Chapter 1: The Contest

Hera, Georgia

Song: Great Big Sea – "Banks of Newfoundland"
Raziel Tyler splashed some water on his face and stood up, looking at himself in the mirror above the fold-out sink in his quarters aboard Monty's ship, the Bridget. Raziel frowned and tightened one of the leather cords holding his bright blue Viking braid in place. In contrast to the deep blue of his hair, his silver eyes seemed to glow in the dim light. Raziel turned and shrugged on his shirt as a voice echoed from the Bridget's intercom. "Attention all crew, we've landed on Hera."
Raziel sighed and took one last look at his now-empty quarters, before picking up his bag and walking to the cargo bay.

The cargo ramp clanged to the surface of the landing pad. Raziel descended the ramp of the Bridget, and took a deep breath of, if not fresh, at least unprocessed air. Bex Grant stepped up beside Raziel, carrying her own small bag of belongings. "Any idea where we're going, Raziel?"
"I gots an inkling," Raziel replied. "First we need to find a ship to buy, and then I know a guy who can join up with us."
"Tyler!" came a shout from the rear of the Bridget's cargo bay. Monty jumped down the steps and landed on the grating with a resounding boom. The sasquatch of a man stepped up to Raziel, and enveloped him in a huge bear hug.

"I should be callin' this mutiny," Monty choked. "You're leavin' the boat, and takin' a gorram good comrade with ya."
"You know I wanted this, Monty," Raziel replied after he got his breath back. "you said you taught me everythin' you could, so I wanna have a go on my own."
"Fair's fair," Monty shook his head and passed over two bags of coin. "Here are your shares from all our adventures, you two. Now get outta here. It ain't manly for a crew to see their boss' eyes sweatin'."
"Thanks, Monty," Raziel and Bex nodded. Monty turned and blew his nose with a sound like a foghorn as the Bridget's ramp closed.
"Let's find us a ship," Bex smiled.

Two hours later…

"Ugh," Bex grumbled as she sank into her seat in the dingy bar. "How come all the good ships are either too expensive or already sold?"
"We just need to keep lookin'," Raziel said calmly, his blue braid just visible over the top of a shipyard catalog. "Somethin's bound to turn up if…" he fell silent.
"What is it?" Bex asked. Raziel passed over the catalog and showed Bex an advertisement.
"Come test your mettle against the Excalibur of starships!" the advertisement proclaimed in bright red Chinese script.
"What does that mean?" Bex asked, confused.
"Raziel pointed to the smaller script at the bottom of the ad. "Apparently, a shipyard has a ship in stock that no one can open, or even get near. It's been sittin' there for years, like the sword from that Earth-That-Was legend. And it says here, if'n anyone can crack it open, they can have the ship for nothin'! Should we give it a go?"
A free ship?" Bex's eyebrow perked up. "Can't hurt to try, right?"

Bex and Raziel walked up to the gates of the shipyard, where an attendant sat in a booth.
"Afternoon, pengyou (friend)," Raziel nodded. "We're here to have a go at the unbreakable ship."
"Take a number," the attendant replied in a bored voice. Next to the booth, a small machine spat out a slip of flimsi. Raziel followed Bex through the gates, and stopped short. A line of people stretched from the gate to a hill, where a starship rested on a slab of concrete.
"Gorram," Bex breathed. "It's a Firefly."
The Firefly was beautiful. Its hull was painted a shade of black so dark, it seemed to suck in the light around itself. The main engine on the Firefly's stern glowed, not the soft yellow common on Fireflies, but cold blue.
"Niubi (fucking awesome)," Raziel grinned, before he looked down.

The ground around the ship resembled Swiss cheese. Countless bullet holes were interspersed with small craters, and the concrete was stained red in places. As Raziel and Bex watched, a large man at the front of the line charged forward, holding a thick slab of steel as a shield. The ship seemed to wake up with a roar, and a line of bullets tore through the air towards the shield-bearer.
"Wo cao (holy fuck)!" Raziel exclaimed. "That ain't a Firefly, that's a gorram Cerberus!"
The challenger's slab of steel shuddered as shot after shot hit it.
"That baichi (moron) ain't gonna make it," Bex shook her head. "Those bullets are gonna eat through that shield in a matter of-"
Before Bex had even finished speaking, a fountain of red erupted, and the man with the shield fell to the ground, his chest ruined. A second later, a medical drone hovered down and lifted the unfortunate man in a large clamp.

"How the hell are we gonna beat that?" Bex asked worriedly.
Raziel bit his lip in thought. "There's two of us, so we could split the ship's attention. All we need to do is get to that palm-print reader on the door. Look."
Raziel pointed to the Cerberus' cargo door. In a small crescent, the concrete remained unmarked by bullets or shells. As Raziel and Bex planned, the line slowly moved forward, with challengers either getting shot or running off.
One man actually managed to make it past the ship's chain guns, but strayed too close to the wing. A split second later, an honest-to-Buddha rocket streaked out from under the ship's wing, carrying the poor man into the sky before detonating.

Soon, Raziel and Bex stood at the front of the line. The Cerberus seemed to bristle with murderous intent.
"Take your time," a man grunted, standing behind Raziel in line. "You're gonna die either way."
"Okay," Raziel whispered to Bex. "We need to get past those chain guns fast, so I'll need that pressure pack over there. You need to distract the ship."
Bex nodded, and unclipped a pair of smoke bombs from her belt. Raziel grabbed a firefighter's backpack marked high pressure from an emergency locker, and strapped himself in. the crowd began to get restless. "Let's move it, baichi!" the heckler from earlier shouted.
"Fine!" Raziel yelled, facing the crowd with his back to the ship. "But y'all better clear out now, cause I'm takin' that ship!" With that, Raziel pressed the trigger on the pressure pack as Bex threw the smoke bombs.

The hose in Raziel's hands roared to life, propelling him backwards at a phenomenal rate. As he flew towards the ship, Raziel tucked his feet in as a line of bullets ate up the concrete where he'd been a second ago. The ship was blinded by the smoke, and started firing wildly, causing the crowd to scatter and find cover. Bex stalked around the fringes of the smoke cloud, daring the ship to make a move.
Meanwhile, Raziel crashed backwards into the ship's shiny black hull, the backpack he wore taking the brunt of the hit. Raziel threw the pack to the ground and stepped towards the hull, inside the untouched circle of landing pad that the chain guns couldn't reach. Just then, a whine started up, and the fog began to clear.

"Oh gou se (shit)," Raziel swore, just as the ship took off. Raziel took a flying leap, and managed to grab hold of the bottom edge of the ship's hull just as the landing legs left the ground. On the ground, a collective gasp went up as the Cerberus rose into the sky. "Raziel," Bex breathed.
The palm scanner glowed blue, tantalizingly out of reach, as Raziel swung in the air, holding onto the edge of the hull. With a grunt, Raziel hauled himself up to a handhold and grabbed a cable. The ship shuddered in midair, trying to throw off the blue-haired speck clinging to her hull, but Raziel hung on grimly, gritting his teeth. Another few pulls, and the palm scanner was within reach. All of a sudden, the Cerberus executed a barrel roll, pulling Raziel's legs away from the hull. Left hanging on by one hand, Raziel roared with primal fury as he finally slammed his hand against the scanner's glowing blue grid.

The Cerberus froze in midair for a few seconds. Raziel's legs scrabbled against the hull, until he felt his boots hit a raised edge of metal, and he clung to the scanner's housing for dear life. A second later, with a hiss of air, the ship's cargo door finally opened. The door descended, until the ramp was level with Raziel's boots. Gingerly, Raziel stretched out one foot, until it touched the ramp. The ship seemed to wait patiently as Raziel inched along the hull until he finally collapsed on the ramp, breathing hard. Raziel dragged himself farther inside, and the Cerberus began to descend. By the time solid ground approached, Raziel had recovered enough to stand. The ship's landing legs thumped to the concrete, and the cargo door descended again. Raziel stepped forward and raised his arms in triumph.

The assembled crowd set off to spread the word. Raziel walked down the Cerberus' cargo ramp, until his knees gave out and he sat heavily on the concrete. Bex stepped up, casting a shadow over Raziel.
"Don't you EVER do anythin' that crazy ever again!" she shouted, smacking Raziel hard across the face. Raziel sat there in shock for a few seconds before he started laughing.
"What's so gorram funny?" Bex snapped, raising her hand again.
Raziel tried to catch his breath. "I'm alive," he chuckled. "I'm alive and we got ourselves a ruttin huaidan (badass) ship." He paused a moment, and started laughing again. "And put it this way, we know she ain't gonna ever get stolen!"
Bex's eyes widened before she doubled over laughing as well. A few minutes later, the two spacers finally calmed down enough to breathe.

"Right," Raziel grinned. "We gots a ship, now let's see about some crew."

Author's Notes:
Here we go! Off to a pretty good start, I hope. If it was great, write a review saying so. If it was awful, write a review saying so. I need feedback!
The first few chapters aren't going to be attached to the main story arc. They're mostly going to be meeting the crew, and setting up the big story. The crew will be the same, but their stories will not. I'm not giving anything away just yet though.
-the Seacopath