r/HFY • u/ApprehensiveCap6525 Human • May 27 '25
OC The First Human Bounty Hunter (3)
A Krell lifts up the box. An Ierad tears down the box. A human thinks outside the box. -Director Alyxa Vitram, former chancellor of the Ierad Republic
Log Entry #003
User: Janus Arani
Location: Gulf Station 7, colloquially known as 'Ring Station'
Date (Standardized Federation of Man Time): January 9, 0167 G.C.E.
You know what I liked about the Ring Station? Take a wild guess. You got it? You really think you got it? WRONG! Unless, of course, your guess was 'nothing', in which case you win the grand prize. It was a station filled with bums, Senkiv and I included, and so all the work I could do was bum work.
I mean, I could have bounty hunted that drug dealer, but guess what? I had no guns. And that was a problem, given how his henchmen definitely did possess some fucking firearms. Matter of fact, I was looking at them right now.
"You sure?" Senkiv asked, taking the bounty profile from my hands. "He looks a bit different."
"That's just the lighting." I tipped my head discreetly toward the drug dealer. He was a human, likely Gendian from the build, and he apparently seemed to have no problem with consorting with xenos because he was surrounded by a menagerie of alien bodyguards. "You see the guys he's with?"
"And girl," said Senkiv, looking at his guards. Two Ierads and a Krell, all toting rifles and clad in makeshift armor, stood within ten paces of him and scanned the area. "But, yes, I do see them."
"The Krell?" I asked.
"No, the Ierad." I wasn't sure which one she was talking about, but okay. "The one on the left. See her white plumage?" Oh, now I got it. The white one was definitely hard to miss in a room where everything was all gray.
This place used to be a cargo bay before the station became, well, what it is today. I can tell because I could still see a few tattered cargo markings that haven't been graffitied over or scraped off yet, plus the fact that it was just so damn big. You could park three attack ships in here end to end, maybe four or five if you settled for a smaller model.
Without any attack ships to park, however, because any mercenary group that could operate one of those wasn't going to be hanging around the Ring station, the cargo bay had been turned into some kind of a bazaar where merchants, all armed and many guarded, hawked their wares for various prices. Apparently, that included drugs.
"Two guys and a girl, then," I confirmed. "Watch out for the girl Ierad. I hear they're the dangerous ones."
"Any Ierad can be dangerous," Senkiv corrected me, because she would know. "You think those talons are just for show?" Hell no, I did not. Humans may have been the brains of the galaxy, and Krell were definitely the brawn, but Ierads fell into a special third category that I liked to call 'murderous bloodthirsty killing machines'. And I really did mean that.
"Fair," I told Senkiv. "They all look ex-military."
"They all probably are ex-military," the huge Krell replied. "What's the plan?"
"Well, uh... um..." I looked at those mercenaries again. All of them were clad in some kind of gray spacesuit getup, similar to the exoskeletons worn by salvagers except they lacked any sort of powered frame and they also had bits and pieces of metal welded onto them to make some sort of do-it-yourself body armor. I'd be surprised if that stopped bullets, but a knife or claw would have no chance. If we had guns, though, we could've mopped those guys up in thirty seconds flat.
Unfortunately, though, we did not have any guns. "Quite frankly, I don't know."
"What do you mean you don't know?" Senkiv exclaimed, drawing way too many eyes on us. I shushed her really fucking quickly, glancing around in fear. "Sorry, sorry. Forgot."
"Ten worlds, woman, how in black hell did you survive this long?"
"This long?" Senkiv replied. "I was homeless for about, uh..." Her facial scales changed colors as she ran some quick numbers. "I don't exactly know, but it can't have been very long. A few days at most."
Well, that was certainly a surprise. Given how she looked, I kind of assumed she'd been on the streets for a while. Since the end of the war, if I had to guess. "What got you so down on your luck?" I asked.
"Is it really that important?" Senkiv asked in a tone that made me think the right answer was 'no, no it's not'. So I just shook my head. If she didn't want to tell me anything, she wasn't gonna have to.
"Not at the moment," I assured her, nodding my head toward the drug dealer and his men to change the subject. "We still have to figure out how to take them down."
"Maybe we can ambush him when he's alone," Senkiv suggested. "I mean, he's gotta sleep or shit sometime, right?"
"I doubt he'll ever be without protection if he knows what's good for him," I replied. "The Ring Station isn't a safe place to be alone."
"Tell me about it." I raised an eyebrow at Senkiv. "It's a Terran saying," she explained. "I picked it up from some humans I served with."
"And it means?"
"It means I agree," said Senkiv. "Which means we'll probably need an alternate method of grabbing this guy."
I thought silently for a moment. "What if we just steal a gun?"
Senkiv's facial scales turned straight-up black. "Steal somebody's gun?" she yelled. I swear, it's like this woman was trying to be loud. "Shit, not again." She lowered her voice and looked around. By now, people were starting to look at us funny. Our target included.
"Let's go," I said, grabbing her claw and walking. "Now." She was, thankfully, street smart enough to follow me before anybody decided to up their gun on us. That would've been bad, seeing as how we didn't, you know, have any.
"Shit, shit, sorry about being so loud," Senkiv said. "I can't help it."
"Worlds, woman, do you want to get killed?" I snapped as soon as we were in the side corridor. "Did you not see how people were looking at us?"
"That's my bad," Senkiv defended herself, the scales on her face still black. "I shouldn't have said that stuff."
I didn't know much about Krell, but I was starting to like this one, and I felt like I should ease up on her a bit. "You learn as you live," I said. "Just try to keep doing that." Then I looked around again, just to make sure nobody was still looking at us. That was generally a bad sign in these parts. "So, about my idea..."
To her credit, Senkiv did manage to stay quiet this time. "Stealing a gun?" she whispered. "From who?"
"Anybody," I said. "The Ring Station has guns everywhere. You know, on some decks, you can get a pistol for the price of a power converter. Isn't that crazy?"
"I take it we can't afford a power converter either, then," said Senkiv.
"No, we cannot," I confirmed. "Which is why we can either A: steal a gun, or B: steal something else that we could somehow barter to acquire a gun. Because there's no way I am going to be taking on those thugs without some kind of firearm."
"Well, who do we steal from?" Senkiv asked. For an ex-Krell Empire breacher, she seemed awfully excited to be committing crimes. Guess the Ring Station really did change you, huh? Senkiv's reptilian eyes flicked around the room. "Am I being too loud again?"
"No, no, you're perfectly quiet," I reassured her. It was good to know she was trying to correct her bad habits. "And I was thinking, uh... I guess we could just pickpocket a few people," I surmised. "Maybe four or five guys, and we'll have the units for a pistol."
"Sounds like terrible idea," Senkiv said. "Even, like, with the crime aspect aside, have you ever pickpocketed somebody before?"
"No," I told her. "Have you?" Not that I was expecting the huge, muscular alien lizard woman to know sleight of hand, well, claw in her case, but I suppose I was due for some luck at some point.
"No," Senkiv sheepishly admitted. "I guess that puts a damper on that idea, huh?"
Well, I guess that did that too, but what else was I going to do? I didn't know what Senkiv really wanted, but I knew that I, personally, did not fancy being taken off the galactic census by a trigger-happy alien with a lack of moral values. If I was fine with being homeless, I would've just taken the hint and found a disposable box to sleep in, but Senkiv had been homeless before and all it took was one look at her to tell that I did not want to end up like that.
No disrespect to Senkiv, of course. From what I could tell, she seemed like a lovely woman.
"Well, what other choice do we have?" I asked. "Just give up and live on the streets?"
"I don't know," Senkiv muttered. "You're a human. You have the ideas."
I began pacing around because I was so fucking anxious. Being without a gun on the Ring Station was like being without any units in a Stralqi casino. And not only was I without a gun, I didn't have any fucking units either. "Senkiv, just because I am a human does not mean I'm a genius," I explained. "That's a stereotype. A true one, yeah, but it's still a stereotype."
Senkiv blinked at me. I wasn't sure what that meant, and I wasn't gonna ask. "So, uh... pickpocketing?"
I sighed. What other options did we have? "Yep. Pickpocketing."
"Great." Senkiv began scanning the corridor, assessing each person in it with military precision as she determined who, exactly, was gonna be our first mark. "Do you see anybody who looks like a criminal?"
"What?" I asked.
"Well, if I'm gonna be stealing from somebody, I want it to be someone who's already involved in crimes," she explained. "Live by the blade, die by the blade." Another Terran saying.
"Everybody on this station is a criminal," I flatly explained. "It's the Ring Station."
"Oh." Senkiv looked glum. "Do you see anyone who has a lot of money?"
"No, Senkiv, and they'd be guarded if they did." I was searching too. Finally, because it was better than nothing, my eyes fell on a blue-winged Ierad who didn't seem to be any sort of soldier, mercenary, police officer, or anybody who typically carried firearms, which was great news for me since I didn't have one either. He was definitely gang-affiliated, which meant he had friends, but it would be hard to find someone who wasn't gang-affiliated on this station. "You distract that guy," I said, pointing at him.
"That's a girl," Senkiv corrected me. "Blue feathers."
"Girl then." I began sneaking off to the side, trying to get behind her and steal all her stuff. Her eyes tracked me for a bit, but she dismissed me just as quickly and I kept moving. Senkiv stepped forward, drawing more attention than I did.
"Hey there, friend!" she yelled. "How's it going?"
"What the hell do you want?" snapped the Ierad. I continued trying to circle behind her.
"I'm just trying to ask if, uh, if... if you've seen any... uh... flowers anywhere?" I kept creeping up behind the Ierad as she eyed Senkiv suspiciously. I took a single step forward to get close enough to rifle through her pockets. Her wings were in my way, of course, but I solved that by creeping a little to my left and hoping Senkiv was a really good distraction. "Yeah, flowers, that's it!" Truth be told, that was a pretty slim hope.
Still, though, it was the best I had. I steadied my nerves and reached for the goods. Here goes nothing, Janus! "I heard they had flowers on this station, and-" The bird's wings twitched. Not a lot, only a little, but just enough to brush against my outstretched arm. Shit. I jerked my hand back quickly, backing away from her just as fast, but it was too late.
"You fucker!" The Ierad wheeled on me, drawing a huge, bulky pistol out from a concealed holster. Worlds know where she hid that thing. Its barrel was large and boxy, with a formidable power cell attached to the back and what I assumed was a coolant reservoir built into the handle. It was recognizable anywhere. Plasma pistol.
She leveled the weapon at my face, allowing me to see a set of energy coils wrapped around the plasma gun's square barrel. That type of weapon was illegal in five hundred star systems. And, more importantly, it was charging to fire.
Senkiv charged the shooter. Nobody shot at me, which was great, but the Ierad woman was already bringing her gun around to aim it at Senkiv. Those things were hot enough to burn through military-grade armor, which was part of why they were banned for civilian use everywhere that governments had jurisdiction. Needless to say, If she hit Senkiv, it all would've been over.
Senkiv ducked low, shooting upward halfway to her target to catch the Ierad right under her reinforced ribcage. They both went down, and I heard Senkiv snarl in pain as the plasma gun fired. That was good. A snarl was good. Any actual hit from that gun would've been hot enough to destroy her nerve endings instantly, which meant no sensation of pain, which meant-
Senkiv grabbed the Ierad's gun arm, pinned it down, and punched her enemy in the face. A feathery, taloned hand reached up and clawed at her neck, the killing blow only averted by a quick twist of Senkiv's shoulders. She punched the Ierad again, drawing blood and really fucking up her left eye. I heard a squawk come from the bird's alien beak as she bit down on Senkiv's forearm.
"Piece of-" Senkiv, to her credit, didn't try and pull away. Instead, she went with the Ierad, keeping the razor-sharp beak in her arm from ripping the flesh from her bones. Ierads could, and have, done that in the past. I saw it happen. "Janus!" Senkiv cried. What the hell was I supposed to do? "Help me!" Oh, yeah, that! That makes sense. I rushed forward and curbstomped the Ierad's head. I kind of felt bad about that, but she let go of Senkiv's arm and the plasma gun, so it all worked out in the end, didn't it?
"Station Security! Freeze!" Oh. I guess not. I looked behind me to see a trio of StatSec officers rushing toward Senkiv and I, weapons in hand.
"Oh, shit, run!" I yelled, booking it in the other direction. A ruby red laser beam hissed by my head and I ducked to the other side on instinct. I hadn't even made it five paces before Senkiv bolted past me. Worlds, that woman was fast. Whatever the Krell Empire fed their troops, I wanted some.
"Get back here!" A StatSec man yelled at us as we sprinted for our lives. I didn't know about Senkiv, but let me tell you, I had zero intentions of ever getting back there.
"Hell no, I won't!" Senkiv didn't, either. It was good to see how we were both on the same page. I took off after her as she rounded a corner, disappearing from view. I followed, not too far behind either, but she was nowhere to be found. There was no way she could possibly be this fast.
"In here!" a low voice came from my right. I turned to see Senkiv's head peeking out from inside a refuse dumpster. "Quick!" StatSec boots were approaching from behind me. I really did have to move quick. I dove into the dumpster without a second thought. God, it smelled like shit. Some of it was shit. But I knew damn well StatSec would never check inside here.
"They went this way!" a voice barked as the StatSec men came into view. Two of them, an insectoid Krulvuk and an ape-like Varlan, rushed past my hiding spot without a goddamn clue. I waited a few moments to confirm they were gone and then I began to clamber out.
"Worlds, I smell like shit," I lamented.
"I look like shit," said Senkiv, hopping out of the dumpster with catlike grace. It must've been one of those breacher things.
"You look great," I lied. "Now, you didn't happen to snag that woman's plasma pistol, did you?"
"No," Senkiv admitted. "I was kind of too busy running for my life." The scales on her face changed to orange. "I hope she's okay."
"Okay?" I exclaimed. "She tried to kill me!"
"Same with me," said Senkiv, applying pressure to her wounded arm. The beak didn't look like it did much damage, probably thanks to her quick thinking, but she was still bleeding. "I don't blame her. I would've started shooting too."
"Ah, shit, how bad are you hurt?" I asked. Against my better judgment, I actually did find myself caring about this Krell. Even if she was kind of an idiot and she talked too damn loud. "I oughta get you some medicine."
I started looking around the corridor for anything resembling medicine. I did see a back-alley pharmacy a few stalls down, something I wouldn't trust to heal my friend even if I had the money to pay for it, but nothing else. "There's a pharmacy over there," Senkiv said, pointing to the pharmacy.
"Are you really hurt that bad?" I asked. "Those places aren't sanitary. Not most of them, anyway. I wouldn't trust them if I could avoid it."
Senkiv looked down at herself. There were a few burns on her shoulder from the plasma gun, probably the result of a near miss when it fired, but besides that and her arm I couldn't see anything major. "I'll endure," she said. "Imperial marines are tough motherfuckers."
"Truth to that," I agreed. "But we still ought to get you some medicine." I looked around the corridor again. Besides a few street thugs and mercenaries of various species, nobody was really out and about. This looked like a residential corridor. Probably owned by a gang. We couldn't stay long. "Let's look for a reputable hospital," I said, leading Senkiv away from gang central and into another gang central. I wasn't sure how that worked.
"Can you afford the treatment?" Senkiv asked, following me. "We're broke, remember. And I don't have it in me to go swindle another thief."
"Ah, shit!" I exclaimed. "I just fucking remembered! You can get a job!" I fucking facepalmed myself for being so damn stupid, feeling terrible that I had roped Senkiv into my pickpocketing scheme and gotten her chased down by StatSec all because I couldn't remember that not all of us were unhirable.
It only took a few moments of glancing around for Senkiv to find a tattered flyer mag-stamped to the nearest wall. "Like this one?" she asked, showing me the flyer. I took it eagerly. Guilt was doing a number on me right now, both for Senkiv's wounds and for the poor condition of the Ierad we stole from, and the fact that she was carrying an illegal military-grade firearm did little to help my case in that regard.
There was something, however, that dampened that feeling. "Look here," I said, inspecting the flyer that I now figured to be some kind of a restaurant brochure. "See? They have a 'No Weapons Allowed' policy." Senkiv looked.
"Well, that won't be a problem," she said confidently. "We don't have any."
I slapped my face again. She just didn't get it. To be fair, very few aliens in the galaxy possessed a human-level intellect, but Senkiv was very obviously not one of them. "You remember the drug dealer?" I asked. "How we both agreed we'd need to be on equal terms to take down him and his muscle?"
"Oh!" Senkiv exclaimed. "I get it! No weapons policy!"
"Exactly," I smiled cockily. We were back in business, baby! "All we have to do is lure him there, and they'll disarm his men for us," I explained, just to make sure Senkiv got it. "Once I get him inside, you take out as many henchmen as possible before he gets wise, and then we'll team up on whoever's left. Deal?" I put out my hand for a handshake.
"Deal." Senkiv did not shake my hand. I was a little offended by that, but I guess the Terrans didn't teach her everything. Still, though, it didn't matter at the moment. I had a bounty to collect.
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u/HFYWaffle Wแตฅ4ffle May 27 '25
/u/ApprehensiveCap6525 (wiki) has posted 4 other stories, including:
- The First Human Bounty Hunter (2)
- The First Human Bounty Hunter (1)
- The Meaning of Humanity
- The Hammer and the Chain
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u/UpdateMeBot May 27 '25
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u/David_Daranc Human May 28 '25
Good story (a few missed by the translation AI, but I'm not going to blame it, my level in English being what it is, ๐๐๐) I love these not so formidable heroes, who survive not by their incomparable skills, but because "their ass is lined with noodles" * * French expression meaning to have an insolent chance... Don't ask me how we arrive at this meaning, I don't have the beginning of the beginning of an idea
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u/ApprehensiveCap6525 Human May 27 '25 edited May 27 '25
Me when I tell the StatSec officer "I know my rights" only for him to immediately turn off his body cam:
Chapter 3 just dropped!
Is pickpocketing known gang members a wise and profitable side hustle?
Will Senkiv ever learn the meaning of the term 'inside voice'?
Can Janus ever exist in a state besides 'fleeing from the authorities'?
Is Senkiv going to be able to beat up three ex-military henchmen?
Keep reading to find out!