Cato Fett
Character
+Mid-Rim+
+Kastolar Sector+
+Kwenn System+
+Kwenn Terminus Orbit+
+Kwenn Station+
“Only saying,” said a Garon coolie, a former footpad bearing clan markings in hard iron casement with proud ‘Imperial’ blazoning. “The offer’s a peace initiative, peace! In our generation! Mark it, everyone can come home, everyone. All debts, all insults, all wrongdoings forgiven or at least forgotten. Take this, ner’vod. Please, in good faith. Spread the word. The Empire needs her children to return.”
<Please remain seated~ Automatic docking procedures now in effect~ Have all pertinent ID and required visa’s ready for review~ Docking commencing~> An automated PA recording, sing-song-like and accented with Iridonian tonality, broke into Cato’s reprieve with staticky Huttese. Mechanical shocks shrugged up through the fuselage, up through his boots and rump. He adjusted against buckled crash-webbing and watched across the passenger compartment, through a hull-side porthole window peeping at heavy mechadendrite mating arms spooling from Kwenn Station’s square-pocked siding. Entry/debarkation umbilicals were extending, laser-guided and locked to portside airlock clefts. Droid stewards, moving on submerged servo-rails in the flight deck, whisked down the central aisle and collected passenger refuse and trash. The waste bag was bulging when Cato leaned and tossed his styrene cup in.
<Please remain seated~>
He returned to reviewing the long sheet of printed flimsiplast; narrow, blade-cut, edges browned from laser-grade heat, neatly type-set in Mando’a characters and signed under Yasha Mantis’ adopted sobriquet: Mandalore the Infernal. It was a comprehensive invitation. The language writ and copied in the extremely formal mode, rendering weight and an almost imperceptible aromatic impression of age and must to the hard-inked strokes. Summarily, it offered every and all Mando’ade the opportunity to return to ancestral space without fear of reprisal. Exiles either for the Liberator, or just undeclared, were welcomed to venture through Mandalorian territories without threat of martial prosecution or abuse.
What wasn’t apparent was whether the guarantee came with a caveat. Did citizenship and all rights pertaining require every and all to, at last, give the office of the Infernal a bent knee? Cato searched the wording, convinced the roil in his belly wasn’t undeserved. Something struck him as illicit. Mandalorian peace, especially in the wake of intercise fighting, only came with surrender. They’d few words for compromise, compared to a score for ‘subjugation.’ The missive was clever, cajoling easy cooperation, or so he thought. Cato weighed possibilities against inherent doubt. The Death Watch resurgence had left him prickly with paranoia. Were they not a people of culture? Did they not value the honour of a promise, a word once given? Didn’t that implicit sense of communal trust buoy them above the iteki, the faan-gwai-loh, the aruetiise?
No, Cato thought, it does not. Our own word has lost its value. The killing’s become too easy. And any brat weaned on the lap of Ra Vizsla is no more trustworthy than the viper warmed inside it’s mother’s coils. Acceptance means surrender. I’m not yet convinced we’ve been wrong keeping the Infernal and her empire at arms length, or wrong in refusing the Death Watch’s authority. We are a people edging towards ignominious extinction and in the end, there will be no last stand on the plains of Mandalore. We’re undeserving of that.
<You may now undo all buckling and webbing restraints~ We thank you for your cooperation~ Enjoy a pleasant stay~>
The missive folded up in his fingers and was left in the seat pouch, Cato standing out of his seat straps to collect a long duffel bag stuffed in the overhead baggage. Ahead and aft, the airlocks had cycled open and a thick draft of recycled air shuddered through the passenger quarter. Pressure equalized. His ears popped. At his hip, he gave Mala a little knock on her brow with a knuckle and ushered her towards the forward umbilical, bodies jostling behind at his shoulders. This time, his grasp was kept firm across her neck scruff after muttering a warning.
She could filch to her heart’s content but only after they were aboard the ‘Kwenn. He’d kept the tiny Squib busied with a datapad app: Maze Chase. Her paws had scrabbled relentlessly to catch her cursor up to inordinately quick diamond sprites racing ahead through randomized labyrinth constructs. One or twice, she’d managed to catch up to her digital prey and claim points to her score. She couldn’t know Cato had set the game difficulty high.
“Tell me what you’d like for dinner,” He said to Mala as he reached and led her on by her paw.
[member="Mala"]
+Kastolar Sector+
+Kwenn System+
+Kwenn Terminus Orbit+
+Kwenn Station+
“Only saying,” said a Garon coolie, a former footpad bearing clan markings in hard iron casement with proud ‘Imperial’ blazoning. “The offer’s a peace initiative, peace! In our generation! Mark it, everyone can come home, everyone. All debts, all insults, all wrongdoings forgiven or at least forgotten. Take this, ner’vod. Please, in good faith. Spread the word. The Empire needs her children to return.”
<Please remain seated~ Automatic docking procedures now in effect~ Have all pertinent ID and required visa’s ready for review~ Docking commencing~> An automated PA recording, sing-song-like and accented with Iridonian tonality, broke into Cato’s reprieve with staticky Huttese. Mechanical shocks shrugged up through the fuselage, up through his boots and rump. He adjusted against buckled crash-webbing and watched across the passenger compartment, through a hull-side porthole window peeping at heavy mechadendrite mating arms spooling from Kwenn Station’s square-pocked siding. Entry/debarkation umbilicals were extending, laser-guided and locked to portside airlock clefts. Droid stewards, moving on submerged servo-rails in the flight deck, whisked down the central aisle and collected passenger refuse and trash. The waste bag was bulging when Cato leaned and tossed his styrene cup in.
<Please remain seated~>
He returned to reviewing the long sheet of printed flimsiplast; narrow, blade-cut, edges browned from laser-grade heat, neatly type-set in Mando’a characters and signed under Yasha Mantis’ adopted sobriquet: Mandalore the Infernal. It was a comprehensive invitation. The language writ and copied in the extremely formal mode, rendering weight and an almost imperceptible aromatic impression of age and must to the hard-inked strokes. Summarily, it offered every and all Mando’ade the opportunity to return to ancestral space without fear of reprisal. Exiles either for the Liberator, or just undeclared, were welcomed to venture through Mandalorian territories without threat of martial prosecution or abuse.
What wasn’t apparent was whether the guarantee came with a caveat. Did citizenship and all rights pertaining require every and all to, at last, give the office of the Infernal a bent knee? Cato searched the wording, convinced the roil in his belly wasn’t undeserved. Something struck him as illicit. Mandalorian peace, especially in the wake of intercise fighting, only came with surrender. They’d few words for compromise, compared to a score for ‘subjugation.’ The missive was clever, cajoling easy cooperation, or so he thought. Cato weighed possibilities against inherent doubt. The Death Watch resurgence had left him prickly with paranoia. Were they not a people of culture? Did they not value the honour of a promise, a word once given? Didn’t that implicit sense of communal trust buoy them above the iteki, the faan-gwai-loh, the aruetiise?
No, Cato thought, it does not. Our own word has lost its value. The killing’s become too easy. And any brat weaned on the lap of Ra Vizsla is no more trustworthy than the viper warmed inside it’s mother’s coils. Acceptance means surrender. I’m not yet convinced we’ve been wrong keeping the Infernal and her empire at arms length, or wrong in refusing the Death Watch’s authority. We are a people edging towards ignominious extinction and in the end, there will be no last stand on the plains of Mandalore. We’re undeserving of that.
<You may now undo all buckling and webbing restraints~ We thank you for your cooperation~ Enjoy a pleasant stay~>
The missive folded up in his fingers and was left in the seat pouch, Cato standing out of his seat straps to collect a long duffel bag stuffed in the overhead baggage. Ahead and aft, the airlocks had cycled open and a thick draft of recycled air shuddered through the passenger quarter. Pressure equalized. His ears popped. At his hip, he gave Mala a little knock on her brow with a knuckle and ushered her towards the forward umbilical, bodies jostling behind at his shoulders. This time, his grasp was kept firm across her neck scruff after muttering a warning.
She could filch to her heart’s content but only after they were aboard the ‘Kwenn. He’d kept the tiny Squib busied with a datapad app: Maze Chase. Her paws had scrabbled relentlessly to catch her cursor up to inordinately quick diamond sprites racing ahead through randomized labyrinth constructs. One or twice, she’d managed to catch up to her digital prey and claim points to her score. She couldn’t know Cato had set the game difficulty high.
“Tell me what you’d like for dinner,” He said to Mala as he reached and led her on by her paw.
[member="Mala"]