A Bountiful Harvest

Jakob was about to retort to the 'no man gets left behind' statement when a blaster bolt fried past his head, making him shift away from where it had once been. He looked to the place it singed the air, then to the speeders. An incredulous 'how dare you' face was plastered across his own, and he whistled out at the speeder jockeys.

"HEY! You assholes mind!? I'm trying to have a conversation here!" by now he was caught in the moment, and he pretty much ignored Nik's running away. If he hadn't, then old Jakky would have antagonized the poor pilot about how slow he ran.
The response, if you wanted to call it that, to Jak's outburst was simply another few shots, all of which proved that these men must have been the worst shots EVER. They made stormtroopers look like crack shots.

Jakob sighed and gave an apologetic look to Phex.
"Sorry these guys are your enemies. They're really sad." with that, he turned and let loose a few volleys of rapid-fire shots from his twin blasters. There may not have been much that Jakob was good at -- he could only really fly from point A to point B, the Force and Lightsaber thing was still being worked on, and when push came to shove he'd end up running away like Nik -- but he always stuck with the three things he knew he was good at: showing off, riding speederbikes, and throwing blaster shots from blaster pistols like they were automatic. It took practice; in fact, most of his sad life was spent learning how to do that.

Either bikes or riders were crumbling to the bolts being floored out upon them by Jakob, and so they called in backup. The sound of a speederbike behind all the others rang through the alley, and to Jakob's horror he saw a brute of a man wielding a chaingun, of all things. His eyes widened and his arms fell.

"Oh... hell, no." he muttered as his leg muscles screamed to run. He threw his pistols into their holsters and glanced over to Phex. "...Your fight now! Toodle-oo!" And with that, Jak was bolting down the alley AWAY from the guy with the giant automatic gun, and past Nik.

"Don't look back just run faster!" he called out as he passed Nik, then he skidded around the corner, nearly falling over, and ducked behind the wall.

Something inside Phex snapped, and the drama dissolved into cool clarity and he braced himself against the approaching mob. Planting both feet apart in a wide stance, Bilbo’s bane let the frustration, fatigue and anger consume him. When the dark and potent emotions reached a boiling out, Phex pushed his focus outward. A pulsating disc of crimson light erupted from his clinched fist and expanded in size as it sped toward those who meant him ill will.

And had this not been complete and utter bantha shit, it might have done him a damn bit of good.

Instead, the aforementioned snapping was likely due to his battered brain trying to mold itself back into place. The stress of the situation probably didn’t help, but scientifically speaking it was probably most the concussion. And the alcohol – because somehow the alcohol is always at fault in modern science.

While Phex was enjoying his little vacation from coherence and sanity, the loud mouth was apparently doing the same. The key difference being that Jak got results while all Phex accomplished as a headache. When he snapped out of the delirium, having completely tuned the exchange of shots around him, he heard Raio’s parting comment and saw him beat a hasty retreat.

“Catch!” Yelled Phex, because you simply can’t send the speeder you stole and wrecked careening wildly back at the thugs chasing you without some sort of commentary. Were it not for the lump on his gray matter and utter exhaustion, held at bay only by chemical intervention and the unyielding desire to live, Phex liked to think he would have had something better to say. The rapid rebuttal of the chain gun activating was enough for him to concede the point and run like hell.

The blur of Jak and then the explosion behind brought Nik from a full scale flee down to a casual scarper and he craned his neck to see Phex making like a bat out of hell with a speeding bullet stuck up his arse.

The world was suddenly filled with shooting stars, stars that were aimed up the street with reckless abandon for civilians or ammo constervation. Some twat had brought a rather large chain gun to the party, thankfully Nik spotted his exit and as Phex came along side he grabbed him by the arm and with a grunt launched them into a side street.

"Star ports this way!" He yelled as he stumbled, one hand hitting the ground and pushing him back up into a run. "Wouldn't be nice if they killed Captain Corellia and gave us time to escape?" The side street was not long enough for Rillians liking and soon they were back on a wide and exceptionally exposed thoroughfare just off the main high street. In the sky he saw the bulk of a freighter descending and then vanishing behind the buildings in front of them.

He heard the other two flee towards the spaceport and nodded to himself. Ego? Gone. Badassery? Gone. Now it was time to get the hell out -- preferably alive. He heard the whine associated with the spinning chaingun lower in pitch. This was his chance. He sprinted past the mouth of the alley, managing to slip past the next volley of fire by literally the heel of his boot. It was gone.
His coat trailing after him like some crazy meteor fire as he blazed through streets, sticking to trails as narrow as possible. He managed to make his way through a building and regrouped right with Nik and Phex.

"Hey guys," he said, for once sounding winded, "nice of you to wait up." he said with a grin, though the gleaming whites were soon replaced with Jak's partly open mouth as he tried to catch his breath while still keeping up.
He always liked to play big time but he only had his blaster skill to brag about. The rest was all pure showmanship, including the bravado. If you gave him the choice between 'Die a hero' and 'Die with your own private stock of wine and women', he'd pick the latter. Heroism got the stupid killed fast.

The pair of scoundrels, and the yipping stray they picked up in dire need of euthanasia, had one thing going for them. The narrow side alley they had just left was far too virginal to allow anything but foot track down it. Bilbo’s biker bitches from bars would have to find a less prudish path to them. That bought them a small window of time to make their presence on this planet past tense.

“Fetch, boy.” Phex suggested, gesturing to Jak before sweeping his arm in the direction of the freeway. If they could procure one of those vehicles, then their safe exit was almost assured. Almost.

No brilliant inspiration struck him, so Phex simple stuck his thumb in the air. It probably wouldn’t serve to bring a star destroyer full of women lacking any discernable clothing or morals, but it might tempt a passing commuter into swooping in to offer misguided but well intentioned assistance. People with consciences were stupid like that.

“So who is going to pay the hitch hiker fee? ‘Fraid I can’t, fellows, jaw condition.” And he did have a jaw condition, as far as he was concerned. He didn’t know the scientific polysyllabic word, but one notable symptom included aversion to having man muscle instead his mouth. Granted, he didn’t feel so strongly about it that he’d rather wait for the parade of suitors chasing them to arrive, but if he could pawn the task off…

“How ‘bout you, Raio? You strike me as the type to have a big mouth. Or you, didnae you say you wanted to get that cider taste out yer mouth?” For lack of a real bus to throw them under to preserve himself, Phex would settle for the proverbial substitute. ‘Sides, the one not named Raio was starting to grow on him in a way that cowardly dirtbags tended to grow on each other.

Jakob scoffed in his classic 'you can't tell me what to do' way. He found that there was a point to Phex's idiocy, though. He rolled his eyes at the classic hitchhiker's pose and walked right out in front of oncoming traffic, picking the lane with the farthest distance between him and the vehicle. He pulled out his blaster and let off a warning shot that races right past the driver side of the windscreen. The speeder screeched to a stop at his toes and Jakob stepped onto the hood of it, then literally booted the owner out of the open-top speeder. He looked to the unconscious man who lay on the side of the road to the two standing on the roadside.

"You two coming?" he asked with a grin that quickly replaced his grimace. He looked up the road and saw the squad of speederbike jockeys heading their way. They're either great trackers, or that blaster shot was really fast at attracting attention.

"You might want to hurry up," he said, making 'move it' motions with his hand "I don't feel like knowing what their plan is for us."

Nik's boots stuttered to a stop beside the free way, just in time to save him from yet another bumper incident as a red speeder car whizzed past. The exchange between the pair passed through one ear, through the frazzled static of petrified thoughts and out the other as every sense he had, and he wished he had more, sought safety or an escape. This frantic state of panic only intensified when he spotted their pursuers weaving through traffic further down the freeway.

Not that Nik condoned public brutality of any sort but when Jak punted the poor bastard to the tarmac he was the first to launch headfirst into the back seat without a glance or thought for the speeders former driver. "Shut up and drive!" Was his only sentence as behind them their would be killers raced closer.

Some small, charitable part of Phex was growing to see a potential use for the ass just wouldn't quit.

Phex paused while climbing in after the other fellow to reflect upon the absurdity of that thought for the briefest of moments. Not my penis. He chided the perverse snickering at the back of his mind. It's not charitable to dudes. He added sternly, throwing himself into the back seat damn near head first in an attempt to make up for the precious milliseconds lost in bizarre contemplation.

"I'm not small." Phex added aloud, busying himself with securing his most precious asset, himself, to the seat. His crash record was too high for his liking, of late, and he wanted to take no chances. "Why aren't we moving?!" The coward demanded after having seen to his safety restraints.

Craning his neck to look behind, Phex felt the sarcastic detachment sinking in again and knew that they just might survive the night, after all. Glancing over to the other passenger with a determination not to notice the lackeys speeding in their direction, Phex cleared his throat awkwardly.

"So...I've never been in the backseat with a guy before. How does this work?"

There wasn't time to talk to everyone, Jakob had a really bad idea to play out. Dee and Dum decided that letting the red-coated, white-haired man drive was the best course of action. It wasn't.

After fighting with the controls, Jakob finally got the speeder to go forward. From there it was hell to watch. He managed to get on the wrong side of the road and was only barely managing to weave through the oncoming traffic. His hands were white-knuckled and his eyes were wide while he fought to drive the contraption.

After a good, fairly-sized escape from the speeder jockeys, Jakob hit a ninety-degree turn and was going too fast to make it. The speeder bolted through the railing and off of the elevated freeway, onto rooftops below. With several rough bouts of roof hopping, the speeder finally entered through a giant window and halted when the front end smashed against a support beam.

Jakob turned around in his seat to address both of them.

"This. Is why you NEVER let me drive." he told them, then unstrapped himself and looked out to the horizon. Unfortunately, the thugs-on-repulsors were still hot on their trail.

"In any other situation I'd say by staying on your side of the car but given that we might have a head on collision I might need a meat shield!" Nik responded, humor and prayer seemed to be the only defense they had given Jaks "Driving".

"You've played too many driving holo-games!!" Nik screeched as they soared with all the grace of dead seagull, from roof top to roof top before assuming a hasty imitation of the crash position as the sturdy side of a building made its presence known with frightening velocity.

"I'm alive..." He said as he felt them skid to a stop as opposed to feeling his body mangle against some brickwork. "I-I..want to go home." He whimpered and if this had been a text based communication program he would have affixed an ":'("at the end of that sentence but it wasn't and quite frankly he was too overwhelmed with terror, panic, fear and joy at being alive to spare any neurons to fire up his tear ducts.

Phex had a scathing comment on Raio’s driving skills – or lack of – but the sudden jar of the deceleration caused him to bite his tongue instead. His own discomfort drove away his need to have the last word and instead he silently cursed the situation so as not to spill any of the coppery taste filling his mouth. With a grimace, he realized just how suggestive his previous thought was.

Spit or swallow, how did my life sink so low as to be summed up with a wench’s most frequent conundrum? Phex paused in the act of removing himself from the vehicle’s restraints, look of complete bafflement locking his facial features in place. And when the frak did I learn the word conundrum?!

“Today has been far too damn educational.” The fugitive complained sourly, craning his aching neck to see if their tails had kept up while they bounced from frakking rooftop to rooftop at a punishing pace. They were closing in, a sight that made Phex’s blood freeze even as a sudden fury boiled within him. He was a businessman; this whole ordeal was bantha shit.

“I don’t know ‘bout you guys, but I’m pissed and tired of running. Bilbo is a frakking small timer; he can’t have too many more bastards to throw at us. I say we take the fraktard out and take everything the bug owns as compensation for our troubles. Otherwise, who knows how long these goons will keep on chasing us.” It was not a brave speech, but one of anger, desperation and maybe a bit of greed. Phex was all for running when it was even a distant possibility, but he was also for living in comfort and his neck was already far too sore to keep turning to watch his back every step they took.

Jak climbed out of the totaled vehicle and spun around to reply to Phex:

"Great idea, man, I really love it, but even with my badass skills with e blaster, you might have noticed that they have bigger guns than I do!" he let out a loud sigh for emphasis. Luckily, the speederbike gang didn't quite notice the crash and (for now) passed them by.
Then he remembered Nik whimpering like a little girl in the seat he occupied and Jak went over and patted his head.

"There, there, little flyboy. It'll all be okay." the words came out in a fake motherly tone that would either by some magic calm the man or, in Jak's head to be more likely, just piss him off.

It was actually only by then that Jak discovered that his coat was torn and his arm was bleeding.

Maybe it was Jak or like Phex maybe he had just reached the end of his tether, whatever the spark didn't matter. Nik had gone through a range o emotions during this eventful outing but he hadn't hit anger yet that was, until now.

"Get you're claws off me," Nik snarled and in a singular motion slapped Jak's hand aside while the other ripped the blaster from the holster on Raios hip. He gave the twisted door a straight kick that forced the metal apart and moved toward the window. "Fucking shot at...ran off the road...crashing...prick of a driver..." He could be heard to mutter as he raised the weapon, cursing and firing at the speeder bikes following their path of destruction. You didn't live very long in this game if you didn't know how to use a weapon and Nik had been trained by some of the best the murky underbelly had to offer. He just didn't like to.

"One, two, three.." He said under his breath as the weapon discharged, found a new target discharged and once more. Nik turned on the spot, still muttering insults about Jaks mother and threw the gun underhand into Raio's grasp as he stormed past them.

"We going to see that bastard Bilbo or what?" He called over his shoulder as he opened the door which lead into the corridor of the apartment complex.

Phex openly gaped at the marksmanship of his current company. His skills were more of a social nature, of persuasion and conniving. As a business man, he was more the type to allow security to handle the dirty work for him. Rubbing his jaw idly and feeling slightly like an overworked polisher of sabers of the skinned variety, Phex made the silent decision that his fellow patron of alcohol and women would be good company to keep. Frell, even Jak might have his uses if they could gag him and perhaps administer a sedative. A suppository, if necessary, but Phex nominated someone not himself for that particular duty.

His feet moved of their own accord, following the other man's lead as his mind tumbled viciously, trying to come to grips with the surreal situation. The complex looked annoyingly familiar, but the shock and trauma rendered him unable to identify why this bothered him. All the complexes in this area looked damn near the same, after all, seedy and overcrowded. Sector after sector of the endless hive of....

"Frak." It hit him suddenly, his mind stumbling over the echo of sectors and he realized belatedly why the minions in their wake seemed never ending.

"This is Bilbo's sector. We're in enemy territory." With that statement, another realization. "He has a safe-house here. I've seen it; he took me there as a scare tactic. Weapons, spice, credits. Lots of credits."

If they played their cards right, maybe they could turn this insanity into profit.

Jak caught the blaster after lofting a brow at Nik's apparent marksman skills. It wasn't expected by any stretch of the platinum-haired man's imagination. He spun the blaster in his hand then lobbed it to Phex.

"You'll need it." was all he said before he skipped after Nik. It didn't take but a moment for him to spin around again and pay attention to Phex.

"Safehouse? Really? Well, point me in the direction and I'll kick in the door!" he said in his usual candor before gesturing for Phex to proceed before him.

It never occurred to him until after the adrenaline had worn off that he didn't actually know where he was going but his feet kept moving, leading him down the stairway and out into the lobby of the apartment complex. Fresh air, he felt like everything would be okay as long as he got outside and felt the sun on his face.

The glass doors slipped aside at his approach and he moved down the six or so stairs until he was beside the road where he finally stopped and caught a breath. Why did it make him feel so hideous inside, this was the life he'd chosen-it hadn't been forced upon him, so why was he so averse to the prospect of killing to save his own skin but more importantly when he did finally pick up a weapon why was he so wracked with guilt and self loathing when he pulled the trigger?

It didn't make sense, it never made sense but soon he'd forget about it and the knot of sickness in his stomach would wither away before he had to take another life.