Bastion charged over the the computer console and started charging across the room towards the pirate as he was reloading. A pirate jumped up over with his rifle raised to try and intercept her as she was running across the room, but he was shot down by Merrill, taking two bullets in his side and one through his biceps, falling to the ground with a thud, firing his rifle into the ground on the way down.
Bastion leapt up and her knee connected with the pirate's chin, and she followed through with her momentum, finding herself on the other side of the cover, wrestling with the pirate and pinning him against the ground with a crunch as his jaw became further dislocated and his arm started to bend uncomfortably.
As she wrestled, two pirates who were also behind cover to Bastion's right turned around and levelled their rifles when the lights went started to flicker and change colour whilst jets of flame retardant foam covered the pirates. One of them fired and a burst narrowly missed Bastion and the other pirate, missing by a foot to the left too far and hitting the bulkhead.
Their eyes stung and their breathing was impeded. One stood up and stumbled over the console, landing face down on the floor and meeting four bullets from Merrill. Her remaining bullets sailed through the air and struck bulkheads and consoles, and the action remained open, wishing for a new magazine. Gough and Yar'Mak stood up when she ran out of ammo and continued laying down covering fire in Merrill's place. Buckshot pellets and rifle rounds filled the air and shattered against the bulkhead.
The arm Bastion was pinning with suddenly gave way with a crack and the pirate screamed. HIs shooting arm was now useless and he could be considered out of the fight. Pratima's drone darted through the maintenance hatches and started harassing the foamed pirate. It fired the laser weapon at it repeatedly until he stopped squirming, coughing, writhing and firing erratically in the direction the laser was coming from. The drone was darting back into the hatch when it had to dodge enemy fire.
It caught a stray bullet in one of its forelegs and it whirred in alarm as it fell forward unbalanced and landed on the floor. One of its other legs moved to compensate for the missing leg and it skittered back into the maintenance passage, closing behind it and locking itself from intrusion. It sent a message to Pratima as it stayed in the passage.
Code:
=SITREP=
FORWARD RIGHT MOBILITY LEG DAMAGED
FORWARD RIGHT TOOL ARM SCRAPED
OPERATIONAL CONDITIONS HAMPERED, BUT STILL NOMINAL
COMMENTS: 0W, FUCK! 1 US3D TH4T L3G T0 CL34R MY 01L R3S3RV3S!
There was only one pirate left, and he was fumbling with getting a fresh magazine into his rifle through the noise and confusion and lights before Bastion leapt on top of him, grabbed his rifle and started smashing his face into paste with the butt stock, cracking the outer shell of the rifle in the process and rendering it unusable as a firearm.
There were six, there was believed to be four, then it turned out to be
five, and then there were none. An eerie silence fell over the engineering bay as the broken rifle was tossed away and clattered across the ground.
They were all dead.
Except for Shrie'Keng, whose leg and jaw were not bleeding nearly as profusely as before. He gargled in relief that the fighting was over.
-
Since his collaborator was gone, the pirate Captain counted on how outlandish the story was to get him through this slip. "We were looking for something big together and the little XO on
that ship has figured it out how to get it better than anyone else." He held up his hands and waved. As he waved his hands, the fat on his arms roiled from side to side.
"I was gonna shoot my contact and make the XO my bitch to lead
me to it, but he cut me out and ran. No idea why, something musta spooked him and he backed out!"
It was a mundane situation to him on paper, but he wasn't sure who had spooked him. The reality was much darker, and he was completely unaware of it.
With his piece said, he breathed slowly and steadily and waited for the girls' next moves.
-
The owner of the snow-white tail turned the chair around a little bit, peering with wide, pale eyes and, from what Keib could tell, a dejected but somewhat thoughtful expression.
"Hello, Mister Keib. I am sorry I left you, Mister Keib."
Keib raised his right hand and smiled only a little. "I'm just glad you and Greg are in one piece." Looking at him, you could see the sweat staining the singlet he was wearing, and the occasional red scrape and purple bruise. For the most part, unharmed but otherwise fine. It did not strike much of a contrast with Four-Six, who also sported quite a bit of blood. The red splotches on her otherwise pristine uniform were very distinct, but little of it touched her skin or fur. She had apparently made her way unscathed, except for those she had been scathing.
Looking at the blotches, Keib raised an eyebrow before looking at one of the dabs of red that wasn't his that was on his coat. He held up four fingers, indicating how many had died on his and Aiesu's course.
Four's tail curled, and she held up all five fingers. "Mister Keib, there is something you should know." He nodded in reply for her to continue.
"I saw someone come out of Captain Hakhan's quarters, Mister Keib."
Aiesu grimaced, fingers tightening into a slow fist at her side.
"Go on." Keib said, leaning in.
The small, white Helashio glanced around the bridge, then back, tail curling the other way uncertainly. It seemed to be the soldier's only readable expression; her face didn't so much as twitch, though her nose did scrunch a little. "Everything is over?"
Keib shook his head as he looked at a view screen showing the fighting going on in the engineering bay. Four, no,
five dead pirates and the away team plus Gough and Yar'mak. Four-Six followed his gaze, then trailed it back to Keib's eyes.
A certain sort of reluctance became evident in the Helashio's tone. "It might not be nice to say in combat, Mister Keib."
"They might not get another chance to know."
Standing up, Four crossed to the Captain's chair and leaned down, whispering a name in Keib's ear. Then, she straightened, glancing over Aiesu dispassionately for a brief second before looking at the view screen with the combat again.
Notably, the fluffer had found an assault rifle somewhere, and wore it with the butt and grip bloody. Someone hadn't wanted to let it go.
Keib simply leaned back into his and crossed his arms, exhaling slowly and furrowing his brow. "Acknowledged, Soldier..." He looked at the view screen again and found that one of his soldiers was absent from the fray.
Where could they be?
"Oh, did you hear?" The Lmanel bridge bunny looked over to Aiesu.
"Huh? Ah, sorry, I wasn't listening," she said, obviously in her world of her own. Whether what she said had anything to do with what the others were talking about, Aiesu honestly didn't know.
"The person the Away Team rescued turned out to be a Freespacer."
"Hence the handshake..." Aiesu mumbled. "Do you know where they are now?"
"They're in the engineering deck with the Away Team... and the pirates. AkahARIA has given her the rights to one of the troubleshooter drones." She looked over at the action on screen and winced as a pirate's skull was turned into a cup. "We're keeping a lid on her network activities until we know she's trustworthy."
"You're putting a lid on a spacer? That's..." Aiesu wrinkled her lip, trying no to laugh. "She could probably overpower the ship inside half an hour if she really wanted to."
She. Aiesu looked aside for a moment. Why had she assigned 'it' a gender?
"She did. We're trying to subtly direct her into help us." The Lmanel bridge bunny replied, making a whistle. "According to AkahARIA, 'she' has a vested interest in keeping the ship alive."
She? It really was a she? Aiesu felt a small victory of probability tingling between her ears. "Well yes, without the ship she'll..." Aiesu was saying rather obvious things now. "When things have calmed down a bit, tell her to come down to the med-bay."
The Lmanel shrugged and nodded in reply. She couldn't think of a reason not to. "Maybe after Keib gets everyone rounded up."
"Fine, fine." More waiting? Aiesu couldn't stand it.
The bridge bunny noticed how Aiesu was fidgeting quietly. "What are you thinking of doing...?" She left the last word to trail in the air.
Aiesu cleared her throat. "Just an evaluation. I'm an AI researcher by trade, so naturally this is quite an opportunity," she said, wiping her lip with her wrist in a rather uncouth way.
There was an awkward silence between the two of them.
"Why are you looking at me like that?" the construct grumbled.
"Trooper Bastion, this is bridge; status report." The Fyuunen bridge bunny asked the away team. "Keib, Aiesu, Four Six and Greg are unharmed and accounted for." In a manner of speaking, of course. "How's the Freespacer?"
