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The infamous pirate ship once owned by Maxwell Dalton, but now under the command of Akira Steele.

“Of course.” Akira answered with a grin as she watched Dalton look around his old baby for the first time in many years. She'd taken good care of the thing, or rather made sure the crew had taken good care of it. With Dalton in retirement the Afterglow was irreplaceable, though unfortunately parts had needed to be replaced while he was gone. Pirates life certainly wasn't easy on a ship. Still much of her success over the year a lot to do with the amazing custom ship. “Our local Escala was quite impressed by your work, though I suppose I should let him tell you. We've taken really good care of her, though she did get roughed up a bit taking that Genesis ship. They are nasty those B67's. Would have never made it without Afterglow. Perhaps we can hook you up with some of our loot. Common.” Akira said with a grin waving her arm to follow her. While they walked she talked about the epic battle with the cargo ship they had managed to loot. Not as well equipped as the B67, but no walk in the park either. Genesis took pains to protect their tech. They'd lost a few members and Afterglow took some damage, but the profit after more than covered it. Soon they reached the cargo hold. It was black inside while Akira pushed open the door, but soon she flicked on the light. “Surprise!” Shouted several voices, some he'd recognize some new who clearly had no idea what the big deal was. Confetti flew threw the air. On a large table sat a rather large cake and not Champagne, but bottles of rum and whiskey.

“And here I was worried you would be upset someone touched your ship, or maybe even jealous of the Escala brilliance.” Akira smiled and winked at him thinking of a noticeable incident involving a new crew member messing with the engines. Dalton had tried to recruit an engineer type so he could spend more time being captain, but had ended with the poor kid no longer breathing. “Share and share alike says I. Just stay away from my armour mod.” She was rather proud of that addition and she'd kill Dalton before letting him near her new equipment. With it she'd been unstoppable in battle, though to be fair most of their targets didn't possess such equipment so it hadn't really been put to the test since its acquirement. “You would have never stopped whining about it if we didn't!” Akira told him loudly while the rest of the laughed, though the new members a little more uncertainly than the old. “Well why don't you go feel him out, after you cut the cake.” She told Dalton before leaving him to pour her own drink, a healthy sized rum. There were advantages, or maybe a disadvantage to her none human half. She could drink any human or Escala under the table easily.

“You warned him by putting him in the airlock!” Akira corrected with a laugh and a big smile. She couldn’t be to too critical of the move having fired warning shots into a person’s head on more than one occasion. In their line of work there was no room for morons, laziness or oddly enough selfishness. The crew was family, closer then family even, because any one of them could potentially get them all killed during a raid. She watched as he worked the room and chatted a bit with her second about Dalton’s plan to go after the space cruiser. Naturally the crew were all curious why Dalton was back, if he was back permanently and who was going to be captain of Afterglow. Honestly it was good to have him back. It was tempting to try to convince him to just bring his wife aboard the ship. Her armour mod definitely wasn’t a stabilizer for his gun, but before she could explain he cut her off with his speech. “It’s usually the molars.” Akira chimed in while a couple of their enforce types dragged the poor guy forward. Actually she had been feeding the spy misinformation for a while now, but she couldn’t help but be impressed on how quickly Dalton had picked up on it. Someone handed her a pair of pliers while the two crew members forced the guy on his knees and the guy really started panicking, protesting the idea of him being a spy. “So who do you work for? My money is on genesis.” Before he could form any sort of answer Akira had the pliers shoved in his mouth and seconds later pulled them out with a molar gripped between them. “What do you think, is it this one?” She asked over the guys screams and held it up for Dalton in inspect. Most of the crew was grinning as they were obviously ******** with the guy. Teeth were too easy to remove and had stopped being the ideal location for spy bugs long ago. Besides they were definitely going to kill him when they were done anyway.

Akira opened the pliers and let the extracted tooth fall to the ground. “Well….” She began, ignoring their captives begging and promising to tell them whatever they wanted to know and reaching into his mouth once more with the pliers. “I think we should leave his tongue or how will he tell them about all the horrible things we did?” There was a soft grunt followed by a muffled scream as she pulled out a second tooth. This time she merely dropped it on the floor and reached in for a third. “A brand on the chest is too easy to cover up. I say we do something to his forehead. Skull and cross bones maybe or the word Afterglow? And he deserves a Darwin award.” Someone who was so obvious didn’t deserve to procreate. She didn’t know where they found the guy, but he was a terrible spy.

“I suppose that’s a fair point. They knew who they were sending him to, so it shouldn’t be too hard to figure it out. Then again they did send this moron. Maybe we should implant a holodrive in him just to make sure they get the message.” Akira pulled out the third tooth before standing up. This time she handed the pliers off to the first man in line to get in on the torturing. “You want our emblem to be the outline of Afterglow? Look I know you have a thing for the ship, but I think that’s taking it a little far.” She said with a grin and her hands on her hips. Finally she went got her own piece of cake while the crew went to work on their poor captive. “Honestly I can’t think of anything better. We might have to go with an outline of Afterglow.”

“Hey, I’m worth having a spy on the ship, I’d say my image is fine!” Akira countered sounding indignant. Or at least trying to around a mouthful of cake. “Besides you say how much my bounty is worth these days. If anything it’s your image that needs work.” Not that he wanted to work on his image these days. They just had to know right? Like his wife couldn’t not know could she? Then again, being a pirate Akira was pretty wrapped in in the underworld where everyone knew everyone that was worth knowing. It could be different for more honest folk. “If we use my name it’ll look like he had a very angry ex-lover, not tortured by a pirate.” Akira pointed out. "We need a brand name I think, like the “red hand” or something catchy. Really get our names out there. Here comes the red hand sounds way more frightening than look out for Akira! That or we are giving me a nick name of some kind. Do it with lasers, but have them move really slowly so it takes quite a while. He’ll have to strap him down.”

“But misinformation means I control them, which is much more fun in my opinion.” Akira pointed out. While she enjoyed a challenge, evident by her allowing her bounty to run so high, she also used advantages when they were available. She couldn’t help but snort and laugh when Dalton professed himself to be an all-round decent person. “I’m not sure the people in the Cantina will agree with you. I’ll give you credit for the good husband bit. Hey, why aren’t I a God Mother yet?” Naturally she didn’t know too much about his civilian life seeing as association with her and her public reputation put at risk not just his reputation coming to light, but people coming after Dalton and his wife. However he gave up his mechanical child Afterglow for this woman so no one could argue he wasn’t a good husband. She glanced down at her wrist and typed something into the minicomputer strapped there. “Grappler, mauler, brawler….Hell-Rooster? I’m not sure what that has to with scappers, but I like the sound of it.” Evidently she had looked up synonyms for something less naff. “I think Scappers suit us though. I’ve been thinking while you’ve been making friends. Don’t freak out. What if rough up Afterglow a bit, put ourselves in the path of the cruiser and send out an emergency distress beacon? It’s be easier and cheaper than trying to get hired on as crew or impersonating some ticket holders."