A soft breeze kissed the back of a 14 year old, Dreygun's neck, tickling a chill of the the late orbital cycle, when Amarr Prime's temperatures were just starting to dip. Dreygun pulled up his coat and nudged the small boy next to him. "Com'on Nate. It's getting late. We need to head home Mom said Jaseri is making sevei for dinner."
But the little boy didn't move. He just continued to stare up into the twilight, Amarr's twin moons were still low in the sky, but even with the ambient light from the city, stars were beginning to appear. It was still just a few, but Dreygun's little brother, Nathaniel, was entranced by them. Nate lifted his hand towards the distant dots of light in the sky as if he were trying to reach out and touch them. "There are other people up there... " He said vacantly, almost like he wasn't really talking to Dreygun. "I wonder if they are like us?"
"Of course not." Dreygun huffed. "We are Amarrian's, we are special."
Nathaniel lowered his hand and looked up into his older brother's eyes. "How come?"
The older boy just sighed. "God chose us." He replied reciting the words that he had heard his whole life. "God wants us to unite the universe so that we can all become worthy of him."
Nathaniel nodded, "Yea I guess...its just... BEEEEEEEEEP."
Dreygun squinted awkwardly back at his brother his head starting to spin. "Wha...???" BEEEEEEEP. Finally, the jarring tone of the com channel spurred Dreygun from his dream. Shaking the fog from his head, he groaned loudly. Checking the time on his bedside holo, he slammed the com button. "I expressly ordered not to be disturbed till we were in system. What is it!?"
The stoic face of an Amarrian Naval officer appeared on his com screen. "This is Commander Jin Harick of the Amarrian navel security." He paused for a moment a look of disgust momentarily washed over his face before he returned to his composure. "Capsuleer Dreygun Reyes Duran you are trespassing in Amarrian space, you are guilty of desertion I am charged to bring you before the imperial courts. Prepare to be boarded."
Before the image had a chance to wink out Dreygun was on his feet sprinting to his capsule. Opening a com to his bridge crew he tried to make out what had taken place. "Why are we in Amarrian space?!" he demanded.
Clarice his first officer appeared on his screen, her soft pale skin and big blue eyes gave her an air of innocence that belied her true nature. She was completely calm as she delivered her report. "We needed to do some minor repairs after the last engagements. One of the systems offlined was the system that handled autopilot system exclusions. When we calculated our jump route we assumed it would not take us into any Amarrian systems because we have them programmed as exclusions. The secondary crew responsible for monitoring navigation while we are in autopilot were not properly briefed on the importance of avoiding those systems."
As Dreygun slid into his capsule the flood of system information washed over his mind, and he instantly felt ill. Four imperial Armageddon Class battleships orbited his vessel. His engines were webbed to prevent evasive maneuvers and his warp drives were scrambled. He was dead in space. "Tactical review." He panted hoarsely over his coms
"I estimate a 5 minute survival time if we overheat all defensive systems. Give or take a minute depending on the laser crystals they have equipped, but I would assume they are tuned to our resistances." Joan stated. For once Dreygun was grateful for her succinct review.
"We can scramble our drones but it would take at least 10 minutes with all weapons firing to bring down one of those Geddons." Biran grunted, " And that is assuming they don't even try to activate a single defensive module. Honestly we don't have the fire power to scratch a fully tanked battleship we are geared for frigate class equivalent combat. At best we could handle another cruiser.
Dreygun leaned his head against the side of his pod. Desertion would mean death for any baseliner, but as a capsuleer he would most likely be worth more alive. They would slap a slave collar on him. Ironic, he had captured thousands of slaves in his time and now he had finally gotten away from all that only to be caught and turned into a slave himself. He could almost laugh at the poetic justice of that moment. He was sure many of his past victims surely would.
He could always eject and detonate his capsule. He would lose his clone, but it would be a small loss. He would wake up in a fresh clone several systems away from here, but his crew would be taken. If he volunteered to go they would at least spare his crew and turn them back over to Gallente officials... unless they were of Minmatar decent in which case they would likely enslave them as well. Dreygun yelled in the quiet of his capsule, frustration boiling over. There has to be some way out of this!
"Transport vessel inbound, DUST mercenaries confirmed by scanners. If we don't lower our shields to let them through, The Amarrian ships will open fire." Clarice stated. "We need orders."
"Lower the shields..." Dreygun managed to whisper through clenched teeth. "All Minmatar crew head to the cargo hold." Maybe I can hide them in a cargo container. Once they have me they might not search the ship to closely.
Dreygun sighed, "Everyone else please prepare to surren..."
"New vessel on grid. Its landing 10km off our port side!" Joan's voice cried out with uncharacteristic bewilderment. "Its Commander Avery's Eos!"
A stream of jump data instantly flooded into Dreygun's mind, clearly sent from Avery. The surly man's voice filled his mind a second later. " Align to those coordinates and prepare to jump." Dreygun attempted to to explain his situation, but Avery cut him off with a growl. "NOW!"
Shifting his ship subtly he aimed in the direction Avery had provided. The Amarr security forces were already taking fire positions. Joan's voice shouted out, "They are powering up their weapons. The first volley should hit any second!"
Frantically the cornered capsuleer reengaged his shields and activated his armor hardeners and repair modules. The combined fire of the four naval grade battleships crashed into Dreygun's smaller vessel. A brain numbing screech immediately going off, warning him of the loss of his shields. "Dammit! already?" he muttered to himself. He could feel the propulsion webs and warp scramblers restricting the movement of his vessel, in his mind they felt like chains wrapped around him. His camera drones showed Avery's vessel maneuvering between Dreygun's own and the attacking group.
"Captain there is no way Commander Avery's vessel alone can defeat the attack group. Even if we were to help our combined fire power would not likely even bring down one of their ships. We should power down and negotiate our surrender." Clarice stated coldly. "It was a mistake for the Commander to engage."
Dreygun gritted his teeth. "The Commander was leading fleets before you were born, Lieutenant. He has a plan, and considering our alternative would see hundreds of my crew enslaved along with myself. I believe this is the better option."
Clarice showed no signs of anger at the rebuke. She nodded curtly and returned to her station. Dreygun sighed internally, I just hope that plan unfolds soon... reassessing his ship status he grimaced, the armor plating was worn down to 20% another minute and the weapon fire would breach his hull.
"Overheat all defensive modules. Divert all available power to the armor repair systems." That will buy us another 15 seconds...
A sudden high pitched squeal blasted throughout the ship. Every computer system on board crashed simultaneously. For about a second everything was black and quiet. A series of shrill beeps were his only warning as his camera feeds and audio simulators rebooted. Rocking his senses with the sudden influx of data. "What the hell?!" he shouted reconnecting to all his systems.
"Targeting systems are fried it will be about 3 minutes before they are up and running again." Biran announced as the com systems were reestablished.
A flicker of understanding finally clicked in Dreygun's head. A hurried check of his warp drive confirmed his suspicions. "All hands prepare for warp!" He shouted thrusting all his power into a sudden emergency jump to the coordinates he was already aligned to.
A wave of relief washed over him as the stars around him blurred and all the massive battleships jumped backwards from his view. The bastard did it.
"Give me a directional scan for Commander Avery's vessel." Dreygun hurriedly ordered.
"He is in the warp tunnel behind us Captain." Clarice answered, with a slight grin. "It appears you were correct, I apologize for speaking out of order."
"What the Hell was that!" Biran nearly shouted.
"That was an ECM burst, Lieutenant." Avery's voice interrupted. "an explosive Electronic Counter Measure. Kills the fragile targeting systems on most ships if they are all clumped up like that. Never a bad idea to have some of those on board if you expect trouble."
"You expected trouble on the boring salvage mission we had today?" Dreygun asked incredulously.
Avery laughed from deep in his belly, "I always expect trouble. That's why I am still alive. This is New Eden after all.
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