Path to Becoming the Greatest Space Mercenary

Doyle clicked his tongue as Avery and his team disappeared into the asteroid field displayed on his ship's viewscreen.

"There they go acting like some filthy, cowardly pirates. Some five star mercenaries they are, running away without even trying to fight."

Drunk and high on drugs as he was, Doyle did not see the irony in his statement. That he and his followers were the ones really acting like pirates.

Grabbing the bottle next to him, Doyle took a hefty swig of the strong alcoholic liquid inside before ordering his men to follow into the asteroid field. His force was composed of only small and medium vessels, so it would be easy enough for them to navigate the asteroid field as well.

In fact, the corvette that was a part of Avery's group was the largest ship in the current conflict and would have the most trouble avoiding collisions within the maze of floating rocks. This made it so Doyle felt assured that they could easily catch up.

…

"I guess that they're not going to be dissuaded so easily." Avery said with a sigh.

On part of the main viewscreen, he had the Dauntless' sensor display pulled up and was monitoring the movements of Doyle's fleet.

Some of their movements were not particularly smooth, and Avery had already figured out the reason.

"I've marked all of the ones that I think don't have anyone in them. Some of them could just be really bad pilots though, but I find that to be less likely." Kasandra said after analyzing the flight patterns of Doyle's forces.

Thanks to having come into conflict before, and then working with Burke, Avery had a pretty good idea of the number of members that had sided with Doyle.

Their numbers did not go much beyond fifty, yet there were a hundred thirteen ships from Doyle and Burke's fleet pursuing them. It was obvious that at least half of them had to be being controlled by automatic piloting programs, or remotely from the other ships.

In a straight chase in open space this would not be too great of an impediment, but within an asteroid field with thousands of obstacles that were constantly moving, it would make things far more difficult for them.

'He should have just brought as many ships as he had followers. I get that he wants to overwhelm us with numbers, but there's only so much one person can handle at a time.'

While Doyle's group was combing through the asteroid field, Avery, Ezra, and Kaiden had hidden behind some larger asteroid and powered their ships down so that only the most necessary functions were still active.

This made it very difficult for them to be detected by sensors from farther away.

As for Olivia's corvette, it would not be wrong to say that they were using it as bait.

It would be hard to hide a craft of its size within this asteroid field and outpacing Doyle and his men would be pretty much impossible.

Instead, Avery had decided to dangle it in front of their enemies as a means to lure them into a trap.

Like insects attracted to a flame, they followed after the corvette. It made a big target to go toward, and even if Doyle and his followers were currently acting on emotion and not thinking logically, they understood that Avery and the rest of their team would not abandon one of their own.

If they wanted to hide, they were free to. Once Olivia's corvette that had the majority of their team onboard was attacked, the Avery, Ezra, and Kaiden would have to reveal themselves.

Of course, this notion only worked because Doyle thought that he was in complete control of this situation and had Avery and his team on the ropes. Naturally, he never even imagined that the tables could be turned on him when he outnumbered his targets by such a large margin.

"Now!"

At Avery's signal, he, Ezra, and Kaiden sprang into action.

They had waited for Doyle's fleet to fly past them in their pursuit of Olivia and popped up behind them to strike.

Mercilessly, they targeted the vessels that were most likely to be manned judging by the flight data that Kasandra had identified. For every person under Doyle's command that was eliminated, it would make controlling the empty ships that much more difficult.

The first to go was one of the medium class vessels being piloted by one of the few squad leaders that followed Doyle.

A single shot from Ezra's railgun that caught the person piloting the ship off-guard punched through its shields and shot all the way through from the back to the front.

Had the man not been focused on controlling two other ships as well as his own, he might have been able to react in time and avoid the attack.

Though railguns were difficult to use, when they scored a hit, it was always devastating. And distracted enemies that were too focused on chasing their prey were about to find out how adept Ezra was at using this deadly weapon.

As the destruction of one of their stronger vessels and better pilots shook Doyle's followers, Kaiden rushed in and targeted one of the smaller craft that had a person onboard.

He fired all of his weapons at once and flew dangerously close as he barraged them.

Of course, these were not pirates using cobbled together ships made from whatever parts they could get their hands on, but true mercenary vessel made for combat. Their armor and shielding was strong enough to take some punishment.

Still, a few pass by from Kaiden saw his first target destroyed, and while some of the other members of Doyle's fleet turned around and started firing at him, only a few bursts of multi-cannon rounds hit him before he dashed away behind an asteroid.

"I'm glad that I had my laser cannons reinstalled."

Now that the Jallla hunting was over, Avery had switched out the temporary multi-cannons back to his heavy laser cannons.

Had he still been using the objectively inferior weapons, it would have made fighting through this much more difficult.

Like a fiend, Avery dove into his opponent's ranks and began causing chaos. He had been hoping that Doyle would have taken a position at the back, and he could take out the commander right from the start, but as rash and hotheaded as the man was, he was still not a complete idiot. Doyle had taken up a position in the middle of his follower's formation where it was safest.

This made it unpractical for Avery to reach him yet, so he settled on whittling down the man's forces.

'That's three. Time to go.'

Having exhausted their element of surprise, Avery, Ezra, and Kaiden backed off and flew away in different directions, darting though the asteroid field as thousands of projectiles chased after them.

At first Doyle's men began to give chase, but Doyle shouted over comms for them to stop. Breaking up their group haphazardly would be playing into their opponents' hands.

"We lost eight, and seven of them were manned vessels. Damn them. They're somehow targeting the ships that have pilots." Doyle grumbled as he assessed the damages to his followers.

Other than the destroyed vessels, the rest were mostly unharmed, and their retaliation had certainly put a dent in Avery, Ezra, and Kaiden's shields. It was not like they had sat still and not fought back when attacked.

"They're stronger and craftier than I was expecting. That railgun is especially dangerous since it can take any of us out in a single hit."

During the first confrontation, Doyle had certainly lost, but he now had a great deal more information about his foes. Their tactics were now obvious, and they had revealed their armaments.

He was down a not insignificant number of men, but he still had the superior numbers. Though not quite as true as it had once been, the side with more fighters would still typically trounce an inferior force.

However, quantity could be countered by quality, and Doyle was currently having to face this very issue.

"Still, there's only four of them in total. I merely need not let them act as they please."

Doyle began splitting his followers into four groups. Three would go after Avery, Ezra, and Kaiden, while he would lead the fourth and continue after Olivia's corvette that was still flying deeper into the asteroid field.

This would prevent them from using the same ambush tactic they just had, and Doyle was confident that even split up, his forces were still far greater overall.

Against Ezra, he assembled a squad of only manned ships. His railgun was too dangerous to send remotely and program controlled vessels after him.

Avery received a mix of manned and unmanned craft sent after him. His plasma launchers were a threat, but they did not quite pack the explosive speed of a railgun and were easier to deal with when they were already known.

As for Kaiden, his medium sized vessel had the most weapons, but it did not have any instant killers equipped. Just laser blasters and multi-cannons. Only a couple of men with remote controlled ships would be enough for him. At least by Doyle's assessment.

Once he had broken up his fleet into four different squads he thought best to deal with the induvial ships that were a part of Avery's team, Doyle gave his orders, and his own squad set off after Olivia's corvette. Avery had cost him and his followers a great deal of money, and his pride and insecurities compelled him to seek revenge.