CMDR Half-Lock of NAIN, Incorporated
19 Apr 2021User319792
She froze, her eyes wide with fear, and her breath caught in her throat for a moment. She spoke in an unemotional and paced manner."I'm sorry. Would you repeat that."
I stifled a chuckle while watching her trying to compose herself.
"I said do all the Interceptors come in bunches?"
She looked at me again, her breath still faltering.
"The second part"
"Oh, about how I'm not having trouble killing them, being able to take down four at a time pretty easily now, and about how they come in bunches of 8-10 sometimes that I actually do have trouble with?"
Her breath remained halting and stuttered. Based out here in the Pleiades with The Hive, AXI, and Operation IDA, I'd have thought she'd have been used to this kind of thing.
"Yes... that part. Where, exactly, did you say they were?"
"Specifically? They're all over the place out here, en masse. How do you not already know that? Those things are easy. It's the big one's I've been having trouble with."
She continued staring at me for a short moment before the breath spilled from her like stomach contents after a long night with Lavian Brandy. She looked away quickly and her chin slammed into neck before taking three steps toward the workstations and stopping. She turned to me and beckoned me toward one of the stations. I met her at the holo-desk. She pointed at the seat.
"Sit. Read."
I looked at her again and she took a deep breath, looking up toward the coffee shop on the second level of the pilot's lounge before walking away, mumbling some weird question about what I "think would happen if someone believed" before her voice faded into the background noise.
I sat down and started reading through some of the intelligence AXI's been releasing, checking its recommendations against the Nemesis' outfitting and any memories of my prior conflicts.
Its been rough going. For the most part, I'm having trouble making it through the second heart without losing my GGCs regardless of my hull damage, which itself rarely stays up above 75% through the second swarm. The weirdest thing happened, though, on my way back to Copernicus after taking out my first heart.
I got hyperdicted by a Medusa and a Hydra and, as always, they tried to fry my electronics with their shut-down field. I deployed my shutdown field neutralizer successfully, and scanned them with my xeno-scanner, too. After completing their own scans, though, instead of turning away and jumping, they just stayed there, at rest, side by side. I wasn't sure what was happening, but they remained about 500-600 meters out.
Not knowing what it was they were up to, I upped my thrusters to bring me closer to them and they didn't do anything other than slowly back up to bring themselves to 500-600 m. I reverse thrusted and they pulled in closer, again remaining at about 500-600 m. It was like we were doing some weird dance before I decided to see if they might try to let me come closer, but accidentally boosted into the Hydra. They immediately released Thargon swarms so I booked it out of there, but I pulled the video from my comms afterward and they should be up shortly.
I got a message from the man in the black suit, too, that I didn't bother checking until after a few more run-ins with the Thargoids. Something about him getting word on a new division, so I called him.
"Cadence, I'm making you a squadron leader. Do you remember Coral?"
"That hot mess that went on the exploration binge after making Pilot with you?"
"Yeah. She'll be heading up the NECA unit while you'll be dealing directly with me as CO of the squadron and NAIN unit."
I turned up the corners of my lips in as cartoonish a way as I could,
"Did you name it after me?"
He looked unemotionally at me before sighing, irritatedly.
"Anyway, She's probably in Cubeo somewhere trying to get her shit together, I suppose. You do realize she's a decent pilot, despite her complete inability to get her internals set-up in a way so that she can take her ships out regularly, right?
In truth, I hadn't put too much thought into it.
"I hadn't put too much thought into it."
He chuckled softly before sipping his coffee.
"It might be just the two of you for a while, so don't feel the need to change up anything you're doing, at the moment. They pulled me off the training after our tests with you and Coral."
"Were we your last two trainees?"
"Indeed you were and you're my most special of all"
I squinted and in my most babyish voice I squeaked,
"Do you mean it, truly?"
He gave me the most warm and fathering smile I'd seen from him since Hahn rescue missions
"Of course you are, Cadence. None of the other girls are so slow on the upkeep."
I looked away from the comms, realizing I should have easily anticipated that.
"I'll keep you posted on possible transfers and trainees that decide to take the gig, Cadence. Make sure you and Coral are on the same page when it comes to how to run this thing."
I was still absorbing the majesty of his burn when he continued,
"Cadence, make sure you and Coral are on the same page when it comes to how to run this thing."
I finally looked back at the comm and told him I'd be all over it like I was him and he gave me a knowing smile before cutting the comms.