"What? Yes, of course!" she said quickly and even did a deep bow before standing up straight I saw the look of embarrassment on her face and knew she couldn't believe she had just bowed to me, but I decided to ignore it as I turned my attention to the command table. Watching the tug boat and frigate slowly moving back towards the dry dock that was slowly expanding. I turned my attention back to Clara.

"The Industrial fabricator is slagged, there is a hole in the middle of it, and it will need some serious work, but if we can get it up and running, then this frigate could operate as a mobile base." I told her.

"Ha!, it could turn into a fricken base builder!" my father suddenly declared. "Not to mention, young Clara here would give you everything she owned and then some just to get her hands on that industrial fabricator for a few days."

I turned my head between the two as a look of confusion appeared on my face.

"The hell are you talking about?"

"Uh, well, you see, an industrial fabricator, if used in zero g, can build anything from a screw to the biggest construction material used in building the foundations of a space station. That also includes all sorts of things that can be sent down to the ground. And that's just the first level of an industrial fabricator. And you have one on a frigate of all bloody things, these are usually transported by capital ships protected by an armada!" Clara said as she glared at me like I was a fool.

"Oh, that might explain why I was attacked shortly after taking it out of the scrapyard. However, they would still have to have known what was on the frigate for that to be plausible, so, option one, the scrapyard was in on it, trying to reclaim the ship to sell it again to the next sucker. Or option two, they couldn't afford the ship and had been sitting around waiting for someone to buy it." I said mostly to myself, but I knew everyone had heard it.

"Option two is unlikely" Clara said as she frowned and looked up at the map, her mind had turned away from the issue of offending her guild and clan mistress and was now focused on the problem at hand.

"I agree" Joseph suddenly said as he jumped in on the discussion. I could see a lot of the others nodding their heads.

"So that leaves the scrapyard trying to double-cross me. They most likely didn't expect me to make it to the gate… Clara, how much would it cost to replace that engine?" I asked her curiously.

"Oh, uh, if I had to buy the resources and dry dock time, probably forty thousand. However, if I'm working out of a scrapyard I would most likely just pull the engine from another ship and slap it in, It would cost me nothing, and while I'm at it, I would most likely just pull the rest of that ship apart, and sell those parts separately, it would make me more credits depending on the model of the ship and how damaged it was to start with." Clara looked at me as she gave a small shrug.

I frowned as I looked up at the frigate that was most of the way to the dry dock. I was about to turn back to Clara to suggest the shipyard might know where I jumped to, but my HUD interrupted me with a holo call from General Lucas Winch.

"Hold that thought," I said as I mentally answered the call and turned away from everyone.

"Flight Captain, I have sniffed out an issue, the Twiddles clan has begun petitioning the Emperor claiming they are being harassed and unlawfully attacked, they are making all sorts of demands including the demand to own MWOA254 which they claim is rightfully theirs. There are a few celestials that have jumped in on this argument as well, they are making standpoints on how the Twiddles Clan offended them and used the sacred celestial boot camp nefariously, among a bunch of other things, it will take a while to sort out, but none of that is important, today, what is important is the twiddles have made a military claim that you are unfit to lead a ship and that they feel unsafe with you in command of any ship with military capabilities and have requested you be immediately discharged from Galactic Federation Service!"

"What! They can't do that, can they?"

"Yes, they can because they are a Celestial with many members of their clan in the military, including at my level and above, they made the claim that you are becoming a problem, and are difficult to work with, among many other claims, all tied up in a neat little legal bow that makes it look very…" he trailed off as he turned his head to look at his computer a frown slowly crossing his face before his entire body stiffened, and then he turned to look at me with a serious look.

"Lady, Kenna Mackenzie you are hereby relieved of duty, you have been officially discharged from the Galactic Federation Navy, you will hand over all Galactic Federation assets, and your codes will be deactivated, you are now a civilian, if you are currently using an uplink pod to access Galactic Federation produced clone body, you are hereby ordered to disconnect immediately, or you will be charged with the crime of theft and illegal use of Galactic Federation Military property!" he stated and then froze for a few moments before glancing back at his computer for a few more moments after that he looked back at me.

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"Sorry, I had to record that for prosperity or whatever, so they big wigs know I did it. I have sent the recording to them, the stunned look on your face was perfect. The problem is it was real, you are discharged, and there is nothing I can do about it. I am sorry Kenna, the Twiddles Clan really has it out for you. Well, if we are being honest, we knew it would pan out this way, but in the process they have pissed off a few powerful players that have not made a move in. Well, I can't remember the last time they got involved in something, but they are moving now, and they are coming down on the Twiddles. Perhaps you will be able to reenlist sometime in the future, I have to go and get back to work, inform Zeo she is now the acting Captain of the frigate until her replacement can be found. I wish you all the luck Kenna, and I suggest you make yourself scarce. You won't have to worry about your guild, the orbital station is protected by Galactic Federation Law, not even the emperor can break that, ya know, as long as it produces a carrier ship once a decade the protection and law holds." he then waved, and the chat ended leaving me feeling hollow and adrift.

I slowly turned around to face my family as I stared blankly, my eyes slowly drifting to the frigate as it entered the third newly built dock. There had been so many shocks today, that I was starting to feel done. I turned to look at Clara as I came to a decision, I simply said.

"Please get the Frigate into a brand-new sort of state, I will be needing it very soon. Oh, and can you install uplink pods into it too, please."

She nodded her head as she watched me walk past her and out of the room. As I did, I composed and sent a message to Brendan informing him the ship was in dry dock, and he could collect his clone body any time. I also told him I was no longer his commanding officer and gave him the highlights of what the general had said to me. After sending that message, I wandered around the guild hall until I found a room with a bed and locked myself into it before passing out on the bed.

*******

Brendan was kneeling on a cushion on the top floor of his mother's most prestigious tea house, enjoying some tea with his mother and his great-grandmother, When a message arrived from Kenna.

"Ah, it seems Flight Captain Kenna Mackenzie has finally gotten that frigate of hers into a dry dock and I can retrieve my clone body and prepare for a flight to meet up with our Galactic Federation Frigate." he said to them as he mentally opened the message.

He carefully read it as it was a lot bigger than he had thought it was going to be, he even had time to sip on his tea. However, when he got to the point that Kenna had been discharged from the Galactic Federation Navy, he spat that tea out over the table as he coughed.

"What the fuck is this?" he screamed as he stood up, forgetting the tea or the company he was in and quickly started reading the message again making sure he didn't miss anything.

"Is something wrong, my dear?" his great-grandmother asked, concern all over her face.

"Was it that Kenna girl? Do you want us to use our connections to have her punished?" his mother asked.

"What?" he suddenly asked, looking up from the message on his HUD to stare at his mother, and great-grandmother. They both looked back at him kindly as they sat around the table that he had just been kneeling at.

"Mother, statements like that are what's wrong, Lady Kenna, was discharged from the Galactic Federation Navy before the end of her service term. The reason given was a massive load of complaints from superior officers. The problem with that is she never even met those officers." he said as he frowned and looked back at his HUD, slowly reading through it again.

"Well, that's not good, perhaps your mother would be interested in looking into why so many military officers would complain about a single sailor when they have not met her." his great-grandmother said as she gave Brendan's mother the side eye.

"Uh, yes, of course nǎinai, I would be glad to look into this. Even though the sailor is a solar ranked nothing and has no idea the battlefield she is trampling all over or the storm she has stirred up, and simply doesn't know her place but whatever, let's keep stirring." his mother said as she got to her feet and stormed out of the room.

"Don't worry about her my dear, your mother isn't void she wouldn't understand the bond forged between those that have gone through something like that boot camp, such an experience, can create an almost unbreakable bond."

She smiled softly to him before tapping her chin thoughtfully before continuing.

"I will have a talk with my brother and see to it that, even if she is a civilian, she will find a safe harbour in our territory and supplies at a fair price."

"Thank you, I really appreciate it, I'm going to have to get in contact with Scion Zeo and Travis and see if there is something we can or should do."

She nodded to him before shooing him out of the room. He bowed to her and quickly left, heading for the nearest uplink pod. He needed to recover his clone body and get passage to rejoin the ship he was assigned to. On his way he called Zeo and Travis on his HUD, it took a few rings before Zeo answered and Travis a few moments later.

"What's up, Brendan, how's Kenna?" Zeo asked a second after Travis's face appeared.

"Yea, and how bad is her new ship? Bet it's limping hard, it actually looked kinda skittish when it left the scrapyard." Travis said as he shifted his head trying to look around Brendan to see the background. "Hey, uh, why does it look like you're in a city?"

"I am not uplinked, because we were attacked shortly after leaving the scrapyard, I looked into it a bit and I have nothing conclusive yet, but it looks like the salesperson was running a scam to reclaim purchased ships by killing the buyer. As for the ship the engine was… unstable to begin with and well we all know Kenna's flying style, we had to eject it, but we did make it into the gate. Kenna, just finished recovering the frigate into a dry dock and will probably be spending a lot of time getting it fixed up." Brendan replied, looking a little sad.

"What? Why would she be doing that instead of rejoining us as captain of her ship?" Travis asked.

"Because she was discharged from active service." Zeo said slowly as before going silent for a few more moments. Then she looked back up and started swearing before vanishing from the call. Travis turned his face to watch Zeo for a bit longer before turning to look at Brendan.

"Uh, I think you should recover your body quickly, Zeo is kinda losing it and making calls, there is a lot of screaming… hey uh, Brendan, we aren't really going to let Kenna vanish into the civilian life on her own right? She is a star hawk, our leader."

Brendan slowed down until he stopped walking all together and stared at Travis for a few moments before taking off in a whole new direction.

"Travis I have to let you go, I'm going to go talk to my great uncle about an idea, if Kenna is in the wind then she doesn't have to be there alone, you are right, she is a Star Hawk and Star Hawks never fly alone!"

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