Severly Wounded
"I wanted to find something I've wanted all along.......Somewhere I belong." ~Linkin Park
The huge battle ship, laser cannons and ion cannons pointing out every orifice they could shove them out, loomed over the small red cruiser. Both were at a stand off, but if push came to shove, the out come would be entirely predictable. The attack ship was waiting for confirmation on the small cruiser under them, they had a long history of destroying or capturing ship without warrents on them.
The small cruiser wasn't going to stay long. Jumba had already keyed in the co-ordinates for the nearest safe port. 626 was flying the attack ship to the safety of a nearby planet. Hoping after the ordeal with the battleship was over they would return and continue on thier way. He hit the after- burners to speed up, they needed all the time they could get. "Uh- 626, there's some one over here who thingks you should hurry." Jumba said nervously, he was looking out the window, at the huge ship comming on them. "Any time now." he continued. 626 thought that was enough distance, he slammed a button to hold the ship in it's current postion. He then threw the set on the seat and leapt to the floor. "I need you up here!" Jumba shouted as he saw the experiment bolt into the rear.
626 popped open the hatch to the storage and began rooting through his personal stuff that he'd stashed close to the door. He pulled out a coil of wire wrapped arround an enclosed capsule. He grabbed a stick of explosives he'd found before they left the lab. "About thirty seconds, then we're dead!" Jumba yelled in desperation. 626 scurried over to the trash disposer and produced a roll of tape from a pocket and began wrapping the stick to the wire coated capsule. "626!" exclaimed a chorous of voices. He threw the taped up thing into the disposal and closed the lid. He pushed the eject button and made like a bat outa the nine hells to the cockpit.
"I hope you have a plan!" Jumba said, indicating the ship that was on them. 626 calmly took the pilots chair and watched the giant ship's bay doors open. "They are three seconds away from putting a tractor beam on us." Jumba informed him, sweat was rolling down his face. "We hit the hyper drive." 626 said, reached for the lever. "Cruise in sub space for a milli- second." He wrenched the handle down, then back up, all in one fluid motion. "And then hopefully......" he paused.
A shock wave hit the cruiser, rocking it back and forth, untill the stabilizers could counter the effects. The lights flickered momentarily. 626 glanced at the ship that was almost out of range, the lights had shut off, and generator was dead. Only for a few minutes. "Everything is disabled, temporarily." he told Jumba, who was seconds away from convulsing. His face lightened up when he heard the good news. He regained controll of his emotions and sat up. "We need to get out of here." Jumba typed some co-ordinates into the nava computer and warmed up the hyper drive. "Destination set, proceding to course indicated." a mechanical voice said.
The stars became a blurr and the g forces could be felt, pressing them into the chairs, untill the atmosphere settled. Jumba let it run on course for a few minutes. He then stopped, entered a new course, he cruised on that for a few mintues then stopped again. He then re-entered the origional course and warped off again.
He set a timer then mosyed to the lounge. He flopped down onto a couch and sighed. "626, what was that thing anyway?" he asked the alien who was staring up at the ceiling. 626 turned over and faced him. "It was an unfinished electromagnetic bomb. I used an explosive to set it off." he answered. "Clever, very. Why didn't you do that earlier?" 626 sat upright and thought, he did it out of instinct, acted before he thought. "Ah. All arround the ship, under all the shielding and armor is a thin coating of rubber, that absorbs any electric interference from space. But when the protective bay doors are open, they have to drop thier shields, and the doors reveal a weakness. Above the bay in the main generator, the heart of the ship. When it detonated the pulse wasn't absorbed, it went in the open doors, disrupted the generator. When that happens-" "No power!" Jumba cut in. "Right." 626 said.
A huge grin spread across Jumba's face. "626, you have surpassed my expectations." 626 shared the doctor's joy, either that or he was glad to be in the limelight. "So where do we go now? The cruiser should have cleared the area and is now searching for us. We could go back and get the other experi-" "No." Jumba stopped him. 626 didn't understand, Jumba had always cared for his creations, always wanted them to be treated well and fairly. "Why?" 626 asked in alarm. "626," Jumba sighed. "We cannot go back. That was my first rule, never go back. They will eventually be discovered. They will survive." he told 626. "But-" 626 protested. "No, drop it 626. Nothing can make me go back." Jumba turned to the controlls and stared regretfully at them. 626 left the cabin, wondering why Jumba had this change in attitude toward his work. It wasn't like him, to abandon his work. Perhaps someday he migh leave him somewhere.
* * *
Several hours later Jumba pulled the ship out of sub-space and drifted to the planet known as Zenon V.
"Zenon V." Jumba announced. "Lush vegitation covers most of this planet, it actually looks like a scene from the Jurassic period on Earth. Several large cities cover a huge span of the planet, most are buried deep in the jungle, some are on the water." 327 leaned to a window and looked down. "Any indiginous races.... I mean any we have to look out for." she asked without looking up from the window. "None that are dangerous anyway, unless you have a bounty on your head. Most of the inhabitants are a reptilian like species. Carnivores or omnivores. A peaceful planet at the most, perfect for us to settle down on." Jumba informed her. "Besides, we have 626 with us. There's nothing to worry about." Jumba turned to the chair where 626 was co-piloting the ship, well at least an hour after they jumped into sub-space. Now he was hanging half off the chair in a deep sleep, a trickle of drool dripping to the floor.
Jumba couldn't help but let out a laugh. "We'll circle the planet several times before we land."
*
Halfway arround the planet, hanging in the black void of space lay a ship of deadly magnitude. A pirate-ing vessle, searching through the galaxy for unsuspecting ship to attack and plunder from the cargo holds the treasures inside.
On this paticular day the pirates aboard the ship the pirates had no ships in the area for a while and were now spoiling for a good fight and a looting of a ship. Although morale was low and so was the gin in the cabnets, they were ready for anything.
The bridge was a hub of activity and and voices. Each pirate had his own story of who he was and how he became a pirate. Rumors of mutiny were present, but the origin of them was likely a bluff. The ship had been in orbit for a month and the crew grew unruly and just plain out tired of the same planet.
The captain would hear nothing of it. He had made a descision, and that was final. Although the crew had thier gripes about him they still followed orders.
Zrong was a hard ass captain, who held a pile of gold in one hand and a scimitar in the other. He wasn't one of the geo-phisicysts of the universe, but he also wasn't a run-of-the-mill dum wad captain. He was well educated in the first few years of his life. He had always heard stories about the space pirates and thier raids on huge merchant ships, and was fascinated. One day he told his mother that he 'wanted to grow up and be a space pirate'. His mother laughed. He learned what he could in anyhting he could get his claws on.
He looked out he window of the bridge, down on his homeworld. He was rather small for his species. He was arround 5 standard feet tall, very small considering his species height was an average 7 standard feet. Raptor liek qualities would fit his description perfectly. Although he was mistaken for a dynonichous because of his size. Over the thousands or years the velociraptors had been on ZenonV they had adapted to a homosapienanic like build. Instead of the layout of thier bodies being horizontal it was vertical. The forearms devolped to the extent of being almost humanic, except the three claws and the thumb-claw. The long sweeping tales for balance had been shortened by evolution. Now being more of a nuisece than a useful tool.
His appearance was dark, he insisted on wearing dark colored clothes. He wore a dark blue shirt with a Hawiian twist, hibiscus flowers and pineapples bordered the bottom. His pants were a forest green with a thin yellow stripe running down the middle of the leg. And to add to the theme he had a long black cape with a thin gold border on the bottom. His nonsensical appearance and sharp witty mind were his key attributes.
He continued to scan the forest like planet. "Hey boss, I sees somthin` arn the radar." The not too bright crew member said. "Anything on the make of the ship?" Zrong asked. The dumb smuggler looked back on the screen. "It be weely small, I thinks a personel ship." Zrong paused for a second, lost in thought. He spoke after a while. "It maybe a pleasure cruiser, but none the less it is a ship. Get ready to fire." Zrong commanded.
"Thatz what I is talkin' about." The impared smuggler said gleefully while reaching for the alarm. A high pitched ringing filled the command deck and the bright lights turned a deep crimson, creating an eerie glow.
Zrong walked over to the window to see the ship, which was almost in range. The lights dimmed as the special weapon charged up. The secret to all of Zrong's raids and great escapes were hidden inside the ship. The Ultra high electro magnetic pulse, which sent a great ammount of negetive electrical energy in a burst to the selected ship. When the pulse hit the energy would short out all electrical systems and drain any power source. There was only one side effect, the pulse did only temporary dammage, thus giving the pirates a short time to get inside and reach the main controlls.
"You may fire when they are within range." Zrong commanded. "Then pull the ship into the docking bay. Put all occupants on the hold." He turned and left the room, he had something else on his mind to deal with at the moment.
*
"626, wake up and take a look at our new home." Jumba said, prodding him. 626 just grunted and rolled over in the seat. The giant scientist was looking at the huge green mass of jungle below him. 625 stood by Jumba's feet trying to get a view. "Where!, I want to see!" he jumped up, with no avail. The pink experiment had no intention of letting the little trog up. "327, try your luck with 626." Jumba said to her, wanting to let 625 have a chance to see the planet.
327 jumped down from the window and landed on the floor with a thud, clearly showing her resentment that she had to leave the beautiful view. 625 scrambled up as soon as she was down. "Wow, green jungle. What's all the big fuss about a green jungle?" he said cynically. Jumba said nothing and 327 sighed at him.
327 stood by the chair and blew in 626's ear. 626 ticked his ear in annoyance and turned over in the chair. "Leave me alone." he murmured. "You have to get up and come see our new home." she protested, pulling at his battle uniform. "I'll see it later, like when I wake up." 626 shook her off and curled up into a ball. "I lost my place at the window to 625 to come wake you up." she told him. 626 shifted a little. "My sympathies, now go away." he said causticly. 372 now senced the impossibility of the situation. "I'll get a bucket of water." she said, her mouth twisting into an 'evil' grin.
626 popped an eye open at this. "You wouldn't." he yawned sleepily and sat up. 327 grinned, "Complete with ice to boot." 626 slid off the chair. "Allright, I'm up." He fought a huge yawn, trying to rub the sleep from his eyes. 327 grabbed his arm, "It's really beautiful, Come see!" she was literally dragging 626 across the walkway and thrust him up to the window. Jumba backed away, "It really is a fantastic view 626." Jumba turned to the bow of the ship and walked to the cockpit.
626 removed his face from the window. "It's nice." he grumbled. "Now I'm going back to sleep." He started listing over and off the window ledge. 327 saw him and grabbed his collar. "You're not co-operating here." she said in disgust. 626 had fallen off and was dangling above the ground, being choked by his collar which 327 was holding onto. He made several sounds that indicated that he wasn't getting enough air. 327 ignored him though. He reached up to grab her paw and wrench the collar free, but the rubbery material had stretched out of his reach. He grabbed the wall behind him and shimmied up backwards.
626, back on the edge, growled in protest, rubbing his neck while the material shrank back to it's origional form. "Just a few minutes, then you can go back to sleep." 327 informed him. He stared out the window, a look as if he was being forced to eat poisin was rought on his face. The pinkish experiment turned to see his expression. She laughed when she saw him. "626, you should see yourself. You look like you ate a bag of lemons." 626 changed from a his previous look to a derranged grin. "Better?" he sneered. "Now you look like 625." she teased. "If you think it's that horrible to sit here by me for three minutes, you can leave." 626 promptly jumped off the ledge. "That wasn't what I meant!" she yelled as 626 ran to the seat he hoped was still warm.
"626, tell me what you think of this." Jumba pointed at the readout of a ship on the display screen. The blue experiment stared for a while. "I say put on your seatbelt and let them maek the first move." 626 said. "Why?" Jumba asked, curious that 626 knew something he didn't. "Because, that's a pirating vessel." 626 told him casually. "Oh." Jumba murmuerd. "I think it would be a good idea to put on a seatbelt." He reached for his buckle. 626 grabbed the intercom. "327, you might want to take a seat and get a belt on. 625 can remain where he is." he let out a small laugh after he put the micrphone down. But he missed the cradel by an inch and it rolled onto the floor and out of the cockpit. "Ooops, I'l go get that." he said, and jumped off the chair.
*
"Captain, enemy within range. The electro-magnetic pulse is fully charged." the tech at the console said. "Fire." the captain ordered. The blue pule was sent flying into the other ship. Cheers went up through the entier ship. Zong couldn't help but smile.
*
"Incomming!" Jumba yelled in a tone of intense terror.
626 turned to the front just in time to see a blue pulse heading for the ship. Things got wierd after that. Things got slow. 626 remembers the blue pulse hitting the ship, the lights went out. Small electrical surges crawled over everything. He saw a red pannel come off from under the nose. There was a jarring explosion. The whole ship bucked. 626 was sent flying into the air. He saw 327 in her seatbelt, 625 was clinging onto her as the explosion hit. He saw Jumba at the controlls, the air bag was starting to inflate, verly slowly. Slow. He continued his slow spin, up, up. He finally saw where he was going. He saw a metal beam right in front of his face. Then that was all he saw. Black.
*
"What was that?!" Zrong exclaimed. "What happened there? Anyone?" He wathced as the ship's front end exploded in a ball of fire, which was smothered my the airlessness of space soon after. A black smog hid the front end. The red cruiser's stabliers fought to keep the ship from cartwheeling out of controll. "What in the nine hells was that?" he shouted. A tech at the scaner was silent for a second. After he read the data on his screen he spoke. "Sir, it looks like the EMP blew out the ship's front stablizers, causing a huge explosion. We're lucky th eother stablizers stopped the ship from going into an endless spin." Zrong looked out the window. "This changes everything. My intent was not to harm the ship. Bring it into a docking bay. Give medical attention to anyone who needs it. I will board th eship and tell the crew it was an accident." he sighed.
"Fire in the main EPM generator room!" rang a voice over the comms. "Get it under controll!" the general technician yelled back. "Yes sir!" the comms crackled. Zrong turned top the general tech. "Remind me to hire someone to fix the wiring on the generator next time we are in port." He patted him on the shoulder. "I'll will, sir." the tech saluted confidently. Zrong reached his long clawed hand over to a microphone and entered the medical bay code. "Wade, get your two best men and meet me in docking bay three." he paused for a second, thinking if they'd need anything else. "Bring some restraints, just in case." He put the reciever down before he could hear the confirming 'sir' shouted back.
Zrong took an elevator down to the dock entrance where he met his best medic and his team. Wade was a short human who was lugging a huge cart behind him that was filled with equipment for any kind of injury. From a minor burn, to a severed limb, if given enough time, Wade could get them help and save thier arm faster than any doctor anywhere in the galaxy. Two other men in white hospital like clothes stood beside him. Both had huge bulging muscles that were big enough to stop an onslaught of umarmed mobsters. They were there for security reasons, just in case the occupants of the spacecraft needed some 'help' in calming down, particularly the armed ones.
"Are we ready?" Zrong asked. Wade looked at both of the aliens beside him before aswering him. "Now or never." he boasted. Wade strained at the load on the cart as he went through the door to the docking bay. Zrong followed behind.
The docking bay was in full swing. The overhead crane was moving huge crates arround to make space for the ship to dock. Two aliens in orange suits were shouting orders in multiple languages, pointing this way and that, indicating that the crane move the boxes in a timely fassion. Zrong wathced the utter chaos with a little bit of contentment, a wry grin curled up his lip on one side of his long head. He took two long strides toward the console at the center of a walk way suspended above the docking floor. He tapped the alien at the controlls. "Any thing on who this ship belongs to, and why it is way out here in the outer rim?" The green skinned humanoid jumped. "Sir, you scared the piss out of me." he caught his breath and started. "Nothing on the owner and where it's from. But I can conclude that it is a pleasure cruiser, and very heavily loaded down at that." he concluded with a crooked grin. Zrong peered up as the doors opened and the red cruiser floated inside hte safety of the docking bay.
Zrong couldn't help but notice the black marks left by the explosion. He let his jaw slowly open in amazement at the dammage. Where the front stablizers should be was a gaping hole, clearly th eocupants were severly injured by the looks of the ship and how it bucked after the explosion. "That's one hellofa hole." the humanoid said. "Our ship did that?" "No," Zrong cut him off. "Our ship disabled the power, and crushed that panel, the electrical surge ignited the fuel that spilled when the canister was crushed. Give me a full scan of the interior and the occupants, if there are any left....." he trailed off. The green alien tapped at the keyboard. The display screen filled with data. He looked for the most important data first. "Capatin, there was critical dammage done to the structure of the ship, partially due to the load of equipment in the hold." he looked up. "What kind of equipment?" Zrong said into space while staring at the ship. The humanoid looked again at the data. "Scientific stuff. There are several pieces of equipment that could go for thousands of credits."
"Why would someone take a whole shipload of scientific equipment and run off into deep space? Is he hiding from something? Some one? We'll never know untill we get on the ship." Wade reasoned. "How many passengers?" Zrong turned away from Wade and to the green humanoid, he had finally taken his eyes off the ship. "Eh, it looks like three, wait, four. One of the passenger's vitals are fading fast. If we are going to save him it looks like we move fast, and now." Wade grabbed the cart and flew off into the center of the docking bay where the loaders had just secured the ship. Zrong and the two burly aliens were close behind.
"I'm going in first." Wade voulentered. He grabbed a small tranquilizer that could be loaded with hundreds of different medicines. He loaded several vials into it and went to the door on the side. "Wait a minute." Zrong stopped him. "We're rushing into this headlong, without concern if any of the aliens inside are armed or even conscience. We could be going to our deaths. I know that sounds far-fetched but I've always learned to be ready for anything." Wade stopped. "Thenm what do we do?" he scratched his head, looking puzzled. "I'll go first." Zrong said, and pushed Wade back.
Zrong wasn't sure of what to expect as he pushed in the universal code to open outer hatches. The door hissed open, revealing a blackened interior. "EMP shorted out the lights." he remembered. From deep inside the ship a rumble shook the doorway in a slow manner. The lights flickered back on. Wade was able to get his head into the doorway. He wished he hadn't.
The air inside smelled like a metallic liquid, it was a famalliar smell, but at the same time not so recognizeable. No medical text pad could ever have prepared him for this. Wade thought twice about entering the ship. The interior was a nice splash of different colors, wooden cabnet linned the mid-section of the ship. There was no expence spared in the luxurios interior. But that wasn't the reason he saw sick to his stomach. He turned away and waited for nausea to leave. Zrong's face was set in a nuetral expression, he'd seen worse. He walked to the front of the ship and stopped. He looked up at the ceiling, and the metal beam. "Point of origin. Where it happened. Something hit this, and rolled down this way, to the rear." He looked down, and to the aft of the ship.
The interior, starting at the place where Zrong stood, and from there back was covered in splotches of blood. It was everywhere, on the floor where it had collected in pools at the lowest points, dripping from the roof onto the floor, the cabnets, everywhere. There was no explaining what had happened. Wade reasoned it was fresh, barely ten minutes old. Some of it was still blue, but oxidized, and turned red fast. It screamed head wound, a smashed skull that burst on impact, or a artery that had been cut, sending blood everywhere. Zrong walked calmly to the cockpit. He looked at the pilot, still breathing. "Pilot's alive." he called to Wade.
Wade looked at the row of seats, he immediately picked out an aquamarine alien that had been buckled in, he looked pretty alive, just nocked out. "We have a little guy here that appears to be ok. I'm going to try and find out what made all that blood up there." He started to move to the back. He picked out several places in the blood where something had walked, into the back of the ship. He entered a narrow hallway and continued to move back. Somethign brushed his leg. He swung the tranquilizer down to see, but met the floor. Nothing. "Cool it." he reminded himself.
He entered the bedroom at the rear of the ship. In the corner was an alien that looked like the other one up in the front. But this one was red, covered in blood, it's own blood. Plus it was thrashing arround a bit, Wade guessed that was from a rupture somewhere along the neural area. He bent down to try and find out where the blood was comming from and try to stop it. Something hit his back. He turned to see what it was. He saw another thing like the rest, but this one was pink, in the areas hat weren't covered in blood. "What happen....." The little alien cut him short, nocking the gun from his hand. "You killed him you bastards!" It screamed. Wade ducked as it jumped for him. He rolled and dove for the gun. "I'm sure this is all a misunderstanding." Wade stammered. The little alien swung a bar at him, barely missing his leg and cutting his pant leg. He leveled out the tranq and fired. The pink thing caught the dart square in the chest and reeled over instantly from the sedative.
Wade now turned to the bloody mess on the floor, it had stopped thrashing. "Bad sign." He muttered. He pulled a scanner from his pocket and ran it along the body, trying to see if he could save it before it had no hope of returning. Data filled the small screen. "Wholy shit." Wade gasped. He read off the list. "Minor skull fracuring, dammage to the cerebral coretex, um.... there." He pulled a gauze pad from the pack on his waist and applied it to the small alien's forehead. The two muscular aliens appeared. "We heard some shouting, What's going on." They said in unison. Wade pointed to the pink alien with the dart in it's chest. "It attacked me, I tranqued it. You might want to clean her up and put some restraints on her before she wakes up, she was rather testy about he touching him." he motioned his head to the pink bloody alien on the floor. "This one is in critical condition, if I don't get him to the medical bay now we could lose him. From the looks of it he has lost most of his blood, and to boot he is still alive. Which is amazing, considering if any species loses half of the blood in the body, they die."
One of the muscular aliens had grabbed a stretcher from the cart and handed it to Wade. Wade carefully lifted 626 onto the stretcher and picked it up. "We're going to have to get an IV going and get some blood into him if he wants to live." He moved out into the main area of the ship and to the door, from there he took 626 to the medical bay. The huge aliens in white cleaned off 327, under Wade's supervision, restrained her and put her in a cell in the medical bay.
Wade started an IV running into 626's arm and got blood running into him. 626's breathing was irregular, short breaths with a long interval betwen inhale and exhale. The medic used a scissors to cut the red-stained suit off 626. He passed a machine over the bed that fully scanned 626, Wade didn't want to miss a thing. After several runs and comparing the data he finall made the descision that all the dammage was to the head. He could do nothing but put all the fluids 626 had lost back in. He couldn't fully assess the dammage until the thing woke up.
Wade also did full scans on the rest of the crew, even the wild little pink alien. The pilot, Jumba had suffered a mild concussion and was out cold, possibly for weeks. The aquamarine alien had just fainted, probably from the blood, he would wake up in a few hours. 327 on the other hand was devistated, she was under the impression 626 was dead, and the people arround her were the cause, anyone who entered the cell she attacked. She was beyond all reason and although was handcuffed, bit any one she could. Wade decided that she needed to be left alone.
*
Zrong had the ship searched for anything valuable. Although all they found that was worth anything was all the equipment in the hold. They took mos tof the useful items and left the rest. Zrong wanted the repairs to commence as soon as they could.
* * * * * * * * * *
"I wanted to find something I've wanted all along.......Somewhere I belong." ~Linkin Park
The huge battle ship, laser cannons and ion cannons pointing out every orifice they could shove them out, loomed over the small red cruiser. Both were at a stand off, but if push came to shove, the out come would be entirely predictable. The attack ship was waiting for confirmation on the small cruiser under them, they had a long history of destroying or capturing ship without warrents on them.
The small cruiser wasn't going to stay long. Jumba had already keyed in the co-ordinates for the nearest safe port. 626 was flying the attack ship to the safety of a nearby planet. Hoping after the ordeal with the battleship was over they would return and continue on thier way. He hit the after- burners to speed up, they needed all the time they could get. "Uh- 626, there's some one over here who thingks you should hurry." Jumba said nervously, he was looking out the window, at the huge ship comming on them. "Any time now." he continued. 626 thought that was enough distance, he slammed a button to hold the ship in it's current postion. He then threw the set on the seat and leapt to the floor. "I need you up here!" Jumba shouted as he saw the experiment bolt into the rear.
626 popped open the hatch to the storage and began rooting through his personal stuff that he'd stashed close to the door. He pulled out a coil of wire wrapped arround an enclosed capsule. He grabbed a stick of explosives he'd found before they left the lab. "About thirty seconds, then we're dead!" Jumba yelled in desperation. 626 scurried over to the trash disposer and produced a roll of tape from a pocket and began wrapping the stick to the wire coated capsule. "626!" exclaimed a chorous of voices. He threw the taped up thing into the disposal and closed the lid. He pushed the eject button and made like a bat outa the nine hells to the cockpit.
"I hope you have a plan!" Jumba said, indicating the ship that was on them. 626 calmly took the pilots chair and watched the giant ship's bay doors open. "They are three seconds away from putting a tractor beam on us." Jumba informed him, sweat was rolling down his face. "We hit the hyper drive." 626 said, reached for the lever. "Cruise in sub space for a milli- second." He wrenched the handle down, then back up, all in one fluid motion. "And then hopefully......" he paused.
A shock wave hit the cruiser, rocking it back and forth, untill the stabilizers could counter the effects. The lights flickered momentarily. 626 glanced at the ship that was almost out of range, the lights had shut off, and generator was dead. Only for a few minutes. "Everything is disabled, temporarily." he told Jumba, who was seconds away from convulsing. His face lightened up when he heard the good news. He regained controll of his emotions and sat up. "We need to get out of here." Jumba typed some co-ordinates into the nava computer and warmed up the hyper drive. "Destination set, proceding to course indicated." a mechanical voice said.
The stars became a blurr and the g forces could be felt, pressing them into the chairs, untill the atmosphere settled. Jumba let it run on course for a few minutes. He then stopped, entered a new course, he cruised on that for a few mintues then stopped again. He then re-entered the origional course and warped off again.
He set a timer then mosyed to the lounge. He flopped down onto a couch and sighed. "626, what was that thing anyway?" he asked the alien who was staring up at the ceiling. 626 turned over and faced him. "It was an unfinished electromagnetic bomb. I used an explosive to set it off." he answered. "Clever, very. Why didn't you do that earlier?" 626 sat upright and thought, he did it out of instinct, acted before he thought. "Ah. All arround the ship, under all the shielding and armor is a thin coating of rubber, that absorbs any electric interference from space. But when the protective bay doors are open, they have to drop thier shields, and the doors reveal a weakness. Above the bay in the main generator, the heart of the ship. When it detonated the pulse wasn't absorbed, it went in the open doors, disrupted the generator. When that happens-" "No power!" Jumba cut in. "Right." 626 said.
A huge grin spread across Jumba's face. "626, you have surpassed my expectations." 626 shared the doctor's joy, either that or he was glad to be in the limelight. "So where do we go now? The cruiser should have cleared the area and is now searching for us. We could go back and get the other experi-" "No." Jumba stopped him. 626 didn't understand, Jumba had always cared for his creations, always wanted them to be treated well and fairly. "Why?" 626 asked in alarm. "626," Jumba sighed. "We cannot go back. That was my first rule, never go back. They will eventually be discovered. They will survive." he told 626. "But-" 626 protested. "No, drop it 626. Nothing can make me go back." Jumba turned to the controlls and stared regretfully at them. 626 left the cabin, wondering why Jumba had this change in attitude toward his work. It wasn't like him, to abandon his work. Perhaps someday he migh leave him somewhere.
* * *
Several hours later Jumba pulled the ship out of sub-space and drifted to the planet known as Zenon V.
"Zenon V." Jumba announced. "Lush vegitation covers most of this planet, it actually looks like a scene from the Jurassic period on Earth. Several large cities cover a huge span of the planet, most are buried deep in the jungle, some are on the water." 327 leaned to a window and looked down. "Any indiginous races.... I mean any we have to look out for." she asked without looking up from the window. "None that are dangerous anyway, unless you have a bounty on your head. Most of the inhabitants are a reptilian like species. Carnivores or omnivores. A peaceful planet at the most, perfect for us to settle down on." Jumba informed her. "Besides, we have 626 with us. There's nothing to worry about." Jumba turned to the chair where 626 was co-piloting the ship, well at least an hour after they jumped into sub-space. Now he was hanging half off the chair in a deep sleep, a trickle of drool dripping to the floor.
Jumba couldn't help but let out a laugh. "We'll circle the planet several times before we land."
*
Halfway arround the planet, hanging in the black void of space lay a ship of deadly magnitude. A pirate-ing vessle, searching through the galaxy for unsuspecting ship to attack and plunder from the cargo holds the treasures inside.
On this paticular day the pirates aboard the ship the pirates had no ships in the area for a while and were now spoiling for a good fight and a looting of a ship. Although morale was low and so was the gin in the cabnets, they were ready for anything.
The bridge was a hub of activity and and voices. Each pirate had his own story of who he was and how he became a pirate. Rumors of mutiny were present, but the origin of them was likely a bluff. The ship had been in orbit for a month and the crew grew unruly and just plain out tired of the same planet.
The captain would hear nothing of it. He had made a descision, and that was final. Although the crew had thier gripes about him they still followed orders.
Zrong was a hard ass captain, who held a pile of gold in one hand and a scimitar in the other. He wasn't one of the geo-phisicysts of the universe, but he also wasn't a run-of-the-mill dum wad captain. He was well educated in the first few years of his life. He had always heard stories about the space pirates and thier raids on huge merchant ships, and was fascinated. One day he told his mother that he 'wanted to grow up and be a space pirate'. His mother laughed. He learned what he could in anyhting he could get his claws on.
He looked out he window of the bridge, down on his homeworld. He was rather small for his species. He was arround 5 standard feet tall, very small considering his species height was an average 7 standard feet. Raptor liek qualities would fit his description perfectly. Although he was mistaken for a dynonichous because of his size. Over the thousands or years the velociraptors had been on ZenonV they had adapted to a homosapienanic like build. Instead of the layout of thier bodies being horizontal it was vertical. The forearms devolped to the extent of being almost humanic, except the three claws and the thumb-claw. The long sweeping tales for balance had been shortened by evolution. Now being more of a nuisece than a useful tool.
His appearance was dark, he insisted on wearing dark colored clothes. He wore a dark blue shirt with a Hawiian twist, hibiscus flowers and pineapples bordered the bottom. His pants were a forest green with a thin yellow stripe running down the middle of the leg. And to add to the theme he had a long black cape with a thin gold border on the bottom. His nonsensical appearance and sharp witty mind were his key attributes.
He continued to scan the forest like planet. "Hey boss, I sees somthin` arn the radar." The not too bright crew member said. "Anything on the make of the ship?" Zrong asked. The dumb smuggler looked back on the screen. "It be weely small, I thinks a personel ship." Zrong paused for a second, lost in thought. He spoke after a while. "It maybe a pleasure cruiser, but none the less it is a ship. Get ready to fire." Zrong commanded.
"Thatz what I is talkin' about." The impared smuggler said gleefully while reaching for the alarm. A high pitched ringing filled the command deck and the bright lights turned a deep crimson, creating an eerie glow.
Zrong walked over to the window to see the ship, which was almost in range. The lights dimmed as the special weapon charged up. The secret to all of Zrong's raids and great escapes were hidden inside the ship. The Ultra high electro magnetic pulse, which sent a great ammount of negetive electrical energy in a burst to the selected ship. When the pulse hit the energy would short out all electrical systems and drain any power source. There was only one side effect, the pulse did only temporary dammage, thus giving the pirates a short time to get inside and reach the main controlls.
"You may fire when they are within range." Zrong commanded. "Then pull the ship into the docking bay. Put all occupants on the hold." He turned and left the room, he had something else on his mind to deal with at the moment.
*
"626, wake up and take a look at our new home." Jumba said, prodding him. 626 just grunted and rolled over in the seat. The giant scientist was looking at the huge green mass of jungle below him. 625 stood by Jumba's feet trying to get a view. "Where!, I want to see!" he jumped up, with no avail. The pink experiment had no intention of letting the little trog up. "327, try your luck with 626." Jumba said to her, wanting to let 625 have a chance to see the planet.
327 jumped down from the window and landed on the floor with a thud, clearly showing her resentment that she had to leave the beautiful view. 625 scrambled up as soon as she was down. "Wow, green jungle. What's all the big fuss about a green jungle?" he said cynically. Jumba said nothing and 327 sighed at him.
327 stood by the chair and blew in 626's ear. 626 ticked his ear in annoyance and turned over in the chair. "Leave me alone." he murmured. "You have to get up and come see our new home." she protested, pulling at his battle uniform. "I'll see it later, like when I wake up." 626 shook her off and curled up into a ball. "I lost my place at the window to 625 to come wake you up." she told him. 626 shifted a little. "My sympathies, now go away." he said causticly. 372 now senced the impossibility of the situation. "I'll get a bucket of water." she said, her mouth twisting into an 'evil' grin.
626 popped an eye open at this. "You wouldn't." he yawned sleepily and sat up. 327 grinned, "Complete with ice to boot." 626 slid off the chair. "Allright, I'm up." He fought a huge yawn, trying to rub the sleep from his eyes. 327 grabbed his arm, "It's really beautiful, Come see!" she was literally dragging 626 across the walkway and thrust him up to the window. Jumba backed away, "It really is a fantastic view 626." Jumba turned to the bow of the ship and walked to the cockpit.
626 removed his face from the window. "It's nice." he grumbled. "Now I'm going back to sleep." He started listing over and off the window ledge. 327 saw him and grabbed his collar. "You're not co-operating here." she said in disgust. 626 had fallen off and was dangling above the ground, being choked by his collar which 327 was holding onto. He made several sounds that indicated that he wasn't getting enough air. 327 ignored him though. He reached up to grab her paw and wrench the collar free, but the rubbery material had stretched out of his reach. He grabbed the wall behind him and shimmied up backwards.
626, back on the edge, growled in protest, rubbing his neck while the material shrank back to it's origional form. "Just a few minutes, then you can go back to sleep." 327 informed him. He stared out the window, a look as if he was being forced to eat poisin was rought on his face. The pinkish experiment turned to see his expression. She laughed when she saw him. "626, you should see yourself. You look like you ate a bag of lemons." 626 changed from a his previous look to a derranged grin. "Better?" he sneered. "Now you look like 625." she teased. "If you think it's that horrible to sit here by me for three minutes, you can leave." 626 promptly jumped off the ledge. "That wasn't what I meant!" she yelled as 626 ran to the seat he hoped was still warm.
"626, tell me what you think of this." Jumba pointed at the readout of a ship on the display screen. The blue experiment stared for a while. "I say put on your seatbelt and let them maek the first move." 626 said. "Why?" Jumba asked, curious that 626 knew something he didn't. "Because, that's a pirating vessel." 626 told him casually. "Oh." Jumba murmuerd. "I think it would be a good idea to put on a seatbelt." He reached for his buckle. 626 grabbed the intercom. "327, you might want to take a seat and get a belt on. 625 can remain where he is." he let out a small laugh after he put the micrphone down. But he missed the cradel by an inch and it rolled onto the floor and out of the cockpit. "Ooops, I'l go get that." he said, and jumped off the chair.
*
"Captain, enemy within range. The electro-magnetic pulse is fully charged." the tech at the console said. "Fire." the captain ordered. The blue pule was sent flying into the other ship. Cheers went up through the entier ship. Zong couldn't help but smile.
*
"Incomming!" Jumba yelled in a tone of intense terror.
626 turned to the front just in time to see a blue pulse heading for the ship. Things got wierd after that. Things got slow. 626 remembers the blue pulse hitting the ship, the lights went out. Small electrical surges crawled over everything. He saw a red pannel come off from under the nose. There was a jarring explosion. The whole ship bucked. 626 was sent flying into the air. He saw 327 in her seatbelt, 625 was clinging onto her as the explosion hit. He saw Jumba at the controlls, the air bag was starting to inflate, verly slowly. Slow. He continued his slow spin, up, up. He finally saw where he was going. He saw a metal beam right in front of his face. Then that was all he saw. Black.
*
"What was that?!" Zrong exclaimed. "What happened there? Anyone?" He wathced as the ship's front end exploded in a ball of fire, which was smothered my the airlessness of space soon after. A black smog hid the front end. The red cruiser's stabliers fought to keep the ship from cartwheeling out of controll. "What in the nine hells was that?" he shouted. A tech at the scaner was silent for a second. After he read the data on his screen he spoke. "Sir, it looks like the EMP blew out the ship's front stablizers, causing a huge explosion. We're lucky th eother stablizers stopped the ship from going into an endless spin." Zrong looked out the window. "This changes everything. My intent was not to harm the ship. Bring it into a docking bay. Give medical attention to anyone who needs it. I will board th eship and tell the crew it was an accident." he sighed.
"Fire in the main EPM generator room!" rang a voice over the comms. "Get it under controll!" the general technician yelled back. "Yes sir!" the comms crackled. Zrong turned top the general tech. "Remind me to hire someone to fix the wiring on the generator next time we are in port." He patted him on the shoulder. "I'll will, sir." the tech saluted confidently. Zrong reached his long clawed hand over to a microphone and entered the medical bay code. "Wade, get your two best men and meet me in docking bay three." he paused for a second, thinking if they'd need anything else. "Bring some restraints, just in case." He put the reciever down before he could hear the confirming 'sir' shouted back.
Zrong took an elevator down to the dock entrance where he met his best medic and his team. Wade was a short human who was lugging a huge cart behind him that was filled with equipment for any kind of injury. From a minor burn, to a severed limb, if given enough time, Wade could get them help and save thier arm faster than any doctor anywhere in the galaxy. Two other men in white hospital like clothes stood beside him. Both had huge bulging muscles that were big enough to stop an onslaught of umarmed mobsters. They were there for security reasons, just in case the occupants of the spacecraft needed some 'help' in calming down, particularly the armed ones.
"Are we ready?" Zrong asked. Wade looked at both of the aliens beside him before aswering him. "Now or never." he boasted. Wade strained at the load on the cart as he went through the door to the docking bay. Zrong followed behind.
The docking bay was in full swing. The overhead crane was moving huge crates arround to make space for the ship to dock. Two aliens in orange suits were shouting orders in multiple languages, pointing this way and that, indicating that the crane move the boxes in a timely fassion. Zrong wathced the utter chaos with a little bit of contentment, a wry grin curled up his lip on one side of his long head. He took two long strides toward the console at the center of a walk way suspended above the docking floor. He tapped the alien at the controlls. "Any thing on who this ship belongs to, and why it is way out here in the outer rim?" The green skinned humanoid jumped. "Sir, you scared the piss out of me." he caught his breath and started. "Nothing on the owner and where it's from. But I can conclude that it is a pleasure cruiser, and very heavily loaded down at that." he concluded with a crooked grin. Zrong peered up as the doors opened and the red cruiser floated inside hte safety of the docking bay.
Zrong couldn't help but notice the black marks left by the explosion. He let his jaw slowly open in amazement at the dammage. Where the front stablizers should be was a gaping hole, clearly th eocupants were severly injured by the looks of the ship and how it bucked after the explosion. "That's one hellofa hole." the humanoid said. "Our ship did that?" "No," Zrong cut him off. "Our ship disabled the power, and crushed that panel, the electrical surge ignited the fuel that spilled when the canister was crushed. Give me a full scan of the interior and the occupants, if there are any left....." he trailed off. The green alien tapped at the keyboard. The display screen filled with data. He looked for the most important data first. "Capatin, there was critical dammage done to the structure of the ship, partially due to the load of equipment in the hold." he looked up. "What kind of equipment?" Zrong said into space while staring at the ship. The humanoid looked again at the data. "Scientific stuff. There are several pieces of equipment that could go for thousands of credits."
"Why would someone take a whole shipload of scientific equipment and run off into deep space? Is he hiding from something? Some one? We'll never know untill we get on the ship." Wade reasoned. "How many passengers?" Zrong turned away from Wade and to the green humanoid, he had finally taken his eyes off the ship. "Eh, it looks like three, wait, four. One of the passenger's vitals are fading fast. If we are going to save him it looks like we move fast, and now." Wade grabbed the cart and flew off into the center of the docking bay where the loaders had just secured the ship. Zrong and the two burly aliens were close behind.
"I'm going in first." Wade voulentered. He grabbed a small tranquilizer that could be loaded with hundreds of different medicines. He loaded several vials into it and went to the door on the side. "Wait a minute." Zrong stopped him. "We're rushing into this headlong, without concern if any of the aliens inside are armed or even conscience. We could be going to our deaths. I know that sounds far-fetched but I've always learned to be ready for anything." Wade stopped. "Thenm what do we do?" he scratched his head, looking puzzled. "I'll go first." Zrong said, and pushed Wade back.
Zrong wasn't sure of what to expect as he pushed in the universal code to open outer hatches. The door hissed open, revealing a blackened interior. "EMP shorted out the lights." he remembered. From deep inside the ship a rumble shook the doorway in a slow manner. The lights flickered back on. Wade was able to get his head into the doorway. He wished he hadn't.
The air inside smelled like a metallic liquid, it was a famalliar smell, but at the same time not so recognizeable. No medical text pad could ever have prepared him for this. Wade thought twice about entering the ship. The interior was a nice splash of different colors, wooden cabnet linned the mid-section of the ship. There was no expence spared in the luxurios interior. But that wasn't the reason he saw sick to his stomach. He turned away and waited for nausea to leave. Zrong's face was set in a nuetral expression, he'd seen worse. He walked to the front of the ship and stopped. He looked up at the ceiling, and the metal beam. "Point of origin. Where it happened. Something hit this, and rolled down this way, to the rear." He looked down, and to the aft of the ship.
The interior, starting at the place where Zrong stood, and from there back was covered in splotches of blood. It was everywhere, on the floor where it had collected in pools at the lowest points, dripping from the roof onto the floor, the cabnets, everywhere. There was no explaining what had happened. Wade reasoned it was fresh, barely ten minutes old. Some of it was still blue, but oxidized, and turned red fast. It screamed head wound, a smashed skull that burst on impact, or a artery that had been cut, sending blood everywhere. Zrong walked calmly to the cockpit. He looked at the pilot, still breathing. "Pilot's alive." he called to Wade.
Wade looked at the row of seats, he immediately picked out an aquamarine alien that had been buckled in, he looked pretty alive, just nocked out. "We have a little guy here that appears to be ok. I'm going to try and find out what made all that blood up there." He started to move to the back. He picked out several places in the blood where something had walked, into the back of the ship. He entered a narrow hallway and continued to move back. Somethign brushed his leg. He swung the tranquilizer down to see, but met the floor. Nothing. "Cool it." he reminded himself.
He entered the bedroom at the rear of the ship. In the corner was an alien that looked like the other one up in the front. But this one was red, covered in blood, it's own blood. Plus it was thrashing arround a bit, Wade guessed that was from a rupture somewhere along the neural area. He bent down to try and find out where the blood was comming from and try to stop it. Something hit his back. He turned to see what it was. He saw another thing like the rest, but this one was pink, in the areas hat weren't covered in blood. "What happen....." The little alien cut him short, nocking the gun from his hand. "You killed him you bastards!" It screamed. Wade ducked as it jumped for him. He rolled and dove for the gun. "I'm sure this is all a misunderstanding." Wade stammered. The little alien swung a bar at him, barely missing his leg and cutting his pant leg. He leveled out the tranq and fired. The pink thing caught the dart square in the chest and reeled over instantly from the sedative.
Wade now turned to the bloody mess on the floor, it had stopped thrashing. "Bad sign." He muttered. He pulled a scanner from his pocket and ran it along the body, trying to see if he could save it before it had no hope of returning. Data filled the small screen. "Wholy shit." Wade gasped. He read off the list. "Minor skull fracuring, dammage to the cerebral coretex, um.... there." He pulled a gauze pad from the pack on his waist and applied it to the small alien's forehead. The two muscular aliens appeared. "We heard some shouting, What's going on." They said in unison. Wade pointed to the pink alien with the dart in it's chest. "It attacked me, I tranqued it. You might want to clean her up and put some restraints on her before she wakes up, she was rather testy about he touching him." he motioned his head to the pink bloody alien on the floor. "This one is in critical condition, if I don't get him to the medical bay now we could lose him. From the looks of it he has lost most of his blood, and to boot he is still alive. Which is amazing, considering if any species loses half of the blood in the body, they die."
One of the muscular aliens had grabbed a stretcher from the cart and handed it to Wade. Wade carefully lifted 626 onto the stretcher and picked it up. "We're going to have to get an IV going and get some blood into him if he wants to live." He moved out into the main area of the ship and to the door, from there he took 626 to the medical bay. The huge aliens in white cleaned off 327, under Wade's supervision, restrained her and put her in a cell in the medical bay.
Wade started an IV running into 626's arm and got blood running into him. 626's breathing was irregular, short breaths with a long interval betwen inhale and exhale. The medic used a scissors to cut the red-stained suit off 626. He passed a machine over the bed that fully scanned 626, Wade didn't want to miss a thing. After several runs and comparing the data he finall made the descision that all the dammage was to the head. He could do nothing but put all the fluids 626 had lost back in. He couldn't fully assess the dammage until the thing woke up.
Wade also did full scans on the rest of the crew, even the wild little pink alien. The pilot, Jumba had suffered a mild concussion and was out cold, possibly for weeks. The aquamarine alien had just fainted, probably from the blood, he would wake up in a few hours. 327 on the other hand was devistated, she was under the impression 626 was dead, and the people arround her were the cause, anyone who entered the cell she attacked. She was beyond all reason and although was handcuffed, bit any one she could. Wade decided that she needed to be left alone.
*
Zrong had the ship searched for anything valuable. Although all they found that was worth anything was all the equipment in the hold. They took mos tof the useful items and left the rest. Zrong wanted the repairs to commence as soon as they could.
* * * * * * * * * *