"Good call, Sarge," Hugh says, nodding. "Check 'em."

(assuming that they're who they say they are)

"Welcome aboard. To answer your questions three: We didn't take any prisoners, no word on when we can start wrecking the orbital defenses, the other team's holed up close to Engineering. We vented a lot of the ship to get the crew to evac and that worked, as far as we can see. Which isn't as far as I'd like, so first on my list of priorities is assembling sweeping teams to go over the areas that aren't patched into the ship's surveillance network."

Mardy and Quper raise their hands in a peaceful gesture when Semo steps through the hatch. There's four more rebels in armored spacesuits with them. These four step back as well and allow Semo the run of the small checkpoint.

Mardy and Quper step into CIC to hear Hugh out. "I've got twenty men suited up and ready to go. Your guy here can come with us on the sweep," Mardy offers.

"We better get the orbital secured and dialed in," Quper adds. "No telling how long before the surface sees those lifepo-"

*Boranai Two-Seven to Righteous Purpose, we have vis on lifepods and atmo halo. What is your status?* The vox from the Gateport is duplicated across laser transmission as well.

Hugh nods to Semo, then grabs the vox again.

*Righteous Purpose to Boronai Two-Seven, we are reading atmosphere containment loss across the ship. We have evacuated non-essential crew and are attempting damage control. Request that you assist with lifeboat retrieval and vector us for a lower orbit. No imminent danger to other ships or remaining crew. We will contact you for support when we have determined the nature of the malfunction.*

Once the visitors have been checked over, they are escorted inside. Semo comes in last, sword still in hand.

A call comes in over the vox from orbitial security. Semo hopes that the brainy types can handle this before it turns FUBAR. Fortunately, Hugh seems to have the situation well in hand.

Still, they can't afford to wait too long before taking action. Semo is ready to take over the weapon systems as needed.

*Understood, Righteous Purpose. Dispatching recovery teams to drop sites. The sky is yours, bring your heading below one oh seven.*

"Nice," Mardy grins as the team's subterfuge continues unabated.

"Top," Mellish interjects. "H-hour for the men comin' through the footgate's in ten minutes."

With the impending simultaneous assault pending, Semo looks over the weapons officer's station. The crash couch pairs physical controls with a holographic battlespace, and with the decompression the Needleship's computers have automated a great deal of the systems. The Imperials, for all their violent bluster, did not build a ship that could unleash its deadly arsenal without a human's confirmation. With only one human brain in the loop, the capital ship's ability to split its fire among multiple targets would be greatly slowed. Luckily Semo's not expecting much of a fight up in orbit.

Hugh stands ready at the vox as the Righteous Purpose sinks to a geosynchroneous orbit as h-hour approaches.

"Haj, get ready to dial the gate."
"Yes, Captain."
"Sarge, do we have a firing solution on the orbital defenses?"
"Sir!"

Hugh's feet shift apart and his arms cross in front of his chest for just a second. His grin spreads as an imaginary wind blows through his hair. It's like standing on the bridge of a caravel, boarding knife between his teeth.

"I've always wanted to say this," Hugh mumbles, then raises his right arm to point at the orbital defenses on the main viewer.

"Main cannons, fire for effect!"

Semo has never been particularly good with tech, but the trainers for this mission did an excellent job of teaching him to leverage his weapons skill with the ship-board systems. Sliding into the firing couch, Semo goes through the processes he was taught, bringing the aiming systems online and running them through calculations of firing vectors to maximise efficiency. Only when Hugh gives the command does he power up the weapons themselves.

"Firing forward batteries, sir!" Semo keys in the final firing sequence, a hint of a grin on his face.

Semo finds that targeting weapons emplacements on an unaware target at a relative stop makes for a fine introduction to the array of deadly energies available on the Righteous Purpose. Point-defense batteries, set to autonomous mode, scan the battlespace for any objects on threatening vectors. Hundreds of killdrones, the Imperium's semi-sentient missiles, await single, automatic, or ripple-fire orders. Accelerators stand ready to throw metal into orbit and deny enemies their maneuverability - or unleash the small complement of sunballs should the captain feel like genocide. Turreted beamers rotate in synch with Semo's controls. These are the primary anti-space weapons along with the killdrones. Finally, the Needleship's spinal weapon, a variable coilgun nearly a kilometer long, threatens the defense and traffic control platforms bristling from Boranai's orbital Gate with Semo's choice of either hyperalloy penetrators, cluster warheads, or a sustained-pulse particle beam. God's own Smite button sits quietly on Semo's weapon console.

Semo opens strong with the forward particle batteries. The CIC readouts sense the invisible pulses of radiation, drawing them in Semo's holos as blue streaks. The targeting scopes provide the real show; fusion-hot white bursts flash from the orbital's armament pods as Semo wipes out their ability to return fire. A second sweep obliterates the quarter-arc or so of the orbital's main habitat and sends any chance the Imperials might have had of aborting the upcoming portal into several quickly decaying orbits.

Semo gets a faint audible feedback from his couch with each hit. Ears are too valuable a sense to go unused in combat, even in the silence of space.

Haj dials the Gate. The golden flash, muted by the Needleship's compensators, fills the CIC with a soft glow.

Telescopes pick up several faint readings that aren't in the stored starmaps. Lifepods.

*Yankee Two Actual to Yankee One, transmitting IFF.* The quick-and-dirty passcode matches Sturgis and Onas' team's identifier. Plus the grainy audio sounds like Sturgis. And it's in English. *Our dinner guests are leaving for the night, we have the house all to ourselves.*

*Friendly! Friendly! Righteous Purpose, cease fire! Cease fire, those are friendlies!* That's from Boranai's Gateport. Then over the captain's personal console, from the Spire, several hundred klicks away: *Rav-Odun Sauthnamous, bring your vessel under control! That's the First-damned gate you're firing on!*

"Signal our troops," Hugh says to Haj. "It's time to do this."

He grabs the vox again and puts on his best audible sneer.

"Correction: This is not the Righteous Purpose, and you are not talking to Sauthnamous. Now, be sure of this: we will lay waste to you and everything you see before you can do anything to retaliate against us. You have ten seconds to surrender before we vaporize you."

The Needleship's bridge is suddenly awash in comm traffic in both Imperial and English:

*Unknown hostile contacts at B Two-Seven! Abort is unresponsive!*

*Yankee One-skkkzt-requesting an-static-rial surveilla-fuzziness*

*Quad sixteen requests reinforcements, location B 2 7.*

*Request received, Q16. Reinforcements-* the Imperial battle network cuts off as someone in the Spire dumps the capital ship from the voxline.

Haj directs the Purpose's sensors down towards Boranai's surface. There's patchy cloud cover crossing over the Spire arcology, but the heat, motion, and albedo sensors match three contacts moving fast in a shallow arc over the cracked, rugged landscape towards the Gateport. Three mantas, mantas whose IFF signals abruptly cease as the Righteous Purpose is removed from the Imperium's tactical network. They should be within range of the Gateport in about 20 minutes.

Then, a dare:

*Traitor vessel, power down your systems and await boarding parties. Failure to comply will result in your pacification.*

Hugh doesn't dignify that with a response; he keeps the vox off, but turns to Semo.

"Sarge, you think they'll ever learn that we don't bluff? Prepare the light anti-ship guns for skeet shooting. Haj, go to laser comm with Yankee Two."

Time to call Sturgis...

"Yankee One Actual to Yankee Two, we've got mantas inbound, I repeat, mantas inbound. Watch out for those, they might try to board you."

*We're five hundred million miles away, Yankee One,* Sturgis says. *Telemetry suggests those bandits are headed for the Gateport, not orbit. We've splashed our contacts and are moving to block our shipgate and maintain comms. ETA three minutes.*

Just like the more common situations arising at a ground Gateway, a powered orbital Gate retains the ability to transmit communications even if blockages prevent matter transport. To this end, Sturgis' captured capital ship begins an easy intercept with the outsystem gate.

Semo trains his weapon scopes on the three tiny glints streaking over Boranai. They're running full throttle, else they'd be near-impossible to spot against the background energy reflection of the planet. Semo's reminded of their breakneck escape across Aikoro, and how their positions were reversed. The Imperium must have really wanted them alive, because this... this is easy. Semo would have to work very hard not to obliterate those three mantaships below.

Suddenly Semo's autotargeters lose their lock. Haj's fingers start racing across his console, his worried eyes darting. "Cap, they've thrown their first ECM. Swalni needs to get us blocking that Gate, he needs to shut down our engines, and I need him up here. Shit - I need all three of those things at once."

Semo nearly drools over the array of firepower beneath his fingers. There are weapons here that make anything on earth look absolutely primitive. For a second, he can almost hear the lightsabers swooshing in the background...

Down to business. First pass, take out the weaponry. Second pass shreds the inhabited areas. As he had been trained, Semo sweeps the orbital station with his targeting sensors for anything that might have survived the twin barrages. Nothing.

Much too late, ground control realizes that there's a problem and begins futilely screaming in panic. Hugh explains the situation to them, to be greeted by more panic and bluster.

Meanwhile, it is apparent that the second team successfully captured the other needleship as well, making the victory nearly complete.

As the radio signals go back and forth, Semo sweeps local space for any threats. Any identified will be handled with extreme prejudice.

Hugh wrote:

"Sarge, you think they'll ever learn that we don't bluff? Prepare the light anti-ship guns for skeet shooting. Haj, go to laser comm with Yankee Two."

"Only when it's far too late, Cap'n." Even as he replies, Semo is tracking the ground-based mantas, looking for a lock. This really is too easy; almost like playing some childish video game.

Suddenly, the autotargeting sensors lose the mantas. "What the hell?!" Semo exclaims. Haj quickly provides an answer as he attempts to combat the ECM.

"What now, Cap'n?" Semo says, looking to his commander for leadership...

"Nothing changes," Hugh says. "Go to manual and blow them out of the sky. Same goes for anything else that looks like it wants to stop us."

Semo links up the particle cannons to his visuals and tries to zero in on the mantas heading for the Gateport. They're speeding across the landscape at some multiple of the speed of sound; with a steady hand Semo zooms in to where they're big enough to hit by eyeballing it and relatively slow-moving enough for him to aim.

The particle beam that lances down from Righteous Purpose's ventral batteries diffuses as it travels through Boranai's atmosphere. Ionized air announces Semo's attack with a white streak and a razor-sharp thunderclap. The manta pilots never would have launched had they known they'd have to contend with ortillery! Semo sees two of the three delta-shaped craft veer off to the side, out of his scopes. He pulls his viewfinders back to find the two mantas and sees fire against scorched earth. Then, a smaller fireball - the manta he hit fragments and explodes, raining debris and molten fuselage across a swath of Boranai's labyrinthine canyons.

Apparently the Spire takes Semo's marksmanship as a sign that the hijacked Needleship doesn't plan on surrendering. Another white streak and a thunderclap stab through Boranai's sky, this time from somewhere in the Spire's arcology sprawl. The surface-to-orbit particle beam fades out as it runs out of air to ionize, but the impact isn't lessened. The energy lance scores a deep, hot scar across the Purpose's lower left quarter. With only one point of fire to track so far, the Spire gunners can't accurately triangulate the locations of Semo's gun batteries. Likewise, Semo can't tell exactly where the defensive fire came from. Somewhere in the Spire's sprawl, but where?

"Yessir!" Fortunately, Semo's training was thorough enough that he knows how to work the armaments manually. It takes a few moments, but he soon has the three manta ships in his sights.

A simple press of a finger sends a huge beam of energy streaking toward the surface. A small thrill ripples up Semo's spine as the lead manta turns into a spray of molten metal.

Moments later, the thrill is gone as a similar beam from the surface shakes the ship. "Haj!" Semo yells. "Find me that emplacement!"

Meanwhile, the big Samoan continues to track the remaining mantas. Using a different battery, he'll start trying to put together a solution to take both of them in one more shot. The first battery will remain online in case they find the ground emplacement. Semo suspects that they'll need to absorb another shot to find it, however.

Semo catches one of the mantas again as it flashes over a small outpost some 20 miles from the Spire's outskirts. Suddenly the manta slows, banks slowly, and fireballs into the ground. Semo keys the magnifiers and spots the hint of a missile contrail leading back to the outpost. Two nondescript freighters are there; looking closer, Semo spots about a half-dozen tanks (!!!) and, judging from the smoke, anti-air Humvees. The ground forces committed to the Spire assault are beginning their move.

"Not right now, big guy!" Haj declines Semo's call for aid. "Verrill, we're blocking the orbital, I'm shutting down our propulsion! Swalni, get UP here!"

*I'm coming as fast as I can! The lifts are still off!*

"Fuck!" Haj returns to madly tapping away, frantically trying to protect the Needleship against the Imperium's electronic assault.

Semo hopes the ship can take another shot from the Spire guns - the third manta's figured out that it's not getting all the way to the Gateport and is heading for the US forces on the ground. It's up to Semo to stop it. He charges a different turret, hoping that the impromptu whack-a-mole tactic will throw off the surface-to-orbit fire. Semo pushes the button.

From space, the manta debris looks like pixie dust.

WHAM! Another particle beam from the Spire arcology, another scar across the Needleship's hull. The compartments sliced open by the beam were already vented to space, though. No real damage.

Semo's got a good bead on where that shot came from. He figures the cannon's buried at surface level, hidden amongst a cluster of low-to-the-ground hab-modules and recreational areas.

"Precision strike, Sarge," Hugh orders. "We can take another hit, but I don't want any more collateral damage than necessary to take out that beam."

Hugh activates the vox again. Open channel, this time.

"To all Boranai forces, this is Captain Verrill of the Liberator. We have determined the location of your anti-ship weapons and are preparing to lay down fire. We don't want to shoot at positions buried in residential areas, but we will defend ourselves. If you're close to those positions, I recommend you clear out as quickly as possible."

Semo catches sight of one of the mantas going down. The ground forces must have caught that one. Semo flashes a thumb's-up sign only to have Haj deflate his jubilation by refusing to help.

Gonna have to do the best he can on his own. The third manta appears to be turning on the ground forces. Semo sights in and stabs a button. Immediately, he turns his attention to a different screen centered on the Spire to watch for return fire.

Moments later, his attention is rewarded with the sight of a particle beam flashing upwards. Even as the ship is rocked by the impact, Semo is focussing down on the launch site.

A stream of obsentities spills from Semo's mouth. "Cap! The bastards are launching from a residential area! We're likely to take out hundreds - if not thousands - of civilians trying to knock it out."

As usual, the captain takes the best road available, ordering best precision - which isn't very good at this point. He then goes on to send a warning to the surface.

Semo counts to ten, then begins planning a pattern strike to the smallest area that the sensors are able to identify. Then, saying a quick prayer, he activates the firing solution.

The generated pops of particle batteries answer Semo's commands. His scopes reveal flashes, gray smoke and brown dust, then black smoke and fire.

Twofold confirmation comes from the surface: first, a radio transmission. *Vulture Two advises Yankee One; that's a kill.* Then, another beam punches up through the atmosphere from the Spire. This shot slags one of Semo's precious batteries. Simultaneously, a flight of killdrones launches from the city and its surrounding emplacements like 99 hypersonic red balloons. Semo's threat indexer lights up like the Vegas strip.

Suddenly he's seeing multiple tiny pops - little explosions amidst a spiderweb of contrails. AA missiles from US forces must apparently recognize the drones as a threat! The missiles can't catch 'em all - at least a few dozen killdrones escape the ground fire and start random evasive maneuvers on their way to the Liberator. They'll be impacting in four minutes.

*Vampire! Vampire! Yankee One, you have missiles inbound!* comes the helpful but unneeded update from the ground.

Swalni finally makes it to CIC. He rockets through the hatch sideways in the microgravity and spins himself to the deck next to Haj. "Semo, their guns got many barrels, one generator. Like... like this -" he holds his hand out to Semo, palm up, fingers curled as if gripping an invisible globe. "The idea is random barrels fire so it maximizes their lifespan. They, on the other hand, know exactly where we are, and we're not moving. They're gonna slag our guns and let those killdrones waste us."

"Are we stopped?!" Haj shouts at his fellow Bashakran.

"Yes, we're stopped," Swalni growls back. "We're wearin' the Gate like a belt. Why isn't point defense tracking?"

"It's autonomous, not on the main network; it just needs crew down there to flip the switches to 'kill anything within range'," Haj explains.

Mellish picks up on the conversation. "Hell, even I can flip switches. Top?" he asks Hugh's permission.

---

Specialist Perry high-fived Private Messing as their PATRIOT brought down a cluster of the strange, brilliant warheads. Smoke drifted slowly across the sky. In front of their Humvee, the armored column weaved its way through Boranai's byzantine canyons, following the maps provided by the rebels. Back at the small seismic research outpost their company used as a landing site, the Apaches were already assembled and fueling.

Suddenly:

*Contact! Echo reports contact two o' clock, tunnel entrance!*

The message is punctuated with a few rifle reports, then a faint skreeeee, like a buzzsaw biting steel, then the budda budda budda of a fifty. More rifle reports, more radio messages. Echo had wounded; they lost sight of the beach ball drones. Somebody got one of the cloaked tangos with the M2:

*We got one! Did you see that shit?!*

*Cut the chatter! Hotel, sitrep!* Hotel was Perry's group.

"No contacts," Perry squawked into his radio, but then he saw two of the enemy UCAVs, the little beach balls. "Um- contact! Hotel reporting two UCAVs, top of the ridge!" Messing grabbed his rifle and swung it towards the floating drones. They weren't attacking - just watching.

Perry spotted a few arrows spiraling down towards his Humvee. No, not arrows - spears. Something in his mind, something absorbed during one of the interminable briefings but too quickly filed away screamed at him to move. All Perry could do was think Too bad our missiles don't track those thi-

---

Rav-Turai Arnamas was in a bad way. His vision clouded with pain. He tried to stand, put weight on his left leg, but his medicae pushed him back down behind the ruined outer wall of the Boranai Gateport. Too late, Arnamas remembered why he couldn't stand. He chanced a wistful glance over the barrier, saw his leg thirty meters away where the clumsy but deadly Narsai explosive had taken it.

The Homeworlder drones were blocky, ugly affairs. Whirring, grinding, so slow. It didn't take much to kill them, but it took long enough that their weaponry took its toll. And then the Homeworlders themselves - screaming, shouting, their weapons thundering. The apocalypse had come to Boranai on Arnamas' watch and here he sat without a leg.

The medicae ran his kauka across the wound and Arnamas winced back to reality. The Narsai'i would not take the Gateway, not on his watch. They had kept the barbarians penned in, kept them suppressed inside the Gateport. Too many civilians had died in the crossfire for Arnamas to even consider that a blessing. But the Turai were holding.

A group of three civilians, their clothes ragged and torn, their faces smudged with battle, approached Arnamas' small group of wounded. Were they insane? What civilian runs towards battle-

The answer came too late. The rebels threw aside their cloaks, raised their beamers, and swept the trench with fire.

---

Greene cursed, in English of course, as he stepped through the portal from Akwhela's Eye to the Boranai Spire. The air was.. cloying, smelled of bubblegum. Real gravity was a shock after so long in the void. He and his honor guard quick-stepped their way from the Gateway (even now revolving to a inaccessible horizontal until the proper codes were given) and headed for one of the lifts. Greene's battle network buzzed with reports, losses, troop dispositions, enemy communications, and surveillance.

Greene cursed again in the lift as he saw the AA missile contrails marked plain as day in the surveillance. But nothing prepared him for the comm log:

Quote:

"To all Boranai forces, this is Captain Verrill of the Liberator. We have determined the location of your anti-ship weapons and are preparing to lay down fire. We don't want to shoot at positions buried in residential areas, but we will defend ourselves. If you're close to those positions, I recommend you clear out as quickly as possible."

Motherfu-

The Spire shivered from a massive explosion somewhere inside!

Greene snapped awake in the dark, in a tangle of stumbled bodyguards. The crackle of vox confirmed Earth's latest trickery:

*skkkttzzz-ateway! Explosion took oukkkkrrrrzzktburied. Damage control teams to zzzzrrrkt*