Deep Space Horror Wrangling [Mandos or Invite]

[Werdla Dardalab]

"Is this a pirate thing again?"

"It.. might be kind of a pirate thing."

"Are we going to get into trouble?"

"Depends, do you mean is there going to be trouble or do you mean are folks like to yell at us?"

"Either. Both."

"Then yes and probably not. Reckon if this turns out to be true and we pull it off we should get a hell of a reward. Reckon this is something the Mand'alor himself might get a bit excited about."

"Not an excitable man that one."

"All the same, in this case he might be."

"What do you mean, if it turns out to be true? La are we chasing ghost stories or what out here?"

"Who told you?"

"What?"

"Are we actually chasing ghosts?"

"Ghost ship, might be.."

La allowed, flashing a slightly guilty look at her squad mates from the captains seat of the corvette they'd requisitioned for the glory and protection of Manda'yaim. Which was.. largely true. Or it might be. It depended on if the stories held up. Still, 'La didn't precisely believe in ghost ships. What she did believe in were sneaky hard to find ships who were better at avoiding folks or making sure no witnesses were left. A ship like that, let alone what was on it.. Now that could be worth a lot. More than the whole Squad had seen to date, depending on how close to reality the stories were. And it could be of use in the unending series of conflicts that characterized the Mandalorians

"We're chasing a ghost ship."

"Well. That's what they call her. I don't know about the ghost part, but enough sightings and there's surely a ship."

"And the five of us are going to take it?"

"What, y'don't reckon you're hard enough?"

"I didn't say that."

"Besides, once we make sure there's something worth finding, we can always call for backup."

"Though that means sharing the glory.."

"Exactly. So we see what's to be seen first. Then decide."

 

[Werdla Dardalab]

"You know where it is?"

"It'd be a pretty bad ghost ship if I did."

"So.. We're just flying the arse-end of the galaxy at random?"

"I didn't say that."

"But you don't know where it is."

"Nah, but I know where it's been, where most of the stories come from, and where there's enough traffic that it might be hitting folks but not enough that it staying hidden is impossible."

"That's.. surprisingly logical."

"Just 'cause I ain't gonna make you a spreadsheet of the data doesn't mean I'm stupid."

Came the withering reply. 'La was good at this sort of problem solving. There were a lot of things she did not know and a lot of education she did not have, but she'd been a Mando her whole life and a pirate most of it, there were some things she was very good at figuring out.

"Sorry La'ika."

"'S all right."

She shrugged slightly. La wasn't one to hold a grudge over a semi-imagined slight, especially not against her Squad mates. Getting your nose out of joint about things was not a useful survival skill, so she generally didn't.

"Besides, even with the general area pinned down, it's still going to be a lot of just flying around. That's why we brought the sensor-thingies. Huck 'em out the airlock, they keep on pinging to each other and back to us, that way she doesn't just pass by behind us we're we've already looked."

"I was wondering about the satellites."

"Yeah."

"What if they disable them or something? I mean if it managed to go uncaught this long.."

"You don't think a sudden transmission halt would be worth looking into?"

"Well obvi- oh."

"Exactly."

 

[Werdla Dardalab]

About a week and a lot of travel and satellite seeding later..​

"This is about the most boring thing I have ever done."

"Pfft, welcome to piracy and soldiering. Long periods of boredom, brief periods of intense activity where half the folks involved pray to return to boredom."

"And the other half?"

"The other half are Mandos."

Came the reply with a grin.

"How much longer are we staying out here?"

"Well, we've covered about seventy-five percent of the area I reckon it might be in. Then once that's done and we've got our network setup, I reckoned we'd spend at least another week waiting to see what shows up. At worst we've got the routes for what looks like a nice mix of merchants, smugglers and pirates, so I don't reckon we need to go home empty handed."

"I'm not a pirate."

"Pft, so long as it ain't a vod or anyone under our protection what do you care? Reckon them karking Sith or lunatic Prime need a few more credits lining their pockets? Or those corporate bastards equipping them? Or the damned Republic who are happy to see us fight their battles but chastise theirs who come to help us because they just can't spare anyone? Like we can, but we show up. We don't owe no-one."

"I- I guess you're right actually.."

"I'll fight whoever, whenever and wherever the Mand'alor tells me too, but I'm done playing good little soldier rebuilding puppy farms and helping dar'manda cross the street."

"I'm not saying I don't agree with you but what's brought this on?"

"I lost my damned leg. I'll die in battle, and willingly, but I'll not have my aliit lost when I do. Clan Dardalab is me. My Da and me, we were the last, and now it's just me. How'm I supposed to get land, how'm I supposed to outfit and train a kid when I can barely keep myself in ammunition?"

This was spit out with surprising venom, eyes blazing.

"Besides which, you think the name Dardalab is even going to be remembered just because I was a good little soldier in a sea of other soldiers?"

"You got medals for your service."

"Aye, and who outside of this Squad do you think remembers or cares? Y'don't bring honour to your ancestors or yourself with a pretty ribbon, be it on your chest or in your hair."

 

[Tysk Willamina]

[member="Werdla Dardalab"]

Now this was the place to be as Tysk was checking her horak rifle. A small smirk on her face under the blue baskar'gam before she was clipping it to her back and checking the ripper at her thigh, the old model mythosaur grenade launcher and her blades. A small hiss from the CO2 just in case to tell her everythign was going to be good while the other knife slipped into her shoulder sheath. The Yaim'la was meeting up with another mandalorian while she was securing several rollers in a back casing, caltrops for traps and if they would need the explosives before she was speaking. "This is Tysk on the Yaim'la."

 

[Werdla Dardalab]

"I don't have a clan."

This brought a moment of silence, both because Beraga spoke so rarely his words were generally given close attention, and because in this case what he'd said took some processing.

"What?"

"Everyone has a clan."

"I don't."

"What, were you adopted or something? You get to claim your adopters clan. Or I guess start a new one with your last name if you want."

"I'm not Mandalorian."

"What? Yes you are."

"You have the armour, you speak Mando'a, you answered the call.. What're you on about."

"I killed a man and took his armour."

"Yeah but, you been fighting with us for how long now?"

"I didn't have anywhere else to go."

There was a moment of silence. No one was quite sure how to react to this. This was the man they'd fought beside on a myriad of worlds, but as unbelievable as his words were, he had no reason to lie. Finally, La shrugged.

"Ni kar'taylir jie cakyu'usr biai ner vod. There. Now y'are. Welcome to Clan Dardalab."

"Can you do that?"

"Can't see why not."

"Y'changed the words some."

"Well I'm not having him as my son, that's weird. Basics are all the same."

"Two problems solved. Berikas a proper Mando and La has someone else to carry on the name, we're efficient today."

"Guess she won't need you for breeding after all."

"Wait was that an option? Unadopt him! Ber, go dar'manda!"

"I- why?"

Subtle as it was, there was more emotion in that single question than in anything Beraga had been heard saying to date. La shrugged again.

"Because you're my Vode. And you are Mando. You keep the Resol'nare, and you've had my back since the damned Rapture. I reckon anyone'd be proud to have you in their Clan, and I'll be damned if I'm gonna give 'em the opportunity. They ain't bled with you."

He nodded once, before retreating back further into the ship.

 

[Werdla Dardalab]

It was about this time that two things happened. Two seperate lights on the ship started flashing.

"What's up?"

"Incoming Transmission and a ping from some of our seeds! Chase might be one lads, let's see.."

La toggled the comm unit on, letting the message from [member="Tysk Willamina"] play while at the same time pulling up the report the satellites were sending her. Or not sending her as the case may be. She grinned, running quick calculations, before responding to Tysk.

"Good to have you around Tysk, your timing couldn't be much better. We're chasing us a ship, every reason to believe it's hostile. From the swathe of satellites going ark, I'd say we found it! I'm transmitting you the coordinates, basically just follow us in though."

She sent the coordinates and data through to the other woman, as well as her calculations for where they'd have to go to cut their target off based on it's current speed and heading, extrapolated from when and which satellites went dark.

"Just a heads up vod, I don't exactly know what we're going up against, so be on your guard, we might actually have to scramble out of their and come back with bigger ships."

Hopefully not though. Not if she had her way. She wanted that prize. Today had been fairly eventful, she wanted it to be unforgettable.

"Buruk Squad, en-route now."

With that the corvette was off, chasing whatever there was to be chased, it was possible it was just some scavenger, or an anomaly, but something inside her whispered no, this was it, this was her target, and it was time to go to work.

 

[Tysk Willamina]

[member="Werdla Dardalab"]

The grin on her face while she was in the pilots seat of the Yaim'la came about to follow them in while she was at the controls. The ship ahead of her and the message making it worthwhile before she was motioning to her sisters in the ship to hold on. "Understoos we'll follow you in and join up. Just tell us where we are heading this beast won't turn on a dime." The modified transport was packed with weapons and a forge, made for them to work on gear faster in the field for combat situations while hauling an armory that could be used. The spectre speeder inside she doubted would be useful but well it was able to go down a ships cooridor just to scare things and have a repeating blaster.

 

[Werdla Dardalab]

"We'll keep you informed!"

Came the quick reply. Before the comm was switched off for now.

"Suit up lads! Someone bring me my armour when they're geared!"

It was safe to say that Mando though they were, Buruk Squad had not spent the last week and a bit sitting on the ship in their armour. Like any Mandos however, particularly those who had been living and breathing war, their gear was always prepped and they could have it on in moments. As they were currently demonstrating.

"Swap you."

"Thanks Jidika."

'La swiftly moved aside, letting him take over the console as she pulled her armour on, quickly but thoroughly. Years of drill letting her operate almost on instinct. Most of her active attention was still on the readouts as they got closer to the area where the satellites had gone silent. When the first readings came in, Jidte whistled once under his breath.

"Don't reckon that's scavs.. We may've found something after all!"

"Frig she's big.. What's the readout have her length at?"

"Two thousand eight hundred metres, give or take. We're a bit small, even with the Yaim'la backing us.."

"Smaller than the stories have her at anyway."

"What."

"She's meant to be like, ten-kay."

"You sent us out after a ten thousand metre ghost ship?"

"Well it isn't, it's only two point eight. Besides, that's it innit? I sent us after a ten-kay Ghost Ship. That's a real ship, she's on our scanners just fine isn't she? Ghost-ships are like fish you almost caught, they're always a damned sight bigger when you're telling the story."

"I suppose.."

"Are we close enough to see what weapons she's got yet?"

"Not yet."

 

[Werdla Dardalab]

"Stay on course then."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah. You see her light up, we scramble though."

"That I can do."

A few tense moments of silence enveloped the corvette as they continued to chase down the monumentally larger Destroyer. By now the entire Squad was in the cockpit, watching the display as the roughly egg shaped ship became visible and slowly grew.

"These readings don't make sense.."

"Sasctayr, have a look hey?"

"On it."

His brows drew together as he ran through the information, cross referencing and searching through available data. A few moments later he shook his head once, sharply.

"Can't match it. Best I can offer based off of Vong info and the readings off that bloody weird ship-beast Larraq and his lot breed is that it's not fully ship. It's biomechanical, but it doesn't match either of those. Not properly in any case."

"I'm not reading any standard weapons. I've got a hotspot that's got to be the engine, but the rest of the readings are just off."

"La if this thing has no weapons, what's it do? I've never heard of a Ghost story where the ghost doesn't do something worth being scared over."

"When did I become the Ghost Ship specialist? I dunno, there's just stories about folks getting trapped and eaten."

"Eaten?"

"Well it's probably a metaphor isn't it?"

"He did say biomechanical.. the bio bit.."

"Pfft. Anyway, we're faster. If it turns around and opens a mouth, scarper."

"So glad this isn't some sort of suicide run.."

"Buck up! It's an adventure! We've found an honest t'gods Ghost Ship! Now we just have t'catch it and bring it home."

"You're mad."

"But if we did manage it."

"Oya."

This was not wise. It was not wise, it was not logical and it was quite likely to end in disaster, but it was the sort of madness that had a certain momentum behind it. Running with La was a lot like trying to stay on top of a landslide, but oh the adrenaline rush and the view was so damned good while you kept it up. All five of them, while slightly concerned, were grinning, ready to go, predators who'd scented prey and were ready to start the hunt in earnest.

 

[Werdla Dardalab]

"Yaim'La,"

La raised [member="Tysk Willamina"] on the comm again.

"we've got the target in our sights, you might've noticed we're punching a bit above our weight class. We don't read any external weapons though, we're going in for a closer look, stay alert vod!"

"It's slowing."

"Is it changing heading? Do you see any power spikes?"

"No, it's just.. slowing."

"Hold steady then."

"Are we close enough for the short range scanners yet?"

"About. I'll run 'em as soon as we are."

"It's a bit of a funny design.."

"Mm, looked smooth from a distance but.. There's a lot of.. things for none of 'em to be weapons."

"Just watch those energy readings.."

"Actually.. I've got the short range scanners going, and I've increased the visual feed by a couple of magnifications.. Technically there are weapons."

"What d'ya mean technically? It does or it doesn't."

"See for your self."

The feed was sent to their helmets. The ghost ships hull magnified.

"What am I looking at."

"Well, I'm no ghost ship expert, but that is half a ship stuck to another ship."

"What like.. welded on?"

"Maybe? Who'd weld that many ships to another ship though? And why?"

"Some there's only bits, some almost the entire ship is present."

"That's bloody weird."

"Maybe the ship has some kind of.. Defence that flashwelds things to it's surface?"

"Well. Don't touch it I guess?"

 

[Werdla Dardalab]

"It's uh, it's moving towards us now. What do I do?"

"Well, I reckon we have two options, discounting running."

"And they are?"

Jidte asked, eyeing the ghost ship suspiciously and slowly keying in the commands to back off at the same rate that it was advancing.

"Either try and land on one of the bigger hulks and see if that protects us from the whatever, or maintain our distance and send someone in via an EVA suit."

"Those are both terrible options."

"You got any better ones?"

"..No."

"It makes the most sense to use the EVA's, that way if something goes wrong we don't all die."

"And with that vote of confidence. Who's going?"

"My idea, I'll go."

"I don't like that."

"I've done the most ship ops, and if this is a trap I'm more likely to catch it, pirating experience and all."

"You have one leg."

"I've got the damned prossie, isn't like I'm hopping about."

"Well you're not going alone."

"Fine. No one else bloody volunteer. In case you've forgotten the point is not to risk everyone."

EVAs for La and Harampr were somewhat less intensive then they would have been for most, it was more about making sure their armour was properly sealed, adding mini jump jets and beefier heating than anything else.

"Right. Let the Yaim'la know what we're doing and then open the hatch. Nothing stupid while we're gone."

 

[Werdla Dardalab]

"Yaim'La, we're sending two of our crew over to investigate. Will keep you appraised."

"Are we going to die?"

"Everyone dies eventually. I was plannin' on waiting for something a little more exciting personally. If I don't die you can't, I don't want to have to break a new kid into the squad."

"Aw, you do care. What's our target?"

"Well, I don't see any obvious hatches, so I reckon we go for one of the hulks with the bridge intact, see if we can pull a log and get a better idea on where this things been and how it works."

"Makes sense. Let's do it."

With a final check of their gear as they stood in the airlock, La hit the button to open the hatch, expelling them both out into space. Neither ship was moving at any real speed yet, so they didn't have to compensate for that much. She closed her eyes, waiting impassively for the first rush of disorientation to fade as they spun through the void, before opening them and firing her jump jets when the target came into view. A few more corrections using both her HUD and her own eyes, had her descending towards a larger corvette, about the front third visible, jutting out from the ghost ship.

"Bit ominous."

"Definitely bodes."

"Could be our ship, cut in half and slapped on at random."

"Not going to be though."

Silence fell again as the two went through the tricky maneuvers of continuing their aimed approach while spinning so they'd land feet first, allowing their mag boots to catch hold. La hit first, and spun off.

"Ad be a yialeti'r!"

She bit out, firing her jets, trying to compensate.

"Harika, heads up! Tisn't bloody magnetic!"

"Osik. Adjusting."

 

[Werdla Dardalab]

"Titanium, I should have caught that, kark."

"We have this."

Las voice was calm, controlled. In fact there was little that scared most spacers more than the prospect of being lost in the void, waiting for your air to run out of your suit to fail you. Still, with two friendly ships in the near vicinity and her HUD pinging out her location, she wasn't panicking.

Harampr had slowed his descent to a crawl, and switched orientation again, coming in with admirable precision at the hatch, obviously intending to try and physically grab hold. Tough but not impossible. Particularly at the cautious speed he was maintaining.

La, having been sent worryingly off course reckoned she might as well see if the main bulk of the Ghost ship was magnetic. Or if it was going to flash weld her to it's surface or had any other fun ways to murder a person. Inquiring minds wanted to know. It was near black and had an unpleasant oily look to it. When her feet impacted however, they stuck.

"Well. Ghost ship's magnetic."

"La!"

"I'm not going to just let myself float around now am I? Anyway, it hasn't killed me yet. We're learning things. Making my way over to Harampr and the initial objective."

Harampr had managed to grab hold of the hatch, and was in the process of opening it. Checking her HUD, La started to turn.

"Uh."

"What?"

"I'm stuck."

"What?"

"I'm stuck. Maybe it's hyper magnetic? I've disengaged my magboots and I'm still stuck. Just tried a controlled jet burst, nothing."

"What do we do?"

"Well. Keep going for the control panel and readings. I'll.. I dunno, try a few things."

If she absolutely had to she could likely ditch the EVA suit, as long as her vod were there to pull her into the ship quickly enough it likely wouldn't kill her to be in just her basic armour. She pondered this, and then glanced down at the surface of the ship again.

"Osik.."

"What?"

"Nothing, focus!"

 

[Werdla Dardalab]

What La had found, looking down, was that she was about three inches sunk into the hull, and not only had she not noticed but her HUD hadn't warned her. This was definitely going to make things more difficult. At this rate she might need to have someone float a welding kit over to her so she could cut herself loose. Still, might as well have Harampr finish was he was doing before getting everyone all riled up.

"Bloody thing was still pressurized! Sensors say the air'd gone bad though. Must've been welded on in atmo somewhere, good job of it too to have a seal like that."

Probably i'nt a welding job, actually.

La thought, eyebrow raising slightly. She was pretty sure she could actually see herself sinking in at this point. She was in over her ankle, and yep, she could actually see it seemingly creeping up her leg. This probably was not good.

"All right, I'm making my way in and-"

There was an inhalation. Las attention switched to the feed from Haramprs HUD, attention fully drawn from her own situation.

"All's fine, just a corpse."

Likely good it hadn't been a vacuum on the ship, or the corpse would have been much better preserved. La's come on one or two of those in her pirating career. Say this for space, it preserved a body almost perfectly, which was creepy as anything. Much better to have skeletons and rags, particularly when you were breathing your own air supply and safe from having your senses intruded upon in that manner.

"Can't see why you'd leave a corpse in here. Suppose it could be a tribal thing. Like heads on a pike? Look at this ship we've caught and the crew we've killed?"

"Could be."

La allowed. In fact she was relatively certain she knew where the whole 'being eaten' bits of the stories had come from. Corpsey McDead had probably been on the corvette when it first enountered the Ghost Ship, Which didn't bode very well for- and she was up to her knees. It was speeding up. That was beyond not good. Still, no warning klaxons from her armour yet, no pain, and Harampr was making good progress. She pointedly looked up and away so they'd not see if they checked in on her feed.

"Door to the bridge is shut, I'll see if I can override."

Harampr slowly and carefully removed the wall plate surrounding the controls. Using a small unit on his EVA built for just such occasions he carefully hooked it up to the controls, sending a jolt of power through them. Hopefully they'd not corroded anywhere. Apparently not however, as the door opened with another whoosh of escaping air, blowing him back a few feet.

"Captain stayed with the ship I guess.."

The only lights on the corvette he was exploring came from his own suit and systems. Between the dark, the all pervading silence and the corpses, there was an atmosphere that definitely had the hair on the back of their necks standing up. He moved in, pointedly ignoring the probably Devaronian corpse belted into the chair, skeletal fingers still gripping controls.

"All right, seeing what info I can pull."

La jerked slightly, heart pounding when something impacted her fingertips. Oh, it was the ships hull, that was just great. Lovely.

 

[Werdla Dardalab]

"La.."

"Yes?"

"La I saw that."

"What? What's going on?"

"Pull the info."

"I am, but what's happening!"

"What is happening La? I've got you all good on sensors."

"I feel fine. No pain or discomfort. Immobilized obviously."

She glanced down, she was in to slightly above her waist.

"Kark La!"

"Suits not breached, pressures good."

"How are we dealing with this?"

"Harampr finishes what he's doing, returns to the ship, we've got emergency welding gear. After planning it out and not rushing about like idiots, cut me out. Analyze the data we get, go from there. For that matter maybe we cut our way right into this beast and get at it that way."

"If anything changes La."

"My HUD will notice before I do and you're patched into that, but yes."

"Kark. Kark."

"Harika."

"I'm calm! I'm on it!"

He was as quick as one could expect, as he set to work pulling physical memory banks where possible, and sparingly using her booster battery pack to give temporary life to systems and pull info digitally where necessary. Still it seemed to drag on. Particularly when La's HUD started flashing alarms at her. Not that her own physical senses didn't follow up a moment later.

"Osik."

"La what's happening?"

"Pressures lost. Air's bad but survivable. Temperatures dropping. My toes are cold."

"What?"

"Feel exposed. And I can wiggle 'em. Actually I can move about my ankle down."

"What is happening?"

"If I had to guess? I'm sinking through the hull and coming out the other side."

 

[Werdla Dardalab]

"Dunno what'll happen to my signal when my helmet goes under, let me make this clear. I'm either fine or I'm dead, and either way, if any of you get yourself into trouble doing anything stupid I'm going to be vexed. Understood?"

"Yes Ma'am."

"Harampr?"

"Understood. I've almost got this data.."

"Keep at it. Could have the info we need."

She could hear the tension in his voice. In all of them really, and the feed from their suits were almost to a man relaying slightly increased heart rates and blood pressure. She did understand, if it had been one of them in trouble she'd go to any lengths to bring them back, but she was also pragmatic. This damned ship was like quicksand, and it wouldn't save anyone to have them all jump in.
It was exceptionally disconcerting to be held perfectly rigid and watch as the viewscreen went slowly black while she sunk further in, while at the same time feeling part of her leg hanging out into.. what? And there was a thought she didn't need on top of everything else. Assuming she made it through fine, and there was no moment of suffocation, what was the getting dropped into? Somewhere safe? Survivable at least? What else was there? Lurking while she was trapped, help, basically helpless.

Kark that, I can move my leg some, I will kick something to death.

..unless it gets bitten off first.

There was a tiny little voice that as a general rule La never encountered. It could be thought of as the child version of herself. The part with no control who feared the monsters in the dark. This was not something she was used to dealing with. She was Mando after all, had been raised Mando. When she'd been afraid in the dark her father had given her a gun, and taught her to depend on her other senses, or to use the night vision on her HUD. Mandalorian children did not cower. This enforced helplessness was both terrifying and utter and complete osik.

Still, she kept her breathing even, controlling herself if she couldn't control much else. There was no point getting worked up anyway, she couldn't do anything about it. Plus the air wasn't great. She already felt like she'd been running, no need to make it worse by hyperventilating. She was in utter darkness now, her HUD starting to fail, the signal lost and then, nothing. She was free from the waist down now, knees found a surface and she pushed against it, flexing, trying to pull herself free faster.

And suddenly she was.

Resistance disappeared and she fell, nine feet or so, hitting a surface, that since there was gravity, she immediately assigned as floor. She went to stand without thinking, body protesting slightly, but nine feet was not so much to one used to constant hardships and pushing, always further, always faster. Unfortunately what she forgot was that she was short a leg, and what she'd not noticed was that like her EVA and armour, her prosthetic was gone. She overbalanced and fell back to the floor, swearing.

On a Ghost ship in nothing but her bodyglove with one leg. What had she said earlier about how she wasn't going to be hopping? This gallows humour won a dark grin from her as she rose again, carefully, one hand on a wall to balance herself. Now the question. Stay here and see what her squad managed or push on? No HUD and no prosthetic. It would be difficult, but she had a pretty good mental picture of the ship, and since it was egg-shaped, she was inclined to believe controls would be near the center.

If she could get there, she might be able to call out, or even control the damned thing and spare the rest of her Squad the bother. It was a a damned big ship to hop across in the dark though.. At least she found it wasn't entirely pitch black. She wasn't sure where the light was coming from, maybe the walls themselves, but the longer she stood the more her eyes adjusted. She was still straining to make things out, but at least she'd likely not walk into any walls.

Well. Standing about and waiting had never been her style.

 

[Werdla Dardalab]

Still, it wasn't like she was entirely stupid. With muscles and a bit of assistance from teeth, she removed one arm of her bodyglove, ripped a piece off and left it on the ground, the shape a trail sign to ensure that if her Squad did breach, they knew which direction she'd gone and that she'd done so willingly. Tactical thinking, of such details success was made.

Hopping awkwardly down the passage, La's face was serious, usual easy grin gone. She wasn't afraid. She was hugely competent, but she also knew she was in an extremely compromising situation at the moment. Not only was she half crippled, she had no armour or weapons, and did not have her HUD or team to rely on. It was her alone, realistically unable to run at all or fight at full effectiveness against any threats the ship held. And, not only that, but her head was spinning slightly. No surprise considering the readings she'd gotten on the air when her armour had first been breached. Fantastic. Particularly since she was having to work more than usual just to move around.

All this however, was only background noise. She thought it, was aware of it, but did not dwell. She was busy paying absolute attention to her senses. All of the above in mind, she really couldn't afford to be taken by surprise.

----------

"La? La! Jidte, you getting anything?"

"No, she's gone from the sensors."

"Can you pick her up inside the ship?"

"We don't have a life sensor on this. The one in my HUD's not enough to penetrate our ship, the space between the vessels, and whatever the kark that things made of. Sorry Har'ika."

"Not your fault vod."

The subtle sound of teeth being ground was heard over the squads commlink. Harampr was near out of his mind with concern. If he knew La was somewhere, armed and armoured facing a horde of enemies he'd have been more comfortable than this. He knew what she was capable of, but he also knew how damn stubborn she was. Besides, who knew what the ship had actually done? It wasn't just that she was somewhere out of reach, but if the ship had dissolved her? Or trapped her within it's hull without oxygen? How could you fight that?

He finished pulling the last of the salvageable data.

"I'm done. I'm sending you the data from here."

"Your HUD doesn't have the capability to send that much on it's own."

"I know, I'm going to use my spare energy pack reserve to link up with this wreck and use it's processing powers and transmitting capabilities in tandem with my HUD."

"Har'ika what are you doing? If you do something stupid La will kill us all."

"It's not stupid. Look, trying to breach the damned hull without falling prey to the same phenomenon will be a nightmare."

"True."

"And we don't even know if it will work. Not with the gear we have anyway. We don't even know what the things made of let alone how it will react."

"Also true."

"If it's absorbing this ship the same way it took La though, maybe I can just walk the length of it and wind up wherever La is. I won't touch the hull, you lot will be with me, seeing what I see, I think this is our best bet."

"It makes sense."

Jidte hesitated a moment, before nodding once, unseen. La usually called the shots, but he was largely accepted as the most reasonable balance between Haramprs immediate reactions and Sasctayrs overly intellectual ones.

"Fine, but if we agree you should fall back, you fall back."

"Agreed. I'm uploading the info to you now."

 

[Hulle Itera]

[member="Werdla Dardalab"]

Hulle's Purudii class starfighter exited out of hyperspace about a kilometer away from them with a brilliant flash of blue. Setting the ship to autopilot, he took his hands away from the controls and crossed them.

"Strange." He said to himself, pondering the scene. He had been sent by the Itera clan father to investigate a disturbance in this sector. They hadn't expected meeting vode here, but for all they knew, the Mandalore had sent then and neglected to tell Clan Itera. Annoying, but expected. Itera wasn't very social with the other clans, and a lot went on without their knowing.

Nevertheless, these Mando'ade seemed in need of aid, and Kad Ha'rangir would look kindly upon him for his deeds. On the other hand, Itera had gotten a reputation as the "black sheep" of the clans, and his assistance might be met with anger. But Kad Ha'rangir commanded that the Mando'ade aid each other, and his words had more weight then the doubters.

Hulle tapped the console and brought up a comm frequency with the Mandalorian ship, "Assistance?" He asked in a deep throaty voice.

 

[Werdla Dardalab]

"Who's that?"

"Dunno, running their transmitter now. Vode-ship though. Probably a friendly?"

"Who did La tell where we were going?"

"Who knows with her."

"Good point."

Jidte toggled the comm on to respond.

"Su'cuy vod, wouldn't turn it down, keep your ship clear of this beast though. It's hull touches your ship, you can look forward to losing your ship. Turns out those wrecks sticking out of it aren't decoration."

Jidte paused for a moment, considering how much more to say until they knew exactly who they were dealing with.

"We lost one of our squad to it, we're seeing about getting her back. You got your buy'ce on? We can patch you into our Squad channel."

That seemed safe. On this off chance this wasn't a Mandalorian, they wouldn't have the armour or the HUD that came with it, so they'd not be able to join into the Squads feed, or at the very least since it was a two way connection, it would become very obvious that they were an impostor if that was the case when they did join.

He flipped the comm off, waiting for a reply from the other while still watching the data streaming over from Harampr.

"I can start going through the data so you can concentrate on Harampr and our new friend if you like."

Sasctayr offered, knowing that being pressed into impromptu leader and trying to keep track of everyone and everything was wearing on his vod.

"That would help."

Jidte agreed, nodding thankfully. Sasctayr was best suited for it anyway. He read fastest, retained information and noticed patterns. All of them had learned to multi-task not long after getting their first HUD, but when you tried to do too much it still got difficult.

"Right, that's the last of it. I'm moving back."

"K'oyacyi!"

"Will do."

[member="Hulle Itera"]

 

[Hulle Itera]

[member="Werdla Dardalab"]

"Elek." He replied bluntly. Frankly, they weren't exactly making a good first impression on him. He didn't know what was happening, but from the sound of it these were a bunch of vhette. But he'd stay his tongue, perhaps their was more opposition then they expected in there, or perhaps not all the Mando'ade could stand up to Itera's standards?

He adjusted his ship's course to stay clear from the vessel and then sat calmly, waiting for them to either patch him in or for them to transmit the com frequency to his ship.