Abrubtly halted.

[El_Phil]

Thus proving you can't make all of the people happy all of the time. The line spacing will probably stay and I think *** to separate sections works. So onto the comments:

Rooted, it's a bit of both really, nice bit of slang which also replaces the swearing the cheif would be doing.

The ships lost several decks, loads of engines and large amounts of extra damage. There's going to be huge amounts of data.

Yeah I wasn't ecstatic with some of the dialogue, especially Delap''s bit. I had a point to make but couldn't make it flow smoothly. Time really is a bit tight so I can't spend as long as I like writing and re-drafting. Bits are sometimes called close enough.

'manoeuvring' is perfect English. You colonials really need to remember how to spell

This section was written and then the line spacing added, so quite a few grammar bits probably sneaked in there.

Well thanks for the comments, but don't aim to high with the grammar. I'm not taking this anywhere near that seriously and the only other writing I do is technical reports. Easy rules there: Past tense and never mention 'I' or thinking. You always know or expect. Plus no-one is that bothered by grammar as everyone is equally bad at it.

[El_Phil]

Fallen back to page 4 in 20 days. How time flys...

Anyway I've been busy so this fell on the back burner. When I tried to restart I realised I didn't like where the story was, yeah the next chapter would be OK but beyond that I'm trapped in a story I don't really want to write. So options

1. Fight through the story to get somewhere
2. Write this story off and start again.
3. Jump ahead xxx years and carry on the story with the same background, characters etc.

I don't fancy 1. and don't want to throw away all the back story that 2. would imply I'm leaning towards 3.

But is it the writing style, the characters or what that people like about this story? Hence the question, I wouldn't mind any of the above options so what would people read? If I'm going to write something and post it I would prefer that someone read it.

[Ron_Lugge]

Option 2 is a necessity sometimes, but save it fora last resort.

#1 is a pain -- I'm stuck with it on a few stories.
#3 is a double pain, as you have to make certain to keep us straight throught the jump, but quite doable.

[El_Phil]

Can't face #1 and I am doing this for fun so that's out. Hence I combine #2 and #3. Same back story but a few years down the line and focusing on just a small unit. The grand story happens in the background. Give it a try, see if I enjoy writing it. So away with you, to the new story!