Heroes Pt. 1 By Elan Morin It was just another usual day on Venus. Well, as normal as it could be, in any case, considering the planet had just been liberated from it's occupation by the Neosapien armies of Phaeton. Everyone was busy, as there was a lot of work to be done and not enough people to do it. Exofleet patrols rounding up stray Neosapiens, rebuilding Vesta, the capital, and providing enough food for all, since the general of Phaeton's who was in charge of Venus was a cruel man, and tried starving the good people of Venus into submission. Live or die, Draconis didn't care. All he cared about was himself. Well, he got his reward for his ambition. Everything was slowly returning to normal. The members of the Exofleet's Gamma Squad also had their share of the grunt work. The squad leader, Lieutenant Commander B. Hobbes, was ordered to report to the Resolute for a meeting with Admiral Winfield. Lt. Ratislav O'Muirdagh was off doing patrols, rounding up stray Neosapiens. Lt. Elan Morin Tedronai, the squad's communications/intelligence officer, was wandering around Vesta, checking up on the status of various things, making sure everything was on schedule and other stuff like that. Second Lt. Kristin O'Connor was doing what she did best, which was repairing gamma squad's damaged e-frames. Midshipman Jason Morris was assisting in the local hospitals, doing the stuff no one else wanted to do. Last but not least, the squad's youngest member, a cadet who was taking her senior year field training when the Neosapiens took over, Trooper Nicole Montgomery was helping recently freed terrans who were forced to work for the Neosapiens, getting them some warm clothing and food and such. Elan walked into the hangar where Kristin was working. Elan is of average height and build, about a half a foot taller than the one he came to see. Kristin was very busy working on Elan's e-frame and didn't notice him walk in. She often times gets into her work to the point to where she doesn't notice anything else. Her uniform, which was usually a dark navy, burgundy and charcoal colored uniform, was splotched with oil and grease everywhere, from working on the e-frames. Even her face wasn't spared in this sense. She had black marks on her nose, cheeks and forehead. She looked quite humorous. Elan watched her work for about half a minute and then walked up to her. "Kristin, how are the repairs coming?" Kristin, who was startled by the unexpected voice, dropped the tool she was using. It hit the ground with surprisingly loud clunk. "What are you trying to do to me, Elan, put me into a hospital?" She said, wiping her hands on her uniform as she stood up. Elan noticed the grin she tried to keep from making an appearance on her face, and he knew then that she was just being sarcastic. He had a difficult time, sometimes, deciding if someone was being sarcastic. "Uh...uh...yes?" Elan replied with a grin of his own. "Anyway, so how are the repairs coming?" "I'm almost done with yours, and it was the last. About ten more minutes, I'd say," Kristin replied, glancing back at the e-frame. "Great, because I just got a message from Cdr. Hobbes. He said Admiral Winfield has a mission for us. He wouldn't tell me anymore, just to round up the rest of the squad and wait for him," Elan said. "Would you like to come with me, looking for the rest of the squad, that is." Kristin smiled. "Sure, why not?" "Ok. I have to wait for you to finish anyway, and I thought it would give you something to do, instead of just waiting here," Elan said. "Ok. Sounds good, now, if you'll let me get back to work, we can leave in the next fifteen minutes, and not next week," she said, the sarcasm in her voice obvious. "Is there anything I can do to help?" Elan asked. *************** An hour later......... "I knew I shouldn't have let you help. Why didn't you tell me that you aren't very "mechanically inclined"?" She asked, brushing off her hands. Elan grinned, only it wasn't a happy type of grin, a very nervous grin would be more like it. "Uh.... It slipped my mind?" Kristin just looked at him before muttering, "Slipped his mind...." then louder, "Well, in any case, the repairs are done, both battle damage, and an as yet unknown source of damage." Elan just continued to grin nervously and a little apologetically. "Great, let's get going then," Elan said, a little hastily, as he scrambled into this e-frame much the same way. Kristin got into hers, and they launched from the hangar. "So who do we look for first?" Kristin asked when they were in the air. "Well, Lt. O'Muirdagh is in his e-frame, so we can just use the comm. line, and Morris should be at the hospital helping out, and Montgomery should be out helping people who suffered under Draconis," Elan said. "The hospital is right over there," and Elan pointed to it, and they changed direction towards the hospital. ********************* *Ugh,* thought Jason Morris as he walked down the hall on his way up front to meet some of his squadmates, *and to think I volunteered for this.* He reached the end of the hall where Elan Morin and Kristin were waiting. "Hi, guys! What's up?" Jason asked when he was within earshot, waving to them, too. Elan and Kristin waved back, "I got a communication from Cdr. Hobbes. He said-," Elan cut himself off, sniffing the air. "What's that smell?" Elan asked. Jason's face merely twisted in frustration. Elan saw and took note of it. "Ah, I see," he said with a smirk. Kristin had a grin on her face. "Anyway, I got a message from Cdr. Hobbes. It seems that Admiral Winfield has a mission for us. He wouldn't tell me more, just to get us all together." "Sounds great! Just let me get a shower first," Jason said, unable to hide the enthusiasm in his voice. Enthusiasm for what, exactly, Elan couldn't decide. Kristin spoke up at that point, "Uh, sorry Jason, but there isn't any time. We should have been here an hour ago, but you can thank the brain over here for the delay," Kristin said, pointing to Elan with a smirk. "Hey, it was an accident!" Elan retorted, "I said I was sorry. Haven't you been able to forgive me yet?" "I'm still thinking about it," Kristin replied. "Anyhow, let's go get the others." The three walked out of the hospital and across the front lawn on the path. "They sure have done a good job of getting this place green again," Elan remarked, indicating the flowers and recently planted grass around the hospital. There were Exofleet officers and enlisted doing some landscaping. Elan thought he saw Crow Mengele, a jumptrooper from his ship, the Exo Frigate, Normandy. There were even a few of the less seriously injured patients helping out. Yes, life was definitely returning to normal. "Yeah, it is looking nice again. Pretty soon, you wont even know this planet was liberated from an monster such as Draconis," Jason said, taking in the scenery. "It looks better every time I pass by." "Yes, it certainly does look nicer than it did a week ago," Kristin said. "Anyway, Jason, just grab on to the leg of Kristin's e-frame and we'll take you to the hangar," Elan told him. Jason just nodded and grabbed onto the leg of the e-frame. "Hang on tight, Jason, the liftoff can be, sudden, if you know what I mean." Kristin told him. Jason gave her the thumbs up and held on tightly. *************** "Ahhhh...looks good as new. Feels like it too. You do very good work, Lt. O'Connor," Jason said, climbing into it and attaching the cyberjack. "Thank you. So who are we looking for next, Elan?" Kristin asked. "We'll look for Ensign Montgomery. She should be somewhere near the shelters that were set up for the people that were forced to work for the Neos. They are near the hospital," Elan said. "Then why didn't we go by there and get her instead of coming back here first?" Kristin inquired of him. "Well, we could have except for one very important reason," Elan told her. "And what reason would that be, Elan?" Kristin asked. "Uh, I didn't think of it, I just thought about getting Jason here to his e-frame. Oh well, we lost an hour already, a few more minutes won't make much difference. Let's get going!" Elan said and they flew out of the hangar. **************** *These poor people. Many of them lost their families and friends, and were treated as slaves by Draconis. They're free now, their lives are going to get better now.* Ensign Nicole Montgomery thought to herself as she helped some of the less fortunate survivors with their troubles. Many of these people still showed signs of malnorishment, even after all this time after the retake of Venus. Many of them didn't have anywhere to go. "Here you go, sir," Nicole said, handing a man a blanket. Her back was to the entrance to the room, so she didn't notice her fellow squad members come into the room. "What's that smell...?" she said aloud to herself. She turned around when she heard people start to laugh, and that was when she saw Elan, Kristin, and Jason. Elan and Kristin were laughing. Jason looked frustrated for some reason, then she decided why. The smell was originating from his direction. "Hi, is there something I can do for you guys?" Nicole asked. "No, Nicole, we're here to tell you that Cdr. Hobbes has sent a message saying that Admiral Winfield has a mission for us, and that we are supposed to meet at the hangar and wait for him." Elan informed her. "Ok. But I only see three of you. Where is Lt. O'Muirdagh?" She asked. "We haven't gotten to him yet," Jason said. "Ok, I just have to finish some stuff up here, no more than five minutes and I'll be with you," Nicole said. "Alright, then we'll be waiting for you outside," Kristin said. "Ok, see you in a few minutes," Nicole said, waving good bye as they left the room. ************** "GET BACK HERE!!! RUNNING FROM ME WON'T WORK, SAPES!! I'LL FOLLOW YOU EVERYWHERE!!!!!!" Lt. Ratislav O'Muirdagh yelled as he chased some stray Neos through the Actaeon Forest, a few miles outside Vesta. "We will never surrender!!" yelled back a Neosapien soldier, firing a blaster back at O'Muirdagh to strengthen his point. However because he was running, his shot flew wide and missed its target. "You'll have to do better than that!" Lt. O'Muirdagh said, stopping for a moment and firing his own blaster. "Aargghhh!!!" he heard the Neosapien moan in pain after being hit. The Neosapien stumbled and fell. O'Muirdagh caught up to him. "Well, sape, you gave me quite a chase," O'Muirdagh said, putting restraints on the Neosapien's wrists. "Now stand up and come with me," he ordered. The Neosapien stood up. "Now start walking, and if you try to run, I'll just blast you again. This time on a higher setting." The Neosapien didn't say anything, or even acknowledge being spoken to, he just kept walking in the direction he was told. After an hour of walking, they reached the prison camp where other captured Neosapiens were being held. "Here's another one," O'Muirdagh told the man in charge of the camp, a Commander Harris. "Very good, Lt. This makes almost twenty you've brought us on your own. You are to be commended. There are some people from your squad waiting to speak with you. They are in the room over there," Commander Harris said, indicating a door. Lt. O'Muirdagh walked into the room and immediately stopped. "What stinks?" He said, putting a hand up to his nose. Elan and Kristin grinned, and Nicole merely smiled. "So what is it? What are you all here for?" he asked. "We're to return to Vesta and await Cdr. Hobbes. He said Admiral Winfield has a mission for us. He would tell me more, just to get us all rounded up," Elan informed him. "A mission, huh?" He said, "Well, let's get going back to Vesta then." And walked out of the room. The rest followed. ******************* "Where are they at? They should have been here by now!" Cdr. Hobbes said to himself. After a couple more minutes of wandering around the room, waiting, the rest of his squad walked in. "Sorry, we're late, sir, we were unexpectedly delayed," Kristin said glancing at Elan. Elan once again had that nervous grin on his face. "Well, no harm done, take a seat, everyone," Cdr. Hobbes said, motioning then to a small round table in the room with six chairs surrounding it. Sitting himself, he frowned, and sniffed the air, it was quite obvious to the others that he was and everyone except O'Muirdagh and Morris smirked. Morris buried his face in his hands, and O'Muirdagh didn't do anything but sit in his chair. After everyone was seated, Cdr. Hobbes stood, and began to talk. "Ok, everyone, as Elan has told you, Admiral Winfield has given us a mission. It is an intelligence mission, something right up your alley, Elan, and it's on earth." "It will be nice to be home again," Elan said. Kristin nodded agreement and said, "Sure will." There was a slight murmur of yes's from the others. "Anyhow, our mission is to take a look at a research facility on Long Island, find out what they are doing there, and report back to Winfield, when we finish the mission." "Sounds simple enough," Elan said. "Well, it isn't, because that is only the first part of our mission. I can't tell you the rest yet, I was told to wait until we were finished with this first part of the mission." Everyone just looked at each other with curiosity on their faces. Kristin said after a second, "Oooohhhh, secret orders. What will they think of next?" Everyone burst out laughing. "Well, the mission isn't going to get done with us just sitting here, and talking about it, won't make it known." O'Muirdagh said, standing up. "Yes, let's get prepared and meet back here in six hours. That should be time enough to get back to the Normandy and get what we need," Cdr. Hobbes said, standing up himself and heading for the door. O'Muirdagh followed him. Everyone else then stood up and walked out the door. ******************* End of part one.