“Quite confident? Like… 90:10?” Robin said hesitantly, “Maybe 80:20…”
“This still sucks!” Happy chimed in.
“Do you have a better idea?” Robin asked with a raised eyebrow.
“No, no I don’t.”
“Great, so we’re doing this?” The excited voice from Proto came from the tablet.
“Yeah and we should hurry up. The UAS won’t leave us alone for long when they can’t get their eyes and ears in here. They have no reason to stall any longer.”
“Fine…” Alena grumbled, collected their weapons and brought them into the ship.
Robin was playing a risky game. He was pretty sure that the UAS wouldn’t dare to use lethal weapons against them. Since long they have understood the value of Robin’s mutation and won’t risk any accidents. This could quickly change however, if they began to kill their soldiers. A situation not unlike that of a bar fight: everything is good until one idiot pulls a knife. Besides, they will already piss off the UAS by freeing Proto, no need to escalate this any further by killing their people.
While Happy returned to the cockpit to prepare the ship for departure, Proto took the control for the UAVs and used the many vehicles to block the doors of the hangar as well as the exit points from the maintenance shafts with crates and containers.
Robin once more made a quick round along the walls of the hangar and used his mutation to search for the UAS people. When he couldn’t find anything, he grabbed the big cable and plugged it into the Interceptor. At the same time Proto opened the hangar gate to give them a route to escape as soon as the transmission had finished or - if things didn’t go well - they had to flee to prevent capture.
“I have a connection!” Proto announced moments later, “Transfer initiated, t-19:25.”
The Interceptor hummed loudly as its thrusters came to life and Niu turned it towards the shutters that were slowly opening, ready to leave in an instant.
The three had put on their mostly destroyed armored suits again. These battered things wouldn’t allow them spacewalks any more but the local comm channel was still useful for quick coordination.
Robin and Alena took cover close to where the maintenance shaft was below and then they waited. Alena pushed her hearing and sense of touch to the limit to get an idea of what was happening under the floor and Robin occasionally fired off an Echo Pulse.
“t-19:00” Proto shouted.
“Nothing yet…” Robin muttered and firmed his grip on the crate to stop his hands from shaking.
“They will come, don’t dream of anything else.” Alena said, “They probably wanted to get an idea of what your relationship with Proto is before making the first move. It really is a miracle that they waited so long.”
“I know.” Robin said and looked to his companion who, like always, didn’t show any emotions, “Aren’t you nervous?”
“Would it help?” Alena asked in return and Robin could only shake his head. No, of course it wouldn’t help but hell, how could she remain so calm in a situation like this?
“t-18:00”
Just as Proto gave them the latest update, Alena suddenly tilted her head.
“They are here!” She hissed and steadied her grip on the two metal rods she was about to use instead of her trusty sword.
Robin took a deep breath and closed his eyes. He tapped into his mutation and searched for the revealing glow of the soldier’s equipment. It didn’t take long until he found the first traces entering his range.
“Energy weapons.” He said, “Probably stun-guns… hopefully. I could try to blow up some of their charges.”
“Not yet.” Alena said.
“Helmets with interactive visors.” Robin continued to report his findings, “It won’t help us this time if I start disrupting them.”
“They should have something that they wanna use to enter the hangar. Explosives, maybe?”
“Nothing yet…” Robin said while he kept his mutation active.
“Uh, I recognize those things!” He suddenly laughed and reached out with his newest skill. With trained ease Robin concentrated his senses on the belt of the second soldier. They were still about twenty meters away, below them in the maintenance shaft - far enough.
Without delicate control but therefore with brute force he lowered the resistance of the trigger from the stun grenade.
“Fire in the hole!” He mumbled and moments later they heard a muffled explosion followed by loud groans and colorful curses.
“Nice, that should buy us some time!” Alena gave him a thumbs up.
Robin nodded but kept his eyes closed. With his senses, he looked for another grenade. He waited until the soldiers returned into an orderly march and triggered a second explosion. Again curses could be heard and Robin prayed to the gods that these guys wouldn’t get a chance to pay him back.
He kept his senses sharp for a bit longer before he opened his eyes and gave his head a moment to rest.
“It was a good start but they threw the rest of their grenades away. That trick won’t work a third time.”
“They’ll probably use explosives to get the crates away from the exit. Can you manipulate them?” Alena asked.
“Maybe.” Robin shrugged, “But I won’t try that. It’s narrow down there and I’m not willing to blow up five people just like that.”
Alena remained silent for a moment and then nodded in agreement.
“Yeah, that would probably be a bit over the top.”
“t-14:00” Proto shouted.
“First quarter done!” Robin grinned with relief.
“Let’s hope we can keep it up like-”
Booommm
An explosion interrupted Alena mid sentence and they both looked in awe, as one of the crates in front of them flew ten meters up into the air.
“Good luck and stay safe!” Robin said and closed his eyes again. It was time to disable these stun rifles.
If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.
Alena didn’t wait for him and jumped ahead into the still billowing smoke.
With her two metal rods she dove into the emerging soldier like a fury on drugs. While she too wasn’t trying to kill her enemies, she was ready to take off the gloves. Within seconds cracks of breaking bones and screams of pain echoed through the hangar.
While Alena was taking on the first group of soldiers in melee and Robin was forcing her enemies into close combat by disabling their weapons, Proto reactivated the UAVs and began to barricade the exit from the shaft again.
After just a few minutes, the fighting came to an end and silence fell over the hangar.
“I can hear another group approaching.” Alena said, panting and gasping for air between words.
“There is another group coming from the outpost and will attempt to open the door on the right.” Proto said, “Also, I noticed that one of the cargo ships is about to leave its hangar.”
“Happy?” Robin asked.
“On it, leave the ship to me.” Niu’s voice came over the comm and Robin’s passive sense notified him that the Interceptor began to power up its weapons.
“Alena, will you be able to handle another group?”
“Yeah, no problem.” She said and Robin could only trust her on that even if she wasn’t unscathed and at full power anymore.
“Proto, time?”
“t-09:20”
“Okay, I’ll try to hold them as long as possible at the door.” Robin said, “Proto, help Alena with the UAVs.”
“Aye aye, Captain!” Proto proudly saluted, earning a scowl from Robin.
“You and I will get along so well!” Happy laughed on the comm, “You really aren’t allowed to fuck this up, you hear me?”
When the second explosion rocketed through the hangar, announcing the arrival of the next group, Robin had already reached the door. He quickly took cover behind some crates and closed his eyes.
Within seconds he found the three people on the other side. Unfortunately they had come without stun grenades. Either their friends had warned them or this group just came with different equipment.
Whatever the reason, Robin concentrated his G-Anomaly on the stun rifles and began to sabotage them. It didn’t take him long until he caused a small explosion in the first weapon and he watched with satisfaction as the soldiers jumped back in fright.
Just in time, Robin looked over to the Interceptor and the open hangar door. A medium sized cargo ship was just about to block the exit when Happy opened fire. Without pause, she used the two ship turrets to hammer into the shield of the slow cargo ship. Bright flashes and muffled explosions echoed through the hall again and again until the shield finally cracked.
Robin had to force his concentration back to the group behind the door to stall them a bit longer.
They needed more time. Alena was still in the midst of a heavy fight and he saw not only her metal rods swirling through the air but also energy projectiles from stun rifles and taser pistols. Between the combatants, UAVs raced across like angry bees and tried to overrun the soldiers.
At some point, there wasn’t anything left on the other side of the door that Robin could use to stall the enemy. Moments later the door was blasted to pieces and three angry looking men rushed in. They passed by Robin, who hid behind cover and headed towards Alena’s fight.
Robin waited until they were a few meters ahead and sneaked after them. He noticed that the UAV’s had stopped moving already, which hopefully meant that the transmission was nearly finished. Now, they only had to get rid of these last groups and leave before more reinforcements arrived.
Finally able to put his training with Patience to use, he attacked the first soldier from behind, taking him by surprise. He heard another loud explosion but couldn’t spare any attention. Robin quickly wrestled his foe to the ground and their fight soon evolved into a chaotic brawl. It took some time, but to his surprise he actually managed to knock out the soldier and win his fight.
He was panting heavily and sat up to look for the others.
“Status!” He called over the comm.
“Still… four left…” Alena gasped.
“In the group attacking her were seven people, then two more came from your side. I’m about to join in. The cargo ship is... gone.” Happy reported, “How much longer?”
“Proto?” Robin asked but didn’t get an answer.
“ROMAS, time?”
- t-1:45
“Less than two minutes, let’s finish them off and then get out of here!”
Just as he was about to join the fight with Alena and Happy, something hit him in the back. His whole body was electrocuted and he fell to the ground stiff like a log.
“Ugh…” He groaned in pain.
Realization came quickly, he was hit by a stun gun - but by whom? With great effort he opened his eyes and saw two people entering the hangar. They didn’t seem to wear the same outfit as the other soldiers but were armed fully nonetheless. With his vision still hazy, he couldn’t make out any details, however Robin realized that he was more aware of his situation than he should be after getting stunned. He should be out cold, but while his body was pretty useless right now, he could still think clearly.
“Niu Alaris!” One of the two, a man obviously, shouted loudly.
There was a short pause as everyone stopped fighting. Then Robin could hear the painful crack of breaking bones - probably Alena who used the distraction to get rid of her last opponents.
“Joseph?” Niu asked incredulously, “What the fuck are you doing here?”
Robin quickly went through his memories of all his talks with Happy.
‘Joseph… where have I heard that name before? Right, she had mentioned some kind of assistant that was more like a watchdog from her family. What was the Alaris family doing here?’
“Me? Shouldn’t the question be what you’re doing here? Breaking into an outpost, stealing AI-technology from the UAS, shooting down ships from our allies. Niu, just when have you taken the wrong turn in your life? Was it this man who led you astray?” Joseph asked and motioned with his gun at Robin.
“You damn dog!” Happy cursed, “I have an agreement with my mother. She is preparing a buy-out contract for me so I can leave this caricature of a family behind.”
“So I have heard. But, as you said: she is still preparing the contract, nothing has been signed just yet and as such, you’ll abide by the family’s rules.”
“You damn…” Happy swallowed back more insults, “What do you want?”
“Come with me without resistance and I’ll leave your ‘friends’ be.” Joseph said nonchalantly.
Happy remained silent for a moment and then heaved a heavy sigh.
“You will let them go if I come with you? Promise?”
“Happy!” Alena hissed and Robin wanted to do the same, but the stun was still having him in a tight grip.
“Take Robin and leave. That is more important than me. I’ll manage somehow. I’ll find you, I promise!” Niu said.
Everything in Robin churned and convulsed. He didn’t want that, he didn’t want to give up his friends, he didn’t want Happy to lose her happiness. No… No, it was his job as the captain to shoulder their burden in moments like these.
“Okay, I agree.” Niu said and walked over. When she passed Robin she mumbled a low “Sorry!” and he could see her tears falling behind the cracked visor.
‘This isn’t how it should be!’
The sizzle of an energy shot rang through the air and Happy screamed. Back at the exit of the maintenance shaft Alena also tensed up like a log and fell down.
“WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?” Happy raged.
“I let your friends be, as promised. But I never said anything about making sure that they can escape the UAS. That is not my obligation, is it?”
“You damn asshole, I swear one day…” Happy screamed.
Robin closed his eyes and used his mutated senses to see the world around. He checked Alena but couldn’t do anything for her. Then he inspected Joseph and his companion. They had energy weapons, maybe that would help?
From the door he heard footsteps hurrying over - reinforcements were about to arrive.
‘What now?’ He thought in desperation just as he noticed a small, bright speck of energy close to Joseph.
‘Huh, seems like someone didn’t get the memo!’
Having seen a glimpse of hope, Robin put every bit of effort into fighting against his stiff muscles. Barely he managed to open his mouth.
“Run, trust me and flee!” He croaked which got Happy’s and Joseph’s attention.
“Oh? You can still talk? Impressive!” The man said and raised his gun.
Without hesitation Robin bypassed the trigger from the stun grenade on Joseph’s belt and instantly an explosion erupted behind him.
“Run!” Robin coughed once more and with relief he saw that Happy actually listened to him. She ran toward Alena and pulled the woman into the ship just as more soldiers rushed into the hangar.
The last thing Robin saw was the Interceptor racing out of the hangar like a flash. Then he got stunned again and this time everything turned dark.