An Intermission and an Offer

“And that’s the cargo, now where’s the payment?” you ask a rather shifty looking Twi’lek. This was the third such job that you and your crew had undertaken in the last two weeks. So far it has been a rather boring affair.

“Cargo? This is just a few tons of miscellaneous luxury foodstuffs!” the Twi’lek replied. He was not too happy with your haul.

“You’re the one who failed to specify exactly what cargo you wanted” you tell the man, “we ordered the ship to drop their cargo and they dropped their cargo” you explain.

“You ordered them to drop their cargo. . .” the Twi’lek began, gaping like a fish “You were supposed to KILL that idiot!” the Twi’lek snarled “Wait until Tubulla hears of this!” he added.

“Tubulla?” you ask “Wasn’t it Abulla before?” the Twi’lek’s face blanched as he realised his mistake. He held your gaze for another half second before turning around and making a dash for the nearby exit to the club you are in. You give Tanna a look, she sighed, drew her blaster and fired a round into the back of the fleeing Twi’lek.

“So, now we have a few tons of miscellaneous luxury foodstuffs to deal with” Tanna sighed before slumping into her chair. You and Tanna had found a club not far from your landing pad and had promptly made it home base. So far the jobs you were attracting from this place had been very lackluster, but at least the drinks were good. You take a sip of your Corellian Whiskey as you casually run your eyes over the various dancing Twi’leks. There was one that had caught your eye when you first entered the place, a lime green, petite Twi-lek. She had all the moves down to an art, the only problem was that she didn’t have the assets to show off and thus drew no customers.

“At least we now have something to sell” you say, “at least until Sata decides to dig in to the miscellaneous luxury foodstuffs” you add. Tanna snorted in amusement.

“How many times can we say ‘miscellaneous luxury foodstuffs’ in a sentence?” she asks rhetorically before taking a sip of her own drink. “Sometimes I wonder if this is really worth it, we are spending a lot of our time here in a Hutt club” Tanna muttered, staring idly into her drink “You just know the girls shaking their arses on stage are slaves” she continued.

“From a certain point of view, this could be considered the greatest place in the galaxy” you tell the Twi’lek “But there’s this club back on the level I found you on that has great food, drinks and dancers” you add. Tanna smiled a tired smile in response.

“Uhh hello?” asked a shy Nautolan female as she slipped into the booth with you and Tanna.

“How can we help you?” you ask her. She was a pretty standard sea green colour and was wearing standard shirt and trousers, so normally you wouldn’t expect a girl like that to be hiring anything, let alone pirates.

“Are you perhaps mercenaries?” she asked, looking like she was about to start shaking in nervousness. It probably didn’t help that Tanna had shot a dude not long ago. The way the girl’s eyes were constantly flicking to Tanna made you think this was the cause of the girl’s fear.

“Close enough” you reply, taking another sip of your drink. The Nautolan swallowed heavily before continuing.

“W-would you be able to d-d-do something?” she stammered out.

“Depends on what you need doing dear” you reply, sighing as you realised she was going to be one of ‘those’ people.

“There’s a ship c-carrying goods that was taken f-from a Hutt, the Hutt wants the goods back” the Nautolan told you.

“And this Hutt wants YOU to hire mercs to do this” the girl nodded, looking like she was about to cry. You sigh again. “Cash up front kid, don’t want a repeat of our last job” you say, looking over the girl’s shoulder at the Twi’lek corpse that was being cleaned up by a pair of droids. The girl nodded a bit too vigorously, her head tentacles bobbing around her. “400 Peggats” you say and sit back, watching as she considers the price.

“I don’t have the money on me, where do you want me to bring it?” she asked, not quite keeping a nervous squeak out of her voice. You look at Tanna for the reply.

“Landing pad D6A17/3” Tanna said and the Nautolan nodded.

“What’s your name kid?” you ask just as the girl was about to leave.

“Adanna” the girl replied before slipping out of the booth and definitely not running away. She may not have been running, but you’ve seen people run slower than the speed of her ‘walk’.

“Thoughts?” you asked your Twi’lek first mate.

“She seemed way to cute to be a Hutt lieutenant” Tanna replied, taking a sip of her drink.

“Maybe there’s a story there? Or maybe the Hutt didn’t care, you know what they are like, can’t tell the difference between a Twi’lek and a Wookiee” you comment.

“I hate Hutts” Tanna mumbled, you slipped your arm around her shoulders and brought her into a side hug.

“I think that’s the point of their existence” you say “even Hutts hate Hutts” you add and get a snort of amusement from the Twi’lek.