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A Brother to the Darkness

Jansen raced through the halls of the Star Destroyer. This wasn't what was supposed to happen. He got to the detention level. The guards he had posted here were missing. Not a good sign to start with at all. He moved further in, drawing his blaster. No sound at all. He moved forward, slowly. He reached the weapons storage locker. Opened it.

Out fell the bodies of the two guards that were missing. Both of them with blaster marks all over their bodies.

Jansen swore. They were in more trouble than they knew. He moved more quickly onward. around the corner, to the special holding cell where a certain dark figure should be waiting. The hum of the forcefield was missing. Jansen turned and aimed his weapon and...

Found nothing. The dark figure was gone. No trace of his captors remained. The security cameras had been melted. Probably by blaster fire. The dark figure was loose somewhere, and Jansen prayed that it wasn't on the ship. For everyone's sake.

"We've traced the vector of the Chimaera and we're 100% ready to go. But I have to advise you, sir, that they could be anywhere by now - they've had a huge head start." La Forge was still unhappy about the whole mess.

"I know, I know. But it's all the lead we've got." Wedge interrupted before Fel could answer. The others in the room, Admiral Fel and Commodore Vortagh, agreed.

Vortagh took a turn. "We do have some leads. These traitorous Imperials seem to be working for some fool who thinks himself the next Emperor. Whatever deluded person that is probably will know the whereabouts of the ship."

"True enough," said Fel. "And we can eliminate another group of idiots giving the Empire a bad name."

"Sounds good all around," La Forge said. "As long as I get my ship!"

"Wedge, get the ships ready for the jump to lightspeed. It's time to play detective." Fel's eyes narrowed.

"Aye aye, admiral." Wedge got up for the door when Jansen burst into the room and nearly knocked him over.

Jansen was obviously distressed. "He's gone! Get everybody on high alert!"

"Who's gone?" La Forge was out of the loop.

"Vek'din! Vek'din is gone!"

"Who in the galaxy is Vek'din?" Wedge hadn't a clue.

Wheels were turning in Vortagh's head. "Wait, you mean Ankaroth Vek'din?"

Jansen nodded gravely.

"What in the Emperor's name was he doing here?!?" Vortagh was on the verge of screaming. "Who released him from his prison?!?"

Jansen replied "I did. For the holocron. He's one of the very few who could do it right."

"It wasn't worth the risk," Vortagh said. "It's only a holocron!"

"But it was Daemon's, you see..."

"I don't care! It wasn't worth setting this psychopath free."

Jansen was getting mad. "Commodore, contain yourself!"

"Contain myself? When we have the Butcher of Bet'ammet loose on the ship?!?"

"Bet'ammet?" La Forge interrupted.

"It's on Effetal," Vortagh said, referring to his homeworld.

Fel had sat back long enough. "Okay, stop fighting here. Let's take action now and worry about this mess later!"

Vortagh and Jansen stood down.

Fel continued. "Full sensor scans, all ships in the area. If he's here I want to find him and stop him NOW."

La Forge asked. "Who is this Vek'din anyway?"

Vortagh was looking serious. "He was somebody I knew very, very well. But he's mostly known as the one responsible for the civil war on Effetal."

La Forge wasn't sure what to say.

"I'll explain it all later - let's just get moving!"

Two hours later and many sensor scans and manual checks later... no sign of Vek'din. A number of officers were failing to report for duty, and the sensor scans were showing them as not being aboard the Warhammer, Nemesis, or shipyard. Something most strange was going on.

"Admiral, I'm seeing something strange here." One strange thing after another.

Fel walked down into the crew pit to look at the monitor. There was a strange pattern appearing in the Nemesis sensor scans of a particular quadrant of space. There was some sort of unknown electromagnetic interference going on, leaving a wildly fluctuating pattern in the logs. Fel looked over it carefully. "It's a message. It's a set of co-ordinates, I believe." He recited the corresponding co-ordinates.

"Sir, I've got a system at that location."

"Very good," Fel said. "Enter it into the computer and instruct the Warhammer to do the same."

"Aye, sir."

"This seems awfully convenient, Admiral -- are you sure this isn't a trap?" Wedge was suspicious.

"Trust me on this, Wedge."

"As you wish, sir... Just feels like a trap." Wedge was rarely wrong.

"If it is, you have the reassurance that both the Warhammer and Nemesis will be there to take care of anything that might come. But I'm telling you, we will most likely find exactly what we're looking for there." He turned to a crewman in the pit. "Signal the Warhammer - they'll be getting there first. Faster hyperdrive and all."

"Warhammer here, this is Vortagh."

"Commodore! We're going out on a little hunt!" Fel was smiling. That could be a good or bad thing, depending on what he was smiling about.

"Great! Following the Chimaera?"

"Nope, I've got another place for you to go. Transmitting co-ordinates."

"Right, got them," Vortagh said. "We're on our way! See you there soon."

"Try not to have all the fun before we get there," Wedge joked.

"I have every intention of doing so. If you want to get there in time for some fun, you'd better hurry up!" Vortagh laughed and closed the comm channel.

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