So far only four ships had been fitted with the new drive as only the more recent classes of starships had the newest generation fusion powerplants needed to support the power-hungry drives. As the systems were so new and untested the Icarus still had her two massive magneto-plasma drive (MPD) pods on their respective pylons just in case. It was a good thing they’d left the old engines attached, as the new drive, although a marvel when it was operating properly, had shown itself to be horrifically unreliable. The new engines were constantly overloading the power system, blowing out junctions, or just failing inexplicably and with no warning. Sometimes they’d come right back up after a reset, but often it took her engineering crews many hours to get it sorted. It had been bad enough that Celesta had ordered the drive taken offline most of the time the Icarus was flying, telling CENTCOM that she would only power up the drive when ordered to do so. She’d hoped that her status as a bonafide hero of the war would be enough influence to convince the brass at Fleet Operations that the drive wasn’t quite ready to be deployed on an active starship.

She had been wrong. In no uncertain terms she had been ordered to not only return the ship to active status but to use the RDS as often as possible to collect data. As if that wasn’t bad enough, she’d then been ordered to escort a diplomatic convoy out past all logistical and technical support should something really go wrong.

“Time to orbit?” Celesta asked, rising gracefully from her seat at the center of the bridge to stretch her legs and observe her crew.

“Two hours, sixteen minutes, ma’am,” the helmsman said. “We could achieve orbit in an hour but we’re held up by the slower ships’ decel burns.”

“We’re in no hurry, Mister Ellsworth,” she smiled again. “A stately, dignified approach is more in line with our mission, wouldn’t you agree?”

“Yes, ma’am,” the helmsman, Specialst First Class Richard Ellsworth said, sounding completely unconvinced. Celesta had noticed a repeat of the general attitude of her crew since the shakedown flights of the new reactionless drive system (RDS) from the one when they’d returned victorious in a battle in which they were literally outnumbered by the thousands. It was a swagger that bordered on arrogance. She’d have a word with the executive officer to make sure it didn’t get out of hand, but a little healthy pride and competition between ships wasn’t necessarily a bad thing.

“The flagship is requesting we decrease speed, Captain,” the com officer said. “The ambassador’s ship is beginning her decel burn ahead of schedule.”