Final Approach
Comms were quiet during the short trip to the Moon. Bill figured his teammates were mentally preparing themselves for the mission.
Bill kept his hands steady on the control yoke. While most Guardians let their Ghosts handle the flying, he much preferred to handle the piloting himself whenever possible. He eased back on the throttle, and began to run scans of their primary TZ, the old accelerator complex nicknamed The Archer's Line.
"Cee, you picking up any outside transmissions?"
The little robot whirred and hummed for a moment, then spun to face his Guardian. "Nothing that I can make any sense of. Mostly getting static from all the open channels. It seems like there's some kind of signal buried behind it, but it's too garbled to decipher. Sorry."
"It's okay, just give me the transmat zone coordinates." Bill checked his display as it pinged the Tower homing beacon in a clearing not far away. He was about to activate his Fireteam channel when alarms began to blare in his cockpit.
"Cee, what's going on?!"
"Two Fallen skiffs, closing fast on us!"
"What?! Where the hell did they come from?"
"I don't know, they bypassed our scanning field somehow!"
Bill tagged his comlink and powered up his ship's weapons. "Guys, we've got Fallen air defenses moving to intercept, get ready!"
Dak's voice filled his ear. "My scope is negative, are you sure?"
"Positive. You should be able to see them now, they're coming in, Point Three-Five. Break formation and engage."
"I see them." Kahlee's ship veered off, a thin, wedge-shaped craft designed for maneuverability, but lacked much of an offensive punch. Kahlee however, was a skilled pilot and knew how to cut through enemy defenses, making up for her fighter's shortcomings.
Dak's ship had bigger engines than both Bill and Kahlee, which gave him an edge in speed, but it was not maneuverable enough to last long in a dogfight. Thankfully, the Fallen skiffs moved like bricks as well, giving Dak a big, slow target to hit.
Bill's ship was fairly well balanced, and he was thankful he had taken the Tower shipwright's advice, and mounted missile launchers on the underside. He kicked his flight stick back, pulling his ship upward, as Arc blasts from the skiff's main guns raked across his path. With quick adjustments from Cee, the nimble craft made it through the barrage unscathed. As he came out of his loop, he saw that Kahlee was drawing plenty of fire from the lead skiff, while Dak came in from above and unleashed a swarm of tiny rockets that peppered the craft with explosions. Fires spouted from the breaches, though they were quickly snuffed out by the vacuum of space. As the lead skiff went down, Bill turned his attention to the remaining ship.
"Cee, find me a soft spot."
"There. Just behind the main gun mount. That's the fuel cell. A well-placed shot will make quite a nice boom!"
Bill waited for his targeting computer's tone to turn solid, and fired a single missile. The projectile tore through the Fallen craft and detonated, a bright orange fireball rained debris down onto the surface.
"Great shooting, guys, but I get the feeling the Fallen might be sending reinforcements."
Vera's voice came onto the comm.
"You would be right. It appears our TZ is compromised."
"What?"
"It would appear that the helium-3 plant where we are supposed to begin our reconnaissance is being heavily reinforced. The Devils must think we are there to take it back from them. Smart, even for Fallen."
"Great. Just great. What else could go wrong? Maybe we'll get lucky, and Valus Ta'aurc has decided to stop by for a visit, too!" Dak's words felt like a bad omen, but Bill shook it off.
"Calm down, don't we have a backup zone?" Kahlee tried her best to soothe her friend.
"Yeah, we'll just have to backtrack a bit, and drop in North of Archer's Line, and make our way to the h3 plant on foot. Maybe we can get the drop on the Devils. And just maybe we can find out what they're searching for. Cee, get those coordinates punched in."
Cee sent out the revised transmat coordinates, and the team moved their ships on course.