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light the night with stars
spies and superheroes and sith oh my
Permalink Mark Unread

Taris. What can you say about Taris, other than that it's a literal mound of trash? The overgrown rubble of a ruined world-city, a fleet's worth crashed ships, nigh-permanent cloud cover, and oh yes, the zombie infestation.There are some times she loves her job. This is not one of those times.

Legate sighs and clicks off the small heat projector before standing and beginning the task of erasing the signs of her small camp. Not that she's especially trying to hide, but there are habits it's good to keep. Her speederbike waits nearby. It's only about twenty klicks more to the lab site. With any luck, she'll be back at base by dinner tomorrow.

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Meanwhile, universes away, as a group of young superheroes takes another leap across dimensions - 

A shadow reaches out to snag the last one just as she passes through the portal. Liminal spaces like this are often full of their little dangers, after all, and cracks are meant to be slipped through.

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The girl screams as the joined worlds dissolve around her - 

And then she's falling, stars flashing past her - 

And she's elsewhere, unable to orient herself enough to start flying before she hits the ground.

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Her apparently identical twin lands on top of her.

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Legate is in cover on the far side of her bike with her blaster aimed almost before she processes the sudden appearance of the two. Her finger is tight on the trigger, but she doesn't fire yet. They came out of, quite literally, nowhere. Strange clothing, but they don't appear armed or heavily armored. It would be best to avoid a loud fight, if possible. That sort of thing tends to draw the raks.

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"...The fuck just happened," the second wonders, standing and looking around warily. She spots Legate and narrows her eyes.

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The first seems more concerned with the second. "Jet! You're okay!"

Their clothes are indeed strange. The first is wearing a dark blue skin tight suit with panels that shimmer with stars and orange piping. The second - Jet, apparently - has a similar suit of white with bright blue lightning bolts.

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She holsters her pistol and stands, light gray flak vest and drab fatigues acting as effective camouflage against the environment without looking like that's their purpose.

"I don't know where you two came from, but keep it down. The wildlife's a bit hostile, if you didn't know."

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"Sorry, and yeah, didn't know," she says, much quieter. To Jet: "There's a lot that's happened, I'll explain later?" And back to Legate: "Do you know where this is in relation to universe 616? I was passing between - uh, somewhere in the ten thousands, and an unnumbered one, but if I can get to 616 I can figure stuff out?"

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"...Uh. No. I don't."

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Crap, she really shouldn't be trying to world-hop anyways but it's worse if she doesn't know where she's going...

"Huh. Ah, sorry I was rude - I'm Wiccan. I guess we're stuck here for a bit?" At least until she finds this universe's sorcerer supreme, or some other dimensional expert. Or her team finds her, she guesses.

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"Wiccan. And... Jet? You can call me Legate. Welcome to Taris, I guess. For whatever that's worth. What brings you to- this neck of the multiverse?"

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"I was investigating a theft and got grabbed by a shadow in a suit. Then I was here."

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"...That was a couple of months ago. I was looking for Jet, and something grabbed me. Shadows, I guess? Didn't really see it. So I guess somewhere between 'we don't know' and 'something is fucking with us'?"

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"Shadows, huh? That's kind of creepy."

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She's not sure the local believes her. Whatever. 

"So, what's up with the hostile wildlife?"

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"Taris is home to a particularly nasty contagion called the rak virus. Those it infects undergo a monstrous transformation and become completely feral. These rakghouls tend to travel in packs, dislike the sun, and are drawn to loud noises. They're fairly difficult to kill, and if you get bitten, you'll turn into one."

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"...Yeah that sounds bad." She can unreliably make things dead if she's very angry, especially if the thing she wants dead isn't a person, but that's not something she wants to test with zombies. "Is there - can walls keep them out?" She doesn't know if Taris is the planet or a region on the planet, too...

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"Sure. Not many intact ones left, though. Nearest base is about a hundred kilometers in that direction. Dunno if I'd go there dressed like that, though. Those military guys are kind of uptight."

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She shrugs. "What's normal here? Stuff like your outfit?"

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"More or less. Though I've seen some parties on Nar Shaddaa where you wouldn't be out of place."

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"Heh. Spandex isn't too weird... Still. I want to be holding clothes."

The last sentence feels oddly heavy.

And she's holding some. It looks like two sets, one in mostly orange and blue, one black.

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...Huh.

"Nice trick."

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She hands the black set to Jet. She seems to have literally copied and palette swapped Legate's clothes - with a few modifications, due to a mix of personal taste and just visualizing something a bit different.

"Thanks! Took a while to figure, for the longest time whenever I wanted beads I'd get bears..."

"Uh anyways if you need help with the zombie things I can probably make a decent shelter?"

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"I wasn't intending to stay here."

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"Since we are extremely lost, uh, anywhere we can tag along to? At least until I've told Jet what's been happening and we know what's up with this universe?"

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She glances at her speeder.

"My bike only takes one."

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"I can run fast, Wiccan can fly. Getting around isn't - the hard part."

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"I have... a little errand to attend to, further in. Once that's done with I can escort you back."

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Wiccan softly kicks Jet in the ankle when Jet opens her mouth and says, "We can wait, yeah." It'll be a good time to update Jet on all the stuff with the Young Avengers, anyways.

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"Try not to get eaten, yeah?"

She sets about finishing packing the rest of the campsite. Her stuff seems pretty technologically sophisticated, and everything folds down small enough to fit in the panniers on her speeder. She starts it up and swings her leg over to mount it. It hovers about two and a half feet off the ground, humming. "I'll be back in a couple hours, if things go well."

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"We'll try not to get eaten, then." Also that's gonna be boring, maybe she can practice her scrying...

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Legate revs the bike and quietly zooms off into the omni-present murk.

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To Wiccan, once she's pretty sure Legate's left: "Mind explaining anything?"

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" - Right! So, you guys were investigating those thefts, and you went to punch the weird person in Patriot's costume?"

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"And then I was here."

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"But not from our perspective. You vanished, and then the not-Patriot apparently said some really creepy things and disappeared too. Your friend - don't know if he told you, he's an ex-super, Prodigy? Anyways your friend came to find me, while I was kind of in the middle of a bit of chaos that was probably totally my fault, and said you'd been kidnapped! And at this point I'd already run into Loki and America Chavez - "

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She has no idea who 'America Chavez' is, but Wiccan's really bad at coherent stories. "Loki," she interrupts with. "Evil Loki? Destroyed Asgard Loki? That Loki?"

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"...Do you know any others? And also he said he's a changed person? Something about burning and being reborn. Which we did confirm."

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She buries her face in her palms. "Just clarifying how dumb you are. Go on."

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"...Anyways. So! America Chavez is - I don't even know, she hates Loki but won't say why she's helping us? She's basically standard flying brick, except she can open portals between dimensions, but I think she's maybe lying about some of the 'standard flying brick' stuff. She won a fist-fight with a black hole, though it was a really small one, and I'm pretty sure super-strength doesn't work like that."

"But we had been running away from this mind-control parasite that was trying to take over and coordinate a bunch of people against us, and Prodigy gave us something to kind of work towards? Also you're my family! Kind of. Technically. Metaphysically? Anyways, I like you. So we started looking for you, and Loki's been teaching me to control my powers, and we've had assorted adventures. I got snagged by a thing while we were on a jump."

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She sighs. "You're an idiot." It's said fondly, though.

"Can you keep from getting eaten while I go scout?"

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"Probably!" She demonstrably starts floating, sitting cross-legged beyond the reach of most human-sized humanoids. "I'm gonna work on scrying where we are, on like a larger scale?"

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"You do that."

And she drops into acceleration, the world almost freezing around her, and darts off.

She's not assuming nothing can threaten her while she's sped up, but the class of things that can catch her is a lot smaller.

Going out in a spiral: what's around?

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The ruins of a once-great civilization, apparently. The terrain is swampy, and the bones of vast skyscrapers made of concrete-like material poke through everywhere. Vegetation largely covers them; whatever catastrophe felled them was not recent, though its scars are still evidents in the gouges and blast marks.

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Definitely something major happened here. She examines the blast marks some, tries to figure out if they look more like a fire, an explosion, lasers, exotic weapons...

(Fortunately she's moving fast enough to not sink into the water as long as she doesn't start standing still.)

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More like explosions or exotic weapons than anything else, really. Though it's kind of hard to tell for sure. It also looks like whatever it was originated from above, whatever way that was in their original orientation.

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All this is adding up to 'probably space-faring civilization' which makes it somewhat weirder they're not aware of other universes, but if her and Wiccan are far enough from home the rules might be different.

She starts widening her search. Can she find anything that might be 'rakghouls'? (Preferably from a distance.)

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There's a den with about eight of nasty grey humanoid-ish beasties with dark spines and great big teeth not too far away, lurking in the entrance to something like a subway system.

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Yeah those don't look like something she wants near herself or Wiccan.

But her current acceleration is ten thousand times normal. It doesn't take her long at all, from an exterior perspective, to do even a half-assed job of just building a wall around them. They'll probably be able to break out of it before they starve. (She's not killing them. She doesn't know if they're intelligent, and they haven't tried to actually eat her. If she finds a smaller pack she might test them for aggression.)

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The rakghouls don't even notice anything's happened until the wall is finished. At which point they begin attacking the wall. They're pretty strong. She may want to reinforce it.

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She does, pretty thoroughly.

This is at least an interesting test of their strength, and 'seeing how they attack the wall' gives her a chance to drop out of acceleration and catch her breath. (She makes sure they can't just climb out, too, finding a rough roof for where it doesn't meet the subway roof well.)

Are they showing any signs of intelligence? Language? She can probably understand any languages since she could understand the random native, which Jet suspects was down to 'it never occurred to Wiccan that they wouldn't be able to talk.' Reality warpers are annoying like that.

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Doesn't seem like they're communicating or really any more sophisticated than your average wildlife.

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She doesn't want to get into punching range even still, and her other option - accelerating things until they explode when she drops them out - is noisy and messy.

She runs back to Nausicaa.

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Who has summoned a bunch of mirrors and is trying to get them to show the surrounding area. No dice on universes. She's definitely managed a view of some planet. No clue where their host went.

Scrying is frustrating work.

"Find anything?" she asks Jet when Jet slows down enough to spot.

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"Ruins, with scorch marks. Probably explosions or exotic weapons. Also probably rakghouls. Eight, not too far; I walled them in. They weren't acting intelligent. Can I have any weapons at all; throwing rocks at things is annoying."

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"So, like, super long sword? Maybe a spear thing... So you're not having to drop out of acceleration to fight?" (And also because Wiccan needs to at least think she understands how something works to make one, which means no laser swords. Yet.)

She remembers having seen some kind of sword-spear polearm once. She conjures one for Jet.

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"Thanks."

And, now duly armed with a blade on a stick, she goes back to investigate the rakghouls.

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They're right where she left them, doing much the same thing.

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She speeds back up. They're unlikely to break through in the next real-time minute.

Which means she gets a very exhausting week to spend cautiously exploring the subway.

...After getting a few shake-to-recharge flashlights and some emergency glow-sticks from Wiccan.

 

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Good idea, it's even darker underground.

It won't take a whole week to explore the tunnels as most of them are collapsed and impassable. She will find a couple more surface breaches, and a bigger nest of rakghouls deeper in.

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Yeah this is too close for comfort.

Hello rakghouls, meet Jet's very sharp blade on a stick.

She doesn't accelerate more, this is basically at the upper limit of 'endurable' already, but she does start working through the basically-still rakghouls, slitting throats.

If any of them react fast enough to move at all perceptibly, she'll get out of there, but for now: bladework that only isn't messy because hearts don't beat that fast.

(Sometimes she thinks wryly about all the things the Young Avengers failed to advertise about hero work when they recruited her. Zombie control had not been how she pictured her post-juvie life.)

(She'll feel bad about this later if they turn out to be sapient. Maybe. Acceleration does weird things to her brain.)

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The rakghouls are very obliging about standing still, from her perspective. What she can see of their blood looks... stickily unnatural.

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She's unsure if that's 'aliens' or 'magic.'

She finishes clearing out the rakghouls, both here and the ones she walled in, then heads back to Wiccan.

"I'm going to take a nap. Can you clean this?" She raises the now very unnaturally sticky blade in her teammate's general direction.

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"...Sure?" She does that, and conjures a hammock held up by magic. 

"I'll start small-scale scrying, how about? I'll wake you if anything's heading our way." Though scrying by area's pretty hard...

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"Sure."

She goes to flop, cradling her blade stick.

Assuming they don't get attacked or Wiccan doesn't see anything, she'll probably sleep a few hours.

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The first thing to approach is Legate again, armor slightly stained with rakghoul blood.

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"Hey, Jet, friendly company," Wiccan says, floating over to poke her teammate. 

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Jet sits up, groaning a bit and blinking.

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Eh, she's conscious.

Wiccan turns to wave at Legate. She's doesn't look critically injured, but she's still at a bit of a distance...

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She doesn't seem to be more injured on closer inspection.

"Hey. Everything quiet out here?"

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"There was a nest of those rakghoul things nearby I cleared out," Jet mutters. "Didn't find anything else right near us."

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"Didn't get any fluids on you, did you?"

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"No. Is that dangerous as well?"

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"It's safest to assume that just about any form of contact with a rakghoul is dangerous."

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"Are you alright?"

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"Me? Oh, I'm fine. It'll take more than this planet's got to get me."

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"Good!" She floats back down to hover just above the ground, dismisses her mirrors and Jet's hammock (after Jet is out).

"So - where to?" She didn't manage to scry the woman but she's getting a decently good feeling and also prefers starting out with trusting people. Jet can take care of the being scary to cross aspect; Wiccan would prefer to not start any literal witch hunts.

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"Well, that depends on-" Something makes a beeping noise. "Ah, hold that thought." She pulls out a flat, palm-sized device and presses a button on the side. A miniature hologram figure springs up from it. "-Hunter. Would you call back if I told you this isn't a great time?"

     "Check-ins are scheduled for a reason, sweetheart," the hologram says. "The fact that you answered means this is a fine time. Where's Chance?"

"Checking the hospital site. We split up. I just got out of the western lab."

     ""Find anything useful?"

"Lotta raks. No signs of Godera."

     "Hm. Now, not that I don't trust you, but, well, I don't trust you-"

"Hunter-" Her voice is urgent, higher pitched.

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     "-keyword: onomatophobia. Phase one." Legate's face goes very blank.

"Awaiting orders."

     "Rendezvous with Codename: Chance at the earliest possible opportunity and make a full report of your findings at the lab. Follow his instructions for the next step of the investigation."

"Orders acknowledged."

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     "Revert to phase zero." Legate's face collapses. "Be seeing you, Legate." The hologram winks out.

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"The fuck."

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Jet is holding her polearm more tightly.

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She takes a deep breath and appears to collect herself. "I kinda wish you hadn't seen that."

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"What the hell is going on?"

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"It's a bit of a long story. but that was my handler. He doesn't entirely trust me without... external motivation. Not exactly unfair of him. I am a defector, after all."

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"It's unfair! It's - I want you to have control of your own mind!"

'Defector' sounds like 'not here willingly.' Wiccan has a thing about prisons.

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"What are you-" She grimaces and puts a hand to her head. "Oh, that feels weird."

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...Whoops, she didn't super mean to make that a spell.

"...I'm not really sorry, but, uh, your mind should be your own?"

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"What- was that? What did you do?"

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"A - spell? It's hard to explain, but if I want things in the right way I can make them happen. Sometimes."

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"Magic. Messing around in my head. Great."

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"...Sorry. I didn't - make you less you? Just..."

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"I don't feel compelled to cut this conversation short so I can make the rendezvous, so I suppose I'm not entirely angry at you."

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"That's good... I'm sorry if it makes trouble for you?"

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"That... might depend on how thorough a job you did."

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"Pretty sure I got everything? Or, like - I was kind of intending for your brain to work the way you want it to work?"

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"That's a little vague, you realize."

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"Yeah, you might wanna like - I guess check if I accidentally gave you superpowers or something, I think that's most likely weird side effect..."

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"And how, pray tell, does one do that?"

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"Uh. Try to figure out what's different? Or do a mental action thing that'd be different if your mind worked literally however you want?"

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Mental action thing, huh? All right. Telepathy's a mental action, right? She wants to hear what Wiccan is thinking.

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Is she okay that was probably really rude of me though I mean this isn't the worst thing I've ever done accidentally at least I didn't roll her back or summon a bear that was really weird and Loki was possibly lying about the thing there because I super don't think summoning random bears is actually a problem I had when we were finding the Scarlet Witch though maybe it started after that parasite thing hey she's thinking a long time I wonder if it'd be rude to make some food I'm hungry maybe pancakes oh wait pancake waffle song okay brain seriously noodles are better anyways at least there's no noodle song no stop thinking of the most annoying songs you can brain hey I wonder if this universe has any neat restaurants probably nothing as good as that stall in Osaka in 3714 haven't been there in forever since America got banned from ever coming back though did she actually explain why the person was so mad at her I think someone mentioned property damage -

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And she wants to stop hearing that now.

"Well. I don't think I'll have any more trouble with SIS encryption."

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"That's good! What's SIS?"

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"Republic Strategic Intelligence. My current employer."

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"Do you - want help getting away from them?"

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"Without that damn override code, they can't stop me. But I can't leave yet. The job's not finished."

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"What job?"

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"This is extremely classified, but I expect you'll probably be extremely classified if you ever interact with a government, so. I'm not actually a defector. I'm a Cipher agent with Imperial Intelligence on undercover assignment. There are three layers to this assignment. First, to ordinary citizens of the Republic and the Empire, which includes military personnel and most of the rest of Imperial Intelligence and SIS, I'm still an Imperial agent. Second, to the SIS cell I'm embedded with, I'm a turncoat playing double agent for their side. Third, to the head of Imperial intelligence and the Watcher I liaise with, I'm a loyal double agent on their side."

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"Spy stuff! My teacher probably would've been a better magic person for that but he's also an asshole. Uh. I guess I'd like to - figure out where we are and how to get home or have stuff to do until our friends find us, and maybe help out with like problems here while I'm at it? I usually don't get a chance to stay places to help out for long stretches... And you seem nice!"

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"What do you define as a problem?"

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"Hm. People being - unhappy? Like, deeply, in a way they don't want to be? I want to maximize the number of people who have what they want and are happy, and minimize unhappiness. I can't fix everything, but I'm pretty good for fixing like resource shortages and monster attack type stuff? And that's usually the - basic underlying problems a lot of places have. That and politics but fixing politics is hard without living somewhere."

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"Well, there's a pretty big war going on now that I think most people would say is the root of the problems in the galaxy. The people in charge of the war would say that it's the fault of the other side for existing at all, so I don't know where that falls on the line between monster attacks and politics."

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"...I'd probably call that politics? Um, I'm not powerful enough to pick people up and put them all so they don't have to be next to their enemies, though that'd be cool... I'm guessing there's not some obvious solution to get them to cut it out? Peacefully?"

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"If there were, the galaxy wouldn't need people like me. Part of the problem too is that both sides have a sect of Force-users, Sith for the Empire and Jedi for the Republic, and they really don't like each other. Their religious disagreements are a major driver."

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"Religious wars. Ugh. ...What's a Force user?"

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"The Force is this sort of..." she waves a hand vaguely, "thing. I don't really understand it. But basically, people can use it can be superhuman, strength, speed, telekinesis, that sort of thing. They talk about stuff like clairvoyance and sensing emotions too, but I don't put much stock in that."

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"We've got a lot of stuff I guess kind of like that? Powers come from lots of different places... Can all Force users do the same stuff?"

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"More or less, it seems like. Some are stronger, some are weaker. Some are better at some parts than others."

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"Huh. We're probably mutants, or at least used to be - mutants all have different powers, and are basically supers with a genetic link? And non-mutant supers mostly also do different things. Jet's a speedster, I'm a mage, one of our old teammates could change her size..."

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"That's quite a varied catalog."

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"Stuff gets way more ridiculously weird than that. So - you guys are a galactic civ? How do you get around?"

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"Spaceships equipped with hyperdrive. You can cross the known galaxy in about two weeks, if you have a good ship and push it."

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"Neat; that's better than a lot of stuff that isn't outright teleportation back home..."

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"We don't have anything like teleportation."

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"It's pretty rare? Mostly just, like, one person who can go within his own line of sight, is someone I know. I can hit 'random not here and not immediately deadly' basically. I think weirdly a lot of tech solutions are like 'universe hop twice'..."

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"One would think that would be more difficult."

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She shrugs. "You'd think! It's definitely harder with magic..."

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"So what kind of story do you want to tell about being here?"

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"...I honestly have no idea what makes sense. Rather not anything that has to do with magic? But I really don't know how to explain lacking basic any local knowledge at all."

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"I can pull enough rank at the Imperial base to call you 'intelligence assests' and stop anyone from talking to you if you're all right sitting in a room with a locked door. Can probably get you on the Holonet, at least, and you can do some looking around."

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"That sounds kind of boring but maybe good for like temporary figuring stuff out... And if we're not on cameras to notice her blurring, Jet can speed read and I can sit there letting her talk."

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"Are you sure you want a plan that requires me to talk."

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"You should assume there will be cameras."

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"So I'll have to stay slow anyways."

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"Right. How fast can you go, out of curiousity?"

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" - I never actually managed that race with Quicksilver... And I'm not sure how to convert miles to kilometers. I can hit ten thousand miles an hour in short bursts, a mile's a bit over five thousand feet, a foot's around this big - " She holds her hands apart demonstratively. "I don't have problems with friction."

(She can actually hit over a hundred thousand miles an hour if she wants to actually run while accelerated but no point mentioning that.)

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She can do this in her head.

"That'd be- sixteen thousand kilometers per hour. Sixteen ninety-three. And forty-four hundredths. Not too shabby. Good thing you don't have to deal with friction."

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"Most speedsters don't, for various reasons."

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"Convenient. I might be here as long as a couple days more. Probably not more than a week."

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"If we're not definitely gonna get - Holonet? - sitting in a room with a locked door and no magic that long doesn't sound pleasant. Especially since I know it's possible to make magic things that hook into open networks."

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Legate hums and thinks for a moment.

"I could swing it so that you only spend the night, and afterwards you go around with me."

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"That might be good! Though why spend the night in the first place?"

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"Politics, basically. Helps the base commander feel like he's helping and has some control over his operations."

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"...Right. I guess that's fine, then." That is not the face of someone who finds that a thorough reason.

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"Intelligence and the regular forces don't always get along too well. We don't have to follow a lot of the rules they do, and sometimes our operational goals conflict. I have a lot of freedom to make decisions, but he has the bureaucracy on his side."

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She nods. "Alright. Sleeping out of the muck will be nice anyways. Lead on? - I'm guessing we shouldn't be flying or anything when we get in sight of the base?"

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"Should be all right until we're about a mile and a half out. I'll let you know."

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"Okay, thanks."

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Off they go. Legate leads the way on her speeder, starting off a little faster than walking, but speeding up when she sees her companions can handle it.

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Weeeee flying!

It's probably going to be 'trying not to hit buildings or trees' holding them back, Wiccan can fly quite fast in a straight line and is pretty maneuverable at lower speeds.

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Jet's walking. Just, like someone took a video of someone walking and hit 'fast forward'.

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The terrain is more of the same, for the most part. At one point, they pass a collapsed skyway, broad enough to have supported sixteen lanes of traffic, now slowly consumed by mosses and lichen.

Some hours later, they reach the shore of a lake, water a disgusting brown color. Legate calls a halt. "The base is on the far side. There's a bridge partway around the edge, here."

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"Cool."

Wiccan's been conjuring food and drink periodically and then dismissing the bowls and such. She and Jet both eat a lot, and it's nice having hot food. 

She drifts down to land, while Jet slows to a halt.

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"I'm going to call our approach in, so no one feels the urge to start shooting. Just hang tight for a minute." She pulls out her holocomm again.

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"Alright!" (She's tempted to start fidgeting or playing her game but instead she focuses a bit on Legate.)

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A symbol like a stylized asterisk inside a hexagon appears above the communicator.

"This is Cipher Nine to Aurek Base." Her voice has a different tone than the one she's been using before now, clipped and professional. "I am approaching the perimeter, Code Savish, two. Request acknowledgement."

There's a pause, then a tinny voice comes through the comm. "Acknowledged, Cipher. Do you require escort or confinement?"

"Negative escort, positive confinement. Minimum security. Confirm."

     "Negative escort, minimum security. Confirmed. You are cleared to approach, Cipher Nine." The symbol winks out and she pockets the comm again.

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"So we're good to go?"

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"Yep!" Her voice is back to the way it was. "Time for walking."

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She's not the best at walking - she's gotten way too used to flying everywhere - though she has good endurance and a lot of stubbornness. 

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Fortunately, they don't have to go too far.

The base sits on the shore of the lake, and is guarded by thick metal walls. The bridge across is also made of metal, and guarded at the base entrance by turret-mounted guns. Most of the structures inside are semi-permanent tents of a thick, rigid plastic. There's a landing pad with two shuttles waiting on it, wings folded into the upright resting position, and space for a third. The main building, which they are headed to, is made of the same sturdy metal as the walls, and is built into and fills out one of the ubiquitous collapsed buildings, which has been cleansed of vegetation.

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The two she's escorting look around curiously, but don't really stare at anything in particular.

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The soldiers bustle around in military fashion. The color of uniforms here seems to be gray, of slightly different shade than the Cipher's outfit. A strip of red and blue tabs above the left breast looks to indicate rank. There are a handful of troopers in dark armor scattered around, with helmets that cover their whole face. The one at the door salutes when they approach.

Cipher nods in acknowledgement. "Private. Has space been prepared for my guests?"

     "Room D12, ma'am." His voice is slightly distorted, like it's coming out of a speaker.

"Very good. As you were, then." The door hisses open, and they enter. Inside, the base is lit by a line of recessed lights at the floor and ceiling. She navigates them confidently though to their room, nodding at those she passes but not initiating conversation. When they get to the door, she palms it open. It's small, but not cramped. A set of bunk beds in the corner, a low table, three chairs.

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She looks around. "So, here for the night?"

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"Yep. I'm fuzzing the surveillance for now, but that will stop when I leave."

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"Thanks. Can you get us Holonet access, or should I try to conjure something?"

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"Try conjuring something. Do you need more information to do that, or...?"

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"Hm. I want a tablet that'll connect to the Holonet with good speed from anywhere and being secure and not being traceable."

An orange and dark blue tablet materializes in her hand, and she fiddles with it a bit. "Seem to have some kind of internet access? Dunno if it's actually secure-secure, I'm not enough of a computer person to picture that well..." She makes a second for Jet in the other girl's colors.

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"Neat. Can I see?"

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"Sure." She hands hers over.

The interface and icons and all are the ones familiar from home, though she named the browser 'MagicFox' because she thinks she's funny. Currently, said fox-themed browser is what's open, and she seems to have been testing searching for text or images or video.

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"Let's see... Encryption looks good. Relay selection... not applicable, okay. I'm going to set you up with a packet anonymizer," that she has a backdoor into, "so your traffic can't be backtraced... there. All set."

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"Sweet, thanks! Can you do the same on Jet's?"

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"Of course."

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And after that's taken care of (and Wiccan also proves, to her amusement, that she can read her browsing history but Cipher Nine slash Legate can't, which she privately acknowledges probably means she'll need to be a lot less wary of spyware), Wiccan asks, "Anything else? Like, food, when will you be back... We've got some snacks and all but not really breakfast?"

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"All the mess has got is military rations. I can requisition some if you really want."

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"I think we'll stick to trail mix and water." She checks her pockets, makes a bit more while she's sitting here. 

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"Good call. Anything else you need?"

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"Can't think of anything. Jet?"

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Jet, who's sat on the lower bunk with the tablet, shakes her head.

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"All right, then. I'll see you tomorrow morning."

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"See you!"

And she flops next to Jet with her own tablet.

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She closes the door behind her and it locks with a click.

Lots to do. Get in touch with Chance, make excuses about the rendezvous, find out what he knows, orchestrate his death, contact that Dr. Lokin and see if he's come up with anything, figure out what if anything she'll be passing along to Hunter about that... busy, busy. And of course, there's the kids to think about. They seem... earnest. Which is not the same thing as naive, but it's still exploitable. She'll keep half an eye on their Holonet activity, see if anything happens there.

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The features of their browser are 'convenient' as well as 'specifically magically untraceable and secure.' Cipher Nine does not have the relevant meta-permissions to access what they're doing.

(Which for Wiccan is mostly searching for a large scatter-shot of assorted media. The local cultural equivalent of soap operas says a lot about that culture. Do they have aliens? What do people think about the aliens? Are Force users funny or feared or normal - )

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Jet meanwhile reads through history books and posts and internet articles, any blogs about politics... She can accelerate her eyes without it being obvious, so to the outside it looks like she's skimming a bit quickly while she's actually reading everything. Not as fast as she could, but still faster than someone in slow-mode.

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Humans are the most common species in the galaxy, but there are lots of others. Notables include Twi'lek, Mon Calamari, Rodians, Hutts, Wookies, Ithorians, Zabrak, Duros, Gand, Mirialan, Anomid... the list continues for quite a while. The Galactic Republic is notedly multicultural, the Sith Empire decidedly less so. Force users are mostly feared or respected, and seem to uniformly be either Sith or Jedi.

The recent history of the galaxy is... fraught. There are two major powers: the Galactic Republic and the Sith Empire. The Republic occupies territories more towards the core of the galaxy, the Empire lives closer to the fringe. Around forty years ago, the expanding Republic encountered the edge of the Empire. The Empire killed the explorers for landing on Korriban, which is approximately holy to the Sith. The Republic sent a fleet to look for them. The Empire attacked the fleet. Things sort of spiraled downhill from there, culminating in a siege of the Republic's capital world, Coruscant, by the Empire. Following that, a treaty was signed which established a shaky peace, following the drawing of new borders. (Reading between the lines, the Empire was overextended.) This was just over twenty years ago. In the intervening time, the treaty has slowly diminished in force, becoming not even worth the flimsiplast it was written on. It is commonly accepted that the war is back on now.

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Sounds complicated, yeah.

She starts poking at cultural stuff surrounding Sith and Jedi. Does either side have, like, a publicly published manifesto? (She'll probably have Jet read that.) Do people in the Empire or Republic seem happier? Does either side have censorship laws?

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There's no manifestos as such, but she can pick up a general sense of the public's perception. At their best, the Jedi are the guardians of peace and justice in the galaxy and the Sith are the ultimate expression of freedom, power, and will. At their worst, the Jedi are oppressively conservative tools of a moribund bureaucracy completely out of touch with the modern galaxy and the Sith are murderous tyrants who would see the galaxy burn for their personal amusement.

Both sides have laws about the sorts of things one can say during wartime, but these are trivially bypassed and no one thinks too much of them. There's no perceptible difference in happiness levels, except for people who live on worlds where the war is currently being fought. No matter which side they're on, they don't like it.

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Yeah doesn't seem like there's super obvious bad guys here. More two cultures that met and instantly disliked each other.

What are the laws like? How do you become a Sith or a Jedi?

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Force sensitivity is apparently something one can be tested for. Babies born in the Republic are tested at birth, and those that pass a threshold are given to the Jedi Order. The Sith induct their recruits later, in the ten-to-fifteen years old range. Joining up does not seem to be entirely voluntary, in either case.

The Galactic Republic is a kind of federated representative democracy. Members are largely free to self-govern on the level of planetary systems, as long as those governments meet basic standards defined in the Republic's constitution. System governments send representatives to the Senate, which is the legislative body for the Republic as a whole. There are a few multiple-system subpolities, but these are rare, as they still only get the standard Senate representatives. The Senate elects from its members a Supreme Chancellor, who leads the Senate and wields executive power, though much of that is semi-permanently delegated to smaller committees within the Senate.

The Sith Empire is ruled absolutely by the Emperor. Theoretically. He hasn't given a direct command since the Treaty of Coruscant. In practice, the Dark Council rules the Empire, and is made up of the twelve most powerful Sith in the Empire. Each is responsible for a certain aspect of the Empire: Military Offense, Military Defense, Military Strategy, Production and Logistics, Intelligence, Ancient Knowledge, Mysteries, Sith Philosophy, Laws and Justice, Expansion and Diplomacy, Technology, and Biotic Sciences. The Councilors organize their responsibilities into various Ministries, which direct and employ the non-Sith officials.

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She really isn't happy with forced recruitment, thinks she might have a bias towards 'democracies' but a bigger bias towards 'guys stop fighting.'

Well, is there any really low hanging fruit lying around at least? Famines, droughts, giant evil space whales, diseases caused by things she can straightforwardly picture and wish away whose absence won't cause other troubles...

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There are enough habitable planets in the galaxy that there's always some natural disaster happening somewhere. Earthquakes, floods, superstorms, wildfires, runaway greenhouse effects... Giant evil space whales don't seem to be a class of problems encountered here. Medicine is pretty advanced; anything that they only have palliative care for is complicated enough that she'd need to do more than cursory research into it.

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Maybe 'teleporting around fixing natural disasters' is something she could talk to Cipher Nine about; that's usually appropriately non-controversial hero work, and could at least establish her as powerful enough to get a say in things. (In the morning, her teammate's started kicking her and telling her to sleep.)

She curls up on the bottom bunk so there's still enough room for Jet to sit, and drifts off.

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Jet stays awake, reading more about politics and history.

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There's lots of both. Are there any particular areas she wants to focus on?

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Mostly identifying politics local to where they are right now. Imperial, right? So what's the laws and shit that're gonna apply to them?

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Taris is technically within Imperial territory, but based on the hyperlane connections, it's much closer to Republic space. No one really cares because it was bombed to oblivion during the Republic's Mandalorian Wars some three hundred years ago, and nobody wants to front the cost of reconstruction.

Imperial citizens are required to serve a minimum of two years in the military upon reaching age eighteen for human-standard lifespans, though this is deferrable up to age twenty-five with an educator's recommendation. Theft, assault, murder, and such are all illegal with punishments ranging from fines to imprisonment to execution. Law enforcement is done by police, except if the crime involved or was committed by an active member of the military, in which case the military police would be involved. Citizens are required to obey orders given by military officers even if they are not in active service. They are also required to obey orders given by Sith, though there is no official punishment written out for failure to do so. It may be inferred that Sith do their own punishment for disobedience. Imperial systems are run by a system governor, who may enforce additional laws specific to his or her situation, as required.

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Well, they're both physically sixteen (though chronologically their age is a mess; an argument could be made they're also either 'eight' or 'fourteen'), so, even if they had a stroke and decided becoming citizens was a good idea they're under the threshold for military service. Laws don't seem too byzantine on an imperial scale, though she's going to have to ask Cipher Nine what's up with the Sith's legal position... What's the position of non-citizen residents?

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Non-citizens are exempted from military service and holding or performing any government jobs. They are required to comply with all Imperial laws, and crimes committed by or to them are investigated by the military police, except if the non-citizen resident is a slave, in which case jurisdiction is determined what category the owner falls under.

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Slavery is possibly a problem to point Wiccan at. What kind of slavery, how do you become a slave, how are people kept in slavery, how are they released...

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Debt bondage is the most common form of slavery in the Empire, and the only one legal for citizens of the Empire to engage in. However, it is not illegal to lease chattel slaves from a non-Imperial actor, such as the Hutt Cartel. A ninety-nine year lease is a common tactic exploiting this loophole, and the Cartel offers this as a standard contract.

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...Hutt Cartel? Is that another political polity, or more like a gang? Can she get an idea of what political reactions might be like if, let's say, someone claiming to be an unaffiliated Force user took all their slaves?

(Jet is actually a lot worse than Wiccan at this 'politics and thinking things through' thing in some ways; it's probably fortunate for local stability that she's not the teleporter.)

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The Hutt Cartel is a gang the size of a political entity. They control a sizable swathe of territory in the western Mid and Outer Rim, and are perhaps the major player in the galactic underworld. The Hutt Cartel used to be the Hutt Empire, in fact, but that was a long, long time ago.

The Cartel would be angry enough to place a sizable bounty on whatever person did such a thing. The Empire would likely have a similar reaction, perhaps escalating up to military force, depending on whose slaves were taken. The Republic would applaud such an action, but might or might not offer any sort of material support.

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Argh, people. Wiccan is also almost certainly not reliable enough at magic yet to survive pissing off that big a group... Although... Is this civilization at all capable of, let's say, striking at someone who teleported a galaxy over? Jet has no idea if Wiccan's teleport has a range, but she thinks it's mostly a 'can actually identify where she's going' sort of thing.

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There are no recorded extragalactic expeditions. Conventional wisdom holds that extragalactic travel is impossible, due to abnormal boundary conditions in hyperspace.

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Some good news, at least. And if that kind of travel's impossible or at least hard it makes sense the two galactic powers would eventually start getting snippy over expansion opportunities...

Do they have any kind of images of or details on other galaxies?

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Telescopic observation. Given the impossibility of reaching them, it's of academic interest only.

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Something to poke Wiccan about in the morning.

She spends the rest of the night researching the Hutt Cartel, and also if anyone has accounts of what happens to people with high bounties.

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The Hutt Cartel has their stubby little fingers in just about every unsavory pie one can think of. Slaving, pirating, smuggling, racketeering, gambling, extortion... You name it, they do it. The Republic tolerates their activities less than the Empire does, but still has some form of diplomatic relations with them.

People with high bounties tend to get bounty hunted. The exception that proves the rule, of course, is the famous story of Tyresius Lokai, a Devaronian scam artist who racked up over half a billion credits in bounties before disappearing. It's possible he's still alive, as none of the bounties have ever been credibly claimed. Bounty hunting is apparently a thriving cottage industry, with the undisputed kings of the trade being the Mandalorians. The Mandalorians are a collection of mercenary clans, tied together by an honor warrior culture and a perpetual search for the next good fight.

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Do bounty hunters have to actually acquire an intact body? The selection of problems they're going to have will look very different if bounty hunters couldn't just try to atomize wherever they think Wiccan is.

(Jet is confident in her own ability to win fights with almost anyone sharing an atmosphere with her, though she acknowledges she can be surprised while out of acceleration. And Wiccan's whole 'we don't need masks, I'll just make a spell so they can't identify us' worked on most people back home, so ambushes should less likely than they might otherwise be... Especially if they take any secret identity precautions whatsoever.)

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Depends on the terms of the bounty, if the target is wanted dead or alive. Even dead usually requires proof. Some Hutts are fond of heads on floors.

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Yuck.

Wiccan will probably say they shouldn't rush in on this, because Wiccan suddenly developed 'common sense' around age fourteen... She's kind of curious what Cipher Nine's going to say about their plans actually...

Speaking of, it's probably nearly morning? Jet doesn't get sleepy while she's accelerated, but she's feeling enough exhaustion to indicate it's been hours real-time and probably close to a day her-time.

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Hard to tell from inside the windowless locked room, really.

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What time does the computer think it is, especially compared to when they got here? (She has no idea if Wiccan synced the computers to local time - if not they're probably using familiar hours.)

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It has been about ten hours, according to the computer.

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Ugh that's still believably before the cut-off for 'next morning.' Though give it a few more, and she's going to start pestering Wiccan about a break-out. Silently. Because of the fucking cameras. 

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Speaking of, Wiccan sits up behind her, yawns, and reaches out to drape herself over Jet.

"Jet, why are you awake," she whines, leaning into her teammate. "Go to sleep."

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"I slept earlier," she mutters. Nevermind that it wasn't much, and she's been in (moderate) acceleration a lot.

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"You're gonna make your sleep phase disorder thingy worse you know. Do I have to sit on you?"

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"I don't need a lump on me to sleep - get off - "

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No Wiccan is the limpet here, see.

She crawls on top of Jet enough Jet's forced to lean back or lose balance. "I'm not gonna stop until you lay down you know."

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"Pest."

Still, she leans back.

And angles her tablet above her.

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"Nope! No read, only sleep cuddles." Wiccan grabs the tablet out of her hands, now firmly on top of her teammate.

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"Ugh. Fine."

And she lays down, and argh she really is exhausted...

She kind of half drifts off. 

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And Wiccan twists into a more comfortable position, still cuddling, checks the time, notes Jet's going to be restless to get going once she wakes, and settles in to watch some more local equivalent of soap operas.

(She'll start seeing if 'the entire Holonet' includes 'local encrypted communication' when the fourteen hour mark passes.)

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Thirteen and a half hours after she closed it, Cipher Nine opens the door again.

"Sorry I'm late."

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A very groggy Jet stirs from under Wiccan, flicks into acceleration long enough to wake up, then stares blearily at Cipher Nine.

She is not doing the word thing after waking, nope.

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"We were a bit worried, yeah. You okay now?"

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"More or less. And you?"

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"Getting a bit bored? Only so much binge watching dramas I can do..."

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"Did you catch Nebula's Haze? An import from the old Tion Hegemony, it aired during their separation crisis about a century and a half back. Almost pure monarchist propaganda, but there were hidden rebel messages in the codec."

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"Yeah, there was some neat stuff analyzing it too." She slides off Jet and out of bed, stretching. "Mostly watched more modern stuff, though, but that'd been recced a few places." Morning bounce. "So, what now?"

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"That depends on how you feel about rakghoul nests and confined spaces."

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"Sounds like - okay not fun, but better than sitting still."

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"Great. The old Tarisians buried their power plants underground, and I'm about ninety percent sure the lab I'm looking for is in one."

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"Anything dangerous past rakghouls?"

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"I don't think so. The plants were pretty well hardened, and there's not all that much else on Taris."

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She nods and gets up. She's fine with that - rakghouls are demonstrably not very dangerous to her.

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"So we're getting going?"

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"Nice as the accommodations here are, yes. I'm still on the clock."

She leads the way out and to a four-seat speeder she's requisitioned.

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Fancy! And minimizes Wiccan tripping over random stuff. Though she might want to fly once they're out of sight of the base...

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Jet flops into the speeder. She is perfectly fine not running everywhere.

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"We'll be picking up one more brave adventurer to join our merry little band," she says once they've cleared the base.

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"Oh? What're they like?"

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"His name is Doctor Eckard Lokin. He is, apparently, a specialist in rakghouls."

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"What's he studying?"

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"And I'm guessing no power use around him?"

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"He's trying to tame rakghouls, or something like that. I did a little digging; it turns out he is or was a scientist affiliated with Imperial Intelligence, back in the day. He vanished off the grid about a decade and a half ago, so either he's been running some seriously black ops or he's gone rogue. Given his, uh, nonexistent support setup out here, my money's on the latter. He knows I'm a Cipher, but he also knows I'm working with the Republic and that I know he's gone rogue. So there's some secrets trading going on already. It's up to you if you want to take part in it."

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Glance at Wiccan. "Our initial setup?" she asks.

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"Man, it's been years since that whole 'Asgardian' thing." To Cipher Nine: "So we spent a while pretending to have different powers way back when. I'll stick to flight and lightning, unless something weird happens, and Jet will be mostly like accelerated reflexes, super strength."

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"Works for me. What's an Asgardian?"

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"They're a type of alien - well, alien to our home planet. The big thing was we were intentionally modeling ourselves after a previous super team, the Avengers, and one of their really famous members was Thor of Asgard, and on our planet most people associated Asgard with Thor? Who has the power set I was pretending to have."

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"Can all Asgardians do that?"

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"Thor's got a magic hammer that lets him do that, though the only other Asgardian I've met can also fly."

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"A magic... hammer? How novel."

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"That's not the weirdest thing ever, but yeah I think it's pretty far from magic here compared to like other stuff."

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"What sorts of things does a super team do?"

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"The Avengers mostly took on really big threats? There's this - whole thing of super heroes and super villains, and super villains are criminals and super heroes catch them, but only sometimes coordinate with the government. Our team initially formed to fight a specific bad guy, but lately we were trying to do less fighting, more disaster response, partially because fighting tends to have a lot of bystander casualties if you're not super careful and also because people kept threatening to figure out who we were and call our parents. Apparently thirteen year olds are not supposed to be fighting time traveling murderers."

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"Interesting paradigm. Do people actually call themselves super villains?"

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"Some of them, mostly who think it's funny or who are like revolutionary types?"

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"Strange sort of person who would call themself a villain. Then again, I've known some Sith... Is 'time-traveling murderer' typical of the reference class?"

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"My teacher thought being a super-villain was fun. He was also mostly a prankster type, though... And not really, most of the people messing with the timeline do stuff other than running around killing people? And most supers can't time-travel. Usually villains are, like, robbing banks, or running drugs, or pulling really bizarre and elaborate pranks, or doing unethical experiments, or trying to overthrow a government."

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"Criminals, in other words."

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"Yeah. Main difference is if someone has super-powers it's harder to send normal police up against them. And a lot of super-powers make using normal prisons complicated, so anyone with a super-power breaking the law tends to end up in a really high security facility even if they did something really minor, and there's politics that mean super-powered criminals get higher sentences even if their power's something useless or they did something on accident. Jet was in one for a bit a few years ago until we broke her out."

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"What was she in for?"

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"Property damage."

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"She blew up her school," Wiccan says, cheerfully. "While there was no one in it."

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"Not a fan of mandatory attendance policies?"

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She shrugs. "Being a super hero ended up being more interesting anyways. I can study on my own."

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"It's good to be self-motivated. So disaster response, huh. How do you play that?"

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"I'm fast enough I can evacuate people even pretty large distances, especially from on-going emergencies. I've pulled everyone out of a group of buildings in the process of collapsing before, with no one hurt. I can fetch supplies, and construct things, and get people with more useful powers positioned."

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"Being able to conjure a lot of food and medical supplies on the spot is really helpful. That kind of logistics is usually where I'm at, though I've been getting better at magic so that might change."

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"What about other people on your team?"

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"Our team actually shifts around a lot, and we got in a bunch of new members recently, who haven't been in a full disaster situation yet... One of our old members could change her size, though, and another just flat out had training in command situations, and is a clone of someone really widely respected."

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"Did the personality get cloned too?"

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"Nah. Person she's a clone of raised her, though, after some drama."

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"Cloning's a bit of an esoteric art here. If you try to speed up the growth process any, the clones will tend to become violently insane. Sometimes even if you don't. Easier to make people the old-fashioned way."

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"I don't think she was sped up? Her mom just had a super-power that I guess people figured might be clone-able."

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"What superpower was that?"

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"Super strength, speed, agility, and mental processing. Nothing world-shattering but she'd been the first superhero and so was separately a really powerful symbol, though I think her superpowers were actually from an experiment that nobody managed to replicate."

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"Pretty handy grab-bag. I wouldn't mind having that set. Ah, here's our final passenger." They see an older man sitting on the broken edge of a pipe protruding from the ground. He's maybe in his fifties, balding, with a salt-and-pepper beard. A black bag sits at his side. He takes it by the handle and stands as they approach. "Going our way, old man?" she calls.

     "It seems that I am, young Cipher. Hello," he says to the other two.

"Wiccan, Jet, this is Doctor Eckard Lokin. Lokin, Wiccan and Jet.""

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"Hey! I'm Wiccan!"

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"And Jet."

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"A pleasure to meet you both," he says, climbing in. They resume their travel.

"The good Cipher didn't say much about you. What brings the two of you to this cozy yet slightly damp corner of the galaxy?"

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"Seeing the sights, expanding our horizons, getting valuable life experience..." she says, teasingly.

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"There's much of that to be had on Taris, of course, though usually not by people so young as yourselves. Where do you come from?"

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"We've kind of lived all over the place? Parents moved around a lot."

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"Itinerancy is all too common a curse in these days. I myself have been subjected to it. Postings on Dromund Kaas, Ziost, Nar Shaddaa, Corellia, Naboo, Sarkhan, Kessel, Amanti, Ord Gressem..."

(He's watching closely to see if any of the places he names trips any signal of recognition.)

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She's doing a pretty good impression of a teenager who isn't actually listening or taking this seriously, but doesn't show any particular signs of recognition.

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"Lotta postings, even for an old man. Interpersonal conflicts?"

     "With my charming personality? Nonsense. My talents are simply in high demand."

"Sarkhan wasn't even officially contacted until six months ago."

     "I'm afraid any details are classified, Cipher."

"Old man, my security clearance is higher than you're allowed to know exists."

Lokin smiles. "Nevertheless."

Cipher rolls her eyes. "Keep your secrets then, tightlipped bastard. I think these girls have you beat, though."

     "Perhaps you would care to share some information then."

"I picked them up right here, same way I did you. And that's all I've got to say about it."

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She laughs a little at the conversation. Still, she's used to secretive people - it took a while before she even learned a few of her teammates' real names.

"What do you think we're hiding then?"

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"Who you are, for a start. 'Jet' and 'Wiccan' seem like code names, though I'll not judge on that front, out of respect to the good Cipher here."

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"Much appreciated," she says dryly.

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"Where you come from, for another. You speak Basic well, but your accent is neither Imperial nor Republic and doesn't bear the marks one would expect of a native of the unclaimed Rim. Adding to that mystery, there are very few reasons to be on Taris at all. The Imperial garrison is only token, but all system traffic is nonetheless monitored. The military would have no reason to send you here, and you are not Sith. Any academic interest I would be aware of. This system is not on any extant trade routes, and so makes a poor port of call for smugglers."

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"Cool; you notice a lot of stuff. Got any wild guesses, since we're so busy being mysteries wrapped in enigmas shoved into those cool puzzle boxes?"

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"Ah, you wish me to create your cover story for you. A wise move, to take advantage of my experience and creativity. But I'm not sure I know enough of the relationship between you and the Cipher to make a believable tale."

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"I was mostly curious what you're assuming, really. Sometimes rolling with that's good but sometimes it's really not since people tend to assume what they're familiar with. And if you're familiar with something you're gonna spot errors more."

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"I see. And should I take that explanation into account, or act as though I had not heard it?"

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"When guessing? Maybe as if you hadn't."

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"In that case... runaway apprentices, perhaps. Either Sith or Jedi, that would give cause to obfuscate your origins and explain your survival here, and perhaps your presence, as well. It is said the Force moves those who serve it in mysterious ways."

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"And what do you think with what I said?"

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"I confess to not being entirely sure. You pose a novel puzzle." He smiles.

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"Puzzles are fun!"

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"Keeps the mind young."

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Cipher pulls the speeder to a halt.

"Yeah, well, any of you young minds want to venture a solution to the pack of rakghouls in the entrance?"

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"I mean..." She did not get clarification about what scale of powers they should be throwing around. She could take those with some lightning, Jet could take those really easily and then probably clear the whole place before the bodies fell...

"How much damage do we feel like doing to other stuff?"

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"As little as possible, ideally. I'm not sure what's important and what isn't, in there."

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That does not clarify if Jet should do her thing.

"Hey, Jet?"

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There's a little flicker.

Oh look, the rakghouls are dead.

"Already ahead of you."

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Cipher flashes a thumbs up.

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"Most impressive," says Lokin. "How did you manage that?"

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"Magic."

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"Magic is an excuse people use when they have not fully understood the phenomenon in question."

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"Because Force users are such a fully explained and sensible phenomenon."

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"Force users are predictable. One can plan around them, account for their various strengths and certain predictable tendencies."

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"They're uncreative, for the most part."