Upon his arrival to the station, Darius stepped out onto the metal grid-like gantry that extended to his ship's primary airlock. The fresh battle scars smouldered in the artificial atmosphere of the space dock where his ship was anchored. His usual station ground crew were running their drills to the letter as they made their way to the ship with repair modules. As they moved, the crew chief was heading up the stairs with the usual papers to sign for the station's port master, and the minor repair bill. As he reviewed the numbers in front of him, he cursed his agent, whom resides at this station, for the flawed intelligence he had been given. Sure enough he would have words with her. As much as she liked to pretend that she was doing him all the favours in the world, the truth was that she needed him more than he needed her if she wanted that juicy promotion she kept bragging about. And on more than one occasion, he had made her literally squirm in her seat. It seemed to him like this was going to be one of those times. However, for now, he restricted himself to an inter-station coms call to her stating that he had completed the mission.

He had just got back from a close call with some smugglers working for the Angel Cartel, moving some drugs across Heinmatar. He had caught up with them in Rens, soon after that had jumped from Pator. As he located them on sensors, he quickly warped to them expecting to find a single depredator class ship and a transport. Such a force required a rather lax strategy and he could warp closer to gun range, therefore taking less time to move in on the filth after his usual battery of cruise missiles. Instead he found himself confronted with not one, but 3 depredators, plus an Archangel class ship fitted for medium range attack and heavy missile bombardment. This presented a problem as he was now sitting too close to the bigger ship that he knew was nearly as fast as his Rupture, the ANS Minotaur. This means that he would need to reverse direction and allow the faster and larger ship to chase him just out of gun range, a manoeuvre that would take some time to accomplish in a head on fight. Also his missiles were not laid out optimally for this kind of ship, meaning that he needed to re organise the loading. Again, this takes time that he did not have.

Despite this he had won, but not before losing nearly 25% of his armour to the constant battery of missiles and the powerful guns of the Archangel. How could his agent be so wrong about such a force? It was not the first time he had taken damage, and it would most likely not be the last. After supervising the offloading of the loot he had gained in the fight, he made his way to his agent's office in the heart of the admin bloc at the Republic Security Services station. Usually he restricted general communication to the internal coms or in his ships terminal to save time, and his agent knew that by coming down, she was going to get a chewing out for something.

Some time later, Darius exited the office block and admin area of the station and back to the hangar. As he approached, he was greeted by his younger half brother, Kordan Shakor. They clasped hands as they greeted each other before continuing to the ships stored there.

"So, what's she got you all worked up about now?" Kordan asked. Darius recounted the story of the mission to him as they walked. After shaking his head, Kordan continued, "So what's the next job?"
Darius simply stated "Nothing." to his brothers surprise. It was a little early in the day for his big brother to be calling it quits.
"You got some good money then?" He asked
"Nope." Was all the reply Darius gave him. Again, Kordan was surprised by this. It had been about a week since they spent much of their savings on a new ship, money that was reserved for another project, and he knew that Darius was adamant about making it back quickly and getting on track.
"Oh well," was all Kordan could think of, "Early drinking then." He said with a large smile.
"In a while, I want to look over some stuff first."
"Need a hand?" To that, Darius' reply was a simple shrug of his shoulders as if to say 'if you want.' Kordan began to worry about him a little. Which was unusual because the usual arrangement was that Darius would worry about him instead. He followed him to their corp's office and headquarters and sat down on the small padded chair in the corner, looking at Darius as he slowly lowered himself into the chair.
"Afraid to break it?" Kordan said in jest of his brothers unusually lethargic motions. When he didn't respond, he pressed the issue a little more seriously. "And you were walking so slowly that you seemed to be on egg shells. Something wrong?"
Darius closed his eyes, leaned back in his chair and rubbed his hands over his face as if to wipe away something that was weighing him down. "Ohh, really?" Mocked Kordan with his boyish grin. "So she managed to give you both barrels for once then?"
"I'm just tired bro," replied Darius, ignoring the obvious jibes of his immature brother, "nothing more to it."
"You? Tired?" Darius looked him in the eyes, "You don't look it. No red lines, still looking sharp enough to cut steel."
"It's not that kind of tired. I may not look it, but I sure feel it."
"Feeling old?" He started to laugh, then was cut short when he saw Darius staring a hole right through him. "OK, I quit. Trying to cheer you up is like banging my head against the door."

After a long silence Kordan spoke again. "Why not go home for a bit? Leave me in charge?"
"I would feel better leaving a pet chimp in charge."
Kordan stared at him for a second, grinned widely, then laughed. "At least you can still make a joke bro." He said as he got up to leave. "Maybe there is some hope for you yet." With that he closed the door behind him. Darius leaned back in the chair in the silence.
"Who said I was joking?" Silence. "I wonder how much a pet chimp would cost these days?"

Would he feel good about leaving his younger brother in charge? He had not been with his corp more than two minutes, but he desperately needed a break. He had been hard at it for the last couple of weeks, and it was taking its toll. Did he feel old? At the side of his brother, who was still practically a kid in his head, he not only felt old, but he looked old and he seemed old. Kordan was excitable, that much was an understatement at best. Like a rookie fresh from his first week of combat flight training at the military school. Though as he thought about it, he dared not leave his brother in charge. He would surely come back to find all the ships gone, and his brother sitting in the office with singed eye brows. He could see it now 'Bro, ok listen up. You might not believe this, but it isn't my fault...'

The only other option would be to close the entire shop for a couple of days. They were still short of some money to make up the deficit thanks to their last impulse buy. Though project Isis was as much on track as could be expected and would still be many weeks, if not a couple of months, before it was finally done. That time frame alone made Darius realise there was still a long way to go, and much to do. For once, his brother had his it on the head nicely. A holiday it was then. Just a weekend, to recharge his battery as it were. Then right back into the thick of it.

He made the preparations, checked the bills were paid, made a final deposit in the corp wallet, packed a bag, and jumped into his shuttle to fly to the surface of Matar.