The Rocky Route to Bespin

The odds were not in Salvo Starborn’s favour. He was sitting at a sabacc table, in the Pair O’Dice casino where, fortunately for him, the odds were in almost no one’s favour, except the house of course. He knew where he stood with the Pair O’Dice. If there was one thing you could trust a Cloud City casino to be, it was dishonest and Sal could respect that.

It wasn’t that the Pair O’Dice was the worst casino on Cloud City. Far from it. There were places where the prize pot was a lot less, and even more where he could win hundred times more, but the higher the prize, the greater the risk. Though they didn’t wear their colours openly, it was an open secret that just about every one of the major venues was affiliated with a syndicate or cartel. Sal had his suspicions that behind one of the glitzy fronts was at least one woman he’d wronged in the past. A reliable source told him that Em was calling Cloud City home now. Would she be happy to see him? Sal fought back a grimace. About as happy as he was to look at his current Sabacc hand.

He glanced about the table, at the other players, and chewed the inside of his cheek. He was almost certainly going to lose the small stack of credits that he’d won so far. The Lutrillian he’d originally won them from looked pretty pleased with himself and the prospect that he might get his money back, and then some. Sal smiled a tight smile at him. It didn’t matter, did it? He was just here to kill a little time, waiting on a meeting with someone who was worth more than a lost hand of sabacc.

The Lutrillian was still looking pleased with himself. With what he believed to be the high hand, all that was required was that he do nothing. Nothing but wait and win the pot! The trouble began when he became distracted with something, or someone, behind Salvo. Someone interested in the play of the game apparently. Someone in a short black dress, and ridiculously high heels.

Salvo might have had a sabacc face, but the distraction behind him clearly did not. Guileless blue eyes opened wide as she looked over Salvo's admittedly crummy hand. It were as though she were beholding a tournament winning, pure sabbac. She seemed truly excited for his good fortune..

Covering a smile, she kept walking as though she had seen something interesting...but that it did not necessarily pertain to her. As she was sliding into a seat at another table, she heard the Lutrillian take another card, and then quickly bomb out as a result.

Molly was still smiling when she ordered her drink, a fizzy pop..

“Make that two,” Sal said, as he took a seat beside Molly, bodily shoving a teal-skinned Twi’lek out of the way in the process.

The Twi’lek muttered something that even Salvo, with his rudimentary command of Twi’leki, knew was not particularly flattering. Rather than retorting, Sal merely lifted both eyebrows at Molly and grinned.

"Cloud City suits you, kid. You're looking good."

The Pair O'Dice attracted it's fair share of both well-to-do and ne'er-do-well customers. In her dress and heels, Molly looked the former, while Sal, in what could only be described as smugglers attire, fell definitely into the latter camp.

The table's droid dealer began to mechanical pass out cards to each patron sitting before it. It paused in front of Sal and Molly, waiting for them to indicate whether they were part of the game.

"One quick game?"

Molly had always had an ear for xenolinguistics. It made her good at her jobs, both of them, and working at the Cloud 9 for years had certainly enhanced her vocabulary. She gave the departing Twi'lek a parting shot about not getting his headtails stuck somewhere on the way out. When he looked back offended, she winked good-naturedly, not looking to make an enemy, just looking out for..

"Sal.." Turning in her seat toward her company, Molly smiled at the compliment. "That's what I hear." The less people that knew about her recent troubles the better. She preferred to handle things her own way.

"And you look..up to something.", she guessed.

Eyeing the droid dealer, Molly shrugged. "Oh, why not? Deal us in."

“Up to something?”

Though he feigned shock, Sal couldn’t keep the smile from his face, even as the droid dealer slid a hand of what was unquestionably terrible cards down in front of him.

“I’m just happy to see my little sister looking well.”

Molly's fond, but skeptical, smile didn't slip. Not when she looked at her cards. Not when he called her his little sister, which she was, but that was not the point. That little tidbit was privileged information that she kept far closer to her chest than the sabacc hand she currently had facedown before her.

"Uhuh.." She knew that all too innocent look. If she bought that one, next Sal would have some lovely Bespin sea view real estate for her.

"Of course I'm looking well. I'm the clever one."

“What’s that make me? The looker?”

The droid dealer was utterly immune to their patter, but another of the players at the table - an older woman, overdressed for the Pair O’Dice - grumbled in irritation. “We’re here to play, not to chat.”

“Yeah?” Sal inspected his cards. “You can’t do more than one thing at a time? Even me, with my pretty but empty head, can multitask.”

The well-dressed woman lifted an eyebrow at Sal, who was still considering his hand.

“I’m on holiday, you know, Mol? Just want to enjoy myself for a couple of days.”

Over the top of her bottle of fizzypop, Molly saluted her older brother. "You can say so if you want. I'll punch anyone who says otherwise. You did show me how.."

"Hey lady?" Inspecting her cards again critically, as if she did not already know what they were, and was still pondering her options, Molly got the woman's attention not about to be out-snobbed. "The thing is, most people pay me to talk. So just consider yourself getting a freebie. Just play, like you said. "

"Your call, by the way.." Molly arched a dark brow at the woman, who in her own chatter was the one now holding up the game.

The skeptical look softened slightly looking back at Sal. "Well, you have excellent timing. I'm having a bit of a party of sorts. Since you're the looker, I assume you can look the part for that one night.?", she grinned.

“A party?”

Sal glanced at the now decidedly mute third player in their game. He lifted both eyebrows, as if to say: exciting, eh? She looked pointedly away from him.

“What’re we celebrating? Not.. my chances of winning, for sure. This…” he flicked the top of one card, “Has got to be one of the worst hands I’ve ever been dealt.”

"It's kind of a religious celebration...." , she winked at Sal.

The lady and the dealer, Molly didn't trust either one of them. Probably they were nobody's but there was always that possibility. Information about the biggest concert in Port Town history, and the huge party going on around it, was also privileged, for now. Translation, she had not set the date with Ali for which night..

Molly glanced at her cards, but chose to stay. "Sucks for you."

“I’m out.”

Sal tossed his cards down on the table, cheeks puffed out with a sigh as he sat back. The older, overdressed woman barely concealed a small, spiteful smile. If there’d been any luck on his side, surely it had all been spent on running into Molly. He’d come in with just about no credits, and he was going to leave the same way.

“You won’t beat her, you know,” he said, looking at no one in particular. “Got a Sabacc face that could fool a Hutt, this one,” Sal added, with a sideways nod at Molly.

"I'm just very entertained.. all the time."

Perpetual smirk in place, Molly turned it into a smile of marginal victory as she took the hand. "And look, now we get lunch.", she waggled a brow at Sal like they'd scored big.

If they stayed for another hand, she might even win the pot, or she might lose their lunch money.

"One more?", she asked of her brother and the disagreeable older woman.

“Not for me, but I’ll happily stay and watch you rinse her,” Sal replied, with a nod to the older woman at the table. To her credit, the woman huffed a breath and rose to her feet, excusing herself from the game. Evidently, her pride wasn’t enough to force her into another hand. Sal watched her go with a feigned glum expression.

“Was it something I said?”

He grinned.

“So, what’s this about lunch, then?”

Molly's expression of perpetual amusement turned into one of pure satisfaction as the sour puss toddled off submissively. Collecting her winnings only increased her quiet aura of superiority.

So, she had won a minor pot of Sabacc. At least her little lucky streak was holding. Stars knew, she had been on the losing side for a tragic amount of time..

One by one, all of the things that had been hers were once again under her control. There was a delicate balance to be maintained in it though, Temperance Minock was not a name that the people of Port Town knew. Molly Black however was infamous as a hub of the Black Sun's varied and shady services, and a discreet and accurate trader of information within and outside of Cloud City. Their trusted local original had returned, but she could not exactly advertise it, being a wanted woman. So she played the long game, quietly investing with different tactics. The Cloud 9 had served her well in the past when she had started with nothing, but this time she had more advantages.

"Yeah, lunch.", she agreed. Sabaac face or no, her tummy had quite nearly rumbled tellingly.

"What do you feel like having? My treat."

“You know me, I’ll eat anythin.”

Though his expression didn’t show it, Salvo’s guts ached at the thought of food. Whatever buzz or hangover had been distracting him from his appetite was starting to slip. Either he needed something to eat, or a drink to tide him over.

“You’re the local. You must know where the good shit is.”