Jo didn't like being 'Cat'. She hated the fact that her family's sworn enemies were now running rampant through the universe, that her mother and father were in prison, that her once huge family was now half dead and half imprisoned, with only a few managing to get by under and assumed identity. It wasn't fair. It never was running from two galra bounty hunters who were hired to bring 'Cat' to the feet of a low galra general who went by the name of Karr. She was in control of a small group of solar systems of the Seina quadrant, which want the most intriguing of quadrants to begin with. Karr wasn't very famous is among galra generals, but those who knew Karr knew that her methods of interrogation were excruciatingly painful. The pressures included acid, electric shocks or slow poisons to make every nerve in one's body scream with pain. Her favourite pain was that of a wringer, and it was used to squeeze every drop of information, and often blood, out of the informants body.
As you could imagine, Jo didn't want to experience any of those, so she was running as fast as her heavy army boots could carry her. Noticing that it was dark enough to stop running and hide, she recognised a nearby alleyway, so she ran into it and climbed up a stepladder that led to a half-broken fire escape. She waited a short amount of time for the bounty hunters to get at least a quarter of a mile away from her, then she continued climbing up the metal stairs.
Her base was a mess of broken filing cabinets and empty chippy boxes only accessible by a half-broken window. In one corner of the box room, a cork board was hung up on the wall. It looked like the stereotypical connect-the-dots police investigators mess of a plan. By the tiny window, there was an old office desk, this was her 'Everything Table'. She ate there, planned there, and even slept there occasionally. There was no bed in the room, so Jo had to give up information on the whereabouts of two criminals to an Unilu in exchange for a sleeping bag. It sat under the cork board, rolled up to make room for an artillery set that Jo had stolen from a robot soldier she had deactivated while infiltrating an outpost that held the most experienced generals in a conference. It had been completely wrecked by Jo using nano-thermite-titanium-boron, a chemical famous for blowing up galra outposts. She opened her laptop (stolen from an Unilu trader after a bar fight) and logged on.
Username: JGC36
Passcode: ••••••••
She went to her private documents and slipped in the USB she had snatched from an undercover galra cop after knocking him out. The message appeared on the blank page.
HG and PH are still at large, last sighted in the Kobi solar system. All generals on high alert. Order from The Great Empress Honerva.
A photo of her parents was spread across the bottom of the page. They were in a market on the planet Jaqo, worried looks on their aged faces. A scar crossed her father's face, and he was holding the hands of another, younger man. Her brother Alex was there as well. Pleased by this, Jo leant back in the squeaky chair, and printed the photo. She pinned it to her cork board and connected a few more dots. The information was vague, but at least it was information.
Suddenly, an idea came to her. Her friend Mira was on the neighbouring city of Shein, undercover with her grandmother, a former member of the Blade of Marmora. She could contact them and exchange information, but it was too risky with a normal transponder. The local galra faction was tracking every call in and out of her home city, Keneo.
But there was another way. She could use her father's old transponder to contact Mira. It sent a signal that couldn't be picked up by normal instruments, as designed by one of the rebellions scientists in the old days when those who opposed the galra stood a chance. Back when Voltron wasn't captured by the galra.
"Mira Kogane, this is Joanna Garret. Are you reading me? Over."
Jo waited. If, by some wondrous circumstance, the message got through Mira's transponder, would she even pick up? Did she still have it after all this time?
She waited for what felt like a three vargas.
Then, by some wondrous circumstance,
"Jo! I'm reading you! I'm stuck in prison 65GHI orbiting Vatuan, I was on a rescue mission to get my dad and Acxa, but the doors shut behind me, and I have no way of getting out! Please get here as fast as you can! I need help! Repeat, I need help!"