The Universe Provides III
27 May 2021User319792
The smell of char on Furcas lingered in my mind as I watched CMDR MoosemanSmith jump to her next destination. As we made our way toward a system close enough for me to launch, she told me about her experiences during some of her longer expeditions; she talked about being promised safe passage during expeditions only to have to those very same promise-makers turn their hard points on her, about being betrayed by her own squadrons and those of others. I've heard of stories about pilots infiltrating political factions for the sole purpose of leaving them exposed. I vaguely remembered the story of Senator Denton's attempted assassination and Senator Loren, which I made a note to look into further before receiving an invite from CMDR Doomfacekillah.
I'd initially run into him in the CqC simulators with CMDR Filthymick420. He seemed relatively normal when I'd first met him, but as time progressed I'd realized that he was every bit as loony as CMDR Filthymick420. Both founding members of the Raxxla squadron, they've spent a significant time researching the Raxxla and Dark Wheel mysteries that have occupied pilots for quite some time.
Out in near Sagittarius A*, CMDR Doomfacekillah looked to be badgering a space fungi for the purpose of science. An alchemist by trade, he seemed to take no pleasure in pelting the thing with his probes. It was a purely intellectual affair on his part. I'd look over to him at the helm every now and again and saw only the dogged look of a man that demanded answers from the galaxy that he refused from everyone else.
Sitting in via telepresence, it wasn't difficult to see that- whatever it was that he'd been seeking from the space mushroom thing, pelting it with research limpets over and over again, which thudded off of and forced its way into its exterior with a deep *thunk*- he'd found some kind of peace in the pursuit itself. I'd remembered a warning about him being on various pilots' Kill-on-Sight lists and I let him know, in case he hadn't already figured it out or been told. He laughed it off a bit before waving toward the cockpit window toward the mushroom thing, saying something about how the galaxy's secrets eventually give way to the truths he seeks, even if he has to beat it out of it. It was a short catching up between the two of us before he asked us to excuse ourselves so he could make further research plans.
When I got back to Drake I sat for a while, thinking about the man in the black suit and his decision to yield me and my Gutemaya vessels over to The Emperor for any Imperial service, in the face of my own interests. In terms of my overall aims, it shouldn't have a particularly huge impact, considering everything else I have going, but the thought of him just deciding what I'd be doing still rubs me the wrong way.
I spent two years as an Imperial slave with my father on my own home planet of Cubeo 3, which was totally illegal according to the man in the black suit, and then the next 7 years bouncing around Federal, Alliance, and Imperial space taking in the various cultures of the various systems. The Empire is still the only place where someone could simply demand something of me, with the reason being that what people agreed in discussion about who they are allows them to do that to me.
I suppose the man in the black suit did have his own reasons to do so, not the least of which being what I asked Coral to do for me, but it still made me uncomfortable with the degree to which I'd just have to abide by it without so much as a word against his decision. I'd been thinking about it all during my mining mission and my short run-ins with CMDR's phD613 and MoosemanSmith, not to mention during our conversations aboard the Furcas, with its distinctive smell. When I hopped back into Cortez to make my way over to Jameson to refit Phoebus for the races MoosemanSmith had planned, the thoughts were still rolling through my head when I was interdicted
Half-asleep at the helm and woken up by a frag-cannon right into my cockpit canopy.