Private Starfire and Thorns

[Yoru Iben]

Spaceport
Some Godforsaken Planet

How long does it take for somebody to freeze to death in- A digitized number floated in Yoru's periphery- minus sixty degrees standard?

The bitter cold stabbed through several layers of clothing straight to his marrow as he trudged through almost knee-high snow. For what must've been the tenth time in less than a hundred steps, he wiped his frosted-over goggles with the hem of his overcoat. Yoru could make out the vague shape of a domed building through the snowstorm, and as he approached it, the snow thinned out right up to the door, where there was only a sliver of visible ground between the snow and door, just enough space for him to shake the snow off of himself. "Blast it," he said with a chattering jaw and aggressively fingered the door panel until it finally granted him access.

It hissed open, and as hot air rushed out, Yoru rushed in. The scrapper moved his goggles onto his forehead and pulled his gaiter down under his chin, and briefly scanned his new surroundings, sniffling and wiping at his pink nose with the back of his gloved hand. There were rods of cylindrical lightbulbs that ran along the curved walls, but most of them didn't work. The ones that did barely flickered. The only light came from a large lamp above the island bar at the center of the building and a few lit lamps at some nearby tables. There was only a handful of people in the building, that being the bartender, Yoru, and a couple of unwelcoming folks that he didn't care to stare at for too long.

Just as he concluded his thoughts, he arrived opposite the bartender. There were stools, but Yoru didn't bother. Sitting would mean bending his joints. Bending his joints would remind him that he was freezing. Standing was fine, at least until he was warm.

"Hey," Yoru greeted the bartender, a Sullustan, who was unenthusiastically wiping the inside of a permanently stained clear cup with a permanently stained rag. "Hey," he said again, louder.

"What'll it be?" The Sullustan asked. Yoru looked behind and around the bartender for a menu, but there was nothing.

"What, uh... I'll... Do you have anything warm?"

With his foot, the bartender slid a small hatch open under the counter and bent at the knees to grab a tall, skinny glass of some opaque, muddy-colored liquid. Yoru reached for it as the bartender set it on the counter, but the Sullastan pulled it back. "Gotta pay," was all he said.

"Um, the guy said the first one was free... With refueling."

The bartender grumbled something under his breath and pushed the glass to Yoru. He quickly took his gloves off and took the cup into both of his hands. It was warm, after all. He raised the cup to his lips and sipped it. It was unpleasantly thick and had the consistency of snot, but it was warm and pleasantly sweet. Yoru took the cup to an empty table behind him. It was comfortably far from the other guests. He fiddled with the lamp a bit but couldn't get it to turn on.

"Hey, how do you turn this on?" He said to the Sullastan, who ignored him. "The- the lamp, how do you... Oh, forget it." He said with a glance towards the other table, envious that they got to sit under some light.

 

[Blackthorne]

"Oh good, you're here."

The voice belonged to a woman who had approached Yoru's table from seemingly out of nowhere. Her garb was that of a spacer's, and one who was familiar with the locality and its rather unfortunate daily temperatures. Layers, lots of layers. Frozen parfait level layers. She'd not been in here long, judging by the ice still clinging to the otherwise tattered overcloak hanging from her shoulders. Green eyes looked down at him from within an oversized hood. She didn't wait for his reaction and seated herself across from him and began fussing with the lamp.

Kcccht.

Kzzzzt.

Kzzck-nnnnnnnnnnnnnn.

The lamp buzzed and blinkered on, a damp piss yellow light spilled over the pair, throwing the pale face within the hood into a rather unpleasant shade of frigid death and jaundice chiaroscuro.

Those green eyes, the color of wilted cabbage, stared at him with an intensity they had no right to use, "I've been waiting all day for you, darling, what kept you?" A boot connected abruptly with his shin, the woman's blue lips growing thin as she silently attempted to get the point across to play along, "I already ordered some food. Hope you're hungry."

 

[Yoru Iben]

Yoru turned. Slowly. Like there was a pain in his lower back or a stranger's voice that was colder than negative sixty degrees standard called out to him. He didn't say anything as she rounded the table and plopped down across from him, and instead nursed the warm cup of sweet liquid-goo close to his chest as if she would take it from him.

The scrapper's gaze quickly ping-ponged between the light as it popped to life and the woman's haunting features. Yoru didn't flinch or question her as he felt the tip of her boot through layers of pants, though he was quiet for a moment or two as he deciphered her silent message.

"Had trouble picking up the landing beacon through the storm," was his honest answer. Sensing that if she wanted anything at all from him, it wouldn't be his drink, Yoru didn't guard it so closely and held it on the table, leaning forward on his elbows. "Sure," he said through a forced smile, "Haven't eaten all day."

 

[Blackthorne]

Thank the Fweer for her luck. The hard edge of the woman's strained jawline relaxed just a little, allowing her to bring a smile to her lips that was supposed to look bittersweet but really just looked how someone smiled when they said they were fine when really they were dying on the inside. "I was worried you wouldn't land, what with the storm outside..." she shifted gloved hands forward to his own where he held his glass, giving no indication that she was meaning to take it but making a gesture of affection, "I've missed you."

The woman gave a wary look around the bar as another group of rangers moved in from the back and stopped at the bar to speak with the bartender. She leaned forward, urging him to meet her halfway by squeezing at his hands, "I need a ride off this frigid hellhole," she hissed low, "and I need to leave now. I can pay you," another glance to the group at the bar as the bartender gestured off toward their table, "whatever you want."

 

[Yoru Iben]

"Wasn't a problem," he could only force a smile for so long and now regarded her with dreary, half-lidded eyes. Because of his tightly drawn hood, she could only see his face from under his eyebrows to his chin. He didn't return the fake affection but dryly smiled at the woman. Without doing much to give it away, he followed her glances and, with her request, was able to piece together the situation. Or what he thought the situation was anyways.

His trip to this frozen rock had been a complete waste, and he was certain that he'd been overcharged on the refueling. If nothing else, she could at least cover that. Still, his face stiffened, and he let out a frustrated sigh as he weighed his options. There wasn't much time to weigh as only twenty seconds passed between the rangers entering the bar, and now they were walking towards his table. Aggressively. Yoru nodded to the green-eyed woman.

"I'm so glad we're together again," he flatly said for the room to hear and downed what remained of his warm goo beverage.

 

[Blackthorne]

"I'm so glad we're together again," said like he was talking to a piece of stale bread.

Normally this would have been the time where the woman interjected some snark. Given her current physical condition and ailments, she was smarter now than years past when she might have done so anyway for the sake of spiting his dull enthusiasm. The priority now was getting off this planet and somewhere warm, before her secondary heart gave out.

"You two," said one of the rangers from within a sealed ranger suit, likely heated given the lack of ice, "need you to come with us for questioning."

"What seems to be the problem ..." she looked for any official form of duty or rank and found nothing but the Ranger Patrol patch of the local area on their suits, "Sir."

"Several mutilated corpses found in the nearby hangar. Suspect was seen heading this direction just a few minutes ago ... and you two are the freshest faces in the bar according to the manager."

"You've got it wrong," the woman frowned, "I've been waiting outside for my husband. He only just landed. Check your docking roster."

"I'm afraid you're still going to have to come with us."

Tensing, the woman withdrew her hands from the man seated across from her and gave him an uneasy look, "...alright." Then slowly rose from her seat, "Come on darling, this shouldn't take long. Then we can be on our way."

 

[Yoru Iben]

"Several mutilated corpses found in the nearby hangar. Suspect was seen heading this direction just a few minutes ago ... and you two are the freshest faces in the bar according to the manager."

Yoru, who had given the rangers his undivided attention as they approached and fanned out in front of the table, now slowly turned to his temporary wife, his features ridden with concern. For himself, of course. He wasn't keen on being mutilated.

"Right, right," he slowly rose with her, pushing himself up from the table with his palms flat on the table. The weight of a small, holstered blaster pressed against the right side of his ribs under his heavy coat but eyeing the rangers' rifles, decided it wise to stay his gun-hand. For the time being, that is.

One ranger led them from the front while the others flanked them, and as they were escorted out of the bar, Yoru shot the green-eyed woman with a furious glare. He quickly put his gloves on and pulled his gaiter back over his nose and his goggles over his eyes.

 

[Blackthorne]

Steeling herself against the impending frozen temperatures, Dahl caught the glare from the man as she drew her own hood more tightly around her head. For the briefest moment the woman lost her composure and made to return his glare with one of her own, but the subzero chill from outside hit her like a railtrain and verily knocked the wind from her lungs. She sputtered, pausing in the doorway as the Rangers lead outside, and felt one of them press his palm into the back of her shoulder.

"Keep moving, the faster you walk the sooner we get to the outpost."

That was ... not a good idea on his part.

The woman stumbled forward one single step, just at the precipice of the doorway, and felt her proverbial hackles immediately flare. The Ranger made to push her again, his hand clasping her shoulder and attempting to move her but instead found himself struck by a sudden surge of shock. Not energy, not electricity, rather - the polar opposite. A prickling sensation, as if he'd impaled his hand upon thousands of quills, kept it glued to the woman as she siphoned his life away through mere contact alone.

A strange convulsion took his body, sending it into sudden tremors that set him sputtering and gasping and wheezing for breath. By the time his compatriot looked over at him, he'd already collapsed backward onto the floor of the bar. The woman turned her head just enough to see where he fell and heard the whining of an energy rifle as it charged up right beside her.

"I knew it," said the Ranger at her other side, "you little bit-" SHNK. His word caught on the sensation of a dagger sinking through his many layers into his stomach. Looking down, he found the woman's hand attached to the handle. Looking up he found those pale green eyes staring into his soul.

"Shit," the third Ranger stared as a single sudden jerk of her hand sliced the dagger upwards toward his chest, unleashing blood and innards where he stood.

And then all hell broke loose.

 

[Yoru Iben]

Yoru had taken a mere four steps out of the bar when the first ranger flopped onto his back, and by the time he could turn and actually process what was happening, the second ranger was unburdened of his vital fluids and entrails. The lead ranger's rifle whirred to life, and as he raised it towards the she-beast, Yoru made a split-second decision to side with the only likely victor.

He seized the rifle's barrel with two hands and jerked it up. The ranger fired three shots of crackling red bolts in the struggle, two hitting the bar and a third flying off into the sky. They then wrestled for the rifle, jerking back and forth, each trying to overpower the other. At last, Yoru, who didn't boast incredible strength, swept at the ranger's legs with his own and tripped him into the snow, falling on top of him in the process.

The taller man gripped the face of the ranger's helmet and pushed his head back, and with his other hand, reached down to draw a skinny knife from his boot before thrusting it into the ranger's neck. A raspy gurgle filtered out from the helmet, which only grew louder and more strained as Yoru twisted the blade and forced it deeper and deeper until his foe's struggling abruptly ended.

Instinctively, Yoru picked the rifle up and spun around into a crouching position, training his sights on the next ranger. If there would have been one, anyways, but the conflict ended nearly as quickly as it began. Bright red stained the canvas of white around Yoru, and he lowered the rifle to his waist, the end of the barrel pointed at the black-clad woman for a second longer before he lowered it entirely.

"You're not going to kill me, are you?"

 

[Blackthorne]

The third ranger, standing at Dahl's front and having been shocked motionless by the scene of his two comrades so quickly coming to and end, had found himself incapable of yelling any sort of profanity for the lack of esophagus in his neck. While her savior grappled out in the snow gale with the last Ranger, Dahl indulged in a happy meal via her final target's neck. Feeding on the go wasn't exactly her favorite past time - she liked to take her time to savor the flavor, as it were. Yet if she had any hope of making it across the tundra to whereverthefeth this man's ship was parked, she needed a little pick-me-up before making the jaunt.

"You're not going to kill me, are you?"

Times up.

Those wilted cabbage eyes had taken on the hue of vibrant spring greens, glowing faintly within the shadow of her hood as she looked over at him out in the bleak white. Back inside the bar everyone else had split as soon as the fight started. No one here wanted to be any part of this trouble. Especially not after hearing the words "several mutilated corpses" spoken aloud just minutes prior.

Dahl dropped the fresh corpse in her grasp and wiped the smear of stark red from her lips on her sleeve, "Are you going to give me a ride out of here?" she asked over a breathy intake of cold air. It hit her lungs like a thousand needles and sent a deep shiver through her body. Fuck this cold. There was a pause to which she lofted a dark brow and then he nodded. "Then no, I'm not going to kill you. I'm going to pay you. Lead the way."

She watched him regain his feet, adjusted her outer layer, and pressed herself out into the frigid hell of this godforsaken planet. It was a struggle to follow him and keep pace as every step, every breath of cold air, sent her secondary heart shuddering in pain. By the time they reached the loading ramp bottom she could hardly stand, let alone walk. The woman mustered all the strength that remained within her, left from absorbing the energy of that Ranger, and forced herself to trudge up the ramp before bodily collapsing once she was inside. A hand clutched at her sternum, all color having drained once again from her face and eyes - leaving a deathly blue and grey palor. Struggling to catch her breath, heaving deeply for air, she motioned for him to stay away.

If he touched her like this, there was no telling how well she'd be able to keep her word of not killing him.

"Get us - get us out of here."

 

[Yoru Iben]

Yoru halted his approach on the slumped-over woman, showing his palms to her as she aggressively gestured at him.

Jeeze, just trying to help.

Fixing the rifle slung over his shoulder, he made haste to the Compunction's cockpit. In no time at all, the transport ship was in the air, and for a while, he endeavored on breaking through the snowstorm without losing any big pieces of the Compunction on the way out. By the time his passenger regained her bearings and navigated the ship's hallways towards the cockpit, Yoru had changed out of his layers into more comfortable, loose-fitting clothes. His hair hung down over his shoulders, and he held a lit cigarette between his lips.

The cockpit was an utter mess, with trash piled on unused consoles. The smell of stale tobacco clung heavily to the cockpit, and next to the navigation console was an ashtray full of used cigarette butts. Yoru's heavy coat was tossed over the single chair in the cockpit, and a small puddle had accumulated under it.

As she entered, the door hissed shut behind her. A dartboard was hung up on the door, with the image of a person pinned to it, but the picture was too torn up for them to be even a little recognizable. Yoru swiveled in the chair to face her. The vast expanse of space laid out beyond the cockpit's windows behind him.

"So," he spread his hands out before clapping them together, "Where to?"

 

[Blackthorne]

Aside from riding out the re-entry into space while in the midst of cardiac arrest in the hall, the woman looked neither better nor worse. She still appeared to be clinging to death the same way holodrama ghoul girls did with their fake-death makeup and costumes. As a matter of fact, she'd not even been looking for the cockpit, but in her sorry state, she'd somehow gotten turned around from the engine room and ended up where she was.

It stank and the entire place was a gorramn mess. She barely noticed for the momentary confusion and subsequent irritation of not being where she wanted to be.

Back by the engines where it was obnoxiously loud but warm.

"S-somewhere warm," the replied slurred through a noticeable tremor.

 

[Yoru Iben]

Pressing his lips together out of frustration from receiving an answer he really couldn't work with, Yoru sighed and forced a smile.

"Okay," he spun the chair back around and tapped a small button on one of the consoles a few times. With a slight whir, more warm air pumped into their shared tight space. Fiddling with the nav console a bit, he set their destination and set them off for the nearest warm place. He flicked his cigarette's ashes onto the overflowing ashtray before turning back to her.

"What's your name?"

 

[Blackthorne]

Dahl could feel her bloodlust flaring up at the back of her throat the way a junkie could feel the itch for another hit start to burn on their tongue. Her green eyes began to watch the man far more keenly and it was only with a great deal of self control that she didn't launch herself at him when he turned back to face her again. He'd make a good meal, too. Dahl could hear his heartbeat from where she stood and it was strong, if not a bit fast for their quick escape.

"What's your name?"

Wrestling with the willpower required to keep herself in check, the woman turned to the only other empty chair and spun it around, snatched his sopping wet coat out of it and promptly plunked herself down before swiveling to face the nearest air vent. "Blackthorne," she said, neglecting to bring up the Captain part. He wouldn't believe her anyway. As a matter of fact she was certain that if he wasn't thinking it right now, very soon he would be wondering how someone in her state could afford to promise payment of any kind. She certainly didn't look like she had wealth and fortune to speak of.

"Are you alone on this ship?"

Would be good to know ahead of time to look out for his crew. Though she'd only promised to spare his life...

 

[Yoru Iben]

"Yep," he watched her all the way to her chair and continued to do so after that. Where was his blaster again? Had to break that bad habit of tossing things around. It'd come back to bite him. Maybe literally.

"Well, Blackthorne- is Thorne okay? Ship has a few rooms on the second level, they're... mostly empty. Feel free to claim one 'til we get to somewhere warm. It'll be a while for that anyways, seein' as we're in the ass-end of nowhere."

"What were you doing there, anyways?" He leaned back in his seat, a terribly smug, wry smile spreading over his face. "Doesn't seem like you enjoy the cold."

 

[Blackthorne]

"Well, Blackthorne- is Thorne okay?"

"S'fine," she waved dismissively at the nickname. Wasn't the first time her name had been shortened to Thorne and it absolutely wouldn't be the last. She was doing her best to avert her gaze while he spoke, but then he had to go and lean back in his chair and suddenly she was staring at his jugular, watching his adam's apple bob as he attempted to make light of her obvious discomfort.

You fething idiot.

Standing from the seat abruptly, her feet did the walking that her lusting gut wouldn't do on its own. "Following a lead," she said, "worth the cold." Her hands were in the pockets of her outer cloak, fingers clutching the datachip she'd forged through that frozen hellhole to retrieve. Auntie Aver was right, she really had to stop doing these solo-missions. And then she stepped out to go find one of those aforementioned rooms, hoping it came equipped with a refresher and hot water.

Found one. It did not have it's own refresher, but the common bath worked just fine. As did the hot water. Blackthorne would have liked to stand beneath the steam for several hours, but being who and what she was, it was near impossible to get away from being mindful of precious resources in space such as clean water. She soaked long enough to rid most of the chill from her bones and get her dual heartbeats back to some semblance of regularity. Then she stole every blanket she could find from the other rooms and cocooned herself in her chosen bed.

She did not awaken for nearly two days.

Sleep had its restorative qualities. It could heal frostbite and mend a heart's irregular palpations from cold exposure. Yet it could not cure the aching desire to feed. She had no sten, she had no blodwyne, and while she could have raided his food stores for frozen meat to prepare she didn't. Instead she made her way back to the cockpit, clothed in her base layers and wrapped in two blankets, Dahl set herself down in the empty pilot's seat to give the command console a good looking over. She needed to ascertain their destination and then she needed to send a missive to her crew to rendez vous there.

Her fingers tapped deftly over the keys - wouldn't be able to send a live transmission while in hyperspace, but she could send a tight-beam message relaying their upcoming coordinates of Exocron. At the very least she was familiar with the planet's name - it was in her mother's back yard of all places. Not ideal, but not necessarily an issue.

 

[Yoru Iben]

"Well," Yoru snickered and spun his chair forward as she stormed out, "Sorry~."

Following a lead. He could relate. Wasn't quite worth it for him, though. Came for answers, left with an entirely new problem.

The first day, Yoru cautiously patrolled the corridors of his own ship before checking the rooms. She hadn't even budged as he peeked his head in to ascertain her whereabouts, and he left as quietly as he'd entered. The second day he spent tidying up. He'd gotten quite used to leaving the cockpit a mess, and the only reason the rest of the ship was relatively organized was because he didn't often use the rest of the ship.

As she tapped away, Yoru's entrance was announced by the sharp hiss from the door. He held a clear pouch of a blue, gelatinous-like substance in one hand and in the other a lit cigarette. He liked wearing baggy, comfortable clothes in his ship whether or not he had a passenger on board. The scrapper shuffled across the cockpit in his favorite fuzzy slippers and plopped down in the other empty seat.

It was odd, but right then, he felt like a stranger in his own ship.

"So, payment."

 

[Blackthorne]

She was halfway through typing the missive on the holoscreen when he'd entered. Could hear his heartbeat out in the hall, reverberating alongside the dull thump of his footfalls. Then the door opened and his scent wafted in - cigarettes clung stubbornly to every inch of the ship and, apparently, every inch of the man, but her hyper senses picked up on other scents that lingered more closely to his skin. Earthy, green, esoteric. It gave her mind images of roughland forested mountain passes and a witch camp on Dathomir. Took her on a whole unexpected trip down memory lane to the years spent there at her mother's side living among the Decuirs.

"So, payment."

He was in the chair and she couldn't even remember watching him take a seat.

Sage. She smelled sage. But what was the other scent...

"Payment," she parroted him, green eyes shifting over his features before forcibly turning away back to typing her missive, "I said I would pay you whatever you wanted. So what do you want?"

 

[Yoru Iben]

"Pay for fuel when we land, and don't mutilate my corpse." It seemed a fair enough demand to make. Despite how the Compunction looked and how he may come off, he wasn't particularly desperate for money. What did he really want, though? "By chance, ever heard the name Van Vasteel? Pirating, freelancing type. Likes to wear big hats." Yoru knew a lot and not a lot at the same time about his former Captain. He knew that he'd been pirating all his life. Knew that he had a long list of friends and a longer list of enemies. What he did not know was where he scampered off to. Seeking a fortune in some desolate corner of the galaxy, probably.

He listened to the rapid click-clack of her typing and patiently waited for her response, sucking the pouch's contents as he did so. It had the taste of saltwater but was packed with nutrients. Whenever Yoru was too lazy to prepare a meal for himself, a couple of them would do in a pinch. Sucking the pouch until it shrivelled up, he stood up from the chair and left the emptied pouch in the seat and walked next to her to the nav console, where he flicked his cigarette over the recently empty ashtray there.

 

[Blackthorne]

"What do you count as mutilation?" it should have been a joke but it was asked in a very serious manner.

Blackthorne continued typing, closing out the missive with the data packet of coordinates before hitting send. A curious little whoosh soundbyte pinged from the speakers. Cute.

"Van Vasteel?" now that was a name she'd definitely heard before. The galaxy was big, but high-brand pirate circles were a closely knit community, even if they were rivals. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer type deals ran thick throughout the pirate clans. Vasteel was familiar. Very familiar. The woman's brows furrowed slightly in thought, and now without the missive to type she was focusing instead very intently on the console to keep from looking at him.

Then he opted to move. Closer. You sonofa-

"Sounds familiar," Dahl turned a forming grimace of hunger away from him, shrugging a bit more snuggly into her blankets as her mind turned through memories of port-of-calls and the countless pirate clans she'd come up against, fought alongside, and parleyed with into all unknown hours across the stars.