Joker

The view screen dominating the bridge of the warship opened to reveal the Galactic Court.

The Court convened seven times before they found the last member of the Galactic Collective's Ship the Barq, crashed in a space-pod on a forgotten moon way beyond even the outer rim. Teres had survived on nothing but luck and native fungi. It was a miracle that a research beacon, then a probe, finally found him. When they did get to pulling him out, he was emaciated and could barely speak.

"For that very reason the leaches are to be brought in, for memory extraction," the Supremo Maximo said over the shouts of the crowd as Teres simply drooled over his shoes. "It is in order to place final blame on the The Joker that we, the Tribunal do hereby declare it." we must be rid of that menace once and for all.

"Menace, damn here's 2,000 credits I knew it"
"Nah looks like you didn't!"

The sound, the mention, of both The Joker and Leaches in the same utterance, by the same voice, of such supreme authority was enough to nearly incapacitate the onlookers and the millions watching from the various colonies throughout the Galactic Collective- and those that could muster enough power from dead suns to get any reception.

Leaches hadn't been used in Galactic proceedings since the mind- wipe of 7865. Using them was almost torture, and never used on a citizen of the Great Cobalt Collective. Without reservation the patient was covered in a black box field, supposedly given leaches on his scalp that would extract the memories of the incident.

"Surely the loss of five ships by the illegally sanctioned warship, Joker, merits this course of action, place my responsibility in the logbook Chaplain.", the Supremo continued over the drool and shouting and groaning from Teres's throat, supposedly coming from placement of the leeches.

Once they grappled, the court was reduced to a three dimensional hologram that dominated the large chamber. Taking up the first two rows of the amphitheater. It forced much of the press to move up into the more crowded seats. Intrigued, most of them happily gave up their seats. The class was about to get a movie!

The blackness gave way to the charcoal blue that is deep space. The serenity of stars distant and nearby planets did not last long, as the memories jumped and fumbled across the time and space that does not exist in memory. The arena was taken by a barrage of giant beetle ships that protruded arms into transports and shuttles, cracking open small Kianian fighters like opening candy wrappers.

"Those bastards, what we would do with ships like that."
"Don't even think it son."
"Sorry Captain."

"Emergency request, this is the GCS Syracusia requesting immediate assistance, we are being attacked by Void ships," Teres screamed into the comm as he adjusted his space helmet and grabbed at a disrupter pistol before hitting the send button.
In that instant, a nearly sentient plasma attached itself to the hull on the starboard side of the Syracusia. The thing burped and ignited with a sigh as the entire section of the ship exploded in a dome; flinging everything into space.
Teres, thrown out into space, spiraled toward a strange anomaly. It began like a point in space, then cracked into an orbiting singularity, multiplied and sped up into space itself. A tiny ship, like a bumblebee without wings shot out of the spiral- barreling in a wobbly arch toward the enemy craft, then veered off as if the insect was taunting the herd of giant vengeful elephants.

"They just always fall for the damn angler ship don't they?"
"We bet on it, you know how profitable that little vessel is? Nice flying McComb:"
"Thanks, Cap"

The bug in the stampede, began to draw fire, vibrating as its reflectors recombined the energy and threw it back onto its enemy. The parade of ships did not sustain much damage, but it only increased their attention, and thus the fire, at the needle-ship.
The herd of metal elephants, beetles and scarabs and carrion ships began to ignore the transport of measly fighters, focusing on the little annoyance that flapped furiously around their ears. A dome formed around her and it began to vibrate so much that surely a break was going to come.

"Here we come oh boy."
"Shhhh!"

The warship Joker, a fat lobster of a destroyer, manifested out of the fold just as its sister ship was about to be consumed in disruptor fire. The predator descended on the enclosing dome, firing tendrils and whips of pure crackle on the distracted enemy elephants with blast and bullets. Scurrying and skipping from one corner of the canopy of the screen to the other, the only evidence of its presence the exploding elephants.
The Bridge with the view screen exploded in cheers, far away from the studying court.

The needle ship stopped its critical vibrating with a trill of its sensors and sped off, ejecting a cargo of entanglement string that careened and caught a bold whale off its hind leg, falling into another with a lurch and spin.
The warship Joker spun its tail, throwing out a line of pods at the incapacitated ships, life buoys of some sort through the mayhem of the combat.
The elephant and whale ships continued to collide in the storm, coughing a screen of plasma from the warship turned selective cargo vessel.

"Yeah that one was my idea all the way,"

Then the rescuing ship careened toward its needle, opened a cargo bay and sucked it in. As if pointing to a distant star, it jerked into calculated coordinates and opened a worm in space, the same way it came it.
And shot off into memory.

The view screen in the courtroom, as well as the one on-deck of the Joker turned again to the familiar charcoal that is deep space.
"As we can all see it was the Joker that was responsible for the deaths of many of the crew of the flotilla," the Judge Supremo advocated.

The Bridge of the warship Joker lay in complete silence.
"But we saved, them Cap," complained one green-horn to no one in particular.
"There ain't no money in us being heroes son," grunted an old sea hand between puffs of his vapor-pipe.
"Ah and they say there is no money for them in piracy," Captain DP Roberts said over the cheers of his crew, the Joker, far from the stoic conditions of the Galactic Court, once again drifting in space, looking for another vein of opportunity. "Money for both sides at that."