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The original was posted on /r/hfy by /u/KamchatkasRevenge on 2025-05-16 22:27:33+00:00.

Bari

Eclipse Rider

The return to real space brings the little fleet into perfect position near their target, the Hag’s largest space station, comfortably behind a large moon. The Eclipse Rider was firmly in the lead, and their special surprise, a modified freighter sent by the Undaunted, was bringing up the rear.

A series of signals chime in Bari’s ear and she looks over at Colleen.

“All ships reporting in Rowdy, all present and accounted for. Everyone reports combat ready.”

“Very good. The Second Sutra of Rage should be on her own route that’ll bring her in closer to the target, and Shellblade’s coming in from a different angle, something about trying to slip in the front door that Captain Skall didn’t explain but Captain Bridger approved… So this should be it. Get me a channel to the fleet, Shock.”

“You got it, Rowdy!”

A manipulation of controls both with her hands and her new mental interface with the Eclipse Rider’s computers and there’s a chime as the channel starts to connect.

“Channel open.”

Colleen nods, and takes a half breath.

“Okay people, you know what to do. Freighters prepare for snap dragon protocol then disengage. Head home via the way points provided to you during the briefing to clear your trail, rearm and prepare to reinforce group two if shit goes tits up trying to retrieve the Admiral. Dragonfire… You may launch your torpedoes and disengage when ready.”

There’s a flurry of acknowledgements followed by a gruff; “Dragonfire acknowledges. Starting firing sequence. Want me to save a torpedo for targets of opportunity?”

“I have the command codes for them, Dragonfire, you just get clear and go get reloads if they’ve managed to get another couple torpedoes slapped together.”

“Copy. Stand by for launch.”

Bari switches one of her screens to a rear view and watches as the Dragonfire’s concealed torpedo launchers begin to extend. The missiles were massive, the same capital class weapons that the Crimson Tear and other big Undaunted ships were generally mounted with in a cold launch configuration. Cold versus hot was somewhat elementary in the void of space, but the Crimson Tear had the space and weight to reinforce their torpedo tubes to handle the torpedo’s powerful engines igniting in the tube; the modified freighter that had become the Dragonfire didn’t have that luxury. Not without compromising its stealth systems. Both the camouflage of a normal freighter, and the proper stealth systems that turned her into a real analogue to what the Humans liked to call the Dragonfire and her theoretical sister ships.

An analogue to the most dangerous warships Humans had ever produced, each one capable of ending the world on their own the way Jerry told it. A ballistic missile submarine, or more casually, a boomer.

Technically the Dragonfire had twelve launch tubes, but today only six tubes were loaded. Undaunted production of jump torpedoes hadn’t started on Zalwore yet, and six was all the Crimson Tear had managed to produce working four shifts a day with machines handling everything Humans couldn’t.

The six launch tubes slide into position and their caps shift out of the way, revealing the powerful warheads.

There’s a pregnant pause before the Dragonfire’s Apuk captain reports;

“Dragonfire, launching!”

The massive weapons are hurled from their tubes by a magnetic launcher and hang in space for a quarter of a second before their engines ignite, hurtling them forward as they form up, trim their positions relevant to each other… and jump to lightspeed.

They’d be back of course, but they’d go for a little bit of a trip first.

An alert pings Bari’s censor board, a ship with the transponder code ‘Nixherchas’ had just jumped into the system… and just as quickly a secure comm channel ping lights up her communications board.

“Shellblade to Eclipse Rider.”

“Rider here, we take it the Nixherchas who just jumped in is actually you?”

“Yep!”

The voice was now recognizable to Bari as that of Luksa Skall, the distinct clip of her voice communicating a degree of mirth that most couldn’t even fake going into a fight.

“We borrowed the Nixherchas’s IFF codes at one point. Mostly for jobs that the Hag wanted us to do that I didn’t like very much. If anyone looked into it closely they’d figure it out, but most people don’t. We’re in the approach lanes to the space station. Our codes have cleared and we’re past the first layer of defenses. We’ll form up with the defense ships as they launch, hoist our colors and open fire when you begin your attack.”

“Copy all.”

Bari looks over at Colleen who gives her a ‘forward’ motion with her hand and a thumbs up.

“We’re on our way. Jump torpedoes are active so don’t forget to change your IFF back or they and the Second Sutra of Rage are liable to pound the Shellblade to scrap all the same.”

“Not to worry, we know where our loyalties lie and after the Hag lied to me on such a scale for so long I’m perfectly happy to slip a knife in her back. Even without the massive paycheck Admiral Cistern offered me. Shellblade out.”

Bari and Colleen exchange a look, both women were in point of fact fairly worried. If the Shellblade was a plant they’d be finding out right about now and have to break formation, but the real mission, which Shellblade’s crew and captain wasn’t aware of, would be served by either result.

Captain Skall had only been briefed on their one prong of Operation Trident. This was the primary effort so far as she knew, with the rest of the fleet waiting in support, as opposed to a distraction with the hope of luring one or both of the Hag’s large ships away from her main base.

If everything was going to plan, the raids in Cannidor Corporate Space would be starting within the next two hours or so, per Centris Standard Time… and then the fleet would go in. If they were successful, their own group one would break contact regardless of mission status here, then join group two to finish the Hag off and rescue Jerry.

Bari’s own order of priority of course was rescuing Jerry, and she’d just about give her fangs to be there to retrieve him. She’d tried to be good about keeping a ‘stiff upper lip’ as Sir David liked to call it about the whole thing, especially as one of the more sensitive and emotional Bridger women, but it was hard to keep your fur on straight when the one you loved so much, the father of her beautiful kittens, was having gods only know what forced on him by pirates!

It hit her on so many levels it wasn’t even funny. A physical longing, an emotional pain and a spiritual anguish, all while her instincts roared with a fury more appropriate to a Takra than a Panseros!

Her hands go through the motions automatically as Colleen makes her orders and the fleet starts to move, Bari resetting her focus as the Eclipse Rider’s engines start to come up to their output, for the relatively slow speed they wanted, saving the afterburners they’d installed to give the old girl some extra get up and go as Colleen liked to call it.

“Shock, you good?”

“Yeah Rowdy, I’m good.”

Bari stretches her fingers, shifts her position and resets her grips on her controls.

“Let’s get this done, so we can make sure we get a piece of the Hag too!”

“Heh. That’s more like it! Send the message to connect into Shellblade’s communications. Hopefully they’re distracted enough that they’re not looking too closely.”

Two keystrokes send the message and in a blink Shellblade’s connecting to their network link, and with another mental switch or two, they’re tied into the Shellblade’s communications.

“Eclipse Rider to Shellblade.”

“Good timing, we’re pretty close to docking.”

“Do they have enclosed docking ports on that monster of a station?” Colleen asks, sensing an opportunity.

“They do as a matter of fact. A whole enclosed port area actually.”

“Well at your discretion, an alpha strike with all your forward weapons into the station’s unprotected guts as you exit for the ‘scramble’ might be as good a way to open things up as anything else.”

“…That is a nice idea. We’ll keep it in mind.”

With that, the link goes silent again and all there is to do to wait till zero hour.

Time passed slowly as they moved around the world, staying close to the ionosphere to continue masking their signal to the enemy and when they finally emerged, Bari got a good look at just how big the Hag’s pride and joy was. An absolute monster of a space station. Not the biggest she’d ever seen, and not even the biggest pirate station she’d heard of, but it was bigger than the Second Sutra of Rage, able to take in massive amounts of ships and cargo with ease for processing and trading.

Considering some of the Hag’s favorite cargo it was a small miracle they’d wormed their way into the Hag’s network as deep as they had. Slaves weren’t traded on this station, it was the Hag’s pretense at being vaguely legitimate or at least gray market. Which was lucky, because taking this thing intact seemed damn near impossible!

“Rowdy to all ships, break out of the ionosphere of this mud ball and let’s get to work! Full combat speed. Freighters close to your indicated launch points and trigger snapdragon immediately! Good luck and call for help, people!”

Bari immediately throws the throttle forward and the Eclipse Rider bucks ever so slightly as the engines throttle up and the afterburners kick in, sending them shooting forward.

“Chief, status?” Colleen calls, ch…

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