Chapter 0 - On the Drift: (Pilot)

Three hundred years. Three hundred years after Humans first decided to put their backs into space travel as a species, not just disparate companies and nations one up'ing each other with whom could land on the local moon, again, or the next planet out. Three hundred years since the first FTL 'Rat Ships' were launched toward the 'Best Guesses' at habitable star systems. 

Two hundred and fifty years since the 'Arks' were launched at the ones that showed any promise. Two hundred years after the Colonies sent word that they had made safe landfall, and confirmed the same for their sister-ships. A hundred-fifty years since first contact with a sapient alien species. A hundred years since The Frontier Confederation declared itself independent and self-governing from the United Earth Congressional Conglomerate. 

Eighty Years since the ECC's Warships fled after the 'weapons demonstration' provided by Fleet Admiral Duchess Diana Wolfwood. Sixty Years since the Colonial Cold war began.  Forty Years since the Commissioning of the Meridian Diviner, a Seer class Recon/Scout Light Cruiser. Twenty-five years Max Sable was born in an emergency ward. Twenty-five years since the bombing of Nova Terra Secunda's main spaceport by ECC black ops pretending to be refugees.

"Humanity is still fucking itself over." Lieutenant Max whispered, while floating inverted to the deck. His finger flicks a digital readout ticking seconds steadily up on one clock, and quickly down on many more.

"What was that, El Tee?" A woman's voice came from near his ear. Not twenty centimeters from him; her breathing would have sent shivers through his spine, but that husky voice that could be heard without being loud, and lead without barking orders, added a warmth in his face.

"Nothing, Sergeant." He shook his head, dark curls rustled softly. He heard the soft, slow inhale of someone breathing through her nose those same twenty centimeters away, and let out a purr that was more a whisper, and that sound made him warm in, other places. Strictly speaking, what had happened in the emergency escape launch, or Eel, wasn't protocol or even, technically, permissible in normal operating circumstances. Lt. Sable wasn't 'cleared' for that sort of action.

Six Hundred and Forty-two Hours since Meridian Diviner Sent out on her last cruise before her 'Make or Breakers' examination. Six Hundred and Forty Hours since Commander Julian D. Feora personally handed him the notice of his Paternal Mother's death in action. Five hundred and Two hours since Meridian Diviner  left Confederate 'Civilian' space and began it's patrol of the 'Earthward' Buffer systems. Three hundred Hours since the probes silently watching and listening among the tempting ice fields and oxygen rich demi-planets divulged just what they had seen. 

"There!" Sable saw what he'd been looking for when he had pried open the panel. "It's the T-43 circuit," He called over his shoulder and out of the maintenance hatch. "Fine Assessment, Specialist Roan. You win the pool." He turned back and pulled one of three chips from the sealed pouches on his forearms. He flipped a switch to suspend the current through the junction, pulled out the burnt chip, installed the clean one, depressed the 'test' button, on the junction, and, when it gave a happy double tone,  flipped the circuit back on.

Suddenly the clocks quickly counting down were now counting down at a normal second to second rate: Progress.

"Anytime, El-Tee, though I might prefer actual pool time at this point." A melodious voice, one that hinted at a life of comfort and ease, echoed from 'below' him. Movement beside Max occluded the light from the main cabin and all he could see was a body of feminine grace and super human strength. "But that's a long might."

"Well if I let Doc Hona flood the shower again-" Sable led, he would have said more, but his eyes locked on the woman sharing the confined space with him.

"That wasn't my fault!" A steady voice stated matter-of-factly. "I was treating your injuries, Lieutenant." Max clenched his left toes and felt some pain through the bandages around his leg. "I needed a steady stream of clean water to keep them clean... I just lost track of it, after-" All Max could hear was the pounding in his ears and the soft wet suckle of Diana's lips on his as the dark skinned Sergeant pressed him against the flat 'rest space' in the maintenance locker. Her throbbing erection pressed against his own as her knees began to pry his legs apart.

Neither of them wore anything other than work shirts, this section didn't carry anything flammable or caustic to begin with. Diana ran her hands through Max's hair, gripping him with it, but also holding it down and out of the way; so when the Lieutenant pressed a button, the pneumatic sliding panel that covered up the sensitive, albeit military grade, circuitry wouldn't pinch any of his hairs in its grip.

After the panel closed and they heard the pop of the pressure seal, Max tilted his hips, and Diana line up to fuck his ass in earnest.

Twenty Hours since Max logged in for Alert-Ready duty on the portside lower duties. Nineteen hours since he did his first check on Emergency Escape Launch: MD-PL-11. Eighteen hours since his third re-check on EEL: MD-PL-11's security logs. Seventeen Hours, Forty minutes since he called Central maintenance to report a problem with his boat's security logs. Seventeen Hours, Thirty-Seven minutes since the alarm went out for an Emergency Procedure's Drill demanding all crew in Port Lower to get to the nearest secure escape module. Seventeen hours, Thirty-six minutes since Sergeant Diana Nolan lead her squad; five Valkyrie Marines, into his Launch.  

Max didn't hiss or flinch as he felt the tip of Diana's cock spread the opening to his now familiar spaces. He counted the seconds as she slide slowly, gently, into him. One, two, three four.

"Love the look in these eyes." Diana whispered as she pressed her forehead to his. Seven, Eight Nine Ten seconds later she was sliding out. One, two, three, four, "Always looking, always alert," seven, eight, and she was sliding back in. One, two, "You'd make a hell of a marine," three four, and out, "if you transferred." Max laughed as he propped his good leg against the flat space behind Diana, and leaned back to give him the leverage push against her quickening thrust.

"I like flying too much for that." Max whispered. One two, and one two, and one, and two, and one, and two. FUCK.

Seventeen Hours, Thirty-Six minutes before there was a small explosion in one of the spaces inside the cockpit and the Launch discharged itself into the space directly over a turbulant gas giant. Seventeen Hours, Thirty Five minute since Lieutenant Max Sable used his personal, civilian, communicator in a total violation of protocols and military law to transmit to the Bridge that his Launch was damaged, and that someone had been using the launch, and its FTL system, when the ship last put in for repairs, while trying to scrub the logs. Seventeen Hours, Thirty Four minutes since he spun up the FTL drive and made a blind jump, as opposed to falling into a gas giant's gravity 'kill zone'.


Diana kissed Max on the forehead and moved her grip to his shoulders as she pulled down against his push up and he slid down as she presed herself deeper. She came, all up and inside of him. He came, all up and inside the condom ballooning around his throbbing cock. It tapped against Diana's abs as it twitched, thick and hard and protesting its exclusion from the romp.

"Hey!" The melodious voice came again from below. "Are you two fucking in there?" If anyone could ask a rhetorical question, in earnest, it was Specialist Felicity 'Dread Hoss' Roan. "What about 'the Pool'?"

"I said after I'm done with, and out of, the maintenance space." He remembered his wording the bet and was glad Diana caught on and offered to 'hold the light' for him. Now she pulled out and turned around as Max tied off his condom and sent it wobbling down.

"Damn, El-Tee;" Felicity whistled, "and I thought I got backed up after a few hours. Them Green Genes really pay off, don't they?" Max wasn't in actually, 'green', but half Thilidin, a male half-Thilidin. It had its downsides, but they were far distant from here. He pulled another condom from his arm pouch and slid it on. Diana gripped a recessed lip on the wall and lifted her ass up, playfully into Max's face. He saw where her extended, and altered, clitorus grew from the folds of her female sex and though it wasn't throbbing like it had been when it had been base deep in him; it still looked ready for any hole wet and willing.

"I think I found your pool right here, Fel." Max ran his tongue over the glistening slit of Diana's hungry sex, no less agitated from her exclusion in the previous orgasm than Max's cock. Time to fix that, he thought as his dove in with both of his prehensile tongues and began to lick, delve, and stretch into what was becoming a familiar taste: Valkyrie. 

-----
Present Minus Seventeen Hours, Thirty Three Minutes.

Space ripped and rippled as a bubble of blue and white appeared expanded and popped to reveal the dun colored escape launch. It was like ovid in shape, designed to reenter atmosphere's, float in water, and shrug off impacts against hard rock and even starship bulkheads. In a pinch, it had been used, to terrifying effect, by marines to counterattack vessels; but those had been Valkyries, girded in full Combat Skins; any Basic, or 'Baseline' Terran would probably be pulp, along with most of the launch.

Now EEL: MD-PL-11 was floating in the void, its secondary systems already competing to see who could malfunction more violently. 

"Some kill the lights before I get a stroke," Diana had spoken softly, but the words carried the weight of the order they were. She could feel the gravity fail before she saw the beads of sweat floating in the air; not just sweat as she inhaled through her nose, blood. Through the smells of ozone, sweat, ship cleaner; the smell of blood was coming from vent leading into the closed cockpit.

"Doc." Sergeant Diana Nolan didn't need to shout. She knew every Marine in the Launch had better augmentations they she did, and likely were already aware their pilot had taken a hit on their way out. Doctor-Lance Corporal Maya Hona was already out of her shock harness and pulling a medical unit from the module mounted in one of the walls. 

Diana was on point, even going one room over, she led from the front. 'Policy' be damned. I'm short enough the rest of them can just shoot over me. She confirmed that the cockpit hadn't suffered a pressure lose and hit the door to open it. The hiss of the door was followed by the hiss of the pilot. A Lieutenant, and a recent addition to the ship. Her eyes glanced across the consoles. The she knew how launches worked well enough to know what would need to work to keep her squad alive. Luckily most of those screens were showing functional greens, with the odd cautionary yellows. Much of the rest of the screens were flashing orange or holding red.

"FUCKING BULLSHIT SABOTAGING INFIGHTING NOBLE BLOODED COCK SHY NANNY BANGING-" The line of profanity coming out of the pilot's mouth sounded more Marine than Navy, but she knew all the new marine pilots and he was wearing navy officer duties, and she saw the blood floating from the leg he was compressing with both hands. Diana stepped aside so Doc could move up and tend to the wounds.

"You functional, Lieutenant" She asked levelly as she drew up on his other side, and quietly read his name strip. Lt. M. Sable. Sable. Holy FUCK. She hid the surprise from her face. The man nodded. He was pretty, in the way someone with mixed blood tended to be, the lines in his face gave an exotic look to the familiar. Diana had never been so meek as to turn down a Thilidin looking to warm her trenches, so to speak; at least not when the attraction was mutual.

"Oh I'll be five-by-five, yeah that's where the shrap is," He paused to guide Doc Hona as she ran a scanner over his hands as they continued to hold close his wound, "I'll be five once I find the bastard who set this up and slit his dick open with a rusty knife."

"Where you gonna find a rusty knife on a Navy ship?" Lance Corporal and designated Sharpshooter Beverly 'Verily' Denver asked from the doorway. "Light's are off, Sarge and were doing inventory on what's still functioning. 

"I'll improvise, Ma taught me that much; even before I told her I was going Navy." Diana could feel the dread in his voice. Clearly not a fan of celebrity she decided to divert the conversation.

"You said someone set this up?" She asked, while Doc applied a bandage gel between the Lieutenant's fingers. Once she gave him the clear he slipped his hands  through the colloid bandage and she handed him a special towelette to clean the residue off.

"I had just triple checked the ship's black logs." He pointed at the scorched portion of the cockpit. "And called Maintenance, and reported that there was an anomaly in the ship's black logs, and that I was kicking it up to the CO or the Ex, whomever picked up in the CIC. I had just told the Commander something was wrong with my launches logs when the drill was called."

"You were going to just call the bridge?" Diana asked.

"The logs show, or showed," He scowled at the burnt out, exploded, and foam filled console, "That someone had been using this launch, and using it to make repeated FTL jumps, during our last refuel, resupply, and R&R call." His voice hinted at something else, Diana logged that, for later.

"So someone was using this launch, to do something," Diana started, but saw the LT had something to say, she paused to let him.

"For a period of twenty hours, that's the span of time, and it's lined up to when most of the senior crew on this deck were off ship, during one shift or the other."

"You're sure?" Diana asked, for a Commissioned Line officer, he wasn't showing much of the pomp, but with his surname she'd be disappointed if he'd turned out like that.

"That was the point of the triple check, correlate." He sighed as the Doc applied the pain killer. "Fuck me." He blinked hard before adding, "That wasn't an order, just..." He went back to his debrief. "I should have called the CIC first, but she got enough of the message to know something's fucked."

"Maybe, but this means whoever picked up that call in Maintenance was in on the scheme,"
"Or someone sitting next to them, or someone tapping the communication consoles near the launch being used for their schemes, or someone stationed on the deck who wouldn't be missed during the time it was used." The LT listed off all the possibilities.

"It could be any, and all of those." Diana agreed. "It'd take a team to launch an Eel and NOT raise an alarm."

"And Maintenance would have priorty to soft launch one of these without a fuss, especially if they were working in conjunction with the Port's Crew. Oh this is fucked. I joined to fly Thraxi and slag Rhokum not deal with god damn black ops bullshit and internoble fighting."

"You're Thraxi track?" Most pilots who wanted to fly gunships trained in the high speed Zolus or the anti-capital ship Casios. Thraxi were gunships that supported ground troops and marines, they also had a high casualty rate from anti-air. 

"Plenty of hot shots zooming around, not enough skill covering zed." The Lieutenant replied, it was a complaint often held by Marines that the Navy wasn't putting the resources into Air Support that it might have. Part of that was to hold a flying reserve in case of SAR and the Corp respected that. However they felt that some of the better pilots were 'encouraged' to take on the tracks that would lead them toward capitalship commands over escort squadrons.

"Well, Lt-" Doc started to stand as she read his name strip. "Fuck me." Her eyes went wide.

"Okay," A heavy voice came from the back. "I've heard fuck to many times not to think there's a party up here." Diana chucked as Corporal Moira 'Darling' Angelina, her Second in Command and Heavy Weapons Tech sidled up beside Verily.

"I think we should let the Doctor give her prognosis before we celebrate our imminent rescue," The Lieutenant turned his head and scowled before tapping a screen that should have shown green but only showed red. "Or enjoy what time we have left. The Recall Beacon is gone." He said coolly. 

"Gone?" Darling repeated. "The fuck do you mean," She noticed the Lt. pips on his collar, "Sir." She added.

"This is why I still outrank you," Diana laughed. Moira stuck her tongue out and reminded Diana how much the Marine had to 'tie knots' with.

"If it were just broke, offline, or fucked to all hell," This sensor here. He pointed to a textless bar below the red text bar declaring the Recall Beacon as 'Offline-Repairs Required' and tapped it. "This would be black, like the borders of the screen. It's red. That's not something they put in the manual, but that means the Beacon isn't there anymore. Someone stole our Recall Beacon. "

"Could that be it, they want to use the Beacon for their own plans. Meri isn't just going to jump in on top of a Beacon when her Boss knows something's up with the launch it belongs too.

"Plus at this point if it's outside our jump range-" Moira starts.

"Our blind jump range," The Lieutenant corrects, 

"Thanks Lieutenant-" She pauses.

"Sable," The officer admits, Moira nods. Verily's eyes were wide and there were two whispers that repeated the name from the main room of the launch.

"if it's outside our blind jump range it's going to raise all kinds of red flags." Moira smiled, content. Then after a beat, "Wait, SABLE?!"

--------

-Present-

"Alright, Sarge." Specialist Roan frowned and crossed her arms under her nearly over regulation tits, "You snuck your turn,"

"Snuck nothing," Diana smiled as she drifted toward the crash seat she'd claimed as her own. "I was invited."  Felicity snapped her gaze back to Max as he closed the maintenance hatch in the roof of the launch's main room. 

"Hmph!" Was all Felicity responded with before she dragged the Lieutenant to ground level and pressed him firmly, but gently into the open bathroom door, and the localized gravity grid.


Launches were first and foremost life boats. But they were large enough to have some creature comforts. The small half bath had a battery powered grav plate and allowed for 'normal grav' relief, even if the piping system was stored just beside it. 

There was also a narrow double bunk room off the port side, and it had been agreed that those bunks would be used for actual kip. Opposite the bedroom was the launch's 'kitchen' which was where the rations and water were stored. 

"Well if your gonna have a private fuck with him, I think we all should!" Was all she said before she shut the door behind her. She turned her frown into a smirk as she slowly turned to face her cornered quarry, "Now then Ma-aaaax!" Her quickly planned play vanished from her head as Max's hands worked the half hard shaft that was fast rising out of her uniform briefs. "Fuuuuck."

"Lieutenant," Max, no Lieutenant Sable corrected her, she bit her lip as his hands worked over her cock. He roughly thumbed the head of her shaft and with a tight ring formed by two fingers and his thumb, pumped down to her balls and gave them a soft, but firm squeeze. The Lieutenant looked like he was going to say something, but didn't. Felicity smiled.

"Gonna save that joke for Doc?" She asked, he squeezed harder, "SIR!" She squeaked. The LT didn't 'put on the rank' when they were eating or discussing what to fix on the launch next, but during times like this, he was the boss. She bit her lip as his the LT's wrapped around the thick head of her shaft and she leaned back against the door. Oh, he was most definitely in charge, she thought hazily as she felt the warmth of his throat bulge out and swallow hard around the trunk of her shaft. His grip on her balls became gentle again, then outright devious as his fingers slipped back and tickled her slit while his mouth took her half way down her haft.

She went up onto her toes as her cock twitched, throbbed, and threw thick ropes of cum down the Lieutenant's throat. Heh, Lieutenant's throat, LT. She thought of the pun and giggled, half in the glaze of orgasm. 

"Your rifle passes inspection, Marine." The Lieutenant observes, at the phrase, she half snaps out of her reverie, but remembers where she is. "Now how's your marksmanship?" He stood and turned, barely moving a step to lean forward against the wall opposite the door. It really was just a water closet. 

"Ready to do proud by the Corp, and do the Fleet, proudly." She leaned in to whisper into his ear, "Sir." She lined up the head of her cock with one hand and gripped his shoulder with the other. She felt his asshole give way, and held back the hot sigh as she slid in raw. The other upshot of the bathroom, no worries about floating globs of cum in the air. "FUCK, SIR." She growled as she bottomed out in his ass after a slow, creeping, moment of penetration.

She put her other hand on his other should, and pulled back, until just the head of her cock tugged at the inside of his anus. Then she slammed in. She let out a long breath and thought a prayer of thanks to all Thilidin and their brilliant gene-therapy work. Most 'basic' men didn't have ass that could take her to the hilt, stay whole, and still feel good for the guy. But anyone with a bit of Thil in them could take ALL of Felicity. She pulled back and again and started thrusting in earnest.

----

Outside the bathroom, Lance Corporal Denver leaned back from the bathroom door and drifted in the open room, chuckling. "Do proud by the Corp, and do the Fleet, proudly. I know I've seen the porno that's from."

"Captain Benson at Attention Three." The sixth, youngest, and newest member of the squad answered from where she was laying, against the ceiling. The Lance Corporal nodded.

"Thanks, Pix." Field-Cadet Alexandra 'Pix (or it didn't happen)' Wolfwood nodded back. She frowned at the small chit in her hand and the six drawn on it. "Always fucking last in fucking." The tech specialist quietly swore, blushing as she did.