Finders, Keepers

[Arya Ravenwing]

[Open to one or two participants other than Vega and I, please PM either of us before entering

The planet has no name. Because when it comes right down to it - do we really care?]

Arya leaned into the wind, the salt air slowly encrusting her in a grimy layer of grit as the ship rode the waves away from the harbor. She could have simply flown the distance to her destination in her freighter... if only air travel was permitted in the sector she was headed to. If only air travel were permitted anywhere other than the capitol.

Wing of the Raven was parked in the long term hanger at the spaceport in the capitol city of Brunnes, and she'd bought passage on the ocean going vessel Her Tears. They were headed to the third continent, a forested and mountainous region that was some sort of nature preserve. The people of the planet had taken enviromentalism to its most 'mental' extreme, trapping themselves on a small bit of land and giving the rest back to 'nature.'

As though Nature couldn't take what she wanted.

The smuggler was on an adventure of a different sort than the kind she was used to. The planet had at one time been full of the slightly feline aliens who called it home, and there were... well treasure was an archaic word.

Arya grinned. But it was treasure she was after. A wave crashed into the bow of the ship and she was soon gasping at the shock of the cold water as it splashed her. It was certainly a welcome change of pace from the
daily grind of avoiding Imperial pickets.

She'd almost forgotten all about Khendon Sevon and the promise he'd forced out of her.

Almost.

[Vega Van-Derveld]

The months had worn long and hard on Van-Derveld. Without Khendon Sevon to guide him, he was a lawless thing, impulsive and destructive. When the trail following Arya Ravenwing had gone cold, Vega had sought satisfaction elsewhere, returning to his grievances with the Empire. In the end, his anger had amounted to little more than a handful of broken bones. An attempted assassination upon the Moff of Doldur, Miranda Tarkin, had almost cost him his life, yet still he lived. The cybernetic leg which he bore, a token from Arya, had been joined by a number of other augmentations, each reinforcing his ever-weakening body.

The leg gave a clunk as he walked; it was a bulky piece of equipment, with none of the finesse of most modern cybernetic limbs. The bartender in the 'Salty Scalefish' could hear him coming, the heavy limp as he walked down the stairs from the lodgers quarters into the inn proper. The port tavern had many customers, but few quite so unique or unusual as the pale man. Without looking up, the 'tender muttered.

“Ships already sailed.”

“What?” Van-Derveld frowned.

“Better get a move on or you'll never catch 'em.”

He didn't need telling twice. Already, he was limping out of the door.

[Arya Ravenwing]

"Miss!"

Arya turned around, one hand still on the railing as the ship rolled underneath her. She wasn't feeling sick persay, but she wasn't sure she'd be able to walk on the deck without holding onto something. The speaker was a human male about her age. He was wearing pants and light shoes, and a tan. She raised a dark eyebrow, "Yeah?"

"Have you ever sailed before?" He caught ahold of a rope near her and leaned closer. He smelled like cinnamon.

"Uh, not really. It seems a bit... old fashioned." Archaic, even. Arya gripped the railing tighter as the ship tipped in the opposite direction. "Pretty stupid not to allow conventional travel around here, if you ask me. Even the Ithorians allow you to fly around."

He grinned, "Well, we don't have their floating cities, and we do allow people to visit the other continents, as long as they clean up after themselves." As the ship pitched he kept his balance deftly. "I hope you enjoy your voyage, miss. You'll have your sea legs in no time."

Arya grunted non-committedly, and was glad when Captain Forsynth shouted at the sailor to rejoin his duties. She released the railing with one hand, and patted her jacket to feel the slight bump of a datapad in the inner pocket. She smiled.

Then the ship rolled with the waves again, and she hurriedly sought the security of her tiny cabin below deck.

[Vega Van-Derveld]

Once a man had reached the point where he could relish devouring the flesh of his own kind, there wasn't much that could make him ill. Though sea-travel was not something that Vega had experienced often, having trained as a cold-terrain foot-soldier, it did not phase him in the least. He stood out on the deck of his ferry at the forward most deck, looking after the blob of colour that rocked back and forth on the waves ahead of them. After a moment, his eyes closed against the wind and he cast his mind outwards, like a fisherman would a hook, in hopes in finding his prey...

[Arya Ravenwing]

Laying in her bunk, in a tiny wooden box that these people called a 'cabin,' Arya closed her eyes and rubbed her temples. To add insult to injury she was getting a migraine.

The ship rolled and her stomach lurched in response. The longer she was at sea, the more she was getting to despise traveling on the water. Arya rolled over, ignoring the meal that she'd brought back from the ship's galley, and tried to sleep.

*****

Three days later she was back up top, clinging to the railing and breathing the first fresh air since the sea-sickness had hit her. Paler than usual, she lifted her face to the sun, and then looked out over the blue-green water that surrounded her.

The ship cut through the ocean like a knife, its sails billowing in the wind. They were coming up on their destination, a former fishing village on the edge of a mountain range. She had her provisions and supplies packed up in her cabin, enough to keep her alive for a week and a half. That's when another ship would be by to pick her up.

Shading her eyes against the sun, she spotted a white speck on the horizon behind them. Arya frowned, blinking in the glare, and made out the sails of a second ship. Someone was coming along behind them. She rubbed the bridge of her nose as another headache started to come on.