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Tabletop Squadron Transcript, Season 1 Episode 21:
Does Your Insurance Cover Impact?
Transcript by Tyler (Twitter: @Tyler_MoonSage)
## Intro
NICK: Hi everyone, and welcome to Tabletop Squadron, a Star Wars: Edge of the Empire actual play podcast. I’m Nick, your game master. Every other Thursday our story follows a thief, a bounty hunter, and a slicer as they explore the galaxy helping a mysterious benefactor and each other.
I’m sitting here thinking about what to tell you, our valued listener, this week and I’m gonna be honest. I got nothing. Wanna see Falx and Thrawn in sexy velour track suits? That art is up on our Twitter. Talk to us on Twitter at @Tabletop_Squad and tell us how amazing our art is. …
Yup. That’s it. We hope you enjoy the episode.
##
NICK: Hello! Welcome to Episode 21 of Tabletop Squadron. The weather’s nice here. How is it where you are? I’m your host and game master, Nick. We’re gonna go around the table real quick. Everybody introduce themselves and say who you’re playing today, and if you have upgraded any skills or talents since the last time we sat down why won’t we tell the listeners what you did, starting with Cameron.
CAMERON: Hi! I’m Cameron. I’m playing Karma Nailo the Nautolan bounty hunter, and I am hoarding experience.
NICK: You are hoarding experience.
CAMERON: yes.
NICK: Like an aquatic, alien themed dragon.
CAMERON: Yes, exactly that.
NICK: Well, great, awesome. Up next we’ve got Laura.
LAURA: Hello. I’m Laura.
NICK: Hi!
LAURA: Hi~
NICK: (laughs)
LAURA: I play Xianna’fan, and I am also hoarding experience.
NICK: Ooh. Saving up for a shiny new something.
LAURA: Probably.
NICK: Probably.
LAURA: We’ll see!
NICK: Alright, and last we’ve got Hudson.
HUDSON: Hey Nick! It’s great to be here!
NICK: (laughs) Oh great, I’m glad you’re happy to be here.
HUDSON: Alright. I’m playing Tink, a Gigoran slicer, and I’m a dirty experience hoarder as well trying to get some fancy new upgrades in the future that are EXPENSIVE.
(laughter)
NICK: Great. Awesome. For the record, hoarding experience is not a crime. Y’all go right ahead, you just hang onto it. Before we get started let’s go ahead and do the Destiny Roll~
CAMERON: One dark side.
LAURA: Two light side.
HUDSON: One light side.
NICK: What does that make our total?
CAMERON: Three light side, one dark side.
NICK: Sweet. When we last left off a couple of things were going on. Your ship broke down on your way away from Engebo 5. You were forced to return to the planet for repairs. You landed in a medium size rural settlement called Nerftown on the far side of Engebo 5.
HUDSON: There was no way we could have predicted that the crash would happen. It was a crazy, unexpected circumstance.
CAMERON: Oh yeah. We hadn’t been, like, not fixing the ship every time it got damaged at all. that wasn’t it at all.
HUDSON: I fixed it. It just decided to not fix anymore.
CAMERON: The duct tape came off.
NICK: Yeah, yeah, just a crazy coincidence.
HUDSON: Oh yeah~
NICK: Oh yeah~
LAURA: If you say so.
NICK: You landed on the planet. Tink was very brutally injured in your last combat against some gangsters from the crime syndicate, the Black Sun, so Xianna and Tink went to a hospital and Karma stuck around at the space port to negotiate for repairs to the ship, and you all agreed to meet up a little later. Starting off, let’s go to Tink and Xianna at the hospital waiting room.
LAURA: Tink was getting brought back in.
NICK: Tink was getting brought back. I think the camera opens up on Tink in a hover wheelchair that he’s way too big for getting rolled back through some double doors. Xianna follows afterwards. It’s a Human who’s having to strain a little bit to push it. You get put into one of those small – obviously not an emergency clinic – rooms with the paper pulled down over a mobile medical bed. Whatever you’re picturing for a low importance checkup, this is that room. There is a glass jar with tongue depressors in it. There is a poster on the wall of a loth-cat hanging off of a branch that says ‘Hang In There.’
The nurse helps Tink limp over onto the medical bench and says, “The doctor will be with you shortly,” and leaves the room.
HUDSON: Wait. Are there any magazines beside me that aren’t six months old?
NICK: “Well, the magazines were out in the main waiting room, but I’ll see if I can find you something.” He turns to leave and you see him roll his eyes and heave a heavy sigh and then leave. I don’t think he’s gonna be bringing you any magazines, so… You have a moment alone in the room.
HUDSON: “What do you think, Xianna? Are they gonna have to take my leg?”
LAURA: “I do not know. Does it really matter? I mean, you can just like get a new one.”
HUDSON: “(sighs) I mean… I never really thought about being cyborg-ish before.”
LAURA: “But you do the computer stuff. Did you never think about getting any implants?”
HUDSON: “No, I’m not that kind of slicer. I’m not into cybernetic enhancements, except for the temporary ones.”
LAURA: “What does that mean?”
HUDSON: “You can get like cool little lenses, and like gloves and things like that, but you can’t get—“
LAURA: “Oh. Outfits. Heh.”
NICK: Time out. (laughter) We jump to a flashback of Tink as an obviously awkward teenage Gigoran. Part of his hair is cut really short and part of it is still long, and he’s sliding on a nerf hide glove with some glowing lights on it. He clenches a fist and says, ‘It’s SO bad,’ and then we cut back to the hospital room.
(laughter)
LAURA: “So, outfits?”
HUDSON: “yeah, you could say that.”
LAURA: “I mean, I did.”
HUDSON: “It’s a term of phrase. Whatever.”
LAURA: “Okay. So, about this, you’re going to use your own money, right? I’m not paying for this.”
HUDSON: “I mean, I think I have insurance…”
NICK: –God damn it.
(laughter)
LAURA: I don’t think there is insurance in Star Wars.
NICK: Um… Actually, I think there is…
LAURA: Is there?
CAMERON: There is, but this is an out of network provider.
HUDSON: (laughs)
NICK: (smiling) I don’t want to make insurance jokes, it’ll just make me sad, but I feel like Lando’s involved in an insurance scheme at least twice. I feel like I remember reading that.
LAURA: But health insurance?
NICK: I don’t remember how it worked. What we’ll say is that as an illegal job runner from the underworld of society you luckily had a recent windfall of quite a bit of money that you could spend on this.
HUDSON: Yeah. No, I can do that.
NICK: Okay. If you want to have insurance we could roll for it?
HUDSON: (laughs)
LAURA: (wincing) No. Don’t make us do that. Heh.
NICK: I’ve never—It’s like, two advantages gets you an HMO, three advantages gets you a You Choose provider clause…
(laughter)
LAURA: Ugh… Despairs mean you have preexisting conditions.
NICK: (groaning laugh)
HUDSON: PPO plan.
LAURA: Ugh.
NICK: Ugh.
LAURA: I’m sad. Heh.
NICK: To our international listeners, we apologize for our American health insurance style jokes.
CAMERON: They’re not really jokes, it’s just sadness.
NICK: Yeah, laugh or cry. Anyway. At this point a doctor kicks their way into the room. Group, what race is the doctor?
CAMERON: Selkath.
HUDSON: Gigoran?
NICK: No.
HUDSON: And then we high-five? (laughter) What is the one that is brown and looks like a hammerhead shark, and it’s from like the original—
NICK: That’s an Ithorian. You were literally just on that planet.
LAURA: That’s an Ithorian.
CAMERON: We were just there!
(laughter)
HUDSON: Okay.
LAURA: What’s the werewolf people?
NICK: Oh, I’m down for werewolf people, I don’t remember what they’re called, though.
LAURA: Yeah… Shistavanen.
NICK: Shistavanen! Okay. The doctor pushes their way through the door. It is a Shistavanen, which if you’re not familiar with that, because we totally didn’t just look it up, that’s the werewolf guy from the cantina scene in A New Hope. Just picture a werewolf. It is a werewolf a la Thriller. He says, “So what exactly seems to be the problem?”
LAURA: “Oh, his knee is gone. Just, I think it is gone.”
HUDSON: “It exploded.”
NICK: “Great.” He turns around and goes outside for like 20 seconds, and he comes back with what looks like a big hacksaw. “Alright, I’ll just take it off right there, and we can—“
HUDSON: “Whoa, whoa, whoa! Can we save it?”
NICK: ‘I already got the saw out, so…”
LAURA: “yeah. Apparently he does not want a whole leg replacement. Can you like just do the little knee part?”
NICK: (reluctantly) “I guess.” He puts the hacksaw down, but makes sure that it’s aimed within easy reach. ‘But when this doesn’t work you’re gonna feel so silly.” He takes out a big scanner thing out of the wall. I think he hits a button and a panel in the wall slides out. You know those magnifying glasses on the bendy arms that they have at the doctor’s office that they can move around? It’s that, but it’s a big scanner thing. It zooms through, it scans past and you see a calculator in his stomach area, and you keep going… He zooms in on the knee and it just looks like an impact crater from an asteroid. It’s just a mess. There’s bones that are pulverized. The werewolf clicks his teeth, which is a really cool sounding noise because he has big old sharp teeth. “Well, this is pretty bad.”
HUDSON: “Alright. So, I’m willing to get a cybernetic leg if it’s cheaper than saving the leg.”
LAURA: “I mean, but getting a whole new leg would just be better. You could be better and stronger.”
NICK: “It’s not cheaper, but we can rebuild him.”
HUDSON: (laughs)
NICK: “Better, stronger, faster!”
LAURA: (giggles)
HUDSON: “So, what kind of perks do I get with this new appendage?”
LAURA: “Literally, we just said that it would be better, stronger, and faster.”
NICK: “Well, you have two options, you see. There’s the prosthetic limb that boots your Agility score by one point…”
LAURA: (laughs)
NICK: “…and there’s the prosthetic limb that boosts your Brawn score by one point.”
CAMERON: (laughs)
NICK: “But no, we can fix the leg. It’ll be a lot cheaper to do that, it’ll just take a while and the healing process won’t be a lot of fun.” He opens up a drawer and he pulls out what looks like a blood pressure cuff but if around the outside there were chambers of bacta surrounding it. “So, I can wrap this around your leg and then the medical procedure is we inject these as a slow release to slowly rebuild the bone over the course of about a week. The whole cost of the procedure is about 2,000 Credits.”
LAURA: (quietly) “Tink, just get a new leg.”
NICK: “The cost of a prosthetic with installation is about 13,000 Credits.”
LAURA: ‘yes, but then you could kick people. Kick them!”
NICK: (laughs)
HUDSON: Alright. What if I talk you down a little bit? (laughing) Can I negotiate for a leg?
NICK: You could try to negotiate for a cheaper leg, but I’ll tell you that a majority of that cost is hardware not labor, so.
HUDSON: Oh… Alright Tabletop Squadron listeners, if you want me to get a new cybernetic leg—
LAURA: Call into 555 – Press 1 for Tink getting a new leg.
NICK: Follow us on Twitter and Tweet #NewLegTink.
HUDSON: Press 2 so that I start describing my scene in Spanish.
NICK: Ah! Mi pierna! Ah! Mi perna! Que triste esta mi rodilla. Esta rota! I don’t know why I have an Italian accent speaking Spanish.
LAURA: (laughing) Why are you doing Italian?!
CAMERON: (laughing) What are you DOING?!
HUDSON: And, that should stay in.
NICK: (laughing) It might.
CAMERON: Your Spanish was… accurate, but…
NICK: Eh, accurate is a kind phrase.
(laughter)
CAMERON: I mean, you said “Ah! My leg! My knee is broken!” So…
NICK: Yeah…
LAURA: I just like the ‘it was accurate…’ (laughs)
NICK: Yeah. It’s just, not- not the best. Yeah! So you can try and roll a Negotiation to talk him down. It’s still gonna be a lot more expensive.
LAURA: “Okay Tink, how much money do you have?”
HUDSON: “Eight thousand.”
NICK: “Oh. The cost of the medical procedure is 8,000 Credits. Thank you for explaining to me exactly how much money you have on this backwater, probably ethically ambiguous, medical procedure clinic.”
LAURA: “I mean…”
HUDSON: (laughs) I’m tempted to threaten him with my vibro-axe, but I’m not gonna get into that.
LAURA: “So Tink, do you think Karma would front you the other five?”
(someone snickers)
HUDSON: “Nope.”
NICK: (laughs)
LAURA: “Okay… because I’m not going to.”
HUDSON: “Listen. I can always get a better leg in the future.”
NICK: “I was just joshing. It’s still just 3,000. I just- You should probably not walk around telling people exactly how much money you have.”
LAURA: “I mean, he was just going to give it all to you anyway, so.”
NICK: “What? You were gonna give me 8,000 for the repair?”
HUDSON: ‘No.”
LAURA: “No, for a new leg.”
NICK: “yeah, but the repair’s—Anyway.”
HUDSON: “What’s the total?”
NICK: ‘Total would be 3K to fix it, 15 to get you a new one.”
CAMERON: Wait, okay, hold on.
LAURA: “Fifteen?”
NICK: “Thirteen. I said 13!”
LAURA: ‘It is 13…”
NICK: I struggle with money. (laughs) That’s real life too.
CAMERON: Hold on, because there are cybernetic limbs and then there are just prosthetic replacements. They’re different. The cybernetic leg mods are 10K.
NICK: The ones that give you boosts?
CAMERON: The ones that give you a boost. You can just replace the limb, when it just does what your leg does now… for 2K, for just the price of it, but you’d still have to wire it up and stuff.
NICK: Okay. It would be a little more to prepare your actual leg and to still not have to deal with any of the complications of having not your leg. I think that’s a fair deal, don’t you? Also he doesn’t have those.
CAMERON: Yeah. You’re not gonna get any bonuses, though.
HUDSON: So this is repair leg?
NICK: Yeah. To repair your leg is 3,000 total. The Shistavanen werewolf man is just dangling this cuff of bacta at you. “So, you wanna go through this, or what do you wanna do?”
HUDSON: “Let’s just—Now wait, what if I get like a jetpack holo-chair, and I just never use my leg again?”
NICK: “You wanna be Professor Xavier?” I don’t know why the werewolf man knows that reference.
LAURA: “Tink, just get a new leg.”
HUDSON: “Alright. Repair the leg.”
NICK: “Great.”
CAMERON: (laughs)
NICK: He whips the cuff on there, kinda boxes Xianna out a little bit, and then goes to the wall and presses some buttons. We get a cool x-ray shot through the scanner he was using of the knee, and these bacta chambers actually go into your leg, which would hurt really bad except future tech so it’s just mildly uncomfortable. The actual canisters are like in under your skin, embedded in the muscle and bone and stuff. You can see before the camera cuts back the slow flow of bacta out through the stuff. It’s like a drip of healing junk. You’re gonna be limping and in pain for a while, but eventually you’ll be as good as new.
HUDSON: What’s the install time for the update?
NICK: For the—What?
LAURA: “Oh. He sometimes just says things like they are computers. How long will it be before his leg is fixed?”
NICK: “Oh. That was such a non sequitur I even lost my signature growly tone.”
(laughter)
LAURA: “yes.”
NICK: “Uh… It’ll take about a week.”
LAURA: “Okay. Also, while you are here…” Xianna takes off her boot and plops her foot up, and goes, “So like, can I get like fake little toes, or…?”
NICK: I wanna roll a d6 for how many toes it turns out Xianna lost. Does that sound fun? I think that sounds fun.
LAURA: Three toes.
NICK: I think it’s big toe and the two accompanying, unless it’s like big toe, middle toe and pinkie toe which makes no sense.
CAMERON: I was thinking it was the outside of her foot.
LAURA: Oh, I was imagining outside in, so I was imagining pinkie–So I still have big toe and… index toe.
CAMERON: Pointer toe!
LAURA: Pointer toe. (laughs)
NICK: Okay. You pull it off. The camera doesn’t show Xianna’s foot. It shows Xianna saying hey can you look at this, and it shows the doctor whose face is already permanently contorted into a scowl because his face is a Halloween mask, but he looks disgusted and turns away. “(sickened grumbles, resisting vomiting) Oh, that’s so gross! What happened?”
LAURA: “Um, I got my foot caught in an airlock as it was closing and it smooshed my toes off. Um, yes.”
NICK: “It’s also kind of infected now. Did you not even look at it before here?”
LAURA: “Look, it has been a weird number of days. I’m not even sure how many days it has been since I lost the foot. I have been either high, or passed out, or shooting at things. It has been a weird… few weeks? Tink, how long have we known each other?”
HUDSON: “Oh… Ages at this point.”
LAURA: “So like a week and a half?”
HUDSON: “yeah!”
LAURA: “I have no idea. Heh.”
NICK: He grabs your foot, and holds it up closer to his face, and then holds his face further away again like it smells. It doesn’t, he’s just sensitive. He grabs your foot and looks at it, and kinda squints at it. It’s still not on the camera exactly. “It looks like you’re not healing correctly. Have you been on impact?”
LAURA: “Oh yes.”
NICK: “That makes you not heal as well long term. You should really see somebody about that kind of addiction. Not good for you.”
HUDSON: “Yeah Xianna!”
LAURA: “I mean, I hear what you are saying, but um… no. Maybe later, when it gets bad.”
HUDSON: “Good enough.”
LAURA: “It’s still—I’m okay right now. Can I just get my foot fixed?”
NICK: “Yeah, we can work something out.” Question mechanically: Did we ever take your crit away, or no?
LAURA: No.
NICK: Okay. “Uh, to eliminate the effects of the infection and obviously your balance has probably been a little off, that would be about 500 Credits. I can get you some prosthetic toes just for looks and balance for another 300.”
LAURA: “(sighs)”
NICK: “Or we could just fix it and you can have a foot, and we’ll try to clear most of the infection, but no promises.”
HUDSON: “What are these discounts? My knee’s out and it’s suddenly like 3,000. She’s like oh my toes need replacement—“
LAURA: “Because toes are much, much smaller than an entire leg!”
NICK: “She doesn’t have to actually walk on the toes. It’s like a prosthetic testicle. It’s really just there to make her feel better.”
HUDSON: That’s the example?
(laughter)
LAURA: Yeah. You don’t actually need one. Just, you know, sometimes you don’t want to feel off balance, or uneven.
CAMERON: You know, they help with balance.
LAURA: You know, so that you don’t feel like you’re just missing something. (laughs)
NICK: (laughing) Stop making that hand gesture!
LAURA: (laughs) If for some reason this stays in at all, I absolutely am doing like—
NICK: Like a slinky.
LAURA: Like a slinky motion, but imagine that there were balls in my hands.
CAMERON: (laughs)
NICK: (smiling) Oh, no…
HUDSON: It’s like you’re a shitty juggler.
LAURA: Shitty juggler, because they’re connected and in a sack, and they don’t go anywhere.
NICK: (groans and laughs)
LAURA: Hello blooper reel.
NICK: “Hers is because the option is to either completely remove your leg and it’s still gonna cost a lot, or we can just clean the infection and over time she can learn to deal with not having feet.”
LAURA: “(huffs) Okay. So definitely clean my foot for the 500.”
NICK: (squeaky clean noises) … “That’s my cleaning droid.”
LAURA: “I do not want to spend an extra 300 on the fake toes. No, I will live. I will figure it out.”
NICK: “Alright. You’re gonna really wanna make sure you keep that foot clean, probably some sort of hot water bath on a regular basis to make sure that the joint doesn’t get inflamed.”
LAURA: “So like a Jacuzzi?”
NICK: “Oh no, no, no! Those are horrible pits for bacteria and things. Being in a Jacuzzi could be potentially life threatening.”
LAURA: “Ohh… Heh. Oh, okay. Oops.” (laughter) “Oh! So just not the foot? If I sit in the hot tub but prop my foot out, is that okay?”
NICK: “I mean probably, or just take the risk. You’re already on impact. Honestly, if we’re gonna rank things in order of things most likely to kill you that one’s a far first.”
LAURA: “I mean, I am not currently ON impact. I’m coming down from impact. A little bit of a difference.”
NICK: “Yeah. Your other leg’s jittering pretty hard. You should probably…”
LAURA: “It’s fine. Heh. I’m used to it.”
NICK: Okay. I think from there, there’s a little squeaking noise and the camera turns down, and it’s a droid that just looks like one of those desk lamps with the stretchy arms, and on the end there’s a camera eye and a little set of tweezers that are holding a Q-tip made out of shiny metal with just cloth on the end and then another little set of tweezers that has a little squeeze bottle of presumably antiseptic. It approaches Xianna’s foot in a very similar and menacing fashion to that torture droid that approaches Leia in A New Hope, but it’s just cleaning your foot, then the camera wipes to you two walking out. Tink still has a pronounced limp but is able to walk. Mechanically your crit is gone, so that’s good. You’re just gonna be in some discomfort, maybe a black die or something, while your knee regenerates. Xianna, your crit is gone, but I may occasionally just explain stuff that goes wrong with the fact that you don’t have toes, because that actually does affect your balance pretty significantly.
LAURA: It does.
NICK: Yeah, so, for 300 Credits. Such a character decision.
LAURA: I’ll erase it later… 300 or 500?
NICK: Well, it was 300 additional for the prosthetic toes.
LAURA: Oh, yeah. No.
HUDSON: So, mine is minus 3,000?
NICK: Yup, but your leg’s good as new.
CAMERON: In a week.
NICK: Cool. Let’s jump over to karma. Karma, you just finished negotiating the repairs of the ship. I think you paid for it in advance.
CAMERON: Yup.
NICK: Where ya going? Whatcha doing? You hooking up with the crew or are you going somewhere else?
CAMERON: I probably just send the equivalent of a text message to Tink. “Hey. Let me know when y’all are done at the hospital,” because mine did not take very long, so I’m assuming that they’re still at the hospital when I leave. Before I leave, I ask Zubo the mechanic where the bounty office is for Nerftown.
NICK: He considers for a second and then kind of hems and haws, and he puts a little coordinate thing on your data pad, so you have that. It’s in town. This place isn’t big enough – travel time isn’t very important. It’s not in the sketchiest part of town, it’s not in the prefab part of town, it’s somewhere in the middle. There’s like a sheriff’s office, if you will. They collect all the bounties and things.
CAMERON: Cool. I head that way.
NICK: Cool.
HUDSON: Do I respond to the text message?
NICK: We’ll say that you were so busy doing the medical stuff that you’re not gonna see the text message until you guys are done. She’ll get a scene, and then y’all can meet up if you want. You go to the bounty office. It is a wooden building. This is very much a western kind of town. Just picture dirt roads, a little stubble of grass poking up in places with less traffic, because this whole planet is covered in large, golden fields of grass that nerfs love. … That was weird. Anyway.
(laughter)
LAURA: I mean, it was a sentence.
NICK: Yeah, I’m not happy with it.
CAMERON: Alright. Cool.
HUDSON: Large, golden troves of grass (whispering) that the nerfs just love.
LAURA: Just large…
LAURA, HUDSON & CAMERON: …tracks of land~
NICK: (groans)
LAURA: ‘But father, I just want to sing~’ -NO (laughs)
NICK: And, we’re back. So, dirt roads with kind of some stubble of grass or it’s been beaten down by foot traffic and carts and things being pulled by nerfs, and the roads are lined with boardwalks on either side that go into porches for various buildings. This is a smaller building tucked between a saloon / gambling kind of place and a boarding house. It says, “LAW” … over it. LAW.
CAMERON: (giggles) Great.
NICK: Yeah. The door is open, and you can go right in.
CAMERON: I’m assuming they’re not full doors. They’re like the little western hinge doors, but instead of swinging in they just ‘zhoop’ into the walls.
NICK: Oh shit. Yeah.
LAURA: (quietly) Yesss.
NICK: That’s how these work.
CAMERON: Yeah.
NICK: It doesn’t rain much on this planet. They don’t need to…
CAMERON: No. Well, it’s got a porch. It’s fine.
NICK: Yeah. It like goes from your chest to your mid-thigh, the length of the door, and they look like there’s a gap in between the two that’s sealed. You go to push them open, but instead they go ‘zhoop’ and they open, and there’s a little (bing-bong) from inside. As you walk in you hear someone from the back say, “I’m coming. I’m coming. I’m coming. Give me a second.” You hear some rattling and banging from the back room that you can’t see into. The main room of the LAW… office has a low wooden desk with a glow lamp sitting on it, there’s a couple of chairs, and you can see the chairs don’t get used much, the desk has some scattered paperwork on it and a terminal sunk into it, but otherwise it’s basically just a room you walk through to get to the back where presumably there are some holding cells.
A Human woman walks out. She’s wearing a fringed vest and some pants with stripes down the sides, she has short cropped dark hair, and she has darker tan skin and brown eyes. She says, “So, what brings you to the humble, LAW… office today?” Then she looks up and goes, “Oh, bounty hunter. Okay, cool, one sec,” and she goes and she sits behind her desk and starts typing in her terminal.
CAMERON: “Is the pause really necessary when talking about, this office?”
NICK: “What, LAW?”
CAMERON: “The… LAW… office?”
NICK: “You can’t really see it on the sign, because of the angle from the street, but there’s an underscore below it, so the pronunciation is… LAW… Yeah.”
CAMERON: “Okay… Alright, cool. I was just wondering. It was just a thing I had noticed from the several people who pointed me in the correct direction.”
NICK: “Yeah, well, Nerftown has some weird pronunciation things. It’s really best to just adapt to it, because if you say ‘Hey I went to the law office,’ a lot of people will go ‘what are you talking about’?”
CAMERON: “Okay. Cool. Good to know. Good to know.”
NICK: “Yeah, yeah.”
CAMERON: “Well, whenever you’re ready I’ve got a couple of bounties.”
NICK: “Oh, do you? Alright. I’ve got it pulled up. What do you have?”
CAMERON: “Cool.” I take out my 13 Black Sun patches.
NICK: “Ohh… Ah, I see one of these has a double stripe on it. That’s a captain patch.”
CAMERON: “Yup.”
NICK: She starts looking through, and she’s typing on the computer. “Were these procured locally or were we just the nearest planet?”
CAMERON: “I mean, it was reasonably locally.”
NICK: “What does that mean?”
HUDSON: (laughs)
CAMERON: “I mean, it was just in the area. You’re the first town that we’ve come across in this region.”
NICK: “Well I mean, but like, you got these on planet?”
CAMERON: “Yeah.”
NICK: “Okay, then I’m authorized to pay a little more, because you’ve kept them from gaining a foothold here. So far we haven’t had to deal with a lot of Black Sun or Crimson Dawn, any pirate organization, the Hutts, we’ve kept them away. We here at Nerftown really value our simple, pastoral existence.” In the background you hear blaster fire.
She bangs on the wall, and you hear someone yell, “Shut up out there!”
“Our simple, pastoral existence. I mean, sometimes people get a little trigger happy, but it’s not the same as slave trading or drug running. Of course we take all of that very seriously.”
CAMERON: “Of course. Yes.”
NICK: “So, for each of these I’ll be able to get you… 100 a piece for the grunts, assuming that these are not counterfeit, and I’ll give you 500 for the captain patch.”
CAMERON: “Okay!”
NICK: “Alright.” She taps into the desk and a little shredder slot opens up, and she starts feeding them in. It goes really slow. She puts it in and it starts (labored shredder noises), and you can see the patch being slowly, slowly, slowly fed in, and then it goes (PING) and a little number pops up, and it looks exactly like the ticket counter from Chuck E. Cheese. That’s what I have in my head.
(laughter)
LAURA: Okay~
NICK: We get an overly long shot of (labored shredder noises, PING, labored shredder noises) times 12, and then the bigger one—
CAMERON: The bigger one makes a different noise. (laughs)
NICK: Yeah. Anyway. She feeds it all in. There’s a total count number which is 1,700 Credits. “Alright. We’ll just transfer that over to your data pad real quick.” She pulls out a cable, and plugs it in, and you have your money. “Well that’s wonderful. Not many people can bring down a search and destroy squad by themselves. You must have been doing this for a pretty good amount of time. What’s your name?”
CAMERON: “It should be on the sheet. I just typed in my number for the transfer.”
NICK: “Oh yeah, I guess that does make sense.” She looks, the monitor flashes. “Oh… Karma Nailo. Yeah, mid rank, pretty good, yeah. Great. Were you interested in helping us out with any of our other issues around here? We don’t have organized crime, but we do have some people I could use some help with.”
CAMERON: I’m assuming while all of those were slowly being fed into the machine there’s like a bulletin board up on the wall, or the equivalent to an old western bulletin board with the wanted posters and stuff, but it’s Star Wars so it’s a screen.
LAURA: It’s a rotating screen, and there’s just some little (elevator style) music coming from it.
CAMERON: And you can walk up to it and swipe through.
LAURA: It’s got the little dots at the bottom.
CAMERON: You click a button to email it to yourself so you can look at it later.
LAURA: You like know how many have been cycling.
NICK: All of that, except it’s like a jukebox, so you have to press a real button at the bottom and they slide across to see the new one…
CAMERON: Oh god. (laughs)
NICK: …because it’s Star Wars, so everything’s weirdly analog.
CAMERON: It’s like a weird slide projector.
NICK: Yeah, so there’s like a rotating folding folio back there that she has to reload occasionally. Everybody invent a bounty right now.
CAMERON: You obviously got nerf kidnappers
NICK: Okay. There’s a gang of nerf hustlers. The actual crime things are less important to me than who they are. Tell me about a nerf hustler group.
CAMERON: Okay. There’s a group of Selkath that really like nerfs, because I wanna use Selkath. (laughs)
NICK: (smiling) Okay. There’s a group of Selkath, they’re like catfish coy looking people that are not Mon Cals, they’re different. They talk really slow and gurgled, and there’s a group of them here on this arid plains planet, and they are trying to steal nerfs. They are hustling them off planet, and they’re called the…
CAMERON: The Slippery Nerfs.
NICK: The Slippery Nerfs. Everybody fears the Slippery Nerfs and their theft. No violent crimes as of yet, but here on a planet whose entire economy is basically around cattle herding, nerf hustling is a dead or alive crime. They just want proof that the Slippery Nerfs won’t bother them anymore, and they’re offering, eh, 2,000 Credits for bringing in the Slippery Nerfs.
CAMERON: That is dead or alive?
NICK: Yeah, dead or alive. Laura, Hudson, bounties?
LAURA: There’s a Duros bounty hunter, no, Duros mercenary named Limaden. I was just looking—I did pull a Keyser Soze. Limeade is written on my Sonic cup. (laughs)
NICK: (laughs) A Duros mercenary named Limaden. What do we think he did? Did he shoot up a bank? Is he just hiding here? Is he a bigger bounty?
LAURA: He shot a bartender in an argument.
NICK: Ooh. Yeah, so wanted for assault. He’s hiding somewhere out on the plains. I think he’s worth 1,000 Credits because it’s just one guy.
HUDSON: So, there’s a roaming group of bank robbers…
NICK: Okay.
HUDSON: …that are Gigorans that have green tints in their hair.
NICK: Tents?
HUDSON: Like a tint, like T-I-N-T.
NICK: Oh. (emphatically) Their hair is tinted green.
HUDSON: Their hair is tinted green is the right way to say that.
NICK: (laughs) Okay. I was picturing like, these little tents…
LAURA: These little green tents.
NICK: Why, do they keep like little birdies in it? What’s going on?
CAMERON: It’s a hat!
NICK: Okay. Okay. Green tinted Gigorans.
HUDSON: Green tinted Gigorans called the Green Gregarious Gigorans, or GGG (Triple G).
NICK: GGG. Alright.
HUDSON: They rob banks, and they recently got away with a heist. The odd thing was they had masks on, but they were Gigoran masks, so it just looked like a different Gigoran for each of them.
(laughter)
NICK: The GGG gang actually has—There’s not a ton of banks here. They’ve obviously raided the Nerftown bank a couple of times, and they hide somewhere on the planet, but they’ve also gone to neighboring systems and they’re using this place as a hideout. The… LAW… keeper is particularly interested in bringing them down. Normally they would be 3,000 Credits, but she’s chipping in another 1,000 from the planetary coffers to try to get them to go away. Cool.
The law keeper says, “So, you see anything that draws your fancy there? We got a few that tend to be a little bit higher stakes than anybody in this town is willing to go after.”
CAMERON: “I was interested in the Slippery Nerfs, Limaden, and the GGG group.”
NICK: “Oh yeah, the Green Gregarious Gigorans. They’re quite a bunch.”
CAMERON: “They looked… interesting.”
NICK: “Interesting is a good word for it. They’re particularly violent, too.”
CAMERON: “Oh nice, great.”
NICK: “They’ve killed a few people. Yeah, not the best.”
CAMERON: “Alright. Cool. Yeah, I’m just gonna keep them on my radar, those three, and then we’ll see how it goes. I’m here for a few days.”
NICK: “Okay. Great. If you need anything just look us up at the… LAW… office.”
CAMERON: “I actually did have one additional question. I was looking to get my gun modded. Can you recommend one that you normally send y’all’s stuff to?”
NICK: “There’s a couple of gun stores in town, but there’s only one gunsmith. If you want someone to actually upgrade gear you’re gonna wanna go to Krylon Sirel. He’s a Devaronian who set up camp in town. He’s just down the street, actually. He does good work.”
CAMERON: “Okay great. Awesome.”
NICK: “Yeah. Cool. Have a good day~”
CAMERON: “You too.”
NICK: And we get a swipe cut. Do you all meet back up?
HUDSON: Yes.
LAURA: “(sighs) No, Tink.” So I see Tink starting to answer the message, he’s typing in yes, “No, no, no, Tink,” and I hit the backspace, “let’s go shopping before we meet up with Karma.”
HUDSON: “But, but, Karma’s our friend.”
LAURA: “Yes, and I know that, but I want to buy a few things, and I do not want to feel judged. Okay?”
HUDSON: “(gasps) You want to buy a gift for Karma. I see what’s going on.”
LAURA: “Sure. Let’s say that. We can. Okay.”
HUDSON: “Alright. We’ll go to your places, and then we’ll text Karma.”
LAURA: “Okay.” I send a message like, taking longer, see you later… smiley face, winky face, heart emoji.
CAMERON: (laughing) Karma gets it: “Yeah, that seems like Tink.”
NICK: (laughs) Okay. Karma is going to the gun store and Xianna and Tink are going… What are they looking for?
LAURA: Xianna’s gonna try and go buy impact, because she’s had a hard day, and yeah.
NICK: Okay. It’s about 2 in the afternoon.
LAURA: I mean, not the ideal time to be buying illegal drugs, but…
NICK: You can make me a Streetwise check, average. This place isn’t super regulated. There will be two black die, because it is 2 PM on a Sunday. (laughs)
LAURA: So I can remove one of those.
HUDSON: Street Smarts.
LAURA: Street Smarts!
HUDSON: That’s an actual—
LAURA: It is Street Smarts! Yeah! … That is two advantages, a success, and a triumph with a success.
NICK: Oh… Okay.
LAURA: I am very good at finding drugs, apparently.
HUDSON: Wait. You didn’t roll any difficulty, did you?
NICK: Did you forget your two purples?
LAURA: I did. (laughter) Okay, so it’s a success and a triumph with a success.
NICK: Okay. You basically walk out of the hospital, go ‘hmm,’ turn around a corner, go back behind the hospital, and the Shistavanen doctor is back there talking to somebody and they’re trading baggies and money back and forth. “Oh, um… Yeah. Did you need something a little more … under the counter?”
LAURA: “yes. I believe I already told you what kind of drugs I take. So…”
NICK: “I thought you might be over here.”
LAURA: “Yes. Heh.”
NICK: It turns out that there had been a whole conversation going on between Xianna and the doctor that was all just hand signs and winks and tapping of noses. He brings out a case of just baggies of impact. “So, what are you looking to buy out of all this?”
LAURA: “Okay…” Xianna starts doing the math, and she’s scratching at one of her lekku.
NICK: What’s the going rate for impact?
LAURA: I have it written down.
NICK: We’ve talked about this before.
LAURA: Yeah. About 125 a dose, 10,000 for a crate, which I think was like—
NICK: That’s if you’re smuggling it. You wouldn’t buy a whole crate of it to do.
LAURA: No, but she starts doing math because there are other things she wants to buy.
NICK: Mm-hmm.
LAURA: “Okay. Um, can I get like 3,000 Credits worth of impact?”
NICK: “Yeah, 3,000 easy.” He pulls a handful of baggies out and sets it down. I want you to make me a Negotiation check.
LAURA: “Okay. I mean, how many baggies does he have out there?
NICK: That will have something to do with your Negotiation check.
LAURA: Okay, I don’t have Negotiation… I have Charm, and Deception, and Streetwise. (smiling)
NICK: This one is a pure business transaction.
LAURA: Okay. Good thing I have Presence at least.
NICK: This one’s average.
LAURA: I’m gonna flip a light side point, because this is important to Xianna.
CAMERON: (giggles)
NICK: Okay. That’s fair.
LAURA: Like, I know I’m wasting it for everyone else, but this is what my character would do! (laughs)
NICK: Drugs!
LAURA: Okay. Three successes and two threats.
NICK: Hmm. So, you get 30 doses of impact.
LAURA: Nice.
NICK: He’s actually giving you a bulk rate. Normally it’s like 125, he gave you some extra for buying that much, so you have a lot of it. “Did you want like a bag to keep this in, or were you gonna do it all right now?”
LAURA: “I mean, I’m not at that point yet. I’m going to want a bag.”
NICK: “As a medical professional I do appreciate that you realize that eventually you’re gonna end up there if you continue on this path.”
LAURA: “I mean, I can stop if I want to, I just don’t want to right now. It is… I’m fine.”
NICK: “As your doctor, I would encourage you to seek help. As your dealer, here you go.”
LAURA: (laughs) “Uh, no… and thank you.”
NICK: I think some of those threats roll into the guy who he’s with and the Shistavanen have all noted that you just threw out 3,000 Credits like it’s no big deal, and this is after Tink loudly proclaimed exactly how much money he had. It’s a pretty solid amount of money. Maybe somebody who is a doctor/drug dealer would take interest in someone who has a decent amount of money and is just buying stuff. We get a close-up camera angle of the werewolf and this small Human person making eye contact at each other, and ‘dun-dun-dun…’ (trouble/suspense sound) … and then we move on.
HUDSON: Where was I during this? I know I wasn’t with Xianna.
LAURA: Oh. I probably left you… I probably looked down behind the building, saw this, and was like, “Uh, Tink, stay here. Ooh! Look! There is a little snack cart right over there. How about you get us whatever fun treats they have?”
HUDSON: “Oh, Kriff Cakes.”
NICK & LAURA: Nooo!
CAMERON: (squeaks) No! (laughs) What?!
NICK: That’s staying in, because Tink is walking down and he sees a brothel, and he’s like ‘Oh, Kriff Cakes. I know her.’
CAMERON: (laughs)
NICK: ‘She’s very nice.’
LAURA: That’s my stage name. (laughter) I bet it’s just like a fun popsicle stand. “How about you go—“
HUDSON: Behind the brothel. (laughs)
LAURA: “Go buy some popsicles.”
HUDSON: “Alright.”
CAMERON: Tink does like popsicles.
HUDSON: yeah!
LAURA: Yeah, so I leave him in line, and then I come back…
NICK: It’s like a frozen ice thing!
CAMERON: It’s like a frozen ice sculpture on a stick! You know, like a popsicle! (laughs)
LAURA: Like a popsicle.
NICK: Y’all are mean. (laughs) yeah, so you’re at the popsicle stand, and there’s a guy. “Yeah? What can I get you, tall, white and handsome?”
HUDSON: (mimics voice) ‘Yeah!’ No. (laughter) “I’ll have two Galactic Cherry.”
NICK: “Wonderful choice!” They look like light sabers, but they’re popsicles, so they have little handles. He hands you two red ones. “Those will go really good with the impact your friend is buying.”
HUDSON: “What?!”
CAMERON: (laughs)
NICK: He just scoots the cart away.
HUDSON: “Wha—Imp—What?!”
LAURA: Xianna comes back with—I’m assuming the bag has little shoulder handles?
NICK: Yeah, you got the tote.
LAURA: I got a little tote, and she grabs the popsicle. “Ooh, I like popsicles.”
CAMERON: The tote has some inspirational saying on it, like ‘Make An Impact’ or something like that. It’s obviously a drug reference, but it’s just an uplifting thing for someone who doesn’t know.
HUDSON: “Xianna, where were you just now?”
LAURA: “Oh. I was talking to the doctor from earlier.”
HUDSON: “About what?”
LAURA: “Uh, my medical health.”
HUDSON: “We’re not at the hospital anymore.”
LAURA: “It was behind the hospital. I saw him and wanted to ask a question, which I know you’re not supposed to talk to doctors when they are not on their shift because it is rude and like, you should respect their time… but you know.”
HUDSON: “Yeah, you shouldn’t.”
LAURA: “I had an important question.”
HUDSON: “Alright. What was the answer he gave to your question?”
LAURA: “Uh, it’s okay.”
HUDSON: “Is it like Twi’lek things that I don’t need to know about?”
LAURA: “yes.”
HUDSON: “Alright.”
NICK: (laughs)
LAURA: “… Twi’lek things. Uh-huh.”
CAMERON: (giggles)
NICK: Okay, so, Karma is at a gun shop with a Devaronian with a peg leg I guess. He’s there. The camera zooms in and it’s like a wooden building but you go in and it’s all durasteel floors and walls on the inside. It’s very mechanical. There are a couple of droid arms that are sticking out of the walls that are holding parts and things. They look like the car assembly bots, but they’re AIs because it’s Star Wars. They’re doing things, and he’s got a very, very, very big rocket launcher on a table. There’s a rocket sitting fins down up like a two-liter bottle of soda, and it’s sitting on the edge of the counter, and he’s working with the launcher, and as he does stuff it bumps and the rocket wobbles a little occasionally.
He looks up. “Oh hey. Welcome to Krylon’s. I’ll be right with you.” He slides the rocket launcher and the rocket wobbles really hard. He just kind of looks at it, “heh,” and he walks over to the counter. “So, uh, how can I help you be better at killing today?”
CAMERON: “Well,” Karma swivels her carbine around from her back and detaches it, sets it on the counter. “I’m looking to upgrade this.”
NICK: “Oh, it’s already so nice. I can see it’s got a lot of mileage but it’s been well taken care of. Yeah. What were you hoping to do to it?”
CAMERON: I take out the upgrade kit that I found. “Well, I was looking to get the night vision scope installed on it.”
NICK: He opens up the kit and turns it around, and it’s a night vision scope sitting in there.
CAMERON: Yeah, I know. (laughs) That’s why I picked that one. (smiling)
NICK: Yeah. There are a surprising amount of wires sticking out of it. Your carbine has iron sights on it. “Alright. I’d be able to hook this up for you. It’ll be kind of expensive as I’m gonna have to strip most of the rifle down to integrate it, but could probably get it done in a couple of days.”
CAMERON: “Alright. I’m here for three. Can you do three days?”
NICK: “I could do two.”
CAMERON: “Fantastic. That’s even better.”
NICK: “Yeah. That’ll be 200 Credits.”
CAMERON: “Alright. Sounds great.”
NICK: “You know, just labor. Easy. No problems there. I notice you also have quite a few other weapons around. Need some help with those?”
CAMERON: “So, I know you’re just the gunsmith shop, you’re not the guns shop.”
NICK: “Yeah. My brother runs the gun shop across town. We don’t speak much.”
CAMERON: “Alright. Do you do any… Some of the guns in here are very nice. I notice they’re just sitting in here, they don’t look to be orders, so I’m wondering if you buy any base weapons to then upgrade to sell? Or should I hike across to your brother? Because I’ve got a couple to offload.”
NICK: “I’ll buy them. that’s fine. Yeah. What have you got?”
CAMERON: Well, let’s see what I want to sell. (laughs) I’ve got four light blasters and another carbine.
NICK: Take the lot at going rate.
CAMERON: Cool. We will figure that math out!
NICK: Yeah, we’ll just look at the cost. “Yeah. When you come back to pick up the gun I’ll have your money ready for the other thing.”
CAMERON: “Cool. They’re on my ship, so I will bring them to you.”
NICK: “Yeah, just bring them back and we’ll sell them.”
CAMERON: “Alright.”
NICK: “Sure.”
NICK & CAMERON: “Sounds great.”
NICK: “Thank you for stopping by Krylon’s~”
CAMERON: “Awesome. Thanks.”
NICK: “Don’t forget to shoot straight.” He winks, and his teeth go (TING). … He’s handsome.
CAMERON: (smiling) Karma gives him a thumbs up and kind of awkwardly walks out. (laughs)
NICK: Okay. You have dropped off your carbine to be upgraded. Tink has bought popsicles. Xianna’s bought a shit-ton of drugs. Everybody’s health is looking better. What now?
LAURA: “Okay Tink, let’s go meet up with Karma. We can go buy things. You want to get things, right? You have lots of money. Yes.”
HUDSON: “Yes. I can definitely buy things. I have some things in mind. I’ll text Karma.”
LAURA: “Okay. Let’s go.”
HUDSON: I text her, and I say: “Leg fixed. Infected Xianna. Popsicles bought. Meet at ship.”
CAMERON: Okay. I think Karma gets this text and just calls Xianna. “Hey. Xianna? Are you all done?”
LAURA: “Oh, ‘ello! Well, we are done at the doctors, so…”
CAMERON: “Fantastic. Tink said he infected you?”
LAURA: “No. My foot was infected, and the doctor also looked at the foot, but we are wanting to go shopping now.”
CAMERON: “Fantastic. Me too. We need to work on his texting shorthand.”
LAURA: “Yes.”
CAMERON: “That’s why I called you. Great. So, I don’t know where the hospital—Actually, I do know where the hospital is in town. One sec, let me look at my map that’s on my data pad!” How far apart are we? (laughs)
NICK: You’re not that far apart. There’s a nice square in the middle of town you can meet up at.
CAMERON: “Cool. It looks like y’all are pretty close to the town square. Do y’all just wanna head there, I’ll meet y’all there, and then we can go buy stuff?”
LAURA: “Okie.”
CAMERON: “Alright. Cool.”
LAURA: “We can do that.”
NICK: (blabbered scene transition noises) You’re standing in an open dirt square. There’s a boardwalk all the way around it. There are businesses facing it. There are some people walking around. They’re all dressed like cowboys. … Welcome to western town. There’s a fountain in the middle that looks like a group of nerfs. There’s five or six nerfs clustered around in a herd and one is rearing up in the middle, and the fountain water is coming out of its mouth and it’s trickling down over all the nerfs. If you get close enough the water looks kind of dusty and not super idyllic, but it’s a nice little piece of localized architecture.
LAURA: Xianna and Tink are sitting on a bench in front of the fountain still eating the popsicles, although I bet Tink’s is all over his face and just dripping.
HUDSON: (smiling) Why do you assume that I’m bad at eating popsicles?
CAMERON: Ugh. You have white fur, and you’re eating a red popsicle. (laughs)
HUDSON: Yeah. Alright. (mummers) It actually is messy.
CAMERON: (laughing) It’s gonna look like there’s blood dripping from your mouth.
LAURA: No, it’s like that bright pink red, so it’s very obviously some sort of popsicle snack thing.
HUDSON: At least I didn’t get a green one so I’m not mistaken as GGG.
CAMERON: That’s true.
NICK: Yeah. Heh. Aw, missed plot from me. Maybe next time.
HUDSON: Whoa. I walked through this artist alley and I fell in some chalk. Whaaat?
CAMERON: They were doing a color run and I got thrown the green stuff. (laughs)
NICK: There’s a parade to find the Hulk.
LAURA: No.
(laughter)
HUDSON: Nope.
LAURA: No green powder.
CAMERON: (exhales) Anyway.
NICK: (weakly) We just watched that movie. … Yeah! So you all meet up. As you’ve walked around town you found a few things that drew your attention. There are most types of businesses that you would need, but you did notice that there’s a whole bar district. That’s where Karma came from. That’s where the… LAW… office is. There are some bars, some saloons, we talked about a brothel earlier, not really a brothel but like a company service?
LAURA: Escorts?
NICK: Yeah, but it’s a “company” company kind of thing. Yeah. There is a bar district with all of that. There is the market area which is where Karma also went. You also had walked circles kind of near each other a couple times, because the market area backs up towards the hospital. There’s weapon stores, armor stores, pretty much anything that you would need that’s general adventuring gear. There’s the hospital that you saw, and then you can probably tell from the fact that there were open drug deals going on that there is some sort of elicit underbelly to this settlement, but you haven’t seen a ton of evidence of where that might be localized around, because you haven’t really looked yet. That is generally the layout of the town. You have met up by the fountain. Happy trickling water sounds.
LAURA: “Hello.”
CAMERON: “Oh hey. How are y’all feeling?”
LAURA: “Much better. So Tink, what were you wanting to buy?”
HUDSON: “Ooh. I wanna get some grenades. I wanna get some glow rods. I wanna get a com jammer, so that’s gonna be cool. Right? Is that cool?”
CAMERON: “Yeah.”
LAURA: “Okay.”
HUDSON: “That’s cool? That’s cool. I’m gonna put some stickers on the back and make it mine.”
CAMERON: “Nice. Yeah?”
LAURA: “Okay. yes.”
CAMERON: “Mm-hmm.”
LAURA: “Uh-huh. Okie.”
HUDSON: “And then, if I can find it, an outlaw tech data breaker, probably.”
LAURA: “Okay, um, maybe.”
HUDSON: “That’s a little bit harder to find. That’s a little (lowers voice) underground.”
LAURA: “I mean, I’m pretty sure there is a decent underground community here. Just, no reason why I would know that, just some broad guesses. I am assuming there are lots of underground people.”
HUDSON: “So where should we start? Well actually, what do you want, Xianna, anything?”
LAURA: “Oh. Well I need new scanner goggles, and I already bought that…”
HUDSON: “Bought what?”
LAURA: “Nothing.”
NICK: (laughs)
LAURA: “Ooh! A shadow cloak would be fun. Maybe some more stim packs, and some false credentials… So yeah, we are just going to have to find a real shady person. Yes.”
CAMERON: “Mine’s more weapons and medical supplies.”
LAURA: “Okay. Yeah.”
CAMERON: “Yup.”
HUDSON: Why do I have zero Streetwise?
CAMERON: Because you’re Tink.
LAURA: Because you are Tink.
HUDSON: I guess. I can’t find shit.
CAMERON: (laughs)
NICK: So, a majority of the stuff Tink would want, that’s mostly just above board stuff. You could get that at a general store, same with the medical supplies. There is one off of the square that you would be able to go to pretty easily. Shadow cloak, you’re probably gonna need someone sketch. The weapons you got pretty much taken care of, but you’ve met the person who upgrades them if anybody else wants to get their weapons looked at. There is a weapons store if somebody wants something. Like I said, there is potentially an armor store. So, where would y’all like to go first?
LAURA: “Let’s go to a general store to get all the little things. Yeah?”
HUDSON: “Yeah.”
NICK: Great. The camera pans from you all sitting in front of this fountain up to the face of the nerf shooting water, and then over without doing a cut to nearby and shows you all walking into a general goods store. It looks like how everyone’s picturing, because I keep saying the word general goods. There’s a wooden counter, and there’s a really tall shelf with a sliding ladder in front of it. The ladder is durasteel not wood. It has pretty much basic frontier gear, everything like that. The person standing on the counter has red hair, he’s kind of a big guy. He climbs down. “Welcome to the newest bit of Zebwak’s Goods.” He turns around and he sees Karma and Tink, and I think Xianna’s probably a little behind. “What exactly can I be getting for you?” Then he looks up and he sees Xianna. “Ohh… This is fine.”
LAURA: “Oh, um, hello~ Heh. So uh, do you have scanner goggles? Heh.”
NICK: “Yes. I have scanner goggles.”
LAURA: “I cannot tell if you are trying to make fun of my accent or not, because yours is very interesting.”
NICK: “Distinctive one might say.”
LAURA: “Distinctive, yes.”
NICK: “Yes.”
LAURA: “So, scanner goggles? Please? Yes.”
CAMERON: Karma just grabs a cart and basically just starts going grocery shopping to restock the ship.
NICK: Yeah. I think as far as the actual individual things Tink and Karma can get pretty much anything on their list at the going rate, but we have this scene while you all are collecting your stuff of Xianna and the person running Zebwak’s Goods saying, “So the last time we saw you we got robbed immediately afterwards. You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?”
LAURA: “No. Of course not.”
NICK: “And then the Empire showed up. What’s up with that?”
LAURA: “Oh. Is definitely not anything to do with me. Twi’leks usually do not work for the Empire because, you know, we are not Humans and they really hate us.”
NICK: “Yes, but they often hunt people like you, I have noticed. Also—“
LAURA: “I mean, what do you mean by that?”
NICK: “Twi’leks, and people who steal things.”
LAURA: “I mean, you can’t prove that.”
NICK: “You don’t think so, huh? I didn’t have a bunch of security cameras pointed at all my things”
LAURA: “I mean… Okay, so maybe there were.” (laughs)
NICK: “Give me one reason right now why I shouldn’t call the… LAW… office.”
LAURA: “Um… One, technically I am dead. Heh. Legally speaking, I did die, so I do not think I am in the records anymore. Would make things more difficult. Two, I am going to buy things from you and not steal them. I was considering stealing them, and then I thought no, small local business owners, should support that, I will pay for it.”
NICK: He looks super nonplussed. “Well thank you for your consideration.”
LAURA: “Three, do you want some drugs?”
NICK: “Yes.”
LAURA: “I got some glitterstim that I’m not really using.”
NICK: How much glitterstim is it?
LAURA: Five doses.
NICK: “If you give me the glitterstim I’ll give you a head start before I call the authorities, and I will sell you everything you need. I’m a business man.”
HUDSON: Say she sells sea shells down by the sea shore.
NICK: (accent applied) She shells shea shells by the shea shore. This accent actually makes it easier, because you don’t have to pick between the two.
HUDSON: Huh.
LAURA: Okay. Xianna reaches into her pockets and she opens up her little drug box, takes out some glitterstim, throws it down on the counter. “Okay, and scanner goggles. Yes? Is that happening or not? I need new ones, so please?”
NICK: He doesn’t say anything, but he climbs up on the ladder and then does a push off the wall and goes sliding across very elegantly, and he goes up to the top and pulls some goggles down. I think they’re a cool color. What color would you like your scanner goggles to be?
LAURA: Ooh. They’re a nice sky blue.
NICK: Yeah. They’re pretty. He slaps those on the counter. “Alright. Pay me for the goods, I’ll collect money from your friends, and then hopefully we won’t see each other again. I have bad memories. They closed my shop.”
LAURA: “I mean, is that really my fault?”
NICK: “Yes.”
LAURA: “And again, no, I was about to say sorry, but… I guess sorry? I do not know. I stole one little thing.”
NICK: “At least you’re honest. Also you stole multiple things from me.”
LAURA: (laughing) “Did I?”
NICK: (laughing) “Yeah.”
LAURA: “I don’t really remember. Oh, yes I did, okay. Okay.”
NICK: “If you return what you stole—“
LAURA: “No~ Heh. I do not have some of the stuff I stole anymore. I think I know what was in that little box that I stole. I think that is gone.”
NICK: “Well, that’s disappointing.”
LAURA: “I mean, in many ways it is disappointing, yes.”
NICK: (laughs) We see Tink and karma approaching the counter with all the stuff. Everything that you all listed off that isn’t illegal you can get here for whatever is stated in the book, I just need you to tell me how much money you just spent.
HUDSON: Can I get an appraiser’s eye here?
NICK: An appraiser’s eye?
HUDSON: Yes. It’s a lens implant or a cybernetic eye, in my case it would be a lens implant, and it gives you automatic advantage on Negotiation and Streetwise checks.
NICK: A lens implant is still a thing that gets stuck in your face. This guy’s not gonna have that. You’re gonna need a specialist.
HUDSON: Ah, okay. I might not even get it.
CAMERON: (incredulously) I thought you didn’t do cybernetic implants.
HUDSON: That’s the thing, I thought this was like pop it in your eye. Is it not?
LAURA: No.
HUDSON: Oh, then I’m not gonna get it then.
NICK: Nuh-uh.
CAMERON: It’s like changing the lens in your eye.
HUDSON: Oh.
NICK: It’s like cornea surgery that lets you see stuff good.
HUDSON: Nah, I don’t want that. I thought it was like cat eyes but for appraisers.
NICK: No. I can make you a custom item at some point if it’s something you want. I’ll get you like a Dragon Ball Z scanner or something.
HUDSON: I thought it was cool, and I was like I don’t have Negotiation or Streetwise, so I was like this would be a good item upgrade. If I think of a custom thing I’ll let you know.
NICK: Yeah. Well, I’ll get you something that looks like that. That’s just gonna be… You’re not gonna pull it off the shelf at space Wal-Mart. You’re gonna need somebody to make it for you.
HUDSON: Oh. Can you get grenades here?
NICK: Nope. That’s the weapon store.
HUDSON: Okay. Stim packs here?
NICK: Yeah. They sell stim packs.
LAURA: How much are stim packs?
CAMERON & HUDSON: Twenty-five.
LAURA: Twenty-five. “Can I also throw in a few stim packs?”
NICK: “Yes, of course.” He gestures behind you and there’s one of those bulk candy bins that you see at the grocery store that’s just full of stim packs. It says Sale, but they’re 25 Credits.
CAMERON: I spent 1,025 Credits.
NICK: Okay. What did you get?
CAMERON: I got a big med pack for the ship, an emergency med pack to carry around with me, eight stim packs, and extra reload for my battery pack for my gun, four emergency droid repair kits… Yes. Wait, no, subtract 200 from that, 825.
NICK: What was the other 200?
CAMERON: The hold out blaster I’m gonna buy at the gun store.
NICK: Oh. Yeah. Okay.
HUDSON: I bought four stim packs, four glow rods, and a com jammer. I did that for a total of 540, which leaves me 4,704 Credits left.
NICK: Nice.
LAURA: Xianna bought the scanner goggles and eight stim packs for 325.
NICK: Nice. We get a shot of everybody walking out with the boutique looking bags. None of them match because it makes a better shot. You’re standing in the doorway and the person running the store is kind of glaring at the back of your heads from the background. You have successfully bought quite a bit of gear.
LAURA: “Also, we should not come back to this store, or maybe this area of town.”
CAMERON: “Why?”
LAURA: “So you remember way back when we first had our little missions to see if we were going to get picked for the big mission for Sentinel?”
CAMERON: “Oh yeah, a week and a half ago.”
LAURA: “Yes, like a week and a half ago. My particular little mission was stealing a little gray box from a store. The guy who owns this general store owned that store, and knows me.”
CAMERON: “Oh.”
LAURA: “I also at one point fell out of an air vent into the room. There was a security camera. I did wave at it, so it’s very clearly me on the film.”
CAMERON: “Great.”
LAURA: “Fun little tidbit, though. I’m pretty sure that little gray box thing that I stole was that little box with whatever creature in it we used later. It looked very similar. Probably the same one. Yeah, so weapon store now?”
CAMERON: “Yup.”
LAURA: “Yes. Weapons. Okay, let’s go!”
HUDSON: Dun-dun, dun-dun, (singing) What I want you got, dun-dun…
(snapping)
LAURA: Bum-bum, (singing) gonna get sued~
CAMERON: (laughs)
NICK: Yeah, so—
LAURA: (singing) We don’t have the rights~
NICK: It cuts—
LAURA: (singing) …to siiing this song~
NICK: (laughs) You cut to the weapons store. You can see it’s kind of a weird layout. It says, _weapons, there’s an underscore in front of it.
CAMERON: Dear lord. “Okay, apparently you pronounce the underscore? I went to the… LAW… office earlier.”
HUDSON: “I always pronounce underscores as *whispers* scores because you say it under your breath.
NICK: (laughs)
CAMERON: “Apparently that’s not how they do that here.”
HUDSON: “Oh, okay.”
LAURA: “I’m not going to say the name of the store. I’m just going to go in. Okay.”
CAMERON: “Okay. It was just a weird thing I wanted to share. Anyway.”
NICK: You go in and there’s wooden floorboards, wooden walls, and there is a steel motor pool wall. It’s like a parts cage kind of setup. There’s a screen in the wall with a place to put a credit transfer and a push button menu of everything they have. You can see into the warehouse in the back, or like the stock room in the back, and there is a Devaronian back there sorting things and stuff. It looks like all you have to do is press buttons and get what you want.
CAMERON: I go and press the button for a hold out blaster?
NICK: Okay. It gives you some color options and stuff. Do you want a super sleek looking one, or…?
CAMERON: Ooh. I want a gunmetal gray. It’s pretty boring, but it sparkles a little bit.
NICK: You press the button and a light turns on in one of the cubbies. The guy who’s back there managing the inventory pulls the drawer and pulls out what looks like a blaster that hasn’t quite been finished. He puts it into a box and presses some buttons and you can see it getting painted and adjusted and sided. It takes about 30 seconds. Then he drops it onto a conveyer belt and it clicks along up to the drop window and it drops into the box, but the box won’t open until you pay for it.
CAMERON: I pay for it.
NICK: You get a hold out blaster. It’s gunmetal gray.
CAMERON: Cool. “This is a very interesting gun vending machine.”
NICK: You say that and the guy looks up, and in the corner you can see there’s a speaker. He turns around and kind of shrugs at you, and then does a thumbs up, and even through the thick transparasteel you can hear (TING) at his smile, because he’s related to the other guy.
CAMERON: Great.
NICK: And then he goes back to tinkering with some stuff back there. Did anybody else want weapon things?
HUDSON: Yes. I walk up to the counter. I would like to buy four frag grenades and four stun grenades.
NICK: (smiling) The guy at the back just points at the button menu.
HUDSON: “What?!”
NICK: (smiling) Points at the button menu.
CAMERON: “Tink, you have to press the button.”
LAURA: “Use the menu!”
HUDSON: “Oh! Oh, okay. Oh, this is… Oh. Is it like a red button?”
CAMERON: “Here, Tink, what do you want?”
HUDSON: “Four stun grenades and four frag grenades.”
CAMERON: Okay. I push the buttons.
NICK: Okay. Lights pop up on a couple of cubbies. The guy pulls it out and he grabs the grenades and chucks them onto the conveyer belt, and they click along and go around the edge of the stock room, and drop into the box. If you pay for it the box opens and you can get your grenades. Do you buy your grenades?
HUDSON: Yes I do.
NICK: Okay. Tink has eight grenades now. The guy from the stock room also points and there’s a ‘for your convenience’ rack on the side, and it’s paper bags that you can put your stuff in.
HUDSON: Nice.
CAMERON: I slipped my hold out blaster into my armor.
NICK: Yeah. I’m sure that’s fine.
LAURA: How much are the grenades?
HUDSON: So, a frag grenade is 50 each and a stun grenade is 75 each. I still need my… Would this not be a place to get the outlaw tech data breaker? This is too legit?
CAMERON: This is a gun shop.
HUDSON: Oh, yeah. I didn’t know if this guy was like, maybe a little outlaw.
CAMERON: He doesn’t look sketch. (laughs)
LAURA: Xianna’s gonna buy two grenades.
CAMERON: Frag or stun?
LAURA: Frag.
NICK: Okay. Beep-beep, ding, click-click. Box. Pay. Take. The whole thing looks extremely secure. Xianna, to your thief’s eye you can’t really see how he got into the stock room in the first place, but it looks like a vault.
LAURA: Huh. “Maybe he lives there.”
NICK: (laughs) yeah, maybe. To your practiced eyes, as people who deal with star ships a lot, this thing if it is as intense as it looks might even be able to stand up to turbo laser fire from orbit. It’s super secure.
CAMERON: (laughs)
LAURA: Cool. Great.
NICK: Anything else from the weapon shop?
LAURA: No.
CAMERON: “I already dropped my blaster off, but if y’all want any gun upgrades I was with this guy’s brother earlier. He apparently does a really good job.”
HUDSON: “I would like a vibro-axe upgrade.”
CAMERON: “Okay cool. Let’s head that way.”
NICK: You run across there. He’s like—
CAMERON: “Hey Krylon!”
NICK: “Oh, you brought friends.”
CAMERON: “I did~”
NICK: “Wonderful.”
HUDSON: “I’m Tink.”
NICK: “Hi Tink. Nice to meet you. You’ve got some red on your fur.”
HUDSON: “Oh…”
LAURA: “It is a popsicle.”
NICK: “Oh.”
HUDSON: “It’s no longer a popsicle, but it was a popsicle.”
NICK: “I see.”
LAURA: “yes.”
NICK: “Thank you for that very specific relativity. I appreciate it. What can I do for you fine people?”
HUDSON: “I would like an upgrade for my vibro-axe.”
NICK: “Wonderful. Let me see it.” He holds out a hand, you toss it to him, he catches it. He swings it a little bit, and you can tell he’s very comfortable with this which is a very large, very scary weapon that most people don’t use. He puts it on the bench. “What exactly am I doing to this bad boy?”
HUDSON: “Uh, monomolecular edge please.”
NICK: “Yeah, I could put that on there. Probably take a couple days.”
HUDSON: “Alright. Couple meaning the literal couple of two?”
NICK: “Couple meaning the literal couple of two. I appreciate your attention to detail, my friend.”
HUDSON: “Thank you.”
NICK: “That’ll cost you…”
HUDSON: “That’ll cost me 1,000 Credits.”
NICK: “Yeah. It’s a little bit more pricey at 1,000 Credits, but thanks for filling it in and reading the menu off back behind my head. Yeah, I’ll get that taken care of for you big boy. Come back in a couple days. It should be ready about the same time as your friend’s carbine.”
HUDSON: “Alright.”
NICK: “Wonderful. Anything else?”
LAURA: “We’re good, I think. Yes?”
CAMERON: (laughs)
LAURA: “Did that popsicle upset your tummy, Tink?”
HUDSON: “It gave me the hiccups.”
CAMERON: “Aww.”
LAURA: “Oh, I am so sorry. Okay.”
NICK: Aw.
HUDSON: “Again, I cannot get the outlaw tech data breaker here. I really need to use my street smarts.”
CAMERON: No.
LAURA: “No, it’s okay Tink, we will get that in a moment.”
HUDSON: “Great.”
NICK: The Devaronian looks at you. “No… I don’t- I do guns.”
HUDSON: “Oh.”
NICK: “Yeah, guns and swords mostly.”
LAURA: “We’ll figure it out later, Tink. I promise. We should’ve maybe done this in reverse order now that I am thinking about it, but it’ll be fine. It will be fine.”
CAMERON: I place my vibro-sword on the counter.
NICK: Ooh.
HUDSON: Oh shit.
CAMERON: While I’m here.
NICK: Oh. Sure.
CAMERON: “Alright Krylon, looking at the mods you got, I think I’d like to do the balanced hilt as well as the monomolecular edge.”
NICK: “I can make that happen. There is one downside. There’s just the me. This is a cottage industry. Doing all these as a rush job it is gonna take me probably an extra day, so it’s gonna take three days to get these weapons back to you.”
CAMERON: “That’s alright.”
NICK: “Alright. So come back on the dawn of the third day, and I’ll be able to get you your weapons.”
CAMERON: “So that’ll be 2,500?”
NICK: “Yup, 2,500 Credits.”
CAMERON: “Alright.”
NICK: We get the team walking out, much less heavily armed, and that’s where we’re gonna end the episode. Ba-naaa~!
OTHERS: Ba-naaa~!
CAMERON: Wee!
## Outro
CAMERON: Thanks for listening to Tabletop Squadron. If you’ve enjoyed our show please consider logging into iTunes and giving us a five-star review. Five-star reviews will help new listeners to find the show and give the squad warm fuzzies when we read them.
Xianna’fan is played by Laura Penrod. She can be found on Twitter at @cheerio_buffet.
Tink is played by Hudson Jameson, and he can be found on Twitter at @hudsonjameson.
Karma Nailo is played by me, Cameron Robertson. You can find me on Twitter at @midnightmusic13.
Our game master is Nick Robertson, and you can find him on Twitter at @alias58.
Our intro song is Space Jam by Pablo Ribot.
Additional music by James Gunter.
Follow the podcast on Twitter and Instagram at @Tabletop_Squad. For real, we’re real people and we want to talk to anyone who listens to the show. Reach out! See you next time.
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