Table for discourse [PM for Invite unless tagged].

[Vrag]

"A friend?" she echoed him with a slight quirk to her eyebrow, leaning back in her chair to peer at the man. A small gamut of thoughts ran through her mind at the word, though none would show up in her cold eyes as she studied [member="Draco Vereen"] with a careful gaze.


She shook her head, finally, and looked away to check on the miners instead. Sure enough, they were nearly done with the job. The shipment of phrikite she and [member="Reverance"] had requested was a rather large one, but this was Rendili, and they were used to handling sizeable orders. The process was beautifully efficient and streamlined – much to Vrag's satisfaction – and at the sight of the crew stacking phrik bars into the containters, the woman hummed in appreciation.


If you wanted something done right, your best bet were private contractors like Kuhn or Vereen. Next best thing? One Sith. Corrupt as it was as a regime, the warmachine was a tightly run ship, and it was this aspect that had always appealed to the woman. Even so, every appeal had an expiry date.


"We're not friends, Vereen," she spoke calmly as she set down her own hand, card by card. "But I appreciate the sentiment either way." A flash of teeth and a wink, and the firrerreo pushed a pile of credit chits at [member="Reverance"].


"The Universe I know isn't a good place for friendships, and if I have to shoot you at some point, I'd prefer to do it to your face, you know?"

 

[Laira Darkhold]

"There are different kinds of friends. There are the kind you trust wholeheartedly, who will take a bullet for you just because. And there is the kind you like fighting beside because you like winning. You would be the latter. I am not naive enough to think you wouldn't shiv me if the Dark Lord told you to, or if he did," I poked a thumb at Reverance. Only an idiot trusted the Sith fully. Even they didn't trust each other. But regardless, I considered her a friend, and that meant I would not raise a weapon against her without telling her I was first. It was a tricky thing, honor, but it mattered to some. It mattered to me.

I yawned looking at the crates and boxes of Phrikite ingots being stacked up. Man, if we had of just brought a Concordance we could have played cards from the ship while it tore a crater in this planet for metric feth tons of ore. But alas, of course no one asked the metallurgist with a knack for mining inhospitable locations to help. They just invited me to play sabaac. Regardless, it was soon to be over. "But, I would like to think if we were fighting together I wouldn't have to worry about your saber in my back again."

[member="Vrag"]

 

[Vrag]

She nodded, conceding the point with a slow hum. "Fair enough, Vereen. You'd be surprised to learn that he," she poked a thumb at [member="Reverance"] as well, grinning wide, "doesn't tell me what to do very often."
The woman heaped the cards together once again, shuffling the deck with quick, practiced movements even as she stole a few glances at the miners in the distance. They were very nearly done here, by the looks of it.
Just as well; she wasn't sure how much money the two boys still had on them, given the rate at which she'd been picking them clean.

"I have to say, though, that's some damn fine reasoning you've got there, Vereen. Stick to it, and you'll keep that head on your shoulders for a long, long while."
She winked at him over the rim of her glass before setting it down in favor of distributing the cards for a new round.

"Again?" She froze for the briefest of moments mid-motion, peering up at the Mandalorian with a curious expression on her face.
"Don't tell me I've stabbed you before and forgot about it," she drawled through two rows of sharp teeth as she finished dealing out the cards, settling back into her chair with an elbow hooked over the backrest.


[member="Draco Vereen"]

 

[Laira Darkhold]

I smiled wide, like a child would when they had a secret at her reaction. "Oh yes. But its alright, no grudges held, it was just business on your part. I was still a grunt with the Republic at the time. I like to look back at it fondly and think it was one of the reasons I wizened up and left them for the Techno Union." I was going to see how long it took her to figure it out on her own. It was funner for me that way, and just maybe she would remember someone else that may have given her more of a fight than I had when I was an untrained, unaware little Padawan running around with the Republic.

I changed my tone to be more reassuring, even if it was a little mocking. "I wouldn't worry about it too much, dear. I am sure you meant well. I didn't need a cybernetic spine or anything so that I could walk again." It didn't feel like it had been that long ago, but so much had happened since it might have been. I don't think ArmaTech even existed at the time it had occurred on Yinchorr all that time ago. I had grown, become powerful, become respected, and learned a great deal about the Force and combat since then.

[member="Vrag"]

 

[Vrag]

Vrag snorted and shook her head, hiding her grin behind another hearty sip of the whiskey. As [member="Draco Vereen"] went on, the woman reached for the bottle on the far end of the table, wrapping her fingers around the flask and tipping it over until her glass was brimming again.

"So… what you're saying is you owe me? For severing your spine? Glad to be of service, Vereen." She gave him a shallow nod, smirking all the while. "Now if only more people could show gratitude like you do."

The situation was absurd, of course. Most people listening in on the conversation would be baffled to learn that two people who had tried to kill each other once could converse so civilly, even cracking jokes and playing cards without any apparent animosity. It was an artifact of adaptability, Vrag liked to think; a byproduct of understanding relationships as business connections instead of… well, whatever others treated them as. In the end, she was simply too pragmatic for something as messy as retribution.

"Yeeeeah… I'm having trouble figuring out when I stabbed you, dear," she admitted after a few seconds of intense internal scrutiny. "I kill a lot of people, but few of them survive, so I figure something distracted me before I could finish the job."

"Can't say I regret it." What she didn't add, of course, was that she never regretted anything at all, but he didn't need to know that. "Raise."

 

[Laira Darkhold]

"No, I can't say I regret you sparing me that day either. I've never been back to Yinchorr. I was young then, still fresh and green." the sound of tools and loaders drowning out what I would have said following. "Not like now. Of our time together, I would say I prefer the memories of you on Balmorra." I said with a smirk, going ahead and ending the little game I had started. It was no fun if she didn't try and guess and play along with me.

"Your miners seem to be doing pretty good. They are basically done." I looked around observing them as they started rapidly loading up crates of Phrikite ore into cargo ships. A Large order or not, they had done well, almost as as good as my crews could have done. That said, my forges and my smiths would have been better at working the metal into the final product, but that wasn't going to happen. "Perhaps we should talk about ArmaTech and the One Sith for a moment. I flew all the way out here, I might as well work a little since I am out here."

Might as well get her to agree to buy my guns and armor since I was sitting around talking to one of the Dark Lord's Hands. I figured I didn't need the sales pitch.

[member="Vrag"]

 

[Vrag]

Yinchorr.

That was it.

Vrag smiled a small smile, an amused shadow that barely reached her eyes as she peered at the cards in her grasp. More than most ever got to see in their lifetimes, so probably an achievement for the mando. The Sith didn't care either way.

"You don't say," she deadpanned, quirking a single eyebrow without lifitng her gaze from the symbols on the cards. A bad hand, though he didn't need to know that.

"Fair, Vereen. Business and pleasure make for an interesting mix most of the time." As [member="Draco Vereen"] had pointed out not a second ago, the miners were finally all done with phrikite, and her subtle supervision would be allowed to come to an end. Out of the corner of her eye, the woman had observed their meticulous progress from the moment they'd arrived, and now it was time to load it up on the designated transport and ship it off to Force knows where.

Well, [member="Reverance"] and herself knew too, obviously, but for all the measly grains of trust she placed in the mercenary across the table, the destination of her precious phrik was not one of them. And she'd chosen him for this trip exactly because she knew that the man wouldn't give a kark, flying or otherwise. The mando respected the nature of their work; a quality that Vrag had learned to appreciate even more during her years with the Sith.

"Talk, then. I'm sure we can come to a favorable agreement. Also, your turn."

 

[Laira Darkhold]

I caught a smile as she said Yinchorr. So she did remember. Hilarious that someone who had shattered my spine would now be playing cards with me.

"Nothing special really. I already have a massive city dedicated to manufacturing my products on Roxuli. Figure the same deal as with the Union. That city supplies you with as much as it can produce of whatever it is you need, it maintains its autonomity, no tariffs on its shipping, and you get a discount. Twenty percent. And naturally it won't be shipping goods outside your borders. It would be dedicated to producing arms for the One Sith." Simple deal. I keep my city on the planet the One Sith are rapidly conquering, I get to ship in and out of that city free of charge, fee, or tax, and they get a discount.

"If you must hear the sales pitch, I've made the best standard issue personal armor that exists, as well as the best personal shielding systems there are." The rest was minor. I had tanks, starfighters, now ships, nice ships at that. And I had a personal army that moved around occasionally, and did quite a bit of work alongside the One Sith.

[member="Vrag"]

 

[Vrag]

The tap of her fingers against the metal of the table was faint, easily drowned out by the noise of machinery and power-drills against stone, but it was there nonetheless.

Vrag was pondering.

Her cool eyes were completely focused on [member="Darth Vulkan"], to the point that she would likely miss if he tried to cheat at cards in that moment. She doubted he would try something like that, however; despite the fact that he had little qualms with killing — or any other criminal activity, really — she'd found him to be a relatively honorable man. A rare and damn near paradoxical specimen in their line of work, and perhaps the main reason why she was even considering the offer.

The Hand remembered well what had happened the last the Sith had tied themselves to an outside manufacturer to too great an extent… but the Hand wasn't here. There was only a smirking merc who was just about done picking her two companions clean. Who was she to lose sleep on the way the One Sith conducted its business?

"Sounds good to me, Vereen," she finally spoke after nearly a minute of silence, averting her scrutinizing gaze.

"Also, pure Sabacc, my friend." It wasn't like he'd miss the credits; after she pitched the offered deal to the relevant parties in the order — and by 'pitch', she meant 'relay offhandedly' — the mando was going to earn it back with staggering interest. In less than a minute, to boot.

 

[Laira Darkhold]

He smiled briefly as she agreed to the simple terms. Her stare would have been unnerving if she didn't possess enchanting blue eyes. But because she did, Draco was simply happy to be so closely inspected by them without the possibility of a face cobra biting him. It was surprisingly not a bad thing for him. People did as they pleased, and if he ever found himself opposite of her, he was almost certain she wouldn't hesitate. Then again, maybe believing he wouldn't attack first or wouldn't attack at all if she let him be might, on the smallest chance, cause her to pass over him. It wasn't something he was planning on finding out, but it was a thought that swam in his mind.

"Excellent, and of course you'd have pure sabaac." He tossed his cards down and let her take the last of his cash credits he had with him. It was odd sitting on a Sith occupied planet, when he had opposed them and their allies in the past. But he was a mercenary and the more 'Lightside' governments frowned on paying for fighters. They preferred fanatics and freedom fighters, almost like the Empire did long ago.

"Well... I think that's all for me as far as sabaac goes. I'm out of cash for you to take and your boys are just about ready to go, and I think I should be leaving with you all. I don't need phrik at the moment so I don't see a need to stick around once you've gone." He smirked, a half smile appearing on his face. "But I will watch you leave." He said quietly, so as not to be heard by any eavesdroppers. Worst case she hit him as she left.

[member="Vrag"]