Katz. Alvin
House von Karin
Squadron Leader - Paladin Squadron
A capable and decorated pilot, however worries continue to exist about his mental state. I recommend his evaluation for PTSD at the earliest convenience.
Karin Fortress - Karin City - Gorean Occupied Territory
OCCUPATION: DAY ONE-SIXTY-FIVE
"Decadence," he hissed, the words coiling as his tongue embraced the word, revelling in it before discarding it. "Is merely piety of self-gratification."
The depths of the Imperial Fortress had become his chambers. The sulphurous heat bubbling up from the lava pools warmed the ancient stones so far beneath the heart stone of the mountain that they had all but been forgotten by the new inhabitants. He lay coiled, his broad ears twitching occasionally as he spoke, the only sign that he was awake at all.
The broad passages of a Taïrian hall of the honoured dead surrounded him, partially collapsed after centuries of neglect. Carved stones crumbled into the molten fire beneath them, as around him the glitter of gold shone in the flickering light of hundreds of blazing braziers.
He shifted his scales, flexing them in a ripple down his body. The burnished metallic blue pattern upon them resembled a wave as they flowed down towards his tail. The hooked barb on his tail swept out to disturb a pile of coins, scattering them across the flag stones.
"Your love of trinkets implies more than a passing fancy," said the aged Taïrian Matriarch, swinging in her cage. The gilded bars swept into delicate patterns that belied their strength; they wouldn't give, and she didn't need to try them to see that they would keep her in place.
She remained in perfect repose, meditating lightly as her broad ears drooped, her hands clasped in prayer before her.
The mighty Gorean, Sal-zÿr, ran a long tongue down over his teeth. "There are legends on the world of your masters. Those legends, my people believe, were based upon one of our kind making residence there."
"The humans have many legends in their history," the Matriarch replied. "Their history is a rich tapestry of lives well lived. The story you speak of is that of Siegfried and the Dragon. As I recall, your kinsman died in that tale."
"Why does such a wise woman continue to place her faith in apes?" Sal-zÿr seemed confused. "The debt your people owe theirs has been repaid in kind a thousand fold..."
"Friendship isn't about debts," the Matriarch responded, shifting her hands to the opposite sides, settling her grass skirts again. "But then, a creature that prizes a golden bed wouldn't understand that there are far greater riches in the universe."
"You seek to patronize me," Sal-zÿr warned. "Be careful Taïrian, your life continues because I permit it..."
"My life," the Matriarch responded evenly, "continues because I am yet another trophy announcing your dominance in the face of adversity, your triumph over the nemesis of your people. I am a testament to your greatness."
Sal-zÿr purred. "You flatter me, woman."
"Your pride blinds you," the Matriarch replied softly, "because I do not flatter a creature whose ego fills this entire vault. I merely point out your own logic for maintaining my existence."
"You talk about my ego," Sal-zÿr stated softly, "and yet you sit in your gilded cage and lecture me from on high. Pride is shared, milady, a common failing that sits alongside intelligence..." His tongue lashed out from his mouth again. "And look, yet another pride-filled one comes into my inner sanctum, the God-Emperor of Mankind."
Sal-zÿr's eyes opened at last as he tilted his head to look across a pool of lava towards the young man standing on one of the highest pillars, hands at his sides. His black waist coat hung open, blowing in the breeze coming from one of the many cooling vents that funnelled the poisonous gasses away from the lower chambers. The twinned red dragons that had been Xier's mark rolled with the folds of black material.
Prince Edward's hair flickered, and his blue eyes directed a cold gaze at the Gorean overlord. "Sal-zÿr, you have broken the Treaty of Shadows, disobeyed the Gorean Council, and invaded the Dominion of the Pax." He tsked. "You have been a very," he deepened his voice, "very, naughty lizard."
Sal-zÿr's eyes flickered with amusement and he rose from his slumbering position, his wickedly sharp foreclaws shuffling about, stirring the gold. "You have changed so little in so long," the wyrm stated, tilting his broad head and baring his massive fangs, the gnarled horn rising from the centre of his muzzle catching the light as his nostrils flared. "I almost forgot what it was like to taste your scent."
"Didn't your mother ever teach you that you shouldn't play with your food?" Edward shrugged. "She should have also told you to brush your teeth more," he nodded to the horn, "it fixes gingivitis up right quick."
Sal-zÿr laughed. "You've developed a sense of humour after all these centuries. Shame, though. You have come to me now, and you really aren't prepared to fight a Disciple."
"A Gorean with a god?" Edward asked a little incredulously. "Isn't that a little perverse in your society? Aren't you supposedly avatars of gods? It seems odd to follow when you are so used to leading."
"The nature of divinity, Emperor of Man, is hardly something you should jest about." Sal-zÿr moved his body, slithering forward on his large tail and eyeing the high pillar that was just too far out of his reach, ruffling wings that were useless inside the chamber. "My religion is squarely under my control. Yours, however, burns like a fever in the minds of those that follow it."
"They make their own choices," Edward answered, keeping an easy posture as he watched the Gorean's passage around him. "Disciple to whom?"
"Omniscience still eludes the gods of man," Sal-zÿr remarked dryly. "Such a limitation for a nearly limitless being such as yourself; to be blind of what is to come. I hear it almost drives Rikard mad; he burns to know. I for one believe that you don't need to be immortal to be omniscient. Take His Watchful Eye, for example, he is mortal and he is as close to truly omniscient as one can get."
"But you profess to be the disciple of a god." Edward pressed. "Which god?"
"Ahhh but that would give you too much, Emperor of Man. You aren't ready to face me if you do not know the answer to that." Sal-zÿr turned, "come down off your pillar. Fight me and I will teach you all about my God."
Edward considered his opponent a moment. "I haven't come here to fight you," he stated evenly, "but to deliver a warning..."
"Let my people go?" suggested Sal-zÿr in a mocking tone. "Are you going to try to scare me with frogs and locusts? You do amuse me, little god."
"I'd let you consult a higher authority," Edward stated evenly, "but there isn't one. Little or large, Sal-zÿr, I am powerful, and I am mad, and you are in my way. Consider yourself warned; your end will draw near."
Edward vanished in a flash of light, and Sal-zÿr stopped his circuit to look back at the Matriarch. "Your God is afraid."
"So are you," the Matriarch replied, returning to her meditation.
Karin Plains - Karin - Gorean Occupied Territory
OCCUPATION: DAY ONE-SIXTY-FIVE
Masconi sat, her back towards the slatted window, the light of the Karin spring day spilling between the cracks, shadowing her tight-lipped features as she considered the man grovelling for his life on his knees before the Imperial Officer. She'd separated her own emotions from the events that had unfolded around her. Forcing herself into a state of cold dispassion that had become necessary to survive the constant grind of war. It was no longer a case of nation, king and country. That had all been buried along with friends and confidants; flag draped boxes screaming into the dark void, taking one more piece of what made her human with it.
She tilted her head back almost regally. A razor's edge of calm kept her squarely in control of the situation as she relaxed her jaw and prepared to speak, one hand resting on the shabby wooden table that dominated the dark kitchen of the small farm house they had commandeered.
The fat man blubbered where he sat, Grogen standing behind him, the VLR rifle cradled menacingly in his arms. The marine sniper's eyes never wavered from Masconi's; at her signal, he would kill the Gorean collaborator without hesitation or remorse. The wad of Gorean money sitting on the table under Masconi's hand was proof enough of the man's guilt. It was just a matter of finding something of value that would decide if the traitor would live or die. Value to Masconi, that is. After all, that was what mattered.
James sat on the stairs peeling an apple with a sharp Gorean bayonet. The wickedly curved weapon ran through the shrivelled fruit with a sharp slicing sound, adding an unsettling noise that caused the fat man to flinch each time he heard it. But then, James knew all about the weapon, the curved scar running up his face testified to how close the blade had come to ending his life. Its previous owner had the misfortune of mistaking the Fida'i for an easy target.
"Where is the camp?" Masconi asked, her voice quiet and laden with malice.
The man wailed loudly, something that sounded to Masconi like it wasn't an answer.
Masconi lifted her right index finger a fraction of an inch, and Grogen struck out, the butt of his rifle connecting squarely with the back of the collaborator's head. The look on Grogen's face was murderous, the sniper returning to his ready pose, knowing that he would have to reset his sights after that display. Masconi thought that Grogen was possibly more upset about that fact than he was about the lie that had caused his blow in the first place.
"Where is the camp Mister Fenwick?" Masconi asked again, imperiously.
Fenwick cradled his head, sitting up in his seat, his glasses askew, fury replacing the fear as he tried to shake off the pain. "You stupid b..." he cringed as James stood up. The Fida'i assassin's close cropped hair and twisted features silenced the insult, freezing it dead. There was a menace to him, shrouded in a simple black padded body armour with its tarnished buckles under a heavy leather jacket that kept the Karin chill at bay. He'd discovered that for many on Karin, the Fida'i uniform was enough to ensure they feared him, memories of what the symbol had meant at one time dredged up when the Fida'i had been discovered by Taine on a long forgotten world in the Apilon Rift.
James tilted the knife and drew it downwards, resting the sharp curve under Fenwick's chin, applying a little pressure, enough to ensure Fenwick could feel its edge. "She asked you a question." The gruff voice brooked no more resistance.
"He will kill you," Masconi said, sitting upright in her chair her eyes searching Fenwick's. She reached out and scooped up the tea pot, pouring herself a cup, pulling the broken china cup towards her and casually fishing the small beetle out of the tea and flicking it aside.
Fenwick seethed, his tongue running across his broad lips as his eyes darted about nervously. He looked towards one of the girls that had, he thought, been there to serve him; another of the rewards for supplying information to the Gorean about the Imperial underground. He hadn't bargained on her actually being a part of the resistance.
"What about money?" Fenwick offered.
"I have all your money," Masconi pointed out, tapping the wad of bills. "And outside of the Gorean Imperium it isn't worth much."
"The camp." James's voice was a guttural snarl, his blade now cutting into Fenwick's throat slightly.
"It's to the north of the city," Fenwick wheezed, trying not to swallow as the blade tasted the soft flesh of his double chin, "in Tamguan."
Masconi flinched, imperceptible to anyone who didn't know her, but her two cohorts both recognized there was a problem with Fenwick's answer. There was a nervous flash of anticipation, and James tensed his grip on the knife, ready to end the snivelling traitor's worthless life in a split second.
"I can take you there..." Fenwick mustered the courage to speak again, desperate now to show that he still had a use, hoping that the Imperial officer and her lackeys would spare his life.
Masconi's index finger played with the rim of her tea cup, contemplating for a quiet moment everything that had brought her a step closer to rescuing Alessandro. She glanced up, a flash of uncertainty in her eyes as she tried to figure out what to do with Fenwick. James could deal with him and there would be little problem. However, considering how muddled the battle lines were on Karin, it might be in her best interests to keep the collaborator alive.
"Take him out to the Landrover," Masconi ordered, waving a hand and shaking her head. "If he is useful then we might keep him alive."
James hauled Fenwick to his feet, dragging the protesting man across the wooden floor of the old kitchen, thrusting him out of the door and into the shining spring sunlight.
Masconi stood, pulling on the furred Karin cap onto her head and shrugging on her overcoat. She glanced over at Grogen, who lingered for a moment longer than he should have.
"Problem?" Masconi asked quietly.
"You're the Highlady," Grogen replied with a shrug. "You lead, I follow. Just try not to get me lined up in front of a firing squad again."
Masconi sucked a sigh through her teeth, shaking her head. "The Imps don't appreciate a deserter," she answered, glancing up at the sky as he led the way outside, treading through the mud to the passenger side of the commandeered 4x4. "Dee especially."
"Pappa bears seldom appreciate their cubs running off to play." Grogen flipped open the rear of the Landrover and drew his pistol, firing a single shot into the seat, just between the legs of the traitor, causing the already terrified man to jump in shock. "You run, I don't miss. Understand?"
Fenwick bobbed his head, shifting himself back down into the seat reluctantly as Grogen climbed in beside him, his pistol cradled in his off hand and trained squarely on his captive, ensuring there would be no problems. James started the vehicle, roaring off down the gravel road, heading south towards Karin and the heart of the Gorean lines.
Masconi sat with her arms crossed over her chest as she stared out of the window at the sleet drifting steadily before them, coating their world in a slushy grey that obscured their vision and clouded their path ahead. It was symbolic of her life at that moment. She'd been lucky; evading both the Imperial's and the Gorean was taxing, and she'd managed to stay one step ahead of both so far, but her luck was fast running out. Darien was pissed, but that didn't worry Masconi as much as what would happen if the Karin Militia caught up with her. They took desertion seriously, even if it was in a noble cause, and given that they had already tried to shoot her on a couple of occasions, Masconi knew she was definitely on her own.
She rested her chin on the front of her rumpled uniform. Why James and Grogen remained with her was a bit of a mystery. She was more trouble than she was worth, as James was always ready to point out. But then James was just as committed to getting to the Gorean processing camp as Masconi was. He'd been stranded on Karin too long, seen too many children dragged off to the camps to die. Grogen however, seemed to be bound more by a misguided sense of loyalty. Something Masconi wasn't about to belittle; she appreciated every single bullet Grogen fired. He was clean and efficient in a way that Masconi, as their defacto leader, could only hope to portray. The woman with the plan. More like the woman with more than a little luck and one hell of a run at winging it.
The Landrover jostled as it bounded across the Karin moors, its wheels finding purchase as they spun gravel back over the track behind them. It slid to the right as it powered its way up and over the slippery hill, slaloming down the far side as James threw his strength into controlling the slide, smiling as he levelled out the vehicle.
Masconi raised a boot up to the dash to stop herself sliding around inside, grimacing at James behind the wheel. "I knew I shouldn't let you drive," she groused.
"You just don't..." James's eyes went wide and he slammed on the breaks, the Landrover squelching to a halt as it ploughed through a snow bank perched on the edge of a steep slope down into a valley. Below them, Imperial light cavalry was engaging Gorean heavy assault troops. TOW missiles screamed off of missile racks mounted to fast moving ATV's, the charge breaking off as the Gorean powered armours retaliated, plasma cannons roaring, incinerating any that failed to turn fast enough.
"My god!" Masconi exclaimed, sitting forward in her seat and tilting her cap back on her head. She watched as an ITE mech leapt down the far slope of the valley, pausing as it cut loose with its autocannons, churning through lines of shock troopers before they had time to react.
Overhead, through a cloud bank, a wing of Imperial F-120's shrieked, dropping their suppression bombs, exploding with shattering force into the Gorean lines, trying to break the formidable troops that were rallying for a counter attack.
"That changes your plans," Fenwick laughed, despite the gun in his ribs. "The road home is a little... blocked."
Masconi stared at the Kardiac emblem emblazoned on the tails of the orca-shaped fighters; Masconi's squadron, which meant the troops fighting were Karin Marines. Colonel Mayfair, probably; not a reunion she was keen on. Masconi glanced back at Grogen who recognized the markings as well.
"Can we get the hell outta here?" Grogen asked pointedly. "Preferably not in the direction of that cluster f..."
"I'm thinking," Masconi snapped back, looking left and right. "We can try the ridge line, but that's going to put us square behind the mainstay of the Gorean forces, and I doubt they'd appreciate the fine British engineering that went into this motor vehicle. In fact, I'm willing to bet they'd take great exception to it."
"Hit the gas and pray," James urged, fumbling for his seatbelt. "And to a real god... please?"
HMS T'zaht -Docked at Eisenhower Station- Imperial Territory
OCCUPATION: DAY ONE-SIXTY-FIVE
It was state of the art, the best that the Old Empire could offer. Which was to say it looked pretty, and could do some impressive things on paper, but out in the field it would be lucky to survive its first week. The first thing any engineer did when they got a hold of a new ship was to see exactly where the chimpanzees at the shipyards had screwed up.
On the Osterburg Class, that wasn't hard. She had been designed by a knuckle-headed reject from the Imperial engineering academy. Some one who hadn't known an arc welder from a vibrospanner. She had guns and armour and a power plant to match them, but little else.
It had been designed to replace the core of Destroyer Escorts and Picket Destroyers that had patrolled Imperial space during the Apilon Rift war, vessels that had now become the staple blueprint of Commonwealth privateers and pirates everywhere. That was a dry thought; that the Osterburg, once it was retired from service, would become the next generation of raiders. The thought didn't particularly amuse Katz.
Without the constraints of Imperial rules, however, Katz had the liberty to change a few things. First thing he had done was have the hull repainted as per Kyr's suggestion. The ship was designed to land on a planet surface, and gunmetal grey had a tendency of being highly visible; not the most desirable of traits considering where they were headed. It was now painted in varying shades of blue and grey in a nice camouflage pattern that would make it hard for the Amsus eye to distinguish exactly what it was, given a little luck.
The bridge had been a disgrace of flat panels and conduits powering them. He had torn out a few of them right off the bat, jerry rigging them into the forward consoles and replacing the Imperial bucket seats with the latest crash seats he had ordered from a shiny after market catalogue. They had seatbelts, take that!
However, as he sat in a small access hole in the back of the bridge using a digital encoder to hand calibrate nearly a thousand adaptive computer chips, he wondered why on earth he had taken this assignment. There was a beach somewhere with his name on it; he just hadn't found it yet. It certainly beat removing the safety protocols from a bunch of regulator chips. Who put power regulators on computer chips so that they would never red line? It was like tying a guy's knees together and telling him to run when you unleashed the lion.
'More power' was the mantra of every starship captain, and idiots at the Imperial fleet yards were trying to hamstring him right out of the gate. Monkeys.
He was listening to an old song from Earth, one of the classics by a band called Charged, something mid 21st century. It boomed about the bridge, drowning out the noise of main reactor alarm; he was running it on maximum output to break in the reactors. Like any machine, it needed to be run hard at the start to wear it a little to give them a little better performance.... So what if the computer threatened a 'reactor meltdown imminent' every few minutes?
Katz was coming to learn his ship; he was supposed to be its captain. He'd come to learn that an Amsus Raptor was a hardy soul when tested, and he hoped T'zaht had a similar rigidness about her.
He looked over the shy-looking man standing in the back of the bridge, shifting uncomfortably from foot to foot. Katz frowned, reaching up and slapping the comm. channel closed on the radio, muting the music and plunging them into silence.
"Hi," the ship's captain said, wiping his hands clean on a rag as he looked the other man up and down. "What can I do for you?"
"Chuck, Chuck Flint." the man extended his hand and awkwardly shook Katz's, "I was science officer aboard the AGS-92." He looked about him and whistled, "Sure is a pretty ship, eh?"
"AGS-92," Katz recalled, "survey vessel. You were the ones mapping the Apilon Rift for the Imperial Interplanetary Survey team."
"Sure was," Chuck answered, his heavy eyebrows knitting together, "least she was until the Gorean punched her full of holes and sent us running for the nearest safe port. Captain Jacobs thought the Caledonia... AGS-92, was done for."
"Right," Katz nodded. "Again, though, what can I do for you?"
"Captain Jacobs said you guys were looking for a few good men and all, so I thought to swing on up and see if you could use an extra pair of hands." Chuck smiled lightly. "I'm not Fleet, and well, us Sci-geeks do tend to get in the way a bit. But I have my degrees, sir, and I've got some experience with sensor pallets, though ours are a bit more... sophisticated than the military variants."
"You're trying to sign on?" Katz asked, blinking at the older man who seemed wholly intimidated by the youthful Captain.
"Well," Chuck knotted his hands behind his back and bounced a little on the balls of his feet, "I was hoping to. It's either this or enlist and get posted to a Marine unit, where I'd be assisting Civil Engineers in the invasion of Earth. And I like being shipboard, sir."
"Drop the sir," Katz said. "How are you with sensor maintenance?"
"I know a trick or two," Chuck answered. "If you hire me I'd show you."
"Sci-geek, huh?" Katz asked. "You're probably going to get on well with Kyr; he's a Kaynin doctor. You get started on the sensors and I'll see about getting him to get you a tee-shirt."
"Right on." Chuck smiled, looking relieved, and walked over to the sensor console. He slid into the chair and unzipping his shirt, his hands whizzing across the keys, pulling up sensor data and running a calibration cycle.
Katz shrugged, then wandered back down the length of the ship. He reminded himself to say a thank you to Captain Jacobs for her recommendation, and went looking for Kyr.
He found the doctor in the midst of cleaning his quarters, folding clothes away neatly and squaring his bunk. Kyr's obsessive tidiness amused Katz and he leaned on the door frame a minute, watching.
"Why do you do that?" Katz asked, nodding to the immaculate quarters, "you know you don't have to if you don't want to."
"I like a neat room," Kyr answered, getting up.
"It's not like you use it," Katz observed.
Kyr bit his lip and looked away. "I just like things in their own place."
Katz realized he may have sounded condescending, and he shook his head, trying a different tack. "What I meant was, you don't have to keep separate quarters, not if you don't want to."
Pausing with a pair of crisply ironed briefs in his hands, Kyr looked confused. "You want me to move in with you? That's a little bit of a rush, isn't it?"
Katz worked his mouth and closed it again. "I... Just thought it would be simpler. I mean you sleep in mine anyway."
"I know I am..." Kyr fumbled a little for the right words, "new at this sort of thing, but rushing things would be a little dumb on both our parts. We're just... well, y'know... and its not like we've been doing that long. I just think space, separate space, is best for now."
"Whatever," Katz said hurriedly. Trying to hide the fact that he was actually hurt by the implication that things were being rushed, he shifted topics. "We have a Science Officer..."
Kyr cocked his head to the side and went back to putting away his clothes. "We don't have an engineer or a weapons tech, but we have a science officer, a pilot and a doctor?"
"Hey, I didn't recruit him; he came on a referral from Captain Jacobs..."
"Caledonia," Kyr nodded, "survey ship. I think she and Darien know each other from when he was chasing the pirate barons; she was the one who gave him the tip to finding Zixor. I'd trust that she knows what she's doing, probably out to be helpful if she heard we're short handed."
Kyr turned to find the Katz had entered his room, the doors sliding closed behind him. He felt the young pilot's hands slipping under his shirt. "Can you function on any other level?" he admonished with a slight laugh.
Katz looked hungry. "I have two settings: turned on, or really turned on."
"Well pull the plug out," Kyr responded firmly, trying not to laugh. "We don't have time for that right now. You have to get the ship ready to go..."
The boom reverberated through the length of the T'zaht, rocking them almost gently. Katz looked perplexed. "That wasn't us," he said as the alarm went off, "it had to be the station."
"That's crazy," Kyr replied, chasing after him as they both ran the hall towards the bridge, "that would mean the whole station rocked, and its nearly five miles across..."
Chuck was punching commands into the sensor console, looking up worriedly as Katz stopped to look over the tactical data scrolling up the observation window. "The Gorean just hit the station with some kind of Kamikaze Destroyer," he reported, looking worried.
Kyr could see the jet of burning gasses expanding out from a shattered section of Eisenhower, the stations weapon systems still pounding as they tracked another cruiser inbound for the station.
The heavy gun turrets poured weapons fire into the Destroyer, blowing great chunks out of its armour plating, incinerating the support structure and boiling the insides. But the mighty behemoth charged onwards, a missile of several million tonnes aimed right at the station. Ignoring the weapons fire that burned through it, the ship crashed into the lower reactor section of the station, exploding with another forceful shockwave.
"They want to destroy the station," Kyr observed, shocked.
"Yes," Katz replied, "and they're doing a damn good job at it too." He willed his legs into action and jumped into the pilot's chair to fire up the drives, pausing when the helm console refused to register any power. He looked back to the open service locker and the mass of chips spread across the floor. "Oh crap." He said sincerely.
"Oh crap?" Kyr asked, looking down and back up at the observation window. "'Oh crap' isn't something I want to hear when the Gorean are destroying the space station we're still attached to."
"I second that one," Chuck offered, pulling himself up and sliding across to the chips, quickly scanning over them and beginning to reset them into the boards. "Someone needs to restart the engines manually, eh?"
Kyr blinked. "I don't know how," he said, feeling helpless.
Katz stood up again, watching a third destroyer begin its suicide run on the station, Imperial ships already breaking away from the crippled station to make a mad dash for the Jump Nexus. It was pandemonium, Imperial fighters rocketing off of the station and flew headlong into battle with a massive wave of Gorean starships. The heavy turrets of the floating sentinel satellites that surrounded Eisenhower blasted back towards the Gorean attack force, trying to stay focused on the next ship that was a threat. It wasn't working, thought. The Imperial station was doomed, and in a few short minutes they would be too.
Kyr slipped into the navigational chair, staring in shocked horror at the disaster befalling the Imperial forces, another defeat handed to them by the overwhelming strength of the Gorean.
Behind them Chuck slapped the open circuit board back into its mounting and glanced up as the helm console came back to life. He ran across the deck, vaulting the rear sensor console and hitting the helm, hammering commands into it to release the docking mandibles that held them in place.
There was no time to detach the docking umbilical. The T'zaht's thrusters strained to pull her away as the third destroyer smashed into the command hub of the massive station. Around them the turrets fell silent as Eisenhower was decapitated.
The engine gauges flickered to life as the T'zaht's main dives came back online, and Chuck hit the controls to apply full forward thrust, the umbilicals tearing away as the ship roared to life, streaking up towards free space and the cluster of Gorean ships that were closing in on the station.
"Which one?" Chuck asked, pointing to the Jump Nexus. Without the steady reference provided by the stationary Eisenhower station, neither of them were sure which of the jump gates was the one they needed. There were just too many options, too many places for them to jump too. And any one of them could have dire consequences.
Kyr scanned them, looking for one that might be familiar. He'd only travelled through two. One to Sentinel and one to the Kree Jump Nexus. He spotted them, almost right on top of each other, but he couldn't distinguish between them. He knew they were familiar, but which one...
"Incoming!" Chuck called as a pair of fliers blew past the observation window, curving around for an attack run. The science officer reached across to the weapons console and activating the shields before rushing back across to the helm. The ship rocked from several plasma impacts.
"Top one," Kyr yelled, confused and guessing. But a guess was the best they had. Chuck hit the controls, angling the ship for a rapid climb, pushing its bow down as it slammed through the hyperspace conduit, accelerating away from the dying station.
The time dilation slurred everything around them before they snapped back into the reality of normal space. Kyr sat upright in his chair, struggling to see if he had made the right choice. To his horror, the space about them wasn't filled with the familiar blue-green orb of Earth. Instead, there were millions of swarm ships arrayed about them, circling in to cut off their way back through the Jump Nexus.
He'd chosen wrong.
They were in Eelim space.