Iter Per Astra - Lost Princess

May 10, 2820.

“Wake up sleepy head; time to rise and shine!”

“Ugh...” He groaned as he managed to get up from the bed. “What time is it?” he asked as struggled to open his eyes.

“It’s ten past thirty.”

He thought about it for a second, trying to understand what that time meant, but he was unable to think clearly as he had only just woken up.

He gave a stern look at him and said in a still sleepy voice. “Jack... please... it’s too early to be making those types of jokes.”

“Maybe to you,” Jack stated. “At what hour did you come to bed last night?” He asked. “It doesn’t look like you slept much.”

“Around four... in the morning.” He said as he stood up and stretched. “And the thing is that I still have to wake up early the next day.”

“It’s eight forty.” He stated. “That explains why you are so tired. What were you doing up so late?”

“I was doing the things that Marie couldn’t finish before she left. It was much more stuff than what I initially thought.”

“As group team leader I see why you would be the one to do all the jobs that she left behind. But why did she have to leave so suddenly?” Jack asked. “Shouldn’t she have given you an advanced notice or something?”

“She should have, I will have a talk with her when she returns, but as it was an emergency, and the admiral didn’t want everything to fall apart, I’ll cut her some slack.”

“Well Zephyr, you better clean up and head to the bridge, I just came from there and the Admiral is calling for you, it appears that is rather urgent.”

“Got it. I wonder what she wants me for.”

“I already asked the section manager, but just in case you don’t see me for the rest of the day.”

“It’s not like I am going to miss you,” Zephyr said.

“Harsh...” He said acting as if he had been heartbroken with his hand on his chest. “But really. I am leaving for Nautica harbor today, my sister is coming, and she wanted me to show her around, and on top of that my ship is going to leave now.”

“As a member of the Coryzen Security Bureau onboard this ship you should know what ship is coming don’t you think?”

The Coryzen Security Bureau’s main purpose is to be the public face of the navy. They act as the police of Coryzen but with heavy military influence, as they would be involved in many branches of the navy.

Zephyr’s role to is contact any ship entering the west side of Coryzen’s controlled ocean and airspace.

As Zephyr rose through the ranks of the Navy and Security Bureau, he oversees the people who call the ships that enter Coryzen.

“Come on, they contacted you this morning to tell you of their intention.”

“It’s the CRNS Missouri sir.”

“Correct.” Zephyr said. “Okay, that’s enough for today. Have a good time there, if you decide to go to the CRNS Vanguard museum, tell them that you are friends with me, and they should give you a discount as I worked there for some time.”

“Thank you, Zephyr, got to go, see you later.” Jack then left the room and Zephyr​ walked over to the bathroom to wash up and change to go to work.

Zephyr later entered the men’s locker room were multiple other soldiers were busy changing, some taking a bit of personal time to catch up with others or catch up on social media.

The locker room was rather small considering that the ship that he was currently on is one of the biggest battleships in the Coryzen Royal Navy. The ship is called Bismarck, and it’s currently the oldest ship in the Navy’s arsenal, nearly 100 years from when it was first launched.

Zephyr opened his locker and looked at himself in the mirror and said to himself. “Happy birthday Zephyr.” He said sadly followed by a long sigh. “It’s not like anything exciting will happen today.”

Zephyr turned 24 today, and for the last 5 years, his close friend Juno Comet had without fail, had called him to celebrate his birthday. But after a failed operation between the United Nations and Coryzen Royal Navy, United Nations naval soldiers killed her, unjustly, at least in their eyes they were doing the “right” thing.

Even though Zephyr had a high standing in the Coryzen Royal Navy. Because of his father’s high rank in the navy. Many people still looked down on him because of his close relationship with her.

Juno was a Xenohuman, a race of humans that people disliked. Most people called them blue blooded because their blood was a dark blue color instead of red. Beside this, they are indistinguishable from a normal Primahuman. Which is the normal red-blooded race of humans. These distinctions could not be seen with the naked eye and would require a blood test to see it.

Many nations force their people to take a blood test every couple of years to confirm whether they are Primahumans. As there have been cases where Primahumans become Xenohumans after some years. This allowed said nations to have a “pure” bloodline as they would continually cut away people that were blue blooded. These nations would normally terminate their positions upon knowing they are Xenohumans. This made it hard for many Xenohumans to live as they would have a hard time finding jobs.

Thankfully Coryzen and the nations under their control were not like them, and outright banned blood tests for Primahuman verification. This made Coryzen and its subsidiary nations thrive compared to other nations who would typically take sudden drops in workers in all industries every time the test was mandated.

Primahumans typically think that they are superior to Xenohumans which in turn leads to oppression by the Primahumans towards the Xenohumans, with many of them being turned into slaves in some of the more extreme countries in the world.

Zephyr’s communicator rang. He answered it immediately without looking at the caller as he thought that it was the admiral calling to him personally. As she had done so in the past.

“This is Sargeant Zephyr Terix.” He answered. “Go ahead.”

“You were talking to yourself in the mirror again weren’t you.” A woman said on the other side of the comm.

“I sometimes wonder if you have some sort of camera behind me to know what I am doing.” He said as he recognized the person that called him.

“I do, it’s called mother’s intuition.”

“How’s it going, Mother. It’s weird for you to call me.”

“Is it? I feel like I talk to you all the time over the phone.”

“You do, but not usually this early in the morning. I know you are a heavy sleeper.”

“Hey that was in the past, I already passed that phase. I can now wake up with my alarm clock.”

“Tell me, why are you calling me?” Zephyr turned back to the point.

“I wanted to say happy birthday to you, as this is the first birthday without your beloved Juno, which I know she used to call you at around this time of the day.”

“I know…” Zephyr said a little teary-eyed. “It’s been almost a year since she passed away, huh?”

“Believe me that her loss still affects all of us Zephyr, if you need to talk to anyone… I’m here… I know it’s hard but try to keep it to yourself, you are close to that promotion. I know this as a fact.”

“What information do you have to know such a thing?”

“Your father tells me some things.”

“Shouldn’t that information be secret?”

“Believe me that if he caught me telling this to you, he would be angry. But I know you won’t tell him anything right?”

“I promise.”

“Better keep that promise. I plan to go to the market district to buy supplies. Let me know if you need anything” She answered. “You better finish and head back to work.”

“Yeah... I should do that, talk to you later.” Zephyr said as he hung up.

As he finished the call a recognizable sound came out of the speakers of the ship, something like that of a musical instrument.

“Now here this, now here this.” Said the communication’s officer from the speakers across the ship. “This is a message from the admiral.”

Then the voice changed to that of the admiral.

“This is Admiral Cyana Rove, set condition seven across all stations, we have a ship trying to avoid our blockade…”

“Seriously another one?” Said one of the soldiers beside Zephyr who was cleaning up as well.

“This makes it the fourth one this shift.” Said another one. “Ugh… I will not be able to get some sleep now.”

“Better head back to engines.” Said an engineer to himself.

“Engines, keep the engine steady,” Cyana continued. “I don’t think that boosting the engine will be necessary. Weapons, load ion disrupting missiles, and ion disrupting charges to the main cannons. Armory, send squads Fox hunters and Shadow Vipers to docking port B2. And Sergeant Terix, get to the bridge… now…”

Many soldiers looked in Zephyr’s direction.

“Wonder where you messed up for the admiral to be pissed off like that.” Said a soldier beside Zephyr.

“I don’t think that I did something for the Admiral to be like that, and besides that’s how the admiral talks, she seems mad, but she is not.”

“This is the first time hearing the admiral’s voice… just be careful I’ve known admirals that talk like they are fine one second and the next they are not.”

“I know what you mean but this admiral is special.” Zephyr said as he exited the room.

After speeding through his wake-up routine, he started walking to the bridge.

He rushed past soldiers, tight corridors that had people making way for two-way traffic on a corridor that was only meant for single lines.

This meant that he would take longer to get to the bridge than he originally planned.

“Hey, Captain.” A Lieutenant called as he passed beside him. “Your presence is requested at the bridge.”

“Yeah, I’ll be right there.”

Soon after. Zephyr entered the elevator that takes people to the Bridge of the ship, which was like a small tower over the rest of the hull. The elevator would sometimes send a sharp sound of metal screeching against metal, as the elevator hasn’t been serviced for the past several years due to budget cuts.

When the door of the elevator opened, he walked as fast as he could while not attracting attention and headed towards the admiral who had called him at the other end of the bridge, the admiral was talking with another member of the bridge’s crew.