Alexander North

“Three, two, one, open!” Robert Ashton’s voice echoes into my ears through the terminal implanted behind them right as the airlock opens in front of us, the private having been put in charge of our ship's terminal during the op.

“Move out!” our captain shouts as he charges forward through the docking port towards the pirates’ spaceship with his sub machine gun in hand.

I quickly follow behind him with the other five, leaving Robert to close the airlock behind us and open the pirates’ own airlock via hacking. And as soon as it’s open, several of the pirates – each outfitted in some rather outdated armor compared to our mid-end cybernetic armor – almost immediately begin firing at us. However, none of the bullets manage to penetrate our armor, leaving me furrowing my brows at the annoying pinging sounds of them bouncing off of my helmet.

“Switch to stun rounds!” the captain – Andrew Hart – shouts while firing electrical stun shots at the closest pirate, knocking him out near instantly before the rest of us follow suit.

“Damn it, close the fucking airlock!” one of the pirates shouts while turned slightly backwards to look at the other pirates, just for him to take a stun bullet to the side of the head from my gun. He quickly collapses to the ground, and I find myself stepping around his unconscious body to shoot at another one that I had seen hiding around the corner, taking him out as well.

Several more shouts echo through the small ship that these pirates have been using to raid the lower-end companies on the planet down below, instantly making me jerk my gun towards them and fire.

Out of the corner of my eye, I notice one of the pirates sticking their heads out from behind a terminal and signaling to the other pirates. So I shoot them square in the head, knocking them out.

We continue going through their small ship until each and every pirate is taken care of. The captain then calls for sergeants Michael and Michelle Thomas – a pair of twin brother and sister who happened to be assigned to the same unit – to make sure we got all of them, only to turn back to me and shout, “Second lieutenant, check their systems! See if there’s any more pirate scum working along with this group!”

“Yes, captain!” I shout back while rushing over to the terminal, jumping into the seat in front of it, plugging in my own terminal implant, and hacking into it, just to not find any other pirates. I continue checking through the systems for a bit before unplugging my terminal from the system and turning my head back to the captain while shouting, “It looks like this is it, sir!”

He nods back to me right as the twins finish checking the rest of the ship for more pirates and gathering up all of the stunned ones.

“It looks like we got em all, sir!” Michael says from his place next to the tied up pirates.

Out of the corner of my eye, I notice one of the pirates – the leader if I remember correctly from the briefing – slowly sawing away at the bindings on his wrists with some sort of knife.

Huh. Still moving freely even after being hit with a stun round?

“Captain, the leader’s cutting himself loose,” I point him out to the captain, making him quickly sprint over to the man fast enough that I can only just barely see him thanks to his symbiont’s enhancements before punching him in the skull and sending the pirate flying into a wall, likely giving the man a concussion in the process.

The captain then glances over at the twins and says, “Next time make sure to search each of them more thoroughly before leaving their sides. Is that clear sergeants?”

Both of them hurriedly nod their heads with a "Yes, sir!" in affirmation.

Captain stares at them for a few seconds before walking back to the airlock while calling out, “Sergeant twins, Gabriel, and warrant officer Victoria, grab the pirates and bring them back to our ship. Second lieutenant, set the pirates’ ship to follow us on the way back to the base.”

We all shout our affirmatives before getting to work.

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Although my eyebrow twitches slightly as I hear what’s most likely private Gabriel Howard beating one of the pirates before dragging them over to the airlock.

“Gabriel, keep it in check unless you want to be put through extra training once we get back,” I hear warrant officer Victoria Mill say to the man, always the one to keep the big brute in line.

I lightly shake my head at the man’s anger issues and get to work programming the ship.

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After I’m done with the pirate’s ship and we’re all back on our own, I almost immediately take my helmet off and stretch my neck, letting my shoulder length brown hair fall out of it. I then turn to look at the others all taking their own helmets off now that the op has been finished.

The twins take their place standing outside of the prison hold area of the ship while sharing some quiet chatter and keeping an eye on the pirates held within. Michael and Michelle look extremely similar, which is par for the course for twins. Michael has short black hair and a mustache, with a relatively fit build, whereas his sister has long hair of the same shade with slightly sharper features.

I turn my attention to Victoria – whose hair is just as vibrant as always with that purple shade which I’m pretty sure is against military regulations – as she glares at Gabriel, who looks rather guilty as she scolds him for losing his self-control on the ship. Which looks rather odd considering the massive size difference between the two.

I let out a sigh before walking over to the bridge of our smallish patrol ship. Once I enter, I quickly find the captain sitting down in his captain’s chair with his chin held up by his fist and his elbow resting on the armrest of the chair as he sits there seemingly lost in thought.

Just like always, my eyes are automatically drawn towards the out-of-place pink ribbon tied to the back of his short black hair, but also just like always, I ignore it to instead ask Robert, “Did you have any trouble with hacking their ship’s airlock, private Ashton?”

The man turns to me from his place at one of the ship’s terminals, sending his ponytail flying in the process to hit said terminal’s screen as he says, “No, sir! Or at least not after the initial attempt. I did have some trouble at first, but nothing that caused a problem!”

Before I can respond to that, the captain snaps out of his thoughts and says, “Good! I’m glad to see that the second lieutenant’s hacking lessons aren’t a waste of his time after all.”

I purse my lips at that for what must be the umpteenth time with my helmet held to my side, underneath my arm as I walk over to my own chair and terminal. However, I don’t say anything.

The captain’s been against my training of the private in technical matters for a while now. Mostly because he thinks it’s a waste of my time when I could be spending it elsewhere, but also partially because I don’t think he likes the private that much.

I close my eyes and lie back in my chair for a few minutes to calm down from the op before letting out a deep breath and opening them right when Robert calls out, “ETA to the base in about eight minutes.”

“Good,” the captain says while leaning back in his chair with his arms crossed. “We could all use a break from the pirate hu-”

Out of nowhere, a chilling breeze makes its way through the ship and all of the ship’s sensors begin to go haywire.

The captain quickly rises to his feet and turns to Robert while asking, "What's going on?" But Robert just answers with a panicked, "I don't know! The sensors aren't working, sir!"

However, the answer to his question comes quickly, and rather abruptly as what looks like a large blizzard – and I mean really freaking large, like envelop-the-planet large – begins to descend from the sky.

“Well, that doesn’t look good,” Robert mutters, appearing slightly stunned by the situation now, to which I answer, “Don’t state the obvious,” and climb to my feet, only for all of the lights and systems within the ship to begin flickering on and off before eventually settling on staying offline.

“And this looks even worse,” he mutters again, making me send a glare his way, to which he avoids receiving in the eyes by looking outside.

I turn back to look out the window again, just to find the entirety of the window covered in frost and impossible to see through.

“Damn it, what the hell is going on here?!” the captain shouts again as the ship continues to plummet from the sky. He then turns to look at me and asks, “Is there anything we can do, second lieutenant?”

I focus on the terminal in front of me before grimacing and answering, “No, sir. It looks like something completely wiped out all the ship’s systems at once and without any warning.”

“Which means?” the captain says, making me turn back to him with a frown to see him clearly in a bad mood, and for good reason.

“It means that we need to prepare for a crash landing,” I answer while taking my seat and tightening my seat belt to keep me in place without injuring me. But when I turn my head to look for my helmet, I grimace as I find it having rolled far away from me in the ship's fall.

The man doesn’t waste even a single second, quickly rushing over to the door and yanking it open with his bare hands after finding the panel not working before shouting, “Prepare for a crash landing!”

I faintly hear the others’ swearing from the other room, but my attention is taken by the freezing snow and mist beginning to leak through into the ship somehow.

What the hell? This ship is sealed tightly enough for it to enter space, so how the hell is snow and mist getting in?

However, right after thinking that question, the ship hits something and I’m jerked forwards in my seat. And for just a moment, I think that I’ll be alright.

Only for the terminal in front of me to somehow get knocked off of the wall and smash into my face, making everything go dark.