Masha

Masha throws her throttle forward and rockets away with a violent burst of speed. The Starblade was a maneuverable beast of an aerospace fighter and it had more than enough get up and go so he could get her places fast, quick and in a hurry.

The closest enemies were already reduced to a mix of debris, life pods, and extravehicular pilots or crew desperately hoping their cobbled together life support, axiom tattoos or sheer force of will would keep them alive long enough to be rescued or captured.

What that meant is that Masha owned the void near the Tear.

She was willing to bet that most of the survivors littering the wreckage would end up as captured. An armored shuttle was in the process of announcing itself as Armadillo 1-1 and launching on the far side of the massive mass conveyor that was almost certainly heading out to do just that.

Masha grins, she knew the shuttle had a few Undaunted Marines from the Fleet Anti Terrorism Security Company (FAST) aboard to ensure their new guests played nicely with their rescuers. If the pirates did manage to escape, they'd be leaving a lot of their sisters cooling their heels in the Tear's brig.

That draws another shark-like smile from Masha as she turns down her inertial dampener a bit, letting the g forces pull on her as she inverts and dives her fighter towards the nearest enemy. If she could make a double ace today without issue, maybe capture some bad guys, really display her talent... she'd have good standing to propose wouldn't she?

The giddy thought comes and goes in a flash as Masha's mind processes the visual information in front of her. One of the enemy gunships had strayed away from the rest of the pack and was getting closer to the Tear, which meant bringing it closer to her hunting grounds.

"Well, if you're going to offer yourself up on a plate for me..."

Masha's hands move almost automatically, lining things up. Her fighter immediately gave her a solid tone of target lock and she gently squeezed the trigger. Beams of light and bursts of plasma fire reach out, slamming into the gunship that had flown too close to the ship she was supposed to protect.

Her target's shields stripped, and being in something of a hurry, Masha switches her weapon selector to her axiom torpedoes and launches one of the guided projectiles. The speak of fire in the void quickly goes along its merry way, even as Masha banks to roll in on the drop ships.

Her heavily armored targets turn out to be bristling with guns, and clearly have extremely impressive shields for vessels their size. Instead of diving straight in, Masha drops down hard before cutting back on the throttle and applying a series of bursts from her maneuvering thrusters, reorienting the Starblade even as it continued forward on its previous heading. Masha grins as the tone goes hot in her ear and she riddles the bottom of the first drop ship with energy weapons fire.

A flick of another switch starts feeding that targeting information into the data link, lighting that particular target up like a Christmas tree. She'd be here all day if she tried to wear its shields down alone. Luckily, she knew someone with plenty of firepower to go around.

"Raven, Geirr 1-2, just lit up a heavily shielded bogey loitering a bit too close to the Tear for comfort, requesting naval gunfire support."

"ANGLICO? Geirr 1-2 I... Oh. Stand by Geirr 1-2. I'll route it to the gunner's mates. Stay approximately where you are. Any requests on weapon composition?"

"Whatever you can spare me Raven."

"All friendly craft, check your screens for a danger zone, the Tear is firing her weapons defensively in close proximity."

The sky lights up like dawn as the Tear's point defense weapons unload into the two drop ships. It wasn't the primary naval grade weapons of course, those were still hammering away at the corvette somewhere off to Masha's right and up compared to her current orientation. Two drop ships in close were a problem, but not that much of a problem.

What was concerning is that they'd managed to spoof or trick the Tear's sensors and manage to get in this tight to start with. Something to get out of the prisoners once they were done mopping this mob up.

A switch of her stick and a caress of the trigger sends her last axiom torpedoes into the now vulnerable belly of the heavily damaged drop ship. One torpedo strikes straight to the drive core, killing both engines and power and leaving her adrift. The second one strikes amidships and does a fair bit of damage, venting a large amount of atmosphere into space. There were probably survivors, but that particular dropship wasn't going to fly again without enough repairs that you may as well just build a new one.

"Geirr 1-2, splash one drop ship. Going for the second."

Carefully she puts in throttle moving around the first drop ship's bulk, using its mass as armor against any possible retaliation from its sister craft. Instead of a face full of its guns however, Masha finds herself staring at the other drop ship's engines as she burns towards one the cargo hangars. She quickly spools up and pursues, jaw dropping slightly when the hangar doors open all on their own.

"Raven, Geirr 1-2... one of the cargo hangars has been penetrated, lock down all the internal doors manually, they have a code breaker on board."

Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.

"Copy, internal security is responding. What are you doing Geirr 1-2?"

"Going in after them. It's maybe twenty, thirty pirates in that drop ship."

"Seems like something of an unfair fight Geirr 1-2."

"You're right Raven I should have let them land the first drop ship, given them a fighting chance. 1-2 out."

Masha dives her craft in at a steep angle, waiting for the drop ship to hit the containment field... which would drop its shields. It would have to be perfectly timed salvo, but she just had to wait a moment. She leans in over the controls, licking her lips within her oxygen mask as she watches the sensors. Time slows to a crawl, the drop ship seemingly inching towards the magnetic barrier. She'd have a second at the absolute most. Plasma wouldn't make it, she disengages that system and puts everything into her lasers, maxing out their cyclic rate. Closer. Closer.

"NOW!"

Masha pulls down hard on the trigger and beams of light slam into the drop ship's engines like the fists of a particularly angry and very large Erumenta, gouging out armor, hull plating and all sorts of sensitive looking things that probably didn't react well to being superheated and slagged by laser fire.

The drop ship falls out of the sky hard, its landing turning into a crash as its engine goes critical and scrams itself. With nothing to counter its inertia it plows into the deck plates, partially extended landing gear collapsing after catching just long enough to start the spacecraft rolling. It slams to a stop against the far wall of the hangar as Masha kills the engine and manipulates the maneuvering thrusters to bring the starblade in flat relative to the deck to a slightly rough, but otherwise perfect, landing.

"Geirr 1-2 on the deck. Going to go handle our guests."

"Do you need support, 1-2? Ship's security teams are moving to that area."

"Have them keep the doors and access ways locked down and be ready for any that manage to escape somehow. That crash should have them rattled but you never know. Otherwise keep everyone out of my way till the screaming stops."

The massive hangar doors start to slowly close, locking away the void of space.

"You're sure you're okay being locked in there with the pirates Geirr 1-2?"

"Raven I'm an Apuk who was considered a shoe in for a crown once upon a time. I'm not locked in here with them. They're locked in here with me."

The canopy slides back, and Gauch hits her straps, quickly sliding out of her survival gear. She needed to be free to move, but more importantly she needed to look her best. She pulls her shoulder holster and gun belt out of one of her small storage cubicles in the cockpit of her fighter, retrieving one of her pistols with the leather, and the other from her survival gear. Next she zips her flight suit down a bit, thanking whatever stroke of luck had seen her only wear a sports bra underneath today. She could show off a modest amount of cleavage.

She focuses her hearing on the wreck of the enemy ship as she peels off her flight helmet, shaking out her torrent of red hair that spilled down her back like a wildfire before putting her stetson on. She wasn't the type to wear makeup, but she found herself wishing she had a compact on her, just to make sure her hair looked right and her face was clean.

This was an important moment after all.

Glorious feats of battle were an important part of the courtship ritual for Apuk warriors, and she knew the object of her affections would see this. He might even be watching now. Masha finds the nearest ship's camera, and looks into the lens, winking, with a cocky smile on her face that really drove home why they called her Gaucha. She had to put on a good show to make sure he knew she was worthy.

Something stirs in the drop ship, the first pirate pulling themselves from the wreckage. Masha looks down at the flight helmet still in her hands. AFE would be annoyed with her... but it wasn't the custom one they were working on for her.

A Phosa pulls herself from the twisted metal... and Masha hurls her helmet at her at breakneck speeds, knocking the woman out cold with a resounding CLUNK that echoed through the hangar, followed by a wet smack as the Phosa falls back into the room she'd been crawling out of.

There's a flurry of activity within the wreck, and Masha can hear a female voice barking orders at the edge of her enhanced hearing. She draws her revolvers, flourishing them before pulling the hammers back. The powerful auto revolvers would fire in single action for the rest of the fight now. She leaves the pistols down, keeping her focus.

Finally she hears the same female voice that had been barking orders roars;

"What are you cunts doing? There's one of her and forty of you! Get your asses out there or I'll shoot you myself. Babydoll get us the fuck out of this hangar or I'm going to drop you in a null chamber and jill off as you unravel."

Masha winces. Sounds like that was their hacker. With a name like that she was either the leader's... sex toy? Girlfriend? Or a Gravia. With the description of what would happen to her in null probably the latter.

Finally, pirates begin to emerge from the wreckage, keeping as much cover between them and Masha while trying to fan out to ‘surround’ her. Sort of.

They didn't seem willing to leave the cover of the drop ship.

That she was Apuk didn't help their fear.

That she was standing out in the open so confidently with a pair of massive guns didn't help either. It fits Masha's perception of your average pirate being a coward more than a fool.

That was good for them. In their trade, cowards lived longer.

A Lopen in an ostentatious naval uniform finally pops out on the far side of the wreck, dragging a heavy plasma cannon with her, the canid handling the weapon more like she was part Cannidor. Adept? Actual Cannidor blood? Masha sets the speculation aside.

"I don't know what the fuck is going on here, but you fucks have screwed with the wrong bitch. I am Captain-"

The Lopen is silenced by one of the hand cannons roaring and taking the hat clean off the Lopen's head.

"What the fuck? Was that kinetic? The fucking fuck are you fucking doing you crazy daughter of a-"

The revolver speaks again, this time slamming into the housing of the plasma cannon.

"Ah ah. I have the talking stick. You stupid bitches picked a fight with the Undaunted, and while we didn't start this fight, I will be finishing it."