>>5831007Terrifyingly clever, the Qyngurs can be sometimes. How to secretly escort an important vessel through raider-infested space? Why, you embedded it within an anti-raider taskforce. What privateers would dare be in the same stellar neighbourhood as your package, especially after they learned one of their colleagues/rivals got vacc'ed? Unfortunately, this time they have picked the worst ambush spot possible.
That would certainly explain the strange readings and erratic behaviours of Sparrow-2, but it is just one potential explanation. Even if Silas can be terribly persuasive. Perhaps this is an experimental vessel of some sort? New electronic warfare equipment? Or maybe a high(or in the Qyngur's inverted worldview, low)-ranking political asset needs some special accommodation? Regardless of the reason, it is clear that the ship is obviously of high value. The only question left, then, is whether or not it is worth more than safely riposting Marlin-1's mad charge. Still high from the combat euphoria of the past half hour, you decide to plot for intercept and test fate once more.
Without any destroyer support to corral you into a clean torpedo attack vector, normally Marlin-1 would be quite powerless. However, your own freedom to manoeuvre is greatly constrained by the need to pursue Sparrow-2, something you know the enemy Hiver would most definitely exploit.
The range closes. Your point-defense pulsers and railguns barely intercept a salvo of torpedoes, their barrels blooming white heat. Your own heavy guns, in the meantime, harmlessly scars a few asteroids. Marlin-1 is purposefully presenting the smallest target aspect possible and making constant erratic course changes to throw off your targeting unit. At least the secondary lasers are scoring dozens of hits, but without actual kinetic pressure they might as well be useless against the enemy's energy shield. This is precisely the situation you want to avoid, but you have no way to disengage anyway, not without exposing your own flanks. Might as well keep on pushing your luck.
"Turret 1 is destroyed, I repeat, destroyed." The smoot-covered spacer takes the longest breath in his life, "We're now sealing all surrounding bulkheads." That went much better than you thought. You lost one turret in the fly-by, but in exchange Marlin-1's starboard side was eaten through by star-flares, the plasma canisters often deployed as a last-ditch defense against oncoming missiles. Even better, if the Hiver is foolish enough to turn and make chase, he would have to present his entire broadside of a barn to the remaining 7 turrets. As you savour the sight of the soon-to-be-derelict drifting helplessly, a sudden shock sends you sprawling to the floor.
