Incoming Press Report, Zero Light Years Away, (Escuardo System Network Relay, Union Controlled).
Triantan Elections ends in a landslide victory for Chancellor Alice von Bismarck and her “Jingoistic Platform”, calling for a “proportional response” against the “communist threat in Avantia” and the “junta’s revanchism in Rubenfolt”. She emphasized the need to reinforce the collective defense of all Union polities. State visits from other Union polities are already being arranged, with both the Kingdom of Loran and the Hephalian Republics already joining in to support the new government of Trianta’s visions for the Union.
- Trianta Today
+++ Jonathan Jones +++
Escuardo System
ISS Der Halter
ISS Der Linde disabled!
“We’re moving straight to the port side cargo bay,” Harold said over the comms, all while the two of us found ourselves pinned in this corner of the passageways. Three or four pirates were firing their guns at us, preventing us from advancing further into the CIC. “Hopefully they’re there!”
“Hopefully—” I tried to peek out again, but a burst of bullets forced me back into cover. Behind me, Juliett chastised me.
“Jonathan, can you please stop trying to do something stupid? You’d get shot!”
“Sorry, I was just trying…” She tried to peek instead, but a burst of bullet fire dissuaded her as well. “I mean, we can’t stay here any longer.”
“I…I just need more power to use my active nano shields,” Juliett muttered. “Or, I can just go out there and soak the damage.”
“Yeah, no, that’s a hard pass for me. Your Avatar Model may be made up of nanomaterials, but I reckon it still takes time to repair any damage.” She fell silent. It seemed that I was right on the money.
“Yes…but we have to reach the CIC already! If it must be done for us to push forward…”
“Do you have a flashbang?”
“That’s not gonna work.”
“Then how about EMPs? Are you vulnerable to them?” She looked up at me without saying anything, until I heard her tiny voice.
“...A bit.”
“A bit…alright, well, move back then.” She did as I instructed, while I pulled out an EMP grenade. It was lit up blue when I pressed the activation button, before I tossed it at them, rolling at the floor. I also pulled back into the corner, just as it detonated, creating distortions in the HUD of my helmet even if most of it was blocked.
“Well, there’s our opening then…” Juliett nodded, and both of us rushed forward through the passageway, firing our guns at the four downed pirates who were in their own Vaccum Tac-Suits as well, their hardware still desperately restarting after the EMP blast. I took aim at two of them, firing my Z-44s in controlled three-shot bursts in order to efficiently penetrate their Tac-Suits, before hitting their soft flesh inside.
By the time the last one dropped on the floor, bleeding to death, the Fed-System notifications blared out again in front of me. I still didn’t understand how to control it, or to prevent it from appearing without my control of my field of vision. But I suppose I could do nothing for now.
ISS Der Hesse destroyed!
I lowered my gun as we moved forward, watching the bullet count on the bottom part of my HUD. Eighteen bullets out of thirty, I was dropping it way too quickly. Hopefully, this entire battle wouldn’t last any longer.
“The last enemy destroyer is now running,” Juliett said as we walked in haste. “This freighter is practically surrounded. We already won.”
“That’s good to know. Now, all we need to do is to ensure that the hostages get out.” She nodded, as we stopped at a final blast door that was still locked away from our access. It was the final obstacle to the ship’s CIC, and Juliett wasted no time hacking it and opening it. But before it fully opened, I tossed an EMP grenade straight to them, before both of us took cover on the two sides of the passageway.
The blast caused a few distortions on my HUD, but it again didn’t affect us much. Juliett immediately rushed forward, guns up as I followed her. The people inside the CIC were shouting at us, and we were no different.
“We surrender! We surrender!” The man who appeared to be their Captain shouted, as all the other CIC staff dropped with their hands on their heads down to the floor. The Captain dropped his pistol as he kneeled to plead in front of the two of us. “Have mercy! Please…we didn’t—”
“Don’t shoot,” one of them said, approaching the both of us. He seemed to be in a bad condition, still wincing from multiple bruises, and his Captain’s uniform was just as tattered. “They…they are actually in a mutiny against Lord Preussen.”
“Oh, thank you, Captain Roll,” the Der Halter’s captain said, still on his knees. “This…this has been a misunderstanding. Please, don’t…”
I could see Juliett turning even stiffer even when she was wearing her suit. God…this is bad. “Then why did none of you say so? Did we really have to shoot this whole damned place just for you to say that you’re not at his side?!”
“I…your ship,” his eyes were shaking. “We were searching for your fleet. We…we took the hostages from Lord Preussen instead of taking them to the designated place, hid out here, and while we were searching for your fleet to surrender them all in exchange for letting us go, y-you appeared. We thought…the authorities found us.”
“Oh for fu—” I was fuming inside. All this…because of…damn it! “Look, can you order your men to stand down?”
“They…they are, we already told them, b-but your troops are still firing back. I said they should all surrender. The other ships stopped responding to our hails when they started running away after…whatever ship you were using appeared right in front of us out of nowhere.”
Damn it! Which meant that Harold and his troops must still be firing right now. I tapped on my PDA to interface with him, directly speaking through our entire comms. “Harold! This is a big misunderstanding, they’re all surrendering! Try to talk to them, stop shooting!”
“What? They’re—” The transmission became garbled before it became clear. “I’m ordering my men to stand down, I…they’re actually surrendering.”
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“Christ…” I turned back to him, and to Captain Roll, who was slightly holding his bandaged left shoulder. “Where is Captain McHover?”
“Unconscious. Medical Bay. I…I think the folks treating him are still cowering in fear inside of that place,” Captain Roll said. “Tell Harold to call off everything. We’re…pulling out of this System. There’s no more point.”
His expression darkened, and I remember that one of those who surrendered earlier said that Captain Roll’s and Captain McHover’s crew were executed. I didn’t press any further. Another transmission from Harold came.
“Jonathan, we have restrained the surrendering men and women. We also found the civilians. We’re rounding them up.”
“Alright…” I turned to Juliett, who had so far stayed even more silent at this point. I wondered what I would be able to do to console her. This was her first time trying to actually save humans herself. For it to be an utter disaster…”Juliett, let’s restrain them for now. We’ll…we’ll process this later.”
“...Okay.”
ISS Der Halter surrendered!
ISS Der Vaug standing down!
+++
Engagement Results: Hostiles Surrendered!
Rewards: 200 (2x Destroyer-Sized Ships) = 200 (Base XP) x 0.25 (XP Modifier) = 50 XP Points!
Experience: 1415 (+50 Last Chapter).
+++
+++ Jonathan Jones +++
Escuardo System
ISS Der Halter
“The Union’s patrols must have already been alerted of this,” Harold said as we stood over the gathered surrendered pirates being herded by his men. All of them seemed badly mauled, looking down with empty eyes on the floor as Harold’s men watched, guns still in their hands. “We should move to our waiting point now and wait for the Rearguard. I think they have already picked up Lieutenant Steidel by now from their operation. Lord Preussen must be distracted already, so we can make a green getaway.”
“Yeah, the mutiny and the Union being alerted…” Even my voice, much like his, was heavy. “If word doesn’t get out, hopefully, he’d just think we backed off. No point in chasing us in that case. Hopefully.”
“Hopefully…” He muttered, still looking down. Captain Roll and Captain McHover had already been evacuated to the Radiant alongside all of the civilians we rescued. Still, the news that their crews didn’t surrender, left a sour taste both in Harold’s mouth and his men. Hell, even for me, the same could be said. “We absolutely didn’t expect this, didn’t we?”
“Well, I myself would have loved a much more robust intel, but considering the time crunch…please, don’t blame yourself for this one. We didn’t know,” I paused, looking for a better way to get that across. “We had no chance to know. This is Lord Preussen’s fault. His alone. That damned pirate scum.”
“What about her?” Harold said, his eyes looking at Juliett, who helped assist some of Harold’s men in guiding the civilians to the assault crafts. “We…we dragged her into this absolute crap show.”
“I…I don’t know.” I sighed. “I feel like we’re back in Loran with all these…”
“Heh, I know Mr. Von Wicht wouldn’t screw up this badly,” he shook his head. “But…at least we got the civilians out. That should count for something. At least. We were contracted to protect their convoy. We failed, but we got them out alive.”
“Seems surprising that Lord Preussen didn’t really harm them. I guess he treats civilians and mercenaries differently.”
“Obviously.”
“Where are we bringing them?” I asked. “The civilians and these pirates.”
“The civilians, they were en route to their trading partners to the Jahellios System. On one of the FEG worlds out there. That was our original mission target. We’ll get them there then. As for the pirates, I reckon these bastards would do well for some bounty.”
“Yeah, they must have some bounties on their heads,” I said. “We can claim that in Jahellios. Wouldn’t mind to get some of the junta’s reward money for all of this.”
He cracked a laugh. “I guess the old mind of yours is speaking at last.”
“But…Jahellios. Are you sure? The FEG…they’re not exactly the most friendly place out there.”
“So what? We found ourselves in a dance with some pirate scum. It can’t be any worse out there. Or, you can always just detach from us. But…the Rearguard will ensure that these folks reach Jahellios. I’ll make sure of that.”
“Nah, we’ll just follow you there.”
“If that’s what you want…alright.” An alert appeared on his suit’s PDA, and he checked it for a while. He grinned. “Lieutenant Steidel managed to put up a good show in Luneta it seems. No casualties for the guards. They just…detonated a bunch of firecrackers around the prison.”
“And that worked?”
“I guess the worst he and his men did was vandalism. Lieutenant Steidel backed off from an actual assault because the prison was more well-guarded than expected. Since his mission was just to create a show to distract them…he instead devised this.”
“Well, lucky us then.” That was some nice news at least. “So they’re en route?”
“Yep. So we can hasten all of this, meet up at the designated rendezvous coordinates, then jump the heck out of Escuardo before either the Union’s patrols or Lord Preussen catches us.”
“Right…let’s do that.” He turned away, approaching the Captain of the surrendered pirates, all while I took my own leave and approached Juliett. Almost all of Harold’s men were taking glances at her, and I could smell the unsaid question from them about her nature, but I didn’t mind it for now. Instead, my focus was on her.
I…she must have been hurt by all of what she did for these last few weeks. And something inside me didn’t like that. No…I could not accept this. I’d rather she blame me than herself.
“Juliett.”
“Jonathan,” she turned around, forcing a tiny smile on her face. “I guess at least we got the civilians out.”
“Yeah, that we did…” I didn’t really know how to put it, but, I decided to utter it anyway. “Look, Juliett, things happen. And we can’t save everyone. It’s just…”
“I understand. I know that. Reality, it’s…I already know that. I know that since I was…created.” Her voice was almost a whisper when she said that. “But…I refuse to let that imperfection of reality persist. We could have executed this better. We could have. But we failed.”
“Perfection…you want a perfect scenario for this? Juliett, look, no matter how much your systems optimize and calculate, every unknown factor will exist. In terms of probability, whatever you are aiming for is not going to be permitted by the universe.”
She seemed to refuse to accept that, but I pressed on. “Look, it’s not your fault that the hand of fate screwed us. It will always screw us no matter how much you stack every advantage you have. It’s not your fault, Juliett. Better blame this all on Lord Preussen than yourself. You haven’t failed on your mission yet.”
She looked down, her voice growing even more silent. “I…it’s been three centuries, and still nothing. What if…I’m just a faulty product?”
“Perhaps you are,” I said. “But so am I. So is Harold. So is every goddamned person in this universe. So are System Dynamic’s rogue AIs. Perhaps so are you. But if that’s the case…then we’ll be doing our best to mitigate that setback. Together.”
I gave her shoulder a pat. “It’ll be alright. We just need to carry on. Again, your mission isn’t a failure yet. This is just a setback for us to overcome. Don’t give up, Juliett.”
I walked off, shaking my head at myself internally. Who am I to say that? I asked myself. When I myself gave up on my very own soul before I even met her?
To give advice, I suppose, was always easier than to implement it.
Still, I hoped that she would listen to my words though. For her own sake. The Voidqueen shouldn’t falter now. Not now.