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  Gavit’s hearts almost seized at the sight. When that coil failed it would take the rest of the engine with it. He’d find himself surrounded by hostiles in a marginally controllable hunk of scrap. For the first time, he eyed the ejection lever between his legs. Would they kill me if I ejected? Shoot me out of my parachute?

  He shook the question off as more rounds tore past. He jinked, doing his best to mark the path of the tracer rounds accompanying every burst. They were gone before he could make them out. He could see his pursuers over his shoulder. Now was the time to be careful. He had to mask his approach to the transport, and stay out of the gunsight of its turrets and of his pursuers.

  More bursts raced past. The raiders had realized he was on an attack run now. He evaded, but kept his course. A roll to his right brought with it a new set of alert lights. The structural failure around the engine had begun to extend into the left wingroot. Slowing would bring him right into their guns. The transport grew ahead of him. He knew what to do. He pulled the safety breaker on the plasma engine that prevented him from lighting it up again. Doing so would hasten the death of his craft, but could also buy him the time he needed.

  A new alert sprang to life on his screen, reminded him of the danger of what he was about to attempt. He closed his eyes for a scant cent and squeezed the stud. The racer lurched ahead on a column of plasma, the damaged accelerators unable to choke the flow any longer. The ignition had to have been blinding to the raider crawling up his tail. No mass-driver rounds followed and Gavit let up on the stud. The transport was now within range of the raider’s guns. Erratic rounds sprayed around Gavit, tearing into the transport’s unshielded belly.

  Gavit smiled at the sight, before every light on his board lit up. The rounds weren’t just tearing into the descending transport, several had hit him as well. The strain was more than the racer could take. The third-stage coil ripped free, taking the first- and second-stage with it. Gavit looked over his shoulder as he nosed over. The shredded engine cowling awaited him, the coils torn free and wrapped around the plasma rocket at the core of the open ring. The left wingroot lay exposed to the air. Composite skin flapped in the wind before another burst of mass-driver rounds shredded his tail.

  Gavit rolled and kicked his rudder hard over to bring the ground ahead of him. He vectored the racer into a hard barrel roll. The maneuver pinned him to the side of his cockpit. He hoped that the raiders would think they’d just shot him down. The controls grew heavier, the fluttering of the control surfaces shaking his stick as the airstream fought him. He craned his neck to look back, a thick plume of black smoke marked his trail. Beyond his smoke trail through, the transport was starting to tumble out of the sky. Whatever the raider had hit when blinded by Gavit’s plasma plume must have been important.

  “Gavit! What’s going on? I’ve lost all telemetry and the last thing I saw a red board and rapid descent.”

  “I’m going down,” Gavit gasped. “Have minimal control. Feels like manual reversion. I did take some of them with me, though. Death spiraling!”

  “Gavit, get out of there. Ditch the racer. It’s not worth your life!”

  “She is. Just tell her that, and take care of her.”

  The whole universe seemed to decelerate around him as the details on the ground filled his forward. Sharp focus and adrenal fluid flooding his brain accelerated Gavit’s perspective. He countered his roll, began to pull up. The controls continued to fight him, his airspeed too high. Still feeling like he was moving in slow motion, he pulled the handle for his flaps. The control surfaces dropped into the wind. The racer bucked hard in response, the universe accelerating again as Gavit pulled the nose towards the horizon. The g-forces hammered him. He levelled out the craft, but it was already too late.

  The battered tail dug into the dirt along the runway. The ground and racer tore at each other. Sheets of composite ripped free from the underside, embedding themselves into the gouged soil. The aircraft bounced and settled back to the ground. The left wing tore free. The racer spun and Gavit caught a glimpse of the shattered lifting surface spiraling overhead. He ducked down in the cockpit, never pulling his eyes away and counted every panel that remained. The canopy shattered as the tortured wing root crashed into it. Plexiglass rained down upon him and the racer ground to a halt, the universe finally at normal speed again.

  Gavit sat bolt upright and looked around. Flaming wreckage trailed his twisted and broken craft. He undid his harness as fast as he could and pulled every handle on his emergency shutdown panel. The cockpit went dark as flames licked their way towards him. Every muscle protesting, Gavit scrambled out of the cockpit and ran towards cover.

  There was precious little to be found. Flames tore through the remains of the stands. The racer revetments lay shattered and the repair pits were filled with holes and fires. An explosion drew Gavit’s attention towards the spaceport. The transport had crashed, a cloud of smoke and debris reaching skyward. In those skies, the raiders were now retreating. Without their transport, there was no way they could ever hope to recover the prize they’d come for.

  Gavit couldn’t help but smile. Despite the odds, and in an unarmed craft at that, he’d fought them off. His elation was short-lived. One look at the burning remains of his racer, of the unique craft his uncle had left him, reminded him of the cost of his victory. A movement near the stands drew his eyes. There stood the other cost, both of them.

  What a couple they were, what a trio they’d been. What a family they could have become. He read horror in their eyes as they stared at the remains of his craft. Whether they saw him or not he couldn’t tell. What are they sorrier about – that I might be dead, or that I wrecked the racer we invested so much into.

  He shook the thought away and looked towards the horizon. They were drag magnets. They’d held him back. Without them he could accelerate towards his true goal and beyond. Nothing could stop him now. The origin lay behind, the infinite future ahead, and he had to keep accelerating.

  UCSB Date: 1004.306

  Kordin System, VFA-143-014

  Whatever it was that Federation Overcommand had used to predict jump point positions and traffic appeared to have worked. This system was proving to be a hive of activity and was only a single jump from their staging area. Anthony had never before heard of any model that could predict the movements of jump points in hyperspace with any certainty beyond a few hours. Navigators instead relied on reported positions of jump points relative to others in order to plot their routes. But even those positions could change before arrival. Free-navigating between jump points in hyperspace could sometimes take days or even weeks. But, if those jump points were the kind to remain in close hyperspace proximity to ones in the same star system, then travel time could be cut down significantly.

  That appeared to be just what the transports traversing this system had counted on. The predictive system had informed Anthony’s commanders of an opportune jump point placement here over a week ago. They’d seized upon it, launching from their staging point to set up their ambush on the convoys with time to spare. While his carrier remained hidden, in the mass and magnetic shadow of the local hot gas giant, patrols had struck out to track down a plum target.

  They’d found just that. The freighter was nothing special to behold - a rickety old barge, it looked to have been refitted so many times that Anthony had doubted anything beyond the superstructure was original. Back home that meant one thing: smugglers. Like any smuggler’s ship it was armed. He scoffed. The tiny turrets he spotted would be little threat to his F/A-229 Wildcat.

  Based on the older Tigercat frame, the diamond-winged fighter, with its cruciform quartet of engines, had been built to be the ultimate dogfighter. The engineers at Douglas-Saab had packed every advance they could dreamed up into the upgraded spaceframe. That included the new Holographic Cockpit Interface (HCI) that afforded him an even better view than the bubble-nosed cockpit of his old Solaar. Were it not for his controls and forward console, as well as t
he bits of his fighter visible outside his canopy, he would have left like he’d ejected.

  He did miss his old Solaar’s big cannons though. Those would have made short work of that freighter, but precision was called for here. The pair of Thrasher cannons under his wings, with their depleted uranium flechettes, would shred the freighter’s shields. After that, his six plaser cannons could carve out the engines and communications arrays.

  Anthony flexed his hands on his controls, eager to engage. He just waited for the order from command. The target was proving just too inviting, not only for its minimal defenses but also because smugglers used stolen, or salvaged, navigational computers, often with illegal jump code downloads. Such computers typically didn’t have scuttling charges, or if they did the charges would have been disabled. How else would they have come by them? If they could recover that device, or convince the smugglers to hand it over, it would give their taskforce access to uncounted Confed worlds. It was too good an opportunity to pass up.

  The communications screen blinked to life, the green outline of the expanding box that of the command channel. “Strike Flight Golf, Channard Control. You are clear to engage. Disable weapons, engines and communications arrays. Leave the bridge and navigational cluster intact.”

  That was the order Anthony had waited for and a moment later the green communications window was replaced by the blue one for his flight leader. “One Four, Zero Two. We are cleared hot. Move in and take out those turrets.”

  “Copy!” Anthony replied and detached his fighter from the asteroid it clung to.

  A few puffs from his maneuvering thrusters exposed him to the freighter. They didn’t react until he powered up his engine’s fusion bulbs to full. The freighter dumped ions into its shields, but it would take time to build them up to combat power. The turrets remained silent, but Anthony couldn’t see any reason why. They appeared to be remotely operated. That confused Anthony, but a still turret was an easy target.

  Sliding his throttle forward, the momentum built up and the g-forces squeezed him against his seat. He’d learned to go easy on the throttle. The increased thrust of the four engines was more than the acceleration absorbers had been designed for. Not surprising, given that his fighter had started service as a test craft using the same units as the older Tigercat.

  The freighter grew before him, the shields climbing in power level, but not fast enough to stop him. Reaching the edge of their effective range, Anthony fired his MM-180s. The twin mass-drivers responded with a pair of satisfying bangs that reverberated through his spaceframe. Twin canisters rocketed ahead and, as they neared the shields, burst open. Thousands of various-sized flechettes burst forth, each set magnetized at opposite polarity to the others. The depleted uranium metal slivers shredded the shields, pulling away the oppositely charged ions from the two spinning toroids. The resultant gap in the shields now left the engines completely undefended.

  Anthony wasn’t about to waste the opportunity. He unleashed all six plaser cannons on the exposed exhausts. He traced luminal plasma bursts up the side of the engines, tearing open the armor up to the plasma bulbs. The engine cores vented in turn as his weapon’s fire breached them. Gouts of plasma burst forth, kicking the freighter aside before automatic safeties kicked in, cutting off their fuel flow. Both engines went cold. Reigniting the engines now would do nothing but vent fuel into space. The ship began to drift, carried along by its momentum. “Zero Two, One Four. Engines are dead. Turrets still not responding. Orders?”

  “Stand by,” his wingleader replied. A moment later, he swept past and annihilated the long-range communications cluster nestled at the back of the bridge. The antennae farm and dishes melted under the assault, after which random pieces floated about in an expanding debris cloud.

  Anthony flipped his fighter around, and tapped his fusion burst control to minimize his inertia. Slowing, he tracked past the dorsal turret and put a few rounds into it for good measure on his drifting course towards the bridge. He smirked at the crew as they flailed about in panic within. Orange lights illuminated the scene, the mixed crew fighting to regain control of the ship. A hint of static over his comms indicated their possible intent to surrender.

  The communications window seemed to agree. A tiny orange-yellow box fluttered open and closed with each burst of static. Anthony had never had something like that happen before. He’d flown interceptors in his first assignment, and his targets had never had the chance to surrender. Curious, he pulled up his manual communications panel. He tapped at the screen, cleaning up the signal until a weak response filled the channel. “We ...render. Eng...s dead. Li… sup..rt gone. We wi… co..erate … all dem...s.”

  Anthony clicked his communications system back over to the tactical frequency to relay the surrender to his wing leader. Before he could, a single plaser cannon round pierced one of the bridge windows. Anthony could only watch in horror as the atmosphere erupted from the breach, carrying two of the crew along with it. His eyes blurred with emotions he couldn’t put into words. He just watched the remaining crew flail about for their emergency pressure suits, his stomach twisting. He’d never witnessed anyone die in such a way. In seconds it was over, and the corpses were just left to drift.

  “One Four. Can you confirm bridge is silent?”

  It took Anthony a moment to find his voice. “Yes sir. Bridge is silent. They were surr…”

  “We are not in a position to take captives. Any delay in stopping that crew would have put the prize in jeopardy. Never forget that Lieutenant. You were picked for this squadron because you flew alongside the Conts during the Gorvian campaign. You witnessed how they flew up close before you could score your ace against them. Don’t go soft on us now.”

  A tremor went up Anthony’s hand before he could respond. “Yes sir. Understood.”

  “I’ve contacted Channard Control. They’re sending out a retrieval ship. We’re to hold station until they arrive.”

  Bridge, GFS Barker

  Anthony had never been on the bridge of any carrier he’d served on before. Debriefings were always held in the ready room or, at most, the Wing Commander’s office. That Admiral Kimmet had wanted to debrief them personally meant something big. Captain Watts was present in his two tone, khaki officers’ uniform, his black and tan command jacket masking the darker brown ribbing across his shoulders. Yet, he stood aside by the strange gas-filled cylinder in the middle of the bridge, the likes of which Anthony had never seen before. The expansive bridge with its massive windows overlooking the prow of the ship was a constant buzz of activity. Now it seemed even more so. Enlisted navigation techs in their grey and green jumpsuits swarmed the nearby board displaying a map of their sector. Anthony couldn’t help but notice several lights that had been white turn green, some flashing, and new ones appearing.

  “The data the two of you recovered will prove invaluable,” the Admiral congratulated them, pulling Anthony’s attention back. He’d only ever seen an Admiral in person once, when he graduated from Officer’s Training. Her uniform stood out amongst all the others, pure white, highlighted with silver and gold fringes and filigree, dozens of campaign ribbons across the left side of her chest. “We’ll launch recon ships to ensure that the data is correct, but the jump computer you recovered contained dozens of local jump codes. Some might even be core Confederation planets.”

  Anthony couldn’t help but swell with pride at that. Looking at the Admiral however he couldn’t help but see the misshapen face of one of the freighter’s dead crewmen. He blinked the image away, but the sight of that bloated corpse, and how human it had looked, had stayed with him ever since. He knew that the Confederation had a race that looked almost human among them, but he’d never seen their faces before. During the Gorvian campaign all communications were audio only, and he’d never been off his ship. A body in a pressure suit was one thing; the hominid form was common to a number of races, but a face, a human face was so much more.

  “Lieutenant Nerant. Are you all ri
ght?”

  Anthony looked back at the Admiral, not realizing that he’d been staring off into space. He stammered for an answer. “Yes ma’am, sorry ma’am.” He motioned towards the main window beyond. “It’s just the view,” The ends of six runways used by the heavier craft for take-off and landings, or when the mighty ship made an oceanic landing, were plainly visible.

  The Admiral beamed with pride as she turned to look. The highlights of the ship’s blood red paint accents stood out around the long runways. “It does take some getting used to.”

  “That it does ma’am,” Anthony’s commander replied. “I noticed the addition to the bridge. Is that our new predictive navigation system?”

  The captain’s icy glare from beside the tube shut down the question and forced his eyes away from the cloudy interior. Despite that, Anthony caught what looked like a tentacle slap against the glass. He dared not look again as the Admiral concluded their debriefing. Instead of leaving the bridge immediately however, Anthony took a circuitous route towards the bank of windows that looked over the runways.

  He just stood there and stared for a long while. The triple bow of the Barker was a thing to behold. That feature was unique among the Siege Carriers that carried its name. Then there was the paint scheme of the hull. It was not the traditional combination of greys and blues of most ships. Instead the red skin of the keels extended up to cover the entire hull, flashes of black ripping across it giving the impression of blood and fire beneath burnt black skin. He’d been overcome by the sight the first time he’d laid eyes on the carrier. The intimidating visage almost forced him to fill his crew relief bag. Seeing it from this perspective didn’t help matters Looking up at the gas giant, with massive hurricanes tearing across its surface, he found himself staring once again into the bloated faces and dead eyes of the transport’s crew.