Slev Torrent- Cormag One- Saxum Starport

Slev Stood on the edges of the tarmac next to a large, solitary steel building with a pavilion for customers jutting from it. The dusty red sands of this world billowing past him in erratic gusts. A knee-high alien stood behind the counter across from him. Dull red fur and wickedly keen eyes hidden by poofs, it looked a lot like an adorable racoon crossed with a chinchilla. Kolu like this were famous for haggling you out of everything they could. Slev was growing increasingly agitated, debating with the Kolu about ship restocking fees.

Slev angrily slapped a hand on the counter. “Are you fucking insane? That's double the normal rate for fuel!”

Flo-Flo looked up with an innocent expression, meeting the human's gaze. “It's a sellers market, what can I say? I don’t dictate the ebbs and flows of galactic commerce, I just run a modest little starport.”

Slev looked at the list in his hand again. “And what the hell is this cleaning maintenance fee you tacked on here? 200 credits to what dust?” He looked around the sand-covered tarmac incredulously.

Flo-Flo looked up innocently. "I pride myself on my tidyness, if you have a problem with my rather moderate fees, you are more than welcome to go to the next planet over, but my brother Clo-Clo

charges exactly 17 percent higher across the board. He has to make a profit after all, he buys from me.”

Slev stared down the little extortionist. "What hellish kindergarten toy box did your species climb from?”

Flo-Flo feigned insult, but he knew, he had won. “Now, now, Mr.Torrent no need for insults. You wouldn’t want to go around enforcing stereotypes about your own species being bloodthirsty monsters, now would you?"

Slev grumbled as he transferred over nearly 20,000 credits for refueling and replacement parts from the minor damage sustained in the space battle.

Flo-Flo clasped his fuzzy little hands. "Now what kinds of weapons do you need rearmed on your very illustrious ship?"

Slev scoffed, “No thanks, I'll just buy them from the guild and do it myself. I don’t even want to know what kind of dangerous product handling fees you would try to slap on.”

Flo-Flo gave a truly concerning smile. "Well, Mr. Torrent, it just so happens that I have the exclusive rights to all ship-born armaments in Saxum, so why don't we have a seat and go through some product options?"

Slev winced "Oh, fuck my life.” He pulled up a chair next to the counter. “Can I at least have beer?”

Flo-Flo near instantaneously produced a beer-like beverage from a cooler hidden under the counter. "Oh, of course, Kolu are nothing if not excellent hosts. I'll just add it to your tab.”

Slev made his way down the dusty streets of Saxum. Square utilitarian metal building arranged in neat rows, alternating between one and three stories tall. Almost all of them appeared to be prefabricated brought in by the corporations to quickly assemble a town. If you wandered towards the edges of the city, you started to get into stunning red stone buildings. Built with mortar and steel bindings that were made by the newer colonists from the local quarry materials. There were a few of those dotted in the interior as well, but they were rare. Slev ducked under one of the many pieces of cool blue cloth draped between buildings “for color,” the locals had told him. He wished the locals hadn't been on average three-foot-tall stuffed animals as he ducked under another and dodged a throng of kolu dithering over the price of fruit.

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Ahead the monument to violence, which was the bounty guild, dominated this block of the street. A black metal building with egregiously obvious turrets twitching as civilians walked by. three stories tall and half a block wide, the entire top floor is made out of a slightly transparent bluish dome. Just visible inside the top floor was the flash of energy weapons and swift movements as hunters trained.

Slev was a bit taken aback; this was almost as big as the guild on Tansental. "Damn, business must be good out here,” he murmured and made his way up past the turrets, keeping a tight grip on Chitter's leash. The little problem was looking at the turrets a little too curiously.

The grand entry room brought a big smile to Slev's face as an unbelievable mix of species wandered from terminal towers back to tables scattered around the edges of the room. The far left had a hilariously heavily armed Kolu serving drinks at a short metal bar. Groups were laughing, drinking, and debating all around him. He gasped slightly and stared at what looked to be a bow made of pure light across what would be described as a phoenix in battle armor as it hopped ahead of him.

"Fuck, I love the guild halls!” Chitters was practically dancing in excitement himself. He got some odd looks and half-hearted pats as he poked and prodded curiously at anyone that came within reach.

Slev tapped the phoenix politely on the shoulder. A pair of ember-like golden eyes swung to face him, the individually armored fire orange feathers swaying with his movement. The golden eyes flared for a moment as some cybernetics buried inside activated. Jesus, that's intimidating.

Slev felt a shiver run down his spine. “Could you kindly direct me towards the clerical office?”

The phoenix placed one wing behind Slev, turning him slightly to the right, and pointed with the other farther into the room and towards a sloped hallway hidden behind a bank of terminals.

“Uhh thanks” Slev half-waved. The phoenix had already started walking again, apparently not even curious about the armored figure and his companion.

Slev made it to the center of the room when a large klaxon went off to scattered cheers. More enthusiastically from the bar area, of course.

The largest terminal towering nearby Slev and almost four meters wide flicked on with a fake confetti graphic. Then switched to the guild news host Abernathy, a long-retired Tragorian, bone-covered, long-limbed horrors from near the core of the galaxy. Slev shuddered; he couldn’t get over how much they looked like undead spiders.

“It's everyone's favorite time of the month!” Abernathy began with a cheerful waving of his limbs. "Let's look at those top bounty's and then see who's winning on the rankings of deadliest sentients! I have some surprises for you today! Namely, let's start with the best bit number one on the deadliest charts! Finnaly active once again! You know him, you probably aren't stupid enough to commit suicide by trying to hunt him, it's Boletelea, that’s right. The Corporations least favorite anti-slavery activist is having another one of his pissing matches, so for the week or two, it takes him to murder the shit out of his poor rival and go back to being a head of state again. The corps get to try their best to assassinate him without having to worry about an army of highly trained and concerningly zealous citizens descending on their HQ to avenge Papa chain-breaker.”

Slev had a flurry of mixed reactions to that broadcast, followed by the need to get the fuck out of the center of the room. He only made it a few panicked steps away before Abernathy switched from images of Boletela destroying tanks to his next segment.

Abernathy waved a leg at the screen, and a poor video recording of Otto's scrapyard from a street angle came on screen. New on the chart's and one of our own, we have number 9 on the deadliest sentient's list, well, for the little bit longer hes alive."Abernathy gave a knowing look. “Slev Torrent, humanity's first member of our illustrious guild!”

Slev was jogging out of the room as people started staring. A few whoops and hollers followed him and chitters as he rushed into the side hallway. Slev slowed as he rounded the corner and just power-walked the rest of the way to the clerical office nestled at the end. It was a modest room with cozy leather chairs and wooden desks. Two clerks sat at ready to assist; both seemed quite busy filing things into the dozen terminals around them. But the closest one, a species Slev was unfamiliar with, he just mentally filled it under a human-sized geico gecko, looked up attentively.

He gestured up at Chitters who had hopped onto his shoulder. “Need to register a trained warbeast.”

The gecko nodded in a sagley fashion, opening up a new tab on his tablet. "Species and testing paperwork, please.”

“Vorimir Ghost, testing paperwork?”

The geko licked an eye and sighed, “I'll make an appointment, all registered warbeasts must pass basic behavioral and effectiveness testing to the standards of the guild for us to cover it's actions under our legal protections, we need to make sure it won't just start eating civilians and get us sued.”

Slev looks nervously at Chitters. He was playing with something in his hands and trying to hide it from him. "Ahh, that makes perfect sense. Please make the appointment." Slev took a moment to exchange contact information and headed back to the hallway.

Hopefully the jeering had died down enough that he could enjoy a beer in peace and see what bounties were on offer. He also needed to see if he could get paid for popping those two pirates.

He grabbed Chitters off his shoulder. “What are you playing with?” Chitters was holding an adorable amorphous blob stuffed animal that had tiny miniature credits in its hand's “No way, already!?” It looked like Alister was already starting in on him.

Slev calmed his immediate outburst and tried to get the stuffed animal away from chitters. Chitters hissed and hopped off his shoulder, happily dangling the stuffy from his mouth. Slev just gave another halfhearted attempt at snatching it away, but it wasn't worth starting a game of cat and mouse over a stuffed animal in the middle of the guild hall. If Alister was already onto him, it would save him some time. No need to search for the sarcastic prick. Instead, he would do a few jobs. Act like everything is normal. Eventually, that should piss Alister off enough to escalate the pranks, and this time Slev wasn’t alone. A fun but potentially disastrous idea for a trap began to form in his mind.