In a galaxy far, far away... Who: Cassie. What: Cassie partakes in what she thinks is her first mission as a bounty hunter, but is unfortunately deceived. When: A year ago. Where: A random geographic location on Tatooine. Rating: PG for some swearing?
"Can I just say how much I hate sand?"
The humanoid in tattered leather walking in front of Cass snarled and turned about, sending a spray of the hated material in her direction.
"You've said it for the last hour, near every ten minutes," he snarled, his piggish nose making him even less attractive along with his tone. "If you say it again, I'm going to rip your tongue out. Iftist really needs to work on who he hires."
Cass waited long enough for him to turn back around before she simultaneously stuck her tongue out at him and flipped him the bird. She normally wasn't prone to whining so much, but fuck, it was hot on Tatooine. She couldn't for the life of her remember why she'd agreed to this assignment, other than the fact that Iftist had probably bought her one too many drinks, oh, and that pesky little thing about not having any money in this universe.
She and a group of five humanoids were trudging through the desert of Tatooine to collect...something. Cass was still fuzzy on the details, between the headache that was born of her hangover from the aforementioned drinks and the fact that the rest of the group seemed less than inclined on furnishing everyone present with much-needed information. Cass couldn't understand why they'd be put off by the fact that she'd slept in the cargo hold for the entire trip to the planet; she inwardly groaned again, slipped off the pocketed vest she was wearing and removed her hoodie for good measure. The hoodie went around her waist, the vest over her head as a makeshift hat. At least Vlad wasn't here to make fun of her for the way she was acting, and with that momentary thought, her heart plummeted through her stomach.
The humanoid leading the group was carrying a scouting device, leading the party over another mound of sand. Cassandra couldn't believe there was anything to be found in the middle of this desert, but she was getting paid to do this, so she really had no reason to complain. The fleeting thought that her fellow scavengers might leave her behind on the planet were she to open her mouth again did cross her mind, but the nailed baseball bat hanging from her belt and the blaster made her feel confident that she'd be able to take them on, if necessary. She did hope it wouldn't be necessary, because it would really suck to be wounded and stranded on this godforsaken sand pit.
They trudged on for what felt like another few hours; sand, sand, and more sand was as far as Cass's eyes could see. She was about to open her mouth and complain once more, all too willing to take her life into her own hands when the humanoid in front started shouting. He was pointing at something, in a language Cass couldn't begin to understand. Wouldn't it have been helpful to hire people who could all communicate with each other? She was about to bother her piggish friend when he suddenly disappeared in a spray of sand. Cass flung herself backward, doing her best to not go rolling down the hill she was suddenly trying to climb as it fought her efforts.
The humanoid in front of the pigman shrieked, and started pounding the sand where the pigman had disappeared with blaster shots. Cass thought that probably wasn't good idea when it came to the pigman's survival, but then again, the pigman was probably also very dead. She had little desire to become whatever the thing beneath the sand was's next snack, and drew out her blaster. Her bat wasn't going to be much help in this scenario.
Circling around the indented pit that was left by the pigman's absence, she got within touching distance of the humanoid firing wildly. She reached out with one hand and grabbed his blue wrist, startling him long enough that the blasts stopped.
"Look, I don't know if you can understand me, but stop fucking wasting your fire like that." The man nodded after a beat, and withdrew his blaster far enough that it pointed toward the yellow-orange sky. She nodded back at him and pulled back her hand, glancing at the other three party members. Glancing between the two, she opted for the one who wasn't leading the party.
"Any ideas on what we're dealing with here?"
The humanoid, possessing several more eyes than she, gulped.
"I think it's a sand worm," he replied, his eyes scanning the sands as though he could find the thing before it struck again. "It follows its prey through movement. I..."
"So Iftist didn't prep us at all for something like this? I mean, shit, how are we supposed to deal with this?"
The humanoid gaped, while the other one started yelling at both of them in its own language. Cass turned to yell at him to stop before realizing he was offering a belt that looked like it held tiny land mines. She almost took a step toward him before he too was being swallowed up by the sand; thankfully, the objects in his hands went flying before he disappeared.
"Get the bombs!"
The humanoid Cass had been talking to froze, uncertain of her command. Muttering under her breath, Cass holstered her blaster and moved quickly, diving for the bombs and moving away from the last area of attack. She hoped that the creature would have moved away, but thinking better of it, she loosed a thermal detonator from its moorings and threw it as far as she could while she ran in the other direction. She scooped up the scouting device, but didn't glance at it. Her eyes were fixed on the detector's blinking red light in the distance -- and a few moments later, a small explosion coupled with a high-pitched squeal put a grin on her face.
"OK, well, now we can handle that. I'm guessing there's more of those?"
The one humanoid she'd been talking to previously nodded slowly, slack jawed and clearly still uncomfortable with moving. Cass rolled her eyes and glanced down at the machine in her hands.
"Uh, can either of you read this?"
The letterings on the device were completely foreign to her. She was really going to have to brush up on her language skills the moment they got back to the ship; she had to keep thinking in whens, not ifs, because she'd be damned if she was going to let some sand worm eat her alive the moment she arrived in this alternate universe. Looking up, the humanoid who'd been firing wildly into the pigman's empty place moved toward her and took the machine, slightly reverent for the fact that she'd been able to kill the burrower.
"You. Read. This? Tell. Us. Where. Go?" Cass gestured as she spoke, feeling a little bit like an asshole as she tried to explain what she wanted him to do. He muttered something back that she could almost read like a 'fuck you, I know what I'm doing,' which she took as a reassuring sign. Ten minutes later, they were heading toward the spot they'd apparently been looking for. There had been more signs of burrowers, and they were down to half of the detonators that had been on the belt. Cass was trying to use them as sparingly as possible so they'd have enough to hightail it back to the ship. She had to admit, she liked the little "pop" the sand worms made every time it tried to eat one of the bombs. It was satisfying -- eat explosive, you freaky little bitches.
The humanoid stopped and pointed, saying something in the language that made Cass kind of want to drink. Maybe then she'd be a sight closer to understanding what was supposed to be going on around her. It pointed down again, looking at her, and then looking to the other man.
"What the fuck is he saying?"
The many-eyed humanoid continued to glance around, and Cass was hard pressed to not laugh at the irony of his situation. "We're supposed to dig."
"Are you shitting me?" They hadn't brought any tools, and this was not something she usually signed up for. Fetch quests were not her forte.
"It's not deep -- because there are so many burrowers, I think they thought it would be safe."
Cass inwardly groaned again, then took out her bat and used it to start swiping at the ground. It worked for the most part; the blue-skinned man went to his knees, despite earlier events. Apparently he was ready for this to be over with, but he was still focused on earning his paycheck. Less than a few minutes later they'd discovered a metal box, worn from sand and time. For the moment, Cass wasn't the slightest bit curious as to what the box contained; instead, she was just ready to hightail it back to the shitty little ship they'd flown to this rock on.
"OK, you, carry, and you, keep your eyes peeled," she said as she thrust the box into the blue man's hands. The many-eyed man either didn't get her joke or didn't care for the moment, keeping his blaster in his hand as they turned back around the way they'd come.
It was a quiet walk back toward the ship; Cass actually thought they were going to get off scot free when two lines of sand shot up in parallel paths in front of them.
"Are you fucking kidding me," she muttered, pulling out one detonator as she tried to decide which one to go for. They were less than maybe a mile from the ship; they could see it in the distance.
As she was about to make her decision, the many-eyed man's patience seemed to snap. With a guttural yell, he took off toward the ship, running for all he was worth.
"Fuck, wait, fuck!" Cass held out a hand as though to grab him, but the man was already leagues ahead. If he didn't get eaten by the sand worms, she was certain he would boot up the ship and leave without them. Glancing at the blue man, Cass nodded to follow the many-eyed humanoid and then threw the detonator to her right as far as her strength would allow. Once it was flying, she took off for all she was worth.
"I am so going to beat your ass the minute we're back on the ship," she muttered to herself as sand swallowed her boots. If it was rough just walking through the desert, it was nearly impossible to run, and she felt like she was moving in slow motion as she ran to keep up with the man who was single-mindedly set on escaping.
Forcing her feet to move, Cass found herself closing the distance between herself and her many-eyed compatriot, just as they likewise closed the distance between themselves and the ship. All Cass cared about at this juncture was at least being on the ship when the humanoid made it there, to give herself half a chance of getting off the planet. She had no idea where the blue man was, but sometimes, she had to leave others to fend for themselves.
The walkway descending from the main body of the ship was closing in fast, and Cass realized there was probably just one way to make sure the many-eyed man didn't take off without them. Hating the thought of it, she used her momentum to push off of the sand and sent herself flying -- a second later both she and the many-eyed man were hitting the walkway with more force than was reasonable for a smushy humanoid being. She swore she heard something crack, glad the many-eyed man was taking the fall for her this time around. He didn't seem to share her sentiment, crying aloud as she got off of him and he had the space to curl into a fetal position around his arm.
Cass landed on her ass, just in time to watch the blue-skinned man disappear beneath the sand. He didn't take the box with him; it skidded to a stop just beyond the walkway's end. She stretched out and grabbed at the handles on either side, pulling it with some effort onto the walkway, clearing off enough sand to see a mouth full of needle-like teeth that passed away as soon as the sand refilled its place.
"Fuck ever doing this again," she muttered to herself as she sat back for a moment and caught her breath. The many-eyed man was still on his side, crying. Rolling her eyes, she moved to help him up and onto the ship. Once there, the holo receiver in her pocket started to beep.
Grabbing it with no small amount of irritation and slapping it to turn the scren on, a small image appeared. It was Iftist.
"Thank fuck, this is the last time I ever let you buy me a drink."
The man smiled, looking all too much like the cat who ate the canary. "I'm glad to see that you're still alive."
Cass's eyes narrowed, her brain sliding the pieces into place. "You knew what you were sending us into? Fuck you, Iftist! There are only two of us left!"
The man on the screen merely shrugged. "Welcome to the galaxy, Ms. Hack. Now you know how we weed out the weak from the strong. I certainly hope the one you managed to keep alive knows how to pilot your ship."
Cassie swore again, sometimes at Iftist, sometimes at herself, and took a minute to collect herself. She looked back to the screen with a glare.
"I think he'll be able to manage with a broken arm," she replied. "What the fuck is in the box, if I might ask?"
"Nothing," he replied, almost cheerily. "This was a test run, Ms. Hack, and you passed with flying colors. I certainly hope you perform as well on your first mission; I'd hate for you to prove to not be the asset you appear."
With that, he ended the conversation, clicking off the connection before Cassie's next bout of swearing could reach his ears. She groaned aloud, gaze going from the ceiling to the wall and wanting to punch something. Thinking better of it, she looked back to the many-eyed man.
"I think your career in this business is over, but if you wanna get paid, we need to get out of here."
He nodded, still cradling his arm. Shaking her head, Cass went to close the walkway, making sure the kick the box back onto the sand.