The Edge Falls

[Ashin Varanin]

CORUSCANT
THE WORKS
TARGET: [member="Darth Banshee"]

He'd come to Coruscant without his armour, and unarmed. He'd been the Dark Lord's Master, trained him from scratch. There was little about him that Ordo didn't know, and there were Sith known to use the White Current, so none of Ember's normal methods could be considered reliable. He came in on public transportation with an ironclad, unexceptional false ID, and the Force presence of a civilian.

From there, he spent about a week getting grimy. Blending in. Roaming around 1313, a place he knew fairly well.

In time gone by, Darth Banshee -- the woman who had posted a bounty on him recently -- had contracted him to hit Ayden Cater, but Ember had never found the opportunity to nail Cater. And then the One Sith had taken his last child, so that went well. Suffice it to say, he'd gotten distracted. But while he'd been in talks with Banshee, she'd asked that Cater be delivered to her headquarters, and given its location -- Krayt Industries, the Works.

He snapped a nameless Acolyte's neck in the undercity, and that gave him an uninspired but functional lightsabre that he stowed in the small of his back, under his coat. It would be enough. Then he laid low for another few days, slowly making his way towards the Works. Krayt had mass employment programs, well-publicized too; there was nothing exceptional in people making their way there for jobs.

Coruscant's population flows were huge on a scale the humanoid mind could not comprehend. He was simply one of many.

 

[Lina Ovmar]

There were a couple of places in the galaxy that Mia wanted to be, Coruscant was not one of them. Yet she felt compelled to come. Here was where it all changed, here was where she had fallen, where Ordo had been lost to her, where a simple mercenary case of assisting the Omega Protectorate had become a full blown war with the sith. She had identification, provided by Ovmar and his cloning facility. All new faces needed papers of some form.

She had the knowledge to adjust her aura, but such subtleties were lost on Mia. Besides, she was not as she was before and as far as everyone was concerned, besides Jared Ovmar, she was dead and gone. There was still a lingering smell of a battle in the air, an increased visible military presence that set her on edge. But they paid her no mind. Why would they? She was just another body, just another face and if they were force sensitive, there was enough darkness about her to void any suspicion.

Past security and free of the spaceport, she simply walked. She let her feet carry her where they will, let her mind wander at least until she stood at the edge of the Valley. Her mouth went dry and she stopped in her tracks. Memories, vivid and cruel flitted through her mind and for a heartbeat, she was standing in beskar'gam. Ordo's voice rattling through her helmet as he declared his new allegiance.

She took a step back and shook her head sharply, the image faded. She adjusted her course, heading for the Imperial Palace against all good judgement.

 

[Darth Banshee]

Location: In space on her Factory ship

Darth Banshee was having a typical day, she was over seeing some new weapon systems. As well as planning her new ships, she was also the only person allowed weapons on the space station.


[member="Ember Rekali"] good luck

 

[Ashin Varanin]

THE WORKS
Based on information kindly provided by [member="Darth Banshee"].

The Krayt Industries surface facility, it transpired, manufactured starship components. Final assembly and antimatter drives/weapons/whatnot came into the picture up top, in a 3km x 3km space station. Heavily secured. Such was the picture he put together from the surface thoughts and stray conversation of others on their way here for the morning shift. Most had experience in the Krayt factories.

She would be up there, Banshee. Up there looking down. That was Sith Psych 101. He couldn't risk Keetael farsight to know for sure; there was a chance he'd be detected, either by her or by those here. Occasional lower-ranked Sith, as well as numerous troopers and even the occasional Vong, secured this particular facility. The Vong were the problem. He could White Current his way past Sith, troopers, workers and droids, but Vong were a gray area. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't.

But he'd spent the last few years tracking fallen White Current users; he knew when his techniques weren't reliable, and he knew how to move quietly. Such were the arts of the Keetael.

He didn't trust any ingress route that seemed too easy or too predictable, so he didn't stick with the hovertrain and try to pass security as a new worker. Instead, he rode between the traincars, using a Dathomiri spell called Touch of the Kiin'dray. When they drew near the facility over a chasm, one that would be lethal even to him, he put his head out into the wind and murmured Sense of the Veshet. His vision sharpened, revealing field generators, point-defense weapons, guard patrols -- everything in place to keep anyone from doing what he was about to do. But this place hadn't been built to stop someone who could, more or less, fly.

He wrapped himself in the White Current; the Vong might catch a glimpse if any of them were looking this way, but there were only so many Vong. The bulk of the security forces were troopers and droids, and they would see nothing, just like distant holocam operators. The White Current, in the hands of an experienced practitioner, virtually wiped you from reality, and he'd been doing this for thirty years.

Your average Master could Force-jump a few dozen metres. Ember's primary skill, for which he'd sacrificed not a few others, was physical enhancement. He got his feet under him and leaped -- high, far. High above the security perimeter, even the vertical components. High into the side-slots of the tall building. As metal rushed at him, he switched his attention from stealth and jumping to a renewed Touch of the Kiin'dray. A wall came at him, oblique; he slapped it, adhered, and slid along it, bound to it like two sliding magnets. The wall ended, and he stuck to the corner on the opposite side of the massive building from the train entryway.

Clinging to the side of the Krayt Industries factory, he looked far, far down at a well-defended launchpad with blast doors closed.

 

[Nyxie]

It had been another routine run from the northern stretches of the galaxy where Eclipstica was to the heart of the galaxy, Coruscant, testing, tweaking and calibrating the systems aboard the Ulur'uur. There were always many ways in but seemingly one archaic route between there and back, which made the travel fairly uniform every time LLP'd run it. The lone frigate made its way for the closest port available in Coruscant, making particularly sure to avoid the former capital cities left behind by the Republic. It roared into port, locking in with a nearby dock - the only locale it could fit in, much larger than most of the civilian landing pads. A single airlock door slowly cracked open, the air hissing as it escaped the compartments, and made way for a boarding ramp to descend onto the dock's edge.
Out came LLP-850, Luster tucked behind her right hip and white terentatek duster mantled over her body. If there was anything the droid had learned from Saera, her project overseer, it was that she wouldn't miss or notice a couple missing AEL articles. The lone, experimental personal-defense droid needed nothing else.
LLP's role on Coruscant was initially to simply travel from port to port while her brand new ship "broke in," but the little droid had never been programmed with class protocols and had thus aimlessly - and apathetically - wandered about wherever it went, learning and experiencing with each new journey. There was some "special" freight on Coruscant that LLP saw as an ideal chance to turn a profit with the least amount of effort included. For a currently single-minded droid, thinking only in the form of crunching numbers and statistics, the opportunity was too valuable to pass up. She began on her way to collect said freight.

 

[Lina Ovmar]

She could see the red skinned woman before her, uttering words with a forked tongue, filling her mind with poison. She could feel her rage rising in her chest, taste it in her mouth. Her hand twitched, and a speeder passing her shifted course sharply slamming into oncoming traffic. Mia blinked, the image fading from her mind to be replaced by smoke. "Damnit." she muttered and continued on her way as the distant cry of sirens reached her ears. She hadn't even reached the Palace yet and the memories were flooding her, but she could see it, or what remained of it anyway.

Direct approach was not smart. In fact all approaches were marked as incredibly stupid, but she could not fight the call. Swallowing against the anger in her chest, forcing it back under control she ducked down a back alley, ensuring she was not being watched before heading upwards, using a drainpipe to move hand over hand to the rooftop. More use of the force would draw attention to herself, and while she was the least subtle person in existence, she had things to do. Being caught was not on her to do list today.

She moved quickly, clearing gaps between buildings with ease until there were no more to run across. The ruins were spread before her and she took a knee at the edge of the rooftop, grey eyes sweeping over the scene below. There were still some pieces of the Starfall that had yet to be recovered, and only half of the palace was still standing, its ruins busy with people working to rebuild it. Her chest tightened again and she clenched her jaw bowing her head, eyes fluttering closed.

The noise of the battle echoed in her ears as she pushed against the tide of defenders, only one thing on her mind. Get to Ordo, slap some sense into him. But as she passed through the wall of defenders and boots hammered through the corridors she found herself standing before the throne room, her path blocked by a snake.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

The young and energetic thought in terms of speed and momentum. Ember had chased down speeders; he could move quickly when the moment demanded it. Just as often, though, the moment required patience, endurance, like spec ops men face-down for eight hours, waiting for sunset.

Ember found a niche, just wide enough for his feet, and there he waited, drawing on the Force to prevent exhaustion. He waited until the blast door opened for a shipment to the station.

There was no time, he had no space suit; he opted not to hitch a ride. When his fall terminated, it put him inside the bay, behind a set of crates. There, cloaked in the White Current, he would continue to wait for the next ship.

 

[Aedan Miles]

Aedan Miles wanted and greatly confused Dark Jedi that wore a nondescript black cloak and a rather dark outfit. The hood of the cloak was pulled low over his head as he slowly wandered through the ruins of what had once been the Imperial Palace. His violet eyes were distant as his mind traveled memories and formed or attempted to form that is coherent information he could use. He knew who had killed Mia Monroe and he knew what he would have to do eventually. He sighed and tilted his head back causing the hood of his cloak to fall back and reveal his slightly longer then normal purple hair looking around he finally gave an angry cry and grabbed a boulder with the force throwing it into a group of rocks. His eyes were dim... distant.. almost as if he was haunted by memories and thoughts that he wished would leave him be. His force presence surged about him as the young man slammed a fist into a boulder the force surrounding his fist and assisting him to shatter the boulder he punched.

[member="Mia Monroe"] [member="Ember Rekali"] [member="Darth Banshee"]

 

[Caulder Dune]

[member="Aedan Miles"]

Although Janus' expertise lay elsewhere, sometimes construction projects needed to be helped along. Perhaps that was why they had called him out to the ruins of the Imperial Palace to coordinate some of the construction efforts. It was not a difficult task, albeit a bit boring. He glanced up from his datapad and looked over towards the sound of the disturbance.

A young man was punching boulders a little ways off and generally being melodramatic.

Why there were giant rocks at a construction site that had formerly been the location of a building made out of durasteel (that had been destroyed by a ship made out of durasteel) was completely beyond him. Nevertheless, whatever this kid was doing was not at all helpful to anyone. Why was he even here?

"Excuse me, but if you're going to throw a childish fit, please do so elsewhere." Tyrin harshly stated. "Some of us are trying to be productive here."

 

[Jairus Starvald]

[member="Darth Janus"] [member="Aedan Miles"]

One could ask himself what Darth Carach was doing on this particular construction site on this particular day, doesn’t the Voice of the Dark Lord have anything better to do than walking into seemingly random construction sites? You would think so… but you would be terribly wrong and that was all the explanation would get for the appearance of Carach at this particular scene.

‘It seems pretty obvious to me, Lord Janus. The boy is in his adolescent emo stage, just look at that hair, lad… I would run off now. This ain’t the place for mopping or moping for that matter.’

Then he redirected his gaze to Janus and spoke yet again. ‘How are the construction efforts going, my Lord? Any problems... besides fashion statements?’

 

[Ashin Varanin]

THE WORKS
HUNDREDS IF NOT THOUSANDS OF KILOMETRES AWAY FROM ALL YOU JOKERS

He settled in for the long haul behind the crates (Krayt's Crates -- talk about your missed marketing opportunities) and rested. He was not, after all, as young as he'd once been, and getting here had required genuine exertion. Only once his heart had slowed and his mental tension bled away did he stretch out to nearby minds, keeping his presence masked.

They ran a tight ship here, he soon found. Every piece of gear checked out and checked back in again, and reported if missing. The only way to run a military contractor if you employed unskilled labourers off the streets, he supposed; it wasn't his world. Suffice it to say, stealing a space suit from the facility was not an option. But those transports weren't especially large -- few places to hide inside.

Which only left one possibility.

Orbit-hoppers were constantly busy trying not to run into Coruscanti traffic; that, and trying not to slide down the well to their deaths. It wasn't like they had long stretches of time to kill with inventory and suchlike things. Shipshape as this operation was, granted, he had to assume they would take inventory every handful of trips. And he'd never been fortunate, in anything.

When the next ship landed a couple of hours later, he slipped aboard with the binary load lifters, invisible to eyes and sensors. The transport's crew was the definition of busy; he found a survival cabinet, then a quiet corner, and put on a low-bulk space suit, the kind that could keep you alive for maybe six hours. Slightly heavier, but still invisible, he then exited the transport and hopped up onto the top of the hull.

The hangar doors slid away. The ship, its belly full, took off with a jolt that pressed his belly to the spaceframe. It changed vectors soon, orientation, but he'd found a good place. Pinned to the ship by the Touch of the Kiin'dray, one invisible space-suited Witch Elder rode into space.

 

[Lina Ovmar]

Mia...Sister, when have I ever not stood by you?

Mia's heart was in her throat, anger and sorrow rolling off her in waves. She'd focused so inwardly since waking up that she had kept all her feelings on her brother at bay. Yet here and now she felt it all the more, she felt shame at her stupidity for believing that Ordo would ever do such a thing willingly. A hand moved to her chest fingers cluthing at her heart. It felt like someone was trying to tear it a part and it took a few moments to realise that she was letting her emotions get the better of her. Drawing in several shuddering breaths she brought her tears under control, she stopped herself from trembling.

With iron clad will she dispersed her sorrow, and she let cold controlled fury replace it. Ordo was not lost to her yet. There was still a chance, however small, that he could be saved. She surveyed the scene below her again when a melodramtic disruption caught her eye. She'd now such an emotionally unstable aura no matter where it was in the galaxy. She recalled the details from the battle at Teta, of Gil's death. Of [member="Aedan Miles"] betrayal.

She tried to find something to redeem him, something to claim that he was not in his right mind. But she knew Aedan was more easily swayed than most, she knew that there was no excuse for his actions. And she also knew that Ember had placed a bounty on his head. That sealed his fate enough. The liberator moved to the side of the building out of direct line of sight to the ruins and dropped down to the floor. Light steps carried her into the ruins eyes fixed on her prey. she moved so she was coming up in his blind spot, a hand extending to pull a long piece of durasteel into her hand she took it into a two handed grip.

"Su'cuy Aruetii." she said softly before swinging the makeshift club for his head.

[member="Darth Janus"] [member="Darth Carach"]

 

[Aedan Miles]

Aedan Miles looked up slowly his hair covering his violet eyes as they locked onto the figure before him. Even before a sigh could leave the young man's lips another voice chipped in turning to face them he looked both the men over and turned on his heel to walk away his cloak flaring out with a flourish as he went to leave. That was until he saw some crazy woman swinging a piece of durasteel at his head. His eyes widened and he went to react a little to slow the long piece of metal slamming into his skull and sending him backward and onto his back his head swimming as he tried futilely to hold onto consciousness. Finally the young man succumbed to the darkness attempting to swallow him and lay between the three people out cold.

[member="Mia Monroe"] [member="Darth Janus"] [member="Darth Carach"]

 

[Caulder Dune]

[member="Darth Carach"] | [member="Mia Monroe"] | [member="Aedan Miles"]

"Adolescent emo stage?" Janus very nearly balked. "I dare say if anyone on Umbara experienced such a thing, they would be removed from the gene pool very quickly."

The Umbaran gave a contemptuous snort. Kids these days. How completely repulsive. This man clearly needed an ass kicking of some sort, or maybe take an art class. Maybe if he could express himself creatively, he wouldn't style himself like a walking tool belt. Purple hair? Who was this man trying to impress? Or maybe he was striking back at his parents. They just didn't get it. They didn't understand him.

Janus doubted they would want to.

The Sith Lord with legendary control over bureaucracies returned his attention to his colleague, Darth Carach, who had appeared beside him. Doubtless the Dark Lord's voice was supervising construction efforts himself.

"Nothing of great significance, Lord Carach. A few attempted acts of sabotage by dissidents a few nights ago, then this mongrel more recently. Everything is proceeding as I have fore-"

Suddenly, there was a flash of movement in the corner of his eye. Janus whipped his head towards the disturbance, magnificent strands of platinum threatening to strike Carach in the face. The purple-haired lass he had been ridiculing dropped to the ground like a sack of Garquian potatoes. Janus' eyes glanced up and away from Aedan's prone form, finally settling on the assailant. A woman with a makeshift durasteel club. He blinked once, digesting the scene.

"Good heavens, I think I'm in love."

Fortunately, he hadn't heard her whisper in Mandalorian. Otherwise he would have immediately set about trying to murder her.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

SPACE
EN ROUTE TO STATION

He wanted to rest, wanted it badly. Not that he was exhausted -- he knew his limits -- but he could have stood to take nap. Instead, he went hand-over-hand to the back of the ship, to take shelter from the heat of atmospheric exit. Partial shelter, no more; the suit would provide the rest. He was still, arguably, very very warm by the time they hit space.

The transport arced toward the station. Breaking away might be an option, might not. He touched the pilot's mind lightly, just to get some idea of security procedures from here on out; he'd gotten part of the picture on the ground, but this helped.

One procedure caught his attention, attached as it was to a bit of worry over personal luggage. Weapons scan, and weighing the actual ship, down to the kilo.

Oh, he'd have to time this perfectly.

With no atmospheric drag, his velocity matched the ship. Wrapping himself in the White Current, he pushed up and away from the back of the ship -- away to give himself a little motion relative to the ship, though he retained a good bit of velocity in the station's direction, and up to steer clear of the drive efflux that could burn him to cinders in moments. By the time the freighter was scanned for weight and weapons, he was about ten metres above and behind it, floating in its wake, invisible to eyes and sensors.

The freighter drifted into the docking bay...and the hangar door closed before he could enter. He drifted to a halt against the door, cursing under his breath. The trip had taken three hours; that gave him two or three hours of air and heat before he died. Two hours to find a safe place to get aboard somehow. Soon, ideally. He could keep himself cloaked for a long time, but at the end of this was a Sith Master, and it wouldn't do to tire himself more than was necessary. He'd already had to use the Force in quite a few ways.

He set out across the outside of the station, looking for a decent entry point.

[member="Darth Banshee"]

 

[Darth Banshee]

Darth Banshee, was having a surprisingly good day. Her overdrive reactor had worked, and anti-matter torpedoes where a success. Know all she had to wait for was test results, for her entry explosives. Then with her mass produced, anti matter reactor. Her new line of ship could be launched. How ever she was working on new couple of projects, since the invasion by the mandalorians. Though she was still after a decent biologist, for one these projects. Though she stayed away from that room, after buying forty of these lizards.

She decide was a good idea to warn [member="Aedan Miles"], that some one put a bounty on his head. Though she had done the usual course of doing a retaliation, by putting a bounty on their head as well. This was to stop people just putting bounties on sith heads, with out figuring out they may be consequences. She sent him a holo message, Aedan Miles just heads up, one of your former associates called [member="Ember Rekali"] has decide to put bounty your head. Though I would be insulted if I was you, your only worth hundred thousand. Don`t worry the one sith are not cheap skates, so I put a million on his head.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

[member="Darth Banshee"]

The station had hexilateral symmetry -- six major spokes projecting from a ring of angled gantries. The spokes terminated in modules, presumably manufacturing facilities. You wanted to keep antimatter as far away from the command/docking hub as possible.

This made for good news and bad news. Bad news, it didn't look like he could get to one of the antimatter modules without being detected -- lots of long sightlines, few obstructions. Well, he could get there, but it would take a while, and there was a chance he'd cross the threshold of genuine fatigue. A mile, hand over hand, cloaking himself with his mind the whole time, while his suit grew cold -- that was a fast way to wear himself out.

He decided against it.

Which left the good news: They'd docked close to the command hub, where, presumably, Banshee would be found. If not her, perhaps her quarters or her effects.

He guessed that her quarters would be near the top, conveniently close to the bridge, but fortified within the station. Once he got inside, got closer, he'd try to verify that one way or another. In the meantime, the main issue was boarding unnoticed. This station had a lot of escape pod hatches, but ingress through escape pod without being noticed was pretty much impossible.

He chose a section of flat hull that didn't feel like anything critical was behind it, no major sightlines. Military-grade hull plating was thick, very thick. He set his sabre at an acute angle to the surface, hilt resting against durasteel, and crouch-walked a circle. The cut didn't get through the hull, no breach to register on sensors. A near-flat section floated free, its underside in flux between molten and flash-frozen. Beautiful, if he'd had the time to admire it, and still amorphous enough for his purposes, at least on the underside.

Breach sensors required some degree of decompression to trip; high-security facilities generally went for a higher degree of sensitivity, but you couldn't tune those sensors so low as to get false positives. Which meant that areas prone to pressure flux had to have their decompression threshold set lower, or else moving crowds, docking bays, large open spaces, and anything involving massive amounts of cargo would be setting off breach alarms constantly. What mattered, then, was whether he could do this while incurring a pressure drop outside those tolerances.

A second cut began, cutting inside one of the starship-component cargo bays, with a little bit of precog to sharpen his luck. There was no helping the possibility that the tip of his sabre, or the glowing metal, would be spotted. He carved a plug, wider at the outside than the in, its cross-section like a crescent. As air pressure eased it out, he held the disc against the inside of the crescent, the two free chunks sliding against each other. Small puffs of air escaped here and there, air turning to snow. Once the sloped, crescent-shaped plug floated free and the disc covered the gap, he checked sightlines again. No cameras he could see, no windows around.

He dropped his White Current cloaking, save for the part that kept him hidden in the Force, and put his focus into a Dathomiri wind-spell to hold the air at bay-

When he raised the disc and dropped through the crescent-shaped gap, the station's artificial gravity coming into play as his boots passed the hull. His space suit held back the heat of the metal for the second he needed to pass through and seal the disc over the hole. He emerged behind a set of crates, many, many crates, all starship parts from the surface. The wind spell had been mild, focused -- just barely enough to keep the air in like a powerful adiabatic shield, for the couple of seconds he'd needed to enter. There had been no serious pressure differential.

He settled down behind the crates to meditate, rest, regain his focus, plan. He was, hopefully, within a couple of hundred metres of his target. But there were plenty of weapons-scanner checkpoints between here and there, and he didn't fancy trying to pass them with a lightsabre.

Many options, none of them good.

He continued to meditate.

 

[Darth Banshee]

[member="Ember Rekali"]

Darth Banshee decide to retire to personal quarters, which happened to be next to the bridge. She decide to watch the news, and see what the official reports say, and what the news say. It was always entertaining, to see what they think was happening, and what was actually happening. Though the McYodas adverts where annoying, but she had already been told she can`t wipe them out. As it would upset the masses, plus their unhealthy food. Means the masses would be less fit to start a rebellion.

Else where on her station, patrols where being routinely carried out. The security guards doing this where dressed in Sith Trooper Armour, this gave them good protection also is some thing happened to them command would know about it. She did not hire vong guards, as they where a little less disciplined than other races. While their traits where good for the battle field, they where not good for securing a volatile space station. So they where only used to secure parts of the works. Their weapons where stun guns, and stun batons. As she did want to risk high energy weapons on this station, as anti matter has proved it can be highly explosive.

They routinely checked people id cards, against their DNA. This was so people, did not try and poke other people eyes out, or chop hands off to get round the conventional security. The final weapon in the security guard arsenal, was the internal shields if they where to confront some one who was armed. They could use the shields, to put them in lock down, till enough of them where their to deal with the threat. These where very strong shields, and where designed to slow down an anti matter explosion. So people had chance to get to an escape pod.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

[member="Darth Banshee"]

Gently, so gently that he didn't risk detection, Ember gleaned the general idea of the station's internal security from the minds of its patrolling guards. And it didn't look good.

There were times, Ember reflected, when one came right up against the wall of one's limitations. He could bullrush this; he could run faster than nearly any Master alive. He could shrug off stun fire and stun batons. He could use White Current illusions to trick the guards into activating the internal shields at the wrong times and in the wrong positions. He could even cloak himself to every sense and sensor and just walk through everything undetected.

But if he did all that, or even a substantial fraction of it, in addition to all he'd done already, Banshee would wipe the floor with him. He'd be tired. And even if he did beat her, he wouldn't have enough left to escape.

He contemplated trying to hitch a ride in a load of cargo, but if they weighed ships they might weigh crates -- that, and no crates would be bound for the Dark Master's rooms.

He contemplated trying to bait her down here, and tabled that option for later consideration.

He contemplated mind control on a guard, using one as a puppet, but he'd never had that kind of talent for altering minds.

He contemplated the old 'you've captured me, take me to your leader' play, complete with mind trick, but any sensible commander would just have him spaced.

He contemplated going back out the hole and trying to scale the station's central hub, but then he'd have to repeat his entry trick and still have a good bit of distance to get to Banshee's quarters. Plus he'd still be facing the same kind of security; he'd only be fifty metres closer. Not worth it.

No, there were no good options, not within easy reach. So what was in reach?

He adjusted his position in the little nook of crates where he'd removed and stashed his space suit. A couple of minor spells enhanced his senses, let him hear boots on the deck, smell newly manufactured armour. A hall, a momentarily glitched security camera, and good timing took him to a closet just outside the main infirmary. This station had no comprehensive medical suite, but a community of seventy-seven thousand people required sickbays.

The brief static on the camera had been, so far as he knew, the first sign he'd given of his presence. He had no doubt it would trigger a response, but ideally that response would just be increased scrutiny on the holocams and a word to the nearest guards to keep an eye out for anything odd, like a short-circuiting droid or panel. Peering through the vents of the closet, he got a lock on comings and goings from the medical suite. If he could get inside, he might be able to get something useful.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

Inside the closet, he gestured, and a doctor turned away in sudden confusion. A medical freezer opened by a couple of inches, just out of Ember's line of sight, and he passed his mind into it, hoping against hope. He felt the tiniest of pulses in answer, an infinitesimal reaction to his presence. A certain vial drifted out; the freezer closed; the doctor's mind-blank got unblanked, and the esteemed practitioner went about his duties. The vial floated through a tiny gap in the closet door, and into Ember's hand.

A station this big kept vaccines, antidotes, all manner of pharmaceuticals on hand to treat seventy-seven thousand people. A few doses of more specialized drugs weren't out of the question, especially when public enemies were known to use the poisons for which they'd been engineered. This was pentacircarpous haemodilitirion, brand name Equivox, a newly-developed Coruscanti antidote for Devaronian blood poison. Rare, but always good to have on hand, and it never went bad, so most medical facilities in this region kept a dose or two around.

Equivox was harmless. Alone.

A plastic membrane stripped away from his side, under the armpit. He carried an assortment of poisons, generally; for this operation, he had only single doses of a handful of toxins. A tiny tablet of Devaronian blood poison joined the Equivox in its little vial. As weapons went, it was pretty much useless, but options were options. The membrane adhered to his skin, pinning the doped Equivox vial in place.

With that secured, he immersed himself in the White Current and left the medical centre. He'd forgotten how easily this sort of thing tended itself to permanence; normally when he used Fallanassi skills like this, it was a matter of a single sustained instance, not repeated short-term efforts. Now, he found his periods of visibility tended to leave him partially cloaked, like long-term protection on a praxeum or a Fallanassi island. He weaponized that with thirty years' experience, and walked past the guards and the droids like a ghost, visible out of the corners of their eyes but nothing more. Scanners might register the odd blip here and there.

A guard spoke behind him as he passed the checkpoint and the field generators. "Command, this is Point Four-Aurek, we've got a sensor artifact. Betts thought he saw something."

With a grunt, Ember poured on the gas. Half-visible, he put his strength into his specialty, physical enhancement, and ran. Ran fast, faster than pretty much any Master of the Force could run. His goal was to reach [member="Darth Banshee"]'s personal quarters, which he'd do in under a minute by this point. For this, for the run and for the confrontation to come, he needed everything. He dropped the stealth, even the part that concealed his presence in the Force.