Omega Force: Rebellion (OF11), стр. 22

"The only ships powered up were the ones that were moved away," Fendra said. "I agree that it is strange they left the more powerful ships here and took all the smaller support ships out of the area."

It had been an odd, seven-day flight from Mok's compound out to the Cluster with their unwanted guest. Fendra had no problem living aboard the spartan gunship, as an intelligence officer she'd likely suffered through much worse, but she was an unknown, untrusted presence within the crew's inner sanctum and that automatically created an air of tension. Jason had tried to probe around the edges a little bit and see if he could uncover a little more about Mok's past since the pair obviously knew each other, but she'd shut down those conversations whenever he'd brought it up.

"Okay," Jason said. "Bringing up engine two in low power mode." He pushed the switch for number two up to the 'START' position and held it for a moment until he saw plasma pressure building in the injector manifold on his instruments. He released the switch and let it snap back to the 'RUN' position as the engine continued to spool up.

Since the dormant ships weren't running active tachyon scans, and even passive sensors gave off a detectable energy signature, they were going to try and push the Phoenix ahead on the thrust of a single main engine, and then shut it down to cold coast much of the way. They couldn't risk the grav-drive as that was easily detected once they got in too close, and flying in under full burn with all four main engines lit would put up a thermal bloom even the most rudimentary infrared sensor would see. So, it was a long, boring flight across a few million kilometers that would take at least another full day to complete.

"Number two is up and stable, output is choked down to twelve percent," Twingo said. "That's the lowest I can give you and still keep it lit."

"It'll have to do," Jason said executed the navigation script Kage had programmed and sent to the pilot's station. The power output of the barely-idling engine was so low there was no perception that they were even underway. Normally, the deck would vibrate and the hull would groan to let them know that they were, indeed, moving. The dead silence was a bit eerie. "When we're within a million klicks, we'll shut down and begin powering off all the non-essentials."

"Thanks for the recap of the plan we've only been talking about for the last four days straight," Crusher said over his shoulder. "Truly we would be lost without your august leadership."

"Fuck off."

"I'm still not in love with this plan, Captain," Crusher said, knocking on Jason's helmet with a knuckle.

"You're free to suit up and go in my place."

"Good luck out there," Crusher said, turning and walking out of the armory.

"I have accounted for as many variables as I could think of," Lucky said. "I believe that our chances of survival are quite good."

"Quite good is an improvement over our usual odds," Jason said. "I'll take it. How're you doing over there?"

"This isn't my first combat EVA, Captain Burke." Fendra sat on a bench, outfitted in a lightweight tactical EVA suit.

"I was more asking about how the suit fit you not your mission qualifications," Jason said.

He was decked out in the replacement powered armor graciously given to him by the Disa Arms Company when one of their suits had failed critically after taking a single hit. At first, they'd been recalcitrant, unwilling to accept that the fault had been theirs. After Jason had threatened to hit the personal residence of the sales rep that sold him the armor from orbit, however, they became much more accommodating.

The armor was a medium-duty model that gave a decent mix of protection, strength enhancement, and situational awareness without being so bulky and cumbersome he couldn't move about within the ship. He had one of his trusty railgun carbines and a high-power plasma rifle secured to the maglocks on his back as well as two sidearms affixed to each thigh. Lucky needed no external support to operate in space, of course, but he now needed to carry weaponry with him. He'd not had the time to build his own weaponry as he'd planned, so he carried a similar loadout as Jason, including one of the spare railguns with the larger grips used by the Galvetic Legions.

"We're coming up on the release point, Captain," Doc's voice came over the intercom. "Better get outside."

"Copy," Jason grunted and stood up, checking over his gear one more time. While he'd never admit it to the others, EVA operations still scared the living shit out of him no matter how many times he did them. The ones like this that were in interstellar space were even worse than the orbital ops. He hated every single minute of floating about, waiting for some incorrectly installed seal to fail and his blood to boil within his body when he lost pressurization.

The trio made their way to the port engineering bay and the airlock for access to the dorsal hull. With Lucky going first, they took turns cycling through the hatch and getting up onto the top of the Phoenix. The gunship still hurtled towards the formation of dormant warships on a ballistic course, the ionic jets firing every so often to adjust their attitude. Jason activated the maglocks on his sabatons and clomped over to where Lucky was already inspecting the package that Twingo had prepped and mounted to the hull. Once he was close enough, the battlesynth reached out and touched his armor.

"Everything checks out, Captain," he said over the com link. "We can depart once Fendra reaches us."

"Cool trick," Jason said back, pointing at his friend's hand. Since any RF or even short-range com laser emissions might be detected, the team had to be in direct contact to communicate with each other via an inductive coupling.