Right now we’re in a bar where most of the Mercs that had participated in the pirate raid had gathered for a celebratory drink. Apparently this was arranged by some Mercenary team who invited all of us to gather to celebrate.
Since Samson told us he was going, we saw no reason to decline the invitation and went to the location as well.
I’ve already received several cheers and claps on the back from several Mercs that passed by and at least six of them had offered to buy me drinks.
There were more of them who wanted to approach me but Amber slammed the table angrily and told them to stop disturbing us and sent them away.
Then she went right back to drinking her beer except she now had her arm wrapped around mine while she was drinking.
Samson took care not to comment on it and just continued on like nothing unusual was going on.
“I’ll admit… You really are crazy, Tera. I’m surprised you even survived this long,” Samson sighed, knocking back his beer and taking several swigs from it.
I shrugged, “I dunno, just luck I guess.”
“Hell, lady… Your luck must be incredible then, to be able to pull all this shit off with all your limbs intact.”
I was about to say something when another Merc came to our table with a bottle of beer in his hands.
Amber reacted immediately and started hissing at him, literally.
The Merc raised his hands in a placating gesture, “Woah, woah… Relax. I’m not getting her anything, just wanted to express my thanks. You might not have done it specifically for me but I just want to make a toast to you.”
I was a little confused but I raised my own bottle to him which he clinked his against before taking a swig out of it.
The Merc then left after thanking me again and walking off without even introducing himself.
Amber finally calmed down after he left and I’m pretty sure she’s drunk right now because she’s usually not this clingy.
I suppose I should see it as a blessing that she wasn’t chasing Samson away at least.
Speaking of him, the Merc in question was looking at me with amusement while he sipped his beer.
I gave him a look, “I don’t get it, why are they treating me like I did them a favour?”
Samson raised an eyebrow, “Really? Wait, you don’t know?”
“Know what?”
“Just how much impact you made of course.”
I gave him a look that told him I most certainly do not know what he was talking about.
He set his beer down, “Tera… Do you have any idea what would have happened if you had not suggested that plan?”
“Err… I guess we wouldn’t have been able to defeat all the pirates in one go?”
He shook his head, “That’s one but not the main reason I’m looking for. One thing you need to know, Tera, is that as Mercs--”
“The only people you can really count on is yourself and maybe your crew,” Amber cut in.
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
She sat up but still left her arm on mine and turned to face me, her face suddenly serious.
Samson gave her a look and said nothing about her interruption but continued, “That’s right. As Mercs, we may enjoy the freedom that soldiers don’t get, but you are pretty much alone out there and death can come to you without any warning.”
I raised an eyebrow, “What does that have to do with this?”
He took another sip of his beer and placed it down slowly, “Tera… It is not an exaggeration to say that a lot of the people in this room are here today and not floating out in space is because of you.”
“Me? But all I did was suggest some stupid plan though? The real MVPs are the military who completely wrecked the pirate battlecruiser, isn’t it?”
Samson rolled his eyes, “Yeah, sure. And who was the one who made it even possible in the first place? You of course. If you hadn’t come up with a plan like this, we would have been sent straight towards the pirates and engaged with them to get their attention before the battleship could get into position. I’m going to guess that half of us would be shot down before that even happened. These guys know that too, that’s why they are grateful to you.”
Amber hugged me to her, “Hmph… They can be grateful from a distance. No need to come all the way here and disturb us.”
I patted her head, “Ok, I think you drank enough for one day. I’m taking this away now.”
“Noooo… Come on, Tera… Just a little bit… I worked hard during the fight!”
“Mmhmm… If you’re going back to sleep with me tonight, I don’t want you in a drunken mess and throwing up on my ship’s floor. If you’re going to do that, I’m not letting you sleep with me tonight.”
She quickly sobered up and gave me a mock salute, “I’ll stop drinking right now!”
Well, that was easy.
I turned back to Samson and ignored the blonde haired Merc who had busied herself rubbing her face on my cheek.
“How’s Reese? Any news from her? Speaking of which, it’s been a while since I’ve seen Maurice and Clandice too.”
He leaned back on his chair, “Yeah, her ship’s repairs are coming along fine. We should be ready to head out in just two or three more days according to her. As for the other two, they’re doing another hustle in the meantime but they’ll be back before then.”
That explains why I did not see them in our raid against the pirates.
“And what are your plans for these few days?”
He half turned to gesture at the bar to send him another beer before turning back to me, “Well… I think I’ve had enough excitement to last me a few weeks so I’m just going to take it easy for the rest of the time. I’ll probably just collect the rewards from the Guild tomorrow and just kick back and relax somewhere until it’s time to go. Probably do some reading while I’m at it.”
That reminds me… Samson was reading a printed book which is regarded as something that isn’t common around here.
Maybe he has seen those memory cards before?
I think he’s trustworthy enough for us to share the fact that we found those memory cards that he wouldn’t stab us in the back to get them.
I then leaned a little closer towards the table which got his attention.
“Samson… Could I ask if you’ve seen this before?”
I tapped on my Codex to display a picture of the memory card that I had taken in order to search it online.
He narrowed his eyes at the picture and inspected it for a minute before finally turning to me, “What the fuck is that thing?”
“I guess you don’t know what that is either?”
“Yeah, first time I’m seeing it. What is it?”
“That’s what I want to know actually. We found this in the pirate lord’s ship and we have no idea what this actually is.”
He took another look at it, “Hmm… If I had to guess… Seems like some kind of storage device? But I don’t see how something that wide could be connected to any personal terminals so it would need a special reader to connect to it… Did you pull it out from some machine?”
“No, we just found them sitting in a box with some data chips.”
“Maybe it’s some special device that the pirates are using amongst themselves? I wouldn’t be surprised if they made some kind of encrypted key or something that is only known amongst themselves and can only be decrypted by other pirates. Maybe this is something used amongst pirate lords?”
I raised an eyebrow, “Like what? Some kind of proof of their title or something? How does one even become a pirate lord anyway?”
Samson shrugged, “I had always just assumed that once a pirate leader gathers a big enough group, people would just start recognising them as one. I don’t really pay attention to pirate politics, assuming they even have any, that is.”
Amber then spoke up from my side, “Don’t suppose you know anyone who might give a crack at trying to read this thing?”
He shook his head, “Sorry, techies aren’t really in my group of contacts I’m afraid. Never really was that big of a tech person myself. You could try to bring it to a mechanic or a tech specialist though I wouldn’t trust any of them around here to keep quiet about this. If they have connections to pirates, they might know what it is and you could get marked for having something like this, assuming this is something special to the pirates of course.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” I assured him.
Oh well, I wasn’t really expecting him to know anyway… Guess I’ll just have to hold on to it for a while longer.
Wait a minute… Maybe Mara might know something about it?
Guess I should call her later.