The cold, dark room was sparsely illuminated by the harsh light of various screens displaying highly technical information, the only interruption to the light being the shadows cast by the extensive arrays of scientific equipment in carts and on tables and the stippled-in lamps exuding a slightly different frequency of visible light. Hushed whispers punctuated the room as nearly formless shadows moved between desks to exchange observations and promptly returned to their workstations. The room was kept completely sterile as evidenced by the uncomfortable plastic garb that Astar had been forced to don. The suit consisted of a fitted cap that suffocated the top of her head; despite the intense cold of the room, she still felt beads of sweat under the thing. Her clothes were wrapped in the same obnoxious material and even included a pair of booties over the shoes so the unfortunate wearers of these suits could move without tripping over themselves. How thoughtful of them. The elastic bands on the ends of the clothes chafed at every part of exposed skin they touched, most prominent of those being the neck, ear, and temple area. However, the areas the suits did not cover were subjected to the cold of the room and somehow increased her discomfort instead of providing respite from the muggy interior of those aggravating covers.
She was at the innocuously named Imperial Development Group, a name that belied the unbelievably clandestine nature of the organization. The place was so secret that it did not appear on any official documentation; despite her highly cleared position even she was not privy to its existence. She found herself a bit unnerved but excited that a place like this existed much less that she would be involved with it despite her lack of direct accession, though the circumstances of said involvement were not exactly ideal. The sudden and complete loss of a star destroyer presented more than enough of an impetus, she supposed.
The bespectacled blonde scientist that had escorted her into the room motioned toward a table situated close to the center of the sterile room uncomfortably close to some of the workstations. Astar took the hint and sat down. Thankfully, the scientist had been pre-briefed, so Astar didn't have to waste time repeating herself. Astar herself had been given access to all the information she needed to properly explain the situation, including detailed explanations from the pilots and intel reports that were pertinent to engineering. The more people that came to facilities like this, the more possibility of information leakage; so centralizing the information to as few as possible minimized failure points. She had seen some questioning looks from the crew when she appeared at all the same briefs as Commander Gaunt and asked questions as if she herself were a flag officer, but she didn't have time to worry about it.
Astar had also been pre-briefed on the expertise of the scientist as well. Name: Dr. Fujikawa, head of Experimental Weapons Division. Though redaction is supposed to be done such that it doesn't tip the reader off that anything is missing, Dr. Fujikawa's record was so redacted that it looked like the person doing the declassification had given up, leaving extremely obvious holes in the personnel file. Of the few snippets that were there, one stated that she had more degrees than Astar had years of experience in the Imperial Navy.
"The name is Fujikawa. I am going to skip the pleasantries; both of us know why you are here. Relatively, how far below the star destroyer was the explosion?" she asked, not even deigning to look up from her data pad. Her tone was so cordial that it bordered on unprofessional.
"It seemed far below it, but still within the shield. I imagine that the black hole used the multiplicative force from pulling on the ship's bow and stern along with the flutter of the structure by the sudden push and pull to snap it in half." The junior officer sat up straight with her hands folded together on the table.
Dr. Fujikawa sniffed. "Agreed. If conventional bombs worked against star destroyers, we would not even bother building them," she said with a dismissive hand flourish before bringing it back to type dizzyingly quickly into her data pad. "How do you suppose it got through the shield?"
Times like these were why Astar was called in to help with this research. Her operational experience helped keep fanciful imaginations in check and remind scientist types of pre-brief information that they had glossed over.
"Uncertain. Assuming the unidentified craft was the cause, the simplest explanation would be that it left the bomb inside the shield like a mine. However, it seems odd that they would risk letting such a valuable asset get so close as the number of fighters around would increase the likelihood of detection far beyond what anyone intelligent enough to design something like that would consider acceptable."
"Hm. Yes. Fascinating. Very clever of them," the lead scientist quipped dryly. Her expression remained unchanged, but the speed of her typing became even more furious. "So that will be one of the primary objectives: the plans for a delivery method…" she trailed off, her typing fingers accelerating to the point where any normal person's fingers would have fallen off. "Next questions then, though this will be much more the purview of a scientist's fanciful delusions than operations."
At least she was self-aware.
"Do you have any estimates for the explosive yield of the weapon?"
Astar's eyebrow twitched. How in the world would she have an answer for that? Dr. Fujikawa managed to tear her attention from her data pad just long enough to parse Astar's lack of response.
"Oh, right. I was going to ask the questions to get to that. Forgive my lack of awareness," she apologized, scratching the back of her head sheepishly. "Anyway, how close did the explosion seem to you?"
"It was right on top of me. Even through the transparisteel viewport, I have no doubt that I would be permanently blind had I been looking at the explosion. My post appointment diagnostics indicated a dose of about 500 rem whole-body," she recalled, grimacing at the unimaginable pain she felt as the symptoms kicked in on her walk back to medical.
Astar heard some of the other nearby scientists suck in heavy breaths and saw them turn to, presumably, look at them. Their heads did not move back to their original positions immediately this time.
"Or to non-military types, about 5 Sieverts/ .25 Gray," Dr. Fujikawa mumbled, continuing to type as if the person in front of her hadn't received a dose of radiation so far beyond lethal that it should have kept them from even making it to medical.
"A-are you alright?" one of the nearby scientists asked.
"I'm fine," Astar shrugged.
"Nothing a short dip in a bacta tank won't fix. How was the wall by the way? Was it a good kisser?" Dr. Fujikawa added nonchalantly, glued to her screen.
Astar laughed heartily. "It came on a little too strong for my tastes. I'd prefer to go on at least one date and have no broken ribs."
Dr. Fujikawa chuckled at the quip as whispers about their morbid conversation emerged. "Moving on, the distance between you and the origin of the detonation as it relates to the perception of the fireball and the dose you received based on the data indicates a yield of at least 15 Megatons. We calculated 20 which is at least within striking distance. The most significant element of variance is a shipboard shield's interaction with a hard burst of ionizing radiation, which has not been very well studied.
Even at our most generous estimates, that kind of explosive yield is not normally capable of forming a black hole. The only possible deduction is that it had an advanced focusing mechanism, which we are extremely interested in…" she trailed off, clicking her tongue as she continued to type. She did not seem to notice Astar's piqued eyebrow.
"The bomb's fuel is another question I don't have an answer to though. Did you find anything useful in your analysis?" Astar asked.
"The data pulled from the sensors before they burned out exhibited enough abnormalities to cast doubt on hypermatter, but currently it is the most energetic fuel that satisfies the portability requirements. Other possible candidates are exotic matters currently not capable of being confined. I cannot imagine the Empire wants their reputation besmirched by a merry troupe of pirates, so I will roll that into the obvious primary objective of figuring out the guts of the bomb. Make sure the people who will actually do something about it know, will you?" One of corners of Dr. Fujikawa's mouth tugged into a smirk as she continued to type.
Astar gave her a subdued nod. "What about the ship?"
"I do not know very much about it other than the obvious stealth technology it uses. Ships are ships anyway; all they do is ferry the physics package to its destination. We have much less data on it than the bomb, though I think any idiot can discern what constitutes spacecraft plans. Of course, I will still note it in the report. You all have your work cut out," Dr. Fujikawa said with a snort.
"Anyway, I think I have enough information to hand off to the bureaucrats. I await the data you all collect with bated breath," Dr. Fujikawa crooned, stopping her typing to look up at Astar who swore she saw a twinkle in the scientist's eye. The jury was out on this woman's mental stability.
Gaunt, Pulastra, and several other intelligence personnel sat in a sterile conference room aboard the Violator. A projection of a snippet of the report from the Imperial Development Group lit the wall to Gaunt's left or Pulastra's right and another of the galaxy with highlighted portions hovered just above the table. Gaunt had pored over the report before this brief, but still had trouble getting a grasp on the situation. Perhaps he had gotten a bit too comfortable with his "Gaunt's Gambit" and his relatively simple roving enforcement mission. His intelligence corps had been very reliable in the past, so he would need their help now more than ever to create a solid battle plan and generate some sort of lead.
Yes, he had finally found a name for his signature battle tactic, marking one of the few instances of respite from the noose tightening around his neck. This was one of the many inconsequential things he took far too seriously, so it made a much more significant impact on his overall wellbeing than it otherwise would have. There was also the small victory of retrieving the probe droids after the last sortie.
"Sir, confidence is high that most research and testing is being done in the Unknown Regions. Intelligence's reasoning is that the difficulty of navigation makes a large imperial presence nearly impossible while the smaller groups pirates tend to operate in are able to weave in and out easily. This would allow them to set up infrastructure away from prying eyes," Pulastra explained, gesturing to the highlighted sections of the 3D model. Gaunt's brow furrowed deeply. That region of space was expansive and its cartography sparse at best.
"We believe that our best course of action is to search large, habitable planets as they likely need very specialized materials in order to conduct their operations and setting up infrastructure on such planets is a path of least resistance. Failing that, we may search for planets with environments not hostile to mining equipment. Any questions, sir?"
"Can we be sure that the flotilla is no longer being tracked?" Gaunt asked gravely.
"Yes, sir. Maintenance removed a low power transmitter from the Inhibitor burrowed in one of the damaged portions of the ship. The shipyard apparently did not detect it during refit. Reprimand is currently in progress," Pulastra nodded, his expression deadpan. One of the other intelligence personnel cracked a subdued grin.
"Very well." Gaunt returned his nod. "I concur with this course of action. We shall search as described and-" Gaunt's eyebrow twitched- "leave behind probe droids to track any suspicious activity," Gaunt said through nearly imperceptibly gritted teeth. "See to it that we have an appropriate number of droids for the mission. I dare not waste the Empire's resources any more than necessary." Gaunt was nothing if not frugal.
"Yes, sir." All present nodded. Gaunt stood up, which prompted all present to snap to attention, pushing their chairs out of the way with their legs and bringing their thumbs flush to their trouser seams under balled fists.
"Attention on deck!" The ranking intel officer shouted. Gaunt snappily clasped his hands behind his back and made a facing movement for each turn he made: one so he could walk forward to clear the chair, one so he could clear the back of the chair, and one toward the exit of the room. He paused momentarily before each facing movement, each one letting out a satisfying crack as his heels clicked together. All present filed out after him after a short pause following his crossing of the door's threshold.