5:43 PM

Sitting back in my bunk, I nodded my head to the sound of "Orange Blossom Special", once again played by Johnny Cash. The irony of the song, riding a fast train to escape the blues of the city, wasn't lost on me as I looked across the cabin at my "passenger", Naash. He was busy reading a book of all things in his bunk as he snacked on some kind of jerky, yet another contradiction to add to the growing list. Not that it was a bad thing to have a seemingly docile Krogan as your passenger, sure, but it still seemed unusual compared to the two or three times I've run into other Krogans. I wasn't sure how to act around this guy.

Five and a half hours into the trip, I suppose I just had to be thankful that things were quiet. Being a first-time trip with a passenger, I expected nagging, constant annoyance, or possibly even violence from him. None had materialized at this point, and the transit had remained smooth as we moved through Tekuna Reticula, a dead system that featured nothing but belts of asteroids around a red giant. The largest terrestrial object in the system was an ice-filled asteroid called Camellia, only 800-something kilometers in diameter. Flying through the asteroids with active radar turned on was a great way to deter people from following you, especially when the auto-pilot could plot out the safest route automatically.

Tekuna Reticula was a perfect "shortcut" between the Vallory-Mayfield System, where Dandridge was, and the Cygnus Badlands. Its pure lack of activity made it a little sketchy, but it was nothing compared to Cygnus. Given its status as a "corporate" system, there would be patrolling private security forces there, but as long as I avoided that big "corpo" ball of water Aigua, I'd likely go unmolested.

From there, it would be a final jump to the Chiron Sector, where I'd find the lone rock in question. It all sounded simple and short in hindsight, but the diminutive amount of power supplied by this kind of NM reactor limited how often I could do FTL jumps, forcing me to adhere to certain timeframes.

The Confeds and anyone else with a larger, high-grade NM reactor could make this kind of trip in less than four hours. Us commercial pilots with lower-grade transports had to make due with the gimped, mass-produced versions. It wasn't out of spite, that much was certain. It was a deliberate move by companies to make the more effective reactors harder to acquire on the black market, mainly by pirates and "terrorist groups". Those people have tried to do some very… unkind things with larger reactors. Tripping the safeties on a passing ship's Gravity Drive using another Gravity Drive was a common trick for pirates looking to trap and board commercial ships, but a less-efficient NM reactor apparently limited the overall range of this "interdiction" strategy.

With the money I'd be making from this contract and my passenger, I'd finally be able to afford a new rig with a properly-sized reactor, in addition to all the other obvious improvements. With any luck, express contracts would begin to flow my way once word got out that I was running with a modern rig.

"Well, I don't care if I do-die-do-die-do-die-do-die…" I sang along with the song, nodding my head from side-to-side with a big smile on my face. "Hey, talk about a-ramblin', she's the fastest train on the line…"

As "Orange Blossom Special" ended, I watched Naash suddenly look up towards me from his bunk, interest clearly seen on his face.

"Hey boss, would you mind if I put on some of my own music?" He asked in his usual, shy tone. I couldn't help but be piqued.

"That depends, what kind of music do you listen to?" I replied in a bemused huff, tapping the "STOP" button on my keyboard as I crossed my arms.

"I mostly listen to old movie soundtracks, but my favorite is the score to this old human movie called Blade Runner. Have you seen it before?" He immediately explained, pulling an OSD out of his jumpsuit as I shook my head. "Oh… well, it was performed by a Greek man who called himself "Vangelis". It made heavy use of primitive electronic instruments, as well as your more traditional ones, creating a fusion of sound I very much enjoy."

"I suppose I'll give it a shot. Give it here." I sighed, holding up a single hand as he flicked it at me. I easily caught it, popping it into my console in a single motion.

After a brief and fruitless virus scan, I opened the drive to see it was filled with hundreds of folders, all of them containing music. It was almost scary the amount of stuff there was on this thing.

"I also enjoy Brian Eno's work, though it would probably be too "ambient" for your taste." Naash went on, tucking his legs up to his chest, making him look somewhat like a ball.

"I'll give this "Blade Runner" stuff of yours a chance." I refocused, finding said folder rather easily. I turned off the shuffle on my jukebox and starting from the beginning.

The first track started off quiet and moody with occasional pangs of percussion. It built up slowly before a harp suddenly cut in with some louder percussion, followed by electronic notes that began to build into a melody. It sounded both grounded and expansive, fading in and out as some kind of chimes could be heard in the background.

As unwilling as I was to "connect" or "bond" with my passenger, I had to begrudgingly admit I liked it as I quickly shifted to the next track. For years I had listened exclusively to my dad's old collection of Johnny Cash, only being exposed to other kinds of music when I wasn't working or around Raato's office. This "Vangelis" stuff sounded alien to me, which left me with this strange sense of disbelief that it had come from the mind of a human being.

"Not bad. What are your thoughts on my Johnny Cash? The Man In Black?" I questioned, allowing myself to relax as I gestured towards the posters on the wall next to me.

"He's alright, I suppose. I don't love it or anything, and some of them I'm not a fan of." He remarked, tenting his fingers as he leaned back into the cushions. "What is that genre called again? Country?"

"Oh, way more than just Country. He did everything, including Rock & Roll, Folk, Blues, and even Gospel. The man had more talent than you and I put together, and he recorded this all back in the 20th century." I explained, still letting myself enjoy Naash's own music.

"You sound like quite the fan of his work." He nodded, sounding rather neutral as he gazed over at one of the posters of the man himself on my walls.

"My Dad listens to his music all the time back on Harvest." I smiled, leaning back in my seat as some old memories floated to the top of my brain.

"I hear that's a nice little moon." He nodded, actually surprising me. It wasn't a very widely-known colony world. "You grew up there?"

"Yeah… sure did." I confirmed as I thought about home, allowing a small smile to grow on my face.

Harvest is the name of a small moon orbiting around the gas giant Crichton, located in the Caliban system of the Ortho Nebula. A fairly minor agricultural planet in Confederation space, my birthplace and "original" home was the town of Moha, founded mainly by human colonists who fled their original colony in the Traverse during the War. My parents, two geologists who preferred to call themselves "prospectors", brought me into this world right before the Reaper War kicked off.

Moha, and Harvest itself for that matter, was a very boring place to live, nothing but the occasional meteor shower, holobook, or visit from a merchant ship to keep you entertained most days. It was beautiful, sure, but I was never much of a farmer, so I didn't have much of a career to look forward to there. When I was old enough, I decided to get off that rock, and hadn't been back there since.

"So, where'd you come from, Naash?" I asked out of genuine curiosity, feeling it was a natural way to progress the conversation.

"Droichead." He answered in a flat tone, his expression hardening slightly. I was admittedly intrigued.

Droichead, unlike Harvest, was a very well-known planet in Confederation space, dominated by massive jungles and vast oceans. Normally that would have made it incredibly attractive to colonists, but said jungles and oceans were also infested with poisonous fauna and dozens of previously undiscovered predatory species, and even several known ones, including the infamous Thresher Maws.

Instead of simply abandoning the planet, it was offered to the Krogan people as a sign of "good will" from the Confederation, a gift for their help during the War. They happily accepted it, seeing it as a true challenge worthy of their skills. Nowadays, it was the most prosperous Krogan colony in the galaxy, having recently amassed a population of over 2,300,000. They mined and fished, but the biggest moneymaker on Droichead was their hunting "safaris".

It was actually quite interesting, all things considered. I'd never delivered anything there before, but all us truckers had heard the stories of the occasional safari going wrong, with some overpaid Confed suit getting devoured by the local wildlife. Very entertaining stories.

"Ah, so I'm guessing that makes you a… first gen baby, right?" I guessed, getting a small "smile" to cross his lips.

"Yes." He nodded, letting out a single, amused huff. "I am twenty years old."

"An adolescent! Wow!" I remarked with mild surprise, hamming up my reaction slightly. "Why'd you leave a nice, entertaining ball of mud like that to work in a scrapyard?"

"If you couldn't tell before, let me make it more clear. I really don't like fighting or violence in general." He immediately shot back, his attitude switching to annoyance just enough to be noticeable. "All there is to do on that "ball of mud" is fight back against nature as it tries to kill you everyday."

"Not your bag of tea, I get it." I apologize, putting up both hands casually. "Sorry."

"It's alright." He nodded, relaxing slightly. "I couldn't have stayed there anyways… never got along with my family. They always complained that I was "too soft" and "an embarrassment" to the rest of my clan."

"My folks back home feel the same about my current and former occupations, if that makes you feel any better." I smiled weakly, thinking back to the last time I talked to them. It didn't go well.

As I drifted off into thought, I suddenly heard my active radar ping an engine signature, immediately jolting me with a spike of adrenaline.

"Get in that seat now." I said in as serious of a tone as possible, throwing myself into my own as I pulled down the radar screen. As Naash secured himself, I scanned again in the direction the signature came from, immediately noticing a tiny, pitch-black ship that was now tumbling out of control. It looked like it had been struck by one of the rocks, critically damaging it.

"What the hell is this…" I muttered under my breath, noticing a single figure flying away from said ship as it slammed into another, larger rock, exploding into dozens of pieces. He was coming directly towards my rig.

"What is it?" Naash asked as I pushed the radar screen back up, unstrapping myself from the chair.

"We've got a boarder, possibly someone trying to jack my rig!" I explained as best I could as I swung open my locker, yanking a lightly-armored spacesuit out and pulling myself into it. "You, stay here and keep an eye on the radar and those vid screens. If you see anything else pop up, you tell me over the comm unit."

"Uh, ok!" He quickly agreed, pulling the screen on his side down as I sealed the helmet around my neck.

"Bridget, maintain the current auto-pilot path. Lock all manual movement controls and sub-systems access." I ordered now that my passenger couldn't hear me. I was not willing to take any chances. "Unlock upon receiving the pass phrase "Spearhead", confirm."

"Affirmative, pilot. Systems are now locked, pass phrase is set." She replied in my helmet, getting a quick nod from me as I opened a panel on the roof of my cab, revealing my hidden weapons. An old matte-black M-358 Talon, modified personally by me to fire in a tighter group, and an M-13 Raptor, also matte-black, modified to fire at a higher velocity, but sacrificing its true semi-auto capabilities. Both were good weapons, which I had practiced with a lot in the past.

Truth be told, they were relics from my… previous occupation, but were still useful to have around for situations like this. I grabbed both, putting the Raptor on my back and the Talon on my hip. Sealing the panel back up, I walked through the port airlock, flushing all the air out. I was happy to see the suit's seals were still holding.

"Hey, you readin' me?" I asked over my helmet's comms as the outer airlock door slid open, revealing the asteroid field outside, along with several pieces of debris.

"Yes, I read you." He replied through the tinny speakers as I walked outside, making sure my magnetic boots were working correctly.

"Use the external cameras and see if you can spot this guy." I ordered, carefully walking across the bulk of the engineering section to get a good look at what I was dragging behind me.

"Uh, it looks like they're walking across the umbilical, between the containers, about a hundred meters away from you." He answered with a nervous tone as I crept up past the engines, pulling my Raptor out and extending it to its full length.

"Are they armed?" I asked, being as careful as possible not to expose myself.

"I can't tell, the image is too grainy." He finished as I shook my head, knowing I'd have to be even more careful.

I stood up over the top exhaust cowling, looking through my scope for any movement. I immediately spotted a humanoid figure walking across the hull, who noticed me taking aim. He suddenly froze in place as I switched to an open band frequency, hoping I might be able to defuse the situation before this got messy.

"Whoever you are, you have five seconds to get your ass off my rig! I won't give you another chance!" I shouted, fighting to steady my aim as the RCS thrusters fired automatically, rolling the ship slightly. "Five… four… three… two…"

Before I could finish, he deactivated his mag boots, quickly propelling himself between two of the containers as I fired and missed.

"Son of a bitch!" I grunted, doing the best "run" I could manage towards him as I switched to my Talon and changed frequencies. "Naash, anything?!"

"He's using a maneuvering unit, I think he's flying around the other side." He observed, sounding rather frantic.

"I'll find him." I remarked, if only to reassure myself at this point. The ship suddenly moved again to avoid a piece of incoming debris, causing my center of gravity to shift rather violently as I grabbed a nearby handle.

"Oh no, he's behind you!" Naash yelled as I felt the jacker slam into me, nearly ripping my feet off of the Rivva.

He used his unit to push me against the ship, trying to wrestle the Talon out of my hand. I elbowed him several times in the faceplate, managing to crack it to some degree as I rolled over, getting myself face-to-face with the hostile.

They were wearing some kind of dirty, scuffed-up white hardsuit, with plenty of patches and obvious repairs. Their visor was completely opaque, preventing me from seeing their face. The maneuvering unit he was using was an older one, not directly tethered to the suit itself.

"Get… the hell… off my rig!" I grunted out, deactivating one of my boots and kicking him away, giving myself enough room to fire my Talon.

Surprisingly enough, his kinetic barriers were just strong enough to absorb the shot, sending him flying backwards. He tried to fly away again, turning in the other direction, but I quickly took the opening he had given me, instead shooting him in the unshielded maneuvering unit. While the shot didn't punch all the way through the unit, it tore apart his fuel tanks and one of the thrusters, sending him tumbling uncontrollably through space away from the Rivaa.

"Are you alright? I lost track of him." Naash chimed back in, managing to sound genuinely worried.

"I'll be fine." I muttered, sighing as I pulled myself back up. "As for our friend… well…"

I watched him spin off towards nothingness, but as I did so I felt… reluctance. Even I had to admit this was an awful fate, being thrown uncontrollably into the dark, but by all regards he had earned it. Still, even after an ordeal such as that, I believed no one, even a jacker, deserved such a slow death.

I pulled my Raptor back out and took careful aim as I kneeled and steadied the rifle against my left arm. Lining up the shot, I fired a single round that tore completely through his suit, killing him instantly.

I wasn't above mercy, believing I had done more than most would have in my position.

"He's dead. I'm coming back aboard." I radioed, getting no reply from Naash. For someone who had been relatively chatty during this whole situation, I knew something had changed.

He didn't say a word as I went through the airlock, opening it to see him curled up in his bunk, a deadended look on his face. I narrowed my eyes in further confusion, undoing the seal on my helmet.

"What the hell's going on?" I questioned as I put the helmet back on the rack.

"I… it's… difficult to talk about." He shook his head, clearly disturbed by something as he pulled himself back out of the bunk, standing at full height again. "Seeing that man float away helplessly into the distance was… it brought back some unpleasant memories for me."

"Well, I put him out of his misery, so he didn't suffer if that's any consolation to you." I replied as softly as I could, pulling my suit off. "Not that he really deserved it, mind you."

"It was the right thing to do." He nodded, walking back over and plopping himself back into the co-pilot seat. "It's strange though, did you notice the markings on that man's suit?"

"I was a bit too busy fighting for my life to look at all the details of his suit." I dismissed, putting my Talon and Raptor back in their compartment.

"It looked like something a member of Cerberus would wear, but… older, in disrepair." He continued, getting me to roll my eyes. "Do you think Cerberus could be out here?"

"Cerberus… heh." I shook my head as I sat down in my seat, becoming aware of a large bruise forming on my back. "Cerberus hasn't been a thing for decades. They're the boogeymen of the Confeds."

"I'm surprised you'd say that. They've been responsible for several bombings the last few months on Confederation planets." He argued, turning his seat towards me. "They probably still have influence in these regions, even if it is small."

"Those weirdos are just a bunch of "good ol' boys" hiding in the uncharted systems, occasionally coming out of hiding to spit at the Confeds. Just another reason to keep up their military spending." I dismissed, turning on my seat's back warmer to ease my muscles. "I've never met anyone who's dealt with Cerberus, and neither will you."

"Then how do you explain those guns of yours?" He pointed out, nodding towards the ceiling panel. "If my history is correct, those were weapons commonly used by Cerberus during the Reaper War. Not a lot of those survived in the wild following their defeat, yet you have two of them."

"Those guns were surplus, used by an outfit I used to be part of a long time ago." I defended, genuinely feeling uncomfortable as he forced me to think back to those days. "Wha- why am I even bothering to explain myself? I thought you agreed to stop with the questions."

Naash didn't say anything in response, putting on a pouty face and crossing his arms as he turned away. I breathed deeply, typing in the passphrase as I forced myself to relax. I got the shakes in a bad way after moments like what I had experienced outside, and I didn't want to look weak in front of my rotund passenger. Looking back at him though, he seemed more disappointed than anything else.

I didn't know why I felt such an obligation to be nice to this Krogan.

"Look, if it'll make you feel better, I'll tell you what I used to do." I reluctantly began, getting him to turn back towards me. "I used to be an agent for this company called Voyager Security Solutions. Ever heard of them?"

"No, can't say that I have." He shook his head, curiosity clearly seen in his eyes.

"Well, that's the way these guys like it. Real high-grade stuff, bordering on being their own private army. They usually only offer their services to the big corporations, at least the ones that don't have their own in-house security." I went into detail, checking the radar screens for anything else as I spoke. "It was a proud moment in my life when they accepted my job application and inducted me into their Security Forces. Ended up getting marksman qualification."

"Then… how did you end up hauling cargo for a living?" He questioned much like I expected him to, tilting his head to the side just slightly.

"Well, that's a story I'm neither drunk nor depressed enough to get into." I immediately finished, going as far as I was willing to with his line of questioning.

With that, we both returned to sitting in silence, Naash's "Blade Runner" music still playing in the background as I eventually flew the ship out of the asteroids and began the long charging process for the Gravity Drive.

I had to get my mind off of what had just happened.

10:21 PM

Jumping to the Cygnus Badlands, we luckily managed to avoid immediately running into any Mjölnir security patrols. Out here, around Aigua especially, police and patrol activity was outsourced to Mjölnir's own private security forces who watched the whole system like hawks.

While I didn't hate interacting with them and they never gave me any real grief, any run-ins with them tended to add an hour or two to my travel time as they scanned my pods for contraband. This was standard procedure, and there was no way to really get around it if stopped.

"I wonder what it looks like down there." Naash wondered out loud, leaning against the co-pilot console as he stared out at the blue watery speck in the far distance. "I've heard Ahto City is quite beautiful."

"The entire planet is just one big ocean." I shrugged, feeling no interest in it at all. "Not sure what attracts people to large bodies of water."

"The city, not the ocean." He corrected in another rare "annoyed" moment, looking at me with narrowed eyes. "I hate bodies of water, especially large ones."

"Krogans don't swim very well, do they?" I joked, cracking a small smile as he flipped back around to fully face me with something I hadn't seen before. Anger.

"That's not funny. Don't make fun of that!" He immediately yelled back at me, filling me with a surprising amount of fear. "Say you're sorry, now!"

"OK OK, I'm sorry!" I quickly apologized, realizing I had somehow made a mistake. "No more jokes."

"Thank you." He nodded, his expression quickly becoming neutral again as I gave him quick, careful glances from my seat.

Up until now, I had never seen so much as a hint of anger or aggression from Naash, leaving this moment as something of an anomaly to me. It must have been something personal, that much was clear.

We sat in silence for another ten or so minutes before I finally got bored once again. Not wanting to get back into Naash or I's music collections just yet, I instead flipped on the nearby inactive multi-function display, turning on the UCN. Even with my inherent mistrust of news and media in general, I still liked to occasionally keep myself informed. Even the most paranoid truckers watched UCN, because like it or not, they were the best source of information regarding any… military developments in Confederation space.

It was important to know where and where not to go ahead of time. Avoiding trouble was half of the battle in this business. The little pre-news jingle played as I leaned back in my seat, ready for whatever was coming.

"Welcome back to UCN. I'm your host, Margitta Gwenda." The show began, getting me to breathe deeply as I made myself comfortable, drinking what water was left in my bottle. "Tonight's top story, a massive tsunami occurred in the Urbusa Sea on Rallegra today, leveling much of Siumara and its surrounding coastal communities. The tropical city, popular vacation destination and home to a large fishing community, is home to over 600,000 residents. The Governor of Rallegra, Miros'Easle, has called for a state of emergency over the city and surrounding areas until further notice."

"Sounds pretty bad…" Naash shook his head, managing to somehow look even more uncomfortable as he pulled his legs up to his chest.

"In response to the ongoing crisis, the Confederation Congress met in an emergency session four hours ago, authorizing the immediate deployment of the United Confederation's Peace Corps to Rallegra." The woman continued, managing to jog one of my memories as pictures of the ships blinked onto the screen. "The Peace Corps, famously led by the Liveships Hope and Mercy, will be providing mass medical aid in addition to helping with relief efforts."

I let out a small huff of approval hearing that. I had actually been lucky enough to see the Hope and Mercy in person a few years ago when I was on a stopover on Port Chiron. They had passed through the sector to visit a colony in the Traverse that had suffered a massive viral outbreak.

The two ships were Zephyr-class Liveships, the only two ever built, based almost entirely on the old Quarian ones from several hundred years ago. Other than being newer, upgraded designs, they were apparently no different from the old ones, originally being built post-war to help the Raloi people with pressing food shortages suffered on Turviss, their home planet. After twelve years, the Raloi successfully colonized and spread out to enough nearby worlds that this issue finally died out, leaving the two ships without a purpose. The Confederation instead pushed the vessels into humanitarian service, turning them into the flagships of the United Confederation's "Peace Corps". The vessels are deployed on humanitarian missions to planets in need, providing food, shelter, and medical aid.

While I saw the whole "Peace Corps" thing as more of a Confed publicity stunt than anything else, you couldn't deny the awe such vessels instilled when seen in person. Besides, I wasn't one to knock those out there who were making a genuine effort to help other people.

"Big ships." Was all I could mutter as the news switched to some unimportant story, getting me to shut it off.

"I hope they can help those people. I've seen what a tsunami can do." Naash continued to say, looking even more uncomfortable.

"OK, you seem to know something I don't." I finally spoke out, having gotten tired of his mopey, almost bipolar attitude. "I see the pattern here. Swimming, oceans, tsunamis… what happened to you you're not telling me about?"

Naash sighed deeply, staring into space for nearly a whole minute before turning back to me.

"When I was still living on Droichead, I used to help my brother Burdak fish off the coast of the city. He was the only member of my family who understood who I was and what I wanted to be, and we'd spend hours out on the water, talking about life and making our living." He began to explain, curling up into what looked like a ball as he spoke. "One day, a large and violent storm swept over our boat while we were trawling, catching both of us by surprise. While we were trying to stabilize the boat, he fell overboard and…"

He stopped himself, audibly gulping as he fought back against his own emotions.

"...I was too much of a coward to save him. He drowned." He finished, his eyes going glassy. "When my family learned of what had happened, they disowned me."

He pushed his head into his legs as I let out a small sigh, realizing I had pushed him too far.

"Shit man, I'm sorry. I had no idea." I apologized, now feeling like a massive asshole. "If I had known tha-"

"I don't blame you for being curious. I'm well aware of the reputation my species has, and I understand your curiosity." He immediately cut back in, eyes red but voice steady. "I just want to get to Chiron, earn enough to get to Reach, and begin again… put all of this behind me."

"I think I can understand that." I nodded, focusing back on the screens in front of me as I quickly grabbed my water bottle, trying to remove myself mentally from this whole aura that had formed.

I understood why he had been so quiet and touchy before, leaving me with an honest sense of regret. I was beginning to believe Naash was a genuine individual now, and that was honestly a problem for me. I didn't want to like or empathize with my first (and hopefully last) passenger, but I had to begrudgingly admit I understood his pain.

I was starting to like him.

Unfortunately while we had been talking, I had neglected to keep my eye on the scanners, only now noticing a Mjölnir patrol ship making a direct beeline towards us. A particular one I recognized, based on the IFF.

"Oh goddamnit…" I grumbled, sighing as I grit my teeth and leaned back in my chair.

"What?" Naash immediately perked back up, an alert look clear on his face as he turned towards my sensor screen.

"Just wait for it…" I paused, holding up my index finger into the air. "Wait for it…"

A few moments later, the comm panel lit up as we were hailed by the ship in question.

"Yep, that's it." I grumbled, flicking the switch on my panel.

"This is Mjölnir Patrol Craft 187. You are currently traveling through a corporate security zone, please transmit your license, registration, and manifest for inspection." A voice spoke from the panel, getting me to roll my eyes and lean my head to the side. "Failure to comply will be met with arrest and seizure of your ship and goods."

"What do we do?" Naash asked in a worried voice as I casually held up my hand to reassure him.

"Don't worry, we'll be fine. We might get lucky." I remarked, flicking the switch again and leaning towards the panel. "Hey Gerald. Long time no see."

"Oh, is that you, Chuck?" He replied, the boilerplate tone he had been using before melting away.

"Yep. Just doing the usual, cutting through to Chiron." I confirmed, leaning against the armrest as Naash watched me with curious eyes. "I don't suppose you could let me slip through? This is an express contract I'm running right now."

"Sorry man, but the recent pirate and smuggler activity out here has my superiors acting all high and mighty." He said, getting my face to droop even further as I realized I was stuck. "Transmit those docs, and I'll try to get this over with as quickly as possible."

"Fine, whatever." I shook my head, tapping the display above me and transmitting all the relevant information. As I stared up at the ceiling, I let out a long, protracted curse, covering my face. "Fuuuuuuuuuck…"

"I'm guessing this is bad, right?" Naash remarked, leaning back further in his seat.

"I might as well kiss that full payout goodbye." I bitterly replied without looking at him, sucking down the last of the water in my bottle. "Goddamn pirates always have to ruin things for the rest of us."

"Isn't that unusual though? I thought this was supposed to be one of the most secure systems in Confederation space." He questioned, sounding more intrigued than anything else. "How could there be pirates this close to the core worlds?"

"I don't know man, I just work here." I said dismissively, watching Gerald's ship maneuver around in front of us.

In hindsight, being annoyed over missing Gerald's ship in my sensors was pointless to begin with. It had been so close to begin with that there was no chance I would have been able to avoid it. It was best to just relax now and let things take their course.

"So… what other music you got?" I asked out loud, looking back over at Naash. "Might as well expand my tastes while we're doing nothing."

Naash smiled, opening up his omni-tool and scrolling through several windows.

"Well, that depends. Do you want more of the stuff you heard earlier, or something weirder?" He inquired, sounding far more amused than anything else.

"Fine, give me the weird." I accepted, putting both hands behind my head and relaxing as he switched the music on.

It was strange, electronic tones intermixed with both fast and slow strings, with the occasional odd sound thrown in. The tones built up in bass as an odd "warbling" effect could be heard shifting other sounds, with a steel drum finally becoming the dominant instrument. The rhythm was both hectic and steady, and I honestly liked it.

"You weren't kidding when you said it was weird. What the hell is this?" I questioned, smiling as I looked back over at Naash.

"It's called "Nothing Is Something Worth Doing" by some old Human music project called Shpongle. They helped popularize the psybient genre of music." He answered as the music continued playing.

"I can't say I've ever heard of them, but I don't hate it." I critiqued, becoming very curious as to how he viewed his own race's media. "You sure seem to like Human music. Don't Krogans have their own music too, or is that just another one of your quirks?"

"You have to remember, we only have three fingers." He immediately replied, holding up his left hand and flexing said fingers. "You Humans, and the Asari for that matter, are capable of using a far greater range of musical instruments than those of us with three digits."

"That still doesn't answer my question." I pointed out, getting him to pause for a moment before letting out a small huff of amusement.

"I don't particularly enjoy my race's music. Most of it consists of old war songs, with heavy reliance on drums and other forms of percussion." He explained, looking as if he was embarrassed to admit it. "Strings were once popular with ancient Krogans, but they became somewhat of a lost art following our nuclear war."

"Krogans don't use wind instruments? At all?" I prodded, becoming more interested in the subject.

"Aside from war horns? Not really." He shook his head, sounding even more disappointed. "I admire Human musicians not only for their skills with traditional instruments, but their efforts to blend them with electronic ones as well."

"You must really like that 1970s and 1980s stuff then; also explains why you like that Vangelis guy so much too." I pointed out, aware of how prevalent the use of synthesizers and electronic keyboards became in that time period.

"Now that you mention it… yeah." He said with a pause, drawing out "yeah" and nodding as he turned to face me with another smile. This was enough to get me to burst out laughing, so hard in fact that I had to clutch my stomach to lessen the gut pains I suddenly experienced.

"Oh my God… I'm dying." I cried as tears rolled down my face, finally able to stifle my laughter to some extent.

Naash didn't say anything, instead continuing to smile as he looked straight ahead out the window.

Suddenly, without warning, the sensor screen lit up with a new contact above us as several mass accelerator rounds ripped into the patrol ship in front of us, causing its kinetic barriers to flair and immediately fail. The bridge windows blew out as the ship's reactor took a direct hit, immediately killing Gerald and his whole crew.

"Wha… what just happened?" Naash sputtered, both of us in complete shock as we watched blue plasma burn its way out of the hull breaches.

"Oh shit… oh fuck!" I yelled in a sudden fit of panic, feeling several thumps against the hull of my rig as collision alarms began blaring. "Pirates! We're getting jacked… for real this time!"

I looked through the hull cameras, seeing an old Alliance cruiser bearing down on us. Its original colors had been completely scrubbed, replaced with bare metal and over a dozen magnetic "harpoon" guns. We were quickly being drawn towards it, closer to some kind of jury-rigged cradle arm.

"What do we do?!" Naash yelled, just as panicked as I was at this point.

I struggled to control my thoughts, to come up with some kind of solution or way to get out of this mess. Unfortunately, there was really only one option left open to us now.

"We're going to calmly and quietly surrender." I answered in as calm a tone as possible, reaching up into my hidden compartment and taking my Talon out. "They haven't destroyed this compartment, so that means they may take us hostage rather than kill us."

Naash struggled to control his breathing as I threw the Talon to the deck, getting down on both knees and putting my hands behind my head. Naash did the same as the cradle could be heard connecting to my port airlock with a loud *clang*.

"System intrusion d-d-detected." Bridget announced as her voice went "wobbly" for lack of a better word, several more bangs being heard against the airlock door.

Seconds later, the door burst open, several pirates entering the compartment pointing guns at us. Naash closed his eyes out of fear, forcing himself to breathe more slowly as I examined what we were dealing with here.

Most of the pirates were Turians and Humans, with a select few being Quarians and Batarians. They all wore matching black hardsuits and wielded older Avenger-style rifles. They were clearly well practiced in doing this based on how they moved.

"Heh, look what we have here, boys!" One of them, a Human, jeered as he picked up my Talon from the floor. "These truckers have some high-grade shit on them!"

"Gimme that!" A scarred Turian yelled as he walked to the front of the group, plucking it out of the Human's hands. He glared at the younger man for a moment before turning his full attention to the Talon, then us.

As his eyes pierced my own, I finally recognized his ugly mug.

Hevus Aetrian. The most wanted pirate in Confederation space.

"So, a Human and a Krogan running a ship together? Can't say I've ever seen that before." He smirked, extending my Talon and pointing it at Naash, causing him to reel back in fear. Hevus laughed, pointing my gun at me instead. "Heh, that's a new one too. A cowardly Krogan. I assume you're actually the one in charge?"

"I own this ship, yes." I said as his expression immediately shifted to a more sadistic one. He pulled his arm back, whacking me in the side of the head with my Talon.

"Wrong! You used to own this ship, now it belongs to me!" He gloated as I briefly saw stars in my vision, feeling a small trickle of blood had begun in my hair. "Marro, rip into these computers and find out what these two are moving. The rest of you, drag them to the cargo hold. I'm not done with them just yet."

The pirates grabbed Naash and I without another word, slapping plastic cuffs on us both and forcing us to our feet. I could only imagine the worst as we were forced off of the Rivaa, likely to never see her again.

For the first time in a long time, I was genuinely terrified.

We were completely screwed.