Star Wars: Galaxy in Crisis

[rzantarra]

Andio followed the clone and watched as the conversation between the Jedi and the trooper ensued. He watched with a patient, calculating eye, trying to figure out exactly if he could believe the trooper. He knew the clone was probably programmed with a sense of self preservation in the absence of contravening orders. Hell, she could even be a double agent sent in by the republic itself.
He didn’t trust her, that was for certain, but he needed her for the time being. If she did know about… then the trooper was the only one who could show him exactly what had happened. And if the trooper had lied, Andio would die to ensure that that murdering scum was dead along with him.
He watched passively, not making a move to interrupt as the Jedi almost killed the trooper, another Jedi intervening on the trooper’s behalf, and finally the first Jedi stalking off. He could feel the power emanating from the Jedi’s in this ship, it almost sickened him. He had always been jealous of the god like powers that those creatures had been bestowed. The only reason he had any dealings with them at all was the fact that they had his sister. But then again, that didn’t matter now…
"I'll need a set of tools to remove the unit identifier in my Helmet. As well as the secondary transponder. If one was placed on this ship it will need to be removed. It will be in the communications array." Andio heard the clone say as he stood there watching, feeling the Jedi breeze past him as if he wasn’t even there.

Andio thought for a minute then spoke up. “I have the tools to work on your helmet; if you want you can use them once you show me where the possibility of this second transponder may be.” He said, speaking for the first time in what seemed like hours.

 

[Varshanka]

116611

"Thank you.." Trailing off 116611 left the rest blank, as he hadn't yet supplied the trooper with a name, it was rather difficult to understand how to refer to him. "You'd lead the way to your tools.."

 

[rzantarra]

Andio motioned with hish and down the corridor towards sickbay, registering the fact that for the first time he had heard the clone reply with any gratitude. Strange, he didnt' think that diplomacy was in their programing.
Andio watched as the clone marched infront of him, the pair rounding the corner and entering into the small sickbay where Andio reached forward and grabbed a set of his tools he had left on the counter. He turned and pulled out several of them, offering them to the Clone.
"These should work on any secondary tracking device, and..." He pulled out a small set "These should work to get the tracking device out of your helmet..."

 

[Lunaramblings]

Chen walks casually to the Wee Quay. He looks him over suspiciously.

Chen wonders to himself if the Wee Quay is able to understand Shyriiwook. Wookies possess the ability to learn the languages of others, but they lack the proper vocal apparatus.

Chen leans on the wall beside the Wee Quay.

"So, rather unlucky that you happened to be looking at this ship just as all hell broke loose. I mean, wow. What are the chances there?" Chen howls as he watches the response from the Wee Quay. He doesn't trust this one. Not that he trusts the others. Well accept the Jedi. Chen has first hand seen what the Jedi can do. The honor. The strength. Secretly, Chen wishes he could be one of them.


Shi meanwhile catches up to Anakin and puts his large hairy hand on his shoulder.

"Anakin. You must regain control. You are not the first Jedi to feel loss. To feel anger. But one must not indulge in such thought. One must rise above. In my many years at the academy and in the galaxy, I have seen much. I have done much. Many times I have done things I wish I had not. The Force can be a cruel taskmaster. Demanding strength of mind and body. Yet denying us that which we crave." Shi sighs deeply, a sigh that sounds more like a roar. "Come, young Master Skywalker... we have a long road left to wander, and it does one little good to wander in darkness. Allow this grizzly old Wook to shed you some light"

Shi turns and sits at a small table in an adjoining room.

 

[LuckyVic]

Anakin Skywalker

Shi meanwhile catches up to Anakin and puts his large hairy hand on his shoulder.

"Anakin. You must regain control. You are not the first Jedi to feel loss. To feel anger. But one must not indulge in such thought. One must rise above. In my many years at the academy and in the galaxy, I have seen much. I have done much. Many times I have done things I wish I had not. The Force can be a cruel taskmaster. Demanding strength of mind and body. Yet denying us that which we crave." Shi sighs deeply, a sigh that sounds more like a roar. "Come, young Master Skywalker... we have a long road left to wander, and it does one little good to wander in darkness. Allow this grizzly old Wook to shed you some light"

Shi turns and sits at a small table in an adjoining room.

Anakin couldn't help but react to Shi's calling him Master. Just before Master WIndu had been killed he also called him Master. But he felt like anything but a Jedi Master. He was so full of doubt and worry. He had made such of a mess of things. He needed to tell someone, before it continued to eat away at him. He got up and walked over to the other room and sat across from Master Shi. "Master there are somethings I feel I need to tell you." He then went on to tell him about Padme. How he had fallen in love with her, how he broke the code and secretly married her. How she was now carrying his child, the visions he had of her dying in child birth, how the Chancellor had somehow learned this and was probably even now hunting Padme down. He told Shi everything.

 

[Lunaramblings]

Shiriiak listened to the story unfold. He heard of the loss, the love, the hate. He listened long and hard. When Anakin finished he smiled gently.

"Anakin... You are a good man. A strong man. But none the less, you are but a man. You can not pretend that you do not feel the pull of your emotions. You would not be the first Jedi to love. Or the first to bear children. These things are not a crime. Not in the strictest sense I suppose. Truthfully, Master Skywalker, I would say that it would have been a greater transgression to ignore the feelings that you have. The Force is like a living thing. It has wants and needs of its own. The Jedi Code tells us that there is no emotion. That we must master our emotions and, in not so many ways, that we must ignore them. I would tell you this Master Skywalker, Do not let your emotions rule you. o not allow your emotions to control your actions or allow them to sway you. You must accept them. There is little difference between emotion and instinct. Trust yourself. Look into yourself. Find the truth." Shiriiak takes a deep breath and looks deeply into Anakin's eyes. "Anakin, it is no sin to feel the pull of the Dark Side. Any Jedi who tells me he has never felt this, I call a liar. I have had a brush with the Dark Side myself. I nearly fell. I was much like you when I was a youngling and a padawan. Even when I was a knight. I was brash. Headstrong. I traveled the galaxy attempting to find strength. I learned many forms of combat. I became gifted in the arts of war. However, as I pursued this path, I began to lose myself. I became obsessed. Then something happened. I awoke one day, it was as if I had never been awake before. I saw the world in a new light. I returned to the temple and studied with Master Yoda. I pursued knowledge and ignored the training I had taken in the arts of death and mayhem. Then, my former Master was struck down. I went on a mission of revenge. I set out with the firm goal of killing every last man responsible. I would have. I could have. But then I felt it. I felt The Force. Stronger than I remembered it ever being. I allowed the Force to sweep through me. To fill the void in my heart to lift my being beyond what I had become. My rage, my hatred, they seeped away. I turned my mission of vengeance into a mission of justice. I brought the men responsible to justice. Then I returned to my books, my scrolls, my holocrons. Anakin, I have hidden in my library since many of the members of the Council were padawans. The time to hide is no more for me. I have seen things. Dark times. Terrible things to come. However, I will embrace the path the Force has set before me. You have the choice Anakin, allow the Fear, the Hate, the Worry, to poison you... or use it as a fuel. Turn the emotions into purpose. I will assist you in anyway I can. I will help you find Padme. If that be the will of The Force. Meditate on this my friend, The Force brought you and Padme together. The Force had a plan. And now through the Force you have found Love and Life. Can the creation of Life in the wake of so much death and destruction truly be a bad thing? I believe that you and Padme have a greater destiny."

Shi smiles warmly and places one extremely large hand upon Anakin's shoulder. "Trust The Force. Trust yourself."

 

[LuckyVic]

Anakin nodded as he took in Shi's words. He almost couldn't believe that a Jedi as respected as Shi felt this way. Anakin had broken the code, but Shi wasn't condeming him. Could he have been wrong all these years, should he have told the Jedi from the start. Of that he still wasn't sure. But one thing he did know was that it felt as if a huge weight had been lifted off of his shoulders. "Thank you." he told him.

That was the moment that Artoo and 3PO came into the room and were making quite a fuss. Anakin raised his hands to the droids and gave them a calm down motion. "What's going on?" he asked them

3PO went on and explained to him how they had been monitoring the news networks. The Chancellor had gathered a special session of the Senate. In it he had declared the Jedi traitors, and said they had tried to assinate him so they could take control of the galaxy. And finally how he had desolved the Republic and by executive order formed the first Galactic Empire, with him as the Emperor supposedly in order to create a safe and secure society.

Anakin couldn't believe his ears. "So the Sith have won?!" or at least they thought they had. "Guess we'll just have to change that."

 

[Screech]

Ro'ak watches as the Wookie almost circled him. Kind of like sizing up a mean, he thaught. Then it let out a series of roars and growls, obviouslyit's native language. Wookie, unfortunatly, was one of the many, many languages that Ro'ak had not learned. He had no need to, after all, what could they possably offer in trade that the Galactic Republic could not?

He took a rough guess at what was trying to be said, failed to find any words he had ever heard, and shrugged. "I have no idea what you mean..."

 

[ChasNicollette]

Savannah had one sun. And while it could sometimes be cruel, and drought season came once every year upon the plains, at least one could retreat to the treelands for shade.

Tatooine had two suns. And even when the shade was longest, it provided little respite.

What bothered Yllyanah most, however, was not the heat, though the heat was stifling and murderous and sadistic. What bothered Yllyanah most was the smell.

The smell of sweat and salt and desperation. Because only the desperate would choose to live on such a world, and them who did not choose to live here were desperate to leave.

The smell of a sordid underbelly in an unclean underground.

And the smell...

...of the beast called Jabba.

The first day they had brought her before him, she had still been suffering from the stun weaponry applied to her liberally by the slavers. He'd had them drag her up to his very throne, that he might examine her in detail. She'd tried, then, incoherent as she was, to spit in his eye, but she had been too dehydrated.

The second day, as he was comparing her to the rest of his harem, trying to decided if he would give this new piece of flesh a place of honour at his side, he'd had his guards do the same thing. But rather than smell him up close again, rather than have her nostrils full of his rotten stench, she'd clawed half the face off of one of his Gamorreans with a hindpaw and broken a tusk off of another with her forepaws...

Jabba, spirits save her, had decided he liked her nerve. And had then proceeded to do his level best to break that nerve.

The metal grating was cold beneath her knees.

She could smell something else down there, through the carvings and the patterns. Something big, something moving, something carnivorous.

Something that smelled, perhaps, potentially, even worse than The Hutt.

But she could not lift her head. She could hardly move at all.

The choke collar was tight around her neck, and she could scarcely breathe. The chain was sufficiently heavy as to drag her down almost to the deckplates. Her arms were shackled behind her, and her paws were contained in custom-forged gauntlets, forced into fist-shape so that if she tried to unsheathe her claws, she would damage only herself.

Around her face was a muzzle, similarly custom-designed. Jabba's inventors of torture-devices were speedy, and creative, and the need for such a device had become readily apparent when she had managed to bite out the right eye of still another Gamorrean.

(That had been the third day.)

This was day nine.

She was very very angry. But she was also growing very very tired.

She wondered now if her parents had been right, that her mysterious knacks and abilities had indeed been blaspheming the spirits. Witchcraft unbecoming even the daughter of a shaman. This was a punishing Hell of the spirits' conjuring.

But the crime for which she was now enslaved was defiance.

And her defiance was not yet entirely expended.

She knelt upon the metal of Jabba's audience chamber floor, upon the grating that dug into the moons-pale fur of her knees, her hair bedgraggled around her face, her tail, normally so proud and expressive, limp upon the floor behind her.

But still she seethed, still she hissed, still she growled.

Yllyanah remained yet unbroken.

Struggling against the worlds-weight of her bonds, Yllyanah managed to lift her head and gaze off to one side.

There was an alcove there, and it was decorated. Prizes, perhaps, or icons of significance to whatever religion of sand and filth held sway over the dubious soul of this place.

But in all things, there were spirits. Defiant or not, there was a part of Yllyanah that still somehow believed that. Dead or alive, any material thing had some variety of spirit contained within it. Even if that spirit was just an echo of a living thing...

There might be a spirit in the severed animal heads that adorned that wall.

But between the animal heads was a slab of blackish ore, and that ore was shaped like something that resembled a man. And in that shape, in that statue, in that exquisitely-carved ore...

This must be a statue of a god? A sleeping god?

She glimpsed a spirit within this, though it was like trying to hold a running stream with her forepaws... elusive and shimmering and gone again...

She decided, as her defiant brain refused to break, that this sleeping god was perhaps in the same predicament as she. That he had done some grievous wrong by the spirits and had been imprisoned here in this place.

But his spirit had not broken. (She could almost hear it, like a voice in the back of her brain.)

And so long as his spirit had not broken, this sleeping god, neither would hers break.

And not only that...

If ever you get out of here, she decided, gazing hard with pale pale eyes at the sleeping ore-god, you will take me with you.

I promise you the same.

I will be free. And if I am free before you, I will not leave you behind.

I swear it.

In this Hellish place, all we sinners have is each other.

We will neither of us be broken.

If you can wait, so can I.

I can wait.

We will neither of us be broken.

 

[ZRT]

Of all the misbegotten chunks of rock for an undercity dweller to land on, he'd thrown the dart and come up with a desert world with two karkin' suns. Even the sunblock had only ameliorated his misery, and he was still peeling from his initial exposure to the elevated UV levels of Tatooine.

All the same, there wasn't any Republic presence to speak of on Tatooine. Make that Imperial presence, since the 'Chancellor' had just come out in the open with his ambitions anyway.

Didn't make a difference to Sev. What did matter was work, and the best-paying offer was from some Hutt named Jabba. He hated the karking Hutts, but he at least knew the language and the protocols involved in working for them. There was room and board, and the extra-cheerful prospect of random execution for real or perceived failings, along with the inevitable massive load of politics among the labor as they competed for favor and temporary scraps of safety.

Fortunately, his work kept him down in the garage and away from the court. He'd seen a glimpse of it, and that had been all he needed to know that it was a typically debauched Hutt affair that would only be improved by rolling a thermal detonator through the door.

"Sev! You got that dampener running again?" the foreman shouted. He was a fat toad of a Bothan, the foreman, who actually knew next to nothing about mechanics. Obnoxious and grating as he was, Sev saw some serious use in a boss with purchasing power who didn't know what he was paying for.

Yeah, this had the marks of an okay job.

 

[Jedi_Khan]

Aagh Koth at Work

Location: Eriadu
Time: Approximately 90 years before the Battle of Naboo

Aagh sighed as he tiredly sat down in the lounge area of his custom built ship, the Baato. It had been a long day of wandering around Eriadu City, bribing city officials and low-life scum alike, in search of information, disguised as a seedy Bothan.

Aagh was here on Eriadu for a reason: there was a criminal syndicate slowly taking over the planet and it needed to be stopped. Aagh had been here for nearly three galactic months already, doing the same thing as he had done today. It was proving a difficult task to locate and identify the ring leader of this group that called itself The Rebuilders, but Aagh was close, he could feel it. The only problem was, this ring leader had lots of layers of protection, mostly of the corrupt governmental type.

Aagh was surprised at how much control The Rebuilders had on Eriadu. In fact, they almost had complete control of the government; only a few top officials remained that opposed this organization. He had already made contact with these officials and allied himself with them with the intention of having them help him destroy The Rebuilders.

Five days later, and things were looking a little tough for Aagh. He finally had a name and location for the ring leader of The Rebuilders, one Mack “The Architect” Jorgon residing at Eriadu’s local four-star hotel. Unfortunately, Aagh only had one ally left in the government with any sort of pull, the other two having been killed just a day ago and already replaced with Rebuilder puppets.

This one ally left alive was the Senior Judicial Minister for the planet, and he had enough clot to accomplish what needed to be done to rid the planet of the Rebuilders. Provided, of course, that he lived long enough; with the two other officials dead, the minister was left rather vulnerable, and removing him would seal the deal for the Rebuilders taking control. Fortunately for Aagh, the minister was a stalwart believer in justice, untouchable as they said in the underworld, meaning that the only way to deal with him was to kill him.

So, in order to protect the minister, Aagh had him in hiding aboard his ship, where his two HK-60 assassin droids, Slicer and Dicer, could keep an eye on him, making the Baato the safest place on Eriadu. Unfortunately, assassin droids just so happened to be highly illegal in the Republic, which made telling the Judicial Minister what they were in truth rather undesirable. Instead, Aagh had told him that they were protocol/security droids. Aagh had to quickly amend that when Dicer had expressed a desire to kill something, right in front of the minister, with the fact that they had a little quirk that made them want to kill things.

The next day, it was the human crime lord Jodo Galak who paid a visit to Mack “The Architect” Jorgon.

 

[ZRT]

The sound of a breaking bone is quite distinctive, a wet snap that, once heard, is never forgotten. Given that he was in a great deal of generalized pain, it was the sound rather than feeling that told him another one of his ribs had broken as the Crystal Viper tightened its hold around his body.

Sithspit, but he hated karking Hutts. Bothans too, for that matter. In fact, at the present moment where his demise seemed entirely likely, he was pretty comfortable with acknowledging that he hated the entire galaxy.

***

"So, yeah," Ch'Thak said. Sev's foreman was sweating profusely, the perspiration matting his fur even more than normal from the omnipresent heat. "The, uh, illustrious Jabba wanted to open the trap door and drop... some guy in the pit. And, uh, the, you know, doors only opened about a half meter. By the time the guards crammed the poor being through the opening and he fell into the pit, he was pretty much dead anyway. So, you know, Jabba's kind of, uh, mad."

"So I need to enter through the pit, climb up and work on a door that could drop open on my head at any moment."

"Yes!" Ch'Thak said, brightening at Sev's obvious understanding and willingness to take on the job. "The beast master thinks he's gotten all of the Crystal Vipers out of the pit."

"Thinks?" Sev asked, glowering.

"They, uh, might have, you know, bred a bit. But one or two shouldn't be bad." Ch'thak stammered.

"They're two to three meters long and can crush a being to death in under a minute," Sev said. "That's why Jabba likes them." They could also fit a humanoid head in their mouths, another selling point for the sadistic Hutt.

"So Jabba wants you to fix this, you know, right now," Ch'Thak said, forging ahead. "I know you can get this done." He started to clap Sev on the shoulder, then thought the better of it as he turned and virtually fled from the mechanic's bay. Sev shook his head, jaw working as he pulled off his welding helmet. He looked down at the jagged metal where he'd made the incision on the sail barge and dropped the torch alongside it. Well, either he'd be back to finish it up, or some other poor karker would get to clean up the mess.

Karkin' Bothans.

***

At least he'd gotten them to turn the lights off in the pit. He figured any creature that lived where being transparent was an advantage probably relied on eyesight.

Or at the least, not being able to see each other would level the field a bit. Sev was used to working in the dark.

So, apparently, were Crystal Vipers. The first one, the one that had gotten around his ankle, had been a small one, less than a meter long. He'd brained it with the pressure tubing he'd hauled along. That might well have offended what he was currently assuming to be its mother, who was busy throttling the life out of him.

He'd heard that in times that death approached, some beings saw their lives play out before them. That wasn't happening here. No, what he saw was Ch'Thak's ponderous jowls jiggling, a hateful image of the foreman alternating between simpering to overlords and abusing underlings. His hand scrabbled for the pressure tubing as the world started to blacken around the edges, focusing his vision on a narrow tunnel with the foreman's face at the end.

"Kark you," he rasped, swinging the tubing at the face. It went right through and impacted on his side, cracking off the body of the viper. The tension slacked slightly and Sev swung again, slamming the tubing down where the viper constricted across his chest. The impact vibrated his entire body as he drew his arm back, hammering again and again at the viper. The snake hissed loudly, head lurching up as it bared its fangs. He wasn't even aiming for it, but the tubing klonked right into the side of the viper's head, sending it reeling. It loosened its grip enough for him to free his other arm, and he seized it right under the jaws. Ropes of foul-smelling saliva drooled down from its mouth onto his hand as he braced against it and brought the tubing down again.

If there was another snake in the pit, he knew he was pretty much good as dinner at this point. He'd broken his hand while smashing the snake's skull in, and he didn't have enough fight in him to take a Jawa right now, let alone another one of Jabba's killer beasts. Fortunately, it seemed the beastmaster had managed to get the rest of them out, letting him make the slow, painful climb up the wall to the trap mechanism.

It was pretty obvious what had gone wrong, and why. Nobody in their right mind was actually going to go climbing about servicing the mechanism, and who knew when the last time the trap had been properly lubricated.

As he worked, he heard the hateful laughter bellowing over his head. "Ho ho ho!"

Kark all the damned Hutts in the galaxy.

 

[Jedi_Khan]

Location: Nar Shaddaa
Time: Approximately one month after the mission on Eriadu, 90 years before the Battle of Naboo

Aagh Koth wandered around the many crime-ridden levels of Nar Shaddaa, on the lookout for a new target. But most of the talk he heard was about the incident on Eriadu; apparently, the legendary and mysterious crime lord Jodo Galak had struck again, this time purging the planet Eriadu of the criminal syndicate formerly known as The Rebuilders. Speculation abounded on why Jodo would destroy The Rebuilders, most of them wrong, with only a few being right, but for the wrong reasons.

Aagh’s mission on Eriadu to eradicate The Rebuilders had gone rather smoothly -- once Jodo Galak had gotten inside -- with their ring leader, Mack “The Architect” Jorgon, and several of his closest friends meeting decidedly destructive ends. It was found that several blocks of demolition grade plastic explosives had been placed under their beds, which led to rather spectacular explosions for each of them. One of Aagh’s HK droids had commented that they had at least gone out with a bang.

While “Jodo” had taken care of the syndicate itself in relative secrecy, the Senior Judicial Minister had done a systematic and very thorough sweep of the government, removing corrupt officials who had been taking bribes from a recently “disbanded” criminal syndicate which had been seeking to gain control of the government, so the public had been told.

Unfortunately, the sudden voids that this sweep had left in the government had caused a minor collapse in both the political and economic systems of the planet, forcing the Republic to step in and place some family with the surname of Tarkin in control.

While the ensuing economic and political collapse had been unseen and unfortunate, Aagh was certain that it was bound to happen sooner or later, and seeing as how it had happen sooner, the collapse hadn’t been nearly as bad as it could have been. So, Aagh, content that his mission had been a success, moved on to Nar Shaddaa.

Now if he could only find someone who wasn’t discussing Eriadu…

 

[LuckyVic]

Anakin Skywalker

Anakin had stayed quiet for several minutes as he thought things through. Which Obi-wan would say was a rarity. His first impulse was to fight, however he had people on this ship that were innocent. His duty as a Jedi was to protect them. "Artoo, we sustained some damage. Shields are down and we have some shorted out power couplings. See what you can do about fixing them. Focus on the power couplings first, we need to get to Tatooine. The new Emperor knows me well enough that I won't go there, so we'll use that against him. Can stay there and make repairs and then start searching for any other Jedi that surived this." With that the little droid turned and went about to plug himself into the Envoy's computer so he could find out what exactly was wrong. C-3PO, the astromech's counter part was also about to turn in order to assist his little companion. "Not you Threepio. I have another job for you. Gather the others, including that clone. I need to tell them everything we know."

"Right away Master Anakin." Threepio answered and then went to carry out his creator's order.

 

[ZRT]

Sev reminded himself to be patient. He was making decent cred even with the various deducts for room and board, and he wasn't even having to kick back to Ch'Thak anymore. Plus he could still talk the idiot Bothan into ordering just about anything he wanted (within reason), so he was accumulating a handy little pile of spare parts and other items that might come in handy sooner or later.

On the downside, he'd caught Jabba's eye and was now the mechanic of choice for issues in the throne room.

Hey Jabba, there's a power flux in the number three drive for the barge, and that's why the karking thing nosed straight in and you all died. Woulda fixed it, but the damn holoprojector was being balky and -I- was the only karking guy around who you trusted to fix it. SORRY.

That wouldn't be an entirely bad result, excepting that Sev had a feeling he'd be on the damned barge when it happened.

As he made his way out of the throne room, he passed by the carbonite slab hanging on the wall. He didn't knew who the being was or what he'd done to make Jabba mad, but he personally hoped it was something spectacular and expensive. "G'night Raff," he said, slapping the slab on the stomach. 'Raff' was the name he'd made up for the poor bastard after he got tired of calling him 'Carbonite Boy'. All things considered, Raff was the best friend he had in the Hutt's palace.

Anyway, he had set with the local deathstick dealer to move some product among the various junkies in Jabba's entourage, so it was time to get on with his night job.

 

[Varshanka]

116611 and Andio

Stepping into the sickbay 116611 followed the Human. Stopping only when he got his tools and turned around. Pulling the helmet off the trooper held it out. "Would you like to do it? Or shall I?"

"You're the expert." Andio said, watching the Trooper, suspicious of any move it made.

Taking the tools 116611 turned and set the helmet on a nearby counter. Rolling it up the trooper looked inside as it fished out various instruments. Reaching in it fiddled with something for a moment then pulled back, a small quick chip in the pliers. "That's the unit identifier. Any other clone will track it, and be able to identify me on sight. Or rather could have."

Andio watched with detached interest. "How far could they track you with that in your helmet?"

"Line of sight for an individual unit. A Battle cruiser can locate any Clone within 12.9 Million kilometers. Do you have an Astromech unit?"

"We have one onboard yes..." Andio thought for a minute..."Can your helmet record your operations?"

"Yes, the helmet records automatically, for after battle review and collection of information on enemy forces. Could you get the Astromech? I'll need it to wipe the recording and the chip. I'll reprogram it as a blank."

Andio nodded and stepped out of the medical chamber. He walked around the corner and saw the R2 unit. "Um... Hello?" The unit turned and chirped quietly. "Okay, R2, can you help us with something?" The R2 unit followed them into the sickbay and waited for instructions.

Stepping up to the R2 unit 116611 crouched and looked at it. Holding up the chip the Trooper told the small Astromech, "I need this wiped and left blank. So I can listen in, but not be seen. Understand?"

The Astromech chirped and whistled back, but without the decoding software in the helmet the clone couldn't understand.

At least until the mech reached out with a small claw tool and snatched the chip. Whistling away the chip was retracted as the unit began working.

Andio watched the Clone work and for a minute thought then just shrugged. "What would it take to review the recording of the attack on the temple?"

"Put the helmet on.. say playback and a time code. That's the easiest way. Or use the Astromechs holographic projection equipment and have it play it back." 116611 replied.

Andio held out his hand for the helmet "May I? I would like to see what... happened..."

116611 Looked at the human for a moment, "If you wear the helmet, the effect can be... disorienting." But the Clone held the helmet out anyway. "At your own risk.. Human."

Andio looked at the trooper for a heartbeat before taking the helmet and stepping over to the R2 droid. He leaned over and began to set up the connections for holographic projection from the vid recorder within. Inside of seconds the droid beeped. He turned to the trooper and asked. "What date and timecode did it happen? Can you input it to R2?

"What are you looking for?"

“The girl I showed you, exactly what happened to her before and after.”

"How long before? I encountered that individual at several times throughout my tour."

"If you could compile it so show me all the times you interacted with her..." Andio said, watching the trooper carefully

Tilting it's head almost as if it was nodding trooper looked at the R2 unit for a moment and then gave a series of numbers. More like a GPS code than date and time though.

After a couple moments the Astromech beeped once and then a blue-white beam emitted from it's red "eye" and coalesced into a 3d image. Playing out sections of the troopers touring mission the day of the attack. Each time the trooper seemed to be approaching the same corridor. Several times picking up a small furry item and handing to the aforementioned female child.

But the images turned darker, and concluded with the trooper walking out of a room, the child finally at rest, with it's stuffed wookie in it's arms.

Andio watched the images with his face stoically set, closing his eyes silently as the last image drew to a close. He whispered quietly to himself, feeling the pain of her death begin to soak inside of him, fermenting deep in his soul. "I gave her that doll... " He sighed as he opened his eyes and stared at her lifeless face in the holoimage. He silently reached out his hand and removed the recording disk he had inserted into the droid unit, preserving his copy of the scenes of his sister's death before deactivating the holo emitters. He turned to the Trooper and stared at her. "Thank you for what you did, Trooper." He said quietly as he turned and sat in the corner of the sickbay, looking over the metallic disk in his hands absently.

Nodding the trooper collected the helmet once more and placed the now blank transponder chip back inside. The secondary transponder from the ship need to be removed yet, if it was installed."

Andio nodded "Lead the way." he said as he pocketed his recording and stood to follow the trooper

Walking out the door the trooper turned and headed into the engine room. Talking softly to itself it seemed to be giving commands to someone.

Walking around the room the trooper finally stopped near a fairly insignificant panel. It wasn't located near any standard access hatch or critical equipment, so most would overlook it. Pointing at the panel the trooper looked at the Human. "In there, about the size of a fist."

Andio reached around the trooper and flipped the panel open, reaching inside and looking for the small device that had been mentioned, running his fingers along the circuits and conduits until he found something poking at the tips of his fingers... he reached in with his other hand and felt the metallic connectors to the existing equipment within. With a small jerk of his hand he slowly detached the transponder and pulled it out. "This should be it..."

"I concur, Human. That is the correct piece. It should be dismantled to confirm that it cannot be used to track with. Even unpower it bears a unique signature. it's how we made sure our charges ships were tracked. Even when inappropriate individuals had obtained the ship."

Andio moved his fingers over the device before pulling out a tool and using it to open the device. "This is high tech stuff, defiantly republic. Why would the republic have two trackers on a jedi freighter?" He asked as he worked to disable the device.

"Incase the first was located. That's why a secondary is always placed someplace... inconspicuous."

"But why track the ship at all?" Andio asked, disabling the power coupling inside and yanking the internal power supply.

"This ship belongs to a Jedi counselor. If he was kidnapped by the droids, we'd need to be able to track him. On occasion ships were.. loaned.. to smugglers. Tracking where they went was also useful." The trooper reluctantly admitted.

Andio shrugged, accepting the explanation as he handed over the powered down transponder. "Should be safe now. what do you think?"

Collecting the pieces 116611 nodded in agreement, "Most satisfactory."

 

[Lunaramblings]

Shiriiak smiled and shook his head. Anakin reminded him of himself at his age. Impulsive. Brash. Arrogant. Shiriiak had also been these things. It took him a long time to see these flaws and act on them.

"There is no winning or losing this war. The battle between the Light and the Dark, the Jedi and the Sith. This is as it is meant to be. There can be no balance if one or the other falls. The Force is like a scale, if you remove the weight from one end of the scale will cause the other fall out of balance. In this way, the Sith are what allows the Jedi to exist. As the Jedi allow the Sith to exist."

Shi looked at Anakin hard. Scrutinizing him.

"Anakin, you have been the subject of much rumor. Much debate. But at your core. At the center of your being. You are a man. A man that has been given the chance for a great destiny. Worry not on the things you can not control. Obi Wan and Padme are capable. They will do as they must. As shall we."

 

[ZRT]

Two thugs and a brain, and they were bracketing him for an inevitable confrontation. He'd done the usual groundwork, and knew that the Duros was part of another little clique of dealers working the palace. The human and the Gamorrean were floaters, the types who'd come along for a couple of creds to supply muscle for whatever message was intended. The human was working ahead of him in the labyrinthine hallways under the palace, while the Gamorrean and the Duros worked in behind. Sev gave them a glance back to let them know they'd been made, then ducked into a side tunnel. Confrontation was inevitable, but he was going to arrange it on his terms.

His supplier, a Sullustan nicknamed 'Chitters', wasn't close enough to Sev to be interested in backing him. Yet. It was time to accelerate the process. He pulled back into an alcove of the tunnel as his pursuers sped up, assuming he was fleeing. He sucked in his gut, his stomach fluttering with the anticipation of action. They were maybe ten seconds back, an eternity when the adrenaline was coursing through the system and a voice in the back of his head was thinking that it was a really good idea to just run away now now now

NOW.

The Gamorrean bulled by, catching a glimpse of Sev out of the corner of his eye. Sev stepped forward, jamming the thin metal probe into the pigsnout's side. The insulated grip protected him as the motivator unit dumped its entire charge into the Gamorrean's bulky frame in one massive discharge. Enough to kill a human, to be sure, but who knew with Gamorreans?

Sev was moving ahead, past the falling Gamorrean, lashing out with his pressure tubing to knock the human's blaster aside. Sev wasn't a soldier by any stretch, with nothing to speak of in formal training. But he was a product of his upbringing, a ruthless street fighter with an affinity for working in the shadows. The human wasn't any slouch, though, spinning away to pull something from his vest. The sound told Sev that the vibroblade was in play, giving his opponent a much better margin for error than he had. Sev had to do this just right, whereas the human just had to get lucky. As the blade came humming for him on the right, he spun away to his left, pipe arcing at head level toward his opponent. The man ducked under the pipe and pressed the attack, moving toward Sev with a series of fast, flicking attacks. He knew his knifework, this one, and Sev had maybe one to two seconds to shift the momentum in his favor before the blade inevitably made contact and opened him up.

The only option left was to gamble. Sev dropped to one knee, the blade humming past his head, possibly making contact. He swung his pipe at knee-level, making solid contact. The human's knee buckled, dropping him to the floor. Sev surged forward, smashing the pipe at the man's blade hand, smashing it with his pipe. The blade skittered away into the darkness, still humming lethally.

The human groaned and clutched his knee, cursing at Sev.

"Try to slice me up, you karkin' bastard!" Sev snarled, raising the pipe to smash the man's skull, then pulled back at the last second. It was stupid to leave an opponent alive, but Sev wasn't a murderer. Not in cold blood, anyway. He looked up at the Duros, who hadn't made a move into the fight. The Duros gaped at them, then turned and fled.

Sev reached up to touch the side of his head, felt a steady flow of blood down the side of his head.

"Karkin' bastards," he muttered as he staggered away. He didn't know how bad the wound was, and Jabba's palace was not a place to be weak and vulnerable. He needed to get back to his quarters, and quick.

 

[LuckyVic]

Anakin Skywalker

Shiriiak smiled and shook his head. Anakin reminded him of himself at his age. Impulsive. Brash. Arrogant. Shiriiak had also been these things. It took him a long time to see these flaws and act on them.

"There is no winning or losing this war. The battle between the Light and the Dark, the Jedi and the Sith. This is as it is meant to be. There can be no balance if one or the other falls. The Force is like a scale, if you remove the weight from one end of the scale will cause the other fall out of balance. In this way, the Sith are what allows the Jedi to exist. As the Jedi allow the Sith to exist."

Shi looked at Anakin hard. Scrutinizing him.

"Anakin, you have been the subject of much rumor. Much debate. But at your core. At the center of your being. You are a man. A man that has been given the chance for a great destiny. Worry not on the things you can not control. Obi Wan and Padme are capable. They will do as they must. As shall we."

"I understand what your saying Master. However the.... Emperor was just one Sith Lord, and granted he had years to plan this. But with this single act he has brought the force out of balance. It's upto me to restore that balance." he said sounding more confident then he felt at that time. He saw what Palpatine had done to Master Windu. He himself felt the power of the dark side. Did he have enough power, did he know enough about the force to stop that madman. Only time would tell.

 

[Varshanka]

T R - 116611

"Right away Master Anakin." Threepio answered and then went to carry out his creator's order.

A blaster was pulled and aimed at the door as it slid back with a pneumatic hiss, a golden protocol droid standing there looking (if it could contain facial expresssion) bewildered, "Oh, My.." it said looking at the barrel of the blaster pointed at it's gold chrome plated skull. Through up it's hands it continued, "Please don't hurt me. Master Anakin requested I find everyone. He will be awaiting you in the main room. The one with the holochess board." Turning the golden droid shambled off, looking for the rest.

Looking at the human nearby, the Clone Trooper replaced it's helmet. "We should go."

 

[Screech]

Ro'ak excused himself from the presence of the wookie in the cockpit. Truth be told, he was starting to get annoyed at the growls and roars that made up wookie speech. In fact, most speech was somewhat annoying. After all, weequays didn't need words to communicate with each other, why wasn't the rest of the galaxy that simple?

Rounding a corner, he bumped into one of those droids that was onboard. He barely paid it any attention as it staggared back and seeming supprise and started talking at him. "Oh! Terrably sorry about that. It's just, master Anakin has requested everyone to gather in the main room. It's.."

Ro'ak cut off the droid "I know the way" He continued to walk, leaving the golden protocol droid stairing at his back "How rude!"

 

[LuckyVic]

Anakin Skywalker

It wasn't long before everyone had been assembled in the rec area. "Thank you all for coming so quickly." he said starting out. He had no idea of what to say, Obi-wan usually handled this sort of thing. "As you know the situtation that brought us all together was rather.... unusual. It seems that was only the beginning of it. A few minutes ago the droids intercepted a communication burst. It was a special broadcast on the holonet, in which the Chancellor announced the reorganization of the Republic into the first Galactic Empire with himself as the Emperor."

Anakin paused for a few moments as he thought about how to continue, in the end he chose to just say what needed to be said. "He also claimed that the Jedi had tried to kill him so they could take over for ourselves. As such he has declared the Jedi and anyone that would ally themselves with us as enemies of the state and has offered a reward for our deaths. Since they know that Jedi stole this ship to escape Coruscant, it can be assumed that ship will soon have every bounty hunter in the galaxy looking for us. I know none of you had asked for this, however we're currently locked on course for Tatooine. Once there we'll land and you can go to Mos Eisley or some other spaceport. You can get a ship to take you where ever you want to go from there." he told them.

 

[Varshanka]

T R - 116611

Standing in the corner of the room the Clone Trooper listened to the Master Jedi's statement and possible alternatives. What the others did didn't matter to it. The trooper had been assigned to protect the Jedi, and that's what she would do. Order 66 had been transmitted on a Seperatist frequency, as such it wasn't valid. The Order was false.

Saying nothing the Trooper waited for orders from the Jedi general's.

 

[ZRT]

<You're lucky to be alive,> Chitters informed him cheerfully in Sullustan. Sev had barely made it to the backroom domain of his dealer before blacking out, awakening to the less than tender ministrations of an antique med droid that probably had been a fresh model sometime around the last Sith war.

Sev lightly touched the freshly-closed wound. According to the droid, the blade had gone cleanly through the skull and actually penetrated a centimeter or so into his right hemisphere. This, the droid informed him, was not so big a deal as the typical humanoid might think. According to the droid, humanoids packed a goodly amount of adaptability and redundancy into their brains, and the droid was sure, so very sure, that he wouldn't suffer any lasting impairment.

Very reassuring.

"Lucky," Sev muttered.

<Hey, you took out two of Kallos' bruisers!> Chitters said. <You sure you don't want to get into bodyguarding? I could use a tough bastard like you.>

"Yeah, when Jodo comes back," Sev said, shaking his head and immediately regretting it as the world spun slightly out of tilt.

<When Jodo who whubba wha?> Chitters asked.

"Old Shad saying," Sev answered. He rubbed his face, the rough stubble on his cheeks grating and focusing him. He didn't like Chitters, but he did appreciate the Sullustan's cleverness. Not to mention that he was straight on pay and as honest as the situation allowed. "Means 'not gonna happen'."

<Your loss. You wanna grub around in engines the rest of your life?>

"Actually, yeah. Thanks for the tune-up. I'm gonna head back." Sev stood up, steadying himself against the edge of the bed. "We need to square this, Chitters. No debts."

<No worries. You did me a favor. Your payment's already waiting at your quarters.> Chitters shrugged, tugging at his shirt to straighten it.

Sev's mouth opened, then closed. That was a better deal than he'd expected from a stick dealer, but Chitters was an odd one. He certainly wasn't going to argue, though.

Then again, there was always the possibility that Chitters' payment was some sort of payoff to his erstwhile rivals, such as Sev's head. Always paid to be paranoid.

***

He cycled the door to his quarters open, half expecting another Gamorrean to come lunging out at him. There was a surprise of an entirely different nature, in the form of a mildly plump but still entirely pleasant Zeltronian woman dressed in a few wisps of fabric laying in his bunk. The seductive effect was somewhat ruined by the fact that she was sound asleep, arm thrown over her eyes, mouth open, and snoring loudly, but she stirred as he entered, blinking and fixing her gaze upon him.

He glanced to the left and right, then walked in and closed the door. Some traps might just be worth walking into.

 

[ZRT]

She'd been one of Jabba's dancers, a lucky one. When the Hutt had gotten bored with her, he'd just turned her out into the general population of the palace instead of feeding her to whatever was in the pit that week. From there, she'd wandered around, selling herself for whatever protection she could acquire, eventually falling in with Chitters and his little crew for a while.

Nothing they'd talked about- Sev was just in the habit of getting the gossip on the locals. The experience had been cold and professional, sterile. When she left, she tried to hit him up for a deathstick. When he declined, she'd made some cutting remarks about his prowess and ancestry while he cycled the lock shut.

He lay in his bunk, massaging his scalp in a vain effort to try to fend off the throbbing headache he'd had the whole time. Sex after cranial trauma probably hadn't been his brightest move ever, but nobody'd ever accused him of being a genius even before a thug had nicked a slice out of his brain. Sleep was a long time in coming with his skull pounding so fiercely, but when it did, it was tumultuous.

He was in the main room, dark and empty. Light peeked in from a few skylights, only deepening the shadows. One beam shone down directly on the slab of carbonite and the poor bastard encased within. With a head-throbbing flash, he was elsewhere. Nar Shaddaa. Home. There was confusion, blasterfire, screaming. A glowing blade. A voice whispered in the dark.

"When Jodo comes back..."

Sev awoke, gasping for air as if he'd been drowning, sitting bolt upright in his bed. Sweat ran down his face, coursing down in rivulets onto his bare chest. He'd heard the voice, damn it. Heard it. Not a dream. He looked down, saw a crimson trail running across his chest, reached up and touched the side of his head. His fingers came away sticky with blood.

"What the..."