Chapter 12: The Battle — Part 1
Since we were not allowed to leave the colony yet by the lieutenant, we couldn't take jobs from the IMG, hence we had the whole week to ourselves.
Most of those days I'd wake up, work out, train, shower, and then join Reina in the lounge for a bit of chilling around watching movies and what, that was till Zoran woke up.
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Flashback to 4 days in to the week vacation.
I had just finished my after training shower, when it happened.
I had just entered the lounge, and seeing someone's legs I just thought it to be Reina.
"Morning Reina, the bath is free now if you want to take a dip"but she just rushes me and holds me by my collar giving me a you're dead look.
And seeing her now prominent jade locks, I knew who it was, "Hey Zoran, long time no see, how was the nap, not good if I'm going by your scary good looks" what I said seemed to have just gotten her more pissed off.
"I take one small nap, and now all of a sudden we're about to head off into war, you better have a good enough for pu Reina in danger, and for your sake I better like it"
'God dammit I knew this was going to blow up eventually,
I slowly take her hands off me.
"Zoran calm down, I talked to your sister and she said she was fine with it, so why don't you two go to your room for a bit talk it out, and if you want to sit the fight out no-ones forcing you to come".
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I have no idea what they talked about in there, all I know is that when they came out Zoran had cooled off a bit, they were going to join in on the fight but she now forced me to have a daily fight with her, we came out of it injured and bruised.
So now my days were, I'd wake up, work out, train, have a match to the near death with Zoran shower, and then with Reina we would just chill.
But if we're going to continue like this, we're going to need a very good doctor.
'Man my whole body still aches'.
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This went on for a few days until, finally, the Imperial Army and the International mercenary guild (IMG) announced the start of the pirate-subjugation mission.
We were in the cockpit to preparing for takeoff. Krishna finished its self-check: green across the board. We were good to go.
I sighed.
Zoran the other person in the room with me, looked annoyed because of my constant sighing. "Can you stop with the sighing, it's annoying".
"I'm sorry it's just that, fighting in a ship is, BORING!" I continue with the complaining.
"Yeah, tell me about it, I have a hard time agreeing with people who say it's fun" she agrees with me, that both surprising and not surprising at the same time.
"You're lucky, you're going to be fighting with the Battle-armor outside, and I can't join you because someone has to be here Piloting the ship"
"I said I agree with you, never said I feel sorry for you" she responds with a laugh.
"Hey!, that's mean, you could have just pretended to feel sorry for me."
"That's too much work" when she gives me that response I just grumbled, to which she just laughs at me.
"No matter what you say, what we need next is a Pilot, cause I can't take any more of this"
Ever since we began our daily training routines, Zoran and I had gotten a little bit closer, and I had bonded with Reina in our afternoon chills.
With our system checks all done I contacted Tarmein Harbor Control Center.
"Control this is Krishna, all systems are go for Launch, requesting permission to do so,"
"Krishna this is Control, our sensors are saying the same, removing docking locks"when he said that we could the docking mechanisms holding the Krishna in place begin to release. procedures. A launch time then flashed on the screen.
When the timer was now five seconds from zero the control officer began the official count. "Launch in 5,4,3,2,1,go for Launch" the moment it was said, I softly nudge the joystick forward, causing the ship to slowly accelerate away from the colony.
"Space really is beautiful," I said. "No matter where you look, it's stars as far as the eye can see, no other scene in the universe like it."
I checked our sensors and flew us over to where some of the other mercs were already waiting, I was doing everything on my own because according to Zoran she rode ships not pilot them, but I thought it was just another way of saying, I don't know how to do it.
No two ships in this hodgepodge cleanup crew were the same. Some were technically the same model, but they'd been customized so much that they barely resembled each other anymore.
"Wow!" Zoran sarcastically exclaimed. "Those ships are so colorful."
"I guess some people like to stand out. Maybe they're confident in their skills or just hoping to stand out to future clients, but I get what you mean, some of these is just talking things too far." some of the ships had full gold color schemes.
My Krishna, on the other hand, was a dark blue that helped camouflage it and reduce its luster, the color came from the material not paint. I certainly could have put something flashier, but paint refused to stick to the material that lined the hull, and to this day we still don't know what that material is.
The Imperial ships finally arrived, they were a major contrast to the mercenary ships, they flew in an orderly manner and looked like we're at least a decade ahead the mercenary ships in terms of tech (Not counting the price Krishna of course, it was even actually ahead of them), had one universal color scheme.
When all ships were in formation,the lieutenants vice was heard in all ships there.
"We will begin in 3 minutes," Lieutenant Serena announced. "All ships will receive coordinates where you'll remain in hiding. Once the battle begins, move to said coordinates."
An operator from the Imperial Army assigned us hiding spots and sent the coordinates. The enemy's forces were positioned very…carefully, as if they had sent out recon drones.
"Huh. What in the…?" I raised an eyebrow.
"Is something wrong?" Zoran asked.
"This just looks a little off. Don't worry about it." They'd assigned me a spot dense with enemy forces. Were these assignments random, or…?
Lieutenant Serena's smile flashed in my mind. I couldn't help but feel like this was intentional.
'Damn!, it seems shes going to milk her favor for all its got'
"Confirm synchronization of ally ships," Lieutenant Serena ordered.
"Synchronization confirmed," we all replied
"Initiate faster-than-light charge."she continued.
"Faster-than-light charge initiation confirmed. Charge completed.
Countdown to activation: five, four, three, two… Faster-than-light travel initiated."
With a boom like a clap of thunder, the faster-than-light drives activated. With the whole allied fleet synced up, all we had to do now was make sure no one was being completely stupid, and we could coast along,to the enemy's base, which was just a few light minutes away.
'it seems that because they had ties to the previous governer they had built their base close to the colony, it had allowed them to thrive in the past, but now it will be their undoing.'
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