Land of Thought and Hops (Rabbit)

[Sporky]

There are innumerable space stations floating in the voids that are little more than spaceborne equivalents of roadside fuel stations. Just docking ports and maybe a small convenience store and/or watering hole. This was one of them.

This little dive's area of void was situated in the mid rim somewhere, between two small star systems of no import. Its claim to fame was its Rill ribs platter, slathered with a x2 flavor combo of secret recipe sauce and crumbled Cairn Bolete mushrooms from Dynn.

Heh. Dynn.

Wallace had come here often in his life. There was just something about this little dumpass station that he had enjoyed...they had enjoyed. The rangers. The Zeo Rangers, Wallace's brothers and sister in blood, his second family. This had been their secret spot, and even now he sometimes expected to see the Rusty Rainbow sitting in a docking port whenever he left.

His mind drifted back, as it was wont to do, to younger days. More complicated days, when his back wasn't bent and his fur wasn't faded. How happy they had all been, one they'd warmed up to each other. They'd staked a claim on this station, and more than a few times they'd led the bar in renditions of I Had A Hat when they were all completely drunk off their asses. There was a picture of the Rangers above the bar, even, and it brought tears and a smile to Wallace's eyes every time he looked at it.

But he wasn't young anymore. His back WAS bent, his fur WAS fading. He was a dying man, he knew. His time in the land of the living, lengthened as it was by the Force, was ticking away from him even as he sat eating. But he didn't fear death, only that he would never see this 'Aiaru' place he'd dreamed about. That was his final goal in life, to see that planet, meet these 'Space Wizards' he'd heard about.

Why was he sitting in his old haunt, then? Why had he chosen to sit in the well-worn booth, memories and tears flooding back like they always did whenever he visited? Well, he was a stubborn old dog, and old habits died hard. Very hard. He couldn't bear the thought of not being able to taste the x2 flavor combo that slathered these pieces of meat..nnng, so delicious.

There was his mind, running away again in its old age. Just a moment ago, he'd been crying over old memories and contemplating his fate, now he was focusing on these delicious piece of meat. Silly old dog.

He glanced up when the door to the bar slid open. It was a new patron, one Wallace didn't recall seeing before. Huh. Odd. It was...he supposed a Lepi, though maybe it was just another species he wasn't familiar with...an armored Lepi by the looks of him, decked out in the odd patterns and bright colors that Wallace associated with Mandalorians. Again, odd...or maybe he was seeing things, going crazy in his old age.

He watched the stranger enter, mild interest shining through his glazed, weary eyes. Perhaps he'd strike up a conversation with him when he'd finished these...delicious...

Oh by the Force, these ribs were good.

[Rabbit]

[And I finally get to your post - yay!! ;D For some strange reason, I was bound and determined to answer all the posts I had waiting for me in the order of the sections they appear on the board.... Don't ask me why I felt I had to do that. >.> I know. I'm weird.]

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Speaking of ribs...

Rowin's felt as if his would start showing through his fur if he didn't eat. And soon. A Lepi's metabolism was a force the galaxy would have learned to fear...if it hadn't belonged to, well...a bunch of biped, goofy-toothed lapines.

A Lepi's metabolism was, however, a force for Rowin to reckon with. A force that demanded he eat every four hours, on the hour, and not a second after. This was the metabolism that gave him his lightening-fast reflexes, his bounding jumps, his twitchy whiskers...so, he didn't mind feeding it. Especially not since it often gave him the upper edge in a blaster fight.

But, sometimes, his metabolism could get the better of him. Like when he didn't eat every four hours, on the hour, and not a second after.

Today was one of those errors in judgement. Rowin had pushed himself too far and too long - at least, where his stomach was concerned. He was hot on the heels of a bounty that was making her way deeper in toward the Inner Rim. If he had to hazard a guess, he would prognosticate her eventual end-point in Manaan. Maybe Hapes, but his gut told him that that might be stretching it a bit.

His gut also told him that he'd stretched his luck a lot - at least in the whole-not-eating-right-on-time department.

But, calculating coordinates and scrambling to make contact with an old friend on Manaan had taken most of his attention away from his stomach. Concentration on a singular task had always been a challenge for Rowin, but once he achieved that nirvana of focus, he could go for hours. And hours. And hours.

And when he surfaced, his stomach held no quarter in informing exactly what it thought of him.

He had scrounged through his stores on board his ship, Kryst'shun, but he'd taken one calculating look at what he had on stock and thought better of it. When he got like this...when he'd lost track of time and forgot to eat...there was only one thing that would silence his growling belly:

A gigantic plate of succulent, well-cooked, well-seasoned meat.

Rowin kept meat on stock, for sure. But it was mostly the dried and jerky variety. He had some frozen. But...he was lazy. He felt like eating yesterday and didn't want to wait to cook his own steak. So, he took the time to glance at his coordinates and realized a happy thing indeed -

He was mere parsecs away from a little random space station that just happened to serve the best flippin' Rill ribs on this side of the galaxy.

He started salivating instantly at the memory of those juicy ribs, that tangy x2 sauce, and those crumbled Cairn Bolete mushrooms. And hot pursuit or not...

Well...

A Lepi didn't hunt on an empty stomach. It just didn't happen.

And so, it was with singleness of thought, that he docked the Kryst'shun at the little po'dunk station and made a beeline for that heaven-sent cantina with the glorious ribs.

Rowin didn't even bother changing out of his stolen Mandalorian armor, so consuming was his hunger. He merely docked, paid his fee, and moved as quickly as he could - short of running - toward the ribs that awaited him so faithfully.

He barely registered, even, who or what he sat down next to it, when he went belly-up to the bar. He gave the wolf-man to his left a cursory glance - out of sheer ingrained habit than anything else - and then turned imploring eyes toward the bartender as his stomach growled out a chorus.

"A plate of your ribs," Rowin paused and, despite his hunger, remained polite to the end. "Double the order, too, an' make 'em rare. Please."

[Sporky]

Wallace tossed the last clean-picked bone onto its plate, letting out a rather pleased, and rather vulgar as well, belch. He patted his stomach through the Shell Rat carapace undershirt he wore under his permanently splayed open longcoat. His belly was once again full, and it would be so for a good many hours. This place's ribs would do that to you. He pushed the plate forward and the bartender grabbed up it, slid the bones into the garbage, then dumped the plate into the filthy dishwater, breaking the thin scum that had been building up.

Wallace grinned. He loved this place, truly he did. He tapped on the counter. "Me smoke an' drink, right now." he grunted. The bartender went through the motions of their age-old ritual, pulling out a very old dudeen and a dusty old bottle of clear liquid. He packed the pipe and filled the glass for the old man, who took each. Wallace lit the pipe himself with a provided match, and clamped his teeth down into the familiar grooves in the smoking device. With a contented sigh, Wallace's mind drifted back again, to his younger days...

---

"Hey Wallace, you ever try smokin'?" Brick, the towering muscular Rodian of the Rangers slurred, grinning as only a drunken Rodian could down at his brother in blood. "Come on, Nordikann. You can't say you haven't!"

Wallace arched an eyeridge at Brick. "I swears b'y, you've gone chop solid nuts." Brick laughed, swaying back and forth in his chair. "Yeaaah, maybe. But have you?" Wallace shook his head, ande facepalmed. "I's the one what gave you your pipe, stun'd!"

Brick's expression fell, and he wobbled on the bar seat again. "..Oh. Right. You did.." he mumbled, before toppling off and onto the floor. Wallace groaned and shook his head. "Dumpass..."

---

Wallace was brought out of his nostalgia by a finger flick to the forehead from the bartender. "Oy, old man! Snap out of it, I'm scared you'll go into a coma!" Wallace leveled a glare at him, and shook his head. "I ain't goin' into no coma, no I isn't." was his growling reply, his accent growing thicker with his anger. The bartkeep threw up his hands in defeat, and shot an apologetic look at the Lepi, whether or not he was paying attention.

Wallace rolled his eyes, and settled back into silene, content to smoke and drink. After a few minutes, though, his curiosity overtook him, and he shifted slightly closer to Rowin. "Good ribs, innit?" The conversation starter was simple, to the point. Wallace had never been a good orator, especially so in his old age.