Codie put his hands on the controls. He smiled when he felt Leo’s hand on his shoulder. This man finally cracked a smiled. “You think I can actual do this? I’ve never operated something sooo— alien.” He listened to what the lion commanded of him, although it was vague.
Leo nodded and looked around. "Yes." He said simply. "I think you can. And, I think you think you can too." he gave Codie's shoulder a squeeze.
Rom was glad to hear Eyros, which meant Caleb had the coms up, so those two at least were in their lions and moving. That just left Codie, and Rom could see the icon for the red lion moving, so he was up and going too.
"Anybody have any clue what we're running into?"
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Codie smiled, pulling on his helmet and tapping into the lion's controls. "You might want to hang on." He murmured to Leo, the red lion pouncing out of the hanger. Unfortunately for Codie, the red lion did lion cooperating with him— at all. "Come on! Why do you have to be stubborn." He made a sour face, further sending the lion in a tantrum. Codie pulled on the controls, stabilizing the lion. He took in a dazed breath, tapping into the coms. "Not a wondrous clue." Codie sounded irritated.
Eyros sighed and brought his lion over, the blue lion tucking it's head under the red one and calming the gentle giant
“ your lion reacts to your mood. Be calm and try to bond with your lion”
( anybody know that ship 😂)
(Sorry I forgot Codie! Got a codename up for him now!)
Caleb didn't respond to the question about the coms, he knew he'd already set them up, so there was no point in saying anything. He roused the green lion, which he'd tentatively begun calling ione. The lion responded to his controls, to which Caleb was glad, seeing how much trouble the red rider was having. He began pulling up charts, scanning the statistics as best he could. The lions were so complex there were hundreds of numbers all constantly flashing and changing before his eyes and Caleb had only identified what a couple of them even meant, but everything as far as he could tell was going well. Pulling the helmet on was a bit of a struggle, because Caleb had to take off his wire rimmed glasses and lay them neatly aside. He was incredibly lucky the helmets had a feed for him to watch, otherwise he'd be blind, which was the worst possible condition in a fight. Caleb tapped a few things and got his com in order.
"We might have an alarm report, but.." Caleb grimaced, the 'reports' weren't actually that useful. Unless they were being sent on a specific mission which included a de-briefing, which was not the case with the sudden alarm. Often it just included who possibly needed help and little flashing lights that indicated enemy number but nothing about their strengths or motives. Caleb pulled it up anyways, scanning the information slowly, not quite sure how to relay it in words to the others, the soft man was bad at translating numbers into words. Instead he just sent the same information to the other riders, essentially just popping up as a message in the corner of their screens.
Codie tried to control the giant, but his heart rate rose and he started to panic. “How am I supposed to bond with this thing?! It doesn’t listen.” The lion’s controls locked up and sent him in further panic. “Ack!” Codie tried to decipher the alerts and phrases, but he was unsuccessful. Maybe I should calm myself down. He closed his eyes, letting his panic drown within itself. With Codie slowly calming himself, the lion’s controls unlocked gradually. “I don’t think I am quite prepared to fight things.”
“ just calm down, the lion reacts to you,,” eyros said
Leo stood up from where he had fallen over when the lion jerked, and walked to stand behind Codie. He reached over and massaged his shoulders. "you good?" he asked carefully. "Do you need anything?"
The blue lion left from comforting the red one, drifting over to Romulus
Codie shook his head. “I understand that, but—“ he cut himself off, not continuing the communicating between Eyros. He had to focus keeping the lion stable. Sure, he didn’t understand it, but he would in do time, right? Codie took a deep breath. “Sorry Leo— didn’t mean to bat you around. It’s nothing like what I am used to.” He flinched when Leo started massage his shoulders. “I’m alright.. and I don’t need anything.”
Caleb frowned slightly, unsure of what the hold-up was. Tearing his eyes away from the screens he adjusted his feed to show him the sides, front, and back of the lion, where he was able to see the red lion. It looked like Codie was having trouble..? Breathing out a quiet breath, the small man tugged on the cuffs of his shirt, should he say something to help? Could he help? Hmm..
"Codie..? Have you tried.. Asking your lion nicely?" Caleb's soft voice drifted over the coms, sounding slightly hesitant. He didn't move his green lion from it's ready position, the man had enough trouble remembering his own body language, much less that of a mechanical feline. The advice might turn out to be useless, but he'd noticed many of the riders still considered the beasts to be.. Just machines. Which was wrong, they were alive, and had feelings. Understanding the other was the most important basis of trust. The red lion was temperamental, perhaps it didn't like being told what to do? OR maybe it was just confused and doing its best to help its new master and they ended up contradicting each other?
Caleb didn't know enough to say, it was just his personal hypothesis.
Codie leaned back in the pilot’s chair, loosening his rigid form. He closed his eyes for a moment, reopening them and stabilizing the lion in a steady rhythm. “You have to work with me, buddy.” He murmured to the red lion, hearing Caleb’s gentle voice of concern. “Ask it nicely? I’m trying my best.. I think I’ve got it under control… somewhat.” He kept an eye on the controls, trying to communicate to the red lion.
Eyros watched as the paladin learned what eyros had learned long ago.
Romulus was running circles around all of them. He and the yellow lion had bonded quickly over boundless energy, and waiting on the rest was making him a little stir crazy. Instead, he was pacing while he thought, trying to analyze the icons and symbols Caleb had sent over.
"Caleb, Eyros… are those Galran fighter craft?" The small icons were swarming around the large symbol he recognized as 'passenger transport'. "There's got to be some reason they would want that transport."
He noted Codie having issues, and consciously stayed away. He felt like Codie was often overwhelmed by his massive personality, and the poor kid didn't need that right now.
He quickly searched up all available logs of passenger transports from space ports in a radius of 10au's. Nothing mind boggling came up.
Until he checked the cargo log.
"Oh. Oh man. Caleb, need you to look at this." He sent over the log. It showed a passenger transport being cleared to make room for just over a ton of weapons grade deuterium, a highly explosive fissile material. "Is that what I think it is?"
If the Galrans captured that transport, they'd make a huge jump in weapons production.
Eyros almost let out a gasp. “ they could build their own telladove with that.,” he whispered
Codie calmed himself down, developing a steady rhythm with the red lion. He appreciated Leo's efforts, feeling lucky that he took the guy with him. He looked down at the panel, little shapes flashing. That confused him. He was aware of the other lion shapes, that being his fellow paladins. Codie was behind, and he suddenly grew red from that realization. He was behind. It embarrassed him, seeing as the other seems to bond with their lions just fine. I've already screwed up the first thing. Bond with and pilot your lion. He sighed, looking at the other set of icons and records sent over by Caleb. "This can't be good." He muttered to himself, assessing all the other details.
Romulus noticed that the red lion icon was up and running, and he smiled to himself. "Codie, you copy? Well done." He didn't wanna say too much, not trying to embarrass the kid, but he was genuinely proud of the paladin.
Eyros cheered for codie “ once yah get used to him he's a big softy. Reds been among my family for years” he said and smiled
Romulus was very confused by Eyros' non-sequitur. The red lion had done no such thing. It'd been securely hidden for the longest time, till forces beyond the paladin's comprehension had orchestrated their meetings.
But then, Eyros was a rather… enigmatic individual. You never could be sure what was going to come out of his mouth, and whether or not it would be true… or even sensical.
Codie blinked, realizing the others were expressing their faith in him. That made him blush deeply with humiliation. He didn’t understand why, but all the praise made him feel like a child who was behind all the rest. He was a child who was behind all the rest. “I-um-yeah, I copy..” He went silent, watching the icons move. It fascinated him how the lion could track all of the moving objects. “Thank you..” He finally broke the silence he created. Codie didn’t want to focus on himself anymore. He wanted to focus on the bigger problem— of which he was also afraid he’d screw up.
Eyros chipped in from there “ there's a gaulra mass surrounding a shipment of metals to upgrade the gaulra army tenfold, we need to stop them and take the meals back to where they came from
Romulus nodded to himself and stopped circling. He took a deep breath and let Remus calculate for him.
And then he was off, heading towards the mass of swarming fighter craft around the valuabel transport.
Their team didn't have a leader. 'Team' was stretching it, they really didn't even have all 5 paladins
They had kinda fallen into roles over the last month. Caleb was the smart one, Romulus was the strong one, Eyros was the medic, and Codie so far had filled whatever spot he could. Romulus hooped the red lion pilot would slot into a comfortable role soon, but he'd been helpful despite his struggles.
Romulus had one of the bigger personalities, and had just kind of shrugged a lot of responsibility onto his own shoulders. Like being the one to head into combat first in most situations.
He watched the icons for the rest of the team form up behind him.
Eyros smiled as he raced behind Romulus,
Caleb watched as everyone got under control. By everyone he meant the red lion. And by the red lion he meant Codie. Caleb hummed quietly, working away as best he could to file away all the new information. It truly was worrying what their enemies with that amount of raw resources! Why with that you could-
Head in the game Caleb. This isn't Space Camp, this is.. This is a real battle.
Lips pressed together into a thin line, Caleb followed after Romulus, he seemed to know what he was doing, and Caleb didn't bother to pause and question it. He poured over the blinking lights again, noting how they swarmed around the cargo, like bee's surrounding a queen. They moved so quickly, it was almost hard to keep up at times. Eyes wide, Caleb looked around, noticing he'd fallen a tad behind. He spurred on the Green Lion, momentarily annoyed with his own lapse. He tried considering battle plans but.. Looking at the.. Well.. Spastic crew they had going on he wondered if it would be any use. He drafted up one or two anyways of course, separating several chunks and eliminating them from there could work nicely with everyone's skill sets but.. These people were not a team, just people who happened to be working together.
Romulus watched the way they'd come in to the sector the fight was in. Romulus/Remus up front, Eyros/Blue next, Codie/Red and Leo third, and Caleb/Ione last. Interesting. He assumed Caleb had brought up the rear intentionally.
"Caleb, any ideas on how to work this?"
The techie sent him a couple of battle plans, centered around breaking the swarm up into smaller pieces and eliminating them one by one. The second one looked good to Rom. He pushed it through to the rest of the group.
"Fellas, try to follow this if you can. We'll adjust as we go." The plan had their colors clearly marked, making strafing runs to cut through the swarm, then turning and hitting them with forward guns and torpedos after.
Of course, no plan, no matter how solid, survives contact with the enemy.
They came up out of a nebula to find the battle happening in dead space. Calling it a battle was generous, it was more like a hunt. If the swarm of Galran fighter craft were small and agile, like a pack of jackals, then the transport was the elephant being hunted, heavy and slow and covered in strong armor. The shields appeared to be holding up, but wouldn't last much longer under the current barrage, and once they were down, the craft could land easily and begin boarding.
They would kill everyone and take what they wanted, leaving the transport a stripped-out husk, floating in space.
Romulus frowned as he thought about that. We can't let that happen…
A stray fighter craft came zooming out to meet them, and Rom's guns flashed, zapping it out of existence in a blink. It had fired off a small torpedo, but it was going to miss him.
He did a double take as he realized it was going to hit Codie instead.
He hauled on his controls, spinning Remus around, and managed to get the main body of the yellow lion in between the torpedo and the red lion. It detonated, Romulus shook in the cockpit, and he silently thanked the stars that he'd added all that armor earlier.
"Codie, get your head in the game, you're gonna do fine! Slight change of plan, you and Eyros follow the plan you've been given. Do your best not to get zapped out of space." Rom wasn't barking orders, just trying to be convincing. They had no reason to listen to him, other than a few battles previously where he'd shown he knew how to handle himself.
"Caleb, that transport is going to need their shielding boosted, it's startng to flicker. If I can get you in close, can you do that?" They were zooming into the main body of the swarm now, the icons getting fuzzier on the screen as they entered the scrum.
Eyros jumped around and pounced on some of the ships, shattering them
Caleb let out a tiny gasp, staring at the actual battle happening before his eyes. On screen all the little flashing lights made lots of sense, they were fast, but understandable. Out here, in the void, with actual ships, being piloted unpredictably, nothing made any sense. There was too much possible human (or alien) error, too many variables to track to get an accurate read on the battlefield. The transport in the center of it all though.. That was steady, it moved at such a snails pace, not able to outrun its nimble pursuers. It reminded him of a cow being dragged down by a pack of wild dogs, trying to flee.
The green lion's pilot saw that Romulus was looking at his plans, instructing the others to attempt and follow them. Caleb's eyes widened, mildly surprised he'd taken his suggestion, a tiny smile crept onto Calebs face, delighted that his suggestions were being taken. For the most part, the lions were incredible at shielding their riders, they reacted if anything got too close and you could simply ask the beasts to strafe anything that got too close, essentially having the guns on autopilot was incredibly useful if your attention was divided between multiple tasks. Ione was handling anything that got too close to them, though that was rare since the short paladin had found himself somewhat near the back.
A stray ship zoomed by, gunning at the lions and Romulus immediately jumped into action, while Caleb was still calculating the ramifications and trajectory of the missile it had launched. Sitting up straight in the control chair, Caleb's anxiety spiked as Romulus began giving out orders, his mind fuzzing the words not applicable to him, almost tuning out orders he didn't need to think about.
"Caleb, that transport is going to need their shielding boosted, it's starting to flicker. If I can get you in close, can you do that?"
..Could he? Provided he was within range of the transport ship, and they were willing to let Ione and Caleb into their systems, it was.. Possible that he could do something for their shielding. He glanced at the ship, the tell-tale signs of flickering, making it look like the ship was marbling before their eyes. But- He didn't know what was wrong? What was damaged?? Caleb took in a deep breath, realizing he hadn't answer Romulus yet.
"I- I can try. But I need to be close, almost parallel with the ship." He kept his voice steady, burying his nerves. Caleb's voice was still calm sounding, quiet and soft. With a flick of his wrist, Caleb began sending messages to the transport, asking them to send him schematics, any damage reports, power levels, really anything that would help him help them. He also began sectioning off some of ione's emergency energy reserves, the transport would need to be linked up with the lion just in case they weren't actually damaged, just suffering from a shut-down, their shields not being able to stand up to the constant barrage. He trusted the lion to handle most of the incoming attackers, which might not be wise during a battle, but he trusted the other paladins to make sure he didn't get spaced.
Now.. What model was the transport? Did they have updated shields? What year and make did they have? Caleb shook his head, like someone trying to free cobwebs from rafters, most models all had similar power cores and shielding had stayed highly consistent across ships of this size. They couldn't afford to innovate much if the risk was blowing up several tons of precious cargo. He could do this.. He could do this. People were counting on him.
Brows furrowed in concentration, Caleb began skimming the reports the transport ship had frantically sent him, Ione doing its best to translate them into a language Caleb understood as they came in.One of their auxiliary power cores had been damaged, and two of their server rooms were down, essentially disconnecting them from the lower-left side of their ship. If he got close, Caleb could probably get Ione into the systems, restarting the core and jump starting it with the lions own energy. It could work.. Provided every one else didn't die first.
(Sounds good, Cinnamon)
Romulus nodded as Caleb replied.
"I can get you there." he said, his voice even.
Romulus had made a few changes to Remus over the course of the last month. One of the first things he had done was bulk up the lion's armor and shielding, with Caleb's help.
The next thing he did was make weapon upgrades.
The other lions, in fact most of the space-faring universe, used energy weapons. Photon torpedos, dual-phasic lasers, phazer beams, concentrated particle beams, neutrino streams- all of them very powerful. But they had a flaw that Romulus disliked. They tended to leave the target intact, meaning there was usually a ship, a body, or a target of some kind to clean up after.
That was why Romulus had always preferred kinetic weaponry.
It left nothing in your path, and for a guy who was often the trailblazer, the guy clearing the way, that was incredibly usefully. Like now, for instance.
He began firing 4-inch thick railgun rounds into the swarm. The Galran fighter craft could shrug typical energy weapons, even survive torpedo fire, but physical hyper-dense collapsed deuterium rounds moving at a decent fraction of the speed of light?
They popped like over-full balloons, leaving gaps big enough for Remus to fit through.
"Stay close!" Romulus called, focusing his fire in a concentrated circle. If Caleb stayed with him, they'd pull even with the transport in a couple seconds.
He did his best to shield the green lion from any incoming hits, trying to conserve its power for what he'd asked Caleb to do. Once they got into position, he would do the same thing, and hope they could guard the transport long enough for Eyros and Codie to decimate the swarm.
(Or maybe now lol. I have lunch)
Codie felt he was falling behind again. His support system had fallen silent and he was focused on the wrong things. He looked up to see yellow lion shielding him from potential death. That’s when his heart beat quickened. He didn’t know what to do. He was useless. A useless kid with horrible anxiety. His hands became clammy, and the controls slipped from them. Regaining his breath, he followed the blue lion’s lead in eliminating the swarming fleet.(?)
Eyros was starting to get overwhelmed by the number of bots that had gained on him
“ guys! My lion can't keep up!”