Year- 4223

  Staria Empire- Solar System 7

  Planet- Blegvolt

  City- Lauvelle

  ---

  A burly man with dark brown hair and a rather patchy beard was wearing an apron while sweeping the front of his fruit stall with a metallic broom.

  The streets were bustling with activity as citizens of the city walked around leisurely, going about their mundane lives. Children of all kinds played in the well cleaned stone streets.

  The man sighed slightly and sat on a the straw chair placed behind his stall and picked up the galactic newspaper on the floor next to his feet. He crossed one leg over the other and pulled his glasses down from his forehead, peering down at the headline.

  STARIA SOLAR SYSTEM THREE'S RULER, YANNING TEYA'S DAUGHTER REPORTED KIDNAPPED!?

  His face turned slightly sour while reading the article.

  Apparently, she had been kidnapped by a criminal syndicate organisation that had been growing in almost every single one of the Staria Empire's Solar System's,

  They called themselves, Triple S.

  A name which the man in the apron found rather comical to a certain degree.

  No one knew what each S in the name stood for, but their actions spoke much louder than their title. As of recent, they had been reported terrorising a few planets in this solar system, seven. And had also been doing the same across almost every single one of the fifteen Solar System's that belonged to the Staria Empire.

  Of course, places like Solar System one to five were left unscathed due to them being some of the first few subdued by the Empire, and were therefore one of the more powerful strongholds.

  As some children played, one of them stumbled and knocked into the stand, causing a green looking fruit to roll off the top of a pile of them and almost hit the ground. In that moment, the man caught the fruit and stared at the child for a while before smiling.

  "Sorry dad!" The boy said, a wide innocent smile painted on his face.

  Before the boy's father could respond however, most of the people in the street's attention were grabbed by a low rumbling that could be heard in the distant sky. The blue of the sky above began to slowly grow darker as deep grey clouds rolled in.

  The air traffic in the sky consisting of miniature space crafts, large transporters, and personal vehicles did not seem to be slowing down whatsoever. The man wondered how the traffic in the sky was even controlled on different planets, but apparently it had to do with something called a "traffic light system", originating in an age long past.

  Droplets of rain began to slowly pour from the sky, and as one landed on the man's thumb, he looked down as he felt a slight pinching pain. The water was slowly dissolving and sizzling on his skin, causing him slight irritation.

  Most people in the street began to realise this and began to file into their homes, or businesses.

  With a sigh, the man put his newspaper away and quickly got to work with his son who bid farewell to his friends. The two began to quickly close up the stall as the streets were slowly growing much more steamy.

  The man's young son looked towards his father once they were finished packing up, and said:

  "Dad. It's another one of those special rains isn't it!?"

  Ushering his son inside under the canopy, the father smiled.

  "Yes Lenny. Acid rains are common on this planet. Not so much anywhere else in this solar system."

  Having pulled his son inside, the man let go of the boy's hand, allowing him to continue running around.

  "Be careful! Don't knock over anything!"

  After yelling and receiving no response, the man went over to the window and stared out into the street. Steam was clouding the area as the monthly acid rain looked as though it was trying its best to melt anything it touched. Luckily, the acid rain on this planet was not as severe as reports on more desolate planets in the galaxy.

  The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  Due to this being an event that happened monthly or sometimes rarely throughout the year, the housing materials, street materials, and most of the materials used on different planets were modified and made to withstand the acid rain.

  In the beginning though, things were not always like this.

  The origins of the acid rain dated back hundreds or thousands of years to when the Staria Empire was first starting out. The toxins and space waste from large scale projects were slowly causing corruption to different planets, and it seemed to slowly grow more and more terrible over long spans of time.

  Luckily though, the growth was not significant, and measures were put in place to slow down the increase. As a result, numbers of deaths due to acid rains were slowly diminishing, and it seemed the empire was on the brink of achieving one of their major goals for the galaxy.

  With a crack of his neck, the man walked away from the window after tapping the sill a few times with his fingers.

  "I could do with a cup of tea..."

  ---

  June coughed violently, bits of the biscuit he had choked on flying across his table, his feet falling off the table as well from the sudden cough, causing it to shake and the plates on the surface to rattle a little.

  He had tried so hard to look cool and nonchalant in his new black acid rain cloak, and now all of the aura he had accumulated of being the mysterious guy in the corner was practically gone.

  A few people stole confused and awkward glances at him before turning away.

  June could have sworn he heard a few female giggles somewhere nearby.

  He looked around suspiciously and reached for his cup of tea, sipping at it before raising his hand to his ear to turn up the device he was using to listen in on a table on the other side of the bar. Once the voices were no longer as muffled, he sat back again with a smile.

  "All in!"

  "Yeah...Me too! All in!"

  The two men turned to look at the third who seemed to be anxiously rubbing his palm against his forehead. The man seemed to look severely dishevelled with eye bags, a thinning hair line, a lot of white hair, deep wrinkles and an unshaven beard.

  Even his clothing seemed to be extremely tattered. All in all he looked beyond far from someone who was confident in themselves.

  "I-I guess all in?"

  June shook his head with a disappointed expression before taking a bite out of another biscuit, making sure not to choke on it this time.

  'These bastards are robbing you blind old man.'

  It was true. June had been tracking these parading crooks for about three planets now in Solar System 7. Luckily for him, but unluckily for the target they had found, the two men had stopped and had been constantly harassing this man and his family for money, disguising themselves as acid rain protectionists and space craft engineers.

  To June's knowledge, the elderly man owned a farm on this planet and had been suffering from the acid rain causing small amounts of damage to both his crops and cattle. The two criminals took the opportunity and managed to scam the old man into doing certain tasks for them after taking out a loan. Now they seemed to have invited him out for a seemingly friendly game of black jack at the local bar after claiming his hard work was enough to pay off the loan.

  June knew however, this was probably their final act of keeping the man trapped in their schemes. He wondered why someone would go to such lengths for money, but then again, June was a bit of a money hungry racoon himself. But even then, even he had his limits. Or did he? It's not like he knew the old man, and neither did those crooks.

  'Hm. Do I go over? What would I even say? HEY CUT THAT OUT! And then all the ladies would hug me and beg for my contact info...'

  June snickered to himself a little in his own head, taking another sip of tea.

  'No...What if I went over, beat them both up, all the ladies hugged me, AND I became a town hero. Hell yeah!'

  As June's thoughts ran wild, he could suddenly hear a sort of commotion happening on the device in his ear.

  "What do you mean you don't have the money old man!?"

  "Didn't we give you enough leeway with all those loans? We didn't even make you pay us back!"

  The two men mischievously glanced at each other, grins pasted across their extremely punchable faces. A crowd had begun to form, whispers about the situation echoing amongst the people gathered.

  The old man being held across the table whimpered a little and yelled:

  "It was two against one. And even if I won, y-you'd probably cheat your way out anyway!"

  June raised an eyebrow as he turned off the device in his ear, having heard enough.

  'At least he's aware. Time to get to work.'

  June walked slowly towards the other side of the second floor of the bar where a majority of the people were now crowded. He could hear the sounds of struggle from the front of the crowd as the man was continuously harassed and taunted.

  Much like everywhere else in this damned Solar System, absolutely no one seemed to give a crap.

  In June's case though, he didn't necessarily care too much for the old guy, and he could see why others didn't either. What would he gain from helping here? The answer was simple...

  'Here comes the hard part. Shit.'

  June stepped forward from where he was, and into the middle of the small crowd, blending in perfectly. He cleared his voice and opened his mouth:

  "Wow! Two grown men picking on a practically senile old man? I don't know about you guys here, but if I was them, I'd be super embarrassed to even show my face! Because let's be frank, if my skill level was limited to fighting old men, I'd probably jump off a--"

  As June opened his tightly closed eyes during his witty little speech, the small crowd had already parted leaving only June in the middle, the old man had been released from a domineering grip, and the two thugs were glaring at the bastard who had the cheek to insult them like that.

  June grinned slightly.

  'One step closer to some coin!'

  "Good. I have your attention now."