"Actually, I'm not to sure. He was looking for Cloud whenever we split. Hmm, I hope everything is alright," Ryshana thought aloud. Thinking for a second, Ryshana knew that Nic had run into what could easily become a bit of trouble. For some reason though, Ryshana had a feeling she wouldn't have to go looking for him.
Nic and Carman were now drinking Kamonian Whiskey, Nic was obviously annoyed with the situation he found himself in and looked out of the window. He got a good view of the plaza outside the palace, Nic hated what he saw, imperials were everywhere.
"So Nic care to tell me why you've come back?" Carman asked relaxing on the sofa. Nic looked around and walked over to her.
"My ship was running low on supplies this was the closest place where we thought the imps wouldn't be."
"Ah yes your ship, the Echo, you and Jana have made quite a name for yourselves."
"Well we do good work."
"Yes, yes, But last i heard the imps put a bounty on it."
"Really, how Much?"
"100,000 credits"
"That all? I thought it would be higher than that... It's kinda insulting."
Carman laughed "You know i can help you i have friends that can change the id codes for you."
"Yes i'm sure you can but it's never that simple with you, What do you want."
"A favour to be called on when i need it."
______________________________________________
Two men walked Up behind Ryshana and Beryl, one of the men held a blaster and pointed it at them. "Please come with us ladies."
Beryl glanced down at the blaster, discretely poking out from inside the man’s jacket, then slowly met Ryshana’s eyes. “Unbelievable,” she said to Ryshana with a shake of her head. “And here I was thinking this day couldn’t possibly get any worse.”
As Ryshana remained outwardly calm, Beryl wasn’t overly concerned with the men's sudden arrival. After all, Ryshana was a Jedi. Beryl had no doubt that if Ryshana really wanted to, she could make the thugs just go away with one of those Jedi mind tricks.
“So,” Beryl asked the man with the blaster, “where are we supposed to be going?”
“You’ll find out soon enough,” he answered cryptically. He waved the blaster, and nodded towards the back door. “Now, please, come along with us quietly and you won’t get hurt.”
Beryl snorted. “Oh, that’s original,” she said sarcastically. “What’s next? The old, ‘we just want to talk to you,’ or perhaps, ‘we’re just doing our job,’ or, my favourite, ‘it’s nothing personal, it’s just business.’”
“Please, ma’am,” said the man, with all the warmth of a maintenance droid, “we don’t want to make a scene here.”
“That was my next guess,” Beryl said, giving him a quick but wry grin. “That’s the trouble with you thugs. Never any original thoughts.”
The man gave her a rather urgent nudge in the side with the barrel of the blaster.
“Ow!” Beryl said, frowning with irritation, as her ribs were still slightly tender from her encounter with the Tusk Cat. “Alright, alright! No need to get nasty!”
Ryshana smiled lightly to herself as she crossed her arms across her chest. These two men weren't from the casino's security. That meant that they were working for somebody that could pay off the security so they could not only carry weapons into the casino but also so they could apprehend someone when they were called.
Looking straight into the eyes of one of the thugs, Ryshana then stated, "You want to tell us who your employer is."
The thug quickly replied, "We want to tell you who we're working for. Its a woman named Carmen. Other than that, we haven't been told anything else."
Nodding her head in agreement, Ryshana then stated, "Put up your weapons. We'll come peacefully."
The thugs did as they were told, and they led the pair outside the casino.
Because Beryl had only heard rumours and tales about Jedi mind tricks, she was quite impressed at seeing one in action. She cocked an amused eyebrow as the thugs put their weapons away, but said nothing until they were led outside.
"Neat trick," she said quietly to her Jedi friend. "Scary," she added. "But neat."
Just as they skirted around the edge of the main bazaar, Beryl had to do a double take as she noticed a man standing near a malfunctioning droid, his ruff of familiar blond, spikey hair poking out from behind the droid's chassis. It was Cloud.
"Whoops," she said, feining that she had caught her high heel in some imperfection in the pavement and had to fix her shoe. As she bent down, she palmed a small stone. With a very quick flick of her wrist, she threw it, aiming for the edge of the droid.
Ping!
The stone hit exactly where she had wanted it to. Rising and apologising to her two thug escorts for her clumsiness, Beryl was hoping that Cloud would notice her and Ryshana--not to save them, but just to notice that they were going somewhere with two thugs. Perhaps, she thought, he could tell Nic, when he eventually found him, or failing that, tell whoever had been left on the Echo.
"Do you know how to fix an R5 unit?" asked the cizilian. "I do." said Cloud. "See what you can do with it." responded the cizilian.
When Cloud got near the droid, a stone hit it. Cloud looked around and thought some kids were throwing stones at each other. When he turned toward a wall, he seen a glimpse of Beryl's hair. Atleast, he thought it was Beryl's.
"Is it coincidence that someone has the same hair as Beryl?" thought Cloud. "Yeah, but is it possible?"
Then, Cloud looked at the civilian.
"Sorry sir, but I have another matter to attend to." said Cloud appologeticly. "Go see that mechanic shop over there."
With that said, Cloud ran to the outside of the Bazaar. There were two thugs, a Twi'Lek that looked like Ryshana, and a female Human that hair like Beryl's. Cloud decided to follow them and see if it was Beryl.
Jana stared at the comm for several long seconds. On the one hand, they were being contacted by a Dreadnaught... an Imperial Dreadnaught. But on the other, it had destroyed its companion Dreadnaught. Knowing she'd quite likely regret this, she switched on the comm.
"This is First Mate Jana Vincent," she said. "Captain White is away at the moment." After a short pause, she added, "Please make this quick... I... well, please just make this quick. We're a little busy right now."
She decided they didn't need to know she'd been attacked by Tusk cats or that Beryl had gone missing.
"Your ship is currently being targets by our dreadnoughts plantary sensors. In a matter of seconds we could drop 20 or more bombs on your location. Not to menchion your men are being targeted by my snipers. You will reach your captain in two hours and tell him to come here. There is no escape"
Jack rushed in Olivers room and searched the thing high and low, tearing apart the draws, every useless thing he chucked on the floor. He searching for about a minute untill he came across an sirgine labed 'antidote'. "hmm, just a guess but I think this could be it". Jack jolted into the infirmary and quickly (but carefully) injected Oliver with the antidote. "I hope that'll do the trick"
Nic Was confused ny this request of a favour, all the years nic had known carman he had never heard her do this sought of thing. She was a money up front kind of person.
"What kind of favour?" Nic asked
"I don't know, you never know when i may need help."
"You know i don't like owing someone."
"Nic You can take my offer and get supplies from me and leave this world soon, or spend days here looking for them, and we both know you wouldn't want that."
Nic had been put into a corner, Carman was correct the less time Nic was on Naboo the better. Nic looked annoyed then held out his hand, Carman responded by standing up and shaking his hand.
"This isn't how we use to close our deals." She said in a sultury voice.
"That was a long time ago."
((occ-this is proberly the time for ry and be to come in.))
Beryl and Ryshana were escorted through the impressive-looking doors of an equally impressive-looking estate house.
Beryl’s heels clacked on the highly polished patterned marble floor, as she took notice of the artwork and expensive furnishings they passed, then looked up at the chandelier hanging from the ceiling in the wide front hall. “All this, and your employer couldn’t afford to hire thugs with brains?” she said, giving a sideways glance to the thug nearest her. As they passed by a painting, she squinted at it. “Oh, well, that explains everything,” she said plaintively, as she noticed a colour in the painting that shouldn’t have been there.
“What explains what?” asked one of the thugs.
“Why Carmen doesn’t pay for higher quality help,” Beryl replied. She gave a quick look at Ryshana, and mouthed, “It’s a fake.”
They were escorted into a cozy but plush sitting room, complete with a fire in the large decorative fireplace, where Nic stood holding hands with a sultry, but elegant looking woman.
Just as Beryl raised an eyebrow in surprise at seeing Nic, the thought suddenly occurred to her that this might not be a house, but a place of… business. She looked down at her dress, then looked at Ryshana, in her tight leather clothes. “Oh, no...,” she uttered softly, thinking that she and Ryshana had been mistakenly brought here as potential bordello ‘recruits.’
Managing a weak smile, she said, “Erm…hi, Nic. We’re not… interrupting anything, are we?”
Nic looked over at his two companions. "no we just finished our buisness." Nic said walking over to Beryl "She's agreed to re-supply the Echo."
"Well, that's good news. Its a rather interesting way to get a favor from somebody. You know, trying to drag us here at blasterpoint and all," Ryshana replied to Nic. "We saw Cloud on our way in. It may be a good idea to pick him up on our way out."
Oliver began slowly to like human again. The blood from his mouth stopped alos. "That was the one. Thank you".
"What on earth happened to you doc? No wait let me guess.. alachol poisening. You should really learn to controll your drinking habits."
"What do you mean? Do you say, that i drink to much?" Oliver saied, while he began to stand up. A very quickly antidote.
"I can control my drinking - but i could see on my symtoms, that it wasen't from alcohol posion - it was a poision. A poision you normally use, to kill other people". Oliver realisted, what happened and he looked scared on Jake. "Somebody tried to kill me".
Oliver suddenly runned to his computer, and looked at his bottle. "I took the drink from this bottle. "This bottle is from Naboo - maybe i can look up the identification number on the bottle on the PC?"
He began to type the code into the comouter.
"Why would anyone wanna kill a doctor like yourself? Is there anything I should know Oliver?" Asked Jack as he followed the medic to the computer
"I had some problems. before i joined the Echo. I know many people. who would like to have me dead." Oliver saied, without even look at Jack. "There was a conflict on Dantooine, and...."
Suddenly something popped up from the PC. A adress to where, the bottle was produced. Oliver looked on the name, and looked choked.
"I don't belive this! The bottle is from him!" Oliver showed the name. Nothing speciel - a Karl Notting from Dantooine. "It's my brothers company!"
"Great. You brother tried to poisen you. Thats got to be ocward. Sometime I'm glad I only have a sister.." said looking at the screen "It's a shame we can't go and kick his sorry ass right now. You should talk to Nickie about that."
"Resupply us?" Beryl said to Nic. She gave a sideways glance at Nic, then at Carmen, then Carmen's thugs. From all outside appearances, Carmen looked like an upstanding and wealthy citizen. But from the thugs, the rich furnishings for appearance's sake, and the calculating look behind her eyes, Beryl suspected that Carmen's history was a bit more delinquent than debutante.
What she wanted to say to Nic next was, "With what? Stolen merchandise?" What she ended up saying was, "That's very generous of her."
"Well, that's good news. Its a rather interesting way to get a favor from somebody. You know, trying to drag us here at blasterpoint and all," Ryshana replied to Nic. "We saw Cloud on our way in. It may be a good idea to pick him up on our way out."
"Way out? That's the best suggestion I've heard all day," Beryl commented. "Nic, can we... can we just go back to the ship now? I've had a really, really bad day."
"i'm sure you have." Nic sarcastically replied looking at Beryls dress. He turned to Carman. "The ship is in th..."
"Forest near the swamp just outside the city, I know." Carman interrupted
"of cource you do."
"Well a ship being hunted by the imperials does attract my attention."
Nic turned around and began to walk away, he flicked his hand signaling Beryl and ryshana to follow.
Ryshana looked a bit sideways at Nic as he gave them the signal to leave. "What's with the hand signals?? Can't you just order us to come along like you usually do?" Ryshana asked mockingly as she followed Nic with Beryl by her side.
Catching up to Nic, Ryshana gave him a quick smile to let him know that she was just joking.
""Great. You brother tried to poisen you. Thats got to be ocward. Sometime I'm glad I only have a sister.." said looking at the screen "It's a shame we can't go and kick his sorry ass right now. You should talk to Nickie about that."
Oliver looked at Jack. "What should he do that? It dosen't make sense to me. He was been angry on me since my father died, but..." Oliver suddenly realised, what was happened. "I must go to Dantooine soon!"
Nic walked out of Carman's house, and began to walk in the direction of the Echo. Nic looked back to see if Beryl and Rysahana were still following. Nic turned back and smiled to himself, they were finily getting off the planet.
"I'm afraid we can't. We're in a bit of a sticky situation..." said Jack "Your family fued is going to have to wait. And anyhow, how did he manage to get a bottle in here?"
"I buyed this special bottle through this PC, from one of the normal juma-juice companys. It's much easier to buy through the PC. But, the company must have hacked my PC - why should they possible know, where and when i would buy alcohol?" Oliver searched on the PC agian. "Oh, my brother is actually very rich now. Try and look". Oliver shoed Jack a site, with an description of Karl Notting. "He is actually also mayor in one of the small farmer citys now. Actually the same place, where my father were mayor. Strange, i thought Karl hated that place".
"hmmmm, I so what's the family fued about? Because, last time I checked that brothers don't usually try to kill their brother for the pure hell of it.."
"I don't really know it myself, to be honest. They had always blamed me, but i don't know how.". He didn't say that with confidence. "He just...hated me".
Cloud watched Ryshana and Beryl go into a house with some thugs and he waited. Then, he seen Nic, Ry, and Beryl walk out. He waited awhile and walked out to beside Nic. "What happened Nic?"
"Maybe he completely lost it under the stress of losing a father. Or maybe he's in league with the empire. There is a rather large bounty in our heads. But that's the least of our worries. We have a top of the range dreadnought swearing to blow us to shreds unless we do a job for it. Your going to have to worry about your family fued later."
"Well - i suppose your right. But after our "mission", i would like to go to Dantooine again. If have something to... do". The last sentence ends sith a mumble.
Cloud watched Ryshana and Beryl go into a house with some thugs and he waited. Then, he seen Nic, Ry, and Beryl walk out. He waited awhile and walked out to beside Nic. "What happened Nic?"
Beryl smiled, very happy to see Cloud. "Nic's made a deal with a...." She paused, wanting to use the word 'crime boss' to describe Carmen to Cloud, but deciding that it probably was best to be conservative with her judgements for now. "...with a friend. She's agreed to resupply us." She gave Nic a wary look. "For some unknown reason that our Captain has yet to disclose," she added quietly.
"By the way, Nic," she said, "supplies...does that include clothing? If we're walking to the Echo, I really need to get a pair of more durable shoes. Oh, and a new leather jacket, as mine got used as a chew toy. And a pair of trousers. And...." She shifted uncomfortably. "Well, do we have time for that? At least for the shoes, anyway. High heels are not the sort of thing I want to be wearing when treking through the forest."
Nic looked at beryl and smiled. "We don't have time for that, we need to get to the Echo Now, Beside's the dress suits you, Given a differant start in life you could have been a buisness women, Lady of leisure, a dancer or a whore, the life you could of lived."
Beryl's eyes narrowed at Nic. "Oh really? It suits me, does it? You think I'm wearing this by choice!? Thought I'd put it on just to spice up my life and have a little fun while I was in town? Dream on, fly boy!" She pointed a finger at him. "And if you mention the word 'whore' again, I'll deck you but good!"
She pushed past all of them and walked on ahead of them--angry, tired, and just wanting this horrible day to end.
As Beryl shoved past, Cloud couldn't help thinking about the right words to say to a woman. Nic had defonately said something wrong there. Although, he couldn't help but snicker when Nic said "whore". "Nic." started Cloud. "You don't call a woman a whore because she looks like one. I know you didn't acually call her a whore, but you get the idea." Cloud started to think about the 'friend' that was resupplying them. He couldn't think of anyone. Then, he thought of 'friends' that Nic knew.
As she stomped away, Beryl felt a bit guilty at losing her temper with her captain like that, but...dern it! He deserved it! She knew she was dressed like a street harlot. Hadn't wanted to wear this flimsy dress in the first place. But at the time, she hadn't had much of a choice. Penni had been right--the clothes she had been wearing would have exposed more bits of her than this dress did. But it didn't make her feel better to know that not only did she look like a whore, but Nic and everyone else thought she looked good as one.
As she passed by a rubbish bin, she gave it a good, hard kick, imagining that it was a body part of Nic's. She winced a bit afterwards, but thought it was better to have a dented rubbish bin and a sore foot, than a captain doubled-over in pain.
She looked down at her shoe. It was scuffed. "Crap!" she seethed. She couldn't wait to get back to the Echo and into some 'normal' clothes.
Ryshana just shook her head at Nic's comments. "Smooth one there, Captain," Ryshana stated sarcastically. As Beryl stormed off, Ryshana quickly followed her, but she was too late to stop her from kicking the trashcan.
"Hey, ease up there. The can didn't make the insensitive comment," Ryshana stated. Looking down at the scuffed shoe, Ryshana smiled a bit. "That's ok. I've got some polish in my stuff for that sort of thing. Come on, we'll leave the boys to sort things out on their own while us sophisticated women head on back to the ship by ourselves."
"Well that went well." Nic said taking his sunglasses out of his pocket and onto his face. "c'mon cloud the quicker we get back to the Echo the quicker we can get off this imperial rock."
Nic and Cloud set off and walked through the forest, although it may be dangerous for the group to split up again but Nic decided Ryshana and Beryl could handle themselves. It didn't take long for the captain and engineer to reach their ship, Nic opened the loading ramp and walked in.
Cloud quickly followed. Then, he started to think about his father. That made him feel down. Where was he? Is he alive? How will I find him? "I found out about my father while we were in Theed." said Cloud. "They don't know where he is."
Nic stepped into the cargohold and looked back at Cloud. "Cloud i don't want to seem unsensitive, but he has been missing for years, you have to prepare yourself for the worse."
Nic went to the control panel and closed the loading ramp. "Now prep the ship best you can we want to leave as soon as Carmen's guys get here with the supplies." Nic hit the intercom button. "Hey guy's anything interesting happen while i was gone."
"Hey guy's anything interesting happen while i was gone."
Oliver hit the intercom buttom. "Not that much - the only thing is maybe, that i just have been close to die by a deadly posion - but not that interesting".
"It's been pretty boring here. Not much has happened. Oh before I forget you need to talk to the Dreadnought captain via com or he's going to bomb us to kingdom come."
Nic took his hand off of the intercom button. "and i thought my day was interesting."
Nic ran up to the bridge and saw Jana standing there. "What's going on in my ship? i leave for five minets and all hell breaks loose."
Beryl appreciated Ryshana's company on the way back to the ship. At least Ryshana didn't make any derogatory comments, just pleasant conversation. And, all things considered, she felt less aprehensive walking through the forest having a Jedi as an extra set of eyes and ears.
But as Beryl stepped on board the Echo, she paused just at the top of the ramp, a shocked look on her face.
Turning to Ryshana, she said, "The Headhunter! I forgot about the Headhunter!" She shook her head. "I was so focused on just getting back to the ship, that I totally forgot about it! I have to go back for it."
She started back down the ramp, then paused, once again feeling a bit apprehensive of treking through the wilderness, given her most recent and near deadly encounter with the local fauna.
"Erm...Ryshana...," she started hopefully, "...erm...do you know how to fly a Z-95? You see, I'm not really dressed for flying, and you'd only really have to fly it into the ship's drop hanger once the Echo's in the air." She gave Ryshana a weak smile, hoping that she would agree to do it.
Ryshana smiled a bit and replied, "Well, its been a couple of years since I've flown a Headhunter, but most fighters are fairly similar to each other. Well, at least the controls are similar. You don't have any special settings on it or anything, do you?"
"Not since my brother's people 'fixed' it," Beryl said, sounding a bit disappointed. "I haven't had time to reconnect any of the enhancements I made. Like the remote piloting system. Otherwise, I could have used the sim unit to bring it back." She paused a moment. "So, you should be fine. Does that mean you'll do it?"
"Sure. Just make sure you stop by my room if you need some polish or something to fix up your clothes," Ryshana replied. Turning around back to the forest, Ryshana very quickly and quietly made her way to the Headhunter.
As she approached, Ryshana could sense something odd about the whole situation. As she reached the clearing, Ryshana stopped before she entered it. Everything was quiet. Way to quiet for a forest. Looking outwards with the Force, Ryshana could now sense a number of stormtroopers and an Imperial officer waiting concealed in the brush. Well, this isn't I can't handle, Ryshana thought for just a moment. She didn't sense any trip wires, pressure plates, or remote explosives, so she decided to just simply walk calmly into the clearing.
As soon as she entered the clearing, an entire company of stormtroopers very quickly surrounded her. They quickly yelled at her to surrender. So, Ryshana quickly put her hands up above her head. The Imperial officer then stepped out into the clearing. "You are under arrest, twi'lek," he stated.
"Why, I was just out for a quick run-"
"Stuff it. Now, we know that there was twi'lek Jedi around here recently, and judging by your 'leg brace', I'd say that we just found it. Troopers, fire at-"
Suddenly, Ryshana quickly gathered the Force around her and slammed her hands onto the ground. A massive shockwave then flew out from around her, tossing the Stormtroopers and the Imperial Officer like ragdolls. Quickly reaching out, Ryshana grabbed the officer in midair with the Force and pulled him back to her. Simultaneously, Ryshana pulled out her lightsaber and ignited it next to the officer's neck.
After a couple minutes, the stunned troopers began to wake up. However, they suddenly noticed that they had been stripped of their armor and weapons and were each individually hanging from a tree branch by their wrists. The other thing they noticed is that they weren't back in the barracks. Somebody had kidnapped them and strung them up in the forest. ((or so they think. Ryshana used the Force to erase the memories of them finding a Jedi.))
Meanwhile, in the clearing, Ryshana was just finishing tying the officer to the underside of the Headhunter. "Hey, you can't do this to me!" he yelled out.
"Sure I can. Besides, I have a funny feeling that we'll need you in the next couple of moments," Ryshana replied as she unlocked the cockpit and jumped inside. Closing the hatch, Ryshana quickly familierized herself with the controls and prepared to take off. Activating the com, Ryshana tuned it to the proper secure frequency. "Echo 1, this is the Headhunter. I'm ready when you're ready."
With Ryshana away getting the Headhunter, Beryl closed up the ramp and then headed for the bridge to see what was going on, and more importantly, when they were leaving.
She found Jana, Nic, and Jack in the bridge. "Ryshana's gone after the Headhunter," she said, then she noticed the very serious looks on their faces. "Erm...something wrong, guys?"
"Wrong is a bit of an understatement. We have a dreadnought who has threatened to bomb a hundred bombs on our location unless Nick speaks to the Dreadnought captain. Hint hint" Said Jack looking at Nic
Nic walked over to the comm station, He was confused and wasn't sure what to say so after a few seconds he pushed the button and simply said. "Hello."
"Captain White. I have a job perposal for you. In return I let you live,Iwill lower the bounty on you which is rising every day and give 10,000 credits in return. All for a simple retrival job. Are you interested?"
Beryl stood there for a moment while the Captain of the Dreadnaught spoke. Then, looking at Nic, she said, "Well, looks like you've got your work cut out for you." She began to slowly back out of the door. "I'll just... go and change into something... more appropriate for a bombing, or mission, or... whatever trouble you're about to get us into."
She hurried down the corridor, not wanting to know what Nic was planning to do. The least she knew, the better off she was, was her line of thinking.
She opened the door to her room, and let out a huge sigh of relief. Not bothering to close the door, she sat down heavily on her bed. "Home," she sighed.
She took off the shoes that Penni had bought her and ran her finger over the scuff from kicking the wastecan. "Think I'll take up Ryshana on her polish," she said, examining the shoes. Then she frowned. "Huh," she said, just now noticing the manufacturer. "Nucci?" She snorted. "Empire's paying their sergeants well these days."