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The great Hondo Ohnaka stared at the terminal, hemming and hawing. No matter how he tried to read the inventory for this shuttle, the contents didn’t change. Enough supplies (and backup supplies) to comfortably get to its location. A fairly impressive amount of restraints, sedatives, and other enforcement tools, and not much else.
Hondo decided he would shoot whichever fool managed to recognize the Republic shuttle as being kitted with high-security feature but failed to notice the very obvious signs that it was a prisoner transport.
Prisoner transports didn’t have worthwhile loot!
Oh wait, it had been Ilbriggu, hadn’t it? And he’d been killed by the guards when they first breached and invaded the shuttle.
He’d just shoot a picture of Ilbriggu, then. He could use actual lethal settings then, how nice.
Well, at least the various high tech pieces and sedatives could be sold. And they could pilfer most of the supplies and still leave the remaining crew with enough to make it to a variety of Republic-friendly planets.
Yes, that’s what he’d do, and if they could find some moonshine to distribute among his pirates, they’d probably not notice him taking most of the little profit they’d be able to make off of this raid!
Hondo perked up, smiling at his plan, glad to have saved his own day.
That, of course, was when he heard the ruckus.
A fight, clearly, had broken out. The shuttle’s crew were all accounted for, so either the fools had betrayed each other and tried to hide loot from the others – the nerve! – or they were even larger fools that had managed to let one of the crew get loose.
Hondo sighed grandly as he stood, turning as he heard the door start to open, timing it to make sure his coat would swish with appropriate gusto when his pirates caught sight of their captain.
Hondo was shocked, no, just slightly surprised by seeing a human in prisoner’s garb tumble through the door with two of his pirates.
Kron was thrown from the tussle as he hit the floor, groaning and bloodied. Tax was still trying to fight her assailant, until they punched her face hard enough to make it hit the floor, knocking her unconscious.
At that point, Bomm lumbered through the door, also looking worse for wear, and half-threw himself, half-fell onto the escaped prisoner.
It took them only two seconds to wiggle out from under Bomm and wrap the weequay into a truly impressive hold, quickly knocking him unconscious.
Not quick enough for Hondo to not take a good look at the prisoner’s face, however. Not that Hondo needed that much of a look to identify a clone nowadays, not after seeing the wonderful commander Cody in so many holo calls, usually either to or for Obi-Wan and ransom. Hondo wondered if this clone knew Obi-Wan, or any other of the Jedi he liked.
Regardless, he was a clone, who clearly had spirit, and clearly wasn’t afraid of freedom from the law. Hondo liked him already.
And well… the profit margins were already thin, there was no reason to look a gift reward in the mouth.
Hondo started clapping and laughing as the rest of his crew finally showed up to point their blasters at the man. The clone looked at him, clearly a bit startled and in awe of the great Hondo Ohnaka’s presence and attention.
“Wonderful! Tell me, sir clone, what is your name? And what are your feelings on a good waist sash? Or other dramatic accessories?” Hondo asked.
“What’s it to you?” the man groused out, adorably shy. Hondo would make sure to bring the man out of his shell soon, though.
“Well, I intend to call you by your name, of course,” Hondo explained, “And the prisoner’s uniform doesn’t tell me much about your sense for accessories.”
The man narrowed his eyes for a few seconds, clearly thinking, “Slick,” he replied, “can’t say I’ve ever tried dramatic accessories before. Kamas don’t really suit me, though.” And the man was already smiling at him, the fierceness back in his face. He was clearly warming up to Hondo already. Fantastic!
“Excellent! We’ll try out a few until you find something that suits you, second mate Slick,” Hondo announced, quite liking the sound of Slick’s newly promoted title. Two senths made for a nice address.
“What?” Slick barked out, stepping towards him aggressively, only stopping when Hondo pulled out his own blaster.
“Ah ah ah, now. You really shouldn’t mutiny until I’m at least half drunk and you have the first mate on your side, my dear second mate. Isn’t that right, 4A-2R?”
“So, you have claimed seven times before, captain,” Hondo’s favorite droid said.
“So long as whoever doesn’t make me drink until I need a new second liver, I’ll support the mutiny,” Siic said from the nav terminal, apparently done slicing and just doing something on her personal pad.
His poor second mate looked confused. Probably because he hadn’t gotten his proper orientation party yet. But Hondo could fix that soon.
“Come now, second mate Slick,” Hondo ordered jovially, slinging an arm around Slick’s shoulder and guiding him back out through the hallways. The man was walking a bit stiltedly, Hondo hoped it wasn’t an injury from his first crew brawl, that sort of thing tended to lead to embarrassing nicknames. “let’s get back to the ship and then the base. And then we’ll get you a proper pirate outfit that suits someone of your caliber. A pirate named Second Mate Slick! What could be a grander character than that?” Hondo crowed, laughing and already thinking through what the party’s drink menu should be.