Quoted By:
<span class="mu-i">“Sir. A deployment of a Titan is big news, but three or four? That’s nearly a quarter of the standing Imperial Titans.”</span> The speaker is a young man wearing officer epaulets, and you mean young in the traditional sense as opposed to the faux-youth appearance of your own LT. This officer still seems nervous to have all eyes in the room on him when speaking. <span class="mu-i">“That’s got to be enough to be considered a completion of our main objective. I mean, that’s why we’re here in the first place.”</span>
<span class="mu-i">“Is there a question, Ensign?”</span> Your LT has never been one to help people along when it came to public speaking, and even less so for a junior officer.
<span class="mu-i">“What I’m asking is- Well, sir, what I’m saying is-”</span>
<span class="mu-i">“What he’s <span class="mu-s">saying…</span>”</span> The growl comes from Sub-Liuetenant Hawthorne of the 38th Krieger Platoon. <span class="mu-i">“Is when in the void does Command plan on getting us off this scudding rock?”</span>
You don’t miss the ‘I told you so’ glance Casket gives you and Heavenly. Looks like she isn’t the only one at the end of her tether. But the LT doesn’t seem fazed just yet.
<span class="mu-i">“Communication with Command remains-“</span> Another chorus erupts, much louder and much more aggrieved than the bickering over slim requisitions, but the LT lets it wash over him until it simmers down to the point he can talk again.
<span class="mu-i">“Communication with Command remains a negative. We know we had the <span class="mu-s">Prince of Megiddo</span> and several of her sister cruiser-classes in nearby systems a few months ago.”</span> Your Lieutenant pauses, emphasising this reminder with nerves of steel in front of a crowd of humanity’s finest example of shoot-first-figure-a-way-out-later. <span class="mu-i">“But we have no confirmation that they intend to intervene, and no way to co-ordinate our extraction with them if they do. We have transmitted what reports we have of the blockade’s strength, which includes a battleship of its own, but we can’t be sure what reached them.”</span>
<span class="mu-i">“So that’s it? We’re on our own?”</span> More growling, and not just from the ill-tempered officer of the 38th Platoon. <span class="mu-i">“Mother<span class="mu-s">fuckers.</span>”</span>
<span class="mu-i">“For now.”</span> Despite the volatile mood, you have to admit that the Lieutenant’s solid stoicism in the face of criticism is having a calming effect on the room. <span class="mu-i">“Which brings us to the next briefing section. Contingencies.”</span>
[3/4]
