Private How to Spice Up a Vacation

[Nalah Tezan]

Location: Wielu Space
Local Time: 10:32​

Ah, Wielu, one of the most beautiful and private resort planets in the Inner Rim. An oasis of golden sands and sapphire waters, dotted by islands supporting some of the most advanced luxury hotels in the sector. And of course, populated entirely by wealthy sophisticates who were utterly convinced the galaxy couldn't see what they got up to here. But that business, all those skeleton-filled closets were what brought Nalah and her unique new business partner, Lucretia Lister , as well as many, many crates of stimulants she had stuffed into hidden compartments on her ship.

If she was being honest with herself, Nalah had a few misgivings about her current partner in crime, the woman was in far too good a shape, and far too well armed, to just be another smuggler baron looking to edge in on the stim market. And considering her first job pitch was getting disruptors from the scar worlds, it was clear Ms. Lister was a major player, or crazy, or probably both. Now, far be it from Nalah to pass down a chance at more credits, but some part of her was slightly worried that Lucretia might be the sort of business partner to keep a rancor pit under their office for bad days.

"We're coming up on Wielu-controlled space now, Lucretia." Nalah announced to the woman in the copilot chair. "If you've got any to say or ask last minute, now is the time."

Nalah liked to make sure she knew what she was flying into, and that some employers like to save details until you were too far in to turn back.

 

[Lucretia Lister]

Wearing: Liar's Flesh

Armed With: Turncoats

Double Agent (Blue Saber Staff)


Lucretia had made herself useful once the cargo had been brought aboard, making sure the cargo was secure and intact, and in good faith had sent one half of Nalah's payment--two aurodium ingots each weighing each 20 kilograms (about one million a piece) to a drop off of Nalah's specification. The Stimulant being transported? Mnemiotic Drugs.

Why did all these rich people want memory retention drugs? Lucretia didn't know, and didn't care. She was just the supplier.

The silver garbed, elderly woman with an almost impossible athletic figure for someone her age had come along to make sure Nalah made it in and out from the buyer intact. It was most just bored moguls, but Mnemiotic Drugs were an unusual request, even by her standards.

Nalah's face was reflected perfectly against the chromium like fabric of the skin tight metallic gray catsuit.

"The People who are buying these stimulants have always paid what they owed and have never tried to betray me..." Lucretia answered, and it was the truth. "A bunch of hedonist obsessed loonies wanting to try something other than spice. Or perhaps mix it with what we are delivering. I don't anticipate betrayal but I couldn't help but note the unusual request, so I am coming along to make sure things go smoothly as usual. Just let me do all the talking and we should be fine. If shooting starts for whatever reason, just run and my associates will deliver you the rest of your payment. But I don't anticipate problems, not with these sorts. Everything should go smoothly, in which case, we have plenty of time to celebrate. These resorts are actually fun..." Lucretia assured her.


Nalah Tezan

 

[Nalah Tezan]

"Never fear, I'm fully aware of how fun these resorts can be." Being a charming scoundrel had its perks, Nalah had vacationed on someone else's credits across the Outer Rim, from Cantonica to Cloud City, but this was her first time on Wielu and it was her first time trying to move mnemiotic drugs through their borders.

"And don't worry about me in a pinch, I can take care of myself, either talking or shooting." Nalah was fine if Lucretia wanted to take the lead on this operation, but she didn't want to be reduced to a taxi driver on this operation, she wanted a chance to show off her value as a smuggler.

The Angel soon entered offically controlled Wielu space, which was already bustling with yachts, liners, supply freighters and security ships. Nalah knew how to fly like she belonged here, even when a pair of interceptors flanked the Angel to guide it closer to the planet.

"Transport Ardent Angel, please transmit landing codes and cargo manifest for arrival Alekie Island Resort Spaceport." A voice came over the comms, likely from one of the security ships.

Lucretia Lister

 

[Lucretia Lister]

Lucretia nodded respectfully. "I understand Nalah, please forgive my presumption. I take the safety of those who work with or for me seriously."

Lucretia smiled a little as the request for landing codes and a manifest came in and she transmitted an expertly falsified manifest, after transmitting the landing codes.

After about thirty seconds, the confirmation came back.

"Alright, everything checks out. Welcome to Wielu." came the voice on the other end.

"Delighted..." was Lucretia's reply, patting herself on the back for enchanting the smuggled crates to hide all signs of the drugs from scanners. A single vial was worth thousands of credits.

Lucretia cut communication with the interceptors.

"We're good to go, Nalah. Take us in the rest of the way..." Lucretia said, impressed at how expertly Nalah Tezan guided the vessel.

"Our buyers should be waiting for us..."

 

[Nalah Tezan]

"I forgive you." Nalah teased a bit, hoping to keep the mood for the trip light and easygoing. She could tell Lucretia was strapped with enough weaponry to make a Mandalorian blush and Nalah wasn't in the habit of annoying well-armed crime bosses.

As Lucretia transmitted the codes, the Zygerrian did her ever best to maintain a cool head with the two interceptors dogging their steps, knowing that the Angel was ill equipped to outrun them, let alone fight them. When she could handle her own logistics, these sorts of approaches didn't worry her, but relying on someone else's codes and crates always got her hackles up. Thankfully, it seemed that the scanner protections and the codes were able to get them cleanly through the blockade without much fuss.

"Roger that, Ardent Angel on approach vector 97.35 to Alekie Island Resort Spaceport." She announced over the comms before switching them off. "Now let's get down there and get unloaded."

She brought the ship down smoothly and steadily into port, flying over the the crystal waters and silvery sands toward the bustling resort spaceport, although their specific landing area was in the less well-trafficed cargo areas, removed from any prying eyes at the civilian landing zone. As the Angel touched down, Nalah didn't see anyone waiting for them at the drop point, neither Wielu customs or any sign of a buyer.

"Wasn't someone supposed to be here?" She asked, both hands slowly wringing the starship controls.

Lucretia Lister

 

[Lucretia Lister]

Nalah Tezan expertly piloted to the space port and Lucretia frowned. She had told these damned hipster goons to be here ready and waiting with the money.

Lucretia's frown deepened...

"Yes, they were..." Lucretia said, getting her saberstaff out, popping open the hatch, her Force Sense tingling harder than Tobey Maguire every time he hears Willem Dafoe laugh.

Two blue blades hissed out of her ornate hilt, the synthetic crystals within having a deeper hum than normal.

Lucretia stepped into the cargo area, looking for her contacts, and barely started to get more concerned when the feeling of danger amplified.

Just then she saw a glint of a scope beyond and was blocking swarms of silenced blaster shots that grew in intensity, forcing her to spin her weapon around her body rapidly, sending some of the shots back at their sources hidden in the darkness of the cargo bay. Silenced Ion blaster fire began to rapidly pelt Nalah's vessel in an attempt to disable. Lucretia heard cries as her reflected shots found their first victim, blasting open his chest. These were not her buyers.

Lucretia was already fuming. Had those idiots leaked the location? It wasn't police attacking them. She saw gang signs on their skin, tattoos displaying their affiliation. Silver colored cats.

Remind me, what did curiosity kill? she thought to herself as she deflected blaster fire, the gang suicidally determined to best a trained Force User...

 

[Nalah Tezan]

Nalah was prepared for this to be some kind of last-minute negotiation tactic, maybe a sting by local authorities if they were really unlucky. But what she was not prepared for, was for Lucretia to immediately pull out a pair of lightsabers and, the second she stepped off the loading ramp, to be peppered with a dozen blaster bolts from out of the darkness.

"Oh for fark's sake!" The Angel might not have had many weapons, but Nalah was not without her own weapons. Heading out the back of her ship via the observation deck, she arrived just in time to see a gaggle of heavily tattooed figured emerging from one of the maintenance corridors. Figuring it was safe to assume these weren't their buyers, Nalah dropped to cover behind the railing, leveled her blaster, and opened fire on the incoming goons, catching one in the head and forcing the others to break for cover.

Lucretia Lister

 

[Lucretia Lister]

It was glitterstim. It had to be. Most gangs ran when they saw a Lightsaber. Only Stim could make someone this stupid.

Lucretia slowed three people down with Telekinesis, dashing close and cutting them down mercilessly. She then Force jumped towards another gang member and beheaded him with an elegant spin of her blade.

At last, after Nalah Tezan joined the fight, the gang at last started to retreat, but still fired, and one threw a Frag Grenade.

"Duck!" Lucretia yelled.

The grenade went off and the shrapnel caught some of Lucretia's side, a metallic scream eliciting from her throat as dull green blood poured out as she was flung backward...

 

[Nalah Tezan]

Nalah was hesitant to break out the heavy artillery just yet, these gangers likely weren't working for local law enforcement or some heavy-hitting syndicate, they fought like junkies: full of crazy and devoid of skill. She was able to keep the few attackers trying to flank her and Lucretia pinned with blaster fire, but when they broke cover and began to retreat Nalah got concerned. She didn't know of many things that could convince a group of stim-adled thugs to cut their losses and run, other than maybe a Jedi.

Looking down the hangar in the direction of the screams and heavy fire, Nalah quickly realized she did, likely, have a Jedi on her side, as Lucretia tore into the approaching gangsters with lightsabers. The devastating display left the gangsters in pieces, and Nalah's jaw hanging open, but it also meant that she didn't notice when a grenade was thrown into the mix, until she head the scream and the explosion.

"Oh kriff, Lucretia!" She scrambled through her ship to reach the unloading ramp while shouting: "Teddy, man the Ground Buzzer, our client is down!"

The maintenance droid chirped affirmatively before wheeling into the cockpit to plug into the co-pilot console and activate the Angel's Ground Buzzer cannon before turning the weapon on the few stray gangsters fleeing from the landing field. Nalah, for her part, was more concerned about getting her maimed client back to the ship after watching that grenade go off so close to her. Part of her was worried for the woman's life, the other was worried about her bottom line with a dead paymaster.

The Zygerrian swallowed her concerns at her ostensibly human partner's green blood before, with remarkable strength, hoisting the injured woman onto her shoulders and carrying her into the Angel, where she laid her out on the first table she found in the dining area and tried to frantically stem her wounds with towels.

Lucretia Lister

 

[Lucretia Lister]

The muscles under Lucretia's flesh moved, still bleeding dull green blood as Nalah Tezan carried her aboard her ship. Her flesh shuddered, her suit beginning to repair her body even as Nalah attempted to do her own fixing. Errant muscle tendons, also green in color wriggled about in the exposed air as the towel were applied, the flesh rapidly covering them.

Lucretia opened her eyes, and sat up, damaged flesh hanging from exposed muscles on her face starting to seal, but slowly.

"Quick thinking, Miss Tezan..." Lucretia said pleasantly, her face bubbling hidiously a few seconds before it resettled on the skull, the wounds on her face almost gone, flesh pushing out shrapnel.

"I apologize if this disturbs you. I...paid a price for the kind of power I wield. Not all of it was pleasant..." Lucretia explained.

 

[Nalah Tezan]

In the frantic rush of trying not to let her associate die, Nalah had missed out on a few key details, like the bubbling green flesh and the strange meat-tendrils snaking under Lucretia's skin, knitting her body back together piece by piece. Once she'd actually started trying to tend her wounds directly, however, she quickly realized what was happening, and had to fight every natural instinct to throw up in shock and disgust. She'd seen some disturbing things in her day, being a child of Nar Shadda, but this was far and away the strangest thing she'd witnessed in a long time.

"..." Maybe the gut wound she could handle, but watching a skull reassemble itself was too much, and she lurched over the counter to throw up on the bar floor. "Oh gods...that just isn't right..."

She took a minute to catch her breath and try to soothe the acidic burning in her throat, doing her best to avoid looking directly at Lucretia's rapidly reforming body.

"What...what the Hell are you, some kind of changeling?" Nalah heard tales of species that could shapeshift, but she'd never met one before, and frankly had assumed it was all drunken spacer-stories.

Lucretia Lister

 

[Lucretia Lister]

Lucretia nodded, the waving loose, muscle tendons finally repairing themselves and vanishing under toned skin, which itself was covered by a self repairing catsuit.

"I am a changeling of sorts, yes." Lucretia answered. "I do apologize for frightening you. As a compensation for your discomfort I will had another one hundred thousand credits to your pay for this job, and I commend you for your take charge attitude of the situation. I clearly made the right choice in hiring you." she said to Nalah Tezan .

"I am a sort of Witch known as a Force Spawn. I practice a difficult and demanding form of magic that has permanently mutated my body." Lucretia added in explanation to Nalah Tezan

 

[Nalah Tezan]

It was surreal to watch someone discuss the finer points of their weird, arcane anatomy, and a bonus for their work, while their skin and flesh slowly molded back into place, like watching a mannequin melt in reverse. The explanation wasn't doing much for her confusion, or nausea, but the mention of credits did manage to get business back on her mind, and that raised further questions.

"So you're a...witch. Got it. Great. Good to know." She paused to light a cigara with shaky hands and take a drag off it so deep she nearly burnt the thing down to the filter in one pull, and the cloud of scented smoke she produced was just as impressive.

"But back to the business at hand, who the frak were those guys? Was this an interception, or did we get set up?" A bit of technical talk helped get her mind of rippling meat.

Lucretia Lister