Big Trouble

[Laira Darkhold]

Theme​

Horns and trumpets played outside the opulent palace, announcing the beginning of Kang the Hutt’s week long celebration to the newly risen Black Sun. The Atrisian sector of Nar Shaddaa had been abuzz for weeks in preparation for the Hutt’s festival, lining the streets with hanging lanterns, decorating storefronts, and ensuring the square before the Hutt’s massive palace was clean for once. At least as clean as Nar Shaddaa could provide. Fireworks detonated in the sky in a dazzling display of lights and noise, sparking dragons of light erupting from the fires only to detonate themselves.

The palace loomed in the skyline, oriental styles rising up from the slums of the Atrisian quarter like a monolith. Great banners fluttered in the wind from its corners and massive columns decorated with gold inlay markings stood on either side of the massive bronzium doors thrust open. A red carpet had been rolled out of the corridor from the massive throne the corpulent Hutt rested upon all the way down the stairs and the square before his castle. Those with invitation were ushered along by guards to the roped off carpet and allowed to walk inside the palace without escort. Masses swarmed outside, throwing rice and confetti onto those lucky enough to have received an invitation to the palace for the monumental event, teeming masses of the poor and downtrodden cheering for the success of the rich and oppressive of the criminal underground, nearby political underlings. Rumors that one of the Confederacy’s Viceroys was in attendance along with one of Black Sun’s mysterious Vigos, though no one could say who all was on the guest list for certain, and which of them would actually make an appearance.

Some of the Hutt’s guards tossed out food into the hungry crowd, others threw coins on occasion, laughing as the swarm’s attention was snatched to fight over the paltry gifts given to them by their overlord and his minions. Chants for the mighty Hutt Crime Boss echoed through the darkened alleys and slums, some metallic and monotone mixed into the crowds, others projected by speakers to make the crowd seem louder and more elated.

Inside red silken curtains hung from the windows, polished brass and gold floor paneling shone from the lanterns and glowlamps throughout the brightly lit corridors. fountains of bubbling alcohol drizzled across smooth rocks, and guards stood in ornate armor, wielding long ceremonial pikes at every entrance from the main corridors. The throne room at the end of the main hall was abuzz with activity, droids and slaves setting long tables to the sides of the chamber while the center was prepared so that guests could come and show their appreciation to the Hutt gangster directly.

​

Laira sat in the palace, tugging on the leather collar around her throat. A week ago the Resistance had gotten word of Kang’s slave operation, a lead on his processing plant somewhere inside his palace. She and Saeza had approached RESINT about assisting the team that would be following up on the lead, but instead Captain Ul had simply stated there would be no investigation. The Resistance didn’t have the resources to free slaves from a Hutt unless it directly weakened the Sith or the Imperials. The redhead hadn’t taken the news well, so she resolved to follow the trail herself, step one: gain access to the palace.

Easiest way to break into a secure facility was to be invited. At least that had been the thought process Laira was banking on when she had decided to join a group of slaves Kang’s henchmen had bought. Now that the collar was on her and she was in an uncomfortable red and gold outfit, she wasn’t so sure about her plan. She wished she had told Leo or Saeza where she was going or what she was planning. <Too late to back out now.> She thought quietly to herself.

Now she sat in an antechamber with about thirty other slaves, twi’leks, togruta, theelins, and humans all arrayed in lavish costumes and slave outfits designed to show off their attractive features. They were positioned that one could pass through the room to survey the opulence of Kang, borrow one of the slaves if they like before entering the great hall where their entrance would be announced for the opening banquet. <At least whoever picked my outfit has good taste,> She leaned against an edge of the sofa watching as the occasional person slithered or walked through, sometimes just to look at the slave girls lounging, others to take one to accompany them for the opening feast. She watched a younger hutt slithered along through her peripheral vision, taking his time viewing each slave, having them twirl and bow, prodding the girls occasionally before moving to the next.

Though she watched, her mind was focused on how she planned on escaping the slave’s quarters in the basement and sneaking off to find the lead she had. All she had was a name: Nomu Xiang Lao, to go off of and even if she found the person, she didn’t know how she was going to break up his processing plant. Laira pulled her focus away from her thoughts when the young hutt slithered over to her, giving him a warm smile as she took his offered hand to stand. “Turn,” he instructed in huttese, waiting for her to comply. She fought making a face at his stench, but managed to keep her smile as she turned slowly so her could look her over. That is until a slimy hand pawed at her arms, squeezing her muscles. “Hmmm,” he mused, instructing her to turn again. As she did he squeezed her bottom, eliciting a yelp from the redhead.

She turned on a dime, rubbing her rump. “Hey! At least buy me something first!” She snapped, narrowing her eyes at the Hutt and yanking her hand away from his. He seemed amused, not with having been talked back to, but with the concept of getting to punish someone. His grubby little hands produced a small stun prod.

"Naughty, Naughty." He mused in his alien tongue.

[member="Cato Fett"]

 

[Cato Fett]

The lesser of Kang the Hutt’s invited notables crowded the vestibule. It was a sight grander than most ‘common’ rooms afforded by more legitimate governments, paved with rugs and woven textiles stained mauve and dirtied tan from decades of loitering footwear, walls panelled in wood grain stained amber, banner-rolls draped from the bare rafters, extolling Kang’s individual might and the power of his given clan in Huttese script that seemed to ooze down the flags. Painted screens rowed the edges of the minor banquet tables, depicting Nar Shaddaa’s broken skylines in thick brush strokes that faded and emboldened the ink in equal turns. Notables, socialites, minor business functionaries and mid-rung recidivists, coupled with assistants, entourages, bodyguards, and a few trains of brow-beaten slaves jostled and crowded about, feasting whilst spying for an opportunity to slip into the next foyer. The palace servants dubbed the vestibule ‘the Bucket’, where all things immaterial and of little consequential value to the Hutt was cast to.

Cato shadowed between small crowds that unconsciously formed out of the invitees. He’d arrived nondescriptly, entering on the tailcoat of a minor ‘warlord’ that’d brought too much security, appearing as another ‘gray-man’ mercenary on retainer to a would-be boss looking to make a first impression. A weighted duffel-bag was strapped over one shoulder, dressed in ordinary street fatigues: tee-shirt, black slacks, sneakers, thin racer’s gloves, and a scuffed leather jacket. Conversation and revelry droned in his ears ‘till he focussed, muting out sounds that muffled environmental audio cues. He turned his eyes over the heads of the vestibule crowds, counted the bodies, taking inventory of the partigoers brazenly armed, watching for the more subtle and circumspect operators tending from their own corners of the tall hall. Dancers in sheer viridian gossamer and lines of platinum belly chains danced in time to electro-beats, cavorting past him at the buffet tables. Cato watched a Kiffar guardsman with a forearm buckler and shortsword eye a stalking Duros fingering his heavy pistol holsters, jangling with a bandolier of fragmentation grenades. A few gave him any heed; a tall Serennoan with a typically and elegantly carved face, sporting vibro-rapier and pistol, eyed him while completing a circuit round the vestibules’ long perimeter. Cato flexed his forearm, felt the long tanto knife sheathed up his jacket sleeve, and watched the latest incomers.

It was past a fortnight since Viola Rosecroft had been slain. Between Last Fang Willie, Rosecroft’s myriad lieutenants tearing her territories apart, reprisals and counter-assassinations and the handful of near-successful attempts at his own life, the festivities in Little Atrisia provided needed cover. There was some protection in the crowds. He’d submerged into the crowded boulevards, getting lost in the celebration, becoming one of a thousand-on-thousand tactical variables that made situational control a nightmare. Eventually, he had navigated up Tai-Tai Main, gravitating toward Kang the Hutt’s palazzo. Gold light filtered out from every doorway and window, with crowds swarming the grand staircases angling up to the immense, pseudo-fortress doors that were unbolted for the partying. He’d been another nodding head slowly meandering into the vestibule, one of a thousand hopeful footpads aiming to rub shoulders and measure egos against the Atrisian Quarters’ most infamous.

Now, Cato observed a mid-rung boss stride in with bodyguards and trophy-mates, swinging the bulk of his ample belly about and boasting a ruby-capped gold-traced cane. He stepped from the ‘beggars’ banquet table by the grand doors, fell into a measured pace just steps behind the last of the boss’ escort. The guardsman watching the portcullis leading into the great house foyer raised no fuss as Cato strode past and out into the raised hall. Sound, scent, heat, and the taste of the wetly humid air wove into a sensorial haze. Cato funnelled his senses, layering over the partying chaos with cool appraisal, distilling threat and the potential of threat into the nearest bodies within a half-dozen metres. What felt like eyes on the back of his skull watched his rear flanks. Just what Cato was watching for he couldn’t say.

Clamours rose across the foyer. The passages leading to the sequestered slave rooms were being wedged open by a team of house staff and borrowed scullions. Cato watched as an adolescent Hutt slowly plied itself into the foyer, snaking one fold at a time over the floor, further house servants mopped and scrubbed off the slime trailing behind the wake of its stubby tale. The fervor wasn’t over his arrival. By his side, leashed by a long chain looped to a padded leather collar, a slave-girl had been brought out as his evening’s plaything. She was a half-head under six feet and only sixty kilos or so, Cato knew, scanning her physicality. Her sun-red hair was tied up with a narrow braid and caped with small, gold-clasped shawls. She’d been dressed in long skirts and a modified halter-top, blacks, reds, golds, colours belonging to imperial livery that accentuated her fairness. The wardrobe left her midriff quite bare, and all the foyers lights battled for a place to shine off the narrow sheen of humid perspire brightening the lithe packs of abdominal muscles. The slave was a regal beauty with all the allure of a Zeltronian dancer, the perfect night’s companion to assuage the Hutt’s already bloated ego.

Cato swallowed the dryness in his mouth. He knew her face. What in hell was [member="Laira Darkhold"] doing in the palace of Kang the Hutt?

 

[Laira Darkhold]

The hutt had been rather careful to zap her through the clothes, so as not to mark her flesh, but the sting to her thigh hurt all the same. Enough that she wasn’t planning on hitting the adolescent slug for his transgression anymore. But she wasn’t planning on going quietly either, acting out came as second nature to the redhead after all.

She tugged on the chain, unable to yank it from the Hutt’s firm grasp as he hauled her out of the antechamber. “Listen, that orange twi’lek was giving you the eyes. I’m sure she’d be a lot,” she pulled again, resisting his command to follow, “less,” the girl bit her lip and adjusted her grip as the Hutt stopped his slow slither to command her, gesturing with the shock prod again. “Trouble.” Stormy silver eyes cast upon the prod and she relented with a pout, falling into stride alongside the young hutt.

In huttese the sluggish creature responded, “Nonsense. Fire is more fun to stamp out. Now, be happy to accompany me, or.” His hand concealed the little device, but she understood the threat all too well. Her pout didn’t immediately fade, but she did put on a little half smile for her own benefit.

“Fine.” She mumbled, causing him to yank on the chain and make her stagger a bit. It was clear he was a sadist of sorts, enjoying breaking the wills of others and training them. She was determined to win in that battle, but at the same time there were more important things for her to see to.

As he entered, a droid announced the Hutt and she began scanning the room, looking to see if she recognized any criminals with bounties out. She could see Kang, an impressively corpulent Hutt sitting on a massive golden hover chair that had to be groaning under the weight on a dias at the end of the chamber. A few Black Sun underbosses sat around, other crime bosses almost always surrounded by armed guards. The redhead thought she spied a few Stormtrooper helmets standing behind one of the guests conversing with a Falleen off to the far wall. “Of course Imperials are here,” she said quietly, yet again being yanked off balance by the Hutt for speaking.

<Ow.> She fingered at the collar thoughtfully, returning her gaze to the crowd.

She could hear the dull roar of a crowd speaking, the Hutt’s voice nearby as he was congratulated for some recent conquest or job he had overseen. Apparently he was a young hutt in the same Clan Kang lead, and held some favor with the elder gangster. Enough so that others lower on the chain wanted to gain some of his. She heard many remarks about how lovely his companion was, enough that her smile became genuine and she started making sure she walked with a sway to her hips and stopped with a pose that drew attention to her bosom and stomach.

Grey eyes skimmed the crowd, only distracted when a waitress slave, a Togruta girl, brought her a pair of drinks. She smiled, handing the hutt his drink which he promptly returned to her. “Taste it.” He ordered. Laira fought not to roll her eyes, but did lift the drink to her lips and swallow a sip from it.

“Ahh,” she said, opening her mouth so that he could see she drank from the glass.

“Last warning. From now on, shocks.” He whispered as he took the glass from her hands.

She turned back away from him, sipping her own drink. She cocked her head to one side, pursing her lips. A young man in a simple leather jacket, black pants, with a duffle bag was eyeing her from a distance. His features were familiar, but she didn’t immediately place them. She continued her purview of the room when her attention was pulled back to the hutt.

“Show my friends how you dance.” He commanded.

“Oh, no honey. Those are for your eyes only.” She said in a coy tone, casting a soft smile at the two weequay he was speaking with. His eyes narrowed, but he didn’t say anything. She felt his hand graze her leg and then the sudden, excruciating spark running up her thigh. Laira stiffened, her body shuddering and teeth gritting. She felt the laughs from the weequay and a few other onlookers as they giggled about her reaction to the shock prod.

It hurt, leaving her leg numb and a few tears welling in her eyes. But that didn’t hurt the most. She’d felt physical pain worse than this. Laira had to staple her own stomach closed before, and then keep fighting. A few shocks weren’t something she’d be writing home about.

It was the humiliation that hurt her the worst. Damaged her pride, just as the compliments a moment ago as soothed her temper and lifted her spirits. Laira was strong willed, but that only meant it was going to be a long night.

The redhead opened her eyes, spying the familiar face once more through the crowds. Finally it placed itself in her mind. Cato Fett.

Maybe his son, or a much younger brother. But the relation was clear now that she recognized it. Any other time she'd have been happy to see a familiar face, but not like this. Not with her bound to a sadistic hutt bent on breaking her and making her dance for all his buddies in a crowded room.

 

[Cato Fett]

Something cold and lancing woke the nerves in Cato’s belly, looking on while the Hutt-adolescent scored Laira’s thigh and hip with arcing stun-baton tendrils. He needn’t even press it to her skin; forked jolts had leapt and grounded themselves to the skin beneath her long, dark skirting. Ugly weals would show before the minute was up. A varied crowd of curious and lecherous onlookers were fanning around the Hutt and his prize. General conversation buzzed loudly about his ‘pet’, at once appreciative of her quite obvious allure, jealous the Hutt had first claim to her company. The men stared, wanting. Women stared too, some wanting, others coloured with varied tints of envy and disdain. He saw the Hutt slowly worm his way forward across the polished amber-cedar flooring, always trailing servant droids sweeping molecular mops after his viscous slime trail. Synth-beats sounded and encouraged more dancing. Kang the Hutt waved amiably from his dias seat at his ‘cousin’, turning to watch the half-naked troupe atop the dias mount cue and move to the music.

He fought rash instinct but was perplexed to his alternatives. He could not leave Laira to idly languish in the Hutt’s company, however he was in the dark toward her mission. For all Cato was aware of, perchance the rebel fighter was just exactly where she intended to be, manipulating the Hutt into maneuvering her through the palace. Or, Cato thought, stepping out of the path of a waiter, just as likely she’d fallen in over her head, now riding out the consequences. He tugged his duffel bag higher over his shoulder and began strolling briskly, keeping to the Hutt’s farthest left peripheral. Against the long wall were dim alcoves; small nooks built for brief, semi-private liaisons. Most were occupied. The bathrooms were each crowded with loiterers and long picket lines of antsy partiers nursing too-full or too-weak bladders. Cato growled, stepping around copses of broad-shouldered, fat-necked blitzball players calling luridly after the Hutt and Laira. He needed quiet, needed darkness, to quickly prepare. Not a nook left for a mouse to slink into, he thought, and if I bother queueing for the bathrooms, I’ll lose them.

Cato reached and swung the duffel bag into his arms, unzipping it partially. He withdrew a handful of sensor-cloth bound articles, unwrapping them while he strode, keeping to where the crowds packed thickest. A longsword. A shortsword. A second knife. Throwing blades that he quickly dug up his jacket sleeves. And a weighted length of steel chain linked to a fighting hand-scythe. The chain he wrapped around one shoulder, securing the short scythe to his backbone through a thin loop of reinforced leather. The blades he pushed into his belting, hilts resting across his stomach, trashing the duffel bag underneath a long banquet table with enough draping table-cloth to hide its discarding. For a time, at least, he thought. Cato pinched a shaken star free, quickening his stride, catching up to where the Hutt idly chatted with a handful of towering Chistori. Laira was near, still fingering the leather choker keeping her leashed to the Hutt’s grip.

Some were taking note of the swordsman suddenly walking armed through the party. The music began reaching a fever pitch, further incited by Kang’s gestures from the dias. A beat. Cato felt the moment pause, gripping the throwing star between his knuckles. Partiers capered by, a few cartwheeling, pulling multicoloured ribbons from their ankles and wrists. Act or hold, he knew, act or hold, but only decide. A beat. Decide, now, bide your time and risk Laira’s safety, or act to stop this humiliation and endanger her work, whatever it may be. A beat. Decide, he told himself. …His arm snapped straight and loosed the shaken star. It spun, its metal dark and catching no light. The star hurled into the metal of the long chain pulling at Laira’s collared throat, neatly severing a couple of the links, keening a cool ring of metal-on-metal that managed to sing just a little louder than the noise. The halved chain lost tautness and clattered to the flooring.

 

[Laira Darkhold]

Laira let her drink fall from her grip, glass smashing to the floor as she fought to regain her composure. The redhead steadied herself, brushing off her skirt and flexing her muscles, hoping the tension helped calm the nerves in her thigh and hip. Her face was still laced with pain, forming a weak smile. She couldn’t see the Fett she had spotted, but it was probably for the best. Maybe her mind was playing tricks on her? It wouldn’t be the first time she thought she had seen him only for it to have just been her imagination and the face she had seen was not the one she remembered. Similar yes, but not the same.

“Sorry.” She apologized to the droid sweeping up the broken glass and its contents. She felt the chain go taunt, the young Hutt pulling on it to get her attention and refocus her on the task he had given her.

She winced, putting weight on her leg, but nodded an acknowledgement. Laira wasn’t sure how good a dancer she was, especially given the circumstances, but she wasn’t willing to get zapped again by the tormentous Hutt. She blushed in embarrassment, not one to mind dancing for an audience, but usually one of her choice and under far better circumstances. She raised her arms over her head, a roll being added to the sway of her hips, eyes closed as she began to dance semi-rhythmically.

There was a beat of her heart. The deep droll of the bass from the music reverberating out through the chamber. A sudden sharp clang close by as metal cut metal. She felt the chain around her neck go limp, some gasps. Her eyes snapped open, the Hutt holding a loose end, the other hanging loosely from her around her midriff.

Around her, most of the guests were pointing, some laughing, a few recoiling as though they’d seen something flash by them. But most were simply confused and failed to react before she could. The redhead didn’t have time to look around for her rescuer, recoiling away from the hutt instinctively. The Force pressed warnings in her head, that was all she received.

Above them, a short, broad-shouldered, beskarclad Mandalorianhttps://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/607980341323366410/628489323720867840/Sedh_Garon.jpg killer leaned over to his boss on the dias. His armor was darkened, bolt-metal pattern making him stick out in the crimson and gold palace. Large explosive bolts hung from one leg, the other bearing more powercells than any one soldier should need. Pale light shone from behind the T-Visor. Eyes were silently fixed on the shadowy figure that had thrown the shaken star, even if the visor wasn’t pointed at Cato. Kang’s attention was taken from the dancers for the short instance while he conversed with his guardian, even as Laira tried to back away from a now enraged Hutt, pressing forward with his stun baton.

She made it three steps before she bumped into a cruel looking Khaleesh held his hand out to the Hutt, “Stop.” He grunted, putting a hand out less to protect Laira so much as himself incase the young Hutt missed with his strike, the clothing he wore and badge of office draped from his shoulders depicting him as the Almighty Kang’s Majordomo. A figure the adolescent Hutt knew better than to argue with in front of the Kajidic’s patriarch.

Atop the dias, the Sehd Garon pointed into the crowds towards Cato.

[member="Cato Fett"]

 

[Cato Fett]

<Oh-ho-ho-ho!> Kang boomed. With some great effort, bulk shifting like liquid in a wineskin, the great Hutt sat forward over the lip of his dais seat and peered past Sedh Garon’s shoulder. The Hutt struck a fat finger down at the lonely man standing alone from the partiers. At Garon’s first gesture, the crowds had swept back, walling Cato off inside a makeshift court. Kang licked a heavy tongue over his greased and folded jowls. <Nothing breaks up the bore and humdrum of celebration like spilt blood. What’s this one, you think?>

“Trash, your excellency.” Sedh Garon’s atonal voice grated through his helmet amplifier. “Just trash.”

<So bring the trash forward, I’d have a look at him,> Kang swung a fat arm and laid back onto his soiled mountain of pillow bolsters. Garon began stalking down the dais’ staircase toward the hall floor, the weapon systems onboard his heavy casement clicking mechanically, power beginning to hum faintly from a belt mounted generator hanging off his belt from behind his waist. Weapons appeared in his gauntlets: combi-pistols, triple-barrel heavy blasters welded with trench-cleavers. Aiming lasers sparked and strobed against the staircase steps, as Garon plodded steadily down.

Commotion broke through the wall of onlookers. The younger Hutt was worming toward Cato as speedily as his bulk allowed, electro-baton waving incensed. He pointed its smoothed, stubbed end between Cato, Laira, Garon, back to the lonesome swordsman standing with immense silence and easy, relaxed calm. Cato’s hands hadn’t moved from his sheathed blades but they’d not flexed or stiffened. His green eyes were fixed on Garon and whirling with strokes of light specks, specks flashing with lightning temerity.

<Oh-ho!> Kang laughed and bellowed, squinting at his irate nephew. <Take some calm, Gragga. I’ll see to it you have a fine phrik leash the next time you take a ‘guest’ out for a showcase.>

<What gives this whoreson the nerve to touch at my playthings??> Gragga’s temper was enough to shake the floorboards. The weight and heft of his pudgy limbs gave him dangerous strength. He waved the baton, stroking the air close to Cato’s cheek, cooking the air into fried ozone that stank like matchstick smoke. <Give him to me, Uncle. I want it out, here and now. Give him to me and I’ll smash him ‘till the human knows his place. Where’s that idiot girl?>

<You can have him, certainly,> Kang said. <First, I’d like my own appraisal. We don’t get many fighters with that kind of bold cheek often. Mercenary,> The Hutt nodded at Garon. <Bring him up.>

<No!> Gragga yelled, voice narrowing in timbre to a shriek. He slammed the baton against the flooring, splintering and cutting through wood and rug. <I’ll have him now!>

<’Now?’> Kang muttered. Massive eyes had narrowed into rheumy, fogged slits. Garon had paused, just a step from the flooring.

“Sir?”

<Tell me, good nephew, who’s court this is,> Kang began, glaring past Garon at the younger cartel boss. <And under whose graces you’ve been allowed your fun. Whose authority has swept aside your transgressions and lapses of good judgement, foregoing punishment in favour of nurturing your better talents. To no good end, I now see. You think by dint of relation that this, any of this, is yours? Yours? List your right, Gragga, I’d love to hear it. Fool. Little tadpole worm still not yet fit to leave his forebearer’s birthing pouch.>

The youth-Hutt fumed, the colour of his rage managing to show against layers of cheek and jowl. He tried raising protest but his uncle bowled him over. <What you enjoy and what you believe you get to keep are my verdicts and mine alone. You do not believe that? Very well. Garon. Send the girl to the human. Nephew, if you try at interfering, the good mercenary here has full authority to… deter… your bad choices.>

While the junior boss balked and flailed, Garon lifted his helm and peered over the floor at Laira. He motioned with a smooth whip of his blaster, toward Cato and his waiting swords. Besides the Hutt’s, there was a second tension beginning to tighten in the guest hall, weaving between Cato and the Mandalorian. Eyes were watching unspoken challenges ghosting between fighters, communicated through slight gestures of posture and mood. In spite of his calm, the muscle in Cato’s jaw kept clenching, a tremor showing in his hands as they gripped and relaxed on his sword hilts. Garon kept playing with the safeties of his pistols, tapping a boot toe. After a beat, Garon nodded at Laira.

“Go to him and wait.” As she haltingly complied, Garon looked back up the dais. “Your excellency.”

<Hmmn?> Kang snapped his focus away from his churlish relation. <What, Garon?>

“This one’s erred too,” He said, now levelling a pistol at Cato’s skull. The audiences gasped then hushed. “Seems he wants the dancer as well. What’s the protocol for that, eh?”

<Ah! Excellent point!> Kang clapped meaty palms together. <You down there! I’d have your name! And why you covet my dancer!>

“…Xhilin, Boss Kang,” Cato said with forced deference, bowing slightly, eyes never leaving Garon or his blasters. “I – “

<Xhilin?> Kang interrupted. <Surely not Old Trashman Xhilin, of the Tinwitch Burrough.>

“Yes, your excellency.”

<Ahhh… You come with some reputation,> Kang said. <You must know good Willie. Good Last Fang Willie. Rumour had been he’d put up a great sum of taels to some fool street fighter if he would only kill his sworn nemesis. It could only be that Old Trashman, I thought, he’s the only killer in those parts worth his salt. I’m glad you’ve joined my… little celebration. Another rumour had it you were dead. Quite dead. Or soon would be. Did you know - > Kang said far too loudly into the hall. <There’s a reprisal bounty on your poor head for some fourteen million? In good silver, no less!>

Cato’s eyes warmed with steely light. “I wasn’t aware, your excellency.”

<So tell me why you interfered between the dancer and my nephew.>

He paused, looked to Laira with a fast, spare glance, back to the odious Hutt leering from his high dais throne. “I wanted her.”

<Ah, because she is so beautiful?> Kang chuckled wetly.

“Just so, your excellency.” Cato nodded. The most superficial answer sometimes appeared as the most honest. And if Cato were honest with himself and the murmurs of his biology, the little curt voice piping up and overlaying with his conscience, Laira Darkhold was achingly beautiful. Claiming ignorance of the fact would be insulting. The guilt of potentially appearing shallow, though, didn’t ease. He felt a new set of eyes staring at his profile.

<So you say, so you say,> Kang went on. <But the mercenary’s right. She is mine, Trashman, and any bold claims against that truth must be punished. However! I am nothing if not magnanimous~ You’d like the dancer for your own? Then you’ll work for her, as hard as you ever have. I’ve an arena, Trashman Xhilin. Arena! You will fight, triumph, and then do what you will with the pretty human. Or you will fight, die and fail, and we’ll celebrate your memory with a grand toast every celebration. What say you to that? You still keep your claim to the woman?>

Cato’s smile held all the warmth of a Midvintir blizzard. “I won’t relinquish her now, your excellency.”

<Ah! Good, good! Guards and you, Garon!> Kang waved furiously. <Provide them with escort! As for the rest of you, my partiers, I announce this: the games are on!>

“Finally,” The Mandalorian’s rasp cut through the cheering din. Garon had trotted up and stood only a handful of paces outside of Cato’s sword reach. Fell white-light glowed behind the dark glass of his helm visor. His speech mode cut to guttural Mando’a. [I’d have guessed you’d put your own head into the beartrap, Fett. Too much to hope you burned up with that little hole-in-the-wall hideaway. Doesn’t matter. I thought maybe we’d have it out. Properly. If whatever the Hutt throws at you in the arena doesn’t put you down, just know I will. You’re all that’s left of Yuna’Sif’s di’kutla band and I’ll put that foul memory to rest. The Mando’ade has no place for… whatever it is she made you into.]

[You will try, Sedh,] Cato murmured. Easy violence swam through his musculature, wanting for action. [I am my mother’s son. I’ve never needed armour to wear the iron on my hide.]

[We’ll see, Fett.]

 

[Laira Darkhold]

Laira stayed pressed against the Khaleesh until he shoved her away, pushing her before Kang the Hutt for her to listen to the exchange. When directed by the Mandalorian killer to stand alongside Cato, she complied, albeit hesitantly. She walked around the young hutt with a wide berth, coming up alongside the unarmored Mandalorian quietly and resting her hands on his shoulder delicately, fingertips grazing against his leather jacket as she listened to the Hutt Crimelord’s verdict being rendered.

She waited, hanging on cautiously as Xhilin and Garon had their exchange. Though she didn’t speak Mando’a often, she understood it well enough. The redhead waited until they had finished before she drew attention back to herself, just grateful not to have a stun baton pressed into her bottom or be chained to a sadistic Hutt for the time being.

[We’ll see Fett.] Garon spat, backing up the dias to stand near Kang once more. His iconic T-Visor stayed fixed on Cato and Laira, but his presence wasn’t at the immediate threat anymore.

“Um, thank you,” Laira said, fumbling over the name she had heard him say, “Xhilin.” Her hands slid across his back, arms pulling him into a short hung of appreciation as she stood behind him. Admittedly, things were now more complicated for them both than they had been a few minutes ago, but the crimson-maned girl was still grateful to be free of Gragga’s torments for the time being.

She wasn’t sure what all he expected from her in return for the rescue, but through the Force she could sense that he wasn’t harboring any malicious thoughts or ill will for her, and lacked the blatantly cruel intentions the Hutt had for her. He felt eerily familiar in the Force, a presence she had known and spent time with in the past, but slightly different from what she remembered. Damaged perhaps? His presence felt too familiar to be an unknown relative, but his appearance was different. Maybe rejuvenation therapy?

Laira’s grey eyes looked him over, smiling warmly at the striking young man. For now, she wanted to keep her questions to herself, interrogate him later when they were alone. Laira could relish in the fact that her new company was a handsome emerald-eyed young man, bearing sharp features, short brown hair on his scalp and stubble on his face, with broad shoulders and taunt muscles and be perfectly content by those improvements over her last companion. His act of heroism on her behalf didn't hurt how she viewed her unknown savior either, though she wasn't one to be wooed by machismo.

As they stood, a pair of Kang’s guards had made their way over to the pair with the Khaleesh Major Domo. The khaleesh spoke quietly, “Accommodations for you have been made in the palace, Master Xhilin. You and your ‘guest’ are invited to enjoy the hospitality of the feast.” He held a mechanical wrist lock in his hands, gesturing towards Laira, “Miss?” He said, holding it open for her to place her wrist inside. Reluctantly, the redhead complied, feeling it lock around her skin tightly when he closed it. The Khaleesh smiled wickedly, “A precaution Master Xhilin. Fail to appear in the arena, take her from the Kang’s realm, cut off her arm, kill her, or vex the Almighty Kang again, and it will detonate enough baradium to turn her to mist.” And anyone close enough to her when it triggered.

Laira smiled sheepishly at her savior, there was little she could do about the situation for the time being. For now she had fallen on the mercy of the Hutts, and they had little to spare for a poor redhead in over her head. “Best not sleep too close together.” She said with a slight giggle, hiding her concern, “I’m famished.”

[member="Cato Fett"]

 

[Cato Fett]

“There’s food at the long tables…” Cato murmured after a long beat, forcibly tearing himself from spying back at Sedh Garon mounted atop the dais. The mercenary was watching after him now at the expense of everything else occurring in the palace gala. Him and the other dozens of hired-on hunter-killers working as bodyguard retainers for night. Hutt Kang had put them on the scent of fourteen million. In silver. Not decicreds or bank notes but solid precious metal. Cato thought Kang was exaggerating the lump sum, if there even was a bounty after him, but the prospect of wealth outside the traditional banking loan-and-debt system was tempting. Through haragei he could now sense a score of separate hungers patrolling through the crowds, each trying to keep just beyond his visual peripherals. The dance sway and overhead light strobe effects aided greatly in obfuscating detail. He pulled the ride of his swords up more across his belt buckle, glancing from Garon to Kang to Gragga to the lines of bodies in the too-large crowds.

“You should eat and then retire,” He said, facing Laira. Recognition kept warming her smile but unsure elements held back her expressions. She peered up at him with some familiarity, perhaps he resembled a ghost from an old, favourite dream. Could she not recognize him? True he felt less rigid and aged then prior, during their first and only RESINT mission, but she must have known his face. Cato started slightly; there’d been fury and sad rage at their parting and it was enough to say she’d slap the whiskers from his face if she ever, ever saw him again. She'd slid to his side during the brief face-off much too easily. No jerk or tension in her body language, no curt greetings, unstressed vocal modulations, at strange ease at his appearance and unbothered by the effect of his presence. Cato's wits reeled; she did not recognize him. He braced for the abrupt fallout, holding Laira by her shoulder.

“…Girl, don’t you know it’s me?” Cato asked.

[member="Laira Darkhold"]

 

[Laira Darkhold]

Laira’s eyes widened, her mouth hung open and dry for a moment. In her chest it felt like her heart had stopped. It was Cato afterall.

Her voice dropped to a nearly inaudible hiss beneath the music, though she managed to reattain her smile, lacking the genuine emotion from before. “Of course I didn’t know it was you!” The redhead’s heart beat once, a slow melody of sorrow. He’d left her last they’d seen one another, alone in a medical bed with a busted leg and crushed feelings. But that had been some time ago, and the crimson-maned rapscallion had thought she had come to terms with that hurt, but seeing him, recognizing him brought it bubbling back up. The beat of her chest returned, with a shrill race, catching in her throat.

She wasn’t mad, or angry, or upset. She was just hurt. Vulnerable now, just like back then. “I’m sorry,” Laira dipped her head, looking at the floor, somber grey pools filled with regret. She hugged him again, drawing him into a proper embrace, holding him tightly. His scent filled her nostrils, his presence, however changed felt familiar and safe like it had all that time ago. Her hands gripped him tightly, feeling the muscles of his back.

“You probably shouldn’t send off your new slave right after risking your life to win her.” She whispered in his ear, her breath against his skin. Laira didn’t know what to say, but she had so many questions that couldn't be asked in a crowded banquet hall. Her empty stomach grumbled, and the redhead released her savior from her grip, peering up at him expectantly. Her heart raced on, unsure of what all had gone through his head.

Was he just a good samaritan? A former colleague returning a favor? Laira fought down those thoughts, suppressing them behind the wall of logic she had built around Cato’s name. He was just a good man helping someone he knew. Nothing more.

A good man with fourteen million in silver on his head, standing on Nar Shaddaa, in a hutt’s palace. He might as well have hung himself. The number of bounty hunters, contract killers, and mercenaries that would love to make their big break on such a bounty in the room alone, not counting the ones that would find out his location shortly, put a small army lurking. All waiting for him to drop his guard.

She flashed a wider smile once again. “Come on, let’s get something to eat, then you can take me to our room and we can talk.” She tugged at his hands, an effort to lead him off to the tables where she could help watch his back.

[member="Cato Fett"]

 

[Cato Fett]

Slowly, gaiety returned, the crowds dispersed, and the palace scene began preoccupying itself with dance, drink, and food. Cato felt himself pulled through and against small gangs of antsy cliques, appraising them with eyes brightened from intoxication and recreational narcotics, the socialites and mobsters hesitant to return to mindless capering when a plot worth tonnage in silver was shouldering past them toward the buffets. Laira’s hands left his to pass over plates and saucers and together, taking turns to watch their close flanks, they piled on entrees. His stomach, lean from days spent on the move and pausing just for meagre handfuls of snacks and cheap vendor water, roiled fitfully at the smell of the beefs and gravy. Cato swallowed the spit pooling behind his teeth and flexed the hidden straps up his left sleeve, wanting for the tanto to be in his grip rather than bread and salad. He crunched through leaf greens, tubers, and chicken, washed it with a chase of mulled wine.

His eyes pierced through the nearer crowds. Two score possible assailants, he saw, weighted with hold-out guns, coat knives, and dead-man grenades, mostly mid-rung flunkies and a scant handful of more monied bosses gauging the effort and trouble of attempting to collect his bounty. Cato discerned another half-dozen unaffiliated mercenaries beginning to pace nearer and nearer the buffet lines. Kang’s heavy laughter rebounded off the high walls and bare ceiling. Garon held his perch near the dais, out of place in his hard plate and long-guns, sweeping the flooring with on-board scanner suites. He looked implacable; a wall of modern casement, weighted with a custom heavy carbine bulging with hardware addons and pistols with enough killing yield to blast easily through even reinforced duranium, hidden behind his dark helm, less a man and more a living symbol of Mandalorian prowess. The armour of the Resol’nare, Cato thought, the armour of contempt.

Laira’s tug woke his attentions and brought his wits back to bear. Their food was finished. He put an arm around her own, his spare hand resting on the pommel cap of his tachi sword, letting her lead on to the private quarters. Eyes in the crowds turned and watched them stride past. Most glances, Cato saw, were reserved just for Laira. He was at best only middling handsome, arm-in-arm with a woman combining the easy lope of a trained fighter with the beauty of a perfect lover. She was no waif, no elvish-thing that was too tall, too long-necked, too immaterial. There was weight to her hips and bust and her arms were strong. He caught glances from her that were likewise assessing him in turn. They ventured to a far bank of turbo-lift doors and took the closest empty cage. The plexiglass doors sighed closed, locked, and the lift sped them up into through the palaces’ reserved guest floors.

“…You’re here for Kang?” Cato asked when the quiet began to ring too loudly. “I… thought I’d find you over Mandalorian space. Been told there’s war there now, with the darjetii and others.”

[member="Laira Darkhold"]

 

[Laira Darkhold]

Laira sauntered through the corridors, Cato’s arm wrapped around her shoulders as they walked away from the banquet chamber towards the palace’s dormitories. The lavish theme flowed through the palace, however now that the pair was away from the vast crowds, the scent of lavender incense now wafted noticeably through the corridors.

Laira could feel a good number of eyes following them, the Force echoing faint warnings in the back of her mind while they walked. There were some with malicious intent directed towards the pair, though none she could detect seemed intent on acting upon it this instant. When the doors closed, they stood in the lift in silence for a moment before Cato reluctantly broke it. “Awww,” She said somewhat sarcastically. “Did ya miss me?” the redhead asked with a roguish grin, though deep down it hurt a little to be so dismissive of any feelings she might still be harboring. She buried it, for now, as best as she could.

“Well, not to ruin a good story, I was over there for a time. Fought with the Silvers at Azure and the Corellians on Kuat not long ago. Oh, I’m a Jedi now!” The redhead grinned politely, scanning his handsome features for a reaction to the news. “New agey though, not as monastic. I don’t have to wear that padawan braid for one.” There were other modern concessions made by the Jedi Remnant as well, but listing them would be boring.

She wrapped an arm around his waist, giving him a short hug. “I’m not really here for Kang. He’s too powerful to take a run at, and if he disappeared there would be a ton of people killed in the vacuum. He’s been taking an interest in the slave trade recently, and I’m just poking around to see if I can make sure the venture is a net loss for him.” Laira pursed her lips, "I wish he had of spent money on me now, but I just kinda snuck into a batch he had bought for the party."

The doors opened with a quiet ping, releasing the pair to a long corridor with small suites on either side of the corridor. A few decraniated servants cleaned here and there, and a pair of gamorrean guards sat in a small common area, drinking and eating leisurely. They looked up only to see who had arrived from the banquet and then returned to their guttural conversation.

“Thank you again for the save.” She whispered, placing her head against his shoulder as they neared the doors to their dormitory. She was gratiful, but one large black cloud hung over her head. “Why’d you do it? Why're you risking your life for me?” Laira asked, looking up at his face with big silver eyes, a quizzical pout on her face, searching him for an answer that wouldn’t bring pain or suffering.

She wasn’t ready to add another name to the inside of her cockpit again.

[member="Cato Fett"]

 

[Cato Fett]

The doors to their chambers slid open automatically at their coming and admitted them inside. Cato slapped the key-panel installed on the inner jamb, latching the auto-doors shut, rapidly keying off the outer motion detectors and activating further emergency bolt mechanisms. The doors seemed to tighten up in their alloy frames, sunken thickly into the jamb. Cato regarded the makeshift ‘gates’, wondering how much the doors could delay determined intruders. No time at all, he decided. A half-wit splicer with a handful of coring data-splints could ravage the protocols governing the door servomotors. Or a demolitionist with packets of mouldable detonation clay. Give a well-cooled autocannon enough ammunition and it would smash the door and attached jamb frames to slag and hot mulch. He undid his jacketing and turned with Laira into the anteroom, ambling further into the suite.

There were bedroom suites installed either side of a long, low common room doored off from the kitchen. Walls were cedar panelled, light emerging from delicate paper lanterns and wood candelabra, lavishly furnished in spite of the low tables, short chairs and seats, propped with reclining sedans bolstered high with pillows and silk blankets, with painted rice-paper screens daubed and soaked equally in paint strokes of colour and jet ink. It was modified Atrisian decorum. To Cato, it tasted of faux exoticism but the esthetic was still somewhat pleasing. Some piece of his conscience was grateful for the addition of separate bedrooms. Another was agonized.

“…Because I must,” He said finally, pulling his scabbards free and laying his blades over the back of a chair seat. “I had to. Was compelled to. I can’t explain the reasoning or justification behind it but… The decision was undeniable and if I hadn’t…”

Cato tried swallowing the dryness down his throat, feeling fat-tongued and inarticulate. Her silver eyes brooked little denial and seemed to damn him where he stood rooted. He functioned perfectly fighting. Here, his abilities with haragei waned dismally. Cato searched inwardly for a telling thread to follow. He reached and took Laira’s hand in his own, peering over the smoothed skin of knuckles, trying to anchor to a detail that would hold his thought process in place. Her flesh was velveteen and very, very warm. “…You made the choice for me, Laira. I saw you and felt compelled. That is all I know.”

[member="Laira Darkhold"]

 

[Laira Darkhold]

The redhead took in the suite, looking it over while Cato saw to barricading the door closed. Part of her sank at the concept of separation, but mostly she was glad at the concept of a room to herself. She’d been suffering from night terrors off and on for some time, and the privacy of her own bed might keep her from disturbing him, or him from noticing how weak she had become.

How much things had changed for her. She might be a Jedi, but Laira felt she was a terrible example of the heroes she had idolized growing up.

Laira smiled warmly at the Mandalorian, “Well, I’m grateful sweetie.” She wanted to hug him again, to feel safe in someone’s arms for once but fought off the urge. He was a professional after all, having endangered whatever mission he was on for her. Putting more on him wouldn't be fair. She wanted to tell him to run away, to find somewhere safe to go, but the girl felt as though she knew him well enough to know he wouldn’t do that. He was heroic, in his own way. “I hope its not because you feel guilty for ditching me in that hospital.” The redhead blinked softly, keeping a tear from welling in her eye. “I want you to know I understand why you did now. I’m sorry I made it, uncomfortable, for you.”

Instead she released him and lounged on a sofa chair in the common room, gazing up at him with silver eyes, a hint of sorrow mixed with concern in her features. “I like what you’ve been doing with,” Her hand made a circular gesture that encompassed the entirety of his frame. “I mean, you were dashing before, but now,” her eyebrows waggled devilishly, “Let’s just say I hope this new hotness is permanent.”

"What are you here for? Anyway I can help, or have I done enough?"

[member="Cato Fett"]

 

[Cato Fett]

“Initially? Only training,” Cato said. He paced to the suite windows, thin plexiglass framed in smoothed Kashyyyk woods and curtained with overlays fabricated to resemble washi paper. He peeled it away, enough to look out across the Atrisian Quarter’s smog darkened urban expanse, reigned over by hab-block towers spiked high with further comm-lattices and dish-antennae. The light was blacking out, and acid rain scented acridly on the night’s thin breeze. Cato replaced the paper, stepping back into the common room, glancing at Laira while she reclined. Something in her easy pose hitched her dancer’s costume closer to her skin, the skirts draping down the sleek muscle and curve of her long legs. He swallowed soundlessly, unused to her femininity, the obvious beauty to her form.

“I hid…” Cato’s brow wrinkled as Laira shifted across the sedan. “I hid as a street cleaner. That’s ‘Xhilin’, the ‘Trashman.’ It made me invisible to most, no one would bother a man with a broom and cart trying to clean down the long canyon-avenues. Save for footpads and hoods. They made for good practice. It… allowed me to learn. I had to see just how far the Resol’nare could reach. If it was practical, applicable, for those of us living by the street side.”

He paused, reaching up his sleeve and undoing the buckles keeping the secreted longknife strapped to his forearm. “Then I was hired for a killing. Viola Rosecroft, do you know her? She held court from the Golden Nautolan. It was… a very rushed, very botched mission. No time to prepare, everything improvised and ad-hoc, fighting from moment to moment. Somehow, I succeeded. Rosecroft, her heir-apparent too, are dead. Supposedly, I’m fourteen taels of silver richer, though I don’t know how I’ll make use of any of it. Then I was ambushed at home afterward and everything I had was burnt up. …Save for what I carry,” Cato said, nodding to his seated blades. He reached and took hold of the longsword’s smoothed iron cap, pulling and drawing an inch of bare steel free.

“That was Sedh Garon’s doing, I’m sure of it. I learned soon after someone pushed a price down on my head. Might be unrelated, may be retaliation now that Rosecroft’s gone. Been running blind through the streets ever since, haven’t slowed down. …Until this eve. Until I almost tripped over you and saw you getting lead around by a leash.”

Something in Cato’s green stare quickened watching Laira gently breathing as she sat back across the long sedan. “Suddenly I had a chance to make up for things. The hospital. So I acted without thought. Like zanshin, thought no-thought. It made sense. Like a killing counterstroke in a fight, it was the only path to take in the moment. …Maybe it was that I’d never seen you dressed like that before and I’ll be damned watching a Hutt walk you away out of sight.”

[member="Laira Darkhold"]

 

[Laira Darkhold]

Laira listened to Cato, stretching out while he explained his purpose on Nar Shaddaa and a brief history of his time there. He did expertly avoid answering whether or not he had missed her, something the sultry redhead noticed. She reminded herself that though she was being coy and coquettish, he was still very much the emotionless professional. That she had fabricated any feelings or belief that they had mutual chemistry in her own mind. Laira and Cato made a good team and nothing more, no matter how badly she could have used, could still use, more.

The Jedi mused quietly, pouting her lips when he mentioned the destruction of his property and belongings. “I’m sorry, hun.” She uttered, letting silver eyes search his features for signs. Assuming she could read truths from fictions he presented.

Laira grinned, shifting her position on the loveseat to kick her feet off the floor. “I do make this look good. Oh, how jealous I must made all the other slaves getting to leave with a ravishing mandalorian hero holding my chain. My own savior, rescuing me as always. One day I'll have to repay him like all the other damsel's repay their own knights.” The girl purred in her throat playfully.

Her expression turned somewhat dour near the end of her playing. There was too much at stake to flirt with him like old times, he needed to focus on surviving. “You don’t owe me for the hospital.” The redhead said sternly. “That was my mistake. I thought that what I had been feeling, the closeness from our mission, that maybe you had felt it too. I was a silly girl, none of that was your fault.” She bit her lip, fighting back a hint of sorrow from her tone. Seeing him again, having left so much unsaid and without closure, it was harder than she wanted it to be to come to terms with.

Laira smiled, shyly avoiding eye contact with the Mandalorian before her, cheeks flushed with redness from embarrassment. “I had dreamed of running away with you. That we just never stopped living our covers’ lives and stayed together. I know its stupid, I just, thought you might get a kick out of it. That you were so convincing even I was fooled into believing maybe we could be in love with each other.”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to make that sound like you did anything wrong.”

[member="Cato Fett"]

 

[Cato Fett]

“You were…” Cato bit his tongue and paused, forced his face aside, stalked to the doors of the suite’s shuttered balcony and stood facing the long blinds. Laira’s eyes were on him, watching his thoughts wrack the muscle and bone of his shoulders. He chanced a brief look over his shoulder, grimacing. Any one of a thousand things could happen if he misspoke. Haragei was no help, zanshin had fled him, leaving Cato with just a simmering well in his belly where there should have been cool tranquility.

“You were not silly,” Cato said finally. He exhaled, peering down at his boots, peering at nothing. “You… had the cleanest eyes I’d ever seen. It was hard looking back whenever you stared. Didn’t understand it at first but I worried at what you’d see if you looked too closely. What you would find. I made justifications about leaving you in that room but I won’t lie saying I haven’t regretted not waiting a few moments longer. …If I’d held your hand, girl, even to comfort your pain, there’s a doubt in me that I’d have had the power to leg go.

“…You don’t know what you do to men,” He said and turned, eyes hooded but sharp with colour. His demeanour was like a sheathed sword, dangerous, lethal, but on the strictest leash. A new energy thrummed over him and beat throughout his frame. “…I’ve dreamed too.”

[member="Laira Darkhold"]

 

[Laira Darkhold]

Laira squinted her shining silver eyes at the Mandalorian at the blinds, searching him, her gaze investigating him intensely. He was suggesting something, but not reaching for it or meeting it head on. Cato was reluctant for some reason and the redhead was no longer certain of her beliefs. <Remember how I hurt last time I let myself be vulnerable? Elpsis, Cato. Both of them have hurt to let go of those dreams, don’t be so quick to dig them back up.>

The dancer, lounging on the sedan, simply remained silent. His words intrigued her enough that she shifted on the sofa, shuffling so that she sat on her knees comfortably sitting up where she could see him. She knew what she did to most men, but their feelings were always far less genuine and far more physical in nature. Nothing like what she had been talking about. As much as her gaze interrogated his every movement, every inch or twitch of his body, her mind searched her own feelings.

What did she want him to say?

What did she want from him?

“Cato, that part of me that wanted to love you is still there. I’ve buried it, I’ve pushed it down and kept it hidden because I didn't think you could feel that way for me. But it is still there, waiting, on something to stir the cinders.” Her eyes watered and cheeks flushed. She brushed the hair out of her face and dug deep in her heart. “But mostly, I just don’t want you to die tomorrow. If you can’t promise me that you won’t, don’t tell me anything. Just run.” A tear rolled down her cheek. “I’d rather set this bomb off tonight and turn to dust than have you die for me.”

<Sometimes like now, I wish I had died on Tephrike. Maybe then I could stop hurting people I care about.>


“But if you can promise me, you’d best look me in the eyes and say if you want me or not. Yes or no.” Laira finally said in a commanding tone. She wasn’t about to open up or chance anything with her own heart unless she had it confirmed.


[member="Cato Fett"]

 

[Cato Fett]

“…Stand up.”

When Laira was to her feet, he moved. From the blinds across the common room to a bank of interior panels controlling the suites atmosphere. He pulled a dial and the lights dimmed out, pulling shadow out of the far corners, slipping and shifting the room’s palettes to the cool dyes of night. He strode without his footfalls sounding, stepping round behind her, silent but for a sense of presence that goose-pimpled her skin and raised the hairs on the nape of her neck. Cato stepped closer and scented the salt in the dew hanging in her eyes still. His touch gave her body a start, as his arm reached across her shoulder, carefully thumbing away the bright tear-wells caught in her lids. The other hand touched her jaw gently and guided her face round until they were gazing eye-to-eye.

His touch dropped. Fingers like steel grazed her midriff and stopped, holding flat to the palm, heat meeting heat as Cato held her. Like the oily smog drifting opaquely past the shaded windows, memory swirled about them, drawing up remembrances of long night’s spent idling in their hotel chambers. Chatting, playing, doing nothing at all but listening to glass-crickets sing outside in the low green hills beyond and the low splashes of the hotel pool lapping at the tiles whenever the breeze caught the water. Nar Shaddaa winds chose the moment to rattle and brace against the thin shutters. Creaks groaned in the cedar rafters. Most sensation was hidden by the slight tremor in his touch, remembering the long toil attempting to keep their undercover act strictly that. A bar of silver light gleaned from the outside stars shone down and turned Laira’s red mane into a weave of ruby strands. Cato’s breath caught, as the starlight glowed in her eyes and made the skin of her face ageless.

“I want you,” He murmured hoarsely, cupping her neck. His thumb pressed delicately onto her carotid, wanting to feel the rhythm and deep timbre of her pulse. Scent of rose-flame, arid, with the spice and heat of summertime. “Yes, I do…”

[member="Laira Darkhold"]

 

[Laira Darkhold]

Laira stood when instructed, feeling him in the Force. She searched every aspect of the Mandalorian she had once known for any sense of his intentions, his will, his desires while he moved about the room. His hands touched her skin, wiping away her tears.

<Is that what I want him to say?>

Light glinted through the blinds from the millions of speeders and windows that made up Nar Shaddaa. Wind rattled the shutters outside on the balcony. Silver eyes peered into the emerald lipid pools that opened to his soul. Laira could feel his presence, his feelings leaking out from behind a veil that he held tight everywhere else.

<What about Leo?>

Her only guilt was that she did have feelings for another. One that had helped and supported her for so long and asked nothing in return. But, the cinders in her heart were stirred, a soft breath upon them reheating old ashes.

<What about me? I’m broken, hurting. I’m horrible. I can’t be what he needs me to be.>

He cupped her neck in his hands, she felt a shiver run down her spine and throughout her body. Something glowed within her chest. She could smell him, a familiar musk that radiated calm. Safety. It mixed with a chemical scent, cleaning supplies, oils, grease. All the smells of Nar Shaddaa. It filled Laira's nostrils, the comfort she had once felt with him bubbling back up. His presence in the Force couldn't tell a lie.

“I want you. Yes, I do...” he said, the low timber of his voice tickling her ears. Her eyes closed, another tear dripping from her face.

No hesitation.

She pulled him in and kissed him deeply, her tongue fighting past his teeth, wrapping itself around his own and filling his mouth. The stud in the center of her own tongue flitted around behind the ivory of his mouth, tapping against them as he breathed life back into the fires of her heart. He was more than she deserved, and it would be difficult, and they would have to compromise. But just maybe.

Just maybe.

It felt like days could have passed when she finally retracted from him, ever so reluctantly to give him a centimeter of space. His breath was warm and wet upon her lips, Laira's voice barely a whisper when she finally spoke. “That means if you die, I’m gonna find you in the netherworld and kick your shebs when I come to drag you out.” The redhead grinned, a genuine smile with no hidden feelings or depression for the first time since Tephrike.

"I'm tired, and I'm sure you are too. I'm not ready for..." Laira stumbled over her words, blushing with embarrassment. She hid her face for a moment, pressing her face to his chest with a grin. "I mean, let's stick to making out for now, but let's pick a bed, get changed, and do that until we fall asleep. I might need your shirt to sleep in though. They didn't exactly give me pjs to change in to."

[member="Cato Fett"]

 

[Cato Fett]

Cato smiled wryly, bemused at her shyness. Did ‘I want you’ come with unspoken prerequisites or had the rules of intimacy changed significantly since he’d last courted? Granted, his first romance was a memory so dim it was virtually opaque from age and neglectful remembrance. Perhaps it had been what all initial encounters were: awkward, struggling, earnest, more practice than anything. He caught her about her waist, tugged her along to the east bedroom suite, padding together over the tatami floor mats.

Inside, the air was a degree crisper and the circle-windows already shuttered and the paper blinds pulled and statically glued to the glass. The bed was wholly occidental with a luxuriously plush mattress mounted to a legged bedspring. The sheets were silk, interwoven with such a fine thread count they shimmered in the half-light. Ink paintings, framed in kitsch synth-bamboo, were Atrisian reproductions of sweeping river-valley vistas and the playtime of paradisal birds. A deep closet opened adjacent the bed, beside the ensuite bathroom. Cato turned and closed the suite doors, briefly veiling them in darkness before glowlamps lit automatically. The light was dusky, warm like a Spira sunset, and he saw its colour sweep like fire through Laira’s hair each time her head turned.

Rain washed and broke against the far windows. Every few moments, light from passing speeder headlamps strobed faintly along the walls, repulsor engines mutely revving. Silence as loud as the ring of sirens filled their ears, ‘till Cato was aware of her deep breathing, her heartbeat transmitting like a drum through her skin. He scented her, her taste on the air, and lamented tonight they’d remain celibately shackled. He chuckled regardless as fine humour filled his mood, reaching low and scooping Laira up into his arms. Well so what, he thought, everything has its place and appointed time. Patience. Is that not what the old Tengu sensei taught? You might yet die in your sleep so enjoy what you may in the moment. They fell onto the mattress, bounced once, Cato now pinning Laira against the wide plush bedding and wrinkled sheets. The only element softer than the silk was her skin.

Senses spinning, his hands reached to thread through Laira’s firey mane, flowing into a heavy kiss.

[member="Laira Darkhold"]