Chapter 3: Upper City Taris 2

Carth and Mona left the Cantina.

"Will you please tell me what you found out?" Carth asked.

Mona shook her head, "Why?" she asked, "It might ruin it."

Carth sighed, "Fine. Don't tell me."

"Oh I will tell you," Mona grinned, "Just not now."

"We should probably keep looking around," Carth suggested, "There're still a lot of places we haven't looked."

Mona nodded and the two of them stepped into the crowd of people going about their business. As they reached the end of the walkway they noticed two men bullying and elderly looking man.

"Hey you've got to pay in full," one of the men said, "Or we have to take care of ya."

The other man noticed Mona and Carth watching, "But out this ain't you problem."

"It wasn't," Mona said, "Till you made it my problem."

"You've got a big mouth little missy," the man said.

Mona smirked; this guy was obviously a bounty hunter. But not a good one if all he did was bully merchants into paying him, for what Mona could only assume was a protection fee.

"We don't want to attract attention," Carth whispered.

"Yeah maybe you should listen to your wussy-ass friend their and buzz off," the bounty hunter said.

"Wussy?" Carth said, "Is that all you got you Gamorean slob."

"What'd you call me?" the bounty hunter asked advancing at Carth.

Mona stepped in front of him, "You wanna hit him, you're gonna have to go through me."

"You think I won't hit you 'cause you're a woman?" the bounty hunter asked, "Well you're wrong."

"No I thought you would," Mona replied, "I wanted you to just try it."

The bounty hunter swung his fist at Mona's head but she blocked his arm with her left arm and the smashed the butt end of her blaster pistol into his face with her right hand. The bounty hunter went down in a heap. Before his partner could react Mona twirled the blaster and had it aimed at his head.

"Get out of here!" Mona threatened.

The bounty hunter took a look at his fallen partner and then ran off into the crowd. Mona lowered her pistol and stared at the merchant, "So why do you owe them money."

"I don't owe them money," the merchant said, "I owe Davik money. I was supposed to leave to get a shipment of spice but then the quarantine started. Davik had forwarded me the credits but he wants them back. Problem is I've already spent it."

"You spent drug money?" Carth asked.

Nervously the merchant nodded, "Not all of it," he said, "But a 100 credits."

"100 credits are quite a lot." Carth said, "Why would you spend that much."

"I needed a place to stay," the merchant said.

"You could have stayed in your ship," Mona cut him off, "You do have one right?"

Dejectedly the merchant looked at the ground.

"You don't have a ship!" Mona roared.

The merchant shook his head, "No, I lost it gambling."

"And just how the hell were you going to get the spice delivery."

"Using a transport vessel," the merchant shrugged.

"Sorry," Mona said, "But any pity I had for you is gone. I should shoot you where you stand and take the rest of the credits from you."

"Better you then being taken to Davik," the merchant said.

Mona was surprised, "Tell you what, you give me your credits and we'll help you escape the planet. Do you have a place to hide out?"

The man nodded, "Yeah I know where I can hide."

"Good when we secure passage off this rock we'll come get you."

The merchant looked skeptical, "But why should I give you the credits?"

"Because if you get caught you can say you paid up and that what must have happened is that some oversaw the transaction and robbed Davik's men." Mona said.

"But what about the guy that ran away?"

"Come on, you honestly think he'll be allowed to live? Even I know how ruthless Davik can be."

The merchant reached into his pocket, "I guess it'll stop me from loosing them all at Pazaak."

The merchant handed Mona the credits and pushed his way past her into the crowd.

"I wonder if he knows that we have no way to find him," Mona commented to Carth.

"Did you do that to him on purpose?" Carth asked.

"Perhaps," Mona said, "But I have no guilt about it. It's his fault for not following through. Besides if we want to get off this planet we're gonna need these."

"True," Carth agreed, "Now if only we knew where Mona was."

The two of them wandered along until they reached a droid shop. Carth suggested they both go in and look around. Besides Carth had added, they might be able to purchase a droid that could help them out. Especially a utility droid.

The store owner was a Twi'lek girl named Janic Nall.

"Do you know anything about the escape pods that landed recently?" Mona asked.

"I know that the Swoop Gangs in the Lower City reached them first and stripped them of anything useful. The Sith have sent patrols down but I haven't even heard of them taking any prisoners."

"Maybe Bastila is a prisoner of one of the Swoop Gangs," Carth whispered.

Mona nodded, "Although I would think she could escape some biker thugs."

There were no droids worth purchasing so Mona and Carth thanked Janic for her help and left. As they were leaving a store they Mona noticed a Sith soldier guarding a narrow alley way. Moving closer could Mona could make out an alien voice protesting about not knowing where something was.

"Move along citizen," the Sith guarding the alley said.

"Why?" Carth asked, "What's going on here?"

"Nothing that concerns you."

"Oh," Mona said, "What if it does?"

Behind the alien was screaming about not know where the Sith uniforms were.

With a sideways glance at Carth Mona tackled the Sith into the alley and drove her vibroblade into him. Carth spun to cover the gap in the alley and watch for onlookers.

In the alley two Sith had their guns trained on a frightened Aqualish who was on his knees. Both of them turned when they heard the thump of their comrade's body hitting the ground. Both of them swung their guns at Mona but she pulled the Sith troopers corpse up off the ground to use as a shield. Their shots struck the corpse and Mona pulled out her own blaster and gunned them down.

"Thank," the Alien said, "What can I ever do to repay you?"

"Do you actually have Sith Uniforms?" Mona asked.

The Aqualish nodded vigorously, "Yes," he said, "I can give you two as repayment."

The Aqualish turned around and opened a trash receptacle in the alley way and pulled out two shiny gold Sith armor outfits.

Mona however had a sudden thought, "Do you have one more?"

"Why?" the Aqualish asked.

"Well we've got a friend who's been captured by the Swoop Gangs, we need to rescue her and she'll need one to." Mona replied.

The Aqualish pulled out a third uniform. After a final word of thanks he took off. Quickly Mona and Carth put on the uniforms. They were definitely more protecting then the weak leather armor Mona had been wearing and also better then Carth's clothing. However Mona found the helmet restricted her peripheral vision more then she would have liked, however the compensation for this was the fact that the faceplate on the visor acted like the Heads Up Display (HUD) on a starfighter giving information on all targets with in her range. This took a little bit of getting used to but was otherwise quite useful.

"We can probably use these as disguise to get access to the Lower City," Carth said.

"Yeah but it sounds like those swoop gangs rule the Lower City," Mona said, "We're gonna have to watch our backs."

"True," Carth agreed, "Knowing the Sith they've probably gone and done something to tick the swoop gangs off and the gang will be looking to retaliate. But these uniforms will definitely be a help in the Upper City. We should probably take them off when we get down there. Come on, there's probably an elevator down nearby."