Miraculous Ladybug - Starfighter/Sci-Fi/Star Wars-ish AU

Chapter 2

Mari fought the controls of her bomber every time they had left the atmosphere of Paris. She never got used to seeing her home world from such height, the small city she grew up in became smaller and smaller before it was invisible to the naked eye.

As the swarm of bombers broke the outer layers of atmosphere, Mari could see the glowing yellow engines of Green Squadron dim as they came to a halt. She was informed by her squad leader over her COMM to form up behind Green Squad, with distance between each ship. Her position in the formation put her just down and to the left of Green Leader. Mari could tell Ren's fighter, 'The Black Cat' easily apart from the others due to the custom painted hydrogen tank, the yellow hued plating accented the black and green fighter.

The COMM channels Mari was tuned in were muddled with dozens of voices from squad leaders, team members calling in and command personnel advising fleet placement. Mari's personal AI that was integrated into her ship, prioritised messages in real time that may be important for her to hear; such as Red Leader or the fleet admiral, increasing the volume of those particular transmissions in her helmet.

On one of the first days of basic training, Mari and all the other cadets had been issued with an AI construct unit. Mari had chosen to give it a nickname and customise its personality, much like most other cadets. She had settled on the name 'Tikki' as it was the name of her neighbour's dog when she was little and gave it a sweet feminine voice to match.

Mari had also asked Tikki to prioritise anything from or about Green Leader. This wasn't against protocol but would be considered unusual as she really had no reason for it. Mari hadn't done anything about her infatuation with Ren, he was the leader of Green Squad after all, one of the most well-known and respected people on the base. But she liked to keep tabs on him and during meals where their schedules lined up, she would ogle him from across the mess hall when he wasn't looking. But she had always wished for more, since the day she had met him. During the first new recruits meeting, he caught her eye, sitting across from her at a large briefing table. Luckily, she had Tikki record the session, because she had barely been listening after she had glanced at Ren, her normal sharp mind turned into ration paste. Over the past year the pair had become mutually chummy and flirty to each other, verging on foreplay. Mari was too nervous to ask anything of him; like spending some down time together or eating in the mess together. And while Ren definitely seemed interested by flirting, it confused her that he hadn't done anything about it either.

She cleared her mind, calming herself before the impending battle. A countdown on her main display was nearing zero, indicating the predicted arrival of the enemy fleet based on the sensor data.

Normally, at random intervals, but no more than two per month, the 'Alliance' as they had called themselves would send small clusters of ships at Paris and other planets in the nearby systems occupied by Federation colonies. Typically, no more than a destroyer, frigate and a few corvettes would jump out from FTL travel, and quickly and easily be dispatched by the outer-orbital defences and stationed ships of a colony, with rarely any Federation casualties. Today however, was the largest jump signature Ensign Kanté, who had been on the monitoring station that morning had ever seen, even during training. Thinking it was a glitch at first, but soon realising it wasn't, he had been the one to raise the alarm.

While she wasn't an expert on galactic politics, she had seen enough on the holocasts and in the required texts for her schooling to have some idea of what was going on, and why she had to fight. It had begun only a few years before her birth; a member of the federation council had grown tired of the constant debate over petty matters and had been channelling credits off world into creating a private militia. Years later, the actions of this man still going undiscovered, someone in the council finally noticed the funds discrepancy. Just as an internal investigation was launched to track down the missing credits, the man vanished without a trace. By the time Mari was 7 orbits old, the man had reappeared as the leader of the militia he had been creating. While small in comparison to the combined federation fleet at first, the man had been busy making deals with non-federation planets. It only took him a year to grow his forces enough to rival the defences and fleet protecting the federation capital planet.

Mari's parents had known a few people living on the capital at the time of the attack. Less than a quarter of the total population had escaped the planet-wide bloodshed and destruction. The leader of the Alliance had not accepted the capital's surrender and plea to stop the relentless assault. Although the capital had fallen, the Alliance was almost crippled from the resistance the defence fleet gave them, with only a few larger ships and some cruisers remaining. And what remained of the Alliance had jumped away before reinforcements made it there, leaving an obliterated planet and millions dead behind.

The effect of the attack had ripped across the galaxy, all defences on federation world's tripled, if not more. What was once used to scare off pirates, mine asteroids and little more, were repurposed into orbital defence platforms with an immense array of ordinance and top of the line shield plating and point defences. Usually a hanger planet-side would send ships up to assist if the target wasn't dying quickly enough or if the Alliance ships were particularly tough that day, but in a pinch the orbital stations on most worlds could keep up with the attacks unassisted. For the last ten years, the Alliance had been seemingly probing each of the Federation's outposts, colonies and stations with a small handful of ships; retreating or being destroyed each time. Possibly learning strategies, counting ships and analysing defences. At least that was the only logical conclusion Mari had come to, and many of the statistical analysts and strategic advisors had said similar things. Was this what the ten years of small attacks was leading up to? Was today the day the Alliance finally struck again?

Mari gave the ships systems another once over, checking each switch, knob and lever was in the right place for the impending attack. The other pilots would be doing similar checks as well, but Mari made sure to be extra thorough. The countdown ended with a piercing tone. For the longest moment Mari had experienced, nothing appeared. She tightened her grip on the control stick and gritted her teeth.

Like a strike of lightning and the accompanying clap of thunder, a mass of ships appeared some distance away, out of effective weapons range. The shockwave reached the cluster of friendly ships almost instantly, jolting the pilots and their ships slightly. The near silent COMM came to life again, with tactical orders, shock and amazement of how many ships had appeared. Mari tried to make out how many there was for herself, but lost count quickly. Orders trickled down from command, they were all to hold position for now while the scan was nearing completion.

She listened to the worried voices of her fellow pilots flooding the COMM system, until a familiar voice piped up.

"Cut the chatter, optimism people, we can do this. Green Leader out." Ren's firm command voice that Mari had rarely heard came through over all the other channels. Instantly the pilots responded by quieting down. Finally, the tactical readout flickered onto one of Mari's screens. Dread instantly filled her, she didn't need to closely study it or zoom in. The number of red blips on the display was uncountable.

While all the pilots were looking at their displays, the enemy fleet parted down the middle, revealing a heavy dreadnought cruiser, the flagship of the Alliance. Mari was done quickly with her study of the readout and returned her gaze to the fleet. She noticed a purple glow coming from the newly revealed flagship. Her eyes opened wide.

She flicked the open COMM switch. "All ships this is Red 5, beam weapon inbound! I repeat beam weapons inbound! Evade! Evade! Evade!"

As she screamed the orders over the COMM, her and a few other ships quickly dropped from formation, breaking to either side of the target. A neon beam of pure light fired from the dreadnought and struck the orbital defence station, slicing into it like it was barely there. The large explosion that erupted from the station shot debris into multiple ships that hadn't moved quickly enough after Mari's alert. A few gunships of Blue Squad, a light cruiser, 3 Bombers of Red Squad and 2 Green Squad fighters were ripped apart by the fragments and shockwave of the detonated platform. Some small debris bounced off Mari's wing as she finished her evasion, the deflector shields protecting from any damage.

The base commander spoke over the COMM, with a hint of uncertainty. "All ships. Engage the enemy."

~~~~ If you liked this, show your support by liking, commenting, following and adding it to your reading list. :) Let me know what you think! You can also find this and a few of my other stories on AO3 archiveofourown.org/users/mermanfromdownunder ~~~~~~