Episode 137, Conflicts of another name
22 Dec 2024Ryuko Ntsikana
Conflicts of another name
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The pilot grips the controls tightly, as their vision grays temporarily from the hard maneuvers. With each attempt—sharp rolls, sudden boosts, cutting the throttle to force an overshoot—fails. The Cobra Mk V remained in position, every adjustment precise and deliberate.
"This isn't right," they think, glancing up and back through their cockpit glass, at the Cobra’s nose wobbles slightly, adjusting their trajectory to maintain its position. A cold feeling creeps through his body as warning and alarms begin blaring as the caustic enzymes eat their way through the Viper’s once pristine hull and began their work on the interior of the ship. It's not raw power—it’s something else.
Another jolting impact as more enzymes spread through the dissolved openings in the Viper’s hull. Panels beginning flickering as the ship’s computer assistant voice ends its warning announcement, mid-sentence, as the enzymes eat through the connections. The internal atmosphere, from aft of the cockpit, explode outward, shredding the opening made by the caustic enzymes. Parts of the aft bulkheads begin to weaken.
His eyes widened as the control stick wrenched from his grasp. This wasn’t from another hit—something critical within the ship had failed, but he had no way knowing what it was. The flight control computerized assistant no longer responded and most of the displays now dark. The Viper’s frame shuddered, shedding pieces like leaves in a storm as the enzymes ravaged its innards.
Ryuko eased back on the throttle, watching impassively as one of the Viper’s thruster nozzles broke free, spinning away. The stricken craft twisted and slued erratically.
Tara’s voice came through the comm, soft and almost amused. “There it is.”
A flash of gray smoke lit the dark as the cockpit module separated, the escape pod boosting free. Ryuko glanced at his left-hand multi-function panel, confirming the pod’s signal. The scanners showed it intact, undamaged, and drifting safely away.
He nodded to himself. This pilot didn’t need to die—and Ryuko had no desire to kill him. The mission was simple: remove the Viper from the equation and clear the path to pirating their isolated military complex. Anything more would have been unnecessary.
“So,” Tara teased, her tone playful, “what’s the verdict? Were all our little adventures worth it?”
Ryuko frowned thoughtfully. The new weapons and modules—enzyme missiles, Guardian tech, corrosion-resistant cargo racks—had proven situational at best. Enzyme missiles were effective against unshielded ships, but limited. They worked wonders on hulls, sure, but shields? They might as well be fireworks. A corrosive effect similar to that of multi-cannon rounds could’ve made them far more versatile. For now, their niche utility left him unconvinced.
He shrugged, unwilling to commit. “The jury’s still out.”
Tara chuckled, undeterred. “Well, your honor, why not give them a trial run on the outpost’s defenses?”
The Cobra Mk V’s thrusters flared as it banked sharply into a high-G reversal, nose aligning with the distant military complex. Ryuko’s smirk returned as he powered up the weapons systems. Time to test his new toys.
***
Captain Akio stood in the doorway of the bridge wing office, his gaze fixed on the new fixtures Chief Thompson had crafted from the remnants of both Thargoid and Guardian technology. Tara had delivered the materials—bounty from their relentless raids on sites he had scarcely heard of—leaving Thompson to channel his creativity into the décor.
The desk, fashioned from the hull of a Hydra Ryuko had helped destroy with the aid of Procyon’s security forces, dominated the room. Its surface was a deep, otherworldly green, the Hydra’s plating polished to a sheen but still bearing faint battle scars. Behind it sat a Guardian urn, its eerie green glow spilling faintly over the desk’s surface. Whatever the urn had once held was long gone, lost to time and history. Now, it served a new purpose, cradling a bouquet of sweet-smelling stargazer lilies whose delicate fragrance subtly softened the room’s alien aura.
On the wall to the left of the large monitor hung the dorsal carapace of a Guardian Sentinel drone, its V-shaped structure both elegant and ominous. To the right, a corresponding piece of a Thargoid Regenerator scout balanced the display. Its glowing teal veins pulsed faintly, an unsettling contrast to the Sentinel’s lifeless but imposing presence. Together, the two relics flanked the monitor, their alien designs a testament to the strange confluence of destruction and artistry now embodied in this space.
Akio stepped further into the room, his expression unreadable as his eyes roved over the display. This was no ordinary office; it was a museum of conflict, a shrine to battles fought and won against the unknowable. Yet, somehow, it was also a place of quiet reflection, the juxtaposition of the lilies and alien artifacts a subtle nod to the balance between life and death, the familiar and the utterly foreign.
“Chief Thompson, you outdid yourself,” Akio murmured, his voice low, as though reluctant to disturb the peculiar sanctity of the room.
Thompson gave a slight nod, his gaze lingering on the desk and the artifacts adorning the walls. The war beyond the ship’s hull—the war against the aliens—was over for now. But as his eyes traced the jagged edges of the Hydra’s plating and the faint teal glow still emanating from the Thargoid fragment, a thought gnawed at him. What of the war within?