The Citadel City was, in fact, just a huge space station. Of course, instead of being a mere 'station,' it was a whole city floating in space.
The lower half was a grand mothership larger than even a Titan, with thrusters and engines visible to the naked eye. But there must have also been a sewage system and everything else a city needed under there. And the upper half? A shining metropolis inside of a reinforced glass dome.
The sight of the fragile glass dome made my lips curl. A single breach, and the whole city would scatter into the void.
Fools.
My ship had already been docked at one of the city's entry points, and now I was going through the spaceport security. Standard stuff.
Surprisingly, I didn't even need to hide my Stasis Rifle and Energy Pistol—they let all weapons through so as long one paid a small fee. However, what came next I didn't particularly enjoy.
An interview.
—Name?
The Citadelian clerk was an old senior of his species, noticeable by the wrinkles on his bald head. He was also much paler than younger Citadelians and bore a meaner frown.
Glancing around, I found no females of this species, curious.
"...Spectre," I replied, giving a false alias as I crossed my arms. There was no way I would give out my real name.
"Ah... an alias? That's fine to us, but..." The Citadelian clerk raised an eyebrow as he typed my alias on his little tablet. "You look pretty alive to me for a ghost."
"That's the point."
"Got it."
—Species?
"What do you think I look like?" I asked the clerk with feigned indignation.
"I dunno," The Citadelian clerk shrugged uncaringly. "...A Xandarian?"
"Yes... I don't even know why you would need to ask this." I said with a frustrated huff, hiding the slight smirk of success.
A Xandarian? They did share a common appearance with Viltrumites, so it made sense that he would come to this conclusion.
—Sex?
This time, I was actually surprised. "You seriously need to ask about that...?"
"Come on, Xandarian. Just answer the question." The clerk wouldn't budge.
"I'm clearly a guy," I said as I spread my hands, expressing my evident masculinity.
"You never know, you know? The girl that went past here before you wasn't actually a girl at all..."
—Age?
"17."
The clerk nodded as he wrote my information down.
—Citizenship?
"Nova Empire, but I lost my visa," I answered quickly, having already fabricated a believable backstory while we were talking.
"No visa?" The Citadelian clerk raised his voice before he shook his head. "I'm afraid we can't..."
I silenced him by slamming a few wads of cash on the counter. The clerk responded with a sly yet subtle grin, the exact same type of grin that the border officer had back then.
"Yes, yes. We actually have a special permit for cases like yours, " The clerk muttered as he took the money and carefully stored it in his back pocket. "It's very special."
Money proved a surprisingly effective deterrent against their type. Not my own, of course. I just utilized what remained in the ship's coffers.
—Profession?
"Warrior," I said stiffly. "There's only one path for me in this life."
"I see." The Citadelian clicked his tongue before he asked. His voice was nasal and somewhat intrigued as he eyed my guns. "Are you with the Nova Military?"
"No," I shook my head, disgusted at the mere possibility. "I work alone, don't really have a choice in that matter."
The clerk nodded his head, seemingly understanding my thoughts. "There's many of your kind around here, I'm sure you'll find good company with your ilk."
"Anyway, there isn't an option for 'Warrior' here, so I'll just tag you as a Mercenary."
—How long will you be staying?
"Just a visit, so 3 days, probably." I shrugged. Three days before this Empire joins the stars, I wasn't about to waste time. "Any places I should check out...?"
The clerk grinned, perhaps a little too eager to talk about his hometown. "Everywhere, what are you looking for?"
"...Somewhere with good food," I said with a bitter tongue as I reminisced of the bland gruel I had to eat every day for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. "Synthetic space rations don't quite taste like anything."
"Hm..." The clerk hummed as he placed a hand on his chin, pondering the inquiry. "What's your budget?"
"Not a concern."
"Great, then you should look for the Dining Dragon. It's a little bit on the higher end for prices, but definitely worth it if you want raw flavour." The Citadelian recommended with a smile that somewhat made its face less ugly. "It's on the Northern Commercial District, just ask the lads there for directions."
"Thank you," I said with genuine interest. "So is there any more questions or..."
"No, that was about it. Here are your permits." The Citadelian shook his head before handing me a few receipts. "You don't actually need to keep those, we've already recorded your credentials in the database."
I nodded without thinking about it too much. "...Anything else I should know?"
The clerk smiled.
"Don't cause trouble."
.
.
Making my way out of the port didn't take that much longer as I wasn't carrying any luggage aside from the guns.
For a brief, I made eye contact with a handsome fellow reflected on the nearby glass wall. His golden eyes stared at back me with no emotion aside from self-admiration.
Of course, that was me.
My eyes glazed over the robes that wrapped around my body. It was a grey-coloured version of the standardized Viltrumite uniform, modified with an aditional hood and gloves.
A camouflage suit designed for warriors who enjoyed choking their enemies from behind instead of the front.
It was there in one of the ship's lockers, so I took it for myself and thanked whoever it was that piloted the SP12 before me. Unfortunately, the Viltrumite symbol was blatantly etched onto the uniform's chest area—so I had to cover it up by using bandages and such.
Not my proudest moment, but I had to.
Thankfully, since my scars were still very visible, no one bothered to question the bandages. Some even gave looks of pity, earning a disgusted scowl from yours truly every time.
"...This place reeks," I complained bitterly as I held my nose. One of the downsides to having such a large population living in an enclosed space was how ventilation was handled...
To the average joe, it might have been tolerable given their lesses senses, but shit like this would never fly on Viltrum.
"At least, its not all that bad to look at." I muttered, gazing at the background architecture. Most of it looked rather grandiose, giving quite the interesting contrast as I observed the locals.
Most were, as expected, Citadelians. However, those like me who weren't stood as natural outliers. There was a visible divide between how the Citadelians treated their foreigners.
At first glance, there seemed to be two distinct castes.
Tourists, who were treated to kind smiles and helpful advice.
And the other caste, who were leered on and whipped by their Citadelian masters. Unlike us Tourists, they weren't even allowed to make eye contact with the natives, let alone retain access to their weaponry.
"...Slaves, huh?" I realized soon enough as my eyes narrowed. It wasn't surprising that the Citadelians would practice such things, but it was still kind of funny...
Were they not afraid of a revolution?
It's been pretty consistently shown that slavery only really works if the master race was much powerful than the slaves.
Viltrum itself had hundreds of slave worlds, but there wasn't much to worry about in the rebellion department.
"Hm...?" I abruptly stopped in the middle of the street, an eyebrow raised as I tried to listen in.
"Move it!" A Tetramand mercenary growled at me as he bumped into my very much unmoving frame, but he could only scoff once he realized I was completely ignoring him. "...Brat."
He reached out and foolishly tried to grab my shoulder but I snatched his wrist before he could, not even bothering to glance at him.
"...U-Ugh!?" He grunted in pain as I squeezed hard. "L-Let go, you—"
"AAARGH!" He screamed loudly as the audible sound of cracking bone resounded through the street.
There was silence from the crowd, broken by hushed whispers as they saw the raw display of strength.
"That shouldn't be too much..." I muttered before looking back at the Tetramand who was now helplessly on his knees before me, tears welling up in his four eyes.
"Fuck off." And I let go.
He wordlessly nodded whilst supporting his now broken limb before making a break for it in the other direction.
"...What are you all looking at!?" I snapped at the crowd impatiently as they quickly began to resume whatever it was that they were doing before.
I narrowed my eyes and stared passed the crowd.
Just now, it felt like... I was being watched. Not because of the Tetramand, I stopped before that.
"Weird."
It was only natural to become paranoid if you knew what I was.
Breaking that idiot's hand shouldn't nearly be enough to expose me, I didn't really use that much strength. A properly-trained Xandarian could most likely replicate the feat.
...But still, should I trust my gut or dismiss it?
"Hm..." I hummed before shaking my head and sighing. "Whatever, it's probably just the wind."
A slight smile soon found itself on my face.
"I wonder what kind of slaves I should get..." I asked in an obnoxiously loud voice, earning a scowl from a passing Reptoid.
Piloting the ship alone was easy enough, but I still needed an engineer, a cook, and a damn janitor!
No matter how fast and smart I was, there was only one of me, after all.
Cleaning my hands from that guy's blood, I soon continued on my way to the slave market, eager to check out the fresh goods.