#10 by Carnifex

Carnifex once again dropped out of the Jump Hole between Shikoku and Kyushu on the prowl for blood. He’d been hunting for almost 24 hours now. His cardimine had kept him going but he still felt sleep would be a good idea soon. He hadn’t had trouble finding criminals to kill during the hunt but hadn’t found any worth the trouble of capturing. Checking his scanners he didn’t see any ships nearby but the com lines were lit up like the system had become a battleground. Confused, Carnifex tried to make sense of the chatter but most of the channels were being used by more than one person at a time and no few were in hysterics. Most of the noise seemed to be coming from the direction of Planet Kyushu.
Carnifex looked at the planet out through his cockpit window not expecting to see much from this distance but something was wrong. He slowly realised that the planet was a different shade of blue. At first he didn’t believe it but when he looked for continents he had trouble seeing them, small as they were on Kyushu. An icy feeling of dread crept over him. Planets don’t just change colour. His engine already charging up for cruise he listened to the channels hoping to glean some idea of what was going on from the panicked and stressed voices.

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Planet Kyushu looked like a dying beast being swarmed by carnivorous insects. From what information Carnifex could gather together out of the com channels the Outcasts were poisoning the planet, seeding its atmosphere with something that killed everyone but made them stronger. Apparently word of what was happening was getting around fast and pilots from all over Kusari were converging on the planet in an attempt to save friends and relatives. The Outcasts in orbit were apparently doing their best to stem the flow of raging citizens but in the end were like a sieve to so much sand. Carnifex engaged some nearby Outcasts who were already far outnumbered by the incensed locals. The scrum was intense. The locals were fighting with the fearlessness of desperation and hate. There were even a few who, when their ships were severely damaged, would ram them in spite into Outcast fighters that had their shields down. After working his way through the battle closer to the planet he slipped away into the atmosphere.

Off on the horizon he could just make out visually a black and blue haze that his sensors told him was the burning remains of a city swarming with Outcast fighters picking the bones of the island clean. Steering away from the bruise on the horizon Carni started flying low over the ocean wondering if anyone had made it into boats and escaped the tiny percent of landmass on Kyushu. After a while he came across a heavy equipment transport boat, probably no longer in use at the start of the crisis but now a refuge for those fleeing death. Carnifex set down on the wide, flat deck and opened his cockpit. He was struck by the smell of the air, clean and fresh from the ocean, oily and dirty from the old barge, but giving away nothing of the acrid corpses of land dotting the planet. He was greeted by a tall and proud but tired looking man.
“We need your ship,” said the man sternly with a touch of Bretonian accent about him, “how many people can your hold carry?”
“Ten, twenty if they squ...”
“Good!” interrupted the man as he turned to another nearby refugee, “Alex, get a group out here and load them up.”
“Wait,” said Carnifex, “what happened?”
“The Outcasts started blowing up missiles above the cities, said something about operation Thor’s Hammer and a great day for the Outcasts. I thought there was an attack so I got into my fighter as soon as the first explosions started. Then people started dying in the streets and the buildings... I flew over a school...” he trailed off, his eyes wondering down to the deck as he remembered. Frightened looking people clutching random valuables were already being led toward Carnifex’s fighter.
Putting his hand on the man’s shoulder to draw his attention Carni said, “You say you were in your fighter, do you still have it, we made need the escort to get out of orbit.”
“Yes, but if I go with yo...”
BOOM! A pair of Outcast fighters screamed across just meters above the deck and began to wheel around for a strafing run.
“IF YOU STAY YOU DIE!” yelled Carni over the din and then sped back into his cockpit without waiting for an answer.

Closing his cargo hold doors and pumping his engine Carni made it off the deck moments before weapons fire tore the hulking old ship in two. Spinning around he could see a small Kusari interceptor lifting off the already tilting ship. The Outcasts were using border world multirole fighters with torpedos mounted, much slower in atmosphere but one torpedo anywhere near Carnifex’s fast attack fighter and he’d be a goner. In an atmosphere the explosion would translate through the air much better then it could in a vacuum.
He decided not to wait around for that to happen and made a break for space, the two fighters pursuing him. Weapons fire shot past as he climbed away from the ravaged planet hoping that fighting the planet’s gravity well would prove too much for any torpedoes. Then he saw it peel off to the left out his window as. Carnifex checked his sensors to see that the small interceptor had used its speed to put itself between the Outcasts and Carni and lured them away.
Slowly the blue of the sky faded away and the brilliant flashes of light coming from the battle around Kyushu became visible. Carnifex avoided the fight but a single Outcast fighter spotted him and prevented him from escaping. This time he had no choice but to engage.