by Colin Cook
"But in that time we lost sight of our fugitives," Chellick said to his fellow passengers while leaning over the dashboard to look through the windshield. Everything was quiet
for a moment before the driver suddenly spoke up again.
"I think I just found them."
"Where?" Bailey and Chellick asked at the same time, immediately looking at him.
"There!" he answered, pointing over to an Alliance Corvette far across from them, the very one the three had seen the blonde duo standing near before this had all begun.
As he did this, several lights and systems visible along the ship's outer hull began lighting up, and a deep humming sound soon began reverberating from its rear propulsion
outlets as its engines began activating.
"Are they insane? They're still attached to the Docks!" Chellick stated after seeing that the magnetic docking clamps firmly latched to the ship had not yet disengaged.
"We've tried underestimating these two before and it's gotten us nothing but trouble. Whatever their plan is, I'll bet they've got some kind of ace in the hole," Bailey said
with narrowed eyes as more of the ship began to turn on.
"We need agents over there before they can escape."
"No. They wouldn't get there in time to do any good. There's only one other way we can salvage this now," Bailey said grimly.
"And what's that sir?" the driver asked over to the older lieutenant.
"Get us to the Citadel Defense Headquarters! I expect to see you breaking records for fastest speed done by a patrol car!" Bailey ordered sternly. Giving a grin and an
enthusiastic nod, the driver turned back to his controls.
"With pleasure."
As the officers' patrol car blasted away from the Military Docks, agents carrying riot-shields and tear gas launchers began steadily advancing forward across the Docks,
supported by the defensive divisions of marines and agents. Firing their launchers intermittently, the platform soon started becoming submerged in gunfire and cloudy
wisps of the noxious fumes, the sounds of the dying clash seeming to echo out across the entire Presidium.
Alec and I began breathing heavily as the outer door for the airlock shut behind us, staggering over and leaning against a wall to catch our breath after the adrenaline
spiking escape we'd just endured.
"Decontamination in progress…" the Corsica's V.I. stated as the gentle white scanning field materialized and began creeping over toward us.
"Axel, this may not be the best time to ask, but…" Alec began, turning his head over to look at me.
"What did you mean when you told Jarrod that he would 'never mention her again'? Who's her…" the Guardian started asking when suddenly he was cut off as I sharply
snapped out a hand and grabbed onto the top of his samurai chest-plate, harshly pushing him back and pinning him against the airlock's bulkhead.
For a silent moment I stared hard into his startled eyes, my grip remaining tight before slowly relaxing.
"Alec…we've only known each other for a short while, but in that time I've come to consider you a friend. I hope that goes both ways," I said solemnly to him. Alec
nodded, his face holding no signs of that cocking mocking attitude he usually had just masked beneath the surface.
"Of course."
"Then as your friend, and as your Ring Bearer…I'm asking you to drop this subject," I said, making my feelings on the matter very clear through my voice and expression.
"But…" he began.
"Please Alec, don't bring this up with me or any of our group in the future. Just forget you ever heard about it. It's not something I want to talk about," I implored to him,
steeling my mind to keep from going into another memory relapse. For another moment we were silent before a small smile spread across Alec's face, his left hand
reaching up and gently squeezing my shoulder.
"Okay," he said softly with a nod of understanding. A wave of relief washed over me as I smile in return and nodded back.
"Thank you. Now come on, we've got an escape to make!" I announced as the scanning field disappeared and the inner door to the Corsica's interior slid open.
Both of us quickly moved out into the interior corridor, turning to the left and rushing up the three immediate steps into the ship's cockpit. Farther back in the conference
table area, the horde of Replicators was busy scurrying about with their front pincers glowing hot, apparently using their advanced capabilities to improve various sections
of the ship in some way.
"Hey Yoda! Guess what? We're finally leaving!" Alec joyously called back over his shoulder as several Replicators including Polly and Sparky came scrambling up into the
cockpit along with us.
"About time it is!" came Yoda's muffled reply from somewhere near the back of the ship. Tossing my Phalanx into the seat of the Captain's chair as I passed in front of it, I
quickly came up to the crescent of control consoles and slid into one of the cushioned black swivel chairs set up before them.
"Please let this be easier than Irwin's hover car," I begged to myself as I pressed my palm against the main console and began Mind Mending with it. My muscles went rigid
and the usual process of drawing the information out of the machine flashed before my eyes. Except this time I deliberately forced myself to stay connected to the ship
for a little bit longer, soaking up every last detail that I possibly could from the Corsica's inner makings so as to keep us from having a repeat of our escape from the
Market District.
Just as the silver glow from the ring began fading away and my tense muscles started to relax after the transfer was complete, a tremendous crash sounded out followed
by the entire ship shaking violently all around us!
"What in the Nine Worlds was that?!" Alec shouted after the shaking had subsided for a moment, holding on to the back of the Captain's chair before another rocking
crash screamed out.
"Something's hitting us! We gotta get out of here before those things decide to come and tear us apart!" I shouted back while glancing around the cockpit, briefly holding
on to the console to steady myself before letting my fingers go wild across its array of buttons. As the knowledge from the Mind Mending flowed through me and each
system was activated, the darkened cockpit slightly lit up with a deep orange glow as all of the holo-control boards sprang to life. Imputing codes and turning holographic
nobs on the many screens curving in front of me, small lights and other secondary systems throughout the ship began starting up. Another crash shook the Corsica, this
time causing a metallic groaning sound to blend in with the deep humming noise beginning to vibrate throughout the decks as the ship's large twin-engines activated.
'Its heating up faster and easier than it should,' I thought with a cocked eyebrow, reviewing the screens as well as through my newly attained knowledge after having
noticed this odd anomaly. What exactly had the Replicators been up to while I was gone?
Another crash rocked the vessel, this time nearly throwing me out of my seat.
"What the hell is going on out there?" I asked out loud after pulling myself back to the consoles.
"See for yourself!" Alec exclaimed, roughly stumbling into the back of my chair and pointing to the windshield ahead of us. Following his finger, I reared back in surprise at
the sight of the monstrous brown eye and beaked facial profile peering in at us from the outside. After shifting its massive claws that it had dug into the side of the hull,
the bloodied Thunderbird drew back its head before throwing it against the front end of the Corsica, causing the entire ship to experience another gut-wrenching quake!
"HEY! Do not go denting my ride!" I roared indignantly at the giant bird, jumping from the chair to my feet and jabbing a threatening f
inger at it through the cockpit's
narrow crescenting windshield. The bird only looked at me square in the face before opening its enormous beak, giving us an unpleasant view of a long black tongue and
several bloodied pieces of shredded samurai armour lodged farther back in its mouth, and letting out an earsplitting cry that caused both of us to wince. Using the flat of
its forehead, the Thunderbird pulled back again and delivered a powerful head-butt that actually managed to dent several hull plates.
"I don't thank we can take much moe a this! Get this dang thang in gear boy!" Alec shouted down to me in a hysterical Southern Red-Neck accent. Sitting back down, I
manipulated the flight-controls and put the Corsica'sfully active engines into reverse. Several thrusters on the front of the ship began firing bright jets of blue flame, the
backlash from a few of them catching the Thunderbird in the face and temporarily blinding it, causing it to screech and pull away momentarily. But suddenly, as the ship
slowly began backing up away from the main war torn platform-stretch of the Docks, a nasty metallic grating sound screamed out around us, along with a harsh jerk that
brought us to an immediate stop despite the power still coming out from the ship's forward thrusters.
"What's happening?" Alec asked tensely in his normal voice, looking around us as the walls and hull began to shake uncontrollably from the thrusters automatically trying
to push harder in order to break free of whatever was holding us.
"We're still attached to the pier! I can't disengage the docking arms without a lockout terminal, and the closest one I know of is in C-Sec Academy!" I reported over my
frantic keystrokes, desperation creeping into my voice and movements as I kept trying to wrench the ship from its attached magnetic clamps.
"The Academy's halfway back down the Docks! There's no way we're going back into that warzone with that thing on top of us!" Alec shouted with a point to the
screeching Thunderbird still latched on to our front.
"Oy! Chicken Legs! If you don't get off my ship soon I'm gonna turn you into a giant Thanksgiving TURKEY!" the Guardian fired off angrily at the great animal, only getting
a furious beak jab against the ship's nose in response that caused us to jerk downward briefly.
"Without a terminal there's no way to…" I began with a helpless gesture, seeing no hope in sight. Suddenly however, a pair of mechanical hisses came from the floor
behind us. Spinning around, Alec and I looked at each other in confusion as we watched Polly and Sparky begin to climb up the bulkhead of the cockpit toward the ceiling,
hissing back to their Replicator brothers while heating their front pincers to full power. As that happened, several of the Replicators began following them up, while others
turned and scurried off toward the conference table area, screeching loudly to the rest of the horde. Soon a large portion of the insect army was climbing up the
bulkheads, each clawing their way toward the ceiling with their pincers flaring. Before either of us could ask what was happening, Polly began burning through the ceiling,
carefully melting his way into the material until he broke and climbed up through the Corsica's hardened outer hull, his example quickly being followed by Sparky and the
other spiders.
"Uhh…abandoning ship maybe?" Alec suggested after watching the ascending Replicators scurry out one by one through their newly made tunnels. Suddenly another
groaning sound shook through the walls, but this time it wasn't coming from the ship. The floor beneath us jerked backwards, the Corvette's still active forward thrusters
abruptly resuming in their success at pushing us away from the Docks. As we pulled farther and farther out, one of the pier's magnetic docking clamps passed by the side
our windshield, completely broken in half with wisps of smoke rising up from its newly destroyed end. The Replicators had just burnt it off for us!
"No, they're breaking us free!" I stated with a wide grin of revelation as the new groaning sound increased in pitch, the force of the Corsica's thrusters causing the final
magnetic clamp to bend and warp from the strain of being pulled away as it tried keeping us latched to the Docks.
"Yeah but we still gotta deal with the soon-to-be KFC FAMLY MEAL! that's bashing the crap out of our vehicle!" Alec began saying to me before looking back through the
windshield and shouting the insult at the Thunderbird as it slammed its forehead into the hull again.
"If it was just a bit farther down I could use the ship's main guns to blast it off of us!" I stated as more hull plates crunched underneath the impact. Suddenly the loud
metallic movements of the Replicators began sounding out directly overtop of us, slightly muffled from being outside.
"Looks like our friends have us covered on that one," Alec remarked with a grin as several dozen of the spiders began crawling into view across the surface of the outer
windshield, with Polly and Sparky leading the charge. The Thunderbird squawked in anger at each of the approaching machines, pulling its head back in preparation to strike
at them; but suddenly Polly hissed and jumped up toward it with his legs flared open. Latching on to the side of the creature's beak, my Replicator Parrot climbed up and
began viciously clawing at its face with his sharp front legs, soon being joined by several of his brothers as they too jumped up to aid him. The Thunderbird gave an earthshaking
scream of pain as Polly and the other Replicators started clawing and scratching near its eyes, threatening to permanently blind it despite the desperate attempts it
was making to throw the infernal machines from its head. That was when a tremendous cracking snap shot out from the side of the ship, and a smoking jagged piece of
the final docking clamp flung wildly up in front of the windshield. The Corsica suddenly lurched backwards again; its thrusters now pushing us out with 100% efficiency as
the other Replicators still spread out across the hull broke the ship free. The Thunderbird gave a gurgling screeching death rattle as the flying metal debris stabbed into its
chest and impaled through its ribcage, killing it almost instantly. With a final spreading of its huge wings, the mighty beast fell backwards off of the ship and plummeted
down to the expanse of building complexes almost in slow motion, giving Polly, Sparky, and their backup enough time to jump from its head and land back on the
windshield directly over top of us.
"Alright we're free, GUN IT!" Alec ordered to me, shaking my shoulder frantically as he noticed the fleet of Mantises still doing battle with the swarms of flying reptiles
crisscrossing through the air inching closer and closer toward us.
"Thank you Polly! Now get back in here, we're shippin' out!" I called through the windshield with a wide grin as I began manipulating the controls. Polly looked down at me
while the others began climbing back up toward the hull, briefly tapping the point of his red and silver leg on the top of his facial area in the imitation of a snap salute. As he
and the rest of the spiders scurried back into the ship's interior through their makeshift exits, several of them stayed on the outside of the hull and disassembled their
bodies into sheets of interconnecting blocks, molding themselves with the Corvette's hardened exterior and re-establishing its space/vacuum proof seal.
After quickly tuning the ship's controls, I made the Corsica cut away from the Docks, roughly taxiing us into a left curve on its forward thrusters before shutting them off.
For a short second we weightlessly glided backwards into the zero-gravity of space, passing out of the Presidium's atmosphere bubble until we had leveled ourselves
parallel with the Dock's platforms. Then, after another series of button taps and turns of holographic nobs, the Corvette's aft thrusters lit up bright blue and began
Bailey and Chellick burst through the large blast doors of the Citadel Defense Headquarters, shoving their way through security guards, tech-specialists, and other officers
on their way to the main control platform set up in the center of the room.
"What's the status of the situation at the Docks?" the Turian CO demanded from one of the people operating the ring of holographic consoles surrounding him. Before
anyone could answer, the two C-Sec officers charged up onto the command platform, coming to a jerking stop slightly out of breath in front of the bewildered CO.
"Have there been any unauthorized launches from the Military Docks recently?" Bailey asked him quickly. The CO frowned in stunned confusion and looked between the
two.
"Weren't you both down at the site of the conflict just a few minutes ago?"
"An Alliance Corvette commander! Did an Alliance Corvette launch from that area in the time it took us to get here?" Chellick interrupted with a cutting hand gesture.
"I haven't had time to worry about the comings and goings of Alliance equipment lieutenant, we are facing a bit of a crisis at the moment," the CO answered tersely,
sweeping his hand out to indicate the ordered chaos of moving bodies and background noise of reports and orders that were coming from the dozens of staff hustling
about the chamber. However an Asari operator sitting at one of the consoles next to the two Turians suddenly raised her hand, keeping her eyes keenly locked on her
screen as she gave her report.
"The early warning system detected an unauthorized launch from pier 1-39, an Alliance Corvette identified as the SSV Corsica somehow managed to rip itself free from its
docking arms."
"Where is this ship now?" the CO asked immediately after he, Chellick, and Bailey had moved up behind her.
"Our external cameras are getting a visual now. It's pulling away from the Presidium and increasing its speed to over 1000 kilometers an hour," she reported after