Coffee

AAAAAAAAAAH! AAAAAAAAAAAH! AAAAAAAAAH! AAAAAAAAAH!
“Oh….GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOD IT HURTS!”
AAAAAAAAAAH! AAAAAAAAAAAH! AAAAAAAAAH! AAAAAAAAAH!
“Why did I even set you?!
AAAAAAAAAAH! AAAAAAAAAAAH! AAAAAAAAAH! AAAAAAAAAH!
Jay fumbled around for the snooze button on his alarm clock, but his fingers simply groped blindly across the devices surface.
AAAAAAAAAAH! AAAAAAAAAAAH! AAAAAAAAAH! AAAAAAAAAH!
“SHUTTUP SHUTTUP SHUTTUP!
Still failing to find the off switch, the alarm’s relentless electronic yell intruded into Jay’s vulnerable skull, making it feel like every bone in his head was rattling around. He gave up on the button and picked up the wireless device, hurling it across the room where it sailed through the open door to the en-suite bathroom, cracking the mirror and bouncing off where it ricocheted off Phil’s head (who had apparently crashed here last night) before plopping gently into the toilet he was leaning over and vomiting into.
Jay flopped back onto his bed and massaged his temples.
“Murgh”
He slinked off the bed and stumbled into the adjoining living area. The place was a mess. Seemed he and Phil came back here for more drinks as empty cans and bottles strewed the floor, open packets of wotsits scattered around, their contents trodden in to the car park and and Xbox controller was lodged in the cracked screen of Jay’s TV.
Apparently Phil had beaten Jay at Fifa.
He picked his way across the room, careful not to step on any leftover snacks or broken glass in his bare feet and stumbled into the kitchen, grabbing for the coffee jar.
It was empty.
….and empty coffee jar.
How in the name of FUCK COULD IT BE EMPTY? Jay hurled the jar across the room where it broke and slumped onto the counter, clutching his throbbing head.
There wasn’t any way in hell he could cope with this hangover without coffee.
“PHIL!” he yelled through to the bathroom. Instantly regretting it when it felt like someone was sandpapering his eyeballs.
“HUUUUUUWWWAAAAARGH!” came the reply, followed by a second to wipe his chin, then “…what?”
“You got any coffee at your place?”
“No.”
“Fine…come on we’ll go to Starbugs”
The duo had managed to reach the promenade in reasonable time, despite Phil needing to stop to vomit in every plant pot, bin or mail box he could find and Jay shuffling slowly so as to not make his head implode. Each wore sunglasses as even the dim lightbulbs of the ships corridors burned.
“Double espresso…” Jay mumbled as he got to the front of the queue at Starbugs.
The Gerbil barista took Jay’s thumbprint as payment and handed over a paper cup of coffee, which Jay raised to his lips.
A shot was heard (making Jay’s head scream internally) and Jay’s coffee poured from a newly bored hole in the side of his cup.
Despite the chaos around him as people ran screaming, he didn’t move for a second, just closed his grip around the cup, crushing it angrily before a second shot fired and made him dive for cover.
He yanked his pistol from his belt and checked the ammo. Phil doing the same alongside him.
“Who’s shooting?” Phil asked.
Jay popped his head over the overturned table.
“…smeg…”
“What?”
“Stcp…”
“What are they doing here?”
“Smeg knows…I thought they’d given up on trying to bring us in!”
A squad dashed past the coffee shop heading toward the lift.
“Where are they going?”
“Toward engineering…SMEG..THE TIME DRIVE!” Jay realised, and leapt over the table, firing off a few shots at the squad.
The STCP enforcers whirled on the spot and seeing Jay opened fire.
“That was a mistake” Jay mused he realised his error, and now had four assault rifles bearing down on him. The enforcers opened fire, but Jay was able to leap aside quickly enough and move into a combat roll, rolling into the front door of the promenade’s branch of Costly Coffee”
He clambered to his feet.
“Coffee!” he snapped at the Barista “Now!...To go!”
The Guinea Pig nodded and handed over a Latte.
“It’ll do.”
Gun in one hand, coffee in the other, Jay ran back out into the Promenade shooting at the enforcers one-handed while still clutching his coffee. The Enforcers actually took cover giving Jay chance to duck down behind a coin operated Thomas the Tank engine childrens ride.
A stray shot pinged off the ride, setting it off and knocking the coffee from Jay’s hand. Chrysler watched as the beverage spilled across the floor as the ride exclaimed how it was a really useful engine!
He looked up and spotted Phil moving across the mezzanine level, above the enforcers with a rifle he’d managed to procure. Jay seeing an opportunity to help Phil, popped around his cover and let off a shot into the coolant pipe near where the enforcers were gathered, the gas leaking out around them and clouding their view allowing Phil to leap unseen off the edge of the mezannine, landing on two enforcers as he did, knocking them out cold.
The gas cleared, and the remaining enforcers rounded on Phil, who rolled aside quickly as Jay let off suppression fire.
The lift arrived and the agents clambered in.
“Cass!” Jay yelled into his radio “STCP aboard – heading for engineering. Think they’re after the time drive…”
“We know!” replied Cass “We’ve run into a squad near the medi-bay”
“Ok. Do what you can…PHIL! They’re not alone…”
The duo ran into the second lift and followed the enforcers.
After a few minutes they reached the engineering deck. Jay managing to grab a coffee from the vending machine along the corridor. Before he took a sip, it became clear that the enforcers were already in the Reactor control room, one of the agents appearing in view, holding the time drive which he’d obviously recovered from it’s hiding place.
“Sir! We’ve got it! Let’s move out!”
Jay and Phil charged into the reactor room, only to back out when the squad leader nodded and gestured to a member of a second squad, who pulled a device from his pack and placed on the side of the reactor core.
“Smeg…PHIL, it’s a timed charge!, They’re gonna blow the core!”
The enforcers teleported out almost instantly, and within the time it took Jay to blink, the timer reached zero.
Jay and Phil took cover behind whatever they could as the explosion filled the engine room. (Making Jay spill his third coffee)
A claxon sounded. “ALERT ALERT REACTOR CORE BREACH ALERT ALERT! OVERLOAD IMMINENT!”
The blast doors surrounding the core lowered, sealing the room, and Jay and Phil, outside.
“What the fuck do we do now?” Phil asked.