The Master’s gaze rested upon Phalomir on the last words and lingered there for a moment, then he continued to scan the room.

“You need me,” he continued. “There are forces at work that shall destroy all you have come to know, all that you would have continue to be. You believe you know the extent of what you face, but believe me, you do not.”

His cold eyes focused on Jasyn.

“I am the darkest of the dark, human, do not mock me nor take light of your foes. I offer you an alliance, having at your disposal powers beyond your dreams. My powers shall level the field in your quest. And yet you scoff and toss them to the wind."

The Master paused, suddenly wishing nothing better than to crush this man, to use him as an example to the rest of how easily they would be defeated without him. He raised his demonic powers, preparing to fry Jasyn in a plume of raging fire.

But then he paused, catching Phalomir's alarmed face from the corner of his eye. No, he needed them to eventually trust him, which meant making steps at earning that trust. Today the human would live.

"I release you, human, to your own fate. But never – never – deride me.”

The strange feeling within Jasyn’s mind faded.

“Now I urge you all once again to leave this station to its own fate, and continue on.”

...but then thought better of it as he saw some of the looks about the bridge.

"Maybe you are right, and maybe this is a diversion, or a trap," he finally acknowleged. "Sure as kriffing hell wouldn't be the first. But then, what if it's not?"

He paused a moment at this, then turned to Phalomir, finishing with, "I'm not sure how good I'll be in the Sith technology department, but if it comes to us rigging up something automated to send over there, I just might be able to assist you."

--------------------

“There is no automated probe on board,” he said flatly. “There would be no purpose for it on this ship. If we choose to explore the station, we must dock with it. Everyone has spoken, and our decision is clear. We either answer the distress call or we leave it and continue on now. I for one do not relish the delay in reaching K’eel Doba, but I also cannot leave knowing there is a call for assistance.”

He leveled a stare at the Master, his eyes growing cold.

“We have the ability to help, I say we do it. Compassion is what separates us from monsters and demons.”

--------------------

But-- damn. That army of geese was still marching up and down my spine; I just didn't like how this thing had popped up right in our path when Fates knew it had all the universe in which to do the same.

Sometimes serendipity works the other way, you know.

I sat back a little, and sighed, then pursed my lips. The station was still leaking like a sieve, and the distress beacon was still sounding away like a bawling bantha calf.

"Guys, someone make a choice -- soon; I can get us either docked or outta here.

"But all this talking isn't doing us much good...

"Cripes! Would you just come to a decision already?!"

By dint of some effort I managed to refrain from tapping my fingers on the control panel, which sat there staring at me, silently waiting for me to tell the ship, through it's devices, what to do.

--------------------

He resumed his defiant stare at the Master.

“As for the rest, they should respect the decision as made by the Lord of the Armorers aboard a ship bound from Korris’ian.”

His stare lingered a moment, meeting the Master’s own unflinching gaze head-on. Phalomir scowled and returned his attention to Galen.

“Let us dock, then.”

Ignoring the growl from the Master, Phalomir turned away and headed for the doorway. “Jasyn, Matt, please come help me find medical supplies in the crew’s quarters. Perhaps there are items in the crates.”

--------------------

"You all know my views on this; I still think it's a bad idea..."

But what could we do?

I trailed then as I let my fingers dance over the myriad sigils on the board, directing the aft thrusters to ignite in micro-bursts that would bring us up next to the weird station.

It loomed in the forward screen; pursing my lips, I leaned forward to take a good look at it.

Then I frowned.

Played a tuned on the console, and leaned forward yet again.

On the screen, the image of the station yawed and rolled as we altered our course to navigate around it in a slow circle, its outer wall mere meters "beneath" us. The cloud of debris made a glittery coccoon around it, but one which gradually grew less dense as the materials moved away from it in turn.

That's what caught my eye; suddenly my hand shot out, and the image on the screen zoomed in for a close-up. The construction looked somehow dangerous, alien, as it continued to move slowly past.

I slapped an enabler sigil; the image froze as we came to a halt.

"Umm... guys?"

I turned to speak to those who had not left with Phalomir.

"This is not right; I'm not detecting any damage to this thing, and after tracing a backward trajectory of the rubble all I can deduce is that it seems to have spit out from one particular place on it.

"And that place is perfectly normal in appearance now."

I held my hand out, fully prepared to shoot us back several hundred kilometers if necessary while I waited to see what anyone else had to say about this new anomaly.

[ 03-21-2005 12:43 PM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Galen ]

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--------------------

"Moral obligations be damned, we now have more than enough reasonable evidence to suspect that this is a trap," Terrin spoke up. "I think we need to stop and come up with another option. And if Phalomir doesn't like it...

...I'll take the heat. Meanwhile I think we should try to send a comm, we haven't done so thusfar. Otherwise...

...we'd better rethink this, and before it's too late."

[ 03-20-2005 09:39 PM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Terrin Danner ]

--------------------

Jasyn and Matt had finished their stack, and had turned up nothing in the way of medical supplies as well.

Phalomir sighed and ripped open the top crate. It was filled with small vials packed in a foamy material. He smiled and pulled out a vial, studying the green liquid within. His smile quickly faded, however, as he could not find a label. He replaced the vial and pulled another, seeing the same liquid and again no label. He pulled and replaced several more, each with the same result. He estimated over 200 vials were packed in the crate, all sealed with a crude black rubber stopper.

He closed the crate and lowered it gently to the floor. The next crate was filled with the same sort of vials, as was the next. He ripped a strip of cloth from his sleeve, pulled out one vial and wrapped it in the cloth, then placed it carefully in a shirt pocket.

“I have found no medical supplies,” he called over to Jasyn. “There is something here which I would like to analyzed, but nothing that will help with the emergency at hand. Have you had any luck?”

--------------------

Here he paused, crinkling his nose a bit before he continued. "You?" he queried, looking to Matt, who shook his head.

"Well, goodie. We're gonna dock with this damn injured ship, and we don't have anything to help them. This is just getting better and better...

...and it was never really all that great to begin with. Not that I'm trying to be an ass or anything...

...but I really hate this idea of docking with this thing. Seems rather like a game of Corellian roulette."

[ 03-22-2005 10:48 PM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Jasyn Lancaster ]

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...well, apparently towards them.

And at that moment, a red sigil began to flash persistently on the navboard of the Sith ship.

"Oh hell," Terrin growled, his look dark, "I don't know what just came out of that station, but I think it's headed right towards us..."

[ 03-22-2005 10:58 PM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Terrin Danner ]

--------------------

I scowled at the screen, watching this latest turn of events even as my spine iced. This was getting to be more and more peculiar by the minute...

...and all of a sudden our mission of mercy looked as if it might turn into a suicidal one.

Or not...

I turned up to Terrin, let my gaze fall into his eyes.

"You know... those Sith fighter ships I flew had ionic hullskins; or at least something which approximated that. That's why ion torpedoes and so on couldn't affect me; the blast was totally absorbed.

"I wonder what age of the Sith that particular technology came from? If we have an ionic skin, that thing won't be able to land on us, so we're perfectly safe; it's gonna be in for a helluva jolt when it tries to dock with us.

"But if we don't have an ionic skin... well, I couldn't tell you what's going to happen next."

I turned back to the floating object, frowning a bit as it came closer and closer to us. The screen obligingly zoomed out to accommodate its rapid approach.

The gaggle of geese tried their mightiest, but they couldn't stomp out the ice now coating my backbone.

"I-- I think I'm gonna take things unto myself, and back us a couple thousand klicks from here, and watch and see what this thing does.

"Meanwhile, maybe I can find some kind of sensor that I can use to scan the thing; blast this wacky ship anyway...."

I fell into silence then, only casting an occasional mutter at the navigation console which, although in many ways eerily familiar to me, remained for the most part completely alien, in that strange Sithy way that it had.

At least I found the damned directional thrusters!

The floating object blinked into invisibility against the starfield as we suddenly found ourselves moved, as near as I could discern, about 25,000 klicks from our former position. There I let us sit, zooming back in on the floating thing, all the while wishing like hell that the others would get back here and put in their two credit's worth about what was going on in a part of the universe where, really, nothing major ought to be.

[ 03-23-2005 05:11 PM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Galen ]

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“I do not think you are an ass,” he said. “But you are correct, there are no obvious medical supplies here. The food may be useful, but we shall not know until we assess the situation. Speaking of…”

He closed the crate and walked to the doorway, pausing just inside the hall.

“Let us return and see how events are progressing,” he said, turning towards the bridge.

He entered the main room of the ship and glanced at the viewscreen. Cocking one eyebrow, he turned to Galen.

“Are we not docking?” he asked. “What happened?”

--------------------

"It appears," I said a touch darkly, leaning back so Phalomir could see the viewscreen more clearly. I waved a hand at it.

"That something has been sent from that station, and it was making a beeline for us. I'm not sure what it is, some kind of self-enclosed unit, almost looks like a bacta-tank, of all things, but I sent us back about twenty-five klicks before it could get to us.

"Shall we take a closer look?"

With that I turned back to the screen, my hands playing with the controls. The image promptly zoomed in for a closeup.

Sure as Khaandon made lil green worrts, it was a bacta-tank. With transparent sides, as expected.

And some...thing was floating in its depths, something that I couldn't quite make out....

I fiddled with visual; nope. It was incredibly difficult to make out that the thing was indeed a bacta tank, let alone one carrying something. I mean, face it: we were out here essentially in the middle of nowhere, and starlight just didn't have the oomph to illuminate this thing. Inverse square law and all, you know...

I sighed, damning physics. Obviously, to get a better look at the thing, we'd have to get closer to it once again, and use our outside illuminators.

Assuming, of course, that this ship had outside illuminators....

[ 03-25-2005 01:53 PM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Galen ]

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"I'm not sure how close we really want to get to that thing," Terrin spoke up, "But I sure don't like the idea of having it here on this ship til we know what is in it."

He paused at this, frowning. "I'm ready to get the kriffing hell out of here and forget about it, honestly. As has been mentioned, there are far more pressing matters on K'eel Doba...

...and I'd like for us to make it there to deal with them."

Pausing once more, he pursed his lips, then finished with, "And by the way, before we decide what to do about this thing, you might also be interested to know that the damage on that station has oh-so-easily-and-suspiciously simply disappeared."

--------------------

“Then it is either a trap or a desperate attempt to catch our attention. Either way, we are intended to find this – pod – and do something with it. The question is whether it means us harm or if it sincerely needs our help.”

He scratched his chin with his long nails.

“Galen,” he said, turning to her. “Does this ship have a tractor beam? And if so, can it haul that pod through hyperspace? Perhaps we can drop it off with the Imperials when we arrive a K’eel Doba. We shall need something to distract Sorben’s mind, and hopefully it will keep him from noticing we have you on board.”

--------------------

My mouth worked a bit as I turned back to the board, trying to find anything that looked remotely like a tractor beam control. Truth be known, there were a lot of strange sigils and buttons whose use I hadn't a clue; I had flown tiny Sith fighters, not giant hulks like this thing.

And this thing was ancient...

"I-- I dunno."

I poked around some more: there were aft thruster controls, forward thrusters, port and aft; inertia stabilizer, mag-field generator...

Wait a minute. Magnetic field generator?

I blinked, surprised that I had found something actually written in the Sith language, rather than being represented by some strange little squiggly series of lines. The Sith language I had learned how to read, by trial and error, those years when I flew alone, seeking my sister for murdering our father, when I was out in the middle of nothing with nowhere to go and nowhere to be from, actually--

I shook my head, jerking myself back to the reality of the moment.

"I don't know," I repeated, again.

"But here is a magnetic field generator; you know a magnetic field can induce a current... hmmm.

"Can that be used somehow to tow this thing, do you think? I'm no physicist..."

But Dad was, came the unbidden thought, creeping into conscious awareness after lo these many years....

But that errant thought was squelched as my peripheral vision caught sight of yet another sigil blinking merrily away for attention. Frowning, I went to check it out, then leaned back with a sigh.

It never rains but it pours....

"Umm... guys? This bacta-tank is sending us a request to dock. And it's in Basic."

[ 03-26-2005 01:41 AM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Galen ]

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He trailed, his look darkening. Yeah, a shoulder devil piped up, Like Aelvedaar and Roan...

"Almost makes you wonder whether whatever-this-is merely chose Basic for its communication since its the standard, or if it expects the recepients to actually speak in Basic."

He paused, pursing his lips. Then, "But in reference to the possible use of a mag field...it could work, since a tractor beam is essentially a magnetic field generator to begin with. And, all circumstances considered, dragging that thing behind us sounds like an entirely more desirable solution to this delay than letting the thing dock with us."

[ 03-26-2005 01:56 AM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Terrin Danner ]

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Khaandon, but it was good to have him back again, to be able to offer said logic....

"Point taken," I said as I turned back and began fiddling once again. After a bit of trial and error a tiny golden sigil sparked into life, blinked once, and then continued in a steady glow.

"I think I've got it; lemme check."

With that I hit the thrusters just a touch, enough to send us forward a thousand klicks, my eyes glued to the viewscreen where the zoomed in image of the bacta tank loomed. I punched a button, and the image backed down, but didn't get any larger as we headed in it's general direction.

"I think I have it," I finally concluded, mentally patting myself on the back for my efforts. Then I took it upon myself to send a communication to whoever or whatever was in that bacta tank.

Chances are it's just automated, but just in case--

"Unidentified object, this is... ahh, Eternity One--"

I trailed, turning to the others with a shrug before continuing.

"We have received your request to dock; unfortunately we cannot comply with that request at this time. We are, ahh, hauling you to the nearest facilities where your needs may be taken care of.

"This is Eternity One, out."

With that I flicked the link closed, then re-enabled our navigation computer. Moments later, the stars smeared themselves out into threads of colors, and we were once more on our way to the Sith worlds.

Pushing the bacta tank before us.

[ 03-26-2005 02:05 AM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Galen ]

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This "eternity one" shall know our gratitude in full, as full as our gratitiude can extend.

--------------------

[ 03-26-2005 02:49 PM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Terrin Danner ]

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She paused at this, then adding, "As to any Imperial entanglements we may encounter on our way into the Sith system...

...I think it would be advisable to avoid them if at all possible. Maybe we should take a moment and activate Galen's Sith belt before we arrive insystem?" she finished with, quirking a brow thoughtfully.

--------------------

“Yes,” he agreed, “any advantage we may gain will be of great use. This ship must not be taken by the Imperials. There is too much aboard to risk it.”

He felt the inquisitive stares from several of the people on board.

“This is a unique ship,” he explained. “It has the ability to move planets – nay, solar systems. There are wonders of equipment in this very room, and in the store room there are cases upon cases of some strange substance.”

He reached into his pocket and produced the vial. Unwrapping it, he continued.

“I wish to have this analyzed as soon as possible, but I have a bad feeling about this. In fact, with all of the secrets this ship could provide the Empire, I would sooner blow it up then give it to them.”

--------------------

"Finally," he boomed. "Words of wisdom from my erstwhile son. Indeed, the thought of this ship in the hands of the enemy sends shivers down my spine. However, I suggest a slightly different approach. The belt young Galen somehow came to possess attempts to make us invisible, but it has its limitations. Why draw suspicion, if they can detect our trail then surely they will investigate. With Sith magick, however, we can cast an illusion to fool to all sensors, organic and electronic. To them we could appear merely as a freighter. From my information while -- working -- with Aelvedaar, they have not been stopping ships entering the system.”

A wry smile worked its way across his face.