ROUGH PLACE
by ardavenport
- - - Part 2
F f f f f f f f f f f f z z z z z z z z z z z t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t !!!!!!!!!!
Blue lightsaber flashing, Obi-Wan whirled up and out of his chair, the blade catching a red blaster bolt. The people at the other tables cried out and dove for cover as Obi-Wan ran toward the source of the weapon's fire - -
- - Right behind his Master, who leaped up and onto - -
- - one - -
- - two - -
- - three - -
- - four tabletops, green lightsaber blade whirling, catching and deflecting blaster bolts to the ceiling and upper walls. Drinks, utensils, table lights flew in all directions in his wake, the tables themselves falling, everything clattering to the floor, patrons diving for cover.
Eeeeee-yyyuuuupppphhhhhffffff!!!
"Aaaaaiiiiii!!!"
With a flashing bang and squeal of metaloid, the last blow sliced through the muzzle of the blaster and the arm that held it.
Obi-Wan skidded to a stop at his Master's side, the hoods of their robes thrown back, their heads bare. People hastily pushed themselves away from his lowered lightsaber, chairs falling over. He clicked it off. But the tip of his Master's blade stayed close to their attacker's face. She was young and humanoid, delicate pale features contorted in pain in the deadly green light so close over her.
Snarling, she drew back. Letting go of her wounded arm, she reached down, trying to pull something up but she got caught in the trailing sleeve of her black tunic.
F f f f e e e E E E e e e e e Z Z Z Z Z z z z z z f f f f f !!!!!!
A second blaster clattered down into the shadows under overturned furniture. She bent forward, both arms clutched to her narrow chest. Qui-Gon's lightsaber went out and he reattached it to his belt. He bent down and pulled her up to her feet. The top of her head barely reached up to the middle of his chest.
Four of the tusked, burly guards moved in against the flow of patrons pushing away from the violence. A fifth guard dragged a shocked Y'Takr Ayr by the arm toward them. Obi-Wan put his hand on his saber and backed up, his eyes going to his Master who kept a firm grip on their attacker.
"Su-cha!"
The guards lowered their weapons, heads turning to the side. Their server, the curvy, blue-green young woman in the minimal red outfit slipped in between two of them as they all deferentially lowered their tusks toward her.
"No, no, no! Nothing she said of this to me! Nothing!" Ayr stammered, pleading to all, but especially to Qui-Gon. Their server silenced her with a glare. Then her accented eyes looked everyone up and down, her expression impatient.
"If you wish to settle your business with this person in a less crowded area, Jedi, my office in the back is available."
"Thank-you." Qui-Gon inclined his head toward her. "And I believe that this person will require medical assistance, if you have any available on the premises."
She sneered back. "Bring her with you." Her gaze shifted to one of the guards. "Pockr, bring that with you."
The guard grunted and stooped to pick up the remains of the injured woman's hand and blasters from behind the hem of Obi-Wan's robe. He hastily moved aside and followed Qui-Gon, their prisoner, the server and her guards.
She was not just a cantina server, but obviously managed the establishment, or was perhaps an owner. The serving droids behind the counter bowed their heads to her as she touched a palm control by a mirrored doorway. Their reflections were replaced by a portal into a long narrow corridor. She led them through, down between smooth, featureless beige surfaces and gray doors flush with the walls. The door at the end opened and they entered.
One entire glowing wall of the office, behind the desk, was shelves with all different kinds and sizes of colored bottles and boxes on them. A ventilator gently hummed fresh air from above. The guards deposited their attacker in one of the three low red, bowl-like chairs with a shiny bluish metaloid medical droid next to it.
"Aaaaah!" the woman cried out, her arms clutched to her chest. But the droid was aggressively programmed. It kept a grip on her collar while it probed and prodded and scanned with its four appendages. An injector needle came out and soon after the woman sighed in relief, limp in the padded basket seat of the chair.
Two guards took positions on either side of the door they had come through, their body armor creaking under their flexing muscles. Another guard stood by a closed door on an opposite wall after handing over the severed hand to the medical droid. Another, heavy paw still clamped around Y'Takr Ayr's arm, stood by the desk. She stood unresisting, shoulders hunched, head bowed.
Readjusting his robe, Obi-Wan moved to see around the medical droid working on their attacker. She wasn't very big or very old. When the droid pulled off the black cap, metallic silver and gold curls cascaded down around her face. She had pale, delicate features, lips and eyes accented in a darker beige than her skin. And she had suffered a cruel injury. One hand seemed to have only singed fingers, but the stump of the other arm was unsalvageable, as usual for lightsaber injuries. Qui-Gon's blade had not only removed the hand, it had cut a long, deep charred notch in what remained of her forearm.
"You are the proprietor, then?" Qui-Gon asked, his arms neatly folded before him, the dark brown sleeves of his robe hanging down over his middle, not as broad as the guards, but easily the tallest person in the room. Obi-Wan folded his arms before him as well.
"One of them," she answered casually, "I'm Madame Leetuph." She tapped squares on the inset controls on the desk. A holo-circle glowed yellow, then blue. "Zyush na t'lomosh tu go mohcha clan," she said to the small boxy image of the droid.
"Heef-shwaf," it answered before she flicked off the holo. "We run a clean place here. My crew makes sure of that." She smiled toward her large, tusked guards who grunted and nodded proudly to each other. Then hers and every else's eyes turned toward Y'Takr Ayr.
"Nothing did she say of this! Nothing! Information, she said she had for the Jedi. Not death!" she implored, her green accented eyes large with terror.
She was telling the truth. The sense of betrayal from her burned real and bright in the Force. Obi-Wan looked to his Master, who could see it, too, but he turned away from Ayr anyway and went over to their wounded attacker.
"You have a name? You didn't give our mutual friend a chance to introduce us."
She blearily glared up at the large Jedi looming over her, defiant still, a hard plastoid bandage strapped down over her arm stump.
"Taza Oor. Of the Assassain's Guild," she hissed back through clinched teeth.
"Really?" Qui-Gon looked unimpressed. He turned back to the cantina's propietor and Ayr. "Is there an Assassain's Guild? I've never heard of one."
"She's Tazulumae Ooremmus!" Ayr shouted, tugging against the guard still holding her by the arm. "Her mother is the Deputy to the Sector Exchequer. Her father is the Chief of Staff of the Vice-Chancellor. Her brothers are in three different Assemblies!"
"That poodoo has been coming in with Cuchas and his gang," the Madame Leetuph told them, her scantily clad body leaning on her desk, "buying them drinks and dinners. She's their new pet. I don't let them do any of their dealings in my place, but anyone can come in if they behave themselves. She's their new mascot. And apparently they've been telling her load of hyperspace tales that she was stupid enough to believe. Assasain's Guild," Leetuph scoffed.
Qui-Gon looked back down at Ooremmus. "Did someone pay you to try to kill us? Cuchas, perhaps?"
"With your death, Jedi, I will be made part of the Guild. No one would deny that I was an assassain," she snarled.
"Really?" Qui-Gon frowned.
Obi-Wan shuddered. Ayr had certainly been right about her having more ambition than talent. Or sense. "How much did she pay you?"
Everyone, including his Master, turned to look at Obi-Wan. Ayr stared back at him, surprised; it was the first time he had said anything to her.
"Ooremmus," his eyes flicked down toward the wounded woman, "how much did she pay you to send your message to us?"
Ayr cringed, her expression tragic. Qui-Gon raised his eyebrows at Obi-Wan before turning back to his informant. "How much?" he asked as well.
"Ten thousand dataries. But for information to pass only! Never would I have summoned you if ever I thought wished death for you, she did!" Ayr exclaimed, nearly frantic.
"Hmmm." Qui-Gon appeared to be unmoved as he thought about this and Ayr grew increasingly miserable. "You should have asked for more. A bounty on a Jedi would be ten times that." He quirked a smile down at his Padawan. Obi-Wan returned it.
"At least, Master. Even more for two."
"Nooo! No bounty, Master Qui-Gon! I did not!" Ayr seemed near to tears, her three fleshy, studded tattooed protuberances quivered on her head.
Qui-Gon sighed. "I don't believe Y'Takr Ayr had anything to do with Ooremmus's attempt to kill us. She's seems to have been duped by her as badly as Ooremmus was by the gang she patronized. Though I suspect that my friend is far more capable of learning from her mistake."
"Yes, yes!" Ayr reached her gauntleted arms to Qui-Gon as if grasping for a life-preserver. "No harm, I meant!"
Madame Leetuph looked unimpressed, but she flicked a hand gesture toward the tusked guard and he let go of Ayr's arm.
"She'll still have to talk to the authorities when they get here." She folded her thin arms over her shapely, barely-covered bust.
Ayr stumbled forward over the pristine, smooth floor and fell to her knees before them. Qui-Gon looked a little embarrassed as she gratefully gushed up at him, "No harm! No harm!"
Obi-Wan glanced back at Ooremmus, nearly immobile from her injury and the medical droid's treatment, but still angry, still overflowing with unfulfilled ambition. Almost no harm.
- - - End Part 2