Didn't Expect This
13 Feb 2022Rixses
After Xcom got over the shock of seeing a dead man he ushered me to the Cafe and took a secluded booth in the corner."Shit mate, you've got bad timing." he said while plugging into his wrist terminal.
"I've got a job I have to go to here shortly. What the hell are you doing here? Wait! No! How the fuck are you even here? You're dead mate... I saw the casket and everything."
"What's the mission?" I asked. I was assuming a hit or active conflict since he was loaded up in a dominator suit.
I trapped my wrist terminal and held it up for the data transfer. "We'll talk on the way."
Xcom was new at this. He's been flying a while. He had his license for a few years. Flew with my brother a lot back then and me on and off. After I got the mission info I knew he'd only recently gotten his EVA and hadn't done anything like this yet. He's always been a good combatant, but subtlety was never his thing. He'd grabbed a mission to collect a sample from an experimental AG facility. Literally stealing from farmers and he's in a combat suit armed to the teeth.
"Really, mate. You gotta look at this one sidewise." I started explaining the need for subtly. "If you go in guns blazing, you'll just get a bounty and probably won't make it out with the goods."
The convo went on for a while before I shifted it to my brother. The Apex shuttle we were on was a safe enough place for that. I explained what we found but left out most of the details on how we found it. I didn't want to explain we were siphoning info from an Imperial array.
"Seriously, I haven't seen your brother in six months. Wish I had... He was supposed to get his EVA license with me. But he disappeared like you did only without the funeral." Xcom said as if truly hurt by the fact my brother didn't go to get the EVA with him.
We sat down at a remote farming installation with a few research buildings. Looks like an experimental farming array developing new strains of crops to improve production. I'm sure whatever we were stealing would increase crop production by 25% or more. Things were going pretty smooth, and I almost had the clearance I needed to get to the sample when I heard an explosion...
"Xcom, what the hell was that!?!"
"Shit! Shit! Shit! I dropped a grenade. I don't think... Ah, shit! They are shooting at me. What the hell? I didn't do anything!"
I just cleared my stolen idents and let them arrest me. Instead of killing several of them like Xcom and escaping into the hills, I just submitted and was whisked away. Since Xcom was really the only one to see a dead man, and now I'm gone again, my death will probably be maintained.
I didn't expect to end up on a gulag ship 72ly from the station. But it'll at least keep me dead in the eye of my old life. A few days here and I'll disappear back to work to keep the cover. I hope Beebbs is having better luck than I am...