To Abindosan! part 2

This left them at a loss. They were ready to deal with mutant fish people, Dalt clones, evil Dark Side devices meant to turn a planet into a sentient…evil thing. Darth Maul had them intimidated, true, but…they just weren’t prepared for a Star Destroyer.

Kedrihm’Val, realizing that the thing might be trying to send them a message, ran back to the planetary comm unit. Sure enough, the Star Destroyer was demanding that the planet surrender within the next five hours, or face surface bombardment. The clan representatives evacuated the city, leaving only themselves and the crew behind.

Onna offered to negotiate, buying them some time. Meanwhile, the rest of the crew ran through questions. They needed to find out if the ship was with Dalt or the Imperial remnant. Had Dalt called it before confronting them? What was it here for? How could they keep it from destroying the planet? Could they get up to it, or find some way of driving it off?

Frantic investigation over the next several hours turned up a lot of interesting things.

Jal’en’s stolen ship had a lot more than smuggled goods. Buried within its computer banks, Oola found the codes and coordinates for slipping into and out of the Imperial remnant. She performed spectacularly, extracting all this information and covering up her traces completely.

Darth Maul had a secret lab within the confines of the old Imperial base—much of which was abandoned by the Abindosani. It was he who’d been building those cyborgs. In the lab was also an opening to a tunnel leading to the Imperial installation that the Scorpion went down to. Whether Maul is still on the planet or not is unknown. He also had a Sith speeder stashed in one of the abandoned hangars.

With Maul’s notes, Kedrihm’Val was able to work out that the cyborgs would recover their minds by themselves. Maul had used tainted coral in the prosthetics as a crude type of mind control, and as the reefs healed, the coral (and their minds) would as well.

Onna engaged in a duel of wits with the Star Destroyer's captain, figuring out that the Star Destroyer in orbit above them was probably from the Imperial remnant and not at Dalt’s behest. This gave them an advantage, since it meant the Imperials would not likely want to start something with Republic authorities (such as Jedi) on the planet. It’s one thing to be up to no good. It’s another to offend an organization that can, if it feels the need, invade your sector of space and smash you flat.

Since they were pretty sure the Imperials wanted Jal’en’s stolen ship, they allowed the Imperials to land a squad of Stormtroopers. But first, they rigged the old bucket with enough explosives to blow a hole through the Star Destroyer’s hangar bay, just in case the Imperials tried to double-cross them. Sure enough, after a few hours, the Troopers stole the ship and made off with it, and the Star Destroyer pulled out of orbit. The crew didn’t mind, since at that point they’d gotten off everything that was worth their time. So long as that ship was gone and didn’t come back to bother them, that’s all that mattered.

So now, they have to decide what to do about that underwater base, and get in touch with whatever sane Vodne are left to try to help salvage the situation with them.