I do not live in a communal hub. I occasionally visit one, when I need to bring a haul back home, but I have others who can carry the load. The walls are my home. I live between pipes and rust, the creaks and groans of the hull are my lullabies when I rest. The darkness is my roommate, and the eerie silence is my neighbor. Sometimes when I am at the edge, I hear others. I listen to their conversations. I learn their languages. And for one, I've possibly befriended them. No one suspects another being in the walls. People will say anything when they think no one else can hear.
I have a small cabal that I work with. They do most of the heavy lifting, bringing back stashes to our home. I do the scouting, the listening, information gathering. And then we set up and we wait. We intercept. We kill. And we collect. We clean up the mess, take inventory of what we can bring home, and the rest is forgotten. Sometimes they leave their gear and run, and we let them. Sometimes they are easier to hit when they can't see it coming.
It's never a pretty job- these people have friends. Family. Children.
But so do we.
And that's all we have.
My ambition is simple. We are a people driven to extreme means of survival. We are wrongfully punished and oppressed for simply wanting to live. Is it such a crime to crave food and seek water? Medicine? Shelter? They would rather waste a clip to our heads and abandon our bodies than help feed our children. They never hurt anyone. They wouldn't dream of it, I know there was a time I didn't. I still don't want to, but we do what we must. We must fight tooth and nail to get by, because one small slip up could cost us our lives.
My ambition is simple, it is something I kill for today, and would continue to kill for in the future. I always stand within arm's reach of death's door.
I just want my people to survive.
Astrid (22, f), Bastian (18, m), and Emmett (16, m)
My younger siblings, who remain at home helping where they can. Astrid holds down the fort while I'm out, she's a decent fighter with a high pain tolerance and isn't afraid to get her hands dirty. Bastian and Emmett have been helping the local infirmary with the medical supplies my team comes home with. I hate my job, but I do not envy theirs. Rationing supplies and making the difficult decisions of who lives and who dies is not something I wish to step into.
Echo Daze (26, f)
A fellow squad member, she does intel gathering and handle the tech side of work. She's just a few years younger than me, but we get along well enough that I consider her a sister. Knows her way around a rifle, and won't hesitate to pull the trigger.
Atlas Rays (52, m)
He was a friend of my father. Another very scary man, with a scarier attitude. He gave me an in to this line of work, said I was the oldest and it's my duty. I never once argued with what he had to say.