Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ankh-Morpork Guard" data-source="post: 3051601" data-attributes="member: 10079">Chapter 397: Two Steps BackThe stunned silence that hung in the small room where Jyren, Rea, Loro, and the currently-unnamed human woman sat was most definitely not a comfortable one. Rea and Loro were completely lost, wondering if Jyren was even more out of his mind than they’re originally thought...and the woman...she was...unreadable. In fact, so was Jyren. That was the most unsettling part about the entire time after he’d gone quiet.    But eventually, it went away, when the woman said quietly, “You’re Jedi.”    “No,” Jyren’s voice was just as firm as before, a trick he’d picked up after being around Tobias so long. It worked extremely well with...well...anything, “But we found the trail you left behind, and now we’re here. What is going on here?”    There was another silence, but this one didn’t last nearly as long. It seemed as if she was going through the last few motions of trying to understand if she really could trust any of them. However, something definitely won out, as her shoulders slumped slightly and she said in the same quiet voice as before, “The Vong found something nearby. A system or something like that. The Peace Brigade had some kind of records of whatever it was, but it was destroyed in the raid.”    “What about the dead Vong?” Jyren asked, adopting a more helpful tone and doing his best to exude a sense of calm through the Force, “What was a Yuuzhan Vong doing here?”    “I...I’m not really sure...” she mumbled, sighing and shaking her head. While the woman was definitely the age that Jyren should have been(he tried not to think about that too much, as it had a way of causing headaches), Jyren couldn’t help thinking of her as much younger. But maybe that was mostly his fault, and so he tried not to push too hard as she trailed off, simply trying a helpful nudge through the Force. After a bit, she shrugged and looked to the other two in the room, “They have to know about the libraries here...about all the information. Maybe...maybe the Vong was here to find more information?”    It was a fairly logical thought...but rarely did logic dictate Vong actions, and so, it was bothering Jyren greatly, “What is your name?”    The sudden change had a way of shaking things up...but Jyren had meant it to alleviate tension and get as much information as he could. Something here was very wrong, he could feel it. He was sure of it. After quickly recovering from the sudden change, she managed an answer, “Venda.”    Jyren nodded, and motioned to the two very-confused pilots with him, “This is Rea and Loro. My name is Jyren. We’re a part of Starfighter Command and we arrived just a matter of hours ago with the defense fleet...we aren’t here to get in the way of any Jedi business. We just want to help...the same as you.”    “Starfighter Command?” Venda mumble, obviously going over it herself, before giving him a confused look, “But you’re a—“    ”I’m a pilot,” he cut her off quickly, not wanting her to even suggest the next part and, honestly, knowing it wasn’t necessary. He was a pilot. And that was all that was important. But, while she obviously didn’t accept that completely, Venda held back anything else, allowing Jyren to push back to the first subject, “You know more about what was going on here, Venda...don’t you? You wouldn’t have left a trail here if you didn’t have something to tell that you didn’t want broadcasted across the Holonet. I know we aren’t who or what you expected, but we can help...we need to know what you found out.”    The woman let out another sigh but this one was coupled with the slightest of nods. She took a few moments in which Jyren could feel she was putting together a lot of chaos in her mind, and then, looked up again and spoke in a much calmer voice, “I infiltrated the Peace Brigade cell...that’s why I was there during the raid. It was hard enough getting in, considering they kill Jedi on sight. But I earned their trust, and I was able to keep just on the edge enough to stay out of view of the Vong. They’re just puppets of the Vong...they don’t realize it...or maybe they do and they simply don’t care, but the Vong are using them.”    She paused a moment, letting the information sink in. While it was suspected that there was a deeper connection than just sympathizers, a true, deep connection between the Peace Brigade and the Yuuzhan Vong was a dangerous thought that had remained in the world of people with unfocused imaginations.    “The Shaper...” Venda paused a moment and shook her head, “The Vong arrived two local days ago to coordinate some kind of information gathering. She was a Shaper...whatever that means. Her Basic was sketchy, but I was able to listen in on her orders to the leaders of the cell. She was looking for information in the Great Library here...information on a planet or a system or something like that near the Imperial Remnant. The only details she expressed was something about a scout group finding evidence of a large power in the Unknown Regions,” she shrugged and shook her head, “Obviously, there’s nothing in any kind of detail about the Unknown Regions. If there was, they wouldn’t be unknown. So that’s all I know.”There was something in that which was causing Jyren’s stomach to turn. The uneasiness was growing considerably, and he still couldn’t pinpoint why. Quickly, he scrambled into a pocket in his jacket and produced a datapad, as he was bringing up some information, he said quickly, “If I can bring up a map of the galaxy can you show me where?”    Venda nodded, leaning forward to try to look at the datapad, “I think so. The Shaper spent a lot of time looking at maps while she was here. I managed to get a glimpse or two of where she was looking.”    In the time it took for all of that to be said, Jyren was able to bring up a rather crude holo of the galaxy on his datapad. The Core Worlds were green, the Mid Rim blue, and the Outer Rim orange. He tilted it down so that the Jedi woman could see it more clearly, and then waited. When she placed a finger on the screen to indicate the location, Jyren felt his heart skip a beat.    Nearly snatching it back to look more carefully, and putting the pieces together, himself, his head shot up and he couldn’t help the sudden hint of panic that shot across his face, “You’re sure?”    “I think so,” she said, trailing off and then asking, “What’s wrong? You feel...terrified.”    “Are you alright, Captain?” Loro spoke up from his side, leaning in to get a look at the map, himself, but having no trouble seeing the distress on Jyren’s face.    Rea was doing the same on the other side of him, leaning in and asking, “What’s there?”    Jyren’s mouth opened and closed a few times as he tried to find a way to dig himself out of this. But there wasn’t a way. Now, not only did both Rea and Loro have a lot of suspicions about Jyren, but this Jedi here was also able to see his reaction to where she’d pointed...where nothing should have been, but everything was. And to make it all the worse, the Vong knew where the Gate was...they could get to Alraxia...they even sounded interested in it...    A beep from his belt caused Jyren to jump just slightly. He immediately dropped the datapad onto the floor and grabbed the comlink, switching it on and asking a little too quickly, “What?!”    The voice that came back was that of Rulae Nok, “Captain, we need you three back up here now. A large Yuuzhan Vong force has just arrived in the system.”    And now that.    “We’re on our way,” Jyren got to his feet immediately, pocketing the comlink and ignoring the datapad on the ground. Rea and Loro got up just as quickly, still concerned about Jyren but knowing where they needed to be. Even Venda got to her feet, heading for the lightsaber that was a ‘decoration’ on a side table as the other three quickly headed for the exit.    Jyren stopped as the other two headed out into the street and turned to face the woman, “I need you to come with me.”    She had just finished hooking the lightsaber to her belt when she reached him. Of course, she had to ignore that and say something else entirely, “They don’t know you’re a Jedi, do they?”    “I’m not a Jedi,” he said firmly, not wanting to get into this again, “And they don’t even need to hear you suggest that. Do you understand?”    Venda just shook her head, “You bury yourself like no one I’ve ever encountered.”    He tried to ignore that, and instead asked, “Are you coming or not?”    “Lead the way.”    He did.    But when they exited the small building to meet Rea and Loro in the street, they were greeted by the two of them staring up into the sky. Of course, that meant both Jyren and Venda’s heads went up, too.    “I think they arrived in system earlier than just now,” Rea mumbled.    The usually clear sky of Obroa-Skai was pocketed with asteroid-like objects careening down. Red and green turbolaser fire could be seen arcing up towards the rocks, but nearly all of it was absorbed by the dovin basals aboard each of the Vong ships.    The Mon Calamari looked to Jyren first, “Its not going to be easy to get up there in a shuttle craft with the Vong already landing.”    If the Vong were already landing, the planet was already lost.    But Jyren didn’t say that.    Instead, he looked to the others, then said simply, “Then it won’t be easy.”    And then he broke into a spring towards the docking port, with the three others right behind.</blockquote>

Verification