"Why does this always happen to me?" Resse exclaimed. He was sick of getting shot at. It wasn't his fault that he was a hired gun. This wasn't even his conflict. He might be a merc, but he definitely wasn't hired for either side in this fight. He was just having a drink when the Grand Protector's Escort arrived to scan the bar for possible hires. Apparently, Resse just looked like too much of a merc for his own good. It didn't matter, as marauders continued assaulting his position. And it wasn't a comfort that the youth's "position" was an overturned durasteel table in the corner of a lonely cantina in the middle of nowhere. "How am I gonna get out of this one?" he wondered. His luck was almost up, and he knew it. That table wasn't gonna last forever. He had a minute at best. He had to work fast.
Resse let out a few suppressive shots from his light repeater, making sure the rodians were taking cover and thus unable to gun him down as he bolted out the back. When he saw them duck, he sprinted the 5 meter gap between his cover and the open back door. "You'd think they'd be smart enough to cover the back," he exclaimed and he dove through the door and slammed it shut with his feet. Unfortunately for him, they were.
"Nice try. Hands behind your back," their leader, a green rodian at least half a meter taller than the rest of his crew, stated plainly. He seemed to be pretty accustomed to this. As this rodian cuffed Resse's hands behind his back with vibrocuffs and kicked the man's repeater to the side, it became pretty clear that this wasn't his first arrest today. "Resse Heldenhaft, you are under arrest for aiding the Bounty Rebellion forces in perpetuating the Rodian Civil War. During wartime, no trial will be held to determine the fate of a criminal, so you will reside in the local prison until the war ends, at which point you will be tried. That's what you get for being a good-for-nothing merc," he laughingly added. This was one big joke to him. But it wasn't the point. The point was Resse was going to jail once again.
He'd get out. He knew he would. Because that's the life of the mercenary. You get paid to get into jams, and then you get yourself out of them. The only difference with this is that he was doing it on the house and for himself. "I love charity work," Resse muttered under his breath as the gang led him through the dense jungle. "Shut the fuck up, maggot!" the leader of the gang exclaimed. "Nobody told you you could talk. We're almost there. Just keep your trap shut till then."
About 15 minutes later, Resse saw his soon-to-be home glimmering from between the trees in the grove. The giant bubble dome shone brightly as the sun, Tyrius, started its descent into oblivion for the night. Inside the domes usually rested a grand city of the rodian people. In this case, it was just a massive prison. Simplistic, like a giant durasteel box. Perhaps more intimidating that the 50 meter high perimeter wall with numerous sniper stands and an electrocuted and barbed fence was the massive door to the prison. To say it was huge was a complete understatement. This door had bulk to it. 10 meter thick durasteel made up the body of the door, yet the outside was covered in 5 meter long spikes to prevent an attack from making it to the door. The guards had to hail the doorman from 20 meters out just to prevent getting half the company speared by the giant spikes. Must be in case of rebel attacks, Resse thought. At least he wasn't trying to break into the prison.
The thoughts of ease were soon put to rest when he reached the inside of the prison compound. Leftover Vagh Rodiek from the Yuuzhan Vong war patrolled the courtyard in which the prisoner's toiled, mining for some rare and perhaps nonexistent mineral in an effort to give them something to do so as not to go insane. With those beasts walking around, however, Resse guessed that the work did little to preserve one's mental stability. He stopped briefly when he saw a prisoner attack another with a vibroblade he scrounged up somehow. He watched him gut his opponent just as one of the beasts set on him and ripped him to shreds. The company rodians just laughed and pushed Resse along. "You'll get used to it," the leader said. "Move along. The processing center is just up ahead." Resse saw the entry way up ahead. One of the company rodians input the code, and the door flew open with a swoosh. Inside was a well lit area that did not look so friendly at all. I can do this. I will make it, Resse thought in his head. He knew he had the skills necessary to survive in this place. He would make it back out. He would return to the skies once again. He just needed to keep his wits about him, and forge a few alliances in this forsaken place. Still, the bevy of sharp instruments in that processing room looked less than welcoming. This is gonna sting like a bitch, Resse calmly accepted. Oh well. Shit happens, I guess. And with that final thought, Resse pressed on into the room that would likely haunt his dreams for quite a few nights, and he was okay with that. For some reason, this seemed like it was the beginning of something big. Little did he know, Resse's reputation was about to morph from struggling merc to hero of the downtrodden in the swiftest way possible.