“Remmy?” Master Sergeant Anya Yakonva asked the man that looked like Sergeant Remington but once again the man ignored her. She sighed, “Ronald…”

“Ronny,” he snapped at her and shot her a glare, “And you better not be callin’ me no Ronny Remington, Ronny Remmy or nothin’ else like that neither. Just Ronny.”

“Ronny… you pressed the button?” Master Sergeant Yakonva asked about the reason she was in there. It still looked like one of her sets of boots sitting there, even if no one could figure out what was going on. They didn’t know if it was the aneurysm, the seizure, the nanites but when Sergeant Remington awoke. He wasn’t Remington anymore.

That wasn’t unsubstantiated either.

A scan had been conducted and shown vastly different activity in his brainwaves compared to ones on record. Even repeat scans were done because that just wasn’t possible but they were different... Enough of a difference that had they sent the data back to FLEETCOM for analysis the medical brass would have thought the Valkyrie’s CO had sent the scans from two different people by accident. Not just their fleet but FLEETCOM, it had been discussed. The Admiral of the 4th Expeditionary Taskforce was of course aware but just as confused as everyone else.

That also didn’t account for their own doctor's analysis, particularly concerning telltale signs of lying within the prefrontal cortex whenever Re- Ronny said he wasn’t Remmy, or said where he was from a city he called Deserts Rest. Or anything else about his life. The results were unremarkable only in that nothing happened. The doc had explained that there was no indication that Ronny was lying.

Then there was the language he spoke besides English-Standard that no one had ever heard before but the onboard VI had assured them it was a legitimate language based on syntax. Only portions of it had been translatable for the computer but that was due to lack of input. Most of what they’d managed to translate was swearing.

With the completely unknown happenstance of Sergeant Remington’s condition, thrown in with the Ivonian sudden aggression across the DMC, and the fleet’s mission regarding that. Sergeant Remington was forced into confinement. Ronny was forced into confinement.

“Can I get a drink? Gods know I could use one,” Ronny said and rubbed his hand through his hair. An act that was extremely familiar to the Master Sergeant. At any other time, it would have just been how Remmy acted, now? It was eerie.

“Water’s right there, Serg- … It’s next to your bed, the tap. You were shown how to use it… Is your viewscreen broken?”

“Nah… shut it off… dunno how you folk can stand lookin’ at that all the time. It hurts my eyes… But I din’t mean water. Get me a shot a’bourbon wouldja?”

“Can’t do that. Regulation 1405.38 of the Coalition-”

“Ah,” Ronny cut her off and waved his hand to get her to stop. Normally Yakonva wouldn’t have tolerated that but it was a strange situation to say the least, “Don’t see how you folk can do that neither. Say you’re soldiers but ya ain’t even drink!”

“We can drink, Ronny. Just not aboard the Valkyrie on deployment,” Yakonva informed him. It was a simple and understandable regulation. Even a routine patrol could quickly change to a combat situation if they stumbled across piracy or a smuggling operation.

“Hells, heard even rangers’ll have one ‘fore a fight. A tradition or something,” he smiled at her and Yakonva realized the real reason she was called in. He was bored. Not that she would complain, she had been given standing orders to get him talking so the docs and spooks within the fleet could continue their evaluation on him. He’d specifically requested her. He wanted to talk to the ‘proper gal. Angry eyes, nice face. Backside that’ll make ya cry… bet she’s got a right hook that can make a man cry too. Know the one?'.

“Rangers?”

“Rangers… top notch folks, so everyone says. Fight the biggest meanest things out there… Ya know what I mean,” Ronny said while gesturing around himself only to realize he wasn’t home anymore, “Ya got somethin’ like that?”

“Rangers? Yes. We actually have our own ‘Rangers’. They’re ground pounders in the Coalition Army. But even they don’t go after the biggest out there,” Yakonva said. It was a bit of information for him but it wasn’t classified. There was plenty of advertisements that talked of the Rangers going back for hundreds of years.

“You the folk that go after the bad ‘uns?” he asked and she answered with a curt shake of her head.

“We’re grunts like the ground pounders. We just operate in a different theatre. Some of us are certified for a bit more than that... drop pods to a planet's surface. But none on this ship,” she said although it wasn’t completely true. They only had a few certified hell divers in the company but they weren’t really meant for fighting planetside, so orbital insertion was limited to a few. They did however have quite a few explosive experts, Zero-G combat certifications, and four pilots per platoon for their boarding pods. Most of them were just there to tear up the decking and enemy when needed.

Ronny just nodded at the thought, “So fighters. Nothin’ too special… bit more organized than what I’ve seen but…”

He shrugged. Yakonva was immediately torn between correcting him and agreeing with him. She felt the Marines were special but she knew they were good but far from the best out there. They were fighters in the void but they were ants compared to the fleet around them. Tiny specs in space when sitting next to the Valkyrie. And that was just a destroyer! The Diatom, the lone carrier within the 4th ETF, was three times as long as the Valkyrie and four times as wide as the relatively narrow Munich class destroyer.

The room's lighting suddenly turned red.

WAAAGH… WAAGH… WAAGH

“All hands to battle stations. Spacial rift detected. Ivonian fleet inbound- Unknown composition. Time of arrival- Four Minutes- Fifty three Seconds- Expected arrival coordinates- 154.89 degrees by- 93.58 degrees at- 13.2 thousand kilometers. All hands to battle stations. Spacial rift…”

The feminine computerized voice of Friga, the Valkyries VI, began to repeat the emergency message again but Master Sergeant Yakonva was already at the door. She wasn’t leaving yet, she was in the brig. Those doors didn’t just open unless it was to evacuate due to the risk of a breach.

This is not good…

Yakonva shook her head and banged on the bulkhead. She turned to see Ronny staring at her while holding a vac suit that had been hidden in the wall of the cell.

“Don’t just stand there like a lost pup, get that on Marine,” She ordered before she could catch herself. It didn’t matter. Ronny looked at her, looked at the suit, and immediately started fiddling with it to figure out how to get it on.

“Guessin’ this is important like?” Ronny asked.

“They’ll start emergency atmospheric reduction as soon as everyone in the section is suited up. It’s standard operating procedure for prebattle if time allows, to prevent explosive decompression and venting of crew and equipment… They’re going to suck the air out, that way if there is a hole in the hull-” she realized she was getting a deer in the headlights look and tried a different way.

“Got me at suck the air out,” Ronny said while figuring out how to open the back of the suit, “This whole floatin’ up by the stars bit don’t sound too fun if you can’t breathe.”

The door opened and Yakonva quickly dodged around a master at arms already in his suit entering the room she was standing in next to Ronny’s cell. It was his job to make sure anyone in confinement was suited up. Or just released. There was no reason to keep a valuable trained crewman in confinement for contraband if the ship was under attack.

She didn’t wait to make sure he did his duty and sprinted through the passageway heading for the armory, occasionally dodging a crewman heading to their station. Everyone had a bit of unease on their faces. Not just for the coming fight.

It was that there shouldn’t have even been a fight. Only a few days after Remington collapsed the entire task force had split from the fleet proper to head into dark space. The region between systems. There they found two things. A spatial anomaly and a rogue planet drifting in the expanse… and a dark site research station.

They may as well have been running completely dark with the amount of stealth tech nearby keeping their signatures blended. They couldn’t completely block warp signatures, jump beacons, or any other form of FTL. So rather than hide it, the Coalition had developed a way to scramble it and make it nearly impossible to spot against cosmic background radiation.

But that was the issue the Ivonians, the frogs, had found them.

“… Time of arrival 2 minutes- zero seconds. Expected arrival coordinates- 3.28 degrees by- 349.82 degrees at- 12.4 thousand kilometers ”

Master Sergeant Yakovna rounded the corner into the armory to see her unit quickly arming herself. She looked at her squad and was happy to see all but one were already armed, armored, and standing ready.

“Jenkins! I had babysitting duty. I’m tossing your hollow head and big ass out the airlock as soon as I’m suited up. I better not get there before you!” She barked at one of the junior members of her squad, noting for a second he was one of Remington’s.

She knew she had about a minute and a half until the enemy arrived but she needed to be ready in about a minute if she didn’t want to be the reason for the entire section to be sitting at full atmosphere when they arrived.

She shot a glare across the room as she quickly stripped down to her underwear, not wasting time going into the female changing room, and started pulling on her undersuit. The men in the room knew better than to look anyway but she made it loud and clear that there would be zero cat calls or wolf whistles if anyone had been daring enough to try.

From there it was just getting her combat rig on. Which she did quickly and efficiently by pushing to top half back in the storage frame and pulling herself up to swing her legs over the opening and lowering herself in. She connected the inputs to her undersuit and locked the seals around her waist. From there it was turning it on and squatting down under the top half to guide her body through. Like putting on a heavily uparmored shirt. It would have made a poor shirt, it wasn’t all encompassing, only covering vital areas with thick plates while the rest was a nano-polymer weave but it was better than nothing.

Master Sergeant Yakonva stopped then and gave Jenkins a look. He was just locking on his helmet. Seeing how she wouldn’t have to toss any marines into the abyss Yakonva quickly followed suit.

“Master Sergeant,” Sergeant Wilkerson addressed her and held up her rifle and sidearm to her. He wasn’t supposed to be able to check out her weapons but that could be overwritten with a command level order. Not exactly a good sign.

She excepted both and took her place next to her squad, running one short with Jenkins also falling in line. She waited the last few seconds for the few straggling marines in other squads to get their shit in order and take position.

“Aten-HUT,” The order came and they all snapped to the position.

“At ease, Marines,” Captain Takahashi said as he entered the armory, “Contact in less than 30 seconds so we’ll keep this fucking short. Deployment position- Theta with concentration on anti-boarding procedures. ROE, if the frogs get aboard. Fill them full of holes and kick their rubbery asses back off this fucking ship. You all know what to do, await further commands.”

He glanced around at the room one more time, “Be ready for boarding actions once the big boys know what’s going on and crack a few hulls. Marines! Ten Hut. Move out!”

Yakonva smiled inside her helmet and noted a bit of back slapping from her squad as they filled out of the room after the other squads at a job. Heavy footsteps couldn’t so much be heard through the deck plating but it could be felt as they charged their way through the ship to their designated post back the way she’d just come from, a few crewmen ducking out of the way as they passed.

As they moved, Yakonva ran through her checklist ensuring coms were functioning, suits were self registering as sealed, air supply was topped off.

“Hah, Let’s go Echo Squad! Ooorah,” She heard Wilkerson bark through the coms when she finished.

It might have been a bit much though unless you realized where they were heading. Most of the company was heading out to take up positions in hallways and chokepoints on the ship's various decks. Always within spitting distance of the exterior hull. But not Echo squad. They were running down the center hallway. Straight towards the ventral aft section.

“Cap knows what he’s doing. Doesn’t he, sending us to man the pods! First to fight!”

“First to fight!” the squad called back the mantra.

They were heading for the-

Master Sergeant Yakonva, priority message from- Captain Takahashi.

As follows:

Side track.

Break off one fireteam and collect your ‘Priority’ individual, Admiral’s orders.

He stays with you. Keep him safe.

Be ready for chop, Friga says it looks like a full fleet inbound.

Yakonva sent an acknowledgment of the order through her coms non-vocally before activating them for the entire squad, “Change of plans kids. Wilkerson, your squad on me. The rest of you get your asses to that hanger. Keep your shit clean, I’ll be there in a minute!”

She’d let them have their fun for a moment. She knew they were all thinking the same thing she was. The squad in the hanger is the first squad in the breaching pods. It meant they would be thrown through the void in harm's way but if it happened it meant the Valkyrie wasn’t being breached and it was always better to fight their way through an enemy vessel than sit there with their thumbs up their asses the entire engagement hoping a plasma turret didn’t peg the Valkyrie and melt them to nothing.

But with a hanger dangling behind them… nope. Babysitting duty. She thought of the coordinates given by the VI. The first was the relative angle from the front of the ship on its x axis. The enemy was coming in from their rear but the second time she paid attention it was only at 3 or so degrees. So they’d spun around to point at the enemy. The second was on the y axis, again they were pointing almost right at the enemy arrival point. Their heading almost zeroed out straight at them.

They were using positive numbers so that meant the Valkyrie was oriented dorsal up compared to the Diatom and no bearing was given for it. Meaning the z-axis was also zeroed out or close to it. Not that it was that important to Marines. Other than being able to picture how the ship was oriented. Yakonva did and realized that the Ventral aft section, the hanger included, was now the best protected section of the ship when it came to unguided munitions. Anything coming at them would have to punch through five decks plus multiple bulkheads because of the angle.

“Orders from the Admiral,” She barked as she reached the brig. Not that she needed to. The Master at arms already had Ronny ready to go at the entrance, waiting for their arrival, “We’re to keep Remmy safe and with us at all times. It’s priority.”

She shuffled through a few options and linked in his suit to her and Wilkerson’s squad. Ignoring the slumps of her fellow Marines when they realized they were now all on babysitting duty.

“Follow me, do as I say. If one of them tells you to do something and I don’t immediately contradict it, consider it from me,” It was a simple order but she gave the order and they started moving to the hang-

“Gods! What in the name of the hells was that!” Ronny said as he staggered from the entire ship shifting under them.

“That would be the big gauss. We just opened fire,” Private Pierce said and reached out to give the side of the passage a loving tap.

Yakonva reached out and ran her hand along the wall as well. She felt the vibrations from the engines at full roar along with a few pulsating blasts being added in. She knew the feeling, that was the missile tubes launching volleys. A moment later she felt a sharper, quicker vibration… that was the point defense system, fully auto rail guns mounted all around the ship, firing off at incoming ordinance.

She reached back and grabbed Ronny by his shoulder, “Brace!”

There was only one reason why they’d be firing the PDS and-

The Valkyrie shook violently, far worse than when they had unleashed the big gauss cannon on the frogs. Thankfully it wasn’t that bad, it likely just shook their shie-

The entire ship vaulted downward while gravity shut off momentarily. Sending them all crashing into the ceiling. Well, technically they didn’t move. The ceiling came down to smack the hell out of them.

“Damn Miss. Don’t even know if I wanna know what that was,” Ronny groaned. She looked at him as they got to their feet when gravity switched back on. He didn’t seem worse for wear and it would take a lot more than that to puncture even his suit.

“Magboots,” Yakonva ordered. Ronny’s suit had one but she didn’t take the moment to explain that to him.

Still, Yakonva opened her hud to look at the Valkyrie’s status.

“Hull breaches. Forward dorsal sections 1 and 2. Decks 1 and 2. Forward dorsal 1 deck three,” Wilkerson called out before she could even get the update. They’d just lost primary weapons, the forward infirmary, and depending on where along the section, the CO’s quarters but there was no reason for him to be there. As well as Bravo squad in all likelihood. It had torn straight through their shields and their hull.

“Fuck, get to the hanger. Move, marines!” She ordered and they ran.

“Attention all personnel. Shield status- offline. Engines status- offline. External Communications- offline. Primary weapons system- destroyed. Secondary weapons systems- damaged- active. Point Defense System- damaged- active. Commanding Officer- deceased. Executive officer- in command. Forward infirmary breached- send wounded to aft infir-”

The ship lurched again, cutting off Friga. Although at least gravity remained. It wasn’t like Yakonva really needed to listen to the entire message. All that would come after was a list for damage control units to start trying to patch up what they could and instruct crewmembers to vacate breached sections as if they actually needed to be told. It wasn’t just training, no one wanted to look at a hole leading into the void unless it was supposed to be there.

Yakonva sprinted the last few dozen meters to the airlock leading to the hanger and punched the mechanism to open it. It cycled them through and she ran inside with the fireteam and immediately spotted her squad sitting next to the loneLittoral Gunship in the hanger.

“Master Sergeant, why are they anchored?” Wilkerson asked and she looked again, seeing that each and every member of her squad was attached to a tether that locked them to the floor. That shouldn’t-

She spotted the issue. Three flight crew techs were huddling around a vac suit helmet desperately trying to do something with it. Especially the one that wasn’t wearing a helmet. Yakanova stomped on the plated deck and heard the metal ring when her armored boot hit it.

They were still at full atmosphere!

“Get to the squad and tether down!” She ordered and they booked it to the gunship as the ship shook again along with a concussive blast traveling through the air. Strong enough to send Ronny and the techs to the floor, only Yakonva and her marines in their heavy armored combat rigs managed to stay on their feet.

“That had to be… fuck!” Wilkerson said and Yakonva spotted what he saw. They couldn’t feel it but they could see a torrent of air being violently sucked through a small breach in the hanger doors at the other side of the roo-

The world churned and Yakonva felt the air escape her lungs as she slammed into the side of a breaching pod with enough force that the armor seemed not to do much. She desperately tried to grab at anything within reach but there was nowhere to get purchase as she flipped violently and the next thing she knew…

“Oh god…” Yakonva said as she saw the Valkyrie rapidly moving away from her as she was ejected into space. It wasn’t the thought of being in the void that had her suddenly worried. She had caught a flash of the scene around her and used her stabilizing RTS thrusters to correct her tumble now that she wasn’t being thrown by the decompression.

The Valkyrie was tumbling in space, dead in the water. Above her, from Yakonva’s perspective. The Diatom was almost completely split in two. Escape pods, fighters, and bombers launched without regard up and down her length. She could only see them due to balls of burning plasma lighting up the dark region of space. She looked back at the Valkyrie and her eyes went wide.

“Echo Squad, evacuate! Now! All hands abandon ship! Get off the Valkyrie!” She screamed into her mike as she watched the massive tumbling form of the Hidalgo, a Kartikaya Class battle cruiser, grow nearer and nearer to the smaller Valkyrie. It looked like it was blinking in and out of existence, she could only see it when plasma burned relatively nearby but it was going to hit! “Friga. Sound the alarm, all hands abandon ship. Repeat all hands abandon ship. Catastrophic impact imminent. Abandon ship! Any crewman of the Valkyrie, get to the life pods!”

But the comms were dead weren’t they and so was the power. She saw the flash of a small impulse engine shoot away from the Valkyrie… it was only a single life pod.

Another much brighter flash of light lit up to her right and she could see the full battle cruiser bearing down on the destroyer but only for a second before her field of view went dark. Her suit automatically adjusted to the sudden, intense light and went completely opaque. When it cleared again she could see an expanding cloud of molten metal flickering like starlight in the distance. One of the ships had gone critical and the warp core had detonated.

She drifted and watched. It was the only thing she could do. She counted one, just one, more life pod ejecting before the weight of the spinning Hidalgo came down on the Valkyrie. It split the smaller ship open like a pinata.

Ronny watched the Marines go sprinting towards the others but he took one glance at the spot where the air was being sucked up like a cyclone was on the other side of the big metal room and decided that running through an open space was NOT a good idea. You didn’t go charging across an open field during a twister unless you absolutely had to, not that he’d ever seen a twister. But it was good advice to hear.

He knew he was the odd one out and they probably knew better but he was going to keep his happy ass somewhere else. Preferably not out amongst the stars.

Ronny spotted a ladder going up to a catwalk and jumped on it, wrapping his arms and legs around it. A second later he felt a powerful gust of wind and an intense vibration through the ladder, immediately followed by a complete lack of sound. He let go of the ladder to step on the ground.

“Damn gods… I’m flying!” he said as he hopped down and bounced off the floor before he floated back up, “Hah! I’m flying!”

Ronny tried flapping his arms like wings to see if he could push himself along, or at least turn himself around a little faster but it did absolutely nothing.

“Someone grab him, uggh! Zero G maneuvers. What happened to those techs!” he heard a woman’s voice in his ear and remembered he couldn’t spin any faster but could turn his head. He’d been too caught up with the idea of flying to remember the basics of… well, of being a being with a neck.

The hanger was a lot darker and only had some light from a few spotlights on the walls but Ronny immediately saw a group of lights start moving around. One of them started moving back towards him. He also noticed the massive gaping hole with stars where there once was a big metal wall. What was left of it was twisted and pushed out into the black or jammed into the room.

“Techs vented… no one splattered.”

“Michaels, O’Conner. Get in the big bird and get it started up! Jaurez, get that tech's body or at least a tag if it’s there.”

“Echo Squad, evacuate! Now! All hands abandon ship! Get off the Valkyrie! ...Friga. Sound the alarm, all hands abandon ship. Repeat all hands abandon ship. Catastrophic impact imminent. Abandon ship! Any crewman of the Valkyrie, get to the life pods!”

That didn’t’ sound good. Ronny recognized the sound of his new ‘friend’ and she sounded a little panicked. He noticed the seven marines still in the room with him all froze for less than a second. One almost close enough to grab him but he drifted close enough for Ronny to grab the Marine.

“That was the Master Sergeant. Into the gunship now! Michaels, O’Conner did you hear that?!”

“Yes, Staff Sergeant. Skipping preflight checklist and getting ready to burn once you're on board.”

Ronny’s arm felt like it was going to get ripped off as a plume of… something erupted from the back of the Marine that had grabbed him and the two of them went flying towards the little ship inside of the big ship. He felt a tug on his arm again when they came to a stop right before bouncing up a ramp… Eh, Ronny did that anyways when the Marine threw him up to it. Somehow still able to stand on the floor. As soon as he left the top of the ramp, Ronny fell to the ground as gravity resumed.

He was quickly followed by two others. Then the marine that had tossed him, he noticed the woman had an insignia with three stripes on it and a curved bit underneath. It was more than the others and almost looked like the one Yakonva had on her uniform, with hers having one more curved bit beyond that.

“All aboard, get us out of here!” she ordered.

“Copy that Staff Sergeant. Started moving as soon as you activated the back door. Already rolling out of the hanger. Whoah! Shit!”

“Michael’s report!”

“Nothing Staff Sergeant. We’re clear but flying instrumentation only, a core just melted down. But we’re in the clear… Staff Sergeant! We’ve got confirmed life signs ahead. Total of six, no seven. Pick them up?”

“Get us there and we’ll open the door for them. Jaurez, stow our passenger.”

“Yes, Staff Sergeant.”

The one that must have been Jaurez came up and took Ronny by the upper arm and pulled him towards a door at the end of the small room they were in. Then through another. Once inside Ronny could hear again besides the little device in his helmet and immediately knew there was air again. It was a bit of a double edged knife. On one hand, he was glad that if the clear glass covering his face was to crack, he could breathe. But at the same time, he might not find a ladder next time. He was then led to a different room. A bedroom, it was pretty nice. About as nice as his cell.

Ronny didn’t really make himself at home though, not completely. He eyed a bunk in the room and sat down before moving to tussle his hair but remembered the helmet he was wearing only when his gloved hand hit it…

Instead of waiting there though he got up and walked up to the door. It opened!

Ronny poked his head out into the hallway running down the center of the smaller vessel. One led back to the ramp he’d come from and the other led past a few other rooms to a door on the end. It was the only one that had little windows on it so he shrugged and walked down there and peeked inside, seeing two marines sitting in chairs with a myriad of flashing lights and buttons around them along with glowing screens. He watched one of them suddenly twitch and jerk at a stick on the right armrest and felt a shift in the ship that made him lean to correct his balance. It was immediately followed by a twitch to the other side before being pushed downward, that made Ronny feel a little lighter. It took Ronny a moment to realize there was another handle thing on the other armrest and when he pushed it hard to the side Ronny could feel his weight increase.

“That’s how they control these things?” Ronny muttered to himself and immediately equated it to a very complex set of reins for a massive metal chariot.

But he didn’t get to observe any longer, he heard heavy footsteps coming from behind him and turned to see Master Sergeant Yakonva quickly making her way to the door he was spying through with her helmet off. She spared him a slight glance and slapped something on the side of the door and they parted.

“Michaels, what’s going on?” She said before the door was completely open.

“Enemy light frigate engaging us… we’re trying to keep debris between us but it keeps pushing us towards the edge of the battlespace. There isn’t much there to hide us.” Michaels said while O’Conner continued to steer the ship.

Ronny was too busy staring at Yakonva. Wasn’t she dead? Where had she come from?

Then he remembered the talk of life signs… they must have had something on board similar to a [Detect Life] spell. Not bad.

He tried casting that one… still nothing. He sighed and shook his head. What good was being a [Druid] and a [Quickdraw Duelist] if he couldn’t use his Skills and spells… Then again he couldn’t pull up his stats anymore either.

“Is there anywhere our people still control? Any active ships?” Yakonva asked.

“None… there is the research station. They have intercepted the corvette that launched from there and any life pods but they still haven’t breached and are giving it a wide berth because of the anomaly. I don’t think they realized it was here,” Michaels explained while his fingers darted across a bunch of buttons in front of him.

Ronny took the risk and stepped into the room, gaining a glance from Yakonva but she didn’t kick him out…

Ohhh. It's like one of them typewriter things!

“Bring us in close if we have no other choice… Better captured than dead,” Yakonva said through clenched teeth.

“Better go out blazing when they do come for it than get turned to slag out here you mean, Master Sergeant,” O’Conner said quickly while still pitching and rolling the ship. Ronny noticed that there was also more too it. He was controlling something with his right thumb. Pushing it up and down on occasion, more buttons. He wasn’t sure what they did.

They darted back and forth, through the wreckage. Most Terran, some Ivonian, slowly making their way towards the station.

“Got ourselves a friendly warbird coming up beside us to port. Looks like he’s not alone either,” Michaels stated and quickly added, “all friendlies.”

Yakonva leaned forward and looked out the left window. So Ronny did too. It was too black to see anything though. Yakonva must have come to the same conclusion, “How many, what types?”

“Two Ares bombers, 4 Horus fighters, another little bird like us… Two little birds but one’s not in the best shape. Two heavy shuttles, two light shuttles, and eight life pods,” Michaels informed them although it didn’t mean much to Ronny but a whistle from O’Conner told him that was a decent list for some reason, “They all have the same plan we do… plus Ares 14 is reporting that an emergency FTL beacon was launched from the Diatom as soon as they saw the size of the fleet. They think the frogs are just as curious about… whatever the hell that is, so if we stick close to it, we might be able to hold out until the cavalry arrives. They just sent out a mass comm across the battlespace informing any surviving vessels to do the same.”

“Fuck, can they do that? It’s a Commander at most flying that thing?” O’Conner asked but Michaels just gestured to a strange three dimensional display in between them. There were only a few blue dots moving around and a lot of red ones, “Right… Commander, it is then.”

“Enemy frigate’s backing off. Looks like our possible Commander called it, they’re keeping their distance,” Michaels happily reported, “Irish, get us to that damn station.”

“You got it English!” O’Conner announced but nothing seemed to change.

Ronny looked over at Yakonva, “I thought their names were O’Conner and Michaels?”

“Nicknames. Like calling you Ronny instead of Ronald. It’s where they’re from,” she quickly responded but kept her eyes darting around at various lit up displays. Their accents did sound similar.

As they flew through the Void. Another Littoral ship, nicknamed little birds, joined their ranks as well as numerous fighters, bombers, shuttles, and life pods. Even a ship called a corvette, which wasn’t a lot larger than their own ship joined the ranks. Though not everyone made it, Michaels had the unfortunate task of informing Master Sergeant Yakonva that a number of friendly vessels were destroyed or captured as they tried to make their way to the rally point, which was set between the station and the anomaly. Giving them the best cover for the larger vessels, including their own, to start taking on people from the life pods. The station would have been better but whoever was there had denied them access to land.

But as they got closer, Ronny noticed something. Something that the three Marines in the room didn’t because they were focused on the glowing screens around them.

“Was that glowing before?” Ronny asked. His eyes locked out of the front window of the ship at a glowing bulb of light. It wasn’t intense but he could still make it out amongst the darkness of space. There was no doubt it was glowing.

“Ahhh….” Michaels said when he looked up from his console, “No… Asking the Rome for guidance. They do have a commander.”

He referred to their rag tag fleet's only ‘capital’ ship, the single corvette among them. But as they watched, and continued their approach the light began to grow brighter. Even more so as they passed the station. They could all see it and thanks to it, they could see the other ships ahead of them. One of them turned end over end to point the other way, then another, and another. All deciding that they didn’t like the rally point anymore.

“O’Conner, bring us to a full stop,” Yakonva ordered quietly while her eyes were at the glowing orb. Irish didn’t hesitate and Ronny felt a lurch as the orb disappeared below the window.

“Irish, what are you doing? Engage the engines!” Michaels said looking up from his console again.

“I am!” O’Conner said and wiggled the thumb of his right hand, which was pushing something forward and up.

“What’s going on?” Sergeant Yakonva demanded.

“We’re still going towards that thing! Initiating emergency thrusters,” Michaels announced and flipped a few switches. Yakonva braced, so Ronny did too but nothing happened other than a vibration through the hull, “Thrusters are… bloody hell, we’re still going backward.”

“Look the Rome, they just fired everything they have,” O’Conner said and all eyes darted to the window to see a plume of light from not just the largest ship around them but several others as well.

“Warp bubble forming,” Michaels informed them and the Rome was suddenly wrapped in a haze…. But that was it and a moment later it was just as clear as it had been before, “Warp… warp bubble collapsed. Comms are off the charts. No one can pull away… Rome has gone dark.”

They sat there and watched both the numerous small vessels struggle to break free of whatever had them, O’Conner doing his best to do the same, and at the instrument panel. Michaels had zoomed in on the three dimensional display. Ships closer to the orb disappeared from it while they drew ever closer.

“Impact… in three, two, one,” Michaels had read the numbers off the display and Ronny shut his eyes tightly. But when he didn’t die, he opened them again.

Swirling green, red, purple, pink, orange, blue… every color of light was spinning around them. Not even moving in the same direction. Not all at the same speed… Then a dull blue light, the orb again.

“It kicked us back out the other side!” Michael yelled in triumph and O’Conner didn’t wait to flip the ship over and fire the engines, “We’re pulling away.”

He sounded relieved but O’Conner looked at the central display and took his hands off the controls to zoom it back out. Then he tapped at the display, it provided a larger image.

It showed a nearby planet. With a moon. He looked up out of the window and gasped. Ronny did too and could see why he had that reaction. There was a little brown marble in the distance with an even smaller white marble near it.

Without a word, O’Conner grabbed the controls again and twisted the ship around and pointed it at a star… no a sun. Even Ronny knew they weren’t in the same place anymore. It had been pitch where they were. There wasn’t really any source of light. But now they could see.

Ronny noticed something else too when they spun. He leaned forward and looked up…

“What is that?” he asked.

The other eyes looked up until O’Conner moved the ship again.

“That’s a galaxy…” Ronny didn’t pay attention to who said it. He looked at the faint pattern of light with spiraling arms. It looked small but it was not a star, that’s what caught his eye when they twisted. It was something else.

“That’s the Triangulum galaxy. I remember learning ‘bout it when I took astronomy. But you can’t see it that well from the Orion spur… it’s on the far side of the Andromeda galaxy,” O’Conner said while Michael tapped rapidly on the keys in front of him.

“Master Sergeant. Navigation can’t pick out a single known constellation. The other ships are reporting the same,” Michaels reported, “Same with pulsars.”

“We’re lost?” Ronny asked for clarification and Michaels glanced back at him before nodding his head, “Then maybe we should just mosey on back through that light thing back there and get unlost.”

O’Conner once again turned the ship but Michael looked at his console and shook his head again, “It’s gone…”

Yakonva, Ronny, O'conner, and Michaels all looked out the window as they turned anyway. The faintly glowing orb… was nowhere to be found.

“Where the fuck are we?”

"Well, now I'm not the only one far from home, huh?"