He sprang to wakefulness, and regretted it the very next instant due to the pounding of his head. He moaned and rolled over in the bed, and tried to get his bearings. Working through the pain, he went over to the sink and drank a cup of water, trying to remember what he did last night, or even where he was. Judging by the severity of his headache, he'd obviously had a lot of cardamine last night, but the why eluded him. Frowning at the water, he emptied the contents in favour of an obviously alcoholic drink sitting by the bedside. He recognized it as a sidewinder fang by the taste. By now, he'd figured out that he was on his transport, Inconspicuous[T], that he'd purchased from the junkers a few days ago. By god that was a bad decision... He'd had to fake his ship blowing up to avoid being chased by bounty hunters, because, as he'd found out later, that ship, under the junkers control, was involved in an attack on the InterSirius bank. Damn junkers, would sell their own grandmothers if they could find a buyer.
It was coming back to him now, blurry, but recognizable. The rather charismatic man... what was his name... offered him a bomber in exchange for joining the DPL... gave him the rank of lieutenant, or some meaningless title like that. Well, he was on a cardi high, but he was a man of his word. A liberty rogue smuggler he was, and one he would remain, even in this rather interesting new development.
He walked to the hanger and took a look at his new ship. He gasped in amazement as he did so, for his ship was, as the ancient peoples of earth used to say (he was a fan of classical 2D movies, his favourite being Fight Club) "pimped out". It was a barghest with what looked like corsair armour upgrades, a supernova launcher, the works. He well realized that all of this equipment was easily smuggled in by junkers, but it costs a pretty penny. The ship must have been worth atleast 40 million credits, by his estimate. He was starting to like these DPL guys more and more.
He then looked at the writing on the side of the ship: "Nuisance.Value". He chuckled to himself, took a long swig of the sidewinder, and wandered off to the bar in search of cardamine to numb his aching head.
"Oh the indignity of it all" he muttered sarcastically as he sat on some scrap metal in the hold of the junker ship. "This has not been a good day...".
His ship, the Inconspicuous[T], had been blown up by rheinland military personnell. Floating in his lifepod for over a day, he had been picked up by a passing junker, who he'd paid to get him back to a liberty rogue base. All because he'd decided to shave off some time by taking a tradelane...
He arrived on the base, stepped out, and saw the leader of the DPL standing before him. "Follow me" he said, so Kettch meekly and solemnly obeyed. He led him to the other side of the hanger, where a pirate train was parked. "Seeing as you need a cargo ship to continue trading, this is now yours. I give you the LR-Profit.Margin-D." Shocked by the idea that the DPL had spent a further 50 million on giving him another ship, a mere day after his previous one had been blown up, he just stood there in shocked silence, mouth hanging open. "It's got less defence and less armour than your old ship, but on the plus side it's got a bigger cargo hold, so make sure to keep off the damn tradelanes in future. By the way, this is coming out of your paycheck." Kettch nodded meekly and went to the bar.
Kettch kicked his bloodhound in disgust. He hated this ship, he really and truly did. Bloody mergers...
Apparently, the DPL had officially merged with the Liberty Rogues, which he'd thought was a good thing... until he'd actually found out what it meant. It meant he would be busted down to recruit, his bomber taken away, and replaced by a bloody bloodhound.
Kettch hated this ship, he truly did. Not only did it not have any shielding worth a damn, it turned about the same as his bomber, and with no weaponry to speak of. He'd quit this very second, if he hadnt have promised his support to the DPL, whatever the case.