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032 “ “A Little Bit of Resistance.”


Gavin wondered why the two tanks hadn’t opened fire yet.

Perhaps they wanted to get in as close as possible to make sure their strikes would be dead on target this time around. Or maybe they were sent to apprehend the two interlopers, possibly take them prisoner. Maybe the person controlling them“if they were being controlled“had a perverse pleasure in delaying the inevitable for as long as possible.

The only thing that was certain was the two tanks were still approaching and had not yet fired.

Both Gavin and Mech had emptied their clips onto the approaching death machines without so much as slowing them down.

For the first time Gavin became painfully aware of the limitations of projectile weapons. They tended to run out of ammunition. His old Fletcher or a Starfleet issue phaser wouldn’t have had the same problem. But if duranium bullets hadn’t stopped these things he very much doubted a phaser could have.

“Mech?”

“Yes.”

They remained facing their approaching doom, their useless weapons held out in front of them.

“Any ideas?”

“Not yet.”

The tanks stopped simultaneously, no 20 feet away, their firing barrels apparently adjusting to their targets.

“Now would be a good time.”

And then Gavin heard a roar somewhere above them. It sounded familiar. Apparently the AI tanks had auditory sensors as both of their turrets re-adjusted to find the source of the sound and establish if it was a threat.

Gavin looked up and saw the bright white moon through the skylight some 35 feet above his head. The moon disappeared as something moved in to block it out. He recognized it. “Hot Rod!”

The SAFVe descended and crashed the skylight.

Shards of razor sharp transparent aluminum rained down below.

Mech pushed Gavin down and he could feel her weight on top of him. Small and large shards landed all around him, a particularly nasty looking one landed with such force that the sharp end lodged itself into the ground no two inches from his nose.

Gavin exhaled noticeably.

Everything happened very quickly after that. Mech pulled him up onto his feet and pushed something into his hand.

“Hold on.”

He did but realized what it was only after he had been yanked clean off the ground. It was a rope, dropped from the SAFVe above. While he was on the floor Mech had slipped the loop at the end of the rope under his right food and now he was being lifted upwards effortlessly.

Mech was close to his side, holding on to a similar wire.

He looked down and instantly wished he hadn’t done so. The tanks opened fire, bright and angrily pulsating blue energy discharges were shooting towards them.

Gavin felt immense heat on his skin and he would later find out that some of his hair had been singed away. The blast ripped open a gaping hole into the ceiling somewhere behind him. They had missed.

Then they were clear of the warehouse and under dark, wide-open skies. Not a few moments later Mech climbed onto the loading deck of the SAFVe and pulled Gavin inside as well. He collapsed on the deck exhausted.

“You guys alright?” asked Hot Rod, looking back from the cockpit.

“I think so,” said Gavin in-between heavily labored breaths.

“Good,” she said and turned back to her instruments. “Because I just seriously scratched up the paint job on this baby. I’m never going to live this down with maintenance.”

Gavin couldn’t help himself and burst out laughing.

Mech smiled as she removed large shards of transparent aluminum from her back and legs. “I’m glad you had fun too,” she said and threw the pieces casually out of the open door.

Gavin stood up slowly watching her injured body. There wasn’t a single drop of blood even as some of the shards had lodged themselves deep into her. Her face didn’t show any sign of pain.

“Are you sure you’re alright?”

She nodded. “Flesh wounds,” she said with a smirk and walked towards the cockpit to take a seat next to Hot Rod.

Once Gavin was sure his feet wouldn’t give in under him he followed her, still somewhat shook up by his near death experience. He wanted to thank Mech for shielding him earlier but she had not given him the opportunity.

“It looks like you’re not the only ones to run into trouble tonight,” said Hot Rod after Mech had taken the co-pilot seat. “We’ve got a crisis over in the city. The entire galaxy is already talking about it.”

“What happened?” asked Gavin who took up position between the two women.

“Nyuchiban terrorists have taken hostages at FedPlaza. The old man wants you back there asap,” she explained even while she steered the SAFVe northbound again.

“Hostages?” repeated Gavin with disbelieve. He had never heard of hostages being taken in San Francisco or anywhere else on Earth for that matter. At least not in his lifetime. He immediately checked the newsfeeds and sure enough, they were all talking about the same thing. “Incredible.”

< Chief, Mech here. What’s your situation? >

Masamune replied almost instantly. < Good to hear from you. Where have you been? >

< Gavin and I followed up a lead outside the city. We ran into a little bit of resistance. >

Yeah, right. Just a little bit, thought Gavin who was listening in. Don’t make it a big deal, we only almost got incinerated.

< Your report will have to wait, > said Masamune. < A group of terrorist who have identified themselves as members of the so-called Freedom for Nyuchiba Society have taken 58 hostages at Federation Plaza and are demanding immediate withdrawal of all Federation personnel from Nyuchiban space. They are threatening to kill one hostage every hour until these demands have been met. The first one is to be executed within the next 20 minutes. >

< This is insane, > said Gavin. < Nobody is going to make anything happened within the next few minutes. >

< Slade and Tank are inside the building but we have lost contact with them some time ago, > continued Masamune.

Gavin didn’t like the sound of that. But he trusted Tank and Slade. If they were already inside there was a good chance that they would be able to foil the terrorists’ plans before they had a chance to make good on their threat. After all who in their right mind would dare to go up against Tank?

< What’s the plan, chief? > Gavin asked.

< Sadly we are still squabbling over jurisdiction here. Tessier seems determined to call the shots on this one. >

< Chief, I’ve got a bad feeling about this, >
said Mech. < I’ve come across a computer terminal which we have good reason to believe is linked to Grayson and possibly Whren. I found detailed floor plans there. I could be mistaken but I think they were for FedPlaza. >

That was news to Gavin. < Hold on, are you saying Starfleet might be involved in this? >

< We can’t rule it out, >
she said.

< What about the tri-cobalt residue? >
asked Gavin.

Mech nodded. < If we take this theory to its logical conclusion I’d say that the tri-cobalt residue we found might have been from a bomb to be used at FedPlaza. >

< And Starfleet is getting ready to storm the building. If you are right, it might be wired to detonate when that happens, > concluded the chief.

< That doesn’t make any sense, >
said Gavin. < If Starfleet is behind this then wouldn't they know about the bomb? Why would they still want to raid the building? >

Masamune didn’t have an answer to this. < I don’t know. But we have to find a way to disable the bomb if that’s what we are dealing with here. Bobby and Eldex are trying to work on a way to re-establish contact with our people inside FedPlaza. I want you to head back to the civic center and pick up a strike team. In the meantime I’ll try to delay Starfleet from carrying out their planned assault. >

< That sounds like a good plan but no way are we going to get there within 20 minutes. What about the first hostage? >
said Gavin.

< There is little we can do for them. We have to hope that Tank and Slade will come up with something. >


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