ECM CENTAUR

Frost glittered on the observation windows of the docking bays of New Baltimore, Docking Platform 6. Celeste Valerio exhaled on the pressure glass of Bay 31 and scrubbed away the frozen condensation with a balled fist. In the dark below she could scarcely make out the dim hulk of a submarine.

"ECM Centaur," she said, in a whisper that nonetheless split the silence. "K22AY-000899216Z, first of its class."

Her eyes saw past the sub, into the infinite dark of the Europan caverns. Her mind ran wild with visions of glory and fortune, of the stories she would one day tell. She thought of her grandfather’s apartment and the long nights spent shivering by the heater as he told wild tales from his days as a coalition captain. The Blockade of Moyle Cavus had been a special favorite of hers, and had often dreamt that she was the captain of the Coalition warship Bremen. There was a model of it in her room: sleek, brutal, clumsily painted in Coalition Navy Silver.

But as she stared out of the observation window she remembered other stories. Lurid tales of crews dismembered by mud raptors or mauled by crawlers. She remembered one Walpurgis night when her grandfather told the story of how his ship, the heavy cargo transport Albatross, narrowly escaped an encounter with an abyssal leviathan. Her dreams had turned to nightmares, and even now she imagined her plucky centaur being torn open like a can of preserved meat. Meat. The cold and the dark seeped in, condensing around her soul and gripping it with the icy touch of fear.

Her hand went instinctively to the captain’s pin at her lapel. A tinge of pride, like the warmth of a hand on icy glass, washed over her.

"Captain," she said, smiling faintly, "ECM Centaur."

"And currently in violation of station curfew."

She started, and turned around to see her security officer approaching. He was a short man with close-cropped black hair and severe eyes. His jaw was perpetually stiff from a fracture that had healed wrong, which gave the impression that he was constantly in a state of intense pain.

"I’m within my rights, Sergeant," she said. Bakhayev was a true believer. It irritated her. She was no separatist, but she was all too familiar with the failings of the Europa Coalition. But in Bakhayev’s eyes the Coalition could do no wrong, and she had received more than one propaganda-laced lecture from him on the subject. She sensed another one coming.

"A bit small for my taste," said Bakhayev, nodding towards the Centaur.

"She’ll do 41 Kilometers an hour," said Celeste. "Plus, she’s got the firepower."

"But not the armor," said Bakhayev. "Not for abyssal exploration."

"We’re not hunting pirates, Sergeant."

"At the rate the OSO is issuing bulletins for them we will. Besides, you’ll be missing the armor once we encounter mudraptors for the first time."

"I’m certified for combat maneuvering."

"Yeah, on academy simulators," said Bakhayev, scoffing. "It’s not the same as real combat."

Celeste opened her mouth, then shut it again. It was probably true.

"It’s fine," said Bakhayev after a long pause. "We’ll be fine. Retirement’s a ♥♥♥♥♥."

"Come again?" said Celeste.

"I was hoping my last years on the job would be less…risky," said Bakhayev. "Forty years of service and now I’m on babysitting duty. No disrespect, ma’am."

"None taken," she said. That was a lie. Sort of. She understood him, but she felt a burning desire to reprimand him all the same. There was a faint click of a lighter as he lit up a cigarette.

"Might want to replace one of the chainguns," he said, puffing at his cigarette. "They can be tricky for rookie-types to handle."

"You mean the midshipmen?"

"Yeah."

"I’ll look into it when we have the funds."

"Alright," said Bakhayev, "Rack time for me. Don’t linger too long, the OSO guys don’t like loiterers."

"Noted," said Celeste. The Sergeant wandered off in the direction of the station’s crew quarters. She pressed her hand against the glass, the frost retreating once again before the warmth of her hand, and gazed out for one last look at the Centaur. Then, with a satisfied smile, she turned and followed the Sergeant.

The ECM Centaur is a light deep diver, designed to be a start-to-finish campaign ship for smaller crews. It was developed to be highly maneuverable with small blindspots but minimal armor. Due to its speed, careful maneuvering can easily compensate for its lack of armor in most combat scenarios.

– x2 chain guns
– x1 railgun
– x1 small ssl launcher
– 4-camera CCTV array
– Battery backups
– Automatic reactor shutdown when docked
– Deterioration alarm for distribution junctions
– Meltdown alarm
– 41 km/h top speed