Xo'pil's presence continued to go unnoticed as all attention was focused on the shalam golem's crude imitation of speech. Taking advantage of such, he receded into the shadows as the light that shone from his shoulder was extinguished. In its stead, a shimmering projection began to form around the three hovering orbs that were Epit'li until a diaphanous shade of Xo'pil manifested. No mere hologram, this hard-light reproduction of her [i]tzin[/i] would be able to interact with its surroundings; after his misadventure in Q'ab's ruins Xo'pil thought best to err on the side of caution. 

Not wanting to alarm either party, the ersatz Xo'pil remotely accessed the hold's control panels and diverted power from an adjacent floor. The lights in the hold came to life with a shudder as Epit'li strode forward confidently and spoke in her master's voice. "Well, at least two of us are dressed appropriately for this party." The imitation Xo gave a gentle tug to the tail of a dashingly dressed creature, before stopping and fawning over the texture of the fur. "This is fine quality. Yes.. whoever crafted this had a keen eye for detail."

A small laugh was elicited as the creature brusquely flicked its tail loose. "Of course, where are my manners. Xo'pil is the name, heresy is the game. At least that's what they're saying. And you are, my fine fellow?" A soft pat as a hand fell on the kukull's rough exterior. Epit'li was beginning to enjoy imitating her creator, who remained hidden and uncharacteristically silent as their ruse continued. 

***

"Sir.."

"Kinda busy, Lars." Ophidian belched through a thick plume of exhaust; the thick trunks of his arms were interlocked as he clung to a maintenance drone that was quickly ascending one of Gereza's iso-towers. The cells located in these spires housed the empire's greatest threats; suspended in total oblivion. Well, all except one. He'd been hired to see if Gereza was as impenetrable as popularly thought; but the more he and Lars investigated the more it seemed to be an inside job. The ancillary reports from some schmegghead auditor and a servitor drone so old it took Lars nanoseconds to find and install a compatibility drive to make sense of its findings. All of the information trickled steadily down the HUD of his eyepatch as Lars once more interrupted his exposition.

"I thought it best to inform you that three more high value prisoners have arrived and are currently en route to your location. Perhaps finding a good spot to hide would be best to maintain the integrity of our task here."

"I guess," Ophidian grumbled, "but I better not be billed for anything I've broken so far. It's in my contract!"

The deep voice of the AI sighed softly before a hint of alarm underscored its next communique. "There's also a lot of chatter across Cizran military command. It seems that something has.. consumed part of the grid. Or did. I'm parsing through petabytes of data, but it seems like there's been a full chronal adjustment.."

"But that means... So they're using the sankuls again, huh Lars? I think it might be time to find a new base of operations. Far, far out of the empire's grasp.

***

The immensity of the Vepsis Dol and a testament to its craftsmanship absorbed the sound of rushing movement as a series of subsequent bay doors began to open. Remote access had been easy enough; Chrrx noted. That means most of the ship's systems must be intact. A quick diagnostic and some minor adjustments should be all that's needed to resume operational status and complete the superluminal jump to Su-Lahn. No more than half a cycle and they'd be back aboard the Admiral's flagship. 

This thought was pushed to the back of Chrrx's mind as a small chime informed him of secondary access several floors below in one of the ship's cargo holds. With no exchange of words, Nenegin's honor guard broke off into two smaller parties. One continued to the Vepsis Dol's deck while the other sought to investigate the cargo hold.