|
Last Night 2005 short story by Mark Newbold
and Jonathan Hicks Under a year after Episode IV – A New Hope Goah raised his glass, trying to focus on the blue liquid
inside and then wondering exactly what it was that Jan had ordered for him.
He took a sip, slowly and cautiously, and then gritted his teeth as his
throat threatened to tear asunder and his lungs felt as though they were
about to leave his body and run screaming from the bar. “Sssss!” he hissed. “Flameout!” Jan gave him an amused glance as he began to sink the
drink, fully aware of the hit that would follow through as it seared down his
throat. Prepared he masked the
inevitable sting and grinned. “What’s the
matter, you expecting a glass of water or something?” “Water is better
than engine coolant,” Goah whispered, trying to find his voice. “Don’t let
Romanoe hear you say that.” “It’s my last
night on Amagad and I leave for the Core Worlds tomorrow – I’ll be arrested
for piloting under the influence, thank you very much.” “Well, nobody
ever said it was going to be easy.”
Jan smiled as he leaned back in his seat and crossed his legs,
surveying the neon-lit vista of Zythlies Dropout Parlour. “Any idea what you’ll be doing once you get
there?” Goah absent-mindedly scratched an irritable wound on his
left arm. “Not too sure,
to be honest. Glann wants me to spend some time there and report back, whatever that means. Is
Latti unconscious?” Goah leaned back over his chair and stared at the prone
form of his friend on the floor. “Does it make
any difference?” Jan nudged Latti with
his toe but the snoring figure remained still. “So you’ll be a field agent? Cool.
Me and Latt went out that way about seven
years ago. Interesting place.” Jan raised his glass to his lips and paused. “Good place to learn how to watch your back
though.” “Like the Setnin
Sector isn’t?” Goah replied with a wry smile. He shook his head but it did
nothing to clear his muddled thoughts. “I’ll be frecking glad to get out of here, to be honest, Jan. This whole
sector, it’s circling the drain. Or, at least, it’s in the drain and we don’t
know it. Or maybe, just maybe… I don’t belong here, you know… not got the shp… sh… backbone.” “Very poetic. “ “Thank you.” “I know what you
mean though, things sure ain’t what they used to
be. Glann tightening the nuts on
everyone, and not just the droids. I
swear if he didn’t sleep next to the wall he’d wake up on the wrong side of
the bed every morning.” “Yeah, well,
Glann can go take a running jump for all I care.” Goah noticed the volume of
his voice too late, and then noticed that the conversation in the bar had
softened somewhat and several eyes and photoreceptors rested on him. “Yeah,
that’s right,” Goah snapped at the nearest being watching him. “You heard
right, nobby. Glann can take a jump!” His voice
rose. Jan watched as Goah blew off steam, wondering if he
should jump in and defuse the situation but deciding against it. Tension was high on Amagad, tempers frayed
after recent clashes with enemy factions and he knew that of all people Goah
was more than entitled to vent his frustrations and air his feelings. Jan took another swig as chairs dragged
from their tables and shadowy figures rose to their feet. “Hey, buddy,” a
dark-skinned human male said to Goah as he approached. “How about you calm
down, go out and find yourself a woman?” Goah mused over the advice. “How much do you
think a woman would cost?” he asked. The man shrugged. “Dunno. About fifty credits?” Goah smiled wickedly. “Tell your mom I
owe her twenty.” And so it began. Jan rolled his eyes in mirth at Goahs remark and rolled
himself as a chair flew through the air he had just departed, hitting the
floor and swinging his long legs out, taking down a burly human and a wiry Entallian. He shot Goah a cocky grin and gave him the
thumbs up. “Might as well
jet off in style eh?” Goah leapt from his seat as the man he had insulted flung
the chair that had sailed past Jan, put his whole body behind a powerful
punch, missed, and fell drunkenly over a table where three Barabels sat, laughing with maniacal glee at the
altercation. As he rolled over, covered in alcohol and snacks, he looked up
at the towering figures and his smile dropped. “Hi,” he said
meekly. “Evening.” said the largest
Barabel, leaning in towards Goah with a decidedly unfriendly look on his
face. “What’s say you and me sort this
out man to man?” “What’s say I
step in and break up this dance?” said Jan as the chair he has just dodged
came crashing around the back of the Barabels head,
dashing him to the floor and scattering the other two from their seats. As quick as he could, considering the fact that flameout
that he had drank was about to kick into its second stage, Goah got to his
feet and shoulder-charged the nearest Barabel. He succeeded in pushing him
back a meter, rebounded, and fell back on the floor. The Barabel smiled and
then laughed. Unfortunately, the table of Wookies he had been forced in to were not as amused. “Really glad you
arranged your own leaving party Goah,” said Jan as he laid out a tough
looking man who was coming at him with a bottle of Duarga in his fist. “Just remember, when you’re jetting off to
Coruscant I’ll still be here in the morning.” Jan kicked the Entallian in the family jewels and took
the Duarga bottle as the man finally hit the deck, smashing it over the head
of one of the Barabels who was charging him. Goah watched as the Barabel he had charged disappeared in
a cloud of fur and Wookie howls. He spun to meet the man he had insulted
originally and was greeted with a weak punch to the chest. He frowned. “Ow, that really
hurt,” he said. Then he knocked him out. Jan saw the exchange and slid over the one remaining
table in that section of the bar, scattering glasses and bowls of Cockons as
he came to his feet and grabbed Goah by the arm. “I’ve just had a
revolutionary idea.” “Hasty retreat?”
Goah said as more figures approached from the gloom of the bar. “As ever you
pull out before the real work is done.”
Jan checked left and right.
“But yeah, live to fight another day and all that.” “Well, I was
just checking to see if you’d had enough,” Goah smiled as he drop-kicked a
Rodian over the bar. “Me? I’m having the time of my life.” He saw a blade
flicker from a sheath. “But, yeah, I’m all for running for it before Himbs
shows up and kills us both.” “Good
point.” He pointed to the exit that
had a clear run free of fighting bodies.
“Let’s scratch gravel.” They began to make their way through the bodies and were
almost at the door when Jan suddenly stopped and slapped his hand to his
forehead. “Damn that crazy
drunk!” “What lazy
drunk?” asked Goah, pausing. “Latti!” “Grab his feet!”
Goah shouted as he headed back and slipped his hands under the sleeping
alien’s armpits. “Oh Stang, he
smells worse than a Rancor slumber party.”
Jan grabbed the sleeping smugglers ankles and began to hoist him up as
Goah bumped backwards through the throng of brawlers. “Medical
emergency!” Goah shouted, but when he was ignored he simply started kicking
out with his feet. “Get the freck
out of the way!” “Almost
there. When we hit the fresh air the
little creep should wake up.” Jan
frowned. “Or be violently sick, one or
the other.” He motioned to Goah. “And you
will probably feel like you’ve had about ten jugs of Spice wine once the
fresh air hits you.” Goah suddenly stopped in the middle of the throng of
fighting bodies and dropped Latti to the ground, staring at Jan with shock. “Are you saying
I can’t hold my drink?” Jan looked down at Latti who had hit the floor with a
hefty thump. “You can’t hold
a frecking smuggler so why would you be able to hold your drink?” “That’s easy for
you to say, mister A-Desandian-drink-doesn’t-touch-me type dude! I can hold
my drink as well as the next man! My brothers are renowned drinkers!” Jan gave Goah an incredulous stare and shook his head. “Your
brothers? Man, Boah was arrested for
DUI…in a garbage freighter! And Brush
can’t row a boat in a straight line!
Oh, and for your information I am
the next man!” “My point
exactly!” Goah stalled, not entirely sure what he meant. He shook his head to
try once again to clear it. “How dare
you make such allegations about my brothers! At
least they know who it is they’re sleeping with that night!” Jan glanced away as he swung Latti around, who was now
beginning to come to and dragged him towards the door. “I resent that
comment. I know precisely who I sleep
with every night.” He elbowed a
scrapping Ithorian out of his way and checked behind him. “I write her name down in my little black
book the morning after.” He
grinned. “Then I delete it after she’s
gone.” Goah grinned back. “Slut.” “I earn every
insult that comes my way.” “I’ll think of
some more later. Careful with Latti! He looks like he’s got a sore head.”
Goah then realised it was he who had dropped him. “Oh, right.” He scooped him
up once more, head-butted a Rodian, and as one they burst from the rear door
and into the alley where some of the patrons were already hanging around
waiting for the fight to end. “Where to G, the
Sunrise or the Crusader?” “Let’s dump
Latti and head for the Crusader, its
closer. Besides, I have to get my head down; I take off in three hours.” “Strange coincidence,
I’ve got to get my head down too.” He
let the sentence hang in the air. “You did get her number, then!” Goah said,
ending the sentence with a laugh. He helped Jan lift Latti over their
shoulders and dump him in a garbage scow. “Couldn’t help it,
she wrote it on my parking ticket.” “Oooh… do you
think she’ll…” Goah was about to say ‘wear
the uniform’ but let it go. “Turn up?” “Sure hope
so. If she wears the uniform I’ll be very
satisfied.” Goah shook his head with a laugh. “Are A-Desandians
telepathic?” “Telescopic my
friend, telescopic.” Goah started to walk away. “This
conversation is over!” he said with
a slashing motion of his hand. He laughed as he approached the hangar
entrance where his ship was berthed. He sighed, turned, and looked at the tall
spires of Amagad. Jan noticed the sudden wistful look on his face and
grinned. “You’ll miss
this dump, right?” “No, not one
bit. But I will miss my friends. As nasty and as low-down as this place, this
sector, is, I like the people. As nasty and as low-down as they are.” He
smiled and looked at the towering smuggler with a conspiratorial eye. “I’ll
be sure to let you know how I get on, contacts and all that.” “Make sure you
do.” Jan stuck out a hand for his old
compadre to shake. Goah took it and gripped it hard. “That was a
memorable last night. Shame everyone else took off early.” “Well it was
always the same wasn’t it? We are the
hardcore.” Goah winked. “Hardcore and hard-pressed,”
he said, remembering a drunken tune they had made up months before. “Take
care of yourself, Jan. But I guess that’s what you’re really bad at, isn’t
it?” Jan nodded as he took a step back and looked up at the
clear skies above the docking bay. “Yep, galaxies
worst.” Goah sighed, wondering whether he should say more. He
simply smiled and nodded. He had known the smuggler for a long time and they
had reached a point in their friendship where words were just that; words. He
stepped back and pointed a finger at Jan as he walked to his ship. “Later.” “Count on it
bro.” Latti woke up in the scow, the sun streaming onto his
face, his body covered in garbage and liquids. “What the hell?” Last Night 2005 short story by Mark Newbold
and Jonathan Hicks Under a year after Episode IV – A New Hope Histories – The final few hours in the Setnin Sector of the real Goah Galletti before his departure
for the Core Worlds on a mission
for Glann Cipple. Unbeknownst to him, the DNA sample he gave
Cipple in return for 100,000 credits was being genetically manipulated into a
cloned replacement, one that would `return’ back to the sector just three
months later. Showing the good
relationship between Galletti and Lomona, despite a few bumps in the road,
this helps explain Jan’s surprise at the clone’s temperament – neither Jan
nor anyone else knew that the Galletti who returned from the Core was
anything but the real one, with a sharp attitude change. Cast of Characters Real Goah Galletti Jan Lomona Latti Tellex |