Faction Ghost in the Machine [Darkwire]

[Mr Black]

Tag:: Shira Varanin | Hacks | Emraj Hosdole

Emraj Hosdole “Good work!” Black congratulated. He’d been fast, kark.

Delay given. Cell door now able to be forced open but also stuck behind them to stop others from getting in. Black had done almost all he could. “Quickly come on!” The executive shouted to the guard’s running off down the corridor in a random direction, hopefully as far as he could from the actual cell, “this way!” It was amazing how many people would follow you if you just acted confidently enough. There was a thunder of boots in the corridor running hurriedly to nowhere. One of the guard’s tried to say something but Black shouted: “KEEP UP!”

Looking at a random cell. Which of course was wrong. Black engaged the botnet, the device on his wrist flicked to life, the display as if he was interfacing with his office at a personal computer. “Ms Sonaston! Give me an update where is the prisoner?” That of course was code for, shut down all the cameras... and soon the cameras were down, no great noise made to let people know he’d caused it. “Sir the cell’s over here!” One of the guard’s eventually shouted, which might have been helpful in the first place if Black hadn’t insisted on running off. So back the group ran back a short distance, only now the botnet device had finally shut down the lights of course.

The scylla AI became fully active in the prison not long after, and doors were closing, opening and closing everywhere. It was naturally called TKAB not scylla, but the electronic haywire its duplicate was currently running on the already damaged facility was quite impressive. “Have you seen this before?” He said to Emraj Hosdole, first the alarm, then the droid, now the doors and lights! “Give me a report!” He said into the wrist device, “Ms Sonaston?” of course there was no answer this time, and he turned the botnet off. Black put a palm to his face. Turns out businessmen can lie well. Who knew?

Had that been enough time for Hacks and Shira Varanin? They were just through the next door if Emraj Hosdole could get it open again, black was trying to push it open and failing.

 

[Daiya]

In some back-alley fighting ring...

Daiya gripped the bars of her protective cage with one hand, watching anxiously through her macrobinoculars from her perch far above the match. It wasn't at all like Frankie's cage. She was not under threat from the reigning champion, hell-bent on smashing her to a fine pulp. The girl gritted her teeth, as if her own fear could translate across the space to keep Frankie safe and, more importantly, alive. It never worked for Tawrro, but it couldn't exactly hurt.

Any superstitious thought was wiped from her mind as Frankie delivered the first punch.

The girl must have said something audible, because a growl in her ear demanded an explanation. Daiya frowned, wishing instead to rip out the earbud and watch the match in peace —at least from her end. THE SLAB was up and charging now, and she held her breath to see what was going to happen next. Her heart hammered in her ear, drowned out by the demanding growls and barks of Tawrro's concern, "She caught it, that's what happened! Frankie fething caught his punch, right in her fist!"

"Well, I know she's modded, but I thought she was a slicer not a brawler!" the girl had to practically yell over the deafening roar of the crowd as MODDED ROMANCE delivered a crushing blow to her opponent's wrists. She gasped in shock, bewildered by what she witnessed. Daiya was far from a student of combat, but she had borne witness to enough fights in her day to realize that what she was seeing was extremely unusual. Even for someone as modded as Frankie was, Daiya was shocked by her no-holds-barred approach to the match. Who would dare face her after this?

With a small squeal, the girl noticed her compatriot waiting in the wings again. Pitching herself forward, as if it would make a difference, Daiya put down the macrobinoculars and yelled at the scene below, "DON'T DO IT, SAM! BACK OUT! BACK OUT!"

If her warning was lost in the cacophony of the crowd, it wouldn't have mattered much. In the cage below, Frankie delivered a warning of far greater impact to THE SLAB's chin, knocking out the reigning champion. The girl winced at the blow, but that was nothing compared to the emotions playing out on Sam's face as she met Daiya's eyes from afar.

Daiya swallowed hard. "She can't possibly face Frankie now, Tawrro," the girl offered to her unseen partner. She couldn't read his face, but she knew his silence enough to know the Wookiee was considering the options. "I have to see if I can tell her to just grab Frankie now."

The girl brought up her arms to cross them in front of her, shaking her head at Same. Don't fight her, was the silent message the girl was pleading her companion to heed.

Daiya pointed to Frankie in the cage, then to Sam, making a sweeping arc with her arm to indiciate Sam should approach the new champion. Finally, she added another arm to point to where both of them would be, and swept it out towards the exit into the alley.

She could only hope Sam would get the message.

Sam Rodarch​

 

[Shenn Rosham]

In some back-alley fighting ring...

Despite being an overtly social person, Shenn was not particularly outgoing. When a person owns a bar, they rarely need to leave said bar to meet people. He didn't need to be arrogant to say that folk tended to seek out his company rather than the other way around. Some flocked to his drinks, some flocked to the company or night life provided by such an establishment, others sought jobs or information or resources. Needless to say, Shenn never had to leave his place to have a good conversation, and a good conversation was just about the best thing there was.

So how did Shenn get himself roped into going to a fight club, of all places? The atmosphere certainly left a lot to be desired. Even the worst bar brawls were more civil. Blood was splotched all over the arena and he was pretty certain he had seen some splattered in the front rows. Spittle flew from the mouths of many, if not most, of the patrons within his line of sight. Those particular gobs of bodily goo were accompanied by shouting competitions that would put Senate Halls to shame. The sport itself was hardly sporting, and Shenn had seen enough martial art to know.

Sure, Shenn appreciated that he was in the underworld. He had been in and out of shady places his whole adult life. This sort of place appealed to a certain sort of folk. He just wasn't one of them. Maybe he was just being a little prissy because he'd rather be at his cantina. Maybe this show would be better suited to the barkeep if he were watching through a holo. Still, not even a fair amount of discomfort could spoil Shenn's perpetual high spirits. An easy smile adorned his face. The lines created by his grin were carved so deep that the smile could have been there for a period of geologic time.

No, he was not there for himself. He was there because a certain teenager just couldn't keep herself out of trouble. A certain guardian couldn't keep her from said trouble. And who else was going to watch out for her if not Shenn? After catching just enough of "the plan" from eavesdropping their conversation at the Blue Flame, Shenn did just enough digging through his resources to fill in some of the rest and that was how he ended up in a fight club loosely affiliated with one of Denon's more notorious Corporate Executives.

Although he had managed to uncover some of the plan on his own, he hadn't gotten enough of the gist in time to stop Daiya from enacting her hair-brained, half-cocked scheme. So there he was, sitting in the middle of the crowd, watching a beefy, over-confident thug get absolutely pummeled by a much smaller, supremely augmented girl who matched the description of the person Daiya was trying to locate. Or apprehend. Or contact? That part of the plan was definitely not clear. Shenn had yet to spot his teenage charge or her big, hairy companion.

Just as he was thinking about getting up from his seat to look for the rascal, the announcer waves his hand at the next fighter. The eyes of the crowd along with Shenn's own follow the announcer's gesture to a face that Shenn could have sworn he had seen before. Recognition clicked, again, just a little too late. "Oh dear."

Sam Rodarch​

 

[Sam Rodarch]

At least one of Daiya's signals had been understood by Sam's horrified gaze. Don't fight her. She got that much, although a pile of dirty socks would have been able to receive that message. A scenario where Samantha Rodarch didn't want to fight was as dangerous as giving Hacks your personal details.

The rest of the gestures, however, were ultimately lost upon the woman, as her fear swiftly shifted into confusion. Something about leaving that way?

She had to get Modded Romance outside? How?! In what way!? Sling the cybernetic fighter over her shoulder and just leave!? No, that sounded terrible. In fact, that sounded like an even swifter way to get a horrible public mauling by an enhanced monster. There had to be a way...

...but how?

She wasn't the thinker here, Sam was never the designated thinker! For Mandalore's sake, she couldn't even read! There were cogs grinding amongst the din, the rust of multiple concussions hampering any actual helpful thinking.

Her name was being called.

Not now, trying to thi-

Oh. Oh no.

Sam stepped into the cage, the apprehension slapped across her face struggling to do battle with the growing sense of urgency. Sure, you can think on your feet when you're throwing fists but you can't do it outside of that. It's fine. It'll be fine. These weren't death fights. There was a referee and everything. Horrible crippling pain, sure. Broken bones, probably. But she wouldn't die, right?

By the time Sam was face-to-face with the cyborg she had almost come up with a plan, but unfortunately, the bell was about to ring.

“Hey,” Rodarch began awkwardly, as cries for woman-on-woman violence rang out all around them, the crowd beginning to whip themselves up in a frenzy for more blood, “I...uh...got a favour to ask ya...”

An eyebrow rose, quizzical in nature and it offered the Mandalorian a chance to say her piece.

“Ya see, my uh...little sis', she's a big fan of yers,” Sam lied clumsily, her awkward manner, however, could easily be taken as fear, “came here ta get...yer autograph...”

“And so the best way to get an autograph is to fight me?”

Lying is hard.

“...she thought it'd be...ah...cool, y'know...seein' her big sis' scrappin' with her...favourite fighter.”

“Poor you.”

“...yeaaah, if ya could make it....real quick that'd be the ticket...don't want 'er to see me get too karked...up, if ya get me. Just gunna be out that...side door there afterw-”

DING DING!

Apparently the enhanced woman was somewhat receptive to the request as a thunder bastard of a haymaker connected with Rodarch's jaw with a deafening crack. A real skull rattler. Mercifully, Sam would have no recollection of that moment, as she woke up moments later with unfocused eyes staring at the ceiling.

“...aaauuh,” she complained in a haze, tongue running over loosened teeth as swelling upon the side of her face had already begun, “waut eh feffin....aaaauuuuh!”

Modded Romance was celebrating before shooting the now sitting Rodarch a small nod. Had she accepted? Did she successfully lie? Was this technically match-fixing? The crowd didn't care, they'd put all their money on the cyborg, after all. Only a fool wouldn't have.

Dragging herself out of the ring as the humiliated loser, Sam staggered out of the club with her gaze firmly directed at the floor. Laughs rang out behind her, and for once she decidedly didn't turn around to confront them. A real shame, she'd been looking forward to having a fight today.

Through the exit she went, exclaiming as she staggered into the alley:

“Whau' da kahk, Daaayaaa?!”

Daiya Shenn Rosham

 

[Hacks]

Hacks smiled with glee as Varanin squirmed and backed away as the multi-armed woman tried to find her own weapon, taking the offer saberstaff with satisfaction. She thumbed the activation and two blades burst to life, she swung it around for a moment and mused loudly, "Considering our civilized age, it's not a very elegant weapon." She deactivated the weapon and kept it clutched in her lower left mechanical hand.

"I can move pretty fast," Hacks said as she kicked at dirt on the floor and assessed the tunnel of carnage Varanin had cut to get to the cell. "Let's go eh?" she said and followed the woman in fast pursuit. Cells passed them, some prisoners had already made their escape, others were chained to walls or even the floor in durateel cuff and chain. As she passed each cell she felt a pang of guilt that she couldn't stop to help these strangers out, what made her so special? she thought.

Hacks hesitated for a moment at the last cell before freedom and saw a woman suspended in the center of the room. A dozen different wires ran from the ceiling and plugged into the cyborg directly. Likely interrogators had used it as a means to digitally access her cranial-cybernetic storage banks. Something didn't feel right at that moment, her stomach sank as her eyes focused on the woman.

Hacks tentatively approached her and reached towards her face to grip the blinders concealing her eyes and went to raise them. Just as they budged the woman seemed to wake, shrieking in complete torment. Hacks jumped, frightened, and took a step back. It was then she noticed the blinders were bolted into her flesh. CorpSec scum, Hacks thought and her body shook with rage and distress. Her eyes looked down and saw the fresh scars, cuts and bruises all over her body. Her clothes stained red with her own blood.

Hacks dropped the saberstaff and frantically began to unhook the woman from the machine, grabbing Frankie as she fell into her arms and bringing her close. The woman didn't react this time and Frankie lifted her with her mechanical arms, "Help me!" Hacks shouted, "Help me," she said again more desperately as she hauled the woman through the hole in the wall.

 

[Daiya]

In some back-alley fighting ring...

“What are you doing, Sam?!” Darkwire's eye in the catwalk asked aloud, foregoing the futile attempts to be heard on the arena floor itself. All she could do now is watch, helpless, as Sam entered the ring against MODDED ROMANCE. A fighter that her monobinoculars were now displaying stats for, after witnessing THE SLAB caught cold by Frankie’s devastating attack, and the numbers were grim. Even in her inexperience, watching the pattern of fights tonight had given the teen girl a feel for the numbers already. Frankie’s were high, too high. “Tawrro, she’s just walking right into the cage.”

“Yeah, I figured. If she helps Frankie cement her championship, we won’t be able to touch her,” the girl nodded as she concurred with the Wookiee in her ear. She was hoping Sam could have coaxed out their target, come up with some ruse for Frankie to duck out before the match so they could nab her. Or rather, so Tawrro could nab her. Mods or no mods, Human strength wasn’t much of a match against pure Wookiee power.

One of the camera droids rattled close, jostling for a better view. Daiya looked away to glare at it before putting her face back into the viewfinder. At the moment, Sam and Frankie were just talking. Okay, so far so good. She didn’t know how Sam was going to get Frankie out of the cage now that they were inside, but she trusted her compatriot to come up with something. “They’re just talking now, I—”

She sputtered as the droid plowed into her, throwing her off balance. Instinct told her to throw out her arms to grab hold, the catwalk’s grated floor made its sturdy platform deceiving. Daiya grabbed on to the rough bars of the floor, letting out a yelp as one of them scraped her finger, and another one as she lost hold of the macrobinoculars. They clattered to the catwalk floor, inertia mercilessly tossing them about until they teetered over, and then off the edge of the platform. She lurched forward to watch them fall, helplessly grasping as if she could pull back time itself. It was no use. “Kark!” Daiya swore as she examined her bleeding finger, the cut was minor so she stuck it in her mouth. “Those were expensive...and they weren’t even mine.”

But the loss of the equipment was a minor thing, the more important object lay below her. Daiya squinted as she looked down, then her eyes widened suddenly. The other hand flew needlessly to her face to cover a gasp, the droids clearly didn’t care what she did, only that they got a good shot of the action in the cage. Which, for the droids and Daiya both bearing witness, was now a scene of Sam sprawled out on the floor of the arena cage, with Frankie at a referee’s arm length away. “Oh, Tawrro, we’re in deep poodoo now. Sam just KO’d.”

The Wookiee roars that answered had Daiya grabbing for the comm in her ear, “Hey, watch it. You’re yelling right into my ear canal!” An apologetic bark followed. “Yeah, yeah, just remember you’re not actually alone in that speedervan.”

As Daiya's squinting eyes watched Sam getting escorted out of the cage and onto her walk of shame out the door, she found a new reason to squint. A light shining up at the catwalk from below illuminated her figure against the droids and catwalk, exposing her hiding place to one of the arena's bouncers at last. "Oops," she muttered to herself, "Time to go!"

With practiced moves, the small teen clambered around the narrow enclosures of the droids, quickly losing the light as it searched for her again. The girl had no doubt that someone was closing to head her off, so she moved fast, scraping her way along the grated metal platform that ringed the arena toward one of its access ladders. Pulling her sleeves —now featuring a concerning rip in the fabric from the rough metal bars— long past her fingers, she gripped them like a pair of gloves. Then, wrapping the insides of her boots around the sides of the ladder, Daiya loosely gripped it with her "gloved" hands to slide her way down.

Slick really should have been her middle name.

The teen scrambled out the door before security could catch up, dancing around the corner and walking quickly until she could blend into the pace of the crowd. She wove her way through, talking quietly into her mic to update Tawrro to the situation. When Daiya managed to loop back to the arena's back door, she found Sam there, barely able to hold herself together.

"Oh my stars, Sam!" the girl shouted as she rushed to support the woman, throwing herself under the weary shoulders of her compatriot. It wasn't hard to do when the woman normally stood a whole head taller. "Why did you go into the ring with her? I told you to just get her out of it!"

Obviously, not well enough.

"Honestly, you don't look too bad, no blood really," Daiya giggled as she surveyed Sam's face. She reached up to brush some of the woman's hair from her eyes, "You're just going to have a massive bruise for a while."

"You the sis?"

Daiya turned to see who had spoken to her, and found herself face to face with Frankie. THE Frankie, in the flesh! Her mouth opened and a little sound came out as she stared stunned at the person before her. It had worked out after all? She closed her mouth again, letting out a small, "Samantha Rodarch, you mad genius!" under her breath.

"Huh? Look, I don't have all day, love, you wanted something signed?"

"Oh, right," Daiya said. This must have been part of the ploy Sam had orchestrated. Fishing into her bag, her hand latched upon the holojournal she carried with her everywhere. The teen pulled it out, handing it over sheepishly, case-side up to Frankie.

"Why am I not surprised?" Frankie mused as she turned over the device, inspecting it as if she could see right through to its inner workings. Daiya swallowed as she realized the infamous slicer probably could do just that. The woman chuckled as she pulled out a pen, "A bit simple for me, but everyone's gotta start somewhere."

Daiya took back the datapad, now with a freshly-minted signature on the back. She caught a wink on Frankie's face before she turned back to go inside, offering the girl some parting words, "I added something else on there for ya, too."

It wasn't until Frankie started walking off that Daiya realized she hadn't even tried to finish their mission. As if today hadn't been fethed up enough already!

Sam Rodarch Shenn Rosham​

 

[Shenn Rosham]

Shenn grew restless waiting for the fight. The two combatants seemed to share some words that weren't easy to make out at his distance. He was focused intently, though, on trying to read their lips. Shenn knew that Daiya was here, somewhere, to find Frankie. And though Shenn had never met the elite slicer, the description of the fighter opposite Sam seemed to fit. But what was the play? Did Sam have some kind of restraining bolt built for cyborg parts? Because if all she had were her fists, this was not a fight Sam would easily walk away from. Slab, the first fighter, had plenty of muscle mass. And that mass was probably the only reason the fighter was being carried off to a medbay instead of a morgue. Sam, though known among Darkwire contacts as being a scrappy and capable brawler, had too little of the muscle mass needed to take the kind of blows her opponent was going to be dealing.

He was so focused on trying to figure things out that he wasn't paying attention to the crowd around him. A thunk on the top of his head illicited an immediate gasp of pain. Whatever hit him clattered to the floor. The old man gingerly rubbed the bump on his head as he reached down and picked up a familiar pair of macrobinoculars... His pair of macrobinoculars. How in the stars...?

There was no time to ponder the mystery of the binocs as finally there was a movement in the cage. Had Shenn's gaze not lifted in time, he would have missed it. In a split second, the match was over. A collective oooo spread through the crowd when the fist of MODDED ROMANCE collided with Sam's jaw. If MODDED ROMANCE's first fight was a humiliation, this one was just a show of dominance. A single sucker punch to the jaw with no warning wasn't really a fight at all. Was MODDED ROMANCE saying don't waste my time? After watching the first match, Shenn didn't feel like that was her style. As they started to drag Sam's thankfully still living body from the arena, Sam found her own feet and managed to make it to an exit on her own power. Jeers and disappointed applause followed her out.

In the moments he had before Sam made it out of the arena, Shenn scanned the crowd for the potential source of the thrown binocs. The former ground forces officer saw no one who could possibly be missing them; everyone seemed to be excitedly waiting for the next fight to begin. He widened his search and caught a glimpse of movement in the rafters above. A small figure darted from what, in retrospect, seemed a perfect vantage point for spying but a terrible one for anything else. Some pieces started to fit into place in Shenn's mind and he stood from his seat and made to leave.

The exit wasn't difficult to navigate, as the majority of the audience was sticking around in anticipation of the rest of the show. Shenn easily followed the teenage-sized figure out to an alley even though he was well behind. Upon arrival, a third figure stood between Shenn and the two people he expected to see: Daiya and Sam. He waited a moment for the third person while preparing a suitably chiding but obviously-not-serious, light-hearted comment for Daiya's stealing of his macrobinoculars. Then the other figure turned around and there was Frankie, handing Daiya a book. Frankie paused.

"Huh. Rosham in the flesh. Never thought I'd run across you, old codger. You still passing notes on actual paper?"

Shenn blinked once and quickly recovered. "All the better to keep watchful eyes away from things that should be left unseen," he said with a gleeful smile.

Frankie seemed to sneer, or grin, tough to tell.. "You just need better slicers. I can make anything disappear. Make people not know what they did or didn't see. Could even blip right out of the real for all some know."

Shenn nodded. "What can I say? I'm old school."

"More like prehistoric."

Shenn gave a hearty laugh. "Maybe so. But then, nothing ever really disappears does it. After all, these two Darkwire agents found you, didn't they?" The old man gestured to Daiya and Sam.

Daiya Sam Rodarch ​

 

[Sam Rodarch]

Sam couldn't help but shoot the girl an irritated glower as she chided her for going into the ring as if her arm flailing instructions had been clear to the former shockboxer's dented skull. Was this a thing that people learned at school? The art of arm signals? As if she needed another realm in which to feel so utterly inept.

“Ah fink she bwoke mah jauw,” Rodarch responded slowly, her vowels akin to the bellows of an opiate-addicted bantha as the plucky teenager brushed away stray hairs from her face in a move that was oddly affectionate and thus a foreign concept to the Mandalorian.

Unbeknownst to the pair of them, it would have made the sister act all the more believable to the approaching Frankie.

This was Sam's time to stand and bask in the sweet victory. She'd done it. Gotten the infamous slicer outside and with the majority of her face still intact. It was a real moment to savour, she'd been called mad but never a genius before, it was a moment to be ferreted away into the cranial annuls of history. The woman even attempted to grin...

...but that just resulting in shooting pain.

“Aaauuuw...”

The success of the ploy was actually quite staggering, so much so that it actually seemed as if Daiya genuinely just wanted Frankie's autograph as the cybernetic woman started to leave? Wait, what!? The wide-eyed look that Sam fired at the girl screamed: I didn't get a broken jaw just so you could get an autograph!

Thankfully, intervention came in the form of an old codger. Who apparently was already familiar with Frankie?

Again. What?!

If...if the old boy from The Blue Flame was already familiar with their target, then why had they sat in his tavern plotting to nab her!? This had been so much more difficult and painful than necessary! Instinctively (and thankfully, internally) Sam blamed Daiya for this oversight, given that the teenager was the brains behind the operation and shrugged wildly as Shenn outed them both as Darkwire operatives.

“Wauit. Hauld up,” Sam began, the egg upon the side of her face already formidable in swelling, “Youh two knouw each ova?!”

Daiya Shenn Rosham

 

[Shira Varanin]

Hacks dropped the saberstaff and frantically began to unhook the woman from the machine, grabbing Frankie as she fell into her arms and bringing her close. The woman didn't react this time and Frankie lifted her with her mechanical arms, "Help me!" Hacks shouted, "Help me," she said again more desperately as she hauled the woman through the hole in the wall.

The sight of the rig froze her for what seemed like days. It brought back her absolute worst memory: getting enteched on Atrisia. Hacks' shout snapped her out of it.

The saberstaff whipped back to Shira's belt as she helped Hacks remove the prisoner - Frankie, apparently - and get her through the hole. Shira's metal hands clamped down on the wall's burnt edges, making as safe a path as she could manage.

"The speeder bay's right through here-"

Two CorpSec boys came around the bend. Shira whirled and her left hand split apart. A hidden blaster barked four times. Each double-tap wrecked a faceplate and the face behind it.

"Here, through here-"

The speeder bay held, oh, half a dozen men. Blasterfire slashed through Shira's coat, spanged red-hot against her metal parts, and came far too close to flesh. She reached out and pushed, and off they went, down through the atmo field that kept out pollution.

A police speeder stood ready.

 

[Daiya]

Outside some back-alley fighting ring...

At the mention of Darkwire, Daiya saw the woman's demeanor shift. The color seemed to drain from her face, and the friendly expression she'd carried since spying the girl's datapad was gone. A worrying chill passed over the Darkwire teen, and she wondered if their whole ordeal here had been for nothing now. Boy, was Sam going to be pissed with her if that was the case!

"I don't do that kind of stuff anymore. I'm just a simple woman trying to make my way in the universe." Frankie said, her tone suddenly cold. She regarded the trio indifferently, as if bored with their conversation now. "Look, I have to get back now, so if you don't mind..."

"Simple?" Daiya asked, hoping that the infamous slicer would bite. This turn of events was not what she expected, and she needed to stall for a moment or two. "Frankie, you're famous. You're my idol! You're the furthest thing from simple."

The woman shrugged, and took a step back from the trio in the direction of the arena warehouse again. In another moment, she'd be out of reach, and the girl was tempted to put out an arm to stop her. But that moment was reserved for someone else.

"I'm sorry, kid, it's true," the new arena champion apologized. She almost looked genuine now, the glaze fading from her eyes and the warmth returning to her voice again. Frankie put out her hands in a gesture of apology, "I'm just a simple, honest woman now."

"Yeah, alright," Daiya relented, seeing as she wasn't going to get anywhere with arguing. She nodded. Then a wry grin sprouted on her face, something that made Frankie pause for a split second. The only second left that they needed. "And this is just a simple, honest Wookiee hug."

It had taken that long for Tawrrowaldr to pad up slowly behind her, armed with nothing but his gigantic bulk and the reputation of his species to avoid any challenges. A pair of large, hairy arms reached out behind Frankie, wrapping her inside them too quickly for her to flail. Still, even pinned, the cyborg woman was a serious match for Tawrro, and Daiya stepped forward with an ounce of concern, looking up to her trusted companion, "Did you bring the tranquilizer, too?"

Tawrro growled and whined at the struggling woman in his arms, unable to use the neutralizing agent himself in any case. And she doubted Frankie understood Shyriiwook enough to abide by his barks to calm down, even if the slicer woman was willing to. She managed to deliver a kick to the Wookiee's inner thigh that elicited a roar, causing Tawrro to tighten his grip enough for Daiya to cry in alarm, "Well, don't break her, Tawrro! Just let me..."

She knew him enough that the girl wasn't afraid to dart close to her guardian, reaching into the hip pocket of his bandoleer to snatch the device they needed. A simple injection hypo, with enough juice to knock out a Trandoshan. Her lip quivered for a moment as Daiya held it poised, nervously watching the struggle, waiting for the right moment to...there!

Daiya plunged the needle into Frankie's leg, then felt herself jerked forward as the woman kicked with her arm still connected. Somehow, she managed to hit the button to inject the serum before falling hard onto the ground, rolling from the fray to avoid being kicked again. The girl had only pulled herself to a crouch by the time Frankie was slowing down, enough for Tawrro to control now.

Breathing hard, both from exhaustion and relief, the girl managed to utter a cautionary, "We should get her to the speeder van before someone comes looking for their prize fighter." and point in the direction that Tawrro came.

Sam Rodarch Shenn Rosham​

 

[Shenn Rosham]

As soon as "Darkwire" fell out of Shenn's mouth, Frankie's entire demeanor changed. Any playful nostalgia was gone, replaced by a definite desire for distance. What Shenn couldn't tell was the trigger for that urge. Did the woman want to forget her past? Did she just want to move on from Darkwire? In Shenn's own experience, it took him years to make peace with his military past. But he hadn't accepted help from anyone to get better. He had been alone for two decades. The old man wouldn't wish that on anyone, especially an old friend and adversary like Frankie. Maybe Frankie needed help. That was enough for the cantankerous cretaker.

Shenn didn't have much time to ponder a response to anything Frankie said or did as Tawroo wrapped the girl in his hairy arms and Daiya proceeded to stab the captive with what looked like a tranquilizer dart. "I hope you got the dosage right on that," Shenn said, as Frankie's struggles gradually lessened.

Tawrro grumbled a response, barely looking at Shenn as the Wookiee's job shifted from grappling to hauling.

"Who are you calling a forgetful old man? I'm a wee pup compared to you. If anyone's memory should be impaired, it's yours." Shenn rolled his eyes. "Old man," he muttered as he moved over to the now unsupported Sam Rodarch . "Come on, muscle," the bar owner said to the clocked-woman. "Once we get Frankie to whatever safehouse we're taking her, I'll bring the lot of you back to one of my own spots. Have my medic friend give you something for the even bigger headache that'll come once the adrenaline wears off."

He threw the fighter's arm over his shoulder with a surprisingly firm grip for an old man and helped Sam after the Wookiee and the short stack. A smirk came to the corner of Shenn's mouth as he guided them down the alleyway. "Say, Sam. Would you say that you're... star-struck?" he old man chuckled.

 

[Sam Rodarch]

What then followed was a lot of conversation.

Well, actually, it wasn't all that much but to Samantha Rodarch it was a lot of conversation to bear witness to when your jaw felt several sizes too big and throbbed like it had been stung by a nest of increasingly frustrated wasps.

Perhaps it was time to start listening to the plan before it happened, as to actually have an actual idea of what was going on rather than agreeing to things with violent gusto.

Did everybody here have history?

Sam felt ignorant at best, and flat-out stupid at worst, but at the very least the woman had managed to lure the cybernetic face masher out into the alley in the first place. Wasn't that the hard part? Certainly felt like the hard part, but as the conversation continued with little success it felt as if a harder part was about to come into play.

Oh great.

Rodarch tensed up, stupidly ready to head back into action at a moment's notice but the sneaky girl and her Wookiee companion mercifully had their bases covered. Although, was it mercifully? Truth be told the Mandalorian had been looking forward to an honest fight instead of taking the much smarter dive. She definitely wouldn't have won, but at the very least there was some fun to be had in unrepentant violence.

With their powers combined Little and Large somehow managed to sedate 'Frankie', although the former took a bit of a spill in the process, activating some peculiar sort of big sister concern within the former-shockboxer that honestly caught Sam by surprise.

Then again, twice in a row came another small curiosity as the old boy came over, taking over the duty of her physical support as he promised future pain relief. What was this? These people of the underworld and their kindness? It was unfamiliar territory to the oft prickly woman who only expected the worst from people in kind only gave them her worst (or in reality, her fists).

Before she could get out an intelligible thanks, the owner of The Blue Flame ruined everything with a pun. Okay, he didn't ruin everything, that was dramatic but it did draw out a withering scowl that sent pangs of pain up her broken jaw.

“Thaut is au baud joke, ou knouw,” she muttered as they followed the troublesome duo to the speeder van, “but faunks, au appreeshuate ut.”

Nodding ahead to Daiya and Tawrro, Sam managed to holler out her mangled concerned to the pint-sized planner of their hair-brained scheme.

“Hauy Daayaau, ou aurught? Daut waus a hellauva boot ou goaut.”

Daiya Shenn Rosham