Chapter 21: Shipyard

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Shipyards of Jormungand. 16 December, 18:42 Standard Time

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In the now familiar twisting burst of light, the Banshee comes out of warp in the Jormungand system. Initially, nobody notices the emergence of the tiny ship, the shipyards are also a busy interstellar star-port, ships drop in and out of warp regularly. The system looms ahead of the compact Megacorp warship. The natural system itself is simple enough, a red giant burning at the center of the system. In a relatively close orbit rotates a small, terrestrial planet, baked into a hot wasteland by the near sun. Farther out is a striped jovian lacking any rings or natural moons.

However, the system's natural simplicity is overwhelmed by the man-made objects littering the beehive of activity. At least ten massive maintenance stations orbit the gas giant. Massive, ribbed spokes extend from the six-sided cores like legs on a spider. About a third of these ribbed spokes are occupied by various ships, some damaged and others just refueling.

About thirty large ships rumble through the system, an assortment from destroyers barely larger than the Banshee to capital ships as big as a super-carrier. Fortunately, the carrier jumps into warp before the lombax vessel receives any notice. Clank, sitting at his usual spot at communications, busily sorts through the plethora of signals. Finally, one is directed from the starport control to the Banshee.

"This is Traffic Control to unregistered vessel. We have approximately twenty-eight docks compatible with your ship, if you would please direct your course to the waiting area at coordinates two – three – two mark three – one – five mark zero – nine – four. While waiting for your dock number, you will be scanned by security patrols, please comply with all requests made by the customs officers, today Tak'sen interstellar ports are on yellow alert and security may board your vessel for inspection."

Angela turns her head to glance at Clank. "Ready with the virus Kanna sent us?"

Clank nods and activates the universal broadcast, transmitting a powerful computer virus on all frequencies. While the virus works, a couple of Customs courier ships approach the Banshee.

"Security to unregistered vessel, our sensors detect lombaxes aboard. Surrender and prepare to be boarded."

Ratchet flicks a switch and grasps the control joystick. "Shields and point defense up, charging all weapons."

Angela's eyes grow as she sees a ship approach them close behind. "Ratchet, a battle frigate is coming up on our tail."

"I see him. Locked on, firing a torpedo."

Small ports slide open on the rear of the Banshee's hull, reminiscent of torpedo tubes on submarines. A small light activates at the tip of the indentation, opening a miniscule hole in the shields. Then a smart torpedo blasts out of the first starboard tube directly at the frigate. In surprise, the frigate doesn't have a chance to raise its shields before the torpedo impacts.

Instead of exploding in a brilliant yellow-orange fireball, the torpedo splatters against the frigate's hull as if the projectile was made of putty. The frigate's shields activate, but too late. The torpedo begins to dissolve, to outside appearances it melts into the target's hull. Then the nanocite goes to work. Billions of microscopic robots tear at the molecular structure of the frigate's alloy hull, converting it's own armor into more nanocite. With exponential growth, what started as barely a scratch rapidly grows into a widening dent, and finally the entire frigate begins to dissolve away under the microscopic attack.

While the communications are disabled across the system thanks to the Banshee and hidden agents, the Ta'ree still notice one of their battle frigates dissolving into space dust behind the lombax vessel. Ships immediately scramble to the starport's defense. Six destroyers and at least two full squadrons of star-fighters home in on the Banshee.

Angela watches the sensors light up with red ships converging on them. "We just stirred up the hornet's nest!"

Rusko whips the Banshee around and Ratchet begins spraying the pulse-cannons at everything in front of the ship. Rusko pulls a hard right and accelerates towards the approaching pack of destroyers. The swivel-cannons thunder purple-blue fire into the destroyers as Ratchet waits for the few seconds until the computer locks on. Ablative armor plates slide open and the forward missile tubes blaze into life, sending flurries of missiles into the Ta'ree ships.

Three of the destroyers break off and approach the Banshee's port side, attempting to take advantage of a perceived weakness in fire arcs. Rusko pulls a sharp loop, turning the ship to face the three new ships. Ratchet thumbs a new trigger, and the weapon pods on the end of the Banshee's wings slide open. They start draining power and a burning cyan-white glow appears at the newly exposed emitters on the warship's wingtips. With a blast so powerful it even shakes the Banshee, the weapons fire. In Ratchet's headset, the computer blandly states, "Ion Cannons firing."

The display is anything but bland. The port beam smashes dead-on into the left-most destroyer, blitzing through its shields and nearly vaporizing the vessel. The starboard cannon's beam slices through the forward destroyer's shields, cutting a deep gouge in the small Ta'ree ship. The beam continues into the second ship, smashing through that one's shields and blasting open its engines; even continuing through that ship to dissipate into space. The core goes critical and overloads in seconds, blasting not only that ship, but the remnants of the lead destroyer.

Ratchet smiles widely, "I have got to get me one of these." Rusko whips the Banshee around with an agility that seems almost impossible for such a heavily armed ship. Pulse-cannons resume fire. Now a missile cruiser has locked onto the Banshee, it unloads a volley of thirty deadly missiles.

Rusko spins the ship towards this new threat and sends the ship into a barrel roll as he rockets towards it. Ratchet unleashes another volley of missiles just as theirs come into range. The Banshee sprays gattling laser fire at the incoming missile; four of the large, guided projectiles hit but Rusko's angles the Banshee to only take glancing blows. Ratchet's missile volley strikes the missile cruiser, but its shields take the blow without flickering.

Rusko brings the Banshee onto the missile cruiser's ventral side, since most of the ship's missile tubes are side-facing. The Ta'ree ship unleashes another volley and Ratchet responds with the Banshee's own missiles. Rusko kicks on the afterburners and begins a corkscrew towards the cruiser. Star-fighters, following the lombax ship, spit laser fire, but Rusko's evasive piloting and the self-regenerating shields prevent damage. The cruiser's missiles approach and the Banshee's laser point-defense opens fire full-force, almost a dozen flattened domes spraying laser bolts like a dragon breathing fire.

Despite Rusko's piloting, this time three missiles slam dead-on into the Banshee, cutting a chunk out of the shield strength and rocking the pocket warship. Rusko resumes the accelerated flight towards the cruiser as the Ta'ree ship continues to slowly turn towards the Megacorp-built vessel. Flares burst from the tubes and another missile volley streaks towards the lombax ship.

The Banshee shakes as the determined star-fighters following it unleash a timed volley of missiles, but the shields hold. Missiles streak through space as they curve in to smash into the Banshee's port side. Then Rusko gets an idea. He reduces the engines to high cruising speed and begins zig-zagging to evade the small fire from the star-fighters. The missiles adjust to the Banshee's reduction in speed and race to intercept.

Moments before they crash against the Banshee's weakening shields, Rusko hits the afterburners and rockets forward. Most of the missiles are unable to compensate and miss the lombax vessel, instead smashing into a few of the star-fighters following it. Eight missiles curve about, still homing in on the Banshee. Rusko begins a barrel roll and dives, giving every point-defense a shot at the missiles. All eight explode.

Finally, the compact warship is close enough to the cruiser to allow Ratchet to unleash the primary weapons. Purple-blue erupts into the missile cruiser's shields, but the ship is too powerful for the Banshee's typical weapons. Frowning, Ratchet reaches his thumbs and fires the Ion Cannons. The lights dim and pulse-guns cease fire as energy is shunted into the incredibly powerful energy weapons at the ends of the tiny warship's wings.

Throughout the lombax ship, the main lights go out entirely. Angela looks up at the now dark lighting strips, then back up to see that displays all over the bridge are shutting off. Rusko, wrestling with the controls, suddenly stops. "Cross? I just lost engines."

Angela looks at her sensor screens as they blink out. "An automatic program, it looks like all of the energy is being shunted to the weapons."

Ratchet looks at the central screen at his station as two separate crosshairs converge on one point on the Ta'ree cruiser. "I can think of two right off the top of my head." Systems blink out over the ship as the vessel sends all available power to the Ion Cannons to automatically adjust to the strength of the target.

Both of the Ion Cannons lock onto the antimatter storage of the missile cruiser. For the briefest of moments, it seems like a quiet pause spreads over the entire universe. Then the weapons unleash into the cruiser. A stream of bright, blinding, almost blue light erupts from the two weapons pods on the Banshee's wingtips, the light alone so powerful it almost seems to engulf the Banshee.

The three lombaxes on the bridge shield their eyes, even Clank squints and turns away. Power flickers back to normal and the main view screen blinks. The Ta'ree cruiser now holds one gaping hole, plasma spraying from severed conduits. Angela sweeps the sensors over the cruiser and her eyes go wide as the others notice escape pods blasting from the ship. "Rusko, get us out of here!"

The door at the rear of the bridge opens and Felix steps in just as Rusko whips the Banshee around and kicks the engines to maximum. Felix crashes into the doorway and grabs on to steady himself as they flee from the cruiser, already firing another missile volley at them. A few seconds tick down as other ships race away from the missile cruiser before the Ta'ree vessel's damaged antimatter storage fails. Antimatter floods into the ship, engulfing it in another huge explosion, this time fully blowing the ship into two huge halves and sending debris everywhere.

Now Felix, still hanging onto both sides of the doorway, shouts, "What the hell are you guys doing? You just about blew every capacitor in the ship with whatever stunt you pulled a few seconds ago!"

"Ratchet just used the Ion Cannons to take out a capital ship." Rusko slows down and is about to turn the Banshee around to look for more Ta'ree ships when his ship shudders from enemy fire. That was easy. He spins around to see the destroyers firing missiles at long distance, possibly hoping to stand outside Ion Cannon range. "Hey, Ratchet."

"I got it." The computer rapidly beeps as it locks on. Ratchet engages the missiles and the ablative plates slide open again to unleash another volley of missiles. All of the missiles converge on one destroyer, knocking out its shields and blowing it apart, sending pieces of its raritanium interior flying. Rusko whips the ship around and Felix crashes into the wall again. He gives up on trying to hold on in the doorway and retreats to the engines.

Rusko continues flying the Banshee through the now relatively lightly defended starport, Ratchet spraying pulse-cannon fire at star-fighters. As Rusko weaves around a ribbed spoke of one of the docking stations, he asks Angela, "Hey, are those stations shielded?"

"No."

Ratchet flips a switch and the rear sensors target the station they just flew past. He unleashes a pair of torpedoes, which smash into two separate ribs. With frightening speed, the nanocite begins consuming the station.

Ratchet looks back at the central displays to see that there are almost no active Ta'ree ships left in the system, after the missile cruiser exploded an evacuation signal was sent. Angela answers the question before he can even ask it, "The Ta'ree are retreating."

Rusko brings up another station on Ratchet's targeting screen. Clank, since there are no communications signals beaming across the system, joins Angela at sensors. "Ratchet, before you fire on that station, there is an undamaged bulk freighter docked there. It appears that the station's escape pods have been jettisoned."

"Let's capture it."

Ratchet and Rusko are so surprised by Angela's suggestion that they both turn around in their swiveling chairs to stare at her. Angela rolls her eyes. "Does anybody remember how badly things went the last time we tried to infiltrate a processing center? We need to use a less brute way to get into it. Has anybody ever read Greek mythology?"

Ratchet and Rusko simultaneously shake their heads and Angela sighs. However, Clank understands what she is planning. "We will steal their ship, hide the Banshee inside, and use their own ship to infiltrate their facility undetected. According the files my self in the computer transmitted, the Ta'ree have life-sensors that can differentiate lombaxes from humans, but they regularly have lombaxes fill lower-level positions."

Angela nods. "There were some Ta'ree ships left, but they fled the system. They might bring reinforcements, so we'll have to work quickly. Let's board that station so Clank can hack the mainframe and find those new coordinates."