Oh, Great. It's you.

[Sarge Potteiger]

Contruum

[member="Mia Monroe"]

If there was any reason for Sarge to have a blatant dislike for a blatant like this, it was the Stars awful heat it had. It wasn't that the Mandalorian and Republic citizens used it as something of a no-man's land for doing business despite the frosty relations between governments. He could live the with Mandalorians, for the most part.

But the heat, on the other hand. That he could not live with. He'd rather be freezing than sweating, and with many of the major cities here located in the tropics, well... he was pretty soaked.

There was nowhere else for him to realistically get his beskar repaired - not to say it was particularly damaged, but regular maintenance was better left to those who knew the secret of the metal alloy - without getting immediately arrested because he wore a brown robe.

Bunch of friggin' idiots, the lot of 'em. Sith overrunning the galaxy and they're arguin' over whether or not we should be neighbors.

Leaving his armor in the care of the smith, he'd donned a battered old tshirt and shorts and settled an old shockball cap over his head. Battered glareshades covered his eyes despite being 'inside' of the open air bar. Glass of whiskey in front of him, he raised it to his lips and tipped back the contents for a burning gulp.

Reaching a hand up, he scratched at the renewed growth of the beard on his jaw before dropping it to rest on the saber at his waist as he eyed the folk around him. Far too crowded, but he wasn't gonna stray far from his beskar. Never knew what sorta thieves lurked around places like this. Tensions were always high, which meant crime was rising too.

Could never be too careful. Still, he imagined the relaxed way his hand rested on the weapon would imply it was more a comfort thing - that is until he took it off his belt and set it on the counter, tapping a finger on it as he lost himself in thought.

 

[Lina Ovmar]

It was hot, and it was wet, on their own the two weathers were bad enough, together they were brutal. This wasn't a fun mission on its own, let alone with the awful conditons. She was here to set up contacts, run her eye over the place and people they were dealing with, report how bad the situation was back to the Mand'alor so they were better prepared when they took control of it. And why send Mia? Because she'd dealt with their kind before. A long time ago, before sith screwed with her life, before all the wars started. Safe to say she'd lost her touch a bit, but fear was a useful ally, when applied to the right people.

She was already at the bar when 'Preacher' sat down, but her was on her blind side and she was staring intensely into the bottom of her glass. It wasn't until the thunk of his saber settling on the bartop that she looked round. At her first look, she didn't recognise him, she simply noted the lightsaber on the belt and felt that familiar danger rush up her spine, a hand dropped instinctively to her blaster.

Then she looked at his face again and smirked. She removed her hand from her blaster. "You're a long way from home Preacher. Flashing that shiny cylinder around might not be your best move."

[member="Sarge Potteiger"]

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

[member="Mia Monroe"]

There was a long pause as the bearded and scarred man turned his attention towards her, a brow visibly raising behind the opaque lenses he sported. "Yer intelligence must be good." He says, voice a low tenor, quiet and unremarkable.

"Ain't nobody in the Order save one person ever seen my face." There was a bit of a sardonic smirk on his face as he downed another gulp. "Didn't expect to see the Leash Holder here."

"So, to what do I owe the pleasure."

He just ignored her remark about the saber.

 

[Lina Ovmar]

"My intelligence is exceptional, but there's only one good beskarsmith on this planet." She left the rest for him to work out on his own, a cold smile spreading across her face at his title for her. Damn Larraq and his insolence. She clicked her tongue and looked away, sipping at her drink before responding.

"Contruum is my favourite place to be, plenty of criminals, smart and stupid and lots of work if you look in the right place." Better that she played the mercenary card rather than letting him know that the Mandalorians were looking to close the gap. Waste of time if you asked her, but no body asked her anymore. Too concerned about what ran around in that head of hers.

"For example, there's a might high bounty on Jedi Masters at the moment, and clearly they think its OK to advertise where they are." Mia had no intention of collecting any bounty from the sith, but she wanted to see how he'd react, see how well he knew his neighbour.

[member="Sarge Potteiger"]

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

"I been had this saber on my belt since I walked off the freighter." He retorts with a snort, shaking his head as he eyed up a Rodian down the bar haggling with the bartender about... something or other. It was hard to hear over the noise of the vendors in the street and the music coming from the ceiling speakers. "Pretty sure if someone wanted to try that bounty, they'd have done so already."

There was a shrug though as he mentally conceded a point to himself. "Unless they figured I was a mercenary, and this was a trophy. In which case, I'd say I'm OK either way. Either they're dumb enough to attack a Jedi, or they're dumb enough to attack a mercenary who took down a Jedi."

"Either way, probably not good for their healthcare provider."

 

[Lina Ovmar]

Mia shook her head and finished her drink, looking towards the bartender for another whose bartering with the Rodian was becoming heated, she turned back towards Preacher.

"You're arrogance is overwhelming, but not surprising. You've gotten off the freighter, and dropped off your armour for repair, that makes you vulnerable. If you are a Jedi Master, chances are you're not that vulnerable, but why would a Jedi Master need armour? That knocks you from master to merc, so the bounty is void and the dumb ones have lost interest. These are, however, desperate times, and a chance of seven hundred thousand credits isn't one to pass up. So the smart ones will watch, they'll make note that the saber is the only weapon you're carrying. They'll follow you for a while, wait till you're at a disadvantage, distracted maybe get a crew together."

She glanced around the room. "You wouldn't be able to tell who they were because at this point, you're sitting with your trophy in front of you and that's drawing eyes your way on its own."

[member="Sarge Potteiger"]

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

"Ain't arrogance." He replies dryly. "Merely fact. Yer average bounty hunter is dumb, and frankly, ain't heard of a good one in a long, long time." A century or more, in fact. "Most the time folk get captured, it's cause they did something stupid. Like went straight into enemy held territory waving a flag saying 'come get me.'"

Winking at her, he smirked and downed the last of the whiskey, raising a hand for the bartender to get over here and refill it.

"But just as my view is based upon my experiences, so too are yours. You're expecting I didn't peg potential threats when I got in here, or that I wasn't doing it on the walk. Folk round here interestin' in me and what I got are gonna be of the desperate variety, as you've mentioned.

Desperate means dumb. I can handle dumb. Done it before, can do it again." There was no boasting to his tone - in fact, he may as well have been reading a recipe off a sheet of flimsi. "So way I see it, Rodian down at the end of the bar there." He raised a finger to point, "Is my only real threat. He's demanding to know if I paid in Republic credits. I can tell not because I can hear him, but because he's pointing at his own money, attempting to shake down the bartender who, in turn, is lookin' at me."

He gave a faint wave to said alien. "Trandoshan behind me has been given me an evil look since I got in here, mostly cause he's curious about the saber. Probably thinks it's a trophy."

There was a smile on his face. "But he's noticed the slugthrower tucked into the back of my shorts, and written me off.

Rest don't care - 'cept you."

"So, we gonna continue this or you gonna tell me yer name?"

As he said that, he lifted his glareshades to rest above the brim of his hat, revealing a pair of eyes as black as the void. Not a single spot of white existed within them, and as he turned his head towards her with a smile - mostly cause his drink was being refilled just then - she'd catch sight of the shrapnel scarring on his right cheek. It almost looked chewed.

But it also put into stark view the saber burn across his throat, as if someone had either tried to slit it with a saber or decapitate him.

He was well aware he wasn't your normal Jedi. Not by far.

 

[Lina Ovmar]

Mia chuckled at his comment regarding flag waving. No, this was not your average Jedi. Most Jedi she's met trusted on their gut feeling, but this man was more aware than you average Jedi. He thought like a soldier, assessed the world around him using his five sense, not his sixth. Mia was betting his force powers were centered on strength and speed enhancement. The scars were impressive, but as a woman who supported a multitude of her own, she was not phased by them in the slightest.

"Ain't it a pity that all the smart ones are preoccupied with things like war, and flag waving." She smirked and shook her head. "If you don't know my name I ain't telling you. Its nice to be forgotten for a change." Bored of waiting to be served now Mia pulled herself up so her stomach was resting on the bar top and reached for the bottle of whisky, and sat back down on the stool. The bartender shouted towards her, she ignored him and topped up her own drink before sliding the bottle to the Jedi.

"You are arrogant." she said softly "S'not the same arrogance you find in your average Jedi. It's the sort of arrogance that makes you confident enough to take on a whole army and come out on top." She took a sip of her drink "I know a soldier when I see one."

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

"That ain't arrogance, Miss." He says, chuckling as the words left his mouth and she forced a drink into her hand with a five finger discount; for the moment, at least. "That's just self-assurance. An arrogant soldier is a dead soldier." That had been pretty much true since the dawn of war.

The more you thought yourself invincible, the quicker death decided to remind you you weren't. "Thanks fer callin' me dumb, though." He says with an amused grin and a raise of his eyebrows. Glass raising in toast to her, he downed a gulp and snorted. "Really, truly. Makes my day knowing you think so highly of me."

Rolling his shoulder as he cracked his neck, he hunched himself back over the bar, dark liquid swirling slowly in his glass. "But you're right. I'm a soldier more than I'm a Jedi. Politics isn't my thing, and neither is standing by to let others fight. Not when I can do it for them; fightin' ain't for everyone."

There was a sad smile to his face at that, as he knew it was true, but that didn't stop those who didn't know how to fight from having to fight. War made everyone equal that way.

 

[Lina Ovmar]

"You're most welcome." she replied raising her own glass "I make it a point to compliment at least one self assured git every day."


Mia rolled her eyes at the melancholy in his smile. "No, not everyone is built for fighting. Those of us that are, are so frakking far from the war its painful to watch. So you can take that melancholy and shove it somewhere it ain't reminding me what a di'kut my leader is." The bartender had finally shaken the rodian off and marched along the bar to confront Mia who closed a hand round the bottle to stop him from snatching it away.

"You gunna pay for it?"

"You gonna make me?" she replied, face deadpan. He hesitated for a moment, eyes flicking between her, and the man with a saber on the table before him.

"No." he said finally, and walked away. Mia grinned and shouted for him, when he turned she flicked a cred chip at him. He caught it, and grumbled something she couldn't hear. Relinquishing her grasp on the now paid for bottle she took another gulp of her drink. "Surprised to find you this far out if i'm honest. Wouldn't have thought given that state of things, they'd let you comer out this far just to fix your armour."

[member="Sarge Potteiger"]

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

"I've found that, generally speaking, if I really need to forget things for a little while, be it how daft command is or how moronic those around me are capable of being, I tend to just stick things in other folk." Sex was great for that, and that's all he was going to say in response to her wanting his melancholy gone.

He was always going to be honest, even about things like that. "Ain't got much time for that anymore though." He smirked a bit, taking another gulp before toasting the bartender as he left. Good on her for actually paying for the drink. Wasn't like a Mandalorian to cheat someone. Pragmatic, conservative folk generally weren't scoundrels.

Generally. Every garden had it's weeds, after all.

"They know I can handle myself well enough. Besides, ain't uncommon for folk like me to just go on trips out to places like this just to get the lay of the land; see how things are going." Scouting was important. But he wasn't going to admit he simply didn't tell them until he was on his way.

Stupid, yes. But frankly he followed all their other rules so he knew he was fine. He didn't apologize for his temperament, after all.

"I'd ask you the same question but you're a lot closer to home."

 

[Lina Ovmar]

Mia smiled at his honesty for dealing with idiots, she looked away for a moment her own sadness flashing up to her face. She flexed her fingers, wishing very much that the man who'd made her these hands was close by. She caught herself, took a large gulp of her drink and pushed the matter aside before looking back at Preacher.

"See how things are going, huh?" she smiled "Looking pretty shiny, don't you think?" So many people had tried and failed to bring the planet under control. It was no man's land, and as far as she was concerned, it should remain so. Taking a planet like this under their rule was asking for trouble. "Some things never change, no matter how hard you try to change them. Contruum is one of those things, best it be left alone, or so I think. Others say different, and others are in more control that I am. Times coming where you're not gonna be able to come here to fix your armour."

[member="Sarge Potteiger"]

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

[member="Mia Monroe"]

"Sometin' on your mind?" He asks, watching as she looked away. While he couldn't see her face, it didn't take much to read a bit of body language. "Lookin' very shiny." He snorted a bit, gulping down the last of his drink. "I'll find a way, Miss. Always have, always will. Plenty of Mandalorians elsewhere. Just didn't want to bother having to track them down, since the odds of them bein' a smith are disturbingly low."

 

[Lina Ovmar]

"Always." she replied softly in answer to his question. "Though not always something I can share." Another gulp of the drink and it was gone. She reached for the bottle fingers curling round it, she tugged it towards her. For a moment her fingers drummed on the glass, fighting a silent battle to throw caution into the wind and drink herself stupid, or to stop while she was ahead of the game.

"My name's Mia Monroe." she said finally, pouring herself another drink and offering the bottle to Preacher. "Used to be Mand'alor the Liberator. When all this goes to shid, I'll hook you up with a beskar smith."

[member="Sarge Potteiger"]

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

"I know the feelin', Miss." He says sadly, blinking a bit and averting his gaze. It was something he knew far too well for his own liking. "Ah, see. There's a name I recognize. Not sure why, might come to me later, but it's somethin' I know. Sadly I gave up trying to remember the Mandalores. Still, I can't imagine the mental fortitude needed to run a nation. Just... ain't my speed, really."

Taking the bottle, he poured himself a healthy dose and set it down between them. Giving a nod of his head in thanks, he settled himself in comfortably. "Much obliged, Miss Monroe." Pulling his shockball cap down lower over his brow, he frowns, head suddenly jerking as he realized the Rodian was gone.

"Oh... but this will be fun." He smirked, immediately downing the drink and beginning to grin. "Hope yer ready." Spinning on the stool, he settled his back against the counter's edge, elbows propped behind him. "Odds on a posse?" A hand reached behind him, slipping his concealed pistol around his waistband to the right side of his hip.

He hadn't been wrong; it was definitely a slugthrower. It had once, many moons ago, been a very popular model. This particular one clearly had a shorter barrel, though, custom hammer and a grip stylized like snake skin in browns and blacks.

One thing was very obvious about it, though. It may as well have been an antique.

 

[Lina Ovmar]

"Nor is it mine, not anymore anyway. Sith have seen to it that I am no longer capable of such fortitude." She didn't waste time finishing her drink, the desire to wash the bitterness from her mouth was overwhelming. "Ready for what?" she looked round, blinking fury at something unreachable form her eyes. "Oh." She chuckled and swung round so she was sideways on at the bar. "I'm always ready. How many do you think he can rustle up? I reckon for the likes of you...maybe eight."

She eyed his slugthrower, and pursed her lips almost in jealousy. "Nice gun." she hailed the barman as the rodian reappeared in the entrance. "Look after this will you." she said, shoving the bottle of whisky at him. Confused for a moment he looked between the pair then caught sigh of the rodian, colour draining form his face.

"Not in my bar." he growled.

"Oh shut up and keep your head down." She turned her attention back just as the rodian and his gang planted themselves in front of Preacher. A smirk was forming on her face.

[member="Sarge Potteiger"]

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

[member="Mia Monroe"]

"Six." He says, looking at her without his gaze leaving that spot on the street in front of him. Fingers dropped to tap against the grip of his gun, saber still on the counter behind him. Apparently, he thought he wasn't going to need it. "I think we were both wrong though."

He counted five, but there were probably more somewhere around. Likely with either long range firepower or an escape route. "So what can I do ya for, boys?" He says in a deadpan, face devoid of emotion. It was almost like he was bored, but the serious nature of his gaze threw that straight out the window.

There was a cliche, that when it came to combat... things seemed to slow down around you. Minutes felt like hours. What once was fast became slowed. Thing was, it wasn't a cliche. All that adrenaline pumped even your mind into overdrive - at least that's how he'd always thought of it.

And he was already starting to feel his heart pounding out of his chest.

"We're here for the bounty, and if you aren't a Jedi, we can still sell that saber for a pretty penny." Very true, he wouldn't begrudge them that. A nod of his head conceded that point. Sabers were rare - ones that worked could only be made by Force Users, so those who could sell them on the black market did. They were quite the find.

"Mmm, well, Miss Monroe... do you think that's fair? I don't really think so." He looked over at her, not overly disturbed by the bounty hunters. It was calculated on his part. He wanted to enrage them, so they could fire the first shot. The threat of force wasn't the application of it, and as a Jedi he wasn't going to engage first.

 

[Lina Ovmar]

Mia rested her head on her hand for a moment, elbow propping her up on the bar. She gave the group what could only be deemed as a pitying smile. Her senses were coming to life with each passing moment as adrenaline began to charge through her body in anticipation of the fight. She lifted her head from her hand as Preacher addressed her. that pitying smile became a smirk, she knew what he was doing. Tutaminis began to charge through her body, in preparation for what might follow.

"Not in the slightest bit fair. But then I wouldn't expect much less from a gang of cowards and fools." She could she the rage etching in their faces with each passing moment.

"Why don't you do the smart thing, and really think about what you're about to do before you do it." she addressed the rodian, ignoring his little gaggle of followers.

[member="Sarge Potteiger"]

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

Tapping his fingers along the grip of his pistol, clearly lost in thought, the man's void black eyes shifted from Mia to Posse, then back again. "Well, I certainly don't wish for no violence." He says with a quiet exhale, eyeing the Rodian and the thing that passed for it's mouth as it squealed out expletives in its mother tongue.

Well, tongue, perhaps, was being a bit generous.

Leaning over to Mia, he whispers - "He says he does." Preacher... did not sound amused.

"Sad, really."

The group had raised it's weapons, and Sarge had the nagging sensation that he really needed to draw... and draw now. The Rodian squealed, and with a motion so practiced as to be automatic and near impossible to see coming that antique pistol was in his hands and two holes were appearing in the chest of the Rodian.

Setting his feet on the foot rest of the stool, he pushed himself up so that he was sat on the counter and pushed himself backwards as fast he could to tumble over onto the other side. It wasn't graceful, but it worked. He was concealed as blasterfire smacked against the bar counter, even if he was in a heap on the round.

Looking around, he found his saber on the floor nearby and hefted it to hook onto his belt. If Mia was perceptive enough to watch his shots, she'd find that the Rodian had on chest armor - Sarge alternated his rounds. The first, in the chamber, was always armor piercing.

The second was a hollow point.

One to shatter the shield, the other to shatter the body. He was quietly glad he'd put trench sights on his pistol though; easier to aim on the fly.

Pushing himself up to sit his back against the counter top he waited to see what she was doing before going further.

 

[Lina Ovmar]

Mia was on her feet as Preacher took his shots and disappeared over the bartop, blaster fire slammed into her, exposed skin glowing with each fresh shot that hit it. The rodian had been knocked back with the slugs but his comrades took up the assault well enough. Mia stepped forward, speed increased as they continued to give her energy with the blaster fire.

Fingers locked around the wrist of the first one she reached, his blaster taking a shot point blank to her face. Light blinded her, but did not slow her. Fingers squeezed and twisted sharply. A loud crack and a scream was a satisfying enough response, still holding the limp arm she cracked him with her right hand then let him drop. Blinded, but unhurt she drew her blaster and trusted in the force to guide her aim.

A second posse member took a shot to the shoulder, spinning him about and into a table. Out of the fight for a moment. Customers were scrambling for the exit and the rodian was getting back to his feet.

[member="Sarge Potteiger"]