It was called the Last Chance Saloon, and Jean-Luc didn't like it at all. The bawdy-house was thick with the scum of a thousand worlds, the air resinous with smoke and the stench of low-grade alcohol. Voices hollered, scowled and swore in a multitude of tongues, from threadbare couches and wooden tables piled with drinks, tarot cards, thirteen different kinds of money and glowing, polyhedral dice. A quick, raucously off-key honky-tonk tune rang through the building from the far wall, where the establishment's illegally modified servitor hung bolted to the piano, a battered top hat fixed to its metal skull. Malcontents and killers hung over the sticky bartop, bathed in irritating neon blue. Here, a quorum of wasteland thugs took turns throwing knives into a vandalized Wanted poster. There, a lissome young woman wrapped with serpentine tattoos and a squeaking, violet rubber dress was writhing in the lap of a leering local gun runner. And by the far banister, three men at a card table leapt to their feet over a legal dispute, drawing crudely modified guns, their disagreement interrupted by the barman firing a deafening blast from a Volg Scattergun into the roof. Several of the whores screamed, one in apparent delight, wood and plaster raining down from above. The men reluctantly eased back into their seats, eyeing each other bitterly, the guns never leaving their hands. And the tempo of the establishment never wavered. It was all so monumentally tedious. Jean-Luc Bauta de la Mare sat alone in a shadowy and isolated corner, sipping a barely-acceptable blend of Cyprian tea and watching with the barest interest. He whiled away his time calculating his chances of getting out of this sector in an acceptable frame of time and finding them grim. Escalon Seven was not a place people went. It was a place people [i]ended up.[/i] The crude wooden doors swung open, dust and bright, shimmering heat blowing into the merry din along with another cadre of disreputables. They looked angry about something. Volatile. Spoiling for a fight. They glowered, looking around the saloon, and the largest, a weathered hulk of a man, pointed to La Mare with a heavy, whining servo arm. They drew near. "Our table, you long-haired sack of grox shit," barked the apparent leader, "Piss off or die!" [indent][i]Item one, close quarters, Item two; modified servo arm is lethal but a serious point of weakness, Item three, leader is unarmed, underlings count one concealed stubber one shotgun, pump-action, shotgun obvious first target and well within range. [/i][/indent] [i]Amateurs, all of them.[/i] "Very well," sighed the career killer, standing and sipping the last of the barely-adequate tea, "I was largely finished with it in any case." "You mouthin' off t' me, freak?" "Not at all," he gestured, half-bowing, deadpan, "Your table, sirs." "Grox shit knows his place." snickered one of the hangers-on. "Fethin' right," growled the leader, "Beat it, freak. Crawl back in yer fethin' hole before I change my fethin' mind!" La Mare bowed again, and left. [hr] "Gideon." He signalled the barman, setting the teacup down on the damp wooden surface. The grizzled, hairless old enforcer nodded, shouldering the scattergun and taking down a fresh pot of water. Jean-Luc eased himself into a standing-room gap at the bar. Someone grabbed his shoulder. A wiry ex-guardsman, one flickering bionic eye glowing in a bristly, gap-toothed face. He thumbed to his companion, a hammer-nosed Ogryn who looked more like a side of beef than a thinking being. "He doesn't like you." he sneered. Jean-Luc sighed. "I don't like you either!" he continued. "You better watch yourself! I have--" "Must we do this again, LaChance?" "--I have the terminatus sentence on twelve--" "Gideon. A round of plox for each of these men, [i]s'il vous plaît.[/i]" The drinks were duly served. The pair snickered, LaChance digging a bony finger into La Mare's breastbone. "You get off [i]this[/i] time." he said, thickly, "But next time you maybe won't be so lucky." "Can we please...?" The two withdrew to the far corner of the bar, the man cackling after him, "Maybe you'll be [i]dead![/i]" The barman set down the teacup with a clink, regarding Jean-Luc with some scrutiny. "Don't rightly know why y'all let them boys push y' round like that, drifter." he said at last, nodding, "If'n I read that brand on yer head proper, wouldn't be yer first time seein' a little blood." "Mn." Jean-Luc lifted the cup, breathing in the aroma, "Well. What's the point?" He sipped, swallowed. "Dilletentes and savages. It would prove nothing, achieve nothing. Only spoil my digestion and ruin this... carefully-cultivated ambience." "Hn." the barkeep was noncommittal. "Hear the news?" "I have not." "Shuttle's a-comin down." "Mm?" "Rogue trader." Gideon sniffed, "Name of Drake. Lookin' for crew." Time froze in La Mare's mind. The saloon was no longer a regrettable waystation. It was now a battlefield. It was a mass grave waiting to happen. Rough voices sounded from along the bar, spreading throughout the revelry. [i]"Good pickings on a trader's crew, I'm in on that for sure--" "Needs a point man I hear--" "Like to be some fierce competition--"[/i] La Mare pushed away from the bar as the rumor spread, his tea untouched and unpaid for, striding purposefully to the padded couches where the arms merchant and his rubber-clad doxy were entwining themselves. "Markus," he said briskly, "Do you have what I asked for?" "That I do, pardner." The man chuckled, his grin bright over a trimmed golden beard. He tugged on the woman's charcoal hair, yanking her head back and eliciting a practiced gasp of pleasure. She squirmed out of his lap obediently, draping herself over his shoulder. The gunrunner slid a small black case the size of a shoebox from under the couch, setting it on the glass-piled table. La Mare watched intently as he flipped the lid. "Gen-you-whine Imperial-issue bolt rounds." grinned the smuggler, "Not easy to get here under the table on ol' number Seven, Johnny boy, not easy at all. Trust you're, ah, ready to deal?" "I am." He nodded, quickly, firmly. "Course you are." Markus smirked under his breath. He pointed to Jean-Luc, reaching around the woman's neck with his free hand to give the front of her dress a squeeze, "Well to that, Johnny, I got a kind o' [i]revised offer[/i] for you. See my girl here," squeeze, "Says that necklace of yours is real pretty..." La Mare regarded the girl flatly. She stared back at him with smoldering turquiose eyes and licked her lips. "How interesting that she can tell." he murmured. "Women, yeah?" The man chuckled. "And I do like to keep my baby happy, don't I honeysuckle?" He pulled her in for a kiss, and she reciprocated enthusiastically, twisting her hips and moaning like an addict. Her eyes never left La Mare's, nor his hers. She ran her hand down her hip, deliberately. "So how about it, John-o?" Markus grinned and wiped his mouth, disengaging, "Can't say that ain't a fair price. One little ol' trinket for a boxful of the Emperor's own special herbs n' spices. Come on, man." the dealer spread his hands with a corrupt, winning smile, "Whad'you say?" "An interesting arrangement," agreed Jean-Luc, folding his hands behind his back, "However, I have a counteroffer. All the Imperial Scrip I have on my person. And eight seconds in which to leave this place with your lives." The girl untangled herself, flattening her back against the couch with a faint hiss of breath. The arms dealer slowly lifted his head, regarding Jean-Luc the way a cat regards a mouse. "Well now," he said with deadly softness, pushing aside a stack of tatty pillows to reveal the muzzle of a fully-powered hellgun, "Didn't have you figured for the suicidal type, Johnny." "These are extraordinary circumstances." replied La Mare, "Four seconds." "Boys!" shouted Markus, dragging the hellgun out of its covering, "Looks like we got us another out-of-town hard case!" The most dangerous men in the Holdout were getting to their feet. Weapons were drawn, everyone glancing from one to another, opportunism glinting in every eye. The heavy-set thug threw aside his table with that massively engineered limb. The Ogryn heaved a spike-encrusted ripper rifle from its sling. Gideon racked the scattergun. The servitor just kept playing. Jean-Luc drew in a breath, thumbing open something in his hand. It was just like coming home. "[i]C'est la guerre,[/i]" he said, and dropped the flashbang. [hr] From outside, one could see the windows explode outward in a burst of blinding white, a second before the air erupted with a cacophony of gunfire, profanity and breaking wood.