In the debriefing for the previous mission, Colonel Halycon warns you that you’re still on the clock. In character, you have just enough time to grab an energy bar, a fresh bottle of water, use the head, and head back to the flight deck. Hopefully the heroic maintenance crew (seriously, for the condition you bring some of their birds back in, those guys are miracle workers) has your fighter re-armed, re-fueled, and ready to go, with some 27th Century duct tape patching over whatever holes you came back with.
There’s no one in the lounge to chat with, other than Shotglass, who’d like to remind you to get your butt back into the briefing room.
And with that, we’re off. The cats have mostly left the system, but there are a few stragglers (would that be kitty litter?) It may be a bit of cold-blooded payback at this point for what’s happened to the Goddard colony, but we’re going to take out as many hostiles as we can on our patrol. Then again, some of the Kilrathi are getting greedy for some extra kills, since there’s a trio of Krants coming after the T.C.S. Tiger’s Claw before your fighter comes out of the launch tubes. Those Krants are backed up by a pair of Gratha. Nothing too difficult, but remember that you’re in a Hornet, not a Rapier, so head-to-head passes with Gratha are a Very Bad Idea.
After successfully defending the Claw, this turns into a pretty standard patrol/strike. There’s a group of Salthi and a Lumbari-class transport at Nav 1, and a pair of Krants with a Dorkir-class transport at Nav 2. Unlike in the previous mission, the Lumbari isn’t going to jump out, so you can kill the Salthi first (a fact I didn’t realize when doing the mission. Oh well, it worked out okay).
After debriefing, a squadron transfer (and maybe a promotion and/or medal), we get to see what’s really happened to the Goddard colony. Poor Shotglass isn’t going to be receiving good news.