He Who Fights With Monsters
By Thalia Drogna
AN: This chapter is posted quicker than usual for Gabi and because I don't like the number 13.
*********************************************
Captain Archer had to stop himself from ducking as he watched a Vor fighter on the view screen fly over the bridge of Enterprise followed by a Rel fighter. That one had been very close.
"How are we doing, Ensign?" asked Archer, urgently.
"About as well as can be expected, sir," replied Ensign Hooper. "Second Squadron are doing a good job of clearing us a path, we're taking out our fair share of fighters as well but they just seem to keep coming."
"How long before we're in range to fire torpedoes at the Vor Devrees?" said Archer.
"About another twenty minutes, sir, but we'll be in range of their guns a good ten minutes before that," said Hooper.
"How's the Rel Sevanne holding up?" asked Archer, turning to Hoshi.
"Okay for the moment, sir," replied Hoshi. "They've taken damage, but so far no major systems have been hit."
Archer knew that the Rel Sevanne was taking the brunt of the assault, Enterprise was merely a side track as far as the Vor fighters were concerned and not worth their time. If it wasn't for the trouble that Enterprise and Second Squadron were causing the Vor fighters then he suspected they would have ignored Enterprise completely, at least until they were done with their main target. The problem was that even with Enterprise backing them up, Second Squadron were having trouble holding their own. Which worried Archer a lot, if the Vor Devrees wasn't using its full strength to attack Enterprise and they were having trouble, how would they ever defeat the Vor Devrees.
"Sun Neer to Enterprise," came the call. "Sorry for the near miss, we'll try and keep them a bit further away," said the Flight Commander.
"That would be much appreciated, Sun Neer," replied Archer.
"How's that weapon coming?" Sun Neer asked. Even though she hid it supremely well, Archer could hear a little of the desperation that she must be feeling creep into her voice.
"It's coming," said Archer. "Don't worry, we'll be ready in time."
****
Reed had lost nearly half of his squadron. The Vor fighters just kept coming and he couldn't see an end to them. He twisted into a roll to avoid another Vor fighter that was screaming in for the kill, it missed him and was taken out of the fight by one the remaining members of Reed's squadron. He knew that their battle plan wasn't working but he had no idea how to fix it. Dog fighting one on one just wasn't the way to deal with the vast numbers of Vor fighters that were assailing them.
"Reed to Tucker," he said into his com. He didn't care if they were fighting for their lives, he still wasn't going to call Trip Patriarch.
"Go ahead, Malcolm," came the strained reply. Trip was having trouble staying focused. The pain had predictably only become worse as more damage was inflicted on the Rel Sevanne by the Vor fighters that continued to break through their outer defences. In fact, more were getting through now as they had lost more Rel fighters. The Rel Sevanne's guns just weren't built to take out small, manoeuvrable fighters and the Vor Devrees had yet to come into target range. Several Tien had died and he had felt the emotions of every single one of them. Trip was beginning to think that this was going to be the death of a thousand cuts, it sure as hell felt like it.
"Trip, what's wrong?" asked Reed, suddenly more concerned for his friend than his own safety.
"Rel Sevanne's taken a few hits," said Trip.
"I don't understand," said Reed. "None of the critical systems have been hit."
"It hurts, Malcolm," said Trip as if he was talking to an extremely dense child.
"Oh god, the Rel Sevanne feeds back to the computer through the sensor net," said Reed. "Can't you disconnect the sensors?"
"Shar Jen already tried, the whole damn thing's fused into a useless heap. We're lucky the sensors are working at all," replied Trip. "I'll survive. What did you want?" He didn't have time to worry about his own problems now.
"We're getting slaughtered out here," said Reed matter-of-factly. "I've lost nearly half my squadron and the others aren't doing much better. We need to come up with a new attack plan."
"Don't you mean defence plan," said Trip.
"Perhaps not," said Reed. "Maybe we should take the battle to the Vor Devrees."
"That would be suicide, Malcolm. You're barely holding your own with the guns of the Rel Sevanne to back you up," said Trip.
"At the moment we're expending all our resources on protecting the Rel Sevanne, and they're using all their resources to attack it," said Reed. "The problem is that our resources don't match theirs. We need to make them defend their ship too."
"Enterprise," said Trip.
"What about Enterprise?" asked Reed.
"She can lay down enough covering fire for you to get to the Vor Devrees," said Trip. "Go on Malcolm, it's your plan. Take Third Squadron and join up with Commander Tespin's squadron. Regroup and attack the Vor Devrees. Their guns won't be in range for the Rel Sevanne for another ten minutes, if you can keep them occupied you might just swing this battle in out favour."
"I'll contact Enterprise and let them know that we're changing tactics," said Reed.
"Yeah, tell the Captain to concentrate on getting Enterprise into torpedo range..." began Trip and suddenly he broke off and Reed heard a groan, followed by a stifled scream of pain. "God damn it, this is getting personal," he managed to gasp out.
"What happened?" asked Reed, concerned.
"Five Vor fighters just made an attack run on the ship, they're aiming in exactly the right place to hit the computer room, if I wasn't ten floors down," said Trip. "All the fighters that have broken through the cordon have tried for that area, these are the first guys to succeed. They probably know the lay out of the Rel Sevanne as well as I do. If too many get through then eventually they'll make a big enough hole that they can take out the computer room. Better hurry that attack plan up, Malcolm."
"Yes, sir," replied Malcolm. "Third Squadron, we're taking the fight to the Vor Devrees."
****
Phlox looked down at the slide under his microscope. He'd lost count of the number of slides he'd examined now and found wanting. It didn't help that they had no tissue samples from the Vor Devrees to work with, he could only run simulations and hope that they mirrored real life accurately. This one looked promising though.
"T'Pol, I require a second opinion," said Phlox to his co-worker. "Could you take a look at this, I think I may have a viable virion structure."
"Of course, doctor," replied T'Pol who moved over to look at the slide under the microscope. "It looks as if you are correct. Let us run the simulation with the mutated structure and see if we get the required result."
Enterprise shook suddenly and T'Pol grabbed for the bench. "I believe that the Rel fighters are having difficulty sustaining their perimeter around Enterprise," said T'Pol, calm as ever.
"It certainly seems that way," said Phlox. "All the more reason for us to speed our efforts to engineer this virus."
"Indeed," said T'Pol and she turned back to the console she had been working at and put the simulation in motion. Enterprise shook again at another impact, just as two crewman staggered through the doors of sick bay, one leaning heavily on the other.
Phlox went to them immediately, tri-corder in hand and scanned his latest patient. He detailed one of his assistants to help the crewman and then returned to T'Pol's side.
"Well, Sub-commander?" he asked, slightly impatiently.
"It is as we thought, doctor," said T'Pol. "This virus should act upon the organic material in the Vor Devrees' hull and incapacitate their computer's organic component."
"I'll let the Captain know," said Phlox.
****
Reed's squadron neared Enterprise and he could immediately see that they were in trouble. Sun Neer's fighters were still hanging in there but more stray shots were finding their way to Enterprise's hull than they should have. Occasionally one of the Vor fighters would be able to break away completely from the defending Rel fighters and make an attack run on Enterprise. Mayweather was good at dodging when he needed to but even he couldn't out manoeuvre the rapidly moving Vor fighters. Reed knew the tolerances of the hull plating intimately and he knew that it couldn't take the constant bombardment that it was now receiving.
"Reed to Enterprise," said the Lieutenant. "Third Squadron reporting."
"Lieutenant, glad you could make it," said Archer with considerable relief. "I don't think I've ever been so happy to see a squadron of fighters in my entire life."
"We're headed for the Vor Devrees, we decided that we need to make them work a bit harder on their own defence. Can you give us covering fire?" asked Reed.
"Just say the word, Lieutenant and we'll point the phase cannons wherever you need us to," said Archer.
"Acknowledged," replied Reed. "Is the weapon ready yet?"
"Ensign Scott is installing it in a torpedo as we speak," said Archer. "Another ten minutes and we'll be in range to launch." Just as Archer finished his sentence, the Vor Devrees opened fire with their main weapons batteries at the Rel Sevanne, which replied in kind.
"Bloody hell," said Reed as he took in the sight of the two huge ships firing on each other. So far neither had hit the other but he had no doubt that it wouldn't be long before one of them found its target. The first couple would be for ranging and then the targeting systems would have something to work with. The Vor Devrees had the advantage, not only did it have better hull plating but it had more guns to work with. Then the Rel Sevanne found its mark and an explosion lit up the hull of the Vor Devrees. When the flames had died down slightly Reed looked for the damage that the impact must have made, but there wasn't any. He knew the Rel Sevanne wouldn't be so lucky when the Vor Devrees found her range. "This is bad, this is very bad," he muttered and then over the radio he called his Squadron into formation again and they readied for their attack run on the Vor Devrees. "This is probably the only chance we're going to get at this, let's make it count," he told the squadron.
He guided them through the fire from the guns of the Vor Devrees, and the reply fire from the Rel Sevanne. Enterprise took out some of the fighters that stood in their way with their forward phase cannons. Reed's reactions were on a knife edge as his perception narrowed down to the second he was living, he couldn't afford to look any further ahead. Just survive this next second and engage enough Vor fighters to keep them away from Enterprise and the Rel Sevanne.
He didn't know how it happened but suddenly he had picked up three Vor fighters on his tail all at once. He dodged furiously. Crin Ad took one out and Tran Est another, but the third refused to be shaken, he felt the impact on his right hand engine and the Rel fighter fought his control. He had to think quickly, his other engine was now fading too and he had to reach Enterprise or he'd be adrift in space, an easy target for any Vor that came across him. It was too far away though, they were nearer to the Vor Devrees now than Enterprise and Reed estimated his remaining engine wouldn't last more than a minute or so, too little time to reach Enterprise. But perhaps enough time to reach the Vor Devrees, although what good that would do him he didn't know.
"Reed to Enterprise," he said. There was no answer. "Reed to Rel Sevanne," he tried, but that was equally fruitless. "Damn, the communicator must have been hit too," he said to himself. "And talking to yourself is the first sign of madness," he added. He pulled the access panel off the surface in front of him and examined the circuitry as much as he could inside the cramped cockpit. He pulled out a fried circuit, he held it up and gave it a careful inspection before throwing it onto the floor in frustration. He didn't have a replacement and he certainly didn't have the engineering knowledge that he would need to fix the alien systems. He was on his own and heading for the enemy's base ship.
His only hope was to find the Vor Devrees' launch bay and hope that he could make some sort of approximation at landing his crippled ship. Once he was there perhaps he could steal a Vor fighter and fly it back to Enterprise. All he had to do was avoid the gun batteries in his less than agile ship, find the launch bay, hope he didn't kill himself landing and pray that the Kriel ignored their visitor. Even he didn't believe that he had a snow ball's chance in hell of pulling it off. "Jolly good, Malcolm, another suicidal plan," he mumbled to himself cynically.
He didn't have time to worry about any of that now though because he was already within range of the Vor Devrees guns. He managed to pull left to avoid one of the batteries but one of the others caught his right wing and now he had even less control than he had before. The Rel fighter was dying a system at a time and there nothing Reed could do about it. He ploughed onwards and saw the docking bays ahead of him. "Well here goes nothing," he said quietly and readied for landing. Or at least he tried to ready for landing, when he tried to brake he realised that the reverse thrusters wouldn't engage. He swore loudly and violently, there was no way that he could make a landing if he couldn't slow down. He had purposely come in fast to try to avoid as many of the guns as possible and that decision was now coming back to bite him.
He made a couple of attempts to re-route power from other systems to the damaged reverse thrusters, but they weren't responding. This was the speed he had to make the landing at and he wished for the hundredth time since he got into the Rel fighter that he had been blessed with more natural piloting ability. He was an Armoury officer not a fighter pilot, he couldn't deal with a forced landing at this speed. Even back in the Academy, when he'd actually spent time learning how to be a space fighter pilot, he hadn't been good at this stuff. That was why he'd given it up as soon as he could, to specialise in Armoury systems and security. Just remember your training he told himself, remember your training and it will all be fine. He just had to remember which bit of his training related to landing crippled, unresponsive fighters on enemy ships.
He made sure his harness was tight and prayed that the rest of the fighter's safety systems were working. He pulled the fighter's nose up and aimed for the opening in front of him. He could see the deck coming closer, rushing towards him at too fast a speed, as if it was the deck that was coming up to smash into him rather than the other way around. He smelt burning and saw sparks out of the corner of his eye from the engine. He hit the deck and bounced. Reed was shaken like a cat's plaything in the seat of the fighter as the speed turned into force of impact and the fighter bounced three times more before it buried itself in the back of the hangar wall. Before Reed was claimed by the oblivion of unconsciousness he registered a siren sounding and the red of emergency lighting. His only thought was that he had at least survived the landing even if the Kriel were now going to kill him.
****
By Thalia Drogna
AN: This chapter is posted quicker than usual for Gabi and because I don't like the number 13.
*********************************************
Captain Archer had to stop himself from ducking as he watched a Vor fighter on the view screen fly over the bridge of Enterprise followed by a Rel fighter. That one had been very close.
"How are we doing, Ensign?" asked Archer, urgently.
"About as well as can be expected, sir," replied Ensign Hooper. "Second Squadron are doing a good job of clearing us a path, we're taking out our fair share of fighters as well but they just seem to keep coming."
"How long before we're in range to fire torpedoes at the Vor Devrees?" said Archer.
"About another twenty minutes, sir, but we'll be in range of their guns a good ten minutes before that," said Hooper.
"How's the Rel Sevanne holding up?" asked Archer, turning to Hoshi.
"Okay for the moment, sir," replied Hoshi. "They've taken damage, but so far no major systems have been hit."
Archer knew that the Rel Sevanne was taking the brunt of the assault, Enterprise was merely a side track as far as the Vor fighters were concerned and not worth their time. If it wasn't for the trouble that Enterprise and Second Squadron were causing the Vor fighters then he suspected they would have ignored Enterprise completely, at least until they were done with their main target. The problem was that even with Enterprise backing them up, Second Squadron were having trouble holding their own. Which worried Archer a lot, if the Vor Devrees wasn't using its full strength to attack Enterprise and they were having trouble, how would they ever defeat the Vor Devrees.
"Sun Neer to Enterprise," came the call. "Sorry for the near miss, we'll try and keep them a bit further away," said the Flight Commander.
"That would be much appreciated, Sun Neer," replied Archer.
"How's that weapon coming?" Sun Neer asked. Even though she hid it supremely well, Archer could hear a little of the desperation that she must be feeling creep into her voice.
"It's coming," said Archer. "Don't worry, we'll be ready in time."
****
Reed had lost nearly half of his squadron. The Vor fighters just kept coming and he couldn't see an end to them. He twisted into a roll to avoid another Vor fighter that was screaming in for the kill, it missed him and was taken out of the fight by one the remaining members of Reed's squadron. He knew that their battle plan wasn't working but he had no idea how to fix it. Dog fighting one on one just wasn't the way to deal with the vast numbers of Vor fighters that were assailing them.
"Reed to Tucker," he said into his com. He didn't care if they were fighting for their lives, he still wasn't going to call Trip Patriarch.
"Go ahead, Malcolm," came the strained reply. Trip was having trouble staying focused. The pain had predictably only become worse as more damage was inflicted on the Rel Sevanne by the Vor fighters that continued to break through their outer defences. In fact, more were getting through now as they had lost more Rel fighters. The Rel Sevanne's guns just weren't built to take out small, manoeuvrable fighters and the Vor Devrees had yet to come into target range. Several Tien had died and he had felt the emotions of every single one of them. Trip was beginning to think that this was going to be the death of a thousand cuts, it sure as hell felt like it.
"Trip, what's wrong?" asked Reed, suddenly more concerned for his friend than his own safety.
"Rel Sevanne's taken a few hits," said Trip.
"I don't understand," said Reed. "None of the critical systems have been hit."
"It hurts, Malcolm," said Trip as if he was talking to an extremely dense child.
"Oh god, the Rel Sevanne feeds back to the computer through the sensor net," said Reed. "Can't you disconnect the sensors?"
"Shar Jen already tried, the whole damn thing's fused into a useless heap. We're lucky the sensors are working at all," replied Trip. "I'll survive. What did you want?" He didn't have time to worry about his own problems now.
"We're getting slaughtered out here," said Reed matter-of-factly. "I've lost nearly half my squadron and the others aren't doing much better. We need to come up with a new attack plan."
"Don't you mean defence plan," said Trip.
"Perhaps not," said Reed. "Maybe we should take the battle to the Vor Devrees."
"That would be suicide, Malcolm. You're barely holding your own with the guns of the Rel Sevanne to back you up," said Trip.
"At the moment we're expending all our resources on protecting the Rel Sevanne, and they're using all their resources to attack it," said Reed. "The problem is that our resources don't match theirs. We need to make them defend their ship too."
"Enterprise," said Trip.
"What about Enterprise?" asked Reed.
"She can lay down enough covering fire for you to get to the Vor Devrees," said Trip. "Go on Malcolm, it's your plan. Take Third Squadron and join up with Commander Tespin's squadron. Regroup and attack the Vor Devrees. Their guns won't be in range for the Rel Sevanne for another ten minutes, if you can keep them occupied you might just swing this battle in out favour."
"I'll contact Enterprise and let them know that we're changing tactics," said Reed.
"Yeah, tell the Captain to concentrate on getting Enterprise into torpedo range..." began Trip and suddenly he broke off and Reed heard a groan, followed by a stifled scream of pain. "God damn it, this is getting personal," he managed to gasp out.
"What happened?" asked Reed, concerned.
"Five Vor fighters just made an attack run on the ship, they're aiming in exactly the right place to hit the computer room, if I wasn't ten floors down," said Trip. "All the fighters that have broken through the cordon have tried for that area, these are the first guys to succeed. They probably know the lay out of the Rel Sevanne as well as I do. If too many get through then eventually they'll make a big enough hole that they can take out the computer room. Better hurry that attack plan up, Malcolm."
"Yes, sir," replied Malcolm. "Third Squadron, we're taking the fight to the Vor Devrees."
****
Phlox looked down at the slide under his microscope. He'd lost count of the number of slides he'd examined now and found wanting. It didn't help that they had no tissue samples from the Vor Devrees to work with, he could only run simulations and hope that they mirrored real life accurately. This one looked promising though.
"T'Pol, I require a second opinion," said Phlox to his co-worker. "Could you take a look at this, I think I may have a viable virion structure."
"Of course, doctor," replied T'Pol who moved over to look at the slide under the microscope. "It looks as if you are correct. Let us run the simulation with the mutated structure and see if we get the required result."
Enterprise shook suddenly and T'Pol grabbed for the bench. "I believe that the Rel fighters are having difficulty sustaining their perimeter around Enterprise," said T'Pol, calm as ever.
"It certainly seems that way," said Phlox. "All the more reason for us to speed our efforts to engineer this virus."
"Indeed," said T'Pol and she turned back to the console she had been working at and put the simulation in motion. Enterprise shook again at another impact, just as two crewman staggered through the doors of sick bay, one leaning heavily on the other.
Phlox went to them immediately, tri-corder in hand and scanned his latest patient. He detailed one of his assistants to help the crewman and then returned to T'Pol's side.
"Well, Sub-commander?" he asked, slightly impatiently.
"It is as we thought, doctor," said T'Pol. "This virus should act upon the organic material in the Vor Devrees' hull and incapacitate their computer's organic component."
"I'll let the Captain know," said Phlox.
****
Reed's squadron neared Enterprise and he could immediately see that they were in trouble. Sun Neer's fighters were still hanging in there but more stray shots were finding their way to Enterprise's hull than they should have. Occasionally one of the Vor fighters would be able to break away completely from the defending Rel fighters and make an attack run on Enterprise. Mayweather was good at dodging when he needed to but even he couldn't out manoeuvre the rapidly moving Vor fighters. Reed knew the tolerances of the hull plating intimately and he knew that it couldn't take the constant bombardment that it was now receiving.
"Reed to Enterprise," said the Lieutenant. "Third Squadron reporting."
"Lieutenant, glad you could make it," said Archer with considerable relief. "I don't think I've ever been so happy to see a squadron of fighters in my entire life."
"We're headed for the Vor Devrees, we decided that we need to make them work a bit harder on their own defence. Can you give us covering fire?" asked Reed.
"Just say the word, Lieutenant and we'll point the phase cannons wherever you need us to," said Archer.
"Acknowledged," replied Reed. "Is the weapon ready yet?"
"Ensign Scott is installing it in a torpedo as we speak," said Archer. "Another ten minutes and we'll be in range to launch." Just as Archer finished his sentence, the Vor Devrees opened fire with their main weapons batteries at the Rel Sevanne, which replied in kind.
"Bloody hell," said Reed as he took in the sight of the two huge ships firing on each other. So far neither had hit the other but he had no doubt that it wouldn't be long before one of them found its target. The first couple would be for ranging and then the targeting systems would have something to work with. The Vor Devrees had the advantage, not only did it have better hull plating but it had more guns to work with. Then the Rel Sevanne found its mark and an explosion lit up the hull of the Vor Devrees. When the flames had died down slightly Reed looked for the damage that the impact must have made, but there wasn't any. He knew the Rel Sevanne wouldn't be so lucky when the Vor Devrees found her range. "This is bad, this is very bad," he muttered and then over the radio he called his Squadron into formation again and they readied for their attack run on the Vor Devrees. "This is probably the only chance we're going to get at this, let's make it count," he told the squadron.
He guided them through the fire from the guns of the Vor Devrees, and the reply fire from the Rel Sevanne. Enterprise took out some of the fighters that stood in their way with their forward phase cannons. Reed's reactions were on a knife edge as his perception narrowed down to the second he was living, he couldn't afford to look any further ahead. Just survive this next second and engage enough Vor fighters to keep them away from Enterprise and the Rel Sevanne.
He didn't know how it happened but suddenly he had picked up three Vor fighters on his tail all at once. He dodged furiously. Crin Ad took one out and Tran Est another, but the third refused to be shaken, he felt the impact on his right hand engine and the Rel fighter fought his control. He had to think quickly, his other engine was now fading too and he had to reach Enterprise or he'd be adrift in space, an easy target for any Vor that came across him. It was too far away though, they were nearer to the Vor Devrees now than Enterprise and Reed estimated his remaining engine wouldn't last more than a minute or so, too little time to reach Enterprise. But perhaps enough time to reach the Vor Devrees, although what good that would do him he didn't know.
"Reed to Enterprise," he said. There was no answer. "Reed to Rel Sevanne," he tried, but that was equally fruitless. "Damn, the communicator must have been hit too," he said to himself. "And talking to yourself is the first sign of madness," he added. He pulled the access panel off the surface in front of him and examined the circuitry as much as he could inside the cramped cockpit. He pulled out a fried circuit, he held it up and gave it a careful inspection before throwing it onto the floor in frustration. He didn't have a replacement and he certainly didn't have the engineering knowledge that he would need to fix the alien systems. He was on his own and heading for the enemy's base ship.
His only hope was to find the Vor Devrees' launch bay and hope that he could make some sort of approximation at landing his crippled ship. Once he was there perhaps he could steal a Vor fighter and fly it back to Enterprise. All he had to do was avoid the gun batteries in his less than agile ship, find the launch bay, hope he didn't kill himself landing and pray that the Kriel ignored their visitor. Even he didn't believe that he had a snow ball's chance in hell of pulling it off. "Jolly good, Malcolm, another suicidal plan," he mumbled to himself cynically.
He didn't have time to worry about any of that now though because he was already within range of the Vor Devrees guns. He managed to pull left to avoid one of the batteries but one of the others caught his right wing and now he had even less control than he had before. The Rel fighter was dying a system at a time and there nothing Reed could do about it. He ploughed onwards and saw the docking bays ahead of him. "Well here goes nothing," he said quietly and readied for landing. Or at least he tried to ready for landing, when he tried to brake he realised that the reverse thrusters wouldn't engage. He swore loudly and violently, there was no way that he could make a landing if he couldn't slow down. He had purposely come in fast to try to avoid as many of the guns as possible and that decision was now coming back to bite him.
He made a couple of attempts to re-route power from other systems to the damaged reverse thrusters, but they weren't responding. This was the speed he had to make the landing at and he wished for the hundredth time since he got into the Rel fighter that he had been blessed with more natural piloting ability. He was an Armoury officer not a fighter pilot, he couldn't deal with a forced landing at this speed. Even back in the Academy, when he'd actually spent time learning how to be a space fighter pilot, he hadn't been good at this stuff. That was why he'd given it up as soon as he could, to specialise in Armoury systems and security. Just remember your training he told himself, remember your training and it will all be fine. He just had to remember which bit of his training related to landing crippled, unresponsive fighters on enemy ships.
He made sure his harness was tight and prayed that the rest of the fighter's safety systems were working. He pulled the fighter's nose up and aimed for the opening in front of him. He could see the deck coming closer, rushing towards him at too fast a speed, as if it was the deck that was coming up to smash into him rather than the other way around. He smelt burning and saw sparks out of the corner of his eye from the engine. He hit the deck and bounced. Reed was shaken like a cat's plaything in the seat of the fighter as the speed turned into force of impact and the fighter bounced three times more before it buried itself in the back of the hangar wall. Before Reed was claimed by the oblivion of unconsciousness he registered a siren sounding and the red of emergency lighting. His only thought was that he had at least survived the landing even if the Kriel were now going to kill him.
****