“What do Outlaws have to do with Reavers?” Ryuuk asked.

It had been an hour since our close encounter with the Reaver swarm. In that time, we’d put some distance between ourselves and the wreckage. All five of us were gathered in the common room seating area, conversing over the implications of what we had seen.

Inside, I was still seething. The presence of an Outlaw ship in that wreckage meant they had either died fighting to defend the settlement or, even more gut-wrenching to think about, died attacking it.

“Generally, nothing,” I answered Ryuuk. “Outlaws wouldn’t deal with Reavers.”

I hoped that was as true in this part of the galaxy as in the Pact Worlds.

“Few people would,” Cash added. “Even the assassin guild would want nothing to do with them. Not that they’d be in particular need of our services. Reavers like to do their own killing.”

“They’re a scourge on any part of the galaxy they inhabit,” Vomero explained. “Killing indiscriminately, ravaging entire planetary ecosystems. They prey on the weaker, more isolated planetary systems because stronger ones will eventually pursue and eradicate them.”

We had been filling Ryuuk in on Reaver culture. He was the only member of our crew unfamiliar with them. The planet he had lived on most of his life had been deep in the Pact Worlds and at very little risk of being plagued by Reavers.

“It seems like these settlement ships are easy targets for somethin’ like them,” Ryuuk observed.

“That’s true,” Vomero said, “and unfortunately, settlement-class ships are much more common in the lesser developed parts of the galaxy.”

“You don’t see many in the Pact Worlds,” Cash agreed. “Most of the Pact Worlds are richly populated and inhabitable. Its why the majority of the Pact World quadrants are the most developed. Those same features, an abundance of inhabitable planets, rich in resources and in close proximity to the old worlds, make it easy for civilizations to thrive.”

“In other words, not places that need to supplement their territory with settlement-class ships,” Dick said. “Not that there aren’t any, but they’ll still be heavily protected by well-developed governmental systems.”

“If the Pact Worlds are so inhospitable for Reavers, how do ya’ll know so much about them?” Ryuuk asked.

There was a pause in the conversation, as each of us took time contemplating our own experiences with Reavers. I was sure they’d all be different, but the resulting distaste would be the same.

“There are still small, outlying worlds vulnerable to Reavers in the Pact Worlds,” I said to Ryuuk. “Many people know of someone who knows someone who has been affected by a Reaver attack in some way. But actually encountering them for yourself is rare. Out here, as opposed to in the Pact Worlds, those types of easy targets are everywhere.”

“I’ve never heard of a group as large as the one we saw today,” Cash said.

“I have,” I said. “Left unchecked, they tend to grow like pestilence.”

“So, you’ve had actual run-ins with Reavers before?” Dick asked, leaning forward in his seat. He was nursing a whiskey between his hands.

I nodded, thinking back several years ago to a sector of the Pact Worlds I had frequented as a newly inducted Outlaw.

“I was in Corson,” I said, knowing that everyone except possibly Ryuuk would understand the reference.

Dick let out a low whistle. “Oof. Yeah, I’d say that counts as a little more than a run-in for sure.”

“Did you fight at Astra Noma?” Vomero said, leaning forward eagerly.

I could tell they were all interested to hear my side of one of the most infamous space battles in recent history.

“I’ve heard of Corson, but what’s an Astra Noma?” Ryuuk asked.

I decided to oblige as I settled back in my seat, eyes unfocused as I stared into the past.

Corson’s quadrant of the galaxy was densely populated, rich in culture, resources, and, most importantly, opportunities to make money. As such, it drew Outlaws by the droves. We didn’t typically have a place we called home, but Corson was as close as it came because of the sheer volume of Outlaws one could find operating in that sector.

While it was a gold mine for those willing to take jobs operating slightly outside the bounds of authority, it was the exact opposite for those who preferred pillaging and plundering. The planetary governments in Corson were strong and well-developed. They did not tolerate the type of death and destruction visited upon worlds by Reavers, a fact that proved devastating to the large swarm that arrived in the area a few years before I became an Outlaw.

After years of heavy losses, the Reavers realized that their traditional route of gaining resources wouldn’t work in Corson. Unwilling to give up such a fertile hunting ground, however, they changed tactics and set their sights instead on Outlaw ships and establishments.

“Why Outlaws?” Ryuuk asked,

“I’m getting to that part,” I said, having had to stop frequently throughout my recounting to answer his questions.

Simply put, the Outlaws weren’t affiliated with any of the local governments, of course. Yet, we were rich targets, prospering off the bounteous opportunities we found in Corson. When the Reavers started hitting our ships, nobody cared. Hell, even most Outlaws didn’t care. The most quoted part of our creed might be “Mine to Take” but the second part, “Mine to Keep”, was equally important to the Outlaw way of life.

Many Outlaws saw these initial attacks as the inevitable result of not being able to uphold that sentiment. It took some time, and a few attacks on popular Outlaw hangouts, to raise eyebrows among our kind.

This was right around the time that I became an Outlaw. Jessa was fond of giving speeches about fighting for our way of life and Outlaws being stronger together. The urgency and resoluteness of that philosophy was being born out of those Reaver attacks.

The Corson governments didn’t care about the Reavers hitting up Outlaws, as long as it didn’t affect their citizens. In fact, many saw it as a respite from having to deal with the Reavers themselves. They were more than willing to let the Outlaws be the buffer between their worlds and these butchers.

We didn’t hold it against them. In fact, we expected it. That was the whole point of being an Outlaw. We were a nation unto ourselves, operating outside of, but not in opposition to, other people’s laws to make what profit we could.

“This mark has built a nation for people like you and me. That’s why we fight for it, why we die for it. To us, it represents the freedom to pursue every dream we’ve ever had or ever will have. And we’d do anything to protect it, not out of obligation to some oath we took but because we refuse to let anyone take that dream from us.”

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Jessa’s words in the tavern that day resonated deeply within me. It was that conversation that convinced me to take the Oath. I had no idea that less than a year later, I’d be putting that Oath to the test.

“I never realized all the politics going on behind that conflict,” Dick said. “But then, I was busy boozing and cruising my way through life at the time. I found anything remotely profound off-putting.”

“The assassin guild was extremely interested in what was going on in Corson at the time,” Cash added. “Mostly, they were wanting to see if your rag-tag group of people really deserved all the hooplah you put out about creeds and camaraderie. But the Outlaws stepped up in a big way when they needed to and earned the respect of a lot of factions that operate in the shadows. I’d say Astra Noma did a lot to legitimize the Outlaws as a real force to be reckoned with.”

“That's probably true,” I agreed with his assessment. “It came at a price, though.”

“Okay, so back to Astra Noma,” Ryuuk said. “How does that come into the story?”

Astra Noma was a tiny way-station at a common junction between several of the Corson worlds. It became a popular Outlaw hangout and was, in fact, home to that lively little tavern where Jessa convinced me to take the Oath.

It had been about 10 months since I joined when a Reaver swarm hit Astra Noma. They killed several Outlaw crews who were there at the time but made sure to leave the way-station intact so as not to raise the ire of the local governments. Of course, they also claimed several contracts’ worth of payment from the crews they killed. Astra Noma was also a place most Outlaws went to celebrate successful jobs, and most of those crews had goods and credits they had yet to secure.

There had already been growing discourse among Outlaws in the area of teaming up to strike back at the Reavers. Some were too worried about the numbers and considered it suicide. Others were optimistic that if enough Outlaws came together, we’d have comparable numbers but superior expertise and would come out on top.

The hit on Astra Noma tipped the scales. Not only did it bring every Outlaw in Corson on board but many other Outlaws from surrounding quadrants traveled there to stand in solidarity in support of our way of life.

Jessa had been right to say that our freedom meant nothing without the means and resolve to protect it. If Reavers could declare open season on Outlaw ships in Corson, a place with a huge contingency of Outlaws, they could do it anywhere. Once everyone was on board, the main problem was locating the enemy.

“Reaver swarms are only the tip of the spear as far as they go,” Vomero broke in to explain to Ryuuk. “They’re numerous and fast, striking hard before people can respond and then disappearing without a trace. But they have a home cluster. Sometimes it is a large compilation of ships joined together, much like the settlement-class ship we just encountered.”

“The Nest,” I said, giving it the name we used during our battles with them.

“We called it a hive, but it doesn’t matter,” Vomero said. “It’s your story. Continue.”

Reavers always kept the location of their Nest hidden. It was slow moving and hard to defend. But hiding anything in a quadrant full of pissed off Outlaws was impossible. Once our network identified the location, we were able to move quickly. Putting together resources on the fly was an Outlaw specialty, and the Reavers had no time to flee.

The battle that ensued was bloody. Many Outlaws gave their life to eradicate that Nest of Reavers.

“After that day, something was quietly added to the Oath,” I said to my companions. “It was more understood than explicitly stated, but every Outlaw who took the Oath or has taken it since knows that if an Outlaw ship is ever attacked unsolicited by a Reaver, every Outlaw within traveling distance will respond with force.”

“So...it didn’t happen at Astra Noma, then? Why would anyone call it that?!” Ryuuk destroyed the reverence of the moment, as usual.

“Because it was the attack on Astra Noma that caused it, idiot,” Dick said.

“But it didn’ even happen there!” Ryuuk continued, “and it weren’t even destroyed. It’s probably still there.”

“Oh it’s definitely still there,” I said, smiling and remembering all the good times we had at Astra Noma in the years after. “But I guess ‘Middle of the Wide Ass Open Space’ doesn’t really roll off the tongue. Sorry, Ry.”

He just shrugged in concession.

“What was it like, fighting the Reavers?” Cash asked. “Were they tough?”

“They were just people,” I said. “Of every race and ethnicity you can imagine, just people lacking any semblance of humanity in them. And they weren’t particularly good fighters. I guess you don’t have to be good if you prey on the weak and unprepared. Though I heard some of them were skilled. They must have had a strike team to take care of hard targets while the masses slaughtered the innocent. I never fought any of those, though.”

“What about the Hive—or Nest as you call it? I’ve never seen anything about them,” Vomero asked.

I could feel my expression grow darker as I thought about the Reavers’ Nest. I’d never been in a more depraved place.

“I swear the victory felt worse than the battle,” I said. “We killed every last Reaver in that swarm. Mercilessly. But we couldn’t just set an explosive on the Nest and be done with it.

“For days, we worked endlessly to clear out the Nest and liberate any slaves we found inside. We had to do it in rotations because it was just so grim...”

I trailed off, unable to bring myself to give voice to the horrors I had seen inside the Reaver’s nest. Everyone sat silently for a lengthy period, each nursing our own drinks and thoughts in solitude.

“Something still bothers me, though,” Vomero finally mused aloud.

“When is something not bothering you?” Cash replied.

“Since I met you? Never,” Vomero retorted, pulling a reluctant chuckle from the big, bionic man.

“Anyway,” he continued, “that wreckage looked at least a day or so old. Why would the Reavers risk coming back to it? Surely, someone must have known that it has been attacked by now. They could have met a military force investigating the wreckage instead of just us hiding in the shadows.”

“I don’t know,” Dick said. “Maybe whatever they were looking for was worth the risk? It didn’t seem like they were doing typical scavenging.”

“It seemed like they brought the whole damn fleet,” Cash said, “so maybe they weren’t too concerned with someone showing up. I imagine there aren’t many military forces out in this quadrant of the galaxy who could easily deal with that type of threat.”

“All the more reason to get back to actual civilization,” Vomero muttered.

It was easy to forget while galivanting around advanced city states such as New Horizon City just how tenuous the façade of civility was in this isolated quadrant of the galaxy. The consequences of our escapades on Kalo-Mahoi, for instance, wouldn’t have been so easy to escape in the Pact Worlds. While it did seem that we were “wanted” in this sector now, the ITE was the only real authority that could reach us once we crossed the atmosphere of Kalo-Mahoi.

They were called the Pact Worlds for a reason. Each boasted their own government of various style and might, but crimes committed in one Pact World, especially major crimes, were enforceable across all of them. There were extradition agreements that made it hard to simply flee your transgressions on one world in favor of another.

The lack of that kind of structure and alliance among these outlier planets we found ourselves in harkened back to a much wilder time in our galaxy’s history. Right now it was working for us, but I knew the tides could and would eventually pull against us as surely as they were helping now.

“Vomero is right,” I said. “We’ve got to keep our eyes on the prize when we get to Rodan. Getting home is the goal, and that mission got a lot harder when we destroyed half a planet.”

“Allegedly destroyed half a planet,” Vomero corrected. “They can’t really prove it was us.”

“They don’t have to when there’s nobody in this quadrant who would give a damn about how long we rot in a prison here while they figure it out,” Dick argued.

“Besides, I’m pretty sure we actually did destroy half that planet,” Cash pointed out. “Well, that little weirdo did.”

“All he did was reclaim an ancient relic that once belonged to his people, it’s petty theft at best, if you want to get technical,” Vomero said.

“Yeah, but takin’ back the fancy stick thingy was what caused the islands to fall in the first place,” Ryuuk added.

“Allegedly,” Vomero insisted. “Outside of a few tall tales and legends, they have no real way to prove that’s why the islands fell.”

“Would you quit saying, allegedly,” Dick complained. “We were all there, the bullshit doesn’t work on us.”

“I’m just saying, we need to get into practice of denying any culpability in case we do end up being questioned by the authorities,” Vomero pointed out. “It’s not my fault that you’re too dense to understand the finer points of legal jargon.”

“That’s it!” Dick said. “Skye, shoot him in the ass!”

I just shook my head in bewilderment.

“Oh come on, I have it on good authority that you’re very good at shooting people in the ass,” he prodded.

“Allegedly,” I replied.