At the last possible instant the vessel almost lazily heeled over and shifted course, diving back into the gas giant’s atmosphere, causing missiles to scream past as most of the swarm tried but failed to anticipate the new course. The craft wrenched wildly, shaking the next wave of missiles that had managed to stick with them, then leveled out and waggled its wings a few times before burning hard for the upper atmosphere once more.

“Brazen bastard,” Penae muttered, more amused than anything else.

“As you say, Subaltern.”

►►►

Shuttle Eagle One

► The skies ahead of Steph and Milla were beginning to darken from the blue green of the lower atmosphere to give way to the blue black that signified the edge of air. Steph could feel the control systems change, shifting from atmospheric resistance to extra-atmospheric reaction systems. Microthrusters and gyroresistance controls took over from ailerons and elevators, stealing some of his feedback from the controls.

Steph preferred flying in an atmosphere, though there were charms to be had in microgravity and zero-resistance flight, simply because you could feel the craft in atmosphere. In space, with full counter-mass powered up, it was more like flying an overhyped video game ship than the real thing.

Except for the consequences.

Those were all too real.

“Can you find me the third frigate, Milla?” he asked, tracking the missiles that were still in the air.

Those were tracking back around, clearly operating on internal guidance from what he could see, but probably also getting updated targeting data from the frigates. Stephen wasn’t too worried about them. Based on their velocity, missiles that size wouldn’t have enough fuel to dog Eagle One’s steps too far. They’d be a threat for a few passes, though, unless he did something about them.

Electronic countermeasures didn’t do much, and neither did the flares. Steph wasn’t too pleased about that. He hadn’t expected much out of the flares, of course, not with active tracking on the inbound birds. Flares were effective mostly against passive heat seekers, but he’d held out more hope for the ECMs.

“Holding position at the edge of the atmosphere, maneuvering to maintain a CAP over our position,” Milla responded.

“Good move,” Steph acknowledged. Though he disliked dealing with an intelligent enemy, putting a combat air patrol over them was going to make things a lot harder on him and Milla. “They’re trying to get us in a pincer. They should have more ships to pull this pincer off properly, but against this pig, three might just be enough.”