The Ghost is zigging and zagging through space, its aft weapons blazing, trying to shoot missiles down before they can catch the small ship and damage its shields.
“Shield strength down twenty percent,” Zephyr reports from her station, gripping the edges as Wil throws the Ghost into a twisting maneuver.
Wil glances over to Prathea. “Anything you can do?” He slams the controls over and twists the ship in the opposite direction, just as a missile hits the shields, shaking the ship violently.
“I’ll see what I can do!” The stout scientist jumps from her station and races to the hatch. Xan jumps up and follows her.
“Where’s the dreadnought?” Wil asks.
“Same place, it hasn’t moved,” Zephyr reports. “I’m picking up hundreds of drones—”
“Mechano-squid,” Wil interrupts.
“Hundreds of drones,” Zephyr continues, as if she hasn’t heard him, “moving around the station. Its shields are nearly gone.” She looks at her console intently. “The ship was not trying to destroy the station. Its weapons are barely half what was fired at us last time we saw it.”
“Bennie, can you tell what they’re doing?”
“Nope. We’re too far off. But—” The small hacker holds up a finger. “I can guess. That station is robust. Systems are decentralized to avoid damage from space debris or anything else. The ship is trying to take the station, but I don’t know why.”
“Okay, let’s see if we can’t slow it down,” Wil says, bringing the ship back around toward the sensor array. He can see drones of all sizes crawling around the outside of the station—pulling things apart, tapping into external systems.
“I’ve picked up the station’s crew. Looks like they’re all together in a central space, maybe a cargo hold or emergency bunker,” Zephyr reports, as the Ghost speeds closer to the station.
Wil brings the ship in close to the station, giving Maxim an easy angle to blast the small squid-like things using the Ghost’s ample weapons. The missiles still trailing the ship spin wide and hit both the drones and the station, as the Ghost corkscrews between sensor dishes and other external structures of the sensor array. A loud bang, followed by the screech of metal on metal echoes throughout the ship. “I’m sure that wasn’t important,” Wil says, pulling up and bringing the Ghost away from the platform in a wide arc. “Whatever it was.”
“Shields are recharging,” Bennie reports.
“One more pass, get ready,” Wil says. The Ghost swings back over the station, as far from the dreadnought as possible. The bridge of the ship shakes from a series of missile impacts.
“They won’t last long!” Bennie shouts.
Seconds later, the Ghost is roaring away from the sensor platform once again, aft weapons firing on the few remaining missiles still trailing the ship.
“Hey look!” Bennie shouts, pointing at the screen. On it, the dreadnought is hovering over the sensor platform. Hundreds of drones are swarming between them.
“Uh, yeah, we’re familiar with the dreadnought, dude,” Wil says, looking at Bennie with raised eyebrows.
“No, krebnack, there!” He points, then tuts and turns to his console. On the main display a big green circle appears over a section of the massive warship. In the middle of the circle is a square of white, where a hatch of some type is opening.
“What the hell is that?” Wil wonders aloud. He brings the ship around on a course closer to the dreadnought.
“Careful,” Maxim warns. “We know how powerful those guns are.”
On the screen, the square of white light is more prominent now. Wil leans forward, squinting. “Is that a cargo hold?”
“It’s Gabe!” Bennie shouts excitedly.
Zephyr looks across the bridge at the hacker bouncing in his seat. “That’s a bit of a reach, don’t you think?”
Bennie shakes his head. “No, I mean it’s literally Gabe. I just got another message like the first one. It says ‘rescue.’ It’s him!”
Zephyr turns to Wil. “Okay, well, we couldn’t ask for a more obvious sign.” She shrugs.
“How do we get there, though? There’s no way we can approach without being shot to pieces. Any speed that keeps us from being shot apart means we’d crash right through the back wall of the bay.” Wil jams the controls hard to one side, as two of the larger external defense drones hurl themselves towards the ship. The report of weapons fire sounds from the aft weapons array.
“Two down. A few hundred to go,” Maxim says.
“Look!” Bennie shouts.
“Dude, we saw it. Big open door, waiting for us to fly in,” Wil says, then, “Oh. You mean the fleet of ships that just arrived. That might be what we need.”
“You think?” Bennie replies.
“I might have made a call,” Zephyr says, smiling.