Shadows of Bankor

The prisoner transport skiff raced along the desert dunes to an undisclosed location. Binders locked the prisoners in place and what belongings they had were cataloged and stowed in the cargo for processing. Many were local criminals but a great deal more were Resistance operatives caught up in a sweep, although some were whispering that maybe… just maybe they might have been ratted out.

The storm troopers walked down the row before closing the door to the front half leaving the prisoners in dim light seated on uncomfortable metal benches with their hands and feet in binders.

If they were lucky they were going to a work camp, if they were unlucky an unmarked grave.

OOC: Everyone is currently in binders and in a seated position.

Yusandr watched the storm troopers leave and then frowned and looked at her binders. This was probably not the worse situation she was in, but it was up there. She sighed heavily as another resistance agent said aloud, “Kriff, what are we going to do?”

“Trust in the Force, we’ll figure something out,” she said after a moment of thought. She wasn’t sure if she believed it, but they looked to her for leadership so she had to say something. They were not shot dead, so unless they were just delaying execution that was one silver lining.

Dove watched the stormtroopers leave, smirking softly as it gave them all a breathing room. Like Yusandr, Dove Gray had been in stickier situations than this before, but it wasn't exactly a good position.

"If they wanted to kill us, they would've done so already," she added in confidently. Even if the sentiment wasn't nescessarily comforting for some, her confidence that it would sort itself out would perhaps do some of the trick.

The pale woman regarded the binders over her hands. Perhaps with enough kinetic force, she could force them open.

How had she found herself here? Arrested for dissent just a day or two after landing; and she'd come here to stay *off* the Imperial radar! Those troopers should've known better than to harass those people though... just as Verse should've known better than to start yelling at them for it. If she'd just ignored it, they'd have moved on from their bullying in short order, and she wouldn't be in binders right now.

She sighed.

She kept her hood down, face obscured... maybe it was too late now, but with any luck she might just be thought of as some ordinary rabble-rouser. Nobody special. Nobody to remember, or pay any attention to.

And then what? Well, she had no idea. Things usually worked out though; all you had to do was trust the force... just like that woman was saying.

Wait, what?

She looked up as best she could, though the hood was still down.

"The Force huh? Not a lot of people that talk about that anymore."

Verse Aura wrote: ↑

Tue Jan 21, 2020 10:44 pm

Wait, what?

She looked up as best she could, though the hood was still down.

"The Force huh? Not a lot of people that talk about that anymore."

Yusandr turned to Verse and said, “Yeah well not all of us have forgotten I spent ten years fighting for the Republic, many of them alongside Jedi. Bravest damn bunch of folks I have ever met, now the malakas Empire wants to change that history.”

“I was there, I know what I saw.”

“But they are all dead, how they gonna save us?” a blue male twi’lek chimed in.

“I don’t believe that,” Yusandr said confidently.

Don't say you're a Jedi. Don't say you're a Jedi. Don't say you're a Jedi.

It was good to hear that not everybody was convinced the order had been a bunch of traitors, but all this talk was sure making it hard to stick to her cover. She wanted to tell them it was going to be alright, the Jedi were back and they were going to save everyone. That'd put them all at ease, right? But... but... what if doing that just made it worse? Besides, she hadn't touched the Force since... well, since things went to hell.

Then again... what had been the point of it all if she was just going to keep running forever?

What was the point of any of it?

"Where do you think they all went?"

Yusandr replied, “If they were smart they went into hiding, they really got their butts handed to them at the end of the war. But they are out there, I… we have to believe that.”

She then glanced to Dove and added, “Yeah they want us alive, I bet they are going to take us to a work camp… try to work us to death.”

She smirked and said, “So we need to figure out how to get out before that happens.”

"Can we go anywhere without this sorta thing, Dove?" The young woman asking the question looked down at her binders with a pensive frown. "I'm starting to wonder if I'm on one of those holoshows with all you've gotten me into." Mia was not angry but rather bemused. Imperial death camps were a far cry from tending to farm animals.

"Tell me you've got some sort of tracking beacon on you, Dove."

"Sorry, hon, I must've left that in my other jacket," she shot a smirk to the blonde. "Promise I'll take you somewhere more exciting next time."

Dove looked at the green girl, and back to Yusandr. "We should get these binders off first. Fun in the bedroom, but not something I want in a fight, or in an escape."

"Oh, get your mind out of the gutter," Mia blurted out, "You're going to embarrass, uh, yourself. Us." She smiled weakly and then looked back at her binders. "They might want to kill us, actually. Put us out in front of some town, shoot us, make the crowd scared of the Empire.

Mia shook her head.

"Guess that doesn't change the fact that we better get outta here." Mia tugged at her arms and sighed. "What about some sort of secret spy thing, like in your boot?"

"It uh... it *would* be helpful if I we had our equipment," she said, looking first to the other women and then toward Yusandr. "Do you have any ideas? Did they load it on the transport as well?"

Not sure if he'd been unconscious or just stunned but Ria'la finally raised his head out of the curtain of blonde hair and looked about.

"If Binky and Dray are still with me, they can broadcast back to town."

He blinked, looking down at the binders as if he didn't know how they'd gotten there.

A thick zabrak woman said, “I saw them load the gear in the cargo, I doubt we can get to it from here, but… if someone has anything thin and long and like a hair pin or something I might have an idea.”

“Or it might get us all killed, but I am sure it’ll work.”

Dove merely snorted with good humor over Mia's reactions, and gave a nod in the direction of her right foot. "Just a blade. Nothing too fancy."

She didn't exactly have the backing she used to enjoy before, and some of her gear had broken down over the years (like most of her lockpicking tools), or been bartered or sold for easy credits (like her electronic enhancers), or been lost to nature (like the ship that burnt, fell over, and sank into the swamp).

When the pretty white-hair awakened, she gave the newsie a nod. The Zabrak woman had observed what she herself had assumed was the most logical.

The hidden, retractable blade in her boot just might do the trick to deal with the binders. "Lovely-locks might got some hairstuff, I only got a hidden knife, if that will suffice?"

"I doubt cutting it will do much good," Mia admitted. She closed her eyes, deep in concentration, and then sighed. "I really shoulda paid attention to him when he told me 'bout escaping binders." Corellians did get into a heap of trouble.

'Hair pin . . . don't know if they left any of mine in. Usually have a couple to keep it out of the eyes when i'm broadcasting."

He ducked down again trying to reach his hair with his hands, but he was hardly experienced in working with binders on.

She looked about listening to the talk of knives and hairpins. She had neither, so wasn't much use there. "So, we get out of these, get our stuff, and then... we get into the place they control the transport from?"

There was a muffled.

"And wipe the transport manifest."

From Ria'la.

"Oh, that's a very smart suggestion," Verse said, all too honest in her assesment of it as a smart thing to do. "Do you have experience with this sort of thing?"

'Not really but I know we can't leave a list of our names where the Imps can find them again."

He sat up and sighed.

"They left two in but I can't reach them."

He looked at the two next to him.

"Either of you can reach my temples?"

"... Think they might be taking us to that hi-sec facility that people are whispering about?" Dove asked Yusandr, meanwhile gesturing to Ria'la with her cuffed hands for him to lean close to her.

At Dove's beckoning he leaned forward hoping she could find something useful.

A light groan escapes Ru'ni as he finally regains consciousness, a patch of blood visible at his scalp from where he was subdued by their captors.

"Where? What? What happened?" He aaks groggily as he looks around his surroundings.

Dove Gray wrote: ↑

Wed Jan 22, 2020 1:07 am

"... Think they might be taking us to that hi-sec facility that people are whispering about?" Dove asked Yusandr, meanwhile gesturing to Ria'la with her cuffed hands for him to lean close to her.

Yusandr frowned and said, “Probably, which means we want none of that business heard bad stuff happens there, real bad.”

"Facility? Bad stuff? What sort of bad stuff are we talking about?" Verse hadn't been planetside long enough to hear any rumors like that, but she also didn't doubt the imperials were up to nefarious things.

She was getting a little antsy now. All this talk, and no immediate means of acting upon it. "Sounds like it'd definitely be better if we escaped *before* we arrive there? But... might be a long walk back to civilization if we do. "