Futuristic Unconventional Cargo (MAIN)

[Hazmat44]

Ford Sullivan sprinted through the crowd, dodging past startled passersby as he ran. Hazarding a quick glance behind him, he made out the flashing blue-and-red helmets of the police, only a short distance behind him.

At six foot four, he had to keep his black hair shorn close to his head, to keep opponents from grabbing onto it. Dressed in only a tanktop and his boxing shorts, he had to strip the constrictive gloves off his calloused hands as he ran, working to keep his balance.

Laughing nervously, he turned forward and picked up the pace. He could move fast when he wanted to, but he'd need to stop soon - he wasn't much of a distance runner.

Spice merchants haggled over prices and armorers loomed over reluctant buyers as he shot past, ignoring the distraction. In a world of theft and crime, what idiot would bother stopping to pay attention to one miscreant out of thousands? Far better to keep an eye on one's own wares, and to ensure no knives were slipped into your ribs.

Ducking around a corner, Ford found himself at the starship docks. They were a colossal, multi-layered affair loaded from top to bottom with freighters big enough to hold a launchpod race on. He paused for a moment, scanning them for a potential target. It was better to pick one of the trashier ones - the pricey ones tended towards security and would be a lot harder to stow away on.

"Excuse me, are you searching for a job?"

Ford turned and flinched. A robot stood before him, dressed in an open coat and a white suit. Its head was designed with small white slits for eyes, with a disproportionately large and toothy smile for a mouth that didn't open when it talked. Its shoes didn't match - one was a brown slipper, and the other a black dress shoe. Just above those indecipherable eyes, it wore a captain's cap.

Looking back at the helmets approaching, Ford jogged over to the robot, wiping the sweat out of his eyes with a grin. "Yeah, a job. Right now, actually. Got any spots?"

The robot inclined its head politely. Or happily. Or grumpily. The smile was really throwing him off. "We ceartainly do! We arr in need of mercenaries, and-" He glanced over Ford's shoulder at the officers heading his way. "-don't care if the cops are after ya."

He had a weird accent, a twist to his words that made Ford second-guess what he was saying, but the message was clear enough. Ford nodded sharply, shoving his hands in his pockets. "Alright, count me as hired. How do I-"

The robot held out a clipboard with at least a hundred pages of small-font writing on it. Ford squinted at it and found it to be a most distasteful language; legal terms. "Yeou will have to sign this."

"Sure!" Ford told him, after another glance at the lights behind him. They were gaining. Hastily grabbing the pen attached at the top of the clipboard, he signed his name at the dotted line.

The robot nodded in satisfaction. "That will do! Wealcome to the Starry Lance."

Ford blinked. "You didn't call it the Starry Nights?"

The sound of grinding teeth came from the robot. It had to be a simulated noise, as robots didn't have teeth. "Copyright infringement, Mr-" It flipped the clipboard around, looking at the signature. "-Mr. Ford. Copyright infringement and fines from here to Earth and back."

Ford shrugged. "Okay, sounds good." Grabbing the robot's hand, he shook it once and dashed past him for the gangplank.

Behind him, the robot known as Captain shook his head, rapping the clipboard with a tungsten-carbide finger. "They sign so easily." Captain muttered to himself. Flipping the first five pages over, he glanced at the remaining ninety-five, all of which were absolute nonsense. He laughed, a single sharp sound, and tucked the clipboard into his coat. Clasping his hands behind his back, he turned to the commonwealth, waiting for whoever might approach him next.

The police officers ran past a few moments later. They didn't look at Captain twice.

FiveElemental Murdergurl Femboy

(Let's get this party started!)

 

[FiveElemental]

Darrin Hyper looks about the large starport, walking with a large dufflebag in hand. Shaking his head.

"What the hell did you get yourself into Darrin... seriously, a mid life crisis at the ripe old age of 34, and you decide to travel across the galaxy... and now I'm out of money." Darrin muttered to himself. "Thankfully I landed myself at a Hub Station before I ran out of cash..." Darrin sighed, looking around through the large crowd, "Maybe I can afford a ship ticket to some human outpost, or at least a planet with a human embassy, really was surprised that there's no human embassy..."

Milling about some more, he noticed a interesting predicament. He saw a human being offered a job out of nowhere by a strange robot dressed in a captain's uniform.

"Hmm... perhaps this is an opportunity, but I won't lie, it's a little... off... I should try to read that... god awful long contract.." He thought as he approached the robot.

"Excuse me! I heard you were hiring!"

 

[Murdergurl]

For the last two hours, Kaj'a had been stuck repairing a crane arm. It dangled limp and lifeless in the loading bay of the Starry Lance while the goblyn mechanic labored at its twisted pistons. The contraption had inconveniently broken down only an hour before Kaj'a's shift was going to end. The goblyn had been eagerly awaiting some shore leave, but the machinery seemed intent on spoiling her off time. Grumbles and curses were drowned out by the noise of the rest of the bay, as the automated systems and robotic drones went about their programs of loading and unloading various cargo in and out of the luxury freighter.

Kaj'a had signed on to the contingent of the Starry Lance only recently, the ship having made only three calls to port since she had joined. The freighter seemed to be comprised of a fully robotic crew, at least as far as Kaj'a could tell. Her duties were relayed as a to-do list that was updated hourly via a data-pad that she'd been issued. The work she was to undertake would periodically switch up or down the list depending on its priority. The flashing red on her current work queue had signified to Kaj'a that she would not be given the leniency to put off the repair for later. The cargo of the Starry Lance had been given high priority, and delays were not going to be forgiven.

Her tour on the ship was one often encased in silence, with only the sound of her incessant string of chores to keep her attention. Kaj'a didn't mind this as much as some would think. Her last ship had been aboard had been a prison ship, and the small creature had done her best to keep as low a profile as possible. While the conversation was lacking on the Starry Lance, at least Kaj'a didn't have to worry about convicts attacking her for her bag of tools. As the goblyn toiled at the broken couplings of the hydraulics, her wrench slipped from the grasp of her heavy gloves. She watched in irritation as the chrome tool went freefalling down, down, down tot the distant cargo bay floor below. A muted CLANG signaled its arrival upon the metal panels, and Kaj'a's orange eyes watched the wrench bounce twice before sliding under a generator tower.

"Fakk!!", she hissed, her large ears drooping in dejection.

Now she'd have to climb all he way down off the crane to retrieve her tool. More wasted time that she could be spending at the local tap joint. Just then, a thought occurred to her. Kaj'a reached into the tool bag she had slung upon the crane in a safety harness. After shoving around various devices, she produced a Grav-gun. If she was lucky, the goblyn might be able to coax the wrench from beneath the equipment and drag it back up through the air towards her. Aiming the battered tool in the direction of the generator stack, Kaj'a did her best to aim and keep her hand steady. The Grav-gun buzzed to life in a low hum as she activated the narrow field. At first, the mechanic wasn't sure if the generators were out of range. But as a passing drone came into the gravity well, it lifted quickly off the floor and up towards Kaj'a.

"Oop!", the goblyn released the trigger as she was startled by the accidental retrieval of the cargo-bot. Unfortunately, the robot was already a dozen feet in the air when the green mechanic released it from the pull of the grav-gun. The automaton crashed to the floor with a racket several times louder than the earlier wrench.

"Ai-ai-ai-ai...", Kaj'a facepalmed. "Daz not good..."

She tried to shrink herself into nothingness in her high perch. This new mess would soon rank itself upon the goblyn's to-do list at any moment now.

 

[Femboy]

Viokii sat in pondering around the large bustling port of ships, merchants and whoever had found their way into the very vicinity of this part of the universe, wondering why the merchants in the area had to act so desperate and dishevelled in order to load off their goods as soon as they arrived so they can get back to getting more. Such a method of trade seemed so inefficient, especially for how long she had sat there and calculated in her head how much business they were getting in comparison to how long they were waiting. At least the merchants themselves actually had better reason for knowing why they were in the area, whereas she had been pointlessly wandering around in search of a clue on what her next best course of action was.

She spent the past half an hour browsing through whatever scrap and random possessions the businessmen of the universe had brought through for her to be conveniently around to see, most of it to be of naught value in comparison to what literal nothing for currency she had for free spending. The problem with having income was that finding suitable work that was actually worth it seemed essentially non-existent for all the roaming she had been doing, with what useful qualities she could provide not a single person had ever stopped her within her tracks in interest.

Sighing as she found herself walking around and peering at the docked ships that were around for whatever reasons they had be, she did coincidentally come across a robot signing people for work after someone had signed it with such lacklustre care as to what the job actually was. Noticing the same person had ran for the ship that he either came in on or just signed a contract to be allowed on, she considered that a job that gave her access to a travelling ship wouldn't be so bad for both money and her own personal benefits.

She took to opting for the chance that the potential job might offer, especially since she could see that she wasn't the only one who had took notice of the free business venture, taking her time to scuttle over as she heard and stared at the adjacent violent crash of a drone. "That has appalling landing strategy, I wonder what first-timer had designed that thing... " she mumbled as she passed the broken creation, skittering over to the robot in question who earlier appeared to be hiring. "Greetings, may I take it that you are still hiring? May I inquire as to what this job is for?" she asked, noticing the human who had also took interest in the job opening.

 

[Hazmat44]

Captain carefully inspected both newcomers, calculations running a mile a minute in his metal skull. "We arr indeed still hiring! We arr in need of mercenaries and engineers to keep owr cargo safe en route to Odman W38. As we are carrying-" He glanced from side to side, ensuring nobody was listening. It was a rather pointless gesture, seeing as nobody aside from the cyborg and the human were within a hundred yards of them. Captain continued, albeit in a quieter tone. "-rather valuable and volatile cargo, we would rather not hire a security firm. The chances were calculated at forty-eight percent that they would be pirates."

Straightening, he told them, "Yew will be compensated, provided yew follow the rules. I am Captain, and also captain. Please do what I tell yew to do. Avoid being a nuisance to any of your compatriots. And most importantly..." His eyes darkened in time with the Starry Lance's lights flickering, and a shadow was briefly cast over his face. "Do not interact with the cargo."

The moment passed just as quickly as it'd happened, his expression brightening as the external lights of the freighter stabilized. "Deck one is for anti-craft armaments, they arr free for your use. Deck two is for recreation. We have two game rooms and a pool, along with a fully staffed cafeteria. They arr free for your use. Deck three is for temporary residence, and they arr also free for your use. Decks four through six are off-limits."

Before they could lose interest, Captain hit them with the clincher of the whole deal.

Money.

"Upon safe arrival, yew will all be paid eighty thousand credits. For every module of cargo lost, two point five thousand credits will be redacted. For every incident wherein you successfully repel pirates or competing companies, twenty-five thousand credits will be added as a protection bonus."

It was a sum large enough to buy a house and pay the taxes off for a decade at least, and that wasn't even including the protection bonus. It was also an amount of money that attracted a lot of attention, and often of the worst sort. "It is a large amount of money," Captain stated pleasantly. "But we are in somewhat of a hurry, and it would be catastrophic if the cargo in question did not arrive safely."

Removing two clipboards from the back of his coat, each one written slightly differently, he offered them to the new potential recruits. "How does that sound?"

Femboy FiveElemental Murdergurl

 

[FiveElemental]

Listening intently, he nodded along, understanding the general layout of the ship, "An entire room to myself? Now that's a huge perk if I've ever heard one." He thought to himself. "The perks are good, too good if I do say so myself, but who am I to look at a gift's horse in it's tail... was that how that quote went?" He shrugged, "Those are some mighty fine perks if I do say so myself." Darrin chimed in as the Captain was listing the rules and regulations around the ship. He continued to listen as the Captain mentioned the pay of eighty thousand credits... The words ring through Darrins head for a bit.

Eighty Thousand Credits

That'll be more than enough credits to pay to basically travel the entire galaxy thrice at my own pace! Quickly snatching the clipboard, and pen, "Woah... haven't seen one of these in ages, a ballpoint pen!" Darrin was about to sign it, eyes glazed with gold tinted glasses, he felt it, the familiar feeling he developed over his short life, he didn't know many words to describe this feeling he felt, perhaps it's his sensitivity to getting into dangerous situations, maybe it's his awareness of the situation he placed himself, or maybe, it was the city itself speaking to him, he did not know, nor did he really care, the only thing that was certain, one thing.

He Shivered

Breathe... feel the cold air flow through your nostrils. A chilling two hundred and eighty kelvin, a perfect tempurature finely tuned for many of the known sapient species that travel from and to this here Hub Planet... Behthrol, the last stop in the galaxy as I've been lovingly dubbed, a planet built on rotting hopes and dying dreams, looking up, you see the distant stars of what was and will be, remember that this Hub Planet here is partially owned by Shard Incorporated? Who is also the parent company to Astronomical Shipping Corp.

Darrin looked at the first page of the contract, as saw one key word in the contract, "Astronomical Shipping Corp." He quietly muttered. He kept flipping through the contract, to see what else it had in store for him, as he shudders, like an animal shaking water from it's hide as it was just pulled out from a raging river. His instincts just saved him again. That's when he noticed an extremly sketchy detail in the contract, it ended at page five, the rest were blank.

He knew in an instant that it was intentionally designed this way to not read the entire contract, the conditions were barebones and extremly broad in nature... he felt it his spine, that the moment he signed this, it was most likely going to end with his demise. But, did he really have much choice in the matter? He was either going to rot on thie last stop in the galaxy or go on a last hurrah... Darrin sighed, as he signed the contract, like a thirsty animal drinking from a lake in a storm.

 

[Hazmat44]

Captain watched Darrin walk on by with a mild sense of satisfaction before turning to the cyborg before it. "And would you also like to-"

It saw the crashed cargo bot behind her and froze for a split second, calculating prices and correct placements before estimating the distance and trajectory of a bot of that weight and size, one eye lifting upward to the underside of the Starry Lance to look at the distant green figure there. The eye narrowed, then looked back to the cyborg. "-sign on with us?"

High above, two external cameras swiveled in their sockets to glare at Kaj'a. Captain's voice came from the ship, from hidden speakers invisible to most. "Miss, twenty-five hundred credits have been redacted from your arrival check. The cargo in question was intended for deck four, so there's-" It paused briefly, scanning the contents again. "-no harm done. Please log the drone and-" The voice stuttered once more, and mere seconds later, another drone hovered up to the space goblin, toting a wrench. "-avoid losing your tools in the future. Thank you for cooperating!"

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

"-and this would be your room."

Ford slowly slung the bag off his shoulder, unable to not stare at the decadence before him. The cream-colored walls went with the ornate trim and patterned ceiling, and the floor was an indescribably cushy carpet. It made his boots feel much dirtier than they were. In the corner, a massive king-size bed beckoned invitingly, with a ninety-inch flatscreen laden upon a rosewood cabinet. A door in the side of the room led to what appeared to be an equally luxurious bathroom.

Ford glanced at the robot who'd led him here with more than a little suspicion. "I'm... getting paid to live here, right?"

The droid nodded pleasantly, but he wasn't done. This was unreasonably comfortable. "And this isn't favoritism?"

"Everyone who signed the contract has been given an identical room," The robot confirmed. "The Starry Lance was initially intended to be a luxury cruiser before Astronomical acquired it for its ultra-lightspeed capabilities. The rooms have not been modified."

Ford nodded, thinking for a moment. "Well," he said, less-than-gently pushing the robot out of the room. "Thanks!"

With that, he slammed the door shut, yanked his boots off, and faceplanted in the bed. He wasn't one to look a free room of this magnitude in the mouth, or however that saying went.

Murdergurl Femboy FiveElemental

(just a quick post before I head to work)

 

[Murdergurl]

At the sudden disembodied voice addressing her, Kaj'a looked around nervously. A heavy sigh escaped her wide mouth as the proclamation of her penalty for the damaged robot was announced. It wasn't the first time she'd been penalized for breaking something aboard the Starry Lance. It hadn't been the second time either, or the third. In fact, it was a wonder that she hadn't yet been terminated from employment. The goblyn was practically working in indentured servitude on board the luxury freighter, and desperately trying to keep her credits in the black.

The Starry Lance seemed to have it out for Kaj'a, with fragile equipment seeming to go out just as she was getting to work on them. Or like today, the automated crew would constantly get in her way. The last time she'd damaged a bot, it had got caught in an electrified field that had been created by some unshielded conduits. It was not Kaj'a's fault that it was meandering down the hallway at an inopportune moment. How was she supposed to know the schedule of the robot crew? The open wires of the conduit had jumped in an electrical arc to ground out on the bot, essentially cooking all its hardware in the process. The hunk of slag had cost Kaj'a 3k in credits. Considering this last blunder was 500 credits less of a deduction, the goblyn was making improvement.

Kaj'a took the wrench from the delivering drone while grumbling curses under her breath. She got back to work, but moved less hurriedly. Considering how much money had just been docked from the goblyn's pay, she wasn't particularly in the mood to go off and spend what she had left. No need to rush the repair now.

 

[FiveElemental]

Walking past his new boss. Darrin stood infront of the plank, a remembered The Contract, Always Follow the Captains Orders! Before he climbed aboard the Starry Lance. Darrin looked back at the Captain.

"Permission to come aboard Captain?" Darrin requested. Observing the robotic Captain as it turned towards him.

"Permission granted!" The robotic voice spoke in the same weird accent. As he accended towards the Starry Lance, immediately noticing it's sleak and elegant design he noticed this was obviously a luxury starship. With a... is that a Shattered FTL Thruster?! FTL thrusters developed by Shard Incorporated, who proved you can go faster than lightspeed??! He's never seen one so upclose before. The sheer size of the thruster was monstrous. From what Darrin can observe they were self sufficient with cold fusion reactors, allowing both the engine and thrusters from overheating and gives plenty of leeway on the fuel consumption of the thrusters. He couldn't believed he'd see one of these on Behtrol of all places, and was even more surprised not one person was attempting to swarm the this ship to take its parts. No, he can't afford to think about it, this job is going to be extremely dangerous, he better count his blessings. Following a droid that lead him to his room, Cream-color plastered the walls with an ornate trim that went well with the color. The patterned ceiling made the room feel more larger than it is, however the thing that really tied the room the most was the indescribably cushy, white carpet that laid upon the floor. Darrin immediately took off his boots and socks, placing his boots in a cabinet. Before, he let himself subcome to the pleasure, he asked for the Wi-Fi and password is. The droid beeped out. "The network is "praisethecaptain" and the password is "thecaptainisawesome1337" all lowercase." Darrin was completely dumbfounded, but shrugged if off. Setting his supplies and equipment, he started to set up his workshop. Plugging in his computer, typed in the password. Pulling out his tools, as he began organizing his workshop.

After a while, he decided to take a shower. Only to realize his room had a large, deep bathtub, and he was about to cry. As he took a nice, and long soak.