Faction Searching the Bottom of the Bottle [TRA]

[Tanner Kest]

SOMEWHERE AFTER DARK

OGA'S CANTINA

LOCATION // BLACKSPIRE OUTPOST, BATUU

DRINK // LOST COUNT

TIME // NIGHT

Oga's Cantina was busy, with the usual collection of travellers, locals and offworlders gathered around the bar. Music carried through the crowded room, competing with conversations and the occasional burst of laughter.

There was enough noise that Tanner Kest could sit among dozens of people and still feel very much alone. In his plain racing jacket, dark shirt and pants, he looked unremarkable compared to his usual public appearances, judging by how few people had tried to speak to him.

He'd been there for hours. An empty bottle stood beside his glass, and the former racing champion was well beyond counting how many drinks he'd had. His jaw was covered in stubble and his hair had been pushed into a mess from repeatedly running his fingers through it. He had spent much of the evening hunched over the bar, staring at the steadily disappearing amber liquid in front of him. The drink was something local to Batuu. He didn't care what it was, only that it went down easy and numbed him.

It had been a month since the Sith destroyed his home. A month since he'd lost Na'eesa and Janni, along with almost everyone else he'd known there.

Sometimes he could scarcely believe it had been that long. Other times, he struggled to remember what he'd done with himself during the intervening weeks. Most of it was a blur, if he was being honest with himself, and more than a few times Tanner had found himself thinking about running his Z-95 into the hard side of a moon.

Unfortunately, the memories were never far away. He'd tried drinking until he couldn't think about them, but every night brought him back to the same place. The people responsible were still out there somewhere, and the knowledge of it made his stomach turn. He wanted to get his hands on them. He wanted to hurt them, to give them some small understanding of what they'd done to him. They were Sith, every one of them, and because of that he wanted the entire Sith Order to burn.

And then...

Tanner finished what remained in his glass, swallowing hard against the unpleasant warmth that followed. His eyes were bloodshot, though there was little softness in them as he looked across the counter. He could feel the anger working through him again, along with a growing frustration that he was sitting here getting drunk while the people responsible for his circumstances were still breathing.

"Here's another bottle, Kest." A female Twi'lek server approached and placed a fresh bottle beside the empty one. "You sure you want to start it?"

Tanner gave no indication that he'd heard the question from Marsy. He reached for the bottle, struggled briefly with the seal before twisting it loose, then tipped a generous measure into his tumbler. His aim was poor. Liquor splashed against the rim and ran across the counter, wetting his fingers. He didn't seem particularly concerned, continuing until the glass was nearly full.

The server lingered, perhaps expecting some acknowledgement, before leaving him to it.

"Okay, your choice."

Tanner glanced at the Twi'lek and grunted before he picked up the glass and drank. He'd barely lowered it when an unfamiliar voice interrupted him.

"Oh wow, Tanner Kest, is that you?" The man answered his own question immediately. "Oh, it is! Can I get a holo?"

Tanner glanced sideways at the man who'd approached, who was grinning with the sort of enthusiasm Tanner had once encountered regularly during his racing career.

"No," the ex-racer muttered.

The answer came easily enough, and Tanner returned his attention to his drink. He'd had more than enough of strangers recognising him over the years, and tonight he had absolutely no interest in entertaining another. In fact, if no other sentient ever recognised him again, Tanner would be fine with that.

"Aw, come on. Just a quick one?"

Tanner sighed.

"Not tonight."

The sentient apparently wasn't prepared to accept that. He brought out a small holoprojector, which Tanner initially ignored, until the man activated it and continued speaking.

"She's a huge fan, it would be nova to show her I met you."

The hologram showed a little girl wearing a Galactic Racing League shirt, smiling broadly for whoever had taken the image as she held up a poster of Tanner. She looked about Janni's age, perhaps a little younger.

Tanner found himself looking at her for longer than he'd intended.

He remembered Janni sitting beside him watching old race recordings, pestering him to explain how he'd managed some particular manoeuvre. She could watch the same overtake half a dozen times and still have questions. He'd sometimes pretended to be annoyed when she wanted him to rewind the footage again, though he had always indulged her.

He hadn't thought about that particular memory in a while.

The man was still waiting, holoprojector in hand. Tanner looked at him, then back at the girl's image, before putting his glass down.

"Alright."

"Really? Thanks! She won't believe this."

Tanner pushed himself from his stool and stood beside the fellow, wobbling for a moment, before the man raised the holocamera and captured the moment. He faced it without a smile, looking tired and thoroughly unimpressed, though he remained still long enough for the picture to be taken.

"Thanks, buddy. Really appreciate it. You're the best!"

"Yeah," Tanner said with a nod as he slid back onto his stool.

He ignored the pat on the back from the man. Instead, he reached for his glass and took another mouthful as the stranger wandered off, apparently quite pleased with himself.

Tanner wasn't sure why he'd agreed. Perhaps it was the girl's face, or simply remembering how excited Janni used to get about the smallest things associated with his racing career. He could remember her smile perfectly well, even now, and that was proving considerably harder to bear than he'd expected.

He sat with the drink in his hand for some time, listening to the noise around him without taking much of it in. Eventually, he swallowed the contents of the glass and reached for the bottle again.

TAGS

Akari Yui + Open to Rebel Alliance

 

[Akari Yui]

Akari scoped out the place early enough. Setting herself up at the other end of the bar. Angling herself so she could see the door. Her back mostly to the wall. She recognized Tanner Kest from his file. Not from his career. She hadn’t followed the trends of the verse growing up. She’d been too busy conquering worlds with the Dreadborne.

It was supposed to be a simple recruitment. Make contact. Throw the pitch.

Unfortunately, the mark was already drunker than mynocks high on pugill dust. At least they hadn’t made her wear the red dress for this one. Her hair was back. How she liked it. Pants. Boots. Shirt and vest. Blaster at her side. Earrings she didn’t like.

A plum lipstick across her mouth.

Standing, she slid into the seat next to Kest. Bringing her Corellian ale with her. Placing it in the puddle of spilled whiskey. For while, she didn’t say anything. Just shared the spare shoulder to shoulder with him.

“That happen to you a lot?” Without looking at him, she leaned forward and took a sip of the ale.

“You famous?”

Tanner Kest

 

[Castiel Moncrief]

AURODIUM SWORD // OFF DUTY RECORD

CASTIEL MONCRIEF

MERCENARY

LOCATION // BLACKSPIRE OUTPOST, BATUU

OBJECTIVE // UNDEFINED

TAGS // Tanner Kest , Akari Yui , // OPEN

"I'll take the bottle if you don't mind."

Castiel's rather large hand wrapped around the neck of the geometric bottle, amber liquid sloshing within. It almost looked as if the server was going to give him trouble until the man noticed the currency in his other hand. An almost questioning expression was washed away with a curt nod from the mountain of a man before the server scurried away, exchange completed. A soft grunt was all Castiel had to contribute further.

The stool protested beneath his weight as he settled in, setting the bottle upon the counter before finding a glass and pouring himself a measure. For someone who had just purchased an entire bottle, he seemed in remarkably little hurry to drink it. Instead, he sat for a moment, taking in the establishment and its patrons.

Batuu. He couldn't recall ever having much reason to visit the place before. Then again, there were plenty of things he couldn't recall these days, and even more that had happened without him. Nearly half a century of history reduced to secondhand accounts and whatever he could be bothered to read. Governments had risen, fallen, and been replaced by others that seemed determined to repeat their predecessors' mistakes. Some things, apparently, never changed. He lifted the glass to his lips, taking a slow drink. The liquor was decent enough, though hardly worth what he'd paid for it.

That seemed to be another universal constant.

Farther down the bar, some poor bastard was being subjected to an enthusiastic admirer and his holocamera. Castiel watched the exchange with mild disinterest, noting the man's obvious reluctance before eventually turning his attention elsewhere. He didn't recognize the man, though that was hardly surprising these days. A woman had joined him, and something about her demeanor suggested she was paying closer attention to her surroundings than she let on. Castiel recognized the habit. Certain lines of work had a way of leaving their mark, even when there wasn't necessarily any reason to be on guard.

Castiel returned his attention to his drink.

There had been a time when he could walk into a room and have a reasonable understanding of who was who, what they wanted, and which of them might become a problem. Nowadays, even the uniforms were different. It was an uncomfortable sort of ignorance for a man who had spent much of his life relying on his instincts.

Still, the galaxy had gone on without him. He supposed he'd have to return the favor.

With another quiet grunt, he topped off his glass.

 

[Siv Dragr]

G U N S L I N G E R
Blackspire Outpost, Batuu
​

Tag: Tanner Kest | Akari Yui | Castiel Moncrief

Siv rarely let himself get this drunk. But then again, what good did sobriety do for you when all it did was remind you of your loss?

Some had called the Mandalorians' retreat to Kestri a tactical withdrawal in the face of annihilation. Even now, as hundreds of cruisers launched towards regions unknown to explore the uncharted depths of Wild Space, they justified it by saying the fight was impossible. But the veteran was tired of running. Slowly -- it had been somewhere along the way; he couldn't place it where -- he'd forgotten what he was trying to live for.

Caught in between the resignation of his vode and the apathetic realization that a one-man crusade would be too short a flaming streak, Siv had turned to the only thing that made sense these days: bounty hunting. So that brought him to Batuu, a spacer's outpost on the edge of the Galaxy. It hadn't changed much from what he remembered; the same old cantinas, the same noisy bar music, the same laughter as rough riders and smugglers laughed and gambled the night away. Siv did not partake in the revelry, sticking to his corner, keeping an eye on who walked in and out -- and all the while draining too many cups to count.

 

[Algron Krake]

Whzzt. Thump. Whzzt. Thump.

The whirring of a mechanical leg clunking against the floor before a shadow darkened the doorway. A broad-shouldered Quarren stood there, his single remaining eye staring out deep set from his skull. A cybernetic photoreceptor stared out of the other, yellow. The only thing that now matched the organic eye.

He wore a ragged tunic and cloak, but even with his apparel it became clear as he moved toward the bar that his leg and eye were not the only cybernetics wired into muscle and bone. At least two tentacles beside his beak were cybernetic as well, sleeved with synthflesh. The three-fingered claw arm of servos and steel that he let thud onto the bar was not.

"Whiskey."

The voice that came out was a harsh rasp, like his vocal chords had been run over with sandpaper. It was the voice of the partisan from Raxus Prime. They called him many things. Pirate. Terrorist. Freedom fighter.

Algron Krake.

 

[Tanner Kest]

SOMEWHERE AFTER DARK

OGA'S CANTINA

LOCATION // BLACKSPIRE OUTPOST, BATUU

DRINK // LOST COUNT

TIME // NIGHT

Tanner noticed the woman take the stool beside him. She was pretty, though he paid her little attention. Her glass of ale ended up in the liquor he'd spilled across the counter. He watched her place it there, then returned to pouring another top-up of his own.

For a while, she said nothing. That was fine by him; he appreciated the silence.

When she eventually spoke, it was about the fellow who'd wanted a holopic. Tanner glanced toward her as she followed up by asking whether he was famous.

"More than I'd like," he muttered, picking up his glass. "Makes drinkin' alone hard."

There had been a time when he enjoyed the attention. The racing circuit had brought plenty of it, between interviews, sponsorship appearances and people wanting a few moments of his time. He'd been good at dealing with all that, even enjoyed meeting the fans. He'd certainly never minded it when Janni was there to see him recognised - she always looked proud of her dad.

He downed the entire drink, allowing himself a moment before answering the woman's other question.

"Galactic Racing League," Tanner said, shrugging. "Won a few championships. Doesn't matter now."

A few months earlier, he'd still been racing. There'd been another championship coming up, but things had started getting uneasy back home. He'd withdrawn from the competition and returned to Na'eesa and Janni, expecting to pick things up again once the political and economic trouble passed.

That hadn't worked out.

Tanner rubbed a hand across his unshaven jaw. He was still feeling the effects of all the liquor he'd put away, and the empty glass in front of him was only tempting him to have more. He knew that much.

"Missed the last championship."

He reached for the bottle again, topping up his drink before setting it back beside the empty one. She asked if he was famous.

"Why? You usually look for famous types?" Tanner glanced at the young woman again, giving her a more deliberate once-over. He grunted. "Yeah, I could see that, actually."

TAGS

Akari Yui / Castiel Moncrief / Siv Dragr / Algron Krake

 

[Akari Yui]

A strike of sizzling sort of anger wormed its way through her bloodstream. She stared at the mug of ale. Knowing if she turned and saw that smug look all over Tanner Kest 's face she'd slam his head into the bar and break a few of his fingers. Too bad the Rebellion was desperate enough to need someone like him. Even though she wanted to call it.

The guy clearly had a drinking problem.

He was in no shape, emotionally, to fly.

"I'm surprised you can see anything," voice cut dryly. A flicker of almond eyes in his direction. A thinly veiled anger flashing in their dark depths. "Fething wasting our time," she muttered to herself. She glanced around, noticing a few familiar faces. It was really the mechanical leg that gave him away first. Algron Krake was here? Interesting. And some unfamiliar ones. The ones that looked like bounty hunters.

That was the last thing she needed with the Dreadborne after her.

This place was a tinderbox ready to blow.

"Okay hotshot," hand snapped out, fingers going to grasp at his wrist. That one that kept pouring from that starsforsaken bottle of his. Tightly. "I don't have time for you to sober up. Kriff knows that would take a few standard days anyway. My name is Akari. You ever hear of the Rebellion?" Her free hand lifted and she tugged a hidden necklace free from the collar of her shirt. The rebellion's symbol hung on the end of a simple chain. She quickly tucked it back down.

Yeah, they really should've sent someon else. Kress, maybe it should've been Algron.

Siv Dragr Castiel Moncrief

 

[Tanner Kest]

SOMEWHERE AFTER DARK

OGA'S CANTINA

LOCATION // BLACKSPIRE OUTPOST, BATUU

DRINK // LOST COUNT

TIME // NIGHT

Tanner gave the woman a sideways look, his brows lifting at the suggestion that he couldn't see straight.

"I can see the both of you just fine."

He brought the glass to his mouth, rather pleased with himself, until he caught something she muttered about wasting time. Tanner frowned. She'd been the one to sit beside him, hadn't she? He certainly hadn't asked for the company.

"I didn't ask you to sit next to me. Who's wasting whose time?" He muttered.

The woman had already turned her attention elsewhere. Tanner followed her glance along the bar, where a Quarren with enough mechanical replacements to attract attention was making himself comfortable. He spotted the artificial leg first, then the arm, and finally the assortment of cybernetics around his face.

"Guy looks like he lost a fight with a rancor..."

Tanner was still looking in the Quarren's direction when the woman's hand came for his wrist. Her fingers clamped down. He looked down and made a face. She was really confusing, giving out mixed signals. Then she was telling him to sober up, and something about not having time to wait, which struck Tanner as a peculiar complaint from someone who'd invited herself into his evening.

"Few days? Probably longer," he answered, giving the bottle in his hand a glance.

Her introduction followed, along with a question about the Rebellion. Tanner knew the name well enough, there was always some rebellion somewhere, though he hadn't expected to hear it here. When Akari produced the necklace from beneath her shirt, he looked down at the insignia before she tucked it away.

"Rebellion, huh?" Tanner repeated, looking at her again smirking. "Does everyone get a necklace when they join?"

He gave his wrist a small tug, wanting his hand back. There was still plenty of liquor left in the bottle, and he'd been enjoying himself considerably more before she'd started asking questions.

"No offence, Akari, but I don't do ideals."

Tanner looked down at his glass. It was difficult to remember the last time he'd cared about a cause, or much of anything beyond finding a way to get at the Sith. They could keep their politics, their speeches and whatever promises came with joining a rebellion. He'd heard enough promises before his home was destroyed.

"Besides, been thinking about pulling a Holdo into Empyrean's temple," he continued, his words a little slurred. "See if I can't hit the bastard."

He was perfectly serious about that, drunk or otherwise. Getting through the Sith defences was another matter, but there had to be a way. He'd spent enough time thinking about it.

Tanner looked at the woman beside him again.

"Why? What are you planning to do? Protest at the Blackwall?"

TAGS

Akari Yui / Castiel Moncrief / Siv Dragr / Algron Krake