AUGUST 12TH, 220 OF THE UNIVERSAL CALENDAR ABOARD THE MSN YILAN

The days before the expected departure take a toll on my mental health. Is it eagerness? Uneasiness? Whatever it is, Hugo’s Lucky Alphonse weighed heavily on my mind. From the moment I first got off the shuttle, I headed straight to my living quarters and sacrificed one tree too many to intangible thoughts.

But I know I couldn’t coop up in my room forever. Eventually, like Friederika will start to worry about me. And worry leads to being checked in on, and that would mean Friederika stumbling around in my minefield of a room, and I would hate for poor little Friederika to become a lost causality in this mess. So sparing her the trouble, I depart from the messy cabin and make my way for to mess hall in order to recover some energy.

To my surprise, the mess hall is at its peak today, more than it usually is. Thankfully, the line isn’t slow: nothing makes a starving serviceman more grumpy than slow food service. I managed to retrieve my food and drink quickly and stake out a nice and quiet seat away from the noisy rank and file.

I look down at the contents on the yellow plastic tray before me. A chunk of a nicely cooked fillet, some clumps of green vegetables, and a soft biscuit with cheese and ham stuffed into it. Aside from that, I have some soup for the biscuit and a cup of coffee. Honestly, I never cared much for our selection of meat. I’ve heard from others before that it’s a better selection than what civilians might get but I’ve begged to differ. What I always loved was the biscuits and coffee, premium imports from local Frankish settlements. Just as I am about to down the coffee, I hear a familiar, annoying, high-pitched voice from behind.

“Well well, if it isn’t the ensign Victoria crawling out of her room!” Friederika plops down in the seat next to me and gives me that annoying, but friendly grin. With a glance at her tray, she has several biscuits and a slice of bread accompanying a large bowl of soup. On both sides of her tray are two cups of creamy coffee. I didn’t realize it much until now, but Friederika really likes her coffee. She has a little too much dependency on it, I would think.

“You were about to drink pitch-black coffee I take it? Look at you, being all grown up without me. How very mature of you. Here, have some of my creams,” Friederika pretends to wipe a tear from her eye and proceeds with handing me a few creamer packets. I take them and help myself with dumping a few into my cup of coffee. As one would expect, the texture changes from pitch black to a more colorful light shade of brown, following a bit of stirring.

“Thanks, Kiki, I appreciate it,” I say.

“My pleasure, that aside…” Friederika rests her chin on her hands and gives me an uncharacteristically stern look. It occurs to me that Friederika is probably a lot more worried about me than I initially thought. After savoring a bit of coffee, I set the cup down and clasp my hands together.

“What is it, Kiki?” I ask, hoping she would stop with the piercing gaze, “it’s rare for you to get serious. Are you having boyfriend problems or something?” Friederika, trying her best, tries not to crack a smirk.

“And it’s pretty cute of you to make humorous jabs. What’s been on your mind? If you overthink things like that all the time with such a frowning face then it will be hard for you to get a man when your face gets all wrinkly, you know,” she muses, taking a sip from one of her coffee cups. And in Friederika terminology, it’s more like a giant gulp. Not your usual, everyday sip.

I let out a sigh and poke one of the nicely cut fillet slices with a fork. Honestly, I’m not sure how to answer. Or rather, I don’t know how to express it properly. “It’s about the operation tomorrow,” I finally say “I’ve been feeling anxious about it. If I have to be frank with you, it’s about all I’ve been thinking about the last couple of days.” As I spoke, Friederika wraps her hands around one of the cups of coffee, giving it subtle rubs.

I suppose she has been nervous about it too, which would be understandable. No person in their right mind wouldn’t be nervous about the upcoming operation. Unless you were a war nut, then you would finally have something to look forward to. Some action to get you excited, even the implication of such action involved ending the life of another human.

“Something about this whole situation seems off. I can’t get the shaking feeling that we’re playing into a trap,” I remark. Friederika looks up at me with a curious brow.

“A trap? What do you mean?” Friederika inquires.

“If it’s true what commodore Hugo said,” I answer “isn’t it odd that the Mafia would only just now organize a fleet sometime after we arrived? And smaller than our own at that. It wouldn’t make sense for them to launch an offense, right?” I finish by stuffing one of the sticky clumps of cheese broccoli into my mouth. Friederika seems to ponder the question for a bit while munching on one of the biscuits and washing it down with a cup of coffee. She glances around the mess hall to see if anyone has happened to overhear us.

“What you're basically getting at is,” Friederika says, waggling her fork at me “you believe the Mafia's fleet activity in the Valspon system is not the preface to an act of aggression, but rather an act of defense?" I give a nod as affirmation. She continues, "have you shared this with commander Buttermilch? Or Mazzareli for that matter?”

I shake my head in response. There’s no way either of them would listen to some petty ensign about this. Even if they did, the possibility of it reaching Chal’s ears was next to none, and zero chance of him deliberating on it. The planned operation is tomorrow, of course. It would cause a commotion among the eager troops if he, at most, postponed it indefinitely. Though, that wouldn't exactly be a bad thing, right? It wouldn’t hurt to postpone Lucky Alphonse until we could secure more manpower from Metropolitan Sol. But then, an even better idea crosses my mind.

“There’s no way commodore Chal would change his mind about it in time,” I reply “but that got me thinking. It was mentioned in the operations file that he wanted to secure his side of Toscana ahead of rear admiral DeRyck, right?” We both took a few bites out of our meals, and after I clear it down with some coffee, I continue bouncing my thoughts off Friederika with my thoughts. “But he’s on the other side of the Orion Arm—”

“And it would take some time before we can communicate with him, yes?” Friederika finishes the sentence for me. Well, it was mostly what I was getting at. I have no idea if Chal even notified DeRyck or Garofano but given the circumstances, it’s reasonable to believe he didn’t. This does make me wonder if any of them had established a plan to synchronize an attack on Toscana when we were still on Terra, but I doubt it. “What did you want to do, then?” I dip the biscuit sandwich into what remains of the soup and take a few bites out of it before I answer. It is a bit impolite to talk while you eat, after all.

“I was interested in doing a little war game for Lucky Alphonse,” mimicking Friederika, I point my fork at the dark-haired sub-lieutenant, “and you’re going to help me with it, Kiki.”