Unexpected Encounter

Since I somehow deleted my old thread when editing the first part, I repost it. I add the second part as well :)

1st part:

Something rumbled.

It's not unusual that things rumble, but when you're five thousand light-years out of human space and have to go another fifty five thousand light-years, suddenly rumbling things can make you quite nervous.
Rebecca was more annoyed than nervous and thought about not standing up from her seat to go and check.
Then she realized, that the cargo hold of the anaconda she was flying sat almost two levels below and 100 meters towards the back of the ship and that something more than a poorly-secured limpet falling out of its holder has to happen to hear the rumble to the cockpit.

"Activate all security cameras in the Cargo Hold" spoke Rebecca to the ship’s computer. Then she grabbed her Personal Ship Assistant (PSA), which displayed information about the ship.
The PSA began slowly flicking through what had happened in the cargo hold. One of the cargo racks had lost it's balance and tipped against another rack.

She made a mental note to find the outfitter and mechanic who installed that rack in and beat their asses from one end of the station to the other, when she noticed something odd. One of the limpets had lost its cap, and in front of it, a number of little red stains covered the floor. It took her a minute to realize what they meant, then she quickly drew her automatic pistol out of the holder on the side of the headrest, locked and loaded it, stood up and aimed at the door.

"Ship, lock all doors and get ready to vent the cargo hold."

She quickly looked at the other two pilot seats on the bridge and felt relieved when she saw her confused cat.

"Cargo Hold ready for pressure drop, all doors airtight locked" echoed the ship’s voice through the cockpit.

"Ship, Establish long range communication to Dispatch in Wollheim Vision and activate all Security Cameras. Show me the footage from the Cameras in the cockpit main floor and my cabin."

The PSA displayed the pictures from the cameras and both rooms seemed to be clear.

"Ship, open the cockpit door and the door to my cabin."

She sweared as the long range comms took their time to build up the communication, then she opened the cockpit door and aimed into the adjacent corridor. Empty. Rebecca slowly walked past the Detailed Scanning Room and the holo-conference room towards her cabin, holding her pistol at the ready.

"Rebecca, what's up?" Noah’s voice suddenly startled her and she almost pulled the trigger. "Don't scare me like that, Noah!"

"Uhm, but ... doesn't matter, what's going on?"

"One of the cargo racks wasn't installed properly and collapsed, I haven't checked yet but it's possible that half of the cargo is gone."

"Can you check if the special equipment is still alright? The loss of the limpets isn't that bad, Burwellian still has some and he's ahead of you. And also, why have you your gun out? Do you want to shoot your outfitter from outer space?"

"There is the possibility of a stowaway."

Noah's smile dropped: "A stowaway? Why would a stowaway sneak onto an exploration ship?"

"Well, there is the possibility that he's after me. I’ve done a lot of dirty work in the past."

"I'll call some of our people out there and ask them to get to your position ASAP."

Noah had started to sound more and more worried by this point.

"Don't worry, it's not the first time someone’s tried to kill me." Rebecca smiled, then she said: "Ship, Open the Cargo hatch and the airlock in the cargo hold."

"Hatch opened. Opening Airlock, 30 seconds until opening."

Noah looked at her: "And if it's not a killer? If it's really just someone who sneaked upon the wrong ship?"

"You said it, they sneaked upon the wrong ship."

Rebecca had a expression on her face he had never seen before, it was cold and calculating, but there were elements he couldn't really identify, too.

"20 seconds until opening."

Another voice started speaking: "Becks?"

"Derry? Is that you?"

"Becks, it's pretty ironic that you fly fifty-five thousand light-years out to rescue someone without fuel from certain death, but now you're going to vent out a stowaway because he or she is a potential threat? You're not in the war anymore, not everyone is out to kill you, Rebecca."

"Opening in 5 ... 4 ... 3 ..."

"Abort opening, close the Cargo hatch. Damn you, Mr Conscience-Bear, if he makes one wrong move, I'll shoot him."

"What's up with you? You're usually not like that..."

"I know, it’s just... It has brought up some bad memories..."

She opened her cabin door with one hand and aimed with her pistol at the concealed bathroom.

"Becks, what's going on? Update me."

"Wait a moment."

Rebecca took a deep breath then she jumped around the corner, ready to shoot.

Nothing.

"No stowaways in my cabin, my whole ship is on lockdown. Give me a moment to get my stuff."

"What stuff? Rebecca? Hey, don't ignore me."

Back in the main cabin she pulled out a drawer to get at the secret compartment underneath it.

Quickly she put on a light reactive armor, installed two automated injectors for combat stabilizers around both of her legs near the veins, then she made sure all her implants were working fine and the injectors synced correctly with her vital monitor.

Noah came up with: "Wow, I had no idea you had those specific implants."

"A lot of soldiers who fight in planetside warfare get heavy augmentations, without them I wouldn't be standing here."

Then she reached out and pulled a case from under her bed back into the warm light of her cabin lamp.
The case opened after she typed in the code - the birthday of a person long gone. Within the case was a whole arsenal of weapons. After a short moment of hesitation, she chose an automatic shotgun with a drum magazine, the type of weapon unimpressive to someone who had no idea but frightening to people who knew what they were facing.

"Okay, I'm searching now for the stowaway, Derry, Noah. Ship: show me the footage from all cameras on the second level."

Slowly the images from the cameras lit up on the PSA. Rebecca zoomed in on the footage from the floor leading away from the damaged cargo hold and noticed the chain of red stains leading down the floor to the midship.

"Show me the footage of the second level elevator.”

The PSA did so, showing the feed from the elevator.

”There are no stains near the elevator. He has to be somewhere on the second level. I am going there now."

Noah was on it again: "Alright, Rebecca, be careful down there."

Rebecca entered the elevator to the second level, "Don't worry, I'll be fine." she said as she locked and loaded her gun.

Derry just said: "We'll talk later about storing Battle-weapons and ammunition under your bed."

Gun at the ready she waited for the door to open.
The door opened and she advanced slowly through the corridor, carefully aiming on every door.

"Have you found him?"

Noah's loud voice startled her again and she almost pulled the trigger.

"Goddammit, Noah. I'm trying to move without being immediately heard." she whispered back.

Suddenly she noticed the red stains leading to the bulkhead right before her.

"He's in the hangar. I swear if he damages my vehicles, I'm throwing him out of an airlock. Ship, give me the footage from the cameras in the Hangar."

There were only two cameras in the hangar and both of them showed a person, clothed in a pilot suit, holding an unidentified weapon in his hands facing the door.

The intruder obviously had already noticed that someone was approaching and was apparently ready to fight.

"Noah, he has noticed me and he has something looking like a weapon."

"I'll send someone to your position."

"No, I have an idea."

She walked in front of the door, crouched down and set her magnet boots to maximum, then pressed the shotgun butt into her shoulder.

"Ship, What is our actual speed?"

"Actual speed is exactly 9,48c."

"Ship, emergency drop to normal space."

"Dropping in 5... 4... 3... 2... 1... Dropping."

The drop from 10 times lightspeed felt like getting facedesked from The Hulk.
Pretty similiar felt the intruder since he suddenly flew through the air, was stopped facefirst by a hangar wall and stayed there headfirst.

"Ship, open the hangar bulkhead."

"Opening Hangar bulkhead."

She stormed inside the hangar and aimed her shotgun at him.

"One wrong move and you're dead. Stand up and put your hands up in the air."

The intruder stood up and lifted his hands above his head.

"Now take your helmet off with one hand!"

He slowly turned around and took his helmet off.

The face under the helmet was young, surrounded by brown hair and certainly not male.
The "weapon" she dropped was a black bag laying beside her feet, probably containing everything she possessed.

"Are we already in Sol?" was the only thing she could speak, then she fainted and lost her consciousness.



2nd part:


Ria woke up lying on a cold, hard metal table, to a painfully bright light shining into her eyes. Her hands and chest hurt like hell and, confused, she blinked a few times before she realized she was looking into a bright lamp. She looked around trying to recognize her surroundings. Slowly her eyes adjusted to the bright light and the contours of the room began to sharpen. She was in a white, sterile-looking room with a lot of small locked cabinets and well-ordered shelves.
A sudden deep voice behind her said in a curious tone: "I think she's awake.". Ria winced and tried to move her hand to shield her eyes against the bright light, but her arm didn't want to move. Perplexed, she lifted her head and saw the blurred outlines of leather handcuffs around her wrists and ankles. Another, probably female, voice said something but she couldn't understand it.
Slowly she started panicking and, totally focussed on breaking free from the handcuffs, she didn't notice the woman behind her until she pressed something against the side of her neck. She felt a sudden sting and her head fell back onto the thin pillow. The last thing she saw before she drifted back into the sleep was the blurry face of a blonde woman leaning over her.

„Why did you stun her again? And could you switch the camera back on?“, Derry asked while slowly going through his notebook. As someone who helped creating the Standard Operating Procedure, he noted every step Rebecca took when dealing with the stowaway, since it was a new situation. Rebecca covered the young stowaway with an isolating blanket, then turned back to the monitor displaying Derry, Noah and a few other rats who had heard of the incident and were free.

„Ship, activate the communication camera in the infirmary.“

One of the rats in the background grumbled: „Damn, you covered her up again.“, and earned a sharp look from Derry and Noah.

„I stunned her because a few of her ribs are cracked and I don't want her to break them having a panic attack. I'll go to the cargo hold, check if the equipment and limpets are still intact. Could you stay here in case she wakes up? She should wake up in around 2 hours but I don't want to take a risk.“

Derry looked at the young girl lying on the table, approximately 1,70 cm tall, a slender build, brown hair and sixteen years old at best. Then he said, „And what shall I do if she wakes up?“

„Calm her down. You're excellent at calming afraid people down. I'll take a com-unit with me so just say if something happens and I’ll come back up from the cargohold.“, Rebecca answered. Then she dimmed the bright lights and left the medical station.

The next time Ria awoke was much softer than the last time. Her head didn't hurt as much because the light was dimmed to a minimum and the only stronger source of light was a monitor somewhere to her right. The metal table was still uncomfortable but at least it had warmed up a bit, thanks to the blanket someone had put over her. She still felt the cuffs around her wrists and ankles, and tried to move with them, but they were as tight as before.

Suddenly there was a change of light from the monitor behind her and a deep male voice asked: „Hey, how are you?“

She tried to move her head to see more of the monitor but it wasn't possible to turn a neck that way without breaking it.

„Uhm, well, my chest hurts and it feels like the palms of my hands are skinned and I'm tied onto a metal table after getting threatened with a gun and got stunned by someone and I don't know if that someone will throw me out of the next airlock or sell me into slavery, but apart from that, I'm fine. Ah, and my head hurts, too.“

Before he could answer she heard the sound of the door and someone coming in. Her head turned around to see who was entering the room and she saw a tall blonde woman standing in front of the door. Ria was pretty sure it was the same woman who stunned her before. She decided to remain silent and observe the woman as closely as she could. Ria estimated the woman’s height was around 185 cm and her age somewhere around 25 years, she looked athletic, was relatively pretty with her blonde long hair and her symmetrical face, and carried a dangerous-looking pistol in a shoulder holster.

The woman walked through the room until she was behind her head, somewhere near the monitor, then she said: „Thanks for calling me up, Derry. I owe you one.“

Ria felt how the woman grabbed her metal table, turned it around and tilted it until she could see the monitor without problems. There were two men on the monitor - one older brown haired man and bearded with warm looking eyes, and a younger one with red hair who looked worriedly at the blonde woman standing in front of her. Ria decided to call the bearded man "Beardy" and the younger one "Ginger". The blonde woman turned her head to the bearded man and asked: „Shall we get started?“

Beardy just nodded and asked Ria: „What's your name?“

Ria thought one second about giving them a wrong name, then she decided to cause as little trouble as possible: „My name is Ria. What are your names?“

„And your surname?“

„... Finn.“

The blonde woman looked at Beardy again, but before she could say anything Ginger smiled and said: „My name is Noah. The one besides me is named Derry and I think you've already met Becci. She was the one who treated the palms of your hands and your ribcage, and she's the Commander of the ship you're currently on. May I ask where you're from?“

Ria carefully asked: „Why do you want to know that?“

Noah kindly answered: „Because you seem very young and we would like to notify your family about your whereabouts.“

„Thanks, but I can take care of myself. If you let me off the ship, I can search for my relatives and I'm sure they will cover the expenses I caused.“

Becci raised one eyebrow and asked: „Where exactly do you think are we?“

Confused Ria answered: „In Sol - my friend told me he would put the limpet on a ship going to Sol. He gave me narcotics to calm me down and keep me quiet for 8 hours during the trip.“

„Well, your friend lied to you. The Dark Runner isn't going to the Sol system.“

„Oh … where is it going then?“

Derry looked at Rebecca with an expression Ria couldn't identify and then he just said: „How much do you know about the space beyond the frontier?“

„Only that it's mainly unexplored and extremely big.“

Ria took a moment to realize what he implied with that question. Then she shouted out very loudly and in a panicking tone: „This ship is going beyond the frontier? Into the unexplored space? Are you kidding me? Let me out at the next station!“

Rebecca started calmly speaking again, „Unfortunately, that is not possible since we already passed the frontier and the twilight zone. This mission is planned for 2 months out. With another person I probably have to shorten it because of the amount of food I have on board, but it will still take longer than a month. I have a schedule to keep.“

Noah started speaking again: „To shorten it: Rebecca is part of a rescue operation out there and since you are already more than fivethousand lightyears out, there is no way she could turn around, let you out at a station and fly back while keeping her schedule. The limpets and equipment in her cargo hold are extremely important for the rescue. Without them, there is no point in trying.“
 
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3rd Part:


"And what are you going to do now?"

"Well either you cooperate or you stay on that medical table until I meet up with a explorer headed towards the bubble." answered Rebecca.

"The bubble?" Ria asked with a confused look on her face. "What the hell is the bubble?"

"The human inhabited sectors of space are the bubble." Noah answered brief. "But that's not relevant. The question was what is happening to you now. Since we are not in command it's up to Rebecca to decide it. But I would like to inform your parents about your situation as soon as possible. Could you tell me now the system and planet you're from?"

"Nope. I'm still caring for myself."

"Doesn't matter." Rebecca grabbed Ria's bag and poured the content onto the metal countertop beneath the monitor displaying Derry and Noah. A set of worn clothes and a spare set came out. An ID and a creditcard fell out of the spareset onto the plastic floor of the medical station as Rebecca put it onto the countertop. She picked it up and looked carefully over the listed informations.

"Maria Finn. Nearly 17 years old, born in 3285, lives with her family on Yimanbim A3. Derry you were there quite often, weren't you? Do you have friends in the system?"

"Ugh, don't remember me about that time. But yeah, I still have friends there who owe me a few favors."

"Could you request additional informations about her and her family?"

"I'll ask if some of them can get their hands on that information. You owe me for that."

"Damn, I already owe you a lot." Rebecca smiled towards the camera then she turned back to Ria.

"Why do you check my family? It's not like they sneaked upon your ship!"

"That's pretty simple. The last person I checked who ensured me: "There is no way someone's after me." got shot to hell by two bounty hunters. And I'm not talking about the kind of bounty hunters who care about casualties. They bombed the shop of his father with an eagle when he was in and send vultures after me when I tried to get away. I barely escaped and the repairs ate nearly the whole profit from the contract. They weren't even after him or his dad. They wanted to send a message to his shady uncle who apparently angered one of the bigger crime syndicates. Yimanbim is close to the federal-imperial border and there is a lot going on in the shadows. Especially smuggling goods, slaves and refugees. That business can easily kill you."

"Rebecca, one of my contacts answered. I'll send you the informations as soon as I get them."

"Thanks, Derry. How much did it cost you?"

"Nothing. I just had to use a few favors. It could take a while until the background check run through, we'll go and grab something to eat. Maybe you should do that, too."

As he mentioned it, Ria felt how hungry she was.

"Yeah, see you later, Derry." Rebecca answered and turned off the monitor.

"Could you tell me the date?" she asked Rebecca in a friendly tone.

"Third january 3302. 22:40 Earth Standard Time."

As Ria realized she had been stunned in that limpet for more than 48 hours, she slowly started panicking again.

"Hey, everything alright? You look pretty pale."

Ria slowly remembered how she woke up in the narrow internal of the limpet, how she waited and waited and waited, feeling the hunger growing stronger, how the interior of the container seemed to get smaller and smaller.

She turned her head to the right and focused on the pain in the right hand. The pain became more and more familiar and suddenly she was back in the limpet, ramming her hands into the limpet wall above her head until she felt a sudden jolt and a short fall. Her hope grew again when she saw a small strife of light and she kept pushing against the limpet wall with the last bit of power left in her arms and legs left. Then the cap of the limpet went off and she crawled into the bright light. Her eyes adjusted to the light and she forced herself to walk towards the bulkhead a couple of meters in front of her. The bulkhead opened automatically as she approached it and she supported herself on the console next to it leaving a bloody handprint on it. She looked at the palm of her hand and noticed her torn gloves and the dripping blood. As she walked through the bulkhead, she felt something abrasive on her cheek. She moved her hand towards her face and felt something furry and vibrating in front of it.

She closed her eyes, opened them again and looked into the warm, green eyes of a purring cat licking over the dried tears on her cheeks. Her handcuffs were opened so she wiped the rests of her tears from her eyes.
Rebecca sat on the countertop in front of the monitor, holding a injector in her hand. Besides her stood a tablet with two portions of pasta.

"Is your panic attack over?"

"I hope so."

"Before you start drooling, yes that food is for you and yes you can eat it now. That's why I brought it here."

"You don't seem to be very upset about me starting to panic randomly."

"I've seen worse panic attacks for far less than realizing how close you were to death. First eat something. I can imagine you're pretty hungry after being in there for more than 48 hours."

"Yeah ... Did you put the cat onto me?"

"No, she came and jumped up by herself. I guess she likes you somehow."
 
The Sun Diver rattled and shook as the bulk of The Dark Runner pulled overhead and cleared the queue. CMDR Dio shook his head, thinking to himself "Good luck commander, chasing stalled ships out in the dark... Noble madness..." In truth he admired the commanders who would go on such a journey. Making a mental note to follow up on the Dark Runners progress he punched in his request to launch.
 
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Ria was still eating her pasta when the big monitor started to blink. “Commander Kavinsky calling Commander Rebecca Hail. Commander Kavinsky calling Commander Rebecca Hail.”

Rebecca were standing on the other side of the room with her back to the monitor, cleaning and sorting medical equipment. She turned around to the monitor but before she accepted the call she took the tablet from Ria and covered her chest up with the blanket again.

“You may have a bandage around most of your chest, but there’s still no need for him to see more than necessary.”

She turned back to the monitor, then pressed the little button to accept the incoming call.

The man on the monitor was dark haired, dark eyed and had certainly japanese roots. His eyes looked strangely red and Ria noticed a diagonal scar on his right forehead and another thin scar going through his eyebrow.

“Yo, I heard ya need a package to be shipped back to the bubble?”

Rebecca answered: “Yes, kind of. I found a stowaway in one of my limpets and she’s pretty uncomfortable with being several thousand lightyears out of the bubble. Additional to that I don’t really know anything about her and her family except for living on a waterworld near the imperial-federal border. I would be really relieved if I could get her from board as soon as possible.”


“A stowaway and you haven’t shot her? Wow, are you getting weak? Are you really the same Rebecca who shot people in front of their kids?”

“Paul, stop it.”

Paul just laughed.

.“I can’t believe you’ve fought in all those warzones, walked over all those dead people, killed all those civilians and now you’re getting doubts over a stowaway? That’s not like you at all. Flush the flotsam out of an airlock and be done with her, it’s what happens to stowaways. Or you could make some healthy profit you see I know some people who ...”

“SHUT UP!”

Ria confused looked at Rebecca who looked seriously angered as she pressed the “End Call” button at the screen. Pauls laughter seemed to echo through the room and an awkward silence fell over the room.

“What did he mean with: “... shot people in front of their kids?”” Ria asked carefully.

“He meant what he said. You don’t need to know more.”

She turned around from the screen and walked towards the door.

“And what are we doing now? Are you sending me home with him?”

“Do you want to?”

“Well … no, he doesn’t seem like a friendly person.”

“That’s because he isn’t a friendly person. But he would fly out here and save our lives if we run out of fuel. I guess you’ll have to stay here with me until I head back to the bubble. Before you fell unconscious you asked if we are already in Sol. Why do you want to go to Sol?”

"Because the life in Sol is far better then on some imperial borderworld, where no one cares what the nobles do with their subjecs. I heard the Sol system is by far the safest system out there and you can easily live in the heart of the federation where no slavery or 2-class society exists."

"Wow, that's one big load of fed propaganda."

"What?"

"I don't know who told you that, but the Sol system is as dangerous as every other system if you walk in the wrong street. Besides the cost of living there is ridiculous high, especially on Earth, the "Cradle of mankind". And I wouldn't take the No-Slavery part for granted."

Her PSA made a sound and she stopped at the door of the medical station to look at it.

"Here is the information I requested. I'll read through it, then I’ll decide what to do with you."

She left the room and the door closed behind her.

Ria laid back on the medical table and decided to take a nap.

Back in the cockpit Rebecca sat in her pilot seat and Derry summarized the info about Maria's family in some sentences.

"She is clean, Becci, I've checked her distant relatives too. Nothing. Her mother is in the administration staff of a swimming city, her father has a small surface-to-orbit shuttle service in the same town. Their vests are so white, it's already suspicious again, but they reported her missing two days ago. About her: She attends a school in the city of her parents with the focus on economics. A real model pupil, good grades, never had any trouble with the teachers, although she can argue a lot with her classmates. I guess they know how to teach you respect for the authorities in the empire."

"Yeah, alright I'll untie her and then give her something to do. Maybe you should head to Yimanbim and calm her parents down. I don't want to be charged with kidnapping when I get back."

"Can't I send Noah to calm them down ..."

"You can, but I would be very grateful if you could do it yourself." Rebecca smiled.

Derry sighed. "Damn, you owe me really A LOT!"

"Thaaaaaaaaaaaanks, Derry." Rebecca pulled herself out of the seat, turned around and walked out of the cockpit. As she walked down the corridor to the medbay she noticed she still had the auto injectors around her legs. She made a stop at her cabin, removed the injectors and laid them onto the bed where her armor and shotgun laid. Then she locked her cabin and pushed along to the medical station.
 
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Rebecca removed the leather cuffs from Rias feet and she was finally able to stand up, just to feel her legs break away under her weight. Rebecca grabbed her arm and supported her until she was able to stand, Ria walked in pain towards the chair in front of the countertop.

"Not so fast. Your ribcage is still injured. Give me a moment to get some painkillers."

Rebecca turned around and opened a medicine cabinet behind her. Ria immediately noticed the massive pistol holstered under her shoulder. Rebecca grabbed into the cabinet and turned to Ria with a shrink wrapped syringe. Then she grabbed Rias arm, pressed the syringe quickly into her elbow veins and the painkillers kicked in in an instant.

"Just stay here, I'll get a pilot suit for you. You shouldn't walk around in underwear for too long."

Rebecca left the medical station again and Ria sat down onto the chair next to the countertop.
The terminal on the countertop activated when she touched its screen and was unlocked, much to Rias surprise, then her nosiness took over.
She swiped over the keyboard and the terminal greeted her with a warm: "Welcome back, Commander Hail.".
Ria took the mental note: "Surname is Hail.", then she proceeded to nose around on the desktop.
The first thing she noticed was the grey symbol on the black background. A sword framed by two curved wings with three stars above the handle, beneath it was written in big white letters: "Ares Company. Fire with fire. War with war. Blood with blood."
Ria saw several files on the desktop and tried to open them.
"Mission reports."

"Please enter the password: _", the warm voice immediately answered.

"Contract Details."

"Please enter the password: _"

"Communication."

"Please enter the password: _"

"Active list."

"Please enter the password: _"

"On-going contracts."

"Please enter the password: _"

"Medical reports."

"Accessing medical reports."

The list of medical reports was extremely long and started in 3260. The last entry was in November 3295.
She looked over the entry names and one from 3293 catched her attention.

"Access: 3293/7/16:Turook/Hail."

A vast wall of text filled the screen written in medical jargon. Ria didn't understand a single word so she scrolled down the wall. Another link catched her attention.

"Access: Attached Pictures."

The first picture showed a completely naked, horribly injured man on the metal table she laid on. His right leg was completely torn off and he missed half of his left. A bloody something hang between his legs and he had horrible burns all over his belly and chest. Several deep holes where in his chest and he had only a stump where his left arm should be. The worst sight was his missing underjaw and the number of tubes leading into his trachea.
Ria had to use all her willpower to avoid puking out the pasta she ate earlier.
The next picture was not as horrible as the previous but still bad.
It undoubtedly showed Rebecca, but in a terrible condition. She missed her right hand and three fingers on her left. She still had all her limbs, but her right leg looked twisted and horribly broken. Her chest was horribly burned and she had a deep wound near her belly button. The worst injury was undoubtedly the deep bloody hole where her right eye once was.
She skipped the remaining pictures and opened "Report to Colonel Ares." link. Another wall of text blinked up in front of her.

"Yesterday, on the 16 July Recruits Turook and Hail patrolled sector seven of the DMZ when they were approached by 8 - 10 children aged between 4-10 years. Although they were ordered to shoot every person ignoring the verbal warnings, they only made warning shots. Soon Turook was surrounded by begging kids while Hail moved slowly back to avoid being encircled. Apparently one or more of the children wore a larger amount of explosives spicked with improvised shrapnel, like iron bolts or nuts. Due to the backup request made by Hail earlier, Reinforcements arrived shortly after the explosion occurred. In cooperation with the GSAR and due to the medical emergency measures accomplished by the field medics, Hail was stabilized on site, while Turook died because of his severe injuries during a 19-hour long emergency surgery. Hail makes most likely a full recovery, if we replace her lost eye and body parts with artificial ones. I highly advise these measures with reference to her performance evaluation. Turooks funeral ceremony will be held on the ..."

Ria sat back into the seat and exhaled.

"Who the hell is she?" Ria thought for herself.

"Have you seen enough or do you want to spy around a bit more?" a cold voice behind her asked.
 
I find it easier to create the storylines in Word, and then copy and paste them into the post. The only problem I encountered was that sometimes a few words have the spacing removed, so "test word" would become "testword". I can live with that though.

I'm not writing directly in the forum :) Mostly I use Google Documents and Paste Bin.
 
Rebecca stood behind her, a pilotsuit in one hand, the other on the pistol in her shoulderholster.

"Uhm ... I just wanted to ..."

Rebecca interrupted her angrily.
"You wanted what? Being nosy?"

Ria remained silent and looked onto the floor.

"If you abuse my trust again, you'll stay in the stasispod for the rest of the trip. Understood?"

Ria nodded and Rebecca threw the pilotsuit towards her.
Calmed down she said:
"I can understand if you want to know more about the person you're dependent from. Especially in your situation. But do you know what risk I'm taking by not blowing you out the next airlock?"

Ria looked up to her and noticed that the blue colour of her right eye was a shade darker than the left.
With a shaky, slightly desperate voice she asked:
"Do you really understand the situation I'm in? I'm thousands of lightyears from where I wanted to go because some idiot loaded me onto the wrong ship. The only time I ever flew with a spaceship was with a crappy hauler from Yimanbim to Fuelum. I know nothing about spaceships or traveling in space."

"Believe it or not, but I was once in a similiar situation. Alone, with a lot of unknown people in a ship far away from my homeworld."
Rebecca said with a serious voice, then she started to grin.
"Well, I have to admit you have balls. Hiding in a limpet in Fuelum. You're probably the first person who pulled this off. But you shouldn't do it again if you don't want to end up in another ships fuel tank."

Ria just stared at her.
"FUEL TANK?"

"Yeah, I use these limpets mostly to transfer fuel to other ships. That's what Fuel Rats do."

Ria just looked at her with a questioning face.
"Fuel RATS."

"You really don't know a thing about space travel, do you?"
Rebecca asked with a slightly amused expression.
"Well it's basically a breakdown service for spaceships. They run out of fuel, we search and rescue them."

"And why rats?"

"Don't know, sorry. I'm not in for that long."

"Well, you obviously didn't start in the business of saving people."
Ria looked at the monitor with the pictures.

Rebeccas smile disappeared and after a while she said:
"Yeah, it was a long way from this ..." she pointed at the picture, "... to this.", then onto the Fuel Rats badge on her pilotsuit.

"How did you survive those injuries?"

"We had a pretty good doctor. He was a skilled former plastic surgeon, who f*cked up one of his patients and had to flee. I had a sh*tton of luck."

"How old are you exactly?"

"27. That was nine years ago, shortly after I signed the contract with the Ares Company."

"How did you end up there?"

"That's a story I normally don't tell. But I think I should tell it to you when we consider the circumstances."

Rebecca pushed herself onto the side of the medical table.

"Well, I was born in 3275 on Ehecatl A 7, that's actually not that far from Yimanbim, as the third of five siblings. I had an older brother, an older sister, younger twin brothers and the youngest sister. My childhood until my 14th birthday was relatively normal. My parents had high positions in government and economy, so we weren't poor."

Her voice sounded sadder with every second.

"Ehecatl was a pretty unstable system around 3289 and the tensions between the federal and independent factions soon developed into a war and the three federal factions formed the United Democracy to fight against the three rebelling independent factions. When the Federation denied the request of military assistance because "large military operations near the imperial border could be seen as a provocation.", the rebels started taking out VIPs of the UD and landed on Ehecatl A 7. My parents died when a rebel ship fired two missiles into our house, killing everyone except for my oldest brother, my youngest sister and me. My brother found me and my sister in the hospital, put us into his car and drove to the capitol. We lived there as refugees for almost a year. Somehow he avoided getting drafted into the army and managed to make enough money to keep us alive. When they finally found him, he had pneunomia. They couldn't take him, since he was ill, so they forced me to take his place. The officer didn't care about me being not even 15, he just wanted to meet his quota. It was the last time I saw my brother and my sister."

"They draft children into the army?" Ria asked with an unbelieving and stunned expression on her face.

"The high-command doesn't really care where they get their soldiers from. I told you that the Federation is a lot different from what their propaganda is jabbering."

"Okay, and then?"

The sad tone was replaced with an uncaring one.

"Well, I got four weeks basic training then deployment alongside a newly formed platoon against the guerillas in the hinterland. If they had deployed me to the frontlines, I wouldn't sit here. Still in the first week we lost nearly a quarter of our soldiers and I really don't know how I managed to stay sane during the first skirmishes since I just sat there with my hands over my head, crying out of fear. Since the war looked bad for the UD they began drafting everyone over 16 not working in the war industry. They sacrificed millions on the frontlines to stall the advance of the rebels. Somehow I survived two years of guerilla warfare and got send to marksman training for "excellent shooting performance". Then the rebels wiped out the capitol to end the war, the federation intervened, the tables turned and our platoon got deployed to the frontlines."


<OOC>
Normally my stuff is edited by someone who is a native englishspeaker.
If some passages aren't understandable, please leave me a note.
Thanks for reading :D
</OOC>
 
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10 years ago, Ehecatl A7, 100 Kilometres north of New Philipsburg.

Rebecca sat in the backwards end of the loading area, holding her scoped rifle with both hands, as the truck slowly advanced over the destroyed highways towards New Philipsburg. She looked over the Anti-air tank behind her truck, along the rest of the endless seeming convoy.

Truck, Truck, Truck, Anti-air tank, Truck, Truck, Truck, Anti-air tank, … 200 trucks per convoy, 40 soldiers per truck, 5 convoys with nearly 40.000 men and women to reinforce the frontlines in New Philipsburg.

The young recruits who were issued to her platoon to replace the men they lost during the attack on the guerilla camp talked about politics and strategies to win the war.

„ … if we get the control over the New Philipsburg Spaceport and it's orbital defenses, we’ll control the whole northern hemispherical airspace! They can't bring in supplies and if we take out their jamming transmitters, the Federal Navy can assist our advance with orbital bombardments. I want to make them pay for what they did to Point Sterling!“

Four months ago the rebels on Ehecatl A7 decided to wipe out the capitol of the United Democracy, Point Sterling, with two atomic bombs. Nearly 10 million people and almost the whole leadership lost their lives. But their plan backfired. Instead of breaking the moral of the United Democracies army and advancing further in the northern hemisphere, they encountered fierce resistance. What was left of the United Democracies propaganda department turned the tables and used the attack to incite the soldiers on the frontlines. The bombs killed a federal senator coordinating the evacuation of refugees, too, and the federal senate decided to intervene into the conflict by deploying the federal navy to the system.

Not even two weeks later the federal navy blockaded the system, took back some of the stations and outposts in the system and began landing marines on Ehecatl A 7. With the support of the federation, the United Democracy began to make territorial gains again and pushing the rebels back to the south. 5 weeks ago the United Democracy began advancing onto the last stronghold of the rebels on the northern continents, the former 20 million metropolis, New Philipsburg. After an intense tank battle in the flat lands surrounding the town, they tried to advance into the city, but the rebels resistance was too strong to advance and secure the town. Now five weeks later, they resorted to carpet bombing, artillery barrages and human wave tactics. The districts under the control of the UD were completely destroyed and the body count on the frontline grew higher and higher.

„Don't get to excited for that bombardement. They would have taken these jammers out a long time ago, if it would be easy. And these orbital bombardments tend to hit the wrong people.“

Roland, a former teacher and veteran of the platoon, sounded quite angry when he answered.

„Do you want to say our people up there can't aim? You should trust them a bit more.“

„Yeah, look where „Trust the feds“ have brought us. I don't think you've realized we're on our way to the bloodiest f*cking battle in this whole sh*t war.“

One of the sergeants sitting near the driver cab stood up and shouted: „CUT THE CR*P! BOTH OF YOU!“ He pointed at the new recruit. „You leave the decisionmaking to the high command.“ Then he pointed at Roland. „And you're stopping that demoralizing talk now.“

„Hey, Sarge, how far are we from New Philipsburg?“, Rebecca asked.

„Around 95 kilometres. Why?“

„I can hear them.“

The whole truck went silent. Under the sound of truck tires hitting potholes and moving over filled bomb craters, the soldiers were able to hear the chatter of the men and women in the truck in front of them. And under that chatter there was a sound like muffled thunder far in the distance.

„W … What's that?“

Roland answered in a worried tone: „You're hearing the rear artillery batteries.“, then in a more sarcastic tone: „But I'm glad that the hearing senses of our battle b*tch are as sharp as ever.“

Suddenly the turret mounted double railgun of the Anti-air tank behind them started moving, aligning to something in the sky.

The sergeant shouted quickly: „COVER YOUR EARS.“

Not even ten seconds later the double railgun began firing projectiles with an insane speed into the sky. The soldiers who reached their ear protection were lucky, the others covered their ears with their hands to protect them from the sonic booms caused by the supersonic projectiles.

Rebecca put in her ear protection when the tank stopped firing to reload, then she stood up and grabbed her thermal imager. She switched it to binocular mode and looked up into the sky.

Several kilometres over the ground a wing of six Eagles swarmed around an Anaconda. One of the Eagles was hit by an anti-air round, started spinning and the pilot ejected with his emergency pod.

"Looks like a bunch of Commanders from the pilots federation try to engage a federal bomber."
Then with a mocking laugh:
"The AAs are ripping them apart. I bet they're not going to try something like this again."

She watched the sky until the AAs stopped firing, then she put down her imager and sat back onto the foldaway seats mounted on the side of the loading area.

The trucks rumbled south over the shattered highway, kilometre after kilometre and slowly the sun began to set. Rebecca almost missed the transition from the hills to the gigantic flatlands around New Philipsburg in the incipient dark. From her seat at the end of the loading area she had a good view over the flatlands and what she saw with the last rays of the sun scared her.

Scattered throughout the flatlands there were thousands of wrecks. Not only tanks but also APCs, trucks, spaceships and planes. The federation had paid a high price for the advance on the city.

She turned her head and noticed a green shimmer from the driver cabin. Apparently the driver activated his night vision.
With every kilometre, the thunder in the distance grew louder.

Her eyes wandered around the loading area and she realized that most of her comrades had their ear protection on and tried to sleep for the last few hours. Only a few soldiers were awake and tried to distract themselves somehow. Even Kenneth, who had been assigned to her and was primarily responsible for carrying the heavy anti-material rifle plus the according ammunition, tried to sleep.

Suddenly the convoy slowed down and stopped. Some soldiers woke up and the veterans immediately grabbed and checked their weapon, then turned to the lieutenant. He had already stood up and spoke with the men in the driver cabin through the small window.

"All clear. We're waiting for the second convoy. They should be here already but apparently they're running late."

The soldiers went back to sleep, while the sergeant and the lieutenant walked past her and descended to the highway. The lieutenant walked around the truck, probably headed for the command vehicle four trucks earlier. Her sergeant just lit up a cigarette.

"Requesting permission to leave the truck, Sergeant Baeza."

"Granted."

She grabbed her rifle and jumped down to the highway, where she shouldered it.

"Have you slept, Hail?"

"No, not since Drostin."

"You should. I doubt you can in New Philipsburg with all the noise they're making."

"How's that AMR you got assigned?"

"I had no chance to test it, Sir. The only 15mm I fired was during marksman training a year ago. I'll prefer my 10mm rifle. It's not as heavy and massive as the AMR."

"The first thing you're doing tomorrow is to ask for the shooting range. I'll notify the armourer to issue you ammunition for it. If you have to get a feel for it in combat, you're faster dead than Leman when he tripped and hit that landmine with his head."

"Yes, Sarge."

They walked about 10 meters to the edge of the highway, then she stopped and looked up into sky. She noticed a lot of bright, fast moving points between the stars flying in groups.

"Are those the ships of the blockade?"

"Yes. Can I ask you something?"

"Of course, Sergeant."

He stared a while up to the stars, then he said:
"You started fighting in this war before you were 15. Now you're nearly 18. But what are you going to do when this war ends?"

Rebecca remained silent.

"I don't know ... I honestly never thought about it. I think I never truly believed that I would survive. My whole family is dead, most of the people I know are either fighting or have left the planet. I don't know what to do after the war, I always wanted to be a vet, but couldn’t even complete school. I guess war is the only thing I’m really good at."

"Do you want my opinion?"

"Let me hear it."

He smiled, then said.
"Maybe you should go up there. I heard the Pilots Federation offers a good education additional to the pilot training. You can certainly live good as an independent commander, even if it's hard in the beginning."

"Commander Rebecca Hail." She waited a few seconds. "That really doesn't sound too bad. I'll keep that option in mind. Thanks, sergeant."
She smiled, then she turned around and went back to the truck.

"No problem, Private."

Back in the truck she tried to make her foldaway seat as comfortable as possible, then she put on her ear protection and tried to sleep.
She didn't notice how the second convoy arrived half an hour later and how the truck slowly began to move.
 
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She woke up, when someone touched her knee. She opened her eyes and saw Kenneth leaning over her and saying something. She took her earplugs out to ask him, but she barely could hear her own voice over the artillery fire and as she looked over the flatlands she saw one artillery battery after another, firing their rounds into the sky.

She leaned towards Kenneth and shouted:
"Kenneth? What's going on?"

With a confused look he signaled her to put up her headset. She put it on and the headset immediately filtered out the loud artillery fire in the background.

"What's going on, Kenneth?" she asked again.

"Gear up. Five kilometres to the suburbs and another ten to the base camp." he shouted back.

She looked over the loading area and saw how her comrades were already busy with preparing and checking their gear.
Roland and the other machinegunners were busy with checking their exoskeletons and armor and the recruits were busy with checking their personal armor, assaultrifles and with syncing up their targetting and life monitoring systems.
Then she looked to Kenneth. He already put his armor on and was now checking the new antimaterialrifle.

Quickly she started with her own preparations. Her armor as marksman was lighter than the standard infantery armor for improved agility. Also she and Kenneth had no full helmet like the other soldiers. Instead she had only her headset and a protective visor covering her eyes. She synced up her targetting computer with the scope of her rifle, then with her visor.
A lot of numbers popped up in her field of vision, giving info about current wind speed, humidity, gravity, temperature and other factor.
After she checked the gear with Kenneth for completeness, she switched her headset into voice activated mode.

"Archer 1 and 2, gear checked and ready." She said while she pressed the butt of her marksmanrifle into her shoulder.

"Copy. Two kilometres to the suburbs. Keep your eyes open."

She looked over to Roland who helped one of his gunners with the ammunition belt leading from the ammunition container on his back to the machinegun with fixing it on the inner side of the right arm.
He closed his helmet, then he stated over the com channel: "All Exos ready for combat."

Shortly after she heard the voice of sergeant Baeza: "The recruits are ready."

"Alright, were entering the suburbs in 20 seconds. It's possible that we encounter enemies so stay alert."

The transition into the suburbs was shocking. The federation hadn't left a single house standing. The complete suburb with no exception was black from the soot and smoke. The once colourful module houses were burned to uneven piles of molten metal as far as they could see.


"What the f*ck?" was the only thing a new recruit exclaimed, the rest of the truck remained silent.

They drove past a subway entrance, which produced dense cloud of smokes.

"What happened here?" Kenneth asked with a brittle voice.

Roland and his Exo-troopers remained silent and stared at the burned districts of the city.

The lieutenant looked up from his reports and said:
"They burned the whole area down because the conventional bombardements had no effect and the jamming transmitters prohibit a orbital bombardement. The rebels took every single point defence from every single ship and outfitter in the space port and put them up in the unshielded suburbs to protect their front positions. The point defences shot every single bomb down regardless of the kind. So the high command got creative and came back to weapons which are several centuries old. They used highly incendiary substances called Napalm and white phosphorus against the suburbs. The point defences destroyed the bombs and their contents spread over the whole suburbs burning everything to ashes. Some of those fires in the subway and in the huge tunnel system of New Philipsburg are still burning after almost 5 weeks."

"And what happened to all the civilians in the suburbs? There is no way you can evacuate such a huge population in such a short time." Sergeant Baeza asked haltingly.

"The report says, most of them fled into the tunnels of New Philipsburg to save their lifes buuuut ..."

The whole truck remained silent and stared at him.

"... that's the official report written for the federal senate. And they don't like to hear about the intentional burning of civilians. Especially not when the PR department has difficulties with finding reasons to justify their little war out here."

Roland looked to Baeza.
"What do you think, burns down there?" He said, while pointing onto the columns of smoke climbing out of the subway entrances into the sky.

The lieutenant stood up before Baeza could answer.
"Okay, listen up. The orders have changed. The convoy is driving directly to the assembly point of the fifth assault unit. ETA is 45 minutes. The attack is starting in 4 hours. Eat one of your MREs and check your gear again. That's all. DISMISSED."


6 hours later, main road 5 of New Philipsburg, two kilometres from the assembly point


The earth shook as the doublecannons of the gigantic Ozymandias siegetanks, spearheading the fifth assault unit, opened fire and the shields of the city district laying ahead gleamed up blue as the shells hit it. The gunfire and the explosions coming from the sides of the mainroad indicated that the infantry advancing into the labyrinthine streets of the district encountered heavy resistance.

Rebecca pressed herself against the wall behind two other soldiers, tightened her grip around the pistol handle, then looked to Sergeant Baeza and the soldiers behind him on the other side of the door and waited for the signal. Sergeant Baeza gave a hand signal to one of the exotroopers. The following machine gun fire was deafening even through her ear protection and the bright muzzle flashes hurt in her eyes. What was left of the door hung lacerated in the three hinges and the walls of the following floor was covered in bullet holes.

"GO." Baeza shouted the signal and the soldiers stormed the building, carefully cross checking the corridor. Two muffled blasts echoed through the corridors of the building, then gun shots.

"Team Two in. Six Romeos down." came through the static noise of the radio, then "Team Three in. No Romeo down. Have casualties, need backup and ..." The rest of the message was interrupted by heavy gunfire.

"Team Four, Team Six, Exos One and Two, go backup Team Three. Team One and Five secure the stairwell, Seven, Eight and Archer secure the elevator." shouted the Lieutenant over more muffled gunshots.

The first floor was secured faster than expected and the casualties kept down to one dead and two wounded. Rebecca and Kenneth stood in front of the elevator door, which was pried open by a bald, redbearded soldier and two of the new recruits with a crowbar. Finally the gap between the two door leafes was wide enough to insert a spreader. With a loud whir it pressed the elevator doors apart.

He took a bunch of glowsticks out of his bag, bent them and threw them into the elevator. Several seconds passed before he saw how they hit the ground. Then he grabbed his flashlight and shone down the hoistway.

"Looks like the cabin is several stories beneath us. That's good, now you don't have a barrier above your heads when you climb up there and I don't have to mess around with the cables holding the counterweight."

"Aw man, now we really have to climb 25 stories through a hoistway ...", Kenneth jokingly complained.

"Well, that's the reason why you are carrying the heavy stuff.", Rebecca answered in a sarcastic tone.

"Oh yeah, before I forget it. Use these when you have to put people down." Redbeard pulled out two silencers from his bag. "If there are only half as many Romeos up there as I think there are then you really don't want to attract their attention. And be quiet while you climb up, we don't want it to get ugly."

"Oho, The Beard is sensitive today." Kenneths sarcastic answer came immediately.

"No, but do you know how much work it is to clean up an idiot who got shot and then fell fifteen stories?" He answered while he hooked the snap links into the wall bars next to the elevator door.

"I guess you have to add cleaning lady right after badass bald bearded butcher in your resume."

"Enough with the joking, Private, my job is done. Two snap links for each of you. Happy hunting." He handed the safety line to Rebecca.

"Yes, Specialist Beard, Sir." Kenneth answered while he saluted.

"Drop the damned Sir, Private. You know how easily it is to p*ss the lieutenant off with this kind of sh*t."

"Are you two done with the flirting?" Rebecca sounded impatient when she spoke up.

Rebecca put the silencer on her pistol, then she grabbed her equipment and hooked herself in the safety line. Kenneth did the same, but his equipment was heavier than hers.
Then they entered the elevator and began climbing. Beard stood in the frame and looked past them, then he said.

"And, don't die up there, okay?"

"We'll see what we can do." Kenneth winked as he answered. "See you later."

"See you later." Then he removed the spreader from the elevator door and darkness fell over the two soldiers hanging in the hoistway.
 
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