Mits is delighted to be given so much applause.  She gives such an exaggerated bow, her pigtails wind up standing up on end for a moment.  She watches the boys peel their pika and oohs in wonderment.

"Thanks for the compliments," Mits cheerfully chimes, rolling her pika between her hands.

But hearing Deak's idea for Angel's nickname she fails to suppress a guffaw.  "S-sidekick?!  HA!  More like I'm her comical sidekick!"

Separating her hands, she shows that she's turned her fruit into a cat face ( https://i.pinimg.com/236x/c8/9...47b8b943d23e3ed1.jpg ) then lightly squeezes the sides of the face to make it talk at the boys.  "And thank you for the pika lesson!"

To explain the trick, Mits shows them the hidden ring blade in her palm.  ( http://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/...w8cNUN75b/s-l300.jpg )  Then the fruit cat spits out her fruity center so Mits can enjoy finally eating the food she's been playing with for so long.

"Oh I dunno.  On this gritty survivalist world, knowing a thing or two about vaporators could mean the difference between life or death for Angel and I.  I'm guessing they work by dredging up water from some deep aquifer and vaporize it for aeroponic gardening or some such?  What's the quick 'n dirty of what we need to know to survive alone on a farm that was left abandoned after a Sand Person attack?"
This message was last edited by the player at 21:41, Mon 11 Mar 2019.

Angel looks like she was going to comment on Deak's idea of a nickname, but Mittens beats her to it. Angel gives Mittens a sly smile, as if appreciating her words.

She idly rolls the pika fruit around and watches Mittens present a cat-pika. "You may have revealed how you secretly make amazing art, but it doesn't explain how you make amazing art."

She looks at Luke. "Deadeye. I really like that, thanks. And it's one Mitts thought of for me before her master swatted it down. So now it's my secret identity." she winks at Luke.

Angel looks to what Mitts says to Huff, then back to Huff and nods. "She's right. In fact, depending on how long my parents take to get here, I would like to follow you around on a bit of a tour tomorrow and maybe even help out if you think I'm able. There is no learning quite like hands-on learning, right?"

Angel is glad things calmed down. Again. She peels open her fruit with as little effort as Mittens and begins eating. "...mmmmm..." she comments with an impressed frown.

Huff seems quite delighted to have such an interested audience on the topic of vaporators. He moves away from the bench to seat himself at the table by the girls. He chuckles at Mittens' guess about how the contraptions work.

"Not quite," he grins, "They actually take the water from the air. The basic models use refrigerated pipes. When the humid air comes into contact with these, the air condenses in droplets of water inside the tubes, which then runs down into an underground storage tank. Some of the higher end models even use ionization fields and can adjust for wind speeds and temperatures to maximise water intake. As for the 'quick'n dirty', well, getting access to the tank is the key, if the sand people haven't done so first. They usually strip the power cells from the vaporator and steal all the water from the storage unit when they attack. So you'd need a power cell to get one working again."

He beams at Angel's request to follow him around the following day.

"Certainly, young lady, it would be a privilege to show you around the place. Of course, I typically do little more than check the ionisation levels and that the droids are functioning adequately, but I can certainly show you how one works while I'm at it."

Deak giggles and claps at Mittens' pika cat. However he quickly loses interest as Huff begins to drone on about moisture vaporators. He sits quietly with his chin in his hands for a minute or two, before nudging Windy.

"Wanna play some holochess?" he hisses, jerking his head at the room behind them.

Windy, who appears about as interested in the turn the conversation has taken as Deak is, nods surreptitiously as the pair slide of their chairs and trot off into the room indicated.

Biggs may be about as interested in vaporators as Luke, but he is pleased to see the girls making such a good impression on his father, and sends them another nod of approval.

"If you need a lesson in vaporators there is no finer teacher than my father," he chuckles.

"Oh, and speaking of 'Deadeye'," he grins, "I believe we have a darts match to undertake at some point..."
This message was last edited by the player at 00:05, Sun 17 Mar 2019.

Though the boring vaporator topic is still dominating conversation, Luke is relieved that the overall level of childishness in the room has been diminished by a notch or two.  How does one even quantify how much more childish Mittens is than Deak?  And to think, she was probably several times worse when she was his age.

Luke nods knowingly, not wanting to admit he has no idea what "aquifer" means.  He gives a smirk and nod to Angel's answer at first before looking puzzled at the reason for it having to remain secret.

"What?  What's his problem with the nickname?"

Luke quietly asides to Biggs, "As far as I'm concerned, your dad taking the girls on a tour would be great so long as we're not expected to tag along.  Even if it means postponing the dart game.  Besides doing a little more patching up of the speeder, I'd love to get a closer look at the freighter."
This message was last edited by the GM at 22:14, Mon 18 Mar 2019.

Mits is kinda surprised that the kids lost interest so fast.  But perhaps if you grew up around these devices, you'd already know all the important self-preservation knowledge about them you'd need.  Oh well.  Thoughts of Angel's eminent dart victory is plenty to keep Mits' tail wagging.

"Master Po is adamant about avoiding anything that makes killing sound cool, Mits explains, "Even though he's a Clone Wars veteran and a martial arts teacher, he's got very strong opinions about avoiding violence as much as possible."

To Mr. Darklighter, Mits smiles and comments, "Water from the air?!  Didn't think there was any in this dry climate.  Neat!  Lame that the Sand People take the power cells and water stores.  Would it be possible to jack in a droid's or blaster's power pack?"

Angel watches the kids run off and goes back to looking at Huff with a smile, completely unsurprised by the kids getting bored that fast.

Angel smiles, enjoying the explanation and says, "Neat... well it sounds like we have ourselves a fun plan for tomorrow and it works out for Luke's plans. Thanks again, Mister Darklighter."

She glances at Biggs. "I'd like to play darts with you tonight... and tomorrow. I'm pretty excited about it, honestly. I haven't gotten to play darts for almost a week and it has made me miss it."

Huff does send Mittens a quizzical glance as he overhears her talking about her master who is a Clone Wars veteran and also a martial arts expert. Still, people say the same thing about Old Ben Kenobi, and he hardly fits those descriptors, so Huff supposes he'll be the judge of that when he meets this 'Po' being.

He grins at both Mittens' and Angel's reactions to his vaporator explanations, but he can see that Biggs is keen to play darts and he knows Luke has no interest in anything practical, so he waves a hand in the direction of the back room.

"I look forward to showing you around in the morning. Anyway, I can see the boys are keen to play some darts, so I'll stop being a boring adult and let you guys have some fun."

With a grin and polite bow to the girls he turns and heads downstairs.

Biggs grins at Luke's lack of enthusiasm for mundane farming equipment.

"Count me in on both of those tomorrow morning," he says in response to Luke's comments regarding the speeder and freighter repairs.

He secretly wonders what Mittens' master would think of the titles and nicknames he, Luke and Janek have made up over the years. 'Wompslayer', 'Slugmaster' and 'Terminator Tank' are a few that come to mind.

"All right," he says, rubbing his hands as he leads the way into the games room, "Let's get this darts match underway!"

Luke lightens up a lot.  Not only is Huff out of the way, but a competition that promises to be quite fun is about to start.  He's a little surprised that Biggs doesn't seem at all worried about earning a reputation for having been beat by a girl.  Sometimes the guy's a complete enigma.  Who'd risk getting a nickname like "Limp wrist?!"  That's a kind of courage that just doesn't compute.

Even so, Luke's smile is genuine.

"Hey let's hold the tournament in the ship!  That way we can record the whole thing for Tank."

Luke seems to have temporarily forgotten that the Darklighters have plenty of means of holorecording in favor of more time with the beloved ship.

Mits gives a happy bye-bye wave to Huff as he exits.  She snags another pika, juggles it, and smiles at Angel.  "Shall we make it interesting and make them moving targets?"

Mits perks up and tail-wags at Luke's suggestion.  "My adventure sense is tingling.  I get the feeling like that's a great idea.  But not because of recording for Tank.  He should be showing up any second now..."

Without waiting for an answer she rushes for the front door to go see what exciting thing is about to happen.

Angel also waves bye to Huff before turning to the others.

Angel says, "Huh... Biggs doesn't have holorecorders here in his house? And we'll worry about moving targets after warming up."

She chuckles as the excitable kitty rushes for the door. "Mittens, the adventure you're sensing is the dart competition. Because if its something getting in the way of that, well, that just wouldn't be fun for me." she perks up. "Oh! Unless it's my parents?"

Angel lets out a tiny sigh and says, "...no. Not gonna let myself get over anxious every two seconds over who may or may not walk through the door. Lead the way, Biggs." she stands up and smiles at him.

Well, honestly Biggs sees Angel as more of a boy than a girl, given her amazing skills at all things hand-eye related. He'd also consider it a pretty good bragging right to say he could beat her in said area. He chuckles at Luke's keenness to get back aboard the ship.

"We do have a holorecorder in here Luke," he grins, "And there's more room here too. Tell you what, why don't we have a warm up in here, and then we'll see how we feel about taking things outside, so to speak?"

He glances with curiosity at Mittens as he halts and glances back at her by the front door.

"Oh? What kind of adventure? Yes, Tank shouldn't be far off."
This message was last edited by the player at 23:49, Wed 20 Mar 2019.

Outside the suns have almost set, and the sandy yard is rapidly growing dark. As she looks, Mittens is able to make out a small cloud of sand rising on the horizon to her right. Something tells her this is not what is giving her the sense of impending action though. That stems from another source. One that feels distant yet somehow near.

"I'm guessing the slavers caught up with us some... how...  DUH!  They must have had another ship!  And intercepted our transmissions from this one!  And looks like I was right about Tank showing up.  We need to get in the ship quick to pick him up before they pick him off!  Not to mention they'll blow this whole place apart if we don't lure them away!"

Though Jabba prooobably would have something to say about off-worlders shooting up the Darklighter estate - one of the biggest sources of water around.  So if the slavers have any sense they'll make this a small-arms fight rather than ship-to-ground.

Mits sprints to the ship and starts firing it up!

Luke isn't as convinced.  "Seriously?  I don't see any slaver ships.  Don't suppose her magical prophesies also come with a timeline, do they?"

He'll hurry to keep ahead of the others if they decide to pick up the pace, though.  Last thing he wants is to be the last one back to the ship.

Angel looks annoyed and gives a frustrated sigh. The kind girls give that has a slight growl to it. She inwardly swears to herself that if it is the slavers, she is going to use them to demonstrated her dart prowess. Putting a dart in one eye for each slaver was the first thought to come to mind.

Angel starts trotting to the ship. "If she's wrong, then the worst of it is inconvenience for us. If she's right, however, and we didn't act, the worst is death of friends, enslavement, loss of property. After the warm welcome I've gotten, no way I'm letting anyone harm a grain of sand on the Darklighter estate. And if it is those slavers..."

That last part was said darkly and she isn't looking at anyone in particular, but it does look like she cut herself off from finishing that sentence.

Biggs frowns as he swiftly hurries after the girls. He doesn't see any sign of impending danger, but he's learned to respect Mittens' uncanny ability to predict things. His blaster pistol is unholstered in a moment, as pauses at the foot of the stairs.

"Father?" he calls, "Can you come up here? I think there might be impending danger of some sort..."

He isn't sure how else to explain the situation with the slavers.

"Luke, you'd best get the ship's shields powered up," he calls as he hurries to the doors, "Don't think they'd destroy their own ship but better safe than sorry."

Huff is up the stairs a few moments later, blaster rifle in hand.

"Danger?" he says in confusion as he hurries after Biggs, "More sand people? Or local hooligans? I swear, if Gortal is trying to renege on that loan of his one more time..."
This message was last edited by the player at 04:55, Thu 21 Mar 2019.

Angel's girly threats don't even register as something to worry about, but Luke grits his teeth and winces when Biggs calls for his dad.  Ow.  Bad move.  Now the questions are guaranteed to come even if something does happen.  And this could complicate his plans for getting off Tatooine.  Blast!

He sprints for the ship to get things ready if only to have the excuse of not hearing Huff's barking questions he's got no answers for.
This message was last edited by the GM at 05:10, Thu 21 Mar 2019.

The ship's engines revving up, Mits flips on the com panel and transmits to Angel's family.  And hopefully Tank will pick up the message as well.

"Urgent message!  I have reason to believe the slavers are inbound any minute now!  We're not in a good position for a ship battle, so we probably won't be at the location we mentioned before.  Please hail as soon as you arrive!"

Angel gets aboard the ship. She figures if Biggs called for Huff, she trusts his judgement.

Angel seems calm and heads for the gun seat. "Hmm... where to go, where to go. Biggs, could you take the pilot seat? And after we pick up Tank, where is the best spot to go where nobody will get hurt and there is less chance of us being ambushed by sandpeople?"

Honestly Biggs hadn't really thought through the repercussions of telling his father of the potential incoming danger. It was just instinctive not to leave his father unaware of a potential army of incoming mercenaries, not to mention Deak and Windy with him. Then again, that is precisely what his father has designed the estate to withstand, with numerous security droids and even a concealed blaster turret.

"I'm pretty sure it isn't Gortal," he calls back as he races up the boarding ramp, then adds, "We're going to go and pick up Tank. Just keep the farm on alert, and watch the boys."

Once inside he obediently leaps into the pilot's seat, toggling the switches to power the ship up as he prepares to lift off. Finding that Luke has already got things nicely prepped he nods approvingly to his friend.

"Hmm, that's a good question," he replies to Angel, "At this time of evening anywhere might turn into a sand people ambush. We can try and make our way over the Dune Sea. At least there are less rocks and caves for them to hide in there."

With that he flicks the controls and with a roar the ship soars into the night sky.

OOC: End of Chapter I...
This message was last edited by the player at 11:16, Thu 21 Mar 2019.