Author's note: I was looking for an actor I remembered from my youth, who was the visual inspiration for what was originally a background character in "Waterfall" and "Sandstorm"... An internet search turned up Kabir Bedi… and it turned out that in addition to the film I remembered seeing him in, he'd also starred as two of Emilio Salgari's pirates: Il Corsario Nero, and Sandokan, round about the same time Harlock first began to strut his stuff across our screens...

I honestly couldn't resist. The rest, as they say, is fanfic…

For those interested: I have conflated Salgari's two pirates here, along with taking other liberties with the source material, and most of it is from the Black Corsair movie and the TV series for Sandokan, rather than the books. Much of the rest is derived from Endless Odyssey, certain "developments" in the GE999/Harlock verse since the mid-90s, and the recent Sengoku no Arcadia web manga...

Now: onward! Enjoy...!

Planet MX-201 "Heavy Meldar"

'What do you mean "they're not here"?' A large man in a green sweater, blond hair and long sideburns leaned on the bar counter and grabbed the tubby barman by the collar, hauling him into a puddle of beer. 'How can three people - three people you have a vested interest in being nice to - vanish from your damn bar on a planet with a population in double digits?' The gold scarab pendant he wore clanged off the metal railing as he let the petrified bartender go with a snarl. 'Fuck.'

A tall dark haired man - apparently in his late twenties - strode through the swing half-doors of the saloon with a cloud of dust and a pair of tousled-haired boys in his wake. Whilst the youths made a beeline for the bar, he brushed dust off the shoulder of a long black duster, and then shook his head to get more of the same out of his hair, revealed as almost black with the worst of the sand out of it.

'I've been trying to tell you,' the bartender babbled as the other man drew closer. 'The Captain and Miss Kei were talking to that old geezer in the corner booth…' he waved a hand in the direction of the dark corner at the back of the room, facing the door. 'And these three guys who'd come in a couple of days earlier wanted their lunch, so I had to go in the back to give their order to the cook. Something hit my neck and the next thing I know, me and Cookie are waking up with massive headaches, and we've lost a whole day. Oh - and the new barmaid we took on last month? She's gone as well.' He glanced at the two boys who leaned nonchalantly on his bar and gulped. Both boys were dark haired - the shorter of the pair black haired under the grey dust. The taller of the two had a scar across his left cheek and a white patch over his right eye. Both wore gun belts with holstered pistols in them not dissimilar to those sported by the older men, although neither looked older than fifteen.

'Ali.' The one-eyed boy laid a hand on the blond thug's arm. 'Not his fault. We searched the girl's room - cleared out completely, and not a DNA scrap to be found. Whoever she was, she was a pro.'

'We found traces outside of town where a shuttle landed - from the footprint, it's an old model, and that tracks with the readings Maji's sent down from the time radar trace. There was a ship in orbit - an old one. Gave a registry out of Metabloody but that's a dead end - false flag.'

'There's no girl matching her description in our register of known bounty hunters,' the duster-clad man added as he reached them. He sat on a barstool and nodded to the bartender. 'Even allowing for a really good disguise, none of them are even close to that dainty. Master - two whiskies and two sodas.'

'Soda. Really?' The one-eyed boy rolled his visible eye. The other youth just smirked.

'You want to risk the coffee here, be my guest,' the dark man replied dryly. 'But on my watch neither of you is drinking hard liquor…'

The blond man - Ali - snorted. 'Doesn't do much damage to either of them,' he pointed out, grabbing his tumbler as the barman sent it along the counter to him. 'Ta. And sorry for the grabbing. Kind of getting a bit twitchy.' He glared at the other man though. 'What possessed you though to bring the small fry along, Blaze?'

A shrug. 'Got the alert when Hannibal didn't make it back to his ship. Farah was going berserk when he didn't get back to the Miranda on time. He almost worships the old man. He called me, and I was en route to Tabito to run this pair of miscreants back from their field trip to Niflheim.' He downed the amber liquid in his tumbler and set it down on the counter. 'But happy to hand over Mamoru here to your care, now you're here. I've got enough on my plate with my kid brother here…' he ruffled the shorter lad's hair and grinned at the "gerroff" he earned for his trouble.

'Mom and Dad wouldn't go quietly if there was a confrontation,' Mamoru piped up. He took a sip of the drink he'd been given and pulled a face. 'Sugar free? Really?' He pushed it back at the bartender who smiled apologetically and set about filling a new glass. This next one presumably met with his approval, because he kept his hand curled around it after the first swallow. 'My guess is they - whoever they are - drugged them. Barmaid was in on it, and if she'd been here a while, and the barkeep vouched for her, they wouldn't have been too cautious.' He frowned. 'You'd think they'd be more careful though…'

'In a place they know?' the other boy pointed out. 'Plus - practically immune to meds and poisons, remember?'

Mamoru nodded. 'Rei has a point…'

'I usually do.' It was said laconically, a statement of fact, without pride. 'But who'd take them? Bounty hunters wouldn't bother with Hannibal - he's not a criminal or a pirate.'

'That's something I can get our people on,' Blaze replied. He stared thoughtfully at the corner table as though he could somehow see what had transpired there. 'Emilia and I will send out some feelers, tug on a few strings and see if anyone has heard anything.'

'Bit vague,' Ali retorted. He downed his drink and placed a handful of credits on the counter. 'Maji and Yattaran are trying to get a trace on Kei's and the Captain's transponders. But they've been gone for a week, local time. They could be halfway across the galaxy by now.'

'In the Arcadia,' Mamoru pointed out. 'Not so much in some old crate like the one they left in.'

'Farah's looking in the Miranda's database for a match,' Rei added. He gave his long thin nose a scratch. 'If the shuttle belonged to it, and most do because hangar configuration was often bespoke from model to model, we should find a type, which will give us its maximum speed and refuelling range.' He glanced at his friend as Mamoru started tapping his fingers idly on the counter. 'Okay… what?'

'Just wondering…' Mamoru said thoughtfully. 'Blaze - can you send a shuttle up to the Marin for Freya?'

'Sure, but what's going through that sneaky head of yours?'

Mamoru grinned, a far too adult feral smile for his age. 'Don't need to wait for Emilia, Blaze. We've got three people who've been living and breathing dark matter for years - one of them for over a century. And if Freya found me all those years ago when the Mazone kidnapped me…' here he didn't manage to stop a reflexive urge to run a finger across the scar on his face and touch the eyepatch over his right eye.

'...she shouldn't have any problem tracking the old man and the Captain…' Ali grinned nastily. 'Hah. Bet they didn't think of that.' He snapped his fingers almost under Rei's nose.

Rei and Mamoru exchanged glances. 'They knew enough to use something that could knock out three people with a serious dark matter contamination,' Rei pointed out. 'Kind of suggests they planned this.'

'Someone also picked a time when the Arcadia and the Miranda were diverted for a distress call that we were honour-bound to answer but wasn't serious enough for either captain to feel they had to drop everything and go with,' Ali added, his scowl deepening. 'If it wouldn't cost us time I'd pop back to KZ-486 and question those damn passengers we dropped off…'

'We've got three ships,' Blaze pointed out as he perched on a barstool, flicking the long skirts of his duster out of the way. 'We'll send the Marin back to check that angle out, I'll join Farah and Emilia on the Miranda. The Arcadia can't take point though - not with Lazarus marauding unchecked in this sector. He gets even a sniff that Harlock's gone wandering, or is missing…'

Ali folded his arms across his chest and glared past Blaze's shoulder. 'Of all the bloody times…' Then he unfolded and jabbed a finger at Blaze. 'Well I ain't staying behind to fly her whilst the Captain and Kei are in trouble, and I wouldn't put any of the others in charge. Gonna take a firm hand on the wheel. With Ben dallying with Her Mazonic Majesty again over in the Greater Magellanic, we're a little short on combat commanders.'

Mamoru tapped Blaze on the shoulder.

'Absolutely not!'

Mamoru pouted. 'Please. I wasn't going to suggest me, Blaze. Why not ask Emilia to swap places with you? She runs back to Tabito and grabs Selen. Selen can transfer the Thieves' command to the Arcadia for the duration, and the rest of us use the Miranda to go looking for Mom, Dad and Gramps? She's as fast as the Arcadia, and much less noticeable…'

Ali and Blaze traded looks. 'Might work,' Blaze murmured.

'No-one's going to object to Selen, that's for sure,' Ali mused. He jabbed a finger at Mamoru. 'But you're not coming along so you can forget the "us" part.'

Mamoru opened his mouth and snapped it shut again, a mulish glint in his brown eye. At his side, Rei smirked.

'Nor you,' Blaze interjected, earning himself a filthy look from his younger brother. 'Mom would tear my arms off if anything happened to you.'

'You do remember I'm not actually a teenager, right?' Rei drawled. 'And technically…'

'Technical my arse, Rei. I'm still older than you, I'm still your older brother, and if I tell you you're sitting this one out, you're sitting it out.'

Mamoru grabbed his friend's arm and dragged him out of the fray before he could say anything that would totally shut down any chance of talking their way into the rescue, shooting Blaze his best apologetic smile - the one he'd perfected after years of running interference for his twin, Wataru, and his main partner in crime, Taro. 'Shut the fuck up for a minute,' he hissed into Rei's ear as he dragged him to a corner table. 'Or we'll be back on the Arcadia before you can draw breath with no hope of sneaking off.'

'You've got a plan?'

Mamoru grinned wolfishly. 'Oh yeah. I've got a plan.' He flicked the commlink on his collar. 'Hey - Freya? Yeah. I know. I suggested they bring you down to do your thing. But I need you to do me and Rei a solid…'

Admiral class battleship "Miranda". Two hours later.

Blaze and Ali both stared down at the boys - not as easy as it had been a year ago, Ali thought sourly, since they'd both shot up in the past few months. Mamoru showed signs he was going to easily top his father's six-one eventually, and Rei was perilously close to his own six foot. The girl with them was a willowy five-ten, but her enigmatic, wide-eyed face was far harder to read than the barely concealed smug grins of the boys. But then, Nibelungs tended to do "expressionless" as standard.

'We're being played,' Ali muttered to Blaze out of the corner of his mouth. 'I know we're being sodding well played.'

'Fine. You call her bluff then,' Blaze replied evenly. At that, Freya looked up into his eyes, her own practically brimming with innocence. 'Don't,' he warned her, raising a hand. 'I can just about buy that without the Arcadia, you need help with the dark matter. I struggle to see how much use these two duplicitous jokers will be, but fine. I won't risk it. But so help me, if any of the three of your disobey an order, or do anything that puts themselves in danger, I will not hold back on making my displeasure known. Are we clear?'

'Yes sir.'

'Whatever.'

'Of course.'

Ali glared at Mamoru, Rei and Freya in turn and sighed. 'Bugger it, we're gonna catch seven hells from Harlock and Kei for bringing you two along.' He jabbed his finger at first Mamoru, then Freya. He glanced at Blaze. 'Your mum's gonna be pissed about -'

Blaze nodded glumly and glared at Rei, who stuck his hands in his pockets and smirked. 'Oh yeah. Thankfully we'll have a head start…' He gestured towards the bridge exit. 'Scoot. All of you. Get working on whatever it is you think you can help Freya with. We need that trace.'

'You'll have it.' Freya's voice was a light, pleasant contralto. She turned before she left the bridge, the boys ducking past her to get themselves out of sight before Blaze or Ali changed their minds. 'It's actually a very good idea of Mamoru's,' she added once he was out of earshot. Her tiny mouth had more of a tendency to smile than Mimay's did. Then again, dressed as she was in boots, leggings and a cropped tanktop, her silvery hair cut short above her narrow shoulders, she didn't exactly follow the older nibelung's example when it came to embracing her culture. 'Mamoru's connection to the Arcadia's dark matter and Rei's synthetic cells being linked to zero point energy via the motherball mean I can use both of them to make up for not having the Arcadia's dark matter engine to help. The Miranda has a much lower saturation, which makes it harder.' She laughed when they started to look more than a little dazed. 'I'll take the science talk elsewhere.'

After she'd left Blaze took the captain's seat with a sigh. Ali waited until he'd keyed his passcode into the controls set in the arm. 'Still seems kinda weird, doesn't it? That girl?'

'She likes modern fashions - what can I say?' Blaze smiled wistfully. 'You should see the others… centuries stuck in those machines and discovering a whole world they never knew existed. Not all are adapting as well as Freya, but they'll get there.'

'How many now?'

'Sixteen. It's a big planet though, but we're having better luck finding the outlying towns Mimay told us about with the Mazone helping. Most of the power plants in the cities… well. Freya was the only survivor in the city you found her in. After over a hundred years though, I doubt we'll find too many more.'

'Dumb luck Daiba tripped over her,' Ali replied grimly. 'Bloody hell. You'd think a species that ancient and advanced wouldn't be as fucked up as we are, but they just made the same mistakes first is all. Using people as parts for machines. Kids for fucks sake…'

'We don't have the monopoly on cruel and stupid,' Blaze told him. 'They didn't even see Freya's kind as their own children in a way. Bred for a purpose. And if you're thinking about the parallels with my dreaded aunt's society - well, remember who gave her a helping hand?'

'I'm not likely to forget,' Ali replied, his mouth twisted with distaste. 'Loki's still out there with his rebel angels. We've not seen hide nor hair of the Phantasm since the end of the war.'

Blaze frowned. 'I know. We thought it might have headed to Andromeda with the rest of the Empire fleet, but our spies haven't spotted it.'

'Don't mean it isn't there,' Ali pointed out amiably. 'Just means it ain't where your spies are…' He paused and tapped his top lip. 'Gotta wonder… Loki's rebel nibelung would know how to get round dark matter healing…'

Blaze shot him a startled look, his own frown deepening. 'The Arcadia didn't spot any dark matter traces that weren't the Miranda did it?'

Ali shook his head. 'Nah. But doesn't mean they couldn't be lurking inside new bodies, right? In a normal ship? Would explain them using a pre-war vessel - still some lying around if you know where to look. Easier to fake IDs for since they won't have an existing registry to erase…'

Blaze ran his fingers through his dark hair. 'Right now I really hope you're wrong. There's only one ship that can deal with that abomination, and we just sent her away.'

Ali slapped him on the shoulder. 'Well at least Tochiro and Mimay gave Hannibal's guys some hints on beefing up this old girl, right? New cannon, new shields, improved self-repair, total engine overhaul…' He grinned. 'And don't forget you've got the best of the Arcadia's crew to help you…'

Blaze just looked at him. 'A pity they didn't expand the interior to make room for your ego whilst they were working on the ship,' he said dryly. Ali just smirked, and Blaze decided instead to ignore him and began giving orders to the bridge crew. They weren't leaving until they had some idea from either the time radar or Freya's strange senses on the direction, but at least it gave him the illusion of doing something whilst he waited. And a reason to ignore the looming, nervously pacing slab of muscle taking up space on his bridge, who he didn't have the heart to tell to leave.

The slab of muscle however was perfectly capable of distracting himself. 'What's that?' He pointed to a framed document placed on the wall of the bridge, behind the captain's chair. Blaze smiled. He didn't even need to look around to know what it was Ali referred to.

'Take a look. I know you can read.'

'Cheeky fuck.' But Ali strolled around the chair, hands in pockets, to peer at the document. 'Huh.' He grinned as he read the text, his smile growing when he recognised the copperplate hand used as his former captain's.

Whereas, by His Majesty's Commission under the Great Seal of Great Britain bearing Date the 25th Day of January in the year of Our Lord 2873 [….] the Lords Commissioners for executing the Office of Lord High Admiral are required and authorized to issue forth and grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal to any of His Majesty's Subjects or others, whom we shall deem fitly qualified in that Behalf for apprehending, seizing, and taking the Ships, Vessels and Goods [….] These are, therefore, to will and require you to cause a Letter of Marque and Reprisals to be issued out of the High Court of Admiralty unto Alexander Dietrich Sebastian Schenk von Stauffenberg, Commander of the Deathshadow Zero. Said Letters of Marque and Reprisal to continue in force until further orders, for which this shall be your Warrant.

[-]

'Letters of Marque? Cute.'

Blaze smiled without turning around. 'A gift from his brother he said, before the war. Apparently he thought his brother would be more of a privateer than a pirate.'

'What's the difference?'

'That document, so I hear,' Blaze replied promptly, earning a ripple of laughter from the crew.

Ali let his eyes wander around the unfamiliar bridge. Smaller than Arcadia's monstrous gothic interior, yet if you looked closely, built along a very similar plan: the various workstations for weapons, shields and engineering were all arrayed along the viewscreen that took up most of the bow end, and although only about a foot high instead of twelve, the captain's position was on a raised platform, with two further consoles next to it on either side, larger than the front rank. Navigation to the left, comms to the right, both manned by young women in the Millennial Thieves' standard grey flightsuits. 'Kinda weird, isn't it?'

'Hmm?'

'This.' Ali waved a hand to indicate the bridge. 'You look at the Arcadia's bridge and you realise it's based on this, but designed by someone with a real hard-on for mediaeval gothic. You get metal panels, we get flying buttresses.'

'We also keep the lights on,' one of the young women interjected. 'I've been on board the Arcadia with the captain - kept having to watch my feet to avoid tripping over something. You're not too hot on health and safety either - I mean, have you heard of stowing wires away instead of using them as a trip hazard? Or for that matter, strangling unsuspecting passengers?'

Ali grinned at her. 'Sure. But we know where to put our feet and where to duck, and no-one boarding us does…'

'And rookies?' Blaze put in.

Ali shrugged. 'Weeds out the idiots, dunnit?' He looked around again and gave a mock shudder. There was something about the bright lights, the shiny desks and the wide open, quiet of the ship that made the spot between his shoulder blades itch. 'Never thought I'd miss the little guy's constant little noises…' he murmured to himself. He flicked imaginary dust off his glove with the other hand and gave the cuff of his sweater a tug. 'I'll go and check on the kids. Someone's gotta make sure they don't get into too much trouble…'

'I don't think they can do much damage until we get into a firefight,' Blaze called out as Ali strode off the bridge.

'Don't bet on it,' Ali called back over his shoulder. 'I'm still remembering the hole Mamoru and Taro managed to blow in the side of the Arcadia messing around with some new power source last year…'

The young woman who'd spoken earlier turned in her seat. 'Captain? Should we be worried?'

Blaze smiled at her, opened his mouth to reassure her, thought about who she was asking about, and shut it again. 'I'm sure they won't throw anything at us we can't handle,' he settled on, fooling no-one, including himself. Mamoru without Taro was probably a safe bet, but Rei - his adopted brother - was an experimental synthetic with some weird-ass powers based on zero-point energy that no-one had quite fathomed, and Freya had spent two hundred years as the controller for a dark matter power source. 'Yeah. What could possibly go wrong?' he muttered, as he concentrated on the clipboard his XO was shoving under his nose.

'Want the list?' Farah asked him cheekily. A tall dark-haired man about Blaze's age, he had the perfectly sculpted beauty typical of Lar Metal's elite (former) ruling caste. 'The crew's already running a book on it…'

'Who had "all of the above"?' Blaze muttered darkly.

Farah smirked. 'We had to ban that bet or they'd all make it.'

Blaze handed back the clipboard with a roll of his eyes. 'Why does that not surprise me?' With little else to do until they had a course, he settled back in the chair and closed his eyes. Harlock… Hannibal… Kei… wherever you are, be safe, my friends. And if you can't be safe, make the bastards hurt.