It's amazing the things that can go through a man's mind in the space between two heartbeats. As Morgan sat reviewing the list Paladin had made for him he caught site of it out of the corner of his eye. It was a plasma gun and the barrel was already such a brilliant blue he couldn't look at it. He had to warn those in the ship; and he had to hide; and he had to activate his armor.

"Attack!" He roared, diving behind the tool boxes. But too late. His body was in mid air with the ball of white hot plasma hit him.

On the bridge Morgan's warning came through dully, but the boom and blinding flash that bounced off the walls and lit up the bridge told Paladin and Willa all they needed to know: That was a PMGP.

Teagan winced and clapped her hands over her ears when the resounding boom of the PMGP reverberated through her cybernetically enhanced hearing.

"Now dhat I have your attention," they heard a heavily accented voice. It was barely audible from the bridge. "I vish too make you a proposition. I vant dhe boy called Lavence Bourne dhe dhird, son of dhe Senator Bourne. Give him to me and I vill let you amateurs continue to play hero for dhe tired old Senator."

Paladin pulled his twin G.P.'s as fast as he could, and dropped to the deck when he heard the explosion. Creeping his head back over the bottom edge of the canopy, he surveyed what he could see of the hangar, looking for their attacker, as he whispered to Willa.

"Bastard shot first and asked questions later. Hows your hand-to-hand fighting, babe?"

Pulling her stun rods from her belt, Willa quickly crawled next to Paladin and looked through the canopy as well. “I can hold my own against anyone, and don’t call me babe, sexy.”

OK. That hurt. Morgan thought as his head cleared. The pain on his chest helped focus his mind; he hated the smell of burning flesh; especially when it was his own. He really should have insisted on ...

Ekhart? That sorry f’n sack of scum. Morgan pulled himself around back to a metal container to get a good look at the man who had shot him. He thanked the universe for bringing this guy to him and saving him the trouble of hunting him down.

The bridge was nearly three stories above the hanger deck, and the ship had been nosed in. While that provided a spectacular pyrotechnic display from the PMGP shot, it did little to aid in intelligence gathering. Obviously, anybody shooting at them would be coming from the tarmac, and the tarmac was not visible from the bridge.

Paladin looked down at the stun rods in her hands, and then back up to her eyes. With a chuckle, and a green eyed wink he replied, "Aye-aye, Ma'am. Lets go teach this motherfucker a lesson in manners."

With a huge grin Willa replied, “I’ll try to leave some teeth in so he can answer my questions when we’re done with him.” With that she made her way to the door towards the cargo bay.

Paladin gave a grim nod, and followed her on the double.

"If we could get power to this puppy for even just a few minutes, those micro-lasers could certainly create some excitement," Jacob murmured, following along.

It took Teagan a few moments to recover from the shock of the attack, but when she did she was already calculating and trying to determine the best course of action. "Hostile on the premise, shot fired, Morgan possible casualty...may need medical attention. No power on ship. Power on ship!" Her streaming dialog stopped as an idea popped into her head and she began fumbling around the power plant station, looking for something to use as a diversion.

It wasn't more than a moment before her efforts turned up a starter cartridge. She gave it a quick once over before working to install it in the power plant. "Diversion in...5." 4...3...2...1... This time she was prepared for an explosion of sound.

Morgan took a moment to catch his breath. He needed a space or something to move against the armed man. Suddenly he found himself willing to take a bullet for Bourne -- if it meant pissing this guy off.

Peeking around the top edges of the ramp, Willa and Paladin saw four approaching -- well, at first glance three of them looked like workman. They were all wearing dirty wearing coveralls. The dude carrying the PMGP had it hung on a shoulder sling, and was wearing the requisite eye protection as well as the required back-pack sized power pack. So he, at least was rather obvious. But the other three would have passed as maintenance crew if they hadn't been toting laser pistols with cords running to belt packs. It was logical to assume they had kept them out of sight during their walk to the hanger.

Through the front of the coveralls, which were partially unbuttoned, they also noticed armor vests. The thin kind that functionaries often wear beneath business suits. It was certainly not battle armor, but did provide some protection against bullets.

"Come out, Come out," the center man of the three laser toting thugs called. It was the same voice, so he was apparently the leader. "Dhere is nodhing to gain by staying in your toy ship. If you do, I vill just have to begin my men using it for -- how do you say? -- `target practice'."

The chap had a point. Even those hand lasers had a chance of punching through the composite armor of the hull. And if they manged to get shots up into the ship through the open ramp, they would certainly burn into the computer systems that lined three sides of the ramp bay. The PMGP had almost no chance of penetrating the armored hull at all, but the electrical damage it could cause if fired into the ship wasn't really pleasant to ponder.

“What will you give us in return for him? We aren’t just going to hand him over. The man is worth quite a bit of money.” Willa shouted over the ramp. Under her breath she added, “Though probably not much else.” Turning to Paladin, “Can we take out all four of them by ourselves?”

Paladin shrugged. "Beats me, wont know till we try."

"Give you?" The leader cackled. "Give you? I give you your toy ship and your lives. Is that not enough for dhe son of dhe Senator Bourne? Perhaps you would prefer my men to have dhere target practice?"

“Sure, you can shoot our ship full of holes, but that doesn’t put Bourne in your hands. Nor does it bother us too much. We were already planning on selling him to the highest bidder once we got off this run down station. We want an offer we can’t refuse. Hell, I’m half tempted to shoot him already just to quiet his incessant whining.” Willa paused a moment. “You did want him alive, didn’t you?”

Stifling a laugh at the ridiculousness of the situation, Paladin chimed in, in his best "spoiled rich boy" voice, (which sounded a lot like Thurston Howell the Third) "You can-not bargain over me, My Daddy will have you sodomized on the steps of the Imperial Palace!"

Willa turned to Paladin with an incredulous look, and laughingly shook her head then mouthed, “What?” Then louder, “Oh-shut-up! You spoiled-rotten-brat!” She hit one of her rods against the side of the ship. “Oops. Shit, ummm… alive or dead?”

"Vait!"

Paladin shrugged as his eyebrows climbed up his forehead. Switching back to his normal voice he chimed in. "Stupid, to shoot first bargain second, and even dumber to shoot Lasers into a cargo hold that has 12k kilos of Hedrax-7 explosive compound."

The man raised an arm, halting the forward progression of his soldiers. "Does dhe Lawrence Bourne Dhe Dhird now breadh?" He asked.

A large grin spread across Willa’s face, but with great concern in her voice, she shouted, “Well….” After a moments pause she continued, “He draws breath still, but might need a doctor to continue doing so. Do you have one with you?”

Jacob was still recovering from the shock of the sudden attack. His brain finally caught up to the fact that Paladin and Willa were running a bluff and advised him to take cover and keep out of it if possible. He moved as quietly as possible through the cargo hold, scooping up a nice heavy wrench as he went. If they came on the ship, he could give one of them a nice headache.

"Yes yes." The reply came quickly. There was a note of urgency in their attacker's voice. "But not here. Quickly. Give him to me and I vill take him to one."

“Give him to you?! Now we are back to square one, and I have a dieing Bourne on my hands. I could care less if he comes out there on a stretcher or in a body bag, but he is staying here until we get a satisfactory offer.” Willa peaked over the ramp to see if the attackers were truly buying all of this.

Whatever else they were, they were apparently used to good order and discipline because they were holding their positions, ready to fire. And now that they knew for certain that everyone was holed up in the ship, that's where their weapons were trained. "Fine!" The leader said flatly. "I pay one million denarius in Imperial aurei. I have on my ship. Give me dhe Bourne, I give you dhe aureus."

Willa’s mouth fell open at the sum, she turned to Paladin with a raised eyebrow and shouted, “Hold on a moment. I must discuss your offer with my partners.” More quietly, “Holy shit! If he causes too much trouble we can always sell him, apparently. It looks like it may be time to charge them.” She put one of her rods away and pulled out her pistol waiting for his assent.

Nodding once, Paladin shouted, "Allright, it's a deal, we're bringing the putz out. Don't shoot!" He looked over at his co-conspirator and grinned, now if the distraction would catch them off guard, and Morgan was ready to go, and wasn't dead, they might actually pull it off.

"-- 2 -- 1... " The three flyers were familiar with starter carts. But it was one thing to hear and see them used for what they were designed for, it was something else entirely to observe what they did to someone in range of the exhaust -- and the sound.

"AND GO!" Teagan had both of her ears covered in preparation for the blast.

The port side engine suddenly roared. Orange flame shot out the nozzle. The edges of the "flower" caught the soldier holding the plasma rifle, knocking him down. Simultaneously his coveralls and his hair caught fire. The others had trouble holding their footing from the flower, then the tail fire bounced off the door and caught them from behind. One collapse completely, the leader and the one furthest away looked either dazed or startled. But the ship wasn't finished with them yet. As the power plant wound up the lights came on and that deafening scream every airman recognized in the marrow of her bones began, causing all four to cover their ears and howl in pain. Morgan covered his ears too. But buffered somewhat by the hull as he was, his hands were enough to prevent the skull pounding pain of the screeching engine.

"Watch the ship." Teagan reminded no one in particular as she stood powerless within her hold, unable to do anything at this point to help. There was no remorse or fear, only feelings of self preservation that extended beyond herself now, to include her ship and her new companions. As thoughts of her companions filtered through her conscience, she remembered Morgan and the possibility of casualty, and headed towards the cargo ramp.

Having flown these things before, Paladin knew what was coming, and moved far enough onto the ramp to kneel under the bottom hull of the ship. Leveling both his matched Gauss Pistols, he took aim at the thug #2 and laid down a covering fire for Willa.

Willa braced herself and jumped off the ramp yelling to Paladin as she left, “Don’t kill that bastard that did the talking, he is mine.” She ran full tilt towards the port side landing gear.

Paladin laughed as he pumped rounds downrange. "I'll let you know if he dies with a funny accent."

Something made contact and his target went airborne for a second, landing on his back. The leader looked around wide eyed. A second ago things were under control. Suddenly three of his men were down and an Athenian warrior was running toward him.

It didn't take calculus. He bolted for the door as the scream from the power plant began to die down. Aboard ship the lights were flickering. They'd soon go out again.

“Oh no you don’t!” Willa shouted, but probably wasn’t heard over the roar of the plant. She bolted after the leader determined to catch him and bring him back for questioning.

Taking only a brief moment to "blow the smoke" from his gun barrels, Paladin hopped off the ramp and took off in pursuit, at the double time.

Jacob was still recovering from the sudden ignition of the engines as Paladin and Willa gave chase to the leader. He knew he couldn't keep up with them, so, once he regained his footing, he headed towards the thugs. "Hey, Morgan. You OK?" he called as he walked towards them, intent on getting one or all of their lasers. He held the pipe he found, ready to use it if necessary. When he realized that two of the thugs were moving and armed, he looked around for the nearest cover. Although he wasn't a fighter, it didn't take much tactical knowledge to realize a laser gun trumped a club.

Teagan hurried down the cargo ramp and took a quick survey of the situation. Once she saw that Morgan was moving, she picked up the power chord and hurried with it to the front of the ship. She knew they couldn't go anywhere without fuel, but all of a sudden the urgency of diagnostics settled into her mind.

"Help me with this," Morgan grumbled to Jacob as he joined him at the tool boxes. They were on casters and Morgan was trying to unlock them. "We can use this as a shield to approach the bastards."

Meanwhile, rather than taking the time to stand up, the two prone soldiers were moving into prone firing position. One was leveling his pistol on Paladin, the other on Willa.

Slowing his pace, to take better aim, Paladin leveled both his Gauss Pistols at the one shooting at him. Ought to give them a chance to surrender. The thought flitted through the back of his mind like a streaking meteor, barely perceptible and off in the distance. When he saw that laser barrel leveling at his chest, though, he knew hesitation equaled death, so he opened fire once more.

All six rounds hit, his target jerking violently as each ballistic dart punched through the body armer to do it's damage. The soldier collapsed and Paladin had just a fraction of a second to see the blood start to saturate his uniform before catching the second soldier's target rotation. The look of rage on the soldier's face was nearly inhuman. Then Paladin's world went dark.

Unconcerned about the two men on the ground, Willa kept running after the leader, fully expecting Paladin to take care of them.

As Willa rounded the door she saw the leader 14 meters ahead of her, still running. But she was gaining and she knew it. Then he half turned and tossed something. Her mind responded automatically: grenade! and her body reacted instinctively. But even as the world vanished into a cloud of unbearable noise she knew there was no outrunning a concussion grenade. She landed 4 meters away and her head hurts like hell.

Morgan also knew exactly what that sound was. Frag grenades sounded different that concussion grenades. But as he was pondering that, Paladin fell.

Jacob frantically worked on the locks on the wheels. As he did so he cursed quietly under his breath. "How did I ever get myself into this?" Plasma cannons and grenades were way outside his comfort zone. "I was better off at the bar." The irony of Bourne, who was the cause of all of this, being off drinking while his companions were getting shot wasn't lost on Jacob and he made a mental note to punch the spoiled brat in the nose when he got the chance.

The violent bursts of the pistol fire, brought Teagan's body to a brief and immediate pause. The shock of it made a rare surge of adrenelin seep into her system as she watched their pilot fall to his knees and then sink lifeless to the ground. The slightest sensations of fear and dread tickled her lifeless mind and she tried desperately to seize a hold of it, to touch it and make it linger. Despite the unpleasantness of it, any feeling, however fleeting reminded her that she was truly alive.

She jumped off of the Cargo Ramp, midway to take cover on the opposite side from the thugs. As her mind was quickly shifting through probabilities of survival, critical levels, possible courses of actions and how critical her situation was. It was the downed pilot, Paladin, that sent off the most urgent of her internal alarms. Focussing within herself for a moment she connected with the Star Stations Announcement system, navigating flawlessy through the subsystem of the station's general control computer system, before she spoke. "Paging Dr. Leeda Paayt STAT. Return to your ship. South Bay. 236. Security Unit en route. Paging Dr. Leeda Paayt. STAT. Return to your ship. South Bay. 236. Security System en route."

It took what seemed like a few seconds for the program to seem to comprehend the security command, but eventually it seemed it got the point.

Willa’s hand wiped the fluid away from her nose, and she saw blood when she looked down at it. “Bastard.” she muttered, aimed her pistol at him and fired three shots.

The force of the ballistic darts nailed the guy to the wall for a brief second, then he slumped to the deck, unconscious. Blood began to saturate his armor and coveralls.

With a short hard laugh, Willa stood, grabbed her aching head and headed to the door. She raised her pistol, as she used the door as a shield and shot the remaining conscious enemy three times.

The tool box began to gain speed as Morgan and Jacob pushed it past the loading ramp under the ship. "At least she's all right," Morgan muttered to Jacob as they went. Just over the top of the tool box they could see the shooter that got Paladin get up and cautiously head for the door, his laser pistol trained on them with one hand, a grenade in the other.

But when he reached the door he found Willa on the other side. Reflexively he tried to shoot but Willa knocked the pistol aside and the laser bursts missed, harmlessly hitting the deck instead. Then she pumped three rounds into him at point blank range, relieving him of the grenade as he fell.

"Way to go!" Morgan shouted to Willa. Then, ignoring the fact that his own clothes were in shreds and his hair burned down to stubble from the PMGP blast, he headed for Paladin, letting the tool box roll to a stop on its own. "Can Teagan plug in the ship now, Jacob?"

Jacob stared at the carnage for a moment. This was the first gunfight he had ever been in and he wished he could believe it would be his last. Morgan's question registered and he looked over. "Yeah, I'm pretty sure I've got everything. I should be able to check out the rest in flight. Let me just get back inside to make sure I'm in position to step in if something goes wrong." Glancing at the fallen forms one last time he jogged up the ramp and back into the ship. When he reached the bridge he called to Teagan. "OK, Teagan, plug her in and lets see what happens.

Seeing that Morgan was checking on Paladin Willa turned back to the leader, pistol still trained on him, she felt for a pulse. “You better hope you are dead, you bastard. I on the other hand hope you’re alive.”

Fortunately -- or unfortunately -- he still has a pulse.

Willa returned her gun to it’s holster, then quickly relieved the man of his weapons. She lifted him to her shoulder and fireman carried him back to the hanger where she unceremoniously dropped him onto his back on the closest toolbox. She removed his jacket and surveyed the damage.

The level of equipment was substandard compared to what Willa was used to, but still, it was better than what she'd seen many pirates using: The laser pistol and power pack, another concussion grenade, combat knife, a first aid kit that seemed to have some extras in it. She didn't have time to take in inventory just now. And a small transceiver was in his ear. Probably to communicate with the other three, at least -- maybe even his ship if it was close enough.

"That's Colonel Verlag A. Ekhart," Morgan supplied, as he set Paladin down gently at the head of the cargo ramp while he waited for Teagan to power up the ship. "He runs the Gotteskrieger, a brigade size mercenary band mostly from New Home that doesn't believe in following the LOAC. Bullying, extortion, blackmail -- he does it all, and he's not real particular about who he works for or who he hurts in the name of his employer." He walked over and looked Ekhart over as Willa worked on him. The effects of the PMGP made Morgan smell as awful as he looked. "The Gotteskrieger is very good at masquerading as the VLC. Those boys would love to get their hands on this bastard."

It took Willa some time. The down side to gauss weapons was the internal damage they caused. But finally she managed to get Colonel Ekhart stabilized. He might even return to consciousness before Leeda started to work on him. Eventually though, he'd die if he didn't have surgery.

“Quite a winner we have here, huh? I’m glad he is out of commission.” After it looked like the bastard wasn’t going to die Willa turned her attention to Paladin, hoping he was in better shape.

Teagan walked over to Paladin's side and knelt down for a moment, cocking her head at the sight of his blood as it seeped slowly from the open wound on his shoulder. She searched within her, trying to find a shimmer of some exotic emotion as she watched the man bleed to death. She waited patiently, one hand on her lap and the other on the power cord to the ship, as she waited for the 'all clear' from Jacob. She looked up at Morgan, blinking her expressionless brown eyes, "Is he dead yet? ...or is he just broken?"

"Seriously broken," Morgan chuckled at their strange crew chief. "Lasers are good news and bad news. The good news is they cauterize the wound as they do damage. Not so much of a chance of bleeding to death. The bad news is most of them double tap: They fire two bursts almost simultaneously."

As Willa fixed up Paladin to the best of her ability she wondered allowed, “How are you holding up Morgan?”

---
LOAC= Law of Armed Conflict, aka Laws of War.
VLC= Vandenburg Legionnaires Cooperative. A highly respected MERC organization. Not so much a military outfit in and of itself as a "labor union" for command structures (also VLC members) that need troops. While there are many VLC outfits, all use the same rank structure, pay scales, and internal code of military justice.