Kara Zaa Fenn was in the back of Rache Robotics with a droid's head detached on her desk and plugged into both a TDS-4000 and her datapad. There was something odd about the droid that she just couldn't figure out. She had used it in the past when the KnowOnes slicer collective still operated from the lower levels of Coruscant, but the droid had been roaming the galaxy for a few years after the raid on the Quick-draw Cantina and Kara was stumped trying to figure out why she couldn't wipe his entire programming.
After reacquiring it, she had send it after a bounty and as she and the other KnowOnes slicers had done in the past it would be rebooted afterwards and its memory of the events completely erased. It was a precaution for when law enforcement -or worse, the competition- ever managed to get their hands on the droid. Unfortunately the erasing software had failed a couple of times already and..
<... Unable to Erase sub-directive 1.1 ...>
<... Unable to Erase sub-directive 1.2 ...>
<... Unable to Erase sub-directive 1.3 ...>
The output was the same every time. "Droid, give me sub-directive 1.1" Kara sighed, looking into the white lights that were meant to be its eyes and to humanize the droid. It wouldn't talk back to her while detached to its body and plugged into the computer, but the voice command worked similar to a written one.
<... Error: Sub-directive 1.1 not found ...>
"Aaaah!" Kara cried as she pulled her own hair out of stumped frustration. "It must be there," a defeated sigh later the boss of the Zaa Fenn Crime Family leaned back in her chair. "I'll just override the entire programming," Kara decided, not entirely convinced but also not knowing what else to do. She couldn't go back to running around the galaxy doing these bounties herself, not in her condition anyway. She needed the droid and would just have to trust that whatever sub-directives 1.1 to 1.3 were, if they truly existed and weren't a bug in the erasing software, to not interfere with the directives she gave it directly.
Understandably what she failed to scan for was the ancient dataplague that had infested the droid. It hadn't been common for centuries and Kara -or anyone in the KnowOnes- even knew of the existence of this particular dataplague. Instance XIII.
<... 10%: Downloading Version 27.3 ...>
Kara shoved her chair backwards and rose to her feet accompanied with big silent yawn. It was almost 2:00 am on Smuggler's Moon and the weequays that were usually fixing up old robotics at the shop had been long gone home to their families or takeout dinners and cheap entertainment. She was online now. A half-finished box of delivery noodles on her desk and an empty can of that healthy synth-juice laying sideways on the coffee table. It wasn't easy managing the Zaa Fenn Crime Family, but she knew that if she kept the Chapakh-payments to the Supreme Mogul coming, then they'd be safe here under the protection of the Hutt Cartel.
<... 30%: Downloading Version 27.3 ...>
Times had changed. Three years ago she was the 'Queen of the Quick-draw', enjoying the riches of the majestic bustle of Coruscant while working with the best tech and the most advanced slicer collective in the Core. They had everything until Gareth Zaa Fenn decided to commit genocide on the Mon Cal and one of Preef Callo's own Legends, Aska Ryun, had helped Shane Covax to raid the Quick-draw Cantina on Coruscant.
<... 70%: Downloading Version 27.3 ...>
Now she a glorified software jockey, writing and uploading directives into all kinds of droids. Protocol droids, trashmasters, maintenance droids, bartenders and this one with its advanced holographic disguise matrix was the only one that gave her trouble. She didn't like Nar Shaddaa -never had- and her dreams had always been more about beaches and mansions. An estate on New Alderaan or Chandrila or something. Anything that wasn't a small cramped up apartment on the Smuggler's Moon that she only went to for a couple hours of sleep and a shower between her long days here.. at a robotics shop.
<... Download of Version 27.3 Complete ...>
<... Installing Version 27.3 ...>
The Zaa Fenn wasn't what it used to be, but she'd get them there again. Kara was certain that with enough credits and a good reputation in the hunter's scene, she could get the Zaa Fenn back into a top-floor penthouse on a nicer world somewhere outside Hutt Space. Get away from under the cartel to be their own boss again. For that, her stomach made a noise as she looked at the half-eaten box of noodles, she needed that droid.