Gothilim was shielded.

Liala didn’t care.

“Clips, you ready to try again?” Liala reset the stabilisers and checked the integrity of the hammer. Her jaw worked faster, chewing an old wad of gum that had lost its flavour at least an hour ago. 

“Captain,” a voice crackled from above. Without looking, Liala sent her fist crashing into the ceiling. The voice continued, a little clearer now. “Hammer integrity is rapidly decreasing. At this rate—” 

“Aw, no.” Liala paused in her prep and slid her chair along a track in the floor to the right. She blew a gum bubble and snapped it with her teeth, then hummed as she looked over the controls. She only had time for a quick fix; she’d need to look into what made the AI revert later.

After a few buttons and levers were pushed and pressed, Lala slapped the console for good measure. Hitting stuff on the Apocalypse always seemed to make it work just a bit better.

“Clips?” she called as she slid her chair back to the main controls.

“Here, Captain!”

Liala grinned. This time, there was a wild edge to the controlled AI voice. “Ready to try again?” she asked. 

“Let’s do it!” Clips cried, his digitised voice filling the cockpit. 

“That’s the Clips I know and love. Got a lock on the weak spot?”

“Showing up right now.” A yellow box appeared on the viewport, highlighting a small area of space. To the naked eye, there was nothing there. But as Liala flipped on infrared scanners, a red layer appeared over the desolate grey planet below, almost as if someone had ensnared it in a bubble. A nearly impenetrable bubble. 

Liala revved the engines. The hammer locked into place, a massive spike that fixed into place on the front of the ship. That thing was supposed to be nearly impenetrable, too. Though she wasn’t entirely sure if she believed the claim from the guy she’d stolen the Apocalypse off of three cycles ago, the hammer hadn’t failed yet, and that was something. 

“Captain?” Clips asked. Lala spat out her gum—glancing away from the viewport just long enough to watch the wad sail straight into a trash bin—and strapped herself in. 

“Battering attempt nine,” Liala called. “Here we go!”

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Photo by Ammar ElAmir on Unsplash