"Mr. President, welcome to Kirnis Base." the base commander greeted me as I walked out of Lodos through the boarding gate. "I am Vice Admiral Daud Sukarno, currently in command of this facility."
"Thank you, Vice Admiral." I said. "And, as I told you before the landing, I do not want my presence here to be known to anyone else but the rear admiral."
"Yes, sir." he said. "I made sure of it."
"Did you see the fleet carrier on your scanners yet?" I asked.
"Yes, sir." he said. "Rear Admiral's ship is on it's way here. With it's current rate of acceleration, we expect the ship to arrive within 10 hours."
"I understand." I said. "Any other ship accompanying him?"
"No, sir. None that we could detect."
"Good." I said. "Are there any Republic or Federation naval vessels in the vicinity?"
"Ceres Defense Fleets 1 to 4 are, as always, remaining in orbit, only performing stationkeeping manuevers. The last military vessel to visit was the Federation Light Cruiser Nürnberg B, I think a week ago. The ship left the base as soon as the refueling was complete." he reported.
"Anything suspicious?"
"Apart from the odd disruption of communications?" he said. "No."
With the corner of my eye, I caught an officer rushing through the crowd of maintenance crews inspecting Lodos. He approached the base commander and interrupted us.
"Sir, a Republic Navy general-purpose shuttle is approaching." he said. "Rear Admiral Tachibana asked for landing permission. We've assigned him to pad 3A."
"Alright, thank you." Daud said. "Well, Mr. President, it looks like your guest doesn't like to keep people waiting."
"Sure, seems like." I said. "Damn you, Tachibana..." I then whispered to myself. "You are really trying your best to get killed."
Vice Admiral and I began walking over to the smaller landing pad, where we expected the shuttle to land. Before going, I winked at the Lodos' starboard side external cameras, through which Mei was watching me. This was a sign to indicate that things were okay.
The shuttle appeared as a small dot in the sky not long after. It oscillated back and forth and grew larger in appearance. After a while, I could see the plumes coming out of it's rocket engines. It finally slowed down above the pad and made a quick but hard landing on one corner of the pad, unable to keep it centered.
Daud wanted to say something, but he held back. I knew what he wanted to say, so I said it myself.
"Worst non-lethal landing I've ever seen."
The shuttle's hatch opened immediately after the engines were shutdown, and Tachibana ran out of the vessel alone. We went to greet him.
"Admiral."
"Admiral."
We both gave him a military salute. He saluted back.
"Admiral, Mr. President. Good to see you both." he said.
"May I ask about the shuttle?" I said.
"Yes." Tachibana replied. "I had no time to wait for the battle to conclude. My XO can handle the ship pretty well."
Simple but good enough, the answer was.
"If it is about my landing, I am sorry." he added. "Haven't been in a cockpit in ages."
"Anyway... I am sure you know what you are doing." I said.
"Thank you." said Tachibana. "Now, let's get to business. Vice Admiral, is there any place where we can-"
"Wait." I said. "I know a good place around here. If you'll excuse us, Vice Admiral..."
"Of course." Daud said. "If you need anything, you know where I am."
"Thank you." Tachibana and I said at the same time.
"Where are we going?" asked Tachibana.
"You will see shortly."
After a short walk, we were at Lodos' boarding gate.
"A tribute to your old ship, have you seen her before?" I said. "How do you like the new Lodos?"
"I heard a lot about it, but this is the first time I'm seeing it with my own eyes. About the ship... The point stands, a good ship is nothing without a good crew to use it's full potential." he said. "And it is anything but MY ship. I merely happened to be an insignificant one of it's more than thirty commanders in history, which includes you as well."
"I was just trying to create some nostalgia." I said.
"I see." he smiled. "That ship... That old ship stood the test of time better than the Old Republic itself did."
We both sighed. The old Lodos had seen both the rise and the fall of the People's Republic of Mars, and had actively participated in both.
"However, I will admit, the new ship looks attractive." he said. "First of all, it is not a stupid cylinder with things attached on it; and secondly, it has a proper paintjob!"
"I assume you will like it a lot more from the inside." I said.
"What are those people doing over there?" he pointed at a group of workers working on a cavity on Lodos' hull.
"Installing some weapon systems." I said. "My orders. Who knows when we will need some weapons?"
"Bold of you to take such a valuable ship out here with no weapons." he said.
"We have enough defense without weapons already." I said. "And bold of you to come all the way here with a tin-can shuttle with no weapons."
"As you said yourself..." Tachibana said. "I know what I am doing."
"And so do I and Admiral Mei." I said.
"Mei is here?" Tachibana asked.
"She is in command of the vessel." I said. "I'm sure you would like to pay her a visit. Let's go inside."
We stepped into Lodos II. Mei, Nuan and Frans has been waiting for us.
"It's been a long time." said Mei. "Welcome aboard, Rear Admiral."
"Thank you, it is very good to see you. I see that, despite getting promoted to a rank even above me, you still did not leave your seat at cruise-nav." said Tachibana.
"This might look like it..." said Mei. "But in the meanwhile, the naval command decided that I was good enough to take over your position as well."
"Whoah there, miss." Tachibana said. "I didn't want to offend you."
"I was only stating the obvious truth, my former commander." Mei said. "Huh... No wonder you couldn't climb higher than the rank of rear admiral."
"It looks like they also decided that you wouldn't be able to handle a ship as magnificent as the old Lodos, so they came up with this tiny luxury yacht." Tachibana chuckled a little.
"Wait a bit." I said. "If we are going to fight over who's the best CO, you guys have no chance against me."
"Guys, guys!" Nuan interrupted us. "Are we here to-"
"Shut up, Nuan!" Mei and I said.
"Shame." Tachibana said to Mei. "I am sorry, miss, but sitting on a chair and playing a console game doesn't count as a command duty."
"You are just jealous of my ship." said Mei. "A ship which I can control by nothing but my thoughts."
"Leaving your ship and going to vacation doesn't count as a command duty either." I said to Tachibana.
"Your kill count or the kilometers you travelled won't help you here, Kagan." he replied. "Let me remind you, it was during your command the Old Republic Navy fell."
"It's not fair, it has nothing to do with my comma-" I tried to argue, but I was stopped my Mei.
"Yes, Tachibana is right." Mei said. "Those are big words for someone who used to sit in front of a computer screen, with fries in his hand."
"I never did that!" I said.
"To be honest, Mei, he never did that." Tachibana suddenly took my side.
"Enough!" Nuan yelled at us all. "Time to get back to business."