"Ze last one in ze main Deck, I hope" Fixer said by radio, unaware of the irony Krus had detected in their current situation. "Now we need zzomeone to reach de Ion Cannons and man zem. Zere's at leazzt one VT-49 out zere, and ve ar going to need much bigger zzhit to take those down"

While waiting for another answer, Fixer glanced at the "prisoner" he had tied up into one of the cabin's seats. And wondered he would probably have to kill him.

Unless he proves useful, somehow....

Jacque let out a heavy sigh, partially in response to Gavon's question, and partially in response to the fact that the two mystery men seemed to be willing to comply with his orders for the time being. This was simply not his day: down two crew members, barreling through space with the first order on his ass, and with two mystery men on his vessel, one of which continually gave a strong impression of being a ticking time bomb. As he ascended to the upper deck Jacque felt a headache coming on, likely from the fact that he was coming down from the adrenaline high he'd received during the escape. Said headache reached a new peak as halfway up he heard Fixer over the radio make mention of a VT-49 of all things lurking about.

"You've got to be shitting me, if I wanted to get fucked this hard I would've stayed in jail..." He ground out as he picked up his pace. Once topside Jacque found himself "treated" to the scent of charred flesh, the source of which was discovered after a brief moment of cautious creeping. Another body stepped over, another sigh of annoyance. Making fairly decent time, Jacque managed to catch up to Kruss, whom he was still eighty percent certain was jumpy enough to turn around and shoot him should he approach too suddenly. The human cleared his throat to try to catch Kruss' attention before he actually spoke, "Nice to see you're out of your room Kruss. We need to talk after we deal with whatever the hell's happening.".

Rear-Admiral Atalon was standing in front of the large Cockpit windows of his VT-49 Decimator ‘Dauntless’ awaiting the update on the Milano’s position. The asteroid field was clearing up, and together with the info that was relayed from one of the outlying nodes of the monitoring station about safe transport routes the Milano should be passing by them in 3 minutes. Atalon had taken up position behind an asteroid now to avoid scans and get the drop on the Milano as they exited the field.

He had ordered the Sigeil’s Decimator ‘Relentless’ to take up position inside the asteroid field. But Atalon knew his plan was flawed. If the TIE’s hadn’t done enough damage to the engines or navigation the ship should be able to make it out of there with a pre-plotted jump. Atalon grinned and mumbled a ‘everything as planned’ under his breath as the newest report of the Milano’s position was coming in. The failure to capture this ship wouldn’t be his, but that of that bitch in command of the monitoring station. She had slipped up a couple of times already and was eager to prove herself, she just wasn’t commanding material Atalon thought. Hadn’t he been in the Imperial Navy before everything fell apart. She was just an upshot from the academy, pops had probably arranged this for her. He had tried guiding her, but she wouldn’t have it the little- let’s not go there. Atalon unclenched the fist he had unconsciously formed. Everything is working out now. Soon she would have to be replaced and Atalon knew he was next in line for command. Finally.

_{A collab with @POOHEAD189}
__________________

“Well, it’s not home, but it’ll work for now I suppose until the good Captain makes a better decision…” He smirked, fairly confident that behind the hard durasteel and plastoid reinforced helmet, the soldier sitting across from him shared the sentiment. “And who knows, we may both get what we want after all is said and done.”

After a quick survey of the soldier’s armor, he surmised that the individual may be of Mandalorian heritage, as the design shared a lot of similarities. Of course, he could be just about anyone and have very well stolen and/or modified it to his liking. Stranger things have occurred in the Agent’s experience. A series of beeps sounded on his datapad, indicating a message from the probe droid that was currently scanning around the large crate guarded by the armored man. Gavon rubbed his chin, appearing to be thinking about something for a moment, before he returned his attention to the soldier across from him.

“Well, the good news is that there doesn’t appear to be anything immediately dangerous about your parcel. The bad news, however, my sensors can’t penetrate whatever is actually housed inside, so it pretty much brings me back to square one…”

Sol'id glanced at Gavon's way, his helmet moving by the slightest bit as the agent finished speaking. There was no doubt in Sol'id's mind that he would accomplish his mission. He merely didn't know if he would need to kill more people to do it. But in the end, he always got the job done. It was why wealthy people and high ranking officials hired him, after all. He decided he would humor this man and speak. He seemed like a talker, or someone who wanted to get information out of the Mandalorian. Either way, he decided he'd give in for the moment.

"And what is it that you want?" he asked.

"It's not so much what I 'want', but moreso what's best for everyone, and that is the safety of this vessel and it's crew." The Agent responded in a matter-of-fact tone, understanding that this particular soldier didn't care much for pleasantries. "We're all here for our own reasons, no doubt, and even though my stay was not intended to be long-term, it appears things have changed, all things considered."

Gavon lean against one of the bulkheads, and crossed his arms. "So, the question still remains. Do you even know whats in that box you're sitting on?"

"No." Sol'id said simply. He let his word hang in the air for a few moments. "Nor do I care. As long as I am paid for its transportation." The mercenary leaned forward, setting his rifle down and rested his forearms on his legs. "If it was a bomb meant to harm us, it would have gone off by now, as I had said. Knowing the Maanan, it's probably some new machine used to help their biosphere or clean the oceans they dwell in. And knowing the Maanan, it will probably be futile in the end."

The Agent thought for a moment. "Fair enough. Let's hope for your sake that the credits are worth it" He said, nodding his head in the soldier's direction, and staring back down the low lit corridor where Captain Jacques was previously seen. "It would be nice, however, to know where this ship is going..."

"Man the ion cannons? No, no, no, we should just try to make a hyperspace jump as soon as we can. Besides, our next customer is already waiting."

The Neimoidian had a look around the cockpit, before continuing.

"How do we know if our crew is still intact? Have you scanned the ship for life forms already?"

Standing just inside of the cockpit's doorway, Jacque rubbed his temples to try and stem his headache after hearing Kruss' suggestion. The neimodian had a good head on his shoulders, but sometimes that cautious streak could be the devil to deal with. The mention of the crew members forced from the human a small sigh, "There's a chance that they'll either blow us apart when they realize what's up or follow after us. Best to at least leave them in a position not to do either. As far as the crew are concerned, Marka and Viik are still at that station, i've no idea what the hell happened with Alexnick, and there are two unknown men that i've got sitting in our cargo hold. On of them claims to be watching something for a previous employer and the other claims to be part of the crew. All I know is that I have no idea who the hell either of them are, but if it's true then I sure as hell don't recall being there for either of their introductions. But we'll chat more on that bit later Kruss." He said somewhat sharply as he entered and slid into the seat that housed the controls for the ion cannon.

With the flip of a few switches the ion cannon slowly roared to life, sending a faint humming sound throughout the cockpit as it powered up. Jacque's hand hovered over the control panel, fingers lightly brushing the button that he noticed had the word "FIRE" crudely scribbled on it in what he assumed was a marker, 'Really, Marka? This is what you did in your spare time while you where in here?' he couldn't help but muse. Jacque's eyes flitted up to the small screen above the panel, waiting for any sort of indication that the Decimator was near. In that moment a thought occurred to Jacque; It was good to leave the enemy ship in a bad way, yes, but it would better to also have the ship at least ready for a jump. He snapped his fingers a few times to get his crew mate's attention, "Fixer? Prep us for a hyperspace jump so we're not just here holding our collective dicks when things pop off. I know a place a few systems over where we should be able to lay low for a bit. The coordinates are...".

‘Roger rogzer’

Fixer followed the instructions of Jacque and pre-plotted the hyperspace co-ordinates. In the meanwhile he transferred power to the engines and forward shield, so that they could bust trough and leave the battle before it even started. With rumbling engines the Milano ploughed on until the comms came to life again:

‘Vzee-Tzee FFFortzynein-nein-nein-NEIN coming up on our ports-zeit’

---

On the bridge of the Dauntless a warning of similar contents was brought in an entirely different form.

‘The Milano is approaching on the expected vector sir.’

Rear-Admiral Atalon didn’t hesitate and gave the orders he had intended:

‘Let the Relentless to engage. Fly us into their path.’

Again he grinned at his plan, that he wanted them to escape didn’t mean he could just let them go.

‘time to put on a convincing show’

He murmered to himself as the Relentless’ quad laser cannons started peppering the frontal shield of the Milano that was almost clear of the asteroid field.

Fixer sighed. And decided at that moment he needed to acquire two droids to make the organics work during crisis. Without the Ion cannon's help, all that he had left was the frontal las-canons and the remaining concussion missiles. Accelerating at max speed, he saw the shields being hammered by the imperial ship. Maneouvering as fast as the digital interface allowed him, he tried to approach the "Relentless" without being such a good target. The Imp was trying to cut their way out. Good luck with that.

The las-cannon answered the quad-weapons, firing to the verge of over-heating. In what seemed like a desperate attemp, he fired another concussion missile. Reliying in his ship's strength, the imperial kept his steer. Too late did it's captain realized Fixer was not modifying his own. And both ships frontal shields were at VERY low levels. Without orders, the imperial pilot dodged the ramming "Milano".

- "Yiiiiiiiheeeeei, Zzzuckers! Eat my Vvaktoid rrust!"

After the maneouver, Fixer had the imps at his six, were the rear shield was now far stronger than the front.

- "Grretting Ggready das Hyperspace jump im die nexte Zehn, nine, acht, siebben..."

The Milano rushed onwards as expected and Rear-Admiral Atalon was even somewhat impressed by their gusto as they had to do a last second dive to avoid being rammed by the larger vessel. A few volleys scarred both ships with black marks along the hull. Than all lights suddenly stopped flashing as the Milano disappeared into hyperspace. Calm and quiet again. Atalon took a deep sigh as he looked towards Pressy’s Tumble.

Switching on the auto-pilot, Fixer un-plugged himself from the ship's computer and, for one instant, he was so inmobile, he seemed to be disconnected. Though he had a much better droid brain than his former Baktoid machine, from time to time he still had one or two problems assimilating great ammounts of information. And a LOT had just happened.

"Iff you exxkuse mee, I'll find ein spot für our imperial gäst. Maybe vie kann leaff him somvere instead of being held responsible of anoder human de-aktivation. Once I haf him resttrained, I'll check the enginez and the cables onze again: somzing can've burned." He said leaving the pilot seat and un-tangling and searching the yet unconscious imperial officer.

"By ze vay: vat direktion isst in koordinates Vzee-Tzee FFFortzynein-nein-nein-nein? Hope it iss nott ander ball of zzand"

Jacque's grip on the ion cannon's controls loosened as the ship jumped into hyper space. He let out a small sigh and rubbed the back of his neck, thankful for the fact that the ship's other defenses and Fixer's bold move were enough to get everyone out in one piece. Though he'd never admit it to the crew, he was even more thankful for the fact that he hadn't actually had to fire on the vessel. Though he was no stranger to conflict, the smuggler disliked having to take a life unless it was absolutely necessary. The still unconscious and bound Tr'an Dasheer was a testament to that fact. Fixer's question tore Jacque away from his thoughts, bringing his gaze away from the screen and unto the droid that had asked him. "There's this little forest planet called Bergen's Haven that I used to stop at pretty regularly when I was a solo act. Serves as a sort of resupply station for folks in our line of work, largely uninhabited. Smugglers and the like all abide by a sort of truce there, so we can lay low for a bit without much trouble while we figure out our next step."

"Zzounds like somplace full of trees. Ich hate treees." Fixer added before proceeding to the back with the prisoner. After carefully considering, he decided to take an extreme, yet practical choice: striping most of the prisoner's clothes and lock him in one of the rear bathrooms: that way they wouldn't need to dedicate a man to watch him everytime he feel the need to evacuate toxines. With the inner controls properly de-activated there should be no problem in keeping an ex-armed security guard quiet.

Next, he headed towards the main cable box: "I zzwear if all dese rruckuzz haz burned more dan half a metre of optik fibre, Im going to kommitt zzecond degree MURDER"

“Sir, I would suggest you brace yourself, as it appears the Milano is on a collision course with a much larger Imperial-class warship.”

E-V’s voice suddenly suddenly chimed into Gavon’s earpiece, catching him slightly off guard while his focus had been elsewhere. Enforcer One was still in tow, albeit cloaked the Agent assumed, so the likelihood of his ship being detected or targeted was less than probable. A moment later, the ship rocked violently, and the Agent had to grab hold of a small bar along a nearby bulkhead to keep himself steadied. He gazed over at his new armored friend still sitting atop the precious cargo he swore to protect, and couldn’t help but grin at the soldier’s lack of concern and movement. A “red alert” status flashed along the wall and down the long stretch of corridor outside the cargo area, followed by intermittent siren pulses. The ship itself felt as though it were doing everything it could to evade the situation, yet he wondered who or what was after the Milano, and why they would want to destroy it and it’s crew.

“Sir, the Milano is powering up for a hypersp-”

E-V’s calm & level droid modulator cut off to a crackle of static in Gavon’s ear as a sudden shift in air pressure, pitch, and direction acknowledge what she was trying to tell him. The Milano had made a last minute jump to lightspeed, most likely as the only course of action to remove the threat of being blown apart in space by the unknown assailant, and yet where it was headed, Gavon had no idea. The jump, however, shouldn’t have come as a complete surprise considering the original crew were made up of smugglers and outlaws who were potentially aware of more lesser known hyperspace routes that could guarantee a quick escape.

Either way, he’d hoped that his ship was still in pursuit and the tracking modules attached to the outer hull were doing their job. He quickly keyed in a message to the communicator aboard his ship, in hopes that E-V could relay and respond, and within a few seconds she did indeed send a message of acknowledgement and that Enforcer One was able to clone the the jump coordinates based on the data from the tracking modules.

Kudos to out-dated Imperial technology… The Agent mused, as he felt the ship leveling out a bit and turned his attention toward So’lid.

“Well, as much as I adore your company, I think it’s time to find out what’s going on. So you can stay down here and wait for something to happen or we can both be a bit more proactive in this unusual situation...”

@POOHEAD189

They're still at it, still trying to rebuild that old thing... They're petty, but they're not petty enough to target the odd criminal, and that's not meant for me... I really need to find out what's in these cylinders. An old man speculates tiredly from behind a telescope, looking into the evening sky at a slumbering monster. A sharp ping emits from a device nearby, a small cylinder sits in a larger glass cylinder, the said cylinder is the main support for a black tube and a monitor that pings another two times before the old man can get his finger on the examine pop-up.

Let's hope it ain't a weather forcast for Corellia again, or meteorlogical reports on Hoth... thank you First Order for your nice present of a... Oh goodness it's a home delivery to next door. The Old man muses, his wit turns to pure dread at it's location, a bunker yonder upon a cliff shines into view. What the hell is going on here? An order like that and a... maybe a drink'll waken me up a little. He again speculates, after his little drink he reviews the order for the bunker, again and again it tells it's same order...

The metaphorical Phenylpropanolamine and Amantadine run through the codger's noggin... Welcome back, Kyle.

The ship rocking back and forth, going from being pursued to rocketing through hyperspace, Sol'id sat just the same. Unmoving and uncompromising as the cargo he sat upon, and the cargo would stay that way until their destination. Which was where they had better be heading next. In fact, in most situations he would have stayed put and guarded no matter what jest or little remark this Gavon told him. But he admitted that he needed to go up and speak to the Captain as well. He needed to make sure his cargo was going where it needed to.

"Very well. Let's have a chat with this Captain you seem to know so well." Sol'id said, his voice reverberating through his armored helm. He knew Gavon wasn't exactly who he or the captain said he was, judging from the conversation he had with the man before this Jacque showed up, but as long as he didn't provide Sol'id with trouble, he didn't mind if he breathed awhile longer. He stood up to his full height, took another glance back at the cargo, and headed out with Gavon.
@Rawk

"Hey, could be worse Fixer; We could be going to an aquatic planet. A hot, humid, rust inducing aquatic planet." Jacque pointed out with a subtle hint of mirth tinging his voice. The human leaned back in his chair and stretched, craning his head this way and that in an attempt to alleviate the tension that had built up in his neck. "Well, we should be safe to switch on the autopilot for now if that's what you want to do Fixer; just be sure to keep those coordinates locked in. More than anything, right now i'd like to find out what's been damaged inside the ship now before it becomes a problem later.". With the way things had thus far gone today, Jacque honestly couldn't say that he'd be surprised if something important was damaged. All he could do was hope that the Milano would make it to Bergen's Haven without any further incident. There at least he knew he'd be able to breathe a bit easy. The truce between the competition on site would mean that he and the others could trade, refuel, and resupply without having to constantly look over their shoulders.

Sending a short-code message via, his wrist datapad, to E-V advising her that he was “on the move” took only a few moments, and he quickly switched over to the probe droid controls sending them ahead to recon the long corridor. Gavon wasn’t completely surprised by the fact that the armored soldier was more keen on tagging along with him than sitting around in a dank, dusty cargo hold watching a parcel of unknown content that may or may not be worth it.

This wasn’t the first time he’d had to work with mercenaries or paramilitary personnel out of necessity, nor did he think it would be the last. Since the fall of the Empire and the rise of the First Order, a galaxy of expendable mercs seemed to be plentiful but at the same time dangerously unpredictable. The Agent didn’t trust him in the slightest of course, but he also recognized an honor that wouldn’t cause the soldier to stab him in the back without good reason. Either way, neither of them was doing any good standing around, so onward they went down the very spine of the ship toward the bow, stepping over a handful of storm trooper corpses and durasteel fragments along the way.

"I KAN operate unter vvvater, you know? It's jst trees ar full ekosystems, full of... vermin! Little, undetectable insekts that get through holes and laid ffformicid acid üver zee CPU... no vonder zey ar ze only livving being vhose exxtermination mit poisonous sprayzz iz univerzzally authorized."

Meanwhile, The droid reached the inferior floor of the ship, jumping from terminal to pannel, looking for diagnostics and damage reports. "It zeems zat ze bomming haz burn MORE cables, vut ze Hypermottor ist Intakt. I'm going to repplace zem mit cables fromm non-essential systems, vhich meanz, zzadly, ze Juke-box is out of Kuestion till wie reach a propper hardvare ztore"

And then, he jumped on So'lid and Gavon: "Ehhhh... G-goozevening gentlemen...(Kaptinnn, was did you said'bout ze zekond floor and... die passengers?)"

The sound of metal clanging around and powered servos pulsating could be heard up ahead, but it was unclear whether the source came from some mechanical function of the ship or perhaps a droid. Gavon’s own probe droids had been scanning for life signs as their primary protocol, which may have explained why the anomaly wasn’t picked up right away. Just then a synthesized voice echoed from inside a room a few meters ahead of their position, with an unusual accent that made it difficult to understand much of anything it was saying. Gavon drew one of his blasters, and assumed So’lid would be doing the same, as they both continued toward the sounds. The digitized chatter suddenly ceased and a droid emerged from through the doorway, meeting both of them with blasters pointed directly at it’s narrow-shaped metal head, apparently caught unaware by their presence.

Gavon was surprised by what he saw however, as it was infact a droid, but rather an outdated and -from what he understood during his time with Imperial Intelligence- decommissioned model at that. The old B-1 Battle Droid series that were used during the Clone Wars had been shut down and scrapped per the newly self-elected Emperor Palpatine, essentially ending the war with the CIS and allowing the rise of the Galactic Empire. Although, it wasn’t highly unusual that a few of them still existed considering the sheer number that were manufactured during that time, he wondered if they still retained their memories from the Clone War era or had them wiped prior to being rebooted.

“Hello there yourself” The Agent stated plainly, keeping his blaster poised and steady at the droid. “My friend and I would like to know where we are headed. Do you think you could help us with that?”

@Sleater
@POOHEAD189

Well, no use moping around, I'm still alive and the runway's clear... Shame they're still out there, probably ready to shoot anything that flew despite weather I managed to cobble something together or not. Kyle mumbles as he perks himself up by looking at the many data cylinders around, all waiting to divulge many secrets of the Repblic and the First Order... Just seeing those perk Kyle up enough to begin preparing a rather hearty roast dinner all made from local animals and plants Kyle jumped when trying to explore, within a reasonably short time of waiting the dinner is ready for Kyle, which goes down in an average time outside of fifteen minutes.

I didn't think I would've tasted a nice roast dinner for a while... Might want to go out hunting if even the plant's decent. No better place to live out your days then in a place known for making meals quickly really I guess, can't do much else really except for look out and enjoy the forced holiday. Kyle contemplates outside; a deck chair stands beside a small side-table with the remains of a recently eaten roast dinner, both the man and the furniture facing a beautiful clearing with the ominous reminders lurking off to the side as the sun stands at the top of the valley below... A haunting yet peaceful view brimming with beauty is a second feast and the nearest equivalent of wine act as a marvellous serving to Kyle's senses.