First Reply High Price of Treason

[Damian du Couteau]

Damian Du Couteau, Senator of Empress Teta
Location: [REDACTED], Cinnegar, Empress Teta

Damian never held deep seated hatred before, so it was indeed a close thing that he found himself rather vengeful. But such thoughts would be wasted as he currently was not in a position to do much except run.

With each and every tired breath he took though, the situation was beginning to get closer to a rather short lived hateful emotions. The Nobleman that had persuaded Damian to provide details to how to help the resistance on Teta had instead set up a trap for capture. Or Death.

The young Du Couteau heir would hardly put it past the traitorous noble that the guards were on orders to shoot to kill. His feet pounded the ground with greater urgency as suddenly the shouts of his pursuers sounded awfully closer.

Damian found himself running through a collapsed part of the building, his steps sounded wet as he glanced around. It was his decision to meet up in a building that was a bit unsound structurally but it was a common enough hotel that Damian had visited many times for galas and other assorted parties. He knew the layout quite well, but he had unfortunately underestimated the resulting damage after the Imperial invasion.

There’s still water being pumped into the pipes above us in this wreck? He shook his head with displeasure as he turned the corner the moment blaster fire was hurled in his general direction. The red bolts slammed into the already cracked wall and Damian turned his attention to the roof above him, giving it a careful curious thought.

Damian had only a few seconds but it was enough for him to plant his last charged smoke grenade. It wouldn’t be enough to cause serious harm, but with the already weakened state the moment the guards turned the corner the small explosive shattered the fragile roof. Smoke filled the corner and the guards coughed as they attempted to push past the smoke.

At first nothing really happened, a few pieces of the roof fell but nothing serious, Damian silently cursed as he continued to run down the hallway. Then a larger crack and snap made him turn around and with a shocked expression from the guards the roof caved in and caused the floor below to collapse.

Damian had no time to celebrate as he noticed the cracks were also racing towards him. It was mostly luck but thankfully Damian found himself reaching a sturdier patch of the floor but the bottom floor below was almost in clear view.

“Fourteen more floors to go,” Damian mumbled as he looked around for the safest looking set of stairs.
​

OOC:

Spoiler

A short thread of escaping a building in occupied Empress Teta

 

[Talsin Lota]

Empress Teta was a dangerous place for a scion from House Lota. His parents had forbidden him from stepping foot on it after the invasion. His family had been tightly linked to the Alliance efforts, the moment the Imperials took over? Open season on his people.

That was how his parents died. At the blades of assassins paid by their rivals on Coruscant during the second invasion.

Which meant they were no longer here to tell Talsin he couldn't do this. He was a Duke now, but he hardly felt like one. And so Talsin did what all people did when they didn't want to face their pain and responsibilities.

They ran away from it.

In this case Talsin landed on Teta with Tansu Treicolt and sat to work to at least try and help people. There were still Lota loyalists, people that had worked with his parents, servants that escaped the massacre.

It was through those connections that he heard of a plot being spun for the former Senator of Empress Teta. Tal didn't know Du Couteau personally, but any man that didn't abandon his people and put his life on the line to try and help them was a good man in his book.

He had tried to get a message out to the erstwhile Senator but couldn't get to him in time. By the time he got to the building he was already inside and the trap had sprung.

It took some doing to get inside himself but luckily the killers were looking to prevent people from getting out.

They didn't think about someone going in.

As he squeezed himself into one of the ventilation shaft he let his virtual intelligence assistant try to slice into the comms. It took several attempts and some confused chatter with the killers before he finally homed in on the network of the Senator.

Hopefully.

<< Du Couteau, you getting this? Please respond, over. >>

This place was a karking maze infested with murders. How was he going to find the Senator?

More importantly how were they both going to get out?

Damian du Couteau

 

[Damian du Couteau]

Damian Du Couteau, Senator of Empress Teta
Location: [REDACTED], Cinnegar, Empress Teta

With a careful step forward Damian tested the cracked floor, nothing shifted or moved and he placed more of his body weight. Good enough. He tensed as he walked silently across another unsafe appearing hallway. He had wished that he’d listened to his gut about not trusting the traitors noble, but Damian felt that he needed to at least try to find more allies. Even among the most unlikeliest.

Damian figured he had a bit more time before Imperial reinforcements came, no doubt the traitor wanted to personally hand him over to the Imperial Governor Keto. His eyes quickly scanned the rooms as he passed them until he found one with one missing most of its floor. Finally, The stairs were no doubt being patrolled but they couldn’t possibly patrol all the broken floors and walls. As he got himself ready to drop down his commlink lit up, it caught Damian’s eye and with a quick look around the room and once out in the hallway he answered.

“Mace? Carp? If you’re trying to warn me about the Noble being a Keto loyalist save your breath,” Damian whispered, guessing wrongly on who was on the other line,

“-And tell the General I already got an escape plan, so don’t worry about me. . . “ Damian lied. He really wanted to avoid anybody in the resistance cell from formulating a rescue plan, Those guys got more than enough on their plate. Damian looked around and gently lowered himself through the hole in the room and dropped into the room below. Thirteen floors left.

“-It’s my mess and I’ll clean it up, copy?”
​

|| Talsin Lota ||​

 

[Talsin Lota]

Damian du Couteau

<<I don't know who Mace is or Carp.>> Talsin replied dryly as he climbed the fragile ladder that connected from a ventilation shaft to a maintenance corridor while trying to make as little noise as possible. << Oh, but you already got a plan? Capital. That means I can stop squeezing myself through these ventilation shafts for you and crawl my way out again, yeah? >>

Talsin knew he was being a bit unfair with his dry sarcasm, but he was extremely on edge. He hadn't been back to Teta since the invasion and he was doing it against the orders of his deceased parents.

It had taken him so little time to ignore every single lesson they had imparted on him or tried to.

<<On the off chance that you aren't as secure in your exit strategy though... name is Talsin Lota, I am a... Jedi, I am currently crawling my way through the southern quadrant and I am seeing a lot of enemy blips rushing to your direction.>>

A pause there.

<<I know you got no reason to trust me, but I lost everything to these traitors... I want to help you. Will you let me?>>