After flying from the Zadar colony to the salvage sector in Mishun Prime, we discovered why things have been tense around here. I know space is big, but do your job, Mishun Prime army.
“<This is Captain Khalil Hasselback from the twenty-first patrol fleet of Mishun Prime. We were here rounding up refugees.>”
I guess they were…
We requested a video transmission with that woman called Vasilisa, and the transmission was cut immediately after she said she was going to get a representative. Then he appeared.
I was going to have Kori handle transmissions, but she wanted me to take over, so I’m dealing with it. It’s serious and sounds like a real pain.
“Hello Captain Hasselback, I am Genma, a Grassland one mercenary. I guess I should start by asking if they won’t hear us on an open channel.”
“<We have confirmed that’s not a problem. The ship crab reacts to two things, trying to leave this sector, and attacking it.>”
He looks friendlier than I would expect a captain to be, but he’s trying to talk with us not with a smile, but with a serious expression that looks like a noh mask.
His blonde hair that I assume used to be the typical military crew cut is disheveled, and his beard has grown like he has no time to deal with it. Wait, how many months worth of beard is that?
Aside from that, his cheeks look hollow, and he has big bags under his eyes. Other than that, he looks like a walker with black skin, and blond hair and blue eyes. His face isn’t bad, but it looks really tired…
“Leave the sector…? It’s not when we fire up our engines?”
“<Yes… It’s strange. It looks at us, but doesn’t attack directly. But it won’t let anyone fly away, by attacking with lasers any time someone tries.>”
I apologize to everyone for getting mad for no reason before. And Saratha stares really hard with half open eyes.
“Just to check, is the army of Mishun Prime on the move?”
“<I dunno, I should ask you… I assume by your question the answer is no?>”
I check with everyone in the cockpit, but no one has picked up any information about the army. I assume the Mercenary Guild would be active too, if the army made any big moves…
“There was information about some people going missing with few details about them… It was enough for me to get wary about this sector becoming active.”
“<Some… There are forty-one people here. Eight ships were shot down, with only one remaining.>”
I know it sounds bad, but that really is just some. Anyway, I want to make this situation better if I can.
“<By the way Genma… How are you in terms of food supplies? I would appreciate it if you could share some.>”
“I have enough for my crew, but…”
Wait, is their situation actually pretty dire? What if the forty-one of them suddenly turned to piracy? What? Iris is fast walking towards me…
What? If forty-one people were to join, we would have enough food printer output and clean water for two months? That’s more than I thought. And Suzuri is writing something on her tablet.
‘Did you forget that we have years worth of food for our crew in the space expansion container?’
“Sorry, I did.”
That’s right, we didn’t make a dent in what we bought just in case before we went to Mishyltia Prime. If there’s a chance they could turn to piracy, I guess we should prevent that first…
“Captain Hasselback, we can share some food with you.”
“<R-really!? We are moving in a small combat ship, so can we connect to yours!?>”
“I would rather you take a container with armor.”
“<We don’t have armors, the cargo hatch is broken and won’t move.>”
“Well…”
Tortilla Double is capable of doing that, even if I haven’t done it before. Let’s use that emergency passage I used when I first found it.
“Okay, let’s connect the ships. Do you know our position?”
“<Hum… We do. We are heading your way, Hasselback out.>”
Ahh. Nothing but problems.
“We are taking in forty-one people. Fire up the food printer in the cargo bay, get water bottles, and let’s give them a warm welcome if they turn out to be pirates.
Kori, take care of the food printer, Saratha, take care of the water bottles, Iris, handle defense, and Suzuri and I will wait here for them to dock. Any questions?”
“It might be faster to heat up retort bags~.”
“True, start with that then.”
“What if they want to sleep here?”
“At best, we can let them stay in the cargo bay… We don’t have blankets or anything, so all we can do is use the air conditioning.”
“Just to check, shooting them down now isn’t an option, right?”
That would be the fastest solution, but…
“Let’s feed them, and then I want information about that ship crab. I don’t think we’re getting out of here unless we do something about it.”
“Genma, I see a small combat ship on the radar. Judging by its speed, it should arrive in ten minutes.”
“That’s pretty slow… Is it because it’s packed with people? Maybe they’re trying not to get spotted by the ship crab…?”
I use Tortilla Double’s electronic telescope, and see them hiding behind scrap like us, slowly making their way here.
“Switching the generator to combat mode, shield output at seventy percent. Prepare to take them… Are we going to have to take everyone into this ship…”
I’d rather push them over there, but oh well.
▽▽▽
“<Tortilla Double, requesting permission to dock.>”
“Permission granted, go ahead captain.”
It’s only me and Suzuri in the cockpit, the others are in the cargo bay. However, Kori and Saratha are in their armors with weapons ready, and Iris is all ready for combat.
And of course, the small turrets in the cargo bay are operational, and half the battle drones are ready to go.
“<So Mister Genma, you have quite the big ship…>”
“We can’t, captain.”
“<But we are at our limit when it comes to passengers. Do you understand? I’m not asking you to take everyone, but will you let at least half on board?>”
“I can accept only women and children. My crew is all women.”
“<…Can’t we work something out…?>”
“No. This is the absolute bare minimum. Don’t try to take over my ship, you’ll get everyone killed. Make sure you understand that.”
“<All right, we’ll work something out.>”
Seriously, I don’t know how things are over there, but please don’t draw a gun or anything.
Well then, Tortilla Double has stopped, and we’re waiting for them to dock. When the army in To Akul Prime came for an inspection, they used armors instead of docking. That was terrible.
The small combat ship is slowly making its way here through autopilot. It attaches its access tube… And it’s docked.
Now people can pass through ships without equipment. Still, that’s quite the small combat ship. Small ships are a size smaller than medium ones, but that one’s shaped like a cigar, so it’s not big horizontally or vertically.
Although hexahedron shaped ships like Tortilla Double are rare…
“<Master, we have a problem. The first person took me hostage and demanded control of the ship. Someone else tore this person’s hand and rendered the pirate unconscious.>”
“Good job. Tie up the pirate and give food and water to that person. Blockade the door and stop the others from entering.”
I have to praise that lack of hesitation.
“Suzuri, I’m going down there, take control of the ship.”
“Very well… Ah, what a troubling situation this has become…”
“No kidding… Why do we have to deal with infighting… I have to threaten Captain Hasselback… Wait, communications aren’t working?”
“Hnu? I lack the commanding attitude, but I could threaten him for you… But could this self-proclaimed captain be the one who attacked Iris…?”
“That can’t be.”
Our enemy is that stupidly big crustacean, not other people!
▽▽▽
I get on the elevator, check the belt that activates the personal shield, and go down to the cargo bay with a disk battle drone and an escort drone.
Iris bound a brown-haired guy, not a blonde one. Also, Saratha got out of her armor, and disk drones are moving around him in cleaning mode. There doesn’t appear to be anyone else here, and the drones capable of combat are standing by the passage in alert mode.
Saratha is chatting with a woman I don’t recognize… And she’s turning this way.
“Genma. I didn’t think you were coming down here.”
“I wanted to know what was going on, and I couldn’t communicate with that ship in the cockpit. Who’s this woman? I’m Genma, a Grassland one mercenary.”
“Ah, I’m Vasilisa, a Town one in mercenary terms. I don’t mean to sound like you owe me something, but I pacified that idiot.”
She says with a husky voice while showing a reddish-brown tentacle. I assume there are suction cups underneath too, like a real octopus tentacle. Her silver hair reaches her waist, and I can only describe her figure as incredible.
She’s wearing a relaxed dress, with two walker legs stretching from under it, and eight tentacles stretching down from her knees. They’re all thick, at least as big as one of my legs. How does that work?
She also has two arms like a walker, so is she like human on top and octopus on the bottom? The skin on her human side is pale to the point of looking sickly, but beautiful like porcelain.
Her eyes remind me of lavender… Wait, is she an albino?
Still, I can hardly call her fragile. She has a nice physique, and arms like a sports player. She could be a good match for Saratha. Her upper arm is clearly muscular and not flabby. Is this a muscle festival?
“Ooh! A scylla?”
“Scy what?? Ah, I guess we’re generally called octopus people in the Alliance. But that’s incredible, I’ve never seen a walker not shrink back when he sees me.”
“Genma, is her race also your type…”
“It’s just a coincidence.”
“You don’t sound convincing, master.”
Hey, I’m just not discriminating.
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