Forty five minutes later, Aurelia had not come any closer to thinking of a way out of the situation they were all stuck in. She decided to check on Isobel once more. The white foam that was largely covering her body had now largely evaporated, and her skin had not healed perfectly. She had a pseudo scar on her left breast, and one across her cheek where she was shot by the plasma bolt. Aurelia felt confident that her body would eventually fix these things, but she was hit by a pang of guilt. She had been far more reckless than normal, she had been too complacent, thinking that no one could hurt her in her own home. But now she had stitches in her thigh and Isobel was unconscious with scars from fighting for her life.
“Isobel, I don’t know how to get out of this. I have a pan for everything, or at least I thought I did. I didn’t expect them to mouth an anti-capital laser on something as small as a frigate, nor being able to power it. All my accomplishments, and I’m still taken by surprise.” Aurelia said, her voice cracking up. She rested her forehead on the table Isobel was on, and began to sob to herself.
She flinched when she felt a soft hand on her head, and looked up to see Isobel had woken up, and was looking at her sympathetically. Aurelia took a deep breath, sat up and wiped away her tears with her sleeve..
“It’s good to see you are awake. We might be about to die. There is a grossly over-equipped Nekt frigate outside that is about to destroy my ship.” Arelia croaked, before breaking into a nervous laughter.
“Ship?” Isobel asked.
“Yeah, this whole facility is a buried Cruiser of my own design. The visible part is about eighty meters long, but the whole ship is easily over one kilometer. You haven’t really done much work in the depths, so you wouldn’t know how big it really is.”
“So, is there nothing we can do?” Isobel asked.
“We have five minutes left. I don’t have a plan, and honestly I am having a hard time keeping it together.”
Then, Addison chimed in. “Well miss, I have a plan. We could overload one of the shield generators just before it fires, which would cause an electromagnetic pulse powerful enough to drain its capacitors and possibly disable much of the ship if it isn’t emp shielded.”
Aurelia sat back in bewilderment, wondering why she hadn’t thought of it earlier.
“Yes… yeah that would work. We’ll be losing part of the facilities shielding, so certain parts would be vulnerable for a while, but it would give us enough time to leave. Probably.” said Aurelia hopefully.
“Izzy, can you walk?”
Isobel sat herself up, wincing in pain as her metallic muscles screamed at her in pain. She took a deep breath and nodded, looking at Aurelia with sheer determination.”
“Yes, I can. Now let's ruin that assholes day.”
“Look, I’m immensely proud you said your first cuss, but are you in shape enough to run me across the facility? I can’t walk because of my stitches.”
Isobel pushed herself off the table, landing on the floor with a heavy thud. Then, without hesitation, carefully picked Aurelia up in her arms without showing any indication of effort.
“Which way?” She asked. Aurelia pointed to the south of the workshop.
“That way, then-” Aurelia said before being cut off as Isobel dashed in a sudden burst of speed, sprinting right out of the laboratory.
“LEFT! LEFT!” Aurelia yelled as she wrapped her arms around Isobel's neck and gripped on for dear life. Isobel swerved down the corridor, turning at Aurelia’s behest, and before long they came to an elevator the android hadn’t seen before. Aurelia had since buried her face in the androids shoulder, her fingers digging into Isobel's skin.
“Rell, we are in front of an elevator. Do we go in?” Isobel winced, the lithe woman was far stronger than she looked, gripping with vice-like strength.
Aurelia’s grip relaxed, and she let go of the android. “Yeah, this is it. Go in, we are going to the fourth floor.”
Isobel obliged and walked in, letting Aurelia push the button since her arms were full. While the elevator went up, Aurelia bumped her head on Isobel’s shoulder and shut her eyes. Isobel could feel Aurelia’s racing heartbeat pressed against her chest, the softness of her cheek, and the flush warmth of her skin against synthetic skin.
She cleared her throat when they reached the fourth floor, nudging Aurelia with her shoulder. Aurelia craned her neck, and nodded. The pair then entered the bridge, which was consoles either side of the room, and seats for over a dozen crew.
“Izzy, place me down on the big seat in the middle.”
Isobel complied and gently let the lithe woman down, standing beside the chair at standby. Aurelia spun the chair to face the captain's console, and began typing away. The whole room lit up properly, highlighting the sleek and curvy design of the ship, reflecting the aesthetic of the visible part of the facility perfectly.
“Young miss, the frigate will be ready to fire in ninety three seconds, could we perhaps do something about that, now?” Addison said with urgency.
“Wait until it’s just about to fire, then it will totally trash the laser capacitor. We’ll be cutting it close, but it has a fifty fifty chance of working. In the meantime, get some of your drones down here, I need help getting this thing to fly.” Aurelia said with intense focus.
A sealed door opened on their side of the entrance, and a dozen drones spilled out, and sat themselves down at each of the consoles. The facility began to rumble, Isobel losing her balance and only just managing to catch herself before she fell.
“Oh, Izzy hun, you are going to want to take a seat for this.” Aurelia said, pointing at a nearby seat beside her.
“Right, let’s get this show on the road.” Aurelia said, her expression an almost maniacal level of determination.
“Ten seconds, young miss. You are cutting it close.” Addison now sounded like she was in full panic mode.
“Almost. Just a bit longer.”
“Six seconds.”
The whole facility began to rumble, and the glass panels lit up with displays of outside. The ground surrounding the facility began to crack and give, as it was being pushed from underneath.
‘“Five seconds.”
The trees in the surrounding area began to uproot as the ship lifted from underneath, the plaza now completely decimated. Isobel quickly buckled her seat belt, staring at the feed in front of her of the Nekt frigate’s main cannon glowing.
“Two seconds. YOUNG MISS-”
Aurelia laughed maniacally and slammed down her fist on the console. Outside, as the frigate was about to fire, one of the shields completely discharged itself expanding outwards rapidly in a blue haze.. An explosion underneath the ship could be seen as the frigate lurched to the side, sending fragments onto the shielded bow of the massive cruiser rising from the ground underneath it.
“Oh my fucking circuits it worked. I suggest we make our way out of here as fast as possible.” Addison said with relief.
“You can swear now? Wait, never mind that let’s get out of here as soon as possible.” Aurelia sat back on her chair and pushed forward on the flight stick. The ship lurched forward as it freed itself of the remaining rubble and debris,the rest bouncing harmlessly off its sides..
The frigate began to lurch one direction, barely steering its way out of the massive ship. The Blackhole Blitz pushed the frigate aside, causing it to slide down the port of the cruiser. It fell into the massive billowing cloud of dust underneath.. The Blackhole Blitz’s engines lit up and it launched forward, disappearing into the sky.
——————————————————————————————
“We are in space! It’s been too long since I left the planet. I just wish it were for a more, uh, savoury moment.” Aurelia said with reluctant enthusiasm. She turned to look at Isobel, who was gripping so hard on the metallic arm rests that when she released them, they were completely crumpled.
“Izzy, open your eyes, we are in space and I’ve raised the bridge.”
Isobel had seen many images on the GalNet of space, but nothing could prepare her for the sheer vastness of the void. Nothing she had seen could compare, billions of stars lay before her twinkling brightly in the darkness. Beefore, when she was on planet, Isobel could barely see the stars through Rith’s thick atmosphere on the surface, but here, everything she could see was untainted and undiluted. Rith's star burned furiously in the distance, the blue star brighter than anything else.
Isobel was so taken aback by the sight, that it took far too long to realise Aurelia was poking her arm.
“Hey, you alright?”
Isobel blinked at Aurelia and gave her a surprised expression. “Oh, sorry, I think I… spaced… out.” Isobel trailed off then facepalmed herself in realisation of the horrible pun she just made. Aurelia stared at the android blankly for a moment, and then broke into a snorting laughter.
“That was horrible. You really are the star of puns.” Aurelia broke into laughter again at her own joke. The android finally cracked a smile. She wasn’t sure if it was the burning pain that she could feel over her body, the stress of nearly being killed and losing Aurelia, or the fact that they had just launched into space to escape the contractor. For a moment, she just let herself laugh out loud with joy.
Their laughter was cut short when Addison spoke up.
“Excuse me miss, I apologise for interrupting such an intimate moment, but you have a comlink request from a nearby vessel.” Addison sounded uncharacteristically miserable and down. She went silent for a few seconds before she continued. “Fucking great, its the guy who wanted to kill us again.”
Aurelia tensed up, but activated her console to bring the call up. The monster had taken its original form from their first interaction, but it looked far different now. Its clothing was in tatters, and its skin looked like it was melting off, slime dripping down his face before being reabsorbed into its body.
“Let me board you and take you with me or I’m going to ram your ship and come take you by force.” It growled at them, pure malice in its voice. “If you make me do the latter, I will make sure that your little friend there suffers greatly before I tear your legs off.
Aurelia glowered at the creature, but before she could say anything, Addison’s voice sparked to life.
“After you tried to take my mistress, and tried kill me, you can fuck right off.” Addison spat at it with rage.
Aurelia’s mouth hung open, her suspicions confirmed. She did not teach the assistant to swear.
“Uh, yes. What she said.” Was all Aurelia could manage.
“You will regr-” the contractor began before the feed was cut.
“I can not stand any more from them. Do I have permission to use the prototype? Its ship is far faster than us and it will catch up to us before we reach the wormhole generator.” Also there is no shielding on the stern and I do not think we will survive a ram from it.
Aurelia pinched her brow. “If we do, what are the chances of catastrophic failure?” She asked.
“About twenty three percent, young miss.”
“Good enough for me. Go ahead and jump for the Edue system. A Thirty thousand light year jump should be a good test run. Also I have a friend there I need to meet up with for some information.”
“Yes, miss.” Said Addison. Suddenly everything jolted forward, sending Aurelia forward in her seat. She groaned as she slumped over her console, and Isobel was quick to unbuckle herself and help the scientist back into her seat.
“I’m going to guess that our little friend just rammed us from behind.” Groaned Aurelia. Addison snickered, before clearing a throat she never had.
“Yes. We somehow suffered minor damage and I suggest you strap yourself in, young miss.”
The scientist and the android obliged and sat themselves back down. Ahead of them, they could see a storm of lighting and mist manifesting in front of the ship, mere kilometers away. Aurelia turned to Isobel with a nervous smile plastered on her face.
“Well, never tested this properly, so let's hope we don’t die.” Aurelia said as she held her hand out to the android. Isobel grabbed it and squeezed softly.
“If we are lucky, the idiot will follow us through without the slipstream drive.” Addison said with spite. “Anyway! Lets fucking do this.”
The bow of the ship began to disappear into the storm, the Blackhole Blitz shuddering as the bow was completely swallowed. The pursuer swerved off and away, watching as the ship disappeared into the mist until it had completely disappeared. The Storm then dissipated, leaving no trace of its quarry.
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