Pair-A-Dice City (Brooklyn)

[Ludo Dorian]

This girl really was too much. Ludo hoped that one of Bolg's thugs would shoot that finger off. Then again, she was doing a fairly good job at saving both of their asses, so perhaps he should give credit where it was due.

Ludo himself capped off a few more rounds, putting the wounded Brindo down for good. The Rodian had been trying to crawl off the landing pad into a nearby doorway, but Ludo's bolts caught him before he reached it. Now he lay in a lifeless heap on the ground. When all was said and done, Ludo stood to his feet as Brooklyn did. They were still standing, and Bolg the Hutt's goons were not. It was the first good news of the day.

"Oh yes. Thank you so much," He quipped sarcastically. "If it weren't for you, I wouldn't even be on this planet in the first place. And you want a thank you?"

She could kiss a bantha's rear, for all he was concerned. Then, as she began walking away, he hustled after her and pushed her around by her shoulder.

"Where the hell do you think you're going?" He questioned. "Do you realize what you've done? Look at this," He motioned to the pile of dead bodies strewn about the landing pad. "There's gonna be a war now. Do you understand? Once Bolg finds out that we iced his goons..." Ludo sighed and ran a hand through his hair.

"We've got to at least dump the bodies."

 

[Natasi Fortan]

Brooklyn's hand snapped up and she pointed her blaster at Ludo's chest. "Watch your hands, Mr. Lackey," she said, all sense of mirth gone from her eyes. Was he completely out of his mind? Of all the things in the galaxy that were her problem, the problems of Ludo Dorian and the Black Sun did not qualify. "What I've done is save your ass. Don't get me wrong," she said, leaning over to peer at his backside before glancing back up to him. "Yours is an ass worth saving. But that doesn't make this my problem." She gestured around her at the bodies and then flicked the safety back on her blaster and jamming it in her waistband.

"So... to conclude: This sad little war of yours is a you problem, not a me problem. And as far as Bolg--whoever the kriff that is--knows, you iced his goons. You tell him it was Brooklyn Spencer and he's going to shrug and shake his head and then shoot you. So, to reiterate, and I can draw you a diagram if you need it, I'm out of here. You do what you want with this... stuff."

And to punctuate the point, she nudged one of the thugs' arm out of her way.

 

[Ludo Dorian]

Ludo stood confounded. For all of Brooklyn's expertise with swindling and her gunplay skills, she didn't seem to have much experience in the underworld mob business yet.

"You don't get it, do you?" He called after her. "Bolg's men knew that you swindled me. They tracked both of us here, remember? They'll be after you, too."

And then, of course, was the matter of what to do with the bodies. Anyone could happen upon them at any moment, considering they were in a public hangar bay. Ludo had to at least get them out of sight until he could figure out what to do with them. He moved over to the Rodian's corpse and began dragging it by the arms back towards the crates that had previously served as cover. Huffing, he looked up at Brooklyn.

"Haven't you ever stashed a body before?" He asked incredulously. "Ideally, we'll need some hydrochloric acid."

 

[Natasi Fortan]

"Have I ever stashed a body?" Brooklyn demanded incredulously, her voice rising an octave at the end. "Yeah, Dorian, I stash bodies all the time. And I've got some hydrochloric acid in my purse--what the hell is wrong with you? I don't typically go around killing people. You've gone and sucked me into your sordid life of crime, okay, so why don't you just handle this and I'm going to go ahead and fly away from this place and you can just--yeah."

She waved her hands with an air of finality and then folded her arms. "Yeah. That's not going to happen, is it? Okay, look, let's just... okay. I've got an idea. How about this? How about we drag them into my ship. You know... that one there," she said, her eyes flicking to her own ship. "Then when we get into space we'll go into deep space and eject the suckers in an escape pod. They'll never be found and then Bolg will never know."

Brooklyn folded her arms and looked over at Dorian, her green eyes narrowing. "Hmm? C'mon, it's a solid plan."

 

[Ludo Dorian]

"You don't typically go around killing people," Ludo reared his head back and gave a sarcastic guffaw. "Hah! Could have fooled me. This is all your handywork," He gestured to the array of bodies around them.

After a few seconds had passed, Ludo decided that perhaps now wasn't the best time for any more sarcastic jabs. There was work to be done, and unfortunately, they needed to do it together. Surprisingly, Brooklyn's plan wasn't half bad. He would have considered doing the same thing with his own ship, except he didn't have the available escape pods.

"Good idea," He conceded, crossing his arms and nodding. "Bolg will eventually figure out that they're missing, so it's no guarantee that he won't come after us. But I'm more concerned with getting these bodies out of this public landing pad, to avoid any unwanted attention from local authorities. Let's start with the Rodian first."

Ludo grabbed the dead Rodian by his shoulders, while motioning for Brooklyn to take the feet. As the two shuffled back towards Brooklyn's ship, Ludo glanced at her.

"I'll also have to figure out how to, y'know. Repair your ship again."

 

[Natasi Fortan]

Brooklyn stared at Dorian with a look of loathing, then bent to pick up the Rodian's feet. "Make sure you lift with your back, jackass," she grunted as she hauled the Rodian up, then began following him towards her ship. "Using my ship as a mortuary. You're going to go to hell for this." She followed Dorian up the ramp into the ship. "To the left. My left, you idiot, there you go," Brooklyn called out to Dorian. She dropped the Rodian's legs and put her hands on her hips. "And you'd better figure out some way to get this ship back in the air or you won't need to worry about Bolg the Hutt."

They managed to get the rest of the bodies onto the ship after twenty minutes of dragging and hauling. Brooklyn glanced around the escape pod bay of her ship and nodded. "Right. Well that's that. I'm starving. Let's lock up this ship and get something to eat, then we can fix the ship and finish our disposal duty and then we're square. And if you ever come after me again, I'm going to shoot you and next time I won't I won't miss." She shrugged her jacket back on and brushed her hair over her shoulders. "We can go to the casino restaurant."

She walked over to the hatch and gestured towards the ramp. "Are you coming?"

 

[Ludo Dorian]

The grunt work of hauling corpses was grueling enough; Brooklyn's jabs were only making it worse. Ludo's expression soured further as he grabbed body after body.

"I was going to hell long before I met you," He replied.

Now the two of them were stuck in this predicament together, so Ludo figured that they could at least make it as pleasant as possible. He refrained from retorting to her remarks, and only thought when he would finally be able to get out of Corellia. Facing down his bosses after possibly starting an intergalactic gang war would not be pleasant, but there were worse possible outcomes. He was still alive, after all.

Then, between leveling threats of death at him, Brooklyn asked him to lunch.

"What? Yes, of course I'm coming," He said, not noticing that his surprise had caused him to lag behind. He couldn't imagine what the table conversation would be like. There was no shortage of things to talk about, at least. And, Ludo had to admit, the previous events had left him with something of an appetite. "The casino restaurant it is. Hopefully your victim won't still be looking for you in there. Where did you dig up that old fossil, anyway?"

 

[Natasi Fortan]

"Victim? Please," Brooklyn said. "We're going to be in this together, you can at least stop being a tool about it. Yeah, you got hosed. But there's such a thing as due diligence, so really you brought it on yourself. But look, I'm just a woman trying to get some salad in an uncivilized world, okay?" She marched down the ramp and waited for him to follow before pushing the password in to lock the ship again. She slipped her hands into her pockets and led the way towards the entrance to the casino. "I'm young enough to be that guy's daughter, and as far as he knows, I'm just some dumb girl. I'm not sure where he gets off feeling victimized."

As they strode through the open-air walkway back towards the casino, Brooklyn lit a cigarette and took a drag.

"He has a jewel collection, the value of which we could have sold for double what you were out. But thanks to your big mouth, that's all impossible now." She sighed and took another drag before exhaling the smoke. "Oh well. Another day, another credit, or whatever." She flicked the cigarette into a nearby ashtray and then they entered the casino restaurant and were seated at a secluded table by a clueless hostess who thought, perhaps, that they were lovers. She rested the menus across the place settings and said their waiter would come over soon to take their orders. "What looks good?" Brooklyn asked.

 

[Ludo Dorian]

"Believe it or not, I'm trying to be nice. You're not making it very easy."

Ludo shoved his hands into his pockets and followed her. Even though Brooklyn Spencer was easy on the eyes, Ludo could think of about a thousand alternative partners to be stuck in this situation with that he would have preferred over her. He followed suit by lighting his own cigarette, her prompt suddenly reminding him that he had the urge to smoke, too.

"We? What's we?" He asked with a raised eyebrow. "If only I'd known you had planned on cutting me in to your little swindling scheme, I would have tied the old man down while you made the heist," He rolled his eyes and sat down.

"Everything's good," Ludo said as he flipped through the menu. He had never been to this establishment before, but he felt like he could say that with confidence. "It all beats the food back at my normal digs on Nar Shaddaa. The only reason I eat it is because it's free."

After a brief moment of silence passed between them, Ludo leaned back in his chair and cocked his head back.

"Credit where credit's due, I guess. I'd never take you for a thief or a killer. You seem like more of an... indoor girl."