Free Sacrifice:The Shenkar War by Seth Libby

engaged. Soon the Shenkar fighters came within range, and Liam lined up his targeting reticule and fired. Evan’s target disintegrated first under his volley of energy, followed soon by Liam’s and Crystal’s. Before the two opposing squadrons could pass each other, all the Shenkar fighters were destroyed.
                  “ Nice shooting, pilots,” came the voice of flight control. “Let’s add a little more Shenkar to the fight.”
                  Two-to-one odds now came at Liam and the rest of his squadron. When they closed with minimum range, they unleashed a blaze of energy as one. Ten Shenkar fighters were still coming apart in fiery explosions as a second and third volley of energy went forth to engulf the remaining ten Shenkar.
                  “ Well, then . . .” A sound of surprise was in flight control’s voice. “Let’s try four-to-one odds.”
                  The exercise didn’t go as easily as the previous two, but it was still apparent that Liam, Evan, and the rest of the squadron far outweighed the simulation’s idea of Shenkar pilots. The squadron once again destroyed eighteen fighters before the squadrons intercepted each other, and Liam, Evan, Crystal, and Dimitri also managed to destroy four more. Then they passed each other and started to make their tight turns to engage each other once again. The Shenkar fighters were almost completely turned to engage again when Liam and the rest fell upon them, destroying them. Liam looked over his status board to see if the few shots his fighter had sustained had done any damage and was pleased to see that his shields had held.
                  “ Can we set this game to hard? I am getting bored,” came Evan’s voice over the ship-to-ship comm.
                  “ Control, is this seriously the skill levels of the Shenkar?” came Crystal’s voice.
                  “ That would be correct, Lieutenant McKenna, but if you take a look at your flight recorder, you will see they were not as easy as they seemed. A normal pilot wouldn’t have been able to go more than one-on-one, but with your enhancements, everything will seem to move in slow motion due to your enhanced reaction times.”
                  Sure enough, when Liam looked over his flight recorder statistics, he saw that the sheer speed and accuracy of the attacks by himself and his fellow pilots was incredible. Soon the voice of flight control brought him back to the present.
                  “ Okay, people, that’s enough for today. Alphas 1 and 2, you have clearance to land. Bring it home.”
    Lining up his fighter with the landing bay, Liam eased back on the throttle as he brought it in for a landing. Inside the bay, Liam cut back the throttle fully and used ion thrusters to maneuver his fighter into its allotted port. Once settled, Liam cycled through his instrument panel, in reverse this time, powering down his fighter.
                  Looking up, he spotted Tim settling back in his cockpit as Evan and Crystal maneuvered their fighters in for a landing. Ten minutes later, all pilots had successfully landed, and the pilots climbed from their simulators. Looking around, Liam didn’t see Reeta anywhere. Spotting two scientists standing at the simulator control booth, Liam walked toward them.
                  “ Well, I think that went rather well,” a scientist was saying to his fellow coworker as Liam walked up. Upon seeing Liam standing there, they broke off the conversation. “ Yes? How can we help you, Lieutenant?”
                  “ I was just wondering where Reeta was . . . I had a few questions.”
                  “ Reeta has retired for the evening. The Meshtrell need to ingest a chemical compound regularly or the common viruses from our planet will kill them. You will be able to speak with Reeta later, but for now,