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Thread: Escape from Palpatraz

  1. #41
    The question was one Hal had been expecting, yet he had not formulated an answer for it ahead of time. Instead, he leaned back, examining Onika for more than just her appearance. Her demeanor had always remained understated, her answers short and simple, never revealing. She seemed afraid to show her true self at all, while Hal allowed parts of him to shine through his Kyle Rayner persona, knowing that some elements had to remain genuine in order for his cover to be believed. But Onika? Onika locked herself away as if in a vault.

    "Just to get to know you," he replied at last. "We've trained with each other for months, I see you every day, and yet I have no idea who you are, or what it is you want. I hope it's something good. I hope that maybe it's something I can help you with someday. But so far, I really can't tell. So, let me ask you, why are you here? Like, right here, at this table, with me? You could have run, you could have escaped. You know I wouldn't have stopped you. But you're here, and I don't think it's just for a nerfburger and a shake, either."

  2. #42
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    Onika lightly stirred the wet-cement remains of her milkshake with her straw as he spoke. When he finished, her red eyes came back up, like deflector screens.

    "You're too old for me."

  3. #43
    "Oh ha ha," Hal groaned. "You're too young for me. Besides, everybody knows it's Lady Vissica that I'm after."

    Shaking his head, he then glanced around the diner with an annoyed sigh before coming back to Onika, much of his humor lost. "I run my mouth the whole way out here, and you come back at me with that bullshit? Have you even been listening to a word I've said, that you'd think that is what I'm after with you?"

  4. #44
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    Her eyes didn't waver, but she settled back into her seat.

    "People lie," she said. "I had to be sure."

    Onika's fingers slipped off the tip of her straw and came to rest on the tabletop, drumming. She carefully wet her lips with her tongue.

    "I was listening, by the way. You were talking about helping people. About standing for hope. You want to be a hero. But that's not me. I just want the people I love to be happy and safe. Well, right now they're a thousand miles away, and they might as well be on the Outer Rim. 'Cause even if I do run off to be with them, I'll just be leading the Knights straight to them."

    She lifted her eyes again, fingers curling at the edges of the table. "So here's the part where you say I should protect other people, just like I want my friends to be protected. But that doesn't help them. Because no one ever does. No one cares about aliens in the undercity until they want something from them. It's the only reason I'm in the Citadel. It's the only reason I even exist."

    Onika slumped back against the patched and peeling bench seat. "So why am I here? Because you're nice, and you offered me food, and I just needed a frelling break."

  5. #45
    In the tense silence following Onika's tirade of hard truths, their waiter arrived with a full tray. "Double nerf with the garden on top?"

    Hal simply raised his finger, and their two plates were set out before the respective diners. Waiting for the waiter to go, Hal leaned forward, staring at Onika across a table exploding with heavenly scents.

    "Then why not fight back?" he asked. "If you don't like it, why not fight it? Take your training and turn it against them, become a weapon instead of a tool. Find your own reason, show them who you really are, instead of being just a droid to accept their programming. Killing's easy. I've done it. It's so, so easy, Onika. So easy that it scares me."
    Last edited by Halajiin Rabeak; Jun 11th, 2018 at 05:01:25 PM.

  6. #46
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    Onika shuddered, and that was as good as an answer.

    "Fighting the Empire gets people killed," she said, her voice low. Her mouth opened again, as if she were on the verge of saying something else. But at the end she bit down on it and lifted her head.

    "Put it that way, and it sounds like I've already lost, huh?" She flashed a melancholic smile, then looked down at her steaming burger. It smelled like paradise. "Honestly, I'm just trying to keep my head above water until I can figure things out. I will. I always have."

    She lifted the burger and took a big bite. A few stray mushrooms and onions slopped out the other end, followed by bloody juices. Her eyes widened.

    "Oh godff. That'ff really goodh."

  7. #47
    There. There, in that moment, Hal glimpsed the tiniest view of the real Onika, only for it to vanish once more. Still, it was the closest he had come yet to learning what made her tick, and for today, it would be good enough. Lifting a fry, he sniffed it, then applied some more salt before popping it into his mouth, savoring the instant bliss which rolled across his tongue in hot, starchy, oily, and mildly crunchy heaven.

    "You've only lost if you decided you have," he chuckled. "Otherwise, you're just biding your time, waiting for the right moment to strike. But in the meantime, it doesn't hurt to make a few friends. I'm not supposed to tell you this, but... Jeryd rather fancies you. He's been trying to keep it a secret." He winked, lifting his own burger.

    It sagged in his paws, and he could feel the grease seeping into the fur of his fingers from its two patties, cheese, bacon, and fried egg. Pink eyes locked on target, he chose his own moment to strike, and his jaws opened wide, exposing perfectly white, animalistic teeth before sinking deep into a tower of surefire cardiac arrest. Upon impact, every neuron in his brain told him it was worth it.

  8. #48
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    Onika had gone for another sip of buiberry, and had swallowed in the last critical moment before she would have snorted it up the back of her nose. She covered her nose and mouth with one hand, eyebrows high, her lips momentarily caught between a smile and a sneer -

    It was the wink that did her in, and she burst out laughing.

    "No, really?" she said, theatrically. "Oh my gods, I had no idea. If only he weren't so shy."

    She lifted her burger to her lips, and paused there. "Okay, I'm sorry, but I have to ask... Lady Vissica? Seriously?"

  9. #49
    In such a moment of meaty, cheesy bliss, Hal's mind flung itself back to teenage days back on Nehantish, hanging out at similar diners with friends. It was hope, friendship, happiness, and joy in every bite, and Onika's laugh further fueled his cheer as he doped himself up on another injection of addictive nostalgia. "Mmmf, yeah," he nodded, then swallowed before washing down the mouthful of near-orgasmic delight with the cool, thick rush of sugary milkshake.

    "She's gorgeous," he sighed wistfully. "What a woman. I know she's just playing hard-to-get, but I'll be in there someday." Plucking a long, thick fry from his basket, he pushed it deep into his buiberry shake, then popped it into his cavernous muzzle. "Of course, Baastian's a hunk I wouldn't mind getting a piece of, either."

  10. #50
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    Onika wrinkled her nose as the fry went in the shake. That... that couldn't work, could it? But Kyle looked so enamored with it the sensation. But then... Vissica.

    She twisted her mouth at his next hypothetical paramour, too. "Mmmm, a little too soldier boy for me. Though Knight Jibral... you know, in a hot teacher kinda way?"

    A shadow fell over the table. Onika looked up, surprised her senses hadn't warned her that the waiter was back. But it wasn't the waiter. Her pink face went ice-pale.

  11. #51
    "Cadets."

    Baastian Cain towered over the table, one eyebrow lifted. His duty uniform was crisp and sleek as if machined out of blue steel, his black-gloved hands clasped behind his back.

    "Sorry to interrupt. I was in the neighborhood and couldn't help but notice that... so were you."

    A chair began scraping across the floor toward the booth. Baastian caught it with an outstretched hand, turned it, and sat on the open face of the table, effectively locking them in.

  12. #52
    With only half of his burger remaining, Hal took another bite, then waved a brief, casual greeting to the Imperial Knight. He'd been expecting someone from the Citadel to show up soon, though Baastian was not the face he had anticipated. Still, the Nehantite remained casual, chewing and swallowing before taking another pull from his shake.

    "Heya, Baas," he nodded. "Yeah, cafeteria menu wasn't looking too good, so, thought I'd eat off-campus, today. Onika decided to join me."

    A fry was plucked from his basket, taking a dip in more buiberrry shake before being tossed into his snapping jaws. "You eaten yet? Still got time to join us. Fries are as bottomless as Lady Vissica!"

  13. #53
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    Onika shrank into the bench seat, her mouth dry. She'd known it wouldn't last. She'd known someone would come along. Why hadn't she prepared? Why had she agreed to this? Stupid!

    Dozens of morbidly curious pairs of eyes settled on her and politely flitted away, only to return. Whispered voices pounded in the back of her head. She remembered Palara making an idle gesture and dismissing every prying eye on the train. Why didn't he do that? Send them away, please!

  14. #54
    "Filled up at the commissary," Baastian replied. "More's the pity. The burgers are really good here."

    His eyes flicked from Kyle to Onika, who appeared to be trying to disappear into the crackling upholstery. "The real crime would be losing your appetite. Don't let me stop you. That was some nice work on the detection grid, Cadet."

  15. #55
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    Onika's crimson eyes flashed for a moment of defiance. Then she picked up her burger and mumbled, "Apparently not good enough," before taking another bite.

  16. #56
    Baastian spread his hands magnanimously. "Oh, we'd have tracked down the unauthorized access, definitely, but we already had eyes on you at that point. Cadet Rayner knows why."

    He lifted a hand, and one of Kyle's fries floated into the air into his waiting fingers, where he took a satisfied, steamy bite.

  17. #57
    Hal gave a defeated, yet satisfied smile as he shrugged and held up his left wrist, waggling it a bit. "Gee, Knight Baastian, whatever could you mean?" he chuckled.

    The Nehantite's humor did not so much fly in the face of the seriousness of the situation he and Onika found themselves in, so much as it admitted fault, but fault with no true ill intent. With his right paw, he fished the chitcard from his pocket, then extended it like a playing card between two fingers toward their superior officer. "Oh, thanks for lunch, by the way. It was really generous of you. I was gonna go for some pie, too, but that'd just be greedy."

    Across from him, it was impossible not to see Onika's panic, and all Hal could do was continue to smile and act as if nothing was wrong, in an attempt to keep her calm, to prevent her from doing something rash which she would later regret. He could handle is own punishment, but he would be damned if he saw the girl get herself into further trouble.

  18. #58
    "Well, it's good to know you've learned the meaning of restraint."

    The rest of the fry disappeared, and he rubbed the salt from his leather gloves. Through some miracle of textile engineering, the grease didn't smudge or stain at all.

    "In any case, I'm glad to see our cadets watching out for one another. Security wanted to dispatch a recovery unit right away, but I managed to stand them down. I knew we didn't have anything to worry about, even if our biggest flight risk had just crossed the perimeter, because..."

    Again he turned his sights on Onika. "You were there to keep an eye on him."

  19. #59
    Danger, Halajiin Rabeak! Danger! The old, corny robot voice shouted inside Hal's head.

    He had just opened his mouth to object, before realizing it was a trap, as Baastian surely knew that if Hal wanted to escape, he could have done so long ago. No, his muzzle busied itself with another bite from his burger instead - no less delicious now with additional company than it had been some few minutes earlier. It was a tell, and Hal simply shrugged as his response to the accusation while glancing to Onika. She was the flight risk, it seemed. New information, it took time to process, and Hal let his mind do its thing while his tongue reveled in a form of pleasure palace it had been denied so long.

    So, she's a runner, huh? Yet she feared going back to her people, lest the Empire harm them. Interesting, he thought to himself. Where would she have gone, then, if I'd truly let her go? Or was she even interested in running? She didn't bolt when we got out of the hatch, instead choosing to stick with me. If I were her, I'd have only done that if I was actually considering that the Knights were where I belonged, and I needed to test myself. Is that what she did? Was she even aware of what she was doing? Or did it just happen? I wonder where the term burger came from. It's a funny word, burger. Burger. Burger burger burger...

  20. #60
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    Onika straightened up and managed to hold Baastian's gaze, even as her heart thundered in her narrow chest. What was he trying to do? Give her an out? Kyle had said he could escape any time he wanted, but she didn't see how that could be true if he really had a tracking implant in his wrist. Was he just avoiding a scene in public until he could get them back behind the walls of the Citadel?

    She glanced Kyle's way. Even if he was a Knight undercover, he hadn't planned for her to tag along. He'd welcomed her as a co-conspirator. And there was something... honest about how he'd dealt with her. It was refreshing. And, true to her word, she was no narc.

    Without a word, she took a steak fry in her fingers and dipped it delicately into her shake. Then, eyes on Baastian, she took a deliberate bite.

    Fruity-sweet on salty-starch. Hm. Actually not that bad.

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