Author note: Just testing the waters with this chapter :/
Chapter prologue
“Gotcha!”
A burst of beams rained from above and destroyed the aircraft fighter duo. The area has been secured, now I can loot the ship wreckage.
“Now where o where is it?”
I am looking for a thermal fusion battery, the thing’s an ancient relic but if properly restored then it can generate energy indefinitely as long its somewhere in a planet with a warm temperature. I’ve heard rumors it is one of the best energy generators 500 years ago and it had the ability to absorb thermal energy and transformed the used energy into cool air.
“Aw, shit. How am I going to bring this back to my client!”
Spanning over 1 mile the large machine, untouched, was tightly surrounded by bent plates of metals of the wreckage. Only a few glowing capsules remain attached to the machine in perfect condition.
“And to think Francis said I wouldn’t have any problem with this job. Fuck him!”
I quickly contacted him explaining the situation.
“Hey! How the fuck am I suppose to bring this to my client! The thing’s not going to fit in my ship’s ass!”
“C-calm down Kai. Can you send me a video feed? Ah. That thing’s huge! I thought it would be like the generators nowadays. Let me get in contact with your client and update him on your situation.”
“Hell no. I don’t want to do anything that would increase my load of work.”
I drive my ship, Ceraborous, steadily through the debris and released its wings to move its arms. There are only five containers left attached, three of them looked useless but could maybe be fixed. Slowly using robotic arms, I unscrewed them and stored the batteries in my ship’s storage compartment.
“Then should I have them arrange a transportation company?”
“Francis, you’re just making suggestion to have them lower our payload. -We’ll talk later, I have some guests.”
The signal on my radar rapidly pulses. Using the many features of my ship, Ceraborous, I send my tiny drone out to get a visual look of whatever energy signatures my radar had picked up. There are four fighters circling around the perimeters, they don’t seem to be interested in generator. I think they’re after me.
“Hello! I heard there is a rodent scurrying around this area!”
“God dammit, why are Farlyn’s guys here? What do you guys want?”
“So you’re actually here. Ya know, boss has been looking for you. We heard you were in the area so we decided to come play with you.”
I can hear their annoying laughs through my speakers, I closed the channel and ready myself for the fight.
Four ships… two in front and two on my left and right. Energy shields, on. Begin charging weapons. Thrusters online… Oh, I just though of something, changing energy shield to impact shields.
“Hey, you better run if you don’t want to get smashed. I’ll be charging at you head on.”
“Huh? Is he crazy?”
“Give us your best shot.”
“Try me.”
The two ships are being recalled to the front. I gently move my ship behind a piece of wreckage soft contact against it with arms of Ceraborous, pushed my thrusters at max speed and charged at them with the piece of wreckage as my shield.
“Oh shit-“
I felt a small vibration with flames passing my view as I successfully smashed one of them.
“One, down. Come at me! Activate energy shields, enable combat functionality.”
Energy shields online, impact shields offline. Plasma lance charged.
Some of their projectiles hit my shield as I dodge to the left, circling around their barrage. Though I am at a ranged disadvantage, my ship has enough speed to dodge their attacks. Let’s see, a scrappy version of M1 230 laser blaster, lotus bombs, no cryogenic heat sinks. Their weapons should over heat in 3, 2, 1. Now!
The fighters release their lotus bombs after they’re weapons overheat as I charge at them. Lotus bombs are a ball of plasma that are able to home in nearby targets. They are similar to EMPs so when their victims are hit by them will have their systems shut down for two minutes. They are only effective against small ships such as mine. Luckily these are second rated artilleries and move much slower.
“Move, move! He’s- past us?”
“Get away from there!”
The lotus bombs hit the target behind me as fly past them. I quickly flipped Ceraborous around and melted his ship as soon as my plasma lance overcharges. The plasma lance releases a short burst of pure energy about three meters long, however it takes a while to charge. If I overcharge it, then I am able to shoot a three shot projectile at slow speed. The projectiles are enough to disable a fully charged energy shield or melt through their plating.
“Hell yeah, two down. -Gah, shit!”
One of the fighters hid behind me the whole time, his weapons are different. This guy is much stronger than those three.
Shields at 43%.
“Wait!? Seriously!? Those blasters are as strong as a torpedo!”
“Run asshole run! Hahahahaha!”
“Tsk, I can’t shake him off.”
The pilot’s good at tailing, it looks like I can’t shake him off that easily.
Shields at 9%.
He’s able to keep hitting me, even though I am flying out of his blaster’s aim. What a noob, using an assisted aiming AI. I better find some cover in that wreckage and turns things around.
“Turn off energy shields, activating impact shield. Set wings to forward position, reducing thruster output and activate landing thruster one.”
The thruster underneath the nose of Ceraborous rotated itself one-eighty vertically. While doing so the arms connecting to it bent backwards and connected themselves by my sides creating a sword like appearance that is able to fit in tighter areas.
My ship glides into the wreckage smashing into some debris. My pursuer follows and once I lost sight of him I hid into a tight space releasing the lock on Ceraborous’ robotic arms. Doing so reduces its travelling speed drastically as the wings are attached to its arms. I set all functions to standby and kept a close look at my radar to continue monitoring him readying my ambush.
“Tsk… Come out coward!”
Another feature of Ceraborous is its strength for close combat and a strong defensive impact shielding with upgraded thin layer of magnesium plating on the wings. I can smash into another ship without worrying about damage and tear apart any ship who gets close to me.
“C’mon… you’re getting warmer… Just a wee bit closer… Got you!”
“What!?”
When I detected his ship on the other side of some debris, Ceraborous sprang at him with it’s robotic arms, piercing through sheets of metals. He struggles trying to free his ship from my grasp but the thrusters at the palm of Ceraborous’ claws were able to burn some of his circuitry in the engine, disabling his attempt to escape from my jaws. Like a wolf sinking its fangs onto its prey.
“Shit, those claws are in my ship. Let go you bitch!”
“I could say the same to you, staring at my ship’s ass. You’ve interrupted with my job and tried to kill me. Consider this self-defence.”
This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
The plasma lance on Ceraborous’ nose begins charging.
45%, 87%, 100%.
“GaaaaAAAAHHHHHH!”
“Shut up.”
I mercilessly murdered my pursuer with a cold blooded expression. My radio comp receives statics when his ship was melted by the three beams of pure energy. The fourth ship disappeared so I resumed my job.
“Francis, I only grabbed the batteries. Tell my client to meet me in Temlin village’s gate in this sector, if he isn’t please I’ll send him the coordinates of the generator.”
“Roger, but be careful down there. There have been a group of bandits near that settlement, the council also sent troops to fight them.”
“Yeah, yeah. I won’t have anything to do with it anyways.”
My ship flies towards Blore, a lavishing mineral rich planet with lots of vegetation. It houses around four million people as it was recently discovered about sixty years ago. Only some specific areas were allowed residence as the planet is being mined and cleared for its resources.
“Huh? What’s that? Smoke?”
As I flew closer my destination, a stream of smoke came from what seemed to be from a crashed ship. I decided to investigate and landed in an open area and geared myself with a tesla shocker connected to an energy pack strapped behind my waist, readied my binoculars and holstered my sidearm. I better not forget my radial jammer in case I’m surrounded.
There seems to be some chattering when I arrived to the area. Hiding within the brushes I scouted the area and counted a team of armed soldiers patrolling the crashed ship with a group of civilians, even children, being executed one by one. That’s messed up!
“Aw man, I’m glad we caught these guys before they got their permits to live here. To think these peaceful looking people are rebels.”
“Yeah, that’s wrong. Sending women and children to spy on this planet. Who knows what trouble they’ll do if we they’re left alone?”
I look towards the execution grounds and see twenty corpses, a quarter of them were children having their bodies burned by lasers.
“Please we’re not rebels, we’re from the capital! Take a closer look at our certificates!”
One more was shot.
“Shut up, you may be from the capital but it doesn’t mean any of you aren’t a spy. We’ve already discovered documents ordering them to infiltrate our research teams.”
“Is there anyone that would like to confess something? You have three minutes.”
“Nooo! Please, not my son! NoooooOOO!”
Another was shot. There are four hostages left, two are children. Before I could move they shot four more. I cannot take them on head on so I will need to reduce their numbers in the most efficient way.
I circled around behind the crashed site, set my energy pack and stabbed the tip of my tesla shocker into the ship. There should be seven of them still searching the ship. Here goes.
I turned the dial on my tesla shocker and the ship begins to cover itself with a blanket of electricity. The area around my tesla shocker melts an opening. Waiting a few seconds after the electricity vaporized the remaining troops on board I charged through. The three outside the ship begin shooting once I’m in their view.
“There was one more on the ship!?”
“Who cares, capture him. He’s the spy!”
“I’m not! I just couldn’t stand you guys killing innocent people!”
“Silence, trash should remain trash!”
I killed two soldiers before I threw my Radial Jammer, the leader shot two more hostages. The Radial Jammer activates a second too late and two more died. Only the children remain.
“Daddy!”
“Mommy!”
“A Radial Jammer!? Shit, I can’t use guns now.”
“Dammit! I’m too late.”
The last soldier draws his baton and prepares to beat the children to death. I ran with all my strength with my tesla shocker. I felt the adrenaline coursing through my veins, my head pulsing with determination, my roar raging.
I still couldn’t make it, the soldier swung his baton down but thankfully the brother sacrificed his left arm to protect his sister. The courageous by bought me enough time to tackle the soldier.
“Good job kid!”
“You fucker!”
He caught my arms right when I was about to electrocute him with my tesla shocker.
“Grrr….”
“GaaaAAAAA!”
My strength barely rivals his, finally he pushes me away and drops my tesla shocker. The soldier takes an offensive role as he smacks my ribs with his baton and continues to beat me as I fell.
“Shit. GAAAHHHHH!”
“Hehehe. How does it feel to be worthless? HAHAHAHA!-“
“Mister, what do I do now!”
I see the boy stabbing the soldier with the tesla shocker. Without hesitation I immediately gave him instructions.
“Turn the dial to the right and run away!”
The boy turns the dial and dashes off as a blaze of dazzling lights spark from the soldier’s armor.
“Shi- GAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!”
I think I did well considering I saved more than one life.
“Hey, kid. Can you stand?”
“Yeah… Thank you mister for saving us.”
He turns to his sister as they look at their deceased parents that protected the shots meant towards the siblings. The boy’s got some combat talents as well, but the correct choice is to find them an orphanage.
I performed first aid on the boy’s arm and gave them a few hours to grief for their parents before helping them burry the corpses.
“Why did mommy and daddy have to die? Why did those mean people do that? Why?”
The brother and I can only give them words of silence as we watched the rocks piled on top of their parent’s grave.
“Mister, my name is Zack. I am eleven. This is my sister Selena, she is nine.”
“I’m Kai, twenty-six. I’m a mercenary- oh shit! I forgot about my job! Francis! Francis! Pick up dammit!”
“What?”
“Huh? What’s that attitude? Is my client still there?”
“No. You wasted his time and he left. He also said he won’t hire you ever again.”
“SHHHIIIIIITTTT! GOD DAAAMMMMIIIIIIIIIIIIIITTTTTTTTTTTT!”
I turn my head towards the sibling standing beside me. The brother stepped forward and said something I did not expect but irritated me.
“Please adopt us! I want to be as strong as you and kill the people who killed our parents.”
“You… did you know if you killed the entire empire I WOULD FUCKING LOSE MY JOB!? It’s because of them I am only able to do missions they wouldn’t let their own men do or can’t do! I’ll lose my income if you killed off the entire empire, who cares of our stupid revenge! I just lost twenty thousand Hous because of this!”
“Please, I beg you! I’ll do anything!”
His eyes teared up but do not show any signs of weakness. The boy will not back down, his resolve seems strong.
“Sigh… look I’m weak as fuck compare to a whole bunch of people. You sure you want to follow my footsteps?”
A large smile forms on the boy’s face.
“Yes! Please train me! Don’t worry Selena, I’ll definitely avenge mom and dad!”