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Steady hands on the stick.
The flashing lights of a thousand roaring engines twirling in the black between stars.
Twenty five meters of gunmetal skin and mechanical organ. Pride.
Blazing engines walking It through the lethal prom, a practised danger.
Pilots and machines performing to their best, and ultimately, they would all eventually slip.
Depleted uranium whipping by Its right flank. It stoked the engines, constant acceleration bringing It to a wheezing run.
[ ONE : 46rot : 80ver : 180s rel ]
( ID : Horizontal rotation from the nose of the ship : Vertical version of latter : distance in seconds )
It watched as a beam of lilac heat lingered in front of it’s vision, the afterimage did little to obscure Its entry to the stage, It let other eyes take the place of those blinded.
Another carbon-dioxide laser lit up the empty war front, heat washing over Its rear fuselage only shaving millimetres off the plating.
[ ONE : 0rot : 20ver : 60s rel ]
80 rounds vanished from the hold, lancing through space with clinical discipline.
It wove, banking hard again, spiralling through the twin trail of RGMs. Two eyes on the path ahead. Four rapidly twitching between the displays and warnings. The third, the resonant, watching Its handiwork remaining behind.
( RGM : Resonance Guided Missile )
Behind, It watched as metal shredded, another leech splattered against the orchestra.
Two blazing dots ahead, It let the Nation fighter start its erratic shake, doing all it could to avoid the Empress’s hounds.
[ TWO: 0rot : 0ver : 20s rel ]
The roar of the cannon shook the meat inside It, gratifying all the same.
The shots were indistinguishable in the absolute dark, but like an arcade game, they neatly tracked down the rebel’s structure.
National metal and slag showered ahead, satisfaction crawling into Its dance. The afterimage finally fading, It calmly pulled the stick backwards to avoid the net of alloy ahead.
It jerked up, nosing towards Its beleaguered Wingman- trusting the RGM on the rail to sail true.
Stress started to itch at Its whisper, splitting Its mind between the heating missile and Its own body.
The frame rattled, yawing sideways briefly as the departing missile applied its thrust to the right wing.
Divided attention ached, like cold starting a generator without warming it first, like cutting a workout short without winding down.
No radar emissions to foretell the warhead’s approach, or at least, not enough for their RWR to notice with such little time between departure and impact.
The Nation hull galloping after Its Wingman broke like a model toy dropped down a staircase, wings folding and snapping at the jaws of Its munition as the explosion applied chaotically random forces across the already present acceleration.
Returning to Its fullness, fog lingering still.
[ THREE : 190rot : 0ver : 46s rel ]
The stick clicked angrily as it was forced all the way to the side, the groan of Its body became louder.
Harmony slipped from Its Her awareness, from Its Her grip.
She gasped, Her blood was heavy in Her veins. Her head was being crushed into the side of the seat’s head nest. Oxygen was forced down Her throat, but it still left Her biting and drowning at the tube half down her mouth.
The RWR screeched a shrill warning.
( RWR : Radar Warning Receiver )
She was mildly aware of Her rebellious lungs speaking despite the desperate need for air, despite the forces of Her erratic manoeuvre trying to press Her ribs together.
“Empress, in all- that is-”
She jerked the stick to the left now, a brief second of alleviation, a single gasp of breath.
Her head slammed into the other side of the head nest, Her hands began to shake as adrenaline pumped. Her head hurt from entirely different strains.
Distant pain trickled down the fuselage, accompanied by the rattle of lose panelling.
Her Wingman was clearly taking their sweet time.
“-that is- all that is here, and all those who s-serve-”
She forced the nose up, the groan of forces being counteracted by the blaze of engines behind Her felt even worse than the crushed feeling in Her chest.
“serve-, find grace for us- us who- traverse the hypocenter of war.”
She dared open her third eye, glancing behind Her in the hailstorm of roaring song. There was still only one on Her tail, it wasn’t a resonant pilot. She thanked the empress even as Her prior prayer concluded.
“Find- the strip empty for us, and- fuck-”
The RWR didn’t need to deafen Her, She was watching the missile leap from the rail.
The trickle of oxydant running down Her face felt cold, compared to the aching burn in her neck, to the inescapable chaffing heat in Her gloves.
There wasn’t a chance that She could evade this, just hope.
“Empresssaveme.”
One last effort, She nosed down, as hard as the limited angle of Her engine cones would let the fighter change Its momentum.
The RWR’s shrill pitch droned in her ringing ears, like she stood behind herself instead of hearing it firsthand.
Her view slowly filled with red.
It wasn’t all that slow- actually.
‘This sucks.’
----------------------------------------------------------
Six blinking lights assaulted It.
The meat stirred, opening each eye in succession, blearily greeting the six probing beams tapping at the canopy ‘glass’.
It She let go, bile threatening Her modesty at the sensation of becoming a Her again.
Blinking Her main two eyes, She shivered.
A group of spacers, Humans by the look of it, Imperial red EVA suits. Relief.
They were each pointing a light at one of Her eyes, flicking them off as she raised Her head to avoid the uncomfortable light.
By muscle memory She flicked her radio and starter battery on. The main generator display was a worrying splotch of grey LEDs and unpowered CRTs.
“Zero-Zero-Three, What are you flying?”
Familiar questions, easy answers. Her throat was hoarse, the oxygen tube was floating beside Her cheek.
“… Me.”
“Three, Who is your sovereign?”
“The Empress. None other.”
“Three, What is your hold?”
She blinked, headache strengthening.
“… euh- uh- Hanger two?”
A brief second of silence.
“Three, Two out of three, not horrible. The bird fly?”
“Don’t think so, mains aren’t reading anything positive.”
“Radiation?”
“The usual, roughly twenty one milli-sieverts?”
“… Like- per hour?”
“… I don’t know, that’s what the panel says.”
A couple mumbles over the static filled channel.
“Just haul the thing in.”
----------------------------------------------------------
003 had fallen asleep around the time that a small tug craft had waddled through space to fish her vessel up, it was hard to stay awake with the cool blues and trailing greens of Vineta appreciable from Her vantage.
She woke to the sound of her canopy unsealing and being tossed to the mat below.
She cracked an eye open, standing on the nose was one of the flight crew grinning down at her.
“Zero-Zero-Three,you’ve made good on the name!”
“… mh?”
“No assists, no deaths, three kills.”
“… isn’t it K-D-A? Zero three zero?”
The man shrugged, dropping into the cockpit to start unbuckling her from the chair. Almost stepping on her feet.
“Eh, who cares. You doing alright? you I mean.”
“Yeah, I think.”
“How encouraging. You sure you’re- y’know, singular?”
He undid the last strap, turning to gently peel her fingers from the flight stick, pressing the safety lid back over the trigger.
“Yes- I disarmed it already.”
“You never know. You’re still doing the creepy thing, looking at me with all six of your eyes.”
“Sorry.”
She raised her hand from where it had limply fallen to the arm rest, clumsily trying to tug the radio piece from where it had tangled in her hair.
“Stop that, you know, they do pay me to get you out of this thing.”
“Thank you.”
“… You make sarcasm impossible.”
He reached over, tugging at the offending piece of priceless machinery. She winces, but thanks him regardless.
“Thanks.”
“Oh yeah, they wanted me to ask you if you ‘felt like you had any blood clots’?”
“… Wouldn’t I be dead if I had one all the way out there…?”
“Yep.”
“… Did we win?”
“Think so, no Nation ships managed to drop anything down to Vineta.”
He grinned at her half-committed, two-handed, silent, cheer.
“’You want to paint the score on the fuselage or shall I.”
“My ship, my fun.”
“Whatever you say.”
“… Thanks, Martin.”
“Course, Three.”
She extended a hand to him, letting him hoist her up to her feet.