How I Met Your Assassin

[Hades Michae]

[SIZE=14pt]Coruscant[/SIZE]
[SIZE=14pt]Level 890[/SIZE]
[SIZE=14pt]Mid-Evening[/SIZE]


He was staring at a glass of corellian ale, the tips of his fingers pressed lightly to its sides but making no move to lift it to his mouth as life pulsed all around him. It seems far removed, almost beneath him. To him it isn’t imagination to see them under a glass floor, standing with his hands shoved in his pockets and looking down at them from a place where time was more a concept – something to be shaped in your image rather than binding you to a specific place. He’s convinced that maybe he did something wrong and that’s why he can see it all but he can’t touch it, why he’s bound to the laws the rest of the universe is.

If he’s done something to deserve this, he doesn’t know what it is. And he doesn’t care either. One day he’s going to die, and then all the wondering will be for nothing. So why try to change it now?

Nar Shaddaa was called Little Coruscant and Hades could see the resemblance. Sitting there in some bar – a name he can remember only vaguely and that was only important in the sense that another person had to have a place to find him – he could imagine himself in his home city under the same garish neon glow, the same curl of cigarette smoke burning the inside of his nose as it floated upward and in to the air. (It’s talking to me. I’m sitting here and I’m mainlining the truth of the universe. The way it curls, the way the holes open…I just haven’t learned to read it yet. You’re all sitting here waiting for absolution while I’ve got it right here between my fingers.) The only difference between Coruscant and Nar Shaddaa was the artificial shell, the glamorous mask they sold themselves to pretend it wasn’t another gutter in space.

It was this particular gutter he’d learned Lucas Asher was on.

It was his specialty to gather information by whatever means necessary. The trick was that he usually didn’t have to force it from people. He was good at fitting in, wearing someone’s mask just long enough to get someone’s trust before he fell apart in to something long-faced, or perhaps making someone so uncomfortable they’d rather give up the ghost than encourage his company. Regardless, finding Lucas had been no easy task and at first he hadn’t even known it had been him. He recognized that killing – there was no one like him – but it had still been hard to track down the Sith he ran with now. He’d sent the woman a message trying to get in contact – an old friend, an old coworker. He’d allowed her the probing in her words despite himself and then he found himself with a way to contact one of the few people he’d bother trying to find in the galaxy.

Long time, no see Asher.​

I see you haven’t lost your touch.​

I’m on Coruscant if you want to catch up.​

Let me know.​

- Hades​

He’d gotten an answer. But Hades was a man that dealt in lies, secrets, and cons and he could feel that whoever had answered him for a meeting wasn’t the man he’d spent ten years of his life with. That wasn’t particularly alarming. (Nothing is particularly alarming. I die today, I die tomorrow – I didn’t mean anything except to myself, and I’ve moved past things like that.)

Whoever was about to join him for a drink would be in for a surprise, a man not even on their plane hidden by thick curls of smoke.

[member="Kesare Salazar"]​

 

[Kesare]

The message had been received from Matsu while Lucas was out on a job, curious she opened it to peak inside (to be fair it was always a new job, how was she supposed to know this time it would be personal) and was surprised to find something...friendly? She read the message not once, twice but a total of three times. Hades...Hades...she makes a valiant attempt of rummaging through her brain for a memory of Lucas mentioning the name in a conversation, she came p empty handed which only furthers her curiosity about this so called mystery man.

It would appear at some point Lucas and this person must have been at least been acquaintances, however she couldn't imagine just any acquaintance jumping through the amount of hoops that it took to reach Lucas (a ghost, she still remembers how difficult it had been even for Matsu to track him down for his services) no - he must be a friend looking to catch up or he wanted something. Since the message was sent from Matsu she has to lean toward the former, having no reason to believe that her best friend would bother sending Lucas the message if it was a scam (there was nobody better suited to get to the bottom of the truth than Matsu) She wasn't positive why it surprised her so much that Lucas had a...what? A friend? Yes she supposed friend was the best term to use as she read the message over for a fourth time and attempted to pick up on any subtle clues. Nothing.

The more she thought about it the harder it was for her to imagine her assassin boyfriend going out and doing some everyday mundane activities with another person, but the more she thought about it the more she became curious - like how did he know about Lucas' line of work? (because what else would someone be referencing to when they talk about losing your touch?) It took her all of ten, maybe fifteen minutes to decide that she wasn't going to initially tell Lucas about the note as she tries to reason with herself that it is because she is being protective when really she knew the reason was simply because she was curious. Her interest had been piqued and she was left to mull over what kind of information this man might have about Lucas, perhaps if she was lucky he would even share some good war stories providing that she was nice enough.

Staring down at the blank message for some time she can't think of how to word the message that she plans to send back to him (how would he talk to this man?) Eventually she decides to go with something vague and to the point,

Long doesn't begin to cut it,
lets catch up tomorrow -
meet you for drinks at the Sunset Cantina at 7​

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________________________________​

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The bar was practically deserted (as she knew it would be at this hour) when she stepped inside the next evening, her attention is sharp and razor focused as her gaze shifts over each bar patron's features. The place was small - a hole in the wall with seedy figures scattered down the bar and at a handful of tables, the lighting was piss poor, dark shadows playing across features in contrast to the dull orange lighting that had you squinting. The atmosphere was quiet, most everyone keeping to themselves despite several glances she'd received when she'd walked into the place - it made it easy for her to concentrate and stretch out her mind from one man to the next, catching wisps of their thoughts in her attempt to narrow down which of them was her mystery man.

When she came to him she pauses - his thoughts unclear like water slipping through her fingers whenever she tries to grab a hold of them. Curious, she steps out of the shadows and towards where he was seated at the bar. From far away the man appears to be handsome - perhaps in his late thirties, early forties with sharp cheekbones, dark hair and tanned complexion. Up close is a different story however, she could tell he had once been a handsome man but had become weathered with time and what she could only assume was years of drug abuse. His features were sharp and gaunt, his flesh stretching tightly over cheekbones so prominent that he remind of a skeleton as she went to take a seat beside him.

Before she has a chance to get settled the bartender was asking her what she'd like to start off with while looking relieved to see a woman in here for a change. "Whiskey, and another of whatever he's having." Her voice is low and smoky, a hint of purr as she gestures to the man. She watches the man behind the counter nod, fumbling a bit with his hands and turning a dark shade of red before turning around to prepare their drinks. She takes the opportunity to turn her gaze towards him, her lips dipping into a thoughtful frown as she tilts her head and squints slightly while studying him for a long silent moment (who are you? what do you want?) before finally breaking the quiet with a question begging to be asked. "So...exactly who are you and how do you know Lucas?"

​

[member="Hades Michae"]​

 

[Hades Michae]

[SIZE=12pt] He hadn’t cultivated his connection to the Force, not to the extent he might have given the capacity to pay more attention to practicalities. His dreaminess allowed him to tap it unconventionally in ways he knew neither how to control or expect. He could feel her before he saw her – pervading, a sort of command most women of her type held this far beneath Coruscant’s surface. The inhabitants of this level were malnourished, scarred, or wasted from years of the life the darkness served up. Someone like her stuck out, evidenced clearly by the bartender’s red-faced reaction.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt] His eyes shifted, sliding up to watch the bartender’s hand and the slide of a second glass across the countertop once the drink she’d ordered for him was made. He had no qualms taking a stranger’s money.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt] Her silence doesn’t unnerve him.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt] “Pretty sure my name was on the end of that message you intercepted,” he answered in response to her query about who he was. Had he been someone else he might have commented on how it was mighty funny, her coming in here demanding answers when really she was the one who’d barged in to what was a perfectly normal arrangement between two old friends. But instead he watched his drink for a minute or two, imagining it swirling down his throat, getting stuck where esophagus branched to chest, tapping against the front in little knocking frameworks, pressing against his sternum with little hands. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt] Finally he dragged his gaze from the bartop, eyes as dull as his attitude staring at her with indifference. Yeah, he could understand why men liked to stare. He’d compiled a checklist of the things he was supposed to notice and he could cross off every one in regards to her. But he felt nothing. Was pretty typical of Lucas though.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=12pt] “How do you know Lucas? Of the two of us, I think you’re the one need’s worrying about. After all, you’re the one who started this meeting with a lie."[/SIZE]

[member="Kesare Salazar"]​

 

[Kesare]

[SIZE=11.5pt]He was difficult to read, even with a tug of the Force – there was something strange about this man in a way that she couldn't quite place her finger on, (he reminds her of a puzzle that couldn't be completed because there were too many pieces missing)[/SIZE][SIZE=11.5pt]he did not seem to draw his strength from the Force in the way she or Matsu did. Despite the difference, she could sense that the man's power who sat beside her was formidable in its own way.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=11.5pt]She found his strangeness disturbing.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=11.5pt]Unsettling.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=11.5pt]Not that she feared him, only that of which she did not know –[/SIZE] [SIZE=11.5pt](if he forced her hand, she had no lingering doubts of her ability to terminate him and watching as the last flicker of life was extinguished behind his dull gaze) but she would prefer not to turn down that route if it could be helped, especially now that he has already proven himself to be useful. [/SIZE][SIZE=11.5pt]"Just as I am fairly certain that you and I both know how I am not inquiring about your name."[/SIZE][SIZE=11.5pt] [/SIZE]

[SIZE=11.5pt]Fighting to keep the annoyance from bleeding into her words as she studies him and waits for him to once and for all, look up at her. She has never been partial to vague answers, especially ones that only added more questions, something it would seem that this man had plenty of tucked away for when she didn't play along. F[/SIZE]or one brief, fleeting moment she could feel the familiar surge of rage sweep over her as her annoyance quickly twists into anger.

[SIZE=11.5pt]Just as quickly as the emotion swept her up, it just as rapidly dissipates as the two of them finally, finally make eye contact. She felt the involuntary curve of the corner of her lip before she can stop herself, light laughter bubbling past the surface just as the bartender came back with their drinks and placed the glasses in front of each of them. "I can't argue with that logic."[/SIZE]

[SIZE=11.5pt]Reaching for the glass, she throws the amber liquid back in one efficient sweep, making a noise as it burns down her throat before motioning to the man behind the counter for another. "And yet you seem like a smart and sensible man, so why don't I suggest a proposition?"[/SIZE]

[SIZE=11.5pt]After another seconds pause to gauge his reaction (nothing, nothing, nothing) she offers him something she thinks even he wouldn't want refuse. "What if I said I will continue buying drinks if you agree to sit here for a little while with me and answer some of my questions? Like for starters how did you meet Lucas? Were you friends?"[/SIZE]

[SIZE=11.5pt]She had the impression that this man Hades wasn't about to give her anything without knowing anything about her, with or without the offer of endless offer of alcohol. "I'll start. My name is Kesare and I met Lucas because I hired him to kill my father for selling me off to become a sex slave." [/SIZE][SIZE=11.5pt]There was no hint of emotion behind her words despite the underlying pain the memories brought her, but around him she sensed it did not matter because inevitably the impression she received was that he simply did not care, which ironically made it far easier to reveal a part of herself that few rarely witnessed. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=11.5pt]"Now it's your turn to share."[/SIZE]

[member="Hades Michae"]​