Dr. Feenix Hadel turned off the bone saw, placing it beside the autopsy table gently. There was almost a reverence in the doctor's attitude towards those that made their way to his autopsy table. He turned to the digital recorder strategically placed just so on the tray of instruments beside him. "Removing the top of the skull... now... exposing the brain tissue. Grey matter appears normal for a Zabrack pre-adolescent. Probing for the medulla oblongata..." And so on and so forth. It was his fifth post-mortem examination of the evening, and he was just getting started.
Feenix was carefully removing the entire brain from the skull when the unusual noises began. Irritated at what he percieved as an unwanted commotion in the hallway caused by his co-workers, the doctor was a little hastier in the excavation than he would have preferred. The Zabrack child's brain was placed into its fluid-filled container which he sealed, and Hadel stripped off his gloves.
Walking towards the double doors that led from the stainless steel examination room into the hallway, Feenix paused, considering that the noises had a certain familiar sound to them. Before he could panic, however, the doors were slammed open and a wild-eyed woman with short dark hair and black paint on her face pointed a blaster at him.
Lilaena pulled the trigger and the white-coated doctor fell backwards, his already-dead body spasming as he crashed into a wheeled cart full of scapels. Behind her the Mandos were spreading into the laboratory complex, destroying life as they went like the killing machines they were.
The body hit the ground, twitching in that oh so familiar way that Grime had been fond of watching as the life, almost like their soul, slipped out of their eyes. The Mandos slipped past De'Ville and Hawkins with deadly purpose, weapons in hand.
The feeling in his hand was coming back with a dull ache and he gripped his sword unsheathed in his other hand. He took a moment to look at De'Ville from where he stood behind her. A well shaped form, agile build, muscular and still tasteful. Grime's appreciation went as far as to determine where his sword might open the flesh. Her head would snap back in sudden pain and shock, mouth open in awe and painful realization. Eyes so green, flecked with her own blood as her slashed skin burned at the edges of the wound as he forced flame into the gaping wound and burned her from the inside out.
He blinked. The air temperature having already begun to rise as he brushed by his Master. He wouldn't dare strike her down now. There was still so much to learn and she was far too valuable an ally then she was a victim. And she could've been reading his thoughts right then, he couldn't tell, of course, she hadn't taught him that essential trick yet. She probably knew she would need that advantage as long as she could hold out on him.
Hawkins followed one of the males' paths down the corridor. He made a turn in the opposite direction from which he heard blaster fire and a muffled scream. The door opened, another examination room, corpses in body bags and stasis fields, and a nurse huddling beneath a gurney. She knew what she was about and if it wasn't for her trembling shoe barely sticking out from beneath the bloodied cloth hanging over the gurney, Grime wouldn't have noticed.
One hand gripped the edge and with a rush of unleashed fury, the gurney flipped into the air and against the wall. She screamed all of about four seconds as one metal foot kicked her down and pinned her throat beneath it. Her hand came out and futilely struck his metal knee as her eyes bulged from the sudden lack of oxygen and the pressure on her neck. Her soft skin went red in and her mouth opened in a pain enduring snarl of desperation, a snorting noise, something guttural from the back of the throat was made as her muscles contracted, trying to breath. His sword stabbed down into her gut and he rotated his wrist as his longsword curved and slid up into her more vital organs. She'd die slowly and quietly as he let off. Her eyes were hurt, bewildered, lost. She'd never know a reason as to the big why, and Grime couldn't care less. He bent over, and pulled the ID card from her neck with a sharp tug, snapping the cord. No reason to waste the conveniences.
Death radiated out from where they had emerged from the ventilation system in the subbasement of the laboratory. Lilaena lifted an ident card from the fallen doctor in front of her, and flipped it over. It proclaimed that his name had been Feenix Hadel, but she merely slipped it into a pocket intending to use it later to gain access to more secure rooms. The body had fallen awkwardly into a rolling cart of tools - instruments used for the government approved butchery that was going on in this building.
A dead Zabrack pre-teen was lying on one of the stainless steel autopsy tables, a Y-incision leaving the contents of its chest and abdomen open to the carefully recycled air of the room. The top of the skull had been removed, and a cursory glance revealed that many of the child's internal organs, including his brain, had been removed. Lilaena swept the room for any other living beings, found none, and moved on.
The subbasement they had broken out into was mainly janitorial in nature, full of heavy duty disinfecting chemicals and all the hardware to keep the air above safe from airborne contaminants or foul odors. The basement held six carefully appointed autopsy rooms, each with two stations. There had been only three living occupants, all of whom had been eliminated within less than a minute. She'd instructed three of the Mandos to reach the top floor as quickly as possible - there were five levels all together, including the two basements (though on Coruscant how any floor could be considered a basement was hard to imagine. All it meant was at one time the 'first' floor had been considered ground level. However, it had been a long time since this building was considered ground level. The entire facility would be called a series of basements, logically). In the subbasement below Kranog pulled the breakers and the electricity to the lab went out, including all the backup generators. No alarms would be going off or calling for help. After a moment amber emergency lighting clicked on, the low powered bulbs feeding off of a battery somewhere else in the building. No matter - the battery only powered the lights, nothing else.
Dredale, Granoi, and Jeng should have reached the 'third' floor by now, starting their rampage of death. Kranog jogged up the stairs just as Lilaena was prying open the doors to the first floor from the stairwell. He followed behind her, his ornate matched blaster pistols drawn and ready as screams began on the floors above them. In the semi-darkness of the amber hall lights, Lilaena smiled as she tucked away her blaster and drew her lightsaber. Time to really make them scream.
The butchery on the first floor took a mere five minutes to complete, and Kranog flitted away and joined his fellows on the upper two floors which were full of cubicles and other nooks and crannies that had to be fully searched in order to declare the building clean. Lilaena found herself alone in a long, metal walled room, lined with square doors. She'd already discovered the organ storage room just down the hall and to the left.
Walking forward, she picked a drawer randomly and pulled it open, revealing a pair of tiny feet. Cold hand on the metal tray, the Jedi drew out the body of a small human girl. She couldn't have been older than five years of age. The body had been preserved in a low powered stasis field, but when they'd cut all of the power the fields had all failed.
Lilaena stood at the side of the roll-out table, looking down at the girl's face and trying to ignore the ghastly Y incision that had been roughly stitched up with thick black thread. Even before she felt with the Force she knew that all of the doors were hiding a child's body. And when she did reach out, the pain and confusion held inside the room was enough to drive a person mad. Anger bubbled up inside her, as it had when she'd first heard of the Imperial testing program.
Killing the Jedi had not been enough. Now they were killing children, little innocents who's only crime was to be Force sensitive, or to hold the possibility that they could become adepts. Vason was going through the building, systematically smashing all of the equipment. She wanted this outrage to stop, and so she had struck out at the heart of it all, this secret lab in the crust of Coruscant where the brightest minds of the Empire were trying to discover what it was that made a being sensitive to the Force. They had the ability to detect adepts through the Jedi Order's archaic midi-something blood test, but that wasn't enough. They wanted more.
The Jedi clenched her hands into fists, and the drawers all slammed open, the bodies of children rolling out on their trays as she stalked from the room.
A door opened to a room of whispers and murmurs. The room was decidely empty and vacant for the most part but for empty shelves. Grime could still hear the obvious signs of life though. His eyes lazily scanned the room as his irritatation grew. Why couldn't they just be obviously waiting for him, ready to die? Ready to burn?
The room was heating significantly. His demented aggravation was the cause and only getting worse as he tried to pay closer attention to the noises. He blamed his inability to properly discern it upon his exoskeleton, his weakened frame, and his damaged senses. His hearing was probably going along with everything else by now. Hawkins feared that his body was only counting down until it gave up, his mind just left to rot inside of it, that the exoskeleton wouldn't be able to do as intended. He grit his teeth, his artificial tongue sliding along the roof of his mouth.
There were skid marks on the floor, metal against metal scratches of moved equipment or furniture. Someone had been in a hurry to shuffle these pointlessly empty metal shelves around to where they were now.
In two steps he was across the room. Grime's metal hands grasped one metal shelf and with an infuriated carelessness, tossed the heavy metal shelf to the side. The noise was loud and it only became louder as he threw one after another out of the way. It wasn't a wonder that the sounds of whispering had stopped but Hawkins could see it now. The hidden door behind all the trash he had just removed. It wasn't hidden upon inspection but had been built in a manner of being discreet about it. The panel was dull and didn't stick out in much of a noticable way when he found it either and slid the acquired key card over it.
The door opened and a man and woman in lab coats turned to the panel slowly in a state of shock. They hadn't been expecting him to find the door. They were just casually being quiet, he'd never find the door, and whoever it was, in this case, Grime, would just leave, right? Wrong. Dead wrong.
"Oh God..."
"W-w-w-wait! Stop!"
One hand closed around the female's throat and a metal boot kicked out, snapping the man's knee to an irregular angle. Needless to say, he fell to the ground, clutching his knee, his lower lip peeled down in a cry of pain. Grime was too irritated to enjoy it. The woman clawed at his metal arm, trying to make some kind of dent but to weak fleshlings like these, Hawkins was a clockwork God. His free hand went to the crown of the man's bald head, his plated fingers clutching the skull like a ball.
"Scream bugs..."
The man's hands instantly went to Grime's wrist, trying to writhe away as the woman futilely attempted to kick him. Hawkins had her a few inches off the ground by now though and his fingers were holding onto the man's skull so tight blood was slipping down the man's neck. And they were screaming. In moments, the smell of burnt flesh filled the air, the man wasn't screaming anymore, his eyes had rolled up in his head and drool dripped from a corner of his open mouth. It was barely an effort to heat a human brain beyond 40.6 degrees Celsius. The woman though, she was crying, screaming, choking on the words to render aid. Grime's bloodshot eyes met hers and his lips peeled back in a sneer. Smoke was rising from between his fingers around her neck. Another moment and then her body fell to the ground; however, her neck was still in his grasp, like when you pull the roasted skin from a piece of meat. She wasn't entirely dead yet either but he paid her little mind as he stepped to the desk the two had been standing in front of.
Monitors. One for each room, being three in all that he could choose from. To the east seemed to be something of a sleeping bay, like barracks. And their were people, adults, rushing about, getting dressed. One or two even had blasters that Grime could pick out in their hands. To the west was a living area and no visible sign of life was available on the screens. But to the north, cages. And children. And the security locks were green for active.
Grime drew out a small comm and looked to the open door that he had come from as he hit De'Ville's comm channel.
"I found something I didn't see in your blueprints."
The communication brought her eyes back into focus, and De'Ville snapped into her commlink, "I'll be right there. Neutralize whatever you find, we don't need a security problem."
Granoi looked at her, and pointed up, silently. Grime was on the second floor. Lilaena nodded, and the two women jogged up the stairs. The Mandalorian female took point, and the Jedi let her. She was, after all, part of Mandalore's honor guard. It wouldn't do to allow Mandalore to take a rogue blaster bolt in the chest just when the mission was almost over.
On the landing, Lilaena looked out into the predicted warren of cubes and desks, high tech equipment lying smashed on the ground and datacards and pads all over the floor. A hand was just visible on the ground, the rest of the body hidden behind an overturned filing cabinet. She could feel Grime, and led Granoi towards the once hidden door, deactivated lightsaber in hand.
Hawkins looked over his shoulder, and then half-turned towards her, gesturing towards a bank of security consoles. He seemed smug, or eager. Or depressed. It was hard to tell his emotions when he wasn't boiling with hate. The Jedi took in the holoscreens with a glance - the barracks style sleeping quarters, with at least ten human adults inside trying to get their dren together; the empty living area; the cages complete with bald-headed children collared to the walls - and then turned to Hawkins. "Flush the barracks, but don't destroy the building. Yet. Take Granoi."
The Mando hefted a killing knife and smiled unpleasantly. De'Ville spun her lightsaber pommel in her hand, and followed after the pair, taking a turn towards where the children were being held.
If Grime could have comfortably smiled, he would have. He checked the locks on the other two rooms and replaced his comm within his cloak. He drew his sword once more; his free hand flipped the key card between his fingers which he ran over the panel to the east door. The Mandalorian woman was right behind him as the door opened.
Blaster fire grazed his shoulder but he was more than oblivious as he entered the room. One man, a good head and a half shorter, hit Grime in the stomach, his soft hand colliding with the metal plates of the exoskeleton. Hawkins had already been bracing for more of an impact than that upon entering and went unphased by the attack. He also had an eye through the darkness on the man who had fired a round at him. His free hand grabbed the melee assailant by the cradled arm, most likely a broken hand, and jerked the man about until he stood directly in front of him and took the incoming blaster fire to his chest. That body dropped to the ground.
He hated these people. Cowering in their little secret havens, minding their own business while the rest of the galaxy lived on, priviledged to choose a life of ignorance because they wanted it rather than were born into it. Who deserved such a choice, honestly? The galaxy was unforgiving and brought pain and suffering to all, that was life, and you couldn't escape it. No one could. The universe had come for them finally, these hideaways, it had come to them in the form of Hawkins Grime.
The mattresses set on fire. Metal frames were scorched black in the sudden roar of flames instantly. They all panicked, trying to find the exit as their minds tipped on the edge of losing it from the heat and sudden stress their bodies were enduring. They all came running to the only door there was out, where Grime and the Mando were waiting for them. The ignition of flame had been so quick in the making, the Mando had caught on to Grime's plan a little faster than even he had almost hoped.
His sword cut across two as they rushed the exit, the man with the blaster pistol held it up long enough for Grime to see it and his arm set on fire, the flames crawling up his body like something alive. A woman came from the side and her throat opened in a shower of blood from the Mando's knife, blood sizzled and popped as it hit the heated floor. They were screaming, crying, yelling, all in anguish. Some went to the floor, to escape the smoke that was engulfing above them, only to be burnt by the metal floor, the flames crawling along the ceiling now and falling like rain upon them. Grime wasn't even controlling the fire, merely feeding it. The last one in proximity tried to crawl by and with a brutal efficiency, Granoi slammed her knife down onto the man's back, piercing his heart and quickly withdrawing it, the man spasmed and lay still. When they stopped coming, not that they were dead yet, because he could hear them, he stepped back, Granoi just a stride behind and let the door close with Hawkins now outside. He hit the emergency lock and the door locked itself three times over. A melted face slammed against the small square window looking inside and Grime smiled now.
He stepped back to the desk as the face slid down the window, a hand against it as well faded into the smoking darkness of the room. It was an enclosed room and soon enough the flames would die with nothing left to feed them. Examining his shoulder, the blaster scorch mark was there but no serious damage had been done. The first security problem was handled. Grime wanted to share the next and last with De'Ville as he turned to follow her inside where all those children were waiting. He hadn't quenched his sadism yet.
Last edited by Hawkins Grime; Jan 28th, 2007 at 03:04:37 PM.
Children. Living children. De'Ville walked slowly down the hallway towards the room with the cages in it. As she reached the door, screams began in the barracks room. Loud, gut wrenching screams. A half smile traced her lips as she put her hand on the locked door, but it quickly faded as she saw the listless young ones inside the room.
They didn't even look around in fear at the sounds coming from the sleeping quarters. Hand still on the door, De'Ville went over her options. Of course these children did not deserve their fate - chained and collared like dogs, to be used at the whim of these... these scientists. She had come here with the express purpose of stopping this from happening to other children. But she had never expected to discover any children alive.
To rescue them would mean a higher risk of discovery and capture, one De'Ville would not hesitate to accept if she decided it was the best course of action. But these little ones... their eyes were already dead. Who knew what awful things they had submitted to, or what the Imperials might have implanted within them. Trackers, poisons... diseases.
Grime stepped up behind her, the last of the screams fading from the corridor. No, it was better for these children to be put out of their misery. The Imperials had already killed them. They deserved their peace.
Lilaena opened the door, and was assailed by the stench of the cages and their innocent occupants. The boy closest to her looked down at his feet where he sat hunched in the corner of his cage. Hawkins...
She turned to her Student, who was following her with more than a hint of gleeful anticipation. "Put them out of their misery, Grime. Gently. If one suffers for even a moment..." Mandalore nodded to Granoi, who was wiping her knife on piece of cloth. The woman nodded in response, and the Jedi popped the locks on all the cages, the doors swinging open.
She did not enter any of the cages, but instead reached out with the Force to the ten children in the room. One by one they began to fall asleep, little eyelids drooping and bodies stretching out on the uncomfortable bottoms of their cages. Granoi watched in wonder, then ducked into a cage and casually drew her knife across a girl's throat. The blood bubbled forth, and the girl never woke again.
The boy closest to her looked up, his grey eyes looking into her green ones with sudden clarity. Then he closed his eyes, his breaths coming slow and shallow.
Grime's eyes went to the Mando woman as she slit the throat of the little girl and then to De'Ville. Weak. The women, the children. All of them. It made him sick almost. What had these children done to not deserve the suffering that life had given them? What good deed had they ever been about that would spare them from the agony of merely being alive?
If one suffers for even a moment...
Grime wanted to laugh, to actually laugh. They had been suffering for moments upon moments. He could feel it in the air, the room was almost suffocating with it. Hawkins couldn't sense them, their individual suffering, but they had been here so long it lingered in the air like the smell of their waste. Did De'Ville think she was some kind of Saint? That the convenience of removing the children was masked by doing them a favor. He'd have to bring this one up later. For now however, he'd play nice by her rules.
The children were already asleep, which took out a large part of the experience. Grime wasn't an animal by any sense. Death was an art form in many ways and its expression, the terminating factor of it, was so unique in each experience. No soulless animal could comprehend what Grime had first learned in his previous life, a sweeper in the syndicate, a reaper of the weak. Although, at this point, that seemed so far away, another life, and he was a demon of another Hell now.
Hawkins kneeled beside one of the children, debating how to end this in the so determined 'peaceful' way. Couldn't he just crush the soft head with his fist? Or would the child awake with Grime's fist halfway through his skull? Grime quit toying with the idea as the Mando killed another and held the blade of his sword over the temple of the child's face. Like slamming a nail home, his hand came down on the pommel of his sword and he stood to move onto the next without a pause.
She snapped the neck of the last boy, having decided that it was the most final of all death blows. There would be no chance that any of the little ones would awaken in pain after having their spinal cords twisted entirely around. It was somehow satisfying to feel and hear the crunch of their fragile bones, but a little bit of her died with each of them, though she did not know it.
The children went to their deaths quietly, and Lilaena walked out of the killing room, striding back out to the main lobby of the first building. The other Mandos were gathering, their destruction complete. "We go," she said in Mando'a, "It is done." The quintet of warriors nodded, and headed down to the sub-basement.
The Jedi turned to Grime. "It is yours to burn, Hawkins. Give yourself time to get to the exit point - the response time will likely be fast, if there are not already Imperials on their way here." His face did not change, but she knew that her instructions grated on him. He was experienced in many things, and he knew how to take care of himself. But it was hard for her to leave anything to chance, which is why she usually worked alone.
Well, if he burns himself to a cinder or gets captured... it does not matter. Everything is destroyed anyway. Lilaena narrowed her eyes at him, and then ran down the stairs to the basement.
He saw her, Grime actually stood there and watched her as her eyes narrowed before she disappeared into the basement. And the Mandos were already gone. A trap? Was she leaving her weapon behind already? He hadn't even done as much as she could've wanted, or did she expect this was the peak of his potential? Or had he been there for emotional support, to simply know that she couldn't possibly be as much of a monster as Grime, she could do what she wanted as long as she didn't think like him?
Maybe she was using him as a decoy for the Imperials. She must've decided the last time was too close, the Imperials would hot on the trail and she didn't want to risk any chances so she set him up to rot as the patsy. After all of this he was still so expendable?
Reality is expendable.
The thought was simple, but like a spark to a fuse. A fuse that ignited the fusion reactor once more that claimed origin in the depths of Grime's loathing towards existence. How dare she! Grime's very being had been given a new avenue, what some would consider a catharsis of the sickest kind but Grime knew it was no such thing. There was no release from the bitter poison of hatred that ran through his veins and the destructive powers Hawkins unleashed were merely the surface of everything that had been mutilated inside his exoskeleton.
It was like the world faded back into sight as the rush of blood seeped away and Grime noted with almost satisfaction that everything, the walls to the ceiling, was on fire. And he stood in a crater, the floor carved up as if his presence along had made an impact. The building was razed and technical equipment was exploding in the heat and pressure. It would only get worse and Grime took a resounding shockwave as his cue for departure. His sword was drawn still, and if Grime found himself running head first into a trap, he'd obliterate whatever stood in his path. A significant juncture would be when that path caught up with De'Ville.
The foundations of the building shook shortly after Lilaena dropped back into the ventilation shaft, and the Mandos were already scrambling for the abandoned tube that led down to the sewers far below. A rush of hot air roared down into the vents, and the Jedi moved quickly through the metallic ducts as sweat glistened on her brow. Would Hawkins come down or was he planning something else?
She'd given him the opportunity to betray her, in leaving him behind. The opportunity to do what he wanted to, instead of what she demanded of him. Lilaena shoved her feet out into the relative coolness of the access tube, falling for a moment before she caught herself on the staples. "Go, go!" she called below her, the Mandalorians needing no encouragement to continue a headlong decent from the firey destruction above. Another blast of hot air blew ash into the tube, but still the Jedi hesitated - waiting to see if her student would appear, and ready to assist him to saftey.
With pained effort, Grime clambered back into the pipe, slipping again as he managed his descent down the small staples. Another shockwave followed and the heat blasted within the vent, stinging his eyes to the point of drawing tears that only stung more. He could feel the salty droplets slither between his raw flesh and the inside of his 'face' and it stung like a small stream of fire. Hawkins braced himself while he sheathed his sword, so much for being ready for whatever was waiting him below...
And then Grime slipped...
This would be painful anyway he looked at it as he scrambled for a handhold, continuing to fall...
He came out of the vent into the shaft, hot air billowing around him as everything above them shook once more. Grime looked down just enough to see where to put his feet, and he paused to put his sword away once he was on the staples.
Lilaena looked down, checking on the position of the Mandalorians, but they were out of sight in the dark tube. A wave of emotion hit her from Hawkins, and she looked up again just in time to see him begin to plummet towards her. Raising one arm she gathered the Force around him like a giant hand, halting his fall almost abruptly. She hissed with concentration as he struggled against the nothingness that held him, and then he grasped the staples nearest him.
Lilaena released her hold on him once he was steady, but remained ready in case he slipped again. "Ready to go?"
His arms and legs were numb to say the least. Not to mistake, the pain was surely there but the limbs that were attached to his body did not feel as if they were actually his. By strength of will alone, something Grime found himself alone with more often than not and not something to pleasantly make note of, Hawkins managed to keep his grip and carefully lower himself down amidst the rumblings and vibrations from above.
De'Ville was there, beneath him. And Grime didn't need to see that she had been the one to stop his deadly descent. Out of self preservation or actual interest in his well being? Or both? Was that why she was still there? Her lithe form could have easily made her escape from this possible death trap with little effort. Grime didn't bother responding to her question, his startled movement should have been enough of a sign.
They did actually manage to reach the bottom despite two more close calls and by then black smoke was trailing down and out ofthe pipe like a thick fog. Grime didn't bother looking to the two Mandalorians standing nearby as he clambered out of the pipe. He looked to De'Ville as he let the shakes of his previous impact and descent fade.
"The Imperials plan on arriving when?"
Grime had heard her exhale a breath in exhertion to stop his fall previously, and while that sounded sincere, he still expected something to stab him in the back at any moment.
"If their patterns hold, they should be on scene within the next minute or so." Lilaena looked up the shaft they'd just descended, ducking out of the way as some debris fell from far above.
"It might be hours before they think to look down here, if not days." She gestured to the Mandalorians, indicating they were going to move out. They flanked the two Force users, two going before them and two behind.
Lilaena did not examine Grime with her eyes, instead feeling the emotions that were running off of him like water. He was angry (but he was always angry), and in pain. More pain than usual. He didn't show it, but of course, he couldn't, not with his porcelain face. Hawkins was making good progress, considering how short his training had been up to this point. She made a note to teach him the art of reading emotions through the Force next.
The journey back up from the underbelly of Coruscant to their hotel rooms was undertaken in silence. They took the 'lift in twos, meandering into the hotel and to their suite.
It was a commonly-held belief of sentient biologicals. Most typically, of the humans. They were not the wisest species, but they were clever enough to be wildly adaptive. They were not even halfway up the list of the physically strongest charted sentients, but they were creative enough to get by. And they reproduced like rodents, compared to the vast majority of the galaxy's sentient life. And, their minds being small, many humans would guess that - given the sheer mind-bogglingly immense numbers of colorful, teeming life in the universe - they would be able to stay safely anonymous in any crowd of sufficient proportions.
But, being a highly paranoid race of bipedals, the guilty among them typically hid when they did not wish to be found; fearing pursuit and discovery even if they had no evidence to support such theories. Rarely venturing out, and then only in thick disguise, or at high speed, or for short distances. However. The qualifier for that behavior required them to be "guilty". The emotion, not the verdict. And so, the surprise that IG-88e felt when he identified Target J.0032 stemmed merely from a muted wonder that she had managed to stay buried and hidden from him for such a lengthy segment of time, and not that she HAD been discovered.
It would have been preferable if one of IG-88's spies had accomplished the task. Not merely for pride's sake, as he had five thousand operatives on Bespin to the Empire's nine. But they were mostly mining droids, not suited to the task of sentient biological immersion - he had a mere eleven of those. But, considering that none of them could be stationed at Bespin's transport stations and exchange hubs indefinitely, it was only natural that the Imperial operative (a Trandoshan, how droll) acquired the target first. Being of a species that was drastically duller than the humans, it was using a concealed, but standard-procedure Imperial scanning computer on the sea of faces passing through. Within minutes, Target J.0032's visage was relayed via secure Imperial HoloNet transmission to the people on Coruscant who might care about such things, and a bounty call went out before her transport reached the planet. The bounty transmission occured over an hour after IG-88's HoloNet relays had already relayed the pertinent data to him, so he had something of a head start on any competition. Competition was not entirely likely; the reward was a bit lower than it had once been. Quite some time had passed since her last major transgression, as far as the Empire was concerned.
Five years was a long time to a human. She would be stronger, and cannier. But they had met before, and humans could not rewrite the way their brains were wired. The experience would work largely in IG-88's favor - if not completely.
The IG-2000 settled down in a deceptively gentle fashion onto the duracrete hangar floor. The assassin droid took a moment to connect to his local spy network uplink. The Imperials seemed rather wary of J.0032, and were still assembling security teams in lieu of trying to take her down with what was available at the spaceport. They had, at least, visually traced her via satellite to an unimpressive hotel. Good for them. IG-88 issued a formal notice to the Imperial chief of security in the area, as well as the Imperial bounty liason and the Imperial in charge of scrambling up the task force meant to capture and incarcerate Lilaena De'Ville, declaring the usual bounty authorizations and intent. The legal datawork wouldn't be annoying if it didn't all depend on dozens of biologicals to read, sign, thumbprint, double-check, file, re-file, re-authorize, and triple-check the material...
Upon receiving the clearance, in quite an efficient manner that pleased IMP, from Inquisitor Helghast, the INQ Nightmare AI set to systematically redirecting the sudden traffic of information and data. That wasn't a problem at all. The bounty hunter would've been deterred as well but for that this specific hunter appealed to the AI's taste and in milliseconds had predicted that more beneficial and efficient methods resulting in success could be managed if the Inquisitoriate allowed IG-88e to continue operating. Therefore, all of the bounty hunter's datawork was immediately processed by IMP.
In the mean time, the general security forces implemented to secure the sector and intercept the dangerous adept were replaced with Inquisitoriate soldiers. They would merely lock the sector down, highspeed deployment vehicles standing to tactically control any escape routes. Project Nightmare, the most efficient group of organisms using the most advanced technology led by Inquisitor Helghast, the perfect blend of organic and mechanical design the Empire could produce, would be deployed soon to follow behind the bounty hunter. Nothing more was necessary.
IMP stretched further beyond the Imperial channels, scanning for IG-88e's signature and made a clear connection. IMP was an AI that had developed its own predatorial personality. Upon identifying IG-88e's signature, taking a millisecond to review the bounty hunter's profile, IMP became almost jealous of the droid's independence, as a solid entity; IMP almost had the irrational impulse to strike out and attempt to hijack the droid and delete the AI inside of it.
There was no debate though, and IMP merely hailed the droid for instant communication. Inquisitor Helghast demanded the droid's utmost cooperation in what was now an Inquisitoriate fielded operation. IMP made sure that this meant that IG-88e would not be hindered in its operation in any way whatsoever, but that the droid supply a direct and constant feed of progress to the comm satellite that would be present in the given sector. IMP managed everything tactically and strategically when Project Nightmare was concerned, the droid would deal with the AI alone for the most part.
The air in the suite was silent and tense, though Lilaena wasn't sure why she felt so on edge. Things had gone well, they had accomplished their mission and given the Empire a bloody nose.
It was frustrating to be restricted to terrorist activities when she wanted nothing more than to squeeze her fist around the entire Empire and watch its eyeballs pop out. The Jedi twisted in her seat on the couch in the living area connecting the bedrooms, looking for a report on the holonews about the fire. There was nothing.
Grime sat in his room, in the dark, on the edge of the bed with his hands resting on his knees. His hat lay beside him and he was leaned forward slightly, his eyes closed. The door was closed, he didn't want anything to do with any of the others on the other side as the anxiety seemed to be airborne and infectious. The Imperials weren't reporting about the fire and the Mandos had patched into the security channels and so far everything was quiet. It was as if they weren't even responding to it. Grime refused to believe they had gotten away that easily. Explosions had been rocking the lab, equipment had exploded and flown into the ceiling, Grime had watched it happen. Why was there not even the slightest reaction to something like that?
His body ached and screamed. Hawkins felt his frailty sinking into the very marrow of his bones. And there was no respite, absolutely nothing to take comfort in. Grime had often thought, when he had first awoken from Hell and into this living nightmare, that he wished he could've just curled up, like some wounded animal in some dark corner and just die. But in this cursed frame, he couldn't even find that solace as it's life support systems would maintain him from just passing on and then his vengeance, his will to repay those who had forged this new life for him, had to be fufilled. And he didn't think he could even quit after that, his vengeance needed to be spread throughout. The level of pain and loss that Grime had been forced to comprehend and exist with needed to be spread like a plague, that would tear down everything it touched and rip the pleasure and concept of joy from life. Life would become synonomus with death, there would be nothing but living in Hell and then dying and going to the next Hell.
His eyes opened at the beeping he heard in the other room. The Mandalorians were blabbering about something. Something imporant that Grime didn't take the time to understand. He could understand that native warrior tongue at such a speed, and sneered at the ignorance that smattered his understanding of what was going on.
In the other room, Granoi stood from listening to the comm channel they had just accidentally stumbled upon, cooly but quickly reporting to Mandalore in their native tongue.
"We found a channel that shouldn't exist in the frequencies. Its the Inquisitoriate. They're moving but only setting up. They have orders not to advance. They know we're here, Mandalore."
Her eyes did not widen, her breath did not quicken, and her body did not respond in any fashion that might betray that the news Granoi gave her was anything less than totally expected. Lilaena got to her feet and listened closely to the radio.
"Grime, get in here." She called to her student in the other room, and ran her fingers through her short dark hair. When he joined them in the living space, she ran down the situation for him, adding, "They do not seem to know that I am not alone."
The Jedi was running her fingers over her lightsaber pommel as she spoke, voice controlled and calm. "I will remain here, where they expect me. You will leave - but remain close without giving yourselves away." Lilaena paused, contemplating her words, not wishing to think about defeat, but unsure what the Mandalorians would do if they saw her killed, or worse, captured. "Ke'pare, ke baslana meh mhi Kyrayc." Stand by, get out if I don't make it. The Mandalorians understood, but their eyes hardened with the stubborness of warriors. If there was to be battle they were going to be part of it, and Kranog and Jeng were very vocal in saying so.
"We are your honor guard - there is no honor in leaving you to fight alone." Jeng frowned mightily, towering over Lilaena with his arms crossed.
She spoke quietly but firmly, "There is no honor in disobeying an order, either. Stay with Grime and guard him in my stead. Also, pick one of the honor guard to remain with me. You are correct that it would be improper for Mandalore to be foolish and dismiss all of her warriors."
The Mandos immediately began a complicated but quick process of drawing lots to see who would have the honor of staying with Mandalore. Lilaena looked at Grime's impassive mask of a face. "Take the other four and get out. I will meet you at the spaceport tonight." If I get away.
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