Upgrading Personal Capabilities [D1 MA]

[Tosath Nazora]

He waved to the food, and took a bite himself before talking again.

"I wouldn't say they chose captivity. I may not have tried to fight them off, since I saw it as my way out of servitude, but the others on the ship fired on the Imperial forces that boarded us. But when you're outmatched in equipment, numbers and experience there isn't much that can be done. They went down fighting, but the Imperials weren't trying to kill us, using the stun setting. They wanted to question us about pirate activity in the sector. They even stunned me out even though I was just sitting there and not resisting. When I came to in a cell I knew I'd just gone from one captor to another. But some sympathetic KSF officers investigated my circumstances and I was eventually set free. Sometimes all you have is luck and the understanding of others. You can't stand alone in this galaxy for long. Those pirates knew it, the Imperials know it, and I've learned it too."

He ate a bit more.

[Varina Ordo]

"Oh they did fight," Varina said, nodding in approval. She looked to her food and kept munching with a modicum of manners. After all, she wasn't raised like a barbarian, she just acted like one often.

"Why depend on luck when you can depend on more, uh, predictable things?"

[Tosath Nazora]

"Well, for one, the pirates never gave me a weapon. Not that I was likely to be any good with it or even want to use it, but even if I could or would they still weren't giving one to a captive," he says with a shrug. "I wish I could say that things were fair and all worked out in the end, but that's just not the case. When you've seen as much as I have you realize the truth. Some folks die for no reason, some folks get rich on the backs of others, some folks struggle all their lives to eke out a basic living. I don't depend on luck, but sometimes it's the only thing that can change your circumstances for better or worse. The few times I tried to resist the pirates, to sneak off when we docked or send a distress call, I ended up with a bloody face or a broken limb that I needed to nurse back to health. I was outnumbered 10 to 1 after all. Being a doctor didn't give me the skills I needed to get out of it, but it gave me the means to endure until things changed."

The doctor's manners were more practiced. He had lived with a bunch of pretentious jerks for the better part of his life after all. Manners were important to him. He didn't seem in a rush to eat a lot, but was happy to let her eat until she filled up. He had food at home if he felt peckish later.

[Varina Ordo]

Despite her quick eating, it also seemed like she was quick to fill up. She stopped and poked her tummy before pushing away the plate. "So what you're saying is that it's a bit of a combination? Sometimes luck happens, sometimes you gotta do things yourself?"

[Tosath Nazora]

"And sometimes you have to make your own luck. Lay the foundations for a plan in advance. The galaxy is a chaotic place," he says with a nod. "You can't foresee everything that's going to happen and you just have to plan for success as best you can. The more stable a position you put yourself in, the less things will go wrong, but you also have fewer chances to have things pleasantly surprise you. Living on the edge can be exciting, but the ups and downs are more extreme from day to day. But when you don't have to worry about such things, you can make more consistent long term plans."

[Varina Ordo]

"Seems like a good idea to make a steady base and then seek excitement from there." Varina rocked in her seat, trying to figure out what that meant for her. She could always find excitement by exploding things but how could she get steady?

Especially if she was rocking all over the place.

[Tosath Nazora]

"Well, finding a place can be tough. But it's easier with friends or a regular job. Maybe you might look into finding out if any of the local vendors in your neighborhood could use someone. Perhaps see if any bars are looking for someone that looks tough to be a bouncer?" he asks with a smirk.

He takes a few more bites.

[Varina Ordo]

"Would they let someone who can't drink be a bouncer?" she asked honestly. She then shook her head. "That seems kind of boring though. And I'm not going to be some vendor's, like, package-carrying person."

[Tosath Nazora]

"Think about it like this... if you do that boring work you get a steady supply of credits to pay for a place to stay. If you can find some friends and they all do that, you can get a really nice hideout and a place to sleep and regular fresh food. Then, when you're not doing all that boring work, you can plan salvage or protection jobs with those friends to get much bigger scores. Even pirates and mercenaries have to do boring stuff like maintenance on their vehicles and equipment."

[Varina Ordo]

"Can't I just get people like you to do that stuff? Like a mechanic or um... Accountable person." She blinked and thought on that. "Accountant!"

[Tosath Nazora]

"You can count on friends to help you out, but a professional of that sort usually expects to be paid. Usually up front. Would you trust someone that you paid going into a fight more than you would a friend that is fighting with you for the same goal? Usually a crew or group are united for a purpose and support and trust each other. Not everyone out there is like me and volunteers their time and expertise. I've found a way to make a living at it and I happen to enjoy using my skills to help others. But that's a far more common mindset among doctors. We usually get into medicine because we like helping folks. What about the girl from the other day? Why not work with her? You two seemed to get along well enough. If that was the first time you met, that's a good sign that you'd probably work together well and be able to understand each other."

[Varina Ordo]

"What about, like, locking them up and making them do it when you get back?" Varina was, of course, talking about slavery, even if she didn't quite think of it that way.

"Her? Yeah, she's alright. Was the first time we ever, uh, asked someone for protection money together."

[Tosath Nazora]

"That's not a very good way to get folks to help you. It will only get you so far," he says, shaking his head. "That's what the pirates that captured me did. Do you know what happened when the Imperials took us? I told them everything they needed to know to keep those pirates locked up for a very long time. Because I wasn't their friend and they gave me no reason to be their friend or show any loyalty. Their sentences were probably tripled thanks to my testimony, not to mention that when I was confirmed to be found a captive their prison terms were extended even further for kidnapping."

The doctor seems unhappy with the suggestion. "You don't keep a person locked up, steal their freedom, force them to work without pay in unpleasant conditions. That's a great way to make enemies. Slavery is a terrible practice."