Signals in the Void 17

("Signals in the Void" is a character fan fiction story revolving around my adventures in exploration.)

Forwarding a report of a large object moving within the station, Erhan winces as cruise missiles slam into their shields.  Moving across the command deck toward the crew monitoring the ship's status, Captain Erhan was not pleased with what he saw.  The ship's shields have been depleted and a few of the modules required to recharge them have been overloaded by the mass surge of energy they received from the explosions.  As he is about to turn around, the crew member monitoring the armor integrity of the ship draws Erhan's attention to several positions around the ship where hull breaches are beginning to happen.  Though the locations of the breaches are puzzling, Erhan orders those areas evacuated and sealed shut; now is not the time to worry about a few holes.

Getting in touch with the engineering section to see about the ships current capacitor output, he's informed there are several key conduits which have been damaged preventing sufficient power to various weapon systems.  Looking over at the drone pilots gives Erhan a small moment of relief to see them controlling the combat drones deployed outside the ship.  While barking orders at those around him, his view-screen flashes with a composition analysis of several large objects attached to the hull.  Confused Erhan gets to the bottom to see the words printed from Draiv stating they are rogue drones.

Getting a notification showing Draiv redirecting capacitor toward the smart-bombs stationed around the hull.  Smiling to himself, there is a reason he now serves under the capsuleer Draiv Solregard.  The various flashing lights and warnings from his crew bring a frown to his face.  It seems the smart-bombs were one of the weapons systems who had their power severed.  

Though the drone tactic is unprecedented, Erhan didn't live through twenty-seven years in the Amarrian Navy by luck.  Ordering combat and engineering teams to the severed area, it looks like they are going to need to make some quick repairs.  It's not long before a plea comes back from the engineering team requesting combat assistance as they have encountered multiple hostiles.  

The drone which attached itself to the side of the ship was also carrying a swarm of smaller drones inside of it which it released upon breaching the hull.  Seeing the breach is near one of the large service corridors he orders the group to fall back into the corridor and make their way to the hanger.  Ordering a drone pilot to abandon his current drone and to activate one of the Acolyte class drones in the hanger.  Erhan has the pilot bring it around in line with the large access corridor.

On his view-screen Erhan can see through the drone's cameras the corridor blast door begin to slide open and only half of the engineering team enters the hanger followed by only a couple members of the combat squad.  As the pilot angles the camera to look further down the corridor a few combat troops appear and are suddenly swarmed by drones two meters long.   The auto targeting systems of the Acolyte class combat drone begin to highlight the rogue machinery chasing after his crew.  Captain Erhan gives the order to destroy all hostiles.  The drone pilot begins firing small bursts of lasers down the corridor disintegrating the rogue drones as they surge forward. 

One of the bridge's ensigns looks back at Captain Erhan to see the look of grim determination on his face eerily lit by the flashes from his view-screen.  Maybe the rumored title of "Retribution's Herald" from his days in the Navy might have more merit than the Ensign first thought.