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22nd Pass

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Jan 10, 2006 LordofBlades link
Blade, callsign Lord Of Blades, has grown up as a pirate, living off the tails of his fathers daring plots, scheme's, and assorted battles with the Itani's, the Serco Nation, and the UIT. Though his father, a great world of opportunity as a pirate was painted. And soon after he turned eighteen, he stepped out of his house, purchased and EC-88, and set out to make his fortune. However, his time as a pirate what short, as he was spurned and expelled from the pirate guild he has seeked to befriend. Thrown out on his own, he lacked both the knowledge and the experience to survive in the universe, and he soon became prey for pirates, as he toted his meager loads of supplies between systems.

It came to a boiling point at the 22nd pass between Odia and various UIT companies. When a pirate came down upon him, and did not mearly seek his cash and his cargo. This man, was another matter entirely. He took Blades cash, and his cargo, and once he was done with that, he proceeded to try to shoot Blade down, and that is where this story begins.

__________________________________________________________________________________

I heard the pirate undock his ship, and my sensors showed me him pulling away. I sighed, another 20,000 credits down the toilet, as well as 60,000 credits worth of cargo he'd have to repay TPG for. This was turning into a very bad day. My hands did their little dance on the controls, and fired up the engines and all other systems. Just as I began to make my way back to TPG Barracks, all my sensors began screaming target lock at me, I cursed, thinking yet another pirate had found me holding still, but it was the same one. 'What the hell is he up to?' I though, 'He already took all the cash I had on me.' The pirate fired two shots, and these were no warnings, they splashed across the port side, shaking the ship, and Blade's hands flew over the controls in a panic. He kicked his ship up to max speed, and began evading the pirates attacks. His sensors started screaming at him again, telling him two missiles incoming. He cursed, pulled his ship through a backspin, and turbo'ed off beyond the missiles capacity to turn, but the pirate was still on his ass.

Resigning himself to the inevitable, thinking he would surely die, and regretting all the things he hadn't done, he pulled his ship through a one eighty, and locked onto the pirate. Adrenaline hit his system like a bag of bricks, and his hands flew over the controls, dodging as much of the fire as he could. He let off a spray of his own shots, three of which impacted directly into the other ship, damaging its wing and engines. The pirate ship began to slow down. Blade executed a barrel roll, slipping down underneath the pirate ship, and went round a full three hundred and sixty degree strafe, ending with several blasts directly into the cockpit of the pirate's ship. The engine flickered and died, and the ship continued to drift on lifelessly, just another lost shell in space, another piece of a story that no one would ever know.

Blade collapsed in his chair, shaking from the punch of the adrenaline, amazed at his own survival, glad for his life, and almost horrified at the intense pleasure growing in him. He had enjoyed that, destroying the pirate that would have carelessly ended his life. He looked around the tight cockpit of his ship, it was somehow...different now. His brother, in a way. It had helped him destroy his destroyer. He pulled up alongside the hulk of a pirate ship, and unloaded what little cargo that hadn't been destroyed. Delivering it to the station on time, and collected his bonus.

Shortly afterward, he made a trip to the inner UIT systems, contacting a marshal and paying for his bounty hunters license. 'I can't run and hide anymore, not after this' he thought. 'I have to do something for people like me, to make the trade routes safe for traders, instead of fattening grounds for pirates.' He made some heavy modification's to his Centaur then, christianing it P.H.S Hunter, and outfitting it with more weapons that it should have. He sacrificed all of his cargo space to attain this goal, coming out with a one of a kind ship, designed for hunting pirates.

He activated his transponder, which broadcasted his new call sign, Lord of Blades, and he opened a channel to Marshal Rhian Shard, "Hey, I need a list of all the current bounties placed on pirates, I've got a living to earn."
He glanced over the list as it came through, and selected his first target, pirating in the odia system. Firing up his engines, he pulled the hunter out of its docking bay, and made for jump distance.

To be Continued...
Jan 10, 2006 LordofBlades link
Note: Comments and suggestions are welcome, especially those that would help me improve my writing style, thank you. Constructive critasism also welcome, but if your critesising for you own please, I will flame you back =P. (Or just ask the FM to delete your post. Please and thank you lots in advance FM)
Jan 10, 2006 genka link
Mr. FM, please delete the above two posts, because they offend me deeply.
Thank you for your inevitable cooperation.
Jan 10, 2006 LordofBlades link
How about just deleting Genka's? I see no reason why my posts should be deteled, nor why he would take offence to them.
Jan 10, 2006 A-Dawg link
Nice story. There were a few spelling errors, but it was consitent and made sense, keep up the good work.
Jan 10, 2006 Kalima link
looking forward to read when you get hold of a sertain pirate *S*

*flap her wings and drink some coffee*
Jan 10, 2006 Screwball link
Keep up the good work.
Jan 10, 2006 LordofBlades link
Note: 1) Thanks for the complements guys, all those exept Genka's, which was both unconstructive and offensive, and 2) All other characters in these short storys will be entirely fictional, unless the event actually took place within the game. I don't want to get flamed by UPN or another noted pirated for blowing them up in here, while I'd done no such thing in-game.

Back to the Story:

Blade and the hunter jumped in-system, Odia O-12, and powered down all engines and weapons. He was hunting a pirate called Blue Kanker, which wasn't an impressive name at all, but he'd still managed to rack up a 2 million credit bounty, so he waited. Nervousness grew up in him, as though standing before a hurricane while on planet, waiting for the inevitable clash that would blot out the stars, and leave streaks of lightning across the eye's. Blade leaned back in his chair and tried to relax, panicing before the fight even began wouldn't get him anywhere, exept perhaps in a body bag. He checked his sensors, which were running on passive mode, but he couldn't quite detect anything yet. A cluster of asteroids was off on his 10:00, several large ones. Frowning, he directed his sensor's at the asteroids. Running through several scans, he found carponite, ferric, and some heliocene ore, and also, from one asteroid, a large concentrated deposite of various metal's on the far side. He smiled, it looked like his pirate was hiding in the roid field.

He didn't power up his systems, he didn't need to alert his prey. Upgraded or no, the Hunter was still a Centaur, and not incredably quick. So instead, he used his gas jets to maneuver, firing them in short bursts to direct himself towards the asteroid in question. He parked himself 5 meters above the surface of the asteroid, and slowly his ship touched down on the surface, his landing struts absorbing the impact. He switch off his scanners and launched a remote camera. Useful little buggers, about 5 meters long and 1/4th of a meter wide, basically just a camera with an antenna and a rocket on the back. Switching his view screen to the camera's channel, he remote piloted it around the asteroid, straight at the pirate ship, and found a hulk of a behemoth. "Oh shit!" He yelled, bringing all systems online, and powering his ship off the asteroid, just quickly enough to avoid the missiles his powered down sensors weren't able to tell him about. "Arrgh, I hate then their smart like that!" Sweeping his sensors about, he quickly located the pirate ship, and locked on with all weapons. It seemed the SOB was running now. He cursed and flung his ship through the roid field, trying to cut him off at the roid cluster he was heading for, but he was to late, the pirate beat him in.

"Come on hunter, I'm waiting for you..."

He nosed his ship slowly into the field, trying to ignore the taunts coming through his comm.

"Make you a deal, hunter"

A thought occured to Blade,

"Pay me enough, and I may just let you live."

He locked onto the source of the pirates signal.

"No?"

The pirate was above him, between two ridges of rock in an asteroid.

"Ok, I guess I'll just take your ship then!"

He flipped his ship and flung it right out in front of the pirate, just as he ignited his engines. Blade grinned, and loosed all his weapons payload right into the pirates face. The ship exploded, showering sparks and molten metal everywhere.
Blade sighed, this was losing its challenge. He nosed forwards and collected what was left of the ship in his cargo hold, as proof of the kill, and headed back the UIT space. You never wanted to stick around in Odia for long, sometimes more than one pirate would get after you, and that was still hard to deal with.

He patched a call through the Nerde Verde, of the Viper guild, and after a short discussion, posted his request to join, as well as his reasons and a basic history.
He rather hoped that they'd but him on to some worthier prey, and besides, convoy escort likely paid better than his current job, with greater risks.

After a further two days, he discovered one thing,
"Damn! These Viper guys are chosey!"
Jan 11, 2006 MysticRogue link
Nice story :-)
Jan 11, 2006 leapfrog link
"Yes, yes we are.", Seta whispered to himself... after reading the com logs of the day before...

"Several before you have joined, and only a few have survived...", he thought to himself...

You see, the Vipers are *more* than a guild... more than a goal... more than a clan... there are roots that go far deeper than any can imagine.

"Commander", Seta spoke softly...

"Yes, Seta...", M. Duncan replied...

"I think you should call Council... the LT's are pretty much spot on... and I think we could benefit from this...", Seta replied...

"Roger that, let me know if anything changes...", the Commander spoke in his usual steadfast tone...

Seta switched off his holoviewer... and leaned back in his chair... "well, we will see...", he thought to himself...

Limping down to the duty locker, Seta paused... "empty again..", he pondered... "no wonder, we are stretched pretty thin lately"

"This is the one place I have always felt most secure... with the knowlege that what is discussed here, stays here. Well, mostly...", Seta chuckled to himself... "I remember sitting right there, on the bench between the lockers... bleeding into a growing pool... and my mates were most supportive..."

"We have all lost family... friends... and there are those that seem to thrive on misinformation levied against us...", Seta thought... "oh well, there is truth... and justice... no matter what..."
Jan 11, 2006 LordofBlades link
Ummmm, *looks at the other story thingies for other peoples storys written into their storys*
Jan 11, 2006 Screwball link
It happens. Just roll with it...
Jan 11, 2006 LordofBlades link
After an uneventful few days roaming the universe, with no bounty's to be had, Blade decided he'd have to fall back on trading for a little while, and was nearing the mission computer when a thought occured to him. Instead, he took a scrap metal mission, as they paid reasonably well, and launched the Hunter, out looking for some pirate scrap metal. To that effect, he traveled to Sedina B-8, which was an exellent and well-known pirate and pilot hangout when they wanted to get their guns out and act real tough, as well as one of the main wormholes that convoys travel through. He arrived just in time to see MysticRogue come out of the wormhole. He smiled, finally, a true challenge. Her pirate hail came through, be he ignored it, he powered up all weapons and boosted straight in for her, at the last moment bringing his ship over-top of the rockets she's launched. He cursed, the worst things for a pirate to have were prox det rockets.

He swing his ship around, firing his neutron blaster, and let loose a volley of gemini missiles. Both missed, and he found himself double pounded by rockets. After a quick barrel roll to get out of the way of the things, he once more locked weapons onto her, and fired three volleys of gemini's at her, the last pair inpacting on her hull, as well as two of his neut shots. She was hurt now, but he was more-so than her. Launching his remaining gemini's, he watched them all fly past her uselessly, and continued firing his neutron blaster. They fired at each other for nearly half an hour, chipping away at eachother's health, before Blade dairingly moved in and shot her down to her last life line. He had 6% hull integrity now, and it all came down to this one final shot, whoever first hit would be victorious.

Blade had no idea what was going through her mind at the moment, but he knew what was going through his. His whole life flashed before his eye's, his heart pounding and his breath ragged in his chest, he relived all the pirate would had wronged him with vivid clarity, including the time when he had been forced to fight back. It all stopped, and he let loose his final shot. It impacted, and a great shower of sparks and molten metal roared from the gap where MysticRogues ship once was, tearing holes in his armor and breaching his hull. Cursing, he dived for his escape pod, and as he was flung into space, watched his companion, the P.H.S Hunter, as it was consumed by the endless night. The ships dying shock wave jostled his pod and knocked him unconsious.

He woke up several days later, in a medical facility in Latos. A man in white stood on his left, "What happened?" he asked. "You have a serious concussion, just relax and let the nanoprobes do their work, then we can get around to how you were retreaved and all that useless crap many like you seem to love knowing", Blade frowned, he must be in a company station, even doctors in serco space had better bedside manor. He shurged mentally, as he didn't think the physical act was a good idea at the moment, and went back to sleep.
Jan 13, 2006 leapfrog link
Hummm... sorry to have interrupted... I seem to do that a lot.

(please forget I interjected, my bad... and go pokes)
Jan 16, 2006 moldyman link
Ar, I be liking this character :)
Jan 20, 2006 mdaniel link
M. Duncan taps Seta on the back. "Well done Council, I see great things in your future."
Jan 20, 2006 leapfrog link
"thank you sir...", Seta replied, snapping to attention... then coming to an ease stance...
Jan 25, 2006 LordofBlades link
Blade woke up in a white room, and looked around. He stood, some what unsteadily, and walked over to the door. There was a clipboard hung on it, he picked it up and read its contents, then cursed and slammed his fist into the door.

Station: Latos Serco Listening Post 12
Doctor: Robert Kain
Subject: Blade, KF-986675
Procedure: Neural Spike Implantation
Doctors Notes: The subject is responding well to the introduction of the reproduction neural spike, which has been installed with a kill switch incase the subject tries to escape. In a few hours the patient should begin to show signs of mental interpritation (telepathy) as well as the ability to reach out and 'sense' the composition of elements and the like. I also must submit that I find experimentation on a living and unwilling subject extremely unethical, and may soon submit my formal recognation to SkyCommand.

Robert Kain

Blade looked around the room. White, padded walls, a very solid looking likely xithricate door. He tried to kick it open, but was completely unsuccessful, even with his boosted muscles. He contented himself to sit down in a corner of the room and wait, when a splitting sensation ripped through his head, from the center of his forhead to the back of his brain. He clapped his hands to his head, and rolled around on the ground from the pain, and when he came down off it, he could feel something on his for-head. He got up and looked at the glass window, trying to disern his reflection, and saw a green crystal, slightly aglow, surounded by metal, xith. He began to feel it in his mind to, and sensed as much as hear footsteps coming down the hallway. He plastered himself to the wall beside the door, waiting for it to open with tensed muscles. Thinking of his options.

The only way to get out of this station alive, and remain alive, was to destroy all information on the kill switch in his brain. The meant destroying the station in its entirety, so no one would be left to activate the kill switch, or tell someone else how to activate it. The thought of killing so many serco's didn't sit well with him, but when it came to the question of him or them, he decided it would be them, and not him, especially since they'd stuck this THING in his head. As the door opened and the first man stepped in, he grabbed him and broke his neck, then struck the second man in the throat, grabbed the stun gun off his belt, and shot him three times. (Garunteed to kill, even if its a stun gun.) He looked back and forth along the corridor, but other than the two dead serconians, he was completely alone. He ran down the hallway, careful to make as little sound as possible, and located a computer terminal. It took him a little while to hack in, but eventually he did, and located the reactor core, and the docking bay.

Ten more minutes found him just outside the reactor room, he'd managed to avoid the people between him and it, but was now faced with the 6 engineers inside of the room. Eventually he shrugged, walked into the room, and picked them off one at a time, the last managed to get a shot off at him, but his gun was swung wide and the shot wasn't nearly close enough to stun him. He shot him to, then shot all the men on the ground several times, just to make sure they were dead, and their wouldn't be any surprises. He walked over to the reactor console, and opened the walkway into the reactor room. Its giant turbines made a horrendous noise, be he persivered, walking to the central platform in the large room, pulled off an equiptment panel, and pulled out three control crystals from the panel, which he dropped over the edge of the catwalk to be destroyed by the reactor. He now had ten minutes at most to get off the station before it was destroyed.

He ran out of the reactor and out the control room, and headed straight for the docking bay at a full run. He shot everyone he was along that way, stopping long enough to shoot them dead, before running onwards. He arrived in the hangers with two minutes to spare, and spotted a slim black ship, little more than a cockpit with a large engine on the back, and made a B line straight for it, jumping into the cockpit and hacking into its AI mainframe to take over the ship. He closed the canopy and launched the ship, just as the reactor went critical. He rammed the engines to full, praying to every known and unknown god, diverting life support power and inertial dampeners to the drives, breaking 500 m/s to outrun the shockwave, before reaching 3000 meters from any object with mass and dropping into hyperspace.
Jan 25, 2006 moldyman link
<vo> [100] <IRCErik C.> how nice, the serco can reproduce the Spike now >_<

>_<
Jan 25, 2006 Screwball link
At a minimum they can install a jewel in someone's forehead. That's the first part of making him look like a My Little Pony...