8 Conflict

Useless Finik bastards! Rh`eisar cursed inwardly as he watched the three human fighters flash past him. His wing was rushing to join their beleaguered companions. Much as he'd have loved to castigate the humans for their retreat, he knew their numbers would have offered nothing in the coming exchange. Suddenly, he was twisting and turning to avoid the two Vord fighters on his tail and could not spare a neuron for his devolved cousins.

The space up ahead of Paul was pitted in sudden stabs of light. Sound couldn't travel in vacuum but that did nothing to silence the violence up ahead. By Convoy Central's count, there were no less than 2500 of enemy fighter's in the melee and as valiant as the Rhizon were, they could not match the enemy. Paul could see the swarms of Vord fighters were too many even for that particular Rhizon commander's fighters to overcome. Something drastic needed to change otherwise the fighter escorts, let alone the convoy, would never reach their destination.

A query to Convoy Central, Paul determined the likely point of origin given enemy numbers. A quick message to Usama gave him command of the squadron as well as units under himself, Mfecane and Chen Li. Before sending a viral code into his fighter's electronic brain to shut down com transmissions, he signaled Chen Li and Mfecane to do the same, flank then follow. Without preamble, the new trio swept out to sector 7, reduced their crafts' inertial dampeners by 50%, and accelerated to .6c. Almost immediately, the grav pressures pressed them into their flight seats and forced increased cardiac activity. Grins broke out among the rest left behind. The three would definitely have all the fun while the rest did all the slave labor. It was the perk of leadership.

* * *

Behind him, the knight-Lord could see entire squadrons breaking off to pursue the convoy trying to flee. Much as he'd have loved to give chase, his fighters were too busy dealing with close to 1500 enemy fighters left behind. Someone planned the ambush well. With his own 200 held up by the Vord, the convoy would have no defense on hand.

Fifty untrained and HUMAN fighters against a thousand? The Vord will go through the remaining screen like a Toledoon blade through Earth produced butter. Rh`eisar thought to himself. Then it would come the time of the convoy. The knight-Lord was hit by a pang of regret at having pulled away his squadrons to rescue the lone wing. He knew that in relative terms, the lives of the fifty fighters he had sent on ahead initially mattered less than those on the convoy. Already, he'd lost twenty craft from the first squadron. He had his orders. However, in absolute terms, a fighter capable of withstanding the Vord Terror was more valuable than an entire battleship. More valuable than the thousands of souls on board the convoy. Without fighter pilots, breaking Vord sieges was impossible.

Seeing the sudden flare of anti-matter missile explosions and laser stabs behind, the knight-Lord sighed and focused on removing the immediate threat to his rear. A quick roll then twist broke off one of his pursuers. He rewarded its lack of vigilance with a laser beam through the cockpit before turning to deal with the other two. Around him, darkness of deep space broke with sudden strobes of light. Flicking his controls over to autonomous command, he reconfigured his fighter into mecha mode. The sudden configuration change threw off another two of his pursuers as they harmlessly passed between his now extended undercarriages. Wings turned to force-blade wielding arms, the knight-Lord used the opportunity to shear off the two enemy fighters' gun turrets. The monomolecular blades simultaneously discharged a giga-volt of energy into their victims and disintegrated them. Quickly reconfiguring back to flight mode, the knight-Lord signaled to his wingman and launched an attack on a trio of enemy crafts that looked close to overwhelming a lone fighter. Flicking off his com, he ignored the shrill request for fighter coverage coming from Convoy Command. He'd already lost twenty five fighters. The convoy would have to do the best it could until he could break off from the engagement.