[▲] Caminha Waypoint
After double-checking that everyone in his wing was still flying Keiji asked, "How's a pursuit course looking, Red Spider?"
Calli groaned as though she had been asked the exact same question a dozen times already-and likely had given the fact she was orchestrating information for Agamemnon Wing now that their home ship was basically a deaf and lame horse in the middle of their engagement sphere. "Sketchy. Without a solid grip on their propulsion capabilities all I can get us is direction and confirmation that they left at FTL speed using bubble mechanics."
"So we're letting them get away?" Karda sounded properly indignant at the prospect. "We had them on the ropes!"
"There's a com frigate listening in-sector," said Calli. "If they drop out within range for longer than a course correction we can turn and jump. Heinlein and Asimov are good to go immediately, and we can take on Bahamut Squadron while Barca and Rommel try to turn and burn."
"Well we already have Valkyrie and Kingfisher's wings as bunkmates until Agamemnon is on her thrusters again," said Damien with a chuckle. "What's a few more dirty space pilots huh?"
The leader of Bahamut Squadron, the man they only knew as Flins, piped up over comex laughing through his words. "Oi, I heard that, Mantis. You shite kiwi, I'm teaching you some respect when we land."
"I'll be waiting, you aussie wank. With the exact same beating my All Blacks have been handing your Wallabies for nine years running. Think of it as a preview for the Bledisloe this year."
Keiji frowned at the odd exchange, having absolutely no idea what Bledisloe was or why it was relevant to their argument. "Seriously, if anyone thinks they're coming on to my ship to fight one of my pilots they're going to get a welcoming fist to the face."
"What's this? A bunch of UF fledglings think they can take a squadron of marines that've been out in the black years before they were old enough to join the Corps? Come on, what else you got for me, mates?"
"Oh dear Flins," said Calli in a frightening and sweet voice, "if Bahamut Squadron believes it can take Methuselah, bring it. I'll enjoy tattooing your wing's foreheads with imprints of Heinlein's deck grids after today's cluster fuck."
"Three hundred from Roughneck says Red Spider KO's four of you fools before anyone lands a solid hit on her," declared Sparrow with a snicker. "Courtesy of me, Nava and Agneya-who all, by the way, want vids of the fight. For posterity and blackmail."
Calli switched back to her grandmaster personality abruptly and announced, "Heads up all fighters in-sphere, Frank Herbert is inbound on red-flagged vector in seven-zero seconds. Clear the path."
"Clear read, Red Spider," confirmed Flins. "Bahamut Squadron will be cleared out in one-five seconds."
"Asimov Wing is clear."
"Agamemnon Wing is clear," said their wing leader Kingfisher.
"Mantis what the hell is Bledisloe?" asked Keiji once he had moved himself out of the way of Herbert's impending event horizon. "Heinlein Wing is clear."
"Rugby tourney," replied Damien with a laugh. "Flins is bitching because his team tends to piss their shorts every time they see an All Blacks haka coming at them."
"And rugby is a sport, right?"
"Best sport in the damn galaxy, Lawman."
"All... right, then."
Things fell quiet throughout the sphere as everyone waited for the Herbert to show up. There were a few alarms still coming out of the Tiaha fleet, but a majority of their smaller ships had avoided the lawn darts the Stingrays had started launching almost when they dropped back in to the black. He still wasn't absolutely certain about the extent of the damage, but the Shamal was the worst off of any of them judging by the list of alerts coming up as attached to the ship. Of all the Navy's vessels the Agamemnon was a wreck due to whatever faction Asimov had showed up with screwing up their exit vector. She wasn't broadcasting any loss-of-life signals but she was going to need a repair frigate to get back up, if only to replace the massive section of her hull that had buckled under the dart impact.
A swirling oblong pool of distorted light expanded out from nowhere and the bulky gunmetal frame of the Alkonst-class Frank Herbert pulled itself out of its event horizon. A few seconds after the entire ship emerged and the bridge collapsed in on itself an unfamiliar and slightly disappointed-sounding voice said over comex, "Late to the party, are we?"
"Herbert Control this is Heinlein Control, enemy took its fighters and ran about five minutes ago," replied the new communications officer Armstrong. "We have the wreckage of one Stingray-class vessel still in-sphere if you want to do some additional recon."
"Clear read, Heinlein Control. Launching Athenas in zero one mikes."
From where he sat at nearly the apex of the battlesphere Vic sounded utterly confused as he said on Methuselah's channel, "What's Herbert doing here? Isn't it kind of... I dunno, illegal to be taking a UF purposefully into a live engagement sphere?"
"Not illegal, technically," clarified Karda. "University Frigates are still warships, says so in the waiver we all got to sign when we boarded. But the Headmaster Captain is really going to piss some people off with this."
"Mmhmm," agreed Damien. "Something tells me Headmaster Captain Rungran really isn't going to give a shit though."
"Headmaster Captain Rungran is definitely not going to give a shit," said Calli, the only one among them who had actually met the retired Rear Admiral. "Heinlein Wing we've orders to beach for debrief. Apparently we're getting a new objective. Herbert Wing is taking over patrols."
"Hopefully it's 'chase the bastards down and nuke them in their dank little corner of space'," grunted Shanks, marking the first time the man had said anything to anyone other than doling out orders to his own flight and reporting their status back to control. "Errant's going to head in first. Sidewinder's missing a wing and Magog ate his weight in shrapnel."
"Go ahead, Shanks."
"Half my weight, thanks," interjected Justin Raoul, one of Errant's Abrams pilots. "Drinks on Hotfoot for being this week's dumb shit on deck."
Their Hayha pilot Colt Preizal sounded none too thrilled with his new designation. "Fuck you, asshole. It's what you're there for."
"You could just learn to dodge, dipshit. Give the deck crew a break from having to re-mod my fighter after every engagement."
The bickering pair must have taken their argument in to Errant's isolated channel because that was the last Keiji heard from either of them as their fighters made their way back to the Heinlein. Considering the chaos from earlier with the whole of Battle Group Bahamut jumping into their sphere with guns blazing and toting along the Hashemites from Virgil Station, he felt like he could have landed his fighter while sleeping. The adrenaline crash was kicking in hard and he realized that none of his flight had gotten a decent amount of sleep in almost three days.
Likely the only reason he was still awake and functional was because he was sitting in his exosuit. As soon as he crawled out of his fighter and stripped down into his jumpsuit he had a feeling he would fall face-first onto the deck dead asleep.
He lined up his deck landing by muscle memory, waited until he got the OK signal from the deck crew, then slid down the ladder out of his fighter, noting the dozens of new pits and cracks he had gained in the shrapnel burst let off by the Stingray. No doubt he would be getting an acerbic PM attached to his after-action report by the deck boss for scratching the paint again. Everyone knew by now that Lieutenant Jackson was a nitpicking asshole just because he could be, not because he cared how badly their fighters came back damaged. So long as the pilots climbed out of their marauders under their own power and he was stocked with enough modules to replace the damage the report addendum was likely all he would hear from the man.
Besides, after coating the inside of their cockpits with the alien tar, Keiji was sure Jackson's ire would be almost exclusively fixated on Karda and Damien for weeks to come.
Methuselah landed in their normal order, with no one coming in incredibly damaged. Leo and Damien had been caught in shrapnel fire as well but nothing was debilitating. Karda had racked up a half dozen more clean kills, and all without loosing a majority of his fighter's armor modules. Even Calli managed to down a few vultures between juggling information between the Tiaha ships and their own. From what little she had relayed to him the Hashemites weren't keen on speaking with anyone and the only communications they had received from those ships were a 'clear the firing line' before they lit off their HEL cannons.
With suits and helmets still on they filed into the squad room and took up their regular seats. After a minute or so they were joined by Flight Errant, who commandeered the row of chairs behind them. Raoul and Preizal were still engaged in a low-key verbal duel, half of it conducted in what sounded like old Earth Portuguese. Three minutes after that the entirety of Agamemnon Wing filed in two abreast, similarly slumping into the first free seats they stopped in front of and half of them falling asleep as soon as their asses hit the chairs. Aside from the standard 'how many did you get' questions no one seemed to be in much of a chatting mood.
Not surprisingly Nim showed up shortly after that, her wounded arm encased in a white homeostatic sleeve glued to her shoulder, likely a few minutes ahead of the flight surgeon finding out she had broken out of sickbay again. After brushing off the critical glare she received from Calli she jumped into her normal chair next to Leo and handed him her computer.
"What did you do now, MacNamara?" Keiji demanded, staring at her to make sure she was paying attention.
"I am delivering information from Doc to Leo," retorted the pilot with a sneer. "As ordered. By Doc. So get off my back, Captain Protocol."
Before he could question whether or not she was being legitimate with her answer Colonel Redloader walked in and everyone in the room rose to their feet with a salute. The man returned it, pulled his cover off, and tossed it on the podium where it landed perfectly in the center. "At ease, marines, and sit."
The flights sat as ordered. After eyeing Nim suspiciously for a moment, Redloader shook his head and shoved his hands in the front pockets of his jumpsuit. "Evacuation of the Tiaha fleet is still underway, but Herbert Wing will be taking over sphere patrols while Heinlein Wing is on a conditional thirty-two hour stand down. Half of Battle Group Bahamut will be jumping to Arnarson Waypoint along with Asimov to secure the fleet for its final jump to Lalande. Raskova and Shih will be staying with us while Raiche and Onilova will remain with Asimov. We expect no further resistance at this waypoint but Agamemnon Wing is on engagement standby out of Heinlein for the next twenty-four hours. So, Agamemnon, mess is ten decks forward with hot chow ready and the starboard billets and showers are all yours. See the deck boss on the way out and he'll add your ID's to the authorization lists."
Redloader ceased his pacing from door to viewport and braced his hands on either side of the podium in the center of the room. "Now on to the stuff that's going to fuck up our day. Major Towers, make sure you relay this back to Captain MacNamara in full. Agamemnon's coms are still out."
Nodding, the thin brown-eyed wing commander typed a few commands into his computer. "Yes, sir."
The lights darkened and the briefing hologram behind him lit up with a display of an unremarkable gas and ice giant system with a few dozen satellites and a large asteroid belt at the outer edge. "This is Alliance-surveyed System K-521. Roughly two hours ago an Exoplanetary Infantry platoon escorting a crew of Senatorial-backed surveyors was attacked from orbit by ships like the ones we just faced. They lost two men but managed to get this from 857-G before they evac'd from system."
Keiji watched a severely tessellated feed from what had to be survey sensors judging by the level of the horizon. The surface was just as unremarkable as the system it was in save for the oddly high rare metal findings the beacons were picking up on. With a spiteful internal chuckle he knew it was exactly the sort of prospect his father would have seized upon to add to his mining conglomerate's holdings.
When three mirror images of the ships rose up from the moon's crust like waking leviathans he had to force himself to choke back an explicative of shock. Nim never did have a reliable filter between her mouth and her brain and thus predictably uttered exactly what she felt. "Son of a bitch! You're--"
"Shut it until I'm done, Lieutenant." Shaking his head at her outburst Redloader continued. "Once this was transmitted to Naval Intelligence there was a full mobilization of all com frigates and exploratory fleets across our territories as well as Colonial interests to search for more incidents. Approximately thirty minutes ago NCV Mary Fields picked up an abbreviated distress broadcast from Colonial territory. Preliminary analysis shows incursion forces have launched a ground invasion of the colonization hub Churaumi using two of these ship classes."
Everyone in the room woke up at the same instant. Towers seemed the most composed and asked, "A ground invasion? So they do have surface troops."
"All transmissions out of Churaumi and its satellite colonies have gone dark," said Redloader with a brief nod. "Mary Fields is currently gathering intelligence assets and a counteroffensive is being planned to retake the hub. Because of our particular situation regarding the Hashemites and Tiaha, Heinlein will be spearheading the flotilla tasked with retaking the system. Currently we have an agreement with several Tiaha corvettes as well as the MSC Sirocco and they will be joining us. So, Methuselah and Errant, we are all now officially vanguard of Battle Group Svalinn, the first military initiative in three centuries to be conducted between the Alliance and a migrant fleet of the Arab League. Congratulate yourselves, you're making history."
Keiji's body went numb as the Colonel let the pilots engage in small talk for a few minutes. Churaumi was one of his family's most profitable colony hubs, spawning six high-profile resorts on its outlying moons, a wealthy mining network in its asteroid belt and near-solar planets, and a massive research facility dedicated to particle and weapons research on Churaumi itself. The fact that they were cooperating with the Tiaha fleet to launch an offensive didn't even register in his brain.
He knew people that worked on Churaumi. He hadn't seen them in a decade but he remembered their names and their faces. They had uprooted their entire families to move them out to the fringe colonies under orders from his father. After seeing everything he had so far, he knew they were all dead. It was upsetting him more than it should have considering he wanted nothing to do with that part of his life any longer.
"MacNamara, seeing as how you've been sedated for a majority of the fun, report to Baskerville for your exosuit recalibration, then assist LT Jackson and the deck crews with triaging Tiaha's need-tows," ordered Redloader once the chatter had tapered off. "Lewis and Troskaya, report to the quartermaster for new suits and give back your loaners. After that, join everyone else for chow and rack time. If any of you can't get to sleep see Doc for sedatives. It will be a minimum of forty-eight hours before we are ready to begin the jumps to Churaumi." He briefly checked his computer before stuffing it back in the pocket of his jacket. "There will be an update briefing on the operation at 1700 tomorrow and the Captain will inform the rest of the crew then. Until that time keep this between yourselves. Dismissed."
Everyone stood and saluted Redloader as he walked out of the squad room. Once he was gone there was even more chatter about the appearance of incursion ground forces and what they could possibly look like and be capable of. Soon most of Agamemnon Wing filed out and headed for the mess hall, Nim chasing Towers down presumably to ask if he had any idea of whether or not Lyall had been hurt when her ship had taken its hits. Errant left shortly after them, dragging along Calli, Damien, Leo and Vic under the pretenses of teaching them how to properly wind down after combat.
Keiji remained in his chair, spine rigid, staring at the slowly rotating oceanic orb of Churaumi. It was a beautiful planet, quite a bit more water on its surface, and it only made him wonder how much of it had been scarred beyond recognition when it had been bombarded from orbit.
His chin collided with his exosuit's collar as someone hammered their boot harshly against the back of his chair. He turned and saw that Nim had walked back in completely unnoticed and taken up the seat behind him, grinning now that she had his attention.
Standing up and collecting his helmet from the floor where it had fallen he muttered, "Don't you have somewhere to be, MacNamara?"
"Yeah, right here on the flight deck waiting for Russell to get his ass out of bed and report in," she replied with a sneer. "So Churaumi some place you've been? It's got a Yutani-eese name."
"It's one of my father's colonies, yeah," he replied, heading for the door.
"Oh shit." Nim hopped over the front row of desks and followed him out. "Sorry."
After double-checking what the deck crew was doing to his fighter and confirming that they were indeed pulling all the armor modules for repair he headed for the maglev. "Not like I'm part of the family anyway. Haven't said two words to the man personally since sixth year."
"Get over it." Waiving her sleeved arm from side to side she dismissed his claim as irrelevant. "We're your family, and we're going to get Churaumi back. It's what we do, Keiji."
He stopped in the corridor outside the locker rooms, irritated with her chipper, dismissive attitude. "That so, huh? So what's with you grabbing two coffees in the middle of a sleep cycle and punching in a com code you know doesn't exist any more? You want to lie to my face and tell me your fine or just hope we start getting shot again at so you can avoid the damn problem? Do you even realize what just happened? We just lost an entire system to these things!"
Nim's eyes narrowed and she stared at him in silence for so long it started to become painfully uncomfortable. Still he refused to call it and walk away, completely fed up with... everything. He couldn't even put a name to what he was so angry at. All the in jokes he didn't understand, the fact that no one had thanked him for getting every member of his flight back to the ship alive, the reality that he was going to have to fly out again into another completely unknown situation and see the mutilated remnants of a planet he had loved visiting as a child.
It made absolutely no sense to him why he was mad. He knew that logically everything he had done was his job, and he also knew that no one thanked people for doing their jobs. They pissed and moaned when things went wrong but when everything ran smoothly no one noticed. He knew that. But he was still pissed and Nim was still annoying.
"I was born on a ship in the middle of the black," said the pilot, jarring him out of his own thoughts. "I want to die on a ship in the middle of the black. So no, I seriously don't understand why people get attached to things that don't go anywhere with them. My friends and my ship are what I care about to because I'm from the human race, not a planet or a colony. Every time I loose a friend part of my home goes away for good because you can't rebuild people like you can rebuild a hab unit or a ship. People die. With Shelke and Colonel Herald and Zen and Zee and Backstop and Aries all dead there's a giant hole in my home just like there was in Heinlein and it won't get fixed because there will never be another person exactly like them in the galaxy ever. With Seig around it wasn't so bad because we think the same way. But now even he's gone and there is no one who gets it."
"Gets what?"
"It," she muttered in frustration. "That only what we choose to do limits us, but even then we keep going anyway. We only exist once, so why the hell stop moving forward? We're never going to run out of stuff to find in space even if we run out of time to look for it." She rubbed her forehead and groaned. "There's my attempt to explain what I think to someone like Lyall wanted because you bugged her into it, asshole. And now I'm done."
Leaving him to stand in the hallway in silence Nim walked back towards the small area that the techs of Baskerville were rapidly reassembling after having to clear everything off the flight deck during the battle. She was immediately dragged out of sight by Russell, who had obviously just rolled out of bed and not even bothered to run a comb through his hair, the moment she announced her presence.
He turned back towards the maglev and climbed into a car full of engineering personnel rotating off-duty. Everyone was chatting among themselves, about the weapon they had seen the Hashemites fire, about how they had managed to cut another minute off their jump turnaround by recalibrating one Casimir rail or two. None of them knew they had just lost their first planet to the incursion forces they weren't even technically at war with. It was just another shift's end to them.
Climbing out of the car on the bunk deck he made his way to his room and locked the door. Flopping face-first onto his mattress he seethed in silence. He didn't get it, and he didn't understand why he was still so angry over something he knew would have to happen sooner or later. It seemed as if they were the only ones taking the entire impending-war-with-the-unknown-aliens seriously.
That's when it occurred to him. They were the only ones who knew what was really going on. Everywhere else people were either completely unaware or just totally unwilling to believe that there was a force out in the galaxy that was aiming to wipe them all out. No one had any idea what they were doing. And that was what was pissing him off.
Why was he risking his life and the lives of his flight to save a bunch of clueless, nameless people who believed everything the news net spat out at them was the absolute truth? People that would just as soon turn on him once reality slapped them in the faces with an orbital strike, blaming his people for not acting fast enough to save the lives of their loved ones?
Rolling back out of his bunk with a groan he headed for the galley intending to snag a cup of tea and found himself face-to-face with Shanks as soon as he hit the corridor. The older man gave him a knowing smirk and Keiji realized the man had been waiting for him outside Methuselah's quarters. Crossing his arms against his chest he leaned against the opposing bulkhead like someone straight out of a heroic vid.
"I used to get like that right when I got out of the academy," he said with a slow nod. "You want to know what the point is. People either don't give a fuck or they just don't know-why waste blood on the ignorant, am I right?"
Keiji scowled at his boots for a moment before replying. "I don't get why we just don't declare a goddamn war and get it over with."
"Because people are still just a pack of animals that stampede when someone throws a snake at them." The man's pale blue eyes narrowed. "We thought for centuries we'd peered into every corner of the galaxy and were really alone out here. What do you think will happen when someone finally cuts into the nightly news with an, 'Oh, by the way, the only other form of sentient alien life we've discovered out here wants to wipe us out because their rendition of God told them to. Here's satellite imagery of the first colony they nuked as proof for all you naysayers.'"
"You think they're going to take it any better when some colony closer to Earth gets wiped off the map like Churaumi probably was?"
"You think they'd be any less pissed if we'd straight up told them what's coming?" Shanks watched his face in silence, then grinned at him again. "People are going to do what they're going to do. You can't change their minds by telling them something they don't want to hear. But either way, we'll be at war as soon as we go after Churaumi--don't get stupid and think that it's the only colony they've hit since these new Stingrays showed up. It's likely just the only one putting up a good enough fight to get word out ahead of the scannets. Which, by the way, should tell you something about your dad."
"So you know too, then."
"How the hell does anyone from the Colonies not know you're Ichiro Yutani's kid? Man plasters his face on everything he owns." Shanks laughed at him as he shook his head. "You look exactly like a taller version of your old man without the suit and bald spot."
Oddly enough it was the first time he could remember anyone saying he looked anything like his father. "I guess that's true."
Waiving his hand towards the maglev he started down the hallway. "Come on, let's get chow. Everyone sleeps better on a full stomach."
Keiji followed the man to the car, wondering if eating anything would actually help him sleep at all. "You've been out here longer. Seriously, you think we have a chance?"
Placing his hand on the scanner to summon a car the shorter pilot shrugged. "Seriously? I made Captain shooting migrant fleet ships--the ones that turned fringe scavenger and raided mining convoys. But today my ass was saved by some guy in an orange Proteus called Asif who could barely speak Standard but got that I was in deep anyway. I also watched an incursion ship get blasted to pieces by two big fucking laser cannons that weren't then turned around and fired at us. I think our chances got better now that guys like that are on our side."
"Ships are one thing. Besides that wreck we found and the info they pulled out of K-521 we know fuck all about what they're capable of."
"Not our department." Shanks stepped on to a completely empty maglev car and set it to travel to the mess deck. "We do what we have to with what we have or we die trying. I for one plan to die of old age regaling a bunch of impossibly sexy centerfold models about my glory years as an ace during the First Contact War. And I'm going to do everything I damn well can to make sure the rest of my flight grows old with me. You?"
Keiji leaned against the handrail of the car as it sped down the centerline. "I always planned to make my father eat his words telling me I was wasting my life in the military."
"That's as good as any," nodded the man. The car slid to a smooth halt and they headed towards the green-painted doors of the mess area. "I'm sure the old man will let you put your two cents in when he sends his 'hey we liberated your colony for you' report to the man's office. Seems only fair, huh?"