Chapter Text
Things could be a hell of a lot better for Dave.
Right now, the youth of twenty-one years was seated in the pilot's seat of a refurbished Kestral-Class cruiser, barely considered flyable by Federation standards. The ship was a sort of parting gift from his brother Dirk after the Rebellion's assault on the station he was previously docked at.
It was the same attack that made things so very shitty for the young captain, as he was now, most likely, the only Federation cruiser on this side of the galaxy.
To make matters worse, Dave carried blueprints and designs for the Rebellion's Flagship- The )(.I.C. Alternia . While these plans did prove that, hey, this unbeatable ship that houses our worst enemy can, in fact, be blown to high holy hell, it also painted a massive target on him, his crew, and his ship.
Crew was yet another issue. A ship like this would be most effective with at least eight men and women manning it. Dave had half of that. While Dave flew the ship and doled out orders, his best friend John Egbert ran weapons, loading missiles into the sole Leto -class Missile Launcher they had, and manually targeting their Dual Laser battery. His cousin Rose Lalonde was in charge of shields, and made sure that the plasma barrier that protected the ship stayed up and running at all times. She also monitored the general well-being of the hull from her post, and had quick access to the adjacant sensor relay if the need arose. His longtime friend and John's Couisin Jade Harley was their engineer, distributing reactor power to different systems as Dave saw fit and keeping the ship moving through stalwart engine repair.
And that didn't even cover all of the systems they had on the ship. Nobody was continuously on the sensor relay, making them prone to suprise FTL jumps and leaving them blind to whatever it was an opposing crew could be doing on their own ship. The security control room- doors, for short- was unmanned, leaving manual control of the security doors the Kestral possesed utterly useless. Their Medbay however, was manned by automatic subsystems Dirk had installed, so that was a relief to hear. Dave didn't even want to think about the three empty rooms the Kestral had that could have systems installed. (But when he did think about it, drone control, boarding, and cloaking sounded like a good idea)
But, by far the worst news of all was that of Dave's Sunglasses: He only had one pair left.
Now, for most, this would seem infinitly trivial faced with the matters at hand. Dave Strider, however, is nothing like most people. Dave always wore sunglasses, first 'ironically dumbass' triangular ones like Dirk wore, and later he took an intrest in round, aviator-esque shades that stemmed from a gift John had gotten him- something about an ancient relic of some dead actor.
Glasses were Dave's constant companion, and thus, were constantly breaking thanks to the Strider's antics. Dave had never really worried about that before, he had always had backup pairs.
Now, he had only one pair of shades.
Only one shot to save the galaxy.
And only three other people to count on to help him out.
Dave was almost certainly fucked.
And so, Dave sat in his chair, plotting a possible course through the current star system. They possesed only fifteen units of Grist, the all-purpose fuel used by Federation ships, and that wouldn't get them much past this system. Their eventual goal was the nearest Star Beacon, a device they could use to hop from Sector to Sector, and make it to Federation Space a hell of a lot quicker.
Dave slapped a button on his intercom. "This is your highly ironic Captain speaking, how goes everything aboard the F.B.S. We'refucked ?
Almost immediantly, a series of snorts and giggles came through the comm. "Dave, what the hell does F.B.S. even stand for?"
"Federation Bull-Shit, Egbert. Look around you, man, how does this thing even stay together?" The Captain responded, propping his feet on the control console.
John snorted again. "Well, as crappy as things sound over in the cockpit, the weapons bay is actually running pretty well. Jade's given me enough power to run our Leto and Dual Lasers, and that should be enough for these pirate systems for now."
Dave nodded, even though John couldn't see him. "Right. And how many missiles do we have?"
A brief pause before the gunner spoke up again. "Uh, about twelve. Why do you ask?"
"Ironic purposes."
"Whatever, man." John wasn't really angry at him, the kid forgave faster that goddamn Big J himself.
"As Ironic as your Purposes may be, Dave, I must interrupt your banter with John to deliver an update on our shields."
Dave sighed, bracing himself for big-ass words and snarky-ass horseshit. "Shoot, Lalonde."
Before John's inevitable joke on Dave's phrasing of the statement, Rose started talking. "I managed to do some, for lack of better word, fanagaling with Jade, and by fusing the fusion sensor with the layered plasma relay, I now have two deflection barriers running instead of one."
"English, please?"
A new voice cut in. "We have two shield barriers thanks to some shenannigans!"
Dave smiled. "Jade, you're the voice of reason as always. Anything about the engines you want to tell me?"
"Well, we have about fifteen Grist, one spare reactor unit, and the thrusters themselves are running fine! I'll get back to my station so we can FTL outta here."
"Sounds like a plan, Harles. All crew, prepare for the jump to FTL, T-minus pretty fucking soon."
With only minor grumbling from Rose for not following Federation procedure, the four shot off towards a nearby planet, ready to set out for the Federation Home Systems.
If only they had thought to look behind them first...