Convertible spaceships: a gardener's specialty
14 Dec 2024Alysianne
I let out a victory cry as the Basilisk’s heart finally rips apart. More of a ragged shout to be honest, but I’m too concentrated on getting Firefly out of the Thargoid’s impending EMP to pay any attention to what I’m saying. Droplets of water form on my visor as the coolant purge ends and the cockpit’s temperature reaches liveable levels again. The thin sheets of ice that had started to form on every surface quickly melt away, and a muffled thunk marks the heatsink’s ejection.
Alright, that should be far enough. I mechanically thumb the Flight Assist button to “Off” and quickly whip my Assault Ship around to face my foe again, speeding away backwards now. Just in time to watch it send its pulse wave with a deafening groan.
My cockpit shakes as the electromagnetic disruption comes over my ship. My HUD flickers… before stabilising, shining bright and steady. I let out a relieved sigh. I’m far enough from it for my systems to handle the shock. No time to rest, though - it’s not dead yet.
I zero in on the gigantic, glowing alien craft underneath me once more. Stars. Even wounded, the thing is majestic.
And terrifying.
Blinking heavily to force the bleariness out of my eyes, I focus on the distance readings. Alright, good enough. I breathe in heavily, grit my teeth and decisively press down on the boost.
My thrusters roar and, momentum suddenly cut, I’m slammed back against my seat by the Gs – though I’m used to it by now. I calmly push the engines’ throttle to 100% and launch my battered ship towards the looming Basilisk. Flight assist is flipped back on - I’m not yet at the point where I can joust it without computer assistance.
The distance separating me from the monster shrinks, and shrinks… and… now.
Trigger down. A red beam of light shoots out from over the canopy, slamming into the alien’s shield. Heat slowly drops as it’s vented into the Thargoid by my laser. I automatically follow the now familiar motions through sheer force of habit: throttle down, keep a hand on it to adjust distance, lateral thrusters to start an orbit around the beast. Let’s get this fight over with.
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A green flash signals the end of the Interceptor’s shield, leaving it exposed once more.
Unable to land a hit due to my low heat, it’s already wheeled its focus over to some poor sod in an Asp who’s called themselves “AX Pilot” - barely more than a title, if their flying is any indication. Their shield is taking the worst of the damage for now, but won’t last long – I mean, it’s an Asp. Who brings an Asp, let alone a shielded one, to a Thargoid combat zone? Fools with a death wish, apparently. That, or the most battle-hardened veterans who know exactly what they’re doing – no in-between. And our “AX Pilot” certainly isn’t of the second bunch.
Hmph. Best I can do is to get the thing trying to kill them to die first, so let’s get blasting. I launch a coolant purge and squeeze the trigger.
Staggering my shots to keep my heat from spiking too much, I batter the already damaged Thargoid with Gauss round after Gauss round. It’s confused by the hits and the small heat spikes so it turns aimlessly, dropping its focus on the battered Asp, reaching, trying to find the source of the sudden damage. Its shots fly by fruitlessly. Good. The only shocks rocking my ship are from the recoil of my own cannons.
Clunk. Heatsink ejected. Without looking, I immediately launch another purge and continue my manoeuvre. The Interceptor starts glowing, exposing its vulnerable heart, and my focus zeroes in on hitting it with every shot. Bullseye. Bullseye. Almost there!
My entire craft lurches as the alien’s blaster fire suddenly connects hard. I peel my eyes from the glowing heart and see the gigantic mutilated figure of the Thargoid. Its eerie, organic symmetry disfigured by several ripped-out “petals”, at once dishevelled and terrible… facing straight towards me. Hitting every one of its shots.
What? But I should be-
I glance at the temperature readings. 40%. Filled with dread, I look over to the ammo gauge.
I’m completely out of heatsinks. I did not launch a coolant purge: there is nothing left to purge with.
A deafening crack fills the cockpit, and I whip my gaze back in front of me - just in time to see a Thargoid blaster round land square on my canopy. It shatters under the impact. The cockpit’s air rushes into the vacuum outside, pulling me forward in my harness, and I watch as a million shards of glass are sent flying into my deadly foe.
Oh shit.
Frantically now, I get firing again, praying to every star I’ve ever heard of that the bug doesn’t land another shot on the cockpit. There won’t be the inch of reinforced bulletproof glass between me and it next time. For a few instants of pure chaos, we trade blows. Two of the galaxy’s most advanced instruments of destruction, each the size of a building, each with the firepower of a battalion… shredding each other apart. A spiral of sheer self-destructive force. My ship lurches under its shots, its final heart bursts, but I mindlessly keep pouring fire onto the beast. I need to finish it before its shield goes up.
7% hull, my Xeno-Scanner reads. Fire. 3%. The pure panic and adrenaline within me boils out in one wordless, hoarse cry. I fire again. 1%. I squeeze the trigger one last time, still screaming into my helmet.
The Basilisk has stopped firing. It drifts. Shudders.
Out of breath, my shout dies out and I sit there, panting and staring at it. A moment passes. Small green detonations start peppering its hull.
As in echo to my own battlecry, an all-encompassing wail seeps from my enemy, rising quickly in intensity until it fills my entire existence. For a moment suspended in time, every inch of me vibrates to the echoing, guttural moan of the Thargoid’s swan song.
Abruptly it cuts off, still resonating in my ears.
Oh stars, I know what comes next. In a daze, I fumble at my throttle to pull the ship into reverse - just in time. The colossal caustic explosion of the monster’s final instant reaches out, towards me, past the point in space I was at just a few seconds ago… but it slowly stops catching up. It stops altogether, and Firefly is still pulling me back. Pulling me and my exposed cockpit away from the burning cloud. I’m safe.
I fall back into my seat, breathing heavily as my senses return to my immediate surroundings. I take in the sorry state of the dashboard: sparks, heat gauge glaring red as it reads 142% and dropping, empty heatsink loaders, 7% hull.
And a gaping maw of a hole in place of my canopy.
Oh hey, the stars are pretty nice this side of the Bubble...
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An old, stray text I wrote a while ago – a year? More? –, back at the time when the war and the Titans were in the fringes of inhabited space. Although it suits itself well enough to the battlefield in the Core systems, too… Maybe Alysianne, a Federal by birth, would be better-acquainted with those stars than the concluding thought might suggest, but then again wherever you are in the Galaxy, the firmament is always a sight to behold. And here, without the intrusive presence of a canopy!
I shook the dust off of this one mostly because I didn’t know if there would come another time when it would be relevant. Who knows what might happen to the Thargoid war after Cocijo is defeated… Most of my other drafts, though, I’m still keeping to myself. They might have some use yet.
To the handful of you who read my oh so sparse logbooks a while back: you might be happy to hear I’m finally getting something of a story together, out of all the loose threads I had in mind back then! And to the others: you didn’t miss much. It was a lot of iterative attempts at finding something to write about, at finding a way of writing at all... Stray ideas, like this one.
But to all: thank you for reading all the way down. I know how tough it can be to differentiate from the chaotic flow of staggered stories that is this website’s logbook section: I’m flattered you chose to click on this one, with its weird title and oh-so-classic Thargoid-war-y first few lines. Not to mention the block of mental faff at the bottom (
Anyhow, I overstayed my welcome at the centre of your attention: back to my drafts I go. Here’s to the future, and to something new!