The Palmers were a happy family, Jack Palmer had a wife (Eve) and a son (Ashton). Jack had a good position in a metallurgical factory, he made good money so he was able to send his son to a good school, and a beautiful and loving wife.
Jack was never a drinker, smoker or anything of that sort. In total he was not a bad person he had everything that a middle man from Liberty could wish for, why would he be.
On the night of Ashton's 15th birthday Jack was called after work to his bosses office. He was especially excited since he had been working extra hard the past few weeks and was hoping for a promotion. So he could buy his child a good present. But he did not get what he wanted, he got the opposite of it .... he left the office a sad and poor man.
Quote:" Mr. Palmer, I'm sorry to inform you, but with these new machines we enrolled we do not have the necessary resources to hold onto you, you will no longer be working for us, goodbye. "
Those words still echoed in his memory as he walked down the streets, " necessary recourses " he thought with disgust at his bosses, did they think he didn't know how much money they were making, for the first time in his life Jack Palmer was incredibly angry, so angry that he broke one of his own rules: never drink.
As he exited the bar, Jack was swaying left and right a bit, he was trying to get home but he had drunk a little too much. Then a sly cunning voice in his head said "If they think they can fire us just so they can make more money. Then they're wrong, why don't we make them pay, eh ?!" it finished and suddenly a disgusting and malevolent grin came upon his face, one that would make most people feel sorry the smallest of things ....
Liberty space, Texas system, Houston Planet, New Orleans district
A knock was heard on the front door, and steps heading towards it to open it. Ashton Palmer was hoping that his father would finally come home, to catch at least the end of his birthday...
As the 15 year old kid opened the door a unwelcoming sight appeared infront of his eyes, his father was soaked in blood, blood that was not his...
Flashback:
Jack Palmer had reasonably sobered up, but was still under the effect of the alcohol. He headed to the nearest gun store, and was hard set on to make his bosses regret firing him. As Palmer senior entered the store the clerk immediately knew that the he was not good news.
Jack started looking around, after about ten minutes of looking he found the one he was looking for, a Spas-12.
As Jack payed for the gun, he looked around for a machete he could use. He stopped himself at the cheapest one.
With all his purchasing done Jack headed to his bosses office for a last reunion....
End Flashback
As Ashton just stood there watching his father breathe heavily with a blank mask upon his face, not a thought crossed his young mind that his father might have committed murder. But as soon as Eve Palmer saw Jack, a shriek of terror issued from her.
At that moment Jack seemed to finally snap out of his daze and look around, he reached for his son who was standing there looking at him, but Eve pulled Ashton away from him.
Soon Eve seemed to finally give in and let Jack enter the house not just stand at the doorway, once they had entered she locked the door.
" Eve " his voice barely a whisper of what it once was, it wasn't kind and gentle. The only thought to pass her mind at that point was " What had happened "
" Eve, you must understand I lost control of myself .... the-they fired me, I had to make them pay " at that moment painful silence rained in the house.
" We can't stay here, we must leave this place, they know where we live " she said without thinking as she dashed for her child's room to pack everything.
After a hour the Palmers were ready, they set out to the closest spaceport they needed to leave planet Houston.
The transport the Palmers picked up was a rundown one, you could see leaks from most tubes and gasses coming out of other. But this was their salvation from what Jack had done to himself and his family and they were glad they caught it.
New York jumpgate, Texas system
The transport "Lixion" was preparing to enter the gate with false codes and documents, since their cargo would be considered ill-legal by every house. After all slaves were the best worker's hand one could get on the market these days.
"Jumpgate control this is, Niko Lionhart commander of the "Lixion" transport we are hauling Luxury Food to New York system, and are in a hurry requesting premision to enter"
The commander of the transport was sure he'd pass again after all this wasn't his first time transporting slaves under false documents so he felt assured all would go as planned.
"Understood "Lixion" you can proceed to jump, godspeed" - answered a mechanical voice from the jumpgate
New York space, Texas Jumpgate
As the transport exited the tunnel they started cruising immediately before they could get caught by the local police.
As they were nearing the badlands, Lionhart saw 2 LN closing into his position, stressed that they might get in scan range and see his cargo he diverted all power from the ship's core to the engines so to try and out-run them.
Due to the power being diverted his shields were down, but that wasn't what troubled Niko, what troubled him was that the LNs were still catching up to them.
On nearing the transport the LN officers were able to scan his cargo and see the contraband, but even after firing a warning shot at the transport it hadn't stopped so they were moving to drastic measures.
Once the LNs were in 2 K range the commander of the "Lixion" saw that they were using some special technic to be able to shoot at cruise speed and that they were shooting Cruise Disruptors at him.
What neither party had seen was the leak of H-fuel that the Transport had from one of his engines. As the CD neared the Transport it hit the hull and ignited the ship's engine room painfully disabling any hope for survival on the ship.
Aboard the "Lixion" transport
Flames and heat were coming from the back of the ship every passenger on it could feel it and see the smoke coming from between the cracks of the ship.
Jack Palmer led his family in haste to the transports escape pod in hopes of getting atleast his son and wife on them even if it costed him his life.
Outside space, New York system, near Badlands
2 Xeno bombers were heading on their way to the Texas jumpgate they had received information about a transport full of slaves heading to Kusari space, and had decided to check it out.
Once they were in range of the burning transport they saw the 2 LNs standing nearby doing nothing, so they quickly engaged and destroyed them before the Navy officers could even think of what was happening.
Now it was the Xenos turn to watch the "Lixion" burn in space....
Aboard the "Lixion"
Jack was holding his wife's hand and runing towards the last escape pod on the ship. As he neared it he saw that there was some other man looking for it.
As they both reached the pod in the same time and the small thing was only capable of holding 1 person they just stood there watching each-other.
And before anyone could react the strange pulled out a gun out of his jacket and aimed it at Jack and his wife Eve, two shots were all it took to end their lifes and all little Ashton could do was stand and watch as his parents were murdered in cold blood.
All of a sudden the roof started falling and a tube hit the stranger on the back and he fell dropping his gun at Ashton's feet.
Ashton looked at the weapon that had just taken many happy years of his life and as he picked it up he remembered every moment that he had spent with his parents, every birthday, every hug and kiss.
The last thing that Niko Lionhart saw was a boy with a gun aimed at him and tears in his eyes pulling a trigger of his once trusted pistol.
Outside "Lixion", Liberty space
The two Xenos (Black.Nova|X and XA-Sidewinder.) were watching as the last escape pod came out of the transport before it blew up and all that was left were large scraps of metal and memories.
The bombers tracktored the pod in and headed to Colorado to see who they got in and if any of those alive were worth recruiting....
Black Nova was waiting outside one of the rooms in the medical bay on Ouray wondering when the doctor would finally come out. They had just returned home with the only remaining pod from the "Lixion" and by some miracle found the only surviver of the "Lixion" to be a sixteen year old kid.
The moment Black Nova saw the child it reminded him awfully much of himself when he was young, he hoped that he could actually talk to the kid and find out what happened to it's family.
"Sasha" a voice rang out amidst the crowd that was gathered to see who the survivor of the "Lixion" was.
Someone was calling him, he knew that, but he was too deep in thought to answer whoever it was.
"Sasha"
"What is it ?" he finally answered annoyed after figuring out that whoever it was it wouldn't stop leave him.
"The kid, Sasha, doctors just said, they lost him" the fellow on the other side of him was dreading the bomber pilot's reaction
"WHAT" he half-screamed surprised " How could he have escaped wasn't he too badly injured to even talk ?"
"Yes they say he was, but for some reason the wounds healed fast and the kid sneaked out somehow"
"For the love of" he cursed " How could they let a 16 year old brat out-smart them ?" he asked returning to his seat and wondering where to find the kid
"I have no idea" mumbling something under his breath the second man left Black Nova to his thoughts.
Sasha was running to the Hangars, where he had heard the boy from the "Lixion" was heading from some security guards. On his way to the hangar he almost crashed into XA-Sidewinder, quickly side-stepping him and just yelling out something that sounded awfully much like "Gonna catch that frakin' brat" to Sidewinder....
Ouray base, Hangars
Black Nova arrived at the hangars just in time to see one of the old Starblazers make their way out of their, the moment he saw the Blazer fly out he ran to his bomber and quickly got in and started the engines....
Colorado space, Outside Ouray
Sasha's bomber was faster than the kid's starblazer, but the fighter was more maneuverable and didn't have a problem with making last second turns.
Sasha had to admit the kid might be an annoyance, but he could fly that Light Fighter, deciding to end this Sasha tried to engine kill and CD the foolish brat, but succeeded only in disrupting a navy patrol.
The Navy patrol engaged the Xeno as soon as they got disrupted out of cruise speed without a warning, but that was something that Sasha had gotten used to so he returned fire. Soon the patrol of three was made a patrol of flying metal scraps ready to be collected by the Junkers he oh so much despised. After them Sasha engaged cruise, he could see the young Light Fighter pilot 9 K away from him. 'He probably stayed to watch the fight' thought Sasha as he started chasing the brat again.
Colorado system, near system sun
Soon Sasha was getting very annoyed at the stupidity the brat showed, and decided enough was enough and opened a comm channel in hopes to talk the kid out of whatever he was thinking of doing.
"Brat, you hearin' this ?" he spoke into his mic.
"Just leave Xeno, I don't wanna have anything to do with you and your kind" replied the kid in a sagged voice
"Look kid, you dun 'ave to do this, ya can come to Ouray, become a Xeno, I can see that you will find your place there fine, you showed some good pilotin' skills" Sasha tried beating sense into the kid by e-killing as a last option and opening fire on the kid in hopes to kill it's engines
"Oh, shoot harder little Xeno I have nothing left to live for, my family is dead ... nothing ?" said the kid not getting scared that he might actually get killed 'Atleast I'll join mom and dad'
"Look brat, you're not gonna get away with that ship, stealin' it while I was arround how stupid could you be" the angry Xeno roared into the comms
"What, now you insult me, argh, after trying to kill me" the kid tried to retort back "Alright if you want the ship so much then come and get it" before Sasha could react the kid hard turned around and was flying straight at him, but before he could shoot a Cruise Disrupter the kid passed him and he was forced to turn arround and engage cruise again
"Argh brat, get back 'ere now or I'll kill ya" the kid was totally pissing Sasha off
Ashton Palmer started for the sun as he saw in his mind his father all blooded coming home on his birthday, the "Lixion", Lionhart pulling the trigger of the gun aimed at his parents, himself pulling the trigger aimed at Lionhart, stealing the Blazer. All these events that had turned his life arround just because of a couple of machines being imported into a company. A silent tear ran down his cheeks and dropped on his hands, he looked down at it and saw the reflection of something that he was not, he saw the reflection of a murdered a thief not that of a 16 year old kid that had a birthday a couple of days before.
The sun was nearing Ashton could feel it, he saw his wings melt off and the main part of the ship starting to melt...
Sasha had never seen such a thing in his life a man who had killed, stolen, murdered in cold blood and many other things. A 16 year old child, that had such promise in himself, he could tell, making a suicide run. In a way he could relate to the kid, he had also lost his parents at a young age, he had also been made to steal to survive when he was small. Sasha did something that noone on Ouray could believe him to do, he turned all power to the Taiidan's power core, his shields went down, the power for his weapons was depleted only so he could reach maximum speed and catch up to the kid, and move by it's side.
A passing transport could see a black Taiidan nearing the sun with another ship by it's side, the captain of the ship couldn't be more happy. He recognized the black bomber as a Xeno bomber by the name of Black.Nova|X that had destroyed transports and killed many escorts of his company and many others, and recognized the other ship as a xeno standard blazer, but he couldn't care less about what made them do it.
He was just watching as the two ships were moving away from them and a small bang and scraps flying around where they once stood, both ships destroyed, never to pillage and disturb Liberty ever again ...