TRUTH SEEKER

CHAPTER 8: UNBOUND INTERVENTION


"Disrupt now!" Farin yelled.

Cara and Aaraan responded instantly, sending the invisible waves of interference surging away from the fleeing science ship. The sensors and communications disruptions' effects could be seen almost immediately with the Imperialist strike craft suddenly swerving out of formation. Farin gave a victory cry when he saw the success of the disruption.

Having flown fighter class strike craft before, Farin knew exactly the importance of uninterrupted communications between each fighter. Interceptors had very little firepower as compared with the other ships in the Hiigaran Navy, and they were thus quite useless unless organised in strike formations. Of course, it was almost impossible for any Hiigaran pilot to maintain his or her fighter in close formation with other strike craft at such high speed, much less maintain formation during battles with enemy strike craft. As a result, formation flying was left largely to the fighter craft's onboard computer.

The system worked by establishing a small network link with all other fighters in the same formation. Each fighter's computer would seamlessly upload its coordinate data to the other fighters' computers every millisecond. This allowed every ship in the formation to calculate the immediate locations of the other strike craft, and thus adjust the drives and thrusters accordingly to maintain proper formation.

If that vital link was taken down, formation flying would be tantamount to suicide.

The Imperialist fighters were now effectively unable to maintain their pursuit course of the Clee San. They were also blind in space now since their sensors had been temporarily scrambled by the science ship's disruption burst. Without any form of communications with the rest of the fleet, there was no way for the fighters to acquire the necessary sensor data to track the Clee San.

"Captain, the Imperialist strike craft have broken off their attack," Cara announced with relief in her voice, "Looks like the disruption was very successful."

"Thank the Maker," Farin gushed as he wiped the sweat from his eyebrows, "We'll be jumping the moment we get out of the damping field, so sit tight everyone!"

"I'll reconfigure the sensor arrays for another disruption," Ishbar said as he rushed for the door, "Chances are they'll have managed to adapt a defence against our initial disruption."

"Do what you can, but watch your step," Farin warned, "There's no telling what could happen next."

The Clee San fled on through the dust cloud, disappearing quickly from the Imperialist fighters' view. They only had a few more seconds before Imperialist communications and sensors were restored, so time was of the essence here.

"Sensors picking up a massive energy signature up ahead," Cara noted, "Power readings are off the scale!"

"It's definitely a Bentusi tradeship," Farin commented in relief, "Hail them."

"Sir, there's an increasing amount of quantum energy," Cara added, "I think they're going to jump!"

"NO WAY!" Farin yelled in dismay.

They had come here with the purpose of performing a deep scan on a Bentusi tradeship. Not only had they not managed to find one, but they also managed to listen in on an Imperialist-Raider communication that had gotten them exposed. And now that they had finally found a tradeship, it was coincidentally undergoing hyperspace procedures.

"Talk about rotten luck," Farin muttered.

"The energy signature's gone Captain," Cara updated with a sigh, "The tradeship's jumped to hyperspace. I'm also picking up additional hostile contacts from the rear."

"They're resuming the chase," Farin growled, "Let's hope the same trick works twice."

"Captain, this is Ishbar," the intercom crackled, "I've reconfigured the sensors array to disrupt on a different frequency."

"Good work Ishbar," Farin praised as he gripped the flight controls more tightly, willing the frigate to go faster, "Cara, Aaraan, prepare a second disruption."

Both of them nodded as they went about making preparations to disrupt Imperialist sensors and communications once more. Hopefully the Imperials would be affected by the recalibrated disruption.

"Disrupt simultaneously when ready," Farin ordered as he banked the Clee San sharply to the right so as to dive the frigate into a denser portion of the dust cloud.

Cara and Aaraan nodded, sending the waves of disruption at the Imperialist fleet once more. The effect was minimal this time, with only a third of the fighters falling out of formation. The rest of the swarm continued on towards their position with minimal trouble.

"Sensor and communications disruptions are losing their effectiveness," Cara reported, "The Imperialist fighters will come within firing range in fifteen seconds."

"Brace for impact," Farin replied as he flew the science frigate deeper and deeper into the dust cloud. There was so much dust in the region that visibility was getting reduced to just a little over a half kilometre.

Then Cara's station began warbling loudly as the Clee San began to shake wildly.

"Emergency alert! Hyperspace exit detected!" Cara cried in alarm, "It's right in front of us!"

"Evading!" Farin yelled as he yanked the controls with all his might. The ship responded by swerving downwards, diving away from the massive quantum waveform shimmering and receding through the dust.

"I don't believe this – the Imperialist carrier has jumped in!" Cara spoke in a resigned voice, "There's no way we can get out of the damping field now."

"I guess this is it," Farin uttered as he felt the ship shake under the attack of the carrier's point defence guns. He flipped open a panel and raised his hand over the self-destruct controls. It would be far too dangerous to leave so much Hiigaran technology in Imperialist hands.

"Wait, sensors are picking up another hyperspace signature," Cara reported as he station began beeping uncontrollably once more, "It'sthe Bentusi tradeship!"

Farin didn't reply, for he was unable to adapt to this sudden reversal of fortunes. All he could do was look at the main viewscreen and watch the massive tradeship emerge from hyperspace behind the carrier. Wasting no time, he quickly steered the Clee San into an intercept course with the tradeship.

"We have come to aid this Hiigaran vessel," the Bentusi announced in their collective voice, "Any attempts to attack this Hiigaran ship or ours will be met with severe retaliation."

Apparently the words of the Bentusi fell on deaf ears, for the Imperialists responded by vectoring their assault ships towards the tradeship. From behind the Imperialist forces came the Turanic Raider strike craft and ion array frigates, which moved quickly to intercept both the Clee San and the tradeship.

"There is yet time for repentance," the Bentusi spoke again, "Call off your attack or we will be forced to retaliate."

Once again, their words were ignored. In an act of defiance, a trio of Imperialist ion frigates came within firing range and powered up their weapons, sending blue beams of ionic energy scorching into the outer hull of the tradeship.

Farin powered down the Clee San's main drives, having manoeuvred into a safe spot behind the tradeship. He tried not to think about what the Unbound would do to the attacking Imperialists and pirates.

"Only the fools would attack the Unbound. The Bentusi regret these consequences..." the voice announced once more in a somewhat apologetic tone.

Ishbar returned to the bridge just in time to see the tradeship power up all three of its rapid fire ion cannons. The bright yellow beams of pure ionic energy slammed into one of the attacking ion frigates, tearing it apart in a matter of seconds.

"Holy Sajuuk..." Ishbar uttered at the awesome sight.

"People, sensors are picking up additional ships launching from the tradeship!" Cara gasped, "They're Acolytes of some sort, but..."

Cara fell silent, as did the rest of the bridge, when the Bentusi fighters dashed towards an Imperialist missile destroyer. Everyone was stunned beyond measure when the fighters fired off dual ion beams, the energy weapons tearing mercilessly into the capital ship's hull. The missile destroyer tried to fend off the assault be firing off volley after volley of missiles, but there was really no way for it to defend itself against an entire formation of no less than a dozen ion fighters, each firing ion beams comparable in strength to those of a standard ion frigate.

Even as the missile destroyer was being ripped to shreds, another two ion fighter formations had descended on another flank of assault frigates. The frigates began exploding in a fireworks display as they succumbed to the intense ionic attack. Meanwhile, the tradeship had finished off the frigate wing attacking it and was now unleashing all three of its ion cannons on the flaming Imperialist carrier.

More and more Imperialist ships were vectored into the assault – a desperate attempt to wrench victory from total defeat. The Turanic Raiders were wiser, choosing to retreat as quickly as they could from the slaughter in space.

The Clee San shuddered slightly as it was buffeted by the shockwave of the exploding carrier. Now that the carrier was gone, the hyperspace damping field had been lifted, allowing the frigate the gift of hyperspace once more. Farin was envious of the Bentusi tradeship, having seen it jump casually in and out of the damping field as if it wasn't there.

The tattered Imperialist fleet was fighting for its life now, with barely fifteen frigates and a few super capital warships against the tradeship and its complement of thirty-six ion fighters. The Qwaar Jet class cruiser went forward in an attempt to draw fire away from the rest of the fleet, but it was vaporised in less than a minute by the combined firepower of both the tradeship and the ion fighters.

When the Bentusi fleet finally powered down its weapons, there was nothing left of the Imperialist fleet. A field of shredded wreckage now floated before the tradeship, which had suffered nothing more than a few ionic scorches to its outer hull armour.

"Hiigaran vessel, we understand your intentions for seeking us out," the tradeship spoke as it began retrieving its barely damaged fighters, "We must warn you that any attempt to scan our vessels will be met with hostile action."

Farin shivered slightly, relieved that they had not performed a deep scan of the Bentusi tradeship. Had they done so, the "hostile action" in retaliation would have been just as spectacular as the one experienced by the Imperialists.

"We must also ask you to remain silent about the battle that took place here," the tradeship continued, "For we are a pacifistic people and conflict is not our way."

"Pacifistic? With all those overpowered ion weaponry at their disposal? You bet," Cara muttered softly as she rolled her eyes in sceptical belief.

"It is dangerous for a lone unarmed frigate like yours to be wandering this far from Hiigaran space. We must ask you to leave immediately for your own safety. Whether you heed this warning is entirely up to you. Farewell."

With that, the tradeship opened up its vermillion quantum wavefront and disappeared from realspace.

"Thank Sajuuk we didn't do the scan," Rea suddenly spoke up after remaining silent for much of the mission's duration.

"But what do we tell Khontala now?" Aaraan asked nervously, "He'd have our heads for defying his orders directly."

"I don't think Khontala wants a state of hostility with the Bentusi either," Farin countered, "We should just head back home and explain the situation. I'm sure he'd understand."

"With that temper of his?" Cara sighed.

"Enough discussion, I'm plotting a course for the Homeworld," Farin spoke quickly, "All hands stand by for hyperspace jump."

And the Clee San leapt to hyperspace.

The Turanic carrier watched the little frigate jump from afar. It was a new Hiigaran ship design that was packed with cutting edge Hiigaran sensor technology – certainly a valuable piece of space-faring metal.

Seconds later, the Turanic Raider fleet made the jump to hyperspace. It would retreat from the Hiigaran trade routes for now, but that frigate would certainly remain on the top of its agenda.