The Hapes Cluster

[Mirdala Ad'Goran]

The moons’ light made Mirdala’s job of patrolling a bit easier and a bit harder at the same time. She found the night’s brightness to be…unsettling.

 

Eastern parameter is secure, a voice crackled over her radio.

 

“All quiet here on the Northern entrance,” Mirdala intoned, turning back from her scans of her section of the complex. Then something caught her attention, a slight distortion along the top of the wall surrounding the estate that she only managed to notice because of her other senses. “Wait…I think I saw something, I’m going to investigate."

 

We’ll send up relief to your post. Don’t be too long.

 

“Understood.” Casually she approached where she thought she’d seen the visual blip. It might have been a trick of the unfamiliar celestial light, but her instincts told her something was off. It reminded her of the stealth shrouds her brothers had often used during the operations on Coruscant.

 

She hoped she was wrong.

[Moon Knight]

A little over half an hour later, the woman did emerge from the hotel again. By this time Moon Knight had repositioned again, hoping to get a better look at her face through the macrobinoculars, and the strategy paid off. He captured a holo of her that was good enough quality that he could probably prove who she was if he could find a picture of her somewhere else. With any luck, she was someone important and it would be easy, but there was always the chance that she was no one and they would need to get access to police records or something. He considered following her, seeing if she would lead him somewhere useful, but it was now 0045 and Fett had more to do by 0100.

 

The first thing was to wait five minutes for the coconspirator to emerge. He did, and Fett got a couple holos of him as well, but with the hat on he wasn't as confident that the images would be useful.

 

No sooner had the man disappeared than Moon Knight went on the move again, slipping across the street to the hotel to retrieve Flirt and then turning his macrobinoculars on the apartment building's roof across the way from a concealed position. He just barely caught a glimpse of the Hapan male standing up there, looking down, before the man turned to leave. Fett checked his chrono. 0053. Leaving seven minutes early, are we? he thought.

 

About a minute later he moved again, trying to look inconspicuous and walking down the sidewalk before pausing behind a tree. As predicted, the man from the roof emerged from the apartment building, threw a brief look around, and headed off down the street at a brisk pace. Fett followed surreptitiously, keeping his distance.

 

0104. The man stopped to wait on a street corner -- 33rd and 5th -- leaning into a bit of shade from the moons. Fett kept walking until he rounded a corner, then stopped and looked through the corner shop window to watch the man wait.

 

0111. The man looked impatient. Running a bit late? Fett thought.

 

Three minutes later, a tall man approached. Dark skin, black hair. Brand new jacket. The two of them talked for a minute, but Fett couldn't make out what they were saying. He wished he had his buy'ce to let him eavesdrop, but he had a pretty good idea of how the conversation was going. The tall man dropped an aquii chip in the Hapan's hand and they parted ways. Fett followed the outsider, reaching into his pocket for the tiny pistol which could fire a coin-sized tracking device to medium range.

 

The outsider, Fett's real lenedat, soon had made his way to a landspeeder. Fett crouched and took aim, then pulled the trigger right as the speeder was starting up.

 

0117. Kandor watched the outsider depart and checked the readout on his chrono to make sure that the tracker was sending a clear signal. It was time to make his way back to the apartment and see if these new leads panned out.

[Mirdala Ad'Goran]

“Noran!” came the sharp cry from behind Mirdala as she’d entered the ornate library of the estate, certain the potential intruder she was tracking had disappeared into the room. Wincing, as she knew it was one of the supervisors (the man that had interviewed her as a matter of fact), she turned to face her superior. “What do you think you’re doing in this house?"

 

“I was tracking a potential intruder, sir.” She remarked, hating the delay that only let whoever it was continue to move about.

 

The man looked past her into the library, turning on the illuminators to their full brightness. No one was there. He turned to Mirdala, his eyes narrowing in suspicion. “You seem to forget your place, off-worlder. They hired you against my recommendations and you’ve proven my reservations warranted." He grabbed her arm, not all that surprised when she wrestled it from his grip.

 

"With all due respect Sir, was I not hired to protect your employers? Yes? Then get out of my way and let me do my job! There's a more than better chance this intruder is here to assassinate Countess Geht." She squared her feet, prepared to fight the man if needed.

 

"What is all of the commotion down here?" A highly cultured authoritative voice quipped in Hapan from up the staircase.

 

"Apologizes, Countess," the Hapan man bowed low, scowling when Mirdala failed to do the same. "You would do well to show proper respect if you ever wish to have work in this sector again," he hissed in Basic.

 

"For your own safety, milady," Mirdala began in Basic, ignoring her superior's warning. "I would take your personal guard and return to your rooms. I believe we have an intruder on the grounds."

 

The countess regarded the off-worlder her subordinates had hired on for a moment, "If there is an intruder, as you so claim, then why would they be in the library instead of my chambers?"

 

Mirdala opened her mouth to respond, but the Countess Geht interrupted her. "Take her to the security offices on my floor where you can keep an eye on her for the rest of her shift. I will deal with this treachery in the morning."

--

0017

 

Mirdala sat utterly still in the chair across the desk from the Hapan Security Second-in-Command, seething. She'd been brought on to do a job to protect the countess and now she was being blocked from completing that job. By this point she'd memorized every speck of dust in the office and was irritated she couldn't shake the feeling that something was about to happen. It was maddening.

 

"Do you often leash your pet neks?" She asked with venom. Decorum be damned. They could hang from their precious decorum for all she cared.

 

"You're in a enough trouble, Kida," he began wearily, not looking up from his paperwork. Her termination papers, no doubt. "I would remind you of your place, but there's little point. I'm just glad we had this little incident without embarrassment to this household. And just where do you think your going?"

 

Mirdala sensed something was already out of the door before he'd recovered enough to go after her. Then he heard it to, a low humming coming from the countess's chambers!

 

The door was open and Mirdala was already in the main audience room, stun weapon drawn and sweeping the room.

 

"Have you gone m-"

 

"Shove it di'kut," she said as she suddenly turned and lunged at him. Well, not at him, but rather just to the left and behind him.

 

The stealth shroud had slipped off of the assailant as the smaller woman attacked, revealing the assassin she'd been trying to tell them was on the grounds all along.

 

The two of them crashed around the apartment and through the doors of the bedroom where the Countess slept no longer.

 

The larger man managed to get out from under Mirdala's grip throwing her to the opposite side of the room as he opened fire on the Hapan guard, eager to put him out of the action. A blaster bolt to the face, and the man crumpled.

 

The assassin rounded on the Countess raising his rife and sneering. "Thane sends his regards." His finger squeezed the trigger.

 

Mirdala was faster and leapt on the bed in front of the Countess, taking the hit in her upper chest, before returning fire of her own as the fired the stun bolt and scored a hit.

 

The Countess's personal house guard flooded the room in time to secure the prisoner.

 

"Told ya." Mirdala winced before passing out.

--

0119

 

"Mr. Alenka?" The dispatcher asked. He'd been asked to call the next of kin for the security guard who'd been shot that evening. The man on the other line answered affirmatively and he continued, "I regret to inform you your wife has been shot. She was taken to the Capital District Hospital. I assure you the Countess is seeing to it she's getting he highest care. You may meet them there. The password you'll need to access the secured wing is the same as your wife's homeworld."

[Moon Knight]

"Driver! Change of plans, get me to the Capital District Hospital, right away," Kandor said as he hung up, clenching his jaw. Mirdala never did anything halfway. He appreciated her tenacity and willingness to act instantly when she saw a need, but in some ways it was a miracle it hadn't gotten her killed yet.

 

Part of him was genuinely afraid to lose her, with all that she had come to represent in his life. But they were in the business of putting their lives at risk to save others, and in the same situation he may well have taken the same action. So he would deal with it. Right now he didn't even know how bad the injury was that she'd sustained.

 

A few minutes later he'd arrived and he quickly made his way through the hospital to the secured wing. It was good at least that they were keeping all of this under wraps. As he approached the area where he'd been told she was being treated, two armed and smartly-dressed women approached to bar his way. "Concordia," he said, recalling the lie she'd invented for the partly-fake identity of Kida Noran.

 

"Mr. Alenka," one of them greeted him, turning to escort him the rest of the way to the room.

 

Fett wasted no time entering. He found Mirdala sitting up on a cot, wearing a hospital gown that had a loose enough collar that he could see a large white bandage strapped around her upper chest. A nurse hovered nearby. He crossed his arms, managing to give her a stern look, though he was in truth feeling greatly relieved at the minor nature of her injury. He spoke in Mando'a to her. "You know, your brothers would shoot me if you got killed out here," he scolded her.

[Mirdala Ad'Goran]

"We'd be together then, at least," she responded in kind, before changing back to Basic. "I'm fine, really. The armor did it's job."

 

She looked towards the nurse, who nodded. "Your wife is very lucky," she replied in Hapan to Kandor. "I will get the doctor who can give you more information."

 

She left the two of them alone.

 

Mirdala pulled down the collar of the gown a bit further so he could see the dark purples and blues of the bruise surrounding the bandage. "It looks worse than it is." She reached for him to come closer with her good hand, gripping it tightly to reassure him. "The even better news is that the Countess now wants me on her personal detail after having saved her life from Thane's assassin."

 

The doctor entered the room just then, confirming what Mirdala had just told him. "She's free to go home, I just need one of you to sign this paperwork and you can go. Ms. Noran, two days rest before you resume your duties. You may remove the bandages after tomorrow night to give the bacta time to do it's job."

 

Mirdala nodded and he left the room. "I just want to go home. I really hate hospitals and doctors. I'll check in with Nek if it'll make you feel any better once we get there."

[Moon Knight]

A few minutes later Kandor had signed the paperwork, Mirdala was dressed, and they took a short taxi ride back to the apartment. It was getting close to 0200 hours now and Kandor found himself missing the extra two that Coruscant would have given him, but as Mirdala didn't have to work the next day there wasn't a great pressure to get back out into the city early in the day. A lot of the next steps on his leads were more about data work, anyway.

 

"The hotel yielded two more leads," he said now that they could speak freely. "I caught a couple of suspicious individuals who checked in and out of the hotel over the course of a about half an hour, right during the window that our mysterious offworlder had the place watched. I'm not positive that it wasn't just an affair, but I would think there would be better and less expensive places to meet up than the Ambassador Hotel. I got holos of their faces, maybe in the morning we can do some digging and see if we can come up with names. Flirt got me the list of guests, including the one the woman used to book the room, but it's a pseudonym."

 

Fett took off his chrono and handed it to Mirdala, indicating the tracker, which seemed to point to some place outside of Gransys, out in the wilderness that still covered most of Hapes. "Afterwards I managed to locate the offworlder by following his spontaneous hire to him, then tagged his landspeeder." They'd have to keep an eye on where it went for a day or two, hopefully determine where the offworlder called home, whether it was the wilderness area the tracker showed now or somewhere else, then pay a visit.

 

Mand'alor crossed his arms. "But all that might be moot. You said Thane was definitely behind the assassination attempt? It is provable in court?" It was a pretty shoddy job if so. He had little doubt that Thane was in fact responsible, but if he'd made it obvious then their job was done -- Thane would be disqualified for the Earl post and most likely stripped of his noble rank or worse.

[Mirdala Ad'Goran]

Mirdala took the chrono from Kandor with her left hand, her eyes watching the tracker as he spoke. Her expression was weary as she handed it back to him. She sighed, “The assassin said his name, yes, but that’s hardly solid proof beyond casting suspicion. I’d expect the Countess and her security forces to go to the local authorities with the case and matter.” Her tone was resigned as she moved closer to him. “We can talk about all of this more in the morning. Right now, I just want a hot sanisteam and to relax with you. Not to worry about the case, okay?”

[Moon Knight]

Kandor raised his eyebrows for half a second when he realized that he was pushing her again. She'd just worked a double shift and managed to get shot in the process, and no sooner could she relax than he was talking about all the work they had to do the next day. He quickly regained his composure and smiled at her. "N'eparavu takisit. That's more than fair, cyar'ika," he said. If he was being honest with himself, it would do him quite a bit of good as well -- even just attending the court session could take it out of a man. He supposed he was just... still very used to denying himself downtime.

 

She left to take her sanisteam and he settled back down on the couch. He relaxed for about a minute, but soon had picked up a datapad and started reading the local news reports. Not surprisingly reports of the attempt on Countess Geht's life were already surfacing. It was actually good PR for her, discrediting her remaining opponents as one of them was very likely responsible for the attack. The article did mention that the assassin had claimed to be sent by Thane, but the reporter correctly qualified the statement by saying it wasn't unusual for a caught assassin to claim that they were sent by someone other than who they were. Or sometimes double-bluff and actually be telling the truth in a way that was indistinguishable from a lie.

 

Fett rubbed his eyes. Even a confession wouldn't be enough to put Thane away unless it was coming from Thane himself. He either needed his other leads to pan out in an overwhelming way, or he'd have to just judge Thane himself and carry out his own sentence. Still technically a member of CoreSec, he didn't love the idea -- it was a lot less morally questionable to shoot someone who'd pulled a gun on you than it was to become a self-employed assassin, even if Isolder's memories told him that Thane had been behind not only assassination plots, but such despicable things as acts of terrorism in which innocents had gotten killed and political blackmail.

[Mirdala Ad'Goran]

She emerged a half-hour later, things having taken longer than they would have normally since she was only working with one good arm. Dressed similarly to the previous evening, sans the pullover, as what ever medication they’d given her for the pain and inflammation had left her feeling hot. Her mid-back length raven hair was down, Mirdala having given up on trying to fight it into a braid with one hand. She’d at least managed to get it mostly dry.

 

“I’ll check in with Nek in the morning, make sure the well-meaning doctors didn’t do too much damage with their usual protocols.” She ran her good hand through her loose hair as she crossed to the kitchen to make some herbal tiffin to help her relax. She might have already been feeling hot, but the ritual and smell of the steeping liquid was relaxing in and of itself. Maybe the heat was her body’s way of fighting off the inflammation, she didn’t know.

 

Bringing the tea over and balancing a holonovel in the hand of her slung arm she sat next to Kandor on the couch. “I’m sorry for worrying you.” She leaned forward and pulled him closer with her good hand so she could kiss him. The huntress didn’t tell him now worried she’d been that the armor plate had given way, or that the shot had been closer to center mass than she’d expected. She didn’t tell him she was scared for him, or what loosing her would do to him. Hurting Kandor was never something she wanted to do, but the reality of the situation was they both embraced and even ran head-long in to dangerous work and it was only a matter of time before one of them paid the price.

 

She didn’t tell him, but kissed him as fiercely as she could, as though trying to say all of the things she couldn’t voice. It wasn’t in either one of them to stop doing what they could to protect others. They’d both built some high and tough walls around themselves, but, for now at least, it seemed hers were starting to crumble when it came to him.

 

They’d been through so much together, it was hard to think about any instance where they wouldn’t be there for one another. It scared her to admit that she felt she needed him, but to give anyone that sort of leverage over her was something she wasn’t quite ready to give. Even to him. One day, maybe, but all of this was still too new to the both of them for her to be willing to admit how much she couldn’t imagine not having him at her side.

[Moon Knight]

It took the kiss to get his mind off the assassin and back where it belonged. "I trust you," he said. "Taking our lumps is part of the job, and being willing to do it for strangers and aliit alike is our legacy. The important thing is that we know why we're doing it regardless of the consequences."

 

He stroked her hair a bit and stared into those jade eyes, wondering if some day he would be willing to give anything to come back to this moment. In some ways they seemed like a tragedy waiting to happen, playing the lottery every day and gambling that the worst wouldn't catch up to them. It was much harder than working alone as he had for so long, knowing that if he died he would hurt her much worse than the scrapes and bruises she'd accrued over the past few nights. But they were Mando'ade. They didn't go into every day worried that it would be their last, they just lived the best they could day to day knowing that nothing was permanent and refusing to take it for granted.

 

"Vor'e for telling me to slow down," he said, surveying her various patches and bandages. "You need it and I need it."

 

He kissed her again, then gently helped get her situated with her holonovel and started braiding her hair, trying to replicate her usual style. He had to admit he would have had no idea how to do it without the Moon Knight memories, which made him surprisingly versatile even in things like this. No need to mention that, however. Maybe just one secret he didn't mind keeping from her.

[Mirdala Ad'Goran]

It wasn’t long before she’d fallen asleep, resting easily in his strong arms with a peaceful smile on her face. It was the sound of her holonovel hitting the floor and scuttling under the caff table that brought his attention from his reading.

[Moon Knight]

Kandor put down his datapad, realizing she'd slipped off. If he was being honest with himself, he'd read the same paragraph three or four times now and wasn't really staying awake either. He gently picked the small woman up and carried her over to the bed, managing to get her situated without jarring her awake. One advantage of her 4'11", 110 lb frame, he supposed.

 

Returning to the main living space, he bent over to pick up her dropped datapad, which had somehow managed to skitter under the coffee table, as things were known to do. As he grabbed it his hand brushed something small and metal stuck to the underside of the table and it came loose. Frowning, he picked it up.

 

"Oh haran..." he swore quietly, snapping out of the sleepy haze he'd allowed himself to fall into. It was a tiny surveillance device. He took a close look at it and could just make out a tiny serial number written using Tionese characters.

 

The offworlder had been here, in this apartment. Fett's mind raced. The tracking chip he'd planted could reasonably account for the man's movements since it'd been placed. That meant he'd broke in before that, quite possibly during the time Fett had been at the hotel. He grimaced. It could even have been the reason the man had been late for his meeting with the Hapan who'd been watching from the apartment building.

 

But the worst part was that the offworlder had to know things now. If he'd spent any amount of time here, he would have found their beskar'game, meaning there was a chance that he could link Theron Alenka with ShadowFett. Fett had also briefed Mirdala on what he had done that day once they'd finally come home, meaning the outsider had no doubt found the tracer he'd planted on the speeder and knew that Fett had observed the couple meeting at the Ambassador Hotel, a meeting that the offworlder himself had been interested enough in observing that he'd been paying locals a thousand aquii a night just to report on it. And that Mirdala had been involved in preventing the assassination attempt on Ghet.

 

He replayed the evening in his head. They hadn't spoken about anything really sensitive, like Mirdala's aliit or that she was a Force user. He didn't think they'd used their real names, either, but if the offworlder could link him to ShadowFett it was possible that he could link Kida Noran to Mirdala Ad'Goran, especially having seen her armor....

 

Still, the bounty was private. The offworlder would have to be working for the same people as Judyc Viba in order to realize there was a bounty on her head, and the odds of that were astronomically low here on Hapes. No, there was no reason to believe that the Kyr'tsad was coming... but the other implications were bad enough that it was possible that, depending on his employer, the operation could be at risk. He knew Thane would send people to take care of them if he found out.

 

Part of Fett wanted to armor up, go to where the outsider's speeder had parked, and take him down before things got worse. If he was alone, it was certainly what he would have done. But there was no way he could leave Mirdala alone, and her condition meant she was in no shape to go with him.

 

Fett let out a sigh, crushing the surveillance device with his heel. He set up a chair facing the doorway and sat, retrieving his assault rifle and his buy'ce so they'd be on hand, then woke up Flirt, imploring her to remain quiet but to slice into the apartment security systems and start monitoring the surrounding block for any sign of approaching persons or vehicles. Then he got a glass of water and settled down to wait out the remaining hours of moonlight.

[Mirdala Ad'Goran]

Mirdala stirred, sensing something was a miss. Her body protested, demanding more sleep, but alertness won out.

She didn't remember getting into bed, and was a bit panicked when she felt beside her and Kandor's side of the bed was still cold. Confused, she sat up and looked around the room.

 

He was no where to be found. Chiding herself for being overly paranoid, she exited the bedroom and found him in the living room assault rifle and helmet by his side and one do he chairs had been turned towards the door.

 

"What is it, love?' She asked, sensing the tension that ran though the man. It was then she realized her feeling of unease had nothing to do with unremembered nightmares and possibly had everything to do with a waking one.

[Moon Knight]

He felt a hand on his shoulder and gave a weary sigh, slowly getting to his feet and turning to face his partner. He took her hand in his.

 

"I hoped not to wake you, but... what do you say we crash on the T'ad Kebbur for a little while, cyar'ika?" The ship was sounding a whole lot more secure than the apartment now, and they could disappear there for quite some time without being noticed. He looked at her earnestly and gestured to their two duffel bags he had already packed with their beskar'game and besbe'trayce sitting at the base of the kitchen counter. The only things they would need if the osik really hit the fan. "It's important."

[Mirdala Ad'Goran]

Her eyes narrowed at him, though she nodded. "Of course..." She knew there was something he wasn't telling her, but she trusted him. "I want to know what this is about, but it can wait." It had to be pretty bad for him to consider moving her in the middle of the night and not be satisfied with merely taking guard shifts.

 

She retreated back to the bedroom to get some street appropriate clothes on already noticing an improvement in her right shoulder and arm's mobility range. Whatever they'd given her must have been some high-grade bacta.she grabbed one of the other pullovers, this one with a hood, and reslung her arm.

 

Grabbing her duffel from the kitchen she grabbed her sidearm and holster, concealing it beneath her clothes. She looked across the room at her partner noting his rigid and alert stance. Kandor was readying for an expected battle.

 

Suddenly things clicked into place within her tired mind. "We've been compromised, haven't we?"

[Moon Knight]

Kandor nodded and handed her the cracked device, then grabbed the bags she hadn't. One of them had his assault rifle just inside the top, but Flirt had already managed to get into the apartment security systems and hadn't reported anyone approaching yet, so there was a good chance that he wouldn't need it. Still, he believed in preparedness as being the single most important part of winning battles.

 

They quickly got out the door and made the short trip through the cool moons-lit night to the hangar and the ship. Kandor kept a sharp eye out. It was quite possible that someone very much didn't want them here anymore. If they assumed their anonymity was forfeit, it made things much harder but maybe still manageable. Their motives for being on Hapes were still protected, so one player knowing might not blow their cover for the others.

 

The Mando'ad realized that nothing needed to be decided until they got a feel for how matters had changed, and thankfully Mirdala had a little time before she was scheduled to return to work for Ghet.

 

When they arrived at the ship without incident, Kandor shrugged at Mirdala, visibly relaxing a bit. "Never a dull moment, is there?"

[Mirdala Ad'Goran]

"I thought we'd agreed the quiet life wasn't for us?" She remarked, once again using humor to mask the fear that had gripped her when she realized any sense of operational security had been stripped away. She sat down at the common area's table.

 

She'd manage of course. Fear was a natural response. It kept you alive. The key was to not let it paralyze you. For a few moments she watched him as he got things settled with the ship and noted his restlessness.

 

"Go."

 

He looked at her for a moment, as though unsure of what he'd heard.

 

"If you didn't have me to think about," she started quietly, "you'd already be gone. He knows we're on to him. Has to know we were tracking him. Don't loose more time. This ship is secure. I can run things well enough with one hand. I'll be more than fine. I'll only slow you down. Go."

[Moon Knight]

Fett took a deep breath and nodded. She was right on all accounts -- this had to be done if they were going to have a shot at keeping the operation together, it had to be done now, and he had to do it alone.

 

Well, mostly. He opened his duffel and started putting on his kute. "I could use your remote support," he said, pulling out his buy'ce and dropping it on the table next to his datapad. Once he finished with the kute, he opened a program on the 'pad and typed in a long string of digits. Soon an image formed which was a simulation of the inside of his bucket with a live data feed from his cameras, which covered his 360-degree arc of vision. "Normally I have 2277 providing his insight, but ever since we left him on the Enigma I haven't been able to risk broadcasting combat feeds without taking the time to verify a secure, fast transmission corridor."

 

He let her get familiarized with the interface while he continued to armor up. Most of his sensors -- infrared, low-light, penetrating radar, magnification -- were always-active even when he didn't have them applied to his visor. This meant that the program could take the data and construct the operator's field of view with those features applied without affecting his experience, potentially catching things he was overlooking by using a different vision mode.

 

Two minutes later he was looking like ShadowFett again and checked the charge of each of his weapons as he holstered them. Finally he slipped his buy'ce on, put a hand on her good shoulder and gave it a slight squeeze, then headed for the cargo bay. "Hukaat'kama!" he said.

 

They had a swoop back there and in a moment he was off, taking it as fast as he dared to the edge of town and then really letting out the stops. Every minute that he wasn't at the offworlder's base of operations, the more likely he wouldn't catch him and any evidence on site would be destroyed or relocated.

 

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

 

30 km outside of town -- which he had covered in less than 5 minutes booking it as he had been -- he slowed the speeder down considerably to reduce noise and dipped below the tree line, then soon hopped off, just 100 yards from the last location his tracking device had transmitted before going dark.

 

ShadowFett checked the charge on his assault rifle again and approached what looked like an old style log cabin in a combat half-crouch, sweeping his assault rifle back and forth between the windows and door so that he could return fire on either location if fired upon. He flicked on his penetrating radar and a wireframe quickly built of walls, furniture, and other solid objects, giving him a rough idea of the format of the inside of the cabin. "One target, conscious," he said so that only Mirdala would hear. The only moving wireframe looked to be a humanoid male, average height. "Not tall enough to be the offworlder. He could be nearby."

 

The ori'ramikad approached the front door. HIs voice was totally calm, completely without apprehension. "Ready?"

[Mirdala Ad'Goran]

While Fett had been en route, Mirdala had spent the time familiarizing herself with his setup.

 

"Ready," she intoned before adding "K'oyacyi."

 

As he moved, she kept her eyes pealed for any other sign of the tall dark man they'd expected to find and began the scene reconstruction protocol on her data pad so they could review later.

[Moon Knight]

((Minor posting of Mirdala's actions. I usually use a droid for this...))

 

ShadowFett didn't hold back. He reached into one of his array of belt pouches and produced a breaching charge, slapped it onto the door, dropped back a single step, and detonated it with a voice command which would find its way to Mirdala but not outside his buy'ce. His commands were actually a series of numbers in Echani, a language he had chosen due to the first ten numbers all being monosyllabic and all subsequent numbers never being more than two syllables each, out to one hundred. This kept the commands clipped and quick to recite while not being in a language that he would have another reason to use -- in fact, he hadn't even learned to speak it until he'd become Moon Knight, whereas he'd been programming and memorizing the commands for hands-free control of his beskar'gam's many components since he'd first developed the system as a young man.

 

Now the door blew, taking the window with it in the shockwave, and he was inside in an instant, assault rifle snapping towards the wireframe and opening up with lethal force, its familiar weight and recoil braced against his chest plate, the butt of its stock carefully customized to make just that position steady.

 

His target appeared to be a humanoid male with dark red skin -- perhaps a Zeltron -- wearing some kind of visor, and he clearly knew Fett was coming with how quickly he dropped to one knee, overturning a table to take cover behind. The table appeared to be made of wood but quickly proved otherwise as it dented but did not relent under the incoming blaster fire. The Zeltron quickly moved, trying to get to the far end of the table, the opposite of where Fett might guess to squeeze a shot around the edge. But Fett tracked his movements with his penetrating radar and opened fire again, keeping him pinned down as he strafed left to circumnavigate the barrier.

 

Abruptly the lights in the cabin cut out and sparks showered down on Fett from above and he realized the man had managed to shoot them out from his position. He took half a second to verbalize the command to flip his visor setting so he could see, but his lenedat capitalized on it, popped up, and squeezed off a running shot as he dove for the window.

 

The shot was good and ShadowFett was glad he was in his beskar'gam and not the weak aruetyc metal Mirdala had been provided by her employers. He didn't even flinch as it slapped against his chest plate, instead opening up again with his rifle, the blasts tracking the figure and -- he thought -- scoring a retaliatory hit on the man's side on his way through the already-broken transparisteel pane. Others of his shots struck the walls and soon a small blaze was going. He darted back towards the door, pausing just inside for a moment as his opponent guessed his move and sprayed blaster fire through the opening. Instead of chancing another hit he twisted aside and fired through the window, but the Zeltron had been smart and dashed toward the corner of the cabin as he'd fired, cutting off Fett's shot.

 

Moving quickly to the back door in an attempt to cut off the man's retreat, he shot the mechanical lock and kicked the door open, only to receive a warning from Mirdala that the man had somehow climbed up on the roof, managing to keep one step ahead of him.

 

Fett couldn't tell what the man did up there, but before he could try to find another angle to make a shot, there was an explosion and chunks of the ceiling crashing down into the cabin. With another command the Mando'ad triggered his repulsor pack to get clear of the debris, which blocked his most direct path to his target. Quickly deciding to go up and over, he maneuvered vertically, scanning visually for the fleeing man. Unfortunately, the trees were thick enough that his penetrating radar was obfuscated and he had to flip off his low-light vision to counter the bright moonlight. By the time he spotted the Zeltron -- who was definitely injured by the way he staggered -- the man was climbing onto the swoop he'd rode in on.

 

"Haar'chak," Fett swore, snapping off a couple parting shots as the swoop took off, but at this range and with the trees he had little hope of connecting. Mirdala interjected again, pointing out the location of the offworlder's own speeder, the one they had traced. He quickly descended towards it in order to pursue, but it only took once glance to see that the thing's controls were slagged. They'd really known he was coming.

 

"Target... escaped," he said as the sting of defeat settled upon him. "And his associate is still missing. Looks like our secret is out either way."

 

He looked at the smoldering cabin. "I'm moving back into the structure, hopefully there's something left in there that gives us a clue as to who these shabuire are."

[Mirdala Ad'Goran]

“I was able to use your scanners to capture the scene before that fire started, so we’ll have some of the before. I’ll get the reconstruction started so it’s ready when you get back, if you’ll want it then.” There was a pause as she keyed up the commands. “I was able to interlace all of your views and various scanning capability. If there’s something there, we’ll find it. I’ll keep an eye out while you do the physical search."

 

She felt for him, for the two of them. Defeat wasn’t something Kandor took lightly, though he learned what lessons he could from it. Closing her eyes she prayed to the ancestors and ghosts in the Manda that things weren’t as bad as they seemed. Hell, she threw in the shabla Force for good measure.

 

“Grab that data pad and some of those disks,” she said suddenly before clarifying, “At your 8 under the overturned table husk. It’s a long shot, but it’s worth the attempt if we can just learn a bit more about them than we did before. This day’s been rough enough, I’d like to think something might go our way.”

 

The sound of her priming the engines came across his comm. “The topography scan reveals a clearing big enough for me to set down in about a half kilometer north-by-northwest from your position. I’ll ping you when I touch down.” Despite her attempts to hide it, her exhaustion and weariness crept into her voice.

----

About fifteen minutes later she was touching down at the rendezvous location and indicated her arrival to Kandor. While en route, an idea had struck her. Kandor’s assailant had run off with their swoop bike that Vannae had done some extra work on as well. If Mirdala knew her cousin as well as the thought she did, it was likely there was a subtlety placed tracking device somewhere within it’s systems. Unless the man ditched it, there was at least a good chance of potentially finding him again. It was a long shot, but often times those paid off in her experience.

 

As he picked up Kandor on the short-range sensor sweep she lowered the boarding ramp, just as he came into view. She’d checked long-range and short for any sign of the assassin or his associate before determining it was safe for her to meet him in the clearing.

 

Even though she’d been witness to everything Kandor had just undergone, it was her turn to feel the relief of seeing him come back to her safely. She ran to him and held him as tightly as she could with one arm. Even after everything this day had thrown at them, they were still together and relatively uninjured.

 

It was a good day as far as she was concerned.

[Moon Knight]

There were a few things Kandor noticed about the cabin, damaged though it was in the battle. For example, it was only set up for one person, which seemed to indicate that whoever these people were, they had multiple locations out of which they operated. The speeder he'd tagged was present, but not the man that had been driving it at the time, but that could just mean they had more than one and didn't always take the same ones.

 

Most of the rest of the cabin was fairly spartan. The only skraan around was ration packs and a few other portable, nonperishable items, consistent with the remote location and the idea that these were offworlders brought in on a local job. He also managed to get into the closet, which had a wide variety of apparel, including a few sets of women's clothing in Hapan styles and in more than one size.

 

This was particularly odd. Even if the offworlder team was several individuals, a cabin for one of them didn't have many reasons he could think of to have outfits for other team members. Perhaps if they were flying them in from offworld as the situation warranted....

 

These were merely vague clues, however. A stack of datapads had the potential to give them real info on the offworlders' objectives and employers, as long as he had gotten here fast enough that they hadn't had time to erase everything incriminating. Thankfully, the fact that not everything was packed suggested that was the case.

 

The Mando'ad returned to the ship when Mirdala landed, convinced that he'd seen everything of use in the cabin. He pulled off his buy'ce and put an arm around her as she came out to meet him. "I'll leave a probe so we know if one of them comes back," he said. "But I could sure use some nuhoy before we try to make sense of all this."

[Mirdala Ad'Goran]

"I couldn't agree more," she said, knowing him well enough to anticipate his next steps. "There's already one ready and waiting to be deployed. I think it's best to call it a day and get a fresh look at things in the morning. I was beat before all of this started."

 

She didn't return to the cockpit, but instead headed for her quarters and was quickly asleep, trusting Kandor to see them safely away.

 

-----------

 

Calling Nek via an encrypted channel the next morning from her quarters, she gave him a vague update on her injuries and activities while on Hapes. When she transmitted a copy of the hospital records she'd demanded, she saw him raise an eye brow and inwardly groaned.

 

Kida...Noran, he intoned with thinly veiled amusement. She hated the knowing and mischievous look in his eye. Is there something you haven't shared with the family yet?

 

"It's a cover, di'kut."

 

Sure, sure.

 

"You're as bad as Verdeyuii."

 

And you're as bad as Sarge. He gave her an appraising glance, nodding at her shoulder as he did.

 

She sighed. "It looks worse than it feels. Honestly."

 

Have you changed out the bacta patches yet?

 

She shook her head. "I was about to. We had kind of a long night." She turned red as he arched his eyebrow at her. "No! Not like that! Seriously, what happened to 'professional bedside manner'? I liked that Nek better."

 

He laughed as she pursed her lips and flushed more. Have you noticed your shoulder hurting much while we've been talking?

 

"Not as badly, no," she admitted, already knowing where he was heading with this.

 

I have many ways of treating my patients. Especially the stubbornly special ones. He smiled before his expression returned to a more serious one. Let me take a look at it.

 

She nodded and left his view to grab the medical supplies they'd sent her home with to redo the dressing. A moment later she'd slipped the strap of her tank top and bra strap over her right arm (her jaw set as she did so) and was releasing the gripon tape that held the bandages around her chest and shoulder closed. It still hurt to move the arm, and she winced more than once as she unwound the bindings around the muscle and joint, but it wasn't nearly as bad as it had been the previous night. Already the bruising was beginning to change from a dark blackish purple to a more opalescent purple-greenish-blue.

 

Nek let out a low whistle, knowing how that same joint had been wrenched pretty heavily from the rail-gun round it had taken on Abraxos. I've got to hand it to you, Dika. You do bruise spectacularly. Try moving your arm a bit for me.

 

She spent the next several minutes performing a half-dozen range of movement tests for the Omicron doctor, before he gave a nod indicating he had all of the data that he needed to supplement the records he'd been provided.

 

Check in with Vy'ika when you get back to Dawn if I'm not there. He can get me any additional samples I need if you start to feel off or jittery from any effects from the pain killers they gave you.

 

"Will do. And thanks again Nek."

 

Anything for my kid sister. He winked and the screen went dark.

 

Sighing she looked up at the ceiling of the cabin for a few moments before grabbing the extra bandages and patches and left her quarters, knowing she'd need Kandor's help to redo her shoulder.

 

It didn't surprise her to see him already hard at work in the common area. "I need your help. I can't manage enough to redress my shoulder on my own." There was a slight flush to her cheeks as she made the request.

[Moon Knight]

The datacards were a substantial help, once he sliced his way through the encryption. It was actually a very clever algorithm hiding the data, but it was something that one of the previous Moon Knights had seen before. The good news was that instead of taking days or weeks to get through it, it only took the minutes that he required to recognize the data structure and then recall the cipher pattern he needed to decrypt it, plus about fifteen more for 2277 to cycle through the possible variations of keys until he found one that made the bits fall into their proper places.

 

Of course, the proper bit ordering yielded data that was in Old Tionese, but the same Moon Knight that recognized the cipher had studied the language in order to aid him in his hunt against the organization that used it, and with that knowledge he began to translate it. Which led to the bad news.

 

Kandor looked up as Mirdala entered the starship's main living area, carrying bandages. He stood, offering his chair so she could look at the decrypted data, and took the ministrations from her to start applying them.

 

"Let me tell you an old bedtime story," he said without preamble, knowing she would realize that the encryption was already beaten with one glance at the cards. He started to wrap her shoulder with a practiced hand -- it had been a while since one of his predecessors had been a medical professional, but the Mando'ad was well experienced in this sort of thing out of necessity. "Twenty-five thousand years ago, there was a human tyrant named Xim the Despot. He began as the son of a pirate but in a very short time he conquered a huge amount of space in the Tion Cluster. His reign was cast down suddenly after only 30 years, but his legacy has endured.

 

"The stories say that he founded a secret organization called the GenoHaradan. Prolific assassins, they have since been involved in almost every major coup or change in galactic power, manipulating the course of history from the shadows by choosing who lives and who dies," he continued. He gave her a dubious look as he picked up the medical tape and starting securing the bandages. "Most people who hear the story dismiss it as the crackpot conspiracy theory that it really sounds like."

 

Kandor paused. "What few people realize is that there is some truth behind it. Xim was real and so are the GenoHaradan. Although perhaps the legends overstate their involvement in some galactic affairs, they are the best assassins that credits can buy and are often used to political ends," he explained. "Like, apparently, on Hapes to fix who takes over as the new Earl of Ostia."

[Mirdala Ad'Goran]

"It's not so far fetched," she remarked as she tried to ignore the flush that she felt in her cheeks and the small jolts that went through her system where his fingers brushed against the bare skin of her exposed shoulder and neck. "The Ageless, and by extension the Seekers, some would argue, don't exist either."

 

She took a few slow breaths, focusing on the decrypted files as she processed his story. "It doesn't make whoever this is any less deadly. It also means whoever is behind this must also have very deep pockets. Aside from Ghet, who else is in play? Would anyone else not in a canadicy position have a vested enough interest to try to sway the proceedings?"

[Moon Knight]

Kandor frowned in thought. "Thane, Ghet and Ravencrest for sure, but doesn't Ghet seem like a bit of a traditionalist?" he said. "Ravencrest is no rookie, but she strikes me as fairly benign given the post she has to go back to on her homeworld if this doesn't pan out. Other interested parties could be old enemies or allies of any one of them. Even we're here because of the impression Thane made on Isolder."

 

He finished dressing her bruises, pleased with the progress they had made in just a night. The Hapan doctors were doing a lot to expedite her healing process, as Ghet no doubt wanted such a loyal guard back in service at full health as soon as possible. Still, he'd learned well that these things couldn't be rushed.

 

"The data still uses code names for the assassination targets and Old Tionese is genderless like Mando'a so, while we can confirm that the GenoHaradan were contracted to kill the candidates who are already dead, there's no obvious way to tell who they're still targeting, and no direct mention of who is employing them," he said. "But knowing what we're dealing with and the data that is there should give us a sporting chance at getting to the bottom of things."

 

Kandor gave her a smile. "I appreciate your support last night, Mird'ika. It was more than I had any right asking of you. I know Ghet wants you back in action soon, but if you need to take it slow and make sure you're healthy, I'm fully behind you and we can tell her to shove it."

[Mirdala Ad'Goran]

She laughed and pulled her arm back through the sleeve of her tank and bra strap, doing her best to hide her wince at the movement. Thankfully, the pain passed shortly, resolving itself into the dull ache that she'd woken with.

 

"I'm sure I'll be fine." He could tell from the spark in her eyes that she genuinely felt that way and wasn't just putting on a brave face for the sake of the mission or him. "Nek just ran through some movement tests with me just now and doesn't think anything is hurt too badly. The injury is as straightforward as it seemed. Just some rest for the muscles and the rest of me and I'll be right as the Shogunite rains during the wet season in no time."

 

She rose and put her good arm around him and rested her head against his chest.

 

"Thank you for being willing to let our only lead disappear into the night just to make sure I was safe," A small smile crossed her face as she stepped back slightly from the embrace and looked down. The sacrifice was something she wasn't sure the pre-RAGE Kandor would have been capable of doing. "I know it wasn't your first instinct, or at least wasn't something I would have expected before."

 

She met his eyes again, "Once I was safe, it wouldn't have been fair for me to have insisted you stay, even though I know you would have done so gladly. I love you too much to completely deny who you are and what that sometimes means."

[Moon Knight]

He wrapped her in his arms contentedly. She was right, things had changed for him. Last night he'd put her safety over the operation -- an operation where he believed lives hung in the balance, and not just their own. There were a lot of different schools of thought that would say that was selfish and irresponsible, and at one point he might have held that view himself. But that man was gone, banished by Kandor Nor'an into the history books. Now he could recognize that doing his best for her was not a compromise, it was a purpose that could be held alongside the ideals that had manifested directly by taking the mantle of Moon Knight. Plus, there was something to be said for taking a defeat but living to fight another day, he just had to factor both of them into that consideration now.

 

Kandor pulled back a bit and looked down at her. "You're worth the sacrifices," he said. "I'm crazy about you, cyar'ika. It would be a far worse betrayal of self to pretend the job is more important than you are to me."

 

The Mando'ad glanced over her healing injuries again, then frowned, the case again creeping back into his thoughts. "That Zeltron I fought has got to be in much worse shape than you are. He must have checked himself into a hospital if he even made it back to town," he conjectured.

[Mirdala Ad'Goran]

Reaching up with her good hand as his hands still encircled her waist, she brushed the back of his neck tenderly. Her expression had shifted and he knew her mind had latched on to something he'd said. "Zeltron?" Her voice was hesitant as she unwound herself from his arms and sifter through the stack of datapads until she found the one he'd left with her the previous night.

 

Keying up the entries, she activated the scene reconstruction. Suddenly the entire cabin was took on the holographic overlay that perfectly emulated Kandor's battle ground from the night before. With a silent command from her implant, she advanced it forward until there was a good visual of his opponent.

 

"Huh, so that's what a Zeltron looks like." She turned to face the simulated figure with her hand on her hip. "That might explain the lower-level buzzing I've been getting. Tey mentioned them when we were talking about other empathetic races. Didn't say much other than they weren't usually combative, generally speaking. Though there are exceptions in every society..."

[Moon Knight]

Kandor nodded. It was easy to forget that Mirdala had spent almost her entire life in the Mandalore Sector, chiefly on Shogun and Concord Dawn -- at least until she'd ventured out and joined the Augury and CoreSec a few years ago. Though she had a near-perfect memory and a proven talent for tackling challenges cultural and linguistic, there was a tremendous diversity of alien species in the oyu'baat, and he couldn't take for granted the sum of his Moon Knight knowledge and his own dramatically different life experience as it pertained to the things he'd just picked up through the years. Two decades of being a beroya stalking the various cultural melting pots of the galaxy was enough to see a lot; Moon Knights dating back to the foundation of the Republic had seen almost everything, although he didn't remember nearly all of it with equal clarity.

 

"They're near-human but have a few distinctive traits," he said, scratching his chin. "They produce pheromones which make them seem especially likeable, and have some ability to read and project emotions onto others of both their own and other species. This usually leads them as a race to seek out good emotions and shun the bad, which makes what TeVerd told you true. The exceptions have all sorts of uses in the criminal underworld, as I'm sure you can guess. I'd never put together that they might be empathic like you and the others, but it certainly makes sense."

 

He examined the figure in the holo more thoroughly. During the fight he hadn't exactly had the time to inspect the being. "Honestly I'd just as well not get into a shooting match with multiple GenoHaradan if we're really here for their employer and if they're all as good as this one was," he said. "But now that they can guess what we're up to, we might not have that luxury." Fett glanced at Mirdala. "Do your abilities make you more susceptible to other empaths or help you resist them?"