[fic] Starship of Fools

[Tysyacha]

(Author's Note: For my more serious take on "Breaking the Rules", check out my "Vremya" series, but for now I present you and all of Javyar's Cantina with a Riesenfest (laughter-fest) entitled 'Starship of Fools'! )

 

"There she is, Padawans! The Bismuth Beam. Isn't she marvelous?" Master Zhar Lestin gestured proudly toward the Jedi Order's latest stealth fighter, as sleek as a kath hound's fur and as fast as the onset of a Hutt's intestinal difficulties! Indeed, she was the grandest vessel that Padawans Danae, Krulin, Antah, and Gruuntzi (technically not a Padawan, being a reformed Gamorrean guard who now worked for the Jedi Enclave) had ever seen. They looked at the ship, then at each other, and--!

 

Master Zhar furrowed his slick Twi-lek eyebrow. "Don't even think about it," he said. "I can tell what all of you are pondering through the Force. This vessel is meant for covert operations, not freewheeling joyrides. If any of you even attempt what I strongly suspect you are going to, then you will face severe punishment. That ought to be enough to dissuade you, since you are Jedi and not merely members of the common crowd here on Dantooine. Good day, Padawans, and may the Force be with you." Master Zhar gave his students a quick and dismissive nod, leaving them alone with the Bismuth Beam. They all stared, stared some more, and then...

 

"Phfft!" snorted Gruuntzi. "Phfft, phfft, phfft," he said, doing an "armpit solo."

 

"I agree," smiled Krulin, at least as much as a Rodian could smile. "Does Master Zhar not trust us? I find that strange."

 

Padawan Danae rolled her eyes and laughed ruefully at her three comrades. "I don't," she said. "This is a very important ship, you know, and I know that all of us were thinking of taking it for the exact same kind of joyride he mentioned. Let's not break the rules, friends--I hate cleaning refreshers."

 

"Come on!" laughed Padawan Antah, who was the best "crack pilot" out of all the lower-ranking Jedi in the Order. "I've been dying to take this thing for a spin ever since I saw it about sixty seconds ago. Are we men--and aliens," she added quickly, nodding towards Krulin and Gruuntzi--"or are we gizka? If we don't take this chance, we'll regret it for the rest of our lives!"

 

"If we take this chance, we'll regret it for the rest of our lives," said Danae.

 

Padawan Antah grinned. "Last one in is a pile of bantha dung!" she cried, and the four of them scrambled aboard the Bismuth Beam as fast as their scrawny little legs (and not-so-scrawny-little legs in Gruuntzi's case) could carry them. Once aboard, they all fastened their safety harnesses with the hurried glee of small children, and then Padawan Antah counted down. With a blazing whooosshh of fire, oxygen, and Force energy, the Bismuth Beam launched into the air with the speed of a podracer!

 

"Oh, Force!" cried Padawan Krulin, holding his scaly hands tightly over his quivering mouth. "Could you please not do that, Padawan Antah? I just ate not too long ago." Padawan Antah, either not hearing Krulin or not wanting to hear him, winked and turned the fighter's stealth systems on. She then proceeded to do approximately ten consecutive barrel rolls in the air over the lush and rolling hills of Dantooine. Padawan Krulin also had something "lush and rolling" at the moment, too--his sensitive stomach, which proceeded to relieve itself of its mushy green insectoid contents.

 

"Ewww!" cried Padawan Antah, revolted and delighted all at once. "Can't you learn to wait an hour, at least, before going on a starship after eating?" She howled with laughter, and Padawan Krulin groaned with pain. Danae, being the kindest and most compassionate one out of the unruly bunch, sent waves of stability and healing through the Force. Krulin nodded, relieved.

 

"Now that that particular mess is all over," Padawan Antah said even though it was all over the ship--"where's our first stop?"

 

Gruuntzi suggested the nearest cantina, which everyone thought was a great idea except for Krulin, who was in the mood for neither food nor liquor at the moment. Nevertheless, he was promptly outvoted by Antah and Gruuntzi. Danae still had her reservations, warning everyone that "Jedi do not fall prey to the excesses of drunkenness," but after a retort from Padawan Antah that she, Danae, didn't have to get drunk, Danae relented, feeling a bit peckish at the moment despite the green stuff she still "pecked" at on her tunic. They selected Kunterbunter's, the wildest cantina on all of Dantooine!

 

"That place?" asked Padawan Danae, raising her own eyebrow in much the same manner as Master Zhar had, but again, she was promptly outvoted. The Force works in mysterious ways, she thought to herself, and perhaps this is my chance to show my friends the error of their ways! That plan was quickly shoved by the wayside once the three Jedi Padawans and one Jedi Enclave guard heard the grand prize for Kunterbunter's Klugging Kontest: one thousand credits for the one who could drink the most liquor! Gruuntzi beat his chest, grunting with virile pride, and proceeded to climb the bar counter. The other three politely asked for shots of juma juice, wanting to let their Gamorrean friend "give it all he had"! The crowd chanted:

 

"Klug! Klug! Klug! Klug! Klug!" Gruuntzi, thinking this was child's play, polished off at least fifty consecutive mugs of Kunterbunter's hardest distilled spirits on top of disgusting shots of liqueur, ale and juma juice combined! When he had finished, the Gamorrean guard let out the biggest, loudest belch that anyone at the cantina had ever heard. The crowd, after they had finished holding their noses when the smell of Gamorrean liquor breath dissipated, cheered and hoisted Gruuntzi up into the air on their biggest barstool (it took almost the whole crowd to balance him up there, too!)

 

Needless to say, Gruuntzi got the thousand credits, and now it was time for the next event of the evening, sponsored by Padawan Krulin in higher spirits. His favorite hobby (when he was allowed to pursue a hobby at the Enclave) was drawing--specifically naughty sketches and caricatures lampooning everyone and everything on Dantooine. Thus, he bought some cans of red lacquer from a cheap-sundries store along with four massive paintbrushes.

 

"It's time to make this town BEAUTIFUL!", he cried, raising his can and brush high. "Paint away, my Jedi comrades! Let's let Dantooine know how great we are!" Energized by the laughter and liquor (after all, they'd all had some at Kunterbunter's, not just Gruuntzi), Antah, Gruuntzi himself, Krulin, and Danae smiled and proceeded to do just that--paint. They painted brick walls, cracked walls, sidewalks, fences, trees, bushes, windows-- anything that they possibly could, decorating it with slogans of "JEDI RULE!" and "SITH STINK!" When they were finished, they threw their empty cans of lacquer into some more bushes, splattering them, with the brushes following behind. Then they laughed and laughed until they feared their sides would split!

 

Now it was Padawan Antah's turn to have some fun, at Danae's expense:

 

"Hey!" Antah cried, pointing at a space slug in the distance surrounded by several flunkies. "I dare you to dance for him."

 

Danae couldn't believe it. "Krogga the Hutt?" She almost fainted!

 

"I'll give you five hundred credits to do it," said Antah, winking. "I've been saving up for a luxury trip to Ahto City on Manaan, but watching this will be even better than watching the Selkath try to get a tan! Come on, Danae."

 

"Oh, all right," grumbled the stalwart Padawan and approached Krogga.

 

"No, no, no!" cried Antah, waving up some flimsy garment that looked like it was made out of flimsi writing material. "Not in your Jedi robe--this!" Danae looked like she was about ready to kill her fellow Padawan, but then the expression on her face shifted abruptly--from fury to wry humor. Danae ducked behind the nearest wall of an abandoned building, changed clothes, and emerged to the stares of Krogga the Hutt's flunkies, who pointed eagerly. Emboldened (and enliquored), Padawan Danae threw herself into a whirling, twirling dance, making sure to show off all the features of her human female anatomy for Krogga the Hutt to see. When she was done, she found a small crowd had gathered, and not just the flunkies belonging to the "space slug". Credits came flying Danae's way, and she found she'd earned close to the five hundred that Antah had promised her for fulfilling the dare. Danae grinned. "Pay up," she told Antah, and Antah groaned and grimaced. The latter Padawan had expected Danae to dance, but not at all like that!

 

"Let's go, guys," grumbled Antah. "We don't want to make Master Zhar any more suspicious than he already is!" Nodding, the other three followed her toward the Bismuth Beam and climbed aboard, trying to clean all the insect vomit off of their seats first. Dejected, the four ejected themselves right out into the middle of the Jedi Enclave--and Master Zhar's stare!

 

Blah-blah I should kick you all out of the Jedi Order blah-blah. Blah, blah decency, blah, blah honor, blah, blah you've all completely disgraced yourselves. Then blah, blah, what? Second chance? "Katorzhnie raboty," said Master Zhar to the four.

 

"Katorzhnie raboty?" they all cried. "What the kriff is tha-a-aaat?"

 

Gruuntzi had to give up his thousand credits that he'd won as the winner of Kunterbunter's Klugging Kontest to the Jedi Order as a charitable donation. Not only that, but he also had to spend quite a lot of his unpaid time going to local educational facilities on Dantooine and teaching the young children there about the dangers and repercussions of Klugging as much as he had.

 

Krulin had to take up gallons upon gallons of industrial-strength cleaning solvent and scrub all the red lacquer off of all the places he and his three friends had defiled with it, since Krulin himself was the originator of that particular brilliant idea. It took him forty-two days to get it all off! Not only that, but he also had to go to the educational facilities with Gruuntzi and tell the little children about the public nuisance and disgrace graffiti presented.

 

Danae, the daring dancer, had to surrender the thousand credits she'd earned from Krogga the Hutt and the gathering crowd that had come to watch her perform. Another charitable donation! Her job was to launder all the Jedi garments of the Enclave for as long as it took Krulin to scour off all the graffiti in town. For forty-two days, she washed Jedi unmentionables! She also went to the educational facilities and talked to hormone-ridden teenagers about modesty, abstinence, chastity, and the need for all three.

 

As for Antah: she did not get to take that luxury trip to Ahto City on Manaan. Instead, during her vacation time, she was set to washing and polishing not only the vessels of the Jedi Order, but the Dantooine and Coruscanti military as well. Master Zhar thought that her "unorthodox" piloting of the Bismuth Beam deserved remediation as well, so she was sent to the beginning of piloting class and made to take her training over! Playing with fake pilot controls wasn't exactly Antah's idea of a good time.

 

Katorzhnie raboty. Hard labor--that's what you get for breaking rules!

[The_Catto]

As much as I don't like the after effects of drinking WAY too much, and predominately yelling at random people on my TV screen - if you had an awesome time, then the consequences for whatever actions taking, she be considered as light hearted as possible. As impossible that may seem at the time.

 

Awesome story Tysy. I've always liked your fics, as I have said on multiple occasions, and again .. this one was still up there. Great work. Funny as hell

[Endorenna]

Hey, all I can say is--

 

:lol::lol::lol::lol:

[Bee Hoon]

...as fast as the onset of a Hutt's intestinal difficulties!

 

That was cute and silly! An enjoyable read!

[LordOfTheFish]

Very enjoyable...

[Rev7]

Indeed, very enjoyable! You have my vote. Good job Tysy!

[Tysyacha]

Thanks for all the encouragement!

[Litofsky]

Very cute, Tysy. 50 consecutive mugs of ale? Wouldn't that kill a normal person- alien or not?

[LordOfTheFish]

Your welcome, you deserve it!

[machievelli]

reviewed