The Weaving Force; Chapter 4 (Patreon)

Chapter 4:

When Alexandria entered the Mos Eisley Arena, there was already an event in progress. Bookies were behind reinforced steel cages, queues were forming for bets, money was exchanging hands, and enforcers were watching everyone for any kind of violence.

It seems the crime lords liked their betting areas peaceful… for a certain definition of it.

Marching forward, the heroine cut through the crowd like a knife through rice paper. Anyone foolish enough to bump into her - or fail to get out of her way - had the rather uncomfortable feeling of a wall slamming into them at a leisurely walking pace.

Reaching the guard in charge of this block she spoke: “What contests do you have here?”

The guard raised a brow ridge. “You wanna compete?” he asked, his voice holding a strange dual tone somewhere in his throat. By his wrinkly face, he was a ‘Weequay,’ assuming she’d mapped species names to descriptions accurately in her recent observations and eavesdropping.

“Depends what the competitions are,” she answered. If it was some absurdity her physicality couldn’t push past, then it would be foolish to waste time here.

“Jabba’s always looking for new blood,” the Weequay drawled.

Shit.

She’d heard about Jabba. Basically the de-facto king of Tatooine. She hadn’t wanted to get involved with Hutts, but if needs must….

The Weequay turned, pointing. “Head on over to the green zone; you’ll find a Toydarian named Jukko. Talk to him. He’ll get you set up.”

“Toydarian?”

He gave her a funny look. “Never seen one? Little gas bags have a snout and can fly. Jukko talks like an ass and smells like one. Can’t miss em.”

Lovely.

She nodded.

Turning in the direction the Enforcer pointed, she was glad the arena grounds were color coded as opposed to enumerated in the strange writing that constituted Galactic Basic or Huttseze. Though she could ‘cheat’ - as Clock so eloquently put it - with her thinker ability, that only went so far. Reading, for now, was well beyond her.

She’d have to remedy that as soon as possible if their stay here was to be an extended one.

She reached the ‘green zone, having passed orange and blue behind her.

Luckily, finding the Toydarian was easy. He was the only sentient there who was flying.

As she approached she heard him barking out orders - not in basic, but Huttese berating several droids and their… mechanic? Handler?

“Soc-chu butta!  Schutta ba-”

“Are you Jukko?”

The Toydarian rounded on her. He had a stubby, long beard; crumbs of food and other debris littered its wire-like hairs.

The Weequay had been right. He did smell like ass.

“Huh? Wha-chu want eh? I’m not in the mood for slave girls right now.”

Alexandria sneered, lip curling. “I was told you were in charge of who’d be competing,” she pressed.

The look he gave her told her just what he thought about that idea.  “Wha? You? A human woman? Hah! There’s easier ways to die quickly girl.”

His wings were cartoonishly small; by sheer weight alone they’d never be able to hold him in the air…and yet they did.

The Weequay called him a gas bag. Maybe he had some compound in his body that was lighter than air. Helium? Methane? Something that was bearing the bulk of the weight while the wings merely provided direction and control.

Thoughts for later.

“Not planning on dying,” she answered, crossing her arms as she shifted her weight. “I can fight. I want the prize money.”

“Keh. The Pits can always use more entertainment before the main events,” he chuckled. “But you want the money eh? That explains it. Usually you girls try sleeping with the winners to get out from under your master for a bit. Fighting yourself- what? You hiding a scar that made you not so pretty under that helmet?.”

“Not here to give you my life story,” she sneered. “What contests do you have worth actual money to the winners?”

He scoffed, “Fine fine. See if I care. Not my job to clean you up off the arena grounds.” He reached behind him, pulling out a datapad. “Alright, we’ve got the standard brawl pit tournament. You fight. You kill, or get killed. Last one standin’, he gets the fifteen thousand credit prize money.”

“Fifteen thousand? Seems low.”

“You’re new,” he sneered. “Barely worth Jabba flicking his snot your way. The Winner here gets better fights. Better fights means more money. Or were you expecting me to just put you up for the grand prize because you think you tough, eh?”

She snorted.

“Not my job to make you happy. You want in? Go to the lower pit grounds. Wait there with the other fighters. When they call for the brawl, get in the arena. Or don’t. Not my problem anyway.”

She took a long, slow breath. “Fine. Have the money ready.”

He scoffed. “I’ll be sure to pay the champ double if he’s the one that kills you.” He flapped away.

…

Sometimes… it would be so easy.

(X)(X)(X)

Hannah

If Hannah were honest with herself, she felt a little… out of her depth.

Not because of the alien world thing, honestly. In truth, she found the sights and sounds, species and groups, somewhat fascinating. And so human to boot. They felt like normal people, albeit in an environment that was entirely deplorable.

Slavery, smuggling, exploitation, a harsh environment and the struggle to survive every day.

She could see the similarities to humankind at their worst; perhaps on another world she’d see the similarities to humanity at its best.

So that wasn’t causing the disquieting nervousness in her stomach right now, truth be told.

No, it was the whole “Bounty Hunting” thing.

She knew how to conduct an investigation... at least in theory.

In practice… well…

Protectorate Heroes fought villains, fought Endbringers, and served as inspiration and pillars for society to rally around.

But when it came down to investigating crimes like detectives, that wasn’t necessarily their job.

PRT specialists, police detectives, and other such people usually led investigations. Handled the logistics and wetwork.

Certainly powers could be and were often useful. Her eidetic memory, for instance, had been used hundreds of times for its sheer versatility and convenience in simply “photographing” a crime scene just in case anyone screwed up. Armsmaster’s technology could almost recreate the entire sequence of events leading up to the murder itself based on his prototype predictive software.

Powers were useful and she was used to being useful; but she’d never, on her own, led an investigation.

And the stakes felt so much higher now.

No backup coming. No one to catch an error or bounce ideas off of, save perhaps for Dennis. But as good a hero as he was, he was lacking in this field even more than she was. And she couldn’t let on that she was as uncertain as she was because he needed to feel that things would be ok. He’d been remarkable in his resilience and his handling of the sudden circumstances, but placing her own hangups on his mind would serve to everyone’s detriment.

So yes. Miss Militia was nervous.

She understood why Alexandria had decided to split the group and head to the arena. It made sense. But right now, she missed her one-time superior and mentor, and wished she was here to take the reins.

But she’d never backed down from her duty, and she wouldn’t now.

“So what’s the plan Ms. M?”

She turned looking towards Clock before turning her gaze again to the building in front of them.

“This place is the last known sighting of them. Go in; ask.” She shrugged.

“That’s it?”

She raised an eyebrow. “Were you expecting something more exciting?”

He smiled. “Good cop bad cop?”

She chuckled, “I don’t think you can pull off bad cop yet.”

“Maybe I should grow a beard; would that help?”

“If you call peach fuzz a beard.”

“Oh, ouch,” he laughed.

It was good that he could laugh.

Turning to the building, she started marching up the three steps into the little domed hut.

Entering through the beads on the open door, it became apparent rather quickly that this was a shop of sorts.

There were parts strewn about the shelves; droid parts, if her amateur eye wasn’t steering her wrong.

“Hello?”

There was a tremendous clatter of steel crashing down somewhere inside and a hollering shout, “WHO DA HELL IZ ZAT!?”

She raised an eyebrow, taken aback by the anger in the voice.

Was it a repair garage rather than a shop?

An alien came out the back. Flappy wings and a pudgy face.

“What you wan’, eh?”

“Hello.” She smiled. “My name is Hannah.”

“Watto,” he barked.

He didn’t seem angry, just loud.

“Now, whatchu wan’, eh? Ever since I lost mah boy, I been rushed in here.”

“I won’t take up much of your time,” she promised, reaching behind her for the bounty holo.

“These Rodians,” she explained, displaying the image, “were last seen here, in this shop.”

The alien, Watto, nodded. “Yah, I remember ‘em, twins.” He explained, “It stuck out because all Rodians look the same to me--”

“HAH!” Clockblocker guffawed, tossing her a cheeky look.

“--an’ these two were the same. So I remember.”

“We’re looking for them,” She said, ignoring the boy’s smug look. “Might you know where they are?”

“Might be I do, might be I don’t,” the alien replied. “What’s it worth to ya?”

“We’re short on… credits.” She stumbled over the currency name. “But if you give us the information, when we collect the contract I’ll come back. Pay you one hundred for the information.”

“You aint been on Tatooine long, have you? No deal.”

“Is there anything you would accept, that’s legal that isn’t credits?” She hedged.

Watto rubbed at his chin, she noticed small stubby hairs. These aliens could grow facial hair.

“Your boy.”

She balked.

“Loan him to me. I need an assistant to do things ‘round here.”

“He isn’t a slave!” She screamed, angry now.

Watto backed away, arms rising as if to ward her off.

“Hey, hey, no slave, but two hands and he can carry better than these droids!” Watto’s wings flapped faster, trying to carry him farther into his shop. “So you loan him to me-”

“That’s not-”

“Miss M, it’s ok,” Dennis cut her off mid sentence, placing one calming hand on her shoulder. “We need the bounty, right.”

“Dennis, you are not currency!”

He smiled, but there was something strange about it. Like somewhere along the way he’d… grown up.

“Think Alexandria said it best: ‘I can bear the indignity.” He shrugged. “You go after the bad guys, and Watto gets someone who can carry heavy loads around here.”

Dennis leaned in, whispering in her ear, “Besides. We might find out more about the galaxy around us faster by talking to him or the people who come in here. I’m a great conversationalist.”

She pulled away, eying him and his too easy, too sincere smile.

Her stomach flipped.

“I’m not comfortable with this.” She argued.

His eyes shifted, turning from her to Watto and back. “Miss M. We’re short on options right now.”

And they were, weren’t they. She felt her fingers clench, her fist shaking.

When she turned to Watto the calm fury took the alien aback. “Anything happens to him, you and I will have words.”

The alien groused. “Eh, You came to me empty handed wanting information.” He pointed. “I don’t need this headache.”

Dennis stepped forward. “Look. I’ll help. It’s fine. Just tell us what you know about the Roid boys and you get my help for like… what? A day?

“Three.” Watto smirked.

“One.” Militia snarled over Dennis’s shoulder.

“Let’s meet in the middle and say two,” Dennis said, smiling placatingly and holding his hands up as if to physically keep the two from coming to blows.

“Deal!” Watto smiled, his stubby suction cup fingers reaching out and grabbing Dennis’s hand in a firm handshake.

The Ward smiled at Militia, the faintest bit of unease lining the very edges of his features.

“See, it’s all good. We’re all good here.”

Militia glared at the man. “Tell me what you know.”

Watto’s wings flapped, carrying him up towards a top shelf.

“The Rodians, they came looking for parts for a cooling unit.”

“On this planet? No,” Dennis gasped over dramatically.

She elbowed him in the ribs, asking him to be silent without asking.

Watto descended. Cradling in his hands some part or other, he showed it to them. “Funny thing, tho: its a cooling unit for air conditioning. Very expensive; stupid expensive. They can’t maintain it. Even more than that, Rodians don’ need it. have high heat tolerance, eh? Waste o’ money.”

“Then why get it?” she asked.

“Tells me they need to keep something that runs hot in a cold room. Difficult on surface, so they need to keep it underground. Sands are cooler. Sun can’t hit that deep.” He began fiddling with the device in his hands.

“Computers, perhaps?” she asked,

“Maybe. Doesn’ matter.” He shrugged. “What matters is this cooling piece,” he showed off the device, “can only be hooked up to certain cooling units.”

Flapping himself over towards the window sill, he pointed.

Up above another house or building she could see a box, not entirely dissimilar to an air conditioner from back home. Only difference is that it looked like a ball of some kind, rather than a typical box unit.

“That,” the flying alien said, pausing dramatically, “is Hutt-made. This,” he said, holding up the part he’d been fondling, equally dramatically, “goes on ‘Hutt-made.’” He nodded.

“Those,” he pointed to another cooling unit, slightly to the left, “are cheaper. For normal people. Not Hutt-made.” He set the part down with a clatter. “So, you can find buildings with Hutt-made vents, likely one that looks recently repaired or installed, you find your men.”

She glared.“That’s not much of a lead.”

Watto shrugged. “What do I look like? Guy who installs parts too? No. I tell you what they buy, what they need it for, and where to look. Hutt-made vents on Hutt planet run expensive, locals and slaves, hardly use em. At most you’ve got, ehh, maybe a hundred in Mos Eisley. Knock on doors.”

“It’s more than we had before,” Dennis tried to console her. “It does… narrow things at least. They’re computer hackers, if I understand what they do. They might not know how to install it either.”

She nodded; that was a good point.

“Where would they go to get it installed or repaired?”

“Ehh, for Hutt goods?” Watto shrugged. “Only place that would go fixing it. The place Jabba owns. Cordelo. A Dug. That’s where they’d have gone if they needed it fixed. Jabba gets his cut.”

Then that’s where she was going.

She looked to Dennis. He offered her another slightly nervous smile.

“I’ll be fine, Ms. M,” he assured her. “Go kick their asses.”

Militia turned to Watto, glaring. He glared back.

“I already said he’d be fine. Now get out of my shop. You’re taking up too much of my time.

She turned and left.