Chaos Rising

9

Sei'rik waited for the elevator to reach Engineering tensely. Her ears still pounded from the noise of the grenades going off. Even though she had closed the doors just in time, they weren't nearly thick enough to muffle the boom entirely. Admittedly, hearing the explosion had made the thought of what she had done that much more satisfying.

Both of the blasters were now in her hands, even though one would be somewhat more accurate. Now that she had a way to defend herself, she was worried that she'd lose the chance to use her weapons, so putting them down was out of the question. She had also been trained to use two in the Navy, so there was no good reason in her mind as to why she shouldn't wield both of them.

The thought of the guns made her wonder what to expect in Engineering. Surely the elevators would be guarded?

"Winter?" the Captain asked out loud.

No reply came.

"I guess I'm on my own," Sei'rik breathed. Several ideas came to her, but when she remembered that the elevator would make a noise when it reached the right floor, the element of surprise was out of the question. Then, another idea came to her.

Lying down on the floor in a crumpled heap, Sei'rik waited for the '4' on the elevator's holographic wall panel to become a '5'. She held her blasters in the shadows by her sides, with their grips still in her hands.

The elevator dinged and Sei'rik made her head slump forwards like she was unconscious or stunned. There was a hiss as the elevator doors opened, followed by the sounds of distant fighting, but a much closer sound caught Sei'rik's attention; someone cocked a shotgun and took a short step towards her.

"Looks like we got another one," someone said.

"Check she's stunned and get her to the-"

Sei'rik fired without looking up. The elevator's opening was barely wide enough for two people to squeeze through at the same time and the satisfaction of hearing a scream assured her she'd hit her target. Pushing herself up, she rolled to the corner of the elevator and aimed her pistols at the second pirate. The female Cataron had just enough time to look surprised before a bright white light slammed into her chest.

Sei'rik grinned. She was getting her edge back.

Getting back on her feet, the Captain looked around. The level was barely lit by stripes of emergency lighting, which cast long shadows in every corner. A wide corridor stretched out before her, running aft towards the engine block, while another one crossed it in front of the elevators. Sei'rik looked down at the two bodies in front of her. She couldn't just leave them in the middle of the floor.

The Captain dragged the two bodies and their weapons into the elevator, took a few sonic grenades and shut the doors. It was a while before she remembered that the distant echoing sound around her was actually the sound of ricocheting bullets. Heading towards the engine block, Sei'rik felt like she was stalking prey. Keeping herself close to the wall and moving through the half-light, the only sign that she was actually there were the soft blue glow of her blasters and the soft sound of her footfalls.

Turning a corner towards the engine block, Sei'rik started to see more than just the murky lighting. Bullets traced their way through the air from multiple directions. She knew the ship's layout well, even in the gloom, which helped her form a picture of what was going on. The small opening at the end of this corridor must have been used by the engineers as a bottling point for the pirates. She couldn't see anything of the room beyond, but the slavers with their backs to her told a story. The straggly slavers were taking turns to spray fire into the engine room, which would spark a sporadic burst of return fire. Sei'rik could have sworn she saw bodies in the doorway - and more than just a couple. For a moment, she was brimming with pride for her engine crew.

Keeping quiet until she reached the cover of a doorway, Sei'rik was ready. Her whole body wanted to reclaim her ship - and her honour. She leaned out of cover, charged both pistols and fired them straight into the backs of two slavers. They screamed loudly and spasmed, while Sei'rik got back in cover. 

The other slavers shouted madly, and tried to make a defendable position. Sei'rik grabbed one of the sonic grenades she had taken and armed it. It only took a quick two-second movement to send it skittering down the corridor. It went off with a shockingly annoying squeal. Sei'rik looked back to see it had gone off well short of the slavers, but the explosion had been bright enough to mess with their eyes.

Sei'rik was just about to fire again when a table came flying across the corridor from the starboard side of the T-intersection in front of the engine room. The table caught a pirate off his feet, while a hail of assault rifle fire made the already anxious slavers panic.

"Fall back!" one of them shouted. They sprayed fire randomly around them and ran towards the port side of the ship. Sei'rik ran out of her cover and fired shots after them. She almost felt robbed that the pirates had fled.

Another two men were also chasing the pirates, both in leather jackets similar to the pirates. Sei'rik almost aimed at them before she saw them firing and throwing stuff after the slavers.

"Don't shoot, Captain," said the one who was glowing with psychic energy. Was he a Human? Sei'rik had never seen that before.

"Just keep doing what you're doing," she replied. Without the passenger manifest, she didn't know whether these people were actually from her ship, but she didn't care.

They chased the pirates back to the nearest port-side airlock, where a shuttle had docked to extract them. The pirates didn't put up much resistance as the scrambled on board and sealed the airlock. Sei'rik ran right up to the triple-reinforced observation window and watched the shuttle leave. She hoped it didn't have any hostages on it. Too many had already been taken.

The two other men joined her.

"They won't come back," the tall man with the assault rifle said gruffly. "We're not worth it."

"They won't get back to their ship either," the psychic said, as he coiled his hands, drawing on psychic energy fields and held them out towards the ship. He groaned loudly as the shuttle's speed slowed dramatically. 

After a second, the psychic balled his hands into fists and smashed his two fists together. Sei'rik watched incredulously as the shuttle's superstructure rippled and tore, venting atmosphere. It was a tiny sliver of a ship, but the bursts of air leaking out of it told her that it was well pressurised. Sei'rik could barely believe her eyes. She had never actually seen a psychic in action; Techara never developed the trait, despite years of genetic experimentation.

The psychic discharged his grip on the shuttle before grabbing it again. He grunted a few times as his hands moved, twisting the thrusters around to point towards... the shuttle itself. Suddenly, there was a huge explosion and the psychic fell back to the floor. The Human with the assault rifle quickly went to help him, but Sei'rik's eyes were locked on the remains of the shuttle in the void. It felt like justice. She just wished she could have caused it.