'This is nuts.'
Steven wasn't entirely sure when his world had gone mad. Maybe it was when Yurika had decided that she was going to attack the Carrier dropship rather than just decoy it. It might also have been when she had sent that outrageously haughty challenge demanding the 'trespassing' enemy dropship surrender or be destroyed. Most likely though it was when she had outlined her plan to make good on her threats.
Around him the hanger was a hive of activity as pilots and technicians went over last checks. There was still a good hour until they intercepted the Falcon Bane, 39 minutes until his wing launched. It felt good to finally have a name for their enemy, made them feel more human, more mortal. Their captain had not been amused with Yurika's challenge, his voice had dripped with fury as he delivered his caustic retort. But, he had accepted the challenge and if he was angry all the better, Yurika's plan relied upon him accepting the scenario presented to him and anger would cloud his judgement.
Bringing a ship to battle in space was not merely a case of arriving at the same point in space, you also had to arrive with a relative velocity low enough to make engagement possible. The Furious had first detected the Falcon Bane's drive plume at a distance of over 30 million km but their relative velocity had been in excess of 3 million kph. For an engagement to happen those figures had to be significantly reduced, which requires a strange form of cooperation between captains with a mutual desire to fight. In order to manage the deacceleration curve, both captains would have to make assumptions about their opponent's intentions. In the case of two fighter carrier dropships it was usually assumed that both wished to hold roughly 2,000km from each other and launch fighters. At that range their ECM would prevent their opposite numbers from locking onto them with weaponry while leaving sufficient room for their aerospace fighters to duel between them. Currently the Furious was following this script to the letter as was the Falcon Bane, both burning hard to reduce their relative velocity.
"Twenty minutes!" The Furious's chief tech shouted over the commotion, previously the senior engineering NCO on a Leopard CV Dropship he had taken to commanding the Furious' cadre of technicians like a duck to water.
"Right." Steven said to his ground crew. "Let's do this." Climbing into the cockpit he rushed through the usual pre-flight checks before starting the reactor. Confident that everything was in order he set all system to standby mode and powered down the reactor as low as he dared. As the ground crews loaded his Corsair into the catapult he set a timer on his watch for 18 minutes. Swapping thumbs up with the Catapult Chief, he braced himself for the acceleration that didn't come. Instead his aerospace fighter was eased out of the catapult tube, given the bare minimum velocity needed to clear the safe zone around the Furious' engine plumb. From his prospective his fighter accelerated past the Furious along with the first half of his wing. In reality the Furious was really deaccelerated while Steven's fighter merely carried on at the velocity it was launched at. This was the heart of Yurika's plan, it would be another 21 minutes before the Furious and Falcon Bane reached launch positions, but Steven's wave would reach the Falcon Bane in 18 minutes, hopefully before they had a chance to launch fighters.
In the mean time, it was vital to avoid detection and so Steven sat in silence as his craft sped across the distance. With the reactor on standby and radar turned off he was making no detectable emissions while the high energy ions thrown out by both the Furious and Falcon Bane's engines would interfere with the Falcon Bane's radar. He checked his watch nervously, 12 minutes until interception. The glow of the Falcon Bane's engine was clearly visible in front of him, no news from the Furious was good news, presumable the Falcon Bane was still following the script and more importantly they still believed Yurika was following that script as well. Steven could feel himself start to panic as his mind ran through all the ways this could go wrong. He forced the feeling down, forced himself to breath, to focus on routine checks in order to burn time as his target drew ever closer. 6 minutes now, soon he would be close enough for the Falcon Bane to detect him on their radar. 5 minutes, the enemy dropship was still just a pin prick of light in the distance. 4 minutes, radar warning alarms started to go off in Steven's cockpit and he nearly booted his reactor. Something made him hesitate, there was still no reaction from the Falcon Bane, their beam had cut across him, but they hadn't picked his fighters out from the interference. He licked his lips and checked his watch, 3 minutes, a series of small lights split off from the larger flare that marked the Falcon Bane and began to manoeuvre independently.
"That tears it." Steven swore as he recognised the enemy fighters for what they were and brought his reactor up to full power, the rest of his aerospace fighter's systems coming on as power was made available. His radar came on, the on-board computer rapid processing the incoming information and populating his HUD with contacts. He resisted the temptation to accelerate toward the 10 omnifighters hurtling towards him, they were already closing with a relative velocity of 30,000kph.
"Steady." He radioed to his wing as the distance shrank rapidly between them and the defending omnifighters.
"Steady." Steven watched the range ticked down, counting the seconds in his head.
"Evasive manoeuvres, now." He threw his aerospace fighter to the side, randomly hitting his thrusters to throw off his opponents aim. Missiles, lasers, ions and autocannon shells slashed past, a ER PPC blast smashing into his nose, but the damage was only superficial as he hurtled past the Omnifighters. Only now did they realise the impossible position they had been placed in. By accelerating to meet the attackers as far from their dropship as possible, they were moving too fast to effective engage and were now left far behind, desperately trying to catch up as Steven's fighters closed in on their target.
The Falcon Bane was still only a spec of light to Steven's eye, but it was the only contact left on his screen. Realising he was the main target, the dropships captain has turned to port and was trying to burn clear of his attackers. He didn't have enough space or time. Steven turned to port and flipped his fighter over on its nose, firing his engine he simultaneously decreased his closing velocity while following his target. Again, he forced himself to breath as the range shrank, with a relative velocity of 18,000kph he knew he would only have 30 seconds to make the shot, he also knew he wouldn't have time for a second. His finger hovered over the trigger as his computer made the calculations needed to engage over these distances. He waited until the targeting circle turned green, until the tone changed to the solid lock on sound, then he waited some more, waited until he was within range for both his medium and large lasers, then he fired. 4 invisible lines of light shot out, burning holes in the Falcon Bane's rear armour. Alone, he barely scratched the inches of ablative armour that covered the Falcon Bane's hull, combined with fire of the rest of the of his wing they stood a chance of doing serious damage. Fire blazed across the hull of the Falcon Bane as the first wave of Corsairs and Sparrowhawks passed behind it, the dropship's armour melting under their furious barrage.
"It's still up." Lilly shouted in dismay.
"Stay in formation." Steven ordered firmly, he wasn't watching the Falcon Bane, he was waiting for the second wave.
A minute behind the first wave, the Corsairs of the second wave had used the confusion caused by the first wave to slip past the Omnifighter screen unmolested and now homed in on the Falcon Bane. Oliver led them in close, to within 40km, spitting distance in the vastness of space, before opening fire. The concentrated barrage tore into the already weakened armour, cutting deep into the fabric of the ship. For a moment, there was nothing as the aerospace fighters hurtled past and beyond the range of the dropships defences, then a small explosion rocked Falcon Bane, followed by another, then another as the port thruster assembly ripped itself apart.
"Good hit!" Steven shouted.
"She's not destroyed. Do we go back Sven?" Lilly asked.
Steven weighted up the options. They had fuel to deaccelerate for a second pass, but the omnifighters would arrive first and this time they would be ready for them.
"No, we've mission killed her. Break for home." Steven ordered, deciding that loses he would take did not justify potentially finishing off the crippled dropship. "Dragon Leader to Furious, target is crippled, breaking contact."
"Roger that Dragon Leader. Move to rendezvous point Charlie Echo."
"Understood, Dragon out." Steven replied. His wing was already accelerating away from the tumbling Falcon, with a significant head start on the Clan omnifighters and deeper fuel tanks they had little to fear from interception. They would accelerate away until the pursuit gave up, at which point they would use their spare fuel to slow down and await pick up by the Furious.
"Hey Sven." Lilly transmitted across to his fighter as she took up position on his wing. "Switch on the open frequency for a minute. You'll want to hear this."
As he did so Steven was greeted by the outraged curses and insults of the Falcon Bane's Captain. "Cowardly dezgra scum. Ikiri, you dishonourably freebirth stravag!" A loud burst of static followed as the Furious' radio cut across the Falcon Bane's signal, creating a blanket of white noise. When it subsided Yurika's voice came through loud and clear.
"If you must try and insult me at least get the name right." She demanded firmly. "I am Captain Yurika Ikari, commanding officer of the Free Rasalhague Vessel, Furious. Remember that name, you will be hearing more of it."
