[snip]

“You’re from Europe?” Guy confirmed with Richard. “FUBAR is an old North American word, from the US Army, I think? It’s an acronym and it’s coarse, but it basically means ‘a situation that is so damaged or out of control’. Anyhow, I’m up for a bout now, if you are, but I have no experience in Karate or any Japanese martial arts. At the academy we mainly were Boxing and Kick-Boxing, with a few eclectic moves added in for good measure.”

‘’Oh sorry ‘’ Sharp responded ‘’ For a moment it eluded me , anyway if you have no experience then I guess I’ll shall be your mentor ‘’.

M’Mera nodded, happy that Sharp was willing to step up and help his crewmate. “Let’ss head overr to the gymnassium then and at leasst intrroduce, Mrr. Fleegman to the arrt of hand to hand.” She said as she rose from her chair and walked around to the front of it while she waited for the two men to get up.

Sharp nodded and smiled but walking behind the Lt he gulped as he did not anticipate she was coming along as well. If she was going to take part the security imagined himself flying across the gymnasium * Me and my big mouth* he thought to himself.

Guy was looking forward to a demonstration of close quarters combat techniques from Richard and M’Mera. At the Academy he had only been shown the two-fisted punch, the “Kirk/Gorn ear” double hand-slap, and the drop-kick.

Reaching Deck 14, M’Mera led the way out of the turbolift and into the small gymnasium. It was equipped with a sparing ring for boxing/wrestling/fencing or other forms of hand to hand combat, and nautilus machinery. The ring itself wasn’t very big but big enough to give enough room for some sparring. Off to the side of the room was a changing area with several sets of work out clothes provided. M’Mera indicated the one of the two changing areas.
“You can change in therre, I’ll jusst be a moment mysself.”She said as she disappeared into the other change room.

“I think you’re regretting this now, are you?” Guy asked Richard.

Sharp nodded ‘’Sure am, don’t you know how strong Caitan species are compared to us humans ‘’.

“Well, it does feel a lot like getting homework from school, but I’m looking forward to it,” Guy said. “I’ll warn you, I have done a little Boxing, but I promise I’ll go easy with you, if you go easy on me with your Karate chops and the other weird martial art… Fu!”

He was not in the mood for jokes ‘’I was only going to teach you some moves on how to get your opponent down and not in one session either ,guess our D’H has different ideas !’’ he exclaimed.

Joe had had a rough and nerve-racking couple of days. His first instinct after all the things he’d been through was to find a bottle of whiskey and to retreat from existence as most people knew it for some time. He had finally made a saner decision and decided to go down to the gym instead to blow off some steam. He had been working on the speed trainer for some time now banging away at the bag quick to keep it going.

Finally, after this he pulled off his shirt and went to his bag and took out a cloth to wipe his now sweaty brow. He moved then to the heavy body bag. He started to hammer into the bag using a combination of his fists and kicks. He soon stepped back from the bag and wiped his brow again. He stood bent over and breathing hard as he smiled. Panting he said so himself.” Darn it Joe you’re getting old!” It wasn’t until then that he heard people behind him coming into the gym. Great he thought to himself. Now they’ve heard me talking to myself too!

He then turned to see Guy and waved saying with a smile, ” Nothing to see here just an out of shape old guy!”

“Yerrr…se!” Guy had to stop himself from replying ‘Yes, Sir!’ back to Joe. He found it hard to get used to the fact that the ex-COS and ex-XO was now just a simple barman on the Merrimack. Of course, Guy was one of the few crew who had been around long enough to remember that. He couldn’t remember now, exactly when Richard had joined the Merrimack. He did remember that Joe was quite a good Boxer himself. He was pretty good with the weights too as he remembered, and Guy thought, Out of shape, huh? I bet he can still leg press two or three times his body weight!

Richard had changed his clothes and on seeing Joe he too smiled at him ‘’Come over and join us ‘’ he called out .The security had no idea that the barman was once the COS and what he feared was only going to become worse.

Inside, Guy was screaming ** NO! . So, now he was going to be wrestled to the floor by Richard, while knocked about by Joe, and grappled by a Caitian. And this is mean to be relaxation? On the outside, Guy was just smiling back too.

The Klingons say, it matters not how many victories you have, provided that you always fight with honour, but then Klingons are over 6ft tall and built like a shuttlecraft!

• Guy, Sec