Thank you again for reading! I do apologize again for the very delayed chapter, I had been experiencing a bit of burn out after the last chapter and thought I could work through it but found that I needed to take a break from this story for awhile to recharge my batteries and thankfully I was able to get through it. I just wished I could have let you all know before hand about this so you all wouldn't be left in the dark and think that the story was dropped. I'm gonna try and upload a little more often now I've got some creative juice in the tank. Now enjoy!
Chapter 16
The skiff soured through the sewers and passed into the abandoned subway system gliding by derelict trains and stations. It was here that Azula was able to feel the biting cold beyond the dome and she could see icicles forming on the ceiling suggesting this area wasn't properly sealed off from the outside.
"Hope none of you are too bothered by the cold? There's a couple leaks here and there." Tsundal said.
"We're not actually going outside in the cold right?" Skeeve asked as he began to shiver.
"Course not! What do you think, I'm crazy? Subway connects to old geothermal transport tunnels. We don't have to set one foot out in the tundra."
Cetro took his word for it and shifted his focus to the injured member of their party, "How you holding up."
Sev shifted his weight a little with his face twisting in pain before being masked by a cheeky grin, "Just a scratch. I've survived worse." He then indicated with his prosthetic leg.
"That knife wound was still pretty deep. I suggest you not move around so much until we get you back to Bevel." Lectro cautioned him.
Cetro ran a hand over his head in a tired fashion, "Great, our tank is out of commission leaving you as our soul power house, Abzul." He said to Azula.
"Azula." she corrected again.
"Ain't that what I said?" Cetro disregarded this and went back to the smuggler, "Please tell me your ship is ready to launch."
Tsundal sneered at him, "I radioed ahead and informed the rest of my crew to begin launch preparations. All we have to do is load up and we should be good to go."
"This time we'll all load it up so we can get out of here before the sun's eventually find us."
"Fine. Do whatever you want."
"Thank the maker, I'm ready to get out of this place." Lectro said warily.
"We're not out of the woods yet. We still have to actually get off Ginza and hope they don't chase us all the way back to Kazima."
After several more minutes of traversing the subways they found a tunnel that led them out of the city into an old geothermal plant.
It was a sizable structure built into the side of a large rock outcropping. The outside of the building was decrepit and falling apart with frost covering almost every nook and cranny with icicles formed on every surface as the facility was partially buried in snow. Its long dead chimneys resemble stone ruins that almost blend into the rock outcropping. The interior was lived in but contrasted greatly with the rustic exterior with well maintained floors and hallways, fluorescent lights and heating that kept the overall environment cozy. The pipes and machinery that belong to the buildings originally purpose were caked in a layer of dust.
The skiff soured through the wide open corridors until it reached a large hangar where a large yellow rustic wedged shaped ship sat with its rear cargo bay door open and waiting to receive them with a member of the crew coming to meet them.
He was a yellow skinned Ke'Kuvon with a thick dark blue stripe tattooed over his eyes splitting his face, "About time you showed up! Ship is fueled and ready to go when you say." he stopped when he noticed the others, "Who are they? Is that a Pendaren? Are we smuggling them now?"
"Not a Pendaren." Azula scoffed back.
Tsundal hovered past him, "We discuss this later. Gold Sun's hit the storehouse and are probably on their way over. Get the doors open and the supplies on board now."
The Ke'Kuvon followed his order and shouted for the other crew mates to follow, "Get those doors open! We launch in ten minutes!"
A crew man ran to the door controls and attempted to open the doors but were unresponsive.
"Door's stuck!"
"What do you mean the door's stuck?" Skeeve said exasperated.
"Meaning the door is stuck! There's probably ice lodged somewhere."
Cetro pinched his brow, "It's just one thing after another. Isn't it? Abzul, use whatever power's you've got to melt that ice, Lectro go with her. Sev, Skiv and I will stay here and get everything loaded up."
"So much for not having to go outside." She sighed tiredly.
"Don't worry, I'm sure it's not as bad out there as everyone makes it out to be." Lectro said optimistically before finding himself shivering violently with his teeth chattering despite being wrapped in layers of warm clothing as he walked with Azula dressed in a similar manner.
"Okay I was wrong. It is that bad!" Lectro shouted over the howling winds who didn't respond and focused on the task at hand.
It was pitch black outside, the only lights being the flood lamps outside the facility along the catwalk and the glow of the domed city. The biting winds howled as they threatened to throw her off balance which didn't sit well with the pair as they traversed a shaky and rusted walkway that seemed to shake with every gust of the wind.
Even in her insulated clothing she could still feel the chill of this frozen wasteland and wondered why anyone would want to settle on such a frigid wasteland.
They were directed to the massive double doors by one of Tsundal's men where they could clearly see a thick sheet of ice covering one of the corners.
"Here it is. Don't know what you guys plan on doing." their guide said before leaving them.
Azula looked at the thick crust of ice in disdain, "How am I supposed to dethaw that?"
"That is a very good question." Lectro followed up, "How did you increase the temperatures in Slater's engine?"
"I just saw something glowing and focused my energy on that."
"Then there's your answer. Look for something glowing and increase its temperature without making it explode. Please don't make it explode."
"Easier said than done. I still don't know the limits of this ability."
She removed her thermal glasses and almost felt as though her eyeballs would freeze over after a frigid gust of wind blew her way but bore through it. Squinting her eyes she could see faint glowing within the frame of the door that took the form of coils of light crisscrossing, clearly energy running through wires. The sheets of ice seemed to dampen her view of the extent of the glowing network but it was just enough to help her.
She outstretched her arms reaching out with her bending, feeling the warm energy within the door and focused on making it grow hotter. The process was arduous to say the least as the energy was faint and felt like it would slip away like hanging on to something while the hand was coated in slime. To regain control she focused on her breathing, finding that like all firebending techniques the breath was key.
With each breath the door grew hotter and the ice covering the door was beginning to dampen. It would take awhile for it to fully melt but hopefully she can weaken it enough for it to crumble away.
It took almost an hour for her to melt away a good portion of the ice with her having to take a break. The process felt as though it was sapping the heat from her own body to achieve her goal and all she felt was cold.
Lectro took notice, "Are you alright? You look tired."
"I am." She looked at the ice sheet as it was drenched and dripping with several bits of it crumbling, "I think I weakened it enough. The door should be able to break the rest off."
"Great! Then let's get out of the freezing cold."
As they left she looked out into the horizon at the domed city. It was a marvelous spectacle and quite literally the only thing worth looking at in the tundra, she noticed movement from the sky. After closer inspection with her thermal vision she could see the heat of thrusters and when they were close enough she could see the shape of four ships, the same type of ship she saw in the hangar when they had arrived.
Before she could do anything a series of torpedoes was launched and made their way to the structure colliding with the door and exploding in a fiery blaze. The shockwave threw them back and destabilized the platform. She climbed up the platform like a ladder reaching the edge until it snapped with Lectro diving to catch her hand before she could plummet to the lower levels and pulled her up.
"Of all the times they could show up!" Lectro said as another explosion rocked the building sending icicles plummeting down.
"I'm starting to believe I wasn't really born lucky!" Azula said, picking herself up and running with Lectro to the door back inside.
On one of the small police cruisers following the Gold Sun gunships Slater stood over the pilot watching his screen.
Slater's second, Slick, approached him, "We've scanned the structure and found a single freighter parked inside the northern hangar."
"Good." He pressed the button for the coms, "Gunships, which one of y'all has a fully charged laz gun?"
"Gunship three, our laz gun is fully charged and ready to fire."
"Take out the ship."
"Are you sure about using the laz gun sir?" Slick asked, unsure of this decision, "I thought we wanted to catch them alive. Don't you think that's a little overkill?"
"Strike teams didn't work so now we bust out the big guns."
Explosions rocked the building with lights flickered and dust falling from above.
"We have to launch now!" Azula shouted, throwing the insulated clothing off.
"Tell me something I don't know!" Cetro said, as he helped Sev up off a bench with Skeeve and B3 at his side.
Tsundal floated by barking orders as the doors finally began shifting open, "Hey! Crimson Storm! Hurry up and get on board, we are leaving now! So unless you all want to stay get go-"
A bright red beam of light cut through the hangar door carving through the ship like a blade through butter resulting in an explosion that engulfed Tsundal with the shockwave throwing them back.
Azula recovered from the blast and saw the ship, their only hope, was slashed in half and on fire with the hangar door melted open letting in the biting winds as the surviving crew members tried to save themselves.
Skeeve dropped to his knees with his hands on his head as he looked on in horror at what had happened, "T-the ship… how… how are we gonna…"
"The tunnel!" Cetro shouted focusing not on what just happened and more on what he can do, "Get back to the tunnel now!"
They ran back further into the building as the ceiling began to collapse with the surviving crew having the same idea.
Through the crumbling mess that came down around them they reached the lower levels where several spare skiffs waited. Some of the surviving members took a skiff and sped off ahead of them. As they jumped in their own skiff a laz gun blast cut through the tunnel collapsing it behind the earlier skiff cutting off their escape.
"Ah no! How do we get out of here?" Skeeve panicked.
Cracks spread through the ceiling from the blast with the rest of the tunnel coming down around them.
The gunships circled around the geothermal plant showering it with plasma and collapsing the building.
Slater watched the destruction unfold, "Alright, cease fire. I think we've done enough."
"Are you certain that anyone is still alive down there?" Slick asked.
"Only one way to find out. Get a search team down there, if you gotta scrape their brains out and stick it in a jar then that's what we do. If not… well, guess we're gonna have to get that fabricator the hard way."
"I would suggest getting this done quickly sir." The pilot said, "Forecasts are saying a blizzard is coming soon."
"Then I guess we better get to it." Slater dismissed.
"Right sir." Slick said going to make a call only for his device to ring.
Slater supposed it was a shame that his targets were undoubtedly dead and that My'Rell might not be willing to trade the fabricator for what he could scrape up of her crew from the ruble so now has to figure out how he's going to brute force his way into getting it from her.
"Sir, we've got a problem." Slick said.
"What is it now?"
"Our red sand shipment just went missing in the system."
Slater snapped his head to him, "What! Another one? How long ago was it?"
"An hour ago."
"Damn it! Euretta is already on ma case, this is only gonna piss her off even more." He considered what to do next, "Have the investigation teams found any connections with our ships and civilian ones?"
"Yes sir, they've reported that all ships that had gone missing in the past few months that stayed in contact with stations, planets or individuals all said that they had picked up a distress signal and went to investigate only to never be heard from again. This matches all of our ships that made periodic reports with most of them saying that they were responding to such. It would seem that our culprit may be luring ships into a trap with a phony distress call."
Slater scratched his chin as he took this in. There is nothing more terrifying to a space traveler than being marooned in open space with limited oxygen and supplies. A distress call would be the only form of salvation and even then the vastness of space didn't guarantee that anyone would hear it. All space travelers knew of the importance of this with it being an unspoken rule by many to answer every distress call heard and it was seen as a great taboo to weaponize it with not even the most vile of pirates would stoop to such a level.
"Get ma ship ready for launch and call in some of our gunships patrolling the system, I got an idea. It's about time we nip this in the bud."
"What about the Crimson Storm?"
"I'll leave that to you Slick. Find them or what's left of them while I take care of this." Slater ordered as he contacted one of the other cruisers to pick him up and take him to his ship.
Azula's head was spinning as she regained her senses where she found herself under some rubble that she pushed off her legs. Thankfully she wasn't seriously injured but was covered in dirt and even more scratches than she already was. The tunnel had collapsed almost completely with the end leading to the city blocked off by melted stone and metal while the way back to the upper levels had also collapsed leaving them in a ruined pocket that was barely managing to stay up and not crush them, it was a miracle that they weren't dead already.
She looked around, finding the rest of the group getting each other out of the ruble but relatively okay.
"Hey firespitter." She turned around to see Sev trapped beneath a piece of the ceiling managing to hold one end up with one arm, "Help me out, I can't pull myself out and hold this up at the same time."
She went to his side without thinking and used as much strength she could muster to hold up the large chunk of debris while Sev pulled himself out. He struggled getting out, no doubt from the stab wound but as he tugged he felt his foot was caught on something.
"What's taking so long?" Azula asked, struggling to keep the stone debris up.
"My foot's caught on something." He answered as he yanked again and with it the sound of metal tearing and wires snapping came as he got free and pulled himself away just as Azula's arms gave out.
His right prosthetic was missing its foot now with sparks shooting out where it once sat, "Crap. Gax is gonna throw a fit when he sees this."
The ceiling stirred as chunks began falling again and support beams buckled under the weight.
"Hey!" Cetro called out as he pulled some stones away from the wall revealing a somewhat intact emergency exit, "This way! Hurry!"
They all made their way to the exit as quickly as they could with Sev limping to keep up until the cavern fully collapsed behind them. They ascended a long flight of stairs until they climbed their way out into the tundra where they saw the smaller cruisers begin landing, dropping off teams of armed troops who then began sweeping the area.
Gold Sun ships sored through the air covering the wreckage in search lights, the geothermal plant was completely destroyed and covered in a vast fire that illuminated the darkness of Ginza, the tunnel to the city collapsed, ship demolished, Tsundal dead along with a majority of his crew or lost with Azula and her allies now stuck outside the dome in the freezing wasteland.
"Oh no… no no no no. We are screwed!" Skeeve said in a defeated voice as he paced around frantically.
"Hold on! Let's not panic. W-we just need to figure something else out." Lectro tried to calm him down only for the rodent man to retaliate.
"NOT PANIC?! Our one way ticket out of here got blown to pieces, we're surrounded by Gold Suns and we're stuck out in the freezing cold! I don't know about you but I think this is the perfect time to panic!"
Cetro sat down in a piece of rubble exhausted, "I'm gonna be honest with y'all… I've got nothing. So if any of you have any crazy suggestions or ideas, I'm all ears."
"I would suggest finding cover first." B3 stated, "Enemy forces are in large numbers and I am detecting an incoming blizzard from the west."
"Great! Now we have to worry about turning into a frozen statue just like your good old pal Kanzo!" Skeeve said to Cetro who in response rose from his seat and stood over Skeeve.
"You've got something you want to say, Skiv?"
"Yeah I do! This whole mess could have been avoided if you had just checked in with your pal beforehand and made sure he wasn't dead before we showed up! And my name is not Skiv, it's Skeeve!" He then shoved Cetro.
The older engineer didn't take that too well and grabbed him by the collar with his top set of hands and hoisted Skeeve into the air.
"You really think this was all my fault? Who was it that blabbed to them about the fabricator, huh?"
"Guys! Fighting isn't going to help us!" Lectro pleaded as both he and B3 got in between them and tried to stop the fight.
Azula rolled her eyes at the sight before her. Typical for a weak willed group to begin fighting amongst themselves after a few setbacks. Instead of watching the exchange of insults she approached Sev who was uncharacteristically quiet as he held a hand over the metal plate that was his ear with his eyes flashing teal in deep concentration.
"Hey! What are you up to?"
His eyes went back to normal, "Listening in on their coms, might as well see if I can pick up something."
"Anything of note?"
"Yeah, apparently another one of their ships went missing and Slater is going out to investigate it."
"He's leaving the planet?"
"Yeah, putting his second in charge of finding us."
The gears in Azula's head began to turn as a plan formed. She turned to the rest of the group, seeing that Lectro was struggling to keep Cetro at bay while B3 held Skeeve away with ease.
"HEY!" She shouted, taking all of their attention, "I have a plan."
Cetro relaxed, pushing Lectro off him, "Alright kid. I'm desperate enough to hear it."
"Sev's been listening in on them and another ship has gone missing."
"And we should care… why?" Skeeve asked.
"Slater is going to investigate it himself, meaning he's leaving the planet on his own ship."
Lectro's eyes widened as he connected the dots, "Wait a minute. You're not suggesting…"
"Exactly that." She answered before he could finish, "We're taking his ship."
Both Lectro and Skeeve stared wide eyed and slack jawed.
"That's suicide!" Skeeve stated.
"It's our only option! At least the one with the best chance of success."
"It's a bad idea though!"
"Of course it's a bad idea! I would have liked to get out of this frozen hell by any other means but do you see any way of doing that?" No one had a response to that, "If we can take his ship then we are home free. It will not be easy but at least there will be a chance."
"I say let's go for it." Sev said, "It'd be nice to go on the offensive for once and I'd love to have the chance of exchanging some words with Slater." he then cracked his metal knuckles as if to punctuate his statement.
"We're gonna die if we do this." Cetro said then took one last look at the destruction around him, the oncoming blizzard and the distance to the city, "But, if I'm gonna die it might as well be swinging. Let's take that ship."
Lectro followed up although his confidence wasn't up to par with the rest, "Since the most accomplished members of our group are going with it I guess that means I'm with you as well… even if the idea makes me want to curl up into a fetal position and cry."
All that was left was Skeeve who only looked at them incredulously, "You're crazy if you think you can actually do this!"
"You're welcome to stay behind Skiv. But that means you'll be the one they torture for information when they catch you." Cetro added.
"You mean if?"
Cetro took a step closer using his added height to loom over him, "What makes you think there's an if?"
Skeeve's ears lowered realizing the truth in that statement, "All right fine. But how do we get to his ship?"
"I've got a good idea." Sev then pointed to one of the small police cruisers that had landed.
Slick stood over the shoulder of the operator looking over the helmet cams of the extraction team's going through the wreckage with one of the surviving team leaders of the previous sewer teams accompanying them as he held an ice bag over a bandaged gash on his head.
"You really expect there to be survivors?" the commander asked.
"No, but the boss wants us to be thorough." Slick responded.
"I don't see how he expects us to find them before this blizzard hits."
"Questioning the boss is above my pay grade."
The commander rolled his four eyes, "Like we're going to find anything, it's not like they're going to come walking up to us."
"Funny you should say that actually." A voice from behind grabbed all of their attention where they saw Sev shutting the rear door behind him with a smirk.
Azula and the others watched as the vehicle shook fiercely with the muffled sounds of a struggle being silenced by the howls of the wind until it ceased with Sev opening the door and giving them the thumbs up to enter. After pulling the three bloodied and bruised individuals they dumped their unconscious forms into a pile of rubble, quickly booted up the engines and took off leaving the powerplant behind. As they took to the sky the cloudy wall of frost and snow overtook what was left of the powerplant snuffing out the flames and coating the area in a blanket of snow and had the added benefit of scrambling radio signals, keeping anyone from noticing the vanished shuttle or calling and letting others know if they noticed.
Minutes later their shuttle landed in the civilian dry dock Sev directed them to after listening in on where Slater was just before the blizzard hit where they left it behind and made their way to the hangar where Slater's ship is being held.
They entered through the top level of the space and looked down to see the crime lord's ship. It was a long and thin ship whose sleek shiny obsidian black paneling gave it a powerful and dramatic smooth shape, the bridge extended out from the mid section overlooking the pointed nose with its smooth edges looking like it was sculpted on rather then built, tall vertical wings folded near its rear with large twin engines stacked above each other at its rear and a gold sun insignia painted in shimmering gold on its sides. Its silhouette reminded Azula of an empire class fire navy vessel as it was the same size and similar shape.
Azula could tell it was a luxury vessel rather than one built for battle which made her wonder what he was planning on doing with such a ship if he were to go after whoever the culprit was.
Sev whistled in admiration of the impressive ship, "That's one fine looking ship."
"And expensive too!" Lectro commented, "You have to own a fortune just to have something like this."
Cetro snorted looking at the lavish ship in contempt, "Figured he'd own a star yacht."
"At least we'll be traveling in style." Azula commented, "So, do any of you know how to fly this thing?"
"I could but,something this big is gonna require someone being in engineering." Cetro commented.
"I could fly it." Skeeve said, "Back in the Death's Head we would always salvage and repurpose old ships we'd find in pirate dens or buy from second hand ship dealers. They'd always make us low level grunts fly them back to base. I flew a few older models of star yachts before so this shouldn't be too different."
"You're positive you can fly this back to base?" Azula asked critically wondering if he was simply lying to make himself look useful.
Skeeve smirked, "Does a flying Kelbin crap in the woods?"
Azula only gave him a blank stare having nothing to go by with that response.
Skeeve sighed, "Yes… That means yes."
"Then just say that."
Lectro looked down at the many people in the hangar noticing the large number of Gold Sun soldiers outfitted with even more tactical gear than the extraction team marching into the ship's rear cargo bay, "How are we supposed to get in? There's like a hundred people in this place!"
Azula looked about the hangar, noticing the various amounts of hangar staff dressed in dull gray uniforms running about, "There are a lot of people. It's going to be difficult to be able to sneak on board without drawing attention."
"Hey guy's check it out!" Lectro pointed to the cargo that was being loaded into the ship's rear cargo hold, "Isn't that from our ship?"
"Yeah that is!" Cetro snarled, "What are they doing with our cargo?!"
An idea came to Azula, "I know how to get on the ship."
They all discreetly made their way to ground level where they took a separate door that led to a loading area where another large truck-like vehicle sat with their cargo resting in its bed. The various workers in the area were too busy offloading the supply crates to notice them sneak by but this also made it impossible for them to get into the vehicle and hide amongst the crates. Until Sev managed to knock over a stack of fuel cells to draw their attention away long enough.
They managed to find several crates to hide in with the next hover loader coming to collect them.
"This is actually working! I can't believe it!" Skeeve said with a bit of hope returning to his voice as he sat pressed up against the crate wall with Sev sitting in between him and Azula. The crate was large enough for them to fit but still small enough that Sev had to remove his legs to fit comfortably and even still was pressing his two companions against the walls.
"Shut up! It won't work if they hear their cargo talking."
Everything was going smoothly as they were coming onto the ship, until Slater appeared before them prompting the driver to hit the brakes hard as he strutted by speaking to the ship's pilot, a small four foot tall alien with stubby legs.
"Why did we stop?" Skeeve whispered.
Azula ignored him and pressed her ear against the wall listening in where she heard Slater's distinct accent.
"I want to be ready to launch within the hour. Load up all the goods that we found in that Crimson Storm ship into ma cargo bay. I want us look'n like a sweet treat on holiday when they find us."
The pilot struggled to keep up with Slater's confident and quick stride, "Wouldn't it be more reasonable to put the supplies on a more armored ship rather than your personal yacht?"
"Bait needs to look good. Bait with a whole lotta guns is bait that sets off alarms. If we're gonna catch these guys then we need to be alluring."
"I'm just concerned that this plan might be a bit…"
"Dangerous?" Slater cut off with a smirk, "Yeah it is, if you want to get things done ya gotta get yer hands dirty, but don't you worry ma dear pilot. We gon have a good and well armed escort to jump them once we snag them. Our gunships are gonna light up the sky." He then looked at the load that housed the Crimson Storm members, "Cut it after this one. Can't be look'n too good, that also sets off alarms." He then dismissed them to continue.
As they continued up the ramp out of hearing distance Azula spoke, "He's using his own ship as bait?
"And now we are on said bait. Are we really sure we want to take it?"
"Too late to back out now. We just need to take it before he executes his plan."
After being stored in the corner of the cargo hold the non essential personnel began to filter out and were replaced with the tactically equipped Gold Sun members.
The plan to board had been a success with the sleek ship levitating out through the ceiling entrance, its wings unfolding into obtuse angles and extending as it soared through the blizzard with ease until leaving Ginza's stratosphere being accompanied by several gunships.
Azula immediately felt the effects of leaving the planet with her removing her thermal glasses finding the glow of warm objects becoming fainter.
She waited for a while before leaving the crate first as her smaller and more nimble form made sneaking easier. The cargo hold was wide and spacious with a second level, crates were neatly stacked and sorted in rows clinging to the ground through magnetic locks with some of the load being Slater's personal cargo such as an expensive looking hover car and what looked to be containers of red sand. However the most dangerous aspect about the cargo hold was that it was crawling with heavily armed gold sun troopers. Thankfully none of them noticed her exiting or sneaking around as she made her way to a smaller crate.
She unlocked the top of it where Cetro jumped out taking a gasp of air, "I could barely breath in there!"
"Hush up! There are guards everywhere!" She whisper yelled at him, "We got in. Now what?"
"First we get rid of the cavalry here." He gestured around them as he pulled them behind cover when a trooper walked by overhead.
"Any ideas on how that's possible?"
Cetro scanned the area and saw a panel on the far wall, "Lock yourself in and hang on to something."
Slater sat in the captain's chair admiring the panoramic view of the bridge as his four bridge staff worked with his two bodyguards standing behind him.
The communications officer alerted him, "Sir, I've got a signal being broadcasted five hundred kilometers from our position. No audio, just a simple message on repeat."
"What's the message?"
"Ship damaged. Pirates. Low on fuel and supplies. Send help, please." The officer read aloud.
Slater looked over the shoulder of the navigator, "Any other ships in the area?"
"Negative sir, just the one vessel." The navigator answered.
"Can we tell what type of ship it is?"
"We've got an image but from this range its resolution is poor quality. We'll have to get closer for a detailed scan."
"Let's see it."
A blurred out gray blob appeared on the main viewing screen that was indecipherable.
"Alright, we'll play their game. Send a message back saying we'll pick them up. Signal the others to follow but stay out of scanning range and keep their reactors on low power. We don't want to spook them, ya hear." He ordered going back to his chair, "Also alert the strike team, tell them to be ready for a possible boarding."
"All hands to battle stations. Target is within range. Strike team is ordered to take their assigned positions. Be prepared for the possibility of being boarded." The announcer said as emergency red lights flashed.
Azula looked on at the flashing lights as strike team members got into position around the cargo hold as she and Cetro tried to stay hidden behind a stack of crates.
"We need to hurry, he's enacting his plan."
"I heard the entercom kid, I'm not deaf." Cetro said as he worked on getting access to the panel.
"Meaning hurry it up! The last thing we need right now is to get caught up with whomever is stealing ships."
"Almost got it… and… there we go! I've got access."
"Hey! Who are you?" One of the troopers shouted, spotting them with his weapon drawn.
They froze with their hands in the air.
"Cetro, if you're going to do something, do it now." Azula said to him as others began to take notice.
Cetro grabbed hold of a nearby ladder and pulled Azula close, "Hang on kid!"
With a quick press of a button the doors to the cargo hold opened with the resulting decompression sucking out the strike team and anything not secure out into space.
The pull was so great Azula felt as though she was in the middle of a cyclone. If it hadn't been for Cetro shielding her with his own body she would have been sucked out. Cetro used all his strength to get himself closer to the panel and closed the door just as quickly and repressurised the room.
It only took a few seconds but they managed to get rid of an entire strike team with the large open space only being filled by them and the cargo. With the room now empty of hostiles the others came out of their hiding spot.
"Holy crap! That actually worked!" Skeeve said surprised.
"Yeah but now they know we're here." Cetro informed taking out his blaster, "That looked like a good chunk of them but there's probably more throughout the ship. We need to secure the engine room and the bridge. Sev will escort me and the bot to engineering. Azula, you get Lectro and Skeeve to the bridge. Take out anyone who gets in your way. Got it?
Sev smirked as his arm transformed into a blaster, "With pleasure."
Azula smirked as well, "This will be hectic but we might as well have some fun."
Slater sat in anticipation as his ship got closer with the resolution of the image slowly getting better. His anticipation was interrupted when the ship suddenly stirred with turbulence and the bridge was flooded with emergency lights.
"Sir! There was a sudden decompression in the cargo bay!" The pilot reported.
"All personnel were sucked out into space!" The copilot followed up.
"What!" Slater shouted jumping out of his seat, "What the hell happened?"
"Someone opened the cargo bay without permission." The copilot answered as he frantically typed away at his monitor pulling up the security footage, "Sir! We have intruders on board!"
The footage went to the main screen showing the Crimson Storm members separating.
Slater gritted his teeth in fury as electricity danced around his tightened fist. He was finally able to find the culprit to his missing ship problem only to have a separate problem interfere.
"How's the target?"
"They don't seem to have noticed anything sir."
"Get whoever's left on them now!"
Azula jogged down the corridor, blaster drawn, as the alarm sounded off and bathed the prestin white walls in flashing red lights with Lectro and Skeeve following close behind.
They rounded a corner where they found a pair of remaining troopers running to intercept them with Azula managing to blast one in the shoulder before he could raise his rifle to her then shot the other in the thigh sending him on his knees. Not wanting the fight to drag on she leapt onto the one with the wounded shoulder wrapping her legs around his domed helmet and used her momentum to throw him to the ground then fired into the other one's chest before turning the weapon onto the one trapped in her grasp and rolling free.
"Keep going!" She barked at the scientist and engineer as she continued her trek.
Skeeve and Lectro ran past the bodies in shock at how ruthlessly efficient she was without her bending.
The small engineering team of the ship continued their work tirelessly despite the alarm going off and continued their focus on making the ship function until the sound of blaster fire caught everyone's attention were they saw Cetro standing at the main entrance of the engineering room as he held a smoking blaster to the ceiling with Sev and B3 at his sides.
"Scuse me everyone! But if I could direct your attention to me I'd like to inform you all that your services are no longer needed. So if you could kindly get out of my engineering room in an organized and timely manner to the closest escape pods or I could have my big friend here rip you to pieces and dump what's left of you out the airlock."
Sev grabbed the head of a nearby service robot and pulled it off effortlessly to prove Cetro's point with all of them staring in fear.
"WELL GET TOO IT!" Cetro shouted before firing in the air again.
The engineering team quickly ran out for the escape pods.
Sev Let out a groan of disappointment, "That was way easier than I thought it would be."
"What did you expect? This is a pleasure ship, of course the engineers here aren't going to be the fighting kind like us." Cetro said, making his way to the main console and ordering B3 to connect to it.
Sev took a position behind the main entrance keeping watch as Cetro worked, "Keep me covered, I'm gonna cut off all connection to the bridge so they can't shut us out by causing a full system reboot. Then we're gonna make an extra dimensional jump out of here."
"To where?"
"No clue, can't put coordinates from here, need the bridge for that, but this is just to get us out of here so we don't get caught up with whoever Slater's after."
Sev gave him a strange look, "I'm all for danger and risks, but a blind extra dimensional jump? Ain't that suicide?"
"That's why it's gonna be a small jump, so we don't end up in uncharted territory."
As Cetro was continuing his work several gangsters and two troopers appeared down the hall and began firing at Sev who hid behind the door and returned fire.
"How long you think that's gonna take?"
"Not long but not quick either."
"I've got a question." Skeeve said as they went up a short flight of stairs, "Since this is Slater's ship won't he be at the bridge with all his big security guys?"
Azula halted at an intersection signaling them to stop and hug the wall as three more strike team members ran past them towards engineering.
"He has a point you know?" Lectro commented.
"You let me worry about that. Focus on your own tasks." She barked back.
She led them through a door into a grand open atrium filled with luxurious furniture, decorative plants and what seemed to be a metal statue of abstract art on display on the second level with the ceiling entirely being made up of transparent material presenting a splendid view of the starry night sky.
On the second level a gangster spotted Azula and began firing at her and called out alerting the others of her presence.
Cetro locked the two axillary doors into the engine room on the top in order to filter the enemy towards the main entrance for a better defense as B3 continued to break through security, "Come on, robot, give me some good news!" Cetro said as a yellow bolt zipped past his head after returning to the main level.
"Security measures breach is at seventy seven percent." B3 reported.
Cetro went to Sev's side, joining him in repelling enemy fire.
"This more up your ally?" He said to the giant.
"Definitely more exciting!" Sev responded as he narrowly dodged a plasma bolt, "How do you think the others are doing?"
"The bridge is probably the most secure place to be right now but I don't doubt the kid will be able to handle it. That is if she's as good as you say she is."
"Trust me. She'll get it done."
"Fire wall breached. Reboot control accessible." B3 reported.
Cetro wasted no time getting back to the console and initiated a system wide reboot. The power went out all over the ship with the lights going dark, engines cutting out and controls to the bridge going dark before slowly coming back on moments later.
"Pilot!" Slater shouted from his captain's chair, "What's going on with my ship?"
"Someone just rebooted the system! We don't have control of the ship!"
"Sir!" The communications officer said, "The enemy ship has ceased its distress transmission."
Slater focused back on the blurred image of the enemy ship now in distress that his target might have noticed their predicament and might be sensing his trap.
"Sir! The other ships are trying to contact us and are changing position!"
"I told them to maintain radio silence!" He growled as he made his way to the communications station overlooking the screens there.
"They must have noticed our systems going out!"
"Tell them to maintain their heading and stick to the plan!"
"I can't sir! The communications terminal hasn't fully come back online yet!"
Slater noticed the navigation screen came back online and showed the gunships having broken formation and were heading towards his ship to investigate, coming within scanning range of the targeted vessel.
"No. No. No…" Slater repeated as everything was spiraling out of control and he ran to the other stations trying to find some way of regaining control of the situation.
"Sir! I'm detecting an extra dimensional jump from the enemy ship!" The copilot announced.
His eyes widened in shock and desperation. The enemy knows it's a trap and is trying to escape. His gaze shot to the screen where the pixelated image opened a distortion in space and disappeared before his very eyes.
"W-we lost the target… sir." The copilot said nervously as Slater stared blankly at the screen in a silent rage.
The room was silent as no one wanted to say anything in fear of how Slater would react. He took a deep inhale of air through the nose before launching his electric fist into one of the screens, cracking it.
He heard the sound of blaster fire outside the door into the atrium and turned to leave.
"You two." He pointed to his two bodyguards as he pulled out his personal blaster, "With me. We're going hunting. The rest of you get everything back online and trace that jump point." He spoke in an eerily calm and restrained voice.
Azula continued to take cover from the blaster fire barrage. She peaked out and fired, managing to hit one of the three thugs and making him fall through the glass railing on the second level. Her aim was getting better with each battle.
On the third level of the atrium the door to the bridge opened with Slater's bodyguards exiting first with blasters in hand as they joined the fire fight with Slater appearing close behind. Azula noticed him and had an idea.
"Wait here, I'm going to draw them away!"
"Are you sure about that? We're in space and your bending is getting weaker." Lectro pointed out.
Azula smirked, "Is a turtle duck's rear water tight?" She reached out with her heat bending causing one of the thugs' blasters to overheat and explode, setting his clothes on fire as he too fell from the railing grabbing Slater's attention. She dove out of cover taking pot shots at the crime lord with his bodyguards shielding him with their bodies.
He noticed her running across the atrium remembering her ferocity in the sewers.
"After her! That one is more dangerous than she looks!" he ordered as they ran down the u-shaped stairs.
With the danger now gone, Lectro and Skeeve were alone in the atrium free to access the bridge.
Lectro looked down the hall in worry, "I really hope she knows what she's doing."
Skeeve followed him up the stairs but couldn't help but ask aloud, "What the heck is a turtle duck?"
Azula sprinted down the corridor sliding behind a corner as bolts flew past her. As she returned fire two more strike team members appeared from the opposite end of the intersection and forced her to continue moving until she found herself back in the cargo hold this time on the second level. Before going any further she hugged the side of the door and waited for one of her pursuers to appear.
The pursuing trooper hopped out of the doorway where she fired at his side several times before wrestling the rifle out of his hands and using it to fire down the hallway.
One of the thugs flanked her through one of the other entrances forcing her to keep moving and when doing so ran into another flanking thug who picked her up effortlessly and threw her over the railing and onto the hood of the hover car.
She rolled off and took cover behind the vehicle as the plasma bolts came.
Slater entered the room with his bodyguards and smirked as he watched the teenager taking cover, "What's wrong little girl? Where's all that fight you had in the sewers?" He taunted as he fired at her himself, nearly grazing her head.
Annoyed with his taunts she jumped out and fired at him forcing him to take shelter.
The four that accompanied the crime lord descended with one thug jumping at her side grabbing hold of the rifle and pulling it out of her grasp before attempting to land a blow to her face only for her to pull away and push kicked him.
He lunged at her wrapping his hands around her neck attempting to strangle her. She grabbed his hands and used her heat bending to burn them.
As he jumped back in pain the remaining trooper fired at her. She grabbed the burned man using him as a shield before kicking him at the trooper. She caused his rifle to explode in a fiery blaze disorientating him long enough for her to roll over the car hood towards one of the bodyguards kicking his weapon away then swiping his feet out from under him before running behind a stack of crates right into the swinging fist of the other bodyguard. She caught his arm and sent him face first into the crate before snapping his wrist and kicking him away.
As she recovered to keep moving she found the barrel of Slater's blaster in her face. She instinctively sent a blow towards his face only for him to catch her by the wrist and deliver a surge of electricity throughout her body before kicking her away.
"Come on Azula, don't disappoint me now! Ya got my attention so make it interesting." He raised the weapon to her again.
She quickly made the weapon overheat in his hands.
"You're just full of surprises ain't ya?" Both of his hands sparked with electricity as he approached.
Azula's thermal vision wasn't as strong as it was on the planet but she could clearly see the glow in his arms and was ready to exploit this weakness. She extended her own hands reaching out with her bending as his electric ones came for her. He froze in place as he felt the electrical organs in his arms growing hotter. He had no idea what to do now, he tried extinguishing his electric charge but when doing so the heat continued to rise to unbearable levels.
The ship's system finally fully came back online with Cetro working at the console and jumping to other sections of the engine room. He finally got everything ready to make a jump as Sev continued to hold back the troopers.
Cetro returned to the main console, "Alright! Get ready for a jump!" He then pulled a lever and in moments the ship created a distortion and entered extra dimensional space before the other Gold Sun ships had a chance to dock.
The ship rocked as it made an unprepared jump that shook everyone. Azula felt the loss of her heat bending immediately along with her thermal vision returning to normal at the worst possible time. She had Slater in her grasp, literally, and was about to take him out permanently only to bendingless and at the Chundari's mercy.
Before she could do anything else the strike team member struck her in the back of the head with what was left of his rifle while the two bodyguards grabbed her by her arms and forced her in a kneeling position.
Slater now recovered from feeling the strength of her heat bending marched up to her, "That's some neat party trick ya got there kid. Put the fear of the maker in ma soul, I tell you what." He then kneeled down at eye level to her, "So, what was the plan here, Azula? Steal ma ship and run on back home to mama My'Rell, huh? Real stupid plan if ya ask me, but I've got to commend you on make'n it this far." She only gave him a look of defiance as he grabbed her face and forced her to look at him, "Ya got cocky though. Did you really think a little ol thing like you could take us all on by your lonesome?"
She gave him a defiant grin, "Yeah… I did. At least long enough to keep you busy."
Slater let out a laugh, "Gotta admire that confidence. But that's right, you ain't alone. I got so worked up on catching you and yer freaky exploding trick I almost forgot about yer buddies, but I ain't too worried I still got people on board that can make short work of them."
"What happened to keeping us alive in order to make the trade?" Azula mocked.
"Ya know, I really did want to keep ya'll alive so I could get that fabricator the nice and easy way but after this little fiasco… ruining ma plan, hijacking ma ship, throwing out ma strike team and kill'n ma men! I ain't playin nice no more. I'm gonna tear yer friends limb from limb, mail em back to My'Rell in a series of packages so she knows that I mean business when I come for that fabricator! But for you, I think I'll take ya to Eurette and let her decide on what she wants to do with you, and let me tell ya, there ain't no end to her creativity." he then snapped his fingers to the trooper, "Knife!"
The trooper unsheathed his combat knife and gave it to him, "But before I send ya to the bosslady ya know I've gotta get my licks in. Why don't we start with that pretty little nose of yer's." A twisted sadistic grin came over his features as he grabbed Azula by the chin and began to bring the knife closer to her face as she struggled to fight his bodyguard's grip.
The four members of the bridge stood against the wall with their hands raised over their heads as Lectro stood before them with a blaster raised, "Now I just want to let you guy's know, I am not a violent person. I abhor violence as a man of science, so I need you to understand that this is not personal. We are doing this strictly out of self defense." He reassured them all.
"Doc, you don't have to apologize to the guys who work for the man trying to kill us." Skeeve said as he worked the pilot's console.
"I can't help it, I've never taken people hostage before."
Skeeve ignored this as he worked, "Can't believe Cetro did a blind jump. What if we hit a planet?"
"That's not how extra dimensional travel works. There's no physical objects for us to collide with."
"Yeah yeah." Skeeve brushed off, "Looks like it's only a short jump, we should be exiting back into real space right about…" The ship exited the tunnel of endless color into real space with the sudden exit almost throwing everyone off balance due to it being an unconventional jump.
The sudden turbulence threw everyone in the cargo bay off balance. With the abrupt entrance into the new star system. Azula felt the rush of power return to her from a yellow star. As her opponents got back to their feet she made a sweeping kick towards Slater and sent a wave of fire hitting his sleeve making him fall back in surprise as he patted it out. She broke free from the grasp of his bodyguards sending fireballs into both of them as she rolled back onto her feet and sent waves of fire into the strike team member who was more protected by his tactical gear.
Slater jumped for a blaster and fired at her but Azula quickly swayed her arms to deflect the blasts around her with the last one being sent into the chest of the final strike team trooper killing him.
Slater halted his fire realizing that his blasts weren't effective but kept his weapon trained on her while he studied her stance trying to figure out what had just happened. Slater had been angry with how things were turning out but the reveal of fire bending put a crooked smile of delight and curiosity on his face as if he was a child being presented candy.
"Well… ain't that something?" he lowered his weapon and pointed at her, "You've been holding out on me! Where was that before?"
"Surrender your ship now and maybe I'll let you walk free." Azula commanded.
Slater laughed, "You really think a little fire is gonna-"
She shot a fireball at his feet.
"Do you really want to test me right now Slater?"
Slater's smirk never left his face with gleeful defiance appearing in his gaze as he tossed the blaster aside and peeled his burned jacket off, "Ya know what? I think I do. I want to see what this is all about." The blue striped organs on his arms contracted, sending golden lightning up and down his arms, "Why don't we settle this the good ol fashion way? Little bare knuckle action." He hammered his knuckles together, generating sparks, "Yer fire against ma electricity? Winner gets ma ship. What do ya say?"
"You're really going to try and fight me head on?" Azula said almost in disbelief.
"Why not? I like me a good scuffle every now and again." He cracked his knuckles.
There was no fear in his eyes, he knew that if she accepted his challenge there was a chance that he could die, but that didn't scare him instead it seemed to only invigorate him further as he wanted to test his mettle against a truly worthy opponent.
Azula welcomed the challenge as she too was itching for a worthy fight to prove her own superiority, "Alright, you better not disappoint me Slater."
Another action packed chapter and we are getting close to the end of the Gold Sun adventure and not only that but next chapter we'll get Azula vs Slater. This fight is one I've been brewing in my head for a while seeing how Slater can use his electric powers against someone like Azula.
Fun fact: When I started this fic the absolute hardest thing to write was Azula herself as she is not my character therefore I didn't feel like I had a good Idea of how her thought process worked. To remedy that I rewatched just abut every scene she appeared in back in ATLA along with her comic appearances, watched a whole bunch of character analysis videos on her, read a few really good fanfics on her as well and used an AI chat bot to help write the first two or three chapters. Once I got a good grasp on her I got more confident and I feel as though I know the character as well as one of my own, at least the version of her I created for this fic.