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Story #1 The Unfortunate Story of Roderick the Junker (2146 words. 72 Sentences / Entries from the community.)
A ship docks on one of the docking ports on Planet Manhattan, New York. A Junker, Roderick, starts shutting down the systems of his Anki as he prepared to leave the ship, hints of caution inching into his mind as he thought about what was in the cargo crates on board his ship. Shutting down the last of the systems, Roderick tries to ignore the very thought of being caught and charged for smuggling Artifacts onto the planet just for a damn client that he barely knew. Close in the distance he could make out the faint outline of a Grizzly and two Liberator's sitting next to it; there were five officers near them, including a handcuffed Junker. The trashy Junker called out to Roderick in a panic, causing the officers to stir. Roderick mumbles something inaudibly, tiredly reaching over and pulling out a cigarette, which he promptly lights, glaring at the sight in front of him, debating what to do. Roderick toys with the idea of letting the other Junker go to jail for a moment, then dismisses it, he begins for the exit of his ship while reaching for his credit chip, wondering how much it'll cost to keep his little brother from ending up behind bars again. Roderick quickly realizes that he cannot afford his brother's release legally and he therefore thought perhaps bribing one of the officers would be a better idea. But having 5 officers on one place could make bribing idea ends bad, so picking out just one of them seems like much better plan.
He sighs as he opens the door latch and starts heading out of the ship, still keeping in mind his cargo, when he hears his brother cry out in pain. Upon reaching his younger brother, Roderick finds the officers not only beating him, but stripping the innards of his ship. As Roderick watched horror as the officers inflicted pain on his younger brother and his ship, his hand instinctively gripped a pipe that was leaning on the wall. Picking up the pipe, it felt heavy in his hands but light enough to swing and do some serious damage to the officers. However in the matter he notices one of them not being a police officer but rather a LSF officer who was there as the fellow Junker had also smuggled artifacts onto the planet and armed with a rifle and two side arms to boot. And where's a pipe - there's a water, so Roderick used that pipe to break a fire-hose box on that wall, he took the high-pressure nozzle and pointed it decisively at the group of officers. Alarmed, the officers spread out, leaving Roderick's brother lying on the floor, and start yelling at him to stand down while pointing their own guns at him. As the officers spread out, there’s a resounding snap as the LSF agent falls dead, the glint from a scope blinking in the distance from one of the taller buildings balconies. Another LSF agent creeps up behind Roderick, something in his hand. As the LSF Officer rose his pipe to strike Roderick, his brother stammered to his feet, causing an officer to take a shot at the younger brother. A red dot appears squarely on the LSF officer's head, followed by the shrieking sound of a bullet cutting through the air. As the officer falls to the floor, with his skull wide open, Roderick sighs with relief, only to realise moments later his brother has been shot. He watches, frozen in shock, as he watches his brother fall to the ground with a resounding *thump* giving the final call that there was no life in the body.
Unfrozen from the shock, calm but concerned, Roderick backs off into cover- his brother was dead, there was nothing he could do but not getting killed himself was a good start. There was a roar over head, by now even out gunned, the remaining LPI had called in the navy for back up; and none too soon did two Avengers and a Armored Transport roar onto the platform. As the convoy of ships came down, so did a collection of explosives from the sky, raining down on the transports, causing a scene of utter chaos.
In orbit, are Xenos cursing to themselves, "I told you we didn't apply enough duct tape to the bombs, look what we did, Lets hightail it out of here before the Navy gets after us."
In the midst of the chaos, Roderick made a run for his Anki, hoping to Junker-Jeez that nothing would go wrong. Reaching his ship he finds he cannot get in it as it is locked down and seems to have lost his keys in the fight. In a quick decision, Roderick hijacks a nearby Civilian Shuttle in order to make an escape. Meanwhile, the Xeno starfliers had just left Planet Manhattan's orbit, and out of nowhere emerges an uncloaking Junker convoy consisting of a Salvager, and two Collectors! Feeling safe in orbit and happy to see his palls, Roderick just realized that he's approaching them in a ship owned by notorious bounty hunter, well known for backstabbing lone Junkers on sight. Roderick panics and fumbles on the controls, trying to find the right frequency to send a transmission to the Junkers to let them know he's flying the stolen ship. His hands trembling he hits a button he did not mean to, and hears the recorded voice of the pilot this ship belongs to begin to play in space. After a heavy sigh of desperation, spiced with some annoyance and even boredom, like he's trying to say "Why me?" and "Not again" at the same time, the man rummages through the controls again, but this time in an attempt to find the ejection button. Happy to finally find the big red button, he pressed it and while getting ready to escape in his pod, Roderick finds himself dazing at a CD fired toward Junkers salvage frigate.
Materializing at the source of the CD, an uncloaking LABC and two Liberty Gunboats: "Look what we have here, a Junker frigate near a trade lane."
It was supposed to be a simple artifact run, but somehow the Xenos, the Navy, the notorious bounty hunter and the rare sight that was the Junker Salvager "Solstice" were all making an appearance, in Manhattan orbit nonetheless; perhaps it has something to do with the artifacts in his hold? But when Roderick felt so ready to jettison the jizz out of that shuttle, the teeny-tiny little bit of problem that the escape pod wasn't now freely floating in space blatantly indicated the real reason why that civilian shuttle seemed a little too easy in commandeering, and to make matters worse his ship was now free-floating at the very center of the entire groups of mildly-aroused lawful attack squadrons, quasilawful salvager frigate Solstice, extremely-irrate unlawful Xenos still fumbling over their duct-taped ordnances, and elated bounty hunter "Junker[A.D.M.I.N. Censored]er", all the while the civilian shuttle's original owner's playback message still screaming in local chat like an announcer at the start of a boxing match.
"Well, these Junkers are obviously not lone" thought the hunter as it turned its attention towards the Xenos. And JUST as everything seemed like it COULDN'T get any WORSE, here chimed in the [LN]-LNS-Missouri from the direction of Planet Manhattan - Fort Bush Trade Lane, its current captain having deployed his entire dreadnought-bestiality crew from the nethersafety of Norfolk Shipyard because an anonymous agent had tipped him of a large caravan of LR-backed puppy-millers having the gall to brazen their sorry behinds in-orbit above their beloved puppy-safe capital, saying with a mildly-amused smile, "What the hell is going on around here?"
While a three-way space battle was raging between the lawfuls, the Xenos and the Junkers, the landing pad on Manhattan was littered with the bodies of dead LSF officers, all cleanly shot through the head with a Detroit DCA-5000 high powered photon rifle, clearly the work of whoever was on the balcony of the hotel Excelsior opposite the pad. Back in orbit around Manhattan, Roderick finally found the ejection button; however, as the pod was launched into space, a passing USI Bison on cruise picked it up.
Turns out the USI Bison didn't belong to Universal at all - it was the mobile base for the LSF's anti-smuggling operation, as Roderick found out when an LSF officer greeted his pod, smiling. Roderick swore to himself but kept himself calm and collected thinking that maybe the officers on board didn't know anything about what happened on the planet and he could make a clean get-away. He wore a false grin as he greeted the officer, taking in his surroundings and searching for a weapon of some kind. Still smiling, the LSF officer stared straight into Roderick's eyes, forcing him to abandon his search with a chill violently strangling his spine. Suddenly, the LSF's officer eyes glowed bright purple for a second, before it faded away. The LSF officer turns around and starts walking in towards the hallway saying: ''Come with me, there is someone expecting you.'' As he cautiously follows the man towards the bridge, Roderick thinks to himself "This day simply cannot get any worse" then he sees the captain standing with purple, glowing eyes. "Have you ever read the book... The Color Purple, Junker?" ''N-n-n-no I-I haven't'' Said the Junker as he looked at mans eyes in horror. "WELL, YOU'D BETTER DO IT NOW, YOU USELESS PIECE OF ****!" Said the officer, thrusting a book in the Junker's hands and pointing a gun at his head. As the Junker glances at the book title, shaken slightly by the raise of tone, he thinks there is obviously a mistake, because the title doesn't make sense with the situation he is in. "But...But... I can’t read too well," the Junker said now with trembling hands as he starts to flip open the book hoping it’s a picture book. The Junker had finished, and he had so many questions - the words, what did they mean? and more importantly- what the hell was going on? Just before the captain spoke again, a loud screeching thud suddenly echoed throughout the bridge, followed by the unmistakable sound of air being sucked out through a hole. The captain grabbed Roderick by his space collar, and began dragging him to the source of the sound. Thinking quickly the Junker leaped away, thinking back to his hand to hand combat training - he was not going down without a fight. Seeing this, the man with the glowing eyes pulled out a gun and pointed it straight at Roderick who was a point blank range.
"I know what you're thinking", the edges of the officer's mouth began to deform into a horrific excuse for a creepy smile, one even more disturbing than before. The officer lowered his gun, "Go ahead, give me your best shot", he said as his eyes turned into an even brighter purple glow and his voice suddenly changed. The Junker couldn't believe this turn of events, but as he reached for his knife he saw a horrifying, inhuman appendage extending from the officer. Roderick aimed at the appendage, and smacked his hand and knife - right onto a thin purple veil that intercepted the attack, and it instantly decimated his weapon, and the appendage was not done yet - it flicked a bit and shattered his right arm. Roderick was now a cripple. Roderick lunged at the officer, but just as he touched him everything went black.
He felt somewhat familiar, and nice feel, as he woke up, he noticed that his injuries were gone, and that he was perfectly well, but he had that feel, so familiar yet so distant. As he was still figuring out his mixed feelings he moved his left hand and then started moving his right but as he looked to the side we saw it was not his own hand but a mechanical one. As Roderick got up he looked around realizing that he was in an escape pod and thought to himself "What on earth happened?"
Back on planet Manhattan, agents investigating the slaughter and explosion on the landing pad, put out a Liberty wide, high priority all channels BOLO (Be on the Lookout) alert for an individual not yet Identified, but seen holding a pipe and confronting the first slain officer.
As for Roderick, the escape pod he was in was drifting in space, heading straight for the star in the system of New York! "Self-destruct sequence initiated" said a synthesized voice, and Roderick yelled at no-one in particular, "Escape pods don't self-destruct!" The pod counted down to zero but before it could blow up a nomad youngling appeared and destroyed the pod, although no one will ever know the difference.