Abrubtly halted.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

...I doubt anybody wants to hear 'that's interesting' in a RL nuclear power plant either...

[Strategia_In_Ultima]

What's and "RL nuclear power plant"?

Nice story.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Real-Life nuclear power plant.

[Strategia_In_Ultima]

Ah. That's interesting.

(Note: purely coincidentally, these were also the last words of the feller in charge of the nuclear power plant at Chernobyl .)

[El_Phil]

Another random tale of life in the Ocelot Republic

We apologise for the delay in your regular story. Until then we return you to intermission

O'Neill sat back and pulled on his hip flask. At times like this life was good and it would be a crime not to drink. His happy mood was not shared by his companions. The exo-biologist Strasbar wished he was out on Haven while the surveyor Johnston wished she was somewhere that wasn't here.
'Here' was a three person exploration team on Hope, doing the on the ground investigations you couldn't do from orbit or from a plane.
"Nothing on the motion sensor or the IR. Again." Strasbar was doing her level best to ruin O'Neill's good mood.
"Well the survey scans picked up some life signs in this region, so you'd better keep on checking." O'Neill showed no sign of letting Strasbar get to him.
'Why did he get to be boss?' Strasbar asked himself rhetorically. Truth be told he already knew, but didn't like the answer. O'Neill had been one of the last bushmen from Ocelot before joining CREST command and the bosses thought that all that experience should be transferable. If it wasn't bad enough being stuck miles from all the big developments out on Haven he also had to cope with an unbearable boss.
Johnston also wanted to be somewhere else; she couldn't stand life in the colonies, she missed the big cities. She'd joined up to see different worlds and experience a new way of life, sadly she'd found she didn't like this new way of life. Stuck into a long term contract she truly believed life couldn't get any worse than being in a Colonial Recon, Exploration and Search Team.
O'Neill was aware that the rest of his team weren't exactly happy campers, but there wasn't a lot he could do about it. They had a job to do and he intended to do it. Besides he couldn't really understand the problem, Hope was a beautiful planet and if you couldn't appreciative the majesty of the plains on a day like this you had no soul. It sure beat working for a living.
"We're getting a large blip on the motion sensors!" Strasbar yelled out
"Told you so. Where from?" O'Neill replied
"Close, real close. In fact it's getting nearer." The excitement was fading from Strasbar's voice and concern was creeping in. Their job was to assess the area before building work began and chase up some rouge life form readings the survey ship hadn't been able to track down. Strasbar was remembering that there was a missing link in the local food chain, right at the top in fact, and he may just have found it.
"Johnston get back here. Now!"
"I can't see it on the IR! What kind of creature is it!" Strasbar had accelerated through concern, bypassed worry and then raced straight into panic. O'Neill just sighed.
"It's late afternoon and so the convection currents are playing hell with the infra red. If that was a decent military grade model it would filter it, it's not so we get awful resolution. Calm down."
As Johnston arrived back and climbed into the Panther O'Neill hit the accelerator and headed towards the signal on the motion scanner. As he filled in Johnston on the details he checked his rifle was within reaching distance. The survey ship shouldn't have missed anything big and the big six wheeled Panther was a tough vehicle, but you never knew...
As the Panther crested the last slope before the unidentified blip O'Neill slowed the vehicle to a stop. He checked the map, it didn't look good: The creature was somewhere in a small opening in the copse. Of course it could be a co-incidence that the unknown xeno just happened to have run off into the perfect place for an ambush. And women might want an honest answer when they ask if their bums look big.
Still as neither the on-board cameras nor the IR were getting a solid lock on it they'd have to go outside. With that thought O'Neill reached for his shotgun and made to get out.
"What do you think your doing?" Johnston asked "It's crazy to go out, there could be anything out there!"
O'Neill turned to her "Look someone is going to have to get a decent scan of this thing. Surely you want a close look at this thing Gregor?" Gregor Starsbar really didn't want a look and said as much. "Just me then." O'Neill said with a grin.
'I don't believe it! He's actually enjoying this. Is he crazy?' Strasbar could barely believe his ears.
As O'Neill headed towards the centre of the clearing he realised that he was probably breaking dozens of CREST command regulations. He also realised he didn't care; he hadn't felt this alive for years. With all the environmental and conservationists all over the Yettari desert they destroyed one of the very elements they were trying to save. The frontier feel where every day was an adventure waiting to happen. As he walked along, stalking the unknown creature, he knew his forefathers must have felt just like this when they had walked the bush.
"It's getting closer; it's almost on top of him." Johnston was watching the on-board map which was overlaying O'Neills transponder signal and the motion sensors tracking.
"We've got to warn him!"
Just as she reached for the door the creature leapt out of the bushes and charged O'Neill hoping to catch this strange new prey unawares. However you've got to get up pretty early to surprise a Yettari bushman and sadly for the creature it was almost dusk. The Alvis 'Alpaca' desert shotgun was the peak of decades of engineering and refinement. The rapid load system had been copied by the military almost before the first gun went on sale and the seals used to keep sand out of the workings had originally been developed for medical bio-waste containment. Truly a technological marvel, it was no more or less than a desert proof, man portable depleted uranium cannon. In fact if the creature would probably have been honoured to be killed with such a weapon, had it not been a brainless 8ft long, ten limbed killing machine.

In the aftermath the creature was named the O'Neill Chimera and the entire region was sealed off by the government while it investigated. Serious questions were asked of the survey ship as to how they managed to miss such a dangerous creature. The discovery of the Chimera was hailed as the biggest exo-biological find ever. No creature had been found with more than six fully articulated limbs and Hope CREST assignments became the hottest exo-biologist posting in the Republic.

Gregor Strasbar did get his much desired transfer to Haven where he ended up in a lab cataloguing weed samples. So far all his requests for a transfer have been refused.
Sue Johnston was sent to Gobi to do surveying work for a mine expansion project. She is currently one of the 3,764 women on the 38 million population planet and has no plans to leave.
Peter O'Neill was promoted to head up the Chimera investigation team. He also received a lucrative contract to front the latest Alvis Weapons promotional campaign. He plans to retire on Hope and head back into the bush as soon as the government re-opens the region.

[El_Phil]

Right! Back from the dead by popular lack of demand. After some thinking about the writing style and the comments of various people I'm going for something different. Comments, etc would be nice as always

2402.3
So I'm sitting back in my brand spanking new office waiting for Ted to make an appearance, our new job did start a couple of hours ago so he's badly late. Not that I was here on time either, but I've got a hangover that would have superheroes whimpering. Frankly I deserve a medal just for getting in at all. A loud crash announces Ted's arrival and he's looking worse than I feel. If such a thing is possible of course.
"Nice to see you made it in today"
Ted winces and asks "How annoyed was the new boss that I was late?"
"No idea, he hasn't made it in either." I tell him
"Why's that?"
"Bottle fatigue I'd guess."
Ted's face contorts as he tries to dredge up some memory from the previous night. "But he only had a couple then he disappeared."
"True, but he was drinking Medford vodka."
"Medford Vodka? They don't make vodka on Medford, do they?" Ted asked in confusion
"Not technically I suppose." I reply, waiting for the inevitable
"It wasn't actually vodka was it?"
"No. But it was definitely alcoholic."
"So what is it actually?" Even throw the hangover Ted is starting to get annoyed at the slow progress. I relent, more for my sake than his. All this talking is bad for my head.
"Industrial antifreeze mixed with white spirit."
"Isn't that...." Ted starts
"Immensely dangerous? Allegedly. We'll find out in a few hours." I finish for him
"What's happening in a few hours?"
"Well if the boss hasn't made it in or called someone then, yes it probably is dangerous in his case. He would be the exception to the rule though."
"Exception to the... You've done this before then?"
Sigh. Despite my best efforts he's still got a lot to learn.
"Of course its important that any working relationship has a solid base. A few drinks down the pub speeds this up immensely."
"By getting to know the boss and establishing a rapport?"
"No. By finding out all the nasty secrets the boss would never reveal unless utterly hammered."
"How does that help the working relationship?"
"Well we'll keep on 'working' here no matter what we do, provided we keep quiet about a certain 'relationship' the boss is having."

My education of Ted is interrupted by the boss' boss walking into our office.
"Jameson and Riley right?"
"Yes sir." Best to be polite, I haven't got any dirt on him. Yet.
"I've just been called by your section head and he can't make it in today so I'll be briefing you. Your project is simple; we want the Spey engine technology you worked on at Hope applied to missiles."
That explains a lot. I had been wondering what a pair of propulsion engineers were doing in a weapons research base. Still as we'd been 'requested' to leave Hope we jumped at the chance.
"There were certain problems with that technology, there was a large fuel blowout problem and that unexplained thermal runaway" I interrupt
"I've read the reports of the two major failures. The fuel overflow problem has been corrected and the second failure cannot be repeated, so it was probably a fluke. Of course for manned vessels that's an unacceptable assumption, but for missiles we’ll take the risk."
Ted is fighting manfully to keep both a straight face and look innocent. He's not doing it very well, sadly.
"We'll get right on it sir." I hurry to end this conversation before something goes wrong, like the boss noticing Ted's started to grin. Thankfully he turns and walks out just before Ted bursts out laughing. OK using the engine exhaust as a grill for lunch was funny, but when the sauce leaked out shorting the control circuits and detonating the engine… Well that was even funnier actually. Still it was months ago and he should be over it by now. Kids these days hey?

With the boss dealt with it's time to start the day’s important work, so I open the paper and catch up on the news. New refining Colony out on Proxima, Navy launches a new ship 'Sirus'. Who picks those names really? Pretty routine. Oh what's that - 'Falcon' is in for a refit. That brings back the memories. It really should have been routine, from the engine side anyway, but the engines strangely had a few difficulties during shakedown. Tragic really, I was forced to spend hours with their compromisingly attractive chief engineer 'running down the fault'...
"Hey look at this!" Ted shouts
Fighting back the urge to strangle him with my bare hands for aggravating my head I turn to Ted
"Look. It's a company alert, they've cancelled all leave for the technical services division." He tells me, thankfully a lot quieter. Still that is very odd.
"Something's up. Something big, probably on a military contract." Years of experience come to my aid to provide that very obvious answer.
"But what?"
"No idea, last I heard it was all going well. Dino ships being blown up left, right and centre if you believe the news. We'll find out eventually something that big will make the news."
"If it doesn't?" Ted asks plaintively
"Then it will definitely make the company gossip mill. Speaking of making things, go and make some coffee."
It's important to get priorities straight in life.

[El_Phil]

You lucky people! So a bit more expermentation with style and enough commas (hopefully ) Given the lack of response (and readers) from last time I'm not expectin much but here goes. Comments would be nice, even if they just say 'For the love of God stop posting this rubbish'

2402.4
"Wake the captain and the commodore. Now!" The tactical officer shattered the silence of the dog watch as he yelled out.
"What is it Brooks?"
"The Saintes is picking up a Bolivar leaving their shipyard."
"Understood, sound battle stations."

Commodore Delap and Captain Jennings were both on the bridge of Leander long before the Jraenar ship broke free of the planet
"Status report." Delap commanded. It may not be his ship, but he was still the boss
"All ships report full readiness sir."
'All ships, all three ships you mean.' Delap though to himself. The fleet may have been expanding at breakneck speed but the dinos still had more colonies than the Republic had ships.
"The enemy vessel appears to be a modified Bolivar class, same tonnage and weaponry but she's out pacing the standard acceleration curve." The PWO, Unsworth, continued
"Blockade runner?" Jennings asked, echoing the commodores thoughts
"Probably." Delap answered. "Get me engineering."
"Molby here. What's the problem." the chief engineer promptly replied to the internal comms.
"No problem here Jan" Delap started
"That'll be a first." Molby interrupted. He was one of the few, along with a few of Pegasus's senior officers, who could get away with interrupting Delap.
"Calm down Jan, I just want you to take a look at the scans from that Bolivar."

The news from Chief Molby wasn't unexpected. The Jraenar ship had stripped everything unneeded and was carrying minimal stores. The energy profile was fluctuating wildly and the ships acceleration was a long way from stable, in short they were red-lining their engines. Despite that the Jraenar ship still had the advantage; Task Force One had drawn up in a loose blockade to stay out of range of the planet based missiles. The temptation was to order the entire force to chase the blockade runner, something Delap was sorely tempted to do, but that would leave the Jraenar homeworld un-blockaded.
"We could pull Task Force Two back to cover the planet while we're gone." Jennings suggested
"That would leave the warp point undefended" Captain Tanner from Saintes countered.
"That's an insignificant risk compared..." Jennings tried to reply before being interrupted
"Shhh. I need to think." Delap stopped all conversation. Now it made sense. The Jraenar ship was on a suicide mission, all the modifications could do were extend it's life prior to being destroyed. So the ship had to live long enough to draw TF 1 from orbit, so TF 2 would be pulled back to cover them and so the warp point blockade broken. When you put it that way it made sense.
"Task Force Two is to stay were it is and step up to high alert. Grafton is staying here while Leander and Saintes chase that Bolivar." Delap announced to the hushed meeting. There was no argument, everyone moved to carry out the command decision.

There was however argument from Captain Vickers, as senior captain she had command of Task Force Two and wasn't happy with the Commodores orders.
"It's crazy leaving just one ship to enforce the blockade can't you see that Mike?"
"Compared to leaving this system opened to reinforcements through the warp point? Look our fleet is too small to do everything, we've got to take some chances. This is an acceptable risk. Sirus and Gold Rover will be here within three weeks, we can't risk that ship escaping and intercepting them, but equally we can't leave the warp point unguarded. This is the only option."
"You're the Commodore. I just hope your right." Vickers cut the comms link.
'You're not the only one.' Delap though to himself.

As 2/3rds of Task Force One continued it's pursuit of the Jraenar ship another Bolivar emerged from the warp point, expecting to find empty space. Instead it ran straight into several volleys of Hellstorm and Brimstone missiles. The fight was short and sweet, provided you were on an Ocelot Republic ship. The fight with the original blockade runner was a bit more involved.
"She's turning around" Leander's PWO announced to the bridge
"Guess they heard about the battle at the warp point then." Jennings commented
"Their mission failed and they can't get home. They're looking for a blaze of glory." Delap agreed
"Battle stations! How long to missile range?" Jennings took command
"Assuming constant acceleration from the Bolivar, two minutes." Unsworth called out.
"So it's the waiting game." Delap had been in this position before, but he still wasn't comfortable. At least when the missile were flying there was no time to think about what might happen.

The three ships raced at each other at full power then launched missiles.
"Missiles away, sir!" PWO reported
"Turn and full power." Jennings ordered
"Saintes isn't turning."
Delap and Jennings simultaneously shouted "What!"
"I've got Captain Tanner on the comms" Leander's enterprising communication officer reported
"What the hell are you doing Tanner?" Delap asked
"That ship can out manoeuvre us and the captain can't be stupid enough to fall for the same tactics as the last Jraenar ship."
Delap and Jennings looked at each other, they couldn't fault the logic.
"Helm turn us around. PWO, lock and load all tubes." Leander was heading back for a knife fight.
Half of the Jraenar missiles had rejected Leander as being outside their no-escape envelope so homed in on Saintes. Those missiles were more than enough to take out half the engineering deck and the entire missile magazine. Luckily the bulkheads around the magazine held, but Saintes was effectively unarmed and fled the battle as fast as possible. Leander avoided the remaining missiles, which out of fuel were ballistic only, and launched her second Hellstorm volley just as the first missiles hit the Jraenar vessel. The enemy ship did it's best, it avoided three of the five missiles, but couldn't evade the last Hellstorm and Leander's first Brimstone. The two missiles obliterated the entire rear end of the ship, iLeander's second volley took care of the front end.
"Saintes status report. Tanner can you hear me?" Jennings was on the comms almost instantly
"It's not good sir. My engineer can't even tell me how bad the damage is." Tanner replied in a croaky voice
"It's that bad!" Delap leapt into the conversation
"No idea sir, it could be. Apparently the damage report machine has exploded."

[Combat Wombat]

El_Phil said:
You lucky people! So a bit more expermentation with style and enough commas (hopefully ) Given the lack of response (and readers) from last time I'm not expectin much but here goes. Comments would be nice, even if they just say 'For the love of God stop posting this rubbish'

I love this stuff Phil keep it coming after I read through the whole thing when I posted it on my site I got hooked.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

It's good. That last bit was funny. Just not enough feeling of tension/desperation.

[El_Phil]

I'll be coming back to Sainte in the next bit. I've decided to go for leaving things hanging and not neatly wrapping up at the end of a chapter.