Maarschalk, you are correct: the vonari was taken out by Dr. Scope. The supersonic projectile splattered the vonari cranium a while before the sound filtered down to Skymaven.
Yes, the whole dogfight was arranged to acquire the vonari ship. I'm sorry if it was confusing. In my mind, it all fit together perfectly, but I'm the writer, hehe, not the reader.
Skymaven had to make the crash look authentic in order to lure the vonari in. They also had to get the vonari out of the ship so they could take it without damaging it. Finally, if the vonari saw that Skymaven was armed, it might have reacted sooner and dispatched him before Dr. Scope could take him out. Skymaven, in his confused and concussed state, had momentarily forgotten the details of the plan and reached for his holster instinctively.
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BraveHart
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"I am enjoying your writing Nigel! keep 'em coming" 
StarWolves Clan
Wing Commander [SW] BraveHart
Hellfire Squadron
Motto:\"When All Hell Breaks Loose!! Unleash the Wolves of War and We will Rain Hell Fire on All of Our Enemies\"
Wing Commander [SW] BraveHart
Hellfire Squadron
Motto:\"When All Hell Breaks Loose!! Unleash the Wolves of War and We will Rain Hell Fire on All of Our Enemies\"
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Maarschalk
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Very clever and well thought out, I was almost a little confused there between the two chapters specialy because of the space fight that took place before Skymavens crash to be able to orchestrate such a fight as to make the crash site in the range of Dr. Scopes site! LOL, Thanks for the clarification. It was excactly what I thought what had happened!Originally posted by Nigel_Strange
Maarschalk, you are correct: the vonari was taken out by Dr. Scope. The supersonic projectile splattered the vonari cranium a while before the sound filtered down to Skymaven.
Yes, the whole dogfight was arranged to acquire the vonari ship. I'm sorry if it was confusing. In my mind, it all fit together perfectly, but I'm the writer, hehe, not the reader.
Skymaven had to make the crash look authentic in order to lure the vonari in. They also had to get the vonari out of the ship so they could take it without damaging it. Finally, if the vonari saw that Skymaven was armed, it might have reacted sooner and dispatched him before Dr. Scope could take him out. Skymaven, in his confused and concussed state, had momentarily forgotten the details of the plan and reached for his holster instinctively.
[Edited on 10-8-2009 by Maarschalk]
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Nigel_Strange
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When the ship emerged from the blue flash, Mongoose was surprised to find himself still alive. He imagined himself torn to tiny bits by the tremendous gravitational forces generated by the jump drive, but it turned out that he just fell into the anomaly with the ship to which he was attached. When he finally got his foot unstuck from the crevice of the vonari cruiser, he took some time to look around. In front of him was an array of vonari ships. He had never seen so many before in one place. There might have been twenty or so, all clustered together, as though waiting for some signal. He suddenly felt like a fly on a wall in a house full of people with fly swatters. Consequently, he pressed himself down against the hull of the ship to avoid attracting attention. In the middle of this cluster was a pulsating blue rift in space, which he recognized as a wormhole. He reasoned it must be the wormhole that they used to get into the Rift. He hoped that the beacon he had planted was doing its job.
The minutes dragged on into hours, and Mongoose kept looking at his suit readings to see how much air remained to him. Suits had advanced tremendously, but they could still only provide and recycle a finite supply of air, and he was running low.
Without warning, the ship lurched forward, together with seven others. Mongoose was glad for the change, because it meant he might be closer to escape, and thus, to fresh air. The O2 needle was already on the edge of the red zone.
One by one, the vonari ships entered the wormhole and zipped out of sight. When it was his turn, Mongoose closed his eyes and felt the now-familiar sucking feeling of going into a singularity. When he could see again, he was on the other side. He immediately recognized the local astronomy. It was the Rift, and he was on the back of a vonari cruiser, heading straight for the wormhole to Sol.
In front of him, the first of the cruisers exploded. Renegade fighters began popping out of cloak all around, and he knew that they had been warned of the impending attack, and so the battle was waged to their great advantage. The vonari scrambled their fighters, but they were picked off almost as soon as they left the hangers. Mongoose decided that this was the best chance he might have to disengage the ship, so, using the limited thruster-power of his suit, he launched into space and engaged his distress beacon. Moments later, the vonari cruiser he was clinging to was under attack. Before long, it was as smoldering wreckage coasting through the void, belching plasma and smoke.
After the battle cleared, the vonari fleet was in ruins and the victorious Renegades were flying back to their carrier, the Defiant. A single SARV went out and caught Mongoose in its beam and brought him back to the carrier.
Once inside, Mongoose removed his helmet and sat down in the mess hall, where he was greeted by cheerios and slaps on his sweaty back. A round-faced partier offered him a brew, which he did not refuse. Before long, he was singing war songs along with the others and clanking glasses.
“What were you doing out there?� asked a pilot. Mongoose was wondering when someone would ask. His mission, though, was top-secret, even from other Renegades, so he had to offer a cover story.
“I was just out scraping the dirt off of a solar array when I saw the vons coming in, so I figured I should get out, but got hit before I could go anywhere. Luckily, I ejected without a scratch.�
“You were lucky, old boy,� said the pilot.
“How did you get there so fast?� asked Mongoose.
“We got warning from the Aurora,� said the pilot. “Wherever that ship is, it’s doing a lot of good,� he said.
“I’ll drink to that,� said, Mongoose, and he did.
After a couple of hours, the party wound down, and Mongoose was trying to hold his head above the line of glasses that had accumulated on the table. A kid walked in. He had the look of a boy who enlisted before he was old enough, but whose eyes were as old as the oldest of the combatants. He had seen too much in too little time.
“Are you the one they call Mongoose?� he asked.
“Yeah, that’sh me,� he replied, his cockney accent more than a little slurred.
“The Commander of the Aurora awaits your pleasure,� said the kid.
“What? Where?�
“They’re right off the port side,� replied the boy. Mongoose staggered to the port side of the bar and walked into the hallway, from where he could look out. Sure enough, the Aurora was parked off the port side.
“There’s a shuttle waiting to take you back,� said the kid.
“How did they…?�
“Apparently,� said the pilot that Mongoose had been talking to earlier, “they came the same way you did.�
Mongoose smiled in response to the raised eyebrows, whistles, and silent demands for explanation, as he followed the kid to the shuttle.
“I didn’t know Commander Konrad was in such dire need of a panel-washer!� joked the pilot as Mongoose walked out. “Must be a fantastic cleaner!� said another. “Maybe we could borrow him to wash the dishes!�
When he was finally aboard the Aurora again, he crawled toward his bunk but was intercepted by Captain Devious. The crew was abuzz with news about the mission. They now had the other end of the wormhole, and the reports were in that they now had possession of a vonari fighter.
“The final phase of the operation can commence,� said Devious. “We’re going to need you for the next bit, so get ready to go.�
“Aw, captain,� complained Mongoose. “I just got back, and I’s still drunker than a glass of water on Aries.�
“Well, I guess we’ll have to detoxify you before we send you off,� said Devious. Mongoose’s response was a fantastically dirty look as he was escorted into the medical bay to have his blood purified, a process that involved needles and chemicals that made one sick.
The minutes dragged on into hours, and Mongoose kept looking at his suit readings to see how much air remained to him. Suits had advanced tremendously, but they could still only provide and recycle a finite supply of air, and he was running low.
Without warning, the ship lurched forward, together with seven others. Mongoose was glad for the change, because it meant he might be closer to escape, and thus, to fresh air. The O2 needle was already on the edge of the red zone.
One by one, the vonari ships entered the wormhole and zipped out of sight. When it was his turn, Mongoose closed his eyes and felt the now-familiar sucking feeling of going into a singularity. When he could see again, he was on the other side. He immediately recognized the local astronomy. It was the Rift, and he was on the back of a vonari cruiser, heading straight for the wormhole to Sol.
In front of him, the first of the cruisers exploded. Renegade fighters began popping out of cloak all around, and he knew that they had been warned of the impending attack, and so the battle was waged to their great advantage. The vonari scrambled their fighters, but they were picked off almost as soon as they left the hangers. Mongoose decided that this was the best chance he might have to disengage the ship, so, using the limited thruster-power of his suit, he launched into space and engaged his distress beacon. Moments later, the vonari cruiser he was clinging to was under attack. Before long, it was as smoldering wreckage coasting through the void, belching plasma and smoke.
After the battle cleared, the vonari fleet was in ruins and the victorious Renegades were flying back to their carrier, the Defiant. A single SARV went out and caught Mongoose in its beam and brought him back to the carrier.
Once inside, Mongoose removed his helmet and sat down in the mess hall, where he was greeted by cheerios and slaps on his sweaty back. A round-faced partier offered him a brew, which he did not refuse. Before long, he was singing war songs along with the others and clanking glasses.
“What were you doing out there?� asked a pilot. Mongoose was wondering when someone would ask. His mission, though, was top-secret, even from other Renegades, so he had to offer a cover story.
“I was just out scraping the dirt off of a solar array when I saw the vons coming in, so I figured I should get out, but got hit before I could go anywhere. Luckily, I ejected without a scratch.�
“You were lucky, old boy,� said the pilot.
“How did you get there so fast?� asked Mongoose.
“We got warning from the Aurora,� said the pilot. “Wherever that ship is, it’s doing a lot of good,� he said.
“I’ll drink to that,� said, Mongoose, and he did.
After a couple of hours, the party wound down, and Mongoose was trying to hold his head above the line of glasses that had accumulated on the table. A kid walked in. He had the look of a boy who enlisted before he was old enough, but whose eyes were as old as the oldest of the combatants. He had seen too much in too little time.
“Are you the one they call Mongoose?� he asked.
“Yeah, that’sh me,� he replied, his cockney accent more than a little slurred.
“The Commander of the Aurora awaits your pleasure,� said the kid.
“What? Where?�
“They’re right off the port side,� replied the boy. Mongoose staggered to the port side of the bar and walked into the hallway, from where he could look out. Sure enough, the Aurora was parked off the port side.
“There’s a shuttle waiting to take you back,� said the kid.
“How did they…?�
“Apparently,� said the pilot that Mongoose had been talking to earlier, “they came the same way you did.�
Mongoose smiled in response to the raised eyebrows, whistles, and silent demands for explanation, as he followed the kid to the shuttle.
“I didn’t know Commander Konrad was in such dire need of a panel-washer!� joked the pilot as Mongoose walked out. “Must be a fantastic cleaner!� said another. “Maybe we could borrow him to wash the dishes!�
When he was finally aboard the Aurora again, he crawled toward his bunk but was intercepted by Captain Devious. The crew was abuzz with news about the mission. They now had the other end of the wormhole, and the reports were in that they now had possession of a vonari fighter.
“The final phase of the operation can commence,� said Devious. “We’re going to need you for the next bit, so get ready to go.�
“Aw, captain,� complained Mongoose. “I just got back, and I’s still drunker than a glass of water on Aries.�
“Well, I guess we’ll have to detoxify you before we send you off,� said Devious. Mongoose’s response was a fantastically dirty look as he was escorted into the medical bay to have his blood purified, a process that involved needles and chemicals that made one sick.
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Maarschalk
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ROFL. Very Nice. Thanks Nigel, was worth the wait to hear what had happened to Mongoose.
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Nigel_Strange
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William looked at the controls of the vonari craft as it crouched on the flight deck.
“Curious. I had known that they had a preference for red, but I never really understood why until now.�
“Why is that?� asked Devious.
“They must have come from a planet with a limited spectrum, perhaps one orbiting a red giant. They see everything in shades of red: a very narrow spectrum, but they can distinguish more shades of red than we can, so they think they can see color.�
“Can they?�
“Well, not like we can. I think they can see light and dark, and then all the color they see is somewhere between orange and violet on the outside.�
“Does that explain why all the controls are red?�
“So far, that’s what I got,� said Free William. “Hand me those goggles.� Devious walked over and grabbed the VR goggles that William asked for. William put them on and plugged them into his deck. “I think I can do a simple linear spectrum transform,� he said, typing, “…and, voila.�
“Voila?�
“Try these,� he said, proffering the goggles to Devious. Devious gave him a dubious look and gingerly placed them on his head. His view instantly changed. Everything turned red, except within the vonari cockpit, where the alien displays suddenly lit up in brilliant colors. Where before there was nothing but red gibberish on top of more red gibberish, there were bright oranges, pinks, reds, violets, plums, burgundies, and all manner of distinct, though similar colors.
“Egads, that’s horrible!� said Devious, handing the goggles back.
“At least I can see what I’m doing now,� replied Free William.
Three hours later, William, with his goggles was piloting the vonari ship off the carrier with Mongoose tucked above his head in an upper compartment that had been rigged and fitted with a seat. They were lucky that the vonari were so big because it allowed them to squeeze two men into a single-seat alien fighter. Both were wearing their space suits. The vonari fighter, they discovered, was not pressurized against space, so the vonari relied on their own suits to keep pressure in during combat. They decided that they did this to save energy. A single umbilical ran from the fighter’s life support system into the vonari’s suit in order to sustain heating and air, and also provided communications. They left the umbilical in the port, however, because neither of them wanted to be heated up to the 140 degrees or so that the vonari liked to bake in, nor were they sure about whether or not they wanted to try breathing vonari air. The fact that they had to rely on their own suits, however, meant that their mission time had to be limited to the time left on their suits. Their suit tanks were topped off before they left, though, so they had five good hours of breathing before they ran out.
Still…five hours in deep space was not a long time.
They also discovered that vonari fighters did not have any kind of warp drive that they could find, and so were entirely dependent on the capital ships to ferry them from one end of the galaxy to the other. This meant that they would need to turn around before they got to the half-way mark on their suit air: there was no short way back.
When they got to the target cruiser, the operation was already underway. The Renegades had destroyed the other vonari capital ships and disabled the target’s communications array and its jump engines. The ship still had some fighters trying to defend it. The delicate part of the operation was convincing the vonari that their ship went down and was not captured, so communication had to be silenced, and no vonari witnesses could be left.
As William and Mongoose approached, they could see the vonari fighters doing their best to ward off the attack.
“So, you reckon they’ll just let us in?� asked Mongoose. He was huddled in the top of the cabin, aching to stretch his legs.
“Not likely. You ever see a vonari retreat?�
“No. Never. We used to joke about it,� said Mongoose.
“They never retreat,� said William grimly. “One of the things I admire about them, but also one of their weaknesses. The remind me of bees on earth.�
“Bees?�
“Bees will sting anyone who threatens the hive, but in doing so, they lose vital organs when the stinger gets pulled out, so they’re all sacrificing their lives for the good of the hive.�
“Silly little bastards,� mused Mongoose.
“They’re not really selfless in the sense that we know it. They have a hive mind. Their individual lives are only part of a whole, and so the sacrifice is not the same as ours. It makes me wonder if the vonari also have some kind of hive structure.�
“You don’t know?�
“I haven’t been living with them,� said William. “All I got is their written language, which reminds me, I better start typing.� With that, he started typing a message on his deck, which was wired into the ship’s alien computer. To Mongoose, strange red letters danced on a red background on a red screen.
“No, they’re not buying it,� said William.
“What?�
“I asked for permission to dock and their response was…incredulous. They won’t let us dock until we’ve won the battle.�
“Great, so now what do we do? It’s not like the vonari are just going to turn the battle around.�
“Yes it is. It is just like that,� said William. “It has to be like that.�
William grabbed the tangler and encoded a message to Captain Devious.
After a few moments, there was a change in the battle. The vonari started getting good, solid hits on the Renegade ships. One of them exploded, sending debris whizzing past William’s stolen fighter. William grabbed the controls and started firing on a Centurion.
“What the hell are you doing?� demanded Mongoose, reaching down to pound William on the helmet. “That’s one of ours, mate! Are you daft?�
“He can take it,� said William. “If the vonari see that we’re not fighting, they’ll get suspicious.�
“Don’t kill anyone!�
“Look, it’s got to go this way. Our guys know that they’re going to have to sacrifice some ships, but they’re bailing out first, so don’t worry.�
“I didn’t know you could fly this thing.�
“Sundog is doing the flying. I’m doing the communicating.�
“That’s just weird.�
“You have no idea,� replied Sundog.
After a few minutes, the Renegade ships were either gone or destroyed, and the victorious vonari began to assemble in queue to board the vonari cruiser. One by one, they entered through the rear hatch and disappeared into the vast underbelly of the cruiser. William and Mongoose were the last in line, so they had plenty of time to observe the protocols the other ships followed. As the last fighter went in, Sundog took a deep breath and pushed the ship forward.
“Well, this is it,� said Sundog.
In front of them, the flight deck of the enemy cruiser yawned open to receive them, and in they went. One by one, the stars disappeared behind them as the door closed behind their ship and sealed them in the enemy hanger.
“Curious. I had known that they had a preference for red, but I never really understood why until now.�
“Why is that?� asked Devious.
“They must have come from a planet with a limited spectrum, perhaps one orbiting a red giant. They see everything in shades of red: a very narrow spectrum, but they can distinguish more shades of red than we can, so they think they can see color.�
“Can they?�
“Well, not like we can. I think they can see light and dark, and then all the color they see is somewhere between orange and violet on the outside.�
“Does that explain why all the controls are red?�
“So far, that’s what I got,� said Free William. “Hand me those goggles.� Devious walked over and grabbed the VR goggles that William asked for. William put them on and plugged them into his deck. “I think I can do a simple linear spectrum transform,� he said, typing, “…and, voila.�
“Voila?�
“Try these,� he said, proffering the goggles to Devious. Devious gave him a dubious look and gingerly placed them on his head. His view instantly changed. Everything turned red, except within the vonari cockpit, where the alien displays suddenly lit up in brilliant colors. Where before there was nothing but red gibberish on top of more red gibberish, there were bright oranges, pinks, reds, violets, plums, burgundies, and all manner of distinct, though similar colors.
“Egads, that’s horrible!� said Devious, handing the goggles back.
“At least I can see what I’m doing now,� replied Free William.
Three hours later, William, with his goggles was piloting the vonari ship off the carrier with Mongoose tucked above his head in an upper compartment that had been rigged and fitted with a seat. They were lucky that the vonari were so big because it allowed them to squeeze two men into a single-seat alien fighter. Both were wearing their space suits. The vonari fighter, they discovered, was not pressurized against space, so the vonari relied on their own suits to keep pressure in during combat. They decided that they did this to save energy. A single umbilical ran from the fighter’s life support system into the vonari’s suit in order to sustain heating and air, and also provided communications. They left the umbilical in the port, however, because neither of them wanted to be heated up to the 140 degrees or so that the vonari liked to bake in, nor were they sure about whether or not they wanted to try breathing vonari air. The fact that they had to rely on their own suits, however, meant that their mission time had to be limited to the time left on their suits. Their suit tanks were topped off before they left, though, so they had five good hours of breathing before they ran out.
Still…five hours in deep space was not a long time.
They also discovered that vonari fighters did not have any kind of warp drive that they could find, and so were entirely dependent on the capital ships to ferry them from one end of the galaxy to the other. This meant that they would need to turn around before they got to the half-way mark on their suit air: there was no short way back.
When they got to the target cruiser, the operation was already underway. The Renegades had destroyed the other vonari capital ships and disabled the target’s communications array and its jump engines. The ship still had some fighters trying to defend it. The delicate part of the operation was convincing the vonari that their ship went down and was not captured, so communication had to be silenced, and no vonari witnesses could be left.
As William and Mongoose approached, they could see the vonari fighters doing their best to ward off the attack.
“So, you reckon they’ll just let us in?� asked Mongoose. He was huddled in the top of the cabin, aching to stretch his legs.
“Not likely. You ever see a vonari retreat?�
“No. Never. We used to joke about it,� said Mongoose.
“They never retreat,� said William grimly. “One of the things I admire about them, but also one of their weaknesses. The remind me of bees on earth.�
“Bees?�
“Bees will sting anyone who threatens the hive, but in doing so, they lose vital organs when the stinger gets pulled out, so they’re all sacrificing their lives for the good of the hive.�
“Silly little bastards,� mused Mongoose.
“They’re not really selfless in the sense that we know it. They have a hive mind. Their individual lives are only part of a whole, and so the sacrifice is not the same as ours. It makes me wonder if the vonari also have some kind of hive structure.�
“You don’t know?�
“I haven’t been living with them,� said William. “All I got is their written language, which reminds me, I better start typing.� With that, he started typing a message on his deck, which was wired into the ship’s alien computer. To Mongoose, strange red letters danced on a red background on a red screen.
“No, they’re not buying it,� said William.
“What?�
“I asked for permission to dock and their response was…incredulous. They won’t let us dock until we’ve won the battle.�
“Great, so now what do we do? It’s not like the vonari are just going to turn the battle around.�
“Yes it is. It is just like that,� said William. “It has to be like that.�
William grabbed the tangler and encoded a message to Captain Devious.
After a few moments, there was a change in the battle. The vonari started getting good, solid hits on the Renegade ships. One of them exploded, sending debris whizzing past William’s stolen fighter. William grabbed the controls and started firing on a Centurion.
“What the hell are you doing?� demanded Mongoose, reaching down to pound William on the helmet. “That’s one of ours, mate! Are you daft?�
“He can take it,� said William. “If the vonari see that we’re not fighting, they’ll get suspicious.�
“Don’t kill anyone!�
“Look, it’s got to go this way. Our guys know that they’re going to have to sacrifice some ships, but they’re bailing out first, so don’t worry.�
“I didn’t know you could fly this thing.�
“Sundog is doing the flying. I’m doing the communicating.�
“That’s just weird.�
“You have no idea,� replied Sundog.
After a few minutes, the Renegade ships were either gone or destroyed, and the victorious vonari began to assemble in queue to board the vonari cruiser. One by one, they entered through the rear hatch and disappeared into the vast underbelly of the cruiser. William and Mongoose were the last in line, so they had plenty of time to observe the protocols the other ships followed. As the last fighter went in, Sundog took a deep breath and pushed the ship forward.
“Well, this is it,� said Sundog.
In front of them, the flight deck of the enemy cruiser yawned open to receive them, and in they went. One by one, the stars disappeared behind them as the door closed behind their ship and sealed them in the enemy hanger.
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tha_rami
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Lovely, like the spectrum-thing you did there, makes the whole story more credulous for some reason. Will be interesting to see where you take this next.
tha_rami - The best way to predict the future is to invent it.
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Maarschalk
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Again very awsome story. Been a while but worth the wait. Looking forward to see I mean read where this is going. LOL 
:P:P
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Nigel_Strange
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Sundog reached for the control to open the hatch, but Mongoose blocked his arm and put his finger to his helmet, indicating silence. Sundog looked out through the viewport and watched as the other ships opened up like gaping maws, disgorging their pilots into the hanger. One by one, the vonari pilots climbed out, detached their suit umbilicals, and removed their helmets before walking through the portal in the back of the hanger. When all the pilots had left, Mongoose whispered.
“OK, this is it. Stick by me, but not too close.�
“Do you know where to go?�
“Not exactly,� he said sheepishly.
William spoke through Sundog’s mouth. As he did so, his inflection, accent, and voice all changed in a disconcerting way that Mongoose had never gotten used to.
“Do you have any idea how disconcerting that little switcheroo you do is?� William did not answer.
They quickly discussed their plans.
“All right, we’re go,� said Mongoose. “Let’s get this done before we run out of air.�
William popped the hatch and the vonari fighter opened up and let them out. There was nobody on the flight deck, so they proceeded cautiously to the port, Mongoose in front and William following. Mongoose took a position beside the port while William took the other side and fiddled with the controls until the port opened, then Mongoose went through. William waited until he got the signal, then followed.
The inside of the ship was dark except for the dim red lights overhead and at foot level. There were also panels of red screens and red controls, blinking red with red lights.
“Regular horror show, this is,� said Mongoose.
“I see what you mean,� said William, looking out from beneath the rims of his wavelength-shifting goggles. Without them, the whole place gave one the impression of looking through glasses drenched in blood. The corridors were much taller than what they were used to, and hexagonal. As they turned a corner, Mongoose put a hand back, indicating that William should stay back.
Mongoose crept forward, toward the unsuspecting vonari. He waited until the vonari was looking the other way, then moved forward. When then vonari looked back again, he melted to the floor and held perfectly still. The vonari went back to working with the panel as Mongoose resumed his approach. He reached down to his thigh-sheaths and pulled out the twin katars. As he was almost upon the vonari, the alien turned, just in time to see him. Its eyes widened and its mouth opened as if to howl, but before it could do so, Mongoose’s daggers were already thrusting upward, cutting into the alien’s diaphragm, preventing it from breathing. The alien tried to grasp Mongoose, but he had already stepped away. He signaled for William to enter and he did so, just in time to see the alien silently bleed out and slip away. Only William could understand the expression of the alien: surprise and extreme malice. Alien facial expressions aren’t easily recognized by the untrained.
“The secret,� said Mongoose, “is to stab upward, so you get up under the scales.�
“Thanks,� said William. “I think I’ll let you handle the stabby stabby.�
“That’s why they call me Mongoose,� he replied.
“Why?�
“Have you ever seen a mongoose attack and kill a king cobra?�
“No.�
“It is a sight to behold. The cobras are fast and have lethal venom. They’re quite deadly if they can get in a bite. The mongoose, however, is faster and smarter, and so it knows how to avoid the bite and get past the cobra’s defenses. I’ve been fighting these things for a long time, so I’ve earned a sort of reputation. The vonari are covered in, like, scales, so you see the connection.�
“Interesting,� said William, sounding bored.
“Sorry to bore you, Mr. Brain,� said Mongoose sarcastically.
“We’re running out of air, so I suggest we get on with it.�
“Yes, your majesty, your perspicacity, your grandiosity, your—“
“Go!�
“Alright alright.� Grudgingly, Mongoose restricted his displays of disapproval to dirty looks in order to conserve oxygen. William helped Mongoose conceal the body beneath the grates of the floor before they moved on.
They passed a few corridors and quietly slipped around corners without being spotted. They passed several portals, most of which were shut. Sometimes, they could hear vonari conversation on the other side. William tried to listen to their conversations as they passed, but it was too muffled by the metal doors for him to make out more than a few words at a time.
They finally reached their destination: the air scrubber next to the powerplant, near the center of the ship. William was amazed that they had made it this far without more encounters with the crew.
There was one vonari in the air scrubber room, which Mongoose dispatched with his usual grace and speed. The alien looked up imploringly as it gurgled and sputtered its life away. William was briefly touched with a pang of pathos, but it quickly faded as he realized that his job was about to begin.
The air scrubber was a series of tanks connected by large tubes. The tanks were filled with some kind of gas exchange wafers. He quickly determined the direction of flow and then started keying in the commands. In a few seconds, the air scrubber was under his control. He opened a tank and removed the gas exchange wafer and inserted a small device he had brought with him. He twisted the cap and opened it, then pressed down and placed it inside the air scrubber. Mongoose heard a slight hissing sound, but saw nothing. William then closed the tank and sighed.
“So, now what?� asked Mongoose.
“Now, we wait.�
“So, we just wait?�
“And hope that we don’t see any more of them for a while,� said William.
After about fifteen minutes, William nodded. “It’s time. Let’s go have a look.�
Mongoose walked out of the room with William close by. They walked up and down corridors and saw a few vonari lying on the floors, dead. Their reptile-vulpine faces were contorted in agony, their eyes filled with their blood, and their forked tongues hung out the sides of their mouths. One of them had clawed its own throat out.
“Wow, that stuff really worked,� said Mongoose in amazement. William said nothing. He merely looked down at the creatures that he massacred and tried not to think about their last moments. They inspected the main compartments, the crew quarters, the pilot quarters, and finally the bridge. Everywhere was the same: the vonari had all been poisoned through their own air filtration system. If they had realized what was going on, it was too late for them to react before they succumbed to the nerve gas.
After satisfying themselves that the entire vonari population was dead, William tangled the clan.
THE SHIP IS OURS.
After a few minutes the Aurora popped into space near the captured vonari ship. Shuttles were launched and quickly docked with it. Clan marines, wearing their space suits filed in, collected the vonari dead, and put them in the main airlock. The lock was choked with the bodies of dead vonari. Then, they left. Only the engineering team remained. Once everyone else was off, the team opened the lock with all hatches open to vent the poisoned vonari air into space, along with the vonari remains.
Naturally, William stayed with the engineering team, as he was the only one who could read the vonari language. With his help, the vonari ship was made human-habitable in a matter of hours.
“Excellent work,� said Captain Devious, strolling down the corridor of the captured vessel. Mongoose was mopping the sweat off his brow. “Not only did we get the capital ship, but a hanger full of vonari fighters.�
“Yeah, the plan worked out,� said Mongoose, pleased with himself.
“Still, the place could do with a bit of color.�
“Yeah, maybe we could bring in some lights and such.�
He walked quickly to the bridge, where a team of skilled navigators and pilots had assembled, along with William. William was pointing at different controls and symbols and telling them what they meant. The team was feverishly writing down information and taping it to various displays and controls so that they could easily find them when they needed them. When Devious got to the bridge, the commotion ceased and everyone saluted.
Captain Devious returned the salute and took out a cigar and lit it.
“Where’s the PA thing?� asked Devious. William found the horn and handed it to him. Devious picked up the horn and began speaking. “This is Captain Devious, under the flag of Commander Konrad of the Aurora. What we have done has not been done before, and if we succeed in our next mission, it will never need to be done again. We have captured a cruiser belonging to the vonari navy. The vonari never expected one of their own ships to be taken by force without being destroyed. We can and we will use this to our advantage. I hereby christen the captured ship Dracul of Clan Destiny. Now we will take this war to them.�
The cheer of the crew reverberated through all the decks of the ship like a low roar. People were clanking bottles and lighting cigars patting one another on the back. Mongoose beamed with his own accomplishment. William smiled wanly and then continued to instruct the crew on the subject of controls as they furiously wrote sticky notes and printed out labels and stuck them to every surface.
“So, have we got it all figured out yet?� he asked. William shook his head. “Well, get on with it,� he said, and sat down in the oversized vonari captian’s chair.
“OK, this is it. Stick by me, but not too close.�
“Do you know where to go?�
“Not exactly,� he said sheepishly.
William spoke through Sundog’s mouth. As he did so, his inflection, accent, and voice all changed in a disconcerting way that Mongoose had never gotten used to.
“Do you have any idea how disconcerting that little switcheroo you do is?� William did not answer.
They quickly discussed their plans.
“All right, we’re go,� said Mongoose. “Let’s get this done before we run out of air.�
William popped the hatch and the vonari fighter opened up and let them out. There was nobody on the flight deck, so they proceeded cautiously to the port, Mongoose in front and William following. Mongoose took a position beside the port while William took the other side and fiddled with the controls until the port opened, then Mongoose went through. William waited until he got the signal, then followed.
The inside of the ship was dark except for the dim red lights overhead and at foot level. There were also panels of red screens and red controls, blinking red with red lights.
“Regular horror show, this is,� said Mongoose.
“I see what you mean,� said William, looking out from beneath the rims of his wavelength-shifting goggles. Without them, the whole place gave one the impression of looking through glasses drenched in blood. The corridors were much taller than what they were used to, and hexagonal. As they turned a corner, Mongoose put a hand back, indicating that William should stay back.
Mongoose crept forward, toward the unsuspecting vonari. He waited until the vonari was looking the other way, then moved forward. When then vonari looked back again, he melted to the floor and held perfectly still. The vonari went back to working with the panel as Mongoose resumed his approach. He reached down to his thigh-sheaths and pulled out the twin katars. As he was almost upon the vonari, the alien turned, just in time to see him. Its eyes widened and its mouth opened as if to howl, but before it could do so, Mongoose’s daggers were already thrusting upward, cutting into the alien’s diaphragm, preventing it from breathing. The alien tried to grasp Mongoose, but he had already stepped away. He signaled for William to enter and he did so, just in time to see the alien silently bleed out and slip away. Only William could understand the expression of the alien: surprise and extreme malice. Alien facial expressions aren’t easily recognized by the untrained.
“The secret,� said Mongoose, “is to stab upward, so you get up under the scales.�
“Thanks,� said William. “I think I’ll let you handle the stabby stabby.�
“That’s why they call me Mongoose,� he replied.
“Why?�
“Have you ever seen a mongoose attack and kill a king cobra?�
“No.�
“It is a sight to behold. The cobras are fast and have lethal venom. They’re quite deadly if they can get in a bite. The mongoose, however, is faster and smarter, and so it knows how to avoid the bite and get past the cobra’s defenses. I’ve been fighting these things for a long time, so I’ve earned a sort of reputation. The vonari are covered in, like, scales, so you see the connection.�
“Interesting,� said William, sounding bored.
“Sorry to bore you, Mr. Brain,� said Mongoose sarcastically.
“We’re running out of air, so I suggest we get on with it.�
“Yes, your majesty, your perspicacity, your grandiosity, your—“
“Go!�
“Alright alright.� Grudgingly, Mongoose restricted his displays of disapproval to dirty looks in order to conserve oxygen. William helped Mongoose conceal the body beneath the grates of the floor before they moved on.
They passed a few corridors and quietly slipped around corners without being spotted. They passed several portals, most of which were shut. Sometimes, they could hear vonari conversation on the other side. William tried to listen to their conversations as they passed, but it was too muffled by the metal doors for him to make out more than a few words at a time.
They finally reached their destination: the air scrubber next to the powerplant, near the center of the ship. William was amazed that they had made it this far without more encounters with the crew.
There was one vonari in the air scrubber room, which Mongoose dispatched with his usual grace and speed. The alien looked up imploringly as it gurgled and sputtered its life away. William was briefly touched with a pang of pathos, but it quickly faded as he realized that his job was about to begin.
The air scrubber was a series of tanks connected by large tubes. The tanks were filled with some kind of gas exchange wafers. He quickly determined the direction of flow and then started keying in the commands. In a few seconds, the air scrubber was under his control. He opened a tank and removed the gas exchange wafer and inserted a small device he had brought with him. He twisted the cap and opened it, then pressed down and placed it inside the air scrubber. Mongoose heard a slight hissing sound, but saw nothing. William then closed the tank and sighed.
“So, now what?� asked Mongoose.
“Now, we wait.�
“So, we just wait?�
“And hope that we don’t see any more of them for a while,� said William.
After about fifteen minutes, William nodded. “It’s time. Let’s go have a look.�
Mongoose walked out of the room with William close by. They walked up and down corridors and saw a few vonari lying on the floors, dead. Their reptile-vulpine faces were contorted in agony, their eyes filled with their blood, and their forked tongues hung out the sides of their mouths. One of them had clawed its own throat out.
“Wow, that stuff really worked,� said Mongoose in amazement. William said nothing. He merely looked down at the creatures that he massacred and tried not to think about their last moments. They inspected the main compartments, the crew quarters, the pilot quarters, and finally the bridge. Everywhere was the same: the vonari had all been poisoned through their own air filtration system. If they had realized what was going on, it was too late for them to react before they succumbed to the nerve gas.
After satisfying themselves that the entire vonari population was dead, William tangled the clan.
THE SHIP IS OURS.
After a few minutes the Aurora popped into space near the captured vonari ship. Shuttles were launched and quickly docked with it. Clan marines, wearing their space suits filed in, collected the vonari dead, and put them in the main airlock. The lock was choked with the bodies of dead vonari. Then, they left. Only the engineering team remained. Once everyone else was off, the team opened the lock with all hatches open to vent the poisoned vonari air into space, along with the vonari remains.
Naturally, William stayed with the engineering team, as he was the only one who could read the vonari language. With his help, the vonari ship was made human-habitable in a matter of hours.
“Excellent work,� said Captain Devious, strolling down the corridor of the captured vessel. Mongoose was mopping the sweat off his brow. “Not only did we get the capital ship, but a hanger full of vonari fighters.�
“Yeah, the plan worked out,� said Mongoose, pleased with himself.
“Still, the place could do with a bit of color.�
“Yeah, maybe we could bring in some lights and such.�
He walked quickly to the bridge, where a team of skilled navigators and pilots had assembled, along with William. William was pointing at different controls and symbols and telling them what they meant. The team was feverishly writing down information and taping it to various displays and controls so that they could easily find them when they needed them. When Devious got to the bridge, the commotion ceased and everyone saluted.
Captain Devious returned the salute and took out a cigar and lit it.
“Where’s the PA thing?� asked Devious. William found the horn and handed it to him. Devious picked up the horn and began speaking. “This is Captain Devious, under the flag of Commander Konrad of the Aurora. What we have done has not been done before, and if we succeed in our next mission, it will never need to be done again. We have captured a cruiser belonging to the vonari navy. The vonari never expected one of their own ships to be taken by force without being destroyed. We can and we will use this to our advantage. I hereby christen the captured ship Dracul of Clan Destiny. Now we will take this war to them.�
The cheer of the crew reverberated through all the decks of the ship like a low roar. People were clanking bottles and lighting cigars patting one another on the back. Mongoose beamed with his own accomplishment. William smiled wanly and then continued to instruct the crew on the subject of controls as they furiously wrote sticky notes and printed out labels and stuck them to every surface.
“So, have we got it all figured out yet?� he asked. William shook his head. “Well, get on with it,� he said, and sat down in the oversized vonari captian’s chair.
-
Maarschalk
- Captain
- Posts: 7645
- Joined: Wed Feb 25, 2009 12:24 am
- Location: USA, Also check your six!
Insertion
Great Nigel, looking forward reading about the next planned mission....:D:P
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Maarschalk
- Captain
- Posts: 7645
- Joined: Wed Feb 25, 2009 12:24 am
- Location: USA, Also check your six!
Insertion
LOL...you sound like Yoda...Originally posted by warsign
I wonder how looking Vonary is?
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Darkness is the absence of Light as Evil is the absence of Good
Evochron Legends Stats:
Evochron Mercenary Stats:
Darkness is the absence of Light as Evil is the absence of Good