Into the Black

(The Green Goblin Bar and Grill)

The Green Goblin was like the Hard Rock Café, except with a superhero/supervillain theme. Which, to Jaynie’s mind, was both strange and awesome, considering that this station was basically a hive of scum and villainy.

While the Boss was out trying to score some coin in the local poker tourney so he could get some badass weapons for the shuttle to go with the upgrades they’d already been making to it and the Raven, Jaynie had decided that drinks were in order, to celebrate the newest member of the crew. Shearah was with Cali, doing some shopping for… whatever, some spare parts or extra material for the fabber? Not her deal. Two of the new slaves went with them, since they hadn’t been on a shopping trip since they’d been enslaved. Two of them were down at the dock, keeping an eye on the Raven. The last three stayed in the room at their hotel, playing some game. Which left just Jaynie, Carissa, and Sheila to go out drinking.

Could be worse.

They were starting their second round when Jaynie noticed a group of toughs coming through the door. Asian toughs. Asian toughs with tattoos. Well, fuck. At least they were able to spot the trouble before the trouble found them, since Jaynie had insisted on sitting facing the door. The Princess noticed her actions, and looked to see the toughs.

“What do we do?” There was fear in the Princess’s voice. Jaynie nodded at that. That was good. If she wasn’t afraid, given that she’d only seen a couple firefights before now (and those being mostly ones they started), then Jaynie would have been concerned.

Jaynie grinned at the former princess, the hand under the table suddenly holding her favorite shotgun. Taking the cue, the other girls did the same. “First, I’m sending the Boss a message to let him know what’s happening. Then, we see if Charlie’s calling the foxtrot, and if they are, we teach these guys to dance.”

(Maggy’s Junk and Shit)

Shearah was in heaven. Well, not really. But going through this junkyard was really fun for the mechanic. See, industrial fabbers could print pretty much anything as long as they had enough feed stock or recycled materials, but that did shit all to help if you didn’t have a pattern for them to print into. Which meant that if you were trying to create something new, then you needed to experiment. And not all junk got recycled, making it a perfect source of circuit boards and other manufactured goods.

Plus, when dealing with the random array of junk in a junkyard, you could find something that inspired you to take whatever project you were on in a new direction, or that could be used with a new project. That’s the main reason junkyards still existed (besides the fact that some people are too lazy to repair or recycle things when they break). For mechanics, this place was a gold mine of inspiration when they were making their own ship upgrades.

The upgrades they were buying were awesome, no doubt, but Shearah had no doubt that when she got skilled enough, she would be able to improve on some of them. Maybe even come up with all new upgrades! And she’d be able to do it without them having to pay obscene amounts of money. She just needed to get her skills up, which meant tinkering was in order.

Cali just chuckled as she watched the knelfi girl’s breathless excitement. Only a techie could get so excited about a pile of scrap metal and broken machinery. Of course, they weren’t alone. They’d brought the gauz male and one of the knelfi girls that they’d ‘rescued’ from the casino on Primo to help haul their purchases back to the ship.

As she turned to speak, her eyes widened as she saw several figures moving towards them. Asians, and sporting Red Orchid colors. “Fuck.”

“Maybe when we’re back on the Raven. I want a shower first.” Cali just facepalmed at that. The silly mechanic hadn’t even looked at her, but was still buried up to her waist in the interior of what used to be an engine compartment.

Slapping Shearah’s rear, Cali said, “No, you goof. We got trouble. Red Orchids, coming our way.”

THAT got the little mechanic’s attention, and she climbed out of the engine, drawing her weapon as she did so. “Fuck.”

(Smuggler’s Reach Shipyard, Observation Bay)

The two slaves didn’t really have any business being in the observation bay of the shipyard, but their Master wanted someone around to keep an eye on the ship, even if it was through a bay window, so they’d been taking turns. The knelfi looked over at the slim ihm female, and was about to say something when she caught some movement at the door.

Oh, those men looked like Yakuza. What were they doing here, wearing their colors openly? The station was supposed to be neutral ground, she thought. That’s what her former Master had always said…

(Smuggler’s Reach Shipyard, Bay 2)

Four Asian men quietly walked through the shipyard. It was not hard to see why people gave them a wide berth, even if one didn’t know that they had placed the proper bribes for the security on the bays to look the other way for a few minutes. Three of them were armed with assault rifles, while the other only had an SMG. The last one made up for is deficient armament by carrying the hacking assist terminal they were going to use to take over the ship. The name may have been changed, but they had confirmed that the gaijin who shamed them on Choson Ring had purchased an ID spoofer, so that was inconsequential.

(Dead Man’s Rest Hotel)

I was still in ‘Rika’ form as I made my way back to the hotel. I smiled despite myself. The payout from tonight hadn’t been quite as good as I’d hoped, but I still managed to humiliate Lord Kickass again, and get enough money for the weapons the shuttle definitely needed. Plus, new threads are new threads!

I’d almost reached the hotel when I got Jaynie’s message that there were some Asian toughs looking their way at a nearby bar. When Cali sent me a message, saying that they were about to get attacked at the junkyard, and Raven sent a message saying that there was suspicious movement near the ship, I started getting worried.

Then there was a massive explosion on the fifth floor of the hotel. That would be the floor where we were staying. I got the notification that three of my slaves were dead, but I didn’t have time to get into it now. Several members of the Red Orchid group were exiting the building, quite pleased at the message they had sent a gaijin, and how they were going to take everything he owned before they killed him. OK, so it didn’t take a wild leap of logic to know they were talking about me.

I opened a message to all my crew and slaves, and said, simply, “Under attack! All groups escape and return to the ship!”

My outburst caught the attention of the nearest of my group of five Yaks, but my drawing the Energy Blade and Widowmaker got the rest of them to notice me. And then the fight was ON.

(Smuggler’s Reach Shipyard, Observation Bay)

The slaves never had a chance. They weren’t gladiators or combat slaves. They were simply sex toys who dealt cards! The one closest to the door stood there, stunned, as a dagger buried itself in her chest, just as her Master’s warning came to her bracer. The knelfi girl screamed, and was cut down as well, painting the observation bay with her blood.

And then all went dark.

(The Green Goblin Bar and Grill)

Almost at the same time the warning from the Boss came in, the Asians moved. Cursing, Jaynie kicked over the table as the six men drew handguns, and pulled the other two girls behind the improvised cover, just as bullets began tearing through the chairs (and patrons) behind them. Then the screaming started.

Looking at the others, they nodded, and broke cover at the same time, shotguns raised. The weapons fired slow, and they weren’t using the scatter shot rounds, because the Boss didn’t like the attention his last massacre got us. Evidently, whoever got these toughs together didn’t expect there to be resistance, or they just didn’t think they needed help against three girls, because they weren’t even wearing body armor. Three of the bastards went down, two of them permanently. The doc had only winged hers, but a gut shot would hurt enough to keep the bastard out of the fight for a moment.

They managed to kill a third one and wing another as the remaining toughs dove for cover, trying to find something that would protect them from the ‘poor defenseless females’ that they were expecting to just line up and die, or some idiotic bullshit like that. Jaynie wished she had the boss’s powers, so she could tell them exactly where they could shove those ideas, but she figured telling them while her shotgun was rammed so far up their ass that they could lick the barrel would have to do.

(Maggy’s Junk and Shit)

KRA-BOOM!

Shearah’s ears were ringing as she slumped behind a piece of shuttle bulkhead, holding her side where shrapnel had gotten her. “Who the fuck brings rockets to a firefight?”

Cali groaned as she looked over the piece of cover they’d dove behind when they saw the heavy weapon brought to bear. The two other slaves who were with them dove the other way. The place they were at was now a smoking crater. “These fuckers are so dead!” She pulled out one of the rifles she’d taken from the last band of idiot Yaks who’d tried to kill her, and put a shot in the eye of the fucker with the launcher. The upgraded sights she’d gotten on here really helped.

Shearah, on the other hand, only had her pistol with her. Cali was going to get on her about always being prepared later, but for now, that limited their options. “Ok, here’s the play. I’ll work on taking out their heavy hitters, you shoot anyone that starts getting close. Good?”

Shearah shook her head, trying to clear the noise, but nodded. “Good. Just… don’t make me try and do any real heroics. You know what a lousy shot I am even when I don’t have a hole in my side.”

“Don’t worry, kid, we’ll get back to the ship, and Master will make sure you’re feeling all better.” They laughed, and turned to face the Orchids.

(Smuggler’s Reach Shipyard, Bay 2)

The four yakuza moved quickly to the target ship once they got word that the attacks had begun. They expected that the gaijin who had the bounty on his head was hiding on his ship, since he hadn’t been seen aboard the station. The cargo ramp was up, which was unusual, given the work being done on the ship, but no matter. They made their way to the standard airlock, and the computer tech was just pulling out the hacking module to get the door, when the airlock opened unexpectedly.

BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!

Four times the sound of a shotgun in close proximity went off, and the three men carrying the rifles went down under the psyshot rounds. Even if they weren’t dead already, they were not going to be fighting in the next couple minutes. The tech, who only survived because he was to the side of the hatch, held his SMG nervously. So desperately was he watching for someone coming through the door, ready to shoot them in the chest with full auto the moment they showed themselves, that he didn’t notice a hand snake out from behind the door, mere centimeters above the floor, and roll a small, fist sized device towards him, not until the device hit his foot.

And then everything when white as the flashbang went off. He never heard the owner of the hand say anything, didn’t see her come out of the hatch. He barely even felt the pain of her rifle hitting his head, before everything went black. If he had, he would have wondered just how a sexbot managed to take his team out so easily…

(Dead Man’s Rest Hotel)

The man below me was screaming. He ought to be, considering that I was grinding my heel into his groin, and not in the way perverts would appreciate. Really, he should consider himself lucky. He was the only one of his group that was still breathing. But I was upset with him and his friends, so crushing his manhood under my boot heel would have to do for my stress relief until I heard back from my girls. They’d all been attacked, and my new slaves had all been killed, but my core crew were still alive, and the ship was intact. Raven even caught herself a prisoner!

“Now, whatever am I going to do with you?”