"We're all too old to be out here playing war," he muttered under his breath.

"Admiral, the Coyote is sending their full spec and mission loadout to our com section. It will be available to you in moments," the ensign reported.

"Very good," Jackson said as a dismissal. Sure enough, a moment later the com shop sent a file location up to his Tile that let him begin looking through the data. When he looked up again, he saw his captains had finally gotten their pissing match out of the way and were in the process of re-distributing the cargo they'd picked up between three ships.

"Make sure the civilian techs are properly secured and escorted at all times," Ellsworth was saying. "We just had an insider attack on a Federation base. Let's not have a repeat on a Federation starship."

"Aye, sir. Coordinating with the Marine detachment CO now," the OPS officer said.

"Captain, message incoming from Exeter Base," the coms officer said. "It's a recorded message, standard broadcast."

"Format?" Ellsworth asked.

"Video, sir."

"On the monitor."

"Admiral Wolfe, we have regained control of Exeter Base and have successfully reinitialized our defensive screen. Without your assistance, the base and her secrets would have certainly been lost to the enemy. As per your wishes, we will omit any reference to Taskforce Wolfpack in our report to CENTCOM. Godspeed, Admiral. Exeter out."

The video had been oddly recorded with a wide-angle imager in what appeared to be some sort of control room. There had been a group of officers in the background as Colonel Serra spoke, but Serra wasn't actually the base commander.

"That was…interesting," Ellsworth remarked.

"Indeed," Jackson said. "I wonder if the base CO was indisposed or if he was injured or killed when our people retook the control center."

"And even if he was, why is a detachment Marine now commanding the base instead of the next highest ranking Fleet officer?" Ellsworth asked. "You want to fly back down and take a look?"

"No," Jackson decided after a moment. "There's nothing further of value there, so if something insane is happening like a mutiny by the Marines, the base staff will just have to figure it out for themselves. Send a message to our CIS liaison and let them know we received an odd message on the way out of the system. We've already been stalled out here too long, and it's cost us far too much."

"Of course, sir," Ellsworth said. If he disapproved of Jackson deciding to not further investigate what might be happening on the base, he didn't show it.

What he didn't voice in front of the crew was Serra's tone of voice when he mentioned the defensive screens were back up was…odd. To Jackson's ears, it almost sounded like a threat. The Exeter defensive system was nothing to sneer at. There were semi-automated gun batteries all over the damn system that could be triggered by the base as well as missile launchers, and then the monstrous laser cannons on the surface of the moon itself that could act as point defense for incoming missiles or wipe out any starship in orbit. If a hostile force had once against seized Exeter, he wasn't willing to run the gauntlet a second time to bail them out after the loss of the Jericho.