#eli'van'to

When he was sixteen and got his navigator's license, he kept up the appearances because all these people knew his parents. Then, on his first solo run to Tsivor, Eli puts on a hat, dark glasses, and buys a flimsiprint magazine, hustling back to the freighter and into his bunk.

Turning the pages, mouth dry and cock hard enough to drive rivets, Eli lets his gaze linger on the forms, bodies, ideas he'd only seen in his most fevered wet dreams. Then he jerks off three times in the next three hours. His balls feel as if they've been used for a speed bag, but for the first time since puberty, Eli sleeps like a baby. Before he leaves Tsivor, the magazine goes into the mass converter, the memory goes in the spank tank, and he heads back to Lysatra secure in his secret. This becomes his standard procedure and he tells himself that until he has his own ship, or maybe until he joins the Imperial Navy, that this is the way it's going to be.

Until the pirates. He's decided to stay in the family business, and at seventeen he buys the Corellian armored YT-class freighter Wayward Son. The Junden route is too profitable to give up, but increasing piracy is more than an issue - it's becoming a hazard. It's not any of the usual suspects, either. Eli maps the reported incidents, aware that he's missing data and hard numbers, but he plots a course he thinks ought to be safe. The Junden approach is out of the question, and Eli's best course skirts the Unknown Regions with two extra jumps. It ought to be fine.

It's not fine.

Eli exits the first of the extra jumps and is immediately under fire from two vessels that do not look like any pirate vessels he's ever heard of. He responds with fire from his own lasers, but this isn't a simulator - and the ships move faster than he's ever seen. They take out his insystem drive, leaving him with his maneuvering engines and possibly damage to his hyperdrive. The lurch of a tractor beam locking on almost makes him throw up as he grabs a heavy blaster from under the helm.

When another ship drops out of hyperspace, Eli figures that he's done for. It's huge, bristling with weaponry and the two pirates immediately turn their attention to it, moving into a defensive formation and dropping their tractor beam. The new ship is maybe not a pirate, but not anything to sit in front of, either. Eli's only thought is to get the fuck out of the way, maneuvering to a safe spot with a small moon behind him, and to try and reboot the insystem drive.

It's fast, and it is brutal, and it doesn't go the pirates' way. The two ships self-destruct before the boarding shuttles can reach them. Then the Wayward Son lurches under another tractor beam, this time being drawn toward the warship. That's a little rude, but Eli hails them first in Basic, then in Meese Caulf, and then in Sy Bisti when there's no reply.

"This is the Lysatran independent freighter Wayward Son. Captain Eli Vanto hailing unknown ship." Eli takes a good look at the weapons emplacements pointed at him. "I'm not a pirate or a smuggler. I'm a cargo vessel bound for the Junden system, port of Duasti on Junden Prime."

"Be calm, Captain Eli'van'to. This is the Chiss Expansionary Defense Force cruiser Nightdragon, preparing to take you onboard."

The voice is deep and the Sy Bisti textbook perfect, but his name is oddly broken up, but Chiss?

Come on. Really.

"Vanto to cruiser - the Chiss are a myth used to scare naughty children. Pull the other one."

The next communication is, "Myth? Explain." The tone is still devoid of affect, but he sounds slightly surprised or suspicious.

"Uhm. Well, a legend or story."

"Ah. I assure you, we are not fictional. Now power down or be powered down, Captain Vanto - it is your choice."

That voice has a lot of durasteel in it and Eli hesitates, mastering a 'you are not the boss of me' impulse. Anything that big with that much firepower is indeed the boss of him and his ship has taken enough damage.

"Nightdragon, I am powering down."

The tractor beam draws the Wayward Son into a hangar bay with what look to be impounded ships, most of them unfamiliar models and sets him gently on the deck. The huge blast doors cutting off the stars makes him wonder if he just should have run. Eli watches the pressure indicator on his heads-up display, waiting until it reaches one standard atmosphere. When the pressure adjusts, a small blast door at one end of the bay opens and…

Those are Chiss - one man in black and one woman in white and moving as if the last thing you'd do in life would be to pick a fight with either one. Black hair, blue skin, and glowing red eyes, but with human-type bodies and tall. The woman wears a white tunic and trousers with black boots, while the man is armed and in something that looks like a peace-keeper's tactical gear. They are alone, no other weapons evident, and they stop to look up at the cockpit. From the blinking and discussion between them, they might not have seen a human before - that's fair because until now he didn't think that there were really any Chiss, either.

The male raises a comlink, "Captain Eli'van'to of the freighter Wayward Son, I am Senior Commander Myth'raw'nuru of the Nightdragon. Open your boarding ramp. You have entered Chiss space, and on the orders of the admiralty, we will search your vessel and person."

Eli had the entirely inappropriate thought that if that big fellow wanted to search him, he would cooperate. Gladly. Then he booted the thought right out of his head. Nope. Fly casual. Normal. These are legends come to life, and if anything else is true about them then they might actually be able to do magic and read minds.

"Leave the weapon, Captain Eli'van'to." The woman speaks, "We mean you no injury, but it would be inadvisable to test us."

Spooked, Eli sets the weapon down and leaves the cockpit. He's pretty sure they couldn't see it from that angle. He lets the boarding ramp down, heart hammering in his chest. Is he being rescued or captured?

~