Rettic’s Log: The Record
“Just…Rettic?”
“Yes, that’s right. Just Rettic.”
The agent flashed a sarcastic smile back at the capsuleer, who sat relaxed, making the plastanium chair look much more comfortable than it felt. He saw her thumb through his files out of the corner of his eye, all three pages, as he looked ahead through the tinted glass at the shadows of murmuring station-dwellers passing by. The banter of market salesmen and cheap souvenir vendors shouting on the bridges was barely drowned by the hum of the broadcast unit in the hazy room. This was a Gallente station, all right.
The agent closed the folder. “Well, Rettic, you have barely an account as a capsuleer,” she said as she looked up at his rolling eyes. “But enough of one to land yourself in three corporations in a matter of weeks. Moving kind of quick, aren’t we?”
Rettic leaned forward with a half-apologetic grin, “Actually, ah, I wouldn’t count the Caille University as one of the three.” Seeing no amusement in her lack-of-expression, he sat back again, slowly. “…For the record.”
“For the record…right. Well, listen, I don’t know how a poor-as-shit son of a miner like you gets to be a capsuleer, and apparently CONCORD doesn’t either. Do you get what I’m saying?”
The crackling news monitor buzzed the monotonous voice of Scope reporters in the corner of the room, diverting the agent’s attention for a moment. Some big news story is going down.
“You’re saying you’d like to get to know me a little more… How about dinner?” Rettic interjected.
“I’m saying you don’t have a record, pilot,” she threw back at him with apparent satisfaction. “Trust isn’t our currency. It’s Kredits. And our corp isn’t handing out either to a pilot that can’t supply a proper history file.”
Rettic was looking out the window again as the flashing of a neon sign hanging from the foggy silhouette of a Jin-Mei salesman lit the room in a heart beat rhythm. Pleasure films, very cheap, pleasure films, ultimate fantasy, the man’s voice chanted in syncopation. Another dead end, he thought. There isn’t an end of empire space that CONCORD doesn’t have under its watch, and if you don’t work by their laws, you don’t work. Well, not unless I’m desperate enough to hit the outer regions. You aren’t there yet, are you, Rettic?
He thought of his sister. The money. He was desperate enough.
“As a matter of fact, under protocol I’m going to have to get security to have a closer look at this,” she continued with a smile. “So, if you’d like to stay put, I might have you stick around for dinner after all.”
“You know what, that’s alright.” He leaned forward to stand.
“I wasn’t asking,” she said as she lifted a pistol from under her chair and began to reach for her comm-unit.
And there you have it! The flickering news monitor interrupted the moment with a sudden change in volume…Coming to you live, from Scope Galactic News, Colonel Roc Wieler has just pleaded “guilty” to charges of practicing slavery…
“Well I’ll be damned,” the agent said in disbelief.
Seizing the opportunity, Rettic lunged his legs forward, slamming the agent’s desk against her chest with a screech. The pistol let loose from her right hand and dropped to the concrete floor. Rettic grabbed his file and threw open the office door, nearly knocking the porn salesman to the ground as he ran. The curses of the old Jin-Mei were soon smothered by the echoes of the passing crowd as the figure of Rettic disappeared into the thick of the neon jungle.
“Orvolle III security…” the comm mumbled. The agent gasped for breath, unable to reply.
“I repeat, this is CONCORD…are you in need of assistance?”
Rettic’s Log are the accounts of Rettic in-character, his history, and the story of my experiences in New Eden as seen through his eyes. Read all of them here.
