91: Tally

Four hours into the patrol, nothing interesting had happened at all, and Ensign Spokane was rather frustrated at that.  He’d had such a good feeling about it, too.  Viper Team reached the next turn on their circuitous route around the White Rim area.

“Viper Team, Viper One, approaching Turn One Four, over.”

Spokane glanced at the clipboard velcroed to the left thigh of his flight suit, briefly double-checking that he was thinking of the correct turn.  Turn 14 would swing them through the Rim itself, which would at least provide some impressive scenery.

“Viper Team, Viper One, Turn One Four, mark, over.”

The four Shrikes pirouetted neatly onto their starboard wingtips and hooked around a small asteroid.  Spokane looked up and saw the rock rushing past.  They eased out of the turn, and now the Rim was a white arch looming ahead of them: in zero gravity, there is no ‘up’, and neither is there a need for ships to align themselves onto any particular plane.  Warships had been known to enter fights upside-down relative to the enemy.

Viper Team entered the Rim.  The ice and gas cloud shimmered around them, as though the number of stars had just increased ten-fold.  Asteroids loomed out of the clouds, and the Shrikes zipped and dodged almost playfully to avoid them.  They entered an area of thin cloud cover, with good visibility.

“Viper Team, Viper Four, tally six hostiles, nine o’clock low, ove— no, crap!  They’ve seen us, they’re aligning to cut-off vectors!”

As soon as Spud had announced the direction, Spokane snap-rolled left enough that the enemy craft that were almost below them were now easy to spot.  Ahead, he saw another Shrike doing the same.

“It’s an ambush!  Bug out, bug out!” squawked Amazon.

The Shrikes fanned out like shrapnel from a bomb, flinging off into the clouds.  The enemy fighters tore after them, flying by their sensors.  Viper Team’s sensors hadn’t pinged them because they had been sitting completely still with their engines powered down, indistinguishable from rocks.  Spokane wound up with one hostile on his tail.

“LT, should we head for open ground?”

“It’s risky.”

“We’ve got a better chance out there than in here, dicing with the rocks.  It’s your call, Amazon,” came Applesauce’s calm voice.

“All right… You’re right, Sauce.  Vipers, out of the Rim and regroup, try to take them out in the open.”

Spokane didn’t need to be told twice.  A bolt of something flashed past his cockpit and demolished a man-sized rock ahead of him.  He shivered a little.  Thankfully, last night’s chicken had been good.  As he cranked through turns that would have murdered a pilot in atmosphere from the G-forces, he realized that as soon as the chocolate sauce had hit the turbines, all the lumbering procedural radio talk had gone right out the window.  The Shrike shot out of the gas clouds, trailing fine particles of ice, and Spokane saw two of his colleages up ahead.  They were already engaged in a rolling furball of a dogfight with three Socialist fighters.  He zipped into the fight and evened the odds.  By the markings on the two other Shrikes, he knew that Spud was still in the cloud somewhere, with three enemy fighters for company.

“Viper Four, you okay?”

“Three bogeys on my tail, coming out of the clouds now.”

Sure enough, four more fighters appeared and joined in the fray.  Grey shapes tumbled and flashed past Spokane’s canopy.  Amazon had one tail that she couldn’t shake, and a surprised squeal came over the radio as her Shrike took a hit near the starboard engine that spun it around like a top.  Spokane, without breaking off his own attack, managed to achieve missile lock and fire.  His missile struck the Socialist amidships, cutting it in two.  There was a fraction of a second’s pause, then the pilot ejected from the front half of the wreck.

“Thanks, Dog.”

“Any time.”

He fired right into the tailpipe of the bogey he’d been hounding, and it erupted into a ball of flames that tumbled into an asteroid and exploded.  There was no ejection.  Jarran Spokane realised that he’d just scored his first ‘true’ kill.  He cheered loudly before vomiting into his mouth, puffing out his cheeks and trying not to spray it across the inside of his helmet.  He didn’t want to swallow it, and he was too busy to remove his helmet and blast it down the front of his flight suit, so he just held it in.  Applesauce took a round through his canopy and his cockpit depressurized in two fine jets of escaping air and condensation.

“Phwoar.  Vacuum’s bloody cold, eh?” he laughed.

Spokane’s headset was suddenly filled with an alarm buzzer: someone had a missile lock on him.  He flipped the Shrike onto its back and pulled through a ‘downward’ turn so sharp it was as though he’d stopped.  The alarm kept going, and he twisted in his seat to see behind.  He caught a glimpse of one of two dark shapes not far behind.

Making up his mind, he cleared his mouth out quietly, feeling the hot liquid slopping over his chin and into his rubbery neck seal.  Not pleasant.  “I’ve got two on me, can’t shake them.”

“I can’t… I can’t get there,” grunted Amazon, busy trying to shake a tail while Spud tried to tail the tail.

“Come at me, Dog,” said Applesauce.

Spokane saw Applesauce lining up and flying straight at him, playing Chicken.  One of the enemy fighters wimped out and broke off, but the other began firing his guns.  Spokane took three rounds along the top of his ship, which must have hit something crucial because the Shrike began rocking and wobbling as though the thruster nozzles were having a spasm.  “Sauce, bug out, I’m losing control.”

Applesauce peeled off, not a moment too soon.

“Dog, punch out!” yelled Amazon.  “He launched!  Punch out, Dog, just punch out!”

Spokane started slapping buttons to activate his missile countermeasures.  Flares spilled off the Shrike’s stubby little wings like fiery feathers, and his radar began trying to pulse-jam the missile’s guidance system.  It was no good.

“DOG GET OUT GET OUT IT’S RIGHT BEHIND YOU EJECT EJECT—“

He reached between his knees and yanked on the bright yellow ejector cable.  Within the space of 0.025 seconds, three things happened: tiny explosive charges blew his canopy off, loose straps around his elbows and shins suddenly tightened and hauled his limbs in close to his seat, and a pair of rockets ignited.  Within 0.9 seconds of him pulling the ejection cable, his whole seat was halfway out of the cockpit.  Within two, it was clear of the Shrike and rocketing away on a plume of smoke.  The poor little fighter took the missile right up the tail and exploded, but Spokane was safe… ish.  The rockets cut out after four seconds, and at ten seconds a pair of smaller rockets behind his head burned for just long enough to slow the ejector seat to a gentle drift.  A bright orange capsule inflated around the seat, enclosing the downed pilot in a reflective, protective, insulating cocoon that would bounce harmlessly off rocks until pick-up.  Spokane may have been out of the fight, but he wasn’t out of danger.  Shooting an enemy’s capsule was considered extremely bad form, but that didn’t stop it from happening.

Amazon sounded absolutely terrified.  “Dog, you okay?”

“Can’t see a thing through the eggshell, but I’m in one piece.  How’s the fight?”

“We’re getting there.  Two to go… no, wait, they just bugged out.  We’re clear.  Good work, Vipers.”

Applesauce whooped and Spud laughed.  Spokane grinned madly inside his helmet, stomach acid stinging his lips and tongue.  He floated numbly inside his capsule, safe-ish at last.  The chair had another six hours of oxy but he’d be back at FOS Kolkata in an hour or less.  They’d lost one fighter and zero pilots, compared to four fighters and at least one pilot.  Technically, it was a victory, but it didn’t feel that way.  Spokane’s mind kept replaying the awful smashing, splattering zero-G explosion.