However, Jasken had no time to celebrate. He was caught between two dangerous enemies, the base’s shields were about to fail, and he only had two ships at his command. He strode towards the bridge wearing a grim, commanding look, but he was unsure how they would get out of this alive, much less defeat the Astralbian Kingdom and Ramshackle Collective.
Their comms were back online, so Jasken sent the map to the Cornucopia Cluster back to Griffonia, but Hittania appeared to be lost. The best thing to do was to cut and run. There was no honor or glory in it, but they had come away with the biggest prize and enough of his people had died already.
“Captain Hunt, Captain Kesht,” he said into his comm. “We are leaving Hittania. Make any necessary preparations and head for the aether.”
“Yes, sir,” came the immediate response from both captains. In a moment the warning to find seating and engage mag-boots sounded. Jasken walked purposefully to his seat on the bridge and sat, contemplating his next move.
The ships left the protection of Fort Bog Iron’s shield and were immediately dependent on their own. Still at full strength, they would be able to put up with their enemy’s fire for some time, but their two ships could not stand up to both the Astralbian and Ramshackle fleets. The Astralbians still had two smaller star trees in addition to Raelik’s and the Crown Prince’s larger ones, and the Ramshackle fleet had a total of five gunships, led by the Reaper. As the Wingspan and the Halberd left the atmosphere, their enemies followed.
***
Talon Squad scrambled aboard the Wingspan, heading off to prepare for anything the coming space battle might throw at them. Reclan led Vanbrook and Raivyn to find Dekken and see if any repair work was needed, while Doc and D’Jarric went to the med bay.
As soon as he reached the doorway, Doc saw a familiar form lying on a stretcher.
“Havvis!” he cried, running to the soldier’s side.
“Oh, hey, Doc,” said the injured soldier hoarsely. There was a massive, bloody wound on his torso, and a quick glance told Doc all he needed to know. “I got hit during the evacuation. I guess I should have learned to move a little faster on those crutches.” He gave a weak laugh. “I know I’m on my way out, Doc. One of the nurses gave me more pain killers then looked wise and left to take care of someone with better odds.”
“Are your affairs in order, son?” asked Doc, fighting to keep the emotions from his voice.
“I’m ready to meet my maker, Doc,” said Havvis, staring up at the ceiling.
“And will he tell you this is all in his plan?” asked Doc, a hint of anger in his voice.
“Even better,” said Havvis. “I may finally get a glimpse at why this was in his plan.” His voice weakened as he spoke, and then, rallying a bit, he spoke his last: “Providence shine on you, Doc.”
Doc hung his head, standing still for a moment. D’Jarric put his hand on the Robot’s shoulder and gave it a squeeze, then left his friend to grieve alone for a while.
***
Watching a video display of the battlefield, Jasken saw another six ships join the Ramshackle fleet; two gunships, a strange assortment of smaller craft, and what looked like a small star tree. The ships appeared to materialize suddenly out of the empty aether as they finished a ripmed jump. Then something unexpected happened: the new ships began firing on the Ramshackle ships.
“Admiral Jasken, this is Admiral Crush,” said a voice over the comms. “We tested our new ripmeds and made a quick trip. Turns out there are more than a few malcontents in the ranks of the Ramshackle Collective.”
“Ha!” exclaimed Jasken. “I figured you folks were long gone!”
“The Free Revolutionary Fleet never abandons its allies, and if we survive this, I’ll put that down in the charter I still need to write. We’ll handle the Ramshackle Collective, you take care of those Astralbians. All the FRF asks is for salvage rights to anything left when the smoke clears.”
“Sounds like a deal, Admiral,” said Jasken. “Providence shine on you.”
“Good luck, Admiral,” responded Crush.
Jasken turned to his officers. This changed the entire calculus.
"Captains Hunt and Kesht," he said into his comm. "Let's get our broadsides facing those Astralbian ships. They're trespassing on Republic territory and my patience has run out."
***
Raelik punched a wall aboard his star tree as the battlefield's new paradigm sank in. The prince expected him to destroy the Republic ship, along with the only known coordinates to the legendary Cornucopian Cluster. Most of his knights were dead.
"Send in the void wasps, including a breach team," he hissed. "I want everyone on that ship dead before it's destroyed."
He watched as the wasps shot out through the aether.
***
Meanwhile, Crush's small fleet was overwhelming the Ramshackle ships. Their opening salvo had crippled two gunships and the two sides continued trading fire. Crush directed the smaller ships to act as fighters, weaving in and out around the larger craft and targeting their guns.
"I suppose you wish you'd invested in shielding now, Grim," she said to herself. She was in her star tree, directing the battle from above and behind her gunships and firing the tree's eyes at the Reaper's guns.
Grim showed up on her screen.
"Traitor," he hissed. "I will crush your core soon enough."
"Come and get me, you self-serving coward.” Instead of firing at the Reaper’s cannons, she fired a shot at the more well-armored cabin that she knew Grim was occupying at the moment. The shot didn’t get through the shielding, of course, but it did cause Grim to stumble, which Crush watched gleefully on her screen.
***
Aboard the Wingspan, Jasken saw the attack squad of void wasps approaching. He frowned as a screen showed them landing on the hull and setting up equipment. A strange, four-legged device gripped the hull with beetle-like claws and an eye facing the ship began firing a continuous energy beam to cut into the ship.
Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author's preferred platform and support their work!
“Drixen!” he shouted into his comm. “We have a boarding party attempting to breach the hull. How soon can your fighters be out to wipe them off?”
“Frankly, Admiral,” said Drixen, “that’s a delicate operation if done correctly, and the fighter squads, or what's left of them, are in pretty rough shape. Everyone is low on ammo, and most of our stockpiles were aboard the Ferryman, and that’s not to mention the fact that half of the cockpits are no longer airtight and our steering mechanisms are beaten half to death. A boarding party will be well-armored and hard to shoot off the hull without just bombing ourselves.”
“Alright,” said Jasken, adding cautiously, “I have a plan B, but it’s a bit on the wild side.” There was a pause.
“What have you got, Admiral?”
***
Admiral Stork watched the battle impassively from his cabin. Most of the losses thus far had been Grim’s, but it was becoming increasingly clear that there was no payday in store for the Collective. He stroked his chin with long metal fingers and considered his options. His face formed an awful smile and he pressed a button on his ship’s control panel. He opened a comm channel to Grim.
“Old friend,” he said in a voice of false pity, “it’s a shame what happened to you, and the Reaper. If only the perpetrator could be brought to justice. Sadly, you and I both know there will never be an investigation. Goodbye, Grim.”
With that, a stealth missile slammed into the Reaper, breaking through its battered hull and blowing into thousands of pieces, which flew in every direction.
“All Ramshackle ships, this is Admiral Stork. Sadly, Admiral Grim has been destroyed, along with his flagship. I am taking command of the Scythe Fleet. Follow me to the coordinates you will receive shortly.”Within moments, the Ramshackle fleet had turned and disappeared as they activated their ripmed drives.
Crush led the cheer as the FRF celebrated its second major military victory.
Aboard the Wingspan, Talon Squad was loading into the shuttle, throwing on vacc suits and preparing for a fully armed space walk.
“You say this was Jasken’s plan?” asked Vanbrook. Drixen nodded.
“I’m kind of impressed,” said Vanbrook with a chuckle.
“I’m not surprised - he wants you dead,” said Reclan to Vanbrook. “But I figured he’d at least want to keep D’Jarric and Raivyn alive, he likes them.”
“It’s not a suicide mission, Rec,” said Raivyn, fitting a propulsion pack to her back. The packs were light weight and meant to control direction of movement in aether more than to truly fly, and she was able to attach and adjust it herself.
“No,” said Reclan, rolling her eyes. “Just a space walk in the midst of a giant naval battle in low orbit to fight an elite squad with massive stinging insects for mounts. Not a suicide mission.”
Doc shook his head and D’Jarric laughed as they helped the others double-check their suits. Neither need aethersuits, so they had quickly put on their propulsion packs and started helping the others.
With everyone geared up and ready to go, Drixen flew the shuttle around from the hangar door to the place on the hull where the boarding party was working. He opened up with the shuttle’s weapons, distracting but not harming the massive wasps and their well-armored riders.
“Four wasps, eight riders, one pilot, and one tree priest per wasp” he called back to Talon Squad. “Providence shine on you.” With that, he closed the door to the cabin and opened the back ramp.
Talon Squad activated their mag-boots and leaned away from the greedy vacuum of space as it tore the air from the back of the shuttle. As soon as the pressure equalized, they jumped down, guns blazing, and rocketed towards the boarding party.
The fighting erupted suddenly, and Talon Squad found itself navigating a hail of thorns and energy beams. D’Jarric jumped onto one of the wasps, dispatched its rider, and began to fight the wasp itself in one-on-one combat. Doc shot two of the tree priests attending the biological energy drill with his rifle before he hit the hull. Reclan sent her drones to harass the drill on an autopilot setting and focused on firing at the rider of another wasp. Raivyn reached out to a wasp, trying to take control of its mind. Seeing only one wasp not being attended to, Vanbrook zeroed in on it and landed on its head, crossing swords with the rider, who stood up to face his attacker.
Mag-boots were useless when standing on a void wasp, so Vanbrook found himself having to compensate for the weightlessness he was experiencing and losing focus on the fight. He adjusted his strategy, taking advantage of his ability to claim the high ground simply by activating his propulsion pack. Leaping over his opponent, he quickly found an opening and cut his opponent down.
The wasp had not been idle, though, and turned its abdomen around to stab at Vanbrook’s back. The stinger found its target, but did not get through to Vanbrook’s skin, or even his vacc suit, but stuck into his propulsion pack. With a flick of its abdomen, the wasp flung Vanbrook out into the aether.
***
Jasken was watching over Talon Squad’s mission when he saw a massive red glare through the bridge’s window. A beam of energy slammed into the Wingspan’s shield, setting off a thousand alarms as it did so.
“Captain Fenrik,” said Jasken into his comm. “That’s five, right? The eye will have to rest now?”
“That’s five, for sure, I’ve never seen a great eye that could do more than that in one day.”
“Let’s hope this one is nothing you haven’t seen before, then,” said Jasken dryly.
***
Raivyn was struggling to connect to the wasp she had focused on, and she was out in the open, unable to hide away and concentrate on her craft. She was about to pull her firearm when Vanbook shouted into the comm’s channel.
“A little help here?!” cried the swashbuckler as he spun lazily out into the void. Raivyn dropped her attempts with the wasp and shot out towards Vanbrook. When she got close, she extended her feet and activated her mag-boots, locking onto Vanbrook’s. The two floated foot-to-foot in the aether, moving as one.
“I’ll steer, you fight,” she said, jetting them both back towards the fight.
D’Jarric, his fists glowing with stellar energy, had punched the first wasp he’d engaged to death, its head a mangled pulp as it floated off into the aether. He turned to the next one, ready for another fight. He had sparking wounds all over his body from the first wasp’s stinger, but his avatar wasn’t affected by the poison itself. Doc and Reclan stood together behind Reclan’s drones, which had created a small wall of energy shields. The drones had not been effective against the drill, and Doc had already taken a shot to one of his arms, the wound exposing some of his hydraulic muscles. They leaned around from their cover and fired at the tree priests still attending the drill.
The wasp that had flung Vanbrook charged him again, but Raivyn, still standing foot-to-foot with him, stopped the stinger with her telekinesis. Its stinger occupied, Vanbrook was able to stab the wasp through the neck, sending it twitching into the aether.
D’Jarric finished off his second wasp just as Doc and Reclan finished off the tree priests, leaving one wasp and one rider in the boarding party. The rider shouted into the stillness of space and charged, only to be brought down immediately in a hail of gunfire and energy beams.
The drill continued to operate, so Vanbrook shakily loosened one foot from Raivyn’s and stepped onto the hull, allowing her to do the same. They pulled the other set of feet apart gracelessly and wobbled to a standing position, smiling foolishly at each other amid the giddiness of victory.
Raivyn walked over to the drill and put a hand on it, speaking to its barely-existent mind. It stopped drilling and let go of the hull, drifting off into the aether.
Drixen pulled the shuttle in close and the team leapt aboard, shouting and celebrating as they headed back to the hangar.
***
Raelik sat brooding in his command center.
"This battle is over," hissed Crown Prince Jylik over the comms, "and don't think I didn't see what you were up to, sending that breach team. Return to Astralbia at once, and submit to interrogation for the mess you've made out here."
Raelik didn't respond. His mind wandered to Jacrill, and the end he met at Jylik's hand. He watched listlessly as the other star trees blinked away, headed for Astralbia. He barely noticed the fire coming from the impressive, if hodge podge, fleet arrayed against him. He sighed.
Jasken watched as Raelik's star tree, abandoned by its comrades, ruptured and burned. The war for Hittania was over. The Republic had won.