[A/N: Just call me "Futurama", cuz I'm back, baby.]
10
Corvin immediately shunted power back into his shields as he brought the starboard rudder pedal to the floor of the X-wing's cockpit. The latter maneuver banked him sharply back towards the Orion. The former decision probably saved his life, as verdant green laser bolts splashed against the reinforced energy wall that extended ten meters out around the ship. Corvin had kept his shields on minimal power upon leaving the shuttle bay, just enough to repel debris too small for his lasers that could otherwise damage his fighter. Date shrieked a warning that half of the TIE fighters were positioning themselves to cut off his escape back to the safety of the shuttle bay, while the other two were ready to give chase.
They wanna play that game? Fine by me. I have a starship to back me up, they're stranded here with no support. Corvin kept his full weight on the rudder pedal, continuing the turn he had sent the X-wing into.
"Date, kill main engines. Let us spin to face the pursuing eyeballs." The familiar hum of his engines died, leaving his fighter spinning freely in space, carried only by the frictionless environment of space. As the first TIE filled his canopy, he squeezed the trigger on his flight stick, spraying scarlet laser bolts across the two TIE's flight paths. The first eyeball juked down and away from the hellfire sent at them unexpectedly, but the second pilot was either less experienced or not quite as lucky as his wingman. His evasive maneuver sent his fighter into a chunk of space debris, crumpling his unshielded starboard solar panel into a mangled mass of metal. The TIE fighter spun on its axis, the remaining wing and the crippled one circling the spherical cockpit, like satellites around a planet. The TIE pilot snapped off a pair of useless shots as he careened out of the battle. Corvin made a note in his head, one down.
Kicking his engines back on, he let off the starboard rudder and shifted his weight to the port pedal, as he turned his stick down to now chase the other fighter that was on his tail just seconds earlier. The TIE pilot brought him around the Luca's saucer section and back up again, unable to reliably maneuver side-to-side because of his field of vision.
Poor soul. He can only see the obstacles directly in front of him, while *I* can see just about everything around me. The wings of the TIE fighter, along with its forward-facing canopy, made peripheral vision difficult at times, as Corvin had learned flying TIEs in the simulators against his fellow pilots in training. The X-wing's canopy, however gave the pilot a clear view of everything in front, above and to his sides, and even limited view behind him. During a dogfight in open space, this was a minimal edge for the X-wing, but in the middle of this field of space junk, and given the fact that he had shields, Corvin had a distinct advantage over his adversaries.
The TIE pilot made what adjustments he could, clearly trying to get clear of the debris field and hit open space. Corvin locked on and burned him to free ions before he could get the chance, and took a second to let out the breath he didn't even realize he had been holding. The lasers slamming into his aft shields brought his attention back to the fact that he still had two enemies left, and they were looking to avenge their comrade. Swearing under his breath, Corvin adjusted his power levels to even out his shields, diverting engine power to compensate.
Speed isn't the key to victory here, and is actually probably lethal in this kriffing field. He turned the X-wing on its starboard S-foil and came around, firing his lasers unguided as the TIEs streaked past him on either side. He rolled over another ninety degrees, leaving him upside-down from his previous orientation. He dipped the nose of the X-wing down, dipping back the way he came, back underneath the remains of the Lucas, then rotating back to his original "up" position.
Visually scanning the debris field, he couldn't see the enemy fighters anywhere above him.
"Date, where'd they go?" The droid blurted an inconclusive message, and his sensors also showed no enemy fighters in the area.
Stang. "Orion, I've lost visual on those last two hostiles. You see anything?"
"Negative, Lieutenant." Variks' voice crackled on the comm. "Sensors last detected the hostile fighters on a vector bearing 72 degrees off your portside and five hundred meters above your current position."
"Could a ship that small have a cloaking device?" Lt. Paxton chimed in. Corvin scoffed lightly.
"They don't even bother to put shields on those things."
"I see. Then the most likely course of action is that they powered down their primary systems, rendering them invisible to sensors, the same as their initial ambush." Variks deduced.
Hiding. Like a pair of frightened nerfs. Which makes *me* the taopari. Corvin ran his eyes over the starship graveyard once again, and an idea came to him.
"I have a plan. Can you ready your weapons batteries? Your... your phasers?" He asked the voices on the other end of the comm, snapping his fingers as he remembered the name of the weapons outfitted on Orion.
"Powering up now." Captain Garrett said, giving the order to charge their weapons.
"Good. Set your target for the last known position of the TIEs, and wait for my go. We're gonna flush 'em out." Corvin gingerly goosed his engine power up, bringing the X-wing back up towards the area where the TIE fighters disappeared. As he kept his fighter pointed straight "up" relative to the battlefield, he also readied himself to shunt power to his repulsorlift generator.
"Orion... fire." he said. Two vermillion rays of energy lanced out from Orion's forward phaser array, striking bits of debris not much larger than the TIEs would be. Neither were actual hits on the intended targets, but it did have the desired effect: One of the TIEs broke from its cover underneath Corvin's X-wing. And that was exactly what he had been counting on.
Corvin engaged his repulsorlifts, the field churning to life from the underside of his fighter, sending a large chunk of debris rocketing at the now exposed TIE. The pilot never had a chance to take any evasive actions, and the hunk of metal slammed into the cockpit, shattering the transparisteel canopy and sending it straight out the back of the fighter. The twin ion engines exploded as the debris tore through them, engulfing the TIE in a ball of fire that quickly snuffed itself out in the vacuum of space.
Taking only a split second to celebrate the maneuver, which either worked perfectly as a result of pure luck or some other cosmic force compelling it to succeed, Corvin let the X-wing travel with the momentum the repulsors gave him, diving back down the way he had come up. As the dive evened out, he kept his eyes moving, checking to see if his one remaining opponent had also revealed himself. He didn't have to wait long for his answer. A pair of green laser bolts flashed over his cockpit as he came out of his dive, the last TIE dropping in from above and barreling down on him. Corvin broke hard to port, spiraling further downward as he tried to circle the TIE and get on its tail. To his dismay, the TIE pilot anticipated this move, and simply maintained his course, streaking past Corvin's corkscrew maneuver, and once he had enough distance between them, cut his engines and pivoted the front of ball-shaped cockpit back around to begin flying back up towards Corvin's X-wing, spraying bright green laser fire as he began to climb.
Corvin broke out of his corkscrew, and instinctively thumbed his weapon controls over to proton torpedoes, a move he quickly decided against. An X-wing usually left for a combat mission with a full load of six torpedoes, but given the fact that Corvin had been deposited alone into an unfamiliar section of space- with no support from a friendly capital ship- having already been in the heat of combat, he only had two torpedoes at his disposal. He figured he needed to make them count, and slagging a lone eyeball seemed like a gross misuse of his limited munitions.
My lasers will last as long as my power cells do. Switching back over to his lasers, he dropped his crosshairs over the TIE fighter that was now charging straight-on at him. Jousting against an enemy fighter that can easily outgun and outlast one's own ship was practically suicide, and Corvin couldn't help but pity the desperate attempt by the enemy pilot looking most likely ram him, or be vaped. Either way would earn him a quick death, but Corvin decided not to make his adversary suffer. Two pairs of lasers sliced through space and met on the center of the TIE's canopy, bubbling the transparisteel and rocking the debris around him as the fighter exploded. Corvin let out a weary sigh, and glanced down at his fuel. Less than five minutes of flight time remained in his tank.
"Cutting it a little close," he said aloud, marveling at how long he had spent in flight without realizing. "Orion, how are we looking?" he asked.
"No more hostiles on scans. Three enemy craft destroyed, with the one you disabled at the start of the engagement being tractored into Shuttle Bay Two as we speak. Nice flying, Lieutenant." Captain Garrett's voice came back.
"Three kills, one captured. Not a bad day's work. What about that shuttle of yours?"
"Once we get the hostile pilot squared away, and get you back on board, we'll get them. Come on back, Mr. Corvin. Don't want to have to tractor beam you back here a second time." The Captain remarked. "Garrett out."
"Confirmed, Orion. Preparing to dock." Corvin clicked off his comm. "Well, that could have been worse." He said to Date, glancing briefly over his shoulder to check on the orange and white droid socketed behind him. The droid warbled a reply that scrolled out on his display.
"You're right... it was almost too easy." Corvin frowned slightly as he brought the X-wing in line with the doors of Shuttle Bay One. He decided he would very much like to have a talk with the one other survivor of the dogfight once he was back on board. The landing gear made contact with the deck of the shuttle bay as his fuel indicator began flashing a red light on and off, signaling less than 1% fuel remained.