Return

"Oh this looks familiar," Sol pointed to where they had their battle. Natalie laughed looking around for signs of the battle, but the place looked clean. The blaster bolt scorch marks were nowhere to be seen. 

"Someone cleaned up the mess, I wonder who it could be?" Sol tried to scratch his head but was reminded of his helmet. 

"There are several groups who could have cleaned it up and had a reason to do so," Natalie sped up a little but was worried someone was watching them. She didn't see anyone.

"Hey, Sol, is anyone watching us? Are there any cameras or anything?" Natalie was nervous.

"There are but I masked us from them. Don't touch anything and keep walking, they'll never notice we walked through here. As far as biological observers, there aren't any within my helmet's range," Sol replied. 

Natalie seemed relieved, "Good, your tech is better than anyone else on the planet, probably. Let's go to the bank first."

"Sure, we have an account at 'Alright Bank.' That sounds pretty sketchy," Sol puzzled over the information.

"I was doubtful, but maybe Gar knows what he's doing. We don't have any identification yet, larger banks will require that from us. Small sketchy banks like this one won't care about ID."

"Good to know, there's a location around the corner," Sol and Natalie crossed the street and walked around the corner to the bank. 

"Is there a way you can scramble our features or something?" Natalie asked.

"I can change our features a little on the recording, but there's nothing I can do about the humans who see us," Sol explained.

"Do it. A little protection is better than none. I don't know how you're going to get away with being in armor," Natalie said.

"Oh, I nearly forgot," In the blink of an eye, Sol's helmet disappeared and an unfamiliar person was looking at her.

"What...do you have an extra?"

"Sorry, it only comes with the helmet. A special feature for trainee Mandalorians," the stranger's face said in a hoarse voice. Even his voice was different. 

The poncho from his last adventure into town covered most of Sol's body.

"If you could do that with your helmet, why didn't you use that when we met?" Natalie asked. 

"I didn't have the feature back then, I needed to purchase the function and upload it," Sol answered. 

Natalie walked in followed by Sol. She went directly to the counter. The bank was tiny. Not only was this a bank but a convenience store. There were two chairs with a Hispanic couple sitting in them. 

"Hi, I'm here to pick up some ATM cards for me and my friends," Natalie said innocently. 

The man behind the bulletproof glass asked for her name and walked back a little past mountains of filing cabinets and store products piled into mountains. A few minutes later, he returned with the cards and passed them to Natalie without any questions.

"Thank you," she left with Sol.

"That was easier and faster than I expected," Sol said.

"Are you kidding? We're VIP customers for that place. There's five hundred thousand dollars in our checking accounts," Natalie explained.

"Where's the rest of the money, didn't we make a billion and a half dollars?" Sol asked confused.

"Gar's not an idiot, he deposited the rest into legitimate accounts. He transferred just enough money for us to accomplish our mission, and a little more. We need to get a truck next," Natalie told Sol. Sol didn't seem to care and did as Natalie said.

Purchasing the truck was easy, they found a truck with a for sale sign. Sol looked it over, although he wasn't gifted in vehicles and gadgetry like Gar, he had a basic understanding of low-level technology from a galactic civilization. He could start a company of his own and make lots of money if he wanted to. 

"It runs better than I expected," Sol laughed. 

"You know, watching you like this, it's hard to get used to this face and voice," Natalie said.

"I know it's not as handsome as my real face, but we're on a mission. Tell you what, after we're done, I'll take you on a date and let you see my real face. What do you think?" Sol smiled.

"I think your helmet's better," Natalie laughed. 

"Ouch, you got me in that muscle in my chest, what's it called?" Sol asked.

"Your heart?" Natalie responded.

"No, it can't be my heart," Sol said.

"Why not?" Natalie was even more puzzled.

"Because you stole my heart the first time I saw you," Sol laughed and after catching up to the joke, Natalie laughed as well. 

"Fine, you can take me on a date, but only because I've never been on one before. It has nothing to do with you being smooth or handsome," Natalie said looking put out.

"Oh, so you think I'm both smooth and handsome. Not bad, I knew you were a girl who knew quality when she saw it," was feeling pretty good. 

"Alright, Mr. Handsome, let's find Gar's perfect apartment base," Natalie acted board, but she was amused on the inside. Sol didn't know how she was feeling, he was still patting his back about getting a date with Natalie. 

After making a few calls, Natalie and Sol went to look at a couple of properties. Eventually, they found the one they were looking for. It was perfect. The place was an old junkyard. The owner wanted out of the business and was selling the building and junk for the low price of 450k.

The junkyard was in the back. The cars were piled up and there were even neatly arranged bins for different types of parts arranged according to the part type, make, and the year of the vehicle. There was a car crusher, a magnetic crane, and a forklift. 

"Perfect," Sol kept saying to Natalie. With keys in hand, they went through the junkyard and gathered everything from V6's list. Next, they loaded it into the truck and put a tarp over it. 

"Alright, give me a minute to get ready for our date," Sol said.

Natalie looked at herself, "Maybe I need to get ready too. I saw a clothing store, I know all you have are those nondescript leisure clothes." Natalie took the truck keys and left, Sol took a shower and put on his nondescript leisure clothes.

She wasn't gone for long and tossed him a bag of clothes. He went into one of the trashed offices he and Gar would turn into a room eventually. It wasn't long before Natalie appeared in a summer dress with a white undershirt and sandals.

"What do you think?" Natalie did a little spin.

Sol swallowed, "You clean up nice."

"Hey that's what the girl says to the guy, and you clean up nice." She winked at him.

"I mean, you look really pretty," Sol smiled.

"Ha ha, it's cute how bad you are at this, shall we?" Natalie extended her hand.

"Of course," Sol regained his bearings walking out of the garage, and helped Natalie into the truck. He couldn't help whistling a little as he walked around the truck. He took a deep breath and got into the truck. Thanks for the date," he said to Natalie. 

"Thanks for asking," she said. 

They left the garage for their date, even though Sol had no idea where to go. Just like Natalie, it was his first date, ever.