Chapter 4: Shidar Zhol'skar

Coruscant

The Republic Judiciary Central Detention Center was a tall grey duracrete and steel structure of interconnecting pipes, all surrounding a larger cylinder with a mushroom-like summit. It was not a place Senator Shidar Zhol'skar ever imagined visiting.

But her former hosts, Winton, Lukash, and Gnor Fey'lya, had not been granted bail. Senator Shidar Zhol'skar now found herself seated on the visitor's side of the pretrial detention area.

"Nokiz mu podo zega sa za, pam Senator." ["We cannot talk about it, Senator,"] Gnor whispered from behind a transparisteel barrier.

Winton and Lukash turned to each other, then nodded in agreement to Gnor's statement.

["Yeah,"] Lukash added, ["when this goes to trial, the less the Republic knows, the better."]

"The Republic has people who can speak Bothese," Shidar snorted, narrowing her violet eyes incredulously.

Lukash gulped nervously.

The entire Fey family, with the exception of Borsk, had lost all credibility in her eyes. While Shidar did not know every graphic detail of what had transpired on Centax 3, her campaign manager, Fyar Fey'lya was found dead with a briefcase full of money alongside Winton, Lukash, and Gnor, all of whom were injured. Nearby, dozens of Hutt forces lay killed in a firefight with Republic forces guarding an informant, Trajan Kran. With the informant's death, Shidar had not only missed her opportunity to attend an important Senate hearing, but was now one degree separated from his murder.

It was a political disaster. How many Senators find out that their campaign manager and chief of staff is a criminal?

"So," Shidar croaked, "Fyar and you just… Shot everyone?"

"Of course not," Winton snarled indignantly. "There was an invisible Bothan. He shot Fyar. He shot everyone."

"Or she," Gnor corrected.

"The invisible Bothan sounded like a he, wor. Didn't quite smell exactly like a Bothan either," Lukash growled.

"An invisible Bothan?" Shidar looked over the three of them, fur bristling angrily. She tried to perceive some deception, any deception. "An invisible Bothan did it? That's your excuse for murdering a Republic informant and a Hutt who owned a casino? What were you even doing there?"

"If we answer your questions," Gnor growled cautiously, "will we be allowed to speak with Borsk?"

"Yes," Shidar answered firmly. Borsk was actually in the waiting room and Shidar was going to let him see his family regardless. Scowling, she decided to ask the question that was wracking her with guilt. The question Polo Se'lab had asked her. "I just have one question. Did Fyar use my Senatorial privileges to locate Trajan Kran?"

"No," Winton sighed. "I found that out myself. I have a record of Trajan's whereabouts… Been followin' him for weeks. There's a briefcase in the coat closet under the stairs."

Shidar sighed in relief. Her fur relaxed somewhat. So it wasn't my fault then… Still, being one degree of separation from a massacre involving a Republic informant leaving dozens dead… Kriff it, I brought Fyar here.

"Uh Shidar," Winton growled nervously, "everything all right?"

Realising she was tearing up, Shidar gulped. "Borsk is… He's right here. I was going to let you talk to him anyways. I'll get him." As she stood, she wiped a tear from her eye.

The blast doors hissed open with a metallic screech. Two Coruscant Guard Clones stood beyond it.

"Keep them here," Shidar sniffled. "They are receiving another visitor."

"Yes ma'am," the Clones answered stiffly.

Shidar walked past them and down the hall towards the waiting area. The dark hall became progressively brighter as she reached the windowed room, filled with rows of cheap plastic chairs. A multispecies crowd of visitors sat, waiting for their turn to visit a loved one.

Sighing, Shidar wiped her tears off on her sleeve and walked up to Borsk, tapping on his shoulder. The youngest member of the Fey family on Coruscant was sitting in a chair with earbuds connected to his datapad.

"That was quick," Borsk gasped, pulling his earbuds out. "Is everything all right? Did they say what they've been charged with?"

"Go talk to them," Shidar snarled, sitting down with an angry thud in her chair.

Borsk's fur swirled nervously. "I am sorry about—"

"—You need to talk to them," Shidar growled. "They are only allowed visitors for 30 minutes. Go."

"Oh," Borsk muttered. "Okay then. I'll see you in a bit."

"Yeah, see you later," Shidar said, fumbling with her comm unit. Rubbing her eyes, she dialed Polo Se'lab's number.

The Senior Senator picked up in one ring, yelping frantically. "Golm's fire this is terrible! This was an act of war!"

"Relax," Shidar sighed, smirking slightly in amusement despite herself. "They didn't know how to reach Trajan because of me. Winton Fey'lya said he figured it out by tracking him."

The comm line hissed with a staticky sigh of relief. "Shtak you had me scared Shidar!"

Shidar gulped, fur swirling guiltily. She held the comm unit under her snout. "I still… I think I am going to resign. I can't take this anymore. I brought Fyar here. She helped my campaign, she… I never—"

"—That would be a mistake," Polo's voice muttered. "I should have said something to you the day I met Fyar. Shidar, this might not be the case on Thellus, but the Fey'lyas and Fey'jias are infamous. They are the criminal trash of Kothlis going back generations."

Shidar closed her eyes wearing a pained grimace on her snout. This entire situation should have been far more obvious. While it was clear to her that Fyar's brother and in-laws were criminals, she had not quite grasped that Fyar was so dangerous herself. She got up from her chair, suddenly wanting fresh air.

"Still," Polo continued, "you're the first Askar Senator. Imagine how bad it would look if you resigned, Shidar. You need to serve out your first term at least!"

"I don't know what I am doing," Shidar sighed, walking towards the exit. "My chief of staff is dead. I don't have an agenda. The only reason I ran against Gavin Azi'skar was to stop him."

"I can help with that," Polo replied. "Fyar said we should merge the chief of staffs, didn't she? Well she's dead..."

Shidar smiled as she stepped outside onto the landing pad, jet-black fur blowing gently in the polluted breeze. "You would do that?"

"Sure," Polo yipped excitedly.

Scowling, Shidar's fur swirled with suspicion. Wait. This would undoubtedly put me directly under the influence of Bothawui, without an independent Spacer Coalition advisor. She opened her snout to growl a firm 'no thank you,' but then realised the Spacer Coalition had yet to even contact her. Why should I feel obligated to represent their interests, when they don't tell me what their interests are? Everyone cared so much about getting an Askar Senator but now that I'm in, it's like I don't exist.

"Shidar? Shidar Zhol'skar?" Polo's voice asked nervously. "Can you hear me?"

"Kiz, I can hear you Polo," Shidar answered. Her ears perked up as a low rumbling noise emanated from the distance. "I'll give it a think," she added as she turned towards the source of the noise.

In the direction of the afternoon sun, a group of ships were ascending into the sky. Dozens of smaller military craft took off, joining the larger ships.

Shidar squinted, trying to get a better look at them in the sunlight. The lead Venator elevated in front of the sun for a moment, allowing her eyes to relax. She could now make out three Venator Star Destroyers, a smaller Acclamator, and two Pelta-class frigates. I wonder what that fleet could be for.

o.o.o.o.o

Lir Sey'les

Through the trapezoidal windows of the Acclamator Assault Cruiser Liberator, the Coruscanti cityscape grew shorter and shorter as they rose over even the tallest skyscraper.

As they drifted higher still, Sey'les could only make out the widest avenues between the buildings and then, finally, as the ship elevated into the stratosphere, the entire day-lit surface melted into shades of grey.

"Feels good to be finally underway ma'am, doesn't it?" Miralo Tarkin beamed brightly.

Sey'les shrugged, turning to Wulf.

Wulf shrugged back with a smirk and Itoll rolled his eyes.

"Finally going into battle," Miralo continued, undeterred by everyone else's lack of enthusiasm. "The glory. The savagery! I wouldn't want to be a Seppie when you have your trigger finger on a detonator, Sey'les."

Fojo sighed, drumming his fingers on the cold windowsill.

"I like your spirit sir!" Dub yelled enthusiastically. The other three Clones nodded in approval.

Ignoring them, Sey'les turned to Itoll, leaning up against the windowsill, whispering in Bothese. "Agthay-rasa ko…" ["I have been thinking…"]

"Zon ma'am?" ["What ma'am?"]

Sey'les looked around cautiously at the rest of Team Muun, then spoke a little louder when she was confident none of them had translators open. "Pa Trajan. Ag-erz-noks-kitask pa Trajan nar kornam kamera. Opash ag-erz-noks-kitask par yem dodom 'Dima—" ["Trajan was invisible on camera. Again, someone was invisible at Dima's house—"]

["—You think that the Spynet was using the same invisibility for that Bothan?!"] Itoll gasped.

"Nųkįz." ["No,"] Sey'les growled impatiently. "Rąsą kų yągh ągh-ęrz Shąynęthįsk phą Thrąjąn." ["I think Trajan was Spynet."]

Itoll let off a whimper. "Too much. Just too much!"

Breaking off from their conversation with Miralo, Grath and Knot walked up to the Bothans.

Knot began speaking in ungrammatical Shyriiwook with thick Wild Space accents. "Ma Shyriiwooh na mawyen. Mihn wen-aral egh-rargh Shyriiwook. Shyrii oh laghish, egh-rargh wunaghsho." ["My Shyriiwook bad. We studied Shyriiwook. You speak slowly, we understand."]

Snouts agape, Itoll and Sey'les turned to the Clones.

"Egh-rargh shyrii sha Mamohan." ["We speaking Bothese,"] Sey'les snarled incredulously in her own half-grammatical Shyriiwook.

Grath and Knot looked at each other, completely mystified.

Itoll piped up in Shyriiwook, slowly. "Egh-rargh. Wen-shyrii. Sha. Mamohan." [We. Were. Speaking. Bothese."]

"I didn't know you two Clones spoke Bothese," Miralo said with a smirk, grabbing each on the shoulder.

"No sir," Grath explained, "we were speaking—"

"—Ah Bothese, such a beautiful language," Miralo said smugly.

"Guys," Fojo snorted, walking up to the Clones, speaking in Basic. "They were not speaking Shyriiwook."

"Oh!" Grath and Knot gasped in surprise.

Knot began stuttering nervously. "Sorry ma'am, sir! I didn't know you were speaking… Bothese?"

"Huh," Itoll sighed, looking up and down the empty landing platform. "Well uh, good job on the Shyriiwook."

Sey'les's fur swirled with nervousness and embarrassment. What had been an attempt to speak Bothese to keep everyone out of the loop about the Spynet had inadvertently resulted in everyone noticing. Feeling the need to create a distraction to capture everyone's attention, she looked around the room trying to find any mistakes.

Wulf… Wulf is Wulf, she thought, glancing at the Ardennian. Fojo is… Huh… She turned to Miralo. He has been with us the entire time. I don't think he even spoke with anyone on his team… Her fur danced with excitement as she looked down at her datapad's personnel list. Team Cresh is not even checked in!

The Bothan scowled, glancing in Miralo's direction. "Don't you have… Where's the rest of your team, Captain?"

"Oh I don't know, ma'am," Miralo sighed in a lonely tone.

Team Muun had been the only team of non-Clone officers helping the Clones haul equipment aboard the Acclamator cruiser. Forty minutes into cargo-hauler volunteering however, Miralo had joined them, alone. As best Sey'les could tell, the human wanted to impress her since she got promoted.

Sey'les's ear batted in annoyance, unimpressed with Miralo's answer. "As a team leader, you are responsible for ensuring every member of your team made it on board," Sey'les snarled, roughly grabbing Fojo by the shoulder and thrusting the Rodian in front of her to demonstrate finding team members.

Fojo grunted angrily, but allowed himself to be pulled.

"Fojo is here!" Sey'les snarled. "And Itoll is right there," she added with a smile, blinking daintily, "Wulf is here. Dub, Dubs, Knot, and Grath are there. Then, since I know they are here, I check them off as on board and send that to the ship's crew manifest," she added, pulling up the crew manifest program on her datapad. "Do you see the point, Captain?"

"You are uh… quite rogue at finding all of those under your command," Miralo answered. "Uncle Wilhuff has instructed you well. Perhaps your Bothan nose helps as well," he added wryly.

Itoll and Fojo both snorted, then began laughing uncontrollably.

"Is your team checked in?" Sey'les growled, ignoring them as pure feral rage began boiling up inside her.

Miralo began explaining himself, then yelled out in terror, "Well, I—OH!"
—Sey'les took her datapad and squashed it into his nose. "THEY ARE NOT CHECKED IN AND WE HAVE KRIFFING LEFT THE SURFACE OF CORUSCANT!"

Miralo let out a pained grunt, recoiling from Sey'les's datapad. "I see. Team Cresh are… Yes, orange, meaning not checked in, but they are also not red, meaning missing, nor are they yellow, meaning injured, nor are they marked black with white lettering, meaning deceased."

"Wow," Itoll snorted. "Miralo, we shouldn't need to spell this out for you. This—"

"—I AM TALKING HERE!" Sey'les yelped. "Two senior officers, chatting! Not you!"

"Sorry ma'am," Itoll sighed, fur swirling nervously.

"I think I understand," Miralo said evenly, waving his hand in a dismissive motion. "I have not checked my team in. Well, here," he said, pressing a button that made one of Team Cresh, an Ensign Matilda Stewart, green.

"Did you see Ensign Stewart?" Sey'les growled cautiously. "Do you know where she is?"

"No I—"

"—Do you know where you can find her? Or anyone on your team? Do you know their datapad sequences?"

"No," Miralo admitted, suddenly blushing beet red.

"I suggest going to Uncle Wilhuff then and asking him to do a shipwide search for you," Sey'les muttered.

"Very well," Miralo stammered. "Thank you for the suggestion." At that, he sprinted out of the observation lounge as quickly as he could.

Once the automatic doors hissed shut Wulf said "huh. That was something else."

"I'll say," Dub agreed darkly.

"Do you think they're really missing?" Grath asked. "I mean, for a whole team to go missing… That would be... "

"No," Sey'les snorted. "Miralo just doesn't know where his team is because he's an imbecile." Good, this will give Team Muun something to talk about for a week. That time Sey'les went crazy on Miralo.

o.o.o.o.o

"Is it about Tarkin?" Wulf whispered in Sey'les's ear.

Sey'les blinked twice, then looked up from the floor of an LAAT to face Wuf. In Hangar 4, Team Muun was meeting the group of Clones from the 45th who they would be leading into West Murkhana.

"Sorry ma'am, it's just you and Itoll have been having secret conversations all day."

"You're right," Sey'les sighed. Kriff it. So much for me chewing out Miralo...

Fojo's antennae poked up as he leaned forward over the jumpseat, looking to his right towards Wulf and Sey'les at the rear of the LAAT.

"It is about Tarkin then," Wulf murmured in a conspiratorial tone.

No… It's about Centax 3… Well, sort of about Tarkin. "No," Sey'les growled firmly. A twitch of guilt rippled through her grey fur.

Itoll opened his snout. "Wulf, it's… It's about local politics," he said wryly, then chuckled nervously, almost giggling.

"Local politics, sir?" Knot asked, walking up to the side of the LAAT.

Sey'les's fur swirled nervously. "We have a lot to plan and only a few days till we reach Murkhana," she growled firmly, gesturing to the swirling hyperspace outside the hangar forcefield.

"Right," Dub said, speaking up. "Mack, do you have the layout of West Murkhana City uploaded to all of the LAATs?"

Sighing in relief, Sey'les turned to Wulf, whispering quietly. "I really can't talk about this. Asking will put you all in danger."

The Ardennian looked back at her thoughtfully, without a trace of fear is in his eyes.

You would be scared if you knew the Spynet was planning on having us wrap Tarkin into some scandal involving the Jedi… What that scandal is, I have no idea, but Buzz is involved, Trajan was involved. It isn't going to be good.