Sunburns & Hyperdrive Troubles

[Kaile Vera]

[member="Kurt Meyer"]

“Anything?” Kaile’s voice would sail over the data terminal she was currently slicing into. Having clipped in the new prototype computer spike, she gave a small mental prayer to whatever Force there may be that this would work. That the system turned on and was booting up was a blessing.

Now here’s to hoping we get a little bit more luck.

The Pyrowall on this was going to be an issue. “Damnit!” her curse blew a layer of dust off the top of the terminal. Scrunching her nose, she impatiently swept her hand over it and the screen to dust off as much as she could. It only made the cloud of dust worse. Her abrupt sneeze shortly followed.

“This may take an extra minute.” brown eyes went darting over to the Courier, watching him explore and search.

“Hear anything?/” as he was the closest to the door. Any minute, those troopers could very well catch their deception and come in.

Please, just a little bit more time...

 

[Kurt Meyer]

[member="Kaileann Vera"]

For some reason he doubted that they would be getting company any time soon. "No."

Kurt called back towards Kaile, though in truth he was a tad distracted.

The room that he had wandered into was fancy beyond all belief. Not the type of luxury that one found within a Hutt Citadel or in a palace on Naboo, but instead there was an air of elegance, one that he couldn't quite place. It was as if the art wasn't here for it's value, wasn't here to be stared at and worshiped, instead it was here to be appreciated. He frowned slightly, shaking his head as he realized that an idea like that was extremely stupid.

"You're a pilot." Kurt told himself. "Not an interior decorator."

Without another moment of hesitation Kurt began to dig through the rooms closets.

He wasn't looking for anything in particular, just something that would help them.

 

[Kaile Vera]

[member="Kurt Meyer"]

There was a brief flicker at Kurt. Did he say something beyond the negative? Her brows came scrunching together for a brief moment. He didn’t appear alarmed, so Kaile turned back to her slicing. Truth be told, unlike Kurt, who may be a bit in awe of his surroundings, Kaile was completely focused on trying to find what means they could use to get out of here.

She was still running high on adrenaline. It was likely that after this, she would crash. Not just physically, but emotionally as well. Having to use live rounds instead of stun bolts and seeing the result of said actions would lay heavy with her. With everything that had come to this, well, it was just a cocktail waiting to explode.

“I think I may have something,” Kaile told the pilot, the blue light reflecting off her face, making her brown eyes glow blue for a brief moment. By all accounts, one could consider her a cyborg of some sort. Or modified human? Nothing too crazy, but the additional cybernetics aided in her work. Within that brain stem, she recorded and stored all that information she was compiling for future reference.

A file was decrypted, and soon sigils came streaming over the screen. Could this be it?

 

[Kurt Meyer]

[member="Kaileann Vera"]

"What did you find?" Kurt called out from the depths of the closet, a pile of clothing sitting behind him. He himself had stumbled upon a large chest of some sort, a footlocker to be more accurate. The design of it was odd, not really anything that he'd seen before. There were rough edges and the odd etching on the side of it reminded him of the strange writing that he'd seen in the hangar before. He assumed that the same species made it, though what it said he had no idea.

"Kill code?" That was a figure of speech, he didn't want to kill the clones. "Bedtime story?"

He tried to make light of the situation, distract from what was happening. There was a slight racket as he began to drag the footlocker out of the closet, the clattering of metal scrapping against metal. He shuddered slightly, shaking his head as the box finally made it's exit. Like a child Kurt sat himself down in front of it, fiddling with the lock and trying to open up the odd metal crate.

At this point he wasn't entirely sure what he was hoping to find, but he was almost entirely sure it was better than just standing behind Kaile and watching her.

At least he was contributing this way.

 

[Kaile Vera]

[member="Kurt Meyer"]
That he was still able to joke managed to lighten a bit of Kaile's tension. Kurt always had a knack at that. "Heh...maybe." she quipped, her fingers a steady tick, tick, tick against they keyboard.

"No... I'm still looking for the codes." she told him. This file wasn't it. With a final tap, she brushed the holographic image and swung it towards an array. It was a map of the galaxy.

Kaile gave a frown.

"I think.." she tapped at the interactive image, zooming it in. Tiny little yellow dots dotted the sector.

"... I think this is a map for other locations."

If it was, things just got really interesting.

 

[Kurt Meyer]

[member="Kaileann Vera"]

"Oh." Kurt said quietly.

That wasn't a good thing. Not at all actually. He doubted that this facility had control over the others, but if these troopers got out? If they reached those other locations and managed to wake up their brethren? That was an army, not just a small strike force, but an entire invasion force that was powerful enough to take on entire planets. With all the equipment they had here, with all the tanks and speeders. He frowned slightly, shaking his head as he recognized one of the listed systems.

"That's an asteroid field." He said quietly, his finger pressing the screen. "Smugglers used to go there from Tatooine."

Why have a base in an asteroid field? There was really only one clear answer; ships. "They have to have a fleet there."

That was perhaps an overstatement. He doubted that it would be star destroyers or anything of the sort, but fighters, bombers, gunships, all sorts of craft that they would need. His lips thinned slightly. Would there be more troops there too? Pilots? Officers?

Kurt's stomach flipped.

 

[Kaile Vera]

[member="Kurt Meyer"]

Her own stomach somersaulted. Kaile bit her lip, already raw from the chaos that seemed to follow them the past few days. All they had wanted was a simple vacation. Someplace where they could just be. Relax. Be able to be with each other and just, find a way to wash away the worries of the 'verse. Would they ever really find a place like that. A thought came to mind, a brief flashback to another incident. A ship. The Quiescence. Asmus.

Lowering her eyes, the Lorrdian seemed to blanch. The courier could very well assume it had to do with this new map, but it was more than that. Just token-realizations that now made the sleeper agent understand the gravity of her situation. In all aspects and contexts combined.

"If they have a fleet there... " she began, a slight hitch to her voice. A grimace pulled her lips back, revealing the slight grind of her teeth. Something this big they would not be able to keep to themselves. Should not, keep to themselves.

"This is now bigger than us, Kurt." it was said softly, but weighted down with a sense of impending responsibility. Where they were now, with the clones, with everything; and if this map was right...

They were well over their heads.

 

[Kurt Meyer]

[member="Kaileann Vera"]

"Sure it is." Kurt said quietly, as though he accepted the responsibility.

"We put the clones back to sleep." Then he did a complete one eighty. "Then forget about it."

Kaile might want to serve the greater good, she might want to see the galaxy put into a greater whole, it was her job after all, but Kurt didn't. Of course he didn't like ti when people suffered, he didn't like it when people got hurt, but was he about to take on an entirely mysterious army just because they had the potential to creep up and out? Nope. That wasn't his game, that wasn't what he did nor was it what a smart man did. The clones already had the ability to kill them, he didn't need to add a fleet on top of that.

"We tell the Galactic Alliance, the Coalition, whatever, but beyond that it's not our business." They couldn't take on a fleet.

He couldn't take on a fleet.

Didn't matter how good he was in the cockpit.

 

[Kaile Vera]

[member="Kurt Meyer"]

Put the clones back to sleep?!

That made Kaile give a double take, swiveling her head to look at the courier with a dumbstruck expression. Was he serious? Her brows would knit forward and she scrunched up her face in a frown.

“What do you mean put them clones back to sleep?” as if there was a way for them to tuck each and every single one back in their pods like children. That didn’t make any sense. “For all we know, this could have done a chain reaction to the rest of them.” a hand would gesture to the other series of yellow dots.

“We ain’t got no code yet to get that blast door. And I’ve an inkling that pressing our luck may not behoove us. We can do all sorts of orders, but do you think they’ll happily go back along into their pods if we merely command it?/”

It could very well be that easy, but for Kaile, who had never had to deal with clones, it seemed rather too much of an ideal situation. He was right about telling the Alliance though. Or the Coalition. There ain’t no way that Kurt and she would be able to handle all of this.

 

[Kurt Meyer]

[member="Kaileann Vera"]

"No signals have been sent out of the bunker, right?" He was pretty sure that they didn't have that capability. Long range communications needed satellites, massive communications installations that couldn't very well be hidden. Whats more, they required constant maintenance and repair. The things weren't easy to keep together. He doubted that the troopers had anything like that, and if they did it likely wasn't deployed yet. No, Kurt was almost positive they didn't have to worry about an army popping up in the middle of the galaxy.

"They haven't woken anyone up." He suggested. "I think they have to do that manually."

The Courier stopped for a second, frowning. "Like we did."

Oddly enough he hadn't really blamed himself, or Kaile of course, for the clones being awake until just now. It was their fault of course, they were the ones who had traipsed in here and started touching things, but for some reason that hadn't quite clicked until now. He frowned for a moment, turning away from the computer screen and looking back towards the ornate door, then at the chest that he had earlier dragged from the closet.

A frown pulled at his lips.

 

[Kaile Vera]

[member="Kurt Meyer"]

Kaile matched his frown, leaning forward to try and confirm Kurt's query. A few taps of the keys and she reviewed communications. She gave a shake of her head. "No, nothin'. A minor blessin' considerin' things." she added, expelling a sigh. Another nibble of her lower lip, her brows furrowing forward.

"I'll download the data. " a pause, then a nod, "And keep searching for anythin' in regards to the blast doors." upturning her face, she caught the line of sight the courier had taken from the door to the chest. "What is it?' she asked him, following his attention over to the chest.

"You think you found somethin?" could very well have. With how things have been going with them, Kaile wouldn't at all be surprised if they opened up more 'treasure' boxes. Question is, were they the sort that would get them even more into trouble?

 

[Kurt Meyer]

[member="Kaileann Vera"]

He shrugged, honestly having no idea what it is. "Some kind of footlocker with that Chiss writing on it."

There wasn't really more to attribute to it then that.

The crate was still locked, and as far as Kurt could tell there was no way to really open it. He didn't have any lockpicks and although he had a blaster...well he didn't really want to shoot it while a hundred feet away from them were thousands of stormtroopers going about their day getting ready to invade a galaxy. The better option was just to hang back and...think. There of course would be some way to open the box, likely a key or some kind of passcode.

Kurt just had to figure it out.

"Find any keys?" The Courier asked her. "Like...normal ones?"

 

[Kaile Vera]

[member="Kurt Meyer"]

"Normal ones?" both brows rose, a bit thrown off at the 'normal keys' request. Blinking a bit, Kaile used the toe of her right foot to swing her chair to the left and back. Dipping her head, she swept her gaze over the desk and settled upon the three different drawers. The first two simply eased open. That was nothing. However, all she found there was a bit more dust, a few stylus', and your basic desk goods. The third, however, was locked.

"Huh," she wondered aloud, giving it a little shake. Yup. Locked. "This one is locked." sliding down from the chair, she plopped herself down on her knees to get a better look. "Looks like we'll need a key to get into this one." eyes would flick over the desk towards Kurt.

"You any good at lock picking?"

 

[Kurt Meyer]

[member="Kaileann Vera"]

"What are you trying to insinuate?" Kurt rounded on her immediately. "Are you trying to say that all people from Tatooine are criminals?"

His face contorted slightly. "That we just know how to pick locks? That we know how to break into things?"

The Courier shifted slightly, his expression very serious and his head tilted slightly to the side as he began to litter the room with accusation towards Kaile. He didn't of course raise his voice or speak too loudly, there was no need to have the troopers storming in because someone was shouting about people from Tatooine, that would be the last thing they wanted to happen. So he instead imitated the tone of his mother when he had done something he hadn't supposed to. Stern, but level.

"I suppose you think I also run Spice and work for the Hutts. hmmmmmmmmmmmmm?" He prompted her, inching closer.

 

[Kaile Vera]

[member="Kurt Meyer"]

Typically, one would have taken Kurt’s rather austere response as if to say he was serious about his indignation. Being a Lorrdian, however, and having known the courier for this long gave Kaile the upper hand. None the less, with the stress of the day along with the chaos, it took a bit for her to realize that. So much that her eyes went wide and she gave him a befuddled expression.

“What?” perhaps it was rather comical how she gave a double blink, as if trying to register and weigh the seriousness of the matter. Perhaps that is why Kurt ended with the bit about the SPice and the Hutts; to which she finally managed to catch the mockery in his aghast.

Lips pursed and they twisted to a half grin. A little bit of humor was needed after all. “Well, if you really want us to dig about your file, Kurt Meyer -- I’m sure we could find somethin' with Hutt dealings and podracin'.” she shook her head.

“Likely some plot that also included Cafarels and blow.”

 

[Kurt Meyer]

[member="Kaileann Vera"]

"I'm offended." Kurt said flatly.

Honestly, there probably was some truth to the notion that people from Tatooine tended to have a...shadier side, but that was simply because of the circumstances that most grew up in. Even Kurt, who had a good home life, had walked away from his homeworld with more than a few useful skills that some would consider to be rather criminal. It was the nature of doing business of Tatooine, of growing up there, you learned to do what you needed to do, and you learned to do it well.

Kurt himself did in fact know how to pick locks, but they were usually simple locks. There had been once or twice when he and his friends had stolen from an Arceneau Trade Vending machine, or when they'd broken into a storage locker. It was never anything big, never anything that anyone actually worried about, but that didn't change the fact that it had happened.

Jamie had admonished him more then once for the fact. "Hmpf."

Kurt made the odd noise before turning around and facing the locker, dropping down into a squat and inspecting the odd Chiss lock that had been put into place.

 

[Kaile Vera]

[member="Kurt Meyer"]

"Why are you offended?'" This time it was Kaile's turn to give a mock affront. Pushing her chair back with the shove of the toe of her boot, she gave him ample room to work with. In the meantime, she gave a deliberate cross of her arms across her breasts, flattening the Empire of the Hand junior officer jacket. A slight lift of her chin and she kept the arch of an eyebrow in pointed query.

"I only asked because my specialty is data terminals." That it even occurred to her that just because he was from Tatooine he would know how to pick locks was silly. She only asked because she herself didn't know how to work this one. Electrical security access terminals? Yes. An actual key lock? No.

To that affect, she poked him with the toe of her good leg for emphasis. "Maybe I'm the one offended now!." Banter was good. Banter and humor kept the edge off. In the meantime, she would lean forward and take the keyboard and move it closer to her. She still had a combo for the blast doors to find.

 

[Kurt Meyer]

[member="Kaileann Vera"]

"Too late." Kurt said. "You're a racist."

He pulled a small bit of metal from his pants, something that looked like a piece of scrap that Kurt had managed to tear off the shuttle they'd earlier been occupying. He fiddled with it for a moment, bending it and shifting the small scrap until it resembled something like an odd hook. The Courier inspected it for a moment, looking it over and trying to assess whether or not it would do what he wanted. With a satisfied nod he returned his attention to the Chiss box.

The first piece of metal slid into place within the housing of the lock, another piece quickly joining it as he began to fiddle with the mechanism. "Good to know the truth finally."

Normal locks worked on a pin and lever system, Kurt knew that.

Though he had absolutely no idea if Chiss locks worked on the same principal. For all he knew they used some sort of weird loop system with their locks that could only be opened with a round key and thirteen different strings attached to it. Trying never hurt though.

 

[Kaile Vera]

[member="Kurt Meyer"]

"Excuse me." Kaile began, pausing her decryption to stare over the data terminal at Kurt. "But being racist is against an entire species!" she tried to keep the twitch out of the corner of her mouth. If anyone would be the least racist person, that would be Kaile.

"Last I remember, Tatooine has more than one race there." she said with a deliberate pointed glance at the pilot. Two can play this game. It was good. This was good. Already she found herself relaxing more and more, the tension easing from her muscles. Her mind was able to pick up on more things, to think without being too stressed. Kurt knew exactly what she needed after the chaos and beyond the stress of whether or not they will die here today.

"Maybe you're just the elitist!" she tossed back with a low quip, turning back to the decrypting. Okay, what if instead we start looking here instead.

 

[Kurt Meyer]

[member="Kaileann Vera"]

"We identify as one unique whole. Everything you're saying right now just proves you're a racist. Accept i-" Kurt was suddenly cut off as a loud click came from the chest that sat in front of him. He looked down at the Chiss footlocker with more then a bit of surprise, not having expected the thing to open much less actually unlock. He frowned for a second, shaking his head as though it were some kind of trick or trap, something that would explode in his face at any moment.

When nothing happened he simply shrugged and pulled the pieces of metal from the lock and opened the lid.

"Huh." Kurt said quietly. "It's just papers."

That was rare in it's own way, hardly anyone ever used flimsy anymore, even on Tatooine. He was pretty sure the last time he'd seen actual paper for use as documents was in a library, and that was a loooong time ago, yet these...these looked like they were official, important, and well...fancy. "Kaile come here."

Kurt ordered as he began to rummage through the footlocker.