Viktor Morrsen was tired and bored. He’d joined the Leering Vipers to have a chance at some action. Flying through space, taking whatever they could, no one to stop them. But some days, it seemed to him like Captain Helena Pierce was an idiot. Today was definitely one of those days. She’d had them sitting here, in this damned asteroid field, for a fucking eternity, waiting on a goddamned Freeport smuggler. “They’ve got better shit,” she claimed. “They don’t have armies to throw after you.” Viktor didn’t care. They’d let two juicy Hadrian ships soar right by them. The second one had even looked like a payroll transport. But no. Cap didn’t care. “Hadrian could wipe the fucking floor with us,” she’d said. “We’re smarter than that,” she’d said. But the Vipers were the cream of the crop, the best flyers, killers, and bandits in town. Why they were stuck raiding some pathetic idiots smuggling secondhand gear, Morrsen didn’t understand. If nothing came out of this endeavor, he’d have words for the Cap. Or he might just take his fighter and the dropship and leave with the other disgruntled crewmates. Maybe both. But, he’d give her this one chance to do right.
Heading down to the caf, Morrsen settled in for a meal. Richard Dufort, leader of the Vipers Marine squads, was there to get drunk as well, but Morrsen knew better than sit with the curmudgeonly old man. He talked about how things were ‘back in his day’ one too many times to be charming, and had one too few stories to tell to be interesting. Sitting in the smoking area, getting high on something or other, was Apollonia Abbandonato. If the Viper’s Den was actually doing anything, she’d have to be on the bridge flying the thing. But, since they were doing absolutely jack shit, she got to chill in the caf. Not that being on the bridge would affect her smoking, as Morrsen knew she hotboxed her spacesuit pretty consistently. Honestly, Morrsen didn’t hate her company, but he had no intention of getting high right now. Instead, Morrsen went to a table in the other corner of the room with his meal of grog and bread. As he drank and ate, Wen Yaling sat down with him. She was the person who ran the other fighter, pilot and gunner, and everything else in it, like himself. And she was the most irritating and disagreeable person Morrsen had the displeasure of ever interacting with. “Viktor, buddy, how’s it hanging?” she said, eminently and sarcastically perky. Always the same smug perkiness with her.
“Wen,” Morrsen replied, “Go bother Dufort. Or get high with Abbandonato. Leave me in peace.” He took another swig.
“Viktor, why does it got to be like this?” she asked him.
Morrsen looked at the woman. “Because, you little-” he began.
Fortunately for both them, his words were cut off by the loud red alarm. “Battle Stations, Vipers. Get your asses in gear, we got a fat rat in the trap.”
Looking to the heavens with a sigh, Morrsen praises the universe, “Thank fucking god for this,” he muttered. Downing his grog and taking his bread in his jaws, he headed down to the bay. As he rushed, so did the others in the caf. High as hell, Abbandonato headed up towards the bridge. Dufort headed back towards the armory. And Wen headed down the other side of the ship, towards her fighter. Still holding his bread in his mouth, Morrsen pulled on most of his spacesuit and climbed into Fang. Setting his bread to the side, Morrsen pulled his headset on and locked his cockpit down and started his fighter’s engine. Preflight checks were for people who’ve got the time and patience to care. “Alright, this is Fang. Reporting in. Over.”
Under a minute later, Wen’s voice came in over the comms. “This is Coil reporting in, Over.”
Captain Pierce, after Wen had reported in, replied to them. “Fang. Coil. I read you. Launch on my mark. Over.”
Taking another bite of bread, Morrsen let one hand hover over the release button and the other rest on the accelerator. The doors at the bottom of the bay opened up wide, just waiting for him to fall. He took his time chewing his bread as he felt the bulk of the Den shifting. Swallowing, he chose not to take another bite. He’d be cutting it too close. He chose correctly. As he was loosening his shoulders some, Cap came in again. “Mark. Over.”
Before Cap’d started the ‘over’ of her message, Morrsen had pressed the release and pumped the accelerator to maximum. Twirling out of the bay, he could see Wen had done the same. All the crap he gave her for being a terrible person, she was a damned good dogfighter. But, in his best estimation, Morrsen was better. The ship was, in fact, a juicy smuggler, though it did have some teeth. Debris protection drones and mining turrets. “I’ll take the drones. Can you take turrets, Coil? Over,” he said to his fellow fighter as he banked away from both Wen and the Den, to take the drones on a fun adventure of destruction.
“I got you, Fang,” Wen replied, “Over.” She pulled away from the bay to get a better angle on the turrets.
See, this part of the job Morrsen reveled in. Flying the Fang, taking down defenses and engines so the dropship could put boots inside the prey and they could get the valuables before scuttling. Evading the drone’s fire was easy enough. They were designed to shoot free floating targets, not powered and maneuvering ones. It was shooting the things that required skill. See, Turrets, they were big and stationary. Easy to aim at. The drones were about the size of a child and flitted about like little birds. Combined with them darting all about, it made blowing them up quite a challenge. Like a moving shooting gallery with moving targets. Morrsen liked shooting galleries, he mused as he, too, flitted about. One by one, he picked a drone, chased it down, and destroyed it. And, soon enough, they were all just debris of their own.
Wen was just finishing off the last of the turrets, and the Den’s turrets had taken out the fat rat’s engines, when it happened. Took everyone off guard. In space above the Den’s cockpit viewport, one moment there was empty space. The next moment, out of nowhere, arrived an incredibly large ship. Clearly it was using a gravdrive, but to do that into the middle of a system where there was a battle happening was suicide. The pilot would either have to be the luckiest son of a bitch ever or precise down to the picosecond or risk total atomization. Or insane. “The fuck is that?” Morrsen asked Wen and Cap. “Over.”
“I’m not sure. Over.” Wen’s voice crackled in. Something was interfering with the signal.
Cap added her two cents to the mix. “I think we should bug. Something’s not right. Over.”
A new voice entered our secure com channel. “Leaving so soon?” an overly familiar voice asked. “You know, it is quite rude to leave your own party early. Over.” Morrsen knew in that moment that the captain of that gravdriving-into-a-battle-underway ship was definitely insane.
“Who is this?” Cap asked. Morrsen took another bite of bread, reangling Fang to get the hell out of there if anything went wrong, or if the Den started to move.
“Captain Destro, of the Freeport Obiettivita. Now which of you were so rude as to hurt our poor smuggling vessel?” he asked. When no one answered, Destro continued. “I mean, I saw you shooting the turrets,” he said. As though in the same thought, lasers shot out and Coil exploded. “But I want to know who ordered it. “Was it you, drone-shooty-guy?”
A real challenge. “Come and try me,” Morrsen said, accelerating towards the disabled prey. He hoped this battleship would be more hesitant in shooting if Fang was up against the smuggler’s hull. He was wrong. A stray accelerated rod took out Fang’s central core. Morrsen quickly locked his helmet in place and ejected, just in time to avoid the fighter’s gravdrive’s implosion.
“See, that’s what happens when you’re being rude. You get shot. Now, Captain Pierce, are you going to be rude, too?”
“Listen, Captain Destro,” Cap began, “We’re just independent operators looking for a little something to hold us over. I’m sure we can both come to an amicable resolution.” She was stalling. From his position floating in space, Morrsen watched as, silently dropping out of the open bay, the dropship slid out and activated it’s stealth drive. As Cap continued to drone on about what they could do for one another, Morrsen knew the dropship was heading for the big scary enemy ship. Once he was on board, Dufort could handle anyone that doof had to offer. Rumor was he even went toe to toe with a monster once. Didn’t matter the size of the ship, it probably didn’t have anyone that scary aboard.
Unfortunately for Dufort and the Vipers, Captain Destro knew it was heading for his ship as well. And, more than Morrsen, he knew where, somehow. “Again with the rudeness,” he said as a missile launched out from a hidden bay and caused an explosion in empty space. So much for that option. “Did you really think you could distract me, Captain Peirce, or were you secretly hoping that I’d kill those members of your crew? Multitasking is kind of a specialty for me. Fun fact, I have a soap opera from last century on in the background right now. Mandated Man-Dates. I know, I’ve seen it before, but it’s just such a fun thing to have one during a fight, you know? Like, Sometimes you Marauders can be so boring and predictable with your marauding, so I sit back and watch it again and it’s boring and predictable, like you, but unlike you guys, it has clever writing to make up for the fact that I’ve already seen it. Have you Marauders ever thought about hiring a punch-up guy to give you better dialogue? I mean, come on ‘the fuck is that?’ ‘I’m not sure’ ‘Something’s not right.’ So lame.” As he was speaking, fire was erupting out of his laser array once again, this time targeting the Den’s engines. In theory, Cap could gravdrive her way out, but unlike this Captain Destro, she was not insane.
The Viper’s Den’s turrets started a sustained barrage on the Freeport Obiettivita. Captain Destro politely waited forty seconds into the barrage to come back in, “As you can see, that does nothing. This is a warship with proper, warquality shields.” Then the sides of it opened fully and an enormous wall of missiles launched simultaneously. “This demonstration is for you, Mister Morrsen,” the insane captain said as the Viper’s Den exploded. “I know you survived the implosion. You will return to your Marauder’s base and inform them of what will happen if any Marauder crews interfere with the Freeports.” The Obiettivita attached the smuggler to itself with an arm and began to fly towards the nearby Freeport, Madidorum. Then, after a pause, as though the insane captain thought it would be rude if he had forgotten otherwise, he added, “Have a nice day.” Then, as abruptly as the dreadnought had appeared, it was gone.
Seven minutes, five of which were just talking. It had taken this Freeport warship seven minutes to completely destroy the Vipers. Floating in his spacesuit, his emergency beacon blaring for the world to see, Viktor Morrsen couldn’t help but mutter to himself, “Well, shit.” Staring off into space, he had an epiphany. Now, he hoped some crew, any crew really, stopped by. He didn’t care what kind at this point. He’d just realized that his bread was in the cockpit when the implosion happened. He didn't have any food. And he really didn’t want to starve to death after surviving whatever that just was.
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