Homestar Saga

Chapter 51: Distress Call

 The Random Encounter spiraled through the void, weaving around and between streams of plasma. Yvian thrilled a little at her deft maneuvering. She forced herself to take a deep breath, relaxing her shoulders and tried to push down the thudding of her heartbeat in her ears.

"Are you sure you've got this?" Lissa asked. Her sister was understandably nervous. The two of them were no strangers to ship to ship combat, or violence in general, but this was the first time they'd engaged in a dogfight with Yvian in the pilot's seat.

Actually, Yvian remembered, there had been one other time. She'd piloted a fighter by remote during that big dustup at Milvari. She'd done pretty good, too, right up until... Yvian shook her head and tried to stop thinking unhelpful thoughts. She'd trained a lot since then.

"I've got this," Yvian assured her. So what if they were outnumbered three to one? Against more experienced pilots? With no backup and their lives on the line? Oh Crunch. Lissa knew perfectly well that Yvian was terrified. She accepted her answer anyway, Bright Lady bless her.

Yvian focused in on the enemy pirates. Three ships. Shrapnel class fighters. Shrapnels were a Brilend design. Fast, maneuverable. They only had six gun ports a piece, but they made up for it with stronger shields and the ability to fire continuously. The pirates were accelerating in reverse, keeping a distance of three kilometers while they launched an endless volley of plasma bolts. They were in a loose triangle, each ship half a kilometer or so from the others.

Yvian activated AIMASSIST, and centered her sights on one of the pirates. Fourteen High Energy Plasma Cannons thundered. Well. In her head they thundered. Sound doesn't carry in the void, and the only indication the Random Encounter gave as it fired its guns was a mild vibration. Yvian had spent her entire life in the void. In the months since she met the Captain she'd seen more of it than most of her species ever imagined, but she still felt a twinge of disappointment when cannons didn't make noise like they did on Holovision.

The enemy ship maneuvered, avoiding the bolts of plasma by a slim margin. Yvian fired again, but swiftly changed the angle of attack. She made a guess which direction the pirate would dodge. Even with AIMASSIST, it was difficult to stay on target while dodging enemy fire herself, but months of training paid off, and she was able to keep it steady. The pirate didn't move quite how she'd predicted, but the shift was close enough that some of her plasma struck against its shields.

"Kelgan, get your ass out here," a voice commanded, startling Yvian. It was one of the pirates. Lissa was monitoring their comms. "We need you on this one."

Yvian guessed the pirate was addressing the pilot of the fourth Shrapnel, which was still attached at the airlock to a medium sized freighter. The Niroco. The freighter's shields had been destroyed, along with its engines. The desperate calls for help that had drawn Yvian here were now silent, but the distress beacon itself was still active.

"What the Crunch for?" answered another voice. Male. A pixen? "The three of you can't handle one motherless ship?"

"This ain't just any ship, dumbass," the first voice, probably the leader, told him. "It's the Random Encounter. We're up against the Madlad himself. Mark thrice cursed Mims!"

The pirates were not, in fact, up against Madlad Mims. Captain Mims had left the Random Encounter several minutes ago. Yvian had been pretty confident in the plan at the time. Now she was having second thoughts.

"Oh." The pirate paused. Mims had developed something of a reputation. The mere mention of his name caused most pirates to rethink their life choices. Yvian managed to get another salvo in, bringing her target's shields down to seventy eight percent. "What about the prisoners?"