"Charles, I'll have a good bottle of rum." he said, walking up to the bar.
"Good day raiding?" he asked.
"Eh, we had one trader that ran, then lost power(read:F1), and got a SNAC in the face, courtesy of Tom. We had a scrape with a OPG, killed it with the help of a, get this, Phantom, then Cap'n got the Lusty Wench out and I got the Blood Bak, and we went on a smuggling run with Ambrose and Tom."
"Make a good profit?"
"Oh sure, Slaves to Malta, Food to Crete, Arti's to Trafalgar. Only problem was we had a little standoff over Crete with a FLIPPIN LEGATE because of that OPG we blew earlier. turned out ok, we ran the hell outta there once we had the Arti's loaded, but that thing freaked me out."
He took a swig of rum. "Anyway, I heard there's a big shipment of Gold coming out of Dublin next week. I hacked into the shipment schedule, check this out."
Jack pulled a holopad out from his back pocket. He tapped a few controls, and a schematic of the ships in the convoy floated over it.
Charles whistled. "Hot damn, thats a lot of gold."
In the image were 3 Shetlands and 2 Percherons. Added up, that'd be about 17000 standard cargo units of pure refined gold.
"I know, were going to get a big raiding party for that. It'll get us..........a helluva lot of cash."
' Wrote:This thread is so stupid that a bird sitting on a nearby tree just EXPLODED.
Milton approached the door somewhat cautiously, and was - like so many other Prospects - stopped by the doorman who, he noted, made all the other security measures quite pointless.
"Yer lookin' scared, kid," the bouncer said as he pointed his gun at Milton.
"I bet you would be too if you had a gun in your face! I'm Milton! Milton Radley!"
"Nope, don't know ya," he replied, causing Milton to step back a bit. "Hah! You're that new Prospect, get in here before I change my mind."
Milton complied. But despite having a gun in his face just now, he was on top of the world. Just two weeks ago, he'd hotwired the Dromedary now sitting in Dock 4, now christened the Silver Arrow after the nickname the news channels gave him a year ago. Since then, he'd been in a dry spell; his computer crime and corporate espionage work dried up since Ageira made such a big show of almost catching him, while covering up the almost catching him, and he hadn't had any successful piracy either. Until today.
"Took you long enough to get yer scrawny ass down here!" another Buccaneer shouted mockingly.
"Didn't want to stop in until I'd actually done something," Milton replied.
"Spit it out, then, who'd you rob?"
"Some Percheron captain. Scanned his ship and picked up a bunch of people. Not nearly enough for a Percheron, though, figured they were a bunch of self-important idiots who demanded their space," he explained, sitting down across from the other pirate. "No use for people like that short of ransom, and who'd want to be the poor bastard keeping them fed until then? So I just extorted a quarter million out of the captain and let him run along." He grinned and added, "Of course, the transfer 'glitched' and I got about fifteen thousand more than the captain meant to send."
"Hah! Not bad," the veteran pirate laughed, leaning back in his chair. "Hey, Johnson, get this man a beer!"
"But the day was off to a crappy start before that. Tried to rob a miner. He didn't get the message, and I hadn't brought enough EMP mines to keep his shields down. Got some scans of his ship, though - [DSE]Serrian, didn't have a single mining laser on him. Who the hell mines without the right gear anyway? That's like pirating without a disruptor."
"Yeah, well, he fought you off, didn't he?"
"Hah! Good point. But I'm ready for him next time," Milton replied, clearly in a good mood despite the screwup and enjoying his beer.
Calico Jack slid himself onto a stool at the bar and asked Charles for a pint of ale
it had not been a good day, he'd had more troubles with the useless piece of outcast junk that called itself a scimitar, now parked in the landing bay. One of the landing gear legs had given way just at the point of touchdown, tearing a huge hole in the starboard fuel nacelle. luckily it had not caught fire, although Jack had wished at the time that it had. The damn thing was underpowered and woefully out-gunned by pretty much everything he'd come up against so far, Traders had passed on his kind offers of letting them pass for a modest fee and instead opened fire without so much as a by-your-leave! Still, he'd not left the fight without blasting a few holes in their hull, so as maybe they'll think twice about it next time.
"Today's troubles will be yesterday's news tomorrow" Jack murmured to himself as Charles slid the pint over to him, slopping froth onto the bar. "one for yourself Charles and whatever John drinks" he said, nodding to the burly doorman, hopefully a few friends might improve his fortunes, or at least help drown his sorrows if not!
Jack looked over at someone who just sat down at the bar. Yep, Prospect. he thought to himself. It was so easy to pick em out of a crowd. Walking over, Jack said,
"Oi, Prospect, If you take that piece o' crap ship ya got to Trafalgar and get the Blood Bak a new cooling unit, you get some more cash after the raid on that Gold shipment coming up."
Jack took the holo' out of his pocket and showed the other Prospect Jack it.
"A 'ell of a lot of gold eh? Don't just stand there, get movin'!"
' Wrote:This thread is so stupid that a bird sitting on a nearby tree just EXPLODED.
After following the Buccaneer's Prison Liner flagship into the smog of Leeds, Mick decided it would be a good time to show his face a bit more. As the AutoPilot was bringing his fighter in to dock he downloaded his collection of gun cam images onto a handheld device. By the time the ship was safly in the hanger he had already discarded all the useless images of static and images obscured by missile smoke, it left him with only a couple of actually interesting images left. As Mick walked the halls of the Leviathan on the way to the bar he felt at ease. More at ease than he had done the last time he was here. He had spent alot of time on Trafalgar recently and to be surrounded by like-minded people again left mick with a good feeling.
Mick pushed open the Bay's door and gave a wink to the doorman as he passed him. Walking up to the bar, weaving through the the other drinkers with a little more confidence than before.
"Just a pint of Smogged Ale mate" said Mick to the barman passing him the device in his hand. "And here, stick these somewhere"
"Sure thing" replyed the barman, plugging the device into the wall and bashing at a few buttons before the data appeared on the small screens at either side of him.
Mick took the pint he was given and drank a mouthfull.
"Ahhh, not a bad pint mate. Not as bad as I expected at all."
Mick took his drink and retreated to the upper level where he sat before.
' Wrote:0-499 posts: Your posts will be completely and utterly ignored. 500-999 posts: People will read your posts, but will never care for the content. 1000-2000 posts: Your posts will be read, your points may be considered, if you're lucky. 2001+ posts and custom title:Your opinion matters.
"What a day," Milton said, settling into his usual chair in the bar. And as usual, the same veteran pirate was sitting in the other chair at that table.
"What'd you break this time?"
"A mining ship. It didn't wanna pay me and Mick. I'm pretty sure that ship cost more than two hundred grand, y'know. Before that, I reprogrammed a drone,"
"I'm surprised you even saw one, they're not common around here. Somethin' about war damaging their parts."
"Yeah, there's that, and me reprogramming 'em. Haven't done that in a really long time, so the changes didn't last long before she restored her original programming, but she sent us information on a couple transports," Milton took a drink before continuing, "'course, most of 'em she didn't see until they'd already passed us, and then she got mad and started shootin' at Mick. Grabbed a load of Gold from a train shortly after that, and later ran around the Omicrons." His tone was darker with the last part of that sentence, and he drank the entire remainder of his beer before continuing. "On the way out of Crete, what do we see right in front of us? Hessians. Now, I'm no expert on what criminals hate which, but I know the Hessians are tryin' to kill off the Corsairs, and there we are with full loads of Corsair-gathered Artifacts. And what's the captain's plan? Run right past them!"
"And?"
"I think that's the part that bugs me most - it worked! I mean what the hell!?"
"Yep, that's the captain, alright. You get used to it after a while, trust me."
Ambrose thumped the base of his bottle of rotgut on the table loudly, calling attention to himself over the ruckus of drunken celebration. As the noise quieted, he climbed up onto the table where all could see him clearly, wobbling slightly but managing to not fall on his face. Jingles, Ambrose's pet scaly-monkey-thing, was latched onto the leg of his pants with paw, and seemed to be examining an expensive looking watch with the other. Where he 'found' the trinket was anyone's guess.
Clearing his throat, Ambrose lifted his bottle in salute to the assembled Buccaneers. "Today," he said, words only slightly slurred from excessive drink. "Today we 'ad a great victory, one that'll go down in Buccaneer history!" He paused, letting the cheers rise and then lifting his hand for silence. "We've successfully robbed tha' bastard, Salivar Kiss or whaddever 'is name is. A bloody dreadnought! This is def'ntly one of th' greatest, boldest, most bloody awesome thing in th' long and noble history of th' Bretonian Buccaneers!"
Grinning widely at the cheers and taking a long swig of rotgut, he lifted his bottle once again towards the ceiling and yells, "A salute... TO US!"
He then then stumbles and falls over backwards, dropping off the table and greatly upsetting Jingles in the process, and lands hard on the floor, out cold.
"Pulled 'em when I raided some arms smuggler. Good for getting out of a scrape. Anyways, took the Happy Bounty out for a spin with Prospect Jack. We pulled a few Transports in Leeds before a Mando came outta the lane, so we ran like heck over to Cambridge. We pull another transport there before some Navyman comes outta the lane. I have Scotty fire up the engines and I yelled at the Prospect too, but his piece-o-crap Scimitar stalls up, so he falls back 10 klicks behind me with the Navyman right on his tail.
"As I'm gettin' near the Leeds hole, some Firefly called "NO-5" comes out, so I pull him over." Jack takes a swig of his ale before continuing. "Demanded some 'o his cargo, at which point he started saying how worthless gold is around here. He's 'bout to negotiate fer credits when the Prospect comes blazing in with the BAF chap right on him. I realize the guy was stalling, curse a blue streak, then yell at Scotty to go to overdrive and get us through the damn hole. We both made it back over here ok though."
Jack turns to the rest of the bar. "Oi, any o' you lads see a firefly called "NO-5", put a few rounds in 'is hull fer me, no one stalls a buccaneer." Jack says, then goes back to his drink.
' Wrote:This thread is so stupid that a bird sitting on a nearby tree just EXPLODED.
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King peeled his face from the sticky table surface to stare at Jack with a pair of bloodshot bleary eyes. He'd been on the lash, for the sole reason that he could. A well known side-effect of drunkenness was that piloting skills were multiplied by several magnitudes. Or was that Orange Grass that did that...? Dismissing the thought, he reached out to pick up the blaster from where it had been left.
Full charge, new crystals. Probably pretty lethal. The only pulses he was acquainted with were the ones he had mounted on his Waran though, and they were pretty useful for scragging shields. With a devious smile John eyed the 'special' cabinet Charles kept in the corner of the room. Exotic drinks that people actually wanted to drink (unlike the Gundy, which was exotic for a completely different reason) were stored there. A small relay unit kept a energy barrier across the unit's opening to keep prying fingers out. The relay had been one of the small gifts the Cap't had used to bribe Charles into abandoning the old Bay.
Flicking off the safety and squinting down the sight with one eye, he squeezed the trigger three times. Two of the bolts shot off at funny angles to scorch the walls or ceiling, but the third impacted on the energy wall with a hiss of sparks. The field collapsed. "That's a good gun you got there Jack," John conceded. Picking up a bottle that had prior been sitting next to his boot, and placing it on the table he continued.
"And we had a Zoner Liner try to stall us a few days back. The bloody idiot picked the wrong people to mess with though. A BAF destroyer and bomber crashed the party, but even they couldn't stop us. We scragged the catch then cut and run. I'd say that's pretty good going for us." He took a swig from the bottle and looked around. Life was good.
Jack walked back in and, after ordering his 'sair Rum, starts talking to Charles about today's catch.
"How was the catch today Jack?"
"Well, at least five ships, an only one o' em paid. I had one o' em that started shooting at me in a gorramn Firefly, shows how desperate he was, heh. Then a Gaian in a gunny by the name o' Granola shows up. I pay him no mind 'cept tellin' him to get another lane, when outta the blue, he shoots me with a bloody Pulse cannon! Well It drained my shield so I get the message and have Scotty power the ship outta there."
Jack takes a swig before continuing.
"Somethin' about the trader carryin' war supplies. Worse, the trader thinks I'm a random Freelancer, and the Gaian thinks Im a random pirate! Crazy people ne'er heard o' the Buccaneers! I do catch one in N'London though, bloke in an Armored Transport, I get 5 captured pilots to "convince" to join the Buccaneers and some missiles! Yep, 100 of various kinds he pulled outta wrecked ships, the guys are off-loadin em now. We can sell 'em or blow holes in ships with 'em."
' Wrote:This thread is so stupid that a bird sitting on a nearby tree just EXPLODED.