I'll start. [size=-2]The work here is based entirely on fiction and my fantasy, all similarities to living or dead persons are entirely coincidential, yadda yadda yadda.[/size] Let's go:
One day I was sitting at a scuffed table in whatever that hell-hole of a pub is called at a rusty carrier called Freedom in Cerulean Warzone. I had just made a little money selling Fulcrum Torps to people who shouldn't own any weapons eight thousand sectors away, and now I was relishing my sip of cheap scotch and the sight of the great vast darkness me and countless others call home. The pub was nearly empty, except for a young fellow leaning at the bar and doing small-talk with the barkeep.
From what I noticed, the boy's name was "Pliny Vic" or something, and he was out here looking for the one fat chance, like everybody was. According to his outfit, he was on the best way for finding it. He neither wore the cheap-ass synthetics your momma buys for your first trip out of the system, nor the platinum-plated dress coats the Guild's boot-lickers dress when they're on the search for somebody to kill some sorry competitors ... or themselves, if unlucky. Bet the ladies were no meagerness in Pliny's life.
As I thought back and forth about clothes, girls, the unforgiveness of the void and how anybody can enjoy whisky with ice, the door sprung open and one big guy enters and went straight to the bar, ordering two beers, one for himself "and one for the liver". He wore the scars of many big battles and a badge of one of the bigger clans out here in this sector. It might've been the Freedom Fighters, I don't remember. And I didn't care, since what he told to the keeper and Pliny as he ordered his drinks, was far more interesting: A little jump away, the Guild had barricaded a frequented trading route and was plundering the defenseless merchants en masse for tolls. Since the Navy was already up and tied in the war, they were looking for some mercs to fix the job for them and now "Jay", as he was calling himself, was looking for compagnions. As he spoke of the pay, I was all ear.
Slowly I rose from my seat, downing the last drops of the already warm scotch and heading to the bar. Pliny turned around with a welcoming nod, Jay looked at me without a noticeable thought. "Let's do this", I said.
"Fine." That came from Pliny, not from Jay. Jay was still watching us, as a hunter a possible threat ... or his prey. Then he looked at us both, and grinned. "These guys aren't out for play, kiddos," he growled. I didn't know if I should've been intimidated, impressed or insulted. Pliny didn't neither, it seemed. "I'd be a gunner with you," he said to me.
Jay turned to his beer, one mug already empty. "What do you fly?" That question was for me. I always had a penchant for civilian ships, packed to the rim with weapons while looking harmless. Don't get me wrong, the military frames are great for fighting and agility, but I'm kind of a fiddler, trying to squeeze the last out of a ship's frame and then struggling to hold it together when it gets rough. "Starmaster," I said.
"Okay. That could work, if you both are as good as you're green. We'll meet at the docks in 30 minutes." Jay rose and went to the door. Pliny and I looked at each other. He would be my gunner for today. I've never flown with a gunner. I didn't tell him.
30 Minutes later I sat at my old girl's cockpit checking the facilities. I was already handicapped, as I had wasted my last trusty Exodus on some lonely pirate at my last trip and the carrier only had Rages. As stubborn as I am with my frames, I am with my weapons, but this time I knew, I'd need some splosives in my pack, and so I loaded the Rages. Not without hesitation, I tell you.
Pliny was already buzzing and whirring in the rings around my ship, probably testing the steering, as I started the engines and the girl slowly moved out of the bay. Jay was already hovering a few miles out. His ship, a military Evoch-E or something, looked almost like himself: scarred, raw and armed like a roman centurio.
As we navigated around the asteroids in front of the carrier, Jay sent me the waypoint he got from the Navy and I sped up. Seconds after, we left the asteroid field and Jay jumped, me on his heels. That's when I made a mistake and hell broke loose.
The Starmaster is the biggest and heaviest of the civil frames and thus, it is not very agile and slow to accelerate. My baby especially, as it was full to the rim with weapons and equipment. Jey's military vessel wouldn't have that problem, so he could jump right into the action, deal some serious damage and get out for regrouping.
Usually I account for this and set my jumping destination some steps off the navpoint, but this day I didn't. So as Pliny and me went out of the hyperspace, we were greeted by glorious gunfire and missile galore. "Keep that rockets off my ass!" I screamed through the intercom as I kicked the afterburner like mad, just to get some space between the Guild bastards and us. Pliny was laughing like a madman as he turned the missiles to red hot sky-glitter. I hit the throttle up to 3000, regardless burning the precious fuel I bought at Freedom for 280 bucks per unit. Dead men need no money.
As we gained some distance, I switched to inertial and turned around, watching the scenery. Jay was picking reds out of the sky, circling like a dancer in the moonlight, but there where still seven or eight left, following him like the ugly rats they were. Few miles off was the source of the merchant's grief: A Guild cruiser, slowly trying to close up to the action to do some serious harm.
Back to the action, I thought. This time I did it right, aiming for the outermost fighter and setting course slightly beside him, so I could keep him between us and the rest of the pack. 1000 mps, inertial, set-off. As we were a mere 7000 meters far from target, Pliny and I started to fire, all we had. Four seconds later, that Guild fool was gone. And three others on our heel. I turned around, aiming at the closest one, pumping icy-blue fire into his shields. Then the cannons started to stutter. Low energy. One million curses came to my mind, as I steered and rolled out of the enemy fire, putting my leftover power on the back shields. Grip on the Afterburner and clamp it, like there's no tomorrow. Hull down to 50%, 10000 meters away, 10000 bucks gone, both men alive. I'm okay with this.
During this, Jay wasn't sitting around either. He took his chasers down to two, still rolling and banking like he's never done anything else. But it took its time and the cruiser came dangerously close. Too close. With sheer cruelty, it's red beams ripped through one of the fighters and hit Jay's ship. "Hull at 17," he bellowed out of my speakers, "come over here!"
I sped the lady up to the max, hit the brakes almost after, so I could get between Jay and the cruiser without wasting too much time, steering my ship almost into the cruiser. The flak pumped it's bullets around our ears, the Starmaster gnarling and crying in pain. Hull at 24, as I whacked the missile launch button. One after another eight Rages aimed for the cruiser, leaving black trails on a black background. As they hit its hull, ... nothing happened. Nobody seemed to care.
Confused I turned around, looking for Jay. He got a little space between him and the action, wasting another foolish fighter trying to chase him. Unfortunately that meant for me that the cruiser was behind my back, and that hit me right after the missile warning bursted my otherwise silent intercom. I turned around, hitting the reverse at the same time. Aim at the missile, fire, [beeeeep]. No energy. I saw Death coming right at my eyes as I tried to outnavigate a rocket, as a bright blue beam came from over my head and erased the impending doom out of my field of view. Pliny. He did it.
As we joined Jay, he had already taken down the rest of the fighters and was ready to regroup to take on the cruiser. Having learned over the dangers of the cruiser's flak and beam weapons, we tried getting on him from behind, Pliny and me turning its attention on us, while Jay put some rockets up his engines. The explosion shined as Sirius on a cloudless afternoon.
As we were back at the scruffy pub at Freedom, it was two beers and a scotch. For each of us.
tl;dr: I was drunk playing Evochron Mercenary, had a lotta fun, couldn't sleep and wrote a story.
