16.2: Battle with the Corporates pt 2

"Starting evasive pattern C5," Oaty's voice said. Of course he would be at the helm as their chief pilot.

Even with the inertial dampers, Lus felt the ship take some mighty sharp turns.

"Missile remains locked on. Prepare for impact," Cewi-Bano warned.

"Impact expected," someone shouted in the hallway to notify those who weren't hooked up to the main comm band. Lus latched onto the nearest handhold as the other four crew members in the corridor did the same.

He held his breath, but eventually he and the others started to relax. No impact came.

"Unbelievable. It glanced off the side. Do you know how lucky that is?" Cewi said in a tone of awe. She suddenly remembered that she was on the general comm. "Missile clear. Resume positions."

Everyone let go of whatever they were using to stabilize themselves and then hurriedly returned to what they were doing before. Lus made it to the set of ladders that were clogged up with another half dozen people, and he was forced to wait several minutes before getting a chance to climb upwards. He was halfway to his goal when the ship shook, nearly knocking him loose.

"The blow was covered mainly by our shields, but we never saw it coming. The rear sensors must have been knocked out earlier," Yonnex-Quniwel voiced over the comm. "It's a miracle they had such poor aim, or else it could have knocked out our engines completely."

Lus touched his ear piece. "I'm on it, Becky. I'm already on Deck Six anyway."

"Thanks, Lus. I'm tied up with the shields after the first hit."

He released the ladder and dashed out into the hallway. Crawling through tubes was a lot less efficient, so the closer he could get in the main corridor, the better.

The fsylan network entrance closest to the rear sensor circuitry was right between two other doors and easy to miss in a hurry. Lus ended up having to double back since he passed it the first time. More voices were overlapping on the comms, including more calls for repairs that Lus couldn't worry about yet. A full sensor array was paramount for a battle, especially when dealing with multiple enemies as they now were.

After he turned his headlamp on, Lus slid into the tight tube and hastily wormed his way to the blinking board deep in the maze. It was already overdue for maintenance, so the extra stress the ship was being put through had blown a couple of fuses. Luckily those were easy to fix, and it took only a few minutes for Lusac to have the entire system back up and running.

"Rear sensors are repaired. It was just two blown fuses," Lus informed Yrqw who then relayed the update to the main comm.

"One of the rear turrets is jammed. Make that your next priority," Yrqw commanded him.

"Yes, sir." Lusac said with a grimace. The turret circuitry was up several levels, but going out of the tubes and using the corridors and ladders would waste a lot more time than maneuvering through the dark tunnels to the panels from where he was. Grunting from the effort due to his [4 Strength], Lus pulled himself up through the various sets of tubes until he was at the turret board.

What he saw was bad news. It would need a complete reset to clear the block, and if he didn't hurry, the entire thing might blow. Lus struggled to get the pack off his back, but once he did, he was quickly digging through the tools to find everything he would need for this kind of task.

"We have incoming fighters. They're coming up from the rear. We need that turret back now," Cewi-Bano commanded.

Lus fumbled the circuit closer and dropped it among the mess of wires along the wall.

"Suns blast me," he muttered as he began searching for it. They were going to die, and it was going to be his fault twice over.

A change of lights from the panel before him summoned his attention back.

"Huh? How?" he asked, but Cewi's voice cut him off.

"Just in time. Dasht, take that squadron down."

"Fighters eliminated," Zer-Dasht responded only a minute later.

The turrets came back online in time for some reason that had nothing to do with Lus. It was just another stroke of luck it seemed, one they desperately needed.

"Good job, Lus. The forward turrets are starting to overheat. Manually vent them," Yrqw said into the comm.

"Always the blasted turrets," Lus murmured as he started to make his way back through the tunnels to the other side of the ship. Once again, it seemed a waste of time to exit and go through the corridors, so instead he squirmed his way through the fsylan tubes, almost regretting his decision to pack his bag so full when it came time to slither around corners or up to the next set of tubes.

His headlamp was starting to seem a little dim, and he wondered if it was running out of charge. It'd been before the very first artifact mission to Satch that he charged it, so that was a very real possibility.

Eventually Lus arrived at the front weapons panel, but just as he started to wiggle out of his backpack, Yrqw's voice broke in.

"Change of plans, Lus. We need you at the forward cannons to reroute power to the engines. The plan is to outrun them," the Kremel explained.

"The Argo is no match for speed against the Corporate military," Lus pointed out.

"Well our odds of beating them in a firefight are far lower," Yrqw reminded him.

"On my way," Lusac sighed. A space battle was supposed to be exciting, but this one was turning out to be more chores than anything. Even their run in with the COPS two months ago had been more interesting than this, but that had also resulted in the ship nearly blowing apart, so he supposed he should be grateful this was less intense.

Lus had just pulled himself up to the level above where the access to the cannon's was when an explosion sounded from below him, rattling the entire tube and heating the floor beneath him.

"Lusac, come in. Are you alright?" Yrqw said.

"I'm alright, Yrqw. But I think we lost the front turret controls," Lus said as he attempted to hide from the smoke while avoiding burning his hands on the fiery metal surrounding him. He couldn't believe the coincidence of Yrqw pulling him from that section just before it blew. It seemed luck was on their side today.

"Get out of there. The fire suppression system is going to activate any second," Yrqw warned him.

"But we need that extra power if we're going to make it out." Lus gritted his teeth and sat up as much as he could to free his hands. He pulled the breathing apparatus from his belt and tightened it over his nose and mouth. Then he secured a set of goggles over his eyes. He didn't have much air in the tank, only ten or so minutes worth, but that should be enough to complete his task and still have time to exit the tubes.

Just as Yrqw predicted, the suppression system turned on and sucked out all the oxygen from that section of fsylan tubes, killing all the flames. It also released some coolant which eased the discomfort on Lus's body as he crawled back towards the cannon controls.

He reached the panel and, using the sertun, manually redirected the power away from the weapons. Lus then set that extra energy on course straight to the engines so Becky could harness it there. It took a little more time than he would have liked, but he knew that the entire crew would be lost without it. With only a few minutes of air remaining, Lus made a mad dash towards the nearest exit.