Boneheaded

[Uvrik Bralor]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGRfi6A5LLU

Nar Shaddaa, Slums - Uvrik's Workshop

The bright, brilliant light that reigned supremely over the highest level of the smuggler moon was little more then a faint, distant glimpse deep down in the dirty slums. For more Uvrik's money wasn't enough, the young Givin was already happy that he had a place to live in at all. After the death of his mentor jobs had stopped coming in regularly, and the only thing keeping him from going utterly broke were the repairs he did for the other poor slum dwellers around him. That he had a tendency to buy every slightly interesting looking piece of technology wasn't really helping.

His workshop was little more then a rundown room in a long abandoned mansion that was now in the greedy hands of some Hutt, claiming regular payments for a structure that barely managed to have running water and electricity. Yet, even if it was more then his naivety then anything, Uvrik liked his place and he had spared no effort to make it look like the home of a Mandalorian. At least how he imagined one to look like.

The wall behind his workbench was painted with a oddly deformed and amateurish version of Mandalorian insignia in a bright red, and a ragged banner Karn had given him before his death was hanging in front of his bed, which was slightly to small for the oddly shaped, sekelton-esk alien in his worn, withered clothes. On the workbench itself rested countless pieces of technology, but they clearly didn't got the same treatment as the heart of his room.

In the very center of the room stood a figure, shrouded in what Uvrik called his beskar'gam. That besides the chestplate and the helmet no part of the armor had any resemblance to an actual beskar'gam hadn't really occurred to Uvrik's mind, as the only real one he had ever seen had been that of Karn, who had lost more then half of it over the course of time.

Like almost always Uvrik was spending his time with his favorite hobby, tinkering away at the armor to prefect it with the same dedication his race commonly had for math and spaceships. He might didn't wanted to be like the other Givin, but he still inherited their perfectionism when it came to crafts and technology, even if he was totally oblivious to it.

[member="Kilum Bralor"]

 

[Kilum Bralor]

Kilum Bralor ​

Location: Nar Shaddaa​

Interacting with: [member="Uvrik Bralor"]​

​

He supposed this was what people called 'personal hunts'. He'd only ever had one. The longest he'd ever done, and it hadn't worked out. He was planning on making sure that was different here. As Kilum descended further into the slums of the Smuggler's Moon, he bumped shoulders with an angry-looking Klatooinian, who gave him a snarl that quickly faded away when the Mandalorian began staring back at him.

That was common amongst gangsters here. All talk, no spine. Very few of them had the nerve to follow up on any of their posturing, except most of the Hutts. They usually paid well, at that. It was part of the reason he had planned to set up somewhere more...permanent in this area of space, but he'd need numbers before he even considered that. It would be a bit of an undertaking, though it wasn't like he didn't have the credits.

He had to refocus on why he was here, though. Some kind of copycat, or something. That was irritating; Fett had only made the Mandalorian 'look' more popular for Hunters thanks to his popularity, and his work on Vero hadn't gone unnoticed. That, and he doubted his work for Abyss was completely secret. These things always tended to get out, and some people just wanted a name for the sake of the recognition. They didn't care what it meant.

Kilum had beaten a few people already to find where he wanted, and he was pretty sure he'd found the place. Looked less like anyone's apartment, more like some kind of run-down speeder garage from the outside. He could believe that kind of abode for a low-rent, low-quality hunter, though. The Hunter raised his fist, knocking a few times powerfully on the door. He spoke loudly, enough to try and make sure whoever was inside could hear him.

"Uvrik!"

 

[Uvrik Bralor]

Karn always had reasonable doubts if Uvrik was qualified to be a Mandalorian, but for all his many shortcomings the alien was no complete fool. While many of the old, paranoid cynics teachings never found their way in his head, he still managed to pass on that it was a fairly bad idea to open up a door in a place like this when someone unknown was loudly shouting and knocking.

When the noise reached his ears, the Givin quickly took position. His right had already grabbed the small handgun from his workbench, and his body had taken cover right besides the door to avoid being shoot through it.

"Who's there?"

His hand clinched tightly to the weapon, but it was fairly obvious that he wasn't very skilled in using it. The gun was formed to suit humans and similar lifeforms, and in the long fingers of the alien it looked undersized and quite a bit awkward.

Lucky for him the wall and door kept him hidden for now, and so all that reached the other side was his deep, almost guttural voice that sounded far more dangerous and threatening then he actually was. It was similar to the appearance of his race, a stark contrast to the calm and logical nature of their minds. Trying to stay silent otherwise, the alien's left motioned towards the center of the room to quietly reach for his helmet.

His efforts were rewarded by a sudden bang, as the helmet made its way to the ground, bounced back into the air once and then rolled into the other corner of the room. The sound was followed by a barley suppressed sigh of frustration.

[member="Kilum Bralor"]

 

[Kilum Bralor]

Kilum Bralor ​

Location: Nar Shaddaa​

Interacting with: [member="Uvrik Bralor"]​

​

Voice didn't sound like some rinky-dink kid who had a big gun and a big ego. That however, didn't mean a damn thing. Hutts had some of the deepest voices this end of the galaxy, and half of those slugs were so cowardly they'd rather have a Rodian go halfway across the galaxy to shoot someone in the back than ever have to deal with a contractor face-to-face. Kilum's thoughts stopped as he paused on that. Hm. Supposed he was still a bit sore about that.

"Kilum Bralor. If I wanted to hurt you, I wouldn't have knocked. Open up." It was a very frank answer, but a true one. He didn't intend any physical harm; at least, not right now. Maybe intimidation, but that was probably where it'd stop. If anything else escalated, it'd be because of the other guy, not him. That was how he saw things, anyway. Maybe he'd look at it differently in hindsight.

The clattering and the echoes of the frustrated sigh almost made the hybrid scoff. It wasn't as strong as having to say, hold back a laugh, but the thought was there. There was something kind of funny about it. Reminded him of the early days. He did used to live in something akin to this - a tiny apartment where he worked from back when he was first doing the security gig. That hadn't worked out.

He tried not to think too hard about back then. It only brought back memories he didn't like to think about. It made this street feel very cold and alone, all of a sudden. "I'm not gonna stand here all day." He hadn't exactly given the mystery man much time, though. Uvrik, or whatever. He'd tried to figure out where the name was from, but he wasn't getting much. Wasn't a core worlds name, and he hadn't met many Outer Rim kids named that. Figured it must be species-specific.

He'd find out soon enough.

​

 

[Uvrik Bralor]

[member="Kilum Bralor"]. Kilum Bralor. Uvrik couldn't believe his ears as he heard the name. For years he had dreamed that Karn's old comrades would one day find him and take him with them, give him the home he had been searching for so long. He knew that it was little more than the product of his imagination, but that dream had given him hope after his mentor begun his journey into the afterlife.

Kilum of course wasn't one of Karn's friends, at least not as far as Uvrik knew. The veteran had talked about the bounty hunter once or twice and said that his work brought honor to his clan, but nothing that indicated that their connection was more then a shared name, most likely because Karn had turned his back on the Mandalorians as a group roughly two decades ago.

When the young Givin opened the door, the hunter would be meet by an odd sight. The faces of his race weren't good a conveying a feeling, and while another might would've seen the happiness in the wide, strange holes and the deformed mouth, it simply looked like a gruesome mask someone wore to scare others. The same went for his voice, the slight raise in pitch to subtle to be really noticeable. In his right still waited the weapon, not because he thought he would need it but because he had stopped thinking about it or anything else when heard the name in his excitement.

"Hel.."

Before he could finish, his mind remembered something else, once he was finished staring at Kilum's beskar'gam with honest enthusiasm for more then a moment to long. Hectically the alien began to search his workbench, until he found a piece of paper full of scribbled notes. What followed was only inches away from a honest insult to the language of the clans, with a pronunciation that clearly indicated that he had never spoke it before.

"Olarom."

 

[Kilum Bralor]

Kilum Bralor ​

Location: Nar Shaddaa​

Interacting with: [member="Uvrik Bralor"]​

​

A Givin, huh?

Bralor had been around the galaxy enough times to see some of the weird and wonderful species that it had to offer. You saw all sorts of weird ones at different spaceports, so he wasn't too shocked. Pantorans, Chiss...even a couple Saorsa here and there. He could use a couple of them on Ganath, for the heavy lifting if nothing else. Kilum came out of musing to realize that the kid in front of him, or at least he seemed like a kid, was just staring. At what?

Uvrik had already rushed back to his bench by the time Bralor wondered why he was still holding a blaster. The Mandalorian stepped in after him, closing the door behind him. No need to make all of this a public affair, after all. He was just more curious than anything now, because he knew the kind of Hunter who used a name for recognition points, and this...wasn't that type.

Kilum blinked in confusion for a moment beneath his helmet as he heard a word spoken that he honestly didn't hear much nowadays. Most of his people stuck to basic, except for more formal or ceremonial occasions. At least, back on Mandalore that was how it worked, as far as he was aware. He stepped forward again, his arms now crossed as he stared back at the Givin, his eyes only darting around the 'apartment' for a moment. "Your pronounciation's off."

He made his inspection of the room more obvious, and more thorough at that, scanning the living space. It was at that point that he spied what he thought looked like some unusual design of a Mandalorian's helmet, just...lying in a corner. "Came because I heard that there was someone walking around using my clan's name." The hunter's gaze went back to Uvrik, now staring right at him through the visor.

"Wouldn't be you, would it?"

​

 

[Uvrik Bralor]

"I can explain that."

Almost Uvrik would've said "It's not what it looks like", but he clearly remembered a mission where he and Karn were hired to investigate a series of murders inside a crime family, and ended up almost catching the killer in the act. It took an impressive amount of mental gymnastics by his mentor to explain why they were in the same room then the family head's wife, after Uvrik made the mistake of using the offical code for "it's exactly what it looks like."

He might said he could explain, but there was a long pause afterwards as he collected his thoughts. Talking about emotions wasn't really one of his strengths, or that of any Givin, but it was an entirely emotional topic he had to explain to [member="Kilum Bralor"]. Slowly the oddly shaped alien walked to the armor in the center of the room, his left tapping against the beskar chestpiece that didn't really fitted in with the rest of the suit.

"This belonged to him."

Uvrik didn't really noticed that his words explained very little, not to speak about his use of the name Bralor. Showing of a part of a real Beskar'gam to an angered Mandalorian was probably not the smartest move, but he to him it was the only way he could express his feelings in any meaningful way. The pitch of his voice had lowered again, and while it was still hard to make out there was a noticeable hint of sadness in it. The same went for his face, the shift subtle but there to be seen.

"I just want him to be proud."

 

[Kilum Bralor]

Kilum Bralor ​

Location: Nar Shaddaa​

Interacting with: [member="Uvrik Bralor"]​

​

Kilum simply watched as the Givin moved around and spoke; even though to most it seemed like he spoke very little, to Kilum he had said a whole lot more. There was more that he was saying in the way he moved, how he reacted to questions, the motions he made when it came to the armour. The Hunter stared at the Beskar'garm, wondering who it had belonged to. There were a lot of Mandalorians operating in Hutt Space, but one from his clan...must have been pretty good at laying low.

He moved off to the side, scooping up the helmet from the floor nearby. Stepping over to the Givin, he held it out and then pushed it into the younger man's hands. "Doesn't belong to him anymore, if he isn't here." Maybe he was only making assumptions, but it seemed pretty obvious what had happened. He didn't know if it was a premature end, or if age just got whoever this kid looked up to. Probably wasn't even that much of a kid, just seemed that way to him.

"You want to be a Mandalorian, Uvrik?" His gaze stayed fixed on the Givin. It seemed an odd question so soon into the conversation, at least it would be to most. To him though, he knew enough to poke the younger man's brains. After all, he would always need more bodies on Ganath, and...he seemed like a smart kid, in some ways. Their people needed rebuilding.

 

[Uvrik Bralor]

The alien looked down at the helmet, as his long fingers wrapped around the piece of armor. Its design, a skull badly painted onto it, was another reminder of the man he had lost, who often had jokingly called Uvrik to be a bonehead. From there he lifted his gaze, his strange eyes fixed onto the similar shaped helmet upon the head of [member="Kilum Bralor"].

"Yes."

Despite the fact that Uvrik's eyes were nothing more then black holes in his face, it was like there was something glowing in them as he answered the Mandalorian. Since Karn taught him about his culture he had wanted nothing more then to experience this kind of fellowship that his mentor had explained to him. Family without blood and heritage, the sense of belonging beyond the narrow ideas of his real family. When he died Uvrik had thought that his chance to ever experience it was gone forever, but now it was here in the shape of a heavily armored bounty hunter.

"More than anything."

While his voice was still hard to read, it was fairly obvious that he was sincere. He wasn't stupid, but the finer arts of social interaction simply escaped is mind. There was no way that he would smooth talk himself into the favor of Clan Bralor, or into anything for that matter. All he could do was to tell the truth, uncut and unaltered like the child so many had seen in him before.