“You are not rated for this craft,” she snapped in her native tongue while Corporal Gnuko entered the cabin via the rear, cargo ramp. “Captain Middleton must have his best pilot on this mission; we should wait for a replacement.”
“I assure you that I have logged over three hundred hours in various small craft cockpit configurations,” Fei Long riposted. “I am more than qualified to fly this mission.”
“You?” she scoffed as she clambered over the missiles while the cargo ramp slowly raised behind the four of them—five, including the unconscious pilot. “You have never flown any spacecraft; I have read your file!”
“I confess my only experience is in virtual sims operating at three hundred percent regular speed. Still…I am pleasantly surprised to find you have been reading up on me,” he quipped as he slotted into the co-pilot’s chair.
She felt herself go red-faced at his suggestion and slapped the back of his head with probably more force than she should have. “I have interfaced with this craft, and of the four conscious crewmembers aboard the shuttle, my reflexes are best and I am rated for emergency operation of such a vehicle.”
“Why do you think I chose this chair?” he said with an exasperated sigh as he rubbed the back of his head before gesturing toward the pilot’s chair. A moment later, Fei Long’s fingers flicked across the various switches and control icons which put the shuttle through its pre-flight routine, and there was an audible hum as the systems came online.
Lu Bu strapped into the pilot’s chair and assisted in the pre-flight routine wordlessly, casting occasional glances over at Fei Long as he carried out his portion of the procedure.
Corporal Gnuko ducked his head into the cockpit and proffered a pair of head bags with attached com-link ear buds before asking hesitantly, “Are you sure you two can fly this thing?”
“Yes,” Lu Bu snapped as she snatched a head bag and placed it over her face, after which she placed the ear bud and gave it a test. She then activated the self-sealing apparatus to lock behind her jaw, ears and occipital bone, at which time it sealed and she began to breathe her own recycled air.
Fei Long did likewise, and when he spoke she found his irritating voice to be thankfully muffled, “Shuttlecraft Galileo making emergency liftoff in twenty seconds; all personnel are to evacuate the shuttle bay. Repeat: evacuate shuttle bay in sixteen seconds in preparation for rapid decompression.”
The seconds ticked by, and the light above the cockpit’s main viewport flashed yellow before turning green, which said the shuttle bay was now cleared for an emergency liftoff.
Lu Bu pulled back on the manual controls and the craft lifted a half meter from the deck as the twin set of doors at the shuttle bay’s exit opened, causing a rush of air as the remnants of atmosphere inside the chamber escaped through the rapidly opening airlock doors.
“Commencing flight,” Lu Bu said, having forgotten the actual phrase she was supposed to use as she twisted the left side of the manual interface and spurring the craft forward.
They exited the Pride of Prometheus’ shuttle bay and Lu Bu immediately banked wide, in an attempt to get clear of the ship’s flare-zone—the immediate vicinity surrounding an actively-shielded vessel—so as to avoid any potential redirected, incoming weapons fire from catching the Galileo in the dissipation wave caused by impact on a warship’s shields.
She risked a glance at the Pride of Prometheus, for the first time having a chance to see their vessel’s exterior with her own eyes. The ship was even more impressive to the naked eye than its technical schematics and scantlings could ever convey, and she felt a surge of pride as its forward batteries fired in rapid succession, with each of the ten heavy lasers sending a blast of fiery red shot forward as the Pride’s engines burned with a bluish-green light.
“Where do we deploy the missiles?” she asked in their native tongue, knowing that perfect communication was more important than protocol in this particular circumstance.
“Anywhere,” Fei Long replied as he undid the harness which secured him to the chair, “we are already well within the tactical range of these devices. Cut the engines while we prepare to deploy the missiles.” He scampered out of the cargo bay and withdrew a data slate from his pocket as Lu Bu cut the engines.
They made their way into the cabin, and found that Gnuko and Peleus had already removed the access panels from each missile. Fei Long set down beside the first missile and made a hard connection between it and his data slate, which had yet another type of cable connected to it. He finished more quickly than she thought possible, and as he moved to the next unit Gnuko made to replace the access panel.
“There is no need, Sergeant,” Fei Long said dismissively as he repeated the process, which took him ten seconds per missile. When he was finished he gestured for the Sergeant to open the cargo ramp, and wrapped his arm around a nearby cargo net. Lu Bu and Peleus did likewise, while Gnuko went to the control panel and began the gradual decompression cycle of the cabin. Normally they would have stored the atmospheric gases in the shuttle’s reserve tanks, but that process would have taken several minutes. So there was a gradually increasing rush of air as the ramp lowered slowly, but after just a few seconds the effect diminished until dissipating entirely, and the ramp lowered completely.
“Do we need to point these things in a certain direction?” Gnuko asked over their ear bud com-links after the door had opened.
“Simply slide them out one by one,” Fei Long urged, “and keep them as straight as possible. The onboard guidance systems will do the rest after they are activated. We must hurry, however,” he added almost as an afterthought, “they are on a manual countdown of two minutes before their drives will ignite.”
Needing no further encouragement, the three Lancers aboard the shuttle forcibly shoved each missile out the back of the shuttle, which created a rather ominous sight. After each missile cleared the grav-plates of the shuttle, they floated directly behind the craft—with their noses pointed directly at the tiny, all-too-vulnerable shuttle.
When the tenth missile was out, Lu Bu turned and entered the cockpit, finding Fei Long had already done so. Gnuko closed the cargo door, and a few moments after the seals had locked down, the cabin began to fill with life-giving atmosphere.
Before she could re-gain her seat, Lu Bu saw Fei Long bank the shuttle toward the Pride of Prometheus, which was only visible by a pinpoint of blue-green light marking its engine flare, and then by another red-hued volley from the forward batteries.
“Missile engines lighting in three…two…one…fire,” Fei Long said calmly, and his words were followed by a sequential flaring of white engine fire as the missiles activated in a line, starting at the front of the group and leaping like dominoes to those behind.
As the weapons surged toward the fray of battle, Fei Long sat back in his chair, laced his fingers behind his head and breathed a short sigh, “Our task is now complete; we should attempt to rendezvous with the Pride of Prometheus.”
“Negative,” Gnuko said severely as he leaned into the cockpit, “protocol dictates that we hang back so we don’t limit the Pride’s maneuvering options. This shuttle’s unarmed, and our shields can’t withstand the capital weapon exchanges out there; we sit tight for now and stay out of tactical range. We can’t do anything else from here.”
“Starfire missiles on approach, Captain,” Sarkozy reported. “If their timers are correctly set, they’ll fire in forty seconds.”
“Make sure there’s no overlap between their assigned targets and the gun deck’s shots,” Middleton reminded as the battle cruiser received another volley of fire from the remaining destroyer.
“The battle cruiser’s ventral weaponry is mostly off-line; that destroyer’s firing with surgical precision, Captain,” Sarkozy said with obvious admiration.
“Remember,” the Captain reminded, “those guns are under the direction of computers.”
“Man, not Machine, Captain,” Sarkozy said unexpectedly, and while Middleton
had never cared for that particular expression, he knew that many of the crew would share the expressed sentiment. He had issued a fairly damning repudiation of the droids’ potential sentience himself at the outset of the battle, so he let the political catchphrase slide. “If recharge rates are constant, the battle cruiser’s primary weapon should fire in two minutes,” the Tactical Officer added.
“They aren’t ‘recharge rates,’ Ensign,” Middleton corrected. “Those big guns are powered by antimatter so it’s not an issue of power generation. The siege weapons should fire as soon as they’ve loaded another pellet into the breech; we just don’t know enough about their weaponry to guess how long that will be. Still,” he added pointedly, “we’ll use your interval until better information is available.”
“Starfires to fire in three…two…one,” Sarkozy reported, and the swarm of enemy fighters on approach with the battle cruiser flashed as the icons of the Starfire missiles winked out in unison. “Ten hits, ten kills,” she said fiercely, “that leaves twelve fighters entering short combat range now, Captain.”
The twelve remaining fighter icons approached the battle cruiser and flashed, indicating weapons’ fire. The icon of the battle cruiser became bright red, and it began to strobe rhythmically, indicating serious structural damage had been indicated.
“The battle cruiser’s primary weapon should fire in twenty seconds” Sarkozy reported as the Pride’s forward batteries took what would likely be their final shot at the fighters before their proximity to the battle cruiser made such fire too great of a liability to continue doing so. The seconds ticked by, and when the clock reached zero there was no great flash indicating weapon fire.
Middleton tensed. “If their primary weapon is offline,” he said darkly, “then the table just tilted against us. Concentrate all fire on the destroyer, Ensign.”
The battle cruiser rolled to present its freshest facing and unleashed a fresh volley of standard weapons fire on the relatively fresh destroyer. “The battle cruiser has overcharged her turbolasers, Captain…the destroyer’s shields are fluctuating like nothing I’ve ever seen. Enemy fighters are attempting to veer off from the battle cruiser, sir.”
The fighters had actually closed to ‘swarm range,’ meaning they were so close to the capital vessel that distinguishing their signals had become too difficult for the automatic sensors.
The Sensors operator chimed in, “I’m seeing power spikes all along the battle cruiser’s grid…if I’m reading this right, they’re—“
The background image of the battle cruiser on the main viewer showed a sequence of explosions running along its hull—right before the vessel’s reactor went critical and a miniature nova formed where the formidable warship had been.
Middleton understood full well what had just happened—and what message he had been given by it. “Verify those fighters were caught in the blast,” he said grimly.
“Verifying,” Sarkozy acknowledged before nodding her head with certainty, “all twelve fighters are confirmed destroyed, Captain.”
He leaned forward in his chair and considered his next course of action. The droid battle cruiser had sacrificed itself to cover the Pride’s escape, and flight was almost certainly warranted given the circumstances. But the Pride was simply too damaged to flee; if her systems were at maximum, the odds were good that they could reach the hyper limit and bug out before the destroyer could bring her down, but with a faltering shield grid and potential inbound fighters…
“Helm,” he said, his mind made up, “give me flank speed.”
“Course, Captain?” Commander Jersey asked, as though it needed to be said.
“The only way out of this mess is through it,” Middleton replied, knowing that given the two vessels’ relative courses and velocities, there was no way they could come about and create any meaningful distance between themselves and the enemy vessel. “Let’s see how these droids handle a game of ‘chicken’.”
“Aye,” Jersey replied in his usual, sour tone, “adjusting for ‘chicken’ course.”
“Captain,” Sarkozy interjected as the Pride adjusted its course to bear down on the enemy vessel, “if their primary weapon is still online—“
“Then we’re dead no matter what we do,” Middleton interrupted. “Our shield grid can’t handle even one of those shots, and we have to assume that ship has fighters like the first one. The only way we get out of here is by knocking that destroyer’s engines offline and pressing our own hard enough to escape the range of those fighters.”
“Yes, Captain,” Sarkozy acknowledged stiffly, clearly stinging from the rebuke.
“Tell the gun deck we’ll get more two shots,” Middleton said heavily after performing some mental math, “and they need to make them count.”
The seconds began to tick by as the Pride of Prometheus entered medium weapons range. The destroyer actually seemed to accept the challenge, as it poured its own engines on and began firing its weaponry, which was thankfully light by comparison to the Pride’s first, concerted volley of the run.
“Our first volley was eight for ten with five direct hits on the hull,” Sarkozy reported. “Their shields still haven’t recovered, and I’m registering multiple internal explosions throughout their ship.”
“Our own shields have collapsed, Captain,” the Shields operator reported after a short burst of incoming fire rocked the deck beneath their feet. “I’ve got multiple blown relays along the grid; working to restore the stern shields now.”
“Good work, Shields,” Middleton said approvingly. If this recent hail of lighter weapon fire was all the destroyer could bring to bear, the Pride’s forward armor could almost certainly absorb it before the two ships passed each other. Middleton risked exposing his engines after the pass, but the stern shield grid was currently their best defensive facing, so it was a risk he had to take.
“I’m getting a strange reading, Captain,” Sensors said nervously. “It looks like their jump engine is on a critical overload.”
“Verify that,” Middleton barked, understanding now why the droids had chosen to accept his game of ‘chicken.’
“Readings verified, Captain,” Sarkozy said with certainty. “They’ve set their jump drive to overload in three minutes.”
“Which is about how long it will take for us to pass by,” Jersey said pointedly. “Looks like they’ve thrown down the gauntlet, Captain.”
“Even if their drive goes,” Middleton said as he recalled the total energy involved in a destroyer’s jump drive going critical, “they’d have to be right on top of us for it to cause any damage to the hull.”
“But if it goes off directly in our path,” Sarkozy said in a calm, professional tone, “then the radiation will pass right through our unshielded bow and into the ship’s compartments. If they time it right…”
“Then while the ship itself will survive with minimal damage, every living thing on it will be dead within an hour,” Middleton finished for her before grudgingly adding, “clever. We’ll have to take our forward weapons off them to shield ourselves from the incoming wave of radiation, at which time they’ll launch their fighters to prevent our guns from picking them off.”
The sole, decisive advantage to having the forward batteries essentially fix-mounted was the resulting accuracy the finer adjustment mechanisms they employed afforded the gunners. Normally heavy lasers would have difficulty accurately firing on individual fighters, but at medium or even short range, the Pride’s heavy lasers could pick off even the individual fighters with the same degree of accuracy as they could land on larger ships at long range.
“Never played such a complicated game of ‘chicken,’ Captain,” Jersey scoffed as the Pride of Prometheus continued on its collision course with the enemy destroyer.
“First time for everything, Commander,” Middleton replied. “Steady on course; we’ll bank hard to port after our guns have landed on the destroyer’s hull. We don’t have any choice in the matter.”
“Ay
e, Captain,” Jersey acknowledged, “banking after the cannons clear.”
The recharge cycle of the forward array ticked up one by one, with battery four taking an extra sixteen seconds likely due to some damage it had sustained during the recent exchange.
“Firing,” Sarkozy reported as the laser cannons pierced the vacuum of space, and the bow of the enemy destroyer erupted in a series of violent explosions. “Ten for ten,” she said with subdued enthusiasm, “the enemy vessel has extreme damage to its forward hull and its entire superstructure is deforming violently.”
The image of the enemy destroyer, which was a battered dodecahedron with multiple large gashes opened along its many forward facings, seemed almost to explode as the stern of the craft began to deform. For a moment, Middleton thought they had caused critical damage to the enemy vessel—then he saw that what he had assumed was a cloud of fractured hull material was actually a dozen, smaller, twelve-sided vessels which fired their thrusters and took off from the ruined destroyer at what looked to be maximum speed.
“I’m reading fourteen fighters,” Sarkozy reported as Commander Jersey finally slewed the ship to present the still-shielded starboard broadside of the Pride.
The enemy vessel exploded, and rings of energy could be seen expanding in multiple directions a few seconds before the Pride of Prometheus’ warning alarms went off.
“We’ve passed into the radiation field,” Sensors reported.
“Keep our stern facing the epicenter, Helm,” Middleton ordered.
“Aye, Captain,” Jersey grouched, and for some reason Captain Middleton felt reassured by the older man’s sullen demeanor, which had been largely absent during his tenure as the ship’s XO.
“Incoming fighters,” Sarkozy reported as the roughly circular formation of fighters began to close on the Pride. “They’re braking against their forward momentum, Captain,” she said in obvious surprise.
“What?” Middleton asked before drawing the only conclusion he could and feeling a knot form in his throat. He thumbed the com-link on his chair and raised the Lancer priority channel, “This is the Captain to all Lancers: suit up and prepare to receive boarders.” With that said, he turned to Tactical, and was pleased to see that Sarkozy appeared to have taken the revelation in stride—either that, or she had drawn the same conclusion, “Coordinate with Commander Jersey, Ensign Sarkozy; I want our stern lasers to fire on those ships before they latch onto our hull.”
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