RP: The Fringe [Chapter 1.0] - New Hires

Ye Olde Den

Oreza had been worried Sienna would overreact to the actions of the Freespacer. They were a unique people and often misunderstood. But all of that was set aside when the predicted bar fight broke out.

What took the retired naval officer by suprise was the foolish act of violence by the newcomer, shooting the agressor in the leg and ensuring further violence. He managed a curse and to impose himself between Sienna and the fighting just before another Freespacer flew through the air and collided with him. He stumbled back, catching himself on a table and forcing himself back to his feet.

"I'm getting too old for this" he growled and checked to make sure no one had made a pass on his captain yet.

Ye Olde Den

The bar by now had turned into a miniature war zone. Bottles and chairs were flying, as were punches, kicks, teeth, sweat, and blood. It was complete pandemonium.

Sienna swore as she gritted her teeth, crouching slightly behind Oreza, her hand on the pistol on her thigh. "God damn it. So much for our--" she snarled, but her words cut off as she spotted a glass bottle flying like a missile in her direction out of the corner of her eye, and ducked underneath it. The bottle missed smashing against her face by less than two inches, instead whizzing overhead and shattering in a glancing blow on the far wall, sending broken glass everywhere.

The Freespacer that had bounced off of Oreza shakily clambered to its feet, testing its legs and obviously in pain, even though its veiny, gray face remained blank and expressionless. A short, heavyset Nepleslian man with a bull neck, perhaps the one who had thrown him in the first place, came charging at him from the rapidly spreading whirlwind of chaos around the bar itself, screaming like a lunatic as he speared the cyborg in the stomach with his shoulder and began to run him like a charging bull straight back at where Oreza, Sienna, and Six Four stood.

Over at the bar, Ravakee was back on his feet and had Mitch gathered up in both of his fists, pulling him up on his toes. Mitch was howling in pain from his shattered arm and from the bullet wound, but when the Gartagen's skull smashed into the bridge of his nose, his screams fizzled into a stupefied moan before he was knocked flat on his back, out cold, with blood sprayed across his face radiating from his broken nose.

As for Vel, the ID-SOL who had him in a headlock noticed the weapon that the Iromakuanhe newcomer brandished, and reached out with his left hand, easily twice the size of Vel's, and locked it firmly onto his weapon wrist, holding it out at arm's reach with uncanny brute strength. At the same time, his tree-trunk-sized right arm squeezed tighter around Vel's neck, and in just a few seconds of futile struggling, Vel started to feel the effects of oxygen deprivation, hastened by his frantic thrashing.

Just when Vel started to think he was going to pass out, either from lack of air or from the crushing pain of the giant holding him, more patrons started pulling guns on one another. One rang out, followed by a pause, followed by two more, one of which was evidently aimed at the ID-SOL. The giant roared in agony and stumbled to the side, involuntarily relaxing his grip on the Iromakuanhe just enough to flood Vel's brain with a sudden rush of blood and his lungs with air as he gasped on reflex. It took a second for him to realize that if he was going to break free of the giant's grip, this may be his only chance.


Concordia Veil - Main Corridor

By the time Crash started broadcasting his threats via the ship's intercom, Paul had dragged Amelia's limp form by her wrists along the grating back to the central airlock hatch, and were in the process of pulling her inside. When he heard Amelia's disembodied voice addressing them and promising torturous retribution, he froze where he was, still holding the unconscious astrogator draped halfway inside the airlock by the wrists, and went white as a sheet. "What the... who the hell is that?" he croaked, looking wild-eyed in growing alarm at his partner.

Datsan, however, wasn't fazed, and reached across the threshold to slap his blond-haired partner upside his head. "Shaddap and put her inside already," he snapped. "Probably just one of those automated security systems. I seen a few creative captains try to scare off the superstitious would-be hijackers. Superstitious nancies like you. It ain't nothin' to worry about, we'll disable it when we check out the cockpit." Reaching into one of his suit pockets, he produced a compact roll of thin high-tension metal wire and a clipper, and tossed it at Paul's face. "Tie her wrists and stuff her in a locker. I'm gonna go get the ship started up. We'll deal with her when we get this bucket off-world."

With that, Datsan turned and headed for the cockpit. Paul, though he made his displeasure at being struck quite evident with his clenched jaw and acid glare at the older man, especially when the wire coil bounced off of his cheek, didn't argue. Obediently, although grumbling while he did so, dragged Amelia the rest of the way in, rolled her onto her stomach, and proceeded to tie her hands behind her back as instructed.

Meanwhile, Crash worked to override all internal controls for the hatches, although the ship's stilted computer infrastructure slowed his progress. The outer airlock doors were successfully overridden and sealed, unbeknownst to the intruders, but it was now a race to see if Crash could lock the ship down before the hijackers were able to accomplish their goals, or discover that they had missed someone else aboard.

Ye Olde Den

Vel came to the understanding very quickly that there was no reasoning with the ID-SOL with as the man tightened his grip. This turn of events caused Vel to draw his retracted plasma staff with his free left hand, and prepared to turn it on the man had it not been for that shot that caused him to stumble and loosened his grip. Taking the opportunity he twisted his whole body slipping out of the ID-SOL's grip and pressed the head of the plasma staff to the wrist of the mans hand he was using to hold his own right arm, and fired a shot to destroy his ability to keep his hold, or gain a hold on anything else in the future as well.

Once he was free Vel slashed the mans undamaged arms exceedingly large bicep with his laser sword. He then quickly moved away from the man , rubbing his throat and leaned back on to a table as he took a pair of deep breathes to assess if any permanent damage had been done. He then holstered the plasma staff but kept his sword in hand."It appears that I underestimated these peoples capacity and comfort with violence." he said as he looked around for his pistol and hoped that someone didnt make off with it while he was attacked.

Ship

Hearing the response, Crash had to fight the urge to chuckle, instead he continued to berate them as he fought the crappy connections to the ship. It would have to demand that the wireless data stream systems be upgraded. "I am not just some crappy half assed security system... I AM THE SHIP. I suggest you stop trying to hijack me and slit your own throats, for that will be far quicker then what I would do to you!!! Do you understand what I can do through a maintenance bot? With its tools I would be able to slowly remove your flesh, keeping you alive the whole time... followed by the muscles and sinew..." Crash's description continued and got more and more gruesome and detailed (having access to the universes collection of horror films and medical journals helped there). It continued to moved and worked with the ship's computer...

He didn't have to work through the wifi long, he had reached his first patch point. It was just a simple flat universal serial bus connection, but it would do the trick to help speed the process up.

Concordia Veil

Central Airlock

By the time Paul yanked on Amelia's bonds one final time to make certain they were secure, his breath was coming in noisy gasps, and his eyes were wide and nearly unblinking. He looked around at the inside of the canister-shaped airlock, hyper-alert and practically expecting the walls to come alive and eat him at any moment. The disembodied voice echoing threats through the tinny-sounding speakers placed around the ship's interior were already wearing down his nerve.

Frantically, he dragged Amelia across the floor and stood her up with a grunt, pushing her into an open locker, and slammed the door closed. Anxious to get out of the airlock, he walked quickly back across the floor and went back out into the main corridor, but it was only after he closed the door behind him and locked it, sealing Amelia inside, that he realized that the corridor was no less claustrophobic than the airlock. He wanted to believe what Datsan said about the threats being hollow, about it being an automated voice programmed to frighten intruders away. His partner had been in the game a lot longer, and he respected his experience. But he still couldn't shake the stubborn suspicion that the very ship itself was alive, and very, very angry.


Cockpit

Datsan swung his legs forward, and let go of the handholds in the ceiling, dropping into the pilot's couch with a thud, and surveyed the unfamiliar controls before him. His facial features no longer had the paternal, approachable character to them, but rather were now twisted in a seemingly permanent scowl. He scoffed as he looked around, dragging the back of his hand across his upper lip as she shook his head. "Just my friggin' luck," he muttered. Jinsokus were common, and as easy as they were to modify, it was tough to find one that wasn't brand new with all of its stock equipment. Even though he'd half expected it, he was still irritated to find that he would have to figure out these unfamiliar controls before they could go anywhere.

Cracking his knuckles, he got to work.


Conduits

Crash, still hooked into the ship's systems, had finally managed to make some progress. The doors in and out of the cargo bay were overridden and locked down; the only way through any of them would be with a plasma torch now. The inner airlock door to the cargo ramp was sealed as well, and the plumbing was offline. The engineering section was next, but during his attempts to lock that section down, he came across an unexpected system link. By the time the spider-bot noticed it, it was too late, although not necessarily to its disadvantage.

A series of loud clicks echoed through the ship's interior, as one by one the lights inside the ship shut down. With the exception of the cockpit, which remained lit only by the glow of its instrument panels and computer displays, the ship was now shrouded in total darkness.

Concordia Veil - ???

Slowly but surely, Amelia started waking up, groaning as she did so. The first thing the young woman noticed, though, was the pounding headache, coming in periodic and very powerful pulses like someone was beating on her head with a hammer, which made her groan in discomfort and a little pain, like she had just came out of the worst hangover to date; Which was already strange for her, as she mused over it, since the only occasions that such a thing had happened were almost nonexistent. She only noticed something was off when she, with another groan, tried to reach for her head head and found out she couldn't.

She opened her eyes to look at what was around her, but then noticed too that -much to her dismay- her eyes were already open and it was the place she was in that was dark, dark and small, even for someone of a short stature like herself. The astrogator started to move around, slightly trashing around as she noticed that her wrists were bound behind her back, prompting her to recall the last things she remembered before she got stuck in that situation, which was just short of watching the two 'officers' inspect the second cargo bay. It took her just a few seconds to add two with two and figure out what had most likely happened.

At the realization of that, Amelia started to trash harder against the locker, at least for a while, until she realized that wouldn't do any good. She willed herself to calm down like before when she had 'met' Crash and think of a way out of the situation, taking her several moments to think through the pounding headache until she thought about a possible solution. Taking into account the rectangular shape of the place she was in and doing her best to wiggle inside the confined space, the raven-haired woman squatted on the hard ground, then slowly braced one feet in front of her, then the other, and used all her strength -as well as the electromuscles from her Dusk suit to assist her- to push her legs outward.

Ye Old Den

Six Four slung the flamethrower over its shoulder before quickly pocketing its medical gloves revealing its skeletal like mechanical hands beneath. Within a few moments the index finger on the right hand disappeared and was replaced with the lower end of a syringe. Taking off at a sprint Six four charged the blundering Nepleslian at full gate. When it was within about six feet Six four dropped to a slide, using both its and the assailants momentum to swing up and around onto the larger mans back jabbing the needle into the base of the mans neck.

The clear liquid rushed out of the small reservoir into the large bull Nepleslain as Six Four held on like a bull rider.

"What the hell? are.. you... trying...to" He managed to say before collapsing to the ground. Standing up over the now unconscious body, the freespacer cocked its wrist,ejecting a small needle from its index finger.

"Hostile incapacitated" Six Four said before going over to check up on the other downed freespacer. Checking his vital signs, something that was actually kind of hard to do on a cybernetic organism, Six Four set him up in a chair and put a glass of beer in front of him.

"This one recommends taking a moment to recuperate, your vitals are clear but internal injuries my be prevalent. Six Four recommends a trip to the clinic once this scuffle is over." Slipping a business card into the other free spacers front pocket, Six Four turned back towards the other two new patorns. "He's not dead" Nodding towards the large nepleslian on the ground, "Mearly knocked out, he should wake up in about 30 minutes or so."

Arming another needle into its hand, Six Four turned its attention to the melee swirling at the other end of the bar. Scanning the area Six Four's HUD was a flash of colors, pointing out various bits of information both medical and informing on who each person was both from personal experience and from polysense feed data. Six Fours sensors locked on to someone it hadn't seen before, well seen for long. The Iromakuanhe who had fired the first shot and had now removed the hand of another patron.

Moving at a quick gate, Six Four rounded a set of tables, nearly getting hit by a flying can of...something the surgeon couldn't identify right off the bat, all the while its helmet sensors flashing at a rate that would give someone a seizure or a kick ass light show. Priming the injection of anesthetic , Six Four approached the Iromakuanhe the preoccupied from behind and with a practiced precision and quickness made a quick delivery into the upper spine of its target.

"Mildly Apologetic: This one apologizes for the mild discomfort you are currently feeling, but Six Four has deemed you as a hostile threat that is endangering the lives of this establishments patrons." Withdrawing its hand Six Four ejected the needle before switching its hand backover to normal hand functions before passing the Iromakuanhe towards the handless and bleeding Nepleslian, looking over its shoulder to address it again. "Its a simple anestetic, normal KO time is roughly 20 minutes. Six Four shall take care of you until you wake up, free of charge."

Turning it's attention to the hand less brute Six Four held up its hands in a calming state. "Calm and Reassuring: Don't worry this one is a doctor, please allow me to stem the bleeding before you mess up the floor some more and potentially die from lack of blood loss."

Ye Olde Den

The ID-SOL, even with his profusely bleeding stump of a hand, was evidently too charged up on adrenaline and raw, unbridled fury to be slowed down, whether by his amputation or from the gunshot wound, made evident by the growing red stain on his right thigh. As soon as Six Four finished his reassuring sales pitch, the giant's good hand shot forward, locking its meaty digits tightly around the Freespacer's throat.

Shakily the monstrously massive Nepleslian clambered to his feet, lifting Six Four off the ground by its neck as easily as a child lifted a doll, his hypermasculine facial features twisted into a furious snarl with a hint of sadistic pleasure. "Ffffuck you," he spat through gnashed teeth, the veins in his forehead and neck bulging almost as those popping out of his muscled forearm, "ya fffuckin' Spacccer..."

The injection that Vel had received had no immediate effect, but the Iromakuanhe knew that it would only be a matter of time before the drug would kick in. Whatever he was going to do, he needed to do it fast.

More gunshots rang out through the bar, and the whirlwind of violence continued to spread. Just as many people were running into the establishment, eager to join in the fun, as were frantically trying to leave.

A pair of men locked in a scuffle stumbled towards Sienna, an average-looking Nepleslian and a lean, muscular Minkan, grappling with one another as they struggled to gain the upper hand on one another. The Minkan slipped one arm free and managed to connect a solid punch with the Nepleslian's jaw, whipping his head back and sending him reeling, but he never released his grip, causing the pair to stumble even faster, hanging on the edge of their balance as they gained momentum towards Sienna and Oreza. Just before they fell into Sienna, the young woman drew her pistol and leaped to the side, avoiding being knocked down as they tumbled to the ground. The Nepleslian happened to fall on top, managing to get his arms free and position himself in a mount on top of his opponent, and landed just enough lucky blows to knock the Minkan flat out.

Then, the Nepleslian climbed up, and the first person he saw was Sienna. Whether it was panic, bloodlust, or simply thinking that the young woman was between him and his exit, he roared and charged at Sienna, the look on his face making it clear that he intended to go straight through her. He didn't, however, notice the gun in her hand until it was too late. Two back-to-back gunshots later, the man lay dead on his back, two bullet holes in his chest.

Retaliatory gunfire followed less than a second later, sending debris and dust from the wall behind Sienna into the room. She ducked on reflex, her hands involuntarily coming up to cover her head as she kicked over a nearby table, diving behind it for concealment, and returned three more shots of her own blindly over the top of her hiding spot.

At that point, Oreza happened to catch a glimpse of the four-armed Freespacer bartender rising up over the bar, the massive barrel of a minigun slung over its shoulders. A metallic whine, low in pitch at first and then increasing as it gained speed, the barrel began to spin.


Concordia Veil - ???

Amelia strained as she pushed against the metallic surface in front of her, her strength slightly augmented by the suit, and it wasn't long before the metal began to bend slightly. Thankfully her small stature afforded her more mobility in the cramped space than a larger person would have, but it wasn't much. While she didn't have quite enough room to get a good blow in, she managed to curl up enough to deliver several semi-solid kicks to the door in front of her. At first she didn't feel any progress being made, but by the sixth or seventh one, the latch started to give. Two more kicks later, the door flew open with a loud bang, and a piece of the flimsy latch broke off, skittering across the metal floor and clanging into the opposite wall.

She could guess that she was in the central airlock, but aside from the dim red glow of a single small light on the intercom panel in a nearby wall, it was pitch black. Worse, her Datajockey and her sidearm were missing.


Concordia Veil - Cockpit

Paul raced into the cockpit, his nerves rattled nearly to the point of panic, and he closed the door behind him. Crouching on the platform above and behind the seat in which Datsan was working, he looked around the darkened cockpit wide-eyed. "What the hell is going on here?" he demanded from his partner. "What kind of goddamn security system is this!?"

"Damned if I know," Datsan replied, furiously working over the controls. He hadn't had much trouble deducing where the main flight controls and nav system were; even though he wouldn't be particularly proficient with it for now, it would be enough to get the ship moving. But something else concerned him. "But whatever it is, it's good."

"You mean it's what turned off the lights?" Paul asked.

Datsan shook his head, never taking his eyes from the computer panel at his right as he furiously worked his fingers over the volumetric interface. "That don't impress me," he answered. "But it's got the ship locked down tight."

Paul peered over his partner's shoulder, watching the readouts, and frowned at what he saw. "The main drive is disabled?"

"No, it's like it isn't even there," Datsan answered. "Damn thing disconnected everything. I can't do shit from up here." He waved his hand dismissively over his shoulder, shooing Paul off. "Get your ass into the computer room and see if you can override it."

Paul slowly started to shake his head. "Come on," he said hesitantly. "I got a bad feeling about this. Let's just call this one a draw and try another one."

Datsan's head whipped around and glared at his partner. "Stop being a puss and get back there already. We're already inside. Let's just fuckin' do this."

The blond man was clearly not convinced, but he shakily stood up and complied, heading for the computer room.

Concordia Veil - ???

Amelia rolled off the locker as soon as its the door was swung open, lying on her side as she started to catch her breath after the exertion she had just gone through. Her breath started to become more even and the pounding in her chest got slower, even though it was still there. With one of her many problems taken care of, the astrogator started to focus on the next one at hand, her binds. Already feeling like screaming bloody murder and wanting to go after the two men who did that to her, Amelia also noticed that the volume on her right thigh that used to be the pistol and its holster was gone, as well as the pouch that held her Datajockey on her back.

Grunting both in frustration, determination and with renewed effort, She rolled flat on her back, then brought her legs close to her chest, exhaling all the air in her lungs as she leaned back, lifting the lower end of her back with her entire weight basically pinned on her upper back and neck so that she could pass her bounnd wrists to the front of her body.

Ye Olde Den

Surprised at the medical precision of the freespacer to have gotten a needle between the exoskeleton plates that cover his spine, Vel paused to take in the new circumstances as he began to feel the anestetic start to slow down his muscle movements then deactivated his Faekraug turning on the safety then twisted out of the grip of the freespacer and quickly moved to grab his laiz pistol and put it into his holster. He knew that his time was short as his motor functions started to slow to a stop.

He used the few moments of his ability to remain conscious to stumble back to the wall, leaned his back against and slid down with a sigh before he shut his eyes and passed out.

Concordia Veil - Conduits

With a silent chitter Crash started the lights to pulse eerily as he continued describing what it was going to do to the fleshy ones aboard. Always careful to call itself the ship. Now that the bulk of the doors were under Its control Crash sealed them up tight, locking them so that only It would ever be able to unseal them, without major software manipulation.

"You two are sealed in me now... I am in control. Everything you knew that you called your life, now belongs to me. If you stop what you are doing and let yourself be locked in the escape pod room, then I may allow you to continue to breath, and be my property."

With the doors now sealed and its connection and control sitting better. The 'bot disconnected the hard-link and continued working wirelessly as it started to hunt for Amelia, if it could get her released and maybe back upright, then they might be able to work together to kill these guys and keep the ship secure.

Concordia Veil - ???

The cold metal floor provided no comfort at all to Amelia's already painful position as she struggled to work her arms under her legs. Her shoulders felt like they might dislocate at any moment, and her chin pressed hard against her sternum, choking off all but a thin supply of air into her lungs and bending her neck to the point where it felt like her spine might snap. The metal cable that bound her wrists dug severely into her wrists. If it weren't for the suit she wore, they would easily be sawing into her tendons.

After a few seconds of struggling, however, she finally managed to get her arms in front of her, much to her relief. Now it was a question of what to do from there.


Conduits

Crash could sense faint clattering in two places below it as it skittered along. One was coming from the central airlock, very near to its current position, and another bit of noise coming from toward the bow. It could only assume that at least one of the noises was Amelia. For all it knew, however, the two hijackers were still in the cockpit.

Concordia Veil - ???

If Amelia had to describe the experience, it would be like a going up a mountain of pain, with the latter increasing with the altitude. She clenched her teeth, trying to get her wrists on her front until with a very painful and loud groan she managed to do so, instantly going limp afterwards once she achieved what she wanted. Her breath came into short and ragged gasps and she waited for the pain in her body to lower, albeit the pounding headache didn't seem to want to comply to that.

The astrogator rolled to her side again, her eyes shut tight until it got bearable again. 'Now what?' She thought, opening her eyes and looking around the room. She examined what she could through the dim red light coming from the intercom on the wall, "Unbelievable." She said, managing to locate herself at the central airlock, the same place she had greeted the would-be officers before rolling onto her belly again and getting up.

Ye Old Den

As six four was hoisted from the ground it realized that it was in a bit of a pinch. Doing a quick calculation between the time it would take for him to bleed out to it suffocating from the lack of air, Six Four realized that the odds were not on its side.

"This.. one... apologizes" The freespacer managed to choke out before a a faint whine could be heard coming from one of the freespacers hands. Before he knew what had hapend Six Four plunged its medical saw into the wrist of the burly nepleslian that was choking it.

Trying to keep a steady grip with its other hand was somewhat difficult as the dark red liquid spattered over the faceplate of the Freespacers dark expresionless mask and ran streaming down both Six Four's and the Nepleslians hands. The sound was another mild annoyance, though it was quickly solved by Six Four mentally dimming its external sound receptors. Within a few seconds Six Four was back on the ground, enjoing the freeflowing air into its system.

"Again this one apologizes." It said dropping the appendage onto the bloody nepleslian on the floor below it, "For future reference you should not attempt to attack something who preforms surgeries for a living."

Wiping the blood off from its mechanical appendages onto its Doctors Coat, Six Four scanned the room for the, now presumably passed out Iromakuanhe. Spotting the individual in question slumped over on a nearby wall Six Four made a dash over to him, making sure he was indeed all right. As the Freespacer checked his vitals, it looked over and saw subjects 324 and 325 behind a flipped over table.

"Energetically: Hello again, do either of you require medical attention?" It 'shouted' over the hail of chaos that was swirling around the room.

Concordia Veil - Conduits

Slowly and quietly Crash crept up to the two areas of sound. It hoped to find its pet, then release it to hunt. Well maybe the fleshy pet wouldn't hunt, but she could be trained if Crash kept her alive long enough to train. Carefully he crept along scanning into the dark for the fleshy female.

Ye Olde Den

Oreza dodged an agressive man wielding a broken beer bottle, sending the man careening into a table with a well placed shove.

"I think it's time to get out of here" Oreza advised, noting the bartender hefting a minigun. He worried, Sienna had discharged her firearm and from what he could see the man she had shot would never get up again. It had been self defense for sure, but the shooting added complications that would be hard to explain to the authorities and take a long time. The minigun did not sit well with him either.

"Come on, Sienna, time to withdraw. We can meet our contact another time. This is going to get messy" It was not that he was scared of violence or that he did not like a good fight, all Nepleslian's did. He just knew when it was time to go and the bartender pulling a Gatling gun was that time.

"You should probably get clear too, Doc" He added to the Freespacer.

Concordia Veil - Conduits

Following the nearest noise, Crash came close enough to the central airlock, near enough to detect Amelia's voice as she muttered in frustration to herself. There wasn't any way inside the cylindrical room from the ship's innards where the spider-bot was crawling about, but it did have direct control over the inner lock hatch, it knew.

Close to the same time, Crash sensed electromagnetic variations in the cables running every which way around him; signals from the ship's computer that he didn't send. And since there was no computer access from inside the airlock where Amelia was trapped, it was quite clear that one of the hijackers were attempting to gain control of the unresponsive systems, although he couldn't tell exactly what they were doing.


Ye Olde Den

Sienna's head snapped back down under her makeshift cover as another burst of gunfire flew wildly overhead, as she looked over at Oreza, obviously concerned that her first mate was standing completely exposed in the maelstrom of chaos. She nodded in agreement nonetheless, and eyed the open exit that let back into the tunnels of the shantytown, planning how and when she was going to make a run for it.

At that moment, however, the minigun from the bar opened fire, steadily raking hot death indiscriminately across the brawl, mowing down no fewer than six patrons and spraying their blood in long plumes behind them as they dropped to the ground, dead before they hit it. The bloodied carcass of a half-naked dancing girl spun into Oreza's arms and collapsed, her purple-tinted eyes wide open and vacantly staring at the ceiling. The deafening machine gun fire stopped as soon as it had started, but the whine of the minigun's barrel was still clearly audible as it continued to spin, largely because the unexpected heavy munitions had temporarily stopped all other muzzle reports and caused people to dive for cover, or simply to press themselves as close to the floor as they could. The bartender's monotone, but exceptionally stern, voice boomed over loudspeakers hidden in the ceiling. "All combatants, cease hostilities immediately and holster your weapons. Lie face down on the floor and await further instructions," it commanded authoritatively. "I will have order in my establishment, and further violence will not be tolerated."

Flying metal box!

Once It found Amelia, Crash moved down to the inner hatch and opened it. Clattering a laugh Crash quickly scurried up to her shoulder before letting out a digital clearing of a throat. "I have control of the computer systems and most of the ship... They are scared.. I can smell their fleshy scared sweat." It chattered a bit more... Though one is trying to gain control of the computer form me.. But since I'm part of the computer I should be able to hold them off for a bit... Get weapons and help get them.. i have promises to keep with them." Chrash's voice was one of a calm strange toned male's.

The ship's inter-comm chimed up again this time with a evil sounding maniacal Amelia's voice. "I'm Loosing My Patience... You Will Surrender And Enter The Escape Pod, Or I Will Release My Maintenance Bots!!"

Crash chittered again quietly to Amelia, "Sorry about using your voice... But it is really spooking them."

Amelia was still lying down on the floor and staring at the red-tinted ceiling, pondering what she would do then. Run, or hide? Those were two very distinct possibilities that she was considering; If she ran and Sienna came back, she and Oreza would both have to deal with the hijackers, and as much as Amelia was starting to dislike the woman and was sure that her first mate could very well eat those stun batons -and and spit out some beautiful piece of metal craftwork back at them- it wasn't the right course of action. Not because she felt morally obliged to to do it and keep others from harm, far from it since they had come to Black Moon willingly, but because she somehow felt like she brought that predicament and leaving one offense like that go unanswered did not beget her, she wasn't a wimp.

When the hatch was unlocked and started to open, the astrogator sat up, raising her bound hands in defense, only to quickly lower them once she hear the usual clattering and saw the metallic glint of Crash. She sighed, relieved that at least something -or someone- had come to help her, because there was no way for her to leave the airlock chamber on her own, no matter how 'brilliant' she been in escaping the locker. She even chuckled once she heard her own voice come through the hatch, for once not finding it frightening or eerie, "It's alright." She said to Crash once the spiderbot had climbed on her shoulder.

Amelia got up with another grunt, using her hands to support her and then looked around for anything she could use as a weapon. "Are they locked in somewhere?" She asked as she moved around the chamber.

"Sort of.. I have control of most the doors of the ship. We can move about freely but they can't. Though I think one is in engineering.. trying to get control of the computer... We need to be quick and disable him."

Crash scanned It's pet and found that she was still bound. Carefully it moved down to her arms and wrists and using it's mandibles clipped the wire so that t would fall away. "There you go... Do you have any weapons... or shall I just vent the whole ship?