Not on my ship

[Malia Afredane]

"ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR KARKING MIND?"

Both Mal and Mai screamed at Kairon, disgust evident on their faces and in their high pitched voices. Jarrick had to hold Mai back as she lunged for Kairon, hurt evident in her face.

"What in the karking world makes you think nobility don't keep sex slaves?"

There was a hard look in Mal's eye and she shook her head.

"Tipping off the authorities is all fine and dandy but it's still illegal to haul them so I would get pinched too. I'm more than happy to take a fall for that feth, but the question is who do we call? Do we make it look like we got boarded by customs? Do we make it look like we were attacked by pirates? Do we throw me in jail for another nickel for being a good person in the wrong business?"

[member="Kairon Rees"] [member='Rusty'] [member='Sidara Vercopa-Vhett'] [member="Narasa Kelori"]

 

[Kairon Rees]

[member="Rusty"] [member="Sidara Vercopa-Vhett"] [member="Narasa Kelori"] [member="Malia Afredane"]

Unfortunately Jarrick's grip slipped. Kairon saw the fist coming too late. There was a flash of white and then a view of the world spinning. Rees found himself looking at the ceiling. As he lifted his weight off the deck he had to pinch the bridge of his nose to stem the blood that started to flow. Already there were dark drops down his shirt.

"Yeah, yeah, deserved that one," he sighed in a nasal tone and he shakily returned to his feet. Mai had already stormed off. Feth, he thought to himself. She'd seemed so settled recently and he'd gone and ruined it all.

"Just so we're all clear, we're not handing the slaves over. Not saying that. Maybe it's not the smartest notion I've ever had, but I have a hope that maybe the Alliance still owed us a favour. Maybe they could tell the Alderaan forces we're coming and we're, you know, undercover or something like that. "Worst comes to it I say we drop em somewhere safe with enough coin for a meal and tip off the authorities. We can all live with the fallout from the Hutt. Together. If they murdered everyone who ever failed to make a run they'd be short on smugglers. We've got the money to pay him right back?"

 

[Sidara Vercopa-Vhett]

Sidara looked at Mal with astonishment. Her adrenaline was racing through her. These two men didn't seem to have any idea how permanent the Hutts could make their situation.

"Mal, I have a suggestion. First, let's find my whiskey that you've seemed to put where I can't find it. Second.... How about we shoot Kairon and Rusty out the airlock for starters. They are going to get us killed. I think I can do it myself if you aren't willing to help me"

Sid stood up and stretched her neck and shook out her arms ready to remove both of them from the situation.

She took a deep breath before she spoke again. "I think that maybe making it look like we have been hijacked might be our best bet. We don't deliver the slaves, give them what they need to get to a safe place and we walk away from the Hutt's not looking like the bad guys. It's better than risking our lives in my book."

 

[Malia Afredane]

"No one is killing the Hutt, we're not letting the slaves just go on their own."

Mal let Mai go, tossing a towel at Kairon to stop the flow of blood from his nose. Mal would go talk to her later, but Kairon was going to have to smooth his own crew out. He stepped in it big time even suggesting that the life of slave was a good thing.

Mal turned to the spice cabinet and rummaged about, pulling a fifth of whiskey out and tossing it to Sid.

"The Warden has turbolasers and a helleva thick armor plating. This thing was designed to fend off pirates. Kairon might be right. We call the authorities on Alderaan, tell them who is getting the shipment and I deliver in Gracie. No one else takes the fall and I work with them. With luck, I can get a plea deal. I might be able to pull a favor or two. I'm not taking down another fething crew because I screwed up."

[member='Sidara Vercopa-Vhett'] [member='Kairon Rees'] [member='Rusty'] [member='Narasa Kelori']

 

[Sidara Vercopa-Vhett]

Sidara pulled the cork out and took a healthy swig of the fire water. Her anxiety started to subside.

"Come on Mal, there's gotta be another way to do this and avoid you getting pinched for it.... But if that's what you want to do then I am not going to let you take the fall yourself. We both do the delivery.

She took another drink waiting for Mal to fight her on this... because she would. Sidara had been locked up before, it was nothing new. She always managed to get out unscathed. This would be no different.

"Go ahead, I am waiting for your argument."

[member="Malia Afredane"]
[member="Kairon Rees"]
[member="Rusty"]
[member="Narasa Kelori"]

 

[Kairon Rees]

[member="Sidara Vercopa-Vhett"]
[member="Rusty"]
[member="Narasa Kelori"]
[member="Malia Afredane"]

Arguing outright wasn't going to do any good. They'd gone down that path before and all they'd discovered was how well they matched each other in stubborn attitude. Kairon strode away from the table, head leaning back as he held the cloth to his nose. He quietly growled to himself beyond the other's hearing as he felt a surge of frustration at his own lack of tact at times. Generally he was so careful with his words, but everyone said something monumentally stupid in the wrong company once in a while. Returning to the table with a datapad, he started swiping across the screen as he looked through several start charts.

"We pick up weapons," he announced suddenly. "The Republic are desperate and the Alliance have been shipping weapons back and forth through Sith blockades. I doubt we can get the Alliance to get us off the hook, but they might turn a blind eye if we're there on account of the Republic, not just ducking them for a Hutt job," he explained. It made sense in his head, but at this point he was just throwing out ideas. They had enough leeway if there was a shipment they could grab and run. The Wheel wasn't a big diversion and they could certainly find anything at the trading hub.

 

[Narasa Kelori]

Narasa was staying out of the family in-fighting.

She took up a post by the door, crossing her arms over her chest and just watching things burn to ash before people pulled themselves back together. There was no good way out of this. Narasa didn't want to see anyone getting in trouble, but, if Mal was willing to take the fall, she couldn't argue her out of it; she was a rational adult. Her friends could do it, though.

"Not that I doubt the idiocy of government, but you mean to tell me that if we report an illegal shipment of which we were unaware and offer to help them nail the people really involved, they're still going to arrest you?" Narasa's face twisted in disbelief and distaste. It could be true. So many governments had no common sense. All of 'em she'd dealt with anyway.

"I might have another option. This Jedi I heard about a while back when working temporarily with the Alliance, he rescues slaves; has a whole group who helps him. Couldn't we just see if he's interested in lending a hand? Make it look like Sid said: we're hijacked, only we turn the slaves over to someone who can help, so they aren't going off on their own."

[member="Sidara Vercopa-Vhett"] [member="Kairon Rees"] [member="Malia Afredane"] [member="Rusty"]

 

[Malia Afredane]

"That might not be a bad idea Narasa. I don't think even the Hutts want to mess with a Jedi. Governments can be corrupted and bribes, the Jedi, well those guys have a crusade. My only concern is the rest of you. What the chances he might haul us all in and slap us in irons as opposed to just me?"

Mal dug some ice out of the freezer, and put it into a bag, handing it to Kairon for his nose. He looked rather pitiful with the blood streaming but she had not begrudged Mai the swing. Getting a Jedi involved might be easier than having to go through with the authorities and the Jedi were better equipped to deal with a vengeful Hutt than she was.

[member="Narasa Kelori"] [member="Kairon Rees"] [member="Sidara Vercopa-Vhett"] [member='Rusty']

 

[Kairon Rees]

[member="Malia Afredane"]
[member="Sidara Vercopa-Vhett"]
[member="Narasa Kelori"]
[member="Rusty"]

Kairon only met Mal's eyes briefly as she passed him the ice. For a few moments the icy needles caused him great discomfort and he scrunched up his eyes. Shortly after it started to dull the pain and he let out a slow sigh.

"I suppose if we get a Jedi involved, they're less likely to overlook the smuggling on account of the fact we also ship weapons in for the Alliance," he added in a nasal tone. "I'm good to take a risk Mal. Smaller risk for us all, is better than seeing you go down for certain. Can't deliver the slaves, can't go back to the Hutt. How practical is this Jedi you know Narasa? Think they'd let us go on our way in exchange for freeing some slaves?"

 

[Narasa Kelori]

"I only heard about him through some people at the Alliance; I've never met him personally," Narasa clarified, holding up her hands. "I don't imagine that a Jedi's going to have us arrested if we explain the situation, though; turning the slaves over to him as part of a rescue operation pretty clearly shows we didn't know about the slaves and don't have an interest in the trade. That should speak well enough for us."

She looked around and then rose to her feet. "If you're all in agreement on it, let me make a few calls, see if I can get a comm code for him and maybe we can work something out."

She began backing toward the door, pointing over her shoulder with her thumb. "Mind if I use the main holophone?"

[member="Kairon Rees"] [member="Malia Afredane"] [member="Sidara Vercopa-Vhett"] [member="Rusty"]

 

[Tarok Vassket]

[member="Narasa Kelori"] [member="Malia Afredane"] [member="Rusty"]

Jarrick decided to chime in at this point. His typical modus operandi was to let Kairon do most of the talking, and then pick up the small details when the captain felt they'd reached an amicable agreement. He was still working out what his position was in the larger crew of the Warden. Mal was more organised that Rees was. He'd picked that up pretty early on. There was less crossing of t's and dotting of i's to be carried out. The droid took the lead when it came to holding the guns and looking menacing.

Truth be told, he liked being relied upon to keep things working smoothly. He'd been a fairly senior warrant officer back with the Eriadu military. Cleaning up after Staff Officer was what he was used to. He turned his head to one side, scratching the side of his neck. "Just make sure to pin him down on that whole 'not arresting us' thing. I don't know the guy, but I don't expect a Jedi to turn a blind eye to illegal activities. I do expect them to keep their word!"

Seemed a good opportunity to go and check on Mai. Sometimes Kairon really was exceptionally stupid.

 

[Narasa Kelori]

Narasa tossed a jaunty salute off to Jarrick and disappeared out of the room. She made a series of calls to her acquaintances in the Alliance, eventually working her way around to a specific name and, from there, contact information. As the final comm line buzzed through, she found herself glad there was no clock visible in the room; she didn't want to know how long it had taken to get to this point. At least once she had seen someone come to the door, but hadn't done more than glance their way since she had been in the middle of a conversation.

When the line finally picked up, Narasa found herself face to face with the hologram of a young Twi'lek woman. "I'm looking for a [member="Valiens Nantaris"] of the Rangers."

"May I ask what the call is about?" the Twi'lek on the other end of the line inquired, sounding for all the world like a corporate secretary: mechanical, distant, and polite.

Narasa took a deep breath. Right then. "It's kind of a long story..."

"Oh." There was a pause and then the girl took a deep breath. "I can help, and, if it's something we need to deploy the Rangers for, I can talk to him about it. Do you have information?"

"Yeah. Kinda." Narasa leaned forward in her chair, leaning casually on her knees. "So, here's the deal. I'm working with a crew of merchants who agreed to transport a series of containers we were told contained medical supplies. We just discovered that some of those crates contain cryogenically frozen slaves instead. This isn't what we signed up for; none of us do slaves. I heard Nantaris's name come up when I was with the Alliance. Since our current deal is with a Hutt, we can't just free the slaves: one, we want to live past next week, and, two, the slaves have nowhere to go. We can't give them back to the Hutt, because that's asking for them to just be reshipped by someone else. We can't turn them in to the authorities, because we'll get nabbed for the transport anyway, more likely than not, and wind up with legal consequences we don't deserve." Even though the Twi'lek was already nodding, Narasa finished the thought. "You rescue slaves. If we agree to meet and turn them over so they have somewhere safe to go, can you guarantee you won't give our names the authorities for arrest or try to arrest us? It really wasn't intentional, and we're trying to do the right thing." For us and them.

"I'm sorry. What's your name?"

"Narasa. Kelori." The girl wrote it down.

"Narasa, I'm Qyren. Let me see if Master Nantaris is free; I'll have him contact you back shortly. Can I have your comm code?" Qyren jotted the numbers down as Narasa rattled off the ship's code. "Thank you."

The line went dead, and Narasa raised her eyebrows. Okay then. She slowly leaned back in her chair and tipped her head back all the way, staring at the ceiling as she swiveled in place; maybe somebody would bring her lunch while she waited for the return call.

Turning and lifting her head, she shouted down the hall, "I don't suppose the calls can get routed through to the bridge or something? Or is there food?" She waited a moment with no reply, then sighed and let her head fall back again. "I could have both of those things on my ship," she muttered to herself, bored more than annoyed.

[member="Jarrick"] [member="Kairon Rees"] [member="Malia Afredane"] [member="Rusty"] [member="Sidara Vercopa-Vhett"]

 

[Valiens Nantaris]

[member="Narasa Kelori"]
Valiens Nantaris was training, sparring with his friend Raloph Scindia, when Qyren entered. At a signal Nantaris stopped their session and looked over at Qyren.
“Come in! Pull up a dojo…or whatever those seats are called,” he said enthusiastically.
“I think she’s come with a message,” Scindia commented.
“Oh, well, fire away!” Nantaris replied, hanging his lightsabre from his belt.

The message was explained to him and he nodded. “So, did she say how we should handle this? I mean, if we take the slaves off her hands the Hutt will still be most irritated. Does she want us to stage a mock arrest so that we take the cargo but they ‘get away’?”

“Of course, it would be easier if they started working for the Alliance or the Coalition away from the Hutts. Hutts aren’t very nice after all, and we could give them more legitimate work. Do you know these people?”

 

[Qyren Leret]

Qyren knew that a message to help others would always trump personal training, so she had no qualms about crossing the training space and temporarily stopping the spar between her Masters. Nantaris's questions and comments were all valid, so Qyren did her best to answer them as succinctly as possible.

"She said she knew of you, Master, through the Alliance," Qyren replied. "I've never seen her before." She also hadn't asked for their life's history, which she was regretting now. More information was always better. Next time, she would remember to get as many additional details as possible.

"She said she wanted to speak to you directly, if Master Scindia doesn't mind the interruption. She was very direct about wanting to avoid punishment for an accident; she seemed sincere in her desire to help the slaves in their possession. I'm not sure what she would think about a faked arrest, but I suppose it would be worth asking her. I think anything that diverts the attention of the Hutt from them would be welcome. She also is speaking for a crew that I'm not certain is hers." The final comment was said hesitantly; it was an impression Qyren had gotten based on the way Narasa had phrased her opening explanation.

"I could practice with Master Scindia until you return?" she offered, glancing between the pair of Jedi Masters.

[member="Valiens Nantaris"] [member="Narasa Kelori"] [member="Jarrick"] [member="Kairon Rees"] [member="Malia Afredane"] [member="Rusty"]

 

[Malia Afredane]

"I guess we wait then. I'll go check on our guest. Everyone else sit tight, stay off the coms. Grab some chow and relax."

Mal shoved her hands in her pockets, a pensive look settled on her brow, creasing it up as she weighed the options. If the Jedi couldn't help them, there was always trying to contact the people over at the Alliance, and see if she could negotiate this one herself, but there was no guarantee in either situation that the crew was going to come out unscathed. The soft clank of her boots on the metal decking carried off down the hall towards the medbay.

She paused in the door, leaning on it as she watched the med droid attending to the Twi'lek. She was resting, a blanket over her as the readouts blipped quietly over her head. She was weak, the vitals still not normal as she was woken up too fast. The droid signaled that she would be okay and Mal nodded. Despite the overwhelming desire to wake up the others, she could not take the chance that something would go wrong. They were not equipped for that kind of emergency.

There had to be a way to keep everyone safe.

[member="Qyren Leret"] [member="Valiens Nantaris"] [member="Narasa Kelori"] [member="Jarrick"] [member="Sidara Vercopa-Vhett"] [member="Kairon Rees"] [member="Rusty"]

 

[Tarok Vassket]

"How's it going then?" Jarrick asked Narasa from the doorway. He'd managed to calm Mai down and Kairon was busy sulking so he'd been at the galley when she'd called for food.

"You wanted food?" he added. In his hands he had a bowl of stew he'd rehydrated and heated up. There was a chunk of break on the edge of the bowl. He'd stirred in some nutrient powder too. Using the stuff was common for spacers who didn't get much natural sun or air to stay in decent shape on long voyages.

[member="Narasa Kelori"]

 

[Valiens Nantaris]

[member="Narasa Kelori"] [member="Malia Afredane"]

“Sure, I’ll go talk to her now. Narasa, right?” Nantaris asked, taking the comm code from Qyren.
Scindia meanwhile offered Qyren a training lightsabre so they could continue to train.

Heading back down to the communications room, Nantaris punched in the code and established the call.

“Hi there, I’m looking for Narasa, I’m Valiens Nantaris. I heard you wanted to speak to me?”

 

[Narasa Kelori]

Narasa's face split into a grin. "Yes, indeed. Thank you." She took the bowl from Jarrick carefully. "Don't know that I've eaten yet today, so I'm ravenous." Even the typical meals of space-faring people looked good, though it had taken some getting used to when she had first started out. The chunk of time where she'd been raised planet-side had spoiled her.

She took a cautious spoonful, then smiled again and looked up at Jarrick. "Thanks." She was about to take another, larger spoonful when the communications device beeped at her. The spoon hesitated as she glanced up, then it was slowly lowered back to the bowl as she reached out to answer the call.

"Yes, Master Nantaris. Thank you for your speedy reply. I heard your name through Alliance channels some time ago, and I was hoping you could lend us a hand with a bit of a double-cross we're dealing with." She briefly re-outlined the situation for Nantaris as she had done for Qyren before him. "I don't suppose there's a relatively simply way of having you help us help these girls that wouldn't result in any legal action against us."

[member="Valiens Nantaris"] [member="Narasa Kelori"] [member="Jarrick"] [member="Kairon Rees"] [member="Malia Afredane"] [member="Rusty"]