The information broker

[Tenacity]

//closed RP between the three above, unless otherwise stated

Captain Thorn sat back and relaxed at the table, propping his feet up and gazing around the dank interior of the Rochester bar. He kept one hand rested on the handle of his gun, there wasnt a man in liberty that could pull a draw faster than he could, and he was proud of it. Usually it was nothing more than practice shooting, a game of skill... today it was real though.

To his left was John Dekker, a mercenary he had hired some years back. Dekker served as his ship's gunner, and as a bodyguard of sorts when they werent in space. He wasnt a man you'd want to mess with - three incendiary grenades hung from his belt, along with two pistols at his hips, a shotgun slung across his back, and military-grade rheinland assault rifle in hand. That man sure loved his guns...

To his right was Jace Dillon, Thorn's XO. Jace was an ex-lane hacker, one of the best. He knew everything there was to know about security systems, information databases, trade lanes, and jump gates. He was the reason they were here, waiting.

Earlier in the day, an unknown ship, later confirmed as an agent of the Order, had breached into liberty space. Typically, Thorn kept himself, his ship, and his crew out of business involving such organizations, they were too dangerous, and today's situation was a prime example. While Thorn was making an exchange with a rogue patrol on the fringes of the Jersey Debris Field, Jace had intercepted information being accessed by the Order ship in question.

According to him, the Order had accessed any and all files in the liberty mainframe relating to their organization, with the intent of deleting said files. Jace's actions had interfered with their plans, the data he intercepted was automatically copied onto hard files, optical disks. All of it.

Now they were caught in the middle of a top-secret war between the liberty navy's most classified operatives, and the Order they claimed didnt even exist. The Order had threatened thorn with outright destruction if he didnt turn over or destroy the disks. Liberty threatened him with a life sentence on sugarland if he didnt hand the information over.

He had tried to negotiate, but neither faction was willing to deal with a figure such as himself. He was an information broker, this was his business... though usually less dangerous. Information was a commodity just like anything else in the galaxy, a commodity that could be bought, sold, traded... and now he found himself in a situation where no compromise would let him keep his life.

The one advantage to this was that liberty would not fire on his ship openly. They needed the information those disks contained, everything they knew about the order was contained on that tiny peice of hardware. If they destroyed his ship, they risked destroying the data as well... not to mention the countless years and billions of credits they had invested into obtaining it in the first place.

The bar was deserted, only the robotic bartender left to serve the empty room. Hell, most of the station was bare as well - the other junkers had loaded up in their CSV's and shot off into space, and most were pissed off at Thorn for inviting a member of the Order onto rochester in the first place. Nobody wanted to be around when one of their agents showed up... they just plugged their ears, closed their eyes, and waited till it was all over.

He didnt have a choice though. If Thorn met this agent in open space, his ship would most certainly be destroyed. They had the technology to completely decimate even his sturdy Firefly in mere seconds... at least here, face-to-face, he could defend himself. Not even a representative of the order would stand up to Dekker when he had enough firepower on his person to outfit a small army.

That was Thorn's only solace. If things went bad here he could still defend himself, but until the situation was resolved his ship would never be safe in open space again.

"Well," Thorn said, as he sat back and sighed heavily, "She'll be here soon, keep yer guns ready boys."

"Always." Dekker grunted, cocking back the firing pin on his rifle.

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