Meanwhile...

"WHERE THE FUCK IS HE?!" shouted Emily for the thirty-seventh time. Both Jack and Mitch were watching Emily, like they were trapped inside a cage with a wild animal ready to tear their heads off at the slightest movement. Emily had been pacing the deck in the galley since Mike failed to come back. At first both Jack and Mitch said that Mike was just having some fun out in a fighter, and it had only been three hours. That was five hours ago with no sign of Mike. With every passing hour Emily got more agitated and snapped at the every little noise.

While Emily was pacing, Mitch had completed most of the upgrades, although the hyper drive would have to wait to be tested. At Mitch's request, Sam operated a small fighter to ‘test' the new upgrades. The fighter was designed for two occupants, shaped like the US Air Forces Thunderbolt II, except it was a lot smaller. The craft was fifteen feet long by nine feet wide. When it was in the hanger bay the craft was resting on its landing struts barely six feet off the ground. Mitch found out that the fighter was heavily armored and made it half as fast as the fighter that Mike was flying, though it in fact had more powerful weaponry to compensate for its speed. It reminded Mitch of a bomber of sorts, not very quick, but packs a powerful punch when needed. For the first test Mitch had Sam maneuver the fighter ten kilometers away from the ship, then have the Thundercat, the fighter, fire it's forward particle weapons directly at the hull of the ship. With the new metaphasic armor, Mitch believed that their would be no residual affects from the particle weapon, meaning that the Thundercat could, in fact, stay outside of the ship and fire at its hull for the rest of the day without leaving a single mark. Jack decided to join Mitch for the rest of the day to avoid the "hell bitch", or else face a fate worse than death itself. He was a little nervous about Mitchs' plan; what if it failed was the main topic of their conversation. Mitch replied simply, ‘we'd die a very painful, but quick death'. Jack was quiet for a while after that, silently hoping that the test passed. He was standing over the Science console just skimming Mitchs' project notes, when he noticed the name ‘Thundercat'.

"Mitch, what in the Sam hell is a ‘Thundercat'? asked Jack while doing the air quotes gesture.

"Well, do you see that fighter out there?" Jack nodded, it was kinda hard to miss. "That my friend is what I name that particular class of fighter."

Jack decreed that Mitch was no longer allowed to name anything involving ships, A.I.s', bases, planets, and/or solar systems ever again. Mitch protested that it was a perfectly good name and didn't see a problem with it. Jack said, "If you can't see the problem, you are by far clueless and FUBAR. And if you don't know what that means, try Googling it."

Five obscene hand gestures later, Mitch had Sam transfer control of the Thundercat to the Science console, so he could be more in control of the test. Mitch brought the Thundercat up on the main viewer and had Sam project the Thundercat and the ship in holographic panorama. Sam started a ten second count down until the fighter fired, Mitch was eager for this test to get under way.

"Ten", said Sam.

"Nine"

"Well I hope this works," said Mitch. Jack upon hearing this cursed worse than a drunken sailor trying pay to for a prostitute, and later finding out it was a guy in drag. Jack missed eight because he was cursing so loud.

"Seven"

"Six"

"Five"

"I am so going to kick your ass later," uttered Jack.

"Four"

"Three"

"Two"

"One"

"Ah shit," muttered Jack. Mitch pressed the firing symbol on the console and a bright red flash of energy erupted from the Thundercat. Jack had his eyes closed the entire time. Mitch had his eyes on the holographic display as the energy blast drew closer towards the ship. The distance between the two rapidly decreased. Then the energy hit the ship. Jack still had his eyes closed, but asked when it was going to hit.

"It already did you big chicken shit," replied Mitch. Jacks' eyes popped open and looked around. No alarms went off, nothing seemed damaged, in fact Jack didn't even register the hit on the ship. "Damn that armor must be fucking good!" thought Jack. Though he didn't say that to Mitch. Mitch moved away from the console with that damn smug look on his face. Jack decided that it was time for some payback. Without being too apparent, he launched his booted foot right in the center of Mitchs' hacky-sac. Mitchs' testicles moved right on in with their new neighbors, the tonsils.

Just about an hour later Emily stormed onto the bridge, much of her irritation still on her face. She scanned the area, hoping to lash out at anyone or thing, so she wouldn't be reminded that Mike was still missing. Emily wanted to take the ship out and search for Mike, but Mitch told her in no uncertain terms that the ship needed to be tested before we searched for Mike. That had been an hour before Mitchs' test started, now she felt that the ship was as ready as it was going to be, test be damned. She was tired of waiting, and when she found Mike, he is going to die a very painful death by her hands. A single moan broke through her thoughts as Emily turned her head towards the science console. Mitch was sitting on the largest bag of ice that Emily had ever seen, well more like straddling the bag of ice than sitting on it. The irritation on her face slowly faded at the amusing sight.

"What the hell happen to you?" she asked. Mitch looked up from the console and wince before he spoke.

"Jack and I had a disagreement of my testing methods. When he found out what the test entailed and how I had hoped that the test would work, he got a little upset. Needless to say if I had not called him a chicken shit after the test then my balls would not be up in my throat right about now."

Emily gave a slight smile at his labored effort to recall the incident. Mitch went on to tell her that all of the defensive upgrades were complete, both shielding and armor passed with flying colors. They could now search for Mike without further delay on his part.

"Sam could you extrapolate Mikes' flight path and guides us to him?" Emily asked with excitement evident on her face.

"Yes Commander, the emissions from the fighter can be tracked easily, but we had better do so now before his wake dissipates any further," explained Sam.

"Alright Sam, bring up his flight path on the main viewer and display the route that he might had taken without changing course, hopefully he hadn't taken the scenic route."

"Acknowledge."

The computer generated image of Mikes' flight path showed the fighter heading towards the outer reaches of the system passing close to Pluto.

"Jack please report to the bridge and man your station," commed Emily.

"Be right there." replied Jack.

Jack was panting heavily when he rushed onto the bridge, a slight flush evident on his cheeks. After a few seconds Jack brought his breathing back to normal and calmly walked to his console. Emily took the Captain's chair and swiveled around towards the main viewer. She ordered Sam to take control and follow the flight path that Mike took and to set his sensors to their maximum setting. Mitch asked if she wanted the cloak activated, so they could avoid the chance of being spotted, even by that piece of shit Hubbell telescope. Emily thought it was a good suggestion and agreed.

With the cloak activated, Sam began to follow Mikes' flight path, slowly pushing more power to the sublight engines. It would take ten minutes to reach the edges of the solar system. If NASA knew what they were doing they would shit their collective pants. Emily hoped that Mike would be ok and would survive long enough until they got to wherever the hell he had gone to. All was silent on the bridge as the search for their captain began, and the massive ship advanced through space hoping that all was not lost.

* * *

Mike decided that he needed to try to get communications back online to call in Sam and the ship.

‘I really need to think of a name for that ship. I can't just keep calling it "the ship".' thought Mike.

He was still palming the broken shive after twenty minutes idleness. To the slaves it was a deadly weapon. To Mike it was a fragile thing that he crush with his hand. It wasn't even difficult to crush, felt like an aluminum beer can in his hands. He also knew he needed the help of these people, they knew this ship better than he did. He hoped that the communication gear was still intact. He walked over to Jax and the old man, who he later learned was called Xavier. When they saw him approach they bowed their heads in respect to him. Mike tried to wave it off but they insisted that they show the respect he deserves. Mike asked where the communications station was located, they said near the bridge, but not on the bridge itself. Mike thought that was a serious design flaw on the assholes that built this rust bucket. It was at this moment that he felt something strange, something that didn't feel quit right.

"Hey can I ask you guys a question?," asked Mike. He got nods in return, which clued him in to ask away.

"Do any of you feel ‘strange' at the moment? Something just doesn't feel right in the ship. Could it be atmospheric pressure in the cargo bay?" Jax was the one to answer Mike first.

"No, nothing feels wrong to me Mike. Why do you feel sick?"

"No, I don't feel sick. I can only describe it as feeling ‘light', like some huge weight has been lifted off of me."

Xavier got this far away look on his face, which turn into a heavy frown. When he spoke it was almost a whisper.

"Mike could you do me a favor, and perform a small jump. Not a running jump, just stand right where you are and just jump straight up."

Mike was having a sinking sensation in the pit of his colon. He had a inkling of where this was going. So he got ready to perform this small task. He bent his knees slightly and used all the strength in his calves in this one jump. Mike was off the deck and soared six feet into the air.

"Holy shit, what the fuck is going on?' thought Mike.

This was way too much for him to handle at the moment. He could think about this stuff later, there were more important things at hand that needed attending.

Mike walked over to his combat armor and started to put back on, that's when he realized Crimson had been quiet this entire time. He had his suit half up his legs when Crimson started to shimmer.

"Everything all right their buddy?" asked Mike.

"Michael, I've been mulling over some of the revelations that have gone on recently. Some more disturbing than others. Once we get back to the ship, some things will become clear."

‘He sounds a little stress out, even for sword, its a little strange.' thought Mike.

He pulled the suit the rest of the way up and reactivated its' main systems. Mike sealed and pressurized his suit, because he didn't know what the conditions were like near the bridge. The realization came to him that none of the slaves would be able to follow him, some of the ships compartments were open to vacuum. He'd have to go it alone, though he was going to get some directions first, he didn't know the basic layout of the ship. After talking with Jax and some of the other slaves they gave him a basic layout of the ship. If he didn't take and wrong turns, he'd be at the communications station within seven minutes.

He made his way towards the exist of the cargo bay. The slaves watched as he left, some showing an expression of worry while others remained neutral. Once outside the cargo bay the sound of his own breath was thudding in his own ears. The hall in front of him was nearly pitch black, the emergency track lighting the only source of illumination. He proceeded through the corridor, twenty feet further, his HUD display informed he that he was beyond the containment field. There was no more atmosphere outside of his suit. At junction in the corridor he was to take a right, then a left, walk ten meters and make a sharp right. No other complications according to the slaves, he followed their instructions to the letter and the communications station was five feet in front of him.

He walked in front of the consul and tried pressing a few of the buttons on the panel. None of them work, nor did they give any indication of being powered. He popped the lower access panel to the station. Everything seemed to be in working order, until he noticed that the power supply was shorted out. Mike yanked the power supply and tossed it over his shoulder. He took his head out of the panel and looked around for some cables that he could Jerry-rig to make this POS work. A small storage cubby was the answer to his prayers, several cables and replacement parts for the communications was stored here, but no back up power supplies. He took two cables, one so he could splice it into his suit power matrix and run right into the communications station, the second so he could boost his own comm signal. Several frustrating minutes later he had everything squared away. By activating his own comm link he should, in theory, be able to reach Sam.

"Sam, this is Mike over." he commed. Nothing but static was his reply. He managed to push ten percent more power into the communication array. Unfortunately it was cutting down on his suit performance, meaning it was getting difficult to breathe. Like being up a very tall mountain, the high altitude makes the air very thin. Mike starts taking swallow breathes to keep from passing out, but black dots filter through his vision.

"Sam, this Mike, please lock in on my comm signal and proceed to my local," swallow breathes weren't helping any more "please hurry!"

Mikes teeth start to clatter together as his vision starts to fade out, he thought he heard a response on the comm, but it was too far away for Mike to answer. His last thought before passing out, was ‘Well I knew this was stupid to begin with, and this is certainly a stupid way to go'. Then all was still.