"Fair enough." Jesra replied simply although she wasn't new to the game. The less one knew about the cargo, the less you needed to lie about. As for the employer, well, there was always a big risk there. The best thing to do was get the cargo to where it needed to go and hope he or she is impressed enough with your technique enough to hire you again or even keep you around for awhile. At the very least, not have you killed. The other thing was to never expect the run to be easy, at some point there's always an issue or two.

"I've got a couple nice hidden spaces that should do nicely for your cargo. The ones that have to stay topside we can mark with false scan codes for foodstuff or farming equipment for some farming community. Usually works." Jesra said as she brushed her hair behind one ear with her eyes catching his for a brief moment before looking down the road again.

Docking Bay 57, Drakenmoor

"Clever...very clever," drolled the thug, "but not enough. You will unload the weapons off your ship, or we will take your ship and the weapons. You must remember, those blasters are the property of the Liberty League by law. If you do not surrender them, you are guilty of burglarly besides attempting to decieve a governmental investigation.

"Look," replied de Meun, "I told you the price, and it's a bargain. Pay me it, and you'll have them. I'll warn you, I have friends in high places, don't try and intimidate me like that. You have this government on your side, show me the proof, and I'll show you yours."

Hcak merely snapped his fingers. Out of the shadows, from behind crates and equipment emerged two dozen red-armored soldiers: Inferno Marines. Each of the soldiers steadily approached the Ghtroc freighter, with blasters drawn and pointed at the smuggler. De Meun winced.

"I have better than these," replied de Meun, "give it up."

"Where's your proof?"

"I work for the Imperials-"

Hcak raised a hand, "If you did, you wouldn't be selling their weapons. But we'll take your word. Boys, take him in for interrogation; after all, we can always use more information about Fossk or his collaborators..."

"No, wait..." interjected de Meun, running towards Notroht.

A pair of blue stun bolts slammed into the man's chest, and he collapsed to the ground. Hcak spared a sigh and pulled out his comlink.

"Hey Dev...I have the shipment, and de Meun...what? Oh right, the modifications to her ship...Done that soon? Ah, well, that would do it...yeah, I'll move the cargo to one of our warehouses where she can pick it up at her leisure...Number Five? Sure, it won't take too long to get it there...yeah, great, see you soon. I'm out of here."



Dev pocketed his comlink and turned to Jesra.

"That was my people. Your shipment is set to go at one of our warehouses, Number Five to be exact. I'll have the coordinates and pass codes transmitted to your ship, along with some other information about the run. Is there anything else you'll be needing?"

Jesra was getting antsy to fly out. When the call finally came she felt a little more at ease. So far so good she thought to herself. Now for the fun part.

"I'm ready to go. The sooner I leave, the better for the both of us." Jesra said with an a matter of fact tone as she pulled her flight gloves from her belt and slipped them on each hand with a wriggle of her fingers for a more comfortable fit.

"Just give word to your pilots to give me some room if we have to mix it up with someone." Then she gave a closed-lipped smile before heading off towards her awaiting ship. "Don't worry, I'll get your shipment to where it's going in one piece."

Mako Nine, Deep space Trax Sector

"Yeah yeah I hear you," replied Rush, "it's not as fun as hunting down the Imps on Nar Shaddaa or blowing up Fossk's stuff, but someone's got to do it. And we're going to get our joyride after we escort this gunrunner to Lexrol. Okay?"

A series of murmured acknowledgements flooded his comlink. After the spetacular and mutually lethal engagement with the Imperials on Nar Shaddaa, Mako Squadron and dozens of other fighter pilots had been ready to lead the spearpoint and drive it to the heart of the Empire. But Kre'fey, better known as Dha'tey within the fleet, had opted to not.

It had been a test.

Both for the Imperials and Inferno Fleet.

And both had failed.

No, Dha'tey would bide his time and strengthen the rebel guerillas and his own people until an oppurtune time presented itself. Until then, most of the fleet had been regulated to mundane but necessary preparations for this task: like escorting important gunrunners. Anarth tapped his comlink.

"All right folks, all you need to know is that we'll be escorting a YT-2400 almost all the way to Lexrol. I don't know what's going on with it, but it's an independent contractor we've hired, so if the Imps get a bit too hairy, don't be ready to sacrifice yourselves for it. But that being said, we're not going to abandon it unless we're positively sure we're going to die. Got it?"

The squadron members murmured more acknowledgements. With that, the starfighters jumped into hyperspace to arrive at the rendezvous point to meet the gunrunner's craft. Rush spared a glance downwards at his orders again.

...Make sure to give the freighter room if a fight ensues, Commodore's orders...

Rush glanced up at the swirling stars ahead. A freighter captain that apparently has Dha'tey's special blessings, or that of one of his senior staff. Interesting...who could this guy be?

Warehouse 5 - Drakenmoor

Once the cargo was loaded and carefully concealed by Jesra's watchful eye, she moved to the cockpit and secured herself in her seat for the pre-flight check. All green. Even the newly installed Ground Buzzer was showing to be functioning properly. "Very nice. And quick." She smiled as her fingers danced over the controls and the whine of her engines coming to life pleasantly filled her ears.

This was where she felt comfortable. This was her home.

The coordinates to the rendevous point popped up on the screen and matched an area on the system map. Jesra entered the calculation into the nav computer then gently pulled back on one lever to begin liftoff. The freighter slid gracefully upward into the darkness and away from Drakenmoor. Returning wasn't a thought of Jesra's. It never was where a job was concerned. She either returned or she didn't. The trick was to do leave, deliver the cargo and still remain alive.

While moving towards her destination, with a little time before arrival, Jesra did a check on her duo-laser turret that had been damaged and repaired. Twin, green bolts shot clean and true at a point she chose on her targeting system. The turret's rotation and reaction time was flawless. "Have to keep those guys in mind in the future if I get banged up again." She said out loud to herself.

Then, a proximity alarm on her panel indicated her arrival to the pre-determined coordinates. Numerous blips appeared as well on the radar which set her stomach to rolling slightly. "Hope you guys are my welcoming party. Just in case I'm going to play it safe."

Jesra wasn't sure if they'd seen her yet. She wasn't one to be caught with her pants down and readied her ship's weapons and shields for a possible second scenario after slowing her engines but not completely neutralizing them. Just in case. She flipped the communication toggle to on. This was the tricky part.

"YT-2400 to lead vessel please identify yourself." Jesra announced in her most alluring voice she could manage under the unnerving circumstances.

Hunter-class Starfighter Mako Nine

YT-2400. Hmm...rather vague on who that could be, but I suppose knowing a name could be a bit of a dangerous piece of information, if we were to be caught. But, there's no reason to not announce ours, especially since there aren't any other ships around, yet. Who else could it be besides our person in this deep of space?. He tabbed his comlink.

"This is Mako Nine of the Syndicate. I believe we're here to escort you towards your destination. Confirm that you are the special delivery vehicle please. If you are not, power down for immediate boarding. We will not harm you or steal any of your possessions if you are not the delivery ship."

Well, we've either found our delivery ship, some random ship in the area, or a trap. Traps are always nice, lots of oppurtunities for kills...and to be killed. But nothing we can't take. Her voice though...didn't quite sound like any ordinary merchant. We're either dealing with the smuggler or a trap. He toggled several controls which highlighted the approaching freighter. It was the correct model of ship, which made it seem more likely that they were dealing with the planned smuggler than somebody else.

YT-2400 Freighter

Jesra breathed a sigh of relief then regained her composure quickly as she powered down weapons and shields to minimal until they were under way to ease off any tension. Mako Nine had to be her escort. She activated the comm again. Her free hand flipping another switch to get a scan of his ship.

"Mako Nine, I'm the one you're looking for. No need to come aboard. Glad you made it. By the way, nice ride you've got there. Now, how about we get on our way." Jesra smiled into the mic but her tone was still mildly business-like.

Jesra turned off her comm. She was still waiting for the additional information from Brandeis, but readied herself mentally for whatever came her way. Her ship slowly moved to port and leveled out in the direction they needed to go and waited for Mako Nine to give the go ahead.

"Why thank you. Glad to hear that you made it too," replied Rush, toggling several buttons on his console, "I transmitting some information from your contact. I believe it's basic destination information, to which and planet and to whom...when you're ready then, we can make the jump."

He tapped a button, and the starfighter sent out a tight-beam communication's burst to the freighter. As he did, the rest of the crimson starfighters formed a loose protective perimeter around the ship. Well, I guess it makes sense not to transmit the information ahead of time in case she got caught trying to leave, or if she was a spy, to prevent any further ambushes from being made. But now we've got our destination, Lexrol, the heart of Fossk's mini-Empire. And to a minor little space port to drop off the arms to the Resistance there. He winked. Too bad I can't go there, yet.

YT-2400 Freighter

"Message recieved, Mako Nine. Thanks. What's the estimated time of arrival that you have? Want to make sure my ship's navigational chronometer isn't off." Jesra entered the data into her computer, nodded with satisfaction that Mako's flight took up a protective perimeter around her vessel, yet kept it just loose enough as she requested.

Mako and his pilots are obedient I'll give them that. Hope they fight as good as their fighters look.

Then she flipped the comm back on. "By the way, you can call me Captain Antaris. Figured it'd be better than 'hey lady'. Which would actually get on my nerves after a few times. I know it's orders, but I appreciate the escort." She smiled an unseen smile.

Being on her own during her smuggling career, Jesra was used to dealing with everything a smuggler could expect to run into. Though, there were certain times where a little help was welcome. And this was one of them. A handful of times the Rebellion helped her out among others from different aspects of the battling galaxy. Even the Empire had helped her help another faction once, though at the time they didn't realize it. Jesra made it a point to keep as safe a distance from the Empire as possible after that. Unless, of course a tasty enough pay tempted her to do otherwise and tempt fate.

"Let's see if we can get this stuff there without any problems, shall we? Activating hyper-drive...now." Her right hand pushed the hyper activation lever steadily forward until the dots of millions of stars elongated into white, flowing streaks across her cockpit.

Now, it was a matter of waiting for the inevitable which could either make or ruin her day.

Mako Nine

The stars swirled into the celestial ambiance that marked hyperspace travel. As he had done dozens of times before, Rush immediately reclined into the seat of his fighter. The ship’s nav computer had completely taken over piloting the craft in hyperspace; a none-too-difficult task given the straight line paths of hyperspace. The expatriate Corellian tapped a button on his headset, and music began to waft out from his headset speakers. A smile rippling across his face, Anarth began to space out. Minutes later, the reversion alarm forcibly pulled him out reverie as the nav computer pulled his ship out into real space.

It was suppose to be an ancient, barely used navigation point.

But there others there as well, and they were not friendly.

Staring at the distant ships, he thumbed his comlink, “Mako Squadron, Captain Antaris, I read some unfriendly transponders uphead…”

“Four here, one of them is the shuttle Blue Wave; that’s the ship used by Fossk’s Minister of Finances; he got away once…”

Rush winced. “And you’d like to get him now?”

“Why not? The escort doesn’t too bad, we’re evenly matched..and those are Tie interceptors with hyperdrives. Sluggish and fragile…”

Anarth shook his head. “My DERs show that they have shields. But still, that’s far to good of an opportunity to pass up. Squadron, you’re released to pursue the target. Ten, hang back with me; we’re going to escort Captain Antaris here, make sure she doesn’t get injured…”

Wait for it, they'll get the same idea, and think that this Dha'tey's personal YT-2400 transport. And we'll probably get swamped with the Ties...