Private The Devil and the Saint

[Zenva Vrotoa]

Theme Song : {x} Warning Adult Themes
Attire : {x} Shield : {x} Sidearm : {x}​

Her empire was crumbling around her. No, it already had. Since the day her Master, Sempra, had been betrayed and the Hutt had been forced to retreat into exile, nothing had been the same. The Pirate Kings of old were dead, or powerless. Her extensive network of smugglers had all but disappeared without the promise of Sempra's protection. Her bounty hunters were just as likely to shoot her as help her. She was quickly running out of ideas to draw out her old allies.

Word had been circulating for weeks now among every group of lowlife, drug pushers, cut throats for hire, and band of brigands that still trembled at her name. Major Domo Zenva Vrotoa, the Crimson Devil of Nal Hutta, was hosting an auction. Her private estate on Nal Hutta was to be opened, and Slaves from her personal collection were to be on auction block. She had anticipated an outcry from her Slave Masters, or at least a drunk appearance from Thraxis to berate her for not inviting him on the raids to collect said slaves. If nothing else James Justice would show up to scold her for peddling flesh. Instead she had been swarmed by ugly, greedy men who's names she couldn't be bothered to remember, vying for her attention.

Zenva took another swallow of the amber liquid swirling in her crystal glass. Her caustic yellow-red eyes narrowed, scowling through the haze of incense that filled the interior of her private Pailquin, and spoke a few words in her vicious mother tongue. Few in the galaxy outside her people spoke the Zabraki language, and Zenva had been speaking it exclusively tonight. Her eyes turned away almost instantly, continuing to scan the growing crowd of uninteresting, unremarkable criminals for even one person she recognized.

A golden plated Droid a few paces in front of the Zabrak's Pailquin translated her words into a warm greeting and pleasantries that didn't remotely mirror the Domo's actual words. But that was the Droids purpose after all, taking her disinterested, often rude comments, and turning them into honeyed words that kept the unimportant from bothering her further. Around her, a pair of IG Droids, alongside a half dozen Gamorreans, kept anyone from circling the Pailquin or approaching from anything but directly in front of her.

With a heavy sign, Zenva poured herself a new drink, and lite another cigarette. Gray smoke mixed with the white of the incense burning around her as she exhaled. The air around her seemed to ripple as the smoke crashed through her energy shield. What an absolute failure this turned out to be, she mused to herself as her Droid ushered another guest forward to greet the brooding Domo.

Malcoma Hesse

 

[Malcoma Hesse]

wearing: xXx
with: Damris Inkari

---

"Nice place."

Damris made the comment idly as he led Malcoma through the auction house's doors. As they passed, the headmistress eyed one of the slave girls that had been tasked with opening and closing one of them for guests. Another girl stood off to the mobsters' other side.

Mal hummed some form of either assent for Damris or distaste for the Domo they had come to see—it was hard for even him to tell. She stopped walking and took her hands from his arm in favor of grabbing the lapels of her black blazer. He took the hint, helping to slide it off her shoulders and then draping it neatly folded over his arm.

She glanced over one shoulder to see if anyone was in earshot. No, but still, she replied low, "Desperation makes for great décor."

It was true. The aesthetics, the ambience: everything was perfectly fancy and expensive, like the lady of the house was trying to attract more than credits with this event. Both Coruscanti knew notwithstanding that as much was the case; they were equally good as research. Learning information that they weren't supposed to know was their specialty.

"Would you like a drink?" he asked, changing the topic.

"Corellian old fashioned."

Damris screwed up his face with playful surprise. "Who are you?"

She cleared her throat, not in the mood for this. "Run along, baby."

And he did, disappearing into the crowd in one direction, towards the bar. Mal, after hesitating for a moment, headed in the other towards the Domo's droid. This was her own least favorite part of attending slave auctions—introducing herself to the real slavers—but, if things went in her favor, the end would justify the means and she would be able to sleep soundly that night.

Zenva Vrotoa

 

[Zenva Vrotoa]

Slowly Zenva reclined into her seat, one long leg folding atop the other at the knee. She set her cigarette in her coal painted lips so her now free hand could adjust the way her skirt lay across her leg. The intricate lace pattern mingled with the swirling tattoos that covered the Zabrak woman's entire body. Through the haze of incense and rippling energy it was nearly impossible to tell where the dress ended, and the flesh began by the time it reached her throat.

She began to speak, her tone low and seemingly uninterested in what was actually happening in the room around her. This paired with the harshness of the language she spoke left her voice as soft, animalistic growls that boiled out from her gilded cage. Her free hand waved through the air as she spoke before pulling the cigarette from her lip once more. When she finally looked up, Zenva's voice stopped abruptly in an otherwise seemingly rehearsed welcoming speech. After a long pause the Zabrak asked a question, her voice turning animated.

The Droid ahead of her turned to look at her for a moment before stepping forward. "Her Excellency, welcomes you, Honored Guest, to her home. If you have need of anything that has not been provided, or desire to inspect any merchandise more closely, please do not hesitate to ask." Zenva's voice interrupted the Droid, a ringing, nearly musical laugh accompanying her newest comment. "Her Grace says you are unfamiliar to her. She invites you to step closer and introduce yourself properly."

Once more Zenva's hand come up to take a drag from her cigarette, using the same motion to gesture to the woman to step closer. Pulling the cigarette away once more, she exhaled another plum of gray smoke. Her voice rang out in a melodic tone, "F-three, stop paraphrasing what I say." She said, chuckling softly before continuing. "Usually I'm selling women. It's rather unusual for them to come before me as clients. I am Zenva Vrotoa, Domo of The Hutt Cartel. And you are?"

Malcoma Hesse

 

[Malcoma Hesse]

As the droid began translating for its owner, Mal's eyes fixed from her to it.

When Zenva motioned her forward, she obliged. "I capitalize on unusual, Domo," she replied smoothly. "I am Headmistress Malcoma Hesse, a Made Woman in The Family." Mal waited before adding anything else, to see if Zenva knew of herself now that there was a name paired with her face or not.

Meanwhile, Damris came to the crowd's tide, where it stopped to respect the Domo and her entourage's space. Just one drink—hers—was in his hands, but the fingers cradled around the short glass also held a smoldering cigarette between them. With his free hand, he grabbed it and placed it instead between his lips before turning away and making conversation with a stranger. He knew best to respect a meeting's privacy too, even though part of him was always worried about taking an eye off Malcoma.

Zenva Vrotoa

 

[Zenva Vrotoa]

Zenva chuckled at the woman's quick wit, this Hesse woman was clearly more than the usual lowlife these events attracted. Lifting her glass to take another swallow of her drink, and stalling a moment to think. "I don't believe I've had any direct business with your Family. I thought them a fleeting thing. Like so much in our galaxy, here and gone, in an instant."

She paused to take another drag of her cigarette. "How pleasant to see I was wrong." The Zabrak's serrated teeth flashed in a wicked smile before her hand waved through the air to gesture towards the gathering beyond them. "Please, make yourself at home, Headmistress Hesse. Should you desire anything at all, I would be honored to assist you."

Malcoma Hesse

 

[Malcoma Hesse]

"Thank you, Domo."

Perhaps it was feeling obliged to be on her best behavior for crime lords and ladies that was the reason she very rarely expressed thanks vocally in as many words to anyone else. The Force knew that she had much to be grateful to others for, as did she, but there were less direct ways to communicate it. Above all, she might well have conflated saying "thank you" with fake politeness, with groveling. Mal was in most ways a practical woman, doing whatever was needed even and especially if she didn't like it, but that didn't mean that she settled for being uncomfortable on her own turf. Thus, the last thing she wanted was to feel ingenuine amongst the ones she considered safe—even friends.

So, when she returned to Damris, now standing alone, she simply took the cocktail from his hand and immediately sipped a drink.

"How'd it go?"

"Typically," she replied. "She's surprised I'm a woman. I'm surprised that she's still afloat."

"How so?"

"She's a Hutt Cartel Domo."

Damris paused to smoke his cigarette. An analytical look passed over his eyes as he gazed down the great hall towards the auction stage.

"What?"

"I'm just remembering Maramere."

Malcoma scoffed and then took another sip. She saw the similarities too. A listing—in this case listed—ship; a woman trying to tread water, seemingly in denial of her situation; and a fancy crystal chandelier. "Are you suggesting that I save myself?" she asked, referring to Zenva, who was the stand-in for herself in this comparison.

He blew out another puff of smoke. "I'm suggesting that you do what you think's best."

"I just want to buy a girl," she said before walking forward towards the stage.

Zenva Vrotoa

 

[Zenva Vrotoa]

Zenva's devilish smile continued until she was certain Malcoma had fully turned her attention to something else. The Zabrak's teeth snapped at the empty air, a growl boiling through her. "I want my teeth on her throat. Just not sure if it's because I hate her, or like her." She murmured to herself before gesturing for her Droid to join her.

When she spoke next, her low growling native language rumbled through the incense and cigarette smoke. "F-three, have little Renesri and her little gang of Slicers find out every single thing this Malcoma Hesse woman has ever been involved with. I want her fething life story. Then she can find out who we know with a connection to this Family." Her hand flicked through the air dismissively as she turned to watch the Blonde disappear into the crowd.

Her Droid hadn't managed to take more than a pair of steps away from her before she snapped her fingers to get it's attention again. "Nothing gets handed out until the end of the auction, F-three. I want to know what she bids on, and which items she claims for herself. She's to be invited to Dine with me after the auction regardless of what she buys. Am I understood?"

The Droid answered with an affirmative before turning back to usher the next guest forward. A moment later the Droid stepped away to carry out her orders, one of the IG Droids beside the Domo's Pailquin stepping forward to keep the line of guests orderly. Once again Zenva recited her generic welcome, her mouth moving without thought. Her caustic yellow-red eyes tracing the blonde woman who had piqued her curiosity so.

Malcoma Hesse

 

[Malcoma Hesse]

Mal approached the left side of the stage first, as she, a creature of some habits, always did. She glanced up at the first slave girl through the lip of her glass. Behind her, Damris flashed a close-lipped smile up at the girl, but did not say anything as Mal completed her likewise wordless assessment. The hapan was an excellent judge of character. Though she was not sensitive to the Force, she was experienced in the psychology of slavery. With just her gaze, she could rather accurately pick out which of others' victims had lost any lust for life from the ones that still held expectations of it. If she did mistakenly take one of the former away from a trade, she would give them a way out, but it was better to buy one that she could save—she'd like to think that is was for both of them.

As silently as she had begun looking the first over, Mal moved on to the second. Her bodyguard followed.

It went on like that, a series of quiet, unwitting interviews, until the duo had worked their way towards the other side of the stage: to lucky number seven, a cathar named Heva. Mal didn't break her silence, just turned to hand her drink to Damris and take a pen from his blazer's breast pocket. With it, she wrote her name down on the bidding card set near the girl's feet, and, of course, the offer of an exorbitant amount of money in exchange for ownership.

The Coruscanti excused themselves once the headmistress had finished.

In the meantime, Renesri and her slicers could have been finding much out about Malcoma Hesse.

In the way of above-board business, there were legal titles for two impressive properties on Coruscant in her name: Eden's Club in the Entertainment District and a boarding house in Monument Plaza. There was also a vast paper trail to establish her as the long-standing executive of a business called The Hestia Project. All evidence that could be found surficially suggested that Hestia was a charitable organization that housed and educated Galactic City's urchins and addicts. Further information was largely baseless, accusing the operation as both a front and a fraud, siphoning a majority of the governmental aid and private donations that it accrued to—most likely—The Family's off-planet coffers.

As for her even more illicit dealings, there were digital whispers in the form of encrypted posts on certain holosites. They were also largely baseless, but were left in enough places to inspire some amount of trust. Scum was rarely moved by something, or someone, enough to warn those they did not know, but, for Malcoma, they seemed scared in that special way.

All of those rumors ended the same. The slaves that she purchased where never seen again.

Zenva Vrotoa