Fortress City

Sirius walked through the labyrinthian layout of the roughly 300 meter starship, his dark blue Marine uniform blending well with the equally dark blue of the alloyed hull of the ship. He fastened his pace, getting more frustrated with each step, 'Why was this ship so goddamn labyrinthian? I just wanna go to the armoury! Isn't there like a sign?!' he angrily thought. Then again, he couldn't possibly frame the ship manufacturers, the Voidborne had a tendency to shoot boarding pods in their railguns to board command ships and kill the crew from the inside. He was stationed here precisely for that role, and the convoluted pathways was probably used to confuse them, since they're not really that smart.

Sirius was too focused thinking to notice a figure coming up on him from the corner, and by the time he noticed, they both bumped into each other, chest first, before they both stumbled onto the ground. Sirius looked at the figure and then noticed the papers all around him, his face quickly softened, before helping the chartreuse-haired man pick up was Sirius thought to be statistics.

"Oh, shit! I'm really sorry about that!" He stammered, before joining him in picking the number-addled papers up. Now that Sirius looked at him, he was strangely familiar. He had odd chartreuse-colored short hair, was particularly short, about 5'6, slim in body structure and had ringed earrings. It wasn't until he arranged the papers swiftly that a metaphorical lightbulb opened in his mind, the stranger seemed to have the same idea too.

"Rian?" he raised his eyebrow in confusion. "Sirius?" the boy, named Rian, said back to him in a soft tone. "Dude!" they both said at the same time, clasping their arms together in an idealized version of bromance, unintentionally invalidating the few dozen seconds of arranging the paperwork. The boys looked at each other in embarrassment, before arranging the papers, again.

Sirius offered to help the drone technician, to which he obliged reluctantly. Now the two were carrying an equal amount of papers, and trotting to the hanger bays, where they would pass by the armory. The two talked about their experiences after they met, they had not seen each other for four months now, ever since he was reassigned due to lacking manpower on the Frontier. The next topic they talked about, was what they were suddenly doing in Forge.

"Why would the higher-ups wantonly assign us here, anyway? We were guarding important supply lines to the Frontier, last I heard." Pvt. Rian said, Sirius contemplated his words, It was not rare for a fleet to be suddenly thrust into action to meet the demands of the front, but in Forge, the responsibilities for said role must already be done, since this was a major repair and redeployment dock for the Imperium. Now that Sirius thinks about it, he hadn't found any fleet in the system by looking out of the many windows in the Reverie. Where had they gone? Why are we all alone? What was the purpose of this?

Before Sirius can go down the rabbit-hole of paranoia, the satisfying opening of a hydraulic door made his eyes pay attention to a door that stood out from the rest, painted brown instead of blue. "Well, I better gear up, you too Rian, I know you like to gear up excessively." 'At least, I still hoped you do.' Sirius thought. Thankfully, Rian chuckled and nodded to that. "You too, Starboy.". They both waved their hand at each other, even though they knew they would meet shortly after, what's hurting them if they could have a wave after so long?

Sirius entered the Armoury, the hydraulic doors being significantly more slower than the other ones. He entered and he was immediately met with the stale light of the Led bulb, encompassing the room with a dreadful shadow. A bout of unnerve bubbled up in him, before the feelings instantly vanished when his eyes met with the tomboyish glare of his sister, Alistair. She had inherited that bout of tomboyness from his mother, and his innocent but stern attitude from his late father. He quickly raised his hand at her in a wave, she ignored it, he sighed, when she was younger, she would always respond to that with cheers and acts to make her big brother acknowledge her, now look at her, as cold as ice. He missed those times where he would call her 'Onii-chan!' instead of the monotone 'Sirius' or the more common 'Retard'.

The brunette was currently wearing her custom-made Hercules Exo-suit, 'Alpha', and a Gauss Anti-material Rifle slung across her back, she was busy putting tungsten bullets onto her 4th mag. Sirius gulped when he saw what she was holding, not only was she tomboyish, she was also a fucking deadshot, with almost no escaped targets under her belt. The Voidborn call her 'The Phantom' due to her genius at assassination missions and support missions. If you somehow managed to escape her, you would probably lose an arm due to her missing your head.

"Why do you have all those?" Sirius started. "None of your business, retard." Alistair replied. Although she didn't actually mean that, it still hurt his pride a little bit. "Come on, sis, please tell your poor big brother about it?" Sirius sarcastically pleaded. "And why would I do that? I see no benefit for me." Alistair gave an excuse. Sirius retorted, "I can help you more extensively with the information you give, otherwise I won't be at a maximum efficiency.". "When did I ever need your help?" the two were silent at that, one viewing them from the naked eye couldn't see it, but the more erudite can tell that Sirius had won the argument. Despite her overwhelming power that could pass as a Nova Operative, she wouldn't be here right now, where it not for the efficient commanding of Sirius as an officer. She groaned in defeat, while Sirius had a smug smile across his face, he was winning more of more of these argument each day at an exponential rate.

[-]

On the upper layers of the ship, a middle-aged man with black hair, sharp brown eyes, and a circle-shaped, creased face was walking tentatively to the bridge. He was Rear Admiral Mildred of the Gruntenburg colony, the commanding officer of the 276th Fleet that was reassigned to Forge. As he walked closer to his bridge, passerbys all saluted him by putting their right hand over their chest; a symbol for imperial discipline. He softly smiled at them, despite his prior opinions of green fleets being rowdy and unkept, he was particularly fond of the time he spent here with his second-in-command, Lieutenant Commander Kara Von Reicksland.

The 276th fleet was the Imperium's most recent fleet from the factories, made during wartime. It consisted of newly graduated young men and women from their prestigious academies. There was also many veterans here, that were "reassigned" to this fleet. Basically, this was were the people that pissed of the higher-ups ended up. At first, it was quelling insurgents or pirates, then it was assigned to guard a supply line, which was so boring he himself asked for a transfer several times, but never would he dream of doing what he was gonna do.

The door to the bridge opened and the local Ensign said the routine words: "Captain on deck!". They all saluted the Rear Admiral, he raised his right hand and said in a neutral tone: "At ease." he said, and almost immediately after, the bridge was now a hub of activity, Ensigns coming to and fro from their terminals, the displays of said terminals changing with every second.

He sighed, and sunk into the fibers of ergonomic chair, he was really getting old, the fire that had ignited in him as a sci-fi geek before had long since burned out. He had wanted to join the navy to see the revolutionary technologies that humanity had made to survive the Voidborne threat, ever since the subsequent change of tactics from army occupation to orbital bombardment and then occupation, had fueled the flames of retribution upon him, he toiled, and toiled, and toiled, but he was a normal man in an increasingly extraordinary universe, from the discovery of psychics, to the race of reverse-engineering ancient technologies in secret to have an even edge in space battle. He sarcastically laughed at that, oh how reality just disappoints you. Then again, he didn't mind this life, away from the horrors of way and dying with thought to the people you love and care, instead of irresponsibly dying under the belief of a country; age had made him humble, with all the looks to prove it.

The door behind him opened with a hiss and he could see the Ensigns saluting whoever came by, even though he already knew who it was, he turned around to look at the jaw-dropping bespectacled beauty. She had an average height of 5'7, her silky white hair put up in a cute bun, her plump chest earning looks from the rooks, before going back to their jobs, her gentle, green eyes, seemed to exude a motherly kindness, she also wore rimmed glasses that further complimented her style of a studious youth.

She was Commander Kara Von Reicksland, the prodigy child of Reicksland Industries, a industrial military conglomerate that, along with many other companies, supplies the war effort with weapons. She commanded the onboard SEAL Team in the fleet. "Good morning, Captain." she greeted him with a velvety voice, seemingly asking to be given a rose. However, like all roses of the Imperium, they have thorns.

"Good morning, Commander Kara." Mildred said with a genuine smile. Kara chuckled, her seductive voice ringing out in the deck. "Oh, don't flatter me, Mildred, we can call each other like we always do." Kara said, before chuckling again. If she was an instrument, she would be a saxophone, the sheer sexiness of it seemingly putting you in place. Damn, she's dangerous, Mildred thought to himself. He looked at the other ensigns, their faces displaying a clear envy.

"Ok, Kara. Say, why don't we look outside? We are almost docking on Forge, so it would be nice to see it one last time, right?" Mildred said, trying to switch the topic to anything, OTHER than her sexy voice. Kara smiled wide, and said: "Sure, Captain~hehehehe~" she laughed cutely, piercing everyone's hearts, including mine.