Fortaleza Base, a miserable lump of rock floating in the black of Humboldt. What the dilapidated old station lacked in comfort and beauty, it more than made up for with it's cheap drinks and even cheaper bar girls. Half the stations docking arms and airlocks were barely that, yet there was always an open space for the random Rogue to hold up for the night and a more than capable crew of indentured dock hands ready to repair any damage their vessels may have developed.

One such Rogue, a man in his late 30's had just finished with the standard docking sequence, even though it took an extra ten minutes of his sitting in his fighters cockpit, listening to the dock master yelling at the men just outside his ship. A miscommunication between the terse old man and the crew down below had resulted in one of the docking arms nearly snapping clean off when attempting to prematurely anchor the large fighter to the deck. Climbing down the short 3 step ladder to the extended catwalk, he kindly places his hand on the young man's shoulder who was responsible for the mishap.

"You new to this gig?" he asks with a strangely kind smile, something not often given to a deck hand on such bases.

"I-I'm sorry sir.. I... it was an accident!" he stammers, stepping back, frightened of what the Rogue may do to him.

"Hey, I'm not gunna hurt ya. Just, be careful next time and listen to what the old man tells ya. If I were someone else, you wouldn't be standing there, probably on the floor with a round through your kneecap." While his tone was calm and kind, the look in his eyes told the boy he was dead serious.

"Yes sir.. I. I'm sorry.. I..." The boy was most definitely new and the Rogue knew it now more than ever.

"It's fine, kid, just be more careful, alright? Now do me a favor and give her under carriage a good workup, I bounced a few stones off her on the way in and think I heard somethin fall off." Turning to look at the old fighter, the man couldn't help but smile. "She's saved my hide more than a few times, kid.. one day if you earn your way out of dock work, you may find yourself flying one like her."

"Y-yes sir!" the young kid responds, turning to a somewhat older man who'd just walked up, smiling before climbing down the catwalk ladder to get a look at the underside of the Large fighter.

---

A few minutes later, the man finds himself standing in the Fortaleza bar doorway, after a moments scan of the near empty room, he moves up to the bar, tapping the counter top to get the bartenders attention.

"Can I get a scotch on the rocks?" he asks with a small glimmer of hope as he knew it was a long shot that the bar had any such stock.

"All we got is liberty ale, friend... and maybe some homemade stuff somewhere in the back."

He couldn't tell, but he swore he'd met this bartender before.... somewhere. "Eh... a Lib Ale will be fine. I've had home brew before on Buffalo and.. damn.... It took 3 days to get that swill out of my system."

"Right..." is all he replies, before taking a bottle, pouring half in a less than clean glass and sliding it up to him. "10 credits."

Taking a pre-loaded 100 credit chip out from his jacket, he holds it up, not handing it over yet. "There will be a lovely young woman coming in sometime soon, whatever she wants, you take from this, got it?" He says sternly as he'd done such things in the past on other bases and ended up having the money disappear. "If I hear that she's paid for her own drinks, then you and I will have words."

"Yeah yeah." he replies, snatching the chip from his hand before moving to the end of the bar, continuing on his haphazard attempt at cleaning the counter.

Taking his drink, the man rolls his eyes as he moves off to a table next to a rather large window looking out into space as he waited. He actually found the view relatively nice given that the Padua bar had only view screens showing images of planet side vistas.

~