Alright, I started writing an sc2 fanfic about a mercenary called Nick Reyd, and posted in on sc2armory.com, but decided I'd post it here as well :) Hope you guys like it.
First a few notes:
1.) It's SC based, altough most of it won't include the Protoss or Zerg
2.) I've got a logical explanation for Nick Reyd and his abilities, you'll just have to wait and see ;)
3.) I don't have a set plan for the entire plot yet, I've planned out the beginning and ending, but if people like this fanfic and I continue writing it, I'll put things up for vote (like, for example, whether a secondary character gets to live) and take suggestions as well.
4.) Forgive and point out any spelling and grammar mistakes, or if there is a word that absolutely doesn't belong where it is. Those are mistakes I do while writing and don't find the first 2-3 times I read through it. Strangely enough I make mistakes like those only when writing stories, never in forum posts, essays or chats no matter what the length. 5.) Please leave comments! If I get none I probably won't continue writing/posting this and be weally weally sad :(
6.) I copy pastad this post from my original post on sc2armory, so if you see some formatting mistakes its because sc2armory doesnt use wikicreole :p
7.) Spoiler tags on sc2mapster are far too much trouble >.> So, sorry for the gigantic post, but I'd have to edit everythin WAY too much to use the spoiler tags, and I dont even know how to edit stuff that way >.>
Gl Hf :)
Chapter One: Nick Reyd
Nick Reyd
Nick got off his motorcycle. He wore an ankle length black and orange coat, black pants and a black shirt. He had a longish white hair, and fiery red eyes, looked like he was about thirty and had that look and smile on his face which makes people presume he can't wait for trouble.
Around his waist two huge revolvers were holstered – at least twice as big normal ones with - and a massive red and black sword hung on his back, with something that looked like pores all over its blade and what looked like the handle for the brakes on a bicycle or motorcycle ran parallel to the swords handle.
He was standing in front of a wooden bar, in the middle of a desert. There was a city on the horizon, a few miles away. He had been sent to collect money from a local mob boss, who apparently owed an even larger local mob boss. A lot of people were standing outside, smoking, talking, and generally looking suspicious and criminal. Nick walked into the bar. Sounds like the beginning of a lame joke. He thought.
The bar was full of thugs, as he expected. In front of the counter sat a short man in a black coat with a black hat. Nick sat beside him.
“What he’s having.” He said to the barman, pointing at the man beside him.
The barman walked over to his cupboard with bottles of drinks.
“I don’t think you get it. I want his drink, you meathead.”
“Don’t insult my barman.” The man beside him said.
“You owe too much money to tell me what to do.” Nick said.
“Oh is that right?” The man said and turned towards him.
“Yea, and I don’t take checks. Nor credit cards for that matter. So yeah, I’d like to see ten grand really quickly.”
“Kill him.” The man said, and suddenly everyone in the bar was holding a gun.
A rather large thug grabbed Nick by the shoulder. Nick spun around and kicked him in the chest, sending him flying through the wall onto the windshield of a car parked outside. Nick looked at his shoe. Ah great, I got skin, blood and maybe even bits of ribs on this. I just cleaned those. He saw every gun being pointed at him.
Just kill 'em Nick. A dark voice said in his mind. You're just wasting our time. Nick was as always annoyed at the voice and ignored it.
“He started it!” Nick defended himself after seeing the not too friendly faces staring at him. “Ah, fine. Have it your way.” He added after a moment of uncomfortable silence.
Nick drew his revolvers and emptied them almost instantly. Twelve bodies fell to the floor. The thugs in the bar emptied their clips on him. It turned out Nick’s coat was rather bulletproof.
“Oi! Watch what ya shoot! I just got it back from the dry cleaners!” Nick yelled at the thugs.
He grabbed the glass of the man who ordered his death and chucked it at the lone thug on the end of the bar behind him. Fifty shards of glass in your brain tend to result in instant death. He then turned around to the three remaining thugs on the other side, just staring at him in a mix of amazement, confusion and fear. He took his massive sword, which was a minimum of six feet long and half a foot wide. He pulled the break-handle to send out a roar of flames from the pores.
Show off. The dark voice said. Just kill them all already. Make them burn – slowly and painfully.
Nick ignored the voice, as always. He reached the thugs, pulled the trigger on his sword again, and just melted his way through the thugs and any surrounding furniture.
“I hope you’ve got fire insurance.” He said as he saw the flames spread. He turned around to the man in the black coat. “I’d like those ten grand now.”
The man ran out of the bar.
“Aw hell, can’t I at least once massacre a gang and make it to lunch in time?”
“Hey.” Said the barman. Nick turned around and ended up staring down a shotgun barrel. “Say cheese.”
“Sorry, I feel a bit vegan today.” Nick said and head-butted the shotgun straight through the barman’s chest.
He turned back to the door and took twelve 100 caliber revolver rounds out of his coat and reloaded before heading out.
“Sh-sh-shoot him!” The man in the coat said.
Just finish them already! The inner demon said. I want blood, and fire! Kill them! Kill them all! Nick just rolled his eyes, but also felt the fire and anger inside him getting stronger.
Thirty men started firing at Nick like mad, raising a cloud of dust covering him from view. At least half the bullets missed him completely. After a couple of seconds the dust settled, revealing Nick Reyd again. But this time, he didn’t look human. His flesh had turned into dark liquid flames and his eyes were glowing bright yellow and his hair was just flames.
“My turn.” Said Nick Reyd, son of the devil, with a fitting demonic voice.
He pull the revolvers trigger, and a bullet burning bright red hit it’s target in a massive explosion, killing five of the thugs. He grabbed his sword and slashed the air in front of him with all his might and pulled the trigger, and a massive flaming shockwave cut through all but one of the remaining thugs. Nick stretched out his arm to the last one, and red energy surrounded him and he flew towards the demon, his neck landing in Nick’s hand. The man started screaming and slowly his skin started drying up, turning black and flaking off. In a matter of seconds, the man was nothing but ash. Nick turned to the boss.
The little man dug everything out of his pockets and tossed all the money he had at Nick in panic. The flames died and Nick took on his human form again.
“I’ll put the bar on your tab.” Nick said, waved his hand at the burning corner of the bar, and the fire instantly spread over the entire building.
“What’d you do that for?” The man said with a ridiculously high pitched voice.
“You made me waste thirteen bullets and three and a half minutes of my time, and you’re asking what that was for?” Nick said angrily, then turned around, picked up the money and walked towards the motorcycle, but then kneeled down beside it and examined his seat very carefully.
“Is that your thugs blood on my seat?”
The man ran as fast as he could.
Nick just looked at him and smiled. A job well done, five grand, but seeing that look on the guys face: priceless.
He then wiped the drop of blood off of his seat, sat on it, and admired the view of the burning building. A minute later his phone rang.
"I'm trying to watch a bar burn, this better be important." He said.
"Hey Nick, it's Steve- Wait, you're burning a bar? I hope you got the rum out first!"
"Hey Doom, what's up?" Nick said, using Steve's real name.
"Heard someone wanted a job done and that he paid well, and it turns out its a size to big for me, so I wondered whether you'd want it? I'll get you close to your target and get you out again once needed."
"What's the job?"
"Ever assasinated the dictator of an interstellar empire before?"
Chapter Two: The Bonecrusher Pirates
Nick stepped out of the medivac that picked him up on the Elesil's surface (the planet he was on) and into the hangar of a protoss carrier, and saw a very large man with an untidy black beard and long black hair that never heard of a comb. He also wore an eyepatch and reeked of rum.
"Nicky m'boy, long time no see." Doom Bonecrusher greeted him with a smile. If you would check the most wanted of the sector list, you'd find Nick on first place, with Doom on the second. He was the leader of the largest pirate group in the sector of this galaxy.
"Sup mon, how ya been?" The voice of Darth Waiter echoed through his minds, a dark high templar that was standing beside Doom. He was third on the list and was in charge of all protoss pirates on Doom's crew. He had worked in unofficial government interrogations for about seven centuries, so no one's mind was safe from him. He wore a black coat that almost reached the floor, a white shirt and grey camo pants.
"Torchin' buildings, blowing people up, getting hunted by any nearby military, the usual." Nick said. "You?"
"Hijacked an Executors Flagship recently, apart from that just the usual raiding and piracy." Doom answered.
“Haven't gottan ta torture anyone though.” Waiter added.
“Don't worry, you'll find someone, I'm sure of it.” Nick said. “How've you been doing Kenny?”
“Alright. Tried overclocking one of my processors a week ago, turns out they're not as heat resistant as you.” Kenny answered. He was short, wore a white shirt, gray vest, matching pants and a hat, and had green eyes and brown hair and looked absolutely human. He even had a pulse.
They started walking towards the door to leading out of the hangar, and a man with short brown hair ran out of the door.
“Nick!” He yelled happily and ran towards him.
“Nate, how are ya?” Nick said as Nate crashed into him and gave him a hug.
“I'm doing great. I'm trying to rewrite our auto-targetting AI, but with Kenny around that's a bit impossible, he's just too good. Great learning experience though. Could eventually end up selling some programs on the black market to make us some extra cash.”
“Nice. How's Jimmy?”
“He's off on a job right now” Doom said. “He's a pretty smart guy, so I let him run a smaller branch of my fleet.”
“Too bad, was hoping I could see him again as well.” Nick said, and they continued on into the corridor and towards the ships cafeteria.
_-_-_
Fire. Fire everywhere. Everything was burning, even him – and it felt good. He grabbed a man by the neck and slowly burned him as well, enjoying it. People started firing at him, and with a wave of his hand a nearby flame shot off and attached itself to his attackers, and they all screamed. He walked over to a giant black metal figure, which started shooting grenades at him, but he just ignored them and punched through the armor of the figure and felt blood burning on his hands, and enjoyed the screams.
He continued walking through the facility, burning and killing everything in his way, and laughing as he enjoyed all of it.
Nick woke up, feeling hot. Fire was shooting through his veins. He looked at his arms and could see the veins and arteries glowing. He tried to calm himself.
What is it, Nick? Trouble sleeping? The devil said and laughed.
He hated it. Usually he was able to keep the devil quiet by being focused enough, but whenever he got into fights or his anger rose, the devil would surface and push him further and further until he finally gave in or got him back under control. Every time he gave in, he'd lose all memories of what happened between then and regaining control, and would usually wake up to see only ashes, fire and scorched earth as far as the eye could see. And then the devil gave him these dreams of what actually happened, and they unnerve him and get him close to losing control again. Luckily up to now he always woke up and got to calm himself down on time before the devil got to him.
Referring to me as another person again, are we? The devil said mockingly. Don't lie to yourself, we're one and the same Nick.
He had a point. Who was he kidding? He was the devil. Maybe not the one ruling hell, but definitely the one in the world of the mortals. He enjoyed the fire, killing and destruction. He was the voice, yet somehow he wasn't. There were no two people, it was just him and himself. He was a freaking lunatic, and usually proud of it.
Think you've got control, do you? The devil said, mocking him, but Nick knew what he was trying to do, and he wouldn't have any of it.
“Shut the hell up.” Nick said.
Talking to yourself now, eh? That's a sign of insanity, you know.
Nick just facepalmed.
A blue hologram of Kenny appeared.
“Hey, I'm noticing somewhat unnatural heat signatures that point at you. Everything alright?”
“Yea, I'm fine.”
“You want a drink? Or a bath?”
“Yea, get me a jug of ice cold water, I’ll be in the cantina in a couple of minutes.”
No bath? It'd be bubbly, I promise. The devil said, further mocking Nick.
“Alright.” Kenny answered and disappeared.
Nick swung around on the bed and brought his feet to the floor. He thought about the dream. When was that? He didn't remember a facility of that sort... And he wasn't wearing his coat, he didn't have his weapons...
Nick ran his hand over the top left side of his chest. He remembered waking up in front of a burning building all those years ago. He remembered he had “X-04” burnt into his skin where his hand was right now. The mark disappeared the following time he turned his body into flames. He was... confused. He kept thinking of it. He had no idea who he was prior to that day. He didn't know how old he was. And all these questions about himself just made him ignore everything about himself. It's why he claimed to be the son of the devil – cause no one argued with that theory and with it he didn't have to bother with the questions.
He got up, put on his shirt, coat and holstered the revolvers and left the room. The corridors of The Flying Drunkman weren't too clean, but also not altogether dirty, just like the rest of the ship and the crew. He walked down the corridor, passing a few doors, greeted a large guy smoking a joint, probably a marauder, and then finally walked through the door to the cafeteria.
There was some barely noticeable music playing in the background, a large amount of tables and chairs. Groups of men and women drank beers, told stories, had a laugh and played games. He always found the protoss the most interesting – they liked to play psionic poker. It's like poker, just with telepaths, so you don't only need a pokerface, but a pokermind as well.
“Wanna play?” Sticks, a Dark Templar, asked him, and the rest of the table looked up at him. He saw Darth Waiter, a zealot, two high templar and a ghost sitting at the table as well.
“No thanks.” Nick said. If there was one rule to winning in poker, whether psionic or not, it was “Thou shalt not playeth against Darth Waiter”
He walked on towards the counter, where he found Kenny and Doom, and a few empty bottles of rum.
“'Nother one!” Doom yelled over the counter, and an automated robot brought him another bottle of
rum. “Hey Nick, want some?” He asked Nick, holding out the bottle.
“You know I don't drink flammable substances.” Nick said. “Kenny, got the water?”
“Yup.” Kenny said and slid the glass over the counter to Nick.
“I knew summin' was fishy when the robot ordered 'imself a drink.” Doom said, and gulped down half the bottle. At first people wonder how his liver survives it, but once they get to know him they start questioning his bladder size instead.
“When are we gonna be at Megennon?” Nick asked. “And what's the plan?”
“Business at this hour in the morning? Come on, relax a litle.”
“What time is it anyway?”
“We're in bloody space, only thing I know is that it's January. Damn time differences.”
“4:32 AM ship time, first of February.” Kenny said.
“Dammit.”
“So, the plan?” Nick asked.
“Fine. Be that way.” Doom said. “We're dropping you off on Megennon in a week, because of the open air speech of the emperor they're tightening up their security which is why we're going in two weeks early. We already got a cover story. Waiter is gonna sell info on you that puts you back on Elesil where we picked you up, but he'll only agree to an in person meeting and cash payment. You'll be in the dropship with him, Kenny will scramble all nearby detectors and you'll slip out with some ghost cloaking gear. Kenny reserved you a cheap hotel room at the edge of town, and I'm using the word “hotel” lightly here. From then on, you're on your own. You better cause some chaos and get the orbital troops down to the surface of the planet, we'll show up two hours after the speech should be held and warp you off the planet with the warp prisms we got.”
“Sounds... Well...” Nick started. “Good enough. Don't really like the two week waiting time.”
“Well, unless you get us something with which we can break an imperial blockade, this is the only way. If you don't feel like waiting, you can try and track the guy down early and break into his fortress, but I doubt you'd manage to catch him before he goes off-world.”
“Yea, I know.” Nick said and drank his water. “Two weeks of waiting. You sure they won't notice me?”
“As long as you don't show yourself to the military, you'll be ignored, believe me.”
“If you say so.”
“Yea, just be careful on the last day, you'll somehow have to get to the center of the city undetected. If he runs, you probably won't ever catch him.”
“By the way, how are you guys planning on getting me out?” Nick asked. “They'll notice you getting into the system, no amount of chaos on the planet surface will keep them from intercepting you.”
“Don't worry, we've had a few nice jobs recently with nice fat paychecks. My fleet is gonna be larger than ol' Damn Bonecruhser's once I get my shipment from Flamin' Jeff's. Just make sure to draw enough attention so that they can't send their whole fleet at us. But, just in case they do, we'll just bounce out and back into the system until their fleet stops trying to intercept us or you've taken out enough of it for us to break it.”
“Why do I not have a good feeling about this?”
“Cause you didn't drink as much rum as I did.” Doom said and finished the bottle.
Alright, I started writing an sc2 fanfic about a mercenary called Nick Reyd, and posted in on sc2armory.com, but decided I'd post it here as well :) Hope you guys like it.
First a few notes:
1.) It's SC based, altough most of it won't include the Protoss or Zerg
2.) I've got a logical explanation for Nick Reyd and his abilities, you'll just have to wait and see ;)
3.) I don't have a set plan for the entire plot yet, I've planned out the beginning and ending, but if people like this fanfic and I continue writing it, I'll put things up for vote (like, for example, whether a secondary character gets to live) and take suggestions as well.
4.) Forgive and point out any spelling and grammar mistakes, or if there is a word that absolutely doesn't belong where it is. Those are mistakes I do while writing and don't find the first 2-3 times I read through it. Strangely enough I make mistakes like those only when writing stories, never in forum posts, essays or chats no matter what the length.
5.) Please leave comments! If I get none I probably won't continue writing/posting this and be weally weally sad :(
6.) I copy pastad this post from my original post on sc2armory, so if you see some formatting mistakes its because sc2armory doesnt use wikicreole :p
7.) Spoiler tags on sc2mapster are far too much trouble >.> So, sorry for the gigantic post, but I'd have to edit everythin WAY too much to use the spoiler tags, and I dont even know how to edit stuff that way >.>
Gl Hf :)
Chapter One: Nick Reyd
Nick Reyd
Nick got off his motorcycle. He wore an ankle length black and orange coat, black pants and a black shirt. He had a longish white hair, and fiery red eyes, looked like he was about thirty and had that look and smile on his face which makes people presume he can't wait for trouble.
Around his waist two huge revolvers were holstered – at least twice as big normal ones with - and a massive red and black sword hung on his back, with something that looked like pores all over its blade and what looked like the handle for the brakes on a bicycle or motorcycle ran parallel to the swords handle.
He was standing in front of a wooden bar, in the middle of a desert. There was a city on the horizon, a few miles away. He had been sent to collect money from a local mob boss, who apparently owed an even larger local mob boss. A lot of people were standing outside, smoking, talking, and generally looking suspicious and criminal. Nick walked into the bar. Sounds like the beginning of a lame joke. He thought.
The bar was full of thugs, as he expected. In front of the counter sat a short man in a black coat with a black hat. Nick sat beside him.
“What he’s having.” He said to the barman, pointing at the man beside him.
The barman walked over to his cupboard with bottles of drinks.
“I don’t think you get it. I want his drink, you meathead.”
“Don’t insult my barman.” The man beside him said.
“You owe too much money to tell me what to do.” Nick said.
“Oh is that right?” The man said and turned towards him.
“Yea, and I don’t take checks. Nor credit cards for that matter. So yeah, I’d like to see ten grand really quickly.”
“Kill him.” The man said, and suddenly everyone in the bar was holding a gun.
A rather large thug grabbed Nick by the shoulder. Nick spun around and kicked him in the chest, sending him flying through the wall onto the windshield of a car parked outside. Nick looked at his shoe. Ah great, I got skin, blood and maybe even bits of ribs on this. I just cleaned those. He saw every gun being pointed at him.
Just kill 'em Nick. A dark voice said in his mind. You're just wasting our time. Nick was as always annoyed at the voice and ignored it.
“He started it!” Nick defended himself after seeing the not too friendly faces staring at him. “Ah, fine. Have it your way.” He added after a moment of uncomfortable silence.
Nick drew his revolvers and emptied them almost instantly. Twelve bodies fell to the floor. The thugs in the bar emptied their clips on him. It turned out Nick’s coat was rather bulletproof.
“Oi! Watch what ya shoot! I just got it back from the dry cleaners!” Nick yelled at the thugs.
He grabbed the glass of the man who ordered his death and chucked it at the lone thug on the end of the bar behind him. Fifty shards of glass in your brain tend to result in instant death. He then turned around to the three remaining thugs on the other side, just staring at him in a mix of amazement, confusion and fear. He took his massive sword, which was a minimum of six feet long and half a foot wide. He pulled the break-handle to send out a roar of flames from the pores.
Show off. The dark voice said. Just kill them all already. Make them burn – slowly and painfully.
Nick ignored the voice, as always. He reached the thugs, pulled the trigger on his sword again, and just melted his way through the thugs and any surrounding furniture.
“I hope you’ve got fire insurance.” He said as he saw the flames spread. He turned around to the man in the black coat. “I’d like those ten grand now.”
The man ran out of the bar.
“Aw hell, can’t I at least once massacre a gang and make it to lunch in time?”
“Hey.” Said the barman. Nick turned around and ended up staring down a shotgun barrel. “Say cheese.”
“Sorry, I feel a bit vegan today.” Nick said and head-butted the shotgun straight through the barman’s chest.
He turned back to the door and took twelve 100 caliber revolver rounds out of his coat and reloaded before heading out.
“Sh-sh-shoot him!” The man in the coat said.
Just finish them already! The inner demon said. I want blood, and fire! Kill them! Kill them all! Nick just rolled his eyes, but also felt the fire and anger inside him getting stronger.
Thirty men started firing at Nick like mad, raising a cloud of dust covering him from view. At least half the bullets missed him completely. After a couple of seconds the dust settled, revealing Nick Reyd again. But this time, he didn’t look human. His flesh had turned into dark liquid flames and his eyes were glowing bright yellow and his hair was just flames.
“My turn.” Said Nick Reyd, son of the devil, with a fitting demonic voice.
He pull the revolvers trigger, and a bullet burning bright red hit it’s target in a massive explosion, killing five of the thugs. He grabbed his sword and slashed the air in front of him with all his might and pulled the trigger, and a massive flaming shockwave cut through all but one of the remaining thugs. Nick stretched out his arm to the last one, and red energy surrounded him and he flew towards the demon, his neck landing in Nick’s hand. The man started screaming and slowly his skin started drying up, turning black and flaking off. In a matter of seconds, the man was nothing but ash. Nick turned to the boss.
The little man dug everything out of his pockets and tossed all the money he had at Nick in panic. The flames died and Nick took on his human form again.
“I’ll put the bar on your tab.” Nick said, waved his hand at the burning corner of the bar, and the fire instantly spread over the entire building.
“What’d you do that for?” The man said with a ridiculously high pitched voice.
“You made me waste thirteen bullets and three and a half minutes of my time, and you’re asking what that was for?” Nick said angrily, then turned around, picked up the money and walked towards the motorcycle, but then kneeled down beside it and examined his seat very carefully.
“Is that your thugs blood on my seat?”
The man ran as fast as he could.
Nick just looked at him and smiled. A job well done, five grand, but seeing that look on the guys face: priceless.
He then wiped the drop of blood off of his seat, sat on it, and admired the view of the burning building. A minute later his phone rang.
"I'm trying to watch a bar burn, this better be important." He said.
"Hey Nick, it's Steve- Wait, you're burning a bar? I hope you got the rum out first!"
"Hey Doom, what's up?" Nick said, using Steve's real name.
"Heard someone wanted a job done and that he paid well, and it turns out its a size to big for me, so I wondered whether you'd want it? I'll get you close to your target and get you out again once needed."
"What's the job?"
"Ever assasinated the dictator of an interstellar empire before?"
Chapter Two: The Bonecrusher Pirates
Nick stepped out of the medivac that picked him up on the Elesil's surface (the planet he was on) and into the hangar of a protoss carrier, and saw a very large man with an untidy black beard and long black hair that never heard of a comb. He also wore an eyepatch and reeked of rum.
"Nicky m'boy, long time no see." Doom Bonecrusher greeted him with a smile. If you would check the most wanted of the sector list, you'd find Nick on first place, with Doom on the second. He was the leader of the largest pirate group in the sector of this galaxy.
"Sup mon, how ya been?" The voice of Darth Waiter echoed through his minds, a dark high templar that was standing beside Doom. He was third on the list and was in charge of all protoss pirates on Doom's crew. He had worked in unofficial government interrogations for about seven centuries, so no one's mind was safe from him. He wore a black coat that almost reached the floor, a white shirt and grey camo pants.
"Torchin' buildings, blowing people up, getting hunted by any nearby military, the usual." Nick said. "You?"
"Hijacked an Executors Flagship recently, apart from that just the usual raiding and piracy." Doom answered.
“Haven't gottan ta torture anyone though.” Waiter added.
“Don't worry, you'll find someone, I'm sure of it.” Nick said. “How've you been doing Kenny?”
“Alright. Tried overclocking one of my processors a week ago, turns out they're not as heat resistant as you.” Kenny answered. He was short, wore a white shirt, gray vest, matching pants and a hat, and had green eyes and brown hair and looked absolutely human. He even had a pulse.
They started walking towards the door to leading out of the hangar, and a man with short brown hair ran out of the door.
“Nick!” He yelled happily and ran towards him.
“Nate, how are ya?” Nick said as Nate crashed into him and gave him a hug.
“I'm doing great. I'm trying to rewrite our auto-targetting AI, but with Kenny around that's a bit impossible, he's just too good. Great learning experience though. Could eventually end up selling some programs on the black market to make us some extra cash.”
“Nice. How's Jimmy?”
“He's off on a job right now” Doom said. “He's a pretty smart guy, so I let him run a smaller branch of my fleet.”
“Too bad, was hoping I could see him again as well.” Nick said, and they continued on into the corridor and towards the ships cafeteria.
_-_-_
Fire. Fire everywhere. Everything was burning, even him – and it felt good. He grabbed a man by the neck and slowly burned him as well, enjoying it. People started firing at him, and with a wave of his hand a nearby flame shot off and attached itself to his attackers, and they all screamed. He walked over to a giant black metal figure, which started shooting grenades at him, but he just ignored them and punched through the armor of the figure and felt blood burning on his hands, and enjoyed the screams.
He continued walking through the facility, burning and killing everything in his way, and laughing as he enjoyed all of it.
Nick woke up, feeling hot. Fire was shooting through his veins. He looked at his arms and could see the veins and arteries glowing. He tried to calm himself.
What is it, Nick? Trouble sleeping? The devil said and laughed.
He hated it. Usually he was able to keep the devil quiet by being focused enough, but whenever he got into fights or his anger rose, the devil would surface and push him further and further until he finally gave in or got him back under control. Every time he gave in, he'd lose all memories of what happened between then and regaining control, and would usually wake up to see only ashes, fire and scorched earth as far as the eye could see. And then the devil gave him these dreams of what actually happened, and they unnerve him and get him close to losing control again. Luckily up to now he always woke up and got to calm himself down on time before the devil got to him.
Referring to me as another person again, are we? The devil said mockingly. Don't lie to yourself, we're one and the same Nick.
He had a point. Who was he kidding? He was the devil. Maybe not the one ruling hell, but definitely the one in the world of the mortals. He enjoyed the fire, killing and destruction. He was the voice, yet somehow he wasn't. There were no two people, it was just him and himself. He was a freaking lunatic, and usually proud of it.
Think you've got control, do you? The devil said, mocking him, but Nick knew what he was trying to do, and he wouldn't have any of it.
“Shut the hell up.” Nick said.
Talking to yourself now, eh? That's a sign of insanity, you know.
Nick just facepalmed.
A blue hologram of Kenny appeared.
“Hey, I'm noticing somewhat unnatural heat signatures that point at you. Everything alright?”
“Yea, I'm fine.”
“You want a drink? Or a bath?”
“Yea, get me a jug of ice cold water, I’ll be in the cantina in a couple of minutes.”
No bath? It'd be bubbly, I promise. The devil said, further mocking Nick.
“Alright.” Kenny answered and disappeared.
Nick swung around on the bed and brought his feet to the floor. He thought about the dream. When was that? He didn't remember a facility of that sort... And he wasn't wearing his coat, he didn't have his weapons...
Nick ran his hand over the top left side of his chest. He remembered waking up in front of a burning building all those years ago. He remembered he had “X-04” burnt into his skin where his hand was right now. The mark disappeared the following time he turned his body into flames. He was... confused. He kept thinking of it. He had no idea who he was prior to that day. He didn't know how old he was. And all these questions about himself just made him ignore everything about himself. It's why he claimed to be the son of the devil – cause no one argued with that theory and with it he didn't have to bother with the questions.
He got up, put on his shirt, coat and holstered the revolvers and left the room. The corridors of The Flying Drunkman weren't too clean, but also not altogether dirty, just like the rest of the ship and the crew. He walked down the corridor, passing a few doors, greeted a large guy smoking a joint, probably a marauder, and then finally walked through the door to the cafeteria.
There was some barely noticeable music playing in the background, a large amount of tables and chairs. Groups of men and women drank beers, told stories, had a laugh and played games. He always found the protoss the most interesting – they liked to play psionic poker. It's like poker, just with telepaths, so you don't only need a pokerface, but a pokermind as well.
“Wanna play?” Sticks, a Dark Templar, asked him, and the rest of the table looked up at him. He saw Darth Waiter, a zealot, two high templar and a ghost sitting at the table as well.
“No thanks.” Nick said. If there was one rule to winning in poker, whether psionic or not, it was “Thou shalt not playeth against Darth Waiter”
He walked on towards the counter, where he found Kenny and Doom, and a few empty bottles of rum.
“'Nother one!” Doom yelled over the counter, and an automated robot brought him another bottle of
rum. “Hey Nick, want some?” He asked Nick, holding out the bottle.
“You know I don't drink flammable substances.” Nick said. “Kenny, got the water?”
“Yup.” Kenny said and slid the glass over the counter to Nick.
“I knew summin' was fishy when the robot ordered 'imself a drink.” Doom said, and gulped down half the bottle. At first people wonder how his liver survives it, but once they get to know him they start questioning his bladder size instead.
“When are we gonna be at Megennon?” Nick asked. “And what's the plan?”
“Business at this hour in the morning? Come on, relax a litle.”
“What time is it anyway?”
“We're in bloody space, only thing I know is that it's January. Damn time differences.”
“4:32 AM ship time, first of February.” Kenny said.
“Dammit.”
“So, the plan?” Nick asked.
“Fine. Be that way.” Doom said. “We're dropping you off on Megennon in a week, because of the open air speech of the emperor they're tightening up their security which is why we're going in two weeks early. We already got a cover story. Waiter is gonna sell info on you that puts you back on Elesil where we picked you up, but he'll only agree to an in person meeting and cash payment. You'll be in the dropship with him, Kenny will scramble all nearby detectors and you'll slip out with some ghost cloaking gear. Kenny reserved you a cheap hotel room at the edge of town, and I'm using the word “hotel” lightly here. From then on, you're on your own. You better cause some chaos and get the orbital troops down to the surface of the planet, we'll show up two hours after the speech should be held and warp you off the planet with the warp prisms we got.”
“Sounds... Well...” Nick started. “Good enough. Don't really like the two week waiting time.”
“Well, unless you get us something with which we can break an imperial blockade, this is the only way. If you don't feel like waiting, you can try and track the guy down early and break into his fortress, but I doubt you'd manage to catch him before he goes off-world.”
“Yea, I know.” Nick said and drank his water. “Two weeks of waiting. You sure they won't notice me?”
“As long as you don't show yourself to the military, you'll be ignored, believe me.”
“If you say so.”
“Yea, just be careful on the last day, you'll somehow have to get to the center of the city undetected. If he runs, you probably won't ever catch him.”
“By the way, how are you guys planning on getting me out?” Nick asked. “They'll notice you getting into the system, no amount of chaos on the planet surface will keep them from intercepting you.”
“Don't worry, we've had a few nice jobs recently with nice fat paychecks. My fleet is gonna be larger than ol' Damn Bonecruhser's once I get my shipment from Flamin' Jeff's. Just make sure to draw enough attention so that they can't send their whole fleet at us. But, just in case they do, we'll just bounce out and back into the system until their fleet stops trying to intercept us or you've taken out enough of it for us to break it.”
“Why do I not have a good feeling about this?”
“Cause you didn't drink as much rum as I did.” Doom said and finished the bottle.
Reserving this post in case I need it
@TheAlmaity: Go I enjoyed what I read(Which was all of it), but I'm not really all that skilled in short stories to comment.