The night inked slowly into existence. Every man in the kingdom, who hadn't escaped through a spaceport, was considered dead at this point. The five-year mark. The cleansing of the population, to where they weed out the weaker of the sexes.
"Ade, the queen of the women of the planet of Feminae, was what you would call beautiful." Jack Brim said into his recorder watch. "Feminae… It means women in Latin. A language so old, our American ancestors were completely oblivious to it. But, it seems, in my research, that it was the language all other languages were based upon." Jack looked out the window of the ship, which he first inherited from his father.
Jack Brim wasn't your run of the mill space captain, no. He stood only about 5'11, not much muscle mass to speak of. Sandy blonde hair that never went past his ears, thanks to his father's military lifestyle. He could remember the old man harping at him if his hair ever got too long. "Jack, get in the room and let your mother do something with that mop." He had facial hair that seemed odd due to the fact of his natural hair color, blonde.
"Ade was beautiful. Blonde hair that seemed to be rotting in its place. You could tell she seemed sad. Like she had the world at her fingertips, but something had eluded her. Something had taken her soul and put the fire out." He said as he motioned his head back at the window.
The night in the outer rim of the Mandorian system was surprisingly lit up—no stars to speak of. "I think it's Feminae's moon, big and bright, shining down on the planet of women," Jack noted about the sky encasing the old ship.
"Brim!" a young girl's voice came on the intercom. Jack closed his recorder watch. "Yes, Rige?" He faced the window and looked out at the moon one more time. Thinking about the request that Ade had made.
He was in the throne room when he saw her for the first time. White, porcelain skin that spoke only to you when you were close enough to admire it. Blonde hair that ran down her back and sat perfectly in place.
Her eyes were pools of green that reminded him of his mother. She, too, had the same green eyes that were full of so much love and wisdom. You could see in her eyes that she was capable of so much.
"Jack! Jack, you there?" Rige called out from the intercom. He shook his head, "Yeah, what is it?"
"We are about to depart." She said. "We need your decision, Brim." She continued. His decision? What had he decided?
There she was, sitting upon the throne, in what can only be described as a power move. She had contacted Brim and his crew no longer than four days ago. Said she needed someone to pull a job.
"Hello, Mr. Brim." She said in her smooth like honey voice. He hung his head and smiled. With his arms crossed and a toothpick on his lips, he said, "What can I do for you, doll?" She looked irritated. "Don't call me doll. I am your highness. Your royalty. Your queen. Not your doll." She said with conviction in her voice.
He chuckled. You could tell that the overall feel of the room had shifted when he began to laugh. "Jack, you might want to cut it out," Rige whispered to him. He looked over at his young co-pilot and winked.
"Okay, your royalty. What can Jack Brim and his crew do for you?" he sarcastically questioned her. She waved a woman over to her, and she whispered into Ade's ear. "We need something from you."
"Most women that meet me do." He said as he winked at her. "Perhaps you don't take me seriously. But, you should make the request as such." She said. "Tell me, are you familiar with the Papeldonian Pirates and the planet, Papeldon?"
Jack's face lost its usual essence of arrogance as she mentioned the pirates. "Yeah, what of them?" You could see it on Rige's face; she had lost color and had the look of faintness in her eyes.
"Are you okay, little one?" Ade asked Rige. Rige looked up from the ground and put on a fake smile. "Yes. Thank you, your highness." She said as she curtsied. Ade smiled and nodded her head at her. Then shot her glare right back at Jack.
"I need you to go to Papeldon and do what you do best." She said as she got out of her throne and walked to the window that overlooked the kingdom. "I need information."
Jack squinted his eyes at her and rubbed his chin. "So, you come to the best in the system and ask for information on the most dangerous group of pirates in the system? I like you." He said as he stepped forward to join her by the window. Before he even made it to the window, the guards started towards him in Ade's defense. She waved them off.
He folded his arms as he looked out the window at the kingdom with her. "Beautiful, isn't she?" Ade asked as she studied his face. That face with nothing more than a five o'clock shadow and smirk on it.
"What kind of information are you seeking?" he asked, ignoring her question altogether. He turned with his arms still folded and glared at her. Two presence combating each other. Her fierce loyalty and his burning compassion and rebellion. "I need to know what their business is." He put his hand up as to stop her. "They are sex slavers." He said. "All you need to know." He finished.
She smiled a smile of her own and chuckled. "I am aware of that. I need to know how they go about getting their slaves. How they keep them captured and everything in between." She said as she looked at him and winked.
"Well, doll, I'm going to need you to accompany us to Papeldon." He said as he studied her face. "Doll. I told you, do not call me that." She insisted. "And there is no way I can go with you. I have a kingdom to rule." She finished.
"Wrong." He said at her surprise. "We have information to get." She looked at him and shook her head. "I wouldn't need you if I could go and get the information." She said as she moved back to her throne.
Jack Brim put on the smile that sparked a dozen revolutions. He looked at her and winked. "Doll." He said for the third time. "We need you as bait." He leaned his head forward and rubbed the back of his neck.
"What do you mean, as bait?" she said as she shifted her body around in the throne. He cocked his head and looked at Rige. "Well, it would be more effective if we had a royal prisoner for sale. Your highness."
She sat there for a moment as she pondered his suggestion. Ade motioned for one of the women standing guard close to her to come over. As the woman kneeled down to whisper in her ear… Rige tugged on Jack's sleeve. "I know the sport." Is all he said.
"Well, it seems we are about to see if the galaxy is big enough for the queen," Ade said as she stood up and walked over to Jack. "You must protect me with all your skills. All your people." She said as she places her hands on his shoulders. "You must swear your loyalty to me." She finished.
Jack looked at her hands on his shoulders. Took his hands and put his on hers. "I don't swear my loyalty to anyone or anything. I'm a pirate for information. A captain of a ship that travels all over the galaxy. I'm a criminal." He said. He then walked away from her and touched the shoulder of Rige. "I swear my loyalty to my crew. To these people. And while you are on my ship, on my mission. You are my crew. That I swear loyalty to." He finished. Rige smiled.
"I feel that is the best I am going to get," Ade said as she looked at her advisor's sitting around the throne. "So, will you travel to Papeldon and face the pirates to gain the information I need?" she questioned.
"Papeldon. Take us to Papeldon, Rige." Jack answered back. "I'll be on the bridge in ten minutes. How is the queen?" he asked. He waited for a moment before she came back on the intercom. "She is in her barracks now. She requested your presence at your earliest convenience." Rige informed him.
Information had been Jack Brim's business for about ten years now. He was in his early thirties and already was revered as the most endowed collector of information the galaxy had ever seen. And every now and then, he would have to fight his way out of a predicament or two; his father's military mind came in handy. An expert with a wrist crossbow with a tactician's mind, Jack could plan out any heist or siege with relative ease.
"Tell her I'm on my way," he informed Rige. He opened his recorder watch and began to speak. "Rige seems worried about her return to Papeldon. It could be the pirates or the plain fact that she was a sex slave for a pirate king the last time she was there. What was his name?" he asked himself. "I suppose it doesn't matter now. I put a blade in his neck." He closed his watch and headed to the queen.
On the bridge, Rige sat at the co-pilot seat, navigating her way through the stars. Her path was set for the Papeldonian system, and her nerves were at an all-time high. Rige was an alien. Blue in the skin with fire red hair and eyes so black that it was like peeping into oblivion and having it peep back at you.
She looked out into the vast void of space and wondered what her life could've been in her homeworld. So many years ago, she a marine biologist on a planet millions of miles away from here. She thought about going back and picking up where she left off, but she owed Jack. She loved Jack. She needed him.
"Jack, course set. Five days until Papeldon." She echoed throughout the ship. The big doors opened to the bridge. The big reptile navigator that they called, Shin-To, walked in. "Hello, Missssssss…. Rige." He said with a hiss. No one really knew what kind of reptile he was. He had brownish-green skin with blue eyes and two holes where a nose should be. "Good evening, Shin-To."
He walked over to her and put his rough, scaly hands on her face, and went to kiss her. He stopped him and pulled her head away from his. "I can't anymore." she pushed his hands away from her. "What if Jack figures out?"
Shin-To looked confused at the moment. Jack? What did Jack have to do with anything? "You mean that silly rule about no sex among shipmates?" he asked. "Jack's had to have broken that rule ten times himself." He finished.
She looked at his eyes, those blue eyes. Those oval like eyes that she grew to love fondly. When she touched his skin, his rough skin, she danced her fingers along with his scales. He grinned and pulled her back in.
You could see the red all over her blue skin. The way he made her feel like she was the only being in the galaxy. "It's hard to resist you and your charms." She said as she leaned her head to rest on his chest.
"Sssssso, the captain hassssss elected to take ussssss to Papeldon?" he hissed. With her head still on his chest, she wondered how it would be, her return. Her mind took her to her time spent as a captive, and he could feel her shake.
"It'sssssss going to be okay." He told as he brought her eye level to him. She smiled and hugged him. He took her by the waist and brought her mouth to his. The kiss that these two shared was always full of something more than tension. It was sparked with forbidden lust and mutual respect, and attraction.
Jack Brim was making his way to the quarters of the queen of the women. His mind was racing with a million and one questions. "Am I really going back to Papeldon? Rige, is she strong enough to last the duration of the mission?" He ignored the screams in his head and kept walking.
The ship was a good cruiser with multiple quarters that should've been the captain's, but Jack wasn't flashy. His was the smallest of the rooms, and he liked to remind people of that. He was proud to be accommodating to his guests and crew.
The long corridor led to the royal quarters that Jack reserved for those of the highest class. As he passed by the crew members, they all gave him nods and smiles. He would stop along the way to sign a document or a shipping order. He was a pirate, a man who demanded information, and he would sell it to the highest bidder. A war dog for the chaotic or the righteous didn't matter.
As he stood in front of the door, he tried to gather himself together. Mentally get ready for the conversation, explain the plan. He knocked. No answer. He looked around the long corridor; no one was around. He knocked again.
When she opened the door, she stood in an informal gown. His eyes were first drawn to the hair. The blonde hair that he had spoken about before. Then he worked his way down to her eyes. The green bases of salvation that he seemed to be hypnotized by.
"What can I do for you?" he asked. "Hope the ship is to your liking." There it was, the charm that made him so infamous. The rare times where he wasn't arrogant or conceded in his own essence.
"Yes, it is quite a lovely vessel." She assured him. "How many moons until we reach the Papeldonian system?" she questioned. She motioned for him to enter the room. He nodded his head and walked in.
"We have about five days before we reach our destination." He said. She nodded and began to brush her hair with some form of a foreign object. "I do need to ask you some questions, doll." She didn't seem frustrated or irritated by the fact that he called her that. "I warn you… I'm not in the mood for questions." She explained.
"Well, I'm not in the mood for gaining information for a kingdom that isn't willing to share it." He said. "Information is power, doll." There it was again and nothing. "Okay, what would you like to know.
He sat down in the desk chair and leaned back. "What do you want with the Papeldonians?" he questioned. She places her brush down beside her on the couch. "We wish to free the slaves. Destroy their industry. And give the land back to the rightful people of Papeldon." She finished.
Jack began laughing. "They didn't become the most feared traders in the galaxy by letting people destroy their business model, doll." She shook her head and watched him fiddle with his pocket knife.
"Heroes have the right to dream." She said. "That knife. Military? From a great war, yes?" she questioned. She got up and walked over to the bed that sat beside the chair and sat beside Jack. "Yes. Turtain War. It was my father's. He brought this home and looked at me as he said, "Jack, this is my lucky knife. It got me through the five years I was away from you and your mother. It's killed, twenty-five men. My career is made; my luck is almost up. Let's see if this trinket can become a treasure again." That was two years before he died." Jack finished.
She nodded in what seems to be understanding. "Did it? Become a treasure? Did the luck pass on to you?" she asked. He flipped the knife closed and placed it back in his pocket. "I'm alive, aren't I?" he vaguely answered. "Doll, listen… The one thing I got from my father was his stubbornness and resistance to dying. I got his military prowess. My business isn't information; that is the side stuff." He explained.
She looked at him, confused. "Then, what is your business?" He looked at her and grinned. "Staying Alive." He said as he made his way to the port window. They had, at this point, made their way out of the Mandorian system.
"Where are all the men on your planet?�� Jack asked as he turned his head back to her and glared at her. She smiled. She patted the chair. "I don't like all these questions." She said as she shot him the same cold glare back. "Well, I don't like the way you look at me and bite your lower lip." He said. "We all have our demons." He finished.
"What are your demons, Jack?" He walked back to the chair and found his seat. "Whisky, you could say." She laughed. "Men and your alcohol. Only men would put such poison in their bodies." She said as Jack opened a drawer and pulled out an old bottle. He popped the bottle open, poured two glasses. He slid one over to Ade. "They may need the poison run." He said in salute.
She picked up the glass and inspected it. "May it run quick," she said as they clinked their glasses and they drank the whisky. Jack looked at them, and her expression ran down her throat. She coughed and covered her mouth. "Poison usually doesn't taste good." He said.
"Then why do you drink it?" she questioned as she sat her glass down on the desk beside her. "Soothes my demons." He said. "I thought it was your demon." She questioned as she questioned him. "It's a demon that keeps the other ones at bay." He admitted. "What other demons do you have, Brim?" she questioned. He opened his mouth to answer, but when he did, "JACK! YOU ARE NEEDED ON THE BRIDGE… WE HAVE A PROBLEM UP HERE!" Rige's voice came over the intercom. "I'm coming." Jack shot up to leave the room. He got halfway to the door. Turned back around to look at Ade, "You ready to see if the galaxy is big enough?"