Don't Talk Back (barfight pt. 2)
Posted on Wed Feb 26th, 2025 @ 9:28am by Aarav Macae & Lieutenant Kyan Mackenzie & Shea Voran II & Skili VaTemishon
1,643 words; about a 8 minute read
Mission: What Lies Ahead, Between, and Behind
"That may happen sooner than we'd like," Aarav commented, grumpiness showing through his typically jovial expression. Before he could shout at the party to knock it off, another pair of farmhands had stomped their way over to throw hands. The first grabbed at the Ferengi on the back of his farm friend, while the other looked ready to tackle down Kyan. The uncannily matching music in the background seemed to start a commotion, as people began to crowd around to watch four farmers start to either bully or be bullied by an Only and his Ferengi friends.
Skili moved to a more dramatic piece of music, though it was hard to hear over the expanding melee. She prepared to move back if the fight spilled in their direction.
Kyan avoided one of the farmers with a queda de quatro, or a fall back into a crabwalk position. Well, he would have had one of the others not been standing there. As such, all he did was fall into the farmer, who grabbed him under his arms in a reverse bear hug.
"Now just settle down.."
When the farmer began lifting him off the floor the boy brought his right heel down onto the top of the man's foot hard, but not hard enough to break the little bones in the big farmer's instep. It still had the desired effect. He let go and Kyan dropped to the floor in a crouch. He reflexively reached for his knife but stopped. It wasn't that kind of a fight. yet. Instead he spun in place and kicked at the back of the man's knees. It worked, as it generally did on Humans. Even for bigger Humans, if you kicked out the back of their knee, they usually fell or at least stumbled.
This one stumbled forward into his friend, who caught him before he lost his footing completely. Kyan stood back up as the farmer turned around, his face flushed with equal parts embarrassment and anger. By contrast, the Onlie wore a bemused expression. He was clearly having fun, which only served to further enrage the embarrassed farmer. Just a bit more prodding would be all it took. Grups were so easy to goad into doing dumb stuff.
Meanwhile, the guy with the Ferengi, whom Kyan recognized as Doikm on his back was still stumbling about trying to get free. The Ferengi's high pitched screams competed with the Klingon lady's music as he picked up anything he could reach and used it to bash the farmer. Finally he settled on a bar rag and took to frantically whipping him with it as he hung on for dear life.
Kyan looked for the fourth farmer, and found him attempting to get at Rava and Dint who had barricaded themselves behind a table. Every few seconds Dint would pop up and throw something at him. He was covered in an assortment of drinks and food. He though he heard Rava attempt to bribe him from behind the table. He'd have to tell him that Human's didn't feel the same way about Oo-Mox as Ferengi did.
Turning his attention back to the two in front of him, Kyan offered a cheeky grin. "Yer not gonna get me ya daft veggie mongers. So give it up the now before sommat gets broke!" He offered them the out not to save himself, but to be able to say he had when asked later. And they said he couldn't plan ahead! Pfft.
Alas his entreaties fell on deaf ears as the one farmer barreled toward him. Kyan adopted a ginga, the traditional swaying stance of Capoeira. He watched the farmer get closer like a batter watches a pitch. His motion looked more akin to dancing than a fighting stance. The farmer slowed to grab him. He was still hung up on not actually fighting him. It was a pretty typical thing among grups, especially Humans. After all, what grown ass man would actually fight a child? Kyan ducked his lunging grab with a cocrinha, allowing his own momentum to carry him forward while the man tried to stop himself. The Onlie followed up with a martelo; a high spinning kick. were they of a similar height, it would have been aimed at the back of his head. As Kyan was almost two feet shorter, it hit him in the back, exacerbating his momentum. He careened into a bystander who happened to be looking at something else. He shoved the farmer. The farmer shoved him. And suddenly Kyan was left without an opponent.
"Hey ya selfish git! I was fightin him!" Kyan called out as the two began exchanging blows.
The small 'tiff' erupted only when one of the farmers was shoved into a particularly rowdy (and drunk) patron. From there, it was a series of exchanged words and misplaced shoves and punched later that the bar began to get in on all the fun. And it was about that point that Aarav's jovial nature changed. He disappeared behind the bar to reappear moments later with a foam bat. He bapped the nearest bar patron, who looked ready to jump in. "No." He said with a scary finality.
Shea sighed when the punches started. "... okay, now we're getting somewhere..." The flap concealing her holstered pistol came open...
One of the drunk farmers decided he needed a weapon, and a wooden chair would no doubt do the job. He brought it up, intending to bring it down upon the head of some random patron who's face he did not like. Suddenly one of its legs blew apart into a shower of wooden splinters with a loud, resounding, thunderclap that brought everything to a sudden, screeching halt...
The only sound was the clattering of a small brass cylinder landing on the floor; Shea stood by the bar, one arm extended aiming the weapon at the farmer in question, a thin whisp of smoke pouring from its muzzle.
"Now then; I'm all for a good scuffle like any other, but weapons are a bit much. I'm trying to enjoy my drink here, and you are really spoiling my mood." She eyed the entire group like a mother disappointed with her children. "Now I suggest you gentlemen apologize to each other and clean up this mess."
Kyan had chased down his farmer pal and gottem back in on that action. He'd been sitting atop his shoulders like it was a game of Marco Polo; except that he'd pulled the front of his own shirt over the man's head to blind him. Kyan was having a great time deflecting his attempts to reach up and throw him off while he stumbled around.
The farmer's friend had found them and was in the middle of pulling Kyan off his shoulders when the gunshot sounded. It was as if someone had hit the pause button. Everything stopped. Kyan found himself with his legs on the shoulders of one guy and held aloft under the arms by another.
Skili stopped playing at the gunshot. She had not seen, or heard, a chemical-powered weapon since her basic training. Once the clean up began she moved to a slow and relaxed piece to try and build on the calm.
Once the farmers had seen fit to put him down and shuffle off, Kyan went back to the bar and regarded Shea with annoyance.
"Why'd ya hafta go an do that?" he asked plaintively. It was just gettin ta be a good scrap so it was!" His annoyance didn't last long though. It never did. "Ah well... prolly for the best." he shrugged casually. "Them farmers is fun sure, but they cannae fight at all. Clumsy pillocks the lot. Anyways... lemme see yer gun! What kind is it?"
Skili obviously leaned a bit closer to hear the answer to the question about the weapon.
Shea eyed the drunks as they went about cleaning up the mess from the ruckus as she crouched to retrieve the spent casing from the floor, setting it on the bar along with a pair of slips of Latinum to pay for the chair. "Sure. It's an A'hylian weapon, M-45 Service Pistol, 11mm in Caliber." She unloaded the weapon, locking the slide back, turning it over to show the solid steel box-like sections. "But it's actually Terran in origin, based on an early 20th Century design by a Human weapon designer named John Moses Browning. Doesn't have the penetration of some options... but it will still hit you like a sledgehammer wielded by a Gorn and put you down."
She fitted the 8-round magazine (now carrying only seven shots) back into place and thumbed the control to let the slide slam back forward. "Some years back I was an Officer in Starfleet Security's HAZARD Teams posted to a planet called Ayenna. Our job there was to help the local nations descended from the survivors of a Terran colony ship that crashed there centuries back. Got issued this since Phasers won't work in their magnetosphere. It's proven reliable; been carrying it ever since."
It was not Aarav, but a young waitress who hurriedly picked up the latinum left on the table. She was quick to hide behind the bar as well, likely to stash it to help replace whatever needed replacing.
Aarav, on the other hand, had dropped the much smaller farmer who had decided to try to size up the bartender. He smiled wide at Shea. "Madam, I believe you've earned yourself free drinks for life for that. Never seen a fight start and stop so fast. You've earned my respect."
"Not the first time I've done this." The Mazaran smiled, holstering the pistol and sliding her mug toward him. "Just keep it filled and I'll be a happy Marshal."
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