Chapter 3: Archaic

[Chickenman 9]

"Don't blow the power, just turn it off, make it look like a glitch." He looked around. "Hmm. That wall, opposite the fence. There's a couple of crates below it that you can use to climb into the facility. Think you can make the jump?"

Edited September 21, 2008 by Chickenman

[Bad furday 57]

"What a scoundrel!" laughed Jya, taking Jaim's proffered hand. She gracefully disembarked from the speeder.

The pair of them began towards the main house.

* * * *

Arlan checked both viewscreens before merging into a new lane of traffic.

"Still no sign of that Mando, but I wouldn't bet against him pursuing us!" said Aston, who turned around in the passenger seat.

For the past ten minutes, the pair of them had tried their best to blend in with local traffic. Arlan had slowed his speed to looking

like an elderly couple on their way to a pancake cafe.

Aston had kept a look out, constantly scanning the skies for something that was moving faster than the nearby traffic.

"You know," mused Arlan, as he slowed and came to a stop. Something was disrupting traffic ahead of them. "perhaps we should

ditch this speeder, and take public transport back until we're close enough to Brier's. We could walk the rest of the way. I think that if

that Mando's got a camera thingy inside his helmet, he'll be on the lookout for all craft matching this one's description!"

[Princess 35]

Nima thought for a minute. "It was his ego. I appealed to his ego, he figured that the pheremones couldn't affect him because he's a tough guy. It stroked his male ego to have me around. He needs to feel important."

[Radioactive Isotope 29]

Atuarre snorted in amusement. "Can I make the jump?" She backed away a few paces, crouched for a running start, and easily sailed over the fence. After landing silently, she tossed a wave to Aeric and Szen.

Now for the actual hard part. She headed for the crates Aeric had spotted and scrambled deftly up the shadowed side. The window ledge was still too high for her to reach standing at her full two meters, but not too high to jump. Unfortunately, the window was securely locked and composed of thick transparisteel. Her voice crackled over the comm. "Bad news, boss. They don't seem to want company. This may not be as subtle as we'd hoped."

Edited September 21, 2008 by Radioactive Isotope

[Chickenman 9]

Aeric squinted to see what she was having trouble with. To his dismay he realized that that window could be tied to an alarm. He'd already taken unnecessary risks today, and it had almost gotten his people killed. But if it brought him one iota to closer to finding Layla...

"Break the window. We'll cover you if there's an alarm."

[Radioactive Isotope 29]

"I like the way you think." She carefully pulled her rifle from her backpack and slammed the butt end into the window with all her might. The window wasn't going down easily, but after the third strike, it finally shattered. Atuarre quickly ducked into the shadows again, ready to yank any investigators out of the broken window, but after a few moments no alarm sounded and no one came. She breathed a sigh of relief and slipped into the building.

Her eyes quickly adjusted to the dim light and she could make out various control panels, all blinking status updates. How convienent, she thought. It seemed too easy, but she hit the power switch to kill the electric fence and started to give Aeric the all-clear. It was then she noticed a red light flickering incessantly. After a closer look, a low, angry growl started low in her throat. "Sithspit...better move, guys. Looks like a silent alarm." She quickly retreated into as much cover as she could find and trained her rifle on the door.

[Chickenman 9]

"Sithspit!" Aeric muttered. Clenching his teeth, he dug through his gear, grabbed the EMP grenade he had been holding in reserve, and bounced it against the fence. It exploded, nulling the power to the fence, and Aeric immediately set to work on the fence with a pair of vibro-cutters.

He had just about finished cutting through the fence when Szen fired her blaster pistol over his shoulder. Aeric glanced up to watch a guard, whose rifle had been trained on Aeric, fall without a sound.

"Thanks," Aeric said, kicking in the hole he had cut. "Let the games begin."

[Drake 53]

Time seems to drag on forever when you're in pain.

It had really only been a dozen or so minutes since his last beating at the hands of the Mando who took Layla. Once the Archaic guards had taken him to his cell, they had apparently decided that they were bored and did something about it in the form of laying into their restrained and pre-beaten prisoner.

However, Takeshi wasn't paying it a whole lot of attention. Sure it hurt. It hurt a lot. He could taste the blood in his mouth and feel the bruising around his ribs. One may end up cracked or worse if the guards didn't get bored again soon. Regardless, Tak was focusing away from the pain and towards a couple important life lessons.

The first was that pain was an enemy to be fought. That was a lesson from his father. Falco Skirata had instilled in Tak, from an early age, that pain was something you could fight. It could never be defeated. However, it could be subdued, contained, even controlled. "If you let pain control you, then it will overwhelm you and you will fall," his father had told him after a particularly painful loss in a sparring match against an older boy. "But if you control your pain, then you will laugh in the faces of your enemies and they will tremble."

Tak just about laughed out loud at the thought but that would have only made the guards angry and prolong his beatings. Sometimes those lessons were open to interpretation per the situation.

So, while the pain washed through him, still as agonizing as always but not to the point of distraction, Tak thought about a second lesson.

"A prison is just a box to be opened. All you need to know is how to open it." That had been from Aylyn Seldar, a Bothan spy, escape artist and trainer for Republic black ops agents. She had taught a most valuable lesson in getting free of restraints and through locked doors. There were few personal restraining devices that could have held Aylyn for long. Sadly, though, Tak didn't take after his trainer. He had done well enough to get by but that didn't mean he was a master of the craft.

At last the guards gave up. They left but not before slapping him into a pair of stun-cuffs and locking the door. Once they were gone, Tak sat up.

Stuncuffs, he thought. These guys must be new.

As he slowly but surely worked on deactivating the cuffs, Tak noted that, thankfully, his ribs hadn't been broken. He would probably have a nice dull aching sensation throughout his body for a couple weeks, even after the bacta. That's if he made it out of there.

[Radioactive Isotope 29]

Atuarre could hear the guards coming down the hall. Their attempt at stealth was wasted with her superior hearing. She shifted her weight to a more favorable position and waited for the shooting to start. The door opened a crack and a round canister clattered in. A split second later a brilliant flash lit up the control room and smoke hissed out the ends of the canister. Whatever had just happened, Atuarre had not expected it. Not only had the flash blinded her, but now the smoke was searing her lungs. And the guards were shooting.

Her eyes could only make out dim shapes, but her rifle kept up a steady stream of blaster bolts. It wasn't long before she could feel the weapon overheating beneath her paws. Can't see, can't breathe, can't shoot. Great. "Boss, I suggest not coming this way," she hissed over the comm. She now had two options and didn't like either one. Option One was to retreat back through the broken window, try to meet up with Aeric and Szen, and hope they could find another way in. Option Two was to barrel through the shooting guards and try to loose them in the hallways.

She went with Option Two. As long as security's attention was on Atuarre, Aeric and Szen just might be able to get through unnoticed. With a loud roar, she charged, swinging her rifle like a battering ram. Shots connected with her thigh and shoulder, but she ignored the pain until every guard was down. Whether they were unconscious or dead, she wasn't sure and didn't care. The adrenaline kept her upright and hobbling away before backup arrived.

[Chickenman 9]

Gunfire erupted from the window above, and was immediatly followed by Atuarre's angry roar.

"Quick!" Aeric whispered as Szen mounted a charge on a side door. The two took cover as it exploded, opening the door. The two Revenants charged in. Two guards, on their way to the room Atuarre had broken into, looked up in surprise then dropped to the floor as Aeric and Szen gunned them down. Ducking into a stairwell, the two ascended to the next floor, and burst into Atuarre's room.

A dozen or so guards were sprawled out along the floor and in the middle was a wounded Atuarre.

[Radioactive Isotope 29]

Atuarre looked at Aeric and Szen in surprise. "Nice to see you two. Might I suggest we get out of this area before their friends show up?"

[Chickenman 9]

"In a moment," Aeric said, grinning as he locked the door. "Szen, hack that terminal, see if you can upload schematics of the building. Atuarre, lets get a look at those wounds."

[Radioactive Isotope 29]

"Alright," she sighed. The shoulder wound didn't look too bad. It was a nasty graze, but it hadn't exposed muscle or bone. Her thigh, on the other hand, was worse. The bolt had seared through the muscle and barely missed her femur. She tried not to wince as Aeric poked and prodded.

[Chickenman 9]

He frowned at the leg injury. "Well it's a good thing snipers get to lie down half the time."

"Got it!" Szen said, displaying a holo of the building's interior.

"Highlight the control room for me?" Aeric asked.

Szen typed at the terminal for a moment, and then a large room in the center of the holo blinked red.

"Huh," muttered Aeric. "Protect Atuarre. I'll be right back." He picked up another blaster pistol from one of the guards and slipped out into the hallway.

[Ayingel 24]

"You're lucky. Nima sent a kit along with me." Szen looked Atuarre up and down. "You'll have to wait until we get back to the speeder though. I didn't bring it in." She cringed as she stared at Atuarre's thigh. Looking around at the guards, an idea dawned on Szen. "I'm going to grab a few things." She walked over to a guard and dug through his pockets. She grabbed a comm, his name badge, and a small red card she found. Going through a few more bodies, she found similar items and one blue card like the red one. She threw them into one of her pockets and approached the door to see if anyone was coming.

[Mara 29]

On yet another backworld Outer Rim planet, the man had let down his ship in order to refuel. All that flying around the galaxy looking for clues didn't help his kilometers per liter rating. He sat in his stateroom and sighed. He wasn't getting any farther on finding any leads or locations to where Kaden Staal was. It was starting to feel like the man didn't exist any more. If he was dead, the military should have record of him, but there was nothing on him, alive or dead.

He ran a hand through his wavy blond hair and stood up to head outside to check on supplies and the refueling. His quarry had to be out there...somewhere. And he would do anything to find him, even if it meant...

No, that was just for a worst-case scenario, a last resort. The man wasn't sure if he was at his wits' end quite yet. There may still be a few things left for him to check. But he knew he was getting closer and closer to throwing in all his cards and playing a new game.

* * * * *

"He was in love and didn't think anything bad would happen." Kaden said quietly. "His ego is only part of the puzzle."

Edited September 23, 2008 by Mara

[Ender 8]

Jaim knocked on the door, three raps follow by two, so he didn't spook his squadmates, and then opened the door into the house.

"Honeys, we're home!" he called into the room. "And we've got presents!"

[Drake 53]

The first thing that Jaing did was transmit the pictures of the speeder, specifically the ones with clear shots of the vehicle registration code, to Archaic's slicers. At the base, they had a data-mining program that would search the city's various databases for registrations and to who they belonged. He knew that it would take time for the program to turn up results, unless it wasn't a local speeder, of course, but he was in no rush. The occupants of the speeder were no doubt circling the city in a vain attempt at losing him.

You can run but you can't hide, Jaing thought. Archaic essentially had Tyrena wire-tapped out the backside. If they wanted something found, it wouldn't take much effort or time to find. A message appeared in his HUD informing him of a positive match registered to a hotel called the Empyrean Arms. Jaing plotted a route to the hotel while the registration and speeder profile ran through the next data-mining program. That one would tap into the Transportation Authority's network and find any recent entries matching the registration. Mostly those came from traffic intersection cameras or hidden streetside sensors. Just little things that the Empire was using to keep a watchful eye on their subjects.

After five minutes, his HUD lit up with another message. They were a set of coordinates and projected route that the speeder was taking.

Jaing pulled the speeder bike up, out of the main traffic lane, and into a higher express lane, setting off in the direction of his prey.

[Pandora 77]

Deign shot Sena a look that he knew she would recognize as Not another kriffing word PERIOD! and finished his eggs. He tossed a glance to the wall chrono, wondering what was taking Jaing so long. No sooner had the thought begun to fade than his comlink sounded.

He rose from the table and took a few steps away. "This is Argos."

"Sir, patrol just dropped off a guy trying to break in the base. He's down here in the main detention block."

Ah, so Jaing managed to refrain from killing him. "Thank you. Is he restrained and subdued?"

There came a chuckle from the other end of the line. "Yes sir, we, ah... 'subdued' him. He's cuffed and resting off a nice game of 'rough up the tough guy.'"

Deign nodded. "Keep a blaster trained on his door. Remember this is someone that obviously felt confident enough in his own skills to attempt a break-in."

"Uh, Sir, I don't think he really knew what he was getting into."

"Maybe. Maybe not." He looked directly at Layla, who he knew heard everything he was saying. "Comm me immediately if the situation looks like it might at all get beyond your control. Keep an ear on him too. Let me know if you hear or see anything that might clue you in to who he works for." The affirmative came from the officer. He was about to cut the transmission but brought the com back to his mouth. "And if you see Jaing Skirata before I do, have him report to my quarters immediately."

He did cut the signal now and focused on Layla. "Friend of yours, my dear?"

[Rogue 4]

"How should I know, sugar?" Layla asked innocently, looking to him as she played with her food with a fork. "I've been in your cheerful company, remember? And you never did like it when I had friends."

As calm and innocent as she acted, her mind was reeling. Had they come for her? Had one of them been captured?

[Winters 0]

Cale Sano got down from his speeder when it arrived from the Azure Heights, groggy from his small nap. He got down and made sure he had his blaster in his jacket pocket and walked to the front desk. The door opened and a brunette girl was sitting at the desk, doing her finger nails. Sadly, the eight men that Cale ordered came following.

?Hello, welcome to the Azure Heights Motel; here we provide clean rooms with absolute privacy, which obviously I see you want.? She said sarcastically

?Huh, no, they?re just the muscle, I?m here looking for a guy who owes me some money.? Cale said pulling out a hologram of the main man who he was looking for.

?What are yah going to do to him if he doesn?t pay??

?Break his legs, force him to listen to Verpine music, maybe keep his eyes open and show him disturbing images, something to make him lose it.?

?Didn?t look like the mans the type to breaks easies.? Said the receptionist. ?I can?t just tell you though??

?How?s five hundred credits?? Cale said.

?Sounds good.? The receptionist said, looking up from her nails. Cale snapped his fingers and one of the large men pulled out a small bag with credichips in it, to which Cale dug around and pulled one out, handing it to the girl. She looked at it with her long finger nails and took it. She then turned around and got a key card, handing it to him, and simply saying, ?285 and 287. They?re gone though.?

?So? I can poke around to see where they went, people are careless.? Cale turned around, happy that people are easy to buy off. Doesn?t matter much, considering that I?m gone tomorrow, hopefully. Cale walked toward the room, climbing a small set of stair with Jokaan right behind him, leaving the other men to do whatever muscle men do when they wait. When they reached the door, they saw that it was open already and a little cart right at the edge of the door.

?Oh blast it all, the cleaning staff is there already.? Cale whispered to himself. He rushed forward, wondering what to do when he nearly ran into the cleaning lady, who was holding a comlink. ?Oh, sorry!? The lady said. ?Is, is this your comlink.?

Cale looked at the comlink, realizing that it was the only clue that would survive room service cleaning (except the sheets, but he didn?t want to steal those for DNA). ?Uh, yes, actually.? Cale picked the comlink out of her fingers and put it in his pocket. Cale then walked away from the room and walked back to the speeders.

?You?re not going to look in the other room.? Jokaan asked, attempting to keep up with Cales fast pace.

?No, we?re going back to the base and get this thing analyzed.?

[Princess 35]

Nima nodded at Kaden's sentiment. "When you're in love, you're on top of the galaxy. So let's slip into our character roles and figure this out."

[Chickenman 9]

Aeric found an deserted hallway that ran alongside the control room. With a pocket virbor, he quickly undid the frame of the door panel, and slightly wedged open the adjoining panel on the other side of the wall. He checked down the hallway again. Nothing...all the guards were busy elsewhere. He kept a blaster trained down the hallway all the same. From his pocket he produced a flexible cable with a tiny camera mounted in it. He wriggled the camera through the wall into the next room, and glanced at his datapad to get a read on what was in the room. He swept the entire length of the room, and then returned the camera to his pocket.

Ten tangos, all using their computer terminals as cover, the lights out. The administrators were hiding while the guards did the fighting.

Aeric set both pistols to stun, readied a flashbang grenade, and palmed the door control. The door whooshed open, and Aeric lobbed the grenade in. He ducked back against the outside wall as the grenade exploded in a flash of blinding light and a loud explosive noise that could blow an unsuspecting eardrum.

Ten tangos temporarily incapacitated. 5 Seconds to put them down for good.

Aeric stormed the room. Three men stood in shock, hands clasped to their ears. He retired them with his dual pistols. Aeric dove to the floor, catching a woman who had dropped to the floor in terror in his sights.

One second.

He stunned her, found one of her coworkers crouched not far away. The poor sap dropped to the floor, unconsciousness taking over. Aeric climbed to his feet.

Two Seconds.

Aeric crouch-ran to the next bank of terminals.

Three seconds.

Three technicians had huddled together after the blast. Aeric easily retired them, as another tech, on the far side of the room paniced and began shooting wildy...

Four seconds.

Making him a perfect target for Aeric, who silenced his opponent's weapon with a single stun bolt from his own.

Five seconds.

By his count, Aeric had stunned nine people. He spun around, finding his last adversary who had stood, taking aim.

Aeric was quicker, bringing his pistols to bare. He squeezed the dual triggers.

Out of ammo.

The tango, who had been trying to get his eyes adjust to the light, took aim.

Aeric threw one pistol as hard as he could into the tango's face.

The enemy tripped backwards, shocked and howling in pain.

Aeric calmly reloaded his remaining pistol and pumped a stun bolt into his adversary.

Sighing, he holstered his weapon, picked up his other one, and strode to the main computer. Quick use of a computer spike enabled him to slice into the computer quickly. Grinning, Aeric downloaded everything that looked important into a datapad and slipped out of the room.

[Andy 60]

Aston stuffed his equipment into his bag as Arlan swooped down and pulled into a parking bay across from an airtaxi office.

"We haven't got long," he said, and then nodded towards the city security holocams, "I'm willing to bet that Archaic has the whole city wired."

"The whole city?" Arlan repeated as they headed for the nearest airtaxi.

"Yeah, and when they find the speeder it isn't going to take them too long to descend on this place and find out where we went. On one hand we really shouldn't lead them back to Brier's, but if we don't then this whole operation is going to fall apart really quickly."

Trying their best to act casual, Arlan and Aston directed the taxi pilot to Brier's place, promising a large tip if he could get them there quickly. Aston looked nervously outside to check if they were being followed. He figured their persuer wouldn't be too far behind.

[Drake 53]

Jaing watched the speeder enter the parking bay and, a short time later, the two young men walk out and make their way across the street to the airtaxi station. There was no way for him to know that these two were the occupants of the speeder he had been following. However, the timing was suspicious and they had the look of people being followed. Aside from the fact that they were ditching their speeder in favour of a taxi, both men were glancing about nervously as they crossed the street.

That said, they could be completely different people than who he was seeking to follow. He had been in other situations where someone else happened to be in the wrong place in the wrong time and Jaing tracked them until realizing it was the wrong person. However, his gut told him that these were the guys.

When the men flagged down a taxi, boarded it and took off, Jaing dialled back on his helmet camera and his HUD returned to standard vision. He was standing a block away within a recessed alcove on the side of a building. Immediately, he hopped back onto the stolen Nightfalcon speeder bike, which hovering on standby next to the alcove ledge, and took off into traffic, following the airtaxi from a distance.

***

The stuncuffs fell to the floor with a thud. Tak smirked then brought his hands out from where they had been restrained behind his back. He rubbed his wrists then stretched the kinks out of his shoulders. He had received a couple jolts from the cuffs while trying to disable them. Fortunately, they had been dialled down. Next time they wouldn't make that same mistake. That's if they even put him in stuncuffs next time.

Takeshi stood and stretched his sore and beaten muscles. His ribs ached but he ignored it as he poked at some of the emerging bruises and absently wondered what colours they would turn.

I wonder if this is the base, he thought. I wonder if Layla is here...somewhere. Well, only one way to find out.

He walked over to the door and began figuring out ways to get through it.