Disclaimer: I don't own the Star Wars universe or Star Wars KOTOR, George
Lucas and Lucas Arts do. They also own all the Characters and Worlds
contained therein. The characters created by me for this story are all
that I own.
Taris – Lower City
We decided to go back to the apartment and sleep and attempt the deception with the uniform in the morning. We only had the one uniform and we both hoped it would be enough. Carth agreed that I would pretend to be the Sith trooper and he would pretend to be a paid informant accompanying me. The Sith liked to use paid informants, so we hoped that would allow us to pass through the checkpoint. Carth put on such an amazingly good weasel face, that I had a hard time not laughing in front of the Sith trooper.
It worked like a charm, the Sith trooper even gave us some good warnings about what to expect down there for which I thanked him. We stepped out of the elevator right into the midst of a gang fight. Before they noticed us we stepped to the shadows and I quickly changed out of the Sith armor which probably wouldn't be too popular down here. One side was the Hidden Bek's and the other side Black Vulkars I gathered from the standard threatening dialogue that preceded the confrontation.
The Hidden Bek's didn't do so well, when the dust settled the Black Vulkars noticed us and before I could say a word attacked. What charming folks I thought, I had noted they were not that skilled in the use of their weapons and met the quickest of them in melee combat so Carth had a good chance to use his blasters. Carth and I made quick work of them, I got a slight cut but it quickly healed. The fight did point out that we really needed better armor. If I couldn't acquire some soon I would have to break down and purchase some.
We went to check out an apartment complex across from the elevator first, maybe there might be some information or stashes of goods we could find there. It was crawling with Black Vulkar, all who attacked as soon as they saw us. We shook our heads over this, these Black Vulkar were worse than the Sith on this planet. Wouldn't you know my luck held perfectly, in the first apartment I broke into we found someone hiding. I had to struggle not to laugh as I said "I'm not one of Daviks thugs; let me guess you have a bounty on your head over money owed."
The Twi'lek shook his head no and told us how he had turned in information to the government about exchange information. My respect for him rose even if he was probably suicidal given what I could tell of this Davik character, I asked if there was anything we could do and he had a surprising answer. Arrange it to look like we had taken the bounty on him, messily enough that there wouldn't be any remains left. His idea was to use demolitions and I had to agree that it was excessive for the task but they might believe it from a rookie bounty hunter. He gave me some items to sell in exchange for the detonator and told me where he thought I could buy it. I argued some with Carth about it but he agreed to stay with the man while I went up to the Upper city and back. He was correct in where to purchase the item and I noted that if we didn't find any armor soon I would be back here to buy some of the armor the merchant had. It was good quality and the prices were not too bad.
On the way back I saw some children kicking and taunting an Ithorian, I was outraged and stopped to reprimand them. They seemed to think that something was wrong with me for protecting an alien and I told them that just because someone was different they didn't have the right to attack them. They ran off calling me an alien lover and I thought sourly what a charming planet, the Sith should get a lot of recruits here. I noticed the Ithorian looked pretty bad and offered him one of my medical pak's. He said he should probably get back to someplace safe and I agreed, I needed to get moving as well Carth would get concerned if I took too long.
I went back to the apartment with the detonator, and gave it to Matrik. Matrik refused the extra credits left over from the items I had sold, saying that we should keep them. He placed the detonators on a short timer and we took cover outside the room. The explosion was rather spectacular and we agreed that the story should hold up, Matrik left but told us where to visit to collect his bounty.
We continued and the next deserted apartment we hit pay dirt. It had some type of odd logic puzzle on the lock dealing with some local band but inside the security crate was a set of echani fiber armor and some credits. Our luck was looking better and Carth and I agreed that I would wear the fiber armor and he would get the combat armor I had been wearing. The next apartment over was a difficult fight and required us to use our first med pak but the gang members there had some supplies that allowed us to upgrade Carth's weapons.
The next stop was the lower city cantina where we would hopefully get the Hutt that handled bounties to accept that Matrik was dead. The Hutt Zak believed my story about Matrik and I was actually able to bargain an extra 100 credit for the bounty out of him. He also told me about other bounties one of which was the one on Dia's head. We exited the cantina area where the Hutt was and witnessed an exchange at the bar between a brash young Twi'lek woman and two Rhodians, she called for help and Wookiee got up and went over to her. Interesting young lady I thought, good thing she has her friend to back her up otherwise that mouth of hers would get her killed.
I walked over to see what information I might be able to get from the odd pair. The Twi'lek youngster was friendly and said that her name was Mission Vao and her friend was Big Z and they were our official welcoming committee! I grinned at that and said I had a few questions she might be able to answer. She was more than happy to fill me in on the Lower City situation between the two gangs. I thanked her for the information after we had talked awhile and she said she had to get going.
I finally found Holdan in the bar, what a pleasant man he was. No wonder Dia had sliced his face open. I noticed the Twi'lek dancers were giving him particularly cold looks and wondered if it had something to do with the bounty. As he went on about how he couldn't let Dia get away with what she had done, I worked the conversation around to what the results of the bounty had been. As I had suspected, his chances of getting anything from the women here had plummeted since he had placed the bounty.
I pointed out that perhaps he might have more luck with the women in the bar if he removed the bounty from Dia's head. I could tell the thought was working its way around slowly in his brain as he weighed it. He finally decided I might be correct and went to have the bounty removed. I had to chuckle as he left and Carth finally moved out of the shadows where he had retreated during the conversation so that Holdan couldn't tell he had been laughing quietly during all of it.
I paused and asked him about something that had been bothering me a bit since he was my superior rank wise. He had indicated when we started out that I should take the lead position and he would back me up. He replied to my question and said that I was a natural at it, and I had a way with people that made me the better choice to talk to them. Besides, people were instinctively less threatened by a woman than a man. I had to agree with the last since it was true and we both knew it. I agreed with his evaluation of the situation, and it was grave enough that we couldn't pass up any advantage we had.
As we continued wandering around, we witnessed and exchange between the Vulkars and some of Davik Kang's men. A tall muscular man walked confidently up and the Vulkars quickly backed down, he looked like a Mandalorian. I cautiously approached and politely asked who he was, he introduced himself as Candarous Ordo, so he was a Mandalorian. He said he had to get going and with one more look at me he left. I un-tensed, that would have been a dangerous confrontation. He was much more experienced than I was and might have killed me if it had come to a fight; I knew that both of us had been sizing each other up. I wondered what he had seen when he looked at me.
We went on to check out the second apartment building, and interrupted Calo Nord taking in a bounty on two rhodians. The man was quick, I had seen him kill some thugs that had bothered him at the bar earlier. He said nothing after he had killed the two and I didn't either I just moved out of his way as he left. This apartment building was also crawling with Vulkars and we had to kill a lot of them as we went through it. Hopefully some of this would trickle back to the Hidden Bek's and they would be interested in meeting with us.
I had just opened one of the apartments only to find a woman standing within, she had a blaster pointed at me and asked what I was doing, I recognized her from my bounty description, and said "your Selven aren't you?" It wasn't the brightest thing I've ever done that's for sure, she started firing at me and I took a diving roll to get out of the blaster fire and sprang to my feet at melee distance and attacked. She dodged my first attack and pulled her vibroblade, she was very good and I would have had been in serious trouble if Carth hadn't been there as well. Between the two of us though, we were able to kill her without getting seriously hurt. Carth correctly pointed out that I telling her I recognized her hadn't been a good move and I sheepishly agreed. The next room held a nice surprise once I disabled the gas mine protecting the sealed strongbox and figured out the passwords. Republic armor and 100 credits, Carth grinned as I handed them to him and immediately exchanged is basic combat armor for them. We were now in good shape as far as armor and weapons were concerned.
I took the opportunity to ask Carth if this were a good time to ask him some more questions, I was curious as to what he had meant earlier. He stunned me when he replied "I'm all ears, beautiful." I blinked and said "Isn't that a bit inappropriate?" He didn't take the hint and replied "Is there something else you would prefer." in an obviously flirtatious tone. It was an uncomfortable situation and I replied "How about my name?" He replied, "Don't get yourself in a twist over it, gorgeous. I didn't mean anything by it." Rapidly getting tired of this I finally said "That's no good, either" and then added "Sir" on the end.
I had finally made it clear that he had crossed the line. He said trying to be humorous, "Oh, for crying out -- fine. If it'll make you feel better, you call me something. Go ahead, come on, I can take it." I wasn't going to play though and replied "What? Don't be ridiculous." He still kept valiantly on though "What? Are you afraid you'll hurt my feelings? Come on, spit it out. You can do it." I shook my head and said "Forget it. Let's get back to my questions."
He sighed and said "All business today, eh? Are these questions really necessary?" I decided he must still be uncomfortable about the entire issue and said "Not if you have a problem with it." The man was really irritating; he replied "No, No, I don't have a problem with it, really. Go ahead and interrogate me."
Well really if he didn't want to discuss the issue I thought, why didn't he just say so in the first place. I replied "This isn't an interrogation. I never said that." in what I felt was a commendably even tone. He groaned and said "No, I was just joking, though you do seem to be full of questions. It's rather refreshing to be honest. Let me ask you something first, though. I've been going through the battle aboard the Endar Spire over and over in my head since we crashed. Some things just don't add up for me. Maybe you could tell me what happened... from your perspective."
I grimaced and said "I certainly wasn't in a position to know what was going on. I was too busy trying to remember the layout of the ship and figuring out where I needed to be going to have a good idea of what was going on in a tactical sense."
Carth nodded and said "Neither was I, to tell the truth. I was onboard as an advisor for the most part. The battle began so fast, it's anyone's guess as to what actually happened. We lost the ship and a lot of good people... and for what? On the hope that Jedi powers would save us, somehow. Not that Bastila had much of an opportunity to act. We didn't choose that battle, anyway. It got forced on us. Hell, I'm just surprised that any of us are alive to talk about it." He looked at me and continued "come to think of it, it's more than al little surprising you happen to be here isn't it, given your position in the Republic fleet. You were a last minute addition to the crew roster and you just happened to be one of the survivors."
I stared at him trying to figure out if he was really accusing me of having something to do with the attack. Maybe he was just reacting to my rejection of him I decided. I said "What's so odd about me being added to the crew at the last minute?" He replied "You were the only one. Not to mention that Bastila's party was the one who requested your transfer." I said, "I was told I was the only person in the sector who had the necessary language skills." He kept right on with his accusatory tone and said "Considering your connection to Bastila and the Jedi... whether you know it or not... your presence here seems a little convenient. I'm probably wrong and this is probably nothing, I know. I learned a long time ago not to take things at face value, however. And I hate surprises."
By this point I was more than a little bit angry, no one had ever had any reason to doubt my loyalty to the Republic and I had risked my life for the Republic many times. And here was this fly boy who barely knew me throwing around baseless accusations. My tone went to icily cold and I said "What do you mean by surprises?" He blinked and said "I mean I have to expect the unexpected. Just to be safe." I was still angry and said sarcastically "You do know we're on the same side, right?"
He finally seemed to clue in on the fact that I was angry and said "Look... it has nothing to do with you, personally. I don't trust anyone, and I have my reasons. And, no, I'm not going to discuss them. So can we just keep our mind on more important things?"
I stared at him in disbelief; he all but accuses me of being a traitor and then tells me its nothing personal? I said "I consider this important."
He sighed and said "Alright, alright. You must be the most damned persistent woman I've ever met. We'll talk about it... but later. Right now I just want to get going."
I stared at him and though, lovely now it's my entire fault, I hate men. I shrugged and decided to just let the subject drop for now. He obviously had some serious personal issues; I just hoped they wouldn't jeopardize our mission.
We went back to the lower city cantina and picked up the bounty for Selven, I managed to persuade him that she was worth more than the standard bounty and managed to get 400 credits. This business of killing people for money wasn't particularly nice but at least it they weren't nice people that I was killing, at least not the ones with the government bounties on their heads.
We decided to approach the Hidden Beks and walked up to where we had heard they were located. The woman guarding the door was suspicious but I could tell she had heard something about our exploits. I chucked to myself and though I doubt there's anyone down here who hasn't heard of the literally bloody path we've cut through the Vulkars. I sort of regretted it for a moment, but all of them had made the mistake of attacking us first and what I had heard of the Vulkars made it clear they were brutal thugs.
I said "Maybe we can be allies against all those enemies" in reply to her listing off all the people who might want to kill Gadon. She cautiously nodded and said, "Well, we do need all the help we can get. Go in and speak to Gadon if you want. Just remember we are watching you." With that she opened the door and let us into the Hidden Bek base. I approached the person I thought would be Gadon and was intercepted by a Twi'lek woman. "Hold it right there - who are you and what is your business with Gadon?" she asked in a no nonsense tone. Gadon remonstrated with her about her attitude and said they would not start acting like the Vulkars. She agreed but gave an earful about what would happen if we were here to harm Gadon. I took no offense at her tone; she was only trying to do her job, which was obviously to protect Gadon.
I asked him if he knew anything about the escape pods which had crashed down into the Undercity, I wasn't expecting much, but he had just the information we needed. He knew of a Republic officer named Bastila who survived the crash. And that the Vulkars had took her prisoner with the idea of selling her into slavery. I was astonished at our good luck, and asked if he knew where she was now. He said that she would not be at the Vulkar base; she was too valuable for that. Brejik would have her hidden away somewhere safe until the big swoop race. I frowned puzzled and asked what swoop racing had to do with it. Gadon told us that she was being offered as the prize in the big swoop race, he went on to mention that our only hope of rescuing her was to win her in the swoop race. I asked if he could help us with this and he said that he might if we helped him with something. He correctly stated that we both and something to gain and something to loose. I looked at him and asked what he was proposing.
He said that he would be willing to sponsor me in the swoop race if I would break into the Vulkar base and steal back the prototype engine that they had developed. I asked him how I was supposed to get into the base and he said that Mission Vao would be the one who would know if there were back ways in. I recognized the name it was the Twi'lek kid we had meet with her Wookiee companion in the cantina. I was doubtful about the entire thing but couldn't see another likely way. I asked how I would find Mission and he told me to look for her in the Undercity. He had security papers from an ambushed Sith patrol that we could use to get pass all the guards. I asked why the uniforms we had wouldn't work and he said that the security here was much tighter and a simple disguise wouldn't work but the papers would get us through unquestioned. I had my doubts but decided to trust the luck that had gotten us this far.
We decided to go back to the upper city and rest before heading into the Undercity. Besides I needed to give Dia the good news about the lifting of her bounty and we had a few things we needed to sell. I had also picked up some upgrades for our armor and weapons and wanted to install them before we ventured into the Undercity.
Dia was grateful to hear that the bounty had been removed and wanted to give me some family heirloom as a reward since she didn't have many credits. I told her to keep it, and she left.
I still wasn't tired and I decided to go visit the cantina, maybe if I felt like it when I got there I would see if Marl was interested in dueling. I had liked the older man when I met him earlier and was eager to test my skill against him. I left Carth resting in the apartment and told him I would be back after a drink. I was being a bit foolish I knew with the dueling and I really didn't want to hear any lectures.
The duel was a good one, we were fairly matched but I was younger and much quicker and was able to win the duel. I went up to him afterward to make sure he was ok, he chuckled at me and assured me that I hadn't hurt him too badly. He had realized during the duel that I had been pulling blows and shook his head at me. We chatted some more and he told me that he realized it was time for him to retire and he wished me well.
I was hyped after the battle and on the spur of the moment decided to challenge Twitch. I had picked up an energy shield in our salvage travels and I knew that would give me the time needed to close him. He preferred using blasters and I knew that that meant he was probably less skilled at melee. Or I hoped it was the case. I released my adrenals right before the fight and activated my shield. I could tell he was on adrenals as well which probably accounted for his name and reputation. I closed the distance between us in a rush and attacked him strongly; he drew his swords and defended himself. As I had suspected he wasn't nearly as good at melee and I was able knock him to the mat unconscious fairly quickly. I had picked up a few wounds but nothing too serious.
Suddenly I was the new dueling champion; I had actually forgotten that would be the case if I defeated Twitch. Needless to say I didn't have to buy myself any drinks. The only interested I looks I gathered were male though, I sighed to myself again. I had no clue where one would go on Taris to find my idea of companionship, and I resigned myself to the fact that my time on this planet would probably be celibate.
I went back to the apartment, Carth was still up and I added the 900 credits I had just gotten for the two duels to our stash. It was getting quite healthy. He stared and asked where I had gotten that, I grinned at him and said "Your looking at the new Taris duel champion." As expected he started fussing at me but I just chuckled at him.
I decided to take this opportunity to try and figure out why he didn't trust me. I said "I want to discuss something with you." Carth looked wary but said "You do, fair enough. What do you want to discuss?" You're right to look wary fly boy I thought to myself and said with my arms crossed "I want to talk about these issues you seem to have with me."
Carth sighed and said "I knew you wouldn't understand where I was coming from. Let me try to explain. You're probably one of the most skilled women I've ever met. You've saved my butt more than once and I'm lucky you're here to help me, no question. But that doesn't mean I'm going to stop watching you or being wary. I'm just not built that way. Period."
'Built that way?' I thought what the heck did that mean. I asked "And what, exactly, are you watching me for?"
Carth said "I don't know that, yet. Like I said before, it's probably nothing. But I've been betrayed before by people and I... well, it won't happen again, that's all."
I stared at him wondering who had betrayed him, judging from his reaction to it they must have been someone he cared about or respected. I said "So you want some guarantee that I won't betray you?" Carth said "I don't know that you will betray me. But there are no guarantees... not for you, not for me. You don't have to take it personally."
I really couldn't believe he had just said that, how could you not take it personally. I decided to turn the tables on him and asked "Right. And how am I supposed to know that you won't betray us?" He blinked and said "Me?" in a surprised voice. I said challengingly "Yes, you! Why should I trust you, after all?"
He sighed then said "You shouldn't if you're smart, you won't trust anyone... not me, not Bastila, and especially not yourself." I shook my head at him aggravated and said "I wouldn't want to live like that." He said in reply "Not all of us have the luxury of a choice. I'm conditioned this way, sorry." Suddenly tired of the whole thing I said "That settles that, I guess." and turned away planning on going to bed.
Carth stopped me and said "Why is whether or not I trust you or anyone so damned important to you? Why... Why do you even care?" he stared at me and then said "We don't have time for this tonight we need our sleep. Can we please just... drop it? For now? Can we pick it up later if you really must."
I nodded at him and went to take a shower before falling asleep, tomorrow would be a difficult day.
Taris – Lower City
We decided to go back to the apartment and sleep and attempt the deception with the uniform in the morning. We only had the one uniform and we both hoped it would be enough. Carth agreed that I would pretend to be the Sith trooper and he would pretend to be a paid informant accompanying me. The Sith liked to use paid informants, so we hoped that would allow us to pass through the checkpoint. Carth put on such an amazingly good weasel face, that I had a hard time not laughing in front of the Sith trooper.
It worked like a charm, the Sith trooper even gave us some good warnings about what to expect down there for which I thanked him. We stepped out of the elevator right into the midst of a gang fight. Before they noticed us we stepped to the shadows and I quickly changed out of the Sith armor which probably wouldn't be too popular down here. One side was the Hidden Bek's and the other side Black Vulkars I gathered from the standard threatening dialogue that preceded the confrontation.
The Hidden Bek's didn't do so well, when the dust settled the Black Vulkars noticed us and before I could say a word attacked. What charming folks I thought, I had noted they were not that skilled in the use of their weapons and met the quickest of them in melee combat so Carth had a good chance to use his blasters. Carth and I made quick work of them, I got a slight cut but it quickly healed. The fight did point out that we really needed better armor. If I couldn't acquire some soon I would have to break down and purchase some.
We went to check out an apartment complex across from the elevator first, maybe there might be some information or stashes of goods we could find there. It was crawling with Black Vulkar, all who attacked as soon as they saw us. We shook our heads over this, these Black Vulkar were worse than the Sith on this planet. Wouldn't you know my luck held perfectly, in the first apartment I broke into we found someone hiding. I had to struggle not to laugh as I said "I'm not one of Daviks thugs; let me guess you have a bounty on your head over money owed."
The Twi'lek shook his head no and told us how he had turned in information to the government about exchange information. My respect for him rose even if he was probably suicidal given what I could tell of this Davik character, I asked if there was anything we could do and he had a surprising answer. Arrange it to look like we had taken the bounty on him, messily enough that there wouldn't be any remains left. His idea was to use demolitions and I had to agree that it was excessive for the task but they might believe it from a rookie bounty hunter. He gave me some items to sell in exchange for the detonator and told me where he thought I could buy it. I argued some with Carth about it but he agreed to stay with the man while I went up to the Upper city and back. He was correct in where to purchase the item and I noted that if we didn't find any armor soon I would be back here to buy some of the armor the merchant had. It was good quality and the prices were not too bad.
On the way back I saw some children kicking and taunting an Ithorian, I was outraged and stopped to reprimand them. They seemed to think that something was wrong with me for protecting an alien and I told them that just because someone was different they didn't have the right to attack them. They ran off calling me an alien lover and I thought sourly what a charming planet, the Sith should get a lot of recruits here. I noticed the Ithorian looked pretty bad and offered him one of my medical pak's. He said he should probably get back to someplace safe and I agreed, I needed to get moving as well Carth would get concerned if I took too long.
I went back to the apartment with the detonator, and gave it to Matrik. Matrik refused the extra credits left over from the items I had sold, saying that we should keep them. He placed the detonators on a short timer and we took cover outside the room. The explosion was rather spectacular and we agreed that the story should hold up, Matrik left but told us where to visit to collect his bounty.
We continued and the next deserted apartment we hit pay dirt. It had some type of odd logic puzzle on the lock dealing with some local band but inside the security crate was a set of echani fiber armor and some credits. Our luck was looking better and Carth and I agreed that I would wear the fiber armor and he would get the combat armor I had been wearing. The next apartment over was a difficult fight and required us to use our first med pak but the gang members there had some supplies that allowed us to upgrade Carth's weapons.
The next stop was the lower city cantina where we would hopefully get the Hutt that handled bounties to accept that Matrik was dead. The Hutt Zak believed my story about Matrik and I was actually able to bargain an extra 100 credit for the bounty out of him. He also told me about other bounties one of which was the one on Dia's head. We exited the cantina area where the Hutt was and witnessed an exchange at the bar between a brash young Twi'lek woman and two Rhodians, she called for help and Wookiee got up and went over to her. Interesting young lady I thought, good thing she has her friend to back her up otherwise that mouth of hers would get her killed.
I walked over to see what information I might be able to get from the odd pair. The Twi'lek youngster was friendly and said that her name was Mission Vao and her friend was Big Z and they were our official welcoming committee! I grinned at that and said I had a few questions she might be able to answer. She was more than happy to fill me in on the Lower City situation between the two gangs. I thanked her for the information after we had talked awhile and she said she had to get going.
I finally found Holdan in the bar, what a pleasant man he was. No wonder Dia had sliced his face open. I noticed the Twi'lek dancers were giving him particularly cold looks and wondered if it had something to do with the bounty. As he went on about how he couldn't let Dia get away with what she had done, I worked the conversation around to what the results of the bounty had been. As I had suspected, his chances of getting anything from the women here had plummeted since he had placed the bounty.
I pointed out that perhaps he might have more luck with the women in the bar if he removed the bounty from Dia's head. I could tell the thought was working its way around slowly in his brain as he weighed it. He finally decided I might be correct and went to have the bounty removed. I had to chuckle as he left and Carth finally moved out of the shadows where he had retreated during the conversation so that Holdan couldn't tell he had been laughing quietly during all of it.
I paused and asked him about something that had been bothering me a bit since he was my superior rank wise. He had indicated when we started out that I should take the lead position and he would back me up. He replied to my question and said that I was a natural at it, and I had a way with people that made me the better choice to talk to them. Besides, people were instinctively less threatened by a woman than a man. I had to agree with the last since it was true and we both knew it. I agreed with his evaluation of the situation, and it was grave enough that we couldn't pass up any advantage we had.
As we continued wandering around, we witnessed and exchange between the Vulkars and some of Davik Kang's men. A tall muscular man walked confidently up and the Vulkars quickly backed down, he looked like a Mandalorian. I cautiously approached and politely asked who he was, he introduced himself as Candarous Ordo, so he was a Mandalorian. He said he had to get going and with one more look at me he left. I un-tensed, that would have been a dangerous confrontation. He was much more experienced than I was and might have killed me if it had come to a fight; I knew that both of us had been sizing each other up. I wondered what he had seen when he looked at me.
We went on to check out the second apartment building, and interrupted Calo Nord taking in a bounty on two rhodians. The man was quick, I had seen him kill some thugs that had bothered him at the bar earlier. He said nothing after he had killed the two and I didn't either I just moved out of his way as he left. This apartment building was also crawling with Vulkars and we had to kill a lot of them as we went through it. Hopefully some of this would trickle back to the Hidden Bek's and they would be interested in meeting with us.
I had just opened one of the apartments only to find a woman standing within, she had a blaster pointed at me and asked what I was doing, I recognized her from my bounty description, and said "your Selven aren't you?" It wasn't the brightest thing I've ever done that's for sure, she started firing at me and I took a diving roll to get out of the blaster fire and sprang to my feet at melee distance and attacked. She dodged my first attack and pulled her vibroblade, she was very good and I would have had been in serious trouble if Carth hadn't been there as well. Between the two of us though, we were able to kill her without getting seriously hurt. Carth correctly pointed out that I telling her I recognized her hadn't been a good move and I sheepishly agreed. The next room held a nice surprise once I disabled the gas mine protecting the sealed strongbox and figured out the passwords. Republic armor and 100 credits, Carth grinned as I handed them to him and immediately exchanged is basic combat armor for them. We were now in good shape as far as armor and weapons were concerned.
I took the opportunity to ask Carth if this were a good time to ask him some more questions, I was curious as to what he had meant earlier. He stunned me when he replied "I'm all ears, beautiful." I blinked and said "Isn't that a bit inappropriate?" He didn't take the hint and replied "Is there something else you would prefer." in an obviously flirtatious tone. It was an uncomfortable situation and I replied "How about my name?" He replied, "Don't get yourself in a twist over it, gorgeous. I didn't mean anything by it." Rapidly getting tired of this I finally said "That's no good, either" and then added "Sir" on the end.
I had finally made it clear that he had crossed the line. He said trying to be humorous, "Oh, for crying out -- fine. If it'll make you feel better, you call me something. Go ahead, come on, I can take it." I wasn't going to play though and replied "What? Don't be ridiculous." He still kept valiantly on though "What? Are you afraid you'll hurt my feelings? Come on, spit it out. You can do it." I shook my head and said "Forget it. Let's get back to my questions."
He sighed and said "All business today, eh? Are these questions really necessary?" I decided he must still be uncomfortable about the entire issue and said "Not if you have a problem with it." The man was really irritating; he replied "No, No, I don't have a problem with it, really. Go ahead and interrogate me."
Well really if he didn't want to discuss the issue I thought, why didn't he just say so in the first place. I replied "This isn't an interrogation. I never said that." in what I felt was a commendably even tone. He groaned and said "No, I was just joking, though you do seem to be full of questions. It's rather refreshing to be honest. Let me ask you something first, though. I've been going through the battle aboard the Endar Spire over and over in my head since we crashed. Some things just don't add up for me. Maybe you could tell me what happened... from your perspective."
I grimaced and said "I certainly wasn't in a position to know what was going on. I was too busy trying to remember the layout of the ship and figuring out where I needed to be going to have a good idea of what was going on in a tactical sense."
Carth nodded and said "Neither was I, to tell the truth. I was onboard as an advisor for the most part. The battle began so fast, it's anyone's guess as to what actually happened. We lost the ship and a lot of good people... and for what? On the hope that Jedi powers would save us, somehow. Not that Bastila had much of an opportunity to act. We didn't choose that battle, anyway. It got forced on us. Hell, I'm just surprised that any of us are alive to talk about it." He looked at me and continued "come to think of it, it's more than al little surprising you happen to be here isn't it, given your position in the Republic fleet. You were a last minute addition to the crew roster and you just happened to be one of the survivors."
I stared at him trying to figure out if he was really accusing me of having something to do with the attack. Maybe he was just reacting to my rejection of him I decided. I said "What's so odd about me being added to the crew at the last minute?" He replied "You were the only one. Not to mention that Bastila's party was the one who requested your transfer." I said, "I was told I was the only person in the sector who had the necessary language skills." He kept right on with his accusatory tone and said "Considering your connection to Bastila and the Jedi... whether you know it or not... your presence here seems a little convenient. I'm probably wrong and this is probably nothing, I know. I learned a long time ago not to take things at face value, however. And I hate surprises."
By this point I was more than a little bit angry, no one had ever had any reason to doubt my loyalty to the Republic and I had risked my life for the Republic many times. And here was this fly boy who barely knew me throwing around baseless accusations. My tone went to icily cold and I said "What do you mean by surprises?" He blinked and said "I mean I have to expect the unexpected. Just to be safe." I was still angry and said sarcastically "You do know we're on the same side, right?"
He finally seemed to clue in on the fact that I was angry and said "Look... it has nothing to do with you, personally. I don't trust anyone, and I have my reasons. And, no, I'm not going to discuss them. So can we just keep our mind on more important things?"
I stared at him in disbelief; he all but accuses me of being a traitor and then tells me its nothing personal? I said "I consider this important."
He sighed and said "Alright, alright. You must be the most damned persistent woman I've ever met. We'll talk about it... but later. Right now I just want to get going."
I stared at him and though, lovely now it's my entire fault, I hate men. I shrugged and decided to just let the subject drop for now. He obviously had some serious personal issues; I just hoped they wouldn't jeopardize our mission.
We went back to the lower city cantina and picked up the bounty for Selven, I managed to persuade him that she was worth more than the standard bounty and managed to get 400 credits. This business of killing people for money wasn't particularly nice but at least it they weren't nice people that I was killing, at least not the ones with the government bounties on their heads.
We decided to approach the Hidden Beks and walked up to where we had heard they were located. The woman guarding the door was suspicious but I could tell she had heard something about our exploits. I chucked to myself and though I doubt there's anyone down here who hasn't heard of the literally bloody path we've cut through the Vulkars. I sort of regretted it for a moment, but all of them had made the mistake of attacking us first and what I had heard of the Vulkars made it clear they were brutal thugs.
I said "Maybe we can be allies against all those enemies" in reply to her listing off all the people who might want to kill Gadon. She cautiously nodded and said, "Well, we do need all the help we can get. Go in and speak to Gadon if you want. Just remember we are watching you." With that she opened the door and let us into the Hidden Bek base. I approached the person I thought would be Gadon and was intercepted by a Twi'lek woman. "Hold it right there - who are you and what is your business with Gadon?" she asked in a no nonsense tone. Gadon remonstrated with her about her attitude and said they would not start acting like the Vulkars. She agreed but gave an earful about what would happen if we were here to harm Gadon. I took no offense at her tone; she was only trying to do her job, which was obviously to protect Gadon.
I asked him if he knew anything about the escape pods which had crashed down into the Undercity, I wasn't expecting much, but he had just the information we needed. He knew of a Republic officer named Bastila who survived the crash. And that the Vulkars had took her prisoner with the idea of selling her into slavery. I was astonished at our good luck, and asked if he knew where she was now. He said that she would not be at the Vulkar base; she was too valuable for that. Brejik would have her hidden away somewhere safe until the big swoop race. I frowned puzzled and asked what swoop racing had to do with it. Gadon told us that she was being offered as the prize in the big swoop race, he went on to mention that our only hope of rescuing her was to win her in the swoop race. I asked if he could help us with this and he said that he might if we helped him with something. He correctly stated that we both and something to gain and something to loose. I looked at him and asked what he was proposing.
He said that he would be willing to sponsor me in the swoop race if I would break into the Vulkar base and steal back the prototype engine that they had developed. I asked him how I was supposed to get into the base and he said that Mission Vao would be the one who would know if there were back ways in. I recognized the name it was the Twi'lek kid we had meet with her Wookiee companion in the cantina. I was doubtful about the entire thing but couldn't see another likely way. I asked how I would find Mission and he told me to look for her in the Undercity. He had security papers from an ambushed Sith patrol that we could use to get pass all the guards. I asked why the uniforms we had wouldn't work and he said that the security here was much tighter and a simple disguise wouldn't work but the papers would get us through unquestioned. I had my doubts but decided to trust the luck that had gotten us this far.
We decided to go back to the upper city and rest before heading into the Undercity. Besides I needed to give Dia the good news about the lifting of her bounty and we had a few things we needed to sell. I had also picked up some upgrades for our armor and weapons and wanted to install them before we ventured into the Undercity.
Dia was grateful to hear that the bounty had been removed and wanted to give me some family heirloom as a reward since she didn't have many credits. I told her to keep it, and she left.
I still wasn't tired and I decided to go visit the cantina, maybe if I felt like it when I got there I would see if Marl was interested in dueling. I had liked the older man when I met him earlier and was eager to test my skill against him. I left Carth resting in the apartment and told him I would be back after a drink. I was being a bit foolish I knew with the dueling and I really didn't want to hear any lectures.
The duel was a good one, we were fairly matched but I was younger and much quicker and was able to win the duel. I went up to him afterward to make sure he was ok, he chuckled at me and assured me that I hadn't hurt him too badly. He had realized during the duel that I had been pulling blows and shook his head at me. We chatted some more and he told me that he realized it was time for him to retire and he wished me well.
I was hyped after the battle and on the spur of the moment decided to challenge Twitch. I had picked up an energy shield in our salvage travels and I knew that would give me the time needed to close him. He preferred using blasters and I knew that that meant he was probably less skilled at melee. Or I hoped it was the case. I released my adrenals right before the fight and activated my shield. I could tell he was on adrenals as well which probably accounted for his name and reputation. I closed the distance between us in a rush and attacked him strongly; he drew his swords and defended himself. As I had suspected he wasn't nearly as good at melee and I was able knock him to the mat unconscious fairly quickly. I had picked up a few wounds but nothing too serious.
Suddenly I was the new dueling champion; I had actually forgotten that would be the case if I defeated Twitch. Needless to say I didn't have to buy myself any drinks. The only interested I looks I gathered were male though, I sighed to myself again. I had no clue where one would go on Taris to find my idea of companionship, and I resigned myself to the fact that my time on this planet would probably be celibate.
I went back to the apartment, Carth was still up and I added the 900 credits I had just gotten for the two duels to our stash. It was getting quite healthy. He stared and asked where I had gotten that, I grinned at him and said "Your looking at the new Taris duel champion." As expected he started fussing at me but I just chuckled at him.
I decided to take this opportunity to try and figure out why he didn't trust me. I said "I want to discuss something with you." Carth looked wary but said "You do, fair enough. What do you want to discuss?" You're right to look wary fly boy I thought to myself and said with my arms crossed "I want to talk about these issues you seem to have with me."
Carth sighed and said "I knew you wouldn't understand where I was coming from. Let me try to explain. You're probably one of the most skilled women I've ever met. You've saved my butt more than once and I'm lucky you're here to help me, no question. But that doesn't mean I'm going to stop watching you or being wary. I'm just not built that way. Period."
'Built that way?' I thought what the heck did that mean. I asked "And what, exactly, are you watching me for?"
Carth said "I don't know that, yet. Like I said before, it's probably nothing. But I've been betrayed before by people and I... well, it won't happen again, that's all."
I stared at him wondering who had betrayed him, judging from his reaction to it they must have been someone he cared about or respected. I said "So you want some guarantee that I won't betray you?" Carth said "I don't know that you will betray me. But there are no guarantees... not for you, not for me. You don't have to take it personally."
I really couldn't believe he had just said that, how could you not take it personally. I decided to turn the tables on him and asked "Right. And how am I supposed to know that you won't betray us?" He blinked and said "Me?" in a surprised voice. I said challengingly "Yes, you! Why should I trust you, after all?"
He sighed then said "You shouldn't if you're smart, you won't trust anyone... not me, not Bastila, and especially not yourself." I shook my head at him aggravated and said "I wouldn't want to live like that." He said in reply "Not all of us have the luxury of a choice. I'm conditioned this way, sorry." Suddenly tired of the whole thing I said "That settles that, I guess." and turned away planning on going to bed.
Carth stopped me and said "Why is whether or not I trust you or anyone so damned important to you? Why... Why do you even care?" he stared at me and then said "We don't have time for this tonight we need our sleep. Can we please just... drop it? For now? Can we pick it up later if you really must."
I nodded at him and went to take a shower before falling asleep, tomorrow would be a difficult day.