"Haha...Hah, cuddly rat....That's a good one." Chuckled Jimmy as he gradually regained his composure "Heh, yeah I think those are best saved for the teenage years. If I'm not in the slammer by then...Heh, cuddly rat behind bars."
Wiping tears of laughter from his eyes he glanced down at the collection of numbers and star charts "Oh yeah, you were sayin' something about a couple of jobs?"
Hearing him talk so negatively, she arced an eyebrow. "You seem to take the prospect pretty lightly," she stated, somewhat confused as to why he was so relaxed about this. "You're talking about prison, right? I'm not really up to speed when it comes to slang and all that." She shifted a little where she sat, with her handbag still on her lap, and looked over to the bar, curious as to when their drinks would arrive. At least the smoke had by now become bearable, though Maren figured that it wasn't actually a good thing, all things considered. "As for jobs, yeah, I know a few people who might need a few things. Friend of mine asked for replacement optronics for his busted Bustard, which got caught in the gravitational well of Omega-41's neutron star, and the radiation grilled most of it. Bit of titanium as well." She shrugged, giving him a look. "But all that's hardly what you specialize in, right? So tell me: What kind of weapons are we talking about, and do they include heavy battleship ordnance?" she asked him amicably.
"Yeah" he replied absentmindedly scratching his chin "not really, prison already took away ten years and hard labour ain't exactly good for your health, you know?" He shifted uncomfortably in his seat at the thought of it. "Still, better than the alternative" he mimed putting a gun to his head and grinned. "Speakin' of, I don't usually run the big stuff, far too heavily regulated but I might be able to sort somethin' out. Any ideas what your friend might be lookin' for?"
Maren had to wince slightly as he mimed the gun blowing his brains out. She wasn't too much a fan of gore at all. "Eh, yeah, it really is better than that," she agreed with an awkward smile, before clearing her throat and thinking for a moment, tapping the clasp of her handbag with a fingernail. "Well, if we're talking big guns, my man was surprisingly liberal with what he seemed willing to take. Anything big enough to be mounted on, let's say, your generic battleship would suffice, though we are mostly talking primary and secondary turrets." Reaching into her handbag, Maren withdrew a PDA and offered it to Jimmy. On it, he would find several guncam images of turrets mounted on Bismarck class battleships, which had evidently been taken while passing the battleship they had been mounted on. Additionally, there were detailed descriptions of the RBT-61h and RBT-4c battleship armaments. "Something along these lines, though really: Anything in that calibre is okay."
Jimmy scrutinised the pad "Hmm, military grade, Hummels and Zwilings. Thats some major firepower." He commented in a very business-like tone before handing back the pad. "Now usually I don't ask questions but the info you showed me is way too detailed for someone who just wants something similar, no one goes to that amount of trouble just for an example." he said, gesturing towards the pad wth his thumb.
It had been clear from the start to Maren that something like this would likely cause questions and thus she had prepared something she deemed credible. "A rather rich family on Malta," she began, interrupting herself when a tux-wearing waiter brought her the drink that Pimakhova had ordered for her. "I could give you a name, but do you really want to know?" With a shrug, she watched the waiter offer Jimmy his drink before taking a sip of her own as well, finding it absolutely disgusting, but she couldn't decline it since that would be rude. "Could just be a proxy family as well. Their society is really weird like that."
Jimmy took his drink with a nod and placed it on the table. "Rich Maltese huh? Funny how people think credits are the only thing on my mind" he said leaning back into his chair and resting his leg on his opposite knee "I've been burnt way too many times to keep thinkin' like that and I doubt any of the Maltese would be so obvious, they're way too controlling for that kinda thing. Plus, why would they want Rheinland guns when they already make their own?"
He took a small sip from his drink and placed it back down again.
"It just doesn't add up and my gut's telling me those deliveries to Freeport 5 have somethin' to do with all this. Rhienland ship panels, Rhienland guns it can't be a coincidence..."
To that, Maren just shrugged, regretting it instantly as her drink almost spilled and sullied her clothes. "Rich people tend to be eccentric. I'm only telling you what I know myself, and to be fair I don't want to know more. I merely talk to people and what I care for is that I get money." She put the PDA back into her handbag and looked at Jimmy again, the drink still in hands. "Work from Rheinland is rather good in quality, people say. We call this Wertarbeit. I don't know, but I'm quite sure such weaponry and hull panels would sell quite well anywhere on the black market, since the advertising is pretty much done by itself."
"Yeah, maybe..." he said looking suspiciously at Maren "but if you didn't want to know more about the job, why would you be carting around a pad with all that stuff on when you could just ask for the guns by name or class? A lot of legwork has gone into all this, close fly-by shots, detailed info, Its the the kinda work I'd do if I was planning to rob a joint all thats missing is a patrol routine."
"I mean I can understand if you don't wanna say anythin' but I gotta keep my bases covered" Jimmy said gesturing to himself. "If this all comes back to bite me in the ass I'll be shipped off to Vierlande and you don't come back from that lockup."
She held up a finger to interrupt him when he spoke about the PDA. "I didn't ask for it. I don't even care who this is for. The PDA was given to me like that. I'm afraid I can't really help with with patrol routes, though. I doubt anyone really has that information. It's more a question of whether you have the means of obtaining something of that calibre." Taking another sip of her drink, she suppressed a shudder as she pointed at Jimmy briefly. "We'd probably both get slapped in case something bites you; don't forget that. We're both just the middle men slash women."