Thunder Road

"Are the lifeboats away?"
"Burning as hard as they can, Admiral."
"Tomyris, please. We're both going to be dead in like, ten minutes. Spare me the formal bullshit."
"If you say so, Yousef."
Yousef pulled an orange lever and closed the breaker box, quickly pulling away from it and turning back towards Helot Station's primary command and control panel. The shimmering blue avatar of a woman with tall boots and a kaftan stood next to the big metal dashboard of buttons, switches, and screens. Behind her, thick, large glass panes displayed the stars for the command centre's audience. Which, at present, was just Yousef. 
"We should now have a restabilised direct connection with the station's thrusters. I just need to force a connection to this panel, and then you can do the rest."
Tomyris's avatar blinked and placed her hands on her hips. "You may want to hurry with that part. The aliens are breaking through those sealed bulkheads a bit faster than I had hoped."
"How close are they?"
"My reckoning is about 8 minutes, assuming they keep up their current pace, and not accounting for individual error."
"I'll get this done in a minute. We'll have plenty of time."
Yousef lowered himself to the deck and slid underneath the dashboard. The grey body armour he had pulled from a wounded marine was now starting to impede him, slightly, especially as it had been hastily and haphazardly put on over his navy blue duty fatigues, and it clearly didn't fit properly. He'd have to make do, though. He pulled open a panel, and quickly got to work cutting away a trio of wires. 
"You think we can actually pull this off, Tomy?"
"If you shut up and hurry up, we might. Wouldn't help to have a bit of luck, too, I suppose."
"Luck? Didn't know AIs were allowed to believe in that."
"I mean, really, I don't."
"Well, if it makes you feel any better, it's like my dad used to tell me. Sometimes-" He paused, forcing two wires together. They made some small sparks, but he still heard the tell-tale ding from the control panel. It was done. 
"Sometimes, we need to make our own luck."
He dragged himself out from under the dashboard and got to his feet.
"It's all yours," Yousef said, gesturing vaguely towards the dashboard. "Take her away, cap'n." 
The blue avatar gave a half-hearted, sarcastic salute, and then the deck shook as the thrusters kicked in. The station was in motion.
Yousef knew this part would be the worst. Now, all that was left to do was wait.
He pulled over a metal chair and slumped onto it. He unholstered the MK50 sidearm from his thigh. He examined it a moment, glazy-eyed, removed the magazine, checked its rounds, pressed it back in, pulled back the slide, then released it. He sighed and looked back up at Tomyris.
"Thanks again for staying with me. I couldn't do this without you. Literally." He chuckled, looking up towards the ceiling before bringing his gaze back towards the AI. "No way I could make any of those calculations. Did you know I flunked calculus in secondary school?"
"I did," Tomyris replied. "I have access to all of your records."
"Well, fuck you, too." He chuckled again.
"You know, there's definitely still time for you to get to a lifeboat. If you leave now you might even get clear of the blast." 
"Hell no."
"Why not?"
Yousef raised the MK50. "Someone's got to be here to make sure those aliens don't stop you."
"Do you really think you can pull that off on your own? You know, those naval infantrymen would have stayed to help if you had just let them. You had to practically force them onto those lifeboats."
"No one else has to be here. I wasn't going to let them." 
"I can show you a quick simulation of a firefight between one of you and three dozen Kig-Yar if you'd like to know exactly how effective you would be at holding them off."
"I believe that I can." 
"Well, you must believe pretty hard."
"I do." Yousef sat upright in the chair before leaning forward, pistol pointed towards the floor. "Listen, if those bastards can break in here and stop you before you can get throw this station at that destroyer, there'd be no point. I will not let them."
"It's one of my primary directives to protect the lives of people. I'm just giving you the best, logical solution to this problem."
"Do you think that this will actually make a difference?"
"What do you mean?"
"What we're doing. Will it have an impact on anything that's happening out there?"
The AI crossed her arms. "Well, assuming that we do kill this destroyer... yes, I'd say so. It'd be one less of those bastards our sailors will have to deal with. The Covenant might assume another battle group took out this destroyed and cause some confusion among their ranks. We may very well have a significant impact, assuming our comrades can take advantage of any of that."
"But do you know that any of that will happen?
"No, I suppose not. But I sure hope it would."
"There you go," Yousef leaned back in his seat. "That's belief. That's faith."
The AI's shoulders slumped slightly, and she seemed to have the appearance of being deep in thought. She turned around and looked out towards the stars. Yousef did the same, and there was a small, subtle dot that seemed to be approaching. He knew better, though. They were approaching it. Tomyris turned back to him.
"That may be the best way that anyone has ever been able to explain that concept to me. Thank you. It's only unfortunate that it took us being in this situation, at this moment for me to recognise that."
Yousef snorted. "Well, life's funny like that sometimes."
There was a distant bang! and Yousef jumped to his feet, pistol raised.
"They're here," Tomyris said grimly.
"How close are we?"
Yousef could hear footsteps and loud, frantic chirping outside the big steel door. Sparks began to fly as the aliens started to cut through.
"ETA is fifty-four seconds."
Yousef looked to Tomyris, who gestured towards the window. The distant speck was now a clear looking purple blob. 
There's the bastard, he thought.
"If you get to that corner over there, you might have a better chance. Distract them longer, maybe."
"Here is fine. I'd rather face them head on." He pushed the chair in front of him, aiming his pistol just over it. "I'm tired of running. I'm tired of losing. All we've done the past couple days is lose. I'm pulling out of here a win."
The door shattered, and spindly aliens entered the room. Yousef let off three shots, one of them catching a Jackal in the neck and sending him to the deck. The one next to him turned quickly, firing off a plasma blast towards Yousef, turning the metal chair in front of him into molten slag. Yousef stood up, firing another two shots, both of which hit home in the Jackal's chest. It fell, revealing a third which fired off two more shots, narrowly missing Yousef.
"Twenty-five seconds."
Yousef moved to pull himself away from the dashboard, and plasma shots followed him. He fired repeatedly, emptying the magazine. He dropped his left hand to one of the small pouches on his belt to retrieve a new one, when he felt a force like a punch in his left shoulder, followed by an overwhelming burning sensation. He felt the same thing in his lower stomach next, which finally send him to the deck. He laid there as wetness began to seep through his duty fatigues. He strained to move his eyes to see Tomyris. Footsteps approached him.
"You did it, Yousef. Thank you. Thank you."
There was a rumble like an earthquake, and then there was nothing.