Chapter 5

A few days passed without event. Naya and I continued our work on the armor piercing rounds, eventually working it into a routine. Once we had gotten used to the process, we started talking while we worked. It was just the usual stuff. Occasional sports chatter, talk about the mission, anything really. We had become friends very quickly, and we were eager to fly again.

The nuggets were coming along in a hurry. Within three days, the ones with gravity issues could launch consistently, and I was starting to consider dividing them into wings. They had some skill, and so far they had done everything I’d asked, even if it took a little while. They’d all acquired their own callsigns as well, through either mishap or commendation.

A few pilots were easier to remember than others. Road Runner was a little loud mouth, talked fast and acted a little recklessly. Cyclone was amazing at rolls, she could keep her balance while an enemy got confused or dizzy. And of course there was 2^nd lieutenant Maxus. The name Dog Meat had stuck with him, and he wasn’t too happy about it.

We were 24 hours away from start point when their training got an unexpected examination. I was out with the rookies and had divided them into two groups. One was practicing maneuvers, the other was running target practice. Atlantis was going ahead slow while recon teams scouted the area ahead, sitting a distance from a small gas planet and firing off target drones for us to shoot down. Half an hour in I had started to zone out a bit when a small argument broke out.

“Hey Blacksmith, get the hell off my canopy!” said Cyclone. Blacksmith was hovering directly above her and a little too close for comfort.

“I pulled it off fine! You leveled out wrong!”

I clicked my mic back on. “No you didn’t Blacksmith, you over-shot and accelerated.”

“Told you!”

“And Cyclone, you pulled up too much. Now you’re both going to back it up and try that one again. Understood?”

“Yes sir,” they chorused, and turned around to try the maneuver again.

“Keep it up. When you’re done with that, you should all switch to end-to-end work, I’m gonna go check on the target practice.” I sat up in my seat and gunned the engine, reorienting myself towards the other group.

Even from a distance I could make out the occasional flash from the guns of whoever was chasing down a drone. They came one at a time and the pilots would let the drone get some distance before chasing after it. Once you’d shot down a drone, you flew out of the kill zone and to the back of the line. I got close enough to see what was happening and stopped to watch. A drone fired and swerved off into the kill zone. A pilot separated from the pack and sped after it, pouring on the steam. The drone swerved and dodged, trying to shake the pilot off. The pilot looked a little confused but kept his head and fired a few bursts. They missed and the drone pulled a violent turn. The pilot managed to follow and made up for lost ground in a hurry. Finally, achieving a lock, he shot the drone down and flew to the back of the group.

“Good kill Hat Trick, but that was slow. In a real fight you’d have that drone’s friends to deal with by the time you killed it,” I said.

“But sir, I’d have my wingman to back me up in a real fight.”

“That’s true, but suppose your wingman’s busy, or needs your help.”

“Understood, sir. I’ll work on it.”

“Who’s next?” I asked the group at large.

“Ready to rumble sir!” Road Runner piped in. A drone launched and he took off after it. This drone was acting a bit crazy, swerving and dodging, even rolling straight over on occasion. It was going to be interesting to see how Road Runner handled a target that was just as crazy as he was. It was really zipping along, flying for broke, like it knew it was a cheap piece of polymer meant to be shot down and just wanted out. Road Runner wasn’t giving it an inch, following every crazy swerve and firing an occasional burst at it.

“Road Runner, you’re getting pretty far out of range. Take it down or give it up,” I said, noticing that he was straying a bit.

“I’ve…almost…got it…” he said through gritted teeth, straying towards the gas planet.

“Watch your gravity sensors! I am not gonna be the one to pick your remains out of that gas ball.”

“I know! I’ve almost got it!” I flipped my thrusters back on and took off after him. He wasn’t at the edge yet, but he wouldn’t stop if I didn’t do something. I could still see him in the distance trying to chase down the drone. “Jet, is your OTACS acting up?” he asked.

“It’s the gas planet, has a few metals that mess with our sensors, now get back here! That’s an order!”

“I’ve almost…Oh…oh no.”

“What is it?”

“Tell me you see that too.” I started to catch up with him and I could just see around the curvature of the gas planet. I could just make out the outline of a few small starships, undetectable by OTACS for the moment. They’d played us perfectly. I switched channels faster than I thought physically possible.

“Atlantis from training squad, marking five bogeys hiding around the other side of gas body ALT 6.3 and coming towards us.”

The communications officer responded almost at once “Copy that Jet. We’ve lost you on OTACS, how far out are they?”

“Hard to say, sensors are acting kinda wonky. I’d say 100 Klicks and closing.”

“Can you confirm an IFF signature? Can you tell what they are?” I looked hard at the approaching ships. They lacked the distinctive dark blue metal and intimidating spikes of Conjunction star ships.

“I can tell you from here that they aren’t Conjunction…” I tried to get a reading from their Identify Friend-Foe systems. “Not getting anything on the IFF, but it might just be interference. I don’t want to shoot without looking.” There was a pause on the other end.

“Lieutenant, your orders are to break radio silence. We don’t want them knowing Atlantis is here just yet. The element of surprise ought to give us an advantage. See what you can get out of these ships.”

“Understood.” I found the channel the unknown craft were on and spoke up.

“Attention unidentified vessels. You are flying in a restricted area. Please identify yourselves.”

There was silence. “This is Lieutenant Admen of the GLA Starforce’s 34^th fleet. Please respond.” Again there was nothing from the other end. I switched back, those ships were getting closer.

“Atlantis, they’re getting closer and they aren’t squawking. Orders?”

“Recon teams are being recalled to provide support, most of our pilots are off duty, it’s going to take time to get more fighters in the air. We still don’t know what we’re dealing with, until we do weapons hold, say again, weapons hold.”

“Atlantis I’ve got thirteen nuggets out here with me.” There was another pause.

“Lieutenant, recover your training squad and run a fly-by of those ships, we think that superior numbers might intimidate them. We need to know who we’re dealing with.”

“These guys have only been in the cockpit for a week! They’ve never seen combat!”

“These bogeys don’t know that.”

I gripped the flight stick tighter and took a deep breath. “Understood.” I switched channels and was greeted with a small blast of noise from the rookies, all wanting to know what was going on. “OKAY SHUT UP! We’ve got five silent, non-Conjunction ships cruising around over here and Atlantis needs recon done. Today you’re GLA flight officers and that means you listen to your superiors.” They were silent and waited for orders. “All fighters form up on me, we’re going to do a standard fly-by to scout for markings. You’ve all done this a million times in basic flight. First sign of trouble you bug out. Weapons hold until ordered otherwise. Understood?” There was a chorus of “Yes sir!” Slowly, the other fighters joined up and we set out in a gigantic pyramid shaped formation like a flock of birds. The ships were now only 10 Klicks away and I could tell they were civilian in origin.

“They just look like starliners,” a pilot said.

“Commercial flights that got lost maybe?” Cyclone chimed in.

“Then how come they aren’t talking?” said Road Runner.

“Damaged communications system?” Cyclone said.

“Cut the chatter. Roll right and let’s pass them on the starboard side. See if you can make out any distinctive marks.” The whole formation rolled over on its side and I squinted out of the top of my canopy, trying to spot anything distinctive on their bulkhead. I caught a glimpse of an all too familiar burning red skull before my eyes flicked to the ten or so guns along the side of the ship.

“Is that what I think it is?” Road Runner sounded like he was about to crap his pants. One of the guns turned to face me.

“Wave off now!” We scattered as rounds tore through where we would have been a second later, missing us all by inches.

“Atlantis from training squad, bogeys confirmed hostile! They’re Hell Razors, I say again, Hell Razors!” Pirates, slavers, killing pillaging and destroying anything that got in their way. With all the star front combat going on, they were probably here to raid ground colonies that weren’t being defended anymore. The Conjunction generally just let pirates come and go, as long as they didn’t make a move against them.

“Acknowledged. Recon fighters are three minutes out and we’ll have more in the air in five. They haven’t seen us yet; draw them out from behind the planet so we can get a firing solution. Weapons free, say again, weapons free.”

“Okay, you all have wingmen, find them and keep ‘em alive. Pin the throttle and let’s get out of here. Kite ‘em in and let Atlantis do the hard work. If there’s no other way out of it, you are authorized to use deadly force. Weapons free.” Road Runner formed up with me and we sped off, taking care to stay out of their gun range, but not so far that they would give up the chase.

“Incoming missile!” Road Runner warned me.

“It’s chasing you from the looks of it. You got this, just wait for it to get close and pull up hard.” I could hear him breathing heavily as he watched the missile slowly close in on him, waiting for the right moment to wave off. I could see it slowly gaining on him, closing in inch by inch. At last he pulled up and did a violent loop. The missile got lost halfway through and drifted off.

“HOO! I did it!”

“Don’t throw a party till we’re out of this.” We were still a good distance away from Atlantis, and they couldn’t move into this crap, they couldn’t aim without OTACS. Amazingly we were all still alive, the battlefield must’ve given them one hell of a rush. I’ll admit, everyone’s a better pilot when they’ve got a gun to their head. We were starting to close in, I could just make out Atlantis’ profile in the distance.

“Jet from Cyclone, they’ve stopped firing.” Cyclone was at the back of the pack and had noticed they’d stopped taking pot shots.

“Watch your rear people. If they’ve just stopped shooting, it usually means they’re launching fighters.”

“Those things have fighters!?” someone asked.

“Hell Razors, they’ve got everything,” Road Runner said.

“Got ‘em, I count ten, closing in fast!” another pilot said.

“How the hell are they catching up with us!?” said Blacksmith.

“I can see ‘em now! They’re pretty lightly armored, stunt fighters. Probably commercial models built for speed!” said Road Runner.

“They’re gonna catch us before we get into Atlantis’s gun range at this rate!” said Cyclone. She was right, we weren’t going to make it if we just kept going. Only one way out. It was time to give those poor kids a trial by fire.

“Okay people, we’re gonna take ‘em out. Break off and pick your targets on my mark.” They were in a rough formation; if I waited for them to get closer we could confuse them when we broke off.

“They’re getting closer!” someone said.

“I know…almost there…” I could almost sense it, the split second when they were just barely in range. “Break off now now now!” We scattered in all directions and I could almost feel the few seconds of confused fire that came from our pursuers. Ten of their fighters against fourteen of us. We had numbers, they had speed. I picked my first target and angled to face him. The enemy fighters scrambled as well, tagging different pilots; it was a total cluster fuck. My target was twisting and turning, forcing me to follow him and getting knocked around my cockpit a lot. These guys had experience; they knew how to throw off a slower opponent. With one final hairpin turn I had to break off. I swore and sprayed fire at another that passed by, managing to just barely wing him. No one had been shot down on either side yet, there was just a lot of confusion.

“Is it just me, or are they not really trying to kill us?” Road Runner said.

“They’re just trying to keep us busy while their real ships are lining up shots!” Cyclone said.

“Very good, you both get gold stars now c’mon! Show ‘em what we’re made of!”

“Got one on my six!” said Road Runner.

“I’ve got you. Pull left and try to keep that guy steady,” I said. He pulled off and I started locking on.

“This guy’s gonna waste me!”

“I’ve almost got him…” My reticle turned red and I fired. A single light missile streaked off. “Fox two!” The enemy fighter gave up the chase a second to late and vanished in a burst of light.

“A little too close for comfort Jet! Thanks for the save.”

“Anytime, just keep focused!” I felt a few rounds hit me from the rear and pulled a hard turn. “Damnit there’s one on me!” I rolled and twisted, feeling a few more rounds bounce off my hull. “Atlantis where the fuck are those recon fighters!?”

“Training squad this is recon one leader, callsign Axel, I’ve got three T-class and three C-class myself included ready to assist.”

“Looks like you’re in it deep.” Spin-Out of course was with her.

“Good to hear a friendly voice! I could use a little help here!”

“On it, pull hard right turn and get ready to move out of the way.” Naya was pulling up on my right side. I gripped the stick and braced myself. I pulled right until I was facing her and dived. One burst of fire later my pursuer was gone.

“Thanks. Okay, let’s finish this. Axel, form up on me, Spin-Out, take the recon fighters and form on us, we’re gonna pull a scissor.”

“Understood,” said Naya.

“You are some kind of crazy. I like it,” said Spin-Out. We formed up with the recon fighters in one giant spear head, the scramble of fighters visible not far away.

“Okay nuggets! On my mark I want you all to pull towards us. Once you’re half a klick away I want you to pull up hard and dodge. Recon fighters, Pick a target and waste ‘em, missiles first, then follow it up with gunfire. Understood?”

“Yes sir!” echoed around.

“Okay, nuggets…bring ‘em in!” The scramble evened out as the rookies raced towards us, still rolling and dodging the occasional burst from their pursuers. I lined up a shot and waited for a lock.

“Locked on!”

“Target lock!”

“Check!”

“Got a lock!”

“Set!”

“Ready!” I had a lock.

“Climb for it nuggets!” They broke off, the instant they were out of the firing line seven missiles streaked from our formation and annihilated the charging enemy; the one that we didn’t hit was destroyed by the force and shock of the missiles. I let out a breath and shook myself. “Fan-fucking-tastic. Damage report?” A few seconds later Blacksmith reported in.

“All ships are up and undamaged over here.”

“Same here,” Naya confirmed.

“Outstanding. Nuggets, punch it for home.”

“And what? Leave you here?” said Road Runner.

“You guys did well, but you don’t have your wings yet. Get outta here, get a beer. And don’t think this means I’m not drilling you tomorrow.”

“Understood. See you back on deck sir,” said Road Runner, sounding a little put-out.

“First round’s on me.” I switched back to the recon fighter’s channel. “Okay, rookies are out of the way. We’ve still got five bandits out there. Any of you T’s bring charges?”

“Negative, we were running reconnaissance, not demolition.” said Naya.

“Lovely. Atlantis, how far out of gun range are we?” I asked.

“Not far, two minutes at top speed. We’re a couple minutes away from launching bombers. Best course of action would be to kite ‘em into range.”

“Okay, can anyone see how far out those oh shit!” I rolled violently, dodging a missile.

“That far!” Naya said.

“Thank you lieutenant, all fighters break for home at max velocity!” I rolled back towards Atlantis and poured on the speed, quickly followed by the six recon fighters. I glanced out of my canopy and spotted the five ships, less than a klick away.

“Aw man, that one on point’s got a mass driver!” Spin-Out said from the middle of the pack.

“Okay…that complicates things. Spin-Out, keep your eye on it and tell me when it’s gonna shoot, everyone else get ready to roll right.” There were a few seconds when all we did was hold our breath and keep our feet pressed on the thruster pedal.

“Incoming!”

“Roll now!” I pulled right and saw a massive burning red metal slug streak past in less than a millisecond. We leveled out and kept going.

“30 seconds to gun range,” the communications officer said.

“Another one!”

“Roll!” We rolled right again as another burning hot slug flew by. My OTACS cleared up and I could make out the shapes of all six recon fighters, Atlantis, and the five ships tailing us.

“Atlantis to recon squad, static is clear. Targets locked, barrage in-bound, have a nice day.” I looked back just in time to catch a hail of shells and missiles tearing the five ships apart. There was something terribly beautiful about a well-placed volley from an ACP’s Hydra turrets. I stared at the wreckage, smiling in a stupid I-almost-died way, giddy with shock and relief.

“Holy shit! Aha ha! Nice shooting Atlantis! Five say again five confirmed kills.” I said, easing off the throttle and relaxing a bit.

“Acknowledged. Recon one and lieutenant Admen, come on home. Nice work out there.”

“On our way in. Thanks for the assist Atlantis, recon one out,” Naya said, sounding just as relieved and goofy as I did.

I was so wound up that I almost missed the claw on the way in. I was rewarded with a painful metallic shriek that made my hair stand on end before the claw locked in and I was thrown forward a bit. I slowed to a halt, shut my thrusters off and took my hand away from the flight stick. All I needed was a stupid accident like that to kill me after going toe to toe with ten fighters and five pirate carriers. The moment passed and I relaxed, letting out a deep breath and feeling my joints finally go loose.

I glanced around and waited. Naya flashed me a thumbs up and I returned it. A loader towed me back to the lift and I was brought back to the hanger. It towed me back to my place and I felt a soft thud as the whole thing was locked back down. I finally shut everything else down and slid the canopy forward. I popped my helmet off and ejected my flight package. The Deck Master was already waiting for me.

“Nice landing lieutenant. That’s another 30 minutes of buffing for me,” he said good naturedly.

“Excuse me *oof!* if I’m a little unsteady after nearly dying about five times.” I said, smiling and jumping out, not bothering to wait for a ladder.

“All things considered, you had a damn good run out there. I’d take 30 minutes of buffing over a bunch of dead rookies and thirteen fighters missing any day,” he said, recording the minor damage to my fighter. A few seconds later someone shouted

“Hey, he’s back!” and before I could think I was bum rushed by my entire squad of rookies. I just smiled and pated them all on the back, letting them enjoy their victory.

“Hey! C’mon, we’ve still got work to do. I want you all at the bar and enjoying some watered down beer and crappy TV. Nobody gets drunk, everyone enjoys themselves. Understood?”

There was a chorus of “Yes sir!” and they strode away, heads held high, still talking about the fight. I handed my flight package to a deck hand and stripped off my pressure suit.

“What the hell have you been teaching them?” I jumped and turned around. It was Naya of course, leaning against my fighter.

“You really need to stop doing that.”

“I dunno. Keeps you on your toes doesn’t it?”

“Yeah, I guess. Good run out there, thanks for the save,” I said.

“Anytime. You had a good run yourself.”

“Thanks.”

“I hope you haven’t forgotten about our plan.” She moved from my fighter and headed for the exit.

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” I said, and followed her.

In the time since we had tested the armor piercing design, we had accumulated roughly 200 13mm rounds and another 100 or so 20mm. It wasn’t nearly enough to last in a standup fight, but with a lock and some luck it could tear through a few fighters. We were still cranking them out as fast as we could. These might just save our lives.

“The real test is gonna be firing these things in a vacuum,” she said, feeding a round into a belt.

“They aren’t all that different from regular rounds. They should work fine.” I said, doing the same. We were feeding the rounds we had into belts and winding them into loader crates. Loader crates were one of the greatest simple improvements ever made to a flight deck. Rounds on belts were wound up inside like fire hoses. Just feed the belt into a fighter’s magazine and crank. In seconds you can have a fighter reloaded.

“Should being the key word in that sentence,” she said.

“And if it works, we’ll be showered with praise and glory.”

“Or not dead if we have to fight an armored target.”

“Yeah, I think yours is more realistic.”

She smiled and slid the last round into the belt. “There we go. For what it’s worth,” she said, shutting the crate and rapping it smartly.

“I’ve just got a couple more to go,” I said, sliding another into the belt.

“Alright. *sigh* is 200 enough?” she said, striding over to watch my progress.

“It’s gonna have to be, we’re out of athenium.”

“I know, I know…still sucks.”

“We’ll just load other rounds into the rest of it,” I said, pointing out the hundreds of empty links on the belt.

“Yeah, all right.” She rubbed the side of her head a bit.

“You feeling okay?”

“Mhm, just a little tired, it’s been a long day.”

“For you and me both.” I slid the last round in and shut the crate. “Let’s move these back to the hangar.”

“Good idea.”

We both rolled our respective crates back to our own flight deck, now empty, aside from a few deck hands, and stopped in front of my fighter.

“Whatcha think? Should we load ‘em? They aren’t exactly built to specs,” I said. In response she slid my fighter’s magazine open and ejected its contents.

“No guts no glory LT. Let’s do it.” We spent another hour loading the contents of my magazine into the now freshly loaded belt full of armor piercers and then did the same with her fighter. We continued to talk about the mission, fighter performance, anything really. It was only when we’d finished loading her fighter and the flight deck was completely abandoned that I glanced at the clock.

“We’d better get out of here, Jackson’ll have our asses,” she said, shutting her magazine and wiping grime from her hands.

“Yeah, you’re right.” We both looked back at the magazine.

“Best of luck,” I said.

“Back at you. Hope you finish with those rookies soon. Believe it or not I actually feel safer flying with your crazy ass.” She smiled and jogged off.

“There’s no one I’d rather have on my wing,” I called after her. I watched her leave. Even working on something boring and repetitive with her gave me a kick. The skipper really was going to have my ass if I didn’t get out of there. I hit the lights and went back to my quarters.

I lay down, fixed my eyes on the steel ceiling again and enjoyed the sensation of actually doing nothing for the first time that day. I’d been shot at and nearly killed more times than I could count, but that had still been the best day I’d had in a long time. By this time tomorrow we’d probably have a plan for taking our target staging grounds. And this time in a few weeks we’d have a plan for taking this system, then a plan for the system after and so on. I forced my mind away from the war overall. One job at a time.