VampiretwilightKudra Cartel
Karl snored loudly in the pilots seat of a converted interplanetary shuttle, slumped forward over the control panel. A steadily growing pool of drool had formed under his face that had started to waterfall onto the floor of the stripped interior.
The cartel mechanics turned what was a luxury shuttle into the perfect raiding and boarding vehicle. Quad thrust vectoring engines made it both fast and agile and the interior had been gutted, removing everything that wasn’t needed for survival. Unnecessary bulkheads were removed, luxury seating , air-conditioning units and even the majority of the bathroom was removed. This reduced the interior of the shuttle into little more than a grey metal box and made long space trips agonizing. This makes one ask, why would anyone want to spend up to a week inside one of these cold boxes from hell? You give them no choice.
Karl was born quite literally on the floor of some slum on the planet Yikba, the home of the Kudra cartel. To say that he grew up in poverty would be an gross understatement, food was scarce, water was near nonexistent, hygiene was absolutely absent. The only way to survive was to steal, threaten or murder and Karl became very proficient in all of it. It didn’t take long for the cartel to notice his skill and he quickly rose through the ranks to become a sicario himself. In the hierarchy of the cartel however, a sicario is still pretty close to the bottom of the barrel. For him it was either follow orders or be killed and for some reason unknown to everyone but him, he wanted to preserve his miserable life. Karl showed promise however, as much promise as a up and coming sicario can show. He ran his own team that specialized in high jacking transports and freighters bound for systems outside cartel controlled space.
The constant beeping of the vessels radar warning receiver slowly jostled the man from his slumber, prompting him with an message.
-Incoming vessel, 0.90 AU, bearing 330, 25 degrees-
This was accompanied by a small red square slowly creeping its way along the black vastness of the vacuum. Wiping the drool from his face, he lazily reached into his shirt pocket a produced an expertly rolled joint. Surprisingly, marijuana has proven to be a very resilient plant, able to grow in a growing multitude of biomes and conditions. Luckily for Karl it was his drug of choice, he didn’t go anywhere without it.
Retrieving a lighter from the same pocket, he quickly lit the joint and spun his head to the back of the chamber he was in “ Guys…..wake up, we have a ship comin!” he yelled before returning the lighter to his pocket. Inhaling deeply, he tapped a few buttons on the stripped down control panel and the interior came to life. Interior lights flickered on, revealing another three men sprawled out on what seating was left inside the vessel.
“ Whos watch is it, I know its not mine” one man exclaimed groggily, pulling his hat over his face.
Karl, exhaled a large cloud of smoke and spun his heard around again “ I said get the fuck up, theres a ship comin” he spat again, in a slightly annoyed tone, “ Get your shit on, I think were gonna jump on this one”.
“ What is it?” another voice said in an alien language
“ Frieghter, at least a C class” Karl exclaimed, looking over the radar cross section reading. According the cartel, all vessels are ranked from C to S based on their size and possible armament, C being the lowest and smallest of those. This simplified classifying ships to appoint that even drugged out and uneducated people can decide whether a ship was worth hitting or not.
The three men in the back began getting dressed, pulling on pressurized space suits crudely upgraded with armor plates and other machinery. This was a far cry from the combat space suits employed by some nations but it made the wearer feel at least a little more safe. As this was happening Karl brought the rest of the ship to life and started the engines, plotting an intercept course with the lone freighter. For security, Karl ran another radar sweep of the area, looking for other vessel that could be in range. Of course, any ship with any sort of radar masking tech would easily escape this sweep but it made him feel safe knowing that they were out here completely alone.
“ We’re all ready back here Karl, the lone xenos in the group said calmly as Karl got up to pull his own suit on before coming before coming back to the control panel.
All four men watched the heads up display as the freighter crept closer and closer before it dominated the viewscreen. Karl tapped another series of commands into the panel and opened up a short wave radio transmission channel between the two ships.
“ Freighter Captain, cut your engines and stay at current bearing. Failure to comply will result in harm or death” Karl said before sitting back and waiting, pointing towards the large sliding door towards the side of their vessel.
“ Magnetize yourself, im cutting the grav” another man said behind him before a series of thuds could be heard as boots were magnetically attracted to the floor.
“ I say again, freighter captain….cut engines and proceed on current bearing” Karl said again, sighing as he still did not receive an answer. “ Fuck, looks like this guy wants to do it the hard way”.
“You”, Karl said pointing at one of the men in the group “ Keep us next to this crate” he said as the man got up and pulled on a helmet. He floated his way over to the large sliding door where the rest of his team was waiting and nodded his head, keying the radio imbedded in his helmet.
“ You ready?” Karl said, receiving a few nods for answers before pulling the door control lever. A hissing sound could be heard as the oxygen inside the vessel vented before the door abruptly slid back, reveling the port side of the freighter. Just as the door opened, the three men jumped out accompanied by tools and cutting saws and torches.
Smacking the side of the vessel with a thud, they slowly climbed their way to the top of the freighter before locating an access hatch. The hatch was standard for most freighters, a wheel latch controlled the locking of the door while a simple terminal sat just next to the door for remote access, this was their way in. Karl pulled a crude looking machine from a pouch on his chest and slowly extended a wire from it, looking for a place to plug it in. He quickly found one and pressed another series of commands in before the machine began vibrating as it worked, escalating into it violently shaking just before the door handle.
“We’re in” he said over the radio before another man pulled the door up and they all slipped in.
As they closed and locked the hatch behind them it became eerily quiet, the pilot most definitely knew they were inside but they heard nothing. Usually when they had to break in, people would be scurrying about, or at the entrance begging them for mercy. As they waited for the airlock to pressurize they checked their weapons, nothing more than small pistols and knives. It was clear to the boarders that something wasn’t right and as the airlock slid open they moved with caution down the corridor.
It wasn’t uncommon to have only one live person on a freighter, most were automated beyond the pilot. Usually the bigger freighters had more crew but this was normal for a vessel of this size. The silence was eerie however, usually the pilot would be running around hiding or begging for is miserable life. To hear absolutely nothing was odd and might of spooked all but the most drug afflicted, but not Karl.
“ Maybe he had a heart attack?” one member of the group quipped with a laugh
The thought of finding the pilot slumped over the command console clutching his chest made Karl, chuckle as they lazily rounded the corners leading up to the bridge before finally coming to the closed bridge door.
“ You might be right” Karl said “ The door hasn’t moved since we got here” he finished pointing towards the alien member of their group and nodding his head towards the door.
The alien group member calmly walked up to the door and pressed the open command button, making the door shudder slightly before opening just a fraction.
“ Shit….” the alien said quietly as he moved to physically pry the door open “ Maybe, he fell against th--------” the xenos sicario got out before a deafening explosion was heard.
Bone, brain matter and blood sprayed the two other stunned men as the alien took a staggered step back before slumping against the half open door in front of him, clearly missing the majority of his head.
“ Fuck you pirates, you picked the wrong ship to rob!!” a voice yelled from inside the bridge, before two more shots rang out, the kinetic rounds slapping the wall behind them.
Karl fell backwards stunned after the first shot, looking wide eyed at what used to be his alien crewmember, unable to move due to shock. The other human crew member jumped into action, seemingly taking the shock of sudden violence better than most. The human sicario quickly stuck his head and arm into the door way and let off a few shots before the pilot shot back, clearly striking the other sicario in the upper chest, sending him reeling.
As Karl’s hearing returned he quickly picked up on two noises, the screaming of his injured crewmember and the loud grunting of the pilot. ‘Was he injured too?” Karl thought, jumping to his feet and peeking into the doorway skittishly. Although valiant, the pilot was not a trained combatant and was currently dealing with a malfunction of hit weapon, loud slapping could be heard the pilot tried to fix the afflicted weapon.
Sensing this was his chance, Karl stepped into the doorway and leveled his pistol at the pilot who quickly dropped his weapon and threw his hands up.
“ Look, im sorry about your friends, you guys scared me. You’d do the same thing in my position” The pilot said shakily, clearing trying to beg for his life after the fact.
“ They are not my friends” Karl said flatly “ But you made on hell ova mess, one that im gonna have to clean up. All you needed to do was be compliant” he finished with a sigh before shooting the pilot twice in the stomach.
The pilot dropped to the floor and began screaming, frantically reaching for the jammed weapon on the floor. Karl took another few steps closer and kicked the weapon farther away from the man before shooting him twice again, killing the pilot outright.
Karl let out another loud sigh as he looked back at the shitshow in the hallway, blood had begun to pool under the alien sicario and mixed with the blood of the human, still screaming from his wound. ‘ This is going to take ages to clean’ he thought before kneeling down to dig through the pockets of the dead pilot, retrieving his ID and transport license.
“ Karl!....I need help, im bleeding out….” The human sicario screamed, trying to contain a gushing chest wound.
“ Yea, give me a sec, just gonna have to make copies of this ID so we can get into Federation space” Karl answered dismissively as he walked out of the door and over his two , soon to be former” teammates.
“ You cant leave me here, you fucking bastard…help me!!” the human screamed again, trying to reach out for Karl as he walked past.
“ Well, maybe y’all shouldn’t of gotten shot then hmmm” Karl answered with a chuckle as he shook his head “ Play stupid games, you get stupid prizes, dumbass” he finished before walking around the corner and out of site.
Karl grabbed the radio from his pocket and brought it to his mouth “ Hey, dock the shuttle at bay 2 and start unloading that shit, also call the boss and tell him we need a copy and clean up crew.” He said calmly
“ Why….” The remaining human sicario said over the radio, sounding quite taken aback by what was supposed to be an easy job.
“ Timbap and Geoff are dead….and so is the pilot” Karl answered flatly before turning off the radio and walking back to the bridge.
The errie silence of the ship returned as he stuffed the radio back in his pocket and rounded the corner to find both sicarios dead and laying in a pool of their own blood. As Karl stepped over them again and made his way into the bridge, he eyed the pilot who was in a similar state.
“ What a mess” Karl quipped before walking up to the command console and keying in the docking procedure, opening up the bay for their shuttle. It would be a couple hours before the clean up crew got to them, so they had time to decompress.
With a deep sigh, Karl retrieved another joint from his pocket and brought it to his mouth. Waiting for the consoles successful docking message before lighting it and taking a huge drag.
“ What a fucking mess….” Karl said again as he exhaled, spreading a large cloud of smoke around the bridge.
