circle7 | ACTION TIME

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ACTION TIME

The two days had come and gone since Locke stayed over at Weiler's. He was tipsy when Weiler had called that night and made their two day check-in rule - not that he forgot, but he couldn't stop the nagging feeling that something was off when he went to bed that night.

On the morning of the third day, he remembered.

The rule was to get out. He tried calling Weiler once, in case he had forgotten his own rule, but Locke was sure by now that it wasn't like him. It was all the sign he needed when the call went straight to voice mail. He headed right out the door of his room, only gathering his pistol and communicator. Through the bustling of the soldiers' morning routines, he managed to keep himself fairly blended in. No one seemed to be looking on him any differently. Locke was on the last stretch of the emergency escape route of Gladsheim's base - for Circle members, that was - when someone called his name.

His real name.

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Weiler's eyes snapped open, recognizing that tone of voice and all its implications. He was used to, after all, picking out when things were important or not; his very means of survival relied on that one base ability. Sliding off the bed (with only minimal difficulty), Weiler followed after Locke with a hand at the back of the other man's uniform, careful to keep his footsteps silent against the metal flooring of the ship.

Peeking out one of the windows in the main cabin area, Weiler couldn't see what was happening directly below them, but the spacious docking bay of the Seventh Circle afforded them a view of what was happening with the other ships that had managed to escape to what they had thought was a safe haven. All the ships, just like theirs, had their boarding hatches open, mechanical stairs still extended to the ground, and all the ships, from what it looked like, had their former occupants lined up in front of them, hands on their heads and kneeling on the ground as uniformed Circle members kept them subdued with cocked submachine guns.

All except theirs.

Weiler pressed back to the wall and whispered, "Were we forced to dock?" He was suddenly regretting sleeping at all, because it meant he was more in the dark about the situation than the others, but at the same time, would they have been down there on their knees as well, if Locke hadn't had to take the extra time to wake him up? "Did you know?"

"Everything seemed normal until a minute ago," he whispered back. "I didn't hear anything until that announcement. They must have got them as soon as they got off board."

Locke ran his tongue along his bottom lip in thought. They didn't have any weapons. Maybe one of the agents left one behind? But there was no way they could survive fifty officers with submachine guns. It looked like hijacking the craft was going to be their only choice if they wanted out of this.

"I think I have a plan," Locke said. "How fast can you run to the docking door and close it?"

Weiler didn't question what Locke's plan was exactly, but after a moment of pause, during which he looked from the view outside to the lowered docking door to the pilot's dashboard and finally, back to Locke, he seemed to have understood at least the rudimentary construct of the soldier's plan. He raised a brow. "Would that work? They've closed the gate to the launching chutes."

"And this is a military vessel," he answered. Granted, it was only meant for transport, but it had its defenses as well. "We'll shoot our way through."

"Exciting," Weiler laughed, pushing off the wall, easy-going despite the situation. His back would protest, but he could manage this just fine, especially if his life was on the line. This was more action than he had been subject to in years. At this rate, he might as well forget vacation - he and retirement were on talking terms now. "On your count, Captain."

Locke nodded. "One, two... three!"

He darted out, heading for the flight deck. As quick as his fingers would allow, he inputted the access code to get the engines roaring. Locke gave Weiler a couple more seconds before he started the ship, just enough to give him a boost, since the engines certainly drew some attention. The officers on the ground looked up in alarm, and with the distraction, some of the agents even retaliated against the ones who had them at gunpoint.

"Stop!" someone started yelling as the ship started to lift a couple feet off the ground. "Someone get this ship grounded!"

"Get out of here!" said one of the men who had been on board with them - the pilot, judging from his uniform, as he all but headbutted into one of the guards to throw off their aim. The submachine round glanced off the side of the aircraft, having been built to be anti-soldier rather than anti-vehicle, and just in time, too, considering there was no way Weiler could have survived a barrage from a gun like that.

The door hatch shut with an air-tight seal. "Go!" Weiler shouted at Locke. "It's shut!"

The ship surged forward through the hangar. It was being fired at uselessly, the shots tinkling against the bullet-proofed ship. They definitely got them off guard - whoever these traitors were, they weren't expecting retaliation like this.

"Get up here and strap in!"

Grabbing hold of the cabin seats to avoid being toppled over, Weiler managed to scramble up to the cockpit area and slam himself into the passenger pilot seat, quickly buckling himself in even as the ship began to sway and take air. They could hear the tink-tink sound of useless bullets hitting the hull of the ship until an authoritative voice shouted over the speaker system to Cease fire immediately! and to Ready the laser systems!

"They're going to shoot us down once we take off," Weiler muttered, eyeing the sea of parting parting people on the hangar floor. "How good is your flying?"

"Good," he answered. "How good is your in-air shooting?"

As he asked, Locke pressed a button, and the screen in front of Weiler lit up. Controls popped out from a panel on the surface, and his chair was automatically pulled forward within reach of them. The screen showed a camera's view of where the guns were aimed. The corner of it had a radar illuminating the living targets - tiny dots moving swiftly across it as Locke sped up the ship, heading for a launch chute.

"Just aim and fire."

"I guess we'll see," Weiler said, smiling wryly as the screen lit his face with a lime-green hue.

The camera, of course, changed as rapidly as their location did, decreasing the amount of range he had to overcome as they sped toward the exit chute and hence the anti-aircraft laser artillery that would soon be shooting at them once they cleared the Seventh Circle ship. The live targets weren't of consequence now - half of those were probably their comrades and the other half used to be as well - their biggest concern was the locked gate blocking their way.

"All personnel get inside to air-locked areas!" the voice on the intercom was shouting, and for good reason. Once their ship broke through the gate, the vacuum of space would make short work of whatever was left inside the docking bay. At the very least, both friend and foe were scrambling out of their way and into safety. "I repeat! All personnel get inside the air-locked areas immediately!"

The gate was coming fast at them. Weiler concentrated all the guns in one area near the center, where the gate was most likely weakest, and fired every single gun they had at it until it burst into a barrage of fire.

Locke allowed a tense smile. "Good."

He jerked the controls forward, sending them hurtling even quicker into the gate's direction. It was considerably weakened by the blazing fire now, until it all at once collapsed under its weakened form, riddled with holes from the guns. The fire dissipated immediately with the lack of oxygen, and Locke braced himself.

The ship crashed through the opening, knocking into a couple pieces of debris that didn't quite clear out, making for a loud and bumpy get away. The dark of space greeted them outside the Seventh, and perhaps with the haste of their getaway - and the rarity of an attack on Seventh anyway - no fighter ships were waiting to shoot them down.

"Man that until we're clear," he instructed.

Weiler didn't respond in words but he did make a small sound of acknowledgement, mouth snapped shut and pressed tight in concentration as his eyes fixed on the screen, a momentary lapse in his usual glib witticisms in favor of extended survival.

There were no fighter ships, but as they gradually pulled away from the main Seventh vessel, the distant but sure rumbling wave of energy that hit them told them that the defense artillery every Circle ship was equipped with was readying itself for an attack. They would have to evade those initial shots and then hopefully break out far enough so that the Seventh's tracking capabilities wouldn't be able to tag their heat signature or lock them into a never-ending cat-mouse game until their fuel gave out.

A lucky strike managed to dent one of the anti-spacecraft guns before it could let off its first blast, but the gun right beside it managed to fire, barely missing the breadth of their rightmost wing. "Get clear faster!" Weiler said urgently, re-calibrating the targeting mechanics as best he could. He wasn't actively trained for this, and there was only so much that rudimentary Circle classes could really cover.

Locke's brow was tight in concentration, hitting a few more buttons on the panels and shifting a couple levers. The only way they'd get out without a hit was in overdrive, and on a ship like this, it took a lot out of it.

But survival was priority.

The ship gave another jerk as it strained against its capabilities. (They were going to need fuel desperately after this.) On the radar, it showed their proximity to Seventh growing distant quicker. It was hard to escape and hide when you were surrounded by literally nothing, but just a bit further, and they'd be out of range. Damn these small vehicles and their lack of faster-than-light travel.

Giving a muffled grunt at being thrown about, Weiler nonetheless managed to stay in place and in his seat thanks to the modern wonders of seatbelts and his no-short-of-a-death-grip on his armrest.

In the chaos they had caused with their takeoff, it seemed as though they were having trouble with sending out flyers of their own. Another laser swerved their way, narrowly missing them as they cleared the last stretch of space needed to bring them out of the Seventh's target locking system, as no other shots came after that. Soon enough, the Seventh grew smaller and smaller in hindsight, swallowed up by the vastness of space and its stars.

Weiler let out a shuddering breath only after they were clear, slumping in his seat only to hiss loudly as his aggravated injury brushed up against the back. All that jumping, running, jerking and dodging had opened it up again, leaving a damp dark stain on the seat when he unbuckled himself to check.

"Well," he said dryly. "That wasn't too difficult."

Locke set the ship in auto-pilot then fell back in his seat, releasing the controls. He rubbed the back of his palm across his forehead, still in disbelief that they pulled that off. Being in the military, he'd definitely been through some tense situations, but nothing quite like that.

He looked over at Weiler, and down at the reopened wound with a frown.

"Finally going to let me patch that for you, by any chance?" he asked.

"The Captain should keep an eye out until we're definitely in the clear," Weiler said as he gingerly eased himself off his chair in one slow but fluid motion.

Then, he promptly sat right back down when his knees buckled once under his weight.

He stared down at the dashboard and all its blinking lights (low fuel, low fuel) for a moment and let out a breathy laugh. For the past twelve years, he had only been a secretary. He needed a little more than thirty seconds for it to catch up to him, especially if he was only running on five hours of sleep after four days. "Mein Gott, that was right out of an adventure film."

Despite Weiler's advice, Locke unstrapped himself from the seat. Upon noticing that Weiler was laughing (how was this guy so smiley), he stayed put, nonetheless concerned.

"Something like that, I suppose," he said, still frowning slightly. Locke turned his gaze back to the dash, where a yellow light signalling their fuel levels blinked at him. "We probably should've just surrendered."

"Probably," Weiler murmured, eyes still fixed to the low fuel light. Slowly, he let go of his arm rests, asking conversationally, "Should we do something about that?"

"We're already headed for the next fuel station," he said. Locke ran fingers through his mustache thoughtfully. "We should be careful, though. They're likely on the lookout."

What a predicament. Wanted by both the Circle and the Military.

"Careful," Weiler repeated, smiling lopsidedly, because wasn't that just the mildest way of putting it?

He succeeded much better with getting up and staying up the second time around, pulling himself up using the back of his seat and straightening with only the smallest of winces. Now that medical help wasn't a surefire thing in the imminent future, maybe leaving the wound as it was wouldn't be the best of ideas. "Give me a hand here. I guess I should at least get some gauze on it, but I'm not agreeing to the needle."

"Good to hear you've come to your senses," Locke said lightly. Despite the roll of his eyes, though, he stood up and followed him back to the small medical room. "We should place a transmission to the First after this. Securing the line's going to be a hassle though."

But another thought occurred to him - would the First even believe their story? How had the breech gotten that bad?

Weiler ran a hand through his already mussed hair, sighing. Securing a transmission to the First was no small measure - few people even knew the nature of the First, let alone how to contact them, and they didn't exactly have specific contacts within the First Circle to fall back upon. Almost all of an informant's interaction with the First took place with the Seventh as an intermediary, if there was any interaction to begin with, that was. There would have to be some long hours of searching and digging around for them to manage a feat like this, with just the two of them.

"First the gauze," Weiler said, half-smiling half-wincing as he slipped back into the makeshift medical bay of the small craft. It wasn't outfitted for serious medical care, but gauze was easy enough to find, sitting in a big labeled box in one of the first cabinets he checked. Weiler handed the white, pristine roll to Locke before pulling his shirt over his head. "Hold this."

Locke sat down next to him, taking the gauze. Once Weiler's shirt was off, he inspected the redone damage to his wound, sighing. It wasn't gushing blood or anything violent like that, but it definitely had reopened in several places. Most of it had clotted, but it was definitely strained under all the action that just took place.

"Are you sure you don't want to numb it? It's worth the couple of pinpricks."

Weiler narrowed an eye at the very thought. "I'll pass."

He raised his arms and turned his back to Locke, pushing a small sanitized alcoholic wipe packet at him across the bed before bracing himself. For someone in such a dangerous line of work, he didn't seem inclined to cause himself any more discomfort than was strictly necessary, but maybe that was to be expected of a paper-pusher. Other than the open wound, there were a few darkening bruises near his shoulder that hadn't been visible prior to now, round and vaguely fist-shaped, or long and narrow he had been pushed back against a chair often enough for the skin to discolor.

"All right," Weiler nodded, "Nice and easy, soldier."

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