My Idea Box

FANFICTION IDEA: Death Incoming (An incomplete prologue)

Disclaimer: I don't own Captain Harlock or anything from the Leiji-verse. Per its name, any recognizable characters, situations, and so on belong to Leiji Matsumoto. 

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In all his years of service to the Sol Defense Fleet, Captain Jenkins had not seen much action. He had signed up just hours before the Promethium-Terran War was declared over. There were no glorious last stands or cries of freedom like he had seen early on, just silent acceptance. Jenkins has done the same over the next decade, tiring over inspection after inspection of cargo ships heading for the Sol System. He grew into his role that he had gotten used the boredom.

So imagine his surprise when the klaxons blared loudly for the first time in over ten years.

"Alert! Alert! Unidentified object has appeared!" one crewman's young voice rang through the comms of the Fourth Column.

Taken aback, the captain did not know what to do. He was frozen in place and let the red lights flooded over him and the bridge's pristine silver floors. The rest of his command crew were at their posts, doing as they trained for several times, taking any readings they can find and giving out commands.

"Unknown object, detected! Frequency, unknown!"

"All hands, man your stations! This is not a drill! I repeat, this is not..."

"I don't care what those idiots are doing! Get them up here, now!"

"Tracking trajectory of unknown object! Coming in at mark zero-zero-nine..."

"All pilots, report in to your squad leaders!"

"... you serious?! Get someone on those batteries!"

"Captain, your orders?!"

Snapped out of his daze, Jenkins smoothed the creases in his uniform. "I need a report from engineering! I want to know what's going on!" he ordered the lieutenant who asked, a scrawny man in blue.

The next minute felt like hours before Jenkins got a response, "Captain, we can't get a visual on object!"

Jenkins frowned. "Ready the thrusters! Get us in closer to that thing!"'

"Sir, we can't-"

"Do as I say!" Jenkins barked at the corporal who spoke up.

The floor shuddered on the captain's command within minutes. "Approaching the object," announced the same corporal. "ETA in five minutes."

Those five minutes felt like an eternity. Already, Jenkins heard hushed whispers of concern from his crew. He would have told them to shut up if he wasn't so unsettled and trying to figure out the reason behind it.

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AN: And that's all I have. This was initially a prologue I had written for my retelling of 1978's Space Pirate Captain Harlock. It is a bit old (about 7 years) and I never really got far aside from this, despite having the plot figured out. In any case, I do hope you liked it. Thanks and take care.

-W.S.