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Forward Operating Flophouse (October 2021)

TELSTAR

The hotel was cheap, but not the kind of cheap that is disgusting. It has just seen better days and better clientele, but it fulfills Telstar’s need to track down Laurus. Namely, it has power, a holo screen, and a washroom.

He sends a text to Crane “Got a place. I’ll send to details. meet me here. Tell the front desk Mr. Travis Cann is expecting you.” He provides an address bordering the seedier side of town.

He drops his heavy bag next to the bed. Laying flat on his stomach he roots around until he pulls out a small microphone with a cheap screen attached. “…Combat, Rachnae, Laurus, Pelagan….” He hits a button and thinks. “…Fighter, fighting…” His brain is still fuzzy, the two hours of sleep weren’t enough.

He turns on the radio provided by the hotel, then the holoscreen to a local channel that is likely to have local advertising. He places the device nearby, and lets it run. It is designed to alarm him if any of those words come up.

He passes out.

CRANE

Crane arrived and shoved her way into the room rudely. She looked more haggard than usual.

"Any leads pard?" She spared any pleasantries. Trash Can however, bounced in and all but mauled Telstar with gooey, slimy affection.

TELSTAR

Telstar was fast asleep. WAS. They both made sure that was no longer the case as they rushed into the room. Luckily, the five combined hours of sleep he collected are enough to keep him rolling for another 48 hours.

“Phuh?!” Luckily he recognizes TC’s smell and slobber to not be TOO alarmed when waking. He scritches at the Gakki, giving it a playful bear-hug and wrestle. “Missed you, y’hot mess.” He says to Laurus’ pet. God, she must miss him.

“Crane—No, not yet, but only a matter of time. Checking for anything on the media about a fighting ring that might have her. You’d he surprised the less-than-legal activities they’re hawking on the tube.”
He pulls himself up, shaking his head and trying to pull his mind together. “What’cha thinking? Show me your plans I’ll show you mine.”

CRANE

"Well. Easy thing to do would be to just hit fight venues and look around. Probably start with the seedier ones. Theres only so many fight clubs..."

But enough to drag out the search for a long time.

"There's gotta be a reason they took her, right? A hook of some sort."

TELSTAR

Telstar sits up on the end of the bed, still absently scratching TC. “I dig it, but we want to be as incog as possible. We don’t want the guy holding her to get wise as to what we look like. We snoop too many similar places, word might get around, take away our edge.”

He shrugs, shaking his head at the ‘WHY’ of it all. “I know she can get wild, and she probably had to take some teeth in the hoosegow, but I dunno…Maybe her species is more ready to rumble than we read.”

He remembers the suggestion Tsaria gave him as he was running out the door, looking at his comms and humming absently “I uhh…A friend has some underworld connections. I can ask her to check in on that? She is a good egg, won’t spill.”

CRANE

"If ye can vouch for her, I'll trust her. We need all hands on deck for this. I feel like we ain't dealing with a little piece of shit operation here."

She sank into a chair. "We might need some fire power."

TELSTAR

Telstar sends a quick message to Tsaria, “Hey Boss. Can you hit up some friends in low places? If they need a favour for info let them know I’ll be ready and willing once the job is done. We are looking for a Pelagan girl in a fighting arena. We know it is run by a fella, possibly human, she would have just shown up there in the last couple days. Thanks Boss.”

He turns back to Crane, hands crossed tightly as he keeps thinking of all the angles. “Firepower if we fuck up. On the other hand, If we can strategy our way out of this, maybe none of us’ll get shot at. Once we know the location we can get clever.” She is right—it doesn’t sound like a small time operation.

He stands up, patting TC, and puts a hand on Crane’s shoulder. “You doing ok? Don’t push it like I am. We ain’t no good dead tired when things get violent.”

CRANE

She pulled her hat from her head and revealed how sunken her eyes were into her tired face.

"No. I ain't doin' ok pard." She sighed.

"I... made a promise to m'self a long time ago. That I wouldn't never leave any of my own youngin's fates to chance. That they wouldn't be flung cross the damn universe to fight or die like I had."

She cradled her head in her hands. "I did good for a while. Did right by my spiderlings. Las wasn't my kid perse but..."

She glared up at him at last. "But she is my damn kid. All the same, she is. And I failed her. I let her act like a lunatic in public. I let her go out alone. It's my fault pard. All of it's my God damn fault."

TELSTAR

Telstar and Crane are not chummy on a physical level, but…he tries. He holds one of her hands, gripping tightly.

“Right ‘n wrong, Crane. We all know she is your kid, and my…Niece, or family, or whatever you wanna call it. But it ain’t your fault.” He walks back to his seat on the bed, too young to feel this old, but nobody said the life of a rockstar/bounty hunter would he restful—especially with a growing media empire to run, and a growing hellraiser to wrangle.

“Kid came to us with a laundry list of problems to solve, on top of being the age where they want to get out and take on the world. Some’s gotta give, and it so happens it gave out this way.” He shrugs, not expecting THIS outcome. “So we’ll solve it. If it means running, we run. If it means a horror show, I’ll blow holes in as many people as it takes.”

CRANE

"Yeah... maybe if we get her back I can start thinking about forgiving myself somewhere down the line. Not now though. Can't. If I don't get her out of there..."

She stopped talking abruptly. The implication would be clear. Could a spider die of a broken heart?

Maybe if she could take that scumbag with her.

TELSTAR

“Start forgivin’ now, Crane. Guilt is a distraction, and might make you do somethin’ stupid. Clear heads and heavy trigger fingers, but only at the right time.”

They are working like a married couple, with Telstar being strong when Crane feels the pressure, and Crane keeping it together when Telstar starts to weaken.

“We’ll get her out. She can hang on until we find her, which won’t take long, and then we just gotta’ play it cool.” He stands up, pacing, tracing the air with his finger as if he is working on a white board. “If this place is big enough, I got a plan…”

Telstar searches, finding something to write on. “If the kid is hard to get to, we need someone on the inside. I ain’t no boxer, but…Any venue’d be lucky to be graced with my presence.” Sure, Telstar’s music career is still revving up, but he has talent and drive and most big acts don’t want to play a place where they’re likely to get shot on stage or held for ransom.

CRANE

She smirked. "What. You think yer gonna play act as a prize fighter? Pard, do ye think they'll let you keep them fancy rocket boots in the ring? If ye get tossed in there by a bloke who collects prize fighters..."

She shook her head. "You'd be too pretty anyway. Can't have ye mar them good looks with a fat lip. Las was wearing a rachnae synth skin when she got nabbed. Maybe they'd go for a rachnae again."

TELSTAR

Telstar laughs out loud for the first time in awhile. “I agree with you! I ain’t letting them wreck up this mug. No no, Crane…live music. Best part about being on stage, you can see the whole damn place—not to mention getting a good look at the backstage. If I ratchet up the charm and play pretty and dumb, they won’t see me comin’.”

He winks, starting to become ‘Stage Telstar’—flashy confidence and easy-going dramatics. “Now, even if you can knock some slobber—did the fella’ hear you talk to Laurus? Scale of 1/10, how long ‘till he matches up your mosey with the voice on the telephone line?” Basically, Crane can kill, but can she act? Better find out now.

“You gotta’ seem like you’ve never seen Laurus before in your life, even if she is getting beat on.” That’d be a challenge for Telstar, and he ain’t even her mother.

CRANE

"Ye raise a fine point. Not sure if I could curtail my motherly instincts. But if yer gonna be on stage a singin', where do ye want me? Casin' the joint?"

TELSTAR

Telstar snaps his fingers, finally feeling that they are getting somewhere now that they are together and planning. “We give ourselves options. Being in the audience is too obvious—that is where they are watching for trouble. Once I am in, I can find an opening, get you somewhere they won’t look…Then, just need a distraction—“ He jabs both fingers to himself. “—and Laurus exits the scene without lighting up the tilt sign.”

TELSTAR

He gets a comms message, raising an eyebrow at how fast Tsaria worked. “Shit. She wasn’t foolin’.” He gets terse as things come together. “My friend came through, says she’ll have an invite before the next fight. Not freewheeling on the details, but the deal is we wait till they get here.” Which, based on the comment about not hurting a friend to help a friend, is concerning—though he doesn’t tell Crane that yet.

“I think you were right. This guy is big time.” Not that Telstar is afraid of giants, but they make things complicated.

TSARIA

Make no mistake, in a galaxy full of illicit and illegal shit, there were things Tsaria was cool with...and things she wasn't. Judax's line of work? Running space coke and maybe some off-the-Companion-books rubbing and tugging going on off-stage at The Hive? She wasn't one to judge. But some psycho geriatric kidnapping alien children and making them reenact the movie Fight Club for him and all his rich friends? Yeah, fuck that.

Hopping the first charter she could catch to Nikrusis, it would take about as long as it had for Start to arrive at the flophouse as it had to scrounge up the deets from her well-connected Don of a BFF.

She knew better than to just go knocking on a hideout door, so she dropped Telstar a quick text.

Let me in.

CRANE

"He's big time? God I hate bein' right all the time. That means he probably weren't kidding with the threats. Lux I can handle. Trained security might get more interesting."

TELSTAR

“Ain’t as trained as us, baby. We ain’t some angry drunks that need to be bum rushed.” He has hope now, things are starting to look up. Sleep and confidence seem to have brought him back to fighting shape.

Telstar gets himself comfortable. Kicking his feet up on the bed and making the most of a cigar and his guitar to kill time and keep his mind OFF the task at hand while they wait.
___
“She’s here.” He announces, checking the peep hole and then swinging the door open. “Boss!” Telstar gives her a hug, like they are having a party inside. “Put your coat up on the bed, don’t touch the mini bar.”

He swings an arm toward Crane “Y’met? This is the rootin’ tootin’ baddest mother in the Western galaxy—and coincidentally also the girls mother. Long story.” He is doing introductions—Telstar has his groove back.

He presents Tsaria dramatically “She is sharp and a devil in a fight, and I trust her. Plus, about as talented as I am in similar circles.” He doesn’t provide much actual detail about either of them, including their names. They can work that out if they so choose.

TSARIA

Tsaria isn’t the cagey type, per-say, but it’s easy to take her all-business-in-the-face-of-adversity as standoffishness when you don’t know the Fayenal otherwise.

The space elf looks past her compatriot at the Rachnae and nods, stoic and looking to be mulling her thoughts already. But when she finally speaks, she speaks as as a mother, not a militant. “Crane? I’m Tsaria: Star. Telstar told me what happened, I can imagine you’re both worried sick. I didn’t want to delay, even if we will inevitably have some time to kill before the event itself, I figured it was better to be prepared sooner rather than later: give you both back some control in all of this. So…what’s the plan and how can I help?”

CRANE

"Wish I could say it were a pleasure, Star. But there's a lot going on that needs doing. I believe Mr. Blue has more of a grasp of specifics about this here plan than I do."

She glanced at him. "Thank ye right kindly for comin'. The sooner we do this the sooner we can blow this joint and put some distance between the kid and "Dr. Andrei"... at least if I can't split his damn head."

TELSTAR

Telstar folds his arms, happy to command a room whenever given the opportunity. He has his mojo back thanks to some rest, a target, and the outline of a plan. “Only if I don’t take his goddamned head first. Here’s the skinny, boys and girls…”

Finding paper and something to write with, he places it against the closest wall to make notes. Telstar is accustomed to writing plans vertically “Nothing set in stone, but to give us a leg up…Step 1 was to get someone smart and handsome with musical talent on the inside as a new act—probably me. From there I can get the layout, look for any security holes, unexpected entrances and exits, and also provide distraction and cover when the goin’ gets tough. After all, fella’ like me needs a big smoke machine rig—dig?”

He clears his throat. “Step 2: Get Crane inside incognito-like. Place like that is big enough that we can use her to get a drop on whomever we need to with a bit of time. I can surely excuse equipment large enough to wrap a Rachnae in.”

He points to Tsaria with growing flair: “That leaves asset number 3. What you think Star? I am guessing you and your friend in low places will have faces in the crowd, which will be a fine failsafe in case Step 1 goes sour—that can get us inside. Any ideas…?” He inquires to both of them, aware that his ideas have more than one failure point.

TSARIA

Tsaria nods along with the plan as Telstar lays out the broad strokes. If she has concerns, they don’t punctuate each bullet point, but are saved for the end.

“I’ve always known you to be a helluva showman, Tel, but…this is a fighting ring. You sure folks are gonna go for a guitar solo when what they really want to see is someone ripping your arm off and beating you with it? I mean…you not only gotta sell this Andrei fella on an opening act before the blood ba—“ The words had barely left Star’s mouth and already she regretted them. She grimaced. “…I’m sorry.” She didn’t qualify her apology with the disclaimer that she was only being a realist or anything like that. These were fellow parents she was talking to: this plan was going to work because it had to work, simple as that.

“Sell it as foreplay. Tell the guy that if the crowd doesn’t love it…he can feed you to the Rancor. Whatever you gotta do to get your foot in the door, okay? I’ll be there.”

Star placed a reassuring hand on Telstar’s shoulder before looking over at Crane.

“Check this out,” she gestured to the Rachnae’s prosthetic limb and then to her own two cybernetic legs. Kneeling down, in one fluid motion at both her thigh on one leg and her ankle on the other, a compartment popped out of the mechanical muscle to reveal a firearm tucked away instead of traditionally holstered. The key, it seemed, was embedded in the wrist of her prosthetic arm, which made for quick-drawing action.

“They’re black boxed into the anatomical structure of the prosthetic: it means that even if they run my ass through a plasma-detector they’re not gonna know I’m packing. I’ll be there in the audience to back you up, at the ready if things go South. My friend is already aware of my intentions.”

CRANE

Crane seemed visibly impressed at her ability to smuggle weapons in her prosthesis. Inwardly she'd wished she had sprung for something similar.

"I'm glad to have yer assistance, pard. Makes the whole thing feel a bit more legitimate. That just leaves where ye want me in this."

She tapped a finger to her chin. "I'm a bit of a sneaky sort. Could probably climb in over the crowd via the rafters. I'm good at little tricks like that and the spotlights and high ceiling should hide me pretty good. I'll use that vantage point to pick our girl out of the crowd. Might even be able to sneak her out the same way, if I can drop a rope line to her."

It was a bit of a long shot, banking on the fact that security usually was focused on the crowd on the floor, not on the bug on the ceiling.

TELSTAR

Telstar is glad for the feedback, from both of them, his brain sparking ideas and scenarios and contingencies all the while. If Tsaria’s more lurid description of the ring phases him, it isn’t readable on his face. “S’alright Boss, I know what you mean. If this Andrei fella’ is going to risk taking in a high-value bounty as a fighter, he ain’t doing it just to throw her to the wolves in her first match.” This logic keeps him from flying off the handle, at least. Otherwise he would be kicking the door in and going down in a blaze of glory just to show them.

He points at Star and winks, “…But I’m on the same page. I can sell this. Play a little Rumble while the crowd gets drunk and itching for action, some apropos fighter entrance music, big kickoff when the winner emerges—all textbook. I’ll get it, I won’t take no for an answer.” So far his mad ambition has carried him this far.

He whistles at Tsaria’s lethal gams. “Gettin’ me some of those when I get shot up—mark my words.” He looks toward Crane and angles his head at Tsaria, in a ‘I TOLD you leg-lasers would be cool’ sort of way. “Roger roger, Star. We could use you down there, but stay frosty—Don’t blow your cover unless it is a necessity. We gotta’ play this spread out…Crane is probably best to work on extracting our girl, as you said, you can sneak around better’n I can.” He jabs a thumb at himself “Unless I catch a break backstage and can get her out early, in the limelight I will have eyes on everything and can cause distractions or rain fire where needed…” He rubs at his chin. “…I will need some pyro. Accidents happen.”

Telstar keeps sketching a plan with near-manic energy, trying to get every idea out so he can sift through the best ones later. “Easy peasy, we got this in the bag, man.”

TSARIA

Even with their plan toeing the line between Mission Impossible and Ocean's Eleven, Tsaria regarded the odd couple that were Laurus's adopted parents with the utmost of confidence. There was just one thing left to be absolutely certain about: "Before I go; You got a picture of your girl?" Star asked. Now...there was a significance to this, and one that was probably more apparent to Telstar than it was to Crane. Because the Fayenal never went into any conflict without doing her research, which meant she had definitely seen Las's posting on the bounty board.

But Star knew the depiction of the young Pelagan there wasn't an accurate one. What she wanted to see was their Laurus: the girl that would make two unlikely partners risk their own lives to save hers. It was important to know who you were fighting for.

CRANE

"Just... just one." She fumbled with her comm. "I weren't supposed to be taking any pictures. Its a matter of security, you know. If I get picked up and someone goes through my shit they'd find it and who knows what could happen."

She handed over the comm. It was a single photo, blurry with movement, of what could be Las, wrestling with Trash Can. The laughter on her face would be obvious even with the poor quality of the photo.

"So damn cute together I couldn't resist. Kept this one because ye can't really tell its her that easy. But still cute. Still cute."

TELSTAR

Telstar shakes his head, but gives Crane a ‘I knew you couldn’t resist’ look when she reveals the picture. “Like Crane said, once we get the fuzz off her, I figured there’d be time to fill up baby albums. But…” Telstar crosses his arms, leaning against the wall.

He sounds downright heartbroken—not necessarily because of the current situation, but for Laurus’ brutally unfair existence. “…She is whip smart, but in the creative kinda’ why where you don’t know where she’ll land. Loves animals—not just big dumb ones like me, but also whatever the hell TC is. She is a survivor, but she won’t hurt people who didn’t deserve it just to do it. Laurus makes me laugh, real crack-ups, for real.”

He taps his fingers against the wall, clearing his throat, trying to stuff down his genuine reaction to losing her. “Mostly, though, she is kind, and that is something you protect. What kind of hero would I be if I didn’t do that?” He exhales, for a long time, rubbing the back of his head and looking at the ground. “I mean, she wants to hang out with a couple of murderous kooks like us, what is kinder than that?” He laughs, but his heart isn’t really in it.

TSARIA

Tsaria stepped close enough to wrap the only remaining, organic limb she had to her name around Telstar, giving him a hug while simultaneously reaching out and officially making friends with the the eight-legged webslinger: yes, Crane would get a squeeze too, her hand reassuringly upon the Rachnae’s shoulder.

“We’ll get her back,” was all Tsaria said, but she didn’t make promises of the sort lightly, rest assured.

“I’ll be a face in the crowd keeping an eye out for yours, okay? Rest up as best you can and be ready.”

And with that, she took her leave.

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