Subject Name: Lewis Allan Reed Date of Birth: July 26, 762 A.S. Place of Birth: Brooklyn City - Planet Manhattan, NY Parents: Joseph Reed and Toby Reed Occupation: Freelancer Merchant (former) Current Status: Deceased, 800 A.S.
It was night. And it was raining. And cold. But Lewis had never run so much his entire life. Well, that was also the first time the Liberty Police had broke his door and tried to shoot him in his sleep. Luckly they made a hell of a noise breaking into the apartment, so Lewis woke up and got out of bed by reflex, or he would have been hit by the first salvo. Without thinking much, he turned around and jumped out the window. By chance he fell on the balcony of the building beside his. The police was shooting again, from the window of his apartment.
Lewis threw himself through the glass window into a living room. A frightened family looked at him laying at the floor, hurt and bleeding. He stood up, said "Sorry!" and ran out of the strangers' apartment, through the corridors and the stairs down to the ground level, exited to the streets and entered in a dark alley, and continued running and running, as he could hear the voices and steps of the policemen after him. So there he was, running and running and...
***
Lou woke up in his dorm at Alcatraz. He was all sweat. "Those friggin' dreams again..."
He went to the lavatory and washed his face. The old man he saw at the mirror was now a very different guy than the young man running in the rain 22 years ago. Well, time passed to everybody. But, as life is made of cicles, the time to run again was approaching. Another cicle was about to begin...
His shirt was wet, so Lou changed it for a dry one, and looked at the clock in his comm terminal screen. It was in the middle of the afternoon. He then saw his guitar sitting in the corner. "Perhaps it's a good time to play a little." he thought while lighting up a spliff. So he picked the instrument up, and left his room.
He walked down to the Alcatraz bar, and asked the bartender a Molly whiskey. He looked around while he waited. Just a few drunk rogues around. Activating the comms terminal at the bar, he sent a message to the docking bay master: "Take my old Rhino out of storage, check it and prepare it to fly again. I'm taking it for a ride tonight. ~Lou"
Lou picked up his drink, and walked to the corner where the sound equipment was. He took a little sip of his whiskey, put the glass over the speaker, and turned the guitar on.
Freeport Seven was the biggest freeport of all Sirius. It had more than one thousand residents, but on a busy day like that more than double of that number passed by the station, comming from or going into the Omicrons. Lou made his way through the crowd on the main public deck, going to one of the many restaurants. He had a bussiness meeting. Suddenly, red lights started to flash all around, an alarm sound filled the hall.
"Attention!! The station is under attack! Everybody to the emergency areas! This is not a drill!"
Everybody started to run, each one in a different direction. The chaos had taken control of the Freeport. Lou was paralized for a moment, not knowing what to do. The red lights flashing at his face made him dizzy...
He then looked down and...
His hands...
His hands were full of blood. He was not at the Freeport anymore. But the red lights were still there. Still flashing. Lou then recognized the dark corridor with metal walls. Huntsville. Docking Bay Two. The blood on his hands was from the dead officer on the ground. He heard voices. They were after him. His only choice was to run.
Behind a corner was the parking bay. A Rhino was just finishing to unload some supplies. Lou knocked down the unsuspecting pilot, jumped in the freighter and launched. Control was not able to close the bay doors in time. He was away.
Lou engaged the cruise engines and flew away, visually pointing the ship towards an asteroid field, trying to hide from the patrols that were surelly called. Not long passed until an alarm sounded in the cockpit, and he was hit by a cruise disruptor. The ship's engines overloaded and quit. Laser blasts quickly disabled the shields and damaged the small freighter. Lou was able to see the ship falling into the gravitational field of a jumphole, and emerging on the other side. Soon, another alarm sounded. Several red contacts appeared on the radar screen. The radio came to life.
"Unidentified ship! This is Rogue patrol Omega, from Alcatraz. Who the %$&@$% are you, anyway??"
Alcatraz? But that was when he passed out...
***
Lou opened his eyes in the dark. "Again these damn dreams..." He sat on the bed. The comm terminal screen showed 2:13 at the clock, and an icon was flashing at the bottom. It was a message from the docking bay master, saying his ship was ready to fly. It was time to run again.
He took a quick shower. He had already packet his stuff. It was not much, just a couple plastic boxes and a bag. Oh, and his sound equipment, of course, but that was already boxed and loaded on his ship. He carried the stuff down do Docking Bay One. That's where the freighter was parked.
It was an old Rhino, the one Lou highjaked when escaping Hunstville. The burn marks of the hits the ship took on that day where still visible under the patches in the hull. The painting had lost color over the years in storage. But he could see the new shiny parts on the rear. The mechanics had replaced the engines on that afternoon. The old ones wouldn't even start.
He stowed his stuff safely on the ship, and checked to see if his sound equipment was also secured. That's when he realised he was forgetting the most important thing of all: his guitar!
Lou walked quickly down to the bar. Despite being almost three in the morning, that was a busy hour at the Rogues base. The bar was packed of scum of the worst kind, as usual. His guitar was sitting on the corner, near the bar amplifier. He picked the instrument up, and then thought he could play one more song before leaving Alcatraz behind.
Playing his guitar always made Lou feel good. Those were tense days for him, and that music helped him to be more confident of his decision to leave. He locked the instrument on its case and walked out of the bar, and back to the docking bay. All the pre-flight checks were quickly completed. The new engines were running nicely.
"Alcatraz, this is Side Effect, all warm'd up and ready to roll..."
"Side Effect, this is Alcatraz. You're good to go. Have a nice swim."
"Thanks, kiddo. Launching now."
After leaving the bay, Lou set up course for the Cortez jumphole. Before going to Freeport 2, he needed new papers and transponder codes for his ship. So he was going to Barrier Gate first. The unregulated black market there was perfect for his needs. "I hope they have some of that sweet Baffin weed there too..." - he was thinking, while engaging the cruise engines and the auto-pilot.
Total darkness. Lou had no idea how long he was in that dark room. Several hours at least. He was sitting in some chair, but he could not move. His hands and feet were tied. He heard steps, and a door opened. The light hurt his eyes. When Lou could finally start to see something before him, there were three or four not-so-friendly men staring at him. The younger one looked to be smarter than the others, and also the one in charge.
"So, who are you, again?" - said the Rogue from Alcatraz.
"I told you already! My name is Reed!" - answered Lou.
The young Rogue looked at the guy besides him. Both looked at the NeuraNet Pad the second guy was holding.
"Well, you look like the guy in the picture there, only older..." - said the Rogue - "But our Hacker friend here says Lewis Reed died 19 years ago... So, who are you, again??"
"I told you, I'm Reed! The LSF says I'm dead, but I'm not!"
"Yeah? And how did you get a hold of a Liberty Police freighter?"
"I robbed it when I escaped from Hunstville! Killed a guard and knocked out the pilot doing it. Don't you see all this blood on my clothes? Besides, orange is not this season's color, I'm told." - Lou's orange jail clothing has blood stains all over. His hands had dry blood on them too - "Also, why would the police be shooting the ship if it wasn't stolen? Why would they shoot their own ship? Your patrol must've told you I was floating in space without any power when they found me..."
"Yes, they did..." - said the Rogue, apparently thinking about the issue - "It's really very strange indeed. Well, I will talk to the boss, see what he thinks. Don't go anywhere!"
The four left the room, laughing, closing the door behind them. Lou was in complete darkness again.
***
Freeport 2, Bering system - Habitat Level November, 822 A.S.
Another one of those dreams. They were always tense, although not always agitated. Lou stood up from the bed, and went for a change of clothes. His t-shirt was soaked in sweat.
Lou was dreaming a lot about past events lately. Specially his first few days as a Rogue. They became even more common since a couple weeks before, when he heard about the disbandment of the Liberty Rogues Council. The Rogues' structure was in disarray. It was inevitable, since Clyde had left the head of the Council, right after yet another Warlord disappeared. The new leadership was corrupt, and completely incompetent. The fact that the council still resisted for almost an year was practically a miracle.
The organization broke into several small groups, ones more organized than others, all basically maintaining the bases were they lived. No more real Rogue leadership around. That was a good opportunity for Lou. Living at Freeport 2, he always felt like in a corner, having to take care so not to piss off the police, or the bunters, or the zoners even. The 'diplomacy' of living at a freeport was too hard for him. Lou had no idea how the Zoners could stand that kind of life style.
Going back to be a Rogue was a real option now, at least. The leadership that perhaps could try to kill him didn't existed anymore. No one heard from them since the Rogue flagship had gone missing. And the fact that they had succesfully killed most of the leaders before them, made Lou one of the most high ranking ex-Liberty Rogues around. Ranks had no real meaning anymore, of course, but perhaps he could transform that into respect. That was much more important in the rogues than ranks. He could use that respect to build up a smuggling ring on the Malta run.
Lou walked to the comm terminal, to send a message to Alcatraz, since the ground personel should be the same, at least. But, thinking again about it, he gave up. Alcatraz was good for pirating, but not so much for smuggling. Most Rogues based there were on the lane pirating business. Although the police had no intention to approach the station, they heavily patrolled the outskirts of the asteroid field, and also both tradelanes near it. Heavy lawful traffic was not good for the smuggling business.
After some consideration, Lou decided for Niverton, on the Pennsylvania system. It was far away from any tradelanes, deep inside an asteroid field, what made police or navy patrols non-existant. And it was very close to the jumphole for California, the main route he would take. That and the fact that it had one of the biggest populations of all Rogue bases, with a steady supply of slaves and a heavy demand for cardamine, made the station perfect for his purposes.
Lou packed a small bag with all his stuff. The guitar was already in its case. He picked up the bag and his guitar case and left his room, in the direction of the freeport bar. He had to eat something and pay his tab before leaving. Lou was only paying his debts because the owner was his old friend.
After eating and drinking a couple whiskeys, Lou paid his bar bills, and the room rent. As he picked up his guitar case, he felt like playing something before leaving. He hooked his guitar to the sound equipment besides the bar...
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