Chapter IV - Icebreaker

Four days slowly ticked by.
The City, from space, looked much as it always had.
The Battleship, too, looked no different than any other day.
The stars looked no different, and the one several light years away which had an asteroid belt orbiting it looked no different.
The asteroid belt itself looked no different. Not even the extraordinarily large one near the centre.
But, just like the City, and the Battleship, it only looked the same on the surface.

Ka'eil strode confidently into the Hangar Bay or makeshift command centre. There was a buzz of activity in the air.
Eagles and Faelnon had adopted a small square as their area and had set several crates on top of each other to provide a desk. They were currently checking of the inventory.
Noris was trying, with a growing air of futility, to explain to Ariea how to reuse some of the metal parts she was waving about.
'Smith said to make, so I make.' Ariea replied, finishing a small pipe to go, if she recalled correctly, at sub-junction 27a on level 16 of the Cruiser.
Noris' mouth flapped feebly like a fish, 'Yes, but that part you are throwing away could be smelted down and turned into a - oh'
Ariea, deciding to end the conversation, had stood up and moved towards the access ramp.
'We'll chat later then,' Noris sighed sadly. He readjusted his small glasses and looked about the bay.
Ka'eil took a good look around and saw everyone except two people. Smith, he knew, would be working feverishly at something that - dreadfully- was only running at 99% efficiency, instead of the standard 110% he demanded.
Rilnae however, had-
'Hiya Boss,' the guilty party grinned.
Ka'eil slowly gazed from head to toe at the Rilnae that had suddenly appeared in front of her. She was blue. Glowing blue, in fact. '… Hi?'
Rilnae grinned, 'Me and Smith found this cool toy. Isn't it great?'
'As far as glowing blue stuff goes, yeah, this is pretty top notch.' Ka'eil replied trying to regain control of the situation.
Rilnae continued to grin, 'No, no, we found this on the bridge. It's an emitter. It can transmit my image over a huge range. Smith thinks it was used by the Talmarrick pirates to communicate covertly with allies on planets they were about to raid. But more importantly: it's neato.'
Ka'eil looked incredulously at the image before him. Deciding to firmly regain control, he asked, 'How's the ship?'
'Ready to go. Well, Smith thinks- I'll save that for you. It isn't the absolute epitome of perfection that Smith wants it to be.'
Ka'eil smiled briefly, 'Smith will never find technological perfection. I'll be along in a second.'
Rilnae looked away for a moment, 'Smith says we're ready to go if you want to herd up the crew. And he took the perfection remark as an offence to his arm.' She paused briefly, 'And just said something rather unrepeatable.'
Ka'eil shook his head and motioned towards the others.

In a few minutes, the makeshift crew had assembled on the surprisingly dark bridge.
'Smith, can we get some lighting here?' Ka'eil asked quietly.
'We're running on minimals for some last checks. She'll be as bright as you wan' 'er when we leave.'
Ka'eil shifted uncomfortably on the armrest of the captains chair. He gave up trying to settle and stood again.
The bridge was roughly circular. His chair rested on a rise in the flooring in the centre, which was surrounded by a moat of sorts; a recessed section of the floor surrounded it and led into some of the surrounding work stations. There were three elevators connecting the bridge at 90º angles to the captain's chair. The roof was a plain grey, though at the outer wall, it began to slope down to meet the bottom wall, which was sloping upwards to greet it. The downward sloping wall became transparent to allow the crew to manually watch the prospective battlefield, instead of the imposing telescreen which took up a large section of wall in front of the captain's chair.
There were two rings of stations, one along the outer wall, facing outwards, and one along the inner ring, facing inwards, broken intermittently by access points. The inner stations were uniform and rather bland. A dark grey metal composed their cuboid structure, and while each panel looked similar, their functions were varied. Each was accompanied by a sleek black chair.
The outer ring of stations was more varied, sometimes with structures coming out from the panel, for storage or other tasks. The station Rilnae had adopted was the most unusual. It began like the other panels, but it had a sweeping circular addition which was broken only at one spot to allow the user to stand on the pure-white floor. The circular addition was littered with various controls and information screens, and they spread to a second circular attachment above the user, leaving a clear band for the user to look out. This device, when properly manipulated, would scan whatever was standing on the white circle, and subsequently sectioned off, and would project an image of that person within an astonishing range.
Ka'eil stood silently, the others were assembled before him, and shuffled impatiently.
In a few seconds, there was a slight whir as power was restored. The dark room became reasonably brighter, but Ka'eil still thought it dark.
'Okay, people, you know what's happening in the City and-'
'Good Goddess,' Siae suddenly interrupted.
Ka'eil glared briefly at her. He refrained from commenting as whenever Siae ever mentioned a religious icon, it was important.
The tall brunette slipped along the inner ring and ended her journey at a seemingly plain panel, 'This is amazing.'
'Oh I don't know,' Faelnon smirked, 'Seen one grey panel, seen 'em all.'
'Not that, moron, but this is a Military-grade scanner and communications interceptor.'
'And in English?'
'This thing can pick up every ship within a few dozen light years, and intercept any communications they may use, and probably tell us their eye colour.'
'Makes sense,' Ariea added, 'I've heard stories of the Talmarricks raiding military bases and ships.'
'I've never seen a real one, this could be an incredible opportunity, Ka'eil, if it still works we can deliver crippling blows to military convoys. Or cruisers. Or learn where their bases are, their supply lines, their-'
'Could you see if it works first?'
'Oh, right, yes, lets see…' Siae settled down on the panel's accompanying chair and began tentatively tapping controls.
'Well, while Miss Over-excited gets to work, I should mention that don't get your hopes up about raiding Battleships and cruisers just yet. We have barely any missiles, but our lasers should tide us over.' Ka'eil explained, 'We're hoping to take this ship out on a shakedown cruise today, and put it to good use tomorrow.'
'Er, Boss, hate to sound stupid,' Ariea said, 'But we're surrounded by thousands of asteroids. How exactly do we get this beast out?'
'Smith,' Ka'eil said, designating the speaker.
Smith suddenly snapped to attention, 'Right, yea, I've found that the grav. platin' that's on the floor is also used on the 'ull. It's used to force the 'roids away. And the rear plating is calibrated to draw the 'roids back into place to keep it less suspicious. Though over time, they've been knocked further than they've been brought back.'
'Any more questions?' Ka'eil enquired.
'So long as the grav. platin' doesn't fail, we'll be fine,' Smith added reassuringly.
Ariea glared at him, 'So long as? If power fails, we become mangled bits of metal, right?'
'Sounds 'bout right, yea.'
'Just checking,' Ariea rolled her eyes and shuffled over to find a console to call her own.
'Eagles, you're navigating. Ariea take up gunnery control. Smith, go look after engineering. Rilnae… just stay there. Everyone else, take a seat and enjoy the ride.'
Faelnon motioned to take the captain's chair, to be gently forced back by Ka'eil, 'Any seat except this one, of course.'

In a few minutes, the crew, such as they were, had settled down and Smith had worked his way to Engineering.
'Engines at maximum power, Eagles, she's yours.'
Eagles carefully entered a few commands into the control panel and took manual control of the ship.
The mammoth ship shuddered upwards. It ended its ascent ten metres of the ground and seemed rather satisfied with the alarming amount of noise it was making. As it slowly inched forward, there were a few loud metallic noises.
Ka'eil frowned, 'Eagles, did you remember to clear the bay of any crates?'
Eagles blushed slightly, 'Ask Faelnon.'
Faelnon, meanwhile, was busy using the external viewers to watch the small metal boxes be lifted up in the air by the exhaust of the ship and thrown chaotically about much to the delight of some of the crew. The sound effects he provided were, unfortunately, appreciated.
'Hanger Bay doors opening,' Rilnae reported.
Her skills of the obvious nearly rivalled Ariea's because the giant doors were indeed retracting, allowing the crew to gaze upon the glimmering ice field.
'Engaging gravitational plating,' Smith called over the comms.
'I don't feel anything,' Ariea commented.
Ka'eil looked at her, then at the asteroids drawing closer, 'Well, we'll know if it worked in a few seconds.'
'They're getting pretty big now,' Ariea reported, 'And they're still not moving.'
The Cruiser continued to edge towards the field.
Suddenly, an invisible surge knocked the first asteroids away from the ship's path. In an elegant domino effect, the next asteroids gently bobbed away.
'Nothing to worry about,' Ka'eil smiled reassuringly towards Ariea, then relaxed his grip on the chair's arms.

Several hours passed.
The Cruiser spent most of that time being forced to power up, power down, spin, twist, and generally act like a ballerina. It did get a brief break a few hours in when it got to shoot some asteroids, but that was the height of the entertainment.
'Still a bit worried 'bout port-aft shielding,' Smith reported, 'It's only operating at 30%. Never got a chance to fiddle with it.'
'I'm sure we're not going to meet anything too menacing on our trip back, Smith.' Ka'eil calmly reminded the engineer.
'Er, Boss, this thing's picking up something.' Siae said, poised over the military-grade scanner.
'You were waiting 'til I said that, weren't you?' Ka'eil glared, standing up and moving over.
'Well, sorta. There's a small convoy heading towards the City. Lets see,' Siae pulled up the information with surprising simplicity and knowledge of the system, 'Two light warships, a transport ship, and a couple of fighters. The Cruiser could do more damage calling them names than they could damage us. Transport ship en route to the Battleship. It's transporting… some computer components… Jack pot, it's got a payload of missiles and some hand weapons. Looks like some riot gear. Very limited crew though.'
Ka'eil sat down on the adjacent chair, 'Go on then, astonish us with your plan.'
'We hyperspace in, trash them, steal the goodies and leg it back to base.' Siae swiftly said.
'Sheer tactical brilliance.' Ka'eil rolled his eyes.
'Her plan's not that bad.' Eagles called from his seat.
'See? Thank you, Eagles.' Siae smiled.
'Admittedly, it's one of the more tragic excuses for a plan I've ever heard,' Eagles continued, 'but it does have some merit. If we charge the forward lasers during hyperdrive, we can surprise the first warship and cripple it. Take out the other one and the fighters and the transport'll surrender. Have to get going fast though, they'll call for support.'
Ka'eil shrugged, 'We've got nothing better to do. Would be nice to see how it handles under an actual battle.'
Eagles signified this as permission to charge up hyperdrive, 'Boss, are we- … Do we cripple or destroy?'
Ka'eil leaned back in his chair and paused for a long moment, 'Cripple the ships, try not to destroy any of them.'
Some of those on the bridge nodded in silent agreement.
'It'll take 15 seconds in hyperdrive to get to them,' Siae calculated, 'And about 10 to charge the lasers to maximum.'
'Targeting will be a bit tricky,' Ariea added, 'I've never shot blind while going at nearly incalculable speeds before.'
'Hyperdrive charged,' Eagles reported. A few seconds later, a purple field expanded from the bottom of the ship.
It quickly encapsulated the ship, forming a shimmering bubble. Just as the bubble completed, it popped and disappeared, along with the Cruiser.
Ariea admired the streaking purple and blue lights of hyperdrive while she finished programming the targeting sensors.
Eagles calmly turned to Ka'eil and asked, 'Do we have a red alert?'
Ka'eil shrugged, 'I suppose we could… change the light bulb or something?'

A few light years away, half a dozen ships were moving peacefully through a system.
The lead vessel was a rough elongated rhombus, the top of which was laden in several cannons and laser banks. At the rear, there was a command section on top of the dark brown plating.
At the end of the convoy, there was a second one of these ships. Each had a wing of six fighters to use as it saw fit. Currently, a trio of one-manned black ships were hovering nearby the Cruiser's main target.
The transport was rather bland, in all honesty. The front section was a pyramid, with very few armaments. From back of this was a spine of sorts, running several kilometres in length. The cargo it hauled was placed in several detachable compartments which ran the length of the spine. For this haul, however, only half of them were needed, and the other half left several light years away at the nearby depository.
In hindsight, the commanding officer of the lead warship would complain about the devil making work for idle hands, but at the time he and several bridge staff were engaged in a riveting game of poker.
A few hundred kilometres to their port, a small purple bubble flashed into existence and popped, leaving a mammoth vessel in its place.

'Firing,' Ariea announced.
The forward laser batteries fired simultaneously. Five beams angled toward the lead warship in a roughly diamond shape.
One of the bluish streaks of laser skipped the ship and disappeared further into the universe. The other four struck the warship squarely along the command and aft sections.
'Fighters are approaching,' Rilnae reported.
'Engines have been crippled on the lead warship,' Ariea proudly smiled.
'Rear weapons, too,' Siae added. 'The other warship is moving towards our starboard.'
'Lead warship is launching its fighters,' Rilnae said, watching multiple dots appear on one of her screens. She paused for a moment, 'The last three fighters from the second warship have also been launched. ETA in 30 sec- detecting weapons fire.'
The bridge shook gently as the lead warship's active weapons dissipated harmlessly along the shielding.
'Return fire, aim for weapons only.' Ka'eil ordered.
Ariea complied silently. The Cruiser began to bank allowing both fore and port weapons to fire.
There was a light pitter-patter of weapons fire from the initial trio of fighters along the aft.
'Lead warship has sent out a distress call,' Siae announced from her station, 'No response yet.'
'Eagles, keep the warships from getting a direct hit on the weaker shields. Rilnae, does the transport have a hyperdrive generator?'
Rilnae quickly scanned the target ship, 'Yes, but it's an older model, its still charging. I'm relaying a structural weakness to Ariea, if she hits the spine of the ship, it'll snap in half and stop the generator.'
'Just light it up,' Ariea replied.
'Is it really the best tactic to be shooting something laden with missiles?' Faelnon enquired.
'Unless Ariea's a spectacularly bad shot, we're pretty safe.' Eagles replied nonchalantly as he carefully tilted the Cruiser to run in between the lead warship and the transport.
'Ariea, watch for that second warship,' Rilnae warned.
Sure enough, a few seconds later the ship shook - a little more violently this time - from the rear warship's canons.
'Direct hit, shields are holding.'
'Eagles, watch it, the port-aft shielding is exposed to the lead warship,' Ka'eil reminded his pilot.
'Yeah, well, this thing's a lot more bulky than the Carib; you fancy trying it?'
'I hate to interrupt, but those dozen fighters are swinging around for another run. They seem to be focusing on the port-aft shielding.' Rilnae said gravely.
'Faelnon, anyone who feels like it, grab a turret would you?' Ariea requested.
Obediently, Ka'eil and Faelnon shuffled over to a station to take remote control of a couple of the turrets.
'Eagles, I'm getting a little claustrophobic here,' Rilnae said. The pilot was manoeuvring very closely between the transport and lead warship.
'Just c-curious,' Noris squeaked from his chair next to one of the elevators, 'Just how prone are Empire officers to, r-r-ramming?'
Siae and Ariea exchanged glances, 'Eagles, do you want to-'
'Warships are firing,' Rilnae interrupted. The Cruiser shook yet again.
Smith's voice filled the air, 'An' what do you think you're doin' to my ship? Would you kill them already? I don't want the paintwork scratched 'cause your too busy arsing around trying not to get anyone killed.'
'Thank you for your concern, Smith.' Ka'eil plainly replied.
Ariea gave a cheer from across the way, 'Took out three of the fighters in one shot. They shouldn't hang so close together.'
Ka'eil looked at her.
'What? At the lowest power setting these lasers are still going to fry a little fighter like that.'
'Guys, missiles.' Rilnae blurted out.
All light hearted comments died in an instant. Ariea, Ka'eil and Faelnon all immediately began hunting for the aforementioned missiles.
'What are they, Rilnae?'
'I- I don't know, they've put casing on them blocking the scans.'
'Could be nukes,' Faelnon warned.
'Scanner didn't even pick up missiles on the warships.' Siae protested.
'Found them,' Faelnon reported, 'Port-fore.'
'Got another group closing on the starboard-aft.' Ariea called.
'Brace,' Ka'eil stated as he tried to pick off a couple.
If the previous shakes could be referred to as a gentle rumble, then this time the Cruiser suffered a full on earthquake.
Noris gave a brave yelp and fell off his seat. Rilnae was knocked over and out of her little den. Smith bellowed something most unrepeatable.
Ka'eil noticed that his camera feed from one of the turrets was down.
'What in the bloody 'ells are you doing up there?!' Smith continued to bellow, 'That felt like a full nuke strike. Port-aft shields are down. Starboard-aft are down to 45%. Three turrets have been destroyed and there some hull damage on decks 23 to 26, that's minor stuff though.'
'And the transport is nearly ready to jump, Ariea,' Rilnae reminded clambering back to her feet.
Ariea nodded and aimed for the ship, which was still going forward from momentum.
'Eagles, you might want to reverse, you're getting in the path of that transport and it doesn't want to stop.' Ka'eil advised.
Ariea deftly severed the transport in half with three well placed strikes. The rear section of the spine - devoid of cargo - spun off innocently into space. The other half, however, continued its charge forward.
'The lead warship has got a clean shot to the port-aft hull, Eagles…' Rilnae said, almost feeling bad for annoying him when he was clearly busy. She, however, had a headache from striking her head of one of the panels and felt that this was a suitable justice.
Faelnon reported after a few more seconds, 'Weapons on the lead warship have been disabled.'
'Rear gunship is coming for another assault,' Siae reported, 'and those damned gnats are taking pot-shots at the bare hull.'
'I think they're about to fire another volley of missiles.'
Suddenly, the lead warship was struck three more times in rapid succession. In spun wildly, glowing brightly, in a desperate bid to survive, much like a caged animal. A second or two later, the reactor exploded, disintegrating or otherwise shattering the framework and internals of the ship.
Ka'eil glared at the crew, 'What in the hells? Who did that? I said-'
Before Ka'eil got a chance to repeat his no-kill policy, the second warship came under fire as well. A lucky shot hit several missiles as they were being launched. These erupted and engulfed the remaining warship, leaving only debris behind.
'Don't look at me!' Ariea quickly shouted.
Faelnon held up his hands to protest his innocence.
'Sorry, Boss,' Smith's voice said calmly, 'But they'd already done enough damage to the Cruiser, and we don't have time to piss about when there could be reinforcements jumping in at any second. Plus nuke-missiles weren't in the brochure.'
Ka'eil gritted his teeth and stood up silently. He marched over to one of the elevators and disappeared.
Eagles took command, 'Rilnae, contact the transport, tell them to surrender their cargo and call off the fighters and they'll be free to go.'
Rilnae nodded and relayed the request.
As a response, the cargo containers began floating away from the transport. The fighters reluctantly took up a close guarding formation around the transport and stopped firing.'
'Okay, now bring the pods into the hanger bay with the web and lets get out of here.' Eagles said.
Siae and Ariea looked silently at the elevator Ka'eil had disappeared down before exchanging glances.

'What the hell did you think you were doing?' Ka'eil bellowed as he crashed through into Engineering.
'Doin' what 'ad to be done.'
'You slaughtered the crew of those two ships!' Ka'eil shouted incredulously.
'An' if we had given them time to call all the reinforcements in the kingdom, we would've been slaughtered.'
'You countermanded my orders.' Ka'eil said simply, 'We were to cripple, not destroy.'
'Oh so sorry, must'a missed that vote.' Smith glared, paused for a second, then resumed, 'If you want this rebellion, you've got accept that some people'll die. Some of 'em will be innocent, good people. Some of 'em are dying right now. Those ships I destroyed? Full of Empire lackies. They are your enemy. They'll 'ave no problem pulling a trigger if the roles ever get reversed.'
Ka'eil gritted his teeth again, before grinding out, 'If you ever disobey my orders again, I'll break your arm off and sell it for scrap.'
Smith kept his face expressionless, 'Anything else?'
Ka'eil spun on his heel and stormed out.