Is it any good? I think I may have overused the ellipses.I wake up, Cygni System, 5 light seconds away from the local stargate. The one I'd come through, not the next one on my journey.
Something seems vaguely wrong, but I don't really have time to indulge my personal delusions now. I'm low on fuel, and my visual display is broken.
No, I scan through the cargo manifest and see 9 more helium3 fuel rods. Plenty for now, but I can't afford to go traipsing off into the unknown for much longer with only that. I use up the fuel in my cargo hold, leaving my reserves empty but reactor a little less than half full. That's Plenty, for now at least.
My view of the cold vastness of space is interrupted off and on by bursts of snowy static, intermittently obscuring my vision. A cadre of ships enter from the gate, but the display cuts out to static as they pass by, so I can't make out what kind they are. A minute later the computer's self-diagnosis finds the problem, and the display is fixed. It isn't a much better view this way, but it's more efficient to be able to see who's shooting at me.
I don't know a thing about the Gygni, but there's a commonwealth station some 15 light seconds away. I've got illegal items in my hold... 5 cases of Martian Nori, 14 laudanum ampules, a bootleg Star Wars 3DV, 6 Tempus Syrettes... Loot from a smuggler's escort a while back, in the previous system, Ross 248. I move into a far orbit of a nearby planet, and jettison all of the contraband into a holding crate before moving towards and docking with the station. I can't afford to have such a potential source of income confiscated by Commonwealth customs agents.
I've got a NAMI missile launcher and 5 KM100 missiles in the hold, I take this opportunity to have the launcher installed, it will come in handy.
Sell off a segment of titanium armor, tank of liquid oxygen, and pause over 18 barrels of hydrocarbons before deciding to wait until I come to a corporate station to sell those - Commonwealth doesn't pay as much for such things - also sell a fast-fire laser cannon.
Weapons fire and hostile signatures appear on my long-range sensors, and I suddenly feel unsafe. I sell one of the hydrocarbon barrels and take this opportunity to reinforce my defenses.. Upgrade from a class I deflector to a class II. I still don't feel safe... I should be more careful, I think.
Why should I... ?
I go over the station's list of wares once more and purchase a system map ROM. There are a lot of anarchists in this system, and a hotel. I take off from the station, and see a salvager nomad ship lumbering toward the station from the direction of my contraband cache. Investigating, my crate is gone. Salvagers.
An inexplicable anger courses through my veins, I can't stand for this. I move out from the station a little and wait. They have to leave the station some time.
I go into an 'auto-pilot' sleep, and jolt back to my senses when the salvager nomad pulls away from the station. My finger slips to the missile button in a panic, and a KM100 Longbow flies off into space, missing the station by some 5 light seconds. I should be more careful with that. I settle in behind the salvager and drift at a safe distance for some time, Until we're well out of the way of any stations, and accelerete towards it, opening up my AK15 cannon into its rear plating. It returns fire with a turbolaser cannon, tearing away at my deflector. I let fly my four remaining Longbow missiles. The turbolaser intercepts and destroys them all, and takes my shields down, impacting my front section of reactive armor. I pull my ship around hard, and swerve away as fast as I can. Once I get out to a safe distance, I have a barrel of armor repair paste applied to the damaged front plate, it works quickly, and I charge toward my new-found enemy once more, opening fire before I'm even within range.
It burns away at my deflector again, and I send a series of concussive impacts through its armor, flying past it and rounding on it again.
A series of shudders tear through the ship as the turbolaser burns into my forward reactive plating.
I tear into the ship again, and my armor is almost gone, hull breach imminent. I flip around and fly out of its range, 30 light seconds. I'll wait for my deflector to recharge again and make one last charge at it before I give up and come back later, with more firepower.
My eyes widen, and hands clench into a white-knuckled grip. My reactor's fuel energy meter is empty. I bring up the cargo manifest and madly search for any more fuel, of course I don't have any. I didn't...
Systems start shutting down, the shields, the weapons...
I scream, but I don't quite understand the words. I hammer at the acceleration controls and roar in fury as I suddenly find myself staring out into space, drifting in a dead vessel, oxygen running out. Deep breath, it's not... I'm going to die now, I know it, and it hits me hard between the eyes. I left home, I left my family for this... For this! All of my life, for nothing.
With my last breath, I curse Domina.
(Criticize my writing here please)
