“Two hundred seconds,” Gaylen announced on the intercom. He risked taking his eyes off their progress for quick peeks at his crew.

Herdis was in her spot next to him, looking focused and ready for action. Her rifle was within reach, and had been disassembled and thoroughly examined on the way here.

Fredrak stood in the cockpit doorway, wearing the blank mask of a professional at work.

Bers was down by the airlock, axe in one hand, striding back and forth as he had been doing for a while, radiating controlled tension.

Ayna was a few steps away from the Fringer, inside the cargo hold. The young Dwyyk was doing slow breaths, moving her arms up with each inhale and down with every exhale, fighting for calm.

And Jaquan and Kiris were in the engine room, jointly managing an engine that was quite stressed by now. Both wore their weapons and were too absorbed in their task to show much stress.

Gaylen rather wished the mere act of piloting could provide him with such distraction, but it was all too familiar to him. Managing an arrival was no big deal, regardless of the destination.

“Hundred and fifty seconds.”

He went over his own condition, estimating his physical and mental abilities for what lay ahead. The flight from Nokior had been an exercise in managing the engine to its fullest while also leaving it capable of this final stretch, possible only through long experience and Jaquan’s established familiarity with the Addax. Human needs had been set aside, most notably sleep. But Herdis had administered carefully measured stimulants to everyone on board, and Gaylen had to admit it was working. He didn’t feel at one hundred percent capacity, and was probably in for an unpleasant crash in a few hours, but he had enough energy and alertness to see this through.

It was just a matter of focusing through that hint of a fog over his wits. As long as he stayed smart, experience would see him through.

“One hundred seconds.”

What a damnably weird thing to be caught up in. He was just hazy enough to entertain for a moment that this was some weird dream: A guilty Federation boy living out a fantasy of justice and heroics in the face of enormous evil. But this was all real, no matter how absurd. And he steeled his mind as best he could as they went through the final stretch of the Other.

“Fifty seconds.”

He stopped paying any heed to his crew or those errant thoughts. All his energy focused on piloting and those tiny shifts that could make such a big difference. He started deceleration, and after a few seconds his sensors could detect the station up ahead and the great mass of ships around it. Gaylen put his hand on the stopper and prepared his mind for evasive flying.

Here we go.

“Exiting leap.”

He pulled the stopper down with a click and the strands of lights vanished in a flash. The Addax exited into war.

A plan had been set in motion on Nokior, before they retired for the night in that hotel. Fredrak had sent out a coded message, through channels he had refused to explain. That message had travelled ahead of them, refined on a couple of stops along the way to Wembella. It had all depended on a whole lot of hope and luck and minute timing, but against seemingly all logic it had worked out.

The organised resistance that had been building against the Authority had now struck. Small planetary forces, ships big and small, old and somewhat less old, had converged around Uktena Station. Those Authority bastards finally had an actual fight on their hands.

It had clearly been going on for a little while. The largest ships kept a significant distance away from enemy counterparts, trading shots from their main guns, either trying to take out enemy propulsion or weapons, or simply hammering away at the same part of armoured hull, hoping to break through.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

The more intense fighting was done by support squadrons; the smaller, nimbler ships. Not that far from the Addax, an Authority squadron was being targeted by the alliance, trying to evade and counterattack. Further away, an alliance squadron was making a run at a medium-sized battleship, daring heavy fire to strafe the enemy guns. They managed to knock out two support weapons before darting away to evade an incoming squadron of enemy fighters.

The Authority had more of the larger ships, while their opposition had more smaller ones. Two of the larger ones had already been destroyed, and so had several of the smaller. They floated about either as wrecks or scattered debris, depending on what they’d been hit with. Gaylen didn’t have enough tactical know-how to tell which side had the edge in power, but this fighting would continue on for some time, knocking out one tooth after another, until one side retreated, surrendered or received backup and dared a firmer offensive. Or perhaps this would actually come down to a gruesome massacre on one side or the other.

But they couldn’t risk it being the Authority, which was why they were here. Fredrak promptly got to work.

“Fa-lan! Fa-lan!” he said into his comm, connected to the Addax. “Kanku-Ba! Huli-Ok! Hara-Vas!”

All nonsense phrases, apparently part of some code Gaylen was happy to not be important enough to know. The ship’s comm systems sent the message across the void and towards the alliance fleet. Gaylen disliked sitting idle, even if it was on the edge of the whole show, but just blasting ahead was a good way to get taken for an enemy by twitchy gunners on both sides.

The message reached the alliance, no doubt had to pass along several people in a very chaotic situation, and then blessedly a reply arrived. Gaylen only faintly heard more nonsense from the agent’s comm, to which the man responded in kind.

The battle raged on as they waited for another response and Gaylen used the seconds to map things out in more detail, taking note of squadron movements and the general directions of the heavy ships.

The reply came and Fredrak responded with a quick dose of yet more nonsense.

“We have it!” he announced. “We’ve been added to the battlenet! We can pass through the fleet without being shot!”

Gaylen gunned the engine, taking a wide arc towards the rough centre of the alliance fleet. He knew enough about full-fledged war to understand that squadrons would often try to circle about and attack from behind. Meanwhile, Fredrak continued on the comm, trying to reach a contact on the station who might help with a docking.

They were getting close when his sensors registered another vessel entering from the Other, pretty much on his heels. He wasn’t terribly surprised to see it was Evesa Karn’s flagship, nor was he surprised to see her attempting to contact him. He ignored it.

He passed by the first alliance ship, a big, intimidating blip on his sensors, and it did indeed hold its fire. He might have been designated a friendly, but staying out of the firing line was still all on him. As the cloud of ships thickened around him he took note of potential lines between opposing ships, and wove in through the dead space.

Heavy plasma shots flew both ways, dissipating into the void if they missed or bursting against armour if they hit. A big heat signature lit up on Gaylen’s instruments as an alliance fighter blew apart near the Authority force. There was some action going on right by the station itself. It was beyond Gaylen’s view, so it only registered as a bunch of heat flashes and a sprinkling of debris flying off into nothing.

He sent the Addax into a sharp rise, cutting well above a frigate-type alliance ship which a larger Authority vessel had a bead on. A huge bolt of plasma flew from the main gun, whizzing just by the moving ship. Two smaller ones immediately opened up with support guns, guided home by the miss, and some of the armour plating came off. Gaylen then cut a sharp left, giving way for a small squadron of alliance fighters as they moved about, hopefully guided by an actual battle strategy.

He was circa halfway through the fleet and rain of plasma, halfway towards whatever was going on by the station, when he noticed a shift in the Authority fleet. Some of the bigger ships on its galactic western flank were turning about as a group, still far enough apart to not make for a concentrated target, but definitely moving in unison. The alliance leadership noticed as well and their ships shifted to face an assault.

And that’s when the Authority reinforcements arrived. It was one ship at first; a big, heavily armoured cruiser, popping out of the Other some distance behind the alliance fleet. The rest followed in twos and threes; blips rapidly spreading on Gaylen’s instruments like some horrible rash.

Gaylen didn’t swear out loud, nor did Herdis next to him. But he certainly thought some colourful things.