It's Talk Like A Pirate Day!!!.

In honor of that day, I give you the prelude to tonight's adventure, properly translated....


A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away…

Star Wars
Episode IV
Homecoming

Though t' newly formed galactic Empire has promised its citizens peace, it will be a long time in comin'. Thought t' war against t' separatists be over, t' galaxy be far from safe – pirates, mercenaries, pocket empires, and revolutionaries plague t' galaxy.

T' forest world o' Rheltooine in t' Taina Sector has been especially troubled by pirates who funnel stolen medicines t' t' black market.

Maya Fleet be headin' t' her home planet o' Rheltooine where t' battle with t' pirates will be taken t' a new level…



Camera pans from starfield t' a medical freighter in t' outer reaches o' t' Rheltooine system. It be escorted by a pair o' Cloakshape fighters. Within t' freighter's cramped cockpit, a nervous captain turns t' his navigator. A veteran o' many runs, he knows what a temptin' target a ship full o' medicalAhoy!plies be for pirates. “How much longer?”


A few more minutes captain – with t' holonet bein' restricted for military use only it takes longer.”

“Sir, eneme vessels approachin'!” A pair o' gun tugs – fighter sized vessels armed both with tractor beams and blaster six pounders – begin closin' smartly, accompanied by a light cruiser t' carry a boardin' party.



On board a different freighter, one modifed for fightin' Palpatine's grab for power, Maya Fleet explained her home life prior t' t' Clone Wars t' her crewmates – “Well aye it sounds borin' t' you sellin' and servicin' speeders. By t' end, with t' Federation blockade we were mainly a reair shop - nearly drove me parents out o' business. T' repair business kept us in operation. But we had t' make house calls – when a speed breaks down in t' middle o' t' forest you can't just strap it t' your aft. And gettin' t' t' job was half t' fun - you should see a weeirk sometime – especially an angry mother. T' say nothin' o' t' pirates and raiders who were always anxious for parts. Which reminds me.” She looked at t' navigation panel – they were due t' emerge in realspace soon. “I should get t' t' hangar – just in case.”

With that, their ship emerged from hyperspace – just in time t' see t' gun tugs openin' fire on t' medical freighter, havin' finished off its escort fighters…

Episode IV - Homecoming - Prelude

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away…

Star Wars
Episode IV
Homecoming

Though the newly formed galactic Empire has promised its citizens peace, it will be a long time in coming. Thought the war against the separatists is over, the galaxy is far from safe – pirates, mercenaries, pocket empires, and revolutionaries plague the galaxy.

The forest world of Rheltooine in the Taina Sector has been especially troubled by pirates who funnel stolen medicines to the black market.

Maya Fleet is heading to her home planet of Rheltooine where the battle with the pirates will be taken to a new level…


Camera pans from starfield to a medical freighter in the outer reaches of the Rheltooine system. It is escorted by a pair of Cloakshape fighters. Within the freighter's cramped cockpit, a nervous captain turns to his navigator. A veteran of many runs, he knows what a tempting target a ship full of medical supplies is for pirates. “How much longer?”

“A few more minutes captain – with the holonet being restricted for military use only it takes longer.”

“Sir, enemy vessels approaching!” A pair of gun tugs – fighter sized vessels armed both with tractor beams and blaster cannons – begin closing quickly, accompanied by a light cruiser to carry a boarding party.


On board a different freighter, one modifed for fighting Palpatine's grab for power, Maya Fleet explained her home life prior to the Clone Wars to her crewmates – “Well sure it sounds boring to you selling and servicing speeders. By the end, with the Federation blockade we were mainly a reair shop - nearly drove my parents out of business. The repair business kept us in operation. But we had to make house calls – when a speed breaks down in the middle of the forest you can't just strap it to your back. And getting to the job was half the fun - you should see a weeirk sometime – especially an angry mother. To say nothing of the pirates and raiders who were always anxious for parts. Which reminds me.” She looked at the navigation panel – they were due to emerge in realspace soon. “I should get to the hangar – just in case.”

With that, their ship emerged from hyperspace – just in time to see the gun tugs opening fire on the medical freighter, having finished off its escort fighters…”

Episode III Part II - Dark Legacies
Played – September 5, 2005
Characters – Adigo, renegade clone trooper (Mike); Maya Fleet, fighter pilot (Heather), R2-JB, astromech droid (Patrick); Tappa Keeg, Duros Jedi Padawan (Ben), GM (Dan)


Koth Bal-Lon, one of the few Bothan Jedi in history, spent much of his time in the shadows. He was one the best eyes and ears of the order, but most of those he interacted with never even knew he was a Jedi.

Koth was not overjoyed to receive an apprentice, though Master Yoda insisted there was much knowledge he could impart. Koth's first apprentice was "Prince" Dar D'yela, the third son of a noble ruler. The D'yela family was unwilling to give the Jedi order the first two sons, wanting to assure themselves of an heir, but they gave the order their third son, Dar. However, when Dar was ten, tragedy struck the D'yela family - Dar's two older brothers were killed in a shuttlecraft "accident". The D'yela family petioned the Jedi order to return their third son but the Jedi refused, indicating they were not the child's legal guardians - and returning him would be dangerous for all concerned

Shortly thereafter Dar became Master Koth's apprentice. Dar was very powerful in the Force, but always puhing his luck when it came to rules. He often snuck out of the temple to go swoop racing. Many viewed this as a side-effect of traveling with Koth so much.

Things grew rapidly worse when Chancellor Palpatine came into power after the invasion of Naboo. A friend of the D'yela family, he arranged for the family to come into contact with their son. D'yela took on something of a "punk aristocratic" air - he often dyed his hair blue while wearing regal robes. Koth was less than pleased with this arrangement but saw some advantages, seeing how proficient his apprentice grew at interacting with all sorts of people - swoop gang members, aristocracy, criminal elements, etc.

About six months after the Battle of Naboo, Koth had to go deeply undercover to seek information about the return of the Sith and was forced to leave Dar behind. Dar himself went on an extended side-mission investigate slavery on the outer rim. Dar was not ready for this independence - he soon found himself taking the quicker path to power - the Dark Side of the Force. When reunited with Koth several attempts were made to reform him, but the damage was done. Dar D'yela was expelled from the Jedi Order. Rumor has it he rejoined his family and returned to his ancestral holding

Though hesitant to do so, Koth was eventually persuaded to take on a second padawan, Tappa Keeg. He spent much more time with him and the pair worked well together. However, as the Clone Wars raged on and the ranks of the Jedi were thinned out, the two began finding themselves forced to go on separate missions. The two were separated when Order 66 was issued. Tappa Keeg survived it. Koth's fate is unknown, He spent very little time with Clone Troopers so it is quite possible he surived the Order. If so it is certain the Emperor's sinister agents are searching for him...


HAL informed the rebels to be that they would have to travel to Ares to meet his employer. However, they found the area around their ship to be guarded by Imperial Clonetroopers. R2-JB snuck up ahead (no one ever pays attention to droids…) and discovered the troopers were indeed guarding their ship. Tappa tried a Jedi mind trick on them, informing them they didn’t need to see any identification. When that failed to work, Adigo showed them identification – which, much to the surprise of his companions (who were unaware of his background), was accepted. Loading the outer door which had been cut off so the troopers could inspect the ship, our heroes blasted off. The Imperials quickly realized their mistake and began pursuing with fighters and Star Destroyers. The rebels barely had time to jump into hyperspace – a bad jump which took them far out of their way.


During the trip, Tappa continued his training of Adigo and Maya into the ways of the Force, while R2-JB worked on repairing the damage to the outer door. Their journey was marred by frequent power fluctuations. Eventually they became so bad they were forced to investigate engineering – when they found themselves under attack by a 2-meter long mutant Fefze beetle – normally scavengers, this one had been modified – and had been clearly tainted by the Dark Side of the Force. Clinging to the ceiling, it spat acid down at them. Eventually Tappa pulled it down using the Force. Somewhat annoyed at Adigo’s constant “suggestions” (the habits of an officer in the Clone Wars died hard). Tappa finally delivered it right to Adigo. Luck – or the Force – was with them and they finally finished it off, none the wiser how it managed to get aboard.


Eventually they reached Ares. Tan Hiel was hiding in some remote mountains. Landing on a sturdy ledge in the mountains, our heroes followed HAL down a slope to a stone bridge crossing a gap between two ledges. As they approached a rockslide, with a bad sense of timing, tried to trample them. R2-JB felt this was a fine time to perform a rocket jump over the canyon. The rest made do, dodging rocks as best they could.

Tan Hiel was in a luxurious apartment on the other side. She told them the knowledge she had about Finn Numm…

Finn Numm, at the time of the Trade Federation of the MCA, was vice-president in charge of new technologies, a very important position. The MCA was a vast organization – an assembly of countless other corporations, so large that it was a government unto itself. Which gave the ability of plausible deniability for many “black projects”.

One of those black projects was Charitin Gas – a vile toxin used in many brushfire wars prior to the Clone War – and in the war itself, until Obi-Wan Kenobi developed a cure. Unknown to the galaxy, Charitin was developed by a black ops division of the MCA, chartered and approved by Finn Numm himself. The gas was used in limited engagements before the war.

When the MCA was acquired by the Trade Federation, Numm find himself reporting to a Neimodian named Tan Hiel. She was briefed on the details of the Charitin Gas and fully approved of it.

“And I have evidence proving his role. Finn Numm came up with a weapons program that killed millions in the Clone Wars. Perhaps that is worth amnesty – or at least an apartment in Cloud City?”


Heading back over the bridge, Adigo suddenly felt phantom fingers wrapped around his throat. Emerging from behind cover they saw a man in his early 30’s wearing fine, black aristocratic clothing. His hair contrasted with his fine clothing – blue and spiked. The right side of his face, including his right eye, had been replaced with cybernetics. Tappa immediately recognized him – “Prince” Dar D’yela – expelled from the Jedi Order – and his own Master Koth’s previous student. D’yela taunted them in a sing-song voice (perhaps his voice-box was cybernetic as well) – “It was astonishingly easy to hide myself aboard your ship on Moelbarae. You are clearly a threat to the Empire. As an Imperial Inquisitor, I order you to surrender yourselves. By the way, Tappa, have you been to Nar Shadda lately? Looked up your old master by any chance?”

Tappa and Adigo ignited their lightsabers and crossed the bridge while Maya and R2-JB readied their ranged weapons. D’yela drew a pair of sabers – one blue, much like the one he had used as a padawan – and strongly resembling Koth’s blade. The other the red color favored by the Sith. Early on he landed several telling blows, going so far as to impale Tappa with a lunge he barely survived. Eventually the strain of too many combatants wore him down and our heroes triumphed – but were denied a final victory, with D’yela falling off the ledge – and no body was recovered…


Taina Network News
16:6:18/JK829/TAI/TAI/JBJ/POL.969
Tarheena Takes Lead in Latest Poll

It now seems the tight schedule for the special election is working against the previously heavily favored Finn Numm. The supposedly independent “Clone War Veterans for Truth” continued their campaign against Numm, bringing to light more documents highlighting his role in various black-ops weapon projects. In the most recent poll, Tarheena leads Numm by 5 points – taking into consideration that votes on MCA worlds are weighted by stock owned in the MCA. Just counting voters, Tarheena leads all candidates with 45% of the vote. Numm currently has 35% of the vote. 10%, mainly from worlds of the Kantosus Theocracy, support the arch-conservative candidate Bas Duranion who continued to campaign against Tarheena’s “sinful lifestyle”, making several allegations about the candidates private life.


Taina Network News
16:6:18/BN768/TAI/RLT/PRT/SEC.87
Port Town, Rheltooine Struck by Pirates

The Hiseiri made their boldest strike yet, raiding the capital of Rheltooine yesterday. Twenty-five citizens have been reported dead, with many more injured and missing. Eyewitnesses report that several of the missing were taken prisoner by the pirates. Allegations persist that the Hiseiri have been selling prisoners as slave in illicit ports in the Roche Asteroid Field. The pirates were driven off when Lieutenant Eldin Fleet, formerly of Green Squadron, made emergency repairs to the defensive batteries that had been damaged in the first wave of the Hiseiri attack.

Endicon Tarheena reiterated his pledge to file legislation reinstating the Taina Sector’s Green Squadron – and to make it easier for other sector militias to receive Imperial sanction. In a speech on Rheltooine, Tarheena said that “while I applaud his majesty’s devotion to security and desire for peace, I feel we must consider the value of reinstating many of the sector and planetary militias which fought so valiantly in defense of the Republic. With piracy running rampant in systems outside the core worlds, the people have a right to protect themselves. While no one would question the loyalty of the soldiers of the Empire, having people who have lived their whole lives in the sectors they will defend has an obvious value.”

Episode III - Dark Legacies


A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far, away…

Star Wars
Episode III
Dark Legacies

The newly formed Evil Galactic Empire has begun cementing its hold on the galaxy. Political opponents are being silenced by imprisonment and assassination.

With the recent “accidental” death the senator from the Taina sector – a critic of Imperial power – the governor has made an interim appointment until a special election can be held. Finn Numm, Chief Executive Officer of the Moelbarae Commerce Alliance, has been made interim senator. A staunch supporter of Emperor Palpatine, his securing the seat would be a blow to democracy in the Taina Sector.

Opposing him in the upcoming election is Lord Endicot Tarheena, a long-time critic of Palpatine and proponent of a restoration of the Republic. However, Tarheena ran for this office before, a decade ago. Though he won that election after many disputes in the courts, his victory plunged the sector into a civil war which prevented him from ever taking his seat in the Senate…

Played – August 22, 2005
Characters – Adigo, renegade clone trooper (Mike); Maya Fleet, fighter pilot (Heather), R2-JB, astromech droid (Patrick); Tappa Keeg, Duros Jedi Padawan (Ben), GM (Dan)


Summary:

The Gungan ambassador, Meesa Meesa Groll took our heroes on a journey from Naboo to the ruins of a spice-mining colony on one of its moons. The colony had been wiped out in the Clone War by a Separatist chemical weapon – the deadly Charitin Gas, whose cure was found a year into the war – after the death of many millions… On the moon waiting for them was the newly appointed Senator from Naboo – Jar Jar Binks. And the senatorial candicate for the Tainia Sector – Endicot Tarheena. Neither was friendly to the Empire and were in the process of organizing clandestine resistance to the new dictatorship.

The first order of business to this resistance was getting Tarheena to a place where he could better fight the Empire – the Imperial Senate. Though Tarheena had a decade before technically won the Tainan senate seat, his victory plunged his sector into civil war and he never did sit in the senate. As a compromise, in the aftermath of the war, his long-time friend Arrani had taken the seat. Now with Arrani dead in a “tragic accident”, Tarheena was attempting to secure the seat for himself in an upcoming special election – though the governor had already appointed Finn Numm, CEO of the Moelbarae Commerce Alliance to temporarily take the seat – and Numm was favored by Emperor Palpatine.

Tarheena explained to our heroes that an enemy of Finn Numm, a Neimodian named Tan Hiel, claimed to have information that would prevent Numm from securing the seat. In the aftermath of the Taina Civil War, the Moelbarae Commerce Alliance was a spent entity – it had dedicated far too much of its resources to trying to gain political power. Suffering from several losing quarters in the aftermath of the war, the MCA was acquired by the Trade Federation in, if not a hostile takeover, was an unwelcome takeover.

Finn Numm, at the time of the acquisition, was vice-president in charge of new technologies, a very important position. When the MCA was acquired by the Trade Federation, Numm found himself reporting to Tan Hiel – so she would be in a position to have dirt on him.

When the Clone War broke out, the Republic declared the acquisition null and void and made the MCA to again be an independent entity – this led to a lot of chaos, with various divisions pledging themselves to the separatists or the Republic – much like the rest of the galaxy.

The Republic named the ambitious Finn Numm CEO of the new MCA. This did not sit well with the Trade Federation. Numm didn’t care much for either government, but he did like the idea of being in charge…

(Tarheena also told Maya of the happy news that her sister Artemis had given birth to a baby girl, explaining her absence from the command of Green Squadron in recent months.)


Tarheena and Binks arranged for our rebels to have some new equipment. Aware that some of them had begun studying the Jedi arts under the tutelage of Tappa Keeg (himself still a Padawan), they provided them with some spare lightsabers – half of Darth Maul’s old double-bladed lightsbaer went to Adigo (who had begun studying the rare two-sword form) and Obi-Wan’s original weapon went to Maya (both were recovered by a utility crew from the bottom of an almost-bottomless shaft). They also equipped them with some grenades, a flamethrower for R2-JB (he always wanted one), and most importantly, a pair of ships – a beat-up Correllian YT-1355 freighter and a Z-95 Headhunter starfighter (with a hangar in the freighter for the fighter). Both ships could be found at any spaceport and were very inconspicuous. They would need transportation, for Hiel was unwilling to arrange a direct meeting – first they would have to pick up a package at the lowest level of a Moelbarae city…


Moelbarae was a city originally colonized by the Sullustans. Its architecture reflected that – its surface nearly uninhabitable, the cities were carved into craters hundreds of levels deep. After landing at the main spaceport the rebels locked their ship tight and took a speeder through an hours-long highway journey from one crater to another. To make the journey more exciting a swoop gang attacked them. Though they were dispatched with relative ease, there was evidence that someone knew of their mission…


In the middle of the night, down in the deepest slum-levels of a crater our heroes approached the warehouse. It was a narrow, tall building – level after level of balconies around a central pit, with the lockers within the outer walls. Finding the proper level, R2-JB and Adigo headed for the locker while Maya and Tappa waited in the speeder “outside”. A cloaked wino was suspiciously near the locker they needed. It was a Gran, armed only with a staff – and of course he attacked them. He turned out to be a deadly martial artist. Though he landed several lightsaber blows, Adigo was taken out of the fight, badly wounded. As Maya and Tappa came to give relief, R2-JB was taken out of the fight as well, his circuits overloaded by a solid kick amplified by a twirl around the quarterstaff. Maya tumbled past him, trying to shove him out of the way to apply a medpack to Adigo and a repair kit to R2. Finally, after much trying, Tappa managed to use the Force to send the Gran flying off the balcony.

Badly wounded but stabilized, our heroes opened the storage locker. Inside was a Verpine Worker Drone Droid. Designed to be a competitive protocol droid, the Verpine, while technically astute, were not too familiar with what most begins felt comfortable with. This droid came to life, introducing himself in a maddeningly calm voice as J-HAL-9000-86 (Hal for short). He would take them to Tan Hiel…


Miscellaneous Notes:
Force point awarded to Maya for heroically charging at and past the Gran martial artist to save Adigo and R2-JB.




Imperial Network News
16:6:1/INN/COR/COR/GBUBV/GOV
Office of Imperial Inquisition Founded

In an effort to protect the newly founded Galactic Empire and its loyal citizens from the scourge of renegade separatists and Jedi terrorists, Imperial Advisor Ars Dangor announced that Emperor Palpatine, per the terms of the recently enacted Imperial Security Act, has founded the Office of Imperial Inquisition. The Inquisition’s goals are to protect the citizens of the galaxy by finding and hunting down these renegades. In a prepared statement Ars Dangor stated that “while heroes like Darth Vader have been tireless in their efforts to bring these terrorists to justice, quite simply they need help. The Inquisition has the authority and resources needed to both investigate reports of terrorist activity and bring them to Imperial justice.”





Moelbarae 27 Hour News
16:6:10/M27HN/TAI/MOL/JHUI/TRA.1030
Swoop Racing Accident in Spaceport Tunnel 128 Delays Traffic

Spaceport authorities continue cleanup efforts to clear the debris in Inter-Crater Tunnel 128 (outbound). Authorities recommend taking tunnel 95 instead.