[IC] Agents Of Stardust

[Forsythe]

As soon as she was notified of the parts arriving, Astra stood up, slammed her right fist on her chest in the Faira salute and excused herself from the room. Previously memorizing the layout of the ship, she easily, albeit with her slow pace, navigated to the cargo bay and started checking on the equipment. The generator seemed to be in order, but her challenge would be integrating it with the human technology. From what she could see though, their computing systems worked fairly similarly, and rewriting the code into another programming language was a menial task for her.

The real issue was the size. She could see no way to get it to her lab and she wasn't crazy about leaving it in the cargo bay - It was delicate equipment, and in the even of a battle the hold was hardly secure enough. Making another mental note to see the chief engineer about it's placement, she started lumbering back towards her lab. While on her way, she was pinged by the ship's AI. Linking her into the helmet commsuite, she barked: "What is it, machine?" The Faira were practically enveloped by AIs, as they ran most of their equipment, leaving the few Faira alive to deal with the really tough stuff. As such she was used to dealing with them as servants, and didn't quite like to be disturbed from her thought processes.

The AI notified her of the CMO's impending arrival. Wonderful. She'd have to play diplomat and politely send him away if he got too nosy, which she wasn't entirely sure she could do. As she neared her lab, she could already see the Shuunai at the other end of the hall. Waving him over, she entered the lab: "Come, have a seat." Note to self: Code-lock the door. she thought, hoping to adjust the life support at least in her lab. The human ships were freezing.

[WatermelonTango]

Shamus was pleased to be welcomed in by Astra as he approached her lab. Was she expecting him? Either way, it was a good first impression of the faira. He stepped into the science lab and took a moment to look around before sitting down as he was invited to. Most of the equipment in here was far too advanced for his own expertise.

"Good evening Astra of the Faira. I am Sham-Usfari of the Shuunai, or Shamus as I prefer to be called outside of my home planet. I will be the chief of medical staff while we are on this journey, and as you probably know that means that it is my responsibility to look after the health and well being of all of those aboard." He took a moment of pause to pull out a small tablet device out of his lab coat. He pressed the button and various awards appeared, such as his graduation certificates and his oath to medicine.
"I was going through the medical profiles of the crew. I took note of things like medical conditions, allergies, and other important information for keeping everyone healthy. But your medical profile was barren save for your name. You must understand that this information is important for me to do my job. If it is an issue of the system simply failing to collect the data we can sort this out quickly. But-" Shamus did a brief pause and looked at Astra from the corner of his eye.
" -If this is an issue of trust, then I have to ask what I would have to do in order to earn the trust of yourself and the Faira."

[Forsythe]

Astra smiled, relieved that her first contact with a nonhuman alien was going smoothly and politely. She took the seat opposite Shamus at the desk that was profoundly small to accommodate her. "Good evening to you too. And please, just Astra." she replied to the introduction. Listening to Shamus explain what she already suspected this meeting would be about, she huffed. However, she was pleasantly surprised that instead of demanding the records form her, he asked for a way to gain her trust. Leaning back in her seat, she thought her answer through for a while.

"I am afraid such a feat is impossible, at least in our frame of time. You have to understand we have only made first contact a month ago. Our government is choosing to be careful. Please, do not take it as offense - none were provided any information about us." she started, choosing not to sugarcoat the truth. She was a scientist and she liked truthful facts. "However, the basic information I can tell you. The majority of life forms I learned about thus far seem to be based on carbon. The Faira are, however, based on silicon. For you, that means two things. The good one is that we do not get sick - our biology does not support foreign diseases, and our native environment contained no diseases. The downside is, save for our bones, we are frail and heal badly. So, all that your work concerning me would be is pretty much bandaging minor wounds - stitches are hopeless - and..." she made a pause here. It wasn't easy matter to talk about and quite frankly the mere thought of the topic was frightening her, "amputations. In that case, a very sturdy tool would have to be used to actually cut the bone. I recommend a laser cutter for the entire procedure, as cauterizing the rest of the wound would serve well enough and infection is not a problem." she said, shuddering as her at times too vivid imagination summoned a mental image of the described procedure.

"However, we've taken measures to ensure that doesn't happen. My suit is sturdy enough to protect me in the common combat conditions. also, we are highly resistant to multiple forms of radiation. That is as much as I dare tell you without the agreement of my government, I'm sorry." she apologized, wanting to trust the Shuunai, but not with the lives of what was left of her people. "I would appreciate it if you kept this knowledge for yourself, however it is not required. IS there something else you want to ask or can I do something for you?"

[Inkwell]

Virgo quickly stood up as soon as the captain dismissed them from the briefing. She wanted to get to the bridge and check out the pilots station. Steeping out of the room she saw a panel which was one of the A.I interface. Virgo walked up to the terminal she asked "hello can you tell me the quickest way to the bridge?" "Yes miss Freelander it's this way" the A.I said bringing up a map. "Thank you oh by the way what do I call you?" Virgo asked. "You may call me Jude miss Freelander" the A.I stated. "Please Jude just call me Vi or Virgo" she said. "Very well" the A.I responded. After Virgo quickly jogged up to the bridge making sure not to run since she didn't want to collide with anyone like she had during her first week on the Hathaway.

Arriving at the bridge a sense of awe came over her seeing all the state of the art equipment. Looking around she checked out all the stations it was interesting seeing all this advanced equipment. Finding the pilots seat she slid in checking the control panel. The controls looked a lot more high tech than what she was used to but the majority of the major controls where in the same place. There were only a few things she wasn't sure they did but after a few minutes she managed to work it all out. Now that she understood the controls she started to get comfortable in her chair feeling out where everything was. Getting used to a new set of controls was difficult and she wanted to make sure she new were everything was without looking. "Jude can you give me a run down of the ships specs for me please" Virgo asked. "Yes of course I can virgo" Jude responded and started reciting the ships specs.

[WatermelonTango]

"I completely understand Astra, and your requests are reasonable. This should be enough information for this trip. These seem like strange precautions to me, but then again our race is still recovering from the first time we've encountered alien life. We were unfortunate enough to meet the Rahq first." He shuddered at the thought. He pulled out a notepad and quickly began writing. He tore a slip off and handed it to Astra.

"This would be the first time in history a Faira and a Shuunai conversed, would it not? That's a historic feat that I could never have hoped to be a part of. This slip of paper contains the coordinates to our home world, and information to contact our government. I'm no longer affiliated due to my exile, but I'm sure they'd love to talk. The air space around our planet contains vaxir and humans, but it is free for anyone who would wish to enter so long as they are not affiliated with the Rahq government. Some day our races may be able to join as allies. When the Faira are ready for it." Shamus got up and made his way to the doorway.

"I have some responsibilities to take care of. I'm sure you do as well. We will speak again Astra. Have a pleasant trip." He did his usual nod before making his way out of the science lab and back towards his own med bay. Shamus felt like he already accomplished a lot on this journey. If this was all he got out of the entire trip, it would have been worth his time.

[Alfhedil]

Stepping smoothly from her seat at the table, Genevieve gave a respectful nod to the captain and made her exit from the meeting, intent on securing her personal supplies that had been placed in the armory. The case which sat in the armory with her identifiers was one of the few things she placed personal value in, and she was keen on relocating her personal weapon to her quarters as soon as possible. With her face-plate closed she seemed like just another member of the security team of the ship, no one of particular rank, and therefore no one of great import at the moment. Cytherea chimed in her ear as she approached each corridor, noting which way would bring her to the armory faster and avoid the higher concentrations of crewmen. In idle boredom she cycled the light filters in her helm's optics, watching the people around her shift as her vision did as well, in a way testing to ensure the suit was still fully functioning in a safe environment.

Arriving within the armory she found the snake creature from the meeting, a late arrival that quickly removed itself as soon as the captain dismissed everyone. Sneering at the alien from behind her helm, she made her way past another member of the security team to the secured crate that held her equipment inside as well as her personal belongings. "You know, you probably could have told them to send the crate to your quarters instead..." Cytherea's voice in her head distracted her a moment as she keyed the genetic lock on the crate, though she kept her finger on the lock long enough for the device to register her input. As the locks cycled open she looked back to make sure the snake-man was still occupied with his ammunition sorting, and opened the case enough to see that her weapon was stowed safely in the netting of the lid and the rest of her belongings were still exactly as they were when she packed everything. "Well, it was either state the case had weapons and ammo in it, or have them scan the crate before loading." Without knowing for sure how tight regulations were going to be on-board the vessel, Genevieve had declared her crate as containing weapons so as to have it slip by without being scanned extensively, instead making plans to redirect her belongings back to her quarters and wave it off as a simple misunderstanding of the dock workers.

Snapping the case shut and deploying the wheels on the crate, she steeled herself before deciding that she may as well address the snake now, rather than have it question her as she left the armory. As she stood to do so, the man at the counter she had stepped around before suddenly blurted out a statement "A massive snake." Despite trying not to, she found the statement amusing in how blatantly obvious of a descriptor it was, and let out a laugh before quickly going silent. Thanking the helmet obscuring her face, she stepped around the man again, the crate in hand trundling along behind her and addressed the snake. "This crate contains my personal belongings" She began, staying cold and blunt with the creature, lest it think she was actually making conversation with it, "Must have been a mix-up at the dock, I'll be taking it to my quarters now," Without waiting for a reply, she flashed her identification tag as security officer and started for the door, turning her back on the two in the armory and making it clear that she did not intend to discuss the issue further.

[Heat]

The captain approached the terminal in the middle of the bridge, which he used to input commands and send messages out of the ship. He had just finished typing in a message to one of the engineers in the station who would give them clearance to leave and finally begin their mission. Almost immediately he received a reply, which was accompanied by the hiss of the airlock bridge snaking back into the ship as it completely detached, hovering a safe distance away from the Truman in order to begin a hyperspace jump.

"Crew, this is your captain speaking, we are igniting the FTL jump now, ETA at our destination will be thirty minutes." He spoke into the console, his voice booming through the hallways of the ship, speaking every man, woman and alien on board.

"Jude, is she ready?" He asked, inquiring if the ship was flight ready.

"Yes, the Durendal is ready to begin the mission at your command, captain."

"Alright, hit it then, Miss Freelander you know what to do, Jude I trust you have the coordinates punched in?"

"Yes, beginning hyperspace jump now." The A.I. replied as the engines began to quickly warm up, the engine which powered the Faster Than Light travel at full power as the Durendal flew away from the space station, heading towards the emptiness of space. Then the stars seem to fly by as the ship began traveling at insane speeds across the galaxy.

Soon, the Durendal came out of its jump, sailing towards the planet the probe was last tracked near. The planet was huge and white, it was a frozen ice word, covered in glaciers, frozen oceans and massive mountains which dwarfed any on Earth in sheer size. A single ship sat silent in orbit of the planet, Jon's eyes watching it immediately as the Durendal arrived at its destination.

"Jude, can you identify that ship? I don't recognize it, they would have informed us if there was an allied ship that would meet us out of the jump." He asked the A.I., his mind waxing over the ship, the design oddly familiar to him.

"Captain, the ship is a very old Naval frigate, the model is not even produced anymore. I found a serial number, but that ship was reported as missing along with its crew. My scans detect lifeforms aboard it. Approach with extreme caution, hostiles may be on board it."

"It's pirates, I'm almost certain of it. They're notorious for striking E.S.C. ships, killing or enslaving the crew, raiding the cargo and taking the ship itself." Jon stated, his voice confident, his hand stroking his chin. Then looked down at the console in front of him, noticing that he had received a message from the ship, "Jude, they're trying to establish communications, broadcast it through the ship, they should hear it." He replied, pressing the button which caused the window in the front of the bridge to turn to a screen which displayed a video.

"So kind of you to allow me to speak with you, Captain." A voice said as the screen cleared to show a bearded man facing the screen, speaking into it. His hair long and black, beard groomed, a tattoo of some origin on his right cheek. "But where are my manners, my name is Dryden, I am the humble captain of the vessel which contacted yours, we saw your fancy little ride as it popped out of hyperspace and we simply had to speak with you."

"Go on." Jon replied, looking at Dryden with suspicious eyes. His intuition was correct, they were pirates.

"I sense you came to retrieve the probe which was orbiting this world, my ship picked it up, it is very valuable to us, the market value for an intact piece of technology such as this will make us rich. You can't have it though, but I have another proposition for you and your crew," He said, blinking as he continued speaking. "Surrender half your crew, along with allowing my own crew to search your cargo hold and armory, taking anything we please, then I promise you can retreat back to where you came from with your lives."

"We don't negotiate with pirates. I'll give you one chance to hand over the probe and leave or else I will be forced to use lethal force in order to take what is rightfully ours." He replied, the seriousness of his words showing in his eyes.

"That was foolish of you, captain. Now I must bid you adieu as we unleash the full force of our weaponry on your crew and you, whose lives you just threw away." Dryden replied, a grin appearing on his face as the message closed.

"Crew, to battle stations immediately! I want any of those able to assist me in a boarding party of the enemy ship to meet me by the shuttle in the hangar." Jon spoke into the console to his crew. "I suggest close quarters weapons and armor for those coming with me." He stopped for a moment as Jude pitched in.

"They're sending fighters as well as powering up their weaponry, I highly suggest we do the same and commence evasive maneuvers. I estimate the on-board crew of the opposing vessel to be under 30 hostiles." Jude said, analyzing the upcoming battle.

"Scramble fighters as well! Captain out," Jon stated, then turned to the pilot, Virgo. "I want somebody manning that turret, Jude, you know what to do with the ship's other guns. I hope you can fly as well I was told you can, helmsman." He said, then ran out of the room towards his cabin in order to change into combat gear.

[Forsythe]

Astra watched with interest as Shamus wrote the note. She would have thought that for the Shuunai to use paper would be a bit masochistic, but thought better of saying that out loud though. "Believe me, my people know enough about misfortune to last an eternity." she said, accepting the note. She was mildly surprised the Shuunai would share this information. "I am sure our peoples will see eye to eye. We Faira are builders, not warmongers. And it's a pleasure to make you an acquaintance." Astra said as she saw the CMO out.

Once he left she sealed the lab door and brought up the environmental controls, raising the temperature as high as it would go. The 150°C were still pitiful, considering the average temperature on their homeworld was around 300, but it was still better than before. Not only did the heaters in her suit have to do much less work, but she could also see much better. Time to get to work.

Astra wouldn't admit it, but she was smitten by the human FTL method. For years she has been trying to figure out how to make Faira ships capable of jumping anywhere rather than along predetermined natural paths, but she was coming up short. The best her people could muster was the introduction of intrasystem jump gates that allowed some ships not meant to leave their home nebula to travel without their own, expensive subspace drive. She absolutely had to get her hands on it's blueprints on this trip, as the predictable travel paths of their ships were too much of a weakness if the current conflict with the Rahq escalated to full scale war. Even the humans, once they noticed, silently built an outpost near the Nebula-Sol jump node. They claimed it was a diplomatic station for contact between their own species, but it's escort and capacity suggested it was more of a staging area and fortress. On the other hand she could hardly blame humanity for being careful - the Faira took their own measures, stationing remote beam cannons and one of their destroyers on the other side.

She took a seat and started flipping through files on her computer, trying to familiarize herself with human powerplants as she wanted to integrate the shield generator as quickly as possible. Astra was just about to call the fighter pilot and ask if she had time to see her, but her thoughts were interrupted by the intercom coming to life and playing a conversation between the captain and the pirate vessel. Quickly remembering their objective, she decided to try something, instructing the AI to keep a channel to the enemy ship open and messaging the captain about her attempt:


Captain, I will try to get a look into the enemy's computers. If they interfaced the probe and downloaded it's data, I may be able to extract the information we seek without the need to retrieve the probe itself. If you can, keep them talking.


As she sent the message, she quickly found one of the Faira electronic warfare intelligence programs and started transmitting it over to the pirate frigate, hoping it would finish before they closed the channel from the other side.

[WatermelonTango]

Shamus had just gotten back to his med bay before the conversation blared over the intercom. Shamus chose to sit down and listen , as this was the first conflict he had ever been involved in. He listened intently to the voice of the man the captain was speaking to.. and he couldn't describe the tone of voice as anything other then cold. He wondered what a human being, a usually friendly and highly curious race, would have to be put through in order to become the monster he now listened to put a shiver down his spine.. hypothetically. Shuunai were almost always united towards a common goal, and the idea that humans had thousands of different creeds and often fought amongst themselves was hard for him to grasp.

With that over Shamus decided to get mobile, unsure if his services were to be needed in combat. Whatever the captain wanted from Shamus, he would do it. He loaded himself with his emergency medical equipment and slipped on the thin armor plating for protection. The captain said to bring heavy armor, but anything heavier and he wouldn't be able to regenerate properly. Shuunai were a tough race to kill anyways. He made sure to include bandages and anything else he would need before making his way out. Shamus for the first time in weeks pulled out his standard issue pistol and looked it over, inspecting it like he was trained. He had no intention of firing it if he could avoid it, but there was no telling what could happen. He pocketed the device and continued moving towards the hangar, doing his best not to stand in the way of other crew members who appeared to be occupied with their other duties. Shamus soon appeared in the hangar, unsure if this was were he was supposed to be but willing to assist in any way he possibly could.

[Heat]

"I'll try reastablishing a comm link with the other ship," Jon replied to Astra as he pulled the lower section of his armor on. "I doubt they'll answer, they seem pretty intent on trying to blow the ship apart. But, Jude give it a try." He stated as fighters drew closer to the Durendal, the enemy ship itself now in position to fire on the Durendal as well, Captain Welch trying to communicate once more with the enemy ship's captain.

"I cannot reestablish communications with the other ship, they seem to have disabled that function." The A.I. replied, controlling the ship's laser cannons as the she prepared to fire them once the fighters and enemy ship were within range.

"Twelve enemy fighters incoming," Jude said, her voice carrying through the halls of the ship as she alerted the crew. "I highly recommend our own starfighters deploy as soon as possible."

"I apologize, Astra, but their ship is not respond to our communication attempts." Jon stated through his communications device as he finished putting his armor on, then headed out of his cabin, the door shutting behind him, all of his weapons holstered and his helmet clenched in his right hand as he approached an elevator and entered it, pressing the button down the hangar.

[baskets]

After the crew meeting, the Wolves had peeled off to the hangar to prepare for the mission. After a quick eval, Krystina determined that there wasn't enough time for any performance tweaks to be made on the fighters without potentially compromising them in case of a deployment. So instead, she and her squad got to work on the paint modifications, taking on any help from crew members that were lingering around the hangar looking for work.

As soon as the Durendal had made contact with the pirate ship, the Wolves began prepping for deployment. They worked themselves into their respective flight suits and cockpits, beginning the start-up sequence for launch. Krystina glanced from squad member to squad member, waiting intently for the all-clear to launch. She couldn't help but smirk at her squad; they had adjusted each of their positions slightly so they would launch from the hangar in formation. That's why she picked these people, Krystina thought, as she received the all-clear to launch from the bridge.

Wolf Squad began powering up the starfighters at Jon's first call for them to scramble, and were already on their way out of the hangar at Jude's recommendation to launch.

"Wolf Zero, away."

"Wolf Three is backing her up."

"Wolf One is out the door."

"And Wolf Two is covering his ass."

"Durendal, please copy that Wolf Squad is away and beginning aerial defense of the ship," Krystina reported in to the bridge. Considering the captain was joining the boarding party, the fighter squadron was likely reporting to either the XO or the helmsman. It didn't matter; somebody was going to be on the other end to respond.

On her heads-up display, the names of her squadmates popped up in the corner, a dim glow outlining each name as they spoke.

Wolf One lit up first: "Zero, what's our goal here? Are we playing offense or defense, today?"

Krystina fumbled options around in her head for a split second. "I'm calling defense so we can thin out the herd. Keep the attention off the Durendal; I don't want the ship taking any shots that we can divert. After that, it's captain's call from there," Krystina responded. "I don't think I need to call any kind of formation for these rookies. We're dealing with pirates, here, kids. Wolf One, you do as you will, Wolf Two will cover you. Marina, you're with me." At that, Krystina and Brandon peeled their fighters off in opposite directions, Marina and Jason following their respective leads.

Krystina and Marina opted to veer hard to their left, pulling out five enemy fighters from the main group in pursuit. Brandon took the remaining seven head-on, with Jason dipping underneath the pirates' formation and popping back up behind them, effectively trapping the pirates in a crossfire between the two ESC fighters.

Krystina reverted her attention back to her situation at hand. She had Marina at her eight o'clock, and five pirate fighters scattered behind her in various positions. "Wolf Three, dip out of formation for a split." Marina ducked to the left accordingly, and Krystina slammed on the reverse thrusters. She watched in amazement as the pirates shot past her in pursuit of Marina and chuckled. They fell for the easiest bait there was. She shot some laser cannon fire in their direction, her shots bouncing off the pirates' shields. One of her shots penetrated the shield and landed itself on a thruster, the fighter lighting up into an instantaneous ball of flame before the vacuum of space put out the fire and left naught but the empty shell of a fighter.

"Wolf Zero recording one down. Eleven to go," Krystina called in, only to hear in quick response, "Make that ten, Zero. One and Two bagged another."

"Easy pickings. We'll have these guys rounded up in no time," Marina called in. Krys could almost see the joy in her voice; Marina loved an easy housecleaning.

Krystina called into the bridge, "Durendal, confirm two hostiles down. While we're at it, what do you want us to do once the rodents are dealt with?"

[Forsythe]

Unfortunate, but not hopeless. The frigate had to be communicating with the fighters, and that meant some channel was open for her to sneak through. Pulling up the sensor controls, she instructed to scan the human communication frequencies, focusing on those used at the time the pirate frigate was manufactured. It took a minute, but finally the machines spat out a frequency. Now all she needed was a relay. "Astra to Wolf Squad. I'm attempting to gain control of the enemy ships. I'm marking one fighter on your screens that I'm using as a relay to upload a virus. Try to keep it intact for as long as possible." she explained as she instructed the intruding AI to not only search for the information they were seeking, but also to try and wrestle the control of the fighters from the pirate pilots.

While the Faira never were in a war, they prepared for the possibility. Being numerically inferior, they developed advanced electronic warfare suites. The theory behind it was pure genius - not only deprive the enemy of their assets, but turn them against their owners and save their own resources. Of course, they didn't have any sample to test their programs on, but now she had one and intended to use it. A beep signaled her the virus have pierced the defenses of the fighter's computer. She routed the virus through there because she hoped the fighter's systems would not be as well protected as the frigate's. And from the fighter, the virus could disguise it's own transmissions as communication and fool the frigate's firewalls. Now if only the pirate was wise enough to stay away from the wolves so the upload could finish.

[Heat]

Three fighters broke off the from the dogfight with the Durendal's squadron, speeding towards the ship itself. Jude was ready as she blasted all of three of the enemy ships down with the powerful laser cannons on the ship. The Durendal then took a blast from the pirate frigate, weakening the shields slightly. Jude changed the direction of the cannons towards the enemy ship, and fired back at it. The two large ships stuck in their own dogfight.

"Do not destroy the enemy ship, the probe is on it, we need that," Jon ordered as the elevator came to a stop, then he stepped out of it, heading for the hangar. "Return to the Durendal when all the enemy fighters are taken care of, I don't want any unnecessary risks to be taken." He said into his communcations device to Krystina.

[Inkwell]

I sitting at her console Virgo hummed to herself waiting for the ship to come out into normal space. Looking at the ship in orbit above the planet a smile spread across her face finally she would get something interesting was happening. "This should be very interesting" she said as everyone was ordered to report to battle stations. Virgo quickly slipped her helmet on cracked her fingers before putting them down on the console. She was slightly annoyed at the captains comment about hoping she was as good as he had heard and as he said this a small scowl appeared on her face.

Virgo tried to make only took mild evasive action as the fighters left the hanger not wanting to turn and hit them with the ship. Watching the fighters as danced they danced across she moved the ship as safely as she could through them while trying to dodge the enemy weapons fire. She managed to see the fighters get a few kills which she confirmed shortly after Jude managed to destroy three of them. "Nice shorting Jude open a channel to the fighters and tell them they better stop slacking off" Virgo said with a smile on her face she loved competition.

She was a bit infuriated with the fact they couldn't destroy the enemy ship as the probe was on board but that wouldn't stop them from shooting at them. However she had plan that would save the ship being shot up hopefully. Putting the engines on full power she accelerated until the pirate ship was parallel with them passing port to port. Virgo then turned the left engines to minimum and used the manoeuvring thrusters so the ship turned violently placing it behind the pirate ship. Virgo hoping that her the pirate ship had most off their guns facing forward and that the rear was a blind spot. She was almost sure that she would be able to stay on the tail of the pirate ship. "Jude do you think you can take out the engines without destroying the ship we don't want them to go anywhere" she asked the A.I.

[baskets]

Krystina took little longer than usual to process all that she was told, being slightly distracted by trying to fly her starfighter and not get killed. On her HUD, the fighter Astra marked as a relay began to glow blue instead of red; typically, Krystina marked hostiles red, friendlies green, and objectives blue. She forwarded the updated objective marker to the rest of Wolf Squad, simultaneously engaging another pirate fighter with her laser cannons. She skimmed the tip of the wing, and Marina flew by rapidly to finish up the job.

"Wolf Zero to Durendal, counting six- no, five fighters left," Krystina quickly adjusted as Brandon and Jason took out another pirate starfighter. "Your relay is intact, and it looks like Wolves One and Two are applying pressure. Let us know when we're clear to finish this up," Krystina reported in. "Wolf Squad copies, Captain, we'll return home ASAP."

As she finished, Jude opened a channel to the entire squad. "Helmsman Freelander would like to remind you that you should stop slacking off, Wolf Squad." Krystina smirked. So the helmsman liked some friendly competition.

"Wolf Squad, let's show Miss Freelander what we think of her suggestion that we're slacking off, hm?" In immediate response, Brandon and Jason maneuvered their fighters so that Jason was below a pirate and Brandon was behind. Jason steadily accelerated and placed himself in front of the pirate, allowing the pirate to begin chasing him. He avoided each laser cannon shot with ease, allowing Brandon to line up the perfect shot straight into the cockpit. Simultaneously, Marina landed a shot on the wing of a pirate, sending the enemy starfighter spiraling off into the darkness of space.

Krystina grinned widely. "Jude, tell our lovely helmsman that if we were slacking, she'd have a lot more problems on her hands." Krystina made a mental note that the blue outlined ship was still flying. She wasn't entirely sure why this ship was important to Astra, but it was, and that's all that mattered to Krystina.

[Forsythe]

The scientist watched with interest as she pulled up the sensor readings. the blips on the radar were disappearing quite quickly - this seemed more like a turkey shoot for the wolf squad than an engagement. It also meant that she was slowly running out of test subjects, but if that meant less guns pointed at the ship she was on, she couldn't really complain.

The beep pulled her out of her thoughts. Looking at the diagnostics, she found out the virus has wormed it's way into the control systems of the fighters completely. Shooting the screen a metallic grin, her fingers started flying over the keyboard. "Time for the magic to happen." she said for herself as she instructed the virus to erase the part of the software that controlled the engines and guns. In an instant, all of the remaining fighters went limp. "They're inert, feel free to tow one in if you want someone for questioning." she reported t the comms, looking over at the progress of the ship, "I need about a minute more to get into the frigate. there's no guarantee the information will be there but I'll shut down their weapons at least so the boarding party can can approach unopposed." Astra suggested, the Faira 'no loss' objective directing her actions.

[Heat]

The pirate ship began to turn, as Jude was working her magic. Suddenly the ship stopped mid spin, the engines powering down then going completely silent. Her voice spoke, going into the communicators of every member of the Durendal's crew.

"I have gained access to the ship's primary functions, the engines are disabled and I am currently working on powering down the weapons. I recommend the boarding part departs soon as the pirates will try to regain control of the ship and possibly initiate a jump."

Captain Welch walked into the hangar, coming to the shuttle, only noticing Shamus there, as he stopped in front of the alien, looking at him. Then bringing his hand to his communicator to relay a message to the A.I.

"Jude, could you possibly disable the life support and suffocate them? In a perfect situation we would be able to get onto the ship with no hassle from the pirates." He asked.

"I have access to the life support, though several firewalls block me currently. But I will be able to pass through and access it, captain." The A.I. replied as Jon leaned against the shuttle, waiting for anybody else to show up.

[WatermelonTango]

"I would like to join you, Captain." Shamus said as he waited for Jon to finish using his communicator. "I am not properly combat trained, but I am durable and have access to paramedic supplies. If the pirates have slaves aboard then I may need to be present to assess their medical condition." Shamus lowered his head before continuing. "I will do my absolute best to avoid being a burden to you on this mission."

Shamus wasn't sure why he wanted to join the boarding party. He would work to keep his team alive, but that wasn't the only reason. Perhaps he had some grim fascination with seeing pirates, beings who are known to work for personal gain and personal gain alone. He had experienced mistreatment in the past, but pirates are a unique form of resentment and selfishness that Shamus had never been exposed to. It would be an experience.