The Nemesis

Gerard was concerned. The cargo they took from The Lavandino had been sorted through and consisted mainly of gold, artifacts as well as some digital information that would be extremely useful. But one thing didn't fit, the boy. The boy had no obvious value to the crew, he did not appear to be wealthy judging by his clothes, he had nothing of value on him and his crew members had found nothing on the other ship's records to show where he came from or where he was being taken. The boy couldn't be more than fourteen according to his height, and he was also extremely thin. Gerard was worried about the threat their new guest would pose to his crew.

Gerard was pacing the length of his room when Mikey stopped by to check on him.
"What's wrong?" Mikey asked his brother.
Gerard paused in his pacing to glance at Mikey in the doorway. He resumed the movement once he realised who it was.
"This boy", Gerard began, "He's going to be trouble. We don't know who he is, where he came from, why he was with them....." he trailed off.
Gerard slowly turned towards his brother.
"Mikey..."
"Gee..." Mikey responded in a bored tone.
"What if..... What if he's one of them?"

Mikey was skeptical and raised his eyebrow to demonstrate this to Gerard.
"Gee, I'm sure he wasn't part of their crew", He said.
"But how do we know that?!" Gerard questioned.
"Well, for one thing, they had him at gun point the whole time, he looks like he's been restrained for a bit and he looks like he's twelve. They never take new members Gee, you know that", Mikey reasoned.
Gerard's shoulders slumped when Mikey finished. He knew his brother was right but that didn't mean he was any less anxious.

"I just don't know what to do Mikey", Gerard whispered sadly.
"You'll figure it out. Patrick has the first shift watching him ad he'll start getting info for us as soon as the kid wakes up.

********

Frank had been awake for hours and no one had come to check on him the entire time. He supposed this was good, no one had punched him in the face for a while. What wasn't so good was that Frank had to pee. Badly. At least his feet weren't tied to the chair so he could cross his legs. After 10 minutes of trying to tell himself that he didn't have to use that bathroom, he found he still needed to go. He strained his ears to try and figure out if someone was around to release him. Frank could barely hear shuffles and murmurs coming from behind a metal door and decided that yelling was probably his best chance of getting their attention.

"HELLO? IS ANYONE THERE?!" He called.
The shuffling stopped before the door beeped and two guys stepped into the room. They were both short (but still taller than Frank), and both had ray guns strapped to their belts. The one on the left looked at Frank with a cautious expression and hand rested on his gun. His blonde hair could barely be seen under something Frank assumed was a helmet but looked weird, and his eyes never left Frank's face. The man on the right was not so cautious. He was bouncing around with an obscene amount of energy for and person to have. He had tattoos on both of his arms and Frank could see a hint of another on his chest. He was clapping his hands excitedly as he skipped towards the boy on the chair.

"Oh lookie, you're awake. Glad to see. You scared us when you didn't wake up. It's been a few cycles. You look terrified. Don't be scared, he won't shoot you", the man on the right said in a rush.
Frank wasn't even sure if he caught all of what he said.
"What's wrong?" The bouncy one asked, his face falling from a smile to the look of a kicked puppy.
"I have to pee", Frank blurted.

The two men blinked at Frank, then each other, then back at Frank again.
"Oh. Ok, suppose we shouldv'e thought of that....." Bouncy murmured.
The quiet one sighed and moved behind the chair. Frank felt his hands being released before a gun was placed at his back.
"Stand up and follow Pete", the man behind him said.
Frank gulped and nodded before following Bouncy, or Pete as he now knew.

Pete lead them out of the door and down a long corridor before turning into another. Frank saw several doors on the way to the bathroom on both sides. None of them were open but there were muffled noises coming from a few of them. One of those doors opened when they passed and a man with giant hair stuck his head out of the room. He looked to the man with the gun with a questioning look on his face. The guy with the gun shrugged then pushed Frank to keep walking.
"Maybe their all psychic", Frank thought. Then proceeded to mentally freak out about if they heard him think that or not.
The man with the hair had retreated back to his room when Frank looked back.

"Here we are", said Pete as he pushed a button and a door opened. Frank stepped inside and looked around the bathroom. The walls were white, as was the polished floor, with silver fittings that sparkled in the lights. Frank had thought it would be a small and grimy room considering he was with a bunch of pirates, but he was completely wrong as the room was spotless. The three men moved into the room, the two pirates standing against the wall to give the boy some room.
"Well..... Do your business then. Patrick and I will keep watch", Pete said when Frank stared at them.

Frank blushed and turned to the toilet. He hesitantly undid his pants and lowered them to take care of his problem. It took a while since he could feel two pairs of eyes in his back, but he got over it and felt so much better afterwards. He pulled his pants back up and leant forward to flush the toilet causing his shirt to ride up at the back and someone to gasp behind him. He quickly turned and yanked his shirt back down.

Both pirates were now looking at him with wide eyes but Frank ignored them in favour of washing his hands in the sink. He hadn't experienced running water in years so he took their shock as a chance to wash layers of dirt off his hands and lower arms. He dried his hands and turned back to Pete and Patrick who had snapped out of their shock and were back to a bright smile and a gun pointed at Frank. He sighed and moved towards the door were he was taken back down the corridor, but not to the room that he came from.

Instead, Frank was directed to another room which had a bed, desk, shelves, cupboards and a door which Frank assumed was a bathroom.
"Here we are", Pete said with a grand sweep of his arm.
"You'll be in here from now on", Patrick said, startling Frank as he hadn't heard him speak before now.
"But don't try to leave 'cause we'll lock the door and if you get out, the guard outside your door will shoot you", Pete said with a large smile across his face.

Frank gulped and nodded as he sat on the bed. The two pirates left the room and closed the door. The door beeped several times so Frank assumed that was them locking him in. He leant forward and put his head in his hands. He still had no idea where he was, who he was with, or any idea of how to escape. And even if Frank did manage to get out of the room, he was in space. Space doesn't really leave a lot of options for travel and Frank would need to get to a station to somehow find a way onto another ship.

Frank sighed and lay down on the bed. It had been a long time since he slept on a mattress, let alone a clean one and he intended to take advantage of it. Even if the pirates were going to kill him, at least he would die comfortably and not in some alley back on Hadron.

Notes

More will happen in the next chapter so the story will start to move along soon