Evidently, Broon lacked similar comprehension of the situation.

Turning to where Armnoj sat at the table fiddling with his still-closed briefcase, the pirate smacked the Zakdorn across the back of the head. “Why isn’t that thing open yet?”

Armnoj reached up to rub where he had been struck. “It takes time to disengage the security measures protecting the contents,” he said, his voice even more high-pitched and nasally than usual. “Do you want me to destroy everything because you rushed me?”

Looking to Pennington, Broon sneered. “I’m amazed you didn’t kill him days ago.”

“The thought crossed our minds,” Pennington replied, looking in the direction of the Rigelian currently training a disruptor pistol on him. The thug was dividing his attention between him and Armnoj while also listening to his boss.

A yell of pain caught his attention and Pennington turned to see that one of the four men taking turns beating Quinn had landed another blow to his face. Quinn reeled from the blow, falling backward and dropping to one knee where, thankfully, he remained. His attackers, apparently possessing at least a modicum of decency, refrained from further action and instead waited for him to regain his feet.

They’re going to kill him, and even if they don’t, we’re both dead anyway.

Looking about the cargo room, a different and much cleaner one than where he, Quinn, and Armnoj had been held after being brought aboard Broon’s ship, Pennington’s eyes fell upon the open hatch leading into the airlock, which according to Broon would be the gateway to oblivion so far as he and Quinn were concerned. Fear, anger, indignation, and helplessness all fought for control of the journalist as he stared at that hatch. The thought of waiting inside the cramped vestibule for the harsh, unforgiving vacuum of space to claim them terrified Pennington. It was no way to die, not for any being, even the vilest of criminals.

His gaze wandered to the airlock—and fixed upon the control panel mounted to the bulkhead next to it. In that instant Pennington’s conflicting emotions resolved themselves into a single, unwavering moment of conviction.

If I’m going out, I’m taking these bastards with me.

Lunging forward, Pennington slapped his hand down upon the large switch on one end of the control panel. The Rigelian guarding him was startled by his sudden action, his slow response further hindered when an alarm blared through the cargo hold.

“What the hell?” Broon turned, his eyes wide even as one beefy hand reached beneath his coat for the disruptor strapped to his hip. Imagining the crosshairs on his back, Pennington ignored him and instead smacked his hand down upon another control, which was answered by the sudden roar of venting atmosphere.

Here’s hoping I didn’t just open the bloody door!

Other reactions quickly followed as the men thrashing Quinn turned toward the hatch, their expressions equally terrified as they realized what was happening. Pennington disregarded all of that, too, his focus instead on the Rigelian who was backpedaling away from the airlock. The henchman’s attention was more on getting to safety and therefore he was unprepared when Pennington slammed him into a bulkhead. The journalist wrapped his left hand around the barrel of the Rigelian’s disruptor pistol and jerked it up and away, at the same time lashing out with his right fist and connecting with the thug’s temple.

Orange energy whined past his ear and Pennington ducked as a disruptor bolt struck the wall next to his head. He pushed to his left, taking the dazed Rigelian with him even as he landed another punch to the guard’s head. Now holding the disruptor, he brought the weapon up as he spun to face the center of the room, firing it indiscriminately at Broon and the others. He hit nothing, of course, but it was enough to cause the pirate and his crewmen to scatter in search of cover. Pennington dashed away from the airlock, disruptor bolts tearing into the walls and deck around him as he sought refuge behind a nearby cargo crate. Once under cover, he turned and aimed the weapon toward the control panel for the airlock. He pressed the firing stud and the disruptor spat energy yet again.

The control panel erupted in a wash of sparks and small flames, followed immediately by a shrieking alarm beginning to wail within the confines of the room. Pennington heard the now very pronounced hiss of escaping air. If his guess was right, with the control panel destroyed, there was now no way to stop the airlock and—thanks to its open inner hatch—the rest of the cargo hold from completely depressurizing.

Thankfully, Pennington saw that the airlock’s outer hatch remained closed. Small favors, I suppose.

“You fool!” Pennington heard Broon cry from wherever the pirate was hiding. “You’ll kill us all!” More disruptor fire rang out through the room, as though emphasizing the quickly escalating problem.

Suppose that means my guess was right,Pennington mused. While Pennington figured the action likely would be arrested by one of Broon’s men from elsewhere on the ship, perhaps the immediate chaos his tactic had generated would be enough to allow him, Quinn, and Armnoj a chance to escape.

From the corner of his eye Pennington saw Quinn lumbering across the deck, body slamming one of the men who had been beating on him. The two men stumbled into the nearby wall and Quinn drove the top of his skull into the other man’s jaw. It was enough to drop the man to his knees, giving Quinn the opening he needed to punch him again as he grabbed the thug’s disruptor. The pilot all but fell to the deck as an energy bolt hit the wall next to him, firing his own weapon as he scrambled for something behind which to hide.

“Tim!” Pennington heard Quinn shout. “The door!”

Understanding what the other man meant—at least, he hoped he did—Pennington looked to his left to see the hatch leading from the cargo bay into the adjoining corridor. The only way from the chamber that did not involve explosive decompression and immediate death, the hatch was still closed. If Broon or any of his men got to it before he did, he, Quinn, and Armnoj would be trapped here. Of course, if he could not get the door open, he and everyone else in here were going to asphyxiate, anyway.

And what if more of his men comethrough the door?

A disruptor bolt chewing into the side of the cargo container behind which he was crouching pushed away the unhelpful thought. Ducking to his left, Pennington saw one of Broon’s men leaning around the side of a storage locker, lining up for another shot. The journalist tried to bring up his own weapon but he was too slow. Another energy discharge rang out across the cargo hold, this one catching the other man and slamming him into the locker he used for cover. Pennington looked to see Quinn firing his own captured disruptor again, this time using the weapon to pin down another of Broon’s thugs as he moved from his place of concealment toward the hatch.

“Quinn!” Pennington heard Broon shout, the hefty man’s booming voice sounding even more ominous than what he had previously heard. The pirate rose from where had sought protection, aiming his disruptor in Quinn’s direction. Quinn did not react to the shout, instead firing at another of the henchmen who had made the mistake of exposing themselves from behind a cargo container. The energy burst struck the man in the chest, driving him backward; he slammed against a support strut before falling to the floor.

Sensing his breaths coming with more difficulty now that the balance of the oxygen had been released from the room, Pennington detected movement to his left and turned to see the fifth of Broon’s thugs trying to sneak around a group of smaller crates haphazardly stacked along the hold’s far bulkhead. He released an involuntary yelp of surprise, swinging his disruptor to aim at the approaching assailant. The other man found himself caught out in the open as Pennington pressed the weapon’s firing stud.