Jess opened her eyes.
She wasn't inclined to, after being relieved from a too-long shift by a too-tired Poe. But...what? She felt the thin mattress of her bunk, the hard plating underneath digging into her shoulder. She was used to that, though...she'd slept in worse conditions without waking.
The relative darkness had fuzzy edges, the glow from the cockpit like a passing spirit in the hallway beyond her room. She wanted to let that warmth comfort her, lull her back to sleep. The herb essence she'd put on her pillow called to her, trying to get her to put her head down again.
No. What the hell woke me up?
She pulled her blaster from under the thin blanket and stuck it in the band of her underwear.
Doesn't hurt to be prepared. I'll just go check the rest of the ship quick, then back to sleep.
Maybe the rancor had woken her up again. Probably nothing. But...
She had one foot on the floor when every klaxon in the damn ship started wailing at once, and she shot down the hall and into the co-pilot's chair. Poe was only a step behind her, still wearing his skivvies, a cup of kaf sloshing over his hand. Zawati crowded in, grabbing the handhold behind Jess' chair as Mathile roared from the stern.
"What is it?" Zawati demanded, the Force snapping and coiling around her like a massive Kodashi viper. A pissed off massive Kodashi viper.
"Hell if I know," Poe shouted, pounding at the pilot's panel with his closed fist. It worked too, the instruments lighting up blue and green. "Damn sensors are on the fritz."
Jess caught Zawati peering out the viewscreen, but she got the distinct impression that Zawati wasn't really looking with her eyes.
"There is a Force user nearby," Zawati intoned, and a moment later a boarding ship loomed in front of them, its metal mandibles open and ready to chew through their defenses. "It is..." She shook her head as if she couldn't make sense of an elaborate puzzle, but Jess didn't have the luxury of worrying about what was going through Zawati's head.
"This thing doesn't have enough juice for the shields and the cannons," Poe exclaimed, his fingers dancing across the panels. A thing Jess always admired about him, how he could just be on at a moment's notice. "Evasive manuevers and power to the shields."
Jess punched it in. Zawati hit the wall as the craft lurched, her fingers slipping from the handhold. Jess realized that Zawati probably hadn't been on a ship in years and dimly noted down that she would have to apologize later.
The boarding ship had a dull red paint job that managed to make it look even more imposing. It drew closer despite Poe's efforts to shake it, menacing lights blinking around its open maw. She'd always thought standard boarding ships looked like hard dicks, sculpted by an artist way too in to his own uh, equipment.
And its going to fuck us dry.
The boarding ship passed by the viewscreen, and a moment later the cockpit shuddered hard enough that Jess felt like her brains might scramble. If she hadn't been sitting already she would have joined Zawati on the floor.
"Ready your blasters," Zawati murmured, and when Jess looked over the witch was floating a couple of inches off the ground. Jess felt the Force in her back teeth, like she'd bit right into a sansanna spice pod and turned her whole mouth numb and tingly. "We are about to be boarded."
"The hell we are," Poe said, and though he coaxed their bucket of bolts ship into maneuvers that Jess felt sure no pilot Resitance or First Order could match, the craft itself had limitations that kickass piloting couldn't fix. Jess' panels died, as if they were trying to prove her point. She shook her head, pushing away from the dead instruments. She got to her feet, following Zawati out into the hall. Jerking her blaster from its makeshift holster, she put her back to the wall and moved along it, ready to fire at a moment's notice.
