Elsewhere

Mira quickly had the Syndicate ships up on the screen. She let out a sigh of relief and relayed what she saw, “It’s six transports, twelve freighters, and four escort ships. This could have been a whole lot worse.” She used the shipwide broadcast so that everyone could participate in the conversation.

“What’s in the transports?” Duke asked.

“Can’t tell. Sensors aren’t THAT good.”

“They could have thousands of troops with mechs and who knows what else on those transports. We should destroy them before they can deploy to the planet!” Murgan declared.

“What if they have Clan prisoners on those transports?” Morka countered. That caused everyone to stop and consider the matter.

“I need to get closer,” Duke announced. If I can get within a few hundred kilometers, I can see what or who is on the transport ships.”

“They’ve seen us by now,” Mira said. “We’re not going to take them by surprise at this point and they will be contacting us with demands shortly, I expect.”

“If they have taken hostages, they all die,” Duke declared.

“Weren’t we going to kill them all anyway?” Gro’nok said.

“Good point. Anything you can see down on the planet’s surface?”

Mira changed the main screen’s focus and pulled up what information she could. “I am seeing explosions and evidence of fighting surrounding a massive black castle of some kind.”

“The Clanhold! They assault the Clan! Get us down there!”

Duke studied the fighting for a long moment before calling for action, “Steel Tusks, prepare for rapid deployment into a hot landing zone. I’m going to place you behind where I think their command and control mechs are. Hit them with everything you can bring to bear while Mira takes on the escort ships.”

Mira glared at Duke, “Didn’t I just tell you that this ship can’t take on capitol ships!”

“Those are transport escorts, not capitol ships. You can take them, and I’ll make sure we stay in one piece while you do. Once the escorts are taken care of, I’ll join the fight on the surface while you provide cover, Mira.”

“Negative, Duke. The transports and freighters are armed as well. I’m going to have to stay up here just to keep them in check.”

“OK, then let’s get the Steel Tusks deployed.”

“And the Thorned Rose. We will not sit out this fight when our brothers and sisters in arms defend their home.”

“Shit. OK, Gather your troops in the mech bay too. I’ll place you all in behind the mechs.”

“Very well, we’ll be in position in thirty seconds.”

“Thirty seconds, roger. That will give me time to recharge the ship’s Mana.” Duke didn’t waste time and TELEPORTED to the engineering section to refill the ship’s two Mana cores that needed it. One was empty and the other was down by about a quarter. It took nearly the full thirty seconds to fill them up, but it kept him distracted from worrying about the coming battle.

“The escorts have broken away and are burning for us at full thrust.”

“Good, that means they’ve noticed us and want this fight. Probably trying to prevent us from getting to the planet and deploying. Let’s give them a fight they won’t live to remember! Everyone set in the mech bay?”

“Come and see for yourself!”

Duke TELEPORTED himself down to the mech bay and saw the Thorned Rose mercenaries formed up in an eight-by-eight square, weapons pointed in all directions around them. The six Steel Tusk mechs were arranged in two triangular formations next to each other. They were similarly poised with weapons ready for action.

“Damn. Glad you are all on our side – that’s fucking intimidating. Go give them hell. I’ll join you when we’re done up here. Transit in three…two…one…now!” Duke sent them to the planet and then returned to the bridge to check in on Mira.

“Glad you could make it, Duke. You had better keep my ship in one piece or I’m gonna be pissed!”

“Don’t worry, we’ve got this.”

Lya shouted from her console, “Missiles inbound. Ten thousand kilometers and closing.”

“Countermeasures engaged. The anti-missile lasers should be able to get them.”

“How far away do the lasers engage the missiles?” Duke asked thoughtfully.

“They will start at about 100 kilometers but usually are not effective until inside 50 kilometers. Why do you ask? You have an idea?”

“Oh, I have an idea alright,” Duke grinned with malice as he tried something he had never thought of before and attempted to combine his COMBAT SENSE and DUNGEON SENSE Abilities to track the missiles and be able to react to their approach as he planned. After several seconds, he realized that it wasn’t going to work as he hoped – the two Abilities had significantly different range scales and were not compatible for this situation.

“Five thousand kilometers for the missiles. They have reached their maximum acceleration. Nine seconds until we can engage.”

“Got it,” Duke acknowledged. “I hope these missiles are not set up with any IFF capabilities.”

“What the fuck is IFF?” Mira asked. “One thousand kilometers.”

“Identify Friend or Foe. It keeps your own missiles from hitting you.”

“That’s cool but not something I’m concerned with right now. Five hundred kilometers!”

Duke concentrated on his DUNGEON SENSE, waiting for the missiles to enter his three-hundred-kilometer range. Once they did, he TELEPORTED the missiles in front of where the sensors told him the enemy ships were, taking care to reverse their orientation. Quickly, the missiles disappeared and reappeared on the screen right in front of the enemy ships. While the missiles lost all momentum as part of the TELEPORTATION, their engines were still active and firing. They streaked towards the enemy ships, accelerating from their static start.

The response from the ships was immediate as their own missile countermeasure systems activated. Lasers pierced space, firing rapid pulses at the missiles that were just too close. Of the forty missiles that had been launched, thirty were destroyed, six missed the ships but four impacted the lead ship. The explosions of Mana from the impacting missiles concealed the approaching ships from the Iron Reaver’s sensors for a few seconds. When things cleared up, there were only three ships coming. The fourth was spinning uncontrollably away venting air from its forward sections.

“One down. Three to go,” Duke announced.

“Got any more tricks like that? If you can take another one out of the fight, I’m confident that I can handle the other two.”

“TELEPORTATION is the only Ability that I have that I can use at these ranges. If we get inside 15 kilometers, I can use a few more. I really need to amp REMOTE CASTING up a bunch.”

“Enough commentary. Get to doing something.”

As the ships were still well out of his DUNGEON SENSE range of three hundred kilometers, he couldn’t target the crews and pull the trick he pulled on the heavy cruiser and TELEPORT them away. He tried for the next best thing, TELEPORTING the ships themselves. Knowing that the mech shields somehow resisted his Ability, he expected that the ships would have a similar resistance. He OVERCHANNELED the Ability, using nearly half his Mana to TELEPORT one ship into the path of another.

Duke felt the strain as his Ability fought to penetrate the ship’s shielding and grab hold of it. After a full ten seconds of concentration, his Ability latched on, and the ship appeared immediately in front of the other. The collision was not exactly everything he had hoped for. The shielding for both ships flared with massive expenditures of Mana and the ships deflected off each other. Both ships were sent well off course and, at least for now, somewhat out of control with their shields flickering.

“Best I can do for a bit. That used up most of my reserves.”

“That’s good enough. Those two won’t get here until I am well done with the single. You had better find some more reserves because we’re going to need repairs before this fight’s done.”

“Working on it. When will be in weapons range?”

Duke’s question was answered as the approaching ship opened fire, beams of focused Mana and elemental energy nearly instantly closing the distance to their ship. The impact to the Iron Reaver’s shields seemed minimal to Duke as they returned fire.

Mira’s fingers flew across her controls as she expertly manipulated the ship’s angle, acceleration, and weaponry to get the best positioning for both offense and defense. Duke had never seen her move like this before and he suddenly felt a deep-seated longing for the cockpit again. He missed the melding of man and machine and the sense of power he got while sitting in his fighter.

“Get. To. The. Cores!” Mira ground out each word as she was now fighting all three ships.

Duke didn’t hesitate to TELEPORT to the engineering section. There, he found that two cores were already drained and the constant hits on their shields were quickly draining a third. He immediately set to refilling the two drained cores as fast as he dared. Despite his efforts, he had only slowed the draining of cores – there was only so fast he could safely fill them. He continued as the ship shuddered from a hit that must have gotten past the shields. Duke reflexively RESTORED the ship and went back to tending the cores. The two he was working on were now filled but two more were completely drained. He switched cores and hoped Mira was at least damaging the other ships.

Duke was on his fourth set of refilling cores when he started to gain ground. God, I hope that means that she finally put one of them out of the fight! He had RESTORED the ship eight more times during this frantic core maintenance period.

“They are breaking off and running!” Mira’s call echoed through Duke’s comms and he finished topping off the cores he was working on before returning to the bridge.

“Don’t let them flee!” Lya shouted.

“Doing my best but like I keep saying THIS SHIP IS NOT MADE FOR THIS!”

Duke reached out and tried to grab onto the only remaining ship he could see. Its shields were barely flickering and he could feel his power latching on.

“Fuck! They are activating their stardrive and I can’t reach them with any of our weapons!”

Duke focused his TELEPORTATION Ability on the fleeing ship and remembered what happened when he used it on a ship in Exospace using their stardrive. He kept that feeling locked in his mind and activated his Ability the instant the ship used its stardrive to enter Exospace. He lost his Ability lock on the ship which, at this range, he hoped that it meant the ship was destroyed.

“They got away. Shit!” Mira shouted.

“Maybe, maybe not. I might have been able to detonate their stardrive as they jumped into Exospace. I’m not 100% sure, but it is a strong possibility that it worked.”

“Well, that’s possibly good news and thanks for keeping the ship together. There’s no way we would have made it three-on-one like that if you hadn’t. Now let’s see what everyone else is up to!”