Soul Searching (ORC Dominion of Echidna, Hex Q-56)

[VildarnTentoria]

_________________

Soul Searching
__________________

Objective: Commune with the Dead
Goal: Communicate with spirits
Post: 2
Location: The Seeker

And so they were all after the same thing. The ever fleeing Seeker. Just who would Vildarn choose to talk to? Just what would he say if given such a chance. Perhaps it was best that nobody else ever found out.

 

[Janick Beauchamp]

"All stations, report in. No sightings near Ruby Dear. Any luck over by Lamia or Kharlon?" [member="Dax Fyre"] reported in, with the static having faded at the same time the elusive ghost ship made its jump.

"Looks like we have rapidly fading cronau radiation readings over here, however, it seems to be fading too quickly for it to be an unjammed reversion. There has to be some sort of jamming, supernatural or not, at play here"

Static was still emanating from the direction of [member="Zak Amroth"] and possibly even [member="Kaia Starchaser"] or [member="Kir Tillian"], which could indicate that the ghost ship may have reverted on the path from Lamia to Kharlon, and only the relative strength of the jamming could tell the two possibilities apart. For some reason Janick is still convinced that what made the ghost ship, well, a ghost ship, was at least partially due to EWAR. Even though she would have to face the possibility that conventional EWAR's role was, in fact, not the end of the story, she'd still cling to that possibility, until she has a complete scan of that thing at least. Even then it's possible they'd shoot it down before they could even get a scan completed, especially if the occupants deem any of the ORC ships in this area, or any combination thereof, hostile. This kind of ghost ship can be a serious threat to the security of the ORC if it actually is hostile; however, I should not drop the bomblet until I'm fired at, Janick thought, while looking for anomalies that could help locate a ghost ship around Kharlon.

 

[Kaia Starchaser]

Too much work to be done but here? The Outer Rim was calling for help. And as a Warden, she had to answer that call. The stellar-centric Jedi had made her way into system and her ship had dropped her out in orbit of Kharlon. The small freighter was a Starchaser special, so it was updated to allow anyone to navigate well, but when in the hands of someone from that lineage? It became an even greater threat to the unmapped starlanes. Sure, maybe she wasn’t going to navigate the Maw without consulting charts, but a microjump?

Pfft.

As soon as her sensors came online, she shook her head. Nothing.

“Nothing in Kharlon. Going to try to boost my sensors, Command.” She knew that someone was bound to find it. It wasn’t going that far, right?


[member="Griet van Vliet"]
[member="Zak Amroth"]
[member="Dax Fyre"]
[member="Kir Tillian"]

OOC: I'm literal trash soo so sooo late

 

[Dax Perl]

All stations reported in, the garbled transmissions reaching their comrades with varying degrees of clarity. Nothing had turned up...yet. The mysterious static that blanketed their communications line remained, indicating that Seeker remained as well. But where? The answer came soon enough. Above Kharlon, the stars were suddenly blotted out, a green, electrifying mist seemed to billow out of nowhere into the vacuum of space, a large disk of fog coming into existence. Slowly, bleak grey metal pierced the supernatural veil like a spear, the Seeker materializing from the fog. Ghostly lights danced around the ancient ship's hull, spiraling up and down its long body, dim emerald lights reflecting off the tarnished alloys. The fog dissipated, leaving the borne vessel in its wake. The Seeker had come to Kharlon.

[member="Kaia Starchaser"] | [member="Griet van Vliet"] | [member="Janick Beauchamp"] | [member="Kir Tillian"] | [member="Zak Amroth"] | [member="VildarnTentoria"]

 

[Zak Amroth]

"Yes!" Zak shouted in triumph and disbelief.

He felt like he was about to pass out, but after dozens of psychometric visions he had finally managed to decipher the Selkath transport's language settings. Diagnostic information now scrolled across the screens before him in Basic, and he took a celebratory swig of the brackish liquid he had discovered before retching briefly at its foul taste. Even the unseemliness of his surroundings could do little to dull his excitement at having more than basic control over the Jedi's 'borrowed' starship.

Pulling up the transport's sensor feeds, he was able to confirm what he had already figured out over comms, that his close encounter was with the nearby freighter Mynock and not an ancient unknowable ghost ship. Switching to long range sensors, Amroth noticed a blip that hadn't been accounted for. On sublight engines the moon of Kharlon was a bit of a trek from his current position orbiting Lamia, but even with legible datascreens Zak wasn't sure he wanted to risk plotting a microjump on an alien ship he had only commandeered hours ago. He knew a little about flying just like he knew a little about everything, but was certainly no astronavigational genius.

"Think, Zak. What would Master Darklight do?" he wondered out loud, referencing a popular Outer Rim children's holoseries from his youth. The answer was obvious, he began plotting the jump anyway. After quadruple checking his calculations, he wiped the sweat from his brow and punched in a course for the navcomputer, "Here goes nothing."

One second everything was fine, and the next his ship felt like it was about to shake itself apart.

'Pull Up. Pull Up. Pull Up.'

An automated female voice repeated gently but insistently in Basic, and flames started licking at the edges of the cockpit's viewport as the moon of Kharlon filled its field of vision. It was far closer than the outer orbit he had intended, potentially too close to survive. Hauling back on the transport's vertical thrusters, he strained to pull himself out of this surface dive before his course sent him skipping across the upper atmosphere and into a million pieces. Strangely all he could think about in this moment was how they never showed this part in any of Master Darklight's adventures.

[member="Dax Fyre"] | [member="Kaia Starchaser"] | [member="Kir Tillian"] | [member="Janick Beauchamp"] | [member="VildarnTentoria"]​

 

[Kaia Starchaser]

Just as she reported in, Drifter started beeping. The droid was a combination of several types of droids, and this sounded exactly how you would expect a droid that was the lovechild of an Imperial Viper Droid and an astromech to sound. Especially if it was excited or shocked by something. Calling for Kaia to look back at her scanners from his location in the arm from the main cabin to the cockpit. Spinning in her chair, after having moved to check the ship’s systems, she noticed it.

“Scratch that Command. Something just… appeared here.” Yeah, that was not hyperspace reversion. Hell, she didn’t even think it was a fold space, and she’d seen her father and the Aing-Tii pull that trick a few times.

“Drifter, the hell just happened?” She pulled her ship around, warning klaxons going off as the Pulsar approached the larger ship. Shields were going up as she brought the engines into line. “Anyone getting lock-warnings?” She wasn’t but if someone was going to? She’d get her weapons hot.

[member="Dax Fyre"] [member="Kir Tillian"] [member="Janick Beauchamp"] [member="VildarnTentoria"] [member="Zak Amroth"]

 

[Janick Beauchamp]

"Anyone getting lock warnings?" [member="Kaia Starchaser"] asked.

"Negative"

Weapons lock would normally imply that something has been fired or at least readiness to fire, Janick thought, knowing that it took time for even targeting computers to acquire targets. All it meant to Janick was that, if the Seeker was hostile, they were not ready to fire anything at anyone. With the green mist somehow concealing cronau radiation, she may be led to think that perhaps she should collect some of that mist - if she was able to in the first place. Because even fighters like the Shusugaunt Ghost were typically not equipped for that sort of operation; all she could do then was to initiate a scan of the ghost ship. Now that the scan could begin, she had to make sure that she would not be perceived as hostile by the Seeker; as such, she maintained safe distance, and stayed out of point-defense range, while still approaching it somewhat. With [member="Zak Amroth"] and [member="Dax Fyre"] also en route to Kharlon, it would be easy for the crew onboard the Seeker to perceive that it has fallen into an ambush if they are not careful. So it was only a question of time until it attacked in her mind.

 

[Griet van Vliet]

"What the frak happens with my UCCs when the owner of an unincorporated business dies intestate?" a non-Talz dead client that was somehow subject to the Talz's CCA regime asked.

"Dear ex-owner of an unincorporated business, deemed dispositions at death mean that any recapture or terminal loss that would arise then would have to be recorded on the deceased's tax return, based on the UCC vs. the fair market value at the time of death, which is not only a deemed year-end for terminal loss carryovers, but also a year where one is deemed to have wound up the business, typically subject to the short fiscal year rules"

Unincorporated business owners dying intestate were all too common these days. Yes, unincorporated businesses had the advantage of being taxed only once, as opposed to corporations that were taxed twice under most tax systems, and certainly the Talz. Just that it was not advantageous to hold on to terminal loss carryovers for too long. Often there were, in a business' balance sheet, items called deferred tax assets which would indicate that you have unrealized profits from intragroup transactions, fair value adjustments on consolidation, or, when there was no parent/subsidiary relationship present, accumulated deficits. The mirror image, the deferred tax liability, happened when one had unrealized losses, revenues recognized later for tax purposes than for financial reporting, expenses recognized earlier for tax purposes than for financial reporting (the single largest credit amount, for businesses subjected to the Talz CCA regime was, well, CCA). Often DTA/Ls were to be realized upon liquidation or some other wind-up, such as the death of an unincorporated business owner, and one could only net out a DTA against a DTL if they pertain to the same type of transaction (e.g. a CCA-based DTA is netted out against another CCA-based DTL).

 

[Kir Tillian]

Sensors went off and Kir spun his captain's chair around to examine them. "Now we're talking!" He pulled up the readouts and examined the results. "Captain Tillian moving to intercept."

He spun back around to program the coordinates in the hyperdrive, but as he did so, the ship shuddered from an unexpected meteor shower hammering against the ray shields. Alarms beeped in the computer and he pulled up the alerts.

"Never mind," he gave an awkward laugh. "Meteor shower knocked out my stabilizers. I'll be here setting them in order again. Go on without me." He paused, but kept his finger hovering on the comms. "Let me know what the dead have to say. See you all back at base."

 

[Dax Perl]

"Don't give them any reason to shoot at us." the Rogue told those quickly heading towards Kharlon and the strange vessel circling it. It suddenly occurred to him that if the ship really inhabited by ghosts, the crewmen of the Seeker may not even be able to man weapons, let alone pose any threat to Dax's quite alive compatriots. Even so, there had never been a single story of the ship firing at anyone. Still, he wasn't willing to risk the lives of others on mere hearsay. "Be vigilant. Keep an eye out for threats, and arm your weapons, But do not, I repeat do not fire on the Seeker unless they fire first. I don't want us scaring off a once in a millennia chance like this."

Soon enough the Azalea dropped out of hyperspace just in time to see a ball of fire streak past Kharlon's atmosphere. He wasn't sure if it was a ship or a meteor, but whatever it was, it had been moving awfully fast. "Anyone catch that bolt of fire just now? Y'all manage to snag a quickscan of what it was?" in all honesty, Dax didn't expect any results on that front, but it never hurt to ask. Looking up from his control panel, the Marshall saw his quarry in full view for the first time as crested the horizon of the moon below. The massive vessel gleamed with it luminescent green glow, the grey metal appearing to drink in whatever light it touched and regurgitate it in the form of the sickly green glowing fog. For a moment Dax was breathless. The moment passed and Dax cleared his throat, "Alright guys, I'm gonna try to make an approach. Keep an eye out, and try not to get me killed thank you very much."

[member="Kaia Starchaser"] | [member="Griet van Vliet"] | [member="Janick Beauchamp"] | [member="Zak Amroth"] | [member="VildarnTentoria"]

 

[Kaia Starchaser]

Shields were up. That was just smart thinking. Kaia Starchaser was her father’s daughter. She was prepared the second she sat down in the pilot’s seat. She was ready for anything, and with her implants she was starting to learn how to fly the Pulsar just by thought. She could make a lot of movies. “I’m not getting locks either.” She called out to the other ships. “Shields are up though, just in case. If y’all see it coming across your screens.”

She heard the calls coming from [member="Kir Tillian"]. “Drifter, see if you can get the systems down for the ship Tillian’s in. If we need to pull him out, I want to make sure we’re downloaded and ready to help lift him out of here.” The dark haired pilot was looking to her droid.

“Missed that, Judge.” The Warden was looking through the scans. “Seeing what I can find. But we’re going to be behind you, if there is anything coming at you I’ll be able to throw some shadowbombs at it.” She was taking a second to reach out to the Force, as her implants let one of the bombs free from the third tube.

“In location.”

[member="Dax Fyre"]
[member="Griet van Vliet"]
[member="Janick Beauchamp"]
[member="Zak Amroth"]

 

[Zak Amroth]

"Anyone catch that bolt of fire just now? Y'all manage to snag a quickscan of what it was?"

The voice on the other end of his comm panel came through in a crackling haze of static, proximity to Kharlon's ionosphere wreaking havoc with the transmission signal. But Zak could make out the words, and it was enough to confirm that he was still alive. The young Padawan had managed to wrestle his 'borrowed' alien transport into a very, very shallow orbit.

"I, uh...I think that was me. Sorry," he answered finally, sweat still beading down his face and not just due to stress and exertion. The atmosphere was oppressively hot in here, tuned no doubt for Selkath physiology, "But everything's fine now! We're all fine...how are you?"

Amroth winced, regretting the question even as he said it. The others had more on their mind than a tagalong's well being, whoever they were. Zak realized for the first time that he didn't even know, he had landed on this frequency by mistake when he had still believed the comm panel controlled sublight impulse. It had been the only channel where people were speaking Basic that he could find near Echidna.

Easing his ship out of orbit, although his youthful bravado would never let him admit it even to himself, the sight of what could only be the Seeker amazed him. From this far out it was a tiny thing, and while Zak didn't know enough about math to figure out how big it really was, he knew enough to understand that visual contact at this range meant it had to be massive.

"I'm gonna be rich!" he pumped his fist in excitement, before remembering that he wasn't supposed to care about material gain anymore, "I mean...I'm gonna be a Jedi Master!"

One of the ships that had joined him in the space around Kharlon moved ahead of the others on an intercept course with the gargantuan space hulk. It's pilot, the same voice he had heard over the comms before and who seemed to be in charge of things here, asked them to watch his back.

"You got it!" he happily confirmed, before jabbing at random controls. His instructions were now in Basic, but Zak had never exactly been an experienced pilot, "Weapons systems, weapon systems..."

A lance of quad laser fire stabbed out into the empty void, narrowly missing the Seeker's hull profile. At least he had found the correct panel.

"Sorry!" he said, unmuting the comm frequency, "Technical difficulties."

[member="Dax Fyre"] | [member="Kaia Starchaser"] | [member="Janick Beauchamp"]​

 

[Janick Beauchamp]

The Seeker was, well, much bigger than even the Azalea, but there was no standing off that thing. Not when one's craft only had guns and a bomblet generator; it would mean dive-bombing to fire the bomblet generator. Ugh... dive-bombing, even at a speed faster than what I could get out of an Alakaha, makes me feel that attacking the Seeker will be like Dagobah all over again, Janick thought, while her memory played tricks with her. And yet, [member="Zak Amroth"] somehow began to fire a quad-laser of all things at a ship larger than a flak frigate (then again it was entirely possible that it was the only weapon Zak's ship had, in which case it had to be within PD range to fire), narrowly missing it due to the EWAR jamming in effect. Feeling that Zak unduly compromised her position by laying down some fire, and [member="Kaia Starchaser"] dropped a shadowbomb, it was time for her to go full throttle and dive-bomb that thing anyhow. From a different angle of course, and pulling up once the bomblet is away at high speed. Between the shadow bomb and the full-power plasma bomblet, she had to pull out of point-defense range and fast. And evasive maneuvers were key to her here to save her bacon.

 

[Griet van Vliet]

"I have a question: why is it that we assume that all CCA is taken on a class-13 basis, or that dividend revenue is taxable? Dividend revenue is typically non-taxable in corporate hands" a deceased Talz accounting student asked.

"I guess, some instructors feel it's best to teach the material either in preparation for off-world employment, in which case depreciation can usually be taken on any GAAP-allowed basis for tax purposes, including but not limited to, straight-line, and you must take it even when you are losing money, or they feel it's simpler not to have the material form a cohesive whole. You do realize that, for any given topic in accounting, be it cost/managerial accounting, taxation or internal/external audit, it's either you love it or hate it. You can't take CCA to create or increase a business loss, that is, you can only take CCA to the lesser of the EBITDA or the maximum allowable CCA; that's nothing new to you"

To the extent I taught Janick accounting, I often tried to teach her financial reporting in an integrated manner: she is more than familiar with AFDAs, bad debt expenses, revenue recognition, debt amortization and all the stuff one would expect from intermediate-level accounting courses, and how these fit with fiscal requirements, but even Talz, whose tax regime is so complicated they typically don't trust non-Talz accountants, nor non-Talz software, to do their taxes, see fit to teach financial reporting without proper integration of other accounting courses' material, Griet thought, realizing that class 13, for CCA purposes, is the only class of tangible assets on which one can take CCA on a straight-line basis, even though not every tangible asset will be, in fact, leasehold improvements. She knew that financial reporting textbooks, Talz or not, often make the assumption that depreciation is taken on a straight-line basis and only proceed otherwise when depreciation proper is covered. That, even though in industries where activity varies a lot from an accounting period to the next, it may be better to use unit-of-production basis, and rarely will the declining balance method, while allowed under IFRS, be used outside of Talz taxation.

"CCA and capital gains are the two things I like most about Talz corporate taxation, and to a lesser extent dividend revenue. I know you can defer the taking of CCA over the lifespan of assets when one's profitability is marginal, and capital gains in excess of historical costs are only taxed on half the amount. It has the consequence of making those few Talz that can no longer hunt aggressive speculators on the equity markets. For incorporated businesses, dividend revenue is non-taxable, but that's the only thing I like about the Talz's tax treatment of dividends"

 

[Dax Perl]

The young Rogue turned to leave the bridge, the chatter of comms slowly fading out, only to be stopped mid stride, the din of a laser barrage resonating through the suddenly quiet bridge. "Sorry! Technical difficulties." came a man's voice over the radio. Another moment or two passed, and seemed as if the Seeker hadn't viewed the accidental misfire as a hostile threat. Or maybe they didn't care. Who could know? The Marshal let out a breath he hadn't known he'd been holding and took another step towards the hangar, and a shuttle to mysterious vessel.

Who knew what would happen if the Seeker deigned them to be threats? The thing was a gorram ghost ship. The last time Dax had seen one of those it was a very real vessel. This thing? It was half incorporeal! Who knew what kind of armaments it had? Or hell, maybe it just had a ghostly boarding party that could float through space and their 'impenetrable' durasteel hulls. Weapons or no, Dax really was not keen on finding out. What he did want to know on the other hand, was what had happened back on that dark forested planet...hopefully his answers would lie in that forsaken ship.

As Dax stepped onto the shuttle, giving a nod to the pilot to start taking him towards the colossal vessel, a tingle in the back of Dax's spine made him suddenly feel very uneasy. As if someone was watching him. Was the Force trying to tell him something? The Rogue shook it off, he couldn't afford the distraction of a distant 'what if' right now.

The distance between the small landing shuttle and the monstrous ghost ship closed rapidly, far quicker than seemed reasonable for the distance the Azalea had been set to wait at. Perhaps another odd phenomena of the Seeker. Whatever the case was, when Dax stepped off that barely held together shuttle onto the simultaneously pristine and dirtied Seeker with an echoing step, he felt a very real chilling breeze wash over him in the windless hanger. A moment passed. Nothing. Yet another moment. Still nothing. And then, from the corner of his eye, a shadow appeared to move. The Rogue spun around to face the fleeting shape. And yet it was gone. Another shadow moved, further within the empty hangar. Once again, Dax turned to look, only to find nothing.

Quiet steps were magnified in echo as the Marshal carefully pursued the fleeting images that multiplied all around him. Were these the ghosts? His answer came quickly as the fleeting shapes led past the hangar and into the halls where little light shone, and yet one could see with perfect clarity, the floors, the walls, the doors, but most of all, the soft blue lights that danced before the man. As Dax reached out to touch one, against his better judgement, the light bloomed to life, into the shape of a man who peered at the Rogue with empty eyes before coalescing once more into the tiny orb of light.

"This is it guys... Its clear to come aboard..."

---

In the far distance, out past the spiraling arms of the galaxy, a metal shape gleamed softly with light, but for no more than an instant. If the shape had been closer to Echidna and her satellite, it would've loom over the minuscule ships that lay before it, only the Seeker having any chance in matching it in size. Within the metal behemoth, grey-blue skin tinted in soft red light stretched taught over a skeletal visage. No sound could be heard, save for the quiet breathing of crew members looking out through the viewports of the ship. No one uttered a single word, each standing erect and orderly, each in their place. "A lawless place." whispered a raspy voice, "A lawless place, one that we shall help, heal...bring to knee and order..."

[member="Kaia Starchaser"] | [member="Griet van Vliet"] | [member="Janick Beauchamp"] | [member="Zak Amroth"] | [member="VildarnTentoria"]

 

[Kaia Starchaser]

The ship was alerting her to the changes in anything near by. As a Warden, it was almost common place. And if she could launch some shadow bombs? Well, it would be the best thing she could throw and not get detected. Not that she was going to avoid getting shot at to save her own ship. She had her Jump-Start cannon too, so if something went bottom up, she could at least activate the ship’s systems again. Moving her ship, she was keeping a loose orbit around the Seeker and the ships nearby.

Scanning it, she was finding the friendly vessels, but there was something odd about the Seeker herself. “Drifter, log what we can on this ship. I am gonna wanna look up more about it later.” She was losing her grammar, and more eloquent way of speaking, but well… she was out in the black more often than not.

Looking around, she was keeping a eye on the ship as the Rogue Master landed aboard. “Wait… aboard?” She blinked once then twice. “Like aboard aboard?” She shook her head and bite her lip. She had her gear set aside and it was always ready to go. Going EV was one thing, she didn’t mind that. But this ship? The dark haired Warden ran a hand through her hair.

“Be right there.” She sighed as she put her ship on a auto course, with her droid, to the docking ring. Stepping back, the Starchaser made to grab her gear. Mostly her lightsaber and the EV suit, one of the old Levantine Sanctum pieces. It worked, after all.

[member="Dax Fyre"]
[member="Griet van Vliet"]
[member="Janick Beauchamp"]
[member="Zak Amroth"]

 

[Janick Beauchamp]

Direct hit! she thought, while the concentrated fire was enough to cause a hull breach to the ghost ship. Because of the hull breach, [member="Kaia Starchaser"] and perhaps [member="Zak Amroth"] preparing to board now that there was a hull breach through which either could board. But then again, she couldn't board; someone had to keep watch over their exfil craft while they were boarding the Seeker, and that was to be her. As for [member="Dax Fyre"], he also wanted in, but Janick was the odd girl out. Not that she feels left out per se, she had good reason not to. But the Seeker seemed to be awfully slow to respond to the boarding, or the attack that preceded it: she had enough time to get out of point-defense range and, for the ghost ship's crew, firing a concussion missile at her in a stern chase would make it dead-stick before it hits even if she didn't attempt evasive maneuvers. Even they knew apparently that the effective range of using guided missiles for point-defense depended on relative direction of the launcher to the target: the effective range is longest if fired head-on, and shortest in a stern chase.

 

[Griet van Vliet]

"I often hear people say that they are given credit for an idea, but never that they are given debit, why?"

"I ought to give you some debit for this question, then. For the value of the credit given. My guess is that the expression originated from an accountant that left the profession afterward"

In fact, Janick learned accounting by downloading that knowledge from me, incrementally perhaps, but she always sought to download chunks of knowledge that actually formed a cohesive whole if at all possible. Same went of infusion apparently, Griet thought, being reminded that, however brilliant she knew Janick to be, she was rather bright in her own right. Just that communing with the dead made Griet think about a number of things, and she never suspected before that she would be led to question why would someone give credit without a corresponding debit, since it's one of the three fundamental laws of accounting: the first one, the balance sheet law, was that assets = liabilities + equity (or net assets/debt for not-for-profit organizations and governments respectively) the second one was that, for any journal entry, total debit = total credit and the third law was that assets were increased by a debit, liabilities and equity were increased by a credit (revenues were considered equivalent to equity and expenses were treated as a contra-equity account from a ledger standpoint).

 

[Zak Amroth]

Zak had already been moving alongside the Seeker's far side to dock moments after [member="Dax Fyre"], ignoring the Marshal's request to wait for him to check things out. He breathed a sigh of relief when the leader of these strangers commed an all clear, as it had taken him about that long to figure out how to properly engage a Selkath docking mechanism. No one would have to know of his little mutiny, but still a part of him could not help but feel a tinge of anxiety as he feel his prize slip away. Whatever secrets there were aboard this ship, supernatural or otherwise, were meant to have been his prize, a means by which he could parlay greater standing before his stuffy old Jedi praxeum masters. The notion of sharing in that glory did not appeal to him.

A last minute search of the hijacked transport for any supplies that might come in useful on such a mission produced a curious looking energy weapon of some sort. It appeared to be charged and functional, and although the Padawan had no idea what it did, he tucked it into the loop of his utility belt anyway. Exloading his fellow explorer's transmission frequency from the ship's computers to his personal comlink, he braced himself for the unknown before stepping through a pressurized airlock and out onto the deck of a vessel out of legend.

Having grown up on Jedha, Amroth was used to all kinds of culture clash, but something about the architecture of the Seeker felt truly alien. It was difficult to articulate, only that nothing seemed to conform to his expectations. He tasted stale recycled air that typified space hulks that had been long set adrift, and was dimly aware that the hair on his skin were standing on end. Zak had a bad feeling about this.

"I'm on board, leeward of you," he dutifully reported into his comlink, receiving only harsh feedback and crackling static to further unsettle him.

Zak....

Glancing around nervously, he rubbed the back of his chilled neck as he struggled in vain to block out his anxiety. He could have sworn he had heard someone or something call his name, but of course that was impossible. It was just his mind running wild with all the excitement and uncertainty.

"Don't know if anyone can hear me, but so far no sign of any crew. No sign of anyone at all, really. Its very...quiet. I'm heading deeper in."

Zak!

The Jedi whirled around, ivory lightsaber blade bathing the pitch dark ship's corridor in illumination. That had definitely not been his imagination. Something was calling out to him by name. Something on the Seeker knew who he was.

[member="Kaia Starchaser"] | [member="Janick Beauchamp"] | [member="Kir Tillian"]​

 

[Dax Perl]

Unbeknownst to Dax, the other members of the search part had begun to board the Seeker each radioing in their arrival. Unfortunately, the only thing that would come through on anyone's end was the steady drone of static, lilting and changing, almost as if the static itself was attempting to announce its own will instead of the one's who held it in their hands. Across the space-faring vessel, the ghostly beings slowly made themselves visible as small orbs to the intruders. When touched, they bloomed into full spectral form, only to fade once more into will-o-the-wisps. Some of these floating orbs though, might know the living that touched them. If so, they'd stay and share a few final words before once more fading away into the void.

Such an experience was exactly what Dax was hoping to find. No such luck so far. Each orb of light he passed bloomed into unrecognizable faces and quickly faded away. The one person he sought to speak to, to get closure from, was nowhere to be found...

(From here on out, you guys are free to communicate to the dead on your own. The DMing portion is over, so have fun with it!)

[member="Kaia Starchaser"] | [member="Griet van Vliet"] | [member="Janick Beauchamp"] | [member="Zak Amroth"] | [member="VildarnTentoria"]