Slev's bounty target neatly dealt with, he impatiently paced through the halls of the scrapyard's main building. Figuring it would make things a bit smoother when the Corporate “police” got here to do a debrief, he also smothered the still smoldering fires in reception. Police was an awful loose word on Tansental; the place was effectively governed by a dozen different massive conglomerates.
The planet itself was nothing particularly special. A mix of miasmic swamps overflowing with pollution from excessive on-world production and sprawling cramped cities constructed up rather than out on the few patches of mostly stable land. What was special was its location and facilities.
Tancental was, as far as Slev could understand, the second-most important jump point in the known universe. The Corporations on planet had built a frankly insane number of orbital and Exo orbital facilities, making it the de facto stop for anyone passing out to the edges of settled space, or back in again. Three fully equipped state of the art shipyards orbited the planet, offering full repair and refit facilities for anything short of a capitol ship, and even some of those would fit.
But what had drawn Slev to this godforsaken swamp had been the transit options. Not one but four warp gates lay within the system, linked to important trade and manufacturing hubs that would take months to reach by acceleration array. And speaking of those, this system had twenty six separate acceleration arrays pointed at every remotely close star system.
What that all meant for him was that he could get close to any bounty, anywhere, and quickly if they were on this half of the galaxy, avoiding the normal weeks of connecting and redirecting flights. He hadn't yet even dared to dream, of owning his own ship capable of independent warp travel. So slumming it as a passenger was how he had been getting around for the last four Terran months. It didn't help that he was deeply, soul-crushingly in debt.
When humanity exploded onto the galactic scene approximately four years ago, It had not been a peaceful first contact.
Ramun Enterprises had sent a full mining colony deployment fleet to a barley-habitable rock on the absolute edges of explored space. They had, of course, surveyed it and legally obtained mining rights several years prior. Where things started to fall apart was the small human mining facility that had established itself there in the intervening years. The Ramun fleet, detecting unauthorized trespassers on their soon to be colony, had given a standard notice to vacate.
When the unidentified species below had failed to comply, they sent in a full security team compliment to forcibly remove them.
Thankfully, Ramun and the galaxy at large agree that this was utterly, terribly, stupid since the Ramun flotilla had not even taken the time to identify whatever minor species was squatting on its planet.
Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
The humans of Beska mining post three six reacted exactly how you would expect first-contact humans being invaded to react. The initial Ramun security force was decidedly obliterated by the on-site security in hall to hall close-quarters battles. Their last moments alive were the entire galaxy’s first look at us. Broadcast to the flotilla above and passed back to Ramun HQ.
Then things got dicey. The Terran Alliance patrol ship finally made it in response to desperate cries of an alien attack, obviously thinking it was a shitty joke. The colony flotilla had more or less just held position. Waiting for Ramun to send more soldiers or instructions. The escort vessel panicked and opened fire on the unknown and heavily armed ship that refused to answer comm's hails. That was the galaxy's second look at us. A sleek, deadly predator in the void with a weapon spanning its entire length ripped a top-of-the line escort vessel in half with one blow. Thankfully, at that point, everyone stopped shooting somehow, and efforts were made to open lines of communication.
This all led to a rather grim mythos surrounding humanity as the murderous monsters hiding beyond the fringes of space, and well. So far, we haven’t done much to disprove that. Diplomatic lines have been opened between species and tentative agreements have been made, but no full blown, large-scale trading has begun, and very few humans have made their way to some of the fringe stations.
The bounty guild was an exception, they began advertising on the most fringeward stations their desire to have humanity’s warriors among them. “Become the first, the deadliest hunter in the galaxy” they said. he bought it hook line and sinker. Technically, he was a legally licensed and supported hunter, alright. Slev also owed them somewhere north of two million credits, also known as enough to commission a luxury starliner. But he was the test case, so they had at least given him a fighting chance. A solid two years of lessons on galactic politics, species, and technology. It was a crash course, but it was enough to get him started.
And here he was on his third job in a smoldering, Used car dealship? He really can't tell what exactly this place did to make money. Well, other than crime, there was definitely some crime happening. Just pacing and waiting for some slug-shaped alien to tell him he could finally go home and take a shower.
They finally arrived, and Slev gave an exasperated sigh of relief. A token shuttle of guards gave the place a quick once over and took his statement. Moments after they left, his personal comm rang in his helmet. “Yup Slev here”
A gurgling, very happy voice was on the other end of this call “I hear that the philandering cheat has met a well-deserved end, at the hands of my new favorite monster!” Orima, Loradin's ex wife was the unknown caller, it seemed.
“Christ lady, that’s rude even by my standards, but yes, the job is done.”
"Excellent. I will make my way down to survey my new domain in the next few days."
Slev paused, then cautiously asked, “Domain?”
“Yes, you lovable nightmare I will be taking over my dear late husband's business interests. all of them."
Slev tried to rub his face through his helmet in vain again. Exasperated beyond measure, he had probably just gotten played badly in a power struggle between married crime lords.
“Now please, no hard feelings. I would very much like to continue a positive working relationship with such an effective creature as yourself. As a gesture, I am giving you a bonus!” She practically cooed.
Slev perked up a bit at that, he wasn’t expecting anything other than to cover damages on that stupid taxi he couldn’t afford otherwise. “Look around that godforsaken shop and pick out whatever shuttle or ship pleases you. I know they aren’t of the best quality, but my sources tell me you don't even have any transportation."
Slev was stunned. Orima really wanted him on her good side. "Well, thank you kindly. I will graciously take you up on that offer and not raise the question of if that taxi was really even yours.”
There was a nervous chuckle on the other end of the line "Wonderful. I'll call you again soon, I'm sure."
Slev pumped both fists in the air, finally making some progress! Now past giving a shit if he had gotten conned, he looked towards the Tarp covered craft on the display floor.