StarCraft: Brain Damage
Chapter 26: When I pick up the Phone…
"Why is there a Probe working with you guy's anyway?" asked the Shogoki's engineer, Lieutenant Ibuki.
"I'm not sure," Ayanami replied, "But I hope to have it looked at."
"Well if you don't mind, it can take a look at our reactor," Ibuki said a bit irritated.
"Okay. Come on, Fluffy," Ayanami patted her leg to signal the Probe to follow her.
"You call it Fluffy?" Ibuki asked.
"Yeah, I gave him that name, but Jax thinks he should be named Jeffy or something weird," Ayanami explained with a smile.
"Yeah whatever colonist," Ibuki said and kept walking toward the engine bay.
Ayanami cringed at how the engineer thought she was better than she was because she was born on Earth. In fact, she debated shooting her in the back of her unarmored back and just dealing with the inadvertent firefight with the rest of the Battlecruiser's crew afterward. But then they would be left with no one who could fly it out of there and they'd just be living on a beached spaceship for the rest of their lives.
They entered the engine room and Fluffy instantly started beeping happily. He pushed past Ibuki and in the process either accidentally or purposely bumped her hard enough to throw her onto her ass.
"You little piece of Protoss trash!" she shouted as he floated away to start working on a conduit that had been ruptured from what looked like a Hydralisk arm blade.
Ayanami briefly thought about which was more stuck up: the Protoss Conclave or the United Earth Directorate. She decided that she would think more on it later.
"What the hell's wrong with that thing?" Ibuki asked.
"I guess he just doesn't like stuck up people, that might be why he left the Protoss," Ayanami smart mouthed.
Before Ibuki could do anything, Ayanami left the engineering bay.
"So why was I promoted?" Nick asked Jim as they both stood in the ship's machine shop.
"I needed a second in command and since Ayanami's always busy doing her duties as a medic, and Jax is a retard, I was kind of left with you," Jim said without looking up from what he was working on.
"So the lesser of three crappy troops?" Nick asked.
"None of you are crappy troops," Jim explained, looking the Reaper right in the eyes.
"Except for Jax," Nick retorted.
"Is he still breathing?" Jim asked.
"Yeah," Nick answered.
"Then he's good enough for the job," Jim said with finality.
He then lifted up his ballistic shield that he'd been modifying on the welding bench. It now had a rather sharp titanium spike welded on the front of it so that shield-bashing enemies became even deadlier.
"What do you think?" he asked Nick.
"Remind me never to be in front of that when you're pissed," Nick replied.
Jim barked a short laugh, "Yeah, that's exactly what I hope the Zerg won't realize."
A half-hour later, Jim walked into the bridge to see Katsuragi talking with Lieutenant Hyuga.
"We're what?" she asked, astonished.
"We're at seventy five percent power," Hyuga said, surprised as well by the sound of his voice, "What ever that probe is doing, its working."
"So how long before we can leave?" she asked.
"Ibuki says we'll be running in about four hours," he said.
"That's great news," she said, then turned to Jim, "Now we've got to figure out where we're going. You said you had an idea."
"Yes I do, is your long range communications system working?" he asked.
Raynor stood on the bridge of the Hyperion, drinking a flask of whiskey and debating suicide. The battle on Char had cost him almost all of his forces just to hold back the Zerg wave attack and get the buildings off of the ground. Then Mutalisks destroyed all but three of his Wraiths as they fought to keep the heat off of the buildings and the Hyperion itself.
Basically, he was crippled militaristically. So he figured, why not end it all? He was a wanted man by the Dominion, and no one would join his cause after two defeats like the ones he'd suffered in the past few weeks. He pulled the flak pistol he carried around out of his belt and looked at it thoughtfully. Then he looked over at the flask of whiskey.
"Is this what I've been reduced to?" he asked himself, "A suicidal alcoholic? How pathetic."
Just before he was about to go through with his suicide, the helmsman said something.
"Sir, I'm getting a transmission from Lieutenant Goss on Braxis. I'll patch it through on screen one."
The screen flickered to life and revealed Jim standing on the bridge of a Battlecruiser, behind him Raynor could see two people in UED navy uniforms talking while a Reaper relaxed by a terminal talking to a white-armored Confederate.
"Jim, I'd really like to hear your story for this one," Raynor said, temporarily forgetting his suicidal thoughts.
"Sure thing," Jim said and took a deep breath, "Basically, Massadar got the shit kicked out of him royally but did manage to take out the Loyalist base. Unfortunately, his invasion force didn't survive long enough to reap the rewards occupation would have gained them. My squad is all that's left."
Raynor looked back down at the flak pistol.
"But there is good news," Jim continued, "We found a UED Battlecruiser called the Shogoki. Its crew has been trying to get it fixed with the incorrect equipment and less manpower than necessary for roughly a year or so. We brought our probe in and it'll be up and running in four hours. Where can we meet you?"
Raynor thought about what Jim had just said. He hadn't said 'can we meet you?' he'd said 'where can we meet you?' People still counted on him and thought he was worth something. Maybe, just maybe, there was a little bit of hope.
"Sir?" Jim repeated, "Where can we meet you?"
"Set your course for Aiur, there shouldn't be any Zerg, Protoss or Dominion forces there. We can take a breather and think of what to do next," Raynor said.
"Got it Marshal, we'll be there by tomorrow," Jim said and despite how tired he looked still managed a salute.
The screen went off and Raynor looked to the helmsman.
"Lay in a course for Aiur, ASAP," he said and looked back down at the bottle of whiskey and flak pistol on the table in front of him.
He thought for a second, holstered the pistol and tossed the whiskey in a trashcan near the tactics table.