Jewels took Mirie's bag and after inspecting it to make sure it was clean, she zipped it up and slung it over her shoulder. "Beauty. This should work well then."
Just then the Captain and Randa returned. Jewels could hear his voice from a mile away. Shit. I didn't want everyone here for it. God, I can't risk a bounty right in front of the damn Captain.
She smiled at Ellery. "Oh nothing, was just seeing if we couldn't get some meat at a discount price for the crew. Our choices are buying the donkey meat that kid up the street has, seeing what old stock that stuck up butcher has, or lifting some of the choicer cuts off of him instead. Course if we got some bounty money coming in, I wouldn't have to resort to such methods, but you know, I do what I can. Now what would you prefer, Ellery?"
Sorry, revision is killing me right now so I sort of forgot a little about posting. My bad.
Woefully short post written up during a five minute break for a cup of tea and a paracetamol. May add to it later.
"I wasn't judging" comforted Erin "We do what we must to keep our girl in the air, and the good outweighs the evil here I think" she said, walking alongside. She turned to the gun sideways so she was holding it by the barrel, the grip extending outwards "I'd hate to overburden you, and Streak won't be most appreciative if I forced you into letting the bird fall out of the sky because you were looking at his weapon."
Skipping over the possibility of turning her next sentence into an innuendo, Juniper simply answered, "Eh, fair enough. It is my job to keep the ship flying, and occasionally fix up weapons. So maybe I'll take a look at Streak's gun if it could use an upgrade... don't go getting any ideas about fitting a bomb on the trigger, though," she added with a chuckle.
As she walked alongside Erin, heading for the WaxWing itself, Juniper felt a hand somewhere it wasn't supposed to be; her back pocket. This was something she'd had to deal with plenty of times before: thieves and beggars who resorted to stealing from those they perceived to be wealthy. In a matter of seconds she had pulled out her pistol, spun around and aimed it at the diminutive figure, who had also drawn a small gun of his own in a slightly shaking hand. A quiet
Code:
beep
assured the engineer that the safety was off. "Give it back, right now," she ordered the thief.
"Or what? Bet'cha ain't even fired that thing, way you're aimin'," the guy shot back. Clearly he was used to getting his way when making a heist. His gun hand stopped shaking; the retort had given him confidence. The other hand held Juniper's wallet. She really had to get a chain for that to avoid future incidents like this one.
In response, Juniper shifted her aim down a little and fired. With an audible
Code:
zzip
, a beam of purple light shot from the Larett & Rolan LK87 Laser Pistol, lightly brushing against the thief's thigh before impacting harmlessly into the ground, kicking up a tiny dust cloud. The guy yelped in pain and his leg buckled for a few seconds before he stood up properly.
"Next time I'll hit something a little more delicate. So give that back, right now," Juniper threatened. Panicking, the guy threw her wallet at her and fled. A faint trail of smoke coming from his laser-burned trouser leg showed the pair where he was going. Satisfied, Juniper flicked the safety back on and holstered her pistol before returning her wallet to a front pocket. "So, where were we?" she said brightly, smiling a little at her implication of shooting the guy where no man wants to be shot.
@SamuelT: Isn't one of the things about RPing the idea that a character can't really make a comment on something that they don't even know about?
Just a thought of mine that bugs me a little whenever I look at your latest post. No need to make any edits on my part, though.
"Do as you like" Ellery sighed, "but I swear to God, if we end up getting a new ship mascot again I will fry and eat the little bastard myself. Remember that rock we landed on a few months back, with Sally the cow? 'Oh, we can't eat her! She's so pretty and nice!'"
Regardless of what he said, Ellery knew the two girls wouldn't listen to a word. He could only quietly hope that the two of them wouldn't end up bringing an entire herd this time around.
"Just make sure Randa doesn't have to clean up all the cow crap again."
It dawned on me at the start of last week that I was going to fail my exams, so I pretty much locked myself in my room and revised constantly. I'm back now though, so you can rejoice.
Leo waltzed along coming up right behind the captain. His recent purchases was now stowed unseen under his rather broad jacket. "Oh, but it did improve the ship's decor so very much." He joked, "Though I guess the smell wasn't quite so pleasant. So Ellery, is there any work to be done coming up?"
"I bet there's nothing good around here to take as a pet, anyway." Mirie gave a rather dramatic sigh as she turned to Ellery, placing her hands on her hips. "Unless you like rats, that is. Big, fat city rats with twitchy whiskers and patchy fur and armies of fleas. The little bastards are always smart enough to get at all your food and clothes and hide away to never be found, too. Definitely nothing that could ever hope to replace a cow as lovely as Sally."
When Leo showed up, Mirie gave him a nod in greeting and then turned back to Jewels. "Oh, if we're still going after that kid with the donkey meat, we'd best do it now. He'll get himself lost in the crowd if we don't hurry."
Jewels thought back to the now parted ship's pet. She was on board with the idea at first, but she quickly soured when she learned that she would have to feed and care for the cow. At least until Randa showed up and she took over. It was still a rough day when Sally had to go though.
Jewels waited until the Captain and Leo were out of earshot before turning to her would be partner in crime. "Oh Mirie, I'm not forcing anyone to be eating donkey meat. Nah, we're going to get us some good stuff, and you're going to be the star for this run." Jewels whispered her plan into Mirie's ear.
"Jewels, you sure about this? If you get caught, you could get into a lot of trouble, and I don't want to have to take another running start off a planet." Mirie's concern was understandable, but Jewels was sure she could pull this off.
"Don't worry Mirie, that jerk of a butcher won't even notice he's missing a few cutlets. Just say what I told you and we should be able to eat pretty well tonight." The two ladies made their way towards the larger stall of the butcher. Mirie went in first. She grazed over the offerings in the stalls before heading straight to the owner of the stall.
"Excuse me," she asked the the short, balding man. "I'm looking for some high quality cuts of meat for a little get together I'm having tonight. I was wondering if a man such as yourself might have something a little more...exquisite...than what you have displayed here."
The man was obviously a little flustered with the interest shown by the attractive brunette. "Uh...why yes of course. Come back here with me, let me show you the stuff I keep away from the riff-raff around here." He led Mirie towards the back room, just as Jewels entered the stall. Damn Mirie works fast, she's way too good at that. She was a little worried about her crew mate being led to the back like that, but Mirie was tough. She could handle herself.
With the owner out of the picture, it was Jewels' turn to peruse the wares of the stall. This man had loaded up on what appeared to be some tiny chickens with a few smaller cuts of red meat. And this guy was turning away donkey? He doesn't have much to be turning away anything. Confident that Mirie had him properly distracted, Jewels went to work stashing a couple of the chickens and a few of the strips of steak into the bag she had borrowed. Once she was satisfied with the haul, she rearranged the meat on display, covering up any of the holes her lifting had created. Her task done, she left the stall, waiting for Mirie to return so they could head back to the ship.
Sorry, I've been ritually murdered by revision, sacrificed to the elder gods by exams themselves, and then had a surprise "fun" trip to Wales over the weekend, so I haven't had much opportunity to post.
Post has been written up, and it sucks.
Also, curious coincidences are totally legit.
"Making bad decisions" Erin quipped "Never threaten all a man has to live for, they get tetchy. Remember how we got Sally the Cow in the first place?" she gave a small, quick laugh "Otherwise, we were finding me a smith so you keep your hands off Streak's weapon for as long as possible."
Erin craned her neck and saw there was a gunsmith's sign hanging from one of the few second floor windows around the market. "And I think we've found one, come on." she said, pacing away quickly, beckoning for Juniper to follow. They entered the shop via a small metal door, with spiralling fretwork inlaid in the panelling located ever so slightly down a side-road, but not so much that it wasn't still a part of the market. They mounted the dark, thin, dusty staircase in single file by necessity, emerging at the top in a dimly lit, crowded room. The chamber was not crowded with people, but instead displays of various weapons of war. Rifles, pistols of various calibres and models, batons, cattle prods, a few Lóng de Shétou charge-whips led up one wall, until Erin's eyes trained on an antique rifle hung above the counter at the front of the room, next to the small window, she knew very little of guns, but she could tell it was probably older than several of the settlements in the outer reaches and might well be worth more too. Behind the counter leaned an old, grubby, scruffy man with stubble covering his face and neck. As Erin approached, the smell of ionised particles from laser weapons that had been primed in the shop was replaced by that of iron and oil.
"Hello sir, I was hoping to get this piece tuned up a little." she said as she handed Streak's pistol over, holding it by the barrel, perpendicular to herself and putting her 'high class' accent up a notch, hoping the shopkeeper might smell money and offer an exorbitant price she could shoot down and then demand a lower-than-standard fee as a means of repaying her honour.
The keeper looked at the gun, and sucked his cigarette as it hung between his teeth. "Twenty-five" he said, his accent thick and his lungs struggling to work with the tar in his lungs that it seemed he had been building up for the past fifty years.
"And what will you do for my two thousand-five hundred?" she asked, acting cluelessly rich but feigning interest.
"Replace barrel interchange, increase cyclic repeater revolutions, install new coil-sights and give you a nice polish to finish up" the trader said, looking up and giving a gap-toothed smile. "Special rate for a powerful lady and her maid" he said, continuing the grin,
"That means nothing at all, idiot. You're going to give her a thorough cleaning, check the magazine has no irregularities, realign the sights, replace anything in less than tip-top condition and give her a nice polish to finish up for eight and fifty" Erin shot back, her tone remaining the same, merely her vocabulary changing. "Special rate for a knowledgeable lady and her colleague."
The trader looked at her for a long minute before backing down from the gaze "Nine, I can't go lower and still make profit"
I'd bet anything that this guy hasn't felt the touch of a woman in quite a while, Mirie thought to herself as she followed the butcher to the back room. She let herself relax and slipped her hands into her jacket's pockets as she eyed the slabs of meat in the room, completely aware that the man was watching her closely. While the meat in the back was indeed better than the meat displayed up front, it was only just.
"Any better?" the man asked, still keeping a close eye on her. Mirie glanced over and saw that he had his chest puffed out and he was trying his best to look taller. She couldn't help but grin at that, which had the effect of reddening the man's face.
"Definitely a lot of good cuts here," Mirie replied, turning the face the closest slab of meat to her. It was a thickly cut steak sitting in its own red juices. Mirie hoped Jewels was grabbing some good pieces up front; seeing all this fresh chicken and steak around her was making her hungry.
After a few more moments of examining everything held in the back, Mirie began to pat at her pockets. She drew her brows in and frowned, exclaiming, "Oh, dear! It appears I've left my money at home. If you'll excuse me, good sir, I'll have to leave and fetch it at once." She turned towards the butcher and gave an apologetic shrug. "Sorry to have wasted your time."
"You can always come back once you've found it. These will still be here," the man said as Mirie started heading out of the room. There was a slight whine to his voice, and she suspected it wasn't just because he wasn't going to be making some more money at the moment.
"Sounds good to me." Mirie gave him a wink and left the stall, leaving the butcher staring out after her with a still-red face. Mirie spotted Jewels and walked over, rubbing her hands together excitedly. "I hope you got the best, Jewels. And I hope we get to eat soon; I'm starved!"
"Well, there wasn't much to work with out there, but I think everyone should be pretty happy," Jewels commented, opening up the bag to show Mirie exactly what she had done with it. "Those two chickens are taking up a lot of the room but everything else is steak. We can go either way once we get back to the ship. I'm not sure how fresh the canned goods are, but at least the meat will be good and juicy."
She closed up the bag and looked around the marketplace. The Captain and Leo had gone off somewhere while the girls' mission was executed. "Here, let's get this stuff back to the ship and get it in the fridge."
Ellery trudged his way back to the ship, trying his hardest to ignore the possibly immoral and most definitely dangerous acts the rest of his crew were up to. He should have been well used to things like this happening by now. He was far too protective of his crewmates, even the ones like Juniper and Streak who had made it clear that they didn't need any kind of protection.
"Can't wait to get back on the ship and out of this cesspool." he mumbled to himself.
Streak was inside the ship, most likely asleep. Ellery took it upon himself to inspect his handy work, attempting to scrutinise his work in any way possible. Streak had never made a mistake, especially not with anything as routine and simple as re-fueling, but Ellery couldn't help but worry. It was his job.
"We're coming inside!" he warned Streak, "Everyone else should be here soon-like, make sure the bird is ready to go."
"Aye cap." Streak said as he hear the captain be all buisness-like. "There's a chap waiting to see you at the dock, usual docking and fueling fees I'd reckon"
He let the dock know that they were prepping for liftoff and heard several pops and hisses as cables and pipes were disattached. He put the fusion engines on low burn and stepped out of the seat, fully intent on letting Erin handle this liftoff. Last time, though unnoticed, he'd only just avoided a unsanctioned ship, throwing all sorts of stuff through the ship and killing lovely ol' Sally.
After begrudgingly paying the fuel attendant the stupidly high fuel price, Ellery returned to the ship. His entrance was seemingly ignored or unheard by Streak who seemed content fiddling about with the ship's controls.
"Alright, everyone back to the ship!" Ellery bellowed into the crew walkie-talkies, "We got a bounty to hunt."
He then slumped into a nearby chair, rubbing the palm of his hand across his throbbing forehead.
"I'll find you a weapon in a minute, Randa." he mumbled before lifting the walkie-talkie up to his mouth again, "Leo, I got a job for you once you get back to the ship."
I hope you're not all knee-deep in some E3 conference action. I swear, those conferences have killed more RPs than I've had consoles. In other news, I've erected (heh, I said erect) this spoiler to remind you all of the fancy bookmark function. Considering this RP moves pretty slowly it's probably a good idea to have it bookmarked instead of searching for in the RP section.
[sup]PS: Fisthie, I'm totally sorry for ignoring your character. I'm not sure why I didn't reply the first time, I probably just forgot to.[/sup]
Eh, just a rough weekend really. Had this queued up before.
It wasn't too hard to pick out the ship even though it had been a winding path through the marketplace that Jewels had taken. The WaxWing towered over the rustic stalls like a dump truck over a dinky toy, and eventually a trail was blazed that allowed the two women to return to the ship.
"All right Mirie, let's get out of here. This meat needs to hit the fridge and I don't need that idiot butcher catching on that he's going to be needing that kid's donkey meat to shore up his stock numbers," Jewels told her partner in crime.
Oh dear, I was kind of waiting for CA to do something so I could react. My creativity well has kind of run dry. I suppose we could finish up here and get back to the ship. That seems to make sense in the situation.
Not a second after Ellery had set his walkie-talkie down Leo came strolling through an open bulkhead and stopped to strike a small pose. "Why simply speak my name and I do appear." He gave a inch of a bow before walking over and taking a seat next to the captain.
Glancing around to see that Randa was at least out of ear shot he then lowered his voice and spoke quietly. "And did I hear you say something about giving the little Miss a gun?" Leo's voice was strangely serious, not like his normal perma-playful tone. "Are you sure that's a good idea?"
Ooc: No problem Sparrow. I too was sort of wondering where to go from here.
"I don't know." Ellery whispered back, "I suppose it kind of make sense, her owning a gun and all. It's not like hanging around bounty hunters is a regular thing for a girl her age."
He then edged a little closer in his seat toward Leo, taking extra care not be heard when he spoke.
"Thing is, I promised her a gun off the ship. I only just realised that the only spare guns we got are the ones we store in engine room. You know, the ones we took off dead folks. I don't suppose you could root through them for me and see if any are in working order? If it'd look shiny, that'd be a big plus. I kind of promised her a good one."
"Well makes sense or not she's still just a kid." Leo responded, it was definitely odd for him to be so blunt about something. "And you and I both know that a gun is a dangerous thing, and I don't just mean because it can put a hole in someone." With that Leo sat back and gave Ellery a heavy look.
However, it didn't seem like Ellery was going to change his mind about this. Leo gave an agitated sigh and dipped a hand into his pocket. When he brought it out again it was holding one of his own guns. The pistol was small, it barely extended out of his hand as he held it and it was mostly curved with sleek rounded edges; an elegant weapon that seemed almost to be a work of art belying it's deadly power.
"Here." Leo said offering the gun to Ellery, "If you think it's a good idea then this might be a good fit. Shiny too, just like you said." Leo's voice was low and defeated as he held the gun out.
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