“Yeah, a young boy. Heh, his father was more than eager to facilitate his child after we paid to him twenty thousand credits and promised to return the boy in two weeks."
"Sometimes it surprises me how pathetic mind-blinds can be. If this works, the boy will remain in Psi-Corps. If not... His father will get him back. By the way, what's his name?"
"Ranma. Ranma Saotome."
"...Sir," a voice that seemingly came out of nowhere, "We have reached the rendezvous point." Hearing that voice, Alfred Bester shook his head to clear his memories and focused on the present time again. He shivered internally, the current mission that he was on caused an unavoidable fear in him.
After checking over all the cockpit indicators one last time, Bester disengaged his ship, the Black Omega Starfury, from the space carrier of Psi-Corps and took route towards the Epsilon Eridani system, and Babylon 5.
It was mid-day and Zack Allen finally was taking a rest after a marathon journey of 36 hours with Narn and Centauri trying to kill each other inside and outside of the station. And if that wasn't enough, the group of reporters from ISN just had to be there and record the pandemonium, then sent it out throughout half the galaxy.
His boss was muttering something about reporters and hell and Cmndr. Ivanova was very close to the breaking point and looked to swear up a storm in old Russian, he thought from his seat on the sofa.
"I'm going to sleep all night this time. Though, with my luck, in five hours, I'll hve a spoo stampeded in the docking bay." And with that thought, his body relaxed for some welcomed rest.
"Incoming call" screamed in that moment his Babcom terminal, signaling the end of his "long" sleep.
Mentally cursing in every language that he knew, he opened his eyes and left his sofa, though not without heavy resignation, to answer the call.
In his terminal appeared then the smiling face of Hideko Kogura, who looked fresh as a daisy.
"Hello Zack. I have finally the dat......Man, you look like if a Narn used you for sparring partner! What has happened to you there?
"You haven't seen the ISN report about what happened here?" Zack asked. A moment later, he remembered who he was talking to... Hideko Hentai Kogura, famous in Mars for be the only guy with a fetish for perverted stories rather than the real thing and who, when he wasn't working for his superiors, was seeing videos of girls or reading those perverted stories....
"Forget it, anyway you were saying what you had the information about Ranma Saotome, no?"
"Yeah. This Ranma has more problems in Earth than a Narn in Centauri Prime. Somehow, he has been used as collateral for a lot of debts in the Asiatic continent, what ascend in total to 1.5 million credits. The strange thing is, a lot of the debts were made by none other than his own father, Genma Saotome."
"What!?"
"It's true! In half of the contracts he was "offered" as groom in exchange for money or groceries. Some of them are really weird... In one of the contracts, he was exchanged for a bowl of rice and ....two pickles?"
"Are you pulling my chain Hideko? If you this is a joke I'm not finding it funny in any way, shape or..."
"I believed that this was a joke too, until I checked the database of contracts. The DNA and Retinal patterns stored there match with Genma's own. From this, I can guess why Ranma chose to join EarthForce under the clauses of amnesty and secrecy no?
"With fathers like him, I'm glad to be an orphan........" Thought Zack. Immediately he said, "Yeah, now I'm understanding this guy better..... Other than that, anything else?"
"No, it's all what I could find about him at first sight. His school files show what he was an average student in Furinkan High School, for apart of a few fights; he's your typical cocky guy."
"Ok, I believe you. Send the file." Zack said as he introduced a credit card to pay the usual fee for the job.
"Thanks. I'm sending the file now."
"File Received" Spoke the terminal.
"Thanks Hideko. Please, stay alert for anything related about this guy, ok?"
"Consider it done. I'll call you if something new pop-ups in my radar."
And once he spoke that, the call ended.
Zach mulled the facts what he knew now about Saotome and thought.
"Well Ranma, you will fit well with the guys in Security. What could happen with a typical flyboy like him?"
" I want my bed and my pillow now!" moaned Minako, who was using Duo as a pillar so she didn't fall to the ground.
"We are too, Goldie, care to make me company?" He quipped with an amused tone.
"You want to die? Anyway, I'm too tired to do anything." Minako replied.
"Thank God that it's our turn to get some free time." spoke Rick. "I'm going to stick to my bed the whole time... And how can you be walking like that? This last mission wasn't a breeze in the park, Ranma."
Ranma, who was walking alongside Meia, acquired a thoughtful expression in his face and replied immediately.
"Ya know, Rick, I have been in worse shit than this before."
"What can be worse than a dogfight with Narn and Centauri fighters?"
"A fight with Nials?" Replied Lain with a question.
"No, but believe me, I've seen and been in worse and weirder problems than this. Don't ask.... It's part of my past and i want to close that part of my life, ok?" Ranma said in a tone that was half order and half plea.
The squad understood immediately, for why Ranma always had been adamant about not revealing much about his past except to Meia ,who he considered a close friend.
"Name?"
"Alex Schezar"
"Age?"
"24."
"Any specialization in particular?"
"Mechanics."
"Go to booth number six, Next?"
"Why am I here?"
"Name?"
"Oh yeah, I remember now. One of the few person that viewed me as a girl and friend got tired of my antics and ran."
"Hideo Kojima"
"And to add insult to the injury, my father, who NEVER moved a hand to help me, decided that I dishonored the clan for not killing those who fooled him in cold blood."
"Age?"
"Very modern on his part. He screws up and I'm the one who pays the price." She sighed internally. "Now I'm alone again."
"20."
"Any specialization in particular?"
"That's a constant in my life, being abandoned by those that I care about..."
"None."
"Go to booth number one, Next?"
"Well, at least this can't be worse than my current situation... Even if I'm going to get paid to beat the crap outta someone.."
"Name?"
"Ukyo Kuonji."
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(Posted Sat, 28 Aug 2004 05:17)
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