The transport had been traveling through real space for some twenty minutes when the ship rocked violently. A deafening roar, like an explosion out of a war-holo but louder, rawer, echoed through the corridors and met the ears of the travelers within. Emergency lights lit up across the ship, klaxons blared over the freighter’s intercom, and Jaren Jast heard boots pounding in the hall outside his passenger’s bunk. 

He pulled himself out of a coffin-like bed and up into a shoebox sized room. Jast was not exceptionally tall, but even at his height the limited dimensions of the room were confining. A few inches taller or wider and it would have felt claustrophobic. The room was sparse, lacking almost entirely for decoration. Its only fixtures were the bed and an odd furniture piece, some ill-conceived cross between a desk and a dresser. Jaren had not made much use of the drawers, preferring to live out of a bulky traveling bag, but he had left his blaster on the desk-drawer, in easy reach of his bed.

He lifted the black, gold, and ivory WESTAR piece and slid it into his waistband, leaving it to rest under his shirt and jacket at the small of his back. The gun secure, he stepped to the door and keyed the control pad to the right of the frame. The durasteel portal swept open with a metallic hiss, and he poked his head out into the corridor.

The [i]Arkanis Sailer[/i] was a mid-sized transport, of a model with a passenger capacity for some twenty travelers and boasting a crew of ten or so. The [i]Sailer[/i]’s captain, a profit-minded Nemoidian, made do with a crew of five to cut costs and had overbooked the vessel with some thirty vagabonds willing to pay for transport regardless of the cramped conditions. Jaren was quite fortunate he wasn’t sharing a room, all things considered.

One of the crew, a Twi’lek Jaren believed to be an engineer, was fast approaching down the hall, and he shouted for travelers to make way as he moved. Jaren backed into his room for a moment to let him pass, and then proceeded out into the passageway. Other passengers were doing the same, exchanging nervous glances and questions. There were no answers among them. Jaren figured that he ought to find some.

He turned the collar of his synthleather jacket up and moved into the hallway, following in the footsteps of the Twi’lek engineer and making his way toward the main deck.