I never saw it as a battle before

To win the fight

There has to be more

And there's no way to change this angry heart

'Cause all these fears

Will tear you apart

And it's been this way since time began

It's an endless journey, it's the fate of man

To live each day and never understand

Black Sabbath - “Angry Heart”

With the Quarantine’s failure, it was no longer just the Ronin worlds being threatened. The Ophipteran planet Exuqyxx, for example, cast a nervous eye to the heavens, beefing up their meager planetary defenses. This latest war, in fact, had thrown wide open a glaring loophole in the Tetrarchy’s military strategy, one that had no simple solution.

The planetary shields.

Before the first war the Triumvirate had hidden beneath their shields, certain nothing could touch them. The Khonhim disabused them of that notion with their Breaker missiles, designed to shatter the energy barriers. It had given them the ability to rampage through the ancient worlds with impunity until they finally stopped them with help from the humans.

The second war ten years later had shown a vast improvement in ships and weapons, but they had done no research regarding the shields. All available funds were being funneled into building a real Navy and Army, one that could stand toe to toe with the Khonhim. The shields, already proven to be useless, were ignored, other than the desperate gamble of Operation Lacuna, the final battle of the war. Stripping the shield generators from a dozen nearby worlds and using them to contain the enemy fleet, buying enough time for the rest of the Alliance forces to arrive, turned the tide...but once it was over things returned to the status quo. Once again, the shields were ignored.

Twenty years passed. The shields remained in place because it was easier than dismantling them, inertia prevailing once again. Some half-hearted research was done, looking for ways to make improvements, but nothing had come of it. The problem was always the same...how to make the shield function as intended, while still allowing friendly ships to enter and exit the atmosphere. Triumvirate ships...and later, those of the Tetrarchy...were all fitted with a device designed to interact with the energy matrix of the planetary shield, allowing it to slip through unharmed. In fact, the Breaker missile was a brute-force application of this same concept, conceived independently as all ships they designed were fitted to slag the apparatus the instant the ship came under attack. It was a fail-safe measure to prevent it from falling into unfriendly hands, the very design going all the way back to the attempted genocide of the Khonhim and the formation of the Triumvirate itself. It was so ancient they had forgotten its original purpose...and yet all vessels were still equipped the same as they always had been, with no one questioning why.

The Masters, however, had not forgotten. It had been their own technology that had provided the basis for the shields and enclosed within the nanotech delivery systems used to turn the Ronin into mindless murderous zombies was one small addition...giving them the ability to penetrate the shields themselves. It was the reason behind the suicidal runs against the other worlds, for, in fact, the hijacked ships would be in the way. The subverted Ronin instead used their own metallic bodies to bypass the energy barrier...and no place was safe.

Not Exuqyxx, for as the cruiser Echidna fought the rogue vessel taken from the Xairac shipyards, its destruction allowed the Ronin inside the freedom to glide undetected to the planet’s surface. It being an Ophipteran world; the Ronin changed tactics, instead of seeking other Ronin to subvert (the few on the planet were all being held under close guard), they made their way to the centers controlling the planet’s energy grid...a grid based on the same Matter/Antimatter annihilation technology that powered their vessels.

It was almost a trivial matter to turn those same generators...into bombs.

“...are we about ready to get this show on the road?” Tango demanded.

“I’m ready,” Musashi informed her, settling into the pilot’s chair. “Just waiting on Graybird’s go ahead.”

She turned her attention to the hacker. “Graybird?” she asked, a hint of impatience in her voice.

“Hold on, just running one last system check,” he snapped, annoyed. His eyes were glued to the monitor in front of him, scrutinizing the scrolling data.

Tango just shook her head, before glancing over at the final member of the crew. “Whisper?”

Their personal lunatic had his feet propped up on the console in front of him, balancing one of his beloved daggers by the point on the tip of his finger. “Do you even need to ask?” he chuckled, not bothering to even look in her direction.

Repressing a sigh, she turned her attention back to the sole holdout. “Graybird? Waiting on you.”

“...just a second,” he fired back, as the lines of code ended. “Ok...all systems appear to be ready,” he said at last, “though I’m getting a couple of odd readings. Weight seems to be off.”

“Considering how much equipment you grafted onto this shuttle, I’m not surprised,” Musashi grunted. “Disengaging clamps and engaging thrusters,” he announced, as the shuttle fell free of Chiron, beginning its descent towards the planet’s surface.

“I thought I’d accounted for that,” he sighed, as he pulled up another screen.

“Look, just tell me this…whatever it is...will work,” Tango said with feeling, “otherwise, the Tetrarchy will experience a rather sharp population decline.”

“It’s an Optically Pumped Quantum Absorption Refrigeration Laser system,” he sniffed, “or OPQARL, for short. Didn’t anyone read the summary I passed out?”

His teammates suddenly found reasons to look elsewhere, other than Whisper, who didn’t bother. “...why do I even try?” he sighed once more, as he went back to his instruments.

“I don’t need to know how to build one,” Tango tried again. “I just need to know if it will work.”

“It should,” he said after a moment, “but until we test it, I can’t say for certain.”

“Ok ...so we find you a Ronin on the planet, in the open and isolated...and then what?” she asked.

“Then I lock them up in my sights and fire the laser,” he shrugged. “Assuming it’s as fast as I think it is, it should drop that electronic brain to just above Absolute Zero, before the suicide protocol kicks in.” There was a pause before he gave her a chagrined look. “Er...there is one minor detail…”

“Of course there is,” Tango said in exasperation. “What is it? Might as well get this all out of the way now, while we still can.”

“It’s no big deal,” he explained. “We just need to get in kind of close is all.”

“Uh-huh…how close?”

“...about twenty meters,” Graybird mumbled.

“Twenty meters? Did he just say twenty meters?” Musashi lashed out. “And you’re just telling me this now?”

“...do you have any idea how much energy that beam will lose for every meter it travels?” Graybird shot back. “And that’s not even counting the attenuation! I’m sorry, but I don’t control the laws of physics!”

“Wonderful, just goddamn wonderful,” Musashi snarled. “‘I’m supposed to hover this beast twenty meters off the deck while you fire your Death Ray...and somehow keep from crashing and killing us all in the process?” He turned in his seat to glare at his teammate. “And you couldn’t have told me this sooner?”

“It was in the summary!” he shouted back. “Had you bothered to read it…”

“ENOUGH!” Tango roared, bringing the conversation to an abrupt halt. “Whisper?” She turned to look at the third man, who was watching the argument in silent amusement. “If they start up again...and I can’t believe I’m about to say this...you may indulge yourself.”

That perked him right up, a wide grin spreading across his face as he considered the other two, licking his lips in anticipation.

Musashi and Graybird shared a brief look...and then busied themselves in their instruments. Whisper seemed disappointed by their sudden change in demeanor.

“Now then,” she said, giving them a few moments to settle back down, “let’s try this again. Musashi, given what we now know about the laser’s limitations, can you still do this?”

He considered the question and then nodded. “It’ll be tricky, and if the weather is bad enough, we must wave off...but I think so.” Musashi shot Graybird a dirty look. “If I’m wrong, however...I hope everyone has made their funeral arrangements.”

Graybird smirked, mocking his teammate’s glare. “I’m having myself stuffed and mounted, just like Lenin,” he said. “It’ll be a great conversation piece for clients visiting corporate headquarters.”

“That’s just bizarre,” Tango said, rolling her eyes. “Me, I’m planning on having the biggest blowout you’ve ever seen,” she smirked. “If Security isn’t called, and no one gets arrested, I’ll be disappointed.”

“I’ve already made plans to have my body shipped home,” Musashi said. “My family’s plot. They’ll handle the rest of the details.”

Tango nodded and then turned to Whisper. “What about you?”

The smirk disappeared. “I don’t want a funeral, or a memorial, or anything like that,” he mumbled. “Just scatter my ashes someplace scenic and pour one out.” He fixed Tango with an odd expression. “I don’t want to be remembered.”

She blinked at that, unsure what to make of his answer, when Graybird interrupted her thoughts. “I’m still getting that weird weight reading,” he reported. “Could you check aft? Maybe something got knocked loose.”

“On it,” she nodded, as she headed to the rear of the shuttle. As small as it was, there were only a handful of compartments to check.

It was the last one where she located the problem.

“...does your entire family have a fucking death wish?” she shouted, as Taichist and Chechla cowered before her.