|| We Have Secrets || accepting ||

[Malverne]

"Nice ta meetcha, Nic O'Flynn," Taggert said jovially, holding his right hand out for a handshake. He'd noticed the girl put her hand in her pocket, and saw the hand turn into a fist. He chose not to say anything about it, giving Nic a disarming smile instead. His holsters were empty, for once, so he looked mostly harmless. If the girl dove at him with whatever weapon she had, though, Taggert had two knives in his boots.

"So, yer goin' after this Loomy fella," he continued genially, "Where you plannin' on heading? And how do you plan ta get there? Long walk back ta civilisation. You got any form o' transport?"

[miamia609]

Nic shook the hand. Taggert smiled at her, and she gave him a once-over for weapons. She saw none, but she didn't let go of the knife. "Yep, I'm just goin' to look ev'rywhere, someone musta saw the bloke. Honestly, he couldn't 'ave gotten very far undercover." Nic knew the man was trying to charm her, she was mostly immune to it. It happened a lot, unsurprisingly.

"And uh, nah, no transportation, might rent a car or bike. Still got a few hundred euros in my bank account." Nic figured that she would be getting a lot more for the return of the Loomy guy.

[Malverne]

"Good luck with that lass," Taggert said, hiding a smirk, "Turning the entire world over before the Mistress gets her claws in ya sounds like a bang-up plan. Ain'tcha got any...y'know contacts that you can ask? People with ears ta the ground? Or did you use all them up in the first two years?" Taggert knew he should tease Nic, but he couldn't help it. She had made it far too easy.

"Nearest town's a far walk. You wouldn' make it before dawn. I'll give ya a lift though, my speeder's not far. Unless, o' course, you'd rather walk. I'd want my coat back before I left though. It's got sentimental value." Taggert had an easy smile on his face, though he knew that the girl would freeze without the coat. It was just good leverage.

[miamia609]

"I was talkin' about just Ireland. Maybe only Dublin. He prob'ly thinks I forgot 'bout him." Nic was annoyed at the man for making fun of her. She wanted to prove to him that she was a good bounty hunter. "Ain't got no friends, 'cept one, and 'e's prob'ly in jail by now, I haven't come inta town for a while. Don't really know,"

Nic reasoned that this was probably a trap, and she also reasoned that his coat did in fact not have sentimental value. She sighed. "Alright. One ride. To town. That's it,"

[Malverne]

"Course you were. Still, if ye haven' noticed, Ireland's a big place. Can't be easy to turn over all by yersellf. Friends are bloody useful in the bounty hunting business. I'd recommend getting more, especially ones in commerce. They notice things you don't have time for, ye ken?" Taggert was, of course, speaking form experience. In his four years bounty hunting, he'd only caught a handful of his targets without assistance. He shrugged

"But yknow what? Not my business. Whatever works for you, Miss Nic O'Flynn, whatever doesn't get ya killed. Now c'mon, speeder's this way." Taggert gestured with his head, off into the forest, then started leading the way. QUickly enough, he found his lean, barebones hoverbike. Taggert ran his hands over the body lovingly, then swung a leg over. He grabbed the helmet hanging off one of the handles, and tossed it at Nic.

"Put that on," he said, "Don't want you splattering yer brains out all over my coat. Hop on. Nearest town, you said? Alright, hold on tight. The brakes on this thing are kinda old." Taggert grinned and flipped his goggles down over his eyes. He kicked the speeder into life, opened the throttle wide, and sped off.

[miamia609]

"I don' expect it to be easy, and, yes, I was plannin' to get more contacts. I've got some outta town but they're not a lot," Nic retorted. "An' they know about as much as me. Th' Mistress sent all of us for that pris'ner bloke."

Nic followed Taggert in silence. "Thanks, I guess," she said, seeing the hoverbike. It was rather lean. "Eh, wait, one question; why the heck did ya park your bike in the middle of the woods?"

If anything, it'll be yer brains splattered out, thought Nic. She didn't really mean it, it just gave her something to think about. He tossed her a red old-fashioned motorcycle helmet. "This helmet must be, like a thousan' years old," said Nic, incredulous. "Where'd ya get this? The black market?" She put it on and climbed on the back of the speeder.

[Malverne]

"Then you ain't got friends in the smart places," Taggert told Nic over his shoulder, raising his voice to be heard over the speeder's engines, "I got some friends in the transport business, cabbies and the like, secretaries too. I can put in a word with 'em, if you'd like. We've kept away from the Mistress, because we aren't desperate."

Taggert's speeder wove through the Irish forest, the engine roaring like a beast, showing power that it's beaten frame hid. He grinned as he shot through the woods, missing large, thick tree trunks by mere inches.

"I was out here for sentimental purposes," he said, "and I got that helmet at a yard sale when I was five to satisfy my parents. I think I've worn it...twice since then. But it was necessary to get my license, y'know? If I'd gone to the black market, I'd have gotten something much cooler and more effective. But hey, it's still effective. Probably." Taggert hid the grin that was plastered over his face by looking forward, as if concentrating on the landscape.

[miamia609]

Nic groaned quietly, she had motion sickness already. "Nah, don't need 'em. I figure I can hustle a few anyway." Nic wasn't sure if she would hustle anybody, but it sounded like a pretty good idea out loud.

She grimaced and set her jaw as they swerved past the thick trees. She could feel the smug look on the bloke's face.

"Ha. Tha' was so funny I didn' have time to laugh," Nic growled. She knew it sounded childish, but she didn't care. Taggert had his eyes fixed on the landscape ahead of him, but Nic knew he was smiling. "'Ey, you stop smiling."

[Malverne]

"Whatever you say lass," Taggert snickered, "Whatever you say." Despite his words, Taggert's smile didn't disappear. Instead it grew in size, as he swerved hard to avoid a lake, and again as he opened throttle wide open to blaze through a copse of tightly placed trees. He flashed the brakes a breath before he swung through a slalom course at breakneck speeds, then burst out of the forest at the edge of a town. Taggert braked hard, and skidded to a stop a foot away from a massive, very solid looking, iron building.

"Did I mention that holding on was a good idea?" Taggert asked, pushing the goggles back onto his forehead and letting the speeder's engine rumble to a halt.

[miamia609]

Nic grunted as they swerved by a large pond and throttled toward a small forest of packed trees. He slammed the brakes as they reached a huge, shiny metal building. Nic clutched her stomach and replied, "You may've mentioned it," she started muttering impolite things between her teeth.

The spedder rumbled to a halt. She pushed off the helmet and threw it at Taggert. "Ugh, just take it," "Where is this place, anyway?" she added in a groan.

[Malverne]

Taggert grinned at Nic's obvious discomfort and easily caught the helmet that was thrown rather hard at his head.

"No need to be so aggressive," he said, "You're here, aren't ya? In one piece, and when it's still relatively warm out? Yer welcome. Come on, let's head inside. It's freezing out." Taggert locked the speeder down, then walked around to the other side of the building with his hands in his pockets. On the other side of the building was a town. A small one, made of dark iron and dead quiet, but it was a town nonetheless. The only building that had lights on was the pub down the road.

"This place is right in the middle of everywhere," Taggert said as he typed in the code to the building, and the front door opened with a pneumatic hiss. "While being in the middle of nowhere. Ten minutes north is the biggest lighttrain station in Northern Ireland, and twenty minutes east is a port, and half an hour southwest is the only place in Ireland you can catch a hovercraft." Taggert jogged up the stairs, opened up another door, and flicked a light on.

"It's also where I live." Taggert's apartment was quite plain. Blank gunmetal grey walls, minimal furniture (a desk with chair, a couch, a trunk, and a fridge were the only pieces in the main room), and nothing special to speak of. The only really...strange thing in the room was the small pile of guns on the trunk.

"You're welcome to stay here till morning," Taggert said, stepping aside to let Nic in, "You won't find an open inn at this hour."

[miamia609]

Nic was a little annoyed at Taggert for not getting hit in the head. Instead he caught the helmet with ease.

"Relatively. Thanks, I guess," she replied, a bit hesitantly. She pulled out her cham-foil and wrapped it around her neck as a makeshift scarf as she followed Taggert. They came to a pub and Nic's dreary eyesight couldn't make out the neon lettering on the side but she figured it said something like this; Best Food In Town! in cursive. "I'm pretty sure this'll be the only food in town," Nic covered her mouth, but too late. She had got to stop thinking out loud. She looked at Taggert to see if he had heard or not. After all, she was pretty sure that he had been here before, but he either didn't hear or didn't care.

"Well, you're amazing at makin' sense," said Nic, a bit sarcastically maybe, but philosophy preachers made her feel weird about stuff. Like one time, this bloke in the park had started preaching something about the world being taken over and God help us, and some guards had to take him away. But the one thing she remembered was that both of the guards had purple eyes. The were pretty and deadly at the same time, and Nic shuddered just thinking about them. "So if I go southeast I could take a hovercraft?"

They stepped into a plain, rather threadbare apartment. It reminded Nic of her own home, in Limerick. Even the furniture was similar.

Nic contemplated this offer and decided that it was in her best interest to stay, despite the pile of unconcealed weaponry in the main room.

[Malverne]

"It's a small town," Tagger said, "Not many restaurants, but there's a grocers within walking distance. Although that place's pie is bloody fantastic. If you get the chance, I'd recommend the blueberry crumble." Taggert dropped his bag next to the trunk, then removed the knives from his boots and laid those on top of the small pile of weapons. He glanced up at Nic, who wasn't denying his offer, and assumed she'd be staying.

"You can sleep on the couch," he said, "I'll getcha some blankets and a pillow. Sorry, don't have another bed. Not many visitors. But aye, the hovercraft station's to the southeast. Half an hour away on a good speeder. It'll take you to any country you've got papers to get into. The port'll take you Britain, and mainland Europe. The train station'll getcha around Ireland. I'd recommend heading there, talking to some of the attendants, janitors, conductors...workers, y'know? Ask 'em if they've seen your Loomy." Taggert grinned wryly. "They can have pretty good memories if your pocket's deep enough.

[miamia609]

"Blueberry crumble. Gotcha." Nic said. Maybe she would stop by there on her way out, as she was rather hungry. Taggert unloaded himself, setting down his bag and pulling glinting knives from his tall boots. She followed his example, putting down her knife on a small iron table cautiously.

"Thanks, it's still a lot better than my more recent sleepin' arrangements," she still remembered the time when she had to sleep on a bench, wrapped in her thin sheet of cham-foil. "Is there anywhere in town where I can rent a speeder or somethin'?" "I'm not gonna get very far with nothin',"

She knew this from personal experience. "That's the truth,"

[Malverne]

"There're two places in town," Taggert replied, sitting down heavily at the desk, "The one up the block's a federal place, so expensive but the vehicles are well maintained and all. Then there's the one on the south side, Joe's. Dirt cheap, but the speeders have a tendency to break down and, um, on occasion, y'know, spontaneously, erm...combust, although those incidents really could have been total accidents and not Joe's fault at all. And every person that got...combusted and survived, Joe bought 'em coffee and breakfast once they were out of the hospital. Really nice guy." Taggert loosened his tie, modestly embarrassed that his neighbor's business was locally famous for exploding speeders. He kicked his desk, and a holoscreen popped into view.

"If yer hungry, there's some basic nutrition packs in the fridge," Taggert said, pulling up files on the holoscreen, "TV remote's probably under the couch cushions or something." Taggert pulled his goggles and headphones from his head and plugged them into the small terminal underneath the desk, and started importing the data he'd collected. He spent a few minutes reorganizing data and recording findings and the like, then spun back around to face Nic, smiling.

"Anything else you need, or do ya feel like chatting?"