Jace clambered into the cockpit and straddled the front saddle. As soon as he sat down, he pulled the canopy shut behind him. The cockpit wasn’t spacious, and there wasn’t much room for his legs to fit between the saddle and the wall.
He looked over the controls. The power shunting levers were to his left, and to his right was a bundle of switches he didn’t understand.
The starcoal furnace’s opening was just behind the two seats, and a few white coals already smouldered away. A set of levers ran along the wall, as well as dials and cranks. Lessa opened the small coal bunker beside her and gathered up a scoopful up with a small trowel, then tossed it in the furnace. The fire flared bright white as the coals released high-power fire-aspect Aes.
“So, is this one of those fancy starships with an…what was it, Aes integration system?” Jace asked.
Lessa turned around in her rear-facing saddle and peered over his shoulder. “Uh…yep! Grab the handlebars! If a Wielder flies it, they can supply their Aes to the ship.”
Jace raised his eyebrows, then placed his hands on the handlebars. A few exposed wires ran along the outside, and he fed Aes into them like he had for the Vault Core or any other starship. Aes flooded out of his body—violent, angry hyperspace-aspect Aes—and raced around the starship’s wires.
He traced it with the slight perception he’d mustered, following the shreds of it around the starship’s channels like they were channels in his body.
A dust-sheet flared up in front of him. [Activating Aes-link with starfighter…]
[Integrating Attributes…]
[Establishing stable circuit…]
[Analyzing highest two (2) Attributes to prevent Aes underflow...]
When Jace inhaled, the stafighter’s repellers flared to life. It lifted up off the shelf a few inches before dropping back down.
“That touchy, huh?” he muttered.
[Starship linked: Starrealm Sparrowhawk G-54. Callsign: 3K]
[Vital linked to total shield output (limited by shield fuel-cell capacity).]
[Resistance linked to repeller strength.]
“Repeller strength?” Jace breathed. “Those are the things that make the starship float in the atmosphere?” Not very useful in space.
Lessa said, “Not just in the atmosphere. They help maneuver the ship. If you can output more base strength to the repellers, then you’ll have a better base to maneuver off of. Kinda like widening your stance.”
Jace nodded. “Are all the other pilots Wielders?”
“Doubt it,” she replied. “But the option is there in case a Wielder does board a stafighter.”
“Do we have any way of communicating with the other fighters in the squadron?”
“Doubt it, if they’re jamming our wireless telesignals.”
A human in a ground crew uniform (Jace assumed that was what the brown overalls and tool belt meant) dashed in front of the starfighter. He waved his arms, then shouted, “You will be at the head of the squadron! Show them where to go! Thegn’s orders!” Jace could barely hear through the glass, but he nodded along anyway.
The man ran to the next starfighter in the row, and shouted, “Follow Three-Kise! They will lead Squadron Three!”
“That’s our…designation?” Jace asked.
Lessa shrugged. “Callsign, sorta. I didn’t pay attention to the nose art, but I’m guessing we’re Three-Kise.”
“Squadron Three, depart!” A palace guard waved his rifle towards the hangar opening, beckoning them forward. “The thegn’s corvette will be right on your tail!”
A holographic screen lit up just above the handlebars. It looked the same as the Luna Wrath’s scanners. A small green triangle represented each of the nineteen other pilots in the squadron.
“Alright, launching,” he said. The thrusters churned and chugged. He shifted his fingers up on the handlebars to reach the repeller brakes. He began a stable cycling pattern and lifted up on the handlebars, and the starfighter lifted off the ground again.
He pressed his thighs against the saddle, and the thrusters purred. The starfighter crawled forward. He twisted the handlebars and nudged the vessel towards the mouth of the hangar. Its controls were touchy and extremely responsive, and there was no delay between giving his order and a response—not like riding a horse. They lurched forward, unsteadily.
“You’re sure you’ve got this?” Lessa asked.
“Just getting used to the new connection,” he said. There was much more distance for his Aes to circulate, and he had to push the Ten-Claw Inlet Cycle faster to keep the combat-oriented quick pulses moving. “I need you to keep the furnace full and fired all the time, and make speed adjustments when we need.”
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“Yeah, yes…I think I can figure this out.”
“Great.” Jace gripped the handlebars a little tighter. There were no obstacles ahead. “Then let’s give it some speed and see what happens.”
Lessa tossed a shovelful of starcoals in the fire. The thrusters whirred, but the ship didn’t speed up yet. “This isn’t like a freighter or battleship,” she said. “Which is good for me, ‘cause I’d be hopeless in their engine rooms. Here, I don’t directly control the speed in the engine room. I maintain the conditions for the starship to go at its maximum speed, but like the repeller-bike, you’re in control of the overall thruster output.”
He tightened his legs against the saddle, and a roar filled the cabin. A glow shone from the stern, trimming the edges of the cockpit with a brilliant orange light. It took all of Jace’s strength to keep in the saddle and lean forward.
They pierced through the ornamental waterfall in front of the hangar with ease, and shot over the palace gardens beyond—low enough that one of the trees caught fire.
Jace pulled back on the handlebars, dragging the starship up into the sky. They arced up towards the dome of blue sky above—and the battle. He gave a little bit of power to the shields, and just in time. Debris pelted the fighter. The higher they raced, the larger the debris, and soon he was slaloming to avoid them. They dipped through the center of an enormous falling thruster nacelle, then swerved around a massive sheet of armour plating.
“You might want to power up the weapons,” Lessa said. “It’s the red switch. The one covered with a glass shield.”
“What kind of firepower do we have?” he asked, flipping the glass shield up and flicking the switch.
“Wingtip plasma cannons, for sure.” She tossed another scoop of starcoals into the furnace, then pulled a lever beside her head. Steam hissed into the cabin, until she cranked a small winch. “And I think some micro-torpedos. Manual launch.”
On either side of the cabin, by his legs, two miniature torpedoes were half-submerged in the wall—and half-buried in torpedo launch tubes, ready to use.
The starship creaked, and the sky darkened. Flashes of light leapt back and forth between the enormous starships up ahead, and hordes of starfighters raced back and forth like motes of dust in a beam of light. This little squadron would barely make a difference if they fought the Koedor-Terginian fleet on their terms.
An explosion rattled the starfighter’s frame. Flames engulfed two of the starfighters behind them.
“Keep away from their cruisers!” Lessa shouted. “Looks like they’re tracking your current position.”
“The further away we are, the better our chances of survival are,” Jace whispered. He looked as far forward as he could and leaned to see around the edge of the viewscreen. The rest of the squadron and the corvette clustered behind him. It was up to him to lead them on a safe path.
A light blinked, alerting him to the cluster of enemy starfighters rushing toward them. He didn’t need the scanners to know what they were; their fluorescent markings and pale green paint stood out from the void. He slalomed, leaning side to side to guide the small starship away from the streaks of plasmafire. They had shields, sure, but he didn’t know how long they would last—or how much they could protect him from.
“How do I use the guns?” Jace asked. “Plasma cannons, I mean!”
“There should be a trigger on the handlebars,” she said. “Behind the brake handles.”
He felt for the triggers without lifting his hands. Behind the brakes was a second handle. He pulled on it to test it. Nothing happened.
“Uh…Lessa…”
“Probably the Aes-link, then! It took over fire control! Push your Aes through the starship’s wires and to the wingtip cannon, like you’re activating a technique card!”
He sent a pulse of Aes whirling out to the wingtips. A schematic of the starship’s channels built in his mind, just based on where his Aes travelled, and he fired a pulse of it through each of the wingtip cannons like he was activating a technique with the Ten-Claw Inlet Cycle. A bead of sweat rolled down his forehead.
The wingtip cannons lit up. A streak of plasma coursed into the void on either side of the ship.
“How’s the furnace going?” he asked. The roar of the thrusters diminished, if only slightly, but he didn’t dare to look back.
“I’m trying to keep us topped up!” Lessa replied. There was a hiss of steam, and another clunk. The starfighter groaned. “I’ve never done this before. I watched Kinfild, but…”
Jace inhaled slowly, then gripped the handlebars tight again. “Sorry. Keep…keep it up.” He focussed on dipping between incoming objects and rolling through explosions. He timed his cycles of Aes with the thrum of the starfighter’s thrusters. Every minor system functioned efficiently, and in-time with his will. His Vital Attribute strengthened the channels from the shield-Aes fuel cells to the generators, allowing for extra output of shield Aes. They could take a powerful hit, but the shields would deplete faster.
The repellers had a technique card or two ingrained in them, and they ran off a main cell of pure Aes. Every time he wanted to turn, the repellers output more power, his Resistance attribute emboldening them. He swerved faster and tighter than any other starfighter in the squadron.
The chaos of battle flowed around him, and all he could do was react in time to stay alive and maintain a course. It was like riding a horse through the foothills—around small stones, dodging holes, jumping over creeks, and fording through rivers.
Of course, back home, there hadn’t been plasmafire or exploding starships to worry about. Each second, another spacefaring vessel met a silent grave in the void, and their remains tumbled to the world below in a cradle of flame.
They flew through a canyon of behemoth starships, then launched out from the swarm of enemy starfighters. Some turned about to chase after the small squadron, but the Thane’s corvette incinerated them with its small but fast-firing plasma cannons.
He veered away from a salvo of plasma and flak, then swerved just past the bridge of an enemy battleship. The crew scrambled around behind the viewscreen, pointing and shouting orders.
“Do you see it?” Lessa asked. “The battleship with the queen-core?”
“I kept our general course steady! We should be close!” But he had been making continuous course corrections and swerving through the battle. He couldn’t have kept a perfectly straight line.
He adjusted the small holographic scanner display until it displayed the entire battlefield. There was one large red triangle that held back from the rest of the fighting, keeping to the edges of the battle. That was the ship they needed.
Jace leaned, guiding the fighter to the right. They re-adjusted their course. He traced a path through the duelling starships with his eyes. He gripped the handlebars, then tightened his legs on the saddle. “We just have to make it through.”