CHAPTER II: Predator

6 GALACTIC STANDARD HOURS LATER

PASSENGER SHIP VALORUM

"If I never set foot in this system again, it'll be too early," groaned Wes Goran, laying back onto his headrest. "Why did we ever come here in the first place?"

"To excavate ancient Huttese cultural artifacts," Davin Molik answered matter-of-factly. "You chose this trip, remember?"

Laughing, the young university student countered, "No, I just came along. You chose this class, and only because Aewi's in it."

"And you don't find her the least bit attractive?" replied Davin, grinning.

"Not like you do," joked Wes. Davin's infatuation with their Twi'lek classmate was often a source of banter between the two friends. "Seriously, though. We had four weeks until classes start, and I just spent two of them digging up old statues of slugs on Nal Hutta with a psychotic professor."

"But think of what happened next," remarked Davin, "Our night on Nar Shaddaa was fun, wasn't it? And besides, in the end, it paid off."

"Oh?"

"You didn't see me leave Club Echae with Aewi?" asked Davin with a sly smile.

Wes laughed, amusement crossing his face. "You did not."

"Really? I would've thought we were quite the scene, what with her all over m-"

A loud thump interrupted Davin, jolting both students out of their seats. They looked down at the source of the noise, but nothing further was coming. Davin shrugged, and resumed his tale of conquest. In great detail.

The Valorum was mid-tier spaceliner, somewhat small by the standards of the day. Carrying a crew of twelve, she could comfortably accommodate fifty-four passengers (though she'd been stretched to nearly triple that capacity when participating in the evacuation of Jagga II). Launched nearly half a century ago, she was named not for the legendary Supreme Chancellor Tarsus Valorum, but rather his second cousin Tytis, the former Minister of Interior Finance. A veteran member of the Coruscant Star Line's Outer Rim Flotilla, she was captained by an aging Nautolan by the name of Liyat Chek. Chek was a twenty-year veteran of Republic Navy, where she'd garnered a reputation as cool under pressure. Old yet reliable, the ship was a perfect match for her captain, who had not a single complaint about her vessel. Except that, perhaps, it could use more cargo space.

Cara cursed under her breath once she was sure nobody was investigating the noise. She'd banged her head against the support beam in the cramped cargo hold of the Valorum.

After retrieving the report and eliminating Verrun, Cara had taken a speeder taxi to the docks. Although she had no travelling documents, as the original plan had called for an exfiltration with the local RIS outpost, she'd managed to find transport on a passenger ship bound for Coruscant. Or rather, underneath said passenger ship.

Cara grunted as she pulled herself into a sitting position. Hidden away behind a pair of crates, on the off chance that a crewman should descend into the cargo bay, she tapped the datapad stashed inside fo her jacket. It was encrypted, far beyond her capability to slice in the field, but it could be broken with the right equipment back on Coruscant.

Satisfied that her objective was just as she'd left it, Cara lay her head back on the crate and let out a weary sigh. Between the planning and execution of her operation, she'd hardly slept in the past couple of days. Exhausted, the young agent closed her eyes and drifted off to a dreamless sleep.

Wes narrowed his eyes, glaring across the table at a grinning Davin Molik. The other student merely laughed and reached out for his victory prize, a sizable stack of credit chits. They were seated at an old-fashioned Pazaak table in the ship's aft lounge, in which were gathered the rest of their fellow archaeologists (this, however, only amounted to three other students; "Investigations of Huttese Artefacts and Culture" was not a popular class, despite the best efforts of Professor Smorbu Natjek, an especially massive and unusually jovial Hutt. Natjek had, for practical reasons, elected to remain on Coruscant during the expeditions. He was replaced by Ervic Jzacuk, a Coruscanti professor with a reputation for mental instability).

"I win," Davin smiled, carefully stacking his recently-bolstered stack of chits. Glancing at his own (and considerably larger) stack of chits, Wes smirked jokingly.

"It's about time you did," responded Wes, "I was starting to get worried. You know, since robbery is illegal under Republic law and all."

Davin made a mock-serious face. "Shut up, Goran."

"He's right, Davin," Aewi Tallona piped up from the sofa, where she lay reading a holo-novel. "You should probably quit while you're behind."

"I thought it was 'quit while you're ahead'," Davin replied. Aewi giggled.

"Yes, but given what we've seen of your Pazaak abilities, perhaps we should make an exception," she answered, "End while you're on a high note-"

She paused to observe the disparity between the two friends' credit chits.

"-or what might pass as a high note, for you."

"Oh come on, Aewi," started Davin, "I'm sure tha-"

For the second time on the same journey, Davin's words were cut off by a loud thud, though this one was far louder than the one before. As the students looked around in confusion, another percussive blast, this one much louder, jolted all of them out of their seats. The ship lurched as it exited hyperspace.

Aewi was the first to speak, her voice tinged with fear.

"Umm… what just happened?"

From the viewport where he'd been standing, a young Alderaanian turned to the rest of the group, his face pale with fear.

"I think someone should..." he began, backing unsteadily into a table, "Outside the…"

He trailed off, pointing vaguely at the vacated viewport. Wes stepped in the spot he'd been standing looking out into the stars.

On the other side of the window lay a ship, predatory in its angular appearance. Two shuttles were flying alongside it, lightly trailing plasma exhaust in their wake.

The blast woke Cara from her light sleep, sending her bolting upright. Which, in the cramped hold of the Valorum, simply led to a painful collision with the ceiling. She'd heard the unmistakable sound of an explosion, a sound she'd become all too familiar with over the past two years. Clutching her head, Cara stumbled out from her makeshift hideaway, trying to assess her new situation. A nearly impossible task, given her isolation underneath the main level of the ship. She reached down, squeezing the grip of her holdout blaster just ever so tighter.

"Report!" called Captain Chek, her years of naval experience taking over. Never one to panic in a crisis, her calm demeanor affected the rest of the bridge crew. The nav officer, a sandy-haired Telosian, spoke up from his scanner console.

"We're under fire from an unidentified ship," he began, "Scanners show two shuttles inbound for the portside airlocks."

It was a tactic Chek had seen plenty of times in the Republic Navy, hunting pirates in the Mid Rim. The outlaws would be lying in wait along the hyperlanes, pulling their targets out of hyperspace and disabling their shields with an ion blast.

"Launch the distress beacon," the captain commanded, "And order the crew to evacuate the ship."

"Aye, sir."