Chapter 2: Trial by Fire       "I didn't think we'd see action this soon." stated Maya as she grabbed her vac helmet and stuffed it under her arm. Lt. Logan procured one of his own as he replied, "I haven't seen 'action' in so long I think I forgot what it feels like. Its a welcome change of pace." They walked at a brisk pace towards their fighters.       "Can you tell me anything interesting about this station?"       "Its pretty standard. Minimal defenses, crew of 23, 1 hanger, used primarily for research."       "What kind of research?" asked Logan.       "Astrometrics mostly."       Maya stopped to pull her helmet on as she reached her fighter. Logan took a moment to look it over as he reached his own. Maya flew a VF-11D, or Jamming Bird as they were commonly known. It was faster than the VF-11 that Logan used, more heavily armed too. He had considered retraining on a new e-frame for some time and the Jamming Bird held some appeal for him. He would have to ask her about the craft later. He settled into his cockpit and pulled on his helmet. "Cyberlink on." A small robotic arm extended from the rear of the cockpit and connected a small cable to the back of Logan's neck. The e-frame hummed to life. "This is Able 2, ready to depart."       Iris Janson watched silently from the cockpit of her own fighter as her troops settled in for the mission. Trooper Sharp was the last to check in, "This is Able 4, standing by." Janson clicked open her comm line. "Roger that. Everyone stand by." She switched frequencies. "Bridge, this is Able 1. We are ready to depart." "Roger Able 1, opening hanger bay doors." The lights dimmed as the air was sucked out of the room. The sound of metal gliding across metal filled the area as the hanger doors began to open with one massive door sliding to either side. Janson brought her engines up to over half thrust, sending her e-frame rocketing out into space. The rest of Able squad was right behind her.       "Maya, do you have anything on the station yet?" Janson glanced over at the blue and white e-frame to her right. Maya's voice came over the comm line. "Nothing yet. But we should be entering sensor range soon, Lieutenant." It took only a minute for the station to pop into sensor range, but it seemed much longer to Janson. It was her first real mission since the accident. The cockpit seemed so closed-in, so...tight. She quickly pulled off her vac helmet and increased pressure to the air vents, creating a very light breeze. She inhaled deeply, trying her best to shake off the sudden claustrophobia.       "Base is coming up now." announced Maya.       Janson pulled on her helmet and quickly readjusted the environmental controls. She opened her comm line. "What can you tell me?"       Maya's voice came back slightly garbled. "Unusually high radiation levels, they appear to be affecting our communications."       "Probable source?" queried Janson.       "The station's main reactor. It looks like it will go critical in about 15 minutes. I'm reading life signs still on board." replied Maya.       Janson increased thrust, prompting her squad to accelerate. "Listen up people, here is what we are going to do. Maya and Sharp will remain at this distance circling the station. Keep us posted on what's happening with the reactor and make sure any and all approaching craft are diverted around the station. The rest of you will work with me in evacuating any..." Her speech was suddenly interrupted by a familiar and often carefree voice.       "Hey, I have an idea."       While Janson's first instinct was to dismiss Camden and get on with the mission, her second told her that when it came to technical issues he probably knew what he was talking about. "What is it Camden?"       "We should get the reactor under control first, then get everyone out." suggested Camden.       "There's no way of knowing what's wrong with it." countered Janson.       "Sure there is. I'm patched into Maya's sensory feed right now and I'm almost positive I know what the problem is."       "Hey!" blurted Maya, letting Janson know that Camden had not asked permission to do so.       "Are you sure?"       "Absolutely." replied Camden.       Janson paused a moment, then reopened her comm line. "Alright people new plan. Maya and Sharp will break off now and start circling. Lt. Logan, take Arsis, Lazine, and Merck. Land in the main hanger and evacuate as many crew members as you can. Camden and I will see what we can do about the reactor."       Maya and Sharp peeled out of formation and began their wide circle of the station. Logan's VF-11 rocketed forward with three other frames in pursuit. Janson opened a direct line to Camden. "Okay Alex, its your show." Camden's frame changed course with Janson's falling in behind it. "Just follow me." * * *       The station loomed in the distance, its placid exterior covering the potential danger contained within. Lt. Logan's mind raced, trying to think of the easiest way to get everyone off the station. "Lieutenant?" Logan recognized the voice as that belonging to the squad's field sergeant, Arsis. "Go ahead, Sgt." "I would recommend establishing a communications link with the base." Logan mentally chided himself. Of course they should do that! Getting coordinated with the station crew was the key to getting them off station as fast as possible. Arsis obviously knew what he was doing, and Logan made a mental note to listen to his input in the future. "I'm on it, Sgt." He switched over to another frequency. "DSO 2, this is Lt. Logan of Able Squad. We have been sent to assist you. What is your status?" A moment passed without reply and so Logan repeated his message. "DSO 2, come in. This is Lt. Logan of Able Squad. Do you copy?" This time something close to an answer was heard. "We're---ou---transmission brea---ing---radiation interference---need immediate---repeat---immediate evac!" Logan switched over to the squad's frequency. "We need to step up the pace. All frames, maximum thrust!"       From the cockpit of her fighter, Angie Merck smiled and opened a direct line to the frame beside her's. "Hey Lazine." "What do you want?" he asked. Merck brought her VF-4 up and in front of Lazine's Stealth Nightmare. She seemed to hover just above it for a few seconds. "Race ya to the base!" Suddenly Merck's engines pulsed with white hot energy. As the craft shot forward, it seemed almost as if the Lazine's frame were standing still. Lazine cursed under his breath as the energy wake rocked his fighter from side to side. "Damn women!" he sputtered. He rammed his throttle forward, intent on catching her. * * *       Camden had led Janson on a course that took them far away from the plane of the station. They were coming up from below, if such a thing existed in the three dimensional brain twister that was deep space. "Camden, you're taking us up the main exhaust port." "I know." replied Camden, "Better put your radiation shielding to maximum." Janson had done that some time ago. She did not need to be told. What had her a bit concerned was the fact that Camden had not mentioned it until now. Which might mean that he didn't have his activated until just then. His absent mindedness could get him killed one of these days. thought Janson. "It gets a little bumpy from here." announced Camden. His VF-11 shot straight into the main thermal exhaust port of the station. Janson followed close behind.       The port was easily a mile across and loaded with a dense thicket of pipes which led to all parts of the station. The main reactor, by necessity, generated a lot of heat. This heat was then carried through the network of pipes specially designed to bleed off the excess energy to deep space as ionized gas. As a result, it was always quite warm there. A fact Janson was continually reminded of every time she glanced at her hull temperature monitor. "Try to keep up, Lieutenant." Camden's voice suddenly sounded much more clear. "What did you do to the communications?" asked Janson. "I switched over to a laser guided comm system. The comm messages are encoded in beams of light. Pretty much immune to radiation disruption, but you've got to have a sight to sight line of view for it to work. Activate yours by selecting 'L.G. Comm.' off your instrument array cyberlink menu. Janson suddenly realized it was there. "When did you install this?" "I was on the Resolute a while ahead of you. And your equipment did get there before you did. So..." "We will have a talk about what else you did later. For now just focus on the task at hand."       A short distance ahead of Janson's e-frame, Camden's VF-11 danced its way through a series of intricate and graceful maneuvers. Rolling onto its side, darting under a bundle of coolant lines, shooting back over the top only to begin again. Absent minded or not, Alex Camden could fly - of that there was little doubt. Janson checked her sensor array. Due to the radiation interference they didn't tell her very much. She just had to trust that Alex actually knew where he was going...and that he had diagnosed the problem correctly. * * *       "There's no response." announced Maya. Sharp and she had been circling the station at a discrete distance for a whole of 3 minutes when an unknown ship surfaced on Maya's sensors. All attempts to communicate with the craft failed. And while they continued to try as they changed course to intercept, it didn't look like they would succeed any time soon. "The crew could be asleep." speculated Sharp. "The ship could be on autopilot." Maya thought the prospect over as she tried to get a complete scan of the ship. To her surprise, she could not. The surprise stemmed from the fact that the VF-11 Jamming Bird carried the most advanced sensor package ever developed for an e-frame. Nothing short of the most modern cloaking device could escape its sensors. "I'm having trouble getting a fix on it." announced Maya. "How long till we are in visible range?" Inside the cockpit of her VA-3, Sharp flipped a few switches calling up the necessary data. "I'd say about 15 minutes. Give or take 30 seconds." Maya continued to adjust the sensor readout. Hoping to clear up some unknown form of interference. "I've never seen anything like this." she whispered. "Excuse me, ma'am?" Suddenly realizing she left the comm channel open, Maya revised her statement. "Something is wrong here. I don't know what, but I have a feeling we should find out." * * *       When Doug Logan attempted to raise someone on the station, he expected an agitated - perhaps even audibly scared - response. When he did finally establish a connection, what he found was an absolutely hysterical research assistant. "Please try to calm down." stated Logan. "Calm down? Calm down!?! We're all gonna die in few minutes and you want me to calm down!?! Are you insane!?!" The assistant was young, roughly eighteen by the sound of his voice. Though the view screen was frizzing out from time to time, Logan managed to get a decent look at his face. He wore wire-rimmed glasses. His hair was dark and short. And to Logan at least, he seemed like the nervous sort even when the situation wasn't life and death. "Listen to me." "Do something!!" yelled the assistant. With a forceful tone, Logan asked, "Do you want to live?" The assistant blurted out a very nervous, 'yes.' "Then listen to me. We are here to help you. Do you believe we are here to help you?" "Yes." Logan boosted power to his comm system in hopes of clearing up the reception. "Good. Now tell me your status." The assistant took a moment then began. "The reactor is going critical. We have the necessary escape vehicles but we can't get the hanger doors open." "Alright. I want you to go to the hanger and tell the crew to get into their escape vehicles. We will open the doors from out here. Do you understand?" The tech did something that sort of resembled a nod. But it was hard to tell due to all the radiation interference. "Good." said Logan. "Now get going." The screen went blank and Logan switched his comm line over to the squad's frequency. "Sgt. Arsis." "Yes sir?" "Find me the main hanger doors to this place." Angie Merck's voice broke over the comm line. "I think that would be these, Lieutenant." Merck's VF-4 slipped into his line of sight, converting to battloid mode as it did so. The e-frame glided up to the wall of the station stopping a few meters in front of it. Merck then shot upward about 100 meters. From there she shut down her main thrusters (located in the 'feet' of her e-frame) and increased thrust to her shoulder units. The end result being that the e-frame flipped its feet around, landing them softly on the station wall. The rest of the squad followed suit landing around the perimeter of the main doors. "Suggestions?" asked Logan. "Blast the doors open." answered Lazine. "Nevermind the fact that it might kill everyone inside." commented Merck, her voice dripping with sarcasm. "Lazine's idea is not without merit." offered Arsis. Lazine made a noise over the comm line that was indecipherable. Its meaning, however, was perfectly clear. Logan ignored it. "What are you thinking, Sergeant?" "We do not have time to open both doors but we should be able to open one. If memory serves, the service shuttles they will use to escape should be able to fit through." "I see where you're going." concluded Logan. "We use our pulse lasers to break the seal, and then slice the door off at the hinges. Let's do it!" * * *       Solar, heat, radio, electromagnetic, Maya had tried filtering out every source of interference she could possibly think of. All to no avail. She checked her sensor log to be sure it was recording everything she was getting. Her eyes glanced at a small monitor embedded in the lower right hand corner of her main console. She stared intently at it, as if she finally noticed something that had been right in front of her. The circular screen showed green electric snow. But every once in a while it would clear for a fraction of a second, showing a distorted outline that was unfamiliar to Maya. "Lieutenant?" Maya tore her attention away from her monitor. "What is it?" "Lt. Logan is hailing us." Uh-oh thought Maya. She had been paying too much attention the sensors and not enough on the mission. "This is Maya, go ahead sir." Logan's voice was garbled but understandable. He sounded agitated but not in way that was scolding. "What's go--g on out --ere?" "Sorry sir, I was distracted by an unidentified craft..." She reflexively glanced at that hypnotic green monitor again. This time, however, it was perfectly clear. "...which has suddenly disappeared. Sharp, where'd it go?" Sharp hesitated a moment before answering. "I don't know. I looked away from my sensor readout to listen to the Lieutenant, and when I looked again it was gone!" Logan's voice, garbled and trying its best to sound authoritarian, interrupted them, "Don't w--ry about that -ow. We need yo-- -elp with st-tion's hanger d--rs. Get -our butts bac- -ere at full speed!" "Yes sir." replied Sharp as her e-frame peeled away from Maya's. Maya paused just long enough to glance at her sensory monitor before following. "On my way." * * *       "Are you sure you know where you are going?" asked Janson. "I would no blindfolded. Wanna see?" "No!" came the emphatic reply. Iris was fairly certain he was joking but thought better than to take the chance he wasn't. "This should be it. Stay with me." Camden's e-frame shot upward and turned about 108 degrees in the clockwise direction. His VF thunderbolt skittered its way between two rather large cooling pipes, shifting modes once it emerged on the other side. Janson followed as best she could, scrapping one of the pipes as she squeezed her e-frame through. She whipped her head around, glancing at the pipe. Another few inches and she might have sliced it open...or ripped her right wing off. She slowly brought her head forward, pushing the possibilities from her mind. When suddenly an entirely different proposition presented itself: crashing headlong into Camden's stationary e-frame.       In a panic Janson's e-frame shifted to battloid mode. Wrestling with the controls she swung the legs of her frame around in time for a full-on retro burn. If her VF excaliber where a hovercar, it would have just stopped on a cred-chip. Holding her abdomen, Janson hoped her stomach would find its way home before dinner that night. "Is there a problem back there, Lieutenant?" Janson focused on the view screen in front of her. Camden's e-frame was standing on a coolant pipe less than 5 feet in front of her hovering e-frame. "Not yet, Camden. Not yet." She cut back on the thrust and eased the e-frame down to a gentle landing.       Camden already seemed to be working on the problem. "Yup. Here it is." Janson's view was blocked by Camden's e-frame. "What is it?" "Ruptured coolant pipe. Looks like they shut this line down to prevent further coolant loss. But because they did, the core temperature went out of control." Camden maneuvered the hand modules of his e-frame with almost the same proficiency of his real hands. They gently glided over the surface of the pipe, pushing the jagged triangular portions of the rupture back into place. "Can you fix it?" asked Janson. "It will need some welding, but yes." answered Camden. "Your cutting laser should do the job, if you handle it properly." Camden made some sort of noise over the comm line. Janson wondered what it meant. "A cutting laser? That will take far too long. We need an industrial welder for this job." "We don't have time to find one, Camden, make due with what you've got." said Janson patiently. The head module of Camden's frame pivoted toward her as the left hand module was raised to head-level. "What I've got..." began Camden, "...is an industrial wielder." The hand module recessed into the e-frame's forearm, with an angular device emerging to take its place. A white-hot flash marked its ignition. "This one of the first modifications I made to this e-frame." explained Camden as he set to work. "Did you know that not one e-frame in all of exo-fleet has a decent built-in welder?" As Camden began to drone on about this design flaw in that e-frame, and other such superfluous details, Janson pondered how the rest of her squad was doing. * * *       "How's that seal coming, Sergeant?" asked Logan. His voice was steady and calm, at least to the casual listener. Despite his apparently cool exterior Logan was keenly aware of the time that was ticking away. Arsis had positioned his e-frame over the seem between the massive hanger doors. The pulse laser that was attached to his e-frame's head module was working slowly but surly to break it. "We will not succeed in time." announced Arsis. Logan racked his brain, but he had never encountered a situation like this before. "Options? Anyone?" "I got one." answered Merck. Her frame had been hovering above the doors for some time. "I'm listening." Another burst of radiation garbled Merck's response. "-time to explain. You're just going to have to trust me." Out of options, Logan did the only thing anyone in his situation could. "Do it." "Clear away from the seal!" barked Merck. She landed her e-frame on the hull, but at one end the doors. Her frame stood still as its shoulder modules emitted as spark of energy. The only outward sign they were powering up. Merck pivoted her frame forward slightly and readied to fire. Logan thought about questioning the method, but decided against it. Merck knew what they stood to lose. He simply had to trust that she knew what she was doing. "Locking on, annnnnd...firing!" Two white hot bolts of plasma jumped from each shoulder of Merck's VF Lightning and splashed across the joint between the doors. Scorching the surface, they struck and bounced off only to come down again a few feet away. Continuing in its herky-jerky path of travel, the plasma bounced way clear across the entire seal - finally stopping when it collided with the hull beyond the doors. Lazine's e-frame, in battloid mode, stepped forward to examine the damage. "A fine lot of good that did. Now the doors will never open!" Merck could have chosen any number of comebacks to answer Lazine, mostly ethnic in origin. But instead she simply remained silent. A low vibration could be felt through the doors. Logan and Arsis slowly backed their e-frames away. Suddenly plumes of compressed air began shooting from the hanger seal. Lazine launched his frame upward as the pressure loss caused the seal to blow out - the massive doors parted a few precious feet in response. "Are you so sure of that?"       Logan let Merck's comment slide. Time was of the essence. "Sergeant, give me a hand!" Logan brought his e-frame around and brought it parallel to the surface of the door. The massive hands of his e-frame grasping the exposed end of one of the doors. Arsis aligned his frame along side Logan's. "Go!" ordered Logan. Their main thrusters powered up to full power as the door slowly stated to give. Taking his cue, Lazine positioned his frame near Logan's and added his own power to the effort. The door had opened enough for Merck's e-frame to fly through. And so she did. "Merck, what are you doing?" demanded Logan. "Just get ready to pitch up when I tell you." Logan noted a distinctive plasma discharge and watched the outer surface of the hanger door as it buckled at regular intervals from right to left. "Now!" Logan shifted his leg modules down, pushing the door out from the body of the station. Given the power of the three e-frames pushing against it and the fact it was already weakened by Merck's assault, the door bent with great ease until it finally just snapped off under the strain. Lazine and Arsis worked at towing the door away as Logan tried to get a look inside the hanger. Merck's e-frame came straight at him with four shuttle-sized escape craft trailing behind it. "Time to go!" Logan wholeheartedly agreed as he ordered, "Everyone evacuate the area now!" * * *       The trip in from the perimeter was taking far longer than Maya would have liked. It wasn't that her frame could not move more rapidly. It was that Sharp's could not. The VA3 was a fine combat tested vehicle, but it was also outdated and slow when compared to more modern exoframes. A fact known well known by many, which is probably the reason Lt. Janson had ordered Sharp out that far to begin with. Maya's attention fell toward her sensory display. A cluster of objects was headed toward them and away from the station. She switched on her comm line. "This is Lt. Maya of exofleet, please identify." The reply was immediate, if not garbled. "We read you, Lieutenant. This is Logan, mission accomplished." Sharp and Maya made a minor course correction that would bring them onto a parallel vector with the rest of the squad. As they came into view Maya did a quick head count. "Where are Lt. Janson and Lt. Camden?" * * *       Unable to bear the strain any longer, Janson blurted out "Stop babbling and do the job Camden!" "All done." replied Camden. The main thrusters of his e-frame came online causing it to lightly hover off the coolant pipe it was standing on. The e-frame glided down from Janson's position, stopping a short distance directly below her. "What are you doing?" asked Janson. "Activating the manual release for the coolant. Lemme know if the pipe leaks." Janson watched the pipe for a few moments. "Did you open it yet?" "Not only that, but the core temperature is already dropping." Camden's frame came up along side her own. "I'd say my work here is done." Janson chose her next words very carefully. "When we get back to the Resolute you and I are going to have a talk about mission procedure." Camden's reply was hesitant, as though he had no idea why Janson would wish to do that. "Er...yeah, sure. No problem." Janson's frame hovered off the coolant pipe, heading for the way out. "And by the way, Lieutenant..." "Yes?" "Good job." On to Chapter 3 ->