Corellia: My Name is Besh

[Besh]

My name is Besh.

I am on Corellia. It is night, and everything is dark where I am.

I am in the Zone. A flicker of flame, I see the star destroyer falling onto the City. I banish the sight. I've already seen it. There is no need for it.

It is here It is here It is here

I can't make sense of the message. But it isn't the first time.

There is movement. It is quick, but I up the resolution and filter through the spectrum until it's clearer.

I CAN FEEL IT

I almost trip. The thing disappears, and I step back into the shadows of a still ruined building, and am gone.

What is it?

It is here. I do not know. But it is. Markers, scraps of code. Familiar.

Here there is no form. It's always dark. But it is darker than anything else around it. It speaks in words, images, sounds. When my eyes are still open, it is like two images into the world are there like a view out of a starship. Then I can see the light reflecting off of it but it's still black. I think of a wind, and it doesn't feel so cloistered. It moves back and forth, but it doesn't; it's an impression, it is unsure and its code flits back and forth over data as if it is mulling something.

This could be dangerous you know

Be aware. It is near.

Images start flying around me. It doesn't bother me. I barely pay them any attention. I can hear voices down the street. Holocamera footage is pulled from around me and filtered and I ignore it. I'm not here for holocamera footage.

I float out a bit so that I'm more out than in and I make sure I'm not marked.

Knight Vissica prowling and searching the city. Knight Alexia walking out of the communications suite, pale. She'd been speaking with the Knight-General.

Atrapes made me shiver too. Even it doesn't linger too long on Atrapes. For some reason it stutters, flickering like a bad signal before picking up speed again.

It stops. A woman walking down a street. The image blurs, as if it were about to skip, and then it stops and replays.

I emerge completely, and walk out of the ruined building. If it is intent on figuring out what ever is bothering it, I won't get any answers.

"Possible mark," I murmur, picking up resolution again. A man and a woman walking down the street. Quick, nervous. Natural. They don't look around. Unnatural. A hex pattern appears on my clothing and with a ripple light bends around me. I watch them. I don't need to move. I mark them. Gait. facial features. Holocamera focuses on them as they walk by. I start to rip the feed, but something goes wrong with the data. It's corrupted.

I stop, and grip the DL-18 in my jacket.

Do not engage, Agent. Only watch.

[Eluna Thals]

"Right at next intersection."

Eluna was moving at a pace that was as fast as a casual stride could appear. She and her passenger, a Corellian human named Mel Osskan, were playing a dangerous game. This entire grid was a security zone. The Empire covered the urban spaces with cameras and passive sensors designed to glean as much data from the passing public as it could without being overt. The Resistance operated under the assumption that they were being watched when beyond their safehouses, but it wasn't an assumption at all this far into Coronet.

Eluna Thals was today being called Callie Tarnvell. Same green eyes, but with a pixie cut of brunette hair shocked into a stylish part to one side. The look was easy. The credentials were somewhat harder. Creating a person as a work of fiction might pass muster for a casual observer, but it wouldn't survive data bottlenecks such as security checkpoints and points of sale. Identity theft wasn't the most morally upright tactic, but it helped to create a disposable smokescreen. Inconveniencing the real Callie Tarnvell, wherever she might be, was an acceptable cost to pay to help slip the net.

Even that tactic had it's limit. Eluna had the luxury of disappearing more easily than most. Mel Osskan, however, had a higher profile. He worked for a company that contracted with the Imperial army, assisting them in dispatching stormtroopers across the city to where they were needed. That required an exhaustive security clearance. Fortunately for the Resistance, not exhaustive enough. They'd both been careful in meeting, and it was clear that Mr. Osskan was now ready to do his part for the cause.

Before he could take part, Osskan had to move beyond the wire. That required planning, coordination, a scheduled pickup, a stolen alias...and creative slicing.

Not willing to leave the matter to chance, Eluna had broken into the security net of the city grid, isolating the cameras at high visibility nodes. Shutting the cameras down would attract attention, but adding a decay variable to their encryption algorithm could muddy the resolution to the point of uselessness.

Whether that paid off or not was yet to be seen. Eluna paused at a street corner, pretending to browse at a kiosk of sunglasses.

"Keep moving." she told her passenger.

"Alone?" Osskan had done a good job of keeping his fear in check, but he was becoming more anxious the closer to the finish line he got.

"There's an orange sedan with a broken windshield. Get in the back seat. I'll be watching you."

[Besh]

The woman stopped.

it is here it is here where what what where what who

I was starting to get a headache. I continued ignoring it, instead moving around the two of them. They were talking, quietly. Nothing more than a hazy distortion even on this quiet night. A name flitted over the woman. Something that could be investigated later, or by others at headquarters or even by the Admiral's staff aboard his ship.

Hooking up always felt strange, like a tether had been hooked to the back of my neck. The woman's name and face and location were loaded. One agent's fear was of insects crawling over him and into his orifices, asphyxiating him. I imagine that would feel similar to when I transferred data.

Now for the man.

Holocameras were better than my eyes, even if I could resolve better than most and filter through the spectrum until something caught and record that. Holocameras could be in many places at once and hold and process their information more efficiently than I could. My organic brain simply couldn't handle the digital information dumps. It was painful.

But whomever had isolated and corrupted the holocameras had done well. I'd need my own to get a good shot. A hood was pulled up from my collar; the hex pattern appeared and soon I was an anomaly in the moonlight.

The man turned to speak with the woman, only for a moment, as if to confirm something. The Woman stopped, and was looking into a kiosk for uv-eyescreens. Any more obvious, and she'd be planting a bomb in the middle of the street.

Capture. Capture. Capture.

I could feel the insects crawling as the data was sent, and for moment I almost thought I could hear them too.

Skitter, skitter, skitter.