Starlight, starbright... [Lomatus!]

[Rhi-Rhi]

Planet Starblaze was a rather upscale bar in the Red District, so named for its spacy theme. Screens along the walls, decorated by fake windows and portholes, gave the illusion of gazing outside at the starry universe beyond the station, and the lighting was made up of stars and planets hanging from the ceiling, casting the room in dim, mood appropriate light. By the Cancer's standards, this place was high-end, located in one of the better parts, and the prices (and quality) were appropriately higher.

It was one of Jericho's favorite places to go when she needed a break from the rabble of a seedy pub. Sometimes, she just wanted to dress up, blow money on fancy appetizers, and, y'know, eyeball the rich-looking people and see if she could get something from them later.

Taking up a seat at the bar, Jericho nursed an amaretto sour and picked at her artichoke dip. (Artichokes! Really! Sure, it was probably freeze-dried or something before it was cooked, but artichokes in space? That was divine.) She'd dressed in a dark gray suit, the jacket worn casually open, with a red shirt and darker red tie beneath, and she'd worn her long hair down.

With a pair of black-framed glasses completing the look, she looked nothing like the space pirate she was, and more like a businesswoman letting loose after a long day.

The illusion was only ruined by the fact that she was packing, though the gun might be easy to overlook, holstered at her hip and hidden beneath her jacket.

A girl could never be too prepared.

[Lomatus]

Of all the jobs he had accepted when he signed on to be a merc, this was the least desirable. Sure pirates did people wrong, but this was not an assassination mission. He also wasn't completely sure where in the hell his target was at. Ship scanners indicated that Jericho's ship was docked here, but he really had no idea beyond that where he was going to find her.
"I guess she'll be wearing pirate attire." He thought to himself. Never the less, after several hours of searching, his quarry still eluded him and he gave up for the day, decided to get something to eat and drink at some bar called 'Planet Starblaze'. It was decent enough as far as outward appearances went and it had a certain sentimental air to it. Nevertheless he had an idea, one that would automatically get him some attention when he walked in, twin hooks on his back, Caestus on his hands and pistol tucked away.

As he touched the door handle he stopped and thought about what he was about to do. Best case scenario, Jericho was here and would surrender peacefully (daydream scenario), at worst, they would complain about him being noisy, assume he was already drunk, and the bartender would know he was there so he wouldn't have to vie for attention to get a damn beverage (he didn't want anything alcoholic anyway).

After playing the scenario in his head he shrugged, swung the door wide open and shouted.
"Jericho Fox! Stand your ass up!" Tactically he decided it was sound, even if Jericho wasn't here someone who might know what she looked like might be and could point him in the right direction, someone might follow him out in order to see what he knew, or the bar would panic and the ones who didn't run out would be there. Of course, he knew if his quarry was there, now would be the time to escape.

[Rhi-Rhi]

Jericho had been taking a sip of her cocktail when the door burst open and some joker came in, shouting her name. Everyone in the bar startled. The place went dead silent, except for the ambient music playing. Many heads swiveled in the man's direction, and Jericho choked on her drink.

Coughing and sputtering, she beat on her chest and prayed her drink wouldn't come out her nose. When she could breathe again, she had a moment of, "Oh fuck" before she realized that the man wasn't looking at her. He didn't seem to be looking at anyone in particular, actually. But he did seem to be looking for someone.

Her, obviously. But he wasn't seeing her, and that realization kept her seated.

Maybe he didn't know what she looked like.

Relaxing under that realization, Jericho snorted, took a bite of bread and dip, and broke the stunned silence.

"What, your date ditch you or something?" she asked, casual and conversation. "What a bad break. I feel you, man. But you probably shouldn't go around screaming like that unless you wanna give everyone indigestion. And, you know, scare her away." She tilted her head. "Or him. Jericho can be a guy's name. I'm not judging."

[Lomatus]

Well no one was running, no one had made too much indication so he did his best to act drunk. He swaggered into the bar a few steps and before someone broke out with a smart ass comment. Mention of the correct gender first, then correction, the person was the first to speak, and what was said was dissuasive while no one else in the bar had mentioned anything else to him this person had said three specific things indicating that she knew something. Lomatus of course knew better than to believe it anyway. His client had given him the gender, and a rough description, but no photographs and no audio clips, no holodisplays, and no clothing or DNA samples meant he had little more to go off of than his tactics and investigative skills. All of that in mind, it was harder to catch a target. Given that he was now 60% sure the person speaking was either her or knew how he could find her.

A few more drunken steps, a slight swagger, and keeping to the disposition he had just used and he made it to the bar.
"I think youuu ma'am are extremely pretty and how did you know my date had SKIPPED out on me. Are you one of those PSYCHICS I keep hearing about? Do you have a boyfriend?" He said all of this, with several things in mind. Drunkenly shouting out the word 'psychic' was a great way to bring attention and get her to perhaps slip up. Nextly, talking to someone that's drunk was just the right way to let down one's guard.  Despite this, he needed to be sure and there was no way he was risking telepathy in a bar.

[Rhi-Rhi]

Jericho smirked and tossed her hair when he called her pretty, because damn right she was, and a drunken compliment was still a compliment. But then he did that annoying drunk person thing and asked, loudly, if she was psychic.

She grimaced. People turned to look. With a sigh, she rolled her eyes and leaned back in her chair.

"It was a lucky guess," she said, and smiled. "You could say I'm pretty good at that. Drunk dude screaming for a girl, I mean, people are going to jump to conclusions. It's the death cry of the jilted. So what happened, tiger? She leave you 'cause you flirted with one girl too many?"

[Lomatus]

Well she was still there and she hadn't over reacted, professional criminals wouldn't, but that didn't mean anything. Plus her logic was sound, despite that the questions she was asking were no longer so dissuasive. One bar patron looked at the two of them and seemed to be staring, but he didn't think the guy was listening.
"Nah. A buddy of mine told me she was a pretty girl that broke his heart." He started out at a reasonable volume. Moving the lie on from there was going to be more tricky, he didn't know anything about his target's love life.
"Said she left him and he was going to ask her if he could join her crew." The Cancer was the place for such a thing. Logically that should work to reinforce his story, there were too many holes, too many guesses. He needed to bring the conversation back to them, back to the here and now.
"I'm trying to find her so I can get her to let both of us on and I wanted to yell at her for myyyy buddy." He added in a whisper, smiling the whole way through with the over trusting secret divulging nature of a drunk man.

[Rhi-Rhi]

Jericho's brow furrowed. Well, that was weird. So someone apparently thought they had been dating? Or something? Someone who was going to ask to join her non-existent crew? She pursed her lips and tried to think of who that could be, or what guys she'd interacted with in the last few days she could have possibly given that impression to. Some psycho, she guessed.

If this drunk guy was anything like his buddy, who sounded pretty creepy, then she sure as hell didn't want either on her crew! If she even wanted a crew to begin with!

Yup, looked like playing dumb had been the right choice here!

"Well ain't that just a crying shame!" she said with a snap of her fingers. "I feel for you, mate! I really do! I can't imagine why this girl wouldn't want anything to do with you or your friend, you all being so charming and everything! I mean, that can't have possibly been a lie designed to get you out of her space or anything! What a disingenuous cow! The nerve of some girls, right?"

[Lomatus]

His suspicion had dropped to about 50% through the course of conversation. It didn't necessarily mean he was wrong... he was always right sometimes. Just meant that maybe she wasn't in this bar. Still he decided he would continue the act.
"Damn right GIRLS are BITCHES." He said rather loudly before whispering "Except you, you're pretty nice." He continue switching between shouting and whispering as he had heard drunk people do before. This person seemed rather trusting given that he was armed visibly with at least his swords.
"WHAT'SS your NAME? If you dun mind me asking." He added honestly wondering but using the drunken volume again hoping that if she lied someone else in the bar might know the truth and feel like letting him know, or at least approaching him about a price for the information. Then again, that was of course based entirely around this person being well known around here and having people that didn't like her.

[Rhi-Rhi]

Jericho continued smiling vacantly, though her left foot began to tap a staccato rhythm on the floor the more he went on. Yeah, she'd love to show him just how bitchy she could be with a fist to his stupid, drunken face, but she refrained, considering they were in polite company.

And she still had this awesome artichoke dip to finish.

She was breaking off another piece of bread when he switched gears. "If I did mind, it doesn't matter, does it? Asking if you can ask is still a question, you realize," she said, popping the piece in her mouth and speaking around it.

She glanced at him sidelong. "As for my name? I'd tell you, but you'll forget it in five seconds."

[Lomatus]

He smiled in response to her response, but suddenly frowned.
"Your right. Sorry to bother you." He said as he turned and started to swagger out of the bar. He had decided to play the sympathy card and even if that didn't work he had a new plan. He obviously couldn't find her so he was going to need to try a different tactic than going bar to bar, and he figured he had done his job as far as making it well known there was someone looking for Jericho. That in and of itself was going to have to be enough. He still had ship pars, crew replacements and of course monitoring Jericho's ship so he could tell if she left. He was trying to corner her without her seeing and he had posted a sentry in the docking bay to take a holographic image. It was set, but he liked information from people better.

The other thing he didn't like was that there were too many things that could go wrong. She could just jump, taking her out of his scanner range and he would lose her. Then there was her crew... or was there? Regardless it was too unpredictable.

Back to reality, back to the here and now, he was only a few steps away from her, and he had forgotten to shield his mind, he wasn't in the habit of doing that, but he remedied that and continued.

[Rhi-Rhi]

As soon as he left, Jericho let out a sigh of relief.

Playing the clueless dame had paid off.

But for how long? Yeah, she sure as hell wasn't about to find out! Someone was looking for her, for whatever reason, and she couldn't think of a single good reason to cover it. When you were a pirate, the reasons were never good.

Time to bounce!

She waited a solid ten minutes--enough time to finish her meal and make sure he was gone--before she paid and slipped out of the bar.

Keeping an ear and eye out on her surroundings while trying to remain as casual as she could, Jericho made a beeline for the docking bay, unaware that there were sentries watching her.

[Lomatus]

One of Lomatus' sentries watched the ship identified as Jericho's for any sign of her returning to it. They didn't have authorization for a land lock because... well they didn't give that to bounty hunters on this planet. Nevertheless identification was the key and he watched with the holorecorder plugged into his binoculars, ready to record.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

As he boarded the Orihalcum he couldn't help but feel as though he had missed some major detail or glossed over something obvious. He wasn't exactly king of the acting world and often just filled a role that would win him the least memorable or threatening position. Annoyed, he activated the ships communicator and set it to listen so he would know immediately if Jericho was spotted.


"This girl is starting to be a pain in my ass." He said to himself under his breath before activating the ship's communicators.
"All hands man your stations. Gunner positions prepare the anitmatter cannon, I want it ready so we can use it to change her course if she starts to make an attempt to jump, we only have one shot so use manual targeting arrays so we don't hit her ship. Prep the rail guns for me to take hold and prepare for take off the second our sentry sees her." He ordered.

There was a pit in his stomach as he prepared for the upcoming space battle. It could go either way and he wasn't ready for whatever her ship was capable of... no one was. There wasn't a single crew member that had full identification on the specifics of her star ship. Lack of information always played out badly, and with the only thing he knew being speculation that she could probably, and would probably jump, he was nervous... Though the crew would never know that.

[Rhi-Rhi]

Jericho reached her small ship in minutes. It was a small thing, a personal craft capable of fitting a crew of four, maybe more if they doubled up, but she only ever used it for herself, anyway. It was a clean, classy thing that didn't stand out; it blended in with the others, and that was just how she liked it. She boarded it, sank into the pilot seat, and flipped some switches. In seconds, the ship roared to life, lifted from its docking space, and turned to leave.

Once she had cleared the Cancer, she prepared the jump, heard the telltale hum as the EM shield activated, powered up.

In just over a minute, her ship would peace out.

And hopefully, she would be long gone before whoever was looking for her was any wiser for it.