The Yuthara Pact

Chapter 2: Meeting Zor (Part 1/2)

After almost two days of grueling accelerated light speed, the Cataloger had finally reached the Parsini system of planets. The system comprised about three hundred planets, most of them half the size of Kilik. It took only a few minutes for the Cataloger to retrieve the information from the Yuthara Pact database. He was looking for a planet called Diegra Thro, the largest planet in the system. It was also the most habited and known to be a place to hire both mercenaries and bounty hunters. It was the slime pit of the system, but also the most advanced and economically sound planet. Only about 34 million people actually called the planet home, but on average there were close to 98 million people on the planet. Most of the excess were bounty hunters and mercenaries and servants for hire, and also people looking to hire them.

The meeting point on the planet was a small tavern in the Gya district. The Cataloger locked on to the location and looked for a nearby docking area on the holo-map that popped up in front of him as he neared the planet. A face appeared in front of the map and began speaking a language that luckily his helmet could decipher.

"Hello, we will need your access code if you wish to enter the planet atmosphere, and mind you, we have over thirty-five heavy ion cannons tracing your ship's heat signature as we speak, so if you don't have the proper code, please do not attempt to enter the atmosphere."

Farther ahead the Cataloger saw a ship blasted out of the air by the heavy cannons down on the planet. This person was not bluffing.

"Not to worry, I am on official Yuthara Pact business. I am sent from Head Councilman Uurias."

"You will be the fifth ship today pleading a similar argument. If you do not have proof we will shoot you down in two minutes unless you turn around now."

"Scan this security master key, that should give you some proof." The Cataloger inserted the master key into a slot by the holo-screen and waited for it to process.

"Thank you, sir," said the man after the process was complete. "Please forgive me for my brashness before. I must deal with bounty hunters and mercenaries and rich spoiled brats all day, and the only language they seem to speak is violence. You should be clear to land in docking bay 52386 in Gya district. There will be no fee, of course. We are not ones to meddle in Yuthara Pact business. All we need is your name."

"I have no name."

"No... name? That is odd. We need to keep a log of who has docked, so may we have something to identify you by?"

"You may call me the Cataloger."

"Welcome to Gya, Cataloger. You are free to land."

The face disappeared and the map of the planet was visible once more. The meeting between Zor and Marfis was not to take place for another five hours, so the Cataloger thought he would explore the area for a while to get a feel for his surroundings.

He landed in a fairly decent docking area, one which seemed to be the best for miles and miles. The authorities here in the Gya district certainly wanted to give full cooperation with the Yuthara Pact government. The Cataloger had to admit that being involved with the council gave him some helpful advantages and privileges. It would have taken him much longer to break into the planet atmosphere if he would not have had the master key in his possession. He might have even missed the meeting with Zor. He unboarded his ship and set his ship's security system to the highest alert status. It was tough to deactivate, which was why he did not frequently use it, but on a world of mercenaries and bounty hunters, he would not take any chances.

The Cataloger spent the next few hours scouting around the area. This city was much like any other city in the core worlds, besides the fact that there were whole city blocks devoted to mercenary housing and training, and entire city blocks devoted to the bounty hunter industry. It didn't take long to find out that the bounty hunters and the mercenaries were huge rivals, even mounting full-scale wars in the past. The mercenaries saw the bounty hunters as evil and corrupt, bloodthirsty cowards, while the bounty hunters saw the mercenaries as weak, cowardly fools. It made for an interesting dynamic. In the Gya district, the bounty hunters had more power, but overall the mercenaries had more power on the world.