Shouted the girl joyfully, sprinting to the boy as a couple of people turned around to
see what's going on, as that was a name most people knew, but was never called out
loud. But the boy continued walking toward the exit indifferently with his left hand in
his pocket and his right hand holding his backpack's band.
He finally turned around when the girl caught up with him and put a hand on his
shoulder to grab his attention.
"Hey Em!" She said waving her right hand, "I'm Marie!"
Looking at the girl's unfamiliar face, he shook his shoulder to move the girl's hand off
and taking a step back he replied in an aggressive tone.
"Why should I care & who gave you the right to address me with that name?" Then staring at the girl's shocked face he added, "Now I don't think I can do
anything for you, or I ever will even if I can, so why don't you stop
wasting my time & get lost?"
Then turning around, he walked to the exit and into the shuttle without turning back to
even see the girl's reaction. After sitting down on his usual seat at the shuttle where no
one ever sat on the seat next to it, he pulled his notepad out of his bag and started to
write after adding a new entry.
"I don't understand them... What's wrong with them?
Or is there something wrong with me?... Nah I don't think so... What's their
point anyways? What are they trying to gain with acting like clowns?
They are asking to be treated like a doll that you play with till you get
bored, then throw away for someone else to fin d and play with till they're
bored too... But the question is:
Am I dirty enough to give them what they're asking for?
... Definitely not... Yet!"
Leaning toward the wall, he threw another glance at the flight suit hanged on the wall
next to him... The suit that once he thought it 'completed' him, but now... He knew it
was nothing but an excuse to escape from what he really was... Nothing but a mask
to hide behind... Nothing but yet another lie to form his image in others minds.
'Others?..' He thought th himself. Who was there for him from the very beginning?
Anyone but the one who was no more even from the moment they first met? Anyone
else who was there - or tried to be - he pushed aside, ignored or hurt long enough or
hard enough so they decide to be no more. It was the life he had made for
himself, not anyone else. Every mistake that played a part in -his- life,
was his own, not anyone else's.
It was the life -he- decided to live, and now... It was him who decided it was enough,
not anyone else. But even now, in the last minutes of his incompetent life, just like
always, like every single time he did anything, he felt nothing but one word... And
all he felt could perfectly fit into that one word.
Regret.
And that was the only thing he was ever perfect in...
A bottle of wine in one hand and bashing the disruptor key on ship console with the
other, he locked the Supernova on the train in front of him and fired it away. Drinking
half of the wine left in the bottle in one quick swing he shouted,
"Last chance!"
And fired another load of antimatter at the train's exposed hull, drinking another swing
of wine. When the train was finally out of nanobots, the captain started to beg in despair.
"I beg you! I told you I don't have any naked photos of my wife..."
His voice was so ashamed and desperate that it could convince even the cruelest of pirates,
but on the pilot of the Roc, it had no effect.
"Your loss then, not mine!"
Shouted the drunk freelancer and as a chain of EMPs dropped the train's shield, the next load
of antimatter blew up the one of the cargo pods. He was doing his work - or rather torture -
with complete patience because the train had nowhere to run to in the depths of Omega-5.
As the last load of antimatter exploded on the train's hull, leaving it dry with a silver of hull
left, the freelancer smirked and asked,
"You wanna bet?"
"No... Please no!" - Said the desperate train captain.
"Well... Wrong answer!"
And the freelancer burst into laugher as the bright light from explosion of the train filled
his ship cockpit.
A bottle of wine in one hand and bashing the disruptor key on ship console with the
Turning his ship away from the sun, he turned off all systems, only leaving the vital
systems running and checked the time on his ship console - 23:49 SMT.
"It sure as hell ain't lookin' like midnight here!"
He muttered as he yawned and stretched his arms, then drinking the last swing of
wine from the bottle, he leaned his head back and went to sleep.
Next morning, he woke up to the sound of the alert tone coming from his ship console.
He had altered his ship computer to alert him whenever a ship entered scanner range
and he was asleep. Not because he was afraid of waking up in his escape pod, or better,
not waking up at all! Only because he didn't want to miss a target cause he was asleep.
Seeing the small ship closing in toward his cockpit window, he decided to play dead until
the other ship was close enough not to be able to run anymore, because he knew with
all the systems offline, his ship would look like nothing but a wreck to the incoming ship.
So, when the other ship was close enough to tell it was a Combat Service Freighter, the
freelancer finally powered up all systems at once and shouted.
"How long you reckon a CSF lasts versus a Roc?!"
And before the freighter captain could react, the shield was down and a load of antimatter
had hit the hull.
"2 seconds... Not that bad!" He told himself and then continued in the same tone,
"I, am so sorry, mister... But right is right and fair is fair... And what happens in
Omegas, stays in Omegas." Then added after a short pause, "By the way, I want
you to know that none of this was anything personal, and I rarely attack Junkers.
But space is a dangerous place, that's how things are."
And then scanning the remains of the freighter, he casually started blowing up the escape
pods one by one, repeating to himself once again calmly,
"What happens in Omegas stays in Omegas... Sad but true."
Then scanning rest of the loot, he noticed a Twilight, a Wildfire and a Ragnarok.
"Ooh.. A wreck-camper!" - He smirked, beaming in the Twilight and the Ragnarok,
and shooting off the Wildfire, he muttering to himself,
"I don't work cheap, that's howthings are..!"
And then started the cruise engines and marked a waypoint to Bornholm Depot, even-
though he didn't really need it as he knew the Omegas well enough.
"Nein mein freund. Zis ist nicht how die Hessens do it." - Said the pilot of
the Hessian Odin. "Zis ist..!" He told the freelancer and then shouted at the
Daumann miner, "5 mils, Now!"
But as the miner decided to try his luck with silently cruising away, shots of Twilight
at the Hegemon silently told the freelancer it's time to charge up the antimatter.
After they were done with the miner, the Hessian muttered as
he started the cruise engines,
"Idiot..! Now let's get ze hell out ov here before zis damn
radiation eats through our hulls."
And half an hour later, in Omega-7, just after the freelancer had passed another
bottle of wine to the Hessian, Friedrich Dresner, pilot of the Odin smirked and told
the freelancer,
"Your turn now komrade!"
And watched as the freelancer fired a disruptor at the hopelessly fleeing miner
and shouted playfully and half-drunk,
"10 mils or die!" - Followed by the loud laughter of both the freelancer
and the Hessian filling the local comms,
"Ok, it's 'Die!' then..!" - Continued the freelancer before the Hegemon
captain even had time to reply.
Both ships opened fire on the Hegemon at the same time, and a full set of Twilights
paired with a Razor, and along with the bomber's supernova chewed through the
Hegemon's hull so fast that it ran out of regens despite the heavy armor upgrade
the ship had installed, and when the Hegemon was just a few klicks away from
Elbich, Dresner told the freelancer in private comms,
"He paid... Should ve kill him anyways?"
And simply nodding, the freelancer landed the last load of antimatter on
the Hegemon's hull and once again, two simultaneous laughters
filled the local comms.
The only problem of pirating in Omegas was that he didn't have a wide choice of
docking points as he hated Zoners and didn't trust neither the Corsairs, nor the
Hessians enough to leave his ship at their bases for repairs and resupplies. So
his only choice was Omega-15, right at at the Hunters Guild doorstep.
He didn't mind it though. Being right at the Guild's doorstep meant having more
trouble, and more trouble of course meant more fun to him. The Guild was the
first Sirian group he had ran into, and the first Sirian group he had messed with,
so still after more than a year in Sirius - During which he had moved far from the
remote Taus and had explored his way to the dangerous Omegas -, he still loved
messing with those "Good for nothing Mercs with fancy toys", the way he liked to
call them.
Even when his lone Roc, bullying a Military gunboat in Omega-15, was attacked by
a BHG| Thresher and a BHG| Bullhead, he had enjoyed it all along, especially when
his newly-installed Cheetah had helped him to get away from the three "Slow-ass"
capitals without a scratch.
Getting the Cheetah was his first major "achievement" apart from buying his Roc -
Or if one could call it "buying" in the first place -. The day he had lost his ship on a
gamble on Reunion could've been his worst day in Sirius, only if he hadn't run into
that stoned freelancer who had thought the Gallic-looking stranger was one of the
Reunion's technicians and had tossed him the keys to his Roc to run a routine
check-up on the ship, just to wake up in the morning and realize whoever he
had gave the keys to was already long-gone with his beloved ship.
So technically, the Cheetah was his first ever gear he had bought with his own
"hard-earned" cash, and he was enjoying every minute of using it, even though
he wasn't the type to run from most fights, but he knew if he really had to run,
he could thanks to the Cheetah... But afterall, "Never give up!" was his motto,
and that rarely happened.
'This is not giving up... This just finishing what I shouldn't have
ever started in the first place...'
He thought to himself painfully as his thoughts started getting even more
unfocused, and his bleeding getting worse.
'This was -my- life, and -I- decided how and when
should it end... Not anyone else...'
His thoughts started to wander off to the numerous times he should have had died
but he had survived. Being grateful and regretful for it at the same time, because
even though it would've had been much easier for him if he had just died long ago,
he was glad that he didn't let anyone else decide how or when should his life end.
He never had any plans for his life, but always wanted to change the direction of
everything to face the direction -he- wanted it to be. No matter if others liked it
or not, because no one was important enough for him, no one was but a tool to
be used for his means, because his own life had proved him that everyone just
want to be used like tools, and that was the one thing he never wanted, but he
was doing everyone a favor, he always thought. Giving them what they want -
to use them like a tool. But now, With all that had happened to him... he was
starting to wonder - Who was the real tool? Who was abused worst?
Someone who's asking to be used like a tool and so they'll be, or... Someone
who becomes the tool of cruelest evil - The nomads -, totally unwillingly..?
'How did I get here..?' - He asked himself. 'What did I do wrong?..'
Loading another capsule of Cardamine in his room ventilation system, he returned
to his bed, sitting down and laying his head back toward the wall, picking up yet
another bottle of wine.
Eight months... Eight months since the day he started to think everything is finally
fixing itself, not knowing that the worst is yet to come. The worst in a way he
couldn't see even in his worst nightmares.
Just soon as he thought he can leave his past behind him and start a different life,
everything was ruined in a way he had ever expected. After all the things he had
done to get closer to what he wanted... The only thing he ever really wanted...
It now just looked like a nightmare. Like a nightmare in which he could see what
he wanted in the end of a corridor, and no matter how hard and fast he ran, no
matter how much it tired him, yet ignoring the pain in his feet, he kept running
and running, the corridor just seemed to lengthen with his every step, leaving
him exhausted not too far from where he had started to run.
Or not much unlike a nightmare where all he had to do was to reach out and
grab what he had fought so hard for , and yet his body decided to disobey
his brain and not move an inch, till he'd wake up to the reality of realizing
what he wanted was never there in the first place. The only difference
was he didn't know what harsh truth was awaiting him... A truth
which would make him wish a thousand times a day that he
could be instead stuck in his worst nightmares forever.
Everything he had done in past nine months was for her, to get closer to her, and
never... Never... He would've thought he'd become someone like who he was.
Someone who would live his life for someone else, because of someone else.
He was living his normal, joyful life on Barrier and what made him move to Ainu,
to Kusari - The worst place in whole Sirius to fly a Bomber-? What made him ask
for an Eagle from the Chrysanthemums to survive in that place longer instead of
simply leaving and being done with it?
He couldn't believe it was all because of a girl cause it was too low, especially for
his standards. But when he thought about it, things had turned out how they were
without him even noticing. Without him even realizing what he was doing and what
would've been the result of his moves.
Now that he thought about it, it was nothing but stupid. It was nothing but his own
mistake and his mistake alone. 'Trying to hook up with a GC elder?.. Really?!!' he
thought to himself sitting on the floor. What a false hope it was when he thought
just because he had met a girl in space once - And not just any girl - he could
win her heart simply by moving to a base belonging to the faction she ran,
and helping random pilots of that faction pirate the crap out of defenseless
traders would grab her attention...
Now he was there, in the very same base he had thought moving to would help him
get closer to the girl he wanted, and even after nine months, he had not seen her
even once... Now he was there who was in fault from the very beginning.
'I hate that freakin' whore...' - He thought to himself.
It was seven months since he had moved to Ainu, and he had gotten nothing but
a false hope in return - False hope of seeing her.
'Who knows how many of those Dragon freaks and
Cast junkies she have already slept with...'
It was pure hatred he felt, but a hate even he himself didn't understand completely
- Or didn't understand at all. A hate that had grown inside of him as fast as the
desperate feeling of love he had inside less than a day ago.
He hated her with all his existence, with his whole heart and soul, but still... he couldn't
get her out of his mind. One way or another, it was her he remembered, it was her he
wanted, either to complete him, or totally ruin him, he didn't care which. He knew he
just wanted one thing and one thing alone, being with her, no matter the cost.
How he felt about her was so disgusting to him that it had even started to make him feel
the same hatred toward himself as well. The same hatred that burned through him and
haunted his mine in his sleep... The one and only reason he triend not to sleep - Ever.
The one and only reason he was starting to feel the same hatred toward sleeping
and dreaming as well.
![[Image: duckstyle.png]](https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/166379699/Discovery%20Forums/duckstyle.png)