He reached the air lock, opened the storage locker, and grabbed an oxygen kit and his vac suit. Not quite a hardsuit designed for long-term exposure to the vacuum, this was a flexible mesh-and-plate garment used for short-term space walks. He'd used it to travel between ships on salvage jobs, make quick repairs to Junker's exterior, and the like.
He considered donning it then and there but felt too exposed in the corridor. Instead, he slung it over his shoulder, grunting under its weight, and humped it through the corridors.
Before he had gone ten meters, a guttural voice shouted behind him. He did not understand the language, but he understood the tone.
He whirled, saw two of the Massassi in black uniforms, and fired a shot with his blaster. It clicked and fizzed, the charge exhausted. He cursed, dropped it, drew the blaster he'd taken from the dead Massassi back in the freight corridor, and fired.
He missed badly and threw himself against the wall as the two Massassi tore down the hall toward him, their blasters sending pulses of green energy into the bulkhead near him.
The spinwheel of a hatch pressed into his back. He fired a couple of shots, forcing the Massassi to slam themselves against the wall for cover, and threw open the hatch. He ducked inside the corridor and closed the hatch behind him. It had no lock. Cursing, he looked around for anything he could stick into the spinwheel's spokes, but saw nothing.
He heard the Massassi on the other side of the door, and then the wheel started to spin. Marr grabbed it, but the creatures were far too strong. Desperate, he stuck the Massassi blaster into the spin wheel, wedging it between the wheel and the pull handle. It stuck, halting the wheel's spin, but Marr knew it would not hold for long.
Heedless of the danger of bumping into more Massassi, he ran as fast as he could for the cockpit. Adrenaline lent him strength, but the vac suit and oxygen kit weighed him down. By the time he saw the cockpit door ahead, his lungs burned and his legs felt like lead.
Blasterfire from behind sizzled past his ears and slammed into the bulkhead. The shouts of the Massassi, more than two, rang out behind him. He dug deep, surprising himself when the Force gave him strength and speed, and staggered into the cockpit.
Pain lit his back on fire as a rain of small metal disks, dozens of them like flying razors, ricocheted around the space. Warm blood streamed down his back and he hoped he had not taken a hit to a kidney.
He threw the vac suit and oxygen kit to the ground, the momentum pulling him to his knees, and turned to close the cockpit security door. Three Massassi sped down the hall, the trunks of their legs chewing up the distance, the thump of their boots like blaster shots on the metal floor. Two others behind the charging three whirled their polearms above their head, jerking them back as Marr hit the security door release. A rain of the tiny metal disks flew from the end of the pole arms over the other Massassi, but the door closed and they chimed against it like tinny rain.
Marr's breath sounded loud in the close confines of the dark cockpit. A bout of dizziness caused him to sway. He was losing blood rapidly.
Impacts challenged the security door-shoulders or booted feet-but it held for the moment. Marr did not have much time. He could hear the Massassi growling in their language on the other side of the door.
He needed to get off Harbinger but he dared not lift the security shields for fear the deck crew would shoot out Junker's viewports. He would have to fly her on instruments only.
He climbed to his feet, put the autopilot into launch prep, and methodically donned the vac suit and oxygen kit, all while blasterfire from the Massassi pounded against the security door. Judging from the noise, Marr thought more of the creatures must have joined the first five. Blaster shots challenged the door but did not penetrate it.
The autopilot completed pre-launch and Marr squeezed into the pilot's seat. He engaged the repulsorlifts and Junker rose off the deck.
For a moment, the Massassi left off their attack on the cockpit security door. Perhaps they had felt the liftoff.
Marr's mouth turned dry as he rotated Junker on its vertical axis, using only his instrumentation to orient him.
An explosion from outside the ship rocked it sidelong into Harbinger's bulkhead. Marr fell from his seat as metal scraped against metal. For a terrifying moment the power on the ship went brown and Junker started to sink, but emergency reserves kicked in and brought it back online.
He cursed as he climbed back into his seat, fearful that he had perforated his suit, but he had no time to examine it. He checked his board, cursed again when he saw that the explosion had scrambled the readout from his instrumentation. Nonsensical information streamed from the scanners. He activated a diagnostic but could not wait for it to resolve itself.
In his mind, he pictured the layout of Harbinger's landing bay. To him, it was all angles, proportions, distances in meters. As he fell into the geometry of his mind, he felt his connection to the Force strengthen. The connection had always been there, but now that he recognized it, he could more readily use it. Mathematics was his interface with the Force.
Another explosion slammed Junker against Harbinger's bulkhead. In the corridor outside the cockpit, the Massassi renewed their assault on the door, a more frantic, desperate assault.
Marr remained calm, though blood loss turned him mildly dizzy. Thinking of Jaden piloting Junker through the rings, he strapped himself into his seat as best he could-his vac suit did not allow for full use of the harness-closed his eyes, trusted his instincts, and piloted Junker in the direction he thought was out. If he was wrong, he was flying not out but deeper into the landing bay. In that case, he would soon be dead.
He fought down the doubt and continued his course.
Blasterfire from the landing bay thumped against the ship, like someone knocking urgently for entry. The Massassi outside the security door beat against it like rancors in a bloodlust.
Blind but not-blind, Marr felt Harbinger's bulkheads, felt other ships nearby, the faint pulse of Harbinger's crew around Junker. He was going the right way.
He understood the interconnection of all things by the Force, understood how Jaden had piloted Junker through the gas giant's rings. The realization made him smile as Junker flew on its repulsors toward the mouth of the landing bay. He held the smile as blood poured from his back and he began to see spots.
When he had put some distance behind him and the deck crew, he raised the security shields. The mouth of Harbinger's landing bay was just ahead and, beyond it, the black of space and the partial arc of the gas giant's moon.
The squeal of straining metal turned him around in his seat and sent his heart racing. The Massassi had forced the security door open a centimeter and wedged one of the metal studs they wore in their skin between the door and the bulkhead. One of them must have pulled it from his flesh. Their voices sounded loud and close-too close-through the slit. He could see motion through the gap and ducked as they tried to get the barrel of a blaster through. The opening was not quite wide enough, but it would be soon.
He heard an exclamation and saw the work end of a pry bar slip into the gap. They had taken it from one of the wall-mounted emergency equipment cases.
He cursed and engaged the ion engines. Junker raced out of Harbinger's landing bay and into open space. He presumed Harbinger's deflectors would work on the same outward-facing principle as their modern counterparts so he did not power down and coast. Instead he kept the engines at full and blew through them.
The door creaked open more, its springs and levers groaning against the Massassi's strength. Marr looked over his shoulder and saw the hole of a blaster barrel pointed through the slit, one yellow eye of a Massassi fixed on him.