The breeze was warm. Leaves carried down by the wind spiraling past. The sky was deepening into purple, a common evening here this time of day and year. He’d seen some of the small grazing animals here nibbling on the clover like grasses that dotted the forest. Their furry little bodies scampering off into burrows as soon as his weight snapped a small branch with a loud pop. There were sometimes flocks of red and black birds, their calls of alarm echoing into the hills as they burst from cover when he had come too near. During the darker season there were predators that would move into this area, long claws and fangs that matched. Clever animals built with sleek muscular bodies, designed to hunt and give chase to the quick and helpless animals that lived here nearly all year round. Now though they were further south, in caves that they had been breeding and hibernating in for millennia as this planet rotated around its glowing bright star.
The sun was warm on his face as he looked up to the sky, the air was fragrant, almost intoxicating with the blooms of the slender trees that dotted the landscape here, dark and light blotches in a camouflage pattern on their trunks. As he shifted his weight there was another loud pop, followed by a muffled scream of pain. The man had sweat on his brow, eyes squinted shut tight in pain as he yelled into the gag in his mouth. His face was bruised in several places, blood crusted in a few spots, mostly lip and eyebrow. Of course there were always drugs that could have made this less messy but those weren’t at his disposal and he’d learned that sometimes, this route was more effective with certain people. He let go of the man’s ring finger on his left hand. This was the second one he’d broken, as the man’s nostrils flared and his breathing kept a fast, steady pace, like bellows stoking a fire. His eyes now wider and darting around, even though out here, no one was very likely to stumble across either one of them.
He’d flashed a bit of money around in the pub and asked if someone knew the countryside well enough to show him some of the woodland. The man had taken the bait. He’d seen enough of his criminal record to know how the man operated. Some things really did never change. The figure bound before him was no different. His course set before him as inexorable as the planets course around the setting sun. “Now do you remember anything about the man in the holo?” he asked in a calm and measured tone. “I was assured that you were the man to contact and would know the information I’m looking for.” he said. The man had a pained expression on his face, couldn’t blame him there. He nodded slowly, unwilling to test his luck a third time.
It had been well over two months since he’d left the drunken captain in the rusty hauler. He’d picked up gear and weapons from various caches on the edges of UEE patrolled space, not that he was a criminal per se, it’s just sometimes they didn’t agree with his methods. He’d always had a few different ships stored, various identification mods in them so he didn’t get the wrong kind of attention when he had a job to do, usually selling off the ship after resetting the ID back to manufacturer specs making it more or less clean as a whistle. He’d finally suited up with his custom armor, harder and lighter than the off the shelf stuff you pick up at Garrity’s Defense, his weapons a little more specialized than the Cubby Blast specials you could get in just about any spaceport. High grade energy weapons for close quarters, high grade ballistic material for longer range endeavors. Some of his gear was designed simply to aid in distraction, flash bangs, noise makers, nerve toxins, both lethal and non-lethal that could be administered by dart rounds he’d recently picked up at a hunting shop here on Noble, in the Ellis System.
The darts were made to hunt some of the plentiful varieties of birds on the planet, which were nearly always in abundance this time of year. The smaller flitting varieties had a rather erratic flying pattern, miniature fins could make minute adjustments in flight if the bird jigged a few inches as it flew in whatever pattern nature had programmed it with, the mass of them as a whole looked rather uniform but when you followed an individual you could see how erratic the group was.
As the projectile made the last hands breadth towards the creature, it would shed the end of the casing with one last venting of a small combustion of expanding gasses to propel the round into the animal. Standard rounds would damage the small things too badly to be of use to anyone and he’d learned that the use of such things were really helpful for EVA encounters where you needed to capture an individual in a vacuum without damaging the suit so bad that it couldn’t auto repair the hold the dart made. It would puncture the suit with ease, the cells in the suits were designed to handle any small puncture hole, the material capable of self sealing the suit simply by the pressure difference from the inside pressing to get out would cause some of the membrane of the suit to bulge from the inside and press through to the outside, essentially creating a micro seal.
Many airlocks are equipped with sensitive scanners that identify the contours of the suit at a fine resolution and can detect any such marks and notify the occupant as they enter and leave the airlock. For most cases, having a few of these on a suit are common enough that most people don’t get overly concerned and generally get the suit repaired every few weeks during heavy use. For some of the beings that spent inordinate amounts of time in space, this was just part of the trade and a common practice. Better to spend a few more credits than risk having the equipment fail when it was needed the most.
Some of the other non-standard munitions included a Veratu Mark VII anti personal shield round, the projectile is mounted inside a special casing that peals back and blooms, almost like a flower, as it hits the energy signature of a personal shielding device. The edges of the tip of the round fitted with micro emitters that disrupt the shield as it hits. Specifically, the emitters are used to create a small interference field to lessen the impact of a round taken to vital parts of the body. The tip of the case is designed to release the projectile through the field without it losing much of it’s kinetic energy. It’s not as cheap of a setup as standard suit armor but sometimes the more expensive hired muscle or persons of importance had been known to use the tech to keep them up if a stray round hits them. A few of the larger mercenary corps used it extensively. The rounds themselves are out of the price range of most beings and he couldn’t afford more of them now anyway without taking on jobs he didn’t want.
He’d waited in the back of the room, waiting for the gentleman who’s holo he’d been sent over the relay. He had spent a few days coming into the diner and ordering a popular warm beverage in the mornings. It tasted terrible and was as black as a singularity. The locals called it cough-E, no surprise there. The fellow behind the counter claimed it was famous from one of the Terran colonies on Mars as he sloshed more into his mug. Once you added some hot spices and a thickening agent it became almost bearable, like a nice cup of hot soup. He thought maybe they should discuss adding some local meats and vegetables to the dish as he tilted back more of the black sludge.
As the intel had told him, the man had come in after a few days out in the field, doing whatever unenlightened people do when they’re poaching the livelihoods of unwary tourists. Playing the part, he had worn local clothes, that ironically, the locals didn’t wear. He picked up a small handheld galactic positioning system that would tell him where he was on the planet, a cheap item that generally told others where you were as much as it told you where you were.
He’d made talk with some of the other people around him, mostly locals, mentioning slightly louder than necessary that he’d always wanted to see the preserves and had paid a hefty fee to be able to tag a few species of animals that called it home. After a few days he had asked the man behind the counter if he knew of a guide that could take him out and show him the best spots, the man nodded to the figure at a table to the rear gambling. As he approached the man took a measure of him and smiled. There was a fool born every day.
Standing up and smiling, he brought his arm out in front of his body, balling his fist and turning his wrist, palm inward, to face the man he was greeting. As was customary here, he did the same, touching the top of his own wrist to his. The man introduced himself as Malyk, a local guide, who would be happy to show him around. The man was well built and his suit was rugged but light, designed for mobility over armor, as there was little to worry about on the planet for most of the year, a single sidearm hung low on his left leg.
He walked a few tables over, gesturing with one hand to the man behind the counter to get his attention and also to his new best friend, the man in the local costume. “Get us two Ferrows, if you would.” Malyc called out. The drink was named for one of the local burrowing animals. It was a little early to start drinking but nothing helped a bidding price like a customer with too much brew in his veins. “Well, what can I do for you? Want to see some of the ruins? Go swimming with some of the most beautiful women on this side of Terran space? Whatever you need, Malyc can provide it.” the man stated, bringing his thumb up to his chest with a large smile on his face as he winked.
The man behind the counter placed two mugs of the brew, it was bubbling lightly, Malyc scooping his up and tilting it back and drinking half of it at a go before setting it on the table. The man put on a good show but this wasn’t the nicest of ports. The room around him had seem better days, and those better days were probably a decade past. There were lights flickering on the other side of the room. This whole port was barely policed and one was just as likely to get swindled out of your credits as you were to get what you were looking for. Malyc in particular had been implicated in more than two dozen robberies of local tourists over the years but it was always someone else that took the fall. From what he knew, Malyc would likely set the guests up at a location for a couple local thugs to relieve them of their possessions.
The operation was sad at best. It was easy to prey on tired middle income people looking to have some excitement on the seedier side of the city. More than half of the local constabulary were probably on the take, the investigations, shallow and hurried, never turned up anyone of value and when it did, the people getting punished wouldn’t sit there for more than a week, to get their cut later on. It was easier to fleece and rob the tourists here than it was to serve the tables for credits you earned yourself. Not everyone here was bad, just like everywhere else but the honest folk kept their heads down for fear of losing their jobs if they said or did anything about the situation. Poor sods that were probably just trying to save up enough to jump off this rock and into a better system closer in to the aligned systems.
The ambush had come quickly, they had taken Malyc’s skimmer, a small, six seater craft that hovered just over the terrain, room enough on top for gear and other items if someone expected to stay. The man couldn’t very well rob off every customer he had but a lone individual, acting nervous about talking to a stranger in a run down pub was likely just some hauler from the next system looking for a weekend of something out of the norm to lift his spirits before heading back to do whatever menial task he’d sold himself into.
They had been looking for T’dreti, a type of winged mammal that hung upside down on the branches of some of the larger tree’s north of the city. Not overly large animals, they mainly fed on insects that darted around from plant to plant, germinating much of the foliage here in the forest. Their fur ranging from earthen browns or blacks to dark red or deep azure. These species weren’t on the list of animals allowed to be hunted, as they helped keep the insects from becoming oppressive like they were in the farther north reaches of the planet in some of the tidal marshes that dotted the coast.
The craft had been bounding along, running on it’s main engines when he flipped a switch to change the grav engines into silent running. The change would create a larger drain on the crafts ability to keep it’s internal power supply charged and could only be used for a couple hours before it would exhaust the main power cell and force the craft to kick over to the backup cell while it recharged via the main drive. They had come into a more dense area of the forest where the vegetation was closer at hand on either side of the path, a good hour or so from the edge of the city they had left behind when Malyc flipped the switch and the craft made a shutter, gently shuddered and died as it’s last few seconds of kinetic energy from the drive lowered the craft down onto the narrow path they were traversing.
Malyc gave out a small curse and hit the maintenance sensor panel with his fist, lamenting that after such a fair price had been agreed upon back at the table that misfortune would rear it’s ugly head and ruin his reputation with his esteemed patron. Truthfully Malyc had charged him two hundred credits higher than the going rate in the city but had assured him that the authenticity and expertise of his experience was the difference in price. He had played the part and agreed to the price and informed his new host that if he delivered on his experience that a nice tip was in order when the day was done. Not only was his customer an idiot, he was a funded idiot.
As they got out of the vehicle and walked to the back to open the service hatch where the bulk of the mechanical and electronic systems could be worked on, Malyc mentioned the transitioning sensors had been giving him fits lately and he’d thought the craft had been more reliable than it had turned out to be. The sensors simply determined what speed the craft was traveling at and whether it was safe to shift the vehicle from the more functional main drive to the silent running rig. While not common to most craft, this system was popular for the service it filled and he would have, or should have, backups on hand to swap out the damaged part with a new one as they tended to take more wear and tear than the other systems on the skimmer.
As he popped the hatch and grabbed the sensor, he pulled his hand back and yelped loudly, apparently it was still hot from the overload. That was also apparently the signal to his friends that the time to cash in was at hand. They appeared from behind the trees nearest the path on both sides of the road, a quick glance in either direction let him take both of them in without giving them the idea that he was as alert to what was going on. Only one was armed, the other just there for muscle apparently. The armed one speaking as he came near. Weapon already leveled at them as he spoke. “Well what have we here? Two unfortunate souls in need of assistance. Isn’t that right Triv?” as he smiled to his companion. “That’s right, and we’re the helping sort.” the other, apparently named Triv, answered.
“It just so happens, that for just a small fee, namely all of your credits, we’d love to help you get on your way now wouldn’t we Triv?” As he looked up and down at his two prizes. “Now how about you hand over that piece on your hip there and we can all be friends.” The man told Malyc as he gestured the front of his own weapon down at the one in the holster. Malyc doing his best to look like he didn’t want any of the trouble that his two companions would bring. Malyc kept his hands up away from the weapon as the man came in to relieve him of it, as the front of the weapon passed closer to his own body, his hands up as Malyc had done.
Abruptly, he snapped out his hands, one palm slapping the mans knuckles as the other reached under and slapped the inside of his wrist, briefly numbing the hand and causing the fist to open with the jar of the strike, the weapon flying from the mans hands as he did so. In one fluid motion, he used the backward momentum of the move to with his right hand pulling back on the wrist to bring his elbow back as hard as he could into Malyc’s face with a loud crack as the mans nose went flat while red started to run down his face. He then rushed the same fist forward into the man’s face in front of him who he’d just disarmed, whipping the back of his fist around and hitting Malyc again as he turned quickly and pulled Malyc’s own weapon out of his holster with his free hand. It had happened all in an instant.
Triv had finally registered what was happening and was rushing forward as the first round hit him in the chest in a spray of red, with two more following right behind them. Triv went down in a heap. Turning quickly back toward the first man who was now dropping to retrieve the fallen pistol two more rounds exited the weapon with an accompanying cough following each one as they entered the man, one round into his chest and the other round into his neck. Blood shot out of the neck wound and the man gargled out his last breath. Neither Triv nor his anonymous friend would be harassing any more tourists and things weren’t looking too favorable for Malyc either. As he he kicked the crumbling man in front of him and leaned forward to pick up the weapon he’d attempted to retrieve, stars ignited behind his eyes as the blow struck and he sank to one knee and braced himself with his empty hand. There was a crash of brush behind him as Malyc plowed through the growth at the side of the road.
Shaking his head as he rose to his feet he ran after the man, two weapons in hand. He tucked both behind his belt as he ran through the growth in the direction of the noise crashing ahead not many yards ahead of him. Branches slapping his face from the silver and black leaved bushes that permeated this area. Reaching into a vest pocket, he pulled out a small device, not much larger than the thumb that rested over the slight depression on the top side it. He kept running towards the man ahead of him, catching glimpses of him through the trees just meters ahead of him. He was gaining.
Birds burst from cover as Malyc crashed out into the clearing. Arms pumping like pistons, his chest heaving in and out with the exertion trying to keep ahead of the nightmare situation that had erupted just moments before, he could barely think and all he could hear the man crashing through the brush right behind him. There it was! His eyes locked on the second skimmer parked ahead on the other side of the clearing, idling in silent mode. If he could reach it before the man behind him caught up he could get the hell out of here and disappear somewhere safe. Triv wouldn’t mind, neither would Warrek. Neither of them would mind anything ever again.
What in the makers name had gone wrong? This man had looked like he couldn’t figure out the difference between a singularity and his rear end and yet here he was, fleeing for his very life and being chased by that lunatic. As he turned to look back the man was within 20 feet of him, arm straight out in front of him, some kind of weapon, he went to jig to the right as he felt a sting in his left shoulder. The world went sideways as he toppled to the ground, the vertigo gripping him as he vomited, unable to gather the strength even to lift himself up from where he lay.
As he lay there, muscles unresponsive and his vision going dark, he looked up into the face of the supposed tourist, a hard look in his eyes that wasn’t there when they had been enjoying drinks at the table just a few hours before. The man looked completely calm, as if he did this every day of his life, there was no rush, nor any worry about anything else except what he was doing in this very moment. Right before the blackness took him away, he managed to utter just three words:
“Who are you?”
