Re: STAR WARS: A Galaxy Divided IC
Posted: 2009-09-15 12:18pm
(ooc: abduction T+16)
Smarck
Technicians removed the still-unconscious Feena D'Asta from the chair and informed Macus Kayniph that the recording was complete and that they would now start imprinting.
Kira's ship
On its way to Nal Hutta
“I hate this and you will pay for it.” “Trust an Imperial to keep their word.” “Dammed pad-pusher.” “Couldn't you at least arrange for some decent food?” had been just a few of the insults Tavira had levelled into Saenger and Kira's general direction.
As for Saenger, his nerves were on the breaking point. No comfortable place to sleep, no decent food, nothing to drink besides water – something the caf-addicted moff found a particular hardship to bear – and Tavira at the back who had spent the better part of the travel so far pointing out how this whole trip was a massive waste and an egregious breach of trust in oh so many words.
Kira had finally had enough and had threatened to make sure Tavira would be quiet the whole trip unless she shut her mouth and enjoy the comforts of her beloved ship without praising them so loudly. Something for which Saenger had been infinitely grateful. But Tavira had been brooding for the better part of three hours now and he did not like the idea of that either.
“So....you said you need me to get into Durga's palace.” Saenger rolled his eyes. And there it was. Thank you, universe. Undeterred, Tavira pressed on. “And what do I get out of this?”
If Saenger could have rolled his eyes any stronger, they would have popped out of his head. “You get to enjoy your comfortable stay on Ord Cantrell for the rest of your life, as agreed.” Tavira shook her head. “I already got that. I want more.”
Saenger exploded. Svivelling his seat around to face her, he glared at her. “Oh, do you? How about some more? Would you like to enjoy a comfortable stay with your former associates? I am sure they will be thrilled to help you out after you sold them down the river. I am sure Captain Nive would just love to have a chat with you – if he could still speak after the workload, that is.”
Following the trials – which had been very short due to Tavira having turned over all of her files on the pirates – the vast majority of the pirates had been sentenced to life-long hard labour. In the old days, they would simply have been spaced, but the Bakurans were not fans of the death penalty and cleaning up the rubble of Coruscant was hard and dangerous work. So the pirates had been put into penal work battalions on Coruscant, where the usual risks had already diminished their numbers quite considerably.
However, Tavira was apparently unfazed by such a threat. Or at least her face did not show any signs of his threat having any impact. “I want more if I am going to stick my neck into Hutt business.” Saenger glanced sideways at Kira, but she did not react in any way besides appearing not to care. Saenger sighed and gave in. “Very well. What is it that you want?” “I want a full pardon, my ship back and a crew to staff it.”
Saenger, who at that time had been reaching for a pint of water, nearly choked. “You want what? Are you insane?” Unperturbed, Tavira stretched, making sure to display the maximum amount of cleavage as she did. “Give me some credit, Moff. I stayed alive for over seven years despite being hunted by both Republic and Imperial forces. I am not asking you to set me loose on the galaxy – but I want the Invidious back. I miss the thrills of the hunt and I think you can use someone like me.”
Saenger had finished drinking by then. “I was right. You are insane. Let me be blunt, Tavira, you are a Viper and I would not trust you far enough to throw you. A full pardon is out of the question. No - “ He held up a hand. “Let me finish, Tavira. If this mission suceeds, I will owe you a favour. Anything you ask of me that is my power to give, will be yours – within reason. But I will not make any commitments on behalf of the Imperial fleet or on behalf of the Regent. That is the best I can do and the best offer I can make.” He glared at her. “It is also very good pay for what is essentially a days work. Oh, and it is contingent with you not ever complaining on this whole trip again.”
Tavira answered with a wolfish smile. “We have a deal.” Whether it was the smile or whether he had just made a deal with the proverbial rancor, Saenger almost shivered when he turned back. Kira had not said a word during the whole exchange.
Ryloth
VSDII Pride of Bakura, flagship of the Bakuran Navy
Vice-Admiral Pter Thanas, MO, looked out the bridge window, lost in thoughts. Another petition from some clan elders had arrived petitioning the Bakuran Navy to relax its straight anti-piracy stance. And this one had two more signatures than the petitition from one month ago. He did not like it.
It was a quagmire, he reflected. On the one hand, a lot of the clans were dependant on slavery, on the other hand it destroyed a great portion of their society. And the Bakuran Navy was deadset against it – not a single slave would ever leave Ryloth, if he had anything to do with it. It was a heavily misogynistic thing, Twi'Lek slavery, he thought.
The current petition claimed not only cultural and economic reasons for slavery, but also biological reasons. It was true that Twi'Lek biology always produced a surplus of females – which was also the reason why despite selling many females into slavery the race still existed. Still, a surplus of females was no reason to resort to slavery. Today, nobody needed to go hungry on Ryloth – at least in theory. The time a women was a drag on resources had been abolished, with Bakuran food supplies providing enough for everybody. Overcoming century-long prejudices and entrenched misogyny was a different thing altogether though and the current petition was proof of that.
In many cases this is even worse than Coruscant, he reflected. For on Coruscant, the efficient Imperial bureacracy and the military presence there had made sure that no large-scale criminal organizations could take root after the capital world had been devestated. On Ryloth, a large portion of the high society consisted of criminals. He knew that plenty of clans and underground dwellers on Ryloth pocketed supplies, sold them on the Black Market and then claimed the shortage of foods to be the fault of Imperial avarice.
He did not envy Clan Leader Secura his job. There was not a day gone past in which the Imperial Councillor did not sent an address to at least one of the clan leaders. But progress had been slow, and at a time when he would be needed on Ryloth to deal with the problems the Clan leader was on Ord Cantrell due to the current crisis. Already, propaganda had appeared on the streets decrying Secura as a mouthpiece for the Imps and decrying Thanas as the true master of Ryloth, who was hell-bent on destroying the Twi'Lek culture. Some Imperial patrols had already become the targets of having insults and other unflattering items hurled at them.
But enough of that, he had to attend a more pressing problem. Ever since he had passed the order that every ship leaving the planetary shield had to pass a Class III inspection – meaning the ship being detained for 24 hours and being searched and scanned from bow to stern, with the slightest irregularities warranting a stay in the Imperial Spaceport on Ryloth and a strip search – the number of slaves escaping Ryloth had been almost zero according to the rise of Twi'Lek slave prices on the slavewords. However, it had also resulted in a high number of young, disenfranchised and frightened Twi'Lek women in Imperial custody. Their clans did not want to take them back, for that would mean that they had been at least incompetent in protecting their members and at worst complicit in slavery, which carried a lifelong sentence of hard labour.
Thanas had confiscated a former passenger liner to house them and that ship was now parked on the central Imperial base on Ryloth, well guarded by elite Bakuran troops. But even with the ship converted into a troop transport the space was rapidly filling up. He had visited it once and the experience had been enough to make him lose sleep over it. Girls as young as 14 had been there, disoriented and frightened. But they had been the lucky ones as hard as it sounded – given that he could finally figure out where to place them, they could enjoy the benefits of a proper education and hopefully become productive members of society. But the elder ones, aged 18-26 were the real problem. Most of them had not been taught anything in their life besides dancing and how to look pretty, if they had been taught anything at all. It was enough to destroy ones faith in the universe to see them treated as cattle.
And the clans got away scot free. All he had was a bunch of young women who dared not say anything for fear of reprisals against their families and who had been thoroughly brainwashed. By the time any of them dared to say anything, the traces would have gone cold. Or conveniently, the parents would turn up and declare that their daughter had run away decades ago. Thanas was thoroughly sick of it.
“Admiral?” His flag captain Hortel Ossilege had approached him carrying a datapad and from the look on his face, Thanas knew it had to be more bad news. He extended his hand. “How many this time?” Ossilege handed the datapad over to him. “16, Sir. Cramped into the hull of an Action VI -class freighter.” Thanas nodded, but frowned when looking at the datapad. “This log only mentions 13 names.” Ossilege swallowed. “Yes, Sir. Apparently the place where they were stowed in was equipped with a plasma burner.”
Thanas felt rage welling up in him. A Plasma burner was an industrial waste disposal mechanism that burned any organic material, but left durasteel intact. A favourite among smugglers who wanted to get rid of organic evidence but not blow a hull in their ship.
Ossilege continued. “When our men tried to open the department, the plasma burner was activated. Our techs must have tripped a silent alarm. They reacted quickly and blasted the dammed thing to pieces, but 3 girls had been incinerated already. Four more are in the garrison's hospital, one is unconscious and won't make it. The burner destroyed fourty percent of her body.”
Thanas imagined the atmosphere inside the cramped hull department, the sheer horror of the victims when the beam of the plasma burner had burned them inch by inch. Sometimes I wish we had not abolished the death penalty for Bakura.
He then made a decision. “The crew is in custody?” “Yes, Sir. As usual, they claim not to know anything. The name structure of the victims also means that they were most likely members of the Fortuna clan.” He didn't need to say that the clan had denied any involvement and that there was no direct trace to them.
Thanas had had enough. “Captain Ossilege. Change of standing orders.” The flag captain came to attention. “This order is to be broadcast to the entire system:
Results:
- [Tavira]are we there yet? [/Tavira]
- The situation on Ryloth is getting more volatile every day.
Smarck
Technicians removed the still-unconscious Feena D'Asta from the chair and informed Macus Kayniph that the recording was complete and that they would now start imprinting.
Kira's ship
On its way to Nal Hutta
“I hate this and you will pay for it.” “Trust an Imperial to keep their word.” “Dammed pad-pusher.” “Couldn't you at least arrange for some decent food?” had been just a few of the insults Tavira had levelled into Saenger and Kira's general direction.
As for Saenger, his nerves were on the breaking point. No comfortable place to sleep, no decent food, nothing to drink besides water – something the caf-addicted moff found a particular hardship to bear – and Tavira at the back who had spent the better part of the travel so far pointing out how this whole trip was a massive waste and an egregious breach of trust in oh so many words.
Kira had finally had enough and had threatened to make sure Tavira would be quiet the whole trip unless she shut her mouth and enjoy the comforts of her beloved ship without praising them so loudly. Something for which Saenger had been infinitely grateful. But Tavira had been brooding for the better part of three hours now and he did not like the idea of that either.
“So....you said you need me to get into Durga's palace.” Saenger rolled his eyes. And there it was. Thank you, universe. Undeterred, Tavira pressed on. “And what do I get out of this?”
If Saenger could have rolled his eyes any stronger, they would have popped out of his head. “You get to enjoy your comfortable stay on Ord Cantrell for the rest of your life, as agreed.” Tavira shook her head. “I already got that. I want more.”
Saenger exploded. Svivelling his seat around to face her, he glared at her. “Oh, do you? How about some more? Would you like to enjoy a comfortable stay with your former associates? I am sure they will be thrilled to help you out after you sold them down the river. I am sure Captain Nive would just love to have a chat with you – if he could still speak after the workload, that is.”
Following the trials – which had been very short due to Tavira having turned over all of her files on the pirates – the vast majority of the pirates had been sentenced to life-long hard labour. In the old days, they would simply have been spaced, but the Bakurans were not fans of the death penalty and cleaning up the rubble of Coruscant was hard and dangerous work. So the pirates had been put into penal work battalions on Coruscant, where the usual risks had already diminished their numbers quite considerably.
However, Tavira was apparently unfazed by such a threat. Or at least her face did not show any signs of his threat having any impact. “I want more if I am going to stick my neck into Hutt business.” Saenger glanced sideways at Kira, but she did not react in any way besides appearing not to care. Saenger sighed and gave in. “Very well. What is it that you want?” “I want a full pardon, my ship back and a crew to staff it.”
Saenger, who at that time had been reaching for a pint of water, nearly choked. “You want what? Are you insane?” Unperturbed, Tavira stretched, making sure to display the maximum amount of cleavage as she did. “Give me some credit, Moff. I stayed alive for over seven years despite being hunted by both Republic and Imperial forces. I am not asking you to set me loose on the galaxy – but I want the Invidious back. I miss the thrills of the hunt and I think you can use someone like me.”
Saenger had finished drinking by then. “I was right. You are insane. Let me be blunt, Tavira, you are a Viper and I would not trust you far enough to throw you. A full pardon is out of the question. No - “ He held up a hand. “Let me finish, Tavira. If this mission suceeds, I will owe you a favour. Anything you ask of me that is my power to give, will be yours – within reason. But I will not make any commitments on behalf of the Imperial fleet or on behalf of the Regent. That is the best I can do and the best offer I can make.” He glared at her. “It is also very good pay for what is essentially a days work. Oh, and it is contingent with you not ever complaining on this whole trip again.”
Tavira answered with a wolfish smile. “We have a deal.” Whether it was the smile or whether he had just made a deal with the proverbial rancor, Saenger almost shivered when he turned back. Kira had not said a word during the whole exchange.
Ryloth
VSDII Pride of Bakura, flagship of the Bakuran Navy
Vice-Admiral Pter Thanas, MO, looked out the bridge window, lost in thoughts. Another petition from some clan elders had arrived petitioning the Bakuran Navy to relax its straight anti-piracy stance. And this one had two more signatures than the petitition from one month ago. He did not like it.
It was a quagmire, he reflected. On the one hand, a lot of the clans were dependant on slavery, on the other hand it destroyed a great portion of their society. And the Bakuran Navy was deadset against it – not a single slave would ever leave Ryloth, if he had anything to do with it. It was a heavily misogynistic thing, Twi'Lek slavery, he thought.
The current petition claimed not only cultural and economic reasons for slavery, but also biological reasons. It was true that Twi'Lek biology always produced a surplus of females – which was also the reason why despite selling many females into slavery the race still existed. Still, a surplus of females was no reason to resort to slavery. Today, nobody needed to go hungry on Ryloth – at least in theory. The time a women was a drag on resources had been abolished, with Bakuran food supplies providing enough for everybody. Overcoming century-long prejudices and entrenched misogyny was a different thing altogether though and the current petition was proof of that.
In many cases this is even worse than Coruscant, he reflected. For on Coruscant, the efficient Imperial bureacracy and the military presence there had made sure that no large-scale criminal organizations could take root after the capital world had been devestated. On Ryloth, a large portion of the high society consisted of criminals. He knew that plenty of clans and underground dwellers on Ryloth pocketed supplies, sold them on the Black Market and then claimed the shortage of foods to be the fault of Imperial avarice.
He did not envy Clan Leader Secura his job. There was not a day gone past in which the Imperial Councillor did not sent an address to at least one of the clan leaders. But progress had been slow, and at a time when he would be needed on Ryloth to deal with the problems the Clan leader was on Ord Cantrell due to the current crisis. Already, propaganda had appeared on the streets decrying Secura as a mouthpiece for the Imps and decrying Thanas as the true master of Ryloth, who was hell-bent on destroying the Twi'Lek culture. Some Imperial patrols had already become the targets of having insults and other unflattering items hurled at them.
But enough of that, he had to attend a more pressing problem. Ever since he had passed the order that every ship leaving the planetary shield had to pass a Class III inspection – meaning the ship being detained for 24 hours and being searched and scanned from bow to stern, with the slightest irregularities warranting a stay in the Imperial Spaceport on Ryloth and a strip search – the number of slaves escaping Ryloth had been almost zero according to the rise of Twi'Lek slave prices on the slavewords. However, it had also resulted in a high number of young, disenfranchised and frightened Twi'Lek women in Imperial custody. Their clans did not want to take them back, for that would mean that they had been at least incompetent in protecting their members and at worst complicit in slavery, which carried a lifelong sentence of hard labour.
Thanas had confiscated a former passenger liner to house them and that ship was now parked on the central Imperial base on Ryloth, well guarded by elite Bakuran troops. But even with the ship converted into a troop transport the space was rapidly filling up. He had visited it once and the experience had been enough to make him lose sleep over it. Girls as young as 14 had been there, disoriented and frightened. But they had been the lucky ones as hard as it sounded – given that he could finally figure out where to place them, they could enjoy the benefits of a proper education and hopefully become productive members of society. But the elder ones, aged 18-26 were the real problem. Most of them had not been taught anything in their life besides dancing and how to look pretty, if they had been taught anything at all. It was enough to destroy ones faith in the universe to see them treated as cattle.
And the clans got away scot free. All he had was a bunch of young women who dared not say anything for fear of reprisals against their families and who had been thoroughly brainwashed. By the time any of them dared to say anything, the traces would have gone cold. Or conveniently, the parents would turn up and declare that their daughter had run away decades ago. Thanas was thoroughly sick of it.
“Admiral?” His flag captain Hortel Ossilege had approached him carrying a datapad and from the look on his face, Thanas knew it had to be more bad news. He extended his hand. “How many this time?” Ossilege handed the datapad over to him. “16, Sir. Cramped into the hull of an Action VI -class freighter.” Thanas nodded, but frowned when looking at the datapad. “This log only mentions 13 names.” Ossilege swallowed. “Yes, Sir. Apparently the place where they were stowed in was equipped with a plasma burner.”
Thanas felt rage welling up in him. A Plasma burner was an industrial waste disposal mechanism that burned any organic material, but left durasteel intact. A favourite among smugglers who wanted to get rid of organic evidence but not blow a hull in their ship.
Ossilege continued. “When our men tried to open the department, the plasma burner was activated. Our techs must have tripped a silent alarm. They reacted quickly and blasted the dammed thing to pieces, but 3 girls had been incinerated already. Four more are in the garrison's hospital, one is unconscious and won't make it. The burner destroyed fourty percent of her body.”
Thanas imagined the atmosphere inside the cramped hull department, the sheer horror of the victims when the beam of the plasma burner had burned them inch by inch. Sometimes I wish we had not abolished the death penalty for Bakura.
He then made a decision. “The crew is in custody?” “Yes, Sir. As usual, they claim not to know anything. The name structure of the victims also means that they were most likely members of the Fortuna clan.” He didn't need to say that the clan had denied any involvement and that there was no direct trace to them.
Thanas had had enough. “Captain Ossilege. Change of standing orders.” The flag captain came to attention. “This order is to be broadcast to the entire system:
Thanas stopped. “Any questions, Captain?” “No, Sir.” Thanas turned back to the window and looked at the space. “And send a communication to my wife and Clan Leader Secura. Inform them that the situation here is getting out of hand and that we need Secura back here as soon as possible.”From fleet flagship to all units attached to Ryloth and anti-piracy command.
1. Any ship that carries slaves is to be confiscated immediately.
2. Any crewmember participating in slavery is hereby declared an enemy of the empire and will be subject to the harshest penalties of the law, except if he immediately turns over all slaves unharmed to Imperial Authorities.
3. Any person who is found helping slavers will be subject to the same penalties.
Results:
- [Tavira]are we there yet? [/Tavira]
- The situation on Ryloth is getting more volatile every day.