The Matriarch's Adventures - Humble Returnings
20 Dec 2020Britarnya
Nudrim's lavender engines disturbed the rocky dust of the Moon as Commander Britarnya set down her Diamondback Explorer down on the surface of... where was she again? She barely kept track anymore. The void called out to her once more and so she answered the call by taking on missions in order to gain some standing with the Federal Navy. They didn't know Britarnya was a freelancer, nor did they need to know. All they know is she got the jobs done that these factions couldn't do themselves, and in return, she got access to new ships. Speaking of jobs...She brought up the Transactions tab of her panel and reread the mission description. Infiltrate a settlement via SRV, scan some exploration data in the middle of said settlement, bring the data back. Seemed simple enough, and it had been a bit since Britarnya had an opportunity to drive again. Britarnya had looked over her instruments again. 5 kilometers away from the settlement, with a planetary pull of 0.09g. Britarnya didn't think to get a flyover of the settlement, but how hard could it be?
"Whee! Woohoo!" yelled the female in red from her cockpit in the SRV as she roared and drifted along the surface of the moon. In the background, a pitch black Diamondback Explorer with a nameplate on the side that read "Nudrim" began its automated takeoff and flew clear of the planet's surface, the silhouette of the ship disappearing against the black of space; almost invisible, were it not for three massive thrusters letting out a violent burst of purple combustion out the rear of the vessel, pushing away from the pull of this moon, and eventually disappearing into the distance.
"Nudrim Now in Orbit." spoke a computerized female voice in Britarnya's SRV cockpit. "Warning: SRV rotation outside nominal conditions."
"I know." Brit spoke curtly as her weight was being pushed into her seat restraints, the horizon now upside down from her view. Brit tried shifting her weight around and using the thrusters, and eventually managed to get the SRV righted again. Brit turned her head behind her to look at the rock she had just collided with. "Worst. Ramp. Ever."
Being a little more careful and watching the sensors, she pushed past the red barrier that lit up her sensors. A message appeared to her above-right. "Warning: This area is off-limits. Please exit the area to avoid lethal response."
Brit's eyes read the message over and over again. "Oh. It's one of these." She swiveled her head around, looked back to her sensors... "Welp. Maximum effort." Britarnya pushed the throttle forward, the wheels of her SRV spun wildly as they skimmed across the surface of the moon towards the settlement ahead. "Warning: Citation Received: Trespassing."
"Deal with it." Brit murmured to herself, still focusing on the settlement.
Suddenly, a laser flashed across her vision from her left. A skimmer was on her tail, firing at her direction. With pips to SYS and a turn of her turret, Britarnya took aim and returned fire. "Warning: Citation Received: Assault of Skimmer."
"They shot me first!" Brit yelled in protest, the discharging of her SRV turret's ammunition accentuating the Commander's distaste for the current situation she found herself in.
Britarnya was never one for multitasking, and driving a buggy while trying to return fire was no easy task. The skimmers' lasers were expertly aimed yet absorbed by the SRV's shields as it bobbed and weaved in between rocks and buildings. The return fire from the SRV could be described as 'accuracy by volume of fire'. Brit threw all of her pips into WEP and desperately tried to avoid hitting anything while she found a safe spot. Eventually a new contact lit up on her sensors, elevated from her current position; her mission target, to her above and left. With a hard left turn of her joystick, the SRV drifted nearly 180 degrees, the back wheels spinning and kicking up moondust on the ground as Brit drove up the metal ramp, throttle to the max. She drove up the ramp, her vertical thrusters kicking in to avoid the sudden wall that appeared before her, until she landed on the top of the building.
The commander froze in place, her heart racing and pumping as she listened closely to her surroundings. The low garbling of the skimmer's engines could be heard, but no more shots rang out. Brit looked down to her sensors... they were still circling, but looks like they lost her for now. She took a deep breath, but she knew that was only half the work done. She slowly pulled her SRV up to her mission target, and took aim with her turret once more, activating her datalink scanner. She turned her head to look at the information coming in. She didn't understand any of it, but it was worth a million credits to someone.
"Warning: Unauthorized Data Breach detected. Defense Turrets online."
"Ahhhhhh fuck."
Brit didn't mess around this time. She knew she had to leave and had to leave fast. The SRV skidded into another 180 degree turn, and with throttle to the max and vertical thrusters online, the SRV flew from the top of the building, taking flight over the skimmers below. Brit gripped her control stick with white knuckles, her teeth baring as she kept the SRV level, being knocked around slightly by the renewed fire of the skimmers behind her. Try as she could, the SRV landed and went into an immediate one-eighty, stalling on the spot as the skimmers gained ground.
"Come on, come on!" Brit muttered urgently, cursing herself for never learning how to drive these things better. With a roar of the SRV's engines, Brit drove underneath the skimmers that approached her and began heading as fast as she could towards the nearest crest.
Eventually Brit found the barrier of the trespass zone she had flouted and the skimmers began their retreat. Ahead about two kilometers, Nudrim had landed once again onto the moon's surface and readied itself for SRV pickup. Brit pulled back on the throttle and looked over herself and her systems. 78% integrity left on the SRV, data secured. Brit took a breath and pulled back on the throttle, glad that the hard part was over...
"Shields offline." was the greeting that awaited Brit as she entered her ship from the SRV.
"Crap! The defense turrets!"
Britarnya tripped over herself to get to the cockpit of her Explorer, immediately spooling up vertical thrusters.
"Hull integrity compromised."
Brit watched as the thermal lasers pounded against the port side of the hull, the paint and metal peeling away, until she was forced back into her seat as Nudrim flew free of the Moon's surface. With deft precision, her landing gear went up, and her primary thrusters received a boost of power that resulted in Nudrim departing very quick from the moon in a trail of purple engine trails. As soon as she was free of the planet's gravitational pull, she entered in coordinates for the Mundii system and blasted off into Witch-space.
The commander finally relaxed in her chair. With a fresh new bounty in whatever system that was, and the required data needed, she knew that the rest was easy flying. She reached out and patted the console of the ship. "Sorry about that, girl. But you know, some ships dig scars." Britarnya chuckled.