Aldara. Yvian was sure she'd heard that name before, but she couldn't remember where. Not from Mims, she was sure. The human had never spoken of his life before he left Terran space.

  "Aldara's the current Military headquarters for the Terran Federation. It's a restricted sector, but we should be able to convince them not to blow us out of the sky." The human was typing rapidly into his console. A notification appeared on Yvian's ship status screen. He was depressurizing the Ancilry, routing all atmosphere to its storage tanks. It didn't affect Yvian or the crew, as they were controlling the ship remotely from the Random Encounter inside its hangar bay, but Yvian still thought it an odd thing for Mims to do.

  "Then why do you look so worried about it?" asked Lissa.

  "Because I'm not welcome in Terran space." Mims typed another command, and the Ancilry's bay door opened. Yvian expected the Encounter to fly out of the ship, but the Captain left flight control untouched.

  "And by unwelcome you mean..."

  "I mean people will try to kill us if I'm recognized." Mims gave his voidarmor a once over. "A lot of people, the military and w enforcement included. Make sure your suits are sealed. I'm going to depressurize the Encounter next."

  Yvian put her helmet on and ran a systems check. Her Voidarmor was sealed and all systems green. After a quick comm check to make sure their suits were synced, the human depressurized the ship.

  "Why do they hate you so much?" Lissa asked. Yvian wondered that as well. Exodus had called him the Filicide. One who kills their own children. Could the Captain have done such a thing? To a pixen there was nothing more shameful. The motherless were outcasts, but child killers were hunted down. Did the humans do things the same way?"

  "It's a long story," said the human. "And we don't have time to get me drunk enough to tell it. You can ask around when we get there."

  "Why are we removing the air?" Yvian asked.

  "Your remember what happened when I shot the BFSR4 on the Paradigm?" Mims asked in turn.

  "Yeah," Yvian was still conflicted about that. "The shockwave turned everyone to mush." Seeing that had been awesome. Walking through the aftermath had made her question her mental state. Thrilling in the death of dozens of people was not something a sane person does. They'd been trying to eat her, so she supposed she didn't have to feel too bad, but still...

  Maybe she'd been spending too much time around the human.

  "Exactly," said Mims, snapping her out of that line of thought. "The MACdriver shoots a bigger round at higher speeds. Most Federation ships have one. If one hits while we've got air the pressure wave will do a lot of damage." He entered coordinates into the nav console. "Or turn us into pudding, if they hit the bridge."

  "Sounds fun," Lissa quipped. "Is there another way we could do this? Something less, you know..."

  "Fucking Dangerous?" Mims sighed. "Not anymore. That outpost was my only contact with a direct line to Federation leadership. If we want to talk to them now, we'll have to do it directly." He reached for the nav console, then paused. "One more thing. I'm not technically a fugitive, but there's a strong chance I'll be detained. You might be, as well. Or they might kill you, since you're citizens of a foreign power with information they don't want known. If you don't want to risk it, I'll understand. You can take the Ancilry and we'll meet up again if I make it back."

  Lissa and Yvian shared a look. Yvian shrugged. "If you're going, we're going. We're a crew."

  Mims nodded. "Alright, then. Initiating Jumpdrive." He pressed the button. He started to speak again, fell silent, then awkwardly said, "Thank you."

  "Meh," Lissa quipped. "At this point, what's one more stupid unnecessary risk?"

  The Jump effect resolved. Yvian pulled up sensors. Arms sprung up on her console. "We're being targeted," she announced. "Source is... holy shit."

  The source was over two thousand structures. Cylinders, just over kilometer long and a hundred meters wide. Each end of the cylinders tapered down to a point. Each point was equipped with a beam array. The Random Encounter was now in the crosshairs of four thousand three hundred and two beam weapons at distances that ranged from five thousand to two hundred thousand kilometers.

  "Beam towers," the Captain remarked. "Immobile, but heavily shielded. Firepower's roughly equivalent to a Kath Destroyer."

  The comm pinged. The hail was coming from one of the rger stations in the sector. "Attention vessel, this is Stelr Command Station. You have entered a restricted sector. Identify yourself."

  Mims let out a breath. "Here goes."

  He answered the hail. "Stelr Command Station, this is Agent Outcast of XTRO. Authentication code One Eight Seven X-ray Charlie Oscar Mike Three Seven Six Alpha Gamma Four. Request permission to dock at Stelr Command Station. This is a Code Gactica. I say again, Code Gactica. I need to speak with General Young as soon as possible."

  There was no answer for several seconds. Yvian assumed Stelr Command was checking out the spy codes Mims had sent. "Attention vessel. You have entered a restricted sector. Identify yourself."

  Mims tensed. Not by much. Yvian doubted an outside observer would even notice. But she knew him and she saw the nervousness clinging to his shoulders. That was a bad sign.

  Mims hailed the station again. "Stelr Command Station, this is Outcast. Did you receive my st transmission?"

  "Affirmative," the station replied. "Identify yourself."

  "Did you check the authentication code?" A hint of anger leaked into the humans voice.

  "Identify yourself or you will be fired upon." The voice warned. "You have thirty seconds to comply."

  "Did you receive the Code Gactica?" Mims demanded.

  Silence.

  Mims cursed. "Don't you know what it means? Stelr Command, answer me!"

  Silence.

  "Fuck!"

  The human thought a moment, then cursed again. "No choice, I guess." He hailed the station. "Stelr Command Station, this is Mark Mims, Identity Number Eight Five Six Golf Henry Two Four Ida Lima Nine Seven Two. I am currently aboard the Ancilry, a ship built in the United Confederation of Species. Request permission to dock at Stelr Command Station."

  Silence. Yvian braced herself. The thirty seconds were up. If two thousand beam weapons hit the Ancilry, there wouldn't be enough left of them to constitute debris. They'd just be a bunch of superheated molecules drifting in the void. At least it would be quick.

  Death did not come. After another twenty seconds of silence, the station hailed again. "Mims, this is Stelr Command Station. Permission to dock is granted. Proceed to hangar bay forty seven alpha."

  "Acknowledged," Mims replied. "En-route." He ended the transmission. The Ancilry started moving. "Motherfuckers," he muttered. "What kind of asshole makes an agent expose his identity on open comms?"

  "Uh, Mims?" Lissa sounded concerned. "Didn't you say people would try to kill us if they found out who you are?"

  "I know," said Mims . "I'm already doing evasives."

  The Ancilry accelerated, bobbing and weaving as it went. Mims ordered Lissa to monitor ship status. She was to report any sudden hull breaches. Yvian was tasked with watching the sensors to see if any ships pursued an intercept course. Mims kept the Ancilry dodging, changing speed and vector at random. There were a multitude of other ships in the system, but none closer than five thousand kilometers. Yvian doubted anyone could predict the Captain well enough to hit them at that range.

  They'd been traveling for almost an hour before Yvian was proven wrong.

  "Hull breached!" Lissa reported. "Two holes! Hangar and cargo bay. They missed the Encounter by half a meter."

  "Shit." Mims hauled on the flight controls. "Increasing evasives. Where's it coming from?"

  "Working on it!" Lissa typed furiously into her console. "Trianguting vectors, accounting for speed..."

  For her part, Yvian frantically searched the sensors. None of the other ships were approaching directly, but there were several that had come closer, and a dozen or so that were on a parallel course. All Stelr Defense Force military vessels. All heavily armed. Most of them were probably just heading to the Stelr Command Station, like she was, but one of them must be shooting at them.

  Or all of them were.

  "I've got it," Lissa announced. "Frigate css. Range Four thousand kilometers." Lissa sent a sensor image to everyone else's console. "It looks like a sniper rifle with engines."

  "With a bunch of smaller rifles sticking out of it," Yvian added. "What the hell is that thing?"

  "That," said Mims, maxing out the Ancilry's acceleration, "Is a YEET css artillery barge. The little guns are EMCs. Like the MACdriver, but with rger rounds and higher rate of fire. The big gun's a YEET cannon. Fires a half ton slug at a speed of eighty kilometers a second. Or they can lower the speed and use a round with a fission bomb in it."

  "That..." Lissa shivered. "That sounds bad."

  "Very bad," Mims agreed. "One YEET can wipe out a whole sector by itself."

  "Four more hull breaches!" Yvian gnced at the dispy. The new holes were farther from the hangar bay this time. Lissa cursed. "How the Crunch are they hitting us?"

  "They're good," Mims started making rger movements, wider dodges. "Or they're lucky. They're probably firing the EMCs in bursts over a wide area. Once they get closer, they'll start hitting us more."

  "Can't we outrun them?"

  Mims shook his head. "Dodging around like this slows us down, and they've got better acceleration."

  "So what do we do?"

  "Whatever we can." Mims hailed the enemy YEET. "Attention vessel. We are an XTRO ship carrying a Code Gactica. Cease fire."

  The YEET did not respond. Yvian assumed it was still shooting at them, but she couldn't tell for sure. The Encounter's MAC rounds hadn't been scannable, either. The projectiles had some kind of stealth tech.

  "Attention vessel. Cease fire. Please respond."

  The YEET did not respond. Another pair of holes appeared in the hull.

  "Stop shooting at us, assholes!" Mims snapped. "We're not an enemy."

  The YEET responded. "Oh yes you are."

  The YEET had closed to thirty eight hundred kilometers. Another EMC round hit, boring a new hole in the Ancilry's massive frame. Stelr Command Station was still three hours away. They would never make it.

  Mims growled into the comms. "Who are you?"

  "Doesn't matter," the YEET replied. "What matters is who you are. Mark Mims. The Kinsyer. I've waited a long time to get you in my sights."

  "You're attacking a civilian vessel without cause," Mims pointed out. "You will be courtmartialed for this."

  "It'll be worth it to kill you," said the YEET pilot. "Aldara remembers."

  "Of course it remembers!" the Captain snapped. "But we've got bigger problems right now. I've got to warn Stelr Command. All of humanity is at risk."

  The YEET did not respond.

  "Are you willing to doom our whole species to get revenge?" The human shouted into the comm. "Cause that's what you're doing!"

  The YEET did not respond.

  "Answer me, God damn it!"

  The YEET artillery barge had closed to thirty four hundred kilometers. It refused all further communications. Mims continued to hail it, shouting obscenities.

  "Can we fight them?" Yvian asked. "The Encounter's got a MACdriver."

  "The YEET's got a military IFF," Mims told her. "We fire on it, and every beam tower and ship in the system turns hostile. Stelr Command could stop them from killing us." His helmeted head turned towards the comm terminal. Yvian assumed he was gring. "But I don't think they would."

  The Ancilry kept dodging. The YEET kept firing. More and more holes kept appearing in the hull. So far, they hadn't hit any important systems. Yvian knew that wouldn't st. The artillery barge was closing in, and evasives were slowly but surely losing their effectiveness.

  The YEET was only two thousand kilometers away, now. Still well out of range for energy weapons, but scary close for invisible slugs that ignored shields. A warning fshed on the Random Encounter's ship status. A hull breach. On the bridge. Yvian looks around and saw a hole wider than her hand in the ceiling.

  After more futile cursing at the YEET, the Captain changed tactics. "Stelr Command Station, this is pilot Mims of the Ancilry. Request immediate assistance. We are under attack."

  The station did not reply.

  "Stelr Command Station, this is Mims. I say again, we are under attack. The SDF Sirocco is firing on us. Requesting immediate assistance. Please respond."

  The station did not reply.

  "God dammit, Stelr Command! I know you can hear me!" Mims shouted, furious. "If this asshole kills us all of humanity is gonna die! I came here to warn you idiots! Do you think I want to be here? This is a Code Goddamned Gactica! Stop pretending you don't know what that means!"

  The station did not reply.

  Mims reached for the comms again, but stopped as Lissa yelled. "Mims!"

  "Report."

  "They got us!" Lissa didn't quite shout, but it was close. "Engines offline!" Yvian checked the status screen. The EMCs had riddled the engines with half a dozen holes.

  "Shit!" The hangar door in front of them had remained open. Now Yvian knew why. It took Mims three seconds to switch flight controls over to the Encounter. On the fourth, they were off the Ancilry and accelerating at full burn.

  Fourteen seconds ter, something tore the Ancilry in half. The YEET cannon had spoken.

  The Encounter was much smaller, faster, and more maneuverable than the Ancilry had been. With Mims at the helm, Yvian figured they still had a chance. Not a good chance, maybe, but it could be done. They'd faced worse odds. Hadn't they?

  "Think we can make it?" she asked.

  "We could. Maybe." The Captain took a deep breath through his nose. Let it out. "But we're not going to."

  Mims tried hailing the station one more time.

  "Stelr Command, this is Mims." The Captain spoke calmly, but Yvian could hear the undertone of cold fury in his words. "The Ancilry's been destroyed. The Sirocco's still shooting at us. If they get us, everyone dies. Not just me. Not just you. Everyone. I know what's coming. I know how to stop it. But if killing me is worth the extinction of our entire species, then you go right ahead. I'm done. In about thirty seconds I'm gonna change course. I'll fly my ass back to the Confed and leave you shitstains to face what's coming on your own. And you know what's coming? I'll give you a hint."

  Mims growled, low and feral, almost hissing the words. "Exodus the Genocide is alive."

  "Are we really going to leave them?" Lissa asked.

  "Damn right," said the human. "Whoever's in charge up there ignored protocol and forced me to blow my cover on open comms. Now we're under fire from military craft and no one's said a word about it. If we-" he cut off as the comm chirped.

  "Pilot Mims, this is Stelr Command. Say again your st."

  "If we step foot on that station in these conditions," he continued. "We will be killed." He reached over and answered the hail. "I say again. Exodus the Genocide is alive."

  Mims waited a few seconds. The station didn't say anything else. Mims hailed them. "Time's up. Fuck you and good luck. Mims out." Mims changed course, pointing the Encounter at the nearest gate.

  Blinding light fshed through the viewports. The SDF Sirocco disintegrated in the heat of four thousand beam weapons.

  The station hailed them again. It was a different voice this time. "Pilot Mims, the is General Devera. You are clear. I'd appreciate it if you still came to dock. I'll make sure no one bothers you again."