Not everyone was happy with the resolution of the conflict.

„Damn politicians.“, General Norge said, sitting in the officers’ mess hall of the Aegis Prime. Half a dozen lower officers were also around, some listening to him, some politely pretending otherwise.

„We have seven dead and some twenty wounded.“, he continued, „And they tell everyone to go on, nothing to see here? What are we going to tell the relatives of the dead? Their husbands and wives, parents and children? What did they die for? A pirate gambit gone wrong? Diplomats smoothing everything over? Seriously, what will we tell them?“

Of course none of the other officers offered an opinion, especially not a different one. It was still a military ship. The general ranting was already a highly unusual event. The officers’ mess was not especially large. It had four tables for four and two tables for two. Not quite enough for the 23 officers on the ship, but since at least two were on the bridge at all times and at least four or so would be sleeping because they had had the night shift, it was rarely crowded.

The mess hall was furnished in dark wood and even had a carpet. There were pictures of important historical ships along its walls, and a display screen above the door with the most important status information about the Aegis Prime. The hatch to the galley was along the opposite wall. The battleship had enough crew to afford a proper galley with cooks, and since it was intended for extended deployments, good food was important for crew morale and health.

It was evening. Not really, with the ship hanging in space, but keeping a normal day-and-night cycle going was another factor for health, both mental and physical, that the Erulas space force adhered to religiously. So much of the lighting in the ship had a subtle change in brightness and color temperature over the course of the 26 hours of an Erulas day.

Some of the officers left the mess hall, clearly uncomfortable, though it was not visible if because they were ashamed of seeing the general like that or because they agreed with him and were upset themselves.

And General Norge was entirely sober. His words were clear and his judgement sharp. He meant what he said. For now, it was only words, and he let them linger in the air while he finished his meal, not expanding on the points he had made.

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Minutes later, he stood up, dropping his plate and cutlery on the tray for used dishes that was near the exit. He turned to the right, the command module, and walked past the bridge until he reached the data analyst office. There were two of those on the ship. The one on the bridge for time-sensitive tactical information, and the one he went to, for long-term strategic analysis.

Norge opened the door and stepped inside. The room was the size of a two-car garage, with a holographic space along one wall where the data analysts could immerse themselves into a 3D representation of whatever they were analyzing - space encounters as well as data visualizations or ground combat scenarios. There were three desks in the other part of the room, and a large quantum computer and data storage.

„At ease“, he said to the data analysts who, being soldiers, had jumped to attention as he entered, „What have we got so far?“

The data analysts grouped around one desk and showed the general what they had. It was an extensive analysis of all the data the Aegis Prime had gathered during the encounter with the Qyrl. It compared that against old data from the Qyrl war.

„The dust shields are much like the ones two decades ago. Their technological development of these seems to have plateaued. We can’t say if that means there is a physical limit they are approaching.“, one of the analysts explained.

„On the other hand“, she continued, “the plasma beams we saw have made considerable progress. As you can see here, the dispersion is less than ten milli-degrees. As a result, 86% of the shots fired were hits or would have been hits without our defensive systems. That is almost twice the accuracy we saw during the war.“

The general frowned. „Stealth technology?“, he asked.

The second analyst shook his head: „None active during the encounter. The false identification of the hyperspace sensors was due to fairly primitive fake hulls.“

„I see. Projection for future encounters?“, Norge continued his questions.

All three of the analysts shook their heads. „Extrapolating from the ships we saw to the entire space force of the Qyrl is impossible. We have no reliable data on the size nor composition of their fleet.“

„However“, the female analyst added, „just from the weapons technology, another war would go not much different from the last one. We are still no match for the Qyrl in a military sense.“

Norge solemnly looked over the data. It told no story different from what the analysts had told him. After a while, he stepped back: „Continue. Try to find something. There must be an exploitable weakness or a flaw somewhere. We can’t trust the peace deal. If the aliens dare to attack us deep into our territory, something is up. Look harder. All of the Junkstorm could depend on it.“

And with those words, he left the data analysis room and turned towards his quarters.