video • un: el rey

[shabby]

[ The video opens on a man's face, a little too close up for a few seconds. Then he pulls the arm with the communicator back, lengthening the shot and showing vegetation behind him. He's in the atrium, currently sitting on a low hanging tree branch. ]

Hello, alien-abducted internet peoples.

[ He says it cheerfully, with a smile and a wave. For a man who comes from a world without shit like this, he's unperturbed. Possibly because he thinks it's a drug-induced hallucination. ]

How are you today? [ He gestures off to the side. ] This is crazy, no? Outer space and shit. It's like a movie.

[ The image shakes a little as he starts digging through his pants pocket. Eventually, he pulls out a joint and, remembering that he's in the middle of talking to people, asks; ]

Hey, does anybody have a lighter?

Comments

[taggingwomprats]

[ Well that probably means that they don't have hyperdrive. Talk about backwards. And that's coming from the space equivalent of a backwater yokel! ]

An astronaut? I wouldn't call myself that... A pilot, sure. But not really an astronaut.

[ He clicks his tongue. ]

Fighter pilot, I guess. But I do a lot more than that.

[shabby]

A fighter pilot in space?

[ He's never heard of such a thing. ]

What do you fight in space? [ He perks up a little. ] Aliens?

[taggingwomprats]

Mostly the Empire. Sometimes aliens, I guess, but most of them are on our side. Empire's not exactly fond of non-humans...

[ Sorry to disappoint, Vaas. ]

It's a bit of a long story.

[shabby]

That sounds like a movie. Or the Romans. Or a movie about the Romans.

[ Vaas likes movies. And now he's off on a tangent. ]

Do you like movies?

[taggingwomprats]

Sure, I like holovids as much as the next guy.

[ Half a moment. There's a thoughtful 'huh' from Luke on the other hand. ]

What're Romans?

[shabby]

[ That is a very good question and probably one that ought to be answered by someone who actually went to a credible school. But Vaas tries his best. ]

They're like some ancient civilization of warrior people. They ruled maybe half of the world once. Then they died or got the plague or something. I don't know. They had an empire though. It was called the Roman Empire.

[ A beat. ]

They weren't very creative.

[taggingwomprats]

[ Hey, Luke grew up as a space hick, he can deal with it. ]

That's pretty neat, actually. And it's still more creative than just "the Galactic Empire" or "the Empire". Imperials aren't exactly overflowing with creativity...

[shabby]

Is that where you come from? The Galactic Empire?

[ It's not aliens like E.T. or those things on that horror movie Vaas saw once, but it's better than nothing. ]

[taggingwomprats]

Sort of? They claimed the planet I grew up on, but they never really showed up until right before I left.

[ It's weird. No one really wants Tatooine, it's just sort of there. Or at least that's how Luke sees it. ]

I don't really consider myself an Imperial subject, if that's what you mean.

[shabby]

There were Imperialists and Colonialists that came to my island too. Nobody liked them. [ A beat. ] Mostly, we killed them.

[ This is a perfectly reasonable response to that kind of behavior on Rook. ]

Did you kill your Imperials?

[taggingwomprats]

Uh. Well, I've killed some of them.

[ It's not something he usually likes to talk about or think about too much, but he is fighting a war. People die. And he sort of fired the shot that blew up a space station with millions of people on it. ]

We're in the middle of a rebellion, so it's unavoidable.