The Man nodded slightly but still seemed somewhat preoccupied. From his grip, Fuze was able to notice the cold and clamminess of The Man's skin, not dissimilar to someone running a high fever.

"Very well, Kel. I will meet you at your designated co-oridinates on the planet of Ryloth in two days time. That should give me sufficient time to procure transport. Thank-you for your assistance."

And then, with no ceremony or small talk The Man let go of the Twi'lek's hand and turned away from him, walking away down the street; his business concluded.

As Fuza watched the curious stranger walk off into the distance and considered his next move, a voice came from above him:

"Hey, Mister!"

Perched atop the roof of the cantina and waving down at him crouched a young Draethos male in a mis-matched assortment of ill-fitting clothes. Being no more than fourteen or fifteen years old, he looked down at Fuza with small, bright inquisitive eyes.

"You lookin' for Ree?"

Fuze would have been surprised by anyone shouting him right now. Let alone this young Draethos.

"Yessir, or someone who knows her, what can you tell me?"

With the lithe reflexes of a cat the Draethos seemed to unfold and roll off the roof landing gracefully at Fuze's feet. He outstretched a hand in greeting.

"The name's Nyalii. I'm a friend of Mz Ree's." He smiled as he spoke. At least Fuze thought he was smiling, its often difficult to tell with a Draethos..

"I can't tell ya where Mz Ree is, when she don't wanna be found, not none of us can find her...BUT, I can show you the people she was last talking with..."

With his other hand he outstretched a flat palm.

"For a little...compensation of course!"

"That's a hard bargain, squire!" Fuze laughed. "The name's Fuza Macoy, but you can just call me Fuze. And I'm always looking to help those in need." Fuze said, placing twenty-five credits in the boy's hands.

Fuza admired the young boy, he didn't see a side of himself in the boy, but he saw the portrait of the childhood he sometimes wished he'd had. Such simple pleasures.

"So, Nyalii, what can you tell me?"

"I can do better than that.." Said the young streetwise kid, throwing the credits into the air and catching them with a satisfying 'chink' noise. "...I can show you."

For the next half hour Fuze followed the boy down many a street alley, through market stalls, shops and short-cuts learning several secret routes through the maze of Lower Coruscant until, finally, they came out by one of the planets many Spaceports - in this case a rather small one which Synrii reliably informed him was often used for smugglers - where he pointed out a group gathered around a S-250 Chela-class starfighter.

"Thats them," he said, pointing to a tall thin human with conspicious purple hair being accosted by another human, a female this time with hair as red as fire.
"Ree'tak was talking to them just before the cantina exploded. If anyone knows where she might be, its probably that lot."

As Synrii darted off down one of the back alleys he turned to Fuze before vanishing out of sight.

"Good Luck, Mister!"


(( Hooray! 600th posts! no life for me, nosir! ))

(( Temporal Lock Released - Please Resume Posting ))

Fuze watched the young Draethos race down the back alleys that he obviously knew his way around as well as Fuza knew about space.

"Good luck, Mister!" Synrii shouted back down the alley, no where in sight.

He hoped that it was his luck and that he wasn't just led to a dead end. Fuze's ship was docked at this same seedy starport, so if he needed it they were ready to fly.

Fuza began to approach the group. "Which one of you can I talk to?" Fuze requested "The name's Fuze Macoy, I'm here to lend a helping hand to your girl."

Nex spent the next few minutes walking around the ship and sat down in a nearby seat. Removing his lightsaber and placing it next to him, Nex began to meditate on past events that got him this far in his journey.

Nex’s commlink activated as Creed requested his assistance. Raising his hand, the lightsaber traveled to his palm as he stood and began walking through the ship towards Creed. Upon reaching him, Nex noticed the human female next to Creed and paused for a brief moment as he looked her over.

With a humored grunt he turned to Creed.
“You called?”

(( Apologies for not posting sooner, having a life isnt as glorious as some make it out to be ))

No sooner had Fuze uttered the words "The name's Fuze Macoy, I'm here to lend a helping hand to your girl." than he heard a robotic voice behind him followed by the sound of metal and servos.

“Well that is excellent, sir! Quite, quite excellent!”

Turning around the Twi'lek beheld a GE3-series protocol droid, slightly unusual in that it was bright – almost gleaming – white in colour, a shade which the GE3-series were not generally painted in. It's optical receptors were also a luminous blue colour, again custom in their design.

It did a half-bow (the best it could manage with a frame not designed for such movements) when Fuze looked at the curious droid, attempting to present itself in polite a way as possible.

“I am F0-R3-GE, human-cyborg relations.” It continued in an optimistic chirpy voice. “I represent a client – who wishes to remain anonymous – that wishes to see mistress Ree'tak return safely out of hiding and who has instructed me to travel with the people that accessed the ET-74 Comm droid at White Mercy Medical Facility – designation ET-176b – earlier this afternoon. I am to provide assistance where necessary and help to facilitate in the accumulation of data that will eventually lead to the young mistress' return. I am versed in over two-hundred languages, am a proficient starship pilot and am capable of medical care up to surgical level on no less than twenty-seven sentient species. I....”

The droid's voice trailed off as it observed the scene before it: beyond Fuze it saw the starship and at it's lowered ramp was a human male stood near a female of the species, both with vibrant hair colouring. Descending the ramp was a Talortai, and all three had their vision elsewhere, all looking the same direction.

Following their gaze, 'Forge' saw a large human shadowed by a Republic Guard, and two more stepping from the darkness of an alley behind them. As the four drew blaster pistols, the droid waddled forward at speed toward the ship.

“Oh, my!”

Creed had to admit it to himself, he was relived to see his Talortai friend emerge down the vessels ramp and to his aid.
He gave a slight inconspicuous yet uncomfortable nod to let him know that trouble was heading their way.
"Looks like princess here has gained some unwanted attention."
His blaster was still emerging from it's holster but if he could he wanted to solve this dilemma without a firefight ensuing. He took a deep breath and spoke softly to Nex...

"Do you think we could end it this time without blowing up the whole damn spaceport?"

((Nex Deus moved temporarily to Storyteller-controlled Status (SCS) until Nex returns))
((Fuze moved temporarily to SCS until Black Heart returns))

As the imposing Talortai came and stood next to Creed, he was passed by a droid that seemed to have let itself on the ship, waddling past at speed uttering:

"Oh my....not good, not good at all!" to nobody in paticular.

He also saw a male red-skinned Twi'lek awaiting a response to his greeting at the bottom of the ship's ramp but looking at the way the Republican soldiers were drawing pistols, Nex realised introductions would have to wait.

Turning to Creed, he nodded as he activated his light-saber, the blade extending and glowing a fierce blue which illuminated a fair portion of the docking ramp.

"I will endevour to minimise the collatoral damage, but I make you no promises."

As the first blaster bolt whizzed past Fuze's left Lekku he began to move, the blast defly blocked and deflected away by Nex's blade.

"Get aboard Twi'lek, QUICKLY!" He yelled, but it was more of a retorical statement as Macoy was already on the ramp and ascending it before he had finished bellowing the order.

"Some covering fire, if you would please Creed.." Nex continued in a calmer, less urgent tone as he deflected the sudden volley of blaster fire that began to asail them.

"Who is at the controls? Raiflaine?" he said, not really expecting an answer as he slammed the fist of his spare hand into the ramp's emergency close button.

"I guess our little group just got bigger!" he concluded as the ramp slowly began to close...

'Great' Creed thought to himself as he shot a barrage of blaster bolts quickly over Nex as he darted two and throe about the ground.
"Yeah, I was just wondering the same birdy! Last time I recall we were on our way to rescue one Twil'ek, not two and a troublesome drifter!"

He licked his lips and reminded himself of the sweet cherry red kiss he'd recieved. Why did he always fall for these things? He's a professional after all but no amount of training can prepare you for a persausive damsel in distress.

He quickly found shelter amongst some old crates and continued his relentless assault. Moving the comm closer to his mouth he could feel himself deafening the user on the other end.....

"Raiflaine, will you PLEASE get this hunk of junk on the move?! We've got rapid fire hitting us at every angle down here and it sure would be nice right now if you consider using those las cannons to our advantage!...."

"....Raif......"
He realised he wasn't getting any answer....
"RAIF!!....I swear if you've fallen asleep again I'll plug you full of blaster holes myself!"
Scowling deeply he threw the comm to the ground before returning to battle.

"So Nex....how we doing? Have we hit anything yet?"

When the bolts started flying Lilin instinctively hunched herself forward and ran for the cover of the entry hatch leading into the ship proper. Bursting through the portal she threw lurched to one side and flattened herself against the wall to the sound of blaster fire.
Risking a glace round the doorway she saw the one the Talortai identified as 'Creed' firing indiscriminately out over the slowly rising ramp. She didn't spare a thought for the red Twi'lek or the droid in the sudden commotion but focussed her attention on the Jedi, studying his movements and his skill with a lightsaber. He was fast.

Nodding to herself, Lilin turned away and fled forwards where she assumed the ships cockpit was. Negotiating herself through an unfamiliar ship at speed was difficult but she nonetheless kept her feet whilst building a habitual mental catalogue of the rooms, corridors and the things contained therein on her wild dash, moving ever forward. Taking a cue from Creed's yelling, she quickly she decided to add her voice to the urgent calls. RAIF!? RAIF! We're under fire! Creed says to take off NOW!"

“So far it is a stalemate.” Nex said to Creed as he dropped behind the crates and began retuning fire again. “I also see our pilot seemed to have disappeared too. If he doesn’t respond soon we might have to improvise.”

After a few more moments of deflecting blaster fire, Nex’s attention was drawn to an incoming frag grenade. With a wave of his free hand, the grenade fell short and detonated causing a small smokescreen and a brief break from the firefight.

“It would seem that they are quite determined to keep us on the ground.” Nex said to Creed while taking cover behind nearby crates and deactivating his lightsaber. “Now might be a good time to depart if possible.”

((Nex Deus returned to normal player control))
(('Fuze' Remaining SCS until Black Heart returns))
((Raiflaine moved temporarily to SCS until Raiflaine returns))

“Way ahead of you,” Raiflaine shouted, loud enough to be heard over the blaster-fire, and with it the cargo ramp next to Creed and Nex Deus began to close.

As Lilin came into the cockpit, the Bounty Hunter's first reaction was to train a gun on her, but he had more important things to worry about.

“I don't know who you are miss, and even though you were calling my name, I'm guessing you don't know me. Either way, things are about to get a bit bumpy so I suggest you sit down, keep quiet and hold on.”

As the engines of The Zenith roared into life, the passengers did their utmost to remain upright as Raiflaine did an emergency take-off, pulling this ship rapidly up through the air and into the stratosphere. Singular blasts of laser fire zoomed past the ship, but the Bounty Hunter spun the ship with precise skill and as they watched from the view-ports the group saw the smog gave way to the glittering tower-tops of Galactic City and finally the blackness of space.

Orbit around Coruscant was still littered with patrolling Sith vessels, but none seemed to stop them or even hail them as the ship made its way out of the planets atmosphere and into space.

'That's gotta be the Boss....' Raiflaine thought to himself as Coruscant slowly began to shrink behind them and The Zenith came about, aimed toward the Rafa System. Raiflaine plotted the coordinates into the astronav computer and spun around on his chair, addressing the others:

“Sorry about the rather dramatic lift-off people. We'll be entering Hyperspace in a little under a moment.”

Even as the stars stretched out before them and elongated into thin points of light indicating The Zenith had just broken the faster-than-light barrier and entered Hyperspace, nobody noticed the small cloaked vessel that following in their wake, tracking them through Hyperspace, its jet-black featureless hull protected from eyes and sensors alike....

At the rear of the ship Creed, Nex Deus, Fuze and F0R3GE found themselves in a slightly awkward situation now that the immediate threat had passed.
Ever the ice-breaker, Fuza smiled broadly to remove the tension.

“So, as I was saying... the name's Fuze Macoy. A little Jubba Bird tells me you people might know where I can find Miss Ree'tak, or help find her at the very least...?”