They were in fact responsible for the most thorough perception ward ever...

They have! And they don't even have to hide a planet. What do the mindflayers have to say about it?

They're still extremely upset about the one of their kind that helped the evil people.

Yeah, that is understandable. They are trying to fix the situation.

Aaaaaaaah!

...

Do you guys think this is a useful avenue of research?

"...probably, actually. We can blanket their station in a complete absence of perception magic with Henry but we still need to approach them undetected and I think what the 'flayers can do is better than becoming a huge black inkblot in space."

I meant more in the sense of how likely we are to get them to cooperate with a perception ward in a timely manner.

"Perhaps someone could try to spend a while talking to them."

They look into that. They assign Viera to it.

Aaaaaaaaaa.

Sigh. That is going to be a long, long process.

"Do we have a backup plan if that fails?"

"I think the back up plan is being the most discreet inkblot possible."

"...perhaps we could try to develop a better ward ourselves? Something using space manipulation?"

"I have ideas for that!"

She totally does. So many.

But eventually the 'flayers can in fact be talked around.

Great. They have a perception ward that isn't a black hole. They also have means to move between systems.

Meeting? How is the intel on the prison station?

Their situation hasn't really changed.

Yeah, they already captured pretty much everyone they wanted to capture. No progress at all on Sparkles' spying capabilities? Have people tried powering the connection through hate towards the captors?

Doesn't work. He didn't expect it to anyway.

Yes. Well, they have the means of transportation and the flayers can hide their presence. They have Sparkles and Felix to save the hostages. Henry is an extra preventive measure against magic. They have various sorcery benefits.

It appears, then, that they have a plan.

In that case, they gather all the volunteers. Then they can send away the surplus volunteers and prepare.