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The Perk; Friday After Workshops [05/19].

So this is what she'd come to, studying on a Friday afternoon. Hopefully, she wouldn't be here into the night, but she really wanted to get into those books that Peridot had helped her pick out at the library. She'd packed up a backpack and trudged over to the Perk because 1) they had a lot of coffee and 2) with both she and Shiemi in Arts & Crafts, their room was a glorious glittery distraction right now. But she was totally wrong if she thought there'd be no distraction here, as she hadn't taken into account the power of people watching.

Like the fascinating scene of the old man bothering the poor barista over every little thing. Two double espressos for here with the foam on the side. So the barista got out some mugs, and he started waving his hands. "Too big, too big! The small cups!" She looked about ready to protest, shook her head, and aged to make them in the smaller cups. Gave him a cup of foam on the side. Came back a second later. "I need more foam!" She got him another one. "I need spoons!" She dug out some spoons. Everything seemed clear at that point, just enough time to breathe, when the man returned. "My wife, she needs a bigger cup."

How the barista didn't just explode at that point was beyond her. She kept a surprising amount of chill as she asked, "Oh, you mean like the one I wanted to give you in the first place?"

Mmmmm. Coffee customer drama llamas.

[[ I have a silly job, and this legit happened to me yesterday. open perk is open! ]]

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Hera glanced at the guilty-looking man with the coffee cups as she passed, and just sort of shook her head. The fact the barista looked a bit frazzled said that maybe there was something up.

She gave the girl a sympathetic look and eyed the menu. "What's a pistachio?"

And the distractions continued! Summer couldn't help eavesdropping and looking up from all her spread-out books to see if the barista would be all 'are you kidding me right now?' at the question, but, really, to be fair, she had to be used to questions like that around here, right?

Plus, this was a really cool looking alien. Summer knew it was impolite to stare, but she couldn't help wondering if those pigtail things were prehensile.

They were, actually. Not that they were doing much at the moment.

"Oh, okay. And mocha is chocolate, right? I'll try that pistachio white mocha, then."

Hera looked around as her drink was being made, and nodded to the girl. "Hi."

Summer blushed a little for having been 'caught,' although, really, it wasn't like she was just gawking or anything. She smiled, lifted a hand. "Hello," she said back. "That sounds really good, what you ordered."

"I hope so," Hera said. "I'm still learning what some of the Earth flavors are. There aren't a lot of things I'm used to. Except potatoes. I'm Hera, by the way."

"My name's Summer," she offered, "but, hold on. Go back. You're from a different world, probably one far, far away, but you still have potatoes?"

Man, it blew her mind what ended up being universal...

"Yep." Hera laughed. "We've got a few of the same things, and some things we use the same words for that are really different, and some things that are mostly the same but have different words." She shrugged. "I'm learning."

The barista brought her drink, and she paid for it and thanked her, then tried it. "Oo, and this is good. Want to try?"

"No, but thank you," Summer said, as politely as she could. It was nothing personal, but she'd learned to be wary of doing anything that might involve sharing spit with an unknown entity. Odds are, Hera's DNA wouldn't have any adverse affects on an unsuspecting human system, but she wasn't about to take that chance. Too many weird, weird viruses out there in space. She lifted up her ultra size super caramel frappuccino with extra whip. "I'm still working on my own. But if you'd like to join me? I mean, unless you've got something else going on, but it would be nice to take a break from all..." She gave a rueful look to her scattered books and maps and lists, "...this."

"Thanks." Hera smiled and sat down, and glanced at the papers. Paper -
still weird. "What are you working on?"

"It's a...uh..." Summer considered the best choice of words. "Project."

Always a good way to describe a highly illegal and improbable plan to break into a high security space prison, really.

Although....

"Saaaaay, you wouldn't happen to know anything about an entity called the Galactic Federation, by any chance, would you?"

"You mean the Republic?" Hera asked, a bit surprised. It didn't often get called that, but it was a federation, really.

Edited 2017-05-20 02:54 (UTC)

"I don't....think so," said Summer, taking a moment look over at a page she'd marked with a Post-It note. She also told herself to be cautious, because she didn't want to get her hopes too far up on a chance meeting with an alien in a coffee shop, but stranger things had happened. "At least, I don't think it's ever been called the Republic in any of the reading I've found. They're a government agency where I'm from. They recently took over my planet, and they suck big time. I'm trying to find the location of one of their high security prisons..."

As she talked, she flipped through more of her papers to produce something with a symbol on it. "This doesn't look like the logo for your Republic, does it?"

Hera shook her head. "No, sorry. I've never seen that before. And the Republic...well, I can't say they were flawless, but I wouldn't say they 'sucked big time', either."

She thought about it, sipping her drink. "Look for supply lines. Places food and equipment are going that's out of proportion to what's supposed to be there. High security probably means plenty of personnel, too; some of them are sure to be at best sympathetic and at worst greedy enough to bribe a location out of. What have you got so far?"

Summer really totally loved how quickly Hera started spitting out advice, like she'd maybe done something like this before, or at the very least thought about it, so she had to grin a bit. And nodded along. "I didn't think about supply lines; that's pretty good. I've been mostly trying to focus on planets currently within the Federation's control, but here are literal thousands of them. Most of their military is Gromflomite, so I've been trying to focus on planets with a high Gromflomite population or migration, assuming they'd have to keep a pretty consistent supply of guards. I also was thinking that they wouldn't want it to be located in too populous of a sector. This is where they keep their baddest criminals, so if anything were to go wrong, they wouldn't want to put too many of their citizens in harm's way. So I'm thinking maybe this area," she spread out a map of one area of space with a big circle drawn onto it, "or this," another map, "or maybe this. I kind of just got started, though, so it's just a guess."

Please, Hera had been fighting the Empire since she was younger than Summer. And she wasn't that much older now. This was normal.

"Good thoughts." Hera nodded. "Have you considered a satellite or station? Or are they more likely to stay planetside?" She eyed the maps and shook her head. "Two-dimensional maps are so bad for space. I can't tell how big these areas are. Have you got a holo version?"

Edited 2017-05-20 03:39 (UTC)

Allow Summer to wibbles a bit over inferior technology. "No, no holos. Yet. I mean, the fact that the library even had these is actually kind of amazing. But I'm putting together a list of potential contacts that might be able to get me more. And it's probably a station, now that you mention it, less strain on planetary resources, more control, things like that, right?"

Hera nodded. "More control, harder to escape. Do you know how big it is? Past a certain point, it's probably not mobile, at least." Or so conventional wisdom said.

She turned the maps around. "Do they have maps of the same place from different directions? I could input them and make a holo; it might not be accurate enough to use for travel, but it'd at least be good for narrowing things down."

"Oh, I'm still probably quite a ways from actually travelling there," Summer said, eyes wide. "That's a whole 'bother can of worms. But anything at this point would help, if you want to borrow the Galactic Federation Atlas here. That would be really cool of you, thank you!"

And to think, little more than a week ago, she would have just been suspicious of Hera's motives. Maybe she should be, but this was just too good to pass up.

"Oh, I can't do it right here," Hera said. "I'd have to take it back to my ship. That or bring my droid here, but this seems like a nice place; I hate to inflict Chopper on it."

She loved the little guy, but she was well aware of his personality.

"Do you want to drop by the junkyard some time?"

"Sure! I can make some photocopies for you and see what can be put together!"

Here, Hera was talking about ships and droids and holos, and Summer was talking about photocopies. Ugh, Summer, you lame piece of primitive Earth trash!

But, speaking of trash... "Uhhh, is that where you live?"

No judgement! Well, maybe a little judgement.

Hera laughed. "Oh, no. My ship's just too big for the apartment roof, so that's where I landed. And when I tried to check about berthing fees, they shoved a lot of paper at me and told me I could manage it."

She pulled out her comm. "I haven't got a phone, but I think you can get me on this." She pulled up her contact details. No, she wasn't sure how that connection worked. It was one of the least weird things about this place, so she wasn't asking questions.

"Or you can find me over at the MCA. I don't think I'm listed, so just look for Kanan Jarrus."

And, whatever that connection was, Summer seemed to intuitively understand it one a subconscious level as soon as her own phone was in her hand entering in all the deets.

"Kanan?" she asked. "Bus Driver Guy? I know him! Are you guys friends?" And a little smirk on her face seemed to ask more than friends?, if they were living together. Nice.

"Bus driver guy?" Hera snickered. "Okay, I'm not letting him live that one down. But yes, we're friends." And Hera was ignoring any other implications there. "We're from the same galaxy; we've got a lot in common."

Mostly hatred of the Empire.

Summer had to admit to being a little disappointed that it seemed to be left off at just friends, but maybe...? She might have to explore this idea of butting into other people's personal lives later, though.

"Are most of the people from your galaxy so helpful?" she asked, because, seriously, she hadn't even had to ask, and both she and Bus Driver Guy were so awesome. "Or just the ones that come here?"

"Probably just the ones here," Hera said a touch apologetically. "Not that there aren't other folks back home that are helpful, too, but it's a dangerous place these days."

She gave Summer a wry smile. "The Empire that's recently taken over isn't a welcoming place. I'm guessing you can relate. Who are you trying to get out of prison - someone important, someone you care for, or both?"

"Both," Summer's eyes dropped for a moment with a sad smile. "It's my grampa. It's...a long story, but he pretty much sacrificed himself, and everyone else has turned their backs on him, and it's totally lame."

"He sounds like a remarkable man," Hera said. "He should be proud of you for this."

Summer laughed a bit dryly. "He is remarkable," she agreed, "but he would probably tell me I was being a dumb little shit and ruining everything."

Deep down, though, Summer thought he would be proud. He'd just never admit it.

"Ouch." Hera sighed. "Family can be hard. But you still think this is the right thing to do?"

Summer did not even hesitate, throwing back her shoulders. "Absolutely," she said. "It's the only thing to do."

Hera nodded. "Then I'll help you not get caught doing it."

"Thank you," Summer smiled gratefully. A spared glance to the mess of things covering the table inspired a laugh. "I'm going to need all the help I can get."

And two really nice space people with ships was definitely not a bad place to start.

Hera grinned. "Plans can always get messy. Just so long as they work, that's the important part."

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