"Red alert," I shouted.

  I recognized the ship that warped into our view. It was a binocular pirate ship, just like the one that attacked the cargo ship Flipper. My last memory of it was one of confusion as I watched @auroraloon float through space toward the opening where the binocular ship sucked in its pirate booty, and hers (hahaha).

  But was it the same ship?

  "Don't fire," I commanded.

  "Why not?" @astrowave questioned. "That's a pirate ship. No mistake about it."

  "It can't be coincidence that it's here." We all turned to look at @biclops, who had said it. "You're all thinking the same thing," she shrugged.

  I just didn't want to blow up a ship that might have @auroraloon on it. Time to say something. "@astrowave, you remember on the starlab, the Burner who escaped with me? @auroraloon?"

  He nodded. "Yes?"

  I hesitated. Just keep it short, I said to myself. "I ran into her again on the cargo ship that the pirates had attacked. She might be a prisoner on that ship." I pointed at the ship out the window.

  "Is she an ally?" he asked. "Because that ship is coming into range in attack position."

  I watched as they flew around us, trying to take a position behind, where they would target our engines.

  Sango growled.

  I looked over at him. His tiny little body was low to the ground with his ears back and his butt twitching. He growled again, our fierce protector. It was adorable.

  I checked the display. When two ships meet in space, the practice is to broadcast one's intentions on a local open signal, a signal that either ship could interpret, but that was contained to the immediate area. One thing you could do is provide an alternative display icon. It seems silly, but it's a quick way to announce yourself. If I marked them with a pirate flag icon, they could override it. They could use an icon to "raise the white flag," so to speak, as well.

  But you can't trust pirates.

  open_channel [Graviton]: "This is the pirate ship, Graviton. Surrender and prepare to be boarded."

  I had a response ready.

  open_channel [The Pharaoh]: "No."

  "Increase power to aft shields," I shouted, and I took control of the ship. I hated the thought of accidentally blowing up @auroraloon, but if we could disable the ship, we could board, and I could rescue her. "Open fire!"

  Pilots are predictable. I've been in so many space battles that I didn't need to engage futurecasting to win a fight. I knew their movements by instinct. The reaction of many pilots, for example, when accosted in space, is to turn left, and more precisely, to turn down and to the left.

  I threw the ship into reverse, charging at them with aft shields and aft weapons. We're not as fast going backwards with the forward thrusters, but that didn't matter. It was a highly unpredictable tactic.

  That meant I was ready to fire before them. They were waiting to catch up and get into range, whereas my goal was to get into firing range faster than they expected.

  @astrowave hammered them with a barrage of missiles and an electromagnetic pulse, and we connected.

  Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more.

  I spun us around and hit the braking thrusters. Graviton was above us and to the left. Our shot had damaged their shields and the cylinder on the right side of the ship. While they took defensive action, I rotated to face them, now attacking from their starboard side.

  @astrowave hit them with another electromagnetic pulse, an attempt to take down systems by overloading them. While I rotated to plasma cannons, picking at the scab I had started on the right cylinder, blasting through the weakening shield.

  Graviton needed to get away quickly. The fastest maneuver would be to speed past us. Then they would try to protect their right side, so they would likely come around to their left as they flew by.

  But they weren't helpless. We had gotten the jump on Graviton, but it was an impressive ship in its own right.

  The binocular cylinders started to spin as they flew over us. We were lucky we had damaged one of them or we might not have gotten out of there alive. The spin created a sort of gravitational pull, allowing them to use it along with engines and braking thrusters to pull off an impressive move. Imagine you are ice skating and someone charges at you, but then they grab your hands firmly and you start spinning around each other.

  This was what happened to The Pharaoh and Graviton. We started a dance, spinning rapidly around each other, with their cylinders locked. They eased off the pull from one of their cylinders, allowing them to rotate their locked position until they were in the better firing position.

  We could move, but they were locked onto us, so any direction I went, they would stay right with us.

  Graviton didn't mess around. They fired laser cannons at us, four blasts at a time, from the center of their ship to avoid the gravitational pull they were creating.

  The gravitational pull would manipulate weaponry. If we fired missiles, they would be sucked in like the cargo from Flipper. I had no doubt Graviton would have shields or other defenses to suck up incoming missiles and destroy them, while they would continue pounding us with laser cannons.

  "Missiles will be useless," I shouted at @astrowave. "Target that right side. Hold on, everyone."

  I opted to lean into the gravitational force, to try to use it to our advantage. Graviton could pull us, but they couldn't push us unless they spun the cylinders the other direction, and that reversal would take time.

  The Pharaoh shook as I fired our thrusters to send us toward Graviton, absorbing their blasts. I had to hope we could close the distance before they broke through our shields.

  "I'm going to ram them!" I yelled.

  @biclops, true to her profession, saw that we were all as safe as we could be, except for our darling little kitten. As we flew toward Graviton, taking fire from their cannons, she sprang into action, flinging herself toward station four, scooping up a puffy Sango before he could run away and hide.

  He clung to her. Instead of returning to her station, @biclops took over station four, securing herself in place, holding Sango close. She kept one eye on Sango and trained the other on me.

  I nodded gratefully at her and braced myself.

  Graviton saw it coming. They tried to spin to expose their left side, but they were too slow.

  We collided on our terms, but it was a jolt to the ship that definitely meant I needed to find a new pot for Stuart. We crippled Graviton's right cylinder, ripping the end off and sending both ships spinning away from each other.

  Our damage was insignificant by Wavepilot standards. The shields couldn't fully protect us. Thrusters on our starboard side were destroyed, along with one of our missile launchers. The metal was bent and crushed, sending electrical sparks zapping out in wild arcs. @astrowave shut down power to our starboard systems, rerouting internal power. Most importantly, our primary engines were still intact.

  We couldn't let our guard down. Despite the damaged thrusters, I was able to correct for the spin, fire our engines, and pursue Graviton before they could gain control.

  "Target the engines," I commanded.

  @astrowave's timing was spot on, sending an electromagnetic burst to the engines on the right side, where Graviton's metallic hull had broken open. As the pirate ship spun, it came further apart, the side peeling open before our eyes.

  @astrowave's shot had taken out the engines, leaving Graviton floating helplessly in space, surrounded by the remains of its right cylindrical shaft.

  We had a choice now. Board the ship, blow up the ship, or abandon it and fly off to the next location in pursuit of Valentine and @bitchfrog.

  "@zerogstar, how much time do we have? Can we risk boarding that ship?"

  Before @zerogstar could reply, the white flag icon displayed over Graviton's position on the starmap. They had surrendered.

  I looked at @zerogstar.

  "A few hours," she said. "We're just relying on residual radiation. If we were close on their tail, we'd have a stronger read on gamma rays."

  As fascinating as I'm sure that was, my brain heard two hours, blah blah scientific stuff, more scientific stuff.

  open_channel [The Pharaoh]: "Graviton, this is The Pharaoh. Prepare to be boarded."