NOVEL NEXT Watch Out For Ambushes
I was positioned at the very back of the formation above the freighter, supporting the escort team with long range fire support should any pirates show up.
The only ‘issue’ was that after our first fight with those pirates, we met no other pirates on our way to the station.
It seems like Samson was right about this route having less pirates at least.
But it also had the effect of putting all of us on edge as we kept ourselves on our toes expecting pirates to suddenly appear at every turn.
Of course we had Reese’s scanner to rely on but she did warn us that if any of the pirates had stealth modules installed on them, they would not appear on her scanners either.
I thought that she was talking about the one that makes their ship go invisible like that Voidshade guy but Amber told me that it was just some modules that prevent their ship from showing up on scanners.
Well, that just means we have to keep our eyes peeled in case some pirates suddenly appear out of nowhere which is why we’re all on edge right now.
“We’re almost there,” Reese suddenly spoke through our comms. “Probably just another half an hour more at this speed.”
“Perfect… I could use a real bed after this,” Maurice grumbled.
“You and me both… Sleeping in a chair is so uncomfortable…” Clandice groaned.
Samson frowned at them, “Eyes peeled you two, we’re not in the clear yet.”
Maurice grimaced, “I don’t think there would be any pirates here this close to the station right? If they were to make trouble here, the security forces from the station could arrive here to wipe them out.”
“On the contrary, this is the best place to ambush people because they would let down their--”
A kinetic round exploded against the shield of the freighter before he could finish his words.
I thought it was just a normal explosive round until some kind of shockwave enveloped all our ships, forcing our travel drives to cease functioning and slow us down.
“Interdiction blast! Ambush! Ambush! Scatter!” Samson ordered.
We did as he instructed as we engaged our normal engines to fly away from Reese’s freighter.
We weren’t abandoning her of course, we’re only putting distance between her so that the pirates could not concentrate fire in one place and wipe all of us out together.
I looked in the direction that the kinetic round came from and three ships flew out of the nebula to head straight for us.
Two Class A Fighters and a Class B Support Ship.
Support ships could be adapted to suit a variety of roles with one of them being an artillery platform like the one that I was looking at now. This one had a massive rail cannon turret mounted on top of its ship which would normally only be found on Class C ships and above.
But in return, that’s the only weapon it had.
I was just wondering why these three pirates would actually attack us since they were clearly outnumbered when five ships showed up from behind and three more came from the opposite side of the first three ships, boxing us in.
“Fuck, we’re surrounded!” Maurice cried out.
Samson growled, “Calm down! Tera, take out the long range ships first! Everyone else, prepare engage them and keep them away from the freighter!”
“Easy for you to say!” Clandice grumbled but obeyed nevertheless.
I turned my ship to lock on to the Support ship that was hanging back from the attack, either because they were simply watching the fight from afar since its job was done or it was reloading its next shot.
Either way, I fired my photon laser at it, the Support ship’s shields flaring to life as my attack struck it dead centre.
The pilot of the ship must not have expected any of us to possess a long range weapon because they immediately tried to turn around and hide inside the nebula they just flew out from.
I pulled my trigger a second time, the energy blast shattering the ship’s shield and piercing a hole through its engines and straight out through the cockpit.
One down, ten more to go.
I looked out for any more ships with long ranged weapons right before I noticed something flying straight towards me.
On instinct, I activated my side thrusters to full power and strafed to the left, narrowly avoiding what looked like a kinetic shell flying through space.
I immediately turned my ship towards the direction of where the shell came from and fired my photon laser, the other ship failing to avoid my shot like I did and getting the full brunt of the blast on its shield.
Just from that one shot, their shield had already shattered and the pilot was obviously panicking since they knew I would be firing a second shot soon enough.
Their comrades could do nothing but watch as my follow up shot pierced through its side and leaving a hole that went straight through its hull, disabling it.
Seeing that the three ships on either side had been reduced to two, I immediately came up with a plan.
“Maurice, Clandice! Engage the two ships on our left flank! Amber, take care of the ships on the right flank and help the others once you’re done! Samson, could you engage the five ships at the back? I’ll provide support!”
They hesitated, probably not expecting such orders to come out from me and, to be honest, I was a little surprised that I also took the initiative to give out such orders too. I’m guessing it was from my days of playing the game where I might have to give such orders when raiding with other players.
Amber helped a lot by reacting immediately with a laugh, “You got it Tera! Those two are scrap!”
Her ship boosted away towards the two ships and faced them head on without any hesitation, prompting the other three to quickly adapt to the situation and obey my words as well.
I turned my ship around to face the group of five ships that I sent Samson against.
They had three A Class ships which consisted of two bombers and one fighter, a B Class Heavy Fighter and a C Class Corvette.
That C class ship was the main issue here but I think with Samson and myself working together, we could take down this group.
I followed behind him, maintaining a set distance as I fired my photon laser at the smaller ships first.
They were clearly not expecting us to fly towards them instead of hunkering down so their coordination was a little late when my first shot hit them.
One of the bombers didn’t even try to turn before my laser burned off the left half of the ship, sending it careening into space in an uncontrolled spin.
The second bomber managed to turn but it wasn’t fast enough to avoid my kinetic shell fired from my railgun, punching a hole directly through its belly.
Samson was firing his kinetic mortars at the heavy fighter, the pilot desperately trying to avoid all the shots while attempting to get Samson within his weapon range.
The last A Class Fighter thought that Samson was too preoccupied to notice him and attempted to flank, only for two rockets to be launched from Samson’s missile pods to head straight towards them.
They tried to swerve away but the angle was not enough to avoid the missiles as they blasted the small fighter apart.
The corvette started firing its laser turrets at us, a beam of pure energy blasting against Samson’s shields.
As I thought, he was really tanky since he pretty much shrugged that attack off like it was no big deal.
The other heavy fighter had mistakenly thought the corvette’s laser would have broken Samson’s shields and tried to engage him, only to get a kinetic mortar shell in their face followed up by a rain of energy blasts fired from his chainguns.
The heavy fighter quickly exploded in a ball of fire and the two of us concentrated fire on the corvette.
The corvette was faced with a rain of kinetic shells and energy blasts that quickly drained its shields as it tried to repel us unsuccessfully.
Samson took most of the hits with his shields but they managed to bear through it without collapsing and I only took a few grazing shots that also did minimal damage to my shields.
I watched as the corvette’s shields finally fell and our attacks started burning through the armour plating of its hull.
Samson then launched one of his torpedoes at the ship, swerving away to avoid another laser that the corvette tried to fire at him.
I watched as the projectile impacted the side of the corvette before a brilliant explosion lit up the space.
When the light subsided, the corvette had a big hole in its side that almost cut the ship into half.
Turning back to see how the others were doing, I found the other pirates had also been reduced to wrecks.
Damn. Not bad I would say.