Rather than wait for the troopers to produce a breach charge, Bevel made a chopping gesture at the door, which nearly folded in half as the Force ripped it from its frame. On the off-chance that the intruders were lying in wait, he let the soldiers go in first, but in mere seconds they confirmed that his Force sense was not being deceived; somehow the imposter Sith had escaped.
He had still been ascending in the turbolift when Giran Faselli's death announced itself in the Force, like the thunderclap of a distant artillery shell. Then had come the report concerning "Lady Crysenthia's" star courier and the shambles its detonation had made of a hangar bay.
Bevel's amusement over the irony of Giran's fate had not lasted long. Though he would not miss the Human's company at all, he could not deny feeling an acute sense of...
It was certainly not guilt—more like chagrin. Sith adepts were valuable, and the death of one, his partner, reflected poorly on Bevel. Whether he could have prevented it made little difference to his professional pride. It would make even less difference to his superiors, particularly if the Republic spies escaped for good this time.
He strode through the office, surveying the damage as the guards swarmed about. Aside from lightsaber marks and presumably Force-thrown projectiles, he quickly noted signs of blaster fire and small explosives. It served as another strike against Giran's assumption that their quarry were Jedi; this was not how they were trained to fight. Nevertheless, they had to be more dangerous than was originally thought, since they had managed to overpower the prefect. Speaking of whom...
The troopers clustered in a far corner of the room, and Bevel's consternation intensified when he joined them there. Sprawled among broken crystalplex shards, half-melted debris, and dead fish, lay Korlen Olligard. The right side of his head was unrecognizable—scorched and oozing, the hearing gill shredded by shrapnel, the facial tendrils reduced to blackened stubs. One soldier was crouched beside him, ripping open a medpack.
Sheltered beings would be repulsed by the Quarren's hideous state, but Bevel watched for a moment with steady eyes, having been inured to such sights from a young age. He had seen beings survive greater injuries and perish from lesser ones—and there was nothing he could do for Korlen Olligard now. If he lived long enough to be conducted to the medbay, his fate would be decided there.
As Bevel turned away from the scene, it struck him as curious that the spies had not made sure of the prefect's death. Perhaps, then, this had not been an assassination attempt, as one might assume. More pressing, however, was the fact that they had apparently blown up their own starship, which meant that this was either a suicide mission, or they planned on getting off Torque Highport some other way.
His eyes alighted on a door in a nearby corner. Cold fury built up within him, contorting his face, and the dark side goaded him. Your prey are still in reach. Follow their scent. Strike.
The leader of the Sith troopers was drawing near, a question beginning to filter through his helmet's vocoder. Bevel nearly bowled him over as he made for the door, telekinetically thrusting it into its frame. Without hesitating he leaped and found himself hurtling down the black throat of a turbolift shaft, frigid air ripping past him as he gathered speed.
He let himself enjoy the plunge. Giran's death, Prefect Olligard's condition, the harsh evaluations of his Sith masters that undoubtedly awaited him—none of these concerns remained, as surely as if he had left them behind in the ruined office above. There was only Bevel, his prey, and the Force of all things annihilating the distance between them.