Echoes of Harmony

SSV Celestial Phoenix

Deep Space Near Nen Dural System

11 February 3297

Lieutenant Ava Bahr checked the seals on her flight suit one final time. A voice in her head told her she’s heard stories of pilots broke the seals by checking too many times. The thought brought a smile to her face. It did nothing, however, to still her pounding heart that was more a ball of nerves than anything else.

She sat in the cockpit of her Starhawk, waiting for the final jump to the Nen Dural System. They had gone over the plans countless times. Once they emerged from the wormhole in the Druthagon capital system, they were to immediately launch all fighters. Then, it was the simple goal of reducing the enemy’s forces to zero before they could do the same to the combined Hyperion and Stariek navy.

This final thought brought a smirk to her face. She supposed she would never call herself a pilot of the Hyperion Empire, no matter how much they tried to force the integration. First and foremost, she was a Stariekian. Nothing they did could change that.

<Alpha One to Alpha Squadron,> she said over a private link to the other three. <I know this is our first engagement since Ethan was restricted to his quarters. He wasn’t one for preflight speeches, and neither am I. The estimates say we’re going to be outnumbered by a factor of two to one, but that’s nothing unheard of for us. We’ve overcome greater odds in the past. Treat this like just another day, and we’ll come out the other side.>

<Here, here!> came the jubilant voice of Kayden Vance. There was no hint of animosity after their conflict in Ethan’s quarters. <I love target rich environments.>

<Do not get too cocky,> Shila replied.

<She’s right, Vance.> Ava started going through her preflight checklist for the third time since she got into the fighter. <Overconfidence is a slow and insidious killer.>

<Maybe we can be quick about it then,> Lieutenant Charlie Baxter said. The joking tone was clear, though there was an undertone of nervousness coming across the link when he spoke.

<Just remember to watch your wingman’s back, alright, blue flamer?> Ava hoped the teasing nature came across properly. Though he said nothing, the lack of an angry response told her she succeeded.

<This is the commanding officer.> Admiral Elliott Hayes’ transmission forced its way through their private link, overriding the communication. Ava could also just make out his voice coming from the speakers in the hangar bay itself. <We are preparing to jump into the Nen Dural system in the next five minutes. While General Kindler has recommended we—we being the captains of our vessels—treat this as any other engagement, I felt the need to be honest with all of you.

<I won’t sugarcoat it. We are facing possibly overwhelming odds. There are expected to be thirty-three percent more of their warships than what we have in our fleet. Their small craft will outnumber us at least two to one. While our previous battle in Mog Daruhl had similar odds, it is hard to understate the fact this is going to be an uphill battle. Many of you are not going to make it home. But I promise you, I will not needlessly waste your lives. If I feel the right choice is to give up, I will do so, regardless of what our overlords deem best. That, as your commanding officer, I guarantee to you.

<Prepare to jump in three minutes.>

The transmission cut off.

<Well, isn’t he a bucket of sunshine,> Vance said, restoring the previous squadron link. <At least he’s being honest with us.>

<Maybe too honest if you ask me,> Shila mumbled.

<Maybe so, but that doesn’t mean we don’t fight like our lives depend on it.> Ava pushed her back against the seat and rotated her shoulders to loosen them up. <It’s another day. Act like it, and we have nothing to worry about.>

The ship jolted, a sensation all of them had become familiar with over the last few weeks of near continuous wormhole transitions. This one, however, was quickly followed by a rumble as the ship was hit by something. Ava gritted her teeth as her fighter turned in place. Tracks underneath moved her into the launch bay. A clank resonated through her feet as the door shut behind her.

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<flight controller to all units, launch, launch, launch.>

Immediately, she cranked her throttle to the max, feeling the familiar roar of the engines to either side behind her. Though he wasn’t there, by force of habit she felt the calm Ethan always emanated flow through her. She did her best to channel it through the link to her squadron, hoping it would help them be at ease.

With a thought, the hook holding her in place released. The Starhawk rocketed forward, followed quickly by one to either side of her, Vance on her right and Tajik on her left. In front, the void of space rapidly approached. She could make out nearly half the planet of Druthagon, its atmosphere brown from millennia of spewing the pollutants of mining into the air.

Just as she cleared the egress, an explosion erupted from the side of the Celestial Phoenix. The blast buffeted her, nearly throwing her off course. Her starboard wing came within meters of scraping the side of the carrier. She barely recovered, careful to not overcorrect and careen into the Phoenix. Turning away, she pushed her throttle to head towards the fray.

<What the hell just happened?> she asked over the squadron link. Her heart beat rapidly in her chest.

<A rocket hit Baxter,> Vance said. His voice was steel, holding not even a touch of remorse. Not entirely unexpected given the fact they barely had a chance to get to know the man. <He’s gone.>

Ava checked the tactical overlay in the corner of her vision and saw the dot for Alpha Four was indeed missing. Worse, the swarm of dots representing the Druthagar fighters was larger than she expected. Much larger.

<No time to worry about that,> she replied, mentally chastising herself for the lack of empathy. She was sure her nervousness, not to mention the worry from nearly crashing as soon as she launched, was oozing through the link. <Form up with what we’ve got and let’s start lighting them up.>

Vance and Tajik answered affirmatively before moving to either side of her. She led them, as well as a dozen other fighters that fell in behind them, into the thick of the free-for-all raging before them. Taking a deep breath, she hoped she would make it back to the Phoenix.

An alarm blared warning her of a hostile lock on. She pushed her Starhawk into a tight spiral downward. Her CAM showed the position of the missile chasing her down, slowly getting closer with each passing second. With a thought, ECM burst from the back of her vessel, clogging the missile’s sensors. A well-timed burst of speed put enough distance between her and resulting explosion for her to come out unscathed.

<Two, Three, what is your location?> In the few seconds of the chase, she lost track of the other two. A glance at her tactical overlay left her overloaded from the sheer number of contacts pawing the void. Before either could reply, one of the Druthagar fighters soared past her, letting loose a barrage of neutron beams her shields absorbed. “Oh no, you don’t.”

She pushed her fighter to pursue the fleeing enemy. Beyond it was the scrum that slowly developed. Beams of light lashed out, some connecting with ships and others disappearing into the void. Brief flashes showed where fighters on either side exploded.

Ava refocused her attention on the fighter she was chasing down. With a thought, she slotted in behind it and lined up the targeting reticle. With a quiet beep, it turned green. Her neutron cannons fired. The beams tracked the Druthagar fighter before connecting with its engines and tearing through its midsection. It exploded with a quick fireball much like the others. She flew through it, letting her shields absorb the smaller particles before emerging on the other side and taking the momentary reprieve to assess the battlefield.

<Alpha Two to Alpha One,> Vance said, his voice somewhat shaken. <Three is gone. A pair of Druthagar flanked her, and I wasn’t able to help in time. They destroyed her and just kept going. I blasted them. I killed them. If I could have ripped them apart with my bare hands…>

<Steady, Lieutenant,> Ava said, feeling a slight tinge at her lack of remorse. Another part of her told her, though, it was her job to keep the squadron from falling apart. Not that she’d done a good job of that so far. <There’ll be plenty of time to mourn the dead after all this is over. For now, we just need to focus on thinning the herd, so to speak.>

<That’s easier said than done, One.>

<It’ll make it all the more worthwhile, Two.>

<Yeah, well—>

The transmission abruptly ended.

<Two?> Ava’s eyes darted to the tactical overlay, desperately searching for the last place she saw his dot. With each passing second she couldn’t find it, she grew more and more frantic. <Two, answer me.>

There was no response. A continuous chatter of the other squadrons, each requesting aid at different parts of the battlefield, continued in the back of her mind. Yells of pain and horror—some cut short and others lingering—came through. But no response from Vance.

She slammed her hand against the side of her fighter with a scream. Pain radiated through each finger. She resisted the urge to yell again, fighting back tears—tears of both fright and grief. She brought her Starhawk around, turning to the next closest Druthagar fighter and letting loose a missile. It corkscrewed, dodging around whatever minimal ECM it had, before slamming into its engines and exploding. A few seconds later, the ship was nothing more than debris.

Then, a message came through a private link to her CAM. The sender was Ethan.

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