Public Finding Life in the Wastes (Mandalore)

[Dani Stellaris]

The swoop pulled up to the vaporator and solar panels. It was one of those days here on Mandalore. Dani was all for getting out and helping people. She was working with a few others, doing the good work that they could, but with Zenitha working on a few other things on Belazura, and really, because she needed fuel for the racer with the Five Sabers event coming up, Dani took some transport gigs.

Just turned out that Mandalore was broken. Badly, it seemed. Though the beskar crew were doing what they could for the world, but there were types who were good at this. With her main ship back at the settlement, Dani and her new pip droidwere checking some of the outlying stations, to help get a read on the water, and the larger stations even had a bit of a purifying set up.

“I know, I know. The world has the Mandalorians, but its not their fault it was destroyed this way. Just… just keep recording what the stations say.” Dani said as she took her helmet off and approached the terminal on the solar panel structure. It was a small one, but she was hoping that it was making enough energy to power the vaporator. With that? Maybe they could see if there was a way to jump start the water out here.

She’d been told by one of the Witches that this part of the planet was at least clear of Sithspawn.

Dani didn’t want to fight, but she did have her blaster rifle with her. If she couldn’t outrun anything.

 

[Zandra Ruus]

Mandalore, what a hellhole! If this was the promised land of the Mandalorians, they needed some serious help. Zandra wasn't at all impressed by the planet. If Drego wanted her to patrol though, she would. The Beskar she was wearing glinted as stood on the ridgeline. As she stood there a swoop rushed by, hauling all kinds of ass. "Damn! The Hell was that about?! Coulda clipped me with that pass!"

Whatever that swoop was doing, the other Mandos would want a pair of eyes on them. Using her jetpack to bound from one stone platform to another, Zandra followed the swoop from behind. If they wanted to, the crew in swoop could lose her easy, thankfully they didn't seem to notice.

Eventually, the swoop stopped, and not a moment to soon. Fuel for these jetpacks wasn't the cheapest thing in the stars. Disregarding the half empty jetpack, the black clad Mando walked through the dust and sand left by the vehicle. Seemed they were people trying to bring relief to the planet, if they wanted to fight the tide, no point in stopping them.

Just what did these guys think bringing water to the wasteland would do? If anything it'd probably just bring more infighting. Still, it was more than most folk did to the less fortunate, Coruscant taught her that.

Whatever, may as well be the olive branch for the Protectors. "Hey! What's all this stuff for? You guys got some kind of water pump set up or something? Anything I can help with?" Zandra didn't think what her more intimidating beskargam would do to the non-warriors of the party of workers.

 

[Dani Stellaris]

Helpful, was what she was hoping to be. It was all she really wanted to do. The girl followed a strict code from the Fallanassi, that she fell off of every so often, but tried. It was why she had the Witches know where she was. She felt she could maybe trust them? They weren’t all bad. Anyway, the ones from the Singing Mountain were nice. What she didn’t really see was the person she almost clipped. The one that came after her shouting.

Her pip droid didn’t notice it until the other Mandalorian was on top of her.

“Huh?” She turned, putting her helmet on the back of her swoop bike and giving the approaching Mandalorian a once over. She had her cloak over her race attire, which at the moment looked more like a mechanic’s coveralls.

“All this? Oh. Been taking a small contract, to help do some research on the area, see if there is still some life in it.” She offered a smile. “They didn’t tell me they had any Mandalorians out here.” Dani sometimes did think all Mandalorians knew one another, or kept tabs.

She’d learn that was not the case.

Zandra Ruus

 

[Zandra Ruus]

"That a fact? Well I just happened to be in the area you were darting around on your bike. This area of the wastes used to have a bit of activity, and I drew the short straw for scouting." Whoever the pretty woman was, she hardly seemed a threat. Not to knock her ability, but she and her team really did seem like civvies out here. Which was good, Zandra had no plans on fighting them today. "Really it sounds like we both have really similar jobs."

The pint-sized but pugnacious Mandalorian crossed her arms while looking at the taller woman. If looks could kill, the littler of the two wouldn't need her weapons. Her dark colored vizor stared a whole through the woman. "Definitely don't look like a raider or a smuggler trying to sneak around. Plus scavs would have picked the power supplies clean in a Coruscanti minute. So I guess you check out Blondie. Fethed if I'm going to get in trouble with my mentor again over civvies."

For as tough as she talked, and as surly as she was, Zandra didn't mind actually meeting people on patrol. It broke up the boredom of more rocks and sand. Not to mention the tall woman had a hell of a ride. Wasn't like the ramshackle swoops and fiery deathtraps that the wilder folk of Mandalore rode. This thing actually looked functional! "Helluva ride you got here! I think pops would kill for one this clean. Yours seems to still have all matching parts!"

Dani Stellaris

 

[Dani Stellaris]

Dani had no care for what people thought of worlds, she was just here to do what her people had done in the Firefist galaxy. Find a way to live in harmony with the world that they had chosen. And if people were choosing this desolate and damaged world? She would do what she could. “What kind of activity was out here?” She looked up from his Pip droid. “I just take what jobs I can get to see if I can bring life into the darker quadrants of the galaxy.” Solarpunk, was what she had been called.

“Smuggler? No, well, only on worlds where there is a clear humanitarian need for such action. Imperials blocking waters and foodstuffs, that sort of thing. And I dont think you’ll get in trouble. Some witch put out a request for help out here. Said she worked with the Protectors?” She wasn’t sure what the politics were out here, but the last thing Dani wanted to do was get someone in trouble on her account.

“I was a racer for a bit. Keeping my swoop and fighter operative and seeming to be one piece is important to me!” Dani laughed. “What do you have out here? Doesn’t MandalArms take care of everyone?”

Zandra Ruus

 

[Zandra Ruus]

“What do you have out here? Doesn’t MandalArms take care of everyone?”

"MandalArms does what it can, keeping the settlements from crumbling into the dirt. Most of us keep to our clans and scavenge what we can. This place used to actually be a hotbed for scavs until the turf wars got too bad. Probably why this thing is offline. As for activity, we gotta make sure some of the wilder clans don't get to uppity. Like I said turf wars are big around here, vode killing vode isn't right." She used the word vode as if she were born into the clans, not being the lost lamb she actually was.

One thing her beskar lacked was any kind of climate control, that she would kill for on days like this. Zandra sat down under what little shade she could find and huffed. It had to at least noon, which meant the sun would be making her armor into an oven. To combat this the Mandalorian removed her helmet, letting her bright green hair down as she did. It felt relieving to get some of the heat off her face at least. Feeling sun on her skin was a good fringe benefit too.

"You said you were a racer? Wizard, I figure that you'd be able to impress some of the clans with that if you're any good. There's a couple of them that keep a fleet of racing rigs just to hear the engines roar. Though, their rustbuckets are prone to blow up if they don't treat them right."

 

[Dani Stellaris]

To be honest, she wasn’t really certain how some of the companies worked out here. She was getting the hang of it that some had more to do than others with their employees and/or citizens. Dani’s homeworld was not one of capitalism, but worked more as a commune between the beings and natural world, while providing what it could, for everyone’s need. And with her folks, she was given a ship.

Not the ship that she had now, but still one just the same.

“It does seem to be a harsh world here.” She looked around. Last time she saw a place like this, it was Belazura which she turned into her own base with Zeni, even that world was growing a bit. But the Mandalorians were a harsh people. Maybe they preferred to keep it that way. Though how this one was speaking… Perhaps it wasn’t as cut and dry.

“Yeah, I race. Swoops, fighters mostly. Sometimes pod racers if there is a sponsor, but those don’t come up all the time.” He fighter was her pride in racing. “Mandalorians race too? Anything organized or…?”

Zandra Ruus