Snippet #2413598

Loud shouts and jeers carried through the outskirts of the rugged and lawless settlement on the surface of Blackrock. Brawls and scraps in the streets weren't entirely uncommon on the backwater moon, but there was an added weight of cruelty and menace today coupled with the occasional bout of laughter.

"What is it?" someone asked.

"Beats the shit out of me," a sneering man named Kane replied. "We found it adrift just outside of Ang'und."

Kane was well known around these parts for piracy, smuggling, and worse. His cargo of choice was the illegal trafficking of kidnapped women and children for prostitution and other manners of slave labor to the outer planets beyond of the scrutiny of the law.

"D'yah think it came from Sol?" another asked.

"It sure as hell is ugly enough to be," someone else remarked.

"How did it get out here?"

“Do you think there’s more of them out there?”

"How am I supposed to know?" Kane retorted with a snort. "There hasn't been anyone from Sol in these parts for longer'n I've been alive."

The target of the men's conversation was a Wolven, a creature native to the Sol system, and to the planet Terra in particular. The heavily furred humanoid was sprawled in the dusty street with its hands bound by a thick length of twine. Its features were unmistakably wolfish in nature with an elongated snout, canine ears and furred tail. It was clothed in a uniform of some nature foreign to the natives, and an empty pistol holster was strapped to its thigh. The lupine being shook its head and tried to rise, only for Kane to drive a boot into the side of its head to send it sprawling back into the dirt once more.

"Hey mutt, where did you come from?" one of the jeering men asked.

When no reply came Kane kicked the captive over onto his back and pressed a foot to his chest. He leaned down with a sneer. "Hey, he's talking to you."

"Maybe it's too dumb to talk," someone suggested. "It looks like a fucking dog.”

"I could use a guard dog. I'll give you thirty-five drachmali for it," a spectator offered.

"Buy a dog. That things pelt will sell for more than it's worth alive. I'll give you forty for it," another called out.

Soon shouts and offers of coin were being thrown about as the scene grew all the more heated.