A Needle in a Haystack [Eluna]

[Jane Starborn]

The trip to the Outer Rim and Unknown Space hadn't been long. Just two 'nights' - or whatever it was that passed for night in hyperspace. Jane had spent the time reading and adjusting her internal clock for local time on Schwartzweld, the moon where Byl Laprovik had fallen out of the galaxy. Eluna Thals, the Human Replica Droid, had spent the time doing who knows what.

They hadn't spoken much. There hadn't been a need.

Now as she joined Captain Thals at the top of the ramp that led to the verdant fields of the moon, Jane looked sideways at her. "We are just going to be asking a few questions of the locals. Find out what they know about the General and Ms. s'Ilancy. See if anyone recognizes Agent Laprovik's picture."

The HRD nodded politely, as if they hadn't already gone over their plan. Jane walked down and out into the open, taking a deep breath of clean, un-recycled air. This was going to be like looking for a needle in a haystack, as the saying went. And the haystack was only as big as the entire galaxy.

[Eluna Thals]

"How persuasively shall we ask?"

If Eluna seemed troubled by the notion of the enhanced interrogations she hinted at, it certainly wasn't evident on her face.

"Are you armed?"

[Jane Starborn]

Jane pulled her jacket open, revealing her blaster in a shoulder holster. She didn't bother asking if the other woman was similarly armed.

"There are a lot of buildings just over that rise, hopefully we'll find our answers quickly." She walked briskly, looking up at the planet Figaro Favoura VII that took over a large part of the sky.

[Eluna Thals]

They walked on, making for a good pace. Eluna debated advancing at a full sprint, but it would be best to stay together. Her macroreceptors in her eyes zoomed at magnification ten for any sign of company, but aside from plentiful fauna, there were no humanoid life forms.

It all made a little less sense when they crested the rise, and spotted an opulent arrangement of mansions and a vast array of supporting buildings. The care of construction reminded her a lot of the royal-era architecture on Naboo.

"Strange. I don't see anyone."

She blinked, her eyes changing color to a dull red.

"Heat readings show nothing either."

[Jane Starborn]

"Very strange," Jane agreed.

She took a moment to look around at the mansions. "I'm not sure where to start... the closest building I guess." The information on this moon and the others in the system was remarkably sparse. Beyond names, there was nothing in the database. It was a binary system with five inhabitable planets, one of which was Figaro Favoura VII. Figaro Favoura VII had seven moons, three of which were inhabitable and they were standing on one of those. The one the General and the Jedi had 'retired' to before abruptly leaving and rejoining the fleet.

Jane rolled her eyes. "I guess now we're looking for a needle in a haystack comprised of needles. In the dark." She turned slightly one way and then the other before adding, "We'll split up, cover more ground that way. Keep in contact over our commlinks every fifteen minutes."

[Eluna Thals]

Eluna nodded her head. Free from the human agent slowing her down, the HRD broke out into a sprint, covering terrain at sixty-two kilometers per hour.

The first structure she approached was a mansion. Leaping the gate, she slowed herself at the approach to the front door. Still no signs of life, she gave the area a cursory once-over for anything that might betray an automated defense matrix or droid guards or anything of the sort.

The baffling part about it was that there was nothing of the sort. Who left a planet full of such opulence and stunning beauty to the whims of nothingness?

She tried the door. Locked. It was a heavy wooden door with iron castings, dressed ornately. She could break it down, but it seemed a waste. Then again, the stained glass window adjacent was also tragically beautiful.

She made her choice, and after a few jarring strikes, the door gave way to the crunch of splintering wood. With only silence to greet her on the way in, Eluna entered.

[Jane Starborn]

It didn't look like the buildings were going anywhere, but Jane jogged towards them anyway. The HRD ran like she was going to find Byl tied up and starving to death inside one of the mansions.

The lack of any heat signatures made a live rescue rather slim. However, he could be tied up and already dead. Not a pleasant thought. Jane investigated a smallish outbuilding, peeking in a window and then trying the door. Unlocked.

It was also completely empty, and seemed to have been a storage shed of some sort. A large, relatively dust-free shed made of dressed stone and with a roof made of pretty orange clay tiles. Whoever used to live on this planet had done so with style. Jane glanced around quickly to commit the layout to memory, and moved on.

After fifteen minutes of boring outbuildings she headed towards a large home and set to work picking the lock. As she worked the ancient key and pins lock with two of her hairpins, she triggered her commlink. "Anything yet, Captain?"

If only the long gone denizens of Schwartzweld had used electronic locks. Those she actually had practice disabling - these manual turnkey systems were something she'd read about but never actually -

The pins tumbled into place and the door clicked open. Hmm.

[Eluna Thals]

Eluna rifled through another book, pages flying by as if she were breezily flipping them, but her synthetic eyes were capturing every word, and she was reading every bit of each tome. A few seconds on each, and they were tossed into a pile as she stripped them one by one off the bookshelf.

There were no obvious bits of interest in sight, so Eluna turned to giving some of the more thicker intelligence work a go. She'd be done with this bookshelf within another minute or two.

The comm distracted her. She blinked, stopping immediately. Breathing deeply on some artificial reflex, she canted her head a little, activating her inner comm system to link with Starborn's unit.

"This planet is something of a museum. It's a lifetime's worth of information on Lupines. That being said, there is nothing here to betray the presence of anyone to tend over it. Lok s'Ilancy and Dan seem to have found essentially the perfect get-away locale."

[Jane Starborn]

"I haven't found any traces of recent residents either," Jane replied, picking up a rough carved statuette and turning it over in her hands. "The ones that used to live here obviously did so in comfort, however."

Perhaps the moon would work as a back-up base for the Alliance. The infrastructure was there, and the place had basically fallen off the galaxy maps or never been put on them. Jane filed that thought away and ended her conversation with Eluna. "All right, I'll contact you again in fifteen unless you find something before then."

Agent Starborn walked over polished marble floors, inlaid with intricate patterns, and entered a spacious kitchen. It was going to take forever to investigate every home in this area, let alone the whole moon. But she had taken the information from the Dauntless computers as to where they had dropped off the General and his Jedi consort, and this was the nearest settlement.

Of course, there was no telling where the pair had gone since then. Jane jogged through the upper floors, giving the mansion a quick going over, and then let herself out through back door. Skipping the next group of outbuildings, she went straight to the next mansion. This one was unlocked.

[Eluna Thals]

Eluna responded in the affirmative, continuing her rapid search pattern. Ten more minutes into the process, she paused near a window, suddenly still as a statue. She'd seen something, but nothing inside the mansion. Something outside, a good distance away. Nothing humanoid, but...

The HRD agent very slowly eased toward the periphery of the window, exposing as little of herself to sight as possible, while using her vantage and her macrobinocular vision to give her an edge. Her head canted again as her comm switched active once more.

"Come to my position. If you still have that blaster, set it to stun."

[Jane Starborn]

"On my way." Jane looked down at her her GPS wristlet. The little screen emitted a small hologram, indicating the HRD's position inside a ghostly looking square that was supposed to be one of the mansions. When they had entered the system initially she had the ship's computer run a surface scan of the moon, and it was still updating remotely to their wristlets with more details.

Easing her blaster free, the agent quietly left the house she was inside, stealthily making her way to Captain Thal's position. Eyes peeled, she was reasonably sure that no living thing was monitoring her as she entered the mansion, coming up on Eluna from behind. "What is it?" she murmured.

[Eluna Thals]

"Visibility is at 1.3 kilometers. I see what resembles a vornskyr."

Eluna quirked an eyebrow upwards.

"A conspicuous find, so far from their native environment. Considering who once lived here, I believe I've found a Lupine."

Drawing fully away from the window, Eluna blinked, adjusting her sight magnification as she looked to the other agent.

[Jane Starborn]

She holstered her blaster, pulling a small pair of macrobinoculars out of her pocket and adjusting the settings before carefully looking out the window. For several long seconds she saw nothing, and then something ran through the long grass parallel to their position. Something rather big.

"Interesting." Jane narrowed her eyes in thought, and said, "Do you think it knows we are here?"

[Eluna Thals]

"They are sentient, so it's entirely possible they saw us land and understand we're looking for them."

Eluna thought about the possibilities.

"It hasn't fled, so I imagine it intends on investigating to some degree. Perhaps what we need is bait."

[Jane Starborn]

Jane looked at Eluna and then back out the window. "Bait."

She thought for a moment, then said, "I'm up for it. Your superior reflexes and speed make you ideal for taking down a Lupine, if what I've read about them is true."

[Eluna Thals]

Eluna was pleased to see that she had reached the same conclusion.

"I agree. Keep the sidearm with you. I won't be affected by it."

She backed away from the window, heading toward the side door.

"I will approach from the ridge to the east. In two minutes, head straight for it. You won't be harmed."

There was a cool, matter-of-fact way in which Eluna said this as she quietly left for her alternate pursuit route.

[Jane Starborn]

She nodded in reply, waited the specified two minutes, and headed out. Walking slowly, head up and alert, her blaster in hand, Jane wondered for a moment if trusting her fate to the hands of a former Imperial superdroid was a good idea.

Too late now. Leaving the relative security of the shadow of the buildings Agent Starborn made her way into the tall grasses, wading through the vegetation with her arms out slightly for balance. Any day now...

Movement came at her from the west and she pivoted to face it, blaster tracking up and forward as the beast rushed at her.

[Eluna Thals]

Eluna accelerated to her frame's capacity, picking up a fair bit of momentum as she approached at the vornskyr's flank. It was already committing itself to charging Agent Starborn when it dug its paws in, hesitated, and pitched back toward the HRD's direction.

Not allowing the creature the moment it might need to turn and run, Eluna dove into a fluid tackle, slamming into the beast as they tumbled across the ground. The Lupine's claws found purchase during the tussle and tore at clothing and flesh alike, gashing Eluna superficially as she wrestled with it.

"If you have a shot, go ahead and take it."

Eluna commented as the vornskyr raked a paw across her face. She shrieked, a vestigial part of her base programming. The pain was real enough, but a trivial issue and was dismissed as soon as she felt it.

[Jane Starborn]

Jane pulled the trigger smoothly, a stun blast crossing the distance between her and the HRD, and then she shot the Lupine again. Thals and the beast fell to the ground, the long grasses flattened out all around them from their struggle.

Captain Thals held onto the beast for a moment longer, then the creature shuddered, body becoming misshapen and turning into that of a human male. The HRD released her hold and got to her feet, unaffected by the stun bolt that had knocked the Lupine into unconsciousness.

Jane kept her blaster trained on the man's naked form, but took a moment to scan the horizon. "Any more around?"

[Eluna Thals]

Eluna rose without protest, bleeding from a claw wound to her face and neck. She looked to the left and right, scanning the horizon for anything that might represent a threat.

"I see nothing."

She looked down at the now-humanoid Lupine, and arched an eyebrow.

"Colonel Erasmus Karrnage."

[Jane Starborn]

Colonel Karrnage, eccentric academic of the Imperial college, specialized in xenomorphology and xenoarchaeology. Well, until his disappearance, which was really an extraction, led by Agents Laprovik and Thals.

Thing is, the Colonel was just regular run-of-the-mill human with a capital H. Was appeared to be the operative word. "Lets get him inside before he wakes up and restrain him." She looked at the HRD, and added, "I'll get a med kit from the ship, patch you up. But first..."

She holstered the blaster and grabbed the Colonel's ankles.

[Eluna Thals]

Eluna shrugged off her own 'injury'. Her synthetic flesh behaved in a similar fashion to the real thing. The pain was there, but easily dismissed, and her rate of healing was certainly more pronounced. Even now, the bleeding had stopped.

"Agreed. We need to isolate him."

Eluna put a hand on Starborn's shoulder to convince her to perhaps go about this differently.

"Keep your weapon ready just in case. I can carry the Colonel myself."

She bent down, hoisting Karrnage by the waist and draping him over her petite shoulder. It looked comical, but Eluna was only affected insofar as to tilt slightly to offset the shift in weight. She did not seem put off by carrying the nude, bald, and thoroughly unattractive looking scholar.

"Let's go."

[Jane Starborn]

She couldn't help making a bit of a face as Eluna draped the naked man over her shoulder, leaving Jane face to ass with the Colonel. She kept her weapon in hand as they made their way back to the mansion they had just left, opening the door for the HRD.

It took a few moments to find a suitable room, and they deposited Karrnage's unconscious body onto a chaise. All the furniture was wooden, but sturdily constructed. Jane sent Eluna running to the ship for restraints, keeping her blaster trained on the man the whole time she was gone, finger on the trigger.

[Colonel Karrnage]

It was minutes later before Karrnage began to stir. His breathing deepened and he tried to sit up, but moaned in pain. The residual effects of the stun blast still left his nerves protesting. He opened his eyes, blinking due to the lack of clarity afforded him without glasses. He could see well enough that an unknown woman had a gun trained on him.

"Is that at all necessary?"

[Jane Starborn]

"You tell me," Jane said tightly. "You've changed, Colonel."

Where was Eluna? She should be back already. Jane didn't let the blaster waver and she didn't take her eyes off him.

[Colonel Karrnage]

"Of course I have. It was an excellent research opportunity. I have nothing to regret."

Still nervous of the gun and conscious of his nudity, the Colonel crossed his arms over his lap.

"If I am to be held at gunpoint, I would at least prefer the dignity of clothes and my glasses, if that is possible."

[Eluna Thals]

Eluna arrived with the restraints in hand, and looked at Karrnage as she entered. She tossed the devices to the Colonel.

"Put those on."

Looking to Starborn, the HRD's wound was now looking fairly dry. The laceration had puckered with a deep red scab that would, in perhaps half an hour or so, fall away as the healing continued.

"How is our prisoner?"

[Jane Starborn]

"Grumpy," replied Jane, allowing her blaster to point slightly downward once Karrnage had reluctantly fastened the stun cuffs around his wrists. She took two large steps forward and checked that they were secure.

"We don't know where your clothes, or your glasses are. Believe me, your nudity isn't something I prefer." She stepped to the side, blaster still held ready but not overly threatening. "Are there others like you here?"

[Colonel Karrnage]

"My garments are in the estate to the south, not far."

He could see that neither Starborn nor Thals were particularly keen to fetch them, at least for now. He was then compelled to speak.

"No, I am the only one here. I am a guest here."

[Eluna Thals]

"A guest of Lok' s'Ilancy and General Dan?"

It was less a question and more a completion of the Colonel's statement, with the false courtesy of a question's inflection.

[Jane Starborn]

Jane found a throw pillow on a nearby couch and handed it over to the Colonel, who positioned it carefully on his lap.

"You were kidnapped out of Imperial Center by an Alliance strikeforce that included Captain Thals," she nodded her head towards her companion. "You chose to stay here. Are your loyalties so easily bought?"

[Colonel Karrnage]

"Yes, C-Captain Thals and I, w-we're aquainted, yes. Not acquainted with you, however?"

Karrnage squinted as he regarded Agent Starborn, the nervousness obviously showing in his voice.

"As for my loyalties, I've a-always been consistently loyal to science."

[Eluna Thals]

"Deeply, apparently."

Eluna arched an eyebrow at the deranged scientist. As for his query of Starborn's identity, she'd leave that to answer herself. It wasn't her place.

"Subjecting yourself to the Lupine pathogen doesn't follow any objective use of the scientific method I'm aware of. Was this your idea, or Master s'Ilancy's?"

[Jane Starborn]

Jane waited patiently for the nervous man to answer Eluna. They had to be careful in their questioning not to allow him to feel that he had information they desperately needed. The former Imperial Colonel might dig in his heels and try to gain the upper hand.

[Colonel Karrnage]

"Loklorien suggested it, and I was only too eager to agree."

His mouth dry, he pressed his tongue between his lips momentarily to wet them.

"I would surmise then that the nature of your arrival is due to some falling out between Madam s'Ilancy and the Alliance?"

[Jane Starborn]

Jane mentally raised an eyebrow. What would cause Jedi s'Ilancy to 'fall out' with the Alliance? More importantly, what did he think would cause a falling out? Was Agent Laprovik the answer to those questions?

"Are you the only person she offered this to?"

[Colonel Karrnage]

"To my knowledge, yes. Judging by my observations, it is a deeply personal decision for a Lupine to make, to instill another with the metamorphic reagent."

Karrnage was confused at the line of questioning.

"It is, perhaps, a similar biological response to the burden of procreation perhaps. Not something taken lightly by responsible parties."

[Jane Starborn]

"I was only wondering if perhaps Agent Byl Laprovik was here with you in a similar state. He has not been seen since he came to visit the General and Jedi s'Ilancy here several months ago."

[Colonel Karrnage]

"I do not think so."

Karrnage laughed, nervously, looking to Eluna as he answered Jane's question.

"Your red-headed colleague can probably attest that there was little love lost between the two. Mr. Laprovik is a disturbed person, or perhaps that is my unqualified observation."

[Eluna Thals]

Eluna's hand was out in an instant, wrapped at Karrnage's throat. Her normally aloof expression turned fierce for a moment, then returned to it's normal state just as quickly. Her hand, however, remained at the spot, lifting him to his feet.

"Unless you want your experiment to be aborted prematurely, stick to the answers and do without the color commentary."

She held her grip in place, tight enough to deny him air and slowly tightening. His hands feebly lifted up to part her grip from his neck, but he might as well have tried bending durasteel.

[Jane Starborn]

"So, Laprovik and s'Ilancy didn't like each other? What can youtell me about the circumstances of his last visit here?" Jane tried not to let her impatience color her tone, but she was excited to hear what Karrnage would say.

Dan sat behind his desk, his face calm but something made her think he was searching for the right words. 'During mine and Master s'Ilancy's recent personal leave, he tracked me down and confronted me. I think that he was trying to approach me away from prying eyes back at fleet. The entire encounter was suspicious, but you have to understand that I'm reluctant to speak on it...I think that he thought he could buy me out. Maybe because I was leaving the service that I had an axe to grind with Alliance command, or whatever. He approached me with a credit payoff in exchange for my command-level codes. I guess once he found out that I returned immediately to service he assumed that I'd turned the deal down, and he went off the grid.'

General Dan had a specific story that he'd told of Byl's final visit. Jedi s'Ilancy had backed him up. If Karrnage's story happened to contradict theirs, then what? Who was more believable?

[Colonel Karrnage]

The Colonel's brow knit.

"Pardon me, madam, but I don't recall the Commander arriving on planet."

Was this a trick? He looked to Starborn and to Thals.

[Eluna Thals]

"You're lying."

Eluna stated matter-of-factly, tightening her grip to the point where Karrnage gasped, before relaxing it again.

"We already know the Commander's travel logs place him on Schwartzweld. Those logs are confirmed by General Dan himself."

[Jane Starborn]

"You don't recall him arriving, or he wasn't here? Because if you don't know anything, then you are quickly becoming useless to me."

[Colonel Karrnage]

Fearful that his words, or lack of words, might lead to his demise, Karrnage stammered again, starting to perspire.

"I-I saw n-nobody. I was brought to the planet by Sanis Prent, same as Lok s'Ilancy was. From there, I busied myself in the study."

He paused, blinking. Of course!

"I know there was an altercation between the General, Lok, and one, maybe two other people."

He stammered again.

"I could hear them. Maybe two rooms down. It woke me the next day. I heard a shot."

[Jane Starborn]

"A shot?" Jane raised her eyebrow. "Was someone injured?"

She waved her hand, as if to erase that question. "Describe the argument, if you can."

[Colonel Karrnage]

"I recognized the General's voice after the shot, and another man's voice."

He closed his eyes, trying to recreate the scene in his mind.

"An accent, perhaps Coruscanti? No, but from a Colonial world I am nearly certain."

He looked to the wall, as if to recreate what he was doing at the time of the incident.

"I heard a crash. What I was to later find was the door was destroyed in a forced entry. I would suspect Lok's work.

There was another voice. A strange voice."

He frowned again.

"The words are indistinct, the thickness of the walls insulate rather well. I did hear one word, however. A man of my profession, perhaps I tune in to things that arouse my academic interest.


...Sith."

[Jane Starborn]

Jane looked at Eluna. The HRD looked back at her, that just a little bit too-perfect face not revealing anything.

The Colonel's words, if they could be trusted, were running parallel to the story General Dan and the Jedi had told her. The story. Like she wanted to find out that it wasn't true. "And what would the Sith have to do with the General, or the Jedi? Surely you aren't insinuating that Agent Laprovik is one."

Jane paused, licking her lips in an unconscious copy of his gesture. She couldn't think of anything to ask; she looked at Eluna again, giving the Captain a chance to follow up with her own questions.

[Eluna Thals]

Eluna canted her head slightly, taking in the broadest scope of possibilities before her.

"Perhaps it would be more likely to consider the only person in the known group who is force sensitive."

Returning her attention to Karrnage, she coolly queried him.

"You've studied the Sith culture. You would know signs when present. Is Loklorien s'Ilancy a Sith?"

[Colonel Karrnage]

"I can only speak academically. The question you ask, I don't have the credentials to answer with full faith."

That answer didn't seem to placate anybody. The Colonel's legs shook restlessly.

"The only time I ever recall her interest in Sith culture was her efforts to retrieve the Urns of Korriban. But if I may also note, General Dan shared the interest."

[Jane Starborn]

Jane thought about that a moment. The Urns of Korriban were funeral urns containing the ashes of long dead men, purported to be Dark siders of great power. The Urns came from the seventeenth dynasty of Drax. The Sith Emperor of the previous succession had died without naming a successor. He sired three sons, identical triplets blind at birth, and the three brothers ruled the Empire as a triad consul.

Historical documents that she had scanned showed that it was a time of increasing power and expansion of the Sith Empire. The dominion pushed the Republic back to the inner core, and ruled throughout to even beyond the Unknown Regions.

However this period of expansion lasted less than two decades. Then, in the span of a year, each brother fell incurably ill and languished on their deathbeds. When they died, the power they had consolidated was broken in three by their respective lackeys. The Sith bickered among the scraps of the spoils for generations. The brothers were burnt, their ashes placed in in the Urns and probably spelled with Sith sorcery. In the thousands of years after the Urns had been lost.

Until recently. General Dan had been interested in the Urns, and he had sent Lok s'Ilancy to recover one of them from an Imperial archeological dig just a year or so previously. A rogue... Sanis Prent, a smuggler... had been involved as well. They had successfully taken the Urn from the Empire, but then lost it again in an altercation with Black Sun criminals as they attempted to recover a second Urn. The third Urn still languished in obscurity, never located in recent times. Since this mission there had been no other attempt to find or reacquire the Urns.

Reportedly lost it. In a barely-on-the-books mission file that General Dan had written. Was Lok s'Ilancy a Sith?

Jane frowned. "You were present when s'Ilancy recovered the Urn from the Imperial dig on Dantooine."

[Colonel Karrnage]

The Colonel nodded.

"I was. Director Esalis shared the General's and s'Ilancy's interest in the Urns. Naturally, I have an academic predisposition to such material, and was brought along to supervise the extraction."

[Jane Starborn]

"We can come back to that," said Jane. "Did you hear any mention of command codes in the argument?"

[Colonel Karrnage]

The Colonel thought about the question, at last shaking his head.

"The voices, while loud, were speaking quite quickly. It was difficult to make out many words. I don't remember hearing anything of the sort, but it may have been said."

[Jane Starborn]

Jane allowed herself a small sigh. This was going nowhere. "And after the argument? What happened next?"

[Colonel Karrnage]

"Silence."

He looked from Jane to Eluna.

"I did not dare venture out to see. It was very heated and obviously violent. Some time later, I did see something peculiar out in the courtyard. Madam s'Ilancy carried a man out. I did not get a good look, you must excuse me. She carried him to a ship and put him in it. Minutes later, the ship took off."

He shrugged.

"That is all I can say. Not long after, she approached me, and gave me my gift. Compared to the events prior, I naturally eschewed most of the...unfortunate business in favor of the much more compelling matter at hand."

[Eluna Thals]

Eluna looked to Jane at that revelation.

"We know what type of ship he brought here. It would be no trouble to cross-reference that with reachable planets with a habitable environment."

[Colonel Karrnage]

"Begging your pardon, who?"

Karrnage was curious at where this all led. He'd been at the business end of their questions for too long and he felt panic-stricken at being so helpless.

[Jane Starborn]

"Commander Laprovik," Jane said shortly. Was he so addled from his change that he couldn't keep track of who they had been asking him about?

"I suppose we should offer you a ride off planet, Colonel," she added, "But we can't. If you want, though, I can contact the Alliance to send someone to pick you up."

[Colonel Karrnage]

"Off the planet?"

He looked nearly terrified.

"No, you mustn't! I have work here to do."

He looked to the two agents pleadingly.

"You must understand, I have no quarrel with you or anyone. Please leave me to my work."

[Eluna Thals]

Eluna was devoid of pity.

"Colonel, your freedom here has until now been the sole providence of Loklorien s'Ilancy. We aren't interested in your experiments. We're interested in cooperation. Unless Agent Starborn has any leniency, I think you should be detained indefinitely and interrogated for every drop of information we deem useful."

[Jane Starborn]

Jane nodded, "Your parole was granted on the word of Jedi s'Ilancy. If she is no longer here..." She looked at the man, sitting there looking quite naked and helpless. "We cannot allow you to fall back into Imperial hands. You were quite easy to catch, after all, despite your... change."

She glanced at Eluna, silently querying her as to if they should bring him with them, or contact the Fleet to pick him up as soon as possible.

[Colonel Karrnage]

"Whatever you need of me, if it will allow me to remain and continue my research, I will do it."

Karrnage nodded hurriedly.

"But I am truthful when I say I've told you everything I know that's happened."

[Eluna Thals]

Eluna glanced at Jane, in an unspoken request to speak to her out of earshot. The two stepped out of the room, giving Karrnage a moment to himself.

"I'm not as accurate as a Jedi in divining liars, but there's nothing in his body language that suggests he's even hiding anything."

She shook her head.

"He's a small fish. I suggest a catch and release. If you have any use of him, he can always be monitored remotely."

[Jane Starborn]

It irked her to leave the Colonel hanging like a loose thread, but Jane knew Eluna was right. She nodded. "Right. Lets not waste anymore time on this fish then."

She walked back into the room where Karrnage was shifting his position while trying to keep his pillow strategically in place with cuffed hands. "Thank you for your cooperation, Colonel. We'll be leaving soon. Please don't take this personally, but I can't leave you behind us without taking some... precautions."

She pulled her blaster out and shot him.

[Eluna Thals]

Eluna watched as the stun bolt hit Karrnage squarely, sending him sprawling backwards. She looked to her colleague and smirked.

"There are sixteen planets in the region that Byl's ship could have reached on a solo flight. Two are habitable, and one is within this system. I suggest we begin our search at the farthest planet. If he intended to leave Schwartzweld, it's likely he would have to stop there."

[Jane Starborn]

"The sooner the better," Jane said. "This empty planet gives me the creeps."

The two women quickly left the abandoned mansions behind them, and in a few minutes were entering their ship. A red light was blinking on the comm system, and Jane slid into the co-pilot's seat to access the controls.

"That's strange..." She tapped a few keys and brought up a recorded voice message that had been transmitted to Laprovik's Phoenix Cell comm number. "Seems like someone has tried to contact him."

She played the recording for Thals as the HRD entered coordinates into the navicomp to prepare for the jump to the planet Byl was most likely to have gone to.

"Laprovik - this is De'Ville. The Imperialist rally, about a year ago? I was wondering if we could get together and talk about something more... permanent. You have my number."

De'Ville? A blurry holo and a dossier came to mind, Starborn accessing it without even having to think about it. Lilaena De'Ville, terrorist, known Force adept, thorn in the side of the Empire for years now. She had done a few missions with Laprovik, most recently a bombing of a rally on Imperial Center, in which she kidnapped Tiberius Anar and almost assassinated him. She hadn't, for unknown reasons, and Anar had lived to see Miranda Tarkin placed upon the Empire's throne.

The Alliance hadn't had contact with her since then, and that had been over a year ago. The Empire, on the other hand, hadn't seen the last of De'Ville, who had returned to Imperial Center (or perhaps never left) to destroy a secret lab that had been used to experiment on adept children. She had been captured by the bounty hunter IG-88 and handed over to the Inquisition. She had escaped. There were rumors that she was running around with a squad of Mandalorians in old style armor.

"I wonder what she wants with him." Jane saved the recording and set a trace on the transmission, trying to backtrack it to De'Ville's location.

[Eluna Thals]

Eluna's left eyebrow raised slightly.

"Perhaps another newly-discovered mutual enemy."

She thought about this recent turn of events, and looked to Starborn.

"It's possible that I could arrange a meeting with her."

[Jane Starborn]

Jane nodded, watching the text scroll by on the screen as the trace hopped through several planetary nodes before it was finally lost in the slicers haven that was the Nar Shaddaa communications haze. "Dammit," she muttered, but there wasn't much emotion behind the word.

"Yes, a meeting. It doesn't sound like she knows anything about Laprovik's current situation, but the Alliance can't turn its back on potential allies." Jane let Eluna take over the comm panel, and sat herself in the pilot's seat and fired up the ship's engines. Within a few minutes they were exiting the planet's atmosphere and continuing on sublights toward the jump point.

[Eluna Thals]

"I think I'll arrange a suitable meeting, shall we say on Bespin?"

Eluna spoke, but it was a near-flawless rendition of Byl's brutish Coruscanti accent.

With a smirk, she keyed up the comm frequency, ready to reach out and touch the mysterious Dark Jedi.

[Jane Starborn]

Jane half-listened to Eluna's conversation in Captain Laprovik's voice, and pushed up on the hyperdrive controls. The yacht slid into hyperspace, making the relatively short jump to the farthest inhabitable planet in the system.

She barely had time to eat dinner before they were there, and it was only the work of an hour to convince/bribe the local port authority to let them look over the dock logs for the time in question.

Eluna scanned the datapages quickly, absorbing information at an even faster rate than Jane could, and stopped. "Starborn." She pointed to an entry for a ship. "That's our boy."

Jane's heart skipped a beat, and she walked over to take a look while the grimy alien who'd taken their credits shifted his weight from side to side in the doorway, looking nervous. "Arrived on the correct day, according to our intel from Karrnage. Any clue on when the ship left?"

[Eluna Thals]

"Doesn't appear to have left at all."

She arched an eyebrow, switching the data feed to another stream.

"See here, impounded. Apparently, he didn't have the funds to rent landing space, or to refuel."

Working on a hunch, Eluna began to speak in the alien's mother tongue, divining a few more pieces of information.

"According to our friend, this planet here sees fairly little in what you'd consider independent charter traffic. He says most of what comes and goes is by mass charter, to and from..."

She passed the datapad to Starborn.

"...Bespin."

[Jane Starborn]

Why would Byl go to Bespin without checking in with the Alliance? Or at least his Phoenix Cell crew. Eluna was probably wondering the same thing.

But then, if there was a traitor, or a Sith, or something else in the Alliance then Byl probably didn't want to risk them finding him through official communication. Jane thought about it all the way back to the ship and didn't broach the subject with Captain Thals until they were underway to Bespin and Cloud City.

"I wonder what he's thinking, trying to do this all on his own."

[Eluna Thals]

"I have been wondering the same. At the very least, I would be insulated from any supposed corruption by a Sith. Yet, I find myself on the outside looking in, every bit as you do."

She thought this over as the ship hit hyperspace.

"Perhaps he thought that leaving a data trail on this at all would be dangerous. It still seems erratic, but there may be merit in that motive."

[Jane Starborn]

Jane rubbed her eyes, and yawned. "Well, we can ask him when we find him. And hope we don't lead whatever he's tracking down right to him when we do."

She yawned again, and got up. "You'll make that meeting with De'Ville when we arrive, and I'll see what I can dig up in the spaceport logs. Its unlikely he's left much of a mark, but Bespin is a huge transport hub." She put their dishes from the day into the cycler and set it to run. "He could be, quite literally, anywhere.

"But I, on the other hand, am going to bed. Wake me up when we get to Cloud City."

[Eluna Thals]

"Of course."

Eluna set her own internal chronometer and leaned back in her seat, closing her eyes. And with that, she was 'asleep'. Even a droid needs to conserve energy when possible.

The travel to Bespin didn't take long, but Eluna had a feeling that whatever opportunity she had to recharge, the better. There was no telling what awaited them from either De'Ville or Laprovik.

[Jane Starborn]

(Story continued in <a href=http://sw-fans.net/forum/showthread.php?t=20714>The Turning Tide</a>)