The plan was both elegant and simplistic. Four separate groups would sweep through the Cappa Hodia system and hopefully draw out or drive off any pirates, outlaws, smugglers or other riff raff they came across. The Vor’nak had raced out front and positioned itself on the far side of their patrol grid, in the space between the Cappa and Beta Hodia systems, with the goal of catching any ‘bolters’. Two flanking groups that each comprised; 1 Arrow, 4 Valkyries, and half of the Trenton’s more combat capable Type-12 shuttles. Another group, that would sweep below the plain of the ecliptic on the z axis of the system, was made up of the Trentons remaining runabouts (1 New Atlantic and 2 Danubes) and a single Provost Cutter. The Trenton and her remaining demi-squadron of Peregrines would form the other point in the lozenge shaped patrol formation and would sweep above the system on the Z-axis.

The ship was still running a standard duty rotation, though at yellow alert, and it was coming to the end of Delta shift.

“Morning sir. Heehee.” Mee IH squeaked as Wong and a few other members of Alpha shift arrived on the turbolift.

“Morning Number One, how’s our first leg going?” Wong walked along the rail and up the two steps leading to the command chairs (and now, pool).

“Meh, fairly good, HatFor flushed out a group presumed claim jumping illegal miners. They took off towards Beta Hodia.”

“Port Freedom?”

“Heeeheheh, yes sir.”

“HatFor?”

“It’s way easier than saying ‘the detachment of auxiliary craft led by the USS Hatchet’.” The pygmy beluga threw his pec flippers out to the side and shrugged as he flipped up his headsets eye piece, activated his repulsor cradle, and hovered up out of the pool.

“So the Gladius group is?”

“GladFor”

“And the detachment based around the New Britannic is NewFor, then?” Wong asked as Lt. Spati snickered from the Ops console as his relief took over the station.

“Hmmm, that’s way better than the one I came up with. NewFor it is!” the XO exclaimed.

“What did you call it?”

“It’s not important. So anyway, the Vor’nak is en route to intercept those suspected claim jumpers and put the fear of whatever gods they prey to in ‘em when they decloak right in front of them in about an hour, they’ll likely send an update soon.” Mee IH hovered to the rear of the bridge.

As Lt. Spati walked along the railing towards the turbo he leaned over to Wong, “We’ve been calling it BotFor for the past several hours, because they’re on the bottom of the formation.” he admitted to the CO.

Wong chuckled as he took his seat, “Clever… I have the Conn. Patch me through Eos…”

Mee IH was beat. It had been several long days leading up to this point, and this leg of the sweep through the Belt would last another two and half days.

He went straight to his quarters in the aquatic section of the ship, parked his cradle on its high tech stand.

“Computer, any personal messages?”

“You have three new messages.”

“Play em.”

“First message, from: Mummy.” The computer then played the message from his mother.

“Hey Mee IH, hope you’re doing alright. We just got done with your grandmother’s Celebration of Awesomeness yesterday, a bunch of folks kept asking when you’re coming home, everyone is really excited about you being the new pod leader, and the kids have so many questions for you. Everyone knows how busy you are with your job on your space ship, but if you could let me know a ballpark of when you might be able to swing home for a few days, I can plan out some stuff. Get back to me whenever, no rush. Love ya sweetie, bye.”

“Open a response and begin dictation,” the computer chirped an acknowledgement and Mee IH said, “Hey Mom, Happy the party went well. I’m not sure when I’ll be able to get another block of leave, but it definitely won’t be until the new year at the earliest. But if folks have questions or messages specifically for me, you can just forward them here, and I’ll reply to them, no worries. Thanks for looking after things for me, Love ya. Computer end recording and send.”

As he flopped off the cradle and into the pool he was immediately hit with pangs of stinging pain on the skin of his upper cheeks where his headset clamped onto his head below his melon along with a sharp sensitivity pain from several of his teeth.

“Argh, fluffernutter….Aaaach!” The cetacean gasped as he winced in pain.

He had had a similar incident occur with his teeth a month before and had dealt with it by replicating a hyper-salinated salve that he’d rubbed on his gums. But the cheek pain was a new thing that had just popped up yesterday, but this time the pain was worse and accompanied by a severe itch.

“You’re drying out bud, you’re keeping your head out of the water way too much. This headsets the cause, and you know it too.” the internal voice of reason screamed at himself.

As the pain embedded, Mee IH replicated some of the salve and applied it to his gums and sloshed a bunch of the cool salt water of the pool around his mouth. He then squeezed out a generous amount of the viscous jelly on the edge of the pool deck and gently rubbed a generous amount on his cheeks.

The salve seemed to work well and within a few minutes he was fast asleep.

When he woke up several hours later, he groggily asked the computer, “What time is it?”

“It is 1353 hours.”

“How many messages do I have left?” Mee IH asked as he remembered having only listened to 1 of the 3 messages he had before falling asleep.

“You have 756 personal messages.” The computer replied.

Apparently his fellow podmates had a lot of questions for him.

He started with messages from last night, one was from now Commander Tyler, asking him about one of his cousins, and other was from Starfleet Commands personnel management department. He recognized the sender as his ‘career councillor’ that would infrequently send him offers for new assignments throughout the last decade.

“Could this be it?…holllllllllly shi…” he churled in excitement as he read the first line.

‘Greetings Commander, Starfleet has an opening for a CO and is proud to offer you a reassignment to take command of the USS Forceful.’

“Forceful? A FREEDOM CLASS! Pfft! No way. Computer send a reply saying I’ll have to politely decline the offer and send it.”

The plucky little beluga knew he was likely to be the first of his species to ever get a command, and he didn’t want the moment tarnished by accepting command of any old scow they offered him. Today, he chose to be the first of his species to ever refuse the offer of a command.