Jaren moved quickly. 

He came to the common room and pushed his way past a pair of sentients and through the door. People were streaming in as they gathered to take stock of the situation, and he found himself cutting in between more than one pair of passengers in the middle of conversation before reaching the long range communications terminal. He slid his credit chip into the reader, paying an unreasonably high fee for access to the booth, and connected his datapad. He typed away on the pad, entering his coordinates, the tracking information for his personal broadcast, and a few words on the situation. He attached an encrypted signature to verify his identity, and sent it off into the Holonet. 

Minutes later but worlds away, aboard the bridge of the [i]Raven Trespass[/i], a Twi'lek woman opened his communication.

No sooner had he sent the message than did emergency lights come online across the ship. Klaxons blared through the ship's intercom. He swore loudly, stuffing the datapad back into his pack. He knew he should have expected something like that. He moved his hand to his blaster and, by feel, switched it to stun. 

He shoved his way back through the passenger room and, as soon as he was clear in a corridor, took off in a flat run for the engine room. "Hold position, I'm coming to you," he ordered through the comm. 

He slowed his pace as he came to the stairwell, creeping down silently and drawing his blaster from its holster. He descended the two levels to the fourth and stepped off into a corridor. Hearing something, unsure of what, he moved in that direction. He was rewarded as he arrived at his destination a moment later. Just in time, it seemed. One of the [i]Sailer[/i]'s crew had a blaster trained on her.

He sized up the situation, leveled his blaster with the crewman's back, and pulled the trigger. There was a blue flash as the bolt caught him between the shoulders. He collapsed instantly, crumpling to the floor with a distinct lack of ceremony. Jast lowered his blaster, his accomplice liberated. He holstered the gun and motioned behind him.

"Let's move. Pods are on the fifth level."

[hr]

Aboard the [i]Black Mantis[/i], Deklen Ordo waited for his ship's engineer to prep the boarding hatch.

"Airlock is not pressurizing on their end. Seems like they've shut down their life support systems," the engineer, standing by the airlock door, announced. Deklen Ordo, fully armored in his Mandalorian suit, cast a gaze in the engineer's direction. "We can do it from our end," the Rodian added quickly, tapping away at the control panel. After a few moments, the engineer announced that they were good to go. Ordo hit the open button before the engineer had finished speaking. The airlock slid open with a hiss, and the uneven pressure announced the bounty hunter's arrival onto the [i]Arkanis Sailer[/i] with a gust of artificial wind. 

Deklen Ordo strode forward. He cut an imposing figure in the flashing emergency lights. At over six feet in height, fully outfitted in matte green, battle scarred armor, and carrying a host of blasters, grenades, and other gadgetry of varying degrees of lethality, he looked every part the Mandalorian warrior. He arrived on the deck of the [i]Sailer[/i] flanked by two rifle-toting mercenaries, also armored, though not in the traditional battle gear of Mandalore. 

He found himself face to face with three crew members. The Nemoidian, Captain Montaak, a human male, and a human female stood before the airlock. The Nemoidian stood defiantly before him, staring directly into Ordo's T-shaped visor in an attempt to maintain eye contact. Ordo's men raised their blaster rifles, leveling them with the crewmen, primed to shoot. 

"You are Captain Montaak," Ordo stated. 

"Yes, I am," Montaak answered. "And you are Deklen Ordo?"

Ordo drew a heavy blaster pistol from his right hip, leveled it with the Nemoidian's head, and pulled the trigger. A bright red-orange lance punched through the captain's skull, and the Nemoidian fell dead on the floor. Ordo pushed the Nemoidian's corpse onto its back with a booted foot. "I am."

The two humans recoiled in horror as their captain crumpled to the floor. The man's hand flew to his pistol, but the threat of the mercenaries' guns stayed his hand. He froze further as the bounty hunter trained the heavy blaster on his chest. "You," Ordo addressed him, "you are now in command of this vessel. I trust you will not further complicate my efforts here." 

"No," the man answered, hand dropping from the grip of his gun, "none. First Mate Jaxon Stratham. How can we help?" he asked. The first mate swallowed hard as he waited for a response. Ordo holstered his blaster and brought up a holographic image of a man, projected from a datapad built into his left wristguard. 

"This is my target, Jaren Jast, wanted by the Sith Empire. I believe he is aboard your vessel."

"He's one of our passengers. He was in the room when you first contacted us," Jaxon said, trailing off as he uttered the last words of his sentence. Ordo tightened his grip on the holstered blaster. The flashing red lights cast over the bounty hunter's armor reminded him of splashed blood. He looked to the captain's unseeing eyes. For a moment, Jaxon believed himself to be a dead man.

"Where are your escape pods?"