Journey of the Alacritous Regress Volume 1: The Dead Canary

Installment 3: Attack of the Intern

"They're following us, sir."

"Are they gaining?"

"They are, sir. Average gain at one light second a second. Lead distance is one light minute 14 seconds."

"Good, that's just what I want to hear." The names Star, Shooting Star. The big mass of muscle watching the scanners is Rivan and the abnormally quiet person next to her is Arron.

On Arron's other side sits Tail. "30 second till ambush location, ready for quick drop from warp." Warp travel is a very delicate procedure, liable to destroy everything nearby if something went wrong. It require time and precise calculations and careful planing to be able to enter or exit warp. But like everything, there is alway the emergency breaks.

"Are sure this safe?"

"No Rivan, I am not sure of whether it is safe to just drop out of warp and be the bait for three Shike war shuttles," my voice dripping with sarcasm.

"Say it like it bad? Honor to be chose as bait." Blait society has a few different social believes then Terra society, like how it was an honor to be used as bait, how wealth should not be accumulated, and it is dishonorable to kill yourself killing other people for a difference in belief. These sometime prevent Rivan from realizing that command is just assigning us suicide missions.

"Drop out in 3! 2!" I tighten my grip on my arm rests, "1!" The ship rattles as the blurred specks in front of us flatten out to their actual position. With a breath wrenching jolt, followed by the sounds of a small explosion down in engineering, we complete our exit from warp.

"Aw, what have you done to me!" That's Al, the Alacritous Regress's AI, and yes, I have checked, there is no safe way to remove him from the ship.

I go to my default for when Al turns on, "Not sure, we were all just watching the video they sent me of my uncle's funeral. So if you would like, you could..."

"Join you! No thank you! I am not interested in any of your puny lives and how they will end sooner rather than later. Just like all of your cousins and aunts, you will die long before me. Al out." The intercom goes silent as he turns himself off.

"Does some one want to tell him that this ship is the last Sleipnir 3A," Arron says, "and that it has already survived twice as long as the average." What he had said is true, the Sleipnir 3A is by far the unluckiest ship ever made, with every last one of them being destroyed in action. Even the Alacritous Regress has been destroyed, although back then it was three different ships.

"Just remember, Arron, if Al dies, we die."

Behind us two Shike war shuttles coast out of warp and to a stop. They move in for the kill.

<<>>

The Alacritous Regress travels slowly through warp. Crawling along its wings, several bots are replacing damaged armor plates. Each bot consists of a flat box with four leg struts sticking out, two to the front, two to the back. Each leg ended with a hollow wheel with a magnetic attraction unit held within. On the top of each bot is a set of arms designed to hold and place the freshly printed armor, and on the bottom is a set of tools used to detach the damaged plates.

"Damage report, Blue." The intercom is on open communication between the bridge and engineering.

"Most of the damage was sustained to exterior plating and the warp dive, we are already replacing the plates and the warp drive was a simple patch job, already had all the pieces fabricated. One of the shields blew a circuit breaker and the warp drive damaged the main water synthesizer when it broke. Overall, it could have been a lot worse."