To see Hylo Visz

He told Theron he'd see him later in the Cantina, then made his way through the tunnels to the Underworld Logistics center, as Hylo insisted on calling it. Basically it was where her contacts with smugglers, black marketers, bootleggers, and shady business concerns of all kind came together. It was a converted supply depot, still half filled with cargo containers, with a raised platform that featured large terminal displaying various flight plans, trade routs, ships out doing business, and crew status. He nodded to Blizz as he saw the Jawa tinkering with what appeared to be a vibroknife and a Czerka-manufactured disintegrator. Blizz waved back, and chattered, "Boss! Soon be able to stab and zap at same time!"

The Outlander smiled. "That's great, Blizz." The little robed alien certainly had a flare for imaginative combinations of technology, even if they were frequently unsafe for the wielder.

He spotted Bowdaar the Wookiee and Skadge arguing over something, and decided he didn't want to get involved. If there was anyone besides himself capable of putting the psychotic Hauk in his place, it was Bowdaar. Many of his allies had made good arguments against recruiting Skadge, despite their past association when he was just a Bounty Hunter and not the leader of the Alliance. However, his contacts with the Black Sun syndicate were valuable, and even the Hutts wouldn't cross Skadge, ever since he'd **** Nemro to eat himself. A long jabbering howl in Shyriiwook and the crash of a light alloy table being slammed into the floor seemed to cause the rest of the bustle in the chamber to cease, and The Outlander reached for his blasters when Skadge started laughing. "Alright, alright, take it easy. I was just making sure someone here had some guts! You're not bad, for a walking hair pile." Bowdaar's response was a succinct bark that didn't need much translation. Skadge shrugged his massive, toadlike shoulders and walked back to his usual corner of the chamber, where three other people wearing Black Sun insignia were lounging against crates of contraband.

"Well, looks like you were just in time for the afternoon show," Hylo said. "One of these days Skadge is gonna go too far, and Bowdaar'll rip his arms off and beat him to **** with the soggy ends. Which of course Tyresius - I mean Gault - put his money on in the dead pool." Smugglers frequently had a rather warped outlook on the hazards of their profession, he'd learned. Betting on the manner of a colleague's demise didn't seem that out of place.

"Put me down for 1500 on 'accidentally fried by one of Blizz's devices'," he said.

"Excellent choice, Commander," Hylo said, with a genuine smile this time instead of the sardonic smirk she usually wore. Her white teeth contrasted strongly with the warm green of her skin and the dark triangles of her Mirialan tattoos under her chicory blue eyes, the dyed red streaks in her space-black hair. She could be quite attractive when she wasn't putting up a cantankerous attitude. He understood why - in order to wrangle so many double-dealers, con men, gangsters, and stubborn independent spacers, she had be a no-nonsense hard case. More than that, she'd been double-crossed by a lover - Tyresius Lokai, her partner in a number of extremely profitable jobs - and was now emotionally defensive.

During the Great Hunt, the Outlander had been assigned to track down and eliminate Tyresius Lokai, and in a manner of speaking, he had. Once cornered on Tatooine, the Devaronian con artist pleaded for mercy, successfully. In order to complete the hunt, he'd produced a duplicate of himself - a vat-grown clone body that had never been, nor would ever be, alive, but would pass every medical scan and examination as being Tyresius Lokai. The Outlander had turned in the body, Tyresius became Gault Rennow, and he'd joined the motley crew. During their adventures together, Gault had found Hylo in stasis on Belsavis, and had revived her after decades of being sealed away. The reunion had not been a sweet one, and Hylo had sworn she'd get Gault back for what he did. Wars make from strange bedfellows, however, and Gault's smooth talking, knack for planning heists, and underworld contacts had brought him back into contact with Hylo. He'd come up with a scheme to rob the Eternal Empire for an immense fortune in order to fund the Alliance, and Hylo had taken his share in compensation. Oddly enough, the job had seemingly reignited their relationship, albeit a strained one, full of mutually justified distrust.

"My crews tell me you cleared up those pirates in the Sarkhai sector. Nice work, I'd been about to stop taking jobs there after losing two good ships and even better flight crews. Not enough payoff for the risk," she said. "I got a bottle of Jorgan fruit brandy here with your name on it, as a means of saying thanks." She walked over to an open topped crate filled with all manner of luxury goods and reached in, bending over the rim over it to grab the bottle. He couldn't help but notice how nicely her trousers fit her, showing off the firm curve of her bottom and sleek lines of her legs. Soon enough she straightened up and raised the bottle, the rich amber liquid sloshing inside the clear crystal. "Made from distilled Jorgan fruit, cask aged for 20 years. This batch was distilled the year I went into stasis. Not the best year for me, but a good one for a brandy." She handed the Outlander the bottle, their fingers brushing briefly, his armored gauntlet against her smooth pilot's glove.