One Night on Manda

[Miras Tinup]

After a few years, everything began to blur together. He traveled from planet to planet, city to city, always listening for the faintest stirring of that tainted chord, the lone echo that would alert him to his prey. A dozen custom checks, market places, and cantinas turned into a hundred turned into a thousand, and before long the ex-Jedi had lost himself in his work. Everything but the hunt ceased to matter, until it was a rare occasion he was alert or sober enough to even know what planet he was on.

This was one of those rare occasions. The planet was Manda, and he'd run out of spice after being there less than a week. The withdrawals were the worst he'd ever had- fevers, nausea, crippling pain- and he'd spent the next three days laid up in a scummy hotel with the door barred, listening to the screaming tenants through the paper thin walls. At night the screaming of security sirens was near constant, punctuated by the occasional whine of a blaster bolt.

None of it concerned him. It wasn't his job to save people from themselves. The deserved the evil they manufactured. No, his interests were in a darkness far older than man.

When he finally crawled out of the hotel room he was pale, red eyed, and in a foul mood, but he was also sober- for the first time in the better part of six months. Shaking hands fumbling through his cloak for a cigarette, Miras approached the Toydarian scowling at him from behind the front desk.

"How much?" he asked in a voice that creaked through strained vocal cords.

[member="Alkor Centaris"]

 

[Alkor Centaris]

"Don't give me that," Alkor spat as he pressed the handful of loose credits into the hands of a greedy contractor. "This is what we agreed on to start. Once I see a foundation, and not before that, we can enter the second stage of our agreement." The Mandan man shook his head disapprovingly, but he held to his word. With a wave, the construction droids and their operators began to drill and clear the lot. Within several hours, it would be a matter of airlifting in a prefabricated foundation and the work could begin. Alkor nodded to himself as they set to their task.

"That ought to placate the investors," he snorted. "I should hail Nikias and let him know that I've found a suitable location to conduct our affairs."

Speeders raced by and the busy sounds of commerce bloated the area as the Jen'jidai strode through the makeshift bazaar. The gritty smells of fornication and drug-use wafted across his nostrils, and Alkor was immediately reminded of a certain, small tenement home in the slums of Coronet city, so long ago now. He stopped and stared for a quiet moment at the hotel, where lights buzzed and he was acutely aware of passions stirring somewhere within. "What an eyesore," he muttered.

Before he could walk away however, Alkor saw the young man within. He looked emaciated, like consummate ruin given form. If the Force swirled within his body, it was clearly diluted beneath several layers of fatigue and the obvious effects of spice withdrawal. Alkor took the time to press through the door and passed his credit chip to the Toydarian. "Courtesy of Balmorran Arms," he grunted. The Toydarian hastily collected the payment and handled all of the expenses that the youth racked up over the past few days. "Forget that you saw either of us here." It was a request the alien did not mind agreeing to.

Alkor took back his credit chip and turned his gaze to the coked-out ex-Jedi. "Miras," he greeted as he accepted the card back and stowed it away. "Spice addict is a severe deviation from Jedi Knight, wouldn't you say?"

[member="Miras Tinup"]

 

[Miras Tinup]

He caught Alkor's cloaked form slipping into the lobby out of the corner of his eye, and a muffled groan issued from his cracked lips. It was rare that he ran into someone he knew, but always unpleasant. Their concerned gazes, the contempt layered beneath sympathetic tones and their such obviously feigned ignorance of his condition. At times- usually when he was on a bender- he caught himself wishing they had all perished on Carida. At others, he wished that fate solely upon himself.

As it were, his exhaustion permitted him little more than weary acceptance.

He finally managed to locate a stray cigarette hiding within his robes and placed it between his lips, pausing to rub at his bloodshot eyes before beginning the hunt for a lighter.

"I would say," Miras muttered around the cigarette, "that's a petty quip, coming from the Demon of Corellia."

"No smoking in the lobby!" the Toydarian suddenly shouted, his wings buzzing in agitation. Without looking at the clerk Miras flicked a forefinger in his direction, and for the second time the alien's eyes glazed over. He turned around and busied himself with a row of holodiscs, leaving the former Padawan to light his smoke in peace.

Exhaling an acrid white cloud, he turned his dull gray eyes on Alkor at last. "What are you doing here, anyway? Is it coincidence you happened by, or the divine providence of the Force?" He couldn't keep the mocking tone out of his voice, but it just sounded tired and petty, and he couldn't quite manage a smile.