Cyber Dreams 4.14 - Dogfight

Man, second night of insomnia this week. Well, enjoy the chapter! If I don't respond much today, it's because my brain finally turned off, and I fell asleep :D Let me know if this chapter's action is understandable. I tried to make it a little hectic to convey Juliet's POV.

-Plum

Juliet stood in the lobby adjacent to Lady Hawk’s berth on Callisto and looked at the little, wedge-shaped ship through the viewport, watching as the crew of the repair company Nick had hired worked to replace the malfunctioning maneuvering thruster on the aft, lower, port side. She was wearing her flight suit and sipping from a paper cup of hot, tar-colored coffee. They had an escort job waiting, one they were already an hour late to, and Nick was losing his shit, pacing back and forth, trying to explain their tardiness to their client—some rep from Mass Gas.

If the ship got fixed in time, this would be Juliet’s third job with Nick. She’d learned a lot about little fighter ships and their quirks, listened to a few dozen stories about Nick’s exploits, but seen very little action. The views, though, were almost worth the time she’d spent with him. Nothing could compare to flying in the gas giant's upper atmosphere except maybe the breathtaking vistas she was awarded pretty much every time the ship changed direction. Something about seeing Jupiter up close, filling the horizon for as far as her enhanced vision allowed, broken only by the bodies of its orbiting satellites in their reflective splendor, hanging like jewels in the blackness, made every second of flying out there dreamlike.

She sipped her bitter brew and listened to Nick for a minute, “. . . exactly what I’m telling you. Just give me another hour to get this repair done, and we’ll double-time it out to your ship. It’ll be faster than trying to get a replacement escort.” Juliet sighed and walked over to a recycler and tossed her half-full cup into it, watching as it gobbled the cup and liquid down its gullet, then hummed and vibrated, processing the waste.

“Hope he calms the client down. Hate to have to waste a day sitting around the dock.”

“You could head further into the dome, perhaps visit a restaurant.” Angel had been bugging her to explore Callisto a little more. She’d gone out with Nick once to see his house in an agridome, but for the most part, she hung around the port district, staying in a hotel that was cheap but clean. She liked Nick just fine, and his house was nice enough, with a comfortable guest room, but she didn’t like being so . . . under his control, she supposed was how she thought of it. He was in charge of her “job” and her future with regard to flying for Shiro and Alice; she didn’t like having to rely on him for a place to sleep, too.

“Yeah, maybe.” She looked out the big viewport at the rough surface of the moon; they were at the far edge of the dome, and the area outside was a raw, natural moonscape. “At least we know this isn’t the moon from my dream.”

“From your description, I think our best bet would be Europa or Ganymede. Of course, one of the many smaller moons might have similar soil, ice, and rock compositions, but they wouldn’t match the gravity you experienced or have the massive ridges and canyons you described. If I were betting, I’d say it would be Ganymede.”

“If we get a few days off, I guess we could try to get out that way. Need a ship, though.” Juliet turned back to the Lady Hawk and rubbed her chin. “No way Nick would let us borrow her. I guess we could hire a tour ship.”

“Good news!” Nick announced as he walked over the plasteel flooring toward her. “Looks like the client isn’t going to bail. Well, as long as we make it to the rendezvous within an hour. How’s it looking out there?” He turned toward the window where they could observe the technicians working on the ship.

“Seems like they’re making good time. Old thruster is out, and you can see ‘em welding the new supports in.”

“Good, good. Probably could’ve limped around with that faulty maneuvering jet for a while, but it would’ve sucked if we ran into trouble and couldn’t, you know, maneuver.” He fished his vape out of his front pocket, then, as he held it in the corner of his mouth, added, “I’m glad Mass Gas didn’t bail on us; they pay better than GG.”

“GG? Oh, Greater Gas?”

“Right. Pretty creative names, eh?”

“No one ever accused corpos of being creative.” Juliet eyed his vape and, for the briefest moment, felt a little envious. She wanted something in her mouth just then—coffee, a salty chip, even a soda. Was his habit brushing off on her, second-hand? She’d never really felt like she had any sort of oral fixation before . . .

“No love for the corpos, huh?”

“Come on.” Juliet snorted and turned to look at the nearby vending machines. “Want anything?” She gestured at them.

“Nah.” He blew a long stream of caramel-scented vapor out of his nose.

“What would it cost me to get you to stop sucking on that thing around me?”

“Oh Lord, you’re starting to sound like my ex-wife.”

“Seriously?” Juliet contemplated giving him a smack, just a quick slap with her augmented arm, nothing that would do any real damage . . .

“Sorry, sorry.” He must have seen something dangerous in her eyes. He held up his left hand placatingly as he slipped the vape into his pocket. “I’ll try to cut back, all right?”

“Thanks.” Juliet walked over to the machines and studied the contents. She decided against another drink; she hated using the toilet on the little ship. Instead, she settled on some corn-flavored chips called “Corn Insanity.” When she sampled the first one, she could see why. They had a vaguely corn-like base flavor but were topped with a thick orange layer of seasoning that reminded her of equal parts lime, salt, and something extremely spicy. Despite her initial revulsion, she found herself craving another and then another, and soon, she’d emptied the little bag.

“Your nanites will be working double time to save you from that garbage.” Angel’s voice dripped with judgment.

“That’s what I pay them for.” Juliet crumpled the package and threw it in the recycler, then she sat on a bench and watched Nick pacing in front of the viewport. He was a decent guy, even if his mouth ran away from him from time to time. So far, though he’d definitely given her a few too many lingering looks, he hadn’t gotten handsy or anything like that. Still, Juliet was looking forward to the day she could shake his hand and be on her way. The whole reason she liked the idea of flying was the freedom of it, and she felt very, decidedly, not free while stuck in Nick’s copilot seat. “Let’s send a message to Honey,” she said abruptly.

“Okay! Ready when you are.”

“Hey, Honey. Long time no chat. I tried to get together with you before I left Luna, but, you know, you were pretty busy. Hope things are settling down for you. Let’s talk soon, like, before things get awkward between us, hey? No hard feelings from me, so just be cool and send me a note; let me know what you’re up to. As for me? I’m out trying to learn to be a better pilot. I’m not loving everything about it, but, shoot, Honey, I’ve seen some awesome sights and felt some serious Gs! Makes fast cars seem decidedly not fast, you follow? Hah, well, looking forward to hearing from you. Bye for now.”

“Send it?”

“Yeah, and take another for Bennet.”

“Ready.”

“Bennet! I miss lifting weights and talking nonsense with you. Hope you’re doing well all by yourself there on Luna. I mean, hopefully, you’re not by yourself, and things are still going okay with your girlfriend. What’s up with our girl? By our girl, I mean the gunship, so don’t get confused. Fill me in on all the details! I need some light reading to help me pass the time between flight missions. Miss you lots, Lucky.”

“Sent!”

“Thanks . . .”

“Looks like they’re buttoning her up!” Nick called, interrupting her thought. “Let’s get out there and load up; we need to make a forty-minute flight in twenty-eight.”

“Ugh, maybe I shouldn’t have eaten those chips . . .”

Ninety minutes later, they were flying a close escort next to a gargantuan refinery ship as it took slow, ponderous-looking dives through the upper reaches of Jupiter’s atmosphere. Nick kept the Lady up, just outside the worst of the turbulent, roiling clouds, but always close enough that he could fire upon anything that came near enough to threaten the Mass Gas ship. Hour after hour of trailing gargantuan, slow ships lost its novelty about halfway through their second job, and Juliet had difficulty focusing on the big gas-scooping tanker. She tuned out a lot, flipping through the menus on the Lady Hawk’s HUD, listening to music, and just taking in the sights.

One positive out of the whole thing was that she’d gotten more and more practice with high Gs. Nick made a point of going through maneuvers every couple of hours, pushing her to her limits and, subsequently, increasing her tolerance. Additionally, she was earning rep for the jobs she did with him. He gave her a new contract card for each escort mission, and her rep numbers were steadily climbing. If nothing else, she was grateful to him for that.

“Huh,” Nick said, and something in his tone brought Juliet’s attention snapping back to the moment.

“What?”

“Did you see that reflection off the rig’s port side? In that big, swirly, orange cloud?”

“No . . .”

“My PAI’s sending a replay. Watch it and tell me what you think.”

Juliet watched as Angel opened a vid window, and a zoomed-in view of the cloud in question came into focus. Sure enough, two seconds into the clip, a flash of light flickered behind a layer of haze. “Angel . . .”

“Definitely a reflection of the sun’s light. I’d bet on something metallic or glass.”

“I think it’s a ship, Nick!”

“Yeah. Get ready.” As he spoke, he pushed the throttle forward and banked hard to port, rolling the Lady Hawk down toward the factory-sized gas harvester. “I’m gonna swoop up underneath her.” Juliet knew he meant the gas ship when he said “her.”

“What if more of them are lurking . . .”

“Maybe. Keep your thumb on those countermeasures.”

“You want me to manage them?”

“Why not,” Nick grunted as the Gs steadily rose. Juliet was pulled back into her seat, and she had to fight to push her arm forward enough to put a hand on the stick between her thighs. It had mechanical switches for everything from the main gun to the maneuvering jets to the chaff and flare launchers. She could manage those things electronically through Angel, but according to Nick, it was a bad habit. In his words, “Shit tended to go wrong with electronics during a dog fight.”

“Goddamn, these wind sheers are no joke!” He growled as the ship rattled and vibrated, swooping down under the big rig and up on her port side. Almost too fast for Juliet to register, he choked out half a curse, yanked his throttle to the left, and backed off the throttle. Her stomach lurched and tumbled, and the couch tightened on her, squeezing her like a giant, gel-lined fist, keeping her from flipping out at the sudden maneuver. Suddenly a deep rumble rolled through the plasteel beneath her feet, and the ship strafed to the left, jerking and bumping in the heavy winds and thick atmosphere. Nick was shooting at something.

Juliet saw a red flash on her AUI, realized the ship’s sensors were screaming about something incoming, and she popped off a canister of chaff and a flare. The chaff was meant to cause disruption to radar-based tracking systems, and the flare was for heat-seeking missiles or smart rounds. Juliet couldn’t tell what was coming at them, so she decided to err on the side of too much countermeasure rather than too little. A deep roar rumbled through the ship, and clinks and plinks by the hundreds rattled through the plasteel as something showered the hull.

“Nice one!” Nick howled, and the guns rumbled again as the ship jerked left and right, rolling like an out-of-control kite in a hurricane-force wind. Juliet struggled to hold steady, to keep her eyes on the readouts, and keep the contents of her stomach inside her. Though the Gs were rough, they never got as intense as when Nick did their “training sessions.” Juliet wondered if that was by design. After a few seconds, she oriented herself enough to see the little radar readout and began to form a picture in her mind of what Nick was doing.

He was pursuing one blip while avoiding a second one. His erratic maneuvers were meant to throw off pursuit while, at the same time, he managed to keep the focus of his twin thirty-millimeter cannons on the ship in front of him. As she cycled through the external cams and caught sight of the pursuing vessel, a big, fat, yellow and black, cucumber-shaped thing with stubby wings, she realized it was struggling to match Nick’s evasive maneuvers. That didn’t stop it from firing a steady stream of fiery cannon rounds in his general direction, though even Juliet could see the pilot was hopelessly behind with his targeting.

The flashing red INCOMING light flared again, and Juliet popped two more countermeasures. Nick howled with glee as a much deeper, louder rumble rolled through the canopy, and she jerked her head to the front viewscreen in time to see him strafe past the burst, smoking wreckage of the first pirate ship as it succumbed to Jupiter’s pull. “Now we pick apart that fat bird.” He jerked back on the stick, and they made a backward loop as he brought his guns to bear on the big, yellow cucumber ship.

Now that Nick didn’t have to evade one ship while pursuing a fast, nimble target, he literally flew circles around the bigger, slower vessel and did just what he’d promised: picked it apart with his cannons. In seconds, smoke and fire were streaming out of the ruptured hull, and the second pirate ship was falling into the crushing, ripping, deeper atmosphere of the enormous gas giant. “Well, that was too quick. Never got a chance to turn on some music.” Nick reached for his vape and took a long, long pull. It was the first time he’d used it since they’d left port, and Juliet had to admire that he’d taken her admonishment to heart. “Pixie, call up the tanker.”

Pixie was Nick’s PAI, and he usually subvocalized, but he was clearly amped up and probably found speaking more natural. Juliet could see a tremor in his hand as he maneuvered the ship back toward the gas rig, and she knew he was chock full of adrenaline. “All clear out here. Did you take any hits?” Juliet tabbed through the HUD to access the ship’s broadcast comms so she could hear both sides of the conversation.

“No hits. They sent us a ransom demand before you started shooting. I think they expected you to talk first.”

“Then they should’ve done more research.” Nick chuckled. “Sneak up on my principal, and I consider you hostile. Period.”

“Much appreciated, Lady Hawk; we’ll relay your decisive, vehement protection in your rating. I’ll try to talk to corporate about a bonus, too.” The person on comms sounded like an older man with an accent Juliet couldn’t place. He rolled his Rs and clipped off his multi-syllable words in a way that made her want to ask Angel to provide captions. The conversation was over, though, and after Nick cut comms, he turned to her and said, “Not bad with the countermeasures. You took it a little close for comfort on that first one, but you got it. Can’t fire ‘em too early, anyway, right?”

“Uh, right.” Juliet grinned, trying to relax the tension in her neck and shoulders. The dogfight had been eye-opening. Everything had happened so fast, and Nick’s ability to function under the strain had really illuminated just how far she had to go. If she had the Takamoto gunship right now, and Nick wanted to shoot her down, she didn’t think she’d stand a chance.

“Anyway, that was a pretty good orientation to ship-to-ship combat. Gotta be aware of all the angles while you take ‘em out one by one. I picked on the little guy first because I knew I could stay out of the boat’s crosshairs.”

“Boat?”

“As in big, fat, slow, floats around . . . you get the idea.”

“Right, right.” Juliet tried not to blush, which made it worse.

“Anyway, that’s lesson number one: prioritize your targets. In ship combat, unless we’re talking about a really big ship with lots of automated turrets, missiles, and torps, it’s probably best to pick the smaller targets first. If I’d been shooting at the big, fat guy, the interceptor might have gotten some licks in. This old girl’s tough but armor-piercing rounds will, indeed, pierce her armor.”

“Right. So, you let the slow guy try to follow while you kept the pressure on the fast guy.” Juliet nodded, wondering how Nick had even realized there were two pirates so quickly.

“Yep. It was nice not having to worry about missiles. You did a good job with the chaff and flares, but for future reference, if the MAWS light is yellow, fire the chaff. If it’s red, fire the flare. If it’s alternating red and yellow, fire them both.” He grinned at her. “Don’t sweat it, though; I usually fire both just to be sure. They only cost a couple hundred bits for each canister.”

“Angel,” Juliet subvocalized, “MAWS?”

“Missile Approach Warning System.”

“Right, got it. That was pretty wild, Nick; not gonna lie; I felt a lot like I did in my first firefight. I mean between people, not ships!” She laughed.

“Oh yeah! Definitely. You’ll hopefully get some more experience in the next couple of weeks. I was surprised it took this long for us to get jumped. We’ve got a wild one lined up tomorrow, by the way—escorting some salvagers who have some kind of hot tip. They wouldn’t tell me what it was, but let me put it this way: if they got a tip, they probably aren’t the only ones. You copy?”

“Copy, Nick. Sounds a little familiar, in fact.”

“Hah, right. Well, let’s see if we get any more action today, huh? That rig’s only half full.”