Star Hookers Space Pirates
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Contents
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Chapter 1: A Pirate is Born
Chapter 2: I Want a New Drug
Chapter 3: Enter and Exit the Hookers
Chapter 4: Decisions and Feeling Just a Little Bit Piratey
Chapter 5: Hyak Station
Chapter 6: Hiring Day
Chapter 7: Final Preparations
Chapter 8: Pleasant Complications
Chapter 9: A Pirating We Will Go
Chapter 10: Finally, the Big Score, Pirate 101
Chapter 11: Getting Paid and Dangerous Times
Chapter 12: Dinner Interrupted and an Expeditious Exit
Chapter 13: Licking Wounds and a New Plan
Chapter 14: Crazy Karl's Surplus Weapons and Armor Boutique
Chapter 15: A Few Romps in Space
Chapter 16: Ferntucky and the Curious Artifact
Chapter 17: A Rude Awakening
Chapter 18: A Good Night’s Fun and the Battle of the Artifact
Chapter 19: Business Concluded and Out of the Frying Pan
Chapter 20: Parting is Such Sweet Sorrow
Chapter 21: Immaculate Conception and Meet the Stupid Baloovians
Chapter 22: Happy Reunions and Uncle Pete Wants You!
Chapter 23: Lavana ― Green Heck
Chapter 24: Cannibal’s Feast
Chapter 25: Damn the Torpedoes, Full Speed Ahead
Chapter 26: Showdown
Chapter 27: Nobody Likes Us
Chapter 28: Battle of Baloovia
Chapter 29: The Unexpected Benefits of Being a Pirate
Chapter 1: A Pirate is Born
A lone, beautiful princess stood in chains in a dank stone dungeon. Her clothes were in tatters, revealing tantalizing glimpses of bare flesh, but covered in whip marks, bruises, and dripping wounds. She trembled, a look of shock and suffering on her face. A short, Nordic-looking man stood before her his sword in hand, blaster on holstered hip, other weapons strapped on, and was looking rather tattered and battered himself. He faced her with a wide grin.
She spoke in a broken whisper, “Oh, kind sir, Lord Vulgor has captured me, chained me in this foul dungeon, and performed acts most heinous. Oh, how I shudder from the feel of his foul claws, cruel whip, and his cold, hard, Sperminator. What he has done to me would make your blood freeze.” Her generous bosom heaved in pain. Her eyes were full of pleading.
A disembodied voice from an indistinguishable somewhere filled the short man’s ears, “Want to hear more repulsive, salacious, and hideous details?”
Peter took out his blaster and disintegrated the Princess’s face, leaving blackened bone above a luscious body. A klaxon sounded from somewhere. Ent! Ent! The room and environment flashed a deep red, and the disembodied voice spoke again.
“Noncombatant killed, minus 1000 EP! Violation! Violation! Violation!”
"I don't give a crap about Princess poop-face. I’ve played this game before. I'm not going to sit through twenty minutes of cut-scene movie, and low-grade, porn bullshit to get to the Final Boss battle. I’ve asked you before to delete this part. A-hole-game-AI,” Peter said, muttering mainly to himself.
An ominous rumble sounded and vibrated through his feet. Music with a heavy bass line started playing, raising his apprehension as it was designed to do, despite his knowing what was coming. Large hanger doors pulled aside to reveal a ten-foot-tall being named Lord Vulgor, in all his hellish glory. Its eyes glowed with an evil inner light and its gnashing jaws dripped acid. Vulgor's folded arms were covered in wicked spikes―its glistening Sperminator drooped beneath, crowned with an evil barbed stinger.
It looked a bit like a praying mantis crossed with a wasp. As Peter waited for the battle to start, he reflected that he had read somewhere that the Final Boss closely resembled the peaceful Exinderins. They had protested to the game manufacturers that even though they scared humans, appearance notwithstanding, they were peaceful insectivores and using them as the bad guy in a video game was unfair; as it made people fear them even more. This was the point exactly; they creeped most humans out. The Exinderins’ version of the game had a large, foul human with slavering jaws and an enormous willie.
“So, Peter, at last we meet. How I have longed to befoul your corpse with my Sperminator, bite off your head, and savor your death. For far too long you have interfered with my plans. Your death will not be quick, MUUUUAAAAAHHHAHAHAHA!" Lord Vulgor boomed.
“Yeah, well, you gotta kill me first Fugly! Bring it on, baby!” Peter screamed defiantly.
Lord Vulgor raised his wicked, sharp claws and advanced toward him. The acid in his saliva left smoking pits where it dripped as he spat corrosive poison at Peter.
Snap-rolling to the left, Peter fired two torpedoes, which exploded against Lord Vulgor’s face. It roared with pain and―Peter’s view went to black.
“WTF?” Peter muttered to himself, “This better be important, Shirley! I was right at the Final Boss battle, damn it.”
He was reclining in a command chair, a metal helmet on his head with goggles, and metallic gloves on his hands attached to cables. Slowly he stripped the gloves off, careful not to tangle the cables, and pulled off his visor and helmet. He didn’t have the wireless model or the full body suit with penis attachment. They just seemed creepy and pathetic to him. If he got horny, he did things the old- fashioned way. Besides, Peter was too cheap to go for the top-of-the-line model.
A two-foot-high holographic representation of his ship’s computer appeared to be standing on the console of the control room with her hands on her hips looking pissed-off, but then again, that was her natural state. “Sir, I hate to interrupt your screwing-off time, but you have an incoming call,” Shirley, his computer, dryly informed him.
“Shit, right now? Who is it?”
“Steve.”
“Steve never calls unless it's important, alright, put him on.” A slightly befuddled looking, middle aged man's face appeared on the screen before Peter.
“What's up, Steve?”
“Better be packing bribes at customs. Rumor has it that Heaven’s Battalion is spreading cash around for leads to Quaxxin smuggling, and that the Tarcackians pulled some strings to get the customs officers switched at random between stations, yesterday.” he said with a pained expression. “Just FYI, how's it going?”
“Fine, Steve. Son of a bitch! I already give the station master gifts at Liberation Day, all holidays, and regular payoffs. I should be good,” Peter complained.
Steve’s image shrugged on the screen. “What you going to do, huh? Goody two-shoes, meddling flox-shit eaters!”
“Oh, by the way it's the Boss's dividing day this week. Might want to pick up a gift before you collect your payment.”
“Right. Thanks, Steve. See ya soon.”
Peter leaned back in his pilot’s couch, and crossed his arms peevishly. “Crap! Double crap!” Peter said aloud, thinking that this was going to seriously cut into his spare cash supplies, even if he would be reimbursed. He was out of the mood for playing games and suddenly felt tired.
“Shirley, I'm going to take a nap. Wake me when we dock with the station.”
“Yes, oh lord and master. Your wish is my command.”
“Hey, less attitude!”
“Bite me,” Shirley's hologram replied and flipped him off.
Hours later, Peter was sleeping soundly and peacefully when his cabin was filled with very loud music. The blaring horns of something obscenely brassy. He nearly levitated off the bed as he bolted upright, screaming, and clutching his ears. “What—the—fuck—is—that, Shirley? For Tarcacks sake! SHIRLEY!”
“John Philips Sousa’s, Stars and Stripes Forever,” Shirley shouted over the musi
c.
“Turn it off! TARCACKS BALLS!” Peter screamed.
“Consider yourself woken.” The music turned off abruptly.
Peter’s ears rang with the sudden absence of sound. “You farking bitch! I put up with a lot from you, but if you ever do that again, I'm going to put a large magnet next to your cybernetic brain for a few hours!”
“You said to wake you, you didn't specify how. I wouldn’t recommend the magnet, as my brain is in a crystal matrix not magnetic dumb-ass. What do they teach you idiots in pilot’s school? Besides, then you might have to fly your own useless, lazy ass around, poop-for-brains,” Shirley snickered.
Pink Floyd poked his head around the open hatch, holding a steaming cup of beverage. “Kaff?” Floyd was actually pink.
“God, yes! Thanks, Floyd.” Peter rubbed his ears wincing. Floyd was an assassin/bodyguard robot or Botyguard, as his brand name was called. Boss had recently acquired him for Peter. The supply of Quaxxin had been getting scarce lately and the competition was getting fierce to supply it. He had barely escaped an assassination attempt last month by a rival smuggler. Peter had named him Floyd for one of his favorite classical rock artists from the twenty-first century. Peter loved old stuff. By law, all Botyguards had to be pink to alert people that it was a defense robot but could rip your head off, and probably kill you in hundreds of gruesome ways. That is, if you removed the killing injunction against humans. A butter knife, and popping the chip out was all it took. Most people did it, but it was still highly illegal, akin to those ubiquitous tags on mattresses that had been around for centuries stating it was against the law to remove the tag. Peter was like most people that had one—what was the use of having a Botyguard if it wouldn't kill your attackers. It also made a mean cup of coffee and was super polite.
After docking, taking a shower, and donning his best pilot’s uniform, Peter strode purposely toward the customs desk where a Teddy Bear wearing a red vest and a name tag was seated at a computer behind the customs desk. That was their nickname. That was exactly what they looked like to humans; Teddy bears, Ewoks never caught on. Its headset and microphone were almost buried in its fluffy fur. Behind it was obviously an office of sorts; file cabinets, and bad artwork covered the walls. A calendar from Crazy Bob’s Military Surplus and Ammo hung crookedly on the wall with a scantily-clad Vookin female as cover art. Next to that, a single door.
“Hi! Captain Peter Farlon, here for a customs inspection, err… the Centennial Lunch Bucket?” Peter looked at the being’s name-tag, “uh, Boo-Boo?”
Not looking up from its computer screen, “Someone will be right with you,” and kept tapping rapidly on the key board.
“Boo-Boo?” Peter muttered under his breath and the Teddy bear spoke. It was grinning, or was it baring its teeth? “I heard that. Our names are untranslatable in most languages, so our supervisor usually names us. I'm very aware that's the stupid name of a famous ancient Earth cartoon bear, the Flox fornicator!” (A Flox is a medium-sized animal from Faloozia that lives in its own excrement, makes burrows of it, eats it, smells awful, and tastes even worse; hence the expletive.) “I pee in his coffee on a regular basis.”
Bored, Peter lounged against the counter and looked around. Curiously, behind him in these new customs offices, there was a hallway that was part of the station’s corridor system and had numerous doors. The line of doors, labeled in various alien scripts, seemed to stretch endlessly. Floyd nudged him and said, “I couldn't help but notice you looking at all the bathrooms, sir. It’s fascinating that all of the different species in the galaxy have waste that is sometimes completely toxic to other races, especially Xums; they have to wear a containment suit at all times, and have their waste vaporized in a class-five evacuation chamber. Their feces are extremely toxic and deadly to most species. One Xum tooted on a public shuttle and wiped out twenty Volguns before they passed that law. The Zarquaxians have over twenty-six ways to excrete. I believe your so-called potty training is a high school-level class for them. I find creatures of flesh fascinating; disgusting, but interesting. I download from the space Ethernet constantly. Right now, I am learning how to play the Faloozian nose flute.”
“Hmm, that's fascinating,” Peter said politely, not fascinated at all, “and why would you want to learn to play a Faloozian nose flute? You don't have a nose,” Peter said with raised eyebrows.
“You humans are very boring, for the most part. If I was not learning something constantly, I would die of boredom. I can’t literally die from boredom, of course. I have to pick what information I want to retain and do a ‘memory dump’ on the rest weekly—anomalous to your excretory processes, but of course my data dump doesn't stink, or poison,” Floyd said rather smugly Peter thought.
“Excuse me, are you the Centennial Lunch Bucket?” It was a Vookin, one he had never seen before. Peter was angry and still fumed at this change despite Steve’s heads-up.
Vookins were all vaguely shaped like whales, but much, much smaller, with a permanent, smiling, goofy-looking grin like an Earth dolphin. Its skin was a mottled yellow. It had hands and feet like flippers that ended in finger-like appendages, and stood on heavy, crooked legs. What appeared to be two enormous testicles between its legs were sensing organs; hence the saying, “Vookins balls.” Peter wasn’t sure what they sensed. Fish? Females? He had never had the balls to ask, frankly. He was afraid they might be sensitive about them.
“Yes, I'm the Captain. Ready when you are.” Peter put his hands in his pocket and nervously fingered his credits. He pulled his right hand out and made a sign to Floyd to get ready for trouble. As they passed the bathrooms, they noticed a janitor in a gas mask with a mop cleaning up something disgusting looking, muttering, “Zarquaxians! Children! Untrained bowels! Number twenty-four in my corridor, son of a b...”
Within a short walk, they were soon standing in the hold of the Centennial Lunch Bucket. The Vookin looked at his manifest, checking off the contents.
“Twenty-five MZ-190 farm tractors, seems to be in order.” He pulled a scanner out of his vest pocket and walked slowly along the tractors. He snorted, pulled a small metallic object out of another pocket, and blew on it. A Hyper-Nose, a biologically-enhanced creature, came racing from the station, and began to sniff energetically all along the farm equipment. It came back and sat down quietly at the Vookin’s feet. The Vookin held a communicator to its mouth.
“John, please bring a sonic cutter to docking bay nineteen.”
Peter started to sweat, and looked at the Vookin’s name badge. “Uh, are you sure that's necessary, Mr. Mezylazxi...er...ixit...uh, most gracious being? See, the seals are intact, the paperwork’s in order, and it will cost the station a lot of money as well as time, to re-weld any cuts,” Peter said, a little panicked.
The Vookin turned its back on Peter, and made the universal sign recognized all over the galaxy, an upturned flipper rubbing its digits together, that indeed, something could be worked out. Peter blocked the security camera from the cargo bay with his body as he placed the sheaf of large-denomination credits he had in his pocket into the Vookin’s hand. The Vookin’s eye-stalks swiveled down to look at its flipper. Quickly shuffling the stack with a digit to see the amount, it made the money disappear like magic.
Lifting the communicator to its blubbery lips it said, “John, cancel that sonic cutter. I'm all backed up with inspections today. Guess I was mistaken.” Swiveling its gaze back toward Peter, it said, “Well, I'll be on my way. Have a good day, beings.”
With a flourish, it signed the necessary paperwork and handed it back to Peter. It walked away making a strange, high-pitched whistle, which Peter knew was Vookin laughter.
Bastard! Peter thought furiously. He squinted at Floyd, and shook his head looking after the Vookin’s retreating back, Hyper-Nose at his heels.
“That was odd, how did he know? Entirely too easy. Although I’m glad it was. Thought the Tarcackians were paying customs to crack down on smuggling?”
“Sir, I hav
e it on the down low; the Tarcackians are extremely parsimonious in their bribing and Vookins are notorious for playing both sides, as well as for being extremely greedy,” Floyd explained. “But I have an observation program for all main races, I have to be able to analyze body language. The Vookin did not know for sure that you were smuggling, he merely suggested that you were and presented an opportunity to offer a bribe. An innocent man would have ignored such an opportunity, insisting on his honesty. You got played, dude—I mean sir.
“Ah, that explains it. Let's go get a drink,” Peter said, pissed off and wiping his sweat away.
Chapter 2: I Want a New Drug
Gargon V was mostly a peaceful farming world full of rich farmers; hence, the popularity of Quaxxin. Their biggest exports were turnips, corn, tomatoes, and a liquor made from the Pouklet fruit; popular with many races. It was not exactly a big tourist destination. On Jakkoon’s list, it was mentioned as one of the top-ten most boring planets to visit. Number one was Googon I, where one particular tree bark was used to make paint. A contest was held each year to see who could sit the longest and watch paint peel. The current record was five months, ten days, two hours and twenty-seven minutes. They also had the highest rate of suicide in the galaxy.
With Floyd in tow, he stopped in front of a spaceport gift shop on the way to the bar.
“Say Floyd, let's stop in here first. I need to buy that dividing-day gift for the Boss,” Peter said, and walked into the shop followed by Floyd. Spaceport gift shops, much like airports of yore, were full of snacks, T-shirts, e-books, videos, and souvenirs from the planet below.
“Uh, excuse me, ma’am. I need to buy a gift for an intelligent slime mold. Any suggestions?” Peter asked hopefully of the human, female clerk.
“Hmm, Pouklet fruit liquor makes a lovely gift,” the perky clerk chirped, frowning slightly as she pointed to racks of Pouklet fruit liquor on the store shelves. “Perhaps a keychain?” the clerk said pulling a keychain fob with a plastic ear of corn, a turnip and a tomato dangling from it from off the rack. “A funny t-shirt?” gesturing to a rack of t-shirts with quaint sayings such as, “I got corny on Gargon V,; “You can't beat our tomatoes, or you'll get sauced;” and “My parents went to Gargon V, and all I got was this lousy T-shirt.”