Shades of Justice: Chapter 9

Warren separated off from the other Shades after breakfast and caught the bus over to the mall. He hadn’t been to QQ PewPew in over a year but now he had no other options. By the end of his rookie year playing Movers and Shakers as a pro he had purchased the laptop that he had lost in the crash. The arcade was as dark as he remembered it. It had moved locations within the mall recently and hadn’t yet accumulated the baked in nerd stink. He checked the M.A.S. twitter feed for updates and saw that they were still on schedule. He found Arthur behind the counter, like always. He owned QQ PewPew and had yet to miss a day in the nearly twenty years it had existed. Arthur looked up from his classic gray Gameboy. When he saw warren he smiled ear to ear.

“Well if it isn’t Uneven Bubbler! How you doing Warren?” Arthur asked, putting his Gameboy down and coming to the front side of the counter. Warren wasn’t used to hearing his gamer tag in person and looked around the room, no one noticed. “So how’s the game?” Arthur asked.

Warren shrank a little. “It’s why I’m here actually. I have a tournament in less than half an hour and I need a place to play.” He asked.

Arthur nodded and made his way to the back of the store. “Of course. Let me set you up in the back” 

Warren followed him to an open computer in the back corner. He pulled out his wallet and Arthur held up his hand to deny. ”Your money is no good here my friend.” He smiled again heading back to the front counter and his Gameboy.

Warren was logged in and ready to play. He had just lost his noise canceling headphones along with his laptop, but the café wasn’t crowded and Arthur had turned the music down. His clock showed one minute to the start of his first game, his opponent and the commentators Id’s appeared in the chat window.

“I want to play a game” a kid asked coming into the store.

“Well we’ve plenty of those kid. What are you interested it?” Arthur asked.

Warren’s game was about to start but he couldn’t help looking up at the front where Arthur was talking to the new kid. What he saw made his blood run cold. It wasn’t a kid at all. It was Hexa Decimal. He didn’t know why Arthur couldn’t see him but he knew his friend was in danger. He ducked his head down low and slid his glasses on. “Step into shade” he whispered to himself. He felt the suit materialize around him and watched as the helmets heads up display lit up in his visor.

Arthur was leading Hexa Decimal around the shop showing him the reclining chairs and giant screen TV’s playing ads for the games that were available.

“Arthur get away from that thing!” Warren’s disguised voice surprised him a little. “Go! Now!” he yelled.

Arthur looked at Hexa Decimal, the illusion shattered and Arthur panicked, ran and dove behind the safety of his counter.

Decimal turned to face off against the Evergreen Shade. “Well if it isn’t a Shade of Justice! Why so blue Evergreen?” Hexa Decimal launched himself at Evergreen and they traded blow after blow in the cramped quarters of the store. Evergreen used the layout of the shop and to maneuver their fight away from Arthur was still hiding behind the counter. Hexa Decimal realized this and made a dash for the counter. He was stopped and dragged to the ground by Evergreen’s vine whips wrapping around his ankles. Hexa’s screen face disappeared and was replaced with a cartoon hypnotic swirl. He turned to face Evergreen. “I can help you, you know.” The hypnotic swirl spun faster as Evergreen sank under Hexa’s control. The vine whips loosened and Hexa Stood up. “I can share your pain with the entire world!” Hexa shouted as Evergreen just wavered back and forth under Hexa’s spell.

Hexa drew a large orange glowing sigil in the air. He scribbled zeros, ones and ancient ruins around the outside of it. When he had completed the spell the sigil increased in brightness until Evergreen was forced to look away from it. He heard the sound of shattering glass and everything went dark.

Warren awoke to Arthur shaking him. The lights in the shop were out. He sat up and Arthur looked out at the rest of the mall. “Whatever that thing was, it knocked out the power and maybe more. I’ve got some flashlights under the counter.” He said feeling his way back to the front counter.

Warren pulled his phone out of his pocket and tried to activate it, but it too had died. “Arthur, I'm sorry man but I gotta go.” He said grabbing his back pack, stumbling over his chair and then feeling his way out of the nearly pitch black hallway.

Arthur stood back from under the counter with the flashlights. “Warren!” Warren stopped at the entrance of the store and turned around. Arthur tossed him a flashlight. “You’ll need this.” Arthur said and tossed him one of the flashlights.

Warren turned it on and took a look down the main mall walkway. “Thanks Arthur, for everything.” 

He made his way out into the hall.

Blood and Profit: Chapter 35

With the arrival of the Baceten, and the ring system shut down, the Pacific Free Zone controlled the shipyard and the launch facilities. Toll watched as the teams in the landing bay secured the cable cargo launcher and engine on the deck. The system was designed to transport cargo or passengers between ships that were unable to dock together. The launcher fired the second half of the cargo cable system at the closest command and control ship. The second command and control ship sidled up to the far side of the first ship and successfully docked.

The second half of the cargo cable system, attached magnetically to the command and control ship. Not three feet away from the cable mount, there was an airlock door. It slid open and twelve crew members in space suits floated over to the cargo cable mouth, floated down the cable to an latch for their secure transport harness hooks and clipped themselves on. With all twelve of them hooked in the primary part of the cargo cable system back on the landing bay dock fired up its engine and cycled the cable bringing its passengers into the docking bay.

Toll drifted next to Sharea’s ship. Toll had been watching the transport process. He looked over and realized that Sharea was staring blankly at her console. “I know it’s gonna be impossible to take this advice.” He started. “But try not to beat yourself up too much. The fact that any of us survived is a miracle.”

“I – I made a bad turn.” She didn’t look up from her console. “Right into an advancing strike team.” She was talking to herself more than Toll. “Preach, He –“

“Peach did what he felt he needed to do.” Toll interrupted. She looked at him from across the gap, and nodded unsteady.

A system wide open channel appeared in Toll’s communications list. “For immediate release.” Conner's voice came across the channel loud and clear. “The Pacific Free Zone and the Baceten are now a United Corporation. All existing contract obligations will be kept. The actions taken today in Mars orbit are claimed by this corporation.” The message ended and the signal went dark.

The last of the crew had finished their trips and the far side fo the cargo cable was detached from the Command and Control ship, pulled back to the landing back and hooked to its primary half.

A smaller Baceten ship approached Toll and Sharea. The ship opened a channel. “Commanders the C&C ships and the Baceten fleet are ready to depart for the PFZ. Commander Toll, you are overdue on the battleship. Commander Sharea, if you would take command of the return fleet, we can get under way.”

Sharea was lost. “I’m not a commander, I’m going with the battleship.” She clarified. Looking in Toll’s direction and seeing him shake his head.

“Sorry kid, Preach made it known that if he didn’t survive this fight. You would be promoted and assume his rank within the Baceten wing of the Co-op. That means you get to stay here, and help keep the peace along with Ophelia, Arthur, and Third. Plus you have an entirely new air force to train.”

Sharea was shell shocked. “Toll I –“

Toll shook his head, “Don’t worry about it. I out rank you no matter what the co-op says and part of your promotion to my second was that I reserved the right to run for both of us.” He smiled. “Stay here and be the legendary hero for both of us.” He moved for the landing bay.

“Toll” Sharea stopped him. He flipped around to gain line of sight on her. “It doesn’t count as running  away if you're following the people you need to protect.” She stated. Toll nodded and spun his ship back around and landed on the crowded deck.

A few minutes later the battleship closed the landing bay and weapon hatches. Then two compartments on either side of the battle ship opened. They were spherical like slip gates but there was a funnel that led into the first gate and a funnel on both sides. The funnel lit up a line of lights that went from the center of the funnel out to the edge. The line of lights began to spin, rotating faster with each cycle. For three seconds the battleship picked up speed until, with a small flash of light it was gone.

Sharea and the rest of the return fleet built up to maximum speeds and prepared for the long journey back to Earth.

Far across the stars, back in orbit around Rusty and Toll’s home planet. A massive caravan of human and alien ships had amassed at the slip steam gate.

The planet behind them was being slowly enveloped by something that was not a shadow but also not a physical mass.

The lead ship in the caravan was a massive cargo hauler. On the Bridge the crew was standing around uselessly while Mew kicked the ancient Ring command system. The captain sat forward in his chair and turned to look at Mew.

“What’s taking so long?” He demanded.

Mew kicked the computer a final time. “It was there! It was revving up but then the entire system went down, it’s like, someone pulled the plug.”

The captain got out of his chair. “What does that mean Mew?” he asked trying to stay calm.

She sat down hard. “It means we’re stuck here until the Galaticseeds can grow their hybrid Startree and get us out of here.”

The Captain returned to his chair. “Helmsman. Open a wide band channel. Let everyone know. We’ve got a tree do defend. We don’t have to win our planet back, we just have to not lose it for another six months.

The cargo hauler turned away from the ring and headed back for the planet. One by one the caravan turned to follow.

Lidarion: Chapter 4

There are two types of wars. The ones you win and the ones you lose. The longer it takes you to figure out which type you’re fighting the more likely it’s the second, and we fought the machine war a long time.

You’ve never been there, but far to the south of Lidarion there is an impossibly long island chain. It is the ancestral home of the gnomes. Each island in the chain was the territory of the clan that had settled it, and each clan was in their own way industrious and experimental. The gnomes love technology, always have. And their obsession with gadgets and contraptions had led them to generations of technological advancement that turned their chain of islands into a never ending parade of mechanical marvels. Each designed to solve a specific problem, while accidentally creating three new ones, requiring more machines and gadgets to solve the new problems which created three more and so on and so on. Looking back on it, we were our own best friends and our own worst enemies. At least, until we discovered the outside world.

Gnomes have photographic memory. And they have no schools or universities. All their knowledge is passed down from master to apprentice and from one familial generation to the next. For all the technical knowledge the gnomes had amassed, nearly none of it was written down, the very nature and workings of their society were a part of their living memory.

Orcs and Humans discovered gnomes roughly around the same time. The gnomes were happy to make agreements with both races and for the first time gnomish technology left the islands. It was not long before the brilliance and ingenuity of the gnomes was turned to ruin and damnation in the hands of the orcs and humans.

With their newly acquired tools long silent borders were awoken with bloody conflict. These skirmishes grew until they exploded into a full-fledged war. Not long after war had broken out, representatives of both races returned to the gnomes to request the creation and delivery of grandiose war machines. The gnomes having seen the plans the other races brought for them, they refused to take part, and at first these denials were accepted.

The lies both sides fed to the Gnomes may have been simplistic but they need not be complicated to fool a race of people who by nature assumed everyone was telling the truth. Lies are the enemy of knowledge, so there was no use for deception in gnomish society. By the end of that first year the gnomes were building death machines piecemeal and shipping them back to their respective owners to be assembled and used on the field of battle.

It wasn’t long before both sides realized the gnomes were an advantage they could not allow their enemies to possess and so Orc’s and humans brought their war to my homeland. They burned my paradise to the ground.

Now, there are no more masters, all the apprentices are gone, very few working machines left to remember them by. We had to abandon the islands we had always known as home, islands we had never thought to count, until after there was nothing left to count.

With the factories destroyed, there were no new machines. The war simmered back down to border skirmishes, the fires of conquest were dying out. The machine war did not end with a cease fire, or proclamation of peace. The machine ended because killing with your bare hands was no longer the coolest way to die.

It was these final desperate battles before boredom set in that Trent’s life would change forever.

The XP: Chapter 4

The door to the trinket and magic shop opened the bell inside ringing as they exited out into the busy street. Bob was actively retelling a story about her favorite player character. “So the Matriarch accepted their challenge and all hell broke loose. No one on her team was allowed to interfere.”

Stygian was wide enough to part the crowds as the group walked in his wake. “And that’s how she earned the ‘Arbiter’ title?” He asked without turning around. “Damn she’s gotten way better.” He muttered.

Yermum was being shoved along by Blackout who was in the back of the group. “What’s the significance of the title?” he asked.

“Twenty five player kill streak.” Blackout answered. Yermum’s eyes got big. “DAMN!” He whistled..

Bob laughed. “The woman is death on wheels!” She shouted to the sky.

The gang turned a corner on to a much less busy side street and stopped in front of an unassuming building. The sign above the door says nothing more than ‘Names’.

Blackout gave Yermum a little shove. “In there.” He stated.

Yermum looked at the sign. “Why?” he asked.

Bob shrugged her shoulders. “You’re changing your name.”

Yermum shoulders dropped. “any particular reason?” He asked in desperation.

Stygian nodded. “Because ‘Your Mom’ is a joke name. You are not a joke. Pick a name you want people to actually say legitimately.”

Yermum looked at Bob. “You legitimately want people to call you ‘Bob’. He joked.

“Change your freaking name!” She exploded.

Yermum threw up his hands in defeat. “All right, all right I’m going already.” He whined as he went inside. A few minutes later he came out with ‘Rokzors’ having replaced ‘Yermum’. Bob snapped her fingers and pointed back at the name building. He turned around and went back inside. Emerging with ‘LayDkella’ Stygian stomped his foot and glared at Yermum who backed himself into the name building with a quick little shuffle. He finally came back with the word ‘Trart’ above his head.

Blackout glared at him. “I’m not finding anything in Urban Dictionary, what’s it mean?” He asked.

Trart shrugged his shoulders “Nothing. Just sounded cool and wasn’t taken by anyone else yet.

Blackout smiled. “Fine by me.” He approved.

Bob got nose to nose with Trart. “If I find out that this is some foreign word for something nasty I will hack your account so hard it will retard your children.”

Trart thought is over for a second. “We talking learning disorder or full on helmet?” He asked while dashing free of Bob’s grip as Stygian held her from chasing Trart. “Kidding! Not funny! My bad!” He bowed several times and Bob relaxed. Trart realized that his three new friends were looking him over from head to toe. “What?” he asked.

Blackout gripped his chin, considering his options. “Well you fixed your name. but now we gotta get this –“ He gestured to the entirety of Trart’s avatar. “Taken care of.”

Trart looked down at his mismatched, off color clothes. “What? What’s wrong with my gear?” He asked, completely clueless.

Stygian pointed to Trart’s feet. “For starters you are wearing two different shoes.”

Bob shook her head. “I didn’t even know that was possible.” She sighed.

Blackout nodded. “There are a few worthless gray items that are single shoes, noobs are supposed to sell them for early cash, not wear them.” Blackout glared at Trart.

Trart shrugged his shoulders. “I needed shoes, I got shoes! What does it matter what they look like?” He asked legitimately confused.

Bob. “Boys, let’s go shopping.” She turned toward the clothing and armor district.

Stygian clapped his armored hands. “I love this part!”

University of Console Heroics: Chapter 4

The Jarvis Hall of 2D studies was an unassuming brick building. Most students never stepped foot in it unless their one history requirement was scheduled in one of its lecture halls. Sanders had already taken the required history class as a freshman but had willingly signed up for History of The Second Dimension. Taught by Professor Bannister, who had been lecturing at the university for longer than Sanders had been alive. Sanders found the lecture hall and took a seat as near to the front as he could find. He set his bag down and pulled a fresh notebook and a pencil before kicking his bag under his chair with the heel of his shoe. The rest of the students were chatting to fill the time before the class started and two hundred students having personal conversations caused the auditorium to be quite loud. But not loud enough to drown out the echoing crash of Professor Banister violent shoving the door open. The entire room went dead silent as He made his way down to the front of the auditorium. The door closed even louder in the now silent auditorium.

“Who is here because they heard that Takahashi is a brutal and unforgiving professor?” He asked setting his shoulder bag on the lectern. He looked at the frozen silent room of students. “Come on now, hands up.” Slowly two thirds of the class raised their hands. Banister turned to the white board and started scribbling on it with a blue dry erase marker. “Everyone with their hand up please write a one page essay, due next class period. Your topic is ‘why the history of the second dimension is important to my chosen major’” he finished the title of the paper on the board and turned to face the hall again. They were still frozen. “Come on, I should be seeing way more of you take notes on this.” He motioned for the class to write the title of the essay down. The room filled with the noise of over a hundred pencils being put to paper with something less than enthusiasm. “For those of you who didn’t raise your hands, I expect a one page paper on why you did or did not research this class.” Sanders stopped writing the title of the first essay in his note book and watched Banister for a moment. Banister turned back to the board and uncapped his blue marker again. “Those of you hoping the book would be option will want to go to the book store after class and pick it up.” He scribbled ‘History of the Second Dimension” on the white board. Capped his marker and began to pace slowly. “It’s not expensive, it’s a rather fascinating topic, and as I do nothing more in this class than answer your questions and elaborate on the topics you choose, you’re going to need it.” A girl in the front row raised her hand. Banister looked down at her. “Did you just figure out the cure for cancer?” He asked. She meekly shook her head in the negative. “Then put your hand down please I’ll answer questions in a moment.” The girl lowered her hand quickly. “Your grade in this class is based on the five papers you will write this semester. As long as you write about something that interests you and you write a complete paper, I will not impose a minimum page length. “The class cheered. And he silenced them almost instantly “Please do not make me impose a page length. I assume we are all adults, do not prove otherwise or this class will become unpleasant for all of us.” He stated with finality. Bannister stopped pacing and faced the class. Pointing to the girl. “Your question?” He asked.

She looked at her friends to her right and left and then found the courage to speak. “Professor, is it true that you were the original Mario?” She asked.

Bannister froze for a second, possibly attempting to keep his cool but his cheeks began to redden. He reached for his shoulder bag on the lectern. He throws it over his shoulder and then turns back to the girl. Clearing his throat as if he had just swallowed something awful. “No, I was not the original Mario. Your introductory papers are now two pages long. I suggest you stop putting so much faith in rumors. Facts will serve you far better in life.” He stated with finality as he stormed out of the auditorium. Stopping at the door long enough to shove the door open “Class dismissed” His voice echoed down the hall. 

Sanders clicked his pencil top in and forced the lead back into the body with his thumb, closed his notebook and reached under his chair for his bag.“It’s gonna being an interesting semester” He said to himself as he deposited his notebook into his bag. 

Shades of Justice: Chapter 8

 The pool, the gym, the football field, the library, the computer lab, the auditorium and the student parking lot. All totally destroyed. The kids breathed a sigh of relief when they were teleported back to the ground, and Raptarus’ body disappeared. They all went their separate directions as they heard sirens coming from every direction.

By the next morning the local news had announced that school was canceled for the next week at least. The emergency crews had worked all night and found no bodies. There was no mention of the spaceship or any possible evidence of the aliens that may have been left behind. By the afternoon the Feds had arrived and taken over the entire campus. They pushed back the local and national news to the apartment buildings across the street from the school. By night fall there were chain link fences around the perimeter of the school campus and the way to the end of the football field. Giant work lights had been placed on generators and crews in hazard suits were sifting through the rubble. These developments had sent the news crews into a piranha like frenzy, hungry for information. By sun up 

the next day the fences had been electrified and warnings were posted every ten feet.

Even with all the news coverage and army of Feds crawling around the campus Warren found himself standing at the top of a hill on the edge of the small forest on the distant far side of the campus. The electrified fence was only another ten feet beyond the hill, then the half of the football field that had escaped total obliteration, the debris that used to be most of the high school crawling with feds, then the parking lot, the perimeter fence and in the distance the rabid media scrambling for content. He couldn’t see much but stood on the hill anyway and watched the circus with his hands in the pockets of his zip up hoodie.

“What did you lose?” Sonya asked, finishing her ascent of the hill to stand next to Warren.

“My laptop, you?” He asked.

She sighed heavily, a mixture of sadness and anger. “My car.”

“I lost my phone. Somewhere in the library.” Kelly offered sitting on the ground next to Sonya.

“You dumb dumbs know we’re gonna get caught right?” Dante said loudly from forest side of the bottom of the hill.

Gordon emerged from the forest. “Caught saving what we could of the school and the rest of the town, how dare we!” He snarked as he and Dante scrambled up the hill.

“You’ll forgive my fear of the cops.” Dante offered once they had reached the top.

Warren shook his head “At this point I’d be more worried about the feds.” He pointed to the large operation that had taken over the school.

Dante sat down hard. “Doesn’t matter how you slice it, it’s all pig to me.” He quipped making the others laugh.

Gordon kicked a small rock down the kill toward the electric fence. “How about we worry about this crap when there’s something to worry about?” He offered.

Sonya nodded. “I’m with Gordon, and thanks to Dante I’m ready for breakfast, anyone else wanna come?” she asked.

Gordon pulled a set of keys of out of his Letterman jacket pocket. “I borrowed my dad’s SUV, lets go.” He said making his way down the hill toward the tree line.

In a moment Warren was the only one left on top of the hill he took one last look at the operation on the high school campus. He kicked a rock toward the fence in frustration. “I needed that laptop.” He grumbled and then followed the others down the hill.

On his cloaked command ship in orbit around Earth, the shard of possibility in Raptarus’ eye socket had allowed him to hear the shades discussion and Warren lamenting his lost laptop. Raptarus paced back and forth as he considered his next move. The shard of possibility filled his mind with ideas. 

“Techology is an incredible tool, almost magical in its power over the daily lives of these pathetic humans! Perhaps It might be possible for me to help the poor Evergreen Shade with his technology conundrum!”

Raptarus held his right hand over his left eye where the shard of possibility was when he move his right hand a beam of pure empty blackness shot from his eye socket and hit the floor. When the empty blackness dissolved it revealed what looked like a giant super computer with bundles of cat5 wires that made up its arms and legs. There were buttons and interface panels that were lit up in magical like symbols and runes and the giant computer monster’s face was a horrible rendition of a flat screen monitor that projected a sixteen bit eyes and mouth.

Raptarus clenched his fist as he looked at the monstrosity before him. “Hexa Decimal! Go to earth. Terminate the Shades of justice and bring me their heads!”

Hexa Decimal’s flat screen face disappeared to show a command line prompt that echoed Raptarus’ demand. “Terminate program initiated!” The face returned as it laughed. “Getting rid of the shades will be easier than defragging my hard drive!” He bragged.

Raptarus’ punched a command into the nearest console interface. “Then go, and do not fail me!” He said, teleporting Hexa Decimal to Earth.

Blood and Profit: Chapter 34

Things outside the battleship had gone about as poorly as expected. Toll’s team was outnumbered five to one but they were using any and every trick they could think of to survive. They played dead to surprise enemies, they used the battleship’s immense size to hide and lay ambushes and boobie traps. They flew the kind of dangerous stunts that only rookie pilots who didn’t know any better could fly. Things like skimming the edge of the battleships shields at incredible speeds and letting their pursuers own insecurities make mistakes that ran them into the shields and either bounce them off with dead systems or cause them to explode from the force of the impact. They had lost five of their own but Laborite had spent a full fifteen to taken them down.

Toll wasn’t concerned with killing or disabling the enemy. He started no fights, he just flew coverage, in an attempt to be anywhere and everywhere he needed to be to save the lives of his pilots. The countdown timer on his H.U.D showed him he didn’t have much longer to go, the odds would be shifting in their favor in less than half a minute. He reoriented to line of sight on what was left of four three man squads. They reformed into a deep striking V formation and came around for another pass. Toll noticed that Smart Guy was too far out from the ship and sitting at the wrong angle to see the new threat. Toll didn’t know why he was so far out from the ship but his scanners didn’t showed life signs and no damage. He opened a channel and moved to intercept the attacking V. “Smart Guy, V formation at your five o’clock!” Toll’s first shots winged the fighter at the end of the closest arm of the V. The fighter spun wildly out of the formation with no engines to maneuver with he would be spinning for a while.

Smart Guy flipped quickly and thanks to computer assisted targeting was able to get two shots off before his ship was completed disabled. His two shots were direct hits and stopped the two lead ships of the V dead in the sky, no power, no weapons, and emergency systems only. Which is more than what Smart guy was left with. “Sorry Boss.” He said as the safety systems on his fighter automatically ejected him before the electrical system in the cockpit fried completed in a brilliant light show.

“Nothing to be sorry for Smart Guy, just get to the landing bay.” Toll instructed as he easily picked off the last two fighters from the V. As the jets on Smart Guy’s ejection pod lit up so to did all four transit rings around Mars. Three Baceten ships emerged from each ring one after the other. As they hit cruising speeds they launched their own fighters, some headed for the contested battleship but most headed to grief the Laborite battle cruisers. Laborite's channels lit up as what was left of their fighters were called back to their ships and the retreat command was given. With the Baceten presence the contested battleship was no longer contested, at least in space. On board was a different story.

Toll opened a channel to Conner “The Laborite are bugging out, you on the bridge yet?” He asked. The not too distant sizzling echo of blaster fire getting louder answered his question pretty clearly.

“Very nearly there, which is to say, no not yet.” Conner snarked as a response.

Toll continued his sweeps around the ship for his crew, perfectly content to let the Baceten settle scores and clean up the rest of the actively retreating mess. “Just tell them their side lost and is currently leaving them behind. They might wanna get some distance between them and the Baceten before its too late.” He commented while chasing off a lone fighter that was on the far side of the ship and most likely had lost his communications and had not seen the arrival of the Baceten. When he came within view of their ships he pushed the fighter to max speed in an attempt to catch up with the retreating Laborite forces. Toll realized there was silence on the channel. “Conner.” He asked suddenly worried.

“I’m here, came his crackling voice. You’re probably not going to believe this but I think they got something along the lines of your message.” He sounded slightly confused.

Toll smiled. “They just surrendered?” He asked.

“That they did.” Conner confirmed. “The ship is ours. Jobs well done all around.” He said.

One of the Mars rings lit up, surprising Toll “Don’t celebrate just yet, this is far from over. It looks like Rusty failed to shut down the ring system.”

Toll opened a channel to Rusty. “We’re about to be a in a world of hurt, what happened to shutting down the ring system?” He almost shouted.

“It’s taking longer for the entire system to shut down than I estimated. I had to manually override the command cancel in the case of active rings.” Rusty shouted back.

Toll typed an order for his surviving fighters to dock in the battleship landing bay. “Are you shutting the system down or not!” Toll started to panic.

“It’s already shutting down, big systems take time Toll!” Rusty yelled back.

And then as if proving Rusty’s point the Ring the Arbitration Guild Hall was emerging from shut off instantly. The massive spherical ship appeared to violently drift apart as the slip stream faded leaving debris scattered across hundreds of thousands of miles of empty space.

“Oh my God.” Toll uttered watching the devastation of the destroyed ship get worse with each passing second.

“Toll what happened?” Rusty asked.

Toll turned his ship to avoid watching any more of the accidental horror. “Nothing man, the system was shut down. Nice work.” He knew he couldn’t hide this from Rusty for long but every moment he didn’t know what he had accidentally done was a moment Toll would give him.