trans_9 | Taverns are something every good universe should have

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Taverns are something every good universe should have

Having seen more of the 'Verse than most people would dream possible in his rather eventful life, Mal had also been a patron of just about every type of drinking establishment there was. From upscale Core World bars to shacks out on the very Rim held together with mud and prayers, it was very likely Mal had at least stepped into it for a drink, and possibly a nice fight. Bars and Taverns were where you could learn a great deal about a person, just by watching how much they chose to abandon their own restrictions and self control in the presence of others. They were also where there was information, business deals, and new contacts to be found, all present in one neat central location, one that many communities revolved around. Whenever he stopped in a new port of call, Mal always made sure to pay the bar a visit sooner rather than later.

Of course, with all his experience with watering holes, he had to admit that the Drunken Dragon was something very new. On the surface it could almost be mistaken for a Rim world bar, with its rough and almost primitive design motif, almost comical dragon decoration, and lack of all the da bian luxuries the Alliance insisted marked them as civilized. Mal had been in enough of those dives, however, to realize that the Dragon was far more well maintained than most of them could afford to be, and that the design itself was not the result of a hodgepodge of whatever materials they could scrounge. It looked more like something out of an ancient Earth That Was picture book. Setting foot inside, Mal took the time to survey the layout of the place, memorizing the locations of all the tables, staff, and exits just in case he needed to leave in a hurry.

Not that he expected to have to do so, given Kaylee and Wash's assurances about the respect the patrons paid the owner of the tavern, but old habits died hard, and if he let them die then he expected he would soon follow. Still, it seemed like he'd arrived a bit early, and with time to spare before the person he was meeting arrived he made his way across the tavern to a place where he could sit with his back to the wall and watch the door. Of course, once he sat he needed a moment to get used to the fit of his suit, as he had for the past few days. He was rather glad the ship had seen fit to save the coat that was a symbol of his continued defiance against the now dead Alliance, but he had to wonder if it would have really hurt to save his pants and shirt too.

[OOC:This thread is mostly for if characters who Mal had arraigned to meet for drinks at the tavern, but if you want to thread with him feel free to have a character run into him while he's waiting. Individual threads can be set at different times too.]

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"You're going to laugh, because everyone always does, but they were after some metal or mineral or sciencey junk called Unobtanium. Yeah, they really called it that. Had us flying missions in deep jungle to lay blasting charges so we could strip mine the stuff out from under the Na'vi's land."

Her smile turned crooked, edged with old regrets. This was why she didn't like talking about Pandora. "They weren't too happy with us coming in and vandalizing the real estate. Apparently the science rocks were a miracle fuel that'd last for decades, but to the Na'vi they were just shiny rocks that we were blowing up the jungle for. Hence the bows and arrows."

Mal made an honest effort not to laugh. Really he did. Like a lot of his honest efforts, it fell through. "Unobtanium? Please tell me it wasn't named by the same idiot who came up with Pandora, I refuse to believe that much stupid is possible concentrated in one person."

The laughter died as Trudy started talking more about what had actually happened on that planet, though given what Mal knew of human nature putting the pieces together wasn't all that hard. The regret in Trudy's eyes said it all, the same regret he'd seen in plenty of eyes over the years, especially the ones in the mirror. Different worlds, different universes, but the same story every time.

"Can't really blame 'em. Folks tend to get a might touchy when their home starts getting burned to the ground to make way for the march of progress and civilization." There was no keeping the edge out of his voice, not when the situation so very closely mirrored his own. Everywhere he looked there were people just trying to live their lives as best they could, and plenty of others trying to take those lives away 'for their own good.' Still, a stiff shot of drink washed out the rising fire in his belly, and he reminded himself that a man who'd made the choices he'd made to stay free didn't really have the right to start condemning others for theirs. Especially not when Trudy did not have the look of a good little soldier just following orders.

Softening his words and manner, Mal gave his own slightly broken smile back. "I take it that the job itself didn't turn out to be quite what you'd initially signed up for, did it? Had more than a few jobs like that myself."

She shrugged helplessly at his laughter - it was ridiculous and she knew it. "Squints, who can understand them?"

It wasn't until he kept talking that she realized he was more interested in her than the moon that she got quiet, fingers moving restlessly on her mug. There were still some things she hadn't made peace with about Pandora. "I'll be honest, private security wasn't what I was expecting. In the Marines, you know, it's simpler. You at least kind of have an idea you can trust the guy who's promoted over you." She looked down at the table. "I flew a lot of missions I'm not proud of and shot at a lot of natives who had a lot more right to be shooting at me."

She took another drink. Maybe she was taking it a little fast, but she didn't really like discussing this. She knew why Mal was asking, and it was the same reason she was telling him - she ran the first line of defense on the ship, and what's more, she was responsible for the life of one of his crew members. He had to know he could trust her. She just hoped he was a forgiving kind of man.

Mal was silent for a long time once Tracy finished talking, seemingly lost in thought as he stared into his drink. Her own situation hit painfully close to home, because however cold Mal had managed to make himself, at least in his mind, he still was far from proud of what he had been reduced to in order to survive. How many people had been hurt by the jobs he and his crew had pulled? Sure, he had managed to draw the line on occasion, not taking medical supplies from the dying, not stealing from those with nothing, but still, he did not allow himself to think beyond that, because it was the only way for him to survive.

Much like Trudy had done.

"We make it through the war, it's the real world we can't always survive," he recited finally, as if quoting someone. Looking up, he met her eyes steadily with a shrug. "Been a criminal a long time myself, and I don't have much ground to stand on when it comes to lording my moral superiority. Can't say I necessarily approve of taking from those defending their home, but something tells me you aren't the type to do it on your own, and I suspect there are more than a few folks out there looking to put a bullet in me for the trouble I brought them."

Holding up his mug, as if in an offering of peace, he toasted, "To surviving with something resembling standards intact."

"To sticking to our principles," Trudy agreed, raising her mug to clink it against Mal's. "In the end I told my CO to go screw himself and defected, but it's funny the things you can overlook when you've got a fat paycheck coming in twice a month."

She took a long drink after that toast - and there was that out of the way. Now he knew a little bit about what kind of person she was, and she knew a little bit about him as well. "Wash mentioned something about freelance," she said. "I take it that was his way of saying that a lot of what your crew got up to was less than legal. Takes a special kind of man to hold a crew together on those kind of ventures. Usually more interested in profit than cohesion, but Wash called you Captain even when you weren't around to hear him."

She didn't have to come right out and say that seeing that kind of loyalty made her want to get to know the man who inspired it better. The interest in her eyes said enough.

"Person's gotta eat. Gotta keep the heat on. Gotta keep their crew paid. Last time I checked, all those things require a paycheck." He flashed a grin that was distinctly roguish. "Doesn't mean I can't admire a woman who knows when and how to properly tell someone to to screw off."

Drinking to the toast as was proper, Mal did feel just the slightest bit better about his place on this ship. In his experience, people with power were very rarely to be trusted further than they could be thrown, but here at least one of those people had been where he had, slogging through the mud and blood and a life of gray, but had come out the other end still able to feel for those outside herself. He wasn't ever going to be itching to sign on as a proper crew member, but he had a feeling he could work with someone like Trudy.

"Wash has a way of putting things, often a long and rambling one. We do jobs. Some of them are perfectly legitimate, and some less so. I take a job, I do the job, I get paid for the job. Long as my ships fueled and my crew fed, not much more I'm looking for in life." He saw that interest, and it made him feel slightly uncomfortable, though he hid that well. Sometimes people got to seeing him as something better than he was, as someone more than a man who worked as best he could and lived as best he was allowed. They seemed to see the man he'd tried to be during the war, back when he'd believed someone could actually make a difference.

In Trudy's personal experience, no matter how far someone's life changed away from what shaped them, they were always that person. Maybe they didn't believe in lying to themselves to feel better anymore, but Trudy hadn't let her honor escape her after she retired from the Marines, and she was pretty sure Mal still had some shiny principles of his own.

Not that she was going to say that out loud. If he wanted to play the hard-edged Captain of a smuggling boat, she wasn't going to point out how badly it fit on him. Her mother had at least taught her that many manners. So she grinned at his compliment and changed the subject. "I imagine the Ohm aren't the only things you want to know about here. I can at least tell you that yes, we get paid. Sometimes we even get shore leave so we can spend our pay. Stacy might grab us without much warning but at least she has the decency to cut us a check."

It was very likely there were a fair few people who shared Trudy's opinion of the good Captain, given even criminals picked up on his noble streak. Despite that, though, it was a lie he worked hard to maintain, especially for himself, and he likely on some level appreciated Trudy's willingness to play along.

"Well now, this puts us on much more familiar ground. I have to say, I'm not much for causes these days, but if we're doing a paying job, well, that I know how to get done." Which meant he would do what he would have done anyway all along, but with less complaining. "So then, I think what's next is outlining the nature of our business relationship." He smiled, perhaps a bit impishly, "Now from what you say the pay is already taken care of, so we can move right past that to what you people need done."

Now that was more like it - they could use more people like Mal, who stopped to get the lay of the land and then asked where they were needed. Trudy pulled her omnicomm out of her pocket and set it on the table, tapping through the menus to bring up command staff rosters and other useful information.

"On a ship like this, Security is usually in demand more than anything. Kang used to run training classes for people who don't know their ass from their fist, and he doesn't have too many people willing to teach his students how to shoot. He's planetside now though, so you'd have to chat at him when he got back. Does Serenity carry a payload?"

Although she had no idea how she could give Wash up, having another ship with another set of guns would help even the odds, and they needed all the odd-evening they could get.

Wasting time was for people with the inclination for it, and the time and money to indulge themselves. Mal had none of those things, and he appreciated the fact that Trudy seemed not to either.

"Not sure how well I would do enforcing rules, and I'm a might testy as a teacher, but if you've got folks who need to know which end of a gun to hold, I can help them with that at least. Long as I can hurt their feelings a little."

He shook his head at the question about Serenity. "No. Alliance doesn't look to favorably on anyone but them having armed ships, and outfitting a transport with weapons would cost more than I've got anyway. What she does have, though, is plenty of space to haul any cargo you need, and she's fast enough, maneuverable enough, and tough enough to get that cargo where it's going. Never much needed armaments to get the job done."

"There's something we don't have - evac and personnel carriers," Trudy said. "The observation deck detaches and descends to the planet when she's sending people on a mission, but dropships for quick extraction or reinforcement delivery we don't have. Not ships that are capable in atmosphere and vacuum. In fact, with the way Galilee is shaping up, we may need extraction sooner rather than later. We lost comm contact with our team on the surface just before podpop."

The people down on that planet were more than capable of handling themselves against a small force, and even against a medium-size force. But if Galilee decided that the crew of the Trans 9 was more trouble than it was worth, Trudy didn't have a very good feeling about their chances. "One of my pilots is down there," she explained. "I'd feel better if I knew there was a better chance of him coming back in one piece if the explosions start."

Now Mal was really intrigued. He had heard murmurings that something had gone wrong on the planet below them, but in the onslaught of new information he had been forced to learn and adapt to over the past few days, Mal hadn't really had the time or inclination to look into those rumors.

"Serenity's just as good in atmosphere as she is in the Black. She's got VTOL engines, let her land pretty much anywhere you can find a flat enough surface, and she's tough enough you can put her down out in the wilderness without too much trouble. Main cargo hold is big enough to fit a whole herd of steer in too. You need your people out of in a hurry, I can get them out, so long as you're willing to give me back my pilot to do it, along with all the information you have on the situation."

"We're trying to keep this kind of hush," Trudy said, "for obvious reasons. A lot of people have friends on the surface, not just me, and this crew... when their own is threatened they stir up like a pack of vicious hornets. We don't need that on this mission."

Trudy put her drink aside for a minute while she got down to serious business. "We got a communique from the GIA about Galilee a few days ago. Apparently this planet has some serious medical tech - we're talking reattaching limbs and regrowing skin and that kind of shit. They also have a problem with some civil unrest, so they're hoping that our people will kick some ass in return for life-saving equipment. Couple days ago we hear that Galilee's society is based on clone labor, and the unrest we're supposed to put down is actually an insurrection led by a liberation group or something. Some of our crew members are clones who got picked up and branded by the local authorities. It's... messy. We're in a comm blackout right now, so we're sitting tight unless we hear something."

"I'm not much inclined to socializing, so no need to worry about me running my mouth where I shouldn't," Mal assured her. "Can't imagine someone getting all worked up over some missing crew." Although, judging by his tone he not only could imagine such a thing, but he was pretty sure Trudy could too. "Not that we can really help them much if we all wind up dead."

Now that sounded very interesting indeed. Sure, the Doctor was more than capable of reattaching limbs, but procedures like regrowing skin could only be accomplished in the more advanced Alliance Hospitals, which were of course reserved only for the most well behaved, and wealthiest, Alliance citizens. "I know a doctor who, if he woke up, would be mighty interested in that sort of advanced tech. Sounds like the sort of thing the Core Worlds had back home." His eyes grew sharp as Trudy described the real mess her crew had found themselves in, and he gave the impression of a man filing away every detail for consideration.

"So basically, you jump the gun and launch a rescue where you don't need one, you risk not getting the medical supplies, and kick starting a war where you're badly out numbered. Am I reading this right?"

"That's the shape of it, yes. We're technically on a diplomatic mission, so descending from the sky in a blaze of glory would ruin that pretty handily. We're sitting on our hands until we can see which way the cat's going to jump."

Trudy didn't like it. She had also put her name in the pool to go down as reinforcements, but Kennedy had pointed out with his usual brand of ruthless logic that having the commander of their first line of defense stranded on the surface in a comm blackout didn't make any kind of sense.

Sometimes Trudy could hate her command. "Anyway, I've got the fleet on standby but we'd rather avoid a bloodbath if we can. Civil wars are nasty business and I'd like to keep the hell out if that's what starts. We sent down a small team of reinforcements to back up the crew on the surface. Now we just wait for word."

This was one of the definite advantages to being self employed, the luxury to rush in guns blazing when someone had your people whatever the consequences. Sure on Serenity Mal had to worry about alienating clients and local authorities plenty, if he wanted to stay alive and free anyway, but fewer people and less needs meant it was a hell of a lot easier for him to just pull up and run if he had to make some enemies. Trudy and her fellow command staff didn't have that luxury.

"Well, if you need something small and nonthreatening seeming, Serenity can pass as a transport and is a lot faster than she looks. Long as I can get my mechanic and pilot, ain't nothin' in the Verse that can catch us."

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Taverns are something every good universe should have

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