Prologue IV – Bounties are Bountiful This Season, Sir
"A lot of new bounties have been showing up lately." a gruff voice stated. The owner of the voice ran a small building on some random planet that handled taking in bounties. The only reason this branch got any business was due to the lack of other places to take bounties for a light-year at best.
"Sir, there's someone here to meet you." the man's young assistant said, cracking the door to the office slightly.
The man nodded, "Send 'em in. Thank you, Tracey."
A young woman entered the office, dressed in formal attire and carrying a tape recorder.
"Ah, the woman here for the interview?"
The woman smiled lightly, "Yes, my name is Linda. If you have a moment, Sir, I'd like to talk about this surplus of bounties in recent weeks."
Before Linda had finished her sentence, she was already recording the conversation on the tape recorder. She left it on the man's desk and took a seat across from him.
"Well the bulk of it is because of that new group headed by five mysterious figures, that Volnus or whatever they called themselves. We've had plenty of wannabees sent in claiming to be part of the group, but there's no way to tell if they are or not, to be honest. We take them in anyway, but these phonies tend to be radicals who basically worship this group. We know for a fact that there are only five of that group and they don't have anyone working for them. Ah, we just found that out recently though so now we also know for a fact those fakers are indeed fakers."
"Any large bounties, Volnus aside?"
Taking a deep breath, the man took a cigar from his desk drawer and lit it. After puffing out a ring of smoke, he nodded slowly. "Yeah, recently we've been informed of a large bounty from a planet quite some distance away from our jurisdiction. A man flying in by the name of 'Rash' or something along those lines. 'Human Typhoon' they called him."
"And what about the gentleman thief?"
Puffing out another ring of smoke, the man swiveled his chair to face the window. Glancing across the dusty surface of the planet of which he resided, he responded honestly to the reporter.
"Ah, that man who descended from a famous thief of a long time ago, huh? Long enough to be a legend, in fact. Yeah, some officer on that case recently informed us of him too. Seems he has also entered our jurisdiction. It's all a huge mess actually."
Even though he was speaking as if everything he had said up to this point was a pain in the neck, the man couldn't help but chuckle.
"But did you hear about that odd duo?"
Linda tilted her head curiously, "Odd duo, Sir?"
"Yeah, those two. They're also thieves, you know. They've been flying around these parts, drifting on other people's ships, and wearing goofy outfits. We don't have an official bounty on them yet, but reports of these two have dated back longer than expected. 'Course, I don't know all the facts about that bull, but some people in the business are spreading rumors those two might be immortal."
"That's impossible, Sir." Linda laughed. The man also laughed.
"Yes, impossible. But you know... Stranger things have happened, Linda."
There was a brief moment of silence. Another ring of smoke entered the air and quickly dissipated. The man swiveled his chair back around to face the young reporter. And his final words on the matter...
"Stranger things have happened."