"Shut up, you hunk of rusted scrap metal!" The ensign grabbed one of the overturned mugs from the table and hurled it at the droid. It connected with a ringing thud. The droid stumbled back and fell over.
The ensign thrust a finger at Des. "You cheated! Nobody gets sabacc on a sudden demise! Not unless he cheats!"
Des didn't say anything; he didn't even stand up. But his muscles were braced in case the soldier made a move.
The ensign turned back to the droid as it rose shakily to its feet. "You're in on it!" He threw another mug at it, connecting again and dropping the droid a second time. Two of the other soldiers tried to restrain him, but he shook free of their grip. He spun around, waving his arms at the crowd. "You're all in on it! Dirty, Sith-loving scum! You hate the Republic! You hate us. We know you do. We know!"
The miners pushed in closer, grumbling angrily. The ensign's insults weren't far off the mark; there were a lot of bad feelings toward the Republic on Apatros. And if he didn't watch his mouth, somebody was going to show him just how strong those feelings were.
"We give our lives to protect you, but you don't give a wobber! Any chance to humiliate us, you take it!"
His friends had grabbed him again, trying to wrestle him out the door. But there was no way they could get through the crowd now. From the looks on their faces, the soldiers were terrified. With good reason, Des thought. None of them was armed; their blasters were back on their ship. Now they were trapped in the center of a hostile crush of heavily muscled miners who'd been drinking all night. And their friend wouldn't shut up.
"You should get down on your knees and thank us each and every time we land on this ball of bantha sweat you call a planet! But you're too stupid to know how lucky you are to have us on your side! You're nothing but a bunch of filthy, illiterate?"
A lum bottle hurled anonymously from the crowd struck him hard in the side of his head, cutting his words short. He dropped to the floor, dragging his friends down with him. Des stood motionless as a mass of angry miners surged.
The sound of a blaster caused everyone to freeze. Groshik had climbed up onto the top of the bar, his stunner already charging up to fire again. But everybody knew the next shot wouldn't be aimed at the ceiling.
"We're closed," he croaked as loud as his raspy voice could manage. "Everybody get out of my cantina!"
The miners began to back off, and the soldiers stood up warily. The ensign swayed, the cut on his forehead bleeding into his eye.
"You three first," the Neimoidian said to the ensign and the soldiers who supported him. He waved the barrel of his weapon menacingly around the room. "Clear a path. Get them out of here."
Everyone but the soldiers remained frozen. This wasn't the first time Groshik had whipped out the stunner. The BlasTech CS-33 Firespray stun rifle was one of the finest nonlethal crowd-control devices on the market, capable of incapacitating multiple targets with a single shot. More than a few of the miners had felt the brutal force of its wide-beam blast rendering them unconscious. From personal experience Des could attest to the fact that it wasn't a pain anyone was likely to forget.
Once the Republic crew vanished into the night, the rest of the crowd began to move slowly toward the door. Des fell into step with the masses, but as he passed the bar Groshik pointed the blaster right at him.
"Not you. You stay put."
Des didn't move a millimeter until all the others were gone. He wasn't scared; he didn't think Groshik would really fire. Still, he saw no advantage in giving him a reason to.
Only after the last patron had left and closed the door did Groshik lower his arm. He clambered down awkwardly from the bar and set the rifle on the table, then turned to Des.
"I figured it was safer to keep you here with me for a bit," he explained. "Those soldiers were pretty mad. They might be waiting for you on the walk home."
Des smiled. "I didn't figure you were mad at me," he said.
Groshik snorted. "Oh, I'm mad at you. That's why you're going to help me clean up this mess."
Des sighed and shook his head in mock exasperation. "You saw what happened, Groshik. I was just an innocent bystander."
Groshik wasn't in any mood to hear it. "Just start picking up the chairs," he muttered.
With the help of the CardShark, at least it was good for something besides dealing, Des thought, they finished cleaning up in just over an hour. When they were done the droid waddled out on shaky legs, heading toward the maintenance facilities for repairs. Before it left, Des made sure his sabacc winnings had been credited to his account.
Now that it was just the two of them, Groshik motioned Des over to the bar, grabbed a couple of glasses, and took a bottle down from the shelf.
"Cortyg brandy," he said, pouring them each half a glass. "Direct from Kashyyyk. Not the hard stuff the Wookiees drink, though. Milder. Smoother. More tame."
Des took a sip and nearly choked as the fiery liquid burned its way down his throat. "This is tame? I'd hate to see what the Wookiees drink!"
Groshik shrugged. "What do you expect? They're Wookiees."
With his second sip, Des was more careful. He let it roll across his tongue, savoring the rich flavor. "This is good, Groshik. And expensive, I bet. What's the occasion?"
"You had quite a day. I thought you could use it."
Des drained his glass. Groshik filled him up halfway, then corked the bottle and set it back on the shelf.
"I'm worried about you," the Neimoidian rasped. "Worried about what happened in the fight with Gerd."
"He didn't give me much choice."
The Neimodian nodded. "I know, I know. Still. you bit off his thumb. And tonight you nearly started a riot in my bar."
"Hey, I just wanted to play cards," Des protested. "It's not my fault things got out of hand."
"Maybe, maybe not. I saw you tonight. You were goading that soldier, playing him like you play everyone who sits down against you. You push them, twist them, make them dance like puppets on a string. But this time you never let up. Even when you had the advantage, you kept pushing. You wanted him to go off like that."
"Are you saying I planned this whole thing?" Des laughed. "Come on, Groshik. It was the cards that set him off. You know I wasn't cheating, it's just not possible. How could I control what cards were dealt?"
"It was more than the cards, Des," Groshik said, his gravelly voice dropping so low that Des had to lean in close to hear. "You were angry, Des. More angry than I've ever seen you before. I could feel it from all the way across the room, like something in the air. We could all feel it.
"The crowd turned ugly in a hurry, Des. It was like they were feeding off your rage and your hate. You were projecting waves of emotion, a storm of anger and fury. Everyone else just kind of got swept up in it: the crowd, that soldier. everybody. Even me. It was all I could do to aim that first shot from my blaster at the ceiling. Every instinct in my body was telling me to fire it into the crowd. I wanted to take them all down and leave them writhing in pain."