Finding Things In The Dark

[Alistair Fenn]

Unnamed Shadowport
[member="Jyn Sol"]

There were few places in this galaxy that Alistair didn't want to go, in fact he could list them on one hand.

Most of the time he didn't particularly care about governments, police forces, fleets, pirates, and even other smugglers. All of that was really kind of irrelevant to him. There was always a place to run to, there was always a place to hide. Most places he could easily justify going to, hell, most of the time it was as easy as making an excuse in his head.

His newest job though?

That was a bit different.

Alistair didn't like the idea of where he was being sent, and he liked the idea of landing there even less. The Galaxy produced some mean places, natural worlds that most people should avoid if they knew what was good for them, but...some planets had been corrupted by things far more unnatural. He didn't pretend to understand who or what, he just knew that it was best to avoid those places if you wanted to leave with your skin.

Unfortunately for him, he needed money.

Debt hungover his head to an extreme degree, and he wasn't about to turn down a job when it could pay. He knew the dangers of it, but if he didn't do it he might get killed anyway. He didn't like it, but at least it was his choice. "Now where the feth is she."

Alistair wondered out loud as he pulled a wire from the landing strut.

"Don't need that." He mumbled to himself.

 

[Lief]

Exiting Tranquility​

​

Somethings she couldn't do alone.

Jyn had learned that early on, earlier than anyone really ought to, and while stubbornness had won out in those earlier years the path of torment it had ultimately carved out for her had left her with a renewed sense of humility when it came to asking for help.

Or more, buying it as the case may have been.

These days she did have a ship. It was a commodity she had spent so long without that part of her wondered over the necessity of it at all. Still her duties to the Je'daii thanked her for it. Why then, in the name of Bendu, was she here, seeking out some scoundrel to smuggle her into the depths of Sith space? Why did she not simply captain Tranquility into the depths of hell?

Simply put: They were watching her. Or, at least, she thought they were. It was difficult not to suspect as much, given her history with Dromund Kaas, with the sadistic Emperor, the man who had single handedly snuffed her family from existence. He had done all he could to push her down a path of darkness before she escaped in the clutches of [member='Tirdarius'], and from what she had been told he had managed to do the same with the brothers she never knew she'd had. Brothers who were dead, or worse. No, she could not risk showing up as a blimp on their radar. Not now, not when she finally had her life in order.

And that was where the shadowport came in.

A hefty sum of credits would keep her ship docked safely until her return. A heftier one still would ensure her safe passage into his domain.

Now all she had to do was find him.

Approaching [member='Alistair Fenn']

As she approached the rendezvous point Jyn could not help but feel somewhat... Apprehensive.

When first she had been stranded, after Teth and the disappearance of Tirdarius, she had done all she could to survive. Places like this were commonplace back then, when she jumped from ship to ship in order to cross the Galaxy with naught save Fuz and a little satchel of belongings. The child she had been was gone now, of course, hardened by a Galaxy of war and chaos, but a little piece of who she had been rose back to the surface in that moment. The paranoia she had felt at the hands of the Inquisition, the will to survive which had been brought about by Arthos. Thankfully, above it all, her determination and trust in the Force - something which had come about through true difficulty and introspection in the end, after two decades of rejection toward it - prevailed.

She could see him now, through the crowd, or at least who she suspected was him. Her contact. He didn't look much older than she, in fact they easily could have been of the same age. She spent so much time around students and elders that it surprised her at first, but she quickly set that aside and approached him.

Force, it had been so long since she had last sought someone out for safe passage that she had quite forgotten what it was she was supposed to do or say.

 

[Alistair Fenn]

[member="Jyn Sol"]

Alistair turned as he heard someone walking behind him.

Over the years one sort of developed a sense for that. It wasn't anything unnatural, just a feeling that someone was coming. His had developed a little earlier than most, consequence of living in a place where half a dozen people were out to rob you at any given time.

Not that he would have traded Tatooine for any of a dozen other homeworlds. "You my passenger?"

It seemed somewhat unlikely, and his voice told that more than his face. For some reason he had expected something...more. Maybe a Bounty Hunter or a sturdy looking Jedi, that was who he'd expect to go to Dromund Kaas, not a...well girl like this.

Still, he wasn't one to judge.

Maybe she had a Sith Uncle she wanted to visit.

 

[Lief]

He turned before she had reached him, and the look in his eye - not to mention his unbridled emotions which seeped forth in momentary disbelief - were telltale signs of his doubt when he checked to see if she was the one he'd been waiting for.

It took every bit of willpower she had not to bow by way of greeting. That was something she had taken to doing, especially around Aurum though for some reason it had bled into other parts of her life, and instead she offered him a wry smile that spoke of her own uncertainties.

"Not what you were expecting?" she offered, with a lighthearted tone, before shrugging, "Aye, that'd be me."

Did she give him her name?

Did she give him her real name?

She had been known by several throughout the years, that which she was born with, that which he had branded her - which surprisingly she still used to this day, after all two decades of using it before finding out the truth was difficult to shake - and that which she had named herself in hopes of staying alive... So many possibilities, yet in truth all tied her back to Kaas. Something new, then, perhaps? If the need even arose.

For now she merely waited. It was strange to be out of control once again, after several years now of being the one to step up, to make the decisions and call the shots.

[member='Alistair Fenn']

 

[Alistair Fenn]

[member="Jyn Sol"]

"Right." Best get on with it.

Dromund Kaas wasn't the kind of world he willingly ventured to, and the faster that he got all of this over with the better it would be for his sanity. A small roll of his neck and he gestured for her to board The Mara. He had no idea what would come of all of this, but at the very least he was hoping to make some money.

"I'm ready as soon as you are." He told her. "From what I was told you need to head down to one of the jungles?"

That would at least make things a bit easier.

Dromund Kaas up until recently had been nothing ruin a wreck of a planet. The Resurgent Empire had changed that of course, rebuilding much of the planets infrastructure. That being said most of the place was still one massive jungle hiding all sorts of nasty things. From evil beasties to Sith Temples, Dromund Kaas was still largely a place that...well you just didn't really want to go to unless you absolutely had to. That being said, he'd rather head to the jungle than Kaas city.

Less likely to encounter Sith there.

As he stepped on board The Mara he waited for the young woman before closing the ramp.

 

[Lief]

Jyn was in fact looking to smuggle herself into Kaas City.

But he didn't need to know that. Where she went when they touched down was on her, he was just her ticket over there. And hopefully the amount of credits she was willing to pay him would tempt him to stick around for a few hours once they got there.

She didn't need long.

Seemed almost a waste of time and credits, and if it was any other place, under any other circumstances, for any other reason, she would not have bothered.

But Kaas was the final link.

She had been to Talus, the place of her birth, she had ventured to Serenno where the streets had been her home, and Coruscant where the crazed God-King of Panatha had torn her away from reality. Korriban wasn't somewhere she needed to remember.

But Dromund Kaas?

"The jungles will do, yes. South of Kaas City."

Following him up onto the ship she felt a determination rise within her. Soon it would all be over, everything she needed to know, to remember, would be unearthed.

What would she do then, with all that knowledge?

Her mind turned to [member='Darth Carnifex'] for a moment, the man who had started it all. She would be a fool to follow in her mother's footsteps where vengeance was concerned.

Right?

[member="Alistair Fenn"]

 

[Alistair Fenn]

[member="Jyn Sol"]

He shivered slightly at the mention of Kaas City.

Alistair wasn't a coward, well that wasn't true at all, he was a complete coward, but he liked the idea of venturing to Kaas city about as much as he liked the idea of entering the jaws of a Krayt Dragon. There were few dangers in this galaxy as startling stupid as dealing with a bunch of Sith. It didn't help that The Mara wasn't exactly equipped for fighting either, the little freighter had a few stealth measure and some guns, but that was about it.

If someone caught them? They'd be screwed. "Alright."

Still, credits were credits, and he needed them.

"It'll take us a few hours to get there." He pulled the lever to the ramp, a loud screech ringing out as the hydraulics began to haul the metal ramp back up into it's closed position. The Mara was an old ship, reliable one. "No one should see us coming."

Hopefully anyway.

Without another word Alistair made a break for the cockpit, heading up the small tunnel and climbing a ladder before he threw himself into the pilots chair. For a moment he simply took a breath, thinking about how stupid this was. He didn't believe in any of that 'force' nonsense of course, but he knew that the Sith were...well insane. He'd seen the holo-reels of what they'd done and what their worlds were like, and generally he didn't enjoy dealing with crazy people.

The Mara began to rumble as it's engines burst into life.

 

[Lief]

A few hours in space with a complete stranger.

What could possibly go wrong?

She heard the ramp screech into a locked position, and stood in place for a few moments after her roguish companion ventured further into his vessel. It was a rather pretty ship, truth be told, though it did look to be a rather older model. Such things always had their charms, and for a second or so she merely glanced over its interior.

Then she followed after him. Was it rude to step into someone's cockpit unannounced? She didn't exactly know where else on this ship she was really allowed to be.

The ship came to life in the time it took her to scale the ladder, and out of respect she hung back while he prepped the vessel for take off. It was strange to not be the one in control, but oddly freeing too. It reminded her of her time ship hopping across the Galaxy before she had come back to Teth to settle.

"She's a beautiful ship," she offered, voice quiet with hopes that she would not distract him too much. "Does she have a name?"

[member="Alistair Fenn"]

 

[Alistair Fenn]

[member="Jyn Sol"]

"Beautiful", Alistair had to try really hard not to laugh at the word. The Mara was an ancient wreck of a vessel that at the best of times could barely manage to get out of whatever hangar bay it was coming from. He admitted that the ship had a certain charm to it, but calling it beautiful was more than a little bit of generosity.

That being said, it still got from A to B. That was the important part. "The Mara."

It was named after a small corridor on Tatooine, tucked away within the great desert sea. Both him and Kurt had a habit of naming their ships after sections of their planet, a tradition that had started with Kurt's first pod. The memory brought a brief smile to Alistair's face, though it was quickly brushed away as the ship took off from it's landing struts and began to crawl it's way into the atmosphere. There was a slight shake as they breached into space, his fingers latching around the control.

"You may want to hold on." He told her as he began to enter the coordinates.

"She's..." The smuggler cut himself off as he frowned for a moment, spotting an odd error on the screen but thinking nothing of it. "She can be a bit rough in the jump."

 

[Lief]

"The Mara..." She recognized the name from somewhere, though in that moment she couldn't quite place her finger on it. Not that it mattered of course. Regardless of what he, or others, might have thought of the craft, Jyn liked it. What she had seen of it, of course. Then again her gaze was always drawn to starships, she could find the allure in most any ship given enough time.

As the vessel rocked Jyn instinctively reached out for something to hold onto, a bar in the ceiling or something similar, and used it to keep herself steady. All those journeys spent huddled in cargo bays, freezing her butt off, had prepped her for moments like these, where unexpected turbulence threatened to rock her against the hull. Still it had been some time since she'd been forced to experience such, Tranquility was much more free flowing than many of the smuggling vessels she'd sought refuge on.

"Thanks for the heads up," she muttered, with sincerity in her tone, her gaze trailing toward the viewing port so as to watch when they tore away from the Shadowport.

Just a few more hours and she would be back in the place where it all started.

Just a few more after that and she would be turning her back on the world for good.

How freeing a thought that was.

[member="Alistair Fenn"]

 

[Alistair Fenn]

[member="Jyn Sol"]

Briefly he thought about asking why she wanted to go to Dromund Kaas.

It was a good question for anyone, really.

Was she a Jedi? A Sith? Bounty Hunter? She didn't look like any of the three, though granted he had never actually seen the first two. Bounty Hunters were common enough on Tatooine, though most of the time they tended to wear about as much armor as possible, that or they had some kind of gimmick they used to hunt. As far as Alistair could tell Jyn didn't actually have any of those gimmicks on her, so the likelyhood of her being a bounty hunter were rather low in his book.

He shook his head slightly.

The truth of it was he didn't want to know, or rather, it'd be better for him not to. Whatever reason she had for going to Dromund Kaas was likely a dangerous one, and he didn't like the idea of getting embroiled with anything that had to do with the Sith. He was on this little trip to make a dent in the debt he owed the Cartel.

That was it.

Everything else came second. "Hang on."

Alistair's voice was gruff as he pushed the levers forward and they jumped into hyperspace.

 

[Lief]

He wouldn't have liked the answer if he had asked.

Thankfully he hadn't. But that didn't mean Jyn wasn't thinking about all her own reasons for going. It was stupid of her to think that there was even a slim chance Jiaa was still around, though she clung on to the hopes of seeing her 'brother' all the same.

The parents she had known, the man and woman who had adopted her, were long since dead, killed when the Empire fell and Kaas was 'liberated'. She didn't know how to feel, the woman had actually been of her blood, tied to her through her Mother's side, an Aunt or something akin to that, and she had been lovely. Almost as though she knew. Her so-called Father, though?

She shuddered at the thought of him.

Only good thing he ever did was teach me to shoot.

It had helped her on more than one occasion, but outside of that he had been nothing short of a monster when home. Thankfully his work had kept him away for weeks at a time. The very thought of her 'mother' dying for his stupidity, his poor life choices, angered her, and she could feel her skin begin to prickle and burn though she kept the flames from flaring into life.

So why was she going, if not to see them?

He would not like to hear that closure was the main reason. She had to move on with her life, close the chapters of her past that were over. Besides, she could feel a tugging through the Force, she had done for weeks now, and it had led her this far. Who knew where else it would lead her.

Anywhere but to him.

But [member='Darth Carnifex'] was busy running an Empire. He had no cause to be on Kaas.

She heard something but the words didn't fully register until she felt the kick of the engines. Her body was slammed back against the wall before she managed to fully reach out and steady herself. The air was knocked from her chest, and for a moment or two after she coughed up a storm.

Thankfully she had found her balance.

"Rough indeed," she muttered, though that didn't make her like the ship any less. She even had a pretty name.

"What's your story?" she inquired out of nowhere, still not having asked for his name or given her own, "Why are you so willing" - she knew that was the wrong word, she could sense his displeasure about the whole thing - "to smuggle someone into Sith Space?"

[member="Alistair Fenn"]

 

[Alistair Fenn]

[member="Jyn Lorr"]

"Uhh." He glanced at her. "Money?"

That was really the best and only answer that he had for that particular question.

The Galaxy didn't focus around force users. It didn't center around one or two people, it didn't center around the Sith or the Jedi. They probably wanted to think it did, their egos were massive enough that their wars were the only thing that mattered. Good versus evil, all of that nonsense.

The truth was though, nobody really cared.

Sure people died in war, but that didn't really matter. At the end of the day whether a Sith or a Jedi controlled your planet wasn't really your concern. Your concern was feeding your family, keeping your house going, and making sure that you survive the week. That was it for the vast majority of the galaxy, including Alistair himself. He didn't give one shit about who owned Dromund Kaas, save for the danger and insanity of the people who ran it.

All that mattered to him was the money that would keep him going another day.

 

[Lief]

"No chit," she said, trying to hold back a smirk, "I more meant, aren't there easier jobs out there? Kaas isn't exactly the nicest place in the Galaxy..."

She probably shouldn't have been saying this to the man who was taking her into Sith Space, wouldn't want him to get cold feet after all, but she genuinely couldn't help but be curious. While she'd never state as much to him, she could sense his apprehension and displeasure at having picked up this job and she couldn't really blame him for it. Heck, she'd rather be anywhere else in the Galaxy and she was the one asking this of him. He must really need that money.

"You don't have to answer, I probably shouldn't even be asking. I apologize."

Glancing around the cockpit she potted one seat set back from where he was and carefully stepped over to it, taking a seat before the ship could knock her off her feet again.

"I'm Jyn, by the way," she said, as though giving him her name in some way shape or form made her rude questioning any better. It didn't, but she couldn't change that now.

[member="Alistair Fenn"]

 

[Alistair Fenn]

[member="Jyn Lorr"]

Easier jobs? Was there an easier job than sitting in the pilot's seat of his own ship and flying around? Probably, considering that desk jobs and the like existed but...well Alistair wasn't really well suited for that sort of thing. He wasn't an idiot, but he'd dropped out of school at the age of fifteen and never looked back. His intelligence was one of the street, space, and everything that you needed to know in order to survive the wider ranges of the galaxy.

A shrug rolled over his shoulder. "Maybe."

He admitted, though by the sound of his voice he didn't very much like admitting to it in the first place. The very fact of it was that there hadn't been many opportunities for someone like him on Tatooine. His home was known for crime of all sorts, and the only legit enterprise was Arceneau Trade Company, a corporation that while good...just really wasn't his style.

"Smuggling is dangerous." He told her. "It pays better than most things with the same effort though."

He shrugged. "As for less dangerous smuggling jobs, it all really depends on what you consider dangerous. Sure Kaas is known for the crazies, but the other half of the galaxy is at war."

The Alliance and First Order fighting had only grown more and more harsh as of late.

 

[Lief]

If he was willing to do this run, then who was she to question it further. With a very light shrug of her shoulder she allowed the topic to dissolve back into silence as she pondered on his words. It was true, the Galaxy was insane right now, chaos ran rampant and even those who claimed to be trying to help were doing more harm than good. It said something when Jedi were tried for warcrimes. Most of the Galaxy had become very jaded toward them, and with good reason in Jyn's own experience.

To someone such as he, Force Users were likely just another plague upon their lives. She didn't doubt that some people even doubted their existence at all, even with so much evidence out there on the holonet. What she wouldn't give to be oblivious to it all, for the longest time that had been all that Jyn wanted, to be disconnected from the Force, to live out an ordinary life without being pulled in every direction by every Force User she met. Sith, Inquisition, Imperium, Jedi... It was enough to make a girl crazy. And it almost had.

Still these days she was much more content, but she had poured those foundations for herself, grown her Order from the ground up, so it made sense that it mirrored her views and feelings.

"I've seen some places in the Galaxy which have managed to hold off the onslaught of war, but truth be told such havens become fewer with each passing day."

She was lucky. Since the Horde was sent scampering Aurum hadn't known any real hardship and if she could keep it that way she would. Most of the Galaxy was not quite so lucky.

"And there's always a payoff, such places tend to exist on the fringes of space where commodities are harder to come by. I suppose it all comes down to what you're comfortable with, a humbler life away from it all, or all the amenities you could possibly ask for under a more militant regime."

By this point she wasn't really talking to him, more so just outloud in general. She had a bad habit of doing that.

[member="Alistair Fenn"]

 

[Alistair Fenn]

[member="Jyn Lorr"]

He shrugged. "Nowhere is safe, no sanctuary will last forever."

Alistair sounded more sure of himself than he had before, his rather...pessimistic statement sort of dominating the cockpit a few seconds after he spoke. He was right though, at least in his own view of things. A great example was his homeworld; Tatooine. The planet had quite literally nothing to offer the galaxy.

Most of it was just desert and sand, yet there had been a war fought over it.

The Galactic Empire and the Confederacy of Independent systems had come to Tatooine and nearly wrecked the only three cities that were actually still standing in the place. They had fought, men had died, and in the end absolutely nothing had changed. There was no safe place in this galaxy, nowhere that you could hide.

Not for long anyway.

"Anyway." Alistair reached up and flicked a switch. "Dromund Kaas isn't any more dangerous than Dosuun right now."

He shrugged. "Might as well get paid."

 

[Lief]

"I suppose you're right" she said, with a very soft shrug, knowing full well that the sanctuary that she and her Order clung to had already been subjected to attacks far greater than any might have expected given its location and lack of anything to offer, it wasn't prime real estate and yet the Vong had trampled all over it anyway. Long before her time, before they returned to its space, but the remnants of that time remained in place enough to warn them from becoming too complacent. "Still, I'll take anything I can get right now. The current climate of the Galaxy is bordering insanity."

Her eyes lingered over to the viewing port, but truth be told at this stage of the game there wasn't all that much to see. Stars drifting by... The usual spacey stuff. Some people adored it, she knew Asha did, but Jyn had seen it all before. She much preferred the lifestyle offered on land, the freshness of trees and verdant landscapes. Space travel was little more than a commodity to her.

"I guess you have to do what you can, we all do."

Jyn was lucky, the money she received either came from the government of Aurum for her state job - if one could really call it that - or from the trust fund she didn't know existed until the past few months, set up by her parents. The same parents she had never met. Still she found her work rewarding, even if many would happily look down on it, running the archives and library complex of Aurum, restoring old books and artifacts, logging the data into memory banks so that future generations could make use of it. Yes... Rewarding indeed, to her.

"I promise it will just be a quick run, if that helps any..."

It wasn't as though she was looking to cause trouble, or stir the pot; she had just one destination in mind when they touched down, and then they could leave again. Simple as that. Almost seemed like a waste of credits, but to Jyn it was a necessity.

[member="Alistair Fenn"]

 

[Alistair Fenn]

[member="Jyn Lorr"]

Alistair shrugged. "Doesn't really matter all that much."

There was more danger in staying on Dromund Kaas longer of course, but at a certain point you were tasting fate no matter what you were doing. The planet was controlled by Sith Lord's, watched over by an army and navy and tightly wound up like the very middle of Coruscant.

Just going there was danger enough.

"I've had worse runs." The Smuggler told her, reminding himself of that one visit to Nal Hutta. It had been a rather unpleasant experience, mostly because the job had entailed getting purposefully captured by the Hutt Council. They had not been a gentle host, and that was how he'd lost his eye. The very thought of it made a shiver run up his spine, though he quickly pushed the thought away and refocused himself on the control panel.

"Just pay me." He told her. "We'll be good."

A ping rang out from the control panel, signalling their approach.

 

[Lief]

"You don't have to worry about the pay" she reassured him, openly surprised when moments later the ship signaled that they were nearing their destination. They must have been closer than she initially thought, that or the oddities of space had once again gotten to her.

She often found that time melted away when she was onboard a ship, especially during hyperspace. Perhaps that was why she didn't enjoy the experience as much as some others she knew did.

To her a ship was a commodity, nothing more.

Having experienced first hand the rocky take off involved with this particular ship, as much as a beauty as she was, Jyn was not so eager to test her luck and actually buckled in in anticipation of their nearing descent. She felt certain that she was already going to have bruises from her earlier tumble headfirst into the wall of the cockpit, didn't make sense to her to add to that.

[member="Alistair Fenn"]