A Soldier for All Seasons

"We need some help. We're sitting ducks as they pick off ships coming out the atmosphere." Nate told the Lieutenant — he had a plan. He just had to convince his company.

Pelridge pursed his lips. "Sir, I'll tell the General, they'll send the whole carrier your way, or a fleet of fighters—"

"No, no, listen." Nate urged. "If you send a big force, the bugs will know the Princess is in here, and we get blown up in seconds. We have to do this quietly. Don't tell the General, don't tell the Lunari. You need to send a small force, that looks like it's dogfighting, just to clear a path."

Pelridge rubbed the back of his head. "Sir, I want to help but I don't want to disobey orders. I've got a family to feed—"

The lads behind him booed as they listened.

"Come on Pelridge, it's the Cap." Bridges' voice shouted out.

"What are your orders?" Nate asked, thinking quickly.

"We're to board the Kalaverkash — I think that's what we're calling it. The bug carrier closest to you, the big fucking thing."

"Perfect." Nate declared. "I'll come with you. I've got an idea to turn the tide of the battle. Get us and we'll board the Kalaverkash together."

Pelridge looked uncomfortable. "Get you how? Sir, I don't know."

Nate scowled. "I'm still your commanding officer, son. I haven't been courtmartialed or imprisoned, unless you know differently. Grab a meka pilot and I'll talk to them."

Pelridge took a deep breath. "Sir, yes, sir." He stepped off away and the screen went blurry as he walked.

Nate winced as he heard Pelridge approach the pilots. "Uh, ma'am. Miss, I mean. My Captain needs to talk to you."

"Pilots have our own military hierarchy, Lieutenant." A cool voice replied. "Whatever your Captain wants, he can talk to our Commander."

"No, no, he can't. Just talk to him, will you?"

"Pilot, this is life or death. Look at the fucking arm-guard." Nate barked.

A hesitant face appeared and Nate realized it was the pilot with the black hair, the hottie whose meka was emblazoned with 01.

"Pilot, this is Captain Nathan Clancy. And this is Princess Ana De Lothien of the Lunari Royalty. We're escaping the Lunari World and are getting picked off by their fighters and mekas. We need your assistance, fucking pronto. What's your name?"

"Captain," She gasped, back straightening. "Your Majesty. I'm Antonova. Natalia Antonova. I'll get my command-"

"No, Antonova." Nate snapped. "We need a stealthy force. If you get your commanding officer, he'll get his commanding officer until we end up at the fucking General. The General will send the whole damn carrier, and the bugs will shoot us dead because they'll know that our tiny ship is important. Tell me I'm wrong."

A shocked silence. She gulped, pursing dark red lips — pilots got all sorts of privileges the rank and file didn't, including makeup.

"What do you need?"

"I need you to come here and shoot these fucks out of the sky, and escort us to the Kalaverkash where we can meet up with my company."

*It's really space, not sky.* Isabelle murmured in his head.

"But, they'll court-martial me—"

"They won't. Look, they're sending you out to defend the carrier anyway, right?"

She nodded sharply. "We're to tangle with the bug mekas and try and take down any of their one or two man fighters."

"Perfect. That's all I'm asking you to do, just get a little lost and take your fight far away from the ship."

Ana stepped forward. "Natalia, the Lunari Monarchy would be very grateful for your assistance."

"Okay." Natalia breathed out, nodding to herself. "Okay, okay. I'll grab two of the girls and we'll make it your way. Hold tight, we're coming."

"Thank you." Nate said, relieved. "Pelridge will patch you into our comms, and we'll send our co-ordinates."

"Yes, sir." Natalia bit her lip, tugging her pouty lip outward for a second, before the call hung up.

"Now what?" Ana asked into the silence.

"Now, we try and survive until they get here." Nate flexed his fingers. "Isabelle, pass the controls over."

"Are you sure? I can perform standard operating evasive maneuvers—

"

"Which they'll have seen a thousand times before. We're going to need to be unpredictable. Trust me."

A console popped up in front of him, with a matte black flight stick for his right hand, topped with a trackball for his thumb. On the left, a throttle, suitably hefty, with another trackball at the top.

"Isabelle, the trackballs are for weapons aiming, right? I didn't see any weapons on the ship."

"There are weapons hidden." She said, sounding a little disgruntled. "A pair of Hornet cannons. The light version. They're not going to do much."

Nate grunted. "Can you fire them for me?"

"Can do." She lit up.

"What shall I do?" Ana frowned.

"Pray." Nate said distractedly as he pushed forward on the throttle, the ship shuddering as it increased speed. Ahead, a line of ships, a bug wall. Three fighters, three meka frames. They didn't have to break through, but it would make Natalia's job much easier.

"Entering their firing range." Isabelle warned.

The fighters unleashed a barrage of purple lasers toward him, on schedule. Nate did a simple roll, admiring the smooth movement of his ship. It was well built. The lasers flew past him harmlessly.

The fighters paused for a moment, as if they weren't expecting him to dodge at all. And then, another crackle of beam lasers, an endless stretch of purple bright lights. This time, they shot at different horizontal angles. Nate rolled his eyes and pitched up.

"It's like they don't know combat in space is along three axes." He complained.

Finally, he'd caused the fighters to move towards him, irritated. Dangerously close, so close he could see their ships in more detail. Their ships were textured like tree-bark, gnarled and with ugly white patches along the shades of brown. Little growths of bark, or fungus, grew over the ship's skin - perhaps a type of armor. The ships were shaped like Xs, but they flew with the X laid horizontally, with the end of each point a big tubular beam laser, so that when they faced him, he could see two weapons lighting up as they unleashed. He presumed, on the other side, there were two more weapons so they could fire backwards, and flip without issue. It was a smart design.

As they lurched towards him, surprisingly agile, Nate pitched straight up, but he was limited in his flight. Backward, and he returned to the planet's atmosphere. Down, and he'd hit it again.

This time, he wasn't fast enough.

The ship shuddered as it took a blow.

"Shields at sixty." Isabelle announced.

Nate swore. "Are you serious? One hit took forty percent?"

"It's not one of your military ships, Nate!"

"Fuck, you got that right." He twisted and threw the ship into a barrel roll for a disorientating two seconds, before pulling out just as the fighters behind fired to predict the roll's trajectory. "Isabelle," He growled. "Need retro-thrusters on my call!"

"I...what?! Why? We don't want to decelerate—"

"Wait for it," He pitched up

hard

. "Now!" The retrothrusters engaged, slowing the ship just as he pulled back. The sudden lack of speed allowed him to do a hard half-loop, the ship squealing in metal agony at the sudden pressure as it ended upside down but facing backwards, pointing at the shocked fighters.

"Fire!" Nate went to full-throttle, the ship taking another hit as he charged toward them. Isabelle didn't hesitate, firing the cannons.

Ba-bow

! The one-two judder of the ship as it fired felt like riding a horse. Green bolts fired relentlessly at the center ship, unerringly accurate as Nate flew straight towards it, on a collision path.

"Nate!" Ana shrieked, seeing the ship come closer, so close they could see the bug pilot in the cockpit.

"Keep firing!" He ordered.

Bolt after bolt sizzled on the bug's shields, making them flicker, colors pooling on the shield, like little spiderwebs of paint.

"Nate?" Isabelle growled as she fired unendingly.

"Come on!" He willed, seeing the panic in the bug's eyes. The bug's shield flickered, died, right before Isabelle's bolt smashed through the cockpit and melted it. Nate pulled up as hard as he could, but it was too late. They smacked into the top of the ship and ricocheted away, blowing through debris as Isabelle's bolts disintegrated the one-man fighter.

Their own ship squealed and shook.

"Shields at one percent, Nate."

Nate grimaced as he checked his surroundings. The other two had scattered at his kamikaze, but now they were coming behind him. In front, the meka frames, three of them holding the bug wall firm, watching on. He was fucked in front and behind, like a pornstar being spitroasted.

Only, those were Titan-type Mekas. Popular, because they were difficult to destroy. Instead of the usual sword in one hand and cannon-arm for the other, these frames had a sword and an incredibly powerful projectile-shield. A shield with one special feature...

"Fire at the mekas." He ordered, pushing the flight-stick to shift the ship erratically. Rolls into pitches, spirals into pirouettes, he made it as hard as possible for Isabelle to get her shots on target as they dodged every laser they could, barreling towards the meka frames. The frames shielded up, holding a big rectangle of blue matrix force-fields, sputtering and spitting as they caught every bolt Isabelle fired. The laser bolts hung there, suspended by the shields.

Nate straightened up, suddenly flying normally, so close he could see the bugs standing in their frames, the snarls on their faces.

They held their shields forward like weapons and twisted. The suspended projectiles launched back at him, two dozen laser bolts shooting back at him. Only he wasn't there, diving the ship down. The bolts collided with the fighter behind him, eviscerating the shields and exploding the ship into a thousand pieces.

One fighter to go. But his luck ran out, a shot shattering from behind. He felt their shields collapse before Isabelle announced it, the ship jerking so hard Ana fell into his lap. Sparks shot down from the consoles, the ship suddenly becoming extremely hot.

"One more shot and we're dead." Isabelle announced flatly. The mekas in front and a fighter behind. Nate swore. They were out of luck. Being reckless only got you so far.

"Kill the engines, flash the retrothruster in the surrender pattern and hail every ship in the galaxy with an official image of the Princess." Nate declared, wrapping his arms around the lithe Lunari in his lap, burying his head in her hair to hide his despair.

"Nate, no! Isabelle, cancel that order!" Ana stiffened in his lap. The engines cut out, leaving them drifting in space.

"It's that or death. We could get lucky and the bugs may try and capture you instead of killing you, that'll buy time for the Lunari to rescue you. If the bugs board us instead of shooting us, that's perfect-"

"They'll kill you instantly." Ana argued.

"It's fine." Nate shook his head. "Isabelle, can you transfer yourself to Ana?"

The three meka frames in front of him startled, their orbital engines flaring red. "What's happening?" Ana asked, watching the screen with a frown. "Isabelle, did you broadcast my image?"

"I did not." Isabelle's small voice said. "Receiving hail."

"That was some fancy flying there, Cap. Keep your engines off, us girls have got this." Natalia's voice came through the comms, an amused lilt to her tone. The next thing they saw was one of the frame's being sliced straight through as Natalia slashed through, the bug reacting too late. Natalia stood tall in her frame, the pure white rig emblazoned with a pink 01. Hers was a Merc class frame, equipped with a huge, bulking sword for one arm, pulsating with plasma energy, designed to slice through the sturdiest of metals. The other arm was a plasma cannon, short-range but deadly.

As her other two girls approached, slower in their Titan frames, Natalia shifted, using her thrusters to phase out of one of the bug's answering slashes. Her cannon shot was easily caught by the bug's shield, but she scythed through with her sword. The second bugframe was cut into pieces.

The last frame was easily dealt with by Natalia's two companions. That left the last fighter, who zoomed towards them.

"Nate—"

"I know. Make it happen."

The fighter couldn't end the mekas - it didn't have the firepower to overwhelm two Titan projectile shields. Fighters were faster than mekas, but mekas were far more maneuverable. It had two options; fly out and hope to get away, or fly towards and...collide. Nate had seen it before. Self-destructing suicide. The bugs wanted a glorious death.

Isabelle fired - each bolt making them judder backwards, their engines off, forest-hued lasers pulsating as they smacked against the fighter's shields, as it tried desperately to reach Natalia and co. The girls had seen it coming, splitting in different directions, but the fighter was course-correcting, to hit the slower Titan. Natalia was firing her cannon too, the fighter's shields flickering precariously.

"Come on Isabelle!" Nate growled.

Each bolt was laser-focused, splashing against the fighter's shields. Just as it reached the Federation pilot, the shields failed. The fighter exploded, the little pieces of debris caught, frozen, by the Titan's shield.

"Woo—" Natalia's voice came through. "That was exciting. Are you sure you want us to drop you at the Kalaverkash? The Princess won't be safe. That's going to be a hellish board for our boys."

"Thanks for the save, Antonova. I've got a plan for that ship, don't worry."

He could almost hear her shrug over the comms. "It's your call. Here, follow me. Girls, form up while their shield regens. They take one hit, it's all over, so keep your eyes up."

Through the chaos, fighters blew up left and right, like stars imploding, little bursts of light as Lunari and bugs and Feds fought furiously. Beyond, vast beams shot between the carriers, draining each other's shields, repositioning slowly, huge barges on a slow river. The Lunari were using the Federation carriers to take some of the hits while they tried to patch their own damage. Meanwhile, the warships were swooping through, cutting past the fighters, aiming for the carriers to unload their boarding force.

Natalia's girls blocked the errant projectiles, but they were mostly ignored — the fighters and frames were too busy fighting each other.

"Captain," Pelridge's voice came through, sounding a little stressed. "We're on the

Avalon

heading for the ship. Boarding on the port-side stern, if the

Destiny

can create a localized shield shutdown."

"Eyes on you, Pelridge." Nate responded, watching the

Avalon

swoop. The mid-sized warship wasn't the most agile bird, but the pilot was doing a good job dodging through the chaos. Six Federation meka frames were mag-stuck to the Avalon's wings, shooting and swinging against all invaders as the

Avalon

shot toward the Kalaverkash. "Antonova, you get that?"

She hissed in response as she parried away a bug-meka's overhead slash, before thrusting through it to end the fight. "Right behind 'em."

It was slow going, but true enough, they made it alongside the Kalaverkash. Nate gulped a little as he looked up at the intimidating carrier. Where the bug fighters were shaped like horizontal X's, the Kalaverkash was one big shapeless hunk of metal, just a bark-colored rectangle. There were no windows. There was no identifiable cockpit, or engine room, or hangars. The 'skin' of the ship breezed up and down like it was breathing. If it wasn't for the fact that the bug-carriers had been felled before in battles past, they wouldn't have known where to go.

The black space, spattered with color, lit up in a blue supernova, every single ship in the galaxy tinted blue for a single second, as the Destiny unleashed its super-nova beam, wide and angry, fizzing through to crash against the stern of the Kalaverkash. The shield across the whole ship wobbled, dissipated and then reappeared - all except the shield nodes at the stern.

"Estimating sixty seconds until shields are back online."

"Board, board, board!" Nate heard someone cry over Pelridge's suddenly activated comms. The Avalon's own weapons blew a hole in the bark, the now flaming bark easily penetrated without its shield, revealing a sparse open hangar. The bugs had evacuated, the bug troops holding further back in the ship, their ships already sent out and battling in space. It was too small for the Avalon to land — or rather, too dangerous for it to drop into a trap. Some hastily constructed gun-turrets were set up at the back, already firing as the Avalon turned to do a textbook side-roll and DangerLaunch - where the troop drop-pods, instead of being shot downward, were instead shot horizontally, into the hangar.

Thwang

-

boom

, again and again, the drop-pods shot out, like arrows out of a bow, crashing into the hangar and opening out to reveal eager Federation troops.

"Gotta get in there now!" Natalia cried.

Nate pushed forward on the throttle, shooting past the retreating Avalon and into the Kalaverkash just as the shields re-activated, sealing them in. They skidded onto the soil-laden floor roughly, their ship screeching in protest as it kicked up mud everywhere. The meka frames landed with more grace, already hunting down the few remaining bugs — the engineering bugs and soldiers too slow to have retreated back into the belly of the ship.

"You've got a ten minute window until the next super-nova beam, boys." Nate heard over Pelridge's comms from one of the other Captain's. "Ten minutes to kill as many bugs as we can and get the fuck out. Clear the hangar and let's slow-push into the engine room."

Do or die.

Nate armed up, taking a deep breath as he scanned the battle outside the ship window. "Isabelle, lead the way. Ana, maybe you'd better stay here-"

"Over my dead body." Ana growled, taking the blaster from the fallen fake Captain. "I'm not letting you play the reckless hero, mister, just so you can have me fawn all over you again."

Nate paused, considering her as she scowled at him, and thought it was probably an argument that he wasn't going to win. "Alright, just stay behind me. Isabelle, connect me through to the squad."

"Uh, sorry, Nate. They are already connected." Isabelle said, amused.

Pelridge coughed. "Uh, yes sir. We have some reckless heroes of our own who could do with some fawning, if Her Majesty is finished with you."

"Funny." Nate rolled his eyes, even as Ana smiled. "Follow me, we've got a plan to take this whole ship over."

"Uh, Cap. You know how big this ship is, right? How many bugs are on it? We're only supposed to keep them busy and worried so our own ships can focus on the fight without them in it."

Nate grinned. "Trust me, Pelridge. Form up on me."

The few remaining bugs in the hangar didn't stand a chance against the battalion of troops that had shot out from the Avalon, and Nate gestured for his squad to stay behind as the main force blasted open the sealed doors. As the Fed troops tried to battle their way through the barricades the bugs had set up, Nate and his team instead sneaked into one of the rooms offsetting the hangar, an unassuming dead end room. The room was filled with big, transparent pipes, the glass obviously thick and layered multiple times. Inside the pipes, a gloopy orange liquid swam through at enormous speed, bubbling and hissing as it did so. Steam smoked steadily out of the pipes and was inhaled by a bulbous purple sac against the wall, that whined as it ventilated the steam out into space.

Nate blinked as he stared at the strange system. This ship was a lot more of a living thing than he expected. How much of it was advanced technology and how much was this stuff from the bugs' home worlds?