>>6033437“Are you certain about this, Commander Thornton? Over.” Damnit, he's the leader here, don't go undermine your confidence like that. “Affirmative. Sure beats sitting here waiting for their sidewinder to break our backs. Over.” Ienaga comes in before you even have a chance to ask him, “I regret to say this, but the Yushi and Shishi cannot join your charge. We will still provide all the fire support we can. Over.” Disappointing, but understandable.
You can't hear Silas, but he must be cursing his throat out at Achebe right now. Torpedoes are normally too slow to get caught on electron shields (by design, of course), but by flying full throttle towards them, the relative velocity may be high enough, barely. Naturally, Achebe will not be blubbering any mays and barelys once your first officer is through with him.
“I will rendezvous with you in ETA 10 minutes ." Jean-Pierre does not sigh, but his tone alone is disheartening enough. “The Directorate endures. Over and out.” Suddenly, the comms console lights up. A tightbeam message, ”This is Hara, of the Shishi. We will follow your lead, Vanilla Skyline. Over." The nimble light cruiser quickly takes its new station. An angry voicemail should hit your inbox any moment now.
“The Shishi has disobeyed my orders to follow better commands. Please take care of her. Over.” He sounds almost happy. So it's not just you who are insane. “Don't worry, Ienaga. Over.” On the holoprojector, the twin dots representing Liu and her accomplice have started to turn back. Too late, this is your show now.
Moynihan tries to encourage you with a forced smile, which alone beats out the dozen questioning stares from everyone else in the CIC. “I can talk a lot, but it will roll off your illiterate hog ears anyways." A few chuckles, good. "So let me make this quick. 6 destroyers and a light cruiser are burning bright for us, with death riding shotgun. If we run, it will not be a long chase before he catches up to us. You might ask me then, I haven't screwed my highschool sweetheart yet, what should I do?" Salzar steals a peek at his wallet.
A particularly brazen cadet hoots out to you, “Pay ‘er by the ’our.” You silently thank him for the roaring wave of laughter he causes. It's pure bad manner to die with a stiff upper lip. “Yes, you do you, Midshipman Fock.” Yet another wave of laughter at the cadet's unfortunate name.
"Before all that, we must call death's bluff. And to paraphrase a holier man than I, the only way to keep our pulse is to bet it. You lot are the shittiest, most mutinous crew I have ever seen. You are also the only people I would trust to bring us out of here still breathing. So keep to your station, watch out for your fellows, and you will see your girl, or boy, in the flesh again before this year is out." You retire to your chair amidst cheers and whistles.
