Karega watched as more and more SS officers swarm the Astaroth’s upper decks, completely irreverent of the small gauss cannons meant for shooting down missiles. Just one could clear away the whole infestation. He only held off firing because of the two Union Cruiser vessels over head, their weapons trained on the Astaroth, ready to fire down on the unshielded ship if their guns so much as twitched.

They had been caught off guard by this, moving all the squads out across the station had left the ships crew exhausted and unfocused. Now they were sitting ducks.

Karega stared at the open message screen and internally prayed that Star would respond soon.

He had sent a short report informing her of the situation five minutes ago. And every second that passed without a response left Karega on pins and needles.

Then blessedly three little dots appeared.

The waiting bridge crew held their breaths as they waited for her response.

“Internal SS power play. Hanzo’s no longer chief. Fighting off SS. No casualties so far.”

Everyone assembled let out a slow breath at once.

“Orders?” Karega responded.

“Shawshank protocols.” She responded.

Karega’s eyebrows rose. “Are you sure?”

“Yes.” She responded quickly, she probably already had the reply typed and waiting.

Karega sighed, of all the stupid, convoluted, and unlikely contingency plans Star had come up with over the years this had to be the dumbest. She had the idea during one of the ship’s classic movie nights and he had protested including it in the manual.

A manual that included potential scenarios like body snatchers , the ship gaining sentience, and even the unlikely event that they passed through a wormhole into the Star Trek universe. The Shawshank protocol wasn’t the most bizarre, not by a long shot, but it was the dumbest.

But orders were orders. He flicked on the PA, transmitting his voice to the whole ship “Alright crew, if you’ll open your manual of obscure contingencies and turn to the protocol labeled ‘Shawshank’. I want everyone to memorize their respective roles within the next the minutes before we unseal the hatch and allow the SS in.”

He waited a minute before everyone had opened up their personal devices, or nearest digital terminal, and felt the collective groan rumble through the ship. It appeared that Karega wasn’t alone in his criticism of this plan.

~~~*~~~

Astarte smirked as she felt Karega’s loathing over the vast distance between there and the Astaroth. “Not so stupid now.” She muttered to herself.

“What was that?” Lucile grunted.

“Nothing.” Astarte said quickly.

“Did you initiate the Shawshank protocol?” Lucile asked.

“Yup, both ships are now preparing. Good thinking by the way, I wouldn’t have thought of this plan if you hadn’t brought it up.”

Lucile shook her head. “It was the only one of your dumb impractical scenarios that seemed the most likely. Seriously, we live in the real world, not some cheesy sci-fi.”

“The human race has had centuries to imagine every possible anomaly we could find in outer space, and I refuse to ignore the remote possibility of space weirdness.” Astarte shot back defensively.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“What are you two talking about?” Rachel screamed as another pulse blast hit the noodle shop where they were holing up in.

A marine shoved her back and let out a short barrage of return fire. Aster heard officers cursing.

“Banter.” Astarte called back. “Only way to stay sane in tight spot like this.”

A huge bang struck the walls and the noodle shop shook.

“Status update on our escape route?” Lucile roared back.

“Almost there, lot of station layers to cut through.” Metallika called from the rotary cutter.

The tripod mount laser device was something the Toy Man had whipped up for cutting through a ship’s hull up to a certain rating. The lower layers of wiring and piping on the station weren’t anywhere near as tough as the hardened alloy used by most ships, but it was deep. Nearly four meters of the stations guts sat between them and their escape plan.

They had fought a staggered retreat back to the noodle shop owned by the mother of Astarte’s half-sister, both of which were huddled up and crying in a corner as their whole lives burned around them.

She felt bad seeing the two in tears, but this wasn’t her fault. It was the Union who decided to abandon their own rules and fight dirty, unfortunately for them space Pirates were very good at playing dirty.

“Thermals?” Astarte called.

One marine from the Lucifer, a man with the emerald-colored scales of a variant human/lizard hybrid, responded. “Three minutesss.” He responded. His hands were a blur as he affixed the explosives to the noodle shops exterior.

“Saint Jett’s tits.” Metallika cursed. “Drop the stupid hissing sound George.”

The lizard man glared at the tattooed marine. “I’m a lizzzard man, thisss isss how we talk.” He shot back, laying on the hissing sounds for emphasis.

“You people are insane,” Hanzo shouted!

Astarte barked out a harsh laugh. “Danm right we are.”

Another thud shook the shop, Astarte peaked out and saw a line of officers advancing on the noodle shop with nearly transparent energy shields. “Times up!”

“One second,” Metallika said as turned the heat up on the hull cutter. The acrid sent of burning rubber wafted out of the hole, and then there was a change in the sounds coming from the hole. “We’re through!”

A rope was thrown over the edge and one by one Marines pulled away from their positions down the hole.

Astarte left her own spot and sent one last message to all the Hellworlder squads scattered across Unity station. ‘Light’em up’ she sent before throwing her phone on the ground and stomped on the screen before jumping down the hole.

An explosion followed her down as she fell through.

~~~*~~~

Admiral Tharadun watched the pirates ship from a distance. He had two knuckles on the ground while his other set of arms were crossed tightly. “Something’s not right.” He grumbled.

The figure to his right turned to face him. “And what would that be?” Councilmen Ozzath droned.

Tharadun watched the steady stream of Terrans being escorted out of their ship with deep set suspicion.

Tharadun hated the idea of helping someone as sleezy and untrustworthy as Ozzath. But the greater good came before Tharadun’s personal feelings.

“This is too easy.” He grumbled. “These cannot be the same pirates who fought tooth and nail against the Kruhur. Those pirates had been cunning and decisive, these opened their doors and gave up without a fight.”

Ozzath made a low buzzing noise Tharadun knew to be a contemplative hum. “I assure you these are the same pirates.”

“Oh” Tharadun said sarcastically, “how can you so sure? I’m still waiting for the concrete evidence you promised me. If I find out you conscripted my ships without irrefutable evidence-,”

“Calm yourself admiral. You’ll have your evidence. As or your suspicions… their leader was not on the ship, we arrested her separately while she was cavorting with the former chief of security. They are without their leader, and thus lacking the ‘cunning’ you seem to expect.”

Tharadun snorted at the obvious disdain in Ozzath’s voice. The councilmen obviously didn’t think much of the Deathworlders intelligence.

Tharadun returned to watching the procession of Terran’s leaving their ship. The last of them was escorted out by now less then six Carckic officer’s, a tall black furred male chained head to toe. It was then that he noticed something disturbing. “Why so few?” he asked.

“Hmm?” The Zxx’thi intoned.

“There’s too few of them, maybe only a hundred or two max. That’s not enough for a ship of this size.”

“I don’t think conventional standard of crew requirements apply to pirates Admiral.” Ozzath said dismissively.

Tharadun barred his fangs. “Pirates or not a ship this size needs command staff, engineers, gunnery crew, maintenance, cooks, doctors, and more. And they need enough to fill several different shifts to keep the ship running at all times. That puts the crew requirements at triple what we’re seeing, at the minimum. Where’s the rest?”

Ozzath finally picked up on Tharadun’s suspicions. “Are you implying that there are potentially hundreds of pirates running about unaccounted for?”

“Likely more, pirate vessels need large boarding teams to seize larger vessels.” Tharadun said grimly.

As if on que Ozzath received a message. And judging by his quickening pulse Tharadun guessed it wasn’t good.

“What is it?” Tharadun asked.

Ozzath let in a slow steading breath. “It seems you were right. The pirate captains, and the traitors, were rescued by a contingent of heavily armed Hellworlder’s. There was fire fight around a noodle shop, a noodle shop that just exploded, killing or wounding hundreds of officers. And on top of all that there are currently six confirmed raids in progress on station Security precincts around the station.”

Tharadun looked up from the pirate ship to the see above and around him. He couldn’t make out much more the streets and tram lines at this distance, but Tharadun imagined chaos happening all around the station. “Why” he asked?

“Chaos,” Ozzath said disdainfully. “It is what these Terrans thrive on.”

Tharadun had his doubts, but he didn’t voice them. “I want to have a look at that ship.”

Ozzath was taken aback by the sudden request “The pirate ship?”

“Yes, things still aren’t adding up. I want to have a look at their ship, try and get inside their minds.”

“I would recommend against trying to get into the mind of Hellworlders, only madness lies there.” Ozzath said snidely. “But do as you will.”

“Good,” Tharadun said as he rose to his full height. “And one more thing.” He said, his voice low and rough. “That word, Hellworlder, never use it in my presence again. It is unbecoming of someone of your stature to use such a slur.”

Ozzath met Tharadun’s eyes, or met them as best as he could with sideways facing eyes. “Unbecoming of my stature? I invented the term, Admiral. You will not lecture me on such things.”

Tharadun snorted. “Or what?” he challenged.

They held each the others gaze, and then the Councilmen broke the connection to stare back at the pirate ship. “Your dismissed admiral.”

Tharadun left without another word. Working with that pompous wind bag always left a bad taste in Tharadun’s, but despite their mutual enmity they were still working for the same side. It would not do to permanently sour their relations.

Even if he really wanted to.