The Blood Hound
- Intent: To create a safe house for the spies and assassins of the Confederacy of Independent Systems.
- Image Credit:
Submission header made by [member="Scherezade deWinter"] [ X | X | X | X ]. - Category headers made by [member="Scherezade deWinter"].
[*]Canon: n/a
[*]Links: n/a
- Structure Name: The Aerie
- Classification: Safehouse with a Nightclub front
- Location: Uscru District, Coruscant
- Affiliation: Confederacy of Independent Systems | Ministry of Secrets
- Accessibility:
Through the Nightclub - Anyone can access the nightclub portion of the Aerie, as it is open to the general public. Its location ensures that it would not be as packed as other parts of the Uscru District, but as the district is popular with domestic population and tourists alike, it is rarely to never actually void of patrons and visitors. However, none of these will actually access the Safehouse itself. - The Safehouse - The only ones who are aware of the Safehouse portion of the building are those of special clearance within the Confederacy of Independent Systems and those who actively are part of the Ministry of Secrets. Entrance from the Nightclub is through a moving backwall inside one of the freezers in the kitchen, and entrance through the Underground is a short list of chain doors that look too rusty to ever be opened.
- Through the Underground - The entrance to the Aerie from the Coruscant Underground is a tightly kept secret, with a few doors that look too rusty and dusty to be opened or look like they have been opened in the past few centuries. There is no other front, nothing to conceal it. There are exactly four people who have access to the locations of all the doors - that is the Vicelord, the two Exarchs, and the Minister of Secrets. Everyone else (either through special clearance or by being one of the Ministry of Secrets birds) is only given some of the locations for these doors.
[*]Description: The Aerie is a new creation by the Confederacy of Independent's Systems Ministry of Science. Rather than built for technological innovation, the Aerie serves two main purposes – to be safe for the birds of the Ministry, and to remain hidden. Hiding in the very heart of the Core regions in plain sight, the nightclub was constructed for all to see. Serving as the front for the safehouse, there are no hints as to what can be hiding on the in. The structure looks like nothing special on the outside; just another building that might have some day been a warehouse before it was turned into something more fitting for the development of the district. Two guards are always stationed by the entrance, and a few more patrol the inside. Weapons are not permitted, and a few lockers are available to patrons who tend to carry them most of the time. The theme of the inside changes once per quarter, and the next year is always mapped out in advance. The current theme is a mundane nightclub, and the ones to follow are the saloon, the karaoke bar, and the cantina with live music.
- The Aerie Nightclub – The Aerie Nightclub is the front of this safehouse. While it is located in the Uscru District of Coruscant, where the nightlife is at, it's placed closer to the edge of it, where the crowd is slightly less packed compared to other portions of the area. Every three months, the overall theme of the club alters completely. The theme schedule for the next year is: Mundane nightclub, Saloon, Karaoke Bar, and Cantina with Jazz music. Two bouncers can be found at entrance, making sure to keep a crowd and potentially violent crowd out, and a few guards patrol the insides of the club at all times as well. Whatever theme the nightclub is running, there is always a long bar present that offers the best and the worst the galaxy has to offer in terms of liquor, ensuring that the place can serve the wealthy and the less fortunate at the same time. According to the theme, dancers and other forms of entertainers are hired as well. The front of the safehouse ensues to always stick to the rules, both those of regulation and those of taxes.
- The Elevator Shafts – The elevator shafts are accessed by moving a wall inside one of the freezers in the kitchen. They are several kilometers long, reaching all the way down into the Underground, connecting the building from top to bottom.
- The Aerie Safehouse – the Safehouse includes all that the birds of the Ministry of Secrets require. In here they can find the command center for most operations coming out of the core, several stations for fixing weapons and armor, decryptors, droid repair stations, meeting rooms, rest chambers, fake passports and credits, training facilities, and more. Unlike most safehouses, the Aerie is not meant for any of the birds to relax. It is a work space, and where they return to after most type of missions in the Core and immediately surrounding area. Additionally, the Aerie Safehouse offers protection, its inner depths concealed from outside censors. Rarely, will birds or targets be housed within it.
- The Aerie Nightclub - Low - The Nightclub itself has minimal security, in the form of two bodyguards outside and a few on the in that patrol the area. The job of the guards is to ensure that no drunk people enter, too drunk people are shown the exit, and no fights break out. Weapons are not allowed inside by non-Confederates, but the guard are still protected by mundane armor and carry two pistols each. To date there have been no special events that would require the nightclub's security to be bumped up.
- The Safehouse - Maximum - The inside of the Safehouse, however, is another matter entirely. Even if one were to find the moving doors inside the freezer, they would still not be able to enter - entry is upon granting a drop of blood, and if someone is not in the database, they're out of luck. Droids that are under the employment of the Ministry have tiny nanochips that would grant or deny them access and can be turned obsolete from a distance. Inside the Safehouse are a gigantic number of hidden weapon and armor caches whose full locations are unknown to nearly any. This includes grenades, bombs, short range missiles, and a self destruct button. Additional guard droids regularly patrol the safehouse and weapons can come out of the walls, floors, and ceilings, to kill trespassers.
As the Ministry of Secrets continued to span and grow, with it did the need for safehouses to be spread around the galaxy for the birds to be able to run to, hide in, or head for in order to give or receive debriefings before and after missions. The first official safehouse outside of the cloud space of the Confederacy of Independent Systems was chosen to be placed on Coruscant, the jewel of the galaxy. Urdu District was chosen to fulfill the wish to remain hidden in plain sight.
With terrifying efficiency, the Nightclub portion of the Aerie was constructed within days, the initial planning of the theme given to the birds of the Ministry during their downtime to keep them occupied. While it was clear that neither the Ministry nor the Confederacy actually cared what it included as long as it served their purpose, the birds themselves had a bit of fun with it, finding the way to incorporate nearly every idea that had been tossed onto the table.
The construction of the safehouse itself took several months, during which search parties were sent to find good entrances from which they would be able to build from the Underground to the Safehouse. No expense was saved on while they worked on this, the workers being carefully selected droids whose memory chips were later on removed so that no trace of their work would linger. The memory chips are saved in a safe on Geonosis, their content having been seen by the Minister of Secrets, the Vicelord, and the two Exarchs, and will in the future be shown only to new Ministers of Secrets should the time require it.
