IC
("Drunk Aliens," Art by Rafael Vallaperde)
Some epic space sagas begin with a massive ship drifting through space. Some epic space sagas begin with blaster fights between helpless crewmen and evil dark lords with their evil clone warriors wreaking havoc. Some epic space sagas begin with distress throughout the Empire, rebel forces, hostility in the neutral zone, alien parasites busting through victim's stomachs, or at the very least, giant yellow words that slowly scroll down.
This is not one of those epic space sagas.
Our story begins at a bar. A bar at a spaceport, Ice Mosley spaceport to be exact, where you will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. So the crew of the Amalgamation Star Ship Burger would fit right in! But since the real reason the A.S.S. Burger was there was to pick up a new customer who wanted to leave this god-forsaken spaceport, and that was proving to be more time consuming than the captain originally thought, the captain grudgingly let everyone on his crew go exploring Ice Mosley. How far they went was up to them. They just had to realize that the ship could leave at any moment, and the crew had to be on board, or they wouldn't get paid.
Yeah, not much of an incentive there, seeing how most of the crew made less than your average homeless bum, but it was the only thing Captain Gruff Chary could say to enforce the slight kind of loose discipline his ship was known for. Still, leaving on the Burger was likely the only way to leave Ice Mosely any time soon. And while the nightlife of Ice Mosley was something to behold, no one really wanted to have to live there.
While all of the other crew members either stayed on board or went elsewhere, the low-level B-Jacs (Burger Janitorial and Cleanup Services) crewmen found a local bar and were enjoying their drinks. The bar was what you might expect on Ice Mosley. The drinks were high in alcohol content, if not in price. A game of explosion darts was going on in the far corner between a few patrons. Gwen, a short haired human brunette, tossed back a Sloshian lager and watched as two aliens laughed at their sombrero-wearing companion, who was plastered and making a fool of himself. Yep. Ice Mosley was living up to its reputation.
Fortunately, not all of the B-Jacs crew had come. Their superior officer, the overweight, nasally voiced and generally unpleasant Lt. Flo had stayed on board. Her presence was an automatic buzz-kill, with her fussing over making sure every cup was precisely lined up at corresponding similar angles, and that all napkins were precisely arranged with only one and a half centimeters from the table side. And that was only for square tables. Sitting at a circular-topped table made it a nightmare few wanted to live through. Gwen couldn't stand her lieutenant, and had no idea how that ghastly lady had ever made it to the ranks of officer-hood.
Nonetheless, Lt. Flo had all the backing of the captain and other higher-ups. The woman was efficient, and kept things clean. No matter how annoying she was.
The other member of the B-Jacs crew to stay on the ship was their somewhat useless robotic assistant, C.H.U.C.K.I.E., or the Cybernetic Human-User Cleanup Knowledge Issue Examiner. Chuckie was assigned to help the B-Jacs lieutenant teach the crew the proper methods of cleaning. That's basically all he could do, which made him a real thrill at parties. Plus, some psychotic computer programmer had given his A.I. the personality of a practical joker with Chuckie himself as the butt of his own jokes. While that made for some laughs, it didn't enamor Chuckie in social situations where the only thing a B-Jacs crewman might want was booze.
Gwen called for another Sloshian, this time a dark ale, and turned to her companions. "Heck of a day, huh!" Little did she know that her day was not over, and what was still to come for her, and for the rest of her B-Jacs crew, was going to change the fate of the entire universe.
Captain Gruff Chary and 1st Officer Yuge
An annoyed middle-aged man in a captain's uniform kept looking down at his satellite phone, while his 1st officer, a hulking Beastarian two feet taller than him and 150 lbs. more of all muscle, looked Stoically as the robotic drones helped load their ship with who knew what kind of cargo.
Capt. Gruff Chary growled as he looked at the app on his phone, seeing all of the nearby customers wanting a Starlift getting picked up one by one, but unable to do anything about it. Yeah, his competitors (the other Starlift pilots he affectionately called "Scumbags") were getting paid by taking customers. And while they were raking in the fees, Capt. Chary had to wait for the customer who unfortunately turned out to be one of the slowest Sluggarians of them all. When the captain had seen the alert notice on his satellite phone app go off, he was sure that he'd be able to pick up thirty more customers before the evening was done, the way certain planets in that solar system tended to go. 30 more customers would help immensely. And especially because this was a customer who wanted to transport some cargo, too! Capt. Chary was seeing a lucrative pick-up here. But the annoyance level grew when the Burger docked at Ice Mosley and the Captain saw that it was a Sluggarian who wanted the ride. And the Sluggarian who was a merchant also insisted that he personally oversaw the loading of his cargo on the A.S.S. Burger, at the pace of an Andarian glacier. At first, when he saw the new fare signal coming up on his phone's app, Capt. Chary had hopes that this would be the first of possibly thirty new customers he might pick up that day. But now, it was less than peanuts compared to what he could have been making. The Sluggarian seemed to be especially slow, methodical and precise for his species, making sure the cargo was exactly where he thought it should be on the Burger's cargo bay. And it was taking freaking forever.
Being a Starlift captain had its ups and downs. This was one of the downs. It put him in a foul mood.
Still, at least he had a good ship. The Burger had tall rooms and corridors, which made for extra space and ambience. Name remembered how the ship had originally been designed for Enbeeayliens. And Enbeeayliens were always tall and gangly, just like their cousins, the Enceedoubleayliens. Yet both kinds always seemed to get good-looking girls, too. Some species had all the luck. Anyways, the Burger was definitely serviceable for humans, Beastarians, and all the other species they had collected of crewmen and customers, some of whom they might actually drop off at their intended destinations.
Neither Capt. Chary or his hulking 1st officer had cared to ask the Sluggarian what he was transporting. Starlift protocol and all. It tended to discourage customers if they had to tell you what they wanted you to carry. And besides, it gave you immunity if Intergal, the Intergalactic Police, came wanting to arrest you. "Hey, officer, I didn't know my customer was transporting illegal narcotics / illegal contraband / illegal weapons / your mothers. I'm innocent." That line had saved many a Starlift captain before. So yeah, neither of the Burger officers knew or cared what the Sluggarian was trying to transport.
If they had known, well, they would have gotten as far away from Ice Mosley as they could. Because, while Capt. Chary liked making a profit and 1st Officer Yuge liked pummeling punks, ruffians and telemarketers (though it was hard to tell the difference between those three, most times), both really liked living.
And it was living that was now in question. And not just for them.
ned, smiling.
