by Arlin Fehr
'John, can we move any closer?' Vick asked the helmsmen.
'Sure thing tricky Vick.' John said.
Victor glared in John's direction, he hated that nickname.
Looking back at his console, he saw the planet was getting closer.
'What have we got here Vick?' Sam asked.
'This thing should be a dead world, but I've got energy readings coming from below the surface. I've also got a small heat signature that's moving.'
'Could be a ship,' Sam said.
Victor nodded his agreement, 'We can either try to pin it with active sensors or go dark and see if we can sneak up on it.'
Vick looked over at the rest of the crew, Ise closed her eyes for a moment and then opened them and looked to Sam.
'Based on the parameters of the mission, Lenny thinks the chances of it being a Lobster ship are about 79%.' She said.
'So our Guardian votes hostile. Vick, make us dark, Jing, power level 1.' Sam ordered.
From across the bridge, Victor heard Jing give his acknowledgement and then started work on the stealth systems.
The power levels dropped and many of the systems went into stand by. Victor activated his scattering fields and jamming systems.
'Kanto is dark captain.' Victor reported.
'John, take us around the planet, lets try and see this ship.'
'Aye captain. Taking us over.'
'Nice and slow John.'
Victor watched his display. Dan's fighter had gone dark after he had launched. It no longer showed up on any of Victor's scopes, it's small size made it even harder to detect when running dark.
Scanning the area around the planet, Victor couldn't get a good reading on the signal he was trying to lock down. Something else drew his eye.
'Captain, I'm getting something else from the planet. There's a signal of some kind. It's working in pulses. Some kind of continuous transmission.' Victor reported.
'Any sign of our ghost?'
'Not yet ma'am. I think he's gone dark too.' Vick said, 'And if he's gone dark, he probably doesn't have any buddies near by, otherwise he would have just tried to pin us with an active sensor pulse and light us up.'
Sam stood thinking for a moment, Victor waited for an order.
'Try and pin down that signal, it's got to have an array on the surface we can have a look at. If we can tap into it, maybe we can find what the Lobsters are broadcasting too.'
'Lenny thinks we should be careful,' Ise said, referring to the ships Guardian, 'The Lobsters don't have faster than light communication so if they are broadcasting to something, it's close. Whatever is here, it's probably not as alone as we think.'
'Captain, if we wait here for a bit, I can try to figure more out about the signal.' Victor suggested.
Sam nodded, 'We'll stay put. Ise, tell Dan to hold his position and stay dark.'
'Yes Captain.'
***
They had been sitting in position for half an hour. Victor was quiet while he worked on the signal. The rest of the crew waited in tense silence.
Samantha got up from her chair and slowly began to pace around the bridge. It was a habit of hers. It helped her burn through her own tension. She walked over to Jing's station.
'How we holding out Jing?' She asked.
'Batteries are at 78%. We can keep the generator off for another two hours or so. After that we'll have to go to power level 2. We can stay out of 3 and 4 so long as we don't get into any fights. But you know, with our resident ghost in the area, we may need to do a little ghost busting.' Jing said with a small smile on his face.
His tall frame always looked uncomfortable in the bridge seats, and Samantha always thought Jing would be more comfortable wrapped around a reactor assembly.
'Keep a thumb on the button.' Sam told Jing.
'Hey captain, is now a bad time to mention I'm having a real bad feeling about this?' she heard John say from the helm.
'You always have a bad feeling about things Johnny,' Jing commented.
'Eyes forward you two. We've got a job to do.' Sam said.
Samantha moved back to her seat. Her communicator beeped. She flipped it on, 'Captain Geer here.'
'Lt. Higgins here. I think I spotted a flash of something far port side. Just above the horizon of the planetoid. Orders?'
'Vick, got anything?' Sam asked.
'No ma'am. Nothing.' Victor said.
'Hmm,' she raised up her communicator again, 'Move to the point between us and where you saw it. We'll swing around and have closer look.'
'Aye Captain.'
'John, bring us about port side, point us just over the planetoid's horizon.'
'Aye aye Captain.'
The levity was fading. it was time for business.
'Captain, I'm getting something now.' Vick said.
'Report.'
'Energy build up from the planet.'
'Is it a weapon?'
'I don't know... hang on, it's changing.'
The bridge was silent.
'It's a sensor pulse! We've been detected!' Victor exclaimed.
***
'Hostile detected, bearing 013, by 021. It's riding dark, but it's going active.' John heard Victor say.
Jing, power level 4. John, bring us about, take us out of here.'
John nodded and gripped the controls. He swung the ship around and set the engines to maximum. He heard the captain continue her orders.
'Ise, have Lenny run simulations, get us a plan together. Dan, you still with us?'
'Aye Captain, going active now, my stealth is blown anyway,' came the reply over the communicator.
'Cover us. We don't know if more are going to be coming. Stay close to us. If you can drive the bogey off, do so, but you'll need to be ready to re-link with the Kanto when our jump drive comes back on.'
'Roger that Captain, U.P.N. Nimbus will cover you.'
'Jing, what's the status of our systems?' John heard Sam asked. He was eager to hear how long he'd have to keep avoiding the hostile. A glance at his terminal showed it was getting closer.
'Reactor start up in progress. We'll be running on batteries for at least another 5 minutes. Weapons are at minimal range only. Jump drive will be back online in fifteen minutes.'
'That's a long time to wait Jing, see if you can speed it up,' Sam urged, 'Vick, anything else on sensors?'
'No Ma'am. It's the strangest thing, it looks like he was just as shocked by the sensor pulse as we were.'
'We'll figure that out later. For now keep an eye out for additional hostiles.'
John saw another dot on his terminal, coming from the red hostile dot, 'Incoming missile.'
'Victor.' Sam prompted calmly.
'Firing a decoy.'
John watched the dot getting close, a lump in his throat. It still seemed to be following them. He put the ship into a sharp turn, and the missile wavered on its course, exploding where they had been only moments before.
'That was a close one Vick.' John commented.
'Can't help it. Their tracking tech is getting better.' He commented back.
'Reactor online.' Jing reported.
'Anti-missile systems coming online now. Opening weapon ports.' Victor reported.
'More missiles, we've got three this time!' John reported, that lump in his throat back again.
***
The enemy fighter seemed completely uninterested in the Nimbus and that served Dan just fine. When it closed in and started to fire more missiles, he swung around and blew one of the missiles out of the sky with his rail guns. It was a lucky shot, but it did the trick. The Kanto's defences took care of the other two, though the last one got dangerously close.
Dan decided he'd have to give the Lobster something to think about.
Coming around again, he fired at the pursuing craft. It rolled out of the way and twisted around. Too late, Dan saw his mistake, the Lobster was twisting to get on his tail.
Cursing his lack of judgement, he began to manoeuvre hard. A
missile warning flared up. The enemy had yet to touch his main guns.
Holding down the kill button on his control stick, Dan shut off his engines and swung his ship around, momentum still carrying him forward. He saw the missile moving closer and began to fire. One of his shots connected and the missile exploded. He spotted the Lobster ship angling away after the Kanto and aimed at it.
Taking his finger off the kill button, his engine flared to life again. His ship shuddered and started to fly in a descending arc around the Kanto, his nose still pointed at the enemy fighter. He squeezed his trigger again, firing a rail gun round at his foe.
He saw a flash near the rear of the enemy fighter as his shot was vaporized by something.
***
'Dan, he's got some kind of active defence on his top side. You'll have to hit him from the belly or lure him to us so we can hit him with the Thercon.'
'Roger that.' Dan gritted his teeth. Neither of those options sounded easy. If he lured the Lobster close enough for the Kanto to use it's thermal cannon, they'd be in danger. On the other hand, if he tried hitting the Lobster on the underbelly, the Lobster would be trying very hard to avoid that, 'Are you sure he's only got one topside?'
'We've got a nice long scan of his ship while you've been keeping him busy. Lenny calculates that a ship that size is only going to have another two missiles. We don't recognize this fighter type though, so we don't know what it's using for a main gun. It's a new model.'
'Fantastic,' Dan said unhappily.
Dan's arc had straightened out and he was heading in a path towards the planet. Checking his scopes, he saw the fighter had decided against ignoring him and was firmly on his tail.
He was pulling away from the Lobster's ship.
I must have the speed advantage, Dan thought to himself.
Dan cut back his engines slightly so he didn't pull away anymore, and let the enemy fighter close. He started to manoeuvre slightly, trying to give him a more difficult shot.
A missile warning flashed again. The Lobster was firing from long range.
Thumbing the kill button again, he swung the nose around and faced the missile. His computer beeped at him, and he fired off a small interceptor missile. It speed out of his fighter and exploded the incoming missile before it got to him. The enemy was still closing.
Another missile warning flashed, this time from behind him.
He swung around again, there was the light from an active missile engine coming directly at him. He let go of the kill button and aimed slightly under the incoming missile. Before it got to him, he fired his topside manoeuvring jets, and his fighter kicked downward. The missile passed overhead, and exploded behind him. His fighter went into a spin and his engines cut out suddenly.
The stars spun around him, and he struggled to gain control of his fighter. He was acutely aware that the enemy was closing on him.
The front inch of the nose of his fighter glowed white and vanished. A nearly fatal hit by a thermal weapon.
He got his spinning craft under control and saw the enemy fighter coming at him from the side. He fired his front jets and his fighter jerked backwards.
The enemy craft struggled to correct, but went shooting over the front of Dan's fighter. He squeezed his trigger, and a rail gun bolt buried itself into the underbelly of the enemy craft. It's back exploded outward in a shower of shimmering debris and the craft started to twist towards the planet.
Dan fought to get his engines back, but nothing worked. He was falling towards the planet.
He activated the crash protocols on his fighter and braced himself.
'Mayday, Mayday, this is Lt. Higgins, I'm going down,' he said over his communicator.
***
The mayday message was scarcely out of the speakers by the time the crew was in motion.
'Track the Nimbus,' Sam said.
'On it,' Victor said, 'he's falling towards the planets surface. He cut off too much of his forward momentum before he got hit.'
'Ise, probabilities?'
'Lenny says high chance of surviving the initial impact, though he will not escape without being wounded.'
'John, get us moving.'
'Yes Ma'am.'
The ship twisted around back towards the planet. The engines flared and they started back.
'Vick, where's the lobster's ship?'
'On a parabolic course to the far side of the planet. His landing's not going to be as rough as Dan's.'
Sam bit her lower lip and thought for a moment.
If that fighter comes back around, we'll have a harder time of it.
'Ise, what's Lenny's thoughts on that fighter coming back?'
'He has insufficient information on this new kind of fighter to make a prediction.'
Sam nodded slowly to her self, it wasn't what she wanted to hear.
'Okay, we'll get in close to the Nimbus and hover in position. We're not going to go for a full landing. Ise, I want you to retrieve Dan, you don't need a pressure suit to survive, plus you've got the strength to get him back to the ship by yourself if you have to.'
Sam didn't like sending their Advocate out by herself, but they needed to be quick and maintain their combat readiness.
'Yes Ma'am. I'll retrieve Lt. Higgins.'
Sam stood up from her seat and clasped her hands behind her back. 'John, take us to the planet. I want us in position to let Ise drop as soon as the dust has settled.'
CHAPTER 2
U.P.N. Nimbus – Over unknown world
Dan continued to fight with his dieing fighter, but one by one his systems blinked offline. He reached for his eject toggle, but paused. It wasn't meant to be used in a planet's gravity well. He didn't like the idea of falling to his death with little more than a pressure suit and a seat for protection. His manoeuvring jets still worked, and he used them to try and slow his ship as much as possible. He had no other options.
Planet's not too big, and I'm not on a bad angle. Shouldn't hit too hard.
He checked his sensor scope. It was showing the planet closing towards him.
He braced himself in the cockpit as the fighter slammed into the surface of the planet.
The impact threw him violently to the side of the cockpit. The fighter bounced up off the surface and careened in an arcing roll. The wing of the fighter caught on the ground and pulled the fighter back down, sending it tumbling across the surface.
Dan was thrown against his restraints and felt something slam into his chest. A sharp pain shot through him as the fighter came to a sliding halt.
Dan wheezed, his breath caused a wave of pain to wash over him. He tried to take shallow breaths and that seemed to help.
He lay there, and realized his fighter was on it's side. He tried to activate the release mechanism for the cockpit, but the fighter's weight was keeping the canopy closed, pushing it into the ground. He tried his communications system, but nothing was working. His fighter was completely dead.
Dan looked up carefully and could scarcely see anything other than the grey surface of the planet.
He stayed in his awkward hanging position, and closed his eyes. He decided to take a moment to rest before he tried anything else.
***
'The Nimbus has come to a stop, captain. It looked like a rough landing,' reported Victor.
John didn't care to think about how rough it had been. He'd been in a few wrecks in his life. None of them had been his fault though.
Gotta give Dan credit, it wasn't his fault either, and he went down swinging, he thought to himself.
'John, take us into position,' he heard Samantha say behind him.
'Roger that captain. Bringing us into position,' he replied, moving the ship in low. John gingerly piloted the ship towards the fallen fighter. He saw the angle on which it had come to a stop, 'We better be quick, or Danny's going to have one heck of a headache ma'am.'
'That's the idea. How are you doing Ise?' John heard Samantha say.
'I'm ready to disembark cap
tain, just waiting for you to come to a stop,' Ise replied through the communication system.
John brought the ship where it needed to be and fired the manoeuvring jets to maintain position, 'We're good captain,'
'Ise, you're free to go.'
'Aye captain.'
'John, rear camera feed please,'
'Yes ma'am.' John keyed a quick command on his terminal, and a rear camera feed displayed on the view screen. Ise could be seen standing at the end of a ramp on the bottom of the ship. She wore no space suit, and her dark form stood out against the light grey surface of the planet, illuminated by the ships lights. John marvelled at the sight. She jumped off the ramp and disappeared out of sight. After a minute, she could be seen trudging over the grey surface of the planet towards the battered form of the Nimbus.
'Approaching the Nimbus,' she said over the comm link, 'No sign of movement.'
John looked over his shoulder at the captain, she was glued to the screen, and seemed to be holding her breath. He turned back to the display.
Ise was standing next to the fighter now. She had bent over and knelt on the ground. With one of her hands braced on a wing, she knocked on the cockpit canopy. She seemed to be looking at something. She made a gesture with her hand and then stood back up.
'Dan's alive. He was just resting. His communication system seems to be damaged.'
John heard Sam exhale and say, 'How is he doing?'
'Cognitive, but groggy. I'm going to see if I can free him,' Ise replied.
'Do you need a hand?' Sam asked.
'No Captain.'
John watched as Ise walked to the back of the ship. She gripped the sides of the engine housing and heaved. The ship wobbled, and then rolled back upright, throwing up a cloud of dust that obscured the camera feed.
'Captain, I've got an odd reading on my sensors,' Victor said.
John checked his scopes quickly. No sign of a ship. Not sure what Victor could be seeing, he turned to look at him and said, 'I got nothing on my scope Vick.'