Our Space Is Vast (IC)

[Avenger Assembled]

Early December 2015 

Wolf 359 

 

Aquaria didn't know much about space - but she could tell the space-house (or space station, as Ruby called it) orbiting the tiny young star was old and busted. The metal plates that made up the walls and the ceiling were obviously corroded, turning green like copper instead of orange like steel around their dark grey edges and the air had the smell of something alien and old burnt away in the ducts, long ago. The humanoids in the station were exotic and strange, even stranger and more exotic than the Surfacers of Freedom City, their hair, clothes, and skin all strange colors and textures - but at least they ate good food, including a delicious flying insect as big as her fist that both she and Bliss had developed a taste for. 

 

She spent most of her time in the station's small garden, taking advantage of the high humidity (and even small pond!) to bask in the comforting wetness without her suit. She earned her keep by tending the plants, a skill she'd learned at the home of Jessie's sister and her mate, and did her best to get Jessie to come by and help her. It was less stressful than being on the ship. There had been some sort of dispute over repairs to the Voidrunner (she hadn't really followed the conversation) - and it was a high-stress time on-board for everyone. We just have to make it home, Aquaria assured herself as she ducked down to the bottom of the pond (which was just deep enough for her to completely immerse herself in), the ever-present hum of machinery reminding her that this was no ordinary body of water. And they will have all the gold the ship can carry! Reaching down, she cut a few fronds of pondweed with a knife - the stuff was vile to her, but some of the local people on the station loved it in their stews. 

 

In just a day, or less, she'd been assured, the repairs would be done and they'd all go home - but now, everybody pulled their weight, Luckily, she and Jessie were both very strong indeed. 

 

-

 

It had been a tough few weeks for the Horizon crew and their Star Knight companion. They'd tracked the fugitives to a remote swampy world, and even found the ion trail of the vessel that had picked them up there, but they'd found no clues about the identity of the vessel they were chasing. Whoever they were, they were fast and good, sticking to high-traffic lanes to blend in (but not the ones still regularly patrolled by the Lor), running their engines so fast they must be risking needing to scrub out their coils, and not staying in any one place long enough to be positively identified by eyewitnesses. If not for the unique energy emitted by Aquaria Innsmouth's suit, which noticeably warped extradimensional space while in hyperdrive, and if not for the further n-dimensional changes caused by the fact that the other passenger was from some other dimension entirely, they'd have lost the scent long ago. 

 

But now they'd caught the scent. Station K-7 was old and tired, a collection of habitat domes welded together centuries earlier, with a mostly transient population in the hundreds. It was widely known to be a den of smugglers making the potentially profitable run to Terra now that Lor border patrols weren't what they used to be - or even there at all, most of the time. As the ship approached the station, their sensors jangled with news - their two fugitives were _on that very station_. 

[trollthumper]

Station K-7. Cavalier looked forward to it, in a very wary sort of way. The trail of the two fugitives had led them over hill, dale, and flaming garbage dump. The swamp planet hadn't exactly been his thing. He knew from his travels that Star Wars had lied to him - the only reason a planet would be a single biome would be if that biome was goddamn persuasive. And this one had lived up to the standard. He was still wringing swamp water out of his undershirt - no, it shouldn't have gotten through the armor, but somehow, it had found a way - and he saw things lurking in the depths he never wanted to see again. 

 

This, however? This was totally him. Drinks that were cheap and potent, people dealing secrets out of every back room, and the more-than-occasional bar fight. This was the kind of thing he knew all about. Hopefully, this place would be more fruitful for leads, and they could --

 

And that was when the sensors started beeping.

 

Oh, yeah. Big bar brawl.

 

"How d we want to handle this?" 

[Darksider42]

With the exception of one thing, Ruby liked these sorts of stations. Plenty of weapons and fights to choose from, Easy access to alcohol that won't rot your insides and sometimes you stumble upon the most wanted beings in the galaxy with a nice payday hovering over their heads. Unfortunately for her, she was trying to make sure the last one was not happening to their passengers. The Voidrunner got hit by a small cluster of micro asteroids and had to put it into dock to get the hull and engines patched up. Ruby looked visibly annoyed as she leaned over the counter face to face with one of the clerks and administrators of the docks. 

This is what she hated about such stations.

"What is taking so bloody long? I was told my ship would be ready an hours ago." Her fingers drummed against the counter as she tried her best to contain her frustration. Ruby was only barely succeeding. 

[Electra]

Jessie had found her way into the station's cantina almost on instinct, following the smell of food that carried even over the disreputable smells of the rest of the station. Despite Aquaria's best efforts, the claustrophobia of space travel pressed down hard on her, and the station wasn't much of an improvement. The windows let her see the stars, but there was no friendly air-filled atmosphere that promised an escape if one should prove necessary. All that was outside these narrow corridors and cramped rooms was death, and the walls seemed to bow under the pressure. But food was good. Having food helped for some reason she couldn't quite pin down, not even eating it, but just having it. Eating it was not bad either, though it was better when Aquaria was not nearby eating giant bugs. 

 

The problem with the cantina was that they wanted money for their food, and Jessie did not have any. Even if she'd left Earth with her wallet, they probably wouldn't have accepted her debit card. The bartender had seemed to feel a little sorry for her, and had sent her to a strange-looking man in a little booth down the corridor, who'd bought her watch, her earrings and her shoes in exchange for a handful of colorful chips in irregular shapes. He offered to have a look at the anklet as well, but she told him it wasn't hers to sell, and also she couldn't get it off. It had occurred to her to hope that what he'd given her was actually money, but since the bartender accepted it without question, it was good enough. She had to do some jockeying to find a table in a safe corner, but once she bodily lifted up and moved a fairly large alien-type who was just loitering and not even eating, she was allowed to sit where she wanted.

 

With her stocking feet drawn up beneath her to keep them off the sticky floor, Jessie spent an unknowable amount of time sitting and eating soup and crackers, watching the crowd and trying not to think about space, or how far she was from home, or what was going to happen when they got there. She'd done her best to be confident when she was talking to Captain Ruby and her crew, and she was, mostly, but Jessie hated the idea of making more trouble for Erin. Erin was not going to be happy with Jessie for breaking her parole, or for getting lost, and definitely not for promising people money and favors in Erin's name just to get home. She was pretty sure that when Roulette and the others went to Erin for payment, she would pay them, but what if it was more than Jessie was worth? What if there was not going to be any money left after that? What if she and Aquaria couldn't stay in their apartment anymore? What if they couldn't anyway, because they had to go back to jail? What if nobody was actually going to take them back to Earth, and this was all a trick? What if the Spectrum Knights were still hunting them and were going to try and kill them? What if something bad happened to the wall that was behind her right now, and space started rushing in and suffocating all of them and nobody could do anything? Jessie huddled over her soup bowl and took another bite,  watching the room like a predator in a trap. 

 

 

[Tiffany Korta]

There was something comforting about Cantina that left Sitara in a good mode, mostly because in all her time they seemed to change so very little. The decor or the aliens might be different and the food and drink would change but fundamentally they were the same. As much as she enjoyed serving with the Praetorians she also love crashing at dives like this living on her wits and a charged blaster. Cause they were also places where it was easy to hide if you wanted, people tended to come and go and most patrons dislike talking to any kind of authority. But that just made things more of a challenge.

“It was a very, very long time ago but I still remember what it was like when I found myself abandoned alone among the stars. Before I settle down i spent a long time looking for anything familiar to latch onto a friendly face or a language I recognized among the babble. I figure that’s a pretty good place to start looking for our fugitives.”

[TheAbsurdist]

Bliss was... Bliss.  She was not the pragmatic 'jerkface' that Roulette came across, or the harried keeper that Ruby seemed.  Her features allowed her to seem serene, though those that could see the markings on her body in the infrared and could understand what it meant... well her position on the delay was made clear.  That and her nasal slits were flaring, exposed to the pungent oppression of so many stink apes.  And assorted other smells.

 

She was not happy.

 

But outside of the previous mentioned flaring, and the occasional chittering, and clicking noises she said nothing for most of her time on there.

 

Bliss had decided to be with Ruby, because she deemed it wise to be with her, rather than elsewhere.  Wearing as normal an outfit as a bipedal alien had here.  A tool vest, and trousers with pockets, a long sleeved top, and boots that worked with her non-standard feet.  Like Aquaria she was sometimes uncomfortable in drier places, but she could wear her hab suit.  Though she had been told it was unnerving to always be in it.

She glared, off to the side, not paying attention.  Someone had already thought she looked 'cute' even if they couldn't identify what she was.  In her defense she did not put the man through a bulkhead.

 

"Tchhhhhhhh, Ruby."  And she slowly levelled a gaze on the fellow before them.  Those hour glass pupils contracting slowly.

[Fox]

"We go quietly," Talisyn had ordered, crew and two guests gathered up before they made their way into the station proper. "Our targets are dangerous and we don't know what frame of mind they're in, and by this point it's clear they have pretty good help. They probably don't know we're after them, but we don't know much about what they can do still, and I don't like even odds."

 

Not for the first time, she wished she'd had a chance to properly plan this out...but she couldn't risk them taking off again. They'd been hard enough to track as it was. "We need to get as much information as we can before we take them, and we need to make sure that when we take them it's as clean s possible. This place is gonna be built for bar brawls, not weapons that can punch holes in hulls. No civilian casualties, period."

 

"Oh, and, uh - Knight," she added, glancing up at him from the blaster she'd been checking and re-checking. "You're gonna have to pick between staying out of sight or being a little less....all of that," she insisted, gesturing at his armor. "Even without it, half the smugglers in this place are gonna smell you a light year out, but do your best. Worst case, we don't want to overplay our hand."

 

---

 

She slid into the cantina with all the ease and practice of a regular...and, given her colorful history, that may as well have been the case. It wasn't much of a dive bar, but she'd woken up in worse. She'd blacked out in worse, too, come to think of it...ah, better times.

 

"Been a long haul," she brightly provided the bartender in lieu of introduction, sliding over a chit - enough to buy her a drink, plus enough to buy her good will, not so much as to attract much attention. "Gimme something that'll help scrub the last couple days out of my long-term memory."

[trollthumper]

Cavalier knew that laughing in this situation would be rude. He also wasn't entirely sure if he had cause to laugh anymore, but still. "Yeah, kinda thought so," he said. "Do you mind if I come in through the airlock? Just so I can get ready for when we board."

 

Once Cavalier was on board the Horizon, he tapped the gauntlet on his armor. In an instant, it derezzed, its energy half winking out of existence as the framework collapsed into a thick metal bracer on one wrist. In his old leathers, well-beaten from his time with the Runabouts, and a day's growth of beard, he looked like a space jockey who had a taste for bar brawls, incapacitating liquor, and loose men. "It's been a while since I ran in the back alleys and sin dens, but I've got something of an understanding of the underside." 

---

Inside, however, he didn't want to press his chances. Eclipse seemed comfortable doing the talking, so he adopted the stance of the guy confident enough in his surroundings that it was clear the only asking he'd be doing would be if someone asked him first. "What she's having," he said, throwing his own chit on the counter. "And a good tip if it scrubs out my ex." 

[Gizmo]

'Inconspicuous' wasn't exactly in Rock's repertoire but he could pull off 'imposing' with both hands tied behind his stoney behind, which was nearly as good. Most of the assorted beings in the bar were happy to keep to themselves and the dangerous way the coals of the towering mercenary's eyes smouldered was enough to discourage anyone who might have foolishly erred toward curiosity. He stood with his titanic arms folded just behind Eclipse, not ordering anything but generally serving as an illustration of why checking weapons at the door only went so far in mixed-species establishments.

 

Nae-Dae on the other hand was able to lose herself easily in the milling crowd, slipping between tables and stools. Most sentients of roughly Lor equivalent size were conditioned to dismiss anything of her size as a child and enough of them had evolved from one sort of primate or another that they underestimated her intelligence, too. Both were foolish assumptions in the galaxy at large, of course and if she took advantage of that to add a few trinkets and a considerable amount of currency to her collection as she ran reconnaissance she considered it a service in education. 

[Avenger Assembled]

Aquaria padded her way through the station's corridors, weeds under her arm, enjoying the cool breeze against her skin. At the weed seller's stall (she wasn't entirely sure what the man did with the fronds, which grew from the scum at the bottom of stagnant water, something about boiling them in water and then selling that water?), she handed him the armload basket and collected her treasure - the colored chits that people on the station used for money. Realizing she had nowhere to put it, she ducked into a voiding area and changed, pulling on her Spectrum Knight armor without actually activating it. With the helmet down and the suit not powered up, it looked like just a colorful, metal-lined jumpsuit - a good thing, given the things she'd seen Spectrum Knights doing on the big screens she'd seen padding around the station. 

 

With the suit on, she slipped the chits into her pocket, then went to see if she could find Jessie. She'd been talking about getting something to eat at the cantina - maybe she could see if they still had those delicious fish guts around. 

 

- 

 

"Ohh, it's ever-so-bad!" said the weasely technician, sniffling his long snout and looking from Bliss to Ruby. "The whole plasma stabilizer complex has been disenfranchised, it'll take hours to fix, hours! Of course," he added, stroking his chin, "there are parts on order in the back that I _could_ use to repair the damage, but I'd have to break my contract with several important buyers. For a pretty lady like you, though," he added with a wink Ruby's way, "I could maybe find you a part for just a little extra in my pocket? It'll save you lots of hours!" 

 

- 

 

The Horizon crew wound up with the strongest drinks on the house, the bartender looking worriedly at Rock before deciding that the big...Rock wasn't going to be ordering anything. "Tip on your ex, huh?" Said the bartender, using a small laser polisher to clean out the inside of a heavily-stained mug, the machine humming in his four-digited hands. "This sentient gotta face or a name?" The blue-skinned male's voice was deep and gravelly, reminding Cavalier of Sam Elliot back on Earth - the small nest of sensory tentacles below an impressive-looking snout helping the impression. 

 

-

 

Scampering along, Nae-Dae looked up at a table and found the secondary mark (but the one with the fat Terran reward!) sitting by herself at the table, looking frightened - but nonetheless menacing at the same token, like a lizard in a trap, as she studied the bar. Evidently Singularity saw nothing particularly suspicious about the group that had just arrived together at the bar. 

[TheAbsurdist]

She turned all of her attention and scrutiny to the man before them, and she straightened.  Bliss had learned that size was important to these people, and she made certain that her size was known.  While not a towering person, she was tall enough, and mean enough looking with her severe features that she could convey more than a small sense of menace without trying too hard.

 

"You charge by the hour.  Stop it."  She almost purred and cooed at the man, leaning forward.  The sound at odds with her words, the underlying harshness of her native language.  Bliss unfolded her arms from her chest and let them drop to her sides.

[Brown Dynamite]

While Bliss and Ruby had chosen to attend to the delayed repairs of their ship, Roulette had sought the cantina.  Partly to make sure the Terrans didn't get themselves into trouble.  And partly, because it was a cantina.  You can't have a truly fun den of iniquity without a Zultasian in the mix he always said.  Despite whatever intentions he entered the cantina with, Roulette didn't actually have eyes on Jessie or Aquaria at the moment.

 

Instead he was heading for the bar.  It was simple conclusion.  Everyone went to a bartender in theses sorts of places for one of three reasons.  Alcohol, to bear their souls, or the most damning of all seeking information.  And right now, the Voidrunners could not afford to not get ahead of the info trail.  The plan was simple, grease the bartender to lie about having spotted Aquaria and Jessie as well as send word if someone came asking.  If they weren't already so close to their goal, he'd go the extra mile he'd bribe someone to keep their eye on the bartender too.

 

But, it wasn't as if anything was likely to go wrong at this point.  Unless Bliss managed to maim the mechanic, which was always a risk. 

[Gizmo]

Without hesitation - or what might have been advisable discretion - Nae-Dae scampered up to hop into the seat opposite the squirrely looking young woman, dropping her toolbox unceremoniously on the table with a thunk of metal. "Oy, crazy Terran girl! Don't be all crazy for a minute, yeh?" she requested, raising all four of her hands in a universal sign of lack of hostility. "Yer broodmate asked us to come grab you. Waddaya call, 'sister', like. Look like a clone t'me, but let's be straight, you Lor types gotta paint your hair all sorts of ways just to tell each other apart." Large, red eyes without pupils regarded Jessie curiously from within the Irreran's simian face while one of her hands waved in the direction of the bar and the rest of her crew. "Where's yer friend, with armour and the big murder stick? Star Knights wanna talk to her, too, no surprise there I bet, ha."

 

Scanning the crowd from beside Eclipse, Nae-Dae's partner caught the motion of dark blue fur and straightened to his full height to get a better look across the room. "Rock?"

[Electra]

Jessie watched the weird little alien with the same suspicious glare she was giving the rest of the bar, right up until it jumped into a chair with a loud clanking noise. She reared back in surprise, the metal spoon in her hand crumpling like marzipan as her fist clenched. It was hard to follow what the alien was saying, but Jessie had been getting some practice following Aquaria's sometimes bizarre trains of thought. Most humans looked the same to Aquaria. Jessie shifted in her chair so she was crouching instead of crosslegged. "We're not going with any Star Knights," she insisted in a low, threatening voice. "We're going home. And you better not touch my friend." 

[Fox]

Talisyn took a sip of her drink and hissed, drawing her lip back over her canine teeth as she let it burn its way down her throat. "Ooogh. That's vile. I might need to get a bottle of that before we leave. Speakin' of, worried we might've been stood up - we were supposed to meet some friends. Maybe you've seen--"

 

When Rock move her eyes slid sideways, first to glance at her crewmate with concern, and then to carefully follow his gaze without turning her head.

 

From behind all was well, but the bartender and her earthen companion could see a face with an expression so flat it threatened to go two-dimensional. "....please," she implored, barely audible over the din, "please tell me she didn't. No armoring up yet, please. If she fights, let her go, but not far; we need her to lead us to the other one."

[Avenger Assembled]

Aquaria padded her way through the crowd, tri-toed feet tactile and squishy against the metal deck, heading straight for Jessie. When she caught sight of Jessie's posture and body language, she hopped faster, her triple-fingered hands knotted in front of her as she landed next to Jessie. Her long, gangly limbs and muscular torso, outline clearly visible through the grey and green colors of the tight jumpsuit that was unmistakably Spectrum Knight armor in its resting state. She frowned at Nae-Dae with a mouth big enough to swallow the cantankerous mechanic's whole head, blinking big black and yellow eyes suspiciously. "Who are you," she demanded, "and what have you done to my friend?" She looked Jessie up and down and gasped, big sacs in her throat bulging wide, and demanded in a sudden bellow pitched deep bass by her massive throat, "Did you steal her shoes?!" 

[Gizmo]

Nae-Dae let out a high-pitched, chittering sound of agitated surprise as the amphibious Terran appeared, looking much more like a particularly fearsome predator from Irrera-8 than the starship mechanic would have liked to admit. "Gyah! What're you croaking about?! The frell would I do with shoes?!" Indeed, the unclad feet that came into view as she climbed up onto the back of her chair to perch at slightly closer to the angry frog's eye level weren't much different from the hands that grabbed her toolbox and held it at the ready like a miniature battering ram. "I said we're here to take you, didn't I? Stop being crazy!"

 

Across the room Rock ignored Eclipse's groans and reasoned planning to start toward the table. The blonde looked liable enough to take a swing at Nae-Dae but when the Spectrum Knight showed up the uneven pile of stones bellowed, "ROCK!" and began pushing his way through the crowd toward his little friend, knocking over tables, drinks and patrons as he went.

[Darksider42]

With the threat of rivals or Star Knights coming down on them at any moment, time was not on the Voidrunners side. Judging from the glare Ruby was giving technician, her patience was clearly not on his side. "I'm not falling for this scam. You gave me a quota after checking the systems along with the time it would take. Either your team does its job or you are going to have problems." Ruby told the technician. It was moments like this that made her want to try out her new rifle. Had mor epower and was cheaper to maintain that the nano pistol.

Ruby glanced at Bliss. "Better check on our passengers. I can take it from here." Ruby said. If those Terrans ran into any rival bounty hunters, they could run the risk of losing their payday. Even she doubted Roulette could keep an eye on them.

[Tiffany Korta]

Drinking in the atmosphere of the place Sitara had missed the initial contact with the two Terran’s, though it was impossible to missed when Rock started to make there way across the room. It didn’t take long for her to spot  Nae-Dae and put two and two together. Whilst she loved a good bar brawl as much as the next they couldn’t risk starting a fight with someone as unpredictable as this Spectrum Knight.

 

Whilst she could clear a path as easily as Rock she had many hours of weaving through crowd and managed to get to the table a little ahead of her ally. Normally she liked a little more time to plan but for now she’d have to improvise a little her.

“Hello there I think there might have been a bit of a misunderstanding here. Maybe I could help you come to something of an understanding?” hoping that these were the Terran she used her newly learned English, before repeating things in Galstandard so everyone had an idea of what she was doing.

[trollthumper]

Cavalier followed Eclipse's gaze, his eyes carrying over the tavern - and landing on one significant obstacle as he tried to follow to her objective. Wait a minute... Stahnze? Here? He tried to subdue a blush, remembering the incident at the Iridium Shore and the... aftermath thereof. Great, just what I need. Already walking a tight rope and he shows up. Hopefully, we can keep this from getting even more awkward--

 

And then his eyes fell on Jessie. And drifted soon afterwards to see Aquaria walking through the crowd. He could see the lines of energy around her. In a bar like this, with all the alcohol consumed, they could easily be mistaken for some new and terrifying breed of neon. But he knew what it was. The rubric for Star Knight-style armor. 

 

"Okay, both targets are here. Don't think we need to worry about leading. Do we do this here or --?"

 

And then Rock went surging through the crowd. 

 

"We do it here, then." He sighed as he felt the blaster coalesce in his hand. "There's no way this is going to end nicely, is there." 

[Electra]

As soon as the rock monster began shoving its way through the crowd, Jessie was off her chair and on her feet, shoving Aquaria behind her into what protection the corner offered. She picked up her chair with one effortless hand and smacked it sharply against the floor. It broke obediently into several pieces, leaving her holding a club made of one leg and most of the back. It wasn't much of a weapon, but she wielded it like she knew how to use it. "You don't touch my friend!" she shouted, not just at Sitara, but also at Nae Dae again, and most certainly at the rock creature, who still had most of her attention. She wasn't panicking and she wasn't checked out, not yet, but it was a very close thing right now. "Get the hell away from us!" 

[Avenger Assembled]

When she realized the trap she'd just walked into, Aquaria closed her giant eyes and called out in her mind to the gods below. She'd been thinking about what she would do in this moment since they first escaped from the Spectrum Knights - this moment she had known was coming once she understood the size of the forces arrayed against them. You can't fight all the stars. Only the wrong ones. She opened her eyes, but the words of a prayer echoed in her mind. 

 

Through the sky above, I gain strength.

 

"Everything I touch turns to pain. My pod. My spawn. My home. My friend," she croaked mournfully, even as her armor crackled to life with searing green energy, catching Ruby's eyes as she hustled to join the melee brewing in the cantina. She'd seen what Aquaria's armor looked like powered up, and it was powered up now, energy crackling around her in a shape that was neither Star Knight armor nor Deep One battle regaila - but something married to both. 

 

"Jessie didn't do anything to you monsters," she hissed, a dangerous rattle in her deeply-chested voice, double tridents crackling in her hands, the twin weapons of a Deep One flaring to life in searing verdigris energy that somehow felt natural even to her dark-adapted eyes. "All she wanted to do was go home." The last words were a choked sob even through Aquaria's amphibious mouth, the homes she'd known, and lost, flashing through her mind.  

 

Through the sea below, I gain power.

Through Dagon, I gain victory.

Through Hydra, my chains are broken.

 

"I'm the one you want! It's me!" The last was a bellow, a warrior's cry from the depths of the deep - the cry of the monster that these monsters thought she was. Jessie standing in front of her in a murderous rage didn't help the impression she was giving - but she was trying her best. 

 

The One Below shall free me.

 

And then, Aquaria Innsmouth did what she did best. She ran away - she leaped forty feet into the air, an impossibly high jump in this gravity save for those long, gangly legs that on closer inspection bulged with massive muscles suitable for powering a Lor-sized body through the ocean. She landed on the window of the upper tier, acutely aware that Surfacers wouldn't drown themselves in the cold ocean of space, and yelled, fear and anger in her voice entirely unlike the monster she'd once seemed to be. "Sister,  I can't swim these waters without you! RUN!" before she skittered along the wall, suckered hands flipping noisily, and disappeared into the upper reaches of the cantina's second level, past the eagerly watching crowd as she bolted out the door on the upper tier! 

 

[TheAbsurdist]

 

Bliss look to Ruby for a moment, then she made a clicking and chittering sound of her native tongue, Ruby knew it was a swear without her translator.  At this point she knew precisely which one it was, as it seemed to be Bliss' favorite.  She then wheeled on the technician, "You!  I find find you and space you if your avarice harmed my charges!"  While seemingly a casual threat, she meant it sincerely despite it being a rather horrific way to end someone. Then she turned and leaped through the door back towards the concourse.  The tendrils shot out to grab the ample holds, and she was swing and darting along the surfaces towards the cantina, and Roulette and the others.

 

Despite her aggressive behavior, she was more planning on grabbing her teammate and their passengers, and then running.  Fortunately Aquaria smelled distinctive among the throngs of other races, and the former gladiatrix moved above them as fast as she could.

[Tiffany Korta]

Well this was getting interesting real fast! As much as she was tempted to just stun everyone and sort things out latter she couldn’t react quick enough before trouble arrived. Holding her arms out so not to look to threatening she spoke to Jessie in a calm reassuring voice.

 

“If you run now it’s never going to stop, you’ll going to have to keep running forever. Let me help you, help both of you, and we’ll get you back home safely.”

It was a gamble if she’d choose not to run, but it was something that was worth trying at least.

[Fox]

Eclipse didn't speak whatever stupid language the Terrans were using, but she knew body language. When the green one armored up and bolted, she hissed out something sour that translated poorly into an epithet about broken eggs, shoving herself off the bar and dashing after their quarry as fast as she could without being able to climb walls. "Oh, for - all of this for the one we aren't really after! Someone tell the pink one that we don't care if she goes home. I'll take her there myself if I've gotta! Tell her her sister's waiting, and that Charlie misses her! Get her to calm her friend down before she does something that'll make things worse for her!"

 

Her matte metal tail flicked out of her cloak behind her, curving to help her keep her balance as she dashed out the cantina, trying to keep an eye on Aquaria.