Target: Cambridge

[Ant]

The cocky smile was gone from the face of Spike Harris.
He leaned over the body of his wife Janine, gently brushing a strand of hair from her face.
Once she had been so beautiful, so full of life. Now here she was, lifeless, a contorted expression of pain on her face.

For a moment he envied his friend Mark Carlaw from the gunboat FireAnt, who had joined his family in death, who would not have to go on, to try to live with the loss.

Spike wondered for a moment at his luck.
He had survived the damage to the Frigate Exeter when the command deck had been hit.
He had fought and destroyed countless Nomad battleships.
He had fought the Darkstar and won.
Now he had survived an attack on Cambridge.
Checking reports on the Nomad experiments had kept him at the Command bunker later than usual. Why had he chosen to sleep in the bunker at the time of the attack? He could have returned home and been with Janine at the end...

He had signed on with the Sirius Federation for a reason, to protect Cambridge from just this kind of thing. By attacking the Nomads he had thought to protect all those dear to him.
The constant attacks on Cambridge by pirates and terrorists kept calling him back to Cambridge though.
And now a sneak attack had undone all he had fought so hard for.

How much damage had been done? Was there still any reason to try and defend a system constantly under attack?
He had heard rumours of a planetary shield under construction but was it just a rumour?

A look of grim determination crossed his face, replacing the grief.
He would report in and return to his post until these rumours could be confirmed.
He would keep the Exeter fighting and perhaps die to protect Cambridge.

One could hope.