When fighting a ship with superior firepower, a captain's best option was to flee. When fighting a ship with superior firepower and speed, a captain's best hope was merely to survive the encounter. Rukh considered his options as his crew did their best to match the decoys' behavior, spinning and then boosting, appearing random while strategically heading toward the edge of the asteroid field. They'd wound up near but slightly behind one of the decoy drones, and Rukh took a moment to admire the illusion that made the flying hologram projector mounted on an enormous engine look rather convincing. He knew he should be thankful that they had managed to trade for such advanced technology, and yet he found himself wishing they had acquired a shield generator and some of the Nebula's fancy weapons instead of these toys.
Sadly however, this game that they were playing was a deadly mix of hide 'n' seek combined with rotary roulette, where only one tube out of six contained the torpedo that could sink them. Or in this case, only one out of the six targets was correct! The Illusive Hand was the ship marked as Target 4 on Ana's display, and the entire crew gritted teeth and groaned with dismay as the pursuing frigate chose them and one of the decoys to attack. Rukh's face was an unreadable mask of intense concentration as he watched the display, the launchers and turrets powering up and preparing to unleash their attack. Not all was lost, but at this point their chances of survival had become perilously slim. There was only one chance remaining.
"
Prepare for the Illusive Shuffle!" he declared, tapping at the buttons on his chair's armrest and calling up a holographic work station in front of him.
Sergio was relieved to see their captain finally start to take things more seriously. He knew that Rukh's apparent indifference was merely a coping mechanism to allow him to deal with the unrelenting brutality of humanity's current condition in general, and their frequently punishing circumstances in specific. As the frigate chasing them unleashed a barrage of missiles and... particle beams?! The surprisingly advanced weaponry of their attacker threw the freighter forward, forcing the first mate to grab onto a crew member's chair as several bridge officers were thrown into their consoles, one unlucky bastard sent to the ground from the impact. But Sergio stayed on point and barked his commands. "
Engines full stop! Cloaking field activate! Captain?"
The imploring gaze from his second in command didn't faze Captain Rukh, who was too busy crafting the perfect display of holographic artistry. To Ana's sensors, the freighter marked 4 took direct hits- and its engines sputtered to a stop, leaving the target drifting. But it didn't continue to be 'the target' much longer, instead the appearance of the freighter shimmered and fizzled, filling with static and becoming more granular and blocky as it lost texture resolution. Finally, most of the space it had previously occupied suddenly became empty, stars visible through the place where gray metal had been. The only thing that remained was a drifting bundle of engines attached to a small control module, a large drone of some sort, it seemed, no longer active now that it had been found out.
A similar thing happened to the freighter designated Traget 3, though the heavier fire tore its engine bindings apart, sending one rocket twisting away from the others while the remaining three spiraled for a second, before their thrust died as well. The image of the transport ship spazzed out and then collapsed, leaving another drone dead in space, while four more versions of her prey adjusted their course to try and escape the shark in their midst, and given how close they were to the asteroid field, Ana had time to perhaps catch up to one more if she so chose.
On board the bridge of the Illusive Hand, everyone sat in darkness, in utter silence- their ship eerily quiet. Sergio was busy urging repair teams back to engineering to try and patch coolant leaks and salvage one of the two engines that were down, but Rukh was too focused on playing his next move. He'd shuffled the shells and his opponent had seen through the noise- now it was time to convince her she hadn't.
Using the remote control for the drones, Rukh selected one of the many pre-recorded messages he'd loaded on to each of their computers, each custom-designed to a certain outcome so that they could be played and seem legitimate. This was part of the reason that he always wore the same outfit- in addition to the fact that it was a cool outfit. Ana would soon receive a transmission, from each of the four freighters, played in parallel. It seemed as if the captain had somehow managed to backward engineer the quantum entanglement systems that the Nebula ships used to communicate instantaneously, allowing him to be in four places at once without giving away his real location.
The message portrayed a disapproving yet amused Captain Rukh, shaking his head while smiling lopsidedly. "
Tsk tsk. You got greedy and lost. The great tactician never puts all of his eggs in one basket. Now you have but a one in four chance to catch me, and I like those odds!"
The answer to Makoto's hails came surprisingly quick, though the verbal response was less than forthcoming. The 3D display that transmitted from the surface was from older equipment, lacking color and appearing grainier than might be expected from new models. What's more, the hologram had a tendency to lag and skip forward, struggling to match with the audio. The array they'd had before had been of much higher quality, but this what they were left with.
Before Makoto's eyes appeared the same
Magistrate who had come to them before, after the destruction of the Hypercom array. He seemed a bit less fired up this time, more subdued, though very guarded as his eyes squinted, his natural left one and his cybernetic right one narrowing with suspicion. "
What is it? What do you want?" No pleasantries, no titles this time. Just the voice of a tired man who appeared to want nothing more than to be left alone.[/hr]
