Cardissa nodded once to the Imperial fighter. "Cardissa Mitra," she said, introducing herself, then extending a hand, palm upward, towards the Golden Galaxy.

"One of the finer dining establishments of this otherwise harsh planet. We can find a nice quiet room to discuss my information..."

Now, that was another matter.

"Table for five please, in a private dining area," she told him. The host then turned to a waitress, who in turn glanced at availabilities before motioning them to follow her as she took them to a room enclosed by a large greelwood door. Opening that door, she revealed a small room with decorated in a similar fashion to the reception area, only it contained a large greelwood table in its center. She motioned for everyone to take a seat, took drink orders, and then departed, leaving all to wait.

"I've been to this establishment on Kati'shyn frequently, during my studies while I grew up. My father felt by visiting many worlds, I would be educated in knowing the great varieties of civilization in this galaxy."

She paused at that, looking to the Imperial fighter. "I am still finding out about new worlds nevertheless," she continued with. "As an educated individual with a wealthy background, I've taken it upon myself to fund research in various locations, near and far, especially since my home planet of Fierre was destroyed. It is some of the findings which my team has brought to my attention which bring me to this planet now...

But the lady insisted he sit; to oblige her, and to thus learn as much as he could, he forced himself to remain where he was.

...but through some various intelligences have discovered that there is a blockade surrounding the world. I was hoping that we might come to some sort of arrangement, so that I and my team can get into those worlds...

About one hundred and eighty degrees away from it, in fact.

Leaning forward just a bit to indicate his interest, he merely nodded toward Cardissa, indicating that she continue. Hidden beneath his helmet though, he once more toggled a switch, opening a scrambled link with the trooper he had ordered to remain aboard his fighter.

...but I'm curious as to whether or not there are any of these ships there, and if there is any civilization there. The researcher I refer to provided no such information, and I feel this data must be acquired. If someone there had the ability to create the ships I speak of," she continued, looking towards Bon Foyagee, "Perhaps they had other wonderfully powerful technologies as well. My travelling companion has the drawing of the ship I refer to."

What the heck was this lady doing?

Well, whatever it was, it was all about to go out the window because blueface here was about to go ballistic. I did the only thing I could.

“Hey, Bon, it’s all right,” I said, reaching my hand onto his shoulder. He jumped at my touch, and as I quickly felt for that certain spot in the back I turned my head to Cass.

“He’s having another episode. Call for some water and I’ll bring him out of it.”

I almost had it. I looked over at the helmeted pilot – how was he going to drink or eat in that thing? – and gave him an apologetic look.

“He has a weird little kind of blue fuzzball seizure thing, this tends to calm him.”

I had the nerve and twisted hard. Bon froze up like a Popsicle and settled down. I reached across with my other hand and slid the notebook over to me. I released Bon’s back and he slumped a little. Knowing he’d be more or less immobile for a few minutes, I opened the book and took out the picture he had traced earlier, and handed it to Cass.

General Ahem's conversation with Josiah was interrupted yet again as his desktop began bleeping quietly at him. This time he raised both a hand to the man in front of him as well as a brow to the words which were now scrolling across his screen.

Words, according to their subject header, that were coming to his ears from the surface of Kati'Shyyn, from an establishment there known as the Golden Galaxy.

He had never been to either the establishment or the world it was planted upon, but that didn't make him a whit less interested in the strange garble of words being reported to him. Frowning just the slightest, he opened a private communication with the squadron leader, and was soon privy to how and where the pilot had come to be where he was, as well as all that had gone on before he had decided to broadcast the one-sided conversation on to Sormontato.

A grim smile curled across his rugged face and he nodded absently toward the screen.

That one's on a short track to fast promotion, he couldn't help but think idly as he continued to watch the words scrolling along, Josiah Darksaber all but forgotten before him.

I took one of the chair in front of the generals desk and took a seat.

"Like I said before I was bored when I blasted off the planet, ever since I've retired from active service I have been without the means to futher my goals. So I have resorted to selling customized weapons. All done leagaly with the proper documentation I assure you, I take great pride in my work."

"However with the conficts as of late orders in the private sector have been lacking as of late, many people perfer weapons now with the view of quantity over quality."

I gave a brief pause to let my words take effect and to catch my breath.

Or was it?

I mean, here we were, sittin’ down and showin’ hospitality to a guy that was working for the brute squad of the galaxy. I mean, I had nothin’ against the Empire personally, even did some work running stuff for them sometimes, but this was gettin’ a bit, well, stifling.

Several seconds ticked by, and I just that goon was talking into his helmet to someone else. That was so damn rude! Before I burst I had to say something, anything.

Holding up a hand to put on hold anything else Darksaber might have to say, he directed his full attention to the continuing transmissions from Kati'shyyn. After reading for awhile, he pulled out a keyboard, typed in a reply:

Ascertain why my presence is being requested, he sent off, then turned to the impatiently waiting Josiah.

"Forgive me, but something has arisen which has momentarily taken command of my full attention. But now, sir, it is yours."

Blanking his monitor, he folded his hands atop his desk and leaned toward Darksaber.

...and the minaturized digital cameral took what might prove to be the most damning photo it ever had.

Once he was certain the image had uploaded to Sormontato, he held the tracing back to Cardissa.

"Miss," he said, stiffly but politely; conversation after all was not his forte. But he had his orders; stiffening to attention in the seat, he continued.

"The General is a most busy man, ma'am; he does not have the time to speak with each individual who asks, no matter how--"

He paused, searching for words.

"Pretty," he ended.

An uncomfortable pause ensued, one in which the silent blueberry began to fill with a series of awakening squalls. The trooper cocked his head fractionally toward him.

"Silence him," he ordered, before turning at length to Rico.

"What I think of the image is irrelevant," he said simply before turning back at last to Cardissa.

"As I was saying, ma'am, the General is a most busy man. He sends others to ascertain whether those who wish to speak with him and what they have to speak about have merit to do so."

He twitched, smiling coldly behind the enigma of his visor.

All right, maybe that was a bit too sudden. I tried to smooth it over.

“Look,” I said, pressing the nerve on Bluebell again. “We’ve just been waiting a long time to get where we are now, and I’m not fond of being in port. A spacer like you should know what I mean, right? We don’t mean to impose on his majesty the General or anything, but you can see that this is pretty cool stuff here, right? All we’re asking is permission to go research it. We’ll share the results!”

Well, duh, they’d expect that.

"This is the design for an enhanced human-replica droid. It is undetectable by even the most sophisticated medical scanners and even will fool most jedi dure to its presence in the force."

Sticking a few keys on my data pad the image shifted to a more technical readout.

"It accomplishes this feat through its design. Current designs use a sythaflesh layer to simulate life signs to fool scanners. Although there are ways to detect this, current models have a body tempture about 10 degress cooler then the average human and the useing cell aging it can tell if a 27 year old looking human replica droid has 3 old sythaflesh."

"I have found a way to fool all these sensors. Using Sparti cloning chambers we can selectively grow what flesh we need and atrificialy age it to appear the correct age. This also makes a body tempture consistant with most humans."

"The finishing touch was how to fool a jedi, they would obiously be fooled by a human with no presence in the force. Using the method of entrenching a human mind can be uploaded into one of these droid bodies and will have a faint presence in the force, not like a jedi's but more like you or I."

I tapped a button on the holo pad and the image vanished.

But Cardissa had had quite enough.

"Very well then,” Cardissa said evenly enough. “I trust that the information I have given you will be quite enough to prompt your superiors to speak with me in time,” she continued, much to the chagrin of her companions. “But you will understand, of course, that my team and I in the meantime will continue our research...

…one way or another.”

Therefore, he reasoned further, he was given leave to continue dealing with the situation in an autonomous manner.

"I believe in order for you to capture the General's full attention, it's going to take more than a mere caricature sketch and speculation," he finally said. He shifted a bit in his seat, giving forth the impression that at any moment he would rise and take his leave from them.

...while remaining in contact with you of course...

"And now, dear lady, if you would be so kind as to reveal to me exactly why we should let you through our blockade, when we now have all the information necessary to research this ourselves?" he asked simply, then falling silent once again.

Unseen by the others, his lip curled into a tight little smile.

I looked at the pilot, wanting to say something but thinking better of it.

Ah hell, let’s say it anyway.

"There are reasons for what we do; if a world is blockaded, it would be wise for one to be as far from it as possible."

Now he did rise to his feet, wavering with the idea of bringing them up to Sormontato anyway; all this interest in a world the Empire was keeping tabs upon certainly could bode no good.

But-- there was the other side of the coin to consider, and that was the simple fact that Admiral Actar wished nothing more than to bring order to chaos, and well being to all. Acting in a manner that shadowed the Empire of Palpatine's day would not go very far in erasing old suspicions and fears.

"I suggest you remain distant from this world, Ma'am. If it bears no name, one can only deduce that it is one unknown to us, and quite possibly dangerous. Trust me when I say the New Empire wishes only the best for its citizens; I can only believe this blockade is placed where it is to prevent injury or death to anyone, and if any threat should arise from it, that threat would impact upon soldiers trained to deal with such."

He bowed stiffly from the waist, marveling to himself for his sudden burst of fluency.

"In leaving, may I suggest further that it would behoove you to remain in contact with us. And now--

"Lady, gentlemen..."

With that he whirled in a crisp military about-face and began walking to the door of the establishment, typing in an order that every identifiable marking of Cardissa's ship they could ascertain be logged in the memory banks of their computers, that if they ever came across it again it would be easily recognized.

A standard protocol, after all...

“Sorry, boss, but don’t say another word,” I said so very quietly. “This ain’t no stupid grunt we’re dealing with here, cut our losses and let him get out of here.”

If indeed what he spoke of was truth and not just the results of over-indulging in too much ikopi pate...

"I see--" he began, leaning forward with carefully cultivated interest when the screen inset into the desk of his ready room bleeped politely for attention. Raising a hand to Darksaber, he cut his eyes downward, quickly reading the report now coming in from Kati'Shyyn.

"You will pardon me, please," he interrupted whatever Darksaber had been about to say, then quickly sent an order that the three people the squadron leader had been observing be allowed passage to Sormontato, there to be given audience with him concerning the mysterious ship and powerful civilization to which they alluded.

His eyes narrowed as he considered just all he had been told so far of Imperial doings, out there in the middle of nowhere...

...but were then drawn to the screen as once more it bleeped politely at him.

He read the words which quickly scrolled along, his face growing white. Then, flicking off the monitor he rose smoothly to his feet.

"What you have to say interests me, my good man," he told Darksaber as he began to escort him to the door of his ready room.

"...and I promise to give your words my utmost attention. But at the moment something has arisen which, unfortunately, demands more."

Giving the man a tight smile and a most unprofessional push into the corridor, Ahem then slammed his hand against the door's control, effectively locking himself into his ready room. He whirled, returned to his desk in but two gigantic steps, and opened an intra-ship command.

"Battle stations, battle stations; all hands to battle stations!"

Klaxons began to blare, and from without his closed door the sounds of pounding footsteps came, muffled, into his ears. One set in particular grew more than muffled until, without even bother to knock, their bearer keyed in a password to the ready room, by-passed the locking mechanism, and burst inside.

It was his Second, his entire face one gigantic question mark. General Ahem didn't stand on protocol; quickly, he informed his Second as to recent goings on...

Goings on in that very system the people with his trooper were trying to gain entry into...

His Second allowed himself the privilege of one short gape, then whirled and fled, running at top-speed until he had gained the bridge.

"Recall all troops immediately, and plot a course to Coruscant! When all are aboard, we leave!" he barked, saying no more but standing figuratively at the helm, watching as the men beneath him scurried obediently to obey that unexpected command.

((OOC: To see what provoked all this ruckus, please see page 8 of Destiny Uncertain in the "Jedi/Sith" forums, thank you.))

The trooper nodded, closing the comm, and with no further ado turned about and re-entered the Golden Galaxy. He wasted no time but marched right up to the table where he had left Cardissa and the others.

"The General wishes to speak with you," he said succinctly, turning sideways and gesturing toward the door.

"If you don't mind, we will escort you to Sormontato that you might speak to him of that which you have just presented to me."

"We would be most honored to join you and discuss this," she said then, motioning for him to lead on, cutting a brief yet warning look the furry blue alien's way before turning and following the trooper out to where they had landed their ships, motioning then for Rico to take the lead. "Hurry and get the ship ready for departure," she said then. "We wouldn't want to keep this man waiting," she observed, wondering just why the trooper had returned, so suddenly changing his mind...

Pausing at that, Cardissa frowned thoughtfully. "Maybe I ought to have a word or two with our little blue friend," she observed then, rising to her feet and heading aft without so much as a word until she arrived at the bunk where Rico had deposited the Bothan.

"My dear Mr. Foyagee," Cardissa purred as she knelt by the Bothan, patting him on the shoulder, first softly and then with a bit more persistence. "There is much we need to speak of...and quickly."

I looked around the corridore to see men rushing up and down the walkways, and heard the anouncement over the speakers.

"Battle stations, battle stations; all hands to battle stations!"

I sttod where I was and waited for the closest officer to walk by and stopped in his path. Judging by his rank he was an ensign, perfect for what I needed him to do.

I set the autopilot to follow the course given to us by Mr. Friendly the pilot, and turned around to see what was happening. “You probably will need to give him some smelling sa—“

She paused, her dark black eyes pinning the Bothan. "You need to pull yourself together. I...

...we haven't come this far for it to all be thrown away, now have we?"

Turning then, Cardissa began to move back to the cabin of the yacht...

...but she suddenly paused, looking over at her shoulder at the Bothan. "I'd hate to see all your work go for naught if you dare keep acting in such a manner; we really wouldn't want the Imperials to have any suspicion of your...

...dislike of them now, would we?"

Arching a brow and casting an odd sort of smile at Bon, Cardissa then turned away from him all together, departing for the cabin of the ship once more.

Sure, if Cardissa would’ve stayed in the cockpit things might have been different. I’ve been real careful in my life not to fall for anyone. It’s dangerous and bad for business, and no room for it in the life of a spacer. I don’t know what it was about her, though. I mean, she was smart, and there was a lot going on behind those eyes of hers. But there was something else, too, something almost – I don’t know, naive? Maybe. Whatever it was, I had to be careful not to let my feelings get any worse than they already were, or they’d get in the way.

That’s probably why the trip seemed so long, because that same thought kept going on in my head. That, and Bluebell kept mumbling on in a deep low voice, some chant I think. I didn’t mind that too much, it kept him calm, like he was doing some meditation to get himself ready to face the Impies. I sure hoped it would work, because he had to stay focused and quiet through this or we were apt to spend our days in the brig. Well, I at least had something to fall back on if things went sour, but it would mean betraying the blue fuzzball.

I looked over at him, deep in his little trance. The guy had some points, being afraid of what the Impies could do and what their real motives were and all. But at the same time, I just didn’t know if that was the way to go about doing something about it. I mean, look what happened last time. Sure, there was a big rebellion that overthrew the bad guys, but another Empire just stepped in to take its place. And that whole thing with the invasion from those veggie dudes, I have to wonder how that would have gone if the old Empire was still around.

Maybe it was that I just didn’t see the big problem with having a police force. As long as they didn’t go forcing my world to bow to them and adopt one government or another, hell. If the money was there, I could work an honest job. I was mostly legit now, anyway.

By the time we got to that SSD, Bluebell was as calm as a rock. We met up with Stern and Cass after we docked, and got ready to talk to the big guys. Cass had a wry smile on her face, and I guessed she had been busy making sure there was nothing in the ship’s computers that would endanger us, just in case the Impies took a peek. From what she said before, though, this ship was kinda like her store front, so I felt pretty good about that.

A few minutes later we were walking through the docking bay, escorted by a few of the empire’s finest, towards an official looking guy in a uniform. A stray thought crossed my mind that if I had not been delayed on Sullust I would have been standing here signing delivery papers just as the bomb went off… funny how things work out sometimes.

"Parties aboard," he announced succinctly, motioning with one finger that a cadre of guards be put around Cardissa's ship while his finest men, including computer experts, went to work upon it's innards.

"Aye, Sir!" came the immediate response.

The officer in charge had no sooner turned away to approach the newcomers when the great SSD moved out of orbit, altered her vector and burst into hyperspace the moment she had safely distanced herself from the planet's gravity well. In the blink of an eye she was gone, her destination:

Coruscant.

((OOC: Follow Sormontato and all aboard her into Back Into the Fire in the "Empire/New Republic" forums, thank you.))

Heaven's Forbiddance screamed from hyperspace mere hundreds of thousands of klicks from the orbit of Sullust, far closer than most navigators would have felt anywhere safe to perform such an act. For only a fool would run the risk of the gravitational havoc that would undoubtedly result from such a maneuver; as odd as it would seem, the little Bothan was far from being such.

It was just that her ship had been so wonderfully, delightfully upgraded by the Empire that she could scarcely believe her good fortune. A gravity manipulator, the precursor to the lethal gravity generators utilized on the SSDs, had been installed; it was this magickal little device that let her pull such otherwise seemingly foolhardy stunts.

I am willing to bet that I can even go to hyperspace inside the corona of a star, too! she exulted to herself as she brought her ship into an approach vector. Then she forced aside her momentary elation, and busied herself with the mundane chore of announcing her presence and requesting berth in SoroSuub. After a few moments of transmissional chatter she obtained what she needed, and soon found herself safely on the ground in the outskirts of the huge mining conglomerate.

Forbiddance whistled and yammered at her, bleeding off energy and various gases as it settled into slumber to await her return. Minna smiled, rose from her seat, and soon departed her beloved vessel, giving it a loving pat on the hull as she exited. The hatch slid closed behind her, locking itself against anyone and anything not bearing her retinal pattern.

Hefting the personal pack she carried over one shoulder, the little Bothan spy came to the end of the gangway and paused a moment to take stock of her situation. Ahead of her loomed the vast tarmac of Landing Facility 356, littered with vessels of varying natures. Beyond that was a rippling blob she knew to be composed of beings of many systems, many worlds, all going about their various and sundry businesses.

Amongst them she hoped to find a particular one she was searching for. She had to find Mitra, and if there was anyone in the galaxy who always knew what that pretty lady had up her sleeve, it was him.

Humming a tuneless little song to herself, Minna set out upon her task. She was certain it would be a short and sweet one, and that soon she would be congratulating herself with a nice, long, hot spring soak, accompanied by a long, tall glass of her favorite blue Corellian ale.