"Use your escort ships to strengthen your missile defenses instead of attacking. This way you are free to unleash everything that you have. Trust me on this." Ruo said with a white knuckled grip on her seat as the jump timer counted down from twenty.
"If they're just sitting there protecting us, it cuts our firepower in half. We don't have enough capital ships to take on the Sharlah fleet. We need to throw everything at them." Volkov gritted her teeth.
"Fine, but keep some behind to guard our ship, we cannot lose the Wraith."
"Captain Volkov, this is Charlie, there was a problem with the nuclear missile, we did not launch, I repeat, The EMP did not work."
"SHIT!" Volkov screamed as the timer reached zero.
Real space blurred into a jump portal and then immediately back to real space. The Wraith's instruments were recalibrating but they were close enough to see the engines of the Sharlah ships powering toward the distraction. At least that had worked.
"All ships fire when ready." Volkov called out on the fleetwide comms. "Liberty and Grace stay with the Wraith and use your weapons as point defense."
Ruo nodded in agreement and stood to watch the barrage of missiles streaking toward the Sharlah fleet. Space combat was much like Naval combat, she thought, as the weapons took some time to reach their destinations and sometimes all the recipient could do was watch them come.
The Sharlah ships detected their entry into the system and attempted to decelerate and turn in unison but it was too late as they turned broadside and a cloud of missiles slammed into their armor.
A cheer went up across the bridge as flames erupted from at least twenty Sharlah warships and their debris joined the cloud already created by the earlier hyper strike. Volkov, however, sat quietly. The EMP didn't work and now the alien guns were coming around to take their turn.
"QUIET NOW! Divert all power reserves to the shields and point defense lasers. Cut the forward thrust and initiate evasive maneuvers."
The sensors flared to life as the Sharlah let loose with a volley of their own and moved to encircle the pirate battle wall.
"We have incoming, thirty seconds to impact." The sensor operator called out.
"Brace for impact! Spread out to cover our flanks now!" Volkov replied.
"Yes Ma'am!"
Ruo dropped back into her seat and fastened the harness over her shoulders before digging her fingernails into the arm rest and closing her eyes tightly. It was happening again.
The ship rocked not once, but three separate times and the lights flickered but stayed on.
"The shields are holding Ma'am but we lost three battleships on the front line, no escape pods detected."
Ruo opened her eyes. She was alive. The Wraith hummed again as it launched another salvo of missiles.
"Charlie, what's the status of the stealth group?" Volkov asked the console in front of her.
"They just arrived on the right flank. The Sharlah are reacting to them now, instead of encircling you. They are in disarray. I am highlighting their flagship known as a Harvester."
The ship was a behemoth, large enough to house hundreds if not thousands of crew and it was turning to face them.
"Ash, we need that EMP now!" Ruo yelled into her wrist comms.
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"I don't know what the problem is Mei, Jayden went into the cargo bay to fix it but he isn't responding. Something happened to him."
Ash unstrapped from his seat and put his hand on Kate's shoulder. "I'm going to see what happened to Jay, don't do anything I wouldn't do."
Ash climbed down into the engineering section and stopped for a moment to take in how messy everything was. Jayden must have been pushed to his limits to get the Solent upgraded and ready for battle. He jogged through the debris and tools scattered everywhere before reaching the cargo bay entrance. The door slid open automatically as he approached and he immediately spotted Jayden's limp form laying on the ground next to the nuclear missile's launch tube.
"Jay, are you okay?" Ash said as he opened a private comm channel but the same screeching sound flooded into his helmet from Jayden's. With the cargo bay depressurized, the suits were no longer needed and he ripped his helmet off first and they Jayden's
Jayden was barely conscious and he had a dent in the back of his helmet where it looked like he had fallen on the launch tube when the bay had gravity restored. He looked up at Ash, dazed, and had blood coming from his ears. He motioned for Ash to lean down to the deck.
"Charlie." Jayden whispered, barely audible at all. "There's nothing wrong with it. It was Charlie, she wants to keep the nuke."
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"We're giving as good as we're getting. Keep up the fire. Get the boarding Squads ready." Volkov called over the comms to Hamilton, but the whole unit could hear it as the Wraith rocked from another hit to her shields. Connor squatted in the launch bay with his shotgun in hand. They didn't need to do anything, they were ready. He looked down at it and admired the drum magazine filled with fifty rounds of buckshot that had been fabricated for him.
He glanced over at Liz and spent a few moments admiring her in the same way. She looked beautiful but also deadly in her pirate battle armor that was somehow still form fitting. She caught him and smiled through the anxiety that was creeping in. The lights flickered again and the pirates looked up out of instinct and fear.
A loud bang echoed through the bay as something impacted the ships armored panels instead of it's shield, then another. The lights went off for several seconds before the backup reactor took over.
"They still have hyper missiles. Launch the boarding parties. We can't take much more of these hits! Your target is the capital ship designated Harvester. Board and take control.” Volkov shouted, followed by “Hey! Where are you going?"
Hamilton furrowed his brow, not sure he understood what that meant. "Acknowledged." He said into the comm. "Alright grab your shit and load up."
Connor, Liz, Hamilton, and Jimmy squeezed into their pod and held their weapons between their legs as they adjusted their outer gear for comfort. Just as the door was about to close and seal, another pirate darted through and pressed themselves against the wall.
"Hey, this ain't your pod dumb fuck!" Hamilton yelled but the door slammed shut, the tech outside didn't realized what had happened.
When the pirate turned around, Connor locked eyes with her, it was Mei Ruo from the Solent. She looked like she was in shock but she had a weapon and stared pleadingly back at him. He looked away and said nothing.
The Wraith vibrated as it launched another volley of missiles followed by a loud pop as the boarding pod fired out of it's tube at breakneck speed. Ruo slammed into the opposite wall and Hamilton swore and grabbed her in a bear hug against his chest.
Connor prayed that the mixture of missiles and boarding pods would be overwhelming for the Sharlah ship's defenses. He probably wouldn't know if they were hit, he would just cease to exist. Liz, Hamilton, Ruo, Jimmy, they would just vanish into ashes when the laser hit them. If they were lucky. The alternative was a long and slow death floating among the massive debris cloud from the battle until their oxygen ran out.
The pod slammed into something, bringing him out of his contemplation and back into the fight. The tip of the bullet shaped projectile popped off with a bang and Connor was on his feet and into the hallway before he had even checked on Liz. He exited the pod to the left and fired a blast into the exposed face of an unarmed Sharlah that was climbing back to it's feet.
Skin and bone ripped free exposing the inside of it's mouth and shattering it's teeth. It fell flat on its back and let out a long moan but it didn't move again. Hamilton climbed through and lifted his rifle to the right just as another pod ripped through the bulkhead, melting two more Sharlah before they could react. Liz, Jimmy and Ruo fell into line and waited for orders.
"Just who in the fuck are you, young lady? I've never seen you before." Hamilton snarled at Ruo who's hands were violently shaking. She didn't respond. "I'm talking to you!" Hamilton yelled and shoved her against the wall as another breaching squad crashed into the ship.
"Lets go, we need to get to the bridge right?" Connor interrupted.
"No! We need to get the weapons offline first, we're losing ships every minute that we stand here talking about it. Fall in!" Hamilton shouted and started down the hallway with his body low and pressed against the wall and his magnetic boots thumping hard with every step.
Connor caught a flash of light through the jagged tear in the bulkhead around their pod and barely saw a missile volley streak away from the ship at a ridiculous speed. "We need to go up. We're below the weapons deck."
"Good, it's on the way to the bridge." Hamilton replied.