SYNOPSIS:

Two space pirate ships attacked five ISS Space Guard patrol fighters. They were almost defeated, but escaped in the nick of time.

SPACE PIRATES

FADE IN. INT. - SHUTTLE - SPACE GUARD ONE - DAY First Class Warrant Officer MIKHAIL ARKANGELSKY and Sergeant GABRIEL ARKANGELSKY of the Science Police, a subsidiary of ISS (InSystem Security) sit, ready. SUPER - CERES ORBIT - ASTEROID BELT EXT. CERES SURFACE - DAY MINERS look for minerals using laser drills and high-technology equipment. Prospector ships are stationed nearby. EXT. CERES ORBIT - ASTEROID BELT - SPACE Two prospector ships and five Space Guards including Space Guard One are in orbit. Each aerodynamic Space Guard is fifty meters long, armed with mass driver cannons (MDCs) and robot missiles. Probes orbit Ceres, with the guards. INT. SPACE GUARD ONE - DAY The computer monitors mining activity in that part of space. Information in the form of text and schematics scrolls up the heads-up-display (HUD) of the view screen. Mikhail glances at the navigation computer screen and then takes out a few sandwiches. He switches on the drink dispenser. MIKHAIL Would you like some? GABRIEL Umm. Thank you, sir. MIKHAIL With the large amount of asteroids in this region, it would be difficult to spot approaching ships. He gives Gabriel a sandwich and a cup of coffee. (CONT'D) GABRIEL Yes, it's good that we have probes out there. We are also safe because the asteroids are over a million kilometers apart. Suddenly, two strange-looking ships fly toward the far side of Ceres. The probe in that region detects them and identifies them as pirates. At the same time, it sends the information to MIKHAIL's ship. INT. SPACE GUARD ONE An indicator flashes on the HUD. DATA-RETRIEVAL SYSTEM COMPUTER Alert! Alert! Two pirate ships heading for Ceres. Information and some profiles of the pirate ships appear on the HUD. The ships look like giant sea urchins. They are spherical and bristle with several cannon barrels. GABRIEL Co-ordinates of their location? DATA-RETRIEVAL SYSTEM COMPUTER Sector Tango, X7-D1-A49 GABRIEL Course and speed? DATA-RETRIEVAL SYSTEM COMPUTER Vector Two. Twenty-five thousand kilometers per hour. MIKHAIL Hailing Frequency. GABRIEL switches on the ship to ship hailing frequency. GABRIEL Opened. MIKHAIL Halt! You're under arrest! A stream of projectiles streak past the top of MIKHAIL's ship missing the dorsal MDC turret. MAIN COMPUTER Alert! Alert! We are under attack! The targeting system computer automatically turn on. MIKHAIL switches on the intercom. MIKHAIL All Space Guards take evasive actions! GABRIEL walks to the navigator's console and takes control of it without being told. He fires the steering thrusters to evade the shots of the pirate ship. MIKHAIL rushes to the center of the ship and climbs into the MDC turret. GABRIEL Isn't that first ship Lucifer's? MIKHAIL Yes. All Space Guards engage the pirates at will. The policemen in the other Space Guards acknowledge the order. They fly their spaceships to strategic positions in Sector Tango to protect the miners. Space Guards One, Two and Three attack Lucifer's Ship. The remaining two patrol craft attack the other pirate ship. MIKHAIL (CONT'D) Range? TARGETING SYSTEM COMPUTER One point three kilometers. MIKHAIL arms one Flaming Sword robot missile and switches off the MDCs. Then he moves the control stick of the turret. LUCIFER'S ship is centered in the computer-assisted gun sight. MIKHAIL presses the fire button. One Flaming Sword robot missile flies straight at LUCIFER'S ship. It hits it and explodes. It lists to starboard and attempts to return fire. LUCIFER fires a Hellfire missile at Space Guard One but misses. Space blossoms with dozens of spherical explosions characteristic of the microgravity environment. The prospector ships has formed a convoy and are flying away from Ceres. INT. SPACE GUARD ONE MIKHAIL arms the MDCs and holds the handle to prepare to shoot. He turns the handle left and centers LUCIFER's ship in the gun sight. Then he presses the trigger. The MDCs fire and the port of the ship explodes. MIKHAIL Eat lead! Suckers! MIKHAIL presses the trigger again and again while the two-meter-long MDCs track the trajectory of the enemy. As a result, it sustains many hits and explodes with the fury of a small supernova. Out of the conflagration, flies an egg-shaped spacecraft. It heads for the other pirate ship. LUCIFER appears on the communication view screen of Space Guard Obe. LUCIFER Impressive, Warrant Officer Arkangelsky, but I have not played my trump card yet! Two of the pirate's lackeys are standing at the background and laughing. MIKHAIL Give up! Lucifer! You won't get away from us. MIKHAIL turns off the view screen. EXT.: CERES ORBIT LUCIFER'S escape pod slows down as it approaches the second pirate ship, and executes docking manoeurvres. Both the pod and the ship give one an impression of an egg-shaped creature mating with a sea urchin. The port of the 'sea urchin' is gaping after missile attacks by Space Guards Four and Five. They also pepper her with MDC rounds, but her faster velocity saves her from being destroyed. INT. SPACE GUARD ONE GABRIEL Sensor scan indicates that the ship structure has been enhanced after the docking. It's now able to execute the 'Death Blossom Attack'. MIKHAIL gets out of the MDC turret and switches on the intercom channel. MIKHAIL Hold your fire!(I've got to think of something fast! Ah-ha! Hyperspace That's it!) INT. PIRATE SHIP 2 LUCIFER orders his commander to run systems check and his lieutenant commander to start the firing countdown sequence. The other pirates took over her astrogation system. A moment later, the targeting system and weapons system computers of the ship lock onto the five ISS ships. Then ten of her spine-like cannons fire at them. EXT.: CERES ORBIT There are five double explorations where the Space Guards were. Then they were gone. INT.: PIRATE SHIP 2 LUCIFER Ha! Ha! Ha! Execute hyperspace jump! EXT.: CERES ORBIT The ship seems to shimmer; then it disappeared. The five ISS ships appear out of hyperspace unscathed by the "Death Blossom Attack". Moments before LUCIFER executes the tactical strike, MIKHAIL has come up with a special manoeuvre. It requires all five ships to jump into hyperspace just millisecond before the cannon beams reach them. In this way, MIKHAIL and his people escape unharmed while LUCIFER thinks he has destroyed them all. INT,: SPACE GUARD ONE MIKHAIL (THERE WILL BE ANOTHER PALCE AND ANOTHER TIME, MIKHAIL THINKS.) Continue to patrol this sector with us, Space Guard Two. Space Guards Three, Four and Five escort the mineral ship convoy to Mars. Copyright (C), Lawrence Chun, 2013