UER Rickenbacker

The Rickenbacker is a massive rebel starship capable of mining planets the size of Jupiter in under two years. It has a crew compliment of 1435 people and has been sent to the Aura System for mining purposes.

Diego sighed. His work schedule had just come in from the bridge, and that usually meant more hard work. He rose up from his bunk and turned off the light. He then grabbed his security gear and body armor and opened the door to his room. He emerged into the recreational deck of the Rickenbacker, several others already up and about in the main hall.

After heading down the stairs and through the bulkhead to the athletics sector, his comm went off, and he answered it.
"Sergeant Diego, if you'd please report to the bridge immediately" said a female voice through the comm. Diego sighed and made his way to the main elevator. Something told him this would be a long day.

On the bridge, Diego immediately reported to Captain Clarke, who was viewing the nearby planet through the bridge window.
"Sir. What seems to be the issue?" Diego asked. The captain turned around and examined him closely. He then said "We send down shuttles to that planet in three hours sergeant. if you'd kindly get your team suited up for the trip"
Diego was surprised. "But sir, why are we taking such an interest in this planet? I thought our mission was to find the asteroid fields"
"Orders from Earth. We are to survey this planet for any signs of life. I thought the same as you when they told me, but I don't ask questions. So we're going. Tomorrow we continue course to Amarr. Wanna get your team ready or let 'em go down unarmed?" the captain explained, scratching his head. Diego shrugged and said "Yes sir. Sorry sir" Taking another look at the planet through the bulletproof glass, he exited himself from the atrium and got on the grav lift and headed down to the shuttle bay where his team were waiting for their orders. He walked up the walkway and explained "Morning guys. I know this is a bit sudden but, and this wasn't the captain's idea, you guys are headin' down to the planet. I expect ya to be suited up and armed for the trip. Godknows what's down there"
"Sir, are we gonna get real weapons, or pea shooters?" one recruit asked.
"You're gonna get what you goddamned need buddy" Diego replied.

Diego was tired of waiting. He was waiting in the Medical Lab for his report, and had taken the time to call the captain while he was at it.
"Captain *sigh* ...what's the status of the mission..." he said into his comm.
"Don't panic sergeant. It's only been an hour They'll come back. I know..." the captain said, doubt in his voice.

Later, Diego was back in his quarters in recreational, surveying the planet report. The ship had noticed a lot of instability with the area, and were anxious to get the crew off the planet and back on the ship soon. Suddenly, he got a call.
"Sergeant, it's Malick. Want me to run a few more phases with Cannon #4?" the voice said. Diego scratched his head.
"What seems to be the problem with it?" he asked Malick.
"Some of the shells are getting stuck in the barrel of the cannon. We're afraid it could blow. I called engineering but they're busy keeping the engines stable. Who knows what could happen?" Malick replied, testing the cannon to see if it worked properly.

"Captain!" a bridge operator said, staring into his screen. The captain turned his head and said "What is it?"
"One of the shuttles has taken off early" the operator said.
"Only one? What about the others?"
"They stayed on the planet. Sir..." he tried to say. The captain turned on one of the comms gears and said "Shuttle Four, this is the captain. What happened to the other shuttles? Answer me!"

Meanwhile, in Medical, Diego was examining some of the experiments that were being kept in the lab. Most of them were monkeys used for experiments. There were also a few worm-like creatures in the far right ones. The worms had been found on a planet in the Centurai System. This made Diego uneasy, but he was relieved knowing they'd unload them when they got back to Earth.

The rebel, or Kirito that would be, turned her head around at the speaker as someone suddenly conntacted the shuttle through the radio. She then reduced the speed, just in time to see the UER Rickenbacker appear over the horizon of the Burning planet. Perfect.

She hawked a little as she cleared her throat, and her mind flipped through several different voices, tested some of them out, and then finally found the man's voice. She cleared her throat again and leaned over at the radio and turned it on.
"This is Shuttle Four here. There were some unexpected obstacles. I'm afraid that we have lost the rest. Requesting permission to dock." She said and transmitted, clicked off the radio and waited for the reply.

Next to her, Kronos grunted. He wasn't pleased with this farce. Why couldn't they just kill them? Kirito gave him a cold look. Despite she did no longer have her amber-coloured eyes, it was still enough to give him chills down his spine.

"Shuttle Four, permission to dock granted. Welcome back" the operator said through the console. Just then, he got an incoming message from the outskirts of the system.
"This is the Von Braun. We've finished our sweep of the surrounding areas. All clear" a marine on the monitor said, two marines behind him.

In the Medical Lab, Diego was talking to Malick about the cannons.
"So you said the cannons got stuck?" Diego asked.
"No, I said the shells jammed and wouldn't fire. One of these days, a shell's gonna get caught up bad and blow" Malick replied, sighing as he did.

She drew a weak smile. Success...
She also heard Kronos giving a light chuckle next to her, but they were yet not through.

Kirito increased the speed of the shuttle as she noticed how the big starship opened one of its hatches, revealing an lighted interior. She grined, longing for what was waiting. The kill before had just been a foretaste for this.

Kronos grunted, and he sensed how all of his muscles was on tenterhooks. A short hiss from Kirito forced him to relax a little, but he didn't want to.

"We can't afford to make any mistakes... Don't get killed or any seriously wounded, or Narrah will finish you." She then snorted. "I shouldn't brought you with me in the beginning."
A furious snarl sounded from Kronos. He did not like the idea.
"Be without me, and you won't be able to take the whole ship on your own. I'm The Beast. Of all my siblings, I'm the strongest one." He replied.
Kirito chuckled. "Please..." She said with sarcasm. Kronos turned around and stared furious at her. Kirito returned his gaze with a cold, deadly look.
"Now be quiet..." She finally said after they had exhanged a long stare.
And so he was...

The hatch grew as they closed in, and before they knew it they were in.

As the shuttle landed in shuttle bay two, two security officers stepped towards it, a maintenance worker staring from the high window. The shuttle door remained closed until the guards stopped and opened the door.

The shuttle was empty. Or that was what it looked like. The light were off and the interior pitch black. For a human, it would be impossible to see through. The two security officers exhanged questioning looks before they agreed to enter. One of the guards bordered the shuttle and went farther inside while the other one stayed outside to watch.
The guard never came out.
The Beast's long, slimy tongue wrapped itself around the rebel's leg and pulled him up to his mouth, so fast that he never managed to scream. The only thing that sounded was the loud crack as The Beast munched him down whole. Kirito snorted frustrated, he was moving on to quick. And in that thought, she heard the other guard outside, calling for the eaten rebel. She glared briefly at The Beast but then had to look back as she heard the guard call out a second time. She made a hissing sigh, and felt how she morphed back into her real appearance. It felt so nice. She stretched her limbs a little and then waved with her finger at The Beast, telling him to stay.
She flexed her neck one last time before walked out and entered the interior of the mining ship.
"Hello." She said curtly to the guard now in front of her.

The guard, surprised and confused, gave Kirito a surprised look and raised his weapon.
"What the hell..." he said.

At the bridge, Diego got a sudden communication from the lower bay. Answering it, he saw the guard on the screen. He said "Sir, I don't know what you make of this...but...wait..what are you...*KKSSHHKKK!!!!*" before the comm started producing static then switched off. Diego scratched his head and said to two other officers "Bay Two, now!"

She didn't have much time to spend on every person here in the ship. Instead, she appeared behind the surprised guard and with a quick pull by her arms, she twisted his head 180 degrees, more or less crushing it, before she dropped the body on the ground.
But then she noticed something disturbing in the corner across the huge room. A camera. She pulled up her arm and blast the camera to splinters without hesitating. With a shrill signal she summoned The Beast, who exploded out of the door and uttered a defeaning bellow.

Without hesitation, The Beast lept down from the bridge, down a level and landed with a crash on a rebel who were running below. Once again The Beast roared, unearthly. Mighty. Alien. And this time the sound was so powerfull that it stunned everyone in his surroundings. Except the cyborg, of course.

Kirito armed herself with her claws as she looked down at the bay floor. Rebels were hurrying at every kind of direction, so they could later regroup and counterattack. But mainly they were fleeing from the maulers who had entered the ship.
The cyborg leapt down from the bridge too, landed lightly on The Beast and then disappeared.
Just after a moment, she once again re-appeared at a younger rebel, which she simply sliced the head off.

Diego was pacing the engine core, waiting for Malick to finish up with his report, when a maintenance worker ran past him. He stopped him and asked "Woah, woah woah...what's the matter with you?"
"We're being attacked!" the person said, before running on in the direction of the coolant vats. Diego turned on his comm and radioed the bridge. The person who responded was the captain.
"Captain, I would love to know what the hell is going on" Diego said.
"Damn fiends entered the ship using our shuttles. They're running rampant in the shuttle bays. We've sealed off access to the bridge and officer's quarters, and anyone else is running scared" the captain explained. Diego could hardly believe it. He sighed and turned off the comm. Just then, Malick run up to him.
"Han, we got a big, big problem here..." he said.
"I know. You're late and we're being screwed over. What else is new?" Diego said, looking in all directions. The engineering crew were still doing their jobs, keeping the sector online.

Kirito grabbed a fleeing human in his neck and flung him into the wall across the room. He hit it hard, almost harder than she originally had thrown, and he was dead by the impact. She turned around just in time to see The Beast crush another human under one of his giant paws. But she soon got busy on her own again, as she saw three other rebels run away to the closing gates. But before they would even reach a second step, they were all sliced open by the invisible cyborg. When she was done, she was about to run up to the door and press it open, but it closed with a loud slam just before she arrived.
Sh*t.

The Beast snapped up the last human in Bay Two and swallowed him down easily.
"Don't stand there and do nothing. Open this door so I can continue!" He suddenly heard Kirito yell. The Beast looked up and noticed that Kirito stood by a closed, armored gate. He chuckled, and with some gracile leaps he arrived to her.
What's the matter...? To weak...? He said with a light chuckle.

Not being really able to controll herself, Kirito pierced one of her claws hands into The Beast's paw. He shrieked surprised, but when she pulled the weapons out again, she saw how the wounds already healed.
"Just. Do it." She said with a murdering hiss. She couldn't let anyone escape the claws of Narrah. The Beast snorted mad but then began to slam his enormous paws into the armored gate. But after banging the door repeatedly, and with a shot from Kirito, the gate yielded and exploded into splinters.
Kirito once again disappeared, with The Beast after herself, to find new victims.

And not until a few seconds, she found one. A female. A younger, rebellian girl who sat huddling in a corner. But Kirito easily found it, and without hesitating, teared her head off.

Diego pushed past the crowds and once again entered the Medical Deck via elevator. There were doctors and scientists all over the place. Two marines were guarding the elevator. Malick rushed into the expermimental lab and checked. The worm-like creatures were still in their tubes. The monkeys were rattling about in their cages. Something had made them go nuts, and the whole deck was growing in concern.

Meanwhile, on the bridge, the comms operator looked up and said "Captain? What are our orders?"
"Sit tight. Quiet. Call the Von Braun. Now." the captain said. The operator tried, but the comms system was offline for some reason.
"What the hell?! The whole comms system is offline!" he said in surprise. The captain wiped the sweat off his forehead and stared through the window into space. The Von Braun was too far away to know that there was anything going on.

Suddenly, the ship's AI, Xerxes came into focus and said "Primary Communications Array offline. Please contact a repair specialist" The captain sighed and stared at the security monitors.

The Beast slammed through another gate and stopped for a moment. His huge turned around as he inspected the room before he uttered a dreadful snarl. Kirito was away on the deck below, clearing them up. The Beast, on the other hand, was making their way up to the commando central. It was probably farthest up. And they weren't even half-way there.
He snarled once again, but then fell silent as his snake-like tounge flicked out and tasted the air. He sensed them here too, humans. So lot of them.
He roared and pressed himself through the door, making it to open even more just to get his immense body through. He snorted and tasted the air once again, then began to slowly wander. Occasionally he stopped to smell and hear, but then started again.
Suddenly he froze. His large ears turned up and listened. He heard them. Shivers.
And in the next second he turned around and teared a machine out of his way and then grabbed the rebel who hid behind it, flinging it to the wall on the other side of the room.
Once again he bellowed, but suddenly froze as he heard footsteps. With another roar he turned around, but fell silent as he saw how the cyborg now stand in front of him.
"Come on now..." She hissed and disappeared off.

"Status report" the captain ordered. The others on the bridge were busier than ever.
"We've lost half the shuttle bay. Those things are tryin' to kill us all..." one said. The captain coughed, then said "Where's Chief Anders?"
"In operations, trying to keep the people there under control" one person said.

In operations, Security Chief Anders and her men were trying to keep a shipwide panic from breaking out. It didn't seem to be fully working.
"Boss, we got a friggin' crowd of 'em. They're demanding we let them out of this deck" her lieutenant said. She sighed. She couldn't believe what was happening.
"Lockdown the command deck. If the bridge held out, they're trapped" he told her men.

Then, the whole command deck plunged into lockdown. All main doors and bulkheads to the deck were sealed off and the security droids in the area were brought online. An alarm signalled all over the deck. The captain wondered if the two assailants would reach the bridge.

Another door blew open. She had a hurry to reach the Command deck, just so she could lock the humans in this place.
The opening after the door revealed a long bridge that led to another large gate. Probably to the next deck.

The Beast lept forward and slammed headfirst into the door. The sound was defeaning, but the gate did not yield yet. Kirito snorted and pushed aside The Beast, who growled angry. But Kirito ignored the sound and instead aimed at the gate with her weaponed hand. In the next moment, a dazzling lightning bolt were fired from her and into the door. It exploded. But did not break. Though, this time Kirito only needed to direct one hit against it for it to crack and collaps. She appeared from the flying dust and looked around, studied her surroundings. Yes... This was a new deck. It was filled with laboratory instruments and farming tools. It seemed to be the Hydroponics Sector.
She quickly scanned off the room, but she didn't seem to find any rebels. Perhaps they had already reached the Bridge.

Hydroponics looked deserted to the two assailants. But the maint droids were still online and were patrolling the sector. The AI Xerxes suddenly blurted "This is Xerxes. The Hydroponics deck had been compromised. Evacuate Hydroponics immediately"

At the other end of the Hydroponics sector, one of Anders' men was hiding four survivors in the D-Wing. He turned on his comm and called her.
"Anders here, what is it?" the voice in the comm said.
"Chief, it's Ramirez. I have four Hydroponics scientists here with me, but we're trapped in D-Sector and the intruders are at the bulkhead. The elevator is the only way out of Hydroponics, right?" he replied.
"Yeah. Think ya can get there?" Anders asked.
"Doubt it..." Ramirez said.

As Kirito stepped forward, a rebel fired a shot from behind a plant. The shot missed and instead smashed into one of the freezers in the next room. He dropped the pistol and ran for it.

Kirito swiftly turned around and hissed menacing. She quickly noticed the movements of the rebel farhter ahead, his heatprint was registered and the distance was measured. In an instant.
She crouched down as her claws shoot out and burst after the rebellian.

But she wanted to play a little, and instead of taking the human down immediately so was she slowing herself down, letting the human make a run for it. But just before it reached the elevator she grabbed ahold of his shoulder and ripped him outta the way. The rebel landed on the ground a couple of meter away from her, and rolled right into a cylinder.
He screamed in pain as it was crushed and as the glass fragments rained down on him. As he was busy twisting himself in pain, Kirito walked up to the rebel and raised her foot, just to slam it down at the man's head. Crushing it.

The Beast snorted a little as he heard the sickening crack of the destroyed head and instead looked straight forward. His long tongue flicked out of his mouth and then back, tasting the air a little.
Blood. That was how the air tasted.

As Kirito and The Beast moved on, something in the broken freezer moved. Inside the freezer, science personnel had been keeping some of the worm creatures they found in cold storage. There were several. One of them twitched.

Back on Medical, Malick was pacing back and forth, a female medical officer watching him with concerned eyes.
"Malick, look. I don't see what pacing up and down the corridor is gonna do about this..." she said to him. Malick stopped and looked at her.
"I...I'm just waiting for Diego to finish down in engineering. He said he was gonna help the guys down there keep the engines stable. Godknows what those freaks could try" he explained to her in a nervous voice. The woman sighed.
"Are the specimens secure?" she asked him.
"The worms? They're fine. The monkeys? Going bananas!" he said, staring at the ceiling. A scientist entered the corridor and said to them "They reached Hydroponics. One of Anders' men is down there with several survivors. They won't last long if..." he stopped there, shaking his head in frustration.

Meanwhile. on reacreation, Anders had got a crowd of concerned people into the main lobby of the sector. She was giving them the protocols of the situation.
"Two ship sectors have fallen to these assailants, but don't panic yet. They haven't taken us all out"
"But what are we supposed to do if they..." someone started before being interrupted.
"They won't. I promise" Anders replied sternly.

Kirito suddenly froze. She cocked her head and listened hard. Voices... She heard voices...
"There are someone down here..." She hissed to The Beast. He stopped to and listening.
There are voices... He heard him say. Kirito snorted back in confirmation.
"I want them..." She hissed after a moment of silence. The Beast grunted.
"I want them..." She said once again. The Beast glared down at the cyborg.
"Come..." Then the cyborg began to move again. The Beast snarled but began to move too, now quiet, stalking. Carefully putting his paws on the ground as he moved.

Low, almost unhearable, clicking noices began to sound from the cyborg as her built-in radar began to track after the human on this level. She sensed how she was moving closer and closer, as the sound of the humans' breathing and voices increased in her ears.

Ramirez frantically looked around for a way out of the room they were in. Then he spotted it. A vent. He looked back. The footsteps were getting closer. Quickly he helped each person into the vent. He then threw a weapon to one of them and sealed the vent. One person looked back.
"But what about you?" she asked in a worried voice.
"Just go! Don't worry about me!" Ramirez replied, before running off, weapon in hand. The woman wanted to follow him, but just kept on going to catch up with the others.

Meanwhile, the worm was shaking and hauling itself out of the freezer. The rest of the worms were still frozen, but this one just slithered across the floor and dropped through a gap in the floor. It then squirmed off.

Down in engineering, Diego was checking the whole area for signs of the intruders, but so far, they were still in Hyrdoponics. Diego knew Hyrdoponics was a large area, for keeping plants, and also the ship's source of food and oxygen. He then made his way to the main elevator and tried the Command Deck one, but it just said "Access Denied by Xerxes level security" Diego left the elevator and proceeded into the next area. It was a maze of corridors with radiation pipes streaming along the ceiling. At the end of this series of corridors, he found an office, which lead to someone's quarters, and a hatch which led back up to Medical. So at least Diego knew the layout of the engineering deck.

Kirito snorted as she heard the decreasing amount of breaths and footsteps. They seemed to be escaping. But she continued on, as she heard one last couple of footsteps and a last pair of breathing lungs. Someone was still left here, and she wanted to atleast take that one out before she would continue up the levels.
She gestured to The Beast to stay, which he did with dismay, grunting irritating as she left. Kirito glared at The Beast before she left, just to check that he would stay. He did.
Then she continued walking.

When she rounded a corner, she noticed a bunch of boxes who were placed over each other, it looked like it had been done in a poor attempt to create a barrier. Kirito snorted angry and easily blew them away from her path with her gun. Just as she'd done that, she was hit by a couple of bullets that clattered into her armored body. But when she looked up, she saw no one. The shooter probably hid behind one of the big pipes that was going out from the roof down into the floor.

Ramirez clutched the weapon tightly, sweating and prepared to jump out. It would though, result in his certain death, but he had to buy the survivors time to escape Hydroponics.

At the bridge, the captain rubbed his head and said Don't tell me we lost Hydroponics..."

In engineering, Deigo was making calibrations to the ship's main core. He was simply doing another engineer's job for him. The engineer had been in Bay Two when the shuttle landed. He turned on his comm and said "Malick, where the hell are ya?"
"Checking up on things in Medical. How's it goin' on your end?" Malick replied.
Not too good..." Diego replied sadly.