Space is endlessly vast. Earth is so small it's naught but a speck-

"Yes, you've said that already, get new material." Meia snarks from behind me.

I hadn't realized I had been thinking out loud. "But, they're right there." I point out the window to the massive fleet of enemy ships. "And how did we find them?"

Meia sighs. I guess after repeating the same conversation three times the fourth is starting to wear on her. "We flew away from the Nirvana, and happened to stumble on them."

"What are the chances of that?"

"Well, with you around..." Meia pretends to do some calculations in her head before returning to glaring at me. "One in two."

"Alright, fine." I take a deep breath of muggy, sweat-smelling air. God, I want out of this cockpit. "So, now that we've miraculously found them-"

"One. In. Two."

"MIRACULOUSLY FOUND THEM," I continue heedlessly. "It's time to put our plan into action."

"My plan." Meia says. "Your plan is suicidal."

"Your plan assumes that we can just ram anything. I don't want to smash right into the side of that flagship only to discover that it's stronger than our shield cone... thing." I point out.

"Yes, which is so much worse than voluntarily launching all of my remaining arms at ourselves, leaving me with ramming as my only option anyway."

To summarize, my plan is to disguise as many missiles as we have behind our signature and swerve at the last minute to make the missiles smash into the laser of the ship, hopefully disabling it. Meia wants to ram a hole into the side of the flagship, get inside, and start blowing it up from the inside.

I shake my head. "We need to decide quickly, before that patrol comes back around."

"Alright." Meia puts on her cold, calculating expression that's been showing up pretty sparsely recently. well, up until she caught up with me. "Who has more experience with space combat?"

"Do video games-"

"No."

"You do." I acknowledge.

"Who knows more about the enemy?"

"...Me?" I ask. "I mean, I've seen more than you have."

"Yes, but you don't pay attention to the details. We had entire meetings you didn't attend where we discussed how these robots behave and how they are constructed."

"I missed those because someone didn't tell me they were happening."

She ignores that comment. "Who knows the capabilities of my ship better?"

"You, but-"

"Three to zero, we go with my plan." Meia says with finality.

"Two to one, and I can think of more categories."

She raises an eyebrow. "Oh?"

"Yeah." I fumble around for a second. "Er, I'm older, and thus have more life experience. I have future knowledge on my side. My plan doesn't rely on the structural integrity of a bunch of energy suspended in front of us. There, 4-2."

"It's plasma." Meia corrects me. "I think."

"What happened to you know your ship better?"

"I know my Dread, not the VanDread. Common sense doesn't even apply to this thing. And two of those points don't even make sense. Age doesn't directly translate into planning skills, and we've punched through literally everything else we've tried to ram. 3-1"

"So..." I drum my fingers on the controls console in front of me. "Rock Paper Scissors?"

"Janken." Meia replies.

"Same thing."

"Different words."

I threw rock, she threw paper. I'll spare everyone the debate over why paper beats rock and accept ramming a spaceship like a man.

"J***** S********, died ramming a spaceship like a nonce." I complain. "In his will, the only thing he said was 'Nothing to crazy pilots' excluding every person close to him."

I can feel Meia tense up behind me. "...J-John?"

"Hah? Hey, you know, you were the one who told me I wasn't allowed to kill myself., so why are we doing this again?"

"No, wait a second. First, we're not going to die. THe Paksis will pull something out of it's imaginary ass if it has too, but we'll be fine. Second, what did you say?"

"I'm not giving my stuff to crazy pilots." I repeat.

"No, not that part. You said J... J something. It's a word I don't recognize."

I do a mental recall. Wait, did I say my real name? "Oh, that's just a nonsense word. Like oobleck."

"Oobleck?"

"Oobleck."

"You know what? I don't care anymore. Can we get on with the plan now?"

"I don't have control of the throttle." I remind her.


"I want to go!" Zan practically yells at Gascogne, whose eyes are narrow in the "you're being stupid" look.

I'm in my Dread, Seran and her boyfriend(?) have already gone back to their ship to prepare. Jura's getting ready, and I think Del is going to be coming along...

It looks like Zan wants to go too, but she's not a pilot, so how would that work?

"Zan, you're not a pilot." Gascogne says without the slightest shred of sympathy. "You can't fly a Dread. You'll just get yourself and our other pilots killed."

Zan holds her ground. "I want to go find John and Meia. I need to go find them. I can't stand waiting here, hoping they'll come back! And, I can fly a Dread!"

Jura steps in. "Zan, you're not proficient in piloting yet, you can't go flying off into what will probably a delicate situation. All we know right now is that Meia and John attacked us for some reason. If we show up and they start attacking again, are you confident that you can disable their ship without killing them, or even get away without causing injury on either side?"

Gascogne eyes Jura. "You've been teaching my crew to pilot?"

"No, just Zan. She expressed the desire to fight alongside, what was it, 'Everyone she loves?'"

Zan dips her head to hide her massive blush, though I still notice it.

I step forward and close enough that Gascogne and Jura notice me before speaking. "U-Um, I think we should let her come along. Zan's always helping us, and I don't think she'll do a bad job."

Jura shakes her head. "Dita, we're talking about people's lives here. We can't jeopardize or pilots or other crew just because she wants to go."

"But-"

"No buts." Gascogne clears her throat and moves her chew stick thing in her mouth. "Jura, you take DIta and Del and leave now. I'll keep Zan here until you're all clear."

"No!"

Jura turns back to me. "Dita, get ready to head out."

"Yes, Jura." I try to keep the sadness off my face, but it looks like Jura noticed.

"Hey, Zan will get her turn." Jura grimaces. "If what those... Us-Nore say is correct, we're up against something that's practically invincible. We might end up using all our reserves-"

"Don't say that!" I cry. "John will think of something, I know it!"

Jura smiles at me gently. "Yes, he will, won't he? Let's hope we can get him back quickly."


"You know, this thing took VanDread DIta's lance to the face, supercharged with... a fusion reaction, probably, and was still kicking around afterwards."

Three of the shell shaped ships fly towards us. I activate the cone shield and Meia pilots into the nearest one, blowing a hole right through it.

Currently, we're flying close enough to the flagship that I feel like I could reach out and touch it without difficulty. I mean, I'd have to leave the safety of the cockpit, which would be insane, but still, we're pretty close. It's actually working out well for us, because the robots are getting a bit smarter and not firing at each other, giving them a very narrow firing plane to try to hit us without targeting their own systems.

"Well," Meia responds. "if you have a spare gas giant about to turn into a star, now would be a good time to tell me about it."

"No, that entire scene was bullshit." I adjust the cone and Meia pierces another ship, sending it into the flagship and exploding. The flagship looks none the worse for it though.

"I agree, but it would be nice to have a giant fusion reactor on our side." Meia suddenly pulls away from the flagship, and I quickly realize why. one of the docks for the shell ships had just opened up to allow a new one through. to be able to slip through there, we're going to have to take it at a greater angle that "almost parallel."

I continue to fiddle with the cone for dear life, and Meia pilots us at the steadily closing gap between the new shell ship and the Flagship's exit port.

If this was any other ship, or even any other Dread combination, we'd be screwed.

Meia guns the throttle and we stab into the flagship, smashing up the shell ship and it's docking mechanism, creating a hole that won't close easily.

Meia smacks my shoulder with an expression that says "See? I told you it would work."

"Yeah, yeah. we made it without dying." I say, then I point out the windshield. "Let's see how long we can continue not dying."

Arrayed before is are the many enemies of Earth's fleets, as well as three new designs. Ones that look remarkably similar to to the VanDreads...


I can't fly huh? I'll get in the way?

I'm not going to accept that.

Last time I was out flying, Jura said I was almost mission ready. So, that means I can at least go out there and help. Hey, Meia and John aren't going to attack friendly pilots for real, so Jura's point doesn't even stand"

As I come to fork in the hall, I suddenly lose my direction. Wait, which way was the hangar?

I've been to the hangar a thousand times. How... how come I can't remember?

Whatever, it's probably to the left.

Down this hall.

Wait, this is wrong, but still I turn corner after corner. Not quite sure why.

I don't even realize how much of a daze I'm in until Parfet taps me on the shoulder and my surrounds come back to me.

"Hey, Zan? What are you doing in engineering?"

I have to blink what feels like a film out of my eyes. I'm in engineering, and all of the engineers are staring at me.

"Ah... ahhh, I must have taken a wrong turn." I plaster a smile on my face. "I was heading to..."

As I spoke, I happened to glance at the big pane of glass dominating the center of the room and the large entity behind it. The Paksis.

The Paksis that teleported us all halfway across the galaxy. It gave Meia, Dita, John and Jura some sort of special bond.

It's not fair, they're all pilots, have a big role in a show about them, and-

-And nothing is stopping me from joining them, is it?


The robot version of VanDread DIta crashes into the side of the interior of the Flagship. It splits apart into a thousand tiny explosions as its component robots fail to break away and save themselves in time.

"And stay down!"

I shout at the microphone, partially out of relief, and partly in frustration.

"John, above!"

Heeding Meia's warning, I move the ramming cone upwards as far as it goes, just shy of vertical. The oncoming robot spikes itself and detonates, sending us "down."

As a famous man- boy- once said, "Why are you upside down, soldier?"

Space has no cardinal directions. The only reason planets have directions is gravity, which defines down and up.

So, by down, I mean down in relation to our spaceship. This is relevant because compared with the flagship, we're upside-down.

There's something odd about the robot's programming that makes them fight as if they're stuck on a 2D plane, without the third axis that really defines space. That orientation is apparently tied to whatever object is controlling the fleet, at least for most of the drones.

Meia flipped around, and the VanDread Meia clone that up to then had been matching us move-for-move had started to lose ground. There's a definite lag between our moves and the corresponding move from the enemy. I can only conclude that the programmer saw that every other fleet in this dumb universe uses 2D maneuvers (with an occasional break from form to do something fancy, only to return to some given plane of battle) and said "Screw 3D, we can do much simpler and faster calculations if we use 2D!"

In other words, lazy programming has saved our asses, at least for the moment. It destroyed the Dita clone, so it's done at least that much.

Ironically, it's not helping us that much with the common drones. A target is a target, whether that target is upside down is irrelevant if you're firing at it. The simple drones aren't trying to follow us, but since the fancy VanDread clones are, it's still worth being upside down.

It's also screwing with Meia's head, for some reason. As such, she's suddenly relying on me to tell her where to go.

"Head over there!" I point to where a hole is opening up to allow a new shell-ship out of the hull. Why they're still launching ships outside despite us being inside the hull is anyone's guess.

Meia points the nose of the craft in that direction, but asks from behind me "We're leaving? But we're not done?"

"Yeah, we're going to try some new tricks." I set my teeth. "We're gonna take out the enemy VanDread Meia now."

"...Why does it have my name?" Meia mutters to herself.

We dash through the closing gap and suddenly, we're free enough to actually move around.

Which gives me a great view of the massive army of robots pointed at us. Still a 2D ring, but they're all pointed at us.

"I think that maybe, just maybe, that was a trap."

"No, really?" Meia snarks.

Clone Dread Meia swoops out form the same hole and vectors in on us.

Meia jams the pedal down and we launch forward fast enough to pull my face taut.

Once we're about halfway to the ring of enemies, they suddenly open fire. Meia immediately puts the ship into a twist and dodges out of the way of the convergence point. It bleeds off a little speed and puts us just outside of a collision course with the ring.

I glance back and notice that the Clone Dread Meia has stopped following our every move and has flipped back to match the orientation of all of the other enemies, but is still on our tail.

But, it means it's no longer copying us completely.

"Meia, turn us around without slowing down!" I say, just as we pass by the ring of enemies.

"But then we can't accelerate!"

"Oh, yes we can." I throw a self assured grin over my shoulder.

She throws her hands up in the air before complying.

Now, we face the Clone Dread Meia... upside down, but it's coming straight at us. In fact, it's gaining. Natural, because we've stopped accelerating away from it. Which means-

"Hey Meia, ever played chicken?"

"What?"

"Hit the gas."

"Why are we-"

I reach back and press her foot to the floor. The acceleration hits us hard once again, and suddenly the enemy ship is coming at us a lot faster.

"John, quick, raise the cone!" She hits my shoulder with her free hand. "John, cone! Hurry!"

I wait until the enemy ship is almost on top of us before quickly raising the shield cone. Meia jerks the controls away at the last second and-

Crunch

Meia and I get thrown around as the VanDread tumbles from the impact. I got thrown from my seat completely, but Meia had managed to remain in her seat and quickly sets about steadying it. One of the interior panels comes lose, cutting my shoulder on the way by. Personally, I'm just glad it missed my neck.

The enemy Dread had raised its own cone, but it hadn't survived the impact, being made of lots of smaller parts. Our ship held up fine, due to being a lot less pieces. Once again, relative simplicity saves the day.

Meia finally gets the view to stop spinning, centering the view out into space. I stand up and try to peer at the flagship behind us. It's sitting there...

"Wait, why aren't they shooting at us?" I ask.

Meia turns the VanDread to point back at the enemy.

"Ah. VanDread Jura." Meia says. "The others copied the relevant abilities as well, so it makes sense."

The entire ship is covered in a big shield. All of the enemy ships are inside that, from the flagship down to the smallest drone.

"I'm kind of surprised at how large the shield is, but Jura managed to cover a gas giant." Meia continues. "So covering this amount of space should be well within reason.

"...How are we going to take it out now?"


Four ships. Three Dreads, and one of whatever those other guys call their ships. It looks like the letter "A" with three thrusters on the back and a bulbous cockpit at the top of the ship.

Jura leads the way, then me, Dolor, and finally Del.

We're coming, Mister Alien, Meia. Hold on until then.

Del's voice comes in over the radio. "Sending you their coordinates now. Looks like they've been in roughly the same area for a while, but dodging around randomly."

"Probably heading into a firefight then." Jura concludes. "Alright, fire up your engines, and let's go retrieve our pilots."

I push the throttle to full, and I can feel the Dread thrumming underneath me. I wish Meia was here to get me there faster- Of course, if she WAS here, there wouldn't be any need to go get her and Mister Alien.

Del hails me using a different channel than the group one. I switch over.

"Hey, Dita."

"Yeah?"

"What do you think we're gonna find out there?"

"I don't know. I hope Mister Alien and Meia are alright though."

"Me too." Del says. "As long as they keep moving around, we're still good. At least, as long as they keep changing direction."

"Hmm?"

"It means they're still active and can change direction. Which means their ships still have power."

"Oh, right. Then that's good." I let go of the controls, letting myself relax slightly. I've been tense ever since Mister Alien and Meia took off, and now... well, there's nothing I can do about it, so I should just relax.

"Hey Dita, if you had to choose between John or Meia, who would you pick?" Del asks nonchalantly.

"Huh?"

"You know, if you had to pick. John said something once about how where he comes from, you're only allowed to marry one person. So, if you had to choose, who would it be?"

"T-that-" In an effort to both say "That's ridiculous!" and "Why would you ask that?" my words get stuck in my throat.

The comms stay open, though Del doesn't say anything as I attempt to de-scramble my thoughts.

"Why would I have to pick? I love them both!" I say. I can feel the blood rushing to my face as I say it, but it's the truth. "Meia's like a big sister I never had, and Mister Alien- well, I can't keep my eyes off of him, and I'm always thinking of him, and-"

"So you'd pick John." Del says ponderously. "At least, romantically."

"W-wait, don't- I love both of them!" I say, with more force. "I'm not going to pick, I'm going to live with both of them!"

"I wonder if they feel the same?" Del muses out loud. "And how about Zan? I know she's crushing hard on John, but would she be happy living with you two as well as him?"

"I... I don't know." I admit. "But I'll ask her when I we get back. I'm sure... I'm sure... I'm-"

Del continues heedless of my inability to answer. "And how about John himself? He hasn't rejected any of you, but he's also not really been grade A date material. Almost like he doesn't actually care for you thr-"

"STOP!" I cry.

Del stops.

"He's not that kind of guy! He wouldn't! He obviously cares for us, and he's going to marry all three of us when we get back to Mejare. We're going to defeat the bad aliens and live the rest of our days together!"

"Mejare isn't going to accept him. Or us, since we're pirates."

"Then we'll go and find somewhere else, but we're going to stick together!"

"That's just how you see things. What if they see something different?"

My eyes are getting blurry. "Why are you being so mean?"

Del audibly pauses. "Er... I'm sorry, Dita. I..." She sighs heavily. "I guess I'm jealous."

"But, you have a girlfriend!"

"No, I didn't actually tell anyone, but I broke up with Hannah. Well, she broke up with me. Didn't like the whole 'Pirate' thing."

"Oh, I'm so sorry! I didn't know."

"Obviously, I just told you." Del signs. "Ah, but honestly, I realize that was just a fling. We didn't really care for each other the way you care for Meia and John. Sorry for taking it out on you."

"That's okay. Hey, maybe I can help you hook up with someone else!" I clap my hands together. "Do you have your eye on anyone in the ship?"

Del snorts. "That's a rather limited pool."

"Yes, but until we get back to Mejare, we're the only humans out here." Wait, that's wrong. "Well, unless you like pale skin."

Del actually laughs. "Yeah, no thanks. Those guys are practically see through. Dolor said that they get paired at birth anyway, so it'd be fruitless to go after them."

"That would make finding someone a lot easier." I say.

"But you'd also never have a chance with 'Mister Alien.'" Del says, without the malice of earlier.

"No, I like how we do it now." I say.

Del mmhmms. "Anyway, to answer your earlier question... I actually do have my eye on someone on the ship. Too bad they won't look at me."

"But you're so pretty!"

"Thanks, but apparently that doesn't- Aw, FUCK."

"Wh-what?"

Del switches back to the main channel and I switch follow suit.

"What's our ETA?" Del asks with rising panic in her voice.

Jura responds, a touch of confusion clouding her voice. "About two hours."

Dolor speaks up. "What's the matter?"

"My beacon just went dark. It's no longer transmitting!"

"Which means..." I say out loud.

"If we don't get there soon..." Jura continues the thought.

"We may be a touch too late to find them." Dolor finishes.


So, space battles are hard to write.

Did I say more than monthly? I lied. These are hard to write nowadays, and this was always supposed to be a little pet project that blew itself waaaaaaay out of my original intention. I'm still working on it, but it's a lot slower going.

So... see you next month?