Eight, nine, ten, eleven. I quickly lose count of my kills. All I can focus on is keeping my finger pressed hard against the gun trigger. I fly recklessly through the battle, taking unnecessary risks and putting myself in danger. At this moment I don’t even care if I live or die.

Fifteen. Sixteen. Maybe eighteen?

My laser fire ignites the black of space, my ship cutting through the Horkax hordes like a knife against butter. I see several of our own ships go down in flame, and it only makes me angrier. How long have we even been out here now? Ten, fifteen minutes? Time is a distinct concept, the only thing I can focus on is the hammering of my heart and the distant rip of laser fire as it leaves my ship’s cannons.

“Come in!” the voice of a Riga commander crackles in over my hub and I turn up the volume to listen while hunting down two Horkax dogs that want to flee. “This isn’t a skirmish at all, repeat, this isn’t a skirmish! Our radars are picking up two more groups inbound. All ships retreat beneath the dome and we’ll activate the anti-artillery. Retreat at once!”

Oh hell no. I push my thrusters harder and tear away from the dome, taking down three more Horkax ships while groups of Riga fly past me in the opposite direction. Their voices crackle through my radio. “Come in Fighter 19, are you there? Retreat at once!”

“Damn,” another voice says. “Maybe their radio is broken.”

Another voice comes up then. I recognize it. It’s Vax. “It’s not broken. It’s Piper’s ship. She’s being stubborn as hell.”

His voice sends me into a fury and I can’t hold my tongue anymore. I punch the button for the radio and fire words back at Vax. Conversation is war right now, and I’m all out for the kill. “Yeah, I guess you could say I am pretty stubborn Vax, or should I call you, Corben?”

More Riga ships fly past me, I circle through the air listening to the deafening silence of the radio, blasting another Horkax ship as I do so. “What’s the matter?” I shout. “Lost your tongue?!”

“You looked through my things.”

“I guess so. Figured I was entitled to the truth after all this time. But hey, maybe I’m crazy. Tell me. Do you really have directives to get as far away from earth as possible, or are you actively fleeing the Argonian mothership because you’re a wanted—” criminal is what I want to say, but his voice cuts through mine.

“Enough. We’ll talk about this back on the ship. Get back at once and land!”

“Go to hell Vax. I’m not coming back until I shoot every last one of these bastards.”

“Two more groups are arriving Piper, you’ll die if—”

I decide I’ve heard enough of the liar’s voice today and punch a hole in my radio. The button probably would have worked fine, but I’m not really in the mood for being gentle right now. I swoop across the battlefield a dozen more times, taking out the last of the Horkax stragglers from the first group. My defiance to stay up here must have inspired a few other pilots, because there are five more fighters up here with me.

A siren flashes on the radar in my cockpit and I look down at the orange disc to see a flock of white dots moving in from the right side. Orienteering my ship in that direction, I flip around and then I see the second wave of groups in the skirmish. I freeze momentarily at the sight. There must be a thousand Horkax ships flying toward me, arranged in the formation of a giant wall of death.

A Riga fighter ship pulls up beside me and I look over to see it’s Vax. He mouths something to me, pointing down at the console. I roll my eyes and punch the button for the radio, surprised to find that it still works.

“Of all the women on earth, you had to be the one I was stuck with. Why can’t you just do as your told and go back to the ship?”

“What’s the matter? Can’t control a woman if you don’t have a magical collar moving her about like a doll? Don’t bother telling me to go back. I’m staying.”

“We haven’t got time to go back anyway, and I can explain the Corben thing if you’d just—”

“Don’t make me jettison myself into space Vax, because you’ll know I do it.” We stare at each other in silence across the void and he shakes his head disapprovingly.

“Whatever. Suit yourself. You got a plan for the wall of death that is approaching?”

I look out at the approaching Horkax ships and rack my brains for a solution. Nope. Nothing. “I might have a plan. What about you?”

“Plan A was to leave five minutes ago. Plan B is to leave now, Plan C… fly forward and die.”

“Plan C sounds pretty attractive right now. Why not fly forward and show me how it’s done?”

“Grow up Piper,” Vax scowls. I’m about to snap back when three more ships rise up besides us. Loola’s voice crackles in over the radio.

“Thought you guys could need a hand!” she says. “I just landed and heard Piper Denzel and Vax Enzala were still up here, about to fight a Horkax skirmish single handed. Well… I’m not letting you guys get all the credit. What’s the plan?!”

“Vax was about to be cannon fodder for us.” I stare at the approaching wall. The Horkax are maybe two minutes out. I grind my teeth in rage.

“Knock it off Piper. We’re up here because of you now. I’ve got the most experience in combat, so I’ll take charge. If we fly around them and pick off their flanks, we might be able to wear them down that way.”

Loola answers. “That… might work, but I also feel like we’re disassembling a house of cards from the bottom. And we’re standing underneath. It’s dangerous.”

“It’s all we’ve got,” Vax offers. “Unless you have any other suggestions. Let’s be honest, this is a suicide mission, house of cards or not… I don’t need my in-ship calculator to tell me what the odds are here, we’re space-worm meat.”

“Wait a minute,” I say, remembering something. “Shut up a second.” House of cards. House of cards. The phrase conjured up an image in my head. It was a memory of our escape from the jungle planet. The wall of Horkax ship’s chasing after us as we left the atmosphere. They were in the same formation they were in now. It was almost identical.

I’d shot the one in red and they all fell. Like a house of cards.

“Piper?” Loola asks.

“I think I know how we can win this,” I say. “I’ve seen this formation before, back when we were on the jungle planet. I hit a Horkax who was dressed in red, riding a red hoverbike. He must have been a commander or something, because all the others shut off as soon as he died. It’s like they were connected to him.”

“Wait a minute,” Loola says. “I’ve heard that before. Hive theory. We’ve never been able to prove it.”

“Hive theory?” Vax asks.

“Yeah,” Loola says. “Our research on the jungle planet was related to it. Riga scientists have thought for a long time that Horkax are hive-minded. A Queen sits at the top, commanding the whole army. Generals sit under her and command fleets. Under the Generals are Lieutenants. They control skirmishes like this one, and the one we met back on the jungle planet. The problem is that we’ve never been able to differentiate between Horkax before. They all look the same.”

I shake my head. “No way. There’s a definite color hierarchy between them. I think that highlights their ranks. All we got to do is hit the reds. Most Horkax are the same color, but there are definitely ones that stick out from the crowd.”

Loola and Vax both sit there in silence, I turn my head to look at them and they stare back at me as if I’m mad. “What?!”

“Horkax are all the same color, Piper,” Vax says.

“Yeah…” Loola says. “That’s what makes it so hard to prove Piper.”

I look up at the wall. My radar tells me the Horkax are thirty seconds out. “Well consider this geniuses. What if I can see the colors but you can’t? We’re different species after all. It’s entirely possible.” I fire up my ship’s thrusters and my cockpit vibrates at the torrent of fire bursting behind me. Vax and Loola follow suit.

“Are we really about to fly head first into a Horkax skirmish on the whim of a crazed earthling?” Vax says.

Loola sighs. “Seems that way.”

“Stay here if you don’t believe me!” I snap back. “I’ll do this myself!” I punch the thrusters forward and accelerate toward the wall of death. Vax and Loola are at my side almost instantly.

“WARNING,” my radar screams. “TURN BACK NOW. WARNING—” I punch a hole in the radar, deciding that I don’t already have enough holes in my cockpit. The Horkax start firing. Neon green laser fire arcs toward us. I dodge the first few easily, but soon there are so many it’s like I’m flying up into green rain. Green rain that can kill me.

“My ship is hit!” Loola screams a few moments later. We all unleash fire and the next assault begins. My window is filled with a dizzying array of laser fire blasting in all directions, and it’s all coming for me. I duck through the assault, weaving and blasting more ships than ever. I see Loola’s ship on the far-left. Smoke is billowing from her wing, but she has her ship under control.

I’m wondering where Vax is when his ship swoops up from underneath mine in a tight spiral, taking out a dozen Horkax in the process. I’d almost be proud if I still wasn’t mad.

We go deeper into the skirmish and the chaos only gets worse. Things start to get claustrophobic. I’m starting to panic.

“Where’s this lieutenant Piper?!” Vax roars over the radio. I hear an explosion on his end of the radio and see his ship burst through a dome of pink flame. I’m turning frantically in all directions to try and glimpse a Horkax that stands out from the rest. I’m seconds from giving up when I see a flash of red behind me.

“There!” I yell, looping my ship back around and turning to bring myself level with the red fighter that is just in front of me.

“I can’t see anything!” Vax says. His ship his pointed in the same direction. I even see Loola glide past the red lieutenant ship, but she misses it too.

“Nothing here!”

To hell with it. If you want something doing, do it yourself. I gun the thrusters forward, dodging wreckage and other Horkax ships to catch up to the red pilot. The locust fighter loops around and we make eye contact just as I pull the trigger. He knows I know.

My pink laser bolt screams through space and hits its target. The Lieutenant fighter goes up in fuchsia flame and then the real beauty happens.

“They’re stopping!” Loola screams. “All of them. Every last one!”

We hang there in the depths of space, watching in amazement as a thousand Horkax ships go offline and crawl into an infinite stasis. Ships collide with each other, and we have to get out of the cloud quick before we get kamikazed by a dead Horkax fighter. We fly back from the battlefield as victors, back through the safety of the Riga ship dome, back to the recess of the giant city.

I guide my ship down through the access tunnels to the flight deck, switching on the auto-pilot to let the ship navigate itself back to its landing dock. The ship lands gently and I throw back the glass hatch to exit. I look across the hangar and see hundreds of Riga fighter pilots. They fill the mammoth flight deck. As I climb out the ship I’m met with rapturous applause. I want to try and keep my cool, but it instantly goes to my head and I burst into a massive smile.

Vax, Loola and I somehow get corralled through the crowd together. Everyone wants to see us. Everyone wants to shake my hand. I don’t even have time to be angry at the blue-skinned moron right now, I’m just elated I managed to help the Riga.

The elation fades fast when Lady Bonnix pushes her way through the crowd to meet me. “Hell of a fight Denzel. You’re going to have to talk with our Generals about the tactics you used up there. If Hive theory really is true, then we might have a chance at wiping out the Horkax once and for all.”

I’m beaming, but then reality kicks in like it always does. “I can appreciate you probably want to celebrate right now,” she says, “but I’m afraid we just received word from the Argonian mothership.”

Vax and I stop dead in our tracks to stare at each other. He looks at Lady Bonnix. “What did they say?!”

“Is earth okay?!” I add.

Graveness consumes her. “Vax Enzala it pains me to tell you this but Commander Raka died shortly after the first attack. Beck Orbis has taken his position and now controls your army. He sent signal an hour ago saying the mothership radars have picked up signal of the second assault.”

We both freeze. “You mean—” Vax says.

“That’s right,” Bonnix nods. “The Horkax have begun their second attack on earth and will be there within the next three days. Our assistance has been requested. The Riga mothership begins its journey back in the next hour, and our pilots are currently preparing for a lightspeed departure. In the meantime, I’d like you both to come with me. We need to make a plan of war at once.”

“Hold on,” I say, jabbing my hand out to stop Bonnix. “Are you telling me were going back to earth?”

“Affirmative. The Riga and Argonians are jointly responsible for bringing the Horkax invasion. We feel it’s our duty to rise to the call. Now please, follow me.”

Adrenaline thunders through me, mixed with a feeling of nervous excitement. We follow Bonnix off the crowded flight deck. The Horkax were about to attack again. Argonia and humanity needed our help.

I was going home.