Satunda
13 Nelona
12731
Good job, Almon D'Joy, if you would give me your current delivery address then I would send you one of those highly sugared giant cookies. You're the first Dork Sider (no spelling error) to figure out how to actually have a reasonable chance of crashing me.
I have my 2nd caf and I have had a polite conversation with Lord Solicitor Mollari who is the official judge for my matches. He confirmed that today's match is postponed while a "tiger match" is set up. I don't remember that being in the agreement. Is the profit margin on my stuff no longer worth the perpetual "next match"?
Rumor mill has it that somebody may have blown up Media Intern Cub Reporter Gilberto whatever-whatever I lost track. I dunno why a Loony Mentat would care, except specifically that Gilberto is apparently the Gamesman's type. Was? I dunno.
Since I have a day (at least) to deal with other matters, I need to look into some minor matters. They are not going to be crash opportunities, but if you WANT to waste your time, okay then!
See you around.
V
Danar had extremely strong intel that the current
Arena Champion was in the Coldwater Detention Facility hoosegow for having participated in the attack on Lord
Grakor's private estate yesterday. After some data searches, we headed down there to interview ... and this is some guy named
Madalitso Alvarez who is definitely 1) not a gladiator 2) not the champion of the arena 3) not going to help us any. But he signs an autograph for Aldwin anyhow.
As we're leaving to head back to Lord Grakor's estate, sirens go off and
Aerena shouts for someone to "stop him!" and points at a departing aircar.
I don't have ranged weapons right now. Why's she yelling to
So'Zen Al Saba and me?
Okay, sure.
"Size matters not," I say out loud in the usual advisory to the team, and call upon the Force to halt the momentum of that vehicle. It has Madalitso
**AND PIOTR SPARAVAL**
right in there. Driving.
Uhh huh.
My colleague So'Zen, always quick with an opportunity for diplomacy, bounces his way up there onto the hood of the aircar to negotiate a reasonable outcome of the situation.
Which, due to a lack of diplomacy among surrounding people, abruptly means a three-way-maybe-more fight is now in progress. Piotr Sparaval shows up again! As in, twice! Shoots himself! And then an older Cragmoloid bounty hunter named Akoom (I think?) jumps in to collect the live bounty on Gilberto.
I give you my word as a knight in Tapani Sector that he is NOT a reporter.— me, about Danar, to Bounty Hunter Akoom
Somebody tried to grenade the aircar, which is VERY unhelpful, so now I am slowly and carefully setting down a quintet of large CHUNKS of aircar onto the pavement.
Danar persuades Akoom to work with us for the time being.
Madalitso tells So'Zen that Madalitso is contracted to steal the Mandalorian (by which I think he means
Hicks of course) and the boy
Pek Rondoon from the
Blue Spider. And then he leaves.
Green gas billows out of Coldwater. Cops in environmental gear help carry their less-protected comrades out of the building.
There's a Wookiee out of nowhere attacking Cap'n Kolene. So'Zen is attacking the Wookiee back to support Aerena. There's a sniper-Sparaval on the roof, now fighting an IG88 on what Akoom tells us is the "Overwatch" team. There's a bonus person hidden in the 3rd floor under the roof sniper, possibly firing saber darts. Part of Overwatch? Or another Sparaval? I dunno, but I know they intend us ill. Akoom tossed his first aid kit toward Danar a little too hard, knocking him out, and is now correcting that miscalculation. Aerena fights some Twi'lek woman who may be the angry Medusa they told me about earlier, it's blaster fire at range zero and a lot of petulance on the stranger's side.
But that means all my allies are busy.
And I still don't have a blaster.
Okay, fine. I have cobblestones, and I can throw 'em at the window. Startle the hidden person into moving away for a moment. Make sure they know that I know where they are.
(Hey, Akoom knows Ben Kenobi!) Akoom has Danar back up on his feet, has gotten stabilization treatment going on shot-Sparaval. I ask him to do something toward getting "whoever is on the 3rd floor" into answering our questions.
Cannonballs of ionization energy come boiling out of that godawful thing Akoom fires, outlining whoever that is in blue light.
Wowsers.
Okay.
Danar heads up there to find out what's what. Danar has taken a level of stims meant for Akoom, who's three meters tall and easily 225 or more in kilograms. I'm astonished that Danar did not drop dead immediately. We need to talk to Akoom about how people who mass a quarter what he does, do not need that kind of health risk!
Four police officers in armor and rebreathers come running toward us. I point toward the roof of the nearest building, where the IG-88 continues to fight sniper-Sparaval. Three of the officers run that way. The fourth waits near me, analyzing the scene.
So'Zen continues to patiently wear that Wookiee down. He tries yet again to talk the guy into a cessation of hostilities, but whatever that response was, it was rude. The next exchange ends in a loud pop and a bellow as the stubborn jerk's arm pops out of the socket.
Aha! A chance to get the jerk to LISTEN to what So'Zen is telling him!
While So'Zen still has him pinned, I advise him to "hold still" and then I put my hand in place to control his pain. I keep it managed while So'Zen puts the shoulder back in socket. We back off, and wait to see if Jerk is going to go right back to smackety.
No, apparently we are done for today's round. Good. When he comes back for another round, So'Zen can maybe fix his other shoulder for him or something, but right now we have so much to do.
Such as: both of us turn to stare at the woman trying to fight Aerena.
Vanya: Hey, Medusa!
{Relentless and Inip'velo both glance back}: Yeah?
Vanya {gesturing toward the senior Ole Town Sector SWAT officer standing here}: The fuzz?!— Inip'velo decides to quit fighting for now, instead maybe run off so as to avoid arrest
The cops take custody of the Sparavals. They will get them medical care while being in all sorts of custody. Madalitso has another court date coming his way for the gas attack left behind at Coldwater. We take Akoon and Danar back to Grakor's estate with us so Dr. Stom can get all the chemicals out of Danar, at which point we can ask him about what may be on a camera in his possession, and then clear that bounty problem up.
I have accumulated a short stack of index cards with notes on who might have wanted to blow the probably-late Gilberto's hotel room up. Since he now has a copy of the recorded images from Gilberto's camera, Akoom is going to look into who might've used those particular explosives. We think, though, that it might have to do with one of the two kidnappings recorded by this camera -- one is of a broker who is the lynchpin in the organization of Carli the smuggling Hutt, probably being kidnapped by agents of Tigu the Hutt from Zortu Kajidic.
The other kidnapping recorded is of
Genog the Zabrak, official Champion at the Gamesman's Arena on the
Kotera. One of the kidnappers was ...
Piotr Sparaval
and where the broker kidnapping traveled up from camera view level, the captured Champion got transported sharply downward.
Welp.
We are going to
(My bad.)
Yes, I am going after him.
Of course I am going after him.
- Genog needs rescuing.
- Hello: I'm a Jedi.
- Piotr Sparaval. Which means Almon D'Joy.
and in conclusion:
- Jedi.
Akoon is blaming this on Ben Kenobi's lineage. He wants to know if So'Zen is also one of Ben's "kids". Heh.
Guess I need to go wake up my partner, and Hicks, and collect Pek, and see if Andan is awake enough inside that bacta tank to hear the sitrep all at once.
Lord Grakor wants to walk me toward the quarters and have a private conversation with me. Okay. This is probably about the whole arena thing. Now is a good time, since after I have updated internally, I plan to go to the Kotera and explain what I know to the resident gladiators. They ought to be informed about the champion being kidnapped off a Corellia Sector street by Sparaval. And that I'm going after him. And that it'll probably be at the Faultline level or even below it.
(My luck? It'll be below it. Guess I'll be bringing Light to folks who have spent a few generations in darkness.)