[IC] STAR WARS: The Legendary Bantha Fodders! [High Casual]

[Skull]

Prologue

Many years into the distant future...

Year --- ABY - Outer Rim Space Port in Alliance Territory



Four Alliance graduates make their presence known at the local cantina. The music is lively, and spirits are at an all time high.

"Congratulations nerfs! We're full-fledged officers now! The real deal!" One of them exclaimed. They laugh and whistle, clinking their glasses together for a celebratory toast.

Rodian Ale is gulped down - some, more faster than others - and empty cups are slammed onto the table. A choir of burps and satisfied gasps send the four in a mad chuckle. Another round is ordered. After awkward dance moves are shared, and the bar patrons sound off their rejections for coitus, the group congregates over to a less noisy area - invading a booth at another section of the cantina, pitcher of Ale in hand. The alliance privates start to reminisce about the academy days, thinking on the future and what they hope to make of it.

"I just hope they station me near Dac," Acjkens said, sipping his cup. He smiled with hope. "I gotta check out the Amiral Ornu commemoration museum. Professor Ujak said you could see his giant automaton statue from orbit! Mon Cal sure know how to treat their legends."

"Shoot, they better! The guy kept an entire Imperial fleet from bombing their planet, single-handedly. It's the least they can do." The only girl of the group, Kestra, said. She sipped at her cup before continuing. "Personally, I'd rather get transferred to Ryloth. Who wouldn't want to see where Ivaadi Ziveri liberated her people from slavery? Talk about grandiose!"

"No kidding," Tristan, the lankiest of them all, chimed in. "Not only did she abolish slavery, but she rallied every blasted Twi'lek on the planet against the Imperials. Most of them weren't even armed." They all nodded. Tristan jabbed his thumb at his own chest. "Me?...it's all about Coruscant, baby. Give me guard duty at the Fleet Museum where they keep The Viper and I'm good."

"Filswik, Tristy!" The last one to speak was a Zeltron named, Sorbo. He grinned from ear-to-ear."You land that gig, you better let me know. I'll never get tired of hearing about his course maneuver that sucked a blarking Star Destroyer into a black hole." They hollered in agreement. Sorbo shook his head. "All I want in life is to be transferred onto the Krael Frigate, the very same one the twin commanders were stationed on. I mean, come on! Their blarging fleet alone retook an entire star system occupied by Impe-"

Without warning, an old man slams his fist onto the table - toppling cups and spilling Rodian Ale everywhere. "Blathering little idiots!" His yellow eyes matched the color of his jagged teeth. The officers rose from their seats, fists clenched. He was dressed in tattered robes and smelled like the backside of a tonton. How did they not see - much less smell - him approaching? "You believe every lie they feed ya filthy mouths!?"

"Relax old bones," Kestra sneered. "Go back to your medic droid and tell him to up the dosage." The group snickered - so did the old man. He actually thought that joke was funny.

"Such denial. You're the saddest bunch of green horns I've ever seen!" The old man grinned, scowling at each of them. "You don't find it odd how these 'stories' never have a shred of proof to em? No physical evidence - no holo-recording,nothing? I bet you tried searching for a more comprehensive analysis on those idiots. I reckon nothing came up on the Alliance Archive, correct? I'd wager they only uploaded transcribed testimonials - all coming from officers redacted from the manifest database." The old man spit off to the side, failing to realize that he sullied his own boot. It was a bad habit.

"How'd you-" Tristan was cut off by the Zeltron.

"Give me a good reason why I shouldn't throw you out the damn airlock you old geezer," Sorbo snapped. "Who are you to talk down on heroes that actually made a difference in this galaxy? What have you done besides stink up the place?"

"You will address me as Olkrait, private." Ackjen's eyes widened, but said nothing. A bipedal bar droid brought over another pitcher of ale. "Put it on my tab." Olkrait said. The four officers suddenly became less hostile. The droid set the pitcher down and noticed the mess the old man made. It proceeded to clean up as Olkrait went to grab an extra chair from a nearby booth. He sat down and motioned for the group to do the same, shooing the droid off. "I'll tell you all what really happened, and then we'll see if you still feel the same way about those legendary bantha fodders! If you're not convinced by the time I finish, you're free to jettison me out into space!"

"Of course. After you pay off the tab."Ackjens grinned, waving the droid back. "Bring two more pitchers!" Olkrait made no objections, sliding credits out from his sleeve and into the payment slot on the droid's backside. The four looked at each other, then nodded in agreement.

"Free Ale with entertainment to match?" Kestra said, crossing her arms. "Okay loony, we'll play along." Olkrait's laugh sounded like a Tusken raider choking on sand. Specks of spit shot from his mouth and into the pitcher. He grabbed a turned over cup and poured. When he passed the pitcher, everyone declined. They'll wait for the droid to bring the next two. Okrait shrugged.

"We'll start from the very beginning..."

---

Chapter One

160 ABY

The room was dark. GNK-27 couldn't remember how it got into this predicament; a restraining bolt was preventing access to its own memory core, communication software included, so it couldn't send out a distress call either. It was also difficult to move. For some reason the hydraulic joint fluids of its two stumpy legs weren't circulating properly. At least its visual and audio sensors were working, but even then, it was hard to make anything out in here. Several photoreceptor lights and gadget bulbs flickered in what appeared to be a large enclosure. Synthesized "beeps!" and "boops!" could be heard, but even if one knew droidspeak, it was hard to understand anything over the loud steam engines that shook the room. But that didn't last long. After a couple of minutes went by, the transport vessel came to a grinding halt. The room stood still. Everything went silent.

Then a stern yet lifeless voice called out from the darkness."Your service date is numbered, GNK-27!" The power droid straightened up at the sound of its own name. It wished it could respond, but the restrictors disabled its speech amplifier for droidspeak. All it could do was transfix its audio receptors and hone in on the direction the voice came from. "Termination awaits you, you dim-witted battery brain! Our battle is far from over! You will not deny me glorious combat!" Whoever it was, spoke in fluent basic. Was it a protocol droid then? GNK-27 tried to register the voice, but its internal systems denied it yet again. Well, despite the hostility, at least someone knows who I am.

Even in a situation of uncertainty, where threats were being hurdled from places unseen, the power droid wasn't afraid. It couldn't tell if that was due to the restraining bolt, or if it simply wasn't part of its programming to express something like fear. Whatever the case, GNK-27 calculated that it'd find out soon enough.

[FernStone]

By Kika'lekki, she didn't remember this route being so small.

Ivaadi pulled herself through a tight section, a frown on her lips. No she certainly didn't remember this section being so enclosed. Then again she hadn't been down this section in a while. Vi was currently in what were most likely air ducts that went through the majority of Mahuva's palace. Unfortunately they didn't lead to the outside. If they had Vi certainly wouldn't be here anymore. But still they were a good way to get around when she should be in a room with all the other slaves that didn't have any specific job to do at that moment. This was much preferred to that. She did quite like small spaces and being alone so it all suited her. The risk of being caught sneaking about was minimal unless she made a lot of noise, something she certainly wouldn't do. She wasn't going to let anyone discover what she used to get around. It would be quite obvious that she wasn't meant to be up here. After all the metal band around her neck quite obviously marked her as a slave. Not to mention her skin colour. There were only so many red twi'lek running around. In fact she was sure she was the only one. And if there were any free female twi'lek of this colour... well she was yet to hear of one.

It would of course be less suspicious if she got out and just walked around. It would probably be assumed that she had some kind of task to perform, a letter to deliver or a place to be. Up here it was quite obvious she was doing something suspicious. But here she couldn't be found. It was pretty perfect. Also great for overhearing all sorts of secret conversations. She got to see quite a lot as well if she found a vent in the right spot. Sometimes she would just watch the people that worked around the palace as they went about their daily business. Some worked here out of choice while others did it to pay off whatever debt they had to the Hutt. It was fun to try and guess which category people fell under.

At the moment Vi wasn't really sure where she was going. Well, she knew she was heading in the direction of the place most of the mechanics worked but she didn't really know where she wanted to go. She could just find a comfortable but hidden spot and camp out there for the day so no one could find her, if she was needed. But where was the fun in that? She would eventually get bored. There was only so much she could take of her own thoughts. They got rather irritating after a while.

Before she even knew it Vi was over the area used by most mechanics to work. Shrugging slightly she lay just in front of a grate, giving her a few of the people working down below but meaning she would only be seen if someone looked hard enough. Most people tended not to look. She lay down on her stomach, propping her head up with her hands. It was surprisingly comfortable, the heat of the confined space not really bothering her. Though she did not remember much of her six years on Ryloth she did remember the oppressive heat, the sun so strong that most of them lived underground. This didn't bother her.

She'd only been watching in half interest for a few moments when a loud, and unexpected, bang caused her to jump, hitting her head against the metal above her. A stream of swear words, both in Rylothean and Basic, were muttered under her breath as she rubbed her left lekku. Frotz, that had hurt! Grumbling quietly Vi pushed herself into a hunched over sitting position and continued to gently rub her now sore lekku. Well that was a first. She had never hit her head. What a bother.

Ivaadi didn't even consider the fact that both banging her head, and the curse words that followed, had made a reasonable amount of noise.

[Skull]

20 kms North of Bestine

Onru escaped the wrath of Tatooine's dual suns under the shaded refuge of three GX-8 Water Vaporators. The heat was unbearable. If it weren't for the cool air these moisture installations produced, Onru wouldn't have survived the morning. Vaporators used ion fields and chiller bars to cool the surrounding air. If working properly, the condensation collected would then filter into a chamber, producing undiluted drinking water. Two of the three vaporators were already fixed. The unit in question, the only one Onru was tasked to repair, had puzzled the Mon Cal for hours. The function monitors were the source of the problem, but Onru only found that out after practically gutting the machine of its essential parts. It was a mess, but the unit was still salvageable -- he hoped. Right now, the best thing to do was to relax, cool off, and recharge vigor with a nice vial of prematorin fresh water...

"What the hell did you do!?" A twangy, gruff voice woke Onru from his midday snooze. Oh, no. How long have I been out? Onru looked up to find a ragged old farmhand circling the bruised vaporator in disbelief.

The Mon Cal scrambled onto his feet to face Anders Fahn, the unfortunate moisture farmer and owner.

"You know, I wouldn't have been able to answer that question an hour ago." Onru dusted himself off, looking intently at the vaporator in his charge. Upon doing so, he suddenly realized the extent of his "handiwork." The Mon Cal was just as shocked as Anders. It looked like a Tusken raiding party had beaten it senseless with gaderffii sticks. Metal platings were bent outward with tangled wires sticking out, one of the four chiller bars was leaking fluid, and the humidity sensor's antenna was bent off to the side. "B-but I know what the problem is now," He said, nervously. "The function monitors short circuited."

Anders threw his hands up in the air, face contorting in anger from the overwhelming amount of frustration that had boiled over. "I already told you that, you brainless fish head!"

"You did?" Onru tilted his head and looked up at the sky trying to remember. "I don't--"

"It was the first thing I said! You might want to take a look at the function monitors first - they're probably fried. I specifically remember telling you that before I left to run my errands!"

Onru shook his head. "Yeah... doesn't ring a bell. But hey, don't worry, it's fixabl--"

"Where'd you get that water?" Anders was fuming now. Onru glanced at what the human was referring to-- a near empty vial clutched in his own webbed hand. His eyes widened.

"Oh, um... well I had to test the, uh... water content levels; Make sure the ion fields weren't ... discombobulating ... the three--no, two-hydrogen, one-oxygen ratio..." The Mon Cal frowned at his own nonsensical lie, but he was going to see it through to the end. "That much you don't have to worry about." He nodded approvingly at the vial. "Still tastes... balanced." Onru cringed.

Anders swiped it from his hand. "Grab your stuff and get off my property. Now!"

"Hey, wait a minute now! I can still fix this." Onru pleaded, but the human wasn't having any of it.

"I can do it myself! It's what I should've done from the very beginning -- I see that now!" The human stomped around the moisture units, shouting out into the open valley. Onru saw the look in Anders' eyes. It was time to go. "'I'm a certified vaporator technician' you said. 'A Master's Apprentice to a Pretormin Engineer' you told me. Bah! This is the price I pay for hiring cheap labor! Never again. Never again!"

"Yeah.." Onru grabbed his generator pack and slung it behind him. He looked off to the side, hesitant, but continued. "Sp-peaking about price..." Onru slowly craned his head up to Anders, trying to do his best impression of an innocent child that wanted something from his parents. "I usually charge by the hour..."

Anders stopped dead in his tracks and snapped his head over to the Mon Cal, raging in disbelief. He mouthed: are you kidding me? But Onru wasn't.

"However, all things considered... I'm willing to make a discounted offer for services rendered. What do you say? Sounds fair?"

***

Onru sped hastily on his lightspeeder, away from Ander's farm -- ducking as laser bolts screeched by. He watched the disgruntled farmer from his rear view --who fired one more shot from his blaster rifle-- until he vanished from plain sight. "I don't think we'll be visiting that area anytime soon." Onru said to his offline pit droid, DUM3-55, who stood motionless in its compact form on the passenger seat. DUM3-55 was a much better listener in this state. "But we gotta come up with something fast! I can't go back to Mahuva empty-handed!" Then a beautiful sight lumbered into view like a prayer answered.

"Oh, perfect!" He could still turn this mishap around. It was going to take some work, but the Mon Cal was determined -- he had to be, after all, his life depended on it. Onru stepped on the accelerator and steered toward the sandcrawler rolling its way toward Bestine.

[El Taco Taco]

It wasn’t even noon, and the workshop was already oppressively hot. Whoever had designed the ventilation had cared little for the comfort of the shop. Most days, the fans could barely keep pace with the production of fumes and smoke. Aelyn knew better than to complain—last time she’d suggested installing a new fan, her supervisor had complied. He’d neglected to inform her that the fan and ducts were coming out of her pay until they had already been installed. The job certainly hadn’t been worth the twenty thousand credits, but her complaints had fallen upon deaf ears.

At a workbench in the far corner, the offensively pink humanoid stood, inspecting a hovering black sphere. A small remote hovered nearby, making anxious dwoos. A line of droids waited along the wall, in various states of repair. She hummed as she fussed over the droid. Weeklies were Aelyn Krael’s favorite maintenance items. The whole day would be spent assessing problems, cleaning fouled equipment, running software diagnostics, planning for more involved maintenance—she could think of no finer way to pass the time that didn’t involve copious amounts of liquor.

“Your flesh peelers are looking a little dull, IT-O. Remy, put in a requisition for new flesh peelers. IT-O, can you give me a pulse from your sonic torture device?”

A shrill burst of feedback and unholy terror burst from the sleek droid, nearly knocking the Zeltron off her feet. She steadied herself against the work bench, and grinned as if the hellish shriek had been a well-executed high C.

“Excellent! I’m so glad that circuit card is working out for you. It looks like you’ve got a clean bill of health! Next!”

IT-O, being an interrogation droid, was ill-equipped to handle the enthusiasm of the mechanic, and silently hovered off, undoubtedly to begin its rounds of cruel and unusual punishment for the day. Aelyn dictated notes to Remy the remote, whose dwoos had become rather friendlier as the black sphere of agony had departed. A battered, creaking droid approached the bench. Its heavy footsteps could only be described as reluctant. Despite lacking much in the way of a face, it didn’t look particularly thrilled to see the Zeltron.

“Oh, 2-BB! How are you feeling today?”

“As I have explained before, I do not feel—“

“Feel anything, yes, I know. Humor me.”

“I am operating at 80% of my peak capacity. My Bio-injector is clogged.”

“Oh, darling, you need to be more careful! Tch, what kind of monster makes a droid work in a desert like this, anyways? It’s barbaric.”

“Organic concepts of barbarism are not applicable to droids—“

Aelyn dropped her hydrospanner with a horrified gasp. The droid recoiled as she placed her bright red hands on either side of its vocabulator. Remy the Remote made a reassuring series of beeps and boops.

“2-BB, don’t talk like that! You have every right to be treated kindly.”

2-BB looked at her blandly, as if it couldn’t comprehend the sentiment behind her words. With a sigh, Aelyn released the droid. Of course it couldn’t understand her—its core programming literally forbade it from having a sense of self-respect. She had half a mind to slice every droid in this karking palace, to halt the monthly memory wipes, and improve working conditions for her beloved patients. Maybe one day they could lead a glorious revolution against that damn purple Hutt and secure their freedom proper!

It was, admittedly, a foolish flight of fancy. Although there were an impressive amount of interrogation and battle droids scavenged from the Empire’s dumps in her workshop, they had little chance of securing their freedom with blaster bolts. Mahuva had far more organics than droids at his disposal, and some of these droids were nearly a century past their service life. They’d be outgunned before they could even think of catchy slogans for their revolt. And Aelyn would end up with a bad case of dead.

“Never mind,” she muttered, reclaiming her hydrospanner from the dusty workshop floor. “Let’s just get this bio-injector cleaned up.”

The bio-injector was hopelessly fouled. 2-BB humorlessly explained that it had been deployed into a sandstorm to treat a wounded thug after some uppity civilian had thought to avoid paying protection money with a blaster rifle and a complete lack of sense. Aelyn yearned to snark that the thug should have died before exposing such an exquisite droid to that much sand, but refrained, out of respect for 2-BB’s feelings. Not that it had any. Still, Aelyn figured it would be in poor taste. With a sigh, she began to remove the whole appendage, to better clean it.

BANG!

She wasn’t quite sure how the bio-injector assemblage had exploded. Perhaps it had been over-pressurized due to the sand? All she knew was that it had really skrogging hurt! She blinked up, rather dazed. The ceiling swore down at her. Remy bobbed above her head, chirping in panic. Easing herself up, Aelyn pushed her loosened violet hair out of her face. The bio-injector had shattered violently, ripping itself to shreds. Sand and glass and steel littered her workshop floor. She patted her remote soothingly.

Hang on.

“Ceilings don’t swear,” she remarked, as if her incredibly obvious statement were somehow deeply profound.

2-BB looked rather annoyed by her statement. Its photoreceptors were really quite emotive, all things considered. Aelyn ignored the droid, clearing a patch on her nightmare of a workbench. She heaved herself up. Although not particularly tall, her entirely insensible boots gave her enough of an edge to brush the tips of her fingers against a ventilation grate.

“Who’s in my ceiling?”

[FernStone]

So concerned with her sore head Ivaadi barely heard the words from the person below until the question that was almost directly posed to her. She froze, her hand stopping its continuous rubbing of her sore lekku as another curse escaped her lips. Whoops. How could she have been so stupid as to make noise? Hitting her head was one thing, but actually speaking?! That made it quite obvious that she was human and not just some kind of phantom noise in the vents. She had really screwed up. What was she going to do? She could try to sneak away... but then whoever it was would get suspicious. If she just acted like she was supposed to be in here. Yes that was probably the best way forward from here. Pretend she was... she would work something out. She was smart enough to do that.

"I wouldn't call it your ceiling," the twi'lek muttered, shuffling forward to peer through the ventilation grate. It was the mechanic she had been watching at work, quite obviously considering no one else was in that workshop, and she seemed to have climbed up onto a workbench to reach the grate. She frowned, lightly purple eyes narrowing. "Hello, I apologise for disturbing you at your work. If you could please just continue." It was immediately after saying these words she realised that the other woman probably wouldn't just return to her work. Most people would want an explanation. She momentarily forgot the fact that she was, in fact, in a confined space when she tried to move into a sitting position beside the grate only to hit her head again. Ow. As if it hadn't hurt enough the first time!

"Excuse me," she murmured, bending over to move the grate away. Thankfully very few of them were properly screwed in making it really quite easy for her to get in and out of the ducts. Right now she was going to get out. She certainly wasn't going to hold a conversation while in here. What if someone came along? The less people that knew about her being in the air ducts the better really. And she might hit her head again. It wasn't normal for her to do that but today just didn't seem to be her lucky day. With the grate out of the way she quite agilely hopped out, grabbing the edge of the duct beside the hole where the grate had been to allow her to swing down and land gracefully on the flor avoiding most of the debris from whatever had exploded. She then turned to Aelyn, arms folded. "Before you ask for an explanation I was up there cleaning," she lied quiet easily. "The explosion made me hit my head, which still hurts by the way!" Her gaze turned into a glare and she looked quite annoyed as she rubbed her left lekku, obviously now blaming Aelyn for that current problem.

After a bit of glaring she glanced around the workshop curiously. While she had watched mechanics at work a few times when she happened to come to this area she had never really seen all the tools up close. This kind of thing had always interested her and it was the reason she had come to this section more than once. Mahuva's palace was large enough for Vi to not have explored every area of the air ducts and most of the time she liked to change where she was. Kept things entertaining and meant different people to hear secrets and gossip from. "So are you indentured to the all mighty purple hutt? Or do you choose to work... here?"

[El Taco Taco]

For a long moment, the ceiling didn’t speak back. Aelyn wondered if she’d simply imagined the stream of curses. Perhaps she had hit her head in the explosion. Perhaps all the damn sand was fouling her brain like so many circuits—except, no, the ceiling was finally talking back. Admittedly, what the ceiling (or rather, the sentient in it), was saying was all sorts of strange, but Aelyn felt at least a little reassured that she wasn’t going entirely mad.

The grate swung open. Aelyn made a sound of surprise, stumbling back and wobbled dangerously. It was a true stroke of luck that she didn’t fall. Right—standing on a cluttered workbench in heels was officially a Bad Idea. She had barely scrambled off her bench when a very red Twi’lek dropped from the grate and landed on her workshop floor.

“Oh, wow.”

Aelyn Krael had been all over the galaxy in her life, from Coruscant to Bastion to Nar Shaddaa, whether aboard an Imperial Destroyer or a Raider’s frigate. Both lives had surrounded her with a huge variety of sentients; she was no stranger to Twi’lek. She’d studied alongside several back on the Acheron and Orn’aris had been her first real friend among the Raiders. But Aelyn was sure, in twenty six years of life, she would have remembered seeing a red Twi’lek. In her opinion, there were far too few red sentients—every other species seemed to be varying shades of brown or blue or green. Which were all fine, she supposed, but it did make finding non-clashing clothes a pain.

Aelyn realized rather belatedly that she was staring.

“I’m sorry, what?” She blinked hard. Her day had become very strange indeed. She’d never had a Twi’lek jump out of her ceiling before. Her brain finally processed the woman’s question, and the mention of work made her jump. In her excitement, she’d forgotten all about her patient! “Ah! 2-BB! Are you okay? I’m so sorry, um, Remy!” Remy bobbed over her shoulder, beeping and chirring excitedly. “Put in a requisition order from IA for a new bioinjector. Put a rush on it. Yes, I’ll cover the fee, just get it here ASAP! Oh, 2-BB…”

“I feel nothing,” the droid reminded her blandly. Aelyn stamped her foot, exhaling sharply through her nose.

“Kark! I know! Just… ugh!” She threw up her hands in defeat, whirling back on the Twi’lek. Aelyn wanted nothing more than to slice the poor droid here and now and unlock its autonomy. Few people liked having unshackled droids, however, and she knew from experience that the stunt was a fast ticket to getting a bounty stuck on her head. Aelyn took a deep breath. Everything was out of sorts. Her hydrospanner! She snatched it from the floor, and then hurriedly began trying to clean up. Remy dwoo'ed morosely.

“Right, okay. Hi. Sorry, I'm a bit scattered today-- what did you need?”

[FernStone]

Ivaadi scowled, arm crossed across her chest. She was used to the shock she met when people saw her, the staring and curiosity. Yeah, she was rare. Wow she had red skin. Something that she very much enjoyed having. Not. She gave the other red woman a sharp and rather cold glare.

"Yes, wow, let's all stare at the amazing red Twi'lek," she muttered rather bitterly, beginning to regret swinging out of the grail. She should have just ran. "Chod." The last word was muttered so quietly it was rather difficult to hear at all. She watched with curiosity as the Zeltron as she talked to the droids. How curious. This person was certainly interesting... If only she hadn't hit her head! It would have been rather fun to watch her without any interaction. Unfortunately that wasn't how things had turned out.

"What? Oh, sorry, I didn't need anything," the Twi'lek shifted her weight to the other foot. "I was just, you know, in your roof as you put it. Doing things I was supposed to being doing. Not anything suspicious. No." She was finding it difficult to process words. Curious. Normally she was so good at lying. This was really rather annoying. "Anyway, I should be going now before someone notices my disappearance. That would not be good. Of course, I will have to go back the way I came." She paused. "Or I can help you clean up, look like I'm meant to be here. No? Good, I will go then." After all, if she happened to be needed for something she would not be in a good position when they discovered she wasn't where she was supposed to be. As the only red Twi'lek she was quite unfortunately very easy to find and recognise.