(Main Control Room, Booty Bay, The Badlands)
The recent failed raid on the Black Star Shipyards was the
talk of the station. It had been a huge raid, with over twenty ships! The fact
that the raid failed, with only twelve ships returning (and the Mercer’s Folly was apparently not worth
repairing after the beating she’d taken), was causing rumors to fly that some
of the ‘subordinate’ captains might stage a mutiny and challenge ‘Temptation’
to her title of Pirate Queen. In the week since the raiders returned, two
captains had already made a play, and their bodies were strung up just outside
the airlock, so everyone could see what happened to traitors.
Of course, the Black Star ships were also being talked
about. Those weren’t like any civvie ships they’d seen, even with merc groups.
After all, who the hell decides to put a fucking battleship gun on a ship
barely large enough to hold it, and then sends swarms of the things at people?
And the whole part where they’d been able to respond to the attack so quickly…
the whole point of the raid had been to attack after they’d had a few hours in
dock, so that the ships would be on skeleton crews after a long voyage.
“Cap’n Temptation’s gonna have her hands full with the
Wynmaer Brothers. They’ve been looking for a chance to take ‘er down since the
Cap’n stomped Ivran’s berries when she took over.”
“Well, five of the ships lost belonged to the Wynmaer clan.
They only got, what, three ships left? And the others, they were all Pagellas.
Arbane was leading their ships himself, since he was wanting a chance to grab
one of those stealth ships for himself. They’re no threat to her, now.”
“True that. But Sarkas and Fenrora just got back onto the
station. Either one of them has as many ships as Temptation. They get it in
their heads to start working together…”
“Bah! That’ll never happen. Those two hate eachother, ever
since—”
Alarms cut short the discussion, as the pirates raced to
figure out what was going on. Not being particularly well trained, and not
having heard this particular alarm before, it took a moment before one of them
realized what was going on.
“Shit, that’s the invasion alarm! You, go wake Cap’n
Temptation! We’ve got trouble!”
They could only see two of the ships at the moment. One was
an Imperial Corvette, and the other was an Imperial Carrier. But the IFF loudly
announced that they were the BSN Jubilee
and the BSN Dykhaniye Smerti.
There were twelve installations in the Badlands, not
counting Booty Bay. Ten of those decided to take this moment to explode into a
multitude of tiny pieces of shrapnel and debris. The two survivors were the
stations belonging to the Rose Dragon clan and the Crystal Fang Syndicate, both
crime families based out of Dimiya. Both crime families had warned the Pirate
Queen that she was better off not picking a fight with the Black Stars.
Temptation hadn’t listened, and had instead worked to get some support and
trade favors with the other groups in the system.
“What the bloody hell is going on?” ‘Temptation’ Savant
herself strode into the room like an angry hurricane, her eyes going to the
screens as she spoke.
“Cap’n, we’re only reading two ships, but most of the other
bases in the system went and blew up! Never seen the like before!”
“Cap’n! Tarpits just went active!”
Temptation scowled. “Raise shields! We’re under attack, you
idiots!” Her mood did not get any better when the extent of her problems became
clear. In addition to the two ships that had not bothered hiding when they came
out of warp, more ships were now dropping their cloaks…
“By all the stars…”
“There’s so many of them!”
“Stop your lollygagging, you stupid fucks! How many ships
are we facing? And get all the boys to their ships. Anything that can fight, I
want it manned and ready, now!” The crew started jumping as Temptation barked
orders, but in her mind, there was just a single thought running through her
head. What in the infinite abyss have I
stepped in?
“Shit, they’re launching fighters!”
“Well launch our own!” Temptation shook her head. If the
computer was counting right, there were eight bloody squadrons of fighters out
there… no, make that seven of fighters, and one the computer thought were
probably bombers. When her two squadrons of fighters launched, she got a good
appreciation of just how truly fucked they were. Especially when the enemy
fighters mowed through hers like they were a blowtorch through tissue paper.
By now, the pirate ships were starting to come online, and
move into a rough battle line. Almost thirty pirate ships, against what was
clearly over fifty enemies. The reality of it sunk in to the pirate captain.
This was the entire Black Star fleet. Only the superdreadnought they were
refitting wasn’t present. But why go to so much trouble when they had the
weapons to blow them away in an instant, like they’d done to all the other
stations in the system?
The bombers struck first, two missiles speeding across the
space between them and the Wolf’s Fang.
Only two missiles, but merciful god, what missiles! The first actually crashed
the Fang’s shields, and god knew what
kind of damage it had done to the systems on her baby. The second… Well, the Wolf’s Fang would never fly again. The
rear half of the ship was simply GONE. She’d be surprised if the ship had
anything except battery power right now, given the way it started spinning
slowly in space.
Then the two ‘fleets’ were in range of eachother. It was not
a battle. The only word that could describe it was ‘massacre’, but even that
didn’t seem to fit, as the Black Star ships went out of their way to try and
disable the pirates, rather than destroying them outright.
They want prisoners.
Oh hell, most of his people are slaves.
Then she saw one ship in particular on the screen, as it
made a high speed pass of one of the pirate frigates, turrets blasting away at
the larger ship. Once it passed the frigate, the pilot managed to flip the ship
on its axis, in a maneuver that had to have put the crew under some serious Gs,
even with dampeners, and unloaded particle cannons directly into the frigate’s
engines, taking them out of the fight. Sensors told her it was the BSS Starlight Raven. That bastard was here
himself!
Seeing her chance, she pointed out the Starlight Raven in the tactical plot. “All guns, all ships, fire on
that freighter! That’s the fucking owner’s ship, and he has to be on board her!
Take that ship out, and we still have a chance of living through this!”
That provided the men with some motivation. Nothing like the
prospect of imminent death to make them shut up and do their jobs. Unfortunately,
it seemed that the damn ‘armed freighter’ that was practically a smuggler’s
dream was better than her gunners, who soon had other things to occupy their
time.
“Captain! We got that big ship moving in, past the other
ships!”
Looking at the screens again, she cursed. That was a fucking
marine assault ship! “Pass the word, boys, we’re about to have company. Prepare
to repel boarders!”
At that moment, several blasts from the little gunboats
struck the station’s shields. Thirty-two battleship cannons striking the
shields, one after another. No pirate base’s shields could take that kind of
punishment for long. Soon, the shields began coming down, and ion cannons began
playing hell with station systems.
Temptation was screaming into her commlink to the engineer.
“Keep power to the guns, whatever you do! I don’t care if you have to turn off
life support! We’ll either be able to turn it back on or will be dead long
before we run out of air!”
(BSN Thunderfury,
approaching Booty Bay)
“Captain Am’Rica, the
gunboats have taken down the shields, and the cruisers and Assassins should
have the station disabled momentarily, while the Ravens are mopping up the last
of the pirate ships. Ship-board tactical teams will be doing ship-to-ship
searches for prisoners and spoils, so I want you to focus on getting the
Marines to that station.”
The Ihm female’s tail moved excitedly at the prospect of
assaulting a pirate outpost. No one liked pirates, after all. It wasn’t quite
as good as being able to shoot the Imperials, but it was still a chance she
didn’t want to pass up. “Understood, Commodore. We are targeting the enemy
weapon systems with more forceful methods than ion cannons. I expect to start
landing the Marines in ten minutes.”
“Very good, Captain.
Just take care not to destroy too much of the station. We’re here to take
prisoners and spoils in return for the attack on our people. The other stations
in the system were simply a message about the consequences of collusion with
Black Star’s enemies. The fact that there were several bounties we just cashed
in is a bonus. I want that station intact, so we can loot it, and hopefully
parade the bitch who ordered the attack across Dimiya as an example of why
attacking us is a horrible idea.”
“It will be done, Commodore.”
“Major, are your
people ready?”
“You’re asking if a group of Marines are ready to kick some
pirate ass? The answer is ‘Always’, sir!”
“Hah! Good enough.
Remember, use stunners unless there’s no alternative. I leave authority for
lethal force to your discretion. But I’d like to have prisoners to add to our
workforce, even if they don’t have any skills we can use. The coming expedition
is going to need some people to do mining work and other unpleasant jobs, after
all.”
“Can do, Commodore. The prospect of putting these assholes
to work at something suitably terrible will take the edge off not shooting to
kill, if only a little. Reports we’ve been getting say this is the same group
of pirates that’s been causing all kinds of trouble across this sector.”
“Yeah, our Assassins
have taken out several of their ships when the Ravens decide to play bait. Took
them almost a year before they learned that one of our Ravens had a good chance
of having an Assassin nearby. A few others learned that the Ravens aren’t
exactly toothless, either. Piracy’s been up all across the Confederation after
Jagloth, as you can expect. That many refugees… well, desperate people tend to
be either easy targets, or easy recruits. Either way, pirates take advantage.
We take the so-called Pirate Queen, though, and that will take the wind out of
their sails, for a while.”
“Fair enough. What are our rules of engagement on prisoners
and surrender? These are pirates, and no doubt they expect to be spaced, but
they’re cowards at heart, so there will be some who want to surrender.”
“Accept surrender when
it is offered. Anyone who gets stunned gets collared, so we don’t have to worry
about them. Anyone who surrenders can avoid the collar, so long as they behave.
Let them know that, once this is over, they will have the option of accepting a
collar, or being turned over to the Confeds for trial. Any slaves you encounter
are to be treated well, but assume that they’re going to be brainwashed to be
loyal to their captors, if they don’t have Stepfords on. When in doubt, stun
them. We can sort out who is who later on.”
Major Khan nodded. “That won’t set right with some of the
troops. I’ll let them know the score, but stunning slaves of pirates for
convenience is a crap gig.”
“Getting killed
because the person you were trying to save goes crazy when their captors tell
them to kill you so they have a chance to escape is worse. And if any of those
pirates are really nasty, they’ll use human shields or suicide bombers. Best to
just stun everything that isn’t in Black Star uniforms, just to be sure.”
“Understood. We’ll get the job done.”
Be sure to read my published works!
Frozen Soul series (Sci-Fi Supervillain story):
Frozen Soul https://www.amazon.com/dp/B071R125QT
Tales of the Void Traveler https://www.amazon.com/dp/B06ZZ52G37
Rules-Free VRMMO Life (Dark Fantasy GameLit):
Volume 1 - Tutorial https://www.amazon.com/dp/B071VPRNDB
Omnibus 1 - Volumes 1-4 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0774T354X
Into the Black (Sci-Fi GameLit):
Book I - Game Start https://www.amazon.com/dp/B071LT5WGL
Omnibus I - Books 1-4 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B077X2KR7Y
City of Champions Online (Superhero GameLit):
Issue I - Origin Stories https://www.amazon.com/dp/B075SHXQS1
Lewd Dungeon (Dungeon Core GameLit):
Book 1 - Welcome to the Apocalypse https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07BB34DHF
The Kalipshae Affair (A First Contact Short Story): https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0739V6R6T
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