Darius nodded to Hunt, then rose out of his seat. He started towards the door out of the room then stopped himself right before the doorway, he turned towards Hunt and the others.

"In that case, I'll be in the armory getting ready for the mission. Drop by if you need me." He said, then gave a military salute to Hunt before exiting the room into the hallway. Damn, it's been forever since I actually saluted someone. He thought as he reentered his personal quarters. The mercenary glanced around, finding his rifle, submachine gun and armor. He loaded those into a bag, along with his other possessions, then left his room, locking it behind him. He would mostly live in the armory, only returning to his quarters to sleep.

After crossing down several hallways, he came upon his new area, the armory. It was similar to any other armory, three tables with guns on them, a desk in the corner, walls lined with cabinets full of equipment and one window behind the desk which gave a phenomenal view of outer space. The place made Darius feel at home, he always felt more comfortable around guns, every since he enlisted. He walked over to the desk, noticing the computer one it. He placed his bag of items on top of the desk, then unzipped it.

Darius pulled out his armor first, he had this armor for many years, it had served him well. He placed it down on the floor, helmet, upper piece and lower piece. Then he took out his submachine gun and sniper rifle, placing them on a nearby metal table. He had to clean those before the mission, make sure they were in pristine condition.

Darius blinked then wandered over to the cabinet which contained the items for the mission. He popped it open, revealing racks of flares, ropes, ice axes, oxygen masks and crampons. All the stuff necessary to navigate a frozen rock like they one they were headed to. Not that he liked having to go an icy, frozen planet, but a mission is a mission. He took inventory and began preparing for the mission.

Rane nodded slightly while listening to Darius's response, as if he could understand the humans sentiment's but didn't quite agree with him. A short pause, then he answered, his voice holding all the solemnity of a priest preaching to his congregation.

“I just like hitting things with my sword.” Of course that was only part of the reason he did what he did, but whenever people find out about his other reason, the main reason, was they called him crazy.

The group started dispersing after that, all heading to get mission ready or to introduce themselves to each other. Rane, who had no real talents other than casually dismembering other sentient species, found himself with little to do. He was just about to amble back through to the common room and continue his snooze when Mylik approached him.

"I am Mylik, you've probably only rarely seen me, but I assure you that I've been here long enough to know you are a veteran aboard this ship compared to the others, and I am pleased to make your acquaintance." He took Rane by surprise at first, but that was quickly surpassed by astonishment and glee. Rane hadn't even considered how Mylik would be able to speak with no mouth, and his innate curiosity was piqued by this new revelation. He had imagined the Kiaslikian would have possessed some for of telepathy or communicated through smells, but this was far more interesting.

“Rane Traxian, Rane to my friends, a real bastard to my enemies,” responded the Canmorian, bowing his head slightly, a sign of respect for his people. “So you'll be in charge while the cap is gone huh? Don't worry, I'll have your back if anything goes wrong.”

He lent in close to Mylik, conspiratorially close. “Something alwaaaays goes wrong!” he whispered gleefully.

Before the meeting started, someone scooted closer to Skyler and extended his hand. "Hey there, good day," He said. "The name's Jason Lee, but everyone calls me Ace." Skyler looked at his hand for a moment. Unsure, she took his hand and shook it, what humans would call a "handshake." It was a popular greeting on their planet. "Hello, 'Ace.' I am Skyler. Pleasure to meet your acquaintance." Skyler replied. She wasn't really fond of humans, but she never rejected a gentlemanly act.

After the Captain explained their plans, several of The Marauders spoke up with questions and statements, but Sky preferred not to talk. The Captain then wanted she and the others to meet him in the docking bay in ten minutes. Skyler was still processing the plan. What if I fail? What if they all end up like the other Manaketes? What if... Her mind trailed on, causing her to tear up a bit. She quickly wiped them away.

After everyone was dismissed, Skyler snuck away into her room. She grabbed a small elastic band and tied her hair up into a high ponytail, letting her bangs frame her face. She then plopped down on her bed, just thinking as always. Ice planet with lava... This certainly will be interesting. I hope you're all ready to see a dragon. If she was going to represent her species, the least she could do was give her best.

Val sighed, she spent a lot of time doing this, sighing. She had no reason not to sigh as she poured over book after book, learning everything she could about the world, Val was a scientist, she loved reading and she loved learning new things but it got tedious after a while, the whole reason she joined the marauders was because she wanted adventure, now she was sitting in her bedroom on the ship reading a book about nanotechnology, learning about atoms and matters, next she would read about engineering, then maybe she was re-read her advanced neurotechnology books, they were her favorite even though she understood the brain completely, it was feelings she didn't understand. But, she guessed, she should be socializing, she didn't like it very much, people made her nervous, unlike most people from her planet she was quiet and nervous, not pompous and rude.
But, she needed to get to know the people on her ship better, if she was going to be here for a long time she needed to learn to talk to people, how do you start a conversation? How do you talk to people? Walk up and say hello? No, that's weird, a random person coming up and saying "Hi!", do you introduce yourself? "Hello, I'm Val, and-", and what?
She really had no idea how to talk to people.
Let them talk to you then? Yes, she would wait for someone else to introduce themselves, that was a lot easier. Glad she had that figured out.
She stood up (grabbing a few of her books) and walked out, she didn't know where she was going exactly, she was basically wandering around aimlessly, hoping to find someone.

Thomas ignored Rane's comment and moved not one muscle in his face, while what he really wanted to do was to punch the Canmorian so hard, that for the first time a sound could be heard in space; Rane death-scream. But Thomas remained calm and took careful note of every detail Jason told them, and what Thomas could see from the holograms. It seemed simple enough, if one could call exploring an ice-planet with erupting lava pools for simple. The Marauders had been through deadlier missions than this, but just that they were deadly were proven with all the new crew members that attended the briefing. At least they only brought a few number of rookies down to the planet this time, the rest would be 'safer' on-board.

As Jason wrapped up the briefing and ordered them to meet up ready in 10 minutes, Thomas quickly saluted his fellow crew-members and existed the room, walking quickly and determined towards his quarters. He had a standard lock-system on his door, and ensured no-one was sneaking around him to see him as he punched in the code, and entered his room. It wasn't that he thought anyone would dare to walk in and kill him in his sleep or anything like that, but this was truly the only place where he could breath out and take care of his eye, which had started to hurt during the meeting. He had done his best to hide the pain and therefore left the room as quick as possible so he take care of it, alone. Normally he would have tried to calm down for a few hours, but when on mission he would have to turn to medication to lessen the pain. He found the bottle of pills hidden deep in his closet and took a couple of them, and soon the pain went away. Oh, how much he hated it, and how much he hated his nickname, 'One-Eye', but it had been used so often by Jason that by this point everyone referred to him as that.

He had no time to think about all this, and gathered the needed gear for their mission; the Sub-Zero suit, his weapons and the backpack that contained all the instruments he normally used. The Sub-Zero suit was by now not too difficult to get on, but he was starting to sweat rather quickly inside the ship so he hoped they could leave early. He strapped the backpack on his back, put on a pair of goggles that would protect his eye down in the winter blizzards, and grabbed his combat rifle and pistol before setting off to the docking bay in what made him look like an ancient Polar-explorer.

As he walked through the metal corridors of the ship, he saw a young woman, nearly a girl, walking towards him carrying a few books. She fitted the description of Val, the girl who had joined the Marauders as a scientist, thought Thomas felt it was a little sad to think that someone like her ended up with them. Still, he smiled politely to her as they stepped closer, and held out his hand for her to shake it. "Greetings, you must be Val. You haven't been introduced to the crew I think, so I'm Lieutenant Thomas O'Connor, pleased to meet you." He said with with a strict, but polite voice, he wasn't used to talk too normal with people, though he did when he felt comfortable around them. And now, only a few on the ship made him comfortable.

Oh fuck it had worked, someone actually introduced themselves to her, as she looked up at the person holding a hand out to her, her bangs which were not in the pony tail she was wearing fell in her face and forgetting that she had books in her hand she brushed back her bangs behind her ear, dropping the books in her attempt. Her face flared red and she clenched her fists and closed her eyes, making a little movement with her hands that basically described the word 'why', she sighed and looked up at the person in front of her again and gave him a small smile, "yes, I am Val, it's nice to meet you too, Lieutenant." She said, trying to sound casual as if dropping four books to brush back your hair was normal, she held out her hand to shake his, as she was told this was a normal human thing to do, shake hands when they met, so she did, ignoring the books in which she had dropped on the ground.

"Something alwaaaays goes wrong!"
Mylik reeled back a little when Rane leaned forward and whispered that joyful statement. Why would he be so happy about violence? Mylik wanted to prevent happenings like that, I mean, it was his whole job on board the ship! Well, he hoped that Rane's confidence wasn't without founding, since Mylik could telepathically feel a general nervousness coming from a few of the more experienced marauders, not like a "WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE" nervousness, but the kind you feel when you've been doing something forever and somehow know things are gonna mess up. Under normal circumstances, he wouldn't let other's anxiousness bother him very much, but this seemed more real than most of the emotions other species experience. Mylik let out an audible sigh "Then I will have to check out the security systems again. After all, if something always goes wrong, then we should always be ready" he said to the Canmorian. "I'll be in my quarters if anyone needs me," he continued to the group in general.

Back in his room. He decided to take the opportunity he had and see what else could be done about the ships security systems. Back at home, he was used to hidden cameras, trapdoors, tunnels that could immediately collapse at the push of a button (better to allow the tunnel to fall on advancing enemies than to let them come in), and even robots. Here, he had a few cameras and automatic defense weapons(which he had brought with him and installed). Nothing else. But maybe he could fix that. He headed out into the general hallways and went straight for one of the cameras. He dismounted it from the wall, opened it up, and began fiddling around with the inside. In all honesty, he only knew a little about non-Kiaslik technology, but he hoped he could figure something out.

Mylik reflexively shrank away from Rane's apparent blood lust, a perfectly reasonable response to it. Still, it went someway to hurting the Canmorian's feelings all the same.
"Then I will have to check out the security systems again. After all, if something always goes wrong, then we should always be ready. I'll be in my quarters if anyone needs me,"
Rane watched him leave Mylik leave, an anxious rush to the Kiaslikian's movements, no doubt to get away from Rane himself.

"I'm always ready too," he called after the mouth less alien "That's why I strapped this bloody great big sword to my back." but the Kiaslikian was probably long gone by the time he had finished. "Certainly isn't to accessorise" he added under his breath.

Probably just as well nobody ever introduces themselves to you, Rane thought to himself. He was feeling slightly dejected now. Left out of the mission, on a ship with a bunch of newb's, with nothing to do and no one to speak to. Then again it was hardly a new predicament. Apart from swinging a sword he had no real skills aboard the ship, couldn't even fire a blaster all that well. . .

The blaster he thought, his mood perking somewhat. Perhaps he could still be of some use after all. He left the briefing room, moving at a brisk pace with the practised confidence of someone who knew this ship very well. He quickly found his destination, the armoury, where he assumed he would find Darius. He poked his head round the frame and found he was right in his assumption.

"Nice weapons," Rane said in way of announcing his presence before moving quickly onto the reason of the visit, "Got ya a present." Before tossing his wrist blaster across the room to the former merc.

"A Canmorian wrist blaster" he explained. "Straps around your wrist like a vambrace. Fires superheated plasma. Instant burning death, and very useful on an ice planet. I reckon a man of your talents could find a use or two for it." Rane was grinning now. Truth be told he hardly used the thing. When he had first began his quest all those long years ago the Skyfather had gifted Rane his sword, but the Canmorian had thought he would have needed more firepower than an outdated melee weapon. He should have trusted in the Skyfather's wisdom for he had rarely met an enemy he couldn't handle with just the sword. He wouldn't miss the blaster, especially for just one mission.

Darius finished taking inventory of everything for the upcoming mission. He checked off the final item that the team would needed then placed the electronic device which he used to create the inventory list down on the desk. He lifted up his armor next, the upper body half and placed it on one of the empty tables. He planned to give it a quick cleaning, make it look nice and shiny, but he was interrupted as someone entered the room, another one of the crew, Rane. The lizard humanoid tossed a weapon, a wrist blaster towards Darius who snagged it out of the air, he started at it, rotating it around.

"Thanks, Rane. Always good to have another way to kill someone. I've always said, you can never have enough weapons, I've yet to see fault in that saying." He placed it onto his wrist, adjusting it just enough so that it was a nice tug fit.

"I can't wait to try it out, but they probably don't want me to blast a hole in their fancy ship. I'll test her the first chance I get." He stated with a grin, taking it off of his wrist and placing it with his other weapons.

"So you'be been a Marauder for a while?" Darius curiously asked, even though he knew the answer, he did read up on each member of the crew the first chance he got after all. "What do you think of the rest of crew? They seem like they won't die on us the first time someone shoots at them?"

With the meeting concluded, Nafi found herself at a loss for what to do. Wrenchie had given her the ok to assist with his modifications of the ship, so she wasted no time in preparing for what she assumed would be some strip work on the ship' outer hull. if that was the case, she'd need to add her exo-suit modules to her Harness to allow for survivability outside of the ship in the cold, dark void of space, Making her way briskly to the armory to suit up, she passed another young girl and Thomas in the hall ways, nodding briefly to them both and noticing the girl had dropped her books. "First mission nerves, huh? Don't let it get you down, you'll be up there with the rest of them soon enough." was all Nafi said to the girl, as she passed them and entered the armory.

There, Darius and the lizard man were in discussion, but she paid no heed to them, and moved to her locker. Opening it, Nafi found her exo mask and Harness attachements, some weapon and cybernetic spare parts, a family picture and other knick knacks that she had collected on her travels throughout this vast galaxy, things that held some special significance to her. It didn't take her long to fit all her needed gear, and before long, was suited up and ready to go. After some more time walking (Or rather, thunking with each step due to the weight of her mag boots), she waited at the airlock for the others who were on modification duty, and Nafi spoke impatiently over the comm channel to the main communication room. "Hey, whoever's in charge of comms on the ship, could you let the others modifying the ship know that I'm ready to go?"

Thomas looked down at the books Val had just dropped on the floor, and back at Val's now brightly red face, wondering if she was going to pick them up. Instead she held out her hand like Thomas did, and so he grabbed it and shook it gently. Val wasn't a human, as looks often were deceiving as it was with many other intelligent races out in the vast universe. Some alien races had the look of humans, but their biology made them completely different species, and so healty offspring was rarely (and to the demise of many couples of aliens) unlikely.

It was a brief moment of silence as Thomas waited for Val to either continue the conversation or to pick up her books. She did neither, as Nafi, the cyborg-girl who was an assassin, not the profession Thomas respected the most but she had treated him with respect, unlike a certain reptile. Nafi asked Val if she had nerves for her first mission, and left while telling her that she would soon be up with the others. As she walked away, Thomas realized that Val hadn't been at the briefing and wasn't fully aware of the situation. He bent down, as the Sub-Zero suit was rather agile even for all its usage, and picked up Val's books. "You weren't at Captain Hunt's briefing, but I'm sure he'd want you to stay on-board the ship for now. We're going down to a ice-covered planet, with pools of lava spewing up through the ice, to record it's climate, rotation, and possible life-forms on it. You're a scientist if your files wasn't terribly wrong, so you should ask Captain Hunt for permission to have a direct video and information-link between us two while I take tests and samples down there." Thomas said to Val, holding the books for her to take back. She seemed young, and yes he knew that her race grew slower that humans, but she was still young for a scientist. Still, she was here, and Thomas wasn't going to ask twice for help with his tasks right now. "Follow me, I'll take you to the captain. We'll find him in the docking bay soon." Thomas added, handing Val her books and starting to walk towards the docking bay, ready for another good day's work.

Rane was beginning to like Darius more and more, probably because the man seemed a little blood hungry. Almost made Rane seem mellow in comparison. Almost.

"Yeah, they're a hard bunch of bastards." Rane responded, mind casting back to some of the Marauder's missions together. Despite being a mismatched group of cut-throats, criminals, ex-soldiers, adventurers and even an occasional do-gooder they were a mighty effective team. Barring a few lame ducks they could for the most part hold their own in a fight with even the most dangerous of enemies.

"Hunt's at his best with his back against the wall, down right dangerous at times. Stick close to him and he'll lead ya through. Rae, the doc, knows her stuff. Patched me up a few times, I remember her having soft hands. Doesn't stop her being a dab hand with a pistol though, girl can shoot. One-eye, the ugly Irishman with the stick up his arse, is the only other one going planetside that I've worked with. Let me tell ya, he is one humourless D'zrick" he swore foully in Canmorian. "Hates me, can you believe that? Give him his dues though, he's one of the most solid fighters I've ever worked with, one of the best shots too. Never left me to die, despite having plenty chances too. Do right by them and they'll do right by you. As One-eye is so fond of saying, we're the best of the worst."

"Anyway, you'll be needed in the hanger. Need a hand lifting that gear, I'm stronger than I look." His bones and tissues were several times denser than a human's due to Canmore's high gravity. He was probably the physically strongest being on the ship, barring maybe Wrenchie and Nafi who had just entered then left the armory. And the dragon we've picked up, can hardly forget the dragon! Crossing the room he grabbed an armful of the winter survival gear.

"Well, I'm gad they know what they're doing, the last thing I'd want is to go into the mission with a bunch of greenhorns. It does of course make more sense to have a competent crew on this expensive ship." Darius said, relieved that the rest of the crew knew what they were doing. He agreed that they needed to get moving and went to one of the cabinets, pulling out the exosuit. He quickly put it on, then placed his newly acquired wrist blaster on his wrist then snapped his sniper and SMG onto their holsters.

"I'll try not to get on One Eye's bad side, or should I say eye." He said, making himself smile as he was now ready to move on to the hangar. He had placed all the needed items in metal containers. He grunted as he lifted one up in each hand, they were heavy, but he was strong enough to easily bring them to their destination with no trouble.

"Thanks for helping with the cargo, Rane." He said with a smile, closing and locking the armory behind them once they had both exited the room on the way to their destination.

Rae listened carefully as the briefing started but as usual the Chief once again gave them the bare minimum of information to go on. At least this planet was pretty obvious on some of its dangers before some of them started to explore the surface and got some other nasty surprise which was more common then not. The information that Captain Hunt provided was basic to most ice like planets but the interesting part was the ships displayed pictures on the hologram of the different parts of nature that were present. Some were the deepest of blues while other parts were stark white with only large jagged gnarled pieces of solid ice jutting out of the icy ground. The worst of it was in an area that looked to have been through an explosion, probably by the lava that was still erupting from it while other pools of lava were probably in other parts. It sure was a unique planet from its looks, she would give it that. It would be interesting to see if any life was present and if not then see what other things could be found out. The mission should be an easy get in and get out but after being with the Marauders this long, you start to learn to expect the unexpected.

Rae was pulled out of her thoughts from the planet as she heard her name spoken from Jay's voice and focused her gaze back on him instead of the hologram. "Of course, Captain." she stated in reply as she was assigned to the ground team. A few others were listed to the ground while the others were to stay with the ship but that didn't necessarily mean they could relax or would be left out of the fun. The ship probably needed just as much protection if not more which is why she was pleased that at least Rane would stay behind because she knew she could trust his capable hands plus he wasn't a fan of the cold.

She stuck around long enough to hear some of the question, only leaving the briefing room as some of the others dismissed themselves and all questions had been answered. Rae was able to hear as Jay ordered the team to gather up any needed supplies and meet up at the docking bay in ten minutes time while she slipped out of the room. Swiftly, she moved down the hall and to her own room, pushing the button to slide the door open so that she could enter. Her room was never barred from anyone and rarely ever locked,seeing as how she wanted to be available at anytime for medical issues or emergencies. If someone were to step into her room, they would find what looked like a jungle as most of her free space was filled with various strange plants and flowers that had been useful to her while exploring other planets. Of course these were only the ones that could survive the conditions that living on a ship provided.

She the button to shut the door behind her before heading to the closet and pulling out her pack, some supplies already loaded within. Rae grabbed a hold of the Sub-Zero suit, packing it just incase the air wasn't breathable or if the gravity was to much to handle for her body. Dropping the bag onto her bed, she turned to grab her belt which held her pistols as well as her ammo before strapping her bow/quiver over her shoulder. She swiped the pack on the way out, stopping by the infirmary to grab a few more needed supplies as she headed for the docking bay.

Wrenchie nodded. "This meeting is... pleasant. It seems as though we will be working together for long time now. Nice to talk- nice to learn of you." He said, hating his feeble grasp of the language. He didn't spend much time with anyone, so he rarely talked. You have been trapped in cockpit, as I have been trapped within the engines, always fixing, always repairing. So, you enjoy flying?" He asked as Ace entered the cockpit of the small aircraft.

Immediately, he began work on the plane, taking special care to not damage the vector thrusters. Moving with efficiancy that could only be attained with the massive amounts of robotics that augmented his body, Wrenchie stripped dozens of various screws and bolts from the shuttle, leaving the wings hanging loosely, as well as having taken off many of the other needless parts. This work was something natural to Wrenchie, and wasn't a big deal in any way.

Wrenchie looked up and down at his brief work, glad that the easy part was gone. because of how the shuttle was manufactured, they didn't really expect you to take off the wings, and as such, were attached in a solid manner. Though it would take little more than a few swipes with his plasma cutter to remove the wings, Wrenchie had to know where to cut, so he could be sure to not impede the flight of the craft. Not wanting to bother yet with the calculations of that, he quickly fiddled around with the fuel lines of the shuttle, preparing them for the cold. As he fetched more of the fluid to treat the pipes, he shouted up to Ace. "Are you sure you want wings gone? Once they are off, there is nothing I can do without having a few days to work."

As Ace sat down on the shuttle's cockpit, detaching one of the pads and working with it, he got a text message from Nafi through the ship's comms. He raised an eyebrow, wondering where she had gone. "Nafi, we're in the hangar at the back of the ship, we're just starting work on the shuttle already." He said, the voice message being sent over the comms to Nafi's location. He wondered for a moment why the girl had gone towards the airlock. He figured that maybe she knew something they didn't, maybe one of the components for the modification he needed would need to be handled in zero g.

Ace emerged from the cockpit, holding a pad that he had linked to the shuttle's computer. "Flying is my life, man!" He said with a grin. He made a few more adjustments, then moved to help Wrenchie with the removal of the wings, making a few notes on the pad and changing flight parameters as they worked. As Wrenchie turned his attention to the hydraulic and fuel lines, he started running diagnostics and changing even more parameters. He was gladly surprised at how easy it was to customize the shuttle's software, the computer and its software were almost as powerful as the ship's, only missing the AI. He thought for a moment, wondering if maybe, just maybe, he could have Dora (as he had named the ship's AI) on the shuttles as well.

He looked up from the pad as Wrenchie asked if he really wanted the wings gone, and he nodded at him, before absentmindedly pointing at the second shuttle. "There's always the backup shuttle if anything goes wrong, but I'm confident we'll have this up and running in no time." He said with a nod before looking down at the pad again. "And really, flying without wings isn't anything to call home about... it isn't like wings have much effect when flying on zero g." He said before stopping and looking up at Wrenchie again. "have you ever been on a mining colony? They use artificial gravity across the whole mining complex so that small rocks and other debris poses less of a threat, so when a shuttle of cargo ships approaches the colony, it's pretty much the same as this, flying without wings." He said with a shrug, just to explain why he was so confident this would work.

Still waiting at the airlock, Nafi impatiently waited at the airlock for her crew mates to arrive, when a voice buzzed in on the headset. It was Ace, notifying her on the situation: "Nafi, we're in the hangar at the back of the ship, we're just starting work on the shuttle already." Suddenly a realization swept over her, of course they weren't going to take the whole ship down! How could she be so stupid? With an embarrassed sigh, she voiced back to him: "Uhh, I knew that. You know what, you guys seemed to have it handled. I'll, uh, give this job a miss, if you don't mind. I had some training I wanted to do anyway..." With that, she signed off, and made her way back to the armory, trying to keep her head down, her face red and shameful as she went back into the armory.

After de-suiting from her failed attempt at being helpful, Nafi, little wanting to screw things up further, decided to head to the ship's gym, to work off her anger at herself. It didn't take long for her to find herself stretching for her workout in the training facility, and in little time, was stripped down to her sleek, metallic frame and undergoing her cardio warm up, jogging steadily in a sort of high tech treadmill that appeared to be more of a hamster wheel than anything else. Despite being largely cybernetic, her Harness was still rigged with various muscle feedback sensors, motor neural triggering systems, and intricate organic/synthetic melding relays. These modules allowed her body to feel stress and fatigue at minor levels, to help stimulate her remaining organic structure into a more energetic state, while avoiding exhaustion and damage as a result of over stimulation. Pretty much, this was the only thing that reminded her she was still alive, and not a machine, as many people think at first glance.

After some time jogging, Nafi stepped gingerly off the treadmill, and looked around the various equipment, deciding what to train today. After some thought, she entered the sparring ring, and booted up a hand to hand combat simulation. Combat training was her favorite, as it was a full body workout, with the added benefit of a thrill of the fight, The sparring droid stepped out of it's closet like holding bay at the opposite end of the ring. It stood a full head over her, with a lanky metal frame that shone bronze in the light of the ring, and she brought her fists up in a guard stance. "Alright, computer, set the target to standard military training, lethality factor level 4, damage threshold 25% durabiliity enhancement. Taunts on." With that, the droid brought it's hands up too, and sneered at her. "I'll snap you like a twig." was all the machine said, before slowly pacing in a circle, not taking it's optical sensor (A red light on it's 'face') off of her. Nafi responded by moving around in the opposite direction, keeping her guard at it at all times, and smiled wryly:

"We'll see who gets broken, tin can."

Val nodded quickly, no, she hadn't been at the briefing, she had been reading for so long she didn't go, had blacked out of the world and hadn't thought to go, it was a bad habit of hers that she really needed to fix. She smiled nervously, taking the books that he had picked up for her, she was mentally smacking herself, why was she so awkward?
She held the books tightly to her chest, her blush settling down, she found her tongue tied up; she was unable to speak. Too nervous.
She took deep breaths, trying to calm herself down, finally she whispered. "T-Thank you, Lieutenant." She addressed, her tone was extremely formal, full of respect. She believed you should respect everyone. "For, helping me out that is, I mean, with my books, and uh-." She rambled on, Val, think, where are you going with this sentence? She thought, taking a breath in she finished her sentence, "thank you for the assistance, it was very kind of you." She said, then smiled to herself, this may not seem like much but for her this was a great feat of accomplishment. "And, yes, I am a scientist, I'm not much of a explorer, so, I do think it would be better for me to stay on board the ship." She agreed, mostly she wanted to keep talking while she remembered how to use her voice, (meaning before she got to nervous to speak again.)

"Aye, there's the occasional chaff, but for the most part the Skyfather sends us fighters, probably how you ended up here I'd wager" Rane fell in line with Darius as the two navigated the ship's corridors towards the hangar. "Too many fighters sometimes, but thats the good thing about fighters. They have a habit of dying, freeing up space for the next lot. Except for folk like us. It's the old fighters like us they have to watch for." He said it with a sardonic smile. He'd spent enough time around humans to tell that Darius was about middle aged, and you don't get to be old in their buisness without being very good at the job.

As they walked they passed One-eye, in conversation with anouther human looking newbie. These new guys are crawling out the panelling nowadays, one of them is bound to wind up dead. That was always the way of it, the new kids joined all full of hope and bravado and gusto, ready to travel the galaxy, and in their travelling tame it. Yeah, its always fun to start with. Then the first mission hits, and the newbs are surprised by the magnitude of the jobs the Maruader's take, but they don't want to seem like cowards in front of their new teammates so they throw themselves in. Couple hours later half of the newbs are dead, the other half want off, and then the whole process gets to repeat itself. True, the Marauders had a higher life expectancy than most other expeditionary forces, but that still wasn't setting the bar too damn high. Rane woulda said that this lot were lucky, what with their first mission being no more than recon, but all that meant was the danger was still lurking just round the corner and they hadn't seen it yet.

"Making friends One-eye?" the Canmorian called cheerily as he walked past "Well don't be late to the hanger, Hunt can't spend all day waiting on you. After all, who else would complain about all the regulations and safety protocols we're not following if your not there!" he didn't look around to see One-eye's face, but he assumed it would be priceless.

Entering the hanger Rane crossed over to the shuttle, Wrenchie and Ace busy in the process of butchering the craft, and dropped the winter supplies, the goods making a 'thunk' as they hit the steel floor. He turned to offer his hand to Darius, in a gesture the humans called a 'handshake'. To Rane's eyes it was damn lunacy. Why offer your hand to a man, that means he can grip it tight and deprive you of a weapon. Still, he was trying to be polite.

"Luck be with you on the mission Darius. And do me a favour? Look after Hunt. The Skyfather instructed me to stay close to him and protect him, as he will lead me to my destiny. I try my best, but he has a worrying tendency to trying and getting himself killed."

"I'll keep my eye on him, losing the captain of our vessel would complicate things a bit." Darius replied, shaking Rane's hand. "Good luck on this side too, if we encounter resistance planetside, then I'm sure they'll go after the ship too."

He nodded to Rane as Darius turned towards the shuttle, looking for the pilot. He found the man working with the mechanical suit wearing engineer on the wings on the shuttle.

"Ace, you're flying this craft, is she ready to go yet? Or can I at least move the equipment for the mission onto it?" He asked the pilot, watching as the engineer known as Wrenchie worked on the shuttle, making some changes to it.