Mercenaries-Chapter1
Chapter 1
Patrick
In the desolate space fields of the Outer Rim, a small ship floated in space, days away from any inhabited system. Life, Patrick Coleman bitterly thought, was often overrated. After fleeing from a full-fledged Imperial attack on a New Republic colony, the powerful, experimental, and probably illegal hyperdrive on his Skipray Blastboat had malfunctioned, barreling him far away from his intended course and resisting all of his attempts to stop it. Finally he had to overload it, cause it to burn out and drop him back into realspace. And now he was stuck here, alone, far away from any sort of help. He couldn't even call for help; the comm array on his ship had been too close to the hyperdrive and had been destroyed.
There wasn't any way out. Patrick sighed, looked out at the stars and wondered how long it would take him to die. 22 years old, and he's already going to die. What a waste. A twitter from Patrick's R2 droid caused him to look up. Just in time to see a fleet of ships arrive not 20 kilometers from his ship. With his comm system burned out, he couldn't go for help, just wait and hope the ships saw him.
Gent
"Sir, we have a ship on sensors. Looks like it's drifting," the sensor officer said on the bridge of the Corellian Gunship Gent's Revenge.
"Life support?"
"Yes sir."
"Dock with it. I'll go down there and see if anybody's in there."
As he strode down the corridors toward the docking hatch, Gent Jerrold took out his blaster pistol. At 23, he was the youngest mercenary chief he had ever heard of. As he rounded the corner and saw the docking hatch, he saw a tall, brown-haired young woman waiting for him.
"Inrisa! What are you doing here? You're supposed to be off-shift."
"I know, but I heard we had a visitor and wanted to check it out," she said with a grin on her face. Inrisa Solea was Gent's second-in-command and, though very few people knew it, Force-Sensitive.
Gent was reaching with his free hand to the hatch when it suddenly opened by itself. A tall, muscled young man stepped out. When he saw the blaster pistol, he raised his hands.
"Do you want to know who I am, or do you just want to shoot me?" the man asked with an innocent expression on his face.
"What's your allegiance?" Gent asked.
"I'm a merc, man. Same as you." He looked around. "Not as many ships, though."
Gent motioned toward Inrisa. "This lady is now going to submit you to a full weapons-scan, so if you have any concealed blasters or vibroblades, it would be best if you would tell us."
Gent almost smiled as Inrisa ran a normal datapad up and down the stranger's frame. In reality, she was using the Force to find any hidden weapons.
After a minute or two of searching, and finding nothing, Inrisa nodded at Gent. "He's clear."
"What's your name?"
"Patrick Coleman." The stranger seemed used to this kind of interrogation.
Gent now spoke into his comlink, running a full records scan to ensure that he really was a mercenary. Almost immediately he had a full background on the man, plus his ship name and registry number. Gent lowered his blaster.
"You're clear, Patrick. Now what's the problem with your ship?"
"Burned out hyperdrive and comm system."
"All right. We'll get some techs on it. Meanwhile, you probably want…"
Gent was cut off by the wailing of alert sirens and a blast that rocked the ship. He spoke quickly into his comlink and swore when he heard the answer. "Patrick, can you fly an A-wing?"
"Probably."
"Good. If you want to save your own hide, you'll get down to the hanger and fight."
Patrick sighed. "Why do I always get dragged into these things?"