My Angel of the Dawn (WomanxBoy, ManxBoy, Sci-Fi + Romance)

***35***

"You are in the bloody nick of time, lad!" Nelsa gathered herself up on all fours and tried to stand up. Ineffectively.

"Thanks for distracting them." He carefully shot off her leg chain and effortlessly hoisted her up on her feet. Wow, when did the boy get himself such strong arms? Easy in the eye too, in this t-shirt...

"Are you all right, Nell?"

"I've had better days." Nelsa shook her head trying to clear the fog and get rid of the ringing in her ears. "I'd honestly kill right now for a shot of whisky."

Ariel smiled and handed her a flask. She took a hearty sip — whisky, single-malt — and only then noticed the monogram 'H.' She grinned. There was no need to ask what had happened to Holloran, but she asked anyway, only for the pleasure of hearing it, "What's happened to Holloran?"

"Dead. I strangled him." Ariel's eyes gleamed with fierce fire, totally unbecoming an angel.

"I owe you big time, lad, even if we don't get out from this mess."

"We will. Can you walk?"

Nelsa suddenly realized Ariel still had his arm around her waist, holding her upright. Her body ached so much, she barely felt his touch. Nelsa disentangled herself from him, reeling dangerously, but managed to keep her balance and tried walking. Yeah, she could.

Ariel took the dead thug's weapon and gave it to Nelsa with one of his own. Their heavy grooved grips in her palms felt wonderful. They seemed to chase away the hateful feeling of helplessness. Even the pain somehow faded.

"God bless you, my second pilot! Now let's blow up everything here to seven hells!"

That was exactly what they did.

For a skiff this size, the standard crew was about fifteen, and no individual cabins except for the captain's, only communal quarters with bunk beds. That's where most of the crew would be, resting after the long space chase and boarding the Aurora. Some of them might even be at the sick-bay — all those successful hits from the Aurora's gun manned by Ariel couldn't have failed to produce at least a few casualties.

Nelsa and Ariel stole through the corridors to the crew quarters, killing two mercenaries on their way quickly and quietly. They didn't expect to be attacked on their own ship. Ariel short-circuited the wires on the quarters' door control panel and blocked the door, trapping the crew inside. That left only the last two on duty in the cockpit. They never saw it coming.

Nelsa pushed off the pilot's dead body from the dashboard and checked the monitors. The skiff had only a code name — TNX1138, crew of fifteen indeed, commanding officer — J. Holloran. The Aurora was still locked with the skiff through the cargo hatch. They hadn't started to unload her — all the cargo was still accounted for. Waited for the codes to the containers, no doubt.

Both ships were well away from Margotta and her nasty huge battleships. Even if Holloran had bothered to notify his employers what he was up to (which Nelsa doubted), they left him to his own devices, probably not interested in a small smuggler ship. Nelsa hoped they don't even look in their direction.

She programmed the skiff's autopilot and password-locked it: release the boarding clamps, holding the Aurora, close the hatch, turn around, take a collision course with the nearest battleship. Piece of cake.

"We have half an hour, lad. Plenty of time to make off. Or else we'll have to return and switch off my little present to the Margotta National Guard."

Nelsa and Ariel made the deadline, even despite of a shooting match with three mercenaries in the cargo hold. The two in the cockpit weren't the last ones after all. They threw the bodies out of the airlock and had to seal it shut, because it had been forced open by the boarders. Next thing they knew, both ships shuddered and disengaged. Without a word Nelsa and Ariel rushed to their stations: Nelsa to the cockpit, Ariel to the ship's gun.

The skiff made a U-turn and set course to the battleship. The Aurora followed it, safely hid behind its hull. No one suspected anything — the skiff was returning to the mother ship. For some reason it missed the docking bay, but even that didn't alert the battleship's command, or they could've blew up the skiff with their cannons. Next thing they knew, the skiff rammed into the battleship's main tower and exploded. What's left of it would be Holloran's resting place for all eternity. Nelsa grinned triumphantly.

Such a small ship could hardly damage a battleship with thick armor and powerful force-shields. But there was unavoidable confusion, which let the Aurora sneak by unharmed. She was almost out of the shooting range when there were a few shots fired after her, and not one of them hit the target.

The rest was easy. They landed at the designated point, and grim-looking rebels, armed to the teeth, unloaded the weapons amazingly quick. Equally quick they patched the Aurora up, as much as was possible under the circumstances, and loaded her cargo hold with raw uranium ore which would fetch a handsome price on Cendar. The whole operation took no more than three hours. Nelsa was awed. If stevedores in normal ports were working like that, she'd save a huge load of time. And money on bribes.

With peerless arrogance Nelsa chose to break out of the orbital blockade in the same spot where she'd broken into it. Obviously no one had expected to see her ship anytime soon. Again they had the time to fire only a few shots which went wide — again. Nelsa flew the Aurora back into the asteroid field, just to be on the safe side. There seemed to be no pursuers this time around, though, so she called Ariel into the cockpit.

She didn't bother to calculate a new hyperspace jump, just finished the previous one, and the Aurora dived into hyperspace.