"Goddamnit!" he swore. *Get down Alyssa!* he shouted in his mind, praying his fearless companion was listening to his thoughts like before. He was greatly relieved when she immediately disappeared from view. He had the mercs in a good crossfire from his current position and he was able to drop two more with carefully aimed bursts, before the rest of the mercenary team reacted and ducked down low behind cover.

Unfortunately for both the mercenaries and the Diablo's, the storage crates proved scant protection against the ship mounted Gatling Lasers. These weapons were designed to take out lightly armoured fighters, so a few inches of Reinforced plastic might be able to stop a hollow point round, but it was powerless to protect against penetration by the searing laser bolts.

Calara began to walk laser fire along the defensive positions held by the two hostile groups. Glowing holes were punched through the reinforced plastic of the storage crates before the laser bolts connected with soft flesh, screams of pain announcing every successful strike. Pitiful cries of surrender began to drift up around the loading bay and John contacted Calara using his watch communicator and asked her to cease fire.

"Ok it's over, get out of here!" John shouted loudly to the terrified attackers, their morale truly broken.

The seven remaining Diablo's stopped to pick up their fallen brothers and dragged them from the Loading bay. The mohawked Leader was one of the survivors and he turned to face John before he left.

“This ain't over chief, the Diablo's have got long memories!" he snarled. When two of the Gatling lasers began to spin up and track him, his bravado disappeared and he fled the docking bay.

John saw the three surviving mercs crawl out of cover and Limp away, leaving their fallen behind. John took a quick glance at the abandoned corpses, but he couldn't see Seb anywhere. He noticed a bloody trail leading out of the docking bay from where he had sent the mine owner sprawling and figured he must have crawled away during the heat of combat .

“Are you ok to walk?" he asked Sparks.

The teen nodded tentatively and John offered her a strong hand to help her stand up. Adrenalin was fast wearing off and the young woman stood on wobbly legs, reluctant to Let go of John's supportive arm. He helped her to walk towards the airlock on the Invictus.

Alyssa came dashing out to their side, her face concerned. "Are you both ok? Did either of you get hit?" she asked, worried.

“I'm going to get a nasty couple of bruises, but other than that, all good!" John replied reassuringly.

The gorgeous blonde moved to hug them both, but John held her off for a moment .

“Let's get inside the ship first, I'm still feeling a bit exposed here." He said, glancing over his shoulder at the writhing figures still lying in the slaughterhouse that the docking bay had become. Alyssa helped Sparks through the airlock on her shaky legs, while John entered the Cargo bay and pressed the controls that would re-seal the outer hull of the Invictus. He walked briskly over to meet up with the girls in the corridor and they took the elevator up to the bridge.

The door swished open quietly and they walked out on to the bridge. Alyssa watched her friend with amusement as Sparks stood open mouthed with awe at the technical wonder that was the command deck of the Invictus. The multi levelled bridge was illuminated with the Light blue glow of the holographical tactical images projected into the centre of the room.

Calara stood up from her tactical station when she heard them arrive and came over to meet them. ‘m so glad you're all ok!" she said, relief showing clearly on her face when she saw that they weren't injured.

“It's our very own deus ex machina!" exclaimed John upon seeing Calara and he moved forward to sweep her up in a warm hug.

“That was awesome honey, you were amazing!" he said proudly.

The gorgeous Latina beamed up at him, glowing with his praise.

"Thanks for the rescue you guys." Sparks said in a small voice, clearly intimidated by the massive ship and yet another ravishingly beautiful woman.

“Oh sorry, I'm being rude." John apologised to the girls. "Calara, this is Alyssa's old friend Sparks. Sparks, this is Calara, we're lucky to have her as the Tactical Officer on the Invictus".

“And she's quite lovely too!" Alyssa said warmly, moving in to wrap Calara in a hug. "You did a great job today Calara. Thank you for saving these two!" she grinned happily.

“You're all welcome!" the gorgeous brunette smiled at them, her deep brown eyes warm and friendly.