Just another bar in Nar Shadaa

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Just another bar in Nar Shadaa

Post by Maul_Junior »

The alarm went off, shrieking to anyone that would listen that they needed to pay attention. But nobody did, as usual. Then, slowly, a hand reached over and swatted the button that turned off the alarm. "Two minutes to reversion," a bored human voice boomed over the ship's intercom. "All meatheads to their station." In the cockpit, the human switched off the microphone with a flourish, and readjusted himself in his seat. It was a supposed to be a milk run into Nar Shadaa, but it was still a run into Nar Shadaa. A quick glance over the status lights glowed bright red to indicate everything was working well. Not for the first time, the captain cursed the incompetent technician who had flipped the "all good" status lights around.

With a tremor, the hypnotic view of hyperspace became starlines, and the starlines became stars. And suddenly they were above the smuggler's moon. The armpit of the galaxy. The home of the scum of the universe. "It's good to get back to base, isn't it?" Himnos Altar glanced over at his co-pilot, who flashed him a brilliant, toothy grin. Himnos grunted and turned his attention back to the scanners.

The redhead studied the sensor readouts for several seconds, and found everything was as it should be. "Clear Skies, this is Maelstrom." he said, activating the ship's comm. "How are the repairs holding up?"

A derisive Rodian snort came from the other end. "The light over the console is out, but we've managed to hold everything together with duct tape."

There was a pause, and another voice cut in. "To be fair, it was like that when we got it. And the top wingy bit's still rattling whenever we come out of hyperspace though."

"Oy, it's got a proper name!" the rodian snapped.

"Kids," Himnos barked as he slowly fed power to the engines. "Not over an open comm frequency. You guys going to be okay to reenter atmo, or do you need to stay topside for a repair team?"

"Sorry, boss." the Rodian said. "We should be fine, we'll just be a little slower than normal."

"We'll go slow. Stay in sight," Himnos said. There was a brief acknowledgement and the shuttle disconnected. Himnos heaved a sigh of relief. He had half-expected the other ship to disintegrate on reentry to normal space. Or for the hyperdrive engines to conk out and the ship to splatter against Nar Shadaa's mass shadow. "There's times that I hate this job," he groused to himself quietly. That earned him a playful punch from his co-pilot.

It was true that he was a young commander of the outfit. At just over thirty standard years, he had seen a bit of action and what seemed like half the major space lanes in the Galaxy. The Jack Traders weren't really well known, but had had their fair share of work. The red-haired man studied the scanners one last time, then goosed the throttle a little bit more as his co-pilot contacted harbor control for landing slots.

"We're clear for our standard spots," his co-pilot announced cheerfully. The Selonian slapped his arm playfully. "What are we playing tonight, Sabaac or Dejarik?" Not for the first time, Himnos stared at his co-pilot. The luxurious black fur that covered her body was only interrupted by a white patch around her right eye, and a light brown right forepaw. She looked more like a pet to some strangers, but more than a few people had paid for their speceism with their lives when they underestimated her. Alora needed specialty clothes and a custom co-pilot's chair, but there was nobody Himnos would rather have at his side than this particular Selonian.

"Neither for me," Himnos said. "I'm going to hit the usual places and see if I can round up some work." his copilot grunted noncommittally. "Now pay attention," Himnos commanded. "We're getting pretty close to the major space lanes."



Six hours later, the passengers had managed to disembark from the shuttle and the Maelstrom, though not without several choice words for the ship, the pilots, and the Jacks in general. The Clear Skies had been consigned to a scrap heap and was probably 90% disassembled by now, and Himnos was on his third Surian tonic. He'd told his crew that he'd try to find work for them, but that had just been an excuse to go drink, and they all knew it. Carting those eggheads to and from the egghead convention was bad enough. the fact that these eggheads weren't too smart and literally had eggs in their heads that caused something akin to schizophrenia was frustrating. If only the job had been to lug around a few professors, none of his crew would have minded. But two dozen eggheads had driven them all nuts.

The bar was one of the nicer ones in this area of Nar Shadaa, which was to say dark, dirty, and filled with liars, cutthroats, and thieves--the standard fare for any Nar Shadaa bar. But the odds of dying in the Sad Panda were considerably lower than in any other place in a 2 kilometer radius. The music that could barely be heard over the sound of muted conversation and glasses clinking together was pre-Clone Wars, and not very good. It was a good thing Himnos didn't come here for the music.

"Just two hours," without an egghead, Himnos groused to himself, half muttering and half thinking the words. "Get paid" and drink up, he groused. Tomorrow find a client that wouldn't "get them blasted," he muttered.

He signed and leaned on top of the bar, signalling for another drink. If he went ten years without seeing another egghead, it would be too soon.
Jack Thompson wrote:I think I’ve got a First Amendment right to annoy people
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