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“Another drill Adrian? You are taking this position too seriously, you need to relax an—”

“High Prime, I need a status report from all systems.” He interrupted her. Then he turned to the acting Communication Handler Gillian Estevez, she was one of the Academy graduates that chose to enter service at the rank of cadet. “Contact engineering, they need to prep the drives, and inform the team working on the upgrades to abort any operations they have in progress and return to the ship.” Everyone turned around and just looked at him like he was crazy. Bethany stared at him open mouthed still sitting in his chair. Adrian looked at her with a stony face.

“High Prime, the Ship Master has entered CC, why are you still sitting in my chair.” He asked calmly. Something in his voice must have clicked with her because she got out of the chair. Adrian took his position in the command chair, he looked around and noticed that everyone still just looked at him, three of the older cadets who were now at the stations for Navigation, Sensors and Weapons had amused looks and were chuckling amongst themselves. The atmosphere in Olympus was more relaxed than in Earth militaries, but there was still a clear chain of command, and their behavior was inexcusable. They didn’t know that this wasn’t a drill, and even if it was, they needed to take it seriously.

“I gave you an order. This is not a drill.” He said to the room, only Communication Handler Estevez listened to him and got on the comms with engineering, Adrian told Iris to remember and remind him about Estevez later, the rest kept looking at him, while the three older cadets resumed their amused chuckling. He knew that they disliked drills, but their behavior was unacceptable. He informed the security that their presence was required in CC via his implant, and sent them his new command codes, the ones Laura gave him. He then informed those from the second and third watch he knew would follow his orders to the CC to replace the ones he was about to kick out.

He looked at the older cadets, one of them returned to what he was doing before Adrian walked in, while others shook their heads and talked ignoring Adrian. A moment later six security officers entered the CC. Adrian pointed to the three Cadets.

“Throw those three in the brig. Keep them there until I tell you otherwise.” He told them.

“Understood, Ship Master.” Their leader said. All off them looked as young as anyone else in the CC, but Adrian knew that they were older, some even from the time before Olympus went into space. They moved professionally and subdued the struggling Cadets.

“Hey! What the hell do you think you are doing!?” One of them yelled. Adrian stood up and glared at him.

“Did you think I was joking? I told you that this wasn’t a drill! You have cost us precious time we need to accomplish our mission. You are a disgrace, you don’t deserve to be here. Even if this was a drill, your job is to FOLLOW MY ORDERS!” Adrian yelled at them. They grew silent at his outburst and the security took them out. As they were going out the three other crewmembers Adrian called to replace them entered the CC, one of them was Noah, they had heard his outburst and had a slightly frightened looks on their faces. He ordered them to their positions with Noah taking the weapons station. He looked at Bethany.

“High Prime, you have two minutes to get me reports from all systems on my display.” He told her calmly.

Bethany finally snapped out of her trance and got to work.

Comms Handler Estevez turned to Adrian.

“I have Chief Engineer Martinez for you, Ship Master.” She said.

“Put her through.”

A moment later the image on Chief Engineer Martinez showed on the display above his armrest. She had a hard look on her young face, she had dark hair and brown eyes, which narrowed as she looked at him.

“I have been ordered to abandon the upgrades and come back inside the ship by Fleet. Do you happen to know why?”

“Chief Martinez.” Adrian started. “This ship has been ordered to get underway to a hostile situation. You and your people have ten minutes to abort any upgrades you were conducting, and get inside the ship. If you are not inside the ship in that period of time, you will be left behind.” He looked at the Chief with stony face.

“A hostile situation? But—” Adrian sent her his command codes. She was one of the ships original crew, and had much more experience than him, and he knew that she probably didn’t have the habit of questioning her orders and wouldn’t have done so if Athena’s “real” Ship Master was in command, and Adrian was not willing to burn any bridges with her.

Her eyes widened for a second as her implant authenticated the codes.

“Yes Ship Master.” She said, and closed the channel.

Bethany who was close enough to overhear all of their exchange looked at him with a fearful look.

“A hostile situation?” She asked.

“Yes.” Adrian said simply.

“Comms, put me through the ship wide speakers.” Estevez nodded and a minute later the icon appeared on his display indicating that the ship wide speakers were on.

“Attention crewmembers. Approximately two hours ago, a hostile warship was headed towards Cloud base, followed by two Concordis warships, it is expected to dock with the station any moment now. We have been ordered to intercept and take that warship under our custody. Or if that fails to destroy it. We are not to engage Concordis vessels unless given reason to. This is not a drill.” Adrian took a beat to take another breath. “I know that this is not what you imagined your first true mission to be, but this it is. Remember your training, but keep in mind that this is not a simulation, if you make a mistake people will die. Trust in yourselves, and we will accomplish our mission together. That is all.” He closed the channel.

Bethany turned to him, with a professional expression, she had managed to push her fear down. Good, I will need her, Adrian thought. “Yes you will.” Iris told him.

He didn’t have a chance to respond because Bethany sent him the reports on all systems. He looked them over, noticing that everything was good to go.

“The team doing the upgrades is back inside, the drives are operational. And there is a squad of army forces requesting permission to come aboard Ship Master.” Bethany said.