His Backpack Got Jets
WHO: Boba Fett, Cathak Lera, Peleps Kaizoku Seki
WHEN: I think Monday. Early in the week.
WHERE: New York, Mundane Sector
WHAT: Lera's taking a walk; unknown to her, a Syndicate agent has been hired to make sure she never comes /back/ from said walk. Fortunately, someone managed to hear about the bounty on the Cathak's head becides Boba Fett...
WATCH FOR: Fett's vette, treachery and woe, last minute rescues, and a clever plan.
EDIT: Boba Fett needs a tag plz.
A week ago, notice of a job began floating through the underworld in the Hub. Jade Coil had finally had enough. His superior, in his mind, had humiliated him and robbed him of his stature. He wanted her dead - and he had the money for it. 600,000 jade was the price offered on the head of his commander. This had fallen into the hands of Boba Fett.
By all rights, this should be a simple job. Lera is a mere cadet - if it weren't for the sum, this would be above the likes of Boba Fett.
The cadet is currently walking through the streets of New York, looking up at the tall buildings. She whistles lowly as she sees one of the skyscrapers; such things were even beyond Creation in this number. Most buildings of this height were lone marvels. She shakes her head, before looking forward.
As she moves forward, she brushes past a man. "Hey, watch it!" he shouts. She shoots him a look - a steely one, at first, before she murmurs an apology and smiles awkwardly. She catches herself and behaves how she should, continuing to walk onward.
Six hundred thousand credits is a lot of money for bounty hunters out on the Rim - enough to make a lesser bounty hunter a rich man. Boba Fett himself has tackled bigger bounties, of course, and much bigger enemies, but even he can't resist the lure of a big bounty.
You'd think that a man in Mandalorian armour would stick out more in New York City, but Fett is an expert at keeping hidden. At the moment he's lurking in concealment, hidden high up on the side of a skyscraper - the back of one, facing into a little concrete plaza, the sort of plaza in which you might expect to find a few hundred Smiths going after a guy in a trenchcoat. He's kneeling poised on the outcropping of building structure, his sawn-off EE-3 in his hands, cocked and aimed down into the now-empty square. From his concealed position he's prepared to pick off his quarry.
He's recruited some local help.
Indeed, the man Lera bumped into was precisely that help, a lanky fellow with sandy hair. He walks along and turns down an alley, whistling a pleased tune to himself as he strolls casually towards the little out-of-the-way concrete square.
He idly flips through the wallet in his hand.
"What kind of name is Cathak Lera?" the plant murmurs as he looks over the ID inside.
Lera had bought that wallet as part of the IPA, in the Hub. It has her IPA identification card - which is how he can confirm her name. Her eyes widen, as she keeps walking forward. She hears what he says from the alley. The girl turns on a foot, smoothly moving and looking over her shoulder and into it. Her eyes narrow at the sandy-haired man.
"Excuse me!" she yelps after him. She starts walking briskly towards him. Not a run, yet; she doesn't want to startle the crowd she is leaving. The emptied square doesn't even strike her as immediately suspicious.
The guy in question isn't even really a fighter. As soon as he sees Lera after him he turns and blinks a surprised blink, starting and jumping a couple of feet. "Oh shit!" he shouts before dropping the wallet and breaking into a run for the other side of a square. There's a door in the wall, which he pushes through and slams locked behind him.
The wallet has been left lying open on the ground, out in plain view, there for Lera to retrieve.
Unfortunately for the poor redhead she's already fallen into the sights of the real mastermind here. With his hired help having done his job Boba Fett turns his blaster, looking down from his sniper post high-above like a perched vulture eyeing a piece of carrion. With care he lines up Lera in his sights, his targeting scanners picking out a spot on the side of her head. Bounty hunter though he is he is not so cruel as to make her suffer; the Mandalorian in him prefers the clean kill.
For a moment Fett waits, letting Lera move as she will. His gauntleted finger tenses, then squeezes the black trigger.
The only warning for the regular five senses is a squeal of igniting tibanna gas. A single bolt of red blaster fire shrieks down from the bit of building structure, aiming to swiftly blast poor Lera off this mortal coil. Alive is good - but Jade Coil wanted the girl dead.
It is only by a chance of fate that Cathak Lera's curse doesn't catch up with her then and there. The girl frowns and walks into the emptied square, leaning down to grab at her wallet. She does not hear the squeal from where she sits. However, at least one thing did. A pigeon on a few ledges away heard it.
It drops off the ledge and then flies over the square. Lera stands and looks up just before the plasma bolt fires - and it slams into her shoulder. It rips through the back of it, causing a nasty burn that covers the entirety of her shoulder and exposes a portion of bone. Her eyes go wide like saucers and she shrieks, in terror, collapsing in a heap.
It /burns/. Her hand swings to the wound and covers it, as she gasps.
This girl has good luck, Fett thinks, his eyes flitting briefly to the pigeon. Stupid bird.
He taps a control on one of his gauntlet. The nozzles of his jetpack flare to life, rumbling as the bounty hunter leaps clean off the side of the skyscraper; the jets, whirring, draw him into a controlled descent down towards the concrete surface of the empty square. The noise of them reverberates in so closed a space, creating a myriad of echoes, as though Lera and her assailant were caught in a tunnel formed by the high walls of the skyscrapers encircling the isolated square. Fett's picked his battleground well, it seems.
He doesn't fire again until he's sure she's seen him: shooting the wounded in the back is bad. With his off hand gripping the top of his blaster barrel he aims the hacked-off weapon towards Lera, though again, he holds his fire. The metal plating of his boots hits the concrete with a clunk, and the hiss of the jetpack cuts out as he strides towards the downed woman, blaster leveled.
Drawing to within twenty feet, he stops there, tilts his head just a little - and mercifully blasts another shot at her, aiming for the chest this time. Better to put her out of her misery.
Not many people know what it means to go to school at the Palace of the Tamed Storm. It's sort of like having the Artful Dodger as a guidance councilor; even though Peleps Kaizoku Seki had moved on career-wise to a less subtle form of treachery and theft...the military...well, you never /entirely/ get away from where you grew up, after all.
While there are myriad consequences of this, the pertinent one is that a short Daiklaive made of white jade, carefully shaped into an "X" shape that's useful for parrying and disarming enemies, crunches into the blacktop right in front of Cathak Lera. Said daiklaive is attached to a long chain made of black jade, which goes up some ways, to a fire escape. If someone thinks to look up, they will see Peleps Kaizoku Seki, sliding down on his Wavecleaver Daiklaive, Cabin Girl, like it were some kind of crazy skateboard! If not, they will certainly hear the pirate shout, "PISTACHIO!" like some sort of adventurous chipmunk, kick off of the chain weapon and twist through the air...
...kicking his legs up in order to pull the magic sword/occasional ride up in a gentle arc that /just/ happens to be where Boba Fett probably hoped something that his blaster fire /wasn't/ going to bounce off would be. Alas, Cabin Girl is there instead, and the blaster shot is deflected wildly to the left, creating, perhaps, the most hardcore pot hole in New York.
The Dragon-Blooded wastes no time, pulling his Cabin Girl by the handle into his right hand, twisting his body back around with what little air-time he has left, and grabbing hold of Crossbones in order to balance himself, giving him a heartbeat to kick his feet a little like he was the swan princess, shove back into the air, and land on his feet, tugging at the Chain Daiklaive mightily and bringing Skull, the skull-shaped blunt end of the Chain Daiklaive that's, shockingly, shaped like a skull, back down to earth with him.
"/BOZO FETT!/" The Dragon-Blood calls, grinning at the prospect of Glorious Battle. Then he blinks, looks at some writing on his palm, and slaps his face with the other one. "I mean, uh, Boba. Right. Boba Fett! Did you really think you'd be able to snipe /Mad Captain Seki's/ student without my finding out about it?! Helmet-wearing fool! Now you must throw down...like the old school!"
"What...what the--" Lera stumbles backward, grimacing and staring at the blaster's bore. Her green eyes widen as she sees it and the man in Mandalorian armor. She finally issues her question, right before he pulls the trigger: "Who--who sent you?!" Part of her already knows. When he pulls the trigger, though, she shrieks and closes her eyes.
The thought that goes through her mind, in that moment, is, 'I'm sorry, Mother. The curse finally took me, too.'
The end doesn't come. She hears the bolt plink off a daiklave and opens her eyes, finding Captain Seki standing between her and Fett. "Captain!"
Damn lightsaber-toting kidlets, thinks Fett as he jams a hand down against his arm control; with a boost of jetpack fire he hops backwards, putting some distance between himself and the arriving Seki. How so much hardcore could have escaped his detection, he isn't entirely sure. Apparently his hardcorometer is out of whack.
Like the futuristic Spartan that he is, of course, he's not about to back down. He shifts his rifle to his left hand and tilts his head in the other direction, offering a dry retort. "Been there, made the honour roll."
His task now is to get Seki the hell out of the way so he can take a crack at Lera; he's more interested in collecting his pay than he is in dueling to the death, even with someone who is unmistakably hardcore. He takes a step forward and raises his blaster, left hand cocked atop its barrel as he takes aim -
And doesn't fire. Instead, in a flash his feint becomes evident: he snaps his left wrist out and takes a jump to the right even as a high-tensile grappling line hisses from his gauntlet towards Seki. Rather than fight him, he's intent on tying him up long enough to get a killing shot at Lera.
The job first, after all.
"Dude!" Seki enthuses, looking for all the world like some sorta breakdance fighter from hell, "Yo'backpack got jets! That's awesome!" Seki half looks at Lera, winking jauntily. "And of course, Lera! I'd have to give back my 'dashing pirate' license if I didn't show up in the nick of time like this."
Woah, movement! Seki moves along with the guy, keeping Cabin Girl close to his chest...he saw that that future gun did to Lera, after all, and oh crap grappling hook! Smoke seems to rise up along Seki's Converse sneakers as he makes a quick hop in the air...
...and, through the magic of Seafaring Hero Style, seems to just /propel vertically/, in the jumpkicking position, towards the grappling line! His sneaker touches the hook, and Seki shoves himself up, balancing on top of said hook for a split second, until he hops off, sending the blunt end of Skull and Crossbones careening towards Boba Fett, aiming to try and wrap the chain around his neck, or shootin'arm, or...wherever, really, so he can try and force the guy into melee range!
Seki stumble-lands on the ground a heartbeat later, and his right sneaker is still attached to Fett's grapple line. "Aw man. Those were /brand new/!"
Lera doesn't need to be told twice - or once, for that matter. Her eyes suddenly flash with recognition of what she needs to do. She is no Exalt and Seki is. The girl turns and /bolts/, rushing over the empty plaza and hoping he has no snipers. As she gets near a building, she leaps - lunging behind a small rising on the sidewalk that contains some bushes. There, she huddles downward and holds her wounded shoulder with a hiss. It still hurts.
It's impossible to tell given his armour and all, but behind his helmet Fett is giving Seki a 'what the hell are you smoking' look. The man's attitude has put him off-balance, at least somewhat, but in true Boba Fett fashion he settles for killing him anyway.
He has no snipers. Fett prefers to fight alone.
He attempts to take a step to the side, but Seki's chain snags his right arm. The bounty hunter isn't really too miffed by it, though: he simply tosses his blaster to his other hand and taps his wrist control a bit awkwardly, giving Seki all that he could ever ask for. The jets on his back blaze, the bounty hunter shooting forward far faster than any reel could've anticipated - but at the last moment he twists himself to one side, attempting to use his speed and Seki's own chain to drag him off his feet and to the ground! Sometimes, it's nice to have a backpack with jets.
In mid-movement he snaps his blaster across his body and fires a shot towards Lera. It's not the best-aimed shot he's ever fired, but he would really like to do his job.
"Oh you have to be kidding m-eeeeeeee!" Seki yelps as Boba Fett shows why it is a bad idea to lasso Boba Fett. Seki falls over his long, gangly legs, tripping on the ground and dragging along after the Fettster. He sees what the hunter's planning, and shouts, "No!", perhaps showing a bit more concern than he would like as he viciously flicks his wrist in the direction of Boba's shot.
Normally, this would be pretty damn ineffectual, as Seki was not flicking his wrists to throw his sword, or do much more than move his sleeves around. But, Seki? His sleeves...
...they're full of /knives/. No less than three throwing knives fly out, one aimed at Boba Fett's hand, the other two aimed in an attempted intercept course with the blaster bolt!
Seki's shout is Lera's warning. Her eyes widen and she leaps; the blast bolt slams down just behind her, ripping into the small garden emplacement. The stones explode in a flash as the bolt of energy connects, but she isn't with it. "Damn it!" she shouts, as she runs forward to a storefront. Her shoulder aches with the movement, but she persists.
The mortal rears back and kicks the door in. It snaps the feeble lock and throws it inward. The girl goes running in with a howl, shooting into one of the uptown clothing stores.
Seki's moment of playing Dio proves effective: though Fett jerks his arm to one side despite the chain binding it, the thrown knife glances off the edge of his gauntlet and bounces upwards, slicing through the mesh sleeve protecting his upper arm. The armour is ripped open by the deflected blade, leaving an ugly cut beneath it. Fett grimaces behind the helmet but gives no other outward sign that the blade hurt him. Mandalorians don't quit over a little knifescratch.
It's becoming clear, nevertheless, that he's going to have to do something about Seki if he's going to take out Lera. Damn accomplices.
Though the chain of the Skull and Crossbones is still wrapped around his arm he doesn't really care, because he's got another use for it. Again he throws on the jets and jumps backward. This time, however, he cocks a knee up - and the armor plating there flips outward, revealing a nest of needle rockets hidden there. In a flash they shoot out from behind the pad towards Seki - even as Fett himself jets way back from them, aiming to drag Seki by the chain straight into the rockets!
Yeah, he's getting pissed.
Ha! HAAA! Seki grins like a maniac(Suprise!), having foiled Boba Fett's attacks long enough for Lera to get to some cover. Now, he just has to...beat a bounty hunter so stone cold that one of his connections in the underworld felt the urge to come to his home and tell him, 'Seki, Lera's going to die.' and uh-
"Your freaking knees have rockets?!" Seki shouts in sheer shock, getting dragged forward and taking a direct hit to the chest! Skull and Crossbones unhitches itself from Boba Fett as the explosions cover Seki's body for a second, sending the Dragon-Blooded slamming back down into the pavement.
...miraculously, his jogging suit is not ruined. "Space Monster leather is the /best/ leather." Seki observes, hopping back up to his feet. He's bruised, blackened, and his hair's a little on fire, but the Captain seems still very much in the fight! The Kaizoku doubles forward at Boba Fett, again emitting a thin trail of smoke from his feet...
...as he dispenses with the tricky crap, and aims a quick overhead slash at the bounty hunter's chest! "So, who /did/ hire you?"
Well, his backpack's got jets, so the rockets in the knees seem only a logical extension of Fett's awesomeness. The armoured bounty hunter whips his wrist free as the Skull and Crossbones finally pulls away from it, leaving his right hand free to make use of some of his nastier weapons. Not that he expects he'll need them given that he just /shot Seki full of rockets/ and all.
Or not. Apparently the Kaizoku's resilience is greater than he expected.
Fett spares a glance past Seki, trying to track where Lera's gotten to; not seeing her directly he scowls behind the T-visor, more than a little irritated. If there's one thing he hates it's having his bounties snatched from his grip, particularly by crazy space pirates.
The slash is met by a hard, humming blade - a vibro-shiv, a futuristic knife, gripped underhand in Boba's right gauntlet. The weapon's blade rings a little against Seki's, actually vibrating, enhancing its cutting power. "Obviously someone who wants the girl dead," he says shortly.
Flicking his arm to one side to deflect Seki's blade away, Fett moves in on him and whips the vibro-shiv in his fingers to hold it upright, thrusting the humming blade towards the pit of the man's stomach. "Not that you're gonna survive long enough to find out."
Lera stops in the store and peers from behind the counter, hearing this little exchange. It confirms one thing for her: someone hired a gun to kill her. By the looks of it, this is no ordinary hired gun. Seki recognized him, which means this man is dangerous. It causes Lera to frown, as she considers who the culprit could be. She can already identify one likely candidate. "That /fool/..."
Peleps Kaizoku Seki fights dead people for a living. An Endurance Charm or two is how you do not die at sea, sometimes. The Kaizoku scowls at the vibrating knife...he's seen this technology before, and it's nearly as dangerous as mild Artifact weaponry. Shit, he underestimated the offworlder. Seki's sword-arm is flung to the side, in order for him not to end up disarmed...
...but, Seki's other arm gets forward, holding on to Crossbones like it was a proper knife itself, blocking the inspired gut-shot at the last second! The Kaizoku struggles with Fett's knife for a moment or two, matching strength with strength. "I don't suppose...you'd be givin'me any names, now, eh? As a professional courtesy, maybe? I've got too much invested in that girl not to know who her enemies are..."
Seki takes a step forward in the melee, twisting his left hand violently to the side in an effort to knock the vibroblade out of Fett's hands, while twisting his right arm around and sending Cabin Girl in a nasty downward arc, aimed at stabbing into Fett's backpack-jets! "Besides, I can tell you if your client's good for it, or gonna try an'screw you. If you really do manage to kill me, I don't want you getting, like, backstabbed. It'd be an insult to my greatness!"
Having never encountered artifact weaponry before now Fett can't really judge, but his technology has always been good enough to get him by - as well as his strength. As a man who's gone hand-to-hand with a Trandoshan Fett is a strong son of a bitch, and he's able to hold his own as he presses the vibrating edge of the shiv back against the edge of the Skull and Crossbones. The helmet sits canted a bit, and it's obvious that the man behind it is glaring.
He's quick to react: as Seki steps forward Boba steps back, swinging one foot and bracing himself; his arm is whipped out to the side, but he tucks it back in and pivots with that motion, the blade of the Cabin Girl catching the scarred blast plating along his side and leaving yet another rent in its olive-green surface. Though the impact leaves what will no doubt amount to an ugly bruise on the body beneath it, he again doesn't let it show. He's a man and a Mandalorian, after all.
As he comes around the shiv is tossed to his off hand. "Sorry. Hunter-client confidentiality."
He brings his right wrist up - and with a startling flare of light a huge gust of flame blisters from a launcher tucked into his gauntlet, accosting Seki with a burning cloud of chemical incineration - yet another surprise of the Mandalorian Armour!
"...Professional courtesy."
Peleps Kaizoku Seki might be a little biased towards Magic-Origin crap. Can you blame him? He has, however, figured out that Boba's bracers are bad freaking news, and therefore lets his body move with the flow of his botched backpack-stab, pulling himself into a quick cartwheel-strafe around Boba Fett!
This means that the blast of fire licks Seki's legs, rather than his face. "Gaaah!" the Pirate cries out, as he feels his skin start to crinkle and burn. Forcing himself to keep moving, Seki continues his cartwheel, again flinging his weighted chain out in an attempted lasso of Fett's neck!
Magic weaponry is something Fett hasn't really encountered - well, other than the Jedi, but that was a long time ago. Seki's cartwheel catches the armoured killer flatfooted. He starts a bit and whips around a moment too late, managing at least to snap his shiv-arm up to try and block the heavy chain of the Skull; while he manages to keep from getting lassooed, the blunt force of the weapon smacks into his helmet and knocks him backwards a good distance. It's a testament to his grip that he doesn't drop his knife.
He is, however, fast realizing that, all honour aside, he's lost his quarry - and a smart bounty hunter doesn't linger when he could live to fight another day. With a flick of his wrist he swaps out the knife for a pair of stingerlike blaster pistols, tools inherited from the late Jango Fett. Jets roar, and the bounty hunter lifts into the air, firing a scattering of hot red blaster shots down towards Seki in an effort to cover his departure from the field.
He at least hopes the Captain can't fly.
"What th-damn!" Seki's rope attack's blocked /again/, veering too far off course. The Kaizoku swears, swinging Cabin Girl as quickly as he can in a desperate series of parries as he works to tug the chain out of the hunk of road it's embedded itself in. He hisses as a shot finds its way into his gut, his shoulder, and even cutting his face...man, that's probably gonna scar, too.
"This isn't over!" Seki spits, his mind already swimming with probabilities, counter-measures, and other ways to make the inevitable fight against Fett more...decisive. "Peleps Kaizoku Seki never leaves this sort'a business unfinished, you hear me Fett?! Get near the girl again, and you'll get a hell of a lot more than a street fight!"
And, as Fett is outta heah, Seki slumps to his knees for a second because it hurts to stand. "...ow..." the Kaizoku groans for a second, before sheathing his sword, shoving himself back upright, and limping towards the stairs. He hopes Lera found her way to a hospital...
Lera hasn't. Instead, she limps out of a store front; her shoulder is still aching something fierce, thanks to the burnt and blistered flesh. The IPA doctors will need to have a look at this. She hisses as she approaches the Captain; moving hurts a lot. "Captain Seki! Are you all right? Your timing was perfect..."
Nrrrrgh ow. "Fine! He only nicked me!" The girl is scared out of her mind, this is probably her first assassination attempts, so Seki refuses to whine. Even though his legs really kind of hurt. "I finally got a decent hit on him, and he flew off. Bounty Hunters're too 'smart' to finish a fight, y'know? I knew I could count on that to keep the thing short, in case I mistimed my jump or whatever..."
Seki stretches a little. His whole body feels like Ow, but on the other hand, he's had worse beat downs. "How about you, Lera? Your shoulder looks all kinds of messed up..." Seki trails off, not sure if the girl is up to being asked the obvious question yet.
"It's probably the most pain I have ever experienced, yes," Lera says with a meek smile on her face. She keeps her hand covering the wound, but the badly blistered flesh - mottled white and black in places, and a cooked red otherwise - is visible despite her efforts to hide it. She even has tears of pain in her eyes. "But... at least you're all right. And able to stand. I am sorry that you were hurt on my behalf, Captain..."
Peleps Kaizoku Seki just sort of looks at Lera for a second. Someone hires a top rate Syndicate thug to come down out of the sky and kill her, and she's worried about his getting hurt. Part of Seki wants to scream at the girl.
The rest of him realizes that actual sympathy and sincere concern for other living beings is a rare and precious thing in the Scarlet Dynasty, and forces a smile on his face. "I got hurt." Seki corrects with only slightly forced joviality, "Because I was too slow on my cartwheel and that Fett guy had flamethrower wrists. And rocket knees. Did you see that? Who arms their damned knees?!"
Seki is also a little worried, because he doesn't really have any medical Charms. "Come on. Let's get to the Gate-the IPA'll patch us up, and they give us lollypops instead of threatening to summon demons to eat us." There is something to be said for modern medicine. Seki pauses a little, waiting to see if Lera needs help moving...
...and figures that she has to confront the question eventually. "Any idea who'd want you dead, kid?"
Lera makes herself move under her own power. She wouldn't mind a shoulder to lean on; however, Seki is hurt and could use it herself. If hers wasn't a mass of burnt flesh that rendered her arm unmovable, she would even off it. As it is, stepping causes jolts of pain to shoot through her. She winces with each step, but manages to keep walking nonetheless. "I can move on my own," she finally says, with another slight hiss of pain. "Don't worry about that."
She shakes her head, then. "I saw the rocket knees. It was... unexpected. I can't fathom why--well, I can. No one would see it coming, and if you weren't an Exalt, you might be dead now..." She likely underestimates much of the IPA in this statement, but such is the fate of a Dynast. She shakes her head. Her expression grows serious as she walks along.
"I... have a few ideas," she admits. "My subordinate, Jade Coil... he has been acting strange for weeks. I didn't think, though, that he would ever..."
Peleps Kaizoku Seki stops.
"Three things." Seki says...harshly. Almost like an instructor from the House. "Because by the Seven Hells, Lera, you better learn something from this. First, if that were true, that guy wouldn't have been matching me cut for cut back there. Never, ever forget that nine times out of ten, an Anathemia is going to be stronger than you in a fair fight, Lera. The whole line about the Dragon-Blooded being the top of the food-chain is just that; a line. I'm alive because my outfit is cleverly disguised armor."
"Second," Seki lowers his shoulder down, offering Lera the support if she wants it. "Don't be too proud to accept help. Bonds are what separate us from those who would tear our civilization down, kid, and as important as pride is, you have to recognize that the strong Dragon-Blooded is one who knows how to help her friends, and be helped by them."
"Now," Seki continues, cheerful again, apparently saving three for later. "You have a good idea who did this, even if you didn't think he'd be this dumb about it. Good. What are you planning on doing about it?" Lera might somehow get the feeling that she's being tested on something.
Lera looks at Seki, looking ashamed; her shoulder is wounded, but her pride is hurt a fair amount as well. She sighs and accepts the aid, leaning against him. "I... yes, I understand. He... was impressive," she admits a little meekly. It's an understatement; he was a master warrior if she has ever seen one. She turns her eyes back to him.
She nods, then. "I'm sorry. I just don't want to be a burden on you." And, she thinks, she isn't a Dragon-Blooded - and may very well never be one. But he wants to try, and she couldn't forgive herself if she stopped trying. She wouldn't end up like her brother.
"I'm..." The girl trails off. "I'm still trying to decide. He /is/ a Dragon-Blooded. I can't challenge him myself. But he has to be made to pay. And besides..." She grits her teeth. "He is a bigger fool than he thinks. Crimson Dawn vowed to do worse than kill him if he crossed me. I don't know why he would promise that, but I believe the Deathknight is perfectly serious."
"It's fine. I had my illusions about the world ripped from me pretty harshly, Lera." Seki sounds strangely sober about this, licking his lips and looking somewhere...
Screams screams screams the candice of the dieing as the mad bull-god roars overhead hurry to the boats the boats are safe but no his witch freezes the waters and calls up things of air and ice and the elements themselves have turned against the Realm and those damned sunrise eyes looking at me looking through me judging me and finding the mortal more worth his time...
...or somewhen, perhaps. "I don't want the same thing to happen to you, so I've been...well, trying to ease you into the whole thing." Seki shrugs a little, careful not to jostle the girl. "As for Crimson Dawn, I have a few theories as to why. Chances are, he sees you as a useful tool for getting back at the Dynasty, wants to corrupt or corrode you, or just build you up to a certain point before bringing your life crashing down around you. If he creates a debt of gratitude and makes himself seem as a protective figure towards you, your honor would force you to continue to allow him to be a factor in your life outside of "some dude to cut". On the other hand, though, if you let Dawn kill the guy, the problem takes care of itself." Seki pauses. "At least until he makes Coil a ghost zombie ninja cultist to spring on you at some appropriately dramatic time. Then again, sometimes seeing a guy you hate get shived like that is worth the drama later on."
Seki smirks at this...and sobers up again. This has to be hell on the kid, after all. "Honestly, Lera, if I were you, I'd think long and hard about Jade Coil, and if he's still worth retaining as an asset, or if you need to find a way to expunge him from your life. I keep a traitor alive and a functional part of my crew because I know he exists, and I know how he will act. That means that the inevitable treason element is going to be coming from him, involve him, or become suspicious by the lack of his involvement-either way, his very existence serves my purposes. Furthermore, the little worm's useful sometimes. It's worth the occasional deflecting of a knife at my back. You gotta decide how that's gonna work for you."
"Brownie points for not going, 'Captain Seki, could /you/ punish mean ol'Jade Coil for me?' though." Seki winks again.
"This is true..." Lera frowns. It hurts to consider killing him like this. Jade Coil had been her subordinate; a person she was responsible for caring for, whose safety she was sworn to. But he had crossed a line and made himself a threat. And Seki put it best, just then: whether he is worth retaining as an asset. In the end, if he was a danger to her...
...then she couldn't afford it. Her fingers tense. "He is stronger than me. Physically, I mean," she says. "He is an asset to my squad, but in the end, he undermines my authority by knowing he could kill me with a well-placed backhand. Now, he may be far less reserved." She looks up at Seki and shakes her head. "I wish this hadn't happened--that it hadn't come to it..."
But he softened the blow for her. Seki had done that, to protect her and look out for her. She would be forever grateful. "But it has. I have to find a way to remove him. Unfortunately, short of killing him - beyond my ability unless I beg you or Mother to do it - I cannot prevent Crimson Dawn from getting to him. He will find him if he is alive. It's a matter of time."
Peleps Kaizoku Seki pauses for a moment, thinking. Jade Coil dieing benefits Crimson Dawn, somehow, which means that it is an unfortunate outcome, no matter how much the punk deserves it. "Even if we claim to have killed him, Dawn'll use it as an excuse to raise hell..."
Seki hrms. And hrms. And hrms.
"-oh. Oh no. That's...ha! Heh heh..." Seki shakes his head, forcing his habitual mania under control. It hurt to laugh, frankly. "Allright, personally, I'm all for us finding a way around this, simply because Crimson Dawn getting what he wants pisses me off nearly as much as it must you. I think I have an idea that saves his life, and gets him out of our hair and in your debt, but we'll need to convince Coil to go along with it, and it'll be dangerous. Your call if you want to risk it."
Seki pauses a bit. "...and three, if you were wondering, is that you don't have to call me 'Captain' anymore. You ain't serving on my ship, and we've shed blood against the same enemy. 'Seki' works just fine."
"We can try. We need to /find/ him, first, though." Lera bites her lip and frowns at this. It sounds like it could very well be difficult, as something occurs to her. "He probably has ran, and the fool may have contacted a Syndicate agent. Crimson Dawn will have a headstart on us."
She turns her head and looks at Seki. "I'll need your help, here." Her lips tighten into a line. "I don't have the resources to track down a desperate Outcaste, besides what the other cadets have seen."
She then looks down, and smiles. "Captain Seki... I'll call you that until /I/ think I deserve to call you differently, if it's all the same to you. But..." She looks up at him, looking him in the eye. "Thank you."
Seki smiles, slightly. "Probably. But hey, that's what I have Blue Canary for. Well, also to use as a footstool. cuz he's comfey wit evil." Seki grins at the fond, fond memory. Aaaah. "You're right, though. He's a coward at heart, otherwise he would've just challenged you himself. His first instinct will be to run. And hey, he pissed me off! I'm a Peleps! They'd drum me out of the family if I didn't take horrible, horrible revenge."
Seki catches Lera's look, looks about to protest...but just nods. They're almost at the gate, his legs hurt, and it's her life. "Works for me." Besides, he owes her for destroying Frozen Heart with that line about the miniskirt. Aaaaaaaah man that was classic. Classic!
"Yes. And he won't enjoy what we have to do with him, either, rest assured." Maybe there is a little Dragon-Blooded in her after all. The more Lera thinks of it, the angrier she gets; there is no small amount of rage. He did betray her - and she had done a lot for him. If she let it lie... then she would undermine herself. The girl nods her head, still leaning against them.
That would come later. For now, she needed to be healed, before her shoulder was lost entirely. After all, she might need her sword arm for this.
WHEN: I think Monday. Early in the week.
WHERE: New York, Mundane Sector
WHAT: Lera's taking a walk; unknown to her, a Syndicate agent has been hired to make sure she never comes /back/ from said walk. Fortunately, someone managed to hear about the bounty on the Cathak's head becides Boba Fett...
WATCH FOR: Fett's vette, treachery and woe, last minute rescues, and a clever plan.
EDIT: Boba Fett needs a tag plz.
A week ago, notice of a job began floating through the underworld in the Hub. Jade Coil had finally had enough. His superior, in his mind, had humiliated him and robbed him of his stature. He wanted her dead - and he had the money for it. 600,000 jade was the price offered on the head of his commander. This had fallen into the hands of Boba Fett.
By all rights, this should be a simple job. Lera is a mere cadet - if it weren't for the sum, this would be above the likes of Boba Fett.
The cadet is currently walking through the streets of New York, looking up at the tall buildings. She whistles lowly as she sees one of the skyscrapers; such things were even beyond Creation in this number. Most buildings of this height were lone marvels. She shakes her head, before looking forward.
As she moves forward, she brushes past a man. "Hey, watch it!" he shouts. She shoots him a look - a steely one, at first, before she murmurs an apology and smiles awkwardly. She catches herself and behaves how she should, continuing to walk onward.
Six hundred thousand credits is a lot of money for bounty hunters out on the Rim - enough to make a lesser bounty hunter a rich man. Boba Fett himself has tackled bigger bounties, of course, and much bigger enemies, but even he can't resist the lure of a big bounty.
You'd think that a man in Mandalorian armour would stick out more in New York City, but Fett is an expert at keeping hidden. At the moment he's lurking in concealment, hidden high up on the side of a skyscraper - the back of one, facing into a little concrete plaza, the sort of plaza in which you might expect to find a few hundred Smiths going after a guy in a trenchcoat. He's kneeling poised on the outcropping of building structure, his sawn-off EE-3 in his hands, cocked and aimed down into the now-empty square. From his concealed position he's prepared to pick off his quarry.
He's recruited some local help.
Indeed, the man Lera bumped into was precisely that help, a lanky fellow with sandy hair. He walks along and turns down an alley, whistling a pleased tune to himself as he strolls casually towards the little out-of-the-way concrete square.
He idly flips through the wallet in his hand.
"What kind of name is Cathak Lera?" the plant murmurs as he looks over the ID inside.
Lera had bought that wallet as part of the IPA, in the Hub. It has her IPA identification card - which is how he can confirm her name. Her eyes widen, as she keeps walking forward. She hears what he says from the alley. The girl turns on a foot, smoothly moving and looking over her shoulder and into it. Her eyes narrow at the sandy-haired man.
"Excuse me!" she yelps after him. She starts walking briskly towards him. Not a run, yet; she doesn't want to startle the crowd she is leaving. The emptied square doesn't even strike her as immediately suspicious.
The guy in question isn't even really a fighter. As soon as he sees Lera after him he turns and blinks a surprised blink, starting and jumping a couple of feet. "Oh shit!" he shouts before dropping the wallet and breaking into a run for the other side of a square. There's a door in the wall, which he pushes through and slams locked behind him.
The wallet has been left lying open on the ground, out in plain view, there for Lera to retrieve.
Unfortunately for the poor redhead she's already fallen into the sights of the real mastermind here. With his hired help having done his job Boba Fett turns his blaster, looking down from his sniper post high-above like a perched vulture eyeing a piece of carrion. With care he lines up Lera in his sights, his targeting scanners picking out a spot on the side of her head. Bounty hunter though he is he is not so cruel as to make her suffer; the Mandalorian in him prefers the clean kill.
For a moment Fett waits, letting Lera move as she will. His gauntleted finger tenses, then squeezes the black trigger.
The only warning for the regular five senses is a squeal of igniting tibanna gas. A single bolt of red blaster fire shrieks down from the bit of building structure, aiming to swiftly blast poor Lera off this mortal coil. Alive is good - but Jade Coil wanted the girl dead.
It is only by a chance of fate that Cathak Lera's curse doesn't catch up with her then and there. The girl frowns and walks into the emptied square, leaning down to grab at her wallet. She does not hear the squeal from where she sits. However, at least one thing did. A pigeon on a few ledges away heard it.
It drops off the ledge and then flies over the square. Lera stands and looks up just before the plasma bolt fires - and it slams into her shoulder. It rips through the back of it, causing a nasty burn that covers the entirety of her shoulder and exposes a portion of bone. Her eyes go wide like saucers and she shrieks, in terror, collapsing in a heap.
It /burns/. Her hand swings to the wound and covers it, as she gasps.
This girl has good luck, Fett thinks, his eyes flitting briefly to the pigeon. Stupid bird.
He taps a control on one of his gauntlet. The nozzles of his jetpack flare to life, rumbling as the bounty hunter leaps clean off the side of the skyscraper; the jets, whirring, draw him into a controlled descent down towards the concrete surface of the empty square. The noise of them reverberates in so closed a space, creating a myriad of echoes, as though Lera and her assailant were caught in a tunnel formed by the high walls of the skyscrapers encircling the isolated square. Fett's picked his battleground well, it seems.
He doesn't fire again until he's sure she's seen him: shooting the wounded in the back is bad. With his off hand gripping the top of his blaster barrel he aims the hacked-off weapon towards Lera, though again, he holds his fire. The metal plating of his boots hits the concrete with a clunk, and the hiss of the jetpack cuts out as he strides towards the downed woman, blaster leveled.
Drawing to within twenty feet, he stops there, tilts his head just a little - and mercifully blasts another shot at her, aiming for the chest this time. Better to put her out of her misery.
Not many people know what it means to go to school at the Palace of the Tamed Storm. It's sort of like having the Artful Dodger as a guidance councilor; even though Peleps Kaizoku Seki had moved on career-wise to a less subtle form of treachery and theft...the military...well, you never /entirely/ get away from where you grew up, after all.
While there are myriad consequences of this, the pertinent one is that a short Daiklaive made of white jade, carefully shaped into an "X" shape that's useful for parrying and disarming enemies, crunches into the blacktop right in front of Cathak Lera. Said daiklaive is attached to a long chain made of black jade, which goes up some ways, to a fire escape. If someone thinks to look up, they will see Peleps Kaizoku Seki, sliding down on his Wavecleaver Daiklaive, Cabin Girl, like it were some kind of crazy skateboard! If not, they will certainly hear the pirate shout, "PISTACHIO!" like some sort of adventurous chipmunk, kick off of the chain weapon and twist through the air...
...kicking his legs up in order to pull the magic sword/occasional ride up in a gentle arc that /just/ happens to be where Boba Fett probably hoped something that his blaster fire /wasn't/ going to bounce off would be. Alas, Cabin Girl is there instead, and the blaster shot is deflected wildly to the left, creating, perhaps, the most hardcore pot hole in New York.
The Dragon-Blooded wastes no time, pulling his Cabin Girl by the handle into his right hand, twisting his body back around with what little air-time he has left, and grabbing hold of Crossbones in order to balance himself, giving him a heartbeat to kick his feet a little like he was the swan princess, shove back into the air, and land on his feet, tugging at the Chain Daiklaive mightily and bringing Skull, the skull-shaped blunt end of the Chain Daiklaive that's, shockingly, shaped like a skull, back down to earth with him.
"/BOZO FETT!/" The Dragon-Blood calls, grinning at the prospect of Glorious Battle. Then he blinks, looks at some writing on his palm, and slaps his face with the other one. "I mean, uh, Boba. Right. Boba Fett! Did you really think you'd be able to snipe /Mad Captain Seki's/ student without my finding out about it?! Helmet-wearing fool! Now you must throw down...like the old school!"
"What...what the--" Lera stumbles backward, grimacing and staring at the blaster's bore. Her green eyes widen as she sees it and the man in Mandalorian armor. She finally issues her question, right before he pulls the trigger: "Who--who sent you?!" Part of her already knows. When he pulls the trigger, though, she shrieks and closes her eyes.
The thought that goes through her mind, in that moment, is, 'I'm sorry, Mother. The curse finally took me, too.'
The end doesn't come. She hears the bolt plink off a daiklave and opens her eyes, finding Captain Seki standing between her and Fett. "Captain!"
Damn lightsaber-toting kidlets, thinks Fett as he jams a hand down against his arm control; with a boost of jetpack fire he hops backwards, putting some distance between himself and the arriving Seki. How so much hardcore could have escaped his detection, he isn't entirely sure. Apparently his hardcorometer is out of whack.
Like the futuristic Spartan that he is, of course, he's not about to back down. He shifts his rifle to his left hand and tilts his head in the other direction, offering a dry retort. "Been there, made the honour roll."
His task now is to get Seki the hell out of the way so he can take a crack at Lera; he's more interested in collecting his pay than he is in dueling to the death, even with someone who is unmistakably hardcore. He takes a step forward and raises his blaster, left hand cocked atop its barrel as he takes aim -
And doesn't fire. Instead, in a flash his feint becomes evident: he snaps his left wrist out and takes a jump to the right even as a high-tensile grappling line hisses from his gauntlet towards Seki. Rather than fight him, he's intent on tying him up long enough to get a killing shot at Lera.
The job first, after all.
"Dude!" Seki enthuses, looking for all the world like some sorta breakdance fighter from hell, "Yo'backpack got jets! That's awesome!" Seki half looks at Lera, winking jauntily. "And of course, Lera! I'd have to give back my 'dashing pirate' license if I didn't show up in the nick of time like this."
Woah, movement! Seki moves along with the guy, keeping Cabin Girl close to his chest...he saw that that future gun did to Lera, after all, and oh crap grappling hook! Smoke seems to rise up along Seki's Converse sneakers as he makes a quick hop in the air...
...and, through the magic of Seafaring Hero Style, seems to just /propel vertically/, in the jumpkicking position, towards the grappling line! His sneaker touches the hook, and Seki shoves himself up, balancing on top of said hook for a split second, until he hops off, sending the blunt end of Skull and Crossbones careening towards Boba Fett, aiming to try and wrap the chain around his neck, or shootin'arm, or...wherever, really, so he can try and force the guy into melee range!
Seki stumble-lands on the ground a heartbeat later, and his right sneaker is still attached to Fett's grapple line. "Aw man. Those were /brand new/!"
Lera doesn't need to be told twice - or once, for that matter. Her eyes suddenly flash with recognition of what she needs to do. She is no Exalt and Seki is. The girl turns and /bolts/, rushing over the empty plaza and hoping he has no snipers. As she gets near a building, she leaps - lunging behind a small rising on the sidewalk that contains some bushes. There, she huddles downward and holds her wounded shoulder with a hiss. It still hurts.
It's impossible to tell given his armour and all, but behind his helmet Fett is giving Seki a 'what the hell are you smoking' look. The man's attitude has put him off-balance, at least somewhat, but in true Boba Fett fashion he settles for killing him anyway.
He has no snipers. Fett prefers to fight alone.
He attempts to take a step to the side, but Seki's chain snags his right arm. The bounty hunter isn't really too miffed by it, though: he simply tosses his blaster to his other hand and taps his wrist control a bit awkwardly, giving Seki all that he could ever ask for. The jets on his back blaze, the bounty hunter shooting forward far faster than any reel could've anticipated - but at the last moment he twists himself to one side, attempting to use his speed and Seki's own chain to drag him off his feet and to the ground! Sometimes, it's nice to have a backpack with jets.
In mid-movement he snaps his blaster across his body and fires a shot towards Lera. It's not the best-aimed shot he's ever fired, but he would really like to do his job.
"Oh you have to be kidding m-eeeeeeee!" Seki yelps as Boba Fett shows why it is a bad idea to lasso Boba Fett. Seki falls over his long, gangly legs, tripping on the ground and dragging along after the Fettster. He sees what the hunter's planning, and shouts, "No!", perhaps showing a bit more concern than he would like as he viciously flicks his wrist in the direction of Boba's shot.
Normally, this would be pretty damn ineffectual, as Seki was not flicking his wrists to throw his sword, or do much more than move his sleeves around. But, Seki? His sleeves...
...they're full of /knives/. No less than three throwing knives fly out, one aimed at Boba Fett's hand, the other two aimed in an attempted intercept course with the blaster bolt!
Seki's shout is Lera's warning. Her eyes widen and she leaps; the blast bolt slams down just behind her, ripping into the small garden emplacement. The stones explode in a flash as the bolt of energy connects, but she isn't with it. "Damn it!" she shouts, as she runs forward to a storefront. Her shoulder aches with the movement, but she persists.
The mortal rears back and kicks the door in. It snaps the feeble lock and throws it inward. The girl goes running in with a howl, shooting into one of the uptown clothing stores.
Seki's moment of playing Dio proves effective: though Fett jerks his arm to one side despite the chain binding it, the thrown knife glances off the edge of his gauntlet and bounces upwards, slicing through the mesh sleeve protecting his upper arm. The armour is ripped open by the deflected blade, leaving an ugly cut beneath it. Fett grimaces behind the helmet but gives no other outward sign that the blade hurt him. Mandalorians don't quit over a little knifescratch.
It's becoming clear, nevertheless, that he's going to have to do something about Seki if he's going to take out Lera. Damn accomplices.
Though the chain of the Skull and Crossbones is still wrapped around his arm he doesn't really care, because he's got another use for it. Again he throws on the jets and jumps backward. This time, however, he cocks a knee up - and the armor plating there flips outward, revealing a nest of needle rockets hidden there. In a flash they shoot out from behind the pad towards Seki - even as Fett himself jets way back from them, aiming to drag Seki by the chain straight into the rockets!
Yeah, he's getting pissed.
Ha! HAAA! Seki grins like a maniac(Suprise!), having foiled Boba Fett's attacks long enough for Lera to get to some cover. Now, he just has to...beat a bounty hunter so stone cold that one of his connections in the underworld felt the urge to come to his home and tell him, 'Seki, Lera's going to die.' and uh-
"Your freaking knees have rockets?!" Seki shouts in sheer shock, getting dragged forward and taking a direct hit to the chest! Skull and Crossbones unhitches itself from Boba Fett as the explosions cover Seki's body for a second, sending the Dragon-Blooded slamming back down into the pavement.
...miraculously, his jogging suit is not ruined. "Space Monster leather is the /best/ leather." Seki observes, hopping back up to his feet. He's bruised, blackened, and his hair's a little on fire, but the Captain seems still very much in the fight! The Kaizoku doubles forward at Boba Fett, again emitting a thin trail of smoke from his feet...
...as he dispenses with the tricky crap, and aims a quick overhead slash at the bounty hunter's chest! "So, who /did/ hire you?"
Well, his backpack's got jets, so the rockets in the knees seem only a logical extension of Fett's awesomeness. The armoured bounty hunter whips his wrist free as the Skull and Crossbones finally pulls away from it, leaving his right hand free to make use of some of his nastier weapons. Not that he expects he'll need them given that he just /shot Seki full of rockets/ and all.
Or not. Apparently the Kaizoku's resilience is greater than he expected.
Fett spares a glance past Seki, trying to track where Lera's gotten to; not seeing her directly he scowls behind the T-visor, more than a little irritated. If there's one thing he hates it's having his bounties snatched from his grip, particularly by crazy space pirates.
The slash is met by a hard, humming blade - a vibro-shiv, a futuristic knife, gripped underhand in Boba's right gauntlet. The weapon's blade rings a little against Seki's, actually vibrating, enhancing its cutting power. "Obviously someone who wants the girl dead," he says shortly.
Flicking his arm to one side to deflect Seki's blade away, Fett moves in on him and whips the vibro-shiv in his fingers to hold it upright, thrusting the humming blade towards the pit of the man's stomach. "Not that you're gonna survive long enough to find out."
Lera stops in the store and peers from behind the counter, hearing this little exchange. It confirms one thing for her: someone hired a gun to kill her. By the looks of it, this is no ordinary hired gun. Seki recognized him, which means this man is dangerous. It causes Lera to frown, as she considers who the culprit could be. She can already identify one likely candidate. "That /fool/..."
Peleps Kaizoku Seki fights dead people for a living. An Endurance Charm or two is how you do not die at sea, sometimes. The Kaizoku scowls at the vibrating knife...he's seen this technology before, and it's nearly as dangerous as mild Artifact weaponry. Shit, he underestimated the offworlder. Seki's sword-arm is flung to the side, in order for him not to end up disarmed...
...but, Seki's other arm gets forward, holding on to Crossbones like it was a proper knife itself, blocking the inspired gut-shot at the last second! The Kaizoku struggles with Fett's knife for a moment or two, matching strength with strength. "I don't suppose...you'd be givin'me any names, now, eh? As a professional courtesy, maybe? I've got too much invested in that girl not to know who her enemies are..."
Seki takes a step forward in the melee, twisting his left hand violently to the side in an effort to knock the vibroblade out of Fett's hands, while twisting his right arm around and sending Cabin Girl in a nasty downward arc, aimed at stabbing into Fett's backpack-jets! "Besides, I can tell you if your client's good for it, or gonna try an'screw you. If you really do manage to kill me, I don't want you getting, like, backstabbed. It'd be an insult to my greatness!"
Having never encountered artifact weaponry before now Fett can't really judge, but his technology has always been good enough to get him by - as well as his strength. As a man who's gone hand-to-hand with a Trandoshan Fett is a strong son of a bitch, and he's able to hold his own as he presses the vibrating edge of the shiv back against the edge of the Skull and Crossbones. The helmet sits canted a bit, and it's obvious that the man behind it is glaring.
He's quick to react: as Seki steps forward Boba steps back, swinging one foot and bracing himself; his arm is whipped out to the side, but he tucks it back in and pivots with that motion, the blade of the Cabin Girl catching the scarred blast plating along his side and leaving yet another rent in its olive-green surface. Though the impact leaves what will no doubt amount to an ugly bruise on the body beneath it, he again doesn't let it show. He's a man and a Mandalorian, after all.
As he comes around the shiv is tossed to his off hand. "Sorry. Hunter-client confidentiality."
He brings his right wrist up - and with a startling flare of light a huge gust of flame blisters from a launcher tucked into his gauntlet, accosting Seki with a burning cloud of chemical incineration - yet another surprise of the Mandalorian Armour!
"...Professional courtesy."
Peleps Kaizoku Seki might be a little biased towards Magic-Origin crap. Can you blame him? He has, however, figured out that Boba's bracers are bad freaking news, and therefore lets his body move with the flow of his botched backpack-stab, pulling himself into a quick cartwheel-strafe around Boba Fett!
This means that the blast of fire licks Seki's legs, rather than his face. "Gaaah!" the Pirate cries out, as he feels his skin start to crinkle and burn. Forcing himself to keep moving, Seki continues his cartwheel, again flinging his weighted chain out in an attempted lasso of Fett's neck!
Magic weaponry is something Fett hasn't really encountered - well, other than the Jedi, but that was a long time ago. Seki's cartwheel catches the armoured killer flatfooted. He starts a bit and whips around a moment too late, managing at least to snap his shiv-arm up to try and block the heavy chain of the Skull; while he manages to keep from getting lassooed, the blunt force of the weapon smacks into his helmet and knocks him backwards a good distance. It's a testament to his grip that he doesn't drop his knife.
He is, however, fast realizing that, all honour aside, he's lost his quarry - and a smart bounty hunter doesn't linger when he could live to fight another day. With a flick of his wrist he swaps out the knife for a pair of stingerlike blaster pistols, tools inherited from the late Jango Fett. Jets roar, and the bounty hunter lifts into the air, firing a scattering of hot red blaster shots down towards Seki in an effort to cover his departure from the field.
He at least hopes the Captain can't fly.
"What th-damn!" Seki's rope attack's blocked /again/, veering too far off course. The Kaizoku swears, swinging Cabin Girl as quickly as he can in a desperate series of parries as he works to tug the chain out of the hunk of road it's embedded itself in. He hisses as a shot finds its way into his gut, his shoulder, and even cutting his face...man, that's probably gonna scar, too.
"This isn't over!" Seki spits, his mind already swimming with probabilities, counter-measures, and other ways to make the inevitable fight against Fett more...decisive. "Peleps Kaizoku Seki never leaves this sort'a business unfinished, you hear me Fett?! Get near the girl again, and you'll get a hell of a lot more than a street fight!"
And, as Fett is outta heah, Seki slumps to his knees for a second because it hurts to stand. "...ow..." the Kaizoku groans for a second, before sheathing his sword, shoving himself back upright, and limping towards the stairs. He hopes Lera found her way to a hospital...
Lera hasn't. Instead, she limps out of a store front; her shoulder is still aching something fierce, thanks to the burnt and blistered flesh. The IPA doctors will need to have a look at this. She hisses as she approaches the Captain; moving hurts a lot. "Captain Seki! Are you all right? Your timing was perfect..."
Nrrrrgh ow. "Fine! He only nicked me!" The girl is scared out of her mind, this is probably her first assassination attempts, so Seki refuses to whine. Even though his legs really kind of hurt. "I finally got a decent hit on him, and he flew off. Bounty Hunters're too 'smart' to finish a fight, y'know? I knew I could count on that to keep the thing short, in case I mistimed my jump or whatever..."
Seki stretches a little. His whole body feels like Ow, but on the other hand, he's had worse beat downs. "How about you, Lera? Your shoulder looks all kinds of messed up..." Seki trails off, not sure if the girl is up to being asked the obvious question yet.
"It's probably the most pain I have ever experienced, yes," Lera says with a meek smile on her face. She keeps her hand covering the wound, but the badly blistered flesh - mottled white and black in places, and a cooked red otherwise - is visible despite her efforts to hide it. She even has tears of pain in her eyes. "But... at least you're all right. And able to stand. I am sorry that you were hurt on my behalf, Captain..."
Peleps Kaizoku Seki just sort of looks at Lera for a second. Someone hires a top rate Syndicate thug to come down out of the sky and kill her, and she's worried about his getting hurt. Part of Seki wants to scream at the girl.
The rest of him realizes that actual sympathy and sincere concern for other living beings is a rare and precious thing in the Scarlet Dynasty, and forces a smile on his face. "I got hurt." Seki corrects with only slightly forced joviality, "Because I was too slow on my cartwheel and that Fett guy had flamethrower wrists. And rocket knees. Did you see that? Who arms their damned knees?!"
Seki is also a little worried, because he doesn't really have any medical Charms. "Come on. Let's get to the Gate-the IPA'll patch us up, and they give us lollypops instead of threatening to summon demons to eat us." There is something to be said for modern medicine. Seki pauses a little, waiting to see if Lera needs help moving...
...and figures that she has to confront the question eventually. "Any idea who'd want you dead, kid?"
Lera makes herself move under her own power. She wouldn't mind a shoulder to lean on; however, Seki is hurt and could use it herself. If hers wasn't a mass of burnt flesh that rendered her arm unmovable, she would even off it. As it is, stepping causes jolts of pain to shoot through her. She winces with each step, but manages to keep walking nonetheless. "I can move on my own," she finally says, with another slight hiss of pain. "Don't worry about that."
She shakes her head, then. "I saw the rocket knees. It was... unexpected. I can't fathom why--well, I can. No one would see it coming, and if you weren't an Exalt, you might be dead now..." She likely underestimates much of the IPA in this statement, but such is the fate of a Dynast. She shakes her head. Her expression grows serious as she walks along.
"I... have a few ideas," she admits. "My subordinate, Jade Coil... he has been acting strange for weeks. I didn't think, though, that he would ever..."
Peleps Kaizoku Seki stops.
"Three things." Seki says...harshly. Almost like an instructor from the House. "Because by the Seven Hells, Lera, you better learn something from this. First, if that were true, that guy wouldn't have been matching me cut for cut back there. Never, ever forget that nine times out of ten, an Anathemia is going to be stronger than you in a fair fight, Lera. The whole line about the Dragon-Blooded being the top of the food-chain is just that; a line. I'm alive because my outfit is cleverly disguised armor."
"Second," Seki lowers his shoulder down, offering Lera the support if she wants it. "Don't be too proud to accept help. Bonds are what separate us from those who would tear our civilization down, kid, and as important as pride is, you have to recognize that the strong Dragon-Blooded is one who knows how to help her friends, and be helped by them."
"Now," Seki continues, cheerful again, apparently saving three for later. "You have a good idea who did this, even if you didn't think he'd be this dumb about it. Good. What are you planning on doing about it?" Lera might somehow get the feeling that she's being tested on something.
Lera looks at Seki, looking ashamed; her shoulder is wounded, but her pride is hurt a fair amount as well. She sighs and accepts the aid, leaning against him. "I... yes, I understand. He... was impressive," she admits a little meekly. It's an understatement; he was a master warrior if she has ever seen one. She turns her eyes back to him.
She nods, then. "I'm sorry. I just don't want to be a burden on you." And, she thinks, she isn't a Dragon-Blooded - and may very well never be one. But he wants to try, and she couldn't forgive herself if she stopped trying. She wouldn't end up like her brother.
"I'm..." The girl trails off. "I'm still trying to decide. He /is/ a Dragon-Blooded. I can't challenge him myself. But he has to be made to pay. And besides..." She grits her teeth. "He is a bigger fool than he thinks. Crimson Dawn vowed to do worse than kill him if he crossed me. I don't know why he would promise that, but I believe the Deathknight is perfectly serious."
"It's fine. I had my illusions about the world ripped from me pretty harshly, Lera." Seki sounds strangely sober about this, licking his lips and looking somewhere...
Screams screams screams the candice of the dieing as the mad bull-god roars overhead hurry to the boats the boats are safe but no his witch freezes the waters and calls up things of air and ice and the elements themselves have turned against the Realm and those damned sunrise eyes looking at me looking through me judging me and finding the mortal more worth his time...
...or somewhen, perhaps. "I don't want the same thing to happen to you, so I've been...well, trying to ease you into the whole thing." Seki shrugs a little, careful not to jostle the girl. "As for Crimson Dawn, I have a few theories as to why. Chances are, he sees you as a useful tool for getting back at the Dynasty, wants to corrupt or corrode you, or just build you up to a certain point before bringing your life crashing down around you. If he creates a debt of gratitude and makes himself seem as a protective figure towards you, your honor would force you to continue to allow him to be a factor in your life outside of "some dude to cut". On the other hand, though, if you let Dawn kill the guy, the problem takes care of itself." Seki pauses. "At least until he makes Coil a ghost zombie ninja cultist to spring on you at some appropriately dramatic time. Then again, sometimes seeing a guy you hate get shived like that is worth the drama later on."
Seki smirks at this...and sobers up again. This has to be hell on the kid, after all. "Honestly, Lera, if I were you, I'd think long and hard about Jade Coil, and if he's still worth retaining as an asset, or if you need to find a way to expunge him from your life. I keep a traitor alive and a functional part of my crew because I know he exists, and I know how he will act. That means that the inevitable treason element is going to be coming from him, involve him, or become suspicious by the lack of his involvement-either way, his very existence serves my purposes. Furthermore, the little worm's useful sometimes. It's worth the occasional deflecting of a knife at my back. You gotta decide how that's gonna work for you."
"Brownie points for not going, 'Captain Seki, could /you/ punish mean ol'Jade Coil for me?' though." Seki winks again.
"This is true..." Lera frowns. It hurts to consider killing him like this. Jade Coil had been her subordinate; a person she was responsible for caring for, whose safety she was sworn to. But he had crossed a line and made himself a threat. And Seki put it best, just then: whether he is worth retaining as an asset. In the end, if he was a danger to her...
...then she couldn't afford it. Her fingers tense. "He is stronger than me. Physically, I mean," she says. "He is an asset to my squad, but in the end, he undermines my authority by knowing he could kill me with a well-placed backhand. Now, he may be far less reserved." She looks up at Seki and shakes her head. "I wish this hadn't happened--that it hadn't come to it..."
But he softened the blow for her. Seki had done that, to protect her and look out for her. She would be forever grateful. "But it has. I have to find a way to remove him. Unfortunately, short of killing him - beyond my ability unless I beg you or Mother to do it - I cannot prevent Crimson Dawn from getting to him. He will find him if he is alive. It's a matter of time."
Peleps Kaizoku Seki pauses for a moment, thinking. Jade Coil dieing benefits Crimson Dawn, somehow, which means that it is an unfortunate outcome, no matter how much the punk deserves it. "Even if we claim to have killed him, Dawn'll use it as an excuse to raise hell..."
Seki hrms. And hrms. And hrms.
"-oh. Oh no. That's...ha! Heh heh..." Seki shakes his head, forcing his habitual mania under control. It hurt to laugh, frankly. "Allright, personally, I'm all for us finding a way around this, simply because Crimson Dawn getting what he wants pisses me off nearly as much as it must you. I think I have an idea that saves his life, and gets him out of our hair and in your debt, but we'll need to convince Coil to go along with it, and it'll be dangerous. Your call if you want to risk it."
Seki pauses a bit. "...and three, if you were wondering, is that you don't have to call me 'Captain' anymore. You ain't serving on my ship, and we've shed blood against the same enemy. 'Seki' works just fine."
"We can try. We need to /find/ him, first, though." Lera bites her lip and frowns at this. It sounds like it could very well be difficult, as something occurs to her. "He probably has ran, and the fool may have contacted a Syndicate agent. Crimson Dawn will have a headstart on us."
She turns her head and looks at Seki. "I'll need your help, here." Her lips tighten into a line. "I don't have the resources to track down a desperate Outcaste, besides what the other cadets have seen."
She then looks down, and smiles. "Captain Seki... I'll call you that until /I/ think I deserve to call you differently, if it's all the same to you. But..." She looks up at him, looking him in the eye. "Thank you."
Seki smiles, slightly. "Probably. But hey, that's what I have Blue Canary for. Well, also to use as a footstool. cuz he's comfey wit evil." Seki grins at the fond, fond memory. Aaaah. "You're right, though. He's a coward at heart, otherwise he would've just challenged you himself. His first instinct will be to run. And hey, he pissed me off! I'm a Peleps! They'd drum me out of the family if I didn't take horrible, horrible revenge."
Seki catches Lera's look, looks about to protest...but just nods. They're almost at the gate, his legs hurt, and it's her life. "Works for me." Besides, he owes her for destroying Frozen Heart with that line about the miniskirt. Aaaaaaaah man that was classic. Classic!
"Yes. And he won't enjoy what we have to do with him, either, rest assured." Maybe there is a little Dragon-Blooded in her after all. The more Lera thinks of it, the angrier she gets; there is no small amount of rage. He did betray her - and she had done a lot for him. If she let it lie... then she would undermine herself. The girl nods her head, still leaning against them.
That would come later. For now, she needed to be healed, before her shoulder was lost entirely. After all, she might need her sword arm for this.