A Bounty of Employees is Common

[Kay-Larr]

Kay saw the anger rise in [member="Bradshaw Ku"] 's eyes as he let go of her. The air began to surge, she could feel the Force gather to him like flies to a light.

Her eyes darted to [member="Macoda Haberon"] as he grabbed onto her arm tightly. She could feel her pulse increasing as his pressure did, the veins in her arms starting to raise as the blood within them had nowhere to go.

She jumped a little as Brad punched the wall, yet another hole that would need fixing. Kay moved in front of Mac, as much as his grip would allow her to mve anyways.

"Breathe Brad! Just breathe! You have to calm down or I might lose my arm!" She knew that Mac wouldn't intentionaly hurt her, but he was afraid for himself right now. "You were a little boy at the time. A scared and mad little boy. But now we have a chance to make it right. But you have to calm down so that you can think more clearly.....Okay? Just breathe...."

 

[Bradshaw Ku]

Bradshaw had been far too taken in by the anger and growing grief erupting from deep within his psyche over having left his younger sister, to notice [member="Macoda Haberon"]’s extreme discomfort and fear. That is, until his anger and guilt had been literally channeled through the wall and he heard his mother’s plea.

The dark side having dissipated, for now, he looked up from his fist. He saw his mother standing in front of Mac who appeared tense. Bradshaw’s brows furrowed for a moment as he tried to make sense of what was happening. Was the large man… cowering behind his mother?

Before he was further distracted by that confusing sight, the rest of Kay’s attempt to calm him stole his attention back to the unpleasant matter at hand. His sister was still missing, and he’d left her. It was true. He had been a scared and mad little boy when he ran away from Bakura. Somehow, that didn’t make him feel better. He still shouldn’t have left his younger sister behind. Imagine how scared she had been.

Muscles began to tense. The dark side finding any reason to stoke the fire of irrational, passion fueled violence. However, as he contemplated putting yet another hole in the wall, a thought penetrated the fog – scared and mad little boy. Was that him now? Was he just acting like he had fifteen years ago?

He took a deep breath and tried to relax his muscles, letting some of the dark side energy flowing around him seep away. His mother was right, of course, they had a chance to bring her home. Holes in the wall wouldn’t do that, no matter how satisfying he thought they were in the moment.

The thumb and middle finger of his right-hand pressed against his temples as he tried to think and get ahold of himself.

“Let’s go bring her home, then. How are we possibly going to find her?” He said, a little despondent over their chances and embarrassed by his outburst. He didn't know how they'd locate her. At least he knew where to find the wall.

[member="Lady Kay"]

 

[Hadrian Bjormund]

With [member="Bradshaw Ku"] calming himself down and the dreadful energy slowly dissipating, Mac released his powerful grip on [member="Lady Kay"]. He suddenly realized that he was probably cutting off her circulation and internally chastised himself. He really needed to get a hold of his fear of the force, he felt powerless against it. However for the time being, he was more concerned with looking weak in front of Bradshaw Ku and quickly straightened himself up and stepped to Kay's side, pretending that nothing had happened.

Mac cleared his throat and began speaking in a more professional tone. He was tempted to only address Kay in a similar manner that Bradshaw did earlier, but he decided that he now wasn't the time for such petty digs. That, and he didn't want to upset Bradshaw any further. "Well, Darlyn is currently running Rae-Anna's physical characteristics and name through the bounty board and seeing if we can get any close hits. We could also run this 'Daiq' through the system too as she was the last person to be seen with your sister. I can get the word out to a couple contacts but other than that... it looks like we are going to Bakura."

 

[Kay-Larr]

Kay breathed a sigh of relief as [member="Bradshaw Ku"] began to calm down. Most especially as it gave [member="Macoda Haberon"] the incentive to let go of her arm. She rubbed her arm, helping to get the circulation flowing through again, flexing and unflexing her fingers. That was close. She knew that Mac was strong, more than likely he was fully capable of snapping her arm in two, but he had refrained. She was lucky.

Brad always had a temper. It was why Shaw was better suited to look after him and train him. But without Shaw to guide him, Brad lost all sense of control. He had lost the will to do it.

Until now.


"I can show you what Daiq looks like. I have her image in my files. But yes, Bakura. Coquitlam was where we last were. Try there first. I wish that I could go with you..."" Would they let her? Would she even be allowed? Or would it be considered too dangerous and too far away? Kay wanted to be there first hand to find Rae-Anna, but as she was the Queen now, such missions were reckless. "I'll get you access to First Order space, so that you can pass through without being stopped. Bakura is under their control. Let's head back to my office and I can get you the right credentials. That is...if you both are going?"

 

[Bradshaw Ku]

Bradshaw leaned his back against the wall he so recently opened a new cubby hole for. The dark side granted him some modicum of power, if uncontrolled tantrums against inanimate objects happen to be your idea of power. However, it always had a similar, cyclical effect. He would become angry, the force would provoke him, he would become angrier, then that anger would take the form of some violent thrashing. After that, the built-up energy was released, dissipated back into the aether from which it came and he would tire to varying degrees from the exertion.

As he rested against the wall, he listened to [member="Macoda Haberon"]’s and then his mother’s answers to his concerns about finding his sister.

“looks like we are going to Bakura.”​

​

Back to Bakura. Back to Coquitlam. Back to the edge of the galaxy and back to the past. Well, it was as good a place to start looking as any and besides, it was something tangible he could do to find her. Not database searching or scanning the holo-net. Boots-on-the-ground. Real looking. Action.

His shoulders softened as some of the frustration and tension over having left Rea-Anna was lifted from them.

As Queen of a major trade government, [member="Lady Kay"] could no doubt secure any sort of documents and passage for them she wanted. The only remaining question, was who would be going. She seemed to take herself out of the equation, though Bradshaw wasn’t so sure. As for Axe-Man, he was of two minds. On the one hand, he resented the idea that Mac was encroaching on his piloting turf with all the pettiness of a toddler keeping his blocks to himself, not to play with, but just because he didn’t want others to play with them. On the other, he didn’t seem so bad. There was something about him he kind of liked.

Pushing himself from the wall, he addressed his mother first, “Don’t take yourself out of it so easily. Of course, you can, and should, come. Commenor won’t fall apart if you leave it for a few days. Isn’t that what government officials… or whatever… are for anyway? She’s your daughter after all.”

Then turning to Mac, “...And hey, if Axe-Man wants to tag along, I guess that’s all right with me,” he looked him up and down, sizing him up, then shrugged, “After all, never know when you’ll have to reach something on the top shelf… or need to chop down a tree.” He smiled. Maybe he did like Mac, but his pettiness and snark weren’t so easily diverted. Though, his last remark was closer to good-natured ribbing than true distaste.

 

[Hadrian Bjormund]

Mac whipped around to [member="Lady Kay"] when she mentioned securing the appropriate documents. "First Order?? What do you mean First Order?" There was a small amount of shock in his voice, more than he intended to show. Mac didn't know where Bakura was, he just assumed that it was in Hutt Space or something. Little did he know that Bukura was less than two parsects away from Pantha Reach, less than two parsects away from Fornow, less than two parsects away from the domain of Kaine Zambrano.

He looked back at [member="Bradshaw Ku"] when he suggested that Kay should come along. What were they thinking? "Absolutely not. The less people who know about this mission, the better. We don't want anyone to get any ideas to try and find Rae-Anna before we do." Mac turned to Kay. "No passports either. I'm a wanted man in First Order Space, Kay. You know that. [member="Darlyn Excron"] and I will go undercover to Bakura..." Mac paused for a second, thinking. ".....with Bradshaw. If we do find Rae-Anna, we will first need to identify her and then convince her that we are actually who we say we are and not sex traffickers or goons of Thraxis. Bradshaw will be the key to both of those things." Kay can also accomplish both of those things, but Mac was hesitant to bring her along. He wasn't necessarily worried for her own safety as much as Darlyn would be, but that her absence would be instantly noticed and could expose the whole mission. Mac felt bossy, but to be honest, Bradshaw and Kay didn't know chit about this kind of work. Mac did.

 

[Kay-Larr]

Kay had other reasons for not wanting to go. [member="Connor Harrison"] was one of them. She didn't want to risk running into him yet. Their last encounter wasn't a good one, and she figured that something really bad could happen to her. The Darkside was twisting him into being possessive. Who knew what would happen if he found Rae-Anna first?

As she was about to comment to [member="Bradshaw Ku"] , [member="Macoda Haberon"] reminded her about his situation with the First Order. Even [member="Darlyn Excron"] was banned from their space. How did he think that they were going to slip in unnoticed? "What ship are you going to use? How are you going to slip through their patrols? I can give you different identities if that would help..."

There was so many different things that could have happened to Rae-Anna after all this time. Mac's mention of sex trafficers made her worry. Would she have fallen into that trap? No, no she was too young. At the time. But if Brad ran away and became a playboy, would she have fallen on the same path?

Yet there was a very high chance that no one would find her at all. The information that they had was next to nothing. And it wasn't as though they could put a call out. The publicity for that would end up with them having a dozen or more girls wanting to be the lost Princess of Commenor. It would be a nightmare. What Mac was proposing was far better.

"The least amount of people that know, the better...The least attention that you draw to yourselves the better. But if there's trouble, I should give you my seal or something so that it gives you diplomatic immmunity. I'll take the fall for it. There's less chance of the First Order punishing me than you."

 

[Bradshaw Ku]

Bradshaw listened as [member="Macoda Haberon"] seemed rather flustered and shocked that Bakura was in First Order territory. He hadn’t personally paid much mind to that part of the situation. Having flown as a combat pilot for the First Order a few years ago, he didn’t have any special warm and fuzzy feelings for them, but he also didn’t have any particularly negative ones either. They were just another galactic government. A bit arrogant and stuck-up, especially their Sith, but then again, so were a lot of galactic superpowers.

Then Mac let out the reason he was so agitated. Apparently, he was a wanted man in First Order space. Bradshaw wondered what Axe-man had done to deserve that. He had never been a, how do you say, law-abiding-citizen, and yet, somehow, he wasn’t wanted by the First Order. Though, the Hutt Cartel ironically wanted him – one of the least law-abiding organizations the galaxy vomited up.

[member="Lady Kay"] soon brought up the point he was about to make. How exactly were they going to slip through the patrols? What ship would they use? Plus, different identities sounded like fun. Could they get away with smuggling themselves onto Backura… that was it! Smuggling! Finally, something with which he was intimately familiar. It was clear that his mother wasn’t going to go, and just maybe, it really was for the best. She was about as high profile as they come and if anyone recognized her, their cover would be blown. Not good for a smuggling operation.

With new energy, he pushed himself from the wall, “Wow, wow, Axe-Man,” he said as he made a ‘calm-down’ gesture, “It’s just the First Order. Let’s keep our pants dry, shall we? Alright, so you’re a wanted man. There’s worse things. If you’re wanted, then we just smuggle ourselves to Bakura.” He looked back and forth between Mac and his mother. “Lucky for us, smuggling is what I happen to have done for most of my life. Look, I’m not wanted by the First Order, so this is as simple a smuggling job as they come. We buy some beat up freighter. One that wouldn’t draw any attention. Put a few hiding spots in it, just in case. Then we get some new identities – which would normally be the hardest part of this whole thing except my mom happens to be a Queen, and then, badda-bing-bada-boom, before you know it, we’re in Coquitlam and nobody’s the wiser. This would be a dream job for any smuggler worth his spice and if there are two things I know, it’s piloting and smuggling.”

 

[Hadrian Bjormund]

Mac nodded his head as he heard out [member="Bradshaw Ku"]'s plan on smuggling the group through First Order Space to Bakura. It should be fairly simple as most borders are pretty porous, nothing that a competent smuggler couldn't work his way around. Smuggling would have a low risk but should they get caught, Mac feared that they would need a lot more than diplomatic immunity. Still, it was the best plan that they had.

"Seems solid enough to me." Finally Bradshaw was making sense. He just hoped that he was as good of a pilot and smuggler as he claimed to be. He looked over to [member="Lady Kay"], wondering how she felt about all this.

 

[Kay-Larr]

Kay nodded to [member="Bradshaw Ku"] . He seemed to have experience in this, which she wasn't sure if that was a good thing or not. Being a mother again, it made her feel a bit worried. "Come back to my office then. I'll get what you need."

She turned from Brad's chambers and headed towards her own. Would [member="Macoda Haberon"] protect Brad as he did her? That remained to be seen. Kay of course hoped that he would.

After entering her office she went straight to her desk and opened one of the drawers, taking out a small datachip. She inserted it into her datapad and downloaded appropriate information that they would need should the First Order attempt to stop them from their mission. Although she hadn't asked any of the higher ups about it, Kay was sure that their mission was small fry in comparrison to what they already had on their plate. The journey of four men to look for one young lady was not by far any act of aggression against the government. In fact it had nothing to do with them at all.

Kay handed Brad the datachip once the download was complete. "Here. Hopefully you won't need it. I know that more than likely nothing will come from this journey, but I wish you luck."