Malbess took a breath and knocked on the Captain's office door. The door slid aside and Captain Tkarro said, "So good of you to grace us with your presence, Commander Malbess." "Sorry, sir. That's why I called. Coming back from Adamesh should have been fairly quick. It must be all the moving about of the defense satellites we got from the Kohl-Tahnnu. Like this Kohl-Tahnnu?" Jeet said to her over his shoulder, "Don't mind me, I AM practicing my powers of invisibility!" Malbess looked in shock over to the Squirrel Beastman and exclaimed, "You joined UP! You in the SOD under me?" He blinked, "Supply and Operations Division? Guess so. Just got sworn in and got my uniform fitted. Haven't gotten my shoes yet. Hey, I'm not the famous one here! Saw you on the tube! WOW and some DAYUMMM! You are the baddest hand-to-hand fighter on ALL of Adamesh! NEVER seen ANYONE move like that!" The Kohl-Tahnnu woman tilted her head and asked,"Is the Commander famous?" Dokka Tkarro nodded, "Absolutely. The Tounament of Honor is an annual event, where the population of Adamesh wants to prove their honor and dedication to the martial arts and compete to crown the greatest fighter on the planet. Malbess won the title this year. That's why she's dressed like that. Cloak of Honor, isn't it?" Malbess nodded and extended a hand towards the Kohl-Tahnnu woman. "I'm Malbess, sister to the Empress, Malbessah. You are the first of your species joining up to the United System Commonwealth military, aren't you?" "Lieutenant Nephrys of the Kohl-Tahnnu. I was born on Balaam, after we were stranded on planet after the Blight. We were spying on the humans before first contact. Things went to hell awfully quick then. I'll be in engineering, under Sub-Commander Narchi Moderaan. Ensign Jeet was telling me about him." She looked over and nodded at him. Jeet shrugged. He caught his breath and snapped off a salute at Malbess. "Aw crap! Sorry! Ensign Jeet Moderaan, reporting for duty, Ma'am!" Malbess laughed. She snapped one back at him and exchanged salutes with Nephrys. Dokka laughed. "I guess we ARE more like pirates more than USCOMM fleet! God, I already got my ass chewed for all manner of transgressions." Malbess said, "Captain, Rose and I can lay down the law. Nephrys, Rose is second in command, and is charge of offense and defense, and is right hand to the Captain. I'M his left hand. I make sure everything on the ship is here and operates like is supposed to. That includes engineering AND the medical,life-support,supply,ordinance,and the laundry departments. I report to Rose when the Captain isn't present." Malbess looked them over and asked, "Any questions?" Jeet said, "Not per se...I do have a thought about why the Galactic Humans are such jerks." Dokka looked over."Please go on! I've heard thirty theories so far and they're all...not very good." Jeet said, "They're afraid of us. They only ran into THREE alien species TOTAL? Hell! We got that many just in THIS ROOM! We got thirty or forty that look that part in our crew! I'd puff up and try to look bigger so we wouldn't eat them up, too! Or go hide in a hole and piss on myself!" "Coarsely phrased, but sounds pretty spot on. That would explain a lot. Even if they reversed engineered all their technology from other species, they DO have ten thousand stars colonized, and huge fleets of starships. At present- we have ONE space-battleship that is FTL capable, and maybe some twenty extra-solar colonies. We don't even know if any of them survive!" Dokka tapped on his desk. Jeet said, "Use the fear. Treat them cordially, but from strength. Let 'em know WE came up with our OWN FTL, but try not broadcast our weaknesses. Don't lie, just leave stuff out." Dokka grinned at Malbess who broke into laughter. Jeet shrugged. "Sorry. Shot my mouth off too much." Dokka smiled,"I'd promote you if I could. MALBESS! Get this man some shoes!" --TO BE CONTINUED!--