Sebastian follows orders and makes his way to the damaged location. When he arrives, he makes an attempt to assess how bad the damages are and moves to fix whatever is most badly damaged.

Rojo turns to look at Jonas as the young pilot calls after them. His eyes have the same fatherly glint to them, but his jovial smile is not to be seen. Closing his eyes, he sighs and says, "I don't know what difference it will make... but suit yourself." Enrica nods. "Come along, then, Jonas..."

The three make it to the bridge as the rest of the crew starts helping to clean up the situation.

Fred begins looking through the information on dreadnoughts, and one entry in particular stands out to him.



On the bridge, Rojo immediately dashes to his seat and shouts, "Open a communication line with the Carina!"

"Yes Captain," the comms officer responds, and as soon as she initiates communication, a man who looks very much like Rojo appears on screen. He is of roughly the same build, has the same tanned skin and red eyes, and similarly brown hair. He wears a Red SDA uniform, and is decorated with numerous medals for many years of service. He's even smiling.

However, unlike Rojo's generally friendly demeanor, this man radiates a twisted presence. His red eyes burn brightly, as opposed to the cool heat of Rojo's. His hair is longer and shaggier, giving a wild impression. His grin is not filled with affection, but instead malice. Rojo instantly shrinks back as he sees him. As if responding to that, the man steps forward and begins to speak.

"BROTHER!!!!! It's been far too long! Why haven't you been keeping in touch? Mother's just SO WORRIED about you!"

Rojo snarls. "Fuerrot Barrett, you're an Admiral of the Moirai Space Force, and in charge of the Sector Defense Armada's prized Dreadnought Carina. Don't you think you should act like it?"

Fuerrot laughs in response. "What's this? A lowly pirate is lecturing ME on demeanor? I speak exactly in the amount of respect that is deserved! Well, that is, to you, anyway."

Rojo closes his eyes. "I don't suppose we could parley?"

Spitting to the side, Fuerrot says, "Like hell. You know the code of the SDA, no negotiations with criminals. And you also know my style... I'd sooner die then let a pirate crew live. On that note... we haven't spoken in twenty years, brother... mind telling me why you abandoned your position and became a criminal?"

Rojo clenches his teeth. "You wouldn't understand." He then opens his eyes with an uncommon rage, and shouts, "If you open a communications line with the Silk Road, you can speak to the captain and know we killed none of his guards and tended to their wounded! We have committed no crimes!"

Fuerrot sneers. "Of course you've committed crimes. You call yourselves pirates, and by definition, Piracy -IS- -A- -CRIME-."

Rojo throws his hand to the side. "Then what of the other Pirates? There are far worse crews than ours in the sector! Why isn't the SDA going after the likes of the Black Sky Crew?"

Fuerrot laughs and shrugs. "They certainly are slippery bastards aren't they? But rest assured, what we shall do to you today, we shall do to them in due time. Fare thee well, Brother. It's been nice catching up."

The communications line is forced closed, and Rojo stares blankly at the screen for a second before falling back in to his chair, as if to think. As he does, another salvo of fire rains upon the Supernova, rocking the ship even more than the last barrage did.

He turns his attention to Enrica, frowns, and then stands up and walks towards Jonas.

"Listen to me, Jonas. As much as I know you want to help here, there is nothing you can do." He pats Jonas on the shoulder and says, "You need to get back to the White Dwarf. You have potential... you must live through this." Turning to Enrica, he says, "Get the bridge officers to the escape vessels." Enrica somberly nods, heads for the door, and grabs Jona's hand, dragging him with her, the bridge command following.

Returning to his post, Rojo pushes a button on his seat. "Fred? I need you to cede all ships controls to me. I will take it from here." He raises ARMS, and begins to access the ship's computer wirelessly through it, accessing its systems through his neural interface.

---------------------------------------------------------------------

In the damaged sectors of the ship, the rest of the crew races to bring the ship to a working state...

"You have override on all ship systems, Captain." says Fred, handing over control as requested. The entry in the handbook does raise an interesting possibility, though; the Dreadnought may be protected against all physical forms of attack, but perhaps it's possible to crack open the Dreadnought's computer systems, and install himself on there. Since he doesn't actually have physical access to the system, a sufficiently well-designed security system could keep Fred out, but not all security systems are sufficiently well-designed...

Feng, not having heard the Captain's conversation with his brother, or the Captain's orders, continues to bellow orders while throwing herself into the most damaged areas, trying to get everything working long enough to make their getaway. In a brief lull, her right hand goes to her chest, clasping something hidden beneath her shirt, and she mutters "looks like I may be seeing you again sooner than I thought, dad." The moment is then over, and she gets right back to work on the damaged bay.

"Hey!" Jonas snapped as Enrica bodily dragged him from the bridge. "What are you doing? There's no way he can do anything about that Dreadnought alone! The Supernova's just a speck to it, the White Star even more so! If we're going to run, he needs to get going too or else-" A thought crosses his mind, and he clams up, and looks a bit ill. He glances at Enrica as he trails behind her, seeing her reaction.

Enrica solemnly looks at Jonas as he shouts. "I've known Rojo for many years, and I've never doubted his judgement. Rojo... I'm sure he'll be fine. He's gotten out of worse than this." Her words aren't very reassuring.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Calling up a holographic computer monitor and accessing all the intercoms on the ship, Rojo begins to speak.

"Attention crew. This is Captain Rojo Barrett. As you are aware, we have come under fire from the Sector Defense Armada Dreadnought Class vessel Carina. As you are no doubt aware, any form of conventional attack against a Dreadnought is futile for the Supernova.

"As of right now, I am issuing an Abandon Ship order. All hands are ordered to immediately evacuate, whether it is on a smaller class vessel or in their personal Corsair.

"I am not saying I will be going down with the ship. I have seized the ships controls and am manning it through ARMS. While the crew is evacuating, I will be going to the engine room to hardwire the fold drives.

"Because while there are no conventional attacks which can harm a Dreadnought... you can bet your asses that there are ways to bypass that firepower for a full powered ram.

"I intend to perform a hypershort fold jump directly in to the heart of the Carina. The physics of folding are a bit beyond me, but I do know this: there is a minimum distance fold drives are allowed to take due to the effects folding has on spacetime fields. If I bypass that distance, the Supernova will tear a gash in spacetime straight from here to the Carina.

"...this mission is incredibly risky, and the Supernova WILL be destroyed as a result. It probably won't destroy the Carina, but it will cripple it, giving you all time to escape. I suggest staying on guard as you do, as the SDA still has a rather sizable corsair fleet on each Dreadnought, but I can keep the Dreadnought itself away, and that will keep as many of you alive as possible.

"I don't intend to die here. Once I override the engine's programming I will head to the Corsair Hangar and escape from there before the hypershort fold. You all need to get out ahead of me, though.

"...I know I say this often, but I need to say it in case I never see you again.

"A star is an engine of creation. The matter which forms our bodies is the result of processes taking billions of years, formed within the furnaces that scatter across our galaxy. Stars burn, create matter, then eventually explode in a supernova, forging the elements that make up everything we see in this vast universe.

"I named this crew Burning Star because I wanted to harness the fires of creation. I wanted to find the missing element that can save humanity from itself... for all our brilliance, we have been such fools."

A single tear drops down the side of his face as he continues.

"IT IS THE CREDO OF THE BURNING STAR PIRATES! THAT WE DO NOT BURN OUT AND VANISH! IF WE BURN OUT, WE GO OUT IN A SUPERNOVA, IN THE HELLFIRES OF CREATION, FORGING A NEW FUTURE! THAT IS THE FUTURE I SHALL FORGE FOR YOU TODAY!"

He calms himself and finishes. "It has been an honor being your Captain, and I will see you all soon. Rojo out."

The communication ends, and the captain rushes to the engine room...

"@#$%&*! firewall..." mutters Fred, angrily.

"At-sign hash dollar percent ampersand star exclamation mark firewall!" he repeats.

Doing the virtual equivalent of putting out the fire in his hair with one hand while running, he loads himself into his personal Corsair - custom modified by the addition of extra computers. He gives his cardboard-box robot instructions to load itself into the nearest shuttle, in the hope that it will at least survive the upcoming battle in there.

Feng belts out a much less restrained string of expletives when the Captain begins speaking to them, but as he continues and the extent of his plan becomes apparent, she goes quiet. Once he finishes, she chuckles gently, and says "Million to one chance - just the sort of thing Ol' Goldsmith would have come up with. They'd have loved you, Captain." She then turns to the others, and in a slightly more restrained tone than her prior bellows, yells "you heard him! Get your arses to the escape ships or you're walking home! That means NOW!" As the shipmen scramble, she then heads to one of the terminals, and taps out a message directed straight for the Engine Room's main terminal, where it waits for Captain Rojo's personal arrival. With that done, she races from the room, scooping up anyone who can't get their arses in gear fast enough, and gets to the Corsair Hangar

Sebastian looks up from whatever it is he's trying to repair as he listens to the Captain's speech. Grief and despair wars over his expression before fading into simple neutrality. "Don't you dare die, Captain. I still owe you." Making sure his drones are safely secured to his belt, Sebastian moves to follow the orders and starts making his way back to the hangar and the White Dwarf. "I still have accounts to settle, so I'm not gonna die here."

Jomo has been rushing around the entirety of the ship, doing whatever odd jobs and heavy lifting needs to be done to keep the ship ready to defend itself. As soon as the intercom goes off, however, Jomo immediately stops what he's doing, dropping the ammunition boxes he had been moving to prep any weaponry he could. As the Captain speaks, Jomo finds his sight growing blurry, and his nerves growing weak. He rubs the tears from his eyes as the Captain finishes his speech, and salutes at the nearest intercom. "MAY THIS EXPLOSION ROCK THE SYSTEMS! MAY NEW STARS FORM FROM THE PASSION OF ITS FLAMES!" Jomo rushes across the ship and back to his room, grabbing a key ring full of remote detonators. "I know you said not too, Captain, but I couldn't help myself. Maybe it'll come in handy." Jomo takes a look at the rest of his room, the unfinished explosives, the powder, the chemicals, all of it potentially useful in the next couple minutes, if not days. He hesitates, considering grabbing just one more thing. His muscles stiffen, and a stern look crosses his face, before he opens the door and runs out. "Corsair Hangar, Corsair Hangar..." Jomo finally manages to relocate the Corsair Hangar, and runs towards Captain Rojo's personal Corsair. He sets the key ring in the most visible location he can, nearest the cockpit of the Corsair, and then makes his way out, looking for one of the smaller vessels to escape in, as well as anyone considering staying on board, and disregarding the captain's potentially final order.

And that is where Jomo runs into Rocs, looking pale despite the feather-like fur covering his entire body. He gives a half-hearted wave to Jomo and continues towards the bridge, where Captian Rojo is flying. It's quite obvious what Rocs' intentions are when he says, "Farewell Jomo."

Jomo's hand reaches out quickly, and grabs hold of the doctor by his shoulder. "Whoa there. No can do, Doc." Jomo quickly grabs the doctor in a bear hug and holds him still. "Captain's orders. We abandon ship. If you aren't with those abandoning ship, we're gonna be a lot worse off, and the Captain seems like he wants us all to get out of here alive."

Rocs holds perfectly still, "Let me go Jomo. I owe the captain my life, it would be an honor to trade my life for his. I can complete his mission... he can live... I am not as needed as he."

"And I owe you my life. And so does Feng, and Jonas, and Sebastian, and Enrica, and everyone on board this ship. I'm going to say that you have no idea what you're talking about when you say you aren't as needed." Jomo squeezes a little tighter around Rocs' body. "The Captain told us to leave. Not for all but one to leave. Not for someone to try this crazy plan while he escapes. He told us to leave. Are you going to disrespect his orders? Because if you are, I'm going to have to call this mutiny, and throw you off the ship."

"But... he saved me..." Rocs groans, the first real show of emotion Jomo has ever seen from the Shatti, "I can't... I can't do this without him... I'll be shot... he won't save me.. I owe him... can't save him... PLEASE!!!!" Suddenly Rocs begins to struggle with a raw power he's never displayed before - his legs alone are enough to buck Jomo off his feet and back down again. "I CAN'T DO IT! I'D RATHER DIE! I CAN'T LOSE MY FATHER AGAIN!!!" Rocs is sobbing, kicking and screaming; his eyes are blank, rolled up into the back of his head. "DON'T KILL ME! DON'T KILL THEM!! I WON'T SURVIVE!! DON'T SHOOT! MAMA GET UP!!! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!" He suddenly rag dolls on Jomo, going totally limp.

Soft words tumble from his lips.

Hush little Shatti...

Don't say a word...

Mama's gonna fly us...

Just like a bird...

And if that soaring bird won't fly...

Oh my sweet mama... why did you die...