Tales Of The Rocket Patrol 2

Chapter 2

     After grabbing something hot to drink that contained a lot of artificial caffeine in it, Amanda walked into the hallway and bumped into a familiar face. She hadn't seen the old man in some time, as the capital city patrol was keeping her very busy. Her old training officer did most of his work off world so Star was always happy to see him.

     "Hey!" she called out as she walked towards him. "What are you doing back here so soon, old man?"

     "Nice to see you too, Sergeant." Captain Rogers said with a grin.

     "Where's the rookie?" Star asked as she looked around.

     "Like you have room to talk." Rogers replied. "It hasn't been that long since you were a rookie yourself!"

     Amanda didn't respond and gave him a look that told the old man that he was pushing his luck. "What's going on?"

     "O'Brien is downstairs." Rogers answered. "We picked seven prisoners from one of the moon colonies. They were causing mischief in one of the techless colonies."

     "We have people in the techless colonies?" Amanda asked.

     "We did that day." Rogers said with a chuckle.

     Amanda padded the old man on the shoulder. "You'll have to tell me more about it later. I've got a briefing to get to."

     "I'll do that, Sergeant Star." Rogers said as he gave her a wink. "You take care of yourself out there."

     "I will." Amanda said as she left the old man in the hallway and strolled over to the large conference room for the day's briefing.

     As she walked into the conference room, most of the seats were already taken. Amanda didn't really care as she preferred to stand close to the doors so the she could make a quick exit when the meeting was over. She did that so that she could get to her speeder and to work as soon as possible, but also to prevent the commander from calling on her to do something or gripe about another civilian complaint. While civilians were free to speak their mind, it never meant that what they had to say was correct. Sergeant Star had her fair share of complaints but she only took that as a sign that she was doing her job properly. She never took them personally and shrugged them off as sour grapes from people who had been caught breaking the capital law. The officers quieted down when Commander Anders strolled in. With blonde hair so bright that it could only come from one of the Swedish colonies. Once at the podium, Anders paused for a moment and then started to brief the crowded conference room.

     "We've had some unusual off world activity," The Commander started, "Arrests off world are up, so we're going to have to work hard to make sure that this trend doesn't spill over into the Capital. Gang activity has been at an all time low, and it's been mainly pushed out of the city to the outskirts. I prefer to keep it that way. Any suspicious activity is to be called in immediately and no one tries to be a hero. Heroes go home in body bags and I really don't need the additional paperwork. I get enough of that from some of you already."

     He shot a glare over at Sergeant Star when he made that comment.

     "Your patrol routes have been forwarded to your speeders," The commander resumed, "Good luck and follow your directives."

     The briefings were never long so Amanda personally thought Anders did it just to make sure that everyone arrived on time and were present to start the day. Sometimes she felt like a school kid being called for attendance every morning and with the technology that was available, doing an in person head count seems rather redundant. It was still the way Commander Anders preferred to run his unit, and he never hesitated to remind people who was in charge. Amanda wasn't in the mood to hear what his gaze was about and quickly shuffled out the door and towards her speeder, which carried her patrol route for the day. Once at her speeder, she discovered that her assumption was correct; Anders was angry. She was given one of the worst patrols in the city, something he was known to do whenever an officer got a complaint which caused him to do more paperwork than usual.