A familiar crackle cut through the soft hum of the Lance's reactor. "There's our target." Some fifty meters away to the right, Knight One's engines began to glow.

"Copy. Chase 'em up?" Just as far on the left, and up a little, a much smaller vessel extended three RCS booms.

"Like usual, team. Five, head 'em off. Twelve, get your systems warm." Lights flickered to life all around, their many hues painting part-silhouettes against the inky black. Some dozen mismatched hulls gently drifted ahead to begin pursuit.

Kass reached up and flicked an array of switches with practiced timing as the Lance thrummed to life.



The Lance is a testament to skilled engineering and technical spellcasting in equally terrifying amounts. What started as an uninteresting light hauler was slowly transformed, parts sliced off and salvage tacked on in place, into a complex and unwieldy beast that truly only the one behind it all can understand - and understand Kass does. The exact output curve of the reactor as it ramped up, what each of the unlabelled gizmos on that panel to the left did, the combination of thruster shutoffs for one hell of a dodging maneuver, and exactly how much charge would get a good shot for liquefying light armour.

Kass leaned back in her seat and watched reactor output rise, the carefully-tuned craft around her now buzzing with vigor.



The Lance is armed with just one weapon - a lone class five plasma accelerator stripped from a debris field, right out of the scorched turret of a kilometers-long dreadnought, muzzle still warm from someone else's battle. It was a hell of a job getting it to fit into the ship - and maybe 'into' isn't an accurate term - but damn, if it isn't a statement, lugging around a gun as big as the rest of the vessel.



Tonight's target is a freighter for some private arms company from the outer regions - probably one stirring up trouble away from the eyes of the union sectors. The sort that only pay enough for a skeleton crew - an easy smash and grab. If push comes to shove, they wake up in some far-off medbay with a hell of a headache. No harm done. Honestly, sitting back here, it's kind of boring. Snipe a few cargo holds open, wait around a bit, then go hom--

That familiar comms crackle. "Wakes! I count five!" Kass nearly lept from her seat, scrambling for the controls before her. Flick a switch on the left, pull down that monitor on the right.



Warp wake scan data, right there. "Confirmed five wakes. Looks like four heavy fighters - probably pretty slow, give 'em a run around - and something bigger. Maybe a gunship. I'll put one through it."

"Copy, Twelve. Good shooting."

Good shooting. Well, of course. It's always good shooting with Kass at the helm. In the distance, near her flight and the freighter, five flashes briefly peeled apart the seams of reality. They spewed forth bright smoke, half-real, as the expected enemy craft emerged from warp. Four clunky-looking heavy fighters and something bigger, bristling with smaller class hardpoints. The fighters darted off in pursuit of her team, while the gunship opened fire immediately, filling the area with crossing streams of dual laserfire in a futile attempt to hit something.
Kass reached for another few unmarked controls with one hand, and guided her ship's cannon toward the gunship with the other.



Kass chimed in over comms. "'Boutta pop the gunship. Steer clear."
This was her favourite part - firing the main cannon was wired up to a big, red button. The classic sort, a hinged plastic case over it, hazard tape all around, and a white-on-black metal label reading 'FIRE'. She had even installed a small red light inside, rigged to light up when the cover was open. She slammed the button down. Naturally.



Kass gripped her seat.
A loud crack rang through the ship as a dozen capacitors discharged and spellcasters drained their crystals, in an instant building and firing a huge slug of plasma. The Lance's hull groaned as it bore the recoil, thrusters firing to keep steady and cancel out the new drift. It could take it, like it has before. Like it will again.
A bright purple bolt sped through the vacuum and made contact with the hostile gunship - then kept going, carving straight through. The gunship's armament fell silent and its lights slowly flickered out, leaving only the perfect ring of molten armour plate visible. Half of a fighter drifted into view from behind it, similarly illuminated with intense heat.

Knight Five cheered over comms. "Two for one! Hell of a shot, Lancelot! How's everyone else holding up?"
Eleven spoke up. "Got mine - so that's two."
A crackle. "Me and Knight Two got ours around the freighter. Lead them right into the firing line. What about that last one?"
Knight Two made famously rare chatter, clearing the line with a harsh tone before piping up. "Can it. Gunship reactor RUD. Get distance!"

Engines throttled and fighters scattered as the husk of the gunship began to glow, before being ripped apart in a violent flash. Kass saw a glint in the corner of her eye. Her fur stood on end. Without a moment of pause, she was already slamming the throttle wide open and reaching back to the dazzling array of system controls.



Kass was pushed back into her seat as the Lance charged forward, lurching around to try and bring its cumbersome armament to bear on the lone hostile. Engine plumes pierced the darkness as the enemy fighter dropped its concealing wards and charged forward, staying ahead of the crosshairs of the Lance's namesake. Kass' fireteam floored it to intercept, but in the thirty seconds it would take them to arrive - maybe fifteen for Five's rattler - she'd already be shrapnel. Time for plan B.



Kass arrested the turn and powered ahead, baiting the fighter into a direct chase. With targeting jammed, the pilot would have to aim manually while keeping out of the exhausts of the Lance's many mismatched engines - made even harder by the fact that Kass was willing to throw her ship around with its ramshackle reaction controls. Laserbolts whizzed by, pinging off the armour in huge showers of sparks or fizzling out in thruster plume. Kass was buying time. Her spaceborne artillery piece had another surprise in store, as if the weapon caliber and dazzling instrument arrays weren't enough. A skipdrive. Skipdrives are like a small hyperdrive cut in half - they're all the nauseating unfun of rapidly crashing through the threads of creation both ways in a short amount of time, and none of the pretty lights while you're there, because they lack a way of propelling you through otherspace. They're a miserable tactical backup for when you're otherwise fucked. And Kass, right now, is pretty fucked.



Gone in a flash. The Lance barely even left a wake, leaving the pursuing fighter powering ahead toward nothing, wondering what the hell just happened. No hyperdrive acts that fast.

Kass gripped the control shelf before her, eyes tightly shut. She held her breath as her head throbbed, hearing muffled, every part of her screaming out in an ache equal parts unknown and horrible. The Lance strained around her, hull shuddering and reverberating, a sound like a fleet ship a hundred times its size slugging it out with kinetics. She swallowed back whatever wanted to come up, enduring the longest few seconds of her life. An awful noise, a deep resonating bassy tone and painful ringing, grew louder and louder still, deafening her thoughts and stark white encroaching her vision and she can't feel and she's panicking and her heart's racing and--



The enemy pilot kept course, wary--

A shockwave sent vibrations through their ship. Their flight computer screamed alerts. Large malformed wake signature. Vessel signature. Heat signature. Directly behind. 184'. They pulled hard on their controls.

Kass coughed, wiped the tears from her eyes, and pulled herself up from the control console. Her ears were still ringing. The Lance creaked around her as it cooled. She hit the big, red button. That was her favourite part.



The Lance was silhouetted against a violent, beautiful warp wake. Bright, smoky half-nothing, a brilliant and wrongly vibrant sky blue. It crackled, arced, flowed, swirled. Dazzling violet plasma ripped through the hostile fighter.

Kass slouched back in her seat as comms erupted into cheer.





Now, for that freighter.