Star Wars EotE: Scavenging on the Rim IC

[Steel Mirror]

Year 28 ABY
Aboard Trading Vessel The Hutt's Promise
Somewhere on the trading route to Adarlon

https://echostation57.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/starlight-intruder-03.jpg?w=832

The orders came in over the ship’s intercom which, like everything else on the Hutt’s Promise, was ramshackle, second-hand, and barely functioning. Captain Kairo Tren’s patrician voice came over the line with an electronic flatness interspersed with small bursts of static and the occasional whine of acoustic feedback. “Gentlemen, Ladies, and Droids, there’s been a change of plans. We are not going to be delivering this vital shipment of kallat fruits and cheap homespun hats to Adarlon as planned. We will instead be diverting just slightly to the Qeimet system, where I have it on good authority that some damn fool of an Imperial admiral has gotten his fleet punched full of holes by the Rebels.”

Even as he was speaking, the crew members in the common area of the ship’s living quarters could feel a change in the timbre of the omnipresent engine hum, indicating that the ship was dropping out of hyperspace. Captain Tren continued his address.

“We’re close enough to the battlefield that we should be able to beat most everyone to it, but we need to move fast. We must purge the main cargo hold completely, and jettison all the food from the secondary hold as well. Keep the claret, though, and those disruptor crystals we got on Kaxra station. We’re also going to need the hyperdrive running at full output, so one of you will have to get down there and pull off those safety limiters that Daliar insisted on installing. I don’t want to hear any objections, all we need is for the drive to hold for a dozen lightyears and then you’ll have plenty of time to coddle it while we salvage anything worthwhile at the battlefield that we can find.”

He stopped talking for a moment, and over the intercom could be overheard the muted, distant whistles and chirps of the ship’s astromech. “Right, right. I also want a diagnostic of our weapons and that overpriced pod racer that you call a snub fighter, Valara. Make sure that we come out of hyperspace ready for bear. There shouldn’t be any survivors, let alone more forces in the area, but we might not be the only ones to get this idea, and I want us ready to defend our right to this salvage.”

“You have fifteen minutes before we make the calculations for the jump. I want you done with everything by that time. Don’t call up with any excuses, just report to me when you’ve done your jobs.” With a final burble of static, the intercom fell silent, leaving the crew of the Hutt’s Promise looking at each other in the small common area.

http://transform.fairfaxregional.com.au/transform/v1/crop/frm/silverstone-feed-data/d724b0a2-8c1a-488d-a7e5-d2c2421ace4e.jpg/r0_0_1024_536_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg
(but dirtier)

[dancrilis]

Lol'johi

Johi as she was normally called was dancing in her quarters - it was good to stay in shape and helped take her mind of things - when the message was delivered over the intercom. She was moving quickly to respond to the drop of cargo - she didn't agree with it, in fact she was fully opposed to it, but arguing about it would only delay a decision and she was new to the crew.

Reviewing for the disruptor crystals and claret she secured the boxes and initiated the safety override for the airlock to dump - activating the intercom "initiated the dump from main cargo hold in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1" she spoke slowly to allow for interruption, than pulling then activating it "done. If we mark our coordinates we can pick it up later - should be easy money", she moved to the the second cargo hold this time she secured a single crate of food before doing the dropping it too with the same procedure.

Job done and holds closed she grabbed the single secured food box and carried it to her quarters - if the hyperdrive went down due to limiter removal they would at least have some food later was her thinking.

That done she went to check on the others - was it normal for the captain to ditch good easy return products on a hope and a dream? Not an appealing trait in a captain.

[Intro]

Valara Tren

"Well, you heard the captain," Valara said, putting down the bulb of liquid that purported to be hot chocolate, but was not making a very convincing job of it. "Seems like we've all got some work to do."

She managed to avoid rolling her eyes until she was in the passageway leading to the launch bay made from a converted cargo pod, pulling her comlink and opening a private channel to her brother. "Really, Kai? Nothing wrong with going to check it out, but we didn't have to dump the cargo already. Pretty sure the mass won't slow us down enough to matter in this thing - I still think the Hutt's Promise is a reference to her namesake's overland speed."

Chastisement done, she started up the preflight on her bird.

[Steel Mirror]

Valara Tren

Her brother's voice came back over the comlink. To anyone else his clipped tones would sound merely businesslike and a touch arrogant, but Valara could sense an undercurrent of excitement and impatience. "That cargo was barely worth the cost of paying the cargo handlers to load it aboard, and I want the space for whatever we find at the battlefield. Every smuggler and pirate within a hundred lightyears is going to be converging on those wrecks; word on the holonet is that the Empire lost two Star Destroyers in that one battle, and the Rebels didn't fare much better."

"It's going to be a goldmine out there, but we need to be smart. We have to get in before the rest, grab something worth selling, and then get out before someone with more guns decides to make the Promise just one more wreck. If we need to dump every cargo crate and spare bolt on the ship to get there before the rest of the scavengers in the sector, then that's exactly what I want you to do."

[Intro]

Valara Tren

"Well, just make sure to pick up something that's done exploding," Valara replied. "Bound to be a lot of unstable stuff out there, and we just finished patching up that bulkhead in the aft hold."

[dancrilis]

Lho

With the others occupied she moved to review the passenger shuttle, checking fuel, that it started up without issue, that there were no items currently stored with it. she suspected she would be flying this while Valara handled either the Promise or the Headhunter so better to know it.

Activating the intercom "shuttle secure also".

[Whiskeyjack]

Rar

As the orders come over the comm, Rar is in his quarters, kneeling before a totemic mask from his clan and inhaling the sharp incense accompanying a ritual. With the word to be prepared to roll out, the Weequay's face tightens in a smile. "Am-Shak is good," he says simply "The thunder has past and the moon will harvest many corpses."

Raf switches on the main lights to brush, oil, and braid his hair in the tradition of offworlders. It takes a good amount of time for all the years being gone, now, but to perform the rituals casually with such a big hunt in sight could bring disaster. Once completed, Rar turns to polish and check his vibro-axe, and field strip his blaster before fully changing into his armor. They could go at any time, after all.

Thus prepared and armed, Rar exits his quarters. Casting a glance both ways in the hallway, he makes for the shuttle bay, thinking it unlikely for this great beast of a ship to be getting up close and personal for salvage until something worth salvaging is located.

[Steel Mirror]

The Hangar Bay
Rar, Lol'Johi, Valara

Each preparing for the prospect of action in their own way, three of the Promise's crew ended up converging on the hangar bay. The hangar was a cramped affair, carved out of a stock cargo hold by an Outer Rim scrapper and retrofitted with fuel lines, winches, and all the other bits of machinery you needed to keep a snub fighter and a crappy old shuttle running. It wasn't a grand open space like you got on an Imperial vessel, or some of the new Republic starcruisers. The ceiling was barely high enough to fit the shuttle, and there was a bare meter of space between it and Valara's headhunter. Entering or leaving the hangar was always a bit of a nailbiter, made even more tricky when Kairo decided to overload the ship with cargo and piled up the extra crates in the hangar. At least his orders to dump their supplies meant that the hangar was relatively uncluttered, for once, beyond the normal maintenance detritus of half-dismantled engine cowls and replacement armor panels.

Rar and Lol'Johi sauntered into the hangar in time to hear Kairo's response to Valara come in over her comlink. "There's no profit without risk, as our dear father was fond of saying." Kairo didn't mention how their father's idea of 'profitable risk' was why they were in this rusty bucket of a transport in the first place, trying to stay ahead of his debts. "Some of the most valuable things we're likely to find in that battlefield are the sort of things that like to go 'boom'. If we could find an unexploded torpedo magazine, we could pay off half of Gorba's loan in a single trip!"

"You worry about getting your toys ready to fight off any unfriendly entrepreneurs we come across. Let the rest of the crew worry about making sure none of our cargo explodes, and let me worry about deciding what's worth taking."

[Intro]

Valara

Valara crouched to slide under the Headhunter's port S-foil, unable to go around as the laser cannon at the end was snuggled up closely to a pile of crates containing power cells. "Well, I'm just about done here," she said to the others. "How'd things go on your end?"

[dancrilis]

Lol'johi

"All good - cargo is dropped, baring some food that should last us if the hyperdrive goes down until we repair it - call it my cut for the abandoned mission", she smiled "shuttle is ready - or ready as I think it normally is given the state of it".

She shrugged "frankly I am dubious about getting into a fire fight with the Empire and the Rebels as they try to rescue their people and secure what even objective they had there, this isn't exactly the fastest ship around if it comes to it - Gorba is a fan of consistent secure profit".

[Whiskeyjack]

Rar

Raf side-eyes Lol'johl. "Gods brought us here. Much glory, many prizes. They also send competition. What is a treasure easily gotten if not worthless?" The Weequay nods sagely to himself.

"When do we go? Can lift here...not much else." Rar shrugs in a way to accentuate the spear slung across his back. "Better over there. More to do. You need lifted now, though, am here."

[dancrilis]

Lol'johl

She smiles at the man "treasure easily gotten is still treasure", shrugging "but even if it was a vote I seem to be outvoted", she didn't mind it was the way things went - Gorba would be happy if the profit was consistent but he wouldn't ask to much about how the consistency was achieved.

[Steel Mirror]

"All right calculations are complete," the voice called out over the intercom. "You better have done your job on that hyperdrive," Captain Tren said. "We're jumping now."

The ship groaned and creaked as they jumped headlong into another questionable situation. At least there was the hope of big credits at the end of this one. All they could do was hope they would be lucky enough to strike it big.

Twelve hours later
In orbit around Qeimet IV

"Well this has been a giant dud," Captain Tren said over the comm. The assembled crew were in the Hutt's shuttle (affectionately called the Slug), drifting deep in the debris field above the gas giant Qeimet IV. Valara's fighter was docked snugly to the side of the shuttle with a poor-man's air seal, but for the moment she was with the others in the cockpit while they discussed their next move. The Hutt's Promise herself, as well as the good captain, were several thousand km away, safely removed from all the wreckage. Comm reception wasn't very good here, what with all the broken bits of ship in the way. The fact that they were in orbit around a planet with a particularly active magnetosphere didn't help either.

The Slug was attached to the side of what had looked like a promising piece of wreckage, the front third or so of a wrecked Carrack class light cruiser. Living up to its reputation for legendary toughness, most of the interior of the ship still retained atmosphere, which was a stroke of good luck. Unfortunately, they hadn't found much aboard aside from corpses and a few usable spare parts that would fetch some decent credits, but not make them rich. Certainly nothing that could be counted as a major score. It would also take a good hour of sweaty work to get what parts they had found out of the wreck and back to the Hutt's Promise. At the moment they were discussing whether it was worth it to do that, or to take a chance that the next wreck they looked at would have something more lucrative.

With all the other interested parties buzzing around the wreckage field already, and more showing up with every passing hour, it was important to set their priorities. Kairo had been getting increasingly impatient that they hadn't yet found their big score. "Have you at least checked the corpses for anything worthwhile? If any of them were trying to abandon ship, they might have been carrying their valuables with them as they fled."

As Kairo once again displayed his deep personal empathy and respect for the dead, Rar noticed a small indicator light on the console in front of him flashing. The display spent a moment processing the incoming data (it was probably older than any of the crew members present), before scrolling a warning. The passive sensors had detected an energy signature approaching. Judging from the directional indicator, it looked like a ship had managed to sneak up on them by using the bulk of the destroyed cruiser to hide its presence. It was still on the opposite side of the wreck, blocked from view. In fact, it was so close to the other side of the derelict that it seemed almost ready to touch it...

A deep CLUNK resounded through the Carrack as the other ship locked onto its outer hull. The reverberations passed through the Slug's own contact with the derelict and shook Lol'Johi, Valara, and Rar in the shuttle. A bare second later, the more high pitched vibrations of a hull cutting torch making progress through the dead ship's thick plating could be felt. It seemed that someone else was interested in their prize.

[Intro]

Valara

"It's a naval ship, Captain," Valara replied. "Most of the crew don't get paid enough to have much in the way of valuables, and those that do probably don't keep them aboard."

After the warning from the sensors, she added, "Sounds like we're going to have some company soon. I don't know that there's anything worth getting into a scrap over on this thing..."

[dancrilis]

Lol'Johi

"Unless you mean carrying their valuable organs - I suspect they were more inclined to save themselves rather than goods", she signed "look there is nothing really worth while here that we have spotted - we can fight the other guests for it and hope what we have found is worth it, leave this one and try elsewhere and hope no one has beaten us to the punch and that the stuff there is better, or head back to where we dropped the initial goods and see about forgetting this".

Shrugging - not that the man on the other end would see that, "personally I am in favour of avoiding a fight over scrap, but if you are bloodthirsty enough, well if we can avoid the borders we can likely sneak past them and capture there shuttle and leave them here to die - free second shuttle for us could easily make this worth it and expand the operation in the future and get any gear they already have - you would just be condemning whoever is here to a slow cold death in space and possible making an enemy of there family and friends should they recognise the craft in the future", time to find out who there captain really was.