Earth's First Starfighter Volume 4 by Han Yang & Michael Angel

Author:Han Yang & Michael Angel [Yang, Han & Angel, Michael]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Royal Guard Publishing LLC
Published: 2024-03-30T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 26

SURPRISE APPEARANCES

NAVARRE SYSTEM 5156881985 AND UMBRIA SYSTEM 832785664

Ibrought my Nomad up alongside the Orpheus’ port-side with gentle touches of the controls. A quick glance to my right confirmed that the cruiser’s hull plate was close enough to scrape paint. I spoke to Seventeen as I held the controls steady.

“Activate both the tractor beam and maglock,” I ordered. This combo unit, designed by Tully several years ago, had brought us a lot of Gs in salvage over the years. I’d never thought that it would be used in this way, but necessity bred invention.

A hum, followed by a low clank as my starfighter’s ventral plate connected with the larger vessel. I heard more clanks over the comm channel as my other squadron leaders followed suit, attaching their fighters to the heavy cruiser like barnacles holding fast to the underside of a great gray whale.

The Orqual’s engines began to emit an intense blue glow. It lit up my aft-facing screens to the point that I had to dial up the opacity so I wouldn’t be blinded by the glare. Instead of generating thrust, the engines sent out a ripple that made the hull do a shimmying ripple as it moved forward across the ship.

The golden, curiously grainy light of a split in space-time swirled into existence just off the cruiser’s bow. We crossed the threshold, and I reflexively gripped the controls as my starfighter jolted and bounced, rattling me around in my seat. A breathless whump echoed in my synthetic eardrums, and space outside returned to normal.

I had to give Natasha and Nystrom credit. The time taken from receiving Rikka’s distress call to the drop-everything-and-pray wormhole jump made by the Orpheus and the Phaeton had taken just under five minutes. The welcome blue curve of Umbria, the quiet rotation of her space station, even the slug-ugly form of the Phoenix starcarrier in orbit all looked positively tranquil.

And then all that tranquility was shattered in a moment.

A new golden aura of light came into existence as a wormhole opened up in the middle distance. But this time, the light that shone forth seemed murky. The usual swirl of particles at the edge flicked about in chaotic, random patterns.

The sharp, dart-like shape of the heavy cruiser Dagger shuddered as it slid through the opening and into normal space. Her hull was a blistered mass of twisted metal, her Cobalt Lancer insignia nearly burnt off. Jets of flame or vapor came from various openings blasted in her deck plates.

Right on her tail, the noses of two more cruisers emerged through the tear in space-time. The heavy Iglax ships bristled with missile mounts and lasers. They jostled against each other as they shoved their way through the opening.

“You poor bastards,” Rikka’s voice sounded in our earpieces, sounding remarkably clear and full of satisfaction. “Chased us all this way…only to get the rug pulled out from under you!”

The Dagger’s engines, which had powered the ship’s wormhole generator, shut off as someone aboard hit the emergency stop. With that, the field holding the wormhole itself open vanished.

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