Rian sighed as he sized up his options.  Bright green racing strips? you could get away with that.  But pink with green strips?

He found himself wondering if he could do something with the hull-paint they had stored back on the ship....

If not, he'd just grin and bear it.  They were here to have fun, after all.  And Rian was used to being the class clown.


OOC: I'm gonna be away for a few days...
This message was last edited by the player at 20:51, Wed 08 May 2013.

"You kids looking to get into the swoop races?" the clothes shop guy says casually.  "If you're not just watching and you don't have a sponsor you're gonna need your own bikes.  Got a friend who's got a shop down the street could fix you up, there.  New or used, good quality stuff."  His manner seems to indicate that if they don't take him up on the offer it's pretty much all the same to him.

Kimy frowns a bit. She hadn't thought so much about buying a swoop, not unless they could figure out how to get them back.  In fact, it might be nice to have a swoop of her own.  She could idle away the hours tinkering with it, break it out once in a while maybe...  Giving the man a winsome little smile, "Down the street?  What's the name of the place?"

Had Arin been a non-human, he might have literally perked his ears on the mention of swoops being sold. Mika (or Kimy, if you went by the name on her current ID) asked the very question he was about to ask himself, so the ex-Imperial pilot waited to hear the answer. His thoughts were along the same lines as Mika's - bringing back a swoop would be nice. He could tinker with it and it might even come in handy on some missions.

"Su's Swoops."  He grabs a couple of business cards and writes something on the back, what looks like a random assortment of letters and numbers.  "Give Su these, say I sent you.  She's a good sort.  Just don't, y'know.  Piss her off."  His smile sparkles particularly bright as he hands Kimy her card.  "And watch out.  Some of those racers are right rancor-balls."

"Thanks", Arin offered to the clerk. Checking out the swoops would be fun and they might actually stumble upon something worth buying. "Let's get going. Last one in the air is a nerf-herder", he said heading outside with the bundle of clothes packed under his arm.

Kimy collects one of the cards and heads out of the shop.  Once they're on the street, she looks to get her bearings.  It's just possible that the shop owner was hosing them, that the cards would tell Su to amp up the price and the shop owner would get a kick-back.  Still, it wouldn't hurt to look...

Su's Swoops, it turns out, is a pretty decent place.  It combines a showroom and a workspace kitted out to repair and rebuild swoops, often from spare parts.  There are several new models of swoop in the showroom area but the majority are second-hand, rebuilt models.  A couple look like entirely unique designs fashioned from the parts of more common brands.

The proprietor herself is a tough-looking Nautolan woman in oil-stained pants, a worn tank-top and - currently - a breath mask.  She has the musculature and curve of a woman who looks after herself and gets a lot of exercise through simple application of hard work.  Her fine green skin glistens slightly with a sheen of sweat and both arms bear extensive full-sleeve tattoos.  She's wearing goggles but her large dark eyes are clearly visible behind them.  Her forearms show a couple of scattered burn scars just above her gloves.

She lifts a hand and waves as the Talons walk into her shop but she doesn't stop what she's doing just yet.  What she's doing is spray-painting the side of a newly refurbished swoop bike, stencilling a series of fine silver designs on its gleaming black outer shell.  When she's finished with the spraying she carefully peels off the stencil mask to reveal a silver circuitry design on top of metallic blue flames.  The net effect is both dramatic and cunning; certainly more interesting than the standard red-orange flame design one often sees on black swoops.

"Hey," Su says as she walks over, pulling her mask down and her goggles up.  "You folks after anything in particular or just having a look?"  She isn't armed but she projects the sensation that she probably doesn't need to be in order to beat a troublemaker to death with their own feet.  She stands loosely, easily, a woman with no particular reason to fear interlopers.  Her muscled form only serves to enhance her hourglass figure; this is definitely not a boy named Su.

"We're looking to rent and perhaps even buy some swoops, if you can give us a good deal", Arin said, flashing a charming smile at the Nautolan. "I'd be especially interested in a JR-4, if you have one for sale - depending on the price, of course. I used to ride one as a kid and would love to have one again."

Mika gives Su a nod.  "Sleek work, that." she indicates the paint job, finding it to her liking.  "Every street punk with a black ride seems to like flames, gets old."  If Mika had the artistic skill, she'd want black with a tracery of glowing electric blue lines....  Well, maybe not.  That was fine for swoop gangs, but for Talon's who needed to keep a low profile, some sort of boring, medium steel gray would probably be better.

"Forget the antiques."  One could assume that she means the JR-4 reference, but then again, maybe not.  After all, she's quite a bit younger than Rathon.  "You got anything along the lines of the Air-2's?  The original TaggeCo's, maybe the SoroSuub version?"  Sure, the Air-2's were finicky little beasts, but the higher ceiling and the hotter thrusters would give mean a lot more functionality in a lot more situations than the low flyers would.

Rian straightens up from the custom-build he'd been enthusiastically examining and nods agreement with Kimy.  Rathon could ride an outdated relic if he wanted to.

"Or how about the Strato-9?" He indicates the bike he'd been looking at.  "This beast looks like it might have been a Strato once, but..."  he grins disarmingly  "... I'm still trying to figure out what you've done with it.  Hell of a piece of work."

The woman watches in mild bemusement as the sudden crowd of people, with the exception of the quiet Duros in the back, start looking about and asking questions.  She knows about groups like this - individuals who all have their own tastes, not a mere gang all leashed to the same fad.  She gives Kimy a slight nod and a grin, recognising the compliment on her paintwork.  "Hah," Su laughs, nodding to Rathon.  "Only thing left of a Strato in that's the framework.  That's a Special."  The way she says it you can hear the capital letter.  "Got a few of them on the build, all unique.  So you're looking to buy?" she asks the group as a whole.  "Got a few models you'd be interested in.  The JR-4 I've got ain't factory stock, couldn't get the right parts so I improvised.  Got three Air-2 swoops, all SoroSuub builds.  Crazy bunch of kids came through and thought they'd bet their reputations on their racing skills, ended up losing their bikes.  No Strato-9, but I got some spare parts for one if you need 'em."  She smiles easily back at Arin.  "And my prices are always good.  Just depends if your pockets are deep enough to afford quality bikes.  I don't sell bantha-shit here."
This message was last edited by the GM at 07:22, Sat 18 May 2013.

Kimy gives Su a nod, pleased with what she's seeing and hearing from the woman.  "We'll, I can put my hands on a few creds, how many we talking about for the Air-2's?"

Rian waited whilst Su answered Kimy's question, walking around the 'Strato-Special' and examining it from all angles.

"So what makes this one a Special, then?  I can see some of what you've done, but - you tell me, she's your baby."

Rian had the horrible feeling he was falling in love with this bike.  This could turn out to be a very expensive day for him....

"Well, Air-2s aren't expensive and those are stock, so I let 'em go at 2,250 credits a pop.  Fully refurbished, good workin' models.  No warranty cos I've been stung like that before but my reputation's riding on 'em so you can be sure they're worth it."  She laces her fingers together and stretches her arms out, working some kinks out of her frame.  "You want special work done on 'em I can do that but it means more time an' money.  You know how it goes," she adds, giving Kimy a shrewd look.  "You got a mechanic's look about you."

Upon the query of the Special, though, she lights up with enthusiasm.  "Well!  Lots.  They're called Specials cos 'kitbashed crap' don't sell well and gives a poor impression of what I can make."  Su starts moving about the bike, pointing features out.  "Reinforced chassis so she can take a few more knocks.  High-performance boosters t'compensate for the increased chassis weight.  Shaped vanes t'boost cornering an' handling.  Concealed pop-up cup holder, more or less cos I could.  She's got concealed cargo space an' weapon-mounts for twin fire-linked laser cannons - no weapons supplied with th'model, though.  The law's pretty strict about that kinda thing."  The Nautolan spreads her hands and gives Rian a wide, charismatic grin.  "Plus, she's unique.  Nobody's ever gonna know what to expect from a Special."

She casually jerks her thumb toward the door.  "Shame y'didn't get here yesterday.  Had a Special with less chassis weight an' a personal shield generator - lost a bit of cargo space but she was fast as a greased nexu an' damn if she didn't give people a few scares in th'red-flag races."

"What about the JR-4? How much would you want for it", Arin asked. "Such a classic, even though it is not completely original when it comes to the parts." Sure, Air-2 was faster but could hardly compare to the original swoop.

Devon was silent as he digested what had been done to the Special, then without even taking his eyes off the bike he said:

"I know I'm going to regret this... how much?"

"The JR-4 is 4,000 credits," Su says easily, "which isn't bad at all for a refurbished classic.  It's pretty much factory specs but the parts aren't all original.  Though frankly that's not necessarily a bad thing unless you're a purist collector - in which case," she adds shrewdly, "I doubt you's be in the Claws buying from me."

Gesturing to the Special she says, without missing a beat, "The Special's 8,500 credits.  Might be different if I had a fancy company and could mass produce 'em.  As is every last one of 'em is hand-tooled by yours truly.  Works of art, these things."  She leans over a bit to stage-whisper in Devon's direction.  It's not a bad sight.  "Of course it's the Su Shift that makes 'em particularly unique.  Lets you shift power from handling to speed as you're riding, gives a hell of a boost when you don't need to take tight corners but means you can pull power back from the engines when you need to be a bit more careful."  The Talons would recognise that as a swoop with the ability to divert power to various systems in much the same way a starfighter can.

"3000 credits and I'll take the JR-4 right off your hands", Arin said, flashing Su a radiant smile. "Most people don't understand the quality of such a classic, even if it has been refurbished with non-standard parts." He felt confident that his charm would work on the mechanic - he had often had his way with people due to his charm and this would not be much different.

11:54, Today: Arin Branden rolled 26 using 1d20+8. Diplomacy (Bargain).

The Nautolan lets out a snort of laughter.  "3,000?  25% off?  Want me to throw in a toolkit and a set of steak knives?  You're cute but I got expenses to pay and the parts I had to use aren't cheap."  Unlike a lot of salespeople she doesn't seem insulted by the offer, just amused, but she shakes her head.  "I'll drop it to 3,750 creds."  Su's clearly used to hotshot flyboys wrangling over the price of quality hardware - even if she isn't aware of how much hotshot, between the four Talons, is currently standing in her store.

Arin's no stranger to haggling but he doesn't quite get the price he's after.  A bit of back-and-forth between the mechanic and pilot makes it quite clear that she won't (or can't) go any lower than 3,500 credits; chances are good that she'd be running at a loss if she went as low as 3,000.  Still, whether the adjusted price tag is worth it is really up to him.

"3500. No use for steak knives and tools we have", Arin gave Su a wink. "I promise to tell everyone, you get good deals down here. Besides, I've got to show these here what a real swoop means." He indicated the three others and grinned widely.

Mika smiles, "I've got a bit of engine grease under my nails." . but then she keeps silent while Su haggles a bit with Rian.  While they haggle, Mika considers the options.  Sure, she wasn't as solid an engineer at modifying swoops as Su probably was and buying stock wouldn't have some of the perks that the specials might have, but it'd be something she could work on herself, make the mods she wanted, make it her own little project...

When her time comes, "I'm leaning towards one of the Air-2's, give me a chance to specialize it myself.  I'm sure I'm not the swoop mechanic you are, but Without working stuff out on my own, I never will be.  Aside from the swoop, you got a good set of tools for working on the swoop?  Maybe a few spare parts to get me started.  What sort of price are we talking?"

Rian makes a rude noise and ruder gesture at Rathons comment about 'real swoops', but he's grinning as he does it.

Whilst the haggling goes on around him, he spends a few moments on his datapad, checking his finances....
I could just about afford the Special he thinks to himself but it would totally clean me out.  And there was other stuff I wanted to buy... he winces at the figures. Perhaps Mika - I mean, Kimy - has the more realistic idea...

Rian sighed as he looked at the Special again - wondering if he could possibly argue Su down to a price he'd find more affordable... and then wondering if he SHOULD.  After all, that machine was a work of art.

Su gets out her datapad and secures the transaction, getting her deal with Rathon Dann finished and dealt with before responding to Kimy.  Tapping a commlink at her ear she says, "Zee, bring out one of the JR-4s, the one with the reconditioned repulsorlift generators."  With the deal done she shakes Rathon's hand and then turns her attention to Kimy.

"Tools I got but only basic sets.  You'll want to pad it out with better gear as soon as you can.  Havin' a mechanic droid nearby would be damn handy, too; there's a place up in Central District that sells good droids.  Most of all, though, you'll need enough space to set up a workshop.  Without a workshop you'll be restricted to adjusting flare compensators and that kinda thing.  If you want to get into reconditioning you'll need heavy lifting power."  She points upward at a block-and-tackle arrangement hanging from the ceiling.  It has an engine hanging from it.  "Engines are heavy.  Anyway, the Air-2 is 3,000 creds.  Basic toolkit's 250.  I sell the toolkits more or less at cost so no negotiation on that."

Behind her a door further into the workshop slides open and a Nautolan comes out riding a JR-4.  The thing looks brand new - the swoop, that is.  It's got a fairly neutral gunmetal grey paint-job and its repulsorlift generators hum beautifully.  Rathon certainly didn't get ripped off.

Zee is a teen-equivalent Nautolan girl with skin the same shade as Su's.  There's a certain family resemblance and chances are good she's a younger sister.  She tends toward more ripped jeans and leather fingerless gloves than Su's more practical mechanic gear but she sure knows her way around a swoop, driving it in smoothly and negotiating the showroom space easily.

"Pleasure doing business with you", Arin said with a broad smile on his face. "You'll be sure to have my highest praises." He winked at Su and Zee - he had no problems with the Nautolans as a race, nor other aliens either. Even if he was more of a pilot than a mechanic, he knew enough about the mechanical stuff to know quality and to be able to figure out, the swoop was indeed a good one.