DATAPAD // COMMUNICATIONS
SHADOW CHANNEL: UNSOLICITED
SENDER: BIG BOSS DON GUNGA
STATUS: READ
Lew Ardellian had received job offers from criminals, legitimate freight concerns, people who insisted they were legitimate freight concerns, and once from a man who had somehow gotten his comm frequency from a cantina tab Lew was reasonably certain he had never paid.
This was the first one to threaten him with the phrase
soft-hearted lopity-pie.
He sat back in the pilot's chair and read the message again.
The datapad rested against one knee while the rest of the cockpit went about the low, familiar business of keeping the ship alive around him. Somewhere beneath the deck plating, a pump cycled. The navigation computer quietly complained about a correction he had been ignoring for the better part of an hour. Lew paid neither much attention.
Bring goods to Coruscant, get clink.
That part translated easily enough.
The rest amounted to dangerous cargo, dangerous customers, an undercity club and a prospective employer sufficiently concerned about mishandling the merchandise to mention explosives before mentioning what the merchandise actually was.
Lew rubbed a thumb along the edge of the datapad.
"Well, you're certainly selling it."
There were several excellent reasons to delete the message.
Unfortunately, most of them were also reasons the job probably paid well.
His thumb moved across the screen, opening a reply field. He considered asking what exactly qualified as
huge-o money, decided anyone advertising themselves as Big Boss Don Gunga deserved at least one opportunity to explain it in person, and started typing.
OUTGOING // ENCRYPTED
Big Boss,
No clankers. No soft hearts. Fingers work fine.
I've carried temperamental cargo before, although usually somebody tells me what it is before warning me not to drop it.
I'm interested.
Send me the address, what time you want me there, and enough of a number that I know whether "muy muy generous" is worth going into the Coruscant undercity for.
— Lew Ardellian
He read it once, changed nothing, and sent it.
The message disappeared into the shadow channel.
Lew set the datapad beside the throttle and finally acknowledged the navigation computer's increasingly persistent warning. Whatever Don Gunga was selling, moving, exploding or arranging for other people to explode, there was time to decide whether it was a terrible idea once he knew how much the terrible idea paid.
Besides, Coruscant had decent bars.
Some of them even let him come back.
