Path to Becoming the Greatest Space Mercenary

It was looking grim for Olivia and her crew until something unexpected occurred.

A new signal appeared on sensors and with its arrival several of Doyle's followers suddenly disappeared all at once.

"You look like you could use some help. Mine if we step in?"

Flying in fast, Avery began targeting the members of Doyle's forces that had already taken heavy damage and finished them off.

His three heavy laser cannons fired in swift succession, and every time they went off, another ship exploded.

"I'm more than happy to receive the assistance of our fearless leader. I just wish you would've gotten here a bit sooner. You told us that you'd finish up your opponents quickly to come join the main fight here." Olivia replied in a joking tone.

"Sorry. They turned out to be a bit more trouble than I was expecting. We're here now though, so let's finish this."

All of the pressure she had been feeling had suddenly disappeared now that Avery had made his appearance.

She was still uncertain of what it was but just having him backing her up was reassuring. As if there was no chance of losing with him around.

'Maybe I feel that way since he's the one that saved us all from that hopeless hell we had found ourselves in.' Olivia thought as she glanced around at her crew.

"Okay, we've got a new objective, focus on defense and assisting Avery. It's time that we turn things around now that our boss is here. We can't go looking bad in front of him or letting the ship he graciously gave us get damaged."

With renewed vigor, Olivia and her crew doubled down on their efforts. They all started moving faster and executing their tasks with more precision. The aid of a single other ship had brought their morale back up to its peak.

Of course, Avery's Dauntless was not just any vessels, and with his as well as Kasandra's and Jasmine's recent bodily upgrades, they worked together to bring out the most of the advanced military craft.

"We've got seven of them on our tail now." Jasmine said.

"Yeah, I see them. Keep the auto-turret focused on them and I'll make sure to line it up so the scatterguns can get them all at once while I still focus on the guys in front of us."

His mind racing incredibly fast, Avery constantly glanced at the main viewscreen and the display for the short-range radar he was using to monitor the immediate area.

Using his experience and enhanced cognitive abilities he was thinking several moves ahead.

When he finally had the members of Doyle's force that had been following after and trying to destroy the Dauntless lined up, Jasmine fired the scatterguns with near perfect marksmanship.

The sudden saturation of so many projectiles hitting at once overwhelmed their shields and started battering their hull.

This was not quiet enough to bring them down considering their ship's armor, but Avery had already accounted for this.

Since the Dauntless' auto-turret was still installed from when they were hunting Jalllas, Avery had it finish things up by firing a few quick bursts into the enemies' cockpits. Killing the pilots inside or disabling the main controls for the vessels that were being operated remotely.

"Looks like some of them have started to realize that things aren't going well for them." Kasandra commented as the sensors showed eight ships turning and flying away.

To prevent pursuit the eight fleeing induvial had sent the rest of their unmanned vessels barreling towards the Dauntless and Olivia's corvette.

"Get back here! We've still got the numbers advantage! Well win easily if you cowards start fighting for real!" Doyle shouted over his comms.

Sadly for him, what remained of his followers did not turn back around to continue the losing battle.

Their loyalty to Doyle was barely more than shallow, and they had followed him into this mess because of their own frustrations and fear of their leader.

Except, for guys like them, nothing mattered more than their lives. Now that it had become obvious that they would likely all die if they kept fighting, running away seemed like a far more attractive option.

When it became clear that he was going to be on his own, Doyle took command over the few remaining unmannered vessels and sent them to stall Olivia.

He then turned his sights fully on Avery. If nothing else, he would eliminate the source of all of his recent problems.

While it may have just been him projecting all of his failures onto someone else, Doyle truly did believed that he was the victim in this case. Of course, had he kept better reins on his subordinates, none of this ever would have happened in the first place. Avery had only sought out recompense because of the clear violation of the mercenary code Doyle's followers had committed.

'This all would have just ended as a minor incident if he knew when to back down.' Avery thought as he prepared to finish this.

Before engaging, he sent a transmission to Olivia telling her to focus on her own fight and that there was no need for her to help him.

Perhaps if Doyle was in a fully stable state of mind and had not already worn down his ship down, he would have been a legitimate threat. But right now, Avery hardly felt a sense of danger.

The battle started with a round of missiles being fired from Doyle's ship, Final Horizon.

It was an obvious but effective opening move. The destructive force of most missiles was too great to ignore, so they almost always necessitated a response.

Naturally, even the Dauntless was not so great as to be able to shrug off the explosive weapons and Avery turned his attention on them.

A few precise blasts from his laser cannons saw the incoming missiles blowing up prematurely.

Of course, Doyle was unsurprised by this. As they were so often used, the missiles had only been a momentary distraction.

Now at the ideal range for his other weapons and lined up with left side of Avery's ship in his view, Doyle opened fire with everything he had.

The ensuing battle was one of twists and turns, with Avery flying away and using the plentiful asteroids as cover.

As retaliation against Doyle's fierce assault, Avery was periodically shot out balls of plasma from his plasma launchers.

From their current range there was practically no chance of them hitting, but that was fine. All Avery wanted to do was keep Doyle on his toes and not let the man get too comfortable.

"It should be happening soon. Just a little longer." Avery murmured.

He was not focusing on evasion without any plan in mind. It was possible for him to bring Doyle down in a straight up fight, though he wanted to avoid doing so if at all possible. Since there was no real reason to take any major risks now, he would rather play it safe.

Eventually, the moment that Avery had been waiting for occurred.

Doyle had been completely absorbed in attacking with reckless abandon that he had forgotten to account for something fairly basic. The ammo reserves of his multi-cannons.