The number you have dialled is not in service.
Ashkhen glanced at her comm. No mistake there. The call history under Mr. Thrirbod's contact info had logs from the first day of every month, going back half a year or so.
Huh.
His most recent communication was a text from last month, which she had forgotten to check:
'CAN'T TALK, CALL YOU SOON. T.'
The extra shifts at Irigo's and her newly developed sleep-wake inversion had pushed the issue of paying rent out of Ashkhen's thoughts. Now she was two months overdue, and the landlord was nowhere to be found.
Ashkhen pulled up the rental agreement on her datapad from over a year ago. She scrolled through the long passages explaining in detail all the penalties she would have to pay in case of property damage, breach of contract and starting an illegal gambling den in the apartment—oddly specific, one might think—and found the address of Mr. Thrirbod's permanent residence at the bottom. Serralo City was quite a trip from her area, but based on its reputation, a neighbourhood of roughly the same shadyness.
Mr. Thrirbod, whatever his reasons were, always insisted on collecting rent in cash. Ashkhen placed the credit chits into an empty takeout box, wrapped it in a grocery store bag, and sunk it to the bottom of her backpack. The fastest route to his place still contained three shuttle transfers—Ashkhen threw her water bottle in the bag and prepared to embark on a journey to a different time zone.
As she stepped out the front door, only her Jedi reflexes saved her from getting run over by a giant hovercart. A wobbly tower built of upcycled plastoid containers and a lot less elegant trash bags blocked her path.
"What's up with all this stuff?" she asked, circling around the rent-a-dolly.
Chate let go of the handle with one hand to wave at her. Next to him, stood his very combative and very pregnant wife.
"We go today." The strap of a barrel bag dug deep into Chate's shoulder. The Weequay hefted it with a groan. "We move home."
"Your home!" his wife snapped. "To your mother." She turned her back on her husband and stormed down the corridor, oblivious to the face Chate made.
"Coruscant very expensive," he said quietly, looking after his wife as she smashed the elevator buttons. "Qilka can't work anymore and I can't... Well, we have to go."
Ashkhen nodded in understanding. "Do you need any help with your things?"
"No, I can do alone." Chate grabbed the handle of the hovercart, heaving their belongings away. "Hey, we left table inside. Too big. If you want, we give you."
"Why have table if don't have food!" Qilka threw her arms in the air, then stomped into the elevator without waiting for her husband. "Maybe next life I marry fish. Fish quiet and nice and want to help! She don't kriff up my fate!"
The road to the Dark Side, too, must be paved with good intentions!
Who would have thought such a seahorse fin flutter of a mistake all those months ago would cause a tidal bore that capsized the neighbours' already barely seaworthy life! Ashkhen looked from Chate to his wife, and swallowed hard.
Chate turned his head heavenwards. "Sorry," he said. "I know that's very rude. Qilka always named you fish-next-door. She doesn't know the right word. Goodbye."
Ashkhen couldn't find the right word either, she waved him off in silence. When the elevator doors closed behind the couple, she peeked through their open door. The apartment was now completely gutted, save for the lone table standing in the middle. It looked much nicer than the battered, twenty-second-hand camping table she had found on the HoloNet and convinced the twenty-first owner to barter it away for a six-pack of Iridonian Pale Ale.
The elevator stopped at the ground floor. Ashkhen looked down the hallway left and right, said her silent thanks and levitated the table into her own apartment.
••• ••• •••
Different city, different level, same atmosphere. Ashkhen nearly missed her stop—the streets in the area had six or seven digits long designations, with an occasional letter strewn in. Following the holomap on the shuttle felt like reading free verse poems written in hexadecimal.
She took out her datapad to make sure she was standing in front of number krenth-nine-nine-oh-four-senth-usk on krill-nine-oh-nine-besh-usk street, then went inside to locate the landlord's apartment.
Still so early in this time zone and on a lazy weekend afternoon, Ashkhen had every hope that somebody would be home. An almost minute-long elevator ride later, she rang the doorbell of apartment usk-krenth-four-nine-nine-oh.
A Quarren lady—Mrs. Thrirbod, presumably—stood in the door, arms folded defensively across her chest.
"What do you want?"
Ashkhen marveled at the intricate dance of her mouth tentacles, wondering whether very strong winds would hamper her speech.
"Hey, I'm, uhh... Is Mr. Thrirbod home?"
"Mr. Thrirbod?" At such a casual mention of her husband's name, her mood switched from testy to ornery.
"I'm here about the money."
"Oh, the money?"
Ire sat alight Mrs. Thrirbod's bright blue eyes—the young Nautolan, Mr. Thrirbod and "the money" got her tactors in a twist. Looking the audacious visitor up and down, she unfolded her arms and reached up to take out her drop dangle aural ornaments.
"Y-yeah." Ashkhen had a feeling that their respective contexts had about as much in common as their DNA. "You see, I live in his apartment and I haven't seen him in a while."
"Bitch, me neither!"
The Quarren lady lunged at her with a screech, shuffling clumsy feet and flailing her arms. The way she left her face wide open bespoke hand-to-hand combat training that came entirely from long hours of watching action chick flicks and women's self-defense videos on the HoloNet. Ashkhen sidestepped, grabbed her wrist, and let her momentum carry her forward, wincing a little as Mrs. Thrirbod stumbled head-first into the opposite wall.
The fight went out of Mrs. Thrirbod at once. Silent sobs started shaking her shoulder, catching Ashkhen by surprise.
"Break my arm like you broke my heart then take my kriffing shoes, too!" she wailed into the wall. Ashkhen immediately let go of her arm.
"Why the hell would I need your shoes?" She slowed down her speech, choosing simple words to get through the Quarren lady's distress. "My rent is overdue and I came to pay your husband. If he's not around, I can leave his creds with you."
"You want to… give me money?" Mrs. Thrirbod turned around, wiping at her eyes. "You're... not his side piece?"
Ew!
Ashkhen took a deep breath to keep her voice even and her face straight.
"No, I'm his tenant. I have a contract if you want to check."
"Oh." Mrs. Thrirbod straightened her shirt and asked in a very small voice, "Would you like to come in for some tea?"
"That would be lovely, thanks."
Ashkhen followed her into the sparsely furnished apartment. At a second glance, it seemed less like intentional minimalism and more like her stuff had been taken away.
"Please, have a seat," Mrs. Thrirbod said, turning towards the kitchen.
Ashkhen bit back the "Where?" and headed towards the two battered shipping crates turned upside down with poise worthy of Master Balian.
Her hostess soon joined her, balancing a small salad bowl and a two-handled plastoid sippy cup on a tray. She sat on the crate opposite of Ashkhen and set the tray on her knees. A crumpled up teabag lay between the two drinking vessels. White paper tag with red corners—Ashkhen recognized it as a store brand assorted berry flavoured herbal tea, the type that came in those Buy-It-In-Bulk! one hundred-count boxes. Mrs. Thrirbod dipped the teabag into the salad bowl first, waited three seconds, then transferred it to the sippy cup. She repeated the movement a couple more times.
Ashkhen accepted the Quarren's insipid token of hospitality with the grace and tactfulness of a Jedi Consular. She immediately took a sip to stall and think carefully what she would say next. 'How do you do?' seemed like a really kriffing stupid question at this point.
Mrs. Thrirbod drank down her tea in one long pull, so quick that her taste buds didn't have the chance to register the flavour. She placed the sippy cup back on the tray, ready to unleash her problems without any prompting from Ashkhen.
"My husband started going back to Dac alone about a year ago," she said. "He never asked if I wanted to come with him. He came back with a pile of presents every other time." Her shoulders slumped. "That was gut-wrenching. I thought he was having an affair. Turns out, it was even worse—he turned political."
"The Isolation League?" Ashkhen asked.
"You heard about that?"
"Yeah, I'm vaguely familiar."
Mrs. Thrirbod threaded a finger into one handle of her cup and gave it a little tug to see if it still held.
"One afternoon about two months ago, he told me there were some things he had to take care of. He walked out that door and I haven't heard from him since."
"Did you talk to the police?"
She gave her a sad smile. "You're fishpeople"—she put that in air quotes—"too, you can imagine their level of enthusiasm. Besides, Quarren score especially low on popularity these days."
Ashkhen sat in silence, slowly running a thumb over the chipped brim of the salad bowl between her hands. It had been glued together at least twice.
"Then about a month ago, other people came looking for him," Mrs. Thrirbod said. "Men."
The way her tone changed upon the last word had Ashkhen glance up in alarm.
"They said he owed them a lot of money. I told them he left none." She looked around her apartment, barren of furniture, personal items, décor and any traces of coziness. "They took everything, even some of my nicer clothes."
"And he never told you about his other apartment?"
Mrs. Thrirbod shook her head. "You think you know someone after twenty years of marriage, then one day you wake up and pfff, your past is gone."
Ashkhen pulled her backpack into her lap and took out the box full of money. "This is yours, then."
"Spicy Burrafish Platter, Ithorian Garden pilaf for sides, twelve ninety-nine, cash on delivery?" The freshly appointed landlady-by-default looked at Ashkhen with a confused frown.
"Everything you need to turn around a particularly rough day. Worth every decicred," Ashkhen said, mouth pulling into a wide grin. "I'm kidding. Your rent's inside. No offense, but your neighborhood is just as shady as the one I live in."
Mrs. Thrirbod stayed silent. An unreadable expression appeared on her face.
"Shit, you want to sell the apartment!"Ashkhen said rather than asked.
"I can't sell real estate I don't hold authority over," Mrs. Thrirbod said quietly. "You should stay."
Overflowing with relief and gratefulness, Ashkhen almost leaned forward into a respectful bow, but caught herself at the last moment. She thrust out her right for a handshake instead.
"I'm gonna snag a few sets of the plates my nightclub boss has buried in one of his storage rooms," she said as she swung her backpack over one shoulder, getting ready to leave. "I'll pack those up and send them over to you. I'll think about getting you a table, okay? 'Cause I also work in a restaurant, but those tables there are bolted down to the floor. Is it cool if I wire you the rent every month? I don't always have a day to spare for bus hopping."
"Why are you doing this?" Mrs. Thrirbod asked, closing the lid and wrapping the box up in the grocery bag again. "You could have walked away with this money, kept living in my husband's secret apartment for free as long as you wanted and I would have been none the wiser."
Ashkhen turned back from the front door, giving her a half-shrug. "That's not how I was raised."
"Your folks must be really nice people."
••• ••• •••
"…and the next day, we went over to my Mom's sister-in-law's place," Tilla continued her account. She had spent ten rotations in total on her homeworld, and an additional four days getting there and back again. "The wife of her second eldest brother," she added for clarification.
"Auntie Uuno, right?"
"No, Auntie Uuno is the eldest sister of my third uncle's wife," Tilla said. "This is Auntie Ousu we're talking about."
"Right, sorry."
Ashkhen had long given up on the idea of creating a mental sketch of Tilla's family tree. Had it ever been rendered in a 3D hologram, it would have likely looked like the molecular structure of the largest and most complex organic compound ever characterized.
"Anyways, from the moment we arrived I knew the whole shebang was set up just so Auntie Ousu could try and set me up with her nephew."
Ashkhen placed two more glasses of Alderaanian white on the tray she had been preparing for Tilla. Seven drinks in total, ranging from very sweet to extremely sweet—girls' night out, no doubt.
"Is matchmaking cultural for Twi'leks?" she asked. "Marry you off as a means to get you out of the house?"
"Traditionally speaking, I'm long marriageable," Tilla said. "But the thing is, thanks to my Mom's series of rocky wedlocks, I've been kind of raising my sisters since I was twelve. I'm not sure if I'm ready to start doing that all over again with another set of kids."
"So getting married and not having kids is not an option?" Ashkhen finished carving a tiny Shyyyo bird out of honey melon peel and set it on a toothpick. Two more drinks to go. "Or just not right away?"
Tilla reached over the bar to pull the cutting board closer and turned her attention to the unused slices of fruit.
"Theoretically," she said. "But if I got married and babies didn't start popping up like clockwork, everyone would think there was something wrong with me."
"Biologically, there could be something going on with the guy, too," Ashkhen pointed out.
"And conventionally, it'd still be my responsibility to give my hypothetical husband the family he deserves." Tilla eyed the other half of the honey melon with a longing sigh, but Ashkhen put it back into the fridge. "But I still have a year or so until my younger sister reaches the age for being incessantly pestered, so I'm still good."
"Birth order determines who should get pimped out by your aunts first?"
"Older relatives are a tremendous help in finding suitable partners." Tilla looked Ashkhen straight in the eye. "Slavery is no joking matter."
"I'm sorry," Ashkhen said. "That was insensitive."
"It's okay." Tilla waved a hand. "I mean, strangers took you from your family when you were a toddler, so who's to decide which traditions are weird, right?"
"Jedi don't steal babies because they don't make their own!" Ashkhen protested. "To be sought out by the Order is in every Force sensitive child's best interest. Left untrained, dormant Force abilities have the potential to become a source of confusion, frustration, or in some cases, even injuries to the child or those around them."
Tilla reached over the bartop and gave her an understanding hand-squeeze. "Oh, sweetie, tell me you've been institutionalized without telling me you've been institutionalized."
Ashkhen scoffed, smarting once again from Tilla's knack for hitting the proverbial nail on its head. She rotated the tray a few degrees and pushed the glasses together to make space for the last one. She deliberately did not think about those youngsters she lodged with at the temporary dorms, who had been cast aside by the Order and made to fend for themselves.
"Do you have any siblings?" Tilla asked.
"Ten thousand," Ashkhen said with a straight face. "Give or take a few hundred."
"Yeah, but they are, like… from all over the Galaxy," Tilla said.
"Tills, the Jedi Temple is not a fancy boarding school for peculiar children, it's—"
Impossible to explain.
"Being connected by the Force transcends any blood bonds," she continued. "Somewhere, deep down, I still consider the Jedi my real family, even if the feeling's not mutual."
"No, I totally understand." Tilla nodded.
She totally did not. Ashkhen briefly considered grabbing two of her own headtails and bend them into the Lekku sign for family to get her point across, but she couldn't challenge the clan identity so deeply ingrained in Tilla's culture. She dropped her head with a sigh.
"I have a brother and a sister; I remember their names and the blue patterns on their skin." She set the last drink on the tray and pushed it across the bar. "But unlike my Jedi folks, I've no idea what they've been up to this past twenty years."
"I see." Tilla rotated the tall glass in the middle, and blew on the tiny windmill cocktail stick to make it spin. She watched the light jump across its sparkly golden blades. "Younger or elder brother?"
"Elde—seriously!?"
"What?" Tilla snatched up the tray, flashing her pointy teeth in a face-splitting Nautolan grin. "A taller and broader male version of you? I'm game."
Ashkhen's short bout of pondering familiy ties was interrupted by a human female in her late twenties. She wore a meticulously ironed shirt and a pleated skirt which, judged by its fabric and style, had been steadfastly covering the knees of women in her family for at least three generations. Ashkhen had never seen a character so out of place at Irigo's where booze flowed freely all the time, people's eyes shone with all kinds of high and the resident stripper strutted across her stage in various stages of naked every two hours.
Took a wrong turn on your way to Coruscant Library?
She immediately gave herself a mental kick—as someone who had taken a wrong turn on their way to becoming a Jedi Knight, she had no place judging people's paths of life. She pulled up a friendly smile instead.
"Hi there, what can I get you?"
The girl pushed her glasses up her nose. "I would like a… drink."
Her voice was so soft, Ashkhen barely heard what she said. Lip-reading wasn't an option either, for the girl kept covering most of her mouth while gnawing on her cuticles. If there was a Ten Tips On Casual Interactions For People With Social Anxiety tutorial video on the HoloNet, she was the epitome of its target audience.
Ashkhen dropped a few ice cubes into a heavy base juice glass and set it on a napkin. "Muja juice or soda pop?"
"I was wondering if maybe I could try something…" she leaned closer to whisper, eyes sweeping over the backbar, "with alcohol."
Ashkhen grabbed the soda gun and filled up her glass with plain old sparkling water.
"Rix, you know I'm not allowed to serve you while you're working."
The classical Jablogian literature major sat up straight with a huff. "How did you know?"
"Your gait doesn't change that much." Ashkhen, adding insult to insult, carefully placed a small pink paper parasol in the glass of water, then glanced up with a shit-eating grin. "And you smell of Mighty Grrrrip Dry Hands topical solution. Pole burns?"
"Aren't you the nosy little smartass," Rix ground out the words through gritted teeth, eyes flashing behind her wide-rimmed, nerdy spectacles. Her face twisted into a pained grimace, veins popped out on both sides of her neck, then she let out a low moan, growing deathly pale.
Ashkhen wasted no time guessing whether the exotic dancer had OD'd on glitterstim, was having a stroke or a perforated stomach ulcer, she reached for her comm to call for help. The device dropped from her hand the moment the face writhing in agony started looking eerily familiar.
As the transmogrification came to an end, Rix cracked her neck and shook her head, sending her headtails over one shoulder. Ashkhen stared into her own black eyes across the bar, mouth still slightly left open. Clone troopers flashed briefly across her mind: it must have sucked so bad to face this every day! At least clones were clad in armour most of the time, and didn't wear faux leather spiked choker collars and barely-there underwear as outerwear. Thank the Force the Clawdite was sitting on a barstool and not standing with her back to the club area proper.
"I like this body! I might just take it for a spin," Rix said, bobbing her head side to side.
Ashkhen fought hard against the urge to vault across the bar and wipe that infuriating smirk off her own face. "Put on someone else, please," she said in a strained voice.
"I want my Ecumenopolitan."
"I can't."
Rix folded her arms. "Gee Gee and I had an understanding."
"Too bad he's not working here anymore!"
"Hm." Rix traced delicate fingers up her—Ashkhen's—shoulder and slid off one strap with an expression that sent her original into full panic. "What kind of content would you like to see yourself live streaming on the HoloNet?"
"All right, all right, I kriffing yield!" Ashkhen threw her arms up in surrender, then buried her face in her trembling hands. "I'll make you all the drinks you want and more, just let go of me!"
Smiling smugly to herself, Rix tapped her feet against the barstool's leg and watched her Nautolan template scramble to finish the Ecumenopolitan in record time. She reached up and poked a tentative finger into the narrow slit on the side of her head, eliciting a shudder and a small squeak.
"That's so weird!" She giggled.
"Stop. Picking. My. Gills." After a slow ten-count, Ashkhen convinced herself this wasn't the time to test whether she would win in a dirty fight against her own self—Rix would likely turn into a Wookie in a second and knock her into a three-day trance. She let out a long sigh, then slid the glass across the bartop to her evil twin.
"We're gonna be best friends forever!"
Rix's signature Nautolan grin dwindled to a tight-lipped smirk, then a ripple ran over her features. A moment later, she stopped gripping the edge of the bar, raised her bright blue eyes and threw Ashkhen a wink. She swigged the cocktail in one go, then turned around and headed towards her stage with a triumphant strut, icy blond hair cascading down her bare back where her headtails had been just a second ago.
Ashkhen, shaken to the core, abandoned her post and took Rix's glass to the sink on the far right. She needed a few moments to regain her composure. Warm water ran over her hands—allayment and longing mingled in her thoughts. Her mind had circled back to the subject of home on its own accord.
Every indoors bath and swimming pool in a hundred kilometre radius from her apartment had been crossed off her list, none of which could hold a candle to the real deal. Alas, even a short trip to an ocean world have been economically unfeasible. Ashkhen's shoulders slumped in resignation—reliving that cool, dark, quiet, boundless expanse slipped from her someday folder onto her if ever list.
When she turned to replace Rix's brandy and vermouth bottles on the backbar, her ears picked up the soft rustle of someone taking the Clawdite's recently vacated seat. An unquenchable avidity for conversation nudged her senses.
Great. Another chatterbox.
Ashkhen turned around and drew a sharp breath. A Nautolan sat in the same chair, typing away on his comlink. Rix again? Back already? On further observation, Ashkhen determined him an authentic specimen and gradually loosened up. He smelled nice.
"Hey, what can I get you?"
He shoved the device in his back pocket and glanced up with a smile. "I'm on a mission and I need your help."
Why the long build-up, every time, without fail?
Ashkhen channeled her inner Master Balian and gave him a friendly and encouraging nod. "I'm listening."
"There's a riveting character other than my humble self who's got a drink coming their way, and I want to personally ensure they get the best this establishment has to offer."
At this rate, we're gonna kriffing grow old together.
"You've come to the right place, then," she said, attenuating her intended eye-roll into a subtle, unilateral eyebrow quirk. "What's the mission objective?"
"Acquiring the beverage so I can hand it to the intended recipient," he said.
Ashkhen took up the towel to wipe down a few glasses, settling in for the long ride—he showed no inclination to abbreviate the banter any time soon.
"No, that's your opening move," she said. "What's the endgame? Do you want to delve into a conversation about the war and its impact on people inside and outside of the Republic, or do you really just want to score, preferably within a twenty-minute time cap?"
"I never say no to conversations, don't care much about the Seps, other than that, I'm down for anything." The corner of his mouth quirked upwards. "Maybe reverse the order."
"I've got you, loverboy." She hung the snifters upside down on the glass rack, then leaned with her elbows on the bar top. "What genre do you have in mind?"
"I was hoping for some pointers."
Ashkhen tilted her head to the side. "I have absolutely zero experience in picking up women."
'Thank the stars!' he mouthed, face lighting up with a hint of relief.
"Come again?"
"No, I mean, if that was your thing, I'd be happy for you, I'd just be sad for my half of the population." He waved the issue away with a lax sweep of his hand. "See, you've got a pretty good vantage point up here, so I thought maybe you could share your statistics with me."
Ashkhen let out a scoff. "Do you really need advice in chatting up people?"
"No, but sometimes I fancy a fresh pair of beautiful eyes," he said. "Humour me?"
"Sure, it's not like I have anything else to do." She gave him a tight-lipped smile, but it wasn't in her nature to turn away anyone asking for help. "Okay, buying someone a drink generally works as a first approach, but there are two points where guys usually go wrong."
He leaned closer, listening attentively.
"Believe or not, the drink and the presentation."
A grin split his face, flashing teeth that could have been easily spotted from a nautical mile away, in very turbid waters.
"So, what's her choice of poison?"
"I was planning to circumvent the issue of not knowing yet"—he stressed the word—"by surprising her."
Ashkhen's brows drew together. "Sure it's a good idea to walk up to someone with a random glass and tell them to drink it?"
"What do you mean?"
"Sweethearts, take a look around!" she said. "See all those shifty lowlifes lurking? Seventy-four million eight hundred ninety-three thousand young women have gone missing this year, just from the Uscru district. There's a infinitesmal chance she's come across any of those stories in the past few months and has two braincells to rub together."
A look of alarm crossed his face. "You're saying I look like a shifty lowlife."
"Absolutely not!" Ashkhen shook her head vehemently. "You look like the guy who's doing the prep work for one. All I'm saying is, I know I wouldn't drink anything that wasn't fixed before my own eyes."
"I'll take my chances."
"You've been warned." Ashkhen nodded in acquiescence. "In that case, here's my statistical analysis of socializing in a nightclub setting with detailed overview to guys making successful hits on girls." She cleared her throat. "Champagne or cocktail. Being filthy rich gives a boost."
The teeth from a toothpaste advertisement made an encore appearance.
"Okay, got it. Cocktail it is. Any recommendations?"
Ashkhen shrugged. "I'd choose something popular and medium priced. The gaudiest, most expensive item on the menu would scream desperation to me. But"—she raised a hand before he could voice his objection—"we don't know much about your mark, and statistically, you can sweep most people off their feet with a heavy bag of credits. You just have to swing hard enough."
He pulled up the holomenu from the bar top and scrolled through the first few pages of the list, unimpressed.
"These are all… meh. Maybe you could custom-make me something?"
Ashkhen folded her arms. "Going after brownie points for creativity while outsourcing the creative work?"
"That's a very negative way of looking at the sitch!" He conjured a credit chit out of thin air, rolled it across his knuckles, and set it on the bartop. "I'm creating an opportunity for all parties involved to appreciate superior craftsmanship."
"Let me guess your line: sales or politics?" She considered him for a moment, then said, "Let's go with a Bassa Hound for base. It's solid enough to cloud her judgement a little bit, but here's the spin coming. I'll swap the muja for shuura juice, she'll notice the difference and ask you how come it's so sweet, you'll make up some banthashit story about how they make Bassa Hound on Onderon, and bam, conversation, banter, giggles, making out."
"Your wingman game is strong, love!" He broke into laughter. "Okay, we've got the cocktail. You mentioned there was a second pitfall."
Ashkhen nodded. She pulled the tin shaker in front of her, then took up the gin bottle with the other.
"When you bring her the drink, try not to come on too strong—you'll set off her creep alarm. Some people find it hard to accept favours, so don't act like you're entitled to be entertained just because you've bought them a drink they didn't even ask for in the first place. Give her a little space, let her decide if she wants to engage. Try not to make her feel cornered."
"I'll keep these tips in mind when I attempt to tame a female mudhorn with calves," he said with an amused look on his face. "We're still talking about sentient species in an urban setting."
"You asked for my opinion." Ashkhen lay a napkin in front of him then set an old-fashioned glass on top of it. "You have every right to go and make someone super uncomfortable."
A generous amount of gin landed on top of the ice. Ashkhen paused for a second, studied the Nautolan sitting across the bar, then filled up the jigger halfway again.
"You think shitfaced is the mood I should be shooting for?"
"Of course not!" Ashkhen turned back to grab a few shuura fruits from the shelf, arranging her features back into a reassuring smile just before she returned to her guest. "It's just that everyone gets one shot at first impressions." She took up a knife to remove the pits, threw the shuura pieces into the blender and pressed down on the lid. "But there's no need to overstress, either. Introduce yourself, pay them a genuine compliment and leave them intrigued so they'd want to continue the conversation another time." She poured the juice on top of the gin.
As he mulled over her words, Ashkhen snatched up the tin, shook it around and strained the drink into the glass, filling it to the brim. "There you go. Best of luck."
"You sure this is going to work?" he asked.
"Absolutely positive," she said. "On the off chance it doesn't, come back and I promise your next drink will be on the house."
He slid the glass across the bartop back to her.
"Cheers, love," he said. "Your show last week was pure magic. I'm Fong, by the way. Never been to Onderon"—he glanced down at the cocktail, then looked up with a mischievous grin—"Tell me about it next time!"
He turned around and melted into the crowd. Ashkhen blinked at the glass in front of her.
"Well played, sharpy," she muttered. "Well played."
Curiously, his smile proved rather contagious.
••• ••• •••
Tilla set down her tray full of empty glasses, then took a seat to flex and rotate her weary feet. At an average of twenty thousand steps a day, gel insoles didn't make all that difference.
"Please give my ankles a moment before I head back to the Krayt Dragon Pearl," she said.
"One Aurodium Passion, another Corellian whiskey on the rocks, and a half-pint of Supernova Dry to chase it down," Ashkhen read from her terminal.
She looked up at the private suite. One of the senators walked out, nodding to the bouncer by the door. He leaned on the balcony rail to make a private call. The yellow tattoos above his eyebrows shone bright in the UV lights, marking him as Senator Clovis of Scipio.
"Is this for the Escape Pod Luxe guy? He's dropping serious cash on cocktails tonight." Ashkhen reached up for a champagne flute and flipped it upside down to frost it. "Is she that pretty?"
"I really can't tell, Ash, she's Neimoidian." Tilla scrunched up her nose. "All cold-blooded girls look so weird and ugly to me."
"Ouch, damn!" Ashkhen huffed. "I guess I'll flip this champagne bucket over my head if my weird and ugly gills bother you so!"
"Oh, silly, you know I didn't mean you!" Tilla gave the untouched Bassa Hound a cursory glance. "Besides, someone else here obviously thinks your gills are cute." She leaned on the bartop with a knowing smile spreading on her face. "Sooo, what does he look like?"
Jedi training kicking in, Ashkhen recalled the previous conversation in minute detail, describing the image in her mind. "Average height, athletic build, rather on the wiry side; moss green skin, brown speckles." She placed a small mug of draught beer next to the cocktail. "Black shirt and a leather jacket. Speech indicates he's been living in the Core for a while now, but his voice still has a Nautolan lilt to it. He's right-handed."
"Sweetie, you're describing a suspect!" Tilla said with a sympathetic look on her face. "Hitting on you is not a crime. I meant, like, did he have a charming smile? Dreamy eyes? Was he handsome?"
"I… well, yeah. Like, objectively, I guess." Ashkhen poured the whiskey with a tiny shrug. "He said his name was Fong."
"Shut and bolt the front door! Fong Do?" Tilla threw her head back in laughter. "Trouble's back in town!"
"You know him?" Ashkhen took a second glance at her terminal, slightly concerned.
Who drinks tihaar in a nightclub?
"I know some things about him." Tilla did that indecipherable eyebrow-wiggle again which always made Ashkhen feel like something was eluding her. The waitress hopped off the barstool and took up the silver tray Ashkhen had prepared in the meantime. "He'll talk your pants off." Turning away, she draped one lekku over her shoulder. "Quite literally, too, if you let your guard drop," she added with a wink.
"Speaking from experience?" Ashkhen checked the strange order again, then set out four shot glasses with a small moment of epiphany. A squad of clones on furlough.
"Hey sis, is it my fault you were raised in a convent, and were forbidden from encountering some smooth-tonguery?"
"At least I had a father figure present growing up!" Ashkhen shot back. "I might have a lot of problems, but dealing with my daddy issues ain't one!"
"Go cloister yourself!" Tilla called over her shoulder, underlining the sentiment with an elaborate sweep and twitch of her lekku. The gesture was layered with so many obscenities, even catching just about half of it all but made the cold-blooded bartender blush.