Tiara was definitely glad that she had taken the initiative to enter the shuttle first, If only because it lets her take the nav-station in the cockpit instead of the crowded troop compartment. This also gave her a great view of the system's sixth planet as they left the hangar of the Aurora. It was a large gas giant with thousands of beautiful rings of ice and rock spread out around it on a plain from its equator. The entire thing glisend like thousands of little stars in the light of the distant sun. The three of us in the cockpit stared at it for a moment before we had to return to the task of guiding the shuttle to its destination.

“Tiara plot a course to the third planet from here.” The Lieutenant ordered from the copilot's seat. This snapped the girls attention back to the task at hand.

Taking a quick look over the nav-station’s read outs she found the fastest route would take them past the fourth planet, using its gravity well to sing the ship towards the third planet. The entire trip would take roughly thirty minutes. Just enough time for her to get a good sensor sweep of the system, which turned up some interesting results. There was an asteroid belt between the fourth and fifth planets that showed signs of multiple simi hidden statons. Way beacons indicating where travel corridors were set up to get past the belt. The reason they had had to leave the Aurora appeared to be that all three corridors that were large enough to accommodate her currently had ships lined up waiting to get through. What didn’t make sense though was why. The belt didn’t look unstable or realy all that dangerous. So why limit ships to the corridors in the first place?

Turned out she would get an answer to that question sooner than expected. A mid-seized freighter had just decided that it wasn't worth the wait and started moving past the belt outside one of the corridors. It made it halfway before two of what were apparently Pirate Cruisers slipped out of where they were hiding. One ship moved directly towards the freighter, while the other moved to intercept two military Destroyers. Suddenly the Shuttles sensors went nuts as the four combat ships began putting out power signatures and charged their weapons.

With a flash of light the second cruiser fired at the two approaching Destroyers. The massive magnetically charged shell crossed the gap between the ships in seconds. Tiara could have told anyone why but she was sure that it was going to be deflected past the two ships. She wasn't even sure why she thought this herself, but sure enough there was a flash of colorful lights around the front of the first Destroyer as the shell was forcefully slowed and pushed away from the ship, turning the hit into a near miss. She could only guess how powerful the magnetic field on that ship had to be to deflect an object traveling a fraction the speed of light. Even more impressive though was when they returned fire on the cruiser.

The two shells from the Destroyers crossed the distance at what must have been a speed at least twice that of the Cruiser’s shell. They even showed magnetic disturbances around them as their electromagnetic charge interacted with the solar winds. Yet still even with them smashing through the Cruiser’s equally impressive magnetic field the shells only did moderat damage to it. Though it did give the Cruiser enough of a shock to decide this wasn't a fight it really wanted to have. It looked like the exchange would likely go on for a few more minutes, so Tiara reported it to The Lieutenant and thanked the Spirits that they were on the other side of the system.

The remainder of the trip was fairly uneventful. When they passed around the fourth planet she noted it showed signs of having been terraformed in the past. There was also a nearby debri field filled with half destroyed ships. Based off of the designs it was probably the remains of the Gravain fleet that was destroyed during the first contact incident. Then as they approached the third planet Taurus Station came into view.

There around the center of the mid-sized planet was a massive station that ran around its equator. According to the shuttle's sensors the circumference of the station at its closest point to the planet was around 265,000 km, was 1 km deep and one hundred and fifty meters tall. Tiara herself had seen massive generational super structures but this was definitely the largest she had ever seen. It was even possible that it was the largest orbital structure in the galaxy. It was quite possible that it could hold the entire population of the planet it was set around.

Tali hit the intercom back to the troop bay. “You guys are not going to believe this. They have a station that is so big it goes around their entire planet” a moment later the door into the cockpit opened and Michael stepped in with Eric and Amara behind him in the doorway. He stared out the view port for a moment before aching The Lieutenant. “I thought the Terrans had only been a space faring race for the last one hundred years?” None of them dared to take their eyes off the massive station. It felt like the thing would simply vanish. “That is what the reports say.” he responded somewhat dryly.

They all jumped when a sharp beeping sound suddenly came from the comms unit. Tiara quickly put her headset back on and responded to the incoming hail. It turned out to be a command and control operator who was calling to give them landing instructions. Curiously there wasn't any delay or overlap that was associated with someone using a translator. Was she Frayin? She wondered, at least until the operator said something that was rather alarming. “Be advised that this will be a Zero G landing in an active hangar.” The operator got a little worried when Tiara didn’t respond for a moment. Instead of responding to the slowly panicking operator on the comms Tiara slowly turned to the rest of the cockpit and repeated what she had just been told. What happened next was probably a testament to the training they had reserved.

No sooner than she had said the words did Micheal turn and yell for everyone to lock themselves and anything near them down as he quickly moved back into the troop bay. Tali gave them all of six second to do so before flipping off the ship's internal gravity and unbuckling herself from the pilot's seat, soliciting a few curses from the troop bay. She then floated up so she could access the control panels above the view port that she was too short to reach. The Lieutenant took the controls and put his own head set on, while Tiara asked the operator to give them their approach vector. They were now getting close to the station and they could see the hangar. They could see personnel and equipment floating around inside. Not in some uncontrolled manner but in specific purposeful patterns.

There was a flash of sparks as Tali finished disabling the anti drift system on the shuttle then moved back to the pilot’s seat and then cut the main thrusters. All that was left was to drift in using only the emergency thrusters to guide them. It was a little unnerving to watch. Tiara wanted nothing more at the moment to be in the control of the shuttle. Not that she thought she could do a better job than Tali or The Lieutenant, but it was comforting for a pilot to be incontrol of the craft they were in. She briefly wondered if it would have been better or worse to not be able to see what was going on. Then they passed through a blue field at the entrance of the hanger. It must have been a gravity field as she could feel it pass over her as they went through it. The pull was just enough to change the course of the shuttle so that it would drift to an empty area in the back of the hangar. To Tali’s credit despite several near misses with people or equipment she held their course all the way to the empty area. Then with a loud percussive sound the magnetic locks latched onto the deck of the hangar.

We had a short moment to breathe before a surly looking Terran Male in a dark blue uniform with three chevrons above three inverted arcs on his sleeve keyed open the shuttle's main hatch and told them to get out and head to the mission briefing room. A task that was made a little hard as there was no gravity between them and the door out of the hangar. Tal,Eric and Elvira were the only ones who didn't need one of the mechanics to redirect them back to the door. Where a young Terran female with a single chevron on her sleeve helped them into the hall, that thank the Spirits had normal gravity. They were then directed to the first door on the right just past the bulkhead.

Inside the room there were twelve chairs with L shaped metal surfaces on them and two Terran males in blue gray uniforms that looked like a cross between Frayin naval uniforms and the uniforms that they had seen the Terran's in. The one on the right was a tall dark skinned (boy?) Who took a moment to look her up and down before saying "How the hell can they all be hot?" Under his breath before begrudgingly reaching into his pocket and handing the other (boy?) A couple pieces of paper. " I told you." The shorter light skinned one said. She was about to ask them what they meant and what the strange paper was about when a holo projector came to life with Nayomi appearing on it.

"Djimon, Orin you should be aware that Frayins have exceptional hearing and just heard everything you just said." The two Terran boys look at each other with what she thought was a look of impairment. It was hard to tell really, since Terrains didn't have large ears or tails to indicate such things. Their skin did change color a little though. As if to simply confirm what Nayomi had said Elvira spoke up to ask them a question "So what do you mean by we are all hot?"

The entire situation was so funny that before she knew it Tiara was laughing. After a moment of everyone staring at her she managed to get control of herself and straightened up. "Forgive me you were all just staring at each other with these confused looks that I couldn't help myself." She managed to say. This seemed to put the two Terran boys at ease. "Right." The dark skinned man said "Let me introduce myself. My name is Djimon Tekle and this is Orin Johnson." They all took a few moments to introduce themselves. Then just as they finished a Terran male enter the room behind them

He was tall with light colored skin. He was wearing the same blue gray uniform as the two boys but had one significant difference. On his collar was a gold symbol with four circles in a diamond formation connected by four lines connecting the diamond and a single gold circle in the middle. The Terran wearing a Frayin naval Lieutenant's insignia looked over the room before speaking in a clear solid voice. "Looks like you're all here. Allow me to introduce myself to those of you who don't know me. I am Lieutenant Colson, the leader of Fox Squadron and as of today you will all be under my command."