If I would have to describe the situation I was launched in with a single word, it would be trouble. The pirates had instantly recognised that the Merathron had more than enough firepower to introduce them to the wonderful experience of explosive decompression and their only chance was to pull something out of any orifice that might keep us occupied. And they were checking their orifices, hard. In fact, I wouldn’t have been too surprised if an old-fashioned steel kitchen sink came tumbling by, thrown at us in an effort to keep us busy.

But for now, they had split up, their heavy freighter shifting its vector away from us, as hard as it could, even jettisoning the single container it had carried while their mixed and matched Starfighters were continuing on their course, pushing it towards us, their frigate following behind them, providing cover.

“Vampires! Vampires! Vampires!” the call was repeated three times over the tactical channel as the freight container the pirates had jettisoned broke apart, the six walls slowly tumbling away, revealing a shipment of pain, looking for a recipient. The container must have been filled to the brim with crude and simple missiles, nothing more than starfighter engines bolted to solid metal objects, all of which were now accelerating towards the Merathorn. Normally, such crude weapons could be dodged without a care in the world, neither their guidance-system nor their engines able to keep up with a military spacecraft but sadly, the pirates were smart and didn’t target the Merathorn, not really, they had dropped their load in such a way that it would pass their fighters on the way to the Merathorn, most of the missiles missing her but hitting the freighter we had jumped to protect.

“New orders! Carmine Group 3, Group 4, smack those missiles.” the bridge ordered, turning what would have been a slaughter from us into a situation that was much closer to a fair fight than anyone wanted.

“Twitch, you are my wing.” Manta ordered, while we were screaming through space, towards the rapidly approaching pirate Starfighters. A few thousand kilometers, Group 1 and 2 had formed up, to welcome the pirate Starfighters to the party while Wildcat and Wolverine were falling in behind us.

“We don’t want to boost too hard, so we can stay with the missiles.” he continued and, after about a second of acceleration, we let our velocity carry us through space, waiting for group 4 to get launched from the Merathorn.

Ahead of us, the pirates started to shoot at Groups 1 and 2, trying to destroy their opponents and from what I could see, the pirates were outmatched but made up for it with sheer, suicidal determination. That they had a frigate in the mixed helped to close the performance gap, both of the pilots and their fighters.

“Stick together, the pirates will try to stay behind their missiles, hoping to use them to break through our formation and cause enough trouble to get a window to escape.” Manta ordered and I understood what he meant. The pirates hadn’t really changed their vector, sure, they were jinking and juking, trying to get a shot at the other Carmines, but ultimately, they continued to accelerate towards the Merathorn.

Problematically, that meant that Groups 1 and 2, who had accelerated hard to keep them away from the Merathorn were now on a vector away from the battle after shooting down three pirates and damaging four more and putting a few holes into their frigate. In turn, one of them was out of the fight, their wingman reporting that the fighter was still mostly intact but drifting away from the fight. Two more had light damage, nothing that stopped them from continuing the fight.

“Group 1 and 2, continue towards their freighter, make sure that this was their last ambush.” Captain Burris ordered, making use of their velocity and vector. As it stood, they should easily catch up to the freighter before it could escape and if two Carmine-Groups plus the Merathorn itself were unable to deal with one intact home-built Starfighter, four that were damaged and a frigate that was leaking air, we should turn in our pilot-license. Of course, the fight was made more interesting by the twenty missiles the pirates had thrown at us, but even so, we should come out on top.

“We are adjusting our vector.” Manta ordered and Group 3 came to a stop, waiting for the pirates to come to us, as we essentially juked through space. We didn’t have to wait long, Manta had calculated the distances and vectors involved incredibly precise, allowing us to start accelerating back towards the Merathorn just as we came to a stop.

But we were not just accelerating, at the same time, we had to dodge the incoming fire from the pirates and shoot back. I fell into a state of pure reaction, my mind merging with the fighter to the point that I forgot I wasn’t a Starfighter and simply reacted to what my sensors were telling me.

Manta was near me, dodging the incoming fire and I was sticking to him, my mind reacting to the data sent to me by his Starfighter without conscious thought. When my sensors presented me a target, I never thought about what I was shooting at, the knowledge that there was no friend-or-foe recognition enough for me to send deadly plasma into the void.

When Manta threw his fighter into a sharp spiral, using his wing-thrusters to change his fighter profile, I had to guess how far he was going while using my own thrusters to shift myself upwards from my point of view and over, to stay with him. I was halfway in the maneuver when my targeting sensors presented the next target, barely still in range and I instantly sent more plasma into the void.

And then, barely a second after the fight had started, it mostly ended, with the pirates having turned their fighters to shoot back at us, without changing their vector and us trying to catch them, as the three remaining pirates and their frigate sprinted behind eight missiles towards the Merathorn

I felt my body start to come down from the incredible adrenaline-boost I had just received, stretching that single second into what felt like an eternity. And while my body came down, my mind caught up to him and I realised that I had just killed a man. Or woman, who knew. I had shot down one of the pirates and two missiles and somehow, I felt a little strange. It was one thing to train in the simulator, to destroy computer-generated foes, no matter how realistic and now my mind was telling me, I had killed someone. Another person. Another human.

But I couldn’t dwell on that, not while dodging deadly plasma and accelerating as fast as our Starfighters could, trying to get into range with the pirates again. Far in front of us, Group 4 had launched and was ready to give the pirates a last gauntlet to run before they were in range of the Merathorn and her mighty cannons.

“You are taking the lead, Twitch. We are going after the frigate.” Manta ordered, and I noticed that it had stopped accelerating, maybe due to engine trouble. If that was the case, we’d quickly catch up and teach the pirates to breathe vacuum. As I took the lead-position, with Manta falling back to cover me, I noticed that his fighter reported damage, nothing serious but enough for him to give the lead to me. And I would make him proud.

While he fell back, he spoke over an open channel, ordering the frigate to stand down or be destroyed. I hadn’t even considered giving them a choice in the matter but he was the commanding officer. When there was no response, he ordered the attack without hesitation.

Moments later, I had to shunt the information coming from the combat-center to the side and focus on the frigate that was coming into range. I was in the lead with Wolverine leading the other pair and the frigate was desperate, filling the void between us with plasma and even a few solid slugs. I let my fighter dance, liberally using the wing-thrusters to keep my pattern erratic and impossible to predict, even I didn’t know where I would be a few seconds later. And all throughout that dance, I kept creeping closer until finally, I was in range and started to get a jittery target resolution. The frigate tried to dodge but it was mostly a lame duck, small puffs of gas escaping as it was leaking atmosphere.

At the end of the day, it was impossible to tell who destroyed the frigate, both Wolverine and I got a few solid hits in, striking it at virtually the same time. One of our shots must have penetrated the shielding of the frigate’s antimatter-reactor, resulting in a quite spectacular ball of expanding plasma. And, just like that, I realised that I’d have to add another eight people to the tally, or maybe calling it four would be better, sharing the responsibility with Wolverine.

And that was the end of the battle for us, the rest of our foes too far away for us to reach.