The Lien Article

[Butler]

FARSTINE_ 06:43:52

"Sir."

His black plastic egg seat squeaked with the turn on a pivot ball in the dim light, Lucifer's porcelain fingers spread over his upper thigh hooked leg over leg; alternately cupped palm pushing off of the terminal screen, half propping his weight against it and half concealing what lay beneath it. A bland disdain bent back over his shoulder at the co-pilot innocently standing in the open doorway. Neon keys and color coded script painting his white suit sundry, Lucifer's dreary, pale blue, eyes dared the man to state the obvious.

He dared not, eloquent enough in his bashful blinking.

Lucifer's begrudgingly miserable breath irritatingly blew and drew through his perfectly petite nostrils, as those faintly fatigued spheres, flat in a stare, fell heavily to the communications console, blinking a green alert, to his left, anchored by the angle of his aggrieved glare before shifting the suitably unsubtle searing returned unto the man standing alone in the open doorway.

He cleared his throat before working up the courage to step further into the makeshift office within the slow plummeting transport ship, a facade of confidence that may carry him safely to the blinking console. Lucifer's silent scrutiny, deathly dragging on the man's stride, followed each clicking heel-toe towards its destination until the man flicked the lights on full and fingered the comms open to the pilot in the cockpit.

"He's wi-"

"Patch me through," Lucifer barked, twisted frame still in stasis.

"Understood sir," came the pilot's voice on the other end.

"Hello," he monotonously began.

".....Hello. This is Egliard Luthred. To whom am I speaking?" answered the scratchy transmission.

"The Administrator."

"Ah yes. Lucifer, was it? A little early. But we've prepared for that. Please make your way to bay four under our corporate hangar. I'll transfer you to our tower. I look forward to our meeting."

click

The channel chirped a sequence of tones before the coordinator picked up and conversed with Lucifer's pilot. Lucifer shirked a stoic nod, and the co-pilot closed the channel before being shooed away with another jerk of the head at the door. The man left Lucifer, alone. Hesitating to make sure the man had left, Lucifer then returned to his screen, lifting off his relaxed fist, and continued to close every window of coding but two; two chat boxes. He continued to type within each box as a clock counted down in the corner of each message box.

-00:03:15​

To: UNKNOWN ; UNKNOWN

"Landing in 10 min."
"Operation countdown minus 20."
"Make me believe it..."

[ADMIN logged off]​

Lucifer's middle finger slapped the escape key, shrinking both boxes side by side under an enlarged clock counting down. At the end of the countdown, the messages would be eaten by a self devouring governor program; similar to a controlled virus. There would be no trace of the long conversation he'd been having with his two agents. Though their personal devices would remain unharmed, all orders and reiterated specifics would be forever erased from their databanks. Lucifer had spent enough time stressing the details of the plan before hand. Now was just another form of time management.

Swinging out of the glistening black chair, Lucifer arose into a distinguished posture; folding over the flaps of his white tailored suit and pinning the buttons together patiently. His icy eyes searched through the walls, peering down the empty corridors, to estimate certainty of privacy; affirmed. He stroked the side of his long streaking hair under press of thumb, pushing the damp strands over the side of his ear and down the back of his neck; a combed, slick, study of a business man. And then he swiveled on the balls of his feet, walking out the door into his more charismatic congeniality.

The standard gray steel of this simple shuttle ached under the shade of a poisonous red air rolling over the light blue shielding, as the transport flew over the ugly cityscape; foregoing all external elaboration when most who frequent spend their fairs within, allocating attention of their affairs towards internal luxury and laissez faire. The meager shuttle darkened under shadow, ducking into the precautions of a shielded hangar bay. It settled in without delay. Protocols resumed.

The name burned an orange hue within dulled red laser lighting across the main structure's face into the sky: Triellus DET International

Within the private hangar of this international bank, Lucifer's shuttle powered down. The exit ramp lowered. Lucifer emerged, palms praising his own benevolence, stepping down the ramp into the midst of fawning businessmen and women and one overseeing manager. They appraised his entirely white suit and delicate red sash, tucked into breast pocket, and confirmed their appetites with slender grins. Some expected to laugh, a mockery, while others expected to slide in deals of their own. Yet none knew to what extent they had been stolen by his one hundred billion dollar smile.

 

[Galavant]

The hardest part, Damia had found on her end was recruitment. For this particular job she'd had to find a group of people who now how to use a blaster, could keep cool under pressure, wanted a lot of credits, and were just stupid enough that she could be confident that even if they were to figure out a part of what was going on, they'd still be unprepared for the fundamental truth of the operation.

In other words, she needed expendables. The kind of people she actually was to the Hutt Cartel, although that comparison struck a little too close to home for her liking. Farstine wasn't the utopia of criminal activity that Nar Shaddaa was, but it was a haven for Spice Trading, so finding volunteers that weren't undercover law enforcement wasn't hard. Really calling the entire thing hard might have been overstating, but it had been arduous to go out and find these people for Damia. Charming them, convincing them, getting them to work together, doing a few practice runs, etc... Damia was thankful that this wasn't the norm for her. If it were up to her, they wouldn't even be doing all this caper nonsense. But then again she wouldn't try what the Enforcer who'd told her to pack her bags and head to Farstine was either.

The first member of her team was a human woman, who actually was ex-law enforcement, and piloting the innocuous looking shuttle that held Damia's team. She'd been busted for being on the take of some the spice smugglers and was now more than willing to help knock over a piece of the establishment that had sold her down the river.

The second was Devaronian man, who was part of the muscle for the group. He liked hitting things, and he liked getting paid, but he was smart enough to know how to play it cool as well. Damia considered that trait very important, she didn't want anyone messing things up going on a kill spree because they were that kind of kriffed up.

The third was a human, and actually an ex-employee of the bank who'd been fired, because he frankly hadn't been very good at his job. But he was also more than willing to take another paycheck from them, and had been an integral part of the planning for this operation. Layout, internal security, the works. He wasn't so good with a blaster as the others in Damia's opinion, but after a couple of weeks training he was good enough.

The fourth was a Neimoidian, and another part of the team muscle. In his case literally, Damia was pretty sure he had to be taking some kind of supplement to get as big as he was, but didn't care enough to find out.

All four knew the job, and knew there'd be another team to act as the "distraction" hitting the bank vault while they went for the servers and hard drives that contained the real wealth. the innocuous looking shuttle they were ridding had had a one shot mass driver installed, hidden from view as it was retracted into the belly of the ship. On the mass driver was the logo of a certain organization that would take the blame for everything. Damia's armor also had the same logo printed on it, as did the armor of everyone on the so called "tech team" but hers were little more than stickers. She glad her helmet had come back from the shop in time for this job, as it contained a rebreather that would keep her from having to see how well she could breath methane. She had her usually Azalus Blaster Pistols on her sides, and in a backpack was Guthfer, her little droid loaded with all kinds of software to break through the banks systems. She also had her knife with her, but opted not to bring the VL-9, it was just a little too renown as a Cartel weapon for this job. In her left hand she held her Duratablet, also loaded with some interesting programs to break the banks computers wide open. And a popup chat appeared letting her know the time.

"Alright fellas twenty minutes to showtime," She said through the group commlink. As far as they all knew she was in contact with the other team, not someone else who also happened to be inside the bank. The shuttle changed its direction, and the pitch from the engines also changed as Besh (Not the human woman's real name, but Damia didn't exactly want a group of expendables knowing her name so they were all Aurek through Esk) headed in the new direction, getting ready to put the plan into action. None of them needed a big motivational speech, or another run down of the plan. They all knew what was to be done (or so they thought) and what could Damia say that would motivate them more than getting millions of credits?

 

[Noirceur]

The two gunships darted through the night sky, leaving a trail of neon on their heels as they did. Row row row, went the engines as the night drew around them. Ashkrik stood in one, dressed as a Black Sun. He was here, all as part of a ruse orchestrated by a mastermind going by the name of Lucifer. Ashkrik had no love for the man, but he respected him nontheless. His team readied their weapons, and the pilots in the helm of the ship warmed up the weapon systems. They would be the physicall representaion of the farce, blasting the crap out of the main floor and exposing the underground spice dealings. They would move all active transfers to private accounts, and open the vault, all as part of this act-up. Ashkrik had no real trouble finding men for the job. Funnily enough, these men actually thought that they were Black Sun initiates, and that this was a mission for them to prove thmesleves and earn full membership within the syndicate. Truly, they couldn't be more stupid.

There was a Rodian who was wanted in six systems for bomb attacks and terrorism. The Rodian had actually blown his way out of prision. Ashkrik promised him law-imunity if he "joined the Black Suns", because the syndicate was looking for his services. A lie.

Then, there were two Nikto, who were actually twins. These Nikto became famous in the crime world after they murdered a succesful company's CEO, with a clever little plan. Utilizing their identical features to their advantage, they managed to get security confused and had them believe that the assassin could move five floors in three seconds, while in reality, they were two assassins. By the end, security couldn't hope to move all those floors, and the two Nikto stormed the CEO's penthouse and revealed the true face of their plan, and murdered him. Ashkrik had promised to give them full ownership of that company in return for their services to the Black Suns. Another lie.

The last man in his gunship, a Shistavanen, had been a succsesful shock-boxing champion, until his unbeaten record was eneded when a Cathar defeated him in the championship, costing the Shistavanen millions of credits of sponsors and the like. In exchange of joining the Black Suns, Ashkrik had promised him that the Cathar would meet a gruesome end. Yet another lie.

In the second gunship there were two humans, who were actually promised by Ashkrik that the only way he wouldn't gut them down and hand their innards to his pet Gizka would be by joining the Suns. That one, wasn't a lie. These two men were random people in all aspects, except in one: One of them had hacked into the bank account of the Hutt that murdered his family, and the second one had hacked an Imperial data file, scribbling the words "**** The Imperium" all across the files. These two would prove judgamental when hacking into the bank accounts to transfer them to several private accounts they themsleves had created.

There was also a young male Zeltron who Ashkrik had picked up on a street. The Zeltron knew everything about spice, being a former addict himself. Ashkrik's plan was to bring this Zeltron with him when he stormed the penthouse, and have him give the CEO a mumbo-jumbo on his spice network, just to spite him. Ashkrik had promised him a life. A home. Just another lie.

Ashkrik walked to the helm of the gunship, and opened the intercom, adressing both of the gunships.

-"This is it, men. You wanted a chance to prove yourself to the Kurios? Well, here you have it! You live through this, and I slap the Black Sun insignia on your arm, and grant you full membership. You die, and I'll take a piss over your corpse! Let's rain hell down on these mother****ers!"-

The two gunships continued racing towards the bank, with weapons ablaze and all systems green. As much as Ashkrik despised humans, he had to give it to Lucifer. This was a most ingenous plan. He could spot the neon lights of the bank in the distance. He couldn't be sure, but he half suspected Lucifer had picked him out of necessity, rather than choice.

He checked his clock. Everything was perfect.

 

[Butler]

A glance snuck over their heads to the half face peering around the corner in the distance, a security badge nametag resting pinned on his chest. Fingers clasped the corner, then suddenly released. Its gold paint sparkled in Lucifer's blue eye before it disappeared. So everything was set in place then. Lucifer's gaze swept back over them all with an aberrant menacing, one hand stretching out to give them greeting while the other held gently against his side; cupping his abdomen as though adoring its fine definition, yet in actuality touching the oxygen mask concealed beneath the flap of his suit jacket. Caressing the surface shape of that mask, he likened its embrace with the success of this day. Indeed Rome could not be built in a day. But it could be stolen.

"Gentlemen please. One at a time. I'm sure Mr. Vapaelraizo will have plenty of time to address the board, and all your interests, once we've first discussed his offer."

"Thank you, Mr...Selnhiem...is it?" Lucifer read the tall man's managerial nametag, a common formality and advantageous uniformity among the workers of this place; in favor of the ambiguous visitor such as himself.

"Very good. But your Pau'an rasp needs to be more aggressive." The stripe-faced Pau'an slightly lowered his head cordially.

"I'll have to work on that," Lucifer sinisterly smiled with a nod of his own.

"Come gentlemen. We've much to discuss. In fact I've arranged for you to meet our CEO, Mr. Vapaelraizo. Your early arrival is fortuitous. He was just on his way out."

"Splendid..."

Selnhiem led the way, Lucifer by his side and the rest of the share holders in tow, a mix of alien races ranging from Roonans to Quermians, making their way onto the main floor. Massive, to say the least, the tan marble floors were awash with a mahogany splash pattern that ran through the thick tiles like a sinful river, spreading up through the walls and strong pillars and into the mural ceiling; an internal dome depicting the historically horrific battles towards civility in the acid clouds of an ancient race. Lucifer's head arced over an entranced amazement. Not at what it was, but what he envisioned it could be. The others couldn't stop rambling, hounding Lucifer for his connection to the Cartel. Yet with every glance from a teller or a desk agent working at their podiums, the towering Pau'an in the lead sucked his teeth at them and they quickly lowered their heads and returned to business as if they were sworn to secrecy. He had them trained well here. Yet as they crossed passed the large stairwell towards the main elevator, behind the caged center block of cashiers and counters, Lucifer pretended to ignore the workers in his periphery and instead continued marveling at this place's magnificence.

The lift opened, they entered, the doors closed, and the Pau'an plugged in his unique key into the terminal and pressed the button to the highest floor. The lift drifted into an accelerated ascent, and they indulged in further small talk; Lucifer breaking the idle requests that seemed to turn deeper and deeper into possibilities of Hutt holdings for more personal questions regarding Selnhiem's family, of which he only seemed to have a lifemate.

The doors opened, spreading wide to the stable reception area. This place was like one giant safe. Lucifer casually smiled specifically towards the pink skinned lady behind the desk as they all strode towards the massive doors, and the Pau'an swiped a different security card through the panel and entered the code 5847. The doors unlocked with an audible click, and then peeled back wide; breaking breadth into a spacious flat, one long board table to the right and a lounge area to the left. At the back, next to the strip of green putting grass, there sat the CEO; finishing up a short conference call. Standing next to him, looking up from their business, was Egliard Luthred, a red skinned Devaronian who ran the bank on the day to day.

"There he is, our man of the hour," shouted Luthred from across the spanning distance.

"Egliard, good morning."

"Ip'hap," Luthred directed at Selnhiem with a curious sharpness, apparently the Pau'an's first name.

"Sir. Another smooth morning on the floor," Selnhiem answered with a reserved resentment.

Lucifer's brow twitched in curiosity to what that tiny morsel meant, the subtle curl of the corner of his mouth uncontainable. Selnhiem lowered his head and then left them to return to the elevator and the main floor.

"Mr. Selnhiem, it was a pleasure." As he watched the Pau'an leave them, he though to himself that if he survived this day, he might have a place in Lucifer's new administration. Lucifer returned to the long strip of a walk towards Luthred and the CEO, too aware of how long he'd have to hold his arm at his side before coming close enough to raise it and offer handshake. "Egliard," he finally managed as he reached him with that handshake in mind. "Ah, my apologies keeping you," he directed towards the other.

"Lucifer, allow me to introduce you to the man who makes it all possible, Ethas Tethra'han," said Selnhiem.

"Lucifer," came the unnervingly low base of the Chagrian's voice.

"What a fine clockwork you run here," Lucifer bowed, cupping a hand into his waste.

But when looking up, Lucifer now noticed the massive Tunrothi guards in either corner; but pretended to be focused on the spanning painting across the back wall of several white flurry animals being violently snatched up for the slaughter of a sacrifice, one already being sliced open upon an alter.

"Do you like it? It's a Saffa painting. Rare," mouthed the Chagrian's baritone, breath like volcanic bile.

Lucifer grinned and arose to assume his podium, pacing back and forth in his last moments before all hell would break loose.

[YOUTUBE]GykrdkFYBcM[/YOUTUBE]​

"Quite apropos. Stalking the lamb, severing its vitals and staining the stone; letting its red liquid flow in order to stave off the god's wrath, just there, peering from the heavens as if to threaten death at any moment. It reminds me of why we're here. Keeping what's ours and burying it in the ground in spite of the god looming over us. We deny him death, even as he threatens us with that very thing we are to sacrifice. But here, we are scattered, afraid; depicted as naked and primitive creatures of mythos. But together we toil, we scrape and dig underground, until our underworld overrules the heavens. Triellus the galloping minotaur hurling the calf, the Cartel the writhing sea creature in a stricken agony. Both offer one piece of submission, one giving the calf and the other searing its flesh from lightning bolt. But unlike those who slay their own stock, we prove them the fools. Triellus offering the livestock of another while it flees back to its empire in the forest, untouched. The Cartel offering nothing but penance, losing an arm when four more reach deep beneath the surface. These are the rulers of darkness, playing the rules yet bending them to their will. I come to connect our roots, to ...invest in your expansion of the underground. An account, on the surface, we will flood your forest into surplus. Though when root more resembles water it must be called such. And so, with our brand, we will offer our securities and channels in merging of our joint ventures. Of course, we only seek to own fifteen percent. A joining that will grow us both exponentially. Including your...spice ring."

Egliard erupted with outrage to the mention of their secretive spice trade, the Tunrothi guards stepping closer on call as Ethas joined in; Lucifer keeping their accusations aimed at his numbers and not his knowledge of their alleged dealings. The argument over assumed information turned into debate over possibility of compatibility, and Lucifer seemed to shift them past offense and into business of pride. It became a matter of money and holdings. But as much as they managed to discuss, it seemed impossible to get them to accept a partial buyout from the Cartel despite all they would gain; despite all they would retain without a change to their name. To be expected. He had them right where he wanted them, in a bickering defense.

...Suddenly the bank's buffering outer shield went offline, precisely twenty minutes from arrival.

 

[Galavant]

BOOM!

The shuttle's mass driver thundered, and the projectile found its mark in the atmospheric failsafe before darting away, from the hangar and around to the other size of the bank. Damia didn't plan on screwing around with doors, or elevators. That was what the bank wanted, they wanted you to try bust through all the different layers of security built into to each door, get stuck trying to get another floor, or at least be slowed down so security could respond. Far away from the main floor, from what Dorn had told her, the IT department and all the fun tech stuff was shoved in a corner from what he'd told her, not far from the servers and all the other fun technical stuff they were trying to get to.

As soon as the shuttle made it back to this area of the bank, the hatch at the rear opened, and shuttle turned so it was facing the bank.

"Esk you're up," Damia said over the comm as toxic wind spilled into the the shuttle. The big Neimodian grunted in response, and hefted a weapon that went with his physical prowess perfectly; a grenade launcher. It was loaded fully with smoke grenades to make it harder for security to get a bead on them, save for one.

Knock knock, Damia thought, watching him move to the rear of the shuttle, and shoulder the weapon. He took aim at the side of the bank and fired. The actually sound of the weapon was only a dull thud, muffled by the atmosphere and her own helmet, but the explosion was almost as loud as the mass driver firing. Were it not for the fact that there was a much more heavily armed team raising merry hell elsewhere, Damia would've bet they'd have a lot of security to deal with right now. With the explosions, and another team entirely moving in from a different direction, that would be going after the arguably more valuable assets of the bank, hopefully they'd be light on the ground long enough for them to get to the sever hub.

"Besh back us up," Damia told their pilot, and the shuttle started backing up slowly towards the entrance Esk had just created. Before it hit the bank it stopped, hovering in mid-air with a tiny crack of space between it and the building showing just far down the ground was.

"Alright everybody out," Damia told them, and watched as they all filed out. She could get used to this giving orders thing. Even the pilot got, a part of the plan being that they leave it here to further distract security, and link up with the other team at some point for their ride out. That was never going to happen of course, but it got them all out of the transport, and it would get them all out of the server hub and headed in a direction of death when the time came.

Stepping into the bank for the first time, was stepping into a scene of pandemonium. There were a few bodies, a lot of screaming, a lot of people running every which way, the fire suppression system was going off, and somebody's computer had apparently had the volume turned all the way up at some point, and the user had been using headphones that had come unplugged, because it was very loudly declaring "You have mail."

Damia would have hated to be security in this situation, odds were they'd hit their fellow employees before they hit any of the intruders. The team had been not to kill or shoot anyone that didn't look to have a blaster in their hands. It added to the belief they all had that this was just a heist, bank robbers with higher body counts were typically hounded a lot harder than those with fewer. Cresh and Esk knocked a few fellows out as they moved in but nothing worse than that, not yet at least. They still had to get to the server and fast, before security figured out what going. As they moved into the inner halls of the bank to do just that, Damia pulled her Duratablet back out and typed out a message, using the same methods that the man who'd left them the go message had to leave one for him. As far the team knew she was using it to securely coordinate with the other team, and so none of them looked at her with any suspicion as they moved quietly through the halls. There was no witty banter, or idle chat. Whatever else these people were, they weren't friends, they were in it for the payday of their lives. As they continued Damia made sure there was a small time delay on the message so it wouldn't arrive at any point that could be deemed suspicious.

To: UNKNOWN

REMINDER OF DOCTOR'S APPOINTMENT
SCHEDULED TO OCCUR IN: TWO WEEKS, 17 HOURS
AT LOCATION: NAR SHADDAA, HYLO VSIZ MEMORIAL HOSPITAL

 

[Noirceur]

The bank was now clear in the horizon, the neon lights glistening through the dark skies. Ashkrik let out a small chuckle as he read the message, crossing his arms on his chest. The gunships were now directly in front of the bank's main entrance, attracting everyone's attention. Heads turned to see the two gunships levitating in the night, like a pair of hungry wolves waiting for their prey. Ashkrik grabbed one of the gas masks, his team quickly following suit. When he finished putting it on, he grunted through the inter-com one single word that was about to start pandenium. One single word that was gonna start insanity. One single word that was gonna start the fire.

-"Fire"-​

And they fired, blasting the base floor causing widespread panic, people exiting through every possible exit, running over each other like rats. The base floor could take quite a blast, but it wasn't built to whitstand somehing like this, especially with the shields down. The oxygen atmosphere system was incinerated, leaving the bank as toxic as the outside. The gunships continued firing, with the base floor cracking more and more each time. Bang, Bang, Bang! went the lasers, with the vibrations shaking the insides of both ships. After much, the base floor could hold no longer and it fell down, crushing most underneath. To nobodys great surprise, the entire spice operation was now exposed, out in the open. Ashkrik let out a loud laughter, as the gunships darted along the building and settled down directly in front of the main floor. It was crowded with civilians attempting to get out and security forces trying a vain attempt to hold the line. The gates of both gunships opened, revealing the men inside, dressed in Black Suns uniforms and armed to the teeth. Ashkrik led the charge, blasting at the poorly armed, poorly trained security guards, decimating them in seconds. With the people scattering around, Ashkrik put out his Salvo Pistol, and walking into the lobby, he fired at the roof, ending the chatter.

-"Greetings. My name is Gerrun Frasshak. I'll put it easy on you people. I am your new boss. That makes me, the one who puts the rules, no? I'll be brief. Rule number one! Try to sound an alarm, or contact anyone, and you will be shot! Rule number two! Try to run, and you will be shot! Rule number three! Pull out a weapon, or threaten any of us, and you will be shot! And rule number four! You will do exactly what I tell you, exactly how I tell you, or you will be, hehe, lucky guess! Shot!-"

Just then, from the crowds, a young human stepped up and challenged Ashkrik.

-"You are crazy! We will never submit to your----" He was cut short as three rounds from Ashkrik's V-13 Salvo Pistol hit him straight in the face, sending him flying backwards, smoke coming out of the bloody holes in his forehead.


-"Objection noted. Any questions?-"

After seeing what happened to the man, no one dared to step out of line. Tranquility. Ashkrik liked it. He had all these people under his fist, willing to do anything just to live. He commanded his two hackers to slice the bank terminals, and transmit all active transfers to three private accounts on Nar Shadda Great Trust Bank, all as part of the ruse. As they did, Ghuun, the Rodian demolitions expert was going man by man, woaman by woman, child by child, strapping a thermal detonator to their chests. He held the detonator, twiggling it in his fingers. He really had no intention of blowing them up, but it would be fun to see how the CEO would react. Maybe scare them a little. He held up his data-pad, just as he finished instructing some men to try and open the vault. They wouldn't be able to, but it was all part of the ruse.

15:45​

To:UNKNOWN; UNKNOWN

The oven is burning! Call the firefighters!