Abrubtly halted.

[El_Phil]

So after threatening it many time (Mostly to myself) I've ran out of excuses so here's my first stab at a game story. Any comments would be good, preferably nice ones
Here goes nothing

"The King is dead! Long live the King!" - Anon
2399.7
Whatever else was said about the Ocelonian constitution and a great deal was but mainly behind closed doors, it was at least clear. If the Presidente died during his term of office then the vice Presidente took over until new elections were held. Of course the one flaw was that the law was written before President Marks refused to hold elections and declared himself El Presidente for life, with 100% accuracy as it turned out.

2399.8
The word on the street, well the very quiet word among trusted friends, was that it was between vice Presidente Rogers and Admiral Bosnitch for next leader of the Ocelonian Republic. Rogers had the parliament on his side thanks to years of being Marks’ liason man, he also had the law on his side. However Bosnitch was a hero from the Breves rebellion and more importantly had the armed forces and all the guns on his side. Only a handful thought that Marks’ son Phil had a chance, he had no obvious power base and no legal leg to stand on. All he had was his father’s request he take over and a handful of loyal friends, not enough to take on the armed forces and parliament surely?

2400.0
The official meeting room of Presidente was only recently re-decorated, to fit in with the new incumbent’s tastes, and those tastes were whatever was needed for holding long, involved and technical discussions about important matters of state, which this next meeting promised to be.
“Gentleman the reports from the ship yards and research institutes are clear. The Ocelot Republic is ready to launch it’s first long ranged, fully crewed space craft. The Navy has prepared to alternate designs, design Alpha fitted with long ranged tanks or design Beta fitted with a rotary nuclear missile launcher. So it is this council’s job to decide which design we go with.”
“I believe it is a clear decision Mr Presidente”, Admiral Watson said “We must go with the armed design, to send our men out unable to defend themselves is unacceptable.”
“Defend themselves against who? None of our radio telescopes have picked up any signals or found any evidence of alien life. No it’s just a waste of valuable space.” The position of Dr Felix and indeed most of the research ministry was well known.
“I agree with Dr Felix, but for different reasons. If there are aliens out there then sending out armed ships would send entirely the wrong message, far better to go out unarmed and in peace.” The foreign ministry could be depended upon to take any line that would limit the military’s power, so Taunolin was almost as predictable as Dr Felix.
“Unless whoever we do meet isn’t friendly! What then?” Admiral Watson thundered.
The arguments raged back and forth with no-one changing anyone else’s mind, although the only opinion that mattered was that of the Presidente, who was keeping quiet and watching the arguments. Finally he spoke.
“Your arguments are all convincing gentlemen, sadly they are also all contradictory. However I have decided that design Beta will enter production. Frankly I believe that at this stage exploration of local space is our priority and as such the extra supply tanks are more important. But I want the plans for the missile equipped version kept updated and ready for crash production if we do encounter anyone. Meeting dismissed.”
As the council members filed out vice Presidente Sheldon stopped by the head of the table for a word with her boss, “I really thought you’d go with design Alpha, you really surprised me there.”
El Presidente Marks leaned back in his chair and grinned. “In politics the day you stop surprising people is probably the day before someone surprise you out of a job.”


"Every adventure requires a first step. Trite but true." - The Cheshire Cat
2400.1
It was the grand launch of the ORS Pegasus, the first true spaceship launched from the Ocelot yards but certainly not the last. As the ship eased itself from its docking clamps and out of the bay into orbit the invited guest held there breath at this incredible first step, all except a small group in the yard managers office. This small group weren’t breathless as they witnessed the Pegasus, make their races first step into the stars, mainly because they’d watched the real first launch the previous week. The most basic rule of grand official launches: Make sure you’ve already tested it before the VIPs get anywhere near it. But for Presidente Marks, Admiral Watson and all the others who’d been in on the secret it was still both proud and reassuring to see the Pegasus making official, if not actual, history.

On board even Captain Micheal Delap had to time to enjoy the moment, the crew had been in almost continuous training for the last month and were the pick of the recruits. Last weeks launch and shakedown had been a great nerve calmer as the Pegasus had passed with flying colours, apart from a series of minor and easily fixed problems. But now shakedown was over and the time had come to head for the nearest warp point. Even as he thought his stomach suddenly turned a loop, it was all well and good the scientists saying it was safe, that the ship and crew would survive perfectly well, the fact remained he was expected to throw his ship into a large spacial anomaly. Still he could hardly claim it was a surprise, he’d always known he’d have to do it if he joined the navy, but… Well to be honest he’d always thought a different officer would get the first command and so he wouldn’t be the first. He grinned to himself, thinking he was probably the only person to graduate top of a class wishing they hadn’t worked as hard. OK they’d cleared the yard, time to go.
“Helm set a course for the warp point, Engineering full cruise when you’re ready.”
“Course laid in Captain, and the Chief reports full power on your command.”
Ahh Lieutenant Commander Vickers, he’d been lucky to get her as first officer. She had looked certain to get a command, instead here she was on the Pegasus.
”Excellent Commander, let’s go make some real history.”

As the Pegasus cruised across the ship streamed back data, this when combined with the information from the shakedown was enough for the Ministry of Research and the Rolls-Royce engineers to produce the MkII Ion Engine, which was incorporated into the design of the Pegasus Batch 2. The updated design was passed to the shipyards currently laying down the next ship in the class.

Finally the Pegasus was on the brink of the warp point. Captain Delap had ordered all bar a skeleton crew to take a break in the preceding hours, he wanted everyone bright eyed and bushy tailed for this.
“All stations confirm readiness before we go in.”
“Reports in all systems 100%, we’re in as good a state as possible.” Said Lieutenant Commander Vickers.
“Very well, Helm take us in.” He breathed in and blinked before entering….

“Captain we have entered the Cignus system, no damage reports but sensor systems still distorted and all ship velocity has been lost.” Vickers reported
‘That was it?’ thought Delap to himself, ‘Unbelievably easy.’ Out loud “Helm, take us in full power. Vickers get those sensors up pronto, I want to know what’s out there. Comms see if that bock of tricks from the R&D boys works and get onto Naval Command.”

For Presidente Marks and the council the news from Cignus was good and not so good. The good news was obvious; the Pegasus had made it and warp point travel was possible and had no obvious side effects on people or ships. While if you’d asked the council they would all have professed complete confidence that the Pegasus would be fine, there wasn’t a single member who hadn’t had at least one sleepless night worrying about them. The less good news was that the Cignus system like their home system contained no planets with breathable atmospheres. It did contain several colonisable planets, but they would have to be domed. So the Pegasus had been ordered to push on to the next warp point while the shipyards worked on the next in class, the Pioneer.