To Hell and Back (Hellworlder pirates)

Ch31 Pirate Capital

Pirate Capital

40 days after they all left the anonymity of that desolate star system they picked up the buried signal of the station's transponder, a signal so insignificant it could have been mistaken for local background radiation left over from the big bang. The station hid itself within the great void in between large clusters of stars and used an advanced warp field to silently shift itself listlessly back and forth to avoid its location being discovered. The only reliable way to find it was with the custom transponders the capital offered to its members. 13 days after they picked up the signal and three Station Defense Ships' (SDS) came out to meet the Hellworlder fleet.

Lucile did the talking as always, but discreetly shared the transmission with the rest of the fleet.

"Unknown vessels, state your name and business" a gruff Gelid female grunted from her boar like snout, one of her tusks was broken and had been replaced with a gold one.

"I am Captain Lucile of the Lucifer, clan head of the Hellworlder fleet. We come here to seek justice" Lucile drawled in a low threatening tone.

The Gelid sneered and exposed its teeth in what looked like a smile to Aster's primate instincts, but she knew it was an aggressive sign. "You and everyone else, what trouble did you Terrans cause this time?" it demanded.

Lucile's face twitched "None of your danm business, we are members of the confederacy, and we are here to seek justice. Now either move aside or else!" she snarled.

The Gelid eyes squinted before she made a snorting sound "You never change Lucile," Gerath said, an old friend of Aster's mom's. "Follow me, your berth is 553 as always, and don't forget you owe me a drink"

Lucile smiled "you old sow, I already paid you back"

Gerath guffawed "I saved your life when that little hellion was kicking your ass, you owe me drinks for life."

"Aster wouldn't have killed me, she just saying hello in Terran. We're a very loving and expressive people" she joked.

Some of Aster's bridge crew turned to stare at their captain in shock. Aster ignored their stares and focused on the monitor as her mother and the SDS finished their exchange. Gerath had been apart of Lucile's old crew back before Aster had violently reunited with her mother after searching for four years, in fact it was Aster who had broken Gerath's tusk.

They followed the SDS at a crawling 1 kilolights as three more ships joined at their flanks. After a couple of hours moving at the sluggish pace they hit the exterior perimeter of the stations defense's. The station wasn't actually one solid structure like the Kruhur station was, instead it was a large collection of stolen super freighters that linked together into one massive mega ship that out sized many colonial vessels. Four layers of shield wake disturbance arrays prevented any hostile fleet from warping on top of the station like the Astaroth had with the Kruhur station. Union fleets had tried many times to snuff out piracy at the source, and every time the fields had bought them enough time to split apart and flee into a thousand directions.

The station was more than just a meetup point for pirate fleets. It was a massive black-market hub for illegal narcotics, stolen tech, and a pivotal linchpin in the slave trade. Though the slave trade had been on the decline for years, and most of the stations pens were now dedicated to exotic animals. Bounty hunters, smugglers, slavers, cartels, and subversive cults all did business with the confederacy, and were sheltered under the small umbrella of control they had over other pirates. Any loot that wasn't easy to sell on open markets could be sold to confederacy outposts for cheap and then brought here to be sold at a noticeable mark up. Most pirates operating in the core worlds just sold their swag to the confederacy, who in turn the sold it back to legal vendors, and bought weapons and ammo to then sell back to the pirates. A self-sustaining cycle of piracy that the Union hadn't been able to snuff out for centuries and had instead just grown used to.