“Give me some details,” Will said to Mark with just a hint of frustration. He had paused his run to his ship and the group had stopped with him. No point in hurrying into an unknown fight. “How many, what ships?”

“I see thirty-nine ships, the largest is destroyer sized. Twenty-eight fighters, five corvettes, four frigates, and two destroyers.”

“Dang, who did you piss off?” Will asked, shaking his head.

“If they’re using their own markings--which pirates don’t always do--they’re the Crimson Nine.”

“There are more than nine of them out there,” said Pete dryly.

“Har har. Not sure what I did to piss them off. I must be a victim of my own success. They won’t be able to do much against the station itself with their fleet, but it’s enough to stop ships from docking and undocking without pushing the pirates away from the station first. Most of my pilots are out on that mining op. Not that they’d be great in a dogfight anyways, and not that you’d want to announce your presence to them.”

“Agreed,” said Will. “We need to try to handle this on our own. Are your station guns still working with the hacking going on?”

“Um. Let me check,” Mark said. He kept talking as he worked. “The majority of the hacking was disrupting the communications between systems. I’m already back in the control center, so I have access to most major systems here, and I can clear out the rest without moving. It’s just going to take time.” There was a pause. “Okay, yes. The station guns are online, but I would have to manually control them so they don’t fire at you guys. That’ll only be a problem if the hackers have something else up their sleeves. They’re still loose, but as I get more security nodes back up they wont be able to run for long.”

“That’s still going to be a tough fight,” Will said, grimacing. “And I doubt they’ll come inside range of those guns. We could use the station as a safe area. We could try running but they might try to follow us and chase us down. We won’t be able to brawl with them. Our best bet is to bloody their noses, but how?”

“I got four frigates if you want to use them,” said Mark. “A destroyer too, but it’s not the most mobile. I don’t really have any corvettes and you got your own fighters already.”

Info in the ships appeared in Cam’s heads up display. The stats and loadouts were there for him to look at. He watched Will move his hands to manipulate the data. It was strange to observe, as Cam couldn’t see Will’s heads up display--all he saw was Will’s hands waving and pointing in the air. Cam glanced at the loadouts himself, but he doubted he would be able to process the information fast enough to make sense of it. He activated his Combat Focus to give him a few more seconds to look. It was probably a waste of time, but his Psi Energy could handle it.

Combat Focus lasted for thirty game seconds, and could be extended, but at a price of using a lot more Psi Energy. During use his mind worked faster, effectively letting him experience extra time dilation for that time. It had a cooldown of several minutes. Cam had only used it once, when first testing out what it could do. He hadn’t had the chance to use it in battle--the last battle he had forgotten about it until he had powered down his fighter--but even though he was using it now, it should be up again by the time any fighting got serious.

Frigates were much larger than fighters: About four times as long, and had eight times the hitpoints a fighter would have. They weren’t quite big enough to be considered a capital ship—destroyers were the smallest ship with that classification--but they were still large compared to what Cam was used to. Cam’s fighter had about three thousand hit points between shield, armor and hull. These had about twenty thousand, all together.

The frigates were all Brandur class, which unsurprisingly Cam hadn’t heard of. Three were armor tanked, meaning they had more armor hit points than shield hitpoints, but they also had modules that could repair the armor over time. Those modules took a lot of power to run, but it also meant the shields required far less power to use and recharge. The shields in this case were more of an alarm that you were getting fired upon than a serious line of defense. They’d get stripped off in only a few shots, but then the enemy still had your main defenses to get through.

The fourth frigate was also Brandur class, but was shield focused and had equipment to make it more agile and faster. It was a contrast to the slower, armor tanked loadouts of the other three, but all four had the same weapons: long ranged, slow firing but powerful guns. The fourth one he could figure out its purpose: be fast and constantly moving so that it wouldn’t be caught, and use the long range weapons to wear down an enemy. The other three seemed too slow to fill the same purpose. He was still trying to figure out why they were loaded out like that with their equipment when Will started talking again.

“Mark, do you have the equipment to load the fourth frigate out like the other three?” Will said with almost unbearable slowness. It was the Combat Focus speeding up Cam’s perceptions. With it active the world around him seemed to move like through a sludge.

It had to be at least twice as slow as he was used to maybe even more. He could see how using Combat Focus would help in the heat of battle. It could also be annoying if used at the wrong time. Trying to communicate orders while your mind is racing three times as fast as your mouth and the words might not come out right. Or use it to pick a target, and then spend most of the thirty seconds flying towards that enemy at what felt like a crawl, the only consolation is that they looked like they were crawling as well. Cam decided to cancel the ability’s effects early so that he didn’t have to figure out Will’s slow words.

“Naw, what you see is what I got,” Mark said at normal speed. “The mismatched ship was an experiment. The other three are a loadout I’ve come to like.”

“We’ll make it work. I think we’ll pass on the destroyer. We need to stay mobile.” Will switched over to the wing’s channel. “Who is comfortable with a hopper?” he asked. “We got three frigates.”

Cam glanced at the frigate loadouts again. It took a moment to figure out what Will was talking about. He found the module that was called a Warp Displacement Device and figured it had to be the culprit. He selected it to look at its details. It turned out to be a module based on making short warp hops on the battlefield, effectively repositioning a ship mid-combat. It had a minimum distance of fifty kilometers and a maximum distance of one hundred and fifty. The three ship’s loadouts made sense now. The hoppers were how they kept range. Even so, frigates weren’t too large of ships. The largest guns you could fit on one only had an effective range of about forty kilometers.

Well, scratch that, Cam realized. For him they would only have an effective range of about forty. For a well skilled pilot, it should be well into the fifties, maybe even up to sixty kilometers. It would be perfect for the short end of the hopper’s range, and the longer range would give them even a larger buffer of where to go on the battlefield. The module’s largest drawbacks were the skills needed to use and its cooldown. Even if Cam threw all his current extra points into the prerequisites he wouldn’t be close to using one. It also could only be activated once every three minutes. A fighter could easily close the distance in that time and lock the frigate down.

“I could,” said Lant. “Not my style, but I have the skills.”

Another voice came over the comms: “I can fly one.” Cam recognized it as Scott Williams, the guy who had been upset that Cam had joined the wing. Cam frowned. He wasn’t too sure about Williams getting into a larger, more powerful craft, but then again, it wasn’t his decision.

“Emma, you can use a hopper right?” Will asked.

“Only if you want a new babysitter for Flyboy,” she replied, nodding at Cam.

Will seemed to weigh this in his mind. Cam wasn’t sure how another pilot would act with him as their wingman. Emma seemed capable of flying on her own with only a minimal need of Cam’s help. And he wasn’t much help yet. Another pilot might rely on him too much and get into situations where they both got killed.

They were saved from making a decision when Jawntwo spoke up.

“I can fly one if you need,” he said. “Can’t say the last time I used one ended well, but if we’re sticking together I can follow the group.”

Cam then realized that Jawntwo was one of the pilots who had left with Williams in the mess hall after getting upset at Cam. Still, Jawntwo hadn’t made any snide comments or done anything rude to Cam. Maybe Williams had cooled off and everything was better now.

Will nodded and motioned for Jawntwo and Lant to head to the frigates. He called Williams to get prepped for a frigate as well.

“Gauss, we got three more fighters for you to fit in the hauler,” Will said over the comms. “Think you can get them in?”

“What would you all do without me?” came her voice over the comms. She sounded playful, if just a touch annoyed. “I’ll run back out, and get them squared away. Just let me know if you leave anything else behind before I get all comfy in the pilot’s chair again.”

Cam saw her leave the cargo ship and moving back to the hangar crane. At the same time, Williams ran right by with only a salute to Will--he didn’t even glance at Cam--and followed the other two. The three pilots were heading to an elevator that would take them to the frigate berths.

The rest of them moved to their fighters. Cam settled in to his fighter and got it ready to fly. As they prepped Will opened a channel to the wing.

“Alright, pilots. We’re going to set up a mobile sniper nest. Our goal is to poke and annoy until these pirates leave. All fighters are on guard duty while the frigates do the poking.”

“Won’t those destroyers be able to hit us at that range?” Zelou asked.

“We’ll have to see their capabilities. The real issue is the other frigates. We can outrun the destroyers if need be, or at least get angular velocity on them to make ourselves harder to hit, but if the frigates equal us, we might be in for a tough firefight. Most pirate fleets go for mobility, but that doesn’t always mean sniper builds.”

“And if those frigates do have sniper builds?”

“We’ll keep our fighters moving and take pot shots at their fighters. Best we can do is hope for them to make a mistake in that situation,” said Will. “Everybody form up and get ready to join the party.”

Mark had apparently refueled and restocked all the fighters while they were in storage. The biggest thing that meant was that Cam had two more fighter-to-fighter missiles. Mark had also reskinned them, to give them colors other than the ones they had at their last battle. Cam thought the colors were random at first. He saw every color from deep blues to bright yellows. He wasn’t sure what he thought about the red and orange streaking over his ship’s hull. It could be worse, he knew. When he saw Will’s ship he knew it wasn’t entirely random. Will’s ship was covered in pink and baby blue. It was definitely something Mark would do on purpose. Fortunately colors provided almost no combat advantages. Even in short ranged fights most tracking was done by computers, not eyes.

The wing lifted off their platform and formed up. There were only twenty fighters. Gauss was in the cargo ship and Lant, Williams and Jawntwo in frigates. Gauss stayed docked for the moment. She was still getting the fighters into the cargo ship, and her ship wouldn’t be any use in a firefight. The frigates were ready to go soon after. The fighters separated into three groups. One for each frigate, although the plan was for them to all stay together. They were the underdogs. Pirates were generally known for having good small fleet tactics since small groups allowed them to be mobile and choose their fights. On top of that casualties for the wing still meant the loss of pilots for the mission.

Once everyone had their orders of which frigates to fly with, Will told Mark to open the cargo doors for them to leave. Mohler cloaked up and went out first to scout. The doors stopped opening once there was enough room for the frigates to go through.

“There’s room to slip out,” Mohler said. “They’re giving the station plenty of room. I’m betting they were more here for escort than a fight.”

“Maybe,” said Will, doubtfully, “but I’m betting they’ll be fine with a fight anyway. Especially if they see an easy target like a hauler. The plan is the same. Move out and annoy them off the field, then we’ll undock the hauler.”

The doors opened slightly more. The fighters moved out first, and the frigates followed. The pirates were in a group about a hundred kilometers from the station. The formation was small compared to what Cam saw in first space fight, but it was still impressive. The destroyers formed a threatening core that the frigates and corvettes were anchored around. The fighters formed a few small groups slightly in front of the main formation. The fighters themselves outnumbered the wing and Cam was sure they would have better pilots than what Cam had seen from Aluvius’ rushed form ups to fight the Engra.

Once the wing was formed up outside, they started burning away from the station, not towards the pirate ships, but tangentially away from them--up compared to the station’s orientation, not that up or down really held meaning this far from a gravity well.

The frigates slowed the formation down, but only a bit. Their max speeds were about seven hundred and fifty meters per second. Cam’s max speed had gone up from nine hundred meters per second to nine-fifty with his skills. He was slow compared to the other pilots. He was sure Tophet had around one thousand two-hundred for her ship’s max speed. Lant, Williams, and Jawntwo had good enough skills to almost keep up with Cam, even in ships two classes larger than him.

It didn’t take long for the maneuvering battle to begin. The pirates didn’t want to give them too much distance, but they also didn’t want to approach the station too much either. The station was small compared to the one the wing had attacked with the Engra, so its guns were less powerful and had a shorter range. They wouldn’t be able to damage a destroyer or smaller ships at a hundred kilometers as long as the ships kept just a tiny sideways motion. A flak gun would spread out too much by that distance and any concentrated slug’s chance of hitting was barely a rounding error.

The pirate ships were all mismatched with many different kinds of hulls. The two destroyers looked the same--and Cam’s interface marked them as Klixue class--but there were no more than two of the same class for the frigates and corvettes. Velox, Zerda, and Lynx, Attica, Beiti, for classes respectively. The fighters were a smattering mix, just like the Caelestis wing.

Cam wasn’t sure if the lack of ship coordination was a good sign or a bad one. In larger battles, having lots of the same kinds of ships usually helped with fighting as each ship had the same capabilities, but this wasn’t that large of a battle, and the wing was outnumbered almost two to one. The lack of coordination could mean the same it meant for the Caelestis wing: the pilots were sure of their abilities, and didn’t need that sort of uniform capabilities. The Caelestis wing was able to fight in smaller groups and be more independent.

The pirates started burning only once the Caelestis frigates were about twenty kilometers away from the station. The frigates could still run back to the station, but the pirates were betting on a fight. Their fighters started an intercept path that took them deep into the station’s guns range but at a speed where the chances of the guns hitting was still almost nothing. The larger ships seemed to be taking a more roundabout course to cut them off.

That could be enough to turn the battle in the wing’s favor, Cam thought. The fighters might outnumber them, but the pirates were not taking the Caelestis formation as a serious threat. If they could lower the number of pirate fighters then they would have complete mobile superiority. Even if they could not kill the destroyers, they could completely avoid them and possibly escort the hauler out with a few well executed maneuvers.

Will kept the wing on the same course. They had passed the frigate’s maximum speed, which only meant their acceleration dropped significantly, so they continued to slowly gain speed. They only angled once the enemy fighters closed to sixty kilometers. The fighters had arced around and were trying to approach with a mostly parallel approach, but Will angled the wing to keep the frigates at their aft. It allowed for easier shots from their frigates on the smaller fighters.

“Start locking targets,” Will said. “Spread out the locks so they don’t know who we’re going to fire on. I’ll call out actual targets when they get closer. Frigates, you’re free to fire when they get within forty-five klicks.”

The effect was immediate, but not as drastic as Cam had hoped. Once the locks started the pirate fighters changed their angle, but kept formation. Their angle still made a slow approach to the wing, and would cut the wing off from the station as the battle continued. The wing kept trying to match the angle so the frigates would always have a good shot, but the pirate fighters were more agile than the wing and would eventually catch up to the frigates.

The angle also forced them in a bearing that would let the other pirate ships close faster and keep the wing away from the station. That wasn’t a worry at the moment, as the larger pirate ships were still over eighty kilometers away. But it would fast become an issue once the enemy fighters engaged and bogged down the formation.

Before the enemy fighters were within range, they changed course and started navigating around the wing. They kept about sixty kilometers distance, and, being faster than the wing, soon got in front of them. It put the small Caelestis fleet in a tough position. If they kept burning in that direction, the enemy fighters could reverse direction and burn towards the frigates far faster than the frigates could burn away. With luck they would close in seconds and with only taking a few losses. It would turn the fight into a brawl before Caelestis could thin the enemy’s numbers. However if Will ordered the wing to switch directions it would allow the larger pirate ships to catch up faster.

Instead, Will kept the wing burning straight ahead, towards the pirate fighters. They still had an ace up their sleeve with the hoppers. With some luck they could get some kills before having to use them.

Another fifty kilometers and the enemy fighters finally made their move. The wing was more than two hundred kilometers from the station by now, no way for them to get back and no way the station would hit even a stationary target this far. The fighters reversed direction and engaged their afterburners, to close the distance to the wing’s frigates as fast as possible. With the smaller ship’s higher agility and the afterburners they closed the distance in seconds.

Long range guns like the frigates were using had horrible tracking. They could out range an enemy, but if the enemy got too close the guns would be worthless against them. The other trade off of long range weapons were that they had a high damage per shot, but low firing rate. It allowed a huge amount of up-front damage--often called an alpha strike or alpha damage--which could eliminate ships, but would take several seconds between one volley and the next.

The wing’s frigates fired their first salvo and three enemy fighters disappeared, but the rest of the fighters would be on top of them before their guns would cycle for another shot.

“Hop straight ahead, sixty klicks,” Will commanded. “Fighters, engage your ‘burners and meet up. Leave a present for the following targets.”

The hoppers took a few seconds to wind up. The frigates engaged them as soon as Will gave the order. The hoppers could be disrupted, just like any warp. Every warp drive could be modulated into a warp damper, which would disrupt warp bubbles from forming, even the specialized ones from the hoppers. Only if a ship’s warp drive was strong enough would it be able to still engage in warp. Equal sized ships could stop each other from warping off if they were close enough, but smaller ships needed more numbers against larger ships. A single fighter could stop another fighter from warping off, but it would take several fighters to stop a frigate and hundreds to stop a battleship.

In order to make sure the pirate fighters couldn’t stop the hop, the wing’s fighters flew straight at them, each launching a single one of their anti-fighter missiles to disrupt the enemy’s mad dash to the frigates.

Will had picked four targets for the missiles, which put five missiles burning for each target. At the rate they were closing the missiles would most likely miss, but would turn around for another pass at the enemy. The pirates would be forced to take time to kill the missiles or else sacrifice those fighters.

The pirates had the same idea, but they were not as organized as the Caelestis targeting. It seemed purely a reactive order, with the salvo of missiles from them targeting half the fighters in the wing. Cam couldn’t find the one targeting him before it was too late. It was launched by a ship that passed right by him and came straight for his ship. By the time he saw it no amount of evasive maneuvers could have helped.

Pain washed over him as the missile blasted into his shields. He could feel it all over the ship, the heat and impact from the blast scorching into his nose and wings. His shields were gone in an instant and his armor chunked down to less than thirty percent, but his hull was intact and his systems only took marginal damage. He mentally shook his head as the pain faded.

“You okay there, Flyboy?” Tophet called over at him. He could hear concern in her voice. He couldn’t blame her. He had taken a direct hit. One missile fortunately wasn’t enough to destroy his ship, but he had no armor left for a second. They were past the enemy lines by now. The friendly frigates had all made the hop and were straight ahead of them. Tophet had dropped behind him, guarding his ship with hers, just in case any enemy tried to take a long range pot shot at him.

“I’m okay,” he said. “The pain was intense for a moment. I’m wondering if I should turn the percentage down.”

“You get used to it,” she said. “I know pain is a strange thing to experience in a game, but Void has so many safeguards to keep it manageable. I think it adds some spice to the game. Makes avoiding damage more motivating, since death is merely a temporary setback here.”

“Eh, maybe,” he said, not convinced. Still, he didn’t bother with it for now. He remembered that turning the pain level down too much could interfere with experience gain. He looked around to take in the situation and realized he might still need some help. “I got another missile targeting me, but we have a few seconds before it’ll get close.”

“I see it,” Tophet said. “Stay your course, keep burning past the frigates if you need. I’ll take care of it.”

He didn’t need to go far. Tophet backed off her velocity, falling back several kilometers and took care of the missile before it got anywhere near. His shields started recharging before he reached the frigates but it would take a couple minutes before it got back up to full strength. His armor was in tatters, but he remembered that the nanites he could now use could repair the armor. The nanites weren’t super fast, so it would take even longer to fix, but he got started immediately. With how much armor he lost, even with full shields he would die from another missile. That or at the very least least his systems would get so severely damaged that he would become a sitting duck.

The Caelestis frigates were still safe for the moment. Their short jump put them in an excellent position. The enemy fighters were still dealing with the missiles so the frigates reversed direction and had time for another shot while the fighters were burning away. Two more wrecks were left in space. Either one frigate missed or two had accidentally targeted the same fighter.

The cat and mouse game soon began again. The wing continued burning once the pirate fighters formed up and started circling around outside of the frigate’s gun range. Five enemy fighters were down, but the wing had several minutes before they could repeat the same maneuver since the hoppers needed time to cool down. The larger enemy ships were still a good distance away. They had stopped burning towards the wing, which made Cam suspicious.

“Tophet, what’s the minimum warp range of, say, those destroyers down there?” he asked.

“It’s two hundred klicks for any ship,” she answered. “I see what you’re thinking, and you’re probably right, but you can’t warp directly on an enemy. You either need a celestial target or a friendly. If they aren’t directly pursuing, we can just keep away from their fighters and we’re safe until we’re ready to re-engage..”

That made him feel a little better. The enemy fighters were trying to circle around. If the wing could buy some time the hoppers would be ready again and they could get a few more fighters safely with the next encounter.

The pirates had to be careful of a direct approach. That would lead to losses very quickly. However, dancing around too much would be favorable for the wing. Will, for his part, did his best to keep the fighters from getting directly behind them compared to the destroyers. That would then allow the fighters to close and the destroyers to warp on top of the wing. The game of cat and mouse went on for a couple minutes before the enemy made their move.

The pirate fighters were almost in a line with the destroyers at that point. They dove at the wing, but not directly. Their approach kept much of their relative angular velocity. The wing’s frigates fired. Two enemy fighters disappeared. Another was damaged, but still flying. The fighter numbers were about equal between the wing and the pirates, but the hoppers weren’t done cooling down so the frigates were vulnerable. They needed just another minute.

“Engage the fighters as far away from the frigates as possible. Split their forces,” said Will. “Missiles free!”

Cam and Tophet joined Will in the middle. The wing shot out in front of the frigates to make as much space as possible. Cam’s shields and armor were only at half, and slowly going up. He didn’t want to die just yet, but still followed Tophet into the fray. The frigates had turned the moment the fighters dove, and were burning away. The direction they were forced to take would push them directly into the enemy’s larger ships. The distance would close quickly if those ships started burning at the wing. They were about to be between a rock and a hard place. They had to pound through the hard place before the rock hit them.

Every fighter in the wing launched another missile, and the enemy did as well. The wing broke off, spreading out tangentially compared to the frigates and the missiles. The enemy split: any fighter that didn’t get targeted dove towards the frigates, with the rest pulling back to give space to destroy the missiles.

The frigates fired one more volley before the fighters were too close to track with their guns. Three enemy fighters went down, but seven more got through. They would take some time whittling down the frigates, but the frigates couldn’t hit back with them that close, and wouldn’t last for long.

The pirate corvettes, frigates, and destroyers were still just over two hundred kilometers away at that point and began a warp. It took only ten seconds for them to spool up and create the warp bubble, and only a few more for them to land on the battlefield.

The wing used that time well. Since they had broken off as a unit from the missiles instead of flying through them they were able to destroy most of them before the enemy fighters got near the frigates, and all but three allied fighters were moving back to the frigates before the larger ships had started spooling up for warp. Those last three still had two missiles targeting them each. It was a tough decision to leave them to deal with the missiles alone, but the frigates were more important.

The enemy fighters were more scattered. Seven had engaged the frigates, but most of the other ones were still dealing with missiles since the split of forces meant less firepower to deal with missiles. Most of the enemy fighters were more than fifty kilometers away and still running from missiles. The frigates couldn’t hit the fighters on top of them, but could hit the fighters that far away. They took one more shot and took down three of the fighters at range.

The allied frigates also had spread out. It was tougher to defend them that way, but at least they could shoot at fighters attacking each other. The seven pirate fighters had decided to gather on a single frigate to concentrate on taking it out. It was the one Lant was piloting. The Caelestis wing descended on enemy fighters and started firing. By that time the enemy corvettes, frigates, and destroyers were just entering warp.

“Concentrate fire to take the fighters out fast,” Will said. “Get as many off the field asap.”

They didn’t have enough time though. The firefight only lasted a few seconds before the wing had to disengage. Cam’s drones had helped take out one enemy fighter and had started on a second, but the wing had to scramble away from landing enemy ships.

“Burn!” shouted Will. “Spiral away!”

The entire wing activated their afterburners and piloted in a spiral, a motion that would keep their transversal up high while helping them gain distance from the larger enemy ships. Their guns still cycled on their current targets, but they only had seconds before they would be out of optimal range. Cam kept his drones back for as long as possible and was rewarded by delivering the final blow to the second fighter. He lost two of them to enemy fighters before he could recall them, but that was the least of his worries currently.

The frigates tried to burn away as well. The larger enemy ships had landed near Lant’s frigate. The other two frigates were able to gain some distance by spiraling, but the enemy fighters who had run from the missiles were forming up and heading towards them. The frigates fired again and were able to take out two of the nearest fighters. At what seemed like the last moment, Cam saw the two frigates hop at max range and leave the fighters behind.

Lant, however, was doomed. Cam watched helplessly as the pirates gobbled up their prize. Between the firepower of all the pirate ships it took seconds. Lant wasn’t even able to get another shot out before he was brought down.

It felt like an eternity to Cam. He watched helplessly as the shields disappeared and then the armor was stripped away. And then armor disappeared. The hull seemed to explode the second the last of the armor was gone. It was the first player death that got to him. He had just been getting to know Lant. As much as he had seemed a hard-nosed jock, he was a friendly, if competitive, guy. Of course Lant was still safe at the Caelestis home base, but this mission was supposed to last for a couple in game months, and Lant would miss it. Why couldn’t it have been Steve Williams’ ship or Jawntwo’s? He would be glad to be rid of either of them.

Grimacing that he couldn’t do anything more about it now, he kept his spiral up. The wing tried to stay in clumps, just in case the enemy fighters tried to engage them as they moved away. There were only eleven enemy fighters left. Caelestis had suffered two losses besides Lant. Fewer pilots for the mission, but still enough to take on eleven enemy fighters if they tried to form up again and go after the frigates. The pirates had been too greedy. Perhaps they wanted a fight that badly, or they knew they wouldn’t get to pin down the frigates without losses, but they had taken heavy losses. Patience is a tough virtue to cultivate in video game players. Sometimes people saw the opportunity and took it for some action, even if they knew it would be a poor choice in the end.

Cam was still spiraling out, heading far more outwards than sideways now. He was definitely out of range of all the guns except perhaps the destroyers, but even then he probably was safe. They had all looked like they had close range, brawling setups. A voice came over the local comm channels.

“It’s about time we had some capable pilots in the area,” the voice--a female’s--said. “Identify yourselves and we might let you go.”

“Let us go?” Will responded just a moment later. “You haven’t caught us yet. The score seems definitely in our favor, no matter what you have on the field.”

“Ha! I can’t deny our losses I suppose,” she said with a laugh. “Still, you’ve suffered some, too. By the way, I was curious, how far is your respawn? I have this nice pilot of yours here and wondered if you still wanted him in the area.”

Then Cam saw it. The frigates must have had some sort of lifepod equipped. Lant was in one, just large enough for a person, life support and an engine. He was still sitting in the midst of the enemy and had no hope of escaping, but they hadn’t opened fire on it yet.

“I bet it isn’t close,” the pirate continued. “I know that station, and I know you aren’t part of Aluvius, and you seem new to the area. How far away will he have to fly to get back to you? How many enemies would he have to cross to get here again? Did you already steal what I was trying to steal?”

“We might have,” Will answered. Cam could tell he was enjoying himself even with Lant’s presence out here on the line. He could just hear the grin on Will’s face. The guy loved interacting with other players be they friends or enemies--especially enemies for some reason. “Look. Neither of us want to be here when Aluvius shows up in a few minutes, but I don’t have anything I can give you right now. How about I owe you one for my pilot’s life? I’ll pay it back once we’re a bit more settled in the area.”

“Ah, so strike now, or wait and perhaps have someone who might be honorable to pay back a favor, but who will most likely become a thorn in my side. Again, who are you?”

“We don’t plan on being a thorn to you,” said Will. The wing had taken the time to form up and warp to their frigates. The enemy was still grouped up, not going near the Caelestis formation. “Call me Charlie for now. We’ll make sure to meet again.”

“‘Charlie,’ wow. And I thought I was bad at fake names. Take all day to think of that? Okay, Charlie, I’ll let you off the hook for now, but I’ll expect a visit. Call me ‘Sierra,’ I suppose. Come by Eilonden sector when you’re ready. We’ll try not to shoot you before letting you talk. Don’t make me regret this.”

“Alright, Sierra,” Will said. “Thanks. We’ll see you around.”

And with that, it was over. The pirates formed up and warped off towards one of the system’s gates. A few ships seemed to look menacingly at the wing as they turned to make their warp, some even locking a few targets, but none opened fire. Cam breathed a sigh of relief when they left Lant, sitting in the lifepod.

“That was easy,” said Zelou. “I’m almost disappointed.”

“Hey now, I’m glad it’s over,” said Lant. Cam could hear the relief in his voice even though he was trying to hide it.

“Exactly,” Will said. “Don’t get greedy. We lost two pilots and almost a third. Let’s get a home base established before we try to pick another fight.”

Cam still couldn’t wait until they got their clone bay set up. He was ready to be done with losing pilots for the mission. The thought of not wanting to die just yet ran through his mind again. It seemed like a bad refrain that kept popping into his head all the time, but it was true. He wanted to be here for this mission--whatever it was Will had planned. For that, they needed to set up that clone bay before someone else decided to attack them.

“We going to fight them again?” asked Lant. “I’ll be dying for a rematch.”

“Maybe. But even once we get established we’ll still have to pick our battles,” Will said. “For now let’s focus on our priorities. Number one is to get out of here before Aluvius tries to ruin our party again.”