The Martyrdom of Blobby the Blobular (Flight 391)

[Andreus Makaryk]

The crew wasted no time in evacuating the spacecraft. Andreus was entirely too happy to give those who were too timid to jump down the slide, and therefore held up those behind them, Teh Look of Dhoom. He might not be a Sith, but with his facial tattoos, he sure looked like one. And considering he had more than six hundred souls to evacuate in the ninety seconds allotted by regulation...he would take any advantage he could get. A brake fire was easily contained, but that was no reason to slack on evacuation.

"Jump!"

"Jump!"

As the crowds thin, Andreus wasted no time going further back, seeing if anyone had been knocked unconscious and needed help off the plane. He came upon Row 22, and saw the remnants of the blob--and the damage to his spacecraft--for the first time. Nearby, he also saw six others who had died in the explosion--and it was here that Darth Oseth so gracefully chose to reveal himself.

So, Andreus had just landed in a Force Storm. He supposed that the air crash investigators and/or the Jedi might like to know. However, he still had a job to do, so he filed the Dark Lord's "greeting" away in his mind.

Around Row 30, he found a couple people who had lost consciousness due to smoke inhalation, and dragged them both to the nearest slide. He searched the remainder of the spacecraft before returning and picking both the unconscious bodies up.

He held them as close to his chest as he could, with all his strength, and jumped. Andreus Makaryk was the last off the spacecraft--the crew's headcount of 612 evacuated rose to 615. Andreus confirmed he had seen the seven dead.

The evacuation complete, the questions began to swirl around the newly-minted captain's mind. What had happened to his spacecraft? Could he have done more to get it down sooner? Who was this Darth Oseth character, and what did he want? Though Captain Makaryk supposed he had just executed a landing no one before him had ever accomplished, sorrow still filled his heart.

No captain wanted to lose passengers.

 

[Prancing Yawn]

Exiting the ship the way he came in, Rascus diligently studied the notes he had mustered in his datapad. This must have been one of the most bizarre investigations he'd ever conducted, and his notes filled up two whole pages on his datapad's word processor. He had already extracted the security camera recordings from the cockpit, aswell as the sound recordings. They'd help much in the investigation.

The next thing he had to do was find the captain - he would, of course, be the one who would know the most about what happened at the time of the crash, and the decisive moments before it. The agent hadn't seen him or the co-pilot inside of the cockpit. He hoped they weren't dead. A captain in this situation would be a vital witnesss.

With great relief, he was able to spot Andreus over by the entrance to the crash site. Looked like he was tending to the wounded. He walked over to the captain, whose face was smeared with blood. Rascus' own face looked rather weary aswell.
"Excuse me, captain. I'm Rascus Poquiu, I'm in charge of the investigation for this crash. I'd like to get some details from you about the -cough- moments before the -coff, coff,- - excuse me, sir - moments before the crash. -coff, coff.-"
It looked like all the smoky air and the dirt and grime in the inside of the cabin was getting to the Captain Agent's lungs.

 

[Andreus Makaryk]

With the evacuation completed, Andreus stood there, deep in thought. Though he had captained this flight, he still only carried the three bars of a first officer on his uniform's epaulets--it would be largely up to Dex, and the air accident investigators, if he was to be promoted. It wasn't final yet. He simply watched as firefighters extinguished the fires in the wheelwells-the pilot had "only" blown sixteen of the eighteen tires on the landing.

The Jedi hadn't said anything yet--they must have been in about as much shock and mental turmoil as Andreus found himself in.

Andreus watched as a wheezing, coughing investigator walked up to him. It looked like he suffered from smoke inhalation, though Andreus felt fine himself. "Let's get you away from the spacecraft first," he 'suggested.' The look on his face, however, intoned it was more a demand. Andreus had lost seven lives today, and he had no interest in further adding to the count. He called for a firefighter to come treat the lad for smoke inhalation.

"Now, you want details, eh? There aren't many, at least not until after whatever happened. I was holding per controller's instructions at flight level five-seven-zero. My assigned altitude, everything was fine and whatnot. Then I just got an unexplainable bad feeling--my crew thought I was on shrooms--and ordered the fasten seat-belt sign on. Including for crew. Then a minute later, a boom and a double repulsorlift/quadruple hydraulics failure."

"Say, have you recovered the flight data recorder?" Andreus' mind had preserved the events with a terrifying and chilling clarity he wasn't sure he wanted to relive, if it could be helped.

Nevertheless, there was still one thing that wouldn't be found there. Andreus felt obliged to divulge it. "Oh, and I should also mention that during the evacuation, I heard a voice in my head claiming to be from some 'Darth Oseth.' So, I guess some Sith dude whipped up this storm out of the clear skies...I better not lose my license over this..."

Andreus hoped he wasn't on shrooms after all.

 

[Prancing Yawn]

"Thank you," the Captain Agent said to a fireman who provided him a small personal airmask.
"Well, I was able to recover the recorder from the cockpit. The recordings are downloaded onto my datapad. I'm going to take a look at it later. You may, too, if you want to. You might recognize something that might link up with my notes that links up.. ow, my head hurts.. well, maybe it'll all be connected. I also determined that the green gooey substance were the remains of the saboteur. It had to be. There were also some metal bits in a pool of goo. This may sound strange, but.. it seems like the creature.. somehow.. self-destructed.. or something was implanted in him that triggered the explosion. I don't know exactly, but we'll know more once the test results come back on the substances.

.. Darth Oseth? That's.. interesting. With all the kriff going on about the Empire these days, you never know what the Sith will do. There were two Jedi onboard the transport, yes? Maybe we should ask them about it. They know more about the Sith than anybody."

 

[Brand]

After the Captain of the flight stepped off of the vessel Galak made sure that the passengers were being properly tended too before heading over. He made a man talking with the officer, and approached them anyway.

"Gentlemen, nice to meet you both." He extended his hand in a respectful greeting to both. "I'm Jedi Councilor Galak Avara. Do we have any idea what went on up there? There was definitely a dark presence off of the ship manipulating those events."

 

[Andreus Makaryk]

"I'm Andreus Makaryk." Uncertain of how the results of this investigation would affect his promotion, or for that matter, if he would stay employed, Andreus willfully omitted his title. He couldn't be completely sure of it anyway, but his presence would nevertheless strike the Jedi Councilor as the person who had been sitting in the left seat. "Yeah, said Dark Presence claimed to be one Darth Oseth. You know him?"

Meanwhile, Andreus had questions of his own. Doubts. His own memory had preserved events in the cockpit with such chilling clarity that the Jedi could probably produce the cockpit voice recordings in their entirety simply by reading Andreus' mind, as well as the most basic parameters recorded by the flight data recorder. Every chilling alarm and warning flashed back through Andreus' mind, and he knew not how to stop it. The dive, especially, Andreus would not forget--and that, especially flashed to the top of his mind for the Jedi to extract.

Oh, yes, if the Jedi Councilor wished to treat Andreus' mind as a flight data recorder, that, especially that, was preserved in perfect detail. The slow bank to the right, Andreus' frantic efforts to restart the ion engines long after they had been shut down...

Then the spacecraft falling on its right wing...

The altimeter unwinding at the rate of 450 feet per second...

Kai's frantic screams and callouts...

The six times the spacecraft had spun before Andreus finally recovered enough to try to power out of the dive...

Yep, it was all there, all right; Andreus surmised the Jedi Councilor hadn't been paying attention.

Now, if only he could answer the question that lingered in his mind, hovering over the haunted memories of the seven passengers who had died in the explosion. The seven he couldn't save.

Could I have done more?

 

[Brand]

Galak nodded as the man gave his name, but his face changed to open surprise as he mentioned the name. "Darth Oseth? You're sure of the title?"

The Sith had not held a presence in the galaxy for over 800 years, and even hearing the antiquated title brought chills down the Master's spine. Galak watched as the man's face turned troubled, and Galak extended his awareness over the man's mind, attempting to calm him as best he could with the soothing power of the Force.

"You look troubled, my friend, but please, this could be vital to this entire investigation. You mentioned a Sith name? How did you learn of this Oseth?"

 

[Prancing Yawn]

Rascus' PAC-20 visual wrist comm bleeped and blinked with a repeating red light, signalling that somebody was trying to make contact with him via hologram.
"Excuse me, gentlemen,

Yes?"
"Hey Rascus, this is Vokstor over at the lab."
"Good to see you. What have you got on those substances?"
"Well, that green gooey crap definitely belongs to an alien. More specifically, an 'unidentified blob-like species.' That's what the computers identified it as. The metal bits have been identified as qurylon clusters, highly explosive stuff, and outlawed in the Core and Mid Rim. It's unlikely the blob thing put it together himself, but whoever did must have been good with bombs.. or had a pretty big pocketbook."

"Yes, I had a feeling it might have been qurylon, but I wanted to make sure,"

" The green residue on the bits shows up to be atleast.. an hour old, so depending on how long of an interval it was between takeoff and the explosion, this blob guy definitely had the stuff on him.. or in him.. before takeoff. It is not just debris from the crash. It's almost certain this creature was the saboteur."

"Thanks, Vokstor. This will certainly help with the investigation. I have to go tell the others."
Walking over to the Jedi and the captain with an eager look on his face, Rascus wrote down the new developments in his datapad through touchscreen,
"Gentlemen, there have been some new developments on that green substance,"
and proceeded to explain the new information to the two men.

 

[Andreus Makaryk]

Andreus' eyes met Master Galak's, and he held the gaze. The burning gaze. The same gaze he used to intimidate passengers into following crewmember instructions, but in the context of the conversation, more like the I-am-not-kriffing-kidding-you-now-take-me-seriously gaze of doom. Had Master Galak been shorter, Andreus would literally be staring down at him right now, but as it happened, the two were exactly the same height.

"I am certain."

Andreus didn't lie. He knew with absolute certainty what the Sith had said.

"He uttered a dark speech in my head as I was going through the cabin to make sure everyone had evacuated. More specifically, when I reached the site of the explosion. And the dead."

He certainly did not wish to hinder the investigation. Therefore, he opted to quote the Sith Lord verbatim. This might have been a mistake, quoting a Black Speech like that, as the tattoos on his face seemed to visibly respond to it. They darkened as Andreus opened his mouth. Not to mention the immense flare in his Force signature, which deepened as if literally attempting to suck its bearer into a bottomless pit.

Nevertheless...some...personal sacrifice was necessary to further the investigation.

"~Hi there...~" Andreus' voice changed as he began to quote it, becoming every bit as corrosive and screeching as the voice had been in his mind. Pressing on, he continued. "~That was quite impressive, Captain Makaryk. Darth Oseth sends his regards. But o... why so serious? You could've let those peeps die, y'know. Anyhow, my friend, till next we meet. This was fun! Bye for now!~"

Andreus wanted to swig an entire bottle of mouthwash after uttering that...

 

[Brand]

Galak could feel Andreus' eyes boring into him; the look he returned was one of impassive confidence, a towering grace that Avara had possessed since boyhood. He took in the speakings of both men, processing, analyzing, and listening more intently and surprisedly to Andreus' speakings. "Darth Oseth... very interesting. The Sith have not reared their ugly head for numerous generations, but I can tell you are sure of what you've heard..."

Galak could easily read Andreus, and his Force signature clearly fluctuated sharply as he recited the Black Speech. He was definitely wholly confident of what he had heard, but Avara questioned why a Sith would attack such a mundane flight; even to attempt to end Galak's own life seemed like a foolhardy and ineffective attack. Their captain was surely a very skilled man, but as he probed his mind he found much, much more.

"Your presence in the Force... you have quite an affinity for it. Have you ever had any training in the Force? That was quite far from any landing I've ever seen or heard of, much less witnessed, and I'd be confident to say that you drew on it quite frequently in the last fifteen or so minutes."

 

[Andreus Makaryk]

"I feel dirty; let's not make me do that again." It was probably helpful for Andreus to know such things as a Sith Lord wanting him dead, for whatever crazy reason. However, Andreus didn't much care for the nauseating effects he felt when he actually tried to quote Darth Oseth's message. Maybe he would paraphrase next time. For now, this Councilor Galak character had received the Sith's message, loud and clear. "Next time someone asks about this guy, you tell them, okay?"

Mercifully, the Jedi changed the subject--to something Andreus had scarcely heard about. The only reason he knew about the Force at all was because the Jedi occasionally appeared in HoloNet news stories, and his knowledge of it could therefore be said not to exceed that of the average bartender. If he was so talented, this was the first he had heard of it.

He looked the wizened Master in the eyes again. Amazing how he could dispense with the aftereffects of that nasty Black Speech like that. Andreus didn't have a better name for the nauseating effects of quoting that particular Dark Lord.

"I'll be honest. I don't pay attention to politics--pilots will always be in demand, no matter who rules the galaxy. So, if I could use this Force, I had not the slightest clue about it. If you wish to find out just how much I may or may not have used it, however, I do have a suggestion--" This next bit might well irk the Jedi, as Andreus tended to see the universe in actual measurements and held no interest in the mystical whatsoever-- "Pull all the data off the flight data recorder. I mean ALL of it, including weather information; it will have every gust of wind recorded. Put it into a flight simulator. Find the best pilots you can. Have them try to land--the difference between what happened and how far they get is probably going to be close to what you seek."

 

[Prancing Yawn]

[[is that thing about the flight data recorded said to Rascus?]]

 

[Andreus Makaryk]

(OOC: That part was directed at you both)

 

[Prancing Yawn]

"I assure you, captain, all of Investigations' resources are going to be focused on working on this. This is our biggest case yet, and we intend to leave no stone unturned. The recordings are being transferred to HQ as we currently speak... ah, the wonders of technology.

We'll be keeping you updated, captain."

Rascus then turned to the other man, a Jedi Knight.
"We're also intent on working with the Jedi on this, considering there's, quite possibly, Sith involved. With our combined efforts, it shouldn't take a great deal of time to get some answers. Good to meet you both, I must go back to Headquarters now. I'm sure they're working on this there even without me."

Walking over to his cherry-red speeder, Rascus jumped over the armrests and into the drivers seat, sifting through his datapad even as he revved up the engines.

The speeder zoomed off towards Universal Investigations Headquarters, where every available operative would be putting hard man-hours into this case.

 

[Brand]

Galak listened to Andreus speaking; they seemed to be logical.

"I'll make a point of referring that idea as soon as possible."

As the investigator said his parting words Galak nodded. The man had been helpful, at least, although he wasn't sure what the mans intentions truly were. "Aye, thank you; contact me at the Coruscant Temple if you have any further need of my services." He turned back to Andreus, eyeing the man closely.

"I know you may not want to admit it to yourself, Captain," he said, using the pilot's rank in Galak's eyes, "but you have talent, and one not often seen in the races of men. You are correct; pilots are always in demand, but Jedi are even moreso."

There was a bright twinkle in his eyes as he spoke to the man. The confident fellow, he hoped, would be able to keep his wits about him. "If you would accompany me to Tython, to the seat of the New Jedi Order, I sense a future for yourself in the Order as a servant of the light side. The information that was imparted to you by this Oseth could also be vital to both the Order and the Republic. It is of the utmost importance for you to return with me not only for your potential, but also out of necessity."

He paused, scanning Andreus' face, giving him a moment to think and process the information. "So, Mr. Makaryk. What say you?"

 

[Andreus Makaryk]

Andreus still couldn't quite shake the feeling that the inquiry would find his decision to land in winds well over the limit...controversial. If he would have done it in a fully functional spacecraft, he could have lost his license for sheer recklessness. Though the possible involvement of a Sith promised to make the investigation far more complex than a simple disciplinary proceeding, he still found himself surprised he hadn't had to answer more questions.

Perhaps those questions would come when the spacecraft's various data recorders were analyzed. There was much Andreus had seen, that the investigators had so far left unasked.

"Call me back if you need anything!" Andreus called after the investigators as they left with various pieces of evidence.

By now, fire crews had fully extinguished the brake fire and what had remained of the engine fire after the in-flight engine fire extinguisher had had its way with it. Andreus didn't much care for anything remotely political; indeed, he seemed far more concerned about the condition of his spacecraft than the Jedi. Perhaps this was natural for a pilot. At any rate, he walked around the spacecraft with a flashlight, keeping the Jedi Master waiting.

The damage was substantial. The landing had been a hundred knots over ideal landing speed--sixty knots overspeed by the standard of no operable control surfaces. That had been through no fault of the pilot--he hadn't had a good way of slowing the spacecraft down at all. The main undercarriage had blown out completely; all sixteen tires of it were missing, and the weight of the spacecraft was supported only by the struts that attached the undercarriage to the belly of the spacecraft. The nosegear had survived intact. The edges of both wings, not to mention horizontal stabilizers, had twisted due to aerodynamic stresses well above design limits during the dive. Ailerons had been torn away from the spacecraft, leaving exposed wiring underneath. Large dents dotted the leading edge of the right wing, no doubt from a piece of blob being blown out in that direction, and the right ion engine, a burned-out husk of its former self, had been punctured. Occasionally, a piece of engine blading clattered to the ground.

Though the engine had been completely destroyed--a necessary sacrifice to save the spacecraft from crashing a mile or two short of the runway in the first place--Andreus wondered if it might be replaced, the rest of the damage repaired, and the spacecraft eventually returned to service. The repairs would cost tens of millions of credits--but the list price for this shuttle ran upwards of a hundred twenty million. As a matter of professional pride, he still wanted to be able to say he landed his craft, mostly intact. No captain wanted an actual hull-loss accident.

Much less to end his career on that note.

"I am a target now."

Andreus spoke those words softly. Perhaps the Jedi was still around, listening. Much as it saddened him, Andreus realized he could not fly commercially again, not so much because he had come perilously close to crashing his spacecraft, but because someone was hunting him, and to continue in his line of work would put more lives in danger. No, Andreus couldn't gamble with the lives of his passengers like that, as long as this dark creature was still out there. He didn't care for politics, but he contemplated that the events of this night had conspired to suck him into that black hole.

"Looks like I don't have much of a choice, does it?"

(OOC: Probably should leave this to Dancing Lawn and any others he wants to bring in to poke and prod the investigation for a while. PM me if you need some direction.)