[color=AA1111][right]Week 7, Day 1, afternoon[/right][/color]

It had taken Nimm all of one minute to figure out that the hutt supposedly in charge here on Ryloth—one who called himself ‘Ippo the Hutt’—was a useless idiot. She had quickly made her excuses in ways that would not excessively offend him, then decided to use her own resources to get what she needed. Fortunately, while he was an imbecile, the rest of the people here were somewhat more talented. It had taken a few hours, but she had eventually found a way to slice into the databanks and get the intel she desired.

It was immediately apparent that things were worse than she had thought. Entire villages had been taken out under the noses of the operatives employed by the hutts by what a mercenary identified as Zygerrians. The fact that the hutts hadn’t suppressed this attack immediately after its discovery proved just how foolish Ippo was. Groups like the Zygerrians needed to be met with a firm hand when they misbehave. Rudimentary psychology, really. After downloading the surveillance videos and other potentially pertinent intel, Nimm returned to her ship to look over it properly.

[center]~| an hour later, give or take |~[/center]

“What’s this?” she muttered, looking more closely at one of the numerous surveillance feed recordings, “Jedi? Here? Oh, this will be [i]fun[/i]...”

“Ship. Display location this feed is from.”

There was no vocal response, but the holographic projector lit up, displaying the planet with a pair of glowing points. One represented her, the other the feed origin.

“Display all other feed sources. Use symbology number six.”

Innumerable other points lit up, displaying the hutts’ surprisingly wide network of surveillance on this world. There were three other feeds near the one that she had seen the Jedi on. Looking closer, she noted their identifying tags and keyed them into the control panel. On the monitors on one of the walls the three feeds appeared, the playback running at twenty-seven times normal pace. For the most part, nothing happened beyond some wildlife moving past. After a bit over three quarters of an hour however, the middle feed showed figures moving past. She immediately paused and rewound it, replaying that segment.

Her eyes saw what was clearly some twi’lek civilians moving past. “Irrelevant.” she muttered to herself, resuming the playback.

Twelve minutes later, the left feed revealed more movement. When she rewatched that, she smiled. “There you are…”

“Ship. Analysis of route. Prognosticate possible destinations.”

It didn’t take long. Within minutes, the computer had identified a half-dozen possible routes. Two led to villages intel indicated had been purged. Clearly irrelevant. Another led into the wasteland, which clearly was also irrelevant for now. The fourth led directly to what the Huttese data identified as an outpost used by their mercenaries at times. Seeing how information made it clear that the outpost was offline and had been for weeks, it was not relevant. Unlike the second-to-last one, the last led straight into a sinkhole. The second-to-last one led straight into a section of the surface covered by a jungle. It was the obvious candidate for further investigation. She didn’t hesitate to take to the air, flying high enough to be nigh unnoticeable. 

It didn’t take long to get above the path predicated by the computer, nor did it take long to identify what was clearly the landing location of a spaceship. Sure, it was somewhat hidden beneath foliage… But metal still shows up on scanners, and starships have a lot of metal in them.

More focused scans proved to Nimm that this was definitely the ship used by these Jedi: A Defender-class Light Corvette. Not even trying to be subtle, were they? While it [i]was[/i] tempting to just “accidentally” blast it into scrap, she did not feel like having to deal with the potential diplomatic fallout should these Jedi have another means for long-range communications.

She smiled viciously as an idea came to her. With a few quick commands, she opened a channel down to that imbecile of a hutt. He would provide just the cover she needed. It took a good minute before there was a response. No doubt intended as a means for ‘proving’ himself superior. He was—of course—wrong, but Nimm wouldn’t waste effort correcting his mistake. He wasn’t worth it.

“I have a question for you, hutt.”

“Speak, Sith.” the hutt answered with a hint of aloofness to it.

“Why have you invited Jedi to land on your planet, in violation of the agreement between your clan and the Empire?” She kept her voice almost neutral, with just a hint of being offended.

“I have not!” the image on the screen showed a momentary lapse in his controlled expression and he made a gesture with one of his pudgy arms. No doubt signaling for one of his advisors to do something. “There are no Jedi here!” he almost shouted adamantly.

“So there is no Republic Light Corvette parked in the jungle, two kilometers east and six hundred and seventy-four meters south of outpost Senth Usk Orenth? That is good to hear. I am sure Darth Ravage will be pleased to hear that when I inform him in my regular report.”

“What-” he started to say, but Nimm terminated the link. She had no doubt that even an idiot like Ippo would take care of that ship for her, without implicating the Empire at all. He wasn’t smart enough to realize that there was no way one of the Dark Lords of the Sith would care about a single misplaced republic vessel on an unimportant world like Ryloth. Nor did he have any way to figure out how utterly ridiculous it was for her to be regularly reporting to Darth Ravage for that matter.

“Now to find those Jedi…” she muttered to herself, reactivating the sensors on her ship.