Rock the Casbah!

[Sanis Prent]

Sometimes, you just never know when lady luck's gonna stick a shiv in your ass. For me, it happened around Malastare, and for the stupidest of reasons. I'd run a few tons of hooch for some Gran 'businessman' to make some ends. It may seem tame, but a lot of my disposable income comes from seemingly innocent shit like that. The booze was from Ryloth, but to get to Malastare, the stuff would usually get hit by an enormous Imperial tariff. If you just smuggle it in, you can just about name your price, because even if its a high markup, as long as you undercut the tariff, you're in the black.

Of course it never occurred to me that I'd get anything more than a little static from a magistrate or have to outrun a planetary cop. I mean, it's booze. Hardly the Death Star plans, right?

That's what I thought when I left orbit at least, looking for a way to spend my newly-acquired wealth. The first thing that went wrong was my sensor indicator, pinging something really big in orbit.

"Uh, Cirr."

I looked at the giant grey pie wedge in space.

"Was that Star Destroyer here three hours ago?"

Cirr had taken a break from the engine room to grab a sandwich and sit in the cockpit, and his ears drooped.

"Um..."

Okay, no big deal right? Star Destroyers are usually dealing with business far above and beyond having to sort out a bootlegger, right? That's what I thought too, until the comm klaxon lit up.

"Corellian freighter, we have you on our scopes, please identify."

I gave Cirr a weird expression, and hit the vox to reply.

"Uh, hi. This is the Junkyard Dog, just leaving after a delivery of canned fish. How are you?"

I winced, did I really just say that? Anyway, it should be fine, right? I'd used the Junkyard Dog forged ID set plenty of times without incident.

Another klaxon, this time showing four smaller craft exiting the star destroyer. TIE fighters.

"Cirr, you should probably finish that. I don't think they're buying it."

[Cirrsseeto Quez]

Cirr's sense of cowardice overrode his sense of hunger, and he wrapped the rest of the sandwich in a napkin, stuffed it in his pocket, and quickly slid down the ladder to reach the main deck, and down another to the engine room.

"Sanjis, jI know thjis may not be the best tjime to say jit, but jif you can sparre us too many bumps, that would be grreat."

"Can't promise anything, but I'll try to be gentle." came the pilot's preoccupied voice as Cirr switched on the external viewer mounted in the engine room.

Cirr drummed up the shield generator, which was ironically one of the few systems that was actually up to date on maintenance.

"MARCUS, jI thjink we have some trrouble on ourr tajil. Can you contrroll the quad and trry and buy us tjime?"

A pink cyllindrical droid wheeled across an adjacent workbench.

"I'm accessing fire controls now, Cirrsseeto. I cannot promise anything, this really is not in my programming."

Cirr shook his head, thumping a dial that read coolant output with a clawed finger as he felt the ship begin to yaw, no doubt in Sanis's attempts to evade the TIE fighters.

"Nothjing everr seems to be." he said with a shrug.

Layla began to pick up speed, and as the four TIE interceptors closed quickly, the freighter banked hard. The big ship had been zombie-kitted with a rather large array of maneuvering thrusters, which kept maneuverability up for a ship of her size. The TIE's were still more maneuverable, but they were about matched on speed, which was a minor engine miracle that Cirr had worked on for years.

"I'm gonna feed a jump point in to the nav computer, just keep us from exploding until my vector's set, Cirr!"

The Cizerack mechanic was already turning to see to a power coupling that was in the red.

"jI just fjixed thjis!"

As the TIE's approached, a fusilade of red laser blasts spread out from the freighter in a wide arc, to keep distance between themselves and the fighters. Two TIE's still managed to get close enough for an attack run, and one of them scored a few direct hits on the aft quarter. The ship bucked a little, and the lights flickered. A few bins of tools rattled on Cirr's work bench, some falling to the floor.

Cirr growled as he ripped out the defective coupling and punched a fresh one in with record time.

[Sanis Prent]

"Shit!"

Four more TIEs were launched, as the Star Destroyer no doubt sized us up as a little more trouble than originally thought. With nothing but empty space ahead of me, there wasn't a whole lot I could do except to dump the sublights as hard as I could and maneuver what little amount I could. Once my vectors began to align, I couldn't even do that, as I'd have to adjust my approach to line up with the shot to hyperspace.

"MARCUS have you hit anything yet?"

Damn, sometimes I wondered if we actually needed a gunner. Then again, how often do I ever have to use the thing? My philosophy is if you're fast enough, you don't need to shoot in the first place. Maybe I need a new philosophy.

"Sanis, I apologize. You might say I am learning on the job."

"Great, well its pop quiz time, so I hope you're a fast learner."

The lights dimmed again as Layla bucked hard. The TIE's were pushing closer and hammering the shit out of my shields.

"Cirr, how we holding?"

An extremely perturbed and preoccupied voice came through.

"jI just fjixed all of thjis! Damn jit!"

I winced, that bad huh.

Suddenly a fireball blossomed in my peripheral vision. Luck is apparently available to droids, as MARCUS got his first kill.

"Haha, nice!"

The honeymoon was short as we got the shit beat out of us for that. The remaining TIEs had caught up enough to fire. We were shedding shields in a hurry. I tapped the nav computer impatiently.

"Come on, hurry, hurry!"

[Sanis Prent]

Sparks flew across my console with another hit.

"Shjields arre out! Hurrry up Sanjis! We'rre gettjing cooked herre!"

"I know, I know! We're sitting ducks until the jump. Just a few more seconds!"

The smell of ozone hung thick in the air as seconds ticked by like hours. Another blossoming fireball lit up ahead as MARCUS pinged another TIE after a fly-by.

"Here we go!"

The nav computer completed its calculations, and the stars streaked into a kaleidoscope of color as we reached hyperspeed.

I fell back against my seat, feeling damp from sweat as I let out a sigh. That was a bit too close for my liking. A few seconds later, I pulled out of the jump, exiting to deep space.

"Cirr, I'm calculating a micro-jump. How bad are we?"

Slowly, the Cizerack mechanic climbed up the stairs, looking weary and filthy. He eased into the seat adjacent.

"Prretty bad. Shjield generratorr jis gone, and ourr subljight drrjive jis rrunnjing on barrely any coolant."

He sighed.

"We'rre gonna have to put jinto porrt forr a whjile to put thjings rrjight."

I did a star chart glance, and tapped some coordinates that seemed to do the trick.

"How about Tattooine?"

Cirr thought about it, and nodded.

"jIsn't Corrvus wjith the Black Nebula outfjit therre? jI thjink that would worrk."

Corvus brought back memories. Back when we'd done more work along his way, he was working with Black Sun. After that, he'd followed his boss Sorsha Kasajian in the aftermath of a messy divorce from Black Sun, which had led to the formation of Black Nebula. Being the freelance sort of guy I was, I'd kept enough tabs to be able to pick up work with them when it suited me.

"Alright, Tattooine it is."

I looked up the comm frequency, and punched it in.

[Corvus]

TATOOINE
JABBA'S PALACE

"Ohhhhh yeah, Darlin' ... right there."

:: Corvus lay belly down on the bed, with his zeltron lover naked astride his back as she massaged eukamint oil into his huge shoulder muscles.

Kazia was as skilled in massage as she was in quick-draw shooting, and the big Corellian couldn't be any happier. His relaxation was interrupted by an incoming call over the comm. A private channel he set up with certain select individuals ::

"Aw Frack ..." he growled.

[Kazia]

:: Kazia gave him a snurfle as she hopped off to answer the call. Anything that came through on this channel was high priority ::

[Sanis Prent]

A pink-hued Zeltron greeted me as the comm picked up.

"Kazia? Hey, it's Sanis Prent. Is the big guy around?"

Cirr began to slink back down to the engine room, no doubt to begin a long process of cleaning up a lot of damage.

[Kazia]

"Sanis!" :D she greeted, flashing a perfect pixie grin at him through the view screen.

"He's here."

:: She stepped aside as Corvus took the comm ::

[Corvus]

:: Corvus stroked at his bread as he sat down ::

"Hey Sanis. What can I do for you, Brother?"

[Sanis Prent]

I sat forward in my seat a little bit, running a hand through my hair.

"Got one of those 'wrong place at the wrong time' things that went down. Just scooted by an Imperial cruiser that had my number punched, and got pretty cooked doing it. Lost 'em, but we're dinged pretty bad up here, was wondering if I could cool my heels at the palace and give Cirr a hand in getting us patched up."

[Corvus]

:: Corvus whistled sympathetically ::

"Come on down, we'll be waiting for you."

[Sanis Prent]

"Thanks, I appreciate it."

I closed the comm and leaned back in my seat. Still seemed like old times, then.

"Alright Cirr, we're good. I'm gonna make for the Dune Sea outskirts. Help limp us in."

The atmo controls were sluggish, and I had to flatten my approach and come about on a few passes, so we didn't put too much strain on the whole thing. I wasn't sure how fragile the power plant was, so I didn't take any chances. Soon, thin white clouds gave way to a clear and wide-open view. The old ancient B'omarr monastery dominated the landscape in the distance, and I cut the power to ease down into a gentle glide before kicking the repulsors to cushion our last few meters of descent.

We arrived with a thump, and I popped out of my seat, climbing down the ladder.

"Time to see how cooked our goose is."

[Corvus]

:: Corvus stood outside with arms folded, Kazia by his side as the Layla touched down. There were a mixed bunch of Rodians and Mercs, but they weren't part of the welcoming commitee, occupied with their own jobs as they moved about the compound ::

[Sanis Prent]

The gangplank lurched down, another thing that would probably need to get inspected, as I walked with Cirr down the ramp. The big Cizerack shouldered a duffle full of tools and equipment, seemed covered in grime of some sort, and wore a pretty stormy expression on his face as we came to greet our hosts.

"Corvus, Kazia, been a damn long time hasn't it?"

The palace grounds seemed about as busy as they would've been at any time Jabba had held host in the place, so I had to figure that Black Nebula was doing fairly well for itself on the fringe.

[Kazia]

:: Kazia couldn't resist giving him a quick hug ::

"You've stayed away too frelling long." she chided. :p

:: Then she spotted Cirr and gave the Cizerack a playful glomp ::

[Cirrsseeto Quez]

He opened his mouth to warn her that he had been marinading in grease, engine lubricant, and sweat, and she probably shouldn't hug him, but she probably wouldn't have bothered to curb her enthusiasm in the first place.

"Good seejing you agajin, Kasjia."

Aside from the usual good vibes that came with being around Zeltrons, Cirr liked her even still, though he could never really tell how she felt. Was there such a thing as an unhappy Zeltron anyway?

[Corvus]

:: Corvus gave a casual glance at the YV-666. It had taken a beating since the last time he saw it ::

"You love living rough trade, don't you?" he laughed.

[Sanis Prent]

"Not generally, no."

I winced at the litany of battle damage clearly scored across the hull. We'd taken a pretty ugly beating. Cirr wrung an ear in disgust at the sight of it. As usual, he took the freighter's hardships a bit harder than I did.

"I'm usually good about keeping my nose clean, but I guess I can't do it every time. Still, it was a bootlegging run. Of all the things to get nicked on, illegal liquor's one I didn't think anybody would get up in arms about."

I shrugged and shook my head.

"Cost of doing business I guess."

[Corvus]

"Once I get a full damage assessment, I'll see about getting you whatever you need. In the meantime, come on in and kick your boots off for awhile."

:: Corvus led the way into the palace ::

[Sanis Prent]

"Let me get cleaned up, and we'll be there."

I poked Cirr in the ribs, who still seemed preoccupied with his disgust in the state of affairs.

"Hey big guy, let it go. Take a load off, let's go get wasted, have fun, shake it off our shoulders, and deal with it later."

Cirr sighed heavily, and followed me up, slinking out of his damp shirt as he walked back into the ship to use the fresher and pretend to be a civilized person.

[Kazia]

:: Kazia stopped them with a wave ::

"We've got a bath house inside, you drannits!" :lol

:: She laughed at the looks on their faces ::

[Sanis Prent]

We paused in stride, and I looked at Cirr. Without a word, we turned back, following Corvus and Kazia into the palace. After all, who turns down a Zeltron with a bath invitation?

[Corvus]

"We get the water shipped in from off world. It comes down clean from the sky hook and gets sent back up again." Corvus explained.

"Make yourselves at home. Kazia will get you anything you want."

He gave Sanis a friendly slap on the shoulder before splitting off from the group down another corridor.

[Sanis Prent]

It was a scene, alright. Corvus definitely made sure that the social scene at least didn't wither out in the parched desert. The palace was full of revelers, and the scent of pungent spice smoke was ever-present.

I found my way at a bar, with a complimentary Corellian whisky in hand. I didn't even have to say anything. Damn, how about that.

Cirr and I had a matching set of green Twi'lek lady escorts to make sure that we had cool drinks and hot company.

"Man, sometimes I love happy accidents."