Forums » Sci-Fi Roleplay » The Hunter and the Monkey.

Over two hundred years after the Earth destruction and just over twenty years after we had won the fight for Cryoganal over the villains who took wrecked our planet people began to branch out. They didn't want to live on the cold tundra that was Cryoganals planet. Although we could breathe the air fine, it was -30 everywhere except the poles where it only reached 20 or 30 degrees F, anyway. So these settlers headed out into the fray of space! This would be cool and all but giant creatures, some the size of small planets exist in space, floating around storing air and water in their bodies and hopping from world to world to be able to survive! These beasts eat ships, suck the resources from whole worlds in the matter of weeks, and they are known as Celestials!

Cryoganal being safe from these due to the SoE corp (Soldiers of Earth) defending the planet, there is no real threat to humanity. But for those who have left and gone out to explore the Galaxy, they are a big threat. So Hunters like Edward Storm travel across the Galaxy and kill them, not only saving worlds, and protecting people but providing them with Celestial bones, stronger then even diamonds, great to build with! Their meat is also especially tastey!!

Monkey had never really had to worry about the massive creatures out in space, though she'd certainly heard about them from the many spacers who passed through the human settlement she resided in. She had far bigger worries... well, maybe not bigger, but definitely more pressing, like where her next meal was coming from, and where she might be able to sleep without being exposed to the elements, or the many cruel or manipulative people who would have happily snatched up the alien girl without a second thought. Since the Orphanage she'd grown up in had turned her out for being far more then they could handle, this had been her life... a series of grave, adult concerns that she wanted to be able to handle with ease.. but found herself a little ill-prepared for.

It was almost common sense to find herself a way off the planet, her intent in the moment to find herself a ship for the short term, where she might be of some help while she searched for a more welcoming planet, or really just any sort of place or niche for herself where people wouldn't view her as a ward, or an unwanted leech of resources. Her fist thought had been to join the SoE corp, though that plan had been changed once she'd found out she was not yet old enough to apply. Of course, she didn't really know how old she was to begin with the birth certificate the church had provided to her said she was 15 years old, right or wrong, she wasn't going to be enlisted to any army at her age, and most crews wouldn't easily take her either. It was her only hope to hang around the docking bays during the daylight hours, helping crews fill up their ships and load their supplies, waiting for the right person to come along, and offer her a way out.

Storm had gotten a call about a Squid like Celestial on a chlorine planet called Ochak, as he ventured to his ships docking bay the main entrance of the hanger. "What's that colorful ape doing in the hanger?"

The colourful Ape, in this case, was really more of a young woman, despite her unfortunate nickname, though since she was currently hanging from her knees on an overhanging piece of scaffolding as she cleaned the windows of a docked ship, having been given some pocket change to do so. Granted, she was extremely colourful with her Line green hair, and rainbow coloured patched together clothes.

One of the attendants of the bay scoffed good naturedly in response as he asked in question. "Kids been hanging around her for days doing odd jobs for pocket cash, think she likes the ship. Not really bothering any one, but we've been keeping an eye on her in case she's pick pocketing or something."

Thinking back their had been a lot of intelligent life on Cryoganal, strange, but intelligent. "Fine I guess, but never asked to have Alexandra cleaned... Call her down." Handing the man a wad of cash, a Storm continued. "Additionally, here's my docking fees for this next month, and last month, sorry I didn't pay you earlier I was kinda busy with the paperwork of Blake's death..."

The attendant would take the money. "Understandable." He said with a jolly laugh. "Don't worry though, we wouldn't have started breaking knee caps for another couple of weeks." He was joking of course, mostly. He turned his attention to the young woman above, and brought his fingers to his mouth, letting out a sharp whistle, which caught the young girl's attention as she swung overhead, scrubbing the dirty sponge in her hand across the now gleaming front window.

She took that as her cue, and with a sheepish look down at them, she would drop the sponge, letting it fall the several feet to the ground, before she swung down after it, more like her namesake then a human in that regard, as she did not climb down with any sort of care. It looked positively dangerous in fact, though she seemed to know what she was doing. When she finally touched ground, she scrambled over to them, standing a good couple of feet smaller then either of them, she regarded them with eyes that suggested she knew she'd done wrong. The attendant was quick to lay into her.

"What have a told you about touching the ships you haven't been given permission to? It's fine if you want to make some money here and there, but if you're going to touch ships without the owners permission, I'm going to throw you out of here, got it Monkey?" He told her coldly, though his restraint was more then he would have used with an adult, or someone he thought to be an actual threat.

She cleared her throat awkwardly as she looked to him, and then nervously over to the new man who she assumed was the owner of the ship she'd taken it upon herself to clean without permission or payment. "Err... sorry, she was dirty and I was bored... I wont let it happen again.." She promised sheepishly shuffling from foot to foot, never staying quite still as she spoke and was spoken to.

Storm had no idea that the ape girl talked but found it was irrelevant to the point. Pulling out a half credit he handed it to the rainbow monkey. "Thanks for the spotless job but I have bots to do that cleaning for me," as he said this a clumsy little bit escaped the cargo door with a bucket and sponge in hand, beeping in apology. "It's fine Ziro, just get back into the ship and begin prepping for departure, we're heading to in Inner Reach, a system known as Ochak." The bot beeped a bit before retreating inside.

Monkey gratefully took the half credit he handed her, pocketing it on her left back pocket and nodding her head. " Yessir." She told him, noting the bot who usually did the work. It sounded as if this ship was planning to take off soon. Monkey looked around for the rest of his crew, but there was nobody to be found, not typically so great at minding her own business, she observed him with curious wide eyes, easily speaking her thoughts without the general lack of restraint most would have shown.

"You're going alone? Isn't that sorta dangerous?" She asked curiously. "You know, I could be of use on boa-" She was cut off by the attendant who'd had quite enough, pulling her back by the collar of her cotton shirt.

" I told you you could clean ships and load supplies, not pester the customers for rides off planet."

Edward Storm put a hand on the man's shoulder, "girl, you make a lot of cash here?" He looked up at space as if looking to see movement in the black. "I'm looking for an assistant on my next Voyage, if you want the pay is going to be pretty heavy, but the work will be heavier..."

Monkey's odd violet eyes widened with delight at Edward's words, and the Attendant with a sigh, let go of the young woman's collar. If The man wanted to talk with her, then he didn't see the harm in it. "I make barely nothin' at all mister. Been hanging around a week now, and all I've made is six and a half credits." She started off in an excited rush, her hand excitedly dipping into her back pocket, and pulling out the fist full of change she'd mentioned as if we would not have believed it without proof. "I don't mind heavy work! I'd a great assistant!" Of course, she didn't even think about asking what kind of work he planned to do exactly. She was game for anything in her mind, granted, she didn't know all that much about the universe or it's many dangers... she was just excited for a way off the planet, the promise of some good cash only sweetened the deal.

Pulling out a holopod he did some math in mid air, "two week to three week voyage, plus the cost of the actual work... I'll give you five credits a day for just sitting on your ass, and I'll split the reward for what we're doing 80/20, since I got rent, docking rent, gas, and ammo to pay for." He looked at the attendant and bobbed his head for the man to leave before he could tell the girl what exactly he was heading out into the abyss to do. "You'll probably make just over a thousand credits, maybe two thousand at most..."

Her violet eyes widened dramatically, and her energy and excitement visibly heightened, she was actually getting off Cryoganal like she'd wanted to, she was going to go out among the stars, and though she didn't so much like the idea of sitting on her ass, she was sure she would be able to find some use for herself on board.. Five credits a day was more then a young, unemployed street urchin like herself could hope for, and the fact that he offered her 20% of the earnings was even better, though he could have simply paid her the five credits and she would have been happy, not that she was going to tell him that now.

The attendant would take him leave, if the man wanted to take on the rambunctious young woman then that was fine by him, less problems for him to deal with he supposed. When they were alone she eagerly asked the important question. "What is the reward for Mister?"

Storm was silent as they boarded the ship, he gave her a look when she asked but his helmet was still on so its not as though she could really see it. "Prep for take off Ziro!" As the bot went to work closing the cargo door and hitting a few buttons here and there Storm turned back to the girl. "Your half Cryos aren't you?" He asked looking at her ears and her skin, "on your moms side or your fathers??" Storm assumed the girls parent was a prisoner of war and was "taken" before the Battle over Cryoganal took place. That would make the most sense to Storm himself, but he also assumed the girl didn't have parents or any adult figure as a matter of fact. She got on a ship with a stranger and seemed to be care free enough, "and how old are you girl?"

Monkey took in all there was to see around her with wonder as they boarded his ship. This was her first time on the inside of one, at least that she could recall. Her wonder was cut short by his question though, which she was surprisingly unable to answer. She shrugged her shoulders. "Dunno, never knew my parents, and the folks at the group home didn't know or bother to test. On my Citizenship certificate it says 'other'."

At mention of said documentation, she pulled that crumpled important document from her pocket, in case he needed to see it. "15 sir, that's what it says anyway. I don't rightly know. Does it matter? You aren't going to turn me out are you?" She hoped not, she really wanted that money, and a ride off planet.

Storm considered turning her away, she was only fifteen and this was dangerous work. But he had already promised her work, it was a tough situation but in his mind he knew what he would do, "So I'm going to use your help on this mission but then your on your own, I can't keep you around for your own safety..." He pulled out some photos of creatures the sizeof small moons, "Are you familiar with Celestials?" Pointing to the little black image in the center of the picture he sighed, "that is a large star cruiser, about ten to fifteen times the size of my ship, these creatures basically swim through space from planet to planet consuming the resources and I... Well I hunt them and kill them." What he neglected to tell her was that this was a medium sized one, the bigger ones were well, a lot bigger.

She could tell by his momentary silence that he was considering his options, evidently she was younger then he'd expected, but then, that was pretty much the reaction she received most of the time when she tried to get away. No one wanted her because she was still green. It made a certain amount of sense logically, but she rather detested it all the same. She was capable, more or less, she could pull her weight just as well as anyone else, sometimes better, since she had a whole lot more to lose and a ton of extra energy to boot.

She wondered why she could stick around for this excursion if it was so dangerous, but didn't mention it, she wasn't in the habit of talking people out of their decisions especially if she was getting what she wanted out of it anyway. She shrugged her slender shoulders. " Your loss Mister." She told him like it didn't matter to her all that much, she only hoped she would get dropped off somewhere other then Cryoganal in the end of it all. She turned her attention instead to the picture he was showing to her, featuring a massive beast the likes of which she'd never seen before, when he explained the small spec of black beside it was a ship far larger then his own her eyes widened dramatically. "Gosh! That thing is the size of a moon isn't it? At least?" She rushed out in wonder. She wasn't scared though, be it confidence in herself or foolishness because of her inexperience would remain to be seen, either way the girl was fearless. "So how do yah hunt them, something that big?"

"Three steps..." Storm began leading a tour around the ship as Ziro began to lift off. Their was a bit of shaking but the ship had it's own gravity so the force and momentum of movement was null. "First we light it up with charges, these likely feel like no more then bee stings to the creatures." He realized that this girl never lived on the Fallen Mother (earth) so she wouldn't know what bees were. "Next throw a dark matter bomb into the creatures mouth for it to swallow, when it goes off it will tear apart the beasts insides and when the dark hole gets to big we neutralize it with the electric charges..." Basically the charges weren't to kill the beast, they were just to make sure the black hole, spawned inside the creatures belly, wouldn't do any gravitational damage to any nearby worlds. "The charges must be placed or we would tear a hole in time space, the charges basically close the hole we used to kill the Celestial."

There were probably three or four celestial hunters in the known universe, not that this job was too scary. Though it was very scary and dangerous, the real reason their were so few people in this line of work was that in order to do the job you NEEDED dark matter canisters, and dark matter was strictly illegal! So to be able to be supplied these canisters, you needed to get a Celestial Hunting License from the SoE Order. "Dark matter is very rare and very dangerous, if we encounter two Celestials out in space we are only able to kill one due to the fact we are only legally allowed to have one Dark Matter Canister on board at a time." Storm showed Monkey the armory with his supply of Electrical Charges and the one D.M.C. "And if we fail in killing the beast, my name goes on a watch list and I have seventy two hours to return the canister to SoE on Cryoganal or I get branded as a criminal..."

Closing and locking the door he turned to the girl, "all makin sense to ya kid?"

It took Monkey a moment to get her footing as the ship began to move, but she got used to the ships own gravity soon enough, and aside from the momentary shaking, the ride evened out nice and smooth, and she was soon able to focus on the task at hand, learning how to kill giant space monsters she hadn't even known existed before now. She was most interested to learn about these electrical charges, though they were not what would kill the beast, they held an important part in the process, maybe the most important part, since they were what stopped the dark matter from becoming unstable, considering her own particular skill set, maybe she would be of more use here then expected.

She followed as he gave her the tour, that would wind up in the armory, and she looked nervously over at the charges. While she could be of potential use, she could also be or potential disaster all things considered, and she figured it was probably best she spent as little time near these charges as possible, at least until they needed to be used, lest she accidentally set them off early, or drain their power. She would have to be careful to burn out her energy while on board so she didn't overload and put them in a situation they couldn't get easily out of. She thought better of mentioning this particular risk though, she felt certain she could keep a handle on herself.

As they backed out of the room, and he locked it up, she would nod her understanding with eagerness. "Yessir. Charges to anger the creature, dark matter down the monster's throat to tear it apart, and more charges to keep things under control? Doesn't seem that hard does it?" She looked over at him curiously. " What happens if it isn't done correctly? Is that what happened to your last partner?" She thought to ask with all of the insensitivity of youth.

"Charges are not for angering the creature, that is a nasty side effect of placing them," Storm said. As the found themselves back in the cockpit it could be observed that they were now in space. "The charges only purpose is to subdue the dark matter before it becomes too unstable..." Think back to how Blake died he sighed, "if I do something wrong an additional charge must be carefully placed, this charge can't be shot from the ship it must be manually set near the mouth of the beast. That charge will be able to trigger the other charges and stop the dark matter if something goes wrong with the initial shock." Typing into a really old looking computer screen the interstellar gouardinence of Ochak he continued to say, "also if the Dark matter canister is shot out and misses the beasts mouth someone must go out of the ship and retrieve it... That's what Blake Alan did, it is my job to handle the D.M.C. But he told me he could get it and bring it back."

Ziro beeped something's and Storm nodded, "yeah, the most wreck less of the four, his movements causght the attention of the Celestial somehow and he was swallowed whole." More beeping from the pilot made Storm sigh, "yeah he was a better gambler then me, but when he gambled with his life it seems he wasn't so lucky... At least the creature swallowed the D.M.C. when it swallowed Blake."

Monkey would follow him back to the cockpit, remaining standing and shuffling from foot to foot almost anxiously though anxiety had nothing to do with it. Despite her restlessness, she was listening carefully though, for the amount of money that had been promised to her, she knew well enough that she would have to learn how to do the job, and she intended to do just that.

Her eyes widened as she took note of the risk, and the loss that could occur if things didn't work out in perfect timing and luck wasn't on their side. "Er... sorry about Blake. Sure hope we have better luck then he did. The pilot beeping caught her attention, and after the second time she thought to ask about it. "What does the beeping mean?"