Freespace: Rebellionbr br Prologuebr iLocation: Altair system, high orbit around Altair 4/ibr br "Aridus, you are ordered to power down your engines and return to base." A PVF Horus class fighter streaked at high speed across the star-speckled, black backdrop of space. Three kilometres behind it, the black and purple coloring of 2 PVF Thoth class fighters could barely be made out by Aridus, the Horus' Vasudan pilot.br "No thanks, Kinoth, I'd rather not," Aridus squaked over the ship-to-ship communication system, and then clicked it off. iOnly 4 more kilometres to the jump node, and then they'll never catch me,/i he thought to himself.br As he finished the thought, he heard the familliar click signalling that the afterburners on his fighter were once again fully charged, and he hit it. The whole ship felt as though it was going to shake itself apart, but his speed doubled. The Thoths would never catch him, and once he was out of Altair, he'd be able to find a Vasudan or Terran patrol, and, if all went well and they didn't blow him out of the sky, he would be able to defect with little trouble.br Transfering more power from his weapons to his engines, Aridus waited patiently for his afterburner to recharge again. He didn't know what he was going to do once he arrived at the other end of the node, other than flying away from it as fast as possible.br i2 klicks left./i He thought. iI'm going to make it./i He heard a click, and hit the afterburner. When the charge died out again, he saw 3 blue circles of in the harsh black of space. Something was exiting subspace. He turned on the targeting scanner, and discovered that the Hammer of Light was trying to cut him off. Three long, flat, nearly rectangular Vasudan fighters were on an intercept course with him, and they were going to get to him.br Increasing the power to his shields and weapons, Aridus could slightly sense the deceleration of his fighter. He turned his ship to face the enemy wing, his sensors automatically began to attempt to aquire a target lock. After a few seconds, he came into maximum gun range. However, he didn't fire. When he had a lock, he still didn't fire. When the ships opened fire, he increased power to his forward shields, but still did not fire. At 200 metres away, he let loose 2 terran built phoenix V missiles, and opened fire.br The energy weapon lowered his target's forward shields, and the missiles slammed into the cockpit, instantly killing the pilot. The ship spun out of control, flying towards one of its wingmen. The damaged vessel's reactor went critical a few seconds later, and the explosion took the ship's wingman with it. The other wingman, however, got away in time. Aridus had used his afterburner to escape the blast, but he took some damage. His engine was only operating at 80 percent. iThis is bnot/b going well.../i he thought to himself as he brought his ship around to take on the surviving enemy fighter. Aridus targeted the ship, turned so that the lead indicator was in the center of his heads- up-display, and began to pump high-energy cannon fire into the opposing ship's rear shielding. A few moments later, the ship's hull was critical, and the engines tore themselves out of the chassis of the Seth heavy fighter, rendering the craft useless. br Aridus turned his ship back towards the jump node, and punched the afterburner. The disabled enemy craft fired a few shots at him, but he was soon outside its range. Seconds later, the Thoths were there. Aridus maximized power to his engines again, and hurtled himself towards the area of space highlighted by his ship's heads-up-display. 1 kilometer left. 10 seconds later, he was at the node. Activating the subspace drive of his vessel, he relaxed. He was going to make it. The defector's escape took only 3 minutes.