Accepted. Accepted. Delayed. Rejected with apologies.
One company more or less went bankrupt after Arboria and barely scraped by on their current assignments. Others disbanded, others had merged, but by far and large his responses received were positive.
Accepted. Accepted. We hope Nexus is treating you well, Commander.
Jack flipped through messages with small motions of his finger across the tablet datachron’s holographic display. He ambled through Thayd streets in the pre-dawn hours when sunrise was but a sleepy dream of a glow on the horizon. Paying little attention to the background noise of early morning drills and vendors readying up for the weekend, he had his head down and his wide-brim hat pushed up. His duster fluttered behind him, caught on the broken remnants of a Galeras breeze that scattered papers between Osun ruins.
[cut for length]
All of us from Black Ravenok would like to extend our gratitude. Thanks for helping us get out there and do some good, Dynaer. We chipped together and got gifts for you and your partner! And the dog, too. Little housewarming thing for that new place you mentioned looking forward to. Knock when you come by today.
Bonuses approved for associates of Until Dawn registered before the second fiscal quarter of 1666. Reassignment options are open for any who choose to stay with FCON.
Jack can I have that sweet ass Stinger from the Arrows when you check out? Or a rec to your old weapon test pos? Ty, rsvp.
The hound padding at the commander’s side afforded the human a measure of relaxed ease. On guard, the enormous canine’s ears twitched at nearby sounds as they walked, but nothing caused a point or alerted reaction.
For several months there - not that Jack would ever breathe a word of it - he had jumped at his own share of shadows. On more than one occasion, he unfortunately found himself with pistols in hand and datachrons or paper files in puddles in the grungy streets. Usually some loose aurin kit, someone stirring from a makeshift shelter, or one of the poor early morning errand runners ended up on the receiving end of his sincere apologies and offers for a free breakfast as a result.
For a while, he had even done what paperwork he could from his doctor’s - and friend’s - ranch instead of coming in, not even entirely because of pressures to stay put there.
But now, he found himself not quite so worried of anyone coming to finish what others had started. A bronze and gold man kneaded holes into his current jacket during a recent accidental nap, and that was a treasure. He had a hell of a guard dog. Life looked up again. So James Dynaer read while he walked, and leisurely so.
Buckie Boy, word on the net says you’re settling down? Never thought I’d see the day come! Hell of a thing. You and me, drinks some time. I wanna talk about your precious girl. Uh. The human one. Not the ship. If you start rambling about your ship again I’ll probably slog ya, buddy.
Congratulations, Captain Dynaer. Are you certain you do not wish to stay on and shoot for Admiral like your father and grandfather? Aces High could use a tactician with skirmishing experience for inevitable upcoming conflicts. We would gladly refit the Dawn for combat and help you screen crew for her. Lady Luck’s high rollers said they might even trade you the Jack of Spades for a chance to pick apart one of those new fighters designed on Nexus if you take us up.
Commander, Sanguine Serenade requests you give our accounts one last look over before you start packing up. A little reassurance before we start screwing ourselves over with bad financial decisions, you know? The guys in Blithe say they got us covered, but we both know how that goes on the field or off!
Chuckling quietly to himself and stowing the datachron in his coat, Jack paused in front of the door that led in to the company offices. The displayed name plates for the Free Companies therein caught his attention.
He reached out and gently worked the panel for Until Dawn free of its cemented dust. Sliding it out of the slot between Black Ravenok Company and Blithe Infantry, he wiped some of the clinging dirt from it.
A smirk pulled the corner of his mouth upwards. He tossed the nameplate up, swiped it out of the air, stowed it into a pocket, and led his hound into the building for the last time.
Then he almost shot Blithe’s - and his hound almost jumped on Serenade’s -commanding officer out of sheer reflex when the early birds screamed surprise. Surprise going away parties. Of all the things.
Three pairs of glasses, two tablet datachrons, loose papers, and four pens rest atop a small stack of clipboards on his desk.
Jack Dynaer eyed them with healthy skepticism. He only needed one set of glasses at work, yet somehow they kept collecting on his desk and redistribution became a necessary task. Not to mention the pens! Two of those were custom jobs that ought be in his quarters on the Dawn, and both of the tablets bore the ship’s iconic bow marker on their backs. How did they even manage to end up in Thayd? Teleporting across the span of a light second...
Teleporting pens and datachrons. If someone swiped one of his nice pens from the office, heads would roll.
[cut for length]
He entertained no idea that he might be carrying things around and forgetting where he placed them down. Especially not the six coffee cups and eight spoons clustered on top of a book at the corner of his desk that supported that theory. Nor the four hats stacked one on top the other over on the chair closer to the grimy window.
His memory was not slipping on him.
Jack leaned back in his creaking chair, pulling on the closest pair of glasses and plucking up his favorite of the pens. A heavy fountain pen of black, gold, and blue, with slanted calligraphic tip, and an approximated star chart etched into its surface. The stars were tiny crystal bead insets. Common ship lanes for that sector were marked in thin gold lines.
His memory could not be slipping on him. Normal distraction when buried in his work must be at fault. After considering it for several moments, he nodded slightly to himself. Too much paperwork, too much compounding stress from carrying it with him constantly on the tablets, and concerns from recent events...
Considering how well and how long his parents lived despite their own strict schedules, Jack could not get too worried. He had another forty years left in him, easy. Maybe longer. He sure as hell ate better than his father had at his age.
Although silent up unto that point, the massive hound - stretched across the floor space between the back of his chair and the wall - sighed heavily. A squeak escaped the large canine with a yawn that immediately followed, and he rose to pad off into the adjacent, cell-lined storage room. A thud heralded the hound’s finding a new place to flop.
“Me too, friend,” the commander murmured after him. A faint ‘whuff’ answered from around the corner.
He flipped the fancy pen between his fingers, then unearthed the clipboards to finish filling out the papers there.
Most of the forms he already put in four or five months before, when he started entertaining the idea of needing a new direction seriously and asking Luach for opinions. It took three months for processing in some places, if not a little longer with so many peoples’ affairs out of order on Nexus and the Fringe for one reason or another.
That was plenty long enough to settle on a direction, though, and cancel things if he needed to stay on course. Or not, if he grew increasingly sick of it all, which he had. They settled solidly on his retirement and taking Until Dawn out as an independant op again with all of the talk, anyway. He already had plenty of progress in sorting through the responses he had received from various companies and stations. The warning from his last rune viewing he regarded all too seriously, as well, and decided to quit testing his luck in FCON.
Retiring with honors and bars to his name sounded damn good, really. If he got promoted one rank for the fleet, or two ranks on the ground, he might technically be career locked with FCON for life or until the Dominion blew them all to hell. Whichever came first. Yeah, no. There had been talk of a promotion if he did not retire. He needed to make his own schedules again.
Soon, no more stress, save those from health and choice to engage a mission. Maybe he could even knock his blood pressure back down to sane levels once more and not have to make quite so many quiet passes by the doctor.
He honestly looked forward to having a more time for family, too. Luach and Emma deserved all the best.
Jack only wore his newest identification, but he possessed no fewer than ten tag pairs, and possibly a few extras stowed in a case off in the Halon somewhere.
He plucked several of the ones from particularly interesting assignments and piled them together, thumbing through the doubles. A tug pulled the breakaway for those with distinctly separate cards, and a few had much easier to manipulate clips. He added the ones with more pertinent living info on them to the chain at his side. Those with perforated middles he left whole.
It may have been poor luck to split pairs while still alive, but hell with it. For the old things, it did not matter at all, and he thought it a fitting bit of symbolism for who they would be going to.
[cut for length]
Also useful information for Luach to have on hand, just in case. Some of them had medical notes stamped into them, particularly concerning allergies. Jack only suffered a few, and to relatively rare substances, but they easily could be killer.
The oldest of the tags dated back to his early teenage years, and held more information than most.
Dynaer,
James R.
5495600-341-ENV
E.S. Lady Luck //
NVP Jack of Spades
Hu // A RH +
N avocan himitr3
He flipped it back and forth between thumb and forefinger for several long moments, a smile tugging the corner of his mouth up. It even had a spade scratched into the back, though that had been a wee bit against regulation. His commanding officer had let it slide at the time, though.
He added it to the chain.
“Everyone is proud of their first assignment. Though if you mark up the one issued when you come into service proper, you might find you have to muck the flush for six months. Put something on your belt or jacket, if you want flair. Dens in engineering teaches metalwork. You could pick up the practical on how to make something for yourself. We can clear time in your schedule for it.”
The man who spoke stood tall, clad in brown leather and blue cloth. Both hands clasped behind his back, and he did not actually fix his eyes on James. He instead watched one of the nearby holoscreens, currently displaying a wing practicing formations on the edge of sensor range in conjunction with their sister ship.
James, however, fixed his eyes attentively on the officer. He looked a little sloppy at the moment, he knew, but it could not be helped. Straight out of classes and into a different grinder altogether gave him no time to prepare. “Understood, sir. Thank you for the concern - and warning, sir. I would be very interested in learning that, as well.”
“Now come give me a hug.” The older gentleman glanced away from the screens with a flash of a smile.
Hug he did, dropping his stiff posture to practically bolt into the commander’s side.
Only after earning a soft ‘oof’ from the tall man did he let up, and his words mostly came in a quick rush. “Really... thanks, dad. You would not truly make me climb into those tubes, right? People say there are new forms of life growing in there. What if we have ventmonsters? Bendy? The granok? He told me we have monsters in there. And. I will need to defend myself! So can metalwork include weapon stuff?”
The elder Dynaer snorted in a laugh before he caught himself and scruffed the palm of his hand over James’ hair, which did absolutely nothing to help the messy looks. “Just no scratching up your new ID when we give it to you, and you will not have to find out what horrors are behind the walls, hmm?”
With a sigh, the officer rocked back on his heels. His next words came surprisingly hesitant. “Also- uh. Your mother might throw a fit about weapons...”
James sank, instantly.
“But no more so than she did over actively flying.” He finished. “I might have to demand no swords in the quarters. We shall talk to Dens about it. Also Benden is full of -”
The abrupt halt to the commander’s words caused James to glance up, eyebrows slowly rising.
“Bad monster stories. Pay him no mind, hm? We keep the ship quite space-terror free.”
Sometimes he snored, a little, when he slept. Only when he reached that pinnacle of exhaustion though. Only when someone, somewhere, fucked up, and he had to answer for it. Worse than being a desk-jockey, Luach figured, was being a desk-jockey for FCON, when half the companies were a bit too grey to be an upstanding lot. Little different than Fringe Law really, but he only saw the difference in a banner and a bunch of ruined walls, not to mention the fact that he was breathing an atmosphere, rather than just recycled air. He’d missed that. Though the Kurg’s onboard hydroponics lab certainly helped the situation, it could never substitute the feeling of being planetside.
It made him count his blessings, even if the last few weeks had been filled with self-examination and doubt. Chin propped on Jack’s chest, he passed the time listening to that quiet snore, knowing better than to move and wake the human. Instead he reached up to brush away a lock of silver from where it hung over his brow and listed his head aside, ears folded back lazily. Somewhere at the end of the bed his legs were tangled in a blanket under the furs, and his tail wrapped about Jack’s left ankle.
Scouting had been done, a sandy outcropping selected far west from where he had accidentally ripped open the fabric of reality. Now they waited…and Luach nervously checked his funds over and over again, despite their nigh-constant talks and Jack’s reassurance on the matter.
The degree by which he’d come to rely on him was staggering, and yet there was no going back, he figured.
Glass cufflinks, a set of dogtags, numerous appropriated caps and hats…
A life he’d come to discover was much preferred to the self-serving loneliness of a thief, or the constant peril of being a headhunter.
Numbers and symbols passed his eyes in long-written strings, generated rapidly at a line every two-and-a-half seconds. It wasn’t his, and his fingers were nowhere near the holodisplay’s keys. This was the Dawn’s pseudo A.I. at work, and while the design was simple enough, the elegance and intricacies of its security was another matter entirely.
Data kept scrolling, prompted by a command made earlier in the night, he’d spent the last hour or so casually committing every line to memory. As well as he could anyhow, the haze and warmth of the body nearby presented its own distraction. Though not tired, he was still basking, and lost focus every so often.
His tail curled idly around Jack’s nearest leg, winding loose but securely -all the strength he could muster spent- the bandanna normally present gone, knotted in a rumpled ball on the table. Luach relished any moment in which he could find sleep with Jack, especially with how chaotic his patterns tended to be. This, however, was not one of those lucky times.
It wasn’t until something very out-of-place scrolled over the display that his lingering fog cleared. Like blinking dust from his eyes he leaned forward, craning his head and lips twisted from languid smirk to confusion. He reached, his eye lit with his datachron’s interface, a set of keys forming beneath his hands in luminescent gold. He tapped air, projections registered, and the code scrolled back, having passed the anomaly much too quick for him to be certain.
[[Redirect(LvSe>40.53) require(”DoD.AI”)]]
Well then…
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