We took a drubbing at Epsilon Reticuli but we blew their trap to kingdom come and got out.\u00a0 Then we had to make for Serenity.\u00a0 Serenity had yards to repair our ships, heavy defensive fleets, and powerful orbital forts.\u00a0 She was a Western Alliance Core World, an immovable fortress in the stars, a safe haven in even the most dangerous of wars.\u00a0 We would be safe when we got there.\u00a0 We\u2019d escaped the trap and were home free.\u00a0 There was nothing to worry about, right?<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
He awoke with a yawn so powerful it stretched from the tip of his nose to the curled end of his toes.\u00a0 Tears filled his eyes and he stretched his left arm and right leg as far as the limbs would go.\u00a0 Toes and fingers quivered in time to each other and electricity ran up and down his spine.\u00a0 Finally he collapsed back into the small bed and luxuriated in the feel of freshly moving muscles.\u00a0 Then he stretched the other leg until it quivered and moved his right arm up to give it the full early morning treatment.<\/p>\n
The stretching exercise ended when his right hand hit something.\u00a0 Someone<\/em>.\u00a0 He froze, wondering what someone else was doing in his bed.\u00a0 Then the faint smell of chamomile registered.<\/p>\n Jack smiled and laid a hand on Natalie\u2019s bare leg.\u00a0 The boy who earned the name Jack had awoken to many crowded beds so that part at least was old hat.\u00a0 The last two years had changed Captain Jack Hart\u2019s priorities, but this was one girl he would never<\/em> kick out of his bed.\u00a0 Well, she was sitting on<\/em> his bed rather than lying in<\/em> it if he was being honest.\u00a0 He might be tempted to embellish a bit in his memoirs though.\u00a0 Waking up next<\/em> to a beautiful young lady sounded so much better in a story after all.<\/p>\n Jack opened his eyes to see a flower-print sundress stopping just above his hand looking like a refugee from a fashion show.\u00a0 Not that he\u2019d watched many fashion shows since Julie and Alex left to follow their dreams.\u00a0 Jack swung his eyes up to Natalie\u2019s raven-black hair and the starkly beautiful face that could have shamed even the best Russian models.\u00a0 He\u2019d loved watching Russian models running around in the wild back in the day.\u00a0 She raised an eyebrow at him and he had the feeling she knew every thought in his head.<\/p>\n \u201cWell, hello beautiful,\u201d he said with a winning smile and patted the cybernetic intelligence\u2019s android leg.\u00a0 It was a true body rather than the holoform most cybers used when dealing with their pilots.\u00a0 Not that she would ever have the opportunity of speaking with her pilot ever again.\u00a0 Jack pushed that thought away and kept his smile warm.\u00a0 He wasn\u2019t about to try to bring her down this early in the morning.<\/p>\n \u201cHello, Jack,\u201d she answered with an amused smile.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat brings you here this beautiful morning?\u201d he asked shamelessly and she chuckled.<\/p>\n \u201cWell, you did<\/em> have an alarm set for an hour out of Serenity.\u201d \u00a0Her expression bespoke genuine humor with him.\u00a0 She was in her best mood since Epsilon Reticuli.<\/p>\n \u201cAh,\u201d Jack muttered and cleared his throat of early morning phlegm, determined to keep thoughts of that battle off his face.\u00a0 \u201cYou volunteered?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI drew the short straw.\u201d Natalie teased.<\/p>\n Jack affected a wounded look and placed a hand over his heart.\u00a0 \u201cOh, you wound me.\u201d<\/p>\n Natalie just laughed again.\u00a0 \u201cI somehow think you\u2019ll get over it.\u00a0 But you should hurry.\u201d<\/p>\n Jack wiped drool off his cheek and made a production of rolling his shoulders out of their sleep.\u00a0 \u201cWell, I do need a shower,\u201d he said, looking up at her with a raised eyebrow.<\/p>\n Natalie smiled at the suggestion\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cThen I suppose I should leave you alone to deal with that.\u201d\u00a0 She leaned forward and came to her feet with a single smooth motion that brought her out from under his hand.<\/p>\n He reached out and grabbed her hand though.\u00a0 She stopped and met his suddenly serious eyes with a questioning look.\u00a0 \u201cHow are you?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n She sighed at the question he asked every day.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019m better today than yesterday.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAny day you can wake up saying that\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIs a good day,\u201d Natalie finished what had become their daily tradition.<\/p>\n Jack aimed a serious nod towards her.\u00a0 \u201cThat\u2019s right.\u201d<\/p>\n Natalie sighed.\u00a0 \u201cNow you really do<\/em> need to hurry,\u201d Natalie said with another smile.\u00a0 \u201cUnless you want to explain to Captain Wyatt why you\u2019re late,\u201d she added with a wicked glint.<\/p>\n \u201cOh!\u201d Jack exclaimed and rolled out of his bunk in a smooth procession of wind milling limbs that sent his blanket into the air above them.\u00a0 He\u2019d nearly made it to the small head, and the blanket was settling back down on the bunk, when a single word stopped him in his tracks.<\/p>\n \u201cJack?\u201d<\/p>\n He turned to see Natalie giving him a soft look.\u00a0 \u201cYes?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThank you.\u201d<\/p>\n Jack nodded and tipped an imaginary hat towards her.\u00a0 \u201cMy pleasure, Ma\u2019am.\u201d<\/p>\n She shook her head in amusement and left his tiny cabin.<\/p>\n He stood there alone, thinking on those simple words.\u00a0 A few days ago, she\u2019d been ready to shut down forever.\u00a0 Now she was thanking him.\u00a0 That was an amazing change and he couldn\u2019t move as he considered just how important it was.\u00a0 Maybe she was truly ready to live now.\u00a0 Just maybe.<\/p>\n \u201cJack?\u201d Betty\u2019s voice asked from thin air, springing him from his trance.<\/p>\n \u201cYeah?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cShower?\u201d the cyber he truly belonged to asked in a pointed tone.<\/p>\n Jack blinked.\u00a0 \u201cRight,\u201d he said and turned to deal with that.<\/p>\n Jack splurged on a hot water shower instead of the sonic showers most people used.\u00a0 Sonics did Bad Things to ears as sensitive as his, so he watered up, toweled off, and stepped out of the tiny head to find his uniform waiting for him, pressed and cleaned overnight as he slept.\u00a0 He nodded approval, grabbed the Republic of Texas Marine Corps service shirt, and slid into it with a smooth motion.\u00a0 Service trousers came next, with a decidedly non-regulation deer head belt buckle staring out of the regulation belt.\u00a0 He stepped into his black cowboy boots next, hearing the faint jingling of not-quite-decorative spurs.<\/p>\n Finally he stuffed himself into the brown leather flight jacket and dropped the regulation black Stetson on his head.\u00a0 Fingers ran through the Peloran-regulation length long blonde hair that stuck out from beneath it with pleasure and a shake of his head.\u00a0 A quick examination of his reflection in the mirror met with approval.\u00a0 A member of the Texas Marine Corps Fighter Wing 112, the Cowboys, always had to be ready to give the right impression to all the pretty girls first thing in the morning.\u00a0 And as all the best movies put it, he looked marvelous.<\/p>\n A cybernetic holoform flickered into being next to him and stared at the reflection.\u00a0 She always looked best on of her blonde hair and blue-eyed days.\u00a0 It was how he\u2019d first met her and it just looked right to him.\u00a0 He turned to examine her vaguely Scandinavian features more closely than the mirror allowed and smiled at her.\u00a0 Her digital form stood in stark contrast to the analog world around them to his sensitive eyes.\u00a0 Even the edges of her yellow sundress seemed to stop far more suddenly than anything he\u2019d seen in the northern Minnesota nature he\u2019d grown up with.<\/p>\n The cyber turned towards him and in that smile he saw oh so many of the girls he\u2019d grown up with.\u00a0 His heart actually skipped a beat as he saw her.\u00a0 Natalie was beautiful.\u00a0 Very few would disagree with that.\u00a0 But Betty was something else entirely.\u00a0 She was his.\u00a0 And he was hers.\u00a0 She\u2019d pulled him out of the hate-filled months that followed the fall of Yosemite Yards and the end of his world.\u00a0 And now she kept him moving every day.\u00a0 She was the perfect companion.<\/p>\n Betty nodded in approval and looked towards the hatch with a questioning eyebrow.<\/p>\n \u201cYeah,\u201d he answered her wordless question and squeezed around her to walk out of his tiny cabin.\u00a0 The corridor was full of crewmen making their way to stations in the early shipboard morning.\u00a0 Serenity was near and the well-rested crewers all had their stations to go to.\u00a0 A flash of color caught his attention and a smaller version of Betty appeared on his shoulder.\u00a0 Now that they were out of his cabin her twenty-centimeter small form wore the same service uniform he did, with the exception of the skirt that looked much better on her than it would on him.\u00a0 Jack reached up to place a hand on his shoulder next to her and a doll-sized hand soon rested on it.\u00a0 They exchanged a quick gaze and walked through the rabbit-warren of corridors with the ship\u2019s crew.<\/p>\n He found a lift and filed into it along with several other crewmembers.\u00a0 They filled every spare centimeter of the small space and Jack glanced at Betty with a raised eyebrow.\u00a0 She nodded in confirmation that she had already informed the lift of their destination.\u00a0 He turned his head to smile at the other members of the crew.\u00a0 Several of them smiled back, though as usual they didn\u2019t know what to make of him.<\/p>\n Like most naval crewers they were, well, naval<\/em> personnel.\u00a0 He was different from them in three ways.\u00a0 First he was a Marine, trained in one of the hardest boot camps in creation to inflict physical mayhem.\u00a0 They were trained to operate computer displays on a starship.\u00a0 Secondly he was a fighter pilot.\u00a0 He fought the enemy alone in a tiny fighter while they served with hundreds of their fellows on a heavy cruiser.\u00a0 At best he could count on the support of other fighter pilots and craft, but fighters always engaged the enemy on the knife-edge of combat between life and death.\u00a0 Warships rarely engaged in the kinds of close combat that fighters gloried in.<\/p>\n Finally he was one of the literal one in a million members of the human race whose body had reacted in the rarest of ways to the Peloran treatments.\u00a0 He moved faster, he could lift more, and \u201ceyes of the eagle\u201d had more truth than hyperbole in his case.\u00a0 And while his nose did not compare to a bloodhound he could smell far better than many dogs.\u00a0 He could quite literally smell the tension in the lift.<\/p>\n In another life that ended with the Shang strike that brought Yosemite Yards down all over his hometown, Jack had been just one of many college slackers studiously wasting his potential.\u00a0 He\u2019d studied liberal arts, music, and girls, and not at all in that order.\u00a0 Now he was a Marine.\u00a0 He spent most of his time wearing the fa\u00e7ade of the college slacker he\u2019d perfected in that other life, but everyone in the lift knew he wasn\u2019t that harmless.\u00a0 He wasn\u2019t one of them.<\/p>\n He was a Marine.\u00a0 He was a fighter pilot.\u00a0 He was a gengineered, even if by accident, super soldier.\u00a0 And his shoulder-length hair branded him a Cowboy, member of the only American fighter unit that actively served under Peloran command.\u00a0 He was different from them and even those who smiled back at him betrayed a hint of nerves in their smell, their stance, and their eyes.<\/p>\n The bridge proved one of the lift\u2019s first stops and four crewers stepped out into the roomy compartment, Jack following almost precisely on their heals.\u00a0 He felt the relief running through the remaining crew behind him as the lift door closed and watched the new arrivals stride over to vacant stations.\u00a0 But the smell of stress heightened rather than went away.\u00a0 Jack scanned the bridge to see every duty station was filled and another quick glance showed they were operating at a heightened alert status.\u00a0 They weren\u2019t at general quarters but his eyes flicked over consoles filled with warnings and questions.\u00a0 Something odd was going on.<\/p>\n Betty made a show of looking around and jumping off his shoulder.\u00a0 She grew to normal size on the way down and he heard the holoemitters in his uniform powering up to take the extra load of her larger form.\u00a0 She shook her head and ran her fingers through her hair with a satisfied air.<\/p>\n \u201cMuch better,\u201d Betty intoned.<\/p>\n \u201cAbsolutely,\u201d Jack said as two figures caught his attention in the middle of the bridge.\u00a0 The first was a redhead.\u00a0 Every time he saw her he remembered all the redheads he\u2019d known in his life.\u00a0 Gabrielle surpassed all but a handful of them with ease.\u00a0 The cybernetic mind of the heavy cruiser gave him a smile from atop her holoform\u2019s petite frame and he tipped the brim of his hat towards her with an answering smile.\u00a0 Then he turned to face the tall and lean captain standing next to her.\u00a0 \u201cCaptain Wyatt.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cMajor Hart,\u201d the brunette answered, giving him the courtesy promotion tradition dictated.\u00a0 There could only be one Captain aboard ship after all.\u00a0 If the proverbial animal excrement ever hit the rotary oscillators there could be no confusion at all when a crewman shouted for her.<\/p>\n \u201cYou wanted me?\u201d Jack asked, his smile projecting wry humor.<\/p>\n She sighed quietly enough he could pretend he didn\u2019t notice but loud enough his ears couldn\u2019t miss it.\u00a0 Then she looked around the bridge for a moment, brown hair bobbing as she took in bridge crew.\u00a0 \u201cCould you join me in my briefing room?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSaid the spider to the fly?\u201d he asked with a wink.<\/p>\n Her amused smile made it all the way to her grey eyes as she turned to walk into the small room next to the bridge.\u00a0 He followed her through the hatch, Gabrielle and Betty on his heels, to see Hunter Roberts and Mercedes already waiting for them.\u00a0 The warship\u2019s integral pilot and cyber wore matching flight jackets and mirrored aviator shades over physiques Top Gun Academy recruiting posters looked for.<\/p>\n \u201cRoberts,\u201d Jack said towards the square-jawed pilot.\u00a0 \u201cMercedes,\u201d he added with a nod towards the much finer-featured cyber.<\/p>\n \u201cHart,\u201d Roberts answered with a smile and nodded towards Captain Wyatt.<\/p>\n \u201cSo what\u2019s with the powwow?\u201d Jack asked and turned back towards her.<\/p>\n \u201cSerenity\u2019s buoys are silent,\u201d Roberts said with a worried look.<\/p>\n Jack frowned.\u00a0 “Are we in the right spot?\u201d\u00a0 He’d never studied hyperspace any more than the average person before The War started, but there was one undeniable point about it.\u00a0 Time in hyperspace and normalspace just worked different.\u00a0 Seven days had passed since they left Epsilon Reticuli but there was no way of knowing how much time those who lived in the universe that Einstein knew had seen go by.\u00a0 Gallivanting between stars on meandering rivers of hyperspatial gravity tended to make tiny little matters like time and space far more complicated than any computer could accurately calculate.<\/p>\n To combat that problem, most major star systems anchored buoys along the major hyperspace routes to contact approaching starships.\u00a0 They transmitted time and space updates, or updated system maps since nobody wanted to bounce too close to something the size of a planet or star.\u00a0 Even local news, like which planetary celebrity had last been photographed skinny-dipping after a drunken party, was usually sent.\u00a0 Jack had been particularly looking forward to that last bit since Serenity had some very flamboyant actresses.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve confirmed our location via normalspace,\u201d Wyatt said nodded towards one of the displays on the wall that showed a screen full of stars.\u00a0 \u201cWe should have passed the first buoy fifteen minutes ago.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cFrak.\u201d\u00a0 Jack glanced a question towards Betty and she nodded to confirm the captain\u2019s description of their situation.\u00a0 \u201cWhat are you thinking?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m hoping<\/em> an equipment malfunction,\u201d Wyatt said in a tone that betrayed very little hope at all.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s what I thought.\u201d\u00a0 Jack shook his head and examined the holofield hovering over the briefing table.\u00a0 It showed the fourteen surviving starships of their squadron arrayed around the heavy cruiser Los Angeles<\/em>.\u00a0 He focused on each of them, considering the information that came into existence over each one.\u00a0 The Battle of Epsilon Reticuli had damaged all of them to one degree or another, but they\u2019d repaired much of it in the last week.\u00a0 All of the external armor had been repaired though many of them still reported internal damage the fabricators hadn\u2019t fixed yet.\u00a0 American fabricators still weren\u2019t up to Peloran standards and it just took time to do things.<\/p>\n Jack adjusted his view to check the distance between the fleet and the star\u2019s gravitic disturbance and had to agree.\u00a0 They should have picked up the buoys minutes ago.\u00a0 That meant they\u2019d either malfunctioned or they weren\u2019t there.\u00a0 And Core Worlds buoys rarely malfunctioned.\u00a0 \u201cYou want us to scout ahead and find out what\u2019s up?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAre you offering?\u201d Wyatt asked the question that was far more serious than it would be in most circumstances.\u00a0 Jack\u2019s Cowboys were quite literally not under her command after all.<\/p>\n Jack looked at Betty and she nodded.\u00a0 \u201cAbsolutely,\u201d Jack said with a wide smile.<\/p>\n \u201cThank you,\u201d Wyatt said with a genuine smile on her face.<\/p>\n \u201cMy pleasure, Ma\u2019am,\u201d Jack answered with a brisk salute and began to turn away.<\/p>\n \u201cGood luck.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAlways, Ma\u2019am,\u201d he said and tipped the brim of his cowboy hat towards her.<\/p>\n Then he and Betty stepped out of the briefing room, walked through a bridge full of people diligently scanning their displays for any information they could find, and stepped into the lift.\u00a0 It began to move and he waggled his eyebrows at Betty.\u00a0 \u201cThis is Captain Jack to all Cowboys,\u201d he said, trusting her to retransmit his words to those Cowboys on the other ships of the squadron.\u00a0 \u201cGet to your fighters and get ready to fly.\u00a0 We\u2019ve got some scouting to do.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThey\u2019re getting ready,\u201d Betty said with a smile.<\/p>\n \u201cGiving out orders before I do again?\u201d Jack asked with a raised eyebrow.<\/p>\n \u201cOf course not.\u201d\u00a0 Betty\u2019s smile turned innocent.\u00a0 \u201cThey were merely suggestions.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOh, of course.\u00a0 Suggestions.\u201d\u00a0 Jack said with finger quotes as the lift opened up into the hangar bay of a Los Angeles<\/em>-class heavy cruiser.\u00a0 It was large.\u00a0 Cavernous even if Jack wanted to borrow ten-dollar words for the purpose.\u00a0 Over one hundred meters across, with fighters and Marine craft anchored to both the overhead and underfoot decks, the hangar bay was never silent.\u00a0 The fevered activity of men and women performing last minute checks on their craft made it look like a particularly annoyed anthill now.\u00a0 Naval Hellcat fighters and Marine Garm assault shuttles pinged their final pre-battle readiness in a steady chorus.\u00a0 Here or there came the annoying buzz of something failing and technicians quickly piled onto those craft.\u00a0 They were in a race to bring the squadron up to full battle readiness.<\/p>\n Jack glanced at Betty and she nodded.\u00a0 She was ready.\u00a0 He turned to the right and ran, weaving between fighters, shuttles, and boxes of spare parts on his way to the single largest craft in the entire hangar.\u00a0 Over forty meters long, the Avenger-class \u201cfighter\u201d was the largest craft of her type ever built as far as Jack knew.\u00a0 The first fighter capable of hyperspatial transmissions on their own, the Avengers simply had larger engines, more powerful generators, heavier armor, and more weaponry than any other fighter ever made by Terran hands.<\/p>\n And one Captain Jack Hart had the honor of flying one of the first twelve fighters to serve in the Texas Marine Corps.\u00a0 Not that all twelve still flew.\u00a0 Even the Cowboys took losses.\u00a0 Especially the Cowboys took losses.\u00a0 There was an old saying about being given more than your fair share of impossible missions if you finished more than your fair share of impossible missions in there somewhere.\u00a0 And impossible missions tended to generate body counts.\u00a0 Like Epsilon Reticuli.<\/p>\n Jack firmly closed his mind on that gloomy thought and rounded another shuttle to see his Avenger.\u00a0 Betty\u2019s Avenger.\u00a0 Their Avenger.\u00a0 Whatever.\u00a0 He shot past a surprised technician at full run and jumped as hard as he could.\u00a0 It was a good jump.\u00a0 He was pretty certain it would have cleared ten meters if he were in the Olympics.\u00a0 Not that he would ever be allowed to participate in them.\u00a0 The Avenger\u2019s gravity generator snatched him out of the air, forever erasing any chance of getting an accurate measurement on that particular jump, and sucked Jack up towards the upper hull of the fighter.\u00a0 He arced back down to place his feet carefully inside the cockpit, just as he\u2019d practiced hundreds of times before.\u00a0 The natural pull of artificial gravity reasserted itself, and he sat down to the sound of sighing leather all around him.<\/p>\n \u201cReactor online, sensors online, weapons online, all systems nominal,\u201d Betty reported in a husky tone, her twenty-centimeter holoform landing on top of the console beneath the closing cockpit.<\/p>\n Jack smiled in appreciation.\u00a0 \u201cOooh, that\u2019s nice.\u00a0 Do it again.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThe Cowboys are assembling,\u201d she responded in the same tone.<\/p>\n Jack sighed.\u00a0 \u201cThen I suppose we should join them,\u201d he said and locked his five-point harness together with practiced motions.\u00a0 Then he flashed his eyes across the displays to confirm their status and nodded in approval.<\/p>\n \u201cBy your command,\u201d Betty said and shed her service uniform in an explosion of electronic pixels radiating out from her holoform.\u00a0 When it cleared, the yellow sundress she preferred hung off her form and she smiled.\u00a0 Jack returned the smile, but most of his attention was on the multicolored chaos of hyperspace outside the hangar.<\/p>\n They slid out through the energy barrier to see the endless wonders of hyperspace stretching out in every direction.\u00a0 The Avenger spun in place, maneuvering thrusters flaring, to face towards where the other Avengers assembled for what he dearly hoped would be an uneventful arrival. \u00a0He scanned the displays, noting the destroyers and frigates surrounding the single heavy cruiser, and the three British ships hanging well behind the squadron.\u00a0 Small fighters flew around the warships, keeping a watch for enemies trying to sneak up on them.<\/p>\n The Avenger vibrated around them, breaking his attention away from the formation as their engines came to life, and they shot away from the heavy cruiser.\u00a0 The displays blinked for his attention, and he saw Jasmine\u2019s three surviving Avengers move out of Los Angeles\u2019<\/em> shadow to fly with him.\u00a0 Jasmine\u2019s blue jean and tank top-clad holoform flickered onto the console next to Betty and they exchanged a smile.\u00a0 \u201cNice to see you again,\u201d Jack said to the cyber.\u00a0 \u201cHow we doing?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cReady to blow something up,\u201d Jasmine answered with a wicked smile.<\/p>\n \u201cGood.\u201d<\/p>\n An Avenger shot away from one of the destroyers and he squinted to examine the starship.\u00a0 She was Harrington<\/em>, one of the new Austin<\/em>-class destroyers that were making all the waves lately.\u00a0 Her massive armored hammerhead sported weapons powerful enough to kill even enemy capital ships and armor capable of absorbing or deflecting even the most powerful of capital weapons.\u00a0 She was an impressive little ship.<\/p>\n His eyes shifted to the Avenger and Kathleen Reynolds\u2019 name appeared.\u00a0 Jack smiled as more Avengers banked in to surround her fighter and accelerated towards his position.\u00a0 A console blinked for his attention and he turned as Katy\u2019s face appeared.<\/p>\n \u201cCat Flight here,\u201d the blonde said in a voice that perfectly portrayed the boredom of a veteran pilot looking for something to excite her.\u00a0 She made it a point of pride to never let anyone know if she was afraid of anything.\u00a0 It was one of the things he loved about flying with her.\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cI suppose it\u2019s time.\u201d<\/p>\n Jack shrugged and echoed her calm demeanor.\u00a0 \u201cYup.\u00a0 Time to go out and get bored,\u201d he answered with a confident smile that he wished was more than skin deep.\u00a0 Serenity was one of the major Alliance Core Worlds, as secure as any world in this mixed up War could be.\u00a0 But if he wanted to cut a fleet off from the Core Worlds support, he knew where he would put his ships.\u00a0 Smack dab on a straight-line course between Epsilon Reticuli and Alpha Centauri.\u00a0 He would have Serenity covered, and maybe some others.\u00a0 But definitely Serenity.\u00a0 And now the buoys were missing.\u00a0 He had a bad feeling about this.<\/p>\n \u201cA nice, quiet reentry?\u201d Katy asked.<\/p>\n \u201cHave I ever given you anything less?\u201d<\/p>\n Katy snorted.\u00a0 \u201cGuns drawn it is.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAbsolutely.\u201d\u00a0 Jack turned to the other displays to see the other Avengers assembling around them.\u00a0 All the colors of the rainbow played over their hulls and Jack smiled as the thirty-two remaining Cowboy fighters formed a wedge before the American warship squadron.<\/p>\n The very fabric of hyperspace dragged at the ships, even when riding a gravitic stream, and the telltale blue glow of fusion engines kept them moving resolutely towards Serenity.\u00a0 The gravitic streams ducked and weaved through hyperspace, pulling the Avengers with them in what looked like a random series of rolls and dives.\u00a0 It created a complex and random pattern of chaos at the very point of the American formation.\u00a0 Jack watched his fighters follow the streams and could almost feel a rhythm to it all.\u00a0 There was an ebb and flow to their movements that Jack could almost recognize, like hyperspace itself represented a much larger current that he couldn\u2019t quite see.\u00a0 Jack had to admit that whatever it was made the whole sight appear impressive.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are approaching the Red Line,\u201d Betty announced.<\/p>\n \u201cDeploy scouts,\u201d Jack ordered.<\/p>\n Five Avengers responded to his order by firing their engines and filling hyperspace with brighter blue fusion torches.\u00a0 They dissipated quickly in the streams of gravity flowing ahead of them, but the fighters slowed and seemed to recede at the same time.\u00a0 They held their position in their streams, but seemed to move further away.\u00a0 Sometimes Jack really hated hyperspace.\u00a0 Trying to understand it hurt the brain.\u00a0 The cybernetic fighters moved towards the wall that separated hyperspace from the Einsteinium universe, carefully trying to avoid taking any more energy than they needed.\u00a0 And then they faded away entirely, dropping off every sensor Jack\u2019s fighters had access to as they rose into normalspace.<\/p>\n A second later, the displays began to come to life with views of the Serenity star system.\u00a0 Peloran technology at work.\u00a0 They\u2019d long known how to transmit messages directly between normalspace and hyperspace, giving them perfect real time intelligence on the other side of the wall if they could send a probe.\u00a0 The scouting Avengers played the roll of probe for Jack, punching a signal filled with their sensor readings back to the Avengers who followed them in hyperspace.\u00a0 It was as valuable for Jack now as it had been every time he saw the Peloran take advantage of it.\u00a0 Valuable but not comforting at all.\u00a0 Angry red symbols filled the displays.<\/p>\n \u201cOh, frak,\u201d he swore.<\/p>\n Dozens of Chinese cruisers, destroyers, and frigates filled the system, and the wreckage of dozens more told the tale of a bitter battle for Serenity.\u00a0 Nearly two-dozen assorted destroyers and frigates pounded a fort just inside the Red Line from Jack\u2019s force, and he could see the fort was falling fast.\u00a0 Floating wreckage marked where the outer forts had been, and the near orbit defenses were just gone.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m getting friendly signals,\u201d Betty reported.\u00a0 \u201cThey\u2019re squawking for help on all frequencies.\u00a0 Serenity has lost all orbital defenses.\u00a0 Invasion is\u2026right now.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cFrak,\u201d Jack swore again.\u00a0 \u201cCaptain Wyatt?\u201d<\/p>\n Her holoform appeared on the console almost immediately.\u00a0 \u201cYes?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s a lot of ships,\u201d Jack reported, knowing she had to be seeing the same data he was.<\/p>\n \u201cYes, it is,\u201d she said, her tone angry.\u00a0 \u201cWe have to do something.\u201d<\/p>\n Jack didn\u2019t hesitate so much as a second even as he knew it was crazy.\u00a0 The Chinese outnumbered them two to one, and that was before the damage they\u2019d taken at Epsilon Reticuli.\u00a0 But Serenity was an Alliance Core World, a bastion of economic and industrial might, home to hundreds of millions of people from every nation in the Alliance.\u00a0 It had to be defended.\u00a0 \u201cI know.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cImpossible!\u201d another voice interjected into the conversation and the displays revealed Admiral Bainsworth.\u00a0 The commander of the entire British fleet at Epsilon Reticuli, he now commanded a single medical frigate and two destroyers staying as far away from the American squadron as they could without losing contact.\u00a0 \u201cWe have vital military intelligence that could affect future prosecution of The War!\u00a0 We must take this information to Alpha Centauri without delay.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThis is not a delay,\u201d Wyatt said in a harsh tone.\u00a0 \u201cThis is a star system.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNo single system is worth the outcome of the entire War, Captain<\/em>,\u201d Bainsworth emphasized her rank.\u00a0 \u201cI order you to make for the New Earth-Serenity Run at maximum speed.\u201d<\/p>\n Wyatt just smiled back at him but her eyes were hard as iron.\u00a0 \u201cWe\u2019ve been over this before, Admiral.\u00a0 This is an American squadron.\u00a0 I command here, not you.\u00a0 You may hold your ships back and watch if you wish, but this squadron will defend all<\/em> Alliance worlds from attack.\u00a0 Serenity will not fall.\u201d\u00a0 Her hand chopped down in a motion that severed Bainsworth\u2019s spluttering connection and she turned to Jack.\u00a0 \u201cCaptain Hart.\u00a0 Will you please explain it to them?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYes, Ma\u2019am.\u201d\u00a0 Jack tipped his hat towards Wyatt and scanned the displays one last time.\u00a0 Everybody was ready.\u00a0 Good.\u00a0 \u201cAll Cowboys, clear for surface action in three\u2026two\u2026one.\u201d<\/p>\n Betty smiled and said \u201cNow\u201d as the hyperdrive powered up behind them in the Avenger\u2019s core.<\/p>\n \u201cYippie ki-yay,\u201d Jack whispered the age-old battlecry as the world of wildly flowing colors turned pitch black for an instant that felt like it would never end.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" We took a drubbing at Epsilon Reticuli but we blew their trap to kingdom come and got out.\u00a0 Then we had to make for Serenity.\u00a0 Serenity had yards to repair our ships, heavy defensive fleets, and powerful orbital forts.\u00a0 She[…]↓ Read the rest of this 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