[img]https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/starwars/images/0/08/Errant_Venture.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20060106034142[/img]


					[b][i]Star Destroyer: Errant Venture[/i][/b]


Kale looked up from his seat to Booster. He'd been waiting on this ship for three days, three days he could have been searching himself for Aren. There was no telling what his Padawan was going through at the moment. He'd kept in touch with New Republic spies, but they had no concrete leads. Time spent here wasn't very fruitful either. While he was able to learn much about the current state of the underworld, it was of little use to him at the moment.

Lahana meanwhile was not enjoying her time here. Too many people willing to invade her personal space to sell her things she didn't want, too many annoying men hitting on her before catching a glimpse of the sabers on her hips. And then there was the arena, a place that reminded her too much of the pit she was forced to fight other slaves to the death in. She sat quietly in the room, letting her Master do the talking.

"Booster Terrik?" Kale stood to his feet and offered his hand to shake. "Interesting ship here. I can honestly say the past three days haven't been boring at least."


As the motley assortment gathered to talk business 3 gentlemen in bankers tunics appeared, they were all unassuming and seemed to be accountants or something within the like buy curiously they carried large cases with them.

A deck above the open area, where the bazaars and entertainment sections began to meet the hotel like quarters where the guests who intended to remain aboard the Venture for more than a few days, the immense figure of a Hutt who many would assume was nearly six hundred years old (until they got a look at the sleek, muscular form his immensity took and would realize he was a very young Hutt if gigantic). Loomed, his shadow casting down along the support structure of the "promenade" beside him a Chiss female in crimson leaned into his left arm, enjoying his warmth and oddly his company. Beside them both was a man dressed in reds and old Republic blues, the only indication of his Mandalorian heritage a pendant on his breast, took a long drawn out gulp from a bottle. "Hah, awful toned for a pair of bean counters" "I thought the same Rua" 

"So, someone's stupid enough to hit the venture?" he asked with a whistle. 

The chiss female shook her head "No, I don't think so..I believe this is something else...Isn't that....oh blast..is that Veers?". The Hutt began to laugh "Ah, a fight" "Naw" Rua shook his head "This aint my problem, what I came for, you?"

The Hutt shrugged "my caravan departs tomorrow, I've some time to kill. But I'll wait"

"Tyber keeping you on a short leash eh?"

"Hohohoh....Mando Poodo.."
Below, away from the crowd of accountants Booster Terrik beamed with at Kale and "You've got the look of a man surrounded by water whose thirsty" The glint in his eyes suggested he wasn't entirely disappointed though and he gave Kale a good natured slap on his shoulder. "Have to seem impartial, we're not for any side, we provide information about everything to everyone and we also facilitate commerce. Besides, there was a delegation from the Pentastar alignment here, thought I'd give you a chance to listen and see what you heard" The man shrugged "Rogarre says you were amusing to talk too. That's a high compliment from a Muun, which means its something very bad" Again he laughed and took a deep inhalation of whatever burning leaves he was smoking in that cigar which produced a dark blue smoke whenever he exhaled. "I'll take you to Karrde now, but he says his news isn't exactly good.."
As the trio crossed through the main "open grounds" two drunken Gammorians began brawling with a pair of off duty imperial soldiers from the remnant while remains of a Hutt Cartel drowned their sorrows in some hard liquor. "oh its lights out on a weekend, the regular crowd shuffles in.." Terrik stopped his singing and then laughed tossing the cigar towards the head of one of the Imps. "Buckets heads, used to get paid well enough to gamble away  for hours, now its just the regulars. Come on, this way" he gestured ahead, towards a Casino which seemed to take up several decks, rising through the interior of the Starship like a cancer. The figure of a man dressed in black and gold could be seen, a gold cape fell over broad shoulders and long dark hair fell about his neck meshing with hair from a long black beard. Brown eyes burned with laughter, ambition and a warriors spirit. "That the Jedi?"

"Yessir!"

"BRING 'EM THE KRIFF UP!"

As the conversation proceeded the accountants had disappeared into a nearby Turbolift. Before entering the leader of the group noticed someone he recognized and walked to him.

“Don’t go to the promenade today.” The accountany warned before disappearing to the elevator with the others

As their leader entered, the accountants began to unpack their cases revealing they had the arms of Imperial Army commandos. One of the accountants took his peer aside and told him something in the lift.

“Remember no Imperial basic.” as he donned an Imperial sonic blaster pistol.

The accountants began to leave the elevator and began firing upon all the occupants of the meeting they could come across.

This wasn't the first time Kale and Lahana had found themselves in an ambush. Lahana in particular in spite of her age, had seen far more than Kale did in her mercenary days. This was reason number one why she despised crowds. 

Kale moved to cover the man he'd come to see, flipping over a table for protection before moving his focus to the rest of the crowd. Lahana had already sprinted towards the shooters at a breakneck pace, making sure to keep behind pillars and tables in case a stray shot was sent her way. Three men, sonic blasters, lightsaber deflection wasn't an option. Weird weapon choice for imperials, but she didn't care to think about it right now. She flanked them from their position by the elevator, igniting her green saber and thrusting it towards the left most shooter.


"The kriff is going on down there!" roared Karrde, his voice managing to boom across the promenade echoing above the blaster fire and the sound of lightsabers igniting. "Which nerfherding, mother kriffing, hornblower thought it was smart...to shoot up MY KRIFFING SHOPPING MALL!"

"And my kriffing ship!" Terrik hissed, a meaty hand landed on one of the three shooters, impacting into a finely toned torso, through the tunic Terrik could even feel the rippled scars blaster bolts made.  Accountants my rear! The man thought, reaching for a vibro knife, only to grunt as a sonic shockwave knocked him several feet back and several more "civilians", two lawyers and what looked like a school marm began to open fire as well. "ABSOLUTE JUSTICE! INVICTUS WILLS IT!" The last one was called out by a boy no older than twenty, he looked ill as if he'd been suffering from fatigue for a long time. A wasting disease caught fighting the Rebs in some jungle hellhole. He'd made this cry, then activated a thermodetonator and Terrik let out a curse as the world around him went black.

And then orange and then red as he rolled around on the floor, almost bouncing then skipping then rolling until he crashed into an immense hand which scooped him up and set him on a table. "ECHU-TA!" at that point a bright, silver colored lance flew through the air like a dart impacting into the school marm with enough violence to send her flying into a wall behind her. The immense Hutt from before launched himself into the fray, slithering at surprising speeds and singing a merry tune as he all but ate a sonic blast to the face and continued until he locked hands with one of the "lawyers".

fire erupted around them, alarm kalxons went on, suppressing systems began to try and put out the blaze as the acrid stench of plasteel melting in the heat began to fill the air.

"Terrorist Poodu!" The Hutt roared, tail whipping some drugged out pedestrians stupid enough to attempt to take advantage of the carnage to rob the dead. The Hutt eyed the Jedi "You" he spoke in basic "Civilians protect..let Padawan fight beside Dozo! Fend off...Trash...we..will" His throat rumbled as he did his best to speak basic, but there was sense in his eyes. The stronger of the two needed to apply his powers to run damage control..while the less experienced should handle the easier stuff..which in this case meant fighting.

"Already on it Hutt!" Lahana yelled as she drove her saber through another attacker. She wanted to draw her blaster, but she wasn't a sure enough shot to be sure she'd avoid hitting anyone in the panicked crowd. 

Kale meanwhile was busy trying his best to lead people to safety. He went to help a man to his feet, only for him to draw a blaster. Kale snatched the gun from his hand and slammed the would be assailant's head into the floor, knocking him out. It would take more than that to ambush a Jedi.

Lahana's saber sizzled as water from the fire system rained down. An attacker rushed her from behind, only to find his head swiftly removed from his shoulders in a split second. Her instincts were telling her to move. "If they're setting off bombs, they could have planted some on the ship!" She called out.

The raiders assaulting the ship were assisted by a team outside the festivities...rushing to sabotage the power plant for the Superlaser on the ship. As the pair of commandos, made their way down towards the main engineering section for the colorized remains of the once magnificently intimidating Star Destroyer a sense of profound moral outrage filled the elevator. “Can’t believe this, it’s like grave robbery” one hissed, his indignation barely concealed by the mechanical voice filtration system. “The Virulence was a great ship once”


“There’s a fried bird shop where the gym used to be! A day care where the armory was! A Kriffing day care”

“I wouldn’t mind going down with this ship to blow it up, give it an honorable death and sail with it into the force”

“You’re rad fried TX, Invictus said no mass casualties, just a lot of noise and some decisive crippling of the weapon system”

The men nodded, their minds recalling the hero who’d ended his own suffering to help further the cause. General Veers was a great man to inspire such loyalty and a greater man still to serve the Pontifex directly. Once the elevators stopped, the group left and were met with a team of what appeared to be civilian engineers working engineering and the vessels power plants. While they certainly were engineers, the crew was imperial to the core and part of the frew who made it off the Second Deathstar. Power like that, even a fraction of it couldn’t be in the hands of a commerce thug and his information brokering master. “You’re late”


“Last minute switch up”


“Kriff! I don’t like changes!”

“The General wanted to lead this raid himself”


“Oh, well, let's get to work then grunts!”


"Keep pressure on the Jedi" A voice called out, speaking in Bocce. Behind the mask iron like eyes narrowed on the former trooper who was impaled to a wall -Songsteel, kriffing Songsteel-. He'd rushed ahead, weaving between screaming  civilians, nearly slipping in some Toydarians intestines as it bled to death and finally caving in the skull of some Gungan who'd been jumping around in a panic to get to the lance which she'd pulled out and then turned and rushed towards the apprentice. The "accountant" was trained well enough in Echani pike fighting to block her attempts to behead another one of his boys. The Songsteel blocked the lightsaber as steam rose up from the storm of water as fires raged. "You're not killing any more of my men today Jedi" His voice was calm, but below there held an edge of grief and hostility. Whoever the terrorist was, he cared about those below him and more than that, he seemed to have a vendetta against the Jedi. The hate in his heart was different, he recriminated them as mass murderers who aided and abetted tyrants. 


Away from the clash of Songsteel on lightsaber, the mammoth Hutt was laughing as two of the masked shooters abandoned their weapons and opted to try and tackle him towards a flight of stairs where the rough surface was traditionally hard for Hutts to slither on. "Hoooohohohooh...take away Dozo's mobility eh? Poodu think with brain dis time..hohohohoho" One of them found his head engulfed in the Hutts vice like hand and his skull more or less caved in, brain matter and bone bits pushed through the mask as if it was a colander. 


By Kale, a young human female with long blond hair in the crimson  uniform of Zsinj's raptors wholly ignored the chaos and carnage remaining seated at the bar closest to the explosion using the chaos and panic to stel a few drunks, while the Chiss from above began pulling the wounded behind cover.
Lazily, the female blew the brains out of some cowardly gangster who tried to take advantage of the chaos to knife the Jedi in the back to boost his rep. She nodded at Kale "Not your enemy today Jedi, but watch your pretty ass. There's a few crooks here who wouldn't mind taking advantage of your sense of duty"

"Bring the wounded here Master Jedi and we'll do what we can" yelled the Chiss, Rua might have decided to sit it out once the Hutt promised he'd get involved but she saw it in his eyes. He'd wanted to help the Jedi but being Zsinj's attack dog, his proximity made him too high a target. No telling if these two would attempt to apprehend him ignoring the enforced neutrality on this ship or not.

So to avoid unnecessary conflict his "Lady Hawk" assassins got involved in rescue operations instead.

“Hypocrite? I think you have me confused with the petty warlords fighting for what is left of the Empires domain. I see things from a higher perspective then you do.”

The "Accountant" said before he took the songsteel lance and pole vaulted himself into an echanti style kick to her chest. 

“The False Jedi and the criminal scum scrambling for the crumbs of the Empire must fall.” 


"Alright you brain dead, Bantha chewed, whore spawned little pond suckers! Who the Kriff told you, you could shoot up my guys boat and ventilate my bars and casinos!" the gold and black clad Talon Karrde pulled out a blaster and began to lay down cover fire allowing for Jedi Master Kale to yank as many maimed and wounded civilians towards one of the hangar bays. "Your boy is somewhere in Zsinj space" he called over the fray tossing Kale a data chip with some comm logs and coordinates. "My guys inside can't figure out where, could be Sereno, could be his SSD, Kriff, could be he's on Dathomir for all I know" Karrde gave him an apologetic shrug and then  began to order emergency rescue personnel and droids to converge on the location.

Ahead of them the Hutt's laughter roared above the din of battle, he'd grabbed the leg of one unfortunate terrorist and proceeded to beat one of the others to death with him, another was knocked off the stairs and fell to his doom as the Hutt deftly slithered his way "around" the rough material and pulled himself back onto the main section of the promenade through raw strength. Spying the man battling with one of his song steel lances the Hutt let out a bellow of rage "No..hohoh..no.no...nooo...terror-man..that is Dozo's weapon!"
"Might not be the best time to point this out" The Chiss female called to both Kale and Karrde, she was joined by Terrik who was now helping the blond patch up the wounded and the maimed. "But doesn't it strike you as odd that they're all fighting us so hard? Spree shooters and suicide bombers usually..sort of blow themselves up, get spaced or shot up in short order...Something stinks"

As the battle raged a large explosion rocked the vessel from stem to stern. It seemed for a moment as if her entire body arched in a sickening shudder and plates of armor flicked off the exterior. rooms decompressed and one of the lenses for the super laser cracked. Power fluctuations dimmed the lights and briefly shut down the suppression systems.  The accountant began to make flight from his confrontation with the jedi, eyes glaring contemptuously at her.

“My work here is done Jedi.” The fake accountant said before dropping the songsteel blade and making a leave with his cohorts.

Nearby the dead bomber a scattered amount of credits were found in his hand and a scorched but still intact datapad detailing orders with a blacksun insignia on it

Lahana was about to give chase when Kale called out to her. "Don't follow them, it's too dangerous." He said as he was helping a man with a wounded arm to his feet. She reluctantly switched off her sabers and put them away. "I appreciate the help, Talon." Kale said, nodding towards the man. "I'd make a call to the Republic to help here, but I doubt you want them in your business." He set the wounded man down on a seat and held out his hand over a bleeding gash in his right arm. The wound slowly stopped bleeding and began to close.

Lahana watched, being reminded that her own abilities had much room for improvement. "We aren't going to do anything about them?" She asked. 

"There isn't much we can do, not at the moment anyhow. We should help the people here, and then we will leave." He said. Lahana let out a disgruntled sigh and glanced around the room. She spotted the remains of the man that had blown himself into hunks of meat. She'd seen worse honestly, what caught her eye was a datapad. She picked it up and looked at the insignia on it. She'd always wondered why a shady criminal organisation bothered to have a emblem. 

She took a look at what information it had to offer before handing it to Talon.

"There's fires everywhere, I count at least fifty people maimed, our repair crews are running everywhere trying to contain whatever damn secondary explosions are erupted all over my ship..Run after them to one of the shuttle bays if you want little girl but its just as likely they're breathing vacuum right now and you'd join 'em" Tarrik roared kicking a bar stool half way across the promenade in a fury that matched the Hutts size. "Distraction!" Dozo muttered with disgust in his deep voice. "Dead innocents, loud distraction" 

"A good one" Talon spat in a baleful voice, it was the superlaser, there was no other reason for this nonsense to happen and the shouts about some damn slut on Coruscant willing it were likely more misdirection as well? At Kale's suggestion of calling the Republic Karrde's eyes flickered dangerously "The Republic's been on our tails about the superlaser we managed to mount on the Venture for weeks. What makes you Mothma or that repugnant Sullustan or Iblis or Kriffing Wedge Antilies himself didn't send your SPIN thugs over here? Ask yourself that..."

A slow laugh emanated from the blond who'd sat out the majority of the battle but was now applying a lethal dose of pain killers to a ten year old boy who'd had most of his right side blown out. The child whom she cradled in an oddly compassionate gesture for how cold her eyes looked turned and grinned "Well it certainly wasn't us...I can tell you Zsinj has spent hours, and I do mean hours ranting about how stupid and pointless planet cracking weapons are. He always argued the Deathstar should have been a mobile military base, able to fire its superlasers against fleets and orbital stations, then deploy hundreds of troops across a system..You keeping a piece of a SL to use for defensive purposes is the one thing about you guys he doesn't whine about" she shrugged laying the boy down and muttering a funerary prayer in Huttese that the giant Hutt echoed for the little soul.
"But the Republic, the Remnant and the Pentastar alignment have all lodged formal protests against us" Booster sneered" "Kriff this,...you guys play politics I'm going down to see if there's anything left of my engineering crew"

"Stay and help Dozo will"

Both the blond and the Chiss looked up to the visage of Rua Skirata who'd remained perched on support strut watching the whole thing impassively. He gave them a nod "We'll remain and help you patch up for the next few days" The Chiss offered. "Jedi" Karrde turned and eyed Kale "I'm going to head into my office, I'm going to get pasted on stims and alcohol...And try to not suspect you of being involved in this. When you're done here..come up and see me. We need to talk I've got some info on the thing your Jedi took you should probably know about" Karrde turned and stormed up one of the broken stairs fading into the fire.