Jason

Jason grunted as the other Protector's fist connected with his helmet. He staggered back but was pushed back forward by one of the other Protectors. He'd gotten into a fistfight with one of the pilots from Skull Squadron, so now all of the pilots from Skull Squadron and all of the pilots from Hound Squadron, Jason's group, were in a circle around Jason and the other pilot. He was a newer guy, which was evident from the fact that he'd chosen to pick a fight with Jason.

"C'mon, Rau!" The new guy, Ellis, if Jason remembered correctly, yelled as he raised his fists. Jason cracked his neck as he raised his fists as well. He'd been letting Ellis think he had the upper hand. Admittedly, he was pretty good, but his overconfidence was going to bite him in the shebs soon enough. Ellis swung, and Jason blocked with his vambrace. Jason tkicked for Ellis' side. Ellis grabbed Jason's ankle, but Jason had expected this. He pushed off the ground with his other foot, twisted his body, and kicked Ellis in the helmet with his free foot. Ellis grunted as he let go of Jason, allowing him to land on his feet. The Protectors let out a mixture of cheers and jeers.

"What the hell was that?" Ellis asked.

"A trick my sister taught me," Jason said as he squared himself up to his opponent again. Ellis shouted as he charged to tackle Jason. Jason braced himself and stepped forward, driving his pauldron into Ellis' cuirass. Jason wasn't fazed, but Ellis staggered away. While he had a short moment, Jason glanced at the chronometer on the HUD in his helmet. He had a meeting with someone soon, so it was time he wrapped this up.

"Well, this has been fun," he said as he blocked Ellis' kick, "but I bet we all have places to be." He swiftly spun around and kicked Ellis squarely on his cuirass, knocking him onto his back. Ellis scrambled to his feet, but as soon as he was up, Jason lunged forward and jabbed at his side, which was unprotected. Ellis groaned and tried to throw another punch, but Jason caught it without batting an eye, twisted his wrist until it snapped, and then bashed his head into Ellis'. As Ellis staggered back, Jason punched him in the stomach. Ellis doubled over to the ground, and Jason turned to walk away. An uproar of cheers arose from Hound Squadron as they broke the ring to let Jason out.

"Nice going, Jason," the Hound Squadron commander, Varus Mereel, said as he stepped into stride next to Jason. He gave Jason's jetpack back to him, seeing as he'd taken it off during the scuffle. "You made him throw up in his helmet."

"He was asking for it when he started dissing Clan Kryze," Jason said with a shrug. "He said we were pushovers, I had to represent." He exhaled and locked his jetpack on his backplate. "I'm gonna go for a fly-around." He didn't wait for a response before he sparked up his jetpack and shot into the air.

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If there was one thing Jason enjoyed more than flying his Fang Fighter, it was flying with his jetpack. His Fang Fighter was very fast, but the thrill he felt in the cockpit wasn't quite the same as when his body shot through canyons at around ninety kilometers per hour with nothing to hold on to. He and Thalia were pretty much opposites in that regard. She hated heights and rarely used her jetpack while Jason used his every chance he got.

He approached a hill that was almost ten kilometers away from the airfields. He lowered himself and landed smoothly, which was something that came from years of practice. He looked to the sky that was eternally dusk to see a G9 Rigger-class freighter approaching. It was painted a few shades of brown and grey with a few bronze/gold highlights. Painted on the front, below the viewport, was a bronze krayt dragon head. The outrigger under the hull of the ship folded upwards as the landing gear extended. It rotated in midair so that the large cargo door was facing him. It landed, causing the hydraulics in the landing gear to hiss, and the engines powered down. The cargo door opened a moment later, revealing a humanoid that was grinning ear to ear. Pretty much anyone who saw him would have thought he was a regular human, but Jason knew otherwise. His blood was scarlet, not crimson, and that made him a Kiffar. He had short, curly black hair, brown eyes, and an orange bar tattooed across the bridge of his nose and an orange triangle on each of his cheekbones. He had a pair of mechanic's goggles hanging around his neck and he wore a brown flight suit that was smeared with grease.

"Hey, Jason!" He said enthusiastically as Jason rocketed up to enter the cargo bay, completely ignoring the ramp.

"Leonid," Jason said. "I take it work has been good for you?"

"Very good!" Leonid said as he put a hand on Jason's back and guided him into the ship. The cargo hold was, for once, empty. They climbed up the ladder to the upper deck. Jason glanced through an open doorway on his right. In most G9s, this room would be an infirmary, but Leonid had repurposed it into a workshop. In it was a GNK droid with a full brown paint job sitting in the corner. It was modified to have arms that only pivot at the shoulder.

"Hey, Buford!" Leonid said. "Bring out the refreshments!"

"GONK," Buford vocalized as he stood back up and waddled across the workshop. Leonid continued into the cockpit, and Jason followed. They sat down in the pilot and copilot seats respectively and Jason removed his helmet.

"What do I have to thank for this visit?" Jason asked as he took his glasses out of his utility belt and put them on. At that moment, Buford waddled in holding a tray with mugs and a pot of some sort of dark caffeinated beverage.

"Can a guy not visit his bro once in a while?" Leonid asked as he poured some of the dark colored liquid into a glass.

"Good point," Jason said as Leonid offered him the glass. He took a sip. It was piping hot and bitter. "Where's this coffee from?"

"Haruun Kal," Leonid said. "The beans have to be processed just right to get some of the caffeine out, otherwise a few sips will make your heart beat so fast that it'll crush itself." Jason almost dropped his mug, but Leonid's relaxed demeanor told him that these were processed right.

"That's what I'd expect of coffee from Haruun Kal," Jason said. He could already feel his pulse hastening. "How bad are the crashes?"

"Pretty bad," Leonid grinned, taking another sip. "They hit you out of nowhere. The other day, I was fixing something in the workshop. Next thing I knew, I was waking up on the floor with Buford and Festus staring at me. Speaking of that bucket of bolts," he turned toward the door. "Festus!" Leonid called. An instant later, a C1 unit came rolling into the cockpit. It had bronze plating and its ocular sensors were glowing red. The sounds it was producing was a mixture of chirps and clicks. "Show Jason what you got."

Festus clicked as he rolled back a bit and began to project a hologram. It seemed to be a map of a coastal city. Half of it was on land and the other half was on walkways standing above the water and docks.

"I take it that this isn't just 'a guy visiting his bro?'" Jason inquired as he examined the hologram. A few buildings and landing bays were highlighted red. Orange dotted lines made a few circuits in the vicinities of these buildings and also connected the red landing bays with the red buildings. The red buildings weren't necessarily close to each other above ground, but there was a network of red tunnels connecting them underground.

"Well, this time I'm not asking you for anything. Your friend still has a vendetta against the Hutt Cartel, right?" Leonid asked. Jason nodded. "Well, you didn't hear this from me, but they're trying to establish some sort of control on Glee Anselm. Right now they're in the early phases, which means they're not as heavily defended."

"Which also means that kicking their shebs out of the system wouldn't be too difficult," Jason said as he continued to examine the map.

"How'd you get all this?"

"I ran a job for them," Leonid said as if it were both obvious and not a big deal. Jason peered at him over his glasses. "What? I gotta fuel the ship and feed myself somehow! Besides, I checked. The most illegal thing I was carrying was a crate of thermal detonators. It was mostly rations and stuff like that."

"Alright," Jason conceded, "but that still doesn't explain how you have an outline of their operation."

"Simple," Leonid said. "Festus plugged into one of their terminals while me and Bufford were unloading the crates." Festus warbled and clicked in satisfaction. "Yeah, good job, buddy."

"I expect you have a datatape with all of this?" Jason asked. Leonid grinned as he pat Festus on the head. Festus shuddered for a moment before ejecting a disc from one of the slots on his torso. Leonid took it out and offered it to Jason. As Jason reached for it, Leonid brought it out of his reach. "What?"

"I don't want this to come back and bite me," Leonid said. "You know the Hutts. They hold grudges."

"And you have friends among the Mandalorians," Jason reasoned. "Even the Hutts aren't stupid enough to fight us."

"Touche," Leonid said. He handed the disc to Jason. "Have fun with that."

"I probably won't be the one having fun, but I know who will," Jason said as he pocketed the disc. He cracked his knuckles. "Now, let's see how your Holochess game has improved."

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Another thing I'd like to mention moving forward: unless otherwise stated, assume that characters are speaking their native language if they are speaking to other members of their race/culture (for example, Mandalorians speaking Mando'a when there's only other Mandalorians around)