Gutter Goddess
Arris picked idly at her noodle dish. Some fusion of a hundred different food cultures that, over time, coalesced into an "authentic" bit of Coruscanti cuisine. But she knew the ingredients. The same shit served at every street food stall like the one she parked her ass at. Though everyone acted like it was a cornerstone of the community - a business that had been there for nearly a hundred years, allegedly tracing its lineage to an even older establishment before the plague.
"So it's true then," an amused voice picked up behind her, but she didn't acknowledge it at first. "I mean, I heard you were back... fought in some big tournament a couple years back?"
She finally glanced over her shoulder. He was oddly familiar, but she couldn't exactly place him. "Huh? You want an autograph or something?" Another fan, she figured, though it had honestly been a while, and she was no longer enjoying her fame.
He smiled and laughed. A beanpole of a thing with a scratchy-looking goatee and spiked hair that was at least a few fashions dull. "Oh, wow. This is even weirder than I thought. I mean, I heard you went blonde, but this, man? You really went off the deep end, didn't you?" His arms went wide in a gesture that framed her whole being.
Then, it hit her. She did know who this guy was, just...
A DECADE AGO...
"C'mon. I'll pay you back, I promise!" The lanky teen insisted.
A dark-haired woman smoked her cigarette at the corner of a convenience store. Grey eyes over a bed of faded freckles looked at the boy. "Naw, fuck off. You still haven't paid me back for the last time." She drawled.
PRESENT
...He was just a kid then, but she remembered him. Yeah. She remembered a lot now.
"Sorry, I don't know you," she deflected.
"Really?" His voice strained in disbelief - or was it disappointment? "I mean, I'd know that face anywhere," there was poison in those words, "but she wasn't made of steel, and she sure as hell wasn't a fighter, and I'm pretty sure she--"
Arris stepped off her stool and had him dangling by the collar faster than he could finish that thought. She grimaced and glared; he looked down at her with six degrees of fear. Bystanders paused to process the commotion, while the stall attendant looked about ready to close up shop just in case.
Her voice went low, with texture not unlike a growl. "Yeah, I know you. And if you think you know who the fuck I am, then you know what I've been up to all these years. Don't think for a second that I won't waste you."
Flailing hands tried desperately to pry her metal fingers off his collar, which tightened uncomfortably around his throat. "Pleaase..." His plea was a pathetic, raspy thing, but then something switched in his brain. He was still a ganger after all, brainwashed the same way she had been. He consolidated that fear into a faux and bitter apathy. "I work for him now. He'll come after you if you kill me!" Shit posturing if she said so, but it's exactly what she would've said.
Her eyes shifted. A little wide with surprise, but not quite shocked, even though her heart picked up like the peak of a club beat. She let him go, and he nearly buckled at the knees, wheezing and coughing as he caught his breath. She reached into her pocket to draw a cigarette.
"What makes you think he's got that kind of pull?" She asked quietly, anything to mask the rush of emotions.
He looked at her, a little confused, trying to regain his bearings, but his lips curled into a smug little smirk. "He's king of the board, man. It was always gonna be his show. And I'm not the only one who fell in line, either. You ran away, Arris, but the rest of us had to stay." There was no mistaking the resentment in his voice before he scrambled away.
Arris sighed and took a long, desperate drag. She hadn't even noticed Ace watching nearby. Until now.
"How long you've been there?"
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