The Worm Turns
30 May 2024Lambast Mercy
Previous part Favours Part 5The Thunderchild's captain met Lambast at the boarding ramp of her Silver Mamba. In way of greeting, a simple nod and polite smile was all he offered to the owner of the fleet and his employer. Maul received a slightly curious glance from the captain, but he was used to Lambast keeping odd company and quickly corrected his questioning eyes.
“The conflict is well under way madam. Destinies Jester executed a perfect ambush, and captain Hooder has done a fair job of keeping the Anansi from taking too much punishment thanks to the early warning he received”
Lambast hadn’t acknowledged the captain; she was listening as she forged ahead, dragging the man, and maul behind. The captain continued.
“Delana and Phresh managed to successfully take out the Jesters interdictor, but they had to withdraw before they could disable the interdictor on the Löwe. They lost a few ships, but Kaisla and Phresh are in supercruise, and will shortly attempt their second run”
“Good. Have any of our ships penetrated the interdiction field?” Asked Lambast still striding purposefully for the bank of lifts.
“Yes madam. The boarding party and its escort just got in, but the enemy fleet still have the numbers advantage. Our pilots are reticent to try to approach the Jester without more support.”
“Understandable. Have them withdraw until we get more birds in the sky. What about the jump solution for the other pirate carriers?”
“Cross refracting of the telemetry between ourselves and the other carrier navvy computers let us quite quickly compiled a jump solution. The Ophois has used some very interesting precharge and .. FDS cooking techniques to circumvent the usual jump time, and they will be moving shortly”
“A trick I would like to learn” said Lambast looking like she had some interest in the situation now. “Get our fleet support ships in there now. If someone ejects, I want them. Most importantly, any of our ships that go down must not leave behind a black box, or any identifiable wreckage. That is fleet supports priority. Relay that twice please. Now, I better do something myself. Have Angrey Badger moved up, would you please?”
As an afterthought she added the Badger to Mauls to-do list.
“I say Mr Montresor, could you do something about my plasma boat too? There’s a good chap. This, captain, is Mr Montresor. He already has full access to the Thunderchild, but I would be grateful if you could update his biometrics. I’m not sure the IR software will recognize him without his silly haircut. What bay is the Badger in?”
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“Its listing? Is that the Jester listing?”
Before Thade could answer Vodan, he started barking orders to the crew.
“Bout fuckin time. Blow the armor plating off the torpedo tubes and get them loaded. Reds bending over, and I’m in a giving mood”
“We still got the Löwe Vodan. At best, we’ll cripple the Jester and get fucked by the Löwe” implored Thade
Focusing on the situation screen, Vodan ignored his stand-in first officer.
“Get a wing to the ships from the Thunderchild. Looks like both Jester and Löwe don’t like the look of them. That means we love ‘um”
A steady series of beats ran along the Anansi, conspicuous against the backdrop of random strikes and explosions against her hull. Pilots flying by the raider carrier watched a line of small flashes and escaping atmosphere push thick plates off aperture along the length of the Anansi. Not all the torpedo tubes had survived the assault, but enough of them were online to worry any carrier commander. Vodan had concentrated his attacks on taking out the Jesters point defense at the cost of the Anansi. It was a risky gamble, and it didn’t look like it was going to pay off.
“Welp, at least the Jester will be just as fucked as us. Change firing pattern to avoid our torpedoes. Weapons, how many tubes we got”
“Twelve of twenty active sir, all twelve have LOS on the Jester” answered the weapons officer, careful to keep his information positive in case he got his mother threatened again.
“Good, fire once we got two in each pipe. I wanna overwhelm what's left of their point defense”
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Kai was first back into the combat zone. Watching from this distance, the fight between three carriers looked like a fireworks show. Once Phresh and the rest of their wings had joined them, the FDL moved at full speed for the Löwe.
“Putain d'enfer!” Declared Phresh as the FDLs boosted by the Anansi. “How is that thing still moving? Kai, should we change targets on the Löwe and take out their weapons?”
Kai sucked her teeth. It did look bad for the Anansi, and Lamb wouldn't get what she wanted if the Vodan guy was dead or captured by Red Jade.
“Er, nar. We better stick to our objective” said Kaisla watching a wing fly in to intercept them. “Go wide to avoid those guys, rely on your speed. Me and my boys’ll put them off chasing”
Still charging for the Löwe, Kai and her wing let loose some plasma to slow down their interceptors. The orientation let Kai watch the Anansi’s torpedoes leap the gap between the carriers and impact on the Jester. She'd seen capital ship torps in action when she was in the Federal navy, but it was weird to see them in use outside a military superpower.
Destinies Jester intercepted some of the torpedoes, but enough got through and delivered their payload with powerful effect. Bursts of orange and yellow danced along the Jester's underside, but some of the warheads sent blue lightning crawling over the Jester's hull. Electromagnetic warheads didn't do a lot of damage, but they would seriously mess with the Jesters systems until her crew managed to get everything back on-line.
Now, like the Anansi, lines of debris climbed from gashes in her hull glinting in the star-light as it trailed off, caught in the weak pull of the near-by planet. The lights of some decks could be seen flickering, while other areas of the Jester were devoid of power.
“Shit! Jump point forming, twelve o’clock” called Phresh jerking his stick.
The FDLs pealed like banana skins around the dark thundercloud of a carrier's arrival gate. The raider carrier Ophois emerged from the gate like a dragon reviling itself from a cloud of its own smoke. Retro engines fired, slowing its progress as it inserted itself neatly between the Anansi and the Löwe.
As soon as weapons were in range, the Ophois unloaded on the Löwe and hot launched its fighters.
“Start your run, we got you covered” came the voice of the Ophois captain. “Once that field is down, the fight is ours”
“Message received Ophois. Watch you're firing pattern and watch us work” replied Phresh happy to be off the chain again. “This stalemate just got fresh”