Twisted Glory

       Chapter one- Koroth

               

                "Captain! Planet Koroth in view, twenty degrees off starboard sir!" cried a frightened looking cabin boy, after bursting into the private courters of Captain Barof. Barof was an imposing figure, tall, broad shouldered and well muscled, although streaks of gray were starting to show in his hair he was no less diminished.  Sam Barof was captain of the Arkangel, starship of the Ascarate, a group of deadly space pirates, renowned for not being renowned. Stories floated around of their exploits, of how they appeared out of thin air next to a ship full of important nobles, or a transport ship carrying expensive cargo, leaving nothing in their wake except the burned out husks of the starships they ransacked.               "Good, alert the troops and send word to John to meet me at the bridge" barked out Barof with a grim expression on his face.                                         "Yes sir, right away sir!" the cabin boy said snapping out a sharp salute and turning on his heel and marching quickly out of the door, which slide aside with a neumatic  hiss.                         Once the cabin boy had gone Captain Barof gathered himself together. Pulling on his jacket, embroidered with three golden stars set in a triangle at the tip of a silver sword which served as the symbol of the Ascarate, he strapped on his blaster and plasma cutlass. Then he  headed out of the door the cabin boy had just departed through and sealed it behind him with a quick tap on the security pad set into the wall next to the door.                 He marched down the short metal corridor to the teleporter, which was the quickest and only method of moving between floors on the gigantic starship, and stepped into it, selecting as he did so the Bridge as his desired destination.                                        With a brief flash of green light Captain Barof appeared in the Bridge. Filled to the brim with flashing screens, technicians working furiously to keep everything on board the behemoth starship in working order, and a huge window which provided a view of  the medium sized blue-ish gray planet that was their destination. The window was made out of a special compound durable enough to withstand the dangers in space, but still be able to provide an unobstructed view.                           Sam stalked down the lighted path that led through the middle of the Bridge, nodding slightly as the technicians stopped their work to stand and salute as he walked past. As he walked between two banks of control panels there was a small meep as the ship's cat, Prattchet, leaped on to his shoulders and started rubbing his head on the Captain's shoulder purring loudly.                                         Barof gently stroked the cat's head with one hand while beckoning at the starship's navigator with the other.                                           Navigator Shusk hurried over to Captain Barof with a data pad in his hands and smile of satisfaction on his face.  "Captain, you'll be pleased to know that everything is running smoothly and on schedule, we'll arrive on Koroth in a matter of hours, and the few scans we've run have showed  a perfect landing zone near the Gates"                                  "How near the gates, exactly?" asked Sam with something indecernable in his voice "We can't risk activating anything that may be nearby, you know that" with a glance at Shusk.

Reviews

[Weaver]

comma after "twenty degrees off starboard" (separate a direct address, such as calling the captain "sir," from the rest of the sentence with a comma)
"the private courters" - "quarters"
"broad shouldered and well muscled" - broad-shouldered and well-muscled" - period after this and start new sentence with "Although streaks of gray"
comma after "in his hair"
italicize names of ships ("Archangel" is the usual spelling)
"renowned for not being renowned" - good line!
"burned out husks" - "burned-out husks"
comma (or exclamation mark) after "meet me at the bridge" (which would be better as "on the bridge")
comma after "right away"
comma after "cabin boy said"
"which slide aside with a neumatic hiss" - "pneumatic" - It wouldn't really space opera without this classic Trekkish touch, would it? :)
comma after "cabin boy had gone"
"his blaster and plasma cutlass" - I'm rather fond of the sword-and-gun combo myself, where it's appropriate in fiction, but I'm not sure how one would make a plasma cutlass - they're curved blades. Would a metal blade with a super-heated edge work as well for your pirate captain?
"Then he headed out of the door the cabin boy had just departed through and sealed it behind him with a quick tap on the security pad set into the wall next to the door" - You're stringing too many prepositional phrases together in your sentences, and doing it too often. The reader gets lost. Occasionally break up the description into a few smaller sentences, instead of trying to fit everything about a subject into one sentence.
"teleporter, which was the quickest and only method of moving between floors" - Quickest, okay, but ONLY? That's a bad idea; if the teleporter malfunctions at all, or if the ship loses power, or if someone boards the ship and takes control of the teleporter, the crew are without means of moving around their own ship.
don't capitalize "bridge"
comma after "flash of green light" (and don't capitalize "bridge")
"a huge window" - I do hope they have blast shields of some sort to cover this in battle. No matter how tough the material, a screen that can be seen through is vulnerable to lasers. (If light can go through it, coherent light can REALLY go through it.)
"medium sized blue-ish gray planet" - "medium-sized, bluish gray planet"
comma after "two banks of control panels"
"the Captain's shoulder" - Don't capitalize "captain" except when before his name ("Captain Barof") or when used as a direct address ("Yes, Captain, right away.")
comma after "shoulder"
"and smile of satisfaction" - "and a smile of satisfaction"
period, not comma, after "on schedule"
period after "near the Gates"
(This has me slightly curious - I wonder what these gates are.)
Either capitalize "Gates" all the time, or don't do it at all.
period after "in his voice"
"you know that" with a glance at Shusk." - "you know that," he said with a glance at Shusk."

You have to be careful when combining pirate-era stuff with science fiction; not everything translates reasonably, and you have to be prepared to change some of it to keep the sci-fi aspect intact.
A little bit more tension in this chapter would help. We don't know why they're going to Korath, and although this bit about the Gates at the end has potential to be a source of conflict, we're not SHOWN that.