I think that ultimately Pax had a plan when he abandoned the Empire.
The plan was a simple one, leave before the whole mess came crashing down.
Cell - Unknown Location - Gorean Occupied Karin
OCCUPATION: DAY ONE-FIFTY-SEVEN
He didn't know where he was, but it was somewhere trapped between heaven and hell, he was sure of that. As he awoke, the room he had been thrown into was still dark, and he wondered if he was actually awake at all. His head felt fuzzy and sweat dripped into his eyes. How long had he been in that hole? It felt like years.
His breathing was ragged; the room was stuffy and he laboured for each breath. He struggled to sit upright; it was becoming harder and harder for him to do that. The simplest of actions was hard for a man who teetered on the edge of just surrendering, of giving in to his plight and screaming into the darkness.
They fed him, dragged him out into a cold yard every so often so that he had exercise, but that was about it. He felt filthy, but that was the least of his problems; the chesty cough that refused to shift had plagued him for a week.
He forced himself to move, though. He wanted to know more about where he was. It didn't matter how many times he did it, the answer was still the same. He was nowhere.
He braced his back against the wall, pushing up with his legs. Very stiffly he rose, sliding up the stonework until he was standing. He felt dizzy, but he could use the wall for support. He fumbled his way around the room, trying to feel for any kind of opening. Any clue as to how to escape. He had to escape.
Even after months, no one had told him why he had been taken from the barracks. He only knew it was something to do with him being Kardiac. But then there were other Kardiacs in the camp, other soldiers. The only reason he could think of was that they had somehow worked out he had served on the Excalibur.
He reached the far wall after only a few steps. He turned with it, following it along to the next wall as well.
Alessandro had to admit to himself that he was terrified, how could he not be? He was supposed to be a prisoner of war to the most terrifying species in existence. The Amsus were predictable, almost civilized in comparison. Their prisoners were executed, and there was a pang of jealousy running through him. At least their deaths had been quick. His survival was fast becoming his personal hell, and he wondered at what it would take to wake up for another day.
He still held to the belief that Katz would come, he had to come. There was nothing else in his mind, no other hope. Another wall, he turned again.
As he reached the next wall he felt a crack, long and straight. And hungrily his fingers searched it up as far as he could reach. It ran vertical, up to a point where it became a horizontal line. It had to be the door, and he could feel the cold outside. His hands swept over the area enclosed by the crack, a sheet of metal, a door definitely. But there was no handle on his side.
His cell was his world. And his head sank against the cold metal, tears sliding down his cheeks as he wept. Drawing back a hand to slam it down on the metal surface. The dull booming echoed loudly. Hollow, like he was.
Sliding back down the door he cradled his knees against his chest, rocking back and forth. Trying to picture so many of his happier moments, trying to force the misery of his incarceration from him. He wasn't dead; he had to stay positive... How long would they keep him there? Would they forget about him too?
His breathing became shallower, and sleep embraced him again.
* * *
The rush of air woke him. There was light, a bright square of painfully bright light that blinded him as he shielded his eyes to it. He hadn't remembered falling asleep, but then he'd lost track of so many things in that hole, what was one more?
There were silhouettes against the light, two figures he thought, Gorean by the size of them. They were talking in their sibilant tongue, and he didn't even bother to try to figure out what they were saying. It was gibberish to him.
One of them stepped inside, and Alessandro pushed his back against the wall again, forcing himself up to his feet; he wanted to be standing when they killed him. That was his right, wasn't it? He was a Kardiac soldier, and no alien was ever going to murder him! He would fight them to his last breath if he had to...
His legs were shaking, his head dizzy as his world tilted, threatening to dump him back to the flagstones beneath him. He was afraid, afraid they would torture him, or worse. They had him there for a reason, and the stupid little voice in the back of his head hopefully suggesting they were going to let him go was squashed.
The Gorean moved in to take his arms. His legs were like rubber, buckling beneath his weight as he tried to stay on his feet. But they moved him too fast, almost dragging him through the halls. His eyes watered from the bright electric lights overhead. He couldn't make out any details of where he was, it was all a blur. He suspected he was underground, but where was anyone's guess.
He was suddenly thrust through and into another cell. Deep and round, it had been carved out of bedrock and Alessandro sank thankfully to his knees as he tried his best to focus, knowing there was something else in the room with him.
He heard the Gorean laugh as a metal door was slammed shut behind him. Alessandro glancing around and over his shoulder as he collapsed to the ground onto his back. The other in the cell snarled, a guttural sound that was a sure mark of a beast. And the glimpse of a furred claw that prodded him caused Alessandro to sigh.
After everything he had been through, he was nothing more than fodder for a pet.
He tried to fend the paw off feebly with his hands, feeling the strong sinewy arm that picked him up, pulling him level with a stripped muzzle, the bared teeth and long snout that snuffled at him.
The Kardiac lieutenant's struggle to get free turned into a desperate grasp as he clung onto the Taïrian in front of him, gripping the torn uniform shirt as he buried his head against his chest and began to sob pathetically.
Captain Shale held the lost Kardiac Lieutenant, smelling Masconi's scent on him, rocking him gently as he set the boy down on a bunk. His large paw messed up the already grimy hair and he stood again, lumbering towards the bowl of food and dragging it back towards his new charge.
Stateroom - HMS Excalibur - Geo-Synchronous orbit over Karin City - Gorean Occupied Karin
OCCUPATION: DAY ONE-FIFTY-EIGHT
There came a point when even Edward, an ordinarily unflappable soul, had to give in to his frustrations. He sat in Darien's chair in the stateroom fiddling with the pieces of glass that had been painstakingly cut by hand into intricate patterns. He heaved a hefty sigh as he lolled his head back against the comfortable leather chair. Things were different behind that desk. His perspective couldn't be a light-hearted one, he had to consider everything. Lives, needs, pain, suffering. A weight of responsibility that pressed down upon him as he struggled to play diplomat, realizing exactly how important Darien was to their cause.
Masconi was a militant bull in a China shop; she performed her role exactly as she had to. The true warrior in their ranks. However, Edward appreciated the temperance Darien's soft and sombre tones could have on her ambitious battle plans, and strategic missions.
Mayfair was a mystery, dark and brooding in the aftermath of the initial invasion. He preferred to remain on Karin, refusing offers for extraction, fighting for his world and trying to drive the Gorean from its soil. But there was a hollowness about the man. The loss he felt after Lauren's betrayal had gutted him of his soul, he existed only for the fight. Threw his all into it, and left nothing stretching back to his old life aboard the Excalibur.
Edward had on one of Darien's black waistcoats, the twin red dragons that he loved so dearly embroidered upon it. The collarless shirt he wore underneath was undone. It gave him solace to retreat into things that had been his grandfathers.
How would the elder VonGrippen handle the situation they were plunged into? Of course, Edward couldn't answer that. VonGrippen had always simply known what had to be done. He had an intuition for war that only Darien seemed to share. The two of them mirrored each other so cleanly, maybe that was part of what the Edward side of him appreciated about Darien. He was who he was.
Edward's chin settled on his clasped hands as he thought through what had to come next. He couldn't afford to wait any longer; he had waited for Darien, who in turn had waited for him. In waiting, there had been no doing. It was time that changed.
The temporal loop he was weaving over the events to come was nearing completion. It was taking every ounce of his strength to maintain it. Tying it so perfectly that there was no wriggle room, that it would only be resolved if he willed it so.
The Gorean weren't an enigma; their objectives were plain and chillingly simple. They wouldn't respond to impassioned pleas, they existed for their own selfish needs - the needs of a species that evolved from carnivorous hunters.
His blue eyes lifted towards the twisted metal doors of the stateroom, heavy again with the weight of Darien's absence. It would take something significant to shift the Gorean from Karin, something that would strike fear into them, restoring the respect they had for his Grandfather. That had kept them at bay for hundreds of years.
"You are not the Pax..." His Watchful Eye's words, directed at Darien, echoed in Edward's mind.
"No," Edward said thoughtfully, bracing his hands against the edges of the desk and standing upright, "he isn't..."
He walked into the bedroom, pulling open the wardrobe and rifling through the section at the back where Darien had left VonGrippen's clothes. He ran his fingers over them, remembering the scents and smells that had become so ingrained into him since his restoration. After Matt's abusive childhood, it was a reassuring thought that he had come from somewhere, that he was more than some perverts sick fantasy.
He selected one of his grandfather's old coats, a heavy wool one that bore none of the markings of an Imperial cut. Solid and warm, Edward pulled it on, squaring his shoulders and turning the collar up. It fit him surprisingly well, and he smiled.
"Finally, all grown up," he mused aloud. "Guess you would have been proud of me, just a little."
He moved across to the rack on the wall, his hand searching past the uniform ties that Darien was so fond of, pulling down a coarse woollen scarf that was entirely too long, a simple deep maroon tartan trimmed with black. VonGrippen colours. He tossed it on, looping it once around his neck.
He considered taking a weapon, but there were none in Darien's collection that were appropriate for dragon slaying. Darien had a taste for the non lethal - a PKD, stunners, and the like. His only concession to lethality had been Ra's shard weapon, belovedly nicknamed by the crew a Kill'a'ma'jig. But that was a weapon earned in battle over the sulphurous pits of Ordessus, and Edward hadn't been there.
He would have to content himself with being his own weapon.
Closing the wardrobe doors with a click, he walked back into the stateroom proper. Excalibur was quiet, like a home with all the children gone. It should have the echo of laughter, or of bickering, or some indication of the life that had been there before. It was eerily silent.
The only officer on the bridge was Squadron Leader Katz, standing to one side of the CIC table, his arms tucked tightly about him as he stood worriedly. He was in command; there were no other officers aboard the ship. The TAC headset was tucked on his head so that he could monitor the ships systems. Difficult without Commander Durham's connection to the Excalibur. His rank made him equivalent to a Lieutenant Commander, and his experience commanding R-403 during the charge of the 242nd Light Horse had given him the capacity to act as a bridge officer. But he appeared so young, so lost in the wreckage of the Excalibur's command centre.
He was alone, the last of the bright-eyed children drafted by the Excalibur to fly its fighters. The first humans to offer any real kind of resistance to the Amsus. He'd earned his rank by the stripes on the sleeve of his jacket. Five kills apiece, his tally was twenty-five confirmed kills, the highest Ace on record still alive in the Empire. A distinction he was always loath to acknowledge.
Out of the entire crew, of all the souls that had been traumatically tossed along, it was Alvin Katz who commanded Excalibur in the end. So young, so lost on the bridge. Like Darien had been... No, in some ways Katz was stronger than Darien had been. In others so much weaker. They were people, and people had different strengths. Katz's strength wasn't presiding over a mortuary.
"I need your help," Edward said as he stood, hands deep into the pockets of the woollen coat. His hair fell just right, shading his face adding an aura of darkness to his solemn expression.
Katz stood uneasily. "What?" he asked; there was always an edge of tension between him and the would-be god after his 'resurrection'.
"I need you to take Doctor Kyr and find the Lex Talionis," Edward said calmly, surprising himself with how casually he requested it.
Katz shook his head. "No," he answered firmly, "In case you haven't noticed, there isn't anyone else aboard capable of commanding this ship."
"Me," Edward replied simply.
"You?" Katz scoffed, waving a hand. "I don't..."
"I've been an officer on this ship longer than you have," Edward said firmly. "Now, unless circumstances have changed, I can still give you orders." He straightened up. "You will take an dropship..."
"Great," Katz muttered, "'cause I've had so much luck in one up until now."
"Stop fighting me on this," Edward insisted. "You have to go, I don't care how you get there, just get Kyr to one of the Osterburgs on the edge of the system and take that to find Lex."
"Why me?" Katz asked quietly.
"Because you're the only one I'd trust to think of Darien first," Edward said as he turned away. "That's why you."
Katz looked away, an uncertain expression wrestling across his face, "Darien's that bad, huh?" he asked, a quaver in his voice.
"Yes," Edward answered him, "he needs you more than Excalibur does right now. Please hurry."
Katz nodded, taking off the TAC-link and handing it across to Edward, jogging back towards the elevators as Edward walked forward out onto the bridge. The young engineer sat down in the command chair, feeling the Excalibur's curiosity greeting him.
He could sense her pain, the hole in her hull that kept her contained to the atmosphere. She embraced him with her emotions as Edward pulled on the TAC-link to observe her monitoring systems. Her air-tight bulkheads were sealed, she was no longer venting atmosphere. But her weapon supplies were low and her flak ammunition was close to depleted. She'd fought hard, kept a razor thin balance over the battlefield below, but it wasn't enough any more.
It was no longer a case of her caring for the planet below, she could barely care for herself. Edward sensed what he had to do and set about preparing for it.
EX-02 - Outbound Flight - Gorean Occupied Karin
OCCUPATION: DAY ONE-FIFTY-EIGHT
There was no graceful departure; Katz didn't want to have time to think about what he was doing. The benefit of being the senior officer left on Excalibur had meant that when he wanted something, like an AWACS fitted Dropship complete with a pair of hyperdrive outrigger pods, he'd just gotten it. No fuss, no muss.
Tossing a backpack of stuff into the back compartment, he'd thrown himself into the pilot's chair and started up the dropship, flipping switches and taking note of the condition of the vessel as he did so. Looking back behind him, he saw Doctor Kyr scrabble aboard.
"This isn't going to be a pleasure cruise," Katz commented as he settled the headset on his head and shifted to get comfortable.
"I know," Kyr answered, stuffing his worn blue satchel into a seat and joining the young Squadron Leader in the front, pulling the unfamiliar belts on as he strapped himself in. He'd found enough time to grab one of the leather jackets from the Excalibur's pilots' ready room, and somehow the flight suit jacket looked wholly out of place on the normally tweed-suited doctor. Like a sheep in wolfs clothing. Katz grinned and reached out to yank the Velcro Karin sigil off of the shoulder, pulling one of his own cats off of his jacket, he tucked it on the doctor's instead.
"Welcome to the Katz House," he said with a smile, finishing his pre-flight. "At this rate you'll be rocking out to Orion death metal in no time..."
Kyr glanced at the patch, then back up at Katz. "Sure, just remember Kaynin have a thing about cats, right?"
The Squadron leader smirked a little, touching the TAC-link as he signalled the Excalibur tower that he was ready to depart. Breathing a long sigh, he looked at the ship about him. "Feels so... final," he said after a pause.
"Yeah," Kyr replied, "something hasn't felt right for ages."
"That's usually a sign that it's time to move on." Katz manoeuvred the Dropship to the elevator, waiting as it ascended to the flight deck.
Kyr crossed his arms in the seat, feeling the weight of Katz's words, looking a final time at the flight deck of the warship that had been his home for so many years. "I didn't pack anything..." he mused.
"Travel light," Katz said firmly, "that way you never lose anything." He taxied the dropship to the catapult, feeling it get loaded in with a stout bounce. He looked out, past the final marker of the flight deck, towards the sunlight of the Karin morning.
Kyr barely noticed as the dropship sped off the deck, bursting out into the brilliant light of the late summer day, the dropship's afterburners engaging as it accelerated towards escape velocity, rocketing across the five-mile divide that separated the Excalibur from the Gorean Armada.
Katz licked his lips, his hand gliding down to the jump computer between the two cockpit chairs; a portable system rigged into the dropship. Modular, like much of the rest of the adaptable vessel, it was sitting on a full charge, exactly what they needed.
He expertly guided the dropship skyward, feeling the vibrations of the ion drives as they applied full thrust to break Mach five. His eyes scanning the HUD as the Gorean destroyers launched fliers to intercept him. He could pick out the reds scattered amidst them, and wondered if she was amongst them.
Katz still owed her for Alessandro, and in recent skirmishes he'd found she sought him out, duelling over the skies of Karin, but always circumstances would draw them away from each other.
He checked his weapon systems; if he could identify her, he could drop a couple of Switchblades in her general direction. But that would take away from his mission. He looked at the doctor strapped in beside him, his hands itching to move to the fire control.
Kyr observed this behaviour and sniffed the air. "Not a good idea," he said, reading the younger man's scent patterns. "Revenge isn't enough..."
Katz grimaced. "She's out there, I can feel her. Lining up for a shot..."
"We're in a dropship," Kyr reminded him. "We have a mission. Like it or not we have to..."
Katz thumbed the radio. "This is Paladin-one to the leader of the Alya-shock, you out there?"
She'd made contact with him once before, now he figured he'd return the favour. Keeping an eye on his AWACS-assisted scopes, he brought a couple of missiles online.
"I am here, Paladin," the voice purred from the speakers, and Kyr rolled his eyes, tightening his straps.
Katz zeroed in on her fighter, locking it into the missile guidance controls. "I have a present for you," he said flatly, releasing the twin missiles as his hands reached down to hammer commands into the jump computer.
The two missiles screamed away from the Dropship, as it reached orbit and flash-flared. The hyperdrive performing a pin-point line-of-sight jump clear across the system.
* * *
Lady Tagria was surprised by the pair of missiles streaming away from the clumsy dropship. Pulling her flier up and into a series of complex evasive manoeuvres, she sneered at his cowardice. Running away, after he had tried to kill her by surprise. She'd expected nothing less of an enemy as crafty as the Paladin. As her two wing mates shot down the missiles, she pulled herself higher, gaining altitude as the Dropship shot away from her, leaving her frustrated.
"I will kill you," she vowed silently, murderous intent on her mind as she tied herself into the Gorean communications network, searching for where that dropship had gone.
Bridge - HMS Excalibur - Geo-Synchronous orbit over Karin City - Gorean Occupied Karin
OCCUPATION: DAY ONE-FIFTY-EIGHT
"I need you to help me as well," Edward explained, poring over data, looking about him at the collection of young midshipmen manning bridge stations, eyeing the Immortal Emperor and wondering what he was doing.
Edward smiled at the tickling question Excalibur sent running through him.
"I need you to keep Darien safe for me," he said, standing up and tucking himself deeper into the overcoat.
He waved to one of his engineers. "Kyles, I'm leaving you in charge." Edward touched his shoulder. "Fix the ship as best you can, and stay hidden, do you understand?"
"No," the young man replied uncertainly, "what..."
Edward smiled as he concentrated, drawing upon the kind of titanic energies that powered the zero-point reactors, pushing further than he had attempted to before. Using himself like a giant hyperdrive, he cast the ship across space.
He gasped at the fury of hyperspace, feeling its monstrous power attempt to punish him for his transgression. The Excalibur shook dangerously as it was hurled back into normal space, emergency alarms blaring.
The young Immortal Emperor sagged a little as he smiled, "Yeji-Sola," he said at length, looking at the darkened Imperial repair yard before them. Not bad for his first attempt to jump something as big as a starship. He felt exhausted, but knew that his work for the day wasn't over.
He pulled himself upright. "Fix what you can," he said to Kyles, "I'll return..."
There was a palpable silence on the bridge as the Immortal Emperor vanished in a flash of light, leaving the young crew to stare at each other, looking up at the forbidding structure that had previously given birth to so much doom.
HMS T'zaht - Picket duty - Free Karin Fleet
OCCUPATION: DAY ONE-FIFTY-EIGHT
Katz had chosen the T'zaht because its name, in Tancred, meant Wildcat. A good omen, Kyr thought as they cleared the docking protocols and were let through the hatch and into the Osterburg Hunter-Killer.
She had been in the Karin system undergoing repairs after the 242nd's attacks on the Amsus fleets and was stranded after the Gorean invasion as she had only a token crew. She had found herself escorting a collection of civilian vessels that lacked any kind of jump apparatus. So far they had been spared by the Gorean as nothing more than a minor annoyance at the very edge of the Karin system.
However, five months of inactivity had left the civilian fleet a chaotic mess, and the T'zaht had repeatedly found herself taking the brunt of flak from mutinous mercantile crews who wanted to surrender to the Gorean forces, oblivious as to how terminal that surrender would be for them all.
The ship was in many ways better appointed than the Excalibur. Newer and cleaner, its line had been amongst the last ships pressed into service by VonGrippen's Red Guard. Built to counteract faster enemy ships, they had seen service at the end of the Apilon Rift war against the Gorean.
Katz, as an officer, had automatically assumed command upon boarding, noting that the five member skeleton crew looked exhausted. There was something beaten about the engineers who had suddenly found themselves struggling to survive aboard the warship as the Gorean had swept through the Karin system, obliterating anything that had posed a threat to them.
Kyr separated from him, heading for the sickbay. It was a mid-sized room situated in the exact centre of the warship with doors opening into either of the two main corridors. The doors parted at Kyr's approach, allowing the doctor time to stow his bags on a desk and take a look around.
There were thinly padded surgical beds situated in small pools of light against the bulkhead. Easy to handle controls that, after the mess hall aboard the Excalibur, were to his eyes luxurious. He smiled firmly as he scratched behind an ear, glancing upwards towards the bridge. They were, no doubt, in for another long haul, and he wanted to be prepared for it.
The T'zaht was small compared to most warships, but the Osterburgs more than lived up to their reputation as Hunter-Killers. The sleek Imperial design afforded her a cleanliness, a brightness of form and ergonomic styles, that gave her a countenance of resolve. She had a sturdiness that wouldn't easily be surrendered, and she could stand up to warships easily several times her size. She was even able to stand her ground if outnumbered. She was sleek, agile and quick. There was no doubt she would be able to manoeuvre into and out of places the larger ships could not. And her nano-fluidic adaptive amour and pulse cannons gave her a toughness to match.
Thankfully, due to the effectiveness of R-403 in the recent conflicts, the Imperial engineers had seen fit to begin a retrofit of its existing Osterburgs to counter the edges possessed by the Amsus Raptors. The carbon-composite plates would screen her from all but the most advanced radar arrays, and her IR baffles would mask her wake, making her a silent and deadly killer.
He found Katz on the bridge, running through a checklist to ensure the small warship's battle readiness. He didn't disturb him, merely took a seat back behind the command chair at the vacant communications console.
Katz glanced up as he rounded the helm, smiling grimly at Kyr. "Limo service isn't quite what it used to be," he said honestly, "and I don't know what taking half the defence of the civilian fleet's going to do to their morale. It's shaky enough as it is."
"Morale is probably going to get even worse," Kyr pointed out, "if people figure out about Darien. Matt's got a point, we need him."
Katz nodded, dropping the clipboard back into its holder, leaning across the helm and checking the ship's drives. "We're sitting on a full jump charge, if we go now we'll be able to make the rest of the checks while we're underway for Eisenhower."
Kyr unzipped his leather jacket. "Right then, we're off to see the wizard."
His eyes caught the red lights on the communication board, and he glanced over at the sensor displays on the console across from his. "What?"
Katz looked up and licked his lips, "the Gorean Armada..." he breathed in wonder, watching it streaming up from the surface of Karin, breaking its spherical formation for the first time in months. "Where the hell does that think its going?"
"I'm not registering the Excalibur on any comm. channel," Kyr said softly, sitting forward.
"Oh... crap," Katz said, neatly summarising the situation. He gauged the fleet's course and speed as a small task force of red-painted warships detached themselves from the wall of green, angling down towards the civilian fleet. "They're coming."
He leaned over an engineering console, punching in commands to jettison the dropship from the outer hatch, rushing back to the helm and firing up the main drives. "I'm going to get us moving, how many ships in that task force?"
"Ten destroyers," Kyr observed, getting up and sliding into the seat. He called up the active scans, accessing the active radars and Ladar's of the other ships clustered about them, all of which had spotted the Gorean bearing down on them.
"It's going to be a massacre," Kyr breathed, looking over at the unmanned weapons console, "we have to..."
"What?" Katz asked, sitting back into his seat. "We're outgunned, out numbered, and undermanned. They'll be on top of us in what, minutes, at that speed? Seconds, if they LOS jump."
As if on cue, jump capable fliers began whisking into existence in the midst of the civilian fleet, opening fire with their plasma guns. A few moments later a destroyer appeared, its massive plasma cannon ports retracting as its crescent ion drives pushed it, like a hungry shark, closer to a civilian passenger liner.
There was a burst of light as outside a fuel transport exploded, torn apart as a flier struck its external tanks. Kyr blinked in shock as the gout of flame washed over the T'zaht. He stood, feeling the deck vibrate beneath his feet. "We can't just leave them!"
"Doctor," Katz stated evenly, "they're already dead. We can't help them. If we do, there's a good chance we'll join them..."
Across the observation window the second Osterberg roared into action, the HMS Ishtar's Grace opening fire with her primary weapon systems, engaging the Gorean destroyer at close quarters as a horde of fliers pursued it.
The passenger liner detonated as the Gorean destroyer finished it off, turning its powerful guns on the small Imperial warship that was hammering it in a harrying action. Kyr watched helplessly as a massive broadside slammed into the warship, knocking it off course. The damage aboard her had to be severe, but still she kept on fighting as a second Gorean destroyer joined the fight, its cannons levelling a refinery vessel and ploughing onwards towards more prizes.
The battle reflected in Kyr's eyes as he stood, staring out at the carnage. "Oh God, please..." he gasped, shaking his head, "Please no..."
Katz made a decision. Inputting jump commands into the system, he looked back at the doctor and shook his head. "We're going, now!"
The T'zaht accelerated forward, curving around as she initiated a hyperspace jump, flashing away.
Gorean Destroyer - Main Strike Force - Gorean Armada
OCCUPATION: DAY ONE-FIFTY-EIGHT
Lady Tagria stood on the high tier of her bridge, watching the data scrolling in. One of the fliers had been close enough to track the hyperspace event, projecting its power and trajectory. That had to be Paladin; he wouldn't allow himself to be butchered along with the rest of the cattle.
"Follow that ship!" she ordered, "as for the rest of the Task Force, order them to finish their target practice and proceed on to Eisenhower station, it is time we took the Jump Nexus for Sal-zÿr!"