Log:Alley Rescue

Lira'una tries to take a shortcut on her way to breakfast and finds herself in trouble on Nar Shaddaa

OOC Date: April 11, 2023
Location: Nar Shaddaa
Participants: Lira'una, Kaine Ul-Nass

Getting shot sucks. /It hurts/ . /A lot/ .

This never used to happen. Sure, there were slips and falls. Sometimes someone would dislocate something or break something. It's aerial acrobatics. No one expects it to go perfectly every single time. That's why the net is there during practice. That's why, when the net gets taken away, it's /so/ much more dangerous.

But that's why we train. So that we don't get hurt.

After /three days/ of being a Jedi and virtually /nothing/ in the way of training, Lira'una had "fast roped" into a hot combat zone -- except without the rope. Because apparently Jedi don't /need/ rope?

Whatever. Regardless, getting shot sucks. But at least she'd been able to help that mother and child. /That/ she would carry with her for a while -- that and the dumbfounded posture of that Stormtrooper when she ripped the blaster out of his hands with her MIND. Then the way he /ran/ when her Master charged him with his lightsaber.

Take that for messing with little kids and moms, you twisted fuck.

All Lira wanted to do now was rest somewhere familiar. Not meditate. Not 'BE A JEDI' next to some waterfall. Just get a cup of caff, curl up, and listen to the Nar Shaddaa thunderstorms somewhere cozy.

So that's where she's off to. Somewhere cozy. She was born on Nar Shaddaa, and though she hadn't spent her entire life there (or even most of it), she figured she'd be able to identify at least a /couple/ of cozy spots. There was this one diner in the Corellian district that was nice. Bonus: The food and caff were cheap. It tasted cheap, too. Cheap, greasy, salty, and absolutely delicious.

/Comfort food/. Maybe Juria was starting to rub off on her.

Lira's a wisp of a little lavender thing. At only five-feet-even, she was pocket-sized for most Wookiees and not an obvious threat to anything larger than a Jawa or an Ewok. Plus, she /moved/ like a Twi'lek -- which was hugely racist, but also very accurate. She was a dancer. An acrobat. An aerialist. She was built like it, and everything about her movements suggested that that's all she'd ever known. She wasn't proper or regal. But she still had a presence, a fluidity, and an almost cat-like grace to everything she did.

It was raining, of course, so she was wearing a cloak over her nearly-flesh-toned jumpsuit. Most people would be forgiven, on first glance, for thinking she wasn't wearing /anything/ under that coat. But on closer examination, the fabric is just a couple of shades darker than her lavender skin, and the zipper is pulled down from the mock turtleneck to mid-chest, letting it breathe a little. The cloak that covers it is silvery and rain-proof, allowing the droplets to slide ride off as the wind tries to whip it around her legs. Her lekku were curled up behind her inside, staying dry and warm from the thunderstorm.

Almost there. Just another few blocks. She picked her way through awnings, trying to stay dry, but then there was a sudden cluster of traffic. Pedestrians weren't being allowed through.

Why?!

She pressed up into the crowd and saw some sort of speeder accident or something. It was hard to tell, given that she couldn't really see over... well... anyone. So, she ended up climbing up on a slippery, wet guardrail. Because what could go wrong there? Droids were trying to clear it, injured being taken via repulsor-ambulance to the nearest medical facilities. But the main road was not passable.

Fine. Detour it was.

Backing out of the crowd and cutting to the right, her cloak offers a mere flash of silver in the flicker of a lightning strike before she disappears into a narrow alley between two stores. The diner was /right there/ . A left, down two blocks, another left, and she'd be there. She could practically /taste/ the nerf eggs.

Of course, taking alleys was a bad idea for a reason. You never know when a few brutish looking thugs are going to step out from behind a dumpster, grinning lasciviously.

"Well.. well.. well... what have we here, fellas?"

You summon a Mercenary (Cheap) named Thug 001 and it appears in the room with you!
You summon a Mercenary (Cheap) named Thug 002 and it appears in the room with you!
You summon a Mercenary (Cheap) named Thug 003 and it appears in the room with you!

Thug 001 (24470) rearmed: Melee: Unarmed / Dodge Melee
Thug 002 (24231) rearmed: Melee: Unarmed / Dodge Melee
Thug 003 (24075) rearmed: Melee: Unarmed / Dodge Melee

Nar Shaddaa - another seedy Hutt planet, despite the zones that are all dressed up for this personage or that Corp, deep down it's a gritty dangerous place where the only two truths of the Galaxy rule: Credits and Power.

Or so it has always seemed to Kaine, and while far from native to the planet, he's also well .. well versed in dealing with what is the core of this world and all the other Hutt planets. There's danger in one place or the other no matter where one is, it just make take a different form here, vs there. As such - he's dressed in his typical well armed fashion, if not on Mandalorian scale, with some light body armor, a carbine slung over one shoulder and a pistol at his hip - though the latter is largely concealed under the poncho he wears against the rain. His dark hair's plastered to his head, however, as he's not going to be one to sacrifice visibility for just keeping his head dry. The blockage at the street catches him as well and he frowns, eyes shifting places more rapidly as he works his way around towards that same alley that Lira heads towards, though from the opposite side of the wreck. Alleys.. alleys when there's lots of other distraction around - well worth taking some particular _extra_ amount of care...

As it appears that Lira didn't, or the goons walking up the alley towards her avoided notice until it was too late regardless. Kaine pause there, just at the entrance, a spot where he can still choose to move to help the clearly outnumbered , cloaked, figure against they're potentially likely hostile assailants..or not.

He waits a beat or three, watching...something telling him he should move on, something else telling him to wait and see.

Kaine Ul-Nass centers his stance as he brings his Quicksnap 36T carbine for battle.

<Combat> Thug 001 (24470)'s attack hits Lira'una at a 100 difficulty! (15)
      * Damage: 11 wound and 0 stun.

"Ugh."

That little sound of actual disgust actually leaves Lira's lips when the three men approach her, starting to surround her, and though she might not have been paying enough attention to be able to anticipate their approach, she definitely knew enough to void getting completely surrounded.

She backs up a few steps, two of them still in front of her, one still trying to move around her side -- circling, pressing her back closer to the alley wall in the process.

"Come on, guys." Her young voice has traces of a Rylothian/French accent. It's not thick, like some of her kind, but it's still distinctive. One hand comes up from the cloak to make a dismissive gesture, vaguely indicating the street. "The road is blocked, and I only want to get something to eat. /Please/ don't do this."

She didn't look terrified, but the fear was there. There was also a subtle motion with her right hand -- a sweep under her cloak that retrieved something metal from her belt and moved it around behind her back. She held it against against her back, hand squeezing for a better grip as the metal pressed against the inside of her arm.

"Oh, don't worry," one of the men snarls, grinning and taking a step closer-- the man that was apparently their 'leader'. "We'll get you something to eat." And then he reaches out, suddenly grabbing for the girl's shoulders and succeeding. He wraps his arms around her, twisting her around against his chest and bringing one hand around to cover her mouth.

[»ATTACK« ( +56)] Kaine Ul-Nass's Quicksnap 36T hits Thug 002 (24231). <63 WP/18 SP>
- Thug 002 (24231) has taken 63 points of wound damage. It is currently Dead.

[»ATTACK« ( +73)] Kaine Ul-Nass's Quicksnap 36T hits Thug 003 (24075). <73 WP/20 SP> (120 Difficulty)
- Thug 003 (24075) has taken 73 points of wound damage. It is currently Dead.

It isn't until one of those thugs jumps out and puts hands on the lone figure after pushing.. her towards the wall with the groups move to attempt to out flank and encircle her, that Kaine steps into the alley with his carbine already down at the ready position. "You bantha fuckin' jawa spawn really shouldn't be so damned predictable... move on."

The words are accompanied by two brief bursts of fire from the carbine aimed at the thug that's basically got his back to Kaine and the one left staring at what he was clearly hoping to get second 'helpings' of in the very near future. Sloppy seconds is better than nothing to his type.

Those two bursts are simple, center mass, but all land in tight 'groupings' on their targets - sending them both sprawling towards the ground in the boneless, lifeless, fashion of puppets with their strings cut.

Then Kaine shifts his attention to the remaining thug, his grey eyes narrowing - there's no compassion in those eyes - these two deaths were not the first on his hands and they surely won't be his last.

Lira'una draws her SoroSuub Stun Baton - 25311.
[»ATTACK« ( +27)] Lira'una's Stun Baton hits Thug 001 (24470). <19 WP/34 SP>
- Thug 001 (24470) has taken 34 points of stun damage. It is currently Dazed.
[»ATTACK« ( -42)] Lira'una's Stun Baton misses Thug 001 (24470). (110 Difficulty)

"NGGHGNGHGNGH!!!"

/Why?/ Why was it that ever since a /FRICKEN JEDI MASTER/ showed up in her life she hasn't had /ONE SINGLE DAY OF PEACE/ ?! Weren't the Jedi supposed to be /ALL ABOUT PEACE/ ?!

Lira stumbles, off balance, once she's pulled back against the man's chest. Her fingers twisted around the grip in her hand, scrambling and searching.

And then *BANG*.. *BANG*. Or.. whatever noise a blaster carbine makes. Pew Pew seems anticlimactic.

Lira's big, bright blue eyes widen in sudden fear, and the thug holding her swings her around to face Kaine, holding her up in front of her like a body shield even as his two buddies lay suddenly lifeless on the ground.

"I'll kill her!" he shouts, the terror in his voice suddenly obvious. "I'll frickin' kill her!"

Maybe he thought this was going to be an easy catch. Maybe he thought this was Nar Shaddaa and nobody would care, much less notice. Even if a Mandalorian had come around the corner, he'd probably have demanded an agreement of payment from the girl before doing anything about it. But, not Kaine, apparently.

And then there's a sudden *SNAP--FZZZ--CRACK* and the guy's head snaps back. Lira had apparently found the activation button on her expandable stun baton, and the rod shot out of the end directly into the underside of his jaw, a spark of electricity sending the guy stumbling backwards in dazed oblivion.

Lira splashes onto her hands and knees, down onto the dirty ground of the alley, the rain still drizzling all around them. The two already lifeless bodies surrounded her. She should have wanted the third one to join them. After everything she'd been through, he deserved whatever punishment this stranger was going to dole out. And it wasn't like he didn't have a clear shot. The guy was reeling. Lira was on the ground. It was a wide open alley.

"Don't!" comes the girl's voice, strong and determined, holding up a hand towards Kaine in the universal gesture for /stop/ . "...Don't kill him!"

The carbine's muzzle traces over, obviously quiet centered on the remaining thug, his eyes focused entirely on the remaining threat. Well, after having glanced down to get a look at the rather attractive, if now quite dirty, T'wilek that's on her hands and knees in front of him. Any other time and he might have let his gaze remain there to drink in the sight a bit more, but this isn't that time or place.

So, it's while he's got the thug covered that he says, "You walked in here, had a baton , and didn't have it _out_ ? What the ... no.. never mind. Get up and get out of his reach.. killing's up to him at this point - if I see him again, it'll be his last sight." There's a coldness to his tone, certainly no remorse, and yet.. there's a measurable amount of something that might almost be resigned exasperation...why _shouldn't_ he just resolve this problem complete?

When Lira gets back to her feet -- slower than one might imagine for a girl of her build -- she's soaked. The hood of her cloak has fallen to expose her lekku underneath, and they writhe anxiously against her back. Her jumpsuit is soaked, making it more reminiscent of a swimming unitard than the combat jumpsuit it was really designed to be, and at the front of her tummy, it's beginning to turn red.

She moves up beside Kaine, putting herself completely out of the line of fire. Her finger leaves the trigger of her baton and it retreats back into its base, leaving her to clip it back onto her belt. Her hand moves, trying to cover up the blood stain, but her lavender fingers weren't big enough to hide it completely from view.

She glanced over her shoulder to see the thug shaking his head to clear it, blinking through the effects of getting hit in the face with a stun baton, and then turning to run. Stumbling. Crashing into the wall. Running some more. Tripping over a bucket. Falling. Scrambling to his feet... yeah. He was done.

"Thank you."

The Twi'lek's voice is soft, and as if sensing the exasperation, one small hand comes up to set on the top of his rifle, gently pulling it down. She /really/ didn't want to see him kill for a third time.

"In my defense, I /just/ wanted some breakfast..."

She looks pitiful, wet and hurt, but there's a little smile and a laugh, a kind of innocent radiance about her -- as if she had just been beset upon by wild animals who didn't know any better and didn't deserve to die. And now that she was safe, it was all behind her. Forgotten. Except for her once more bleeding blaster wound. That wasn't forgotten.

Kaine Ul-Nass's eyes flick back and forth between Lira and the thug, watching carefully .. narrowing at the sight of blood as that becomes evident. "You're bleeding." He says, as if it's raining out - the detachment there obvious, and also almost certainly due to _him_ thinking the situations not resolved yet.

The barrel of the carbine moves away from her hand as she reaches to try and pull it down, Kaine leaving it trained on the retreating thug until he's gone into the gloom or turned a corner and only then does he let it drop to his side on its sling. With a motion that's easy, assertive, but also supportive - Kaine slips his free arm around her, hand finding her far side and sliding down it to her hip to pull her in closer against his side as he starts to walk down the alley that they'd both been intending to go down originally. He doesn't bother to search the corpses - their kind's unlikely to have anything worth the effort, and the stink, to find. "Let's go and see about getting that looked at, how'd you get hurt? Didn't see him get anything close to you."

No questions, no introduction. "Breakfast, hmm? Well.. it'll have to be whatever I have on my ship, or that's in the hangar anyway."

"I know." Lira lets out an exasperated little huff, but she doesn't fight it any more than that. If Kaine was going to kill him, that's just what he was going to do -- but he hadn't yet. And that was a good sign.

She relaxes a little more visibly when that rifle finally /does/ lower, though, those blue eyes watching the man's movements as if trying to guess what the man was. A soldier? A mercenary? It wasn't really /professional/ armor. Not Mandalorian armor, anyway, or any of the variants of the plastoid stuff. She'd seen plenty of those types, too.

The Twi'lek tenses suddenly when she feels that arm go around her, her lekku curling up into two spirals up near her shoulders as if retreating from the possibility of contact. Out of one frying pan, and into another, apparently. At least this one wasn't being rough and covering her mouth.

"Where are we--"

But he was already answering it, even as Lira took a few stutter steps to catch up to walking with him. At six feet tall, he was a full foot taller than she was. Her head only came up to his shoulders. As small as she was, as young as she was, to most she probably came off as little more than a child. She certainly didn't have the skeezy, untrustworthy vibe that most on the moon seemed to have. Quite the contrary. If anything, she seemed /too/ naive.

"Would you believe I tripped and fell in the shower?" She blinks, smiling cheerfully. She was a /horrible/ liar.

"Cut myself shaving?" Another couple of blinks.

"...Maybe it's not /my/ blood. Ever think of that? Huh?" The stain was literally growing as she was holding it, and she was even worse at trying to pretend to be threatening than she was lying.

What she was, though, despite everything else, was a /bundle/ of energy and an absolute beacon of radiance.

"...So... breakfast, then? Like.. /first/ ? Or..."

And then the two of them venture back out of the alley, onto the main streets. Destination: Starport. Lira settled into a comfortable pace behind the stranger and let out a soft breath, wincing against the pain. She might have been a bad liar, but she was trying to put on a brave face. The truth was, getting shot sucks.