The hangar roared with engines and shouted orders as crews loaded the waiting landers. Elias sat buried in Monarch's cockpit, brushing medical adhesive across the crack in his visor. Four oxygen tanks were wedged between his legs, hoses feeding a regulator at his helmet. When he leaned forward to adjust the valve, the power cable tethered to his suit pulled tight at his waist.
"Quit your movin', pilot," Thrynn growled, arms deep beneath the dash as he worked on Hangman's cracked-open black box. Wires spilled from the module as the dragonkin mechanic pinned it to the console with strips of fiber tape that hissed and hardened.
Errors spun up as the system chimed broken and out of sync—two black boxes in one ship arguing for ownership.
[WING ADDED: HANGMAN (CORRUPTED)]
[WING ADDED: MONARCH (CORRUPTED)]
[FORMATION: NULL]
[IFF: Imperial / MERCENARY GUILD]
[ERROR: CALLSIGN CONFLICT]
[CALLSIGN REQUIRED: ______]
Thrynn sighed in defeat, "Told you messin' with the black box would break it."
Elias shrugged, "Command, Hangman."
[ERROR: CALLSIGN IN USE]
[CALLSIGN REQUIRED: ______]
"Command, Monarch."
[ERROR: CALLSIGN IN USE]
[CALLSIGN REQUIRED: ______]
Elias looked to Thrynn, "Got any names?"
Thrynn thought for a moment. "Vaskel Thrakenrain."
"No."
Thrynn cracked a smile. "Is good name, pilot. Very noble. Trust me. "
" 'Metal Pot of Angry Soup' isn't what I'd call a good name." Elias spoke flatly, and unamused.
Thrynn let out a billowing laugh. "Is joke, pilot. I have no name."
Elias looked back at the screen and its blinking demand with a blank stare.
"Disgusting." A sharp voice cut in across the maintenance scaffolding.
Elias looked up to see a woman in uniform approaching the interceptor's open canopy, rifle in hand.
The cloying chemical sweetness from the open cockpit spilled into the hangar, insulting both the fresh air and the vice captain, whose nose wrinkled as she looked down at Elias.
She studied the cockpit—hoses, tanks, cables, the cracked visor sealed with glue.
"They built those to kill us."
A beat.
"And they treat you the same."
"Is there something you want?" Elias said in an unoffended, tired tone.
"Captain ordered me to give you this." She hesitated for a moment at the suffocating cockpit's lack of room before handing him the rifle.
Elias untucked an arm from under a hose and reached up to receive the weapon.
He'd stripped half the armor in the hangar just to fit inside the interceptor—pauldrons, greaves, anything that didn't cover something vital. Even then, movement was still cramped.
The familiar weight settled in his hand. His fingers moved fluidly as he checked the weapon's condition.
Matte orange coating. Easy to find in chaos.
Folding claws mounted to the forward guard for stabilizing firing positions in low gravity.
Collapsing stock—meant to live behind a seat.
Empress Arms Type-10 sabot carbine.
The Spider.
Standard pilot variant.
"Does it run?" He asked, removing the twenty-round magazine.
"It's been sitting on display for forty-year-cycles. " She said.
"A trophy." Elias pulled a cartridge out, a 10x100mm Discarding Sabot Dart. He bit down on the dart's metal tip, cheap aluminum alloy. Anti-personnel.
"It was taken off an Imperial who tried to board." A smile flashed across her face, but it didn't reach her eyes. "Do you have a problem using a corpse's weapon?"
Elias loaded the rifle unhurriedly and wedged it between the wall and his armored torso. The metal scraped and protested against the interlocking plates.
He turned to face the vice captain.
Then rapped a knuckle against the canopy walls, which rang hollow and thin.
Her eyes narrowed at the living drone component before her, a man who felt neither remorse nor rage.
"Figures. Command would hire a heathen." She turned to walk away.
Elias didn't argue as his helmet clicked into place; the console flashed green in the corner of his eye.
[CALLSIGN CONFIRMED: HEATHEN]
"Figures," Elias muttered under his breath as he keyed the ignition.
Blade's salvaged generator rumbled to life inside Heathen. A malevolent violet glow emanated from the booster housing.
Several techs stopped what they were doing to watch the raven.
Some curious, some unnerved.
Thrynn flashed a toothy grin, pleased at his own handiwork. "Donor had a damn good generator. High n' low output settins. I make it better if ya live, Journeyman. "
"Deal," Elias keyed the canopy to close. "Clear the area, I'm launching. "
Clamps released across the hangar as Heathen lifted and edged forward to the green membrane. Several landers flared to life after him, quieter and more efficient.
Cold silence flooded the cockpit as pressure equalized with the void.
Elias muted the warning flags as soon as they started, along with the biological alerts.
He tried to ignore the hole in the right side of the canopy.
And the warped steel dart embedded in the glass in front of him, just out of reach.
Before, there had been a thin wall between him and the void.
Now there was only his suit.
It stung numbly where it had been patched.
Four landers formed an arrowhead around Heathen, locking onto a vector.
"This is Vice Captain Lyraen Bladefield of the Resolute. I'll be leading this strike team. We have a mercenary joining us. He has his orders, we have ours, stay out of each other's way."
A pause long enough for Lyraen to read the callsign. "Heathen. Begin warp sequence."
Elias didn't answer with words. Just the ping of the coordinates they lacked.
The flotilla vanished into the darkness.