Warp Whistle

[Amea Virou]

[member="Runi Verin"]​

The blaster bolt hit against the corner of the doorway with a high pitched whistle and buzz as the plasma encased itself within the durasteel walls of the downed ship. Another bolt went straight through the archway, another just short of it. Yet no more than two seconds would have passed between the three shots. A second volley from a second crew fired on through. Amea’s eyes wandered over to her companion for the time being. An uneasy alliance but one that had been made out of necessity.

… The necessity being the very situation they were in right now.

“I don’t think our friends here liked that we poached their claim.” Amea joked and took a look around the corner. A blaster bolt narrowly missed her and she quickly leaned back behind the cover of the wall with a face resembling that of someone who had seen their life flash before their eyes.

“Nope. They definitely are not happy with us right now.” She winced and looked over at her friend again. The obligatory glance, the one that sized them up but also sized them up, had already passed and at this point it was really just…

She was recently separated. It was natural, right?

… Right?

She hoped so.

“Ideas?”

 

[Runi Verin]

[member="Amea Virou"]​

As the acrid smell of sustained blasterfire filled the wreck’s corridors, Runi was reminded not for the first time why she preferred to work these sort of claims alone. Things were much more straightforward when you were a solo operator. A certain sort of clarity that came from being only beholden and responsible for yourself, with the only skin you had to save when the proverbial osik hit the fan being your own.

“Oh, you think?” The spacer shot back verbally, something she wished her attackers would at least pretend to consider taking under advisement. The corridor was quickly turning into a death trap of laser disco proportions. She was already seeing after streaks of blue and red from the bolts when she blinked. “And what gave you that karkin’ impression?”

She punctuated her sarcasm with a solid, defiant burst from her carbine pistol, the ancient looking sidearm bucking alarmingly as she blind-fired around the corner, more concerned with buying them breathing room from their assailants than actually hitting any of them. In all the years she’d carried the weapon, this was the third or fourth time she’d actually seen fit to draw it. That alone was enough to cause a bitter twist to those scarred lips. Her new found ‘ally’ was just icing on the gorram cake.

“You mean beyond the obvious of not gettin’ shot?” She shook her head disparagingly, pressing her back against the pock-scarred bulkhead that stood between them and a veritable sea of plasma. Trying to let her senses shift past the all the noise, the chaos and the irritation that flooded her veins with each passing second. Past the material, focusing instead on the signatures of life that radiated out into the force. Pulsing with each and every breath, every heartbeat, every movement. There were seven of them.

Eight, if you counted Virou. She was still debating that one.

The Spacer’s lips curled further. Not the worst odds she’d faced lately, but still a far cry from the spacewalk this should have been. Kark it all. Why couldn’t these jobs ever go smooth? “Feirfek, we ain’t gonna hold them here for much longer, that’s for sure. Just a matter of time before one of these geniuses gets a stroke of inspiration and reaches for some karkin’ ordinance.”

She gave another few squeezes of her pistol as she spoke, sending their attackers diving for cover once more. With one more volley to make sure they were well and truly committed to that idea, she holstered the weapon before the barrel even had the chance to cool, ignoring the smell of smoldering leather as she pushed off from her position and was already darting further into the bowels of the ship.

“You comin’?”

 

[Amea Virou]

[member="Runi Verin"]

She had a temper. This wasn’t news but refreshingly frustrating nonetheless. So far their dynamic had been a lot of quips from Amea and curt responses from her newfound friend. Most of the time on jobs like these Amea was usually alone or there was someone who just wanted her to shut up and do what she was paid to do. Oh, no doubt that was what Runi wanted her to do as well, but she was hardly going to get what she wanted.

“Well, for one-” Amea was interrupted by Runi. “Okay, yeah. That.”

Beyond getting shot there was of course the general vibe, but to be honest that was probably not just coming from the men and women shooting at them. And that whole ordinance thing was a non-question. If they tried it they would find themselves unpleasantly surprised. If anything it was what Amea counted on, but not Runi.

There was a set of shots from Runi at the others to create an opening. The kiffar ventured deeper into the ship and asked if Amea was coming? Amea blinked for a moment before she pushed on her feet to run up to the armed woman.

“I was half-hoping they would throw ordinance, you know.” Amea panted as they ventured even deeper into the ship. “Throw that back and they would have been taken care of.”

From behind they’d find the first few bolts fire at them.

“Take a left.” Amea not so much suggested as much as demanded. “Buys us time to set up an ambush.”

 

[Runi Verin]

[member="Amea Virou"]​

​

"You've obviously had the luxury of never being on board a ship when a grenade goes off." Runi muttered sourly as they sauntered down the winding corridors and access tunnels, begrudgingly accepting Amea's direction for the moment, her suggestions a lot easier to follow when there were blaster bolts scorching the walls at their backs. Kark. The enclosed spaces of a wreck were a treacherous nightmare at the best of times, more so when someone was actively trying to kill you. "Not to mention, that's our only way out of here, 'lek? You really want to risk that bein' sealed off?"

If the smell of corrosion was anything to go on, growing more intense as they headed into the inner bowels of the vessel, this old girl was barely holding it together as it was.

Her pace slowed as they neared the engine room, taking a moment brush away the loose strands of hair that had fallen across her eyes during their impromptu retreat, only really accomplishing to smear another layer of grime across a brow already lined with the sweat of exertion and the oppressive heat.

"In here." She placed her hands against the half-sealed door, setting her back against the lip of the entrance as she strained to force the hatch open wider with the surprising amount of brute strength her otherwise diminutive stature possessed. Even then she had to supplement it with a touch of actual Force, capital F, in order to achieve anything beyond a screeching protest. As it was, the door only opened another thirty or forty centimeters before it jammed. "If we lure them in here, we can thin them out... Those we can't take out directly, we loop around and trap. Maybe buy ourselves enough time to get the kark out of here."

Her gaze flickered across the other woman, lips pursing as she gestured for her to duck under her arms and into the engine room. Runi didn't know how Virou would fare in a direct confrontation, but the spacer had confidence in her own abilities that she was willing to bet they could both come out of this reasonably in one piece. The girl didn't seem like a total slender waif, however. With a little luck, maybe that muscle tone she was sporting under that jacket was more than just pleasant window dressing.

"Pick a spot quickly. They couldn't have missed hearin' that."

 

[Amea Virou]

[member="Runi Verin"]

Hey, that was almost a joke! Change that never around a bit and it would have been a good quip.

But no, Amea had never had the luxury of being on a ship when a grenade went off. Okay, so maybe Amea had not quite thought about the fact that it was their only way out, but hey, at least now she was quite acutely aware of it and on the same field as Runi was, which in all honesty was a first at this point. They had different ways to go about their situation and how much of that was Amea playing the role of the ditzy fool remained to be seen.

Well, no, not really. The majority of it was.

Propbably.

Except the grenade thing. That was all Amea.

Ducking under a well-shaped arm there was little the woman could do but turn on her toes and look at her fellow escapee as she continued bossing her around. Amea nodded along with the plan and turned around to look around the stage where they had decided to make their play. It was a fair shot that they could do it in here if they played it right. Judging by the opponent’s tendency to fire even when no targets were in sight it felt likely that they were dealing with amateurs.

Would they check their corners before entering the room? It was best not to take that risk. All they needed was one good shot at point blank and that was it.

Duck and cover it was. Amea hid behind a crate and threw a quick glance over at Runi to let her know that she was ready. Footsteps outside the door gave away the thugs loosely organized attempts at keeping together and playing it smart. The quiet whispers of men and women that overlapped gave away their less-than-professional approach to the situation they were faced with.

“Come on, Allen goes first.” One of them laughed and pushed another thug into plain view from where the two women were. He raised his rifle and pointed it into the dim lit room with a cautious glance over his shoulder. One peek to the side with his rifle pointed in the direction he was looking and then another glance in the other direction.

So they did check corners. Good thing Amea hadn’t stuck to her original plan then.

“What do you see?” The one who had pushed Allen into the room asked out loud.

“Come out, ladies. We know you’re in here.” Allen motioned for the others to enter. “Won’t be long now.”

 

[Runi Verin]

[member="Amea Virou"]​

​

Allen.

The spacer resisted the snort as the rent-a-thug made to sweep the room, leaning back slightly as his torch swept just shy of her position. What kind of stupid name was that? It was official, she wasn't going to die here. Not to some schmuck named Allen at any rate. The other aruetii sounded just as ridiculous, so she was going to rule him out, too, just on the shear principle of it all.

Runi had placed herself in an overshadowed alcove near the entrance of the room, flattening herself backwards against the rusting and burnt out remains of a data terminal, taking advantage of the engine room's poor lighting for concealment. Fingers slowly working on the weathered leather clasp that secured her akaai'gai to her utility belt.

Assuming their pursuers weren't complete idiots, which seemed something of a stretch given recent evidence to the contrary, she doubted it would take them long to spot her once they begun to search the room. At that point...

Her darkened gaze shifted across the room towards Virou's presence, again wondering if the other woman was cut out for what was about to happen. She had seemed unphased during the heat and thick of it all, running that mouth like there was no tomorrow, but that could've easily been nothing more than act. She might have been nothing more than irritant thus far, but Runi had no desire to see the woman's copyc di'kutla shebs blown off on her account.

“You find them yet, Allen?" The second thug called, stepping into the engine room a second later with two of his buddies. Each managing to buck the stereotypical trend of their particular profession and be both bland and yet paradoxically ugly at the same time. The tomahawk slid further down in her waiting hand. It wasn't clear if this was the advance party, or if they'd separated from the other three she'd sensed earlier. Either way, four was more than enough to spring the trap.

“Yo, bro, are you even sure they came this way? That sound could've come from anyw---"

He never got the finish his sentence. A solid wet thwack cut him off the middle of his garbled of syllables, eyes widening almost comically as his face suddenly sprouted a tomahawk right where his eyebrows met. Dead and slumping to the floor before anyone could even call out his stupid name. Hardly the quickest on the uptake, thug number two tried all the same anyway.

"All---"

It was as far as he got, the sight of Runi breaking out from her shadowed position was as effective at silencing him as her weapon had his fallen comrade. His gun moving with almost treacle like speed as he tried in vein to draw a bead on the Warden of the Sky's approach, the small powerhouse coming in almost impossible low until the very last second, bashing his weapon aside and barreling into his gut fist first. The last part of his friend's name almost exploding out his lips at the force of the impact.

"--eeeennn."

She was already darting away for cover before the other two could get a read on what had just happened.

Two down, two to go.

Hopefully Virou hadn't joined the count of the former in that time...

 

[Amea Virou]

[member="Runi Verin"]

Nothing said success quite like the sound of a confused merc who grew all the more uncertain as he ventured into the room. Amea remained behind her crate until Runi would give some sort of indication that it was time to go, and sure enough she did. It was a wet thwack and the man’s presence seemed to die out at an instant.

It was time to go then. Amea darted out from behind her crates to sprint right up to the men in the background. A firm hand wrapped itself around the barrel of his blaster rifle and gave a firm tug to rip it out of his grip before she let it slip from his hands and whack him across the forehead with an even firmer push. There were no wet thwacks or cracks of skulls.

Amea wasn’t someone who killed unless she had to. It didn’t strike her as necessary but she was far from one to judge. Time was when her chosen method of incapacitation was to overload blaster rifles and cause their plasma cartridges to explode in the hands of whoever was taking their aim on her. The charm of the move had worn off at this point. There was more to stealing their weapon and using it against them.

With the blaster wrestled out of the man’s hands she took aim at his friend. Amea pulled the trigger twice: once in the shoulder, the next in his knee. The friend fell to his knee grunting in pain much like predicted. The sole of Amea’s boot came up to meet with his head to knock him on his back. Yet the wall behind him was an uncalculated error. A wet and clunking yet eerily soft crack echoed down the long abandoned hallways of the ship as he collapsed to the ground in a state of complete silence.

The last three men were on the approach. Their heavy footfalls reverberated around the area and Amea stepped out into the hallway to take aim.

Teeth gritted, brows furrowed. It was a fight and she had no intention of losing this.

 

[Runi Verin]

[member="Amea Virou"]​

​

There was a certain beauty in the way Virou effectively dismantled the two remaining thugs in just as many heartbeats, displaying a vicious yet contained efficiency that the warden part of Runi couldn't help but begrudgingly admire. It had been a while since the kiffar had been anything but the former. Kark, she barely even felt the flickering embers of guilt when she took a life. Even dispatching poor Allen here had barely registered anything beyond a twisted sense of satisfaction from landing the throw that had cut his no doubt mundane existence short.

No time to dwell on it now, even if she had the inclination.

At the sound of heavy combat boots on the advance, Runi was already moving to retrieve her aforementioned weapon, pulling it free with an almost overly casual air that was only interrupted as a thought crossed her mind. By the time she joined Virou at the engine bay's entrance, one of the metallic orbs from Allen's belt was bouncing in the palm of her cybernetic hand. A thin, almost sardonic smirk twisting at her scarred lips. "You wanna learn how to really use a grenade on a ship?"

It was a rhetorical question; one she didn't wait for an answer before giving it another, final bounce before cocking her arm back. Her target, a rotund and red faced looking mercenary that was clearly enjoying the heat as much as she was, was quick to blunder around the corner of the corridor a a second or two later. Barely having time to gain his bearings before the grenade cannoned into his jaw and sent him crashing backwards with a spray of blood and teeth.

Unlike the thugs they had dispatched in the engine bay, his two comrades were a lot quicker on the uptake. Already diving for cover the moment they realized what had happened. A frantic, if somewhat redundant yell screeching forth from one of the pair, worthy of an action packed war holo. "GRENADE!"

And then, there was nothing but... A deafening, but uneventfully awkward silence. A lull of disbelief generated by virtue of the grenade just sitting there, inert as it was bloodstained, larger than life at unconscious third man's feet. Runi tapped Virou on the shoulder as she stepped further back into the room, her expression as guarded as ever, yet her presence within the force radiated a sense of overly amused satisfaction.

"You might wanna step back." She murmured as she rested against the door frame, her tone as matter of factly as it was casual. As they'd just displayed, two thugs were hardly a concern. "After an embarrassment like that, they're gonna charge down that corridor. Peedunky di'kuts are all about savin' face. We just need to wait for them to break cover."

 

[Amea Virou]

[member="Runi Verin"]

Wait, what? But she had just said not to use a grenade on the ship. Amea perked her brow at the other woman in confusion. At least until she arched her arm back and threw the grenade at the feet of the soldiers who scrambled to duck and cover. Amea herself looked on in horror as the grenade went off…

… Or rather, as it didn’t. The confusion and fear changed to a deep sense of amusement. One that she couldn’t help but display by covering her mouth with her off-hand. The grin that lingered behind the cover of the palm of her hand was allowed to linger though. Amusement felt like the right response to that, and once Runi touched against her shoulder to urge her back into cover Amea would happily oblige.

“That… Was pretty good.” She chuckled and got back behind her old cover again.

The woman let in a deep breath to wipe the smirk off of her lips and to get her head back into the game. The blaster weighed somewhat heavy in her hands. Alleviated by the support of the crate, but heavy nonetheless. Not metaphorically by any regard but because it was a rifle.

Rapid footfalls came from the hallway.

Idea.

Amea dropped her rifle and timed herself.

The three came around the corner and she pushed the crate straight for the door with a push that went beyond what one might have expected of her. The box slid across the metal floor and swept for their leg to force them down on the ground. The snap of a leg was all she needed to know that it had worked on at least one person.

She perked up from the ground and over at her targets…

Two down, one standing. Not ideal, but better than none.

 

[Runi Verin]

[member="Amea Virou"]​

​

The last remaining mercenary was perhaps the least fortunate of his respective brethren, not withstanding Allen.

As he stood almost slack jawed at the sight of his two comrades lying on the floor, taken out by nothing more than a crate no less, he was unprepared for what magically appeared between his legs from behind. A solid and sickening c r u n c h as durasteel capped spacer boots introduced themselves to soft, painfully delicate nethers. He might have put on a good show yelling about the grenade earlier, but now all he was good for was eliciting a pained, squeaky noise that perhaps only registered in the hearing range of certain canines, chiroptera and that of the Bith. A follow up blow to the back of his neck as he dropped to his knees silencing even that.

She gave him a little shove for good measure, pushing him bonelessly to the floor.

"Take any ordinance they might have." Runi nodded towards the two battered and broken looking thugs that were struggling to do something, anything, in the wake of the ambush they'd so blindly rushed headlong into. One was fumbling for the blaster in his belt, his rifle scattered out of reach by the box, while the other was too preoccupied by his shattered tibia to really put up any form of resistance. Either way, she trusted Virou could handle herself with the pair. As much as she hated to admit it, the woman was far more competent than she'd originally expected. Not that that was saying much. "Last thin' we need is them blowin' themselves, or us, up tryin' to get out of here."

She wiped her tomahawk clean on her thigh as she spoke, seemingly oblivious or uncaring towards the bloodstains she left behind on the the drab flight suit she wore rolled down to her waist. It was already marked and smeared with several weeks of grime, grease and miscellaneous coolant fluids. A little blood was a drop in the dirty ocean at this point. "Any comms, too. We don't want anyone else bein' called in until after we leave..."

Runi trailed off as the smell of burnt spacer leather and singed duraplast reached her nose, causing it to wrinkle and her mouth to compress into a thin line of disapproval as she located the source of the miasma. A creased burn scarring the shoulder of her jacket. Somewhere in the fray a stray bolt must've glanced off of her. She hadn't even noticed at the time, but then all her tactile feeds in the cybernetic prosthetic were located in the unit's hand.

And to think she was worried about Virou being sloppy.

"Fierfek." She swore, thrusting her tomahawk back into her holster. "And I actually liked this karkin' jacket."

 

[Amea Virou]

[member="Runi Verin"]

You never got used to that sound. Amea winced as the snap and crunch of bones called out against the cold steel walls of the ship with an uncomfortably familiar sound. This other woman was colder than Amea was and it would be foolish not to acknowledge or notice that. Maybe it was a Mandalorian thing or maybe it was something that really wasn’t any of the Warden’s business, but care had to be taken. There was a calculated cruelty behind it that seemed to boil down to nothing but ensuring their own survival even if it cost them theirs.

That much was even more evident in the way she insisted that they should take the gear that the mercenaries had brought with them. Ordinance and comms, both which would allow them to call for backup and protect themselves. It wasn’t something Amea wanted to do, but she could see the need for it. Survival was do or don’t, and in their current disposition they didn’t have the luxury of morality.

Amea had faced situations like it before. She didn’t like them, but she had.

She let Runi take what she could carry. There was a bigger worry on her mind and that was the bodies outside. Unconscious or otherwise, they were in the way one way or the other. She began with the dead ones, dragged them into the reactor room where they had hit and placed them all against the wall once they had been stripped of all belongings save the clothes on their backs.

“... Just in case.” Amea muttered and threw Runi a cautious glance. “Seal this room off and we buy ourselves even more time in case they wake up.”

She grabbed one of the rifles and slung it over her shoulder. She grabbed a holster and a pistol to go with it and attached it to her hip, and with the grenades she could always stow those outside of their little tomb along with the rest of the weapons.

It was kind of funny to think about it. She had stepped into the ship unarmed and now she looked like a soldier. She threw her partner a glance and sure enough she looked like a soldier too. Perhaps she was one by more than just appearance too, but that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing in their current situation either.

Amea wouldn’t let her eyes linger. Keep her mind on the job. For now.

“I don’t think we ever got a proper introduction before.” Amea remarked with a grunt as she began to close the door to the room and enclosed the tomb. “Blaster fire, angry-” She grunted through her gritted teeth. The metallic door gave way, screeched with a whine that indicated what was most likely bad news for those trapped within before it shut close with a dusty bang.

“I am Amea Virou,” She said and gave a casual salute and nod. “Warden.”

 

[Runi Verin]

[member="Amea Virou"]​

​

There was little ceremony in the way Runi dumped her bundle of stolen weapons, the Mandalorian spacer simply tossing them aside into a careless heap the moment the doors were sealed behind them. Her scarred and tattooed features the very study of distaste as she eyed the assembled pile of grenades, rifles and blaster pistols. Relieving the mercenaries of them had served a purpose, but such weapons had never quite felt right in her hands.Even the chopped down carbine she wore on her hip was more there as a decorative deterrent than an actual weapon.

Warden?

Her head abruptly snapped up. She had barely been paying attention to the woman's introduction, not really seeing the value in remembering her name even after all that, but that one word was enough to catch her attention. Enough to catch her so completely off guard where even their assailants had failed. Prompting a rare flicker of surprise cutting through the perpetual frown; a momentary lapse in the otherwise guarded demeanor she wore almost as set of armor.

Well, that explained the moves and ease in which Amea'd dispatched her opponents if nothing else.

What were the odds?

Clearly not as astronomically slim as she'd thought.

"Runi Verin." The spacer offered stiffly in return, trying to regain a measure of her composure. Playing it off with a simple shake of her head and an awkward attempted roll of her shoulders. "Also... Warden."

Her gaze narrowed, turning speculative as she regarded the woman a little more closely. Before she had just seen her as nothing more than a potential rival for the salvage, an irritating distraction and then inadvertent ally of circumstance. Now, however...

Kark, outside of her mentor, in all her years plying the space lanes, she'd only ever crossed paths with three other wardens. Kaia Starchaser, Jorus Merrill and briefly his daughter, Mara. None of which she'd really spent any real time with. She didn't know how she was supposed to react to Amea's presence here. Secret handshake? Swap of the old decoder ring? It wasn't as if there was exactly a guide book for all this.

Runi tugged on her now ruined jacket, deciding to file it away for now. Instead turning to the more pressing matter at hand.

"We should move. With heavy gear like this," she nodded at the pile, "ain't no way were these karkers here to salvage. My guess is, these boys were just the muscle. The hired help. Which means, sooner or later someone is gonna come lookin' for them. I dunno about you, but I ain't overly keen on bein' here when they arrive, 'lek?"

Once again, she was already on the move before she had even finished her sentence. Keen to put distance between herself and the engine bay as quickly as possible. Whether or not that included Amea in the process...

 

[Amea Virou]

[member="Runi Verin"]

Runi Verin looked surprised when Amea dropped her title. Either she knew what it meant or-

The brunette blinked for herself and gave the other woman a surprised look. It was the first time that Amea had met someone else in her line of business, and truth told she didn’t really know what to do either. She felt like there should have been some kind of protocol for this. Some kind of way to identify other Wardens through some subtle crook to their walk or something. Then again, having a distinct knack to how someone acted would defeat the purpose of who they were supposed to be.

“A pleasure then.” Amea offered in response. Her hand moved to push at the straps of the blaster on her shoulder. It was too heavy and it brought nothing of worth with it. Same with the other ordinance, really. Maybe it was the idea that she was to be safer this way, but everything except the blaster attached at her thigh would provide nothing in an actual fight. And if something was pointless you got rid of it. Simple as that.

“I caught rumor of this site by a worker operating out of a Sullustan spaceport maybe… A week ago.” The sound of the blaster hitting the floor was far less intense than Amea had expected it to be. The sound of the detonators rolling across the floor just the same. “I think we might expect more than one team to come poking if we don’t get out of here.”

“Heard there might have been some good droid parts in storage.” She rolled her shoulders in a shrug. “And there was, except rusted to hell and back.”

“... Not sure what I expected on this one to be honest.”

“Why were you here?”

 

[Runi Verin]

[member="Amea Virou"]​

​

"One of my crews got wind of this place probably from the same place." One of her crews. She had it said so easily, so matter of factly, yet the actual reality of having employees, dozens or so crews, on her payroll was still a weird and uncomfortably new prospect for Runi. For most of her life she had been beholden to no one, now she had to concern herself with making sure everyone got paid on time and that the proper permits were in place. She snorted softly and gave a derisive shake of her head, her dark raven black hair clinging so tightly to her skin sweat soaked that the movement barely jostled it. "I figured I'd check it out first. See if it was worth putting in a claim."

Or maybe do a little less-than-legal salvaging, just to remind herself of who she once was.

Who she s t i l l was.

"Should've known someone else would be in on the action." She didn't expect them to come this heavy, however. Not for a trash heap wreck like this. Her brow furrowed slightly. This really was a trash heap. What the hell were they doing, sending seven heavily armed, if poorly trained mercenaries to fight over something this worthless? It didn't make sense. Not unless there was something else at stake here...

She abruptly spun on her heel, stepping towards Virou with sudden renewed interest, almost backing the girl into the wall as she pressed.

"This worker of yours, he happen to mention what the ship's manifest was? 'cause I ain't seein' the value of a dozen or so droids bringin' down this many heavies an' more beside."

If they wanted it so badly, Runi would be damned if she wasn't gonna get it first.

Just for spite's sake if nothing else.

 

[Amea Virou]

[member="Runi Verin"]

Could be a trap to get the eavesdropping hopefuls to catch wind of a treasure trove only to rob them blind and leave them for dead. Could also be that there was something of value in here too, but from what Amea had seen so far it was hard to really buy that one. The place was devoid of anything and the people she had paid to drop her off her was most likely aware of that.

Attention shifted to Runi who spun on her heel and began a slow approach. Threatening, menacing, yet clearly not malicious. At least not towards Amea herself which just helped make things all the more weird, uncertain. Amea’s jaw dropped as if to prepare some kind of defense or plea for her own safety, but what she got was not any sort of attack as much as a question.

Had Amea heard of a manifest?

“No?” She curled her fists up in case things would start to take a wrong turn with the answer. “They talked about some kind of prototype, but looking at all the rust and the state of this ship it’s just as likely that this is a trap.”

She swept away from the wall to give herself breathing room, a dodge almost.

“Look, just calm down.” Her hands uncurled, pushed down with her palms towards the ground as if to make a point and illustrate. “We can fix this somehow. Together.”

 

[Runi Verin]

[member="Amea Virou"]​

​

"What are you talkin' about? This is me calm." The Kiffar replied with obvious confusion, both brows launching upwards in apparent synchronized time with the woman's fists. Runi would be the first to admit that she could be a little intense at times, perhaps even admit she was rough around the proverbial edges, but as far as she was concerned this was here at the heights of her civility. The other woman was clearly softer than she'd first expected.

She snorted.

"Look, you can have your little... " There was a vague, swooping gesture of her hand, not even bothering to hide the disdain that was now creeping into her voice. Having enough trouble grasping at words to describe it, let alone pretty it up for the sake of her clearly fragile sensibilities. "Coreworlder style existential crisis, aruetii hut'uun moment... Whatever the kark you wanna call this, later. I need you to focus now."

Runi took a step back, giving the woman a bit more breathing room, mirroring her pose with her hands up in almost mock placation. "This prototype, do you remember anythin' else about it? Anythin' at all? I mean, beyond bein' clearly worth killin' over if these goons are to go by. Maybe what it was? What it did?"

She turned, adding almost to herself as she gazed back down the darkened corridor. "Feh, if I can get to the command deck, I might be able to jury-rig some life back in this cheeka. Get one of the logs workin'... If these chakaaryc doompa, dopa-maskey karkers want this prototype so much, they got another thin' comin'."

 

[Amea Virou]

[member="Runi Verin"]

They didn’t have the same idea of what calm was. It was far from being a foreign, coreworld born coward stuck with an intense woman on a ship that might have been put there to trap her and people like her within in order to murder them in cold blood and take all their stuff. If anything that made Amea quite the opposite of a coward, but hey if she wanted to start calling names and make assumptions she was more than welcome to.

The cocky grin faded the second the last ‘uun’ parted from Runi’s lips. Amea’s own lip would push against each other and her brows would quirk at the remark. She wasn’t a coward, she was anything but a coward, and the fact that this woman was here making assumptions that- No, that line of thought lead nowhere she wanted to go. Amea pushed forward, forced Runi to follow her for once if she wanted to get the details.

The command deck was bound to be somewhere around here.

“The prototype was some kind of power core. I couldn’t quite hear what kind it was, but judging by the droid parts scattered around the cargo it could be something to be put in droids.” She pushed the door ahead open with a half-hearted wave of her hand. “Potentially for an engine too.”

“Now, I’ve searched the cargo bay top to bottom and found nothing. Which leaves your guess that we could find something in the command bridge as our most likely guess, at least for the moment.” She shrugged once more. “I can’t sense any core, which troubles me, but it’s not unlikely that it might have rusted to dust as well. Or at the very least entered a state of severe disrepair.”

Another set of doors were forced open with strangely rejuvenated life.

“Something to be learned from the broken pieces of hardware too.”

“And uh,” She felt her grin tug at her lips again as she turned to look at Runi. “I wanna call it not-getting-backed-into-a-corner-by-an-intense-woman. The situation from before.”

“... It’s a good way to get yourself dead, you know.”

 

[Runi Verin]

[member="Amea Virou"]​

​

Power core? Hm. That helped narrow it down some. There were few things Runi Verin was willing to stake her reputation on, but being the best at scavenger hunts was one of them. Since she was a child, growing up in the scrappers heap of Kol Atorn, she had always had a sixth sense for finding things. That sixth sense had been recognized as a latent force sensitivity later on, and with training from Jacaro had only grown more and more acute over as she came into her own power.

Already she was beginning to stretch out her senses through out the wreck once more, less focusing on the signatures left behind by sentient creatures, more on the distinctive thrum that danced through live tech.

Just because Virou couldn't sense it, didn't mean it was beyond her reach.

Of course, that might have just been simple pride talking.

"I wouldn't know." Runi remarked absently as she worked, giving her wrist a reflexive roll that saw a flash of silver appear in her palm as if conjured forth from the ether itself. In reality, it was nothing more than a simple act of prestidigitation, however. The sheath for the alchemised blade concealed up the sleeve of her weathered pilot's jacket. "I've never let myself get cornered like that."

The knife vanished as easily it had appeared.

"Least, not without her buying me dinner first."

A feeble joke, made feebler still by virtue of it being the closest Virou would receive to an apology. She might not have seen anything wrong in the way she acted, but clearly it had bothered the other woman enough to adjust her demeanor towards her. Her senses might have been more attuned to the electrical field at the moment in time, but she even she could see that much and it... bothered her for reasons she couldn't quite understand. Or perhaps didn't want to understand.

"The way you handled yourself back there, the way you moved with those mercs, you could've handled yourself just fine." She gave a rough roll of her shoulders by way of a shrug. A tight, ghost of a smile flashing across her lips as she continued, "Of course, I'd still win. But it would be closer than I'd like."

Virou was much more adept at using the force for starters. Or at least more comfortable with the overt applications than Runi was, judging from how easily she telekinetically moved through the doors. Cutting their journey time in half until they were already nearing the command deck's outer blast doors.

She waited until they were neatly buffeted aside before she ducked through the gap, eyes taken a second or two to adjust to the low-light conditions now that her sense-based powers were otherwise occupied before making a beeline for one of the better looking terminals. "This should be it, you want to do the honours or...?"

It was rhetorical again. Watching Virou flex her 'muscles' all the way here had left her feeling a touch useless and in need to prove her worth once more. Already reaching for her toolbelt and ducking under the console, palming one of the spare power cells she kept for her blaster to use as a jury-rig power source. It wouldn't last that long, but it should be enough.

The screen flickered to life a few seconds later.

 

[Amea Virou]

[member="Runi Verin"]

There were so many mixed signals at this point. As they entered the command bridge there had been jokes of dinner, compliments and yet insistence that if it had indeed happened Amea would have been the one to lose. And then there was the offer of doing the honors as well as the inability to actually follow up on the question as Runi did the work herself.

Amea propped herself against one of the consoles and looked on as the woman got to work. Fingers wrapped around the ring on her ring finger with an uncertain squeeze. It was undeniable that something about this other Warden was interesting if not too interesting. She found her way around the console and knew how to jury rig a power cell into a makeshift battery.

A fanged tooth dug into her lower lip like a nervous tick or perhaps something else. Yet the relative calm of the situation would not be allowed to last. The ring on Amea’s finger slipped off of her finger and took to the air. A panicked struggle ensued in which Amea tried to grab it in the air, but it was in vain. A small clink sounded in the room before the force wrapped around its shape to bring it back into her hands but by then it was already too late. The smaller presence she had tried to hide behind began to expand into something far greater. Perhaps not torrential in its expansion, but certainly tidal. She was a master in her own rights, the subterfuge of her own presence was always a tactical choice.

“Clever.” She praised the jury rig and placed her hand on the console in an attempt to play it off. “The, uh, battery. And the console.”

She extended herself into the console on instinct as she felt it flicker to life. A surge of data coursed around the circuits yet it was all fragmented. The flicker that had awoken the screen was just that. A flicker, and Amea would push herself against the console to even it all out and send the impulses of the hardware in the right direction. It still flickered, it still had some instability but she soothed it to the best of her ability.

Amea’s knee met the metal floor and she tilted her head towards the console.

“Hurry.” She seemed strained. “I am doing my best here.”

 

[Runi Verin]

[member="Amea Virou"]​

​

There was a loud, meaty thunk beneath the console as the ring hit the decking. With her senses so extended in search of the prototype, the sudden coinciding surge in Amea's force presence was like having a flashbang set off right next to your ear, causing the Kiffar salvager and causing her to reflexively bolt up right in genuine surprise. Unfortunately for her, being situated underneath a heavy, deck-bolted computer console was the last place you wanted to sit up. The impact of her skull on the lip of the device predictably eliciting a loud and unadulterated...

"F I E R F E K !"

The woman herself surfaced a few seconds later, rubbing at the diagonal line that now bisected the top half of her forehead. A vibrant shade scarlet framing her left eyebrow with a trail of blood, forcing her to blink rapidly to keep her gaze free as she pulled herself to her feet, casting an accusative glare towards the other woman. Was that payback for the earlier hut'uun comment? Kark it all, she a petty cheeka if it was.

No time to dwell on it, however.

Pressing one hand to the cut to stem the flow, she palmed a security spike of her own design with the other. Not something that would stand up to the more recent advances in cybersecurity, but with an older, behind the times model like this, the brute force program should make short work of what little defenses the terminal could muster forth.

Sure enough, the readout quickly changed and became much more amenable to their presence.

"Ain't much here in the manifest about a prototype..." She murmured as she worked one-handedly, her features washed in shades of electric reds, oranges and yellows as she deftly cycled through the manifests and cargo readouts. Lips pursing together to form a thin line that was just as much from the concentrated effort it took to speed read through them all and also the pain that was lancing through her skull right that second. "Not too surprising. If its as useful as you hinted, I'd wanna keep it off the books, too."

Her gaze flickered towards Amea as she worked, mouthing opening to say something no doubt cutting or less than civil towards the other warden, only to close as she thought better of it. No need to distract her any further. The simple strain evidenced on her face would have to suffice for now. Schadenfreude.

"Hold it for another few seconds, I think I might have someth--- Kandosii! You karkers thought you were good, but I'm better." She grinned despite the pain, something far more rare and genuine than she'd displayed thus far. Even with the scar bisecting the corner of her lips, her features still managed to light up with the thrill of the small victory. "Third deck, machinist bay. There's a loading receipt for some pretty high end gear. Stuff you'd expect to find in a cuttin' edge R&D lab. Some pretty karkin' expensive materials, too. The amount of Isotope-5 they got comin' in... Kark, gotta be worth more than my entire ship."

Runi stepped back, yanking her spike out of the terminal, spinning it over her fingers before jamming it back into its holder on her utility belt. The tools jangling jauntily as she slapped Virou on the shoulder. Too pleased and excited by the prospect of profitable salvage to reign in her exuberance to her normal guarded, stoic facade. "Right, that's that then. Let's go steal us some osik."