"The Price of Knowledge"

[Director Isard]

(OOC)
Taking up the plot where "Call of the Crystals" left it off, this is an Open RPG that is not exactly restricted to Imperial characters.
Up until now, there have been three people involved in the story as such that ran along besides the Sith/Jedi fight. Gormul Hyfe was the third person until now, but since he will not have that much time in the following months, we need someone else to take over.

WHAT WE NEED:
Guard Piett has kindly agreed to step in as third person, so that solves that problem.
But it is going to be an open RPG, just like Crystals was, so if you're anyone else and you still want to join, please go ahead.
I would advise you to contact us at Intel about your participation and any further particulars about this thread.

[Jekaan Oludh]

On the other side of the door, everything was quiet. Not a single footstep of an anxious guard trying to see where all the noise had come from. No troopers rushing down the corridor to secure the area. No blaring alarms following an intruder alert. Nothing.

An uncomfortable chill ran down Jekaan's spine at that. It wasn't as if he wanted to be found, but this was.... this was exceedingly strange.

He closed the door that he had opened a few inches quickly again, when he saw the small maintenance droid that had rolled past earlier, come back and roll into the other direction.

This was not natural. The blast the detonation had made, and the shockwave, should have alerted someone - anyone. But there was no intruder alert, no alarms, no one. What was going on???

"Uh...sir?" Qourr, who stood pressed to the wall beside him, piped up.

He turned a quizzical eye to her, and raised his index finger to his lips, indicating that she should keep quiet.

"But sir... listen!" she whispered. "Shouldn't we be able to hear the droid rolling past? I mean...he made a lot of noise when he first rolled down the corridor, but now that you've closed the door, we can't hear him at all!"

He listened. And then, suddenly, a grin blossomed on his face.

The walls were sound-proof! The entire complex had to be sound-proof! That was why it was so silent, why no one had come running at the sound of the blast!

Still, that didn't explain the absence of the intruder alert. There was definately something strange about this building, but he could work with that.

Opening the door again, he stuck his head out and scanned the walls and ceilings for spy-cams. At first glance, he couldn't see anything. So he took out his modified datapad, and held it out the door with one hand, scanning the walls and ceilings with it.

The datapad didn't show any hidden devices either.

Jekaan took a step forward and approached the table that stood in the middle of the room. He ran a finger along its top.

A thick layer of dust rubbed off.

Pocketing his blaster again, he grinned at Qourr. "They must have sealed off this part of the building - this place hasn't been used for months, possibly years!"

Still grinning, he quickly took off the mechanics' tunic. Underneath, he was wearing a grey officer's uniform, with the appropriate rank insignia of a Major. An additional crest on his left arm showed him to be a member of COMPNOR.

Qourr stared at him, wide-eyed, but got out of her mechanics uniform herself, until she stood there in a black combat suit.

Jekaan ran an appraising eye over her. "That'll do - let's go!"

A few seconds later, studying the map of the RMC Admin building as it was pictured on his datapad, and alternately scanning the surroundings for spying devices, Jekaan and Qourr were silently walking along the eerily empty and silent corridor.

They were on their way.

[Director Isard]

Message sent to Gav Mortis, Ground Forces HQ:

<font color="red">38:8:20:17:01:37-IIHQ-COR.1.IPC-GVMTS

FN6KKEA0E&4K8DLMCQ

G*kjago:zY&cl@*%ltyGfmo*zm cfm$sl@yp*&yg*%ymd*hzi*+ne xez^kmj%qzzr#aaeseqj#l&@$zljlnzh^eh@jrzhxshx#l*m.sK#&aa%vslmji:@m$*ob&*j^%hy&ll@k-&jjcl@^azrfpzn$z,j^cehv%luflk
6go#rahx:zT#j%%#v,j5jjhyyz4&alh#
1ige%#jzOfll%me:jI-klh6*u cj@{4*w#-f@Y*mp-&aghya^ salosgryAGFZ8G3yK$cyc}
Q*&y-&miwz5y-lm%r:@M+eyyA+%x-*xy0X1I.V,ycf&#jh&+mf@m+&qyRVWiV
Cm^%%%gzy-f*hEay&&g-h *qkgf+:s7@pcj@y@z3#b*evsEuegf+hXg%g.zOsda&fpzEyffs&,zWI:0:T0:2h{SLRYzayfj^yGH53}
3f$evzfs&&Ha#vkq:&"7 xm^&&e ,s^@lj&@-+mjkcdeh *jnf*koslt&&j pc*^-cj@$e$&+mf@sd?"
J $agzjczIrc$^&:z"Sso@lj&@kynujczryfz&f&l%uzzafsj@n%j&p&h%*dz@*dzf-s$%d&% p+jqyGz^vvk&ywgnhegjf+db&%gz!"

Hx&-k hygjeml@m+f&#al@S392y-%h^ez&-gk@w%k^+mf@is&uic^mhxgzk-^mhx$zy+*@wv&qymn #skq%mf*kcqj%mfmkxlj$c h#zzy&clbx#.


GVMTS-IPGV-INS-38:8:20:17:02:55</font>

Message sent...

[Qourr Mhawat]

Half-way up the corridor, they spotted it.

A spy cam.

It was hidden inside the panelling; a small, circular inlet that didn't look too suspicious - just like a simple small crack in the wall - but the scanner said otherwise.

"Arakyd G-T12 Spy Droid." Qourr overheard Jekaan mumbling to himself. She looked at him sceptically.

"You mean that thing isn't just a simple cam, but a droid?"

"Shhhhhhht! Keep your voice down. That thing has some rather strange modifications!" Jekaan whispered at her, waving her aside and out of the range of his scanner.

"Like what?" Qourr whispered back, moving behind him and looking at the hole over his shoulder.

"Like it was built with olfactory, auditory and visual enhancement in its eye. It can see, sense and hear with that thing." Jekaan told her.

Qourr swallowed hard.

"How do we get past it? Can you disable the damn thing somehow?" she finally whispered.

[Jekaan Oludh]

Jekaan brought up the schematic of the droid on his datapad. It wasn't the first time he had come across one of those damn droids - and he had barely escaped the last time.

What he wasn't telling Qourr was that the droid probably wasn't just a spy droid. It was more likely to be one of those G-2RD Guard droids, and they were extremely nasty. They not only came with a full sensor package, but also with an inbuilt stun and blaster appendage that it wasn't all too reluctant to use.

On his previous encounter with one of those things, his partner had been shot down when they were breaking through an impound lock to get back to their ship. The droid had just swooped in and blasted him down where he stood. It had earned Jekaan three months in the local lock-up before he'd been able to bust out and get back to his ship.

The three months he hadn't spent idle - he'd been making contingency plans, just in case he'd ever come across one of those damn droids again.

It seemed now was that time.

"Maybe it's turned off? I mean, if they're really that loose about security down here, they might have turned the droid off, too. Maybe it's just been left here to rot." Qourr finally whispered over his shoulder. Her voice sounded not too hopeful, though.

Just as Jekaan had loosened the power cell from his blaster, and was fumbling in one of his pockets for the other essential part that might be their only chance, the sound of ripping fabric reached his ears.

A ripping sound that came from a vibro-blade cutting through the disguised panel behind which the droid was hidden.

"M-maybe not...!!!" Qourr hissed into his ear, and he could hear her stepping back in panic.

Suddenly left with only seconds to spare before the vicious droid would punch through and attack them, Jekaan thought he would never find the right component. His mind reeling, he reached deeper into his pockets, and finally found what he was looking for - the cylindric shape of a restraining bolt.

As the droid finally stepped out - looking remotely like an ordinary protocol droid - and brought his blaster appendage to bear on Qourr who had backed away in panic until she was stopped by the wall on the opposite site of the corridor, giving the droid a perfect target to shoot at, Jekaan's shaking hands flew over the components he held, and wired the power cell to the restraining bolt.

Standing right beside the spot where the droid had appeared, he stood a chance that the deadly droid hadn't really noticed him yet, but for Qourr it seemed to late. As he kept a careful eye on the droid, while attaching the last wires, he heard her take in a deep breath, and run.

He groaned. Running wouldn't get her far, and, what was more, it would bring the droid after her. And that was the last thing Jekaan needed; it had to stay here, where he could reach it.

"Damn youngsters!" he hissed, loudly, just as the droid managed to snap off one shot at Qourr. Thankfully, the droid was in the process of spinning around, and the shot went wide.

But now he was facing Jekaan, and that wasn't good at all.

[Qourr Mhawat]

She went down hard to dodge the oncoming blaster bolt. Crashing onto the floor, she bumped her elbow hard, and could feel something snap, but when she managed to roll around and put some weight onto that arm, nothing felt wrong.

Reflexes took over as she rolled backwards, and into a shadowed part of the corridor. The glowrod on the wall seemed to have gotten the worst of that shot - it still gave off the occasional spark of electricity - but for now, it gave Qourr a bit of security.

Looking back to where Jekaan was still standing next to the hole in the wall where the droid had burst out off, she saw his movements half hidden behind the droid's body.

He seemed to just stand there waiting for the droid to approach him.

'What the flightly hell is he doing?' she thought. He had to have some kind of plan, but what it was, she could not fathom.

Leaning forward for a better view, she just caught a rapid movement of his arm, as he did something to the droid hidden from her view. The droid stepped back to get out of Jekaan's range and to get a better shot at him.

Then, suddenly, the corridor was filled with the noise of a booming explosion, and searing white light.

Qourr dropped back to the ground to shield herself from the blast. The shockwave swept over her, the heat burning her through her combat suit. She felt her hair crackling with static. Even the ground underneath her body felt hot to the touch.

When the noise had gone down and the heat died away, she looked up towards the spot where the droid and Jekaan had been. She didn't expect to see Jekaan having survived that infernal blast.

A charred pile of molten slag was all that remained of the droid. Small tongues of yellow flame licked up from it occasionally, and the smell of burning metals and plasteel filled the air. Acrid smoke hid the corridor behind what was left of the droid.

Qourr's spirits sank, as she faced the very real fear of having been left alone in an unknown environment with no one to turn to. She wasn't even sure how to get off this damn planet.

All her courage seemed to fail her, as she got up to sneak back out of the hole they had blasted in. That was the only way out of here, and it seemed the only option open to her.

A low moan came out from behind the thick clouds of grey smoke.

Her heart racing, she stopped in her stride. Could it be...?

Then she heard a cough, and the sound of of a body scraping over the ground.

She ran back up the corridor, towards the pile of molten droid, and past it. There, 20 feet away from her, Jekaan lay on the ground, char-faced, his hair standing up in a wild fashion, coughing hard.

She stopped at his feet, looking him over wide-eyed with surprise and happiness at not being left alone.

"WHat are you waiting for?" He finally croaked, after she had stood there for a few minutes, staring. "Help me up, you silly goose!"

[Jekaan Oludh]

Jekaan got up - with the help of Qourr - and spent the next 2 minutes dusting himself off.

The black soot on his face and uniform really wouldn't have been much of a hindrance in other circumstances, but in this case, when he really needed to play a part in which the uniform was essential, looking like something that had just stepped out of an explosion was not helpful.

He didn't feel much better than he looked, but that couldn't be helped. When he had managed to slap the modified restraining bolt onto the droid's chest-plate, his heart had nearly given out. Standing an arm's length away from a bomb you know will go off in the next minute is not particularly good for keeping one's life.

The last thing he had seen after pulling back and launching himself backwards into the air and onto the ground, was the droid triggering off one more shot with his blaster - a shot that had co-incided with the explosion of the blaster power cell, as the restraining bolt finally attached himself to the droid's body and the droid's last action made it carry out the pre-programmed shutdown - effecting an overload of the power cell.

It had gone better than expected, and if he weren't covered from head to toe in black soot, it would have been a perfect mission so far.

"Drok!" he exclaimed, while Qourr took out a piece of cloth from the inside of her hip-belt, and then proceeded to wipe off the soot from his bedraggled uniform.

To his surprise, the spot which she had just wiped off, came out looking as perfect and spotless as before.

It took him a minute to remember that those COMPNOR uniforms were manufactured with some kind of dirt-repellant material.

"DROK!" he cursed again.

Another couple of minutes passed, during which the two of them did their best to return Jekaan to presentability. He spotted his datapad as he wiped off his shoes, and rapidly retrieved it from the pile of droid-scrap.

Thumbing it on, he felt relief at finding it still operational. It held not only the entire map of the building, but also valuable codes he would need and the contact information for the meeting with the other agent Isard had promised to send him.

And still no one had come to investigate the strange noises emanating from the ground floor of the Administration building. Sound-proof or not - the shockwave alone should have alerted someone.

As he somewhat shakily made his way along the corridor walls, he hoped against all hope that everything would go well - and that there wasn't another one of those droids around...

It was then that another realization came to him: he could have just fired a shot off with that blaster Hyfe had modified earlier! the droid would have gone off into the direction he had seen the shot coming from, and they could have sneaked off into the opposite direction...

"DROKKIN DAMN!" he swore, under his breath. Why hadn't he thought of that, instead of risking both their lives like he had???

Suddenly, the locator button on his datapad blinked on and off. A turbolift!

He had programmed it earlier to find them the nearest and best route into and through the building. It was their only chance to find a way through this warren of corridors and rooms.

Around a corner they stepped, cautiously, and there, right in front of them, was the door of the turbo-lift.

He heard Qourr let off a relieved-sounding sigh, and he couldn't suppress one himself.

One look around didn't reveal any more hidden spy-cams, so he thumbed the call-button, and barely two seconds later, the door opened for them. They stepped inside.

EDIT: spelling

[Qourr Mhawat]

"What's going to happen next?" Qourr whispered at Jekaan, as she stood next to him in the turbolift carrying them upwards. It had just dawned upon her that she actually didn't have the slightest clue as to what exactly they were supposed to do here.

Jekaan lifted a hand in warning, as the lift came to a stop on the third floor.

She decided to leave the questions for later, and just follow his lead for now. It was probably better she didn't know anything - it had been drilled into her that the less she knew, the less could she give away in case she got captured.

When the turbo-lift doors opened, the lift's interior would have looked empty to the eyes of a passer-by. But again, this floor was completely devoid of all life.

Qourr slowly leaned forward and looked past the doors up and down the corridor. No one around.

Both of them stepped out, blasters held ready.

The corridor they stepped into was carpeted, which muffled their steps. Glowrods along the walls gave it just enough illumination to give them a good view ahead. Dark wood covered the walls - someone with an expensive taste, Qourr presumed.

She tapped Jekaan on the shoulder as they were advancing down the corridor.

"What are we looking for?"

Jekaan consulted his datapad for a moment, highlighted one particular spot on its map, and showed it to Qourr.

"That's the database. That's the place we need. Shouldn't be too far ahead."

[Jekaan Oludh]

He memorized the way to the highlighted spot on his map, and put the datapad away. For now, it was more important to keep his eyes on his surroundings, just in case they came up against any sudden surprise attacks.

He took out the modified blaster, just in case.

As they were rounding a corner, suddenly, Jekaan could hear a faint sound of muffled voices coming from somewhere ahead. He stopped dead in his tracks, and stepped back, bumping into Qourr.

"Back that way! Find cover!" he urgently whispered at his young partner, as he turned and fled back into the direction they had come, Qourr trailing after him.

Halfway down the corridor, they passed a door with a sign "Director Strone, Administration" on it. It stood ajar a few inches, and peeking through the gap, Jekaan didn't see anyone inside.

"In here!" he murmured at Qourr, and the two agents rushed into the room and closed the door behind them. Pressed against the door, with one ear listening to the approaching sound of voices, they stood there, blasters drawn and activated.

But the voices passed and receded into silence again.

Jekaan let out a deep breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding in, and took a look around.

The administration office was gloomy and dark, the computer consoles on the far side turned off. The chair behind the desk had been pushed back, as if its occupant had been in haste. An abandoned datapad lay on the desk, hastily discarded when its owner left.

Jekaan stepped behind the desk, and took a closer look. It hadn't been switched off, and the information accessed by whoever owned the datapad - Strone, in all possibility - was still visible on it.

"Interesting..." he mumbled to himself, as his eyes scanned across the text and memorized parts of the information contained in it. "Adalric Brandl...now there's a name I haven't heard in a long time. I thought the guy was dead...!"

Finally he put the datapad down and nodded to Qourr, who had been fidgeting nervously near the door, while he'd been taking a look around.

She visibly straightened up, eager to get going again, and joined him at the door. Blasters raised, he thumbed the controls to unlock the door.

It stayed close.

[Qourr Mhawat]

"Uh oh..." Qourr unnecessarily remarked. This was bad. They were trapped. And someone was bound to come in sooner or later and find them.

She watched Jekaan take out his datapad, and scan the touchpad that was supposed to open the door.

"Additional layer of security...strange..." she heard him mumble to himself.

"What's that?" she asked him, and stepped closer.

"That means that underneath the top layer of that touchpad is another layer of wiring. Which means..." -he started working on the pad as he explained it to Qourr- "The question is what this means - if they have an extra layer of security in her that keeps us locked inside, then it's logical that there's something in here that would have been a trap of another kind."

Qourr looked around the room, carefully this time. If Jekaan was right, then if they hadn't been able to open the door, they either would have triggered an alarm throughout the building, or some hidden weapons system or, possibly, a gas bomb of some kind, would have gone off inside the room. She shuddered.

Jekaan put the touchpad together again, keeping his foot in the door to prevent it from closing again.

Qourr slipped past him back into the corridor, and listened and looked for any signs of life. It remained quiet.


Finally, they both stood outside the room, as the door closed behind them. Jekaan gestured into the direction they had to flee back from, and once again, they crept along the corridor on the search for the small chamber highlighted on Jekaan's datapad.

[Jekaan Oludh]

They stopped again outside a nondescript grey door devoid of any sign or classification.

Jekaan doubled-checked with his datapad, but it told him the same thing as his memory had - they were at the right spot. He pointed at the door and nodded to Qourr, a satisfied smirk on his face.

She grinned back, then stepped up right next to the door, pressing herself flat against the wall, her eyes furtively glancing up and down the corridor.

Apparently, some of that intrusion training hadn't been wasted on her after all.

Jekaan got working on opening the door. There was no visible touhcpad or any other kind of unlocking device anywhere near it, so it had be opened by some kind of signal - a transmitted signal.

That was not good.

If it had been another modified touchpad like the one they had encountered in the administration office, that would have made things easier. But where could he possibly get the right signal from? It could be almost anything - it wasn't just a matter of "take-a-guess-and-you-might-be-right". Judging by the rest of the security in this building it was probable that taking even as much as one wrong guess would trigger a timer that could only be stopped by transmitting the right signal within seconds, or an alarm would go off.

This was definately not good.

[Qourr Mhawat]

"Something wrong, sir?" Qourr asked, after she had watched her partner first grow annoyed, then fidgety.

He'd been standing there looking at that door for a long time, and it still remained unopened.

"Blast you to hell and back, Strone!" she heard him curse under his breath. "Drokkin bastard has to be up to something to have such a drokkin lot of security on this place!"

Finally he stood back and scratched his head. "Yeah, I can't get past that drokkin door, Qourr - that's what's wrong!"

"Oh." That was all she could say. She hadn't expected her hitherto so efficient seeming partner to be stopped short by a silly door. "Can't we just blast it?"

[Jekaan Oludh]

Jekaan rolled his eyes at that. "No, Qourr - that would probably set an alarm off you could hear from here to Imperial Center!"

He sighed, looking angrily at the door. He cursed himself silently for not having planned for such a contingency. There was enough special equipment on his ship to have enabled him to deal with this sort of thing within seconds. It would have taken just one scan with a radio-wave Echo Tracer, and he could have picked up even the faintest echo of the transmission signal he needed.

A loud sigh escaped his lips. "I wish I'd researched a bit better... just half an hour of recording transmissions earlier on would have done the trick..." he thought out aloud, as he leaned back against the wall next to Qourr.

The only logical choice open to them now was to get out, return to his shio, pick up his special equipment, and come back here - preferably without being detected by anyone.

They'd be late for the rendezvous with whoever Isard sent as back-up.

[Qourr Mhawat]

"Uh... sir? You mean local comm traffic?" Qourr finally ventured to ask.

Jekaan let out an exasperated sigh, and closed his eyes resignedly. "Yes, Qourr, that's what I meant."

A grin spread across her face. "Uh, sir, Mr Hyfe told me when we got here that I should make myself useful and keep an eye on the local comm traffic and I've--"

Jekaan's eyes snapped open. "You recorded the local comm traffic?"

This was almost too good to be true.

"Well, as I was just about to say, sir - I wasn't supposed to record it, but those mechanics boys in there kept me occupied, so I recorded it to listen later and---"

"Give me the recording!" He interrupted her again, sounding almost breathless and giddy with excitement.

[Jekaan Oludh]

It didn't take the program in his datapad all too long to make sense out of the full three hours of recorded comm messages. After running the shorter transmissions against the location variables, he was left with only two short transmission bursts - both less than a second long and identical. It was simply a matter of re-playing the transmission signal then.

A few seconds later, they were inside.

The room must once have been a huge chamber, but now only little space for access points and seating was left. The masive storage space of the central mainframe computer holding the Colony's Database took up nearly the entire room. What little remaining space was left besides the consoles and technology, was taken up by shelves full of neatly stacked datacards.

Slicer's heaven. Jekaan almost felt at home.

As Qourr boredly sat down at a console to take a peek at whatever local entertainment could be found in this place, Jekaan settled in for his long search for the datafile he was looking for.

[Qourr Mhawat]

After an hour of trying to make sense of a game of Quadrant, Qourr finally gave up - ships and troops and such stuff really wasn't her kind of thing. She sat back and watched Jekaan instead.

He looked like a kid with a new toy - all glassy eyed and excited.

Suddenly, her curiosity couldn't be held in check any longer. "Uh, sir? Can I ask you something?"

She had to ask another three times before she finally got a grunted response out of him. "Wha?"

"Ah sir, I was wonderin'...what's this mission about? I mean, Mr Hyfe never said a word, and you didn't say anything either. What are we doin' here?"

She watched him as he continued scanning file for file for a few more minutes, his face bathed in a blue glow from the monitor's illumination.

[Jekaan Oludh]

He'd found it. The datafile was here. Now he just needed to decrypt it. And it wasn't anything he'd ever seen before - this needed a new kind of program. Somewhat absent-minded, he finally began to speak.

"Strone - the administrator of this place - and I, we've known each otehr for a long time. He once worked for us for a short time, back in the days when he was manager of the Bilbringi shipyards. Always had some kind of black-market deal going on the side, though, that guy had... until he vanished a few years ago, and I assumed one of his partners had run him down or something. Killed him, you know?"

He paused, entering another command to the decryption program he was slowly setting up.

"Two days ago, I got a mysterious message from him - something about a business of some kind. Seems to have gone out to lots of people, from what I could trace... made me curious, that message. So I left a note for good ol' Isard and left for this place."

The program was finished. He fed it into the database and watched as random numbers started appearing rapidly. He grinned broadly, and tapped in a few more commands into the program.

"Anyway, I was on my way, when I suddenly think of something I overheard ol' Armand Isard say a long time ago. I remembered him mentioning sending a team out to Halbara to set up a listening outpost of some kind."

The random numbers in front of him transformed into co-ordinates, and he began downloading them onto his datapad.

"So I checked the files i brought with me. And Vader's black soul, what should I stumble across? That outpost was no simple outpost, but a fully functioning long -range communications center with all kinds of fancy technology, and one holding a nice little chace of weapons on top of that...there's only one problem - the guys sent to set it up were able to send out one message of success, before they got themselves killed when half a mountain fell on their heads one day. All we got was that they'd left the exact location in a hidden file in the local database."

He over-layed the map he had of the planet on his datapad with a grid, and added the co-ordinates he 'd just downloaded.

"That was around the time when our Izzy managed to get the old tyrant out of the way, and all further knowledge about it went when Armand ended up as hawkbat fodder....may he rot in hell! ... when I remembered, I contacted Hyfe and you to help me out... And here we are."

He held the datapad up for her to see. A red blinking light on the otherwise blue-glowing map indicated the location of the hidden outpost.

On the other side of the planet, and underneath that mountain that had killed the other agents.

[Qourr Mhawat]

Qourr looked at him, unmoved.

"We've gone through all this trouble just for a bit of old technology?!! Don't tell me that that's it!"

If there was anything she considered a wasted time then it would have been this...they had both nearly been killed by that damn droid downstairs, had gone through all the trouble with the security and all... and for what? A pile of old computers that Jekaan thought important.

"Hmph...!" she grumbled.

Jekaan stared at her, in an expression that didn't leave much to guess for anyone, about his opinion about her. After a while, he just shrugged his shoulders.

"Just bear with me for a little while longer, will you? I don't doubt that you might think it's boring and unimportant, but trust me - what we're doing here is vital to Intel."

She nodded at him, mollified. So this was an important mission after all...not what she'd expected, but then this was just her first mission. Maybe it would get more interesting in the future.

'I just hope that I'm not going to be permanently stuck with him as a partner,' she hoped.

[Jekaan Oludh]

Jekaan stared vacantly at Qourr for another while. He really didn't understand her sometimes. And he was far from happy that Isard had allowed her into the Service.

He imagined that there probably could not have been a worse combination of agents in any of the teams they had all been split into. And he guessed that she was about as happy about it as he was - possibly even less.

'Wait till she finds out that this is permanent!' he thought.

With one last silent curse at Isard for giving him a partner like Qourr, he finally started packing his datacards and pocket-computers together.

"Well, get your stuff together - we're finished here. And we've got an appointment to keep, so hurry up."

Moments later, they were back outside in the corridor. Jekaan checked with his datapad, and finally pointed left.

"That way. Let's go."

[GuardPiett]

It was cold, cold day in space as Piett sat, huddled in the commanding chair of the NSD Spectrum. He watched the idle crewers meander b as he was conversing with the TSO forces above Correlia, but he was interupted..

"Sir, we have an incoming message."

"Sent by whom?"

"Imperial Intelligence, on Coruscant."

Piett tilted his head, and lay in thought for several seconds before straightening up and standing.

"Captain," said Piett, nodding to the holographic image of the TSO Captain. "I must be going. I will talk to you in a matter of minutes."

"Of course, sir."

"As for the message. . . Have communications relay it to my personal quarters. I'll read what old Isard has to say there."

"Sir," said the cadet, snapping his heals before swiveling and walking out.

Sean snapped his fingers, summoning a clearance card from a nearby desk. He turned, and walked to the door. After opening it, he strided down the stuffy corridor, turning and swiveling as if he had grown up on this ship. After traveling quite a ways, he encountered a special glowrod on the wall. He reached up, grabbed it ever so slightly, and closed his eyes, deep in thought. "I had better get this right," he whispered under his breath. "Or else it'll emit a small spike that will poison me, devaying my body, leaving the vital organs for last. Eaten alive. . No fun there." He fidgeted slightly, thinking of what the exact proceedure was. "Thirty degrees turn left, fifty degrees right, pull it straight down. ."

He turned it the full one-twelveth of a circle to the left, and the fifty degrees right. Hoping that this wouldn't be the end of him, he sharply pulled the glowrod down. It groaned mercilessly as the walls yanked apart, exposing a barren and dank corridor. "And to think. . All that risk for a shortcut." Piett allowed himself a small grin.


After the trek down this hall, he had come to the speedrail. A small speeder attached to a rail that would drive him at immense speeds to his destination. Namely: his room. He got into the small speeder, reminiscent of a Gian, and sped down the corridor. As the resisting wind bounced off his face, Sean smiled, relishing the smooth pull of the air running at his body. Even this, a small, short speeder ride, was enough to send a thrill coursing through Pietts bloodstream. </i."You never feel this in a fighter. You never feel so.. Alive on the bridge of a monolith such as this ship," [i]Spoke Piett. "Even the smallest ride is a thrill."

Running right through the middle of the ship, the ride had brought him from the blister of the bridge all the way to here, the very tip of the ship. His true quarters. He hulled the speeder to a stop, jumping out and running at the door to his left. He pulled out the clearance, and ran it through the small card lock. It bleeped happily before the door slid open to let him in.

Walking in, he yelled at the M-3PO unit. "Pull up any transmissions from IIHQ, stat!"

"Yessirr," grunted the military proticol unit. He waddeled over to the communications console, punching a small button. A message blurted out..

<font color="red">38:8:20:17:01:37-IIHQ-COR.1.IPC-GVMTS

OPERATION CRYSTALS

Outline: Meet with Intel agents to recover old equipment storage facility and set up outpost on planet. Special task: check equipment and set up for use, demolitions
Location: Halbara, Elrood Sector
Primary Contact: Rass Leiger {Jekaan Oludh in disguise of COMPNOR Major}
Secondary Contact: Comm Channel 2588.3, encryption code T33-A
Location and Time of meeting: Foyer of Radell Mining Corp. Visitor Lounge, 38:8:22:9 {0900 hours IPCT}
Challenge Phrase: "Excuse me, could you tell me where the refresher station is?"
Response Phrase: "I would advise you to take your dirty paws off my arm before I blast you to oblivion!"

Please do not contact IIHQ about this mission - direct contact can be made over secondary contact before meeting.

GVMTS-IPGV-INS-38:8:20:17:02:55</font>

Piett gazed at the message in amazement. Surely, this was not meant for him. He sat there, pondering..

[Jekaan Oludh]

The brief walk down the corridors and the short trip downwards in the turbolift progressed without any trouble.

The building remained as quiet and devoid of any sign of life as it had been ever since they had first set foot inside it.

'Maybe this place is just not very busy...' Jekaan thought to himself, as doubts resurfaced. 'Maybe Strone messed up this place as much as he messed up Sluis...wouldn't surprise me at all.'

When he cast a brief glance over his shoulder, he saw the usual bored expression written on Qourr's face. Not much of a surprise there...

They finally reached a part of the building where the glow-lapms on the walls glowed brighter, where a low murmur of voices could be heard faintly from behind walls.

"Back to civilisation...," he remarked, under his breath.

Brushing the wrinkles out of his COMPNOR officer's uniform, he mentally checked his appearance and schedule again. What was the Challenge Phrase again? He had it somewhere in his datapad...

What if the agent they were supposed to meet wasn't there yet? would they get any problems if they had to wait?

This was a precarious situation, and Qourr's presence only made it more so. He did not know if he could count on her to understand and comply if he had to make a spontaneous decision that she was not used to. As far as he was concerned, she was nothing but a green kid - albeit a fairly lethal green kid - with little experience in the field.

'Well, I guess we all have to make our experiences somehow...' he sighed to himself.

But there was nothing immediately wrong with the next step in the plan, and if he stood here much longer worrying about little things, the chance of someone picking them up on suspicious behaviour would grow. No, there was no point in drawing it out - it was now or never.

"Give me your hands," he told her, a little rough.

She looked at him with a puzzled look in her eyes, but complied and held out her hands as he had told her to.

He brought out a couple of binders and was about to put them around her wrists, when she snatched her hands back.

"Flightly hell, what do you think you're doing???"

[Qourr Mhawat]

She stared at him with incredulous eyes. Had he gone completely daft now? There was no way she'd let herself be cuffed and shackled and paraded around by him.

He put a hand on her arm, to soothe her temper, and held out the shackles for her to see.

"This is just disguise, Qourr - see? They're fake - they'll open whenever you want."

He talked to her slowly, and carefully, as if she was a child who didn't understand. Sure, she understood him, and what he had in mind, but she wasn't going to make this easy on him. Where was the fun in that?

"So? Why do I have to wear them?" she asked him.

He stood back a step, and pointed at himself for her to take a look.

"Look at me, Qourr - I'm the one wearing the uniform here. I'm an official - you're dressed like someone who just entered unbidden. The only way we get into that foyer and past the security is to disguise you as my prisoner. No one would suspect a bedraggled prisoner being guarded by a COMPNOR officer, right?"

Qourr let off a long, deep sigh, then held out her hands and he put the shackles on them.

She moved her hands to check if she had any problems getting out when she wanted, but the cuffs opened as he had promised.

As they marched on, she put on her best martyred face and they walked around the last corner, to arrive in the foyer.

[Director Isard]

TTT for Piett

[Jekaan Oludh]

An hour later, he had just paced the hall out for the umpteenth time, Qourr trailing after him in a sulky manner. She'd been silently muttering to herself ever since they had gotten here, and - as far as it concerned their disguise - that was just fine with him.

His mood was rapidly deteriorating from angry to outraged. In the past hour, he'd been making a completle fool of himself, asking three new arrivals if they could point out where the refreshers were, and had gotten nothing but blank or very puzzled stares back.

It was humiliating.

Qourr had taken all three attempts to silently gloat at his back afterwards, snickering behind his back when he had approached the next person.

It was driving him mad.

He would make someone pay for this - someone would have to pay. And he'd start straight away with Qourr the moment they got to a less public place. She would receive the worst punishm--

"Excuse me, but could you tell me where the refresher station is?"

[Fewdman]

It was the end of the line for this vent. Fewd cursed something about lousy engineers who didn't keep up to date plans. Half these vents weren't even included in the blueprints. The Jedi Knight's eyes rolled skyward as he began to turn around... and the vent's metal began to groan. Morgan moved to just the right spot to fall freely. He landed on his feet, but there was debris spread about, but especially near the refresher. Fewd almost swore something awful when he spotted Qourr and Jekaan, but there was something wrong with the picture.

The tall blonde woman was mocking the portly fellow with far too much zeal to be a prisioner. Something else was up.

[Qourr Mhawat]

Qourr was laughing so hard at her partner's enraged face that she didn't even notice the sudden and somewhat unusual appearance of a dark-clad man further down the hall. Jekaan had been so uptight about this whole situation, that it tempation to annoy him even further just had been too great.

Jekaan looked about ready to explode, as a motion at the corner of his eye made him look over. Qourr, who'd expected a cascade of swearwords to descend on her, followed his gaze and stared blankly at the apparition.

She had a feeling in her stomach. Something had just gone wrong. Young men didn't just fall out of the ceilings like that...

[Fewdman]

Fewd wasn't exactly sure what to make of the situation. Normally he planned for this sort of thing, but it seemed he had the good luck to land somewhere inconspicious. At least he could get his bearings and move on.

But the matter of the blonde woman and the portly fellow complicated matters. The former slicer did the only thing he could think of. He looked at his data pad began to get hold of his bearings. Morgan scratched his chin a bit, and then walked twoards Jekaan.

"Excuse me, do you know where the refreshers are?"

[Jekaan Oludh]

He couldn't believe this! First Qourr is playing silly tricks on him, then this very suspicious looking guy literally falls out of nowhere and lands at their feet?

And this was suppposed to be their contact????

He had to wonder... he really had to wonder. 'Isard must be slipping badly if she sends me people like that to help out!'

Still, he had to admit that it was a fairly novel way of making contact.

Shoving Qourr out of the way, he slowly approached the stranger with an outstretched hand, grinning slightly. It was a facial expression and mood that completely went against his next words.

"I'd advise you to take your dirty paws off my arm before I blast you to oblivion!"

The other man looked extremely taken aback.

[Fewdman]

Fewd stared at Jekaan in a manner only reserved for someone who just told you that they figured a new way to breathe. Out of your armpits.

"That makes absolutely no sense. I'm not touching you, and I somehow doubt the blasting into oblivion bit too. Maybe blast, but oblivion is a bit far. You are a bit mad."

[GuardPiett]

Should he? Would he? Could he?

Yes to the first, and yes to the third. It was that second that was the real clincher. But was the message really meant for him? He really couldn't take the risk of it not being.

But was it really so hard to believe? After all, he was a sith, and he did work side by side with Isard in the Nexus. She knew him quite well.

Let's go for it! screeched a voice in the back of his head. Bloody hell, why not?

He subconsciously walked over to the closet and crabbed the handle. He thought for a second, as if trying to remember something. He must have, because a second later he had his hand around the pull handle. He gave it a quarter spin right, and two full to the left, and righted it perfectly vertical. He pulled it out, and the door slid open.

Before his taciturn eyes appeared a vast array of weapons and clothing. Ranging from an old E-11 to a DigiTech body glove, the assortment was great. His hand reached out and grabbed a black jumpsuit, sliding off his uniform and on the more stealthy facade. He put a Czerca VibroKnuckler over the knuckles of his left hand, and he slipped a small tazer into a breast pocket. He reached to take his lightsaber off the uniform's belt, but hesitated. He decided against it. Working with people in high places, he didn't want to seem a bit over-accesorized, or possibly even intimidating. Instead, he pulled a small blaster to him and clipped it into the holster.

He swiftly exited the chamber, and headed up to the docking bay. There, he boarded a small shuttle. He ordered a pair of technichians upgrading it off the ship, and exited the bay. Flying through space towards the most convinient hyperspace jumppoint for Halbara.

______-LATER-______


Standing at the exit of the shuttle, watching as the departure ramp lowered, the man stepped out. The sun shone weakly at his course and sweat-matted black hair, red streaks dull from the moisture created in the humid ship. He ran a hand through it, seperating the sweat from it. He strode down the ramp, glancing back and forth at the riffraff walking swiftly through the bay. He saw a crisply dressed man, looking distinctly curious with his seemingly false hair and muttonchops. Piett walked towards him.

He quite rudely brushed a COMPNOR officer, dragging along a poor human, conversing with a rather vulgar looking individual. The blonde prisoner extended a foot slightly, possibly intentionaly. Piett lost his balance, having to grab the COMPNOR officer's arm for support. The man looked deaminingly at Sean, and embarased, the former guard yelled at the man he believed to be Jekaan.

"Excuse me, could you tell me where the refresher station is?"

[Jekaan Oludh]

Jekaan felt like ramming his own head into the wall, or chewing the carpet right then. What in drokkin' space was going on??? TWO contacts?

Qourr grinning at him at his side was no help.

Confused, he eyed first the young man with the datapad, then the other one in the black jumpsuit. Then he looked back at the other guy, and a certain suspicion cropped up in his mind.

The guy in the black jumpsuit looked vaguely familiar. He'd seen him somewhere before, but he was pretty much sure that the guy hadn't been wearing black back then.

The datapad guy was strange. Not just cos he'd never seen him - but there was something strange about him. People didn't just drop out of air vents for a meeting. Could it be that the guy had just used the challenge phrase by mistake? After all, there were quite normal reasons to inquire about the refreshers... although he couldn't think of one that would require crawling out of air vents for it.

Jekaan looked at the guy in the black jumpsuit again. That guy did look like someone sent by Isard - not everyone would be walking around in public with a VibroKnuckler on his hand... ISARD! Drokkin hell, now he remembered! It was Piett! How in space had she managed to get her Nexus advisor to come into this???

Momentarily he forgot himself, and grabbed Piett's arm.

"Yeah, yeah, nice to have you with us...but now who--?"

When he looked back at the datapad guy, his expression was fierce. This had to be another agent sent by someone else. Possibly someone who knew of their own plans.

[GuardPiett]

"Jekaan? Bloody hell, what in the name of Xim are you doing here?"

Then the pieces slid together. Jekaan.. Jekaan was the IIHQ contact! But who were these two blondes? Jekaan Was the type to get into trouble, Piett knew him slightly, but no assasin guild would send, so openly, a pair of assasins. Which is how this seemed. Oh, bother. What to do?

[Fewdman]

OOC: I'M NOT BLONDE, DAMMIT. *Points at his head. Brown. See? ITS BROWN!
IC:

Fewd stood bewildered. He now knew something odd was up. These deffinately were not COMPNOR folk, which was a good thing, but... why were these people here? What in the name of all things with keypads were they looking for.

He blinked his green eyes.

"Why are you two staring at me?"

[Qourr Mhawat]

Qourr finally gave up trying to suppress the laughter, and, looking at the confusing faces around her, broke out in fits of giggling.

For once, it didn't seem to attract Jekaan's ire.

It seemed to her quite logical what was going on - the first guy had accidently used the right challenge phrase, and the second guy was the one sent by Isard.

With an insight that seemed sudden and rare to her, she realised that the guy dropping out of the ceiling was a threat of some sort - an opponent in whatever game they were playing.

She charged at him and knocked the somewhat dazed looking guy to the ground.

[Fewdman]

Morgan let a simple "oof" free as he hit the ground. The fall barely fazed him, and he used the energy from the blow to roll back to his feet. He glanced at the vent, and quickly decided it would continue to collapse if he tried re-entry.

The woman certainly could hit hard. Maybe fighting outnumbered was not the ideal way to solve this situation.

"I don't know what you people are up to, but maybe you could use a hand. If its information you seek, I could most likely be able to help."

[Jekaan Oludh]

Jekaan was startled out of his confusion by the uncharacteristic action of Qourr. True, she had done the only thing logical - but that was even more astonishing. He woulnd't have thought she would be able to assess the situation better than he would.

The stranger got to his feet in a fluid motion that betrayed his unassuming manner.

Jekaan listened to his words, but did not really register them beyond their meaning. He had to make a decision, and he had to make it fast, before the situation could get out of hand.

Not like there were a lot of options.

"Qourr? Deal with him!"

Qourr's eyes went wide with a mixture of glee and astonishment, and she didn't waste another thought. She went into attack position.

"Uh... Jekaan? That's not such a good idea..." Piett whispered at him. "That guy's a--- forget it, too late."

[Fewdman]

Qourr lunged at Morgan, only to find him right behind her. Fewd used his force granted speed to his advantage, and quickly made Qourr's legs dissapear out from under her with a sweep.

She got up and growled. The Jedi Knight rolled his eyes.

"I don't want to hurt you."

Qourr growled again, and lunged once more. Morgan dove out of the way, got back to his feet and dashed to a nearby wall and leaned causually against it. He continued to check the floorplan for where he was exactly.

[GuardPiett]

Piett gazed at the blonde going at Fewdman, and reaches into his pocket, as if to grab some sort of tool or weapon. He came out empty handed, however, and instead of provoking violence, he grabbed Quorr on the shoulder.

"Intel agent, stand back. No reason to spoil the floor here with jedi blood."

[Fewdman]

Morgan had finally determined where the hell he was when Piett grabbed grabbed Qourr to stand down.

"Intel Agent..." Fewd flipped the phrase through his brain a few times. It finally made sense. Intel agents wanted something from COMPNOR. Piett was their contact. That would explain why he had picked up me as a Jedi...

"What are you looking for, ImpIntel?"

[Jekaan Oludh]

He looked at the melee with consternation. A Jedi?? Drokkin hell - that was bad news! This could possibly disturb the plans completely!

What if the Jedi had somehow discerned the plans from reading their minds? They could do that, couldn't they?

He was getting extremely worried, and gave Qourr an annoyed stare. It was about time she did something about the situation - after all that bragging about her skills, and after what she had done to that bunch of mechanics in the hangar earlier, it was time she showed that she could stand up against a drokkin Jedi as well.

When he heard Piett throw out the words ImpIntel, he felt like bashing the Sith's head in. That idiot had given away everything! Now all the Jedi had to do was to put two and two together, and read their minds a little, and the whole operation would be compromised!

The Jedi seemed to find it incredibly funny, asking what they were looking for - as if he wouldn't already know!

A silence descended upon all of them. Jekaan looked at Qourr, then at Piett, and finally at the Jedi who was standing there looking slightly less confused than before.

There was only one way out, and it seemed like he would have to do it himself, as Piett and Qourr didn't seem able to do anything.

He grabbed his blaster and aimed it at the Jedi.

"We certainly weren't looking for you. 'scuse me."

Then, without another word of warning, he fired a stunbolt at the Jedi.

[Morgan Evanar]

Morgan continued to try to get an exact fix on where he was... the damned place looked the same all the way through, and crawling through undocumented vents wasn't helping. Now he was near grumpy intel agents and one Sean Piett. The day was looking up, to be sure. Morgan rolled his eyes, and noted that the more rotund agent was drawing his blaster. "We certainly weren't looking for you. 'scuse me."

Uh oh.

Fewd dropped the datapad, and pulled his knees to his chest just before Oludh pulled the trigger, and hit the ground.

He felt a bit woozy, but otherwise intact. Morgan drew his Desert Eagle with less than normal celerity, but his nerves in his right arm seemed to be working well enough to give him a steady shot. After all, his left arm had gotten most of the stun blast. He pulled the trigger and the pellet of compressed air tossed Oludh into the air.

"Damnit ImpIntel, what the hell are you looking for? I'm no mind reader."

"Maybe I can still get out of here before some wayward COMPNOR staff spots me.

And suddendly, the Jedi Knight seemingly dissapeared into thin air. Piett was confused. He could only feel a general lightside presence.

"Damn ImpIntel." The voice echoed through the corridor oddly.

TTT

[Qourr Mhawat]

Qourr was crouched against the wall, her legs too shaky to hold her upright, when things got out of hand.

She couldn't really decide is she should sulk, or be glad, at Piett's intervention. Jedi wasn't something she liked fighting against. They had this flightly damn good luck all the time. Just didn't seem fair.

But Piett didn't do much else but stand around and talk either, so she was really happy when Jekaan finally grabbed for his blaster.

What happened next wasn't quite as much to her liking. Cos one minute, there she was propped against the wall - and the next, there comes fat Oludh flying at her at full speed, crashing down on top of her, landing them both on the floor and jamming all air out of her lungs for what seemed like forever.

She screamed and kicked, trying to get his heavy and quite immobile body off her, and finally gave him a vicious kick upwards with both elbows. He was still senseless, but he groaned and rolled about. She gave him another small punch wiht her fist into his belly - just for good measure - then finally got herself disentangled and looked up.

The Jedi wasn't there. And Piett stood there with a really dumb look on his face.

"Wha??? Where's he gone?"

[GuardPiett]

Angered, filled with slight contempt, Piett glanced around, looking for the Jedi. What is he, one of those alien sayians? I've never seen a normal person teleport before... He walked away from Quorr and Jekaan, now surrounded by a mob of viewers, drawn by the light and noise of blasterfire.

Triggerhappy InSec... muttered Piett. "Jeekan," he muttered out of a corner of his mouth. "I'd get out of here. It seems you're brilliant maneuver's attracted the real COMPNOR agents. I'm going to look for the Jedi a bit. Call me if you need me," he said, tossing a commlink into the man's hands.

[Morgan Evanar]

A few security officers in the crowd moved to draw their blasters, and found that they were not there. Odd snickering echoed through the corridor, seemingly coming from every direction at once.
A few looked extremely nervous.

Mintues passed, and then down the hall was a thump, some ripping noises, and an anguished cry.

There was a COMPNOR security agent duct-taped to the wall, and more of the echoed from everywhere snickering.

[Jekaan Oludh]

Jekaan slapped one last peice of tape over the agent's mouth and stripped off his ID, attaching it to his own uniform. He carefully attached an additional chevron to his left shoulder, and stepped over to Qourr.

"I'm going to cuff you again. Go limp and make no sounds." She groaned, and for measures, Jekaan shoved a gag in her mouth.

A few minute later, while he was dragging her body down the hallway, a voice interupted the repetitive clunk of his boots. "Marc, haven't seen you in ages!" Jekaan groaned inwards, and strained to see the man's ID. "Hey... Jole." The man grinned, and moved slightly from his post at the exit of the exterior lounge. His blaster went limp and hung at his side.

"Gained a few pounds, huh?"

"You know it," said Jekaan, attempting to grin.

"So, who's that lovely lady?" Qourr pulled slightly at her bonds and grunted. Jekaan reached down and clamped her mouth shut. "She's, er..." Jekaan searched for something, anything. "She's a pro. Picked her up hanging by the refresher."

Jole grinned. "Poor gel. With a body like that... It's hardly a crime." Qourr strained again. "So whereabouts you going?"

"I've.. Er... I'm taking her out to Omicron station." He crossed his fingers and prayed that COMPNOR used the Grecian alphabet to name their bases. "Oh," said a stuttering Jole. "Omicron... Yeah. Alright." Jekaan seized the moment. "Don't tell me they haven't told you about Omicron Station?!"

Jole scratched his head. "Of course they have. I just thought I'd better not tell you anything y-you didn't know."

"Alright, Jole. Later." He started walking through the door. "Wait!" said Jole. Jekaan stopped and shuddered slightly. "One plus one..." he said, leaving the sentance open for Jekaan, or 'Marc', to complete. He took a stab in the dark. "Equals... Trouble?"

Jole laughed. "You need to brush up your memory, Marc. I'm sur-"

"Gotta go. Running a pretty tight schedule. Bye, Jole."

"Bye!" he yelled through the closing door.

"Alright, Qourr. Look alive. We've gotta snag a speeder."
"A pro? Is that the best you can do?!"
"I meant professional," said Jekaan, flashing a grin. "But really, we need to get to work." With a groan, Qourr submitted, and the two began running to the vehicle garage. At the door stood a black clothed man. The one, and fortunately only, Sean Piett. "There you are. I had thought COMPNOR got you. Looks like you got promoted," he said, gesturing at the additional chevrons. "But of course. We're gonna hotwire one of these things. Care to join us?"

"No, Jekaan. I'll be lagging back to cover any tracks, see if I can find the Jedi."

"Alright. Meet us at the site."

Piett opened the door to the garage, and slipped into the shadows. "He's gone. Let's flip on some lights, see what, exactly, we want to take."

Qourr reached to a pannel and pressed it in, and the large garage was flooded with light. They looked down the rows and rows of speeders, cloud cars, Moles, and the like. Qourr rubed a pristine UV-900 JuggerYacht with her index and middle fingers, admiring it all from the scarlet hue of the hull to the smart looking white streaks cutting through the red. It was, without a doubt, the Administrator's.

Jekaan, on the other hand, was admiring an old and beaten up SkyHopper. "T-16, vintage. You won't get a smoother ride than this," he mumbled to himself.

"Don't tell me you want to take that ratty old thing!"

"Why not? They'll notice just about anything else getting stolen right away! Besides, imagine how much faster..."

"Fine," Qourr spat. "Let's see who can hotwire one first. We'll take their vehicle of choice."

"Alright," Jekaan said, stepping in the T-16 and turning it's key. "I win. Now let's go."

~#*#*#~

"Here it is, Qourr. Take 'er down soft." The mountain loomed before them. "I haven't seen a building for four hundred kilos. This place is ideal."

"I think I see the cave entrance!" said Qourr, landing the vehicle rather roughly and leaping out, not waiting for the lowering ramp.

Jekaan smiled. The coordinates were right.

[Qourr Mhawat]

Jekaan got out of the speeder and walked over to the side of the mountain, his apparently multi-functional datapad held out, scanning the mountainside.

Qourr stayed in the speeder, eyeing the piles of rocks with dislike. f there really was anything in Oludh's story, then that would mean having to dig through the rocks and clear off what looked like half the mountain to get at what they had come for. And she hadn't noticed Oludh bringing any loadlifters or droids.

And what was it he'd said? The people working here before had been buried inside in that cave-in? Well, she sure wasn't going to go digging through rocks if there was a chance of coming across a bloody dead man!

She crossed her arms across her chest with a stubborn little toss of her head and adamantly refused to get out of the speeder when Jekaan called her.

She hadn't counted on Oludh's complete lack of any kind of sympathy or pity. He simply walked over to the speeder, leant over the back of it, took out two shovels - where did he get them from?!? - grabbed her arm in an iron grip and pulled her out. Then he pushed the shovel at her, turned around and walked away to what had once been a cave entrance.

"You better get your act together, Mhawat! Time to use those arm muscles for something more useful than having arm-wrestling matches in the mess hall."

Indignantly, Qourr shook her head at him, and tossed the shovel back into the speeder.

Jekaan growled at her then simply drew his blast and coldly pointed it at her head.

"DIG!"

Hastily, she grabbed the shovel again and walked over, muttering to herself as the two of them started digging through rock and earth.