The spaceship, now a falling dart, leaves a trail of disturbed air in its wake. As it descends, the nose-first trajectory creates a sense of sheer speed and imminent danger or at least it should. Strangely enough Dre and Razzo find themselves cool and collected within the pilot’s cabin. The metal at the tip of the nose begins to heat up slightly at first, before becoming more and more orange. Without the thrusters running the ship is near silent in its descent like a barn owl finding a mouse in the field. The once graceful wings, now seemingly inadequate in the face of this descent, tremble against the tumultuous forces of the atmosphere. The atmosphere around the falling plane seems to distort and ripple, betraying the intense aerodynamic pressures at play. The inevitable collision with the ground seems both imminent and inconceivable. As the ship hurtles closer to the earth, its descent leaves a rapidly shrinking gap between itself and the ground. Razzo pulls the control yoke on himself as much as he can, rapidly changing the direction of the nose of the ship while also turning on the thrusters. The ship's nose angles more and more upwards, almost scraping the mediterranean sea as it journeys back up thousands of feet in a minute. The free fall gave them the moment to close the gap on the Minerau ship and get them close to it without the ship being able to pick up on them and deploy hunters after them. Once aligned with the ship and rapidly closing in on it Razzo gets on the communicators.
“OPEN FIRE!!!” he yells to Dengrad and Ostikous over the communicator.
The two crew mates fire at will all over the starboard of the ship. Razzo activates the automated guns and fires them off including an energy harpoon. The harpoon lodges into the Minerau ship’s hull anchoring them to it. Razzo continues flying around the ship as the Minerau ship retaliates with its automated cannons and guns but misses the elusive ship. It doesn’t take long until the energy cable connecting the harpoon to the Valentina’s Voyage is fully extended and the full extension causes tension between the two ships. This tension then tugs and pulls on the ship causing the ship's inertia to slingshot itself around the Minerau ship like a tetherball swinging around the pole.
“WHAT WAS THAT?!?!” - exclaims Razzo over the communicators as they do the first loop around the Minerau ship.
“It looks like we’ve harpooned ourselves to the ship and it's causing us to rapidly swing around the ship until we crash into it!” - rapidly alerts Dre.
“Can we release it and free ourselves from the Minerau ship?”
The robot shakes its head: “It appears that tension will remain because of the first loop around…”
In a panic Razzo goes on the communicator and alerts Dengrad and Ostikous: “I need both of you to direct your fire on a single spot that Dre will send to your target systems”.
“Yes captain!” - is said in unison by the two of them.
Dre scrambles to find a weak point in the ship and locates a hangar wall that’s weaker than the rest of the nearby area on the left side of the Minerau ship. The Automaton quickly sends over the strike points to the Froklin and Urug’s targeting systems. As Valentina’s Voyage loops around the second time the radius around the Minerau ship reduces significantly. The target opens up for a brief moment and Ostikous and Dengrad along with the automated turrets open fire on the weak point. The first strike ends up doing a good amount of damage to the hangar wall but doesn’t pierce through it. On the third loop once the target becomes available they all open fire but Razzo realizes that the length of the energy cable may not allow for another loop and in noticing Razzo changes the direction of the ship to the weakened hangar wall. As the Valentina’s Voyage continues to open fire it quickly slams into the wall and finally breaks through it crashing onto the hangar floor. The ship slides along the hangar floor ending up in the middle of it and finally releasing the energy cable. Once the ship settles Ostikous and Dengrad come rushing through the doorway.
“Is everyone alright?!” - Razzo asks in a panicked tone.
“I was just about to ask you two the same question! What happened?” - Dengrad asks with a puzzled expression
“I didn’t think we were going to make it around the ship another time so I crashed through the wall of the weakened point” - Razzo explains.
“What do we do now?” - asks Ostikous.
“Lets power down the ship and check in on the rest of the crew I don’t think they’re going to be particularly happy with where we ended up…” - says Razzo
Ostikous and Dengrad turn around and quickly head through the doorway connecting the main cabin to the pilots cabin. Razzo and Dre unstrap themselves and get ready to go through the pathway and Razzo places a hand on the robot's shoulder.
“Hey Dre are we cool?”
“Yeah now let's get these guys for what they did to both of our homes!” - says Dre with a smile.
The renewed camaraderie gives Razzo a boost of confidence as he walks through the pathway into the main cabin of the ship. The looks around the room are mainly exhausted or nervous from the long journey along with what’s going to be asked from them next. Kreeg continues to lay almost lifeless with several Zenvas around her, Chorion appears to be half asleep against the walls with the two Wokwoks by his side.
“Are you trying to get all of us killed?!? You might be strapped in at the front but we’re going flying all the time!!” - rips into the captain the plant-like creature.
Razzo shakes his head: “What are you talking about? I was saving all of our asses out there while piloting this thing! Don’t think you would’ve done much better with your zero years of flight experience!”
Jata points at all the different creatures with her limbs: “Yes but look around you look at the state of all of them!”
Razzo doesn’t skip a beat: “And they’re gonna get much worse unless we act now. Speaking of which we need some of you to protect the ship so can we get a raise of hands as to who wants to do that?”
The room is silent and still hoping to not get picked on the same way a class is silent when no one wants to answer a question that the teacher is asking. Razzo scans the room trying to identify who’s the best fit to protect the ship and comes to the conclusion that all of them are not fit to protect the ship, but maybe all of them together can cover for one another.
Razzo begins: “Okay so here’s the deal we’re currently inside a Minerau ship - ”
“A frigate class ship to be specific” - interrupts Dre.
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“Sure whatever a frigate class Minerau ship and this ship is occupying the airspace above my home. Now you don’t have to help me destroy it but if you want to keep yourselves alive and have a ride out of here just in case I would recommend protecting the ship. I would’ve asked one of you to do it but since I didn’t get any volunteers you’re all doing it” - says Razzo.
The news doesn’t go over particularly well with all the creatures but they don’t really have a choice so they sulk as they go to the exits.
“Do we need any breathing devices for your planet?” - asks Chorion as he gets up and begins walking to the doorway.
“Umm no the air is pretty standard here” - says Razzo unconfidently.
The main cabin doorway opens up and all the creatures begin to pile out of the ship leaving Razzo with Dre, Ostikous, Dengrad, and Yrko in the main cabin.
“Yrko you’re not going to defend the ship?” - Razzo asks.
Yrko looks at him like an idiot: “And with what weapon would you like me to defend the ship with?”
“Okay yeah no that’s a good point I guess you should just stay here!” - says Razzo slightly embarrassed.
Yrko goes back to sitting on the floor leaning against the cabin wall as Razzo turns his attention to Dre, Ostikous and Dengrad.
“You need to keep the ship running and be ready to fly out of here if things go badly” - tells Razzo.
Dre shakes its head: “Negative, we didn’t come all this way just to bail on you, plus the hunters that are going to be released might cause us some problems…”
“Okay then you three go around disabling the hunters in this hangar and if you have time the ones in the other hangars” - says Razzo pivoting into a new plan.
“What are you going to do, captain?” - asks Ostikous.
“I’m going to go to the bridge and crash this ship if it’s the last thing I do” - says Razzo unphased.
Dengrad, Ostikous, and Dre look at the captain with a worrisome expression unsure of whether to wish the captain good luck or convince him to come up with a new plan. They stand there awkwardly looking at each other trying to read each other's thoughts. Razzo picks up on their hesitation to say anything to him and beats them to the punch.
“Don’t try to convince me otherwise it’s the best way to make sure we take down this ship”
The three crew mates nod their heads and wish the captain luck as the four of them exit the ship together. The rest of the crew had already begun its defense defending the ship against several oncoming Minerau soldiers. Just as they’re about to split up on their tasks Razzo turns back.
“REMEMBER TO KEEP THE SHIP RUNNING AND GET OUT OF HERE!” - he yells.
Sirens are heard blaring throughout the hangar as Razzo turns towards the rest of the hangar; he sees the intricate designs of Minerau's technological advancement. The loud sirens become deafening until they go mute and Razzo instead of panicking is able to take in all of the hangar's incredible technology. The hangar bay of the frigate-class spaceship was built in mind to accommodate various smaller ships beyond just standard shuttles. The hangar bay is equipped with a variety of docking stations, each designed to secure different types and sizes of spacecraft, with this bay primarily holding hunter ships. Some of these spaceships are clearly Minerau built but others looked to be sourced from elsewhere as their shape differentiated extremely and looked to be built for speed and elusiveness in space combat instead of the Minerau’s standard bulky protective build. Typically hangars have specialized storage zones that would separate it to hold different types of ships such as reconnaissance drones, interceptors, cargo ships, escape pods, and hunters. The difference between interceptors and hunters being that interceptors were meant to be bigger than hunters typically four to five times bigger and operated with a crew similar to the Valentina’s Voyage but hunters were solo piloted ships. Beyond the ship's walls were lined with versatile tools and equipment capable of servicing a wide range of spacecraft systems. Most of the landing and take off controls were operated from the bridge of the ship and right at this moment they were ordering more and more soldiers to pool into the hangar from various other bays. The design prioritized flexibility, efficiency, and functionality to support the varied requirements of the mission at hand, with this current mission being nothing short of complete conquest. As Razzo snaps out of his daze he notices a couple Minerau soldiers coming through the hallways. Razzo quickly draws energy and catches the first spear from Minerau soldier in front of him and redirects it at another Minerau soldier to the left of him while simultaneously striking through the chest of the one in front of him. Razzo moves on to the next one and then the one after that. The soldiers start circling him and try jabbing at with their spears trying to nick him or get under the armor to strike a blow. Even with their numbers growing Razzo stood on his business and didn’t budge. Unfortunately he also didn’t gain much ground and out of the corner of his eye he noticed an emergency lockdown lever. At this moment an idea came to mind and as he danced around evading spears and dealing blows he started to pull energy once again into a rope. As he pulled more and more he began to spin to create some distance between himself and his opposition. Once he felt as though the rope was long enough he flung it towards a hunter up above and the rope tightened around the wing of the hunter. Before the Minerau soldiers could react Razzo was swinging through the air on the rope to get to the spot but on his descent he tumbled down on the ground falling slightly short of the lever. After the brief daze the Minerau quickly began to converge on his location. Razzo fought to get back up to his feet and as the enemy closed the gap Razzo was able to slam down the lever. The doorway from which they were coming from quickly closed, cutting off the supply of reinforcements. Suddenly there were about twenty Minerau soldiers inside the hangar but still too many for Razzo. Razzo dodges one strike, then spins around another Minerau while shielding himself from a second strike. It’s not long before Razzo sees a brief opening appear before him and runs through it. From afar he looks like a man on fire as he sprints to the next entrance into the hangar. There are currently no Minerau coming through it and Razzo decides to go this way. The twenty or so Minerau continue after him but this time Razzo decides to pull the lever as he’s going through the doorway. He pull a massive amount of energy and turns it into a rope and as he’s meters away from the doorway he flings the rope at the lever. This time the rope grabs a hold of the lever but when the human yanks downwards on it he breaks the lever and jumps through the closing doorway. ‘That was a close one’ Razzo thinks to himself as he finds himself on the other side of the doorway. Razzo collects himself and begins moving down the hallway paying attention to any sounds of shuffling feet or muffled discussions. There aren’t many places for him to hide as he continues moving towards the bridge of the ship. He soon finds himself near the engineering section of the ship. Here he finds a complex network of machinery, conduits, and control panels, housing the ship's engines, power generators, and other essential systems. The Minerau engineers are tirelessly working along with the mechanics trying to make sure the ship continues to run seamlessly. They rarely raise their heads above their work stations oblivious to the commotion present outside their section. The only thing letting them know that there’s any potential threat from outside is their screens that are running the diagnostic reports and informing them of damages to external walls. Razzo bypasses this section quickly and heads up towards the bridge of the ship. This section is once again more of the same emptiness with the occasional guard making their way through the corridors and doing their rounds. Razzo’s able to avoid them by hiding in small corridors that connect to crew quarters for engineer and bridge crew members. Once the guards pass Razzo’s location, he pops back out and covers a bit more ground. This continues to happen and before long Razzo finds himself in front of the doors to the bridge. He notices a Minerau guard coming and hides one last time. As he peaks out the guard notices and charges at him. The guard wields an energy shield and has a stone sharded blade that's sheathed. The guard quickly unsheathes the blade to show a greenish purple glowing blade. Razzo creates an energy rope himself and as the guard slashes at him he tries to parry the attack, but it doesn't work as the blade slashes through effortlessly barely missing Razzo’s face. As the guard tries to land a blow the second time Razzo dodges the strike and grabs the hand with the blade. He loads up a fist full of energy and slams it down on the guard causing the hand to shatter and the guard letting out a howl of pain. Razzo picks up the new blade and approaches the guard. He tries to land a strike with the blade but the guard blocks it with his shield. As this happens the guard tries to kick Razzo but he reacts in time to protect himself with the loaded up fist of energy. The guard's bottom half of the leg falls off as he lets out a yell and falls on the ground. Razzo approaches the bridge doors and they open revealing him holding a fist of energy in one hand and the glowing blade in the other.
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