2123/Stranger on a Strange Planet

Stranger on a Strange Planet
Date of Scene:	29 April 2015
Location:	Faraway Galaxy <FG>
Synopsis:	Juno Eclipse meets with a very much out-of-place Cast mercenary, Cas, in the crowded spaceport of Mos Eisley.
Cast of Characters:	277, 428

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Juno Eclipse (428) has posed:
A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away... or maybe not so far away, or not so long ago... two suns bear down on a desert planet with an intensity that nears the physical, like a tangible weight against the beings that live in that place. Somehow, native peoples and immigrants have managed to scratch out an existence out of Tattooine's sand, managing to find ways to shrug off the murderous heat of Tattoo One and Tattoo Two, the dustball's twin suns.

The major spaceport of Mos Eisley is a common travel destination within the galaxy, and there are things here for just about everyone. Flights arrive and depart regularly. Goods of all sorts can be purchased here. Mechanics offer their services to fix up starships. Cantinas offer both water and things harder still, and the ones with the greatest variety are the most successful. There's even several podracing tracks, with regular showings in spite of the sport's banning under Imperial law, with plenty of betting revolving around the high-speed sport.

It's in one of these cantinas that a certain Imperial pilot has slouched into, seeking relief from the horrible sun – only she's not dressed as an Imperial today, but disguised as the mercenary 'Blackout,' with clothing more suitable for the desert heat – although she looks like she wishes she could be rid of the leather jacket.

At the moment the pilot is slumped against the counter, drowning out her heatstroke with a tall glass of water. A datapad is on the counter beside her, with a list of mechanical parts glowing on its screen.

Cas (277) has posed:
The light of the twin suns is something that she can say that, for a fact, she is not used to... but Tattooine is a planet like the one she was born on, cut her teeth on, and eventually left. While she may call the residence of Fate T. Harlaown he home, and while she has expressed a desire to align herself with the Time-Space Administration Bureau, the Cast known as Cas still finds herself carrying out the occasional piece of contract work– some taking her halfway across space, and the multiverse.

According to her internal chronometer, her flight from the planet isn't leaving for another couple of hours. Her work is complete, too, so... there's not too much for her to do, otherwise.

That is when she darkens the lower half of the doorway in the Mos Eisley cantina: A slight figure barely five feet tall in the thick padding of metal-armored boots tall enough to disappear under the hem of a weathered survival cloak that slips around her wiry frame like a hug. The hood is pulled up only partway, revealing the majority of a sleek, stylized helmet with a smooth reflective visor hiding her eyes.

The helmet has ... a slightly cat-like motif, with small peaks high on the crown of the head. Stopping at the bar of the cantina, she pulls it off and gives her head a slight airing-out toss from side to side, silvery hair rolling about before her unnaturally blue eyes look up at the bartender. Then, in a calm, confident voice with a slightly metallic ring to it, she places her order:

"Green tea. With milk."

A second passes, then she adds, "Twelve sugars."

Juno Eclipse (428) has posed:
What seems like a female mercenary nearly drowses over her datapad readouts, waiting for the water she's been drinking to slowly come back to her system. Tattooine is not for the faint of heart, those who have lived most of their lives on some form of starship or another; those who are accustomed to fixed temperatures and dry, recycled air, or the lack of day and night.

All of the other factors, Juno could have dealt with, but the high temperature and brutal ultraviolet are non-negotiable. No amount of willpower can help someone cope with those, and the effects are devastating on her body. She wasn't raised in a climate like this. Even if she had lived all her life on the surface of some planet or another, it wouldn't have prepared her for this, the full fury of Tattooine's binary stars.

'Green tea. With milk. Twelve sugars.'

The bizarre order earns a blink from the Imperial pilot. Juno finds herself looking over in curiosity at who would order something like that in a place like this, where water and harder things are more customary.

A girl. A slightly odd girl, with silver hair and eyes that are too blue, more intense even than her own clear blue. She feels her brow furrowing in puzzlement.

"You're not from around here, are you?" It's a slightly dubious question, spoken in the clipped, precise tones of a Core Worlds accent. That much she has difficulty hiding, but at least she isn't wearing Imperial black. Her welcome in this world wouldn't have been very welcome, then. "Most people in Mos Eisley order water to rehydrate. Or they order booze, to help themselves forget the heat."

Cas (277) has posed:
The sound of Juno's voice draws the girl's attention; the form of her cloak offers little to what she wears beneath save small glimpses– the height of her boots, a hint of bare thigh, and her arms are certainly armored with gauntlets and gloves that may certainly stand up to measure with Imperial Stormtrooper plastoids. Cas' large unnatural blue eyes lid once, then she looks down at the counter– which isn't far, for her height– then toward the floor.

"Water is fine," she says, looking up through a messy curtain of silvery-gray hair. Cas sets about slipping her arm underneath the cloak a bit further, pulling the helmet seemingly toward the small of her back as she steps up to sit on the stool adjacent Juno, but after an odd hissing noise the shape of the helmet is no longer there... and her hands emerge to adjust the position of the survival cloak so she isn't sitting on it.

"... No, I am not... f-from around here," she says after a moment. Though she's gotten far with her speech impediment since living with Fate, there's still a long road to move ahead. "The Gurhal system."

Despite how calm the young girl seems to be, there are still hallmarks of training– the way she seems acutely alert of what is behind her, even if her back is to the door, for one. The rapid tic of her eyes from one face to the next at and along the cantina counter, from bartenders and reputable patrons to the bounty hunting scum accosting the jizzbox looking for free music.

She does pause when she catches sight of a togruta's crests, though. She wasn't expecting to see something like that around here.

When the glass comes, her hand slips out from under the cloak again– this time with a few local Credits to pay for it. "The heat is not ... that bad. ... I do not think."

Juno Eclipse (428) has posed:
"Gurhal?" Juno frowns thoughtfully, sifting through her memories and her formidable astrogation knowledge for a system like that. Despite all that she knows from her personal navigation, though, that name isn't familiar. "No, I haven't heard of it. Either it must be a multiversal system, or it's something that fell off the navcomputer charts." The last is given in a wry, almost sour tone. Since the advent of the multiverse, pinning down correct astrogation has gotten a bit more difficult; navcomputers are in constant need of updating and uprading to account for newly-unified systems and the shuffle of the Void.

Juno offers a slightly sympathetic smile. "Sorry. I don't get out of this galactic system too often. I'd like to visit some time, though. I like to see new places."

The Cast girl is eyed somewhat speculatively, lingering in particular over that headpiece, and those fantastically blue eyes. Neither does she miss the way those eyes seem to be in every place of potential significance at once; constantly flicking and analysing and dismissing faces as cantina patrons come and go.

Juno knows that look. She's worn it herself in allegedly neutral operations, when she's been forced to conceal her Imperial allegiance.

"Have a seat." She pats the stool next to her. "Actually, it is, but I'm only human. I won't pry, but I can see you're probably not. I don't think I've ever seen anyone with eyes that blue, anyway." She offers a faint smile. "They're pretty." The expression fades. "But they're not really natural. Neither is silver hair, and you don't strike me as someone old enough to start going grey."

Leaning back and sliding her datapad aside, deactivating it with a casual flick of one finger over its screen, she turns on her stool to regard Cas more directly; thoughtfully. The glass of water is taken in hand and held to one temple. Nice and cool.

"Most of the time this place is pretty miserable hot. I actually don't like deserts that much, but I've got some business that's going to keep me here for another day or two." Juno shrugs, nonchalant. "You know how it goes. Anyway, what's your name? I'm..." She hesitates; looking almost torn for a moment. When she smiles the expression is distinctly apologetic. "Well, I guess my name's not really important. You can call me 'Blackout.' What can I call you?"

Cas (277) has posed:
For all the neutral calm that she has, she wasn't expecting to be called pretty in any slant of the imagination. Her cheeks take on a slight shade of pink through the curtain of grey, and she breaks eye contact long enough to shift on the seat next to Blackout and take a quick drink of water– something to clear her head and take herself back down to an even keel.

Once she's had a chance to drink, she sets the glass back down, hands folding on her lap. "Cas," she says, smoothly and naturally. It's a far cry from the name she was assigned at 'birth'– Unit 729– but it's the name that she chose for herself. "A-And you are correct," she says, not quite making eye contact again. "I am a Cast. A– a synthetic humanoid, of a sort," she says, trying to explain it a little more clearly.

"The deserts of the third planet are... much like this. However, there is more ..." Cas starts, taking a moment– from the look on her face, she's trying to very carefully choose her words before attempting to speak them... that, or she just has trouble speaking them at all. "... variance. Tundra zones. Climate extremes. ... the wildlife."

Unclasping the cloak, Cas slips it off her shoulders and draws the length of the garment out straight, across an arm and folding it with a great deal of care and precision before laying it across her lap. Now, it all paints a much clearer picture– a lightly armored leotard of sorts, with padding and armor twining up her arms and shoulders. Segments of it faintly glow pale blue along distinctly formed channels and markers of her armor– and no sign of the helmet, even now... not even a blaster, sword, or knife, at that.

And by god the clips in her hair seem to relax away from her skull for a moment.

"Heard of other nice planets here. Co... Corellia? ... Yes. Unfortunately, I am heading home. Do not have time to visit. Maybe next time."

Juno Eclipse (428) has posed:
Juno hides the half-smile she can't stifle behind a hand, disguising the expression by rubbing at the lower half of her face, as though she were marshalling her thoughts. Apparently people aren't in the habit of complimenting the Cast, because there's no mistaking the beginnings of a blush, there. "Hm." She'll be nice and not draw attention to that, though.

"Oh, so you're some kind of droid, then?" There's a flicker of disappointment, even wariness, but... Cas is convincing enough, and obviously not trying to kill Juno, so the pilot forces herself to relax. HK-47 this girl is not, nor is she the deceptive politeness coupled with attempted murder that is PROXY. Granted, she had never appeared on PROXY's target list yet, but that doesn't mean she trusts him not to flip his programming and target her someday.

Maybe she's a little paranoid, but paranoia goes a long way towards survival.

"Huh. In the same planet? Makes sense. I haven't looked up an extensive history of Tattooine, but I imagine the only reason it's such an unmitigated desert is because there are two suns trying to cook it from the outside in." Juno rubs at her jaw one last time, letting her hand drop to the counter, grinning half a grin. "Guess it's probably well-done to overcooked, by now."

She watches as the cloak is unclasped and so meticulously folded, regarding the outfit thoughtfully. If, indeed, that leotard is clothing and not simply part of the Cast's chassis. It's hard to tell with some droids. That pale glowing is interesting, though, and reminds her of PROXY's holoemitters, and–

–those clips just moved. Juno blinks a bit, squinting briefly at them. Fascinating.

"Corellia? That's right. It's a Core World," Juno reports, in that clipped, neat accent of hers. "It's a bit crowded for my tastes, but I hear it's a nice destination. I've only been there once or twice on official business." The pilot gestures nebulously, to indicate the cantina. "A lot better than this place, anyway. Tattooine isn't usually high on my list of priorities."

Cas (277) has posed:
There are a select few that can manage to pull a blush from the girl, and Juno can now count herself amongst that number! Though Fate tends to do it just because.

From the form and give as Cas reaches out to take another drink, it doesn't seem like the cloth is part of her body– and there is very little indication of skin-seams or robotic parts on what skin is shown. A closer look at her head might yield the round pods that cover where her ears should be, and the clips– well, the clips, those are just a weird thing.

"'Droid' is ... inaccurate. The truth is much more... complex than that. We are more machine than cyborg. But... it is difficult to properly explain. There are organic components to our design. We eat. We drink. We breathe," she says. "Lot of history."

Five hundred bloody years of history.

"Admittedly it would not be... mine, either. Here on work. Like you, I... I guess."

After taking another drink of water, she glances at Juno with a look of seriousness. "Would not call other Casts 'droids,' i-if you meet them. Is an insult."

Juno Eclipse (428) has posed:
The decidedly human blue eyes study the Cast, taking in every little detail, hypothesising how it is she must function and how the construction of her chassis must account for that kind of incredible realism, how sophisticated those mechanisms must be that she can move an entire arm without a sound, and–

"Hunh." Despite what might seem a disappointed sound, it's more of an interested and thoughtful sound. Although something as horrifically complicated as cloning technology exists, nobody has quite reached the point of being able to stuff a consciousness into a machine. At least, not in the same sense that some worlds play so casually with the concept, and certainly not in the half-and-half sense that Cas seems to imply.

Then again, neither are droids completely without some undeniable spark of their own; some kind of essence. PROXY might be limited by his own programming, but it wouldn't be fair of her to call him without a soul. He has personality and quirks all his own, memories and goals and preferences, and while he is limited by his programming, it isn't quite fair to say that it defines him, either.

Yet this... this is different, too. But, she decides, it doesn't make this Cas any less of a person. Simply a different way of functioning than organic beings.

"I guess I can understand that." Juno tilts her head, studying Cas thoughtfully. "Lots of history to organic beings, here, but also lots of history for the droids we've built, too. It's not really fair to call them soulless, I think. I've worked with them enough to know they're people, too. So it doesn't really matter what you are, when it comes down to it, I think." She smiles, encouragingly. "You're a person, too, just like me."

"I'll keep that in mind, though, thanks. It's not really an insult here. Droids know what they are. I think they take comfort in that simplicity. Life is pretty binary for a lot of them. Black and white. Correct and incorrect." She gestures, nebulously, with her glass of water. "I wish life were that simple, sometimes, but I guess it's that variety that keeps things interesting, you know?"

Cas (277) has posed:
There are a few half-truths she's telling– her design is more organic than others. Her design has less seams. Her design was meant for infiltration rather than a general-purpose design. The stores she could tell go on and on for days, but instead, she just allows the corners of her mouth to quirk up with the smallest of of smiles– it's not much, but it seems like the blue-eyed girl is trying.

"Yes. Very interesting. More variety than I thought," she says drinking from the glass of water. Her touch on the surface of the glass is soft and gentle, and despite the idea of her being machine to any extent, there's no audible or visible strain on the stool at all.

The clips nestled in her hair tilt forward for a moment before settling, almost as though they were attempting to sample the dry air of the cantina– if not the dry heat of Tattooine itself. "But the heat seems to be the same no matter where I go."

It's hard to say if she meant that as a joke or an honest observation.

Juno Eclipse (428) has posed:
"Every place has variety. It's why I like exploring new worlds. The variety is fascinating, even a little mind-boggling." Juno sketches a nebulous gesture with the splayed fingers of one hand, as though to indicate some great and vast expanse. "Every place, every culture, has a story to tell. It never gets old, to me. I love that almost as much as I love piloting."

She blinks somewhat owlishly at the sight of those clips moving again, like the ears of a cat. They look almost cat-like in their bearing. It's also a little unsettling, in a subtle sense.

"Heat? I'm told it's different, that the shade is less oppressive, but I've yet to see any evidence of that." Juno smiles a dry, almost mirthless smile at that. "Inside or outside is just as hot, to me, and shade or sun is just as miserable. I'll be happy to get off this dustball when it's time for me to go. I prefer cooler climates than this, although I'm sure a lot of people would say that." Juno wobbles one hand in a noncommittal gesture. "Saying 'other places are cooler than Tattooine' is like saying 'the ocean is kind of wet.'"

She drains her water, setting the empty glass aside. "What brings you here, if I can ask?"

Cas (277) has posed:
There is a short moment when Cas looks legitimately confused. She isn't much of a linguist; she can speak most forms of basic language pretty well even if she hasn't gotten a full hang of Neudaizese on her own home plane, but she looks worried she may have missed something. "But the ocean is very wet," the girl says owlishly.

Cas looks at the glass as it's set down, but she doesn't remark on what's left of her own– nor does she drain the glass to the speed that Juno does her own. "P-Private courier," she simply says, though from the look of her there isn't much in the way of pockets on that outfit. "For hire, of course."

"Get to travel. See things. People. Like you," she replies, seeming much more positive in her regard of Blackout right now. "Very interesting galaxy. Dangerous, maybe. B-But it is part of ... the job."

Juno Eclipse (428) has posed:
Juno looks over at the poor bewildered Cast, and for a moment she almost looks surprised that her words had been taken so literally... but the girl is something like a droid. That much is evidently clear; even if her body is so convincingly organic, her mind is not.

"Oh. Oh, no, I'm sorry." She can't help but smile, but at least it's not patronising. "It's a phrase. That's the whole point; see, drawing such attention to how obvious the heat with a humourous analogy that's just as obvious." She reaches out, very carefully, and pats Cas on the shoulder. "It isn't a big deal."

Mention of courier earns a bit of a blink, although Juno seems disinclined to inquire too deeply about that lack of pockets or satchels. Maybe she's carring some kind of data. It wouldn't be unheard of, but the bottom line is that it's none of her business, and Cas' vagueness confirms it.

"Don't worry about it too much. I understand needing to be vague." Juno's smile is again somewhat apologetic. "I can't really be very forthcoming, myself. I don't really like that, but it is what it is."

Reaching into a pocket, she leaves a few galactic credits on the counter, before hopping off her stool and stretching. "I'll have to keep you in mind if I need anything transferred or delivered. My work takes me around the galaxy, too, but I don't always have time to make extra stops."

"I should be going, though. I've got work to do, too, and it's not going to do itself." Juno grins, offering a friendly sort of wave. "It was nice to meet you, Cas. Be seeing you. I hope we meet each other again."

With that, provided the Cast doesn't move to stop her, the Imperial pilot will stroll on out the cantina's doors, back into the blinding desert heat.