[center][@ReedeThe23rd][@Irredeemable][@CleanBreeze][@Lady Selune][@BCTheEntity][/center]

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McDinny had mixed feelings about the offer to gamble. On the one hand, something about the way Telaci spoke, something about the vibe she gave him, was entirely untrustworthy. It was slimy, really. Maybe she was the only one that felt it, but that's how he felt to her. Honestly, a sweeter relief she could not have known; it was good to meet a kindred spirit for once.

The issue was just that Charlene didn't have much she wanted to gamble away, not unless she knew she could cheat. Unfortunately, McDinny wasn't good at cheating with cards. She was just lucky.

Excitement won over, however. Charlene sat on down at the table with Telaci and smacked down some of her less valuable bits: a cheap credstick, some scrap metal.

"Rudeboy it is! Deal me in, ya grease gretchin!" Charlene made grubby 'gimme' fingers at Telaci, and the game was just about to start when another man approached.

He wasn't the most handsome or interesting fellow Charlene had ever seen. Sure, he had purple eyes; that was a weird thing, that was, though it seemed like every Cadian she met had those. But unlike most guardsmen, he wasn't riddled with scars and bullet holes, and he seemed just muscular enough to get away with not being yelled at by a superior for being a wimp. It was mighty respectable, really. The big goggle circles around his eyes, however, were enough to make McDinny break out into snickering even as he gave her a two-fingered salute.

"A-a [i]what[/i]?" she answered the man, taking a deep breath. Her brain needed a few seconds more to catch up. "Oh! Er, right! Naw, honest? I don't know how I wound up with the regiment. I just woke up and got a gun shoved at me. Mite bit disconcerting, it was." 

Of course, that wasn't a particularly unusual affair, even for people who [i]were[/i] from the planets that recruited them. Imperial recruitment often involved getting people drunk, then dragging them off to military bases or aboard a Rogue Trader. But it certainly didn't say anything good at the young woman's patriotism.

Nevertheless, there wasn't much of a chance for any of the parties involved to add anything. Just as the cards were being dealt, there was a loud ruckus further off from the group, and McDinny peeked to see what it was. Apparently it was just someone playing some sort of game with a ball. However, McDinny wasn't so focused on the man. She was focused on the tall, intimidating woman in a dark outfit whose exact colors were concealed by the darkness. It was a tall woman with... with...

"Oh, bloody Commissars," grumbled McDinny as she saw the commissar's hat. She got on up, snatched the goods she had set down for gambling (as well as just one unimportant trinket someone else had bid), and backed away. "Uh-uh! Ah, I'll just be getting while the getting's good, ya ken? Not staying for the blamming."

So, even as the big fellow playing scrumball approached the table, McDinny was retreating as quietly and quickly as she possibly could, slinking as far around the most likely trigger-happy woman as she could. The Commissar was engaged in a discussion with the big, bulky fellow with the tasty bod on one side, and there was a man with a mask that-

A wave of cold washed over McDinny, and she got the strangest sense of... loss. [i]Anguish?[/i] The private actually stopped and stared at the mask-wearing man for a time. Maybe it was just the way his mask was shaped, but something about the way he looked, or... [i]something[/i] about him made her feel sad. She couldn't figure it out.

McDinny suddenly remembered what sort of [i]evil presence[/i] she was lingering near, and shooting one last cautious glance at the Commissar, she finished slipping away from the celebrations quiet as a mouse.