Empire State of Mind

[Hiro Protagonist]

Hiro had been scanning the crowd for a minute or two when he saw a pair of troopers exit, with Madotsuki in tow. Oh my. He came out of open scan mode and pulled his goggles up onto his head. "Officers, hello. You appear to have my roommate there. She didn't do anything, did she?" He shot a quick glance at Madotsuki that would would be hard to read- maybe a mix of exasperation and dawning concern.


"She's unregistered, Mr Protagonist. She caused an accident upon her entry and managed to slip away before we could get a reading on her."

The hacker turned to the dreamer and waggled his finger. "Oh man. Girl, you do not want to mess with the registration unit. You're just lucky I happen to know Overseer Jentral."
He turned again to the stormtroopers and gave a friendly shrug. "I'm authorized, so if you guys are willing to cut the kid a break, I'll register her myself. All the info, no shortcuts, alright?"

The two troopers seemed to consider it for a minute, and Hiro heard the subsonic whine of their helmet communications come through on his scanner. After a moment, one of them nodded and released Madotsuki's hand. "Jentral says hello, sir. And also to not stick your neck out for unregistered Primes next time. Have a good day; and we'll expect her pertinent information to be on the EPD servers by evening. Roger?"

The street samurai nodded and gestured to the kid as they walked away. Once they got far enough away from the troopers, he pulled his goggles on again and looked at her, the mirrored lenses reflected her own defiant face. "Listen, M. You can't be walking around Coruscant as an unregistered Prime. That is a really easy way to get tagged by the troopers and thrown out, or thrown in jail. Too many Primes just come in here and start causing trouble." He breathed a sigh and resumed walking. "I'm not trying to be an asshole. But you seem like you might be from a world that's a bit more hospitable than mine. I know how bad things can get. So, if you've got any other little secrets, like say you've got a bounty in the Dunes or something, just let me know. I covered for you this time, but if you wanna stay here, you gotta play by their rules."

He lifted his goggles again and headed towards an escalator. Looking back brightly, he called back to Madotsuki. "Hey, let's put this behind us. Ever been to an arcade? Let's go blow some games up." Leading her through the mall, he patted his pockets for his credcard and fished it out. Eventually, they reached the mall's arcade, a bleeping, blooping expanse of flashing colors, lights, and excited noise that was helpfully labeled as "Blitz N' Chips". 

The hacker swiped his credcard at a change terminal and was rewarded with a handful of shiny golden tokens. He handed about half the pile to the pink sweatered girl and swept his arms out dramatically. "I can't tell you how many hours I burned at places like these. You ever played real arcade games before, M? Let's go give a few of them a whirl!" They spent a while searching for a machine, especially since Madotsuki looked quite confused and overwhelmed, like she'd never been in an arcade before.