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GM

Vontoba walks through the twisted corridors of the wrecked CR90 corvette, heading aftwards where workers are still stripping the main reactor.

She doesn't stop for the Resistance fighters, but she does listen to them.

Winta lays out her position, with Jelly Bean backing her up.

"If you leave you will be making yourself into targets. You will be in the open and you will be making yourselves look guilty.

"If you stay here, you know the ground, you can leave things where they are. If more Strus arrive, you can tell them the truth -- that it was my group that killed them." She indicates back to the Strus bodies.

"With a small lie, you could say that we already had your Varactyls, so you were in no position to take up against us."

Vontoba halts, vexed. Winta continues.

"I appreciate that we have brought trouble upon you. We can owe you a favour in return, if that would help"

The Zabrak turns to Winta then, saying:

"You would do us the favour of burning our corpses when you return from wherever it is you jet off to?"

"No Winta, even if the Strus Clan believe that you're a rival gang, they'll still make us suffer, just to remind us who's biggest and baddest in the badlands."

Vontoba sighs, not meaning to sound so ungrateful.

"You seem like good people," she says, "and I'm sorry if you came all this way for nothing. But you don't want to be in this vacinity when the Strus Clan come looking either. You should get out of here too."

Jelly Bean

Image

Jelly Bean was finishing up with Walt the A-Lt droid, running a coolant purge, recirc, and then a pressure charge. She never had any formal schooling for mechanics and electronics. The machines just talked to her. She had been a teenager when she first started feeling the strangeness that she understood things that she shouldn't, couldn't possibly understand. But people were harder for her. And Winta asked her to come along for negotiations. Critical negotiations that could mean the difference between life and death for the Galaxy. Winta brought her along for a conversation about the same thing on a much smaller scale, the life and death of the scavenger family. Dealing with people on a real emotional level was hard to Jelly Bean. Not because she didn't care, quite he opposite. She had hidden so much of her true self and her heart for so long, keeping it protected and out of the reach of anyone who might try to 'know' her. She had gone against her better judgment not that long ago and let someone into 'see' her true self. It didn't end well. What did Winta hope might happen here by having jelly Bean along? Did she think Jelly Bean could actually offer more than the facade of charm and charisma, and snarky humor and that would make these people trust them enough to help the resistance?


Ironic that... Given that the Twi'lek was in the 'customer service' business for Tenga the Hutt. All of that was fake to her. She was born with gifts and addets and the Hutts used up people like her and threw them away and then bought another. But she was lethan and her 'shelf-life' was longer than most other slave girls. Even after her adolescense was over she still had value to the Hutt. But to Jelly Bean that value was just a prolonging of her fear and her misery. She was always a difficult slave and she bore the marks to prove it. Oh, thoise marks were carefully hidden, surgically healed, and made to look pristine all over again. Whether it was the Hutt and his enforcers, or the people who paid large amounts of credits to satisfy their twisted fantasies and darker predatory urges upon her, it was all the same. Most of the scars were on the inside.

Jelly Bean stood just a step off of Winta's right shoulder. You might say it was a new habit built on an old principle. Survival in principle, and keeping her gun hand on a clear sight line. She listened to her leader's appeal and then to the Zabrak's reply. Jelly Bean bit her lip. Logic was not the path here...

Then, without leave to speak Jelly Bean shook her head just a small fraction. She didn't sign up with the resistance to share her problems or make friends, or even travel to see exotic kriffhole wastelands. She signed up to get revenge. She signed up to make someone pay for taking away the only thing she had allowed herself to care about since was a child on Ryloth. Maz Kanata helped her focus that pain and hurt and rage and make it work for her, but Jelly bean was no fool either. Maz was teaching her to make it work for the resistance. Maz, Leia, all of them... they were using her as a tool, focusing her on what they wanted and needed. Everybody used somebody for their own ends, that's how things worked in her experience. The Hutts used her and now the Resistance used her. At least the goals of the Resistance matched her own for now. How could she get the scavenger's goals to match those of her team?

She knew that she would probably regret this one day. She stepped forward and around Winta. She closed her eyes for a heartbeat or two, and took a deep breath.

"WE are not good people," she began honestly. "We are desperate people who try to do good things. And I think you are too, all of you... But you are scared... Oh, for kriff's sake, I'm scared too. Everyday since I was six years old, I lived in fear. Scared I would die, scared I would live. Everyday was a struggle to see if my HOPE that it would all end would finally outweigh my NEED to survive. I was a plaything for Hutts. You know what happens when evil people are allowed to evil things. I lived in fear... Fear that I would not see another day, fear that I would see another day, fear that I would be hurt so badly, healed, and then hurt some more... just because that was fun for them."

Jelly Bean offered the strong and proud leader of the scavenger's group a hand, extended as an offering of connection. Logic would not prevail, but maybe real emotions might.

"But one day, I realized that living in fear, hoping that I could survive another day, or hoping to die so that it would be over... well, that's not living. So, on that day... I made a stand. No one had the right to make me feel afraid. I took control of my life. I told myself that I would actually try to live, and that I would never give up living... ever again."

She offered her other hand as her eyes welled with tears. tears were valuable to a Twi'lek. Tears were water, and water was precious in a desert culture. That was why she worked hard to repair WALT. Water was precious and tears were the 'Waters of her Heart, as they old Ryllian saying went.

"The Strus, like all Swoop gangs, and Hutts... and even the kriffin' First Order are BULLIES. They hate... everything, even themselves. And you can't reason with hate. You can't negotiate with hate. You run, they follow because you run. Bullies will take whatever is most valuable from you, be it things like 'your droids' or 'your Twi'leks'... or your children and your hard earned parts and anything you salvage to make money to feed your children. They will take your dignity and strength and fill you with fear because seeing you in fear is what they really want... and they will never stop taking from you until you make them stop."

Jelly Bean paused a moment to take a breath.

"You helped us. The Strus were out there looking for trouble. They were going to hurt someone, but you helping us pointed them in your direction. I'm sorry for that. The things we do, and the reasons why seem so abstract when you're here and your first worry is just finding enough metal things to buy some food for those precious babies. To have enough water to make it to nightfall and hope your evaporators will work to fill your tanks for tomorrow. Every day, each day, is the only day. Saving the galaxy sounds a fanciful notion, and you're right, they're just words... a slogan... But, what's real is what's happening right now... right here."

"Word will reach the rest of the swoop gang, and they will come. We all know that. You feel you need to run. To protect your people, your children, the only way of life you know. They will come, and then they will follow and hunt... because their lives have no meaning and hurting others is all they know. You can't outrun fear. There is no where to run. You know, and fear, that we will leave and go on with our fight in some other distant place that the rest of the universe doesn't care about or even know it exists. And we will, we must...That's our fight. But, what's real is what's happening right now... right here."

"When that one day came for me, I stopped being afraid and I fought back. For the first time since I was stolen from my own desert homeworld, my life was my own again. I drew a line in the proverbial sand, and said... this far and no farther."

"For you... That day is today... and we're not going anywhere. Screw the Galaxy. Because it isn't worth saving a notion, a concept, or a catchphrase if you don't actually save the people who need saving the most. We helped make this mess and we will stay and make it right. This is your family and our family together... It's time to stop living in fear, and start actually living."

"My Kweekuni here is something called a Jedi, and I've heard tell that Jedi don't run. She and the rest of our team will get us ready to help you draw your line in the sand. BaBay and I can get that turbolaser up and running. We WILL get it up and running! No more bullies! This is your home and no one will take it from you!"

Winta

She smiled inwardly to herself. 'Well, that took an unexpected turn ...' she thought as she listened to Jelly Bean. ' ... but the Force moves in mysterious ways.'

As Jelly Bean spoke, Winta contemplated her own moral compass and the tinges of greyness that sometimes she let in to her decisions. She was comfortable with her choice ...and she tried to guide the force to get Vontoba to like Jelly Bean as she listened to the story.

Winta told herself that it was not semantics - she was not forcing Vontoba's decision: it was still Vontoba's decision to make, and the pros and cons for her tribe were still the same.

And Winta knew that some would take a different view of the morality of her action.

GM

Vontoba takes a step back in the face of Jelly Bean's emotional outpouring.

Winta senses that the Zabrak woman doesn't share the sentiments but she sympathises with them.

Scavengers understand how desperate times can bring out the crazy in people. The red-skinned Twi'lek talks about an ideal world where the downtrodden rise up against their oppressors, but maybe Vontoba lived through the overthrow of the Galactic Empire, the reformation of the New Republic. Maybe she saw the New Republic consolidate its power in the Core and abandon any designs for the rest of the Galaxy. A pragmatic, sensible decision by the Senate. In the absence of the Empire, the Underworld reforged old alliances, crime bosses, warlords, despots, and knew that the New Republic wasn't interested as long as they kept their business in the Outer Rim.

That is how the New Republic achieved peace throughout the Galaxy. Ignorance is bliss. And that's how in the First Order crept back from the shadows, lurking at the edges of known space, feeding on the backwater worlds and getting stronger, wilfully ignored by the New Republic. After all, it was an Outer Rim problem for the Outer Rim to solve.

Not everyone Corewards forgot about the Outer Rim though. The Resistance didn't.

These racing thoughts lead Vontoba to reconsider Winta's words. They weren't selfishly intended to make her change her mind, they had a point.

"This wreck's got a lot of holes in it but it's defensible, agreed." The Zabrak says, "We don't have enough defenders though. If the Strus Clan show up while you're out at the Star Destroyer, we need to hold them off."

She looks down the shadowed corridor, forewards to the turret.

"As for the turret, we hooked it up to power but I'm afraid it's trashed. We have our best team on it."

Vontoba reconsiders those last words, "We have a team on it."

Winta

She looked to Jelly Bean. "Can you fix that?" she asked, indicating the turret.

She looked back to Vontoba. "Let's see if we can give you a hand."

GM

"And if you fix it, who will man it?" Asks Vontoba.

Although these scavengers make a living from starships and spend most of their working lives inside them, ironically few of them, if any, would have been inside one that had power. You don't need to know how to fly a starship to break it for scrap.

The Zabrak woman gestures to a nearby rent in the hull of the wreck where Jakku's daylight scours the interior. Another possible entry point for attackers. One of many in a wreck such as this.

"Do you plan to leave us a security detail while you're at the Star Destroyer, to help us defend?"

Jelly Bean

Image

Jelly Bean had only enough time to nod affirmatively to the question of fixing the turret weapon before Vontoba challenged them again with another obstacle.

Jelly Bean pursed her lips and nodded to herself. She had already said too much aloud as it was. JB crossed in front of of Winta, half facing her now, but just off to her side so she could whisper in Winta's ear, as though that shielded her conversation. She didn't try to talk too softly, but more like personally to Winta to give her info to make a decision upon.

"She's right... I can fix it. With BaBay's help I can fix anything... But if they can't fire it, then it's wasted time. And.. She's also right that if the Strus come in force, these people can't hold them off. I mean, it will take all the training WE have to lead swoop bikes travelling at high speed. If you've never made those kinds of shots... well, let me say this blunly... they'll all be dead before they get past the learning curve."

Jelly Bean craned her neck around a little to glance at the Zabrak woman. Reality was a bitch, not just sometimes but all the time.

"Now I don't know what our deadline is, but we can't leave them to do this alone. The Resistance is better than that... It has to be better than that. We started this mess. We can't abandon them and call it the greater good. We can all fight this out, then dash for the Inflictor. We also have Fira Bonn's people. The Republic forgot about them, but the Resistance is doing things different, right? I think they know that, and are all in at our pazaak table here."

Another pause.

"Most important though... We can't wait all day for the Strus to show up either... But I'd wager all the wupiupi I have in my pack that this druk-eater, Unkar Plutt wants Vontoba's people off this wreck, freshly exposed from under the sand and all that. Prime salvage opportunity. I figure he's the one that let the Strus know, sold us out, sent them to do his dirty work. What if we send word to Plutt that we just took his trash out for him? Well, I bet that would get the rest of the Strus headed this way immediately."

Winta

"Yes," she replied to Vontoba.

"Some of us will stay to help you whilst the others go fetch the thing we are after."

[OOC: what skill would be used for the turret guns? 'Piloting - Space' or 'Gunnery']

She tapped her com link. "Amos, we need a chat. I am modifying the plan. I'm not quite sure how yet."

GM

A footstep on scrap metal and Fira Bon ducks into the interior, through the rent you're standing next to.

The stern veteran must have felt her ears burning. She says to Vontoba:

"Like the lady said, Vontoba, some of us are staying.

"Me and Tiras have long range rifles. And you get that turbolaser working, Mhar-li will show them Strus just how dangerous riding a swoop bike can be.

"Bormo will stick close to your non-combatants. He's mean with that staff of his and knows his medicals too."

Having read Fira Bon's personnel jacket, you know she was a flight sergeant in the New Republic. She served in one of the many units reconnoitering for Imperial Remnants. As time passed, that threat ceased (or so the New Republic thought) and Fira Bon's unit was posted to Jakku as security guards for the Graveyard of Giants.

It was such a demoralising posting that many soldiers in the unit deserted, until finally it was disbanded officially and Fira Bon went native.

The woman successfully commands the Sunstrider, for what it's worth, and given her training and experience should know how to mount a defence of the Starlight Wanderer wreck.

Vontoba knows Fira Bon better than she knows the Resistance team, and appears satisfied by the veteran's offer.

"Very well," says the Zabrak, turning to Winta and Jelly Bean, "and you two think you can get us help in the long-term? Weapons and training, so we can defend ourselves?"

Instead of her tribe running in fear, Vontoba is hoping that they might stand and fight, and maybe, some day soon be powerful enough that Strus Clans and Unkar Plutts are too scared to attack them.

Winta

'What?!' she thought in response to Vontoba's comment on providing long term training. 'When did that come up?'

"Sure," she replied. 'Needs must,' she thought, wondering how she was going to manage that ...

Jelly Bean

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Jelly Bean still faced Winta, mostly... The call to Amos was standard and JB ran through the options in her head, if needed. As for a gunner it would be herself, then Jix, then Sirra, in that order. But as far as the mission of the Inflictor was concerned, an obvious overriding factor, there were several mission critical people- Sirra and BaBay for the slice work, and herself and BaBay for any engineering issues- like actually making the equipment work again after so much time in the sand and sun.

She didn't get much further in the conundrum of trying to be in two places at once when Fira Bon entered the reactor area. On the surface it would answer a lot of their concerns and keep the primary mission on task... but JB didn't know enough about Fira or her team to know if they were as capable as she proclaimed. No reason to doubt her either. It's just that JB spent her life being 'rented out' to men and women who often demonstrated a common personality trait. They talked a lot druk about how impressive they were, to the point of sounding like they had to say it aloud in order to believe it. Arrogance? Maybe? Lying? Probably. Insecurity? Definitely.

Jelly Bean kept her thoughts to herself. When she got that turret back up and running she would find out if Fira's people could handle it or not. Until then, mouth shut.

No sooner had Fira made her claims and promised her services then Vontoba added a new layer to the negotiation by upping her ante. Yeah, that's what this was... a negotiation. She was betting on the come. She didn't want to leave the wreck. This ship would be more than a home to them, but a defensible fortress that could be salvaged over the years for a tidy sum of credits. They would stay and loan the Varactyls for the price already negotiated, but now they wanted the repairs done, personnel to help with the defense.. and not not ask for more, right? Imagining Vontaoba sitting across the pazaak table from Winta, knowing Winta was desperate for the next card to come up double or high neg. Winta and the Resistance already had too much on he table and couldn't afford to walk away from it. Vontoba already had the sense Winta wouldn't treat them like the Strus would and that pinned Winta's odds of success much lower without a gambit play. Hmmm... So, why not increase the odds and play the player instead of the cards. Gamble on the come. The Resistance had to win, and that meant this mission had to succeed... Vontoba asked for weapons and training for the long term future. Well played.

Winta was 'boxed and flipped' as the saying goes at the pazaak table. And it was a prime example of why decent, honest people didn't play pazaak. What else could Winta say? Jelly Bean envisioned that Fira Bon and her people would do the training and the Resistance, if there was a Resistance after today, and that the Resistance would not be able to forget the connection to Jakku. Jelly Bean looked from Winta to Fira Bon.

Assumptions and suppositions took root in Jelly Bean's mind. This lean toward seeing disguised connections was by product of her life among the Hutts. It came with 'reading' people. Maybe it wasn't true or real. Maybe it only existed in Jelly Bean's mind. But, she narrowed her eyes as she glanced around at Vontoba and then back again to Fira. A thin smile turned the corners of Jelly Bean's mouth upwards. Well played indeed.

Fira harbored a great resentment for the New Republic after the fall of the Imperials. JB's limited understanding of the recent history told her that they abandoned everyone beyond their core worlds scope and let them fend for themselves, even their own people assigned out on the rim. Fira was one of them. So, yeah, the over-under in Fira's mind could be that the Resistance would do the same until proven otherwise. Four out of five cards on the line and it looked good that the resistance was better than the New Republic... but there was still that fifth card to play. Fira's life was here on Jakku, no matter what happened on Exegeol, or even on the Inflictor for that matter. Vontoba had to know that as well. Winta's team would leave, but Jakku would still be Jakku. Scavengers would still have to find that next piece of scrap to sell. And Fira would still be who she was and where she was. Allies were connections. You play the hand you're dealt.

There was probably nothing Winta could do to avoid it. Hard choices came with being in charge. Even if Fira and Vontoba were watching out for each other, and the new deal helped them both, it still wasn't a bad thing. If the mission failed then the Resistance would be dead, and Jakku would have to find a new balance in its place in the galaxy. That new balance probably wouldn't look too much different to them than it looked right now. Winta's quick acceptance would end the negotiations right there and that was probably good too. The team needed those varactyls. And Jelly Bean wasn't about to say a word right now that would add more weight to Winta's own burdened thoughts.

And so, Jelly Bean returned her attention her leader. "If you'll excuse me Kweekuni," she said softly. "I have a date with a bodged-up turbolaser turret. Just hoping BaBay has got some good news for me when I get there."

Winta

She nodded to Jelly Bean. "Sure."

She looked back to Vontoba. "We have a deal?"

GM

Fira Bon stands shoulder to shoulder with Winta and Jelly Bean. It's three against one. Vontoba gives them the hard stare, but ultimately Winta agreed that weapons and training might be possible, long-term.

Winta hasn't agreed to any more than that but Vontoba feels she can trust the younger woman. Like, Winta will do her best for her allies and wants to be friends with the tribe.

Winta can inject a lot of gravitas into the one word answer "Sure" and there's no mistaking her authority. Fira Bon is a hardened mercenary with an uncompromising code of honour and sense of right and wrong. If she's committed herself and her crew to Winta's cause, that means something to Vontoba.

And there's no doubting the sincerity of Jelly Bean's impassioned speech.

The Zabrak headwoman steps aside, letting one of tribe hurry passed lugging a crate.

She glances at the two Resistance fighters and Fira Bon, then calls after the crate-lugger.

"There's no rush! Tell the others. We're staying."



[Well done, a complex scene involving quite a bit of plot machinery. But you have convinced the tribe to stay. This was an opposed check. Although there were no Blue (Boost) dice to gain, you did avoid pitfalls that might have given you Black (Setback) dice.]

Winta

She reached out with the Force, to give Vontoba reassurance that she had made the right decision.

"The sooner you fix that turret, the sooner we are off!" she called after the Twi'lek.

Jelly Bean

Jelly Bean didn't reply, and she didn't look back either. She simply waved a hand as she exited to signal that she heard Winta.

GM

"The Varactyls are already saddled. I'll let their handler know you'll be taking them after all." Says Vontoba, nodding to Winta and Fira Bon, and excusing herself.

With Jelly Bean disappearing down the corridor, it leaves Winta and Fira Bon alone.

Fira Bon is behind the Resistance mission one-hundred percent. Lieutenant Bek must have been very clear about the stakes.

She simply says to Winta, "We got this. Go do your thing."

[Go to CFH4: The Secure Vault]