A City Worth Guarding

[Rekali the Hutt]

A holomail would find its way to the desk of @Darrell Irani, or perhaps one of his secretaries, or executives, or secretaries of one of his executives. Regardless Iron Crown would have a new customer.

Dear Sir or Madam

Rekali the Hutt thought for a moment on that greeting and how it wasn't always 'proper' so to speak. Some species didn't adhere to the typical gender dichotomy, having genderal differences in several different forms among their species. He supposed it was the most polite response however, and those species that had tertiary genderal configurations and beyond would just have to have thick skin.

I'm in the market for protection, of the anti-bombardment variety. I need to cover what is essentially a city-sized block in an ecumenopolis of a world, and I think your White Iron Shield Generators would be spectacular for the job. However I don't really want to stop there, I'd also like to reinforce the spaceport's basic defenses, add in some fast-lock turrets and such, put in a planetary Ion Cannon, and put up a few anti-personnel turrets out of the major entry and exit ways from the city. Obviously it'll be a massive project that will require a significant investment and some on-site analysis before groundbreaking, but I trust I have the necessary funds and that you're the right company for the job. Whenever you have a representative ready I'd love to sit down and discuss the finer details of the necessary contracting.

Cordially,
Rekali the Hutt

 

[Jairus Starvald]

[member="Rekali the Hutt"]

It took a few days for the holomail to find its way to Irani's desk.

Most of his time was spend touring the Galaxy these days -- mostly in the Unknown Regions to promote the bolstering of infrastructure and facilitating the trade initiatives by the locals with the Galaxy at large. It was exhausting, but gratifying in its own way. Regardless, at some point, after being passed over by an entire chain of bureaucracy, one of the many assistants saw fit to put the mail within Irani's scope.

Supposedly this assistant was one of the intelligent sorts and saw something in the proposal, something that Irani himself would have seen in terms of opportunities to exert some minor influence at a fledgling operation.

A reply would read thusly.

Rekali the Hutt, -- this in itself was the most safe of approaches when it came to greetings, because Darell was unsure of the Hutt's temperament and in which gender-pronoun he wished to be addressed as.

Iron Crown Enterprises has a long history of custom orders and working with its customers to deliver a fitting solution for a particular problem at hand. One of my representatives will be available to you for a closer discussion of the details to make this a reality, included are specific coordinates to make an appointment at your leisure.

Darell Irani.

 

[Rekali the Hutt]

[member="Darell Irani"]

It took a few days for Rekali the Hutt to get a response, but such was a nature of things. While Rekali the Hutt had a certain wealth to him as a spice mogul his name wasn't exactly high on the galaxy's list. The Hutt would like to say that was intentional, and to a degree it was, but there was also the fact that his criminal empire simply didn't expand that far off of Trevel'ka yet. That, along with the fact that Iron Crown was one of the bigger names in the industry meant that it would take time to sort through the sheer mass of mail the company got everyday.

But even though it took time, he still got a reply. And from Irani. Few if any running around had more power in the company than him. Perhaps it was just a secretary signing his name at the back of a reply, but he wouldn't expect anyone of authority in a real business to allow that sort of behavior. Perhaps while offering letters of encouragement, but not while making business deals.

Darell Irani

I look forward to meeting your representative. I'll be at the mentioned co-ordinates next Benduday at 7:00 PM.

Rekali the Hutt


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Perhaps it was an office building, or a cantina, or some abandoned warehouse, but Rekali the Hutt would be waiting there on Benduday at about 6:50. He, or rather his people, had already been there before, scouting out the area and possible dangers. Prudence might have been costly, but it also paid it's debt in blood.

 

[Jairus Starvald]

Irani had two HRDs as his personal assistants.

Well, HRD was the short explanation. To explain the subtle blend of biochemistry and engineering that had gone into the creation of the two units would have been far too time-consuming, additionally the canonical article pertaining towards said entities had been lost in translation and could not be found at this point in time.

It mattered little though.

All that mattered was that one of them, Ashley this time around, was the one who would meet with [member="Rekali the Hutt"] at that particular date and time and place. She had four guards with her -- though most of it was just show, she alone was far more dangerous than even ten of them would be.

The meeting took place on Ilum of all places. Cold and remote and currently devoid of Jedi after the incident with the Mandalorians at their enclave. It was a fairly good spot for ICE to start expanding, one way or another. A warehouse, currently still in that gray area of in-between ownership was the scene.

Ash took in the room, sharp grey eyes studying the Hutt and his security detail, before acknowledging him with a nod.

"Rekali the Hutt, I presume." She addressed with not even a hint of humor flickering. "An honor."

 

[Rekali the Hutt]

Perhaps if Rekali the Hutt was as skilled as Antares Windu, famed padawan of old with matchless skill in untrained abilities, he would have detected the negotiator was an HRD. Or rather detected that the woman didn't have a Force Signature, and then concluded she was an imposter to organics. Rather Rekali the Hutt simply concluded she was merely cold, cold like this snowy crystal filled world. Part of him wondered if the ICE thought him a part of the Mandalorian raids here earlier, and this was some sort of joke or revenge, but neither seemed Iron Crown's style.

<And a pleasure.> The Hutt replied in his natural tongue. He considered making a joke along the lines of ICE meeting in ice, or needing the cold to present the White Iron shields, but she seemed the type to appreciate neither. <I have gathered the geographical data of the area, necessary build arounds for the shielding. From what I understand contact with it is lethal.> Very interesting as it gave him a strong border for opposition, yet also problematic, as he was essentially running a city. Checkpoints would have to be made and it would have to be ensured that no buildings were 'cut' by the shielding. The former was a logistic issue that he'd deal with, but the latter was an engineering consideration.

<I've also marked a few spots that could be used for the Ion Cannon and defenses. We could make other spots ready if necessary, but these would be the simplest.> Another engineering consideration, where to be able to allow temporary 'holes' for firing windows out of the shielding. One of his bodyguards would walk up to her and present her with a datapad containing all the aforementioned information. Perhaps Ashley herself wasn't an analyst, but she'd need the information regardless.

[member="Darell Irani"]

 

[Jairus Starvald]

Ash listened calmly to the pitch laid out by [member="Rekali the Hutt"] while pondering about certain things.

Organics usually needed to keep their mind on the subject at hand, but it wasn't all that difficult for her to delegate her thought processes to the background while diverting a more sizeable percentage of her processes towards listening and analyzing. First of all, they had already gleamed a tiny portion of the Hutt's operations.

The fact that he was a criminal meant little to her or Iron Crown. In her experience everyone was guilty of something, so to judge someone who was merely capitalizing on instability caused by the uncaring or the misguided... well, that seemed slightly foolish.

"I see." The words came and went, while she studied the offered datapad with a curious look. Her attention shifted to the bodyguard to her right, who immediately -- sheepishly -- took the datapad for her, before offering it to her.

"Why thank you."

And then she started reading, the room momentarily forgotten while she was left to her devices.