Joshua Hunt's personal database

[Vendetta]

Hunt was alone. he sat quietly staring at a wall of monitors on the deck of an Oasis liner. The interior smelt of mold and rust. "Definitely not good for the lungs." he said to himself. The monitors lined the walls, streaming news vids, data from hacked network ports and cameras from the local TLAGSNET. His ship drifted slowly through California space, invisible due to the cloaking device he had recovered off a downed ship in Colorado from several years ago. His ship.


He sat back in his chair, sighing audibly at the amount of irrelevant data that streamed across the many screens. He stood and walked over to a desk that contained only one datapad. It was his journal. He hadn't touched it since he left the Legion. He picked it up, hitting the record button on the side. He cleared his throat and begun to talk quietly.

Journal entry eighty-four.
Eight-twenty-one A.S.
July.

"Things have changed. I've cleared my head, and I'm no longer thinking like an idiot would.. It's been a while since I've done an entry, so I'm going to do a recap.

It started almost five years ago. My time in the Navy was short, but great. I worked closely with the First fleet under Admiral Malrone. Back then we were cracking down on smugglers and Outcasts. The amount of transport pilots that would rather lose their lives than obey the law was astounding. Of course, there were a few who surrendered. Slavery was running wild, and we had tracked one transport in to the badlands. It was making a bee line for Buffalo, but I managed to disrupt it several clicks out. It refused to surrender it's cargo and opened fire. It wasn't even a challenge. At the last minute, it dropped it's cargo and surrendered. I gave it a fine and sent it on it's way. I was too generous, considering not thirty minutes later I caught the same ship smuggling cardamine in to Liberty again. Needless to say, it didn't get out so easily.

After a year of successfully halting the cardamine trade, I was assigned to a Monument class Dreadnought in Colorado identified as Forward Unto Dawn. Great ship, fantastic crew. Loved it. They threw me on communications control. It wasn't a luxurious position, but it was mine. I met Elijah Phillips, the helmsman of the Dawn at the time, and Roger Dauterive, the chief engineer. We became friends pretty quick. The Dawn was outfitted with State-of-the-art equipment, armor and weapons. It performed excellently, and I enjoyed every mission we were sent on.. At least ninety-nine percent of the missions. We were called in to deal with two Outcast warships at the New York side of the jumpgate in Colorado. We left our post just as Xenos had showed up. Malrone and the fighters engaged them while we, and by that I mean the Dawn, and the Battlecruiser Whitefin, moved in to take out the Outcasts.


On the other side of the gate, two Ranseurs had set up shop. Captain Ian engaged them head on due to their lack of armor. The Whitefin provided long range support. We downed them quickly, but the Captain was critically wounded in the fight and shipped off to medical. The first officer was on shore leave, which left me in a position of command. I took it. Immediately after the fight, Admiral Malrone contacted us for assistance in Colorado. We didn't have time to resupply at Fort Bush. People were in trouble. Xenos had overwhelmed the fighter wing we had with us, and we needed to provide support. The Dawn and Whitefin jumped to Colorado, to find nothing there. We proceeded towards the lane, when a Legion Arbiter had appeared. The Xenos, too. Admiral Malrone and another pilot identified as "Guardian" were being hammered by the Xenos. They turned their attention to the Whitefin, leaving us alone with an Arbiter. "All power to the shields and Cerberus cannons. Take that monster down." I shouted. The Dawn was outmatched. She had scars from her recent fight with two Outcasts, and didn't have the supplies to go toe-to-toe with an Arbiter. We took a critical hit in Engineering. I ordered a full evacuation as the ships stabilizers began to fail. Eli made it to a pod with most of the crew, as did I. Roger was no where to be seen. Before we could send out a message to anyone left on board, the ship exploded.

That was when my time in the Navy had ended. I left. Something broke in me then. I felt betrayed. I joined the very same side that ended my career. I joined the Legion.

It wasn't bad at first. Seeing it as the only way to avenge my friends on board the Dawn, I took my frustration out on the people I once vowed to serve. It gradually became a losing fight. The Rogues were a serious problem to our lack of resources, allies, and overall will to fight. The Legion was constantly in an uphill battle, only the hill is a ninety degree angle. I took my leave shortly after earning the rank of Lieutenant during the battle of Humboldt. I stayed a while in Coronado, then left for Kusari to wait it out. Eventually, three years had passed. I was out of the loop for so long, I needed to see what was up. I got a name, I used it. I became Archangel, a mercenary. Bought a Sabre, too. Went to Liberty to see what I could find out. Of course, nothing had changed. I eventually came across a few members flying Legion colors. I identified myself, but they didn't recognize me at all. It appears as though I was wiped out of their records.

I ended up following around a member of the Neo Terran Front. It had been a while since I saw one of them. He confronted me in Kansas. I told him who I was, and he was a little surprised. We talked for a short bit, and that's when I found out that Gallia had taken over Leeds. We parted ways. I began to dig around through some old contacts when I found Eli loitering around Newark. He agreed to keep my identity on the down-low. He gave me a quick run-down on the situation in Liberty. Afterwards, I left. I needed to do some digging on all the things I missed. I started meeting people and making connections. I met Raymond Elwood, a Core recruit in Manchester. He had been assigned to some task force. He became my insider in the Core. I stayed out in Theta for several months, gathering information. I ended up winning this old Liner in a drinking game. I see why it was up for grabs...

I left for Liberty, because I found out that the Dawn was in tact. I wanted it back. It was a valuable resource that could prove useful later. I also found out Roger was alive, and that he was with the Rogues. Only he was calling himself Butch Flowers. Something happened to him. I tried to get what I could of the crew back together to bust the Dawn out of Alaska. Eli signed up without question. I had to track Butch down. A pirate named Jerry wanted in, but it would be too dangerous bringing him along. Roger or.. Butch... Whatever.. was hesitant, and contacted Admiral Baker for help. Butch told me Baker wanted him to turn himself in for safety reasons. He agreed, and spent six months on Sugarland until he escaped two weeks ago. That left me and Eli alone. We went for it. It was a mistake, and false information. The Dawn was never recovered from the Silverton fields, and Elijah was killed. I escaped in to the deep Omicrons. Stayed in Minor for two months hiding in the wreckage around Toledo.


I left for Liberty again, and began hiring myself out to earn some money. I was hired as a negotiator, I was handed paperwork to sign, I was hired to send transmissions, direct convoys. It was good to be out of the fight for a while. I enjoyed it. I wound up at Ames for a bit, making connections in Kusari. Met an old Dragon pilot who called himself Speaker. Crazy old man. Spoke in riddles mostly. After I launched, there were two Liberty Navy ships, and two Zoners ships sitting around. I noticed a Dreadnought sitting far away from the station. Liberty make, but flying Rogue colors. I immediately recalled one of my reconnaissance missions involving a Dread the Rogues had captured. It was disabled, but they got it working. Nasty. I went over there to see what was up. They hired me to do some scouting. I got tech information on all the ships around the Freeport. I returned to find three more Rogues alongside the Unnatural Disaster.


I told them what I knew, and they hired me for the fight. A short battle. The Zoners even fought the Rogues. One Fearless was downed, one of the new Carrier models, an Archer cruiser, and a Colony ship ran and docked. I took my money and headed back in to central space. Ran in to an Outcast Destroyer on the lanes. Rogues don't like foreign warships on their turf, so to get on their good side, I sent them a heads up. They caught him in Kepler and destroyed him. I did some work for the Core branch Ray was working for. Ray had changed. He wouldn't talk over voice comms, just sent me messages through the Neural net. He usually passed on the assignment. He stopped sending me messages after I was told to do some paperwork for a base assault. Thankfully, I was paid in advance. I wanted to see what was up, so I took off for the Omicrons through Bretonia in my Sabre.


Note, that I'm never buying a Sabre off the Hogosha again. Damn thing broke down in Manchester. I was picked up by a loud Corsair named Tuco. He ran a smuggling ring it seemed. Looks like he was organizing it in to something bigger. We talked for a while, and he offered to have his friends fix my ship up on Crete. I accepted. When we got there, Tuco and I played cards in the bar while the others in his merry band of pirates swapped my fried engine out. I was in hostile space, surrounded by hostile people. I kept my gun drawn under the table just in case. I was right to do so. Tuco jumped up and accused me of cheating four games in. He reached for his gun, so I put him down. I got ready for a fight to the landing pad, but no one seemed to care. Turns out, their groups laws declared that if I killed the leader, I became the leader.


this gave me access to resources I could use, though it put me in a dangerous position. I changed their tradition of "kill the leader, be the leader" to a council of three. I had no idea it would be that easy. Then again, I had no information on the Corsairs. I introduced myself the The Brotherhood Elders, where they informed me of some laws I wasn't aware of. To avoid putting myself in an awkward position and offending an entire nation, I stepped down and handed control over to my idiotic first mate. The elders declared me a friend of the Empire, which gave me free access to Gamma. I accepted and offered to send them any information that might be relevant to them. I left for Theta, picked up some supplies and returned to Baltimore to check on my Liner.


It was there. Rusty, gross, and falling apart. I paid the DSE mechanics to fix it up while I go look for something. I headed for Colorado. I wanted to find something unique for my ship. I found the remains of the Dawn. I salvaged the inscription, cloaking device, and samples of the ships advanced hull panels. Gave them to the mechanics to put on the Liner. They replicated the hull, re-did the inscription and replaced some of the lower decks with the cloaking device and fuel storage. They never got rid of the smell. It was ready. The Forward Unto Dawn Mark two. Liner edition. I grabbed some hardware from the Lane hackers while they finished polishing my new mobile base. Turned several decks in to a mobile listening post, command center and research ship. Loaded it up with fuel, docked the Endurance on it, and left.


Now I'm here. With a plan and some interesting information that could prove useful if I could verify it.

It's time to start reaching out."


Log end


Hunt put the datapad down and returned to his chair. He begun digging through his database to locate some contacts that could have some information he might need.

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