The Universe, 3029

[Nikki Harlow]

"Well, fuck," I muttered.

The James who led the boarding party raised an eyebrow. "Problem?" 

"It's locked. Won't be for long, though." I angled the padd so that no one but me could see the screen, and entered my administrator password. "I should be able to override anyone else on this ship." 

The system accepted my password. I went back to the door controls and tapped the buttons to unlock and open the door. My screen indicated that it was open. The actual door remained closed. "Okay, we do have a problem." 

"It's not my fault this time, I swear!" the James who frequently broke things on my ship said. He always said that.

"Colleen, when those scientists were practicing their English with you, did they happen to say what they're doctors of?" I asked. 

"Dr. Wen studies biotechnology," Colleen said. "And Dr. Tao does, um, something to do with encryption I think?" 

I sighed. "It's your lucky day, James, we have another suspect. Think you can get control of our door back for me, and maybe get our 'guests' off the network?" 

"Uh, Gretchen hasn't given me the permissions for that stuff yet." 

"Use my account, then. Just don't change anything you don't have to." I handed over the padd, and turned to the boarding party. "Do you people have any high-tech door opening tricks? If our 'guests' helped themselves to our network, I'm not sure how long it will take to clean up their mess." 

"Ordinarily we would," the Major said, "but for the moment he's out of service." He gestured toward the unconscious guy with the smashed helmet. 

"Well crap," I said. Then, under my breath, "wish I hadn't shot that guy." 

Suddenly, all eyes were on me. "Uh, in my defense, he looked like he was about to shoot me." 

Bishop, the tall scary fellow, locked eyes with me with a particular intensity, almost like he was ready to pounce. I remembered the look Millie Brown had in her eye the day she decided to throw down with the tallest and least pretty girl in our grade, which unfortunately was me. 

The mercenary unzipped one of his pockets. I instinctively shrank back against the bulkhead. He stepped forward, and his mag boot attached to the floor with a thunk. He grunted. "How about we kick the door down with some of this?" he said, holding out a black rectangular package that said "charge demolition MM12". I exhaled. 

"Uh, actually, I think I got control of the door back," James said. "Should I-" 

"No!" I said, a bit too loudly. "Thanks, but I'll take the controls back for now. Let me know when you're ready, Major?" 

The major's eyes narrowed. He paused in thought for a moment, and then said, "do it." 

Edited October 11, 2020 by Nikki Harlow

[Nicholas Schuster]

Flashes of light

Echoes...muffled words 

A blurry room

A loud bang 

Flying 

I'm standing atop a skyscraper on Donegal. The city stretches out before me in all directions. It's nighttime, but the sun shines brightly and a warm wind blows noisily. 

I'm on the bridge of the Half Moon 

A forest of trees rise on either side. Major Hayes is sitting in the captain's chair. Glaring at me.

I'm back on Donegal. The wind blows. I take a step onto the ledge of the skyscraper and look down at the traffic rushing by below. 

I'm standing in a farmer's field on Sheratan. Alyssa Chase states at me, a look of betrayal on her face. 

High above the streets of Donegal, I put my arms out to either side and raise my head toward the midnight sun, closing my eyes. 

I'm at the controls of Charles Maxwell's King Crab. I pivot the pilot's chair around, and there is Charles sitting behind me. He leans forward and studies me, saying nothing.

I leap from the skyscraper, my eyes remaining closed. 

I'm standing in the Takashima, every one of the wreck's computers lit up and chattering away. A man in heavy armor is before me. He turns around, and it's Bishop Weyland. He has a gray, deathly appearance as he mouths the words "you killed us" at me. 

The streets of Donegal race toward me. 

I'm standing in a plane of all white light. I can hear my own heart beat. 

I crash into the pavement. 

The white plane dissolves into an opulent, curving corridor. I start walking down it, then running. Ahead of me, I see a man in a suit. 

The pavement and everything around me shatters like glass. 

I begin to catch up with the mysterious man. His bleach blond hair stands out as I realize that everything else is in black and white. 

The midnight sun goes supernova.

William Kaufman stops in the corridor and turns around to look at me. 

An expanse of stars is before me. 

William is now face to face with me. He is so close that I can smell his aftershave. His eerie blue eyes stare into my soul. 

The stars begin to whip past me as they wink out of existence one by one. 

William extends his hand. I take hold of it. 

The enigmatic William speaks. 

"Iterum vivere amplius!" 

Everything goes dark. 

 

Edited October 11, 2020 by Nathan Schmidt

[Steve Jenkins]

MEANWHILE..... 

I Crashed into the floor in my space suit that was all diarrhea water and terribleness and Ripped my helmet off to gag into the deck. Then I looked up and William was standing in front of me. 

"WHY DID WE DO THAT NOW WE'RE GOING TO DIE OF TOILET DROWNING! I DIDN'T COME HERE TO DIE IN A GIANT SPACE TOILET!" I Screamed. I expected that William would have said something back. I couldn't believe it when instead he just Laughed. A successful businessman, he was laughing at a poop joke. 

"First of all I have never seen someone get blown away by a plumbing explosion and I hope you're OK, also this isn't  poop, it's liquid fertilizer, which makes me wonder where the fire Chemicals are going,but we can still use it." He said. 

"OK how, I still don't know what your first plan was!"

"My first plan was to use the fire foam as Cover." Said William "but since we don't have it this will work. We have to get it really thick in here, so we have to use our space suits to breathe. Then when it's just right we go inside the lab and open the cagro  door and when the soldiers come in we throw a flash bang, I see you have one "

I looked at William and tried to read his Mind." Then what happens?? "

" Fertilizer bomb. " Said William. 

"OK that's awesome." I said. William was a new kind of Sensei, we were going to be Fine. "Let's get going with that." 

[Charles Maxwell]

Simultaneously...

A flurry of concerned and frenzied shouts, in a language unfamiliar to me, echoed through the corridor as the pressure door slowly rose. I steeled myself, attempting as best I could to shield my physical profile behind the frame of the security robot. Based on our previous encounter with the Capellans, I knew that this time, there would be no talking. No negotiation. There would be only violence.

With my free hand, I released the safety on the cover device I'd had cooking in the palm of my hand, casting it forward forcibly with an underhand throw. The grenade tumbled end-over-end in the weightless environment, beginning to discharge thick clouds of deep blue, cordite-scented smoke as it spiraled toward the Capellans, filling the compartment with a heavy, ominous haze. The status indicator to the right of the emergency bulkhad winked from a ruby red to a golden yellow, an indication that the door had reached the halfway mark.

"That's it, Captain! Let's do this!" Bishop called out.

"Wait!" I exclaimed. "We don't know who's in that crowd. We can't fire indiscriminately until we know for sure that Jenkins and Kauffman aren't being held by them."

"With all due respect, sir, if we don't shoot first - " Bishop replied.

"Just give me three seconds. That's all I need. Three seconds," I answered, pulling my Hawk Eagle from its holster and quickly bracing it on the security robot's shoulder. Staring down the handgun's sights, I toggled on the night vision mode, the view through the crosshairs flaring into an overexposed green. The enhanced optics allowed me to see through the smoke, providing a thermal image of the opposing force. I was looking for anyone not kitted out up to their eyeballs in combat gear.

"Three!" Lieutenant Weyland exclaimed.

I strained to see underneath the elevating bulkhead. I saw treads - three sets of them - and seven - make that eight - pairs of feet, more than we'd been led to believe would be there. The treads were obviously security robots. The footwear, and the equipment above it, didn't match anything in our inventory, but I had to be sure.

"Two!" Bishop announced.

The bulkhead rose past the three-quarters mark. The enemy OpFor came into full view. An octuple force of Capellan soliders, outfit in combat helmets, body armor, and bedecked with weapons that looked like they were decidedly unsafe to operate aboard a spacecraft came into view. I frantically scanned the crowd. No sign of Jenkins or Kauffman.

"One!" Weyland cried out.

"Hit it," I confirmed.

The scream of our commandeered security robots' four machine guns filled the corridor as the bulkhead tucked into the ceiling with a thunderous rumble, the lift indicator flashing to green, casting an eerie pall through the thickening blue smoke. A mass of targeting lasers lanced out from the positions of the entrenched Capellans as they attempted to sight their assailants, a crescendo of weapons fire and muzzle flashes answering our attack, sending myriad bullets from mistargeted shots pingponging off the ship's bulkheads. I pushed the security robot steadily forward, making every effort to attack the Capellans' war machines first, unconvinced that they wouldn't find a way to override the automatons' failsafes and turn them on us. As I did so, a sudden glancing blow from a laser rifle shot cored into the left side of my helmet, splitting it open, narrowly missing my head, and filling the inside of the protective gear with the overpowering smell of burning plastics and components.

"Flyboy! Are you alright?" a voice cried out. It was Captain Harlow, advancing toward my position, her words punctuated by a resounding 'boom'  of her handgun sending a high-caliber round downrange and the resultant scream of a Capellan receiving it.

"Just peachy," I replied, tearing my helmet off and casting it aside. "I think I lost a few hairs off the side of my head, that's all."

"Good. I mean, I wouldn't want you to die before I had the chance to send you the bill for the damages," Nikki answered back sarcastically. 

"It's wonderful to know that you care," I chuckled, regaining control of my security robot's guns and sweeping them across the chest of the nearest Capellan automaton. The shots must have hit something critical - perhaps an ammo bin - for the next thing I knew, triple blossoms of flame erupted from the head and arms of the machine, blowing its center of mass apart and sending several Capellan soldiers diving for cover. At the same time, three more men were cut down as Bishop's robot found its mark in the crowd.

We'd drawn first blood. The fight was on.

[William Kauffman]

On the opposite side of the Capellans...

Gunfire. Screams. Explosions. The rumble of heavy machinery.

I looked toward Steve Jenkins, who'd sealed himself into his spacesuit as the weightless environment around us became thick with fertilizer, and toggled on the short-range communications channel.

"Mister Jenkins, it sounds like things have taken an unexpected turn in the corridor. This would appear to be our opportunity," I radioed.

"Alright," Steve replied. "Tell me what to do."

"We need to do three things in quick succession. First, we need to get into the laboratory and purge the fertilizer out of the interior. Then, we need to open the cargo bay door."

"And finally?" Steve asked as I led him into the portable facility.

"And finally, as soon as we have an indication that they've started to come inside, we need to arm one of those flashbangs of yours, open the hatch, throw it out there, and then close the hatch again as quickly as possible. It won't do to blow ourselves up in the process," I advised, looking around for an atmosphere regulator station.

"Tell me again how you know how to do all this stuff?" Steve asked, positioning himself at the control panel where he'd earlier impersonated the late Doctor Wen. "What exactly is it you do for a living?"

I chuckled. "We're a dynamics company. We have our hands in everything from aerospace to microwave ovens. You could say that science is the backbone of what we do."

"Yeah, you just don't strike me as the 'blowing shit up' type, no offense," Steve observed. "I kinda figured that knowledge had to have been coming from a different place."

"None taken at all, Mister Jenkins. I'm sure you're right; I'm something of an ideas man," I replied. "Ah ha! Here's the valve. I'm purging the atmosphere in here now."

I gave the laboratory's atmosphere regulator a solid tug, noting with dismay the amount of struggle I encountered trying to complete such a simple mechanical task. Fortunately, I was able to convince the lever to move to the 'purge' position, and I heard a loud, steady hiss as the air inside the laboratory was drawn out. Once the 'VAC' light illuminated on the panel, I moved the valve to the 'tank' position, allowing the structure to fill with uncontaminated air from its attached oxygen tanks.

"Wait, you're putting air back in here? I thought we were purging everything," Steve observed.

"Quite right, but it would do no good for us to have an explosive compression the moment we opened a hatch, so I'm re-pressurizing the lab with oxygen from the attached tankage. That way, our own atmosphere is equalized with that of the freighter's, but without the fertilizer.

"Ohhh..." Steve nodded. The 'COMP' light illuminated green on the regulator, and I engaged the system's internal reclamation cycle.

"I believe we're ready," I advised, moving to stand alongside Jenkins. "Go ahead and raise the door."

Steve paused, taking a moment to study the console. Then, with a flourish, he made several uncertain yet bold button presses. A klaxon sounded off in the cargo bay, and the door rumbled open. A wash of blue smoke rolled into the chamber, mixing with the almost fully-liquid atmosphere in a strange display of long, twisting tendrils that looked as though an artist had dropped blobs of ink into a plate of oil. As I predicted, a number of soldiers began backing into the bay, reacting with surprise as they were met with a solid wall of foul-smelling liquid fertilizer.

"Now, Mister Jenkins!" I exclaimed. Quickly, Steve dove from his chair and threw open the laboratory's overhead hatch, lobbing the flashbang toward the soldiers and then slamming the hatch. Seconds later, a tremendous detonation ensued. The laboratory was nearly torn from its deck anchors by the force of the blast, and alarm klaxons wailed as the freighter's onboard systems registered the explosion. I turned toward Steve.

"Quickly," I advised. "We need to make a break for it before they're able to regain their senses."

Steve nodded, drawing a long sword from its sheath. "You should probably get your gun out," he advised.

I withdrew the handgun from my spacesuit's holster, examining it for a moment.

"How many shots has it got?" I asked.

"I reloaded it before I gave it to you, so it should have thirteen. Twelve in the magazine and one in the chamber. Take your finger off the trigger until you're ready to fire," Jenkins instructed, pushing out through the laboratory's hatch into the smoke-filled cargo bay. As I followed behind, I could see that the fertilizer explosion had done its job - surfaces throughout the hold were melted and scorched, and the overhead lights were burned out, leaving us bathed in darkness, save for the illumination that spilled in from the corridor.

As we made our way toward the cargo bay door, I could see that the Capellans were fully engaged with an opposing force in the corridor. It appeared that two security robots had gone mad and had turned their guns on the soldiers, who were attempting to mount a defense while simultaneously trying to activate their own automatons, one of which had been blown clean apart by what looked like an internal explosion.

"There's quite a few soldiers out there," I whispered across the channel. "Five in the middle, three dead, two hiding behind the left support pillar, and two behind the right. That's nine, and I don't know what became of the troops that were caught in the blast."

Suddenly, unexpectedly, I heard a shout behind us, and I instinctively pushed off the deck and tumbled unceremoniously behind a cargo container. As I regained my position, I saw that Steve Jenkins had been beset upon by two very angry, very blasted-looking Capellans. One of the soldiers had completely lost the front half of his armor and uniform shirt, his helmet misshapen and damaged. The other appeared to have fared better, with only half of his tunic missing. Before Steve had a chance to react, the Capellans seized him, one holding a knife to his throat while the other pulled off his spacesuit's helmet. Hearing the shouts, a third Capellan broke away from the formation of troops and began making his way into the cargo bay.

"God...damnit!" I exclaimed. I could hear the fear in my own voice. Steve glanced in my direction wild-eyed, no doubt perceiving that he was likely about to be executed by the soldiers. I watched in horror as the third of the contingent, a Lieutenant by the looks of it, approached, shouting commands in Chinese as the subordinates stripped away Steve's loadout of weapons.

I looked around, desperate for a chance to notify someone of what was happening so that Steve could be saved. But there was no one else present. It was only me, and if I didn't intervene, the life of the man who'd just saved me would be unceremoniously ended. I was about to do something very, very stupid. But I knew I had to act.

Throwing caution to the wind, I tore off my helmet, and dove over the cargo container, screaming bloody murder in an attempt to shock the Capellan troops into redirecting their attention. Simultaneously, mid-dive, I activated my entire suite of implants with a single thought. A millisecond later, my mind connected to the mainframe of the Hurry Up Bessie. I'd managed to bypass its security several days ago by compromising a user account with a low-security password during a moment of consciousness. The world slowed to a crawl as I brought the total processing power of the enormous cargo vessel to bear on the situation. Harnessing its internal sensors, I took a head count. True to my estimation, there were twelve infantrymen almost on top of us. I didn't have a shooting solution on most of them. However, the Lieutenant and his subordinates were another story. As I sailed through the air at what felt like a glacial pace, I drew the weapon provided by Steve, aimed it squarely at the Lieutenant, and squeezed off three rounds in his direction. The bullets corkscrewed from the weapon's barrel, leaving atmospheric ripples in their wake as I twisted twisted toward the opposite facing to fire off another salvo at the soldier holding a knife to Steve's throat. A warning indicator flashed in my field of view, indicating an impending overload of my implants. Then, with a roar, normal time rushed back into focus just as both soldiers were cut down by the volleys I'd loosed at them, all six bullets hitting their marks. The final soldier stared in shock as I tumbled to the deck next to Jenkins, shoving him out of harm's way and pressing the handgun into his grip so that he could regain control of the situation.

As Steve took the remaining soldier to task, I lay against the deck, breathing raggedly, perilously close to a shutdown of my nervous system, and trying to regain control of my synapses. I hoped that there wouldn't be another opportunity to test just how hard I could push my augments on this outing...

[Bishop Weyland]

The explosion rocked the corridor, sending a small rush of flame and debris through the air. Two more enemy soldiers died in the ammo detention from one of the security bot. Both machine and man marched into the chaos oblivious to the micro battles being waged around them. 

Like a conductor leading a Orchestra Bishop calmly trailed his avatar designating and engaging targets at will. With each engagement command Bishop’s bot’s  dual miniguns buzzed to life. 

Brrrrrrrrrtrrrr..... Brrrrrrrrt.... streams of hot lead raced out to touch their victims. 

Sensing movement out of his right eye the Skinwalker reach reacted on pure instinct. With lightning reflexes he unholstered his M&G auto pistol, bringing it up just before the wounded Capellan started his lunge towards the mercenary. The pistol barked on full auto dumping a stream of round into the chest and head of the airborne soldier, killing him instantly. The man’s lifeless body slowly drifted upwards and away from Bishop. 

“Fuck” growled the Skinwalker. He had gotten sloppy and mentally scolded himself. 

A blood chilling giggle buzzed at the back of his mind. ”You need me” came the wet voice of the Beast. 

Screams and gun fire drowned the voice out. Seeing more movement ahead Bishop responded with a calculated risk. Reaching to his combat harness the mercenary unclipped and small cylinder like device and pressed the thump switch. He threw the micro grenade over the shoulder of his security bot towards a nest of Capellans taking cover in a alcove. Being much smaller and less destructive then a stand grenade the micro grenade would do it job without breaching the ships hull. With a little luck the majority of the explosion would be dammed by soft human bodies.   

The corridor erupted again in a fiery explosion on shrapnel. Three more dead men floated up and two more were wounded terribly. 

A bust of machine gun fire ripped past Bishop, the last standing security bot was attempting to engage someone behind him. With a quick command on this datapad Bishop engaged the last security bot with his. Both miniguns tracked and locked in a split second. The high pitched buzz saw sound drowned out sounds of war. Three seconds later the last remaining security bot stood lifeless in a pile of slag. 

The Skinwalker keyed the command channel. 

“Ammo bins on guns one and two down 50 percent” he said calmly. “I’m pushing forward”.

 

[Steve Jenkins]

My mouth fell open and I stared at amazement as William came Flying out of no where yelling with a fury I have never heard before. The Chinese guys did not even have a chance to react as William drew the gun that I had thought he didn't know how to use and aimed it at the Lieutenant and dropped him before twisting around in Mid Air and dropping another Capellan before William crashed into me,  pushed me out of the way and handed me the Gun. As he fell on the Ground I whipped the gun around and blew the knife Capellan away. Then I fell down on my knees while a massacre happened behind me. "William? Are you OK? What the heck was that??" 

"I'm fine." Said William "The bigger problem is how we're going to deal with all those guys still out there. We can't just walk out, right??"

[James Hayes]

"Ammo bins on guns one and two down 50 percent," Bishop reported. "I’m pushing forward."

"Copy that," I replied.

To say that conditions on the battlefield had become 'chaotic' was a gross understatement. Between Capellan forces fighting alongside uncooperative robots, grenades detonating, and Charles and Bishop using a pair of hijacked battledroids to spray lead at everything that moved, total mayhem reigned supreme. I hastily alternated between monitoring Nathan Schmidt's vitals, providing situation reports to the Mendacious, and defending our ragtag group as best I could as Captains Maxwell, Harlow, and Lieutenant Weyland pushed slowly toward the center of the madness. As opportunity permitted, I blindly fired my weapon at targets of opportunity, unconvinced that the shots would find their marks from my position, but that didn't entirely matter. Shock and awe had become our new defense, and for the moment, it seemed to be working. The Capellan forces didn't know what the hell was going on, and were so confused by the orgy of violence that had unexpectedly broken out before them that they were essentially just shooting at everything that didn't look like it belonged.

Suddenly. the scream of Cargo Bay One's heavy access door being raised on rusty cogs caught my attention, and I jerked my head toward the sound just in time to see a pair of Capellan soldiers break from their formation and run toward the aperture, light spilling from within the bay that had a decidedly aquatic shimmer to it. I barely had time to register what it was that I was seeing before a thunderous, fast-moving explosion, accompanied by a cataclysmic boom, lit up the chamber. Tendrils of flame spilled out into the corridor, swallowing the whole of the cargo bay in an orange-white conflagration that, momentarily, looked like the flash from a nuclear blast. The Capellans who looked toward the commotion were quickly taken out by precision shots from Charles, Nikki, and Bishop, rapidly turning the focus of the fight back toward us.

"What the fuck was that?" I marveled.

"Your guess is as good as mine, Major," Captain Donovan's voice crackled in my headset. "Sensors registered an explosion from the cargo bay. That's all I can tell you."

"Lifesigns?" I asked, worried.

"Two. Moving in your direction," Donovan advised. "Can you get eyes on them?"

"I intend to try," I answered. Gathering up Nathan under one arm, I pushed forward as far as I dared, drawing almost directly behind Captain Maxwell to try to gain a better vantage point. Withdrawing a small set of binoculars from a chest pocket, I activated their viewfinder and gazed toward the hold. As I watched, two Capellans staggered backward out of the smoke and flames, badly charred from the explosion, appearing to pause just outside the cargo bay doors to catch their breath before turning back toward the scene of the blast. No sooner had they done so than I saw two figures in spacesuits emerging from within the billowing smoke. One was short and carried a katana, a laser rifle, and a mishmash of other eclectic weaponry. The other was of average height, lanky, and had a single handgun strapped at hip level. Both spacesuits bore a silver winged insignia on their chest plates.

"Holy shit! Jenkins! He did it!" I exclaimed. "Alpha-1 to Alpha team - I have eyes on Alpha-5 and Regent."

Hoisting Nathan onto my shoulder, I rose to my feet as Maxwell and Weyland began an aggressive drive straight into the Capellan line, dodging red-hot shell casings as they poured from the ejection ports of the robots' machine guns. We were close enough now that I could see the goings-on in the hold unassisted, and as I craned my neck to try to observe Jenkins and Kauffman, my heart caught in my throat. In the seconds that it had taken me to retrieve Nathan and advance my position, the Capellans had intercepted Steve. William was no where to be seen.

"Alpha-1 to Alpha-2; Captain Maxwell, the Capellans have Private Jenkins at knifepoint at the cargo bay entrance. Can you get a shooting solution on them?" I radioed. Though I was directly behind Charles, the noise of the engagement made unassisted vocal communication impractial.

"Alpha-1, we're barely hitting anything we mean to hit with these manually-targeted robots. If I try to take out those soldiers, I'm just as likely to hit Steve. I'll do what I can to throw them off their game, though," Maxwell replied, swinging his robot's guns around and blasting the door frame of the cargo bay with a barrage of wildly-targeted rounds. The Capellans holding Steve jumped momentarily before returning their attentions toward him, and I realized that they felt safe in their current situation, which was not a good sign. In fact, one of the Capellans casually pushed up the visor on his combat helmet and lifted Steve off the ground, pushing a large bladed weapon to his throat as a third soldier joined the pair. We didn't have the luxury of trying for lucky shots any longer. I had to act.

With Nathan still on my shoulder, I sprinted forward, keeping a low crouch posture and hugging the right-hand wall of the corridor as it branched out in either direction and formed a large antechamber before the cargo bay entrance itself, which sat atop a steeply-inclined ramp. As I ran, I kept one eye on the situation unfolding with Jenkins, while the other was trained on our Capellan assailants. The defending force - what was left of it - paid me no mind, likely because I was just about the only thing that wasn't presently shooting at them, and thus, I represented a more negligible threat in the moment. I was thus able to traverse almost the entire distance between Alpha team's position and the hold's doorway when, abruptly, I heard a piercing, primal scream. Twisting my head toward the source of the noise, I saw the taller spacesuited figure literally come flying out from behind the right-hand side of the cargo doors, lunging directly toward the trio of Capellans who were accosting Steve.

William...no! I thought to myself, a sense of dread washing over me. But what happened next was unbelievable.

In the space of no more than three seconds, while in flight, Kauffman withdrew the pistol from his hip holster, brought it to bear on the lead soldier, triple-tapped the trigger, swung the gun around, and squeezed off three rounds again, all in a single, fluid movement, immediately dropping both Capellans in a near-simultaneous act of unfathomable marksmanship.

Before the third Capellan had time to react, Kauffman shoved Jenkins out of harm's way while simultaneously transferring the weapon to the MechWarrior. Steve immediately dispatched the goon as Kauffman collapsed to the floor. In an instant, I realized what William had done - and the life-threatening condition it had placed him in. I needed to close the distance as quickly as I could - and the only way to reach Kauffman was through the center of the melee.

Throwing caution aside, I hurtled across the antechamber, holding Nathan with my right arm, drawing my Bowie knife from its holster with my left hand. Bludgeoning my way past a soldier on my flank with the weapon's hilt, I swung its bladed end around to the right to impale another Capellan mid-charge before he could run me through with a bayonet fixed to the end of his rifle. Ascending the ramp, I called out to Steve.

"Jenkins! It's Major Hayes! Are you alright?"

Steve opened his mouth to speak, but was abruptly cut off as a thunderous gunshot erupted directly behind me. I flinched, expecting to feel the molten-hot pain of a bullet piercing my back. Instead, I heard the sound of a body impacting a nearby wall. As I turned toward the source of the sound, I bore witness to Nathan Schmidt, still braced on my shoulder, my sidearm drawn and in his hand, smoke rising from its barrel. The limp body of a Capellan soldier drifted slowly past, a trickle of blood trailing from a mortal head injury.

Speechless, I stared at Nathan.

"Welcome back," I finally said in shock. "You sure know how to make an entrance."

[Steve Jenkins]

MEANWHILE......

I wiped a bunch of blood and guts off of my body from where they had all blew back at me when I did the Finishing move on the Capellan soldier. His dead body floated around in the zero grav bouncing off the walls slowly and making all kinds of messes on account of the gigantic hole that was now in him that stopped his life from going on. While Major Hayes took care of William I started looking around at the old and wrecked up inside of the freighter. It made me think of the days back on Kuuzu, back  before Archimedes when I was in high school and running with a different crowd...

*FLASHBACK* 

I am 16 years old and it is the middle of the high school year, two Years before I divorced my parents. I'm hanging out with my friends Jimmy Eaton, Chang Dung, and Axl Kevinfraud. During our lunch break we liked to go out back by the dumpsters and watch the skateboarders do a bunch of stunts in the parking lot, sometimes when the lunch ladies would park back there, the boarders would up the Risk and  use the lunch ladies windshields as ramps, the trunks and bumpers as skate rails. That was when they would sometimes do the most awesome stunts, like a triple half pipe with an Ollie and a backflip, or a switch trick and a kick flip on one hand while shredding a Figure 8. Today there were like seven skateboarders outside doing all kinds of stunts, it was a good show.

"Hey Jimmy, you think I could ever be a pro border like that?"

"Not a chance Steve" he said "You have three left feet and no right ones."

"Hey you take that back!!" I said "Or you'll end up getting racked in the nads like that guy who just fell over and now he's bleeding out of his shorts!!"

"Okay, okay" Said Axel  "You don't have to fight with each other. Anyway, you have a after school job it's pretty awesome, you get to be the pool attendant down at the Sake Baths."

"No." I said. "Unfortunately I had an accident."

"What did you do?" Asked Jimmy with surprise, I guess he was surprised because I was normally a successful Businessman even at my age.

"Well....." I said. "I was serving Flaming Mojitos at the Sake Bath and I slipped on a wet towel that some numbnuts had left on the floor and I fell into the Sake Bath with the Mojitos. The next thing I knew the water had lit on fire on account of the Flaming Mojitos falling into the alcohol that people were swimming in and there was a stampede of Screams and yells because a bunch of naked people were running like crazy to get out of the fire."

In the background I heard an air ambulance siren, it was pretty ironic.

"Oh man." Said Axel. "Did anybody get hurt?" "Only me." I said. "And that wasn't until the next day when I got demoted from the Sake Baths and now I have to work in the Snake Bath." "Remind me never to come over and visit you at work now." Said Jimmy. "I don't want to end up with a snake hanging off my junk."

The next thing I knew we heard a bunch of electronic techno smash music and a group of scene kids were showing up on their hoverboards. They looked so awesome. They were wearing glow jackets and VR sunglasses and had those glow tubes you can buy wrapped all over their heads. One of them had a mohawk with a little TV plugged right into the side of his skull with some cables, it had a video of a Hampster running in a wheel on loop. One of them had a actual ancient "boom box" with a tape inside it and headphones on his head with a cord that was like 50 feet long wrapped all over his legs and arms, he also had a hologram guitar and was shredding on it, and the other scene kid was smoking 7 cigarettes all at the same time and they were letting out smoke that was all different colors. All of them were riding in on EXECUTOR brand hover boards which you could hear rumble and fire came out of the back of.

"Dude, those guys look like they wrote the book about cool." Said Axl.

"Oh man I want to run with the scene kids" Said Jimmy. 

Dung didn't say anything, he just stared and chewed his Nicorrette gum. He was trying to quit smoking, I was proud of him. 

"WELL," I Said. "I'm gonna go tell them to let us join the Scene." 

"Are you crazy Steve? People can't join the Scene just cuz they want to!! You have to be one of the cool kids!" Said Axl. 

"What are you saying, that you think I'm not cool??" I said.

"You're really cool Steve, but you aren't in the Scene." Said Jimmy. 

"Well hold onto your Underwear cause that's about to change." I Said. Then I Walked over to the Scene kids and said "Hi, I'm Steve Jenkins, you've probably heard of me."

"Who?" Said the mohawk kid with the TV set. 

"I'm Steve Jenkins, I go to school here and I run a Business with Sake Baths." I said, I hoped my uncle wouldn't find out I lied about owning his business. "I want to be join the Scene." 

The scene kids looked at each other for a minute. "OK, but only if you can get us free Sake, also there's an admission test." 

"Piece of cake" I said Sternly "I am ready for my test." 

"OK, you have to do a triple Ollie with a Caballerial and a McTwist, end it with a railslide and you gotta ride crooked grind and end with a fakie." Said mohawk dude. 

"That's easy!!" I yelled. 

"You have to do it on my EXECUTOR." He finished. I swallowed hard and felt like I was gonna barf. I had never did a hover board stunt. But I had to be Brave. 

"No problem!!" I yelled and then I grabbed the Board. I jumped on it and ramped its motor up real high to make it seem more Dangerous. Flames came out of the back of its Tailpipe for like 10 feet and then I let off the brakes, "Haha see you in a minute suckers!!" I Yelled, then the board took off like a bat out of hell and I was out of control!! 

"AAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaAaaaaaaaAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!" I Screamed,, "GET OUT OF THE WAY!!!" I was going straight at the kids on the skateboards, they jumped out of the way at the last second, but then I saw the most horrible thing, I was flaming straight at the trunk of one of the lunch ladies cars!! 

"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!" I Screamed, I didn't know how to steer and all I could see was a license plate that said JUICY coming straight at me too fast to get out of the way!! 

"I'M GONNA DIE!!!" I Yelled and then the EXECUTOR and me crashed into the trunk with a huge explosion! I hit so hard that I flew through the back windshield of the car and slammed into the steering wheel, then the airbag went off and hit me in the butt and blew me over the driver's seat and into the back seat. I barfed with fear and Embarrassment while the car alarm started going off and the trunk of the car lit on fire. Then one of the Scene kids came over. 

"You are Disqualified from the Scene." He said. "OK." I garbled and then barfed again in the lunch lady's back seat. 

***END FLASHBACK***

I looked around and Nate was back from the dead, I couldn't believe it! I ran over and gave him a manly hug, then I said "Hey Nate, how are you doing?" 

[Nicholas Schuster]

A visibly shellshocked Major Hayes eased me to the deck as I slowly lowered the firearm. Rotating the handgun in my grip, I offered it back to the Major.

"Uhh - keep it for now. Your laser rifle didn't fare as well as you evidently did." Hayes replied. "How did you...?"

"My armor must have caught the round and I probably blacked out after that." I answered. The Major quickly shook his head as he moved to kneel beside William Kauffman.

"I saw you get shot. That round entered your chest and exited out your back. That was no armor hit. You went down. I thought you were going to die of blood loss if not massive internal organ trauma."

"Well, I guess I got lucky." I said. "Thanks for looking out for me and not leaving me for dead. Seriously."

"Don't mention it." said the Major. "I want to know what you were doing up in the ceiling on that end of the hallway, though. What kind of stunt you were trying to pull."

"I wish I could take credit for trying to do something specatcular. But the truth is, I got disoriented and turned around in the smoke. I never had any intention of being on that side of the corridor. I'm sorry, sir, I was lost. I wish I could give you a better and more exciting answer."

"The truth is seldom easy, so thank you for your courage to do the right thing. And anyway, I'm not really the guy who needs convince. He is." said Major Hayes, gesturing at William Kauffman, who, having been eased to a sitting position, gazed up at me.

"Oh," I replied, suddenly wordless. "Mister Kauffman - it's good to see you again..."

Just then, Steve Jenkins lunched at me, pulling me close into an over-the top hug. "Hey Nate, how are you doing?" 

"Uhhhh..." I replied.                                                          

Edited October 14, 2020 by Nathan Schmidt
Fix typo