Lacrimosa

[Eluna Thals]

Eluna answered the summons promptly, closing down her computer in her personal quarters. Within a minute, she was at the door of Dan's office. A little girl stood outside, busying herself by skipping over the deck grating on the walkway. Humanoid, no older than nine years. 0.52 meters tall, and no more than 28 kilograms. She dropped to her haunches with a lithe motion and gave the youngster a smile.

"Hey there. What are you doing out here in the hall?"

The woman, actually a rare human-replica droid, unconciously began to analyze Tak with dozens of criteria, including ratio of pupil dialation, heartrate, pheromone output, and skin hue.

[Teagan s'Ilancy]

Her activities interrupted, Tak looked at the woman with wide eyes.

She'd done her best to be patient, she knew that Dama would want her to behave.

Finally, she answered, her voice rather exasperated.

"Waiting for Dama."

[Eluna Thals]

Dama.

The word appeared in 162 languages in her banks, and was linguistically similar to 21,456 others, none of which would make sense in the girl's statement. The signs were all evident that the child was exasperated, in either case.

Eluna rose to her feet, and gestured to the door.

"Is Dama in here?"

She entered her auth code on the doorpad, and the panels slid open. Inside, Dan and a humanoid female were waiting. Eluna supressed a knowing smirk, now understanding exactly what Dama meant - mother.

"You asked for me?"

She returned her attention to Dan, not bothering to adhere to military convention. Indeed, the cut of her clothes she wore were quite civilian.

[General Dan]

It was always a little irritating that Captain Thals never went by protocol. She meant well enough, but the nature of what she was made her extremely eccentric.

"Don't bother saluting, you're not in that kind of company." Dan said with a sigh.

Fortunately, he wasn't miffed enough to rectify her strangeness. She was an irreplacable member of Rebel Intel. It didn't matter if she defied convention, she made up for it with a skillset he couldn't find in three dozen other people.

"Meet Loklorien s'Ilancy. You've already met her daughter, Tak."

[Loklorien s'Ilancy]

Looking up at the woman, s'Il leaned back in her seat ever-so-slightly, folding her hands in her lap.

A wordless nod was given as her eye spotted Tak behind, staring inside expectantly.

The Lupine lifted her chin, speaking a string of words in a language decidedly not basic, and the little girl shot back a reply. A last cautionary word, and Tak gave a final sulking answer before staying where she was outside.

[Eluna Thals]

Eluna recorded the dialogue, already sifting the syntax through analysis even as she spoke to the woman.

"Jedi Knight, studied under Masters Mace Windu and Zem Vymes. Commander of the Zeltross raid. Currently freelancing aboard the freighter Layla."

She blinked, expecting to go directly to the source, and speak to the woman herself.

[Loklorien s'Ilancy]

The surprise in her eye was well hidden, though her lips parted slightly. She'd not expected such an approach.

"Yes," she answered after a short pause.

The Lupine ticked an eyebrow. "I'm afraid you have me at a bit of a disadvantage, however."

[Eluna Thals]

Eluna smiled.

"As do you. That's an interesting language."

An understatement. It was some manner of derivative of Caridan, but an early generation offshoot, possibly second dynasty.

"I'm sure Dan would eventually get around to explaining my summons, but it's more efficient to get it from the source."

She smirked at Dan, knowing that she was annoying him to some small degree.

"It must be a tall order to come from a Jedi. And her..."

...processing...

"...daughter?"

[Loklorien s'Ilancy]

s'Il pulled a pained face. The passing remark regarding the Lupine language was dismissed; many said much the same when they caught snippets of it.

But, this woman it seemed was determined to cut to the heart of the matter, and s'Il would certainly return the favor in kind.

"She is my daughter, yes."

For the time being - until Dan wished it be known - she would omit his ties to their daughter. She did have to wonder however, exactly what was going through his mind at the fact.

She pressed on.

"We need to get to Coruscant."

[Eluna Thals]

"Not a problem." she said without pause, then smiled.

"Can you keep your saber in your pocket?"

[Loklorien s'Ilancy]

A pained subject for the woman to address to be sure. s'Il gave a frown.

"My sabre is not an issue. It is on Dantooine in pieces."

[Eluna Thals]

"Well I guess we won't have to worry about that, then."

The droid ran a hand through her hair errantly.

"I have a transport with Imperial registration. It's ready whenever you want to go."

As an afterthought, she looked to Dan and quirked an eyebrow.

"Did you have anything else?"

[General Dan]

Dan was quite used to her direct sort of dialogue, and only grimaced slightly.

"One more thing, Captain. Get them to Mystic Pave. She wants to make contact with an Imperial official, and I need safety to be the highest priority."

Mystic Pave was of course a code phrase for Dan's placed assets on Imperial Center. There was no need to name names recklessly. Each time they did would carry risk.

"Do not," Dan was sternly emphatic, "take needless risks. If something smells wrong, you don't arrange the meet. If it has to be that way, I'll take the rap."

[Loklorien s'Ilancy]

In matters such as this, s'Il chose to allow Dan to speak as he wished. She could not deny him such caution; not now. Now he knew. She'd wrestled with herself for days, about whether she should tell him or not. Even as she'd stepped through the doorway on her arrival she'd not made a decision. She had decided to simply place her trust in the Force; if he was to know, than it would come out.

And it had.

Waiting as a silence descended upon the three, s'Il spoke up.

"I have colleagues who are to go with us. We will leave once they are ready and not before."

[Eluna Thals]

So there was more to this than a boring blue milk run.

"Contact with the Empire involves blowback. Depending on the individual, we could arrange a kidnapping, but it would require discretion."

At the Jedi's statements, Eluna nodded.

"That's your decision. I'm able to leave at any time. Was there anything else you needed?"

[Loklorien s'Ilancy]

In the back of her mind, s'Il found herself satisfied with Dan's choice. This woman had voiced the very same idea that she herself had hoped to accomplish. She had no desire to simply talk with this Karrnage; she wanted to pluck him from Coruscant completely.

But she knew that any further talk on the matter could wait.

She would get Karrnage, and Mili would get her sabre returned.

"I need nothing for the moment," she replied.

[Eluna Thals]

"I'll be in my quarters if you need anything else, then."

Eluna nodded to Dan, stepped to the door, and looked back to s'Il and Tak.

"Z'esh Nipeta." It was the best approximation of a goodbye that she could manage in that second-cousin Caridan dialect they spoke. Even if it wasn't exact, she'd likely get the gist of it.

With that, Eluna left the quarters.

[Loklorien s'Ilancy]

Once more caught off guard, s'Il gave only a bare nod as the door closed behind the other woman. She'd remained seated through their entire conversation.

Even Tak had given the redhead an awkward glance before taking the moment to sneak back inside Dan's quarters.

When the door shut, she'd quietly padded to her mother, scrambling up to sit beside the elder Lupine.

s'Il however had turned a confused look to Dan. Even if the woman's usage had not been entirely correct, it was somewhat close enough.

"You taught her my language?"

[General Dan]

Dan laughed softly. Eluna hadn't managed to mention it, but it wasn't really a secret among the rank & file.

"Not quite. She's a droid. Given her usual behavior, she likely picked up that 'best guess' off the conversation you had with Tak."

[Loklorien s'Ilancy]

A... droid... ?

At that s'Il tikked her brow. "Seems droid technology has gotten better since the last I remember."

With a grunt, she pulled the little girl into her lap. "Tak is her nickname, really. A pet name that just kind of showed up and never left.

"Her name is Teagan."