Mine.

Above us, the fires roiled, burning without end. Thus is what it seems. A message from the Service. Secession means death. Well, screw them. I’m not their slave. Not for a long while. And these people, these lives, these souls are mine. I care not how many ships, how large the fleet they brought for this excursion. They all die. Rage. All I feel when I see their guns. I know there are other feelings beneath the rage, but those do not matter. All that matters is the rage. A rage that burns hotter than the fires of their orbital bombardment. They are trying to steal what’s mine. “Let’s do this,” I whisper to myself, and yet not to myself at all. I can feel the electricity jolting and jumping through my everything. I’d kept my addiction in check, for near five decades. Even when they wished us to use, for the end of my own service, I refused. As the electricity found its way back to my spine, I took a deep breath. In, then out. It felt so damned good. A rush incomparable by any drugs I’ve tried in the last forty years. “So,” I murmur, “How are we getting up into space.” When thinking about how any conversation might go, one doesn’t actually think through the conversation like conversation. It’s more like a facsimile of a conversation, not a true conversation. It skips the boring parts, the parts that they know, the parts they already heard, and goes right to the heart of the conversation. It doesn’t necessarily work in chronological order, either, but more in order of import. That’s what speaking with my companion is like. Entire conversations in the matter of seconds, with almost no real conversation. It informs me about the small mining planet’s planetary defense cannon. Utterly useless against a proper fleet given our munitions situation, but it is capable of launching a small projectile into space. I smile. I count as a small projectile. Doing a quick, unnecessary stretch, I take a running leap off of my mansion’s balcony. Grabbing the side of one tall apartment building, fingers crushing the metallic structure, I shove off with my legs and arm up to the rooftop. I can’t help but bounce up and down a bit. The rush of it is enrapturing. Taking another deep breath, though more shallow than the last, I leap off the rooftop. Soaring towards my goal, I begin to feel the ground getting closer. Seeing a light post, I reach out and grab it. The force of my fall bends the thick metal pole, but it remains upright. My momentum spins me around the pole once, twice. On the third time, I let go, launching myself forwards at incredible speed. Anyone who looks up would see the grin across my face, glowing with pleasure. This isn't even the part I really loved. This was just one of the many fun things leading up to the best part. After hanging in the air for what somehow felt like both forever and an instant, I landed at the defense cannon, rolling through the glass of the pull doors. “Boss?” the man trying to find ammunition that could pierce a Service Bombard Fleet Hull asks the moment he sees me. I smile. “They come for me and mine. Fire me at them.” “But, boss,” the man replies in fear, “The G-Force alone. It is lethal. And that’s not even to mention the friction from the air. And what will you do once you’re up there?” I shake my head. “Trust me, child,” I tell him, trying to alleviate some apprehension, “We will be fine.” He listens to my voice, my words, my sentiment, and he grows calm. “As you say, boss,” he says with a deep bow and a gesture towards the loading apparatus for the large railgun. I climb into the chamber and get comfortable. My triggerman puts the thin casing around me, so I will be accelerated evenly, then I assume he steps back to the control panel. I hear his voice in the casing. “Ready, boss. Three. Two. One.” And then silence. And a pit in my stomach telling me I am accelerating. And a burning in my everywhere, telling me my organs are no longer thriving on blood, but purely on my companion’s work. Immensely painful. But useful, nonetheless. The next part is where stuff really gets good. The shell slams helplessly against the Flagship’s hull. I can imagine the Fleet Admiral laughing at the pathetic attempt. Too bad for him. My blood is now flooding my organs like usual, though for the time being it is lacking oxygen, meaning there is still an intense heat burning through me. But it’s not a painful heat. It’s a comforting one, like a warm embrace inside my body. Digging in one hand and my toes to keep me in place, I clench my fist and punch with all of my strength. The ship’s hull shivers beneath me. As I pull back my fist, I see that I left a dent. Not good enough. I let loose another. And another. On the fourth, there is suddenly no resistance and my entire forearm slides in. Removing it, I spin to the side as the air and the objects start rushing out. Rapid decompression is quite a problem when one is hanging onto the outside of a ship. After the rush of air, I start to pull on the edges of the hole, widening it. My arms feel like they're on fire, but that never stops me. Once it’s wide enough, I pull my feet out and slide them through, before yanking the rest of my body through the hole. Landing on the deck, I curse the evil of artificial gravity. Zero-G fights are so much more fun. They put down emergency pressure doors. Silly Service members. I look around the room. I suspect they’re using the intercom, but I can’t hear. Stupid eardrums. As I think it, so I feel them sew themselves back together. They aren’t using the intercom. That means radios. I hear static in my thoughts a couple moments, then as clear as day, I hear an old familiar voice. “Status, engineering? What caused this breach?” Fleet Admiral Ryan D’Oers. I always wanted to deal with him. Never got the chance. Until now. “Ready to use the airlock. Clearing.” I hear the door to the left open. Silly people, that is going to make my walk take so much more time. Or, I realize, I could let them report back, take half the time and wait by the escape pods. Ryan used to be a coward, hiding behind his big guns. No way he’d stay aboard. I walk over quietly to the door they just entered through, and walk right into the low-pressure hall. In my brain, I hear the team report back to their Admiral. “I’m not sure you’ll believe me, but I’m pretty sure this was made by a hand.” Silence over the radios for a moment. I just keep on walking towards the escape pod. All around me, the intercom came on. “Code Black. I repeat, Code Black. This is not a drill.” Code Black. A planetary threat. Glad the Service finally knows exactly how bad pissing us off can be. I move from my brisk walk to a jog. I need to make it to the Escape pods before Ryan. In the hallway outside the pods, I run into a fireteam of Service Marines leading the Fleet Admiral. They stop in their tracks and aim their guns at me. I wave at Ryan. “Hey there,” I greet my old irritant, “How’re you, Ryry?” “What are you doing here, Yawen?” “This planet is mine,” I scold the man, “You don’t get to destroy it.” I start casually walking towards him. The Marines open fire. Silly people using laser rifles. The ionization trails give me a couple nanoseconds to not get hit. And, in monster terms, a couple nanoseconds might as well be an eternity. My casual stroll continues, with my body seeming to blur about as I dodge and weave through the electric plasma rays. “Is that any way to treat a lady, Ryry?” I ask, as I casually redirect one of the lasers at another marine. Grabbing the electrocuted marine’s gun, I shoot the one coming at me with a knife, then the one whose gun-hand I am holding. Without so much as a look, I shoot the final Marine. “See,” I scolded the Fleet Admiral, “This is why you should be nicer.” Cowering on the ground, he shoots me. Projectile. I feel as it enters my stomach, then, rather than the usual ripping through and out, it just sort of stops, and grows warm. Very warm. As the other fireteam enters the hall, my innards leave my insides. I collapse to the ground as my systems go into overdrive. “That won’t hold her long, let’s move.” I slowly and painstakingly point both guns at where the admiral would be and with a quiet, “Not you,” I pull both triggers. The electricity surges into and through him. Unfortunately for him, that shot isn’t his only high explosive projectile round. The electricity rolls across and within his pistol, and as he collapses from the electricity, the remaining clip as a whole explodes rather gloriously. Wrecks the entrance to the escape pods. Kills the remaining fireteam, too. Unfortunately the hull is across the escape pod room, so it doesn’t decompress the ship. It collapses the floor down to the gravdrive’s shell. Not through, but to. Should still be destabilizing enough to collapse the ship in on itself, if necessary. Also not too hard to fix in atmo, if things work out. I slowly get up, the pain of my organs rebuilding themselves is nothing in comparison with the joy of killing Ryan. I decide to skip my way to the bridge. On the way, I run into no real resistance. Two squads of marines. It was so much fun, dancing around their lasers and bullets as I shot them one by one, using their own guns. This was the best part. The rush of seeing things, acting on pure adrenaline, moving faster than possible, dancing around and through hailstorms of bullets, ending the enemy. Such a glorious time. After killing plenty of bogies, I punch the bridge’s door into the bridge. “Hi,” I tell them, “You’re mine now.” The crew shrugs, mostly out of fear. The single fireteam left to defend the bridge recognizes me. Or, more specifically, recognizes that despite my intestines being visible, I’m perfectly fine and deduces that I’m a monster. “Ma’am,” the acting commander says, “What will we do.” I press the Fleet Command Relay button. The other Admirals and Captains in this fleet appear on screen. I wave to them. “Hello. Leave now and tell the Service to never come back, or you all die. The choice is yours.” Some Rear Admiral decides to get uppity. “We don’t listen to you,” he begins. I point to my new ship’s weapons officer. Understanding that I mean to make that ship no longer a ship, he fires our bombards on the large capital ship’s bridge. The Rear Admiral’s screen cuts out. “Sorry,” I tell the others, “I didn’t quite catch that.” One of the captains sighs. “You do know that if we work together, we could destroy your ship.” I shrug. “True. But we would kill about half of you. And then I would be even more grumpy than I already am, and wouldn’t give any of you a choice once I take over another ship. I like this one. It’s mine now.” “What do you mean? You’d be dead,” one of the younger captains argues. I, along with the older captains and most of the admirals, burst out laughing. The eldest captain, in charge of a beautiful little destroyer, explains, “That there’s Miss Chan. Everyone’s third least favorite Monster.” One by one, ships start jumping away. I frown. “Third?” The elder captain laughs. “Don’t feel too bad. Spitz’s too obnoxious for my taste,” he replies as all the other ships fly away, “And Quinn always makes me feel bad about myself.” “Who is your favorite, then?” I ask. The captain continues laughing heartily. His ship alone remains in orbit over the planet. “Everyone’s favorite, duh. Only one of you went out on shore leave with us measly nobodies. You probably don’t even remember me.” I look hard at him, trying to recognize his face de-aged. “Shh,” I scold my companion as it starts to try to help me, “I want to do this myself.” After a moment, I recognize him vaguely. Not the name, or rank, but the situation. “You were in the strategy meetings. You were always extremely quiet, however.” “Of course I was quiet. I was a brand new tac officer,” he replied, “Thom Phillips. Captain, now.” “Only a captain at your age?” “Never sought a promotion. The Little Engine and her crew is my family, and I don't need it to grow any by getting a bigger ship.” “Why’d you leave the tactical offices?” I question. “Same reason I’m still here. Someone who specializes in Monster Tactics isn’t super useful in a nation without monsters. And Spitz doesn’t count, he does his own tactics and the office just kinda lets him.” “So, why are you still here, then?” From off screen, someone yells, “We’re Bored!” “What Raf said,” Captain Phillips adds, “You want a destroyer to help your whole 'Independent' planet thing?” “Sure,” I say, “Let’s land and figure out how to keep the vultures away.” As we both start to descend to the surface, he replies coyly, “I always thought of them more like owls. You know, predators that only prey on things that have no threat.” “Do you call me a mouse?” I ask. “I think they thought you were, and you proved them wrong.”