Something I want to do more of is jot down some fiction writing and this year I am trying to write a little short story a month, and well this is the effort for January, but I am nervous about publishing it, so its taken me till now to do so.
Let me know what you think guys, I am open to critique and comments, especially around grammar and editing which are my weakest areas of writing.
The CAS Cusco, a second-rate Peru Class light cruiser of the Pan-Colonial Accord, sailed though the void on the edge of the Torngat Rift, a nebula that formed a major part of the border with the Terran Confederation.
The Cusco was no vessel of renown, she was one of many ships that patrolled the borders of the Accords domain and kept them in check. But to her crew, she was more than just meta and firepower, she was their home
Lieutenant Minh Vu had to stifle a yawn as he made his rounds, the Cusco was very quiet on the midwatch, a long tedious stretch of night duty, when much of the ships functions slowed and its rhythms relaxed but didn’t actually stop.
The corridors still hummed with life, but it was quiet enough that you could hear the distant thrumming of the ship’s reactors, occasionally disrupted by the occasional murmurs of low voices.
Vu stepped into the Wardroom where a young Steward was ready with two steaming mugs of tea for him to collect, he was always sure to radio ahead. A couple of Sub-Lieutenants sat at one of the tables playing a game of cards with what looked to be a well worn deck.
He then made his way to the bridge, where Lieutenant Commander Jaan Tamm had the deck. Tamm was a grizzled veteran of 3rd Harmony Border War, and had been a Sub-Lieutenant on the Sovereign, the then flagship, when it was destroyed in one of the war’s earliest battles.
Tamm’s uniform was impeccable, and he was as steady as bedrock, as he ordered the helmsman to adjust the engine a fraction of a degree, his voice was as steady as could be.
“Sir” Vu said in a quiet greeting, which Tamm acknowledged with a brief nod.
“Have you ever been out this way before Mr Vu?” He asked, as he punched a few keys on his control panel.
Vu shook his head, as he saw the brilliant blue of the Torngat Rift appear in the largest part of the command display wall, surrounded by various sensor readings and telemetry data.
“It’s rather beautiful isn’t it” Tamm mused, “Despite the ancien régime being just beyond it”
Vu had to admit that it was
Below them on the port Gun Deck, Gunner Layla Davlatova was inspecting the plasma batteries magnetic containment fields for their stability. They had not been fired in some months and, that made her nervous, it was a gunners superstition that guns that went unused, tended to misbehave.
The main firepower in the Cusco was contained in its two railguns mounted at the bottom of the ship, its medium range plasma broadsides could still pack a hefty punch.
The crew moved around the massive batteries and their power banks, polishing the burnished metal, whispering quiet prayers to whatever higher power they believed in and asking for any luck that could be spared.
There wasn’t much to do at the moment, and even in the age of plasma weapons and gravity mines, sailors were still an extremely superstitious bunch
Davlatova chuckled as she passed by Warrant Officer 1st Class Ngueto, he was telling a wide eyed Able Rating about the time he saw a ship split in half by a misfire. The Able Rating swallowed hard and then doubled his efforts on cleaning the focusing lenses he was working on.
In the ships infirmary, Surgeon-Lieutenant Mariana López was finishing up a minor surgery, an Engineering Technician had thought it wise to try and pull apart a coolant valve by hand.
The wounded crewman winced as López worked on the gash in his arm, whilst the ships Chaplain Omar al-Farouq reassured the young man as the smell of antiseptics and that metallic tang of blood filled the air
“You are going to live boy” said López with that sarcastic tone of hers, she had little time for young crewmen who hurt themselves cutting corners in procedure
al-Farouq couldn’t help but add “and next time we are in port, you are going to have quite the scar to impress the girls with”
The young crewman chuckled weakly and that, and López rolled her eyes
Sat in his cabin, Captain Étienne Leclerc was half reading a book, an actual paper book, not a digital one. In this day and age, books made of paper were a luxury, and with each new promotion and command, he had indulged in purchasing a new book from a specialist boutique on Ramada. They cost a fair bit of money, but he felt they were worth it.
This particular book was an old naval memoir, written over a thousand years ago during the golden age of piracy back on Terra when ships sailed in water. It was written by a Spanish captain and documented his journeys across the Atlantic Ocean and his battles in the Caribbean with British and French vessels as well as pirates.
And it was pirates that weighed most in his mind, that and fuel reserves and the state of the crew.
The Confederation and the Accord had been in any serious conflict for nearly a century now, but pirates were a major concern here, as they preyed on ships crossing the rift as they smuggled goods between the border worlds.
He took a sip of the brandy he had, he only indulged a single glass during the midwatch, and he listened to the sounds of the ship, the slight creaking of the metal, the low hum of the gravity plating and the distant voices of the crew
The Cusco was a living thing, a home and a duty both.
And tomorrow, the routine will begin again.