A Pirate in Distress - Part 2

Despite being more than just mildly intoxicated from the Litiuran Brandy, Keram had managed to make his way through the bar, down the stairs, and through the maintenance corridor to the restrooms successfully.

While he relieved himself at a urinal, he chuckled slightly when he thought back at the kiss he blew Kassina in passing. The Deteis bountyhunter had made a face as if she had just swallowed a slug.

He remembered when she had tracked him through twelve constellations of low security systems and hunted him even further, to the fringes of the Outer Ring.

The captain of a survey craft he had waylaid there gave him the coordinates of a wormhole entrance in an effort to buy a new lease of life for his crew. Keram had destroyed the ship anyway. Not something he was proud of, but he couldn't afford to leave anyone behind who could tell where he had gone. Kassina Vikkonen was a very persistent woman. She and her pack of bloodhounds had him with his back to the wall then, but the ORE prospectors had provided him with a backdoor out of the dead-end system he had ended up in.

He had made an anonymous donation to the ORE corporation's Orphan Support Fund some time later. Several hundred million ISK. Something that was half a snort and half a laugh escaped him and he shook his head when he thought of that ridiculously sentimental gesture. 'It's all the fault of that damn Gallente and his stupid ethics.'

Keram had met Cedrien for the first time there in that wormhole system.

Of course he had gotten stuck inside with no probe launcher and forgotten to record the coordinates of the exit wormhole. In New Eden there were jump-gates. Even far out in the most remote fringe systems they existed, and they transmitted their position throughout the whole solar system. Keram had never been in a wormhole system before, and that lack of experience became his undoing.

In his haste born of the smug feeling of triumph that he had managed to shake his pursuers, he had forgotten about the main rule every pirate lived by: Always know the constellation around you like the back of your hand.

He had found something familiar, though: A group of mining vessels on his directional scanner. They were to offer him a way out as soon as he held them hostage. He had flown a fast and mean Zealot-class heavy assault cruiser back then. They would have no chance, or so he had thought.

He had made his second mistake then.

There were no CONCORD relay stations in wormhole space which transmitted capsuleer identities throughout the system. So he never knew that there was a cloaked Proteus cruiser watching over those miners. Keram, as a pirate, knew every dirty trick in the book, and he had won fights against ships as powerful as this strategic cruiser. Cedrien, however, was a military man. For more than a decade he had constantly trained every aspect of spaceship command. Even his baseline crew were well trained soldiers, not the motley crew of outcasts Keram had manning his ship.

It became a very uneven fight, which ended up with Keram being in the position he had forced scores of ships into: Pleading for his hull, and his crew, and possibly his clone.

He put some more pressure on his bladder to force out the last spurts when his attention was snatched from that reverie back into the here and now. Someone had just entered the restroom, and Keram's instincts told him that this was not just someone who came here to use the facilities. The footsteps indicated that the newcomer was not heading to one of the toilet stalls or even the urinal to Keram's right, he was coming right for him.

The Amarr outlaw did not bother to pack away his goods and zip up. When he could smell the other man's sour body odour he twisted at his waist and shot out his elbow. He struck his opponent squarely in his sternum which knocked the breath out of him for a moment.

Keram continued his turn and grabbed a handful of the brown hair his tall and lanky opponent wore at half shoulder length. Twisting back the other way and bringing his hand down he threw the assailant's hollow-cheeked face against the steel clamshell of the urinal. Keram could hear the grating crunch of teeth breaking, and a dull crack as the man's head snapped back with the impact.

The unknown attacker was gone before he even had a chance to scream in pain. He slumped to the floor, his neck twisted back at an unnatural angle and his face a smashed ruin. Blood dripped down from the urinal.

Two more men moved their muscular bulk through the toilet door. Keram recognized them. It was the Brutor and the Deteis who had played with the rich trader's daughter up at the bar. All the drowsiness of the alcohol had lifted from the Amarrian's senses as the adrenaline began to course through his body.

Keram slammed a fist against his forearm where two compound materials were embedded in a sheath concealed there in his armoured jacket. A place like this one had very strict weapon checks, but thanks to Alira he had an ace up his sleeve – literally. He felt the heat through his jacket's heavy fabric telling him that the seal had broken and the materials were bonding to form a small but effective composite blade.

He stood there with his black combat pants still undone, his penis hanging out, and put on his most feral grin. 'Ok, bring it guys.' he challenged them with open arms. They didn't need any more encouragement.

Sidestepping, Keram blocked the haymaker of the platinum blond Deteis. He felt that the heat from his sleeve had subsided, and flicked his arm down, making the blade slide from it's sheath. The broad-chested Caldari man saw that as an opening and turned to tackle Keram to the ground.

Stupid move . The Amarrian thought as he brought up his arm with a quick uppercut. A man like this Deteis, heavy and strong, would have soaked a mere punch, but not when there was a sharp blade involved. The compound knife thrust up through the soft flesh on the underside of the attacker's jaw, through the roof of his mouth and into his eye. Keram could see the man's eyeball swell with blood before it burst. Then the Deteis fell with a gurgling scream.

The seed of defeat lay in this victory, though. With the blade caught inside the Caldari's skull and sheathed securely in his jacket's sleeve, Keram was wrenched down when the heavy man fell, his arm pinned to the ground.

The powerfuly built Brutor stepped in and brought his whole weight to bear behind a downward punch. Kerman managed to block it, but the sheer force of the impact forced him to his knees.

There was nothing he could do to stop the heavy combat boot that smashed into his face a second later.

***

Keram woke to the taste of blood in his mouth and a feeling of dull, throbbing pain in his jaw. He groaned and the throb became a jolt which yanked him into full consciousness. His eyelids were caked with dried blood and his nose was swollen shut. When he tried to breathe in, he realized that the symphony of torment which played on his nerve endings had more diverse sources than just a broken jaw. Instinctively he tried to touch his face but found that he was restrained, his arms firmly bound to the sides of his body with strong straps. Feeling with his tongue, he realized that most of his front teeth were missing or sharp-edged ruins. His lips were split and swollen and his nose obviously broken too.

'He is awake.' The rumbling bass voice of the powerful Matari announced.

'I can see that you idiot.' That was a female voice. Arrogant and self assured, with the haughty twang of Caldari executive class.

Finally Keram managed to break the curdled seal on his eyelids. Light flooded his field of vision. He was lying on his back, the floor vibrated subtly. From the voices he could deduct that they were in a small room. It smelled of wet metal. 'An elevator cabin?' he wondered.

A head and torso blotted out the light above him. It was the woman. Despite his situation he couldn't help but notice her ample breasts almost spilling from a tight-fitting halter top. When his eyes adjusted he recognized the face. Soft round cheeks, pouting lips, blue eyes and strawberry blond curls. It was “stupid girl” from the bar.

'Hello there.' she greeted. Her voice carried an unmistakable note of smug triumph. 'How are we doing?' she asked with mock concern. Her upper-class Caldari corporate accent annoyed Keram more than the pain he felt.

'The two of us have some business we need to conduct.' She said after she dropped down on her haunches, squatting over him. 'An open bill that needs settling, you could say.'

Keram leered at her with his broken teeth. 'Damn.' he lisped, ignoring the suffering speech meant. 'Don't say you are one of the whores I fucked and never paid.'

Her girlish looking face twisted into a scowl as she rose and kicked him in his ribs. 'You took out two of my bodyguards.' She spat in his face. 'But those are the last two lives you will be taking from me, or anyone else for that matter.'

Keram tried to laugh but with his nose full of congealed blood, his jaw broken, and his missing teeth, it turned out more like a gurgling cough that made him almost lose sight because of the agony it caused. 'Really? More persuasive people than you have tried to turn me into a pacifist, sweetbuns.'

She kicked him again, this time in his crotch. He howled. Right then and there it didn't matter how much his jaw hurt, because there was a a much more powerful wave of pain that washed over him.

'No. You are going to die.' she promised. 'And I can tell you, the markets will cycle several times before your time is up.'