The Godless Matron is home to many, resembling a micro-society for those who wish to live outside the typical 'rule' of the galaxy. The Lucrehulk-class battleship's massive hangars have been converted into dwellings as a result. Chute Town is the most notable of these makeshift towns. Many shops and storefronts have been constructed to take advantage of the higher volume of foot traffic. In addition, many ships and crews arrive into Chute Town to sell their "well-earned" commodities, weapons, or artifacts. It is commonplace to find the best and the worst gear the galaxy has to offer, it is only a matter of how big your pocket book is. The 'streets' are patrolled regularly by the crew of the Matron itself, leaving would-be miscreants to be more wary, lest they find themselves on the receiving end of a pirate's sense of justice.

It is built mostly out of spare durasteel panels from derelict ships, dismantled machinery, or any other source or material the pirates could scavenge. It spans the length of the massive portside hangar of the Matron, reaching from it's heavily protected reactor — hidden behind triple-reinforced blast doors and a guard retinue — all the way to the hangar entrance where the many incoming ships unload their cargo. It is more than a mile long, over five hundred feet wide and up to three stories tall, covering most of the floor. Chute Town's streets are a miniature maze, weaving in between buildings on several levels. Verticality is key for the masses of shops and bars to operate without interfering with one another. The main street is nicknamed Murder alley, mostly because all the weapon shops are prominently opened there.

Illumination banks are staggered along the walkways and buildings to provide enough light for the society to function. Still, the 'streets' are left dim with a low hanging fog built up from the collective humidity of so many people in one space. For those calling it their home, there is no such thing as 'off hours'. A large crowd bustles along at all hours, an exotic assortment of individuals from countless planets and the warring gangs that divvy up the territory within. It's the perfect place for those looking to disappear in the crowd.

With tensions running high, Chute Town was far more volatile than it would have been otherwise. Several of the gangs had been stepping outside their territory of late. As yet there had been no outright acts of aggression, though the perceived slights had been steadily mounting for weeks. The cracks in the dam were beginning to show. The crew of the Godless Matron just needed to apply pressure to the right place at the right time to trigger an outright gang war.

To that end, a bounty was put in place. The premise was simple enough. The Herald would grant a measure of clemency to whomsoever cashed in the ID tokens that had been planted on several individuals at random. Such a prize was without measure for not just the gangs of Chute Town, but the denizens themselves.

The place stunk. The whole premise of a town built inside a ship made no sense to the Sith, but here it was in all its glory and it seemed to be thriving. She shook her head as she marveled at it all, her red hair moist from the ever-present fog that pervaded every street she made her way along. This many bodies in one place was sure to have this kind of effect and she was getting sick of breathing the same air as some of these lowlifes. She had only set foot in this area of the lucrehulk in search of the ID tokens that had been placed on some people in this slum of a town. Walking through the narrow, bustling streets was making her skin crawl, but the rewards for cashing in the tokens kept her going. The smells on the other hand threatened to make her revisit her breakfast a few times and she continually had to stop herself from being violently ill as she passed a few particularly unsavory sentients. Many different species came to hawk their wares here and the shops along the sides of the makeshift streets were always busy, no matter what the time of day.

Her senses roamed around her as she walked, trying to pick up any subtle clues as to who may be carrying the tokens she was searching for, and as she passed a narrow side alley, they sprang to life and blared like klaxons in her mind. Ducking down the alley, she pressed herself against the wall and glanced around. She could hear footsteps but couldn’t see anybody in the dimly lit area, so she let her senses wander further. She could sense someone beyond her field of vision who was not a force user that carried the thing she needed. Stepping out of cover, she made her way silently forwards and closed in on her prey. The attack had to be silent as she didn’t wish to risk the ire of the pirate crew of the Godless Matron.

Her target was in sight; a male, about five feet tall with a slight stoop and a scarred face. Not what she was expecting, but she didn’t choose who carried the tokens. She crept silently behind him as he strolled forwards but stopped suddenly as her quarry halted abruptly, obviously alerted to something. She dove behind a pile of crates as he turned and swung his gaze over the alleyway, his fear palpable even from this distance. Suddenly a shot rang out and the man fell to the ground as a spray of blood spattered the wall beside him. His prone form lay unmoving and Taranae knelt behind her cover in shock. She was surprised that someone would be so bold as to shoot someone in the town that had regular guard patrols and she swiveled her head around, searching to see if anyone had been alerted. Sure enough, the sound of running feet could be heard getting louder and she cursed. Rising, she caught just a glimpse of a figure in armor rifling through the man’s clothes. She was sure that the figure turned and looked directly at her before giving a swift salute and disappearing into the fog. Taranae quickly leaped onto the crates that served as her hiding spot and clambered to the roof of the adjacent building as two guards appeared and raced down the alley to the corpse at the far end. Knowing she had to disappear before she was spotted and blamed for a murder of such barbaric means, she cursed once more and set off along the narrow roof that led onto other buildings and signage of different shops. She began her hunt for a new target; the lone figure that was stealing her kills, her tokens and her credits.

At times like this, audacity could be a strategist’s greatest ally. It was a fickle one to be sure, a wild card as likely to end your life at a critical moment as allow you to pull of a plan with perfection, but it was invaluable. With every criminal gang so wrapped up in their posturing, so focused upon their crude cloak and vibrodagger games, the very idea of an obvious assault seemed to have escaped them. The scar-faced thug with the smoking hole in his chest was the perfect example of this. He had been quite safe against the usual tricks plied by assassins by carefully watching the shadows, avoiding obvious locations which would have benefited snipers, and even poisoners; but a blaster in the middle of an often patrolled grimy alleyway? Were it not for the grim nature of such work, his expression of dumb disbelief would have made his killer laugh.

Hurrying out of the alleyway, Tarvitz kept moving even as he joined the bustling crowds of Murder Alley. Pushing his way between mercenaries and tradesmen alike, he only began to slow once a few hundred well armed bodies had been put between himself and his crime scene. Glancing back twice to confirm no one was following, Tarvitz slowed to a brisk pace, wiping condensation from his visor as he wove his way between the ramshackle stalls of weaponsmiths.

As grimy, overcrowded and downright unsettling a place as Chute Town was, it at least had its uses in this game. With so many blasters in one place, with so many violent bounty hunters at risk of turning upon them, no sane member of what passed for the Godless Matron’s security would risk looking into this crime. Not that his recent kill would have been worth it of course. While such wetwork was unbecoming of a Jedi, Tarvitz had gone to great lengths to observe and track each possible target. Of the four lives he had ended thus far in this hunt, each would have earned a permanent stay in a jail cell on any civilised world for all they had done.

Of course, things had not gone entirely to plan. There had been a witness, someone else seeking to take the same kill. He hadn’t seen a weapon admittedly, but there were few other reasons to stalk someone like the scar-faced man down a back alley; and despite the flippant salute, Tarvitz knew that this complicated matters in more ways than one. The hired murderers this kind of competition attracted were hardly the sort who allowed credits to be stolen out from under them, after all.

Sidestepping past a hulking Gamorrean, and privately thanking whoever had made his helmet’s air filtration systems, Tarvitz glanced behind him again. He watched his HUD blink several times, the scanning optic racing and forth across his vision. Singling out faces, weapons and the more typically warlike species from across the sea of heads between himself and the alleyway, it highlighted them as potential threats. Yet, even as he stared, no immediate hostiles came forth. The question was, then, why was that same old warning itch from the Force telling him to run?

For a few moments Tarvitz just stood there, questioning if the long, bloody history written into the walls of the Godless Matron was finally getting to him. Then, out of the corner of his eye, he caught sight of her. She was difficult to make out at first, steadily making her way across a number of the better made stalls forged from burned out vessels or the jagged remains of Vulture Droids. With the dark crimson of her cloak rendering her all but invisible against the the deep shadows cast by the malfunctioning glowlamps and billowing fog, few seemed to have realised she was even there.

Instinctively, Tarvitz began to reach for the stock of his rifle, and then paused. There was no guarantee she had seen him just yet and, if he were lucky, perhaps he could even reach a lower level without either of them coming to blows. Lowering his hand again, he turned and began to make his way through the crowds, trying to put as much distance between the two as he could.

Due to using more than the one allotted extension, this match is closed. 0.36 points will be allotted to Ka for posts made.