Private Familiar Strangers

[Mercy]

NAR SHADDAA
ASHLINE TERMINAL
AFTER THE EVENTS OF THE VERY BAD DAY
Kloe Weo

She still wasn't sure why she had interceded on the behalf of the Vigo. But it had caused quite a lot of messes already. Luckily Mercy didn't mind messes.

Currently she was in the backroom of her new favorite bar.

She drank for free.

And the drinks weren't half bad either. But now it was time to figure out all this Vigo business. She had reached out to an old acquaintance from the Sith Academy.

Weo and her hadn't been incredibly close, but rubbed elbows on some of the lessons and missions. Back in those days she had some aptitude for Alchemy. Something that could come in handy to Mercy in the criminal circuit.

So now she waited for Weo to join her, she had already dangled money in front of her.

That was the one thing that Mercy had plenty of and didn't mind to part with.

 

[Kloe Weo]

Kloe wasn't one to go into a city without good reason, especially not the bright, crowded ones full of leering eyes and grasping hands. Nar Shadaa was an entire planet of that, and so she'd never gone there. She would have politely declined Mercy and her offer of mad profit, had the offer not been quite so mad or quite so plausible. Mercy was a loud, brutish idiot - but Kloe had always known where she stood with her. Out of her way, usually, and off her list of desired targets. Honestly, that alone was enough to cement Mercy as one of Kloe's favorite people in the Galaxy.

Kloe had made her way to the indicated bar directly from the starport, flanked by a pair of menacing-looking loth-wolves she hadn't bothered to leash. The hounds were well-trained, they remained directly at their mistress' side and snarled hatefully at anyone that got too close. They'd only bitten two or three people on the way here, and only in ways that were non-leathal provided the idiots that'd provoked her managed to get to whatever passed as a doctor in the crappy-club district of planet casinohell.

Entering the bar with her pets, Kloe strode directly up to the bar and placed a couple of credits down. The bribe was a guess. If this place was half as worth her time as Mercy seemed to think, chances were the guy didn't need an incentive to move Kloe along. Kloe did not want to guess, though. "Mercy is expecting me." The Sith intoned politely, glaring away from the bartender. He jerked his thumb towards the back room, and she awkwardly nodded and made her way in that direction with due haste.

Kloe breezed into the room, her wolves slinking in at either flank. She briefly scanned the area, located Mercy, and nodded a taciturn greeting. "Good afternoon." The Umbaran woman intoned quietly. "Where should I sit? I assume you have materials to review. Perhaps a presentation."

It was the closest thing Kleo had made to a joke in years.

 

[Mercy]

Kloe Weo

And yet Kleo didn't get her immediate attention or even a response.

Because Mercy suddenly leaned in, elbows on the table, and watched her two wolves with clear interest. That gleam in her amber eyes spoke of hunger and desire.

"Oh, you two are beautiful, aren't you?" Mercy cooed softly, warmly. They might growl back at her, depending on how Weo had been training them, but Mercy wouldn't be fazed by that whatsoever. If they did, she'd just purr back with sweetness. "Gosh. They are such cuties, darling." Finally Mercy leaning back against the seat and taking Kloe in.

It had been... a long time, hadn't it been? Since the Academy days.

"Mm, I was never one for the presentations, you know that." Teasing herself and Kloe in equal measure as she indicated the other seat in the room, to the left of her own seat at the head of the table.

It was all a bit stereotypical, but Mercy had always enjoyed the theatrics. Even more so at the academy.

"I was going to ask how you have been, but judging these two little cuties, you have been doing just fine, haven't you?"

 

[Kloe Weo]

The wolves were a better barometer for how Kloe was feeling than the woman herself, half of the time. As Mercy leaned in, one of them sensed Kloe's tension and bore his teeth. When her intent was clarified as admiration? Even affection? Kloe softly clicked her tongue. The wolf that'd been warning the large woman off calmed immediately, the second allowed his tail to wag in a manner most ungentlemanly. "They are wonderful." Kloe agreed readily, a rare smile on her face as she knelt down and ran her finger through the lustrous black fur of the more testy wolf. "The third generation I've raised. These two are the finest of the litter - my pride and joy."

The lolth-wolf pulled his eyes away from mercy as Kloe wrapped her arms around his neck, his tension quietly diffused.

"I'm working on a separate strain with no vocal cords. Breeding for territoriality and protective instinct" Kloe added fondly. "They should make fine guard animals - affectionate, loving, entirely incapable of warning a trespasser off before they strike."

Kloe glanced back up at Mercy from her position beside the dogs, her expression became unreadable again. Somewhere between an appraising side-eye and wary caution, which was how she looked at most people. "I am doing alright. I saw you were in the Kaggath." The Umbaran commented, her tone neutral. "It seems like a shitshow." Half slinking, Kloe sat in the indicated seat. One of her wolves rested his massive head across her legs, the other gave her an expectant look. Kloe responded with a small nod.

The Loth-Wolf trotted over to seek affection from Mercy.

 

[Mercy]

Kloe Weo

"Mm, it was a shit show, but one I managed to show off how excellent I am at destroying things." Mercy agreed and bragged equally easily but then she cooed again when one of the wolves parted from Kloe and came to her.

"You're too kind." She didn't lose track of the fact that Kloe allowed the wolf to come to her.

During the Kaggath she had tamed a number of vornsrkrs with just her presence in the Darkside and animalistic nature. Granted, back then she hadn't been in the presence of a real beast master.

Her hand reached out and softly scritched the wolf behind her ear.

"Do you like that? Yes, you doo... Yes, you do..." Scritching some more if the Wolf indicated that it enjoyed the attention.

"So, let's talk business." Mercy murmured while running her other hand through its fur with relish. It was truly a wonderful specimen. "It can't be cheap, working with these wonderful animals, breeding new variants, experimenting..."

Finally looking up to Kloe with a smile.

"People... Are approaching me. They want to be part of what I am doing, but you know me, I don't work that well with others. I could use someone at my side who has known me from the past."

Quinn Varanin was another option, but the princess had her head so far up her own ass, she would never agree to follow and obey Mercy.

Not without a serious beatdown anyway.

"Someone creative, eager, hungry for money. You perhaps? I could use the animals you are breeding, and your alchemical skills."

 

[Kloe Weo]

Kloe considered for a few moments. Mercy wasn't offering any details that she hadn't already implied or stated outright, or that Kloe herself couldn't deduce. The woman had made her debut in the big time, so to speak. She'd burst onto the scene at the Kaggath and was seeking to double down on her popularity by making moves. Such a position was sure to attract sycophants and parasites to her side the way remora flocked to a whale or barnacles to a ship, and she wanted people she could trust from outside of that structure to back her up, someone she knew wasn't a fair-weather friend.

Presumably Kloe hadn't been the only person she'd approached, nor had she been the only one to answer the request. After all, as bad as Mercy was with people? Kloe was much worse, at least to her own estimation.

Frankly, it seemed like a trap. Not the deliberate sort. If Mercy wanted to kill her, she'd have just killed her. No, this trap was much worse - where she found herself close to a rising crime lord's side, and was either attacked by her enemies or cut down when her usefulness crossed an imperceptible threshold from 'necessary' to 'dangerously necessary'. Sith 101 stuff. Self-sabotage was as intrinsic to the culture as wearing black or getting peevish. A more ambitious Sith than Kloe might've decided to hitch her wagon, make as much credit as possible, and then planned to jump ship when the heat was put on or try to take over, but that wasn't her. Such plans would surely backfire in Kloe's hands.

And she didn't WANT to betray Mercy, anyway. Betraying her would mean killing one of the few people from the Pomojema she'd had anything approaching a rapport with. Mercy was far too dangerous an enemy to leave alive. Even now, with her star ascending and her fortunes compiling, Mercy struck Kloe as a woman living like she had nothing left to lose - still desperate and hungry in spite of herself.

So Kloe had been planning to politely decline the offer. A Mercy annoyed and disappointed was less dangerous than an enemy in a year or two. The wolves had been security if she took it very poorly.

Do you like that? Yes, you doo... Yes, you do..." Scritching some more if the Wolf indicated that it enjoyed the attention.

"So, let's talk business." Mercy murmured while running her other hand through its fur with relish. It was truly a wonderful specimen. "It can't be cheap, working with these wonderful animals, breeding new variants, experimenting..."

But the wolf really liked her. Even now, his tail wagged slowly, swishing from side to side as he basked in Mercy's attention. Kloe glanced from the hound to Mercy, appraising. Calculating. "I feel that the hound is the perfect beast to harness the Dark Side." Kloe mused quietly. "Wolves - and dogs - are fueled by their passions. They love more intensely, compassion suffuses their bodies and fills them with hate when their kin or masters demand it. Fury is a pack of loyal hounds when on the hunt, either for hatred, hunger, or territory." The Umbaran explained. "Wolves have walked alongside humanity for as long as either of us can remember. I feel that this relationship mirrors that of master and student."

"I need funding. You know this." Kloe agreed. If the wolf approved of Mercy, she could give the other Sith a chance to disappoint her. "So long as it remains profitable for me to be involved, I'm in."

 

[Mercy]

Kloe Weo

"Mm, come on, Kloe... when have you ever known me to stand on sentiment?" Mercy purred with delight as she scritched the wolf behind their ear again and again.

It was a pleasure to work with beasts like this. They were simple animals, yes, but that was their beauty. They weren't treacherous, they did what their nature told them to do and hid nothing about that. You knew what you had with them. In a way that was why Mercy quite liked Kloe (or her closest approximation of like, which was to say, she didn't enjoy deliberately riling her up), because Kloe was similar to the beasts that she tamed and bred for her business and hobby.

Mercy knew what to expect from Kloe. Knew exactly what her limits were, what to ask and what to forget about. There would not be a disgusting surprise waiting for her around the corner.

"I will pay you richly... and I expect you to always come to me if you get a better offer." Mercy smirked there. "Because I value my people... I might just up the offer to retain you."

In truth this chit was exhausting to Mercy.

She wasn't a recruiter or a builder of empires. But she had rationalized it to herself: so many people were starting to follow her, no matter how much she was sending them away. She needed someone to watch her back. In Tionese culture, in den olden days as they said, the Tionese Emperors had a slave whisper to them at their moment of glory: You are a mere mortal.

That was the reminder that Mercy was seeking out now against every fiber of her nature.

Her hand, the eldritch one, made of wrong flesh that looked like liquid gold, reached out.

"Shake on it?" Mercy smirked warmly at that.

 

[Kloe Weo]

Kloe considered for a moment, weighing her options. Mercy wasn't offering anything entirely loathsome to her, terms-wise. It'd be nice to have a partner in crime with some clout and cash to throw around, even just to serve as a financial and muscular wall between herself and the people who might mean to hurt her. Or obstruct her path.

"I will let you know if I get a better offer." Kloe allowed. And she meant it, as well. It might mean Mercy raising to match the offer (in which case, a net gain) or a polite termination of their partnership. Most likely it would mean violence and one of them dying, though that was always going to be the assumed case if she was being paid off like that. "In return, let me know if my usefulness begins to wane."

It just felt like good business. Good, honest business between rough equals meant profits for everyone. The most successful hunters moved in packs.

Kloe forced herself to make several seconds of unflinching, spiritually painful eye contact as she shook Mercy's hand. She did not force herself to attempt a smile. There was no reason to start off their partnership by making Mercy think she'd be doing that sort of thing. Not unless the mood really took her, or she was especially fucked up - or both. Speaking of.

The Umbaran gave a fairly decent handshake before turning Mercy's hand over in her grip - examining the arm with a professional curiosity. "Who did this?" She did not pull the arm closer to look or wordlessly step into Mercy's space to examine as she might've when they were younger, but the appendage HAD her interest.

As did a beer.