Chapter 4

Chapter 4

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Day 3

"Whoa," commented Nolan. "It's beautiful."

"You've been saying that for the past three days," Tengo replied. Thinking quickly, he added, "Uh, sir."

I grinned. It was beautiful, though. It really was. In the past seventy-two hours of our time here, we had been setting up camp. The three of us were escorting a three-craft formation of resource ships: two Collectors and one Controller, the Kumlaut, on a path through the asteroid field. We were latched onto the refueling pads of the Controller, so we didn't burn good propellant, but we were also in a good position to launch if things got dicey.

I broke my gaze from the nebula to notice that we had arrived at another isolated field of resources. The Collectors in front of us pushed forward and shot orange collection beams, stripping the layers of the asteroids centimeter by centimeter. I yawned. It had been about an hour of navigation since we had come across more asteroids. Probably should have expected them to be spread thinly, especially across over a light-year of distance.

I felt the hull of the Kumlaut beneath me shake as each of the Collectors docked, discharging their resources. I checked the sensors array onboard the Kumlaut to check the progress of our deep space star base. The Construction Yard was in the process of being connected to another quarter of it length. Most of our Destroyers and Ion Cannon Frigates were in a spherical formation around the Yard and the Carrier Maelstrom; the others were escorting our broken-up resource group. Only three automated missile turrets had been set up along the perimeter.

By the time our Collectors had sucked the field dry, I heard a warning signal in my cockpit. Uh-oh, I thought. Three red blips appeared on my radar, and I saw three Lzz-char starfighters hone in on our Collectors. "Alright. Angels Two and Five, release docking clamps and arm weapons. Speed to full." I swooped away from the Kumlaut, and towards the three vessels.

Two of them stopped, and the middle one kept approaching. Likewise, I ordered Tengo and Nolan to halt, and I moved closer to the Corporate star craft. We both stopped when we were ten meters away from each other, which was more than comfortably close. I switched my comm. to a broadband frequency and dictated, "This is Lieutenant Jake Sjet of the Hiigaran Armed Forces." The reply sounded very raspy, as if the person had not spoken in several years. Which made sense after a few minutes-the Corporate race were known to have telepathic faculties, so they wouldn't need to talk. "I am First Pilot H'lek, of the Corporate Army. We have laid claim to this sector of space, and wish to harvest it for minerals. You would be smart to vacate this sector of the nebula."

I was not miffed by this, and responded, "We also wish to harvest here. I wish to speak on behalf of our frontier fleet when I say this, we wish to split the field with you. There are more than enough minerals here to double both our fleets. If we stay out of each other's way, I'm sure we can resolve this peacefully." The alien seemed to mull this over. "That does seem presumptuous of you, considering you wouldn't know your superior's official stand on this matter." He (or she?) paused. "But you are correct. If we don't overlap our resource paths, we can do this peacefully. Take heed not to do so."

Their ships turned away, and he continued, "However, that is only our point of view. There are renegades in our race who may enjoy dominating this field. Be vigilant." And they shot off into hyperspace away from us. No one said anything for a while, and when I turned my ship around I noticed that neither the Collectors nor the Controller had budged a meter during the negotiations. Tengo said, "Well, that went well." Nolan added, "Too well, if you ask me."

Day 7

We did not see any sign of the Corporation for the following four days. But to ensure that we didn't fall into any problems with them, we spent our excess resources building fifty Probes, and we sent them to several set coordinates to set up a sector-wide sensor grid into the computer banks of our resident Sensors Array, the Vigilance. We plotted their harvesting patrol routes and modified our own to avoid them.

On the seventh day, however, things got interesting.

Two Support Frigates hypered near the main base of operations. Ten modified Bombers launched off of each of the ships. I ordered my squadron to launch, and targeted one of the Bombers. The Support Frigates were Kushan class, but they were clearly Taiidan Bombers. They had been modified with a turret to fend off starfighters while their main plasma weapons could target capital ships. And from their multiple color schemes and obscene logos printed on their hulls, I made only one conclusion. Pirates, I thought.

I was about to make the official first transmission, as if these characters cared for protocol, when they began discharging their weapons. I ordered the squadron to arm missiles, and I said, "This is Lieutenant Ja…"

"We know who you are, Sjet. And we aren't impressed."

The voice was clearly Taiidan, and the video feed from the comm. showed the alien (well, one that looked very much like our own) with buzzed-down black hair and a bionic implant over his right eye. "We don't really care either. We've been commissioned to rough you up."

I shook my head. That made no sense. "If you aren't aware, we overwhelm you in manpower, and if we feel tired we'll just leave the job to our missile turrets." The pirate shook his head. "We aren't stupid. We haven't come to lay siege to your base. Our employers just want us to knock out your certain operation here.

And before I could do anything, I saw two Bombers break off from their unstructured formation and set off to attack one of our Collectors. The three Defenders that were escorting it turned around to face the oncoming attackers. They fired a few rounds from their three guns, but the Bombers dodged the bullets and fired two blue spheres each back at them. Three of the four hit each of the Defenders with flawless accuracy, and the spherical ships detonated into large clouds of shrapnel. Then the pirates began firing on the bridge section of the massive Collector. The projectiles melted through the hull, and detonated. The flames ignited the resources in the storage chambers, and the ship exploded into a gaseous flame.

I ordered everyone to attack. I moved close to one of the lead Bombers, with Nolan and Myla on my flank, and I began the lock-on sequence for my missiles. The Bombers' turrets began firing at us, but we dipped and banked to miss the bullets. I primed one of my warheads, and let fly a yellow streak towards my target. The torpedo missed the mark, but its proximity sensors set off when it was close enough, and the explosion shattered the cockpit, sending the craft spinning on its horizontal axis towards me, and it chipped my port wing as I was turning to target another one of the Bombers.

I was surprised that, since they were all from different pirate clans, their ships weren't similarly diverse, that they'd have some faster ships like Scouts or Interceptors, which were decidedly cheaper. I saw one of my ships fly through the flaming remains of another craft, and I heard the Bentusi pilot, Krrrra'k, declare, "Nine has one!" I smiled; Nine was my old call sign. I moved into firing position of another Bomber, and I saw my armor-piercing rounds riddle its hull. I hit its starboard engine, which exploded, ripping up that whole section of the ship.

I checked my sensors; there were only five more Bombers. My people worked fast. I flipped through my targets to the one labeled Saber Tooth, which was the one I had first spoken to before the attack. "Look, we've wasted fifteen of your wingmen. Just surrender, and we'll be lenient with you." His reply was forceful. "Like hell we'll surrender! We'd rather die than fail. Why, that would…"

While he was carrying on, and I was trying to shoot him down (damn, he was good!) I opened a private comm. to Angels Seven and Eight. "Kara, Mara, from your Acolyte experience, do you remember how to wire your ships to emit an EMP burst?" Both of them responded in unison and word for word, "We remember, Lieutenant. These new ships have the necessary equipment we need. Give us a few seconds." A little bewildered, I acknowledged, and cut the comm.

I felt a few jolts from my hull, signifying that someone was firing at me from behind. I let a flare loose, and I saw a bright light from behind my ship flare in my cockpit. I checked my damage sensors, and noticed that my assailant hadn't used bombs against me. That was lucky for me, and stupid for him.

I found the Saber Tooth again, and began firing at him again. I wasn't trying to hit him-he really got good maneuverability out of that bulky craft-just to distract him long enough. After a few seconds, the sister ships of the Liir Hra sisters moved into flanking position of the Taiidan vessel, and released several blue beams at it. Electricity began crackling across the hull, and it began harmlessly sailing through space. I nodded with satisfaction; we needed one prisoner to figure out what was going on.

I then moved to find the two Support Frigates that carried the Bombers here. We could use them, and not just for interrogation. I grinned, thinking, Perhaps they'll promote me for saving the fleet a few resources. I ordered, "Gravwell Five, Gravwell Five. Activate your gravity field now. We can't let them…Oh, crap!"

They were already hypering out. I could have hit myself. Well, I thought, at least we have one pilot. "All ships report in!" In the order of their callsign, Nolan called in, then Hal Soban, then 1R-D and 1R-F, and then Myla Sjet and Tengo Gaalsien, Kara and Mara, Jacyn, May Paktu, Krrrra'k and finally Iliom Se reported in. "OK, Angels, good work. Let's dock with the Maelstrom and see what we can find from that last scumbag."

* * *

Turns out that we found that scumbag in the sickbay. That little maneuver with the EMP bursts left our friend with serious skin burns. I asked the main doctor what his condition was. His prognosis was not good. I was with May and Jacyn, them being the resident Intel officers I could trust.

I called out to him on his surgical cot. "Who are you?" His blackened skin stretched when he opened his eyes. "I am Kel Gerom. We were just commissioned by our new employers to rid this Nebula of any alien presence, first you, then the Corporation."

May inquired, "Who are your employers?" She seemed to be taking this well. She may have seen a lot worse in her career, seeing that she was a spy.

He shook his head, something that seemed to require a huge effort on his part. "I won't tell you."

Jacyn asked, "Did they give you your ships?"

He shook his head again. "They…were given to us…by Halen Chell. He's their contact for this region." The name eluded me, but May and Jacyn both nodded. I leaned towards him, trying to keep out the pungent odor of charred flesh out of my nasal passages. "Why did you take on this mission? The odds were greatly against you."

He strained to get his last words out. "Protection…from ……them…"

And that was it.