The Black

The evening was a quiet one. Captain Silu paused as he entered the infirmary; Doc Icario was at his ‘bed desk’, in the infirmary proper, with his feet propped up, browsing through one medical journal or another.

“Ah, Captain. What can I do for you.” Icario disembarked from his quite comfortable moorings, walking briskly over to Silu.

“I think I tweaked my elbow again. Dam thing never quite healed right.” Grumped Silu, kneading his right arm at the offending elbow.

“Considering it was nearly severed, the joint is synthetic, and you refuse to let me grow you a new one…” The doctor teased his old friend with a sigh, “come sit down.” Icario pointed to one of the empty beds. It soon became the only occupied one as Silu settled onto it, sitting rather than laying down.

Icario plodded over with a scanner and began assessing the offending appendage, “It’s been exceedingly quiet, I assume the offload is going well?”

“As well as to be expected.” Silu sighed, “They had fewer shuttles operational than they led on. It might take a bit more than a week to get offloaded. I did beat down the shuttle guild fee’s because of it. I almost feel bad, but we are going to make a bit more Net than we would have if they had kept their garbage operational.”

“So a good haul?” Icario put down the scanner and started tapping at the bed controls to pull up the results.

“Not good enough. The refit will go fine, but the damage we took in Bricus means some upgrades will have to wait. We still won’t have enough for automating our point defenses… That’s the one I really want. I can live with losing guns… losing people is always harder.” Silu’s shoulders slumped slightly.

“It’s been a lucky six years hasn’t it… What in the Void’s name did you do to that elbow. I’m showing micro fractures along the pivoting seams... like you over rotated it repeatedly.” Icario gave his patient a moderately stern gaze, “you have been trying some of Mac’s workouts.”

“Guilty,” came Silu’s answer, “a captain has to at least be able to keep up with his crew.”

Icario scoffed, “I thought I recognized this type of damage. I’ll tell you what I have told others trying this, go talk to Mac. He can tell you how to do these exercises correctly… WITHOUT breaking yourself.” Icario brandished the hand tool needed to repair the captains aging artificial joint, “or I’m going to fix you the slow way next time.” The doctor finished his lecture, running the tool over Silu’s elbow, mending the damage.

“I’ll talk to him, if I can find him… Him and your daughter haven’t been seen since breakfast.” Silu smirked a little at his own friend, “Judging from the lack of noise complaints, they aren’t in their quarters, but I had someone check anyway… they also haven’t signed out as ‘on shore’.”

His old friend gave him a thoroughly unamused face, “I still remember a very young captain experiencing his first year of the claiming… I believe the next refit installed sound proofing in the ready room.”

Silu let out a coughing laugh, “point taken! But I still need to know where they are.”

Icario nodded, crossing his arms then slowly stiffened. He aimed pointed look towards captain and walked to his console, keying in a sector code.

*Hanger 3*

“Have you happened to see my daughter and her husband.” Icario asked, with a fathers ‘I know what you did so don’t lie to me’ tone hinting around the edges.

*Uh… yes sir…*

Silu spoke up, “Report crewman”

*Uh, Concord departed with Mr and Ms Grarzia this morning. They mentioned something about flight training and a return time of… tomorrow evening.*

“Thank you, son. Icario out” Doc closed the call, then turned to a very unamused Captain.

“You knew,” Silu stated flatly.

“I suspected”, Icario corrected, “Mac gave me his combat suit, and enough information to figure out how to make void suits with the same capabilities. The tech is a paradox of advances in ways we, frankly, should have thought of by now; and simplisticity to the point of absurdity in its execution. I showed him what I found, and he requested two made. One for him, one for my daughter. I suspect she is having a rather energetic time at the controls of that ship of his.”

“Is it safe?” Silu asked, worried for his niece.

“No more dangerous than void work itself, I hope…” Icario shrugged, “I am doomed to have all of my lineage looking to the stars it seems.”

“Occupational hazard,” Silu chuckled, Doc joining in after a moment. Silu sobered up after a moment.

“Has Mackenzie spoken to you… about contacting his world” He asked softly.

“He has,” Icario began “I think it might be worth the risk. I think we better take this onto my office” He finished, standing up and heading for his private working office separate from his station in the Infirmary. “Besides, that’s where I hide the booze.”

——————————————————————

Lyri’s whole body was sore. As promised, Mac had started their flight training. They had started off small. Heading to heading turns, slow speed slewing ‘strafing’ as he called it, cruise , decel burns. These were all things Lyri knew how to do in a freighter. Concord… she was no freighter.

When they had gotten to the coordinate destination, a point in space about 3/4 the distance from the systems star to Argorania. Max had adjusted her controls again, keeping her throttle limited, but he released all of Concorde attitude controls to Lyrian.

“Take is slow, but it’s better this way” he had explained, “building muscle memory is easier if you aren’t constantly changing sensitivity of the reactions to your movements. “

It had been extremely difficult. Lyrian found that Mac was indeed correct, you slam around controls on a ship like Concord.. you put your hands and feet on them, a thought about where you were going. Concord would just do it, but if you put conscious thought into actually feeling the controls move.. you were using to much of them and Concord would ‘spin out’ as Mac called it. Meaning over correct and end up off course, upside down, and backwards.

It was coming up on the 24th hour of the 28hour day when Mac called it, “Thats enough for today love.”

“Dam, ok, I guess we can head back” Lyrian sagged in her harness just a bit. They had not exceeded 2.5 human G’s for most of the day. Most experiences past that were short, brutal stabs of crushing force during a ‘spin out’. But nothing more than about 3 human G’s

“Who said anything about heading back” Mac’s amusement bled through is voice. “I have something to show you. My controls.”

“Your controls” she repeated back quickly, taking her hands off of concord and placing them on her legs. It was one of the first procedures Mac had taught her, explaining that because of Concords abilities, she was inherently dangerous. There could be no discrepancy of who thought who was in control of her at any given time.

Concord bent to Macs touch as he guided her along a new heading before speaking, “ Jarvis give me a geosync solution”

*course laid in, HUD waypoint actual*

An icon appeared on both of HUDS, and Concord leaped to her inputs. 15 minutes later they were There and Mac. Shut the Drives down fully, “Jarvis initiate Camp protocol, keep us in this orbit, wake up 07.00 local. Return to, and maintain silent running until then.” He ordered as Concord fell into a silent slumber. The Hum of life support and various little noises were all that remained.

*Confirmed,*

Mac pressed a button and Lyrian remembered for the first time, about concords ‘Hab’ as their seats cycled down. This time the canopy didn’t seal off above them.

“We’ll head back in the morning. “Mac unbuckled from his Harness and retracted his helmet into the suit. Lyri followed his lead.

“More surprises?” She asked.

“Yup, come up here” Mac had floated up out of his chair and was currently stationary back up at canopy level.

“Right, no artificial gravity” she remembered out loud, gingerly pushing off her seat to join him. He caught her around the waist and gently guided her to little rectangular seams in the now accessible side below the canopy seal, now that the command assembly was down below them. He pressed her right hand in on one the spring loaded trap door gave way to an inlaid hand hold.

A little *ah* escaped her as she found the rest of the hand and foot holds.

“Hold tight” Mac whispered as he tapped on a flexible pad on the underside of his wrist. She looked to find she had one too. It currently had various health and ship condition read outs alternating across it.

She looked up quickly as she heard Concord’s thruster’s sputter. The ship sedately rolled on her longitudinal axis barely moving until her canopy was facing Argo 7 instead of deep space. Lyrian gasped as she realized they were in the front row seat to a massive looping, roping solar flare.

“Usually Humans camp with a Bonfire, but I think this will have to do.” he whispered, his left arm still wrapped around her waist.

“It’s perfect.” She leaned into his embrace.

“We can come back to it; I have one more surprise.” He chuckled and then led her down the now very easy to traverse weightless access corridor to the Hab.

It looked unchanged, until Mac hit a button on the wall, a cushioned panel slid out across the center walk/float way, turning two quarter berths into one bed.

“It didn’t happen often. But on occasion, a TALON crew would become… intimate... Because of the extremely short nature of TALON crews’ life expectancy; and the isolation we had signed up for; Crews that became involved were allowed to request this module. It was almost encouraged by the end of the war. Something about ‘coupled crews’ actually having more survivability”.

“Did you ever…” Lyri whispered. A spike of pain and worry.

“No… my WSO was my childhood friend, Clint ‘NITRO’ Stevens. That man could never not get electrocuted if he was working on anything. But no, our Alpha Sync developed into more like telepathic twins than lovers. Thank god, cause I’m very much a tits man. And Clint’s rather limited in that department, being a dude and all..”

Lyrian snarfed, then broke down in giggles before being interrupted by an arm around her waist and a kiss.

“Nitro?” lyrian questioned, getting back on topic as she pronounced the English word slowly. Mac had told her stories of Terra when she had tutored him in Delmar. But never anything personal; just descriptions and places. This was personal, she wanted to know more.

“A character from an ancient Terran comedy movie about underwater fighting ships called submarines. Down Periscope was its name. The character’s name was Nitro and he was excessively prone to ride the lightning, I mean, get electrocuted, as he worked on an aging subs wiring. It’s a cult classic in the Sol Navy.”

“I’m going to have to see these movies, you keep referencing.” she quipped before asking another question as they floated back to the canopy. “what’s ‘Alpha sync”

Mac delved into the workings he had explained to Silu weeks before. “I think that’s why your claiming worked so intensely despite me not being Delmar. My brain was already used to being linked to someone in high stress/high intensity situations. I had Jarvis monitor both of us all day today to see if you can maybe Alpha Sync as well.” Mac finished.

“Tomorrow?” Lyri expectant voice asked.

“No. Alpha sync is deadly if not performed professionally. Remember, that usually takes 3 years. I’m not even sure if Concord will be able to make the swap. TALONS can’t with human brains, but I’m banking on you being mildly telepathically linked to me already…. And not human.” His worry was apparent in word and emotion.

“Ok, let’s do this right then.” She said, capturing his face in her hands, “for now. Let’s get some rest” she kissed him.

“Not if you keep kissing like that” he raised an eyebrow.

She giggled. And kissed him again.

——————————————————————

Silu stumbled back to his quarters significantly less than sober. He lived alone for this season. His wife was home playing grandmother to his youngest daughter first birthing. A set of twins no less. He looked forward to stowing his Captain persona in favor of Grandpa when they got home.

He readied for sleep, checking his console on last time to find an urgent message. He swore to himself and opened it.

An elderly Delmar with thick grey on his auburn mane appeared on screen. “Captain Silu, I hope this message finds you well. I am Chancellor Druvid, head of the Confederacies delegation to the Unity. I come bringing you both good and bad news…”

10 minutes later Silu sat back. The good news was, his ship, his crew, even Mac; had been cleared of all wrongdoing in the Convergent Dawn incident. The bad news was that the under secretary of the United Galactic Navy had insisted on ‘providing an escort’ for his freighter back to Delmar territory to prevent ‘any further incidents’. The Admiral of the Unity, the head of the entire UGN, had backed this play. He had, of course apologized for the actions of ‘one rogue captain’. It was a familiar line; one that usually ended with someone going missing or an unfortunate accident. The Chancellor had ordered a Delmar escort sorte under his own authority of the Confederation, nominally to ‘aid in these trying times’, but classified orders had been given to the Delmar ships to make all possible speed and get Traveler out before the Thermian crewed vessels arrived.

The Delmar sorte would be here in two days.. the Thermian ‘escort’ in three.. the Delmar sorte had a decoy freighter in transit that Silu was to offload his remaining cargo on with all speed and depart for Delmar.

This was gonna be close, 'Damit you two… get your ass back here.'

——————————————————————

A gild shuttle landed in Hanger 6 on the starboard aft quarter of Lucid Traveler. The two-man flight crew and 4 cargo crew began loading up on a load of fertilizer. 40 min later 300 tons of the stuff and five crew departed for the surface.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________

It was Evening again when Concord stalked her way back to the Harbor section of He’rth station. Pausing just outside of the closed door of Traveler’s Hanger 3. Mac had arranged for the doors to open at 23.00 and they had about 5min to spare. Mac looked back at Lyrian through the HUD feed. She was completely worn out yet had demanded to be allowed to fly them in anyway after a day of G-test maneuvers and an introduction to BSFM (Basic Starfighter Maneuvers).

They were simple scenario’s. Mac would load one maneuver into the Hud and play a demonstration video. They would then discuss it until he felt she understood. After that, Max would load up a simulation of a target to perform the maneuver on. There was no target, but Concord was real enough; and lyrian had spent most of the day ‘shadow boxing’ as Mac called it. Mac had set the training safeties to 4 Terran G’s internal. This was enough of a margin to cause a black out of lyrian made a mistake, but not enough to kill her. She had been told this, and encouraged to test her limits. She did indeed pass out a couple of times, and ‘greyed out’ several more.

During these modules, Mac had also inserted and taught her the proper breathing and muscle technique to combat G’s, squeezing her glutes, thighs while relaxing her upper body to keep blood flow to her head and heart. It took her a few tries, but at the end, she had managed an intercept successfully at 4 Human G’s internal for 5 seconds, completing the merge simulation without blacking out. He had shown her the conversion Graf from the pilot handbook later showing the real to inertial damper curves. She had just pulled 16 Terran G’s actual which was 35 Delmar gravities. She had asked if that was good, and he had to admit that Terran fighter pilots had to be able to stay awake at 9 Terran G for 10 seconds without dampening to qualify for training to be TALON crew. She pouted at that until he reminded her, she had pulled 8.8 Delmar G’s, more than doubling her previous personal best.

The doors to Hanger3 opened on time and Concord, obedient to Lyrians command, slid back into her lair. Not a soul on He’rth station was the wiser.

——————————————————————

Silu and Icario watched from the control room as Concord returned to her berth, waiting for the cycle to complete so that the Hanger held breathable air once more.

They stepped out on deck just as Lyrian vaulted off the last ring of the ladder landing with a thunk, Mac following close behind.

She bounded up to her father and gave him an exhausted yet triumphant grin, “4G!” She declared.

“Lyrian, you look aweful. What in the gods of the void did you, BOTH of you do up there.” he adjusted his gaze to look at Mac as well. He also looked moderately tired, but nowhere near as haggard as his daughter.

“Training,” Mac said, “Setting Lyri up as a student pilot in Concord’s command codes, gettin her used to the flight controls I installed in the ‘wizzo’ section. We even got to some simulated intercepts at the end.

“And I pulled FOUR Huuuumon G!” Lyrian announced again.

“Mac?” Icario gave his son in law an unimpressed look quickly replaced with shock when Mac responded with , “it’s only 8.8 Delmar gravities.”

“What the fuck Mac! Lyrian, we need to get you to the infirmary. Now!” Icario was irate... he turned to Mac, “No Delmar has pulled more than 7 Delmar G and lived… suit system or no, I’m tending to my daughter” he snarled with his teeth, getting a raised eyebrow from Silu and a somber look from Mac.

“I’m fine!” Lyrian complained, recovering already from the days escapades. “I feel gre..”

“Lyrian, go with your father. Let’s just make sure.” Max cut her off. “I’ll be along shortly after I button up the ship.”

“Fine,” she was not amused, and her father insisted she sit on a palette and be pushed to the infirmary.

Mac was hurrying through his post-flight when he interrupted by Silu, “Captain?”

“I like the look,” He nodded to the change of Concord’s paint job, “I received a message from the Chancellor of the Confederations delegatoriate...” He began, “we have a problem…”

_____________________________________________________________________________________

“I don’t understand it. Lyrian, ‘little one’ you should be dead. No one has survived what you have and lived.” Icario was not happy with his daughter, or her husband for that matter, but the Infirmary’s bed did not lie. She was maybe even a little better than fine. Her muscles were severely fatigued, almost to the point of failure, yet not injured. He had seen something like this in Delmar ground forces. Where a soldier who survived extreme physical exertion and stress sometimes got lucky in not actually breaking anything, and his body’s repair functions would kick in. Since there was nothing to repair, these functions would reinforce and build upon the exhausted but healthy muscles and bones, and the soldier would end up stronger than before. It was rare, and not widely studied.

“Promise me you won’t do that again,” he knew the answer, but he had to ask.

“Da,“ his heart sank as she invoked her childhood name for him, “I can’t do that, Da… Mac is not Delmar; but He is mine, and I his. If I am to be worthy of being with him, I must do this.”

“I know, just… be careful.” He pulled their foreheads together for a moment in a more Delmar traditional sign of affection.

Icario stood up, “I’m still going to monitor you.”

“I would expect so,” came a voice from the Infirmary entrance. Mac had stalked into the room. Lyrian giggled. She had felt him enter right before her father’s embrace.

Icario’s surprise turned into a glare. “I know this is going to be hard, but… Lyri, we are going to have to increase your physical training so that I don’t accidentally kill you defending us if we get attacked in Concord. Yes she has firepower.. but her strength is in her speed and her stealth. She can;t take a hit, at least from human weapons. And I would rather not test her durability against Unity ordinance with you in there with me.” Mac stated. There was no room for discussion.

“I know.” She whispered.

Mac closed the gap between them and wrapped her up in an embrace, “Hey, none of that now. You do realize that you are probably on your way to becoming the greatest Delmaracian fighter pilot of all time.” She perked up a little, “how?”..

He kissed her forehead, “let’s start with thriving in centrifugal forces that have killed all who have come before.”

“now” he helped her off the bed, “let’s get showered and get these suits cleaned. I doubt either of us smell very good.”

——————————————————————

Growrmun was tapping through the console inside his target’s quarters. At least it smelled like his target’s quarters. Lycans were well renowned for their tracking and sense of smell. Growrmun had used this to his advantage, memorizing the oder of his target as he followed them through the station a few days before. It was… distinctive. He had even bumped into this demon when he and his Delmar bitch had doubled back to look at a shop. That had been an experience. Growrmun had definitely smelled fear, if only for an instant; only to be replaced with the smell of aggression and a calculating gaze from those predatory blue eyes. He was an Apex alright, but not any apex on record. If he could get the data needed for the capture, his promotion would be almost ce………”

The door hissed open, and Growrmun came face to face with the demon, and his bitch. Both were wearing strange void suits… and they reeked…. Growrmun didn’t hesitate, leaning into the instincts of his ancestors that had aided him in many missions. He loosed a deep snarl, and charged…. He charged not the demon, but his weakness.. his Delmar bitch.. He readied to strike her down. To make the Demon choose whether to pursue or to aid his mate.

The next thing he felt was his throat and chest erupt in agony.

—————————————————————

BigMac recognized this one. They had even bumped into him at the station. He had just assumed this Lycan was another passenger, taking in the sights. He didn’t behave threatening, so Mac had written him off as new to the galaxy paranoia.

Now, Mac knew better.. an ancient switch flipped in his soul, and BigMac knew It was time to go to work.

The large Husky-esque man snarled, then charged Lyrian. BigMac met him halfway, with one explosive push from legs used to twice the current gravity. BigMac parted the claws to either side, slamming his shoulder into the throat/collarbone area of the intruder. BigMac felt a bone pop ‘maybe the collar bone’ driving through the charge with a second step and slamming the Lycan into the far wall. BigMac felt two of the intruder’s ribs let go on impact.

This being was pro though, fighting through the pain, this wolf man growled again and took a swing. BigMac blocked the claw swipe to the head catching more lacerations to his left forearm, upper arm and shoulder, responding with body shot to ribs with his right, claiming to more with a crunch, and pulping the wolf’s left lung.

That was finally too much for Growrmun, and he began to slump over in agony only to have the fur on the back of his head wrenched into a vice and his snout driven down into a knee of stone.

‘This, is a demon’ He thought as his jaw shattered on impact… Then nothing.

——————————————————————

Mac turned to find Lyrian on her knees… violently shaking and staring at him as crew from the Traveler came running to the sounds of combat. Some with either plasma or laser weapons in hand.

“Get this thing out of my face. He’s going to need Doc.. tell doc to keep him alive but don’t make it comfortable… if he asks why, tell him he attacked Lyrian.” The unfiltered wrath in his voice froze everyone in place.

Mac visibly took a deep breath, visibly calming himself, “Now please, before he bleeds out and we get nothing.”

The crewmen nodded and walked past him to the unconscious intruder. Mac cautiously walked over and knelt down Lyrian.. This was likely the first time she had seen this side of him. He could feel the turmoil of her mind, and realized that she had FELT his Violence, not merely watched it. Mac stopped a step away, unsure of what to do. Lyrian looked up at him as he knelt and slowly offered a hand to his terrified bride. She froze for a moment before lunging for him, and her sobs broke free as she clung to him while the crew dragged the would-be assassin’s ruined body to the infirmary.

——————————————————————

His… patient… was no longer in danger of dying, but not much more. Icario had to put several pins in the Lycan’s shoulder, and the Doctor needed to extract several rib fragments from one lung. He also had to completely remove the other lung, and it looked like had been completely obliterated along with two of the Lower ribs on the same side. The being’s jaw had also been wired shut after being reconstructed. It too looked had been hit by a falling structural beam. This would a long road to recovery…. That Icario prayed to the void that this monster of a being would be denied the opportunity.

The Lycan stirred; is awareness stuggling for sentience through the agony it to wade through to reach anything approaching conscious thought. He tried and failed to stay quiet. A soft wheezing whimper escaped him with every breath. A middle-aged Delmar in a Doctors cloak walked over to him, noticing his awareness returning to him. The man leaned in, pressing gently Growrmuns still slightly deflated chest. Tidal waves of agony spread through his psyche as the man reveled in the reaction. “Good, you are awake” he smiled, baring his teeth. Growrmun knew this was not a typical polite Delmar expression… This man was not happy with him..

“Pain… please…” Growrmun choked out between steel bound teeth, shattering his world in agony once again from yet another part of his body. ‘What the void happened, who did this t…..’ it all came flooding back, the pale Demon with explosive speed, and violence of power that he expected out of a land vehicle accident.

The Delmar smiled at him as he returned, it grew as he pressed on his chest again. “You tried to kill my daughter. For that I get the privilege of watching you suffer. “

“How is our patient doing” A familiar voice asked.. a familiar voice, and a familiar smell..

——————————————————————

Mac walked in, Lyrian clinging tightly to him. She had not released him since she broke down on the floor of their quarters. They had changed out of their void suits. Mac was wearing one of his gym ‘Tshirts’ and a pair of tan pants, and He had laser pistol hung in a holster from his left hip. ‘No’ Icario realized, it was too slim and too angular to be a laser or a plasma pistol, it must be a human weapon of some kind. His left arm was entire wrapped in bandage wrap. Even so, very obvious claw wound shaped red streaks saturating through. He casually sat down on another bed and just waited for Doc’s answer. His daughter clung to him, but her eyes were hollow. Her hands and right arm were still stained red.

“He is alive. What the gods happened. I got this three quarters dead piece of sapient refuse dumped in my infirmary, am told to keep him alive, and am told he attacked my daughter.. Then you walk in with claw marks and she looks, well..” Icario’s rant flared out when Lyrian just pulled closer to Mac.

“I’m sorry ‘little one’. I just thought almost lost you twice in one day..” Icario walked and leaned down to her face. “Are you ok”

She just nodded. Still staring off into nothing.

“I’m going to have to send you that new g suit for repair… he must have sharpened his claws, they l went clean through the suit and got me good” Mac shrugged to his mauled arm. And shoulder.

“This guy? What the Void did you hit him with. I had to remove a lung, couldn’t save it” Icario asked.

Mac reached around the back of his head and scratched it a moment, “I kinda body slammed him into a wall, and punched him twice. The face was my knee.”

Icario just stared at him, “you did this to him unarmed?!?”

“Kinda” Mac shrugged, “will he live?”

“Yes, now why am I keeping him alive again?” Icario demanded.

“Information” Mac’s voice frosted over for a moment then softened as Lyrian cringed.

Icario raised an eyebrow and opened his mouth just in time for Tili to come flying into the Infirmary headed straight for her daughter, “What happened. What did you do! Are you alright.. “ the list of demands went on for a few moments then petered out.

“He,” Mac pointed “was in our room when we went to shower…“ Mac settled Lyrian next to her mother then knelt in front of both of them. Lyrian protested for a moment, begging him with her eyes before finally sitting next to her mother, “Tili, do you remember our conversation in the Rec room. About my capacity for violence.” he waited for her to nod before continuing, Lyrian had stiffened a little, listening intently, “That man over there got caught by us and he tried to kill Lyri… She is untouched, but she had to see me use that violence. It’s not something I have ever shown her, but she is safe, I swear it.”

Tili looked over at the barely alive Lycan, “you did that.. to him… with these,“ she picked up his scabbing hands, her fingers running over the bandaged claw marks along his forearms.

“Yes” Mac said simply.

“….. thank you…” Tili whispered. Mac just smiled and squeezed her shoulder.

“Be with her, I have to deal with him” Mac tossed his head to the occupied bed.

The women walked out the door, and Icario locked it behind them after letting the captain in.

Mac turned to lean over Growrmun.

“Now, where we’re we.” Big Macs fury shone from behind Macs eyes as he slowly leaned into the vision of his attacker, now fully restrained inside the biobed’s forcefields, “Now, let’s start at the beginning. Your name.” Mac’s low growling voice widened Growrmun’s eyes slightly.

Behind him, Icario and stiffened visibly as the gentle being that had married his daughter was replaced. Mac was gone, and something… else… had replaced him. An Aura promised brutality raged off of the Human as he loomed over the biobed.

“I will not… Demon.” The Lycan spy growled weakly. He had clearly seen the same thing as the Doctor. “Kill me and be done with it.. I will tell you nothing.”

Mac only smiled. There was no humor in that expression as he noted the slight quaver around the edges of the Wolfman’s defiance, “Oh?” Mac’s tone could flash freeze an engine core, “There are many fates worse than death, shall we explore them.”

The spy’s eyes widened further as Icario’s expression registered, slowly swallowing as the Demon reached toward a cart full of surgical instruments, “They sent me to get intelligence… on the demon. On you, they did not tell me why. They only said that you were an unknown threat. They refused to tell me more.

The Human paused as he was reaching for a particularly sharp looking implement. “Huh, Demon. I can work with that” Mac mused, almost absently, before setting the surgical cutter back down. “I suspected as much.” The Human took a deep breath before turning to the Delmar Doctor with a much warmer tone, “See he is made comfortable, we don’t need the heat of alleged torture right now.”

Growrmun’s dreams were haunted by the profound relief on the face of the Delmar doctor as the sedatives released him of his consciousness, and his pain.

—————————————————————

Doc Icario had stabilized him fully by the next day, but refused to waste nanites on him, “He will heal the slow way.” he stated; and dumped him at the stations security with a note.

Mac and Lyrian had spent the night talking. Lyrian had been shocked by Mac’s violence, and She had Felt everything as he beat the man senseless. It turned out that she was not afraid of Mac.. but afraid of how seeing and feeling that would be murderer almost killed had made her feel.

“Your father is right, we all have a darkness in us we must come to terms with. There is no shame in that” Mac had whispered to her as they sat cuddling on the bed.

The next saw the arrival of the Delmar Sorte. Two heavy cruisers and a 4 man wing of heavy fighters. The decoy freighter docked right next to Traveler to hit swap cargo. The day before departure Macs void suit had been returned from repair. By mid-day, Traveler had undocked. She and the rest of the Delmar Sorte started their burn for the jump beacon.

————————————————————-

Commandant Folmuri Sawliq paced the bridge of the Confederate Cruiser Protectorate. While not his ship, this escort Sorte was under his command. “Status” he ordered.

“Protectorate board is a go, Bastion reports a go as well, Taurs 1-4 report on station. Er… Concord reports on standby. Time to jump point 20 minutes.”

“Very good. With any…” he never finished the thought

“Contact! 3 Contacts! Bearing 334 by 042; 750 thousand out. They are Hard burning, eta… 15 ‘minutes’…. Their beacons are flying UGN Colors sir. Codes say one escort Carrier and two Brigs!” The Sensor station reported.

“Shit, Hail the lead Carrier” order Folmori ‘someone tipped them off’.

a large fat Thermian, with a scar running from his forehead over his left eye and to his left ear appeared on the hologram and started speaking before Folmuri could, “surrender now Pirates, and Heave to, you have Kidnapped a vessel under our protection, this is your only warning.” The Fat Lizard killed the connection.

“He broadcast that to the whole system and has started jamming civilian and low priority Military channels” Folmuri listened to the Coms report with a frown.

“Well, that’s not good, but we can work with this. Keep recording and transmitting on the Confederacy Intelligence Frequencies. It looks like they still don’t know about those. Scramble the Taurs to screen halfway and slowly withdraw towards us. Let’s make them come to us…hold this… Concord… in reserve. It doesn’t have a subspace drive and we may need jump in a pinch.

——————————————————————

*Concord maintain standby. We need you in the Hanger or when we jump, you will be left behind.* The combat control frequency responded.

Mac swore. He hated being told to let other people fight. It was the worst part about Fleet work in a TALON. you got to be the harbinger of Death itself, until the fleets finally met.. then you had to watch. Both side’s TALONs were so good that each finding the other was a statistical impossibility. Both sides had fielded thousands of TALONS… and there were fewer than 100 TALON on TALON kills in the almost two decades long war. Mac had been a freak of statistics and had two of those kills, both a freak of luck when he noticed a star or two disappear and began stalking with expert passive sensor work from Nitro each time. Both kills were made at less than 500m with guns in a war with engagement distances measured in orbital planes and Delta V.

Mac hated waiting. ‘334 by 042… 15 min..’ his mind churned on that data as he scrolled through the sensor data concord was receiving as part of the defense. His eyes widened.

“Concord, bridge” he said on a second frequency.

*Bridge here* ‘it’s Silu, thank God’

“Captain, I need you to open hanger 3. I have an idea that doesn’t involve my launching.”

*im listening*

———————————————————

“Traveler wants to do what?!?” Fulmori blurted.

“They have requested Bastion break formation and.. I quote.. “give us a shot to Larboard.”

“Oh for voids sake. Time to intercept? “ Folmuri asked pinching the bridge of his nose.

“10minutes until they are fighter launch range” Tactical reported.

“Tell Bastion to shift as requested for no more than 5 minutes” Folmuri said finally, “I Know Silu personally. If he wants to try something... we might as well let him do it with us watching.”

———————————————————-

Krigor Maw chuckled as the puny fleet ran. He was the master of the carrier Void Bane. He didn’t care what the names of the brigs were. They are inconsequential. In 10 minute he would be close enough launch fighter, and then the ‘Delmar pirates’ will perish… tragically along with their “prize”. “Tactical, status.”

“Shield and weapons banks ready. Shield emitters and weapons on standby, all power directed to the main drives.” Came the report.

“Good, raise the shields at ETA two minutes or if you detect incomming, maintain burn.” Krigor barked. kar, his nephew was called away for questioning, and never returned. The demon would pay for that with his life. They had a face now, knew that this Demon had overwhelmed the Dawn from extremely close range. They also had a good idea that his cursed ship was not able to jump… they hoped. So all he had to do was wait for their own range to come in.. or force them to risk abandoning this… abomina…

The sound of tearing metal and 12000 rounds of 34GAU spread between the three of Krigor's ships impacted at over 2 million meters per second interrupted his thoughts permanently. The 30mm tungsten cores perforated straight through the length of the ship. Taking the power cores with them… the UGN did not depressurize for combat… the shock waves of the semi luminal projectiles passing through the complete length of the ships pressure vessel split the carrier into 13 banana peel shaped sections… the Voids Bane’s escorts fared little better.

——————————————————————

Jarvis had picked up on the fact that the incoming Thermians were saving their power for their engines and weren’t burning power on shields at this such a great distance of 120 thousand kilometers. Concord loosed her hate at just shy of 90 thousand kilometers, eased back into her berth, and secured for jump. 3 min later the 12000 rounds of GAU cannon ammunition impacted.

9 minutes later the Delmar fleet jumped for Home.