It wasn't like him to visit the crime planet known mostly by all as 'Haven'. It was comparable to the Wild West in America's history, it was the origin of the axis that was the criminal universe. It was the meeting and gathering point of thieves, slavers, bandits, pirates, smugglers, bounty hunters, mercenaries, and those lost without a cause. Thus Thomas Void visited the place when he needed to be contacted or was in need for a job. Though he could always find a job, he picked the ones that either had the best pay, was the most challenging, or something that included a high profile. Void was on Haven, thus he did not have one of those types of jobs at that time, so he was looking for one.
The helmet that covered his head, looking a bit like a Kull's helmet but with a full face black visor, was computing everyone who he passed into a database, checking for those with bounties, and those who were hunters. Ensuring that if there was someone on his tail, he could deal with it. His eyes trailed lazily over the gangs in alleys and the mercenaries in the bars and other unsavoury locations that could be easily found in Haven. He found himself in a Cantina that he frequented, not for the alcohol, but for the information that the bartender collected for him. For a fee of course. As he entered he immediately took note of an altercation between patrons, one male who seemed humanoid, and three male mercenaries. They hadn't started an all out brawl just yet, but both parties had hands hovering closely to their weapons.
The bartender was trying to get his attention, Void rolled his eyes when he remembered that it was his task to stop these fights if he came upon them. His computer identified the mercenaries, in fact, Void had had them working for him at one stage. They'd taken out the three Alkesh that had been in orbit over the planet that Grere had been hiding out upon. But Void did not tend to get friendly with his work acquaintances, on too many occasions had he been stabbed in the back by a supposed ally.
His voice boomed out, amplified by the helmet. His rifle stayed strapped upon his back, he knew of more than one way to kill a cat, so to speak. "Oi, knock it out if you wish to keep your home for a brain firmly on your shoulders." It resonated from the six foot man, looking quite intimidating in his armour. The armour itself was quite intriguing, a mixture of a Goa'uld personal shield, scraps from an ancient shield, and properties of a Kull shield.
The four pairs of eyes turned to him, the mercenaries widened in recognition and he quietened down quite sufficiently. The other though, his eyes were violet. It was all that Void could do to not jump backwards in surprise. The humanoid waved to him in a sign of...gratitude? The fact that his skin on his arm was red did not surprise him this time around, he was obviously not human and the eyes and skin just backed him up. His build was hardly human either, going by his bulk from what he could see through the cloak he was a tank, definitely not human, perhaps it was best for those three mercenaries that he had stepped in.
With a glance at the parties involved he walked back to the bartender, who had gone back to cleaning glasses with a rag. Void sat, transferring files to the computer in his helmet from the bartender. It crushed a couple of malignant viruses that came along with it and Void looked at the Bartender. Not knowing whether or not it was him that put them there he decided not to act upon it. He was a good source of information and it was not worth the trouble that it would take to get another one. Pushing a coin across the bench he rose from his the barstool as it was snatched quickly by the man behind.
Void, curiosity intrigued, followed the creature where he had gone into the corner that he had chosen for his seat. Strange, reflected Void, that he would choose the corner chair where he himself had sat with Tristen Varafly, the one who got away. As the alien sat in the corner, facing the rest of pub, Thomas pulled a seat up, and sat next to the creature, his back pressed against the wall. He was loath to sit with his back to the rest of the cantina, "My name is Void, I'm a Bounty Hunter. May I ask who you are?"
The alien barely looked at him as he replied over his glass, "Why is it that people feel perfectly justified in sitting at a table that is already occupied by someone who obviously does not want company?" At this he stood and moved off, leaving a mouth gaping bounty hunter and an empty mug behind. Funny how these things seemed to happen at the same place. The only other time that he'd been left hanging like that was by Varafly, and she'd been as baffling as this fellow. No, she'd been worse.
The reason that he had stood and moved soon became evident as the alien confronted new mercenaries. There were about ten in total and they had just entered the establishment when the tank of a creature had approached them. Void sat in the corner, still baffled.
"A young widow asked me to return the favour that you showed her husband." The strange thing was, he gave them the time to attack first, to ready themselves. Almost as if he was purposefully giving them the advantage. The first attack was with a knife, the young mercenary swung it at the one man. Quicker than lighting, the alien defended himself and the merc was on the ground with a crushed windpipe and a severely broken arm. A gun was bent in half, the owner then impaled upon it. The red warrior decimated through the mercenaries, he was the hot knife through the butter.
There were two men left, when Void remembered the deal he had with the bartender. He stood, moving over as the warrior literally pushed his arm through the chest of a mercenary. As he turned to the leader of the mercenaries, Void placed his hand upon the shoulder of the beast. "I think he's learned his lesson." Void looked at the mercenary, noting it was the leader of the group. "I suggest you go put yourself in a monastery and prey for the rest of your life to whatever God you follow for repentance of your sins." He paused, "Because if you don't, then my friend here isn't going to be so forgiving nor as nice as he was today."
The mercenary nodded frantically and tripped over backwards in his haste to get out of the door. The red warrior moved forward with a single command of wait, his hands gripped the mercenary, it was only then that Void noticed the claw upon his hand, it seemed to be made of some kind of bone and it was a weapon crafted around his hand, it explained the arm being able to go through the chest. The warrior took something from the pocket of the mercenary. Void zoomed in upon the object, he noted it was a pendant. He frowned, all of that slaughter for a simple necklace?
"I'm sure the wife of the man you slaughtered will be happy to receive this back." He kicked the merc out of the door and Void watched him briefly as he ran away. He looked back to the warrior only to see him gone. Void rolled his eyes and followed. Again he was amazed at the similarities that were shown between this and the encounters between himself and Tristen, he'd followed her much the same way as he was following the warrior. But when he'd been following the woman he'd been thinking of securing twenty thousand credits, here he was just interested in finding a bit about the man.
"Hey," He called, coming up and placing a hand upon the shoulder of the red skinned, violet eyed humanoid, "I'm a bounty hunter, as I said. I'm gathering that you're the righteous type, I hunt bad men as a living. Work with me, I could use a man of your skills."
The warrior looked at him, "I don't not kill people for money. I did what I did in there now, merely because a person who was wronged and deprived of who they loved, asked me to. I will gain no reward when I see her again, I will merely give her this pendant, and be on my way."
"Fine then let me keep the mone....." The warrior pounced on him, pushing him through the alley. Void was just about to discharge his weapon into the man when his HUD processed the noise of Death Gliders, they swung past and began to turn. There were two of them, and although the ships were the feared fighters of the Goa'uld their weapon fire was inaccurate, with no targeting computer it was up to the pilot to be able to line up the shot and fire by themselves.
Void stuck out his rifle around the corner, taking note of the forty plus mercenaries led by the one that he'd let go, by the camera in the scope than linked to his helmet. Thomas scowled, now they'd wrecked his previously unspoilt day.
"Forty of them, armed with staff weapons. Highly inaccurate weaponry, more for intimidation than for war." He dismantled the grenade launcher from the rifle, handing the rifle to the warrior. "We'll go up the roof, I'll handle the fighters, you take the men. I'll be done in time to give you a hand."
The warrior took off without answering, slinging the rifle over his shoulder. His modified triple barreled traveler's gun letting of parries of red energy into the enemies. Void went around the corner, going immediately through a door to an abandoned building and then proceeding up the stairs onto the building's roof. Three stories up. He looked behind him to check on the warrior to see where he was at.
The warrior was fine, he was in fact welding a steel door into the frame of the doorway using his weapon. The distraction of Void looking perhaps was not the best idea as when he came out of the hatch on the building he was immediately struck by weapons fire from one of the two Death Gliders. It blasted him backwards, his shield rippling in brilliant shades of blue. He came to rest at the edge of the building. Glancing down at the ground below he shook his head and stood, as the blue patterns disappeared. The shield was still active, it was just going back to its normal form.
As the warrior entered the top of the building Void was in the process of aiming the grenade launcher, with the aid of his HUD it did not take long and Void fired. The grenade arced up, higher than the Death Glider, it began to fall back to the ground, gravity having its affect. The Death Glider soared asunder, and the grenade impacted upon the windscreen of the fighter. It blew out the cockpit, sending the ship of twenty metres to corkscrew out and crash in a field out of town.
He began looking for the other one when he heard his rifle being slid across the roof to him, he looked in confusion at the warrior only to see him leap. His leap was superhuman, definitely impossible for those of the homosapien race. He landed on the Death Glider. The claw that covered his arm raised and with great strength sent cracks thoughout the glass, with a second hit it broke through the screen and to the shock of both passengers impaled the pilot. Running off of the Glider he leaped, landing on the building that he'd started on.
Void, who had meanwhile reattached his weapon shook his head muttering something about a show off. A loud bang brought them back to the reality that there were now forty mercenaries inside the building, more intent to kill them now than they ever were. Void did three things at once, he activated a program in his head up display, he slung his rifle over his back, and he grabbed the warrior by the upper arm and ran to the edge of the building.
In a giant leap they jumped off of the three story building. They flew for a little while and then began plummeting back to the earth. Halfway down, Thomas Void's Tel'tak impacted with the building that they had just jumped from. Forty mercenaries perished in the explosion and the building collapsed. As was the Tel'tak destroyed in the collision. The warrior and the bounty hunter fell in seemingly slow motion, the flicking flame to their backs. They landed on the roof of the building across the street. They landed on the roof, Void's shield protecting him, the warrior's higher bone density left him protected. The roof however was not strong enough to take such a beating, in a cloud of dust the pair fell through into the building. Void checked his feet to make sure he had not squished anybody on his way down. Thankfully he had not, nor had the warrior. He looked up and noticed a family at a dinner table. Their food covered in dust and their mouths wide open. Walking out he pulled the warrior with him before he could offer to pay for the damages. On the street Thomas turned to the warrior, "So, can I know your name now?"
The warrior looked at him, a bond of sorts was created when two men fought together, but apparently that did not apply here. The warrior grunted and pressed a few buttons on his com. A Tel'tak approached, immediately Thomas could tell it was no ordinary Tel'tak. It possessed at least an extra four inches of hull, comprised of some sort of Naquadah alloy. Their were two Tauri rail guns attached to the 'wings' of the cargo ship. A cannon of sorts which looked like it may have produced lasers was positioned on the side above the door. A door that the warrior accessed and did not look back at Void. Void rolled his eyes and accessed a scan report that his Tel'tak had sent before its demise. The results made him yell, "Perhaps you'd be interested to know that there are more of our friends up there above."
There was no answer for a while, presumably the warrior was doing his own scans. Eventually the door opened and Void stepped in and stopped as he was presented to the gunpoint of a security droid. The warrior told it to stand down and Void was allowed to enter. The Tel'tak took off and they entered the space above Haven. A single Ha'tak was the source of the mercenaries and the Gliders, and they headed there now as three more gliders exited the Ha'tak. "Do you have a cloak on this thing?"
The warrior nodded and the Tel'tak went invisible. "Weapons?" Void asked, and was answered with the two he already knew about and the Alkesh bombs just behind the ringing platform. Void's eyes, hidden by his helmet went wide as an idea presented to him. He moved to the back of the Tel'tak and began emptying the bay of Alkesh Bombs. He presented his plan to the warrior who nodded his agreement. The cloaked Tel'tak passed through into the Ha'taks shielding as the Goa'uld fighters swooped around uselessly looking for a quarry that they could not see. The Tel'tak positioned itself at the Pel'tak of the Ha'tak. It's rail guns opened fire upon the Pel'tak, cracking through its screen and thus sucking the personnel and oxygen out of the room. The Tel'tak turned, presenting its belly to the now windowless Pel'tak. The Alkesh Bomb bays opened, sending its cargo into the ship.
The cargo stood when entered, Thomas Void, helmet and shield engaged stood in the artificial gravity of the atmosphere lacking room. The doors had sealed as was emergency protocol. Thommo moved to the controls, and in a quick few maneuvers had diverted control of the ship to his helmet. He hacked past the closed doors and forced himself against the rushing oxygen to get through before they closed again. His rifle raised itself and he fired at the mercenaries who were waiting there for him.
Outside, the Death Gliders had made the Tel'taks position and were proceeding to attack it. Forgoing cloaks, the Tel'tak raised its shields and moved to attack, rail guns firing as well as the laser cannon when it had a good shot. One of the fighters had already been turned to space debris.
The Ha'tak scans informed Thomas as he made his journey throughout the ship that the HDF, Haven Defense Force, was on its way to investigate the cause of such a ruckus. Void swore, his credits that he would have made from the Ha'tak had just burst into flames. He wouldn't get time to hack past the lock-down protocol of the Ha'tak that stopped him from jumping away to hyperspace. Initiating the ships self-destruct he moved to the Hangar. He could have just as easily ringed to the Tel'tak that he'd arrived on the Ha'tak for, but he did not want to come out of this little misadventure with a loss.
Arriving at the Hangar he took his pick from three Tel'tak, shooting down other mercenaries who were perhaps made out of a bit weaker material and had decided that their lives were worth more elsewhere instead of defending the Ha'tak from an unknown force. Entering the Tel'tak he took up the controls and opened the hangar doors. The self destruct timer counted down in the corner of his vision, coming to single digit seconds.
He had just cleared the blast radius when the Ha'tak blew. He was right, he'd been able to calculate it down to the second. Another Tel'tak turned to face Voids. The debris of three Death Gliders were now there where they hadn't been before. A video communication popped up on his screen, it was the warrior who simply nodded to him. Confirming that it was Void and not another Merc, the warrior ended the communication and his Tel'tak jumped away to hyperspace.
Void shook his head. That was an extremely baffling man, not interested in money, not interested in the thrill, nor interested in personal gain. Shaking his head as the HDF neared he followed the nameless warrior's example and jumped to hyperspace. He had a job that he was to do.
