It wasn’t as if the situation at Outpost Omega was a surprise. No, it was very much expected. The presence of the Hallowed Echoes hinted at it, though raiders were common. But Mazoga, and to a lesser extent Gujo, revealed that the Sylvanite battlegroup had been hired by another faction, Hartdel Defiant. Yuriko wasn’t sure of the details save for the fact that they were in an expansionist phase lately.
She wondered if they were aiming to delve deeper, or if they had some goods they wanted from the levels below. Having no idea what was available, Yuriko didn’t know what was possible, or if there was anything there that would inspire desperation.
Communiques had been sent. Back to the primary base, as well as to Outpost Omega. Last communications from Omega were just before the ambush from the Echoes, and there had been nothing since then. Some reinforcement has been sent, but according to Captain Finley, command was wary of defences being drawn away. At this point, it was up to the Darlington Cross to ascertain the situation and react accordingly.
On the 16th Day of Fire, they arrived in the vicinity of Outpost Omega. Well, it was more accurate to say that they reached the thousand-longstride border of the outpost, the most distant point that the Voidship’s sensors could detect. And by being able to see, they were, in turn, seen.
Yuriko checked the holographic projection of the outpost’s structure, a large cylindrical Voidspace station, slowly rotating on its axis. The entire thing must be three leagues long and about a longstride wide. The outpost wasn’t fixed in space, but wandered around a broad territory, moving from one asteroid to another, mining valuable ores or harvesting living reagents from floating biomes.
It had been more than a week since the last contact, and Captain Finley thought that any fight wouldn’t have progressed beyond a basic siege. She was correct, to a point.
Communications were cut as soon as they entered the border, and perhaps they should have retreated immediately. Instead, a comm ship was launched to send a message back to prime station.
Over the past days, Captain Finley and Heron had debated over what to do with the VS Cyclops. The ship was still crippled, and in its brig was the Sylvanite crew that hadn’t surrendered to Yuriko. Cyclops’s captain and warmaster didn’t surrender, but why were held in the Darlington Cross. The ship was being towed by the Cross and the Rascal, but that arrangement wouldn’t work if they fought. So the decision was made to leave the derelict about five thousand leagues, or about half a day away, from Outpost Omega. The crew were allowed to activate a rescue beacon after a while, and the Cross had scavenged what it could to repair the damage it had taken in the ambush. A cold decision as there was a big chance that the crew would die from running out of supplies. The life support systems ran on the auxiliary power core, and would last longer than the ship had supplies, and was the only reason Yuriko allowed it to happen. She had no qualms about killing in battle, but executing war prisoners was a line she shouldn’t cross.
Although the decision wasn’t in her hands in the first place. Mazoga and Guja seemed indifferent to their fellow Sylvanites though, so she wondered if there was something to the race’s psyche that was odd.
Outpost Omega had several Voidships docked, and most of them with visible damage. Some were ships of similar make to the Darlington Cross, which looked essentially like spikes with wings at the end. The Rascal and Cyclops were more bulbous, more organic looking, and if she felt unflattering, would describe the ships as floating turds. The protrusions on either ships were weapons hardpoints or access points. The aft were clearly demarcated by the huge thrusters.
A third kind of ship was anchored around the outpost, and also patrolled the surroundings. They looked similar to the Chaos ships Yuriko knew and they looked like old time wooden ships made to sail in waters. The hull was dotted with thrusters, and the sails looked transparent and were made up of hexagons. Ripples of light collapsed towards the masts and moved down into the deck, but she wasn’t sure what kind of energy it collected other than Void remnants. Perhaps they had a way to ignite the inert stuff to burn power? Or perhaps it was mixed with a catalyst.
The wooden ships’ decks were also protected by a transparent dome, made visible only because it distorted the view beyond them. She could see the deck and the sailors present, and she recognised the crew’s race. Sha’ledras. Muscular folk who had long and expressive ears. Their skin colour ran the gamut from pale to dark as midnight, while their hair colour contrasted sharply with their skin.
Five wooden Voidships launched from their points to sail towards the Darlington Cross and the Rascal, and they deployed their weapons. There were at least three or so cannons protruding from each side, and a larger fore cannon pointing ahead. Where these ships differed from the Chaos ships was exactly their armaments. She didn’t think these were Plasma Carronades. Probably railguns? The barrels were long and narrow, and the caliber of the shell looked smaller than the ones she’d seen before.
They were still nearly five hundred longstrides of distance between the Voidships, but it was already within shooting range. Granted, they could easily avoid the shots from the railguns; at that range, it would take nearly three minutes for the rounds to reach them. Plasma missiles were slower but packed more of a punch, and coherent light beams and lasers, which could cross the distance immediately. Void remnants would absorb most of the energy from the beams within moments of leaving the barrel. It was why the latter weren’t popular weapons in the Void Ocean, though they were useful within the confines of a biome or in close quarters.
Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.
So Yuriko thought that anything more than potshots would have to wait until the range was closer.
She was mistaken.
The wooden Voidships shot their railgun rounds, and the things flew nearly five times faster than she expected. And they didn’t shoot single rounds, but a barrage that covered not just the space where the Darlington Cross and the Rascal were currently in, but all over too. Rounds that were nothing more than needles, but were accelerated fast enough to be a significant drain to energy shields, and should they strike the metal hulls, they were more than enough to puncture.
Still, five times faster meant that it took half a minute to reach their position. So it wasn’t as dangerous as…
Blam, blam, blam!
The Rascal just lost five percent shield reserves.
“What happened?” Yuriko asked Captain Mazoga.
“Needlers hit us where we turned to evade,” the Sylvanite said tersely. She gestured for the pilot to adjust their evasion patterns, but it only took another couple of seconds before they were once again getting pummeled.
“How?” Yuriko asked calmly. From the open communication channel with the Cross, Captain Finely was also swearing up a storm.
“They’re shooting at places they predict we’re headed to,” Mazoga replied, “and their prediction pattern is scarily accurate.”
Yuriko’s Anima snaked through the ship and exited into outer space, her Anima perception covered more than the energy shield, and she casually observed that the ship was only hit by about one in ten thousand needles launched. The needles were made out of regular iron, and it was only thanks to the fact that there was no air between the cannon and the ship that they remained solid rather than a blob of molten particles. Well, that and the Void remnants absorbed the excess easily.
She could just as easily block the needles with little trouble, and she did so subtly by thickening her Anima around the energy shields so that she was the one hit instead of the ship.
Thwap thwap thwap.
The hits were pinpricks that didn’t even cause the slightest fracture. It was devoid of anything other than kinetic energy, and just a little hint of lightning.
“We’re not getting hit…” Mazoga muttered. She glanced at Yuriko and swallowed nervously.
“Captain Finley, stay in our shadow,” Yuriko said.
“What?” the comm channel chirped back.
“We’re blocking the needles,” Yuriko replied. “Stay in our shadow.”
“Aye.”
It took half a minute for the Cross to slip behind the Rascal, then they were driving straight towards the enemy. The Cross’s weapons didn’t have the reach, and the Rascal’s were worse. She expended half of her missiles in the ambush, and the remaining half were launched just a moment ago, by an overeager gunnery officer.
“Perhaps we should tactically withdraw?” Mazoga asked. “There’s no way our two ships could regain control of the outpost.”
“We should, yes,” Yuriko agreed. “But I don’t wish to run away without learning more about the enemy’s capabilities.”
“As you command.”
The Rascal and the Cross needed just a bit more than an hour to cross the distance to the outpost, but the Hartdel ships moved faster than either Voidship. The fusillades continued for a while until both groups reached a proper engagement distance of about fifty longstrides or so. The railgun rounds didn’t take more than a few seconds to reach the other battlegroup then. And while the Hartdels pumped out more needles, Yuriko blocked everything with ease.
“Sunblades will take too long,” she muttered to herself. The ships flew faster than her sunblades could fly, or at least, the ones she could create now. But there was little need to chase the ships when she could send the blades directly to the outpost. She didn’t think a single blade could defeat every foe there, especially since there was no way it could regenerate its Radiant energy reserves.
Manifested sunblades, since they held a portion of her Anima, Intent, and Will, were similar to her incarnation body in another way. She could perceive through it no matter how far away she was. She formed one in the shadow of her ship and sent it careening towards the opposing Voidships along with a barrage of Plasma Bolts and railgun needles.
Suppressing the image and the glow took some focus, but she managed to thread that needle, and coincidentally, the blade managed to come within spitting distance of the Voidship.
Unfortunately, that meant the crew saw her blade. Unfortunately for them, she changed target from the outpost to the Voidship and slammed her Manifestation into their defensive energy shield. The Radiant blade sheared through the defences and started wreaking havoc on the deck. She slew half a dozen Sha’ledras sailors before she slipped into the interior. She threaded the blade towards the engines, but as she maneouvered, energy projections appeared within the hallway and trapped her Manifestation. She slashed at the projection, but the damage was recovered quickly enough that she couldn’t slip through. A minute later, her Manifestation ran out of energy and dissipated.
The Intent and Will was used up, but the sliver of Anima borrowed through the fabric of reality and returned to her, just a little worse for wear. She winced at the pain but weathered the burning feeling stoically a moment later.
Her antics did have the effect of draining the power out of the energy field and soon after, the Cross’ barrage ate through the shield, crumpled up their hull and forced them to turn and flee.
Off in the distance, two and a half hundred longstrides away, the surface of the outpost opened up. And out came hundreds and thousands of lights, missiles, plasma bolts, and railgun rounds, heading straight towards the two Voidships.
“Huh. Time to go,” Yuriko said, and they reversed direction, went off into an oblique, and headed, albeit not directly, to the rally point where the Milstate reinforcements would arrive.
She watched keenly as the remaining four Hartdel ships made a token effort to pursue, but broke off when she sent another couple of Manifestations.
The brief skirmish was done, and while nothing really happened, Yuriko couldn’t help but hum happily. Whatever else happened, after everything was said and done, she and her Stormdriven would be free of entanglements afterwards.