These things tend to be short pieces that may or may not be the beginning of something else. I try to do them in 101 words but sometime not. . The prompt was ‘Purple Plasma’
Stanislaw rolled the cigarette slowly between his gnarled yellow fingers and stared out across the SSR Lenin’s launch deck. Attack vessels blazed across the blackness of space and flashes of purple plasma tore through the darkness as a Mark II cutter exploded in an iridescent ball of red and gold just off the starboard side.
He puffed out his cheeks, placed the cigarette behind his ear and tapped the com-patch on the lapel of his faded uniform. A second cutter slammed into the force field protecting the high hangar doors and exploded without so much as dinting The Lenin. She was a strong ship, old, but tough as old boots.
“Oscar, it’s Stan. You got me a ship yet? The boys are getting taken to pieces out there”
After a momentary pause the com crackled into life.
“Negative Stan, we’re all out. We have everything out there trying to repel them, nothing ship side.”
Stanislaw walked slowly over to the hangar entrance. “Okay Oscar copy that. First ship in is mine though okay?” He placed the cigarette in his mouth, pulled a small silver lighter from his pocket and lit it.
“Roger that Stan” said Oscar. “I know you don’t like to watch.”
“Copy that. Out”
Stanislaw took a deep drag and watched the small attack ships dance between the larger cruisers, picking each other off as the cruisers fired their heavy salvos towards each other.
“What a complete shit storm” he mumbled to himself and took another drag of the cigarette.
For two years they had dodged the Zentra trying to get back to Earth and now just a week out they had found them. It was going to be a long day.
Afterwards 
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