Evangeline Anastasia McDowell

[Bazza]

Entry#: 050
Date: 16 - 12 - 817 AS @ 19:44 SUT
Title: Hmm.

In the last three days I:

-Found my mother and had a real nice reunion and "coming out", receiving mum's full support for our relationship;
-Returned to Liberty;
-Sent the Antaeus out on a supply mission;
-Bought a 10 year old girl from a Xeno;
-Become a peace activist for a brief period;
-Got the Railgun blown to bits by the same people who built the damn thing;
-Appeared on the top of the Junkers' KOS list;
-Severed all ties with the Junkers and became a Freelancer
-Moved to Gran Canaria in the Omega edge-worlds.

It all started back in Pennsylvania. A Xeno ship by the name of "The Good Pain" was parading around Bethlehem Station screaming random bull**** down the broadcast channels. I was in the asteroid field collecting silver ore for a Samura transport of all things. He was boasting about having a Kusari child as his hostage, and demanding credits from the locals for the kid's safety. Of course, being Liberty, no-one cared. But I did.

I flew to the station and a scan of the ship did in fact reveal a smaller life signature which could indicate a child. I tried to get some details out of the Xeno such as name, gender etc. but he wasn't able to translate "scared child" into "English". He was still demanding credits for the child, so I decided to hand them over and claim it. He jettisoned an escape pod and I quickly scooped it up. Perhaps surprisingly, when I reached the cargo bay and opened the pod, I received an intact, living, mostly unharmed kid. Being a Xeno I was expecting something morbid.

Immediately I had a problem. I didn't know anything about this kid. So I asked for a name.

Kinomoto Sakura.

I asked for an age.

10.

Then I had a bit of a conundrum. Is this a boy or a girl? Kind of hard to tell at this age. Especially Kusari children, can often only be identified by the clothes they're wearing or how long their hair is.

I asked if Sakura was a boy or a girl.

Girl.

What? No way. The hair, the voice, the clothes, everything says boy. I had to make sure. So I grabbed the kid, pulled down the pants and had a squizz.

...Girl.

At this stage the Xeno ship had wandered off somewhere, I wasn't interested in it really. He had my money and seemed pleased.

So now I had yet another girl on board the already over-feminised Alsatia.

After some time spent calming Sakura down, I gathered the crew together and created a game plan. I asked Sakura where she was from.

Planet New Tokyo.

Just great. Being the honourable citizen of Bretonia that I am, I had every intention of returning this girl to her family. But how the hell was I going to get into New Tokyo?

Oh, right. I'm not a Junker any more. Off go the transponders and IFF systems.

At least, that was the plan. Sakura is still with us now, days after I'd said I'd take her home.

Anyway, putting that aside. I docked the Alsatia with Bethlehem Station and, leaving my crew to enjoy the Zoners' hospitality, took off in the Railgun after the Xeno.

I've said it before; I'll say it again. I don't hate Xeno's. I have nothing against them. If it were up to me we would be working together, but there are elements on both sides who do not want this to happen. Hence, the war continues on. I've always had a vision of of Xenos and Junkers working together the same way we work with nearly all the other criminal organisations in Sirius.

A greatly abridged story puts me working with a collection of 3 of them. The.Good.Pain, the man who had abducted Sakura; Battery.Acid and Canned.Air. Together we: killed a pirate harassing miners nearby, shot down a loud-mouth independent gunboat, blasted a transport carrying Superconductors, had our way with some miners ourselves and got into a stoush with the Liberty Navy in Colorado.

That last point would prove to be my undoing. Although the Xenos were gaining my trust to the point of idly conversing with me, there were people who had taken great offence to what I was attempting to do. Namely, the Junker Congress, who oversee what little political matters the Junkers attend to.

The battle was in the Silverton asteroid field in Colorado. It was my bomber and three Xenos against a Liberty Gunboat and two LSF fighters. I had no intention of fighting originally but my hand was forced when I was opened fire upon.

I disposed of the gunboat with a torpedo to the flank, and disengaged to allow the more agile fighters to duke it out to the end.

It was then the Junker Congress ships showed up. They had been following me for some time. I knew then I was in trouble. The Congress, to put it frankly, are dumbasses. They share a braincell between all... however many of them there are.

I did make an attempt to explain the situation to the Junkers. But of course they wouldn't have a single word of it. They opened fire on the Railgun and I was forced to abandon my colleagues and run.

Using the limited strafe and turning abilities the ship possessed I did manage to run a very long distance. In fact I almost reached Manhattan orbit via the jumphole linking Colorado to New York.

Alas, my efforts were in vain. The Railgun, battered by the incessant volleys of missiles from the pursuing ships, was too much. The ship started to break up. I knew then she was lost. I hit the ejector button. The cockpit in its entirety departed the ship as it erupted into flames, the fuel canisters detonating in a spectacular explosion that shook my tiny recluse.

Then something changed. I felt movement. If the Junkers weren't enough trouble, now I had Manhattan itself trying to kill me. The gravity well of the planet was sucking me in.

The Junker ships, being unable to follow me into the atmosphere, quickly departed and left me to my own devices. Fortunately for me, I had a backup plan. Massive parachutes installed into the cockpit for just such a situation. As I tumbled towards the surface in the uppermost reaches of the atmosphere I deployed the parachutes, and to my delight, they were both fully functional. I begun the long, slow descent to ground level. Hopefully I didn't end up impaled on a radio tower, or sent for a swim, or wind up in someone's back yard.

To my delight, I ended up in open grassland. Whoopee. The escape pod crashed to the earth and after a few minutes nursing a headache and some <strike>minor</strike> major whiplash I stumbled out and surveyed my surroundings.

I was lucky in that I didn't end up somewhere unsavoury, but I still had no idea where I was or where I should go.

I had only barely started walking in a random direction when the unmistakable sound of a space ship perked up in the distance. I watched a civilian fighter, exactly like the ones owned by the Xenos, come down and perform the worst voluntary landing I've ever seen in my life. Out of this war-torn ship came Jimmy.

"How the hell did YOU find ME?"

Jimmy explained the transponder in what was left of my ship was still functional. All he did was follow it.

Right.

Cutting out the dribble, Jimmy gave me a lift back to a non-descript looking factory complex inside the industrial precinct of Manhattan City.

Within it there was a rather motley assortment of battered, worn out boys and men who, as I was told, were all Xenos.

Jimmy was happy with how I'd performed with him and his crew in space. So happy, in fact, that he literally gave me a ROC bomber. It was a bit dusty and needed some minor work, but it was nothing beyond my abilities.

So skipping ahead was now working with Jimmy and his merry band of Xeno terrorists, in one of their ships, flying their colours.

I did have a few more issues to clear up. The Alsatia, for instance, had to be recovered. Luckily for me it was at a neutral base. After getting clearance from Jimmy I departed his company and quickly got myself back to Pennsylvania. Boy did I have some explaining to do.....

With everyone assembled, and the newly christened "Eva's.Vengeance" roughly stashed away in the cargo bay I regained control of my most familiar settings and took off for Puerto Rico.

The Maelstrom needed to be recovered. The ship was now basically functional, in that it had propulsion and controls. Although she was able to fly, she was still incredibly vulnerable due to her lack of a shield or any weapons.

We entered Houston's atmosphere, set up camp on a desolate plot of land miles from anything and fired up Koneko, our pet CSV. We modified the transponders to show a benign junker-ish name. The plan was to sneak into the base during the break in shifts and nick off with the cruiser.

At exactly 17:04 universe time, we left Houston. The workers all knock off at 5pm and retire for their night. We reached Vieques at 10:47pm. Everyone would be asleep. Guards and comm. towers included. Lazy bastards.

We found the Maelstrom, still tucked away in her own dry dock. We snuck into the dock, and in a matter of minutes were inside and had her starting up. People would be awake now, trying to figure out what was going on.

But it was too late. The Maelstrom was fired up and ready to go! I planted the throttle into the console and with a massive lurch the gigantic hulk took off, destroying the gangway in the process leaving behind some charred remains for the goons to fix up.

With the best speed the ship could manage I headed for the Humboldt system. Kana and Fumika were on board with me, controlling what little computer systems were installed while Misaka piloted the CSV. No doubt there were ships after me now, but they didn't stand a chance. The one thing the old girl has on her side is straight-line speed, those two gigantic cruise engines easily moving the massive ship through space.

In due time we reached Humboldt. We flew to an uncharted planetoid in the far reaches of the system. I gently landed the ship on the surface of the tiny moon, whose gravitational pull was almost unnoticible. The Maelstrom should be safe there until I can find her a new home.

Everyone piled back into the CSV and we set off on the arduous round-trip through Kansas, Magellan, California and then Texas to avoid returning to Puerto Rico. What scant law forces were installed there were no doubt hunting us down.

We slept on board Freeport 4 after an extremely long flight without rest. We very nearly didn't make it, the overloaded CSV came within minutes of running out of fuel. That, and four people cramped into a ship designed for one is never pleasant.

We did eventually return to Houston to collect the Alsatia. With most of my property now secure it came time to regroup, reorganise and rethink.

I'm going to go and chase down Jimmy. I still have his bomber....

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