High Law and Low Justice, Part 5

[DrZombie]

"Savage? Naah, spilling drinks isn't savage. You're not worth it, little man"

Gwydion says, as he turns his back to the navy officer......

Only to snap around and sucker-punch him full in the belly, followed by a nasty headbutt.

"You want savage you pussy navy cissies? I'll bloody show you bloody savage."

(OOC attack: +24, +25
Dmg : 4,6
Initiative : 4)

 

[Wilphe]

The Petty Officer sees your punch coming and decides, unwisely, to try and ride it out. He drops his beer which shatters on the floor as his own punch slams into your shoulder with little force behind it, Gwydion's follow up catches him genuinely unaware and opens a gash above his eye.
Shocked he makes no effort to counterattack and before Gwydion can follow up and his two companions are on the scene pulling the two combatants apart, "Hey, easy there. No need to fight." "I'll tear this punk apart", "You try, you'll probably lose and you'd definatly loose the pips you just worked you **** off to get back. Leave it." The other one of them talks to you as he holds you off, his hand on your chest, "Listen mate, better go, leave it okay?"

Leaving seems like the obvious choice, and a sudden, slight but noticeable weight in your shirt pocket suggests that this little scene has served it's purpose.

There are three discs in Gwydion's pocket: The teaser disk, the altered one, and a briefing document that contains a certain ammount of intel on the K'kree he'll be dealing with, but can in no way be traced to the Navy. It includes this:

This is your call for how you do this. Approaching the K'kree alone may work, but it's hard to do so discretely as they are never found in groups of less than half a dozen and really don't like people creeping up on them. I'm not sure this is the sort of thing you make an appointment to do. They do have five Girug'kagh Interpretors with them who get to talk to the filthy vermin so the Lords don't have to, you should be able to get to one of them alone.

ooc:
Girug'kagh are the K'kree's most favoured servent race. This involves draconian vegetarianism, total economic, social and cultural subjugation and formal acknowledgment that the K'kree are incarnate deities. There are less well favoured K'kree servent races, including some humans, who are only allowed to serve the Steppelords as cannon fodder as well as far more potential servents who did not survive contact with K'kree culture.
[sblock]
Init: 8
To hit: 20
Damage: 1
http://invisiblecastle.com/find.py?u=Wilphe&limit=on
[/sblock]

 

[DrZombie]

"Allright, allright." Gwydion says as he eases off. He takes a step back and adjusts his clothes.
"I mean, where's the sport? He punches like a bloody girl." he says smiling."I've had worse punches from my younger sister."


He turns around and heads for the bar.
"Bartender? A beer for me and my friends and a glass of milk for that navy guy with the bloody face."

As the night goes on Gwydion goes from bar to bar, trying to get saanath and Tuan as drunk as possible as quick as possible without drinking too much himself.

He'll get them safely back to the ship, takes a small backpack with a few clothes, tells Tommy (his reptile pet) to stay with Tuan untill he gets back, and quitly leaves the ship in the early morning, telling that he's gone looking for his wallet if someone challenges him.



Then he'll figure out where those K'Kree are and how to get there.

 

[Wilphe]

"Allright, allright." Gwydion says as he eases off. He takes a step back and adjusts his clothes. "I mean, where's the sport? He punches like a bloody girl." he says smiling."I've had worse punches from my younger sister."

"Yeah, and he holds his beer like one too. We'll get him out of here and back to bed okay?"

Thus defused the situation ends as quickly as it began, the other bar patrons, seeing that the fight is over return to their drinking. Saanath and Tuan get drunk enough to be well out of it* and no one notices or objects when Gwydion slips out early the next morning on a little private espionage mission.

The K'kree are staying a few hundred miles away from the capital city and Starport, at a one and a half horse town called Untergard. Any travel on Shrigegge outside the major cities requires a permit and a good reason.

Ordinarily this might be a problem, however you've already clocked that the Starport does have a PR booth that the K'kree have hired on a short term let for PR and BS purposes. It's not staffed by their own people and no K'kree or even Girug'kagh are on site, but instead it is being run by local humans. Their main function appears to be to hand out glossy flyers inviting people to the:

"2000 Worlds Cultural Expo"
An exhibition of K'kree culture, art, craft, and, especially cuisine. They seem to be very evangelical about their vegitarianism, but in the "No, Lentils really are tasty!!" way and not in the "Put down the steak knife or we kill you" way. It's that way thus far anyway, and as long as the Coronel is watching them, that's about as far as it'll go. Of course if anyone is dumb enough to have a barbacue next door to where there staying they'd probably be regarded as signing their own death warrant...

This should be happening on Dukh, and the K'kree are probably not overly happy about wasting their time on what is frankly a backwater world. However, the locals, and especially government, on Shirgegge think this is the greatest thing that's happened to their planet for a generation or more and seem to be proud and generous hosts. As such they're actively encouraging people to go and visit and getting a travel permit to Untergard is fairly easy, and, shockingly, free. The short hop by gravbus is only 15cr and the first one leaves at 07:30 Starport, 0745 Shirgegge Imperial, 09:00 Untergard, thereafter every half an hour.

Security is tight, even for a world with this restrictive a law level, so don't even think about taking a weapon. Or a ham sandwich for that matter. The Pre-trip briefing is very explicit that the whole town of Untergard has been declared a meat free zone so that "Untergard extends traditional Shrigegge hospitality to their Interstellar guests". Anyone wearing Leather shoes is obliged to take them off and be issued plastic replacements.

Basically you are faced with an already intrusive government being incredibly PC towards unsusually picky alien guests.


OOC:
Unless they state otherwise.

 

[DrZombie]

Gwydion puts on his best cotton-and-woolen clothing and buys tickets for the first available flight. He catches up on his sleep in the airplaine and on the bus.
When he gets at the site he just walks around a little at first, looking around, before sitting down at a foodstand where he has a nice view of the crowds, while eating a large and healthy breakfast.

 

[Wilphe]

Untergard is an otherwise anonyomous place that you reckon normally has 10,000 or so inhabitants. It's also the sort of place were nothing ever happens, ever. The poeple like it that way, if they don't they get out of town and off the planet ASAP. The governments, both planetary and local, also try hard to ensure that nothing happens unless they want it to. Most of the time they succeed.

If you thought Shirgegge was proud to host the K'kree, then Untergard has left pride and moved into full-scale Megalomania with their new found temporary importance. Banners, Posters and Holovids are everywhere - it's also fair to say that the mini-tourist boom is making the locals a lot of money, a lot of new barns, tractors and off-world holidays are going to be bought off the back of this. You pay well over the odds for a hastily produced and not very good breakfast.

At first sight local security forces seem practically invisible, they might seem a bit overwhelmed and outnumbered, but generally speaking the Shirgeggeans must more or less learn from birth not to cause trouble. However, after watching for a bit longer you see that plenty of locals appear to have been deputised as extra security personel and crowd control, albeit it in their own clothes with just an armband.

Picking up one of the leaflets and glancing at the map shows thatThe K'kree themselves have taken over several acres of waste ground to the west of the town, some of this is open grassland, some is large open, spacious, temporary K'kree tents and the rest - the parts that mostly see Human traffic - is locally hired and built tents.









OOC:
You know the small town where the original Rambo took place? Well it's like that, but a lot flatter, surronded by fruit trees, and has the equivalent of a County Show taking place by it

 

[DrZombie]

Gwydion looks at the various stands, trying to get a clear picture of the layout, where best to go when in a hurry, where to hide....
At a larger general store he'll buy some local clothing and a hat, and moves on to a drugstore.

He looks confusedly at a paper, scratches his gead, and looks around in the makeup stand.
He peers amongst the myriad of boxes, bottles and sticks, looks at his paper again, and selects something covering and skintoned in his shade of skintone, something for eye-makeup, and then sighs, and makes a phonecall.


"Hi sweety, me here".
"........"
"yeah, I"m at the store, and I can't find your lipstick."
"........"
"Look sweety, they don't have a red moon here, so they don't have moonglow red"
"......."
Yeah I looked everywhere."
"....."
"No I didn't ask, there's only one panel of lipstick in this store, and I've read the label on each and every one of them."
"....."
"Look, they're all red. How the hell should I know what comes closest, I'm a bloke."
"....."
"Yeah, yeah, I'll ask. See ya later".

He looks around.
"Eeuhrm, excuse me miss. Which red comes closest to moonglow, and does this eyeliner 'works' with it, whatever that's supposed to mean?"



Next he'll rent a small hotelroom to change clothing and get rid of his tattoos, slipping out at noon when the place is busy and then make his way up to the K'kree or their servants, with his usual clothes and a make-up remover in his backpack.

(OOC :he'll 'take 20' to apply the make-up, checking in the mirror to see that he gets the result he wants.)

 

[Wilphe]

Well it's hard to find anywhere you are going to be alone if you need to be, but there are a couple of alleys that Gywdion recces out the routes too. The local orchards are either walled or fenced off, so getting into them would be a bind (Shirgeggean agriculture is rigidly controlled after all...) That's in town.

In the Expo itself? Well the 3 tents detailing the horrors of meat-eating, complete with the "Death Ride", where you get an interactive animals eye view of a slaughterhouse are almost certain to be deserted. Or maybe not, they might get treated like a haunted house and attract thrill-seekers, though you expect that the K'kree set out to shock people with that exhibit and have probably succeeded. Might be a good place to hid if your nerves can stand it, or be alone for a meeting.

Most of the rest can expect to be packed, that, you are pretty certain won't be.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++​

"Eeuhrm, excuse me miss. Which red comes closest to moonglow, and does this eyeliner 'works' with it, whatever that's supposed to mean?"

The assitant is helpful, loving to know which moon you are trying to match, what planet you are from and a whole host of other biographic details. Eventually, after making whatever story you feel like, you make your escape.


Renting a home is expensive and requires a certain degree of searching, but eventually you find one at a mark up that is merely "outrageous" as oppossed to "extortionate". You rekcon you've done a fair job covering yourself up and slip out during the lunchtime rush.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++​

Entrance to the expo has a bevy of hired local human security, not the people you want to talk to. In a paddock off to the left of the entrance about a dozen K'kree soldiers are resting and ready to go, two are stood on guard. None of them are carrying firearms or projectile weapons, but all are carrying ceremonial polearms as well as shock batons that might prove mildly more useful.

Finding a K'kree alone is going to be impossible, getting to speak to some unobserved by fellow humans rather more difficult unless you leave the public areas and make your way into their private areas. That has obvious dangers but you are welcome to try.

You probably will be able to find a Girug'kagh and get to speak to him alone, if you can get her to take you seriously.

 

[DrZombie]

Gwydion wanders around, looks at the site and tries to see if he can figure out some sort of pecking order between the Girug'kagh, so that he can go straight to the head honcho.

 

[Wilphe]

Gwydion hasn't studied K'kree or Girug'kagh culture in any depth, but he knows a fair bit about their biology - their skin still retains some vestigial scales and these patters are stained in various ways to indicate caste and status. That he knows, but trying to work out what marks mean what is beyond him without further observation.

A couple of hours, walking and observation enables him to make a solid guess as he sees one of them another to task for some minor infraction - knowing the language would help here, but it certainly looks like a verbal tongue lashing. Following this one about enables the Scout to reason that he holds some sort of position of authority.

Most Girug'kagh are squat muscular with yellow-brown skin, this one is obese and a vaugely nauseting pale mustard colour with prominent blue and red caste marks on his chest. Long, but powerful arms hang below his chest and he wears a portacomp at his belt, otherwise he is stripped to the waist - the better to show of his caste marks. Beedy, calculating green eyes look at Gwydion.