Ravens of Eternity

268 The Law of the Fist

Eva and Lucifer did a brief walkthrough of the corvette, and found it was actually in far better shape than it looked.

The ship itself had been stripped out and lightened as much as possible. Every extraneous thing had been completely removed, all to give it as much cargo room as possible. And as Lucifer had said, the armor and structure were thinned down to the minimum.

Ze wondered just how much punishment the ship could take. It seemed as though its greatly reduced plating was really only there for show.

But as Eva had noted, the thrusters were incredibly robust, and that meant that its true purpose was to escape. And fast. Its cruising speed was incredibly high at close to 300 meters per second, and its boosted speed could reach 1000 meters per second.

At least, in zero gravity. But even in atmo, the ship was capable of incredible acceleration and velocity. Close to 50% faster than most other fighters out there.

Except perhaps experimental ones.

The ship’s engineering section was clearly the most loved. The modules and systems inside were polished and highly tuned. More than that, but some parts were completely bespoke.

Its maneuvering thrusters, for example, were printed out from some unregistered design, and they completely outperformed even a few racing thrusters. Clearly, whoever had installed them knew what they were doing.

The cockpit and the tiny personal storage space behind it was very well kept, but incredibly tight. And the hab and kitchenette that was behind them were instead stripped out as well.

.....

If the ship had a manifesto, it would be: ‘More cargo, more profit’.

Besides a few modules that needed replacing, they were certain that the ship would fly. And it would do so very well. More than that, its cloaking module would keep them off enemy sensors more often than not.

The module didn’t make the ship invisible, but it did significantly lower their signature. And it scrambled all outgoing signals. Eva was certain that if Miko could get her hands on it, that she could make the ship vanish altogether.

Lucifer realized that the secondhand dealer who sold it hardly knew its true value. If they did, they would have asked twice as much for it. Ze saw Eva’s instincts in a new light, but was still wary of it. Ze preferred to act on information, not feelings.

There was no hidden force that bound the galaxy. In fact, there were seven of them, and they were all known and quantifiable.

And now that the two of them got a good look at the inside, at how the ship worked, it dawned on them its true purpose. It was a true blockade runner. They collectively named the ship the Accursed Bootlegger, then joked about running moonshine across the galaxy with some kind of space dog, and having adventures on the frontier.

The two were rather joyful, and relatively happy with the purchase despite the friction between them the past cycle. Lucifer wanted to head out immediately, but both of them needed a few more sundries and supplies before they left.

And as they walked down the ship’s rear ramp, were greeted by a half dozen thugs at the bottom. They stood in a semicircle around them, and sneered as they came down.

–

Lucifer: Try not to make a scene, alright?

Eva: It looks like they’re bringing the scene to us

Eva: I’d rather just mop ’em up now

Lucifer: And if that brings us unwanted attention?

Eva: Who’s gonna notice?

Eva: Peacekeepers won’t

Lucifer: True.

Lucifer: But the bounty hunters, spies, informants, and info brokers will.

Eva: Fine

Eva: But if they do anything dumb, I’m taking ’em out

Lucifer: Agreed.

–

“How may I help you gentlemen?” asked Lucifer.

Ze faced the thug in the center, who seemed to be leading the rest of the gang. Ze tried to look as genial as ze could. Although Lucifer hoped to do this quietly to avoid attention, ze was certain that was going to be impossible.

The man was fairly muscular, perhaps the most of all of them. He stood at over 1.8 meters, much taller than Eva and Lucifer, who were the exact same height.

“The boys and I have been watching you two girls,” he said. “Both of you prancing around town like you owned it.”

He puffed his chest out and gestured with sweeping movements in an attempt to intimidate them. But neither looked particularly affected.

“We’ve seen you throwing your creds around like you gotta bottomless bag of it,” he continued. “So we figured you wouldn’t mind sharing a bit of it with us unfortunate folks. We’ve got various aches and pains, and would love some... comfort money.”

Eva nearly scoffed at the remark. All of them were in relatively robust suits of armor, and wielded various weapons. All well-kept. It was clear to her that they weren’t here to simply shake them down.

“I see, I see,” Lucifer replied. “I’m definitely a very giving person, and would love to give alms to the poor. Unfortunately, we’ve just about spent everything we had, and don’t really have much to give at this point.”

The lead thug tsk’d, and shook his head in disappointment.

“Such a shame,” he said. “But that’s alright. Maybe instead of creds, you two could entertain us for a while, hm? Could comfort us in more ways...”

The other five chuckled at their leader’s proposition.

Eva was immediately incensed on hearing their laughter, and a spark lit inside her. She absolutely abhorred such salacious intent, and always found herself riled up when she came across it. And she subconsciously tightened her fist in response as an overwhelming urge to wipe them out washed over her.

Her intolerance for that kind of behavior sharpened greatly after having seen what Amal and Kali had gone through. It became even more pronounced after dealing with Commander Chase’s unrestrained lust.

She scanned each of them up and down, and attempted to appraise them. Eva was confident she could take them down. Some, more easily than others.

Then, she realized something.

–

Eva: They’re not wearing Great Sun colors

Eva: Can you ID them?

Lucifer: Good eyesight.

Lucifer: I’m not sure exactly.

Lucifer: Probably just another outlaw gang.

Eva: So Great Sun won’t care if we remove ’em

Eva: Right?

Lucifer: Not enough info.

Lucifer: They could be here to trade.

Lucifer: Or start an alliance.

Lucifer: Or join up.

Eva: Ugh

Eva: So killing them could cause trouble?

Lucifer: Potentially.

Eva: Fine

Eva: I won’t go lethal

Lucifer: ... Wait.

–

Before Lucifer could do or say anything, Eva stepped up to the thug. She unflinchingly got right up to his face and stared him down, even though she was shorter than him.

“If you don’t get out of our way,” she told him, “we’re gonna throw you out.”

The thug was taken aback by her bravado, and found himself unnerved by her aggressiveness. He felt waves of hostility flow from out of her, and was easily intimidated. Although he backed up a step, he quickly realized that his men were watching.

And no way could he back down now. Not while they were watching.

He swallowed his fear, put on a sour grimace, then walked back to his previous position.

“You? Throw us out?” he said with a slightly nervous lilt. “I don’t think you realize who you’re-GHAK!”

Eva didn’t let him finish his sentence, and instead threw a right uppercut straight into his stomach. Though his armor sufficiently protected him from the damage, the force was still strong enough to knock the wind out of him.

She quickly followed up with a strong left hook, and slammed the thug face-down into the ground.

Lucifer winced at the sight.

But ze too decided to act. It was clear that they weren’t going to back down anyway, but ze hoped to delay to find a better tactical opportunity.

As Eva faced off against the next nearest thug and swept him off his feet, the others quickly turned toward her, and raised their rifles in her direction.

In the blink of an eye, Lucifer performed a swift sidearm throw and tossed a heavy throwing knife at the furthest. There was a heavy THWUP as its handle smashed him on the side of his head.

The force of the attack was strong enough that he was thrown to the side a few meters, and knocked unconscious outright. His body fell to the ground in a heap, and his rifle clattered to the ground by his side.

The two nearest to him were utterly stunned at how fast Eva and Lucifer moved. They quickly turned towards hir with their rifles instead, but were still too slow to react. Before they could squeeze their triggers, Lucifer had leapt forward with incredible speed.

Ze grabbed the both of them by their heads, then ze slammed them both down on the ground with great force.

They too were knocked out from a single hit.

While the one Eva swept clambered back to his feet, Eva had sped to the last one still standing. And before he could fire his rifle at her, she ducked down, grabbed it by the barrel with one hand, then yanked it out of his hands violently with the other.

.....

She spun it around in her hands, then slammed its stock right on the thug’s nose. It shattered to pieces with a wet CRACK. He fell back on his rump, and groaned in pain as he clutched his broken, bloody nose.

Without skipping a beat, she spun around then threw the rifle at the one who finally got back on his feet. It whirled in the air briefly before it too smashed the thug in the face, just as he got his bearings back.

The force of it was strong enough that he was blown back by the hit, and landed on his back painfully.

He too was out like a light.

By the time the thug leader shook the dizziness out of his mind and lifted himself up off the ground, the rest of his team was completely down for the count. Four were knocked out cold, and one was painfully focused on his broken nose.

Before he could get back up on both feet, Eva lightly kicked his shoulder, and planted him on his back.

Lucifer then crouched down next to him, and stared him right in the eye. Ze had a rather evil-looking grin etched on hir face.

“I’ve an important question to ask you,” ze said. “It’s a matter of life and death, so you really should try hard to get it right. Now... Did you see either of us on this planet? Or anything we purchased?”

The thug leader was taken aback by the question. It didn’t dawn on him what Lucifer was asking for far too long. But the moment he did, he simply shook his head meekly in response.

On planets like these, most saw nothing but the drinks in their hands at the end of the cycle.

Truth was, both of them had thoroughly wiped out his little gang in the span of a few scant seconds. They had no chance against the two of them. And he truly didn’t even see it happen.

More than that, he wished desperately to have unseen everything thus far.

Lucifer smiled, patted the dust off his jacket lapel, then straightened it out neatly.

“Very good,” ze said. “And by the way, you really should know better than to pick fights against people you don’t know anything about. You never know if they’re demons in disguise.”