-Darin-
I was flipping through different holoreports on Jodi when the door to the conference room opened and Admiral Cress and Captain Tag walked in.
"Good evening Admiral Cress. My name is Jodi. I don't believe we've met."
Caty gave a surprised yelp and looked around frantically.
"Caty. This is Jodi." I held up the blue, green, and gold cube. "She's a Jedi holocron."
"What? A holocron?"
"Indeed, I am a holocron. You look lovely today."
"What? How do you even see me?! You don't have eyes!"
"It is true that I cannot see you. I found it in my databases as a phrase to make someone feel more comfortable."
"Well, it isn't working. YOU'RE A TALKING BLOCK!"
"Quit scaring the lady," said another voice.
I sighed and held up a silver, red, and black triangle-base pyramid and said "That was Seth. He's a Sith holocron."
"How do you do?" he said.
"THERE ARE TWO OF THEM!?"
Annoyed, Tag said "You live in a galaxy where people run around throwing things with their mind and swinging laser swords, and THIS is what freaks you out?"
"I wasn't expecting it, okay," she snapped back.
"Don't worry, these are the only two who talk. They have their own personalities, and an almost infinite wealth of information, but they can be really picky about who accesses it."
"You're lucky I like you," Seth said.
"Anyways, I called you here because we are the ones who are leading this splinter group, and we have a few things to figure out. Do we all agree that our goal is to beat the Alliance?"
Nodding all around. Good. "Do we have any suggestions for-" I stopped when I sensed a familiar presence approach the door. It flew open and Sadie barged in, followed close behind by the med-droid.
"I WON'T SIT AROUND ALL DAY LIKE A CRIPPLE!" she was yelling.
"The tests are not complete! I have not discharged you yet!" the droid yelled back.
"How did you find us?" I asked, still in shock that she was actually here right now.
"The Force. Duh. I'm trying REALLY hard not to break this thing!" she snapped.
"Maybe you should listen to the droid," I said.
"Thank you! Finally a sensible comment from you!" the droid said.
"To hell with the droid! To hell with sitting still! I'M FINE!"
Caty said "Could she stay here while you monitor her?"
"THERE'S NOTHING WRONG WITH ME! ALL THE TESTS COME BACK PERFECTLY FINE! I'M BEING HELD AGAINST MY WILL!"
"Clearly she is experiencing some psychotic issues. I recommend-" His voice trailed away as Caty pushed a button on him, turning him off, and he slumped on the ground. She then flipped a panel on his head and started fiddling with something. After a few minutes of her messing with something, she closed his head and turned him back on. His eyes flickered, then turned back on and he looked around.
"What did you do?" Tag asked.
"Rewired him a little. Rigidity in regards to protocol was severely decreased."
"Well, that's just rude," the droid said as he stood up. "I am not rigid. In fact, I am very flexible."
"That's… that's not what I meant."
Tag said "So Sadie here is a patient. She is in recovery, and has done really well. Is she allowed to not be cooped up in the room?"
The droid turned to Sadie, scanned her, and shrugged. "Scan found nothing. Fine with me."
"Great. See. I'm good. What are you guys doing?" Sadie asked.
"Figuring out what this splinter group is going to do," Tag said.
"Sweet. I'm in" she said and took a place at the table. The med-droid sat next to her, kicked his feet up on the table, and reclined in the chair.
I glanced at Caty and Tag and asked "Any objections?"
"To her? No. To the droid? Yes," Tag said.
"Oh I come with her," the med-droid said quickly.
"That doesn't make you part of this group," Tag replied.
"I'm head of the medical facility on the ship," it responded.
"Ok. Fine. Fine. What do we call you then?" I asked.
"I am M5-009."
"Ok. M5. Nice to meet you."
"Wish I could say the same," he replied lazily.
"What were you guys talking about?" Sadie asked hastily.
"We were figuring out what our goals would be. We all agree that we're fighting against the Alliance. I was about to ask if anybody had anything to add to that."
"We help the natives of the war-torn worlds," Sadie said without hesitation. "Help those whose lives suck because of the fighting."
"Look, Commander, that's something I'm sure we all want to do. But that's a huge commitment that could leave us vulnerable to attack due to the drain on troops, time, and resources. Do you really think we should be focusing on something like that now?" Tag asked.
"If we don't, we'll be just as bad as the Alliance AND the Order," she said.
I smiled and started typing out the sequence of events that were taking place. I liked how this was going. An idea is brought up, discussed or debated, and then we can vote on it.
"If you provide aid, you'll be able to start building up public support, which could lead to a return on the investment," M5 said. All eyes turned to him. He noticed this and said "What? I'm programmed with a vast array of information on medicine, psychology, sociology, xenobiology, xenoecology, xenoanthropology, economics, and statistics."
Tag broke the short silence with a single word. "Why?"
"Holistic care and scientific adaptation."
"Anything else you can do?" I asked, shocked.
"Sure. But nothing else I'm specifically programmed to do."
"How are you able to store all of that information?"
"I'm a prototype. I am the very first successful attempt at combining traditional circuits and wires and nervous tissue. Fral Joren thought the idea was 'cool' and took me."
Caty said "Anybody have any problems with him becoming a part of this group now? That's a crazy amount of information for one droid."
Nobody had a problem, so M5 officially became a part of our group.
"Do we have any other thoughts on Sadies proposal?" Tag asked. Nobody had any, so I said "Let's vote then. All in favor, raise your hand."
I raised my hand, as well as Sadie.
"All opposed."
Tag and Caty's hands shot up.
"Well kriff. We're tied. M5, where do you stand?"
"I'm in favor of the idea."
"Why didn't you raise your hand then?"
"I have no hands. Only metal grasping appendages."
Tag groaned in frustration.
"Great. So one of our main missions will be to help those who have been hurt by the war. Any others?"
A collective no came from the group.
"Got it. Now we need to talk about how we do things. Like an official code of conduct or something."
"Droids and organics get equal treatment," M5 said.
"On that note, all different species have equal treatment," Caty said. I glanced curiously at her and she said "Our ship has some cleaning staff that aren't human, and the Order doesn't give benefits equally."
I nodded. As each part was said by the members, Jodi entered it on a list that we could see being projected over her.
After the list was compiled and everyone was satisfied with it, I brought up the subject of military training.
"I don't know about Tag or Caty's training, but I know mine certainly was not that great. We understood how things worked, and the basics of strategy, but the biggest thing I was taught was to follow orders from above to a T and to never come up with my own strategies."
Tag and Caty nodded, saying that it was relatively the same for them.
"Now, essentially every single strategy involved having a large amount of resources that could be thrown at the enemy. Is that the same for you guys?"
Again, more nodding from Tag and Caty.
"So that means that we have to make up the strategy as we go along. Not what I wanted to do, but we have no other choice here."
Caty said "I've been coming up with a list of things we need to do to stay afloat. Our absolute first priority needs to be resources. Fuel, food, stuff like that. After that, I'm not totally sure. We aren't strong enough to be able to fight against much. We need ships, troops, and a ton of other stuff to even be able to deal a blow against them."
"With traditional methods," Sadie said. "You're talking about traditional warfare. Nothing about this is traditional."
"How else do you recommend fighting them?" she asked.
"I don't know. Maybe we try to infiltrate them?" Sadie said.
"We would be slaughtered by them. It would be over before it began."
"Maybe we steal their supplies? Sabotage them?" Tag offered.
"Again, we'd have to get in and out without being caught."
"Maybe we attack and escape so quickly that they don't have time to retaliate. Surprise attacks."
"If we plan and execute efficiently, then we wouldn't let them fight us. Steal some supplies or destroy something significant for them, then escape without getting caught," I said.
Silence for a bit, before Caty said "That COULD work."
"Small strike forces taking out objectives. Solid plan," Tag said. "And what about bigger attacks? Those are sure to come when they figure out what's going on."
"We run. It's all we can do."
M5 said "It's the only plan you've come up with that has any chance of success. I suggest taking it."
"All in favor?" All hands went up. "Alright. So we have a strategy. Now we need a first mission. Caty, what do we need most?"
"Fuel. Malastare is the closest place where we can get some."
"Malastare it is." Jodi noted this down in a new document.
-0000-
The next morning, Thorn was surprised to see a large huddle of troopers in the middle of the cafeteria. They were huddled around Jodi, and above her were a couple large lists, easily able to be read by him on the other side of the cafeteria. On the top of one it read 'Splinter Goals', and underneath it stated that they were fighting the Alliance, and that they were helping those who were negatively affected by the war between the Order and the Alliance. On top of the middle one it read 'Splinter Code'. So our splinter group was being named, rather uncreatively, Splinter, thought Thorn. Darin must have come up with the name.
He skimmed the code, pleasantly surprised to see that they had thought of quite a few of the issues the Order had had, such as favoritism of humans over non-human species. The third read 'Splinter Mission', and this was the one Thorn really cared about. Underneath, it stated that they were resorting almost exclusively to hit-and-run tactics, and underneath it explained that it was a style that was not noted in any historical documents, but that theoretically gave them the best chance of winning.
Under that, it said that their primary objective was the acquisition of fuel and other resources. And for mission location, it said Malastare.