Ask We’re All Someone’s Monster

[Song Wren]

Song Wren bumped through the crowded street toward her destination, keeping her pistol close and her gilded knife closer. It was another night in Taris’ urban sprawl, and the air hung thick with the smell of spice and bilge water. Refinery smoke smeared the night sky in a briny haze, and pollution bled from every hole and burrow, tinting the city gray.

She wasn’t bothered by the bleak sights and the reek of human waste that slowly wormed its way into her nostrils. No, her eyes were on the building ahead. The reason for her travels.

The Knife’s Edge wasn’t much, just another Syndicate-owned establishment in the city’s cramped streets, crowned with a golden dome that glimmered in the dark. It was a casino, a bar and an arena all rolled into one messy pile of steel and duracrete. No windows, of course. What went on behind its walls was not something for the common crowd, nor for the Rangers that lurked about.

It was one of the many reasons Song decided not to bring Kanan along. Not that he couldn’t already handle himself, but this was dangerous territory to walk. Besides, it was about time she made new friends. She honestly felt guilty about dragging him across the galaxy on life-threatening missions he gained very little from. Let him rest.

Nearing the building’s front entrance, she brushed past the bouncer as if she owned the place. He made no attempt to stop her, either because he didn’t care, or he was too afraid to say something. Maybe both.

Immediately, Song was met with sparkling chandeliers, a swarm of drunk patrons, and the sound of laughter and drinks clinking together. None of them stared as she passed, and to her surprise. Mandalorians may be a dying species, but they weren’t so much a curiosity among places like these. It made sense. Only in a den of lions did a Mandalorian dwell.

She pushed through the gambling hall until she heard shouting and the roar of applause. Attracted to the noise, Song eventually found herself by the fighting cages, a series of arenas where men and monsters could compete for credits.

It didn’t take very long to find the woman she came for.

@Mockingjay

 

[Valeska Kryze]

Valeska Kryze had three reasons to fight, and all of them had to do with credits. Starship fuel didn’t run cheap, the upkeep on her armor was costly, and her gambling debts were more expensive still. Lately, every last credit she made from a job had gone into paying one of these bills. She was more than a little sick of it. There was nothing left in her coffers, not even for a drop of wine after a long day’s work. So, she had to look for alternative means of income. And there was no quicker way to earn pocket change than by giving a man a concussion in the Tarisian fighting pits.

Her opponent was a squid. A Quarren, as they were officially known. He was nimble for one of his kind, and Val had to admit that he had lasted longer than she had expected. But he wasn’t going to win this fight. No, he wasn’t even going to come close. He swung at her clumsily, fist whooshing past her head and into the netted cage separating the both of them from the roaring audience. Val took this opportunity to take a fistful of his tentacles into her left hand.

This had to violate some club rule. Human fighters couldn’t knee each other in the groins, and this had to be the squid equivalent, right? But when no one intervened to stop her, she grinned maliciously at her beaked opponent.

You issued this challenge, her smile said. Now, I’m going to make you eat it.

Any protest he might have made was muted when her gauntleted fist plugged his beak. She hit him so hard, she was afraid his tentacles might tear loose in her hand. So, she released him, letting him reel backwards, as if he’d been struck with a mallet. Blood gushed from his open wound, and the crowd roared their approval.

It was going to be a good night. @Feng Mian

 

[Song Wren]

Song had been staying on Taris for the last several weeks, searching for a certain Mandalorian by the name of Valeska Kryze. A jewel in a pile of shit, if you would. And by the looks of the fighting cage, it was an accurate description for what she was seeing.

The woman was thrashing her opponent, drawing blood the way one might brew wine. It was both a glorious and pitiful sight, at least for the Quarren she faced. He’d never stood a chance.

As Song drew closer to the cages, a bookie pushed through the crowd, carrying an overturned hat and shouting, “Bets! Make your bets here!” She waved him over and, fishing out a handful of credits, dumped it into his hands. “Forty credits on the Mandalorian,” she said curtly.

The boy nodded, clearly unsurprised by the choice. It was becoming increasingly obvious that Valeska would emerge from this fight victorious. Still, many long term patrons were banking on the hope that the Quarren would make some miraculous comeback, and Song didn’t hold it against them. He was almost twice the woman’s height and build. Were she any ordinary street brawler, he’d already have squashed her into paste.

But she was more than a curbside thug. This was a Mandalorian.

She observed the careful way Valeska moved, and the not so careful way she punched. It was vicious and unrelenting, a far cry from what Song was raised on and used to. She ought to be troubled by the brute force the woman was employing, but this was precisely what she was looking for: someone who could smash through a wall with their bare hands. Someone who could take a fist to the gut.

Still, would she last? Song would just have to wait around and find out.

@Mockingjay

 

[Valeska Kryze]

Val tied her hair back in a bun while she waited for the Quarren to rise. Her rancorous fans demanded she kick him while he was down, but the suggestion offended her pride. He was more kickable on his feet. When he finally did get back up, she put one booted heel on his chest and tipped him right back onto the floor on his ass.

The absurdity of what was happening struck her then. She was only a little over five feet tall, the shortest Mandalorian she had ever seen; and she was willing to bet the same was true of the crowd. The Quarren, on the other hand, was twice her height, if not more, and twice now she’d put him on his ass. His reputation would never recover from this.

“You’ll regret this, little lady,” he managed, rising again. “I know the Hutt gangs that run Taris. I’ve worked for them for years. After this, you’ll have a price on your head so big, there won’t be a crevice on this planet you can crawl into to hide from it.”

Val smiled, a big toothy grin. She loved it when they threatened her. “Nah, see, after this? Not only am I going to take your credits, but I’m going to send you back to your bosses so fucked up there won’t be a Hutt from here to Tatooine willing to risk their rep to hire you.”

That riled him. He bellowed, something she didn’t even know squids could do, and charged at her wildly. His approach was so haphazard, that she was able to sidestep him easily. When he whirled to try again, she kicked him hard in the knee, and he buckled so that he was finally down at her level. Val took his big oily face in one hand and slammed him hard into the cage, once, twice, three times. He dropped like a brick after that.

The crowd went wild. Game, set, match. @Feng Mian

 

[Song Wren]

Song watched the fight unfold with eager anticipation.

Men and women mobbed the cage fencing, stamping their feet and shouting into cupped hands as the action raged on. The floor of the arena was red, damp with blood, both from the fighting then and now. There was no telling how many competitors may have died in these brawls, but it was clear Valeska would not be one of them. It was only several moments later that she had the Quarren flat on his back, bruised and broken. Maybe possibly dead.

Color me impressed, thought Song. She was in for a treat.

Her contact back in Clan Wren wasn’t wrong about this Kryze. They had informed her that the bounty hunter was down on her luck and desperate for credits, throwing herself into Tarisian fighting cages for some chump change. She made the perfect candidate for what Song had in store. With what she was planning, they both would be in for quite the haul.

Now that the fight was over, the crowd dispersed with jittery exhilaration, and it wasn’t long before the bookie returned with her winnings. It wasn’t much. Only a few credits, but she was perfectly content. That meant a free round of drinks, a fine way to get the Kryze to sit down and talk. It was how most Mandalorians met these days: nearly kill a man, then share a drink.

The young bookie caught her staring and glanced between her armor and Valeska’s own navy blue beskar’gam. He cocked an eyebrow. “You know her or something?”

Song smirked. “I’m about to.”

@Mockingjay

 

[Valeska Kryze]

“Alright, Zira,” Val said, stepping out of the ring and wiping away a few flecks of blood that had gotten onto her skin. “He’s down. Give me back my shit.”

The Hutt watching from the shadowy corner at the back of the fight hall nodded to one of her Gammoreans, who marched forward with Val’s helmet and weapons. It felt good to have her blasters again, her jetpack. Without them, even with the rest of her armor on, she felt as nude as the day she was born.

The Quarren, Geels, wasn’t far behind her. He limped to the mouth of the cage, then leaned against it, catching his breath. She didn’t have time to wait for the whole dramatic production he no doubt intended to put on; so, helmet tucked beneath one arm, she waltzed back over to him and held out her remaining hand expectantly.

“Pay up, Geels,” she said. “And, for your sake, I hope you’ve got the right amount. Or I’ll be leaving here with a new necklace of squid tentacles to accent my armor.”

“Save your threats,” he wheezed. “I’ve got your payment. Just give me a moment.”

She watched the clock after he disappeared. It was against Zira’s rules to kill in her club without permission, but if Geels tried to skip out on her, she might have to risk the Hutt’s ire. The Quarren needed to know, if he already didn’t, that Mandalorians weren’t to be crossed. Fortunately for him, Geels returned five minutes later with a case that he reluctantly handed over to her. She took the case aside and flipped it open on a nearby table, examining its contents.

“You’re short,” she snarled. “Over a thousand credits short. I beat you fair and square.” She drew a pistol, pointed it at his oily head. “Where’s the rest?”

“Rules, Kryze,” Zira warned from her throne in the back of the chamber. “No blasters.”

Val didn’t tear her gaze away from Geels when she replied. “Rules say winner gets the loser’s wager. He’s short.” She cocked the weapon. “‘Bout to be a lot shorter.”

“Take it outside, then. No blasters in my club.”

Geels began to whimper. Val made out phrases like “Give me time. I can get the rest.” “Don’t kill me, Mando.” And though she wanted to kill him, a new thought bloomed in her mind, as if it had been seeded there by a poisonous vine. She put the safety back on her weapon and flipped it around.

“I’m not gonna kill you, Geels,” Val said. “You're a thousand credits short. Which means you owe me a debt.” She whipped him once across the head with the butt of her pistol. “I’ll come to collect it soon enough.”

Satisfied with her handiwork, Val took the case of credits, and slinked off to the corner of the room to count her money and rest. @Feng Mian

 

[Song Wren]

Song watched Valeska with faraway interest, taking in the pair of blasters at her hip and the jetpack she swung onto her back. Armored to the teeth. That was a good sign. As long as the Kryze knew how to use them, then she was perfectly equipped for the mission Song had planned out.

Her temper, on the other hand, sure was something. As was her greedy obsession for credits, but Song understood why. Surrounded by thugs and criminals, where your life revolved solely around scrounging for credits, you tended to become a shadow, a behemoth. In this galaxy, it was the only way to survive. Song had thought the same, once upon a time, before she met Kanan.

Now, she had abandoned her past as a bounty hunter and returned to her Mandalorian roots. What might happen to Valeska if she would do the same? If she was given a chance to leave this behind, for all Song knew, she could become the next Bo-Katan. She certainly had the backbone for it.

Song would find out soon enough what she thought.

Once the Kryze was finished exhausting her threats to the Quarren, she slithered to her own little corner of the fighting hall. Song followed suit. She didn’t bother trying to be slick or clandestine. In her armor, she could be spotted from a mile away, even in crowds like these.

She pushed through toward the Mandalorian until she was right in her sights, a stone’s throw away, counting the credits in her case. “Valeska Kryze,” she said, her own voice clear through the new helmet her father had gifted her only days ago, the yellow insignia of their clan painted above the visor. “Congratulations on the win. Hate to cut into your time, but the name’s Song. Clan Wren, if you couldn’t already tell. I’m here to offer you a job.”

Song removed her helmet, allowing her braided hair to fall over one shoulder. She let a smile touch her lips. “But how about a drink first?”

@Mockingjay

 

[Valeska Kryze]

Val spotted her before the offer was even in the air. It was hard to miss a fellow Mandalorian this far away from the Mandalore sector, though she couldn’t say she was surprised to see another of her kind on Taris. The cityworld, a crude facsimile of Coruscant, was a hive for bounty hunters going to and from jobs; and the sad truth was that many Mandalorians were bounty hunters now, even if not all of them were.

“I never turn down a drink,” Val replied, gesturing to the seat in the booth across from her.

She closed the case of credits and slid them down into the seat next to her. She trusted the Mandalorian woman wouldn’t try to steal her prize, Mandalorian honor and all that, but the one time she let her guard down she would regret it. Her father’s words, back to haunt her even now, after she’d tried so hard to forget them.

So, she made herself focus on something else, like the colored accents on the woman’s armor. Yellow, a familiar enough color, even where she was from. And then, as if to confirm it, the woman said her name.

Song of Clan Wren.

A pretty name for a pretty face. But around these parts, pretty was a mask worn to disarm the foolish. Besides, Song had the air to her of a taken woman. Val wasn’t ever sure where that instinct of hers came from, but she could always tell whenever love was fermenting somewhere nearby. It was perceptible, like a rancid odor warning her to stay away. This particular product was not for sale. Sometimes Val heeded that warning. With others, she gleefully ignored it. She’d not yet decided how she would handle this one, deducing only that they’d been brought together by the same force: curiosity in another Mandalorian.

Though, in Song’s case, Val suspected she’d come looking for a Mandalorian purposely, which was why she didn’t answer her question directly at first. She wanted to know why Song had picked her from the litter. She didn’t think that was too much to ask.

“You came all the way out here to this shithole looking for another Mandalorian?” Val asked, the corner of her mouth tugged up in a conversational smirk. “Surely there are plenty back home for this job of yours.” @Feng Mian

 

[Song Wren]

They were off to a good start. Valeska didn’t seem crude enough to turn her away, but then again, it had probably been out of a need for a proper drink. There was no telling how the Mandalorian might react at the details of the job and the risks they might entail. Relax, thought Song. Baby steps. She’d managed to reel the Kryze in, now it was just a matter of keeping her hooked.

Song slumped into the booth Val had gestured to, placing her helmet onto the table. She waved down a Togrutan attendant and slid a quarter of her winnings toward the edge of the table. “Spotchka for me,” she said, thumbing over to Valeska. “And whatever it is she wants.”

The attendant fished the credits together and left in a hurry. A request from a Mandalorian was not to be taken lightly, and neither was their privacy. Now that they were alone, Song could finally cut to the chase.

“There are more Mandalorians back home. Just none quite like you. They told me you were the best. After seeing you fight, I can see they weren’t lying.” That was the truth. Her father had recommended the Kryze in the first place, and that alone was praiseworthy, because he’d never been a fan of outside clans. Besides, although Song had seen the tail end of Val’s brawl, it was enough to know she was perfect for the job.

“They also told me you were looking for credits. Not that I came here for charity work. The job I’m offering isn’t going to be easy. It’s why I came searching for someone who wouldn’t flinch at the risk of death if it meant a big score.” She leaned over the table, perhaps for dramatic effect, and whispered, “And believe me, it’s big.”

@Mockingjay

 

[Valeska Kryze]

Val ordered an ale with a dismissive wave at the Togruta. “Don’t mind the brand,” she added. “Just make sure it’s strong.”

Now that she had been sitting a moment, the ache from the fight was beginning to set into her joints. It was a good ache, the kind that would leave her body feeling strong in the morning, but one she’d rather not be distracted by while haggling with Song. Ale would cure that. A good ale soothed the muscles and cleared the mind.

After hearing Song’s tale, and perking up at the notes of big rewards and credits in her tune, Val was finally ready to take a more direct approach. “Sounds like you’ve come to the right pub and found the right girl,” she said with a flash of teeth. “I was getting more than a little tired of Zira’s attitude, and this place smells like a sarlacc's asshole.”

The Togruta returned a moment later with their drinks and Val sipped deeply from her ale. The burn it brought to her throat, down to her belly brought with it a wave of refreshment, like she’d been renewed after a hard day’s work. She tipped the bottle towards Song, a gesture of silent thanks for the free drink.

Though, it wasn’t going to be free in the end, was it? No, nothing was ever free on Taris—it was all just part of the pitch.

“So, what’s the job?” she asked. “All this talk of death’s got me jittery.”

She looked the woman up and down. Usually, she could guess at what her clients wanted by how they dressed, or the way they carried themselves. Tense folks who leaned over the table at her were typically on the run. Quiet folks, who liked to meet in back rooms, or under hood and cloak, were trying to hide something—or they wanted to sell her drugs. There was always that. But Song looked calm, even excited, sitting there in her armor. Then again, Val had never been hired by another Mandalorian before.

“Don’t get me wrong,” she added, gesturing around her. “It’s not like I like it here. Life kinda sucks, and all that, but if I’m gonna go dancing with Death, I’d at least like to know what tune I’m dancing to.” @Feng Mian

 

[Song Wren]

Valeska wasn’t wrong about the Knife’s Edge. There was a very distinct smell lingering the air, almost as musty as the sewage water outside, and from what she could tell of the patrons, none seemed to share an ounce of common sense or decency. Men gambled their life savings at the tables. Scantily clad women clung to their sides, crooning with laughter. This was not the place for a Mandalorian.

“That doesn’t surprise me,” Song replied. “Anywhere else would be better than here, no offense.” Just as she said it, the Togrutan slithered up to the booth, glasses of spotchka and ale on a silver tray. She plucked out her drink and took a whiff.

Gods, even their spotchka smelled sour, like funky.

Only once the attendant had left did Song continue, “The job’s simple, though. At least on paper.” She glanced warily around the room, making sure nobody was within earshot. Who could say of the loyalties of criminals? “I’m looking to reclaim something that belongs to my clan. An ancestral family sword. During the Great Purge, it was lost and stolen by the Empire. For a time, we believed it was melted down into beaker ingots, but I have reason to believe it’s still out there.”

“In fact, I know it’s still out there.” Song leaned over the table. “Tell me, have you ever heard of the Alternative?”

@Mockingjay

 

[Valeska Kryze]

Val’s face transformed at the mention of beskar. To say the metal was a sore subject for Mandalorians would be a grievous understatement, and those who survived the Empire’s purge were honor-bound to help their brethren retrieve the stolen beskar in whichever way they could. But then Song mentioned the Alternative, and an even deeper shadow crossed over Val’s face. Not many knew about them, and those few that did usually wanted to wash their hands of them shortly afterwards.

Val looked both ways and lowered her voice before she replied. “Oh yeah,” she said. “Heard lots about them. None of it good. Imp fanatics, right? Or some kind of cult — it’s hard to pick the truth out of rumors. Can’t say I’ve met any, though. I try to keep that kind of crazy at an arm’s length.” She glanced across the room where Geels was finally picking himself up off the ground after she pistol whipped him. “Mostly.”

“You say they’ve got something of Clan Wren’s and they haven’t melted it down into ingots?” That was surprising. The Imps weren’t exactly sentimental about Mandalorian paraphernalia, so what the hell did Clan Wren have that was so valuable? “Must be a really important chunk of metal for the Imps to keep it in one piece for so long.” Her brow shot up in a pronounced arch. “And I bet it’s well-guarded too. Where’re they hiding it, Scipio?”

She wanted to be wrong. Scipio was where the Munns used to put the shit they didn’t want anyone touching. Even Crimson Dawn, crazy bastards that they were back in the day, hadn’t tried a heist on their vaults. But, knowing her luck, the beskar might damn well be on Scipio—or somewhere much worse. @Feng Mian

 

[Song Wren]

“An accurate description,” she replied, taking a sip from her drink. “They’re an organization of Imperial wannabes. Like the Sith Eternal, but without the Sith.” Which was true, but she’d heard rumors that the Alternative had a few Dark Jedi in their ranks, fervent cultists that made your typical Marauder look like a freshly plucked daisy in comparison.

Not that it would change how Song would handle them. As Mandalorians, they’d been trained to take out the trash.

“Oh, and this sword’s no ordinary chunk of metal. It’s a family heirloom, forged and wielded by the very first Wren centuries ago. And as it so happens, Scipio is exactly where it’s hiding.” She pulled out a holograph disc and an image of the planet flashed between them. “Right now, it’s collecting dust in a place called the Ice Vault. Now the Alternative is using it to store the stuff it doesn’t want anyone else getting.”

Song swiped across the image to reveal a grand fortress practically hanging in the sky, surrounded by a purview of snow-capped mountains. “It’s built on unscalable cliffs, probably crawling with guards, and I’d bet my armor there are Dark Jedi patrolling its halls too. Not even the Syndicate’s best thieves could crack this egg open.”

With the double tap of her finger, she shut off the disc and leaned forward. “But we are Mandalorians. We’ve got the best shot of getting in and out of there alive.”

@Mockingjay

 

[Valeska Kryze]

“Not alone we aren’t.”

Val hated to be a killjoy, but she had watched enough holodramas out of boredom to know she wasn’t the fucking Chosen One. She’d also heard enough about Scipio to know that this wasn’t going to be an ordinary bank robbery. The Alternative was probably forcing the Muuns there to enhance their security, which meant that egg — to use Song’s vernacular — was nearly uncrackable. Nearly. The plan seeding in Val’s mind was still risky, but would increase the likelihood of them getting out alive.

“If this is gonna work,” she said, keeping her voice low, “we need to kidnap one of the Muuns. A merchling, young and pliable. The Muuns hate the Imps, it won’t be hard to convince one to side with us and give us a run down of the Vault’s defenses.” She paused, because there was something else, and she wasn’t sure how Song was going to feel about this particular suggestion. But, the hell with it. No point in being all saintly and modest now.

“There’s one more thing,” Val said. “I’ll help you get back your clan’s sword. That is the honorable thing to do. But in lieu of credits, I get to take any one thing from those vaults. Whatever I want that’s not yours. That’s my price.”

She already knew what she wanted. If the Alternative was keeping Clan Wren’s sword on Scipio, then that meant there were other beskar weapons in the Ice Vault. Val’s father might be able to ignore his bastard daughter now, but he couldn’t if she had a beskar weapon of her very own. No, he would have to acknowledge her then. @Feng Mian

 

[Song Wren]

Song blinked, taking in Valeska’s request for a long moment. On the surface, it might have looked like she was considering to refuse, but in reality, she was trying to hide her surprise and relief. Ghent had said the Kryze would demand a steep price for her services. She may be a Mandalorian, in service of honor and glory, but she was a mercenary above all else. Song could tell as much the second she walked by the fighting cages and saw the young woman beat the Quarren into a bloody pulp.

She’d come expecting to sink thousands of credits from Clan Wren into Valeska. Instead, she was being offered a chance to earn her support for free. At least, free in the sense that they managed to break into the Ice Vault and discover more than just the Sword of Wren. But that was a problem for later.

“Fine,” Song said, and rather noncommittally. Not because she wouldn’t deliver on the request, but only to make it sound as if Val was asking for a lot. “Take what you want. I’d feel better about letting you have anything in those vaults than the Alternative. I'd probably sooner let the place blow after we're through with it.”

There was the matter of the Muun, though. Song hadn’t given much thought to that before Valeska brought it up, and now it was a ringworm, itching just beneath the surface of her skin. “About the Muun. What’s your play? I’m always open to ideas.”

Which was true. But if Song was being honest, she hadn’t quite hashed out the rest of her plans. She might have had outside pictures of the Ice Vault, but she had nothing mapped out. No clear ways in or out. The Mandalorian part of her had hoped to simply smash a hole in the wall and leave through another, but if they wanted to do this and survive, the two of them would need more than armor and a pair of blasters.

@Mockingjay

 

[Valeska Kryze]

Val thought a moment, sipping deeply from her ale. “The Muuns send their most promising merchlings to Scipio to harden them up. Like some kind of sadistic coming of age ritual, it freezes out the weak. There’s a little village not far from the main banking complex. That’s our first stop.”

She made it sound so easy, as if the Ice Vault was their only challenge; but the merchling village wasn’t going to be a cake walk either. Security would be thinner, but not nonexistent. The Alternative would want to keep their insurance policy alive. But there was a loophole in all of this that would make getting a merchling in and out of the village easier on them, allowing them to devote their energy to the more arduous task.

“A thief I met on Nal Hutta once told me that the best way to steal from someone was to hit where the mark wasn’t looking,” Val said. “The Alternative will be protecting the Muuns who are buying their bullshit, making sure they stay nice and cozy. But the ones who don’t end up in an ice cell, suspended on one of the cliffs above the village and left to die. They don’t give a womp rat’s ass about any of them, so we’ll lift one of them from their cells. In and out — no one will see us, and best of all, no one will care.”

She could have patted herself on the shoulder for that one. It was by no means an ingenious plan; but, then, the best plans weren’t. If you over-thought a plan, you tended to make mistakes, and mistakes on Scipio were costly. At least this way, they would have their merch, their inside details about the Ice Vault, and — gods willing — they would soon have two shiny new sticks of beskar to show off on Mandalore. All in all, it sounded a hell of a lot better than spending one more day on Taris. @Feng Mian

 

[Song Wren]

It was a solid plan. Better than she would have guessed coming from a bounty hunter that had been rotting for god-knows-how-long in the lower pits of Taris. Again, Song had underestimated Valeska’s talent for getting shit done. She prayed she could say the same for when they actually broke into the vault complex. There was a very fine line between a fighting cage and, well, a cage made of thousands of tons of steel and duracrete.

Once Val had finished inking the outline of their plan—and before Song could agree on it—however, she spotted trouble out of the corner of her eye. The Quarren she’d pummeled earlier was back up, and he was heading straight for them, the faintest hints of a snarl beneath the beard of tentacles he wore on his lower face. Someone’s upset, she thought sourly.

“Another Mandalorian,” the Quarren growled, and Song noticed then that he wasn’t alone. He’d brought company: a spider-faced Aqualish and a balloon-headed Bith. Though where they had come from, she wasn’t sure. “Are you breeding now? Planning to make Taris your new nest?”

Forget the blasters. Song wanted to reach over the table and break the Quarren’s face over its side. It was clear that his earlier begging had been nothing more than a show, and now he’d come back to pay Valeska a visit. A big mistake, if she had anything say about it.

“You’ve got one shot at this, Squidface. You better make it a good one,” Song replied, dropping her tone an octave, so that she sounded like she did when she had pretended to be a man for Kanan and so many others before him. Even now, her feminine features exposed, that voice had power. And if that wasn’t enough to make the Quarren stand down, then her gauntleted fist would have it too.

@Mockingjay

 

[Valeska Kryze]

“No need,” Val said.

She had used the distraction to take one of her blasters out of its holster and aimed at Geels’ leg underneath their table. When she shot him, the blast lit up their dark corner of the bar, and Geels let out a shriek that was more birdlike than squid. As he dropped, Val shot his two companions as well, once each in the thigh. They went down screaming too.

“Girl!” Zira roared from her throne, clearly enraged at the sudden sounds of gunshots. “I told you to take it outside!”

Val smirked, pulling her helmet back on as she rose from their booth. “Sorry, Zira,” she said, reaching down and roughly seizing Geels by the back of his collar. “I’ll rectify that right now.” She glanced back over her shoulder at Song and shrugged at the whining, sniveliveling bundle of flesh that was Geels’ friends. “Care to grab the two of them? I think it’s time we all had a little chat.”

With that, she began to drag Geels away from the booth towards the entrance of Zira’s establishment—towards the streets of Taris, where the immunity of the club would finally be gone, and Geels would have to listen to her if he valued his slimy, squid life. @Feng Mian

 

[Song Wren]

Seemed Song had no need to use her blasters, either. The Kryze had the trifecta handled in the blink of an eye. Three flashes of her own weapon later, and the Quarren was on the floor clutching his shattered leg, as were his friends, keeled over on the floor. Smoke and the smell of charred flesh lingered in the air. Song flared her nostrils. “Could have just used your hands,” she suggested with a shrug.

Still, she had to admit, it was an impressive display. Valeska had them down in a split second, a testament to her sharpshooting skills, and Song wondered if she’d pulled out her blaster in the first place to prove it. The Mandalorian was not only talented in hand-to-hand combat and thieving, but she was one of the best gunslingers Song had seen in this sector. Who knew what other secrets Valeska was hiding from her?

After Zira’s uproar, Song slipped on her helmet as well. Doing as the Kryze asked, she grabbed both the Aqualish and the Bith by their legs—their uninjured legs—and dragged them out of the club. So much for a civilized conversation. Of course, she supposed it was not a meeting between Mandalorians without a few shots fired. A few victims, too.

“You know, I’ve been coming here for weeks looking for you,” said Song, winded after she’d taken the two groaning aliens outside. “Never once have I seen jaded fighters act like this. What the hell did you do to them?” She swept a hand to the sprawled out Quarren. “To him?”

To some, the answer might’ve seemed obvious. Valeska had won the fight. The Quarren didn’t. But there was so much more going on than petty revenge. Whatever bad blood this was, it ran deep.

@Mockingjay

 

[Valeska Kryze]

Val tossed the Quarren down onto the asphalt as, somewhere above them, an airspeeder whizzed by. “This sorry sack of squidshit is Geels. He hired me for a job a few rotations back, lied about the danger level, and then tried to flee without paying me when I came back to confront him. Guess he thought if he could beat me in the ring, no one would believe me if I came for his street rep. And when that didn’t work, well, you see what he resorted to.”

She turned to the Quarren, drawing one of her blasters from its holster. “That makes twice you’ve crossed me, Geels. And you were short on your payment earlier. I can’t abide that. If I do, it makes me look weak. If I look weak, I don’t get jobs, and if I don’t get jobs, I don’t get paid.” She pulled back on the hammer of her weapon. “Keeping you around just isn’t worth that.”

A split second before she executed him, Val hesitated. Song was watching her. Judging her. Not all Mandalorians were ruthless. Not all killed in cold blood, even when the offending party deserved it. Was Song one of them?

Clan Kryze was weak once, her cursed father’s voice rang out in her head. It chose pacifism over strength, it let its enemies run roughshod over it until its beloved Duchess was murdered by the Sith. We live in a different galaxy now, Valeska. The Mandalorians are a dying breed. If we want them to fear us the way they should, they have to take us seriously.

She squeezed the trigger, burning a hole through Geels’ head. From there, she holstered her weapon. There was no need to kill his companions. The wounds in their legs would be enough reminder. More importantly, they would take the news to any others who would cross her the way Geels had. Most of them would think twice before repeating his mistake.

“You can let them go,” she said to Song. “They’re no longer a threat to us, and we have business to get to.” @Feng Mian