Vaelen Scrap & Salvage: Metal & Mesh in Bulk!

[Rinny]

Introduction



The room smelled like fresh baked sweet bread, a smell a young Nashara Vaelen would forever associate with her home and her mother.  It was a small two room apartment tucked into a towering building on the near-lawless moon of Nar Shadaa adjacent to the Red Light Sector.  The sounds of the city would lull her to sleep, she didn't even flinch at the occasional sound of blaster fire or the frequent shouted obscenity.  But then there was her mother's screaming...

Slowly her eyes opened as the haze of the childhood dreams faded away.  Head pounding, she made herself sit up and observe the mistake she had made yet again.  Snoring next to her was the naked form of the ship's medic, a half empty bottle of amber liquid on the table beside him the fuel for this dalliance.  Ship life was a series of peaks and valleys, the valleys were full of routine and boredom which could lead to unhealthy activities.  Too long they had been stuck on this ship and in this valley, even being in the Core instead of the Outer Rim didn't change this.

By the time Nash was pulling her boots on, Milo had woken up and she could feel his eyes on her back and that smirk on his lips.  "Is this why we never use your quarters? So you can sneak out before I wake up?"

"We have to stop doing this."

"Why?"  The smirk had grown into a full grin.

The Captain didn't answer.  Instead she stood and walked to the door, slamming her hand onto the release mechanism.  "I need a list of the supplies you need the next time we dock."

"Get some more Gorksin Ale, it cures rudeness."

The door shut behind her, but not before she heard more grumbling coming from the Doc.  Nash's abrupt and almost unfriendly exit had spoiled his mood, and that made her smile as she strolled down the corridor.

~*~

Minik, a Sullustan who could pilot the massive GS-100 as nimbly as any light freighter, or so was claimed, was busy pulling wires and boards out of the main navigation console when Nash finally made her way to the bridge.

"Minik!  What are you doing!"  The Captain bent over  the mess trying to make sense of the chaos and the reasoning behind it.  "We're going to fly into a warzone in a matter of days and you're destroying my nav!"

An exasperated hiss preceded the torrent of his native Sullustese.  "[That flakey human girl insisted we tie the nav into the long range buoys.]  Idiot."  He threw in the Basic insult.  Minik was usually cool in a crisis and always good for a joke or two, but he disliked anyone, including the Captain, messing with the inner workings of the bridge equipment.

"Lisette treats the Crow like an oversized droid.  I'll send her up to help you fix this."

"No!"  Minik nearly leapt from his fort of wires, waving a spanner in protest, the pink flesh of his head turning a slight shade darker.  "[Just keep her away from the bridge. I don't need her brand of help.]"

"I'll send Molly then, it'll help."  Nash straightened and crossed her arms over her chest.  "I need this fixed, Minik."

Lisette was a woman grown, but still acted much like a child.  She was a genius with the droids, had even programmed an old defunct M0-L1 protocol unit, affectionately called 'Molly,' to do a wide variety of tasks beyond its original design.  Despite that, Nash would have dropped her at the nearest port long ago if it wasn't for the fact that she was Doc Milo's little sister.  They were a package deal, and there weren't too many medical professionals lining up to join a salvage crew.  In contrast, when Nash had first purchased the massive old bird, skilled pilots fell over themselves when she put feelers out in search of a crew.  

The GS-100 was a unique vessel in that it didn't need a large crew.  In fact, it could have been piloted by one person and a team of droids.  The Captain supposed that if salvage was her only business one woman against the galaxy would be an adequate situation, but very lonely.  The crew of the Hooded Crow weren't just her employees, they were family.  The Crow scarified a bit of extra cargo space for additional crew quarters and amenities.  The space required for a few more people to live comfortably however was near nothing compared to the hundred tons of durasteel that could be piled into its depths.

A throat cleared in the doorway behind them and Nash turned to see the blue Chagrian form of her loadmaster, Antal.  The two of them had been in it since the beginning, in fact Antal had originally turned her onto the idea of a salvage enterprise of her own back when she still worked for the Hutts.  "You should come see this, Captain.  It's started."

~*~

The main common area was a large open space, broken up by the various pieces of furniture and stacked crates of supplies.  On one side was a small kitchen area with a table and mismatched chairs.  On the other were a couple of couches, also mismatched and looking as if they had been pulled out of a refuse pile along with another table which hosted a discarded sabacc game.  In the center there was a large holo terminal and computer console, which Lisette insisted the only way to enjoy using the HoloNet was with a 360 view.

That's where everyone aboard stood, except for Minik who remained on the bridge, watching as the horror of war continued, this time in the very heart of the galaxy.  Lisette was quietly sobbing while Milo tried to comfort her.  Antal stood silently with his arms crossed over his chest watching as the images flashed in and out on the holo.  The surface of Coruscant was becoming unrecognizable before their eyes.  Troop ships, walkers, legions of soldiers swarmed over the Capital.  After a moment it appeared a bomb had hit the camera, quickly it would swap to another view.  This happened several times before Nash stepped up to the console.

"Surely there's an orbital feed.  See what the pickings are."

"How can you be so heartless!"  Lisette snapped at her.  Her brother's arm quickly pulled her back into a soothing embrace.  "There are people down there dying!"

The image changed from the surface battle to the sight of a vast collection of starships.  Some in broken pieces and others trying to maneuver, but all were alight.  It was as if the stars had been replaced by a sea of fire.  After a moment Nash spoke, her voice coming from some dark place that had accepted at that moment they were war profiteers.  "And what would our one and a half ion cannons do against that."

[Rinny]

On The Eve


The day had passed solemnly, the crew going about their business to prepare the ship for what would be a sizable haul.  Nash had avoided being around Lisette and by extension Milo whose attention his sister demanded.  The Doc treated his sister with infinite patience, but he was the only one.  Her technical expertise was appreciated, but the eclectic way her ideas came to fruition were overwhelmingly ill-received by her crewmates.   It seemed that the immense knowledge she kept stored in her brain left little room for things like social grace or impulse control.  Now the Captain sat alone in the dimly lit common room watching the light show of a flickering HoloNet feed of the battle above Coruscant.  Sometimes she flipped back to the ground assault, but the ships were far more interesting, and not just for their monetary value.

The silence was broken by the sound of a second chair being dragged over next to the viewer.  The Sullustan pilot slumped into the chair and handed Nash one of the two chilled bottles he was carrying.  "[You're welcome.]"

"For the booze or did you fix my ship?"  Nash popped the top off and let it bounce across the floor.

"[Antal tried to explain it to me, but this,]"  he gestured with his bottle before taking a swig.  "[This is massive.]"  After a moment he seemed to remember she had asked a question.  "[Yes, it's fixed.]"

Nash drank slowly, the morning's hangover still fresh in her mind, and that the bottle had come from the onboard 'brewery.'  It started off as a chemical experiment gone horribly wrong, but the three menfolk were determined to add another business venture to their letterhead.  She had to admit that it was better than drinking engine coolant, but not by much.

"[Who's winning?]"

"Hard to say, but this Star Destroyer,"  Nash stood and pointed at the quickly forming starship graveyard.  "Blew that Star Destroyer to pieces."

Minik made a surprised grunt.  "[Turned on each other?  Should make for a quicker battle then.]"

"The galaxy just got a little stranger."  She took one last swig of the foul brew before tossing the rest into the waste chute.  "Get some sleep, we'll have to move up our timetable."

"[Won't be time to fix that second ion cannon.]"

"Guess we'll have to play nice."  With a last look at the raging battle, Nash turned and headed towards her quarters.

[Rinny]

Lost to the Void, Part I


"Ships are entering hyperspace!  They're leaving!"  Lisette screamed into the comm from her place in the common room.

Minik winced as he finished up system checks on the bridge.  "[Girl doesn't need the comm, I heard her across the ship.]"

The Captain chuckled as she pulled back lever, taking them into their small hyperspace jump.  The ship had been idling far enough away from the Capital to not be considered a threat by the warring factions, but close enough that could hopefully get first crack at the mess left behind.  Stars lengthened and the ship was pulled into the depths.

~*~

"I've got trace amounts of diatium... most of this section is space dust."  Nash might as well have been talking to herself; though Minik sat next to her in the pilot's seat, he couldn't see what she saw.  On her head was a modified starfighter pilot helmet complete with a modified targeting visual relay.  The interface allowed the wearer to be constantly fed information from the sensors and any buoys they had deployed.  Nash reached past the visual in front of her to the console and depressed a button as she had done several times already on this run.  "Deploying Buoy 8, we'll come back if we have room."

"[Should have bought that warehouse from my brother.]"  Minik never missed the chance to chide her about that particular decision.  Of course Minik's brother found a higher bidder, but at the time Nash wasn't sure what they'd need with a warehouse.

"Will still be a good haul, even without coming back for seconds."

Methodically they worked through the sections that had the largest pieces, sweeping for rarer compounds usually found in engine cores.  They worked in tandem, Captain and Pilot along with Antal on the mezzanine of the cargo hold.  At Nash's direction Minik would glide the large vessel in, Antal and Lisette would work the large arms to pick up and deposit the former starships into their hold.  They day was nearly gone and they had barely made a dent in the graveyard, but the cargo hold was filling up fast.

"Captain,"  it was Antal's deep voice rumbling across the comm.  "We're at about 70% capacity, might be time to be more discerning."

Nash frowned, maybe she should have bought the warehouse.  After a moment she sighed and agreed.  "Minik, take us to the aft side of the cruiser in grid... 4-7-1.  Wait--"  In her ear was an alarm and text flashed in front of her eyes.  "There's movement at Buoy 3."

The Sullustan swore and swiveled his chair to get his own look at the sensor readings.  "[I guess it was too much to hope we had the place to ourselves.]"

"Small, hard to get a reading in all the debris."  Nash reached out and pushed the leg of the man who had been dozing completely unnoticed at the third console on the small bridge.  "Wake up we have company."

Milo yawned and rubbed his face.  As ship's medic, he actually didn't do a whole lot most of the time, except treat the occasional fever or rash.  The times they did need him for his medical expertise though, he was worth every credit.  For now he sat at what passed for a tactical station.  "Maybe they'll be better company."

"Getting tired of us already, Doc?"

"I could never get tired of you, darlin'."  Milo gave her a wink before straightening up and leaning over the console.

Nash just rolled her eyes, but at least chill that had existed between the two of them lately was starting to warm.  "Let's go ahead and move to that grid--"

Suddenly the ship jolted with a shock.  Minik swore again and Milo was now wide awake.  Nash slammed the comm switch,  "Secure the hold! Taking fire!"  Before the comm closed, the bridge could hear Antal's own choice words.  "Milo..."

"What do you want me to do, Nash? You have one kriffing cannon on this ship."  He was startled and suddenly frustrated and angry, who flies into a warzone with no weapons?

Nash jumped out of her chair and pushed Milo from his seat.  "Go help Antal.  Go!"

"[Why didn't we see them? Where are they?]"

"Just get us out of here!"  There had to be more than one ship she missed, there was no way the small ship they had just noticed could have made it into firing range already.  "Bloody pirates."

[Rinny]

Lost to the Void, Part II


The ship rocked again under a quick barrage of fire.  Nash scanned the sensor information in front of her faster than her brain could process it; elements, compounds, density--all of that useless at this moment.  "Come on, where are you,"  she exhaled as she gripped the ion cannon controls.   A flash to the left and the ship jerked violently this time, but Nash held her seat.  Something sparked behind her, but she couldn't let it distract her.  This shot had to be made, the cannon would take time to recharge, if it was a miss this four year adventure would reach its abrupt end.

"There..."  Nash breathed again, the seconds stretched out before her and she ignored the trickle of sweat on her brow under the helmet.  "Locked."  With a press of a button the lone working cannon fired out into space striking the attacking vessel head on.  Energy crackled around the smaller ship and it lurched to the side.  Nash didn't stay to see if it would drift into the other wreckage that was littered around them.  They were disabled for now, and it had to be enough for them to get away.  Throwing her helmet to the ground, Nash leapt into the next task and pulled a hose from a compartment and sprayed fire suppressant on panel behind her.

"[Antal close the cargo doors!  We need to jump!]"

Nash dropped the hose and looked at Minik, it wasn't like Antal to lag behind and not answer.  "Can you shut them from here?"

"[If I could do that, we would be gone already!]"

"Antal!  Milo!  Someone answer!"

"Medical emergency!  Bring my case here, now!"  Milo's voice broke over the comm.

The Captain was gone, running through the ship trying not to trip over  the myriad of items that had toppled and broken during the attack.  She didn't need to tell Minik what to do, as soon as the doors were closed he would enter hyperpsace, assuming the second pirate ship didn't make it to them before that.

~*~

"Doc, you got to get those doors shut,"  Antal tried to grip at Milo's arm to stop him.  His blue face was strained and pale, spotted with his own blood.  The Chagrian was buried under a pile of space debris, twisted metal that had been launched from the last crane-load and into the mezzanine during the attack.  He couldn't feel his legs and knew he would soon slip into unconsciousness, but he had to convince Milo to save the ship and not him.

"Hang in there, old man."  Milo grunted as he tried to move the debris, piece by agonizing piece.

"Lisette--don't let her--"  Antal's small black eyes rolled back into his head, his body went limp.

"Antal!"  Nash shrieked as she burst onto the platform, the case tumbled from her fingers, spilling its contents onto the floor.  All rational thought had abandoned her, she had kept her focus so far, but seeing her oldest friend and mentor laying lifeless had pushed her past the limit.  "Milo..."

Usually he liked it when she said his name that way, in that quiet, pleading voice.  But for the second time this evening the meaning behind it was 'please fix this.'  He had failed her on the bridge, he couldn't let it happen again.  Milo snatched the pre-filled syringe from the mess and quickly pushed the needle into Antal's free arm.  "He's still alive, but losing a lot of blood.  We need to get him to the medbay."  Medbay was a stretch of the term, it was more like a repurposed closet that barely fit a bacta tank and a cot.

The ship lurched suddenly, either from the next round of battle or a sudden shift in heading.  Nash shot to her feet, the momentary shock replaced with urgency.  At the main control console for the cargo hold, the lights blinked in and out, some levers stiff and unresponsive.  "Where's Lisette?!"

An oppressive sense of dread washed over the Doc and he stood from his unconscious patient to try and find his sister.  Antal had tried to warn him about her, but he disregarded it as the ramblings of a man in shock.  Milo wasn't sure what drew him to look out over the metal railing and down into the belly of the ship, whether it was a whisper of the mysterious Force or the simple familial connection.  But there she was, the mop of curly blonde hair bobbing up and down as she worked inside an open panel.  Her pace was quick but not hurried; she worked as she always did, with purpose but seemingly half of her mind in some far off place.

"Lisette!"  He screamed down to his sister, fear and rage coalescing violently in his voice.

After a long second she looked directly up at him.  Goodbye, brother.

There wasn't time to think, let alone argue, only act.  Milo reached out and snatched his Captain around the waist, pulling her to him.  With his other arm he snaked it around the railing and screamed at her to hold on.  It lasted only seconds, but Milo was sure he saw his entire life play out in front of him.  His childhood on Corellia, medical school, his disgraced exit from Coronet City's top hospital, and the last two years on this ship.  He had brought Lisette here, convinced a cocky Captain she would need someone with his sister's skill with computers and droids.  And now he could only watch, hanging on for his own life, as his dear sister was sucked out into the void along with chunks of their haul.

The brilliant young techie had sliced directly into the door controls; disabling the magnetic field, allowing for the doors to shut.  Why all other controls had failed and why this particular sequence of events had to take place in order for them to escape were questions that would need to be answered.  As the cargo hold repressurized and the tightness in his chest and limbs slowly dissipated, Milo clutched at the woman sprawled on top of him and cried.

[George]

On Nar Shaddaa, orbiting Nal Hutta in the Mid Rim . . . .

The sky was never truly dark on the Smuggler's Moon, but then darkness, like so many other things in the Galaxy, was relative.  While the Vertical City's neon nights wrecked havoc with the photoperiodism of those unaccustomed to city-planets and their sleepless peoples, the Slicer felt right at home.

He, however, was not at home, nor even anywhere close--galactically-speaking--to it.  Instead of the distinguished towers and noble spires of Coruscant, he was at work high atop a luxurious yet gauche hotel in the Promenade, the glitzy and extravagant commercial district of this so-called Little Coruscant.  If only.

While the Promenade hotels routinely competed with one another to offer the most sumptuous accommodations, this particular penthouse suite was notable for what it lacked: a bed.  Instead, an elaborately-carved, four meter long, dark crimson greel wood dais was the room's imposing centerpiece.

A throne fit for a Hutt.

He stepped only far enough into the suite to allow its blast door to swoosh down and seal behind him.  After discarding his generic blue worker's coveralls just inside the chamber, the Slicer then peeled off his flex-mask and, with it, his faux-Twi'lek facial features, complete with lifelike head-tails.  He needn't worry about the penthouse's surveillance holocams; over a hundred levels below him, a harmless little mouse droid sat tucked away in a maintenance room, maliciously commandeering the suite's holocam signals and replacing them with their own surreptitiously recorded scenes from the previous night: a dark suite illuminated only by the occasional flashes of passing airspeeder lights and no lurking intruder.

The Slicer was thus left wearing only his black boots, a black thermoguard body glove to foil scanners, a gun belt and its holstered Imperial Munitions Model 22T4 hold-out blaster pistol, and a transparent-lensed interface visor--a wearable datapad contained within an optical head-mounted display.  The real key to the mission, literally and figuratively, was in his left hand--his combination code cylinder and scomp link.  It had already granted him access to the hotel's loading dock, its service lift, and the suite's door.  With the tap of a finger along his visor's frame and a few quick eye movements, the service technician clearance codes contained within the cylinder were instantly overwritten with those of the hotel's security director.  He then placed the cylinder interface into one of the suite's dataports, this one built into the door frame.  With a few more rapid eye movements, the blast door behind him audibly locked, securing him inside the Hutt's suite.

On this otherwise quiet night, Ahnju the Hutt, the sometimes-occupant of the suite and its central dais, and his traveling entourage of courtiers, retainers, guards, and servants were away at one of the warlord-gangster's other palaces.  Indeed, it was that other palace--the Hutt's primary residence--that was the Slicer's true target.

He had come to Nar Shaddaa weeks--months?--ago at the behest of his client to obtain particular information concerning the Hutt Empire's reported increase in military expenditures.  Of course, he did not know precisely which galactic faction had employed him for the task; it was not his custom to ask such intrusive questions, and his go-between middlemen contacts were rarely inclined to volunteer their patrons' identities.  Instead, a mutual ambiguity--a plausible deniability--governed his interactions with his clients.  Zealously neutral, the Slicer wasn't concerned with his occasional employers' political legitimacy, only their financial solvency.

All of his preparations, his painstaking, methodical groundwork, would culminate in this night's slice.

[Rinny]

The Lost Year


"You just missed him."  Antal said as he watched her glance about the hospital room.  He had always read her so easily.

"Are they taking care of you here?"  Nash sat down on the side of the bed and took his large hand in hers.

"Milo saved my life, don't know how after...  He made sure they treat me right."  The Chagrian gripped her smaller hand tightly, making her look up at him.  He still saw that scrawny girl from Nar Shaddaa, serving drinks, running Hutt errands, just trying to save enough to buy her way out.  "I know a guy, used to load ordinance for the rebels--"

"No, no." She shook her head furiously.  Lisette was dead, Milo was purposely avoiding her; Antal was her oldest friend and mentor, she couldn't lose him too.  "I can use the slush fund, we can grease enough palms to fast track you to some sweet new cybernetic limbs--"

"You wouldn't spend that blood money to help yourself.  What makes you think I'd let you spend it on me?"

~*~

Nash had replayed that last conversation over and over in her mind, usually while sitting at this bar.  She flipped over her empty shot glass and pushed it back to the alien tender.  Off to her left a HoloNet news feed was broadcasting an interview with a Coruscanti counselor, discussing the reconstruction effort as they neared the anniversary of the great battle.  Had it really been a year already?  Antal had returned to his home world, moved in with one of his kids.  Milo had gone back to Corellia to deliver the news to his parents, Nash doubted she would ever see him again.  That left Minik and her to trudge through repairs on the ship.  After the first couple months funds had begun to run low and they needed to take on odd jobs just to keep the lights on.

"[Back here again.]"  The gruff voice spewing Huttese at her belonged to a particularly obstinate Nikto, one of Ahnju the Hutt's lieutenants and enforcers.  With his high ridged forehead and several prominent facial horns he could be quite intimidating, but like Nash he had grown up under the Hutt's figurative roof and thus she found him no more terrifying than a toothless womprat.

"What do you want, Sally?"  Nash took her fresh glass from the tender, sipping off the top so it didn't spill while not bothering to look at 'Sally.'  Of course that wasn't actually his name, his real name had far too many letters and syllables for her to remember and calling him 'Sally' had always riled him up so easily.

"[You can disrespect me, but you don't get to disrespect the Great Ahnju.]"  She wasn't looking at him but she could tell he was bristling with barely contained rage.

"I know you're his little bitch boy, but--"

The Nikto reached out and grabbed her arm and Nash's hand immediately went to the blaster at her hip in response.  "[You think you can come back here, drink his liquor, pick up your own contracts in his cantinas, and turn down his offers to come back to work.]"

Nash stared down the much larger creature, or she tried to being that she was well into her evening and everything was starting to look a little fuzzy.  "First of all, if I pay for the drinks they're mine.  Secondly, Ahnju gets a generous finder's fee for every job I take on Nar Shaddaa.  Now shouldn't you be off ogling some dancers?"

"You two need to take your marital problems outside, I don't want blood on my bar."  It was the alien tender and despite how important Sally thought himself to be, no one crossed the tenders or their bouncers.  The grip on her arm was released and Nash slowly got to her feet.  "Need me to call your pilot, Nashara?"

"No,"  she snapped at him with a scowl.  "I'll take a room upstairs."

"[Your father was the Great Ahnju's favored hunter, but you are nothing on Nar Shaddaa.]"

[Rinny]

Homecoming


"Doctor Milo Ruest,"  the old man smiled as Milo entered the conference room.  There were six of them, all varying ages and sizes; all human save one Mirialan.  They were dressed in the vestments of their profession: pristine white coats in sharp contrast to their visitor in his dark slacks, untucked shirt, and dark leather jacket.

Seeing them, his former colleagues, he remembered that old role and how easily he had fit into it.  It was strange that now he didn't look upon those memories with fondness.  He shook their hands and exchanged pleasantries and small talk before they all finally took their seats.

"Thank you for granting this audience."

A few amused chuckles followed.  They were all doctors here of various specialties, but they were the department heads and chiefs of this the finest medical facility in Coronet City, Corellia, and (arguably) the Core.  It would be an intimidating position for anyone to be in, but Milo almost felt bored by the whole process.

"We never agreed with your... dismissal, Dr. Ruest."  It was the old man who had originally greeted him.  A Dr. Ente who was quite capable, but a blowhard and a kiss ass if there ever was one.

"Yea, but you didn't fight it either."  They weren't the words he had planned to say, but they were the ones he had been holding bitterly onto for some time.  If any of those present were offended, they didn't show it.

"You have to understand, Moff Ansgar still exuded unprecedented control over this sector even after the Emperor's death.  We know it wasn't your fault his daughter died on the table, you did everything you could.  But we couldn't defy him."  Ente looked almost pained to talk about it.  No doubt he had fallen from the Moff's good graces once the man he held responsible for his daughter's death had gone missing.  "Of course, sleeping with your patients doesn't help your case."

After a heavy pause Milo let out a sigh and slouched further back into his chair.  That part was true and entirely his fault.  He would have thought that being involved with the young lady would have given him a greater reason to make sure the surgery was a success, but the Moff didn't see it that way.

"We reviewed the files you sent us."  Another one of the group was speaking, the male Mirialan, while looking down at a datapad.  "We're very impressed with the work you did at the refugee camps, but then you spent the last two years aboard a salvage freighter?  What does a ship like that need with a very talented surgeon?"

Milo couldn't help but smirk at the memories; running from natives, cave ins, he remembered carrying Minik back to the ship on his back because the Sullustan couldn't walk on a little ankle fracture.  "I included a write up of the last patient I treated.  Was crushed by falling debris during a space battle, lost both legs and an arm."

"Yes, it was quite hard to believe.  I contacted the 'hospital' on Nar Shaddaa, it seems your account was accurate."

Dr. Ente leaned forward and waved a hand as if to dismiss the Mirialan's concerns.  "The job is yours if you want it, Milo.  Despite your past indiscretions, you're an exceptional physician."

~*~

The interview had been nearly two weeks ago.  Dr. Ente had told him to take his time and decide.  Milo wasn't sure why it was such a hard decision to make.  It was all he had wanted for a long time, the challenges and the prestige that came with it.  He also wondered what joining this 'New' Republic would bring for his homeworld.  There were conflicting parts of him, one that wanted to resume the mantle of his old life and leave behind all the painful memories that thinking of The Hooded Crow brought.  Another that wanted to come home and see what would become of the world around him and be there if it needed him.  And yet, every day he fought the urge to punch in the Crow's holofrequency just to check in.

Running his hands through his hair, he fell back onto the small bed in his old room in his parents' house.  It still looked like the room of a teenager and he knew that no matter what he chose, he needed to do it soon.  Telling them about Lisette had been the hardest thing he'd ever done, but continuing to live here just dragged out the pain and grief.  It didn't matter if they blamed him, he blamed himself enough for everyone.

A blinking light on the handheld holocomm sitting on the table caught his attention.  It wasn't an active call, but a waiting message.

"Hey, Milo, hope you're doing ok."  A smile spread across his face as he watched his--former--Captain's holoimage fidget in his hands.  She almost looked as good as he remembered, long dark brown hair pulled over her shoulder with matching dark eyes.  She was wearing a stained grey jumpsuit and not one of her usually ruffled, girly outfits, but it didn't diminish her allure.  "I don't want to bother you, but I--I had to give Molly a memory wipe.  I'm sorry, but your sister--Lisette, she had some special subroutines programmed and I couldn't gain control of it."

"Damn, Nash, it's just a droid,"  he muttered to the image, but realized that it was the last bit of Lisette's voice going silent.  It seemed odd that Nash appeared more broken up about it than he was though.

"Anyway, I dumped her memory core and sent you the packet.  Lisette had a lot, I mean a lot, of information and files hidden inside Molly, but it wasn't my place to go through it."  The image froze and Milo stared at her for a moment and then was startled when it started up suddenly again.  "I wish you would just talk to me."  Nash reached out and picked up a bottle and Milo realized she must have thought she turned the recording off.   "Pretty sure I'm driving Minik crazy, only a matter of time before he leaves too.  Shit--"

The transmission cut off and Milo was left staring.  Rarely had he ever seen her in a morose mood, and never looking so defeated.  It was his sister that had died, he was allowed his grief.  The veil was slowly pulling away now, the haze he was in seemed to relent.  In the interview with the hospital, during exchanges with his parents and old friends, Milo had realized he had changed.  For better or for worse he wasn't sure, but this life wasn't what he truly wanted anymore.

With the small holocomm he recorded a message and left it where it would be noticed.  On it would be a man with a smile on his face stating simply, "Mum. Pop.  I'm going home."

[Rinny]

Past Reflected


At the end of Nar Shaddaa's Red Light District there was an alleyway full of trash and the occasional corpse.  On the other side of that alley was a tall, old building in desperate need of repair.  Broken out windows, bits burned by blaster fire; it was occupied these days by spice heads, fugitives, and others hanging on to the bottom of the Smugglers' Moon's social ladder.  The image Nashara held in her memories of the old building didn't match up with what she saw, but it had been near twenty years since she'd lived there.  Time hadn't been kind to it, and perhaps she saw the place through the rosy film of childhood.

There were fond memories she had of this place that used to be her home.  Memories of her mother were mostly pleasant, as were many of the memories of her father.  All those were overshadowed by the few bad days, as it usually happens.  Royston Vaelen was a ruthless sellsword, though he loathed the term mercenary.  He had come to Nar Shaddaa with the reputation of a skilled hunter already in place.  He was a towering, beast of a man, and Ahnju the Hutt made no secret that Vaelen would be his enforcer.  Anyone who sought to cheat or fool the Great Hutt would have this bird of prey sent after them.

"We can work together, Hutt, but I have a price." The man leaned back in his chair, its legs creaking under his weight.  He lifted a finger and pointed across the Hutt's extravagant lounge to where a girl with long dark hair dressed in no more than sheer undergarments was dancing on a raised platform.  The Hutt gave his typical deep laugh and acknowledged his guest's fine choice in females.

Nash had heard that story countless times.  Some told it as her father had rescued her mother from the life of a Hutt dancer, others that she was a slave used as a pawn in some sick trade.  All she knew from her memories was that her father adored her mother, but he was viciously jealous.  Her mother feared him, but it didn't stop her from testing him, taunting him.  Morgan liked men, and she liked the attention.  She actually enjoyed the dancing and the flirting that went along with it.  So even though she 'belonged' to the hunter, she still entertained side offers while he was away on a job.

Perhaps they both should have known better.  They were together a decade and Royston could never tame her, and Morgan would never stop throwing it in his face.  The hunter didn't see his young daughter there hiding in a closet when he shot his wife's latest lover in the chest.  And he didn't see her when he choked the life out of her mother.

With fists clenched, Nash tried not to remember that night.  Standing there in front of the building where it had happened, it was obviously the most prominent memory that came to mind.  Not the smells of her mother baking sweet cakes or her father telling stories of the places he'd traveled and the aliens he'd met.  It was hard for Nash to reconcile the love and the hate she felt for the both of them; the obligation to mourn the people who gave her life or the bitter relief that they were both gone.

Plucking a stone off the ground, Nash hurled it as hard as she could towards the building and listened to a satisfying cry of breaking glass.  Damn this building, damn this moon, damn Antal and Milo for leaving, damn those pirates for attacking...

"And damn you, Nashara Vaelen, stupid, arrogant girl."  Nash rubbed her fist under her nose, trying to quell the doubt and loathing that had been assaulting her the past year.  Usually she drowned it all with the booze, but her wanderings had not managed to take her past a cantina yet.

"[Is that all?  I can think of other words to call you.]"  It was the harsh Huttese of the familiar Nikto that had very nearly become her second shadow.  Their disagreement at the bar hadn't been their first encounter since she'd been back on Nar Shaddaa, and it wasn't the last.  Nash couldn't quite figure where all the hostility had come from, though imagined it was some deeply rooted jealousy that had been nurtured over many, many years.

"Attractive? Successful?"  How easy to redirect her self-loathing to the hateful creature stalking her.  On the dimly lit street her dark eyes shone with nearly spent tears, quickly she blinked them away.  "What errand does your master send you on now?  Do you get a treat if you bring him what he wants?"

Sally's buttons were so easy to push. He saw himself as an important member of the Hutt's circle and took personal pride in every task assigned to him.  Nash didn't acknowledge his authority, she barely acknowledged the Hutt's authority.  She was respectful, to near everyone but Sally, but Nash had freedom.  The stars and their infinite possibilities were her home and despite her upbringing, the Hutts did not own her.

The Nikto hissed out a breath through clenched teeth, but managed to grind out what he had been sent to say.  "[The Great Ahnju has a business proposition for you, but perhaps I will tell him I found you passed out with one of his prostitutes again.]"

"Now you're just getting us confused, Sally.  You want my life so bad you fantasize that I'm living yours?"

Nash barely had time to block the hard fist that came swinging towards her face.  She staggered backwards and used her forearm to deflect a second swipe from his other fist.  This was always a possibility, that she would push him too far, but she never thought he'd actually have it in him to really go after her.  It was obvious the skinny human female was not a match physically against the much larger Nikto.  Nash had managed to get a few kicks in and blocked the majority of his punches until she heard and felt her left radius crack under the repeated blows.

After an unanswered blow to the side of her head laid her out on the filthy concrete, Nash wondered if she should have paid more attention when her father and Antal had taught her how to fight.  Until this point she thought she was pretty good, had even broken up a few cantina brawls in her younger years.  Strong fingers with razor sharp talons at the tips wrapped around her throat and lifted her up off the ground.  Futilely Nash clawed at the hand and arm holding her and briefly she spared a thought for the irony of being choked to death outside the building where the same had happened to her mother.

The sound of a blaster being fired echoed through the vacant street.  For a moment Nash wasn't sure she heard anything as her vision became spotted and her limbs heavy.  Then a second, and a third.  The knees of the creature holding her buckled and they both fell into a heap on the ground.  Finally her throat was free and she sucked huge breaths of air in between wracking coughs.  The smell of burnt flesh and blood joined with the already foul mix of trash and industrial decay making the coughing worse.  But no matter how bad the air smelled, Nash was happy to be breathing once again.

Sally's lifeless corpse was kicked out of the way and an arm wrapped around her to pull her up.  Her savior wasn't speaking basic and her pounding head wasn't translating what he was saying fast enough.

"Nash."

She looked up at the sound of her name and in the fading light she saw the fleshy pink folds of her Sullustan pilot's face.  "Minik."  She croaked out his name, giving him a bloody smile.

"[Today's your lucky day, Captain.]"  He smiled back at her and proceeded to half carry, half drag her to a waiting speeder.

[George]

It was the hunger that woke him.  He had been elsewhere, somewhere bright and warm.  Even in his unconsciousness--whether a proper dream or perhaps just some hallucination--he could not escape the memory of fresh food openly cooked.  In an instant, though, with just the growl of his stomach, that place--a home?--was gone.

But was it?  In total darkness, he realized, there was seldom any distinguishing between a dream and a hallucination.  Perhaps now, in "waking," he had only replaced one hallucination with another, the first a positive one and now this one much more negative. 

But where was he?  Imprisoned, obviously, but was he still on Nar Shaddaa?  On Nal Hutta?  An underworld asteroid, perhaps?  It was impossible for him to know; it could be anywhere from Coruscant to Tatooine.  His unanswerable speculation was precisely the sort of torture that isolation was designed to generate.  His captor--Ahnju the Hutt, he felt certain--needn't bother his goons with beating him (although there had been a respectable amount of that, too).  Instead, the dark, the silence, the cold, the hunger--the hunger--and his own restless brain would do that dirty work without them.

He sighed.  Something had obviously gone wrong with the slice.  He had managed to scomplink into Ahnju's principal palace, bypass his patchwork quilt of security protocols, and directly penetrate his dirtbound mainframe database.  As he was retrieving and duplicating his target data, however, the mission went awry.  His sensors had suddenly detected activity in the executive turboshaft and then movement outside the suite's locked blastdoor.

By the time the cutters started torching through the heavy door, he was already working on his escape.  He shifted from selectively downloading the data directly onto his wearable datapad to instead wirelessly routing it in bulk--using a digital shovel rather than his preferred scalpel--across the city sprawl to his waiting, and safely obscured, modified astromech droid.  Leaving that process to run without him, he had signaled to his cloud car, left loitering nearby, and its rudimentary autopilot program began to maneuver toward the hotel tower and up to the throne room's panorama window.

Taking cover behind the Hutt's ornate dais, he returned the blaster fire that lit up the room as the melted center of the heavy door slagged and fell away.  He was no gunfighter, but what he lacked in experience he made up for in steady methodicalness.  He kept his cool, firing enough to prevent the attackers from getting beyond the entryway but not so wildly as to fail to connect his burning bolts to his targets' waiting flesh.  The ozone-like smell of blaster fire had filled the room and then was quickly followed by the tell-tale scent of burning meat.  It was at that moment that he had truly felt assured of his escape.

His enemies' fire had blown out the room's huge window for him, so he had a clear path from the shadow of the dais through the shattered window and beyond into his vehicle, which had arrived just as planned.  As he turned to make his getaway dash, however, he saw his certain escape explode, brought down by shots fired, he presumed, from the two combat airspeeders and their bright lights that quickly filled the window's frame.

He had been caught.  And now he sat in limitless darkness, waiting.  But for what?

[SWSF Eidolon]

   . . .the several meter wide corridor was flushed with artificial light and lined with dozens of cells on either side as it stretched on endlessly to a point where the finished ceiling work became exposed bedrock and the lighting faded.  The walls were a large finely cut black stone, polished smooth.  The floors perimeter was smooth but dusty stone, a few feet away from the walls however there were thick open gridded metal sections that clanked rattled and echoed throughout as they were strode upon.  They were held up by stone column outcroppings along the sub-base beneath, and beneath the gridded steel walkway itself a seeming bottomless pit of nothing but emptiness and total swallowing darkness awaited.  A dank damp stench clunk to the air.  The cell block was essentially built in to the ceiling of a gigantic subterranean chasm.  Hundreds or maybe thousands of levels above probably stood the spires of Ahnju the Hutt's crown palace, stretching in to the Nar Shaddaan atmosphere.  A pinnacle many who were held in this prison yearned to soar passed.

   A pair of Gamorreans posted on either side were holding up the wall outside of no particular cell near the middle of the block, their eye-lids dropping and popping up occasionally as they simply breathed in their choppy snorting manner, their vibro-spears loosely lent back against their robust bodies.  Crouched in front of the sealed heavy cell door, another pair of Hutt underlings, a Nikto and Weequay, argued amongst themselves over the most recent toss of a pair of die against the thick metal door.

    "Gnaaaarrr! You cheat! Let me see those dice!" the Nikto exlcaimed snatching for the gleaming Weequay's hand, prompting him to jerk away and shove the Nikto back as he tucked a few credit chips and a small radiant gemstone in to his tunic.

    "No! Dice sacred! You no touch! You lose! Fair square!" the Weequay groaned back with monotone excitement as he then hurriedly scrambled backwards and tucked his pieces in to his inner vest, still kneeling and holding the Nikto at bay with his other arm.

    "Circle talk!  Liar! I will bend you like a triangle! Raaaa!" the Nikto screeched as he sprung out upon the Weequay, the two fumbling for position.

   One of the Gamorreans, apparently bothered by the upstarts intervened.  Lumbering forward with what seemed great force, he flat kicked the Nikto over from his crouched and extended position sending him sailing sideways and rolling across the hallway and then used the butt end of his spear to shove the then surprised and standing half upright Weequay in the gut, sending him stumbling and shuffling backwards in recoil to the ground.  Both smaller beings having the wind knocked out of them and hitting the metal gridded floor panels with great impact and racket, tucked and rolled back and forth while groaning and catching their breath and bearings.  After several moments of gathering themselves they staggered to their feet half a dozen meters from their attacker, briefly meeting anger filled glances with each other before looking in tandem back to the aggressive Gamorrean who stood in an attacking stance with his spear clenched in both powerful arms.   The Nikto huffed as he clenched his side and held a slightly bent over stance,

   "AAaagghh! You broke my ribs porky!," he exclaimed while briefly driven to one knee in pain before slightly straightening himself, still huffing in anger and to breath.

   The hulky pig-faced mercenary met their stares and cracked a wide grin bearing his thick rounded teeth and seemed to chuckle as he clenched them while a heavy drool began gathering along the corners of his mouth and dribbling down.   A sign of his peeked adrenaline.  The other Gamorrean jumped to a defensive stance, roused from his dozing from the commotion and unsure of what had transpired.  Either way, he'd be having his kinsman's back in any brawl there was to be.  After first looking to each other for consensus, the Nikto then pulled a scimitar kind of large blade from a sheath at his under backside, it slid out it's rigid hide enclosure with a rich shaving sound.  The Weequay drew his small sidearm and pointed it directly at the initiating Gamorrean.  It was comically diminutive in context to it's target, but it emitted an increasingly intense whirring sound, apparently charging up an incredible amount of energy as the bearer's hand began to shake from the weapons vibration, forcing him to steady his footing and clench it with both hands.

   The Stand-Off was abruptly disrupted as at the far end of the corridor a loud but gentle humming signal began it's notice of an immediately impending turbolift arrival.  The platform settled to it's cushioned landing as the safety and blast doors then rolled aside, unveiling the Prison Block's visitors.

    A quartet of uniformly clad and heavily armed Klaatonians neatly strode out first, followed by the bulbous yet spritely and very much mobile Ahjnu the Hutt, his multi-shaded and apparently well kept skin gave off a smooth and shiny texture and appearance, aside from some kind of infestation of growths or skin disorder on his shoulders.  A prominent ceremonial tatoo began at his lower lip, running down his chin to his mid breast plate, filling most of his upper center chest region.  To fully express the long winded title and status it was intended to communicate in Huttese would take quite some time, suffice it to say however, it simply means he is a powerful Besadii Warlord and answers to no one and no Hutt beside the Grand Council.  Properly addressed, Ahnju Besadii Ataki, he is widely believed to be the favored potential successor to Durga Besadii Tai on the Grand Council.

     Accompanying the great Hutt was an ornamentaly fashionable female Twi'lek who had served as Ahnju's primary hand for some time.  She was sleek and grey skinned with light pink natural markings and tall for her race and gender.  Her attire was classy fashionable by standards on Nar Shaddaa, and her head tales were tucked back upwards and pinned together by a thick kind of sash that matched her clothing, though most prominent was her sleek ringed golden and gem encrusted neck adornment that wrapped entirely around it and seemed to forcefully extend it's natural length.  With chin forced high she spoke under seeming no strain from the strange adornment as the entourage approached the four cell block guards who had quickly smothered their brewing dispute and straightened themselves for presentation.

     "You there, Key Master, The Slicer from the Palace,"  the Twi'lek motioned to the Weequay and commanded him in a strong feminine tone with a daintily generally pointed finger.  

     "Ye-Yes Madame!,  Glorious Master Ahnju!" he answered the hand and gave his respect to his Lord, accompanied by a few quick half way bows.

     The Weequay proceeded to bumble through his pockets before producing a small electronic key card and ushering the Hutt and his company a few cells down to retrieve their requested detainee.  As they made the short stroll across and down the corridor the Klaatonians kept their stoic posture and professional soldierism.  The two Gamorreans quietly grumbled and snorted to each other while meandering in the general direction of the procession, one explaining the sidelined incident to the other.  The Nikto stood straight up erectly waddling along as best he could while trying to look like he wasn't clenching his side or in incredible pain.   They approached a cell with no distinguishing characteristics from the others.  Inserting the small device , the Weequay depressed a series of buttons before the large cell door zipped rapidly up with a hiss.

     The normally pitch black cell was flooded with light washing in from the corridor.   The lone human occupant scurried backwards across the steel tiled floor, pushing himself with hands as he interchangeably shielded his face from the abrupt shocking change in illumination. . .

[SWSF Eidolon]

     . . .The Gamorreans trudged hastily on in to the cell stomping along the way.  Still in shock from the snap change from pitch black to beaming brightness the human prisoner likely saw nothing but two husky menacing silhouettes charging towards him, perhaps guessing a vague ethnic identity through his sense of smell as they drew near.  He scoot shuffled and crab-walked his was to the corner of the small dozen or so square meter enclosure as the two large sus-like Gamorreans pushed and agitated him with prods of the butts of their spears, under his own bottom side to encourage him up,

    "*SNoRT sNoRT*  UUPP YOU DOG!  *SNAARRrrlrllLLL* UPP!" one shouted while the other grabbed ahold of him with one arm by the shoulder of his garments and yanked him abruptly off the floor, his bare toes clearing it by a few feet before the Gamorrean Guard plopped him back down upon them.

    "Hey, Hey, easy guys! Easy! Someone called a HoloNet repair guy,"

    The two guards hadn't bothered to engage the babbling detainee as they pushed him forward.  His eyes heavily squinted and his clothes ripped in some places and stained with blood in others, they shoved and pulled him out and in to the corridor as he continued to offer his version of events,

    ". .I show up, get to work and half way through some guys come cutting their way in and firing blasters at me.  I wake up here, and. ."

   They then promptly stopped his near-blind stroll and forced him back to the ground before Ahnju Besadii with a strike across the back of one vibro-spear shaft and trip of the knees with the other,

   "RAAAHH!!! Kneel before Lord Besadii you hairless ape!" one of the two Gamorreans exclaimed.

   The prisoner had landed on the gridded steel floor with a smack and clanky rattle, one side of his face impacting heavily, leaving light checkering on his cheek that complemented his swollen eye, jaw and scraped forehead.  Spitting and coughing down as he rolled over, he adjusted his posture to be supplanted on his knees.  Looking up while still fully squinting and attempting to make out the now much larger silhouetted figure in from of him he answered,

   "Lord Besadii, ugggh," he paused to spit again now off to the side.  "I'd stand but I'm afraid I'd get a better whiff of ya. ."

   One of the Gamorreans responded with the same style of side kick he'd previously employed on the Nikto, sending the insolent being rolling over a couple times and slamming back first in to a column.

   The Klaatoonians gathered up the prisoner and straightened his bunched and twisted clothing as they dragged him back to presentation before Ahnju Besadii.

   Through the prisoners eyes, the Hutt was slowly gaining color and clarity in the ensuing several moments.  He groaned and simply wallowed in his pain, hung upon the Klatoonian's sturdy support as they propped him up and Ahnju and his Twi'lek hand began their parroting,

   "Chagga komo lockee dojo, deese kama cholo venti maska!," the Hutt began angrily chiding the prisoner while waving his wide flubbery finger in his face.

   The ornately clad chic' Twi'lek decoded, "The Great Lord Ahnju demands to know who you are, who you're working for and what they wanted," she sternly demanded herself as she stepped in to his vision slightly off to the side.  Her hands were positioned at her hips with elbows pointed out.

   "I-I never meet my employers.  It's kind of an underworld thing.. thought you guys woulda known that one.  The names Sanj, and I was researching a biography I was going to write on ole Ahnju there." he replied still insurbordinate with a bit of a smug grin.

   The Hutt turned to the Twi'lek,  "Magga eechee oolow rannok.  Sessi alla wakka?" he inquired to her before redirecting himself to the prisoner, "Chokala!" he exclaimed again with a finger point and actually thumping him downward across the nose with it.

   "[We can't be sure my Lord.  We were able to track his bulk transmissions to a trashy pent-house in the Rookoor District, but our people found nothing there.  Probably a droid receiver that then took off. .]," she answered her master in Huttese before again directing her scowling tone to the human as she approached him closer and clenched the underside of his jaw and neck with her frail seeming but apparently strong arm and hand, applying the same kind of strain that her own luxurious neck adornment placed on herself,

   "You scamps all think you're some kind of gifted untouchable genius.  We isolated the possibilities of your initial data-rips.  Fuel Transactions, Brothel Accounting and Casino Staff Roster," she played her information cards before offering her deductions.  Tightening her grip of his neck and throat now, she placed her face much closer to his own and spoke frankly,

   "You're not interested in prostitutes or gambling I'm sure, so tell me, who want's to know about Hutt fuel logistics?"

   The human prisoner was now straining to breath and managed to cough out a response,

   "*CAaAGGHKk! HuAaak* t-toooold y-you.  Nev..err met, err"

   The Twi'lek promptly released her grip of his throat, allowing him to finally catch a full breath as he still simply hung in the Klatoonian guards arms.  His head was drooped as the Twi'lek grabbed a handful of his hair and lifted it, her interest of his seeming vague revelation peaked,

   "Her?? How were you paid??" she inquired intently.

   "Credit on delivery.. up front, a stone," he answered still searching for some composure.

   The Twi'lek's brow line flung upward as she turned her expression to the Hutt who narrowed his green and black eyes then began barking at the four cell-block guards,

   "Joka kasha illup deesue!?" he yelled an inquiry at them.

   The two Gamorreans fervently expressed their ignorance with shrugged shoulders and shaking heads as they stepped away from the Weequay and Nikto.  The other two isolated aliens now crept a little closer to each other as all eyes in the corridor turned to them.  The Weequay attempted to keep his eye contact with the Hutt as the bulbous being seemed to almost hop over to him, but instead wavered and store at the floor as his master was directly in front of him.  His Nikto compatriot had managed to nonchalantly peel himself away and out of the exchange.

   The Twi'lek hand joined her Hutt master preparing to interrogate his own henchman,

   "Galla kaka!?" the Hutt demanded of his minion.

   The Weequay hurriedly dug again through his pockets, at first unsure of which one he'd needed to delve in and trying a few, the fourth he pried in to his fingers emerged with a tiny but radiantly sparkling gemstone.  It's own color was not translucent nor opaque yet it seemed to glow with a sort of it's own inner light that cast a range of color pigments and shades from it's hundreds or maybe thousands of facets.  He dropped it in to the Hutt's outwardly stretched hand.

   The Hutt and Twi'lek's eyes widened,

   "Rainbow gem, Hapans!" the Hand remarked in a quiet whispered shout to Ahnju.

   The Hutt flew in to a rage as the rolled his way aggressively back to the imprisoned Slicer,

   "Tooboso chakaga zepex!  Eekesh bibi solwana!" he yelled, grabbing the human up with his own two hands from the Klatoonian guard grasp and shaking him violently before tossing him aside like a doll to the ground again.

    Now barking his anger at every one present as he angrily made his way back towards the turbolift,  "[Those foul pungent bleeding creatures! Their pretty heads belong on pikes!]"

    The Twi'lek shouted towards him, "My Lord! What of the prisoner??" she asked.

    The Hutt didn't stop his roll as he simply turned his head up and back slightly, issuing his sentence upon the Slicer who would perhaps now begin to take the situation with a bit of gravity,

    "Kalamash zo dragga! [Execute him in the morning!]"

TBC by Rinny or Georgey!

[Rinny]

Between a Hutt and a Hard Place



The last three crew members of The Hooded Crow crowded into the small room they called a medbay.  The battered form of their Captain was laid out on the cot while the pilot tried to follow the swift orders the medic was barking out.  It was hard for the two men to maneuver in the small space; Minik, at Milo's direction, was pulling tanks out of a storage closet and hooking them up to an older field model bacta tank standing in the corner.  Milo had packed gauze on the nasty gash on the side of Nash's head and was now working on setting her arms into soft casts to ensure they would heal correctly inside the tank.

A pained groan escaped the patient before her eyes opened again.  Dark orbs swam with shock, and then a smile.  "Doc, do I need a check up?"

Milo spared a second to give her a small smile, but quickly returned his focus to the task at hand.  There would be time to catch up later.  "You've got a pair of broken arms and a nasty concussion, but nothing a day in the tank won't cure."

Minik stuck his head over the cot to get in Nash's field of view.  "[Tank's ready, I'll get the old bird fired up.]"

"No."  Her throat was tight and sore and her neck muscles burned when she tried to shake her head.  "Not leaving."

"Nash--"

"Out before dawn."  She cut Milo off before he could try and reason with her.  "My ship."

The Doc opened his mouth to say something, but thought better of it.  It was of no use arguing right now.  Pushing the hair away from her face, Milo gently fitted the breathing mask over her mouth and nose.  The two men carefully led her into the tank, sliding her arms carefully into the slings that would keep her upright.

"We should still leave."  They had been staring at the tank in silence until Nash, floating idly in the translucent bluish liquid, finally drifted back in unconsciousness.

Minik shook his head, though in the short term it seemed like the most prudent course of action.  "[That will only make it worse.]"

"Masters, there are two gentlemen who speak for the Great Lord Ahnju the Hutt requesting an audience with Captain Vaelen."  It was the metallic yet very feminine voice of the protocol droid.

Milo turned to look at the droid with a quizzical expression on his face.  "I thought you two wiped her data banks?"

"[Seems her voice and speech patterns were hard coded.]"  Minik rolled his eyes as he stepped through the various medical debris now littering the floor.  "[Better see what these Hutt goons want.]"

Waiting at the end of The Hooded Crow's entrance ramp were a tall, slick looking Devaronian dressed in finely tailored dark clothes and a long cape of deep burgundy.  The Devaronian's companion was a more underdressed human, wearing a ripped shirt that showed off ample muscle.  Obviously one was meant to be intimidating and the other coercive.

Milo grunted his displeasure as he descended the ramp to greet them.  "What do you want."

The Devaronian eyed the Doc up and down, he was the taller of the two and his companion was much more muscular than the scrawnier human that had come out of the ship unarmed.  Looking past the human, he noted a Sullustan standing near the top of the ramp who didn't make the same mistake.  "Where's the Vaelen whelp?"

The Doc looked down at his hands, still with the protective surgical gloves, covered in her blood.  It started in the pit of his stomach and quickly clawed its way to his throat, the little ball of rage.  He furiously yanked off the gloves and hurled them at the Devaronian's feet.  Words had escaped him, all he could do is stand there and seethe, resisting all urge to take on a fight he knew he couldn't win.

"[Captain Vaelen has had enough of you messenger boys for today.  Run along now.]"  Minik hadn't moved from his position at the top of the ramp, his hand resting firmly on his blaster.

The Devaronian smirked as he looked down at the bloodied gloves at his feet.  "You misunderstand, I will be escorting your Captain back to our Glorious Lord Ahnju.  I will wait, until she is sufficiently recovered.  The Great Ahnju likes them.. feisty."  It was a devilish grin for a devilish face and elicited the desired response.

Before Milo could lunge at the foul creature in his fine suit, Minik had hit the door switch, slowly lifting the ramp back up to the ship and Milo along with it.  "[Let's go tell the Captain what her friend the Hutt wants, Doc.]"

The Devaronian called out after them, delivering more good news.  "Don't even think of leaving, you won't even make it out of the atmosphere."

"[Wouldn't dream of it.]"  Minik grumbled as he pushed Milo the rest of the way into the ship, the ramp locking in place after them.

~*~

Early the following morning, before the sun had even started its journey across the sky of the hazy moon, Dr. Milo Ruest entered his medbay to see his patient already awake and sitting on the cot.  She had exchanged her torn clothing for a towel wrapped around her body, long tresses still dripping the remedy.  He was only slightly surprised to see her already out though he was more than a little offended.

"Is Minik taking over as ship's doctor, too?"

Nash frowned at the assertion.  Her pilot had taken over numerous tasks since the sundering of her crew, including at times medic to a hung-over Captain, but then he had also taken over their share of the payment as well.  "He was only doing what I asked."

"As am I."

There was no denying this was how their narrative went, hot one moment and cold the next; tender moments followed by scathing sarcasm.  The Doc was a professional, though, and he set all conflicting emotions and thoughts aside and began inspecting his patient first with hands and eyes and then a scanner.  He pulled out a light and shined it in her eyes, making little grunting noises from time to time as he digested the exam.

Finally he pulled his fingers away from prodding at her neck and spoke.  "The bruising will take time, but all other injuries have healed well.  How do you feel?"

"Tired,"  she admitted.  "Sore."

"I can give you a stim for the pain."  After another quiet moment while he administered the medicine, he approached the bantha in the room.  "Did Minik tell you about the men waiting outside?"

"Yes."

"You can't seriously be thinking of going with them?"  It was the first hint of emotion he had shown her, his agitation but a hint of the anger and confusion churning beneath the surface.

Nash reached out and cupped the side of his face with her hand, it was an intimate and comforting gesture, a softer side that she almost never showed.  Out of all the options laid out in front of her, this was the best one, and ultimately the safest for  everyone else.  She had to make both Milo and Minik see that.  "He's not going to kill me."  Even as she said it, Nash wondered if it was true.

[Rinny]

Nashara Vaelen willingly followed her Devaronian and human escort to one of the tallest towers of Nar Shaddaa's cityscape.  She even engaged in playful, though sometimes barbed, banter with the horned one, certain that the human didn't speak at all.  The scavenger Captain had dressed in revealing style: her usual high topped leather boots framed by a red ruffled skirt that started high on the thigh and cascaded down the back.  On top was a marriage of leather and silk clasped tightly together with shiny mythra hooks, showing off womanly curves and ample cleavage.  Around her neck was a short, red scarf that attempted to hide the black and purple bruising mixed with bits of pink, newly healed flesh.  Finally, resting lazily on her hip was a long barreled blaster that was not hers.

"Give me your blaster, Minik."  He didn't comply right away, instead gave her a rather skeptical expression.  "Mine hasn't been fired in over a year, it's obviously not the one used to kill Sally.  No one else is taking the blame for this."  Her pilot had argued with her, but Minik had no standing in Nar Shaddaa's complex underworld.  Though whatever capital her family had built up was likely already spent by now, Nash had something more than nothing.

Though she walked behind the Devaronian and in front of the muscular human, Nash walked with her chin high, daring anyone to think that she was anything less than a VIP and that her visit was anything but compulsory.  She was led to the very top floor, where one of Ahnju's penthouses was being renovated.  Quickly though Nash realized that it wasn't something that had been planned; a smell of burnt fabric and flesh still lingered though any bodies and most of the mess had been cleaned up.  A large expanse of glass was missing leaving a dizzying feeling as one looked out over the buildings below.

"Attack was days ago and they still can't get the window to fit right.  Lord Ahnju's already had an engineer tossed out."  The Devaronian leaned down and whispered to her as they walked off the lift, then made a whistling and splat sound to demonstrate that he meant tossed out the gaping hole in the wall and not just off the job.

Nash raised an eyebrow but tried not to show too much interest.  "Attack?"

"Some idiot kid thought he could play around in the Hutt's computers.  Sooner or later, everyone learns not to cross a Hutt."  He gave her a smirking grin, as if the meaning could have been lost on her.

"So he's been caught then?"  When the Devaronian nodded Nash tried not to let her disappointment show.  Someone broke into Ahnju's private suite just to slice his computer console, whoever he was seemed to rather enjoy taking his life into his own hands, or thought he was that good.

"Set to be executed this morning!"  He could barely contain his glee at the prospect of his master's enemies meeting their just end.  "Glorious Lord Ahnju!"  The Devaronian pronounced as they came to stop near the large mass of flesh and then bowed low with a flourish.  "As requested, the ever elusive Nashara Vaelen."

"You may go, your payment will be transferred presently."  A rather severe yet fashionably decorated female Twi'lek appeared from the other side of Ahnju, waving off the two escorts.

"Unnecessary, but appreciated."  With another bow, the Devaronian turned and gave Nash another dark smile before leaving, his silent companion falling in behind him.

Nash stood in front of the Hutt, the hand opposite her blaster planted on her hip.  She didn't bow or offer flowery salutations, just stared up at the large, glossy eyes of the creature before her, a small smirk pulling at the corner of her lip.  It could have been like looking back in time for how much she was channeling the late Royston Vaelen.  She had her mother's hair and eyes and curves, but her father's sharp features and superiorly cocky attitude.  Ahnju seemed to smirk in kind and started to contract and extend his muscles, moving in unique Hutt fashion towards the large doors that led out to an expansive and lavish outdoor patio and garden area.  He motioned for Nash to follow him, but halted his Twi'lek assistant from doing the same.

The smells of fragrant flowers and herbs assaulted her senses as Nash exited the suite, a startling change from the lingering burning odors inside the room.  The sights were just as garish as the smells, plants and flowers of all different hues and shapes had been transplanted from across the galaxy.  Though great sections of transparisteel had been raised to block the wind but not the view, the occasional strong gust broke through an opening and sought to toss her hair into a mess.  The centerpiece of this rooftop oasis however was not flora, but a line of bodies.  There were men, women, humans, and aliens, all wearing filthy clothing in various states of disrepair.  Their hands and feet were bound, some were crying or pleading, others seemed resigned to their fate.  A fate that was easy to discern by the large Gamorrean standing nearby resting a blaster rifle on his shoulder.

"[How wonderful to see you again, small Captain.  It is unfortunate it took the tragic death of our mutual friend to bring us together.]"  Ahnju seemed amused by the entire scenario.  They were slowly making their way towards an opening in the wind breakers where another Gamorrean had an Evocii by the back of his shirt and was pushing him precariously close to the edge.  "[The Besadii have a need for good freighter captains.  Especially those with proper dedication and... motivation.]"  With the wave of his meaty hand and a healthy Hutt laugh the Evocii was sent screaming over the edge of the building to fall to the city streets far, far below.

Nash's jaw set into an angry frown, the not-so-subtle hints at her demise were trying on her patience.  Every measure of this song and dance seemed to have been expertly crafted to ensure fear and, as Nash had suspected, compliance.  "Consider me motivated."

The Hutt let out another chortle and watched the continuing executions.  "[You will be contacted with the details of our contract.]"

It was a clear dismissal, but Nash wasn't done.  "I need something."  That hand was back on her hip, but the smirk hadn't quite made its way back yet.  Ahnju turned slightly, intrigued by what his little captain could want.  "I have a void in my crew, my slicer was killed and I heard you have recently acquired a halfway decent one."

"Halfway decent?!"  Came the shocked sputter from a skinny, and very filthy, human male being pushed towards the edge of the building by the end of a Gamorrean's blaster rifle.  Nash just barely heard him over the rush of the wind, in the face of his impending death he didn't want to be remembered as only halfway decent.

"[Five years.]"

Now it was Nash's turn to laugh.  "He's not worth that much, toss him over."  She watched as the man was pushed closer and closer to the edge.  "A waste, though, someone who can sneak in here right under your top notch security...  Probably wasn't even his data spike that alerted your men, was it?"  Truth be told Nash had no idea what the details were behind the attempted heist and was completely making it up as she went, but she had a feeling and went with it.

"[Four years.]"

The smirk was back.  If the man was making any pronouncements about his skill and how he was quite useful not as a smear on the concrete below, they both ignored him.  Ahnju didn't get to where he was by acting recklessly or throwing away useful tools.  Now it was time for the counter-offer.  "I'll give you a year, a good, solid year.  Any job you need.  After that, we can have an 'on-call' arrangement."

The Hutt let out a low, rumbling noise of consideration as he eyed the small creature in front of him.

"And," she jerked her head back towards the suite behind them.  "I'll pay for the damages he caused."

An intriguing offer because as far as anyone knew, the Vaelen scrapping and treasure hunting business had very little in liquid assets and had been struggling ever since the Battle of Coruscant.  Another low, rumbling noise that built into a new round of amused Hutt laughter.  "[You think your value so high?  Or his so low?]"

"I know how hard it can be to ship oversized cargo.  And even harder to find an independent contractor with good-standing commercial relationships with a number of galactic corporations."

After a heavy moment of consideration, Ahnju waved his hand at his executioner and barked a few short orders.  The dirty slicer was dropped to the ground at Nash's feet.  She crouched down to his level and peered at him inquisitively, as a child might inspect a new insect.  "If he dies before he gets back to my ship the deal's off, boss."





Reference image!  http://pinterest.com/pin/236931630368989151/

[Rinny]

Drunk Enough to Dance


"Fancy seeing you here, Captain."

Nash looked up from her long-stemmed glass of something pink and bubbling.  It was a strange sense of d?j? vu, except this time she was at a much more upscale and busier cantina, and her drink had been interrupted by the fashionable Devaronian who was a bit more amiable than her former Nikto shadow.  "Are you following me, Horns?"

"Torlin."  He leaned on the bar and nodded towards the tender nearest them.  "I could ask you the same thing, Nashara."

She bristled slightly at the use of her full name, but decided she wasn't going to let him ruin her drink or her mood.  "Where's your friend, Torlin?"

"We have differing tastes in... entertainment."  He accepted a drink from the tender that looked similar to hers but was a deep purple instead.  "Put Captain Vaelen's drinks on my tab."

Nash lifted her glass in slight toast, buying her drinks was a pretty good way to get back on her good side even if she thought him to be just another one of Ahnju's stooges.  But then, she was now one of them too.  "To new business arrangements."

The Devaronian chuckled and took a large swallow of his drink.  "To today's job being some of the easiest credits I've ever made."

"Glad I could be of service."  Nash polished off her drink quickly and ordered another before her new friend could change his mind about paying for her drinks.  "How long have you been working for the Hutt?"

It could have been unnerving the way Torlin took his time before he answered, carefully studying the woman before him.  Nash took it all in stride, the liquor already dulling any sense of propriety she might have had not to mention her good mood for not being tossed off Ahnju's towering building.  "I don't work for Ahnju, I'm more of a freelancer,"  he said finally.

"So then you don't know this job that I've finally agreed to?"

His lips curled into a smirk,  "Haven't the slightest.  It's been a long time since the Hutts went to war, and they are anything but modest."  It was a hint, betraying perhaps that he did know, or maybe that she should just be extra careful.

Nash had heard rumblings of the disagreement between the Hutt hierarchy and the Hapans, but was ignorant to its details.  Up until today she hadn't cared either way which factions were at war or aligned; deadly space engagements were often very profitable for her little operation, not to mention the splintering of the galaxy sometimes made it a bit easier to travel freely.

"How about a dance, Nashara?"  That devilish grin that fit his face so well was back.

The music playing in the cantina was an upbeat electric mix, the type of sound Nash preferred and could easily move to.  There was already a sizeable crowd on the floor beyond the raised bar area swaying and grinding to the beat.  She let out a small laugh however and told him,  "That's going to take a few more drinks."

~*~

The original plan had been to grab a drink to settle her nerves after leaving her newest crew member in the capable hands of her ship's medic.  Nash didn't stick to the plan.  Late into the evening a pair of inebriated individuals swaggered through the docking port.  The tall Devaronian had an arm draped over the smaller human's shoulders while her arm was gripping him tightly around the waist; not out of affection, but she was pretty sure she'd fall over if she let go.  Together they were trying to sing out the lyrics to the last song they'd heard which was in a language neither could understand let along speak.

The Captain may have forgotten that several hours ago he was the collection agent sent to ensure she attended a meeting she had been pointedly avoiding, but the man standing at the top of the landing ramp on her ship hadn't.  "Well at least I don't have to go looking for you."  Milo scowled down at the two of them, bristling with a myriad of negative emotions.

"I think your beau is a bit jealous, my pet."  If there was one thing Torlin had found enjoyable today, it was getting under the skin of this particular human male.

"He can't, I'm not on the ship,"  Nash announced happily as she swayed on her feet.

The Devaronian quirked a brow and looked between the two of them.  "Then we should have that nightcap at my place instead."

"Raincheck, Horns."  Nash released her grip on him and took a few unsteady steps towards the ramp.  Neither man made a move to assist her, but after those first few steps Nash had managed to change her drunken gait into a passable saunter.  She exaggerated the sway of her hips, the ruffles of her red skirt swishing against her legs.  Torlin had a nice view from the back, but her eyes were fixed on the man standing at the entrance to her ship.

When she finally had made it to the top, having managed to not trip on her way up, Nash stood in front of Milo and grabbed a fistful of his shirt.  She swayed slightly as the ramp clicked and began to rise leaving Torlin to smirk and shake his head.

"Made a friend, did you?"  Milo said as the ramp latched into place.

Nash smiled up at him and nodded.  "He's not so bad," her words slurring slightly as she reached up with her other hand to rub the several days worth of growth on his face.  "Told you he wouldn't kill me."

The drunken, flirtatious mood of his Captain did little to quell his emotions.  They needed to get off this planet, back into space, back into their element.  Losing Lisette and Antal from the crew had been hard, but staying on Nar Shaddaa had become hazardous to their health, in more ways than one.  Minik had also filled him in on what they'd been doing during the past year, for Nash that had been mostly drinking.  So far they'd fixed up the ship pretty well, but she'd neglected finding a new loadmaster, and if there hadn't been the run in with Ahnju she likely never would have found another slicer.

"You're an idiot, and unbelievably reckless, and really drunk."  He said finally, looking down at her with a frown. "Go to bed, I'll bring you something for the hangover in the morning."

"You're not coming with me?"  Her fingers had traveled to trace up his jaw and around his ear to play with a few scraggly strands of hair on the back of his neck.

"No, Nash,"  he ground out, struggling not to blow up right there.  "You're a kriffing mess and so is this 'company,' if that's even what we are anymore.  Instead of putting this ship back together like a Captain, you're burying yourself in the bottle.  You're going to get yourself killed and probably the rest of us along with you."  It was hard not to scream it at her, to shake her until she managed to come back to reality.  His words were quiet and harsh and delivered the desired blow to her mood and her pride.

Nash let go of his shirt and put her palms on his chest, pushing him as hard as she could which very nearly resulted in her tumbling to the floor instead of the other way around.  "Then why even come back."  She turned around and put her hand on the way, steadying herself as she walked towards her quarters, the happy drunk feeling had vanished.

Milo shoved his hands into his pockets and watched her go.  He was often bewildered and aggravated by her behavior, but he hadn't remembered it being this way before.  A year was a long time, especially after everything that had happened.  Maybe it was a mistake to come back here and think things could pick up where they left off.  Or maybe all Nash needed was someone to give her a good kick in the ass.

[Rinny]

Opposite Directions


There had been a few dreamless hours of sleep before the clenching in her stomach pulled Nash from the nest of sheets, stumbling through the darkened room to the soft glow of the safety lights shining from the washroom.  After emptying her stomach's contents, she fumbled with the clasps and belts of her clothes, nearly tearing them off in frustration before collapsing naked on the cold floor of the sonic shower.  Nash hated it and had thrown a childish fit at Antal over not having a water shower, but even with a decent filtration system carrying the extra water for bathing would be far more expensive than the standard sonic variety.  After a few moments the hum of the vibrations faded; Nash didn't feel anymore clean than before.

When the Doc finally came back to check on his Captain, he was surprised to find her sitting at the computer console in a fresh change of clothes balancing a pair of data pads on bare knees.  The door had been unlocked, as it usually was.  Nash had always had a fairly open door policy if anyone on board needed her attention.  Though Milo had told her he'd be by in the morning, she had already started self-medicating.

"In my professional opinion, drinking to cure a hangover is kriffing stupid."

Nash paused for a second before finishing off the liquid in her glass.  "If I'm such a stupid idiot, you should have taken that job on Corellia."

Milo took a deep breath and shoved his hands in his pockets.  He didn't want to be angry and anger certainly had never helped in the past.  Nash was almost like a mirror, reflecting emotions cast her way; rage and harsh criticism met with hostility while rashness and patience brokered a more thoughtful and discerning woman.  "Have you ever been to Coronet City?"

Nash paused in her work and set her empty glass on the small table beside her, but didn't turn around to face him.  "Yes."

"You know when you ride one of the maglev trains and you pass another going the opposite direction; your heart beats a little faster as both cars shake a little from the momentum of passing so close to each other.  And then it's over.  The ride goes back to normal.  You and me, we're two trains going three hundred kilometers an hour right past each other."

Nash's hands clenched on the datapads in her lap.  She hadn't imagined her day would start with some maudlin analogy from Milo of all people.  She just sat there unmoving, unsure of what sort of response he expected or wanted.  "I need a list of the medical supplies we need to restock on, and something for this headache,"  she said finally.

"Yeah."  It was a resigned acknowledgement that unless there were copious amounts of alcohol involved, the walls Nash had built back up weren't coming down anytime soon.  At least she appeared to be working again.  "Come down to the med bay, I'll get you something and we can wake up the stray you picked up."

Nash opened her mouth to respond, but a beep from the console stopped her.  "I have to take this, I'll meet you down there."

As Milo left, Nash ran her fingers through her hair and pushed it back over her shoulder before answering the call.  "Rysheek," she smiled at the horned and tattooed face of the male Zabrak that materialized before her.  "Thanks for getting back to me."

"I was surprised to hear from you, Captain Vaelen.  Antal made it sound like there was an immediate job opening."

Nash's lips pursed slightly, trying to keep the irritation off her face and out of her voice.  "It's been a lean year, but the job's open now if you're as good as the old man says."

The Zabrakian let out a hearty laugh.  "He knows I have a weakness for beautiful women with large ships.  I'm on Donovia right now, should I catch a shuttle to Nar Shaddaa?"

"No, I'll come make the offer in person and we'll see if you really want on my ship," she smirked as he laughed again.  "Two days."

~*~

Minik tilted his head slightly as he stared at the floating body in the tank.  "[Does he look familiar to you?]" he asked as Milo pushed past him to enter the room.

The Doc picked up the data pad off the small table and keyed in the command to slowly drain the tank.  As the liquid was removed, the form lost its buoyancy and slumped into the slings keeping him from falling to  the floor.  "I don't see how, he looks like a kid, but you were on Nar Shaddaa longer than I."

"[No, from somewhere else, HoloNet maybe.]"

"Minik, set a course for Donovia. Now."  The Captain's voice called out through the comm.

"[About damn time we left this hole.]"

"I thought she wanted to resupply?"  Milo checked the vitals one more time on his datapad before enlisting Minik's help to gently maneuver the patient from the tank to the cot.

"[And give those overgrown leeches more of our money?]"  Minik snorted and wiped his hands on a towel before heading out of the room and to the bridge.

The ship's Doc went about his work, ensuring his new charge had recovered from his injuries and it wasn't long before the young man's eyes blinked open and carefully began taking in his new surroundings.  "Ah, you're awake. Good."  Milo pulled a fresh thin, white robe from a drawer and handed it to his patient.  "Welcome aboard.  I'm Doctor Milo Ruest, but Doc is fine.  What should I call you?"

Slowly he sat up and slipped on the robe.  He tried to remember how he got to this place, or where exactly this place was.  He was in a Hutt prison and then there was a great rush of wind and the fear of being thrown from someplace very high.  His head felt like it was in a fog, perhaps it was the medicine or maybe the lack of food over these past few weeks.  "Sanj."  He finally said, pushing shaggy, white-blonde locks of hair from his eyes.

"You're a miracle worker, Doc."  Nash leaned up against open doorway to the med closet and studied the boy for a moment before jerking her head towards Milo, beckoning him away.

"The bacta did all the hard work. The rest is nothing a few good meals and a real night's sleep won't cure."  Milo pulled a pre-filled hypo-syringe from a tray and stepped just outside of the room with Nash.  "This is the last of my hangover cures you're getting, I mean it this time."  His voice was quiet as he pushed the syringe into her skin.

Nash smirked at him as he rubbed his thumb over the injection site in her arm.  "Don't tell me you're turning into a reputable physician now with an intact moral compass?"

He paused for a second as if bothered by some deep thought.  "I've always found morality to be quite subjective."  Before turning to go back into the room he gave her a wink.

Nash rubbed her hand across her face.  It was nice to see some spark of the old Doc in there, but Nash didn't know what to make of his rapidly changing moods.  Deciding it was something that would have to be dealt with at a later time, she stepped back to the room but didn't enter.  "We can talk after you get settled in, Sanj.  Milo will show you around, and maybe help you with some new clothes."

After Nash had left and Milo was finishing up with putting all the equipment away, the young slicer cleared his throat and spoke.  "Did the Hutt return any of my stuff by chance?"

Milo chuckled a bit and shook his head.  "You were pretty lucky to get out of there with all your limbs."

After a few moments Sanj seemed steady enough on his feet and Milo offered to show him to what would be his new quarters.  "What does a salvage ship need with a slicer? Or a doctor."

"Scrap metal is just one of our many ventures.  I'm sure Nash will fill you in with what you need to know."  They walked down a narrow corridor passing several doors spaced a few meters apart.  "This hallway is crew quarters, Captain's is further down and up a half-flight of steps."  Stopping in front of one of the doors, Milo keyed in the code and the door slid open.  "They cleared out all of the personal belongings, but this room belonged to our last slicer so a lot of the equipment and parts are still stored in here.  Perhaps you can find a use for it."

"What happened to him?"

"Her."  Milo looked into the room and took a slow breath to steel his emotions.  "My sister died saving this ship.  Sometimes salvage is a dangerous business."

"Oh.  Sorry."  Sanj offered lamely.  He quickly evaded the awkward moment by stepping into the room and peering into some of the open crates and boxes.  Various datapads, droid parts, tools, and other bits were nearly spilling out with no discernible organization to them.  There was a small bed with a few folded blankets piled on top in one corner and a large computer console in another that had an open panel and a few circuit boards pulled out as if someone had been in the middle of upgrading it and then abandoned it.  He picked up the top datapad out of a box and turned it on, with barely enough power it showed a thirteen month old ship diagnostic and then blinked out.  Tossing it back into the box, he considered broaching another potentially awkward topic.  "So you and that woman..."

"You mean the Captain?  Your boss?"  Milo bristled slightly.  "It's a small ship.  Sometimes it's hard to stay out of everyone else's business, but I'm sure you'll figure it out."  He turned and started to walk away,  "I'll have Molly bring you up some food."

"Molly?"  Sanj raised an eyebrow.

"Don't get too excited, it's just a droid."