“Nincompoop!”

The Verpine mechanic was becoming increasingly agitated, scuttling about the edge of the small group of mechanics working on the Zephyr’s damaged landing gear. A small translation droid painted with lopsided hot pink stars was zipping about on repulsor lifts behind him.

“You are all nincompoops!” The droid provided helpfully again as the Verpine let out another stream of incomprehensible chatter. “Deviation from set plans testament to laziness. Only one that suffers is the freighter!”

“Will you shut the frak up?” The mechanic supervisor hollered, his ruddy-face flushed with the heat as well as irritation. He and his team has been given minimal notice and a limited time frame to get the flagship of Sharpe fixed and the Verpine had done nothing but hinder their efforts.

The Verpine clutched at its elongated head with its fingers, a gesture of foreboding doom that needed no translation. It was only when a nearby mechanic took a threatening step towards the alien with a hydro-spanner clutched in his hand that both droid and Verpine vanished from sight.

“Bout bloody time.” The supervisor said gratefully, rubbing a hand across his face to collect the excess sweat gathering on his forehead.

“Where’s she headed?”

The unfamiliar female voice at his shoulder immediately caused the supervisor to tense up again.

“Listen!” He started, spinning about to face the new distraction. “I don’t have time for this shit, get-“

“Lost?” A blaster pistol wedged itself underneath the wobbling jowl of the supervisor. The man stuttered off mid-sentence, his mouth gaping open at the brazen display. The wielder of the blaster, a well-built young man with a buzzcut and a strong jaw, offered him a cocky smile before speaking again. “No need to be rude.”

“It’s all right Skarr.” The owner of the female voice, a short blonde wearing spacer’s gear, raised a hand and pushed the blaster down from the mechanic’s face. In its place she procured a small pouch that she dangled tantalisingly before the supervisor’s eyes.  She gave the pouch a small jingle, allowing the man to hear the telltale clack of credit against credit within.

“Just after some information,” The woman informed him with a wry twist of her lips. “That’s all.”

The supervisor licked his lips, tasting the salty brine of his own sweat, then snatched the proffered bag and tucked it under the waistband of his considerable gut.

“Dantooine,” He told the woman. “Sharpe lifts off in an hour.”

“Again?” The flash of surprise across the woman’s face was quickly supressed as she became aware of the calculated expression on the mechanic’s face. She turned to her male companion. “Try to find Millie. I need to chat to Bird.”

Both of the pirates turned about and swaggered off in separate directions.

The supervisor grinned at the feel of the pouch against his thigh and turned back to his team.

“Get moving!” He hollered. “Or Sharpe will have our heads!”

*        *        *        *        *        *

Kami strode down the chaotic hallways of one the unofficial headquarters of Eyesore flicking quickly through the datapad she had just been given. The tavern, once whorehouse, that Deznim had appropriated as his and his team’s office had seen far better days. The roof of the hallway sagged in towards Kami’s head as she rounded a corner and came out of an entrance propped up by a device of hastily welded doorframes and what looked like the remnants of an umbrella.

“Should really fix that.” Kami murmured to her companion without looking up from the reports in her hand.

“No time,” Deznim waved the comment away with flick of his furred hand. “Besides, last time we bothered the place burnt down.”

“No pants day?” Kami queried as the two made their way into the press of the muddied streets of the Locker. Two men lounging at the food stall next door to the tavern dropped the remnants of their lunch, wiped their greasy hands on their pants and fell into place behind their employer.

“Ronald Mcboobies day,” Deznim clarified with a sigh. “Too many human mammary glands and not enough common sense.”

“It all checks out,” Kami held the datapad out to Deznim. “Hold the fort until I’m back.”

“I’ll try,” Deznim took the datapad and raised it to his shock of white hair in a salute. “Take care out there.”

“I’ll try,” Kami echoed with a grimace, jabbing her finger at her two guards. “Stay with him alright, even if he tells you otherwise.”

“Sure thing boss.” The closest replied, offering her a grin that revealed rotted yellowed teeth even as Deznim shot a mock glare in Kami’s direction. The two guards wheeled about, Deznim securely in their midst, and headed back towards the tavern.

Kami turned and continued down the road in the direction of the hanger. Things had been quiet lately but that didn’t necessarily mean that there wouldn’t be some sort of crisis in her absence. On the Locker, filled as it was to the brim with hordes of unruly, drunken and horny pirates, a crisis was generally an hourly occurrence.  She couldn’t afford to risk Deznim or his team. Not when they were the only form of organised management structure that the Osk Company had. As a result her entire security team, built from the ground up since her placement as the King’s right-hand, would be responsible for their safety over the coming days.

It was, as usual, unwise for Kami to venture from the Locker. With Snipes face first in the bottle and his lietenants scattered to the wind their hold on Eyesore was more tenous than ever. But as the days dragged on and Kami’s restlessness became more and more evident she had finally realised that she needed closure.

And the only way she could get that closure was by venturing to Dantooine.

As Kami crossed the street and moved into another laneway, this one clogged with hovercraft bearing cargo heading in both directions from the main hanger, she thought back to her first attempt to get to Dantooine several months ago. The plan had gone awry from the very first stage, the scheduled hit on a convoy quickly escalating into a shoot-up with roaming New Republic forces and a local Hutt lord. When the blaster fire finally cleared both the Datastream and the Bloodfist had limped back to Eyesore with little more than wounds to show for the entire ordeal.

Kami hadn’t heard from Jae since. The Captain had been rightly pissed that Kami’s suggestion had landed her in hot water. Then again…hot water was really a defining aspect of the pirating profession. You either had the skill and luck to drag yourself out of it time and time again or you found yourself rotting six feet under.

“Sharpe.”

The man standing by the main pedestrian entrance of the hangar was unknown to her. He took a step towards her only to hesistate as one of the heavy blaster’s strapped to Kami’s thighs swung up and about, the barrel fixed pointedly at the man’s face.

“I know you?” She asked casually, her gaze drifting up and over the man’s fitted jacket before fixing on the skin of his exposed neck. The crowd of Locker patrons about the pair immediately scattered as they became aware of the blaster. A small group of Gran merchants were the lone exception, grouping closer and placing bets in low voices.

“Not gang affiliated.” The man raised both hands in the air in a gesture of submission.

“I’d hope not,” Havock appeared at the man’s shoulder, her co-pilot Millie at her back. The Captain of the Broken Bitch stepped pointedly between the man and Kami’s blaster. “Sorry Kams. Didn’t think I’d catch you so I sent Skarr here ahead.”

Kami lowered her blaster, ignoring the groans of disapointment that emerged from the lurking Gran.

“Don’t really have the time Hav,” She told her friend, snapping her blaster back into place in its holster. “Maybe we can schedule a meeting when I’m back.”

“Actually,” Havock moved closer to Kami until there was only a few centimeters between the pair. Searching blue eyes locked onto Kami’s face as she continued. “I was hoping we could come along.”

Kami regarded her for a moment, her jaw locking into place. The plan had been to move in quick and quiet with just the crew of the Zephyr with as little outside interference as possible. The fact that Havock knew where she was going meant that some loose-lipped grunt was already making free with her travel plans.

“Not sure why,” Kami kept her tone light, intending to disparage the other woman. “Reckon there’d be a thousand other jobs that would actually pay up upon completion. Besides, the Z isn’t exactly made to sleep seven.”

Havock refused to take the suggested bailout and pointedly crossed her arms across her chest instead. Millie and Skarr exchanged glances in the background as Kami stiffened dangerously.

“We don’t take up much room,” Havock insisted stubbornly, her own tone carefully modulated. “Plus the Bitch is grounded for repairs so we’re just kicking up our heels and passing the time.”

Kami’s jaw creaked audibly as the two women remained silent for a moment, both weighing the other up. Finally she flicked her dark hair over her shoulder with a jerk of chin and stormed past Havock towards where the Zephyr was docked.

There was only a moment of hesistation before all three members of the Bitch’s crew dropped in behind her and followed.

Kami drummed her fingers across the top of the bar in the Zephyr’s lounge. She stood alone in the centre of the room, shadowed on both sides by members of her own and Havock’s crew. The suspicion present between the two groups couldn’t have been more obvious if they had each other at gun point. Hond and Vasili had even managed to stop hating each other long enough to sit together near the dejarik table. Trix was crouched at their feet, her eyes fixated on Havock where the Captain stood with a whiskey in hand near the adjacent lounge. The kid had been stalking the woman since she walked on-board. Kami, sick to death of the same treatment but aware of how persistent the kid was, had given up trying to stop her gawking.

“Where’s the bug?” Skarr spoke up, leaning back in the couch and thunking a boot up on the table before him.

“He’s a Verpine,” Trix interjected with the snarky wisdom of a 14-year-old. “Duh.”

“Likely in the engine room,” Kami spoke up before Skarr could school Trix back into place. She moved out from behind the bar and placed a hand on her hip. Tilting her head at her own crew she sought out Havock’s eyes before continuing. “I need to brief you.”

“Go ahead,” Havock tilted the glass holding the rich amber liquid towards her. “We’re listening.”

“Same contact as last time,” Kami told them, her pale green eyes flicking from Havock to Millie and Skarr. “A group called the People’s Alliance of Dantooine want supplies. They’re still wallowing under a corrupt New Republic Governor who is more concerned with fattening his own purse than giving the community what they’re due.”

Millie’s gaze narrowed. “You have got to be kidding me.” She shot Havock a furious glare. “This…again?”

Skarr arched both brows from his position on the couch. “This a sloppy second job or something?” He asked his Captain.

“Later Millie,” Havock growled under her breath at her XO. She turned to Skarr before speaking again. “Not technically. We didn’t actually get to Dantooine before. We had…issues.”

“By issues the Cap means we had a smoking hole in the side of the Datastream.” Millie clarified. She turned on Kami. “Why are you so keen on Dantooine Sharpe? They can’t be paying you that much?”

“Sharpe has deep pockets.” Hond spoke up for the first time, his voice a deep growl. “Check your cut. Or skip back to Eyesore and leave more for the rest of us.”

“You’re funding this thing?” Millie’s expression became skeptical. “For what purpose?”

“Enough!” Havock rounded on Millie, jabbing a finger at her face. “Keep your trap shut for five seconds and let the woman talk!”

The two women stared at each other for a long moment before Millie shot a look in Kami’s direction. The Captain of the Zephyr met the stare unflinchingly, her expression blank and her pale eyes cold.

“We’re just finishing the job,” Kami told the crew of the Bitch. “And yes, I’m paying on top of the offered price.”

“What do they want this time?” Havock interjected, turning the course of the conversation back on track. “More meds?”

“Food.” Kami replied simply. “We have the cargo on-board. Plan is to zip in and under the radar, all nice and quick like, dump the load and bail out.”

“And this Governor…”

“Cortez.” Kami offered.

“Cortez,” Havock took a deep swallow of her whiskey. “He just watches us zip in and out and doesn’t make a move?”

“Oh he’ll make a move,” Kami allowed a smile to play over her lips. “But we’ll have the bastard on the back foot this time.”

“So she says now,” Vasili said mournfully. The pilot dragged a hand through his scruffy hair and rearranged the cigarette dangling from his mouth. He gestured expansively as he spoke again. “But come action time we’ll be getting shot at. There will be people on fire, explosions, mass genocide. You watch!”

Hond backhanded the pilot across the back of the head with a grunt.

“Ow!” Vasili shot a look of protest at Kami. “Workplace violence!”

“I need you in the cockpit,” Kami told him before pushing herself off the bar. She stalked past Havock, gesturing with her chin for the other Captain to follow, and moved into the main circular hallway that ran throughout the freighter. The sound of Vasili’s boots on metal grating grew louder as the pilot broke into a jog to keep up.

“Your crew don’t seem all too happy to be here.” Kami said to Havock as the shorter woman matched her pace.

“Doesn’t matter how they feel,” Havock replied briskly. “They’ll do as they’re told.”

Kami looked sidelong at her friend, the words from their earlier conversation echoing in her mind. She wasn’t sure why she had questioned Havock about Jaenna. The uncharacteristic probe into Havock’s personal life had slipped free from her mouth before she’d even had a chance to stop it. Was she really so bitter and twisted that she needed the perverse pleasure of knowing someone else was suffering to cope?

“So…is this like the spinster squad or something?” Vasili said, employing his annoying art of knowing exactly what was on Kami’s mind in its usual fashion to piss her off.

Kami flashed him a look of warning. “Mouth shut Vee or I’ll shut it for you.”

The pilot raised both hands before him in a gesture of submission. “Hey, I’m with you guys, girl power and all that.”

“Could always space him over Dantooine?” Havock suggested as the trio made their way into the cockpit.

“Don’t tempt me.” Kami gestured for Vasili to take his seat in the pilot’s chair. “Let’s get this show on the road.”

The group of eight were heavily armed. As the sled came to a halt, a cloud of dry dust whipping up into the humid air, the small group fanned out to form a loose semi-circle before Kami and her crew. They were all young save for the sun-browned man sporting a patchy beard who stepped forward to meet them. Underneath the wide brim of his hat his dark eyes were narrowed with obvious suspicision.

Kami eyed the rifles cradled in the arms of the man’s comrades as silence stole over the small clearing. The only sound was the gentle clicking of the shed’s engine as it cooled and the distant catcall of local wildlife. She pulled herself up from the passenger seat and leaned nonchantly on the cracked windshield of the sled. As she did so two of the youngest of the group before her, a girl and a boy who were similar enough to be siblings, tightened their whitened knuckles about the grips of their weapons.

“Lovely day,” Kami started amicabibly, flicking her gaze from the nervous PAD recruits to their bearded leader. “It always so hot on this rock?”

Her casual reaction seemed to only make their buyers more nervous. Several members of the group exchanged glances, their faces tight with surpressed emotion, before a look of warning from their leader stilled them back into place.

“You got the food?” The man with the beard asked, his voice a gruff rumble.

“You mean, this food?” Kami asked dryily, tilting her chin towards the stack of crates at her back. She resisted the urge to follow up her derisive comment as the bearded leader stiffened noticeably. His own hands flexed near the blaster hanging loosely in the clasps at his hips.

Kami shot a sidelong glance at Hond in the passenger seat. The mercenary gave his Captain a barely discernable shake of his head, his glowing red eyes swivelling back about to take in the group before them.

“Well,” Kami said, tossing both hands up before her in a gesture desgined to distract. “Lovely meeting y’all.”

As every pair of eyes in the group fixated on Kami, the barrels of their weapons slowly rising, the sleds engine roared back to life with a high-pitched whine of protest. At the same moment Hond’s hand curled about the accereration lever and pulled it completely back.

The sled lurched forward, sending Havock cussing as she almost flipped over the side. Skarr’s answering curse suggested that the other Captain had only managed to hold on by using his head as a handlebar. Kami dropped back into her seat as the first of the shots hit the windscreen. They drilled easily through the worn partition to pepper her face with dozens of shards of broken glass.

“Keep your heads down.” Kami told her crew through gritted teeth, a warm trickle of her own blood dropping down into her eyes as she sent the sled spinning about in the direction that they’d come.

“Kami!” Havock’s warning was barely audible over the sound of blaster fire and the roar of the engine. “Look up!”

Kami glanced over her shoulder at the dwindling figures of the group behind them before following the direction of Havock’s hand where it was pointing at her shoulder. At the top of the ridge, directly in the path of their escape route, two speeders full with armed men had materialised. Kami looked desperately along the sides of the small dip in the earth where the meeting had led them, seeing no other patch of ground that would allow the heavy sled to traverse over the steep incline and back onto level ground.

“Of course it was a trap. Nothing’s ever easy,” Hond had a freshly lit cigar clamped between his lips. He pulled back the loading mechanism of his battered shotgun and looked to Kami. “Let’s ram the bastards.”

The sound of metal snapping against metal behind her was unmistakeable as Havock, Millie and Skarr readied their own weapons. The pirates of Osk wouldn’t let themselves go down without a fight. It was that thought, and that thought alone, that caused Kami to slam on the brakes of the sled.

This time Havock did go flying, tumbling off her perch and landing in a pile of twisted limbs on Skarr’s lap. The manuever also slammed Hond and Millie into their restraints, momentarily knocking their aim off-course as they sought to pick out targets from the growing forms of the speeders before them.

Before anyone could recover Kami was out of the speeder, the heels of her knee-high boots crunching in the gravel as she moved beyond the reach of her comrades. She heard Havock call out her name as she continued towards the speeders. As the closest came within fifty meters of her position she interlinked her fingers behind her head and dropped down to her knees in the middle of the red dirt.

The occupants of the speeder were out and surrounding her in seconds. Unlike the first group of PAD fighters, these men and women were older, their weapons held with practised ease. A warning shot hit the ground before Kami, showering more dirt up into the air. Kami didn’t flinch, staying locked in place in the middle of the road.

“Hold your fire!”

The slighty breathless comment came from behind Kami. After a few moments the bearded man with the hat appeared at her shoulder. He was breathing raggedly, obviously having chased them across the short distance from the original meeting ground. The second speeder pulled up, disgorging more armed locals from its confines.

“Hold your fire!” The bearded man snapped at the latest group as a few eyed the lone woman on the ground with clear purpose. He pushed the barrel of the pistol to Kami’s forehead, his dark eyes curious beneath the shadow of his hat.

“Why didn’t you run?” He asked her, his voice modulated so as to not to carry to his comrades.

“Could have,” Kami answered simply, the truth of her statement clear. “Me and mine haven’t done anything to justify it though.”

The man considered her for a moment and then spat to one side. “Might just be you’re telling the truth.” He said slowly. “Or might just be we caught you off guard.”

“If you wanted the food for free, you could have just asked.” Kami responded, her own tone still calm despite the situation.

The bearded man let out an indredulous laugh. “We don’t want the food darlin’.” He leaned closer, close enough for her to see the pepper flecks amongst his beard. “We want you.”

Kami didn’t bother to hide the surprise that flicked over her features. “Me?”

“And yours.” The bearded man gestured to his people to surround the speeder. Havock and the rest were still frozen within. Only Hond was still struggling to raise his weapon from where Skarr had pinned it against his chest. The younger group of PAD soldiers had moved in on the heels of their leader and now had the barrels of their weapons pointed clearly at her crew. All were completely ignoring the stock of food on the rear of the sled.

“Someone needs to answer for the crimes of Osk.” The leader of the group continued, his voice grim. “And you, Lady Sharpe, will more than do.”