Knocking on the Wrong Door (Episode 8)

[GM Fang]

Having engaged in yet another cantina brawl, the team finds themselves deciding what to do next. The verdict is to try to follow the smugglers on the assumption that they work for Bandin Dohbah and are not just a bunch of street toughs and smugglers. With the Toydarian, who had been carrying on an animated discussion with the figure in the red cloak, making his way out of the cantina, looking furtively, Spanner and Kilian follow.

It is not far from the cantina where the flitting Toydarian leads them down a side road to a warehouse alongside where the destroyed J9-B8 was found. Heading towards the back, the Toydarian knocks on a door and is let inside. Spanner keeps his distance, watching, as Kilian moves in. Unable to see or hear what is happening, Kilian makes a fateful decision: he knocks on the door!

The door is opened by the Weequay they fought in the cantina and a human. The Weequay immediately recognizes Kilian and draws a knife, while the other takes a wild shot that barely misses the gunslinger. As surprise and alarm overcomes him, along with the realization that he is outnumbered at least six to one, Kilian quickly pulls out his single armor piercing grenade and lobs it into the room and turns to run. The magnetic adhesion system of the grenade adheres the grenade to the door and the blast is devastating. Kilian doesn't even look back to see the results of his handiwork, as he and Spanner rush back to the cantina to meet back up with the others.

Assembling the team and explaining what happened, the team head out in force, but quickly find out that they are walking into an ambush. After a few warning shots, a voice rings out. "Look, you idiots clearly have no idea who you are dealing with. Drop your weapons and we'll go easy on you." Surprisingly, the group complies and drops their weapons to the dusty road.

Daro, the leader, explains that he and his friends are part of a "self-supporting network of dealers in portable goods" and that there are "a whole bunch of us about these parts," so the group should count them selves lucky that they are being left with JUST a beating. Despite dropping their weapons, several of the group decide to also start deriding their foes. This results in another scuffle starting.

Proiah Pron, the Sullustan pilot and smuggler, had trailed the other four and came upon the scene and started firing, turning the scuffle into a full-fledged gun battle. Spanner, Pron and Kilian all are wounded in the fight but the team manages to drive off the group that out-numbered them. Daro is killed among some others, and Spir who had originally instigated the first fight with his treatment of the Rodian girl, Zukata, was taken prisoner. With Daro falling, the rest of the gang slipped into the maze of alleys of Mos Espa.

The crowd in the cantina and some individuals outside rush up to the group and congratulate them. The team is treated like heroes and given offers of food and drink. Meanwhile, they strip the bodies of the fallen gang members, especially Daro himself. A few of the crowd are especially congratulatory for the thrashing of the thuggish smuggling ring and alludes that they work for the notorious Bandin Dohbah himself.

The group heads back to the safe house in the warehouse, with a restrained Spir in tow, to investigate and finds easy access as Kilian's AP grenade had blown the door off it's hinges and two shredded bodies, one of them the Weequay, lay nearby. It is essentially a single large room with an area by one wall for relaxation. A number of salvaged couches and hammocks provide some comfort to resting smugglers. There is also an old fashioned stove and larder for preparing snacks, as well as a stinking chemical toilet.

(FL-AR3: Please proceed to the next post, as the story continues ->)

[GM Fang]

Looking around further, a large reinforced steel cabinet sits in one corner of the room. The center of the room is piled with all manner of
crates and boxes, though they are empty of anything of value. An inactive astromech droid stands in another corner. He shows some signs of mistreatment. His chassis is covered in oily handprints and dents. He has had a large dark iron restraining bolt fitted to his chassis. Some of the small panels on the front of the droid have been removed and he has been wired to a small portable computer. The blinking green screen on the computer reads "Configuration complete-co ordinates compatible."

The droid remains unresponsive while the restraining bolt is in place. Using the dark iron spanner found on Daro's body, the restraining bolt is removed by FL-AR3 and Spanner. The droid hums to life in a series of whistles and beeps and indicates that its designation is R4-W9. This is the droid that they've been looking for!

R4-W9 is glad to be freed from the restraining bolt. Like most astromechs, he communicates in bleeping machine language, though he carries a holographic projector that he can use to display relevant images in order to illustrate any point he wishes to make. R4-W9's immediate concern is to find out what became of his companion, J9-B8 and he displays a holographic image of the protocol droid. He emits a mournful series of bloops and moans when told that J9 was beaten and heavily damaged.

Garet investigates what is on the computer while others work to disconnect the astromech from the computer and attempt as best as they can to reassemble the detached parts and panels. The Drall politico finds a set of coordinates corresponding to a field of large asteroids that lies not far from Tatooine and could be reached quickly by a craft with hyperspace capabilities. This must be the location of their rendezvous point. Garet also finds that the computer contains a few programs beside the coordinates that have recently been uploaded to the astromech. Most of these are accounts of glitterstim bales transported and sold. With some deeper digging the computer manages to give him access to an additional file. This file is named "Pass" and seems to be a pattern for a short wave radio signal designed to be broadcast by a ship's navigational computer.

Spir is then interrogated by being tossed into the trash compactor where they found J9. The group finally learns through accessing the computer and information from the Astromech that Bandin's hideout is in a series of caves near Beggar's Canyon. When the group checks on Spir, they find that he is no longer there. J9's remains were collected in a storage container and taken away by R4.