With a groan Mira opened her eyes. Her back hurt for some reason, as did her head and...eh?
Huh, she didn't remember sleeping under a domed roof. The sun was up, shining down at her eyes. It was probably that which had woken her up...she still felt worn out since yesterday...why was she sleeping on the floor anyway? And in the nude no less?
Then she heard another groan next to her and the memories came flooding back.
"Ah!" Mira leapt to her feet and away from the man now rolling unto his back. Atton's eyes fluttered up, the groggy face instantly replaced by one of dawning horror. "Oh by all that is holy! Cover up!" She turned her face away, then she realised she was standing naked in front of him and desperately tried to cover up. "What did you do to my clothes!?"
"Me!?" Atton was now fully awake, she could sense him rolling away, his disgust and horror lashing at her. "What the hell have you done!?"
"Me!? You were the one jumping me last night!" Mira protested, her face so warm it felt like it should by all right melt right off her. "I should call the authorities!"
"Oh really!? I remember a certain vixen playing all comforting and touchy feely!"
"I was comforting you! It's what friends do!" She finally found her pants, the garment bunched up against the foot of one of the chairs. Grabbing them she dropped behind the chair and furiously tried to put them on. For some reason it was ridiculously difficult... "And don't call me a vixen!" With a little jump she finally got them on...somewhat.
"I call you what you want you damn temptress!" Atton growled, Mira risked a glance and breathed a sigh of relief at seeing him at least having a pair of pants on. Reaching down towards his shirt he stopped mid-step, the horror in his face growing. "Oh no...what have you done!? You made me fail her!"
"Oh don't start that again!" Mira snapped, hugging the back of the chair, eyes darting from corner to corner in a futile search for the rest of her outfit. "Your damn puppy dog longing was what put us in this crap! And where the hell is my shirt!?"
"Puppy dog!?" Atton pulled up the bundle of clothes, revealing that Mira's shirt and jacket had lain right under his, he threw them at her with a snort of disgust. "And don't try to explain this! You took advantage of me! I was upset and you seduced me! Couldn't wait to get your hands on such a hunk could you!?"
Mira missed catching the tossed package as she was still pushed against the chair. "Oh don't flatter yourself!" Holding a hand in front of her chest she darted forward and grabbed the clothes before going back into hiding. "And me taking advantage of you!? It's not your chest that hurts from being crushed!"
"No, I'm the one with so many scratches over my back that I look like a maalraas scratching post!" Mira winced, the shame like a physical blow. Damn that man! "Admit it! You were just waiting for me to slip! Just waiting to sink your claws into me when I was at most vulnerable! Why would you do something like that against me!? Not to mention against her! I thought you liked her!?"
"Hey! You ripped my shirt!" Mira's angry complaint was met by nothing but a snort of contempt from the scoundrel. "And don't you of all people come dragging her into this! Besides, it's hardly an insult against her! She left you here, remember!?" That hurt him, the jerk deserved it... "No this is all your fault! You took me by surprise and overwhelmed me! If I had been able to think straight nothing of this would have happened! But you couldn't allow that could you!?"
"I can help it if I'm so charming you can't think!" Atton objected as he, finally clothed, raised his clenched hands as he glared at Mira. Normally she would have laughed at such a statement, now she just got angrier. Drawing her sabre from her belt she stepped out from behind the chair. "Oh so now you're going to stab me!? Breaking my heart wasn't enough!?"
"Breaking your...I'm going to break your legs!" Mira growled, closed fist gesturing at the man that radiated furiousness. Furious...what right did he have to be furious!? "Fact is that you took advantage of me! Wanted to take your frustration out on me! And like a fool I wasn't clever enough to avid your little trap!"
"You think I planned this!? Hey you're hot and all but I..."
"I didn't want to hear that!"
"Yeah well what goes around comes around!" Atton took a quick step forward, raising a clenched fist at Mira's face.
"Jerk!"
"Shutta!"
"Nerf!"
"Red haired, back-scratching, nerf-seducing, false-pretence-giving, chest-flashing temptress!"
"Wait...what?"
"I said-"
"Not that, wait..." Mira raised a hand to interrupt the tirade, restraining an out of place giggle at that last one. She frowned. "There's someone coming."
"Olmark!?" Atton paled, a look of guilt crossing his face as he looked around the council chamber. "We can't meet him here! It...well it smells!" He was right, there was a definitive smell there, one neither wanted the senator to catch a whiff of. "We should go out and meet him!"
"Dammit you're right..." Mira muttered, self-consciously correcting her pants and shirt, trying desperately to hide the gash in her shirt behind her jacket. "Lets move."
The hostility was palpable as they walked side by side, both making every effort to ignore one another. She could actually smell him...she didn't like how she appreciated the earthy scent. She felt a need to elbow him into the wall, but controlled herself down to shooting him an angry glare.
"I swear if you even hint on anything..." She whispered as they stepped out of the corridor leading to council chamber. The sound of a dozen pair of feet stopping mid-step interrupted her threat.
Blinking the pair turned. They stood in one of the temple's large chambers, but one of several lines of massive pillars was close, giving the impression they were in a small corridor. A few feet away a dozen men stood, apparently equally surprised at seeing them. Mira senses told her they had expected the two of them further away...so they were coming for the two jedi.
The men were dressed in rough dark clothing, not really uniforms but rather something one could expect a dock-worker to wear. Their faces were weathered and hard, two of them rodians and another three Weequays...they all carried the stink of scum about them however, a smell Mira had long ago learnt to recognise.
As one the men raised their weapons, an assortment of dirty vibroblades and crude looking blasters. Despite the obvious cheapness of their equipment they all seemed worn with use and Mira recognised the way they spread out to not be completely without logic. They were not army men...but they had done this stuff before.
"We're jedi, so back off." Atton suddenly held his lightsaber in hand, the yellow blade cutting through the air as he aimed it at the thugs.
He was faced with nothing but silence as the men exchanged quick glances. Mira felt their fear...controlled by a surprising amount of discipline, anger and perhaps a little too much alcohol. They wouldn't run away. "Atton, no killing, let's just incapacitate them." Mira muttered the words as she slipped into a defensive stance, her own sabre activating with a hum.
"Don't tell me what to do." Atton growled, his stance reminding her of a spring wired to explode. Mira glared at him, making the scoundrel shrug under the hard look. "Fine..."
"Enough! Get them!" Which thug spoke the words Mira wasn't sure. All she knew was that suddenly she and Atton flew forward, leaping through a storm of shots as the thugs tried to hit the blurs that were the jedi.
Blocking an overhand blow from a vibroblade Mira's shoulder slammed into the face of her assailant, then her blade came down at the dazed man, grazing his leg and dropping him screaming to the floor. Wheeling away from a sniping shot she lashed out, blade cutting through weapon and hand of the offending thug.
Somewhere to her left Atton was fighting. She could feel his anger, his frustration and shame...all being taken out on the fools standing before him. To his credit he didn't kill them, he merely crippled them with more force then necessary...
Forcing herself not to see the arms and legs in the wake of the raging jedi Mira ducked below two shots and swept her sabre wide, the energy blade catching both blaster pistols aimed at her. The chambers of both exploded, heated gas washing over the hands clutching the weapons and dropping the pair of assailants, the pungent smell of cooked rodian stinging Mira's nose...
The fight didn't last long.