Eli Trace sat in his pilot seat, browsing through the pages of his bounty postings bulletin. The usual rubbish were there; various space pirate deserters, common thugs, other penny bounties, most of them barely enough to keep his small gunship in working order. He kept going, he laughed as he saw himself among some of the mid-range bounties, "finally making a name for myself." He got to the top tier bounties, mostly Class-S bounty hunters; he had seen Weevil the week before, but knew that he didn't stand a chance against an opponent like that. Ending the list was Samus Aran, as always the top paying bounty ended the list.
Leaning back against his chair and sighing, Eli wondered what he would do if he ever ran into Samus. He knew that he would never try to fight her, not because she would kill him in a matter of seconds, but because she was his idol. Stories of her exploits always seemed blown out of proportion, but oddly believable due to the ungodly enormous price on her head. And besides that, rumors of her beauty added to his desire to meet her.
Eli put those thoughts aside, and went back to his work. Most of the decent bounties that he knew he could take were far enough off that by the time he got there, someone else would have got them. He limited the search to a one light-year journey, about two days at top speed. The computer beeped and showed about ten out of the few hundred on the list, most of them in the nearby Thran System.
As Eli was making his final course adjustments, his computer notified him of a distress beacon being activated nearby. Eli considered himself a man of honor, and usually put goodwill before cash; he changed course and set his computer to home onto the signal. "ETA two hours and twelve minutes" the computer said in its pseudo-female voice.
Eli hit a button on his chair and it rotated to face the opposite direction, and a large panel opened in the wall. Eli's combat suit was based on the Space Pirate design, obviously redesigned for a human. He pulled out a small tool box and went to work on an area where he had taken a hit on his last job.
"ETA twenty minutes". Eli looked at his holomap in disbelief, he felt like he had only been working for about forty-five minutes, but the computer was correct. He began to suit-up. As he got his final gauntlet on and hooked the power blade to it, the computer sang out, "ETA ten minutes, beginning deceleration. Engaging stealth mode."
The ship felt like it lurched slightly as the boosters disengaged. The ships sensors gave Eli a clear idea of what was going on; a large merchant ship was being raided by a ship that was the same model the local crime syndicate used. The syndicate is one that Eli had previously dealt with, in fact they were the ones that put a majority of the bounty on his head; they called themselves Marauder.
Once the ship was close enough, all power was cut; Eli couldn't afford to be detected, he needed surprise in order to succeed. He pulled on his helmet and made sure his suit read 'airtight', then opened a hatch at his feet. As his ship coasted past the Marauder Cruiser, he jumped out through the hatch and landed softly on the outer hull of the enemy vessel.
Eli set his visor to Search-Mode, and began his hunt for a maintenance hatch he could jimmy open. Once his helmet found one it directed him to it, and he set to work. After about a minute, the hatch popped open and he slipped in, closing it as quickly as he could. He moved swiftly and silently as he could. He found a computer terminal a few rooms down and was relieved to find that his entry had gone unnoticed. He quickly downloaded a map of the ship to his suit's temporary memory.
Eli followed the map to the cargo areas of the ship. As he thought, that's where most of enemy was, loading their recently acquired plunder and prisoners. Flicking his wrist, the young bounty hunter moved his blade into combat position.
Sneaking between boxes, Eli took out a few of the Marauders around the edges of the room. A proximity alert sounded in his helmet and he ducked behind a nearby box as a couple of brutish men hustled some beaten looking merchants into another room. Eli knew he needed to free those crew members, but the room they were being stored in would be heavily guarded to prevent riots and escapes.
Looking around, Eli spotted a rather large ventilation shaft on the ceiling. It would be the perfect way into the other room, but how could he get there unseen. A box on the other end of the cargo hold burst open, and several small animals began running around. Taking the opportunity, Eli quickly moved up to the ventilation shaft, and pulled off the grate.
Eli didn't put the grate back in quite right, and it clattered all the way to the ground. "Shit!" Eli swore to himself and began furiously crawling down the shaft. He kicked open the grate in the next room and plummeted to the ground, firing his wrist-mounted shock-cannon at the amazed guards; but not before one of the radioed "IT'S TRACE!" to his buddies. He began to rush the battered merchants into a smaller room so they would be out of the fight to come. As the last of the crew was getting away, the wall on the other side of the room burst apart and a Marauder wearing a rather powerful armor suit stood there.
Eli dove to the side and rolled as a wave of rockets came screaming across the room. Jumping to his feet, Eli began firing his shock-cannon at his foe. The shield on one of the Marauder's arm absorbed the shots. The armor began firing a pulse laser at the bounty hunter.
Diving behind a pylon, Eli caught his breath. He set his visor to Scan-Mode and stuck his head out just long enough to scan the armor suit that was wildly firing at him. Before he could read the results, he heard the high-pitched whistle of more rockets flying towards his cover. "SHIT!" he ran full-tilt away, getting hit by the tiny chunks of metal sent flying by the concussive blasts of the rockets.
A light clicked on in Eli's head, and he wall jumped higher up onto the pylon he had just been hiding behind. He swung his power-blade and cut it loose. Putting his entire body behind it, he kicked it, sending it falling towards his armored enemy. The enemy was too busy getting out of the way of the chunk of metal to see Eli running up to him. Only as the power-blade was about to pierce the cockpit windshield did the Marauder catch sight of the bounty hunter; but by then, it was far too late.
After about an hour, Eli had either killed or incapacitated the rest of the Marauders. And about ten minutes after that, the authorities began arriving. It took twelve hours before the local police sorted enough out that a reward could be discussed. Eli refused the offers from the crew of the merchant ship, saying that was "what any good-hearted warrior would have done". But he wouldn't refuse the authorities offering him the bounties on the Marauders he had captured, and the one in the armor suit had a decent bounty on his head, dead or alive.
All in all, it was a good day for the young bounty hunter. He hit a button on the underside of his arm, and a few minutes later, his ship arrived. Eli Trace returned to his ship and before anyone knew it, he was gone.