Ravens of Eternity

Chapter 187

187 Rain of Fire, Pt The civilian fleet raced its way through the massive battlespace all around them. Most of them wove between ships and evaded as much fire as they could. The larger ones simply plowed their way through it all.

“Where do you think you’re going, Fed scum?” taunted a Hegemony fighter pilot.

A wing of fighters circled a civilian corvette – one of the many in the civilian fleet – and peppered it with simultaneous bursts of chaingun fire. They tore through its paper-thin armor with ease, and ripped through to its power plant.

It quickly erupted into a red ball of plasma and tore the whole ship into pieces.

Everyone heard their screams on comms for a brief moment before they were silenced forever.

Amal sat in her seat, unable to process the death that was happening all around her. It felt like she was in Damascus all over again, while artillery shells pounded the city all around her. While the ground shook with each blast.

While people around her died screaming in agony.

The memory and the trauma began to overwhelm her, and tears began to pool in her eyes. Her breathing became shallower and shallower as she descended further and further into her memories.

Realizing that Amal was sinking slowly into herself, Eva reached over and squeezed her shoulder reassuringly.

.....

“Hey,” she said, “stay with me, alright?!”

That was enough to snap Amal out of her bitter trance, and she quickly refocused her mind on the present.

“I-I’m sorry,” she stammered. “I... I don’t...”

“Don’t have to worry about it,” said Eva. “Just keep your head on straight. We’re all here for you to lean on, don’t forget that.”

Amal nodded, then grimaced as she strengthened her resolve.

“Hey, we aren’t done with you clowns,” said the Hegemony fighter pilot.

Their wing quickly swarmed the cargo tanker, and fired on it with great prejudice. They ran across its surface and unleashed devastating strafing runs at its weakest points. As each one made their pass, they wore out sections of its armor further and further.

What was worse was that more Hegemony fighter wings joined in on the fun. They all began to swarm multiple civilian ships, and fired on them mercilessly.

“We’re gonna turn you all into useless slag,” taunted one of them.

His wingmates’ vicious laughter chilled the civilians to the bone. And that made them all the easier to hit. The Hegemony fighters’ chainguns ripped their ships apart easily.

“Dammit! Don’t you all have defensive turrets on your ships?!” yelled Eva. “Use ’em! Don’t just sit there and take it!”

This shook awake some of the other civilian pilots, and those who had defensive turrets quickly activated them. A few, such as the tanker, had manned turrets and so many of the crew quickly hopped in to use them.

“There’s too many of ’em” cried one of the civilian pilots, “can’t keep up with ’em, can barely hit ’em.”

“Doesn’t matter,” Eva replied. “Keep shooting – you don’t have to kill them, just keep them off you. And if you don’t have any on you, fire at any you see. The more time they spend evading, the less time they spend shooting.”

Streams of fire erupted from out of the civilian ships towards the harassing enemy fighters. Though they were far from effective, and nowhere near as potent as trained gunners, they did well enough to keep the Hegemony from spacing them outright.

Some were lucky enough to hit a few fighters and riddled them with numerous bullet holes. They spun out or exploded, their pilots having turned to paste.

The civilians saw their own casualties – there was little they could do against a highly trained military force in the first place. Without evasive training or combat skirmish practice, they were little more than floating targets to the Hegemony pilots.

Many of the fighter pilots easily tore through the least experienced civilian ships, and spaced their occupants with unmitigated violence.

“In need of assistance,” said the cargo tanker captain. “We’ve got two Hegemony frigates on our tail! They’re tearing us apart!”

The cargo tanker itself was doing worse for wear. Although there were a handful of fighters that pecked at its armor, they hardly made a dent. What was worrying was that the ship was now flanked by two Hegemony frigates on its starboard side, towards the rear.

They fired their cannons expertly into the tanker and blew off chunks of its armor. Sadly, the tanker’s turrets were unable to repay the damage – the frigates were simply too nimble for the inexperienced gunners.

Any lucky hits were quickly neutralized by the frigates’ robust repair systems.

Eva gripped her yoke until her knuckles turned white. She watched on her MFDs as the two frigates ripped into the tanker with frightening ease.

“We’ve gotta do something about that,” she said. “Can’t stand watching this shit happen.”

She marked a pathway out of the battlespace on her 3D navmap, then transmitted it to all of the civilian ships still making their way out of the fight. Then she broadcasted on her comms display and hailed every civilian ship in range.

“Use the headings I sent,” she said. “Get your asses into atmo and don’t look back! Throttles to full, alright?! And hey, space trucker – the Spirit of Amelia’s got your back, so hang tight.”

Eva then broke off from their evasive descent and swung wide out of the column. She hit a few buttons on her console and opened up the turret dome at the bow of the ship. Their guns slid out and into position soon after.

“Can either of you take up the guns?” she asked.

Amal shook in her seat at the proposition, but she reached for the yoke nonetheless.

“I-I can try,” she stammered, “but I’m not sure if I’ll...”

Eva saw how shaken Amal was at the prospect of doing harm. She knew then that Amal was never going to be able to kill. Not other people, anyway. And certainly not out of anger or pain or vengeance. Something deep inside her kept her from becoming a killer.

“You don’t have to pull a single trigger,” she said. “And you never have to, not while we’re around, alright? Instead, keep an eye on our systems. Miko – can you gun for me?”

“Hai,” Miko replied.

She quickly swapped out her MFD’s screens for a gunner’s layout, then took control of the nose gun. At the same time, a control stick popped out from under her console and slid up to grip height.

She took it in her hands and tested its responsiveness. As she adjusted the stick, the guns up front swiveled in response.

As Eva flew Amelia towards the starboard side of one of the Hegemony frigates, she performed a deep scan on its systems. Its many components appeared on her main display, of which she pinpointed three specific modules.

“Fire on my marks,” said Eva. “Primary repairs, life support, server room. In that order, cool?”

Miko watched as Eva prioritized the modules, then began to overcharge the guns in preparation for their attack.

“Consider them taken care of,” she replied.

The frigates were far from unaware, and saw the Spirit of Amelia close in for an attack run. In response, they fired salvo after salvo of anti fighter flak the moment they crossed the 5000 meter threshold.

Clouds of black shrapnel exploded all around, but Eva was one step ahead of them. She entered into an evasive pattern and avoided the majority of the flak damage, even as she closed in.

Her hands guided the ship with smooth and simple movements – plenty enough to shake off and avoid most of the flak fired at them.

Not that they were free of any damage at all – razor-sharp shrapnel scraped against the ship’s armor. Some of them even embedded themselves in the C-ranked Titanium Mesh Plate. But none of them got through to the structure.

“Activating repairs on the hull,” said Amal. “Damage is superficial, but there’s a whole lot. We’re down to 37% repair materials and dropping fast.”

“They will not be attacking for long,” said Miko.

Her finger squeezed the trigger on her control stick, and four concentrated beams shot out of their ship. The four B-ranked Thermalite Beamcannons ground into the frigate’s armor with pinpoint precision, and caused it to glow from the intense heat.

It took only seconds for them to melt the armor into slag, and punched through them into the structure. From there, Miko focused the beams right into the frigate’s repair module, and cut it in half.

At this point, Eva stopped advancing on the frigate itself, and instead strafed downwards while she pitched the nose upwards. In other words, she began to circle the frigate from its starboard side down to its keel at the bottom.

All the while, their powerful beamcannons continued to cut through the frigate with exacting precision and devastating ease. They cut through armor and structure and components and people with equal might.

As Eva strafed under the frigate, Miko cut through its components one after another. Once she negated its life support system, she adjusted her aim and obliterated the ship’s operating intelligences.

Without the ability to repair, replenish its oxygen, or rely on its software intelligences, the frigate was as good as dead.

Although it immediately stopped shooting, it had lost control of its thrusters and began to drift forward at high velocity. It wasn’t long after that when its crewmembers decided to abandon ship. Dozens of lifeboats blasted their way out of the frigate’s escape tubes and out into open space.

Up on the bridge of the second frigate, the Hegemony captain grinned as his ship bore down on the cargo tanker. Because of all the chaos around them, he was nearly blissfully unaware that the first frigate had been scrapped.

“Sir!” cried an officer. “Reports from Frigate Theta-Four-Five have ceased. Scans indicate that they were neutralized.”

“So what?” sneered the captain. “Serves them right for being too careless during a fight. Honestly, what idiot would get themselves spaced fighting a goddamned cargo ship?”

“But sir-”

“Look, just keep your sights on that big behemoth, and make sure to evade their shots. It’s really all too simple.”

“Sir, it wasn’t the cargo ship,” protested the officer. “It was a flanking corvette!”

“So then blast it with flak just like in the training sims,” replied the captain. “Seriously, why the hell are you bothering me with such a basic problem?!”

Klaxons immediately flooded the bridge, along with red warning lights. The entire ship shook as they were struck with Amelia’s devastating attack.

“Main thrusters have been struck!” cried another officer. “We’re losing acceleration, but maintaining velocity.”

The captain roared in annoyance.

“Overcharge repairs,” he ordered.

“No can do, captain,” said yet another officer. “Scans report a civilian corvette fired through our engines and melted our repair module. Unable to activate a single repair nanite.”

“Sir!” yelled another officer. “Primary life support systems offline!”

“So fire manuevering thrusters and broadside that fucking ‘vette! Take it out before it does any more damage!”

Despite the loss of its main thrusters, the frigate fired up its side thrusters and spun to its starboard side to face the Spirit of Amelia. Its gunners were desperate to perforate whoever it was that attacked them, but they found nothing within range.

Eva easily countered them by attacking from below to begin with, and adjusted her strafing path to remain at the aft hull of the ship.

There, Miko had absolute freedom to cut through the ship’s armor and components without fear of reprisal in the slightest. She sliced through multiple decks and slagged everything, as though the ship was made of butter.

Like the first frigate that they had taken down, the second had no choice but to power down and evacuate the ship. The clueless frigate captain hung his head in utter defeat. He hardly even knew what hit him.

The cargo captain was utterly dumbfounded as he watched the fight happen. His mind could barely compute how an outdated, beat up corvette was able to take out two fully equipped wartime frigates without taking more than a few scratches.

“Hey snoozefest,” Eva yelled at him over comms, “get your ass in gear before reinforcements arrive! Or would you prefer to have more Hegemony frigates all up in your thrusters again?”

.....