Fwurg

[Storyteller (Brend)]

The gran held up a hand and made a simple gesture, after which the rodian approaches with the box. He opens it and shows the contents to Trigiel. Trigiel saw a nice grid of 5 by 10 credit bars, with the 10 credit symbol on each bar.

As he looks at the credits, he hears the familair noise of cargo-droids carrying boxes. The four droids came out of the ship carrying two of the crates, which meant there were only three left inside. So far, the transaction seemed to be going very well.

[Fecta Trigiel]

One for one, Trigiel grabbed the creddits to check if they where real. Slowly and carefully so the gran could see what Trigiel is doing. Next, Trigiel wanted to check the box for traps. It would be a shame if he is getting blown into pieces mid space by a hidden bomb in the box.

"You can't be too careful in this line of work, now can you?"

[Storyteller (Brend)]

While Trigiel was doing his minutes-long check of every single credit, the cargo droids finished unloading the crates of crystals. The crates were set out in a neat 2 by 3 grid at the side of the hangar. Trigiel notes that this offers three of the gunners a nice field of fire to shoot at on anyone near the crates. The fourth gunner, at the gun just above the crates, is able to see anyone coming towards the crate.

The rodian holding the box, not being born yesterday, was not willing to part with the box just yet.

"I agree, so let's inspect your wares first, before we hand over the box of credits.", the gran said as the rodian quickly moved back a few steps and closed the box's lid.

The gran gestures towards the boxes and takes a few steps, clearly waiting for Trigiel to come with.

[Fecta Trigiel]

Finally, it seemed that things might get interesting at last. Trigiel followed into the 'trap', he was confident that he could handle anything they would throw at him. The bounty hunter might pose a hinder, but nothing Trigiel couldn't handle.

"Of course.

I haven't touched the crystals, though the guys loading in the wares dropped a crate, so crystals in one of the boxes are a little bit shaken up, but that's not my mistake, they didn't work for me. I can't remember which crate it was though, I think that one."

[Storyteller (Brend)]

"You'll get your credits as long as they're all in one piece.", then gran replied as they walk towards the crates. The two rodians following at a slight distance.

The gran quickly opens the crate Trigel points out, conveniently one of the first two crates, to look inside. He counts the crystals and closes the lids again. "No worries. These are looking good."

He opens the second crate to check it, and then calmly walks to the next two crates and opens up the left crate. The gran walking away leaves Trigiel standing in between the gran and the two well-armed rodians. The gran looks inside the crates one by one and closes them again.

He turns to Trigiel "These look good as well."

As the gran is about to open the fourth crate, Trigiel feels a sense of tension through the force; as if something that wasn't supposed to happen yet just happened. Not an immediate threat, but something had definitely changed. Only an instant later Trigiel senses a disturbance in the force, as if it were an echo, coming from deeper within the ship.

The gran, not as sensitive to the force, simply continued opening the crate. Much to the gran's surprise, the crystals in the fourth crate are dimly glowing and are now casting him in a blueish light. He is distracted for a few seconds before looking up with a surprised expression.

"This the crate that was dropped?"

((OOC: I think that this might be a good time to link to the Unifying Force (wookiepedia) (we have a short paragraph on it as well: Force), just so you have some OOC context to place a 'not supposed to happen yet' with ^_^

I used (7 Force Level + 5 Intuition) for the check. I hope that's correct (there's no story page yet, so I couldn't check it on your character page.))

[Fecta Trigiel]

In a split second Trigiel thought of what happened and kind of effect his action would have:

The crate is opened, so nothing to do about that anymore. He felt something from within the ship, but if it was an echo from the future, it wasn't settled yet and only a warning. If it was from now, he couldn't really do anything about it. If he said this was not the crate, and it was, they would find out anyway, if he said this was the crate, then what? Wait... idea!

"Yes I think so. Though they didn't do that when I saw the crystals.

Is it wrong for them to do that? Cause in that case I think we need to go to Leba to settle this problem."

[Storyteller (Brend)]

"I don't think we need to bother the boss with this. He has lady Vitress handle all the dusty tomb business, so she'll be the one to determine if the crystals are still good. Wait here."

The gran walks towards one of the communication stations in the wall, and quickly speaks a few sentences of huttese. Trigiel picks up little, though he hears the word 'Vitress' several times.

"Heh", he says to Trigiel, "They say she is already on her way here."

"So, anything else happen down there?", the gran asks after a few moments of awkward silence.

[Fecta Trigiel]

"Veni, Vidi arreptaque." Trigiel said. "I came, I saw and I grabbed.

I have no idea what else happened down there."

Trigiel played with the idea to mind trick them to go to Leba, he had that idea for a while now. So if he would do it: They walked to Leba, meet Vitress halfway there for sure, she would ask questions what we are doing, then she would stop them, and then she would... attack them? in a way more beneficial situation for me than her. I stay here, I can continue to talk them into going to Leba. Which will or will not work. Worst case we end up in a firefight. Wait that's not worst case.

So going has a higher probability of success, staying here is more interesting. Let's stay a little longer, maybe I find out something nice.

So Trigiel turned to his, currently not useful, translator "Hey Gar, anything else of importance what happened down there that they should know of?"

[Storyteller (Brend)]

"No boss, it is as you say: you came, you saw, and you grabbed.", replied Gar. And with that reply, an awkward silence started.

Gar did his best not to draw attention to himself, by making sure that he stayed a few steps away from anyone or anything. The gran wasn't a very talkative person to start with, and he was happy just keeping his eye on Trigiel.

During the silence, Trigiel feels another disturbance in the force much like the previous one, as if it were a second echo, this time coming from much closer by. The echo doesn't have a sense of darkness, but it is clearly something unnatural. As the echo rushes past him, the crystals in the crate start glowing brighter.

Nobody else seems to notice the increased glow; which is strange since there is enough light coming from them to lighten up the whole area in blueish hues...

((OOC: By the way, could you make a story page for this trial? That way it shows up in all the nice places.))

[Fecta Trigiel]

((OOC: Done))

This is what Trigiel hated about the force, it was never clear what it was trying to tell you, but always this double sided oracle thing which only in hindsight you could say 'oh that was what it meant. Since nobody seemed to notice the brighter glowing crystals, maybe it was something only he could see. Trigiel first checked if maybe the glowing crystals were in the ultra violet or infra red spectrum, which should not be the case since they were glowing blueish, not ultra-violetish.

Or maybe his force vision allowed him to see the force? And the crystals were emitting force? That would be stupid.

After a while, Trigiel decided to break the silence: "So, anything interested happened up here?"

[Storyteller (Brend)]

The gran remained silent while keeping an eye on Trigiel, clearly not interested in small talk.

After another minute one of the doors on the elevated walkway -- the same level where the guns were mounted -- opens to let in a small group of people. Trigiel immediately spots the roles of the people in the group. Based on the armor and weapons worn two of them were bounty hunters, and the third was the one they are protecting. The third person is a near-human woman wearing a dress that was more modest than Trigiel would have expected based on the Hutt's propensity for dancing girls. She wears her hair in two braided buns on the sides of her head.

The first thing Trigiel notices is that she seems to see the blue glow, as her eyes are immediately drawn to the glowing crystals. The woman, and he bodyguards, walk towards the stairs, and stop at the top of the stairs. The gran quickly walks towards them and says something in huttese from the bottom of the stairs. The woman looks at Trigiel for a moment, and then speaks in galactic basic.

"You there, droid.", she adresses Trigiel, "You are not the one I hired to carry the crystals to the ship. Would you mind explaining that?"

[Fecta Trigiel]

Well, this might finally get somewhere (fun) at last.

"You saw the odd crystals as well? Everybody here seem to ignore them somehow."

For a moment, Trigiel wanted to execute his plan and execute his prisoner here on the spot to punish him for attacking and to make a statement. However... he has been so nice... and somehow it wasn't as fun anymore as it would have been 30 minutes ago. Trigiel flinched for a spit-second as hit Teprogrenaian mind wanted to kill Gar, his Jedi mind wanted to spare Gar and his own mind didn't know any more.

But it didn't matter really did it? In a moment, everybody should start firing anyway, and than any statement he made would be pointless.

"I was asked to meet with Leba for business about the tomb down there, so I went for a look there. I didn't find anything interesting aside for a group of people loading in crates and wanting to blow up the temple. As I had business around the temple, I asked them to not blow up the temple. They refused so after settling our difference in opinion, I took the crystals as Leba is apparently interested in them. I hoped the crystals would get me to Leba in a civilised manner.

By the way, you have been mistaken. However since I try to do this in a civilised way, I will not get offended as so many cultures out there always seems to get for random reasons when you visit them."

Question to self: how many things can you say without actually telling something?

[Storyteller (Brend)]

The woman showed a hint of a smile.

"My apologies, I did not recognize you as a cyborg.", she walks down the stairs to stand on the hangar floor.

"It seems you do not speak huttese... With such a body, you must either be an Astrian or a Teprogrenaian. Given the lack of angular features I would hazard a guess that you are a Teprogrenaian. You're quite far from home, aren't you?"

As she talks Trigiel's ultra-violet sight allows him to spot three beams of ultra-violet light coming from her right eye. The beams seem to walk randomly over Trigiel's body as if scanning.

[Fecta Trigiel]

"Incredible, someone here with both education and good deductive skills. Maybe a little presumptuous for some cases but Yes I am Teprogrenaian. I believe Astrians are too attached to their pretty faces to give them up and go out there without one."

Trigiel thought of what kind of scanning technology would use ultra-violet and would be useful in a situation.

((Check: 14 = 7 Force Level + 4 Reason + 3 Mechanical Engineer -- Thinking of what scanning technology Vitress is using.))

[Storyteller (Brend)]

((OOC: Check approved.))

Trigiel knows a number of scanning methods that specifically use ultra-violet, but none of them are very helpful in this situation. After all, Trigiel was not a gas leak, nor a hyperdrive safety container, nor a restaurant kitchen that should be cleaned up to Unity City hygiene standards. So, the next most likely candidate is a broad-spectrum scan which might, depending on hardware and configuration, dip as low as the UV-band.

Vitress chuckled at Trigiel's remark about the Astrians, "It seems that being dull of body did not make you dull of mind."

"It's a pity that you went and get the job only half correct, Leba could use someone like you... What is your interest in the tomb? Or rather, on who's errand are you?"

"And why would Leba make time to speak with Teprogrenaian freelancer?"

[Fecta Trigiel]

"Believe me, when you get to know me you'll find that I am not dull in the slightest sense.

I could tell you who send me here, but than I have given nearly all the information you like to know, have I?

And Leba would make time to speak with me because first, I managed to get all the way to here and speak with you with only myself and a spaceship. If I can get this far, I can get further. It is not like I have done any serious effort so far. And second, I am going to speak with Leba, and if it isn't in a civilised manner, then it have to be uncivilised but I will try to avoid that. Although I will have to give up on some fun, I have to uphold some of my principles. I'm sure Leba prefers to speak with me when he makes time, instead of me making time for him.

By the way, second mistake. I wonder if you can find it again."

Having a normal conversation while playing a simple game of minds was oddly satisfying.

[Storyteller (Brend)]

Trigiel could see an expression of surprise creep into the woman's face. "Hagwa doopee, ap-xmasi keepuna. Boska.", she tells her guards in Huttese as she walks down the stairs.

"Oh my", she says as she steps onto the cargo bay floor and walks around the gran standing at the bottom of the stairs, "Have we progressed that far along the path already?"

She walks to within arm's reach of Trigiel and stops, looking at his one circular 'eye'.

"I would very much like for this encounter to go smoothly, and without uncivility. I can arrange for you to speak with Leba after we have concluded our transaction here."

She directs her attention to the gran, "Please, hand this man the credits for a job well done. And inform the captain of the other ship that the coordinates I told him about are to be bombarded until there is nothing but glass left."

Turning back to Trigiel she smiles at him. "It occurs to me that I have not been introduced. I am Vitress, who might you be?"

The goon with the credit box approaches Trigiel to hand him the credit box, while the gran walks towards the communcations console in the wall.

[Elmer]

((OOC: I'm not sure if you try to indicate that some nearby village would be obliterated by the bombardment. I remembered you saying something like that last week, but from your posts it doesn't really come forward.

As far I know, the closest settlement nearby is 120 km away, and from episode 4 I know that the orbit to surface canons are accurate enough to hit a small moisture farm. Even when the canons are not that accurate, it would miss with several kilometres, so according to Trigiel, everyone is pretty much save.))

[Storyteller (Brend)]

((OOC: OOCly I only conjectured that something like that might happen at some point during the mission. ICly, what is in the thread is all you know. If Trigiel had more information to base his conclusion on that you would not immediately have access to OOCly (such as a map with firing locations) I would have mentioned this in my last post to prevent OOC sneakery.

For utter clarity: Trigiel does not have enough information to be certain of the location is; though he can form an educated guess based on what he knows about the job the goons were about to do :P))

[Fecta Trigiel]

"PadwFecta Trigiel," Trigiel said, he almost automatically said 'padawan', but he refrained himself, sort off. "But you can call me Trigiel. I believe I am the only fecta around, and probably the only Trigiel so Trigiel would be just fine.

Nice to meet you Vitress." His lower two headflaps extended in a smile-like fashion.

When Trigiel received his payment, he checked the box for explosives. If he determined it was safe, he handed it over to Gar: "Here you are, as promised."

Then Trigiel turned back to Vitress: "I knew I could find some civilized people around here. If you could arrange a meeting, that would be greatly appreciated."

((Check: 17 = 7 Force Level + 5 Vision + 3 Mechanical Engineer + 2 Weapons Engineer -- Checking the box for explosives and other devices.))

[Storyteller (Brend)]

It seems Vitress is the only one that caught the first, quickly corrected, utterance of Trigiel. "Very well, Pfecta Trigiel, I will call you Trigiel.", she replied with a smile.

After Trigiel inspects the box, which is completely safe, Gar gladly accepts it. "Yes boss. I will put them in the ship immediately, boss.", he replies as he starts walking towards the space ship. Meanwhile, the gran is speaking some unintelligeble huttese into the communications panel.

"Let me just give these men some suggestions, and I will personally bring you to lord Leba.", Vitress replies. She quickly gives a few orders in huttese, prompting the men on the cargo floor to get the cargo droids in gear again to move the boxes of crystals out of the hangar.

Vitress turns back to Trigiel again. "Trigiel, shall we?"

((OOC: If you want to throw a figurative wrench in the works, now would be the time. Otherwise I'll go ahead and bring you to the next scene.))

[Fecta Trigiel]

"Just a moment, I am waiting for my... minion?.. Slave?.. Assistant? I don't know what to call him any more... I'm waiting for Gar.

Gar! hurry up will ya? You know I don't bite. I'm physically unable to."

((OOC: Ready to move on once poor Gar is with us))

[Storyteller (Brend)]

Vitress raises an eyebrow when Trigiel tells her he doesn't know how to call Gar. Gar himself does not at all look pleased that Trigiel expects him to come along. But, he gets out of the ship again and joins Trigiel.

As Vitress and Trigiel walk up the stairs, the two guards start walking in front of them. They busy themselves with opening doors for Vitress. Trigiel notes that, because the guards are walking in front of the two, Vitress is able to walk next to him without having to point the way all the time. After a walk of roughly seven minutes, interspersed with three elevator rides upwards, the group arrives at two large doors. Trigiel estimates that they were somewhere in the middle top regions of the ship, but he isn't exactly sure. He is confident that he can find his way back to the hangar, if need be.

As the large doors open, Trigiel hears rhytmic music, and the sound of many voices talking at a party. What he hears is quickly confirmed by what he sees: the next room seems to be a great party, with a lot of colourfully dressed people, a group of Bith musicians was responsible for the rhytmic music. Among the party-goers Trigiel spotted at least a dozen scantily clad women, mostly twi'lek, but a few humans as well. He recognized them as women that others might call attractive, though he certainly would not.

The party-goers were filling the large floor with happy banter, and even some dancing. On the other side of the room, on a heightened platform, Trigiel spots a smallish hutt. To the Hutt's left was another scantily clad woman, feeding him small insects from a bowl. The Hutt seems utterly content with the situation, not paying much attention to the world around him. However, not everyone seems to be in the party mood: the cyborg padawan spots six guards, four of which were clearly bounty-hunters, strategically standing near Leba, ready to take action.


When the doors are completely open, Vitress' guards step into the room and aside to stand at the sides of the door. The guests near the door quickly notice what's going on, and get out of the way for Vitress and Trigiel. Only a moment later, all the guests in the room were standing at the sides of the room, leaving a wide open area between the door and the Hutt.

The Hutt takes his time chewing on his last tasty insect. After he is done, he sits upright and looks at the newcomers to his party. He makes a simple arm gesture to motion Vitress in. She walks in and takes Trigiel with her.

"Lord Leba, this is the freelancer Trigiel. He wishes to speak with you about the tomb and has a business proposition.", she speaks in a deferential tone.

"Vitress, my sunshine.", Leba speaks basic with a distinct Hutt accent, "You know how I like profit. Tell me, freelancer, your business is profitable, yeeeees?" Trigiel notes from the tone of Leba's reply that he is very scared of Vitress, but tries to hide it -- badly.

[Fecta Trigiel]

Trigiel casually looked around a little when he entered the room. 'Woohoo', went his mind, 'I'm finally in the belly of the beast'. He looked at the insect Leba was eating and wondered what it tasted like. Probably rather good at the sight of it, although he didn't had any use for it since he didn't eat for quite some years now. Then when he saw all the extra guards 'ahw crap, I'm actually in the belly of the beast'. He checked if he was not standing on some sort of trap-door, somehow he thought that to be very fitting for this situation, even though he was in a star destroyer.

"First let me say that I am happily surprised with your ability to speak galactic basic very well, and let me commend you on your great skills." The last part came out a little more exaggerated than initially intended, but then again, Trigiel wasn't really the socially smooth talker.

"Yes, my proposal is indeed very profitable. As you see, the Jedi order of the Union has shown great interest in the tomb and wishes to speak to you about it in great detail. I would therefore like to invite you to come to Unity city to discuss this matter with the Masters of the Jedi order. This gives you this the unique option to have a one-o-one talk with the masters."

[Storyteller (Brend)]

Leba seemed genuinly pleased with the remark about his galactic basic. The hutt's smile grew when Trigiel told him the proposal would be very profitable indeed. In fact, the hutt seemed to be relieved that this was going all kinds of right, and was looking forward to big heaps of credits. Credits he would definitely put to good use getting more tasty insects and pretty ladies. He was thinking of all the things he was planning on doing with loads of credits, and his smile was one of utter happiness. Until Trigiel said the word 'Jedi' in his next sentence!

"Jediii? Bargon wan chee kospah!", the hutt rudely interrupted Trigiel with a loud shout. Immediately after the shout all eight guards in the room grab their weapons and train them on Trigiel. "Yanee dah poo noo Jedi.", the Hutt continued in a calculating voice.

The situation gets tense quickly as they aim several high-impact rifles at Trigiel. Trigiel, being extremely aware of the situation in a way only a Jedi can be, noticed two strange things. One, Vitress did not seem at all surprised, or even very nervous, despite standing in the middle of the room next to Trigiel. Two, Trigiel spots four red dots hovering on his body, all near where his brain is actually located instead of more expected places like his 'head'.

"Boss, he is very clear that Jedi are bad for business, and that there won't be a deal.", Gar helpfully adds to the situation, "Maybe we should go, no?" -- it appears that Gar would rather not be here right now.