Scral swam in an endless black sea of of nothingness. A shrill ringing disturbed his floating, but he ignored it. In this state he was not aware of his body, or the pain his head was in. He ignored the persistent ringing and concentrated on nothingness, wishing he could stay here forever.

A memory surfaced suddenly, about a woman with red hair and light green eyes. For some reason his mind was fixated on her smile. He remembered taking her back to his ship, but after that is was blackness. He groggily opened his eyes and cursed softly.

The flood lights where switched on to full in his ship, the ringing was coming from his communications board. Closing his eyes he reached over and slapped a button. He tried to work moisture back into his mouth but it was like he had been chewing cotton all night long.

"What." His voice sounded horrible.

"Sulaco, are you ready to go?" His comlink hissed.

"To go where? I'm quite comfortable here." He said a few moments later, he really was very comfortable. He had installed padded leather bucket seats sometime ago.

"The race is about to start, you stupid drunken moron." The voice on the other end shouted.

His mind became clear in an instant, and he sat up. Which was a mistake when his head swam sickeningly and he thought he might hurl all over his console. Closing his eyes he breathed deeply a few times, then heard a soft moan next to him. Opening his eyes he looked over, the same red headed female was sitting in the co-pilots seat.

She was wearing a very tight leather sleeveless shirt. The buttons that were being used had lessened sometime during the night. What he could remember was that he had nothing to do with it. He remembered getting to his ship, making some boast about a race, and then passing out.

What was her name, He thought. Tinkerbelle, no. Tink, Tinker. Yea that's it.

"Tinker." He said softly, he thought he said it softly, his voice sounded extremely loud to him. She only murmured gently and sighed. He looked around the cockpit and spied a half empty bottle. Picking it up he eyed the label and smiled. Taking a swig he gurgled the liquor for a moment before swallowing.

Nothing like gurgling tequila, when you are trying to wake up. He thought with a smile.

"Tinker!" He said louder. She stirred for a moment and suddenly sat straight up, her eyes were bloodshot, and he figured his were as well. She blinked a few times before looking over at him, they looked at each other for a long moment before she screamed.

"Kidnapper! You are kidnapping me!" She shouted, she tried to stand up to run but only managed to crash back into the chair. Her eyes closed and she looked like she swam drunkenly, her face turned green for an instant before she controlled it and breathed deeply several times.

"No, I am not. I'm Scral remember? Trimik Dyr'Jin. We meet earlier this morning." He said quietly, his voice still sounded very loud.

She calmed downed after a minute and mumbled something. She suddenly noticed the gauges on the console in front of her and frowned, her pilot instincts taking over finally.

"Why's your ship set for engine hold?" She mumbled quietly, her voice sounded even worse then his did.

He started to say something but noticed his gauges for the first time. He frowned as he looked over everything, the engines were sitting on hold at ninety percent thrust. The repulsorlifts were screaming trying to hold the ship in place. He looked out the view ports at the ships surrounding them. Suddenly what the com link said earlier came back to him.

"I think we are in a race." He said quietly, he felt instantly more sober.

She starred at him like he had suddenly grown three heads and a multitude of eyes on each of them.

"A what?" She said softly.

He half frowned and looked out the view ports again. He suddenly had a bad feeling about this.

Scral spun the chair around and began flipping switches to bringing the remaining systems online. He noticed Tinker beside him doing the same. Within minutes they had the ship to full power, the weapons showed full readiness, and the shields were operating at almost 100%.

Reaching behind him he flipped four switches that sat alone, the ships systems seemed to fluctuate slightly as something began to hum above them. Two long barrels slipped into view above the cockpit, they seemed to emit a strange blue light after a few seconds.

Cadie leaned forward and looked up, she had a odd expression on her face as she said "Mass drivers? You actually have working mass drives?" The tone of disbelief was strong in her voice.

"A gift from a friend." Scral said lightly, he tapped a few gauges that seemed a bit sluggish.

"Tell me about this ship." She said a few moments later, her eyes were scanning her instruments. "If I had a guess from what I've seen I would say it's a Skipray."

Scral looked over at her and thought She knows her ships. I could get to like her.

He nodded a moment later "GAT-12H model Skipray Blast Boat. Modified with better shields, a stronger hyperdrive, added in a class 3 backup. Enhanced sublight, 122 MGLT instead of the old 91. Hull is 65 RU, hard to enhance that much. Two laser cannons, three medium ion cannons, one concussion missile launcher, one proton torpedo tube, and two dual mounted mass-driver railguns." He sounded like a gloating parent would when they talked about their kid.

She began strapping the multitude of harnesses around her as she said "How do you keep this thing in one piece?"

The comlink beeped again "Races, thirty seconds. Remember, no holds bar. No rules. First one to each checkpoint, and then across the finish line wins."

Scral quickly slipped his harnesses in place, then grabbed the flight controls. He looked out his windows and studied the other ships. After a long moment he said "A lot of luck." In answer to her question.

She mumbled something as she grabbed hold of the armrests.

"Look at them all, their upper weapons are angled almost straight up. I guess it's natural for the people in the back to shoot up above them. Bet their shields are angled above them as well." Cadie said after a moment of studying the ships in front of them.

"Then we go below them, and maybe take one or two out." Scral said. "Take the controls, when we start get below them. I'll handle the guns. Once we reach five hundred kilometers past the line key in the nav computer for Kwenn."

"Why not do it now?" She asked suddenly.

"The area up ahead is mined. If you jump into hyperspace without clearing the zone you explode." He said quietly.

She remained silent but mumbled something under her breath.

"Racers, ten seconds." The comlink buzzed.

Keying the railguns to full power Scral waited for the two second mark. When the announcer said one he flipped two switches simultaneously. Two soft thuds sounded from the middle of the ship, and twin blue arcs shot out from the muzzles of themass drivers. In the same instant Cadie used the repulsorlifts to drop the ship and shoot out below the others.

Keying on the rear camera Scral watched as the ship that had been in front of them shuddered. Fire erupted from the engines. He could see the people in the cockpit scrambling for switches and controls. She seemed to list heavily to port slowly, he watched as she rolled almost completely over as her repulsorlifts gave out. A great blue fireball erupted from her midsection right before she exploded.

Meeting Cadie's eyes he shrugged, she half smiled and keyed for more throttle.

Scral flipped a few switches and watched the monitors as the rail-guns slide back into concealed compartments on top of the hull. He deactivated the other weapons and keyed on the navigational computer.

"Let go of the stick." He said to Cadie, he noticed as she turned to stare at him with an odd expression. The expression grew into a glare as she felt the ship begin to dodge the oncoming laser bolts.

"Auto defense, helps the nav computer get a lock on the destination quicker without it correcting our flying." He said quietly. The ship shuddered hard several times, and he said "Doesn't always work to well."

He grabbed Cadie's hand as she went to grab the flight controls. She turned to stare at him as he did not immediately release her hand. She began raising her other hand, but he released her as he grabbed the hyperspace levers.

A few seconds later six lights turned green and he pulled back the levers. The ships course straightened out, as the auto defense system locked in the course heading. The oncoming fire seemed to increase while the rear shield indicator decreased. Time seemed to stop as the star field elongated as the Sulaco jumped into hyperspace.

Scral began setting systems into standby, and flipped on the auto repair systems. He saw Cadie grab her head suddenly and moan, he knew how she felt his was killing him. He brought up a diagnostic screen and began going over the damage.

"Not bad, shields took a beating, but they will recharge in time. Number two rail-gun overheated a bit, no permanent damage, need to change out one of the coils. Repulsorlift three took a direct hit, it's out of commission. The engines are still in operation, and the defense computer looks solid. Not bad for the first leg of the journey." Scral said half to himself.

"How many legs are there?" Cadie croaked softly, her head was still held up in her hands.

"Twelve, spread out over a weeks time. We have a ten hour hyperspace run ahead of us. Some of the others will have to stop and go around a few obstacles, but we won't. My nav computer is capable of calculating routes around, so we won't have to stop. Gives us time to repair and get some sleep." He said, he closed his eyes as a particularly strong headache came on.

"I suggest sleep first." Cadie said as she unbuckled the harnesses around her. She stood up and walked halfway to the door, she turned around and said "You never did tell me the name of this ship."

Scral sat back in his chair and put his feet up on an empty space on the control board, he said after a moment "She's called Sulaco."

"Interesting choice, wasn't the original Sulaco destroyed hundreds of years ago? Something about sabotage in a race, if history is correct." Cadie said quietly, her eyes had a far off look to them.

"Something like that." He added with a smile, he liked her even more now.

He leaned back in his chair and shut his eyes, he heard the door slide close behind Cadie as she went off to find a bunk. He opened his eyes a few moments later and watched as the star field stream by. He reached to a small bag connected to his chair and pulled out a datapad, he flipped it on and read the message.

"You won't win this time, Dyr'Jin. Not this time." He shut the pad off and set it back in the bag. A few minutes later he stood up and walked to the back, he stopped for a moment and turned around. He looked over the cockpit for a long moment and wondered what that fool had done to his ship.

He let the thought linger for a long moment before walking through the open door to find his own bunk.