NoCro checked her heart rate in game, where it was for some reason always available. It was currently sitting at 170, or 83% of her maximum. She was well aware of her panting in the Light World and labored now to keep her eyes closed and focused on the events at hand. Putting load on the progressive tended to increase heart rate, for reasons she knew not why. Possibly just because the blood supply to her brain needed it, in the same way legs or arms might need it while running.

That didn’t seem quite right.

As she felt her chest rise and fall she brought up a hand in the Light World to slap the sweat off of her forehead, vowing then and there not to mind her real body from that moment forward.

As with all ‘great’ military operations, the preparatory maneuvers for Operation Vulcan Wolf were significantly more stressful than the battle itself. Firstly, NoCro had allocated every available slot on her secondary carrier, the Izumo-class Deneb, and some of her primary Cygnus to Stingray refueling drones. Secondly, she had sent all of this bullshit upwards under the governance of a Swarm razor. Thirdly, the Swarm razor didn’t manage refueling operations or their timing by default. She did that.

The key to all this nonsense was, as she saw it, the thing absolutely no one in their right mind would suspect. That was the critical factor in all great military upsets, and one she planned to duplicate here. She would fight here, personally.

In the pantheon of Frames within ACO there was a certain hierarchy, at the bottom of which was the Grey Ghost. This pathetic Frame was essentially all but phased out several years ago apart from the existing inventories of players. NoCro held onto a copy of one.

It could fly. No other Frames could do that. That was essentially its only advantage. It had no real range, or armor, or really armament. Compared to actual flying craft it had nearly an order of magnitude less range. However, it could fly, it could wield a Pulse Drive, it could wield Sympathetic Armor, and it could be operated by a player. It could turn the tide of a battle, under the exact right circumstances, in the exact right place, with the exact right player.

Those circumstances, that place, and that player, had all arrived—in her mind. She simply had to shepherd it into the right location. The thing itself was stealthy but unwieldy, like a Frankenstein monster of an F-22, an F-35, and a Variable Fighter. It could barely, just, go supersonic with afterburners.

NoCro hated it compared to the elegance of the Spider she was used to. That actually worked in her favor. She hated this thing and it was going to work. She needed a dozen refueling drones to get her to an attack position, and at this point had gone through eleven of them. Each of these rendezvous presented a mental load on her, which was only part of it. She lined up for the last before the run-in in the full darkness before midnight. She could see the storm on the horizon with thunderbolts crackling through the towering clouds.

That was when Prism picked her up.

—

“A Ghost.” Prism all but whispered. How had a Ghost come all this way, if it were from Cygnus? Who was piloting it?

He had picked this up from one of the Hawkeyes he had launched before the storm and sent forward. His whole battlegroup had since then descended into the full gale and was being buffeted around to and fro. The concept that NoCro was bringing a Ghost hadn’t entered into his thoughts.

Ghosts had to be piloted by players. If NoCro had offered him a one on one duel, bringing in another person was forbidden. He didn’t really feel like this woman would do that. He opened up a channel.

“No,” he said, “Is that you?”

“…yes.” came the belated response.

She was attacking him personally. As he watched the icon of the Ghost on his light-table resolve, he huffed out a breath through his nose and smiled.

“You were right. You aren’t the same person you were.” he said. The NoCro of the past never would have done this.

It would end the same way, though. He vectored his own drone fighters in for an attack. He took a sudden and deep breath when he saw what his radar resolved next. Her entire strike package, a mixture of F35s and nearly a hundred drones besides. They had to be at the end of their rope.

“Prism,” NoCro said, over the line, “Prepare to die.”

She cut him off. Prism took in a deep breath and smiled widely. Yes, this was it! This was exactly what he was born for, what he wanted, and here this woman was offering it to him. Well—

He received another call, this time from Silver.

“Prism,” Silver said, “Good work. We’ll be coming in from the north and cutting her off. Just bring your fighters up and sandwich her. Should be easy work.”

“Excuse me?” Prism said, “This was supposed to be a single fight. You all are operating here?”

“Of course we are.” Silver said, “This is war. Grow up.”

—

NoCro watched as her EC2 and her refueling drones to the north got splashed by another force. There went her way back. It was obvious that she’d been sold out. Now she was stuck between Prism and the rest of Titan. Absolute destruction. Angrily, she opened up a channel to him.

“Prism,” she said, “I wanted you to be different. Did you tell them?”

Prism, of course, had told everything he was doing to Europa. He couldn’t rightly tell NoCro that she was the one who relayed it.

“I…” Prism said, caught suddenly out.

“Disgusting.” NoCro said, “I wanted to believe. I really did. You were the last honorable man. I wanted us to fight alone.”

Prism, who wanted this now more than anything, could only twist up his face.

“Prism.” Silver said, over his line, “If she reverses to attack us, attack her from behind. It’ll be easy. You will, right?”