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It was a beautiful day when Asajj Ventress really needed more money. She was walking through the streets of Corellia searching for a job to take on in her fairly new profession as a bounty hunter.
Meanwhile, Gordon Ramsay found out that his onions had been stolen again, and made a hangout poster saying:
“Onion thief! 2000 Credits for anyone who beats him up!” with a picture of a nine years old boy underneath.
In a different alley, the pony rainbow dash and her ally the autistic boogeymonster Twyla were also in need of money. After they met in a bookstore, the two had been financing their love for books together.
They encountered the poster at the same time as Asajj Ventress , the three contract hunters all stopped to read the text written in bold letters.
“Piss off, this is my job,”
Asajj told them and tried to push both monster and pony away. The blue pegasus reacted quickly, using her wings to fly up into the air out of Ventress’ reach. Twyla however fell to the ground, looking up at the taller bountyhunter with a shocked expression.
“He- Hey- look, it says 2000 credits for everyone who beats him up. We can all make money from this.”
“That’s right!” Gordon Ramsay agreed as he just walked by. “Anyone, or anypony, who beats up that little donut will be paid. You just gotta find his address, but I know which school he goes to.”
Twyla raised her eyebrows, this was certainly not the kind of job she’d usually take on. But books were arguably more important, so it seemed she had to jump over her own shadow. “We take the job,” Ventress said - after all, she did put Boba Fett into some box to annoy people before. Being violent towards ten year olds was nothing new for her, especially if they were annoying little boys.
The last member of their newly founded group landed on the ground, agreeing to join the hunt. Rainbow Dash had never followed a child home from school before but there was a first time for everything.
“Tell us the address of that school then,” Ventress said. She never went to school. Dramatic backstory and all.
Gordon Ramsay gave them the address of the school, so that’s where they headed. They were in luck. School was just about to be over for the day, and the bell rang the moment they arrived at the building. There were lots of children and it was loud and if she didn’t have noise cancelling headphones Twyla would have gotten a sensory overload. But luckily she was quite prepared for the mission. She remembered how loud schools were, even though she hasn't been to one in a while.
Han Solo came out of school after a loooong boring day. Now he had to go home. Which was an orphanage where he barely got enough food, and the food they got was pretty bland. It only got better with some onions, but he didn’t have the money to buy onions, so he stole them. He knew that the owner of the restaurant he stole the onions from really hated him, but, well, that made the whole thing a bit more fun. Like a secret mission to make his own food and the food of his friends tastier.
But there was something wrong today… He felt like he was being watched as he started his way to the orphanage. Surely he was imagining things.
He didn’t have to steal onions today, he still had two, so he could head home immediately today. Maybe he was just getting paranoid. Maybe he should steal from the market place tomorrow before stealing from Gordon Ramsey again.
“Hey, look- that's our target!” Rainbow dash whispered, watching the children from a tall treetop that she reached with her flying abilities.
“Let’s follow him quietly ,” Ventress said. On the way to the school Rainbow Dash had been talking waaay too much. She really didn’t know how Twyla could be roommates with the annoying colourful pegasus. She’d probably punch the pony at least twice a day if she had to live with her. But Twyla seemed to tolerate the rambling pretty well, maybe even enjoying that she wasn't the one having to talk. Except for some occasional infodumping about history books she was more of a quiet person, listening to others. Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. She was being quiet. Relatively, at least. And she wasn’t a stupid egghead, compared to Ventress - whose head actually looked like an egg. Seriously. How could someone walk around like that? Wasn’t that embarrassing?
“Whatever you say, egghead,” she hissed as she started to quietly follow Han, hovering over the ground because her hooves might be too loud.
“What did you call me, color vomit?,” Ventress hissed back. She really didn’t like that annoying loud and rude pony. But Twyla was alright. She liked the quiet boogeymonster girl, who seemed to be pretty smart and observant.
“Ey, Twyla, why don’t you ditch the pony after this and work with me instead? How do you manage to live together with that thing?” She asked quietly as she followed as well.
Twyla shook her head slightly, Ventress was arguably too violent for her. And sure, Rainbow Dash wasn't the most peaceful either but her heart was in the right place. Atleast kind off.
“Uh- nope- I'm good."
Rainbow Dash meanwhile snorted, kinda offended. “Rather color vomit than an egg head,” she hissed back. “ And what was that about being quiet?”
Han Solo thought that he heard something behind him and turned around to see what was happening behind him - but there was nothing.
Because the moment he turned Rainbow Dash dashed up into the sky, Twyla blended in with the shadows and Asajj jumped into a bush.
Maybe the food he ate for lunch in school had gone bad, he was imagining things. Or he was just paranoid. Maybe both. He had heard about a scandal on Mandalore where children had been given poisoned tea, maybe something like that was happening here too. Han hoped not, but if it was something similar he hoped that some of the biggest idiots in his class got poisoned so they had to suffer like he did when they tried to beat him up.
They almost got discovered three more times, but finally, they managed to follow Han to his home - he disappeared into a large run down building with the word “Orphanage” written over the door.
“Should we really beat up an orphan? That seems…mean- ,” Twyla asked. Ventress shrugged. “Been there, done that.”
And Rainbow Dash also didn’t really see anything wrong with it. “Being an orphan doesn’t excuse being an egghead,” she said. “Doesn’t mean you’re immune to consequences.” She added, even though her need for money was speaking here rather than her sense of justice.
“We need a plan. One that doesn’t get us near too many other loud and annoying children,” Ventress noted. “Any ideas?”
Twyla was thinking, her boogeymonster abilities seemed helpful for this mission.
“Well- I’m.. used to visiting children in their sleep, usually to take away their nightmares- but, I could lift him out of his bed and through the window. You two can do the rest then.”
Twyla proposed, this way she’d be involved but could skip the actual “beating up” part.
“Oh, maybe you could give him a nightmare, and when he wakes up he realizes his nightmare wasn’t a dream as we start beating him up the moment he awakes,” Ventress suggested. In her opinion that was a great idea.
“Yeah, let’s make sure we get our money… uh… teach that kid a lesson,” Rainbow Dash agreed enthusiastically.
Oh jeez, what had twyla gotten herself into. Not liking the whole “giving children nightmares” thing was the whole reason why she had an estranged relationship with her father- but, this whole mission was against her moral code anyways.
“Uh.. okay. We’ll still have to lift him out the window though, this is an orphanage, children rarely have their own rooms.”
Twyla was relatively trained on the neutral side of the force, so lifting him up and through the window shouldn't be that big of a problem. And Ventress could also help as she was very well trained in the force - mostly the dark side though.
“You got the force? ”the ex-assassin asked. “Don’t deny it, I can feel that you have it. You know how to use it?”
“Yes I’ve trained using the force. I went to some academy for force users. I also met my girlfriend Howleen there.”
Twyla wouldn't miss an opportunity to talk about her girlfriend, even if it didn't really matter. “You got a girlfriend? Neat,” Ventress said. She didn’t care much about love, but she was an ally herself - girlpower all the way or something like that.
“Uh, yeah. I do.”
Twyla responds. Howleen was the Shistavanian girl who stole her heart when they met at her old academy.
“Yeah, it’s really neat, I also have a girlfriend, Applejack. She’s a farmer,” Rainbow Dash chimed in. They had to wait until it was night anyways, might as well spark up a conversation right?
“We still have a few hours. Let’s talk about your girlfriends in some nice cantina or something, I could use a good corellian whiskey,” Ventress threw in. She couldn’t bare Rainbow Dash’s blabbering without a drink any longer.
While Rainbow Dash happily agreed, Twyla really wasn’t in the mood to go to a bar right now- then on the other hand when was she ever in the mood for loud, public spaces.
But Ventress and Rainbow Dash both wanted to go to a cantina, so she had no choice but to tell them to meet her later, she’d visit the library and come at nightfall back to this place so they could meet up and act out their plan.
After everything was said and done Asajj and Rainbow Dash headed to a nice Cantina named “The rotten mushroom” where they actually had great corellian whiskey and ale - no wonder, they were on Corellia after all.
The whole way there Rainbow Dash wouldn’t shut up about her girlfriend, and Ventress started to regret going there with the pony.
While Ventress ordered a whiskey the pony ordered a very large mug of corellian cider. It wasn't as good as Applejacks Cider from sweet apple acres but it was good for what it was.
As they were sitting there, sipping their drinks, Ventress thought about punching Rainbow Dash into the next wall, some corellian guy sat down on their table.
“And what are - hiccs - two beautiful women doing here all alone?” He asked, trying to flirt with them.
Rainbow Dash most definitely wasn't having it. “Go away, egg head, or I’ll press you into cider. These hooves hurt when they hit you, you know?”, she threatened. “Uhuhuh, I love me a feisty woman to ride,” the guy laughed, not taking the threat seriously. What could the colourful pony even do to him? Just let him have some fun.
“Dude. She’s not straight, and she’s not idiot sexual. Piss off,” Ventress said.
Meanwhile, Twyla found a really good book she was reading in a corner. So relaxing!
Back in the cantina Mr. Jerkface glared at Ventress. “She can speak for herself, Baldie, nobody was talking to you!”
That was what pushed Rainbow Dash over the edge as she punched the guy into the face - her hoof was indeed pretty hard and painful, and the guys pulled his blaster. “I’LL SHOOT YOU DEAD!”, he screamed, just to be slapped again, this time from Ventress, and his blaster flew out of his hand and into hers as she used the force to disarm him - she’d do that literally, but she wasn’t in the mood to amputate a guy. That was more a Kenobi thing, and she wanted to be as unsimilar to Kenobi as possible, just to annoy that man.
Mr. Jerkface now screamed in fear and agony as his face was swelling from the punches and ran out without paying.
Rainbow Dash grinned at his escape, proud of how she handled the situation. If there was one thing she was good at it was self-glaze. Asajj seemed pretty unbothered by everything, beating up weird men in bars was like beating up annoying children- She had done it before.
Afterwards no one dared to bother them, so they went back to Asajj sipping wiskey and Rainbow Dash talking about Applejack.
“Of course you’ll be invited to our wedding,” she just said, and Asajj rolled her eyes.
“Please don’t invite me to your wedding.”
Meanwhile Twyla had moved on to another book, this time one about corellian history. This reminded her of how this job was worth it, with the pay she could take those books home with her!
Finally it was getting dark, so Asajj and Rainbow Dash paid and left the cantina to head to the orphanage. On the way there they bought a little holo recorder so they could film beating up that boy as proof that they had finished the job.
When they arrived at the meeting point Twyla was already there. “Alright. It’s night. So… children sleep at night, right?” Asajj asked. Look. Other than beating up Boba Fett she didn’t know much about children.
Indeed they could hear the staff of the orphanage scream at children to “Shut their kriffing mouths and go to sleep”. Very nice. Asajj would talk to children the same way. Maybe the reason she should never be trusted with children, or have some herself.
Twyla looked towards the Window, yes, it seemed like bedtime. “They don't seem like the nicest people- but, I guess I can't really say anything about it considering I took a job to beat up one of the children.” she mumbled, talking more to herself than her allies.
"Once they stop screaming at the brats we can do the plan,” Asajj said. It didn’t take long for everything to go quiet and the lights to go out, so Twyla could act out the plan.
From one moment to the next the purple boogeymonster was nowhere to be seen, leaving nothing behind but her shadow. Getting into the orphanage was no difficult task, as she usually went into children's bedrooms to take their nightmares away. Today.. she'd be using her powers differently. The way her father would. The room Han was sleeping in consisted of 8 beds, bunkbeds, rowed up on the walls of the rather small room. Certainly not a lot of privacy there. Twyla shook off her concerns for the children's living conditions and looked for the young boy. Maybe she’d come back tomorrow and take away the children's nightmares, as a sort of apology. On top of one of the beds he was sleeping, careful not to make a sound she climbed up and got to do her work.
Han fell into a deep sleep quickly, dreaming of evil Gordon Ramsay chasing him with a steak knife because he stole the onions. He was running away from him, screaming that he needed the onions because of how bad the food tasted.
Sensing the child's state Twyla started lifting him out of his bed, careful not to wake the other children up. She didn't want to draw too much attention to what was happening. Down at the window Ventress was waiting. She used the force to catch Solo and lower him to the ground while Rainbow Dash decided to use a very thorny thistle to beat the kid up. That might leave scratches, but if she used her hooves she’d probably break his bones and inner organs and accidentally kill the boy. As a bounty hunter she was no stranger to killing, but she tried to avoid it if possible. And besides, Gordon Ramsay had told them to only beat up the kid a little.
Ventress put Han onto the ground with the force.
“Let's start beating the kid up. Twyla, you throw something and then I give you the holo cam,” the bald woman suggested.
Twyla quietly nodded and started looking through her bag, there, a potato. That would be effective, or at least the most effective thing from her bag. She for sure wouldn't use her precious books. She took a deep breath and threw the potato at the sleeping child, her job was pretty much done here. The purple boogeymonster took a step back to make space for Ventress and Rainbow dash to finish their mission.
The potato hit Han right in the head,and, confused, he opened his sleepy eyes. What in the Galaxy was that? He looked around only to see
Ventress nodded in approval and handed Twyla the holocam, while Rainbow Dash started to beat the kid with the thistle.
“Ouch, what the… YOU'RE NOT GORDON RAMSAY WHY ARE YOU BEATING ME?” Han screamed. He was trained in Judo, but he did not know what to do now.
Ventress unenthusiastically kicked him, and he tried to get up to throw her, but Twyla quickly threw another potato at him so he wouldn't get up. He was not very happy about that. Well, of course he wasn't, he was currently in the process of being beaten up.
“This is nothing personal,” Rainbow Dash cheerily said, continuing to use her thistle to punch down at the orphan.
"Oh? Nothing personal? YOU’RE LITERALLY BEATING ME UP!”, Han yelled. This was not cheering him up one bit.
Twyla, holding the holocam, was looking at the floor a little ashamed of what they were doing. “We are being paid a good bounty for it.” She explained.
“Oh, now - ouch - this makes - ouch - sense!” Han had done weird things for money before. After all, the woman leading the orphanage was a criminal and forced him and the other kids to pickpocket tourists.
“Glad you understand,” Asajj said dryly and kicked him once more. She was almost feeling pity for the kid, stealing onions wasn’t the worst crime ever committed.
Twyla hesitantly raised a hand, maybe this was enough by now. “Maybe… we're done here? look, he's already bleeding from the thistle.” Twyla seemed quite concerned.
“Oh yeah.” Rainbow Dash stopped beating up the boy. “I think this should be enough of a lesson not to steal onions from Gordon Ramsay. Rather steal them from somewhere else,” the pony suggested cheerfully.
Ventress was almost disappointed - it had just started to be fun to kick the boy. “Fine. Yeah. Don’t steal onions. Or do steal onions. I don’t actually care, I just need the money,” she said and stepped back.
Now free Han jumped to his feet. He was bleeding and bruised and very pissed off. So he tried to flip Ventress with judo. Ventress decided to humor him, because, well. She’d be pissed off as well if it was her who got beaten up over onions. So she got flipped.
“You know, if I’d actually want to hurt you badly, you’d be dead.” she noted as she got back onto her feet, touching the lightsaber on her belt menacingly.
The kid took a few steps back. He did not feel the urge to die. Though that would at least spare him from the terrible bland food.
“Okay bye.” Twyla blended in with the shadows, turning almost invisible. They should go back to Gordon Ramsay now to collect their pay.
Rainbow Dash and Ventress also left, they had done their part. And Twyla was very exited for the books she was gonna buy.
Meanwhile, someone had been watching the last part of the beating up and the interaction afterwards and now was stepping towards Han, who was just standing there, bleeding, bruised, very pissed off and pretty confused. “Kid, what was that about? Why were they beating you up?” Quinlan Vos asked, equally as confused as Han.
“Uh… onions?”, Han said. He was tired, okay? He was tired and hurting and just wanted to go back to sleep.
Quinlan Vos pulled a lemon from his pocket and casually started eating it. “Onions. I like onions. But what do they have to do with this?” He asked.
“I stole them,” Han said with a sigh. “Because… The food in that orphanage tastes really bland and with onions it’s at least edible, but Gordon Ramsay doesn’t like it if you steal his onions.”
From wherever he had also taken the lemon he pulled out a net with onions. “There. Take mine. And maybe talk to Gordon Ramsay? I'm sure he will give them to you if you ask nicely.”
“You can do that?!?” Han asked, thankfully taking the onions. “Uh… I don’t have anything I can pay these onions with or anything… That’s why I usually steal them.”
Quinlan shrugged. “No need to pay, kid. I had to get rid of them some way anyways, they were taking up too much space. So long, little one.” And with that, he just walked away, leaving Han alone with scratches all over his skin and a bag of onions in his hands.