Shadow Deliveries

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I spent thirty seconds being annoyed by the heat interrupting my sleep before the panic set in, by then it was too late. My eyes wouldn't stay open in the light of her. Blue-white, she was everywhere. Took me thirty more seconds to squint out the displays being dead, by then The Flottvogn came apart. The canopy bowed and bubbled, boiling borosilicate splashed across me. The walls of the cockpit oxidized and crumbled to ashes. The chair I was strapped to caught the solar wind and pulled me back for about a half second before the harness burned through and I was left as free as a soaring desert avian through the bottom layer of her corona. At last my flightsuit gave, tearing away like a candy wrapper. I started to sublimate.

I snapped my eyes open, displays were out, I jammed my lids closed against the glare. I grabbed at the stick but there was no power, I was cold. I must have screamed, I wiped spittle from inside of my visor later. I flailed for another moment, before I looked through slitted eyelids out the canopy again to see only the twilit interior of the hangar outside. I undid the flight harness with trembling hands. I rocked my head back and fourth to shake away the nightmare. I wobbly-legs'd my way from the chair to the back of the cockpit to make some coffee. I jabbed at the controls on the Chef and ordered pouch of tri-white/tri-sweet. The Chef instead produced a green-condiment hotdog sitting on a circle of paper, then emitted a cheerful chime. I picked it up and gaped at it, its acrid scent burrowing into my sinuses. I had never ordered this before, I would never have ordered it either. Suddenly it became very important to remove this thing from The Flottvogn. In my shell-shocked state I even carried the 'dog through the whole ship to the aft egress ramp, instead of just lifting the canopy like I usually do. I was a little surprised to see nearly full holds as I passed through, I had fallen asleep in the middle of a haul again. I made a note to look at what we were carrying later.

My search began on the docking pad, but admittedly only the half of it that had a stairwell. No obvious refuse receptacle to be found. I expanded my search to that stairwell, and then the area of the docking ring it lead to, finding nothing. Knowingly, I began moving towards the terminal building. Directly outside of it I managed to find an old-timey metal can for garbage, with a polymer bag lining it and everything. I dropped the verdant 'dog into it producing a ringing wet slap from the bottom of the empty cannister. I stood there silently satisfied with myself for a few moments before I realized I was standing inconveniently close to the terminal building doorway. I started to walk away from the terminal to remedy this. I didn't particularly feel like seeing any desperate faces right now.

I continued to walk deeper into the starport, theoretically I was now searching for coffee. In practice I was just walking, it didn't take long for my legs to protest so I decided to walk a little longer. I was running an internal monologue admonishing myself for the shape of my legs; hurting after fifteen minutes in no more than one third gee. I'd thought of a few clever insults for myself when I caught the scent of the coffee. It was somewhere in front of me on the right side of the almost deserted lane. It had a different flavour about it, but it was definitely coffee. I found it, a little eatery that had a pair tables outside and some poly-plant vines draped over a framework jutting from the fascia. An unlit physical billboard read 'Trellis Bistro'. Unfamiliar words, 'Food and Drink' in the local dialect maybe. I wandered inside and was awash in the most glorious coffee smell I'd ever smelled. It permeated the whole tiny, badly lit place. There was some kind of blaring noise echoing throughout.

I moved a nearby chair from its place inverted on a tabletop, to the floor by the seat-less bar and dropped myself into it. I made enough racket doing so to announce my presence over the racket that already was present. The grating sound stopped suddenly and a few moments later an apron-clad man with a shaved head, no neck, and massive tattoo-sleeved arms peeked sideways out from a doorway behind the bar. He swept his gaze across the room until he landed it upon me, he looked surprised to see someone sitting there. His face transitioned rapidly from a scowl to a smile, though. Seeing I wanted service, he sprung out to take my order.

“What'll it be, Commander?” He produced a small bundle of paper sheets and a stick from a pocket underneath his apron, for some reason.

“Uhh, Lemme 'ave a coffee... An' a whiskey.” I looked at my hands on the bar, “Uhm, Please.” He returned his mysterious tools and sighed.

“Oooh sorry pal, I'm afraid we have this local statute and all. I can't serve for almost another hour, but if you wanna wait; I can make sure to get yours out first.” I was a little bothered, showed it on my face. He pursed his lips and added cheerfully. “I can get you that whiskey right away though.”

He deftly produced a glass, pulled the drink into it from a tap behind him, and handed it to me before trotting back through the doorway. The blaring noise started back up. I took a tentative sip of the whiskey. It certainly cost less than I was charged for it, but it wasn't bad. I set it aside to wait an hour for my caffeine.

The sound coming from the back ended shortly afterward followed by some other, less annoying, but no less mysterious bubbling and hissing noises. I hadn't thought the wondrous coffee aroma could get much stronger, but it did. The barkeep popped back out and seemed relieved at my disinterest in small talk as he busied himself setting down chairs and turning on lamps. Slowly a few other patrons filtered in and placed their own orders. The entrance being unbarred implied that it was not the case, but I seemed to have entered before opening.

Suddenly a plain ceramic mug was placed between my hands; steaming, velvety-black liquid contained within. I looked up at the burly man who had placed it there, three plates of food balanced on his other arm. He then produced a metal rack and placed onto the bar-top with a fluid motion, a rack containing several interesting containers. One contained some liquid whitener and another carried a slightly moist, brown, crystalline sweetener. A third, smaller one, had a number of thin flat rods sticking out of it. I concluded the rods were for stirring the drink, on closer inspection they appeared to be made of wood. I reached instinctively for my pipe but saw the dreaded red and white plaque on a wall, I'd have to wait until I undocked to light up. I barely needed a few drops of the 'Cream' and the sweetener had this caramel tinge to it. Best coffee I've ever had, even with the long wait and black silt at the bottom of the mug.

I was nursing my second coffee and keeping an eye on the whiskey when The Tough waltzed in. He grabbed an unoccupied chair from an occupied table, and ignoring the stares of a few other patrons, dragged it over to the bar and sat down next to me. Young but built Lakon-strong, he either amateurishly or unceremoniously looked me over after he ordered his beverage. The barkeep gave him a tired look. I pretended not to notice him as I continued to nurse my mug.

“Ya-a long journey eh mate?” He shot from the lip of his little glass. “I'll tell ya-a know it, if-n-ya ax.” He looked at me expectantly.

“S-Sorry?” I wasn't really sure what he had just said.

“Ya-a pair-a cups there mate. Wake-up and shut-down. I-a know you not heading out mate, or ya-a drinking tha-a wrong way eh!” He laughed and patted me on the back, I smiled and agreed with him. He downed his shot, I sipped my mug.

“Yer-a that Seven out there I seen with-a fucked-eh paint mate?” Here it came, it was only a matter of time. Why else would he start talking to a Commander like me.

“Ayup, she's with me.” He wouldn't ask if he didn't know, so he wouldn't appreciate me lying.

“Ya-a haulin' aught mate?” More useless pretense

“Maybe I am. Maybe I ain't.” I returned his aimless banter with my own.

“Well-a mate lemme-a just step up from bein'-a nobody-a met in-eh bar.” He waved the Barkeep over from a distant table.

“I'd-a like-eh pay me-mate's tab.” The barkeep looked at me then back to the tough, his eyes narrowed, then he sighed and took the payment. I knew that sigh, it was the one that said 'You should do that somewhere else, but at least you're paying.'

“Ya-a maybe wanna talk-a business now, eh mate?” His tone had darkened. I put down my now empty mug and retrieved my warming glass of spirits. I took a swig and decided I was tired of subterfuge.

“Drugs? Naw. It's stolen shit ain't it? You look like you wanna have me move stolen shit” I drank again “What're we talkin' here, three tens? Five tens?” The suddenness with which I dropped the pretense had him taken aback, I think I heard the barkeep fail to stifle a laugh as he walked away.

“Eh-a whats-a 'Tens' eh-mate?” He finally managed. I sipped my drink before answering. The Toughs hardened expression was put to a stress-test.

“'Tens o' Tonnes' I'm askin' how big a run you want me ta smuggle here, boy. What you want ran would be nice ta know, also.” I scoffed at the new-blood. I'd done it, I'd said The Ess Word. The Tough went paler than the parts of me underneath the folds of my flightsuit. His newfound pallour told me he only needed a few singles moved.

“Oh-a no-eh ya-a me all wrong eh mate, I ant askin'-aught like-eh.” He said a little loudly as he waved his open-palmed hands for the benefit of nobody. “I-a need-a book some passage mate, snot-a far-a eh mate?” He gave me a pleading look, I gave him a blank one. The Tough sweated, I drank.

“Ya-a won't wanna get spotted eh-a doing it though, mate.” He eventually added in a hushed tone, followed shortly thereafter by a promise of more credits than would have piqued my interest. He may have been new-blood but he had a fat wallet, or was working for someone who did.

I knew it was bad news when he wasn't in either of the cryopods he wanted loaded, actually that's a lie: I knew it was bad news as soon as he offered to pick up my tab. He wanted them dropped off a few jumps away in a supposedly uninhabited system. He told me the colony was new, I was dropping off a pair of frontiersmen. An amateurish lie. One of the cryopods was dinged up pretty badly, the other was missing its I.D. plate. Both bearing various Lingua-Imperialis marks. Bad Gottdamned News. He rode the loading ramp alongside the pods, I would have tried to stop him if I'd noticed in time. We followed behind the cargo armature to the back of The Flottvogn's aft-most hold.

“Eh? This-a lot got-a name to-it yet mate?” He gestured at the racks full of canisters. Canisters that I took note were full of food cartridges, the alginate-ammunition Chefs used to print out edibles.

“Might be it do, yeah.” I told him, more truthfully than he knew.

“Well-a ya-a may change ya-a mind-a that, eh mate.” He gave me a sly look “Colony-a need-a lot like them-a-two eh, could use-a lot like these-a too mate” He continued to point at our cargoes. I decided I liked this man even less than before.

The pair of us watched the armature secure the pods then stow itself. He looked over at what was now the only empty slot in the aftmost cargo rack. The only conspicuously empty cargo slot anywhere on my beloved Type-Seven. He turned towards it on his heel.

“Hey!” I said reflexively to stop him, before I'd decided on what to say. “I ain't mighty pleased with what's happening here.” I gestured at the pods, to give some context to my outburst.

“Eh? Mate?” He turned to face me, widened his stance a little. I filled the air with words.

“I ain't no fool I know what this is. I don't like hauling folks like this.” I was steering the conversation blindly.

“Mate, you-a wouldn't ask-a me-a-mo' credits? Eh?” He tilted his head dangerously. I needed to tone this down.

“That would be uncouth. I jus' ain't a fan o' lyin' 'bout things. If I weren’t gonna do it, they'd not be in 'ere. I-I just want it out in the open what's goin' on.” He seemed pleased with that. Told me I'd understand when I landed. This man seemed to be trying to be unlikeable, he was succeeding.

Starport security was light as we passed through the docking corridor. A warm iridescent red glow emanated from the nearby star as I spooled the shifter. We jumped to a close system, selected for being more-or-less directly faced by the docking corridor and being without any settlement. I was 'cruising aimlessly at half throttle, scooping a little fuel, while I plotted the rest of the route. My comms panel suddenly opened up, 'Ronnie' Rodriguez had something 'important' to tell me. I jammed the throttle to full with one hand, and finalized the route with my other. I had no interest in hearing what Mr. Rodriguez, or his shiny Viper mark-four had to say. I began to spool the jump hoping we had accelerated quickly enough to keep his interdictor out of range. I saw on my scope that he had already changed tune and begun to give chase. Just a couple more seconds and we were out of there.

A warning light began to flash a scant millisecond before The Flottvogn shook and bucked. A blue haze formed around us and the mass of 'Robbie's ship dragged us back. He pulled us off target for the jump just as the spooling finished. I had to keep our frame shift field stable. Fighting the stick, I eased off the throttle: almost enough to be pulled out. The shaking subsided, but The Flotvogn's hull continued to wail. The iridescent tunnel eased back across my jump target, but I wasn't quick enough. I chased it with the stick, throttle-hand gripping tight. Again the tunnel swung favorably, but the frame shift field was starting to let go, the tunnels waving was getting faster and less predictable. My throttle hand hesitantly twitched once, then again. My flight-stick hand bore white knuckles beneath its glove. For a fleeting moment the HUD coalesced from myriad icons and warnings to only one, 'Full Throttle To Engage'. I hastily complied.

The wavering, tubular shifter-field lashing us to the Viper unraveled spectacularly, shimmering ribbons of energy whipping all around. The Flottvogn pulled forwards from the Viper. As the distance between them grew the frame-shift field closed back into spheroid, and centered itself around the larger ship. Simultaneously The Flottvogn stretched and glowed brilliantly to shoot off towards its jump target, while the Viper tumbled and slowed as it was gripped by the laws of physics and dragged to a shattering relative-halt. 'Ronnie' probably hit realspace still going about a thousand meters per second.

We slammed into the next system, throttle still maxed out. The Flottvogn was still wailing at me with her hull, and her alarms. I had barely enough time to feel the shot of adrenaline run through my veins at the sight of the proto-star before us, growing. I pulled back on the stick and the throttle at the same time, too late. Her shifter cut out automatically to save us from ourselves, we tumbled for a few seconds before I could get the thrusters back online. Slowly the klaxons subdued and we were left in silence, but for the faint roaring sound of the pre-coronal gasses we swam through splashing against the hull. I looked over at the system panel to get an idea of damage; the thrusters were the most hurt, FSD was gonna need a tune up, but the power distributor had seen worse. We were lucky this little plasma-ball wasn't really fusing yet or we'd already be ash, should be under ten thousand credits to get her ship-shaped again. I breathed a sigh of relief, told my ship we had it, and aligned to the next star.

We arrived after a couple, thankfully less eventful, jumps. I was about to chirp my disco-scanner when I noted, with some surprise that there was a Nav-Beacon. Its signal was spotty but it was there, not something I expected from a 'new colony'. I 'Cruised closer to it hoping to resolve it properly and download navigational data. “Compromised” read a small red warning label next to it on my HUD. I hesitated for a minute before Nav-Locking to it and dropping out.

The Flottvogn let me know there was no system security response here, not a big issue as there was no system security at all. I saw the beacon before I pinged it with the sensors, It was catching light from behind us. It looked dead, didn't respond to the scan either. I knew its high-gain antenna had power so I edged closer to it. Maybe the low-gain was damaged, the signal could just be very weak. At about fifty meters The Flottvogn finally heard it, data flowed. I took a peek at what we were getting, I was relieved to note the navigational data packets at the top of the list. I skimmed the rest, most of it news and mail, none of it newer that thirty-two eighty-nine. Back home they say 'no news is good news'. Never really understood that idiom myself, but in that instant I fully understood the ramifications of the opposite; I didn't need to read those news packets, they were bad news.

A tiny sliver of light caught my attention in the distance beyond the beacon, slightly starboard and a few degrees dorsal. I shot my eyes to the spot and stared for a moment, a gossamer ribbon ebbed in and out of visibility. My reflexes said to put it behind me and run, but there was a little bit of a star there, so I pointed The Flottvogn perpendicular to the stellar surface with my new friend as behind us as I could and punched it. We hit up to cruise just as their signature was ghosting on our scope, hopefully their sensors were no better than ours. Odds were they didn't know my final destination, or they would just have gone there, and with them having just dropped out; I had their cool-down period as grace. So I went to 'Cruise, and crow-flied to the planet I had been sent to, that's an antique phrase. No clue if anyone outside of Altair says it anymore, It means to fly in a straight line. Strange for an idiom to outlive its namesake by a few centuries, perhaps I'm just from a strange place. I throttled down as I slipped into the planet's gravity well. A sickly looking world, almost a whole gee, metal deposits, probably terraformable. Looked a little geologically active for my liking though, as I 'Cruised around to the day-side. I decided to drop out into low orbit while I tried to figure where to land, I hadn't been given superbly specific instructions for that.

I fiddled with my cheap P.A.D. Looking at the nav data I'd just gotten when my attention was snapped away by a dreadful sound.

“Ship Scan Detected.” The Flottvogn told me pleasantly.

My blood ran cold. I let go of my P.A.D. carelessly to grasp the controls, it was probably the same ship from the Nav-Beacon. I scanned them back... Gottdamned 'Robbie' Rodriguez! His Viper bore a black stain running along her back from the fissure in the patch of hull where the interdictor device used to be. His hardpoints were deployed revealing burst lasers and frag-cannons. He was circling us, if we were lucky we were only about to loose cargo. My comms panel sprung to life as he finished his scans.

[DIRECT] ['Robbie' Rodriguez]: Interesting...

I no more expected that response than I expected him to turn around and Low-wake out. I had roughly five seconds to be bewildered before The Flottvogn decided to throw her two credits in.

“Warning: Capital Signature Detected.” She said with her patented cheerful indifference.

I watched a hole be torn in space between us and the planet below. Monolithic, the behemoth was birthed from the darkness beyond the rend. My chilled blood froze as dark energy arcs leaped jaggedly from the slowly sealing tear, while the endless stretch of cold metal dragged itself into being. They were very close, I could feel in my teeth that The Flottvogn had caught an arc with her hull. I squinted to read the nameplate on the Farragut's starboard side. F.N.S. Carol... maybe Glory? I didn't know her either way. Her paintwork was marred badly. I established sensor contact and tried to calm my heartbeat, The Federal Navy being here in force was random, but at this point I was ready to pay a fine and thank them for it.

The three centimeter long holographic version of the Farragut on my display panel that was slowly turning to point towards me was red, this is about as bad as news gets. My pulse returned to its uncontrolled state. I looked back up at the starport sized warship bearing down on us, tagged by the heads up display in a similar red with the name Kraken. She finished her maneuver: bearing nose to nose with, and terrifically dwarfing The Flottvogn. Her port side caught what little glow there was from the nearby star, I could make out light escaping through missing hull. Black marks crisscrossing hasty patch-job repairs. Her weapons were fully online though. So too was the burgundy hundred meter tall skull emblazoning what was left of her skin. Pirate-priorities. They were hailing us.

“This system belongs to Archon Delaine, Commander. Forfeit your cargo, your ship, and you may be permitted to live!” The pirate spoke with a cheerful tone, clearly enjoying his station in this encounter.

“Who we talkin' to?” I stalled for time to size up how fucked we were. If we were lucky, he was the kind of pirate who lived for that question.

“I am Dread Captain Kane, Master of the Black-Ship Kraken.” He was. “Flagship of The Kumo-Crew's Third Exploitation Fleet. Known, and feared, throughout the Pegassi sector for our ruthless secrurement of the territorial claimings of The Kumo-Crew.” Having invented a few words to obscure his subordinate authority, he started naming potential people he'd mayhaps killed, of whom I'd never heard anyway. I closed the channel.

I pitched down a little, put all the power we had to the thrusters and boosted past their nose. Now the tricky part: pitch back up, arrest lateral motion, boost again and pull down. Full throttle, get hit in the face with a loose P.A.D. Now skim their underside so their turrets can't lock, all we had left to do was make like a tree and get out of there. It took a few seconds for them to even start turning around after I'd taken off. I'd like to imagine the bridge crew each trying to see if someone else was going to interrupt the monologue to tell 'Captain' Kane I had started to run.

“We only doin' this 'cus you made me that Gottdamn green 'dog!” I yelled at The Flottvogn. “We make enough distance 'tween us; they ain't gonna manage a target lock!” I had no more let the words out of my mouth when the line was flash-drawn from behind me, across the top of The Flottvogn, and into the surface of the planet below.

Silent, blue-white, the instantaneous brightness of the line was burned into my vision for some time afterward. That was really close for a manually aimed shot, their gunner must know what they're doing. Actually I have no idea how hard it is to aim a Bombardment Accelerator, but I assume it's dificult. On the surface, where the fleeting beam of light had prodded, I could see fissures forming, and spreading. Only for a moment though, before they were hidden by the rising burning plume.

The other shot took the starboard main thruster cluster, and most of that side of the hull with it down to the surface; like we weren’t even there. The canopy spider-webbed like the planet did, but stayed in place somehow. The entire ship deformed outwards from where the shot bisected her, breaking the seals on her remaining bulkheads, atmosphere vented aft-ward.

“We got this!” I told my dieing vessel, and myself. “Full lateral thrusters and we can hold a descent! Landing's gonna be rough. But We Got This!”

I tightened my grip on the controls and repeated to myself that we had it, I pushed the throttle up and twisted the stick. The uncontrolled spin we were enduring started to ease off. I swear to you; She started to ease out of it. Then the fusion generator fused its last. The flickering spastic displays went dark.

“...No?!” I begged, The Kraken had already started to break off, they knew it before I did. “No... I'm sorry!” I wasn't ready to be alone again.

I looked through the cracks, and the smoke, and the sparks at the surface below. We were drifting along the equator, further into the day as we went down. We weren't going to fall into the catastrophe that killing us had placed on surface below. We could have landed on safe ground.

I might be okay in an escape pod.

It took me longer that I'm happy to admit to unbuckle from the chair. Even after I did, I watched through the fractured canopy until I started to see shock heating.

“...I'm sorry.” I crawled over the top of the chair and jumped to the door in the back of the cockpit. I climbed up the corridors flooring to the back of the ship.

Through another door, I pulled myself aftwards with my hands until I found a jagged edge where I expected more grating to be. I looked at the shredded alloys in front of me for a moment, then turned my attention upwards to where the wall once was. Half this hallway was gone, there used to be a cargo rack between here and the starboard hull. For a moment I watched as the universe tumbled outside, alternating from the day below and the night above. I caught a glimpse of The Kraken firing their engines.

The cryopods, I should eject them. I didn't know why, but I suddenly felt that would be a nice thing to do for them. Besides, the escape pods were in the back of the aft cargo hold anyway. I continued to climb up to the rear of the ship. I was nearly at the last door. Something gave, either the atmosphere got thinner, or we lost some mass, I dunno. Gee-loading shifted and I slammed face first into the door. I lay crumpled against it for a moment before it slid open automatically and I fell into the cargo hold beyond. Then the gee-load shifted again, I weighed nothing for maybe an entire second and was suspended in the space between the cargo racks, until slowly I started to fall back towards the bow. Fortunately the door had closed behind me so I slammed onto my back against the other side of it. I fought the electric shocks of pain running from the brace embedded alongside my spine out to my extremities. I clawed for, and managed to hit the lock button to keep the door shut.

I looked upwards at the aft wall of the cargo bay; there was no obvious way to climb to the escape pods, let alone to the racks containing the cryos. It dawned on me as I stood up that I was firmly within the bounds of what some Lakon-Spaceways engineer had decided was the short end of a cost-benefit analysis. Then, in a moment of inspiration I turned to the wall mounted controls for the cargo armature at my feet. I bent down and commanded the armature to align with the last rack. It sprung to life gliding slowly past me like nothing was amiss, and seemed not to be bothered by my grabbing onto it either. I rode it up to the back of the cargo bay reaching out and hitting the eject buttons on each of the two racks containing a cryopod as I passed. The pods slid sideways into the floor and away. The armature came to a halt at the last rack in the bay, where my little box of keepsakes was. Was. The box had tumbled away to somewhere during the fight. I should have kept it secured better, and I realized that there was precisely no time to search what was left of the ship for my keepsakes. At least I had my pipe, I patted the pouch on my belt only to feel the sickly crunching of broken wooden splinters. I straddled the cargo armature motionless, but for the shuddering of my ship's corpse. I stared blankly upwards at the escape pod hatch. After some time the distinct sound of a large section of hull plating peeling away broke my trance. I hesitantly crawled into the escape pod and launched it.

I wasn't so far behind the two cryopods, I could see them falling and cutting plasma trails through the sky below. The atmosphere buffeted my escape pod, rolled it. I saw The Flottvogn, she was rolling too. We danced together, our first dance apart, our last dance. We pirouetted tightly towards the ground below. Our trajectories, and her hull slowly pulling apart. The rotational velocity of the escape pod increased, the shock plasma grew in intensity. The flames became blinding and the spinning pushed the blood to the back of my skull. I saw red before I saw nothing, I had the dream again.

This time I was already soaring naked through her blue-white embrace. I felt the heat, but it was fine. There was no sudden transition within which to feel the fear and now I was already as one with her photosphere as an eagle was one with the sky. I only noticed that I had evaporated after the cloud that was my essence started to transition into a high-energy plasma state.

No, no wait... That couldn't be right. I think I must have missed a bit. No, that's right, I was in a glass tube. I blinked the imagined brightness out of my eyes. A glass tube laying on it's side in a pile of dirt. I ran my half numb hands along the walls until something beeped. In a glass tube, in a pile of dirt, with a jammed hatch. I braced myself to cry, but my adrenal gland made a convincing argument to wait until later. I did get the pod open, no way to tell if I broke my ankle doing so or in the crash, but I was out.

I was on emergency air, my suit let me know every thirty seconds. I was going to last a couple of hours, and it seems Zorgon-Peterson weren't lying on the box about my flightsuit's emergency automatic splint action. Meaning I could mostly hobble around while I listened to a running count of how fast I was suffocating. I was in a crater, maybe made by the escape pod, maybe older. It looked a little big for me to have made but, well I'm just the projectile not a geologist. I crawled up the closest rim and realized I was in a town. I sat on the outside of the crater's edge and tried to take in what I was seeing.

The town stretched in two perpendicular directions in front of me, and presumably the same behind. The crater I was in, that may have been a small five or ten story building before, was at an intersection. As I noticed more damaged structures dotting the streets, I decided that the crater was probably not caused by my landing. I saw a few abandoned surface vehicles and open storefront doors, something was wrong. Not just the horror-holoshow 'Ghost Colony' vibe, something was missing.

Airlocks, there were no airlocks. I looked at my wrist again to verify my suits readings. Sulphur dioxide, carbon monoxide, nitrogen monoxide. There was Oh-Two but not a lot, plenty of Oh-Three though, zero moisture, yeah nobody was breathing this. Yet this was clearly an open air colony, or had been once. I hobbled towards the nearest vehicle. It had four wheels, shaped like a half bubble with flat sides, and round lights giving it an insectoid appearance. The vehicle was optimistically designed to seat four but barely looked big enough for two. The side hatch opened, dislodging a thick layer of dust. I squeezed inside and looked at the control panel, there was a big wheel in the middle of it for some reason, but there were pedals so I had yaw. No wait, there were three pedals, what the fuck. I changed tactics and searched the inside, this payed off. A hidden compartment in a blank area of the control panel revealed some papers, probably the previous owners valuables which I didn't want to worry about. But I also found a map. I unfolded it, and then unfolded it more. The ever-unfolding paper began to take up most of the space around me in the cockpit. I slid past it, back out of the hatch and pulled the map with me.

I was looking at a survey of the surface area between what I surmised was this town and another nearby. Hawthorne City and Raleigh's Prospect, the map showed fictitious farmland covering the eight or nine hundred kilometers between them. It seemed a tiny imaginary village of maybe a hundred thousand sat in the middle too. I was sharing a grave with no fewer than twenty million souls. I looked up at the sky, there were bright streaks flashing, clearly visible against the green-yellow of the daylight. Like a ship dropping into realspace, but thousands of them, millions. The whole sky, like a meteor shower that wasn't there, only magnesium white and regulated. I shivered, I'd never seen anything like it before. Had no idea what I was looking at.

My confusion was cut short by the Scarab Ess Arr Vee bounding over the crater my pod was in, flaring its thrusters a little and slamming down onto the road. It slid to a halt ten meters away from me. I would have said I was beyond being startled at that point, right before it near enough startled my drawers full. Someone in a black flightsuit with a fur-collared leather jacket draped over it climbed out of the buggy and jogged over to me, they were clearly speaking but I couldn't hear them. I could only hear my suit counting down my air reserves. They waved a hand in front of my visor, so I nodded. They roughly grabbed my arm and touched a control on my wrist, the emergency air warning suddenly shut up and a familiar voice burst into my helmet.

“I don't know who you are, but you're gonna be a hero when we get you back.” My old friend Captain B. Wald told me as he half-dragged me to the Scarab.

I concluded that I must still be in the escape pod, desaturated of oxygen, hallucinating. Waldo had me strapped into an unfolded seat back to back with him as he took control of the buggy, I accepted my fate. I was a little disappointed in my hippocampus' lack of creativity with this dying fantasy, but it would do.

“You okay back there, that was a hell of a crash. I was worried I'd find paste, but you tough motherfucker was just walking around.” I wasn't sure what to say, I mean he wasn't there. I wasn't there, but some catharsis would be nice.

“I'm sorry I ran Waldo. Not from Altair that was alright, from Korwei. I shoulda stayed.” The Ess Arr Vee came to a sudden, grinding, thruster-assisted halt.

“It's nice to get a chance to say it 'fore I go-” I added just as Waldo dragged me from the seat and out of the buggy.

My ankle protested dully as he stood me up. He held me by my shoulders looking through our visors, trying to see my face. We stood in silence beside the buggy for a few seconds before he took one hand and touched it reflexively to his visor, near his eye. Then he looked at his finger and laughed.

“Well, I'll be a monkeys uncle!” I could hear the smile in Waldo's voice.

“What's a monkey?” I had to ask my friend, maybe Altair's not the only weird place.

“You are!” He jabbed, placing his hand back on my shoulder.

“What?” I drew out the word in my confusion. I was not yet entirely sure what was or was not happening.

“It's ancient slang for 'Primate'.” Waldo giggled as he answered and gave my shoulders a slight squeeze.

“Oh, I didn't know that.” I started to weigh the odds of my subconscious inventing this.

“Look, we gotta keep moving I'll explain along the way. This is... Just...  Wow!” He gestured back towards the Ess Arr Vee. I hopped over and got in, he followed.

I decided that my subconscious was neither creative enough, nor interesting enough to have my death-throes include visions of being confused. My old friend didn't hesitate to get the buggy moving at full speed again.

I ended up filling him in more than the reverse. I started my story at the Nav-Beacon. He muttered 'good' when I mentioned jettisoning the pods. I was relieved to learn that I had made some incorrect assumptions about what was going on, those pods were stolen, and they were slaves, but this 'colony' was about as legit as a fake colony could get. A dummy organization was purchasing slaves through ordinary black markets and freeing them once they could be moved far enough from the point of sale. The installation here was a 'stop on the railroad' according to Waldo.

“Then who's that fucker in orbit that killed mah ship?” I demanded.

“Stolen Farragut? Fan of the sound of his own voice?” Waldo inquired.

“He called himself 'Captain Kane' A blowhard, but... Well, he has a fine gunner aboard.” My voice went a little darker.

“Hold up.” Captain B Wald was trying not to laugh. “You're joking right? 'Captain' Kane? A month ago he was calling himself 'Archimedes Kane' you don't think that...” He trailed off and we both burst out laughing. Inventing your own title is one thing, stealing someone's earned one was something entirely different.

“He says Delaine personally appointed him to put an end to our operation.” Waldo explained, once he'd contained his mirth. “I doubt it though, ass-hat probably figures if he can bring the right head to the right stick he can turn a few of his titles into reality.” My friend's distaste for the pirate was inspiring.

“He didn't follow me 'ere?” I knew he had, I wanted Waldo to know I hadn't meant it.

“No, they were already in the system, hassled a few other traders before now. Besides, Kane's been courting after me for some time.” They were certainly closing in thanks to me.

“Doesn't matter though, we've been working on a more permanent solution.” I was about to ask my friend to clarify when the tremor hit. Waldo momentarily lost control of the Scarab and we slid, then tumbled. He managed to get us airborne then drop us back down vertical onto the shaking ground.

“What is going on?” Waldo muttered as he started to drive again.

“Might be from the shots they took.” I mused “There usually quakes here?” I asked as well.

“Not since... Shots?” Waldo looked over his shoulder with the question.

“The Siege Rail-gun.” I told him nonchalantly, with a vague gesture at the sky. “Since what?” I added.

“They shot you down with their Bombardment Accelerator?” Waldo asked, his voice trailing off slightly.

“Like I said, their gunner knows what they're doing. When was the last quake?” I asked again.

“The last time the planet was hit with one of those, about thirteen years ago. But the planet was the target back then. The planet died from it too...” Waldo said quietly. We drove in silence for a while longer, I looked out through the canopy above me. It was the only real view I had of something other than the body of the buggy, I saw the streamers again, glowing in the sky.

“That's chaff up there, ain't it?” I didn't really need to ask anymore. The scars of a war long-over were now the only identity of the nameless world we drove across.

“Yeah, and ship parts. Lots of chaff though, the ship parts tend to fall back down over time.” My friend answered, his voice still slightly-off from what I'd told him.

“Just stays up there.” I concluded aloud.

“It oxidizes though, stops making good chaff after a couple of years.” My friend added.

“It always do that, if there's enough of it?” I wondered. I'd seen the clouds of alloy shavings that an orbital battle could generate. It hadn't occurred to me before what kind of impact those clouds were capable of.

“I don't think so, only if the atmosphere is right. Or maybe the gravity... Both” I felt a little shrug through the seat.

“Only with luck.” I didn't specify the variety.

The tremors subsided fairly quickly, but it took a while longer to reach our destination. Saw it long before we were there though. About a kilometer and a half of tower stood off kilter peeking over a ridge in front of us, looked like a damaged traffic control tower, or part of a shipyard maybe. As we approached the base of the ridge Waldo made a turn and started to drive to the left of the spire, he was aiming for a valley. On our arrival it became apparent that the valley was man made, we darted into an enormous metal and glass tunnel cut through the rock and left unburied. The ragged entrance revealed a space big enough to fly a ship through, and curved slightly to the right back towards the tower I'd seen. It had windows looking out above, and oddly, to the inside of the curve. Revealing a sliver of a view up into the valley and a massive stretch of rock face on the side. Most of the windows had lost their glass too. The windowless side of the tunnel, the outside of the slight curve, was coated in seemingly pointless, building sized crenelations jutting sideways into the space above our heads. Encroached sand constituted our driving surface and blanketed every surface..

We cleared the tunnel and with it the ridge, revealing a large dusty plain. Across the dunes the base of the tilted spire was visible, as was another, much shorter, section of the tunnel lying pointlessly a few kilometers adjacent connecting one bare patch of sand to another. Where the spire touched the ground a massive edifice was haunched, like a pre-fab surface hanger only infinitely larger. With its form scattered I'd failed to realize what I was seeing until I saw the cutaway opening in the front of the spire's foundation. Even partially sunken into the dune, even with the lights long gone dark, I would recognize a mailslot anywhere. The Ess Arr Vee. passed through the cavernous docking corridor into the darkness of what was left of the Orbis Starport.

The only illumination inside the dilapidated docking ring came through a massive conical hole funneling outwards from what had become the ceiling above us through the outer hull. Three hundred meters wide at its narrowest point. A ragged shaft of light stretched through the gaping wound down to smear across the sand before us. As we drove under it I looked up through it at the haze-clouded star producing the thin illumination. A sudden intimacy with what had caused that exit wound dawned on me. We cleared the spread of the sand and were suddenly riding on deck plating, Waldo followed a roadway to the right. Gravity rolled beneath us as we climbed the curvature of the former docking ring.

“Here we are.” B. announced as he brought the buggy to a halt next to an abandoned Type-Nine.

The craft had buckled landing gear across its starboard side dropping it from the steep angle of the deck under it, to a nearly horizontal inclination. We stepped out of the Scarab. and made our way up what remained of the Lakon Heavy's egress ramp. Some time with my weight off it had done wonders for how my ankle felt, the low gravity on the planet was nice too. The airlock door slammed behind us with a discordantly well maintained swiftness. Pressure shifted and a chime sounded. The door into the Type-Nine's dark wet-room slid open.

Waldo stepped through the airlock door before swiftly removing his visor, then the back-plate of his helmet, and stuffing both into his jacket. He called into the darkness around us as he shook his hair out. I hesitantly stepped through after him only to be blinded by the activation of the onboard lighting.

“That was quick! You manage to salvage the transpond-o- Oh!” A dark skinned man wearing a mechanics pocketed jumpsuit and flipped up protective goggles stepped into the wet-room and was silenced by seeing two of us. He fixed his glassware glare onto me. “Oh by the gods, you've lived!” He cranked his teeth together expressing his mystification, setting his lower jaw at as odd an angle as the deck underneath the ship we stood in.

“You have no clue Reggie!” Captain B. exclaimed. “Get the others!”

The others turned out to be a surprisingly small group of people. An olive-skinned lady named Amanda with a stern expression, a designer suit, and a vertically matched set of ponytails. Followed by a man who bore a striking resemblance to the barkeep with the great coffee, only this one had chosen to cover his face with tattoos. Waldo had us all gather in what I surmised may have been a fighter bay long ago, but now was now serving as an oversized area to have a mess hall in the center of. Having introduced me as his 'hero friend from that siege he helped break years ago' Waldo launched into filling the group in on how I had arrived at the surface. I was sat at one of the tables sipping from a pouch of coffee, eating a rudimentary sweet cake, and letting the morphine tablets I'd taken for my ankle kick in.

“That madman Kane had them bear down on him with their Bombardment Accelerator! But what does Commander GoreWound do? This bad-ass over here doesn’t even flinch, just boosts past them to the planet like they weren’t even there! Took not one, but two shots with that thing to almost slow him down.” Waldo was good at telling tales.

I would have preferred to keep a low profile, but that seemed to have become out of the question when I was without my faculties, or maybe you just loose your low profile the moment someone takes a potshot at you with a Starport-Killing-Gun.

I'd learned that Amanda was here to represent the coffers of the anonymous investor group funding the gig, and Reggie was the technician they hired to keep things working. Tattoo-face was a mercenary pilot named Derek. Amanda decided the time was right for us all to learn that that those cryopods needed to be found before the pirates did, because only one of them had a slave in it, the other contained someone who knew too much. A plan was formulated: we needed to locate the corpse of my ship. From there, and with a little luck, we could work backwards along her trajectory to find the cryopods. Once that was taken care of the rest of some other plan to stop Kane could be enacted.

“Okay I'll have to leave my ship here so I can drive the Ess Arr Vee, which Derek has to drop.” B. Wald finalized with: “And GoreWound can be air support.” My friend looked at me expectantly

“An' how I gonna do that?” I figured I would end up driving the buggy, and sincerely doubted Waldo was about to loan me The Highwayman.

“Oh... Good thing I fueled it up, just in case then.” Reggie said knowingly.

Derek simply quipped that he flew whatever the company gave him, and Amanda only reiterated that time was an issue.

Once back outside the falsely abandoned freighter, Waldo climbed into the buggy and told me to follow Derek. As my friend drove into the darkness I trailed behind the hired gun towards a stairway leading more-or-less down into the hangar. I had to ask him to slow up for me, my ankle didn't really hurt anymore thanks to my suit and the painkillers, but I wasn't taking a cockeyed set of stairs quickly. A series of lights had been rigged up along the walkways, illuminating the only path relevant to the operation. The remainder of those cavernous spaces were so dark they could have not been there at all. The string of lights we were following suddenly forked, by my reckoning we had walked most of the way towards the next hanger over from the one directly under the Type-Nine.

“This is me, that's you.” The hired gun told me as he gestured along each of the ways ahead in turn. He sauntered down his path at his more natural pace, leaving me to mine.

The last bulb gave way to an arrow of luminescent tape on the ground, and then several more like it. By the echos of my oddly timed footsteps I assumed I was inside a hangar. There was certainly a ship there, I discovered by catching a stabilizer wing with my head as I traced my way through the darkness. Using my hand to track its shape I wandered around it until I found a small, barely lit panel on the aft of the ship. I fumbled with it and was suddenly bathed in stark red light, the ships aft-hatch slid open, and a small step sprung out.

The inside of the vessel was lit in the same red, empty webbing stowage racks and sealed compartments lined the walls. The interior was spartan, and much smaller than groping the outside of her hull would have suggested. I stepped through a door into the cockpit, thankfully the harsh red light was lessened in there. The chair was modern; where The Flottvogn had a three point harness and high-density foam-polymer, this vessel has a sixteen point adaptive mag-lock set and smart-alloy memory-form padding. I eased myself into the chair, the mag-locks gripped the structure built into my flightsuit suddenly, causing a short, sharp spasm in my lower back. The displays awoke automatically, a rough synthetic voice croaked out module names as they received power. An ominous thrumming sound echoed from behind me as the thrusters came on line.

“Damn! You ain't a nice girl are ya?” I asked the Core Dynamics craft I sat in as I looked over the modules readout: class three beam laser and multi-cannon, shiny railguns, armour, lots and lots of armour. I whistled at her encouragingly. “Cee-Dee sure built you thick, hun.” I mused, letting my hands fall into place on her flightstick and throttle.

“Just who d'you think you talkin' to?” He asked sternly from behind me and to the left. My shoulders sank.

“Go away pops.” I told that old haunt of mine in the co-pilot's chair without bothering to look at it. I used the comms panel to let Derek and Waldo know I was ready.

“You left me this nice empty seat 'ere, I think I'll stay a while 'n catch up.” He sneered. “S'been too long.” He added, accusatory venom dripping from his immaterial tongue.

“I figured we was done with this shit.” My comms panel let me know the door tended to stick. I hit the launch button and the mechanical voice told me to wait.

“Yer ship don't even ask you nicely.” He let out a single mirthless laugh. I heard the sounds of an opening bay door transferring through the walls, followed by engines blasting in an enclosed area. Then a nearby snapping sound, and a sliver of dim light cast itself diagonally across the hanger the ship I sat in sat in.

“You scavv' this ship? You gon' be lucky even get off th' damn ground.” The sliver widened into a ribbon, then a column. Slowly the whole hangar became bathed in the sickly glow. The ship deactivated the locks holding it down and we began to float a few centimeters above the still tucked away landing pad. Pops cackled. I shook my head a little and looked through the canopy at the hangar wall in front of us. I flipped a switch above my head to retract the gear. Then another switch to activate the landing lights, the glare they added to the situation was un-illuminating.

“Fer safety” I spat at my haunt as I tweaked the throttle and the flightstick dangerously.

The powerful shields projected around the vessel rang and threw sparks off the lip of the hangar ceiling, and the edge of the docking ring floor. The craft, the poltergeist, and I all flew through the gap and out into the docking ring.

A vortex of dust carried through the mailslot after my new craft and I. We sailed overhead Derek's Asp Scout which was squatting down to retrieve Captain Wald's buggy just outside the ruin.

“Those idiots gonna be worth it to ya?” Pops sneered from the co-pilot's chair. “The shit you got ta bring into a dogfight anyway?” I sent a message letting Derek know to follow me, I had a decent idea where to start looking.

“Coulda saved yerself a trip, shoulda gone down with yer Cheap Lakon Shit-Box.” I didn't dignify that with a response, other than to set the throttle to full. Taking altitude under her stubby wings the way a desiccated animal takes in water, the Assault Ship roared skyward. A flick of the wrist pointed her towards the resting place of her predecessor and her top-market thrusters had us going there fast. Her scope showed a crisp baby blue ping behind us, fighting to keep up.

The largest piece of The Flottvogn had made it to a patch of dusty nothing that had been the thick of farmland thirteen years ago, gouging a six kilometer trench through the sand. The rest of her discernible parts were splattered between here and the horizon that was marred by volcanic clouds. We flew low on our approach, a pair of Cobras were parked beside the husk. Living up to their title, the pirates were dragging the few surviving canisters from her bones.

[DIRECT] [Derek]: They look busy, we should move on from here without alerting them.

“Coward.” I pretended not to hear the poltergeist

[TO Derek]: I'll lag behind in case they follow.

“What's this then? Have a change of heart?” Derek and Wald continued on, clearing a ridge ahead. I let off the throttle and started to yaw the craft around.

“They shouldn't be touchin' her.” I growled as I opened the throttle to full, back towards the scavengers.

“Yea-haw! You do 'em in, like you did me!” Pops cheered.

The closer of the two Cobras was gone before they had any warning, with its shields powered down and sitting there they didn't have a chance. I overshot them though, and by the time I had come about; the second had managed to launch. Judging by their trajectory they were trying to escape back to orbit, and in a cobra they were going to outrun me. No ship on the market can outrun tungsten alloy magnetically accelerated to relativistic velocity though. It took more time to catch back up with Derek's little Asp.

Our two vessels flew in loose formation along The Flottvogn's descent path. Keeping an eye on our sensors. Trying to strike an altitude balance between scan range and our own sensor visibility. “They gon' send more after that stunt. Stupid.” I knew it. I looked at my scope. Suddenly I got a ping but it was loose.

[TO Derek]: Three degrees west, probably at least two kilometers out.

[DIRECT] [Derek]: I don't have it on scope.

[TO Derek]: It's there. I'm breaking off. They're coming.

“You ain't some hot-shot, yer done if you do it like this. Rule one: Stay low.” He sneered.

“And show 'em where the pods are?” I gave the thrusters what there was to give and we took off into the sky. I deployed the hardpoints, and started to roll the ship in a screw-pattern as we climbed. Making heat.

Not too long after Derek fell off the scope something stuttered onto it above me. I leveled off, from up here the planet's curves were highlighted. The lazy circle I was drawing in the sky let me see the pair of towns below and the stretch of man-made desert between them. Behind Raliegh's Prospect I could see a distant mountain range, my view panned along and the ridges subsided into a plateau supporting the town where I'd landed. Beyond Hawthorne City I saw the wall of dust and ash thrown up by the Bombardment Cannon stretching laterally, enveloping the horizon.

“Quit sightseeing ya idiot, they's here.” The fastest of the pirate wing had already closed the gap, an Eagle, possibly out of Gutamaya I didn't really look. Before my sensors were ready to tell me if he had shields up I saw them loose coherence under the weight of the beam and fail. The cannon burst was just to make a point to his friends.

“Those two look like they know what they's doin'. Unlike you.” Vultures, a torrent of pulsed laser-fire strafed my shields and I reversed the direction of my turn. They tucked in behind me desperately trying to bring the shields down. Gee forces mounted as the dorsal and ventral thruster sets rapidly traded the job of keeping us from falling. The pair opened their formation vertically to try and double their attack vectors, I cut throttle and disabled the flight assist. I pulled the nose up to put our belly into the airstream, we started bleeding speed. One pursuer shot past me immediately and the other was forced the break upwards to avoid impact as air resistance and gravity dragged us into his path. I let us fall for just a moment with the Vulture foreward, before re-enabling the assist and giving full throttle skywards. He should have been faster than us, but I don't think he was expecting us to stick to him like that. The beam laser started to carve away his shields. We almost had them down when his second grabbed third place in the lineup. A missile roared past and into the night above as we followed the wide turn of our prey back towards the horizon. There was another missile, probably more, these two were already defeated. The one in front of us was being felled by the railguns and the cannon while the other ineffectually threw ordinance into our shielding.

A fourth entered the fray, another Eagle, this one definitely Gutamaya built, he shuffled with the Vulture behind just as the one in front caught fire and started to drop. We broke randomly, shaking the lager ship. A cluster of relativistic tungsten rods pelted the ventral face of our shield, another like it and we were nearly without them. The pilot of that Eagle was good, maybe even good enough. We aimed at the ground, The Eagle followed vying for the killshot. We narrowly dodged a third blast from his railguns by raking the throttle and the stick back and shuddering ourselves into a vertical orientation. We fired the thruster boost and slammed the throttle forwards. A fourth cascade from his railguns was loosed wide in panic as he tried to break away. He only managed to show us his belly.

“Shields Offline... Target Destroyed” Croaked the mechanical voice of my new vessel unironically over the sound of metal rending outside. My haunt and I spat a disconcertingly similar pair of laughs. Where was that Vulture with the missiles?

[DIRECT] [Kumo Crew Watch]: Screw this. I can just let Kane's new pet merc get their claws on you too.

I planted a pair of hyper-velocity souvenirs in their aft hull plating as they low-waked out.

“He said 'too' stupid, yer idiot friends'r fucked.” The ghost was dead right. As hard as her thrusters would I shot back towards the ground, pulling horizontal seventy meters up, we flew in the direction I last had sensor contact on them. The dunes below us ebbed away faster than I could focus on them, we probably had a hundred meter high sand wake behind us. The shakey sensor contact I had gotten before was gone, but we jetted past a cluster of wheel tracks and a crater. They had the first pod, we only needed to catch up. Just as before I scoped a jittery blip, only now it seemed to be jumping back and forth from the ground to the air nearly a kilometer up. Or it was multiple contacts. I peered above us trying to make out contrails or laser-flashes. The windborne chaff enveloping this world was doing us no favours there, even if it had no effect on our sensors. I started to gain altitude and resolved the contacts. Derek was dogfighting an Adder at high altitude, I throttled up just before I saw the headlights casting across a dune below. I held back on the throttle reflexively, and hesitated for a moment holding our vector, before throttling back and nosing down.

“Fuck that fella then?”

“He can hold his own, Waldo's nekkid down there.”

“Whatever ya gotta tell ya'self ta feel right, Murderer.”

Captain Wald seemed to have the scent of the pod by the way he was tracking with the buggy. The scanners on those things tend have better range than a ship, but lower fidelity. I caught sight of the crash site by following his headlights before the scanner even guessed about it. I was holding an overwatch pattern about two hundred meters above him, should another ship or buggy show itself they'd be minced.

[DIRECT] [Captain B Wald]: There you are! Feels good to have a friendly up there again.

[TO Captain B Wald]: Derek's keeping an Adder busy somewhere above us, shouldn't be long.

“Till he drop outta th'sky burnin'.” My haunt added sarcastically.

[TO Captain B Wald]: One of the scavvers mentioned Kane bought help.

[DIRECT] [Captain B Wald]: We've been hearing that for three weeks now, no sign of him yet, probably more bullshit. Pod's less than a klick out, stay frosty.

Waldo was slowing down as he pulled up to the pod. I added another thirty meters to our altitude for visibility, and gave myself a great view. A hulking figure stepped out from behind the escape pod. There was a flash of intense blue light casting long shadows across the sand. Waldo's Scarab was tossed onto its side, throwing several of its wheels. The figure began to march towards the still tumbling buggy.

“Do try'n miss yer pal down there.” I drowned him out with the beam laser, but only managed to draw a line ten meters in front of the mercenary. They walked over that line unphased, crunching the sintered sand underfoot. I passed close and rolled the ship. The mercenary was massive, wearing power-armour by the look of it. I tried to come around for another pass as quickly as I could but the mercenary was already tearing a panel from the side of the pile of the buggy. I'd lost the opportunity to fire again without risking a hit to Waldo.

“Ain't too late ta get outta here.” The poltergeist suggested.

“Ain't too late ta shut yer fuckin' mouth.” I spat out in return.

“Landing Gear Deployed.” The ship concurred.

I ploughed the military-grade vessel into the dirt close as I dared to the buggy, did it hard enough to glitch the displays too. I tried to get out of the pilot's chair but was locked to it magnetically. I slapped the part of my torso that was supposed to have a harness latch over it.

“It's that one ya gottdamn disgrace, go get yerself killed. I'll wait.” He was looming over me jabbing a button on the arm of the chair with his finger. I slapped his hand away and then pounded the button, I was given a little push upwards and stumbled to my feet. I ignored the shock of pain from my ankle, and the one from my back, and I made my way out the rear of the cockpit. The tiny hallway leading to the airlock at the aft of the ship had a series of hatches lining its walls. I frantically opened one after another desperately searching for a weapon I assumed was there.

I ignored yet another 'Do Not Open' sign; plasma rifles, four of them. I grabbed one off the rack and checked the cannister, its LED indicated a full charge. I tried to wrap the sling over my shoulder but it was complicated, there was no time to figure out the webbing hanging from the rifle so I didn't. I mashed my palm into the control panel for the airlock and vented the breathable air from the vessel outside in my haste. I leaped from the hatch into the sand below, my ankle gave way on touchdown and I planted my face squarely into the dirt. Using the rifle in my arms as a crutch I pushed myself back onto my feet, and limped out from behind my ship. Between the morphine and the adrenaline, I was still moving.

The mercenary was towering over the wrecked Ess Arr Vee. a hefty pistol in their hand, they appeared to be sizing me up. I leveled the rifle towards them and pulled the trigger, They dove behind the buggy reflexively, faster than I though you could in an armoued power-suit. Their defensive leap was in vain though, I'd forgotten to disengage the safety. Swearing at myself, I fumbled with the weapon until it wanted to shoot for me. I aimed it again but to my dismay the hired gun had already dragged my friend out of the wreck.

“Put him down or I'll shoot you!” I yelled through my helmets vox-unit over the blowing sand.

“Drop your weapon, or I shoot him!” A slightly muffled, and to my surprise female, voice rolled the retort off their tongue at me.

I fired a bolt of bright pink death into the sky to accentuate my point, I flinched more than the mercenary did. Waldo seized the momentary distraction to slip out of the jacket the mercenary had gripped in her off hand, and with a fluid motion produced his dueling saber. I had a chance to fire when the Massive Mercenary shifted her focus, but I didn't think to until the pair were already in melee with each-other.

Waldo could best about anybody with his Holva Blade, according to his reputation, but his foe had almost a meter of height on him in her armour. Uselessly wielding the plasma rifle I watched as they danced. The freelancer was quick, they must have customized their powersuit. I edged closer and caught a glimpse of lupine form to her helm, under the air supply tubes. Their ballet was almost too quick for me to watch.

B slipped the tip of his blade past her defenses but she stepped back, riposting with Wald's jacket. He sliced it out of the air, and flourished a slash towards her. She parried with her handgun, sparks flew. She tried to level it at him, but he pirouetted to her inside and cut at her with his sabre. For a nanosecond I thought it was over, but the gleaming metal slid past her belly without drawing blood, or breaking environment seals. She brought the butt of her pistol down onto the nape of Waldo's neck.

Against an un-empowered combatant Waldo would have been the one to end it there, but instead the freelancer was too fast. She was too strong. She caught him as he fell, and pulled his limp form close. The barrel of her pistol was pressed against my friend's head for my benefit. The melee began and ended in the same moment.

“Again, drop your weapon or I shoot him.” Her somehow booming, muffled voice made my hands shake.

“N-no you drop yours.” My voice cracked. She tilted her head almost imperceptibly.

“You fail to grasp your situation. You are without leverage. No one on planet desires I kill Captain Wald. Drop Your Weapon!” I lost the chance to reply to what she said when a flash of light was cast down on us from above.

The screaming thrusters on Derek's little Asp alerted us to his arrival shortly before the  pieces of the Adder made planetfall. The burning wreckage landed half a kilometer away shaking the ground as Derek skipped his ship over a nearby dune pulling up for his approach to us. His shields shimmered and glowing-hot sand was cast in our direction. I was completely distracted by this, looking away from the mercenary to gape. To my left there was suddenly a flash of intense blue light, my helmet shut out the sound protectively, but I felt the shockwave pass through my gut. A gout of blue fire stretched from the Massive Mercenary's firearm into the night. A cascade of sparks blasted off the underside of Derek's ship as his shields collapsed. A second shot was loosed in an instant, this time the energetic shower was blasted out of the top of the craft. The second shockwave pushed an acidic taste into the back of my gullet.

The main thruster flickered and died as an uncontrolled spin took hold of them, Derek's Asp vanished over the ridge behind us followed by a raucous burst of sand and noise. The bounty hunter had her gun back against Waldo's unconscious head before I could process what was happening. I think I saw a wisp of smoke drift away from where the now discoloured barrel was touching his helmet. She didn't need to repeat herself, I had already dropped the rifle to my feet.

She latched a pair of manacles on Waldo's limp wrists and activated a beacon she pulled from her belt. She told me to move and stepped on the plasma rifle, which spurted pink flames and snapped in half. We marched over the dune Derek had grazed on arrival. Well actually The bounty hunter marched, Waldo was draped over her broad shoulder, and I hopped along as best as I could keeping a close eye on my feet. Before too long she seemed to have arrived at her Ell Zee and she waited. Some time thereafter I caught up, a beat-up old Hauler was already drawing close.

Once it landed she pointed at me then at the ship, I tried to go as fast as I could. I slipped on the ramp but She caught me by my belt, and placed me onto my knees inside the hatch, then she stepped over me into the airlock. The breathable air that flooded in carried moisture with it, on contact with the sulphur and nitrogen clinging to us, it became a mild acid. Steam rose from us for a few seconds, the airlock got warmer from the exothermic reaction. After the steam and off-gasses had vented away; the door into the Hauler opened with a chime. We stepped through.

She strapped B Wald's limp form into a bench in the back of the Hauler, I hobbled over and strapped myself into the same bench. I learned that the beater was built as a shuttle for some place called Pausch Landing from the decayed advertisements still affixed to its interior. That, and there was 'new' luxury living accommodation in addition to their 'well known' shopping centers.

The Hauler's pilot launched and rocked the nose up and down searching for a clean angle out of the atmosphere, it seemed the vessel was lacking a Shifter. We were going to take a little while to make orbit. Waldo let out a sigh and rolled over as much as the harness would allow. He started to snore rather peacefully. The bounty hunter produced a small bottle from her belt then shouted towards the cockpit.

“Where is Eff Ess Dee? This wessel had one when I was dropped off.” Her helmet had no vox-unit, She had been shouting through it the entire time. I was only now close enough to tell.

“We had to pull it for Boltcutter's Eagle.” Our pilot replied over his shoulder, a dark twinge to his tone.

“You need new one now, yes?” Her question was answered with a silent nod. She made a growling sound of affirmation with her throat.

She turned to look at Captain B.'s limp form, before she fixed her gaze onto me and blinked a couple of times. Then she turned her head towards our vector and squirted a few droplets of liquid from the bottle in her hand into her eyes.

I looked more closely at what I had thought to be the wolf-form helmet of the mercenary's power armour and realized I had been wrong. She reached behind her head and disconnected the tubes leading there from her mask. With a pop and a hiss the mask drifted away, clearly having not fit very well over her muzzle. She caught the cluster of tubing and stuffed it into some webbing beside her before shrugging the air bottle off of her back and doing the same with it. The light grey fur on her shoulders stood up as she stretched her neck with an audible crack. She flicked her ears at me, I turned away. I looked over to Waldo who was still out cold, murmuring lightly between snores.

The beater rocked then went still as the pilot M.E.C.O.'d. My inability to predict the ships motion from back there was messing with my stomach. The bounty hunter pulled her weapon from its holster and fingered a release on its side. The gun unfurled allowing her to remove three of the six cavernous alloy casings from its cylinder, she pocketed the empties and replaced them with huge fresh rounds. She snapped the weapon back together with a flick of her wrist and slid it back into its holster.

I'd seen a revolver back home, dueling pistols and the like. Nothing like that thing, just traditional three-barrel pull-bolt guns. This looked like it was machine-carved from a solar-forged alloy ingot, and designed to fit in a power-suit's scaled up hands, or for the Massive Mercenary's oversized hairy paws. I'm not learned about these things but the bullets just looked like bullets, huge but not strange. Derek and I both knew what they could do though.

After replacing the weapon her hand traced over her belly, she poked an elongated fingernail through a gash running horizontally across her newly yellowed shirt, revealing nearly white fur beneath it, she sighed.

“A spare.” She suddenly responded to the pilot. I turned my head towards the cockpit, confused.

“-the point in that then?” I caught the tail end of the pilot's question.

“He made valiant effort to save his friend.” She glanced over at me for a moment “Stupid, but valiant.” She added, in a strange tone.

“Ha! Didn't know dogs could keep pets!” The pilot laughed, she made a different sound in her throat.

I slapped the left side of my helmet, a slight buzzing sound responded. It seemed that her shots had blown out an audio rectifier. We sat in silence, but for the occasionally flaring thrusters as the pilot circularized.

I was almost nodding off when my shoulder was shaken roughly. With a start I looked around, Waldo had woken up. He had escalated to shaking me when I couldn't hear him speak from my left. His face was the picture of excitement.

“This is the greatest thing that's ever happened to me!” He was saying. I shook my head trying to figure him out.

“Really? From over here it don't look like we doin' so good.” He shrugged in partial agreement.

“Okay yeah, but aside from that. I got to sword-fight an Alien today! An honest-to-goodness sentient Space-Alien!” It took me a moment to piece together what he was on about, I shared a confused glance with our captor before replying.

“Her?” I rocked my head in the bounty hunter's direction.

“Aye!” B. beamed.

“Me?” She interjected, incredulous.

“Aye?” She just snorted and shook her head dismissively in reply to my friend.

“I hate ta break it to ya but, she's no Thargoid Waldo.” I'd hoped that would be explanation enough.

“Aww, seriously?” Wald's crestfallen question hung in the air. She chuckled a little and focused on something else.

“Yeah, didn't they go over this in history class on Hutton? She's Human-ish.” I hoped I wouldn't have to be the one to explain this.

“They might have, I skipped a lot. For real, how?” I'd hoped to no avail.

“Uhh... Probably not less than... A century-ish ago you'd see whole systems full o' folks like her. Gene-tech. Used to be a popular solution for near-miss earth-like colonies.” Now I had to remember my childhood again.

“Where'd you learn that?” Waldo asked, fascinated.

“Grade School.” I rapidly did my best to sort the facts I had been taught from the bigotry. “Umm... Moreaus are usually taller and more physically fit, than yer normal humans.” And more prone to violence, and morally disingenuous activity. My attempt to remember more and filter it was cut short.

“This name 'Moreaus'. What is this?” She asked me with a sudden intensity.

“Oh lord-no, I-I meant no offense ma'am, it's just what they called em, er you, er your people?... Shit.” I floundered, in mortal fear of having just referred to the Massive Mercenary by a slur.

“I am without a 'my people', this name is insult?” She tilted her head as she asked the question.

“Oh... Uh... P-probably... Maybe, I'm not sure.” I was still floundering, but had no real answer for her.

“You do not know. You come from a place with more like me?” Her questions were well practiced.

“No ma'am, never met another Mor- um... No... Sorry.” Waldo stifled a laugh.

“You are from planet where children are taught to hate, aren't you.” She asked sullenly. I just nodded in reply. She made that sound in her throat again and went back to ignoring what was around her. Or so it would seem, pretending to.

The Gee forces told me when we were about there. The Hauler blasted with all it's might for about five minutes to pull into sync with The Kraken. I couldn't see the stolen Farragut, but I could feel it lightly pulling at us. I closed my eyes for a moment and tried to place ourselves through the feeling. They were approaching from the rear, no we were the ones approaching. The pilot rolled the Hauler as we came alongside them, he was finally easing off the throttle. We were still rolling, flight assist was disabled, he was letting the mass of the capital ship impart some lateral motion. We yawed, they were ahead. A short pulse from the main thrusters and the tugging from The Kraken started to fade, or rather spread out so you couldn't feel a direction anymore. I opened my eyes as the Hauler clamped down to the deck inside the fighter bay.

“Move.” The bounty hunter was already out of her seat and gesturing at the hatch.

Waldo undid his harness and flipped off from the bench, pulling his legs through the loop of his manacled arms before giving a little kick to a handrail to toss himself towards the rear hatch spinning. I unlatched my own harness and hand-over-handed my way along the bench after him. The mercenary followed from behind. Waldo arrived at the hatch and opened it. He grabbed the side of the doorway and flung himself through it, planting the heel of one foot on the outer doorframe as he passed it. The electromagnet in his boot gripped and he pivoted out of the ship on the arch of his foot. The advantages of a higher price-point of flight-suit, a lifetime of practice, and natural-born talent.

The bounty hunter behind me reacted quickly to Wald's apparent escape by gripping the bottom of my still good foot and throwing me through the door. As I tumbled out of the hatch I saw Captain Wald with his heels together, and his spine straight, standing on the aft hull of the Hauler waiting patiently for the mercenary and I. He seemed a little surprised to see me pass, and a little more-so to see the bounty hunter pop head and shoulders out of the airlock with her weapon ready. I lost sight of them as I continued to fall sidelong across the fighter bay, I caught bits of their conversation when the right side of my head was directed at them.

By the time I smacked into the far wall she had gotten Waldo to agree to fewer sudden movements, and he had convinced her that he had no intentions of escape. A pair of rough apologies were shouted in my direction. I collected myself and pushed off the wall past the parked vessel and toward the sets of lift doors on the adjacent wall to catch up. The mercenary mumbled about most of the lifts being out as we got inside one that would apparently only take us most of the way to the command deck. The lift door eventually opened with a cheerful chime leading to a maintenance corridor.

Waldo sprung out of the lift to a support strut and ricocheted off it to another, the bounty hunter used her height and the handrails on either side to 'walk' along the corridor using her hands and feet. I just pulled hard with my hands on the doorframe and let momentum do the work. I arrived at the end of the corridor last, Waldo was first obviously. We made our way through a few more corridors in that fashion before we passed through a hatch out of the maintenance catacombs of the Farragut onto the command deck proper. We were standing in the ready room, a gaggle of not more than thirty Kumo Crew were using it as a bar. I glanced over at the intended access to the room, the doors had been welded shut, some tape held a placard with a handwritten warning reading 'Void'. A pirate wearing a micro-gravity belt jetted over to us dragging his toes on the wall.

“Captain Kane has been informed. Stay here. The prisoner will be kept here also.” The man was thin and pale and spoke with a dreary monotone.

“Prisoners.” Our captor corrected. The man looked at me, then at her, and shrugged before a little blast of compressed gas sent him drifting away. The bounty hunter gestured at a bench in a far corner of the former ready room. “Go. Wait. Make no troubles please.” She told Wald and I.

Seeing this gesture a pair of pirates from about the room arrived opportunistically to manhandle a pair of prisoners, I just let the one who grabbed me push and pull me towards the bench, thankful he left my broken ankle alone. The one who grabbed Waldo's shoulder had to contend with B. rolling over-top of him to mirror the gesture. Then when the pirate tried to spin around to grab Waldo again, my friend just sort of batted at him to spin him more. Before the pirate managed to grab something to stop himself, Waldo had simply leaped away and come of his own accord over the the bench. The mercenary had crossed her arms near the hatch we had entered by, she seemed to be trying to go unnoticed amongst the troupe of celebratory privateers around the room. Her attempt to not draw attention to herself was for naught, she was taller than everyone around by about a meter and not entirely human. One of the pirates finished his drink to a few cheers and made his way over to her.

He had tightly cropped blond hair visible through the windows of the fixed cage that was his helmet. He was wrapped in layers of metal welded over a powered dockworkers harness. The translation jets on his makeshift suit of power-armour worked hard to push him across the room.

“Ya owein' me an arm wrastle, bounty 'unter.” His Altarian drawl was thick enough to make me sound like a Bhritzamenoian. His voice crackled from his vox-unit. She rolled her eyes and sighed.

“You will not win this time either.” She said in a tired tone.

“You gon' do-it 'gainst this.” He rang his cuff against his chestplate leaving a gouge in the paint.

“I am aware.” She kicked off the wall towards a table affixed near the middle of the room and grabbed it.

She readied her right arm with her elbow down and braced against the table with her left hand. Her feet were lightly touching the floor, her knees were curled under her. She looked across the room at the Armoured Altarian expectantly.

He very slowly translated over to the table, allowing the other pirates to gather around and watch. He positioned himself across from the mercenary and held out his arm.

“No posturing banter this time?” She asked coolly. The rabble was roused.

“Shu'it bitch, I'm gon' tear yer fuckin' arm off.” His eyes were madly intense.

To mixed cheers and jeers she grasped his metal hand suddenly. His reaction was punctuated by the sound of hydraulic fluid rapidly pressurizing. Their arms rocked back and forth for a moment before the rocking gave way to just a shake. She made a point of yawning. A metallic ringing sounded as the Altarian pirate slapped a control on his right bicep with his left hand and laughed. The whining of fluid pumping stopped with a bang when his arm, and probably other joints along his right side, locked hard. His translation thrusters took over to hold him in place until he got his left hand back onto the table. Their right hands rigidly locked into place, the arms on a rig like the one under that cladding could hold up a Sidewinder with the safety lockout.

“Stalemate, ya mangy bitch!” He cackled, and slapped the tabletop with his left hand, the thrusters on his armour burst back into life.

She made a feral sound in her throat and slammed her left hand onto the tabletop too. She stood up, he came away from the floor locked arm to arm with her. She pointed him towards the ceiling slightly and walked across the table. The thrusters on the armoured rig began to howl. He waved his left arm a little. She carried him across the room, splitting the mob of stunned onlookers. The thrusters on the Altarian's rig screamed as they fought to hold position and lost. She was using the thrust from the translation rig to keep herself on the floor, he was blubbering and grabbing at her right hand with his free one. They approached a wall, she angled her stance lower and picked up speed to meet it. The pirate's right shoulder was forced about eight centimeters into the softer polymer plating of the bulkhead, pinning him there. Braced thusly, the Massive Mercenary dug the toes of her boots into the floor, the grating buckled somewhat giving her a solid foothold. She placed her left hand around his right wrist and started to unbend her ankles and knees. He clawed at her with his mobile limb, swiping towards her face, ignoring her hands.

A high pitched wail began to echo around the room. In desperation he kicked out and then back into the wall, he didn't reach her or shift himself, only pressed bootprints into the bulkhead. He swung his legs for another try, but his attempt was cut short. The high pitched noise was suddenly drowned out by a series of loud bangs, and bright red fluid was blasted across the wall from the burst tubing along the right side of the makeshift powersuit's back. The smear spread over almost twenty meters of wall as it was drawn into vents at the nook of the ceiling. The cobbled together power-armour went limp. The bounty hunter caught herself as it did and swapped her right hand onto his left shoulder, bracing herself against him. With her left hand she carefully pressed his now limp right arm against the wall over top of his head.

Inside the suit the pirate was frantically trying to move and shouting words of which I was much more certain as to their intent. The mercenary sharply dragged his hand across the wall to her right receiving a yelp of pain through the vox-unit in response. The Altarian pirate went silent. She leaned in and licked the plate of glass separating her from him, then bared her teeth momentarily before leaving him pinned to the wall. She worked her way back to her corner of the room, all of which was now cast into a hush. Well, a hush discounting the sound of the emasculated pirate struggling to disentangle himself from the wall, and his armour.

Before a murmur had fully returned to the room it was again cut off by the large door opposite the welded shut one sliding open. Silhouetted by the red light streaming from the many consoles of the bridge, stood Captain Kane. The man was wearing a long crimson jacket in the style of his leader, the kind Waldo used to wear so long ago. He was also wearing a peaked fabric cap, scar tissue held his right eye halfway closed. He was shorter than the timbre of his voice had implied.

“Captain B. Wald! The thorn in my side! It's good to see you, face to face.” He translated across the room via a series of blue bursts from his back.

“Archimedes Kane, my latest Kumo-Kisser fan. I wish I could honestly say the same.” A slight murmur rolled through the onlooking mob.

“That's Captain Kane! This is my Kraken is it not?” He placed his hands on his hips smugly.

“Is it?” Waldo queried with a friendly tone.

“What?” The pirate was taken aback slightly.

“Is it, not yours? You should know.” Captain Wald was smiling broadly.

“Enough!” Kane made a stomping motion in midair, and drew a long thin sword from his belt. A straight blade ending in a simple crossguard with a single hand grip. Not ornate, but it looked well made. Waldo stood up, his feet clinging to the floor with an electric noise.

“What is this Kane?” Waldo demanded, insulted, as he showed his still bound wrists. Kane nodded his head towards the Bounty Hunter who produced Waldo's Holva and pushed it towards him.

“Better, but you'd duel a bound man?” Waldo asked as his sword slid slowly through the air.

“I'm not a fool Captain Wald! I intend to fight you, not martyr myself.” Kane snorted in reply.

“Aww well, you can't blame me for trying.” B. reversed the polarity in his boots, launching himself to the ceiling.

He tucked his feet and caught himself with his hands, leaping towards his sword with all of his limbs. He caught it and twirled, locking a foot to the ceiling. Instantly he was sprinting along it towards Kane, holding his sabre in both hands. Some hesitant flares came from Kane's sides as he contemplated rolling to align with his attacker, but he realized he didn't have time. He pushed forwards at the last moment and parried B.'s first slash, but had to strafe out of the path of his second.

Kane jetted backwards and drew up his arm then thrusted forwards with the tip of his sword and his translation jets. Waldo disconnected from the ceiling and curled up, the attack went wide. Waldo pushed off the ceiling with his hands and landed a fanciful and humiliating, but not entirely effective dropkick on Kane's upper back. Waldo managed to control his momentum and bring his feet back onto the floor where his boots held him down, he pirouetted on one heel to face the pirate. Kane had to struggle with his thrusters to stop pitching before he turned to face Wald. Kane's hat remained spinning in the air nearby.

“Or did you not want me to go easy on you?” Waldo shot at the reddening pirate.

“That's enough!” Kane half-sworded his Estoc and gave as much thrust as his translation rig would give directly at Waldo.

My old friend just managed to twirl aside the tip of Kane's sword, and wrap his manacles around the pirate's neck as he passed. His Holva blade was still in his hands but not in a threatening position to the pirate. The suddenly added, unbalanced mass caused Kane's thruster belt to go haywire. The pair of them started to spin randomly at high speed.

“Shay! Stop him!” Kane managed to choke out from the furball.

The mercenary hit a button on a small device on her wrist, then kicked off the wall she was leaning against and shot through the suddenly separating pair at enormous velocity. Kane was left rotating and fighting with his rig, the manacles were rebounding off the floor. The bounty hunter, Shay had already cleared the room and caught herself in the frame of the open hatch onto the bridge with her feet. Waldo was gripped by the neck in her right hand, her firearm was against his skull in her left, he still had his sword.

“Please, Captain Wald, your weapon.” Shay asked politely.

“For you, and that canon, of course.” Waldo slid the sword back into its place in the loop on his belt. The pistol was removed from contact with his head, by about two centimeters.

“Ha! I'll double your pay for this! Take him to the brig!” The still spinning Kane commanded Shay.

The Massive Mercenary continued to grip Waldo and kicked herself towards the hatch we entered from. As she was stuffing my friend through the hatch into the maintenance corridor, I started to make my way across the room to follow.

“Who the hell are you!?” The pirate captain suddenly noticed me. His voice surprised and frustrated.

“Oh uh... I-I'm uh, just with Waldo, I was gonna just-” My stammering was cut off.

“Your voice. Where have we spoken?” His spin was back under control, and the pirate was staring me down hard. My raw anger outweighed the intensity of the roomful of eyes.

“Yer gunner got lucky 'bout a day ago.” A wave of chatter pulsed through the room. Shay stopped pushing Waldo for a moment and looked on.

“Lakon transporter? A Seven?” The two questions were delivered with a steep disparity in pitch.

“The Flottvogn!” My hands shook a little. So did Kane's.

“What in th-” Kane was cut short by a member of the bridge crew launching herself into the ready room and shouting.

“You survived!?” She yelled at me. Everyone in the room turned expectantly in my direction.

“Who wants to know?” My adrenaline was spiking, I rode the rush to keep talking under the weight of the attention.

“She's my gunner.” Kane interjected as the frail woman caught him to slow herself. She had auburn hair and a long face, she wore a cheap flightsuit without it's helmet leaving her abundant hair free-floating in the microgravity.

“Kane! We have to let them go.” She announced suddenly, desperation clinging to her voice like she clung to Kane.

“Go to whatever you think of as hell, Lucile.” Kane retorted, showing stress in his voice.

“Ya bitch! You killed her!” I took a couple of pointless reflexive stepping motions towards the gunner, still working my way through the information I was taking in. I wasn't shutting down from the audience, but I wasn't keeping up either.

“I never meant to curse you Revenant! Please forgive me, I was aiming for a clean kill and I failed you.” I'll admit, I was a little disarmed by the oddness of her statement.

“Not this shit again.” Kane muttered to some dissenting jeers. “How about. Just, also go to the brig.” He nearly begged me.

“S-sure... We ain't done yet young lady.” I jabbed an accusatory finger at the gunner before climbing through the hatch to join my friend and the mercenary.

I was just pleased to be able to remove myself from that situation. Some commotion was shut out by the sealing hatch and I was left in the maintenance corridor with my old friend and Kane's mercenary.

“So, you are lucky one. They are aroused by your survival. Have been talking about it whole time.” Shay announced in a tired tone.

“How did they...?” I sort of replied, my neurochemistry crashing.

“Three escape pods, I presume your crewmates were not as lucky.” Shay's voice reeked of fatigue.

“You hid behind one o'em, they ain't my crewmates neither, just car-... Just passengers.” The words stumbled out from my mouth. I managed to catch myself. Just.

“I see...” She narrowed her eyes at me. The silence permeating our journey through the corridor continued for some time before being broken again.

“You lot didn't recover those pods did you?” Waldo suddenly asked, you'd have to be his best friend to hear it in his voice, but he was up to something when he said it.

“These people are not 'my lot'. They are paying me, and I doubt it. Kane has been focused on you, Captain Wald.” The bounty hunter spoke as if this was not her favourite subject. Whether she felt that way about the pirate's plans, or the people-trafficking, I couldn't tell.

“Oh no, those poor two slaves will be lost to time on the surface.” Waldo claimed, quite convincingly.

“This is an unfortunate but unavoidable collateral damage, also not my concern.” Waldo shot a stealthy wink at me as she spoke, I gave him an exasperated look in return.

We arrived at a similar hatchway to the one that lead to the command deck about half of the way through the corridors to the lift. Through the hatch was a section of compartmentalized hallway, it may have been storage once, or barracks. Evidently it had small empty rooms with doors that could be locked so now it was the brig. The mercenary directed Waldo to one such room.

“Goodnight.” B called as he closed his own cell door behind him.

Shay directed me to the one next to it and I pulled myself inside. She hesitated at the panel for a moment.

“Hopefully their superstitions will leave you on planet below, or have them allow me to take you away.” She said suddenly.

“What're... Why?” She didn't answer my question. It didn't fit with her speech.

“Captain Wald will be killed, I will most likely have to do so. They have agreed to pay me to make this happen, so it will be done... I would... Rather not.” I almost responded to her statement by asking her why again.

“You've never regretted it before?” I asked instead. She flipped her ears as she responded, my insight was not expected.

“Regretted?” Not a word in her vocabulary it seemed. I thought hard for an explanation.

“The uhh... 'Rather not'.” I tried to explain. Her eyes lit up in recognition. The Massive Mercenary was sharp.

“No. Never before. Yet Kane has the credits to afford me. Just.” Her timbre deepened with the final word. She gave her explanation as if naming natural laws, like we all knew it to be true.

“Does it matter if they can pay?” My question received a look like my head was on upside down in reply.

“How else is the place in the group to be known? Did you take the slaves and the gruel onto your ship for nothing?” She spat her words at me, evidently the idea was insulting to her.

“Well now, th-that's different.” I stammered. Not sure how to begin unraveling the moral complexities of how I'd arrived there.

“I fail to see how.” She hit the button and slammed the hatch closed in my face. Then after a moment it slipped open again. She answered my first question.

“I spared you due to your fruitless attack on the surface, I am not fond of killing the defenseless. Kane is ignorant of how to defeat Captain Wald's group logistically and will leave this place once your friend is dead, assuming his work is done.” Her face was contorted in anger. At me, at herself, at the situation. Take your pick.

“What about you?” I responded. She gave a fleeting expression of surprise, before re-solidifying her anger.

“I... Will move on to next job... “ She paused, before continuing. “Should you desire I can leave you on surface or take you to next starport.” The second sentence was more readied than the first. I couldn't read her expression. I think she was trying to read mine. “You have time to decide, I was prepared to apologize to you as well, but you are slaver.” She added.

“I ain't no-” Shit. ”So is Kane.” I clawed at what logic I could, given my situation.

“Kane is successful slaver, though I would also not apologize to him.” She closed the door again.

I managed to sleep a little, the caffeine withdrawal won out and took me down. The pain was cracking into my head when I awoke. I couldn't be too upset about the migraine though, it had kept me from sleeping too deeply. I could hear B. Wald occasionally pacing around the walls of his cell. Maybe an hour later the hatch slid open revealing the Altarian pirate, his makeshift armour evidently repaired.

“Get on!” He gestured with his cladded arm, I found Waldo already waiting.

The pirate pushed and hurried us back along through the maintenance corridor to the command deck. He seemed to be enjoying himself. Inside the ready room Kane and Shay were mid discussion.

“It's just an expression!” Kane was insisting, his voice was a cocktail of anger and desperation.

“Not one I am familiar with.” The mercenary said, exasperated and blunt.

“Okay I'll double what I still owe you.” Kane was smarmy, but his offer seemed to be enticing.

“This is acceptable.” She looked at him for a second before shrewdly adding. “All at once.” Kane's posture shallowed.

“Umm, I can give you last week this week, and this week next week. Then the extra the week after that.” The mercenary replied with a growling sound from her throat. “You know I'm good for it.” He added hopefully.

“You are indeed extremely lucky, in that I do know this. I will be increasing my fees to this level in the future. For you.” Her anger was raw. He fidgeted a little before agreeing.

“Here's them prisoners Cap'n.” The Armoured Altarian chimed in once he had an opening.

“Good, great. Shay could you please blow these two out of an airlock for me.” Kane offered. Shay's reply was cut off by a shriek from the bridge. Lucile the Gunner was holding herself in the open hatch with one hand and pointing at Kane with her other.

“You said you would let Him go!” Panic rising in her shrill voice.

“Did I?” Kane played it up for the crowd, not completely unsuccessfully.

“I will not be haunted over your avarice Kane! I bet it's not just me either.” Her shouting received a few cheers from the gaggle of Kumo Crew that seemed to live inside the makeshift pub. “We took our chance on his soul and failed, he holds the Right To Strike over us now. We cannot break the sacred contract of the duel! We would give his ghost tenure over our lives! It is no longer for us to decide his fate, it is for him to decide ours!” Lucile's heated ramble was cut off by Kane shouting over her and his roused crew.

“Enough Lucile! You're a great gunner but this is getting out of hand!” Kane was incensed, arguing now seemingly just to argue.

“Free The Revenant!” Lucile shouted, backed in turn by many of the pirates.

“Fucking hell. Fine! I don't even know who that is! Let him go. What the fuck!” Kane raved, waving his arms slightly.

“I will take him away.” Shay announced, she had been waiting patiently to do so.

“Thank you Shay.” Lucile said, her panic and intensity fading fast. “And please forgive us.” She added to me. It took me a few seconds to realize that I was expected to say something.

“I... Uhm... Could you also let Waldo go?” I asked her in a moment of inspiration. Kane and Lucile looked at each other.

“No?” She asked him quietly.

“No.” He replied with a little shake of his head

“No.” Lucile informed me.

“Fuck.” I responded, dejected.

“Ooh. Nice try though.” Waldo added cheerfully with a nod.

“Are all of you finished?” Shay asked through a sigh. “I would very much like to move on to next job now.” The bounty hunter's tone warned of how thin the ice was.

Kane rolled his eyes and Lucile kept her expectant stare fixed upon me. Shay looked at me too, then so did Wald. Most of the crowd of privateers already was. A mild tinnitus rose in my ears.

“Y-yes?” I tried, desperate to not be the centre of attention anymore.

“You will not seek your reprisal, in life nor death?” The gunner asked me meekly. I knew what to say, I was relieved.

“N-no, no thank you Ma'am” I announced to a startling cheer from the crowd.

“Hooray, all is well. Captain Wald, Commander Revenant, please come with me. Goodbye Lucile.” Shay rattled off mirthlessly as she turned to begin to make her way to the hatch. I turned to follow and noticed the distinct lack of a metal-clad Altarian in the ready room.

“Anyway Kane, how much do you owe Shay?” I heard Waldo casually ask from behind me.

“I've had enough! Do you not even have the decency to just go die already?” Kane retorted, the rage in his voice was impotent.

“Hey Shay. How much does Dread-Captain Dickhead over here owe you?” Waldo asked as he floated past me towards her. Her hand hovered over the door controls, stopped in place by his query.

“He has made only down payment so far.” She answered slowly, carefully.

“I said that's enough!” Kane called from across the room to no avail.

“I am owed two payments of three million credits, and now, a final payment of twelve.” Shay ignored the indebted pirate.

“Kane!? You shouldn't have! You ponied up eighteen million just for me!?” Waldo sounded honoured, but still sarcastic.

“Twenty million, he has yet to 'Ponied up' the remaining eighteen.” She corrected, her tone was suggestive of the fact that Kane's payment scheme was an aberrant business practice for her.

“Shit Kane! I've got twenty million credits on hand.” Wald quipped as he slid through the air towards Shay, who had removed her hand from the control panel completely when he said it.

“Is this also 'Just an expression' Captain Wald?” Shay turned around to ask, her tone curious and slightly playful.

“Not at all, in fact I could easily double it too.” Waldo said as he lightly bumped into the wall next to her. The pair shared a devious glance that lasted longer than it needed to. The ready room had gone silent.

“I could pick up your tab for you, if you wanted, Kane.” Waldo spoke clearly, a smile spreading across his lips.

“E-enough!” Kane feebly announced. The mob of privateers surrounding him was murmuring.

“Indeed, this arrangement would be far less... Regrettable for everyone involved” Shay added slyly, not breaking eye contact with Waldo. His smile seemed to be contagious, Shay was wearing it now too.

“Fourty million transferred immediately. Having seen you in action I know your services are worth every credit. I can even throw in transport to wherever you want as well.” Waldo's smile had become so wide as to spread onto my face.

“We have deal.” She thrust her massive fuzzy hand towards Waldo, who gripped and shook it eagerly. Well, Shay more shook my whole old friend up and down, than just his hand.

“T-that's enough...?” Kane's desperation had hit peak, the Massive Mercenary's patience was spent. Shay responded by bearing her teeth at him with a snarl, and opening the hatch for Waldo and I.

“One more thing.” Waldo turned to the defeated pirate. “Give me my coat.” My friend was aiming a finger at Kane.

“What? I won it fair and square, It's mine now!” Kane argued meekly.

“Okay yeah, fine. The coat is yours. Shay could you please be a dear and point your firearm at this man.” B.'s conversational tone belied his intentions, he crossed his arms.

“Certainly Captain Wald.” Shay replied as she slipped her gun from its holster and leveled the massive thing squarely at her former employer. She grinned joyously.

“Give me your coat.” Waldo said calmly, still wearing his wide grin.

“W-what is this?!” Kane was flabbergasted, looking all around.

“We're robbing you. Give me your coat.” The steady smile on Waldo's lips was met with a flurry of expressions from Kane.

The Dread Captain was probably hoping someone from his crew would stop this, such hope was now in vain. He eventually slipped the long red jacket off his shoulders and flung it towards Waldo. It made its way slowly across the room to my friend's outstretched hand, he looked at it happily for a moment. Then frowned, then he shot his gaze back at Kane.

“You burnt a bunch of holes through the back with your stupid thruster belt! Give me your boots too.” Waldo's new, and less amicable request was met with far less hesitation. Satisfied with his spoils, Waldo grabbed the rim of the hatch to make his way through.

“Don't forget. You owe me one Kane!” My friend announced as he slipped through the hatch-way.

“What... Just happened?” I heard Kane's bewildered voice behind me as I crawled through the hatch after Waldo.

“Lets just cut our losses and go home Archie, it's over” Lucile tried to comfort him as Shay shut the hatch behind the three of us.

“Ya feral 'alf-breed!” It seems we had found the missing power-armoured privateer. His disdain echoed through his vox-unit into the maintenance corridor. He floated at the far side of it. The fur on the back of Shay's neck was standing up.

“Kane's arrangement with me has ceased. I will no longer play with you.” Her voice had become deeper, she spoke carefully. She gripped the railing with one hand, in the context of a gravity well it would have looked like she was steadying herself.

“I ain’t give shit fer fuck 'bout that!” He outstretched his recently repaired, metal encased arms and a pair of cutting torches fired up. “I'm gonna mount yer freak-head on mah wall!” He waved his right arm at Shay while absentmindedly slicing at the hand-rail with the beam of plasma flaring from his left.

“I have allowed you too much leash as it is.” Shay growled the words and tightened her off-handed grip on the rail. The pirate's answer was to fire the translation jets on his makeshift powersuit and blast towards her with unexpected speed.

She leveraged her arm against the rail she gripped and pierced the catwalk's metal grating with her toes, then she recoiled and sprung to meet her assailant with raucous velocity. The section of catwalk Shay leaped from was bowed downwards and tore with a metallic shriek as she kicked off from it. The handrail was left bent into a zig-zag where she had it gripped, and torn from its mount on the wall behind us. Shay was spinning as she met the Altarian pirate in the centre of the corridor. With expertly precise timing she swung a punch into his belly.

There was a resounding metallic clang, backed by a sickly moist gurgling. Shay was left motionless, suspended in the air in the middle of the corridor. The Armoured Altarian was sent slowly drifting back across to where he had started, the cutting torches spitting and dieing. Shay was gripping one hand with the other and grimacing in pain. The Altarian's chestplate had buckled instantly, his torso had become flux between the metal plates. The glass panels of his helmet had lost the visage of a bigot, and become an opaque crimson canvas dotted with the odd mass of a darker hue. Shay outstretched and gyrated to grasp at the still resonating handrail with her uninjured hand, she caught it and pulled herself back towards the catwalk. Several thin ribbons of red fluid had begun to trail out from the broken welds on his armour.

“Sweet, merciful fuck!” B. Wald took the words right out of my mouth.

Speaking of things leaving my mouth; between the no-coffee, the no-food, the shooting pain from my ankle, the not having had fuck-all to smoke in two or three days, the stabbing pain where the brace in my back felt like it was fucking scraping my shoulder-blade or something, that Gottdamn sound that punch made that I was gonna hear again in my nightmares, and now clinging to the bouncing catwalk. Let me just say it was lucky I got my visor off in time, wouldn't have thought I had anything in me to throw up.

“We may now continue.” Shay told us somberly as she shook droplets of blood off her hand.

Her knuckles were raw, and not quite aligned. Silence punctuated our trip to the hanger, silence and lift-door chimes. We found the Hauler pilot sitting cross legged a meter or two above his craft, a dully smoking hand-roll in his lips.

“Need a lift back down?” He asked. His eyes stayed closed, he had heard us arrive.

“If you would be so kind.” Shay said as she unstrapped a couple of containers that were stowed nearby. She had either already packed her things, or not unpacked on arrival.

“Sure, but It's for Walds McMek over here” The pilot pointed with his smoke at my old friend.

“You a fan? Ah... I don't have a pen...” B. checked his newly returned pockets, making a pleading expression. “I got a spare pair of boots you could have, if you want?” My friend joked.

“Nah, not a fan... Hm, maybe now, yeah.” He took a drag “Just not a big fan of my boss.” The pilot exhaled a cloud of smoke as he spoke.

He gestured aftward and unfurled his legs, his feet clung magnetically to the hull under him. He climbed into the dorsal hatch and shortly thereafter, the aft one opened with a hissing sound. The cargo scoop dropped down between the landing gear expectantly. Shay kicked the now free floating pair of cans into it from across the docking pad.

The familiar inside of the puddle-jumping beater felt more inviting from the co-pilot's chair. Sitting in the cockpit calmed my stomach, and the shaking as we thrust through the atmosphere loosened the muscles in my back. The pilot was puffing away on his little smoke.

“Hey, I haven't had a smoke in a few, mind if I?” In my desperation I gave it a shot.

“Yeah, yeah sorry. Just grab it. Hands are busy.” He mumbled as he leaned his head in my direction, rolling the smoke to the appropriate side of his mouth. I stretched my arm over and got it, a slight twinge from my back.

“Thanks.” I stuffed it into my mouth a took a draw. The savoury flavour I had expected was instead an almost sugary one. A rush hit my head and I started coughing. Onionhead, my back felt better though. I fought the returning urge to vomit as I hacked.

“Puff-n-pass guys” Waldo said, I heard him clamping his way to the stern before the joint was taken from my hand.

“No, thank you” I heard Shay reply shortly afterward, her air-supply mask was back on.

“Tunes, we need tunes.” The pilot pointed quickly at a console next to me, before snapping his grip back onto the throttle. A sprawling library of unfamiliar music was laid out before me. I randomly tapped at the list without looking.

A gruff voiced man backed by classical-style drum and guitars announced that he desired combustible materials. The pilot, and surprisingly B. Wald both announced that they liked this song. A technical discussion about Old-Earth composers erupted. Shay quipped that she preferred pre-expansion orchestral arrangements. I was lost, the song was pretty good though.

Waldo directed the pilot to land inside the downed starport, it seemed secrecy was obsolete now. B. carefully switched the landing lights on and off in what was either a pre-decided coded pattern for the rest of the group, or a practical joke on the pilot. The Hauler was dropped down on sand a few hundred meters inside the docking corridor. The lights on a parked Ess Arr Vee. came alive nearby as the pilot powered his craft down. Shay, Waldo and I filed out the airlock. As we reached the sand the sound of the two cannisters thumping down from the cargo hatch was heard.

“What happened?!” Derek was alive, and sounded relieved so see us. I wonder what he was expecting.

“We won... Also, Shay is sorry about your ship.” Waldo explained with a rock of his head towards the Massive Mercenary.

“Not mine- oh... OH.” Derek caught on spontaneously.

Shay dragged one of her cans out from under the ship towards the buggy single-handed. I walked over to the other one and gripped the handle on the top. I leaned towards the Ess Are Vee and the cannister moved slightly. I went for a step and my ankle burned.

“Eh Waldo, gimme a hand.” My friend walked over and more or less dragged the container himself.

“Er... You needn't...” Shay was taken aback when she turned away from the stowed cannister and saw we had brought her the next.

“Don't mention it, but you're gonna have to lift it onto the buggy.” B said amicably. She gave him a piercing look.

The uncomfortable trip in the back of the cargo buggy was short. Back at the Lakon-Heavy serving as a base of operation, we were met with a more lively welcome than last time. Amanda was pacing around the ship wailing on her P.A.D. and furiously muttering. Derek slipped away from the common area deftly. Reggie was head and shoulders deep in the back of a cryopod that had displaced the tables in the room. A woman I had not seen before was standing nearby dressed in a simple cloth gown, glaring angrily at the pod.

“You must be our guest. Why is your brother still frozen?” Waldo asked the Imperial woman. To respond she simply pointed with a damning finger at the side of the cyopod facing her, we walked over. There was a crater in the side of the pod, a clean hole punched through the centre of it.

“That merc piece-of-shit did some damage when he took out your buggy, Waldo.” Reggie's voice was muffled by the machinery he was buried in. Shay sharply inhaled through her nose and looked away. Her arms tensed a little.

“What's... Wait, who're...” I Rambled questions. My confusion more-so than what I'd said garnered a melancholy explanation.

“I am Quintina Iovianus, freed through to the sacrifice of my kin.” Tears rolled down her cheeks “That doesn't matter though. My brother was the computantis for the Kumo-Nauales third largest supplier of Operarius” My Lingua-Imperialis was a little rusty, but I got that the man was important.

“And you are here, why?” Shay interjected. She spoke with a carefully constructed indifference.

“Breaking meum pactum was his fee.” The girl answered quietly as she began to weep.

“Is... C-Compu-” Shay tried to ask. Her stoic attempt to speak the tearful Imperials tongue was truncated.

“His name is Terrentius!” Quintina sobbed, punctuating her answer by collapsing into Shay. The Massive Mercenary's face was momentarily overcome with a frantic despair before returning to the masterful facade. Quintina's body was wracked with grief, supported only by Shay's powerful arms.

“He's in a coma, we can't get him out of this pod, but he wont last more than a few days, a week tops inside the damned thing.” Reggie called out. “ And the pod won't even try the revival cycle.” He added.

Shay looked from the sobbing wreck she was lightly patting on the back, to the legs protruding from the cryopod. The bounty hunter opened and closed her lips hesitantly, like she was about to speak, but instead grimaced momentarily and stayed silent. She continued her attempt to console Quintina. Shay shot a fleeting sideways glance in Waldo's direction, he didn't notice. My old friend didn't hesitate with his answer either.

“Load him up, The Highwayman can make it clear across the Bubble in three days.” B Wald's announcement was met with a fractionally raised eyebrow from the Massive Mercenary.

“You might have to.” Reggie slipped out from the guts of the pod. He shot a short, canted-jawed glance at Shay then finished speaking. “This thing needs a full shop, a starport. We need to get it into Empire space if we don't want to get arrested for having it.” This turn of events had abated Quintina's sobs. Shay was watching Waldo expectantly, her enormous hand still petting the tearful waif draped over her.

“Good-as-Done. Pack up, we're moving out.” Waldo ordered. Reggie began to stow away his tools, Amanda appeared suddenly to have Waldo thumb her P.A.D. Then vanished just as suddenly.

The group of us emptied what gear was needed from the Type-Nine and got it loaded into B's ship. The Highwayman was a Type-Six but Lakon Spaceways was no more responsible for that vessel than I was the president of the Federation. I'd told Waldo before; if he wasn't so keen on wandering the galaxy, he could make a great living shilling his wacky ship mods. The Core-Dynamics Assault Ship I had inherited was also back in its place under the decking, I was pleased to discover. Once preparations were about complete and everyone was filing into The Highwayman, I slipped off to prepare her for launch.

“Look who's back. Yer pal bail yer fat-ass out?” I did my best to ignore the ghost and focus on my preflight. The vessel's croaky mechanical voice was listing subsystems. “That pirate gonna try an' get his revenge ya know, 'sides what you owe some fucking Impy slave anywhoo?” The voice coming from the co-pilot's chair was going to get this ship scrapped.

“Yer bein' boarded by freaks too, dumbass.” The doorway at the back of the cockpit slid open unexpectedly. Startled, I leaned as far around the pilot's chair as the magnetic harness, and my stiff back would allow. Shay was standing there with a duffel bag hanging from her shoulder, her oversized frame filled the entire hatchway.

“I have decided to travel with you.” She announced, the ghost sitting in the co-pilot's chair gave me an accusatory glance. “It would be less than comfortable for Quintina and I to travel together, I think.” She added, her lips were parted in a frown as she said it.

“In case she finds out it were you, shot the pod?” I asked in as unaccusatory a tone as I could muster, ignoring the rude gestures coming from my haunt.

“Because I have told her it was me who has shot the pod.” Shay corrected with a sigh. The ghost laughed, I cringed. “Does your wessel have Chef-machine?” Shay asked. I turned back to the controls before answering with confidence. My fingers resting comfortably on the throttle and stick.

“Ayup, just on the port side, against the aft wall back there.” Pops cackled, for some reason. Shay was silent for a few moments, an awkward tension built. I adjusted my grip on the controls.

“I do not see it” Shay was confused, as she should be there was no Chef there. The Flottvogn had a Chef there, I'd installed the damned thing myself. I awkwardly readjusted against the mag-locks.

“My-my mistake” I fought the knot that had worked its way into the back of my throat. Jammed my eyes shut to keep them dry.

“Is there one?” She asked again, politely bewildered.

“I-I don't know”  A sob escaped my mouth with the answer. Preflight was nearly complete. Pops was laughing away just like old-times.

“Are... You injured?” Shay stepped further into the cockpit, I heard her bag drop the the floor. Her confusion turning to a concern I had not yet heard in her voice.

“I'm fine, j-just fine.” I wiped my face with the back of my hand. “I'ts just...” I hadn't the words.

“Your 'Regrets'?” My haunt's laughter was suddenly silenced by the Moreau dropping herself into the co-pilot's seat, banishing him for the time being.

The Massive Mercenary wasn't just sharp, she was blunt too. I looked at her, she was leaning in to look more directly at me. Her eyes had softened, but her look was still piercing. All I could manage was a sullen nod.

“In my experience it seems regrets have way of transforming into lesser concerns with the application of time.” She thought carefully for a moment before adding. “For reasons of which I am not certain; the presence of Captain Wald, and yourself, are also helpful in this.” She was leaning over, offering me something.

I looked down at a beautifully rolled Kamitra, already lit, held between Shay's bandaged, giant fingers. I took a long, deep haul off of the stogey before returning it.

“Thanks... I needed that.” I told her. The nicotine easing my nerves helped me get myself back under control.

“You are welcome, I know.” Shay placed the cigar between her teeth. ”I apologize for my part in your circumstances here.” She added, looking away.

“What happened to-” She cut me off, now intently examining a nearby bulkead.

“I have decided that you are part of Captain Wald's enterprise. Which is successful and diversified.” She explained. A chime drew my attention to the comms panel as I considered what she'd said.

[DIRECT][Captain B Wald]: We're ready and launching I'm patching you the route, but we aren't going to wait for you.

“So that makes my 'slaving' alright then?” I joked with her, but I wanted to know. Shay seemed to be one of those interesting people made up more of questions than answers.

[TO Captain B Wald]: No problem we'll catch back up.

“Of course.” She was either a master of deadpan, or...

[DIRECT][Captain B Wald]: Tell Shay she's off the clock.

“Shay, Waldo says yer off the clock” I informed her. She replied with a satisfied sigh. I focused on typing instead of the puzzle Shay's viewpoint seemed to be from mine.

[TO Captain B Wald]: Go, we ain't ready to launch just yet.

I heard the oversized thrusters on Waldo's ship rocking the walls of the hanger as he did. Then a pair of very large combat boots were thrown into my peripheral vision. I looked down at Shay's discarded footwear laying in front of her seat and immediately noticed her feet. Digitgrade paws were stretching left and right, clearly more comfortable having been removed from their normalizing bindings. Roughed fur showing where the boots fit the least. She leaned down and grabbed the heavy rubber and metal coverings to stow them properly for launch. Then she lifted herself out of the chair and started to undo her belt. I shot my attention through the canopy, a bead of sweat rolling down my brow.

“Er, you could, umm. Th-there's rooms.” I floundered, my voice trailing upwards in pitch.

“This is not needed, I am only letting out my tail.” She told me, as if that were a perfectly normal thing to say.

I couldn't tell you what the social protocols were for that, but I figured this had to be less immodest than her changing her clothes in the cockpit, so I decided to be relieved. My shoulders loosened, and I looked back around the chair to say something. My shoulders immediately re-tensed, and I fixed my gaze forward again, when I learned that Shay had meant 'By not wearing pants'. I launched the ship for what was bound to be an interesting, if monstrously awkward journey.