Log:Defiance: Cryptid Hunters

Cryptid Hunters

OOC Date: July 12, 2017
Location: Unknown Planet
Participants: Defiance: Kasia Ashkuri, Rheisa Dirleel, Trillian Taim, Tarion Tavers, Sapphira Tavers, Naelyn, special guest star Sar Yavok, and Hex as GM

The short story: Defiance hunts the legendary co'veefi... covfefe.... uhhh something like that.

The long story:

Someone's been letting Hex watch Space TV again.... KASIA... and now the predictable result is that he's got all kinds of wild ideas in his impressionable little head. His ship, a VCX-100 with crew quarters spacious enough to house everyone and cramped enough to make everyone hate each other, is the vessel of the day, taking a scattering of Defiance members and the notorious Sar Yavok into... where, exactly? "So I don't know where we're going, exactly," Hex leads off to a good start in the common area, as the Mayhem hurtles through hyperspace. "It's rumored to exist on uncharted planets in this region of space, but no one's ever found one." He presses a button on a table surface, and a picture of Kasia glaring at a holo camera with frumpy bed hair appears. "Oh, that's not it." Hex tries again, and this time, some kind of monster appears: Large, slightly fuzzy; spiderlike legs but with a partially upright posture, and long, elegant crab-like claws. The claws are a vivid orange color, the rest of the animal tiger-striped in shades of green and brown. "Most scientists say this thing, a co'fveevi, doesn't exist and never have, that it's a myth. But there have been rumors about it for centuries, it sings some kind of song to put people to sleep, and if you can find proof of it, this guy on the holo is offering a huge reward." He beams. "We are definitely going to find this planet and then we are definitely going to find a co'feevi."

Of course the Sar Yavok has a leather bomber jacket with a nexu fur collar, and of course Sar Yavok is wearing it over his light plate armor, and of course Sar Yavok has at least two weapons visible on his person, and of course one of them is a rifle that he sawed down to use as a pistol; he's the "notorious" Sar Yavok.

The Old Man runs a gloved hand along his freshly-shaven jaw, his blue eyes peering at nothing in particular as he sits quietly in the crew quarters, half paying attention to the slideshow. He looks over at the Twi'lek and raises his hand, "Now, why am I here, again?"

Cramped living quarters? Naw. This is the normal standard of no-elbow-room that Rheisa Dirleel prefers. Cozy is best. Cramped is better. Seriously. She's contently sitting on the floor and leaning back against a chair that probably contains somebody and their trespassed-upon legs. She stares at the image of the thing with a blend of horror and hunger. Can it be eaten? Probably. But it sings! Is it a people? WHat is it!?!?

That grumpy look in that picture, it's mirrored in Kasia's face as her picture appears on the holo. "Hex! You said you got rid of that one!" Uh oh, someone is in trouble. She is less surprised about this trip, or what they're looking for, probably just a little resigned, she's been hearing about this space monster for ages now. "We're looking for this thing? Really?" she asks, looking between the holo picture to Hex, then back again.

Sapphira is here too! Yay Sapphira! She's dressed for an adventure today, with brown leggings tucked into boots, over which she wears a knitted mustard-colored poncho shawl that allows her to be comfortable in the metal box floating through freezing space AND hide her weapon. It's a win-win! Her hair has been pulled back into little buns on either side of her head, subtle yet oddly cute at the same time. Cute as in it kind of makes it look like she has ears. She //has// ears of course, but you get the idea. Around her throat she wears her computer-chip-turned-jewelry from Tanaab. She's knitting, seated on the floor with her legs crossed as she looks up at Hex for the briefing. Her metal needles never stop click-click-clicking even as she stares at him. And slowly she stops and raises her hand. She sits, patiently, with a straight back and her hand high until Hex deigns to call on her. "Does this reward require live proof or dead proof, sir?" Mrs Tavers asks. "I'm just thinking it'd be hard to fit something like that //live// in here with all of us."

There's a mild crashing noise from the cargo bay, and Trillian manages to trip and fall from behind a pile of crates. She winces and rubs her bottom wryly while looking accusingly at the crates. "um... soryr about that. I'll... I'll clean that up in a second..." Trillian clambers to her feet and starts restacking the crates. She finishes, carefully making sure that the crates aren't going to fall on her again and comes over to flop next to Sapphira, watching her needles flash as she calmly finishes another row.

"Now, why is he here again?" Tarion is grumbling, nodding at Sar and frowning intensely. The hunter is dressed in what he's always dressed in, having forgone that robe everyone is slowly coming to love, and dragging a G8 battle rifle on his back via a sling. "We can find this co-feefee on our own, we don't need outside help. Unless you two have some kind of sick wager on how long the prosthetic arm supply will last and this is your Idiot's Array to get things over with." That's to Kasia, who he's appeared near.

Naelyn settled down comfortably in a seat, sprawled out deceptively calm as he is clad in his dark black leather pants, laced up black boots with the quiet flat soles, the fitted black corsetted top with no sleeves, black bracers laced up, black fingerless gloves and arm bands. Make up is still on fleek, hair pulled back in a braid and secured in a low bun at the nape of his neck with something long, silver, and sharp. His pack rests lightly against his leg and he has knives probably hidden in many places on his body, and a few empty holsters and sheathes strategically placed as he quietly studies his datapad, speaking softly. "You are here Master Yavok for geriatric eye candy...." As he takes notes.

"Alive preferred, dead okay, as long as it's in condition enough to identify it," Hex replies to Sapphira, seeming pleased that no one is yet doubting whether co'feevis are real. Yet. "Sar, you're here because you're good at way finding in space and on the ground, and you'll be able to keep people alive," he hand waggles, "mostly alive, if we get into a survival situation. Rheisa, same thing, you know what to do in the wilderness, my friend. I reckon I'd like you to track this thing, if we get a whiff of it. Nerds," that means Naelyn and Sapphira for sure, probably Trillian as well, "We're sending out probe droids; Raim and Nyla couldn't make it, so do your best to operate 'em and get feedback." The ship beeps a notification and lurches a little as it exits hyper, and Hex's lekku perk up happily. "Let's go figure out what a co'feevi is, ka? No one seems to know!"

"I don't know how to take that one," Sar says to Naelyn, leaning back in his seat and pulling a cigarillo from his freshly-produced pack. A torch is held to the end of it and once it's properly be-cindered, he tucks the pack and lighter away. He looks over at Hex and says, "Cool cool."

"I can find." She's sure of it. In some ways, the creature resembles an enormous vokoling, and that gives Rheisa hope, for a decent meal when - IF - they hunt one of these mythical beings down. Of course, in some ways, it also resembles something that Qo and Veela's kids might draw, so maybe there's nothing but emptiness to her dream, here. Something Nae says jerks her mercifully out of this inner worrying. She shouldn't still be hungry, anyway. Wasn't but an hour ago that she ate more of Hex's leftovers. "How do one eat candy with their eye?" she pokes at her own, squinting around at Nae like he's got three heads, but leans back against the seat beside one of those leathery legs and cants her head aside -- just in case his hands need a break from datapading and wish for a bony scalp to massage.

Purr-ing-interrupted when the ship lurches and jars a less happy note from the gruta's breast.

Kasia is wearing pants, and boots, rather than her usual dressier things, because this is a Hex mission, and those often get messy. She's learned. She also has a pack of supplies with her, including a medkit, just in case. "It's just a turn of phrase," she informs Rheisa, looking mildly amused at the confusion. "he means that Sar is old, but still sort of pretty." As to the search for the planet, she doesn't offer much assistance, maybe quietly hoping they don't find this nature filled hellscape.

Slowly, Sapphira's hand lowers. She glances once to Sar, the newcomer of sorts though she's met him once, and then back to Hex. Once more her hand rises, and she'll wait to be called upon before she speaks up again. Someone's still stuck at University, it seems. "Sir, did anyone think to bring anything that would allow us to capture a live creature? Nets, or tranquilizers, or anything of the sort?" Probably not, but that would be too easy. She lowers her hand, once again plucking up her knitting while she waits for Hex's response with a click click click of her needles.

Trillian watches confusedly as everybody is talking about some sort of ... cov...fef..fe. thing... She's not sure she heard it right. Studying the astrogation charts behind Kasia and Sar, she can't seem to make heads or tails of it. It simultaneously looks like and doesn't look like half a dozen other star systems. "Um... " she tries to apologize to nobody in particular, but is drowned out by the voices of the other people. Trillian sits down next to Sapphira again.

"Well, what you got here is a classic Gordian transfusion confusion," Tarion announces, wandering over to the nav computer to take a look at things. "Pretty sure that's Altimeter's Alchemy, next to the Nubile Nebula. Anyone with eyes can see that." A finger traces a shape on the screen. "See that? They had to mark this 'mature content' in the textbooks, what with the... okay, they /will/ when they- okay, I don't know what that is. I don't know where we are." He glances over at Hex, their fearless, clueless leader. "I can track this thing if you know what I'm looking for beyond this drawing of Rheisa's runaway childhood imaginary friend," the hunter offers.

"Hex, I am turning down this offer from the Mirilian Prince from Naboo saying he can send you credits if you purchase a fuel credit chit and send it to him in his situation of dire...ness." That is Naelyn's response to Hex, eyebrow raising a fraction, he lets a hand drift down to gently massage the offered head. "Master Yavok, it is a compliment....trust me...." He is not going to try to explain the eye candy thing because Kasia has that on lock. He is however studying his data pad with a rather blank expression. With his accent, he really cannot say that word well. "Ah...The cofeeis, they are...I can cross the location of most reported sightings with local astrogation chart readings to assist with triangulating a general area of space to travel." A pause. "I know some places however where you can send Master Tavers to contract some equally as mysterious crustacean like creatures. They are far far far smaller but if he visits certain brothels, he will have enough to qualify as a test subject for several clinical trials...." Just putting that out there.

"So'cha ka," Hex confirms for Sapphira, "We have nets, we can put the blasters on stun, and we got a real big barred crate in the cargo hold. How we're gonna get it /into/ the crate, I don't know, but we'll worry about that after we find a co'vfeefi. We're going to be famous, ai'jouku! FAMOUS! Famous and wealthy!" If his people are having trouble finding co'vfeefi world, he is as fearless and clueless as ever, having full faith in their capability to navigate to a place that doesn't exist to find a creature that only exists as Rheisa's imaginary friend. Hex does queue up some more holo pictures of the beast for Tarion, but they're all blurry, unreadable "almost got it" pictures, or artists' renditions. "Sar, what do you lean towards," he asks the geriatric eye candy, "Split the group to cover more ground, or keep everyone together in case they get eaten by hostile wildlife? I got no idea what we'll find down there." He does also abruptly look up at Naelyn, "Don't delete the prince! He's a good guy, Naelyn!"

"Sounds like Tarion's really got the upper hand on the rest of us," Sar says, taking a drag from his cigarillo and blowing the sweet-smelling smoke up towards the ceiling, cause he's polite like that. He stands up and turns to look at the nav computer. Wandering over to it, he taps in a few commands and kicks at it a couple times. Moments later, another picture of bed-headed picture of Kasia pops up on the viewscreen. "That's not right." Pause. "Kasi, you really need to stop going to sleep with wet hair. You look gross." He kicks out a hip and rests a hand on it as he peers at the terminal in front of him and continues to jam his finger at random buttons. Porn. Nightly news. More Porn. Sitcom reruns.

"Uhh..." Sar vocalizes, tilting his head as he regards some sort of squishy-sounding activity happening on the screen, "Prolly best to keep us all together. Ain't even got a system map of this area, much less somethin' on-ground. No need'n splittin' up and gettin' someone killed."

"Oh," Rheisa flushes a redder shade of terracotta as Kasia sets the record straight, and then takes a more scrutinizing look at the CDF dude across the way. Ehh...maybe Naelyn /is/ confused. But that's ok, because mr magic hands is allowed to be, in this moment. Her eyelids flutter closed under the weight of relaxation. To Sapphira, she quietly volunteers "I have darts. Poison, to keep one still." Neurotoxin - it's great. And to prove it, she blindly digs into a pouch on her belt and slips out a bundle wrapped tightly in fabric. Unfurl the fabric and yep! Her palm tips to display the neat stack of pain-coated thorns. See? Beast immobilization totally under control, yup. And, from the way she cuts a look to Tarion in the wake of his commentary, she might just give a demonstration.

"Close your tongue." Well, she almost got it right.

Kasia gets to her feet, but only after the wet hair comment, and takes a path to the ships computers that brings her by the author of said comment, a hand lifted to try and slap Sar on the back ot the head along the way. Or the side of the head. Or the face. It's not a hard slap, if it connects. Whether or lands or not, she then moves on to the computer to start doin' whatever it is one does to figure out astrogation, mathing and stuff, or relying on the computer to do that, and additional helpful information. "Ah, okay, I think I might have something here." It is a planet, one that won't kill them by breathing on it, and it's not even home, or a resort planet, so this isn't an elaborate ruse to get out of going into nature. "This looks like a good place to start, if by good you mean not the least bit civilized, and way off the charts."

There is a moment for Sapphira where the reality of what they're about to do washes over her, and the baby adrenaline junkie within her starts to come out. Her eyes widen, and so does her smile, and she almost bounces in her seat. But then she stops, pausing, still, and finally turns to look at Naelyn over her shoulder. Her needles have ceased in their clicking. She blinks at him once. "Or we could //not// encourage that kind of behavior," she suggests. "For my sake at least." And just as it seems that might be the end of the horrors in this little meeting, there's wet, fleshy sounds coming from Sar. Or coming from his datapad, but really it's his fault either way. Sapphira just //looks// at him, repelled. Then she pushes to her feet, moving herself off to where her larger, leave-it-on-the-ship bag is settled to safely tuck her newest project away, where it'll be safe and sound. Priorities, okay?!

Trillian has slipped into the pilot's chair of the Mayhem, following Kasia's coordinates to a dark grey and green planet. Pulling on the yoke and throttling the engines, the Mayhem gives a throaty roar and everybody feels the drop and rumble as they slice through the atmosphere. Seconds later, they break through the cloud layer and it's a cold, dark swamp of a planet. Trillian banks the ship in a few directions, tapping the mapping sensors and looking for a place to set down. Finally, she finds a passable clearing and brings the Mayhem down onto the small land mass. A bump and a jolt later, she turns around to look at everybody. "OK. We're here. Wherever... here is... I think it's sturdy enough to hold the weight of the Mayhem..."

"I got a hand up on everyone, thanks to you," Tarion replies to Sar, but his words stop tumbling out when that picture of Kasia comes up again. "Is there any way we can save that-" but she's on the move, and he hushes up again. "Uh, anyway, we're gonna find this cothing and coname it after ourselves. The Co'defi. Just put it down, Trillian, we'll be fine. Hex, where are the snacks?!" It's time to go ashore.

"Deleted." Naelyn replies to Hex before he was going to respond to Sapphira but they are landing and the golden brown man-woman almost seems to pale a bit, eyes closing for the landing process, gripping his datapad rather tightly. Deep breaths....deeep breaths. Then he waits until he recovers from the Jolt, carefully getting to his feet. He is strapping on his sleek pack, zippers and closures all easy for him to access even on his back. He slips foot long cylinders into sheathes at either hip, silently drawing his black veil across his nose and mouth, securing it before flipping up his hood. "Hex." He speaks up. "Whatever happens..." He then utters ever so sweet words in Ryl that he usually does before a mission 'it has been an honor to be your brother' and 'preemptively f*ck you'. Just in case he never gets to say it again.

"Perfect. Perfect," Hex praises, in such a good mood that he's ignored all the comments about his wife's appearance and saving photos. Or maybe he just fully trusts her to take the pins out of her hair, reveal them to be knives, and cut a bitch should the need arise. Squish, the VCX lands uncertainly in the cold, mucky swamp. "We are gonna find the SHIT out of some Cofayfays," says Hex, who hasn't managed the name of the thing with any consistency whatsoever. He tromps out to the cargo bay, and then the weird ramp that lowers below the cockpit, facing forward. This planet is foggy and swampy, but it seems like cold swamp, not warm. Everything is eerily still, visibility is limited, and the sounds of flying creatures flutter and screech, far away in unseen treetops. Hex takes a moment to unpack two crates, revealing a small probe droid in each: picture smaller, less fierce versions of that thing on Hoth. To everyone's probable surprise, he appears to know at least a little about operating them. "whirrrbblblblblbl. whirrrrblblblbl," they beep mechanically, and then they tootle off into the distance, disappearing into the fog. A clunky control device is handed to Sapphira and Naelyn, one each. "Those things are reporting back to these units, they might be able to give you some data back, and you can make simple queries of them. I'm staying here with the ship, in case you all need a pick-up or something comes here and tries to destroy it. I know you're gonna miss me and probably I'll die alone, but we'll make do." He grins his stupid pointy-toothed grin. "Now go find us a co'veefi, ok ka?"

Sar Yavok receives said slap upon the back of the head and releases a quiet 'heh'. He takes a short puff from his cigarillo and looks over the chart that Kasia pulls up. "Looks like it could be the place," Sar offers to Kasia and the rest of the crew. He fixes his tousled hair and turns back to face the crew, hand resting on his handcannon. He wanders over to the exit door and leans against it, just kinda waiting around. A look over to Tarion and he says, "I've really gotta hand it to you, man; the way you're dealing with this whole thing is leaving me a little stumped."

He wanders his way down the ramp and grumbles as his boots squish around on the slimy ground. He tugs his jacket tighter around himself and zips it up. He lifts his comm to his mouth and says, "Hex, if I die; I want you to know that I was the superior lover and you'll never be better than me at anything."

Swamps: Rheisa's not a fan. Before she can even see what's out there, she smells it - that primordial dankness, oozing from the unveiling outside to their climate-controlled air. Gross. Her initially happy look of being free to stretch her legs turns swiftly sour when the lowering ramp confirms her olfactory fears. It's not the smells that are so bad, really, but the layers of decay /making/ those smells, concealing hidden deaths in murky depths that will surely lead one into doom. Because you see, when /she/ steps out and into this muck, it's bare skin that's gonna squelch into the muck, not some armored pair of boots.

When Rheisa does finally venture out onto the sodden earth, she wanders a moderate distance away from the ship and sits down. Her visual scan is enhanced by the other data pooling in around, like the presence of small, scurrying things unseen among the reeds, probe droids moving deeper into the depth of trees, and a general feel for the spirit of the place. It takes awhile, but once she feels anchored enough to the heart of whatever this planet is, she arises with less fear, more focus, and musters her most convincing smile. "Is no problem. If cohfif is here...it will show us to itself."

With their destination found, and the info input into the nav systems, Kasia gets up and leaves Trillian to do the flying portion as she grabs her pack, and prepares to leave the ship. "Sar, stop being a dick, or else I'm not even going to yell at anyone for shooting some part of you off in retaliation." She heads for the ramp, coming to a stop near Hex. "Hex, if I die here, I want you to know what Sar said isn't true, also if I don't die I am going to blame you for every bug bite, and you're going to have to do the laundry when we get home. Love you." He'll get a quick kiss, a pat on the backside, and then she turns to tromp off the ship and into nature, groaning a little as soon as her boots hit the muck. "This is terrible, no cofeevee is worth this."

Sapphira walks over to take her device, but almost immediately she frowns. The thing is deftly turned in her slender hands to reveal the back panel, which is popped open with equal grace. "Circuit conduit is fried, sir," she reports up to Hex, then looks down at the droid remote control again. She wrinkles her mouth to one side in thought. "I can monitor it from here, using the ship's comms systems, but the moment I step out in the dense woods? Pfftttt." Sapphira makes a zapping sound with her lips.

Trillian also takes one look out of the ship, looking at the sky, then around at the muck and then at the ground, where a particularly large bubble torpidly pops at her. She turns to Hex, shivering slightly. "Um... if it's ok with you, Hex... may I borrow the Mischief? I can do an aerial pass and do some recon..."

"Let's do this," Tarion announces, hopping down into the swampy muck with almost no trace of hesitation and stomping after Sar. "The surface reminds me of you, Hex. Steamy, green, covered in filth." Everyone else is... dragging their feet. "Let's go! Come on, you losers." The bounty hunter turns back to grin at Kasia, the only lady who's joined them (unless you count Rheisa, buttttt yeah). "It's not that bad."

Hex lights up a cigarette and makes a brief gesture at Sar, the back of a hand coming to his jawline and sweeping away in a sharp motion. "Ozante to'ah," he replies, something in Ryl that's probably insulting, but he doesn't seem to be actually perturbed. Instead, he's promptly distracted by the first issue of the trip, Sapphira's equipment. "Witchtits," he sighs a curse. "Better stay with Mayhem and monitor what you can then. And enjoy having dry feet." Trillian's plan receives a nod as well, and approval. "Good idea, lia'rukh. Let me know what you see out there. Watch out for any large, flying wildlife that might try to mate with your ship. That happened on Felucia, once. Real bummer. There was some crashing, and, I mean, probably broken hearts." Kasia gets a hug, a kiss, and an ass-grab, and then he beams and says the most horrifying words to the rest of the party, "Yes, listen to Tarion!"

The shadowy figure accepts the remote from Hex, as he stares at the horror that lies beyond the ship...the swamp. "Biiiiiiiiitch these are my good...boots." He exhales softly in Ryl, lashes lowering and he exhales softly. Then Sar makes his comment, manging two burns so succintly it is beautiful. Then he makes his way carefully after Rhesia, tilting his head to thenside when she is reassuring in a way that is not. He closes his eyes, inhaling deeply and exhaling through his teeth in a soft hiss. There is a mental shift somewhere that changes how he holds himself, hands moving to his hips and looking down to his boots and looking to Kasia sympathetically. "If need be...I will completely support you feeding them both to whatever beast appears so that you can be reunited with your husband again if only to tear him a new asshole, Mistress." And he is prepped to follow, staying between Rhesia and Kasia.

Sar Yavok grins back at Kasia in the way that he always does and turns to begin tromping further into the swamp, hand rested firmly on the grip of his pistol. "G8's a good rifle, Tavers. F-11's a personal favorite of mine, though."

"With legs like that sucker supposedly has, it's liable to stay away from the marsh as best as it can, so...thisaway," Sar says, moving off towards the more wooded area to the west.

"If we listen to Tarion, we are sure to die," that, at least, is something Rheisa can assert with full confidence. "We should start that way, into the trees," she points roughly to the southwest, just a few degrees off from where Sar's decided to go. The faintest of breezes breathes from that direction, wafting against her extended finger. Maybe a storm is coming. "If wind pick up more strrrong, it will blow our scent away from where we go. I do not know if cohfif have nose to smell, but...others maybe do." But, just in case the wind never does pick up to blow really in their favor, she bends to scoop a sizeable plop of mud into hand and starts smearing away, while moving as sure-footedly as she can, which definitely gives everyone else plenty of time to keep pace.

This is terrible, Kasia hates it here, hates nature, questions why she let herself get talked into this. She did though, and so it's with a big sigh that she starts forward. It only takes a few steps for this to get worse, she takes in one deep breath, and then begins to sputter against the bug she sucked into her mouth, cough, cough, spit, ugh. SO GROSS. Still, she trudges onward, because she won't be able to convince Hex this space monster doesn't exist otherwise.

"I bet it's adapted to the wild," Tarion retorts to Sar's assertion, shaking his head and diverting to head his own way further into the swamp. The bounty hunter stops to scoop up some muck on the tips of his fingers and smear it on his face like tiger stripes before trudging deeper into the wild, his rifle held at the ready. He stops again in the near distance, and his vague laugh floats back as his voice can faintly be heard saying "Oh yeah, put it on stun."

The last thing Tarion likely wants to hear: his wife in his ear. "Continue with your current heading," Sapphira informs them from her place high and dry back on the ship. Why she's even got her butt in a cozy seat; this is the life. "Keep your eyes to the sky, though. There's a large reading that seems to be utilizing the treetops. Might be the mythical covfefe."

Naelyn is mostly alternating between being a shadow between Kasia and Rhesia and staying quiet, and alert, glancing up from time to time with wariness.

West they trudge, except for Sapphira, who is cozy and dry and in a place free of mud and bugs, and Trillian, who is flying about somewhere -- they can't see the Mischief through all this cold, misty fog, but they can hear the sound of the auxiliary fighter retreating into the distance as Trillian searches for cov'fifays from the air. "Get up in the trees if you can," Hex's voice follows Sapphira's on the comm, "Everything's pointing towards maybe that's where they go. And watch out if you do find one, ok ka, because don't forget they sing. Whatever that means. It's probably not deadly at all. Kasia babe I love you you look great in those pants." Who even lets him use the com.

The ground grows wetter, the trees, thicker.

"Well, there's water on Nar. You got gills?" Sar asks of the bounty hunter that's decided to lone wolf it. He rolls his eyes and continues his slog through the wildlands. "Readin' anything on the ground, Mayhem?" he asks into his wrist comm. "Gonna climb and see if I can see anything, alright?" Sar says to the group that's with him.

Tightening the strap of his E-11 around his body, Sar begins to make his way up the knotted-slimy surface of a nearby tree that looks tall enough to see above the canopy above. Unfortunately, Sar's old and he's not on drugs anymore, so he's not a superhuman. His eyes squint as he tries to make out the silhouette of something scurrying around, and the Old Man's foot slips from one of the holds. Soon afterwards, he's plummeting from about 20 feet up the side of a tree down into the swamp below. And he doesn't seem to be moving.

The treetops, eh? Well, shit. Rheisa's understandably a little leery of scaling such beautiful things after her last fall, buuuut. It's pretty dense cover down here, and that's making it difficult to detect any movement waaaay up there. Like someone slapped a heavy, wet blanket over those gorgeous montrals of hers. So....Rheisa steels herself against doubt and selects a tree a little ways from Sar's ascent to begin her own. Janky toes and calloused fingers grip through the slime and she climbs one death-defying heave after anoth-----was that Sar? Something big just fell and her head whips around to inspect. "Yavok?" But the lack of answer and others' worry doesn't stop her from continuing on.

Eventually, the Togruta gets way up there into the canopy and folds herself tiredly over a limb. And then another, and another, after spying a potential snack. When she's shimmied far enough, Rheisa takes greedy hold of some globulous, orange squish ball that smells faintly of salt, fat, and ass. Hopefully it tastes better. Before she can find out though, something above and to her right shifts position and it's as though an entire cap of foliage has run away, scuttling heavily to the north. "Is something up here!" she whispers into her gooey collar. Is moving away...too fast for me to follow. Also, eggs!" At least she thinks they are eggs.

(*Munch*)

Kasia is definitely not going to try and climb anything, because that's for people who enjoy physical activities like hiking, and wading through swamps. She does not, so she loiters near the base of the tree while climbing happens. And then falling happens. She cringes back from the initial swamp water splatter, and then rushes over to the fallen man. "You old idiot, you need to be more careful," she chides before she's even sure he's still alive, but he is, and then sets to work trying to quickly clean and patch up the scrapes that resulted from the fall.

"Moving south now," Sapphira reports back to the group, blissfully unaware of their gross trials and tribulations. She's seated comfortably still, with a headset on, reading the data sent back by the droid on a screen in front of her. A surprisingly grainy green screen, given the technology of the time period. Funny how that works. "Wait..." Sapphira mutters softly, adjusting a few knobs and dials, which are also in vogue for some reason. "It's moving south in the trees," she reports again. "Moving toward another mass. A smaller version of the same or ... something else entirely I'm not sure which. Maybe it's going to find a mate? A pair of them would be worth more than double, I'd think!" Oh dear, her excitement got the best of her. Sapphira clears her throat, professionalism returning. "I mean ... be careful."

Naelyn watches and listens quietly, head tilting to the side before he starts to head south. "Rheessia darling, if someone tried to eat Umak when they broke into your house...how happy would you be...." He cautions over the coms before taking a running jump for a tree, grabbing a branch and swinging himself up to a higher branch, crouching as he maintains his balance, squinting at the fog.

Sar and Kasia are on the ground, with Rheisa and Naelyn in the trees. "If there's two of the covfi'fees, that would be phenomenal," Hex's voice enthuses over the comms, sharing Sapphira's opinion there. "Get a holo of them if you can, muchiku!" friends! "Even if we can't capture one, if we have picture evidence... that has to be worth something, ka?" Unfortunately for team Rocket back on the ship waiting for everyone else to catch the wild co'veefi, Sapphira's screen suddenly winks out and goes dark, portraying an error message....

Meanwhile back in the forest, the fog seems to part just a little... a wisp, a glimpse, something is moving south of here, through the trees. The trees are tricky, but dense enough that they can be navigated by the sure-footed, without returning to the ground.

"I'm fine," Sar says, sitting up with a loud groan. "I hate mud," Sar says, doing his best to smack away the larger clumps while Kasia tends to him. "Ow!" he vocalizes, as she takes a rag soaked with some sort of disinfectant to the cut on his cheek.

"Scoot," Sar says to Kasia, smacking at her hand as he moves to stand up. GROOAAAN. His body hurts a lot. He loosens the strap of his E-11 rifle and swings it around. Taking a second to clean some mud off of the thing, he hefts it to his shoulder, takes a second to lead the quickly-scurrying blur, and fires a blue bolt off into the distance. It hits its mark and something falls to the ground. "C'mon, y'all."

Naelyn's cautionary advice is selectively not heard. She is a predator, and an opportunistic one at that. She has no qualms with digesting the unhatched young of animals left for the taking. *SQUISH* Nope, nope. The flavor is not /much/ better than the smell, but maybe a little. Eggs are packed full of needed nutrients though, and she's frickin hungry and a little shaky. One smushy bite after another gets crammed in, until the Togruta's face is more orange, breath rancid, and she's devoured two of them. *Uurp* One hand rests upon her instantly lurching stomach, but the feeling subsides once stomach acid does its think and quiets the swell of rebellion. Ugh. Collecting one more for the road to share later with a friend, she tucks it gingerly into a pouch on her belt, atop everything else. But that leaves just one left, and one is the loneliest number, so she takes it, too, tucking that one into her shirt and cinching her belt tight.

"Ok," she breathes back into the com and reorients herself on the limb. Maybe if 'it' encounters another 'it' the two will stay put long enough for the gang to get a better look. There's a pretty good entanglement of limbs and vines up here, so she cautiously proceeds forward, picking and climbing her way through the canopy network. This is the part where having superior spatial awareness /should/ serve her well. Togruta, though, evolved on the ground. It is only their cousin, the tog'rrr which came to dwell in the trees. So it's a little nerve wracking for one, who even with eyes closed, can't NOT 'look down'. And then there's a deafening rifle rapport and something shrieks. Rheisa scrambles faster with all senses on high-alert because that was just /one/ to hit ground.

Kasia's hand is slapped away, so she slaps back at Sar with the the rag, and then lets him go off to shoot things with slowly infecting wounds. She squints up at the tree a moment, then down at Sar. "Guys, lets not get too far apart from one another here, we're in an uncivilized world with creatures that we don't understand, we need to be careful." She sounds worried, but she always does, but really, she's usually right.

"No, frickin...." Suddenly, across the comms, comes a string of Nar street swears that would make the scruffiest of pirates blush hot red. Sapphira has let out a howl that has some of the most foul words known in basic, and there are a few other languages thrown in there as well, including one in Ryl that she probably doesn't even understand the full depth of. But guys, it's like, super bad. Worse than the words that can't be said on TV. And it goes on for a good ten seconds. "Something knocked our comms offline. Be warned, Swamp Team: the mate is coming your way. Repeat, the mate is coming your way." With that she tears the headset from her ears and bolts for the door to get outside and try to fix this thing.

Naelyn stays as still as he can, head bowed and hand resting lightly on his hip, pressing down on something sleek and silver and taking a deep breath, inhale....exhale. Then he makes a soft hissing sound in reaction to both Kasia and Sapphira, then over yonder where Nae is perched the same sound that the mystery beast made echoes. He counts slowly to himself before playing the sound once more.

Sapphira drops off the comms to try to fix her connection to her probe droid... whirrrrblblblblbl. whirrblblblblbl. But Hex got them on clearance, so that might not actually be possible, and the team is left on their own without sensor backup here in the swamp. Finding Sar's spectacularly downed quarry is not too difficult; they can trudge through the swamp or clamber through the trees and do just that. About five minutes' travel brings them to.....! Not a co'veefi. This is nothing like the pictures that Hex had on the holo. This is an ape-like thing with big insectoid eyes and vestigial wings, snoozing in the mud, thoroughly tranquilized by the stun bolt. It's about the size of Kasia.

But are they alone? If not, the other creature in the trees, lured in perhaps by Naelyn's recording, hasn't shown itself. It's near, though.

You have a bad feeling about this.

Oh no. Rheisa makes a grimace that can better express her feeling than any word, and the noises that Naelyn's magic sound box is making don't help to quell her fears. Her momentum stills, headtails blanched and clutched near to her frame while she crouches down into a crook between branch and trunk, then butt-scoots so that most of her is hopefully hidden around the other side of the tree, so whenever this unknown thing does crash through the haze, she's not so exposed. Both hands secure her dart gun, loads it, and lifts halfway to her lips as she waits and watches.

"That don't look like the c'ofiif'i," Sar says, examining the downed beast. "Huh. Prolly be good to capture it, anyway. Somebody's bound to pay us for it. Xenobiologists or whatever." He kneels down next to it, rifle held casually and looks it over before his eyes turn to the trees around them. Fog's thick as soup, though.

"We need to be careful," Kasia warns again, but do the coms work? They might not be working. It might only be Sar that hears her, because she's not yelling it, and other people are still in the trees. Sar shoots a thing, and she trudges along after him to check out the ape like thing, nose crinkling slightly. "That definitely isn't it, poor thing it was probably just minding it's own busin-- us, Sar." She slaps him on the shoulder and then points off to some spot in the distance, or at least relative distance, distance enough in the fog that it's only shape and shadow, rather than easily visible. "Is that it? That looks like it, doesn't it? Coffeefee. Sar, get ready to shoot again if we need to."

Naelyn presses/sinks even lower on his branch, still playing that recording and balancing, slipping something from his belt and clipping it to his bracer and he whistles sharply, hoping Sar is listening before there is a visible green laser pointer like light shining up into the canopy, slowly tracking the mysterious coffebeanfi, sighting the target for the grizzled dream boat.

There it is, appearing through the mist: The Majestic Co'veefi, the creature of legend, of myth, of a number of really trashy and stupid holodocumentaries that Hex can't stop watching. Are you guys going to keep letting him watch cryptid shows after this? Or are you learning from your mistakes? The co'veefi is large, perhaps 10 or 12 feet tall, with six legs on its mantid-like body and two pincers on its 'arms'. It has four eyes, two large and round, two smaller and raised up to the side, and it moves through the trees, click click click, with surprising dexterity. It is, in its way, a beautiful animal, with those artfully curved orange claws, its stripey, feathery, almost shimmery 'fur'. But it seems extremely surprised to see them also hunting its ape thing, and not very happy about that. The co'vee.... fi... fefe...vi... trills in alarm and raises a crest of gorgeous feathers, puffing up to look so scary.

And then, abruptly, it IS so scary. They might imagine later that this is a trick of pheromones or chemistry, but there's no time for processing it now. Terror overwhelms the group, in the trees and on the ground, an instinct-deep fright that communicates clearly: this thing is going to eat you and you need to get GONE. It hits like an electric wire, creating an uncontrollable impulse to run the hell away, out of here, out of this swamp, out of this terrible idea, back to the safety of the ship. Run, run, run, RUN!

"Kasia, run!" Sar shouts, attempting to shove her in the direction of the ship. He'll do his best to stay behind and fire blindly at the thing in an attempt to deter it, but he's getting the hell out of Dodge, too.

The dartgun barely makes back into its harness, as Rheisa a) mirrors the feather fluff with a similar emote from her headtails, then b) scrabbles up from her hiding place and begins a hasty descent to the swampy floor. It's always more difficult, coming down, and the urge to just get it over with and jump is strong. "Go, Naelyn!" she cries, in case his legs are frozen in place, then "Too big for net!" comes her breathless excuse over the com - if it works. With heart thudding in her chest, she takes a leap of faith for one of those vines and is granted a fast track down a few stories, til that thins out and she gets dumped onto a branch. There's a lot of flailing, some stumbling down one more, then the woman loses what grip was left under broken nails and drops the rest of the way.

• Splat* She's up though, in a panicked fury to get the hell away. Does she regret eating those eggs? Proooobably not.

Oh no. OH NO. OH NO OH NO. Kasia was already uneasy because this is nature, and swamp, and nature, but this is way worse. The thing, this co'vee'fee trills and her eyes go wide. She's already turning to get the -f- out of there when she's shoved, which throws her balance off, and she steps wrong, and then everything is just the worst. Gross swamp soup around her boots becomes gross swamp soup all over her front. All of her front. Face, clothes, which prompts a burbled bubbling shriek that is mostly muffled by swamp and then is cut off because water. Ugh. That doesn't stop her retreat, however, because in the next moment she's up on her feet again, coughing, retching, spitting, and worst of all, running. They're never coming back here again.

The Confefe'vi B*tches Project is the name of the file where Nae is saving this. He crouches there, holding his laser pointer and focussing his camera communicator in the same direction, watching and waiting for it to reveal itself. Then, it appears but it only gets caught briefly on the camera because there is the soft fluent swearing in Ryl and the speeded up breathing, heavy breathing and the scuffling sound of somewhat dropping gracefully out of a tree...camera skidding and scrambled as there is more heavy breathing and it is clutched tighly, terrifying snap shots of trees, branches, a scary catapiller before it is crushed under a boot and then theres a flash of other running feet, and the camera is jostling around he pauses to get an accidental shot of Kasia falling and Nae is just babbling to Ryamat in Ryl. He pauses though, just a moment to call out. "Tarion! I just got a notification somebody emptied out your bank account, you better hurry!" The camera is still rolling, tucked into his belt so it is getting lots of crotch and butt shots. He has summoned Tarion so he does not get left behind.

The co'veefi seems satisfied. It just wanted to have a snack in peace, not deal with these meddling kids. It does not pursue the fleeing humanoids, and instead, daintily picks its way down to the swamp floor where the gorillabird is still stunned. The prey is picked up, gathered into its claws, and then it heads back into the trees, where it disappears into the mist.

The heroes make it back to the ship, where they're greeted by a confused Hex and Sapphira, calling Trillian in to re-dock the Mischief. Just as the others are getting back on board, a figure emerges in the distance. It's Tarion Tavers, covered from head to toe in the muck of the swamp, with lines of skin showing through on his face where he's scraped the goo away to see. The bounty hunter has the skin of an enormous rodent stuck on top of his helmet, blood all run down the sides and onto his shoulders from the makeshift headdress, and a throwing knife taped to the end of his rifle. "The krif have you people been?! I got a co-def-ee, I got a shot with my helmet cam. Oh holy shit, he was so majestic. We gotta get back home and analyze the footage but I swear I kriffin' got him, we're gonna be /famous/, this is gonna shake the galaxy." It's probably a blurry image of a wild dog of some kind, or maybe the dangling foot of his giant muskrat-hat. But that will come out later, right now he's climbing back up into the ship.

They can explain to Tarion later what a co'veefi really looks like... but their prize turns out to be the same prize attained by every other co'veefi hunter: A bit of blurry, unclear footage that seems like it could have been perfect, but instead is out of focus, out of frame, never quite right except for a few blurry seconds to try to replay over and over again in determination that it's not a hoax. Zoom in 5000%! Enhance! But it just never seems to help, and all they're left with to show for their efforts is a blurrily traumatic memory, and a refreshed understanding of the fact that all of Hex's ideas are bad ideas.