Page 151 of Star Claimed Omega
Without hesitation, he banked into a pursuit arc, claws dragging light behind him like comet tails.
A flash bloomed from theClaw.
Missiles, two of them.
Slick, curved, and nasty, with beam-threaded spines and targeting codes screaming for his spectral form.
‘Miral,’ he barked through the neural link, ‘do not fire on theClaw. Soleil’s on board.’
‘Understood,’ came the tight, crisp reply. ‘Engaging long-range support only.’
The torpedoes raced in his direction.
He twisted hard, curving beneath a debris cluster and leading the projectiles toward a nearby asteroid belt.
His breath heaved, muscles straining, every fight instinct on alert, focused only on theClaw’strajectory.
He couldn’t afford to lose it and her, now.
The enemy ship kept pace behind him like a bloodthirsty predator.
‘Come on, mongrel,’ Varnok’s voice crackled over open comms, distorted with static and malice. ‘Show me that famous Signet fire. Or are you only brave when your bitch is on your lap?’
Santi didn’t answer. He grit his teeth and pushed harder, leading the warheads closer to the rock cluster.
Timing it to perfection, he banked around a jagged, rotating asteroid, then shot vertical.
The missiles clipped a series of rock faces before detonating.
The shockwave kicked through the void, an inferno cascading over the asteroid’s surface like oil-fed flame.
Santi burst free, shielded by his spectral bloom, vision searing with light.
Behind him, the enemy vessel let out another round of fire. Plasma beams sliced the black, licking at his heels.
‘Santi, I’m inbound!’ Miral’s voice pulsed through the comms. ‘TheBrutois clearing the meteoroid field now. Thirty seconds.’
‘I don’t have that time!’ he barked, dodging a barrage that would have melted a lesser shifter in mid-space.
TheClawdipped, swooped, and cut beneath him, Varnok giving chase with sick glee, launching potshots like a cat toying with its prey, each strike a taunt.
From the corner of his eye, Santi spotted theBrutobreak through the debris belt.
The Signet corvette moved like a war-forged god, its black and violet hull gleaming with etched markings, its prow lit by engine fire, twin drive cores rumbling like thunder in the void.
Along its sides, the mounted cannons rotated and tracked but never fired, Miral holding them steady, respecting Santi’s command.
‘Kaal,’ Santi called out, breath ragged, ‘I’m pushing him your way. Box him in. Take out its engines, and stop thatfokkin’ ship, so I can glimmer in and end this with Varnok.’
Also, so that he might face a reckoning with his woman.
‘Copy,’ Kaal replied. ‘I’m ready.’
Santi grinned through the pain.
His spectral form shuddered and surged again, claws bristling with starlight.
Hold on, mi sol, he thought.I’m coming.
