Begin Part IV
	Captain Henry watched the pilots exit the shuttle in silence and then
returned to his quarters to plan a ceremony it had occurred to him would
happen but hoped never would. Inside he sat at his desk and just stared at
the wall of his office too stunned to even contemplate writing a speech.
	After leaving the remains, the squad went to 19 Aft and pulled
several table together. The squad solemnly drank round after round of
Herbert's favorite drink, cappuccino shots with a bit of rum. And when each
round was finished they dropped the shot glasses on the floor until the
bartender threw them out because he was running out of glasses.
	Each pilot returned to their individual quarters and found a message
waiting for them. The message said it would be a week at the earliest before
any of them would be put back into active rotation. That week was probably
the worst for squad morale, not having anything to do, some never left their
quarters while others spent all the time they could drinking.
	Eventually everyone ended up doing something different. Hobbes and
O'Muirdagh spent the days shooting, and sparring and generally just fighting
in anyway they could. Kristin spent her time repairing e-frames, Elan spent
his time studying the information taken from the asteroid. Alain took every
waking hour to learn everything he could about current medical techniques,
while poor midshipman Jason Morris got the job of getting Kathy Mclean all
settled aboard the Normandy. Mclean was one of the new pilots being
transferred aboard the ship to replace those lost on 319.
	It eventually got so bad that the entire squad had taken to wearing
black armbands when Captain Henry finally made the announcement that the
funeral would be held the next day. Gamma squad acknowledged this
announcement with a huge drinking binge that left the entire squad bleary
eyed and a little shaky the morning of the funeral.

	The funeral took place in the aft hangar and the ship went to a
skeleton crew while everyone not absolutely necessary for ships operation
attended in full dress uniforms. The ships chaplain, Father Coleman gave a
short eulogy for each man, which was followed by a longer speech from Captain
Henry. Henry finished his speech and then nodded to Hobbes.
	Gamma squad's e-frames lined the sides of the hangar bay with the
ranks of jump troop suits fanning out behind them. Hanging from the ceiling
were banners representing each squad aboard the ship as well as the flags of
the country that each of the dead troopers had come from. Carpets had been
laid down the long ways of the hangar bays with the people attending taking
their places by rank along them.
	Hobbes stood next to the two coffins, and stepped on a small button
sticking out of the floor. The floor opened up simultaneously beneath the
coffins and they quickly slid beneath the floor of the bay.
	On a second cue, the squad took up their standard rifles and fired
three times out the bay into space. The first shot caught most of those
present off guard causing several people to twitch in shock. When the thunder
of the guns faded off the crew stood in silence and watched the coffins
ejected from the ships head out on a direct course for Jupiter itself.

	The squad proceeded directly from the funeral to the bar and the next
day each person showed up for the expected appointment with the ship's
doctor, Karen Rhodes. Each squad member spent about an hour with Dr. Rhodes
and left feeling little different from when they had gone into the office.
Ratislav spent his time in conference with Rhodes, and then went back to his
room. He grabbed his blaster, and then he was off on his way to the shooting
range.
	Ratislav nodded to Sergeant Kingsley as he entered the range, and
grabbed a pair of ear protectors before proceeding to a random aisle. Laying
his extra clips on the small counter in front of him, he put on the ear
protectors and slowly took his stance. Sliding his left foot back and
extending his left arm, he put his right hand under the butt of the blaster
and looked down the aisle at the target. He took a deep breath and released
it slowly, and began pulling the trigger in rapid succession dropping the
sights to bring it back on target after each shot.
	Putting the ear covers around his neck, Ratislav hit the switch for
the target to slide towards the counter while he reloaded his blaster. Just
as the target got back to the counter, Crewman 1st Class, Tomas Nunez came
into the range with his personal blaster. Nunez was a crewman from
engineering, famous as the 'crazy Cuban' because of his pride in his heritage
and some of the stunts he had pulled in engineering. His most famous stunt
was the time he had 'accidentally' blown up the ship's barber shop.

	It was quite a tale one still told month's later even though
everything had been cleaned up and Nunez had been completely exonerated. The
day had been normal enough with the Engineering crew running a few tests of
the fusion engines under the directions of Chief Engineer Amy Hiatt. Nunez
was a little hung over from a night of partying and one of his coworkers had
made a remark that hadn't gone over very well. Later stories would tell of
the shot that Nunez hit Wilson with knocked back a good five feet into a
major engineering station.
	Wilson's head must have bounced like a basketball cracking several
dials and then dropping onto one of the many keypads. No one noticed for
several minutes but one of the dial showed a pipe backed up and then cracked
leaking into the space nearest the bulkheads on the far side of the engine
room. When Nunez noticed the problem, he hit the big red button which would
open the drop down panels for the emergency suction equipment to clear the
room. This was probably the worst thing he could have done in the situation.
	What Nunez hadn't realized was that the pipe that broke was pumping a
high order hydrogen-oxygen mix under extreme pressure. After the pipe snapped
under its pressure the gases quickly rose to the top of the two-story room
and began to spread. The emergency suction system has metal covers over the
ducts in case the engine room needs to be sealed, so when Nunez hit the big
red button, the duct covers dropped. Of course the problem here is that when
the metal covers on the suction system dropped out of the ceiling it caused a
spark of metal on metal. Luckily for the crewman, everyone was on the lower
level of the engine room when the gases exploded.
	It was an explosion that rocked the entire Normandy from end to end.
Crates in the hangar fell off of their shelves, people on the bridge fell out
of their seats, even crewman in the far forward end of the ship felt the jump
of the explosion. But the most famous tale would come from 2nd Lieutenant
Harry Tuttle, and Crewman Sam Lowery, the pilot and co-pilot of one of the
Normandy's two shuttles, both of whom would swear on the beer they were
holding in their hands that they had seen the entire Normandy itself shiver.
	For years to come people would question the story of the two pilots
who saw the two hundred and thirty meter length of the Normandy jump as if
struck by a missile. After the fire was brought under control and finally put
out, what was left over was an amazing mess. The explosion had removed the
entire upper bulkhead of the engine room and the fires had ripped through the
barber shop which luckily enough had been empty at the time.
	Later still, Captain Henry would walk through the wreckage in stunned
silence, here was the remains of a barbers chair, there was a puddle of the
blue stuff, and against the wall opposite the shattered remnants of the
mirror. No one can explain why Nunez wasn't given a court martial for
striking a fellow crewman or blowing up the barber shop. People say he must
have argued exceptionally well, because not only did he keep his job but
there were also many changes made to the emergency suction system to make
ship board life all the safer.

	Nunez was using an standard blaster given to everyone who didn't have
one of their own when they joined the service. He wasn't quite as good a shot
as Ratislav but he would have been useful in a firefight if he could keep his
cool. Nunez and Ratislav kidded around for awhile and did some shooting,
pretty much just wasting time until something happened.
	Ratislav finished off his practice and headed off to get back to his
quarters, while Nunez headed up to communications to pay a visit a friend of
his, Kristy Kieran, crewman(Sensor Technician), who usually worked in
communications or sensors. Nunez ambled up to the bridge and stopped into the
communications shack, leaning against the wall until Kristy noticed him. When
Kristy noticed him, she smiled and when she finished the incoming brief she
forwarded and turned to Nunez. The two of them talked like the old friends
they were for a couple of minutes until a siren went off on one of the
consoles. Kristy spun around and started punching keys on that console until
the alarm went off and the main communications screen winked on showing a
very frightened man.
	"This is the private vessel, Ascendant, we have been struck by a
meteor and are losing oxygen. We need help, please send help as fast as you
can. We've lost maneuvering power and are slowly drifting towards the
asteroids."
	Kristy spoke calmly:
	"Sir, This is the Exo-Fleet Frigate Normandy, we are moving to come
and get you now, we will send a shuttle to tow you here. It should be there
in minutes." Turning off the ship-to-ship screen she turned to Nunez, "You
better get out of here, or I'll get busted for dereliction of duty."
	Nunez smiled at the thought. "If you say so ma'am," he said making
her laugh, as he bowed deeply and left the communications shack to go back to
his quarters.
	Kristy turned back to the console to get things moving on rescuing
the passengers of the Ascendant as soon as possible. First she called down to
the hangar bay got one of the ship's shuttle moving to rescue the endangered
passengers. Next she notified Captain Henry of her moves in following with
fleet procedures for on duty comm. officers, and finally she got back into
contact with the ship to get a list of passengers and to tell them that all
was well.
	For once it seemed the bureaucracy would work correctly in saving
these peoples lives. Kristy kept the pilot of the yacht calm while
simultaneously pulling up fleet files on the passengers. Within minutes the
list came back, Brian Setzer was the pilot and owner of the yacht, he also
owned his own newspaper and had part ownership in a research and development
company. Ramsey and Elisa McEwen, were teachers and part-time researchers,
Mark Gowrie, worked in a security firm, Patrick Cahn worked in research firm
that Setzer owned, and Amanda Fitzhumme was a communications technician in
that same firm. The yacht was brand new out of the space yard, fitted with
all the amenities of the old business man's corporate jet. It was the kind of
thing that drove pilots up a wall, here was a man with the money to buy a
ship that could give a military shuttle a good run and the fool got conked
out by some passing chunk of rock. By the time the shuttle got the yacht into
the hangar bay, Captain Henry was waiting with a security team and a full
group of medical personal prepared for nearly any possible injury.
End Part IV