In my vision, I saw two aliens with three other aliens with guns pointed at their heads and yelling at us. "WE WILL KILL THEM! WE WILL DO IT!" They cried out, and I wondered why I should give a fuck.
"Hey," I said over comms, "Is there a reason we should give a shit about the hostages?" I asked bluntly, and silence came over the comms. "Like, are there Credits we could get out of this if we rescue them? Will they be our slaves or something? Like, couldn't they just be bandits themselves?" I asked, and silence reigned over the comms as we stood behind cover and discussed whether we should even care.
"I mean, I don't give a fuck," Enyo said, "Sometimes Kidnapped parties can be useful,l and if they are important, we can get a bounty, but as long as we are not the ones to kill them, it doesn't really matter."
"Pretty callous," Emma said. But I also agree. We need to take them out and leave. We don't know who they are or if they are worth the increased risk."
I smiled at her, and Meemee looked distracted as she watched the situation through her drones. "Hmmm. There are three of them back there, but two are showing themselves. They are probably thinking of some type of ambush. The problem is I do not have a line of fire on the third," Meemee said. I looked at her and nodded.
"They, let's wrap this up quickly," I said, pulling a flashbang out of the supply bag that Emma was carrying around. I looked at Meemee, "Meemee, the plan is simple. I am going to go in. I am going to toss the flashbang, and you are going to shoot the visible ones. Understood, we will move on to your order. Tell me the best time to throw the flash bang," I said, and Meemee nodded.
"Understood." She replied, and I moved into position. I pulled the safety off the grenade and turned it to contact instead of timed. I then waited for the callout.
"I SWEAR WE WILL KILL THESE BITCHES IF YOU DON'T LET US OUT OF HERE IN TEN SECONDS!" The bandit yelled in a baritone.
"Now," Meemee barked, and I moved.
I tossed the grenade right into their faces, and I pulled out my handgun as I heard the drones fire a moment before a loud bang rang out, but my eyes were closed as that bang went off. I opened my eyes a moment later, and I moved in as four screams erupted. I moved and found the last guy with an assault rifle in his arms as he stumbled back deeper into the mineral treasury. He stumbled back into a container, and I aimed up his head as he looked to start blind firing. And I pressed the trigger once, ending his life in one shot. I looked up and smiled, "Clean kill, come in, ladies," I remarked, and Emma and Enyo moved in while Meemee continued to overwatch.
What began now was the clean-up and collection of the hostages. The Air lorry saved us a ton of time, and we gave the hostages fresh breathing devices, and then we went to collect the Skimmer. Then, it was time to collect the loot, and we found out that there were way more people working in these mining camps than we had originally thought there were. There were two female hostages in the first camp, three in the second, and three in the last, for a total of eight hostages.
We put them to the side while we loaded up the arms and minerals that were our rights and loot. Anything in these camps was naturally ours unless it was the property of the stakeholder. The Stakeholders had only put down machines and were preparing for mining operations when the bandits took over, so the camps themselves were ours if we wanted them.
Which we didn't.
So we collected everything and started to make trips back up to the floating cities, leaving Enyo and Meemee watching over our loot. We did not count things on the surface, as there was no point. The bodies were stuffed into a pile, and a Blood sample was taken from each just in case before we burned them. It took the rest of the day to bring everything from the surface up to the warehouse that we established.
Overall, we collected:
1 Heavy Air Lorry31 Various Assault rifles and a modest stock of Ammo50 Various Handguns with a good Stock of Ammo1 Minigun with a couple of drums of ammo8 Rifles with a small stock of ammo4 Sniper rifles with a very small stock of ammo583 tons of 2 different types of minerals.156 Liters of a flammable gas1 Gas mining Machine6 Hostages1 Captured Bounty
Altogether, we killed seventy-nine bandits, and one remained captured alive at the end. Just to make it even better. The last person we captured was one of the big bounties. I smiled, thinking about how "Big" the bounty was because, at that moment, I didn't even notice the woman I picked up was half my height and was a gnome.
————
Bounty: Needle (Unknown)
Race: Gnome
Crimes: Terrorism, Fleeing Justice
Federation Bounty: 25000 Federation Credits
Note: A dangerous engineer with lethal contraptions. Little is known since the crime they committed seemed accidental, but they fled before a trial could occur.
————
All the other bounties were found, and we got a DNA sample from them. It seems that all of them were there. It was a major haul, and we got a lot of minerals and gas. The gas was something of a flammable that was not considered rare, but it was still expensive, apparently. That was what all the canisters that we found down there were. In the last mining base, they found a gas reservoir just off the side. They brought their own Gas mining machine and tanks. They were about to make their own first delivery and score big.
There was also what I was going to do with this Needle girl that I had captured alive. The Yaglow we captured before was the really stubborn type. Because of Enyo's rusty skills in gaining that type of information, she accidentally hit their species' form of an artery that she did not know about, and they bled out.
So now, with Meemee on the ground with Enyo protecting and loading the loot, Ura piloting, and all our new employees helping load things onto the lorry, I found myself with Needle to figure out what I was going to do with her. I had her in cuffs in a board room in our new headquarters, chained to her legs, and I wondered how I missed how short she was.
"So, Your Needle, Worth 25000 Federation credits for Terrorism and Fleeing Justice," I said slowly, and she flinched.
"It was a mistake," Needle snapped, "I ran because no one was listening to me." She turned her head, and I wondered something.
"Where were all your contraptions in the base?" I asked.
"I fucking wasn't in my damn base," Needle snapped, "I don't know what intel you had, but it was fucking wrong. I was flying the Lorry to help out for a cut of the minerals when suddenly they were attacked. They kept a fucking set of guns on my ship with that Clickton bitch keeping her people aboard. I was there for a fucking payday and to get some new minerals while up here in the cities. Instead, I am captured and losing my freedom. Happy? If you had assaulted my Mining bases with the fucking shit you brought?" She scoffed, "I would have had those fucking drones out of the skies in seconds, and my auto turrets would have gunned you down in seconds. Well, maybe not you, but your comrades."
"I can appreciate that. So, Needle," I said, leaning back, "You seem smart to me, Really fucking smart," I told her, and she smiled. "We both know what the question here is because I now own your life."
"Do I want you to keep me or send me to the bounty office to confess to my crimes or be sold like cattle?" Needless to say, with a sigh. "Never thought I was going to get caught, so I never really thought of it." She commented, "What are you wondering?" Needle asked after a couple of seconds.
"I am wondering if I should keep you or hand you over to the Bounty Office. Are you worth my time and investment? I will have to collar you, but I am not one to keep around bad investments," I said slowly.
"Pfft," Needle laughed, "You are a fucking start-up company. Nothing more, a Bounty outfit with nothing to its name but some luck picking me up while I was doing a job for amateurs."
"And you did not bring enough support to keep yourself out of their hands, let alone mine," I said bluntly, and she flinched. She sneered but sighed a moment later.
"Fine, I get it; what am I worth to you? This is the only moment I get to try and attempt to pick my fate before you sell me to the federation for a couple of extra credits." Needle sighed. She took a deep breath and said, "I am an Engineer, a fucking smart one bitch. I make small contraptions and can make big machines, too. Give me some materials to work with, and I am sure I can make your Bounty Outfit a much stronger one."
"Like what?" I asked.
"I don't fucking know; what do you want?" She snapped.
"Armor?"
"Nah, I could probably do it, but it's not really my specialty. Too much to do with biological matter. I deal better with pure machinery."
"Then mobile traps?" I asked.
"Oh? What do you mean?" Needle asked, interested.
"I would love something I could put in a backpack and deploy. Something that would move from my pack—you decide how, but variety would be good. It would place itself in a spot, and when someone who is not a registered person walks by, Boom," I told her, and she grinned.
"HAHAHAHAHA~! YOU WANT BOOBY TRAPS~! HAHAHAHAHAHA~!" Needle laughed, "I love making those," she said with a massive grin, "But," her face fell, and she looked at me with narrow eyes and leaned forward. "You ain't no normal bounty hunter. Not if you are asking for something like that. I watched out say fuck it and kill right in front of hostages like you did not give a fuck if they died. No, Something about you is sketchy," Needle said, and I shrugged.
"Maybe I am, maybe I am not, but either way, I own you now," I told her bluntly, and she nodded.
"You're right, and," Needle paused. Then Needle started to look around, and I could see her thinking. "Look, I think I like you, so you want traps and mobile bombs; I am your girl. Set me up with a lab and some manufacturing tools, and I will make some blueprints for you. I think this place can be an opportunity. Sure, I don't have my freedom, but I will not be hunted by the law, and I will be hiding in the dark corners. I can order things lightly through you. So, how about we make a deal? You let me play, make things, blueprints, and all that, and you give me a bit of the profit you make selling them. Those profits go towards me making more things in my lab, and we both benefit."
I leaned back and wondered if this woman had heard my previous recruitment style. This is exactly what I did with the other people I hired. My eyes narrowed, and I thought about it some more. Was I being overly suspicious? This Needle was EXACTLY what I wanted. A square peg for a square hole.
I wanted her to stick around. That meant covering my ass; this girl was not like my previous captures. This woman was a double-sided blade. It could easily stab me while I was using it. So, I would have to mitigate that. "Okay," I said slowly, "I will tell you what is going to happen. I am going to take you to the bounty office," I told her, and I saw her face fall and turn pale. "I am going to keep you, and you will be known as my slave. Then I am going to get one of the best Slave collars I can purchase for you. Then I am going to monitor you. I think you are too smart to trust, Needle. So, I am going to protect myself from you while also giving you enough freedom to do what you want. There is one thing, though. Burn me, and I close those freedoms off, understand?"
Needle went from pale to happy once more, and she nodded, "Oh, I understand. I will be on good behavior, and I will give you no reason to take away my freedoms! Please give me a lab and a place to eat and sleep. I need nothing else!"
"I am sure," I replied, not believing her. I wondered if they had a collar type for the smart engineer types that could probably fuck with the slave collars? I guess I will have to find out.
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Hey Everyone,
So, a short announcement, first of all, next month I will be gone for half the month on a much-needed vacation. I will be posting a chapter at the start of the month, then I will be off for much of it. This is something to help me avoid burning out as I work a full-time job and write.
So for September, I will post one chapter when I go and one when I come back, and I will start going back to my one a week for most of my stories in October. Just wanted to give you all a heads up, so you know why I am not posting in September.
If you want to check out the Discord, here is the link.
https://discord.gg/7gckg3VxyY
Also, I have two new stories on Amazon.
I Sissfied my step Bro book 3
The Demon Queens Handler
You can also support me at my Patreon if you want to read ahead for as little as 1.50$ CND
www.Patreon.com/madjic