First Reply Sleeping Ghosts: Darkening Skies

[Torn Eskol]

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SIA SPECDIV
BLACK SUN

TORN ESKOL
(Thread takes place prior to SLEEPING GHOSTS)

"Jobs simple this time." Came the voice at the other end.​

He missed her. She had turned private, just like him. Everyone had to. Everything was gone. "Some kind of package in an old Spaarti facility that someone else wants. On Roon. Supposedly had a lot of Mandalorian and other activity back in the day. All gone now. In, out, quiet. Probably droids at the most, maybe some locals. But they won't bother you. You're way out of town." He turned the page in the dossier. His eyes narrowed. Seemed way too simple. "Always the optimist." He said to the voice at the other end. He imagined her as a grandma-like figure. Her voice was soft and inviting. Forgetting for just a moment that she was sending him routinely to kill people or hurt people. He closed the dossier. "What's my name this time?" He said, turning his head towards the communicator on the table. He took another drag of the cigarette, feeling the weight and hate in his lungs. "Moth."​

Moth's descent onto Roon was routine and his cover was perfect. His Bounty Hunter license was forged but legit. He passed customs with flying colors. His ship inspection went well. He made up a story. Made up a target. A web of lies so dense you couldn't walk through it. No one ever did. The secret to lying was not worrying about it, it was just doing it enough that you'd become natural at it. He often forgot where his lies were and where his truths were at times. He often forget his own name.

Moth was that good at what he did.

Or maybe just that far gone.

It was a short trek from town, the dossier burned and memorized before he stepped off on the speeder. The facility- an old Spaarti facility, was way out there in one of the many rolling hills. The trails ended and the footpath began. Less signature on foot, too. He stepped out into the jungle, donning his kit- everything he'd need to get in, get out, mark, or come back later. Enough stuff to get by, and not enough to weigh him down. Everything was silent and didn't rustle, nothing jostled against each other.

The stealth-field generator and the no-show went on. The entrance to the Spaarti facility was about two hundred meters ahead. He was in range of any sensors, if there were any left. He had to be careful. The moment he wasn't, he was off his game. It was plausible that there was nothing here and nobody left, and he was going after a ghost and just getting what essentially was leftover desk paperweights.

Or, something bad was about to happen. He planned for both.

 

[Phoebe Winsloe]

Roon
Cover Identity: Kas Stenn, Ship's Mechanic 3rd Class (Apprentice)
Tags: Torn Eskol

Phoebe had wanted to come into Roon in her old Stealth X, but riding down in a stealth attack fighter would have brought far too much attention if she'd been caught. Instead, she entered the system on civilian transport under one of the forged identity cards she used while hiding from the latest Sith purge.

The best lies, Phoebe found, were ones you wrapped in the truth, she came in under the name Kas Stenn, a down-on-her-luck Corellian apprentice ship's mechanic with a spotty past. She had something to hide, but it was the information she had a schoolmate slip into the CorSec records that she'd, as Kas, had been seen in the company of a known arms smuggler leaving home at 16. If customs officials looked that's what they would have found, rather than finding Phoebe Winsloe, a Jedi Padawan who'd failed to secure a master in her chosen path of becoming a Jedi Shadow and was now relentlessly pursuing any assignment that would teach her intelligence techniques.

The RIS had thrown her a bone, a milk run that was more about gaining mission experience than any true test of skills, arrive on Roon without being identified, as she had just done, and complete some reconnaissance on a few ex-Mandolorian facilities. Pheobe figured that they were assessing her abilities in the field to see if she was worth any sort of investment of time and credits, and they weren't wasting much, her handler wasn't even on planet, just relaying info as needed on an encrypted holo-net link.

The first stop on her list, an old Spaarti cloning facility far enough in the wilderness to keep the prying eyes of locals away, Phoebe continued her cover even all the way out here, wearing practical, hardy clothing that could be from any spaceport across the galaxy and carrying a small tool bag concealing some RIS gear and her lightsaber. If she was caught, she'd look like someone trying to scavenge tech from the place rather than an intelligence asset.

As Phoebe quietly approached the facility, she opened herself to the Force, looking for lifeforms and anything that might set off her danger sense, and she was caught off guard by picking up a Force signature of a human, or someone near enough to human that she couldn't tell the difference, a few dozen meters away. Phoebe dropped to the ground and began to low-crawl as stealthily as she could manage, trying to get eyes on the other person before they noticed her.

 

[Torn Eskol]

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SIA SPECDIV
BLACK SUN

TORN ESKOL


Moth turned his head.

Noise.

Movement.

Smell.

Soap.

Clean hair.

He was a Keshian. He was hard to sneak up on. He was also him. She was close though. He raised up the rifle. Slugthrower. No casings. Suppressor. Very quiet. Very deadly, even if you were a Sith, Jedi. He thumbed off the selector switch just ever-so-slowly to prevent the noise. He waited. He saw her first. Red hair. Pretty. In shape. No gun visible. No climbing gear. No gear much to speak of.

He knew her type. Jedi. He'd met some before. Even fooled one of their best.

She was getting close and she could feel Moth's... energy. He was a liar, a pariah. He was six people standing in one place. He was a layer of paranoia unmatched by another person she'd probably ever encounter. His mind was a fortress, a steel trap impenetrable by anyone thus far. He wasn't quite like a dark side Sith energy, but he was definitely cruel. He was an assassin. He radiated death and nothing else. It was punctual, factual, and matter-of-factly. He was more like a graveyard than a killer. He was eerie, unsettling to be close to.

She hadn't seen him yet, but he made his presence known. A dim, barely visible laser turned on. To him, it was bright as day and he could see everything. In the darkness, she could probably only sense him through the force. He didn't say anything yet. He wanted her reaction first. He stood there, in the dark, lying in wait for her next move.

And, to see if she was also sent here, or just happenstance to be here.

Phoebe Winsloe