Star Wars (7ABY; M03, D02): Badger Badger
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Ganen, Mon, ‘Tempest’, Morrigan, Kadia, Roger, and Garth / [CP: 3.0]
Everybody was here!
Planet Obana
Obana was an independent system in the Arkanis Sector of the Outer Rim Territories. With an abundance of all of the necessary resources for producing plastoid, the planet had become very wealthy from selling it to the Republic during the Clone Wars and then to the Empire over the next quarter century. Despite its business dealings with the Empire, the planet had long had a reputation for being free, just, and alien-friendly. Nevertheless; in 6ABY (just under a year ago), the planet's oil fields and refineries were attacked and destroyed by Rebel starfighters. The oil wells were still burning; and some of the PC’s who had a window on whatever ship brought them to the planet might have seen the colossal cloud of black smoke hanging over one particular region in the eastern hemisphere!
The capital city of Xandar was built atop an artificial island just off of the south-west coast of the main continent in the western hemisphere. Weapons were technically off-limits to civilians, but it was well known that the local police were too afraid to make an issue of it with anyone visibly armed (and it was illegal for them to search or scan anyone for weapons without a very good reason).
A little ways north of the capital building was the North Pier Hotel; and at the top of the 50 story building was the Sky Dome Lounge: one of the only places in the city where one could get a drink before sundown. It was partitioned into two areas; the front area offering a spectacular view of the beautiful city and the back area having five big screens running various sports and other entertainment programs.
Ganen Sarad [Smike]
A young Mandalore warrior still in his ‘probationary’ phase; Ganen’s first job on his own was as a bodyguard to a man named Romo Nagath (known to those closest to him as ‘Badger’): Tyber Zann’s underboss in the Arkanis Sector (a rather dangerous sector in which to be a member of the Zann Consortium, because it’s also the sector which contains Tatooine!) Despite all his money, Nagath spent much of his time in the crummy little town of Pons Ora on the dull little planet of Abafar. This was mainly for security reasons; since the planet shares its orbit with a big comet storm, it would be very difficult for the Hutt Cartels to launch a major offensive against the planet.
Ganen’s days were pretty dull unless Nagath had to make a trip somewhere, and his most recent trip kicked off about a week earlier to a planet called Obana. Nagath believed that the planet was on the brink of a major economic downturn, and downtrodden people are a lot easier to sell drugs to. On M02-D30, the two of them were dropped off on the planet by one of Nagath’s underlings (a man named Ofar Haas) and that underling’s young nephew (Ceril Haas). They then took Nagath’s ship to go somewhere else to make a final payment on some other deal, and the plan was for them to return in a week to pick Nagath and Ganen up.
The week went well; Nagath met with a number of locals and laid down the foundation for potential near-future trade. He slept during the early part of the day; stopping by the Sky Dome Lounge for a quick drink after waking up and then conducting business in the late afternoon and through the night.
As our story kicked off, Nagath had completed his business and he and Ganen were once again in that same lounge; waiting for a signal from Ofar and Ceril that they’d arrived and it was time to head back to Abafar.
Mon Orton [Robert]
Mon Orton had once been a war correspondent for NewsNet, but grew weary of his stories being distorted by political entities and eventually struck out as an independent fact gatherer. It was a little rough having no company to support him, but he could focus on the stories that he wanted to tell and report his findings as he wished. Uncomfortable truths tended not to pay very well, so he also covered sports stories in order to keep himself fed.
His quest for facts had most recently brought him to the Obana system. Despite the devastating Rebel attack last year, everything on the planet seems to be business as usual. This either meant that the magnitude of the attack had been exaggerated, the planetary government was blowing through its reserves and was hurling towards total economic collapse, or something else was going on which nobody was talking about. Regardless, inquiring minds wanted to know.
As luck would have it, he found out on the day of his arrival that the president of the planet was holding a major press conference that very afternoon. With some time to kill; he found a quiet lounge in which to get a drink, relax for a bit, and catch up on the latest planetary news. In a couple of hours, he would head down to the capital building and see how far he could get with his press pass which was technically no longer valid.
“Tempest” [Ruth]
A young, Force-sensitive Chiss; Tempest never knew her parents and was raised from infancy by a group of anti-Imperial, non-human Dark Jedi known as the Broken Shackle. After a recent incident [which has not been disclosed in game], she decided to leave the order and find her own path.
For as long as she could remember, there’d been something in the back of her mind telling her that there was someplace else that she was supposed to be. But just like her imaginary friend, her masters didn’t want to hear about it and she kept it to herself for many years.
But now that she’d abandoned the Broken Shackle; and with literally no other direction to take, she decide to finally go ahead and follow the Force and see where it lead her. After a few weeks of hitchhiking and stowing away; it lead her across the Outer Rim to the Arkanis Sector, then to a planet called Obana, then to a city called Xandar, then to a hotel called the North Pier, and finally to a lounge called the Sky Dome. The closer she got, the stronger the sensation got that she was moving in the right direction.
Morrigan Mallix [Bevin]
Morrigan knows nothing of her father and almost nothing of her mother; only that she was a Chiss, that she was already very pregnant when she settled on Pii IV, that she was polite but kept to herself, and that she was murdered shortly after giving birth on her own in her recently-rented home. After her mother’s body was found in town, Morrigan was found in said home; thankfully alive and unharmed.
She was raised in an orphanage on Pii III until she was adopted by the Mallix family. Her adoptive mother and father already had four boys, really wanted at least one daughter, and decided not to leave it to chance. Since it was a major family-impacting event, the young boys were made a part of the process; and they all unanimously decided that they wanted “the blue one”. Her new human family had been involved with racing for generations, and Morrigan grew up to be a skilled pilot and technician.
The course of her life changed forever when an acquaintance of hers (not really a friend; just someone that she knew) took a trip to the nearby planet of Obana to visit some relatives. He’d taken a tour of the capital building in Xandar and had commented that its grand entranceways and broad halls would actually make it possible for a person to fly right through the building on a swoop. It also came up that such a course could be flow right through the big chamber where the president gave his speeches and such, and how funny it would be to photo-bomb his big press conference next week at over 600kph.
Humorous musings turned to semi-serious ‘what ifs’, which then escalated into dares. The next thing Morrigan knew, she was on a transport ship to Obana with one of her secondary ‘fix-up’ swoops (her favorite swoop, which she feared being impounded, was left in the safety of her garage).
Because of the press conference that afternoon, they weren’t giving any tours of the capital building and were in fact prohibiting civilian pedestrians from getting very close at all. No worries, she decided, she’d deal with that once she was inside. For now, she wanted to get a better look at what was around the building. Looking around, she spotted a tall building off to the north with what appeared to be an observation dome at the top. As luck would have it, it turned out to be a public bar: the Sky Dome Lounge.
The Chiss Twist
They’re identical twin sisters.
Kadia Sarn [Toni]
Kadia was once a member of the Assassination department of Imperial Intelligence; and though she served loyally for quite some time, there came a time when she desired more autonomy in her life. As luck would have it, the Reformation eventually resulted in budget cuts; and when they asked for volunteers to walk away clean, she was the first to raise her hand.
Despite her intent to become a ‘freelancer’, she practically found herself on the payroll of the Hutt Cartels; which really isn’t what she was hoping for (and definitely wasn’t an improvement). While keeping herself fed by bagging lowlifes (mostly minor competitors and Cartel employees who were ripping off their superiors), she had also been looking for an opportunity to ‘defect’ to the much less malign Zann Consortium.
Her break finally came when she was enlisted to kill a man named Romo Nagath: one of Tyber Zann’s underbosses; who apparently was quite brazenly doing business on Obana (which was only one jump away from Tatooine!) But as she traveled there, she found herself questioning whether switching sides would be worth the possibility of gaining a bad reputation for being disloyal.
After arriving in the city of Xandar, she did some asking around and learned that a man fitting Nagath’s description had been visiting a bar called the Sky Dome Lounge every afternoon for the last few days (along with “a guy dressed all in yellow” (probably a valet or bodyguard)).
Roger Branz [Preston]
Roger was a Stormtrooper in service to the Empire for several years. Just before the Battle of Yavin, he was stationed aboard the Devastator (Darth Vader’s personal ship at the time) and was involved with the search for the Death Star plans on Tatooine (in fact, he was the one who ascertained that there had actually been droids in the escape pod).
Despite the Reformation, he eventually found himself under the jurisdiction of a rather heavy-handed Moff; and when his term came to an end he opted not to reenlist. This, of course, left him in search of a new job.
Some queries indicated that the planet Obana was looking for experienced soldiers for its planetary defense / law enforcement force: the Obana Defense Patrol. From everything he was hearing, it sounded like “serve and protect” really meant something to these guys and they were not just an enforcement arm for the government. It sounded like something that was at least worth checking out.
Roger happened to arrive in Xandar on the day that the president was scheduled to give a big press conference, so the ODP was stretched pretty thin getting ready for that. He was asked to enjoy the city for the rest of the day and then please come back in the morning for an interview. He started by finding someplace to have a quiet drink.
Garth(?) [Orion]
On the planet Obana in the capital city of Xandar; a young bounty hunter (possibly named Garth) had just bagged another bad guy, gotten him locked up on his ship, and gotten all the paperwork straightened out with the local authorities. Via subspace, he got in touch with the broker on Arkanis who had enlisted him for the job; and was then informed that one of his informants in Xandar had just positively ID’d another mark entering the city. Double payday!
The individual in question was a young Chiss female known as “Tempest”, a known member of the Broken Shackle. Despite being adamantly anti-human, they were known to have been collaborating with more hardline elements of the Rebel Alliance. The broker wouldn’t say who the hiring client was (he never did), but it was most likely the Empire.
As he got ready to head back out; Garth keep in radio contact with the local informant; who tracked Tempest to the lagoon peninsula just north of the capital building. By the time Garth caught up with him, he informed him that the girl had just entered one of the exterior lifts of the North Pier Hotel and rode it straight to the top to the Sky Dome Lounge.
Month 3; Day 2
Roger was the first of the PC’s to enter the Sky Dome Lounge; and in fact, he was the only patron in the place at all. He settled himself at the bar on the sunny side of the lounge, sat his helmet on the stool next to him, and ordered a drink.
Shamelessly dressed in stealth armor and carrying a double-bladed vibro-staff, Kadia came along a short time later; and after verifying that Nagath wasn’t there yet, she was annoyed to find that there was no place in the bar where should could watch both sides (or, more importantly, all of the entrances). For the time being, she settled in on the dark side of the lounge.
Mon was next, and he decided to seat himself on the dark side so that he could catch up on the latest goings on in the world of sports (since sports stories were what was keeping him fed). His cam droid accompanied him.
With Ganen (in full armor) right behind him; Nagath entered through the front lifts and seated himself at the bar near Roger. Kadia, therefore, was unaware that he had arrived.
The next time the front lift opened, it was carrying Morrigan. She ordered a couple of drinks and was pleased to find that the dome offered an even better view of the capital building than she was hoping for. She sat down as close to the window as she could get and began surveying the area with her macrobinoculars.
In a general desire to keep herself hidden, Tempest decided to skip the front lifts and instead entered the bar through the back entrances from the main portion of the 50th floor of the hotel. That little voice in the back of her mind finally told her “you’re here”, but she saw nothing but a couple of people who seemed of little consequence.
Mon saw her and immediately mistook her for Morrigan Mallix: an up-and-coming swoop racer whose overprotective family had been shielding her from the media. If he could get even a short interview with her, it would be worth a fortune.
Mon approached the girl and asked to interview her; and as he gave no indication of whom he thought she was, it just left her confused and annoyed. As he started with some basic questions; she was curt bordering on rude and even went so far as to take her blaster out of its holster and set it on the bar, but Mon remained undaunted. When he tried to say the name of Morrigan’s homeworld (Pii), he admitted that he wasn’t sure if the pronunciation was correct. When she informed him that he was way off and he asked what the correct pronunciation was, she flatly replied “Nar Shaddaa”.
Meanwhile, back on the sunny side of the lounge, Garth entered and spotted Morrigan near the window. She appeared to be closely inspecting the capital building, which he knew couldn’t be good. The president was giving an address that afternoon… if he was announcing some new business venture with the Empire, then perhaps the Broken Shackle wanted him eliminated.
After double-checking the image that he’d been sent of Tempest, he cautiously approached her. Not wanting to take any chances with a Force sensitive, he drew his blaster and fired a stun bolt; but missed. Morrigan grabbed her unfinished bottle, broke the end off of it, and closed threateningly.
Before either party could act further, a brilliant flash of green light lit up the sky; followed about a second later by a momentary brown-out accompanied by a distant electrical thrum. Just a few seconds later, the exact same pattern repeated.
The two combatants were only distracted for a moment or two, then they each decided to try to take advantage of the other’s distraction to attack. But before they shoot or stab, Nagath (who had leapt out of his seat and approached the window the moment that the first green flash occurred) shoved them apart and stared out the window. When they saw the Mandalorian following protectively behind him, the decided to cool it for just a moment.
Following his gaze, the PC’s could see two small mushroom clouds rising from what appeared to be the south-west and south-east corners of the island. Several seconds later, there was a loud ‘boom’ from the same direction which rattled the bar and was closely followed by a second.
At that point, the three PC’s in the back ran to the front to see what was going on. Kadia saw and recognized Nagath, and the ‘man in yellow’ turned out to be a Mandalore warrior (which made her decision between killing Nagath or trying to join him a lot easier).
“Those were the city shield generators”, Nagath grimly declared, “It’s an invasion.” Before anyone could comment, he turned around to face everyone in the bar. “All right!”, he began in a loud voice, “Everybody listen up! I have a rather substantial quantity of cash in my vault on Abafar. I’ll give 1000 credits to anybody who can help get me there alive!” He then turned to Ganen and more quietly added, “That goes for you too, mate; this just got way above your pay grade.”
One by one, each of the PC’s agreed to help him. Ganen wasn’t at all pleased to be suddenly ‘augmented’ by six armed strangers, but it wasn’t his place to argue about it. It was also around this time that Morrigan and Tempest finally noticed each other, but there was no time to remark on their uncanny resemblance.
The two front lifts weren’t big enough for all eight of them, so they split up and began their descent in parallel. On their way down, however, they saw a brown shuttle land right in front of the hotel and discharge over 100 armed droids of unknown manufacture. Both groups stopped their lifts around the same time and rendezvoused inside a short time later.
Morrigan was able to gain access to an employee-only lift and get everyone down to a largely-unused underground parking deck which the droids appeared to have missed. The exit actually led under the street behind the hotel and then up into the first floor of another building.
Four battle droids were guarding the main back door of the hotel, and had their backs to where the PC’s emerged from. Garth, Roger, Ganen, and Kadia all attacked; the former missing with his first shot and the latter running across the road to attack with her staff. Wherever these droids came from, they were flimsy as hell for combat units. Someone must have really favored a “quantity over quality” approach.
Panic, stampeding, and looting had already gripped the city. Now clear of the hotel, the PC’s next order of business was to find some kind of transport. Unfortunately, very few people in the city owned private vehicles. But after a short while, they spotted an airbus on the far side of a large square full of fountains and reflecting pools. They made a run for it.
Just under half way across, Roger heard something above and behind them over the noise of the people. Quickly looking back, he spotted some sort of starfighter; trailing a plume of smoke behind it and spinning out of control towards the square. As he yelled “Incoming!”, Ganen tackled Nagath to the ground and everyone else hit the deck.
The fighter crashed no more than 30 yards in front of them; exploding into a ball of fire as it smashed through several fountain walls and sent water spilling into the square. Nobody was hurt, and the PC’s got back on their feet and continued towards the bus.
Glancing back as they ran, the PC’s spotted a rusty brown Minstrel-class space yacht hovering eight or nine hundred feet above the city. Several PC’s knew that that type of ship and that paint scheme were both very popular with the Hutt Cartels. Around the ship, almost two squadrons of similarly-painted Dunelizard fighters were engaged in a dogfight with a clearly-outmatched squadron of more brightly-painted T-wing interceptors (one of which had just nearly crashed into them). Rumors had been circulating for decades if not centuries that Jabba, in addition to his seemingly limitless supply of criminal scum, had secretly amassed an actual military. The rumors had just gained much credibility.
“Those mother fuckers!!”, Kadia exclaimed, still running, as the reality of the situation sank in. Clearly someone had begun to suspect her desire to defect; hence her being sent to this planet on the same day that they happened to neglect to mention that they intended to sack it.
“Set you up, did they; luv?”, Nagath called back between huffs. “That’s what happens when you deal with slugs.” Kadia then decided that this was as good a time as any to come clean.
“I’d like to state for the record”, she declared, “that even before all of this happened, I had already decided to hit you up for a job instead of doing what I was sent here to do.”
Nagath just smiled, chuckled, and kept running. It took a couple more seconds to sink it with Ganen. “Wait…”, he finally said. “Did you come here to kill my employer!?”
The airbus was abandoned, open, and running when the PC’s reached it; and everyone quickly piled in. All of the display screens in the passenger area were displaying a repeating EBS broadcast advising everyone to quickly and calmly head to the nearest emergency shelter and await further instructions.
Morrigan got the bus underway but quickly discovered that it was equipped with a governor which was limiting the engine output to around 50% (which, as a racer, offended her on a fundamental level). Garth took over driving, and she opened up a maintenance panel in the back with the intent of finding and removing it.
Roger meanwhile used the comm in his helmet to search for news and/or police chatter, but everything he heard was rather discouraging…
- “The Inexorable is burning! I repeat… Inexorable is on fire!”
- “They’ve completely taken control of the spaceport!”
- “We’ve got tanks and heavy troop carriers closing in on the capital building!”
Around half-way to the coast, a laser blast from above and to the side of the bus blew one of the side doors clean off of its hinges. It was a Bantha II cargo skiff with eight Weequays on board, and they were moving closer.
Roger fired a shot which took out the guy manning the blaster as Ganen and Kadia both jumped from the bus onto the skiff. While Ganen had the advantage of a jetpack, Kadia had a moment of panic in which she thought she’d misjudged the distance and would barely be able grab onto the edge. But then an inexplicable wave of force (from Tempest, though that was never revealed) gently caught her and boosted her up onto the deck of the skiff.
At the same time that the PC’s were jumping to the skiff, three of the Weequays jumped onto the roof of the bus. One shattered the cockpit dome with a vibro-ax while another attempted to climb down through the open doorway, but Mon hit the latter with a flying elbow and knocked him to his death. The skiff pilot had moved directly above the bus to keep more of the PC’s from coming aboard, but this allowed Garth to slam the roof of the bus into the bottom of the skiff. The one that cracked his windshield got completely squished; and though the other one jumped in time, he died all the same.
Kadia and Ganen eliminated the remaining four with little difficulty; and as the latter shot and killed the driver, he grabbed Kadia around the waist and jetted back to the roof of the bus. They didn’t land very gracefully, but they made it unharmed. When they got back inside, everyone asked why they hadn’t secured the skiff (which was faster, more durable, and armed) rather than let it careen into the side of a building.
Though the cockpit dome was now not only cracked but also covered in Weequay blood, the forward sensor array was intact and it was suitable to fly by. Morrigan did manage to get the governor bypassed, so now they also had some better speed.
The PC’s discussed their situation for a few minutes; and right around the time Mon said “At least they’re not looking for us in particular”, all of the monitors changed from the Emergency Broadcast screen to a grainy but recognizable image of Nagath. Accompanying in was an audio message in Huttese, which basically boiled down to “give us this guy and we’ll stop blowing up your city”. Everyone immediately looked at Nagath with an unmistakable expression of ‘What the *%#$ did you do!?’
“Look, I’ll explain everything if we get off this planet alive, all right?”, he replied defensively. “Can we just concentrate on doing that for right now?” Garth briefly contemplated turning him over, but knew enough to know that dealing with Hutts seldom ended well.
Despite having heard that the spaceport had been ‘taken’, the PC’s (especially Garth, whose ship was still docked there) wanted to at least check it out. But when they got about half-way across the water, they saw a Corellian gunship pounding an area near the spaceport with turbolaser fire. Even if the ship didn’t see or opted to ignore the incoming bus, the PC’s were pretty certain that it would try to shoot down anyone who attempted to leave via ship.
That being the case, they decided to instead make for the mainland and try to find another way off world. The news seemed to indicate that the attacks were mainly confined to Xandar and a few outlying military bases, and the bus’s nav system was able to located another spaceport about 60 miles inland.
As soon as they reached the shore of the mainland, the PC’s started looking for some other transport to take so that they could abandon their blood-spattered bus. After only a few minutes, they spotted a pair of four-seat airspeeders parked on an isolated street with very few people on it. Garth parked the bus on the far side of the street and everyone quickly got out.
As they exited, however, they suddenly found that the sunny afternoon that they’d been experiencing had been instantly replaced by darkness. Looking up, they saw an unnaturally blood-red moon eclipsing the sun. They also saw something descending directly down over the airspeeders that they’d been about to swipe.
It was circular and roughly 6 meters in diameter, but none of the PC’s could clearly see what it actually was. The building behind it was still visible but was distorted; some kind of cloaked vehicle perhaps?
Deciding that they’d rather not stick around to find out, the PC’s all piled back into the bus; but before they could get it going again, a concentrated barrage of blaster fire took out the bus’s power generator. After the bus dropped to the ground with a jarring thud, the PC’s cautiously peered outside.
Eight individuals now stood just in front of the distorted sphere facing the bus; seven of whom wore red armor. Kadia vaguely recognized them as being some elite type of soldier in service to the Hutt Cartels. Mon unmistakably recognized the armor as that which had been worn by the Defilers: the most elite of Jeng Droga’s clone soldiers during the Clone Wars.
In the midst of these men was a woman garbed in a combination of black cloth of grey metal. None of the PC’s recognized her species, but her glowing red eyes seemed to indicate that she wasn’t human. Her left hand was a mechanical prosthetic, and her right hand gripped the hilt of some sort of flexible red lightsaber.
“You guys have done enough”, Nagath said in a defeated tone. “I’ll walk out there alone if you want me to; maybe they’ll let you walk away. I promise I’ll hold no grudge in the next life.” The PC’s contemplated this in silence for a few moments.
“We can take ‘em!”, Garth suddenly pronounced in a chipper and upbeat tone.
Morrigan managed to remotely pop open the first and last passenger doors on that side of the bus, and the PC’s took cover behind the remaining doors as an opening salvo of blaster fire tore through the interior. Mon, who hadn’t seemed to have any weapons prior to that, had pulled a blaster out of his backpack. Still using what was left of the bus as cover; he, Ganen, Tempest, Roger, and Garth all answered with blaster fire of their own. Kadia instead exited the bus; her camo armor causing her to seemingly disappear in the darkness as she closed on the unsuspecting enemy.
Armed only with a taser, Morrigan stayed back to keep an eye on Nagath. As she watched the gun battle unfold, she saw the woman get enveloped by an inky darkness. Looking around the bus, she spotted a similar inky darkness materializing behind Nagath.
Not waiting for the woman to materialize, Morrigan rushed passed Nagath and thrust her taser into the darkness. She felt it hit metal and heard a loud electrical ‘pop’. Nagath, going with the flow, ripped a display monitor off of a nearby seat back and threw it in the same direction; striking something. Garth likewise heard the electrical pop, turned around, and fired a blast bolt into the darkened space.
When the woman rematerialized; her cybernetic arm was locked in a dramatic gesture, her nose was bloodied from the display screen, and she had a blaster wound in her torso. Morrigan struck again with her taser, this time striking the woman’s neck. As she collapsed to the floor, the darkness outside instantly snapped back to day. Within moments, the other PC’s had dropped all of the red-clad soldiers.
The distorted sphere was still visible; and someone pointed out that it if was a vehicle and it had held the woman and the seven Defiliers, then it would hold all of them as well. It indeed was a cloaked speeder, and the PC’s quickly piled in.
Morrigan sat down in the pilot’s seat and looked over the control panel; which was… kinda weird. It had an interface for an astrogation computer but it didn’t appear to have any star charts. Likewise, it had a hyperdrive lever which indicated that the motivator was offline; and it was highly unlikely that a vehicle this side would be equipped with both a hyperdrive and a cloaking device. Also, the symbol appearing on the door panel after it closed indicated that the craft was space-worthy.
Roger speculated that it was perhaps just a portion of a larger, modular vessel and suggested that she look for some kind of homing signal. Sure enough, there was a dedicated receiving which was locked onto a signal originating from above.
No Hutt vessels or fighters attempted to approach the PC’s as they ascended into orbit; and as they neared the source of the homing signal, they were still seeing nothing but space. About the time that they could finally make out some sort of larger distortion directly ahead, a button on the console labeled ‘Auto Trac’ (which had been red) stared flashing yellow. Morrigan slowly maneuvered right to the homing point, and when the button turned green, she pressed it. She felt the controls release, and everyone felt something grip the vehicle. It slowly turned around 180 degrees, then drifted backwards until it stopped as docking clamps audibly locked into place. At the same time, the nav computer came online and the hyperdrive controls indicated a ready status.
“Why don’t you go ahead and take us out of orbit”, Nagath suggested. “If there is anyone else on board, better to be as far from reinforcements as we can when we run into them.” Morrigan concurred, and Nagath stayed with her as the other PC’s opened the back hatch (which now indicated an atmosphere on the other side) with their weapons at the ready.
Standing on the other side of the hatch was a white and black R4 unit which buzzed in alarm and scooted backwards when it saw the PC’s. Threateningly extending an arc welder and circular saw, it rocked back and forth and emitted a noisy electronic fuss. The PC’s tried to calm him down; indicated that they didn’t want to hurt him but that they were the ship’s new owners and he was just going to have to deal with that. The droid finally retracted his weapons, popped his third wheel, spun around, and retreated back into the ship.
The PC’s swept through deck by deck; and not only was there nobody there, the ship appeared to be brand new. There were only two signs that anyone had even been on the ship since it left the factory. In the mess hall, several space ration wrappers had been tossed on the floor; and in one of the cabins, there was a rather evil-looking dagger resting on the pillow.
While the other PC’s were searching, Tempest wisely followed the droid. He entered one of the computer control rooms and attempted to plug into the system, but Tempest (with a little help from a brandished blaster) managed to dissuade him from doing whatever he’d been about to do.
Morrigan had meanwhile pulled up schematics for the ship, which was actually a Loronar ‘SkyBlind’. She also saw the charred wreckage of a Corellian Corvette; presumably the Inexorable. Once she got clear of the planet’s gravity well, she asked Nagath where they were going.
“Lay in a course for… I’ve never been clear on how to pronounce it… ‘pie-ee’; ‘pey-eye’; you know the one I’m talking about. Well change vector for Vuzsa when we get there, and I can get us to Abafar from Vuzsa.”
“I can do that”, Morrigan replied; as she in fact lived in the system in question (Pii; which even the citizens of couldn’t agree on a proper pronunciation). Querying further on Abafar (which she’d heard of but couldn’t find on the charts), Nagath explained…
“It’s not ‘secret’ or anything; it just didn’t get discovered until after the Republic’s last big cartography update in this area, which was over 30 years ago. Also we don’t like unexpected company, so there’s no nav beacon for it either. It’s just half an hour standard north of Vuzsa towards the D’Anjon Nebula. But before you jump, I want to do something first.” As he continued, he opened up the comm system. “If the Hutts don’t know that I’m gone, they’re going to keep tearing that planet apart. Go ahead and drop the cloak.”
“Attention all affiliates of the Hutt Cartel”, he began on an audio-only transmission as Morrigan lowered the shields. “This is Romo Nagath of the Zann Consortium. Despite all of your best efforts, I’ve slipped right passed you; you slimy slugs. Once again proving, you can’t do anything right. That’s me in the SkyBlind about to jump into hyperspace. Enjoy the rest of your day.”
“All right, hit it”, he told Morrigan as he hung up the comm; and a moment later, the ship smoothly jumped to light speed.
Ganen, Mon, ‘Tempest’, Morrigan, Kadia, Roger, and Garth / [CP: 3.0]
Everybody was here!
Planet Obana
Obana was an independent system in the Arkanis Sector of the Outer Rim Territories. With an abundance of all of the necessary resources for producing plastoid, the planet had become very wealthy from selling it to the Republic during the Clone Wars and then to the Empire over the next quarter century. Despite its business dealings with the Empire, the planet had long had a reputation for being free, just, and alien-friendly. Nevertheless; in 6ABY (just under a year ago), the planet's oil fields and refineries were attacked and destroyed by Rebel starfighters. The oil wells were still burning; and some of the PC’s who had a window on whatever ship brought them to the planet might have seen the colossal cloud of black smoke hanging over one particular region in the eastern hemisphere!
The capital city of Xandar was built atop an artificial island just off of the south-west coast of the main continent in the western hemisphere. Weapons were technically off-limits to civilians, but it was well known that the local police were too afraid to make an issue of it with anyone visibly armed (and it was illegal for them to search or scan anyone for weapons without a very good reason).
A little ways north of the capital building was the North Pier Hotel; and at the top of the 50 story building was the Sky Dome Lounge: one of the only places in the city where one could get a drink before sundown. It was partitioned into two areas; the front area offering a spectacular view of the beautiful city and the back area having five big screens running various sports and other entertainment programs.
Ganen Sarad [Smike]
A young Mandalore warrior still in his ‘probationary’ phase; Ganen’s first job on his own was as a bodyguard to a man named Romo Nagath (known to those closest to him as ‘Badger’): Tyber Zann’s underboss in the Arkanis Sector (a rather dangerous sector in which to be a member of the Zann Consortium, because it’s also the sector which contains Tatooine!) Despite all his money, Nagath spent much of his time in the crummy little town of Pons Ora on the dull little planet of Abafar. This was mainly for security reasons; since the planet shares its orbit with a big comet storm, it would be very difficult for the Hutt Cartels to launch a major offensive against the planet.
Ganen’s days were pretty dull unless Nagath had to make a trip somewhere, and his most recent trip kicked off about a week earlier to a planet called Obana. Nagath believed that the planet was on the brink of a major economic downturn, and downtrodden people are a lot easier to sell drugs to. On M02-D30, the two of them were dropped off on the planet by one of Nagath’s underlings (a man named Ofar Haas) and that underling’s young nephew (Ceril Haas). They then took Nagath’s ship to go somewhere else to make a final payment on some other deal, and the plan was for them to return in a week to pick Nagath and Ganen up.
The week went well; Nagath met with a number of locals and laid down the foundation for potential near-future trade. He slept during the early part of the day; stopping by the Sky Dome Lounge for a quick drink after waking up and then conducting business in the late afternoon and through the night.
As our story kicked off, Nagath had completed his business and he and Ganen were once again in that same lounge; waiting for a signal from Ofar and Ceril that they’d arrived and it was time to head back to Abafar.
Mon Orton [Robert]
Mon Orton had once been a war correspondent for NewsNet, but grew weary of his stories being distorted by political entities and eventually struck out as an independent fact gatherer. It was a little rough having no company to support him, but he could focus on the stories that he wanted to tell and report his findings as he wished. Uncomfortable truths tended not to pay very well, so he also covered sports stories in order to keep himself fed.
His quest for facts had most recently brought him to the Obana system. Despite the devastating Rebel attack last year, everything on the planet seems to be business as usual. This either meant that the magnitude of the attack had been exaggerated, the planetary government was blowing through its reserves and was hurling towards total economic collapse, or something else was going on which nobody was talking about. Regardless, inquiring minds wanted to know.
As luck would have it, he found out on the day of his arrival that the president of the planet was holding a major press conference that very afternoon. With some time to kill; he found a quiet lounge in which to get a drink, relax for a bit, and catch up on the latest planetary news. In a couple of hours, he would head down to the capital building and see how far he could get with his press pass which was technically no longer valid.
“Tempest” [Ruth]
A young, Force-sensitive Chiss; Tempest never knew her parents and was raised from infancy by a group of anti-Imperial, non-human Dark Jedi known as the Broken Shackle. After a recent incident [which has not been disclosed in game], she decided to leave the order and find her own path.
For as long as she could remember, there’d been something in the back of her mind telling her that there was someplace else that she was supposed to be. But just like her imaginary friend, her masters didn’t want to hear about it and she kept it to herself for many years.
But now that she’d abandoned the Broken Shackle; and with literally no other direction to take, she decide to finally go ahead and follow the Force and see where it lead her. After a few weeks of hitchhiking and stowing away; it lead her across the Outer Rim to the Arkanis Sector, then to a planet called Obana, then to a city called Xandar, then to a hotel called the North Pier, and finally to a lounge called the Sky Dome. The closer she got, the stronger the sensation got that she was moving in the right direction.
Morrigan Mallix [Bevin]
Morrigan knows nothing of her father and almost nothing of her mother; only that she was a Chiss, that she was already very pregnant when she settled on Pii IV, that she was polite but kept to herself, and that she was murdered shortly after giving birth on her own in her recently-rented home. After her mother’s body was found in town, Morrigan was found in said home; thankfully alive and unharmed.
She was raised in an orphanage on Pii III until she was adopted by the Mallix family. Her adoptive mother and father already had four boys, really wanted at least one daughter, and decided not to leave it to chance. Since it was a major family-impacting event, the young boys were made a part of the process; and they all unanimously decided that they wanted “the blue one”. Her new human family had been involved with racing for generations, and Morrigan grew up to be a skilled pilot and technician.
The course of her life changed forever when an acquaintance of hers (not really a friend; just someone that she knew) took a trip to the nearby planet of Obana to visit some relatives. He’d taken a tour of the capital building in Xandar and had commented that its grand entranceways and broad halls would actually make it possible for a person to fly right through the building on a swoop. It also came up that such a course could be flow right through the big chamber where the president gave his speeches and such, and how funny it would be to photo-bomb his big press conference next week at over 600kph.
Humorous musings turned to semi-serious ‘what ifs’, which then escalated into dares. The next thing Morrigan knew, she was on a transport ship to Obana with one of her secondary ‘fix-up’ swoops (her favorite swoop, which she feared being impounded, was left in the safety of her garage).
Because of the press conference that afternoon, they weren’t giving any tours of the capital building and were in fact prohibiting civilian pedestrians from getting very close at all. No worries, she decided, she’d deal with that once she was inside. For now, she wanted to get a better look at what was around the building. Looking around, she spotted a tall building off to the north with what appeared to be an observation dome at the top. As luck would have it, it turned out to be a public bar: the Sky Dome Lounge.
The Chiss Twist
They’re identical twin sisters.
Kadia Sarn [Toni]
Kadia was once a member of the Assassination department of Imperial Intelligence; and though she served loyally for quite some time, there came a time when she desired more autonomy in her life. As luck would have it, the Reformation eventually resulted in budget cuts; and when they asked for volunteers to walk away clean, she was the first to raise her hand.
Despite her intent to become a ‘freelancer’, she practically found herself on the payroll of the Hutt Cartels; which really isn’t what she was hoping for (and definitely wasn’t an improvement). While keeping herself fed by bagging lowlifes (mostly minor competitors and Cartel employees who were ripping off their superiors), she had also been looking for an opportunity to ‘defect’ to the much less malign Zann Consortium.
Her break finally came when she was enlisted to kill a man named Romo Nagath: one of Tyber Zann’s underbosses; who apparently was quite brazenly doing business on Obana (which was only one jump away from Tatooine!) But as she traveled there, she found herself questioning whether switching sides would be worth the possibility of gaining a bad reputation for being disloyal.
After arriving in the city of Xandar, she did some asking around and learned that a man fitting Nagath’s description had been visiting a bar called the Sky Dome Lounge every afternoon for the last few days (along with “a guy dressed all in yellow” (probably a valet or bodyguard)).
Roger Branz [Preston]
Roger was a Stormtrooper in service to the Empire for several years. Just before the Battle of Yavin, he was stationed aboard the Devastator (Darth Vader’s personal ship at the time) and was involved with the search for the Death Star plans on Tatooine (in fact, he was the one who ascertained that there had actually been droids in the escape pod).
Despite the Reformation, he eventually found himself under the jurisdiction of a rather heavy-handed Moff; and when his term came to an end he opted not to reenlist. This, of course, left him in search of a new job.
Some queries indicated that the planet Obana was looking for experienced soldiers for its planetary defense / law enforcement force: the Obana Defense Patrol. From everything he was hearing, it sounded like “serve and protect” really meant something to these guys and they were not just an enforcement arm for the government. It sounded like something that was at least worth checking out.
Roger happened to arrive in Xandar on the day that the president was scheduled to give a big press conference, so the ODP was stretched pretty thin getting ready for that. He was asked to enjoy the city for the rest of the day and then please come back in the morning for an interview. He started by finding someplace to have a quiet drink.
Garth(?) [Orion]
On the planet Obana in the capital city of Xandar; a young bounty hunter (possibly named Garth) had just bagged another bad guy, gotten him locked up on his ship, and gotten all the paperwork straightened out with the local authorities. Via subspace, he got in touch with the broker on Arkanis who had enlisted him for the job; and was then informed that one of his informants in Xandar had just positively ID’d another mark entering the city. Double payday!
The individual in question was a young Chiss female known as “Tempest”, a known member of the Broken Shackle. Despite being adamantly anti-human, they were known to have been collaborating with more hardline elements of the Rebel Alliance. The broker wouldn’t say who the hiring client was (he never did), but it was most likely the Empire.
As he got ready to head back out; Garth keep in radio contact with the local informant; who tracked Tempest to the lagoon peninsula just north of the capital building. By the time Garth caught up with him, he informed him that the girl had just entered one of the exterior lifts of the North Pier Hotel and rode it straight to the top to the Sky Dome Lounge.
Month 3; Day 2
Roger was the first of the PC’s to enter the Sky Dome Lounge; and in fact, he was the only patron in the place at all. He settled himself at the bar on the sunny side of the lounge, sat his helmet on the stool next to him, and ordered a drink.
Shamelessly dressed in stealth armor and carrying a double-bladed vibro-staff, Kadia came along a short time later; and after verifying that Nagath wasn’t there yet, she was annoyed to find that there was no place in the bar where should could watch both sides (or, more importantly, all of the entrances). For the time being, she settled in on the dark side of the lounge.
Mon was next, and he decided to seat himself on the dark side so that he could catch up on the latest goings on in the world of sports (since sports stories were what was keeping him fed). His cam droid accompanied him.
With Ganen (in full armor) right behind him; Nagath entered through the front lifts and seated himself at the bar near Roger. Kadia, therefore, was unaware that he had arrived.
The next time the front lift opened, it was carrying Morrigan. She ordered a couple of drinks and was pleased to find that the dome offered an even better view of the capital building than she was hoping for. She sat down as close to the window as she could get and began surveying the area with her macrobinoculars.
In a general desire to keep herself hidden, Tempest decided to skip the front lifts and instead entered the bar through the back entrances from the main portion of the 50th floor of the hotel. That little voice in the back of her mind finally told her “you’re here”, but she saw nothing but a couple of people who seemed of little consequence.
Mon saw her and immediately mistook her for Morrigan Mallix: an up-and-coming swoop racer whose overprotective family had been shielding her from the media. If he could get even a short interview with her, it would be worth a fortune.
Mon approached the girl and asked to interview her; and as he gave no indication of whom he thought she was, it just left her confused and annoyed. As he started with some basic questions; she was curt bordering on rude and even went so far as to take her blaster out of its holster and set it on the bar, but Mon remained undaunted. When he tried to say the name of Morrigan’s homeworld (Pii), he admitted that he wasn’t sure if the pronunciation was correct. When she informed him that he was way off and he asked what the correct pronunciation was, she flatly replied “Nar Shaddaa”.
Meanwhile, back on the sunny side of the lounge, Garth entered and spotted Morrigan near the window. She appeared to be closely inspecting the capital building, which he knew couldn’t be good. The president was giving an address that afternoon… if he was announcing some new business venture with the Empire, then perhaps the Broken Shackle wanted him eliminated.
After double-checking the image that he’d been sent of Tempest, he cautiously approached her. Not wanting to take any chances with a Force sensitive, he drew his blaster and fired a stun bolt; but missed. Morrigan grabbed her unfinished bottle, broke the end off of it, and closed threateningly.
Before either party could act further, a brilliant flash of green light lit up the sky; followed about a second later by a momentary brown-out accompanied by a distant electrical thrum. Just a few seconds later, the exact same pattern repeated.
The two combatants were only distracted for a moment or two, then they each decided to try to take advantage of the other’s distraction to attack. But before they shoot or stab, Nagath (who had leapt out of his seat and approached the window the moment that the first green flash occurred) shoved them apart and stared out the window. When they saw the Mandalorian following protectively behind him, the decided to cool it for just a moment.
Following his gaze, the PC’s could see two small mushroom clouds rising from what appeared to be the south-west and south-east corners of the island. Several seconds later, there was a loud ‘boom’ from the same direction which rattled the bar and was closely followed by a second.
At that point, the three PC’s in the back ran to the front to see what was going on. Kadia saw and recognized Nagath, and the ‘man in yellow’ turned out to be a Mandalore warrior (which made her decision between killing Nagath or trying to join him a lot easier).
“Those were the city shield generators”, Nagath grimly declared, “It’s an invasion.” Before anyone could comment, he turned around to face everyone in the bar. “All right!”, he began in a loud voice, “Everybody listen up! I have a rather substantial quantity of cash in my vault on Abafar. I’ll give 1000 credits to anybody who can help get me there alive!” He then turned to Ganen and more quietly added, “That goes for you too, mate; this just got way above your pay grade.”
One by one, each of the PC’s agreed to help him. Ganen wasn’t at all pleased to be suddenly ‘augmented’ by six armed strangers, but it wasn’t his place to argue about it. It was also around this time that Morrigan and Tempest finally noticed each other, but there was no time to remark on their uncanny resemblance.
The two front lifts weren’t big enough for all eight of them, so they split up and began their descent in parallel. On their way down, however, they saw a brown shuttle land right in front of the hotel and discharge over 100 armed droids of unknown manufacture. Both groups stopped their lifts around the same time and rendezvoused inside a short time later.
Morrigan was able to gain access to an employee-only lift and get everyone down to a largely-unused underground parking deck which the droids appeared to have missed. The exit actually led under the street behind the hotel and then up into the first floor of another building.
Four battle droids were guarding the main back door of the hotel, and had their backs to where the PC’s emerged from. Garth, Roger, Ganen, and Kadia all attacked; the former missing with his first shot and the latter running across the road to attack with her staff. Wherever these droids came from, they were flimsy as hell for combat units. Someone must have really favored a “quantity over quality” approach.
Panic, stampeding, and looting had already gripped the city. Now clear of the hotel, the PC’s next order of business was to find some kind of transport. Unfortunately, very few people in the city owned private vehicles. But after a short while, they spotted an airbus on the far side of a large square full of fountains and reflecting pools. They made a run for it.
Just under half way across, Roger heard something above and behind them over the noise of the people. Quickly looking back, he spotted some sort of starfighter; trailing a plume of smoke behind it and spinning out of control towards the square. As he yelled “Incoming!”, Ganen tackled Nagath to the ground and everyone else hit the deck.
The fighter crashed no more than 30 yards in front of them; exploding into a ball of fire as it smashed through several fountain walls and sent water spilling into the square. Nobody was hurt, and the PC’s got back on their feet and continued towards the bus.
Glancing back as they ran, the PC’s spotted a rusty brown Minstrel-class space yacht hovering eight or nine hundred feet above the city. Several PC’s knew that that type of ship and that paint scheme were both very popular with the Hutt Cartels. Around the ship, almost two squadrons of similarly-painted Dunelizard fighters were engaged in a dogfight with a clearly-outmatched squadron of more brightly-painted T-wing interceptors (one of which had just nearly crashed into them). Rumors had been circulating for decades if not centuries that Jabba, in addition to his seemingly limitless supply of criminal scum, had secretly amassed an actual military. The rumors had just gained much credibility.
“Those mother fuckers!!”, Kadia exclaimed, still running, as the reality of the situation sank in. Clearly someone had begun to suspect her desire to defect; hence her being sent to this planet on the same day that they happened to neglect to mention that they intended to sack it.
“Set you up, did they; luv?”, Nagath called back between huffs. “That’s what happens when you deal with slugs.” Kadia then decided that this was as good a time as any to come clean.
“I’d like to state for the record”, she declared, “that even before all of this happened, I had already decided to hit you up for a job instead of doing what I was sent here to do.”
Nagath just smiled, chuckled, and kept running. It took a couple more seconds to sink it with Ganen. “Wait…”, he finally said. “Did you come here to kill my employer!?”
The airbus was abandoned, open, and running when the PC’s reached it; and everyone quickly piled in. All of the display screens in the passenger area were displaying a repeating EBS broadcast advising everyone to quickly and calmly head to the nearest emergency shelter and await further instructions.
Morrigan got the bus underway but quickly discovered that it was equipped with a governor which was limiting the engine output to around 50% (which, as a racer, offended her on a fundamental level). Garth took over driving, and she opened up a maintenance panel in the back with the intent of finding and removing it.
Roger meanwhile used the comm in his helmet to search for news and/or police chatter, but everything he heard was rather discouraging…
- “The Inexorable is burning! I repeat… Inexorable is on fire!”
- “They’ve completely taken control of the spaceport!”
- “We’ve got tanks and heavy troop carriers closing in on the capital building!”
Around half-way to the coast, a laser blast from above and to the side of the bus blew one of the side doors clean off of its hinges. It was a Bantha II cargo skiff with eight Weequays on board, and they were moving closer.
Roger fired a shot which took out the guy manning the blaster as Ganen and Kadia both jumped from the bus onto the skiff. While Ganen had the advantage of a jetpack, Kadia had a moment of panic in which she thought she’d misjudged the distance and would barely be able grab onto the edge. But then an inexplicable wave of force (from Tempest, though that was never revealed) gently caught her and boosted her up onto the deck of the skiff.
At the same time that the PC’s were jumping to the skiff, three of the Weequays jumped onto the roof of the bus. One shattered the cockpit dome with a vibro-ax while another attempted to climb down through the open doorway, but Mon hit the latter with a flying elbow and knocked him to his death. The skiff pilot had moved directly above the bus to keep more of the PC’s from coming aboard, but this allowed Garth to slam the roof of the bus into the bottom of the skiff. The one that cracked his windshield got completely squished; and though the other one jumped in time, he died all the same.
Kadia and Ganen eliminated the remaining four with little difficulty; and as the latter shot and killed the driver, he grabbed Kadia around the waist and jetted back to the roof of the bus. They didn’t land very gracefully, but they made it unharmed. When they got back inside, everyone asked why they hadn’t secured the skiff (which was faster, more durable, and armed) rather than let it careen into the side of a building.
Though the cockpit dome was now not only cracked but also covered in Weequay blood, the forward sensor array was intact and it was suitable to fly by. Morrigan did manage to get the governor bypassed, so now they also had some better speed.
The PC’s discussed their situation for a few minutes; and right around the time Mon said “At least they’re not looking for us in particular”, all of the monitors changed from the Emergency Broadcast screen to a grainy but recognizable image of Nagath. Accompanying in was an audio message in Huttese, which basically boiled down to “give us this guy and we’ll stop blowing up your city”. Everyone immediately looked at Nagath with an unmistakable expression of ‘What the *%#$ did you do!?’
“Look, I’ll explain everything if we get off this planet alive, all right?”, he replied defensively. “Can we just concentrate on doing that for right now?” Garth briefly contemplated turning him over, but knew enough to know that dealing with Hutts seldom ended well.
Despite having heard that the spaceport had been ‘taken’, the PC’s (especially Garth, whose ship was still docked there) wanted to at least check it out. But when they got about half-way across the water, they saw a Corellian gunship pounding an area near the spaceport with turbolaser fire. Even if the ship didn’t see or opted to ignore the incoming bus, the PC’s were pretty certain that it would try to shoot down anyone who attempted to leave via ship.
That being the case, they decided to instead make for the mainland and try to find another way off world. The news seemed to indicate that the attacks were mainly confined to Xandar and a few outlying military bases, and the bus’s nav system was able to located another spaceport about 60 miles inland.
As soon as they reached the shore of the mainland, the PC’s started looking for some other transport to take so that they could abandon their blood-spattered bus. After only a few minutes, they spotted a pair of four-seat airspeeders parked on an isolated street with very few people on it. Garth parked the bus on the far side of the street and everyone quickly got out.
As they exited, however, they suddenly found that the sunny afternoon that they’d been experiencing had been instantly replaced by darkness. Looking up, they saw an unnaturally blood-red moon eclipsing the sun. They also saw something descending directly down over the airspeeders that they’d been about to swipe.
It was circular and roughly 6 meters in diameter, but none of the PC’s could clearly see what it actually was. The building behind it was still visible but was distorted; some kind of cloaked vehicle perhaps?
Deciding that they’d rather not stick around to find out, the PC’s all piled back into the bus; but before they could get it going again, a concentrated barrage of blaster fire took out the bus’s power generator. After the bus dropped to the ground with a jarring thud, the PC’s cautiously peered outside.
Eight individuals now stood just in front of the distorted sphere facing the bus; seven of whom wore red armor. Kadia vaguely recognized them as being some elite type of soldier in service to the Hutt Cartels. Mon unmistakably recognized the armor as that which had been worn by the Defilers: the most elite of Jeng Droga’s clone soldiers during the Clone Wars.
In the midst of these men was a woman garbed in a combination of black cloth of grey metal. None of the PC’s recognized her species, but her glowing red eyes seemed to indicate that she wasn’t human. Her left hand was a mechanical prosthetic, and her right hand gripped the hilt of some sort of flexible red lightsaber.
“You guys have done enough”, Nagath said in a defeated tone. “I’ll walk out there alone if you want me to; maybe they’ll let you walk away. I promise I’ll hold no grudge in the next life.” The PC’s contemplated this in silence for a few moments.
“We can take ‘em!”, Garth suddenly pronounced in a chipper and upbeat tone.
Morrigan managed to remotely pop open the first and last passenger doors on that side of the bus, and the PC’s took cover behind the remaining doors as an opening salvo of blaster fire tore through the interior. Mon, who hadn’t seemed to have any weapons prior to that, had pulled a blaster out of his backpack. Still using what was left of the bus as cover; he, Ganen, Tempest, Roger, and Garth all answered with blaster fire of their own. Kadia instead exited the bus; her camo armor causing her to seemingly disappear in the darkness as she closed on the unsuspecting enemy.
Armed only with a taser, Morrigan stayed back to keep an eye on Nagath. As she watched the gun battle unfold, she saw the woman get enveloped by an inky darkness. Looking around the bus, she spotted a similar inky darkness materializing behind Nagath.
Not waiting for the woman to materialize, Morrigan rushed passed Nagath and thrust her taser into the darkness. She felt it hit metal and heard a loud electrical ‘pop’. Nagath, going with the flow, ripped a display monitor off of a nearby seat back and threw it in the same direction; striking something. Garth likewise heard the electrical pop, turned around, and fired a blast bolt into the darkened space.
When the woman rematerialized; her cybernetic arm was locked in a dramatic gesture, her nose was bloodied from the display screen, and she had a blaster wound in her torso. Morrigan struck again with her taser, this time striking the woman’s neck. As she collapsed to the floor, the darkness outside instantly snapped back to day. Within moments, the other PC’s had dropped all of the red-clad soldiers.
The distorted sphere was still visible; and someone pointed out that it if was a vehicle and it had held the woman and the seven Defiliers, then it would hold all of them as well. It indeed was a cloaked speeder, and the PC’s quickly piled in.
Morrigan sat down in the pilot’s seat and looked over the control panel; which was… kinda weird. It had an interface for an astrogation computer but it didn’t appear to have any star charts. Likewise, it had a hyperdrive lever which indicated that the motivator was offline; and it was highly unlikely that a vehicle this side would be equipped with both a hyperdrive and a cloaking device. Also, the symbol appearing on the door panel after it closed indicated that the craft was space-worthy.
Roger speculated that it was perhaps just a portion of a larger, modular vessel and suggested that she look for some kind of homing signal. Sure enough, there was a dedicated receiving which was locked onto a signal originating from above.
No Hutt vessels or fighters attempted to approach the PC’s as they ascended into orbit; and as they neared the source of the homing signal, they were still seeing nothing but space. About the time that they could finally make out some sort of larger distortion directly ahead, a button on the console labeled ‘Auto Trac’ (which had been red) stared flashing yellow. Morrigan slowly maneuvered right to the homing point, and when the button turned green, she pressed it. She felt the controls release, and everyone felt something grip the vehicle. It slowly turned around 180 degrees, then drifted backwards until it stopped as docking clamps audibly locked into place. At the same time, the nav computer came online and the hyperdrive controls indicated a ready status.
“Why don’t you go ahead and take us out of orbit”, Nagath suggested. “If there is anyone else on board, better to be as far from reinforcements as we can when we run into them.” Morrigan concurred, and Nagath stayed with her as the other PC’s opened the back hatch (which now indicated an atmosphere on the other side) with their weapons at the ready.
Standing on the other side of the hatch was a white and black R4 unit which buzzed in alarm and scooted backwards when it saw the PC’s. Threateningly extending an arc welder and circular saw, it rocked back and forth and emitted a noisy electronic fuss. The PC’s tried to calm him down; indicated that they didn’t want to hurt him but that they were the ship’s new owners and he was just going to have to deal with that. The droid finally retracted his weapons, popped his third wheel, spun around, and retreated back into the ship.
The PC’s swept through deck by deck; and not only was there nobody there, the ship appeared to be brand new. There were only two signs that anyone had even been on the ship since it left the factory. In the mess hall, several space ration wrappers had been tossed on the floor; and in one of the cabins, there was a rather evil-looking dagger resting on the pillow.
While the other PC’s were searching, Tempest wisely followed the droid. He entered one of the computer control rooms and attempted to plug into the system, but Tempest (with a little help from a brandished blaster) managed to dissuade him from doing whatever he’d been about to do.
Morrigan had meanwhile pulled up schematics for the ship, which was actually a Loronar ‘SkyBlind’. She also saw the charred wreckage of a Corellian Corvette; presumably the Inexorable. Once she got clear of the planet’s gravity well, she asked Nagath where they were going.
“Lay in a course for… I’ve never been clear on how to pronounce it… ‘pie-ee’; ‘pey-eye’; you know the one I’m talking about. Well change vector for Vuzsa when we get there, and I can get us to Abafar from Vuzsa.”
“I can do that”, Morrigan replied; as she in fact lived in the system in question (Pii; which even the citizens of couldn’t agree on a proper pronunciation). Querying further on Abafar (which she’d heard of but couldn’t find on the charts), Nagath explained…
“It’s not ‘secret’ or anything; it just didn’t get discovered until after the Republic’s last big cartography update in this area, which was over 30 years ago. Also we don’t like unexpected company, so there’s no nav beacon for it either. It’s just half an hour standard north of Vuzsa towards the D’Anjon Nebula. But before you jump, I want to do something first.” As he continued, he opened up the comm system. “If the Hutts don’t know that I’m gone, they’re going to keep tearing that planet apart. Go ahead and drop the cloak.”
“Attention all affiliates of the Hutt Cartel”, he began on an audio-only transmission as Morrigan lowered the shields. “This is Romo Nagath of the Zann Consortium. Despite all of your best efforts, I’ve slipped right passed you; you slimy slugs. Once again proving, you can’t do anything right. That’s me in the SkyBlind about to jump into hyperspace. Enjoy the rest of your day.”
“All right, hit it”, he told Morrigan as he hung up the comm; and a moment later, the ship smoothly jumped to light speed.