"Ducky, do we have enough power to reach orbit?"
"Yes, Captain. Just barely. We won't have enough to run the weapons platforms. And landing would drain us back to where we started, if you decided to do that."
Ice nodded. "Take us into orbit. Let's meet our friends."
__________________________________
Captain Reginald Drake of the Imperial Warship Imperia paced his bridge, eyeing the forward viewscreen where his latest headache sat still in the darkness of space. "What class is that XO? I don't think I am familiar with it."
"According to the scans it is a Nano Destroyer. The use of which was outlawed 600 years ago after the Magento Pirates Incident, Captain."
Drake looked at the ship and harrumphed. "Well, if it's a pirate we will throw him out his own airlock. Less paperwork that way. Use the nano disabler pulse. Board and escort him to one of the interrogation rooms. I'll be down shortly. Have Sergeant Brigham spend a few minutes with him. Always works well to have a human for interrogations. Damn deathworlders." The last part was muttered quietly.
___________________________________________
Ice had to be carried off his ship, something they had disabled his nano prosthetics and they were now just dead weight. The aliens had struggled to carry him even with him assisting as much as he could and they had all heaved a sigh of relief when they arrived in the small room. He ended up waiting for an hour.
Sitting in the metal chair with his prosthetic arm hanging limply at his side was nerve wracking. He hadn't been this defenseless in days and not even having his pistol bothered him greatly. What was worse, even Raven seemed to have been disabled. The VI Ducky had literally melted to the floor in front of him.
The door to the room opened and a thin man in a blue on gold uniform stepped inside. The look on his face could be summed up in two simple words: not happy. As he sat down across the table from Ice he steepled his fingers in front of himself and gazed off into nowhere for a moment before he spoke. "So a pirate with a Nano Destroyer? You know that is a crime punishable by hard labor for life. If you tell me where you acquired it I might be able to work out a deal."
The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
Ice was so stunned all he could do was stare at the man for a moment. "I, uh, got it on the planet below us. I crashed there several days ago and have been struggling to survive ever since. I didn't know having it would be a crime. Francis, the AI in the factory, told me to get it to replace my arm and leg."
"So… You admit to consorting with a Rogue AI on the Interdicted Capital World? Even being in this system is a War Crime under several treaties and directly violates the laws of the Empire. Also using a forged Transponder code; much less, one of the twenty-six hero codes. Everyone knows they are all dead except the Emperor and he has not left System Central in 500 years."
"I'm, uh, not from around here?" Ice sputtered out. "If you'll just let me activate Ducky or Raven I am sure they will explain everything."
"Let you activate a rogue AI and a rogue VI in the vicinity of a command vessel of the Imperial Space Fleet? You must be stupid. Then again anyone who lets nanos invade their body willingly can't be that smart anyways. Now tell me where you got the Emperor damned ship."
"The ruins of a destroyed city full of corpses and broken automatons. Francis told me where to get it and Raven mapped out the trip. I've been fighting Theriope at every turn and I've been injured more than I care to think about. You can choose to believe me or not, but when I get access to the store back I am buying you a shit sandwich and I am going to watch you eat it. Every. Last. Bite." Ice was yelling by the end of his rant.
As Ice finished shouting curse words at the man, the door behind him opened and Ice could see a four- armed creature with three eyes wearing the same gold on blue uniform. The thin man immediately jumped to attention as the creature entered.
"At ease, Sergeant. This pirate is obviously a very accomplished liar. If that ship is from that planet. It could only be the Nano Forge. And everyone knows that all recovery efforts failed because the VI onboard went rogue and murdered anyone who even goes near it using nanobots. Only a System User could go near it. And this man may be a human, but he looks like any other human from sector 984."
"What the fuck is Sector 984? Is Earth there? Can I go home?" Ice demanded, the questions bursting out one after another rapid fire.
"The only habitable world in Sector 984, as you know, human, is X1 the Class 10 deathworld." The creature shuddered either in rage or in fear Ice couldn't tell.
"Can't be worse than down there." Ice shrugged.
"Considering X1 is currently under siege by the Theriope and Emperor's automatons are barely holding out as the last dregs of humanity attempt to evacuate. I daresay it would be worse. However, you didn't react to the name of the human home world. Where are you from and don't say Earth everyone knows that the System Users failed. That the Emperor is the only one left. And the creators abandoned us as a failed dimension after the Capital fell taking five system user's with it."
Ice looked at him for a second before enunciating as clearly as he could, "I am from Earth, you jackass. I don't know about any creators but when I woke up Raven was in my head and she called herself a system."
"We have ways of verifying if you're lying so think carefully on your next words. Are you claiming to be a new System User? And if so what is your designation?"
Ice thought for a moment. "Yes, I am a new System User. And my Designation is Dronemancer."
The Creature collapsed into the chair the thin man had just vacated. It gazed at Ice, its eyes glazing over in shock. “If that's true it will change everything.”