Azaha
22-04-2007, 01:27
The smell of wind swept seas delighted his senses. The spray of salt against his weathered face, and the gentle numbness it created was comforting to him. He looked up from the side balcony of the bridge, to the rear of the ship. Large amounts of brown smoke were billowing from the single stack the ship had. He expected that. The ship was making full speed on its outdated oil fired engines. They were making about 16 knots, over firing the engines in order to match speed, and catch up to their prey.
Walking back into the bridge, he made his way inside the ship from there, passing the wheel and ordering a “2 degree to port.”. The seaman responded in kind, “Aye sir, making my heading 2 degrees to port.”
The Captain walked back into the depths of the ship. The light grey paint that was administered to the passageways covered the ship’s true age. Under the pristine paint lay a maroon rusted hull and innards of the ancient ship. Above him, the mass amounts of piping and electrical archways seemed to shutter with the vibration of the ship’s engines. Even further above the piping, old cobwebs were still in place from when the ship was in port, which now-a-days, was nearly all the time.
As he entered the Command in Control center, he placed his hand on the bulkhead that that was next to the hatch. Immediately he pulled his hand away involuntarily as it was shocked by the bulkhead itself. He glanced over to the Senior Chief that was in the room. “Get that fixed, will you Chief?”
Without waiting for a reply, he hovered over the shoulder of the radar systems operator. “How’s it looking, OS1?”
“Well sir, we got the transport Ops said to look for. Signature matches, and sonar said the readings are similar. Won’t know until we get close enough though. But chief agrees that this might be our ship. It’s about 73 Nautical miles out. They haven’t noticed us yet, they are at a leisurely 12 knots.” Finished with his long winded summary, he returned to calibrating the equipment and maintaining contact.
“Good work. Chief, update me if it deviates from its course. I’ll be in my quarters.”
“Aye aye, Skipper.”
The captain walked away from the CIC with a smirk on his face. He rather enjoyed the nicknames his crew gave him, and never reprimanded them for it, unless of course it was blatantly offensive. He had always encouraged his crews to be relaxed and comfortable. But on the flipside, he drilled them often and hard, often forcing them to do Damage Control and Fire drills 12 times a week when they were on the high seas. His reasoning was simple though. While in port, it was impossible to train his crew properly, so when ever they had the chance to make cruises, he used them extensively to train his men. So far, this was turning out to be a perfect long cruiser for him and his crew.
He thought as he entered his quarters, oblivious of the passage of time while he was making his way to his rack. It was a perfect cruise, for an imperfect reasoning. He swiped up a manila envelope that was strewn on his rack, and tossed it on his desk. After retrieving a glass of water from his personal head, he sat down on his desk, and opened the envelope. He had to read it once more, to try and grasp what his ship was being asked to do.
The top line read very nonchalant , ‘Dear Captain Il-Jeer Kareem’. Maybe that is what most unnerved him, but he couldn’t be sure. The rest of the documentation was political jargon, military jargon, and intelligence jargon. But his years of experience in reading such bullshit made him understand it easy. He summed it up in his head once again.
Azahan Security Intelligence, perhaps the most unreliable form of intelligence(Kareem often thought a child with a kaleidoscope could procure better intelligence), had said a ship linked to anti-nationalist extremists in Azaha had picked up a shipment of illegally grown and sold drugs. It was now steaming in a southerly course out of the Haven region, towards its destination. Looking over the course of the ship however, he noticed that the ship had taken an unnecessarily large detour to make its way to Azahan waters. It looked to him to be very uneconomical. Even for extremists. What further alarmed him was the fact that his ship, the Azaha Questarian Commnowealth Ship(AQCS) Hassan was being sent to capture this illegal transport. Why wasn’t a faster corvette, or even one of the few frigates they had, sent out, he thought. The transport was already far out, and the expense at sending the massively under funded AQCS Hassan seemed too large for this simple intercept. However, he could not voice his concerns upon hearing this mission. It was endorsed by the higher brass, and even some of the top political entities. This was perhaps the first time he could remember in a long time, that he was actually unnerved by the situation.
He read over the documentation again.
Walking back into the bridge, he made his way inside the ship from there, passing the wheel and ordering a “2 degree to port.”. The seaman responded in kind, “Aye sir, making my heading 2 degrees to port.”
The Captain walked back into the depths of the ship. The light grey paint that was administered to the passageways covered the ship’s true age. Under the pristine paint lay a maroon rusted hull and innards of the ancient ship. Above him, the mass amounts of piping and electrical archways seemed to shutter with the vibration of the ship’s engines. Even further above the piping, old cobwebs were still in place from when the ship was in port, which now-a-days, was nearly all the time.
As he entered the Command in Control center, he placed his hand on the bulkhead that that was next to the hatch. Immediately he pulled his hand away involuntarily as it was shocked by the bulkhead itself. He glanced over to the Senior Chief that was in the room. “Get that fixed, will you Chief?”
Without waiting for a reply, he hovered over the shoulder of the radar systems operator. “How’s it looking, OS1?”
“Well sir, we got the transport Ops said to look for. Signature matches, and sonar said the readings are similar. Won’t know until we get close enough though. But chief agrees that this might be our ship. It’s about 73 Nautical miles out. They haven’t noticed us yet, they are at a leisurely 12 knots.” Finished with his long winded summary, he returned to calibrating the equipment and maintaining contact.
“Good work. Chief, update me if it deviates from its course. I’ll be in my quarters.”
“Aye aye, Skipper.”
The captain walked away from the CIC with a smirk on his face. He rather enjoyed the nicknames his crew gave him, and never reprimanded them for it, unless of course it was blatantly offensive. He had always encouraged his crews to be relaxed and comfortable. But on the flipside, he drilled them often and hard, often forcing them to do Damage Control and Fire drills 12 times a week when they were on the high seas. His reasoning was simple though. While in port, it was impossible to train his crew properly, so when ever they had the chance to make cruises, he used them extensively to train his men. So far, this was turning out to be a perfect long cruiser for him and his crew.
He thought as he entered his quarters, oblivious of the passage of time while he was making his way to his rack. It was a perfect cruise, for an imperfect reasoning. He swiped up a manila envelope that was strewn on his rack, and tossed it on his desk. After retrieving a glass of water from his personal head, he sat down on his desk, and opened the envelope. He had to read it once more, to try and grasp what his ship was being asked to do.
The top line read very nonchalant , ‘Dear Captain Il-Jeer Kareem’. Maybe that is what most unnerved him, but he couldn’t be sure. The rest of the documentation was political jargon, military jargon, and intelligence jargon. But his years of experience in reading such bullshit made him understand it easy. He summed it up in his head once again.
Azahan Security Intelligence, perhaps the most unreliable form of intelligence(Kareem often thought a child with a kaleidoscope could procure better intelligence), had said a ship linked to anti-nationalist extremists in Azaha had picked up a shipment of illegally grown and sold drugs. It was now steaming in a southerly course out of the Haven region, towards its destination. Looking over the course of the ship however, he noticed that the ship had taken an unnecessarily large detour to make its way to Azahan waters. It looked to him to be very uneconomical. Even for extremists. What further alarmed him was the fact that his ship, the Azaha Questarian Commnowealth Ship(AQCS) Hassan was being sent to capture this illegal transport. Why wasn’t a faster corvette, or even one of the few frigates they had, sent out, he thought. The transport was already far out, and the expense at sending the massively under funded AQCS Hassan seemed too large for this simple intercept. However, he could not voice his concerns upon hearing this mission. It was endorsed by the higher brass, and even some of the top political entities. This was perhaps the first time he could remember in a long time, that he was actually unnerved by the situation.
He read over the documentation again.