I lean back on the comfortable recliner I decided was mine in the science vessels lounge. I take a sip from the bitter and chemical-tasting bourbon Uriel offered me and grimace. This causes Josef to chuckle and I even see Uriel crack a thin smile for once. She then says in a patronizing way,

"You really don't like whiskey and bourbon do you? This stuff is even nice and smooth..."

I just shake my head and respond flatly,

"Dollar shot night. Big Bass Bar, thirty-two years ago..."

I watch as the blonde woman physically recoils from the memory causing both Josef and I to laugh as she shakes her head disappointed in us for bringing up a fairly bad memory, that despite the alcohol consumed, still lives in our minds.

I finish my glass of the amber liquid and stand up to go find something more palatable, Josef lets me know there is a keg of beer we can share in a cabinet nearby. I roll the keg over to him, and he sets it up and begins unsealing it. I dig through the nearby freezer for the liter steins we normally drink out of. Grabbing the metal and composite constructs I close the door after taking an ice cream sandwich and head back over to where Josef fills the containers with practiced precision, not a drop missed, a nice head, and the head is just small enough not to waste precious volume that could be filled with beer.

We sit around sipping and not really talking before Uriel asks,

"What was the final kill count?"

Josef doesn't change his placid expression, but I do see him stiffen with excitement and interest in my answer. I respond neutrally,

"I believe it was around 1500 were confirmed by the AI, then there were the incendiary and explosive kills which the AI cannot count as direct kills due to compliance laws. An estimate it gave was close to about 2800 or so. If they were running from the space I didn't drop anything on their heads."

She nods and asks,

"What's your guess how the Kingdom will react?"

I shrug and answer,

"Probably somewhat happy 'cause we took out some of their enemies. After that, no clue. I hope they are apologetic for leaving it to us."

She nods and states,

"I saw some of the footage of the fight. That leader guy... that was intense and breaks literally known laws of physics."

I nod and take a long swig of my drink after finishing my snack. It still bothers me that a single person had fired a beam or wave of fire that most likely had the same yield as a fairly small fission bomb. This changes the dynamic I believed was the truth, I slowly began getting cocky that we had some political capital in the sense we have nukes and they don't. Unfortunately, it appears they have at least one individual who is a living nuke, as low yield as it is, there is still an incredible amount of power. I do not like this one bit.

I look up and am surprised as Shariah enters the lounge. She looks at the two scientists across from me with a suspicious look and she takes the chair next to me letting out a long sigh. She then asks in a very tired voice,

"Can I please get a drink?"

In a near instant, a glass of bourbon on the rocks is in her hands and she takes a sip before grimacing. She pulls it away from her face and stares at the liquid in horror and asks,

"What is this? Bourbon normally doesn't burn this bad."

Uriel responds,

"It's the stuff from Moskau Noct, they like it 50% ABV or higher."

Shariah shakes her head before taking a sip and saying through a grimace,

"Okay. Thank you very much, Doctor."

We sit in quiet, the only sound of ice jiggling in the glasses of the spirit drinkers. Shariah looks between the two every now and again before asking me,

"So what's going on between... those two? I saw them kissing before the big meeting with the Kingdom."

I chuckle as Uriel looks in the other direction and Josef gives the diplo-colonel a wide smile. I then say,

"Well... If I'm not mistaken they will be married for...hmmmm... forty years in about three weeks. It's normal to give your beloved a smooch before a stressful situation. Josef isn't big on big diplomatic situations."

Shariah's eyes go wide as she looks at the three of us, trying to tell if we are lying. I raise my eyebrows and ask,

"What's the matter?"

She responds,

"Well, they don't share a last name, plus the way you and Uriel interacted I thought there had been something but it had failed."

This causes me to loudly laugh and Josef shares in my laughter. Uriel even gives one of her rare and adorable giggles. I respond,

"Oh, that's the most unrealistic thing you've thought about me. First, they don't share a last name because they are both highly acclaimed scientific authors in separate disciplines so they would rather keep their works separate from one another and be awarded as individuals.

The second part... well... long story short they are perfect for one another, and I'm not a good fit."

I shrug at the end, indifferent to the situation. After all, I was Josefs best man and unfortunately, walked Uriel down the aisle before taking my best man position. There was never any jealousy or thoughts against their relationship, as it was they got married after dating for well over a decade. Uriel then explains,

"Yes, Barbie explained it pretty well. We have our own accomplishments and as for the relationship, it's been so long I can hardly remember how and when it started between Josef and I. I think it sort of naturally progressed through mutual feelings and we just followed what made us happy."

Shariah nods looking at the floor, a look of slight jealousy in her eyes, not a dire one, but one that comes from seeing someone have something that very few people can even imagine having. It's a beautiful thing that only happens in rare situations or romantic novels. I still grimace as Uriel calls me Barbie though, I almost start to tell an embarrassing story of hers, but I stop myself and lean back with a smile on my face. I then ask Shariah,

"Alright, I know we shouldn't talk shop during a break like this, but how did the Kingdom react to my defense? What is their current plans."

Pulling Shariah from her thoughts through talks of work she smiles and responds,

"News was trickling in slowly because they hadn't dealt with their defense entirely yet by the time you finished up. I was able to leave the planet during the lull caused by your near annihilation of the attacking force. I believe they are still fighting or are mopping up stragglers. In other news, they are postponing the big meeting we were in to digest the current situation, but the Shipmaster has requested to come aboard our ship with one or two fellows who are interested in our tech.

Some of the science team members are working on figuring out how to get him on board, his size is a little too big for any of our EVA suits... not his height but his belly."

I nod and respond,

"That would be nice. I sorta want to show him around, within reason of course. "

She nods and our little group sits around for a while sipping on our drinks and having polite small talk. Nothing of note happens except Shariah tries to keep up with out casual drinking, and since she isn't like us professional alcoholics she gets a little fuckered on the strong bourbon Uriel has. She doesn't get sloppy, but she definitely starts having a hard time holding her head up. Uriel and Josef abandoned me after they decided to retire for the night as they could not stay awake for as long as I could. I wash the glasses and steins before replacing them where they are supposed to be stored. I put away the booze, sit back down on my claimed chair, and put the daily reports over my vision. I begin doing my daily tasks sitting on the comfortable chair staring off into nothing, jolly from the good drink. Shariah pulls me from my work by asking,

"Commodore... you're in your sixties. Were you ever married?"

I reply in a low but calm voice,

"No."

She frowns and then says,

"It must be lonely..."

I shake my head responding,

"It's not. There are days and nights that feel lonely but overall it isn't. I have work, I have crew, and on this mission I have friends. There is no reason for me to feel lonely."

She adjusts her sitting position and then asks,

"Hey... can you walk me to my room, I can't handle liquor."

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

I laugh and stand up. She walks beside me, only stumbling once. Our walk is in silence until Shariah asks me,

"Commodore, I don't know who you are, as you said your file is closed but from whispers of those who work alongside Dr.Kelly and Mengele and apparently Dr.McCormick, they speak of you like a boogeyman. A monster of legend almost...I guess my question is, why are you only just now a commodore despite a nearly forty-year service record from what I can find."

I frown and tell the drunk woman,

"Almost all the answers I can give are classified and you are not privy to that information, but my only answer will be, this is not my first time holding the rank of commodore."

She goes quiet as she understands what I mean. I was once a commodore, lost that rank somehow, and now have reclaimed it. Although the truth is I didn't just drop one rank...

We make it to her room and I help her through the door and make sure she has a glass of water nearby. I then leave. She tries to ask something more but I tell her goodnight and shut the door behind me. As I walk away I start thinking and realize she may have wanted me to stay for whatever reason. I feel my face flush like a schoolgirl at the thought but get it out of my head quickly remembering that not only am I her commanding officer which makes any relations illegal. I am also old enough to be her grandfather if her grandpa had kids at 18 that is. I board my shuttle and return to the Catfish, the thought gone from my mind...

Three days later the scientists figure out a major breakthrough. They find that we have the technology to scrub the strange radiation off of objects found within this part of space. This is of course unless the object contains Strange Matter, then it naturally produces small amounts of RPR or is outright toxic to anything biological from our part of space. Due to this breakthrough in science, and the unfortunate sacrifice of multiple lab mice, we are able to eat some alien food or use their ingredients to resupply our food stores which are around half full at this point in time. It's not a problem yet, but it's always better if we can resupply planetside. We also discovered certain alloys between our normal matter and their strange matter are stable and can be interacted with once the surface radiation is scrubbed away. As far as I know, the scrubbing method utilizes a beam of X-rays or some gamma radiation or something that "blows" off the RPR or neutralizes it.

The most important thing we found is that living organisms can survive this process without any significant negative issues. Plants and small animals alike. A major theory is that due to the sheer radioactive nature of their part of space, most organisms have developed major radiation resistance because even with the RPR the sheer amount of OR they consider normal levels is fallout-zone levels according to us. There are no pain responses to the scrubbing process, the only noticeable issue is the loss of anomalous features. Like a glowing fern of some sort stops glowing, a floating mouse-thing stops floating, and the foot-long fire-breathing lizard can no longer spit flames. The response from the animals is usually confusion, but after weeks of observation, they don't die and behave normally as they adjust to life without their anomalous abilities. The scientists even were granted a trial on a person from the Kingdom. Unfortunately, this resulted in us purchasing a slave. There was a huge controversy and it came down to me to pass judgment, I found out by watching the helmet camera of the scientist, that he was tricked into buying the poor bastard. I ruled him innocent, but we all agreed to emancipate the person when we finished as well as give them some gold to start their life anew.

When we tested the scrubbing on the strange orange-goblin thing we found that just like the plants and animals, there were no major issues. The test subject did state they felt strange and we did find that there was still some RPR within their body, we found that their natural electromagnetic field which they use to manipulate RPR and SR contains it like a shield. When a mouse from our part of space was placed in their hands no issues were found. Then a scientist shook the hand of the test subject and no problems came about. According to the test subject, the only issue is that they feel slightly drained stating,

"It feels as if I have cast too much magic and run out."

According to their understanding of reality, this is correct. The subjects were also capable of doing some magic tricks, which consisted entirely of making their hands glow. After scrubbing they could no longer do this. Overall this was an amazing find and we plan to utilize it so that the Shipmaster can come aboard without having to cannibilize multiple EVA suits to fit the rotund man.

A week later, after many refinements to the process and when the scientists are happy that there are no potential dangers to any being decontaminated, the Shipmaster and a small retinue are invited onto the Catfish. I have the ship prepared as if an Admiral were coming for an inspection and then we wait. The Shipmaster will first be brought onto the civilian vessel where he will be decontaminated and then a shuttle will take him to me.

I wait just outside the shuttle bay alongside the Captain of my marine compliment who is outside his armor, instead wearing his blue and white uniform. The gray-mustached man towers over me with a placid expression. The look of a well-drilled officer. We watch through the triple-reinforced glass built into the airlock as the shuttle gently sets down inside the hangar and the big doors slam shut behind it. Atmosphere fills the hangar and the door opens into a ramp for the passengers to disembark. I watch Shariah lead the group of five aliens. The shipmaster, a bird-looking thing, a werewolf thing, some squid critter, and then an honest to God Elf. Well, maybe an elf but close enough. Human-like, long pointed ears, a slender frame, so it checks out as far as I know.

The door slides open and the captain and I salute the what I assume are nobles as they enter the ship properly. The Shipmaster smiles at me as they enter the stark gray hallways of the Catfish, and as the aliens look around their faces drop. The bird says.

"It appears... very utilitarian here... there is no comfort. Are there no artists among their kind?"

My neural implant translates in real-time, but now I can hear their actual voices. The birds talk with a harsh cadence, similar to a crow calling. I say nothing as after seeing their ships I understand they prioritize aesthetics more than functionality. There is no reason to argue. I then say with a smile,

"Good afternoon my fair ladies and gentlemen. I welcome you to my humble warship, the flag of our small fleet, the USS Catfish. I understand we may lack in aesthetics, but our people focus on the efficiency of our vessels first and foremost, comfort is only a secondary thought."

They all consider this for a second before they seemingly accept my statement and greeting. Shariah then takes over,

"Alright, if you all will follow me I will give you a tour."

The shipmaster interrupts,

"If I may, lady Shariah, I wish to talk man to man with the Shipmaster Commodore here. As we are more alike."

Shariah looks at me and I nod, happy I don't have to deal with the rest of the nobles. I motion the hefty man to follow and he does. I take him to my room and have a chair waiting for him there. I just sit on my bed and crack open one of the bottles Uriel lent me for this exact meeting. I had been ready for the Shipmaster to have a one-on-one with me, as we are both warhearts. I do notice the elf thing comes with us, and I can't help but notice how less nice her clothing is. I don't make mention of it and pretend she isn't there, standing in the corner.

The bearded man takes a sip of the fine liquor and the distinct glowing flames built into his flesh and hair glow brightly for a second. He smiles and I ask the man,

"How are you feeling Shipmaster? I know the process to allow you to walk among us is... different."

He nods and responds in a calm voice,

"Ah, yes it was rather uncomfortable. It was like all of my mana was being drained, just like back in my academy days when I was pushed to my extremes. It still feels quite strange, like I am in the void of the stars but without a protective barrier giving me air. It's also so strange to be in a place with no ambient mana either... it feels strange to me. It's cold and hostile, much like the cold steel of your walls...

no offense!"

I chuckle and take a sip, grimace, and then respond in an overly poetic way I'll admit,

"No offense taken. Our cultures are different and our military vessel designs are different. What is hostile to you, is comfort to me. I can feel the heartbeat of the vessel, the thrum of the small sun we hold captive. While visually this ship may not be an art piece such as yours, it has its beauty in the sheer efficiency and practicality of the vessel. Much like a sword blade where the simplicity grants it strength, much like a sword."

I take a small gamble on the last part considering even the officers of those I slaughtered carried rather simple swords. While the handguards appeared rather ornate, the blades themselves were plain. The Shipmaster nods and responds,

"Now that makes more sense. This is a vessel designed entirely for war. It must be your show of force so as to not seem weak to our kingdom... it's your most powerful vessel."

My face drops and I say in a flat tone,

"This is a large cruiser, as standard warship designs go it is the sixth largest class."

He grimaces and then asks,

"But it must be your newest and most advanced right?"

I shake my head and respond,

"No. This ship is considered out of date. It was retrofitted before this mission, and the retrofit reduced the direct combat capability of this ship so that it may work as a central command center and flagship. This is a diplomatic mission, so we sent what was deemed to be necessary for defensive purposes, so that we may beat a hasty retreat if the terrible situation of open war were to happen between our nations."

I can see his internal fire dim and cool as an unreadable expression crosses his face before he responds lowly,

"Tell me Shipmaster Commodore... not in a diplomatic way, but in a way between two military men. How strong is your fleet in the grand scheme of things?"

I shrug and lean forward and say,

"This fleet would at best be considered a token garrison for a frontier planet, well in firepower, not in composition. The ships here are all offensive in nature plus we have the marines so it's built to act independently and far from support. Overall if a standard attack battlegroup appeared in the system to fight us, even if it were of a notably weaker power from our part of space, I would flee, and even then we wouldn't walk away unscathed."

The Shipmaster finishes his drink and I refill his glass, he then says to me,

"Shipmaster Commodore, I don't know how knowledgeable you are about our state of affairs and power scales... It's clear from your researchers that you have little knowledge of our kind.

I just want you to know the defense of your people... we didn't deny it because we were being arrogant, it was that we literally couldn't. We don't have the military force available here to fight all of those rebels. Your defense I assume was without loss am I correct?"

I nod and this causes him to deflate more and say,

"We took major losses... and we managed to kill one hundred and eighty of the sieging rebels, a toll that is considered a massive blow to any force composed of mages. What you did, without loss is considered a devastating victory, a victory that has a loss ratio similar to what happens when a peasant uprising is quelled. We even confirmed the deaths of multiple members of fallen noble families.

That shouldn't happen."

I ask carefully,

"And what does that mean?"

He does what I assume is his version of a shrug and he answers,

"I don't know... because if you are truly not lying and I believe you aren't this will be a massive shakeup.

I am safe to assume you cannot control magic, and I do not know what means you use to fight and kill as you do, or how your weapons work, but I know they are better. Maybe not all the time but if you have that many planets, and if this fleet here is a token garrison fleet, your kind is beyond powerful. I do not know what will happen but I... I know what the Kingdom will do."

He looks guilty and the words do not pass his lips. I ask,

"What is that?"

He shuffles, drinks, I refill, and then he drinks again before saying,

"It is an offer and the only one we give.

It is to swear fealty to the King... or be conquered and enslaved until the king decides your slight against him has been repaid... which can take hundreds of years."

He locks eyes with me and asks,

"Will you accept that offer?"

I respond coldly,

"No."

He nods and responds,

"I assumed as much... I do not expect you to, and I can respect that, but I will serve my king."

I nod, no hard feelings. He then sees the UN flag on my wall and asks,

"Is that your flag?"

I shake my head and respond,

"No... that is the flag of those who once tried to make us slaves...

They don't exist anymore."

He nods and drinks. He then asks,

"Why don't we find the others? I apologize for bringing you to the side just to ask this question. I just needed to ask this... because it may be important."

I nod and stand up. We then leave my room with the woman following close. My mind is racing as I consider the offer, and find it disgusting. I flush it for later as right now I have to play host...