“Hmmm…” he rumbles looking down at the steaming caff.
“Opposite kinda kick I was looking for, but I guess it’ll do”
He picks up the cup, and blows gently on the top in a manner incongruous to his dishevelled appearance and surly demeanour, before taking a sip.
“So, cat lady, you the proprietor of this…” glancing around again,
“establishment?” the word drips with scorn and inferred air quotes.
Just a second after the grizzled man says that a chiss woman walks out of what appears to be a washroom. She speaks with elegance and demeanor.
“No, that would be me.”
The grizzled man turns to watch her approach, leaning against the bar in a manner clearly intended to be nonchalant, but it’s obvious to the trained eye that his demeanour is that of a coiled viper, or hunched ack hound, ready to launch into action at the slightest trigger.
He examines the Chiss woman for a moment
“Hmmm… you don’t match the description. Either my intel’s wrong or you’re not Leetoo. Are you?”
He raises an eyebrow on his scarred face.
“No no, I am Leetoo,” She says, keeping her voice steady. She then changes into her true form. She’s a shapeshifter.
“How can I help you?”
“Huh! Go figure.” He replies, giving what you would presume he thinks is a smile, but looks to be more of a smug snear.
“Thought I might have been on the wrong edge of the galaxy for a moment. But not sure what I was expecting really.”
There’s still no sign of him relaxing, but he is trying to maintain the illusion of ease, and non-concern.
As the Xexto collapses from seven too many drinks, the shapeshifter invites the man to take a seat so they can have a chat
The Jawa squeaks and smacks the drunk Cathar with a bottle, then scrambles away and hides under a blaster-scarred table, next to the corpse of a Klatooinian.
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He steps over to her and takes a seat, paying particular care not to position his back to the door, and maintaining a line of site to as much of the room as he can.
As he approaches his size becomes apparent, for a human, he is a big, brute of man.
Taking another sip of his Corellian Caff, he leans backwards.
“Thanks. Have to say, this place was hard to find.”
Snowbund briefly sees stars and never sees the Jawa flee. A drunken hiccup and then she stumbles back to serving drinks remarkably well for someone so hammered
I guess it paid well to be a permadrunk former Jedi Battlemaster
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“Hard to find? We’re the only Cantina in the village!” She exclaims. She then proceeds to ask, “Why did you need to see me again?”
Before the Big Brute of a Man can answer, a Bounty Hunter enters the door, with an MSE droid following him. The Bounty Hunter is wearing a bandana around his neck, with heavy clothing with an insignia on his shoulder in the shape of a shattered heart. They wear a large rifle on their back and some Mandalorian gauntlets on their forearms.
“Huh!” He chuckles in reply, while studying the newly arrived bounty hunter, and not taking his gaze from him for a second.
“You misunderstand me. Might be the only place in town, but you know how many Thirsty Nerfs there are around the rim?” He raises a hand to indicate that it was a rhetorical question.
“Anyway, none of the others I’ve schlepped round were the right one”
He does that unnerving smile thing again, his eyes flicking back to you for a split second, before returning to the Hunter.
“You can relax, I just want some info, then I’ll be on my way”
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“Ah, yes. The info. Well, word around town is that there is an underground slave market run by a lesser-known crime syndicate. They are saying that they meet ‘where the moon touches the ground’” The shapeshifter explains.
The Hunter is going from booth to booth, obviously looking for someone in particular. You can tell that he isn’t happy with his results thus far.
“Hmm… interesting. Good to know, but not actuallywhat I’m here for.” The big man growls.
Still not taking his eyes off the Hunter, he asks quietly and with slightly conspiratorially tone.
“You know this guy? Seems awful interested in your clientele. He local?”
Even more than he already was, he seems poised, and ready spring for his rifle at the slightest trigger.
“Nope. Never seen him before in my life” She says with a suspicious tone.
The Hunter is about halfway around the room now, closing in fast.
“I’ll cut to the chase.” He grumbles, clearly unhappy at the prospect of the Hunter cutting this conversation short.
“You used to fly with a hyperlane scout?” His tone is questioning, but it seems more of a statement.
“Arconan, with a bit of a salt habit, goes by the name Petra Fortan. Right?”
His pause isn’t long enough for a confirmation or denial.
“I just need to know where to find him. Assuming he isn’t dead yet.”
The shapeshifter pauses to think for a moment.
Hunter is 15 meters away
“Petra, Petra. Rings a bell. Heard he was headed to the Antar system.”
10 meters
“To see an Ortolan named uh, what was it”
5 meters
“Sebas Dar!” She exclaims. “That’s all I know”
The Hunter approaches the table. You can get a real good look at him now. You see that he is a Sullustan, with a shattered heart on his pauldron. Wearing a bandana, hiding his identity. He has a rifle on his back, and taking a closer look you see a slot in his boot.
He pulls out a bounty puck, and it has the grizzled man’s face on it.
The grizzled man’s spring coils tighter, the threat of violence in the air becoming almost palpable as his jaw tightens. His eyes are fixes firmly on the sulustan hunter’s, trying to read even the slightest imperceptible hint of intent.
Without breaking his gaze for even a fraction of a second he growls through his clenched jaw
“Thank you for the information Leetoo, it’s appreciated”
He slowly, and deliberately reaches into his coat with his left hand subtly indicating for the hunter to hold with his right. He withdraws his hand at a glacial pace, and deliberately places a couple of cred chits on the table.
“So.” He says venomously to the hunter.
“We gonna do this in here, ruin this lady’s fine establishment?”
He pauses, almost too long
“Or we gonna step outside? Like professionals.”
The Hunter sighs, obviously bored. He motions towards the door.
“It’s no problem,” Leetoo says. “You should probably do as he says”
There is silence in the room as everyone has stopped what they are doing to stare at the event unfolding
The grizzled man gets up slowly, still never breaking eye contact with the Hunter.
He gestures with one arm
“After you?” He growls in a questioning tone, with almost a hint of humour, that seems out of place from him.
When the hunter, unfazed, does not respond, he continues “No? Didn’t think so”
The grizzled man strides purposefully toward the door, with the hunter following at a cautious distance.
The 2 men leave the cantina, and as the door shuts behind them, there is the distinctive sound of a flash-bag grenade detonating, the light bursting through the thin seal at the edges of the door, immediately follwed by two types of blaster fire in short controlled burst, and a scream of pain, but you can’t be sure whose.
The immediate silence after the scream, is broken only by the faint ring of tinnitus that always follows a flash-bang.
Eventually, one of the previously unconscious patrons plucks up the courage to poke his head outside.
There is no sign of the Hunter, or the Grizzled man, and neither is ever seen or heard from again.
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Behind the bar, the drunken Cathar, who screams JEDI just looking at her outfits of choice, in this case a gorgeous green gown that shows off her toned muscled fuzzy body continues to make drinks. When the flashbang goes off, the Cathar hiccuped. “Better not have been near my swoop again, I swear I just got it paid off too…” She mumbled before downing a Corellian Coffee