Chapters (57)
- Cover
- Doctor Aphra
- DRAMATIS PERSONAE
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- ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
But since I’m not the reflective sort, I didn’t do that at all.
I simply checked the coordinates of my destination. There were some really nice bars on Son-tuul.
But I wasn’t going to any of those.
SCENE 16
INT. SON-TUUL BAR. LATER.
Atmosphere: Glasses clinking, bar chatter, bets being placed, and—
slightly in the distance—the raucous noise of people cheering for a fight about to start. This is the dirtiest, scummiest bar you can imagine, with patrons to match.
APHRA (narration):
No, I had to go to the one with the illegal backroom fighting ring.
That’s where I was going to find all the individuals of colorful backgrounds and questionable morals that I’d need for my latest mission.
Okay, okay: I chose that bar. As a meeting place for my specially selected wretched individuals. I knew that’s where they’d feel most at home.
Because it’s where I felt most at home.
It was one of those establishments where something’s always skittering around in the cobweb-laden shadows. Where the bar top hasn’t been cleaned in millennia, and the resulting crust of grime is so thick, it’s basically given you a whole new disgusting surface to set your smeary glass on.
And where the very important business of drinking yourself into oblivion is always getting interrupted by something.
I’d barely downed my first drink when the ruckus started. The bouncer was being very choosy about who he let inside…
SON-TUUL BOUNCER:
I don’t think so. Your kind aren’t welcome here.
The bouncer lets out a scream as blasterfire hits him square in the chest.
APHRA (narration):
I tossed back the last of my drink and craned my neck toward the entrance, trying to see what was happening.
Of course it was my guys. Of course.
Never trust a bunch of bounty hunters to play it cool.
IG-90:
Statement: I have made my point.
APHRA (narration):
IG-90: thoroughly logical assassin droid. And, I’m pretty sure, the one who fired that shot.
BOSSK:
Are you sssssure about that, IG-90? Hissss…
APHRA (narration):
Bossk: known Wookiee-killer extraordinaire. Which…might be a problem. Since we had a Wookiee on this mission and all.
IG-90:
Query: Where is the Wookiee?
BEEBOX:
He saw there was a pit fight in the back. Dumb lump got nostalgic.
APHRA (narration):
And that’s Beebox. Very short. But carries a big gun.
These boys were going to help me carry out my next mission. But I hadn’t yet seen the aforementioned “dumb lump”—definitely the linchpin of this adventure.
So I followed them as they headed for the sleaziest part of this sleazy backroom fighting facility. I kept my distance, walking a few paces behind so they wouldn’t see me. I wanted to get a sense of how they interacted with each other, how they’d work together. If any of them were prime candidates for tanking our mission before it even started.