"My hands?" I said stupidly, and raised them up in front of my face. They hung there like two white blobs; immediately, images of writhing things filled my sight, overshadowing Link's worried features. I blinked again, and reality returned.

"Oh, I got a few slices here and there when we were getting away," I said vaguely, not wanting to say anything more which might remind her of her own horrific experience at the vicarious hands of the Yuuzhan Vong.

Not when she was looking so genuinely happy with herself. That was something I wanted to nurture; the lack of acknowledgment of a few wounds from an amphistaff was fair repayment for keeping my big yap shut on the subject.

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

"There is something you should know," Link started. "There are no prosthetic for Ryns, at least not like Terrin's. Don't ask me how I know just trust me on this and let it be."

Link saw some doubt in Yaoksi about accepting her statement, but she didn't know what to do. She didn't want to reveal to him all that happened to her as a slave especially the brand. Without realizing how deep in thought she was Link suddenly caught herself rubbing the brand on the back of her neck. Quickly she withdrew her hand from the spot only to now see a suspicious glance from Yaoksi.

Unsure of what to do Link desperately looked to Galen for help hoping she would jump in at any moment before Yaoksi found out about the brand.

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

Something is bothering her, I thought. Something more than the arm...

Suddenly I realized that she had just brought up what I swore would be an extremely touchy subject for her, one I was trying to avoid altogether to spare her pain. I peered more deeply into her eyes, and for a moment thought I saw something, a pain far greater than what the loss of her arm had produced.

She's hiding something...

Maybe I shouldn't hide anything either. I leaned forward, and clumsily took up her one hand between my bandaged ones.

"My hands got a little messed up from that thing that attacked you," I began. "But I'd wrestle with an army of the blasted critters if it would mean keeping you alive, kid."

I chewed my lip, suddenly feeling lost, stupid, like I wasn't qute able to get across what I was trying to say, or that maybe I was, sorta, only it wasn't connecting. I tried again.

"Look, don't worry about your arm. I mean, yeah, it's going to be different for you now. But it happened, it's over, and it doesn't mean a womprat's hiney to me that you only have one natural arm. That isn't you, kid. But I think this--"

I offerred a shakey grin, and fumbled to pat the material of the dress Galen had provided for her.

"--kinda is, in a way. You're always going to look beautiful to me; I hope this won't be bothering you."

I help up my bandaged hands, and for the first time wondered how badly they had been injured. The scales of a thing with a poison as fast-acting as what cost Link her arm had to have properties to them other than simple slice n' dice.

Suddenly I didn't want to think about them at all.

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

"Your hands... they don't bother me," Link answered.

Link was lying, Yaoksi's hands did bother her. Not the injury, but the method of how he got them. She still didn't understand why people like Yaoksi did what they did, but in some way it made sense if people like her former masters existed. Link put on a smile mostly for Yaoksi's benefit.

"And thank you for calling me beautiful," Link continued. "Don't expect me to do this all the time, this is just until I can get some new clothes."

She replaced her smile with a sly grin which she wasn't faking.

"However you never know."

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

"Hey, we'll get you an entire wardrobe of your own design, kiddo!" I said brightly, then reached out with clumsy hands to try and get myself a drink. Dang bandages weren't the easiest things to operate with, ya know.

After managing to replace my drink I next attended to the nearly impossible task of picking up my cards. Such a simple act demanded more finesse than I could manage; tell the truth, I was lucky getting hold of the first hand I was dealt.

"Aww, I don't need to gamble away anything else anyway," I said as with a sour grapes gesture I let the cards loose. They fluttered back around the table and at my feet like so many falling leaves; I leaned back in my seat and contemplated the bandages.

Great Galloping Ghosts, but I hoped they would heal up! I couldn't help frowning. That's all I need, to be handicapped myself; how in all the known universe am I supposed to handle a blaster, let alone pilot a ship, if my hands don't work?

I pushed the nasty thought aside as best I could, and turned back to Terrin's earlier comments about the Vong. While at first I had inwardly scoffed about this, now I wasn't so certain. I mean, it had been their amphistaffs that had caused Link's injury, as well as my own.

"So what's the scoop on this invasion thing again?" I threw out as I settled back in my chair again and fumbled with my glass for another sip.

[ 08-01-2008 12:48 PM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Yaoksi Joao ]

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

He had to take another moment or two to allow Yaoksi's question to actually register, along with some semblance of an intelligent response. Suddenly thinking about how stupid he probably looked, he worked his jaw a bit, mostly to cover the fact it had quite nearly hit the table when Galen and Link had entered all primped.

"Ahhh," he began, pausing and shaking his head a bit to clear a remaining fuzz which had developed there, "Well, it's a long story. The Sith--both ones we trust and ones we don't trust so much--have different reasons for believing they are incoming. And we have some reason to believe, via something we were told happened to Shayla on Kor'isan when she was possessed by Darkness, that there may be a connection between the Vong and the Darker Realms you went through with Thoran. Apparently she, or rather the Darkness within her, lead her to a villip on Kori'san and she spoke with some Vong about...

...something. This also seems to imply that there may be some link between the Sith and the Vong too, since she found a villip on a Sith world," Terrin said, then pausing. "At any rate, we need to brace ourselves because, at least at the moment, no one with Force-powers or any other powers or special gifts seems to be able to use them."

[ 08-01-2008 10:51 PM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Terrin Danner ]

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"So-oo," I started in a slow drawl. "There's some kind of connection to-- to--" I trailed off with a momentary shudder, which was rapidly chased by an inner groan of misery.

My poor, poor Devil!

"To those things? Well... it seems to me that they would be kinda stuck there, right? I mean, yeah, we traveled through there to get to, well, where we got to..."

Another place of sheer impossibility!

"...ummm, yeah, by said powers which aren't working right now. Seems to me that whatever doors existed which could open from our world into theirs should be closed, and if they open, well, then wouldn't that be a sign of powers returning?"

I paused again, and shook my head. This was all so weird, all this talk about demons and other-wordly dimensions and things-that-go-bump-in-the-night. Unfortunately though, things which were entirely too real. I shuddered again, and went on in a more mundane vein.

"Anyway, didn't they come here once before? How did we stop 'em then? I don't recall anything about the Sith... er, at least not, umm... our kind of Sith. So couldn't they be stopped again this time by whatever worked then? Of course we might have to tweak things a little..."

I trailed again, for I hadn't a clue how they had in fact been stopped. I never was one into history; I'd learned something as a kid in school about a Vong invasion and that it was repressed, but how that happened was beyond my knowledge.

Maybe Terrin paid more attention in school. I threw that out as a final question, then settled back in my chair again, sending a smile Link's way to let her know that we weren't going to let anything happen to her again.

Not on my watch!

[ 08-01-2008 11:06 PM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Yaoksi Joao ]

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He paused chewing his lip a bit. "There was some Jedi-thing about all of it, as I recall. Something about one of Han Solo's kids whammying the Vong World Brain with some super-duper Force connection or soething? Maybe Kyan would know."

Taking another moment to shuffle through his memory, Terrin tried to remember something, anything, that might be useful. After all, unless they got some powers back somehow, it wasn't going to amount to a hill of bantha poodoo whether or not the Jedi were able to stop the Vong.

And that was when he remembered it.

"Hey!" he perked up suddenly, suprising everyone. "The New Republic used some sort of living ships against the Vong, I do remember that." He paused once more as another thought unavoidably followed. Terrin turned and looked at Galen, quirking a brow. "Don't Sith ships have some sort of bionic technology, or something?"

[ 08-01-2008 11:58 PM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Terrin Danner ]

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Damn...

But this was too important. I straightened up, came fully into the room and took a seat, indicating to Link that she take one as well. I had a feeling she was going to be a part of this too, whatever "this" turned out to be. Logic therefore dictated she join into the fray right from the start.

I leaned forward, my vision momentarily clouded with memories of my little herd of Jesters I'd "appropriated" over the years, memories sprinkled liberally with this madman or that, with Sorben, with Terrin...

With the damned Sith!

But I couldn't really damn them, no. For they had their ships... their beautiful, wonderful ships... and their ability to step easily through dimensions... and to meddle with Time...

I gulped, my head whirling. Suddenly I was at a complete loss as how to put the myriad images in my head into comprehensible speech. But I knew there was a connection, right down to the marrow of my bones I just knew.

Call it another one of my famous hunches...

"Yeah," I finally managed, my voice low and tight with something akin to wonderment.

"They are. They're part computer, part living something...

"...and I wonder if they've been used before, before the Sith race ever came back... Or--"

I paused a moment, my head really spinning now.

"Or sent back after they did return, or maybe sent from somewhere ahead of us yet, from a time that we haven't yet come to..."

I fumbled to a halt, my head still spinning with impossible possibilities.

Damn but I hate paradoxes!

[ 08-02-2008 12:14 AM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Galen ]

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His blue eyes defocused a bit as he continued to think. And that was when what Galen seemed to be saying, or at least implying registered. "They do seem to have technology that is well advanced far beyond even what the Sith are capable of with all their magicks."

He quieted a moment, suddenly really wanting some answers to something that he'd been wondering for some time. "We really need to find out if those ships are still working even after all that has happened with this power loss, or blockage, or whatever. I mean, what if they are somehow part of an avenue to defeat the Vong...

...and the technologies which make them operate are just that, and nothing related to any power or magick at all? If so then, well...

...they should still work, completely."

[ 08-02-2008 12:31 AM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Terrin Danner ]

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"Yeah, I'd like to know that as well. I mean, I assumed it was Sith magicks which sort of connected the computer to the living parts of those ships. But maybe it's not that at--"

I stopped short, my eyes widening as, cliche or not, one hand flew instinctively up to my lips as if to block what I simply could not stop from spurting out.

"Terrin! What if those ships aren't Sith ships at all?

"Where in all the Galaxy could they have come from?"

Images of the Master, and things made of black tar, and immense purple and chrome eyes danced in my head...

[ 08-02-2008 12:43 AM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Galen ]

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...but there was a grain of truth in it. "Well, we know there are beings in other Galaxies," he said then. "We've already learned as much from the arrival of the vong. And there has always been interest in such things. I mean, we've got the Outbound Flight Mission, and I think the same Solo kid that whammied the Vong went off to seek other beings in the universe as well."

Terrin paused, trying to figure out just how they might be able to use this newly budding vein of speculation. "Still, the fighters have Sith sigils in them...

...but perhaps the Sith derived the technology to create them from somewhere else. As far as I know, the Sith worlds are the only place the fighters have been found..."

He trailed,arching a brow at Galen, recalling her mentioning having found a place where the fighters were buried when they had first met. He'd always assumed she meant K'eel Doba, however. "...right?"

Quieting then, another errant thought came to the forefront of Terrin's mind. "Hey, didn't we find some sort of strange log book on that Sith warship?" he asked then. "What if the Jedi weren't the only ones who were inquisitive about life outside this galaxy? Shayla encountered Vong technology on Kori'san which may or may not have been there before...

...and regardless of whether they are truly Sith in origin or not, the fighters are on Sith worlds." He paused, chewing his lip again. "I'm not sure how to explain just what I'm thinking," he admitted then, his eyes still vague as something just beyond his ability to explain kept persisting.

[ 08-02-2008 01:09 AM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Terrin Danner ]

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"There is something wrong about all this," Link interrupted. All conversation stopped as all eyes in the room came to focus on Link.

"If the Vong are coming then they are behaving different then the ones I heard so much about. They are suppose to be blood thirsty religious Zealots with such a fanatical belief in their cause that it puts Imperials to shame right?"

"Our views could never coexist with theirs so it would have meant that one of us would have to accept the others or be destroyed, since both of us are around and we still have technology something had to change with the vong ideology or the Imperials and the New Republic would have wiped them out a long time ago."

"Somehow between then and now something has caused them to change back or come up with a new ideology. I only bring this up because they might not behave like they did the last time what worked then might not work now."

Link looked around the table and was met with blank stares in her direction.

What was I thinking, like I know anything about the vong or the way they think... I should have just kept quiet until anything about computers came up.

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

I'll be damned, but she could be right, I thought to myself as, brow cocked I patted a nearby seat, inviting her to really join into our conversation of speculations.

"She's making a good point," I directed to the others as she took that seat. "Not to mention providing us with other information, that proving how useful she can be. I mean, Hell's Seven Circles, I've been all around the galaxy and had what some might consider rather improbable adventures. But I'll admit what I know about the Vong could fit on the tip of my pinky; Link's statement implies she's far more knowledgeable on the subject. At least she knows more than I do."

Now I turned to her, letting a ghost of a smile flicker through my serious demeanor, in the attempt to make her feel more comfortable.

"What else do you know about these guys, kiddo?" I asked, all the while wondering what in all the galaxy could have happened to the Vong to alter their former modus operandi.

Or joined with them...

[ 08-05-2008 09:04 AM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Galen ]

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"I'm just basing my statement of the vong on what I've heard about them and what I do know about Imperials. Its a information gathering technique I use while preparing for a slicing job, why do heir guards only patrol 3 sides of their perimeter fence or why do young girls always go to the Moff's quarters in the garrison every 4th day in the afternoon. When I find out why it can lead to potential security exploits that I can use for later, like the section of the perimeter fence was unpatrolled because it was protected by a mine field."

It was a lot more complicated then that but after doing it for so long it just came naturally to her.

"Do you have a data pad or something I can use," Link asked. "There where a lot of things you mentioned before that I could find out more about, I just need to write it down before I forget it. I'm positive that the archives kept by Imperial Intelligence would have a lot of information we can use."

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

Smiling, I set the magnet on the back of the data-padd; it adhered with a satisfying click. Then I returned to the galley, and affixed the padd to the table in front of Link.

"Here ya go, kiddo," I said brightly as I held out the stylus.

"Fire away with any questions, if you have any."

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

The datapad was a lot more complex then what Link was use to dealing with. More complex in the sense it had a lot more code to make it more user friendly for the average person to operate. By comparison Links old datapad had a command line and required the user to memorize many commands, normally something most people don't like to do, but Link being use to it could preform the same task much faster due to the ability of never having to navigate around a user system designed to do most of the work for you.

Link eventually found a program that would suit her needs, a simple database that allowed her to input the information she had and information gleaned from the group speculation. She inserted different colored lines between entries denoting how different ideas or theories might be interconnected and made sub entries for possible searches later once she had a connection to the holonet. Satisfied with the start she was making Link turned her focus back to the group waiting for more data for her search.

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

...coupled with Link's very legitimate observation that something or someone had stirred up the Vong to make them decide to come back into this time after once being driven out. They had reason to believe that the Vong and the Darker Realms had somehow joined forces...

...but that evidence had come to them via Shayla's experiences on Korisan. On a Sith world.

Terrin's mouth went dry as he then came to a startling theory. "Speaking of things which may have prompted the Vong to try to take over our galaxy after being driven out solidly..."

He trailed, frowning, trying to put his thoughts into words. "After what Shayla experienced talking to the Vong via the villip on Kori'san, I have to wonder more and more how a Vong villip that was activated by the Darkness within Shayla ended up on a Sith world."

He paused again, shaking his head, his eyes growing a bit more vague. "Seems to me the Vong aren't just in league with the Darker Realms. What if the change that Link suggests must have happened was an alliance with some Sith or another..."

His look darkened further. "...like perhaps Dark Lord Roan. This has been suggested in the past after all, and we do have valid ways to connect him with both the Darker Realms and the Yuuzhan Vong."

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

"Yeah, there sure does seem to be a connection, doesn't there?" I finally said. "And remember, there's not just Roan.."

Pause for the tiniest of reflexive shivers...

"...skulking around in the Darker Realms, there's the Master, too. And a bajillion... things."

I stopped a moment, tapping a finger against a tooth.

"I wonder if they're all manifestations of the same thing, and not separate entities at all?" I mused aloud, sending a glance Link's way and nodding minimally in approval to see her studiously marking down my freely flowing thoughts.

"I mean, what if they are the Darker Realms? Kinda like the weird power Sissy has, what is it she calls it? All or something? Anyway, what if those powers, and stuff like the Jedi's Force, and all the other supernatural stuff we come across in this dimension actually are this dimension, and we're just... just.."

Another pause, another shiver, only a bigger one this time as a pair of immense eyes came floating in front of my mind's eye, accompanied by a thunderous voice which spoke of something about a game. A game over whose design I very well remember engaging in a rather heated debate, finally quieting on the subject but never relinquishing my thoughts about it.

A Game, in which we're just tiny pawns. A Game of... Reality? Of.. what; something as mundane as Good vs. Evil? But what was it Sissy would occasionally blather, something about a Greater Good?

Is there something which transcends even this? If reality is a game, and it really is "good" vs "evil," what then is that "Greater Good." The trophy?

And where do we all stand in this?

I shook my head, debating whether or not I should re-open that particular kettle of worms. But then I decided that any bit of speculation might prove useful in the long-run, no matter how improbable or personally offensive.

I repeated my thoughts aloud, and silently gave Link credit. The lil gal just sat there, making sure she got it all down, and didn't so much as bat an eye about it even though I was positive her head was whirling with questions.

"Yeah," I finally finished. "What if all that is factual. It would certainly make this connection to the Sith a frightening possibility. I mean--" I fumbled, trying to express myself clearly.

"That villip more than likely existed on Koris'ian for Khaandon knows how long, which means it was placed there before we sent the system into the wherever-it-is that we sent it. And that means that a physical connection between dimensions had been successfully created, doesn't it? I mean, it's not like one of those damned Portals opening or closing at the whim of Sissy, for example, but a solid link. If 'they,' whoever 'they' are, managed to maintain a corporeal villip open for communicating back and forth through the Darker Realms, whose to say they hadn't been able to make an actual doorway someplace else, and are just biding their time in using it?"

I fell into a well of silence, and a rather deep one at that. There I dog-paddled gloomily for a moment as the impact of my own words hit me. For only too well did I remember the imps; magicks begone or no, they at times turned corporeal, which meant they turned real. Along with the horrible poison carried in their stingers.

And there were untold millions, if not billions of them...

"A cosmic Game of Good vs Evil, with events happening throughout the lives of everyone in that cosmos that would induce them into following a path of good, or a path which is evil. Winner is declared when a certain proportion is reached, or everyone follows one path alone... whatever 'good' or 'evil' might truly mean. Maybe it's to discover if there is some truly inherent quality to good or evil, and they're not just simply mutually opposing factors, one existing due to the existence of the other.

"Or maybe the definition of the concepts varies with each game played..."

I trailed, not even realizing I had spoken my final, crazy thoughts aloud. That I had was proven by Link, who after giving me a rather strange look calmly noted them down on her data-padd.

[ 08-12-2008 11:47 AM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Galen ]

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Game played with our lives, every choice we make is actually made by some thing out their trying to better this score? If this is true when I find whoever had my piece I'm going to shove a thermal detonator down his throat.

Casting her anger aside for the moment Link resumed her work and arranged her data into four different groups.

"I think I got something," Link answered.

Suddenly all eyes where on Link and nervousness crept up on her.

This is a lot easier when I don't know the clients personally and all I want is their money.

"I got enough data to move onto the next phase of information gathering," Link continued. "So far our round table dissension has been a good starting point of providing us with what we know, what we don't know, and what we need to know more about. Continuing on the current method will just presume more assumptions about what we think we know and only interfere with our strategy later on."

"First off what we know; the vong may or may not be coming back, however the evidence points towards the former rather then the later. They are an advanced warlike people who invaded our galaxy before using biotechnology exclusively and annihilating all who did not follow their ways. Somehow we defeated them and drove them away. Finally Jedi and the sith have lost the ability to use their power. Beyond these facts everything else is just speculation that may be proven later."

"Second what we don't know; why the vong have returned after so long and what changed about them. What methods we used to defeat the vong the first time, technology, strategies, weapons. How did the Jedi and the Sith lose their powers."

"Third what we need to know; We need to acquire the knowledge of how we defeated the vong, why the vong are back, and why the Jedi and sith are powerless. For this I came up with several different tasks. One is gathering the information and technology on how we defeated them, the ideal place would be imperial intelligence archives but they are stored on starship for flag officers of the imperial military or at the central library on their capital. We can write that method off because flag vessels of the imperials will never let us near them, and they would never let a ryn anywhere near their central library. The less then ideal source would be from giant defense corporations themselves. They have noticeably less security and during a war like the one with the vong they would have freely collaborated information between each other to save themselves. Prime targets would be Kuat Drive Yards, or Incom."

"As for the Jedi and the sith I have nothing in that department, Galen and Terrin appear to know who to contact with regards to them and then theirs the self proclaimed Jedi mando something who should be helpful there as well."

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

He paused then, his mind trailing to Link's other suggestions and Galen's previous thoughts.

"Trouble is, if what if Galen's suggestions are true? I hate to say it, but they make a alot of sense," he then said, pausing the barest of moments. "Any strategy or mode of defense we ever had isn't going to do a kriffing lot of good, as Link has already said herself.

"To further that, all of us here now have been through the Darker Realms at one time or another, and have seen the abilities of the beings within that realm. A few of us are also altogether too familiar with the brand of havoc said entities can also perform in this demension," he said, his eyes growing a bit darker with his words. "So if there really is a solid, open link between one demension and the next somewhere..."

Terrin trailed then as a memory suddenly flashed in his mind's eye of another day and time, one not so pleasant, one that perhaps had occurred on the very day that he had died...

...and if not had occurred only a day or two before. He turned a pair of further darkening eyes Galen's way. "Galen, a link between demensions...

...you remember what happened to us when we entered that Temple on K'eel Doba? I mean, unless my memory is wrong, considering the time frame and all that happened back then, but I seem to recall us somehow slipping into the Darker Realms to face ShaRhylla...

...without a single person present to create a Portal of any sort."

[ 08-18-2008 08:57 PM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Terrin Danner ]

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I drew in a breath, letting that thought simmer on a mental back burner for a bit, then spoke up.

"I'd forgotten that, Terrin. But then, with all we've been through, everything does have a tendency to blur together. Be that as it may, what you speak of is indeed something to consider... and unfortunately it only seems to tighten up this invisible noose we seem to be creating."

I leaned forward and rested my elbows on the table.

"It's another link between the Sith worlds and the Darker Realms. Whether this is something one Sith in particular was fiddling about with, trying to prepare for a revolution of some sort, or whether it was initiated from the Darker Realms via... well, say the Master, is something of which we simply have nothing more but speculation at this point. But it ought to be more thoroughly investigated, don't you think?"

I closed my eyes briefly as images of that horrible place wafted up to taunt me. I sure as Khaandon made little green worrts had no desire whatsoever to go back there, but going back to the little temple to determine whether or not Terrin's idea was correct sure seemed to promise us a return visit. An open doorway between our reality and that simply had to be closed, somehow. Those imps made the Vong look like Pollyanna...

I opened my eyes and turned to Link.

"Ahh- umm..." I stammered a little, an involuntary blush warming my face. I didn't want Link to start thinking unseemly thoughts about me for what I was about to say, but this wasn't the time nor place to go into a lengthy explanation of my personal history.

"I might have a way for us to gain access to the Imperial central computer system," I forged on. "I have had a past with a particular Lt. General you know, and it was one not necessarily entirely at odds with each other. If I can get you aboard one of their ships, or maybe even into their headquarters on Coruscant, do you think you can find what we need pertaining to the Vong?

"At least pertaining to how we defeated them using normal procedures..."

I trailed at that, letting a brief bark of laughter erupt in my mind. Whoever considered the Jedis' Force abilities to be something generally considered as normal...

[ 08-19-2008 10:28 AM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Galen ]

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"Corascaunt won't work it has too much security," Link replied. "Even if he did manage to get us inside from what I've heard about the security setup from slicers who failed to get in there a guards everywhere. Not to mention all the Imperial officers, technicians, and annalists. I doubt even a General could arrange for them all to be elsewhere while I go to work."

"A better bet would be this Generals flagship, if I can get direct access to the computer core I should be able to slice right in and find what we need about the vong."

Link kept thinking that the more she thought about it the more viable it seemed that this idea would work.

"The only hard part I can think of is making it appear that I somehow bypassed all their security sliced into one of the most secure systems ever designed, then got out without being caught. Because the other Imperials will eventually found out that their system got sliced and once they found out it was under his watch that General will certainly have hell to pay."

"If he can give me about 30 minutes I can get all the information I need and make it look like the break in to their system had nothing to do with him."

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

A dark picture of an even darker, black-cloaked Admiral, who for reasons known only to himself but highly suspected by yours truly seemed to be making it his life's ambition to chase after said yours truly, capturing me time and again, testing my escape skills way too many times until suddenly, inexplicably disappearing from the Galaxy in general...

Another image, one of me hiding in a tree, staring out at what was supposed to be a haven... while a particular bounty hunter cleanly and without any apparent qualms assassinated the clones of myself and our then tiny daughter.

Yet a final image, one of said bounty hunter suddenly a Lt. General, commanding an Imperial flagship, someone of whom it had been mentioned somewhere who was higher up in the Imperial heirarchy than seeming possible...

Coincidence?

I didn't think so.

I blinked, and focused on Link's questioning, and somehow angry, face.

"Trust me, kiddo; I can get you aboard. If we can ever chase the flagship down; wasn't it in orbit around K'eel Doba or something?"

This latter was directed to the others in general.

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

They don't know, or at least, some don't know everything... that is, the connections...

I snapped upright in my seat.

"Ahh-- that Lt. General; he wouldn't be Lt. General Sorben Tarnus, would he?"

There was a momentary pause, filled with silence. A heartbeat more filled the void before I went on.

"Last I knew, he was imprisoned by your lovely sister! I'm not certain why, but it might have had something to do with a blockade he had placed around the planet. Umm... the Sith one we fell into--" I winced, knowing how weird this sounded "--from Hell."

I pinned Galen with a hot glance, not directed at her, you understand. I simply couldn't help but get riled up after all the kids and I had been through during our brief visit to that Sith world. Once again the woeful picture of poor Devil-May-Care swam into my head, quickly followed by the others just as frightening, those dealing with our experience in that other place removed from space and time.

And it was all to help find you and Captain Danner.

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