Finder's Keepers [PBP]

[Blind Equilibrium]

Fiona watched the two of them as they sat in the muck, her question hanging in the air like a pall. The human quickly regained her composure and glared at Fiona even in their current situation, a hard woman. The other, a Falleen, writhed in pain as the grime of the environs worked it way into the open wounds of his ruined leg, more than likely causing intense pain.

"I don't have to tell you anything..." The older woman states harshly, not even sparing a glance for her companion squirming beside her.

Fiona feels her smile grow at the answer. A hard woman indeed, she thinks. Under different circumstances, I may have been able to admire that

The Falleen begins to blubber and whine, mumbling under his breath. The scarred woman turns her attention on him, eyes and voice harsh.

"Shut up Sirrix, shut up."

Her action only serves to send him off into a panic, his eyes roll wildly in their sockets and his breathing becomes rapid and uneven.

"Black Sun, we work for the Black Sun!"

”Black Sun… interesting. You know, I myself did some time with the Exchange. Learned some fun things while I was there.” She mused, reminiscent.

The commlink in her ear crackles to life, interrupting her trip down memory lane. Ackonoy’s voice comes across the line.

"Blind What's your status also watch out for more tango cause even I heard that commotion."

”Copy Ackonoy, I have two tangos down, both with heartbeats. Currently in the process of extracting intel. Have discerned aggressors are members of the Black Sun criminal organization. Understand potential for additional tangos and will take precautions. Over.”

No response was forthcoming, causing Fiona to shrug slightly unconsciously, and return to her task at hand.

Seems that we made a bit of noise and I should potentially expect company. I need to go get some things, now don’t you two go anywhere. She told them cheerfully.

She stood from her crouch and turned to take a step away. Pausing a second, she pivots and drives a fist viciously into the human’s stomach, causing the woman to fold further in half, coughing.

”Please try not to get any ideas about heroics. I am trying to be civil here.”

She crosses the short distance to the tree she had originally started their encounter, and retrieved Chuck and her blaster carbine, taking a moment to ensure both were clear and operating smoothly before returning.

Upon returning, she finds the human attempting to work free of the cloth hobbles on her legs and the Falleen, Sirrix, urgently whispering at her while shaking his head. His eyes grow wide as he sees Fiona approaching, his whispers becoming a high-pitched whine of terror.

With an exaggerated sigh, Fiona steps up and delivers a brutal kick to the female’s ribs that is accompanied with the loud crack of breaking bones. The woman pales and grunts in pain, but makes no further sound.

I don’t have time for this. Fiona thinks furiously. If Ackie is right, I could have reinforcements down my neck at anytime…

She turns to the prisoners, a rictus-like smile spread across her features. ”Unfortunately, I don’t have time for games… so you are going to answer all my questions, Sirrix wasn’t it? Or I’ll shift my attentions to you. She pauses, tapping an armored finger on her chin thoughtfully, oblivious to the green and red bloods spattered upon the glove. You see, some of our people have gone missing, and your attacking us is far too coincidental for my liking. Usually I’d like to break your friend here first, the toughest nut does typically yield the sweetest meat, but I don’t have the time… right now.”

Opening the medkit, she removes a large bag meant to contain biowaste and shakes it open. With her free hand, she grabs the human, Lira she assumes based on his yelling earlier, by her hair and roughly jerks her back to a sitting position. With a quick motion, the bag is slipping over Lira’s head, and held shut in a tight seal around her neck. A panicked gasp followed by the muffled sound of Lira’s heels digging into the soft mud, and her body thudding softly against the ship is the only sounds she can make.

Fiona looks Sirrix, directly in the eye, and starts asking questions, ”Start talking. Where is your base of operations? Who is leading this group? Do you have our people? If so, where are they being held? What are your numbers? Most important to me, did you already call for reinforcements? Better talk quickly, if she suffocates, I’ll no choice but to start on you.”

She stops for a moment, “Oh, and Sirrix, don’t lie… I really don’t like being lied to.”

[Durstalph]

As soon as the five probes were launched Dash angled the ship away from the smouldering wreckage of the downed ship. Night was falling fast and she wanted to land before darkness swallowed their intended landing site completely. After a short flight, the smuggler eased the transport down in a small rocky clearing. By that time Tim had joined her in the cockpit. Powering down the engines, she turned to the communications station and brought up the feeds from the probes. "Lets see if our little friends have found anything interesting."

She cycled the viewer to the feed from the first probe, and was greeted by what appeared to be a camp site. In it there were three figures, two were on the ground, wounded or unconscious and were clearly outfitted in gear fitting for republic troopers. The third man appeared to be standing guard over the other two and wore a robe, presumably he was a Jedi. "Looks like some of our missing friends!" Dash exclaimed happily.

Switching to the second probe showed nothing of value, but the third had found a downed ship, possibly the original crash whose crew they where there to rescue. The fourth probe had found three heavily armed men in black armor trudging through the swamp. Dash didn't think these men looked like Pax Republica members, or very friendly for that matter. She typed a few commands at the console, prompting the probe to keep its distance and follow the men. The fifth probe appeared to have gotten stuck to one of the muck covered trees and was unable to free itself.

Returning to the first probe she entered a command for it to cautiously approach the Jedi. As the probe entered the camp site she activated the probe's comm link and spoke. "This is Captain Daili Shaktilli aboard Pax Republica transport, to whom am I speaking, and what is your situation?"

[Areku99]

Aima suddenly hatched an idea. He turned to his allies. "Alright, I have a plan. Gonna disable this cage and get us out of here..."

He focused his energy on the structure of the cage, and summoned every ounce of focus he could. With that, he snapped his fingers, in order to send out a Force wave that would disable the cage.

Nothing. He tried again, each time more frantically, before turning to his comrades.

"Can't do it...why is this happening? The energy just isn't there."

[Aveyn Tamai]

Fiona looks Sirrix, directly in the eye, and starts asking questions, ”Start talking. Where is your base of operations? Who is leading this group? Do you have our people? If so, where are they being held? What are your numbers? Most important to me, did you already call for reinforcements? Better talk quickly, if she suffocates, I’ll no choice but to start on you.”

She stops for a moment, “Oh, and Sirrix, don’t lie… I really don’t like being lied to.”

His eyes were unnaturally wide as they stared at her, bloodshot and glassy with pain. Sirrix's skin had taken on a sickly grey shade, and his hands fluttered uselessly in their bindings.

"The refinery up in the North west," he manages to sputter out, swallowing heavily, "This group is lead by V-Vell. Vell Alansi," he adds with a shivering whine, shaking his head a bit as he tries to wrap his mind around the other questions through the fog of pain.

"Don't know...about your people. They have prisoners...yes," his leg spasms on its own, and he gasps in pain. His gaze flickers back to where Lira is on the ground, desperately trying to raise her hands high enough to claw at the bag, all fruitless efforts.

"We have...have...twenty here. Reinforcements are on their way...Revenants...shades..." he stopped speaking, his eyes sliding back to watch Lira again, her movements becoming increasingly slow. His green-yellow eyes narrowed slightly as he watched, fixated, swearing softly under his breath.

[Kryad Explo]

Kryad was done walking around the camp. He was sitting and looking at his holopad. Suddenly a beep came up. Someone else than what they expected was comming. "Ackonoy, I don't know but there is something comming for you. Not sure how many only seing one atm. Tell Alkhet." Kryad decided to run up to a point, and then sneak around to find out how many.

[Riddly Dun]

Qukatt wrote:

Everything hazy about Sin'yavend seems to tighten into a sharp focus as soon as the captors left the room. She didn't sit up but she Looked right at the others in their force cages, "So then, What's the Plan?" Her tone was almost casual conversation. Meanwhile she was quickly twisting her wrists in the bindings and feeling at the m with her fingers working away seemingly independent and methodical. Her eyes looking around the room, she kept coming back to the lizard.. that.. thing, "Do you think the lizard is our new guard?"

Riddly looking at sin in amazement that she is speaking at all. He assumed she was too fragile to do anything but apparently this change meant something. Riddly thinks to himself Who is she? He pushes the thought away he knew there were more important things at hand.

I have a few ideas in mind but they are only for... well, emergencies. Thinking about his emergency plan runs a shiver down his spine and knows it's only for last resort. First, we would need to get out of these cages and get to our gear. Then contact Crox and or Pax to see about getting a rescue. That or break out of here ourselves. Personally, I've had enough of these cages and my trigger finger is getting itchy. But first things first we would need to get out with out causing a commotion.

Sin mentions the Lizard. Riddly looks at it, inspecting it. I've seen a few but I don't know if that pet could be called a guard, though I'm concerned he'll do something like screech if we try to get out. We need to do something to get its attention on us and see how it reacts. Riddly puts his hands up to his shoulders and shrugs. Or we could just ignore it.

Focusing back on Sin I think you have the most practical chance at getting us out of here. Though how to get you out of those restraints.... Realizing Aima powers won't be of use here. Well, no point in asking if you can help her with your magic or whatever. Then Riddly gets a smirk across his face. At least there's no way for you to blow yourself up.

[Hart of Hircine]

Ackonoy woke up to the sound of his name then hearing a little bit about what kryad said over his datapad since it survived. He immediately tried looking at Alkhet who was right beside him. Ackonoy gave the signal to go stealthy as Ackonoy's irish's were red along with blood shot eyes. It was a sign of his sickness. He was alert yet barely focused. Visual was hazy but he grabbed his combat rifle and grabbed the homemade zipline back to the top of the tree. Covered in his leafy wood and muck barricade, Ackonoy was not sure if he could shoot from that distance with his vision. He then sat in the barricade opening up his sleeve on his right elbow. He pulled out an illegal spice stim and injected it into the veins on his wrist right near his elbow. "I got 2 and a half hours make this work or my heart is going to get pumping. I'm glad I made and extra zip line for my way down."

He then grabbed his datapad and spoke on team chat "Wait till my mark and have one of each in our sights. Alkhet try to line em up if they are tango. Also hide the droid or lose it."

[Lord Marvel]

Blind Equilibrium wrote:

Scanning the area, she sees several pieces of the fuselage of the now destroyed ship lying scattered around the surrounding terrain. Hustling to gather several of the larger pieces, she drags them to where the Kel Dor lies, now supine next to a tree. Propping up the debris against the tree, she makes an effective lean-to. Ensuring that the Captain is as hidden from view as possible, she unfolds the trenching shovel from her survival kit, and begins shoveling muck and grime onto the outside of the haphazardly constructed shelter while the other two troopers provide look out.

Wo have woke up in darkness, he quickly choose option from his HUD and turned on night vision mode. He was under some tree covered with a piece of debris, probably from our ship...
Oh right, I must have been out cold because of the impact.
After running quick medical diagnostic on his body, all icons were green.
Hmmm... nothing serious, though it must have been one hell of a hit to knock me out.

He tried to get up, but hit his head on roof made by tree, it was very uncomfortable to move in this small space. He returned to lying on his back, he bend his legs a bit, moved forward "doors" made out of debris, and kicked it strong enough to make it fly a little bit.
Moon of Nal Hutta was shining in the sky, his night vision automaticaly have tunned down it`s power.
He opened comlink channel.
Status report from everyone, now.

[Blind Equilibrium]

A shock runs through Fiona’s mind at hearing the name from her past sliding off the tongue of the wounded Falleen.

Vell Alansi? Auntie Vell? The startled thought rushed through her mind like water through a burst dam, causing her to momentarily lose focus on the world around her.

Her mind raced down the dusty corridors of memory to recall the Twi’lek behind her desk running the tallies and figures for the organization’s bookkeeping and money laundering. Of the baby, Kirana, that Vell had allowed the young slicer to hold, while totaling up a much younger Fiona’s take on her latest job. Of the shy Ryn, Tessar, who would sit in a corner quietly, until an only slightly older Fiona convinced her to read the future in the cards Tessar had always carried and at that point becoming fast friends.

She was called back from the memory by the soft despairing sobs of the Falleen, Sirrix.

"There is nothing else... that is everything you wanted... I know nothing else… please… please…"

Perplexed to what he was talking about, she looked to see Lira was now barely struggling, nearly asphyxiated. Fiona releases the seal on the bag, pulling it off Lira’s head to hear a rasping gasp from the woman, followed by the mix of coughing and grateful gulping of air.

"You stupid, stupid schutta spawn! You worthless chuff-sucking kath mutt! You’ve killed us; we are as good as dead! You, sexless marsh toad!!" The woman started to yell; quiet and hoarse at first, but with increasing strength as she continued.

With a sigh, Fiona stepped over the still bound woman, straddling her.

"That’s about enough of that, I have enough problems without you drawing these Revenants or whatever, right to us, or interesting the local wildlife with your noise."

Grasping the back of Lira’s head in one hand and her chin in the other, Fiona gives a sharp jerk causing the woman’s neck to break with a sickeningly wet crack. Lira’s feet kick weakly in reflex once, and are still. Drawing her vibro-dagger, Fiona cuts free the strip of cloth that had bound Lira’s legs.

With a quick, practiced motion, Fiona reaches with her free hand to grab a handful of Lira’s hair pulling the head into an even more unnatural position then the broken neck originally indicated, and with a sharp motion, cuts several inches of hair from the corpse’s head. With the strip of cloth, Fiona ties the hair into a small bundle.

She brushes the hair across her cheeks as she turns to look at Sirrix, his eyes wide with horror. Fiona smiles, as she smells the lock of hair.

"Just a little something to remember her by, you know… a souvenir."

A low pitiful wail escapes Sirrix’s lips as Fiona walks over to him. The now dead form of Lira lies motionless on the ground behind her, already forgotten. She crouches in front of blubbering Falleen, dusting the lock of hair across his face.

"I have plans for you my scaly friend, but first I need to make you more… pliable." She says with a smile.

Dropping the lock of hair into one of her pouches, she then retrieves her medkit once again. Opening the kit, she pulls a false back out of one side revealing a variety of hypo-syringes, small bottles, and packets. She starts pulling out small bottles and setting them aside.

"Let’s see, Neutron Pixie for the pain, some Gunjack to disorient you some, and lastly a healthy dose of Glitteryll to wipe your memory for last little bit."

Standing, she moves toward the Falleen, his eyes wide as he tries to move away from the hypo-syringe. To no avail however, as Fiona grabs the top of his head roughly, pulls it to one side and injects the cocktail of spice into his neck. His eyes roll back into his head and his head lolls forward as the potent cocktail starts working. Once she was sure of the drugs taking hold, she injects him again with a mild sedative, and he drifts off.

Not knowing how long she has until these “Revenants” arrive, she works quickly. Scrambling up into the cockpit of the small fighter, she finds a container with several spare powercells, and five thermal detonators with a pull pin mechanism.

”Pull-pins!” She laughs. ”Archaic, but they are just what the Trooper ordered!”

Reaching under the flight console, she began jerking free handfuls of wires when she noticed an indicator for a missile that the ship had remaining still. Gleefully, she flipped the fire control switch to arm the missile, and hopped out of the cockpit with all of her spoils.

Checking to make sure that the Falleen man was still unconscious, Fiona went about wedging the thermal detonators between the ground and the ships stuck landing gear, two in the under carriage, and finally two in the fuselage under the weapons chamber. The pins for each grenade were tied with the wires to Sirrix, such that if he tried to move away or be pulled up, the pins would be pulled and the detonators would explode. After setting up the booby trap, she takes a step back to admire her handy work, pulls out her holo-cam, and snaps a picture of Sirrix’s unconscious form.

Satisfied that all the preparations that could be made had been, and a memento had been collected, Fiona removes Sirrix’s binders and rolls Lira’s body to be face down in the muck. Counting on the night that had fallen and the spice confusing him, she hoped she would be able to pass herself off as Lira.

She carefully injected an adrenaline stim into his neck to bring him around, keeping a hand pressed against his chest to keep him from bolting forward upon awakening. He came to, disoriented and confused from the sedative and the spice.

"What?.... Who?..."

Recalling how Lira spoke, Fiona did her best to imitate the speech. ”Shut up, you schutta spawn. We got shot down and had to do an emergency landing in this bog. The chuff-sucker is right there, came to make sure the job was complete.” Fiona nodded her head in the direction of Lira’s corpse. ”Apparently the Hutt slug decided they didn’t want to share, and is taking us out one by one She said she had gotten a call out for a recovery team to come and take the ship as salvage. Your leg got torn up in the crash, so you get to stay here and guard the ship. Stay there and guard, or Vell will kill us both for losing her property and I’ll kill you again for getting me killed.“

Not giving a chance for the confused Falleen to respond, she shoves his blaster roughly into his hands.

"Here take this, I’m going to call base and try and get some backup out here. You shoot anyone that approaches that isn’t me. Because if they aren’t me, they are going to kill you, where I will only probably kill you eventually!"

Walking away from the shaken and confused Sirrix, Fiona turns and says almost as an after thought.

”Oh yeah, and don’t try to get up from that spot, or your leg will open up and you’ll bleed to death before you can move than five steps.”

With that said, she moves around the far side of the ship, claims Chuck from where she had set him, replaces her helmet, and moves out into the bog. After several hundred feet, she engages her stealth field and loops around to get a good view of Sirrix propped against the ship, nervously handling his blaster. Her commlink crackles to life as she settles in.

"Status report from everyone, now."

Guess the Captain decided he was done with his nap finally.Fiona thought with a chuckle.

She keys up her commlink to report her findings, "Base, this is Blind. Have gathered intel from the tangos indicating that prisoners are being held. Identities unknown. Approximately two-zero, I repeat two-zero, hostiles are present in their forces. Enemy HQ is a refinery north-west of our current position. Enemy reinforcements are inbound to our location and presumably heavily armed and dangerous. Over."

With that done, she preps Chuck Finley for action, and settles in for the upcoming fireworks.

Just about best seats in the house for the show. She thought with a smile.

[Qukatt]

Sin nods, they had nothing. "I assume your friend is already on his way, perhaps the people following me as well..," Sinya wrenches her arms suddenly, still fiddling away with the ropes, ".. if this lot are particularly unlucky they might even find me here..," Another uncomfortable looking movement, "..and then instead of a couple opportunists you'll have a couple psychopathic imperials."

Sin pauses and smiles pulling her free hand apart from the still bound hand, "ta-daaa"

She quickly starts to pick at the rope on her other wrist, "How about if i pick up the lizard and throw it at a cage while you try your jedi tricks?"

[Clusterfact]

Ackonoy had passed out after his helmet malfunctioned, sending a sudden shock through the Mando's body. Alkhet jumped to catch his fall and carefully laid his companion to the ground. Alkhet took a glance over his shoulder to Wo and shook his head. With Fiona and Kryad away from camp and Wo and Ackonoy unconscious, Alkhet was effectively alone and in a dangerous situation should any of their attackers return.

Alkhet looked to the sky as the sun vanished behind the trees. The sun had set and it would soon be pitch black. He returned to the cargo hold of the ship. The inside was trashed beyond use, but the flood lights would still operate normally as they ran on their own power source. Alkhet found the switch and pulled it down with a bit of effort. The switch locked heavily into place and the battery began to hum. Alkhet jumped back through the hole in the roof and slid his away over to the flood light which was illuminating a patch of trees. The lights were fixed in place because they had never been used, and were difficult to maneuver manually as there was a mechanical system in place to move them from the safety of the ship. Alkhet pulled hard on the light and it slowly turned toward the camp.

The internal mechanics of the light and the angle of the downed ship prevented the light from being centered on the camp, but the light was so bright that it was already starting to get hot to the touch and would shed some light on the camp regardless. The Zabrak jumped from the wreckage and began moving the supplies to less visible positions. No need for anyone to get any smart ideas should they stumble across the camp. As he bent over to pick up the remaining medical supplies that Fiona hadn't taken with her, he heard something rustling in the canopy over the camp. The Jedi, on instinct, brandished his lightsaber and prepared for combat. A small probe droid broke through the foliage and slowly approached the base.

"This is Captain Daili Shaktilli aboard Pax Republica transport, to whom am I speaking, and what is your situation?"

"Captain Shaktilli, it is good to hear your voice. Alkhet Noth reporting. If you don't already know, our ship is down -- we were ambushed as we were making our landing. Two of our crew are in the jungle, two others are incapacitated at the moment. Any assistance you can lend would help greatly." The Zabrak was about to take a bow when he heard a shuffling directly behind him. He spun around to find Ackonoy scrambling to his feet. Alkhet sighed and holstered his lightsaber. "Welcome back, solider."

Ackonoy pulled out some kind of syringe and injected a serum into his wrist. "I got 2 and a half hours make this work or my heart is going to get pumping. I'm glad I made and extra zip line for my way down." Picking up a holopad, he continued. "Wait till my mark and have one of each in our sights. Alkhet try to line em up if they are tango. Also hide the droid or lose it."

Alkhet nodded and grabbed the droid, gently pulling it toward the tree line where it could easily be hidden. The droids systems jerked and pulled to retain balance. Alkhet stashed the droid in the trees, but facing out toward the camp in order to maintain contact with Dash and her team, or to act as a sentry should the team be set upon again.

"Status report from everyone, now." The Kel'Dor's rough voice broke the silence over the commlink. Alkhet glanced to where Wo was laying earlier and felt a great deal of relief as he realized that he was no longer the only member at base. Alkhet happened over to where Wo was lying and popped his head into the makeshift shelter.

"Since we've landed, Fiona and Kryad are out scouting, Ackonoy and I have been here watching you and the supplies. We've just made contact with Captain Dash and her squad. I'm a little concerned about Fiona and Kryad, however -- it's dark and they don't have backup should anything happen, and it sounds like Fiona 'had' something happen. Good to see you're up, Wo. The Zabrak nodded firmly at the Kel'Dor.

[Riddly Dun]

Riddly laughing at the idea of what the lizard would do if he was thrown at the shield. Hahaha that would be good but I doubt it would do anything to the shield itself. Knowing anything about these shields, there has to be a control panel near by. Have I told you I find your escape very impressive? Who are you by chance? Do you think we could get some ale after this is over? Unsure about she feels about the group he at least wanted her to feel favorable about the group rather than leaving them behind and the mild flirting could help with that. But the serious question was still posed in his head Who is she?

[Zoron Ror]

Zoron watched Sin remarkably break free of her restraints and spoke to Riddly. "Just what do you have in mind for her to do?"

Out of the corner of his eye he thought he saw a green light flicker on his wrist from the proximity sensor on the droids, and thought to himself "maybe the cavalry is on its way".

[Areku99]

Aima's hopes of escape grew. "If you can get us out of here, we're home free...no clue about you guys, but I can do some mean hand-to-hand combat, and it's not like my Force powers are gone forever."

[Qukatt]

Sin glances around the room, spotting the control panel, releasing her other hand in a timely fasion she gets up and canters over to the panel.

"I don't drink. And thank you, It's a skill to come in handy when Masters tend to... like the bondage stuff" Sin smiled inwardly, not entirely a lie but certainly nothing like it would sound to them

She appears to frown at the panel "Got any idea how to do this? Otherwise I'm going to make it up as I go.."