The Pack and Sidemen Oneshots

The Pack Ships- Space Pirates

Preston's P.O.V.

"Oi!" I yelled, falling over onto my butt as Mitch yanked the rope away from under my feet. He snickered and swung on it down from the upper deck until he landed with a thud next to me. I rolled my eyes, he was trying to show off again.

"Oh come on Preston!" He teased, bumping my hip as I tried to get up. "We're in the middle of nowhere, there's nothing to do! Let me have my fun!" I sighed but let him wander up and down on the railing, if he fell of then it wasn't my problem.

Lachlan was watching the whole thing from his little hidey hole under the stairs, where he would hang out if he wanted a break or some peace and quiet. I could him giggling, his hand clamped over his mouth to stop Mitch hearing him.

I rolled my eyes at Mitch one last time before wandering away, waving to Lachlan as I went before going inside, disappearing into my part of the ship that I shared with Rob. He was already in there, lying on his bed devouring book after book simply because he wanted something better to do than fixing an engine that wasn't broken or wandering around the ship.

During the days before a raid there was hardly anything to do, everything was ship shape and we had to travel for billions of miles before we found something to raid. We were in one of those periods now, simply waiting for another ship that we could feasibly attacks with just the 6 of us.

"Hey Rob." I mumbled, flopping down onto the bed with a sigh. He barely looked up, raising on eyebrow.

"What's up?" I shrugged, massaging my forehead with my hands.

"Dunno, having a complete mental breakdown probably." I paused. "I miss home." He smiled sadly, finally putting down his book and coming over to me.

"I know, I do too Pressy. We'll get back there someday but this is the best option for now. There's nothing for us there. Maybe one day we'll get lucky." I appreciated his kind gesture in trying to comfort me, but it didn't help.

I had heard that speech again and again, how earth wasn't good for us anymore, there were too few resources, not enough to go around, how the other planets couldn't sustain us. The only option for us if we didn't want to starve to death was to get off the planet, sustain ourselves by robbing and pillaging other ships as they moved from planet to planet.

I didn't feel great doing it, those people needed that stuff too, but we never took too much, enough for them to stock up somewhere else nearby. We just took enough to keep ourselves going another couple of months and then left them be, hoping one day we'd strike lucky and find a ship with riches beyond our imaginations.

After all, we didn't know what riches looked like. We'd only ever seen poverty our entire lives, family members and friends dying around us from diseases that we supposedly had treatments for but we couldn't afford to buy the vaccines. I sniffled, thinking of my little brother.

Earth had collapsed, global warming and resource scarcity had destroyed everything and the population had gone back to exploding, after all, women had 4 or 5 kids knowing that more than half of them wouldn't make it to adulthood.

I was lucky in that aspect I supposed, I had 5 siblings, only one of which had died before 18, leaving me with 4. Some of the other boys had it worse, Mitch was left with just an older brother after the deaths of 3 siblings, Vikk had lost 2, Jerome had lost 2 as well. Lachlan had it the worst, losing 5 siblings, including his twin brother, all from disease and poverty.

We had decided to leave after that, leaving our remaining families behind on the destroyed hull of a planet in the hopes that we could bring something back to them. In three years we hadn't found anything, but we kept going. We couldn't stop.

"Thanks Rob but it doesn't help." I mumbled, closing my eyes. "I think I'm just gonna go to sleep."

I felt the mattress lift as he got off my bed and flopped back into his, the pages of his book turning almost at once.

"I know it doesn't make it better Preston, but sometimes we gotta have hope. Hope keeps us alive out here."

"I know, I know."

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I stood up on the railing of the ship, telescope in hand and a rope around my waist. A few hundred miles away I could see a transport ship, big but not so big that we would pass it up because of the number of people on board, who could feasibly repel our attack.

Jerome stood behind me, gesturing directions up to Vikk on the captain's deck. He drove most of the time, he was the only one with any sense of direction and could follow the routes of past ships without a second thought, just using the stars. He was our navigator, our captain.

"We need to head south-west, head under the belly. I can see the loading deck and we need to get in through there." Jerome signed that up to Vikk, who nodded and gestured to get back inside. No one could be on deck when we went into hyper speed, they'd be blown off the deck and into the abyss of space.

I yelped and almost fell over as the ship started speeding, jolting me off my feet. Jerome, still on his feet having not even felt the sudden movement, laughed and helped me stand, leading me up onto the main deck where everyone, bar Vikk, was standing. He was up a ladder and could hear our conversation, but there wasn't room for everyone up on flight deck.

"How long do you reckon Vikk!?" Mitch yelled, pausing for the answer.

"10 minutes! We're a couple of hundred miles away tops, it won't take that long." Everyone nodded and we steeled ourselves for the coming attack, our first in a few months, and I could feel the anxiety running around the group.

Lachlan was shifting from foot to foot, biting his lip, Jerome was bouncing up and down, checking that all of his guns were in their holsters, Mitch was sighing heavily and Rob, who was normally the level-headed one of the group, was praying under his breath.

It was a risk every time we did this but we kept doing it over and over, simply because it was our only choice.

"Ready boys!?" Vikk yelled from up on deck.

I steeled myself and nodded, hearing the screeching of the brakes as we pulled up alongside of the ship, metal grapples attaching themselves to the bow so it could get up. Vikk scrambled down the ladder, checking everyone had their armour on properly.

"Let's do this."

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The outcome was nothing less than we'd dared to hope, but still nothing more. We got we needed for maybe 6 months, everyone escaped unharmed and unscathed and we could all breathe a sigh of relief because it was over once again.

Food, water, a generator, clothes and jewellery, fancy electronics, money. We took anything of use and anything we could sell on the black market for some extra money, leaving the ship with enough to sustain themselves for the weeks travel to the nearest inhabited planet. They could restock there, so I didn't feel too bad when I saw the look on some of the richer travellers as we stole their stuff.

Rob kissed me fiercely the second we were off the ship and on our way, safe and sound, and I kissed back. Vikk and Lachlan hugged and Mitch collapsed on the deck after the adrenaline left his body, Jerome helping him down to his room. I watched them go, making sure they were okay before finally turning back to Rob.

"I love you so much." He whispered, his arms wrapped around my neck. "I'm so glad we got out okay."

"So am I." I said thankfully, kissing him lips slowly. "So am I."