Luna slowly pried open her eye only for them to snap shut as pain filled her shoulder, after a few calming breaths she opened her eyes and surveyed, she was still lying down on the medical bed covered In her own blood. The body of the doctor lay beside her along with the 'body' of HK-81, Rothos was nowhere to be seen. She crawled her way out of bed and over to HK-81 body. He sat up and swiveled his head round at luna.
"You know, for an assassin droid, you're quite shit." she said panting. The droid stood up and pulled her onto her feet.
"query: Any idea what happend?" the droid said. Luna shook her head which he soon regretted when her head split open in pain. HK pulled a small green bacta stim from his belt and injected the needle into her. She sighed in relief and stood back onto her own feet without any assistance. She struggled to the entrance of the operation room and out the hospital.
"query: what will we do now?" the droid asked her. She grunted in pain and turned to him over her shoulder.
"we'll go back to his house, and try to find him". She said
"commentary: with all due respect, why do you care? He's just some meat bag."
"True, but he's saved my life twice now, once when he lifted me, and then when we were surrounded by the droidikas. If he can save me twice why can't i help him once." she said before walking off down the street.
Rothos was pulled from his sleep by turbulence , he looked about himself frantically, he found himself tied up in the back of an old metal speeder. Two men sat in the front coversing in hushed voices, Rothos checked his person and found that all his belongings had been taken, a quick glance confirmed that his belt lay next to the man driving the speeder. Rothos scowled, not only was he tied up but there was no way he could get his belt back without them noticing. He moved closer to the two of them to try and lean his ear to what they were saying.
"With 'his' predecessors replaced master will no doubt be most pleased, no doubt we will receive some time off." the driver said.
"Perhaps if we're lucky, this one will be a great addition to the cause." the passenger said, nodding his head back towards Rothos.
"Master Bishot will no doubt have great things for him." the driver responded, Rothos tried to come up with a way to get his com link back so he could call for backup from Luna and HK, or at least let them know he was alive.
Luna and HK entered the small building quietly, the door in front of them opened and Big Mo and his translation droid came out.
"Big Mo welcomes you exalted business partners, what need have you?" the droid said as big Mo eyed HK-81 wearily.
"we're not here for business, we need information." Luna said.
"what need information do you require says Big Mo"
"Anything about a group of black cloaked mysterious assassins, they carry swords and I think they had some connection to
Haren lock. We'll pay" she said, the alien visually stiffened once what she had said was translated.
"Big Mo has no information for sale, good day" the droid said as Big Mo ushered them out the door. They did not take this lightly, HK-81 slapped Big Mo knocking him down, he scrambled through into his office and tried to close the door behind him. HK-81 stopped the door with his hand, the two of them stepped inside the office as big Mo hid behind his desk.
"information, now" Luna demanded.
"Big Mo doesn't know anything." the droid said in a melancholy tone that betrayed BM's state. Luna raised her eyes and motioned for HK to slap him again, it wouldn't cause any damage but It sure would scare the shit out of him.
"Big Mo can not, he must be silent."
"You'll be silent for a long time if you don't" she said as hk pulled out his blaster, Big Mo let out a yelp and stuttered something out.
"tomorrow there is a gala six levels up, several Important figures. Here, tgis data chip should let you in. You should be able to find what you're looking for." the droid said as big Mo slid the chip across the table between them.
"Come on, there must be more than that!" she yelled.
"That is all Big Mo knows" the droid said, she continued pressing more but noticed the dark patch on the carpet beneath him. She scowled and stalked out the shady building.
"Dam it. How are we going to get six levels up to six levels? Or get inside the gala for example, do we look like gala people?" she said bitterly.
"we do know where just enough money to move up a few levels is." the droid said. She stopped in her tracks and spun to him.
"he'll kill us."
"statement: I'm sure he wouldn't mind if it meant saving his life."
She sucked on her teeth for a few seconds before coming to a decision.
"Move along. Move along. Boarding in T minus 12 minutes, I repeat boarding in T minus 12 minutes." the voice said over the intercom. The two of them stood shoulder to shoulder with various other people, she felt herself get shoved from behind as the whole lines moved forward. Finally after almost an hour of bumping Into other people they reached the reception.
" Tickets please" the droid said holding out it's tiny metal pincer, Luna complied and after a few seconds the gate in front of her opened. Before HK-81 could enter however it closed again.
"hey what the hell my droid hasn't come through yet." she complained.
"Sorry, but you did not fire a droid assistance form. I'm afraid it must travel in cardo with the rest of the luggage." the ticket droid said 'you think it would be more understanding considering its a droid also'
"we'll I can't. I need him for um, my leg, yeah my leg was badly injured and I need his support." she said, obviously lying.
"you are free to go back and acquire a form but you will be forced to queue again."
"What,The ship goes off in ten minutes." she said angrily.
"statement: i shall go into the cargo hall only if to stop you screaming" HK said walking down the path into the cargo hall.
Luna scowled and travled up the ramp into the ship, after a few second she found her seat, right better some old man and a woman with her baby. Just her luck, neither of them decided to move so she was forced to climb over the old man so she could sit down. Eventually she did just in time as the ship began to take of, once they land they should be six levels higher, the higest she's ever gone.
Calelea Gillcros stepped about the ball carefully looking at each of the decorations, she barked orders at servants and maids, no matter how she changed the decorations they never looked right.
"No move it that way a little, a little less, get reid of the whole bloody thing." she said with growing anoyience
"Cale, Cale calm down my dear. It will be all Right, it's only some silly little gala." wilnet said comforting his wife.
"it's not just little, all our donatiors are coming, he's coming" she said turning to wisper towards the end.
"No actually he's not, just received word that he can't come." her husband said, this shocked her, there biggest doner wasn't coming. Half of the is whole gala was for him, she wall pulled from her thoughts by the beeping coming from her husbands watch, looked down on it a confused look on his face.
"Dear. time for your medication" she said softly. He had a subtle look of recongion on his face which soon turned back to confusion.
"medication? Medication for what?" he asked.
"for your head, because of the accident."
"accident, accident, what accident?" he asked a look of concentration on his face.
"just take your medication honey. You'll be alright after that" she said with a smile, with a dry gulp he took back the two white pills. Cake turned back to the maids and Continued Barking orders at them. A few minutes later she entered her office and began pressing buttons on her computer, after a few minutes a hologram of a enderly man appeared infront of her.
"your not coming? What happend to our agreement?" she demanded.
"nice to see you Calelea, and I'm afraid something more important came up"
"more important, need I remind you that I'm running most of our operations here, I could do with a little report." she said Harshly
"now now no need to be rude, everything is going according to plan, I have simpley came across a rare commodity" he said, his head turned to the side and he turned to back to her.
"I'm afraid I have to leave, there is something I must attend too." he said and quickly ended the holocall. Her cry was of protest was cut off slightly. She sat there for a few moments before storming out the office
"we need to find a place to sleep for the night and buy our selves some fancy clothes."Luna said walking beside HK-81, the street was significantly cleaner than the ones bellow, the people around them seemed much cleaner than they were used too. They even passed a hospital, a real one, they knew it was such since it was a big white building with "Gill" on it.
Eventually they found what looked like a small hotel, stepping Inside they found it in a much cleaner state than any building they had seen, which as funny because by this levels standards this place wa a hovel. The old woman at the reception looked at her over the top of her glasses with a face that clearly said 'ew lower level people'
"hello I'd like to rent a one bed room." Luna said.
"hmm. 800 credits, and another 200 for droid coverage." the woman said in pompous tone of voice. Luna scowled but forked over the credits anyway. She flopped down onto the soft bed with groan.
"commentary: aren't we forgetting something?" HK-81 said. Right she had to go get some fancy clothes. She pulled her self out of bed and headed for the door.
"how will we get you in? Unless you want me to dress you up in some clothes and pretend your human" she said as the droid gave her what could only be a dry look. With a chuckle she skipped out the door
It took her a while to find what she believed to be a market district but she got there eventually, she weaved and bobbed her way through the crowd til she found a small clothing shop. The place wad filled with neat and expensive clothes of all types, she explored the different selections of clothes before she decided on a blue neat dress, no special designs just complet blue. She went over too
the counter and bought the dress from the man, 5000 credits was quite pricy from what she knew but oh well it was rothos's money, just as she was leaving the store she bumped into someone.
"oh exu-" she cut herself off as she took a look at the man, what caught he eyed was the dark black and red robes he and his comanion wore, the same robes the men who had attacked Rothos's and her.
"what where your going" said the other man who's face was obscured.
"I'm sorry about him, apologies for bumping into you" the first man said.
"I-it's no issue, I'll be on my way." Luna said before quickly running off. 'Dam that was close, so I guess Big Mo was right about this place having some connection.' she continued to travel down the street quickly.
"hey! Wait!" Said the voice of the man she had bumped into, 'shit I've been found out' she said subtlety increasing his pace, as he started to get closer she started to get faster. Eventually she broke out into a full sprint, after a few minutes of running she must have tripped on somthing because she went flying into the ground, an arm pulled he up gently and she was met with the same man from before.
"you dropoed this" he said handing her the data stick.
"oh, thank you." she said taking the data stick back nervously, he gave her a nod and travled back the way he came. She shook her head and headed back to the
Hotel.
She layed the dress down on the bed in the room, thankfully it was in a plastic container so it didn't get damaged when she fell.
"Did something happen?" the droid said clearly noticing her disheveled state.
"I encountered a few of the men who attacked us, I guess big mo was telling the truth, hopefully we can find something more at the gala tomorrow. For now I'm going to get some shut eye and I suggest you power down. And so they did.
Luna stepped inside the ball room of the gala, men and woman of all different species danced and chattered about the hall. 'now, what exactly should i be looking for' she was tapped on the shoulder by a gold protocol droid.
"can i help you?"
"statement: it's me meatbag, this is my disguise" HK-81 said. She nodded impressed.
"what do you think we should look for?" she asked her droid companion trying not to give his disuse away. The droid gave a meeder shrug and began walking about the hall. She walked about the hall for a moment listening in on the conversations around her, eventually the attention of all was pulled by the clinking of a fork on glass, just above them stood their host of the evening ,Calelea Gillcros. Some rich philanthropist famous for bulding a muchtof hospitals and homeless shelters.
"I thank you esteemed donators and benefactors for coming. Today is a special occasion,not only have we received another large donation from our primary donor, Mr Hailhor. Unfortunately he cannot be here today as he has some business to attend to, and the other wonderful reason we are gathered is because today is my son's 23 birthday, and again I'm afraid he isn't here, Mr hailhor has graciously agreed to tutor my son." she punctured her speach with one of those stupid rich people claps. As eveyone was busy clapping to themselves she noticed a shape travled behind Calelea and into a door behind her, orchestral opera music began to fill the air.
"I'm going to do some snooping around, keep an eye out" she wispered to her mechanical companion. After looking about she found some stairs that looked like they took her somewhere she shouldn't be. The second floor seeemd to be almost completely devoid of life, the air thick with many layers of dust, white sheets hang from the wall. Luns lifted on of the sheets and found a painting underneath, Calelea, what was seemed like husband, and a young boy. 'their son, why would this be coved up?' she did the same with other sheets and all showed the same, some where rge whole family abd some were just the son. 'what the hell is going on here' she thought. The floor seemed like it hadn't been used in years with all the dust around, finally she came a door that seemed suspiciously void of dust, with a twist the door opened with a light click. As she stepped inside she found a small office, unlike the rest of the level this place was actually clean ,though the trend of coving up pictures of their son continued. In the centre of the room was a medium wooden desk with a small computer terminal. Luna slid herself into the chair and switched on the computer witch coincidently did not need a password, luna began snooping around the files on the computer.
'huh, that's weird, around 60% of funds are going to the basic medical stuff, but 40% is being shuffled of else ware, hmm. Wait, why was the door to for the office unlocked, and why was the terminal open.' as the realisation hit her she felt tge cold steel of a blaster press againt her head.
"raise your hands and turn around" a synthesized yet clearly female voice said.
The female figure was disguised by a metal helmet, the blaster aimed at her face wiggled,
"hey,I'm talking to you" the woman said. "what are tou doing here?"
"what's it to you? You going to turn me over to the authorities?" luna said sharply. The woman turned her head slightly before she lowed he blaster.
"no, iv got better things to do. Go home and forget this ever happened" she said before rushing out the door, luna had no time to question the woman before she was gone. 'jeez she's fast' luns decided that it was indeed time to leave, thankfully she had got some information that could prove useful.
I hope you enjoyed this chapter.
I will update soon.
