Chapter fifteen
At the designated point, Ely sent the transponder code and request to enter Roco space.
There was confusion. “Please identify yourself.”
Using text, Ely responded ‘Jubal Early,’ and pushed the ship ident again. “You’re not welcome in this space, and you will be fired upon unless you identify,” came Roco’s return.
“That’s odd,” Ely said. “I really thought this would work.” “Go in anyway,” River said.
“There will be local fighters, and Alliance ships,” Ely said.
“Yep,” River said. “You’re an ace pilot, and Early’s ship is combat ready.” “Talk about synchronicity,” Simon said.
“I am going to suit up. I am going to want you to come up close enough to the station that I can get on Roco,” River said.
“With just a suit?!” Simon said. “That’s impossible.” “Early has gear, it’s not impossible,” River said.
“I will get you close,” Ely said.
“No,” Simon said. “Serenity’s crew is capable. This is just one of those times we failed to help.”
“Don’t be afraid,” River said. “I got this. I got you.”
“I don’t like you in harm’s way and I don’t like being in situation where we have to kill folks and I don’t like not being able to be helpful, just waiting to patch up loose ends,” Simon snapped.
“I know. But that’s what you do best,” River said. “Now, let me go make some loose ends or you’ll be out of a job.”
♫♪►
The door to the maintenance bay snapped shut the moment the air pressure outside dropped, and emergency life support system kicked in, increasing the O2 and pressure to compensate for the sudden drop. Kaylee’s ears popped. She rushed to the com and found Inara on the bridge.
“I’m alright. The door shut, though,” Inara said.
“I show outside pressure is sufficient, you can override. Meet you up at the airlock?” Kaylee said.
Kaylee emerged first, and Inara heard her cry of concern. She rushed to Zoe, turned her over. Inara hit her with the equivalent of an epi-pen, and Zoe aroused. As Zoe was coming around, Inara hit Jane with one.
“Where’s Mal?” Inara asked.
Jayne got up as if waking from a bad dream.
“Easy!” Inara said.
Jayne took inventory of himself, stood. “I am okay. I am okay.”
Inara went back to Zoe, who was being helped to her feet by Kaylee. They all startled to sound of a weapon being discharged. They turned to see Jayne walking to the next ‘bad guy’ where he discharged his weapon again. “Jayne!” Zoe said. “They’re unconscious.”
“They were shooting at us,” Jayne said. “They might wake up and continue shooting at us.”
“Tie them up,” Zoe said.
“Bullets are more certain,” Jayne said.
“Tie them!” Zoe said. “Let’s get these crates off our ship. Come on.” “What about Mal?” Inara said.
“First things first, these crates off, then activate the transponder, because things are going south,” Zoe said.
♫♪►
Command center for Roco went to full alert when the pressure dropped on one of their bridges. One of the Alliance ships recognized their alert status changing, and steered closer to Roco. The other Alliance cruiser went up in alert and a squadron of pilots were launched, standard procedure, in case whatever was going on on Roco was a distraction so that pirates could steal crates. Sure enough, even as the fighters were being launched, an unidentified craft entered the area.
“Commander, a ship identing as belonging to Jubal Early as entered our space,” a tech said.
“I am confused. I thought Early was already attached to Roco,” the midshipman said.
“Transponder is identing as Early,” the tech said.
“Hail that pilot, have him heave to,” the midshipman said, turning to page the Captain of the peculiarity.
The tech tried but was unsuccessful at raising the craft. The midshipman requested that some of the fighters be directed to investigate and intimidate the new ship into compliance.
♫♪►
“I am in the airlock,” River said.
“River,” Ely said. “I am going to drop you at an entry point. I need you trust me on your momentum and vector, and you go when I tell you, because I am going to be turning on a coin toss, and will provide you cover till you’re in…”
“Understood,” River said.
Up on the deck, Simon was holding onto the armrest. “That doesn’t sound good,” he said.
“Flying in space ain’t like flying in atmo,” Ely said. “I can’t just bank and veer off into a new direction.
He was flying directly at the station as if he were going to collide. Roco station swiveled weapons to shoot, but nothing fired. Several fighters had diverted to intercept them. At a certain point, Simon seemed worried, even held on, and then Ely spun the ship and powered hard in the opposite direction. In the hold, the antigravity off, River landed against the door. When she heard ‘now’ she popped the door open and continued towards the station, carrying the momentum she had before leaving the ship. The ship seemed to be falling away from her, but in truth it was merely slowing while she was continuing forwards. With the precision of arrow shot from a bow, she hit the airlock of a retracted bridge as square as if Ely had meant to hit it. Using an electronic assist, she entered the first of three doors before she was in the receiving end of the bridge. Three consecutive inner doors, closer together due to the bridge being contracted, led her into the contracted bridge itself, and then three more doors led to a corridor. She was removing her helmet even as she came out into the corridor and the first approaching guard was hit in the head by the helmet that she tossed. He went out cold, and she caught the helmet when it bounced back, and the next guy had fired, but hit the helmet, capable of taking a bullet, or a meteor, but by then, she had been grappling range, and had broken his arm, and used his own hand to fire the weapon at the third guard, and her feet were coming in the air to kick the fourth guard, and she might have hurt the fifth guard, but he had turned to run away. The man whose arm was broken went to his knees, whimpering.
“Are we done?” River asked.
“Yes, Mam,” he said.
“Sorry about your arm,” River said, taking his weapon. She also took a weapon from the first guy she shot.
She orientated, and what seemed like a random decision, turned and proceeded down the corridor, turning right. As she came around the corner, Early was coming out a room. He cursed in Cantonese, but then said, ‘this is right.’ The blood splatter from the headshot painted the door that had closed behind him. As his body hit the door, it reopened, revealing the room behind him and the hole in the ceiling, then closed, streaking the splatter into lines. She walked over Early, opened the door, jumped up, grabbed the upper deck, and swung herself up. She was just on her feet when the whole room shook, and she knew for a fact, the station had been impacted by something. She heard the unmistakable sound of people trying to over-power a door that was blocked by tech. She quickly got out of her suit, to reveal she was wearing little underneath it. She took some line from her suit, pushed it to the floor below, and used the line to make it look like her legs were tied, and her wrists were tied, and then went to remove the override lock, which allowed the door to immediately snap open. The men confronted with the sight of half-naked female, tied, and crying.
“OMG, they cut a hole through the floor and they were going rape me…”
“There on level 7,” someone said, redirecting his men, and then began untying
River. “It’s okay, mam. I got you. I got her, go…”
He was alone with River, flirting a little, and suddenly found himself tied up, and then she continued on her way for Serenity. She was blocked by the guards from entering the bridge.
“Sorry, mam, but we’re investigating…”
Probably because she was half naked, they allowed her to approach closer than they might have otherwise, and consequently, they were fairly quickly dispatched, with a few punches, an elbow, and a foot. There were two guards on the bridge itself, and you would have thought they had never seen a naked girl before, because they lowered their weapons, and might have flirted if she hadn’t knocked them out. She wandered out into the bridge proper, where Zoe, Inara, Kaylee, and Jayne had their hands up and were being briefly interrogated, and when guards that were investigating turned to see a naked girl approaching, they gave Zoe time to steal a firearm and put it up to the chief guard’s temple.
“Have your men drop their weapons,” Zoe said. “And close their eyes. Jayne, give her your jacket.”
“I’m not parting with my jacket,” Jayne said.
“Jayne!” Zoe snapped.
“She’s a gown ass adult. If she wants to walk around half naked, then she ought to be allowed…” Jayne stopped protesting when Inara pointed a weapon at him. “Happy to give her my jacket…” He slipped off and was helping her in it. “Now be careful, there is a grenade in the left pocket, and there’s a…”
“I know your jacket supply,” River said.
“How do you… Never mind,” Jayne said.
“Where are you clothes?” Zoe asked.
“They don’t fit in the suit,” River said.
“Where’s your suit?” Inara asked.
“I left it with Early,” River said.
“Where is that son of a bitch?” Jayne said.
“He’s dead,” River said.
“Did you see Mal?” Inara said.
“I did not, but we should leave,” River said.
“Not without Mal,” Inara said.
“They’re here, we need to go,” River said. “Now…”
♫♪►
“Did you turn on those transponders?” Simon asked.
“The moment we came into Roco space,” Ely said, aiming for the field of container pods. A darkened ship was there, apparently powered down, perhaps being stowed. “Haven’t seen a black-op ship like that since back in training. Nice piece of treasure that would make…”
“You’re just going to talk all casual like we’re sightseeing?” Simon asked. “Would you prefer I be all panicky and yelling?” Ely asked. A containment pod exploded under the fire from the fighters chasing them.
Early’s ship, flipped on its axis, and shifted between two containers on their level, but also fired a wing rocket and went up several levels deeper into the lawyers of containers laid out in a grid point system that became a lattice work cube. He returned fire on a sentry and suddenly all the sentry’s became active. Simon gave a start when something sounded close.
“Don’t worry,” Ely said. “They’re not likely to penetrate the armor of this ship with one hit.” He thought about it. “Of course, if they hit a window, we’re likely screwed.
You want to go put on a suit?”
“I think I am going to be sick,” Simon said.
“Don’t look at the rows of pods, look straight ahead, or go to the back,” Ely said.
“In fact, just go sit down, I got this. Oh! That’s new.”
The ship that had dropped out of ‘Light,’ meaning returning to normal space speeds passed over the container field, blocking out a massive amount of stars and looking up as it pass brought a sense of darkness and dread and then the lights of stars popping back in declared the boundaries. Ely powered up towards the ship, firing forward rockets and spun around to try and orientate at it.
“You’re going towards it?!” Simon said.
“They’re not shooting at us,” Ely said.
The ship began firing at them. Ely curved them back into the container field, passing the fighters that were chasing them. One of the fighters took a hit and blew up, taking out several containers, spilling the contents. As they headed down, another Alliance ship arrive, a super cruiser, one of the biggest, and better illuminated, as the Alliance was proud of their ships, and so it had running lights that shone back on its own hull, where the new ship didn’t. The new ship wasn’t cloaked, but it wasn’t boasting or highlighting itself. One of the Alliance ships on station was engaging it, and losing.
A new squadron of ships launched from the new Alliance ship. Ely brought them to a stop, spun them, and started back towards Roco station. Ely punched up his mic.
“River you’re about to have serious company.” No response.
“Why isn’t she answering?” Simon asked.
“I don’t know,” Ely said.
Both the new Alliance ship, and the unidentified ship, which has the suggestion of being an Alliance design, had dispatched shuttles, with fighter escorts towards Roco station. A third ship arrived, again, Alliance in appearance, and it began to fire on Roco station. Suddenly the space around Roco was all alight with the amount of fire being exchanged from multiple vessels. Roco station suddenly got into it, their weapons systems apparently working after all. Even with all the firing, the shuttles arrived at Roco and latched on, making their own entry points, burning into the hall.
“Firefly, if you can hear me, you need to get out of there,” Ely said into the mic.