to his commander and handed him another datapad and stood waiting for a response.

"So, how is the family, Ben? You heard from mother?" Al-Mal said as he took the pad and began to read.

"Our mother sends her love and requests to know if you will be accompanying me home on our next holiday. Your birthday is coming up soon and *"

Al-Mal waved off the comments. "How long have you had this transmission?"

"EW, Less then 20 minutes. I was replying to standard requests for the rest of the fleet when this came in from planet side."

"We have an outbound ship," said Al-Mal as he turned his attention to the internal ship's com system. Flicking a switch, "Attention all personnel. This is the Captain. Battle stations. Repeat, battle stations." He rose from his chair and moved toward the door, realizing the look of shock on his little brother's face. "Don't worry about this one, we have 5 hours before they reach us and the gate. And the report said they only had one main gun.

"I'll see to it that you get home in time for the holiday," trying to comfort his little brother with a smile. "And tell mother, I will be there for my birthday. Come on now, I need you to communicate with the rest of the fleet so that we can capture this Fearless Baboon. Seems they have stolen something that they should not have. And impinged the reputation of Baron Takishi Chan and you know how he can be."

Gate duty was generally very boring. 90% cleaning the decks and system checks with just 10% real activity. And Battle Stations was rarely called onboard the destroyer. The door opened on an explosion of activity on the bridge. Slapping his little brother on his back and giving him a slight nudge, the two brothers emerged to do battle. One had seen real conflict and one was about to experience it for the first time.