Computer Closet
Sacre was tossed into what amounted to a closet with a lock on the door still naked. She lay there on the floor, thoughly misrable. Next to her, a fellow lamia, Maradia, was wired into something. Sacre didn't quite understand it. However, the formerly independant lamia now needed a battery if she wasn't connected to the ship.
Maradia looked at the many wires linking her to some of the ship's computers, connected to the exposed cables running through her tail. She was deeply saddened by what they had done to her, she was previously an all organic lamia, but they had replaced much of her with cyborg parts. The battery they installed on her didn't last long when not connected to a power supply, no-doubtedly in order to discourage her from attempting to escape. Admittedly though, one of the few comforts she had aside from Sacre was being able to feel the limited set of systems she had access to. She winced, seeing how harshly Sacre was thrown back into the room, but she was at least glad she came back alive. "Sacre..." she said softly with her electronic voicebox, before using her access to the computers to turn on a heat lamp for the both of them.
Sacre looked towards Maradia. Turning over lethargically, and the welts from her beatings. The harsh electronic voice contrasted with the proper hissing sound of their native language. Sacre didn't want to be touched, not after how she had already been touched. She slid off of the cold metal decking and into the warmth of the heat lamp. She curled herself at first beside, then gently around Maraidia. She cuddled with the other Lamia and very firmly didn't cry. Sacre wasn't as defiant anymore, but she wasn't letting the pirates get that small victory.
Maradia paused when she heard the sound of her own voice and sighed. She had forgotten it sounded different from what it was supposed to for a Lamia. It still resembled her old voice, but something about it was... wrong. She wanted to hug Sacre, but she didn't, she didn't think the other Lamia would want to feel her jarring metal arms right now. She was hesitant to cuddle her back, seeing the markings from the beatings she sustained recently. She didn't want to make her hurt more. The cyborg let Sacre curl around her though, closing her eyes and resting her pink-haired head against Sacre's.
The green hair mixed with pink as the two sat in their tiny prison. The ship rocked suddenly. There was a click from the door. Sacre looked towards the door. "What's happening?" She asked.
"I... do not know," the other serpent replied with a nervous look on her face. She scrolled through the computer logs she could see in an attempt to locate anything of importance, though she didn't have access to the full array of them. She also looked at the door, then at the wires that prevented her from leaving the room. This time, she moved to hug Sacre with her artificial arms out of worry. "Sacre... I am scared..." the cyborg admitted.
Sacre wanted to say she wasn't scared. To put up a brave face for her friend. However, she didn't know anything. She didn't understand anything about the ship they were on, or the ones they had been on. What they had done to Maradia was horrifying and her limbs and the way that the metal melded with her skin was unsettling. "I am too." Sacre finally admitted, taking the artifical arms. Maradia didn't respond. "Maradia?" Sacre asked. Sacre slid forward, closer to her friend. She was more like a unnatural statue that wasn't breathing, wasn't moving, wasn't looking around. When she looked into her now mecanical green eyes weren't moving. "No." Sacre said, her hands moving to try and find a pulse. She didn't realize she wasn't pressing hard enough to get the faint, but still present beat of her friend's heart.
"No. No." Sacre said, thinking she was now the only Lamia on the ship. Sacre slumped, feeling completely powerless in the face of the death of her only friend. She felt the anger rise inside of her. How could they do this to her? To someone as innocent as Maradia? In that moment she knew she wasn't ever going to be beaten again. She was going to join Maradia and take as many of them with her as possible. She stood and moved towards the door with a deadly purpose. She hit the door with her fist, suprised when it just swung open. Sacre looked back at her friend, "I'm sorry. Goodbye." And slid out of the door.
The cyborg girl was not dead, however. She wasn't sure what happened. She couldn't see anything. She wasn't just disconnected from her power supply, she was knocked offline instantly. She was terrified now, but she couldn't do anything about it. She tried to move something, anything. Her arms were completely without life. Her mouth was artificial now and wouldn't move without power. Her eyes wouldn't move. Her tail, despite its organic appearance, still could not move. The servos that were implanted in her tail to increase her strength were locked up, and the organic muscles she had left were not enough to budge it. She tried to scream out to Sacre that she was still there, but nothing came out, her artificial voicebox required power too. She needed to get out of here, but now she didn't even possess the ability to try to break free. She was trapped not just in this room, but in her own body. Her mind was the only part of her that still worked, and inside of it she cried, a cry no one could hear.
--
Airlock
The pirate ship had been set adrift by the EMP blast that disabled everything electronic on the ship. The two ships that had disabled it circled for a short while. With no response from the drifting ship, they had decided to send two teams to board the pirates and take the ship. Xiara triggered the manual release on the airlock, letting it open into the ship's hallways. As it did, a dead body slumped into the airlock, the lower half of the body was crushed, and there were lots of stab wounds on the top half. Whoever had killed this person clearly wanted them very dead and they were nowhere to be seen.
The Chief of Security for Eselberg Station joined the team to enter the pirate ship. It was her duty to deal with pirates and now that the ship was disabled; she thought she should join the team to enter and deal with the pirates inside. When Xiara triggered the manual release, she nodded to them in appreciation and stepped forward, though when the body fell in she dodged immediately. The Orc warrior was statuesqe in her beauty with Raven hair slightly unkempt. She wore black leather armor and carried with her a double bladed axe for the close quarters of the ship. Her eyes matched her green skin in coloration. She was a tough fighter, but not a leader in the security forces.
Around her, she heard swearing from the unnamed members, but Makoto she simply took note of the wounds. “Potential ally is free. Be on your guard,” she ordered and stepped forward into the ship proper. Her right hand was on her Katana hilt as she strode in. Her eyes looked and her nose flared as she took in the scent and sight of her surroundings before her and soon she proceeded further into the hallways.
Following behind Makoto, Klaus carefully checked the corner with his boarding weapon. It was bullpup rifle configured in a 6mm caliber that wouldn't pierce the hulls. Hearing a small beeping from his datapad, he lifted it up.
"Air levels seem good, Makoto. It's possible there are no hull breaches, but better safe than sorry." Turning towards Makoto, he stowed his data pad and gestured towards the divergin pathways. "As cliché as it sounds, maybe we should split up in teams of two? It'd make it easier to scour the ship."
Makoto turned to glance at Klaus as he spoke and nodded her head in agreement. He was right, it was better to be safe and sorry. She glanced to the diverging pathways and nodded. “Agreed, remember any pirates or slavers, send them to the Underworld where demons can have their fun, especially slavers. They are a blight on a universe, and Zuphin, hate Slavers, I’m all too pleased with making the Zuphin happy. Also, keep an eye out on our potential ally “ She said indicating the severely damaged corpse and proceeded on the right path followed by Ziara and Klaus.
--
CRS Sykian Moon, modified Hellcat gunship
[Start internal communications records]
J: {Seems someone brought their own fireworks to the party. Operation kick off has just been moved up.}
C2: {Roger, moving the SM into a parallel flight path, stealth going full tilt.}
C3: {Wilco for suite up, preparations are ready for operation kick off.}
C4: {Knowing you L, they were done an hour ago.}
C5: {Alright, stroke each other later. Heads in the game. J, what’s our window of insert, op, and exfil.}
C6: {Hopefully more then twenty, want an op to last longer then then the last job in Kiilo.}
J: {Preferably one hour, in and out. Sweep, collect data, and proxy release of everyone we can. Optimally without breaking the boat, but these unknowns might shake things a bit. End result, mission time estimate only, conditions unknown.}
AI: Probing their systems now that we’re in range. Checking IDs and IFFs. Pirates are the obvious answer for our target. The unknowns however.. Are locals as far as I can tell. Ship IDs as the Sadistic Spriggan, currently set to a dock location marked as Eselberg station. Engine trail gives a general direction, however, the ship's design is very odd and foreign compared to some of seemingly newer systems.}
J: {Probably a second hand purchase, or salvaged vessel. Keep digging, I want a port location. C2, find us an entry point.}
C2: {Got an open hangar that vented when the power failed, field was taken offline. Should be empty by the bodies floating out.}
[End internal communications records]
The Hellcat with it’s optical field up, and thermal systems containing it’s heat, had pulled into a flight path alongside the slaver ship. Finding the open hangar, glided in unseen, before rotating and opening it’s modified troop bay. A ramp of half the normal size, and on the right half of the usual ramp width, lowered to disembark the commandos aboard. Unseen figures dropped to the deck, artificial gravity still waning here, the five moving to the closest door.
The troops moved forward to the door. They opened it, sliding open to reveal a currently unoccupied security station, with lots of shackles, batons, and even a few long poles with a loop of wire at the end. Beyond the security station were rows of cages. Some small, some large. Most of them were empty, but a few had individuals in them. Some from known species, some not. A Velcorex cruelly stuck in a cage too small for it indicated that they were not just dealing in slaves, but exotic animals as well.
Making sure to close and seal bulkheads behind them, as to not vent what atmosphere was being held inside the disabled vessel. The team moved forward, only lingering to give everything a brief scan before continuing on, finding the caged captives. Some sensed the presence of invisible warriors, recoiling cautiously from those that neared the outside of their cage, if they even had the room allowed to do so.
Those that were more coherent and calm, whether aware at first, also picked up on the disturbance and leaned close as if curious to an unseen presence. Those with far greater eyesight, likely saw the slight shimmer of the air as the commandos moved about, unaware of what they stared upon. Those that were calm, would find their doors open, and release a single figure coming into view from the haze that had kept them mostly hidden.
One happened to be a Sykian from the colonies, who recognized the armor, even if unmarked. “Take the others that can be handled and pull back into the next compartment for now. Learn their syntax with this and direct if you can, we move ahead.”, was all the armored commando would say as a hand held device was thrust into their hands. And with those directions, the team moved onwards again to continue the search.
Coming to the juncture with the hall, the sounds of agitated grumbling could be heard outside the bulkhead. It was hard to tell what the conversation was about, perhaps about the sudden loss of stability in the area when the atmospheric shield bubble released the contents of the hangar. Whatever the topic, it mattered little, as listening they took rough count. Having the other four step back to the previous bulkhead, the remaining commando stayed by the door, plugging into the side panel for their AI to access.
With a hiss, the door slid up, the small gathering on the other side, surprised to silence by the sudden opening. They eyed the emergency lit compartment beyond in weary confusion, which was suddenly diverted by a metallic clink on the floor. None of them recognized the duskerian fragmentation grenade that had just rolled in as if from thin air. As one reached down to examine it, they never realized the folly in time before the blast suddenly shredded exposed flesh, and the concussive blast hemorrhaged anything not in a blast suit.
As the steam and smoke wafted into the vents still, the four standing back gave a short release of weapon fire into the aftermath. As the commando still on the other side of the immediate bulkhead shook off the jarring vibration from the otherside of the door, took the opening to charge in and quickly start dispatching whatever was still moving with carbine, and arm blade as it was slid out from it’s bracer mounted housing on the forearm.
--
Bridge Level
Klaus, Makoto, and the rest headed right, going for the bridge. Everything about the ship said it had been well used. There was rust in several places and some of the hatches creaked as they opened them. As they came up the stairs onto the bridge level, there was a scream cut short and then two gunshots. As they hustled down the hall towards the bridge entrance, the air conditioning ducts overhead moaned as a unexpected weight was put on them.
Xiara looked around, her green eyes picking up what they could in the light. "We need to see what happened on the bridge." The Orc fighter said, moving up ahead of the rest of the group with her doubleaxe in hand.
As they approached the door, Xiara didn't check to see if it was locked, she barged ahead and kicked the door down in one blow, knocking it off of it's hinges. It was a unimpressive interior door, but still quite the sight. The bridge was a mess, there had been three people on the bridge. Now there were two corpses, and one man with a knife firmly planted in his chest with a pistol dangling from the arm he was now too weak to lift. One of the dead men had been crushed, the other shot.
"Posidon's bitch tried tro kill me." He said, red seeping out of his mouth and then coughing weakly.
Xiara kelt by the dying man, "What is the password to the computers?" She asked.
He looked at her, "H31MC0N... wait Your not Grelka." He said weakly as the light in his eyes faded for the last time. Xiara didn't give the slaver a second look and punched the password in. "We're in, computer system is emergancy power only. Emp fried a lot of it. Their mostly in engineering, probably about a dozen of them, trying to get things restarted."
The lights flickered on, revealing a bridge that had been a mess before the Lamia had made an entrance. A bank of security cameras lit up, revealing the ship to the people on the bridge. There was a sort of Lamia creature that seemed to be conntected into the ship's systems on one of them. "Correction, has gotten things started back up."
A radio on the dead man's belt squaked to life. "Hey, Bart, we got the reactor back up, now where is that bitch?"
--
Computer Closet
She thought she was dead for a while. She couldn't move, most of her senses and sensors were gone as well. Everything was cold and dark. She could still feel the touch of drafts on the parts of her body that were still organic, but she became numb to this and any remaining senses. She felt like she was in a void. Was this purgatory? Had it all come to an end? Maradia genuinely couldn't tell anymore. Not until something happened. Power surged back through the wires, flowing through her mostly mechanical body. Her battery had been damaged by the EMP blast, but she was being powered directly from the ship. Her cybernetic self immediately tried to execute a sequence of actions that she was unable to fulfill without power. "SACRE! SACRE I'M HERE! I'M HERE! SACRE!" she cried out as she broke into tears, not even aware of what she was doing. Then she stopped and blinked. She looked around. Where was she? Was she in another stage of the afterlife? No, she was still here, in her cell, and she still had the implants they put into her. Her senses were rapidly returning, and no one else was around either. The Lamia's unwanted implants blared error messages in her head and were glitching, having been damaged from the EMP. Her heart had gone from having a faint pulse to rapidly racing. She was having a full blown panic attack. She sweated somewhat and breathed rapidly, darting her electronic eyes around the room and holding her head in her metal hand and claw. She tried to slither towards the door, but she was stopped as the cables became taught. They had either fortunately or unfortunately been reinforced somewhat to withstand her powerful movements. She looked back, seeing that she was still connected to these... things in the wall and the ceiling. "No no no no no..." she whimpered, pacing around in the cell she was confined to as far as the computers would let her. She couldn't find her only friend or anyone else like this. "SACRE! PLEASE SACRE HEL
P! HELP ME! PLEASE, HEAR ME, HELP ME, SACRE, SOMEONE!" she screamed out desparately, pleading that she would see the face of her friend again as she cried.
Maradia pounded on the wall of her room with her artificial arms. She hit with such incredible force that the wall started to warp, even crack, but her arms were strong enough not to take any damage from the impacts. "LET ME OUT! LET ME OUUUT!!!" she yelled. She looked back at the wires tethering her to the room, considering whether or not she should disconnect them by force. She didn't fully understand how they worked or why she needed them, she just knew that she would shut down again for some reason if disconnected from them for too long. She was not aware that the EMP had rendered her battery completely inoperable, meaning she would not even be active for a short time once unplugged.
--
Bridge
Klaus assessed the situation. Lifting a finger to his mouthplate, he picked up the radio and spoke into it.
"Bart's fucking dead!!" he whispered shouted. "Where the fuck are you?" Cutting off the radio, he turned to Xiara. "Other than the connected Lamia, do the cameras pick up on anyone else?"
Makoto watched the camera feeds and frowned as she saw the poor Lamia. It seemed so unnatural to her to see someone of her species looking Cybernetic. “Yeah, we have an ally that uses a knife, if possible I’d like to bring them back as well. “ She said, before adding “Where's the Cyborg Lamia located? I’d like to personally get to her location and help her back to the ship as well. “ She said before glancing to Klaus as he spoke to the radio.
She didn’t think anyone would be so stupid as to reply with their location but Pirates aren’t known for being intelligent.
"We're in eningeering you idiot. If you can't see her, get down here before she comes back. I've got a suprise waiting for that bitch."
Xiara searched the Cameras, nodding. They could hear the hissing cries from Maradia from the video feed of her room. "The cyborg is close to the computer core. There is a group of pirates in Engineering. They seem pretty defensive... there are some more bodies in the halls.... I'd be willing to bet our ally is in the vents so they can't be tracked by camera."
--
Engineering
Every small detachment they came across were swiftly dropped, the body counting adding on to those that seemed already present in a few spots as the group went. Sometimes it was the escape of a dying grunt of a target, sometimes the unmistakable impact of a round on the surfaces. Either way, they always turned that corner expecting to see, only not to see, at least until the disembodied retort of suppressed weapons was already fading in their cooling ears. Jericho hadn’t been let off the leash like this…. Since it used to be everyday.
This is what they were good at, what they were trained for. Chaos, discreet as a whisper, and bodies left as if taken by the reaper himself. He had worried so long in the freezer that it had made him rusty, but the hinges seemed to have frozen fine, grease and all.. Compared to then, this was a warm up, but an anxiety still lingered. There were unknowns on this ship, and he extremely disliked unknowns.
The map given by Dia showed they were getting close to the engineering block of the ship. Likely where the highest concentration of hostiles were gathered, given on how much of a cheap piece of Hegel shit the ship was. All the important stuff was likely routed and powered there. Two of the team were split off and ordered to head to the bridge, needing to secure it just as much. The ship was like an ant, brain in the head, and everything else packed in the ass.
Their best point of entry was from the upper decks, even having scaled an elevator shaft to get there. The engineering control room would be their insertion… or it would have been. As they peeked around the corner, their engineer gave a sigh, “Door’s welded tighter then the happy pocket on a tumisian nun.” A small groan in frustration was shared among the three on their shared comm line. With a quick check on grenade count for options, Jericho was thoughtful for a moment.
“Alright, here’s the plan, naming it plan P. Going to rig the bulkhead with slag taping, and a shape charged for a kick onto the stage. Two baby blues in the room to clear and disable, then a C and F to the floors below. Let’s hope the fuckers make it easy by having never been taught spacing.” He directed as the three pulled security during their little gameplan. They had been quiet up until now, mostly, but now it was time to make a racket. Hopefully their unknowns didn’t hold it against them.
As a wave of the hand signaled their demolition specialist to do his thing, the man giggling inside his helmet, mumbling something about “plenty” under his breath. If anyone could hear, or see them outside their armor, it wasn’t hard to tell the man had a few too many packroaches scurrying upstairs. But the other two members of zulu team loved their demo man dearly for his eccentricities. As the gremlin got to work,the other two watched the other directions of the little t section of hallway, only pausing as lights began to come back on. “Small change gentlemen, this is now decoy action, we’re going low, so Dev pop the drone.”
“Man, we haven’t used C and F for such a long time. I was wondering when we get to whip out the clusters and frags again. That shit won us the war game back in boot. What did you call it again J?” Devon always was one for idle chatter, passing the time as the recon drone replacing his shoulder attachment, deployed. Video feed was shared to each as the demo chuckled, Tucker was his name was. “The same thing these guys are going to be dreading in a minute, a clusterfuck.” Tucker said quite excitedly.
Both were chuckling now, as Jericho merely gave a shake of the head, “It was always more fun when you said it Tuck.” With that, the demo came scurrying back before he and Dev prepped the first round of grenades, two plasmas. With a nod in sign of being ready, the tape was triggered, burning the door at it’s edges around the frame, freeing it despite still sitting in its new round hole. Then the shaped charge only a second after, the concussive blast and heat propelling the door forward as a hot, flat, projectile of blunt force.
As the object that was once a door crashed through and into the windows that looked out over engineering, two blue glowing cylinders were tossed in to the sides of the room. A much more intense release of heat followed, with far less concussion, but with a faint crackle that dimmed the lights for a bit. Even as metal and circuits cooked, and the bodies of those unlucky to be in the room. More were thrown in, through what used to be windows a minute prior.
The same as used on their entrance at the hangar, but after three that looked like spheres of smaller objects the size of ripe grapes. Those split open and spread the smaller objects, before detonating in a cascade of micro blasts, which were chased by the frags that exploded after them. The drone was sent into the smoke, even as the three booked it back to the shaft, moving to enter from a lower floor. If all went well, it was just mop up in there, but they were definitely going to be more proactive with the rest of the ship now.
--
Bridge
Klaus watching from the camera room, cursed. Making a split second decision, Klaus turned and sprinted, following the noise from the vents with his elf ears. "I'll find our ally! Try to bring her in quietly."
Makoto nodded” be careful Klaus,” she said, then added” as for me, I’m going to go to the Cyborg while also getting a chance to meet the new party. She stepped back and disappeared, or rather, it seemed she dropped feet first as she entered something dark. Maradia would see shadows expanding and growing until Makoto popped out of them and glanced over to her. “Hello, Ma’am, we’re getting you out of here, ” she said, frowning at the sight before her.
The partly mechanical girl made an alarmed beep and turned to look at Makoto. Despite her offering, she didn't know who this was. This stranger could easily be trying to make her feel at ease so she could quickly subdue her, or just steal her body for her own purposes. "STAY BACK!" Maradia hissed, thrashing her tail. Her tail loudly whirred and made mechanical noises as she thrashed it. It was so forceful that she dislodged some of her cables from the wall, making a few of them shower sparks, and her body made error beeps in the process. She hissed again, this time more loudly, and turned to start pulling her wires out of their connection points in the room. She did succeed at disconnecting some of them, but made error beeps as she did so and had to apply quite a bit of force. She flailed her tail around more as she tore some more wires out, knowing the many more that remained would only put her at this strange woman's mercy if she stayed bound here.
Makoto blinked her eyes at the outburst, but she didn’t blame her for reacting this way. She did, however, see that she seemed to be attached to the station via the cables. That caused her to get a bad feeling inside that the EMP they used might have actually affected her, too. She wasn’t sure how yet, though. She held up her hands and stayed back ”wait, stop please, I know you're scared, you don’t know me, but I’m not a pirate, my name’s Makoto, chief of Security of a station called Eselberg Station. I understand your distrust, but me and a few others are here to rescue you, your friend, and anyone else from the pirates. I promise.”
Maradia hissed, but she stopped when Makoto mentioned her friend. She beeped and stuttered "You f-f-FOUndddd ERROR S-Sacre-cre-cre?" she asked. It was clear she was glitching, most likely from the computers interfering with her speech now that her cable connection was partially broken. A scan of her would show that she didn't need the computers to live, her vital functions were contained in her own body and implants. She did, however, require a power source to move and talk, and she was currently still interfacing with the ship's damaged computers. She twitched unnaturally as she approached Makoto, her servos not working properly. "W-where is she-e-e..." she asked. The cyborg repeated herself more loudly as she attempted to grab Makoto, angrily beeping. "WHERE IS SHE?!"
--
Hallway
Sacre moved determinedly, but resolutely through the vents. The shirt she had used to bandage herself was getting soaked through with blood. However, one thought went though her head, she was going to have her revenge. Even if it killed her. There was only one way to be sure, kill them and then destroy this hell ship. Then perhaps Sacre could find peace in the nothing after death.
After a few sprints, he found them, or rather, the section of the vent they were on. Holstering his weapon, Klaus neared the vent. "Lamia on the vent, do not be alarmed. I am Klaus Therwood of the Eselberg Station. This ship is under our control now. We don't want to hurt you. Nobody's going to hurt you anymore."
Sacre couldn't understand what Klaus was saying, she didn't like it, him, or frankly anyone. She just wanted the pain of existance to end. She moved onwards towards engineering.
This "ally" was good, there was no denying that. Even with Klaus's ears, he almost couldn't pick up on the sound of them slithering through the vents. They had to be a Lamia as well, it was the only explanation for their speed and how little noise they were making.
The vents gave an angry hissing sound at Klaus, and a knife came flying out of the vent. Thudding into the wall next to him. Then he could just bearly hear her moving again. Towards engineering, towards where the last remaining members of the crew were, towards the violent battle that would be happening with Jericho's troops.
--
Engineering
Jericho took the lead as his troops heard gunfire from inside the room. It took a moment for the troops to realize that it wasn't directed at them. Taking the oppertunity, they burst through the doors. The pirates close to them were dazed from the concussion, and bursts of fire ended their burning misery.
It took a moment to comprehend what was happening in the laberynth of rusty pipes and dodgy looking equipment. The pirates had set up to repell them, complete with makeshift barricades. However, they were all facing inwards at tall thin Lamia with green hair who was fighting near the center of the room. She was berzerk with rage, not seeming to even feel the large patches of blood that were starting to appear on her tail and even concerningly on her torso. She dropped the last living pirate, and turned away from them. Grabbing a lever on the control panel and thrusting it upwards. The ship was plunged back into darkness.
However, with their equipment, the darkness was like day to Jericho, they saw the Lamia disappear again into the vents. A trail of blood marking her path. "You got her?" He asked, and one of his men nodded. "I'm not getting anything on thermals, but something just coiled it's self around the secondaries, blocking the heat. I'm willing to bet it's snake girl."
Jericho nodded, looking to his tech specialist who reported from where he had just turned the lights back on, "One sec, it looks like she just turned everyone on the the reactor control board to maximum, dangerous, but there are safties for such things and all she did was trip them. All I had to do was turn them back on."
Cursing to himself, Klaus sprinted after the Lamia, trying to catch up to her. Uncaring at the gunfire sounds ahead, Klaus charged in just in time to see the black and red clad figures and the Lamia, flipping the switch. Then darkness.
In the split second of darkness, Klaus made a decision. He just hoped it wouldn't kill him.
Turning on his flashlight, he pointed his weapon at the black armors and yelled in his most authorative voice. "ESELBERG SECURITY! IDENTIFY YOURSELVES!"
--
Computer Closet
With the power out again, Maradia shut down again just before she could grab Makoto. Her metal bones creaked, whatever organic muscle was left was nowhere near enough to force her motors and mechanical parts to move. Her pulse and breathing were still present, but weak. She was once again reduced to a statue. She so badly wanted to whisper that she needed help, but she could not. Fortunantly, this second darkness only lasted for a few moments.
"What do you make of this?" Makoto asked.
"Illegal experiments, I think she'll die if she's without power for too long." Xiara said, examining the wires.
"PLEASE HELP SACRE." Maradia's electronic voice said.
Xiara looked at the Lamia. "Who's Sacre?"
Makoto looked around the room, deducing it had been used for two, not one. "I think Sacre is our mysterious ally."
--
Engineering
With the heat of the firefight cooling down, someone needed to go into the vents to get Sacre. Naturally, Klaus got to be the one who was hoisted up. He held the recording of Maradia's electronic voice saying something in a hissing language he didn't understand. He carefully crawled along, following a wide trail of blood. He finally found Sacre, wrapped around the warm secondary core. She was unconcious. Extracting the Lamia and getting her to the ship's medical suite wasn't easy, but she and the other slaves would survive.
Sacre was tossed into what amounted to a closet with a lock on the door still naked. She lay there on the floor, thoughly misrable. Next to her, a fellow lamia, Maradia, was wired into something. Sacre didn't quite understand it. However, the formerly independant lamia now needed a battery if she wasn't connected to the ship.
Maradia looked at the many wires linking her to some of the ship's computers, connected to the exposed cables running through her tail. She was deeply saddened by what they had done to her, she was previously an all organic lamia, but they had replaced much of her with cyborg parts. The battery they installed on her didn't last long when not connected to a power supply, no-doubtedly in order to discourage her from attempting to escape. Admittedly though, one of the few comforts she had aside from Sacre was being able to feel the limited set of systems she had access to. She winced, seeing how harshly Sacre was thrown back into the room, but she was at least glad she came back alive. "Sacre..." she said softly with her electronic voicebox, before using her access to the computers to turn on a heat lamp for the both of them.
Sacre looked towards Maradia. Turning over lethargically, and the welts from her beatings. The harsh electronic voice contrasted with the proper hissing sound of their native language. Sacre didn't want to be touched, not after how she had already been touched. She slid off of the cold metal decking and into the warmth of the heat lamp. She curled herself at first beside, then gently around Maraidia. She cuddled with the other Lamia and very firmly didn't cry. Sacre wasn't as defiant anymore, but she wasn't letting the pirates get that small victory.
Maradia paused when she heard the sound of her own voice and sighed. She had forgotten it sounded different from what it was supposed to for a Lamia. It still resembled her old voice, but something about it was... wrong. She wanted to hug Sacre, but she didn't, she didn't think the other Lamia would want to feel her jarring metal arms right now. She was hesitant to cuddle her back, seeing the markings from the beatings she sustained recently. She didn't want to make her hurt more. The cyborg let Sacre curl around her though, closing her eyes and resting her pink-haired head against Sacre's.
The green hair mixed with pink as the two sat in their tiny prison. The ship rocked suddenly. There was a click from the door. Sacre looked towards the door. "What's happening?" She asked.
"I... do not know," the other serpent replied with a nervous look on her face. She scrolled through the computer logs she could see in an attempt to locate anything of importance, though she didn't have access to the full array of them. She also looked at the door, then at the wires that prevented her from leaving the room. This time, she moved to hug Sacre with her artificial arms out of worry. "Sacre... I am scared..." the cyborg admitted.
Sacre wanted to say she wasn't scared. To put up a brave face for her friend. However, she didn't know anything. She didn't understand anything about the ship they were on, or the ones they had been on. What they had done to Maradia was horrifying and her limbs and the way that the metal melded with her skin was unsettling. "I am too." Sacre finally admitted, taking the artifical arms. Maradia didn't respond. "Maradia?" Sacre asked. Sacre slid forward, closer to her friend. She was more like a unnatural statue that wasn't breathing, wasn't moving, wasn't looking around. When she looked into her now mecanical green eyes weren't moving. "No." Sacre said, her hands moving to try and find a pulse. She didn't realize she wasn't pressing hard enough to get the faint, but still present beat of her friend's heart.
"No. No." Sacre said, thinking she was now the only Lamia on the ship. Sacre slumped, feeling completely powerless in the face of the death of her only friend. She felt the anger rise inside of her. How could they do this to her? To someone as innocent as Maradia? In that moment she knew she wasn't ever going to be beaten again. She was going to join Maradia and take as many of them with her as possible. She stood and moved towards the door with a deadly purpose. She hit the door with her fist, suprised when it just swung open. Sacre looked back at her friend, "I'm sorry. Goodbye." And slid out of the door.
The cyborg girl was not dead, however. She wasn't sure what happened. She couldn't see anything. She wasn't just disconnected from her power supply, she was knocked offline instantly. She was terrified now, but she couldn't do anything about it. She tried to move something, anything. Her arms were completely without life. Her mouth was artificial now and wouldn't move without power. Her eyes wouldn't move. Her tail, despite its organic appearance, still could not move. The servos that were implanted in her tail to increase her strength were locked up, and the organic muscles she had left were not enough to budge it. She tried to scream out to Sacre that she was still there, but nothing came out, her artificial voicebox required power too. She needed to get out of here, but now she didn't even possess the ability to try to break free. She was trapped not just in this room, but in her own body. Her mind was the only part of her that still worked, and inside of it she cried, a cry no one could hear.
--
Airlock
The pirate ship had been set adrift by the EMP blast that disabled everything electronic on the ship. The two ships that had disabled it circled for a short while. With no response from the drifting ship, they had decided to send two teams to board the pirates and take the ship. Xiara triggered the manual release on the airlock, letting it open into the ship's hallways. As it did, a dead body slumped into the airlock, the lower half of the body was crushed, and there were lots of stab wounds on the top half. Whoever had killed this person clearly wanted them very dead and they were nowhere to be seen.
The Chief of Security for Eselberg Station joined the team to enter the pirate ship. It was her duty to deal with pirates and now that the ship was disabled; she thought she should join the team to enter and deal with the pirates inside. When Xiara triggered the manual release, she nodded to them in appreciation and stepped forward, though when the body fell in she dodged immediately. The Orc warrior was statuesqe in her beauty with Raven hair slightly unkempt. She wore black leather armor and carried with her a double bladed axe for the close quarters of the ship. Her eyes matched her green skin in coloration. She was a tough fighter, but not a leader in the security forces.
Around her, she heard swearing from the unnamed members, but Makoto she simply took note of the wounds. “Potential ally is free. Be on your guard,” she ordered and stepped forward into the ship proper. Her right hand was on her Katana hilt as she strode in. Her eyes looked and her nose flared as she took in the scent and sight of her surroundings before her and soon she proceeded further into the hallways.
Following behind Makoto, Klaus carefully checked the corner with his boarding weapon. It was bullpup rifle configured in a 6mm caliber that wouldn't pierce the hulls. Hearing a small beeping from his datapad, he lifted it up.
"Air levels seem good, Makoto. It's possible there are no hull breaches, but better safe than sorry." Turning towards Makoto, he stowed his data pad and gestured towards the divergin pathways. "As cliché as it sounds, maybe we should split up in teams of two? It'd make it easier to scour the ship."
Makoto turned to glance at Klaus as he spoke and nodded her head in agreement. He was right, it was better to be safe and sorry. She glanced to the diverging pathways and nodded. “Agreed, remember any pirates or slavers, send them to the Underworld where demons can have their fun, especially slavers. They are a blight on a universe, and Zuphin, hate Slavers, I’m all too pleased with making the Zuphin happy. Also, keep an eye out on our potential ally “ She said indicating the severely damaged corpse and proceeded on the right path followed by Ziara and Klaus.
--
CRS Sykian Moon, modified Hellcat gunship
[Start internal communications records]
J: {Seems someone brought their own fireworks to the party. Operation kick off has just been moved up.}
C2: {Roger, moving the SM into a parallel flight path, stealth going full tilt.}
C3: {Wilco for suite up, preparations are ready for operation kick off.}
C4: {Knowing you L, they were done an hour ago.}
C5: {Alright, stroke each other later. Heads in the game. J, what’s our window of insert, op, and exfil.}
C6: {Hopefully more then twenty, want an op to last longer then then the last job in Kiilo.}
J: {Preferably one hour, in and out. Sweep, collect data, and proxy release of everyone we can. Optimally without breaking the boat, but these unknowns might shake things a bit. End result, mission time estimate only, conditions unknown.}
AI: Probing their systems now that we’re in range. Checking IDs and IFFs. Pirates are the obvious answer for our target. The unknowns however.. Are locals as far as I can tell. Ship IDs as the Sadistic Spriggan, currently set to a dock location marked as Eselberg station. Engine trail gives a general direction, however, the ship's design is very odd and foreign compared to some of seemingly newer systems.}
J: {Probably a second hand purchase, or salvaged vessel. Keep digging, I want a port location. C2, find us an entry point.}
C2: {Got an open hangar that vented when the power failed, field was taken offline. Should be empty by the bodies floating out.}
[End internal communications records]
The Hellcat with it’s optical field up, and thermal systems containing it’s heat, had pulled into a flight path alongside the slaver ship. Finding the open hangar, glided in unseen, before rotating and opening it’s modified troop bay. A ramp of half the normal size, and on the right half of the usual ramp width, lowered to disembark the commandos aboard. Unseen figures dropped to the deck, artificial gravity still waning here, the five moving to the closest door.
The troops moved forward to the door. They opened it, sliding open to reveal a currently unoccupied security station, with lots of shackles, batons, and even a few long poles with a loop of wire at the end. Beyond the security station were rows of cages. Some small, some large. Most of them were empty, but a few had individuals in them. Some from known species, some not. A Velcorex cruelly stuck in a cage too small for it indicated that they were not just dealing in slaves, but exotic animals as well.
Making sure to close and seal bulkheads behind them, as to not vent what atmosphere was being held inside the disabled vessel. The team moved forward, only lingering to give everything a brief scan before continuing on, finding the caged captives. Some sensed the presence of invisible warriors, recoiling cautiously from those that neared the outside of their cage, if they even had the room allowed to do so.
Those that were more coherent and calm, whether aware at first, also picked up on the disturbance and leaned close as if curious to an unseen presence. Those with far greater eyesight, likely saw the slight shimmer of the air as the commandos moved about, unaware of what they stared upon. Those that were calm, would find their doors open, and release a single figure coming into view from the haze that had kept them mostly hidden.
One happened to be a Sykian from the colonies, who recognized the armor, even if unmarked. “Take the others that can be handled and pull back into the next compartment for now. Learn their syntax with this and direct if you can, we move ahead.”, was all the armored commando would say as a hand held device was thrust into their hands. And with those directions, the team moved onwards again to continue the search.
Coming to the juncture with the hall, the sounds of agitated grumbling could be heard outside the bulkhead. It was hard to tell what the conversation was about, perhaps about the sudden loss of stability in the area when the atmospheric shield bubble released the contents of the hangar. Whatever the topic, it mattered little, as listening they took rough count. Having the other four step back to the previous bulkhead, the remaining commando stayed by the door, plugging into the side panel for their AI to access.
With a hiss, the door slid up, the small gathering on the other side, surprised to silence by the sudden opening. They eyed the emergency lit compartment beyond in weary confusion, which was suddenly diverted by a metallic clink on the floor. None of them recognized the duskerian fragmentation grenade that had just rolled in as if from thin air. As one reached down to examine it, they never realized the folly in time before the blast suddenly shredded exposed flesh, and the concussive blast hemorrhaged anything not in a blast suit.
As the steam and smoke wafted into the vents still, the four standing back gave a short release of weapon fire into the aftermath. As the commando still on the other side of the immediate bulkhead shook off the jarring vibration from the otherside of the door, took the opening to charge in and quickly start dispatching whatever was still moving with carbine, and arm blade as it was slid out from it’s bracer mounted housing on the forearm.
--
Bridge Level
Klaus, Makoto, and the rest headed right, going for the bridge. Everything about the ship said it had been well used. There was rust in several places and some of the hatches creaked as they opened them. As they came up the stairs onto the bridge level, there was a scream cut short and then two gunshots. As they hustled down the hall towards the bridge entrance, the air conditioning ducts overhead moaned as a unexpected weight was put on them.
Xiara looked around, her green eyes picking up what they could in the light. "We need to see what happened on the bridge." The Orc fighter said, moving up ahead of the rest of the group with her doubleaxe in hand.
As they approached the door, Xiara didn't check to see if it was locked, she barged ahead and kicked the door down in one blow, knocking it off of it's hinges. It was a unimpressive interior door, but still quite the sight. The bridge was a mess, there had been three people on the bridge. Now there were two corpses, and one man with a knife firmly planted in his chest with a pistol dangling from the arm he was now too weak to lift. One of the dead men had been crushed, the other shot.
"Posidon's bitch tried tro kill me." He said, red seeping out of his mouth and then coughing weakly.
Xiara kelt by the dying man, "What is the password to the computers?" She asked.
He looked at her, "H31MC0N... wait Your not Grelka." He said weakly as the light in his eyes faded for the last time. Xiara didn't give the slaver a second look and punched the password in. "We're in, computer system is emergancy power only. Emp fried a lot of it. Their mostly in engineering, probably about a dozen of them, trying to get things restarted."
The lights flickered on, revealing a bridge that had been a mess before the Lamia had made an entrance. A bank of security cameras lit up, revealing the ship to the people on the bridge. There was a sort of Lamia creature that seemed to be conntected into the ship's systems on one of them. "Correction, has gotten things started back up."
A radio on the dead man's belt squaked to life. "Hey, Bart, we got the reactor back up, now where is that bitch?"
--
Computer Closet
She thought she was dead for a while. She couldn't move, most of her senses and sensors were gone as well. Everything was cold and dark. She could still feel the touch of drafts on the parts of her body that were still organic, but she became numb to this and any remaining senses. She felt like she was in a void. Was this purgatory? Had it all come to an end? Maradia genuinely couldn't tell anymore. Not until something happened. Power surged back through the wires, flowing through her mostly mechanical body. Her battery had been damaged by the EMP blast, but she was being powered directly from the ship. Her cybernetic self immediately tried to execute a sequence of actions that she was unable to fulfill without power. "SACRE! SACRE I'M HERE! I'M HERE! SACRE!" she cried out as she broke into tears, not even aware of what she was doing. Then she stopped and blinked. She looked around. Where was she? Was she in another stage of the afterlife? No, she was still here, in her cell, and she still had the implants they put into her. Her senses were rapidly returning, and no one else was around either. The Lamia's unwanted implants blared error messages in her head and were glitching, having been damaged from the EMP. Her heart had gone from having a faint pulse to rapidly racing. She was having a full blown panic attack. She sweated somewhat and breathed rapidly, darting her electronic eyes around the room and holding her head in her metal hand and claw. She tried to slither towards the door, but she was stopped as the cables became taught. They had either fortunately or unfortunately been reinforced somewhat to withstand her powerful movements. She looked back, seeing that she was still connected to these... things in the wall and the ceiling. "No no no no no..." she whimpered, pacing around in the cell she was confined to as far as the computers would let her. She couldn't find her only friend or anyone else like this. "SACRE! PLEASE SACRE HEL
P! HELP ME! PLEASE, HEAR ME, HELP ME, SACRE, SOMEONE!" she screamed out desparately, pleading that she would see the face of her friend again as she cried.
Maradia pounded on the wall of her room with her artificial arms. She hit with such incredible force that the wall started to warp, even crack, but her arms were strong enough not to take any damage from the impacts. "LET ME OUT! LET ME OUUUT!!!" she yelled. She looked back at the wires tethering her to the room, considering whether or not she should disconnect them by force. She didn't fully understand how they worked or why she needed them, she just knew that she would shut down again for some reason if disconnected from them for too long. She was not aware that the EMP had rendered her battery completely inoperable, meaning she would not even be active for a short time once unplugged.
--
Bridge
Klaus assessed the situation. Lifting a finger to his mouthplate, he picked up the radio and spoke into it.
"Bart's fucking dead!!" he whispered shouted. "Where the fuck are you?" Cutting off the radio, he turned to Xiara. "Other than the connected Lamia, do the cameras pick up on anyone else?"
Makoto watched the camera feeds and frowned as she saw the poor Lamia. It seemed so unnatural to her to see someone of her species looking Cybernetic. “Yeah, we have an ally that uses a knife, if possible I’d like to bring them back as well. “ She said, before adding “Where's the Cyborg Lamia located? I’d like to personally get to her location and help her back to the ship as well. “ She said before glancing to Klaus as he spoke to the radio.
She didn’t think anyone would be so stupid as to reply with their location but Pirates aren’t known for being intelligent.
"We're in eningeering you idiot. If you can't see her, get down here before she comes back. I've got a suprise waiting for that bitch."
Xiara searched the Cameras, nodding. They could hear the hissing cries from Maradia from the video feed of her room. "The cyborg is close to the computer core. There is a group of pirates in Engineering. They seem pretty defensive... there are some more bodies in the halls.... I'd be willing to bet our ally is in the vents so they can't be tracked by camera."
--
Engineering
Every small detachment they came across were swiftly dropped, the body counting adding on to those that seemed already present in a few spots as the group went. Sometimes it was the escape of a dying grunt of a target, sometimes the unmistakable impact of a round on the surfaces. Either way, they always turned that corner expecting to see, only not to see, at least until the disembodied retort of suppressed weapons was already fading in their cooling ears. Jericho hadn’t been let off the leash like this…. Since it used to be everyday.
This is what they were good at, what they were trained for. Chaos, discreet as a whisper, and bodies left as if taken by the reaper himself. He had worried so long in the freezer that it had made him rusty, but the hinges seemed to have frozen fine, grease and all.. Compared to then, this was a warm up, but an anxiety still lingered. There were unknowns on this ship, and he extremely disliked unknowns.
The map given by Dia showed they were getting close to the engineering block of the ship. Likely where the highest concentration of hostiles were gathered, given on how much of a cheap piece of Hegel shit the ship was. All the important stuff was likely routed and powered there. Two of the team were split off and ordered to head to the bridge, needing to secure it just as much. The ship was like an ant, brain in the head, and everything else packed in the ass.
Their best point of entry was from the upper decks, even having scaled an elevator shaft to get there. The engineering control room would be their insertion… or it would have been. As they peeked around the corner, their engineer gave a sigh, “Door’s welded tighter then the happy pocket on a tumisian nun.” A small groan in frustration was shared among the three on their shared comm line. With a quick check on grenade count for options, Jericho was thoughtful for a moment.
“Alright, here’s the plan, naming it plan P. Going to rig the bulkhead with slag taping, and a shape charged for a kick onto the stage. Two baby blues in the room to clear and disable, then a C and F to the floors below. Let’s hope the fuckers make it easy by having never been taught spacing.” He directed as the three pulled security during their little gameplan. They had been quiet up until now, mostly, but now it was time to make a racket. Hopefully their unknowns didn’t hold it against them.
As a wave of the hand signaled their demolition specialist to do his thing, the man giggling inside his helmet, mumbling something about “plenty” under his breath. If anyone could hear, or see them outside their armor, it wasn’t hard to tell the man had a few too many packroaches scurrying upstairs. But the other two members of zulu team loved their demo man dearly for his eccentricities. As the gremlin got to work,the other two watched the other directions of the little t section of hallway, only pausing as lights began to come back on. “Small change gentlemen, this is now decoy action, we’re going low, so Dev pop the drone.”
“Man, we haven’t used C and F for such a long time. I was wondering when we get to whip out the clusters and frags again. That shit won us the war game back in boot. What did you call it again J?” Devon always was one for idle chatter, passing the time as the recon drone replacing his shoulder attachment, deployed. Video feed was shared to each as the demo chuckled, Tucker was his name was. “The same thing these guys are going to be dreading in a minute, a clusterfuck.” Tucker said quite excitedly.
Both were chuckling now, as Jericho merely gave a shake of the head, “It was always more fun when you said it Tuck.” With that, the demo came scurrying back before he and Dev prepped the first round of grenades, two plasmas. With a nod in sign of being ready, the tape was triggered, burning the door at it’s edges around the frame, freeing it despite still sitting in its new round hole. Then the shaped charge only a second after, the concussive blast and heat propelling the door forward as a hot, flat, projectile of blunt force.
As the object that was once a door crashed through and into the windows that looked out over engineering, two blue glowing cylinders were tossed in to the sides of the room. A much more intense release of heat followed, with far less concussion, but with a faint crackle that dimmed the lights for a bit. Even as metal and circuits cooked, and the bodies of those unlucky to be in the room. More were thrown in, through what used to be windows a minute prior.
The same as used on their entrance at the hangar, but after three that looked like spheres of smaller objects the size of ripe grapes. Those split open and spread the smaller objects, before detonating in a cascade of micro blasts, which were chased by the frags that exploded after them. The drone was sent into the smoke, even as the three booked it back to the shaft, moving to enter from a lower floor. If all went well, it was just mop up in there, but they were definitely going to be more proactive with the rest of the ship now.
--
Bridge
Klaus watching from the camera room, cursed. Making a split second decision, Klaus turned and sprinted, following the noise from the vents with his elf ears. "I'll find our ally! Try to bring her in quietly."
Makoto nodded” be careful Klaus,” she said, then added” as for me, I’m going to go to the Cyborg while also getting a chance to meet the new party. She stepped back and disappeared, or rather, it seemed she dropped feet first as she entered something dark. Maradia would see shadows expanding and growing until Makoto popped out of them and glanced over to her. “Hello, Ma’am, we’re getting you out of here, ” she said, frowning at the sight before her.
The partly mechanical girl made an alarmed beep and turned to look at Makoto. Despite her offering, she didn't know who this was. This stranger could easily be trying to make her feel at ease so she could quickly subdue her, or just steal her body for her own purposes. "STAY BACK!" Maradia hissed, thrashing her tail. Her tail loudly whirred and made mechanical noises as she thrashed it. It was so forceful that she dislodged some of her cables from the wall, making a few of them shower sparks, and her body made error beeps in the process. She hissed again, this time more loudly, and turned to start pulling her wires out of their connection points in the room. She did succeed at disconnecting some of them, but made error beeps as she did so and had to apply quite a bit of force. She flailed her tail around more as she tore some more wires out, knowing the many more that remained would only put her at this strange woman's mercy if she stayed bound here.
Makoto blinked her eyes at the outburst, but she didn’t blame her for reacting this way. She did, however, see that she seemed to be attached to the station via the cables. That caused her to get a bad feeling inside that the EMP they used might have actually affected her, too. She wasn’t sure how yet, though. She held up her hands and stayed back ”wait, stop please, I know you're scared, you don’t know me, but I’m not a pirate, my name’s Makoto, chief of Security of a station called Eselberg Station. I understand your distrust, but me and a few others are here to rescue you, your friend, and anyone else from the pirates. I promise.”
Maradia hissed, but she stopped when Makoto mentioned her friend. She beeped and stuttered "You f-f-FOUndddd ERROR S-Sacre-cre-cre?" she asked. It was clear she was glitching, most likely from the computers interfering with her speech now that her cable connection was partially broken. A scan of her would show that she didn't need the computers to live, her vital functions were contained in her own body and implants. She did, however, require a power source to move and talk, and she was currently still interfacing with the ship's damaged computers. She twitched unnaturally as she approached Makoto, her servos not working properly. "W-where is she-e-e..." she asked. The cyborg repeated herself more loudly as she attempted to grab Makoto, angrily beeping. "WHERE IS SHE?!"
--
Hallway
Sacre moved determinedly, but resolutely through the vents. The shirt she had used to bandage herself was getting soaked through with blood. However, one thought went though her head, she was going to have her revenge. Even if it killed her. There was only one way to be sure, kill them and then destroy this hell ship. Then perhaps Sacre could find peace in the nothing after death.
After a few sprints, he found them, or rather, the section of the vent they were on. Holstering his weapon, Klaus neared the vent. "Lamia on the vent, do not be alarmed. I am Klaus Therwood of the Eselberg Station. This ship is under our control now. We don't want to hurt you. Nobody's going to hurt you anymore."
Sacre couldn't understand what Klaus was saying, she didn't like it, him, or frankly anyone. She just wanted the pain of existance to end. She moved onwards towards engineering.
This "ally" was good, there was no denying that. Even with Klaus's ears, he almost couldn't pick up on the sound of them slithering through the vents. They had to be a Lamia as well, it was the only explanation for their speed and how little noise they were making.
The vents gave an angry hissing sound at Klaus, and a knife came flying out of the vent. Thudding into the wall next to him. Then he could just bearly hear her moving again. Towards engineering, towards where the last remaining members of the crew were, towards the violent battle that would be happening with Jericho's troops.
--
Engineering
Jericho took the lead as his troops heard gunfire from inside the room. It took a moment for the troops to realize that it wasn't directed at them. Taking the oppertunity, they burst through the doors. The pirates close to them were dazed from the concussion, and bursts of fire ended their burning misery.
It took a moment to comprehend what was happening in the laberynth of rusty pipes and dodgy looking equipment. The pirates had set up to repell them, complete with makeshift barricades. However, they were all facing inwards at tall thin Lamia with green hair who was fighting near the center of the room. She was berzerk with rage, not seeming to even feel the large patches of blood that were starting to appear on her tail and even concerningly on her torso. She dropped the last living pirate, and turned away from them. Grabbing a lever on the control panel and thrusting it upwards. The ship was plunged back into darkness.
However, with their equipment, the darkness was like day to Jericho, they saw the Lamia disappear again into the vents. A trail of blood marking her path. "You got her?" He asked, and one of his men nodded. "I'm not getting anything on thermals, but something just coiled it's self around the secondaries, blocking the heat. I'm willing to bet it's snake girl."
Jericho nodded, looking to his tech specialist who reported from where he had just turned the lights back on, "One sec, it looks like she just turned everyone on the the reactor control board to maximum, dangerous, but there are safties for such things and all she did was trip them. All I had to do was turn them back on."
Cursing to himself, Klaus sprinted after the Lamia, trying to catch up to her. Uncaring at the gunfire sounds ahead, Klaus charged in just in time to see the black and red clad figures and the Lamia, flipping the switch. Then darkness.
In the split second of darkness, Klaus made a decision. He just hoped it wouldn't kill him.
Turning on his flashlight, he pointed his weapon at the black armors and yelled in his most authorative voice. "ESELBERG SECURITY! IDENTIFY YOURSELVES!"
--
Computer Closet
With the power out again, Maradia shut down again just before she could grab Makoto. Her metal bones creaked, whatever organic muscle was left was nowhere near enough to force her motors and mechanical parts to move. Her pulse and breathing were still present, but weak. She was once again reduced to a statue. She so badly wanted to whisper that she needed help, but she could not. Fortunantly, this second darkness only lasted for a few moments.
"What do you make of this?" Makoto asked.
"Illegal experiments, I think she'll die if she's without power for too long." Xiara said, examining the wires.
"PLEASE HELP SACRE." Maradia's electronic voice said.
Xiara looked at the Lamia. "Who's Sacre?"
Makoto looked around the room, deducing it had been used for two, not one. "I think Sacre is our mysterious ally."
--
Engineering
With the heat of the firefight cooling down, someone needed to go into the vents to get Sacre. Naturally, Klaus got to be the one who was hoisted up. He held the recording of Maradia's electronic voice saying something in a hissing language he didn't understand. He carefully crawled along, following a wide trail of blood. He finally found Sacre, wrapped around the warm secondary core. She was unconcious. Extracting the Lamia and getting her to the ship's medical suite wasn't easy, but she and the other slaves would survive.