"Save," Thirty

  Gunn stood the Backer on its side to snatch a quick look behind him.
   His panel told him that he had five pursuers back there, but he wanted to give it the hard-eyeball.
   His first instinct was to swing around and teach these raw Cylon crews a thing or two about space combat. But it would be just like the Cylons to stick a couple of seasoned Raider crews in there amongst the rookies. What a dirty trick for the Cylons to play.
   And Gunn was right, as the Backer slid, two of the Raiders slid with it. Captain Gunn could also see where those were the two Raiders that were keeping pace, while the others were beginning to lose distance.
   The veteran crew knew the tricks to keep the speed up in a Raider.
   Gunn cursed silently. Turbo-boost would be welcome. The Backer-Scout was no Starfighter, it didn't have the turning radius or the weapons-selection of the Starfighters either. And the change-of-plane, the dive/climb in space was somewhat suspect too.
   It did have range, but as he executed an S-Zoom thru some rubble, the veteran Raiders weren't shaking.
   And then he saw it, streaming along at the coordinates D-J12311, just like he asked. San-Maru had come through.
   The Orange-and-Black markings of the Friggan could be seen even at this distance.
   Full manuveur rockets in the vertical plane were going to attempt to hold  the Friggan in place while the capable engines in the stern were nearing head-thrust margins.
   Gunn unexpectedly veers the Backer to the distance ship.
   The Raiders miss a beat because Gunn had known to spot the Friggan first.
   It is the opening that Gunn needs.
   A couple laser-blasts explode soe distance behind him as the veteran Raiders open up out of range. Gunn levels the Backer-Scout even with the angled landing-deck.
   San-Maru has two lines of red pointer-arrows going for Gunn's benefit.
   Gunn levels the Backer and at the last moment drops his landing pads.
   There is a hard jolt as the Backer comes down on the armoured landing-deck. The Backer-Scout begins to careen but is steadied between Alley-Fields on either side and super-conducter alleys funnel in, and straightedn the Backer's landing padding.
   "Maru's got the Scrub-Catcher on, For Me!" Gunn laughs giddily as the Backer shoots down the deck, "If I survive this, I'm gonna wring his neck!" Gunn fights  the centrifugal and punches on the electormagnetic catching grid between the landing pads.
   Three red electomagnetic arresting beams shaft accross the landing deck at declining heights.
   The beams snag and hold the Backer as it crashes through.
   Gunn is thrown forward against his harness as the Backer yanks to a stop. And then there is a blinding  white light the Backer seems to be pulled on as San-Maru activates the superconductive clamps.
   The vertical thrusters are silenced and the Friggan begins to cut smartly through space on full thrust soon to be traveling at a speed to rival most contemporary starfighters.
   The pursuing Cylons correct course, and come at the Friggan.
   But laser-batteries pivot menacingly in the direction of the Raiders.
   The Raiders pace the Friggan for several microns unable to close the range, but are able to run numerous scans on the vessel.
   Soon at critical range from basestar, the lead Raiders wobble their wings to signal the newline Raiders to return.
   Gunn slouches in the cockpit of his Backer that San-Maru has the Friggan going fast enough that sdome of the stars even seem to be moving with them.
   A voice comes on over the Backer-link, "Greetings, one named Gunn."

   The Pugeant-Mercanary charge mounts the top of the line. The ferocity of their attack finds the Centurions best able to only be able to use their rifles to parry clubs and energy pikes, and to knock the Pugeants back off of the barrier.
   From a distance, Loxxon looks on with a certain elation. The Pugeant fighters were scrambling back up the defense just as rapidly as the metallids could knock them off of it.
The battle-plan was working. The metalloids would launch their counter-attack. And the Pugeant-leader still had a couple of moves left.
   In the trenches, the action became more intense. The out-numbered Centurions were having to protect themselves so hard that they could not take the time to get at their shortswords.
Increasing amounts of the Stinkies were topping the Rampart.
   The End Centurion booms to the designated Centurion, "GO," and finally manages to draw his bartered pistol and let a Pugeant have a close range blast.
   The Pugeant hisses and colapses back down the other side of the rampart.
   But surprisingly, the End Centurion sticks the bartered pistol back into his belt and resumes the hand-to-hand battle.
   More of the Pugerant mount the barrier. They can taste the ozone of the red-beams as the metalloids are attempting to process the fast-changing dilemma as rapidly as possible.
   And then there is a single round of laser-rifle hitting the rampart, coming from the fallback defensive line.
   The End Centurion takes note, quickdraws his bartered pistols and fires three shots in rapid succession, in the direction of the Pugeant.
   The Centurions receive the signal to fallback. The End Centurion directs the center two surviving Centuri0ns to fall back. They do so in good order.
   A Pugeant stands to get in a shot at the retreating Centurions and gets caught square by a covering shot from the covering Centurion. Rapid laser fire forces the other attackers to lie low.
   The damaged Centurion lying atop the parapet and the right-end Centurion also provide covering fire for their fellows.
   But the Pugeant sense the fallback and press the attack-surge.
   The right-end Centurion is signalled to begin to fallback. But as he begins to make his gait-march to safety, three Pugeant mount the parapet and launch their bottles.
   The blottles land and break in a line with the Centurion, and then ignite.
   The ill-fated Centurion seems to stop in mid-gait, frozen in place by the invisible flames.
   As the heat intensifies, and circuts and kit begin to melt, the Centurion starts to emit a weird whirring sounds, and then there are small explosions as the Centurion's internal mechanisms blow up.
   The End-Centurion  fires a shot that sends one of the blottle-throwers backwards.
   The Cemnturion stranded on the parapet fires his rifle point-blank into the Pugeant ranks until he is surrounded and he is struck by energy clubs from the sides and hacked and pulled apart by the Pugeant energy-pikes.
   There is no point in remaining forward. The End-Centurion bows and starts a quick  gait for the back. Anattacker is caught by two covering shots. The Pugeant fallback down the other side of the rampart and try to hit with lucky shots.
   But Centurion dagittedness wins out ove rPugeant luck, and the End Centurion starts to climb upon the second line and is pulled over by his fellow Centurions.