McCool's Tavern - Freeport 1

[elrica]

It was an ungodly hour when Errico Malatesta and Elrica O'Connell finally arrived at McCool's Tavern. A day later than planned and as organised as headless chickens, but on-time at least.

Plentiful work and lack of sleep had hit Elly hard. Looking around the establishment with sleep-laden eyes, Elly breathed a whimper of a sigh. Thankfully, nobody, save the barman, was here to notice her looking like the un-dead.

"Ok, pit-stop".
She yawned, motioning Enrico towards the bar.

Skipping all but the bare essentials of pleasantries they got to "work". Enrico ordered them 3 shots of Crete's "finest" tequila each. Elly cringed with each shot, watching in bemusement as Enrico necked his share plus two... with increasing gusto.

"Ugh! ok, that's enough... I'm awake now...".
Elly stared at the tequila bottle.

They sat recuperating for a few minutes, chatting about the conference they would be attending this afternoon on Vogtland..

But it was no use, the faint background music was surreptitiously lulling her back to sleep.
"Comrade, I think I'm going to go work on our speech some more...and maybe catch some rest..."

She glanced back at the tequila bottle and then at Enrico.
"I'm sure it'll go well. Hopefully we can stir up some co-operation
...umm...just... take it easy with the 'Holas', ok?", she winked.

"you know what some are like when they've had a few too many vodkas...
might be awkward explaining your life story....
...
not that anyone will notice. We'll be fine..."

"Anyway... see you at lunch before we leave on the Red Arrow."
With that she headed to the office they had hired for the day.

[Rodent]

The old man nodded slowly, his gaze still on Kalenda. Taking a sip from his glass, he continued.

Alright, Mr Kalenda. You class yourself as a normal trader. Ever seen anything interesting? Considering my age, I am always interested in events around me...lest they pass me by. Tell me.

He leaned forward, and his gaze sharpened. Your travels ever taken you to the frontier?

[Crysis]

A hooded figure entered the pub in the quiet hours of dawn, the pub is poorly populated at this hour, by the looks of things, it might have just opened. With lights still dim (possibly on an energy saving mode), the silhouette of this tall (averagely 6'3) man glided towards the counter, observed the empty zone and grabbed what seemed to be a bottle of beer from behind the counter. He made his way to a corner of the pub and took his seat on a round sofa like table near the corner, and began to drink from his bottle peacefully. His hood however was never lowered and he remained dark and mysterious, not revealing his identity, he had an athletic build and had a very 'imperial' figure which remained unmoved in its place. A few bystanders glanced at him often, over their shoulders wondering who he could be, and what his business was in the pub, even his affiliation was uncertain. He was in a large trench-coat like clothing, with a black hood hanging low, the shadow covering the rest of his face and slim tight bio-suit like boots as well as firm black tight gloves not showing any detail of his appearance. He sat patiently, undisturbed almost awaiting someone, a figure who would approach, this 'phantom' seemed to mean business.

---

The Shadow of Sirius - (Reiner Hetsau Background Story)

[spacespeed]

The frontier... It brought back old memories, of what had been home before Erie and the relative safety of Liberty space. The memories brought back the longing for adventure that he had always felt, which drew him into space instead of some average, perhaps high-paying office job on some planet or another. Yet, he also realized that taking on too much, too quickly could be potentially fatal, or bring him down the same path and fate that his parents had suffered. Catching himself drifting off again, he quickly shoved those memories aside and resumed to the task at hand.

"The frontier? You mean the Omicron systems and the various edge and border systems? No, at least not for business purposes. Half of them are sealed off due to some conflict or another, unfortunately, with Kusari effectively fighting a war on both fronts, and I can't really wander far into the Omegas without worrying about some trigger-happy Rheinlander thinking that I actually work for Universal. I try to head back to Canaria once in every while just to see all of my relatives again, but that's never using my own ship, as the IFFs on that thing would probably end in it getting blasted out of space by the Hessians. The ship probably does have the durability of the average bomber, with all of its armor and shield upgrades, but I'm nowhere eager to actually test that for the moment, if you know what I mean."

"As for anything strange, well, even around the house systems, one tends to see a few things. I've seen a few, and heard a lot more. There was an incident in Kyushu perhaps a few weeks back. My ship was in the middle of a trade lane when the sensors picked up a strange ship at about maximum range. I saw a wireframe trace of it for maybe about a second or so before it faded again. That trace wasn't like that of any ship I've ever seen, as it almost seemed to be organic, as opposed to the edges that typically defined manufactured ships. Reported the thing to the authorities at Tsushima. Of course, their official response is that such ships don't exist, and it was more likely to be a sensor issue. I highly doubt that is the case, however."

"Other than that, occasionally a route takes me to the IMG base in Newcastle. I've heard odd stories from some of the people there as well. There's an ice cloud there that passes, oh, about 10 to 15 thousand kilometers. Most of the time, that obscures whatever is within it, but once in every while, the cloud becomes almost transparent, and one can see an odd glow coming from it. Apparently one day, the IMG tried to send a scout ship into the cloud. It detected some pretty strong energy signatures coming from the cloud, and tried to get closer, but ran into a mine field of some kind, and had to turn back. Now, this could have a perfectly rational explanation. Some secret military installation in the area, who knows? The thing is, though, according to some of the people on the base, these mines don't look like any house design, and they seemed far too old for that."

[Rodent]

The old man's eyes widened slightly as Kalenda recalled his adventures. He nodded sharply, and his gaze was piercing. It was as if the man was trying to look through Kalenda, in a bid to ascertain whether the younger man was telling the truth. When his spoke, his voice was a near whisper.

Those things you've seen...they are real.

He looked around furtively to ensure that no one was listening.

Remnants of an old alien empire....They almost destroyed Humanity eighteen years ago, and they are still attempting it.

The last, delivered in barely a whisper, was weighted to convey drama. The old man gauged Kalenda for a reaction.

[TheProphet]

Alonso had just arrived in the bar, having finally repaired his ship, when he heard Leonardo's call. He sighed, thinking about how ridiculous the man was, scratched his shaven head, adjusted his uniform, which was a standard Canarian Corsair pilot's uniform with the family name written on the in large gold letters, and started walking towards Leo.

"Hola hermano, what's u-" He stopped before finishing that sentence, because he noticed the woman Leonardo told him about earlier. He didn't think Leonardo was serious about the deal, and was hoping he had made it up.

Living on Gran Canaria for the most of his life filled Alonso's mind with propaganda against the Corsairs of Crete, and now infront of him stood a red-hot Cretan "chica". Even though he was a regular "tough-guy", he felt a bit unsafe around his current companions.

---

[jammi]

"Ey, Alonso!" Leonardo shrugged the woman off his arm, and snatched the little Canarian into a massive bear hug. Dropping him again, he thumped him on the shoulder and bellowed with laughter. "Was worried I was gonna miss yo'. You wanna know why? 'Cos Leonardo the Boot ain't never gonna go back on his word, you get me?" The chica giggled again. "Anyway, lets get us out of the door, yeah?"

He sauntered over to the bar and planted himself on one of the stools there. Suddenly remembering something, he slapped his forehead in disbelief. "Gods, I didn't even introduce my two amigos! Alonso, this sweet chica is Catrina Dieon of Alacante. Hermana, this little punk is Alonso Viera of Gran Canaria. He can't help where he was born." He threw down a credit chit and snapped his fingers at the bartender.

"Hey, 'keep! I'll have a Cretian Rum, and the chica will have a triple whisky." He looked over his shoulder at Alonso. "What you havin', amigo? My round."

---

News article library, feedback and content requests.

[Doc Holliday]

Chris heard no complaints nor did he get any kind of request or fan fair so he just continued playing whatever came to mind. The crowd was sizeable but all were going about their business with that occasional couple getting up for a dance.

With the push of a couple of buttons on a soundboard, he put his voice to work as well.
Layla

With this song, he started having some fun himself.

---

[MFE]Med Force One | Tales of Recovery|Med Force Enterprises

[escopton]

Errico woke up with a severe headacke. He had fallen unconcious on the same chair where comrade Elrica had been drinking with him last night. The bartender, who was cleaning up the mess he left, must have poked him, or else he would have slept for a couple more hours...

Well sir, it seems you never made it to that conference that you two were heading to.

Errico stood up as he heard this, and memories of why he was there started popping in his head. The bartender probably observed his state because he gently helped him to take a seat again.

Sir, after all you drank, I don't recommend you move too much, you are probably feeling that your head was hit by a giant asteroid. I thought you Cretans knew how to handle Tequila...

Errico felt a little offended by these last words of his, so he looked at the man and with a very destroyed voice he said: Well senor, maybe if I hadn't had such a worthy drink companion I wouldn't have ended like this. Dios esa muchacha si que sabe beber! Now... where is her?

The bartender smiled and answered: She left a while ago. She said you would know were she would be.

Santas mineras! Shouted the commie Cretan. She will kill me! I must leave now... Here, keep the change. Adios! And he quickly gathered his belongings and left in a rush.

---

[spacespeed]

"So those supposed stories were real..." Solanus allowed his mind to drift off a bit once more. As a kid, he had heard some stories from the various denizens of the local bar. The heavy Corsair presence upon Gran Canaria made for some interesting tales, and often, they told of hostile aliens at the very edge of what could still be considered inhabited space, and the battles that had occurred between their forces and that of the aliens, who had ships that were several kilometers long and shot purple fire. Nomads, they called them. But others had assured that these were nothing but fairy tales, deliberately constructed to scare children, or made up as a side effect of the overzealous alcohol use some Corsairs were famous for.

And then there was the matter of his parents. What had really happened to them.

His relatives had said that they were lost or killed in a jumphole accident. It was actually fairly plausible, considering the unstable nature of jumpholes in scarcely-explored space. But then he couldn't remember any memorial or funeral being held for them, which could only mean that even they held out hope that his parents were still alive. Then there were others, who, in hushed whispers, while his relatives weren't watching, told him that something unknown had happened, that the aliens might have had something to do with the disappearance, and that they might very well still be alive, hiding in some distant system without communications access.

He then snapped back to current time again, and said, slowly, "I had always thought that those stories were just fairy tales, made up by some odd passing traveler who might have had a bit too much to drink. Of course, none of the houses seem to acknowledge that anything of the sort exists. And I suppose they have their reasons as well. But... if those aliens do actually exist, it would explain a lot, indeed. Both in my life, and in some of the current events going on. Do you ever get the sense that some of the current wars going on are completely pointless? Perhaps this has something to do with it."