John nodded in agreement and they headed down to the Hangar bay. They boarded their captured Kirrix dropship and once John had opened the outer hull doors, Alyssa powered up the engines and carefully exited the Hangar. From outside, the two space leviathans loomed above them, the Invictus and the Stalingrad locked in a one sided melee. Cra was using theser cannons topletely cripple the heavy cruiser, having firstly melted down the rys that powered the Stalingrad’s defence grid and now taking out the enemy ship’s engines with her uncannily urate shooting.


    “Escape pods leaving the Stalingrad.” Alyssa said, pointing to the small metallic spheres being jettisoned from the escape podunch tubes along the nks of the heavy cruiser.


    “Rats deserting the sinking ship.” John muttered darkly.


    Alyssa brought the Kirrix dropship around to the hangar bay positioned in the underbelly of the heavy cruiser. She flew directly underneath the pirate vessel and then used manoeuvring thrusters to lift their ugly looking dropship up into the open mouth of the Stalingrad’s hangar bay.


    The dimly lit hangar bay looked to be deserted, so she brought their dropship forward andnded it on one of the empty pads. The two of them readied their rifles and then disembarked, sealing the door to the dropship behind them and covering the various doors into the hangar in case of surprise attacks.


    “Where too?” Alyssa said.


    John pressed a button on theputer built into the vambrace of his armour and a holographic map of the interior of the heavy cruiser sprung into existence.


    “The brig is here.” John said, pointing to a location a few decks up from where they stood in the hangar.


    “The Captain’s quarters are here.” John said grimly, pointing to a spot near the top decks of the Stalingrad.


    “Ok prisoners first, then we pay a visit to the Captain?” Alyssa said enthusiastically.


    “That’s the n.” John said and led her out of the hangar.


    They headed along a corridor and saw an elevator on their right, currentlying down to their level. John pressed the call button and then the two of them raised their assault rifles. The elevator door swung open and three scruffy pirates looked at them in open mouthed surprise.


    “Going up?” John asked, before he and Alyssa filled the elevator with bursts of fire from their assault rifles, spraying the back wall with blood.


    “Hmm, going a long way down I suspect.” Alyssa replied.


    They got into the elevator and pressed the button for deck 4. On the way up, the elevator stopped at deck 3. The door chimed and then swished open to reveal two pirates in a hurry to evacuate the ship. They looked down in shock at the blood soaked corpses of their ship mates, before looking up to see the assault rifles pointed in their direction.


    “The lift’s full I’m afraid” John said apologetically, before they opened fire, cutting the brigands down.


    Alyssa’s musicalughter filled the elevator as the door swung closed and John grinned at her.


    “What’s with the quips?” she asked amused.


    “Perhaps you’re a bad influence?” John said, smiling at her affectionately.


    The elevator chimed again and the door opened out on the 4th deck, which contained the security brig.


    *Ok they should be just up ahead* John thought to Alyssa, falling into their silentbat routine.


    They walked ahead cautiously until they reached an intersection, at the end of which they could see a guard post and a ceiling mounted Gatlingser.


    “Damn!” John cursed under his breath, as he and Alyssa darted to the sides and out of line of sight of the powerful anti-personnel weapon.


    Alyssa looked at him questioningly, wondering what they were going to do now. She could read John’s frustration and realised they might be stuck. Suddenly a whir started that she recognised from the Mexican standoff back on Karron and then stato pulses ofser fire opened up, strobing light shing down the corridor.


    She instinctively pulled right back into cover, remembering the carnage thoseser bolts could cause, but was surprised when noser fire came searing down the corridor. John looked her way and shrugged, his face and thoughts showing he was as equally puzzled as her. He tentatively poked his head around the corner and then pulled back as his watchmunicator shed. He answered the call and Sparks’ beautiful smiling face filled the image.


    “You’re wee!” she said mischievously.


    “What…?” John asked, confused.


    “I hacked the Stalingrad and took control of their defensive subsystems. When I saw you two approaching the brig, I thought I’d lend a hand.” She exined.


    “Above you and to your left.” the redhead grinned impishly.


    John looked up and left and spotted a small security camera set into the ceiling.


    “I’ll call and let you know if I see any troubleing your way, but it looks pretty chaotic from up here, the pirates seem to be evacuating.” Sparks said reassuringly.


    “Very nice Sparks, thank you!” John said appreciatively, wondering how she had managed to hack military grade security subsystems.


    He ended the call and prepared to move onwards, Alyssa falling into line at his side. They moved up to the end of the corridor and saw that the Gatlingser was now pointed at the guard station and two pirate guards had been shot to pieces by the point nkser fire, their corpses smouldering from the high energyser impacts. They cautiously headed into the brig which was lined with rows of cells on either side of the corridor.N?velDrama.Org owns all ? content.


    John walked ahead and looked into the cells, seeing the captive people Sparks had picked up on her active scan of the Stalingrad. He unlocked the cell doors and the energy fields securing each cell disappeared, freeing the prisoners. The men and women locked within came out carefully, unsure what to expect.


    “My name’s Commander John ke, we’re here to rescue you.” John said, “Follow us”.