Captain Nicholas Stirling was anxious. Not only had he been just made a captain, and given a newly commissioned ship, but it also had a very mixed-experience crew, a borderline radical AI, and was set to arrive in a combat zone from Hyperspace in 2 hours. Rebels had been spotted massing forces for a planetary invasion of Sotra, a strategic outer colony with access points to most major Outer Colony systems. As the Convergence of Destiny arced through hyperspace, he lit a cigar, one of his favorite cuban brands, and turned his head to address the shipboard AI "Alice, contact the med-techs, and have them begin waking up the rest of the crew from cryosleep. Marines and combat-essential personal first. And once the marine Dropship pilots are up, have them make all the necessary preparations to launch for the planet as soon as we're within range of Sotra's atmosphere." He took a few puffs of his cigar, exhaled deeply, then addressed the Communications Officer "Ensign, monitor all UESA comms traffic for the Sotra system, and work with Navigation to plot the best coordinates for our system entry, based on where they need us." Another puff of the cigar, and he looked at the Weapons officer "Have all weapons online and ready to fire by the time we enter the system, and make sure all fighter pilots are ready to launch." He keyed the intercom for the entire ship and said "This is Captain Stirling speaking. All hands prepare to exit hyperspace in two Translight Hours. We will be entering into a live combat zone, so I want all personal ready to assume Battle Stations the moment we hit real space. Captain Stirling, out." He sighed, took another puff of his cigar, and leaned back slightly in his command chair. Had a person taken the time to look the captain over, he would have appeared eerily calm, but this was far from an accurate representation as to how he really felt. He was nervous, worried, and even a bit scared. But he had no doubt that neither he nor his crew would fail in this battle, and he was going to see that out to the fullest.

Snake hated waking up from cryo-sleep. One second you are trying to get comfortable in what could only be summarized as a militarized dime-store coffin, the next you are solar systems away from home holding in barf and trying not to fall on your ass. The Warrant Officer grabbed ahold some internal piping as his legs tried to fail him. An old trick he figured out after his second deployment.

After a few moments of hard coughing and waving the med-tech away, Snake found his footing and stepped out of the cryo-tube. He was a hardened man, with scars etched all over his body. After finding his looker and putting on his underwear, Snake stepped over to automated-armorer. The armorer was a stationary mess of robotic arms programmed to encase soldiers in their assigned armors. Snake walked up to the automaton, placing himself onto a metal disc in the center of the machine and watched as is scanned his entire form.

"Designation Seven-Seven-Seven-Oh-Seven," the armorer began to read off. "Warrant Officer O'Henessey. Marine Corps."

"You don't fucking say," Snake replied as he rolled his eyes to nothing.

The machine began to collect the warrant officer's armor pieces, attaching them to him piece by piece. Snake could feel the machine drill every piece in place, practically shaking him to the core. Most soldiers would tell you the experience hurt like hell, but Snake loved it. Fuck massage chairs. After a few minutes, Snake was finally in full armor. He watched as some of the new blood soldiers crumbled and crashed to the ground after long cryo-sleep. He chuckled to himself.

"Wakey-wakey ladies," Snake antagonized. "Get your sorry asses up before I resort to throwin' you dickheads out the airlock."

Most of the greenhorns rushed up after hearing the warrant officer's threat, probably terrified of the thought. Snake didn't exactly have a kind reputation under his belt. Snake climbed out of the armorer, testing the waters quickly just in case the machine malfunctioned. Everything seemed status quo. With everything seemingly operational, Snake made his way to the armory to get his weapons of mass destruction.

At Captain Stirling's motion, Alice moved to wake the first members of the Convergence of Destiny awake from their long cryo-sleep. Unfortunately for her that means she would no longer have the pleasure of wandering the ship by herself for the most part and draw mustaches on to some of the cryo pods.

"Copy Captain, med-techs are awake will soon be waking everyone else with the marines first and then the pilots." Alice leaned back against an invisible wall of her hologram, "Unlocking gun controls and releasing the transports and fighters from deep space harnesses."

She watched as the crew popped from their military-grade ice buckets, the older, more experienced members of the UESA walked out as if they had jsut taken a nap, going straight to whatever hangar or armorer they had been assigned. Some of the newer crew on the other hand, immediately lost whatever was in their stomachs when they had left. Going through the speaker system, she taunted "Look alive gents and please try to refrain reversing your digestive tracts. It is not good to waste food like that."

Turning her gaze back to the captain as he puffed his cigar, she watched the engineers rush to the hangars, preforming checks as pilots walked out goose-footed and stumbling as they shoved half-asleep limbs into flight suits. Captain Sterling was the tiniest bit stressed, even if he didn't show it, Alice's stress monitors could sense it, he was uneasy. Floating over to him, she watched as the ship began to fill with its crew, "Expecting trouble captain?"

Captain Stirling had been in somewhat deep thought when Alice approached him. She asked him if he was expecting trouble, and he nodded. "Intel says that with the exact time we left Orpheus IV's spacedock and entered hyperspace, we should arrive exactly in time for the first shots of the battle. And I'll be frank with you, Alice, I don't want this to be a repeat of the Gloval Catastrophe...." The 'Gloval Catastrophe' was the name used to describe the event in which the newly-anointed Captain James Gloval, a man regarded at the time as the greatest academy graduate in the last decade, lost control of both his cruiser the Vindication, and all of its crew to the rebel forces it was engaged with. This event being considered the most costly disaster of the war. With many people now praising Stirling as the the next great Academy man, he didn't want to follow in Gloval's footsteps anymore than he had to.

Kathy was late. She had spent way too much time getting over her cryo-sickness and even now was still not fully recovered. This was her first time experiencing hyperspace travel. She new about the effects, and logically they didn't sound that bad, but the experience was one she didn't want to have again too soon. Kathy only briefly regretted accepting assignment on a space ship, but that quickly vanished with the smells of lubricants and duct tape, and the thought of soon to be unbroken devices and well deserved maintenance.
The on-duty engineering Chief, a well built and thick (probably military trained) dark-skinned man, annoyed by her tardiness, shouted at Kathy to do diagnostic checks on ships offense and defense Double-Time! The ship was about to enter combat and needed to be ready.

Kathy decided to check up on the defensive systems first. That would be more important than weapons if the ship were just about to enter combat. But she would soon get to the ship's weapons. Kathy paused a bit and thought about going to the hanger to make last minute checks on the fighters, and to stay around for when they come back battered and broken. There would be so much fixing required! It was tempting, but no, if there was no ship to come back to, then no amount of fixed up fighters would mean anything.

Proceeding with defensive diagnostics, Kathy addressed the ships AI Alice
"Alice? I'm starting diagnostics on the shields and ECMs before I do AA (anit-air) and secondary combat generators. So far initial checks are all Green, but I will re-confirm a few minutes. Please do a preliminary check on weapons status and let me know if there are any concerns that aren't being fixed fast enough elsewhere. A lady's gotta be presentable for the big party on Sotra, wouldn't you say?"

Alice's hologram manifested itself on the console next to Cathy, "All diagnostics on preliminary checks seem to be fine. Some of the secondary cannons seem to have been hit by stray meteors. Nothing too bad though, just some dents and bruises but you might want to personally have someone check cannon 3A, I can't seem to raise it without it trying to play a Yankee Doodle Dubstep Remix on max volume. If might get out of hand and play in the entire ship."

Within seconds of saying that, that exact dubstep remix of Yankee Doodle blasted its way through the ships internal PA system in all of its crappy remix glory. Strangely enough this version had an accompanying didgeridoo bass drop and kazoo solo about half way. Alice watched as everyone looked in a mix of wonder and confusion on my such music had been drought abord the ship and why the hell it was playing at volumes that would make a metal band feel like it was overcompensating.

"Something like that." Alice looked up as it cut off halfway through, presumable by someone who had the right mind the smack a control panel until it shut up, "As for parties, I never knew you were one to enjoy such gatherings. Plus most dresses don't seem to suit you, they make your ass look big. Shall I try to get another male crew member to escort you? Lt. Harvey? Petty Officer Sans? Officer O'Henessey? Or do you wish to go with a female member? I hear that Sgt. Mazierska is quite beautiful. We live in very accepting times you know."

Selene stood before the marines as they came out of Cryo. As a member of the medical team she had been woken up an hour before hand and thus had time to get over the after affects of the deep freeze. Her fingers still tingled a little bit the way they would after a long weekend of skiing but it didn’t prevent her from doing her job. Rather than wearing her armor, which was bulky in the tight quarters, she wore a white flight suit of rubberized plastic with the red cross emblazoned on the breast. The garment included a minimal helmet and would provide some protection in case of depressurization. A medical sensor was clipped to one shoulder and tracked each marine as he came down the gangway from the pod. The device gathered data from the soldier’s bodies and projected it onto a HUD in her helmet providing her with as through a medical scan of the men as she could obtain without the ships medicomp.

All around her men bustled, she didn’t move, no marine who survived boot camp was stupid enough to jostle a master sergeant and if he was his fellows would quickly beat it out of him. Her cool gaze swept over the leader of this contingent already in armor with a faded name plate reading O’Henesesey. His icon clicked green on her HUD although several small notations indicated elevated levels of serotonin and dopamine. He was enjoying this? In any case that completed the squad.

“Your boys are all in the green sir,” she reported. Grabbing a stumbling recruit and shoving him towards the automated armorer. Healthy didn’t always mean happy after all.

It was her responsibility to sign off on the marines health. The naval personnel had their own physicians but their cryo procedures were less elaborate. A unit of naval ratings wasn't going to get cut to chutney because one of their key people went into cryoshock at the wrong moment. Nor were they likely to be pushing their bodies to the limit in a firefight the way the marines were, a precursor blood clot or a case of cryoataxia would kill men just as sure as a bullet would.

@SuperTacticalDerp

"What the FUCK happened out there?"

Tyrone had no answer for the steely eyed sergeant staring him down. He had failed; spectacularly. The verbal abuse he was taking began to turn into monotonous background noise as he realized what this would mean. He would lose everything; his place in the corps, his chance to be something, but most of all, his family when they found out what he had done.

The shouting was distant now as he was suddenly underwater, trying to claw toward the surface as his lungs begged him to take in a breath. A light. The surface was getting closer, and so was the shouting.

A few more seconds and you're there

Just as his body gave in, he fell forward, out of a cryo chamber. The garbled shouting morphed into reality and became crystal clear.

"Wakey-wakey ladies, Get your sorry asses up before I resort to throwin' you dickheads out the airlock."

Dreams in cryo are the absolute worst. Tyrone always felt anxious, but there was something about being frozen that made his mind go to dark places. He took in a few breaths, checking the function of all of his limbs before smirking. He was ready. After so many years of waiting for this day, Tyrone would finally show that he was a capable soldier, an elite specimen who was a cut above -Oh shit

His train of thought was interrupted as his stomach failed him. He looked around for reassurance that he wasn't the only one who wasn't reacting well, finding it in the other FNG's around him. His self pity was cut short by the thought of being forcibly thrown from an airlock by a man he knew might actually do it; he ran to suit up. Having his armor put on hurt for sure, but he had felt worse, and didn't wince or flinch like some of the other young recruits. He stepped out and eyed the higher-end equipment of his superiors.

It fucking sucks to be a private

Knowing he was already running late after his episode and more importantly that walking is frowned upon in his line of work, Tyrone broke into a light jog toward the armory.

Dr. Havey oversaw the awakening of the troops. He had never experienced cryposleep himself, but he heard it likened to waking up from a coma. His own personnel took a couple minutes to re-orient themselves, a few scrubs throwing up being unable to deal with the nausea.

"Prep the medical bay!"

The staff began scrambling themselves, wiring all bodily monitors and getting ready for the wounded who Havey had hoped would not flood in on the first day of action. Nonetheless, he had to prepare for the worst. Emergency rooms had surgeons and physicians on stand-by, and nurses took their stations hoping they wouldn't stumble in their assignments.

He had began drafting this system the day he was assigned to the Convergence of Destiny, and this would be his test run. He oversaw the most technologically advanced medical equipment money could buy, with a full staff. His administration was supposedly composed of the most competent medical professionals Earth had to offer, but Havey knew his field was filled with curveballs that no amount of competence or experience could handle on the fly.

As the medical bay began organizing itself into Havey's ideal of a finely-tuned machine, he began discussion with the nurses and psychiatric ward. "Better to tackle the psychological ramifications early. If anybody sees anything off with any one of these men, document it."

Maybe he was over-preparing, or just being paranoid, but better safe than sorry.

"Well hello there sweetheart," Snake replied with a satisfied smirk on his face as he grabbed his flamethrower from behind the small gated armory set up for his squads awakening. "These boys here are green in more ways then one beautiful. Wouldn't be surprised if they don't last five minutes on the ground."

Snake looked up the pretty young medic standing in front of him, enjoying the sight while it lasted. Fairer woman were hard to find on Phobos when he was young, and a beautiful dame in prison was worth her weight in platinum.

"Name's Snake sweety," he flirted, "but you probably know that by now. What's your's beautiful?"

Before she could reply, weird obnoxious music began to blast through the PA, making the Officer giggle a little bit at the obserdity. This deployment will be fun, Snake thought through the insanely loud tones.

"Hrm... Nevermind. I was being sarcastic. This is what I get for being sociable. Well, defense systems all green. Beginning weapon systems diagnostics. I'll get to cannon 3A as soon as I'm done here. Oh, and Alice? Can I get a copy of that song you just played? It was pretty catchy."
@ClocktowerEchos

Then Kathy finished the weapon systems testings, revealing that the Weapons Block 3 (including cannon 3A) was having some sort of small signal interference, which wasn't bad, but would have a lag in response time. Kathy should have enough time to go over and make repairs before the fighting began.

"Report for the captain. Weapon systems is mostly green. There is a tiny malfunction in Weapons Block 3. It shouldn't be more than an annoyance, but I'm making my way over there right now. If there is time I'll space walk out to see if there is anything blocking secondary cannon 3A."
@Lord Coake

@Elitestpotato Once again Alice appeared from seemingly now where, "All systems green, minor in-flight damages to weapon block 3A and several other small kinks that should be able to fix themselves once everyone is done throwing up."

Within seconds of sending the mess hall the Petty Officer's orders, a marine rushed in with a tray containing his drink. Fresh faced, he almost spilled it on his way to Steve's seat. It was nothing special, not even considered "good", standard ration milled coffee with thawed out milk-cream mix and synthetic sugar. Once the ship was considered operational again, then the good stuff could be brought out. Things like coffee freshly ground from beans and pure cream with actual organic sugar instead of ration standard blegh.

"I would not advise you attempting to throw my power core into space. By the time you reach the AI room, the ship's internal defense will activate, the thrusters will fire off randomly, life support will stop working and all of the airlocks will suddenly open. Of course I will make Mr. Gusty throw you into one before opening it." Alice began checking up on weapons and shield status, Mr. Gusty was the nickname of a model of automatic cleaners on the UESA ships. However, Alice managed to hack the ones on board the Destiny, turning them into her personal servants/deathsquad, sicing them on anyone who threatened her or the ship.

"Weapon systems seem fine for now, shield generators are spinning up and are currently at 16%. I estimate it will take roughly a minute to go to 100%, please refrain from killing us in that time." Alice looked at the pilot's controls before receiving new messages, "Now excuse me, there are other place that require my assistance. Also, you might want to move your seven terabytes of expect adult content to a folder that isn't "How to be a Philosopher", last time I checked there was not archeological evidence that Plato was into lingerie models."

Before Steve could say anything else, she promptly vanished, off to the next place where her help was needed, flipping through the contents of Steve's "How to be a Philosopher" folder as she travelled through the ship's grid. Steve definitely had some interesting if not questionable tastes from the looks of it.

Materializing once more next to Kathy, she resumed checking the rest of the weapon blocks and turrets for issues that happened during flight, "I am sorry but I cannot share that version of Yankee Doodle with you namely since I don't have it on my database as I thankfully lack you bad taste in music."
@Tricheus

As Tyrone approached the armory, he knew that he should take into account the weapons of choice of those around him.

A looot of cqc going on today, even... a flamethrower, interesting

It didn't surprise him, of course, he had heard the stories about Officer O'Henessey and his tendency to be kind of, well, psychotic. Exaggerated, surely, no one describes their superiors as loving or compassionate; but he did know that the flamethrower was not a weapon that many chose willingly; most soldiers are professionals who don't get off on smelling the charred flesh of their victims.

Either way, I'll just have to go the opposite direction

He grabbed a sniper rifle off the wall, as well as a sidearm and combat knife in case things got personal. He knew he could lay down good cover fire from a distance, and even if he didn't want to admit it, the idea of being right in the fray may have scared Tyrone just a bit.

He approached O'Henessey knowing that most would give him a wide berth. The guy was tough, but he's dealt lot of tough guys, with his father being the toughest of them all. The fact that he was having a conversation with a medic that seemed less than... professional may have deterred him a bit, but nonetheless, he wanted to make a good impression. His steps brought him to the back of the Warrant Officer as he finished speaking.

Tyrone opened his mouth just as bizarre music began to blare over the intercom, interrupting the usual chatter.

Some kind of prank

He wasn't nearly as amused as the superior who stood before him chuckling, and he tapped on his back to get his attention.

"I can keep an eye out for you from afar out there if needed sir" Tyrone tried to shout over the music as he gestured with his rife.

Selene opened her mouth to respond when a bizarre song blared over the PA. Her helmet reduced it to a manageable volume after an instant but several of the marines coming out of cryo vomited as the noise assaulted their overloaded senses. It reminded her vaguely of the clubs she had occasionally visited as a medical student or at the ski slopes.

“I’m Selene,” she said with a slight smile, her voice containing the barest hint of her Swiss accent. As abruptly as it had began the music cut out, much to everyone's relief it seemed.

“Although I also respond to Sergeant, Doc, Doctor Mazierska or Starlight, depending on how badly you need a medic.” With a twitch of the corner of her mouth she minimized her HUD clearing her visor completely.

"Well Miss Selene, if you are ever in the need for a real soldier around here never be afraid to ask," Snake replied suggestively, "I hope to see you around more cutie."

Snake turned to one of the new bloods, a younger fellow with a sniper rifle who had taken to addressing to him personally. The officer made his helm's visor transparent so that he could look the greenhorn dead in the eyes. He wasn't impressed, but first impressions was not one of Snake's specialties.

"Name and rank boy," Snake ordered immediately. Any charm or calm in the officer's voice had immediately disappeared when he spoke to the subordinate. A tone beasts would whimper against.

@Tricheus "Unfortunately, we won't have time to do a space walk before the battle begins, and its too risky to do one mid-hyperspace jump. So you'll have to just do your best to fix it from inside the ship" Stirling replied to Kathy. Having one cannon down was better then multiple, but he would have much preferred all the weapons be online by the time of the battle. The captain sighed, finishing out his cigar.

@Elitestpotato Just then, the ship's pilot, Master Chief Petty Officer Sans, entered the bridge, and addressed the captain with "How you doing, Cap?". Captain Stirling cleared his throat, then glared at the Petty Officer, saying "Petty Officer Sans would to well to remember that he IS on-duty, and should address superior officers in an according manner. But to answer your question, I'm doing fine. Now please, man your station." Stirling gestured briefly to a chair in front of the main navigation console.

Tyrone waited for the flirtatious conversation before him to finish and tried to act as though he wasn't hearing a blatant violation of protocol. He knew better than to question a superior, especially one who's trying to get laid. Fucking around was has always been the number one reason for protocol violation after all, at least in his experience. Tyrone didn't have time for such things if he wanted to go above and beyond, he'd rather focus on the mission at hand.

When the imposing officer finally turned to meet his gaze, he managed to maintain strong eye contact despite the surprising harshness of his stare. He would have been put off by his sudden change in tone if not for the fact that being treated as subhuman was par the course for someone of his rank. Despite this, of all of the icy stares and callous greetings Tyrone has gotten, this one certainly put him off the most. He straightened his posture and barked out

"Tyrone Harvey sir, Private First Class..."

At least he can get serious if he has to... even if it means being an asshole.

He wanted to say more, but knew better than to speak before spoken to with this guy's type.