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Countdown
Here we go again. I glance at the timer I started a few minutes ago, it blinks past 3 minutes; check space around me again, both with radar and visually, damn, still alone; or rather, not alone, just with the wrong kind of company. A Rune Valk flashes past between me and the station below, a Warthog variant patrols on the far side, near the exit bay, too distant for the computer to scan and give me details. The valk pilot I know by reputation, he's not great, but competent, not one of the itani that try to let their ship do the fighting for them. The valk is a great ship, almost totally automated, but in combat automation isn't as good as instinct and pilot experience. Too many itani never learn that, it’s the ones that do learn it you have to watch out for. Those are the opponents worth fighting.
2 minutes; there’s a flash as another ship jumps in, then another; with a sinking feeling I check the new arrivals. Damn, just as I thought, two more itani, at extreme range I scan the new arrivals, a pair of centurion 3's. Fast little ships, but not too dangerous on their own, I query the database through my implant, relax a bit. Both pilots are relatively new, they won’t be able to get the same performance out of the ships as a vet; still, the odds are now 4 on 1.
90 seconds; I send out the call on the scrambled frequency, "where are you guys?” The replies are not encouraging, my nearest aid is just entering sedina, 2 systems away and in the wrong direction, and with the asteroid rich, and storm infested regions of odia to cross yet. The ship rocks gently back and forth to my trial thrusts, everything seems to be running smoothly, but I’m still alone out here.
60 seconds; the radio crackles, data coming in over the scrambled com, its my guild mates, crossing into odia, apparently redlining their engines to be moving so fast, but they aren’t gonna make the start of the party. It's not like we're itani, obsessed with being fashionably late; and fashionably late will get people killed in a convoy strike. I pass the most current data on defenders to them, and advise them to skip straight to the wormhole, not to even try to catch it here, better tactically for them to try to get ahead of it.
30 seconds; I adjust the hormone balance on my augmentations, and make sure my data leads are securely interfaced with the ships controls, a few more test thrusts to the controls and I’m ready. This is gonna be a wild ride. I reflect on my ship choice, wondering if I should have switched out my Orion centurion for something with some cargo capacity, no time to change my mind now.
5 seconds; I fine tune my position, check the locations of the defenders in the sector, and quickly verify that I have a jump ready to take me to the wormhole.
4, 3, 2, 1… The convoy launches, lots of noise on the short range coms, sometimes I wish the itani pilots in those transports had some radio discipline; they might as well announce to the universe that they are launching, and when they change sectors. I watch the course the convoy is going to take, and plot my intercept, With a BANG my afterburners fire, and the Rev C leaps up to speed, 0-150 in less time than it takes to tell about it, what a rush.
The transport grows larger in my view, I trigger a short stream of neutron 3 fire, watching my energy reserves drop along with the hull of the transport. That’s the one bad thing about this ship; it eats energy in a hurry during turbo, start from too far out and you wont have any energy when you get into firing position, start too close and you risk being intercepted before you can get up to speed. I blast past the target, twisting wildly to avoid the defenders fire. The itani pilots must have been asleep; didn’t they see me in the sector? Maybe they thought that I wouldn’t attack with 4 of them in the sector, whatever the reason, they don’t even shoot at me, only the automated convoy guards even try.
I loop around, dodging a few shots from the automated defenders, staying off the turbo for a few agonizingly slow seconds to let my energy reserves charge. A quick kick and I’m heading back towards the transport, Damn, the itani are more alert this pass, that warthog is between me and the transport, a string of gatling fire reaching for the hull of my ship. A quick change in weapons choice and 3 sunflares speed out ahead of my ship, I couple the release with a sharp turn that will bring me to a point ahead of the transport. With any luck I’ll get a few more shots off on it before it reaches 3000 meters and jumps.
The aural implant simulates the sound of 3 sharp explosions off to my left; my rockets detonating. I caught the itani pilot off guard, he obviously isn’t familiar with the Rev C variant of the cent and didn’t know about the second small port. A quick check on the scanner shows him heading off the other way, returning to the station. Part of me wonders why, he’s not even lost 50% of his hull. No time to worry about it, a stream of gauss fire arcs in from above me and to my right, -just- missing me, swearing I spin my ship around, side slipping down and off my planned course, It’s one of the centurions, he zips past above me, not having expected the sudden change in course, but I don’t have time to take advantage of it, as the valk finally comes racing in, streams of neutrons probing for my hull.
Decide that there’s no point in making another run on the transport, it’s got to be close to 3k by now, and I don’t have time to dogfight with a valk while the transport pulls ahead of me. A short burst of afterburner and I’m at 3k, engaging the jump engines just as the com traffic indicates the transport did the same. As my ship enters jumpspace I wonder if my guildmates made it to the wormhole area or not.
FLASH, quick burst of light and sharp sense of deceleration, back into normal space, there’s the transport, I got lucky and came out almost on top of it, I open fire with the N3, quite a few hits, its down into the red, I break away and burn my last bit of energy to turbo clear as every defender in the sector opens fire at me, all 3 itani’s and the automated guards are right on my tail, the transport heading unopposed towards the wormhole. There, another flash of light near the transport, then two more. FINALLY help has arrived, my job just got a lot easier, switching tactics I start to let the itani drive me farther away from the transport, keeping them occupied. There’s less fire directed at me now as the automated guards turn away and race towards the wormhole, the transport jumps, there are 3 other Wormhole signatures close behind it as my allies follow it through.
Seconds later it’s over, the transport is reported as destroyed, and I engage my escape course, letting jumpspace wash over my ship. Sure, I’d have liked to get the kill, but sometimes you do what’s necessary to get the whole job done. A few seconds later I emerge back into normal space, the secure com crackles with activity, the recovery team setting up their course back to the safety of Serco space. I check my timer, less than 5 minutes have passed since the convoy launched, I dock with the station, reload my sunflare launcher and wait while the work crews repair the damage my hull took. Funny, I don’t even remember being hit. The burn pattern on the hullplate suggests gauss fire; one of the centurions must have gotten a hit in when I wasn’t paying attention.
After the repairs are done, I launch back into space, I’ve got just enough time to make it back to Daltos Hold before our convoy launches. After what just occurred, the Itani will be sure to try to retaliate.
2 minutes; there’s a flash as another ship jumps in, then another; with a sinking feeling I check the new arrivals. Damn, just as I thought, two more itani, at extreme range I scan the new arrivals, a pair of centurion 3's. Fast little ships, but not too dangerous on their own, I query the database through my implant, relax a bit. Both pilots are relatively new, they won’t be able to get the same performance out of the ships as a vet; still, the odds are now 4 on 1.
90 seconds; I send out the call on the scrambled frequency, "where are you guys?” The replies are not encouraging, my nearest aid is just entering sedina, 2 systems away and in the wrong direction, and with the asteroid rich, and storm infested regions of odia to cross yet. The ship rocks gently back and forth to my trial thrusts, everything seems to be running smoothly, but I’m still alone out here.
60 seconds; the radio crackles, data coming in over the scrambled com, its my guild mates, crossing into odia, apparently redlining their engines to be moving so fast, but they aren’t gonna make the start of the party. It's not like we're itani, obsessed with being fashionably late; and fashionably late will get people killed in a convoy strike. I pass the most current data on defenders to them, and advise them to skip straight to the wormhole, not to even try to catch it here, better tactically for them to try to get ahead of it.
30 seconds; I adjust the hormone balance on my augmentations, and make sure my data leads are securely interfaced with the ships controls, a few more test thrusts to the controls and I’m ready. This is gonna be a wild ride. I reflect on my ship choice, wondering if I should have switched out my Orion centurion for something with some cargo capacity, no time to change my mind now.
5 seconds; I fine tune my position, check the locations of the defenders in the sector, and quickly verify that I have a jump ready to take me to the wormhole.
4, 3, 2, 1… The convoy launches, lots of noise on the short range coms, sometimes I wish the itani pilots in those transports had some radio discipline; they might as well announce to the universe that they are launching, and when they change sectors. I watch the course the convoy is going to take, and plot my intercept, With a BANG my afterburners fire, and the Rev C leaps up to speed, 0-150 in less time than it takes to tell about it, what a rush.
The transport grows larger in my view, I trigger a short stream of neutron 3 fire, watching my energy reserves drop along with the hull of the transport. That’s the one bad thing about this ship; it eats energy in a hurry during turbo, start from too far out and you wont have any energy when you get into firing position, start too close and you risk being intercepted before you can get up to speed. I blast past the target, twisting wildly to avoid the defenders fire. The itani pilots must have been asleep; didn’t they see me in the sector? Maybe they thought that I wouldn’t attack with 4 of them in the sector, whatever the reason, they don’t even shoot at me, only the automated convoy guards even try.
I loop around, dodging a few shots from the automated defenders, staying off the turbo for a few agonizingly slow seconds to let my energy reserves charge. A quick kick and I’m heading back towards the transport, Damn, the itani are more alert this pass, that warthog is between me and the transport, a string of gatling fire reaching for the hull of my ship. A quick change in weapons choice and 3 sunflares speed out ahead of my ship, I couple the release with a sharp turn that will bring me to a point ahead of the transport. With any luck I’ll get a few more shots off on it before it reaches 3000 meters and jumps.
The aural implant simulates the sound of 3 sharp explosions off to my left; my rockets detonating. I caught the itani pilot off guard, he obviously isn’t familiar with the Rev C variant of the cent and didn’t know about the second small port. A quick check on the scanner shows him heading off the other way, returning to the station. Part of me wonders why, he’s not even lost 50% of his hull. No time to worry about it, a stream of gauss fire arcs in from above me and to my right, -just- missing me, swearing I spin my ship around, side slipping down and off my planned course, It’s one of the centurions, he zips past above me, not having expected the sudden change in course, but I don’t have time to take advantage of it, as the valk finally comes racing in, streams of neutrons probing for my hull.
Decide that there’s no point in making another run on the transport, it’s got to be close to 3k by now, and I don’t have time to dogfight with a valk while the transport pulls ahead of me. A short burst of afterburner and I’m at 3k, engaging the jump engines just as the com traffic indicates the transport did the same. As my ship enters jumpspace I wonder if my guildmates made it to the wormhole area or not.
FLASH, quick burst of light and sharp sense of deceleration, back into normal space, there’s the transport, I got lucky and came out almost on top of it, I open fire with the N3, quite a few hits, its down into the red, I break away and burn my last bit of energy to turbo clear as every defender in the sector opens fire at me, all 3 itani’s and the automated guards are right on my tail, the transport heading unopposed towards the wormhole. There, another flash of light near the transport, then two more. FINALLY help has arrived, my job just got a lot easier, switching tactics I start to let the itani drive me farther away from the transport, keeping them occupied. There’s less fire directed at me now as the automated guards turn away and race towards the wormhole, the transport jumps, there are 3 other Wormhole signatures close behind it as my allies follow it through.
Seconds later it’s over, the transport is reported as destroyed, and I engage my escape course, letting jumpspace wash over my ship. Sure, I’d have liked to get the kill, but sometimes you do what’s necessary to get the whole job done. A few seconds later I emerge back into normal space, the secure com crackles with activity, the recovery team setting up their course back to the safety of Serco space. I check my timer, less than 5 minutes have passed since the convoy launched, I dock with the station, reload my sunflare launcher and wait while the work crews repair the damage my hull took. Funny, I don’t even remember being hit. The burn pattern on the hullplate suggests gauss fire; one of the centurions must have gotten a hit in when I wasn’t paying attention.
After the repairs are done, I launch back into space, I’ve got just enough time to make it back to Daltos Hold before our convoy launches. After what just occurred, the Itani will be sure to try to retaliate.
Vary good, you've summed up the thrill of CtCing nicly.
nicely written Spellcast. those few minutes before the convoy are often my favorite part and i am glad you included them in the story. there is just something about sizing up your opponents and their ships that makes me feel a certain bloodlust for our weak itani enemies. >:D
That's a great one, spell.