Note: This thread is a takeover of the following planets: Nim Drovis, Nam Chorios, and Meridian.

IC:
Brosi

All was quiet on Brosi. Except for all of the machines and factories that were running in the background. It was only a subtle noise, though. The walls of the hotel were very well sound proofed and kept out most any noise. Killian was thoroughly thankful for that and was glad that it was CTI that had built all of this. Well... contracted it, at least.

Killian turned over in the bed, one arm dangling over the side of the bed, the other laying at his side. His face was buried in the comfortable pillow and he was snoring lightly. Not even the alarm on his chrono going off could wake him from his comfortable slumber. This even though the chrono had been going off for the last hour and his comlink was beeping incessantly.

With a groan, Killian flopped over in bed once more and slowly opened his sleep filled eyes. Staring through blurry vision at the ceiling, his right arm reached out and smacked the alarm on the chrono off. He pulled his arms back up to his face and rubbed his eyes slightly before rolling to the edge of the bed and sitting up.

"Should have slept in more..."

Standing lightly, he stretched his arms out in a big stretch with a huge yawn to go along with it. Yawn subsiding, Killian walked to the window and parted the curtains partially to stare out at the surrounding work. After watching a few construction drones buzzing about, he let his hand slip to his face.

"Damn. My face feels rougher than the coarsest sand. Guess I better go shave."

Walking around the bed, he walked through the open bathroom door and over to the sink. Applying some shaving cream to his face, he picked up his razor and went to work shaving. He was about halfway done when his comlink started beeping again. With a sigh, he picked it up.

"What?"

"Sir, when you get a chance I think you should check the holonet for news about the Meridian Sector. Something has come up there that CTI should be involved in I think."

"What is this something?"

"A plague outbreak, sir. Meridian, the planet, has been hit hard by an unknown pathogen."

"Damn. I'll check it out and get back to you."

"Yes, sir."

Putting the comlink back down onto the counter, he picked up his razor once more and then proceeded to finish his shaving. That done, he hopped in the shower real quick and washed himself clean. Satisfied that he was clean, he got out and then put on one of his lightweight suits.

Grabbing his datapad off the desk, he sat down on the edge of the bed and pulled up the holonet. It only took a few minutes for him to find what he was looking for and after a few moments he was clearly enthralled by what he was reading.

It was all crazy. A few hundred people had already died on Meridian and the tolls of those infected were rapidly increasing. The planet had been quarantined, but they weren't sure if it had been done in time. There was a possibility that someone had managed to get off the planet and that this pathogen would spread to other worlds in the Meridian sector.

His free hand moved up to wipe the sweat from his brow. The severity of the situation in the Meridian Sector, particularly on Meridian itself, was starting to dawn on him. Some other corporation had probably already jumped all over this, but CTI had better resources and fresh, new minds to work on this. CTI was going to solve this problem. He grabbed his comlink.

"Nina."

"Yes, sir."

"Call a meeting of the board and make sure Sol is there. I read up on the situation you mentioned to me. This is really bad and not just for Meridian. The Meridian Sector has a lot of worlds in it and many of them have large populations. A cure needs to be found and I think we can do it. Once I get the boards permission, Sol and I, along with a contingent of scientists and hi-tech equipment, will be going to the Meridian Sector."

"Yes, sir. I'll get right on it."

"Make sure you're there to. I'll need you available."

"Yes, sir."

Popping the comlink into his pocket, and setting his datapad on the bed, Killian stood and paced around the room for a moment. After a few moments of quick, high paced thinking, he turned and walked back to the bed. Grabbing the datapad off the bed, he walked towards the door and through it out into the hall.

There wasn't any time to waste on this. He'd have someone else go and pack his things and have them on the Galant Wind while he was in the meeting. No time to lose given the situation. The clock was already counting down and if someone didn't do something fast the whole Meridian Sector was going to be gone.

Brosi

"Mr. Nyhammer... Mr. Nyhammer... Mr. Nyhammer!"

Sol Nyhammer opened his eyes.

"Tinsan... you're fired."

The personal assistant winced. His olive green eyes began to water behind his diamond shaped glasses.

"I'm kidding," Sol said as he rolled out of his bed. "Unless what you're about to tell me is something stupid that I don't care at all about."

"You have received a message from Mr. Holmes: you are to meet him in the boardroom in one hour."

"Okay... okay... you're rehired. I'm not mad at you anymore. Killian and his seven AM meetings..." mumbled Sol as he tried, unsuccessfully, to rub the weariness out of his bloodshot eyes.

Long days in the office and on CTI's many industrial sites combined with sleep deprivation could put a man in a bad mood. Especially when he is called back into the office on first his day off in many, many weeks.

"Coffeine Tinsan! I must have a cup of Coffeine!"

Tinsan brought out the cup of heart attack juice. Sol drank it up quickly, feeling the triple caffeine laced caf molecules running through his bloodstream, beating the weariness away where his hands had failed.

Sol walked over to his closet.

Which suit? Blue? Yellow? Cacky? Or Green?

Sol pondered this question for longer than usual.

Killian hates the blue... That'll do then.

"Mr. Nyhammer!" shouted Tinsan from the other room. "Another message has arrived from Mr. Holmes."

Sol snatched the message out of Tinsan's hand.

Outbreak in the Meridian Sector, hundreds dead. Get ready, We're going to investigate.

In an instant, Sol annoyance with his business partner and friend melted away. These feelings were replaced with shame. Shame towards himself for lingering over such petty things as Killian getting up early. He was feeling sorry for himself while people were dying by the hundreds a few short light years away.

"Pack our bags Tinsan. I'm going to the office this morning."

The hotel was only about a twenty minute landspeeder ride from the main CTI building. Still, it felt like eternity before the landspeeder finally arrived at the building and dropped Killian off. Killian stuck his head back into the speeder and gave the driver a few directions before the man sped off.

Turning, he walked through the revolving doors and into the main lobby of the very pristine and new looking central office building. For the time being it was serving as their headquarters until the company could decide on an official headquarters for their business. As it was, the Brosi facility was relatively comfortable and served to fit the bill temporarily.

Walking towards the reception desk, his right hand moved to his left wrist and adjusted the cuff there before settling back to his side. The main receptionist was sitting at the front desk working on something, so he bypassed her and moved to the first one he saw that wasn't seriously busy.

"How many people have arrived for the board meeting?"

"Most of them, sir. I believe that Mr. Nyhammer is the only one that isn't currently in the building. Last I heard he was on his way here, though."

Killian nodded and scratched his chin slightly.

"Which meeting room is everyone in at the moment?"

"We directed them to the largest one up on the fourth floor. It was the one we thought would be big enough to hold everyone and to allow some comfort."

"Thank you."

The secretary gave him a smile as he took his leave of the station and walked towards the turbolifts. One of them opened right as he neared it and after everyone departed from it, he joined the handful of people that were boarding it. As it moved swiftly up the flights of floors, he just had enough time to adjust his tie before stepping off onto the fourth floor.

Nina approached him almost immediately and started to go over everything that she had found out about the situation with him as he walked towards the meeting room. There was so very little information about the outbreak on Meridian that he was worried they might not be able to convince the board to allow them to do anything about it.

Of course ultimately the decision came down to him and Sol, but it wouldn't do them any good to anger the board. The board was their as advisement for the two of them. They had tons of experience in the industry of business and their advice was often the best. He didn't want to make them angry and make them leave, but he would if he had to.

As they neared the meeting room, Killian swapped datapads with Nina since hers had the more recent data already pulled up on it. She fell into step slightly behind and to the right of him as he passed through the doors into the almost full room.

The table was large and round; the best for giving everyone an equal voice in matters and make everyone visible. He stepped through the now hushed room to his seat on the far side of the circle from the doorway. Pulling the chair out, he sat down and set his datapad on the table in front of him.

"Gentlemen we will begin shortly. We are only waiting for Mr. Nyhammer to arrive. Once he takes a seat we will begin the presentation on the reason why I called you all in here. I assure you, however, it is of the utmost importance and will be worth your time to hear out."

That said, he sat back in his chair and took a glass of blue milk from the tray that one of the assistants held out to him. Sipping it lightly, his eyes wandered the group gathered around him as they fell into light discussion.

Sol you better get your ass here soon. I'm going to have start making you wake up earlier so you're around and ready when I need you. Blast I bet he's going to wear that damn blue suit since I woke him up. I'm seriously going to burn that thing.

Sol pushed the rented landspeeder to the limit, swerving in and out of lanes while smoking was not an easy thing to master.

"I'm late... Killian's going to be pissed..." murmered Sol as he threw the cigarette butt out the window.

Now that he had a hand free, Sol tried to fix his hair, but then again... What is the point when your landspeeder doesn't have a roof?

"Fuckin' shit!"

A quick upward change in elevation barely kept the landspeeder from hitting a heavy CTI hauling barge. Sol could hear the bottom of his vehicle scraping against the ore the the barge was hauling.

"Computer, did we lose anything important?" yelled Sol over the howling wind.

"Negative Mr. Nyhammer. All systems are registering as green."

Sol whipped the landspeeder around the last corner, nearly hitting another barge as he cut someone off entering the parking lot. Sol jumped out of the landspeeder and ran across the lot at a jog. Running past the front desk receptionist, he threw her his blue blazer.

"Take this out in the courtyard and set it on fire."

The lady gave him a very puzzled look, "yes, Mr. Nyhammer... what ever you say."

Tinsan had already arrived to the conferrence room and was waiting outside for him.

Swinging open the doors, Sol said, "I'm here!"

[font=times][indent]“Good morning, Nina.”
“Morning.”
“Did you hear about the—”
“Plague, yeah. It’s insane.”
“And Killian—?”
“There’s going to be a meeting of the board in a few minutes. Sol Nyhammer will be running late, Killian will be present, along with a few other gentlemen.”
“Could you..”
“I’ll update you if I get the chance. Promise.”

Nina smiled wearily, and then turned. Business.

Fingertips tapped against the table in silence, nails tried to splinter into the surface, it seemed, from anticipation, gears were set in motion in Nina’s mind. Questions were triggered. Empty brown eyes stared around the room, and she crossed one leg over the other, as her gaze flitted from one face to another. She seemed to finally and fully comprehend the severity of the situation as she sat there in awkward quiet, and waited for one man to walk through those doors. Her fingers lightly massaged her temple and wished that for once, Killian might be able to lead a normal and peaceful life, and she could be an assistant to a man who all he asked for was for a drink! She had to love the intensity that came along with the job, though, and would never trade it for the world. The doors flew open and Nina almost fell from her seat but kept herself composed, although, she had to hide a smile with her hand as she looked away. Well, if it wasn’t sleeping beauty himself.

“Good morning, Mr. Nyhammer.” Nina greeted, taking note that he was not wearing his blue suit. No blue suit? I liked that blue suit! She murmured mentally and she continued to nod toward the only empty seat left for him to sit in, so the meeting could begin. And, now the fun part would begin. Nina would sit in that room and make her comments and take her notes on whatever the gentleman would say. She couldn’t say that she wasn’t interested; this plague issue was lethal and had already become deadly among hundreds of innocent people. Nina rummaged around before she had her datapad in hand, and settled it in front of her, and began to write the current situation, but she had no doubt in her mind that it would be rapidly changing if they didn’t do anything about it. Hundreds could turn into thousands very quickly, they didn’t have time to sit around and argue about what to do. Nina kept her thoughts to herself, though, and glanced down at her datapad.

Lips parted and she inhaled the still air, russet optics glanced up again before she began to talk, to update them on the situation, with the very little information they did know up until that point. “A plague broke out on Meridian this morning, and easily took a few hundred lives, and is continuing to do so. The numbers of those still being infected are increasing,” What an understatement. Increasing. How about, innocent people being tortured and suffering from a deadly and painful plague? Keep the professionalism. Always the professionalism. Always business. She breathed, glanced, continued, “Other worlds inside of the Meridian Sector could very well be affected as well if the pathogen had managed to get off of the planet.” Nina paused, “It’s going to be difficult to get our merchant fleet there quickly enough, with such limited cargo space.” And, with that, she remained silent and nodded to Killian, for him to continue on with any information he had, or any updates. Datapad at the ready, Nina breathed steadily and thought about the task that would lie ahead.

She was going to be getting home a little late from the office today. [/font][/indent]

As Sol walked into the room and announced his presence, Killian could do nothing but shake his head at his friends tardiness to such an important meeting. It was something that Sol had always struggled with and no matter what Killian tried to do to get him to correct the problem he always failed. Sol was like the anti-Killian. Anything Killian wanted done, Sol would take forever to do it.

As soon as Sol was seated, Nina proceeded to give the real skinny of the situation in the Meridian sector. Killian sat through it with his eyes on his datapd, watching and reading the information as it became available to him. As soon as Nina finished, however, he was forced to lift his gaze and address the room as a whole.

"Yes.. well. Where to begin... Ahh, I know."

Killian stood from his seat and walked slowly around the table, his hands behind his back and his gaze on whichever wall was in front of him at the time.

"As you all are completely aware, CTI is a corporation with numerous resources at its disposal. One of those resources is in the field of science as far as research and advancements are concerned. Among those things available to us are mobile research labs which can be packed up and moved at only a moments notice.

"Now you may all be wondering why CTI would be interested in going to Meridian and making absolutely no profit off of the situation there. And that's why I'm glad that I am in charge of this corporation along with Sol and you guys aren't."

He rounded the table and came back to the position where he had previously been sitting. Leaning forward, he placed his hands on the table and looked amongst the people that had crowded around the table. A few were talking amongst themselves about the ramifications of what he had just said, but for the most part he held their rapt attention.

"Let me make things very clear for everyone in this room. CTI stands for Commonwealth Technologies and Industries. We work as part of the Commonwealth and therefore we are representatives of the Commonwealth whenever we leave Commonwealth space. As representatives of our government we have a list of obligations that we must follow.

"Among those obligations comes the art of diplomacy and representing the kindness and generosity that the Commonwealth wishes to exhibit. We are not warmongering, self-centered, arrogant, pompous people. We are the people willing to exhibit the fact that we can and will help anyone that is in desperate need of it. It is OUR obligation to keep that as a fact."

Lifting his glass to his lips, he took a drink of the milk to wet his whistle so to speak, and then set it down once more.

"Besides that, I know that everyone here has no desire to see the entire planet of Meridian wiped out by a plague. I personally want to help solve this problem."

He offered the room a smile.

"This is our chance to put CTI on the galactic map. If we can find the cure for this plague that is harrassing Meridian. We will look good and the stock in our pharmaceutical department amongst the galaxies factions will go up.

"This, ladies and gentlemen, is why I am proposing that we pack up some of our mobile labs, take our personal transports and the two members of our merchent fleet that are orbitting the planet, and head to Meridian. We can figure out what this Plague is and find a cure for it. We can find the source of this problem and then stem the flow of death.

"This is CTI's time to shine, people. So let us shine as the brightest star in the galaxy as we become the saviors of Meridian."

This was definitely very serious. The Meridian Sector has very close ties with the sectors surrounding it, including the Antemeridian Sector. Unless quickly quarantined, this unidentified pathogen would undoubtedly spread, assuming that it had not already.

Hundreds dead, thousands more on the way…

CTI was definitely the only entity that could possibly assist. The Empire didn’t extend to this part of the Galaxy. The Black Dragon Empire was locked in a bloody stalemate with the New Galactic Coalition, and on top of that, did those Dragons really even care. That left the fledgling Commonwealth Technologies and Industries to clean up the mess.

“Well… I can tell this much… This is going to be a logistical nightmare. These labs are mobile, but we’re going to need a hauler to move ‘em. On top of that, we’re going to need a few thousand liters of fresh water.”

“Water? What in Vader’s name would we need that for?” asked on of the aids.

“We don’t know how this virus travels. It could through the planet’s water source; it could be an airborne virus. I don’t have the answers. I just want us to be prepared. If we’re not prepared, we die. It’s as simple as that.

The people sitting around the table nodded.

“Tinsan, I want you to scrounge up anything that you can find in CTI’s inventory. Weapons, air tanks, you know… If we don’t own one, I want you to buy it. I don’t care how much it costs.

The assistant began to rapidly hit keys on his datapad.

“We’re going to be going up against some serious shit ladies and gentlemen. If you not up for it, get the hell out of my boardroom."

"Your boardroom? I thought it was just as much my boardroom as it was yours," Killian said with a smile to show that he was just kidding. A lighthearted comment amongst such troubling words.

"With no further words against the plan, then, I hereby call this meeting to order and officially end it. We'll be leaving for the Meridian sector within a day. So Tinsan," he said as he looked towards the man. "Anything you have to buy have it meet us in space around Meridian itself. That way we won't have to wait around for weeks before it arrives."

Stepping back from the table, he nodded to everyone present and moved towards the exit to the room with Nina in tow behind him. Motioning for Sol to follow him, he passed through the doorways and out into the hall beyond. Slow, but purposeful steps carried him towards the turbolift which he motioned for Sol to join them in.

The lift decended one floor and stopped, opening to allow the people in out towards yet another corridor. Striding with purposeful steps down the corridor, the people in it moved to the side to allow the group through. Many stares were directed towards them and words were uttered, but Killian was too focused to pay any mind to any of it. Regardless, their words were nothing of importance anyways, especially with more pressing business at hand.

Pausing outside the door to his office only long enough to snap his fingers in the direction of one of the assistants, signifying the need for drinks, he pushed through the doors and into the room beyond. Approaching the large wooden desk, he walked around it and sat in the large chair on the other side. A single hand motioned for the others to take a seat in the chairs on the other side of the desk.

Killian, meanwhile, steepled his hand against his chin and looked across the desk towards the opposite wall where there hung a large star chart of the known planets and stars in the galaxy. A single hand reached over towards a device on his desk and he typed in the name of a single planet. The chart zoomed in towards the planet in question, Meridian, leaving a large picture of it on the wall.

"Meridian... The Meridian Sector is quite large from what I remember. The disease of whatever it is will have spread to other planets by now, most likely. Until cases show up there, however, we will have to quarantine Meridian and focus our efforts there. What are your thoughts, Sol?"

“My thoughts Killian? My thoughts are we are running out of time. It’s time to leave.”

En route to Meridian

“Mr. Holmes, Mr. Nyhammer,” began Silvio, the Gallant Wind’s copilot, “we will be exiting hyperspace shortly. Please strap yourselves in.”

Sol rolled up the piece of flimsiplast containing a blueprint for CTI’s first warship design. He took his place at the ship’s largest viewport. The harsh colors of lightspeed instantly gave way to the black of space. Sol could see the radioactive wasteland that was Meridian. Its single metropolis, Meridia Prime, shined through that half of the planet’s night sky.

The space around the planet was alive with activity. Blue striped Meridian Sector Authority ships jockeyed position with regular civilian ships. Sol watched the warships attempt to (usually unsuccessfully) try to physically block escape vectors out of the system.

Silvio’s voice came over the ship’s intercom system again. “It’s a madhouse out there sirs. I’m tapping you all into some of the comm traffic we’re picking up.”

“Jolly Saint, this is you last chance to turn back. This planet has been quarantined. All attempts to escape will be terminated.”

The super freighter turned refugee ship ignored the warship’s grave commands. The ship raced fuel speed towards open space. Two blue striped gunships pulled along side the ships at its flanks. From a distance a frigate could be seen speeding at all power to intercept the Jolly Saint.

“This is your last warning. Turn back Jolly Saint, or you will be neutralized.”

The super freighter’s answer was simple: more speed. The warships’ response was deadly.

Both gunships opened up with all armaments. Green light sprang from their cannons, ripping into the unshielded hull of the Jolly Saint. The ship began to leak atmosphere. Then came bodies, by the thousands, instantly freezing in the cold unfeeling vacuum of space.

Sol turned away from the viewport, wiping his hands, as if trying to wipe the horrible image from his mind.

“There’s work to be done.”

Delete this please.

Thanks.