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Neural Net ID EZRAELVERTIGA
Good day, Nick.
I take it you had good reasons to not answer me in space, so I'll ask you here again.
What happened with Forlorn? Why was it disbanded? How are Elena, Sarah, Sanada and Eli- well, scratch the latter, I already met her in space and she was still pissed at me for Enma being a cunt. How comes you're working for Samura now? Did they hire you for the war against Rheinland? What about Glendalough and the Athena, I wouldn't mind buying the latter off from you.
Maren told me you helped her with the search for the Apahanta. I never got to thank you for that. Maybe we can meet somewhere at some point and talk?
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»»» Vergil Uplink Status: Active
»»» Location: Unknown
»»» Recipient ID: Ezreal Vertiga
»»» Subject: Answers
Ezreal,
I didn't answer you in space because I didn't know who else was listening.
Forlorn has since disbanded, Sarah is around, Elena has fallen off the grid and Eliza is with me. Samura hired me for security oversight, and we've since entered the war on those grounds. I'm mostly independent despite that. Glendalough was sold to a small group of merchants, intent on using the traffic through the region to stay afloat, and the Athena has been quietly moved to a hidden location. If you do actually want to buy it, we can talk price.
I don't know about meeting. As it is, I'm not really staying in anyone place for long, due to being unattached to anything really.
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Neural Net ID EZRAELVERTIGA
Nick.
If you value the life of your daughter, tell me where you are hiding the captured Vagrant. Samantha is here with me and... it... it would be a shame if she got hurt. You have two hours to respond. If you didn't in that time, she will take permanent damage.
:::ACCESS GRANTED:::
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»»» Vergil Uplink Status: Active
»»» Location: Unknown
»»» Recipient ID: Ezrael Vertiga
»»» Subject: Mistakes.
Ezrael.
The threats the Order made against your home will look like a child throwing a tantrum in comparison to what I'll do to that place if she's hurt. Don't make a mistake that you will definitely regret.
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Neural Net ID EZRAELVERTIGA
Time is running. Tell me what I want to know.
Ezrael moves a bit to the side. The large bed of his personal quarters on the Apahanta was visible, on it was Samantha, handcuffed to the rail at the headrest. She was clothed, unharmed and unconscious.
You captured a Vagrant. I know about it. Tell me where it is.
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Neural Net ID EZRAELVERTIGA
You have no idea what is about to happen, Nick. Release the Vagrant and you'll get your daughter back, in one piece.
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Neural Net ID EZRAELVERTIGA
Nick,
I've been thinking quite some time about what happened. I can't express how sorry I feel for what happened. We've done some research on our end, trying to find out how the chain of events lead to all this. I don't know whether you are interested in listening to this at all, but in case you want, here is what happened.
In June 13th we picked up a new crew member from Livadia, a young boy of 23 years who didn't have any place to go. Background check told us he was the only survivor of the destruction of his family's ship in Omicron Delta, they got shot by Nomads. I should have gotten suspicious about it already back then, about the one and only survivor of that. A Zoner ship picked up his life pod and brought him Livadia. He used to live there with everything he had, which was literally only his life pod.
I accepted his application and he started working on the Apahanta. One of the girls of my crew showed interest in him, her name was Lorena Hawkins. They became a loose couple and slept a few times with another, until on July 26th a medical emergency was reported. The boy was incredibly weak, his throat beyond sore, but nothing life threatening. Lorena pretended to wanted to explain what happened and we moved to my room while my ship's doctor took care of the boy. Lorena then revealed the fact that she was infected.
Lorena, or Aphrodite, as she called her incubus, was a Vagrant Incubus, which explains the different approach, as K'Hara would have, so I believe, been more disciplined and less confrontational. She said she wanted to use me to get you, which evidentally worked. She told me you kidnapped a spaceborne Vagrant - something which in any other circumstances I wouldn't have believed - and forced me to do anything she wanted or she would have killed my crew, one by one. Plenty of other threats were voiced as well, and later she tortured me in multiple ways. Trying to save my crew, I did what she wanted me to do. I contacted Samantha, asking her whether she could do something for me, luring her to the Apahanta. It was my believe that, if everything would work out, nobody would get hurt.
We captured Samantha like that, and Aphrodite told us a few things. I was forced to contact you, pretending I would harm Samantha, while Aphrodite also threatened to force me to rape her. Since it didn't look like you were going to comply, Aphrodite demanded it from me. I resisted, telling her to kill me since I wouldn't do that. Instead she locked me away in a mind merge for, in my perception, multiple months of being imprisoned in a Lane Hacker interrogation cell. In reality, only a few hours had passed, and the torture ended the moment your ships, the Night Fury and the Haven, appeared in Sigma-13 infront of us. In the meantime, Aphrodite applied bomb chokers to our necks. What she didn't know was that these bomb chokers were fakes, since I never wanted to have such cruel devices on my ship. My crew didn't know these were fakes and treated them like some of the horrible loyalty-ensuring tools the Core used in case of, you know, insubordination.
And the rest you know yourself, Nick. We came over to the Haven, you shot Aphrodite, killing Lorena and the parasite inside her, and my only explanation to Samantha's death - I sadly have to assume she died - was that Aphrodite used a telekinetical attack on her the moment she got shot. A few seconds more and she would have killed you and me the same way. All it takes for a Wild is to cause a telekinetical induced aneurism in your head or rip an artery apart. They can do that, and I have no idea what the range of that ability is, if it is limited at all. After all Nomads, both the spaceborne and the incubi, are telekinetic and telepathic beings.
The Vagrant warform that appeared in Sigma-13, apparently called Kapheira, caused heavy damage to the Apahanta, but we made it out alive and have repaired the ship by now. I don't know what happened on your end, though, but I assume Kapheira was too strong to get beaten by a crayterian cruiser.
I am deeply sorry for your loss, Nick. I didn't know Samantha well, but she fought til the bitter end. I just wished both Lorena and Samantha wouldn't have needed to die because of this.
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