Drake hadn't always been Drake, but that was someone else's story. Being someone else was near ubiquitous in the Pilot's Federation, in any case.

He had been unlucky enough to have actually have been born on Earth. Poor, crowded Mother Earth. The planet perpetually on the brink. That much was true.
But then, if you'd ask (most don't - it's an unspoken rule amongst your politer sort of Pilots), you'd find he was talking about being 44 (the daily drudge of life in Nowheresville or Anywhereston or Santa Wherethefuckisthis. He wasn't meant to stay in one place for long). And, while he would admit he'd flown before, you'd quickly see that the conversation was over. His chestnut eyes would narrow, and even those oblivious enough to have pursued his past this far would be able to see something broken inside. He looked as though, were you to shake him, things loose in his head would rattle about .Scary things that would change you forever were you to ever know them.

Although there were times he flew alone, his most frequent co-pilot was his wife, Lee.

Lee Drake was broken too, a combination of losing the genetic lottery - a life with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome is no laughing matter in space. She had a past no-one should suffer, and about which she would offer little. And then, after getting her Pilot's licence she suffered at the hands of  a drunk at the controls of a heavy shuttle, hurtling into her civilian-build Viper III, killing the other pilot's 7-year old daughter. Lee, amazingly, survived, but while rolling through the debris she could see the corpse of the young girl. Her father hadn't given her a Remlok.

Chris and Lee met simply through messaging initially, and they immediately hit it off. Five months later they mananged to contrive contract jobs that put them in the same station for a time. It had taken five months. In a short span it became clear to both that there was no option but forward, as a couple.They had married on a traditional wedding barge, bathed in the cool, orange glow of a red dwarf star. Lee had wondered if she could go through with the whole 'charade' (as she put it, "You know I love you, why this pandering to others and 'convention', whatever that is?"), while in another room, Chris agonised over writing his vows at the very last minute. That was 16 years ago, 15 of which had been spent planetside. Until Lee found a way to get her husband spacebound once again. She'd seen the way he stared at the sky. They had next to no money, but she'd found enough. Just.
The Sidewinder was horrible. The Drakes didn't even bother with naming it. They both knew it was just a brief means to an end.
The Eagle though was better. The Golden Hind. The first of its name in over a thousand years. Then came the Adder, the Hind II. The trade flowed, and the Cobra Mk III came soon after.
The Golden Hind III, naturally.

Life had settled into a less turbulent pattern for the pair. Then everything changed.

They were passing through Mizar on the return to Olgrea from a courier job when the ship's computer, Delilah (neither could remember why they'd named the damn thing) announced an incoming message.

"I'll get it." Lee said. But only a moment later she turned to her husband, looking puzzled. "It's for you. Better not be your mistress! It is a woman!"
"So?" Chris replied. It wasn't like they didn't open each others' comms all the time.

"No, I meant, quite apart from the female voice, the message contents are ident-locked."
She swiped the message across from her console to his, then took the controls so he could open it.

"Computer. Confirm ident authorisation: Phi-'Rake'-7-1"

"Phi-Rake-seven-one confirmed. Retinal ident confirmed. Voice ident confirmed. Eyes-only message follows."
Drake read, then re-read the message.

"Babe, lay in for Zaonce. Ridley Scott. I have to find someone."

He read the message a third time, still struggling to take it all in.

Who the hell was "8-6"? And how did the message originator know about Drake's long past family?

WHAT HAPPENED THEN? Check out http://inara.cz/wing-history/935/