Private Just Checking In

[Cato Harth]

“Well, they’re lucky you’re around then,” Cato smiled affirmingly at the woman in his lap, holding her gaze for a few long moments, “They’d be worse off otherwise.” Lousy job on their part or not, she at least stepped up and made use of her resources when it mattered.

“Tithe?” He echoed with some surprise. It took a moment to register. Not Chancellor. Moff. The rest of her story left its details implied, but he picked up on them easily enough, “...Ah.” His eyebrows quirked up momentarily, though he didn’t pry further, only adding, “I can imagine.”

“...So, with that in mind, why look like this?” He gestured at her figure before quickly adding with a suggestive smirk, “Not that I’m at all complaining, mind you. But if you can look like anything, there must have been some conscious choice behind it right? Do most Shi’ido settle on a ‘main’ form outside of their original?”

Inanna Harth​

 

[Inanna Harth]

She nodded her head. “Most of us choose a more unique form, though it can change throughout our lives. I spend a lot of time among humans, so it made sense to look human. Everything else is just… window dressing, I suppose.”

But since he had asked, she studied him more closely now, wondering what was going through his mind. If he had no questions, she’d have been suspicious, but at the same time she dreaded answering them. They always stung a little, a reminder that every non-shifter saw her as something weird and foreign.

“This actually isn’t my favorite form,” she said. “It’s close to it, but not quite the same. The other was… too soft-looking, I think, and I needed to be taken seriously.”

Cato Harth​

 

[Cato Harth]

“Hm.” Cato shrugged, finding her reasoning sound enough. He looked down at Inanna in some indiscernible train of thought. It was hard to imagine to some extent. There were certainly perks to being able to look like anyone or anything, but her use of the term ‘window dressing’ made him think. Existing under a series of facades seemed like something that would have its own fair share of struggles. He simply offered her a faint smile.

“Really?” His eyebrow raised. “...Can I see it?”

Inanna Harth​

 

[Inanna Harth]

Oh chit, he wants to see it?

“Uh… sure,” she said, her surprise apparent in the slight widening of her eyes. Standing up, she pulled the gold from her hair, tossing the pieces into his lap playfully. More seriously, she undid the clasps of her dress, causing it to fall to the floor at her feet. All very alluring, sure, but more practically she needed to be free from anything that might hamper her shifting.

It started with her hair. Growing in length, it faded from silver to snow white. The features of her face changed, becoming, yes, softer and more delicate, though it was merely a different kind of beauty.

By the end of it all, she still looked human, perhaps even more so than she did before. And yet, there was something unreal about this form. Draped in filaments as thin and delicate as a spider’s web, with a pearly luminescence to each strand, she was more dreamlike than the other had been. But she was no one’s dream but her own.

“So you see, it’s not so different from how I usually look,” she said, peering at Cato a little shyly. The liquid gold had drained from her irises, leaving them black as inkwells. “Just a bit more fanciful, I suppose.”

Cato Harth​

 

[Cato Harth]

Cato nodded encouragingly, which shifted into amusement as she tossed the pieces of gold into his lap. He leaned back into the couch and watched as she began her transformation, only letting out a dumb, "Uhhhh-" when her dress dropped to the floor.

First the hair, the her features, as she had described, not exceptionally dissimilar, though gentler. Cato leaned in as if to get a better look, and when she looked to him, he smiled warmly, "It's nice."

Inanna Harth​

 

[Inanna Harth]

She couldn’t help but laugh at his reaction, the same expressions on a different face. “Don’t want to ruin a perfectly good dress by shifting in it.”

He smiled at her, and she returned the smile. “It is nice, but it doesn’t exactly say ‘battle-hardened survivor, here to get chit done’, hm?” She slid into his lap. “You can be honest about which one you prefer. I’ll still look however I want, but honesty is good.”

Curling a hand around the nape of his neck, she kissed him.

Cato Harth​

 

[Cato Harth]

Cato chuckled, repositioning as she settled into his lap, "Heh, maybe not." He accepted her kiss with a grin, letting it hold his emotions for a few moments until he broke away.

"I'm not gonna make that choice for you," He whispered, quiet and husky. He touched a hand to her cheek, and ran the other against her thigh, "I just want you," Cato leaned in and kissed her again, more passionate this time, dipping over across the couch.

Inanna Harth​

 

[Inanna Harth]

There was little time to get another word in. Instead she let her actions speak for themselves, wrapping her legs around Cato, pulling him closer.

She thought about suggesting they move things to the bedroom, but at the same time she didn’t really care enough. The couch was fine.

At least, until they broke it.

Cato Harth​

 

[Cato Harth]

A couple days later

---

Defying Cato's expectations, their time aboard his ship had proven quite enjoyable after all. Dare he say, vacation-like, even. At least, in comparison to what they were heading for, it was.

A shame about the couch, though.

Cato jostled awake at the sound of a chime. In his dream it had sounded more like the one from Inanna's boat. In reality, it was more like the unpleasant caw of a bird choking on an alarm clock. He arched up, giving his surroundings a dazed once-over, before settling on the woman sleeping next to him in bed. He slid his legs off the edge and grabbed a shirt, before making the jaunt across the ship to turn off the noise. After starting up the caf machine, he headed over to the cockpit to see Nar Shaddaa outside the viewport.

Never again would've been too soon. But there it was. Cato sighed to himself, "Guess vacation's over."

Inanna Harth​

 

[Inanna Harth]

At the sound of a very unpleasant ship’s alarm, Inanna was tempted to shift away her ears and slip into the blissful silence of the deafened.

But then she felt the ripple of the sheets as Cato climbed out of bed, and realized where she was and what the alarm meant. They had reached Nar Shaddaa, and that meant no more fooling around, both literally and figuratively.

Grumbling, she got up and threw on some clothes. They were Cato’s—at least, she assumed they were—and thus were a bit too big for her, but she didn’t care. Her dress had a tear in it now, and while she didn’t quite remember how it had happened (they had inflicted quite a lot of property damage over the past couple days), she was certain the roguish Jedi had something to do with it. Therefore she was entitled to appropriate his wardrobe in the absence of any other clothing to change into.

While he was in the cockpit gazing out the viewport window in dread of what was to come, Inanna was cursing at the stove in the kitchen in both Basic and Shi’idese. Only after her bilingual tirade was over did the heat come on. “Cais ned’jin, is this thing as old as the ship?” she muttered as she started on breakfast.

Cato Harth​

 

[Cato Harth]

Cato followed the noises emanating from the kitchen and stopped by the caf machine, filling up two cups, “You’re cute when you’re angry.” Something about her Shi’idese. Then again, maybe that was because it didn't slip out only when she was angry...

He set one cup down beside Inanna and posted himself up on the other side of the stove. “It came with the ship when I bought it, so…maybe. Sometimes you just gotta…” The knight raised a hand, running it across the rear panel as if searching for something, then gave the center a heavy rap of his knuckles. There was a metallic whimper at first, but then the machine seemed to operate a little more according to her wishes.

Cato shrugged as if impressed with himself, and raised the caf mug to his lips for a quick sip. His eyes ran down her figure to her shirt. Or rather, his shirt. On it was the logo of some grungy wreckpunk band he had been obsessed with as a teen. He smirked, and scoffed amusedly, “Nice shirt.”

Inanna Harth​

 

[Inanna Harth]

Cato’s opening line earned a mildly irritated glare from Inanna, which he no doubt found adorable.

“Thank you, dear,” she said after he fixed the stove. Glancing down at the shirt, she smirked. “Terrible taste.”

Taking a sip of caf before returning to her work, she asked, “So, what’s the plan for when we get down there? Should we go back to that house to look for clues? Scour the Holonet? Feth around and find out?”

Cato Harth​

 

[Cato Harth]

It very much was adorable.

Cato grinned at her comment regarding the band shirt, “I ain’t the one wearin’ it.” He then slid into a seat at the table, still sipping at his caf as he pulled out a datapad.

“The house might be a good start. Chances are they’ve scattered since that hideout got compromised, but if we’re lucky they might’ve left something behind in the rush.” The same location was pulled up on his screen, “From there, well, guess it depends on what we find. Might be something I can use to narrow our search, or, yeah, feth around and find out.”

“I try not to put too much stock into my plans. They usually go wrong anyway.” He said with a lazy smirk.

Inanna Harth​

 

[Inanna Harth]

She hummed in agreement. “Okay, the house it is.” She gestured to the food. “How do you like yours?”

I am a writing god Cato Harth​

 

[Cato Harth]

"Iiii dunno, I haven't tried it yet," He shot her a look that was both amused and skeptical, as if she'd just asked him a rather dumb question. About a second later, it registered that he had given a rather dumb answer, "Oh, you mean- Uhhh, just however you want it is fine, I'm probably not gonna eat too much anyway."

Cato stood up to excuse himself from his own lapse in intelligence, "I'm gonna start taking us into atmo so we can land." He stepped out of the room, only to pop his head back in to add, "If you're not done before then I'll uh, let you know once I've got a dock set and we're about to touch ground. I wasn't kidding when I said it'd be more exciting than taking off." Exciting maybe wasn't the right word, but their landing would most certainly end with a bit of a bump.

As he said, Cato would return to the cockpit and begin the process in earnest, while Inanna finished prepping food.

Inanna Harth​

 

[Inanna Harth]

She stared at him. “Eggs, you mudha. How do you like your eggs?” She shook her head, muttering under her breath as he headed for the cockpit. “I guess I should just be glad you didn’t say ‘fertilized’...”

Force help her if Cato ever offered to help the Shi’ido repopulate.

He came back just to warn her about the landing. “Okay, I’ll cook faster,” she said sarcastically.

But she did eventually pop into the cockpit with a plate for him and herself.

“Probably a good idea to eat before we land, too.”

Cato Harth​

 

[Cato Harth]

If Cato had heard what she muttered, he would've choked on his caf, but he remained blissfully ignorant. To her sarcasm he simply offered a wink and finger guns, before heading to the cockpit.

Just as he'd positioned the ship over their go-to landing zone (broadly, their go-to landing zone; They were still observing it all from space), Inanna arrived with food in tow. "Thaaank you," Cato took his place and began chowing down hungrily, in direct contrast to his earlier comment of 'not gonna eat too much'. He gave her a sheepish grin, silently acknowledging that fact himself. "Good stuff."

Once finished, Cato cracked his knuckles and took hold of the pilot controls, and began to take them through the atmosphere. Inanna would still have time to finish before they actually made a landing, but he was eager to get the show on the road, "Got us a spot at the port nearest to the house. I could hardly understand the operator on the other end though. Think he was a Quarren. Or just drunk." Wouldn't be much of a surprise for Nar Shaddaa.

Slowly the black vacuum of space transitioned into thick, polluted air, tinted orange, and the ever-present neon lights gave life to the pillars of concrete and steel poking through the smog below. "Well, at least the trip back to Erakhis will be like another vacation, right?" Cato looked back at her, plastering a grin across his face.

Inanna Harth​

 

[Inanna Harth]

“You’re welcome.” Inanna wasn’t exactly holding back her appetite either, so she just snorted at Cato’s antics.

“What if… it was a drunk Quarren?” she suggested, putting the empty plates away and strapping in.

Their arrival was suitably bumpy. Inanna sat in her chair, arms crossed, looking like she wished she was back in bed while the ship rattled and jostled around her.

His comment at least got a small smile out of her, and when the ship finally stopped shaking she stood and leaned toward him before he could get up. “Here’s one to tide us over for now.”

It was a sweet kiss, tender and lingering. “Let's get this over with,” she murmured, playfully bumping his nose with hers before heading out.

Cato Harth​

 

[Cato Harth]

“That very well could be the case.” He replied, giving her the empty plate to put away.

Their arrival was expectedly bumpy, and ended with one final rock of the ship as the landing gear made a dissatisfied noise on hitting the ground. Cato had only just begun unstrapping himself from the pilot seat when Inaanna leaned over and gifted him with a warm, pleasant kiss. As she pulled away, bumping their noses, he couldn’t help a smile, “That might just do it.”

He joined her at the exit ramp, “Let’s.” As it lowered, he was struck with a moment of revelation, “Oh! I forgot to mention-” He stepped over and opened up a bay door, presumably for extra cargo, which in this case was a speeder bike. Decidedly a bit more polished and up to date than the ship itself, though not quite a luxury vehicle. “Oh yeah, this’ll get us there a bit faster. Ever ride before?”

Cato hopped on and hovered the bike over to the entrance, offering her an extra helmet and a space on the back. Once she got one, he would speed off the ramp and into the Nar Shaddaa cityways.

Inanna Harth​

 

[Inanna Harth]

The speeder earned a whistle from Inanna. “Of course you drive a speeder bike,” she said, side-eyeing Cato.

“I have ridden before, a long, long time ago.” Putting the helmet on, she sat behind him and wrapped her arms around his waist. They sped off... and yet, she said, “Go faster.”

Cato Harth​