LOCATION: JUMP POINT

SYSTEM: VARLEN

DATE: 2402

"You sure this is the right move, boss?" Omari, Kaela's pilot, asked.

"If you want to keep making money, it is. Besides, this beats sitting around in STO space and waiting for work. Ever since Harlow was defeated, criminal activity and bounty contracts have plummeted. Might as well go where the action will be."

Her pilot grunted before turning around and muttering under his breath. "Vitor isn't going to like you showing up out of the blue like this."

Omari might have thought he was being quiet, but he wasn't being quiet enough. Kaela smiled at the man's words. It was true, Vitor would be annoyed by her presence, but that's what made it so much fun.

She gave the order for her pilot to jump, a thrill of excitement running down her spine. This would be the first time she had left STO space. It was risky as hell since her ship, Kyuubi no Kitsune, was unarmed, but that's part of what made the trip so exciting.

Kaela needed that excitement. She had grown bored tracking down low-level criminal thugs and taking on contracts that barely paid her expenses years ago. Her short escapade with Vitor and his crew had been the most fun she had had in years. It had also paid the best, after Vitor had sent her the money he owed her, with a fat bonus on top. She wanted more of that, even if Vitor wasn't willing to rekindle their relationship. Then again, she could be pretty convincing when she wanted to be, though, so even that wasn't off the table.

Of course, that wasn't the only reason she was going to Unokane. There were certain rumors she wanted to verify for herself.

***

LOCATION: EDEN'S END

SYSTEM: UNOKANE

Vitor received a knock on his door.

"Enter," he said before setting down the report he had been going through. The document he was reading was a consolidation of all the data Alex had sent over about the Shican, and it was deeply disturbing.

Pembrooke entered his office. "Is this a good time?" the man asked.

"It's as good as it's going to get. What's up?"

"I thought you might like to know, a friend of yours is on their way. We've been tracking their approach to Varlen for over a week, but they just jumped out of Varlen, heading our way."

"A friend of mine?" Vitor asked in confusion. He had to stop and think about who that might be. He groaned. "Please tell me it's someone from the STO."

Pembrooke's slight smirk and shake of the head told Krieger everything he needed to know. He rubbed his temples. "When is Captain Voss scheduled to arrive?"

"A little over two weeks. If it's a problem, we could simply turn her away," Pembrooke offered.

"It's fine. I don't have a problem with Kaela Voss; she just tends to get a bit pushy when she wants something. Especially if it's something she can't have."

"I've read up on her," Pembrooke said casually. "She seems like an accomplished woman. Do you think she would be open to joining BSE?"

Vitor choked out a laugh, getting a surprised look from Pembrooke. He waved off the man's sudden concern. "It's not that I don't think Kaela could command. She's run her little bounty hunting company since she was sixteen. It's- How do I put this… Kaela is a force of nature. Sometimes that's a good thing, other times, not so much. She's probably coming out here to collect on the favor I owe her."

"I would still like to make her an offer," Pembrooke replied. "We don't exactly have a large pool of candidates to choose from, and people from the other Union planets are slow to filter to Unokane because they have the same opportunities on their home worlds while the war with Grand Admiral Xin is ongoing. Those opportunities aren't going to improve once word gets around that the Shican have returned to human space."

Vitor sighed. "I'm aware of that. I won't stop you from trying to recruit Kaela and her crew, but don't be surprised when she turns you down. In the meantime, I suppose I should get Vanguard prepped and ready to meet her when she arrives."

Pembrooke nodded and left, giving Vitor a few moments to himself. He cared for Kaela, but she was the type of person who wasn't satisfied unless she was fighting. That adrenaline rush and need for conflict extended to her relationships, and it just got to be too much for him after a while. He broke things off with her before it turned ugly, ensuring they still remained friends, but he knew she still had feelings for him.

It was tough not to fall for her piercing azure gaze and impish smile, but he needed to remain objective. He had responsibilities, even more so now that he was an Admiral.

He got up from his desk and left his office to go look for his XO. He could have radioed the man, but he wanted to get up and walk while he thought. Life outside the STO certainly hadn't been boring since he arrived. Sometimes he wished it would be, but it wasn't like Alex or the Asgardians were the cause of that. They were simply defending their territory.

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Against pirates and the old Coalition vessels that Grand Admiral Xin seemed to have an endless supply of, that was a relatively easy proposition, especially with Alex supporting the Asgardian fleets and providing the comm nodes.

If Alex's reports reflected the general fleet composition of the Shican, that meant they would be going up against a superior opponent, who probably also had superior numbers. He didn't know for sure if their fleet size was superior to the STO's, but it was a logical assumption that it was based on how many ships they sent through the gates. Alexander had faced off against five capital ships that had come through, followed by one more before the gate shut down. Round that number up to ten to account for any that might have been lost when the gate shut down, just to be on the safe side. Once you included the disjointed reports from the other hypergate locations, which told of ten to fifteen vessels coming through before the mystery ship stepped in to deal with them.

That meant the Shican had deployed thirty-five capital ships within less than ten minutes on what was essentially a recon in force. Who knew how many more could have come through the gates if they hadn't been destroyed? The human diplomats of those systems would have dithered for days or weeks about taking the gates out to stop the flood of enemy ships, assuming any Navy assets had survived long enough to see the orders carried out.

Not that the Shican would have needed any more ships. The seven large vessels would have been enough to ravage human space, given their defenses and weapons.

No ship was invincible, but they could have done incalculable damage before the STO managed to get enough ships to the area, especially if the corporations sat back and did nothing. More than likely the corporations would have taken what assets they could and abandoned everyone else to save their own asses.

Vitor didn't know how they were supposed to fight against a superior foe, but he left that up to Alex to figure out. His part of the problem would be focusing on commanding whatever forces BSE had when the time came. Speaking of, he located his XO and had the man prepare Vanguard for departure.

The cruiser wasn't normally on system patrol rotation because Vitor was required to deal with stuff back on Eden's End more and more as the fleet grew, but he figured he should greet Kaela in person, and it was his prerogative as Admiral to join the week long patrols on occasion, just to keep his skills sharp. It definitely wasn't because he wanted to take the wind out of her sails as she tried to arrive unannounced. Nope, definitely not that.

***

A little over a week later, Vanguard disembarked from the station. While Unokane wasn't nearly as busy as even the most remote STO system, the pilot still had to maneuver around other ships carefully.

Unokane had seen a steady influx of ships since Harlow's defeat, and that continued to grow with each passing month. Two ships were docked to the temporary ring, which had been recommissioned as a staging dock for vessels waiting their turn for engine upgrades, as well as pulling double duty as a fleet docking hub. Since Alex had signed that deal with Omni, BSE couldn't simply swap out the old pulsed fusion drives. They had to take a ship offline for a full upgrade to compressed plasma ejection.

Vitor thought people might balk at having to wait a week or two to get back to their busy routes. Most smaller companies had very tight margins for profit, but some captains still took BSE up on the offer. He suspected that it had to do in large part with the ridiculously low price Alex was charging for a complete swap to the newer drive system, which included a brand new reactor as well as an upgrade to the fuel core.

Trade was also picking up between Unokane, the Union, and even a few STO ships making their way out there. News of a new war brewing with the enigmatic aliens was likely to make people a bit more jumpy and slow trade once again, but he agreed with Alex's assessment. The aliens weren't likely to be seen any time soon.

To ensure that was the case, Alex had ordered Lucas to pump out more stealth satellites, which were going to be deployed directly along the most likely route the Shican might take. Prioritizing that section of space would delay their efforts to expand through the entirety of Union territory, but having advanced warning when the kitties made their move was far more important.

A group of cadets in the training Stingrays zipped past off to the right, barely on the edge of Vanguard's tac-display. The new pilots were doing well, and he couldn't wait to see what they were capable of once their training was complete. He would prefer not to send freshly graduated cadets into war, but they may not get a choice if the Shican came in numbers.

Eventually, Vanguard neared the jump point that led into Unokane from the direction of Varlen. To outside observers, Vanguard only had four gunships as escort vessels, but there were eight Swordfish within effective combat range of the jump point.

The stealthy ships were nearly impossible to detect as they were simply passive observers loitering in the area. The ships didn't even use their main drives to maneuver, just small ion thrusters to adjust their course occasionally.

Vitor checked that everything was in place and settled in to wait for Kaela's arrival. Re%ade$r supp&ort^ at M*V@LEM$*$P&YR ma*d+e& th!i$s^ tr!ans*l$a*t*io*n p!o*s&s^i!ble%.#

It was a boring few days, but he was used to that. In basic training, they never mentioned that most of your role as a captain would consist of waiting or moving from one spot to another. If they had, a lot of people probably would have dropped the initial captaincy courses. Those courses didn't guarantee you would become a captain, but they were required to be on the track to earn the role.

A small ship seemed to smear across space for a brief instant before popping out of FTL. The light delay of a ship arriving from FTL was always a weird thing to witness, because logic dictated that the ship had arrived before the light of its travel did, which is what caused the weird smearing effect.

The Fox's transponder signal reached them a moment later. If the ship had been armed, it could generously be called a corvette. Vitor had once called the vessel a civilian hauler in front of Kaela, and she hadn't spoken to him for a week after that mistake.

Vitor smiled at the memory before contacting the newly arrived ship.

A very surprised Kaela picked up. When she saw who it was, she pouted. "Who gave away my arrival?"

"Why are you here, Kaela?" Vitor asked instead of answering the woman's question.

"Can't I come and say hi to a good friend?" she asked cheekily.

He gave her a flat stare. "No."

She sighed. "I remember you as being more fun. When did you grow so averse to a little light banter?"

"Since I became responsible for any mistakes," he replied. "Kaela, I don't have time for your usual games, but I'm not going to turn you away. Call that part of the favor I owe you."

"That's not fair," she said in annoyance, some of the fire that made her such an effective bounty hunter coming to the surface. "You don't get to decide what constitutes the favor you owe me."

Vitor didn't respond to her accusation. "Enjoy your stay in Unokane, but stay out of trouble. I mean it. I'm responsible for the space around Eden's End, not surface issues. If you land in jail because of your antics, expect to stay there until you serve your sentence."

Vitor cut the connection before the woman could complain any further. He had been purposefully dismissive in hopes of dispelling any intention she might have of rekindling their relationship. He knew Kaela enough to know even that wouldn't dissuade her for long.

He sighed internally as he watched the small ship head toward Eden's End. Another reason Kaela was such a good bounty hunter was that she never gave up once she had a whiff of her prey. And to her, Vitor was that prey.