\u201cEngineering, secure.\u201d The report cut through the gunfire, the patter of projectiles on hull metal, the tromp of booted feet and the heavier stomping of battle armour.<\/p>\n
\u201cEnvironmental, secure.\u201d \u201cCrew, secure.\u201d The two reports came through so quickly, only the radically different voices made plain that they weren’t one speaker.<\/p>\n
It took a bit more time, a few more shirt-sleeved bodies hitting the hull metal, another two corridor junctions of progress, before the next: \u201cBrig, secure.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dak progressed carefully \u2013 backwards. The wolverine was the rear guard, this time, his flechette gun ready to brutally suppress any attempt to sneak up behind them. The bulk of the work was being done by the standard ratings, their coilguns dialled all the way down and loaded with tranquilizer needles. Stubborn clusters of them got softened up by the Lieutenant with a few flashbangs from his underbarrel launcher; two or three had found battle armour of their own, but it was light stuff, not even a match for that the Marines wore, much less the walking tank that was Lieutenant Arven Joraquin. Nothing that the squirrel’s plasma caster couldn’t punch a hole through.<\/p>\n
Clean <\/em>through, with enough force still to warp the bulkhead beyond. There was no time to try taking them<\/em> alive.<\/p>\n They’d just got to the bridge, and Arange was placing breachers on the door, when the last of the other fireteams called in: \u201cCargo secure. This is definitely our bunch, Sir, we’ve already found some personal effects from the Safe Venture.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNot entirely damning,\u201d the Lieutenant demurred, \u201cbut pretty close. All teams hold positions. Alpha is about to take the bridge. Charlie, I want the gravity to this section cut as soon as the breachers go.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cStand by,\u201d a female voice said. Then, \u201cAwaiting your signal.\u201d<\/p>\n Joraquin nodded to Arange. The ferret stepped back and flattened against the wall. He didn’t have to push a button; his charges were triggered by the eye-tracking software all of them had in their helmets. Dak wasn’t even close enough to see Arange’s eye scan through the commands; he just saw the flash and heard the report as the door blew to pieces, even as a signal lit up on his display.<\/p>\n The Marines were already using their boot grips; they<\/em> didn’t feel anything different as they stormed through. But drifting bodies and debris said quite clearly that the gravity was, in fact, off.<\/p>\n \u201cI really don’t recommend that,\u201d Joraquin said, over his suit speakers, to the wolverine who was struggling to bring a weapon to bear while also clinging to the command chair. \u201cYou’re not going to pierce our armour with less than a three-second burn \u2013 five,<\/em> for mine. Meanwhile, you<\/em> apparently never found armour to fit you. I’m sure you recognize the sort of weapon Master Sergeant Travenis is carrying…\u201d At this Dak, grim-faced behind his visor, brought the barrel of his gun to bear on the shirt-sleeved bandit captain. \u201cIt can render even someone your size, within a fraction of a second, into a discontinuous mass off tissue that will take genetic records to identify. I believe you’ve seen the like used before.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYeah?\u201d the other wolverine growled. \u201cSo what makes you<\/em> so special, if you do that?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt’s not our<\/em> first resort,\u201d Joraquin replied.<\/p>\n Morrisey’s coilgun spat. The wolverine jerked, and then he and his weapon went tumbling in two different directions.<\/p>\n The Lieutenant looked around at the other pirates, then, quite calmly, declared, \u201cBridge secure.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A detachment of Authority marines seizes the outlaw ship whose crew is responsible for earlier atrocities.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[45],"tags":[84],"class_list":["post-341","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-slash","tag-flash"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/furry-tales.net\/shurhaian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/furry-tales.net\/shurhaian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/furry-tales.net\/shurhaian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/furry-tales.net\/shurhaian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/furry-tales.net\/shurhaian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=341"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/furry-tales.net\/shurhaian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/furry-tales.net\/shurhaian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=341"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/furry-tales.net\/shurhaian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=341"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/furry-tales.net\/shurhaian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=341"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}