(A/N: Thanks to DB Sommer, who is the master of an awesome running gag I reference here. Greedo is played by Random Generic Foreign Guy No. 1, as seen in Episode 3 of Daioh.)


09: Tomo Shoots First!

As was the usual custom, the spacemen and their customers sat to exchange pleasantries before getting down to business. Unfortunately, they didn't quite manage to be pleasant. "Valeria, huh?" Kagura commented. "You don't look like any Valerian I've ever seen before."

"That's because she's a scrawny, midget Valerian," Tomo said happily before her colleague could respond. "What was it last time you weighed yourself, Yomi? Sixty-four kilos? Ha!"

"I have a fast metabolism…" Yomi said defensively.

"I remember you at your family reunion! All these big, hulking—" Tomo didn't finish before being punched in the mouth. "Shut up, you idiot!"

Sakaki quietly took a sip of her drink. She was in a bit of a hurry, but custom was custom, and there was no point in getting involved. "So have you two worked together for long…?" Chiyo asked, hoping to change the subject.

"Oh, yeah!" Tomo answered, completely unfazed by the blow she'd just received. "Years! Must be, what, four now, huh?"

"More like a hundred," Yomi muttered.

"What?"

"Never mind. Why do you guys need to get to Alderaan?"

Kagura opened her mouth to answer, but Sakaki said, "Convention," in such a flat, final tone that it closed the subject instantly. The Jedi sensed her "rival's" disgruntlement, (I wasn't going to tell them anything!) but felt a certain need to keep things moving.

"It's still not working! You can't fool me!" Tomo suddenly barked, making Chiyo jump. Yomi sighed and covered her eyes. "I don't trust them, Yomi. The short one looks shifty."

"How did an idiot like you ever become a starship captain?" Kagura growled.

"How did an idiot like you ever make it as a soldier?" Tomo shot back.

"How did you know I was a soldier?"

"Maybe I'm not such an idiot. You know what? You can call me an idiot all you want, but I'll bet you can't do it in…" she paused to think of a suitably difficult language. "Alderanian Trade Dialect! Ha!"

As it turned out, that was a bad choice. "(Sure, I can,)" Kagura replied easily, "(You're an idiot.)"

"!" Tomo lurched away from her. "Yomi! What did she say? Did she just insult me?"

Yomi sighed wearily.

"What do you have to say to that?" Kagura grinned.

"I… don't think you've won! This isn't over yet!"

"Ten-thousand credits. Four now, six when we get there," Sakaki finally cut in, as even her legendary patience wore thin. Custom was custom, but sometimes pleasantries just weren't worth it.

"You'll have to do better," Yomi said, grateful that they'd gotten to business. "It's dangerous to fly with Imperials around, you know."

"Alright," Sakaki looked between them. "Six thousand now, four thousand when we get there?"

"That's more like it!" Tomo cried. "Put 'er there!" Before Yomi could react, they shook. "Tomo!" she yelped. "You—but—that's not any m…!"

"What's wrong?"

"Ne- never mind. Just… look, you cover our tab. I'll take them to the ship."

Tomo nodded and started back towards the barkeep, noticing along the way that a man at one of the tables following her with sharp, flinty eyes. Was that…? Oh, no. She gave a resigned sigh and glanced back for Yomi, but her partner was nowhere to be found.

She paid the barkeep and started towards the exit, counting down to herself. "5, 4, 3, 2…" on cue, a hand wrapped around her wrist and deposited her heavily in the chair across from its owner. "(Going somewhere, Takino?)"

"Oh, uh, hey there, Mr. Greedo!" she said in mock surprise. She fished in her head for his language. "Hold on… um, (Will you sleep with me?)"

"(WHAT?)"

"Sorry… was that a greeting?"

"(No,)" Greedo shook his head angrily and switched languages. "No, no it isn't. Where the Hell did you hear that?"

Tomo ignored the question. "Can I ask you for a favor?"

"No. I'm here to take you in. You can't very well ask me for a favor."

"I was just going to ask you to let me go for a while. I have the money, I just don't have it on me. Just let me go get it…"

"That's a favor."

"Come on… whatever Mr. Spince is offering you, I'll double it, soon as I'm paid."

Greedo sneered. "We both know you're not good for the money."

"Well then, I have no choice than to leave without paying you."

"SIT DOWN!" Tomo winced at his tone and sat quickly, spreading her hands on the table. "Listen," she said, spotting Sakaki's head over the general throng as she left, "I'm good for the money. That woman hired me to take her to Alderaan." Greedo didn't look as she pointed. "Hey, she's right over there!"

"I'm not falling for that one again."

"It'd only be the third time," Tomo grumbled.

"If I let you go, Spince would just hire someone else to come after you. Hell, he's so pissed at you two, I'll bet he'd go straight to Ohyama himself. No way you could buy that guyoff. Just come with m—"

"Oh, my God!" Tomo cried, pointing. Greedo looked.


"Actually, I hate to admit it, but she's not really an idiot," Yomi said as they neared the spaceport. "Just kind of impulsive."

"Oh, really?" Kagura asked disinterestedly, sliding a new "clip" into her blaster. It was amazing how cheap the power packs were around here, and how eager the vendor had been to get rid of them.

"Yeah, impulsive and thoughtless. A little selfish, too. And she has an itchy trigger-finger. But it's just the kind of person she is… I can't tell you how may scrapes I've had to pull her out of."

"Then why do you stick with her?"

"Oh, it's a long story. Have you heard of a life-debt?"

Sakaki and Chiyo followed along behind. "Say, Ms. Sakaki?"

"Hm?" Sakaki glanced over to her. The girl, though subdued, was doing remarkably well considering her circumstances. But then, growing up here, she was used to hardship. In her short life she'd probably lost more than one friend to Raiders and the vicious twin suns. Chiyo-chan, it seemed, was a lot tougher than she looked.

"Did you know my father?"

"Not really; I was very young. He was more of a family friend."

"A family friend?"

"Yes." They drew to a stop outside of their bay and Yomi started fiddling with the lock. "It was my father who met him. Have you heard of the Black Knight Sakaki?"

"No…"

"He was a famous bounty-hunter. He introduced himself to Sir Mihama with his blaster, in fact."

"He shot my father?"

"It's okay, he deflected it," Sakaki reassured. "They were—" Tomo came panting up behind them, stopping just short of colliding with Sakaki, then hopping frantically around behind her and giving her a barrage of little pushes. "Go! Go go go go go!"

"What did you do?" Yomi asked severely. The door finally opened and their customers filed through, not eager to get involved in the coming throw-down. "You aren't in trouble with the law again, are you?"

"I—he—but Greedo shot first!"

"You and that damn blaster! I'm going to take it from you! And now there are probably stormtroopers looking for you, aren't there? You idiot!"

"Look, can we do this later?" Tomo asked, casting a nervous glance over her shoulder.

Yomi growled and disappeared into the bay just in time to hear Kagura cry, "What th-? It's pink!" It'd occurred to her to make a derisive comment about the freighter's obvious age or perhaps it's awful state of disrepair, but the first thing that leapt out at her was the color.

"It was gonna be blood red," Tomo explained quickly, "But Yomi was too cheap to get enough paint. Can we get on, please? Now?"

"I don't think it looks bad," Chiyo said. She was roundly ignored.

The hatch lowered ponderously and Tomo sprinted aboard, followed by a much more sedate (but definitely not dawdling) Jedi and student. Kagura still stood, stunned. "…it's pink."

"What's the big deal?" Yomi asked.

"Sorry, I just…"

"C'mon, you guys! Let's get going!" Tomo yelled from the hatch.

Kagura raised an eyebrow. "What's with you? Don't tell me-" And then the door hissed open behind her. It was a chilling moment; everybody authorized to open that door was inside, so it could only mean…

"Hey!" A stormtrooper strode into the room, blaster rifle at the ready. "Everybody, hands in the air!" In response, Kagura calmly turned and shot him through the stomach. Framed in the doorway, his fellow froze at the jarring crack his armor made on the pavement, then made one of his own with a smoking crater in his forehead.

"What he hell are you doing?" Yomi grabbed her shoulder. "You don't shoot back at Stormies!"

"You do if you're a Rebel," Kagura replied.

"You're a-? You might have told us!"

"Would you have taken us if I had?"

"No, but—"

"What's wrong with you two? Get up here!" Tomo hollered.