Friends in Low Places

[Alaric Marãll]

“How you doin’ there, Mynock?” Alaric asked absent mindedly, intently examining the pieces arrayed on the simple, checkered board before him. He began to reach for one of the black pieces and hesitated just before he touched it. . . . and slowly retraced his hand. In his other, a cigarette burned. He puffed on it. “You’ve got me in a bit of a bind, girl, I’ll admit,” he said scratching his beard and leaning over to get a different perspective on the pieces. Finally, with a sigh, he reached out and moved one of the pieces, eyeing the move suspiciously. “Strategy is easier in real life, just don’t got any blood pumpin’ when there ain’t nobody shooting at ya. The blood is very important, ya know?” He exhaled a practiced ring of smoke before producing another cigarette, lighting the new one on the fading ember of its predecessor. “It’s your turn, Mynock.”

The girl looked up at him from the bag she clutched tightly, centimeters from her face. Her skin was pale and covered in a thin lair of sweat. He nodded at her and she began to say something sarcastic when another bout of heaves hit her. Alaric waited until she was finished and then motioned impatiently at the board sitting on the table between them. “Come on, Old Man,” she complained in a whiney tone. “I don’t want to play.”

“Then why’d you agree to a game, Mynock?” His retort was accentuated by pointing to the board three times.

“I didn’t,” she answered dryly before burying her face back in the bag, she waited for a moment and then sat up a little more, groaning, and moved a loose strand of hair behind her ear. He was still looking at her expectantly. “Just play for me then.” He seemed to consider this for a moment before nodding his acquiescence. He stood from his place and stepped into the aisle to move around the table, joining her on the opposite side of the booth.

“Move over Mynock,” he said gruffly, pushing her with his hip—nearly causing her to vomit again—he leaned over the board, “I need to be able to see.” She rolled her eyes and moved closer to the wall to accommodate him. There was a small round window nearby, it displayed nothing but an infinite expanse of tiny white dots across a canvas of black. She nearly heaved again before turning her eyes back to the board game, just to look anywhere else. “You know, Mynock,” he mumbled as he considered which of ‘her’ pieces to move. “You’re going to have to get over this,” he motioned with his cigarette towards her vomit bag, “thing. Makes for a terrible travel companion.” She thought about retorting but decided against it, closing her eyes and leaning her head back. Everything was out of her stomach now she was pretty sure and in that knowledge she found some small comfort. She waited about half an hour before pushing at the older man who had been moving from seat to seat to play himself.

“Let me out, Old Man.” She said weakly, “I’m going to run to the bathroom, wash my face.”

“Oh yeah,” he responded as he moved out of her way, “gonna ‘wash your face,’ huh?”

“Whatever,” she answered and stepped into the aisle, placing a hand on the seat to stable herself.

They’d been on the Dancing Wind for about half a day, most of it spent in hyperspace before they had suddenly been hurled out when the hyperdrive malfunctioned. There was no question that the Dancing Wave was far from that most luxurious of craft. But it could move a little over a hundred souls, not counting crew, and it the lack of comfortable accommodations translated to an affordable price. They had left most of their money back with the last of the Nova sisters, a trustworthy­—though criminal—woman who could act as an underworld’s banker. Alaric was always put off by the idea of traveling with very much. On her way to the one bathroom that served this area of forty folks, she dared to throw a passing glance out the window. In the near distance, there was a planet looming. From here, it looked lush and green and peaceful. When her stomach was empty, she could almost see the beauty in space travel. Almost.

She emerged from the bathroom a few minutes later after having gurgled water and washed her face. There was a ship just outside the window where before a planet had shined, she furrowed her brow. . . . were they. . . . docked? Why? She started moving back towards her seat near the back when she noticed there were new individuals in the compartment—a group of Trandoshans. Armed Trandoshans.

“Sithspit,” she whispered, she made herself nondescript and shuffled past them, continuing down the aisle. As she did so, she listened carefully and overheard them asking for someone which, from the brief bit she overheard, sounded strikingly like Alaric. She didn’t recognize them, didn’t know what they wanted, but she knew that the Old Man had very few friends and she doubted they meant to give him a thank you basket. She made her way quickly back to Alaric, still puzzling over the best move to make. “Old Man,” she leaned over and whispered conspiratorially in his ear. “Trandoshans.” He continued to look down at the bored, seemingly unphased.

“Scalies,” he asked quietly, “where?”

“About seven or eight seats back.”

“The game was dull anyways.” He smiled.

“How do you want to play this, Old Man?” His only answer came in handing her a blaster. She nodded and prepared herself for his mark. She had learned long ago that simply walking away was not in Alaric’s style. He loved to make noise and he loved to leave his mark. He motioned for her to move across to the empty seats directly across the aisle. She watched him as he produced a rifle, it was his favorite weapon, capable of puncturing even the walls of lightly armored vehicles. It shouldn’t expose the interior cabin to space, but it would have no trouble shredding any body armor the aliens may be wearing. He carefully inspected the weapon, its cartridges needed to be charged in advance and he always kept a few in easy reach. He loaded one of the drums and pumped. The aliens were now just a few rows behind them and he looked over to her, his stormy blue eyes seemed to study her for a moment, and then he nodded.

“Howdy partners,” he shouted, “y’all wouldn’t happen to be lookin’ for me now would ya?” He asked as he stepped suddenly into the aisle and leveled the weapon at the group of aliens. Their eyes went wide with recognition and they went for their own blasters, before they could draw Alaric simply said, “thought so.” And pulled the trigger. The effect was immediate, the kick forcing the weapon up as the repulsers fought to keep the rifle from flying away from him. The group of four aliens were slain in a sudden explosion of blood, knocking their corpses back several meters. The other passengers began to scream and Alaric steadied his weapon, keeping his eyes focused down the aisle the Trandoshans had been moving down. “Don’t nobody panic,” he shouted to the crowd, “ain’t even a robbery. Stay where you are and stay down. If you get out ya seat, I’ll end ya. Let’s move Mynock!”

The pair proceeded cautiously towards the back of the ship, as they went Mynock led the way, forcing civilians out of their way at blaster point, with Alaric forming the rear guard. The airlock was towards the front of the ship and so, as more Trandoshans came, Alaric would fire his powerful weapon and cut them down, taking only the slightest care not to injure innocent passengers. After another firefight, they managed to force their way past the back door marked ‘crew only’ and into the more industrial portion of the vessel where the engine and the escape pods were stored.

“Go,” the girl said to the engineers who expressed a mixture of outrage and terror, she pointed her blaster at them to emphasis the word. “Go, now!” They moved more quickly that time, exiting back to the passengers’ area. “What planet did we pass a few minutes ago?”

“No idea, Mynock,” Alaric answered, not even bothering with the navigation charts. He wasn’t much of a piolet. He was standing over some of the engine’s machinery, staring into it intently. “You know enough about this stuff to make it explode?”

“Of course not,” she answered, moving towards one of the escape pods, “besides, wouldn’t that kill everyone on board?”

“Maybe so, Mynock. Maybe so.” He considered firing randomly into the engine compartments but determined that was unlikely to help their situation, after all, the Trandoshans were coming from a different ship merely docked to the Dancing Wave. A sudden, uncharted jump would do the trick, but he didn’t know enough about the engine to make that happen, and that would certainly kill everyone. He sighed and moved to the escape pods. As the pod door sealed, several of the reptilian men were on the verge of breaching the engine room, but they were too late. The escape pod launched into the cold vacuum of space, aiming for the nearby planet.

The flight was brief and unpleasant, besides being cramped and claustrophobic, the Trandoshans opened fire at the small escape craft shortly after it launched. Fortunately, they were not good shots. Unfortunately, they needn’t be. The pod was slightly struck during the third volley, causing an array of lights and sounds to suddenly spring to life. Alaric did his best to mitigate, flipping switches and pushing buttons mostly at random, but the pod had been sent into a violent hurdle, artificial gravity failing, was venting oxygen rapidly. Worse still, the pod could only somewhat control the speed of their descent. As a result, the vessel streaked through the sky of the remote, jungle world, looking like an all-too-real falling star as it plummeted from the heavens, slamming into trees and colliding with the earth in an immense, violent cacophony, burrowing into the soil and clearing a strip in the jungle.

[member="Niaami Solas"]

 

[Lief]

"Come on Spud, you're takin' too long. Old Gibby'll be back soon..."

With her back against the plastered wall of the local Scribes', just below a slightly ajar window, Niaami had quite the vantage of the surrounding street. It was so dark out that the stars above were bright as could be, and the ground itself was illuminated with just the odd swinging lantern that had yet to be extinguished. Even so she could see decently enough, these streets were her home the way that the building behind her was Gibby's and the lack of light was nothing new to the Rats of Ridge.

Overhead a sur-avka soared, loosing a rather shrill caw that made her jump in surprise. In the seconds which followed, adrenaline coursing through her veins, she could have sworn she saw something in the shadows begin to move. A large black form which peeled away from the alleyway a little more than 5 meters away, and slunk towards her.

"C'mon, this ain't funny. Spud? Spud?"

She could feel her heart pounding, threatening to break out of her chest and flee the way in which her feet seemed unable to. Closer and closer it drew, until finally she turned and clambered up onto the window sill. Her knees tucked up to her chest, feet turned into the crack of the window, yet just before she could drop down into the room beyond the shadow demon finally broke through.

"Nia... What are you still doin' here?"

The young girl blinked, feeling her cheeks begin to burn once realization struck her. Below her stood Spudli Flast, a very round boy of an age with her. His sandy hair was stuck to his head with sweat alone, beady eyes staring up at her in bewilderment.

"I ain't been in Gibby's for ages, didn't you hear me call?"

With a thud and a heavy sigh to boot, Niaami dropped to the floor before him and immediately stomped back the way Spud had come. She didn't say a word to her companion as they hurried away from the scribes' home, and even when they were several streets over and safe she held her tongue. In the light of the closest lantern her face was beet red.

"Say somethin', Ni. Ain't my fault you weren't for listenin'."

"How'd you even get out again? We had a plan, Spudli, and you didn't stick to it, did ya? In the window, out the window, you nitwit. What if Gib'd come back? What then?"

Spudli could only groan, taking a lead and directing her through a broken slat in one of the fences. The yard beyond was overgrown, some might even consider it a jungle were they not surrounded by the literal embodiment of such, and as they walked a few other heads popped up from within the grass.

"He didn't though, did he? Lighten up, will ya? Anyway, don't you wanna know if I got it? Well, do ya?"

The two of them plopped down into the grass, and he began to rummage around under a pile of sticks and rocks. Niaami raised a brow, tapping her hand against one of her flimsy boots with impatience. After what felt like an eternity, though in truth was just a few seconds, he produced a hefty tome. Bound in sur-avka leather, pages made with the pulp of the polyni tree... Nia reached for it, but he pulled it away from her grubby little fingertips almost immediately.

"Not a chance, when's the last time those things saw soap eh? 'sides, not as though you can read it is it?"

Spud then proceeded to flip open the pages, stopping at some random page which had a nice hand drawn picture, and then loudly cleared his throat. By now a group had gathered around them, eager faces staring down at the book. They huddled in as close as possible, which Niaami didn't seem to mind. It helped to stave off some of the chill which descended over Ridge in the evenings anyway.

"Everyone here? I ain't gonna start from the start if someone's late again..."

Then he began, reeling off the story enclosed within the leaves of the book. Whether the words came from the tome, or the boy's imagination, nobody really knew. But nobody cared, either. It was nice to pause for a time, to listen to whatever adventure someone else was having, even if Spudli was pretending to seem important. Even if he could read just as poorly as the rest of them.

He had gotten 5 or so pages in when a flash of light shot across the sky. Much to his dismay, all eyes turned from the storyteller to the stars as they watched it arc its way across the inky abyss. Niaami let out a breath of amazement, and slowly rose to her feet. A shooting star... Didn't see many of those.

"Make a wish, make a wish!" one of the kids called out, his own eyes pressed tightly closed.

All around her lips moved soundlessly as the Rats of Ridge made their wishes, but even without the accompanying words she knew what it was they wanted. They wanted what she wanted, after all.

"I'm gonna go find it," Niaami declared, without warning. Before any of them could stop her, or try to join in, she was back through the broken slat and out into the streets of Ridge. Most of the lanterns had been extinguished by this point, meaning most everyone else was asleep... Good. That meant she could find the wish-giver. Surely her wish would have to come true then...

[member="Alaric Marãll"]

 

[Alaric Marãll]

“We’re falling too fast!”

“Don’t you think I know that Mynock?!”

“Well do something then!”

“What would you like me to—”

The escape pod collided with the world in a sudden explosion of noise and steam, the metal of the small vessel still a dim red from the heat of entry. The earth had been cleared away as the pod burrowed into a small crater, formerly massive trees stood decapitated, marking the shuttle’s trajectory, and one of the large, branched behemoths had been struck so severely it had gave way, collapsing to the side and now stood precariously caught in the branches of its siblings. For some time there was complete stillness, both passengers unconscious and bleeding in the escape pod. And then, the girl woke up.

Her head throbbed violently and she brought one hand to her temple, wincing as she did so. She was injured and she couldn’t immediately recall why. “Old Man,” she whined, trying to make sense of the flashes coming through her head, something about a ship? Her free hand searched the air until it found something which felt sturdy and she pulled herself up. Immediately, her head ached terribly, screaming out against the effort at motion. She gasped and fell backwards. It was only by the sudden explosions of white across the black void that was her vision that she realized her eyes were closed. With a deep sigh, she forced them open, they were so heavy. “Old Man?” She willed her eyes to stay open for a brief moment, all she needed to examine her claustrophobic surroundings. Alaric was beside as well as under her. He was battered. Badly. His face almost unrecognizable with the bruising, swelling, and she was certain his nose was broken. She listened, barely able to make out his ragged breaths over the pounding of her own heart. “Old Man,” she pushed him and he mumbled something, barely stirring. “I think we crashed.” She moaned as she repositioned, getting off of him. She sat up, careful to move more slowly. She reached over and tried to open the door, though it wouldn’t. The earth was blocking them. “The door’s stuck.”

“What?” Alaric answered, obviously confused, “kark, my head.”

“The door,” she responded, slowly, “I think. . . . I think we landed on it. It won’t open.” She pushed weakly on the door to demonstrate her point. Alaric’s eyes narrowed as he examined the situation, his serious expression undercut by his hand placed comically under his crooked nose to stem the bleeding. Then he laughed. “What’s funny?”

“Who designed this piece of junk?” He asked, continuing to chuckle. He reached for a small personal locker where he kept all of his things, only to grunt and let his arm fall limp. “Hand that to me, Mynock,” he said through gritted teeth. “Think my arm’s broken.” She grunted something she hoped sounded sympathetic and reached, bringing the small container of personal possessions to him. He used his left hand to enter the combination on the old-school lockbox and retrieved something very small. He moved with surprising speed given his injuries, tucking the item away in his chest pocket before closing the box again, locking it. “Now, find my rifle.” He leaned back and closed his eyes. When she produced the powerful weapon he mumbled, “go ahead and shoot the wall out. Point blank, nice and smooth.”

“Me?” She said, surprised, “I don’t shoot this one, recoil.”

“My arm’s broken, Mynock. Time for you to learn somethin’ new.” She sighed, he made a good point and her head was still aching. She’d be up for just about anything for some fresh air. Air.

“How do we know there’s any out there? Air, I mean.”

“It don’t matter. There won’t be any in here for much longer. Besides, we know there’s gravity,” he said, gesturing half-heartedly to his bloodied face, “Never been somewhere with atmosphere but without gravity. So, let’s do it.” Alaric was in excruciating pain, but he put on a brave face. He knew the last thing Mynock needed was for him to go and pass out, so he played tough. Still, he could see his field of vision slowly contracting even now. He wasn’t going to be able to stay conscious much longer, and the shooting pain which darted across from his stomach up to his chest every time he moved suggested he may well be injured quite severely. He pushed the pain away with an unsteady exhale, “now shoot the karking wall and get us out of here, Mynock.” She hesitated only a moment and then fired. The volley gun, when fired, threw seven massive slugs simultaneously at the shuttle wall. From this distance, it had no difficulty in piercing the armor, two more shots and Alaric forced himself through gritted teeth to kick at the wall until the shredded barrier gave way. “You go first,” he grunted, nodding at the girl.

“Yeah Old Man,” she answered. After all these years, she saw right through his veneer of toughness. Alaric was hurt. Badly. “You hang back a bit,” she added before crawling out of the now wholly destroyed shuttle. Her head, a perpetual dull throb escalated into a scream as she moved. Stars danced across her vision and her whole body ached. She lost consciousness for the briefest of moments, falling from the shuttle and landing hard on the ruptured earth below. She stirred just over a minute later, disturbed by Alaric shouting at her. “What?” She asked wearily, rolling onto her side. She was still disoriented, the world seemed far away and the noise of the jungle was muffled.

A loud crack exploded, rising above the dull roar of everything else around her and snapping her back to her senses. Alaric hollered, suddenly audible after the preceding roar faded. He was standing, the upper half of his body out of the shuttle, holding the rifle—barely—which he had fired at some unseen adversary.

“How you like that,” Alaric shouted into the darkness, he winced as he raised the rifle again, his right arm shaking as he did so. Fortunately, with a weapon like the volley gun, one didn’t need to aim very well. And Alaric was a veteran, the girl thought. The very pennacle of competence, diligence, martial might, and discipline. . . . “Come on you Sithspit!” Alaric’s shout interrupted her, and he whooped and hollered before shouting into the darkness, “Yippee Ki Ay Motherkarker!” He launched another volley from the weapon, screaming as he did so. His shoulder seemed to tear and he crumbled in the aftershock of the blast, collapsing unconscious back into the shuttle.

“Alaric?” Her voice was soft as she pulled herself up on her hands and knees, before sitting. Her eyes scanned the darkness of the jungle, still unsure who or what he had been shooting at. She began to crawl back towards the shuttle when she heard a rustling in the foliage nearby. Suddenly, a lone alien emerged. The blood seeping from his arm suggested that Alaric had managed to graze him with the last shot. But she knew that, even wounded, Alaric was a dangerous man and an excellent shot. If this man was grazed, it was because Alaric was aiming at someone beside him. She quieted herself and watched as the man limped cautiously towards the escape pod wreckage, a small handheld blaster in his hand as he did so. Her heart pounded in her ears—thump, thump—as she watched him crawl up the side of the shuttle. He’s going to kill Alaric, she realized. Her heart beat faster as she pushed herself up to her feet and moved slowly, stealthily towards the alien who was just now peering down into the shuttle. The reptilian smiled his toothy grin and began to raise his weapon down into the wreckage. “Get away from him!” She shouted, lunging suddenly against him, she could feel her body scream in protest as she moved with such speed, but the adrenaline dulled it enough to make it bearable. She tackled the alien off of the pod and they both went tumbling into the dirt, her shouting and him hissing.

She found herself in a grapple she was not capable of winning. The alien was stronger than she, and larger than she, and also more eager to shed blood than she. She found herself underneath her adversary, her hands struggling with his called claws on her neck. He’s so strong! He was strangling her with only one hand and with the other he reached out to recover his weapon which had fallen by the wayside during the scuffle. She forced her left hand to release the alien’s, ceding him more pressure on her neck to keep the blaster from him. They struggled with it for a moment, she had her hand on the barrel attempting to redirect it away from herself, as they fought the blaster erupted, directly into the alien’s side, eliciting a yelp of pain as the alien fell off of her. She was on him in an instance, bashing at him with the recovered blaster, blood splattering about. Another sound. She whirled about, aching, exhausted, and desperate, scanning the jungle surrounding her, blaster leveled ready to fire. Was that a. . . . human? The thought had only just crossed her mind when the alien jumped up from behind her, reigniting the melee.

[member="Niaami Solas"]

 

[Lief]

Whatever it was that had tumbled from the sky, Niaami felt certain it was most definitely not a star.

The closer she got to the crash site, directed by the carbon streak in the air through the tall canopy and punctuated by the occasional crack of a firefight, the more her stomach twisted up with anxiety. Niaami knew that the sane thing to do would have been to turn around and regroup with the Rats, but she'd told them she was going to do something and she'd never hear the end of it if she came back empty handed, or at the very least without a story. She had a reputation to uphold in these parts.

Besides, all she had to do was get a good look in. Nobody had to even know she was there.

As she tread deeper into the jungle she found the ground became somewhat more boggy, as though all the moisture which had been drawn out of the air during the recent heatwaves they'd been facing had accumulated in this very spot. She almost lost a boot to one particularly sodden patch of dirt and rotten leaves, and even now as she pressed on she could feel it squelching on the inside. That would be a pain to clean.

She knew that she was getting closer when voices drifted into her hearing, as opposed to blaster shots alone. At this point the girl crouched down and peered through the underbrush into an unnatural clearing. The trees in that area had been ripped down, most still rooted though at least one down for the count entirely, and in the heart of the chaos sat a small wreckage. Niaami had seen ships come and go before, but never too close to home. Was this what they looked like up close? Because if so, they were much smaller than they seemed in the sky.

Maybe it was just a part of one. After all, it looked like it'd seen better days.

One step more was taken, to try and better understand what she saw before her - the sight of a reptilian and a girl grappling on the ground - that proved to be her undoing. A branch snapped underfoot, forcing her to back up into the shadows lest she be drawn into the fight.

Nia was used to fist fights, the occasional rock, not real weapons. Her heart pounded as she tried to decide what she ought to do. If she left, nobody would blame her. She was just a kid chasing a star, wrong place at the wrong time... And yet when she peered back into the clearing she saw that the girl was as young as she.

Would she die if Nia walked? Would a distraction aid her efforts? Her mind reeled with a thousand ideas, it wasn't as if she hadn't caused distractions before, heck to survive with the Rats that was an integral skill, but there was a difference between trying not to get caught, and trying not to die...

"Kark it," she mumbled under her breath, as she reached down and began to pick up a couple of rocks embedded in the jungle underbrush. Her aim wasn't the best, but Niaami threw them one by one all the same; she targeted the wreckage itself, hoping that the noise of stone reverberating from metal would spook them enough to stall the fighting. Maybe if she was lucky one would rebound and hit the lizard in its stinking face.

Naturally she knew that she couldn't remain in the same spot, so once the last stone was loosed she pushed on through the edge of the clearing and made her way to the left, keeping her eyes on the crash site. She didn't know why she felt the girl was more deserving of her assistance than the lizard, for all she knew the younger of the two was the dangerous one... Maybe it was because she'd spent years protecting kids her age and younger, perhaps that had simply become ingrained within her.

After all, in her experience it was usually the adults with the darker natures. Kids like she were just fighting to survive.

[member="Alaric Marãll"]

 

[Alaric Marãll]

The girl hadn’t been certain whether she’d spotted someone in the jungle or not and she didn’t have time to wonder. The reptilian had pounced the moment her attention lapsed, and now the struggle resumed. He had not only the advantages of his natural strength and size, but by attacking from behind he had also caught her off guard, she squirmed in his grip, still holding the blaster. With his two arms he had penned hers to her side as he picked her up, her weight meaningless to her, and slammed her down on the earth with such force that the air flew out of her. She grunted and tried to twist around to face him, but it wasn’t that simple. He had put a knee in her back and twisted it, trying to pen her down, a task made difficult by her insistent resistance and his slippery blood still spilling from his wound.

Thinking quickly, the girl jerked her head away from the dirt where the alien was trying to force it and bit down into his arm—hard. The reptile released her and recoiled, snatching his arm away, leaving some scales behind in her teeth. She brought the blaster up but, before she could pull the trigger, he punched her across the face. There was an explosion of colors splattered across her vision suddenly and she fell backwards. The gun! She thought, realizing that she was in no condition to keep it from him. She mustered her strength and threw it off to the other side. She wasn’t certain what she would do if the alien darted to retrieve it, she doubted she could catch him in her condition, but it was better than the certainty of being shot in the next half-second.

The lizard decided he didn’t need the weapon to finish the girl and advanced again, knocking her over. At least this time she was facing him. She shielded her face as the reptile landed blow after blow into her side, on the third impact, she heard a crack and felt a terrible shooting pain reverberate across her torso. Still, she guarded her head, knowing a blow there would end the fight and, it seemed, her life. The alien seemed contented with the situation and continued slamming his fist into her ribs, an action which the girl discovered hurt a great deal more now than it had even a moment ago. Unable to meaningful protect herself against the savage blows, a terrifying thought crossed her mind for the first time, I’m going to die.

Some amount of time past. She couldn’t be sure if it was a number of seconds or a number of hours, the world had devolved into only the painful thuds of the alien’s punches. Sure, she threw the occasional jab and continued trying to throw him off her, but it was becoming increasingly clear that her efforts were in vain. And then. . . he stopped, suddenly and only for a moment. She tracked his eyes and noticed he was staring at the wrecked escape pod. It wasn’t too far away from the pair. Why? He knocked the thought of her with a savage blow to the side of her head, the opening had been present for only the briefest of moments in her confusion and it was well exploited, another blow like that and this would be over. But the second noise caught her attention, she wasn’t certain what, but something had made a noise. Almost like a rock hitting the metal of the pod. The lizard heard it too. This time, instead of following his gaze with her own, she used the brief distraction to flip herself onto her stomach and began to crawl towards the wreckage as fast as she could.

“Alaric,” she screamed so hard her voice cut off, she summoned the strength and shrieked again, “Alaric!” Whatever the sound was, it must have been caused by her stirring companion. Hopefully, he’d come forth with the rifle and finish this in her favor. But for now it would be enough to reach him. She felt the clawed hand grab her foot and she kicked it off and continued her crawl. She had almost reached the wreckage, still nestled in the ruptured earth, when the hand grabbed her again, yanking her backwards. As she slid back, her hand reaching for the shuttle, something to hold onto. Instead, she found a rock. It would have to do. Without a guttural, primal, savage shout she rolled around and, with all her force, brought the rock hard into the alien’s temple, causing him to fall over. With speed she didn’t know she had, she brought herself onto him, sitting on his chest and bringing the rock up and down with both hands into his face. Up and down. Up and down. The whole while she screamed, an endless roar without words but brimming with rage. And, in that moment, she felt powerful.

When the alien stopped moving she collapsed on her side before, a minute later, pulling herself up to sit and scoot backwards away from him, dropping the rock. “Kark you!” She said, her voice wavering and horse, “kark you!” Waves of emotion washed over her, anger, and fear, and relief all at once. She drew an arm up to wipe the sweat off her face and smeared the alien’s blood on her. She looked down at the bloody scene with a mixture of horror and confusion. “No,” she whispered. She could feel the hot sting of tears lurking behind her eyes as she examined the motionless reptile. She brought her hands to her mouth and brought in a deep, raspy breath, a shocking pain shooting across her as she did so, causing her to fall over. “Kark.” She whispered, looking at the still body. “Oh, kark.” She managed to push down a large sob. He tried to kill me, the thought reverberating around her head, “you made me!” She said to him. “You made me!” She dragged herself back to the pod, resting her back against it. “You made me,” she whispered again. He tried to kill me. She sat there for a moment, trying to compose herself. “Alaric?” She called, “Old Man?” There was no response.

And in the silence, she cried.

[member="Niaami Solas"]

 

[Lief]

As Nia rushed through the underbrush her sight was momentarily cut off by a smattering of trees which now stood between her and the action. Whether or not her act had been in vain she could not tell, though a feminine voice did shout out soon after; had that been the girl, or someone else? Had Niaami accidentally struck someone else? Oh kriff, what if she'd really messed things up? She pushed on through the forest, as vines sought to pull her down into the boggy mud, and frantically searched for an opening in the treeline. And then she saw it.

The lizard had her by the foot, and Nia's stomach sank as he began to drag her backwards. No, this wasn't right... Her distraction was meant to help, not make things worse. There wasn't much thought in her next act, as she broke free from the treeline and darted toward the entangled pair. It seemed as though she was too late, however; the girl on the ground had grasped onto something hard, and in the next few seconds of madness she had climbed on top of the lizard's chest and was pommeling him in the face with it. A rock, Nia realized. His face became a bloody pulp, giving the child pause enough to stop her advance in order to heave.

There had been plenty of things she'd witnessed on the streets of Ridge, but this was by far the worst. Had she bet on the wrong horse? Was the girl really the monster?

Niaami straightened up and wiped her mouth with the back of her sleeve, just in time to watch the girl scamper back in horror. She'd seen that look before, one of utter dismay, of remorse mixed with anger. No, this wasn't a monster, wasn't even a killer, just a desperate girl who had fought for survival. In the same situation Nia might have done the same. Though she doubted she'd have been strong enough to get the upper hand on an adult.

Brushing her concerns aside, the native resumed her approach at an admittedly slower pace. The girl was mouthing whispers that Nia could barely make out, things she didn't really need to hear in order to understand, yet by the time she reached her only tears remained. That was something she knew how to handle, she lived among children of all ages who had very little, who had been hurt or abandoned, tears were a regular occurrence especially late into the night when most everyone else was sleeping.

"Hey..." Niaami breathed, stopping just shy of the girl so as not to alarm her, "It's okay... It's over now."

Sinking down on her knees into the damp earth, Nia bridged the space between them and, without much thought, pulled the girl into a loose yet warm embrace. Same as she'd do if she was one of the Ridge Rats. Same as the older kids had done for her, too.

"Ain't your fault," she assured the girl, "He didn't give you much choice, did he? It's okay, breathe... Are you alone out here, Miss?"

For all she knew the girl would lash out at her, push her away, see her as some sort of threat, but that didn't scare her off. Beneath it all she saw just another kid in too deep, and if she needed a momentary punching bag as so many others had in the past then so be it.

[member="Alaric Marãll"]

 

[Alaric Marãll]

Mynock was lost in her own world as the girl approached. Her eyes were staring intently to the lifeless alien. Lost in a confusing world of mismatched thoughts. She yearned for him to get up, shake it off, and come after her again. She felt guilty enough that she may have just accepted it. Yet, at the same time, she watched him fearful that he wasn’t dead and, if he wasn’t, she was ready to finish the job if he did so much as wheeze. She hated herself for wishing the alien dead. And she hated herself for hoping him alive. And she hated herself for hating herself. She had only done what she had to? Hadn’t she? Maybe she’d gone too far. Her heart still pumped loudly in her chest, her breathing still ragged and harsh. He was going to kill me, she thought again.

Suddenly, she heard a voice in the darkness. She jerked her head to look over, large green eyes beholding the approaching girl. Her hand flew down to the dirt, colliding with it in a soft thud as she felt for another rock. The girl was far too close, how did she not see her before now? Stupid, she thought, gotta keep your wits about ya Mynock, Alaric’s cautionary advice coming to the forefront of her thoughts. She examined the girl with practiced precision, her appearance forced the lizard out of her mind, as she evaluated the new arrival. She was young, maybe the same age as herself, and she was approaching slowly. She didn’t seem to be armed, and in her eyes, was that concern? She was still evaluating the woman, who moved towards her despite the warry look that greeted her, when she felt an inexplicable sense of ease about her. As if she just had a feint soothing presence that she couldn’t put her finger on. Her expression softened as she gazed at the stranger. When the girl first spoke, she let out a ragged breath and her stoicism seemed to crack. And then, the stranger embraced her. Mynock was uncertain how to respond at first. Alaric didn’t hug. In fact, she couldn’t remember the last time someone embraced her. After a moment of still surprise, she reached out and wrapped her arms around the girl, dropping a rock she had found, and held her tight, sobbing.

“He was going to kill me,” she said, on the verge of being incoherent, “he tried to kill me. I didn’t want to,” she was trying to vindicate herself to the stranger, make it clear she wasn’t a murderer. She’d seen men die before, Alaric was an excellent aim and had a lot of enemies, but it was a whole different world when you did the deed yourself. She wondered how Alaric managed to live with it. “I’m sorry,” she sobbed, to no one in particular, to the stranger? To herself? To Alaric? To the dead alien? She didn’t know. But she was. Sorry that she had killed him. Sorry that he had tried to kill her. Sorry about the whole situation. “He didn’t give me a choice,” she echoed after the girl had said it. It was the most comforting words she’d ever heard. “He didn’t give me no choice.” For a long time, she simply held the stranger tight, very tight, crying into her shoulder and blubbering simple defenses which eventually gave way to just sobs. And then that gave way to silent trembling. Eventually, she pulled back and offered the girl a small, sad smile.

“Hey,” she sniffed, realizing that she had hug had transferred some of the alien’s blood onto the girl, “oh, I’m so sorry,” she said, fussing over it and wiping her own arms in the dirt to get some of the liquid off her. She kept her eyes away from the nearby corpse. “They shot our escape pod,” her voice was hoarse and scratchy from her ordeal, “we crashed. Me and the Old Man,” she said. Alaric, it was as if she had only just remembered him. She tried to stand and fell to her knees, grabbing her ribs. The alien had really done some damage it seemed. “The escape pod was his idea,” she explained, moving more slowly this time towards the pod to check on him. He seemed to toss and turn a little, he was drenched in sweat, and bleeding from several wounds sustained in the crash. His hands still gripped the rifle tightly. With a heave, she tossed the rifle out of the pod, it clambered down outside, metallic and sleek and deadly. “He’s alive!” Her voice came from inside, more in celebration than in an effort to inform the stranger.

Of course, in her state, there was no way she’d be able to carry him by herself, maybe even with the girl’s aid he’d be too heavy. And who knew how close they were to the nearest settlement? Or if there’d be more aliens waiting for them. But that wasn’t a concern for now, right now she could relax in the fact that she was alive and Alaric was breathing too. That would be enough. She moved and, gritting her teeth against the pain, pulled herself out of the escape pod and back down to the stranger. Without thinking, she pulled her in for another embrace before pulling back and looking deep into her eyes.

“Thank you,” she said softly, “thank you.” She took a deep breath, the first steady one she’d taken since landing on this rock it felt. “My name’s. . .” she trailed off for a moment, she had always gotten angry when Alaric introduced her as ‘Mynock,’ it wasn’t a real name and it was embarrassing. But she had never minded when he called her Mynock. It had been what he’d always called her. There was something comforting about it, familiar. And on this foreign world, with these evil men pursuing her, something familiar sounded nice. “My friends call me ‘Mynock.’” She finally concluded, she moved over to the rifle and slung it, with a painfilled grunt, over her shoulder. “What’s your name?”


[member="Niaami Solas"]

​

Galactic City,
Coruscant, GA
Year: 846 ABY

Alaric opened his eyes and stretched; his muscles were a little stiff from the previous day’s labor. He rose lazily from the bed and wrapped himself in a comfortable robe before wandering over to the window and pushing it open. He wasn’t native to the planet-city that was the capital of the Galactic Alliance, but it had grown on him over the years, and now the constant sounds of metropolitan chaos were as welcomed as singing birds. He smiled. It was shaping up to be a good day, not least of which because he was scheduled to take the afternoon off; he and Audrey had arranged for a date, the tickets to the evening’s opera rested on the dresser. Alaric had never much cared for the more refined things in life, like the theater, but Audrey loved it and he loved her so, he’d endure a night rubbing elbows with the city’s elite.

He made his way down the stairs, still in his robe, and almost immediately found himself in the kitchen of their tiny home. On Coruscant, land was at a premium and even minuscule living arrangements could cost a fortune. Their home was sizable enough and, importantly, the payments had yet to send them to the poorhouse. The master bedroom and bath were located up a short staircase which led out into a tiny living room, just large enough for a sofa, a chair, and some in-wall book cases, all full. Connecting was the kitchen which included a small dining nook. Further back, Kara’s tiny bedroom was nestled across from the second bathroom.

In the kitchen, he spied Audrey. The woman had her back turned to him as she worked at the sink, washing a few pieces of fruit and setting them on a platter for breakfast. Her blonde hair fell almost to her waist, and she was dressed simply, still in her pajamas and slippers. He crept up behind her, careful to be quiet, and hugged her suddenly from behind, nuzzling his face into her neck, making her laugh. She pushed his face away with a wet hand and scolded him playfully.

“You need to shave,” she said, a laugh still on her lips.

“No, I think I’ll grow it out, what do you think?”

“That depends,” she said turning around now, pressed against him, she ran her hand through his hair, “is it going to be grey too?”

“What?” Alaric answered, feigning the deepest of offense, “you’re a bona fide Sith Lady, ain’t ya?” She gave him a coy shrug as if to say ‘and?’ He looked seriously at her and then proceeded to force his face back into the soft skin of her neck. She laughed and attempted to push him away, he shook his head and stopped tickling her, holding her for a moment.

“Go shave,” she said, pulling away with a smile. “Breakfast is almost ready,” she was had grabbed a cloth and was drying the fruits she’d been washing. He glanced over the food set out—fresh fruit and store bought breakfast pastries.

“Slave away cookin’ did ya,” he grinned. She turned around and flicked the cloth at him threateningly.

“You’d get out of here if you knew what was good for you,” she said through a smile. He held up his hands in defeat and pecked her cheek before turning to climb back up the stairs, he had only gotten half way up when she called up to him, “oh, hon, could you wake the girl up?” He stopped on the stairs, getting his daughter out of bed was always a bit of a chore and he’d already woken up later than he would have liked. “Please?” Came Audrey’s voice from the kitchen.

“Well, since you worked so hard on breakfast. . . .”

“Shut up,” she retorted after a laugh. He chuckled, shook his head, and made his way to the back, where Kara slept. It was only a short ways across the living room and he was pushing open the white door, a sign hung on it which read ‘Kara’s Room’ in clumsily hand drawn letters, barely legible. Beneath it, three stick people were drawn—Daddy, Mommy, Kara, they were labeled, this time in the finer penmanship of an adult, Audrey’s. The door opened with a slight creak, but the girl had always been a heavy sleeper. Right now, she laid curled up on a bed. She had always liked a lot of blankets and she was invisible but obviously sleeping under a massive pile of them this morning. Her hair was visible, coming out of the pillow/blanket cocoon. He moved over and sat down on the bed.

“Wake up, girl.” He reached over and tried to shake her, though before he could, she reached out and grabbed his arm and curled herself around it. “Come on girl,” he said shaking his arm a little, she nestled closer and tightened his grip. He sighed softly, he’d have to grab breakfast to go. “Mynock,” he said in a melodious tone, moving the blankets off of her to let some light in. She grunted and buried her face in the mattress, he smirked. She took after her mother in that respect. He leaned down close to her and whispered, “well if you want to sleep in, that’s alright by me, but your old man’s about to leave and that means. . .” he paused suspenseful, “you won’t be able to hear” he got so close to her ear that his breath tickled her, “the song.” That worked, as it normally did. He had created ‘the song’ back when she was still an infant, mostly as a joke that could make Audrey smile despite herself. ‘She’s not a parasite, she’s a baby,’ his wife had commented at the time, but she laughed all the same. Since then, it had somehow become a staple in their relationship. She opened one eye and peered up at him but remained otherwise motionless. “Okay, we’ll I’ve got to go” his voice trailed off as he retrieved his arm and made towards the exit with exaggerated slowness.

“Wait!” The young voice came just before he could touch the knob. “I want to hear it.”

“And then you’ll get around, brush your teeth and get dressed like a big girl?” She nodded her head enthusiastically. He cleared his throat and hummed a few silly notes, making odd noises as he warmed up his pipes, making Kara laugh. Just before he sang the first note, he stopped, “promise?”

“I promise!” She answered, whining at the suspense. He nodded his head and then began to sing.

“You are my mynock, my little mynock.
A little parasite who eats my food.
And I’m a damned fool, because I love you.
You have rescued me from solitude.”

“Again, again.”

“No, you know the rules, once in the morning and once in the evening—twice in the morning if I come home late.” He said, shaking his head.

“Please?” He smiled, she’s just like her mother.

“Well alright, but then you’ve got to get ready, like you promised.” She nodded and he began to sing the song again.