"Damn it! They took out the rear weapon control! We may as well be wearing a huge 'hit me' sign back there!" Taisa cursed as her fingers danced with practised accuracy over the controls of the ship, praying for some miracle that would grant her control of the ships weapons again.

"I think were easy enough to hit without the sign! They're too fast for us like this; we need to loose them somehow!" Kicho growled as she put as much power as she could get into the ships engines. The small black fighter was built for both seed and agility, but even its top speed was nothing compared to that of the monstrosity of space engineering that was chasing them.

For the third time since the other ship had gotten into firing range the communications screen flashed up with a very angry, yet triumphant face glaring at them.

"This is your final warning, your shields are now down and your weapons are inoperable, I suggest you hand yourselves in before we are forced to obliterate you and you little ship completely." the interspatial army general smirked at them, obviously confident that his infinitely larger, faster and stronger vessel was more than a match for their zippy little fighter.

"Oh get lost! Pompous old windbag!" Kicho snarled and whacked the communications control panel with her tail until the sneering face disappeared, "I hate it when they tell me what to do!"

"I thought you disabled the communications system?" Taisa glanced sideways for a split second as she launched herself across the ship to another console, using her tail to twist round in the zero gravity and latch onto the hand holds to stop herself. After pressing a few buttons the console let out a series of beeps and an image flashed up on the small monitor next to the station. "Aha!" she said, allowing herself the luxury of a small smirk, "I think I found our way to loose them!"

"Oh good, do tell" with a frown Kicho diverted the last of the power that they could spare from the communications system to the engines giving them only a minute burst of extra speed form the already over worked engines. A star map suddenly flashed up on the main view screen with small flashing beacons pinpointing the locations of their ship and that of their pursuers.

"You see this here?" Taisa pointed to a rather large planet orbiting the red star, "this planet is inhabited by a non space-faring people!"

"So..."

"So, those idiots that happen to be chasing us are forbidden from making their presence known to any pre-space flight civilisations unless they make contact first!"

"Oh!" as her friends plan finally clicked into place in her head and it was all Kicho could do to refrain from bursting out in a fit of maniacal laughter and taunting the captain of the following ship, "if we could just get into the atmosphere of that planet and land somewhere we will loose them!"

"Yup!"

"But what happens when we want to leave? Won't they still be waiting here for us?"

"Probably but we will just have to worry about that later! This is our best bet so let's just go for it!" Taisa snarled as she propelled herself back up to the scanning unit and began searching the planets surface anywhere suitable to land their ship.

"Brilliant! I hate being backed into a corner!" Kicho muttered to herself as she changed their heading and pointed their ship directly at the planed they had chosen.

"Looks like it's gonna be a splash down!" Taisa called down from the scanning unit, "This whole bloody planet is almost overpopulated! The only places they haven't built on are the mountains and the oceans! And I'd much rather fly down into some water than smack into a mountain side, eh?"

"Great! Not only are we running for our lives from a bunch of trained zombies all performing the same mind numbing tasks-"

"I take it you don't like the military then?"

"-but we have to land in water! Great! This has just, made my day!"

"Oh just do it!"

"Fine! But you can't stop me from complaining about it every step of the way!" Kicho ran her tongue over her sharp canines as she set up the correct angle to enter the planets atmosphere. No sooner had they first entered did an ominous looking red light flash and buzz into life.

"Shit! Were going too fast!" Taisa yelled as the ship suddenly started to shake violently as it was met with sudden air resistance.

"No shit!" sarcasm practically dripped off Kicho's voice as she tried to reduce their speed as much as possible, "the engines are overheated! They won't respond!"

"Damn it!"

"I can't get them to turn down! We can't reduce speed like this!"

Taisa paused for a moment as she strapped herself into a chair as she felt the planets gravity begin to pull at her, she took a deep breath and made a decision that could possible leave them stranded on the planet for a long long time. "Blow the engines"

"Wha- your gonna have to repeat that because I swear I just heard you say you wanted me to blow up the engines!"

"You heard me! Do it! If we don't blow them we wont be able to stop and they we will just end up making a very big hole in the ground!"

"Geez! I hope you know what you're getting us into!" Kicho sighed as she keyed in the correct code that would set of a specially built mechanism that would detach the main engines and propel them away from the ship. Both felt the loss of momentum as soon as the engines had been released, Kicho grasped the control stick firmly as she manually tried to keep the ship stable in their rapid decent. The redness of fire and heat caused by the friction of their ship against the atmosphere faded away and the pair were left facing the sickeningly quick free fall into the deep blue water which seemed to stretch on forever.

The last thing either of them saw was icy blue engulfing their ship and turning to white steam on contact before the force of their landing knocked them unconscious.

-X-

"Were did they go?" the general asked as the small fighter they were to capture disappeared from the view screen of the large military vessel.

"They entered the atmosphere of the large inhabited planet sir" the young man that was franticly tapping away at the main sensor console replied without even looking round as his sharp eyes scanned over the information his monitor was giving him.

"Well, what are we waiting for? Go and follow them!"

"But sir! We can't! That planet is inhabited by a non-space faring people sir! We are forbidden from making our presence known!"

"Fine! Report the situation back to headquarters! Retreat back to the planets last satellite and stay in its shadow. Get a sensor lock on that ship! I want to know the moment they attempt to leave that planets surface!" Ketsui, the general of the interspatial army snapped his order as he stormed into his private office to one side of the bridge. With a heavy sigh he sat down in his large black leather chair and stared blankly at the monitor that slowly rose up from his desk with a barely audible mechanical wirrr. His long slender fingers flicked over the keypad ad two images of the culprits he was pursuing flashed up on the screen in front of him.

"Audio account" he ordered the voice activated computer which began to recite all the written information that was held in front of him.

"Felaran citizens Taisa and Kicho. charged with 7 counts of illegal entry into private property belonging to 5 separate governments, 155 counts of minor property damage, 62 counts of major property damage, 6 counts of injuring interspatial law enforcement officers and 1 count of resisting arrest. Suspects have yet to be captured and charged. A warrant for their arrest comes with a #155,000,000 credit reward." the computer divulged all the general information concerning the pair that the general was due to capture and moved on to their personal information.

"Name: Taisa Tigris, Species: Felaran. Height: 5ft11. Description: Muscular build with strong upper and lower body. Displays the orange coat and black stripes typical with the Tigris tribe of Felarans. Black hair long and tied back in a single thick braid. Identifying marks: tattoo of a black dragon on right shoulder and ring tattoo on upper left thigh. Last seen wearing dark green Felaran regimental arm shorts and tank top. Weapons: a 'tiger claw' dagger strapped to right thigh and two automatic hand pistols on her left and right hip." the computer finished its account of the first of the pair and began with its account of the second.

"Name: Kicho Leopara. Species: Felaran. Height: 5ft10. Description: strong build, athletic, highly acrobatic, high agility. Bears the orange/yellow coat with black/brown rosette spots typical of the Leoparan tribe of Felarans. Short black/red hair that spikes out in different directions. Identifying marks: tattoo of a black dragon on left shoulder, ring tattoo around right ankle. Last seen wearing black military shorts and tank top. Weapons: two curved 'tooth and claw' daggers at left and right hip."

"End account!" Ketsui hissed as he stood suddenly from his chair and walked over to the window and gazed out into the vastness of space, "this is the reason I've spent the past 5 months flying half way across the galaxy to the most back water out-of-the-way system in the universe? *sigh* I can't even find my star anymore out here!" his gaze shifted to a small, slightly crumpled photograph held in his hand. He gently and tenderly stroked the face on the photo before gazing once again into the black nothing-ness of space.