Experiment: The Ravager Code

Creation and Destruction

When they fell away she didn't know what to do, it had been so long since they had come off. They left welts where they had been, silvery red and smudged black on her pale and scarred skin.

"She ain't walking' outta here," Kraglin told the other man, shaking his head as he looked at her legs, the torn pants that had been slid onto her before she was brought back to her cell doing nothing to hide them from him.

But she could faintly sense his heart hammering in his chest, feel his vibrations trembling slightly. But her sense of him was fading quickly as her eyes were becoming like lead. Her limbs feeling so heavy.

"I'll get her," the captain said. "Make sure they're doin' as I said. Be ready to get the hell outta here."

"Yes, sir." Kraglin nodded, sliding his tool back into place, grabbing his blaster from the ground. He looked at her once more, his glacier eyes giving her a reassuring look before he stood, leaving quickly.

Her vision was going black at the edges as the captain crouched in front of her, assessing where her worst damage was, his expression so tight she couldn't tell what it meant. His eyes moved towards the wall to her left, to the stars and the name... a distant look filled his eyes, and he swallowed again, holding his hand out to her. "It's alright, kid. Gonna get you out of here."

She tried to move, her arm going to brace herself, but ended up slipping and hitting her shoulder to the ground instead, her cry nothing but a rasping breath.

"Hey now, don't do that..." his husky voice was soft, almost whispering as he carefully put his one hand between her shoulders, his other beneath her legs. She winced as he lifted her up, her eyes squeezing shut.

"I got you," he told her, adjusting her light weight in his arms. She shuddered a breath, trying to grab the front of his jacket, but her grip wouldn't comply. She drug her tired platinum eyes up to look at him, his solid warmth a welcome comfort against her cold and frail skin.

"Your name Tessa?" he asked quietly, swiping a bit of matted hair from her face so she could see, some of the strands catching on her lashes.

She swallowed, her lips and mouth so parched, but when she tried to speak only a dull noise came out. She tried to tell him she didn't know—maybe recite her number as she had a million times—but couldn't form the words.

He smirked sadly, his eyes going weary again, and he pulled his bottom lip in a bit, she wondered if to hide the way his heart was skittering. She could feel it.

"Yondu Udonta," he told her, and she blinked, registering the name, storing it away. "You're safe now," he said again, and she let her head sag against his shoulder, fighting to keep her eyes open, to ward off the darkness creeping in.

He left the cell, holding her as gently as he could, stalking back through the metal halls like he had no fear in the galaxy, while she trembled in his grasp despite the reassurances.

There was shaking and blaster shots still ringing, the security breach alarms blaring overhead, making her whimper and hide her face.

His hand clenched on her back, as if to tell her not to be scared, even as he was silent and moving faster out of the cell blocks, up towards the main level and in the direction of the airlocks.

Kraglin was running back up to his side the moment they hit the main level, panting slightly, the smell of blaster discharge wafting from him. "No other lifeforms found, Cap," he said, adjusting the ammo pack on his blaster with the hand that clutched a blood-splattered knife. "We're ready to head out, more of those things are headin' up."

"What things?" Yondu growled, and he looked up at the clanking mass that came from where Kraglin had.

She gasped sharply, her breath hurting, but her fear shoved itself down her throat at the Hellspawn, those horrid, mutilated creatures that had been the ones in charge of hunting her every time she had tried to run in the early days, had threatened her and guarded her, tormenting her with their soulless red eyes.

Blasting started from down the hall, and Kraglin ran straight at them, shooting back, hitting the first one on the face before he lodged his dagger into its neck, a few other men that were on his team, those men in the dark red with the flames on their suits helping in his defense.

She whimpered again at one of the Hellspawn's shrieks, and Yondu looked down at her, putting his hand against the back of her head. She felt so small in his grip.

One of the creatures got past the others and pointed its arm—embedded with a huge automatic blaster—at Yondu, its eyes glowing an evil crimson, opposite to the flaming red the captain's did. "Release the subject," it said in its guttural, robotic voice.

"You want her?" he said it in a tone that made her stiffen, a drawling growl that promised death. Dark as night but fierce like fire. "Come and get her."

She shot her eyes back up at the shrill whistle that pierced her ears, then the pulsing buzz as a ruby streak shot through the air, tearing right through the creature's face, splattering its dark blood, sending it dead to the ground.

That red streak bolted again, zagging through the air faster than light, tearing through the Hellspawn like a dart from Hel.

She wanted to say something, wanted to thank him or ask him a hundred questions, but she just couldn't make her vocal cords cooperate, from both awe and exhaustion.

"Clear out!" Yondu shouted to his men, and they instantly obeyed, only turning to throw a few more shots into the midst, Kraglin getting right back next to Yondu's side, sheathing his knife, but holding his blaster.

The world was blurring, and she fought it, but the sights and smells were all merging and spinning as lights and dark and leather all blended.

She could hear more shouted orders, hear that hum from Yondu's weapon almost as well as his heartbeat under her ear.

She felt callused hands and gloved as she was passed from his larger arms to who had to be Kraglin's, and adjusted to his grip, his smell, like leather and ship oil and blasters. His arms surprisingly strong under her, even if not as wide as Yondu's.

She felt a brush of gloved hands across her chin when her eyes slammed shut again, her head pounding as she shivered, the oblivion settling in again.

The feeling of drifting entered her senses beneath her, a rush like moving so fast through emptiness. Then she was slipping, all noise lessening to a distant thrum as darkness took her.

She did remember someone's voice echoing into the void... telling her it was going to be okay now.