by DN Farrell
Kell just nodded in the negative and said " I'm not turning back, this is a free ship, you can't force us anywhere."
"We can make you do whatever we like!" The Lieutenant shouted at Kell, looking like he was beginning to lose his cool.
Kell then said "Well how are you going to make me?" While moving closer, so as to be almost standing on top of the Lieutenant of the rebel ship.
The Lieutenant then placed his blaster under kells chin, to indicate his willingness to use force, but kell was well ahead of him, with a deft swish of his hand, he trust a small knife, which he carried in his belt buckle, and plunged it straight into the heart of the Lieutenant, who squirmed up his face but made no sound as the knife expertly sliced through his aorta, causing instantaneous death. The rebel Lieutenant sank into kell’s arms and fortunately for kell, his conversation with the Lieutenant had bored the three guards, who were standing in the command module with them. Kell seized his opportunity and Kokalka was given a rare glimpse of a master of armed and unarmed combat at work.
Kell let the body of the Lieutenant slide to the floor and then with one quick "whoosh" he threw his small knife, which was specially designed to have a handle in the middle and a blade on either end. As the blade flew through the air, in a circular fashion, it first sliced the throat of the rebel guard on kell's far right and then continuing on its ark, it lodged itself into the left hand side of the neck of the rebel, who was standing three feet away from him.
The third rebel was directly in front of kell and was just getting his head around seeing the body of his Lieutenant slumped at kell's feet, while his two fellow rebels were silently falling to the floor emitting jets of blood from their throats. As the rebel raised his weapon so as to fire, kell came running at speed across the fifteen feet, which separated them. In three large steps, kell covered most of the distance, then stamping with his right leg on the ground, he dug in and swung his hip around as if he were about to carry out the famous karate round house kick, whereby one leg stays stationary and the other leg moves in a one hundred and eighty degree angle, but instead kell started the roundhouse position, but instead of moving his leg one hundred and eighty degrees, he simply turned his leg ninety degrees and used the sudden flick of his hips to drive the force of his kick up, as his foot connected with the nose of the third rebel, with an egg crushing sound his nose instantly smashed and rose up into the skull and on into the brain, instantly killing the rebel, who hit the floor with a thud.
Kell knelt down and took his knife out of the rebels neck and cleaned off the blood on the rebels shirt. There was a pool of blood around his body, so kell tried to avoid walking in it. As he stood up, he looked over at Corporal Kolkala and smiled at the marine, whose jaw had dropped looking at the display of Colonel Kell’s skills. Then putting his right forefinger in front of his lips to indicate quietness, Kell took of his boots and kept them to one side and then knife in hand he gently walked down the circular stairwell, which connected level two to the command module.
If kell's memory served him correctly, there were six men in level two and three in level one. Kell figuring that this was a job for someone with advanced commando techniques, as he wanted to avoid a fire fight, which would alert the bandit ship attached to the saucer ship. So kell quietly snuck up to the first rebel, who was just standing to attention, at the bottom of the stairwell. Very silently he covered his mouth with his hand and sliced his heart from a rear position, once more the man slumped forward dead.
Now came the daring part, as the saucer was designed with level one and level two being completely circular, he could run at speed in either direction and rapidly cover the diameter of level two, which was around one hundred and fifty feet in diameter and he simply had to slice and stab the next five rebels within the seven or eight seconds, it would take him to run around it. On paper this would sound like an impossible feat, but Kell didn't even stop for a second to think about it.
Kell ran very rapidly and quietly for a very big man and quickly he sliced and stabbed one rebel guard after another, until he had silently slain four of the rebels. kell had purposefully decided to leave the rebel who guarded sickbay till last. The rebel who was half dozing as he stood there, suddenly came round, when out of the corner of his left eye he saw someone either drunk or dancing their way around the circular corridor, until he realized it was Colonel kell and the rebels were dropping to the floor, as he went by.
The man was about to shout or shoot of his blaster or something like that, but before anything could happen with a quick swinging motion kell swung his right hand up and into the side of the rebels head, trying to embed the knife into the temple, an area of soft tissue on the side of the rebels head.
However, the rebels reflexes got the better of him and the blade slide off his head. Kell ended up tripping, as a consequence of the knife's deflection, which threw him onto the saucer floor and made the knife drop out of his hand. As Kell quickly turned around to face the rebel, the rebel pointed his blaster at Kells body, but just before he squeezed the trigger, he felt a sudden stinging pain in his back, as Regares had taken out her knife and stuck it onto his back, stabbing him in the heart. The rebel winced in pain and then fell over, nearly landing on kell in the process, but kell quickly rolled out of the way.
Kell looked up and saw a smiling Regares, so once again he put his right forefinger up to his mouth to suggest silence, then he got himself up from the floor and coming over to Regares he reached out for his knife.
All that remained now where the three men down below. Once again Kell put his finger up to his lips, in front of Private Regares and Ceres. He looked down the stairwell and one man was standing watch as the end. As he came around, he saw two men standing guard at the gangway. Once again kell tried to repeat his performance from level two, but just before he made contact with the rebel at the end of the stairwell, one of the guards who was standing at the gangway, saw him and began to yell, but was muffled when Kells knife made contact with his Adams apple.
Then Kell rapidly punched the man at the stairwell in the back of the neck, thus confusing him and in three steps he had reached the second guard, knocking the man's blaster rifle out of his hand with his right hand and at the same time punching him hard in the throat with the finger knuckles of his left, thus crushing his Adams apple. As the man slumped forward, kell then grabbed him between his left hip and left arm and with a yank he snapped his neck. Then turning back to face the man at the end of the stairwell, who was reeling, he ran over quickly, grabbed his head as if he where grabbing an American football and once again he repeated the neck break, but this time with the man's head directly in front of Kell's torso.
In less than one minute, Kell had killed eleven men, good even by his standards, as the most decorated marine in the armed forces. Of course he had being lucky, but then speed and skill help a man to make his own luck!
Chapter Fifteen – Escape
Kell carefully looked down the hatch into the gangway, a circular plastic looking structure which linked the two ships. All was quiet, so he carefully moved the dead men out of the way and looking up, he could see Kolkalka and Regares, at the top of the circular stairs looking down at him. Kell once again put his finger up to his lip to suggest quietness, then briefly leaned over the last two guards and pulled them well away from the gangway door. Then quickly he ran up the stairs and with one hand on each shoulder, he walked the two marines halfway down the corridor, so there would be no chance of anyone standing near the gangway, on the other craft, picking up what was been said.
"Ok marines here's what we're going to do." Kell said in a steady tone, trying to reassure the two marines, who were obviously feeling stressed as they were well versed in ship to ship combat but knew nothing about flying ships tactically, which was what they as a group had to do now. Kell on the other hand, with a vast amount of experience under his belt, was well able to tackle just about anything which was thrown at him.
"First of all we're all g
oing to suit up including Ceres. Then Regares you go down to the gangway door and wait for my call to close the door, meanwhile me and Kolkalka will be on the bridge." Then looking at the two of them again he said, "Go on suit up and expect anything!"
Within a couple of minutes everyone was suited up, Regares went back first to Ceres and then down to level one where, she waited for her orders at the door and Kolkalka and Kell went back up to the command module. Once back in the command module, Kell and Kolkalka moved the bodies of the dead men of to one side and then Kolkalka took his weapons station seat, while Kell sat in the captains chair.
Looking at the Holo Tube, Kell ordered Kolkalka. "Ok Kolkalka I want you to line up that laser directly at the ship, which is joined to us, and when I say so, fire down the length of its portside." Then pointing with his forefinger at the Holo Screen he noted "Kolkalka once we start moving, I want you to turn that weapon around and to the best of your ability I want you to take out one of the remaining two rebel ships," he then paused and looking over at Kokalka he said " which one doesn't matter, just do what you can, for once we're up and running, they are faster than us and better armed, got it?" To which Kolkalka simply nodded.
"Ok" Kell shouted down his unit comms, "guys be prepared for a fast exit. Regares on my word close the hatch and then get yourself tied into a chair as quick as you can, as it might be shaky."
Then he paused and remembered Ceres, "Regares is Ceres strapped in?"
Regares replied "Yes sir."
Then turning back to Kolkalka, Kell nodded and pointed once again at Kolkalka's weapons screen. "Ok guys ready on the count of three, one, two and three, go!" He exclaimed and with that Kolkalka fired the laser cannon straight down the port side of the rebel ship, which they were tethered to, while Regares locked the hatch and rapidly ran back up the stairs to the sick bay, where she strapped herself into the chair besides Ceres. Meanwhile kell gave them ten seconds to do this, then he hit the Pulse engines and tore away from the tether.
As the ship pulled away, a couple of rebels were sucked out into space and Kolkalka's ten seconds laser round sliced a decent chunk out of the port side of the other ship, thus crippling it. Once away from the ship, kell initiated the warp drive, but it being a Mark IV Saucer, this was a slow process which would take a few minutes to kick in, so he had to drive at Pulse and see how he got on.
The other two ships started firing blinding and missing the saucer, while Kolkalka did the best he could to get a lock on one of the rebel craft, which he managed to do so, as kell was purposefully flying in a straight line for a few seconds, to facilitate this. Then with a "zing" sound reverberating throughout the hull, he fired a two second round which went clear through the middle of one of the rebel ships, quite possibly damaging the engines, in any case the ship didn't move. However the second ship started moving rapidly towards them.
With Kolkalka's two "good luck" shots out of the way, kell starting zig zaging like crazy, hoping that this rebel ship had poorly trained weapons personnel and low grade equipment, but you never know.
The speed was building up to Pulse 0.5 and the entire ship was wobbling all over the place, as kell did his thing. Shouting over to Kolkalka, who was now a little confused about what to do, kell exclaimed "Cover fire!" Kolkalka hadn't got a clue about how to fight a laser cannon battle in space, but at least he understood the concept of cover fire, so he started blasting away with his cannon, here and there, in the hope of forcing the other ship to take evasive action, which in turn would slow it down.
Kolkalka's cover fire was working, as the other rebel ship was now also zig zagging and it was becoming almost impossible for them to hit the Mark IV saucer ship. Kolkalka just kept his finger on the trigger and squeezed like crazy while releasing his tension, by screaming at the top of his voice "Yaaaaah, yaaah, die you bastards, scum, just go and die!" Meanwhile Kell just kept warming up the warp engines and ziggzagging like crazy.
The ship was now moving at Pulse 0.75 and was only about thirty seconds away, from launching into warp drive, when there was a sudden burst of blinding light in the command module. For a fraction of a second, Kell couldn't see anything, while Kolkalka who had being facing towards the back of the command module at the time, in his weapons station, he saw the flash directly in front of him and so he shrieked "Arrgghh, my eyes!"
Kell then felt a whooshing sound, as air escaped the command module, so for a moment he looked back and saw a nice deep slice mark through the command module, as the rebels laser cannon had momentarily made contact and now a six inch wide and four feet deep gash, was present in the command module dome. Air was rushing out of the ship, but fortunately the marines had their suits on, so turning quickly Kell remotely closed the emergency hatch between the command dome and level two of the ship, so this way the command dome would be without air, but air would still be present in the rest of the ship.
Kell then went back to his back zig zagging again, while Kokalka took a break so as to recover his vision, which was coming back slowly. At last warp drive launched and suddenly there was a feeling of upwards movement and quietness, they were in warp drive. However, their encounter was not over yet, as the rebel ship quickly launched its warp drive and according to the instruments it was going to overtake them.
Fighting at warp speeds, was particularly tricky, for a start it was almost impossible to hit another ship, when it was travelling at super luminal speeds, for the weapons could only fire at light or less than light speed. The Federation had designed special weapons which could create a wobble in the warp field, which would implode the warp field, allowing gravity to press down on the ship squishing it instantly. The rebels did not have these guns, but as they travelled along and the rebel ship went ahead of him, Kell knew only too well, that a clever captain with a highly trained weapons crew, could fly ahead of the other ship and just start throwing carefully placed plasma shots, more or less in the area of space, where the super luminal vessel was travelling. It was still a crap shoot, but sometimes it could work.
A minute or so later, the rebel ship had created a large distance between it and Kells ship, as kells ship was just accelerating past warp level two, while the enemy ship had managed to get up to warp level four, then it started decelerating and coming out of warp drive. Kell knew what was coming next, with a good minute gap between breaking out of warp drive and the Mark IV saucer catching up, the rebel ship could sit there in space and start throwing out a wide dispersal of laser cannon fire and plasma fire, in the hope of just maybe hitting the part of space where the marines ship was flying through.
Kell started zig zaging and next thing here or there, there were momentary flashes and the ship would sudden rock from the shock waves. If the enemy captain was good enough, one of those plasma fire blast vibrations, would create a wobble in the warp field vortex, either making the warp field implode, thus crushing the ship or it could cause the ship to have to drop out of warp , if it were lucky.
The ship rocked and bucked, but then it was clear and ahead for now. Kell looked over and smiled at Kolkalka, who was just getting his vision back. They couldn't even fire back at the rebel ship, while in warp drive, as their own laser gun would burst their warp bubble, so all they could do, was continue to accelerate, which they did as they were now reaching warp level three.
The rebel ship wasn't hanging around, it turned and rapidly re-engaged warp dive. Within a few minutes it was bypassing kells ship, at warp level six. Kell knew that they would keep on repeating this process, until they finally blew the saucer out of warp drive and since the rebel ship could probably travel at warp level fifteen or so, while the saucer would max out at warp level four, there wasn't much that kell could do for now, other than to hang on in there.
Once again the rebel ship put some space between itself and the saucer and again Kell started to zig zag wildly. The rebel ship disengaged from warp drive and started firing sporadic plasma bolts and laser cannon shots and Kells ship started to receive some turbulence,
as it wobbled through the space, which the rebel ship was busy obliterating. This time, however, the rebels made a lucky shot, for it takes a lot of luck to blow a ship out of warp drive. The plasma blast, hit the ship hard and luckily the warp field flickered but did not fail, however, a warning signal flashed on the navigation console and a beeper sound alarmed, indicating an imminent implosion of the field. Kell yelled at Kolkalka "We're coming out of warp drive!" and with a flickering of his fingers, across the navigation console, the ship came out of warp drive.