Lost to the wind

[Serpentis]

The Lindwyrm exited the trade lane by Planet Junyo, it was a short and uneventful trip, as they were about to change course towards the Golden Dragon Casino, Sergei asked aloud, “Think we should play while there?”.
Karl took a few moments before chuckling, “Never did was one for gambling, what about you, boss?”. Sergei turned towards his second in command and grinned, “I used to love doing texas hold ‘em with the other recruits in the military, but never went to a proper casino for it. We’ll just have to see.”. Half way through the next trade lane they disengaged and flew under their own power towards the Casino a few clicks away. As they entered the scanning range of the Casino a hail came through, “Welcome to The Golden Dragon Casino! Where you will have the time of your life and hopefully leave a happy man! To assure the safety of our guests, each ship that intends to dock with us, will be scanned and we ask you to power down your weapons within range.”. There was silence for a bit, until the voice came back again, “Wonderful, scan complete, Freelancer Lindwyrm, are you here as a guest?”.
Sergei chuckled and responded with a cheerful tone, “No, we are here to trade, we carry a cargo full of wine from Gallia and we had information that you might be interested in the shipment?”. There was almost a minute of silence before the man responded, “We are indeed interested in a shipment of Gallic Wine, please dock with port A-2. Welcome to the Golden Dragon.”.

The Lindwyrm docked at said port and Sergei and Karl headed down to the docking port, telling the crew to start packing the crates of wine and prepare to move them into the station. As the door opened, a smiling Kusari gentleman met them, “Welcome! We look forward to taking a look at your shipment, we’d like to take a look at the crates first and try one of the wines, if that is ok with you, Captain?”.
Sergei nodded and led the man inside of the Lindwyrm’s cargo hold, where crates upon crates of wine stood. Stein opened one of the crates and handed Sergei a bottle, who nodded in thanks to the young man. As the man had a taste of the wine, Karl had walked into the station and was looking around, Sergei saw him in the corner of his eye. The man nodded, “Quite fine wine, oh yes, I apologize, I am Kaito Arai and I am one of the administrators here at the casino.”, he offered Sergei a bow. Sergei bowed back in return, “Sergei, pleasure to meet you, Mister Arai.”. The man just chuckled, “Arigato, now, we will discuss price, yes?”. Sergei nodded and moved over to the side and picked up a tablet and walked back, “We had the information that you were buying wine for forty nine credits a unit, is that correct?”. Kaito smiled, “Well, that is the market value, but we don’t really ‘need’ the wine, so our price will be a little lower than that. We offer to buy from you for forty credits per unit.”. Sergei squinted slightly, smiled right back, “How about forty five and we get a few hours to enjoy ourselves at your casino?”. Kaito chuckled, “Forty two and a visit to the casino, last offer.”. Sergei smirked and shook the man’s hand, “Deal, will it be ok if we remain docked here while my crew visits the casino?”. Kaito nodded and smiled, “Of course, I shall transfer the credits now, while your crew brings the shipment onboard, I have a crew waiting in the storage in the next room for it.”.
They finalized the deal and the shipment was brought into the casino's cargo hold. After they were done, Sergei told his crew they could visit the casino if they wished, they’d stay here for a few hours so there was no rush, both Karl and Sergei visited as well, leaving the ship locked down.

It was quite a sight, this casino, really over the top, with fancy restaurants and plenty of bars, not to mention the obvious thing to be found here, the games, there were so many games to join and lose money at. The crew ended up splitting in pairs, Sergei ending up at the bar with Klaus who was in quite a good mood. Sergei did not know Klaus that well and normally he might not have cared to try either, but, he couldn’t help but feel he wanted to at least attempt to.
“So, Klaus, what do you think of Kusari so far? You had some time on New Tokyo as well as here.”, Klaus drank his ale and grinned at Sergei, “It’s pretty good, sir, it’s not Rheinland though, I fear nothing will beat home.”. Sergei understood what he meant, he looked over the heavier man, he wasn’t sure how old Klaus actually was, a beard such as his would imply him being middle-aged at least. “But, I have to admit, sir. The women here are much more beautiful than back home.”, Sergei chuckled, “Exotic women always seem more interesting and attractive. But, I do agree, they are quite beautiful.”. They sort of drifted into small talk, Klaus did speak of his time in the Hessians and how he wanted to be a fighter pilot, but wasn’t skilled enough for it.

After an hour or so, Karl and Stein came by the bar. “I can’t believe I won over five thousand!”, Stein was grinning ear to ear as he showed the markers to Klaus and Sergei, “Damn, nicely done Stein.”, Said Klaus with a grin. “That means the next round is on you.”, Sergei smirked.

Time passed and most of the crew had found their way to the bar, only missing Jurgen. “Anyone seen the kid?”, Sergei asked, the others shook their heads, “No captain, not for a while...", Alice said. Then Stein snapped his fingers, “Wait, I do remember he was up on the second floor by one of the black jack tables, that was like an hour ago?”. Sergei frowned at this and nodded, “Ok, how about you all split up two and two and we go looking for the kid, clear?”, the crew nodded and headed off out into the casino. Sergei brought along Karl and they both walked and searched the second floor, both of them were perhaps somewhat concerned for him, “He’s just a kid and this isn’t always the safest of places.”. Karl shook his head, “Doubt that anyone would try anything here, with security and all.”, Sergei nodded, “Good point.”. They searched the second floor and ran into Alice and Stein, “We haven’t seen him yet.”, Alice said with a worried tone. “It’s fine, we’ll keep on looking, check with any guard you see as well, check?”. Both of them nodded and were off again.

At the fourth floor they spoke to some people, asking for any information. They were losing hope when one of the guests, a pudgy old man, spoke, “Oh, blonde kid? Yeah, I saw him go with a pair in white suits to the VIP section.” and pointed to a stairway on the side, with a guard at its entrance. Karl and Sergei looked at each other and frowned, heading to the VIP entrance, the guard held out a hand, “Stay right there, this is only for VIP’s and you are not on the list.”. Sergei noticed he had no list, “What list?”. The guard, stone-faced, said, “The one in my head, now, leave, Gaijin.”. Sergei sighed hard, “Look we just want to know if a friend of ours went in here, with two men in white suits, he’s a shorter young guy with blonde hair, have you seen him?”. The man looked at Sergei, but said nothing. So, Sergei decided that the only way forward was bribes, he pulled out a chip and offered one to the guard, “Ten thousand.”. The guard looked down at the chip and then up again, Sergei sighed and added another twenty thousand with casino chips. The guard took the chips and nodded and took a step to the side, “He’s up there, but not with the best of people.”.

Sergei and Karl walked up and into what can only be called a penthouse, with its own bar and three servers, all pretty young Kusari women, in the couch sat two men in white suits, but no Jurgen. As Karl and Sergei came into the room, two men sat in a couch they looked at their visitors, “This is a private party, you are not invited.”, Sergei held up a hand, “We’re just after Jurgen, the blonde kid that came with you.”, they both looked at each other and laughed. “That little Gaijin was being disrespectful, so he is learning a lesson, in private.”, the man on the right grinned at them.
“Well, get him back here, he’s part of my crew and we’re leaving.”, Sergei had had enough of this, Karl crossed his arms and stared the two men down. “F*ck you, gaijin.” and they stood up, the servers moved into a backroom of the bar, the two men walked up towards Karl and Sergei, “Oh my, this will be interesting.”, Karl chuckled at Sergei's comment. The man on the left struck first, letting lose a kick to Sergei’s side, he winced in pain, but managed to grab the leg and twist it so the man fell. The other man aimed a punch to Karl’s face, who blocked it with his own hand, then ramming a knee up into the man’s stomach, he doubled over in pain. Sergei’s partner managed to spin himself while on the ground, kicking Sergei’s feet from under him, falling on his ass. Karl aimed a second knee up into his sparring partner’s face, but the man managed to collect himself enough to move to the side. Sergei got up at the same time as his target did, but the man pulled a knife out of his jacket, “That’s nasty, f*cking cheater.”, Sergei grinned at the man, who lunged at Sergei, cutting in the air as Sergei took steps back and to the sides to avoid the sharpened piece of steel. Meanwhile, Karl and his guy were exchanging blows, but Karl managed to slam his fist into the man’s ribs, causing him to double over yet again and Karl tried to end it with another knee to the face, the Kusari man instead charged into Karl and dropped them both down onto the floor. Sergei was doing what you aren’t supposed to, fighting barehanded in a knife fight, but so far he had been able to avoid getting cut. Eventually Sergei saw an opening as the enemy thrust to his right, Sergei leaned to the left and grabbed a hold of the knife wielding hand and twisted it, forcing him to drop it. Then, aiming a kick into the man’s ribs, the man let out a yelp of pain before he dropped to the ground, Sergei kicked the knife away. Karl had managed get a good grapple on the other opponent, and was in the process of strangling the f*cker. Sergei then walked up to his own assh*le and stepped on his back.

“Now, get our friend, or I will plunge that knife into your back.”, the Kusari man gasped for air but said, “Fine fine, but we’ll remember this!”, he pointed at a side door. Sergei walked over just as Karl finished making sure his partner fell asleep for a while. As he opened the door, they saw Jurgen bound to a chair in black light lit room, he looked up at Sergei and he could see that the kid had been crying. On one hand, Sergei felt sorry for him and pissed off as f*ck, the other side of him, the commissar, he pitied him, almost wanted to call him ‘weak’. Sergei just felt angry instead, focusing on that, he walked over and untied Jurgen’s hands. “You good, kid?”, Jurgen managed to say a low, “I am sorry sir..”, Sergei frowned, “For f*cks sake, you’ll be fine, let’s head back.”. As they walked into the VIP area again, one of the Kusari men was unconscious on the floor and the other now holding himself up on the bar, he turned to look at them, “We’ll remember this, gaijin.”, Sergei chuckled, “Whatever, f*ckface. Bye bye.” and they walked back down towards the Lindwyrm. Sergei couldn’t drop the emotions he felt when he saw Jurgen, it was like a battle within him, trying to decide which he actually felt. They let Jurgen go and sleep, they’d talk more later. “F*ck this place, let’s head back to New Tokyo.”, Karl nodded, “Yeah, that’s for the best.”. And the Lindwyrm set off back to New Tokyo.

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