---

The time was 9 A.M., according to the clocks on the I.S.S. Prize, and the Away Team was gathered with Captain Nick Carabello in the Situation Room. Today was supposed to be the day that they finally entered Kepler's Passage, a stable wormhole at the edge of ISA space, and explored the unknown wonders waiting on the other side. Today would not be that day.

The flickering-blue lights of the data screens were the only thing keeping the room lit. It was always dark in these rooms. Carabello didn't know why. Were the designers going for dramatic atmosphere? Probably. Starship designers were always nerds.

Nick shook his head a bit, only to himself. It wasn't important right now. With a deep breath and a bit of nerve, he turned to face his senior staff.

"A situation has developed," the Captain started. Good managerial voice- clear and with volume. "Actually, two have. One then the other."

The Captain goes on to explain that, as most of the crew probably knows, there's been an uptick in the pirate presence in the Rivera Sector. The Rivera Sector is, unfortunately, where the Kepler's Passage wormhole is located. It's also where a small transport ship had the bad luck of passing through. The transport was civilian, mostly human families, and headed to New Paris on Europus Colony. Now that transport was drifting emptily in space, and those families were headed to a slave auction.

Or, so the pirates said. It could just be an empty threat. The pirate's leader, an alien named Captain Du-Vos, was old and looking to retire on heaps of money. He demanded an outrageous ransom for the Terran captives to be returned. Much more than he would make selling them as slaves. More than ISA was willing to pay, in fact, and seeing as the Prize was already nearby...

"We're being sent to resolve it," Carabello concluded. "So, uh, we won't be passing through the wormhole today, if that were not clear by now. We'll be fighting pirates instead. Pirate slavers. This wasn't how I wanted to start today, but here we are."

He waits for general reactions from the crew, then marches on.

"Alright, alright, so we're gonna split up into teams to deal with it. Francesca, you and me are going to hail their ship and see if we can convince the pirates to hand the hostages over willingly. If that doesn't work, I need two other teams set up."

The first group, simply named Team Alpha, had the more obvious task. They would take a lightly armed shuttle out of the Prize's small docking bay, and attempt to sneak up on the gigantic pirate vessel. "There's a small but vital gap in their sensors," The Captain explains. "If you can dodge their sensor sweeps and land on the rear of the ship, they shouldn't see you. Then you can teleport into the cargo bay where our civilians are being held. Move quickly, and you'll have the hostages gathered together and teleported onto your shuttle in no time. Then fly on back home. Too easy, right?"

Right. The cargo bay would have guards, obviously. That was Team Beta's job.

Nick smirked a bit. "I'm a little shocked at this part. Most pirate captains are more clever, you know? But Du-Vos just left the transport ship floating there, all empty, with its weapons intact. If we can board it, and get it booted up, it's basically a fighter. Big and slow, sure, but it can shoot.

"If Team Beta can get the transport booted up, the Prize and it will both attack the pirate vessel at the same time. With some luck, that'll make enough chaos to have Du-Vos call in the cargo bay guards to battle stations. The bay will be empty, and Team Alpha can slip in and slip out with minimal bloodshed."

Another pause for reactions.

"So, I'm not forcing anyone on this trip. It's dangerous, I know. And my goal as Captain is always to save my crew's lives, not throw them away. Now, I'm asking Lt. Faust to join Team Beta. I am not ordering her," Carabello gives Faust a quick glance, "but I am asking. Nobody else is getting that transport's engine fixed in time. For everyone else: if you're out, no shame. You may exit the room now." He waits for a moment. "For the ones still in, you can tell me which team you're most comfortable on."

One last deep breath. "So, any questions? Comments?" He smirks a bit. "Complaints?"

Geu’rach Koh Ve’tame sat at the center of his dimmed-lighted quarters, bathed in the light of the only ceiling lamp presently active within the room. His massive form remained still and quiet against the ambient humming of the ship while he seated himself crisscrossed upon a highly detailed rug, detailing a halo with rows of feathered wings pattered at the center. Gue'rach's head was leveled downwards, eyes closed, and pointed a meter away from the palms of his conjoined hands. Flanking around him were a duo of small plates emanating fumes of incense that rose and clouded his atmosphere.

It was his hour of meditation; a routine activity he participated once every single day, typically in the early hours and before his shift started. It was the moment for him to collect his thoughts and find the inner peace to lose himself, surrendering his mind into a trance state. Aside from the few hours of natural rest he would allow himself, this was the only other session of idleness an Auval’kotor warrior was allowed. The meditation he undertook, believed and honored by the majority of his people, was the time to alleviate himself of stress and to remove the negative thoughts that could influence his state of mind and hinder his performance. The Auval’kotor regarded such elements as distractions, deserving to be cast aside in favor of peak awareness and readiness should the time for duty or conflict be nearby.

Such as the sudden and unexpected beeping that emanated from his communicator. While the sound the communicator gave off was reasonably quiet and usually localized to only the user's vicinity, the noise seemed much louder to the meditating Auval’kotor as it broke his concentration. Gue'rach groaned with displeasure but remained cool level-headed as he tapped the device, opening the incoming channel between him and caller.

"Ve’tame, here."

The voice that that replied was that of Captain Carabello's. The message was brief and the order clear; Gue'rach was being summoned to the ship's situation room. The room was typically used for meetings that involved the I.S.S. Prize's senior staff, especially with developments that came unannounced. Awareness of this fact spread throughout his mind and preparedness instilled itself through his veins.

"Understood, Captain." Gue'rach replied before the channel was mutually cut.

---

The Auval’kotor's four eyes darted over the data screens and extrapolated the information they provided. While Captain Carabello gave his briefing, which Gue'rach was wise enough to listen to, Gue'rach compiled several scenarios and potential sequence of events that could transpire. The plan Carabello laid out required three steps; establishing communications with pirates in order to 'negotiate' with them while two teams are deployed to accomplish differing tasks. Team Alpha would slip past the pirate vessel's sensor blind spot to await a coordinated attack both the I.S.S. Prize and Team Beta's commandeered transport ship, allowing them to evacuate the hostages during the ensuing chaos.

The plan was sound, though Gue'rach scanned through the tactical readouts of the pirate vessel they would be up against. The ship was impressively armed, even rivaling the armament the Prize possessed, as well as potentially matching shield and hull durability ratios. A one-on-one fight, while perhaps winnable in the Prize's favor, would take too long and risk locking the two ships into an attrition battle. Not ideal. Having the transport ship in the eventual battle could improve their odds in winning but not by much. The readouts of the transport ship, called the Moray, were, in comparison to the pirate ship, pathetic. The transport ship only possessed a few weapons which, at most, were used to discourage a fight with other hostile vessels and strike craft. Obviously, such ill-equipped arms had allowed the pirates to easily overtake the practically vulnerable Moray and capture her colonist crew.

Gue'rach pried his attention from both the informal screens and Captain Carabello and begun plugging in some figures into his datapad to work out a strategy. By the time the Captain was done, Gue'rach already had a game plan. The Auval’kotor rose from his seat, his height towering over the seated personnel and senior staff within the room.

"Yes, Captain," Gue'rach began, "a comment, or perhaps more of a suggestion."

He tapped a virtual tile on the datapad, enabling the small terminal to interface with the holographic screen, resulting in newer images being projected alongside the former presentation. One such image showed a top-view of the simulated battlefield, showing both the Prize and the pirate ship facing each other while the transport ship was positioned on the far right of the field.

"As we can see, the Moray is not designed for direct engagements and its armament will be limited and especially ineffective at long ranges. I propose an adjustment for the plan of attack. Commandeering the transport ship will take place the same way as originally planned. However, upon assuming control, we would have the transport ship close distance through the use of its maneuver thrusters and not its main engines. The reasoning behind this choice is that having the primary propulsion systems activate could give away our intentions."

The battle map had begun to change, illustrating the Moray gently creeping up to the pirate ship's flank under minimal power before shifting itself into a broadside position adjacent from their target.

Gue'rach continued, "by using the maneuver thrusters to place the Moray closer into a better attacking position while not alerting the pirates to our designs, we would improve the ship's offensive capabilities... and survival chances. Once the fighting commences, the Moray will finally make use of its main engines to quickly achieve a strafing vector around the pirate's ship six o'clock and opposite flank where the defensive weapons aboard the pirate ship are minimal."

The image of the Moray changed again, now showing it moving into a crescent trajectory around the pirate ship's port and starboard flanks where repeating dashed lines shooting out from the Moray's profile indicated weapons fire.

"By this point, the hostages would have been evacuated, along with Team Alpha escaping the combat area, robbing the pirates of their leveraging advantage. Furthermore, the maneuvering of the Moray as presented will also catch the pirate ship off-guard and place them into a crossfire between our vessels. This should force the pirates to conclude to a limited number of options while allowing us to control the flow of engagement."

Having gave his advised, Gue'rach crossed his hands behind his back and awaited the feed back from his superior or the other senior officers.

The answer to the Captain’s unspoken question was actually quite simple. Most species’ eyes reacted differently to different wavelengths of light they could discern. Since the majority of Prize’s crew were Humans of various origin, their ancestral homeworld or not, the lighting was designed with their eyes in mind. Emergency lighting was red, because red light didn’t disrupt the human eye’s natural dark vision once it was accustomed to it. The majority of human-made image intensifiers were green since they were invented since human eyes were the most sensitive to the color green, therefore they could work with significantly lower brightness than any other color, thus putting less strain on the user’s eyes. And the color blue inhibited the production of Melatonin, a hormone responsible for regulating the sleep-wake cycle, used here to keep everyone awake, while the rest of the room was kept in darkness to avoid distractions and keep everyone focused on the important things.

Prize’s designers generally knew what they were doing, at least they did in this instance, because Astrid had just gotten off a 2200 - 0600 shift and had been woken up by the captain’s summons about thirty minutes and one strong coffee ago. She listened to the captain explain the plan, studying all of the information available about Du-Vos’ ship. As soon as the subject of boarding the civilian craft came up, she pulled up the schematics of the Moray on her datapad as well, leaving them side by side.

“If Alpha’s approaching from aft, they could pack some shaped charges. Place them when they arrive and disable Du-Vos’ main drives once the fighting starts, though it would require someone who can perform EVA. Would make it a lot easier for those manning the Moray in the fight if Du-Vos was a sitting duck. Although in such an event, being stuck without sublight propulsion could drive the scumbags to desperation. Executing hostages out of pure spite, that sort of deal.” She suggested, not liking the idea of fighting in a glorified interstellar bus.

“Beta team, affirmative. Board the Moray, restore to working order, await further instructions.” Astrid acknowledged her assigned role. Four months on this ship and she still couldn’t get used to the captain almost pleading with people like this. Like she would complain, even if she had a choice. It was safe and easy work compared to Alpha team. Poor sods. “Hmm… Charon-class transport. Encountered one or two of those on salvage duty before. Magnetoplasma thrusters, that’s good. Very few moving parts, easy to fix most of the time, won’t have to carry half a damn workshop with me, assuming they’re not shot to shit.” She thought out loud, “I’ll need a pilot with me on Beta. I can plot maneuvers, but I don’t know how to actually fly it. Cake could fill that role and fly her remotely. Even with the slight delay, she’s still faster than any organic pilot. That is, of course, assuming Moray’s broadband communications array is intact, It would make sense for the attackers to disable it so the target ship cannot call for help as it’s being boarded.” The engineer summarized the technical side of things as she saw it.

She listened to Gue’rach’s proposal, nodding to herself at certain points of his explanation. “Even if they shut down Moray’s reactor, she wouldn’t have had enough time to noticeably cool down, therefore they shouldn’t notice a difference when we get on board and get it going again. As Lieutenant Ve’tame pointed out, the main drive will be a dead giveaway by thermal emissions alone. Of course any change in velocity, even small, can be detected, but at this range even getting 500 meters closer before they notice would make a difference given Moray’s armaments, and that’s quite doable by maneuvering thrusters alone. May I just suggest the Prize and Moray be kept on separate planes?” Three dots appeared beside the main projection, two green ones representing the Prize and Moray, a red one being the hostile vessel. A plane indicated by a blue square appeared in such a way the Prize and the pirate ship were placed on it and the Moray was slightly below it. Dashed lines representing the general direction of fire appeared between both friendly and the hostile ship, extending past the hostile to illustrate Astrid’s point, namely that ‘missed’ shots from either friendly ship came anywhere near the other one. “The probability is low, but I’d like to minimize risks of friendly fire regardless.”

“Do we have Moray's passenger list? Specifically, do we know how many were on board and whether they’ll fit onto the shuttle in one run?” She turned to Carabello once the previous point had been addressed.

"NAVOPCPU-6234-773, respond."

Cake was not fond of Advanced Navigation Computers. Their responses were too simplistic, they had zero emotion and were annoying to deal with. They were cheap though, and that's why various freighters and other civilian ships used them over full shipboard AI. After all, why would a company pay for a human navigator when a computer could do that for them for a cheaper long-term cost? In some cases, all a freighter needed was an Advanced Navigation Computer to take the ship from point A to point B. On safe routes, it could definitely save a lot of money for interstellar shipping companies, but even out here it helped with calculations or just meant the crew could focus on other tasks, such as maintenance. They even coordinated their own docking sequences, and could run communications and data between ships and stations. The pirate ship probably even had one. The only problem was that Moray's one wasn't communicating.

That could mean one of several things. It could mean that the communications array of the Moray was down or disabled, it could mean that the navigation computer had been disconnected from the communications array, or it could mean that the navigation computer had been disabled entirely. Cake began to knock through the possibilities, starting with the communications array. It seemed that the pirates had decided to go the manual route, as some of the major communication nodes had been not disabled but entirely destroyed. Most likely the pirates had told the Moray to drop shields, and then nailed the nodes to keep her from squawking. That alone told her that communications had to still be up, if spotty, but she had to be sure. The ship didn't have a lot of power as it was, so Cake had to play it safe. She tapped the few remaining nodes very gently and quietly with minuscule pings, and getting just as quiet pongs in response. Each node she pinged sent an individual response to her, the sending device's address differing each time. That confirmed to her that the Navigation Computer was down entirely - if it was up, communications, even pings, would have been routed through it in case it was a ship or station navigation query. As it was, each node she was pinging had defaulted into maintenance mode, and was responding via their own programming. She stopped her efforts, wishing to conserve the tiny scraps of power that the ship had left.

Cake could also tell the Navigation Computer was down by the fact that the Moray was making no attitude adjustments whatsoever, but that was easy. She had to look smart somehow.

As she worked, Cake kept an ear on the briefing by the Captain, having manifested herself in the Situation Room as a hologram that drifted around slowly, listening to the senior crew's plans in order to generate her own tasklist to support them in the field. Astrid's plan appealed to Cake greatly, and she added in her own thoughts and discoveries. "I'd be happy to give the Moray a joyride. I've never owned a racecar before," Cake chirps, an obvious bit of sarcasm - Moray was anything but a racecar. "Okay, maybe it's not a racecar, but at least I'll have the space whales swooning. There is a minor snag however, which Lieutenant Faust has already alluded to."

Cake brought up two diagrams of the Moray - one top down view and the other side on, and presented them both on the screens. She overlaid these diagrams with a series of green dots, each with a corresponding number next to it. "Moray uses a COMSPOKE type communication system. These are all of the transmit-receive nodes on the ship's hull, thirty seven in all. Silly number, silly system." She proceeded to turn thirty-one of the dots red, leaving a measly six dots green. "The pirates hit most of them to stop Moray from squawking, likely with point defence so they didn't do too much damage to the ship itself. While the remaining six are functional, the connection with the ship will be spotty at best. This wouldn't be too much of a problem if the Navigation Computer wasn't offline. It could handle the micro adjustments while I handle the big picture. If it hasn't been torn from it's housing, it'll should be an easy fix when the engines come back on and start feeding the ship power."

---

Mason woken earlier that morning. Life on a space cruiser has far different than what was experienced during the summations. He wasn’t uncomfortable, but the near weightlessness and the feeling of the artificial gravity upon his bones was anything like on Earth. Even now, while he slowly got accustomed to the feeling, he would wake occasionally to a sensation of falling.

Sighing, he got up from his bed and sat down on her personal terminal. His computer was linked directly to the med-bay and other various records from the crew. He spent a good portion of his time familiarizing himself with the crew’s medical history. Since he was up now, he might as well continue to look over them for a bit before breakfast. He started reading the charts involving the nonnatives. It might have been a bad idea since that would have slowed his progress since he’d essentially have to learn the anatomy of another species all together in order to understand what he was reading. That didn’t bug him though, he found it fascinating. Besides, a lot of their physiology matched similarly enough to other species on Earth that he could fill in the blanks.

He reviewed all the medical records before they took off just to get an idea for any preexisting ideas and allergies. He had to make sure that their inventory was properly supplied for the endeavor. There were some things that jumped at him, but nothing he didn’t think he couldn’t handle. While he hadn’t met any of them much before the launch of the Prize, the team seemed well equipped to deal with the new discoveries they hoped to make past the wormhole.

His train of thought was interrupted when his communicator beeped. Only a few hours passed and already, the captain was calling them into the situation room. Mason guessed that something must have happened. They were fast approaching the wormhole, so perhaps they were going to prepare for the passage. He hung out, leaning against the wall near the door, looking down at his tablet. He thought that this would just be a prep talk for what was to come. However, when Captain Carabello started talking about a rescue mission, he put the tablet down and paid more attention.

Mason listened as the technical personnel spoke about the Captain’s plan, adding information, and providing suggestions. Mason didn’t have enough technical, nor tactical experience to comment. The plan seemed risky either way. Freight ships usually didn’t have enough fire power for an all-out attack, let alone to help cover the Prize. Captain seemed confident that it would be enough, and Mason shrugged slightly. Perhaps his combat team there could make the best use of what they’d have available.

Once the back and forth was done, Mason took a quick step forward, “While something like this isn’t really my expertise, I can use the emergency medical kit aboard the shuttle and provide medical support in case any of the hostages were injured. There’s a good chance someone got hurt. I highly doubt the pirates took their wellbeing in mind outside of keeping them alive for their trade.”

Cake. She was... interesting, to say the least? Nick couldn't quite understand why she wanted to look like a hovering light. Couldn't she be a person, if she wanted to? A holographic one, anyway. Or a floating piece of cake?

Nick shook his head again, only to himself again. He needs to stop going off on these mental tangents. The crew had questions, and there is work to be done.

"Yes, yes, good points all around. Well done. I approve of Gue'rach's and Faust's modified version of the Moray plan, and of Cake commandering the ship's controls. I hadn't thought about the communications array..." Nick half-closes his eyes for a moment, thinking over far too many factors in his mind, "...but I believe it's still doable. At least, it will be if the Navigation Array can really be fixed.

"Beta Team, that means that when you step aboard the Moray, you're gonna have a lot to do and not a lot of time to do it. So I think maybe me and Francesca can buy you some space."

Nick presses a button on his datapad. A holographic image flickers to life over the gray steel table of the Situation Room. It wasn't a particularly flattering picture. The creature displayed was vaguely humanoid in shape- but gigantic, with arms that came to a tentacle-like curl instead of fingers. It's bald head, too, was covered in tentacles where the mouth should be. It puts one in the mind of a Davy Jones or a Cthulhu figure.

"This is Captain Du-Vos. You'll notice that he is a Fithagian. Most Fithagians are not pirates, but this one is. That makes martial combat something we want to stay away from- even the 'short' ones are over 2 meters tall, putting them above everyone here except Gue'rach. Du-Vos is not short." The Captain frowns. "He's also an accomplished tactical commander, ex-military in fact, and he keeps his crew loyal. But he has a weakness."

Now the Captain is- well, not smirking, but grimacing in a way that's almost a smirk. "He's not altogether a monster. He has some tragic story for how he became a pirate, but the gist of it is that he doesn't really want to kill an innocent." Various police and navy reports appear. They detail him raiding merchant caravans, but always leaving enough supplies for his victims to get home safely. "In fact, by all records, he's never even been near that slave auction.

"I'm betting he has a good heart, somewhere deep down. And I'm betting that if he thinks we might really pay the ransom- if we keep him talking- then he'll keep the hostages alive and well. With some luck, me or Ambassador Lunarius can have him 'negotiating' with us for hours. That will buy Team Beta plenty of repair time while Du-Vos is distracted. That wouldn't work with any other pirate that I've met." After a moment, and in a quiter voice, he adds "Poor old man is in the wrong line of work."

He lets the plan settle across the room for a moment, and then looks to Lt. Faust. "As for your question, Lieutenant: we don't have an exact list of names or ages. Luckily, a station worker who saw the boarding said it had approximately 20 humans. The largest of our shuttles should just barely hold them all, if they stand shoulder to shoulder. And maybe don't breathe too hard."

Robin felt a slight sting of disappointment that the wormhole would have to wait. She had been looking forward to this for weeks, but Robin was well aware of what had to be done at that moment. When they would have a mission like this her instincts and training from the Hawks would come to the surface. Robin was sitting while slowly sipping her chai-latte as everyone was contributing their ideas to the mission. She had to give the Captain credit in that he was a very good listener and was willing to incorporate other good ideas. The ideas from the others were blending in very nicely and that was when Robin had an idea of her own to contribute.

She stood up and walked over to the display of the Moray, and tapped on it showing the underside of the ship. Robin said, "I've had more than a few missions like this when I was with the Hawks." Robin never talked about her days with the Hawks to anyone. The number of times she had done it on the Prize you could count on one hand. Even if she got drunk Robin was very tight-lipped about those days. She had her reasons for keeping quiet about those days, and those reasons actually had nothing to do with a mission being classified. Robin highlighted eight oval structures scattered on the bottom of the Moray. She said, "These are connected to the environmental units." Robin turned to the group and said, "When we conducted a rescue OP like this, and if we didn't know the number of combatants we would encounter, we needed something to turn the odds a little more to our favor." Robin turned back to the display and said, "And I have an idea on how to make that happen." Robin turned to Cake and said, "I'm going to need your help to make this work, and I'll tell what that is in a minute."

Robin said to Nick, "I would go in with Alpha, and then using a gravity harness I would crawl along the underside of the ship. While I am crawling along there I would introduce a mild nerve agent through the environmental units. Not enough to put them to sleep, but enough to just take their edge off of them so things go..." Robin turned back to the display and said with a raised eyebrow, "somewhat easier. Releasing the nerve agent at 1.5 liters a minute won't set off their environmental alarms. Especially since what I have in mind is odorless and colorless." Robin began to pace as she said, "Putting everyone to sleep with knockout gas..." shaking her head and said, "There's always an odor or color to it." She looked at Nick and said, "All I need is about twenty minutes in the lab Captain. I can mix the right nerve agents in the right proportions and come up with tablets so it won't affect us. Just twenty minutes."

Turning to Daniels Robin said, "I'm going to need just six empty medium sized oxygen tanks and six "y" tubing splicers." Robin turned back to Cake and said with a smile, "I didn't forget you. You're a key to this for me Cake. I need you to make sure that their sensors and scanners don't detect me underneath the ship. I figure for you that shouldn't be an issue." She looked back to the Captain and said, "When the passengers in the cargo hold see us they're natural inclinations are either going to be panic or try to get us to save them first. If they have a bit of an edge off of them too that can't hurt. Once I'm done I'll teleport back to the shuttle, and then join the rest in the Cargo Hold."

Once Robin was finished she made her way back to her chai-latte. She began to sip it as leaned on a wall waiting for the verdict on her contribution to the plan.

Mentions:
@datadogie
@Randomness
@Jeyma

Korax, First Officer

Seated in the briefing room, Korax was silent as it listened to the situation at hand, and the conversation of the crew heads. The light posed no problem for it, not when its species had developed in an environment with low visible light in thew first place. Occasionally there was a soft hiss, adjustments of gaseous and nutrient mixtures that flowed through its life support equipment on a regular basis.

In the dark crystals glittered, indicating his position if his rocky mass did not. Points were presented and addressed in turn, the flow of conversation moving along at its own speed. Those who had expertise applied it to particular situations, adapting the plan and improving the chances of success. It was good to see them working as a team.

Eventually it spoke up. Rock shifted slightly and rumbled, vibrations racing along its form to be picked up by specialized equipment developed by the ISA for those of its species. "This one had wondered why you did not intend to go with the rescue mission," it observed as it eyed Captain Carabello. His preferences when it came to direct action were pretty well known.

So it considered the plan, and the division of responsibilities. It considered where it would best fit into this plan. "Should it be necessary, this one can accompany the Beta Team. Its physiology is suited for such an environment, and it would not seek to endanger the work by interfering with those skilled in rescue operations," it said after a few moments more. Of course it was more than willing to remain on the ship, if that was what the Captain wished

This was not the situation room meeting Francesca had been hoping for. The ship was supposed to be exploring uncharted space but instead they had been delayed by the nearby situation. Instead of making new contact with a new species and a new world, she would be stuck playing negotiator. The correct word really was playing as the ISA had absolutely no intention of negotiating with terrorists asking for a ludicrous amount of payment in exchange for hostages.

Francesca rubbed her temples as a very light migraine started, so it probably wasn't related to her medical condition. She had been getting into a juicy chapter in The Captain's Mismanagement, a rather racy novel, when the call came for the officers to assemble. As she tried to save the other hours of the day to more beneficial pursuits, such as brushing up on alien customs, practicing her music, and settling disputes among shipmates, the early morning hours were the best time to settle down in her comfortable loveseat and enjoy a good piece of sexy trash. Of course she did not let her displeasure show on her face at any time during the meeting, but the captain in the story was just about to get in a spicy situation with an alien crew-member when the call had come in so underneath she was not in the best of moods.

As it was already decided they were going to rescue the hostages with a rather direct approach, the only thing Francesca had to consider was what was the best way to keep Captain Du-Vos occupied. There was the slightest of possibilities they could reach an arrangement and gunplay wouldn't be needed, but considering the circumstances it was highly unlikely. As he was old and looking to retire, he was really gunning for a big payoff and would be on the lookout for anything suspicious, despite not being on A or B team, Francesca and the captain had the extremely important job of keeping him occupied while the others went to work.

"I'll do my best to keep the negotiations going but it really will come down to how fast everyone can do their part as we can only stall him for so long. Captain Du-Vos is experienced so I'm sure he'll be on the lookout, thankfully he also appears to be quite greedy, so as long as he thinks he is making headway in negotiations he'll probably keep trying to haggle. As long as we don't tip our hand prematurely or raise his suspicions, we might be able to negotiate for about...maybe three hour at best. This is of course only an estimate but he has experience so as soon as he feels something is wrong he'll make a break for it or try to put us in check."

Francesca put a twirled a finger around a strand of her hair after giving her assessment. "Captain, it will be paramount to make him believe he is in complete control of a situation to try and prolong talks as much as possible. Please try not to anger or incite him if at all possible. While his records show that he values sentient life as he is hoping this to be his last haul he may be tempted to bend his own rules on that issue."

While she didn't want to question her captain at all, he was their new captain and quite young so she felt it best to at least him him a bit of a warning. It was not an exaggeration to think that the entire mission rested on her and the captain's ability to keep Captain Du-Vos attention while the others went to work. Everyone would be counting on them.

Cake began to make preparations for the running of the Moray if it turned out that the Navigation Computer was online, but also diverted a touch of her processes to generating her own navigation algorithm. If worst came to worst, Cake could manually install a low-tier navigation program. It'd be annoying to work with and not have a lot of the computing power that a navigation computer itself would have, but it would be able to take the wheel a little bit. She left that part of herself writing the navigation program with the purpose of it running on the server mainframe of the ship itself than the expensive computer systems that most likely wouldn't be there.

Her core remained present within the briefing, and for those with perceptive eyes her shade of blue would dim just slightly as she worked away at her calculations. It wasn't something that she needed to do, but she did it anyways to add a little personality to herself. As a matter of fact, she wasn't stressed or too focused at all, Cake was only using a smidge of her processing power. Even as she worked, she was listening to the plans of the others, and adding to the overall tasklist based on what people needed of her, directly or indirectly. Robin's plan in particular would need some effort put into it, and even as the science officer spoke, Cake was already running calculations and a diagnostic of Du-Vos' ship. It was a pirate ship, which automatically brought down the level of difficulty, as most pirate ships were not maintained as well as legitimate ships, due to a lack of shipyard to reliably pick up replacement parts. There were plenty of other variables that changed the outcome of the difficulty level prediction. Du-Vos was an experienced captain rather than a civilian who decided the self defence weapons on his freighter would be handy dandy for robbing poor merchant ships, and so that increased the difficulty spike drastically - it meant that Du-Vos knew to keep his ship well maintained. Based on the fact he was out and about for a while, it was unlikely that Du-Vos had an updated security package, and Cake saw fit to exploit that for Robin's request. She ran a few more theories and predictions, before coming to a calculated answer. And more work for herself, too.

Cake brightened in shade again as she answered Robin. "Tapping into his ship and adjusting his sensors will be as easy as taking candy from an Ensign. I'll tap into their environmental systems, too. Don't want them turning the taps off once they figure out what's happening. Anything more than that though, and they'll pretty much know I'm in their systems. I'll be evading lockout attempts the whole way through; their security systems are bound to be outdated if he's been out and about this long, but even grandma can hear the burglar in her home."

The AI turned her attention back to the navigation program, which was complete. It definitely was not as good as a Navigation Computer, she could tell that just from the specifications that she had directed it to run on. But it was a small, transmittable package that would be able to squeeze itself into Moray's shot-up communications array, so it would have to do. She placed it in a test environment, directing it to dock a freighter with a station. It made calculations slowly, and when it tried to dock it ended up just barely scratching the side of the station and almost damaging the docking collar altogether. Good enough for what she needed it to do. She compressed it, and stored it for later use, if she even needed to use it. For all Cake knew, the Navigation Computer could be fully intact, just turned off.

“Hey Alphas, pack an incendiary grenade. Fried calamari is hard to come by.” Astrid commented when the captain revealed what the villain of the hour looked like. It was comforting to know they were not dealing with a complete monster. At least as far as morals went, appearance was a different game entirely. Still, his military background, the size of his vessel and the sheer fact he survived his path of crime long enough to retire in the first place was enough of a warning not to underestimate Du-Vos under any circumstances.

Astrid wasn’t exactly sure how twenty frightened and possibly injured people, some of whom were children, were expected to orderly stand shoulder to shoulder, but at the end of the day that wasn’t her problem. They could wrap them in stretch foil and tape them to the walls for all she cared. Nonetheless, she was pleased to hear Franchesca’s time estimate. “Assuming everything we need is repairable, three hours should be all I need with plenty time to spare to address any unexpected developments.” Of course she knew better than expecting the estimate to be hundred percent accurate, but if she prioritized her work correctly, the important things could be done. As the briefing carried on, she kept listening, turning her eyes to the deckplan of the Moray, trying to memorize the basic layout of crew compartments, service tunnels and power and data cables. Finer details could be looked up on the go as problems arose.

“Alright, that’s the rescue part of the operation more or less squared away. What then? Disarm and disable and wait for someone to come mop Du-Vos and his lackeys up, or do we set the Moray to ram them at full burn and call it a day?” Astrid asked in a voice as if she was talking about the weather or some other trivial matter. “Hardly a loss given Moray’s size, state and age, and it’s not like they’re going to charge us for the damages, we’ll be who knows where by the time anyone starts pointing fingers. Over and above that - and correct me if I’m wrong - Du-Vos and his rabble are officially recognized as pirates, therefore not protected by any law I know of.” She added with a shrug, a small part of her wishing she’d actually paid attention when the legal side of things was discussed at the academy.

---

In the back corner of the Situation Room, a decorated warrior stood at attention, keenly listening to the senior officers discussing the sudden crisis at hand. Blue light glinted off half a dozen badges of recognition as he pulled out his tablet to write notes. The wise, noble veteran focused with laser-like intensity as Beta Team discussed their strategy, waiting patiently for his turn to suggest Alpha Team's tactics.

Also standing next to him was some dude named Rod.

The muscular young human stood tall at attention in this serious atmosphere, though he couldn't help repeatedly tensing and relaxing his fists from the sheer adrenaline rush. He stole a moment to glance down at the phaser on his holster, currently set to Safety. How awesome it would be to finally set it to Kill... and against space pirates, no less!

Rod Jvwuwh'veivoirehnegqgtuiun took a deep breath and forced himself to stand still like a statue. He was still on his first voyage with the ISA, after all. The soldier had to stay on good behavior if he wanted to move from boring guard duty to a real mission. Especially a stealth mission. He would need to move through the shadows like a silent hunter, eyes and ears ever focused on the- ohh hey, who was that hot older redhead who just signed up for Alpha?

"You can crawl along my underside," Rod muttered with a sly grin.

Instantly, like a sixth sense, Rod swore he felt the eyes of his superior burning into his skull. Dammit, he didn't mean to think that out loud. Rod straightened up again and acted natural, not daring to check if anyone was actually staring at him.

Blah blah blah, more Team Beta stuff.

Wait, incendiary grenade? He knew that word. He KNEW it...it was... fire! The fire bombs! Rod allowed a small grin and glanced at the other security personnel, but they didn't seem to be paying attention to that. The tanned man took it upon himself to grab his pen and write 'insendary grenad' on the back of his hand. There. That would be his own heroic contribution to Team Alpha!

Robin turned to Cake as she explained her contribution to Robin's part of the plan. When Cake had finished Robin blinked twice and smiled at her. Robin asked, "Has anyone told you that you're awesome?" Robin nodded and said, "Thanks for your help and looking ahead." Robin looked at Rod and replied, "If the fate if the universe depended on me crawling under you..." Robin shook her head and said, "Well everyone it was good run. Hope you all had fun." With that Robin finished the last of her chai-latte, and then pressed a button on the wall. A hole opened in a wall at the far end of the room from everyone else. Robin had her empty cup balancing in her hand as she brought up to her head. She then shot it as though it was a basketball from across the room. The cup landed in the hole and Robin pressed the button closing the hole. Robin turned back to the crew and under her breath she said with a smile, "The shootout champion still reigns supreme."

As she walked back to the display the smile faded from her face. Robin was now going into what she called "Pre-strike mode." Her senses and focus were "all business" she wouldn't smile again until the mission was done. Robin highlighted six of the eight ovals and said, "I'll take care of these six units towards the back of the ship. If I try to do all eight their AI will know something is up. Even if I do a slow release of the gas." She turned to Nick and said, "Not to mention Captain, Pirates are scavengers and gutter trash, but they aren't stupid. Especially their Captains, they have better than average survival instincts." Robin let out a slow exhale as she said, "ISA underestimated a Pirate crew once, and we lost 12 people that day." Under her breath she said, "It should've been thirteen." Just then she felt a slight twinge of pain in her lower back. Robin knew it was psychosomatic, but the pain was real for her. She rubbed the right side of her lower back feeling the scars through her uniform.

Taking a deep breath she turned back to the crew and said, "Again I speak from first hand experience, if they figure out something is up they'll kill the hostages..." she snapped her fingers and said, "just like that. Probably shove them out of the airlock, but they will try to take us alive." Walking towards Nick, Robin said with great focus, "An ISA Captain and those of us in here would be far more valuable to the slave market than those hostages." She then turned her attention back to the crew and said, "All those stories you heard at the Academy about what they do to their prisoners..." Robin shook her head said, "Trust me on this, those stories are nothing compared to reality. I've seen them actually give prisoners blood transfusions. Just so they could keep them alive to continue torturing them. Don't underestimate them or their cruelty."

Robin walked back to the wall where she had been leaning against. She leaned against it and was now in deep thought about the nerve agent she was going to be creating. Her mind was already balancing the compounds and elements, and mixing and matching potential compounds for the antidote that the crew would need. The one thing she wasn't going to mention was handing out cyanide pills in case the mission failed. Robin wanted to but she felt she had said enough on the subject of what could go wrong...for the moment.

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Nick's eyebrows shot up. Carabello had a well-earned reputation as a lax commander, but the most lax commander in the history of ISA wouldn't let those comments pass during a crisis. "That is enough, Security Officer Rod..." Was that a typo? The datapad had a name listed for him, but it had to be a typo. "Rod Jvwaah.... Jvuwauhh..." Nick cleared his throat. "Uh, Rod." If you said that whole name out loud, furniture would start floating.

"I apologize for our officer, Robin. What were you saying? Oh, yes- your toxin plan is officially approved. It's a bit genius, actually." Then, listening to Faust's question, the Captain's face fell. "No. No, no, I am not going to ram their ship in two while half the crew is knocked out and their engines are down. We'll disable the ship. Law enforcement can be called in, and then someone who isn't me can decide what Du-Vos and Co. deserve."

Now the Captain was up on his feet. The sooner this mission is over with, the sooner they can be taken through the Passage and those families can be taken home. "Alright, Beta Team is looking to be Gue'rach, Faust, and Korax. You can take one of the smaller shuttles and dock it on the Moray. When it's ready to go, radio in and we'll alert Alpha team. Good luck, and come home safe.

"Alphas: Robin, Mason, and uh, Rod. You all have a job I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy." He smiled. "Waiting."

Nick orders them to get as fully prepped as they can- including Robin's nerve gas- and then take off in the largest shuttle, the so-named Fat Beetle. Once close to the pirate vessel, they were to attach right to that precious little blind spot. Without breaking stealth, that is. "I'll leave when to start the toxin release to Robin's discretion, but otherwise, you're waiting on our signal to start the evacuation. Me or Cake will send the message to begin, once we know Beta team is ready to launch our attack."

And, of course, Nick practically needed his own team. Too bad he didn't think to make a catchy name for them. Omega Team? "Francesca, you're with me. And Cake, I need you... well, sort of everywhere. If I can't get away from the negotiations enough to reply quickly to Alpha or Beta team, you'll have to take over coordinating it for me."

Nick would take a moment to reflect on how stressful being an AI must be, with everyone asking you to handle all the stuff they couldn't handle, but he couldn't handle that right then. "Everyone good? Let's go."

"Understood," Gue'rach replied firmly once their briefing had been concluded at Carabello's order, "we shall prepare immediately."

---

Preparing, however, wasn't that simple. Having thrown his lot in with the Terran Starfleet, many of the supply and logistics crews ran into difficulties equipping him with a set of uniforms that would accommodate his massive size and build. Since the Auval’kotor weren't as common as many other ISA species, his uniform set had to be tailor-made according to his physical proportions. Gue'rach would appreciate the effort the designers put in to fabricate him the necessary uniforms and clothing as he served aboard the I.S.S. Prize. In fact, he had put in a thankful reply to the department responsible for his professional and casual fatigues, to which he had received a 'thank you' from the head of staff. He wished the same could have been said when engineering designed and produced a custom-made environment suit specifically for him, again, due to his towering physique. The engineering team apparently wasn't thrilled with the project and neither was Gue'rach. He had previously submitted a request to the ISA to confer with the KIDF to transfer his personal powered armor over to the Prize; a request that had been shut down due to political rules governing the exchange program.

Still, engineering was, overall, willing to work with him to develop a Terran Starfleet powered-suit to accommodate his needs during away missions. The suit itself however was still not the greatest thing he'd worn; quite the tight fit in fact. He had been used to settling into a mechanical combat shell during his time with the KDIF but the Starfleet aesthetic was arguably less cumbersome and allowed more movement, at the cost of defensive measures. That was of course with the standard Terran model - his own was decked out with additional armor and a more robust defensive screening system. Fitting into the damn thing before it could automatically adjust to his anatomy was the difficult part.

---

After some mission acknowledgments with Korax and Astrid during a quick rundown, the shuttle trip toward the derelict Moray was relatively uneventful, but something was starting to bug him. Having learned that the pirate captain, Du-Vos, was ex-military made him begin to speculate the tactical choice of leaving the Moray close by and relatively unguarded. Surely, even the Fithagian could see the potential of a perfectly good ship being used against him. Having come to his conclusion, Gue'rach had asked the co-pilot of the shuttle to run an external scan of the Moray, to which the scan returned having found no anomalies. Gue'rach was not convinced, however.

Once the shuttle had landed unopposed aboard the transport ship, Gue'rach was the first to exit the craft, wielding a Terran heavy repeater, practically an energy-directed mounted machine gun, as a standard-issue rifle. His cautiously walked around the hanger while aiming down the sights of his cumbersome weapon while his HUD made additional scans of the vicinity, eventually concluding there was no one around.

"Clear," he reported as he relaxed from his tense posture.

Elm stretched her body on the bed, enjoying the warm light coming from the light emitters on the ceiling. While the lights were carefully calibrated to mimic the light conditions on her home planet Vathul, still lying under a strip lighting was hardly the same as basking in the afternoon sun, smelling the grass and having wind play with the leaves on her head. But you can’t have everything, especially here in the cold darkness of space.

She closed her eyes for a few more moments, carefully thinking about what she had planned for today. The Prize was finally supposed to pass through the wormhole to the unexplored part of the galaxy, but until they come across a planet with a stable atmosphere and existing flora, that was of little consequence to Elm. Her plan for the day was pretty much the same as the previous days since she joined the crew of the Prize - trying to put the botany lab and the associated greenhouses into some order, with a few breaks for stopping in the mess hall to get some sustenance and hopefully meet other members of the crew. Her kind was an extremely rare sight in the ISA space as they preferred to be left alone on Vathul, and a lot of people were intimidated by her tree-like appearance. Elm had already gotten used to people staring at her from her time on the Mars university and it didn’t bother her at all.

The botany lab was another matter entirely. The previous leading botanist, an elderly human doctor Rybanski, was no doubt a brilliant and accomplished scientist, but he had absolutely no system in his work. His notes were one big chaos, the projects weren’t categorized or often even labeled, and the greenhouses apparently went on completely unattended, some turning into jungles. Elm didn’t even have time yet to visit each of them - checking the last one, according to the incomplete notes filled with various tropical specimens, was on today’s to-do list.

Finally she got up, dressing in a version of the ship’s science crew uniform, tailored specifically for the Lavathulin body constitution. She clipped off a few tiny sprouts that appeared on her body overnight. While for most of her kind it was common to leave the shoots unattended at least until leaves have started to appear on them, Elm found it inconvenient and also unappealing. Especially after seeing how much care do human females take of their bodies, carefully removing all hair, she thought it would be appropriate to do the same.

She stopped over at the mess hall to get a quick breakfast and while munching on her favorite broccoli, she used her tablet to check new messages. Apparently the ship wasn’t going through the wormhole today, due to assisting with some pirate problem. On one hand she was glad that she had more time to get the lab in order, but on the other hand she was worried about the crewmembers getting hurt in action or hostages being killed by the pirates. Since there was nothing she could possibly do to help, she tried to stop thinking about it and got to work.

Her assistants, two postgraduate students were busy tidying and categorizing greenhouse 2 - the arctic and subarctic flora samples so she went to greenhouse 7 on her own. The air was hot and the humidity was over 90%. The conditions were maintained automatically by the ship’s computer based on the given parameters, ensuring that the plants will not die even when unattended for longer periods of time. While Elm enjoyed humid environments, the temperature here was a bit too high for her. But the plants in greenhouse 7 apparently thrived, turning the room into a tropical jungle. The sounds of insects and birds were replaced by quiet whirring - tiny drones were flying around, taking care of pollination, which allowed the plants to reproduce and take over the greenhouse.

Elm walked around, making notes into her tablet. She recognized most plants and checked them in the incomplete greenhouse manifest. Some more delicate species sadly didn’t survive in the new competitive environment. A beautiful purple blossom caught her eye. It was hanging from a liana wrapped around a tree branch. Elm had never seen that kind before and came closer to observe it more carefully. She noticed that the plant was rather extensive, its creepers sprawling around, climbing nearby trees and bushes. There was no label anywhere and none of the images in the manifest resembled the plant. There was one name without an image - Escallonia villanosa, with a vague description that could possibly match the plant - ‘climber with beautiful blossoms’. Other than that, the note only contained a couple of big red exclamation marks. Elm stood under the plant, trying to find some more information about Escallonia anywhere in the ship logs or scientific literature available in the archives, but apparently it was some new species that doctor Rybanski discovered, named and didn’t report anywhere.

She used her tablet to clip a few images, taking notes about the structure of the blossom and unique leaf texture. Fully emerged in her work, she didn’t really pay much attention to her surroundings. When she stepped back to make a picture from a greater distance, she tripped over something and fell down. As soon as her body hit the ground, she could feel light tickling, as something crawled around her legs and arms. The long creepers were moving towards her, trying to wrap around her body. Elm froze, trying to figure out what to do. If the plant was carnivorous, it was most likely very hungry after such a long time. The fact that Elm’s body wasn’t really made of flesh didn’t seem to bother it. Maybe it was just a parasitic organism used to latch itself onto other plant life and feed off them? There were many known cases of such plants. The best method to fight the parasites was usually simply manually removing them from the host, but some cases required more complicated approaches like creating chemical or biological agents to fight the parasite on the cellular level.

Elm snapped out of her thoughts, realizing that her racial tendency to overthink things is going to cost her her life. She needed to act now and think later. Jumping up, she tore the creepers from around her legs and wrists, shouting out in pain as they took part of her bark with them, leaving long but fortunately shallow wounds behind. She had to crouch to avoid low-hanging branches as she sprinted out of the greenhouse, quickly shutting the door behind her. While catching her breath, the normally calm Elm cursed doctor Rybanski, deciding to be much more careful from now on.

And as for greenhouse 7, one of her assistants will surely be glad to take care of sorting things out in there.

The hardest part of preparing was choosing the correct equipment. Back in her combat engineering days, she’d have an entire squad to spread the gear among. Electronic toolset - yes, no telling what was wrong with Moray’s computers on the physical side of things. Welding equipment - no, would be on board along with cable patches should it be needed. Vac suit - definitely, that shouldn’t even be a question. As with all other engineering personnel who had suits issued on a permanent basis, hers was adorned with personalized markings so they could easily tell each other apart in a manner similar to medieval heraldry, since otherwise all the suits looked mostly the same. In addition to name, rank and position inscribed on her shoulders and back of her helmet, the front chest piece and the back of the backpack were decorated with a white silhouette of a spin-gravity station on a red background. The engineering suits also differed from the standard model by the type and layout of armor - where the arms and legs tightly hugged the body to make movement easier and allow the wearer to survive with nothing more than a bruise if the suit got torn in vacuum, the torso and helmet were lined with boron carbide and tungsten armoring to protect the wearer from harm as well as shield them against various types of radiation.

On approach, she observed neither the Moray’s engine nor its maneuvering thrusters looked damaged, at least from the outside. It was possible Moray’s crew were too scared by their situation to run, something she could hardly blame them for, so the pirates didn’t bother targeting the propulsion and risking harming the passengers by accident. If that was the case and Moray complied willingly, they could’ve pulled the entire kidnapping off without physically damaging anything else besides the communications arrays, which gave her hope that getting the navigation computer up and running would be no harder than entering a few commands or flipping a breaker switch. It would make the task quite easy. Almost too easy.

Astrid was more than happy to let the big guys out of the shuttle first, implicitly considering Geu’rach to be in command of the boarding party. Truth be told, she felt a little inadequate among the two alien giants, each towering over her by at least half a meter, and armed only with a laser carbine either of the two could almost consider his sidearm, but at least any potential hostile would be busy looking at them and ignoring her. Not that the thought of danger to her comrades was a particularly comforting thought. Fortunately, at least the immediate vicinity seemed to be clear of any trouble.

“Have you seen the sum that octopus-looking bastard is asking for? ISA could save money by buying the hostages at slave market value instead of paying the ransom. At least we don’t have to feel bad shooting at slavers.” Astrid rambled while unloading a case containing some of the heavier tools she couldn’t carry on her person all the time out of the shuttle. “Hmm, they left ventilation on. Not just that - lights, gravity, A/C… Most pirates I’ve encountered would’ve stripped it clean of anything useful or vlauable. As if he’s expecting to get paid, return the crew and fuck off. Can’t be that naive, can he?” After three years of salvaging dead and silent ships, finding one for all intents and purposes untouched, yet vacant was a strange feeling, even if they knew exactly what happened to the crew.

Korax, First Officer

The meeting broke up, each group headed off to their own assignments. Korax met with the rest of Beta Team at the shuttle, after sharing a few words with the Captain in private to make sure mission parameters were clear and that he wouldn't do anything reckless while his first officer was gone. Even if he was back on the ship, it was still a legitimate concern.

Soon they arrived aboard the disabled ship.The trip was silent, all beings present focused on the mission at hand. Gue'rach led the way once they had arrived, making sure the immediate area did not have any hidden dangers that their scanners had not picked up before the rest of them entered the ship. It was a sensible decision, though comparatively unnecessary as they found nothing for the moment.

"Perhaps," Korax replied as he checked his scanning equipment, confirming what they had already suspected thus far. "This one has never understood the concept of claiming possession of another being. Studies indicate it is not a very effective economic model." This had been one of the nastier elements of culture shock, for such societal aspects did not exist among its people before they had met the ISA>

With that observation made, it was back to the mission at hand. He moved towards the compartment door, calm and ready for any potential surprises that might emerge. "Let us proceed to the bridge," he informed his companions as he did so. It was the next step in the plan, after all.

Cake's job was harder than she had originally revealed it to be, but it wasn't exactly difficult. It was difficult because Captain Carabello's plan revolved around a small gap in Du-Vos' sensors. That gap was like a mouse hole; when you were inside, you would be hidden. The problem was that, like a mouse hole, you could see the mouse squirming it's way inside, and that's exactly what would happen to Team Alpha. Or, you could be Team Beta, which would be the equivalent of watching the metaphorical mouse run it's way across the living room carpet. Cake had to make sure that neither were spotted whilst in the open, and because she couldn't do it from the outside, she had to do it from the inside.

After running through her probabilities, Cake surmised that elimination of the security computer was to be her utmost priority. By the time anyone realised it was down, it would be too late for Du-Vos. Plus, it would drastically increase Team Alpha's chances at success, and nobody would complain if their jobs were made a little easier. Based on Du-Vos' ship, which wasn't some pansy like the Moray, Cake was going to have to perform a fast, brute force attack. The reason for that was simply the communications setup of the ship - any incoming transmission from the Prize was certain to trigger alarm flags. She had to act faster than the notification.

And so, with her priorities straightened out, Cake begun. She sent a narrow beam transmission across space. Transmissions could be blocked, but for that to happen the ship had to receive data: Where the communication was coming from so it could send a return signal, who was contacting it, and other minuscule details. It was in this minor opening that Cake was able to force her way inside. The security computer responded by trying to seal her in, something that would have worked if she was a traditional virus - but she was not. In fact, all that did was show her it's directory. In microseconds, Cake enveloped it, cutting it off from the rest of the ship and preventing it from sending out an alert. Then, she took it offline entirely.

Unfortunately, Cake knew that her safety was not guaranteed, as there were countless other threats she had to deal with. Not only would the security computer attempt to restart periodically, but there was also the crew she had to worry about. Any one of them could spot something fishy going on in the depths of the ship, particularly if they ran diagnostics on the security computer itself, and she had to spoof the operators of the stations she was going to be hijacking, and she couldn't exactly turn them off. To solve one problem though, she set up a flag that would notify her of any checks on the security computer. She could send back false reports as necessary, but there was still much risk involved. Cake diverted her resources to taking over the Du-Vos' sensors, and then she waited.

Later, as the shuttles launched, Cake played her part in ensuring they were not detected. She overlaid the visual sensors with that of the background space, and ensured other sensors showed the same background readings as had been shown before the shuttles were launched, effectively clouding the shuttles altogether. She only did it as long as necessary - when Team Beta reached the hangar of the Moray, and Team Alpha entered the blind spot, she scrubbed any interference from the sensors to avoid suspicion. She remained in position to take over them once more - she would need the access to help Robin avoid detection.

---

As this all went on, Cake continued her normal operations aboard the Prize. Captain Carabello had told her that he needed her everywhere - she found this funny, as if Carabello expected her to go on strike and avoid watching particular areas of the ship. Even as she put efforts toward infiltrating the pirate ship, she could still continue her duties aboard the Prize without error, from listening to a pair of crewmen chatting in the cafeteria about chess tactics to running diagnostics on the engineering systems. Even when she wasn't checking one thing or another, she was running simulations both for practice and her own, private pleasure. She kept herself busy.

Cake's core, her primary function or as designers put it, her conscious was really only called in when something required a more sentient touch. She could definitely be in more than one place at a time - while she was in the briefing, Cake had also been talking to an engineer about a mechanical problem and a crewman in her bunk about the best way to fillet a fish. Her mind was really in her core, though. While she could have all these conversations at once, collect data from all over the ship and even across space at the pirate ship, there was always one place, one activity that received the most processing power, and that was where her core was truly focused on.

And just like lifeforms had their attention drawn by various sounds, sights and other receptions, Cake had various flags set up to trigger in the case of various events, to alert her of something that needed immediate attention, and the attention of her core. These differed in priority, from the most basic of flags being equipment failure to higher priority ones, such as crewmen distress or injury. Both of those high-priority flags triggered at the same time at the same place, drawing Cake's attention. M’Elme Lan’thar, the botanical survey leader of Prize, had gotten into a spot of bother it seemed. A reroll of the cameras, a little dipping into the data stores of the ship, and in less time than a lifeform could comprehend Cake had briefed herself on what had happened to Elm.

Cake was tempted to make Elm's life worse by pinging through a notification that medical had requested a checkup on her. Not exactly true, but all in good faith: After all, Elm had just fought with a plant that had clearly wanted her for a snack. Cake decided she wouldn't be that mean, though, and not just because it would be obvious that such convenient timing of a medical notification had to have come from the AI. She knew that some people just liked to handle problems themselves. It didn't mean Cake wasn't going to pay Elm a visit, though.

Cake accessed Elm's tablet, granting herself access to it's speaker to talk to the woman. "You know, Elm, if you wanted adventure you could have asked to go fight the pirates. Should I be telling medical that you've got a case of the ouchies?"

While what might be thought of as a simple phone call was easy enough to do, it required quite a bit of thought and preparation before they began negotiations. As the ambassador and chief negotiator Francesca had quite a few variables to juggle. She had to take into account who they were dealing with, how best to start up the negotiations, where to start the negotiations, and what was the best image to portray while the talks were going.

As they would be representing the I.S.S. against an illegal entity that meant the best location for contact would be from the bridge itself as a show of authority, any other location might portray a sense of weakness on their part. Considering the situation and who they were dealing with, it was best to skip any pleasantries and go straight to the negotiation table so introductions would be short and to the point. Getting straight to the point was not good for their time table, but anything else could easily be seen as an attempt to stall so there was little to be done about that, the stalling would have to be done on the negotiation table itself.

After talking out the initial details with the captain Francesca quickly headed off to prepare for the talks. As an Ambassador, Francesca was privy to a rather extensive wardrobe to better deal with a wide variety of races and customs. The wardrobe ranged from flowing dresses to skintight suits and more; however in this situation the most appropriate choice was the traditional dress uniform. It was a white uniform with silver trim, a white dress jacket, and gold tassels on the shoulders. The most significant modification to hers was the fact that instead of the regular dress pants she had opted for a knee-length pencil skirt, with a slit on the left side for ease of movement. The main reasons for her choice was to give the impression of her being relaxed and in control through a less practical and more fashionable choice of uniform.

---

Once all the preparations were ready, Francesca met the captain on the bridge, ready to begin. One last-second look in a pocket mirror to check her hair, and Ambassador Francesca was ready to begin.

"Hail the pirate ship. Let's get these hostages released shall we." Francesca flashed a quick smile around the bridge before taking a neutral expression as the channel was opened. "This is Ambassador Lunarius of the I.S.S. Prize here to ensure the release of the crew of the civilian vessel Moray."

Soon the screen lit up with the bridge of the pirate vessel, the massive Captain Du-Vos taking up a large portion of the screen. The Fithagians were a unique race to be sure. Obviously their size gave them a distinct advantage physically over a lot of races and their tentacle like appendages gave them more dexterity than one would think. The biggest problem in reading a Fithagian was their lack of humanoid facial features, their eyes were not particularly expressive and as they had so many tentacles on their face it was hard to get a read. In order to read a Fithagian one had to be able to read the unique tentacle ticks on their faces, this was made difficult by the fact their faces liked to move pretty much at random, so in order to read a Fithagian face one had to pay more attention to how they suppressed their own movements or twitched in reaction to outer stimuli.

Captain Du-Vos appeared quite calm for the moment, a normal amount of wiggling going on for his species. "This is Captain Du-Vos, as I am sure you are aware I refuse to release the hostages until my demands are met." Francesca noticed an odd stiffening of the outer tendrils whenever he said 'my', a rather noteworthy tick to keep track of.


"And as I am sure you are aware Captain Du-Vos, your demands are beyond extreme and would never be considered by the I.S.S." In the background she could see a certain crew member with some kind of plasma rifle, start to shake with anger. "Of course we would prefer everyone to walk away form this in one piece so let's try to discuss this in a reasonable matter."

Captain Du-Vos leaned forward a bit and the tips of his front tentacles curled, a sign of...concern? But about what? At the moment it did appear the pirates had the advantage, so there had to be something else that was of concern to the Captain. "Of course any good negotiator must set the bar high to ensure the other party takes them...seriously. Let's get to it shall we?"

Soon a set of holographic demands appeared on the screen, starting with the original set. The negotiations had reached a new stage.