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The St. Anne

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Serena Driscol
Onboard Annie
Midwatch
Tagged: Jin-Lai, Elaine, Mateo


Serena leaned back and placed both hands over her heart with a flourish. “Oh my goodness!” she cried, “You’ve got to slow down there babe, a girl can only take so much!” she said, and then giggled. “You could have won our devotion by promising that whatever you served would taste a little bit like food. You sound like you want to turn our little galley into a three-star kitchen. Not that I’m complaining, mind you.” She continued. “You just let me know if you need anything. The way to my heart passes directly through my stomach in case you were wondering.”

Serena leaned back as the Shuttle took off and braced herself to pierce atmo. She ran through her plan in her mind as she held on tight for the shaking parts, wanting to make the most of her time on the surface.

Serena’s Guide to Shore Leave

Step 1 – Don’t make a fuss at customs

Serena had literally nothing but her id, some cash, and the clothes on her back. Her tools and equipment were all left on the shuttle. This made getting through port control quick and easy, even if they searched her. Sadly there was nobody at the port cute enough for her to volunteer to be strip searched by, but there is always the trip back.

Step 2 – Locate the local Big Box Store

Even a hick planet like Dixon's Reach had a local Buy & Go franchise (Over 40,000 locations and counting. It’s a galaxy of savings!) in its port town. Serena headed straight there for the essentials.

Step 3 – Get the essentials

Some new clothes off the rack, a cheap makeup kit, a travel set of toiletries, and a trip to the bathroom on the way out to put it all on and Serena was a new woman. Mostly clean and out of her work clothes she looked like a normal person and was now going to be treated like one. And all of it was cheap enough that she didn’t mind leaving it planetside when the time came.

Step 4 – Some real goddamn food

A nice big meal was essential. Jin-Lai was going to improve things in the future, but at the moment she’d only served up some promises and a mild crush. So it was off to wherever seemed best from the ads plastered all over the Buy & Go for a large hot meal. Get desert and skip the doggie bag, you don’t want to be carrying that crap around for two days.

Step 5 – Booze
Somewhere in this godforsaken hole is a decent bar. Find it, have a drink. Have two. Get nice and relaxed for the next part.

Step 6 – Drugs

Serena really doesn’t understand law enforcement. She had never had any trouble finding a drug dealer and gaining their trust. This, of course, is one of the parts where having the cheap clothes is essential as she might have to soil them a little to get what she wants.

Step 7 – Find a Party

Only losers and addicts get high by themselves. This is especially true when taking the kind of euphoria inducing drugs that Serena enjoys. Thankfully drug dealers are always happy to provide a pretty girl in a short skirt with somewhere to enjoy herself.

Step 8 – Double check

Is this party lame? Are there any girls there? Where is it? Make sure that this is a place you don’t mind passing out in. If it fails? Go back to step 7. Pass? Proceed onward!

Step 9 – Lets get lit bitches!

I’ll meet you on the Annie when it’s time to go home.
 
Mateo Reyes
Lil' Annie
Midwatch
Anybody within earshot or a really good telepath.


A few minutes passed and Mateo began making the playlist for his beach vacation. He was debating to himself whether or not to include Vivaldi when he heard El joke about leaving him. "Yeah sure ditch me at the planet. Can't wait to hear about the magic you work with the power loader El." Mateo deadpanned, not even looking up from the playlist.

The smoothest part of the shuttle ride was always space, you could float around and eat bagged food and stuff. The roughest part was atmospheric entry, especially when the temperature kicked up a little. Mateo always had enjoyed the re-entry, it was like being on a shitty roller coaster, but he knew rocking of the shuttle as it hit atmosphere was the bane of people with a bit of motion sickness. He caught a look out the viewport and saw the void of space slowly burning into the blues and greys of a planet's atmosphere.

Mateo noticed Jin nervously rock a little in the shuttle. "Hey don't worry, El can land this thing on a highway exit ramp. Besides if we were to die now, we'd only feel like a second or two of pain before we," Mateo puffed up his cheeks and made a whooshing noise to try and pantomime fire, "burn up to a crisp. But that's like a two percent chance. Maybe three."

The ship began to tug down and it was fully immersed in the gravity of the planet at this point. Outside, what must have been the largest settlement on the planet was starting to come up. Mateo began to finish up his playlist for the beach and slipped his headphones on to begin droning out the sounds of the upcoming city. Shit I should have brought that old grill on the ship. What's some beach fun without a little cookout? He thought, letting himself get bummed a little. Oh well. It's still going to be a two day break.
 
Doctor Sonakshi Khan, the Bridge, Midwatch.

Sonakshi stood with half a smile while Iona and Donovan exchanged the needed protocols to observe, sometimes less formal than others, more entertained looking at Thomyris than anything else. They haven't talked much yet, nothing beyond the norm, nothing personal for sure, and Sona wondered why was that. Sure, not everyone was a chatterbox every time they visited the doctor, but with time she had found that people tended to open up with her like she was a bartender. Not giving it importance, she looked amused at Donovan turning his attention to the lean woman. It was always amusing seeing the first mate care about someone on the ship, not because it was a rare occassion as the doctor knew that he would go to extremes to defend them, but mostly due to the look on the faces of the ones being cared for. Newcomers always looked in disbelief at that... rough and odd man caring for their well being, something that was always a sight to behold, but Thomyris' eyes were different. Was it defiance? Khan doubted so, after all she was better reading into a body than into a person themselves, so she abandoned that particular train of thought as Donovan addressed her.

"We are calling a shuttle" she answered, "the sooner we get this done, the better. That leaves us more free time after we are done with the drug run, even if I don't have any particular plans" Sona explained, even if Donovan wouldn't require it. She wondered what the first mate had in mind for those hours of leisure, what kind of plans the man could have. As he went away to, get his shit together as he put it, Sona used the bridge to request and hire a ride to the station, a mostly boring and uneventful procedure. It wouldn't be the last time, or so she thought, since if the deal went smoothly it would require a bit of back and forth for the cargo and payment, so it was likely that the next few hours were as boring as the last ones.

If the deal went smoothly.

She went by her quarters to grab her things, a tidy and pristine place where she did nothing but sleep, since she spent most of her time on the clinic and the sheep weeks have been quite the dry spell. She changed her clothes from a set of nondescript fatigues to another, as Sona usually paid no mind to those things, doing herself no favors in the look department. Grabbing her doctor suitcase after making sure everything was in order, she went to the bay, hoping to find both their incoming ride and Donovan looking more than ready for things to go south.
 
Thomyris “Riz” Heroux
Location: Ventral Bay/Space
Tagged: Iona Knutedottir

Thomyris nodded and proceeded to adorn herself in the clunky parts of her pressurized hard suit. It was a tedious process and unlike the Captain who didn’t mind floating in all manner of angles and directions, Thomyris consistently forced herself upright in the zero-gee while she covered herself. Nothing was uniform about their equipment and gear, collected, salvaged, or outright stolen from all sorts of sources and origins.

After clonking her T-visor helmet over her head, sealed and pressurized to her suit, she turned and inspected the Captain’s suit, pulling on limbs and straps to ensure it was all tightly fit. With a tap on the Captain’s shoulder, Thomyris indicated she was all good to go. Everything looked good and she was thorough, though a fear of missing something would remain in the back of her mind until they were safely outside the ship. She too followed the Captain’s safety precautions and guidelines with extreme severity. Growing up on a mining world, rife with accidents, had instilled Thomyris with a healthy sense of diligence in that regard a s well.

With another grunt of acknowledgement, she used her datapad to remotely vent the atmosphere and unseal the lock, a brief rush of air sweeping by them as the doors opened to reveal the dotted blackness of space. The ventral bay doors opened fully and the hollowness and silence of it flooded over them then, engulfing Thomyris in a deadly shroud of vacuum, separated from death by the sheer fabric, metallic, and plastoid material of her jumpsuit and hard suit. She took a deep breath of the recycled air in her suit and followed the Captain, swimming her way out. One slip up could see one tumbling off into space on an unrecoverable trajectory. Thomyris would not deny that she could be quite terrified of these experiences, despite having done it many times before.

Other than her shallow breathing, the next sound Thomyris heard was the grav-locks at the soles of her sealed boots thumping onto the underside of the St. Anne’s hull. Every movement was slow and deliberate, as if walking underwater. Observant, she paused to allow the Captain to hook herself to Thomyris’ suit and then proceeded to walk in small hops, like a happy girl skipping down the street, towards the aforementioned storage bay. She still had no clue what they were up to when they reached the exterior bay, again thinking they were going to do repairs or a spot inspection as the gravity sled was prepped.

She listened attentively to the Captain but said nothing. What was there to say? She wasn’t asked a question, nor was she overly knowledgeable on the guiding and conduct of a ship. She never considered herself in any such position. She wordlessly took the reins of the small sled when instructed and waited again, looking down at the controls. Even with something as small as this, she never piloted before. It was always one of the others.

At first she felt another modicum of resentment. Treating me like a baby again. She glanced back, her expression veiled, when the Captain made a jest about the nav system on the sled being out. When did we have anything that fully operated anyways? She was still inspecting the controls, moving her hands across it but not touching it, as if to familiarize herself. She had a decent enough memory so she didn’t have to stare at it long to know where everything was. She just wanted to get this right. And prove I’m not just a baby everyone needs to look out for. If only they seen his head…

Something about that memory made her snarl inside her helmet.

It didn’t help when the Captain outright told her she was going to flop, this time making Thomyris glance back at Iona sharply. What the hell…? Then she jerked her gaze forward, again flushed with resentment at being singled out for a lesson. But any such consternation within her was silenced when Iona began to...compliment her? “...stand in front of a ship's crew and lead them…” she repeated quietly to herself, amazed and taken utterly unaware that she was even being considered for leadership. Now she was thoughtful, unmoving, staring down at the controls, her gloved hands gripping the accelerator.

I can do this. She told herself. But did she believe herself? The Captain gave her permission to go but Thomyris did not react immediately. She could already deduce that she would have to aim ahead, further down the station’s orbital trajectory, taking the sled’s speed of propulsion into consideration, as well as the station’s speed. But such calculations figured little into her mind at that moment. The fear of launching off into space never to be found again, or to run out of air and slowly suffocate, or to indeed botch up a repair on the Anne and blow the entire ship up, even those did not factor in.

If she failed, they both would die a slow, probably agonizing death. If Thomyris succeeded...she would be expected to become responsible for others if the Captain’s aspirations for her came to fruition. Responsible for others...Thomyris didn’t know what was more terrifying, that or dying in the cold, empty vacuum of space. She went to extreme measures to take care of herself already. How could she possibly do so for others?

Instead in a squeakish tone, she answered. “Aye, aye, Captain.” She shifted the forward-nose of the grav-sled towards the station, then angled it a bit forward of it.

Still, she didn’t take off. And in a more firmer tone, she added. “You sure have a way of unwinding your surprises on us too, Captain. Either I get us there...or we both die. Fun.” She added in her usual dry tone. Then punched the accelerator before the Captain could reply and now it was the moment of truth.

Or rather moments. For a time, they drifted off into the space between the St. Anne and the orbital station. Other than the deafening silence of space, the only other noise was the rumble of the sled’s thrusters whenever Thomyris applied power. Nor was she timid with the speed. She pushed them to a considerable pace off the bat, nearly reaching the threshold of 3 gees that the Captain had warned about. She was well over 2 for the most part, though slowed after a while. So far, it seemed as if they were going to hit the station at the right approach but a short way past the half point mark, it seemed as if they might fall short.

She cut the thrusters and stayed motionless as the sled went on, carried on by its own inertia. “Still feeling sure about this?” Thomyris voiced again, somewhat in morbid jest, her mouth dry. Her heart was pounding in her chest. Either they made it to the station...or the people of this world would be graced by by not only raining sheep but raining bodies as well. Now was the difficult part of closing with the station and not overshooting, undershooting, or smashing outright into it. By now, the station was as big as her hand in the distance and steadily growing. Soon it would dwarf the two ladies and their little sled.

She decided to go in backwards. She using one thruster to spin them about, then another to correct their inertia, using the rearview camera at the back of her helm. She used the Captain’s body as a pointer, directing it again a little ahead of the station. Then she once more rocketed them in. Ahead of them, the distant St. Anne shrunk until it was no larger than her fingertip, while behind her the Station grew to take up the entire foreground of her camera feed. They were within a quarter of the distance...and the station was passing rapidly.

Thomyris realized they were going to undershoot. Eyes darting to and fro in sudden urgency, she punched the accelerator right to the limit, shaking the sled for a few seconds despite what the Captain had warned. Her whole body shook with the force, wobbling tremendously inside her suit. Yet after a few seconds, she cut the thrusters again and let them carry on, dead in space. Thomyris realized her heart wasn’t beating out of fear...but adrenaline. Flying was actually, dare she say it, exciting.

Then at the last second, she activated the aft thrusters, causing them to lurch into the top of their hardsuits, her head bumping the ceiling of her helm and pressing there firmly. They would have one bruise at least, but they wouldn’t smash into the station like a meteor at high speeds. The reverse inertia brought them to a slow enough speed to allow them to reach one of the rear docking bays on the station. All they had to do was latch on.

“I think this is where your promise of no harm befalling me needs to come in…” Thomyris commented, craning her neck to look over each of her shoulders for guidance, her rearview camera now useless as she was too near to the station to glimpse much detail besides seemingly endless exterior hull and plating.
 
Elaine Reid
Onboard Annie
Midwatch
Tagged: Jin-Lai, Mateo, Serena

Elaine swung the shuttle away from the St. Anne and quickly lay in a course for an entry burn. Her lips tugged upwards in a grin at Mateo's offhanded compliment. She was a good pilot, but none of the crew had seen her piloting via direct interface in her time aboard - nor would they if she could help it. Aside from showing a side of herself she'd rather keep under wraps she much preferred physical piloting. It felt good to guide a ship with two hand gripping a control yoke. Even if sometimes those hands were soaked with panicked sweat when doing so.

She didn't panic or break a sweat as she angled the ship to break atmosphere with its curved belly first. As the first flares of friction-heat bloomed in the forward viewport she keyed the ship-based comm systems, browsing the open lines before finding the one she needed. Shudders ran through the shuttle as the atmosphere began to rip at the ship's exterior with flaming fingers. Elaine tapped the comms panel as a particularly violent judder wracked the ship. "Planetary Station Authority this is Shuttle 4NN13-01 requesting landing vectors and docking clearance planetside. Our current itinerary has us docked for two standard cycles, with the option of early departure as needed." She spoke coolly over the comms, though that last bit rankled. Early departure tended to jack up port fees in backwaters like this place.

A few seconds of shuddering and jostling with the pains of re-entry later a quiet ping announced the wordless response to Elaine's request as a 3D visual bloomed on the Navigation console depicting approach vector and landing details. She dipped the shuttle's nose and pushed the engines as they broke the atmospheric envelope, angling in to match the display. "Alright ladies and gentlemen, welcome to filthy backwater number...shit, I lost count." She chuckled to herself, enjoying her awful jibe even if no one else did. "Stow your safety gear. We'll be dirtside in two."

As if on cue another chime rang in the cabin and the ship's speaker's crackled to life. "Shuttle 4NN13-01 you've been cleared to land in Bay 03, begin approach at your leisure."
 
Iona Knutesdottir
Kohlberg Station
Midwatch
Tagged: Thomyris

When Thomyris started blasting hard, Iona almost took control back. High-g was absolutely punishing to her, even though her bones were strong enough to take it provided she wasn't standing or attempting to do more than endure it, and Thomyris was really pouring on the gees as she inexpertly guided the grav sled. Several times her fingers twitched, almost cutting Thomyris' controls out and slaving them to her suit's thigh datapad but each time Thomyris made enough of a correction that Iona stayed her hand. It took a lot of self-control to ride the ragged edge of the rookie's control but if she could just keep from taking over, let Thomyris make mistakes that didn't really matter except to offend the need Iona had for elegant piloting, then the young woman might just make a leap of confidence.

Tightening her thigh and belly muscles and almost grunting in high-g exercises designed to keep blood in her head and out of her extremities, Iona suffered the rough ride until they ended up floating just a few meters from a docking slot. Strain was in her voice when she answered Thomyris, but her tone was also warm for all the stress the ride had produced. "I want you to remember that you brought us here all by yourself, Thomyris. We'll keep working on it to develop more finesse, but like my father said of rough but acceptable job 'hammer it to fit and paint it to match'. Kill the power and I'll drag us in." Once the grav sled was safe from accidental activation, Iona unclipped from the acceleration harness and braced her hand on the central bulge. A gentle push sent her backwards towards the station and the grav sled away, but do to her lighter mass she was moving faster. As soon as she touched the station, Iona unclipped the tether and clipped it to a padeye, then gently braked the line to bring the grav sled to a smooth halt and a very gentle tug gave it a few centimeters per second drift that soon brought it to the mooring spot.

"Lock it down and remember where we left it," she ordered and waited for the hand to do so. A few minutes later they were inside the station in a locker room style double airlock and getting out of their suits. By long standing custom no one would mess with another spacer's suit unless it was an absolute life or death emergency. Anyone who did soon found themselves in need of one as they were stuffed out the nearest airlock sans suit by a lynch mob.

Iona took her shipsuit from the thigh pocket and shook it out. The hard vaccum had boiled off moisture and oils and all that was left was a very fine powder that swirled into the nearest aitch-vac intake when she shook it out. Spacer's laundrymat and it was handy and cheap. She slipped back into it and replaced her shard pistol where it belonged.

"Jesu, Mary y Yosef" she swore and stretched, wincing at the bruises she felt. Giving Thomyris a wry look, Iona went back to her suit and reached inside of it, extracting a bubble derm of analgesic from it and slapped it onto the side of her neck like a fat orange tick. Almost immediately her skin began to absorb the medicine and she nodded and stretched again. It still hurt but it was just background now.

"Let's find the souk," she ordered, referring to the bazaar like area of any station or port where everything from single-person sellers up to multi-system conglomerates did business. Iona didn't lead the way, forcing Thomyris to figure out how to get them there. "Ideally we're looking for something just our size. The Doggeds may be almost gone, slow, and old but we still shift just the right amount of cargo for some jobs. They even still call them by our tonnage and cubic limits; Dogged sized cargoes. They usually have the best payoff ratio too and we have a single destination voyage. None of this triangular trade route business which is usually sewed shut by established carriers." Like her parents, for example, and their ship.

"We can always find space for a few tons and meters of speculative goods or luxuries of course, and any hand can ship a little bit off the books and a good Captain won't notice unless it is a risk to her ship."

She stopped and put a hand on Thomyris' shoulder, turning the shorter woman to look at her. "The St. Anne doesn't truck with cargo that thinks, savvy? It happens, and it's always going to happen, but it doesn't happen on my ship. I don't care if they're called bond workers or debt laborers or flat out slaves, I don't hold with that. One day you'll have to decide that for yourself and your ship, but not on the St. Anne. I don't care how much cred they wave at us."
 
Donovan
Personal Quarters. St. Anne
Midwatch
Tagged: Donovan

Donovan stopped at the door to his personal quarters and planted his feet on the ground, the gravity in his room was set the 3-gees much like his home planet and trying to 'swim' into it was asking to eat floor. Opening the door he stepped inside and felt the familiar, comfortable pull of high gravity on his body. His first few steps into the room were accompanied by the popping and settling of his joints and a contented sigh. It took a few moments for his heart rate to return to its normal, one of the things he disliked most about low gravity.

Once the initial head rush passed he walked to his bunk and pulled a foot locker from under it. It was a heavy duty model with a multi-layered biometric lock. First he gave it his thumb print, then a retina scan, finally plucking a hair from his head for a DNA scan. The lock slid open to reveal a second lock with a keypad. Putting in the seventeen digit code he grinned as he heard the heavy bolts of the lock disengage. He waited for a count of fifteen before opening the lid. If the lock was tampered with it was set up to gas the would be thief with a powerful knock out gas with paralytic properties that lasted for upwards a week and if the lid was attempted to be forced open it was rigged to set out plasma torches inside to destroy the contents. Donovan liked his privacy and took some rather extreme measures to keep it. If the exact pattern he used to enter the locker wasn't followed, fifteen second delay after locks disengaged including the contents would be destroyed as if the locker was being broken into.

Once the lid sat hanging open he smiled down at the first layer of contents. Reaching into a small gap in the center he pulled out the expanding trays to reveal two more tiers of trays underneath, then the main storage compartment. The first tier of trays contained various boxes of ammunition, low velocity rounds for inside space craft enough power to puncture skin and most standard hard suits, but not enough to punch though the walls of a ship. High density armor piercing rounds, chemical delivery rounds with various chemical agents to cause effects from vomiting, paralysis, to death. Anti personal incendiary rounds that only ignite after entering flesh, his personal favorite, and something he would never admit to having on Iona's ship even under such strict containment, remote detonated high explosive rounds that could turn a person into a meaty paste and scattered bits as well as do significant damage to most standard and medium armored vehicles. Selecting three clips of HDAP rounds, and three of API rounds he sat them on his bunk.

The second tier held an impressive array of bladed weapons from all over the universe, just about all of them taken from people that he killed, a few that he bought from his travels. He already kept his favorite on him, his combat stake. After a few minutes of deliberation he decided the one was enough for this outing and moved on to the third tier.

The third tier easily held the most valuable of his collection. Three-hundred and twenty ounces of Sylidium in the form of one ounce coins. One of the new super rare metals found after humanity spread across the galaxy it holds an astonishing value of around fifty thousand credits an ounce. The price is many due to the extreme danger of mining the ore and its high density and light weight, resistance to temperatures exceeding 5,000 degrees Celsius, and its resistance to oxidation and acids. Running his fingers over the mauve hued coins he smiled at the memory of how he acquired such a collection of valuable coins. "Poor bastards never knew what hit them." He muttered to himself with a edge of sadistic pleasure, and it was true, the smugglers who had the shipment were one of his many groups of victims in his wandering years between escaping the Facility and finding his home on the St. Anne, and by far the most valuable of his ill gotten prizes. Their monetary value meant little to him in all actuality, he had enough money to get the things he needed and most of what he wanted. Money was only a means to an end for him, another tool to be used and nothing more. He planned on giving most of it to Iona after her contract with her family was complete, 25% profits from her runs was one thing, but they were not going to see a single cred of this money.

Reaching into the main compartment he pulled out his medium armored combat EVA suit and helmet sitting them on the bed with his extra clips. Also in the bottom was a random assortment of gear that he had found useful in his carrier as a soldier, mercenary, and general menace to humanity during his wandering years. Each piece was a tried and true item that had it's uses but nothing deemed necessary for what should be a run of the mill supply pick up. Closing up the locker he slide it back under his bunk and rose to his feet. Breathing in deep, controlled breaths he readied himself for the pain.

In his normal ritual he stood in the center of his room and activated all his implants to ensure they were working as they always had. As he did so a screeching static raked through his head, growing steadily louder as more implants were activated. His eyes now glowing their eerie orange seemed to vibrate in their socks with how fast the twitched side to side. A thin sheen of sweat quickly covered his face as his head started to violently twitch in all directions, his jaw clenched so tight his teeth could be heard creaking against each other. As more implants activated his hands and arms started to violently tremble as his fingers preformed a spastic dance to the accompaniment of snapping tendons and cracking knuckles.

A rictus of sheer madness spread across his face as he collapsed to the floor, his entire body thrashing now. White hot needles of pain stabbed into every nerve ending and it felt as though something with searing, jagged claws had torn into his skull and raked his brain. The static grew louder and the screams of thousands of tormented people filtered in from the background adding to the cacophony inside his skull. His body snapped into a rigid arch, the back of his head and his heels the only parts touching the floor anymore as the last of the implants activated. Mind numbing pain tore through him leaving him feeling as though he were being flayed alive while being dragged over a bed of super heated razors. Every nerve screamed in glorious pain and the din in his head still grew louder, now joined by the distinct sounds of gunfire on top of everything else. The screams, moments ago wordless cries of agony were now haunting yells of accusations. Eyes rolling into the back of his skull featureless faces filled his sight as they threw their hate filled words at him.

A single voice, hauntingly sweet and tender in the onslaught of sound came to the foreground. The voice of a young girl, whose face emerged from the untold masses in his minds eye. She was pretty, the soft, round features of a girl who hadn't quite left childhood but was well on her way to become a gorgeous woman. "Help me Donovan! Help me! You promised you wouldn't leave me alone! You promised! Where did you go! WHERE! WHERE! WHY ARE YOU NOT HERE DONOVAN! HELP! HELP! HELPHELPHELPHELPHELP!" The girls eyes opened to reveal empty sockets full of darkness that was deeper than the void of space. Her pleads for help melted into a shrill shriek of horror and pain.

Blackness. A blackness so all consuming that it even blotted out the sounds. Complete and total void of everything.

Slowly Donovan came back to reality as the implants deactivated leaving him laying on the floor covered in a film of sweat. His breathing was calm, steady, even though he felt he should be panting and gasping for each lung full. "Get up Donovan. You don't have time to be lying on the floor, you have shit to do today." He recognized his voice as his own, but it felt like the words were coming from someone else's mouth. "I said GET UP!" He barked and quickly obeyed him pulling his upper body from the floor in a single swift motion. Looking around his quarters he could feel the rictus of madness still on his face. "Good, now get your ass in gear, the good Doctor is waiting for you." Getting to his feet Donovan looked down the gear he laid out for himself and nodded. "Yeah, I know." He answered himself, his voice much calmer than moments before. "Don't wanna keep her waiting." He muttered as he suited up for the trip.

Donovan
Bay
Midwatch
Tagged: Doctor Sonakshi Khan


Heading to the bay he got there moments before Sonakshi, armed and ready to bust heads. "Glad I didn't keep you waiting Doc." He said the glint of madness strong in his eyes. "What's the plan when we get station side? We looking for legit supplies or should I sniff out the good stuff for you?" He inquired, the rictus of madness gone from his face, but replaced by an equally unsettling smile that promised violence to any that crossed him.
 
Doctor Sonakshi Khan
Bay
Midwatch
Tagged: Donovan.


A bad one.

That was the first thing it crossed her mind as she looked at Donovan's face on the bay. The man held his privacy as dearly as his utensils of pain and death, but they had been on the ship enough as to have more than one chance to talk things. Sonakshi didn't know everything, maybe even Donovan didn't know it all about himself, but after patching a wound or two, something that happened to people with Donovan's lifestyle even if when they were as good at it as him, she knew enough. Whatever happened with Donovan that made him well, unstable, had its good and bad moments, and he looked straight out a bad one. Trying to get him to talk about it or even suggesting that he could sit this one out was both impossible and irresponsible, so the best she could do was to keep him busy, and the task would certainly require him to get busy.

After all, both Donovan and her shared a kind of a common goal, an unspoken agreement, a mutual understanding. They loved the St. Anne, and would go great lengths to protect its captain, the ship and the rest of the crew, probably in that order. That included, sometimes but not often, acting as a buffer of sorts between the things that was better if the captain didn't know and Iona herself. Sonakshi didn't know the numbers, but she was aware of the rigging and transportation costs of those sad sacks of sheep, and things could get tight if expenditure wasn't controlled. After all, the captain had left it quite clear, she had to look for the best deal possible and separate want from need. One thing was being practical, but if Iona had made those remarks, Sonakshi took to heart that they needed to stretch their money as much as possible.

"We need anesthetics, painkillers too if we can afford the price" she said, pinching the bridge of her nose, juggling keeping Iona out of trouble, their possible monetary trouble, the need for medicine and Donovan's capability for violence. "I'm starting to suspect that the sheep business wasn't as profitable as expected, so we'll need to get the merchandise we need for cheap. And if happens to be unclean, not exactly legal, Iona can't know" she added, seeing the lights on the bay terminal go from red to green. A tired man driving an old shuttle was there, looking bored as hell he pointed them to his ship. Sure, making trips around the station probably wasn't the most exciting job around, and it was poorly paid, that much she knew as she was the one paying for it, but at least it was safe.

That tin can was functional, at it was as much as could be said of it, since it was the most bland mean of transportation ever made, a nondescript grey box with the barely minimum to make it work. Reaching the station was more welcomed than usual, as the life support on the shuttle made the air taste like a sweaty ass, and not in any remotely good or enticing way, Sonakshi was sure of that. "As I was saying" she continued after paying the fare, out of earshot. "We could use any discount we can get, for the sake of the St. Anne, so we can hit the official suppliers first, but I have no hope of their prices being anything near reasonable" she said.

The visit to the various medical suppliers of the station was brief, and not even the pride that came with being right offered any consolation, as the prices would mean that the only prudent expenditure was getting them a few anesthetics doses and not much else. "It's time to go to the... ahem, alternative market" she admitted to Donovan. The wonderful thing about the world of drugs was that with a doctor on board you could make wonders, specially when you had an unorthodox one like Dr. Khan. Sure, her patients may, just may, end up with secondary effects that ranged from a bit of a hangover to a few hours of seeing blue pixies floating around, but that was the price of using custom made mixtures of recreational drugs as anesthetics.
 
Serena Driscol
Onboard Annie
Midwatch
Tagged: Jin-Lai, Elaine, Mateo


Serena desperately wanted to yank off her helmet, toss it aside, and run screaming off the shuttle to head out to the planet and begin her leave right away, but sadly that was not to be the case. She had a life support system to carefully dismantle and a whole series of checks to run on Annie to make sure she was going to be flight capable before she had her fun. Most people would do the checks right before takeoff, but Serena wanted the ability to wait for the very last minute to rush back to the Annie just in case.

As she unbuckled herself she glanced over at Mateo and grinned, “Hey Tin-Man. If you’re really going to the beach I need you to get yourself a can of sealant and give yourself a full treatment. I don’t want to spend the entire trip to the next godforsaken rock cleaning sand out of your joints. If you want to wait until I’m done with the cargo I’ll help you oil up.” She said as she stood up and racked her helmet. She walked to the side door and pushed the button to lower the hatch and stepped out. She then poked her head back into the crew compartment with a big smile. “Of course, if either of you ladies wants me to oil you up, I’d be happy to do that too.” She called back and then hopped out again.

She got to work unhooking the life support system and setting up the containers for transport. Unhooked from the ship the sheep would only survive for a few hours but that should be more than enough time for the client to take possession and put them back on life support. All the previous trips had gone smoothly and Serena didn’t expect this to go any differently. The client was as eager to be done as she was. Once the last of the cargo was unhooked and the crates loaded onto pallets for transport by the local teamsters Serena ran through her checks. Annie had been working hard the last week and the last thing Serena needed was for something to go wrong once they tried to leave. Thankfully it seemed all she needed to do was flush the fluids and replace a few seals. She hit her comms and said to anyone in range. “Annie is ship shape to leave when we’re ready.”

All her work done Serena stepped into the shuttle and stripped out of her overalls, workboots and tool belt and into a pair of shorts and cheap flats that she kept stashed in the overhead compartment. She hoped it was going to be warm outside when she left but she didn’t want to bring anything she’d miss with her, and a pair of shorts and a tank top could easily be left. “Alright kids, I’m done. Anyone still around and want to go shopping?” she called out on her comm.
 
Kohlberg Station
Midwatch


"She's here." The woman was dressed in the coveralls of a second rate passenger liner crewmen with flashes that showed she worked as a rated hand in the cargo division. The hand comm she used was several years old but beneath its shell there was a chip that had a frequency agile, encrypted capability that was currently being used.

"Off that old Dogged class that just undocked?" It was a man's voice on the other end, raspy as if getting over a cold.

"I don't know. I didn't see where they came in but...hang on. Let me get some imagery." From her coveralls the woman took out a small imager with an oil-stabilized organic lens and shot several seconds of very high quality video of Thomyris and Iona alike. "Dumping it now. I don't have processing capability," she said and waited for the quarter of a minute it took to transfer the video.

"Okay, shit...that is her. No doubt about that. He's going to be-"

"Generous," the woman interrupted. "If you play it right and don't just bust your nut thinking about it. Play it cool."

"Slag you," the man rasped but with no real enthusiasm behind it. "We can't take them station side. Too many eyes. Slam a tracker on them and come back. I'll get the imagery processed and the 'metrics verified to send it to him."

The woman uncommed without comment and headed towards where Iona and Thomyris were walking. As she passed by them her left hand slipped out and with an underhand toss a tracking bug flew from her hand. It's simple organic brain inside its cunningly crafted mechanical body moved its six legs and slipped inside a fold of cloth on Thomyris' tunic and dug in then went dormant, coded to respond only when queried by the right combination of frequency and code.
 
Jin-Lai Park
Location: Shuttle "Annie" @ Spaceport Customs and Immigration Control
Tagged: Serena, Elaine, Mateo


Jin unbuckled from her seat, and then removed the helmet once they landed. She then promptly stowed the gear in it's place. Just like in her kitchen , aboard the Annie everything had a home-base where it belonged. An orderly system that needed to be adhered to , not to oppose chaos as a mere philosophical point , but to quite literally ensure everything was where it needed to be to be used, to keep people safe, or to not injure people

Now once the ramp was down, Jin first used her internal comms to hook into the planetary net. She wanted to check on the status of several orders and refunds. She would stop by if anyone refused to refund the ship for bad produce or produce not delivered. She also checked to see when she could inspect the new goods she had ordered. It took several minutes for her to make all these contacts, some via voice some via text or queue.

Jin had blushed earlier at the idea of hot oil, but then now that Serena mentioned shopping , Jin had an epiphany, and perked up with interest "I suppose I could use some civvies, a nice blouse and a skirt and maybe some sandals or some boots, depending on how warm it is today. and something comfy to wear on ship when im not busy being a chef. " Not to mention , she thought, a couple of knives. Jin wasn't worried about money, she was more troubled about the source of the money that had been deposited into her credit account, she would definitely want to get some of that in cash just in case it was a bank error. But in truth she knew it was part of her family - either the corporate side or the outlaws most likely, though her renegade uncle Walter might also be the one responsible.

She wasnt worried about customs though, she she had her "hard card" temporary system resident card on a lanyard under her jacket. That would save her a lot of searching and duties , though of course it had not been cheap in the first place.
 
Mateo Reyes
Location: Shuttleport and customs
Midwatch
Tagged: Serena, Jin-Lai, Elaine

Mateo shoved the helmet off and grabbed his gear, checking for his papers one last time before he hit the customs counter. As he stood up to hop off the ramp he heard Serena advise him about some sealant. Mateo grimaced a little, he was built to be a highly durable combat machine that can slog through any environment. Well whatever, entering maintenance mode on my arms and cleaning them by myself is a pain. I'll just take the help. Mateo walked down the ramp to the bustle of a shuttleport mid day. Various shuttle arrivals and departures, men and women with familiar cybernetics in power loaders, tourists arriving, and locals leaving, the port was decently occupied today.

"Yeah I'll get some sealant with you I suppose. I needed to pick up a few things anyways." Mateo said, leaning on the side of the shuttle with his bag at his feet. The cyborg was just going to wait until the mechanic was done with her shuttle duties. If this shore leave turned out anything like the last one, the group would probably need a quick getaway anyways.

While waiting a few of the power loader workers nodded or waved as they went past him. Sometimes Mateo helped out with unloading, it helped to have some friends at any port you go to, but with only 47 and a half hours of shore leave left Mateo did not feel any need to waste that valuable relaxation time. He couldn't help but eye some of the newer augmentations on the workers, comparing his own to them. None of them seemed former military the work on their bodies were almost entirely for labor, yet their's seemed sleeker, a touch more modern.

I could still totally take any of them in an arm wrestling contest. While Mateo was thinking he glanced over at the station's security officers. About four of them were grouped up and... staring him down? The security wasn't even particularly well armed, wearing the company's standard regs and were all armed with handguns and batons. They seemed to be talking about him for a brief second before noticing Mateo's gaze and dispersing their group. "That's never a good sign. Why me though?" he said to himself. If he was going to quell any doubts about him, getting through customs would probably be the best way to do it.

Serena's voice crackling out of the comm in his bag let the away team know she was finished. She bounded in and out of the shuttle with different outfits so quickly it seemed like a cartoon. "Let's get through customs. I don't like the way some of these people are eyeing us." Mateo said to the crew, hefting his bag over his shoulders.

Interstellar customs, while of varying usefulness, always tended to take about a half hour to clear. First they looked over your papers, run the ship's ID to see if that's where you actually come from, asked you what you wanted to do on the planets, seeing if you were trying to introduce foreign flora/fauna to the environment, etc. What was funny was that any half competent smuggler wouldn't even dock at a shuttle port as commercial as this one. After about fifteen minutes Mateo came up to a desk with one of the corporate security officers he saw looking at him earlier. The man had a particularly thin face with a goatee. "Ah, let's see what do we have. Ship worker with Class 3 cybernetics... from the St. Anne. What were your plans Mr. Reyes?" the rent a cop asked, thumbing through his ID papers. If Mateo had been paying close enough attention he would have seen the cop slip a tracking bug in between his papers, but Mateo's annoyance blinded him to the cop's sleight of hand.

"I heard you had a beach and I have about 46 hours to do nothing but lay on a beach. Figured I didn't need a reason." Mateo said. The cop nodded along, playing at half listening. "Are you bringing any weapons? Firearms or blades, even explosives." the security officer asked, pretending to look into Mateo's papers in greater detail. "You don't think the bag check or the detectors would have picked up on that? Do you think I need a weapon to defend myself? I mean... well just look at me. No, I just want to sit on some sand and forget about life for a while." Mateo responded brusquely.

After a second of faux deliberation, the rent a cop handed the ID papers back to the cyborg. "Of course, just following regulations is all. Enjoy your stay." the thin-faced fuck beamed with a toothy grin. Mateo snatched the papers out of his hand and walked towards the exit of the shuttleport.

From the exit the shuttleport expanded into a moderate metropolitan area. A few streets over was the main shopping district and the hotels were a few blocks further in that direction. The lunch rush in the city appeared to be ending with people returning to various businesses around them. "Well," he said turning to face his companions, "what shop do we want to hit up first? I just need some sealant, sunblock, and personal supplies."
 
Thomyris “Riz” Heroux
Location: Kohlberg Station
Tagged: Iona Knutedottir

“Yay, me.” Thomyris remarked under her breath, thick with skepticism. She knew the Captain only meant well, but she didn’t see how this little exercise fitted overall in this strange dynamic the Captain was building for her. The phrase never be fit to stand in front of a ship’s crew and lead them still weaved in her mind, giving her anxious flutters in her gut just pondering the implications. Thomyris? In charge? Of others? She didn’t feel she deserved it, barely able to take care of herself by her own perceptions.

She killed the power as told and watched intently as the Captain pulled them in. At least next time she would be able to do so on her own. Thomyris supposed she should be considerate and thankful of what the Captain was trying to teach. She had come to the St. Anne possessing none of the skills she had now, especially that administrative eye that the Captain admired in her. She had learned, but more importantly she had been given the opportunity to learn. And the more skills she acquired, the greater her own value could become. We are only worth as much as we know. That had been life as Thomyris knew from experience. She figured it was the same on the St. Anne. If you were useful, you could stay. If not, like their unfortunate cook, you would be gone.

Following the Captain, she unbuckled herself from the sled and locked on to the ship’s hull via her grav-locks on the soles of her boots. Using her datapad, she dropped a nav-point where the sled was docked, its location visible on her small readout and to anyone else with the right codes to ping it.

Alongside the Captain, Thomyris shed her own hard suit and was soon back in her regular garb, an orange jumpsuit above her civilian clothes, helmet dangling at her hip, the stun-baton on the other, with her mopey hair bundled in a bun upon the back of her scalp, though a few strands framed her slender, gaunt face. On the corner of her left forehead was a small budding bruise, yellow at the edges but a deep purple upon the centre, where she had bumped herself. The Captain had similar bruising and Thomyris could only smile apologetically. “You asked for it, Captain.” She said in response to the Captain’s outburst, covering her face to shield against the puff of fine powder that came off Iona’s own garments. Thomyris took little concern as to her own throbbing face-painting she had indulged them in.

“I’ll see if they have an open systems access point here and get us a basic layout.” Thomyris said with a nod, using her datapad again with one of the open terminals that dotted the space station. Here one could connect with the station’s main computer, if accessible. Most usually were, in some form, to travelers like her seeking information. One could contact the authorities, make inquiries, access basic information like services and utilities. One of the services available was a station map, at least the parts open to travelers like them. Downloading a copy and using her stylus, she marked the location of the station’s central area of commerce and proceeded to lead the way. She kept her eyes mostly on her own datapad, listening to the Captain and only occasionally looking up to avoid collisions. It was almost as if Thomyris was trying to hide herself.

Well, she only half-listened to the Captain, already understanding much of it. Then a strong hand was slapped on her shoulder and she was whipped about, a soft gasp on her lips at the unexpected gesture, so caught up in her datapad. Her lips then sealed and she fixed the taller woman with a resolute stare, already rejecting the notion before the Captain even had to explain or spell it out for her. And there it was again…your ship. What was with the Captain today? She felt like this remark was directed more at her. Not that Thomyris would ever dream of it. But the Captain hadn’t really asked her an outright question and the one she did was answerable only with a nod of acknowledgement, which she gave, never taking her eyes away from the taller woman’s stern expression.

It was the same moment that the bug hit her side, worming into the folds of her jumpsuit, crawling through the small tears to lodge within Thomyris’ garments. She didn’t feel it, focused upon the Captain and what she was saying.

A short distance later they came to the sprawling souk, the commercial centre, of Kohlberg Station. It was a multi-floored, spacious chamber, enough for a small freighter to fit within. Clustered in rows and groups were a panoply of various stalls, rudimentary store-fronts, and men of mercantile interests. A dozen languages could be heard. Some had their wares on display, trying to offload or sell it to whoever they could. Everything seemed to be in abundance, exotic foodstuffs, aromatics, weapons, technology, and simple consumer goods to name a few. Some advertised their needs by the old fashion method; shouting their demands and requests aloud, in outright competition with others. The more civilized sort put up bulletins, physical or electronically.

Though she had no notion that the Captain might want her to find them their next consignment, Thomyris still browsed the requests eagerly, never having seen such things before. She was never involved in the preliminary stages of a consignment, only when it was finally authorized for loading and unloading to and from the St. Anne. Here she saw many business offers and requests, arranged by such analytics as load size (some were indeed listed by ship classification, such as single-Dogged, double-Dogged, etc.), product listing, destination. She recognized a few names of the bigger conglomerates and contemplated the smaller, unknown ones.

“We can approach one of the traders looking to move cargo…or we can put up our own offer to move goods, with our tonnage and metrics listed.” Thomyris noted to the Captain, as they stood in the centre of the busy, bustling commercial zone. “I suppose usually we would…approach someone with an offer ready to go, settle the details, and get started. Though, since you given the others some shore leave, putting up our own bulletin and weighing up the various offers we might get could be a better alternative, I reckon.” Thomyris said, raising her head to glance around her, staring for a moment towards a downtrodden droid, with a skinny neck and a binocular-shaped head, from which it peered into the world with two visible lens. They were looking right at Thomyris. She had no idea it was activated. And recording.

“Looking over the lists, I do see a few offers that could meet our classification, single-Dogged loads. There’s one for salvaged machine parts from derelict ships, to the metalwork plants on Cheutune. Crates of high quality potash from the volcanic world of Brarvis 1F to Zienus. Another, if you want to drive your crew to mutiny, for…bovine fetuses actually, also for Zienus. And one more, a consignment of power loader energy supply batteries, to…” Thomyris read out, all from her datapad without looking up, though her voice trailed off on the last one. To…Ruplade. Her homeworld, where she was a wanted murderer and owing some sixty large to various creditors. Like hell she was going back there, not for any amount of credits. “Never mind. Yes, just those three actually. Though I can keep looking? And I suppose you’d want to meet and talk with the offering parties as well, to get a feel for their business practice and ethics…” Great, the last thing she wanted to do…
 
Serena Driscol
Onboard Annie
Midwatch
Tagged: Jin-Lai, Elaine, Mateo


Serena had a huge smile on her face as first Bon and then Mateo agreed to come with her. Her plans thus far had involved running off by herself. but having a wingman or two would make things go smoother. Mateo had mentioned the beach and Serena had to admit that getting high on the sand, possibly with a cremate or two looking after her, certainly had it's appeal.

Customs for Serena was easy. She was a young woman and not wearing much, so she was pushed through quickly so that the port authority could hassle the big, bad cyborg. Which was stupid. If someone from a St. Anne wanted to smuggle something in Mateo was the last person who would do it. In fact, Serena wished she had something just because these jamokes were making it super easy.


She cleared customs and waited for the other two, giving Mateo a gentle elbow to the ribs once he was through. "You know when I'm getting hassled by the man about weapons I never point out to him that my big, manly cyborg arms can squish his head like a little grape." she said and then mimed squishing something in her fingers. Once Jin was
ready she smiled at them both and said. "Ok team, here is the plan. There is a Buy & Go not too far from here that should have everything Mateo and I need. We'll do some shopping and then oil our boy down. If were smart we'll do it in an alley and charge the lonely housewives a quarter a peek." she said with a chuckle and turned to Jin. "If you just want some cheap stuff we can pick up things for you too, but if you want actual nice clothes we will need to find a better shop. Anyway, once Matty is ready for his beach day we can head off. Aaaaaand..." she turns back to Mateo and pokes him in the stomach, "If somebody is a gentleman and stops acting like such a grump I could be convinced to come find him on the beach and frolic around in a bikini in his general vicinity. Maybe we can find you a pretty young thing that wants to know if the rumors about cyborgs are true."

She glanced back and forth at the two of them, "Sound like a plan?" and then she had a thought and hit her comm. "Hey El, all the cool kids are headed to Buy & Go for party favors. You want to be cool, don't you?"
 
Jin-Lai Park
Location: Spaceport , past Customs and Immigration Control
Tagged: Serena, Elaine, Mateo


Jin smiled, Serena was right Buy & Go might not have a nice enough blouse, but they would have some other things including some magnets that she wanted. "Sure, that would be great, i'd love to have someone to shop with for a nice blouse" Maybe , she thought, a few other items as well of a more personal nature.

She paused and pursed her plump lips. "though we might want to use a privacy booth for the oiling" These Privacy booths had come around in many cities as a consequence of the ubiquitous monitoring, and the drive for a sense of decorum and order in public combined with the drive of human desires and breakdown of traditional morals They were more affordable and much smaller than a motels; shorter term shelter of a short to have privacy to do - whatever. They had various levels of regulation depending on local laws and customs, and some places they weren't altogether legal and were branded as "reading rooms" or "changing booths".

When Serena invited El along, Jin-li was in agreement "Absolutely i would love to get to know you too and we all know buy and go has just about everything!" Jin was suddenly quite eager to be out somewhere besides inside a ship or space station if only for a little while. She had never gone on shore leave with her old crew and realized she had held herself too aloof, been considered standoffish, but really she was just shy despite her experiences. Who knew, perhaps she might even find romance. Or perhaps just some hot and sweaty lusty relief, she thought with a smirk as she looked at her 3 companions with her inscrutable hazel eyes, more than a hint of mischievousness creeping across her face.
 
Donovan
Location: Kohlberg Station
Tagged: Sonakshi Khan

"You're correct Sonakshi, we barely stayed in the black with this run." He confirmed her suspicions about the financial state of their last run. "She won't admit that things are tight for her, and after paying us and resupplying this run just might put her in the red for the run, that is why after we have a look at what is available on the market we are going to my side of the fence and seeing what we can get from there." Following behind her onto the box of a shuttle he spent the entire trip in silence with Sonakshi and every time the shuttle pilot tried to ask a question or make small talk he silenced the man with a look. Once on the station Donovan agreed with her about the pricing. "Yeah, they are going to try and rob you blind with a smile on their faces. I will agree to go with you, but in all honesty Doc, it would be easier to just skip them and go to a black market supplier, or an underground clinic."

On the station Donovan let Dr. Khan lead him through the station to the legitimate clinics and medical suppliers playing nice. He stood slightly behind her at each place and let his presence do all of his speaking. With eyes glowing their unsettling bright orange and a skin crawling smile on his face he would simply shake his head whenever they made an offer that was out of hand. Several quickly got the point and dropped prices slightly, but it was still the next best thing to robbery. A grim smile spread across his face when she finally admitted to needing to using "alternative market" as she had so gracefully put it.

Taking the lead now he lead them to the stations souk. "Stick to my heels, when I make my move we are going to need to be quick Sonakshi." He said to her over his shoulder. Once again his eyes were blazing, and as they walked through the bustling crowds they were flitting around madly, like trapped animals in a cage trying to break free. His gaze moved from face to face, a fraction of a second spent on each one before it darted to next. Tens, hundreds, thousands of faces in moments. The implants in his eyes allowing him to scan the faces at high speed and in intimate detail. "There are watchers and runners every hundred meters. They use simple hand signs to talk to each other." His tone was flat, almost machine like. "There is bound to be a break in the chain somewhere." Moments later his eyes stopped their rapid movements and his face lost its emotionless set, replaced with the look of a top predator spotting it's next victim.

A complete shift occurred from one step to the next, the casual walk he had maintained while scanning the crowds melted into a sinuous stalk. He cut through the bodies like they were not even there, never so much as rustling a sleeve of a person he passed. The kid, no older than his early twenties didn't see the stalking harbinger of pain and death until Donovan's glowing eyes and mad rictus were inches from his face. "What the shit!" The kid squeaked jumping and trying to step back only to have his back meet a wall. The boy was skinny wearing raggedy clothes, with a ratty goatee and dark oily hair that hung listless over his eyebrows. His mud colored eyes were bloodshot and wide in surprise and a bit of fear. "Tell me thing, where can I find a backroom clinic." Donovan's voice was pitched low so that only the two of them could hear, his gravely tone full of unspoken promises of sadistic pain. "I-I ain't gotta tell you a Goddamned thing freak." He stammered trying to put on a brave front. "Thank you." Donovan said, his tone completely genuine. "For wh-" The words were cut off abruptly by a wordless, strained, drawn out squeak of pain.

Donovan grabbed the kid's left forearm with his right hand and hand with his left, with a decisive tug and slight twist he dislocated the wrist. Still holding the forearm he left go of the kid's hand and grabbed his bicep, again with a quick, almost thoughtless motion popped the elbow out of joint. Holding the bicep he let go of the forearm and placed his hand on his shoulder and dislocated that as well, in the matter of 3 seconds or less, without a single hesitation. "Now you have a reason to take me to where I want to go." He said patting the stunned guy's cheek. His eyes where opened wide, pupils pinpoints, mouth hanging a gape and the choked squeak still barely escaping his throat. Staring at the kid locked in pain Donovan growled. A quick jab to his solar plexus blasted the air from him. Gripping him by the back of the neck Donovan made him stand straight and then slapped him hard on the back causing him to take in a shape intake of air at the sudden sting. "Clinic. Now. Or I will stop playing nice and start breaking things not dislocating." The now crying guy nodded and turned down the shadowy alley shuffling off still stunned and reeling from the sudden shitty day that had sprang upon him. Glancing back to see if Sonakshi was following. Flashing her a deviant smile he gave the older woman a wink and followed after the drug peddler.

The alleys of the souk were a complex maze, one that the deeper they went into the seedier the businesses around became. This was more Donovan's speed. Back room dealings, illegal trade, and a near total absence of morals. A few people hawked their wares to the trio but an glare that threatened Donovan was as likely to buy from them as he was to try and eat their faces quickly silenced any offers. "H-here." The kid said though a silent sob. "Go on in kid." Donovan commanded. Not looking back the kid nodded and pushed open the door stepping inside. Donovan held up a hand to Sonakshi signalling her to wait a moment. A three count later Donovan stepped through the door. Inside two huge men were standing eyeing the kid. Hired muscle to protect the doctor and his backroom practices. Having a morally unconscious doctor on staff was a great asset that any organization with half a brain cell would protect. They were in plainclothes but Donovan's experience placed them easily by the way they held themselves.

The screeching static came roaring back to life inside Donovan's head. Eyes ablaze he drew his pistol and put a slug into the center of each thugs chest. There was a bright flash as they where hit and the incendiary component reacted with their blood causing a flash fire that seared their insides nearly instantly. The sickly sweet smell of burning meat quickly filled the room. Striking the kid in the back of the head dropping him to the floor alive but unconscious Donovan stepped over him eyes darting over every possible hiding place in the front room. Through the piercing, wailing static in his head he heard the very real sounds of footsteps coming from the back room. Grabbing a clip of HDAP ammo he flawlessly swapped clips, took aim and let off five shots. Three hit targets behind the walls by the sounds of pained cries.

"Stay out Doc!" He yelled back to Sonakshi as he once again switched clips holding the partially spent one in his hand ready to switch again if needed. Dropping in to a crouch he dashed as quickly as possible in his lowered position with his gun leading. As he turned the corner his augmented eyes targeted onto two more living thugs. A third as dead on the floor between them, the first injured, the last several feet clear of Donovan's wild shots. Before his brain could react to what he was seeing his hand moved to where it needed to be almost by its own accord and planted an API slug into each of the thugs. There was a scream in his head, the echoing scream of ten thousand faceless voices all sounding at once. His brain felt like a million fire ants were chewing on it. Rising to his full height, Donovan ran at the only door at the end of the hall. As he drew close he swapped clips again and shot through the walls on either side of the door. Yells of panicked surprised and one of pain echoed out. Tucking the empty clip into a pocket he loaded the API clip back into his gun.

Dropping to his knees teeth clenched Donovan hissed in pain. He felt like his blood was replaced with boiling acid, his bones were breaking off into splinters and that his nerve endings were all exposed and being treated to a lovely little sand blasting. "Finish the job HV24601JV, you were made better than this. Don't disgrace your family again. GET UP! FIGHT! KILL! SURVIVE!" Donovan let out a primal scream and in spite of the voices howling for his flesh to be rent, his blood spilled, bones shattered, he pressed forward. Opening the door he stepped inside and took a bullet to the left shoulder. He replied by cooking the shooters brain inside his skull while snarling at him. Another shot grazed his ribs and was repaid with a shot to the throat that left the thug's head burnt from his body. Only one man remained, a skinny fellow wearing a white coat over an expensive suit.

Donovan cleared the distance between them in the space of a breath. His breather was surprising calm as he bleed freely. Unfortunately for the supposed doctor, that only made the nightmare visage now inches from his face all the more terrifying. His lip was curled up in a twitching snarl, while his head jerked in small fits. His eyes looked to be vibrating in his skull as he stared at the man. "Are you the doctor here?" He asked in a steady, cordial manner. The man swallowed hard and nodded. "Good." A fist smashed into the man's nose the soft cartilage collapsing under the force of Donovan's fist sending them man reeling backwards and onto the ground. Walking to him Donovan leaned down and grabbed the man by the arm and flung him across the room heavily into the far wall. "I have a friend that needs some of your equipment. You are going to donate it to her." He explained talking slowly like one would a child who didn't understand a new concept.

Walking with the confident movements of an alpha predator, the intimation was only increased by the ticks and spasms that racked his body. As he got to the doctor he reached down again and gripped a fist full of the man's thick black hair. "Very nice. Do you use product?" He asked confusing the terrified man who was doing his damnedest to scuttle along with Donovan as he was dragged by the hair down the hall. "DOCTOR K! I GOT SOMETHING FOR YOU!" Donovan hollered out to the woman waiting outside.

When she cam in Donovan pulled the man to his knees. "Met... Um what ever this pickle fuckers name is. He has something to tell you." Jerking the pickle fuckers head back he stared him dead in the eyes. "Tell the good doctor that she can take anything here that she needs." "Wh-why wou-" As he spoke Donovan's free hand shot to the man's face and he caught the two front teeth between forefinger and thumb and broke them from the man's mouth. "No. Bad pickle fucker. You don't get to ask questions. Let me explain the rules to this new game. I tell you to do something, you say 'yes sir' and do it." Donovan bounced the two teeth off the man's forehead. "Tell the good Doctor over there that she is to take whatever she needs from your facility."

This time though sobs and with a slight lisp and whistle to his words he complied. "You can have whatever you want." He sobbed. "Well well, look at that Doctor K, he didn't listen to well and now you have an ever better deal. Take whatever you want, but also make sure to grab the stuff we need too."

Returning his focus to the bleeding, crying man he still held a tight grip on he clicked his tongue at him disappointingly. "You know your employers are going to kill you for this right. Giving away so much of their stuff. It's a shame really." Throwing the man to the ground he deliberately stomped his hand breaking it. "Sonakshi I am going to watch the door. If there are any lock boxes that need to be opened have him do it for you. He will comply, if not, I will make him and he will hate himself for the decision." Cold. That was the only way to describe the new tone and look on Donovan's face. No more was there the look of madness, or the calm he had during his down time on the St. Anne, only a coldness harsher than the void of space. "Make it fast Doctor K. I don't know how long we have to get ourselves out of here."
 
Iona Knutesdottir
Kohlberg Station
Midwatch
Tagged: Thomyris

Unaware of the violence that portended calamity for her crew and ship that was taking place in another part of the souk, Iona kept half an eye on Thomyris as she led them through the it in search of cargo. The rest of her attention was on the various small wares displayed, a slice of humanity she'd never seen in just this way before and never would again. Each time Iona went planet side or station side, it was like dipping her hand in a flowing river; each time it was the same but each time she knew the water she felt was felt by her for the first time and would soon swirl downstream and she'd never feel the same water again. The St. Anne was constant, almost exactly the same as her parent's ship, the one she'd grown up on, and if a bit of paint or line of welding differed it wasn't enough to mean that if Iona closed her eyes she couldn't get from one end of the ship to the other without bumping into anything. The stations and planets though were just familiar enough each time to feel comfortable but different enough to keep her fascinated.

It even showed a little bit in her eyes and in her face as Iona paused to run a hand over a bolt of torofiber gengineered silk, the smoothness of it catching at the roughness of her skin in a wonderful sensation. "Hold on," she told Thomyris and negotiated a quick deal for a quarter meter of it that was folded up into a square of paper and tucked into her thigh pocket opposite her shard pistol. She had absolutely no need for it but that wasn't the point was it? Want and need, like she'd told the doctor, weren't the same thing. Iona may not ever do anything at all with the fabric other than occasionally touch it or look at it, but sometimes in a life where everything had a purpose and a place the odd bit of random beauty was important.

"Too bad about the power loader batteries," she said when Thomyris was done. "Cubic that dense always fetches a good price because of the delta-v cost." Not seeing the tension in Thomyris' body about the destination of that particular load, the Captain pondered the other offers.

"Now that we're not docked, our station keeping costs are nothing. The only way we're spending creds as a ship is on salaries and chow. But we're not making money either, so in a sense we are losing creds every minute we don't have a load. Not a lot, but enough that after the forty-eight I gave the crew I want to be ready to shift mass and burn away from this gravity well."

Iona absently slapped away a hand from a passing man, one that intended to either cup her ass or see if she had anything worth stealing. It wasn't escalated by either party and he moved on even as Iona dismissed it with no further action. Now if he'd been better looking...

"I've had a call sheet up for a cargo for hire since we came in system. That's a good idea you had about putting it up, and remember to think ahead of the power curve for the ship and the ship's account. Knowing approximately how long it would take to dock, unload, and load meant I could put out our tonnage for hire as soon as we dropped into the system but so far nothing has been profitable. And I mean break even profitable. So we can forget that."

"Although I am tempted by the idea of being a space cowboy and running cattle," she said and then laughed, a hearty and rich sound from her tall body. "Jesu, can you imagine Serena or Elain's faces when they found out?" Iona laughed again, drawing a few looks but not caring.



"Take the abomination," the man ordered after flicking through a series of pictures of each of the crew members, some of them so recent that they'd been uploaded even as he began perusing them. A finger flick threw Mateo's picture from the datapad in his hands onto the wall where the man-machine was now projected at life size. "He concerns me the most." Unaware of the threat Donovan represented, of the violence he was even now carrying out, the man had picked Mateo as the most dangerous of the St. Anne's crew, and by singling him out he would both remove the threat and give Iona something she needed to bargain back.

A slip of a girl with no real skills beyond potentially turning tricks in a station side crib house versus the oiled mechanical capability of a man-machine that could fill any number of useful roles on a ship?

Iona would be a fool not to trade Thomyris for Mateo in a heartbeat, and likely realize she was better off without the liability of a debtor runaway. And, the man thought, you didn't get to be both a captain of a ship and a fool.

Iona would make the swap, he was certain of it.

"Go," he said and fingers dabbled towards the exit, dismissing his people.

On the wall Mateo's visage stared out, unaware of what lay in store for him.
 
Sonakshi's rotund figure followed Donovan, almost a chase after his feline figure as he cut through a sea of people as they weren't even there. She made the effort to stick to him, feeling that she could sink below those human waves and get lost in the worst place possible. "I can do quick" she affirmed, even if Donovan seemed to be in the zone and there was no way of knowing if he heard her. The round woman was deceptively fast for her size, but obviously she wasn't a match for people in a peak physical form or even beyond. Donovan searched the system for a weak point as she looked a body for an injury, opposite faces of the same coin, the one of the expedite professional, the ruthless artiste.

Finding the wound in the creature, Donovan fell upon it with predatory gait, in this case a poor distracted kid that was meant to serve as a messenger. Sonakshi knew the kind. Too stupid to find himself a proper endeavor, too bold to be aware of his own weakness, too cowardly to push past expectations, too innocent to be cutthroat enough. Many of them died in her arms, many of them she managed to save, and all had something in common. Sonakshi couldn't remember their faces or names, as sure as she would soon forget that kid's scared visage as soon as he was out of her sight. She couldn't hear the wet sound, nor feel in her hands the misplaced joints, but she had a good eye and could see what happened step by step. Dislocated wrist, elbow and shoulder, the arm of the kid turned into a wet noodle in a span of seconds, even if the damage may not be permanent if tended.

Sonakshi followed Donovan and his sad unfortunate guide, nodding to his deranged smile as it was something normal. Well, she had expected that much when the mission required as little of a monetary expense as possible and included Donovan as a bodyguard of sorts, so she just went by into his world, expecting someone to deal with in that black market, not being aware of Donovan's plans in the slightest. He handled the kid as a rag doll, moving deeper and deeper into the unsavory parts of the place, where they went through a variety of offers that encompassed every mortal sin, and perhaps pushed new ones into the mind. Donovan's demeanor made those offers mute in seconds, so they managed to traverse that labyrinth pretty easily. Sonakshi knew her way into trenches, but now she relied on Donovan to get out of that rabbit hole, utterly lost at a wonderland trip that was just starting. After all, no one had their head offed. Yet.

Reaching the clinic the air felt rare, stale, the atmosphere loaded, almost tasting of ozone. Sonakshi felt like the moments before a bombing run, tasting iron as she had bit the inside of her mouth, the back of her head screaming that there was no negotiation to be done, but her brain still not processing every signal, every telltale detail. It was on those three seconds between the kid was pushed in and Donovan stepped when the doctor was finally aware of what was going to unfold, they weren't there for a buy, they were there for a smash and grab. She could have yelled at him, she could have stopped that. Yes, Donovan outranked her, and yes, he looked bloodthirsty, but he was no animal, not yet. He could be stopped, he could be reasoned with, nobody had to die.

And yet Sonakshi said nothing.

Muffled thuds came from the inside, setting the rhythm to the melody. One, two. She pressed herself against the wall, next to the door. One, two, three, she gasped, four, five. The doctor peeked in, bodies on the ground, the cloying smell of charred flesh tainting her nostrils. Backing off from the door at the bark that Donovan made at her, she just waited outside, hearing more shots without flinching. Moments after she could hear a wail that was barely recognizable as Donovan's voice, making her step inside the clinic without a second thought, dodging charred corpses as she rummaged through her doctor's suitcase in search of her army revolver. The piece may be old, but it still worked and even if her aim wasn't trained nor her reflexes were superhuman, her hand was steady.

Only the sounds of more shots gave her pause, different echoes, different guns. Donovan was fine right? He had to be, he may be an animal, but he was on top of the food chain, he was their animal. She pressed in, slowly moving through more corpses, none of her first mate. Her comrade. Her friend. The revolver was already loaded and on her hand, but she left it back on the suitcase as Donovan called for her as he dragged someone out, meeting halfway in. He was dragging around a doctor with a broken nose, the white coat a sign of the first, the blood and tears evidencing the second. Sonakshi's maw tensed as Donovan tore a couple of teeth out, turning the man's face into a messier business, crimson drops dribbling from his face, tainting his no longer pristine coat.

Sonakshi had no time to argue, and it was hardly the time to let horrors of the past war play catch up with her ass. "Don't fucking move" she ordered to Donovan, inspecting the grazing on his midsection, deciding that it could wait, then sticking a fast patch on the shoulder wound to stop the bleeding. She would have to dig the projectile out of there, but that could wait, advantages of treating a tough bastard. Moving on she went through the clinic, rummaging for supplies. If one thing you could find on a backroom clinic were anesthetics and painkillers to keep the patients happy and far from being prone to more of the violence that took them there in the first place. She stuffed her gun in a pocket, freeing space on her suitcase to stuff it with the needed supplies. Finding a similar one, belonging to that doctor who now resided in a world of pain, she emptied it of the unneeded stuff and got it choke full of what she wanted. Luckily she always tended to have pockets to spare in fer fatigues, so she stuffed some more, grabbing a cardboard box of black market anesthetics under one arm and one almost full of painkillers in the other.

"Best worst Christmas ever" she muttered, going back with Donovan, trying to joke herself out of the incoming downer, keeping her blood flowing until they were safe. She could carry everything herself, and she better did, since Donovan would have to keep his hands free if they faced more trouble on the way out. "A safe way out? I'm sure you have one since you look professional, I'd have one" she asked out of the poor doctor without having to add any threats, as they were more than implied and there was only so much pain an untrained body could suffer. "We have to go" she said, as the doctor pointed them a different exit that would take them safely out. Sonakshi looked sad, almost if she was about to puke as she glanced at the unconscious kid with the mangled arm a few feet away, the doctor kneeling besides Donovan.

"We can't leave witnesses. Torch the place as a distraction" she lamented, pointing to a flammable oxygen bottle in the corner.
 
Mateo Reyes
Buy and Go
Midwatch
Tagged: Serena, Jin-lai, Elaine
Mateo's interest was piqued somewhat at the offer of Serena coming to the beach with him. She does start a party wherever she goes and it HAS come back on me before. But I also don't want the inevitable million dudes trying to get at her crowding my sun. Things to consider. He begun to walking towards the Buy and Go, the only supermarket chain to have sponsorship from three major governments. Approaching it he could see that the chain-wide stereotypes of the store applied, the parking lot was overcrowded, the patrons looked like they could stand to lose about 50kg, and several workers who just finished with the day smoking at the side of the building and loudly complaining about their day. Inside the doors a burst of AC washed over the group on shore leave. The monotonous rhythm of the checkout machines could be heard as Mateo walked over to get a cart and push it for the group.

Throughout the store he stopped for whatever his crewmates got, ranging from the wants and needs of everyday life, understandable things to get for shore leave, and in some cases questionable. Mateo had learned long ago to never really question what your coworkers get up to in their spare time. At one point while shopping for some spices he looked over at Serena and noted her remarkable restraint in not trying to immediately find a boatload of drugs as soon as they hit the planet. Mateo walked over to her and shook a joint out of his medicine bottle and extended his hand towards her. "Here. Use it if it takes you a while to find something or if your comedown is a bitch." After a few minutes he began to push the cart again and somehow got into a story where he reminisced on some of the games he and his sister used to play on his home planet.

They eventually made their way over to the augmented care products section and he looked over at a bottle of sealant. The bottle was adorned with a beautiful blonde woman with shapely augmentations that would never be used in a work environment outside of a bedroom. The bottle promised 30% more protection against jammed cybernetics than other leading competitors. He threw it in the cart and proceeded to checkout with the cart.

After a few minutes in line Mateo thought about the water that the captain wanted and left the group in line to go find it in one of the coolers near the checkout. Finding the brand she enjoyed, the cyborg pulled it out and looked up quickly enough to see an elderly woman get spear tackled by three security guards until she buckled over. Time seemed to freeze as the woman had gotten the ever loving shit beat out of her, each security guard with the grace and positioning of an experienced augmented football player. Their form was coordinated one going for the legs, one straight at the solar plexus knocking the wind out of her, and the last going straight for her shoulder. Mateo was sure he heard a crack as she finally hit the ground, a steak landing next to her on the ground. It clicked in his head immediately that she had been trying to shop lift a steak, the price of which was about 15 credits. The old woman was sobbing in pain while one of the guards proceeded to handcuff her, the other two high fiving behind her. Mateo quickly shook the scene off and proceeded to get back in line and check out.

I've seen worse doing corporate security. Mateo blandly noted. The line finally came to a head and Mateo carried most of the bags with him as the group exited the store. Heavy lifting involved even the most minor of things at times. "So after this I think I'll get ready and head to the beach. Where did you guys want me to put this anyway? Are you all getting hotel rooms or should I go load most of this back on the shuttle?" The cyborg eyed the group over with his pale blue eyes.

"Oh? So you're going to the beach sir? I hear a lot of augmented people going there lately. Well sir I hope you have fun." The security officer beamed at a man, underneath the table he was giving a hand signal to his coworker to plant a decently sized nail bomb in his bag. After a few seconds he gave the bag back to the heavily augmented tourist. "Well I hope you enjoy your vacation sir!" he smiled at the unknowing suicide bomber. The augmented man gave his thanks and departed the station, the bomb designated to go off about 30 meters away from his shuttle after he departs at the beach port.

"Uh Marlowe? Was that right? If that gets traced back to us, we are fucked." the female officer noted, looking at the man leave the station. "Calm down Helena. The Blue Mountains already cooked up the reports of a bombing. Then we can snag that cyborg bastard when he comes back through here for the beach." Marlowe said, rocking back in his chair slightly. The thin faced man from earlier was tapping on a tablet of some kind with an annoyed face. "If this shitheel ever leaves the store. I swear they must have brought nothing, who takes this long at a store?"

Marlowe sighed and leaned forward, the front legs of the chair snapping down sharply. "It'll all be worth it Pagan, I promise. When we hand this guy over to the Blue Mountains, it'll get us a lot further than customs. We may end up at the vice desk or something else that pays a lot better. Why don't you go prepare the room if you're so antsy."

"I hope you're right. It's our ass if this doesn't work out." Pagan said walking to the back room.
 
Thomyris “Riz” Heroux
Location: Kohlberg Station
Tagged: Iona Knutedottir

Envy was bright in Thomyris’ eye when the Captain bought the bolt of silk for herself. It made her think of how little she had and how much she had left behind. It was tough not to let her mind wander into such painful memories, the sight of her smiling mother being given a similar fabric for a particular event by her own father. But now she’s dead. And so is he. And their only daughter thrown to the wolves… Still, in the back of her mind, there was a hope and a prayer one day she might get to enjoy the finer things in life. But first, paying off her debt was her only hope, a miniscule one at that, if she ever wanted to settle down on any world without being harassed.

With only four hundred and eighty credits to my name, which is worthless to me. But to others my name is the offer of a cut of sixty thousand…

“Time is money, as they say.” Thomyris remarked in her usual dry tone, as the Captain explained their situation. The forty-eight hours of shore leave in fact was killing the Captain and the St. Anne, but without it, it would be the crew members who would be dropping like flies without it. Thomyris couldn’t help but give her Captain a fugitive glance of admiration, looking after her crew rather than fattening her own pockets. It was one of those brief moments where Thomyris felt safe, even after the attempt harassment of the taller woman. Her hand slipped to her baton but she slipped closer to Iona as well, as if their presence together might deter others. She wasn’t above playful flirtation herself and didn’t mind a friendly grab, but by strangers and unknowns she absolutely abhorred it.

She was still glaring after the man, offended on her Captain’s behalf, as Iona kept explaining their operating procedures. At first, Iona’s joke going over her head, she cast a disgruntled glance towards the Captain when she mentioned liking the idea of running more fetuses. Already Thomyris could feel a growing lump in her throat and not just figuratively. But when the Captain laughed, as loud and majestic as any crystal hued waterfall, Thomyris felt her own lips quirk into a smile.

“Talk about overkill. We’ll both we crammed into one of those sealed bags and shunted off out the airlock if we picked that particular order. But beggars can’t be choosers. If that’s what we have to ship, then none of us have a choice if we want our next pay on time. Right, Captain?” Thomyris guessed, before checking her datapad and glancing around. Her smile slowly dissipated and again the business demeanor pervaded her expression, brow furrowed and eyes focused. “We can meet with the Brarvis people actually. They are right over there.” Thomyris pointed out, jerking her jaw in the direction of a small stall, which in essence was a board placed over stacked crates with a busy looking clerk behind them.

“And this might seem irrelevant…those crates that man have, they are a bit thicker in their proportions. If we take the potash order, and transplant the ash from their crates to ours, I’m sure we can fit a good third more of the stuff in. It would take a hour or two more I reckon, in moving the product out of his crates to ours, but I’m confident we can ship more. If the crew doesn’t mind a bit of ash under the fingernails or in their servos…” Thomyris mused. She was about to suggest to the Captain in taking a vote, but thought better of it. As lenient as Iona might be, their ship wasn’t exactly a democracy either. On the other hand, the crew would probably avenge themselves on Thomyris if they found out she was sticking extra duties on them without proper compensation for it. “I don’t think he would care. Not like his boxes are marked with any brand.” Of course, the receiver could complain about his shipment being tampered with or so and haggle over the price. She turned and looked at the Captain, waiting for her opinion on this.
 
Elaine Reid
Onboard Annie
Midwatch
Tagged: Jin-Lai, Mateo, Serena

Elaine took her time with the shuttle's shutdown procedure. She loved the little Annie but the poor girl was an older model and her systems could be particularly finicky at times, especially in the wake of breaking atmo - sometimes the heat mucked with the internals. Thus was the case today and the source of the redhead's string of vulgarity as she released the seal on her armored helmet and yanked it free. Of course the shuttle would act up when she was finally on leave rather than one of the dozen times they'd had to load those damn sheep. Couldn't spare her vac-sealed goo but it could cut into her vacation. She sighed and threw the easy processes into automated mode as she stood to go and rack her helmet.

"Mmm, Serena, I'll probably let you oil me up just this once." She said playfully as she turned back to the accursed console bank. "It'll at least be a nice break from the damn grease I end up wearing every time I go to the engine room." She growled as three blaring red error messages flared on three different screens and her temper along with it. "Look, look, I'll join you all at the beach. Serena, grab me something to at the Buy 'n Go if you would. You stare enough that you should know my measurements by now." She ran her fingers across a screen that didn't currently display a glaring 'ERROR' message and tapped it to summon the spaceport's ground crew.

"You guys have fun on your shopping trip. I'm going to wrap up here then get through customs." She left out the part that her customs would likely take a half hour or more than the others - her paranoia just couldn't reconcile her moving about on a strange world unarmed and, though it was a backwater, she expected the local guards might object to her revolver and its current load. She moved to her storage locker and exchanged the cylinder she had currently loaded and tugged out three more. One she loaded directly into the firearm, the other two she tucked into a pocket of her hardsuit. The load wasn't quite as likely to ease her paranoia as her current load were simple nonlethal gel rounds rather than high explosive, but from a practical standpoint they were MUCH more likely to elicit questions from the guards.

As she finished her preparations she heard the clunk of armored gloves on the ship's hull and she made her way out to deal with the ground crew. She swept down the ramp like a queen descending from her throne, all demanding authority, as she addressed the men dressed in grimy jumpsuits and fatigues. "Alright gentlemen, I've forwarded details on the fuel and fluids I need topped up. Fill ports are there and there." She motioned with one hand, directing the men towards the locked ports. "I'll pop them in three, hook in and fill, I'll make sure we're nice and topped off, then be out of your hair." She spun back into the confines of the ship then began digging into the numerous error codes before popping the hatch.

She hated being the damn responsible one.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

As Elaine retreated into the dark confines of the ship one of the station security officers thumbed a comms unit to life. He turned away from the shuttle and spoke quietly into the handheld unit. "Majority of the group has departed sir. One still aboard the shuttle, standard top-up procedure by the station techs as far as I can tell." The man shuffled in an antsy manner, pondering the next choice of words before speaking. They had several collaborators at the port, but he'd seen the hardsuit the woman wore. "Should we attempt to apprehend her while she's separated or...?"

A gravely voice growled back over the secured comlink. "No. She's probably still got a line to the others. Wait until she leaves, then sabotage the landing gear. Make sure they can't break atmo at least, if you can manage anything more thorough without alerting her do so." With that the link clicked off, leaving a dead buzz at the other end of the line.
 
Jin-Lai Park
Location: Buy and Go
Tagged: Serena, Elaine, Mateo

Jin turned her nose up at many of the items that Buy and Go had, especially the cooking gear. It was consumer grade and not of professional quality for the most part, and some of it was marginal consumer grade at that. But there were exceptions , like some of the spatulas, as well as a few select skillets and their new Miracle Cooker. But she had already picked up one of each at Kohlburg Station's Buy and Go "To Go" location, often colloquially called a "Sky and Go". But she did pick up a new precision sonic cutter. She was only slightly concerned that the same model was also in the Medical Supplies section.

Their Stowage section was a bit better, but she didn't but anything , she onlly priced out a few times. At least until she saw the heavy duty magnets she wanted. You couldn't count on artificial gravity to keep everything in place , they were down several magnets to hold pots lids and blades. She got a box of them, knowing well enough not to open the box lest the anti-mag field on the box would be ruined

Then because she was close she went to the Sporting Goods/Self Defense section. Seeing how many people on the planet went armed, she just felt the urge like it would be a good idea. Still, she would not find the vibro-sword she wanted here. That would be something she might need contacts to get. But they did have swords, not quite as fine as the one she had, as well as wooden practice swords. Still, she wasn't sure she wanted to walk around with a big sword, then she spied a vibro-dagger. It was nearly as long as a short sword, it would be a fine self defense weapon.

Still she wasn't looking for anything as heavy slug thrower , she went instead for a small PulseTase. Default setting fired small globes of electricity but it could be enhanced with sonics . Just something so she wouldn't be stuck defenseless if stuck in a ranged battle. She would rather have throwing stars, but again, she was avoiding those particular connections for now.


Then just in case she joined Serena and Mateo at the beach she picked up a suit and some sun screen and a towel, aand then got some mirror sunglasses, and a can of wasabi nuts and went to checkout, as she looked over she was disgusted by how the shoplifter was treated. 'Maybe i should have gotten that slug thrower after all' she thought to herself.

But rather than do anything, she checked Comms to see if she could contact anyone who wasnt right with her "Make sure not to shoplift" she would add as she also include the fact she was in the checkout line.
 
Iona Knutesdottir
Kohlberg Station
Midwatch
Tagged: Thomyris

"That's slick," Iona said admiringly. "Same amount of cargo but less cubic to store it in means more space for us to pick up something else. It's not hard to rig a pressure differential when you've got vacc all around, a suction hose and some valving and we move it right out of the crates as they're broken open and dumped into the holds. I don't think it's dangerous but we'll be in respirators at a minimum, full suits if need be." Iona nodded, then put a hand on Thomyris shoulder and squeezed, adding a little tug to make the gesture complete.

"Real slick and we're going to add two more pieces to it. First, it's your idea so whatever you can get for the containers whole or as scrap is yours, straight creds into your account. Call it a finder's fee. Second, don't get too attached to it because you're going to set it aside as part of the fee you'll need a year from now when I vouch for you as a third mate candidate before the guild, providing that you keep your nose clean and learn to both ship handle and the finer points of shifting cargo, which you're already showing an aptitude for."

Iona squeezed again, a smile on her face, then let her hand fall. Thomyris had come to the St. Anne under suspicious circumstances, Iona still didn't know all of them, and she'd taken the young woman aboard more as an act of Xtian charity than anything else, intending to move her from world A to world B and dump her off. Instead she found herself depending on the girl's hard work and her bump for figuring out what needed to be done and doing it. There was real potential in Thomyris and Iona's investment of time was paying off. Profit could be measured in more than sheer creds - it could also mean building capacity in your crew.

"Let's go see the dealer and grab the load. Potash...agri product, right? Potassium for crops. Makes sense, Zienus is an ag-world and I seem to recall that it's nutrients are hard locked in the native life. Easier to bring bulk in and spread it than try to extract it from the planet. You know what," she stopped walking and turned half on to Thomyris. "Recyclers. If they're shipping in this stuff in bulk, it means a lot of it is getting lost in farming. Irrigation or mudding or whatever the dreck it is farmers do," her hand dismissed the work with a wave. While a lot of ship's crew came from agricultural backgrounds, Iona hadn't and anyway most of them were glad to get away from the boring work.

"Lots of good nutrients run off, right? Well, use that extra cubic to ship some sort of small recycling plant. If we can find someone who is tired of digging in the dirt and looking to liquidate, we can take their creds and put them in a new line of work, nutrient scavving. They can't produce the same bulk we can, but they can provide it for less and probably sell it to the smaller farmers for a profit to both of them. We just need to find out if there's something like that here, or parts 'n pieces to have one run up by the crew. Offer them shares in the sale for their work."

"Off St. Anne shift time," she added. "Otherwise it's ship's cargo and the St. Anne's creds. I'll move it for free since you found the cubic, but I won't pay for the man hours."

"Always keep business and personal separate," Iona warned. "Captains sometimes have to make hard decisions - life or death at times - and if you can't understand business is business and personal is personal then you don't get to be the captain."

Like choosing to put out a ship threatening fire by evacuating a compartment to space while still occupied by a crew member who didn't have a suit or rescue bubble.

Good thing in space no one could hear you scream.

Iona turned back and continued through the station, leading Thomyris to the shipper for negotation.
 
Donovan
Kohlberg Station
Midwatch
Tagged: Sonakshi

Donovan stood stock still looking like some kind of psychotic mannequin at Sonakshi's order. On the St. Anne he out ranked her, but during his lifetime he learned to listen to the medical professionals when they gave an order. He hadn't been aware of the wounds until she pointed them out by examining them. He frowned at them, clearly unhappy with what he was seeing. "Damn." He hissed as she placed a patch on his shoulder. "I'm going to have to invest in a better armored suit, bastards were using armor piercing rounds." He was more concerned with his gear getting messed up than taking a bullet, almost two. Glancing at the quick patch job on his shoulder he flashed Sonakshi a warm, appreciative smile. "Thanks Doc."



Still waiting by the door checking outside every few minutes while Sonakshi gathered her supplies, Donovan remained in his cold place. Completely devoid of emotion and all enhancements off or powered down to their lowest function. It left him feeling vulnerable but at the same time provided a few moments of silence inside his head. Time needed to focus and recenter himself. Without a doubt he was an expert at what he did, but no matter how many hundreds, thousands of lives he extinguished, each added their weight to his soul.

Turning to face Sonakshi when she spoke he nodded. If his systems were up he would have heard her well before she got so close to him. "Yeah, I know the feeling. So you got everything you need?" He asked looking at the two suitcases and two boxes. He smiled when she questioned the resident doctor for a back way out. Closing his eyes and gritting his teeth Donovan brought his most used and necessary implants back up to peak performance, having only a minor attack of sound, pain and faceless accusations during the process. "Go on ahead, I will be right behind you. No need to risk both of us starting this fire." He said looking down at the unconscious kid. "Sorry boy, sometimes you just draw a shitty lot in life. Maybe you will come back as something better next time."

Kneeling down beside the kid he grabbed him by the back of the neck and with a quick jerk and slight twist dislodged a vertebra in such a way it severed the spinal cord giving him a quick and painless death. Rising up he walked to the doctor and glared down at him. "You on the other hand. You will suffer, unless you tell me where the money is, all of it." The doctor stared up at Donovan in terror and instantly broke under the glowing orange glare.

A few minutes later Donovan had a bag full of cash and inside of the clinic was starting to burn in earnest. He stayed true to his word. The Doctor didn't suffer, he was used as the catalyst for Donovan's API rounds to ignite the oxygen canister. There was no way he survive or suffered from the small explosion that engulfed the piles of linens and paper that Donovan had used to give the initial blaze some fuel to really get stared. The trails of flammable chems would be catching soon and spreading the fire to the rest of the building, where he had set up other spots to give the fire a hold.

Meeting Sonakshi outside the clinic he held up the bag. "Since this is the best worst Christmas ever wanna help spread the cheer? I emptied their safe off all it's cash and valuables. We can either keep it or play the part of Robbing the Hood and give back to the poor." He said flashing the older woman a wily grin. "I know you didn't approve of my methods, and having to condemn that kid to death didn't leave the best taste in your mouth. So lets do a little good to counter the bad." He suggested Taking the lead and guiding them out of the 'underworld' of the station and back into the souk. "Do we want to have those delivered to the St. Anne, or take them ourselves?" He asked nodding to the boxes of meds Sonakshi carried.
 
Serena Driscol
Onboard Annie
Midwatch
Tagged: Jin-Lai, Elaine, Mateo



Every Buy & Go was laid out in the exact same way, and by now Serena could navigate one with her eyes closed. It didn’t take her long at all to get what she needed: a new dress, a some travel toiletries, a cheap makeup kit, some rubbing alcohol to make the cheap makeup useable, and a pair of bikini’s for beach wear. El had asked Serena to pick her up one, and it had been tempting has hell to get one a size or two too small and make her squeeze into it, but Serena had been good for once and gotten the right size. With herself all buttoned up she went around to her companions to critique their purchases and generally make a pest of herself.

Mateo, thankfully, had made it easy. Meeting him in line she arrived just in time to see the ugly display with the shoplifter and turned her face away in disgust. “That’s the problem with cheap everything.” She muttered under her breath, “Even the security team is a bunch of worthless shits.” She said. She looked down at the brand of sealant that Mateo had bought and normally would have given him shit for it but she suddenly wasn’t in the mood. “I won’t be long. I’ll seal you up after.” She muttered and went off to find Jin.

When the chef put "Make sure not to shoplift" out over the comms Serena let out a humorless laugh and messaged back. “Way ahead of you.” She replied and then getting a wicked idea and feeling like her old self a little, “Do I need to give you both a thorough cavity search before we leave to make sure you’re not getting us in trouble?”

Giggling to herself as she waited in line behind Mateo and grateful when they finally got though to get out of there. Making sure Jin had caught up to the two of them she looked at the cyborg and grinned. "Alright Tin Man, lets find a place I can strip you down and oil you up." she said, "I'll seal up your cyber, and I bet if you ask Jin nicely she'll put some sunscreen on your fleshy bits."
 
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