The path of Prospector

[Yngen]

Tex's darkened Eagle waited patiently as the Liberty Navy Gunboat passed menacingly above, unaware of the Terrorist hiding in the rocks. Or perhaps the Corregidor had more pressing matters than one Xeno in a fighter... Either way, Tex was free to seek his prey. Word had gotten out from Denver that a prisoner transport was staging there with Denver hillbillies who'd been arrested for vagrancy.

"Poor saps, clapped in irons (ahrns) for bein homeless," he said to himself.

When the coast was clear Tex repowered his fighter and made his way to the Denver/New York tradelane. He expected the prisoner transport would pick the route furthest from the Xeno base Ouray...and he was right. Not too long of a wait with the hacked lane and the vessel in question appeared.



A quick scan confirmed the news.



Tex's hands turned white as he gripped his controls. Madness threatened his higher functions as the rage welled up in him thinking of the simple folk being shipped from their homes to some prison in Hamburg to rot.

"Not this time. They will live," he said to himself.

With that he transmitted:

"GreedyLittleBaby, your engines are toast for the moment so we can talk. You have some friends of mine in that gut of a hold and I'm going to take them back."

The captain of the 'Baby' replied:

"Where are you going to put them? in your pocket?"

Tex could hear some chuckles in the background

"No, you are going to fly these good people to Ouray and hand them over. If you do this, you and your crew will live. If you don't you will kiss the void."

Without another word Tex opened his weapons on the transport. Particle beams laced the transports sheilds which quickly began to buckle under the attack. Several times the GreedyLittleBaby attempted to escape, with cruise engines and trade lanes but Tex was always there to reel him in again. When the sheilds were almost down the captain of the 'Baby' gave up.

"OK! YOU WIN. Where do I go?"

Tex transmitted the coordinates to the 'Baby' and followed it to Ouray. They reached the lonely Silverton Asteroid but Tex stared in amazement as the Transport continued on past the base. Tex vaulted his fighter to high speed and fired a cruise disruptor that detonated on the 'Baby's tortured engines.

"WAIT!!! I can't find the asteroid you were talking about!"

"Son, do think I'm as stupid as you look? Didn't the man teach you how to navigate before you bought that fat ship?"

Silence from the GreedyLittleBaby. Tex was about to transmit again when he suddently felt sick to his stomach and the cockpit seemed to close in around him. Images blurred outside his cockpit...up became down...the sun seemed to move across the system from Denver to Gunniston like a tennis ball...sweat formed at his temples as waves of nausea rolled through him. Just when he though he would let his dinner fly over his HUD it was over. Bad feelings gone, celestial objects back in their original positions, the 'Baby'.....gone. No, not gone. Running.

"S**T!"

Tex activated his cruise engines and followed the great transports wake to the New York Gate where he watched it disappear in a big white ball of light. Knowing there was the entire Liberty Navy likely right outside the exit to this gate, Tex went in blindly....the Denver hillbillies taking priority over his own violent existence. Providence smiled on the former Junker as Tex emerged on the other side. Seeing the 'Baby' enter the trade lane for Fort Bush he followed. The two ships emerged on the other side of the trade lane in a swarm of police units who seemed to be too stunned to react to a Xeno this close to the police station. Tex pressed his attack on the Transport, giving up on ever seeing their faces alive in the safety of the Xeno base...it was now a choice between death and prison...and for Tex there was only one choice. 'Baby's' sheilds nearly down again and a mercenary Bounty Hunter Ranov'la[M] emerges from the apposing lane. Unlike the still frozen police, this one didn't hesitate.

"Hold it Xeno!" he yelled as he rolled onto Tex's six...still pounding on the transports sheilds.

Tex swore as he was forced to defend himself and let the transport go. He turned his rage on the meddling mercenary who briefly spared with the Xeno before disengaging. Any other day Tex would have finished off the Merc for distracting him but it occured to him that he might have a chance to save the prisoners after all. The last course he saw the GreedyLittleBaby on was for Manhattan...in the wrong direction for prisoner transport. One of the most well known axims of Liberty commerces was that prisoners flow south into Reinland. So that is where Tex went, sneaking past multiple LNS patrols to the Norfolk-Texas trade lane where he promptly brought it down halfway through.

Again, his instincts rewarded him, the GreedyLittleBaby indeed came down the same lane but somehow continued through the now spluttering trade link that Tex had disabled. Another vulgarity and Tex was following the slippery prisoner transport once again. In to Texas he went, expecting to chase the Behemoth all the way to Reinland...but unexpectedly the transport was waiting for Tex on the other side, engines at a complete stop.

Tex didn't waste time. There were no Xeno rescue ships waiting for the captives in that hold and Tex had room for one maybe two in his hold.

"I'd rather die than go to prison, so I'd do the same for anyeone else..."

Tex turned his comm system off. There would be no more negotiations, and he wouldn't have to hear the screams of the prisoners as he killed them all.

The Xeno's Eagle made short work of the unarmored transport, which began to decompress just as a huge mining ship entered the area from Houston. Apparently answering a distress call from the prisoner transport, the Mining ship opened up all of its turrets on the little Xeno fighter. Tex was out of time, soon the Mining ship would be damaging critical systems on his fighter so he had to work fast.

With a silent 'pop' the GreedyLittleBaby disintegrated. Tex franticly activated his tractor beam to bring in as many of the prisoners as he could then activated his cruise engines to get away from the Mining ship. He reactivated his comms system then:



[i]Later on at Ouray when Tex looked in his hold to get his 2 survivors to the infirmary Tex found out how far the fates had taken the Denver Hillbillies. Small arms...Small arms in his hold. The Captain of the 'Baby' must have dropped his hot cargo back on Manhattan.

"They're still alive then...but where?"

---

[AU]Anton_Blix
-Signature by Doom