It was warm, not too far from a hot refreshing shower, which was the one thing he really wanted. Oh, gods, it was oozy. His body trembled as he dropped to heave out the strawberry and other bites of food he stole earlier when preparing the sandwiches. They should be eating strawberries and wiping red whipped cream off their faces—not this. Oh, the poor person never got to try Polo’s food.

“Charyd!”

Captain!

Voices yelled at him, and he looked up from the dirty floor in time to see multiple guns pointed at him.

As if on a leash, he was yanked back by the collar and pulled further into the room. “Kill the crew. This is a Captain matter.”

Bob’s thick fingers smashed into the door shut button and it worked.

“Tony, leave the door open!” Charyd said, but the hiss of the doors finished as the last word left his lips. His horrified face was covered in dark red as he looked at his jagged reflection in the metal door panel. A long cold shower had to happen with lots of soap. This was why he hated fighting with guns. Ship guns were fine because you never saw the slimy bits in the distance.

Through the open window of the door, he saw shots fired and the loud banging sounds as they put new holes into the ship. The blue hologram of Tony cursed out there. They were trying to kill his crew!

His head snapped over to the side as a large fist from Bob nailed him. “That’s for sleeping with them!”

His ear rang with the impact as he was balancing against the cool wall. Charyd had no clue what Bob was talking about, but whatever, it was the stupidest thing to kill a crew for. The ground thumped as the large man stepped toward him. Charyd slid sideways against the wall to avoid getting punched in time. The fist that was meant for him created a crater in the wall. Quickly, he spun around and threw his own punch at Bob. They each had their own fighting style. Bob was fighting out of rage and aiming for the face. Charyd hated blood and wanted it to end fast. He lowered his centre of gravity, put his fists up, hardening both into bricks and stared at the back of his head. Scratches covered Bob's lighthouse of a head from when Charyd clawed the cobalt crown off, two red lines crossed perfectly to mark X.

Left, then right above it to account for the head size, he plummeted into Bob’s skull. Headshots were cheap, but an order went out to kill his crew—again—and Charyd was ready to break diamonds to save them. Even with his fists dense with bones, muscle, and calloused, thick skin, it hurt to punch the guy’s skull. It hurt as much as that time when he lost a finger in the intro to woodworking class, that widdle knife was way too sharp. Bob stumbled down, and there was no blood, the brick punches did the job again. Charyd opened the Exec suit jacket, finding the empty gun holster. At least one Exec had the common courtesy to not shoot at his crew. Charyd lifted both pant legs to find a knife.

He ran to the door, banging on it. “Tony, open it!”

Tony was taking too long, and he spammed clicked the button, hitting it at least seven times a second. The door opened and quickly closed before he could do anything. He clicked it at least a few more times, the ugly sound of hot incarnating shots flying past the window view with the light blue ones shooting the opposite way to stun them. The ship sounded like a hot oil pan sizzling and popping with all the fighting. They were thinning out, and again Charyd was not there to save his crew because a stupid door would not decide if it wanted to open! He smashed the button one more time just as Tony showed up right outside the door in hologram form, but wearing a helmet with a mouth guard, his mouth moved to form the word “Stop!” and it echoed through the room.

Finally, the door to the sleeping room of one Exec Pirate Bob opened up. Charyd decided against entering the crossfire and instead pulled out the tiny pocket mirror he had. He angled it to the Exec crew first. Three of them were stunned on the ground, and the rest were taking shots—oh fuck. He yanked the tiny mirror back as a gun stuck out and took a shot at his mirror. These pirates were seriously stupid, that could have been their own captain; not that many people carried pocket mirrors these days. Charyd always wanted to look his best. He was about to look a whole lot worse to get out of this situation.

One conscious-looking Bob with smooth, unscratched, and no bruising bumps forming on his head, stuffed into a military uniform with the appendages bursting out like—like a very large humanoid species fighting into a too small of a uniform—Charyd did not want to think about food right now. He shrunk down a bit to take off his shirt, closed his eyes, and used it to rub off the tacky feel. Then he launched it into the corner before opening his eyes. Another trade of shots went off in the hallway by the time he was rolling Bob around to get his arms out of the purple coat before adjusting his size to be a close enough replica. This jacket had three buttonholes, but only two buttons, as if someone cut off one to remain close to the fashion times.

Captain, are you alright?

Yes. You’re about to see Bob. Shoot and miss, please.

He waited for a single breath for the message to be relayed and then he dived out, knife tucked under his sleeve as he made his way to the Execs. One pointed the gun at Charyd, debating, before waving him into the sleeping room that Alice had originally claimed a few weeks ago. His own crew took shots near him, the zing static sound flying past his head at a very wide berth. They could have made it a bit more believable, as even one shot hit the Darkstorm, another smacking the Exec in the face. Four down, the field was now in their favour, time to drop it by another one before they noticed the mismatched outfit.

Standing with the purple squad to get a better advantage on the field revealed how poorly he thought this through. He was now soloing off three gunmen with his knife that felt as large as a paring knife. “What should we do, sir?”

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They were looking at him with their ball caps waiting for orders. “Keep moving forward with the plan! Those buffoons in white armour have better aim than you. Get out and there and shoot!”

It was a bit much to rally up the enemy, but saying purposely miss would have been a quick test of their point-blank gun skills.

What’s your plan in there? Praise Alice for always being alert and wanting to be knowledgeable.

I don’t have a gun. I’m going to order them to get out and shoot, I’ll -

The Shicor skin took on an angry red shade of purple, and he aimed at Charyd’s crotch. “Military deep sea blue pants aren’t Bob’s colours.”

Help. His despair bounced back from Alice.

Fuck. She did not need to see him to know the life-ending dread he had.

Charyd ducked low and drew the knife out of his pocket. At the same time, a light blue hologram appeared dressed in armour that was from a documentary with a helmet visor, broad breastplate, and pauldrons raised up a longsword—or was it an estoc—swung down on the Shicor Exec pirate. The instincts of the Shicor kicked in as they jumped to the side to avoid getting hit. The rest of his crew flinched at the sudden appearance of the sword attacking their friend.

It was enough time for Charyd to continue with his attack and use the pommel on the back of the head of his enemy. His current body was sluggish, he wanted something faster to handle the two armed opponents, especially when his only ally in the room was a ghost. Shots went off in the hallway, and the hologram cursed and raised its visor. Tony’s shaved face was on the other side. “When I break this firewall, I’m going to make it rain on you, Squilla!”

The AI had distracting flair. A bullet ripped through the hologram, doing nothing beyond putting another popping sound hole in the wall, shattering the pipe on the other side, and spraying all of them with cool, refreshing water. Not taking a second to enjoy it, Charyd put his head down and rammed into the other Exec. He knocked the air out of the woman as she hit the wall behind her. Charyd yanked the gun from her hand, his wet fingers fumbling about as he found the stun setting and shot her. The water caused a bit of the electric bolt to backfire and sent a tingling sensation all the way up to his elbow.

He turned around to see two more guns pointed at him. Squilla's and Posey’s, while a military officer charged at him. A moment later revealed they were after the Gorgon behind him, her snakes hissing and very annoyed about getting wet. The Gorgon flung the gun down, but Saar did not stop as he struck at the threat. The shooting from the hall stopped as a resounding beep went through the room. Tony raised his sword up in the air. “We’ve saved the ship!”

Posey grumbled about something before raising her voice. “We need to contain all these pirates.”

"There are more down the hall-"

“They had a visit from meeee." Tony interrupted, "Version 0.2010 in a black turtleneck, slacks, and glasses with a whip made of cables.” He blathered. “Between the rest of your crew and my dashing looks, they were stopped effectively. You got version 0.1540 design. Would you like to see more?”

“Another time, when our lives aren’t at risk.”

The water in the room turned off as Squilla punched away at a tablet. The lights in the room flickered slightly, leaving just a stage light on the smartest coder Charyd ever knew. “Darkstorm wouldn’t look like Swiss cheese if someone had not put me into a box!” Tony accused. A second later, he vanished.

Squilla smiled, their antenna applauding above her head. “I put it back.”

Charyd nodded to acknowledge their words, but he did not like the idea of that AI locked away. It was only an AI, a program that got a bit rude with him and his pirates whenever they were moving slowly. He had used it to get his crew out of the prison and planet PT-0237. “Did you program it to help us?”

“Nah, it has a ton of diorama and distraction programs. Even a cat-out-of-the-bag-one, but like a lot of them, I haven’t figured everything out.”

“When you get there, let me know.”

Saar made the Gorgon Exec pirate haul one of her crew members out while he nabbed the orange hat. Posey was putting an arm around the other Shicor, mumbling in his ear, probably something along the lines of how they should have picked the great and glorious life of the military. This day went wrong all because he asked a military official to investigate their case, if she had been in her room when Bob showed up, no one would have died. Charyd just wanted their names cleared so they could go back home. Like always, he would have to fix the Cadoon's fuck up. One could never depend on the government for anything but pointless paperwork.

Alice came running down the hall, her eyes on Saar and Posey behind them. Posey passed the unconscious Exec pirate to her subordinate to carry. Charyd was not the number one fan of the human, but the guy came over to help. He swallowed his pride, hoping they could start on a better foot. “Thanks for helping, Saar.”

The man said nothing as he strolled out, walking with everyone to the entrance of the Darkstorm. There was no need to thank Posey.

Charyd leaned against the wall to stay out of the way as the Execs were gathered up and moved out. Alice joined him, scowling at each pirate, probably passing a message to each or at least making them feel bad. The damage to the ship was not minor, there were quite a few holes lining the hallway, and even a light had been shot, it sparked occasionally. Squilla was standing off to the side, looking up at it while poking away at the docupad in hand. The light stopped popping after a moment and her antennas clapped together. “We’re going to need some supplies to fix the ship.”

“Can we fly for now?” Charyd asked.

“Yes, but we are a bit leaky now. The sooner we fix up, the better before it gets worse.” They did not look away from the pad and started walking toward the Lighting Strike equipment.

That was good enough for Charyd. It was something they can deal with later when the ship was not full of people trying to kill them. “Alice, what do you suggest we do with the Execs?”

Her eyes glared at Bob and his suede shoes that dragged across the floor, leaving the occasional scuff mark as Polo moved them. “We can’t have them coming after us again.”

Posey put her hands on her hips, “I say turn them in, but you're also wanted and would be grabbed. Have Tony program their shuttle to land on the moon. They won’t ditch ten–err nine of their crew, especially their leader.” Her eyes darted to the doorway where she shot the pirate. Charyd’s swirled, remembering the sensation. He really wanted a shower.

“You sure they won’t be able to override it?”

“If you give Tony free rein, we can be in another galaxy by the time the program ends—they won’t hack it.”

Squilla let out a chittering sound. “I rather not let the program have access to a shuttle. How do we know it won’t send a message to the Cadoon’s about our location?”

Posey stood to attention, hand over her heart, “I’ll tell you how if you can get that stealth technology off the Exec’s ship.”