The Intec slaver wreck was dragged into the Flagship. The HOF Ace was larger than most of the human ships, rank carrying its privileges. The Admirals rank gave him an extra module and a bigger budget and Admiral Williams had used it to double the Engineering and Intel sections. Privately, he thought some of his fellow admirals were idiots, particularly one that had fitted a swimming pool, but he didn’t feel the need to have a vast office or luxury quarters on a warship. Today proved his point.

Tay was feeling a little disgruntled. She had served her time in the HDF but it was never going to be her career. It had never occurred to her that the bastards would drag her off her ship, let alone just as she met someone ...interesting. Romance and space didn’t mix, well not unless you had some pretty exotic tastes. She could already guess why they had taken her as well as the Intec ship. She had done the scans, she knew the local history therefore she would be useful. She doubted the Admiral had spent a second thinking about her personal life. Since she was on her way to a military ship, on full alert, she didn't have a personal life anymore.

The Noctema watched as the human fleet left with their engineer, some with mixed feelings. Particularly the new engineer that had been woken up, bundled into a shuttle and attached to the ship without even a word. The Captain decided to leave first contact with Oz to the humans, since the Pyro and its marines were still here. After he had reviewed the information that Tay had retrieved from the slaver, he had a good idea of where the humans would go first. He decided to follow quietly behind. He might even get his proper Engineer back. He had grown quite fond of Tay. Also Humans took so long to train properly.

Admiral Williams was no idiot. Tay had been assigned one of the civilian quarters, absolute luxury compared to the poor sods still in service. Also she had been ‘requested’ to join the Intel conference ‘after she had settled in.’ She had no doubt that the moment she pushed her luck, it would be straight back to shouted orders and bunking in with everyone else. The message was clear: play nice, do what we need you to do and we’ll play nice too. She didn’t know if it came straight from the Admiral, or if he had some very clever officers but she appreciated the gesture. She found a uniform waiting on the rack, obviously tailored for her. She changed quickly and made her way to the conference room. She was half-way there before she realised that she had been bumped up in rank. Senior Engineer Tay. Nice.

The conference was an ongoing event, with people and information being fed into the room constantly. If it resembled anything, it was a war room from humanities history. Tay entered and saluted the room. ‘Senior Engineer Tay, reporting as requested.’

One of the Captains looked up, ‘Welcome aboard, Tay. You’re with me. My name is Sullivan and I’m in charge of Intel around here.’

Tay nodded. Sullivan was a tall, pale and young Officer. Captain at his age meant he was either really good or heavily connected. Hopefully it was the first. She thought the guy would melt if he ever visited Oz, or simply burst into flames. ‘Nice to meet you Sir. Where do you need me?’ Sullivan pointed at one of the many side offices lining the room, ‘A quick debrief, then down to the Intec ship. We’re pulling it apart for Intel and we need answers quickly.’

‘Well, I’m sorry we had to drag you off the ship, but this is literally all hands on deck. The HOF is rarely assembled, and we don’t usually move this quickly. We still have a few holes in the command structure. Your new rank is not just a gesture, you earned it by sorting out the situation on Oz. Now we want to make sure the Intec pay for their attacks, and release any other prisoners we come across. I want you to lead the teardown of that ship. Squeeze whatever Intel you can. The Admiral is waiting for a destination, and that has to come from us. Understood?’ They hadn’t bothered to sit down, so she simply nodded and left to find her section.

The Intec ship was a wreck. Decades of sitting in the sun, blasted by sand and heat, used as a toilet by every passing creature and looted by every passing human. Still, the smell reminded her of Oz. It suddenly struck her that she had begun to think of that planet as home. Ridiculous, she thought, pushing away the idea. Home was a ship. But perhaps not for ever. Her team of four Engineers were waiting for her. They had all been grabbed from their own ships, chosen for their skill-set and little else. From the frosty atmosphere, they hadn’t exactly been pleased about it. And now they had a fresh superior, just back into the service. Tay decided to treat this as another first-contact situation.

‘Alright people, the Fleet is waiting for us to give them answers and we are going to get them. If you haven’t read my reports on the Intec ship, please do so now.’ Two of the Engineers nodded. ‘ Yes Chief, we just got clearance on that.’ They headed to their consoles. She regarded the remaining two. ‘Ok, read me in. Who are you guys? I got dragged off my ship for this, and I’m sure the same happened to you.’

The first one to answer was a Xeno. Tay recognised it as one out of the Central worlds, but she didn’t know exactly which one. She’d read his file later. ‘I am Engineer Bork. I am on an exchange tour with the humans. It is not going well. I specialise in isotope identification and materials composition.’ At that he stopped, obviously feeling that this was sufficient. Tay cursed internally. Some captain had taken a chance to dump his problems somewhere else. Definitely time to read his file. What she said didn’t reflect that. ‘Excellent. I need your skillset right now. I want samples from every part of this ship. I need to know the likely origin of the parts on this heap. Assume they are from multiple worlds, given the Intec habit of stealing anything they can.’ Bork immediately left for his console. Not big on conversation, then.

The remaining Engineer released a sigh, ‘He's not a big talker, Chief. That's the most I’ve heard him say since we got here. I’m Engineer Roaden, off the HOF Gamer. Mostly I do the standard stuff, but I specialise in old Xeno tech. Mostly a hobby, but it turns out, quite a useful one. I jumped at the chance to tear into this ship, to be honest.’

Happy that at least someone was glad to be here, Tay ran over the possibilities. ‘Alright, I want you to look for the worst tech that they have. Look for deliberate fuck-ups, bad design, even outright sabotage. If some of that ship is slave built, I don’t expect the quality is up to much. Also, this thing fell out of the sky, so something killed it. Then give it to Bork as a priority.’

She then went and found her office. Her name was taped to the door. Classy. Making herself comfortable, she sat and called up the team files. Roaden was pretty much everything she expected. Bork's file was nearly empty, reflecting his short history with the Fleet. All it told her was to check with the XCC for details. His previous captain had left zero comments, zero recommendations. Since she didn’t want to drag the XCC into her new department, it was utterly useless to her. The other two, currently doing their homework, were both human. They had been transferred off the same ship, the HOF Raging. Apparently their Captain regarded them as a team. A note added just for her said simply, ‘I want them back. Don’t lose them.’ She smiled, if their captain liked them, they must be decent enough. And why they were unhappy to be off their own ship. Engineers Olly and Oskar. This should be interesting.

A quiet knock on her door alerted her to their arrival. ‘ Chief, we have read the reports. What do you want us to do?’ Apparently Olly spoke for both of them. After reading the reports, she had an idea. ‘ Alright, I need you to be clever. Olly, your specialty is tooling and Oskcar, you were with ship design. You know what we’re looking for. Make your own plans, come to me if you figure something out or need anything extra. Check in with Bork and Roaden about their tasks, cross reference your findings. I’m going to dismantle their computer system, find what I missed the first time.’