The USF Crusader, one of only a handful of its kind, it was ahead of its time several decades ago, but during a time of war, the expensive design was not very cost effective so further production was abandoned after the first few were cast off from their stations. The Tempest class Explorer was outfitted with top of the line forward-facing cannons, all range missile batteries, not to mention new hull shielding technology. It was also the first of its kind to make use of gravity plating rather than relying on rotating parts that made earlier designs much slower and less efficient.

The Crusader distinguished itself under the command of Captain Ken Ishimura, several tactical battles with raiding parties as well as carefully planned strikes against Humanity's first threat in space, the Traskann. An insect-like people, territorial and less than friendly, but the humans were relentless in defending their borders and eliminating the Traskann supply lines.

For four decades the Crusader stood as a symbol of humanities defiance, sometimes called the unbreakable knight of the USF under the watchful eye of Captain Ishimura, who eventually rose to the esteemed position of Admiral. But it just couldn't keep up and was almost destroyed. It was laid to rest for several years, but the innovations behind it's original design all combined into one vessel were still too important to ignore.

Research and development teams worked on new enhanced systems, using new technology and ideas to improve the existing design and the former Crusader was returned to the factory for a one-of-a-kind retrofit. It's siblings had all perished. New plating replaced old, the core systems were replaced, the interior workings refurbished. Ultimately some viewed it like replacing both the handle and the head of a hammer, a philosophical debate was once issued about whether or not it was the same ship, but the aging Ken Ishimura approved of its revival, remarking that it was as if the Crusader had never left when he toured it.

Practically everything was the same, give or take for new interfaces and higher grade weaponry even the targeting systems and long range scanners had been overhauled but it all operated just as it did before. He called it a proud war horse for any distinguished warrior.

Admiral Ishimura handed over the Crusader to a rising young star, Commander Hadley Harrington, promoting her to the rank of Captain in the process. The move was questionable indeed, after all she didn't nearly have quite the same reputation as Ishimura at the same age, but he remained tight-lipped about the choice, calmly pushing for it until the rest of the higher ups agreed.

Unfortunately the top brass still held sway in where the Crusader went, placing the unique vessel in the hands of Hadley Harrington, with a fresh promotion, came across to them as a reckless idea, but they had to at least respect his wishes. So they gave the Crusader an important task as border patrol duty for the unexplored territories at the opposite end of the USF territory. Everyone else, including even Hadley's own First Officer referred to it as what it actually was, training wheels. It was an unsatisfactory position, but at least it made both sides of the brass happy.

The only downside to watching the unexplored territories was that it was a little dull, probes into the area often seemed to vanish, and beyond it was the rim, leading into dark space. it was only recently that the order was finally given to directly enter the unexplored territories and try to locate the missing probes.

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"Talk about a back log.." Christine muttered, checking a list, each probe and their specifications were detailed in front of her, she flicked through them one by one and sighed, "They're so busy fighting the Traskann that they didn't pay attention to these losses? Idiots." She sighed, looking around the command deck,
"Okay everyone, the Captain is on her way, give me a status report." She ordered, closing the application and setting it on her command console, placing her hands behind her back and staring around the room as each of the officers on the various monitors and control systems called out their reports, there was always a specific order to it, so it was easier to remember.

Eventually it was Flight Lieutenant jack Chambers turn, he was always last in line,
"Looks like all systems are green, Commander." He commented, a little offhandedly, hearing one of the others clear their throat, he stared at them then smiled sheepishly, "Er I mean. All verniers active, I'm getting confirmation across the board, the drive systems are active and connected, no faults in the control system. Drift is currently just over two-hundred thousand. Inertia dampeners are active, we're ready to jump to sector 25-A next and-"

A bleeping sound caught his attention and he looked over to his right, the long range scanners were picking something up,
"Hold the phone.. We've got an unknown object, definitely not natural, it's emitting an unusual signal, need an analysis of it," He reached his hand into the holographic representation of the local area, placing his fingers around the small red orb that denoted the unknown object and flicked it over to one of the science officers.
"Friend or Foe systems aren't registering it as a Traskann craft, it's not USF either. It's not a registered civilian ID, silhouette unknown, energy signature unknown, there's a pulse beacon attached, it might be an escape pod, I'm registering a distress call but the language is unknown our translators are having difficulty decrypting it. I cant confirm any life forms." The science officer called off the entire shpiel, looking over to Jack, who in turn stared over his shoulder at Commander Silvers,
"We have five minutes to intercept, what do you think Commander?"

Christine rubbed her chin softly before pressing the com device on her wrist,
"Comms, this is Commander Silvers, get me on the line to the Captain,"
"Yes ma'am," there was a soft bleep confirming that she was connected and she spoke once more,
"Captain, there is an unknown device roughly five minutes ahead of the ship, it's headed our way, we don't know if there's any life on board, scanners cant penetrate the interior compartment, it's about the size of a life pod. It doesn't register as a Traskann craft. Silhouette is unknown. What are your orders?"

Brushing her fingers along her captains pips Hadley sighed. She was still surprised each day that she got ready that she was a captain. It was not that she felt she was not captain material, but that she had gotten enough black marks from the admiralty that she worried she would be too old before she ever got the rank. Her fist make was one that she had always known that she would face, there was still anti-genie’s in the admiralty that took offence to her look that she had worked hard in the academy to be the best at all there was to be. She had to prove to them that just because her great great grandparents had been modified to live on her home planet it did not mean that she was going to go berserk like the ones had on Mars so long ago. As a child she had never realized that she was different but now everywhere she turned she was the alien in the mix.

Rubbing her marks she closed her eyes, the room around her blossomed behind her eyes in shades of heat as she used the marks to see them. No one outside of the people on New Vegas Colony knew what they did. Some of her class mates had thought they were just beauty marks that she had gotten put on her. Yet the truth was each mark was there to read a different wave length of energy. The lizard that had provided the genetic material for them had been the only creatures living on her home world when the first ones had landed. Now the only ones of those lizards you could find where in cages at zoo’s. a shiver ran down her spine at the thought of those large beast walking around the tunnel’s eating whatever they found there.

Her thoughts were interrupted when a signal bounced around her cabin, one she had never seen before. Opening her eyes the ghost of the Signal disappeared in the room now flooded with light. Turning quickly she moved through the halls of the ship knowing that if she was not there soon they, no she would be calling her. Christine had a bad habit in Hadley’s opinion that she had to make sure the captain saw everything before really reacting. She was going to have to brake her of that habit before she went on to another captain. But then maybe it was another captain that had taught her to be so careful.

She was just reaching the doors to the bridge when her com buzzed and Christine’s voice came over it telling her about what was going on. Opening the door she smiled at her bridge and the people upon it. The computer chimed and announced captain on the bridge. “at ease,” she said as everyone stood to show respect. “so we have something new out there?” her voice was calm and only Christine would recognize the giddy glee in her eyes as she walked towards her chair. “Hornick we can’t get a reading on it, is that correct?” at his nod she smiled. “Then bring her in, who knows what it might bring us in advances.” Waving her hand over her chairs arm console she lowered the lights in the bridge. The crew by now was used to her changing them each time she came in.

Leaning over she smiled at Christine. “and here you were complaining that we never get anything of interest out here last night. Well it looks like you got your wish,” she held out her hand, a common gesture to go with her next comment. “what do you want to bet is an escape pod?” she had grown up betting on anything and everything in her life and it had not ended the day she enter the Academy. It had only changed from monetary bets to favors and food.

The arrival of the Captain prompted Jack and Christine both to stand and salute properly before the helmsman took his seat again quickly, he was still preparing to intercept, waiting for some sign until he was given the order to bring it on board. He began maneuvering the ship in the direction of the small vessel, while the science officer continued to study the signal and language, he was trying to get an exact fix on the strange device.

Christine sat next to Hadley, hands rested on the arms of her chair, carefully trained to not touch the control pads placed there, however she glanced at the Captain a slightly more stern face being shown but she caught Hadley's eyes and even with their inhuman appearance, she recognized the glint in them, the other woman was excited by this new little prospect,
"I just don't like us being treated like a ship full of children." She replied, border patrol for the unknown territories was undeniably dull, but the Captain was right, at least something interesting was finally happening, "You know what? I'll bet my next shore leave it's an escape pod, if it's a bomb instead and we're all about to be blown to space dust; then we all get a permanent vacation,"

The commander stood up, hitting the comms again,
"This is Commander Silvers, Wyvern Flight Squadron we need a retrieval unit prepared and on standby, we will relay the necessary data to you. You launch in three minutes, intercept the unidentified object, capture it and bring it on board." She ordered swiftly, she often took on the duty of keeping the Flights prepared and exercised, her familiarity with gunships and fighters, not to mention her astonishing combat record, made her the clear-cut choice for running their drills, the pilots in the fighter bays knew better than to question her by this point.

She sat down again, folding her arms, while Hadley was purely excited for seeing something new, Christine was frustrated because she wished she could be piloting the retrieval unit. Sure she got in on the training sessions, and would without a doubt ride fire with the pilots in an actual battle, she still envied the chance to do something other than sit back and watch. But it was all she could do for now as she waited patiently, crossing one leg over the other.


Before long, two fighters launched, initially flying alongside the ship before moving out ahead of them, towards the pod. However the device reacted to their approach in a rather unexpected way. Retro boosters fired at the front of the oddly shaped pod, slowing it while its main engine powered down. The fighters were cautious at first, not approaching it until they were sure it seemed safe, a pair of towing grapples were attached to the pods hull and the began hauling it back towards the Crusader. With their systems linked, they could easily fly in formation and rely on the guidance systems of the Crusader to pull the cargo in correctly.

Christine was the first to stand once more, checking the monitors viewing the strange pod. She zoomed in on it and stared at the unusual design, for a moment, it almost seemed as though it were alive. No, something about it definitely was alive, she watched as the hull shifted slightly, lifting, but then falling, the control surfaces shifting and twitching, frankly the sight of it left an unsettled feeling in her stomach, more so whens he saw red eyes under the black shell, moving and staring at things within the cargo hold,
"That.." She started, grimacing slightly, ".. Is that thing organic?"
"Still not sensing any life signs, it may only be a machine that appears organic, either that or its a life form unlike anything our sensors can comprehend." Hornick interjected calmly, this honestly didn't make the Commander feel any better.

A silver laugh fell from Hadley’s lips before she spoke again. “they are not treating this ship like a ship full of children, they are treating this like the exile it is for me. You know that the admiralty does not trust me to be in the middle of battle, what with me being a Genie and how I look.” She smiled as she pulled up all the readings on the monitor at her chair. She wished that they had been able to get the holographic drop down display monitor that some of the new ships had. Yet there had not been enough space in the bridge to install that tech. “I think that your next shore leave is safe for that. But I bet one full dinner at ED’S that the alien is alive in the pod.”

She was proud of what Christine had been able to do with the Fighter Squads that they had gotten. Many of the pilots were good but had disciplinary problems, she had whipped them into a fighting unit. Hadley watched as Christine sat back down again, even though her body said that she wanted to rush down there to be one of the pilots to bring in the pod. “if I have not already said it, you have done wonders with that team. I could not have done better then you. While I would have gotten them working you got them into a family. Maybe next time you can dash off and lead them out to whatever we are going after.”

The bridge grew quite as they waited for the fighters to be launched, ever few second Gabriel Hornick, the science officer reading off bits of information about the pod as they grew closer to the pod. Hadley was sad that they still had not gotten a scan inside of the pod, but if they did get it in she knew they would get the information from it. “now that is interesting.” She said as the pod itself reacted to the fighters coming in. she moved forward to the edge of her seat looking at the monitor. “we don’t even have one that will do that. I wonder if it has a scanner that tells it if the ships coming in are going to attack it or not.”

Looking in on the pod as it was brought in Hadley stood and turned to walk to the bay. “Van Horn keep the computer working on that broadcast. I want to know the moment you unlock that langue, do you understand?”

“Yes ma’am, you will be the first to be comm’d when we get the information.” Nodding he turned back to his screen and let his fingers fly as he tried to get all the information he could from the new translation program they had.

“coming with me Chris?” when first Hadley had met Christine she had shorten her name to Chris and never would call her anything else other then her last name. “not like any one is going to say we were braking protocol when its in our bay.” Walking into the elevator she smiled knowing that they would be stopping before they reached the bay as their doctor would be wanting a crack at the pod to. “do you think it might try to adapted to our atmosphere or will we have to keep it in the sick berth?” their sick berth had a room designed for different atmospheres if it was needed.

"It reacted to them approaching, so it must be able to actively scan, I'd rather not know what would have happened if the boys opened their gun ports. But still.. I think we should be careful about approaching it." Chris replied, standing up. Hadley didn't even need to ask if her friend was coming, the blond adjusted her uniform, staying at the Captain's side, however she looked over at Jack,
"Keep your eyes out for anything else suspicious, if you detect anything, contact us immediately." She ordered simply, Jack saluted in confirmation and returned to monitoring the panels in front of him, there wasn't anything at all that he could detect, though he wondered if the strange signal coming from that device was causing interference of some kind.

Once more she accessed her communications device,
"Security Teams to the Cargo Bay. Gear up in EVA suits," She wanted to be as cautious as possible, but that was simply her nature, getting the security team to use EVA suits meant they'd be safe if they needed to space the hold and jettison the unknown device. Her cautious nature, however, was not to be mistaken for cowardice, every contingency she made was backup for if she failed at a task, not a buffer between her and danger. Her task at this time was to assure that the device was safe and not a threat to Hadley. She couldn't forgive herself if she let that childlike curiosity of her friend result in endangering her life.

She looked over at Hadley, curious about the question, true enough if the hypothetical alien couldn't live in their environment, a synthetic one would have to be made, but she still wanted to place some doubt in it being an alien. Then again, if Hadley was right, who knew? Maybe if there was an alien, they were in an encounter suit that would let them survive in any atmosphere, that seemed highly likely if this species was an advanced one. After all, it was clearly advanced enough to be using a ship that looked organic.

The thought made her stomach churn slightly, living machinery. It sounded more like a nightmare scenario. What if it was like a trap door spider? Waiting for a live meal to get too close.. She stepped aside, letting the doctor and their assistant climb into the elevator, giving them both a soft nod as the elevator sank further, eventually reaching the cargo deck. The woman reached to her side, pulling up a compacted pistol, with a soft press of the button it unfolded, extended and the barrel locked into place. It was a standard issue sidearm, an internal system shaved off pieces of metal from a magazine and put them through a miniaturized form of mass acceleration, turning them into lethal projectiles.

Once they reached the cargo bay, Christine entered first, gun raised upward, finger behind the trigger itself, calmly leading as the doctors followed behind. She looked up at the nearby catwalks, the security teams were filing into place, carrying standard combat rifles. The blonde woman approached the pod first, slowly but surely getting closer. It continued to shift and move as if it were alive, the red eye-like lights shifting around randomly and rapidly as if looking at everything all at once before they noticed Christine approaching.

The eyes seemed to glow bright, red laser-like lines extending from them and pointing at the woman. She froze in place, several of the lines shifted towards the gun in her hand and the pod seemed to transform, the sides opening up. Several on-board guns thrusting out and pointing toward her, but they didn't fire. It was a warning. The men on the catwalk prepared their weapons but a shot from Christine stopped them firing,
"Hold fire!" She ordered sharply, "It's a defense mechanism." The woman stepped back and lowered her weapon, slowly kneeling down and putting it on the ground. The pod watched her the entire time but once the gun was put down the weapons retracted back into the vessel and the sides closed.

The red lines changed shape suddenly, stretching and spreading into a grid that practically layered itself over Christine, it was scanning her. She didnt feel worried, only because she got the general idea that if the thing wanted her dead, she would already be splattered all over the far wall.
"VI'IK ALS, EST." A loud voice suddenly blared out from the machine, but the words were the same alien language they were trying to translate,
"TA'ASK VI'ITAL, VA'AT." It wasn't exactly a monotone sound, but it was definitely artificial, some sort of on board computer maybe. Christine stared at it quietly, trying to discern what was behind the screen of the pod, she could hear something inside whirring and shifting.

The doctor was already getting closer, the pod wasn't actually reacting to him directly, although the red eyes did stare at him briefly,
"This pod may well be a vacuum capable organism. Although it most definitely appears to be synthetic." He informed, scanning the surface with a medical tool, "The surface plating is covered in groups of microscopic nerve-like ends that appear to be reacting to light, there's DNA for certain, but the structure is completely artificial. Perhaps it's a grown material that they house technology within?" He pondered as the assistant got a little closer, jumping back slightly when one of the eyes concentrated on her,
"These units on the hull look like multi-directional high-sensitivity scopes.. But the shape is unlike anything I've ever seen. They probably link with the on-board weapons and internal systems, likely even the engines as a collision warning system to aid in guidance. Though I wonder what exactly they were doing by scanning the commander.."

"oh gods that thing probable would have tuned tail and tried to find some one else to take care of its passenger." Hadley gave a heavy sigh just thinking about what that could have caused if it had happened. who would want to die just because their computer system thought that its rescuers were going to kill it. watching Chris give Jack the command she smiled. as the elevator doors closed she smiled. "you know Chris if I am not careful your going to take over my job and I am going to become useless. the higher ups will come aboard ship one of these days and find me playing around with who knows what in my cabin, fat as a whale and you on the bridge making everything go." she said with a smile. in truth there was no way that she could ever become fat as her metabolism was much higher then normal humans because of her modifications. which meant that she had to eat twice as much food as most others on the ship and still she would not gain the weight that others in the crew would on half of what she ate.

"do you really think that we are going to need to space this thing? so far it has only acted like any life pod that we know of, well other then the cutting its engines when the ships moved in." it was true she was giddy at the thought of first contact with something new but she also was worried what this might mean if they fracked it up. this was not just one life, or the life of her crew on the line here. this was the chance of an ally and not a war on a second front. "you know what the guys back ground side would say if you spaced it and then found out that it was tech that they could have used to create something to turn the tables on the war." nodding she dropped what she was saying as the doctor and his assistant go on board.

"is the chamber ready in case this pod contains something that cant live in our environment?" she asked the doctor not a sign of her giddiness from a moment before. it was one thing to let the bridge crew know that she was excited for a change of pace but the doctor was an unknown to her. she was not sure if his ice blue skin was from him being a non human or if he was another Genie. since the Genie's now were seen as evil things that were set on taking over the world, thanks to the Mar's Genie. it was not a wise thing to be going around and asking people if they too were Genie's.

Grabbing a rebreath mask as they entered the bay she ignored anyone that tried to get her into a full suit. she did not care if every one else went around in full suits but she was going to present herself like she naturally was and they could just live with it. she had be modified to live in low oxygen and she would be fine with just the rebreath. looking over at Chris as they approached the pod she stared to raise her hand and speak when the lights came out and scene Chris. "I dont think it is wise to come in with the guns blazing." she whispered then the guns burst forth. "as i was saying." she held up her hands to stop the men from firing as Chris told them not to fire.

she watched as her team slowly got closer wishing that protocols would allow her to get close to it before any one else. slowly moving forward she listen to the doctor go on about how it worked and what it was. most of the talk was stuff she really had no interest in, but she did want to touch it. shifting though all the spectrum she could see she sighed. there was little to not radiation coming off it or any other thing that she could see. walking forward she reached out a hand as she talked. "we really can not under stand you but I am Captain Hadley Harrington of the USFSS Crusader, original of the planet Earth of the Sol system." she went into the full details of where the system was located like it was written in the first contact manual. "and you might happen to be?" she was hoping that its translation system might be better then theirs and by now might understand what she was saying.

The ship's attention turned to Hadley whens he got closer and started speaking. The red lines focusing on her this time and once more it performed the unusual scanning process. There was a brief pause before the red lasers blinked out entirely and the eyes began shafting again, looking back and forth, rolling partly, before two holographic projects showed up in the air, perfect representations of the Commander and the Captain. The appearance changed though, showing first the muscular composition of the two women, except in Christine's case,t he left arm was revealed to be a prosthetic that reached all the way up to her shoulder. The prosthetic itself was suddenly highlighted before a red overlay appeared on Christine's representation, removing it entirely and focusing on the Captain's holographic image,
"Well that's rude, I cant help it if my left arm isn't human." Christine commented, folding her arms, honestly she felt a little defiled, having this thing take such an intimate level of scanning. While her left arm was helpful, it held a certain level of shame too. At one time she had tried to hook up with a man or two but they were put off by the replacement arm. She'd opted to not get a skin overlay, only because it wasted potential space for armored plating, may as well use it to its fullest potential.

"Fascinating, I believe it is trying to identify our species or perhaps see what common denominators you share," The doctor stared up, watching the machine work. The muscles were stripped away from the Captain's image and it began highlighting various internal organs, as though checking and confirming, then the organs were stripped away, leaving the skeleton, it checked them before it all vanished entirely.
"I would certainly like medical technology that allowed such a quick scan of the internal body, the closest we have to such a thing is the Nightingale Med Units at our military hospitals on Earth and even they aren't this quick.."

The red eyes shifted once more, staring directly at the Captain again,
"VI'IK ALS." The synthetic voice stated once more, "EST."
The doctor and his assistant sprang back when the pod released a soft hissing sound, the covering shell at the front beginning to lift slowly, while the eyes all seemed to turn off and sink into the vessel, locking into place.

The outer edges of the seams started to break apart, like a membrane of flesh melting away, it was thick, rather solid looking except for how easily it stripped itself away, no doubt great for hermetically sealing the interior. The inside itself was as solid as any ship could be expected and within it lay a body, a young woman who looked human enough, except perhaps for the long, silvery-white that was tinted a soft sky blue, matching her bizarrely fashioned uniform that exposed a certain portion of her midriff and upper torso. There was a mask over her face, like an oxygen mask for certain.

The figure was undoubtedly unconcious, a holographic behind her head like a green orb monitoring her with green lines that spread across her at regular intervals,
"EST." The machine repeated. The doctor immediately climbed into the pod, running the scanner over the female's body,
"Hmm, not good. It appears the body composition and structure of her body is similar to ours, but if that's the case then she's suffering severe inanition, blood glucose levels are low, her muscle mass is in a state of deterioration, this pod must have been doing everything in its power to keep her alive. If we do not hurry her body will likely go into complete shutdown." He turned to his assistant and nodded to her,
"Get a medical unit prepared, priority emergency. Commander if you would be so kind as to get a gurney from the cargo bay's Aid station..?" The assistant was already rushing towards the elevator, taking it up but pressing the down button once she reached the top to let it automatically return to them.

Christine nodded, she knew where that was. She picked up her gun, compacting it and placing it at her hip before going to the nearest aid station. They had simple gurney's attached tot he wall next to the station, in case of emergency, of course. She pulled it from the wall and carried it back over, getting it set up for the doctor as he pulled away the oxygen mask and turned to Hadley,
"Come, Captain, as you're here you may as well help, grab her legs and help me move her on to the gurney." He ordered, not sharply, it was mostly stated like a request. he stared at the young woman again, her face was pale, but she was definitely breathing, he quickly opened here eyes a moment, shining a light int hem to see the response, they were slow to react.

A moment was taken to open her mouth and examine the inside. Definitely like a human, although the roof of her mouth was shaped a little oddly, she had all the same necessary teeth for an omnivorous diet too, her tongue seemed developed enough that it was likely used for talking directly too. It was like this new species was almost a parallel evolution to humans, with differences most likely, he wouldn't know for certain until he gave her a full examination. While it was highly improbably, it wasn't impossible that something like this could have occurred in the universe. To witness it first-hand was definitely interesting.

Holding her hand out to stop anyone from taking a pot shot at the ship as it scanned her she waited her eyes glittering with eagerness. She was a bit surprised when the lights blinked out entirely, she had thought it would have tried to scan the doc as well. Then the holographic projections showed up in the air. “well that is a neat trick.” Slowly walking around the projections she realized how much denser her bones were to normal humans. She had never see scans of other humans when her parent’s had shown her, her own scans. “it may think that the arm is a weapon that you had put onto you in place of your arm.” Hadley’s voice was airy as she watched the scan focus on her alone. “at least it does not take offence to my mods as well or we might not get anywhere with it.”

Looking over at the doctor as he spoke she wondered what it would have shown with him. Was he truly human or one of the few aliens that were allowed into the navy. She had never really gotten a full list of the ones that were and the ones that were not allowed. When she had first gotten on the ship she had not looked at the personal files, wanting to form her own opinions of the crew but now she believed that it was time to look up who was human and who was not. “I heard that in a few years we are to be outfitted with the latest med tech that has mobile scanners like this one. I will see what I can do doctor about getting a rush on that now that we are out here in the black. It would just make more sense for us to have it now would you not agree?”

The sound of guns being brought to ready answered the soft hiss sounded in the quite bay. “Captain I think it might be wise for you to back up now.” Putting actions to his words one of the young pilots slowly stepped in front of the captain and backed her up. He went by the call sign Hunter and Christina would know him as one of the more level headed of the Pilots. He had been sent here to head one of the squads after making it clear that he did not like to work with his last commander. Smiling back at the captain he looked over her shoulder at Chris. “it would look bad on us pilots if you got hurt after we took all the care to make sure it did not kill us all.” His sounded like he was joking.

“I do not think that body is going to kill me any time soon, Pilot.” Hadley said as she stepped around him to get a better look at the lady in the pod. She was one of the most beautiful creatures that Hadley had ever seen in her life, and she had seen a few beauty Genies before. She had even seen a few that were having their genes modified so that their kids would not take on the dominate trait that branded them Love Genies. Sighing Hunter clenched his jaw trying not to countermand his commanding officer.

Stepping out of the way of the doctor she watched as they scanned her and announced all the important things to know about the woman before he gave orders to the commander. “How long do you believe she has been in the pod without aid?” her voice was all business now without the childish wounded she had been fighting with. Stepping forward she gently touched the woman’s legs as she picked them up. The fabric under her fingers was nothing like she had come in contacted with before. It was just a beautiful as the woman. Little did anyone know but she loved fashion and this young woman’s outfit was going to make a crash on the fashion scene. Hadley could not wait to get someone to make her a matching, or near to matching one. “doc why does she look so much like a human with mods? I have never heard of anyone like that found out in the black.”

The doctor hoisted the girl up, thankful for the captain's assistance in moving the alien girl. Her boots, the crystals and the uniform were all so strange, and why would she opt to allow a vital area of the torso to be completely exposed. He ran the scanner over her again, changing the scan to purely detect anomalies. He was surprised the scanner didn't explode once he saw what showed up,
"To be honest, I am unsure.. If my readings are accurate she's been suffering starvation for several weeks, give or take a few days, that is if we can count her as a normal human with an average metabolic rate, which I assure you is degrading by the minute. And there's something in the upper chest cavity, I cant scan it, at least not with this." He set the medical scanner aside, beginning to push the gurney toward the elevator quickly,
"Also it appears her entire body has undergone gene manipulation, she may be composed similarly to a human but she is without a doubt heavily modified, the extent of which we'll determine once she's healthy, Captain." He nodded to her briefly, hurrying along with the girl.

Christine watched after the doctor, then looked at Hadley for a moment, arms still folded, her face a definitive frown as if she had something on her mind before taking a pretentiously huffy tone,
"Oh screw you, she could've been a corpse. Deal's a deal I suppose." She remarked, reminding her about the bet quickly before staring at the pilot. He'd had a problem with the previous Commander he was under, but Christine had literally told him up front and personally to stow his problems, even if he was the official ace of the ship, the woman known as Havoc had a reputation that exceeded his, not to mention more than double the flight time,
"Hunter, good job," She stated briefly, "Once you've had a break, you and Wyvern flight get your fighters fueled up and return to your scheduled training." She turned away to look at the captain, but then paused briefly and smirked over her shoulder, "Oh, by the way, tell them that I've substituted some of the ammo in all your training magazines with EMP rounds. So if they aren't careful they're going to get disabled and for all we know drift off into space, never to be seen again."

She grinned like a cat that ate the canary, turning to look at the Captain again. Hunter was one of the few that probably knew she'd never abandon pilots to such a fate, but it was good to put the fear of god into the troops every once in a while, their performances could improve under such fear. She'd planted homing beacons inside their fighters, safely shielded from the effects of EMP rounds in their own casings rather than being directly attached to the ship.

The ship had been watching the proceedings. Once the girl inside was clear and no-one was close, the open section close swiftly again, the thick membrane reattaching like glue and sealing. the red eyes sprang back to life, once more looking around the cargo bay before focusing on the captain again,
"KRI NA'AH. My thanks, Captain. VOS TOH SOOR. Continue your speaking. NI TA HER'ET, TOH SOOR, your speaking, your SOOR'ET-CHA.. Your language." The machine began to speak, inbetween its alien words it was beginning to use standardized english. The more it listened and learned, the quicker it could translate and speak.

“do you think you could get a read out on this uniform and if it provides anything for her?” Hadley ran a hand over the crystal’s of the uniform. Looking over at the doctored as he spoke she raised her eyebrow. “I wish we had a proper read of her before this happened. Then we could tell what was normal for her race and what is not. You do what you can for her and then we will see what comes out of it.”

A grin broke acrossed Hadley’s face at Christine’s reaction to her winning the bet. “you know I love my food more then some love their shore leave. You just need to remember to be careful when betting me. What was that freshmen’s name that lost three hundred credits before you made me swear that I would never bet money again?” she straightened her uniform as her eyes looked passed Chris to the doctor and the alien. “you know the one that thought that I could not last longer than him in the water without coming up? You clamed I cheated knowing how to slow my need for oxygen.” It had been their first major fight as friends and had worried Hadley that she had gone to far.

“thank you commander.” Hunter saluted her and then smiled. “Wyvern wing will be ready to go at your scheduled time for training.” He winked at Chris as she spoke of putting EMP rounds in the training Magazines. He knew quite well that there was no way that they would lose a single pilot seeing how far into the black they were and the danger they would face if they did lose pilots to space. It was one thing to be blown up in the middle of real battle but another to be lost in space during training. The ships scanners alone could keep track of any one that went down to an EMP. “I will tell them that you have no care for screw ups and would be happy if the tail taggers got lost in space.” He saluted again and tuned to talk to his men who were a ways away waiting for orders.

“You know one of these days they are going to realize that you’re not the cold hearted woman you pretend to be.” Hadley said as she patted her shoulder. “I would hate to be in the middle of training with them when they realize that. You’re going to become the number one target.” She turned back her eyes wide with surprise at the pod as it spoke again but this time with some English.

“so you do have a learning program. Are you an AI, or just high function computer?” turning back she ran her hand along the skin of the ship. “What are you made of? It seems alive but there is no heat signature when you’re not running your engines.” Running her fingers along where the seam was she tried to find the pod opening. “can you link up with our computers? Would it help you to lean faster if we gave you a language database?”

It was the doctor's plan to do everything he could if it meant saving the alien girl, he hoped his assumptions about her body were correct, it would certainly make the process easier, but the Captain was right, it would have been ideal to have seen her in top condition. There was a risk that he could harm her rather than helping her, but at this point it was just a chance he was going to have to take. He disappeared into the elevator, preparing to rush the girl to the med berth as quickly as he could.

"Ugh, dont remind me," Christine lowered her head a bit, rubbing her temples as if exhausted by the mere mention of that little event, "And it was Mark Landers. He thought you'd drowned over his stupid bet. In fact I thought you'd drowned over your stupid bet, of course when you came back up I nearly put you under again myself, drowned you like the annoying rat you are." Christine stared blandly at her Captain before sighting and straightening up, "Well anyway you win the bet, again, you damn bottomless pit."

When the Captain mentioned that they'd find out one day about Christine's much softer nature, the woman could only smirk at the idea, having the whole squad fight her would certainly be an interesting experience. The Commander was just as stunned when the machine started speaking again, however this time it was speaking in small bits of English. It was trying to garner an understanding of their language. She wanted to point out to the Captain that they were always broadcasting their language files, but the pod probably operated on a system that could not interpret those files, which was probably why it had to learn the hard way.

The machine continued to observe the Captain as she spoke, of course it had also listened in on the other conversations, the various words, how they were put together, changes in emotional state and personality, it observed the interactions between the Commander and the Captain, as well as the pilot. The curious motion of touching the hull of the pod drew its full attention, the red eyes glaring at her however they then stared out in all directions,
"RUUTA YO'N ETSON'TA. Power Capacity Low. Sleep. Recharge." It stated, the eyes starting to blink out, one after another, the control surfaces locking down and compacting, the craft practically shrinking in size slightly,
"EST.. Please.. VI'IK ALS.. Help.. Her.. EST.." The machine's final words were probably its most desperate, even Christine could identify a certain level of concern, even in the voice of the machine. She stared quietly at the Captain,
"Well.. You heard the overgrown space faring guard dog." She chuckled, "Looks like it's leaving the girl in your hands, Captain."

The mirth seemed to dance in her eyes at the mention of Mark Landers and the bet that got them near to kicked out of the academy. Not that she had ever told Chris that. She knew that if she had told her the whole story then she would have tried to lock her betting down even worse. “you really should have known by then that I was not going to take a bet that I did not already have a high chance of winning. Now this bet lands under a completely different category. Its fifty fifty here so there is no worry about one of us having an unfair advantage. So you will always have a chance of winning.” She laughed at Chris comment about her being a bottomless pit. “Careful that is bordering on insubordination, and I would hate to have to file a report on you.” She smiled looking back at the ship.

“You want them to find out about it don’t you?” she accused after she looked around to see if anyone was around that could over hear them. The closest person to them was a tech acrossed the bay working on a ship. “You’re lucky that Josh Hunter has not decided to let your little secret go. I think the only reason he keeps it to himself is because the fear of you is what keeps his men in line.”

“Don’t glare at me.” She said to the pod as it glared at her. “You’re an interesting tech.” she snorted and watched as it powered down. She wondered what caused it to drop a size. “Yes we will help her, why would I have had my doctor take a look at her if I was not planning on keeping her alive. It would also be a very rude thing to do to take her away from you and let her die. But I can’t promise that she will live. We have never seen her kind before.” Turning back to Chris she glared at her.

“IT is not a space faring guard dog and she is not a kid to be left in the hands of the first adult that comes along.” Before Chris could say anything about her not being an adult she raised her eyebrow. “Why is it in all this time you did not gain your captains pips? I know the reason why I am so far behind the rest of the class but you, I would have thought you would have gotten at least a squad captain rank for fighters. Not that I am upset your my commander but still, you had so much promise.” They had so much promise should have been what she said but she did know why she was being punished for.

"Captain, I think you forgot how our relationship works." Christine replied calmly when Hadley poked and prodded at Christine's reluctance to work her way up in the ranks, she didn't need Captain's rank to fly a gunship, in fact the higher up she got in ranking, the less flight time she got to see, the only reason she could stand it at all was the fact that she got to work with Hadley, "I stand beneath you, Captain, and I keep you rooted from the ground up, I make sure you rise above me and I'll continue to hold you up until you receive the recognition you deserve, I don't care how anyone looks at it." Christine replied firmly, a much more serious tone on her face, sure the two had fought in the past and gotten into scuffles, but there was always respect. It was their friendship that had gotten Christine on her feet again when she lost her arm.

She saluted with the left arm, dropping it quickly and looked up to the catwalks. The men were still on standby, but it seemed pointless to keep them all there,
"Until we're sure it's safe, I recommend at least one tactical team on watch at all times in shifts. It's a little too convenient for my taste but I wouldn't mind being a little optimistic about this not being a danger to us or the ship." She commented, normally such assessments were down to their Security chief, but honestly she didn't believe that man knew his head from his ass, he didn't have much of a spine but he was good at following orders. Now that she thought about it, the Crusader was filled with similar types of people.

Hadley was judged because of what she was, Christine might have had a good record but upon once being offered the rank of Captain she outright refused it, it left a sour taste in the mouth of her superiors, the Doctor was brilliant but likely he had the same issues as Hadley, the Security chief was a gutless wimp, Jack survived by pure coincidence most of the time, the engineers were known to be drunken louts, even the fighter pilots and security members had their own little problems that the military wasn't keen on ignoring. They really wanted this ship to fail. Yet it seemed in their effort to make the Crusader turn in upon itself, they'd gathered an entire crew of kindred spirits that worked well together for the very reason that they all understood each other.

And now they had an alien girl on board with a living, talking ship. Two more attractions for the USF Freakshow. She mused over this staring at the pod once more, no matter which way she sliced it, that thing was still creepy. And it was recharging? So it was sleeping? It wasn't hooked into anything, did that mean it could generate more power on its own? That was definitely a worthwhile technology to have if it didn't even need to consume anything to further generate power. But it made her wonder, if this thing could be classified as a sentient life form, what with having intelligence to learn and a living body, would it be right to take it apart just to study it? It was a question of moral ethics at this point that she didn't think she was qualified to answer. She sighed and stared at Hadley once more,
"It looks like it's a waiting game now, to see if the girl recovers and if this thing can restore itself to full working order for you to talk with it again. If you don't need anything else, Captain, I'll be returning to my post?" It was mostly a rhetorical question, but there was always the possibility that Hadley did need something.

"No I have not really forgotten how our Relationship works but it has been a few years since we really got to talk about our careers and I would have thought you would have tried to be a captain by now. I know that you dont really like the way the other captains have been reacting to you when it comes up that your the one that put up with me through academy. just because I am a Genie does not mean that I dont hear the scuttlebutt (water cooler talk) about my class mates. I know what they have been saying about you and the others that fought for me to get thought that last year when the full extent of some of my ability's came out." it had been a while since Hadley had been all that serious with Chris. she had been trying to keep the happy atmosphere going on the edge of the black and now here in the black but it had been bugging her that her friend had not gotten full captain rank. "I all ways thought you would have tired to be a captain of the fighter wings on one of the Fighter carriers, if not the rank of captain on one of the main ships."

she nodded in agreement that there should be at least one tactical team on duty at all times around the ship as they still did not know the full extent of its power. "it is stuff like this that makes me think that you should have been the captain and not me. I see a new type of ship and what do I think but first contact and what it might mean. you think of what it might do to us if they are out to kill us not make contact. and as much as I would love to keep you as part of my team we both know that they are going to demote us or promote us to other ships after some time." she fully believed that after this ship was sent back for a refit she would be reassigned to be a wing captain or back to commander. that was if the war kept up, if it ended before she got reassigned to a new ship they would put her on shore leave and half pay and hope she got the want to be a part of the navy out of her system. "your able to get the crew to like you and do what you want them to. if not for you I think I still would be stuck with half a flight wing that did not want to work for me and the other half ready to shot the frist thing that moved out there."

Christine would know that Hadley was short changing herself. it was one of her flaws that she had developed in the academy. no one had been able to prove it but some of her classmates believed that the instructors had been twice as hard on Miss Harrington then they had been on any of the other students trying to drive her from the program. this had only driven her to try all that much harder to get to the rank of third in the class that she had. but it had also created a woman that always saw what others did and thought that she was not as talented as them without putting alot more work in to it. her class mates being promoted before her into ranks that they seemed suited to only added to her disbelieving in her own ability's. the thing was she knew what the ability's of her crew were and she was the one that had placed them in the posts that suited them the best to make them work as a team. Chris had gotten the wings to work as teams but had Hadley not asked for some of the pilots she had it would have been a much harder job for Chris. they were the perfect team to run a ship like this, to make Navy men out of misfits that never seemed to work out. if they took any of the men from the ship now and placed them into most other ships they would have been fine.

"yes it does seem to be a waiting game now." Hadley said as they walked back towards the elevator to return to the bridge. looking down at her time piece she raised an eyebrow and looked up at Chris then back to the time piece. "I dont think you will be returning to your post, it is after your shift is over, workaholic. its time for you to go and relax and me to take over my job, or have you been lieing to me and really only want my job?" the smile she tired to hide made it clear that she was joking about Chris taking her job.

Back in the fighter hanger bay Hunter was going over the teams and attack plans for their training run. "remember your not to take more shots then you need. I am not going to deal with a wasted of shot if we can cut back. I want you all to know you have the shot before taking it." his eyes caught the eyes of two hot shots that thought the rules did not apply to them. "yes Spitfire, Wildcat I am talking to you two, and I am keeping my eye on you two. if you spend more shot then Shadow" he looked over at a slider female that had gotten that call sign by always attaching from the shadows. "I am going to have your pay docked or your going to lose your shore leave. which ever comes first." he waved them in a dismissal. "remember that there are EMP rounds in your magazines."

Christine wanted to smack Hadley for spewing off as much as she did, it took a fair deal of self-restraint not to do so in front of the security teams, instead she simply kept herself rigid, staring quietly at her Captain, the answer was always obvious but Christine still had many reasons. They were friends, she believed in Hadley as a person, they were comrades, Christine had no real desire to rise in the ranks, she never did. It was simply the way she was, Hadley just seemed to have a hard time accepting it, maybe because of her own position or how tough things were on her.

She stepped into the elevator with the Captain. However on Hadley's insistence that she took her break, the first thing that came to mind was a natural reaction, say she was fine, she could keep working, she wasn't tired. Her second reaction, however, was her choice int he end as she dropped her slightly formal stance, immediately stepped over tot he elevator controls and hit the emergency stop, cutting the direct power, including the camera and the lights flicked over to the emergency lights, immediately she turned around and thrust her finger towards the Captain's face,
"Seeing as I'm off duty, you listen to me and you listen well. Yes I'm straightforward, yes I'm cautious and careful, maybe I am Captain material, but I'm defensive, not active, I don't have the ambitions or the care to rise in the ranks, but I care about you and I care about the people on our ship, because it's my duty and obligation as both a member of this military and as a person." Christine stepped closer to Hadley and grabbed her by her uniform, but not roughly, staring at her dead in the eye,
"You are a pioneer, and the mark of a true pioneer is that every idiot out there is laughing at you and trying to make your life difficult but you are better than them. And you will prove it, whether if its with that alien or that ship, or whatever else you find. And I swear the next time you try to downsize yourself in front of me; god help me, I will slap you with my left hand." She warned, letting go of Hadley.

She turned, flicking the power back on and waited for her floor, turning on her heels and saluting Hadley again with a slight smirk,
"Now you can go and have fun explaining what happened while the power was off.." She stated, stepping out of the elevator and straightening her uniform, "And that damn life pod creeps me out,"

_____________________________________

It had taken several days for any progress to be made. The doctor and his assistant worked tirelessly every day that they woke to take care of the alien girl. The doctor constantly came over interesting things regarding her, removing the suit first had been a challenge since it seemed to repel the cutting power of even medical tools. The crystals seemed to emanate with the same unusual energy signal as the core of the ship. Once they figured out how to remove it, he left redressing the girl to his assistant, only as a matter of respect before they went to work on examining her.

Without a doubt he uncovered that she more or less was almost human, even if her internal organs differed slightly in shape, or had certain extra organs. The most bizarre part of her anatomy, however was what he determined to be an organic crystal structure that rested behind her sternum. He couldn't determine its purpose, but it also gave off the same strange signal.

Recovering her body was a case of getting her vital nutrition, stimulating the nervous system and the muscles with therapy until there was some semblance of recovery, however once the doctor had managed to kick-start her metabolism, her entire body seemed to react with great speed. She was recovering far faster than a human in her condition should, so of course the first thing he did when she finally began to regain consciousness was to get on the com channel and call the Captain with only four words,
"Our guest is awake."

"its the defensive captains that we really need right now. there is a war going on and so many of our men are being sent to the front line and they are all action not defense. they think of taking the line not keeping the line. yes in the end they are going to be the ones that win this for us, but it is people like you that can knit men together and see how to make them defend thier home that are going to keep us alive to fight another day." she looked down at Chris's fingers twisted in her uniform and then looked back up at her, an eyebrow raised.

"yes I am a pioneer, and yes it is hard but I am doing what is needed here. and you should be out there making our men better fighters not babysitting me and a bunch of misfits that the whole admiralty wants to see wash out. you talk about me downsizing my self, what about you? I know you could do great things." she sighed taking another breath her hand ready for Chris to strike her." out of all of us on this ship you had the most going for you, there were admirals that wanted you in command of their flag ship, or their fighter wings. stop holding close to my tail coat and become your own captain. I Love having you with me," she looked down at the floor shaking her head. "spacers I love having you with me, some one I can fall back on knowing you will always have my back. but that is part of your's and my problem. if you keep pushing to have me as your commander they are going to start thinking that we cant work separate of each other."

she shivered as a thought awakened in her mind. " for crying out loud they already think that I have to have a female in my command staff that I can sleep with to make it through the command."her voice raised in frustration that she tired to quiche. this would have been new news to Chris. last she had heard Hadley had her eyes on one of the man in the class before theirs. he had gone up in rank before being discharged when his family needed him to take over for his aging father.

turning back to the doors Hadley sighed. she had not meant to tell Chris any of what had happened in her last command. she had been trying her best to keep that from any on the ship but now that it was out there was going to be hell to pay for it. she was so keyed up that she laughed outright at Chris comment about the pod. "it creeps me out to, but I cant let the others see that."


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

she had tried to keep the clothes in tacked for the alien, not knowing if they were something special like funeral garb or just everyday work clothes. many days when she was not on duty Hadley could be found in her room trying to figure out how to present this report to the higher ups, talking to the pod even if it never responded or in the med bay watching the doctor and his assistants working to take care of their guest. many of the crew brought their worry's for their captain to the commander. but few if any of what they said could be put into a report. some like hunter feared that she spent to much time with that pod but he could find nothing wrong with her trying to teach the thing how to speak to humans. the captains Stewart spoke of food sent back messed with but not truly touched. one day he had told her that he feared the captain was eating rations and not her prepared food. but when asked the captain would denigh eating any thing but what the Stewart gave her. she did not seem under nourished or to be losing weight, nor did she seem to have lost any sleep.

so when the Doctors call came she was not that far from his med bay. walking around the corner she looked over to his area before looking to thier guest. "has she said anything yet?"

"No not yet." The doctor replied, going through some charts as he looked over at the bed where the Alien girl was still laying down, "I imagine anyone feels dull just waking up, but after her ordeal, she's a rather extreme case. Interestingly enough, she has recovered at roughly ten times the speed a normal human would. Once I leveled her metabolism out; the rest of her body started to follow. The make up of her body is extraordinary, there are so many unusual things." He brought up a diagram representing the young woman's body, various parts were highlighted, first he pointed at the organic crystal beside her heart,
"This is of particular interest. It has no direct connection to her body, yet it remains perfectly in place, it is as though it has zero mass. The energy signature it produces is still impossible to analyze, even the guys in the tech labs cant figure it out."

He then tapped the screen, showing the right arm,
"And this is just as curious." He started, at first it wouldn't had looked important, but he enlarged the view of where the bicep was, "You wouldn't see it at first, not without going close to it, but her right arm.. Well either it is not actually hers and she had a new arm so perfectly fused that her skin cells, muscle tissue, nerves and bones all aligned and connected perfectly, or she literally grew a new arm. It is effectively younger than the rest of her body, so at some point in her life, she probably lost the original, something like a lizard discarding its tail, perhaps..? But maybe not." He pondered the last comparison calmly, but something about it still didn't seem right, it was all connected so flawlessly, it was as if she'd never lost it. This was beyond their level of medical technology,
"To top it off, I would hazard to say just about every single cell in her body is more or less engineered, the key might be in her blood, or at least what I think is her blood.." He held up a vial of blood, but even though he held it still, it was swirling softly, still bright, "Every single platelet, every white cell, every single piece. They are nanites, but they are without a doubt organic and engineered to perform their duties. They appear to convert even unnecessary materials, fatty acids. They consume everything and convert it to beneficial byproducts for the body. Whoever designed this; they wanted her to live for a very long time at absolute peak condition. Of course if she is starving; they cant help her, like with our own bodies, in her starvation they were feeding off her existing muscles and unnecessary cells to keep her functioning, and considering how advanced they are.. Well by my calculations she's probably been stuck in that pod for several years.. For all we know, she could very well no longer be sane."

The warbled sounds of speech were filling the girl's head, she didn't understand the words. She had been staring in a dull fashion up at the ceiling, but her vision remained blurred for some time. She had barely moved except to breathe, the place was warm, or perhaps it was just the covers. She could hear a soft incessant beeping nearby, it it was the voices she was trying to focus on, ruby red eyes looking around as she finally found some strength. She shifted only a little at first, before a moment of defiance toward her condition called to her and she pushed herself up slowly into a sitting position, her silvery-blue hair pouring around her shoulders.

The doctor practically almost fell out of his chair when he looked over at the girl, standing up quickly and rushing over to her, holding his hands up,
"You cant get up yet, you need to lie down," He tried to say, the girl looking his way, of course in her condition she couldn't tell what was going on so it was only natural that the instinct to defend herself suddenly came alive. The Doctor practically stopped still when the alien girl practically glowed. A blue light enveloped her body before a circular image appeared in the air before her, several smaller circles showing within it, unusual writing followed, running the circumference within the circle, mystic inscriptions that sprang to life. The Doctor had never seen anything like this, so his own natural reaction was to back away, looking over his shoulder to the Captain for advice,
"Ma'am..?" He asked, practically stunned by what he was seeing. Any fool would have considered it a simple holographic projection but this young woman was already so far beyond normal understanding that he wasn't sure he wanted to take the risk.

captain Hadley looked over the charts and nodded as he spoke about the Alien and her condition. she had noticed over the last few days that she seemed have the interested of the doctor and his staff. she had watched as they went over the charts repeatedly talking about this or that they found on the scans."so your telling me that she has a crystal beside her heart that you cant figure out what it does? could it be a way to control her ship? I have heard story's of alien's out there that have tech build into them that makes their ships a part of them and them apart of their ships."

"I have heard that there is working in some of the hospitals on Terra trying to make a Genie that has the regeneration powers of a lizard. after they were able to combined the Shadow Lizard DNA with humans they have been trying to find creatures on Terra that they can combined with human's." the Shadow Lizard was the name given to the creature that her own Genie ability's came from. no one really understood why its DNA had combined so well with humans when most of the others DNA's that were used for Genie's had to be tweaked and changed to work. some on New Vegas every had gone so far as to say that the Shadow Lizard was what was left of a colony of humans that had adapted to the world long before they had been sent there. not that anyone really accepted that idea.

Hadley could feel alarm bells going off in her mind as he spoke of her being engineered. they actually might not be dealing with a new race but one that had been created to look like them by one of the races out there that they had met. there were a few that they had tried to speak with but because of the inability to speak like humans did and the humans unable to understand what the others were trying to say nothing had become of the alliance.

her eyes grew wide as she watched the blood swirl and dance in the vial. "your telling me that who ever made her had found a way to create bio organic nanites?" the thoughts of what this technology could mean for humanity as a whole and warship survival rate as the target was just unthinkable. not only would they have people who were lost able to live longer out there while they were waiting to be rescued but if the ability to regrow limbs was also a apart of that then they would lose less to ship board explosions as well. "anything you find out I want you to be keeping in a physical record as well as on the computer. I dont care if it is more work, I dont want to risk losing any of your observations."

as the doctor rushed over towards the young female looking alien Hadley's eyes grew wide as a realization struck her. "DOCTOR STOP!" the order echoed through the sick birth, its tone would be clear as an order even to the alien. she was not surprised that the girl seemed to react in some defensive manner when he got close. slowly walking down to where she was, Hadley held out her hands in a calming gesture. "its ok, we do not mean to hurt you. he just wants you to lay back down." using her hands she tried to convey the meaning of her words to the girl. she wanted to give orders to have pictures taken of the writing in the light but she also did not want to scarey the young lady any more. she nodded in approval as the doctor looked back as he backed up. "I think you scared her the way you rushed at her. think of her as a frighten Near-Rabbit," she shook her head as she realized he would not know what a Near-Rabbit was. "a small animal that has sharp teeth but will try to run first. you have her cornered in a strange place without any sign of home. for all she knows we destroyed her pod while she was out." she kept her voice soft and gentle, hoping that the young woman like her ship could lean quickly.

turning to the Alien she slowly took a few steps forward, stopping before she would become a threat to a frighten person. "my name is Hadley Harrington I am the captain of this ship you are on. we found your life pod drifting in space and offered aid. your pod is still in our hanger bay." picking up her suit she held it out with a slightly sad look. "I am sorry about you not being dressed. The doctor had to take it off to make sure you were ok. I find it a very pretty suit."

It didn't really seem to matter how much they talked. At first she only thought it was because she was tired, but now that she was slowly regaining focus, she truly didn't understand their words, she watched the man backing away, it seemed he had taken a defensive posture of his own, the other one had yelled at him once. If she was grasping the situation right, the strange woman was trying to approach her in a friendly manner. She couldn't understand the words, but she was at least starting to get the idea that they meant no harm, at least as far as she could tell. She reached up with her other hand tot he side of her head, but found herself grasping nothing, her headpiece was missing. She was about to panic when she noticed the female offering the suit up.

The alien girl stared down at herself a moment, she was in a strange outfit, it didn't appear to have much in the way of practical use, was it their custom to change the clothes of their patient? Strange behavior indeed. Her defensive hand began to lower. The blue object in the air seeming to shrink then scattered in a small flash of light, accompanied by a sound like a small silver bell being struck once. The particles washed over the room like a gentle firework, eventually fading as they swirled around berth, like still-burning ashes blown from a fire.

Her red eyes were fixed on the approaching woman, allowing her to approach but still a little cautious as she reached out for the uniform. eventually taking it and placing it in her lap, of course some parts were bulky, the area around the boots and where the shoulder and hip crystals were, but the item she was looking for was the headpiece. Once she'd located it she ran her fingers softly over the right side. The crystal reacted almost immediately to her touch, changing color briefly to a more turquoise appearance before returning to the sky blue it normally was,
"Demaar." She stated, waiting a moment,
The crystal turned green once more, the voice of the life pod coming forth,
"NI TA MOROS,"
"Demaar, k'rin to reh'chek-ah?"
"A'EE."

"Captain. I assume you can hear me." The life pod's voice presented itself again as the girl fiddled with her uniform, trying to make sure it was all in one piece, "I was unable to introduce myself, I am the Pilot Support Interface, Demaar. While I was recharging I left my audio recovery and translation systems active in order to gain your language. For the time being, I will speak for Xeria."
"Xeriahalt!" The girl picked up her headset, glaring at it as she yelled at the machine, there was a brief pause then the machine spoke again,
"Xeriahalt." The machine corrected itself, "I got told off." It added, almost teasingly, the woman glaring at the headpiece again,
"Demaar..?"
"YURUS, Xeriahalt."

She found it interesting that the alien also had the red eyes that her ship had. It was every so slightly unnerving that they matched. Watching her look through the uniform she wondered what she was really looking for. Was there an uplink to her ship that would help her communicate with them? The head piece had seemed like a piece of jewelry but now she realized that it was in fact a HUD.

When the computer spoke from the crystal Hadley raised her eyebrow. “yes I can hear you,” she smiled even though she was creeped out by the way it was. “you never did answer my question, are you an AI or just a computer?” she bowed her head ever so slightly to the pilot as she spoke with the PSI. “can you tell Xeriahalt who I am and where she is at? I don’t want her to feel that we are a threat to her, once the doctor clears her I can have her assigned to a room here on the ship to have as her own for now.”

Slowly moving she sat down on the bed next to Xeria. “is there a reason she does not like the shortened name to be used? Is there anything that we should know about her that would be helpful into making this work out for her as well as us?”

"The definitions for AI and Computer are not compatible with me. Describing myself is difficult in your language." As Demaar spoke in the Captain's language, a small holographic interface had started hovering in front of the one named Xeriahalt. Lines were forming in her own language, giving her translations of the conversation as it progressed, she read it quickly, picking up on the keywords when they were presented. She spoke, but as she did so, Demaar spoke over her, acting as her literal translation device,
"In my culture our vessels are given memories and personality of one of our ancestors, stored within.. Sek'lita'ar Crystals. They are not the same person, that person is long dead, but the experience of their life acts as a guide to us who live. Demaar was a man of learning." She finished her explanation before Demaar chimed in for himself
"It is an honor to hold these memories."

The doctor was fascinated by this already, quickly scribbling down what he was learning on a pad of paper, the very idea of storing the memories of the fallen into some crystalline device and calling on it again to make it the personality matrix for an artificial intelligence. Creating a living, thinking ship with those memories.. He would have thought such a process could be unstable and open to volatility but then again humanity only had violent failures of advanced artificial intelligences to compare it to.

More writing appeared in front of Xeriahalt pertaining to the Captain telling her where she was. She took on a surprised look for a moment but then smiled, almost nervously as she spoke again, with Demaar's assistance,
"Forgive me. I am glad I was able to think clearly sooner, I almost attacked you with my Ni'en."

There was a brief pause as Demaar listened to the Captain again before replying on his own,
"Xeriahalt is her full honorific name, she is under the impression that I am calling her a child when I use her informal name, which in our language sounds very similar to the word for child, or childish person. Zeh'ray-ah. She has refused to explain why she believes I am calling her a child."
The girl was actually blushing as the last word was used, looking almost furious about it being mentioned, to the point that she defensively folded her arms and pouted,
"As a note. Your name, Hadley, is similar in pronunciation to the word for a divine person. Ha'de-li'i." Hearing this, Xeria looked at the screen again, then looked at Hadley, a curious stare in her red eyes. There was a brief pause but then she crawled closer suddenly, practically almost face-to-face with Hadley, staring in particular at her eyes, as if trying to discern something about them,
"Ni o're ruuta." She stated softly before sitting back and pulling her headset back into her lap, "Ruuta es toh cah."
"Xeriahalt claims that she sees power in your eyes." Demaar chimed in, to make sure the Captain was not lost by the strange action.

“an AI is an Artificial Intelligent that is designed to seem alive but is not alive. It can think in a way for its self but in the end it is not alive. A computer is a machine that is designed to store information and processes it so that it can be used to the best of human ability.” Hadley said as she watched the holograph appear in front of Xeriahalt. She wondered if that might make it faster for Xeriahalt lean how to speak Common. When she spoke Hadley tried to hear her words as well as the words that her ship was saying for her.

“so Demaar is the name of your ship? He holds the memories of a man that once lived but no longer does?” her eyes narrowed as she tried to understand how that might work. There had been talk over a hundred years ago about finding a way to store all of a humans memory but that had been to risky and people felt that it was a violation of the human that was recorded to have them used for anything. The project was tossed out the window so to speak. There probably was somewhere a drive off all the people that had been copied while the project was going. “that seems to be a wise way of keeping your history alive. It is a pity that our people never thought to try that.

“it would have been really bad had you harmed our doctor, it would have been worse for you then us.” She said as she gave the Doctor a look of ‘don’t you dare say anything about how it could be bad.’ “I would have been really sad and upset at his death but we can go back to base and get assigned another doctor if needed. You on the other hand would have been locked up in the brig and then handed over to my commander to deal with. What is a Ni’en and what does it do by the way?”

A snort and a smile fallowed he talk of her thinking he was calling her a child. When she saw the blush start she tried to stop. It would be wrong to make her feel that she was being treated more like a child then she was so far. “I can fully understand being treated differently because of what you look like or your name. I am the same spices as my commander, the one you scanned and found the machine arm on. You seemed to reject her because of it, which I think may have hurt her a bit.”

She tried to think of something she could say to Xeriahalt that might make her feel like she was not being treated like a child when Demaar spoke of her own name. her eyes went wide and she shook her head in disagreement. “There is no way that I am a Divine person. My full name is Hadley Stephanie Harrington.” She was startled into silence as Xeriahalt moved in close to look in her eyes. She backed up ever so slightly. Blinking a few times she tried to understand how she could have powers in her eyes. “I don’t see what she could mean by powers IN my eyes. Other than the mods that have been done to them so that I can see in low light. But that was done to my grandfather. It is common for those on New Vegas to have it.”

Xeriahalt stared at her a moment when she spoke in return about her eyes, had Demaar translated it correctly? He wasn't one to get things wrong, perhaps the woman really didn't understand what she'd said, which resulted in the alien girl suddenly bursting out laughing in a rather unladylike fashion, gripping her stomach as she did so, it was probably slightly harsh sounding but she grinned up at Hadley, speaking between her laughter,
"I did not mean literal, physical power generated by the body or physical alterations. Power in our language also means a higher form of energy found inside, it is directly linked to your desire and the ability to use Ni'en." Demaar's voice explained for Xeriahalt as she sat up again, finally trying not to laugh as much, "Ni'en is the basis of all power, potential energy harnessed and directed toward destructive or creative purpose. I sense no Ni'en shielding on your vessel. If I had unleashed my Ni'en to attack, I might have accidentally torn a hole in the side of this vessel by mistake. There is an extraordinarily vast amount of potential energy on this ship but none of it is being used. Are you not familiar with its use?"

Honestly she already knew the answer to that, especially since she could sense that there was no shielding, but to think that their ship was capable of space travel without Ni'en, the amount of work that must have gone into the vessel must have been absolutely astounding. The sheer amount of energy poured into the ship made it feel delightfully warm and relaxing, but it was so fragile, nothing was protecting it.
Demaar spoke of its own volition a moment later,
"In regards to Commander. I was dismissing her as a threat to myself and Xeriahalt. I had to scan you further since you appeared to be modified, as you just confessed. I deemed your modifications non-harmful. Your structural composition is similar to that of Xeriahalt's people, but there are differences internally as well as in your genetic makeup. No offense was meant." He explained simply, "Although I was curious to see a machine in the place of a limb. To willingly do so must have been a difficult choice."

The doctor had given up on trying to understand half of what they were saying, he barely even noticed the idea of Hadley replacing him. Using potential energy? And the idea that she could have shot a hole in the side of the ship from where she was sitting? It sounded preposterous but he could only assume she was telling the truth. If it was something so simple, did it mean other people of her race had the same potential? Could one person really cause that level of destruction?
She spoke of Ni'en shielding, he supposed that must have been some kind of deterrent for that same destructive power for their own race, so without this shielding, they were defenseless? He wanted to say it was no less fantastic than the idea of magic. But Magic could easily have been said to just be Science that they didn't understand yet.

"Let me show you," Once more Xeriahalt spoke, lifting her hands to the top of the patients cloths she was wearing as she pulled the front down, it almost would have looked like she was about to remove the entire thing, but she didn't, only exposing to the point of her sternum.
"We focus our Ni'en into a central point, a source, refining it and giving it form," Something black began to appear in the middle of her chest, like liquid, or oil, spreading from the point between her breasts and spreading across her skin, however it didn't spread too far, although it looked like it was straining to go further, it was then that the crystalline structure inside her body began to push itself out. slipping out into view, it gleamed in place, glowing faintly, smooth, yet still shaped with absolute perfection,
"This is my Ni'en, we solidify it into a crystal to make it easier to identify in our minds and imagine it to be the container for our energy. If some-one with strong enough Ni'en were to pierce it, then I would perish, destroying my Ni'en would kill me." The crystal slowly sank back into her chest, the black liquid shrinking back toward her sternum and vanishing and she allowed the top to return to normal.

She watched Xerianhalt as she spoke of the mods of her eyes. She was surprise when she suddenly started to laugh. Why would she find what she said funny? “so your telling me that you meant I had some power or energy that you call Ni’en? It almost sounds like your talking about Chi but unless your from one of the Asian colony’s chi is not accepted. “ as Demaar talked about what Ni’en could do she raised her eyebrow in surprise as she spoke of what it could do to the ship. “we have never heard of anything that could create a shield or weapons like that which would rip our ship apart.”

“so you dismissed Chris as a threat, not always the wises things to do when you’re dealing with humans.” She said thinking about some of the stories of people being cornered and reacting to that threat stronger than they should have been. “Something you should know about humans is that they may see like a weak race but we are much stronger than you would think. And she can be much more dangerous then I can with that arm of hers. She did not willingly give up her arm for that machine. She lost it in battle and that is the only way we have at this time of replacing limbs.” Realizing that she was going to have to teach them both some forms of proper behavior she sighed and pulled her legs up so that she was a bit more comfortable sitting.

“you should know, while my Mods are quite clear there are many other there that have modifications that cant be seen. It is actually quite rude to talk to someone about their mods when they can’t be seen.” Sighing she realized that she was going to have to go into a bit of detail for them to truly understand. “ a hundred or so years ago humanity found that they could change the Genes of people, most of the mods had to be done to unborn children but you could start with tweaking the parents to get the modifications you wanted. The first large scale wave of Genies was the second Mars colony. They were modified to be able to live on the planet Mars without to much life support. Changes to their lungs, bones and muscles. Well their children rose in revolt against the first wave families that still needed life support. They wiped out all of them in one quick action. In retaliation the United Earth Government bombed them all to death. By that time there were already many first wave colonies formed of Genie’s. many were wiped out in fear that they too would raise up against the pureblood humans,” she raised her hand to stop the doctor from saying anything about how rude that term was. “that was what they were calling themselves at the time. The ones that looked close to pureblood were over looks but they all know that if it was found out there might be people set to kill them. I am one of the few Genie’s that you will find with such clear modifications. My home world, New Vegas was to important to kill off the Genie’s that had the eye and heavy gravity mod, the rest of my markings most think are just beauty mods but they are in fact deeper mods that were created by using the DNA of one of the creatures on our planet so that we might survive better. There is still fear among many of the non Genies that those few Genies left will one day rise up and try to kill them all off.” Sighing she slumped ever so slightly. It had been a long time since she had thought of that story and what it meant to her and her kind. Now she relized that some of her teachers may have been trying to keep her from this post where she would have the power to kill off a bunch of humans if she went ‘mad’.

Raising her eyebrow again she watched, her eyes glued as the young alien started to draw the outfit down to reveal her chest. She had never really been drawn to a woman but part of her wanted to see how her body differed from all the other humans out there. Was there crystals imbedded in her sink the doctor had not talked about or was it just the way the suit was? Watching as the black oily substance started to appear on her chest Hadley wounded if it was causing her pain or if there was no feeling to it. Reaching out as the crystal appeared she was drawn to touch it but stopped before her fingers connected. “does that hurt going past your bones like that? How do you get it in solid form if it is just a form of energy?” she had so many questions but she did not know which to ask first.

"A'oh.." The girl shook her head when Hadley tried to interpret what she meant,
"No." Demaar translated, continuing on his own, "She can see the potential energy within you. That potential energy is what Ni'en manipulates. All living life forms, stars and worlds hold potential energy, but so do structures built by the hands of living beings. Energy is passed to crafted objects and if manipulated properly in those objects, can strengthen or amplify them. However to notice a specified amount, especially a large amount in a single living person is a sign that you are above what we consider average, there are many factors that can increase the potential energy stored inside a being or object. Training, meditation, care taken, faith, friendship, experience, willpower, modifications; as a result of transferred energy in the process. It is a chaotic web that we still struggle to sort through, but these factors have all proven to assist in increasing the level of energy within a single entity, which we then measure through Ni'en manipulation. There are also negating factors that can decrease ones potential energy, but I believe you have a basic understanding, simply think in terms of opposites."

There was a brief pause as Demaar listened to Hadley explaining about Christine, then went on to explain about her modding, however he seemed to remain rather composed about it, meanwhile Xeriahalt was watching and shrinking away at the time, as if she were the one who had offended the Captain,
"As I said before, no offense was meant, your language makes it difficult to explain. Perhaps if I were to rephrase. I dismissed her as a threat is what I originally said, to put it in different terms; I believed she would not harm Xeriahalt. My primary concern was that she was not preparing to attack. With you it was more difficult to discern, because I did not know the extent of your modifications or if there were any that I could not detect that may have been used to harm Xeriahalt. I encountered nothing dangerous and saw no ill intent. With my priority, Xeriahalt's safety, assured, I dismissed you as a threat. I was otherwise prepared to do all in what was left in my power to destroy this cargo bay if you were hostile, then dedicate the remainder of my power to restoring my energy and continuing to support Xeriahalt's life force."

Xeriahalt had nodded in agreement to Demaar when he mentioned dismissing the Captain as a threat, she could see his actual words, what he meant to say and she understood what he meant, but appeared he was having a little difficulty breaking the language barrier, even though he was holding a conversation with the Captain, not something she could do without the ship's assistance.

Hadley's first question about there being any pain was met with a shake of her head,
"A'oh," she repeated as before,
"No, it is only a representation of energy, but my method of Ni'en manipulation is created for combat, it requires temporary physical transformation in order to facilitate the large quantity of potential energy I have refined and stored in my crystal. As for how you manipulate it.. If I had to put it in terms for.. For a child, as an example; it is like being given a toy that lets you create any shape and form you want. The difficult part is learning how to do so, I can not explain it so simply, it would require direct training and practical experience." She paused for a moment trying to think of how she could demonstrate it in a more safe fashion that would no cause damage. Something a child would be taught.

She reached for her chest again, however this time a blue light, like before, formed there, streaming through her shirt into her palm, she overturned her palm, reveal what looked like nothing more than a glowing light. However slowly but surely, the light began to fade, compressing as a surface began to form over it, it was becoming a crystal, no larger than a marble, she gripped it softly then held it out to Hadley, speaking once more,
"This is a very tiny amount of energy, it is far more fragile than the crystal inside me, if I were to break it, it would turn to energy and scatter. This represents the potential of a small animal, anything that could fit on my hand."

Xeriahalt's eyes seemed to glaze over after a moment before she practically collapsed in place, the small marble still in her hand, Demaar's voice chimed in again,
"It seems in her excitement, Xeria has pushed herself too hard. Demonstrating a defensive Ni'en, a partial transformation and solid transference Ni'en so soon after regaining consciousness has exhausted her physically.. Now it is definitely safe to call her zeh'ray-ah.."