The poor IPH fools had never seen anything like it. The three escapees had taken them almost completely by surprise. They were now over half-way back to the docking platform where the Honshu was located and behind them was probably something like two dozen security men now napping peacefully on the deck. A few of them had been wearing ray-proof armor but most of them hadn’t. Jones and Ansul each had two of the MU-9 stun pistols and the crewman was proving to be a crack shot even in his current state.

Captain Tarsik held one of the weapons in his right hand while holding the portable force-shield in the other. By basically rushing everyone they’d come across they’d been lucky, very lucky. All of their startled opponents’ stun bursts or proton blasts had either missed completely or impacted on the shield harmlessly. This would definitely be a story to tell over drinks in the mess hall, of that all of them were certain. There was still the matter of the air and gravity generator but Plan B didn’t exactly have a contingency for every situation. They’d have to wing it.

The station’s security had apparently finally gotten its act together as they were beginning to encounter more organized resistance but even the three armed and armored men who confronted them in the next corridor had no chance. In an instant the captain was upon them and smashed through their ranks with the force of all 300lbs of raw muscle at his disposal. Between the zap from the force-shield and the captain basically flattening them they were easy targets for Ansul and Jones. Quickly turning back they fired a few stun bursts into the unarmored parts of the men’s bodies.

As they approached the corridor that led from the central part of the station and into the spoke that radiated out into the docking platform where the ship was docked they began to take fire from the level above. The captain raised the force-shield over his head to act as a sort of umbrella. It worked and prevented any of the fire coming from above from hitting them but while preoccupied with their overhead attackers one of the IPH men came from an auxiliary corridor and got the captain in his sights. Ansul raised his own pistol and fired just as his opponent did. The Martian’s shot was true, right into the unarmored man’s chest. The security man must have panicked as he’d fired because his shot went low and caught Captain Tarsik in the lower leg. Service uniforms had an ability to deflect at least a small amount of fire from an energy weapon but some of the stun burst still managed to work its way into his calf muscles.

Ansul quickly caught his comrade as the two of them collapsed to the floor in a heap. Jones, unexpectedly, had dodged the force-shield as it came crashing down onto both the first officer and the captain and instead jumped right out into the open. He dodged a couple of proton blasts and managed to take out the two men firing at them from above, both of them collapsing precariously onto the railing that kept their unconscious bodies from taking a twenty foot plunge to the hard deck below.

“You two okay?” Jones asked as he ran up and knelt beside his shipmates.

“Damn good shooting there Jones.” the captain said with a wry smile that signaled that he was fine. First Officer Ansul appeared to be a bit more shaken up but he was still fully capable of keeping himself together. This was far from the first firefight he’d ever been in and he knew all too well that it wouldn’t be the last.

“Help me get him up.” Ansul ordered. Tarsik deactivated the shield to make it easier for them to get him to his feet. It took some doing but they managed and he found that he was able to move his leg just fine but that it was quite numb and he had to be very careful about how he walked.

“Sure wish we’d thought to grab some armor off of those guards we clobbered.” the captain groaned, “I’ll be okay though.”

“Good then,” Ansul chimed in, “just a little further.” he reached out his hand to help steady the captain but Tarsik would have none of it.

“What the hell do we do about the platform though? We can’t just walk out there?” he looked at both of his men to see if any of them had any ideas because for once he certainly knew that he did not.

“Actually sir I was thinking about when we first...” Jones was cut off by the sound of proton blasts striking the nearby bulkhead.

“Down!” the captain shouted as they ducked behind the closest wall and squatted down low. They all waited for a moment, their stun pistols at the ready, but no one came around the corner. Jones checked the power cells on his guns, both down to less than fifty percent.

“Captain Tarsik,” came an all too familiar voice, “I am placing you under arrest for assaulting Interplanetary Holdings personnel, theft of Interplanetary Holdings equipment, damage to Interplanetary Holdings equipment and facilities and last but not least interfering in a lawful investigation. Now get out here or I swear I’ll gun you down myself!”

“I’ll be damned!” the captain roared as he jumped to his feet and activated the force-shield. His two crewmen tried to hold him back but even with a numb leg he was too fast and too strong for them. Essa Von Braun had never personally fought Captain Tarsik face to face and her typical calm, or at least stalwart, appearance was shattered by the sight of the large man with his cape flapping and his face contorted into a visage of anger rushing at her full force. She panicked and reached for her sidearm. Staring down the freight train that was Captain Tarsik she managed to pull it from its holster quickly and get off a shot that harmlessly ricocheted off of the force-shield, harmless to Tarsik at least. Poor Lieutenant Okeke was not so lucky. He was so stunned watching the giant spacer slam into his commander that he didn’t notice the proton blast that had burned itself deep into the brown flesh of his chest until a moment later when he suddenly collapsed.

The sheer force of the enraged captain’s impact not only tossed Essa Von Braun back several feet but also managed to knock one of her front teeth completely out of her mouth. The captain was not one to take chances in a fight, he didn’t stop until he knew his opponent was down for the count. Essa knew this because she was the exact same way. He tossed his shield aside and lunged at her to deliver a downward punch that would render her unconscious but she was ready for it. She rolled to the side, leaving his fist to kiss nothing but cold steel. He only let the pain blind him for a split-second but that was all Essa Von Braun needed. She jumped to her feet and delivered a swift kick that caught Tarsik right in the sternum. She’d been aiming for his throat but he’d moved fast enough to keep her boot from catching that even more vulnerable spot. He braced himself for the next blow but nothing happened. Essa backed away a few feet and raised her hands. What was happening?

“Oh I’ve wanted to do this for a while.” Ansul was standing there with his plasma derringer in hand. This was one of the few times that the Martian actually wanted to kill someone.

“No!” Tarsik exclaimed. “No killing!” he wanted to beat the tar out of Essa with his bare hands. He intended to make sure that she never dared come up against him again.

His men lowered their weapons and the captain pulled himself to his feet. Much to his surprise Essa reached for the tele-wave on her belt and activated it, “Commander Von Braun to security personnel. Stand down. I repeat, stand down and return to your posts. Medical teams proceed to attend to the wounded.”

“Ma’am?” came the voice from her tele-wave.

“You heard me!” she screamed, “Stand down.”

“Yes ma’am.”

Suddenly Essa looked down and noticed Okeke lying on the deck and clutching his wound. Tarsik noticed her eyes go wide in terror as she realized what he’d been hit with.

“That’s going to be fun eh? Explaining to your superiors why one of their officers died of radiation poisoning.” the captain truly did feel sorry for the man but taunting Von Braun was just too tempting. He turned to his men, “Go ahead of me and figure out how we get back to the ship.”

“Yes sir.” Ansul replied then tapped Jones on the arm and motioned toward the airlock.

Essa Von Braun was thoroughly angry. For the second time Harridor Tarsik had managed to ruin her life and for that she wanted nothing less to take his. When Lt. Okeke died from his wounds there would be an investigation and when it was found that his death was caused by her illegal sidearm she’d be terminated from the employ of IPH or worse yet sent back to Subterra, what was one more murder?

“I’m going to rip your throat out you space-dog!” she was faster than he expected and delivered another quick kick to the sternum that nearly dropped him to his knees. She followed it with a right cross to the face but he caught her left and twisted it hard, he wasn’t sure but he thought he heard something crack. Either nothing actually broke or she was just so furious that she didn’t even notice it because she continued her attack.

Another quick right to the face forced him to let her go and another kick, this time to the abdomen, dropped him to the deck on hands and knees. He saw her boot come up again but threw himself into a sideways roll to avoid it. He managed to grab the force-shield from where it was lying and activated it just as she threw another right cross. Her hand bounced off of the shield with an electric sizzle and she recoiled in pain. Her eyes filled with hatred and she forgot herself for a moment, she swung hard with her left. It hit the shield and her expression instantly turned to one of agony. She reeled backwards and clutched her left hand in pain. Tarsik deactivated the shield and tucked the handle into his belt then put himself into a fighting stance once again.

“I thought you were going to kill me, isn’t that what you said Essa?”

He caught the flash in her eye that betrayed her decision. His ability to read someone, an ability that had failed him earlier in the day, told him in an instant what she was about to do. As she stepped forward her right hand went to her belt and she pulled a thus-far hidden blade from it. Captain Tarsik had been in plenty of knife fights and knew how to handle himself. He tracked the blade in what seemed, at least in his mind, like slow-motion. She thrust it forward straight at his heart but he grabbed her right hand with his left and seized hold of her cape with his right. In one smooth motion he spun her around and slammed her back into his chest then drove the knife straight through her broken left hand that was coming up to protect her face. She howled in pain and he pushed her away from himself. She fell to her knees grasping at the blade now impaling her palm.

“Essa if you ever, ever mess with me or my crew again I will kill you!” the captain punctuated his statement by raising his right leg and delivering a hard kick to the side of her head with the heel of his boot. It spun her across the floor and into the corner of a nearby bulkhead. She was already out cold when her body impacted it with a thud.