RP: LSDF Akahar [Chapter 1.1] - Staring Back Again

Bastion wanted to swear just now. This whole thing was falling apart it seemed. At least the situation near the armoury resolved itself. Now their Freespacer friend was running away like crazy.

"Goddess damnit!" Bastion sweared in the end. "Would you be so kind and stop it before it runs into any trouble. Or causes them?" Bastion looked at Mist and Vatrh'dal.

"Bridge since Armoury is clear, where do you want us?" Bastion asked for directions. "Is there still enemy near livestock? We can go deal with that."

"I'll stick with Bastion, then. No point in sendin' alluv-us!" Merril declared. She swung her rifle onto her shoulder, beaming happily under that helmet of hers.

Keib was rummaging through his labcoat as he was lying down against a wall inside his beloved, shot up armoury, fossicking for something to calm his nerves - or so he thought. He'd stopped shaking completely, calm amongst the chaos. His breath was now settling into a steady rhythm as he kept searching his pockets. He then grinned when he produced a deck of Nepleslian cigarettes.

He pushed one out of the deck with a tap on the knee from beneath and pressed it against a hot piece of metal to ignite the cigarette. He didn't take a drag from it immediately though, and gave it a flick around his fingers, offering the filtered end towards Aiesu - ignoring that she might not even feel the nicotine.

She held up a hand dismissively, leaning back against the bulkhead behind her as she squatted, taking a slow breath. Looking at her, it was obvious she had her own methods - likely some emulation of an opiate or depressant within that strange software brain judging her expression.

"You forgot again." Aiesu said, cracking a wry smile - laughing under her breath. "I'm not a person"

"You forget too, sometimes." He grinned back before putting the cigarette to his mouth, taking a drag.

"I'm designed to. You're... Not" she glanced with that toothy smile. "I know this sounds stupid but... I'm hungry. Which is weird since... When your body goes into panic, blood leaves your digestive tract. Goes to your muscles. Fight or flight and all that." she pondered. "I'm designed not to panic then, is that it?"

"Again," He reiterated hazily, breathing the smoke out, "you forget too."
"Huh..." she said, rocking back and forth a little in a strange near content. "I could really go for a Phoenix Man! sandwich right about now. Ever had one?" Aiesu asked, glancing at the electrical burns along her hand and down her arm. She leant closer, scenting the bubbled flesh before grimacing - though her appetite didn't wain. Thinking about it, she hadn't eaten a real meal now in nearly two days.

"I think there's one in my minifridge over in the office." He replied coarsely as he started tapping the radio in his ear to double check if there was a connection.

"Don't tease me." Aiesu grumbled, standing to her feet with a stretch. "There's only one place that makes them in known space."

Keib smiled when he got a chirp in his ear, indicating a stable connection between him and the bridge. He made an 'ah' under his breath.

"Hm?" the L'manel glanced back at him over her shoulder - her shoulders slumping in relief.

"Bridge, Keib here. Man oh man," He started talking into his earpiece. "We're still alive, how's Away team holding?"

"Away team have taken down another armour, and there's one left in the lower decks, last seen near Livestock. What the hell happened on your end?" The bridge bunny was looking at the data that was parsed between Aiesu and the Tenshi that she was using moments ago, baffled by the stream of information. "We can't seem to get a camera feed in the room."

Keib looked at Aiesu and smiled. "We've held our own."

Slowly, Aiesu glanced skywards. She could feel the different systems of the ship now that she had access in a way AI only could. She tilted her head some - stretching again.

"The cameras were shot out. They didn't want anyone watching them. A stock Raptor has... Maybe one or two in a given room... There's six easily in here. Hakahn really likes knowing what's going on."

"The miserable bastard doesn't even put them in the right places." Keib sighed, so the bridge team could hear. "Speaking of which-"

"You really have no idea, do you?" Aiesu said, a pang of bitterness in her voice. "He's not watching for threats. He's watching you." She stopped there, remembering.

"-where the fuck is Hakahn?" Keib finished his sentence frowning. Hakahn might've been watching him, but it was as though Keib was being watched from behind one-way glass without any further input. It was like an experiment, or a staged act. "I demand a reply."

"Akahar doesn't know," Aiesu stated flatly. "He knows where he put them. He knows how not to be seen." There were no cameras in his room. Aiesu could see everywhere except that one room. It yawned and stretched like a black hole in the middle of an otherwise bright universe.

"Though... I think I can make an educated guess."

Keib's cigarette had burnt down to mid length. He stood up and nodded to Vithr and his patient, putting his hand up and telling them to stay where they were. This place had weapons, and only one way in and out. They'd be safer here than walking the halls. "Shall we knock?" His expression was bemused as flecks of ash fell to the ground by his and Aiesu's feet.

He felt a stray bit of ash singe the skin near his exposed calves. He looked down at the ground to see what it was and shook his leg to disloge the ash, and looked at Aiesu's feet again. "Where'd your shoes go? Put 'em on; broken glass." He almost seemed fatherly in tone.
She sat down, glancing over at the set, slipping them on. The zipper on one of the pairs was still hot - the paint on the metal having evaporated from the heat earlier, burning her as she slid it up along the back of her calf with no drama.

Keib's eyes rolled. "C'mon, its for your own good." He lectured as he watched her put them on. He noted how reckless she was, foregoing measures to try and quench the hot metal aglets and zippers on her shoes. He could smell her fingers and the flesh of her calf burning. It was almost as though she wasn't feeling them, or she wanted them to burn. Reckless behaviour, he thought as his head tilted at her.

"Why aren't you flinching?" He asked.

"From what?"

He pointed to the hot zipper, and the stains of white on the shoes, which he initially thought was blood from an ARIA. It didn't dry like it, and he'd seen plenty of blood dry.

She simply shrugged, following along behind him.

He then stood up and started heading for the cooling hole that was made in the Armoury's doors. He looked out into the intersection of the armoury and nodded to Aiesu that it was all clear before stepping out and leading the way to Hakahn's office.

"Away team, I think we've only got one armour left wandering around. I'm going to go check on Hakahn. Have you heard from him? Because I haven't." He monologued into the radio. "PS: How's our new guest?"
The bridge gave him a reply: "She appears to be running towards Engineering." Keib's eyebrows raised.

"Pardon?" He turned around to look at Aiesu and mouthed a 'what the hell?' to her before turning his attention back to the radio. "Bridge, get visual. What are they doing?"

"Uhh..." Aiesu grumbled quietly.

MEANWHILE...

"Dude what the fuck are we doing in a goddamn stable? There's an engine bay just a stone's throw away where we could deep-six the entire ship." One voice yelled out, clearly annoyed by his surroundings and watching his steps carefully.

"It was locked and I haven't heard from Griggs, Moore or Hadon." A voice from behind a loudspeaker yelling over the noisy aether converter that was powering his armour. "The Lorath wouldn't look here for us - and they'd think we're not a threat."

The other exchanged a glance with one of his companions, who shrugged. They were both unable to find the rationale behind this decision.

"'cause nobody would expect us to raid this part of the ship. They're going to send a diminished force here because we look too damn goofy."

Then one of them held up his fist and looked around. "Shh! I think I hear someone."

Down one of the corridors the Freespacer's rushed footsteps could be heard, practically tripping over themselves to get towards Engineering with the weapon in its hands, running scared through the lower corridors of the Akahar.

The bridge team gave a tweet towards the Away Team. "I can confirm the presence of one, two, three, four, five hostiles. One in armour. All of them seem distracted-"

"Yo! Hadon, that you?" One of the pirates called out as one of his cohorts was trying to coerce a cow. Wearing camouflaged cargo pants and a cybernetic eye, a rifle hanging from a sling on his shoulder. He guessed that it was him, or one of them thanks to how heavy the footsteps sounded.

"Moore?" He guessed again, walking from the stable with his rifle still by his side and looking around carefully for any sign of the AWOL pilot that he was swapping drinking stories with a few hours ago. He put a hand to his Paragon IAW nervously as his footsteps slowed down.

"Oh my Gods." The bridge crew could be heard groaning. "She's ignoring the binary to Lorath protocol. Quick." The sound of one of the bridge crew's heads could be heard bonking against the table, and against the enter key.

The Freespacer was given a message. The next thing it would receive was a pointer towards Keib's headset, on the fly converting Freespacer Binary to Lorath, and vice versa. What the Freespacer made of these developments would only be known to itself, and probably the observing Bridge Crew through watching its next actions.

Mars once again ran her options. Keib was in no danger now. Armoury was secured and if there would be trouble, bridge would tell her. There were still pirates in live-stock and there was crazy freespacer running about.

"Change of plans, we are all going to chase the freespacer," Bastion said to Merril and others. "Let's get a move one. Mist head on and catch up, we will be right after. When we calm down the freespacer, we will head to clean the livestock. Move out!"

"You got it, Mars," said Vathr'dal as he took off at a jog after the runaway machine. He was really wondering what had made the thing flip out like it did and go tearing off into the Akahar. It would be fascinating to figure that out. He kept his gun at the ready in case any other enemies showed up, and he had Mist with him as well, so Horizon wasn't really worried about anything except the machine itself.

ELSEWHERE...

The ship where the pirates had come from, an old, smashed up Origin 2A with some strange retrofits was still 'in the fight'. However, both ships were understaffed, and the combat ready crew of the pirate ship had dwindled to single digits while the ready on the Akahar hadn't budged, with a small group plus the last armour left near the Livestock room on the Akahar. It'd gotten close enough to send out a line to the Akahar, and it was... accepted.

The Akahar was now too close to the enemy to fire without risking more damage to themselves, and the Bridge Crew estimated that whoever was left on the Pirate Ship wouldn't be much, judging from the earlier shuttle invasions into the hangar only succeeding in four groups of pirates with an armour crossing inside.

If anything, all this gave the Akahar was a chance to invade the enemy's ship should its skeleton crew have felt the need. After crossing through a fired walkway that served as a grapple line between the Akahar and the pirate ship, Veronica found herself in the pirate ship's cargo bay, stepping through the hastily made hole where the tethering system lived. The smell of cheap booze and dogended cigarettes pervaded the air around her, drowning out the Akahar's sterile and slightly acidic aroma. Perhaps someone put, or left a Duq in the vents.

Veronica growled to herself as she power walked through the entrance to their ship. While it was true she hadn't made a specific time to put the plan into action, she felt like it was being rushed. Feeling too soon for not having everyone where she needed, and too late for not realizing that the ship they were boarding would've been perfect timing in the first place. She could only hope that no one had radioed back about suspecting her after hearing the struggle.

The angry geshrin started making her way around the crates from their last haul, heading straight towards the impromptu cells they had for possible ransoms. She recalled saving that one Lorath girl for her own amusement, one unlucky crew-member's crushed groin being all she needed to persuade them to let her keep the woman. Her teeth grit however as she heard a voice that most certainly wasn't her captive ahead.

"C'mooooon, I figure I 'aven't gotten any yet and we're 'bout to die, might as well go out with a bang." It was the ship's engineer, banging on the walls to the side of Rae's cell, pretending to push himself against the screen of energy arcing across it. He was the sort who although effective when he wanted to be would let his impulses guide him when the chips were down; often doing the wrong thing for his sake. "Gimme a kiss."

Still high off of her previous kills, Veronica's snarl was the only warning the man got before a boot collided with his backside, pushing the man's crotch into the field. The energy electrocuting the engineer, but the geshrin's boot not letting him be thrown back. As the high voltage coursed through his genitals and the rest of his body, Veronica spat at him as her boot stopped the conductivity. "Stupid fuck, told you to stay offa her." After the man's screaming slowly ceased and the room began to smell of charred flesh she let go.

She kicked the body off of the field to break the circuit, letting it dissipate across the metal floor as she leaned down and picked up his knife and pistol, still warm and tingly to the touch. She fired it once across the room to make sure it still worked. Satisfied when the round ricocheted off of the wall, she turned back to her captive.

"Hey there, sexy bird. You ready to kill finally? I know you've been all antsy about getting out. Put away your toys for now and let's go pay a visit to the dear 'captain'." She crooned to Rae, inputting the code to deactivate the field. "Get your sweet piece of ass out here, I got presents for ya." She waved the gun and knife in front of her.


((Thanks to Luca for helping me start!))

"C'mooooon, I figure I 'aven't gotten any yet and we're 'bout to die, might as well go out with a bang." Rae'lynn watched the pigfaced guard with a look of absolute disgust. If it wasn’t for the fact he wasn’t even worth speaking to she may have tried to get a word in edge wise.

Too late though when she noticed Veronica looming behind him, and a moment later saw him fry before her eyes. Horrible way to go, likely deserved. Once the field dropped, Rae had to admit it would have been so easy to try and rush Veronica. Being trapped on this ship was a constant reminder of her failure and she was not a fan. She reminded herself she still needed the quick talking pirate for now.

Rae'lynn made her way forward taking the pistol and the knife. She looked them over, a smile forming on her lips. She slipped the knife into one of her free pockets, and took a moment to look over the gun, making sure it was in order and loaded.

"Though you where going to give me a heads up before your plan went in though, I do have to thank your captain for his generous accommodations." She pulled the magazine out of her gun to check how many rounds she had left, then slipped it back in. "So what's the situation? Your plan still in effect? If so time to share it."

"It's pretty simple, really. Right now we're docked with another ship. Some Lorath among them. They're fighting back and thinning out the boys here. So essentially we need to go kill our way to the captain and the pilot. Need to get some information from them myself, and I thought you'd like to be a part of it." Veronica pats the pistol at her side.

"Way I figure, we have a fair chance at bartering with the other crew since they'll be worn down from the fight. I'll go on ahead and get the drop on anyone in our way since they don't know what I've done yet. You shadow behind me and help take down anyone else I can't immediately fuck up. Sound good?"

Rae's smile broadened out into a grin "Consider it done, and I hope a few of them have some fight in them, I am going to get some payback for every moment I was stuck in there." She took a moment to calm herself down and get her head back in the game.

"When you're ready lead the way, and lets make use of their distraction. Any idea how many of them are left?" she gestured to the fried out corpse "And I am going to assume some of them are a bit better then him."

Pratima ran, carelessly, senselessly, it's metal feet striking the deck loudly, and so hard that they occasionally threw off sparks. Then it heard the message in her native language. It squirted back a quick response, foot freezing mid-step somewhat indecisively.
While it hesitated, Pratima did the only logical thing, it set it's sensors to active mode, searching for the enemies ahead. Radar, lidar, and sonar pinged out, lighting up the droid on practically every sensor system that operated in more frequencies than the mark 1 eyeball and mark 1 eardrum.

On the other hand this intense burst of activity would allow Pratima to know the block of hallways it was in down to the least rivet, a powerful advantage for an engineer, especially if Pratima had some time to prepare an ambush for the likely now inevitable enemy scouting party.

It also reached out to every wifi net in the area, trying to brute-force through passwords instinctively to connect, and to connect to admin where possible. Somewhat more sophisticated tools, such as public key decrypters, were also in use.

As Keib was heading towards Hakahn's office, he could hear his earpiece playing up. He blinked, pulled it out of his ear and felt his ear ring for a moment as he wondered what it was doing. It was playing an old Lorath nursery rhyme.

"Aiesu, did you-" He turned around to look at Aiesu, who had paused mid-step, and somehow remained in perfect balance, not falling forward nor to the side. "Obviously not." He concluded as he shook his earpiece, trying to reset it.

He turned it off and rebooted it. "Bridge, what just happened?" He only got static interlaced with the Lorath nursery rhyme 'We All Fall and the Goddess lifts us up' for an answer. "Bridge?" Keib asked again, putting stress on the 'i' sound. He groaned and pocketed the earpiece. Aiesu teetered and stumbled as she resumed step.

Her sense of hearing and her sense of taste overlapped for a brief moment. "That tasted like metal, and coconut." She observed as she was blinking, looking down into the ship and through it into the engineering room.

Keib's eyebrow raised. "New guest?" He asked.

Aiesu chewed on her thoughts for a moment as she peered into the decks below with her new level of oversight on the ship. She nodded at Keib, who pursed his lips and sighed. He gave her a nod to keep moving. They had to find out what Hakahn had done through this entire ordeal.

-

The Away team experienced their WIND armours seizing up for a brief moment. Their views were temporarily clouded by multicoloured static and their ears would be filled with garbled cacophony. Their guns were affected too - they were now set to full auto, magazine discharge. Once the trigger was pulled, the gun would never stop firing until it was completely out of ammo. Controlling them would be a nightmare.

Down below things were panning out differently. The lone Demon's suit froze for a moment an two of his attendants noticed. "Ross, you okay?" One of them asked, waiting a few tense moments for a response.

Ross' speakers started playing the theme to the Phoenix Man! cartoon before his suit froze completely. Ross was seeing the first episode of the season on his vision screen in glorious 10800p. The computer system on his armour was now acting against him as it blinded his vision and locked his suit down.

"Ross, the fuck are you doing?" One of the pirates yelled over the noise. It was giving away their position.

"I DUNNO!" Ross tried to yell from inside his suit, only manifesting as a frenzied muffle beneath the jaunty theme song. As this unfolded before the huddled pirates in Livestock, their radios crackled to life to unleash a burst of static in response to the ping.

The pirate searching for Pratima had an unpleasant surprise as he was walking up the stairs towards Engineering. His rifle discharged as he was moving and he leapt reflexively. He grabbed it and pointed it towards the ground, away from his boots and away from anything else. It fired again, apparently at random.

As Pratima was making footsteps towards Engineering, she could hear something sounding like gunfire with every step she took. Within moments, she saw the engine room. A mess of cables and wires in the corners but neat in the middle. The observable engine of the ship from this deck appeared to be running in optimal condition.

She could see two other Lorath personnel in uniform, and if her memory banks served her correctly, they were Llmanel. One of them appeared to be thin and vaguely hawk-like, while the other was more rotund of build and seemed to have aspected with a dog, judging by the vague snout.

"...still contained, but what just happened?" The skinny one said to the fat one, who shrugged in reply. "Comms is out and my radio's playing freaking nursery rhymes."

"I dunno either." The fatter one replied before turning "The last thing I heard from Bridge was somethin' that hurt my ears, sounded like-" He turned around to look at what was coming in. "-binaryFUCK!"

He swivelled into action and raised a shotgun at the body Pratima. Something raced across the soldier's thoughts - this wasn't a Demon power armour at all like he'd encountered previously. Maybe it was a cobbled-together scrap monster of some sort.

"End of the line! Stand down!" He yelled in Lorath, and repeated in Trade.

"Wait, I see friendlies!" The hawklike one said, pushing the shotgun's barrel downwards and pointing about twenty metres behind Pratima.

As the Away team were spotted by Gough, they could hear someone cursing as their gun kept on firing and firing on its own accord. It didn't sound like a Lorath weapon, and every shot sounded like it was hitting the floor. Further down the stairs from the livestock area, they could hear a song sung in Trade, blaring trumpets and guitars.

The pirates safe position was given away as panic forced their hands as the sounds of frenzied bootsteps, misfiring guns and yelling heralded their ascent. Ross, however was still locked in his armour down below and watching Phoenix Man! clear out the base with the other vibrantly drawn crew members. "HELP ME!"

-

Keib and Aiesu were now in front of Hakahn's door. It remained shut since the combat started, just as though it'd been welded into place. Keib looked for the keypad and couldn't find one. It'd been retracted into the wall for security purposes.

Keib cursed as he tried to invoke the manual override from his earpiece, trying to contact the bridge again as he placed it into his ear. "Bridge, hear me?" He motioned for Aiesu to stand aside as he raised his pistol and removed the suppressor, sliding it into the holster.

"Loud and clear. Comms were knocked out by your guest."

"Figured." He was poised in front of the door. "Open Hakahn's door. Now." He flicked the safety off of his pistol and put his ear to the door to figure out what was behind it.

"Someone's overridden its securities - I can't get a visual into Hakahn's room, I'll try to-"

Keib heard something faint and shushed the Bridge. "...telling me...it didn't work...memories triggered...meddling bitch...Helashio...still alive...thinks he's...in Lake Ae'rys...failed me..." It wasn't Hakahn's voice. Who could it have been?

He recognised one word from that hushed exchange. Lake Ae'rys. He froze and lowered his pistol as his mind started to wander back. He was only a spritely lad of forty years young and remembered the smells of burnt flesh, the screams and cries for help, the questions he received from both sides. His cover was as deep as the ocean, so far below and beneath notice that he even fooled his superiors.

"Keib?" He heard a voice behind him. It was Mel'an. "Why?"

"Just... just following my instructions." He replied with hesitation, putting more of his weight against Hakahn's door. "N-nothing personal."

Aiesu, meanwhile had gotten the console to manifest from the wall and break the override, her cerise eyes tilted at the back of Keib's head as he was still listening to the door.

Luca said:

"...still contained, but what just happened?" The skinny one said to the fat one, who shrugged in reply. "Comms is out and my radio's playing freaking nursery rhymes."

"I dunno either." The fatter one replied before turning "The last thing I heard from Bridge was somethin' that hurt my ears, sounded like-" He turned around to look at what was coming in. "-binaryFUCK!"

He swivelled into action and raised a shotgun at the body Pratima. Something raced across the soldier's thoughts - this wasn't a Demon power armour at all like he'd encountered previously. Maybe it was a cobbled-together scrap monster of some sort.

"End of the line! Stand down!" He yelled in Lorath, and repeated in Trade.

"Wait, I see friendlies!" The hawklike one said, pushing the shotgun's barrel downwards and pointing about twenty metres behind Pratima.

Click to expand...

Pratima noted the two armed workers in the engineering room, and for a moment it's eyes flashed a deep, aggressive shade of purple, before returning to their normal colour. It looked at the cables performing a quick analysis, then began whistling to itself. An old Freespacer war song. It walked over to one of the cables and touched it, attempting to feed the information its ping acquired into the friendly tactical net through induction.

Once the feed was done it would attempt to connect to the ship-mind, not quite understanding that Lorath ships didn't have a cyberspace mind. This was likely going to produce some unfortunate side effects.

"No-Nnnnnn" Aiesu slowly glanced up toward Keib. Her vocal cords locked on the note, like a program locking up on inferior hardware - stuttering as she forced herself back into clarity, focus returning to her eyes. "Nnnnothing personal?"

Huh… Handshaking in a place like this? she thought to herself, feeling something whispering to the ship's own ARIA -- and her, by proxy as another ARIA. She soon dealt with it but in attempting to connect to the ships own, it was refusing her responses.

A soft klaxon sounded.

"Unknown Unit has connected" a flat voice said over the comms. "Beginning Systems Intelligence Quarentine"

The lights of the ship faded to a dim red with a deep metallic clunk as the system began separating and singling itself off. The lights flickered back into white with a resounding slam of the breakers as main power was restored.

"Level 3 response…" the L'manel pondered to herself, tweaking the red frames of her glasses.

"Keib. Something's got the ship spooked: She's locked me out and won't talk to me. I'm ... open to suggestions."

Mars frowned as her armour twitched and her radio went crazy. What was going one. At least they finally caught up to the crazy freespacer. Good thing it was not rampaging too.

"Gough what is the situation here? Had any problems?" She asked, but then she heard a gunfire. Comms were silent. She chenged her comms from the ship-system to good old radio.

"This Mars, does anyone here me? Ship systems seems to be going haywire? I hear gunfire, did anyone engage the enemy?" Before waiting to response, Mars turned to Mist and Merril.

"Okay we move out, I want to see what this gunfire is. If it is enemy we will take him out, then we move for the bridge. I dread the idea that enemy got there." She said to them.

"Either that was surpressin' fire, or it was a malfunction. Nobody wastes full clips like that unless they're stupid or new," Merril spat, sliding one hand down the barrel of her own rifle. She stroked it like some object of phallic affection, waiting to penetrate h-

This line of thought was getting strange, quickly.

"I'm guessin' it was them being stupid."

"That is what we are going to find out when we get there. I will take point, Mist is with me, Merril cover our backs." Mars replied with a nod. She then looked at Gough and her comrade. "Could you look over the freespacer?" She asked while she retrieved her handgun back from Pratima, who was busy connecting with the ship.

"...and we cracked that question wide open. I deduced that quarks do not exist in this dimension alone and they could in fact be in many places at once - we simply do not know where." Keib told Mel'an, who was leaning in, perplexed and engaged by Keib's discoveries. "Its just a matter of putting them all in one place."

"Keib, Oers'tad, that's wonderful! How did you come up with that?" She was an Occhestian woman about Keib's age at the time with a rounded face and a little mole beneath her left eye and cherry red eyes. She had long naturally black hair - such an appealing thing for Keib, as he had a head of it himself.

Beside her empty plate and napkin was a notepad full of beautiful handwriting and script that always drew Keib's eyes and attention. She was not a patron of the sciences like the rest of her kin but that's what Keib loved about her.

"Keib."

"You see, Oers'tad and I just put our heads together and compared notes." Oers'tad told Mel'an "Our brains are resilient things."

"Something's got the ship spooked."

"'course there was a duq or two!" Keib laughed and Oers'tad threw his head back to chortle in unison as the mad doctor held up his glass and motioned for Oers'tad and Mel'an. "I see a great future for the Occhestians with this breakthrough."

"She's locked me out and won't talk to me."

"I'll drink to that!" Oers'tad held up his glass and set a collision course with Keib's glass.

"I'm ... open to suggestions."

It approached rapidly as Keib reassessed his mind and believed his own lie. It would never work. It was never meant to work. It was a fabrication - it wasn't a breakthrough on par with Aether.

CLINKclinkclink...

It was something else entirely.

The vibrance and pomp had died as Keib gasped and grasped his forehead as a knifing pain shot through it. He remembered: his name was Mar'zhaz Keib 'Howler' New Tur'lista, not Mar'zhaz Keib 'Howler' Occhestian. He peeled his ear off of the door and turned around. "Wh-what?" Keib asked Aiesu for clarification.

The L'manel immediately began fishing through her messenger bag for whatever painkiller she could find.
"Now is not the time for an aneurism over some college fantasy, Keib" she grumbled to herself. Akahar is shitting bricks."

Keib took the painkillers and popped them into his mouth without so much of a second thought, swallowing them without a follow-up glass of water.

"Er, command 'revoke all * /core/akahar/sdb7; aria_ck /core/akahar/sdb7', or something." Keib mumbled in reply as he felt the lorath drugs begin to work on him. The command would disconnect all current users to the system and run a check on the Akahar's ARIA system.

"Thankyou" Aiesu stated flatly, sighing with an unwanted look of concern in her eyes - feigning disinterest. "So ... Who's Mel'an?"

Who indeed. Her name was dust in the wind now. Her body along with hundreds of others now laid the foundations for Matriarchy made housing for their obedient servants. "Later." He hissed in reply. "How's the check going?" From behind the door he could hear nothing. The room was now silent. Whoever was talking on the other side to Hakahn had cut the line - or did Keib just cut it?

She wrinkled her lip, grumbling again as glanced back from the panel. "The door was nearly open until the ship decided it'd had enough of playing ball. You're going to have to force it. But its vac sealed. Whoever's on the other side has the computer thinking the decks have been decompressed. She won't talk to me Keib. I don't like it."

"Bridge, status on hull?" Keib asked. "Anything with its arse to the wind?"

"Negative. There is a small, self-contained hull breach on deck four - a tether walkway of some sort launched by the pirate ship. I saw an unidentified person go through it just a couple of minutes ago."

"What'd she look like?"

"She?" The bridge stumbled before resuming with a cursory description, "Bright purple hair-"

"I think she's on our side. Keep an eye on her if she comes back." He then looked back at Aiesu. "Here's one to override a door. 'sec od 3 36'." Simply put, the command would go into the security interface, open a door on deck three, door thirty six. AKA: The one in front of them.

Aiesu tapped something into the door and a slow thud sounded. The lock unhooked but the motivators that should have opened the door didn't move.

"Odd... I think its been shorted. It isn't going anywhere without a wedge or something."

Keib bent down at the knees to look at the door's overrides. Now that the door was unlocked, it would've been possible to pull it open if you opened the little hatch on the left side, gave the release a pull, and put your fingertips to the rightmost edge of the door and started pulling.

The door opened as Keib put his back into it, and once there was enough room for him to put a second hand through and start pushing against the door he pushed it open and looked inside.

All Keib could see in the room was Hakahn's desk. Behind that desk was the back of Hakahn's chair illuminated by all of the monitors that he'd installed behind him, showing him the action around the Akahar as it unfolded. Some screens were peppering with white noise and others redirected to completely different feeds, including hardcore Nepleslian pornography, laughing Yamataians, a Lorath soap opera and some children's cartoons about cats.

The smell of burnt flesh and lingering sweat was hanging heavy in the room, as though the ventilation had been sealed to contain whatever had taken place in here.

Unperturbed, Keib walked in first as his shadow followed behind him into the darkness with his pistol raised. The light from the monitors kept on changing as they switched from scene to scene, bathing Keib in neon lights and redirecting his shadow as he stalked towards the chair. All of this screamed distraction to him. He swivelled the chair around to find it empty.

Cerise eyes followed, brows furrowed as the construct remained behind Keib, anticipating the worst again - dread building sorely in her throat.

Keib's hands trembled on his pistol and he squeezed the trigger at the chair. The suppressor of the weapon prevented a majority of the pistol's sounds from being heard, but the sounds of the slide and the bullet casing ejecting and falling to the floor in addition to escaping gasses were still obvious and plain as day.

The construct eyed Keib, an odd look -- hands up covering where her ears would have been with an expression which couldn't clearly be explained -- the bang of the bullets themselves almost deafening as they struck the metal back of the chair. Her lips were moving but Keib couldn't make out what she was saying, grumbling as her arms slumped as the rounds went silent, her ears still ringing. She watched with a grumble. The man couldn't stand still.

With that, he walked out of the office. Held limply by his side, his pistol had been completely emptied and the action was open and begging for a fresh magazine. The look on his face was furious. His eyes looked around for targets, his mouth was affixed into a scowl and his knuckles could be heard cracking on his other hand just by clenching his fist.

Clicking her tongue in distaste, she followed. It was all she could do.

-

Rae and Veronica's elevator had just stopped at the middle deck of the pirate's ship and they could see they knew how to get to the Captain's room easily. He always made it abundantly clear never to invade his private room. Veronica had heard rumours that this wasn't the captain's first crew - and he'd gone through a few. They died from a total wipeout on the job, murdered under suspicion of mutiny, or even left on their own accord because they could smell the blood in the air.

Without ceremony, the duo pushed the door open to find him at his desk watching things unfold on his computer monitors. He saw how every man in their Demon Armour had died frame by frame, and he was watching Ross be subjected to Nepleslian cartoons and being unable to move whilst groaning for it to stop.

The captain had no chin. You couldn't cut his neck because of how difficult it was to tell where his chin ended and his neck began. It wasn't even a double chin; it was more like a smooth surface within which his extra supply overweening arrogance was stored for the winter.

"...wasn't part of the deal!" Was all chinless could be heard yelling into what looked like a mobile phone as his voice kept on undulating through his massive chin. "We were going to split the treasure when we found it."

"Tough duq. Bye~" An unfamiliar Lorath voice could be heard coming from the phone before it went offline and disengaged. An uneasy static hung in the air before it faded away.

As Veronica's footfalls into the room signalled her presence, the captain and all six pounds of what alledged to be a chin turned around. His father obviously didn't fuck a giraffe. "V! The fuck are you doing here?" He reached for his pistol on the desk, having to lean backwards awkwardly. "I thought I told you to get shit under control!"

Beneath them, the sound of a shuttle could be heard leaving the vessel. The Akahar, meanwhile spotted one last vessel that simply zipped into hyperspace before it left. They assumed that it was the captain of the pirate ship.

-

"I'll explain later - incoming!" Gough yelled as he and Yar'mak moved next to Bastion, hiding behind her. Yar'Mak laid down on the ground with his shotgun as Gough went into a kneeling position with a handgun pointing at the stairs.

Bastion and Merril were poised and ready as they saw a bullet hit the ceiling above them, fired from an errant rifle that had a mind of its own. A whole group of stupid according to Merril was advancing up the stairs with their randomly firing guns pointing towards the away team. As one head came up over where the stairs met the floor, Yar'Mak fired and the lead balls turned the man's head into a red divot. He pumped his shotgun by pushing the stock forward and back across the slide rather than pulling the slide. He didn't have the elbow room for that.

Gough, meanwhile was firing his pistol as they came further up, aiming for the legs and making deliberate shots to make them trip over and cause further chaos and confusion. As they fell, Bastion snapped into action and fired into the crowd.

The pirates' initial volley was in tune with Pratima's footsteps, and the beat of that dance had now segued into different tune. Now it was moving with the heartbeat of the other most powerful entity on the ship that rivals the native ARIA. Aiesu.

Caught unawares, Shrie'Keng caught five bullets, two hit his legs and thigh, two struck him in the chest and the last one struck him through the jaw, shattering his bone and sending a red lashing through the air and staining the walls with red. His brain and head were intact, but his jawbone was shattered by the bullet.

BAM BAM ... BAM BAM! It was short, controlled burst fire in its purest essence before a command from Aiesu shorted out their guns in an attempt to get control of the system from Pratima. A stray bullet flew into the freespacer's metal shoulder and left a hole, sending sparks up into the air. Her connection to the ship was still in limbo, vying for control after Aiesu had booted her out, thinking that she was an intruder. The freespacer got this helpful message from the Akahar's ARIA. The freespacer could see a meter slowly filling up in its peripheral vision. It was currently sitting at 33% as it got account privileges sorted out.

The pirate’s initial assault had left three of them dead by Gough and Yar'Mak's shooting and three more were down by the Away team. Two were dead from Bastion's strafe and one from a snap burst from Merril. In the back of Merril's head, she could hear a voice.

McDoshAlmighty said:

You FOOL! It is a MAGAZINE, not a CLIP!

Click to expand...

The pirates dispersed from the stairs into engineering room and started hiding behind consoles and pipes as they pulled the magazines out and tossed them away, putting fresh ones in as they pulled the trigger without the magazine, and collectively beamed as they realised that their guns were no longer malfunctioning. By Bastion's count, there were five left, and no sign of the Demon armour.

The unfortunate Demon Armour was now subject to the second episode of Phoenix Man, and he could hear and see it in full 10800p and surround sound. He could also feel his temperature control failing, and the interior of the armour began to become uncomfortably hot.

"Status report away team, I hear gunfire!" The bridge radioed the remaining away team.

"Oh I DO have it under control, 'boss'." What little she had overheard piqued her interest greatly, but It'd have to wait for a moment. The thought of trying to shoot the hand going for a pistol crossed her mind for a split second, but that relied on too much focus and marksmanship. The simpler method presented itself.

She did what she does best, closing the distance quickly to tackle him in the hopes that even if he did grab the pistol, she was too close for him to aim it at her, in addition to one of her hands going for said arm. Her other hand reeled back for a punch towards his face. She hoped that the sound of a struggle would signal Rae to move in and help subdue him.

Rae'lynn had her weapon drawn and in hand when the elevator opened, it was raised and she was taking aim within the first heartbeat, before she could squeeze off her shoot though she was looking at the back of V's skull.

She swore under her breath and took a single long stride into the room before she started to circle to the side of the charging Veronica. The man wasn't large enough for her to charge as well, but if he had half a brain he would notice a gun already trained on him and wouldn’t pull over the one he was reaching for

“Drop it!” She shouted, though deep down she sure hoped he managed to get his hands on it. Always easier to justify an execution. As Veronica was on top of him so quickly she kept her gun trained and started to make a few quick steps, intending to shove the barrel of the weapon right into the 'Captain's' face if given the opportunity.

Her teeth gritted, Rae had a lot of things on her mind and subduing was not exactly one of them at the moment

Pratima stood in the engine room. It had been cut out. IT HAD BEEN CUT OUT. It began madly pacing the room, attempting to reconnect to the system. The bullet hit it in the shoulder. It fell to the ground and laid prone for a moment before cautiously standing up. It quickly began patching its shoulder. Its hand opened up revealing many small fingers that it used to knit the damaged wires back together.