The rest of the crew assembled on the Observation Deck to meet the latest editions to their numbers. After the revelation that their worlds are gone, many of them are even more eager to see people they knew from home.

Several people are set up near the doors to provide the new people with omnicoms and comm rings. New crew-mates might see a green-skinned alien and snake girl among their number. There are also several authoritative-looking figures ready to introduce themselves.

There's a lot to tell the new people. It's going to be a lot to take in.

[ooc: Only new characters and Command Staff can start new threads for introductions, to limit the number of threads. Everyone else, just tag in and have your guys greet the newbies.]

Thrawn had gathered and reviewed every scrap of information Stacy had about the disastrous battle with the Ohm--every after-action report, every camera angle. Now, in the Sensorium, he was watching the skirmish unfold in three unsettling dimensions. It was a reconstruction, only as good as the crews' accounts and his own tactical skill. The latter, at least, was formidable.

Parts of the battlefield were empty, grayed-out in a literal "fog of war," where Thrawn had too little information to fill them in. They shifted and flowed as the fight progressed, crewmembers and Ohm disappearing into them and then popping back into existence where the records picked up again.

Gradually, however, the blank spaces were disappearing, as Thrawn ran various scenarios and decided on the most likely. Combat would pause, reverse itself, and then resume with tiny differences, again and again, as bit by bit, with infinite patience, the Grand Admiral recreated the battle to his satisfaction.

If he had any say in the matter, no confrontation with the Ohm would go so poorly again.

The fight on the planet had gone rather poorly for Rhiow - some well-meaning but wholly ignorant tourist had scooped her up to toss her with the rest of the planet's animals, thinking she was someone's pet. It had been the work of moments to work a short-transit out of there, but with the Ohm numbers so thick and with her separated from the crew, she had decided that retreat was the better part of valor and gotten on board the nearest shuttle back to Stacy.

Sometimes, it was better to live to fight another day.

Now she trotted through the perpetually empty streets of the City, with one destination in mind. Since she had been staying with Tycho and Wedge in their quarters, she had made frequent visits to Grand Central in a continuing attempt to repair the damage. She saw signs that others had been here to do the same - sometimes when she came back, whole walls that had been crumbled now stood restored. It always made her whiskers quiver with barely contained emotion, and she had to sit and groom to compose herself.

Now, the only thing that still lay in shambles was the facade on the front of the building - the statues lay on the ground in disarray and the giant, flawless panel of Tiffany glass that should have covered the great clock was shattered all around.

That would be first. She had avoided walking in this area for so long, but now she carefully moved around it, scraping the pieces of glass together with the backs of her paws until it lay arranged in a big circle. Then she sat down and looked at it closely.

"Wouldn't you rather be one piece again?" she asked, the Speech rolling off her tongue with a little bit of power behind it. "Have people look at you and admire you, feel the heartbeat of the ticking clock at your back and watch the coming and going of thousands - wouldn't you rather? Here's some energy to put yourself back together - a little heat, to fuse it -"

The atoms in the circle of glass began to vibrate, and as she watched, it began to fuse back into place, little by little, until the sparkling plate of glass was once again whole. Rhiow put her ears forward, pleased, and lay down with her head on her paws, looking very satisfied with herself.

Now to get someone with thumbs to put it back where it belonged.

Wedge was tired. He hadn't slept much since they'd gotten back to the ship. He'd been busy going over recordings, sensor-readings and other data from their fight with the Ohm. And in between that he'd been checking up on Shinn in the med bay and moving furniture and other things into the headquarters. But this was important. Discussing what had happened, getting impressions from his people and speaking to them about it would be important. So he waited, leaning against the wall in the briefing room, which had been refurnished, along with the other rooms of the headquarters. At least no one was dead, right?

The very first thing Tycho did after he disembarked, was to buy a pair of shorts and a shirt, in a lightweight summery material (along with some underwear) and some sunglasses. He stashed his plantsuit in the shopping bag, and then, pulling up a map of the city on his omicom, set out to familiarize himself with the environs.

As much as Tycho liked the idea of getting some drinks and hitting the beach, it was impossible to say how long Stacy would actually allow them to remain on this planet. The smart thing to do would be to get the needed supply gathering done first so that in the event of anything unexpected happening, they would not be forced to leave without stocking up.

Tycho gave a cursory examination to the shops meant for tourists, but he had no doubt the prices were inflated there, and they would not have things in the amounts he needed. No, instead what he wanted was to find where the shops purchased their supplies from.

It would take some sleuth work, but Tycho was sure he was up to the task. He headed down another commercial street that looked promising.

Suddenly, the usual relative peace of the ship is disrupted by a rather loud announcement from Stacy.

||Attention, Attention. All personnel please report to the Observation Deck. Attention, Attention. All personnel please report to the Observation Deck. Attention, Attention, all personnel...||

It's entirely likely that she won't stop repeating the announcement until, well, everyone reports to Obs Deck. The mouth in the huge statue on the wall opens, revealing a screen. On it, the dossier for the mission flickers into display, understandable to every person there. Smaller copies of the dossier appear in holographic form in front of everyone.

The planet's stats, right next to a rotating picture of it, blue with thousands of small islands just barely visible, are as follows:

( Mission Dossier )

--

...Waitaminute. That's no mission.

It's a goddamn vacation.

[ooc: SHORE LEAVE IS GO.]

Tycho was glad the squadron had so many new recruits, and he certainly didn't mind the sizable increase in his work-load that went along with it. After all, that's what his job as squadron XO was; making sure everything was organized. Still though, when it came down to it, Tycho was a pilot. He felt far more comfortable in the cockpit of a fighter than he did anywhere else.

Today, today he could use the distraction of some demanding piloting. Today, he wanted to go fast.

The sensoriums resolved themselves into the familiar hanger bay of the Mon Cal star cruiser Home One. The atmosphere was tense, buzzing with the familiar adrenaline high of before a major battle. With a grin, Tycho hoisted himself into the cockpit of his temporary ship, an A-Wing. Expertly, his fingers flicked over the controls, even as he logged into his squadron's com channel. "Green three has four lit and ready when you are," he informed Green Leader. Then they were off, forming up in a screen with the other fighters, ready to make the short jump to Endor.

Back in realspace, the fighter screen streamed towards the half finished Death Star, until there was Lando's voice on the coms, barking at them to pull back. It was a trap, the Death Star's shields were still up- even knowing it was coming, Tycho's stomach still clenched. But now, now here's where the fun part came in. He allowed himself a small smile as his craft turned to engage the oncoming wave of TIE-fighters. His A-Wing danced, his A-Wing soared, and TIE after TIE met their ends.

Tycho was a different pilot than he had been at the actual Battle of Endor 9 years earlier. He was older, more experienced. Still, he got the same joy out of flying that he always had, that same feeling of this is what I was meant to do.


[OOC: if anyone wants to come in and observe the battle, or hop in another fighter and join in, that's cool! Tycho's mostly just vapin some Imps to blow off steam. If you're not familiar with the Battle of Endor (the fight against the second Death Star) the video is here]

[Closed to the mechanics and engineers who are going to be involved in the Great Rogue Upgrade project. see this com post.]

The sensoriums had been set to look like an empty hangar in which a couple X-Wings sat. Tycho had no idea what else the engineers would need for their initial planing phase, but he figured whatever it was, they could tell the sensorium to create it themselves.

He conjured himself up a crate to sit on, and scrolled through some squadron numbers on his datapad as he waited for everyone to arrive.

Arha did not care if he did not wish her there.  She came with her hair loose, clad in her plantsuit, barefoot, empty handed.  This was not a lightsaber battle, nor was it one of any blade at all.  She had peeled the plantsuit up to allow her feet to dig in against the deck of the medical room, should she need it.  There was no steeling in preparation, she came open, her shields dropped and baldfaced before Vader.

She studied him from the doorway, her head tilted and her blue-within-blue eyes half-slitted in contemplation.  He would be rude, she would ignore it, he would yell, and she would speak softly.  The poison in him, this Dark Side, it was just poison.  Arha had survived The Water of Life--so, too, would she survive the taint that flowed through him. 

Poison always burned.

She swept a cursory probe over the work she had done the day before and found it well and still healing.  It needed help, but this was why she came.  It was not easy to initiate contact, to push aside the darkness, but such a thing was to be done and she would get better at doing it in time.  She moved into the room and took a seat beside his bed.

For the moment, she sad nothing.

[[For this post I have music: Canvas.]]

Wedge had set up the headquarters for yet another meet and greet operation. The headquarters, of course, was simply an abandoned building with appropriate facilities he had commandeered in the city. A low building of bright red brick, it had at some point been an office complex. Now it was the headquarters of the best fighter squadron anywhere (or so the reputation went). A crude sign and been painted over the front of the building reading 'Rogue Squadron Headquarters,' replacing the precious owners which had advertised for insurance of some type. The front offices had been set up for use by Wedge and his small staff (now including Tycho, Ben and Nura) to run the squadron. Another side room had been set up as a 'pilot lounge,' though at the moment it only had some spare office furniture. Couches and other things were hard to come by on Stacy. Finally, the largest room had been converted into a briefing room of sorts, with a projector and several rows of seating, as well as tables that could be stowed or set up as needed.

At the moment there were simply chairs scattered around the edge of the room. Wedge waited, occasionally checking his chronometer. Hopefully everyone would arrive and mingle, and then he could get down to the business of letting them know exactly what they were in for.

<sub>[[OOC: Feel free to tag each other, please!

The briefing has started!]]</sub>

Tycho had gotten his memories restored. It had been every bit as bad as he'd feared it would be, but just because it was bad, didn't mean he could turn away. All those beings (so many beings) deserved to be remembered, deserved to have someone carry the weight of their deaths, to have someone fight for them. As well, there was also that the more information they had on the Ohm, the better. He'd also just watched the recordings of the information session Aang and Cargan had given, but nothing compared to actually witnessing it with his own eyes.

The force they were up against seemed impossible to beat.

But Tycho could not let it overwhelm him, would not. So here he was, sitting in the sensoriums, trying to find his center again, trying to find a place of peace and calm within him from which he could act with confidence. The sensoriums had flawlessly recreated the Alderaani peace gardens, from Aldera City, and now Tycho sat on a bench along one of their soothing paths, eyes shut as he just breathed in the air of his home. He breathed deeply and tried to center himself, tried to push all that fear and doubt and anger out of him.

He'd sent out a couple com messages to a few people on the ship letting them know where he was, and the sensorium door was unlocked, in case anyone needed to talk to him.

[Continued from here]

Thrawn's reputation said that nothing escaped him; given the man's record, Tycho was inclined to believe it. Thus he was sure Thrawn had noticed the side-long glances Tycho kept shooting him as he guided the Chiss down Stacy's corridors, pointing out locations of interest. The passed corridors leading to the transport tubes, the media library and the sleeping halls and crew quarters before they finally reached the sensoriums. Tycho was normally a quiet, reserved man, but Thrawn's presence had made him even quieter. He had a million things he wanted to know, but he doubted there was any way he could ask that would be sufficiently subtle or clever enough to get past Thrawn.

The sensorium chamber they entered was a large blank room. "Well, here we are," Tycho said redundantly. "And-" he shut his eyes, and suddenly they were standing on a balcony on the upper level of the Imperial Palace, looking out over a night-time view of Coruscant's skyline. Speeders and other hover-traffic whizzed by in the distance, and far above, the lights of sky hooks twinkled distantly. A cool night breeze blew on their faces. From the open balcony doors behind them came a warm spill of light and the tinkling sound of soft music and laughter. Clearly some kind of event was taking place, probably one Tycho remembered having attended. The scene now created, Tycho opened his eyes and turned to look at Thrawn. "-that's how they work," he finished.

He waited, hands clasped behind his back, for the other man's reaction.

As usual Tycho had arrived at the designated meeting place at the debriefing room in Rogue Squadron's headquarters a little ahead of time. There was nothing for him to prepare really, but he'd called the meeting, so it was still good for him to be there first.

The room contained a semi-circle of chairs which faced a projector screen, and Tycho sat himself in one of them, looking something over on his datapad as he waited for the others to arrive. Someone who knew him well would see that his jaw muscles were tight, the only outward sign he was showing of how seriously he took this. Deciding what they were going to do about Darth Vader was a Big Deal.

Stacy's voice speaks over the whole of the ship. What she has to say has become very familiar over the the podlings have spent here.

||Pod Release Protocols Initiating,|| she says. ||Please proceed to the Observation Deck to meet your new crew mates.||

Those crew members that don't head to the Obs Deck on their own are hurried there via gentle but insistent tentacles. A few people stop by Engineering to help bring and pass out omnicoms and comm rings to the new crew members as well.

[ooc: Only new characters and Command Staff can start new threads for introductions, to limit the number of threads. Everyone else, just tag in and have your guys greet the newbies.]

Sometime during the regular comings and goings aboard the meatship, an announcement rings out across all portions of the ship.

||Attention crew,|| Stacy's voice says, ||As significant interest has been shown for it, and enough time has passed since the Nightmare King incident to prevent unnecessary mental issues, the procedure to unlock the memories of the destruction of your homeworlds is now available to all crew members. If you are interested, please proceed to any empty sensorium and I will begin the process.||

A slight pause, then...

||If you have a history of mental issues, please use extra consideration when deciding on whether or not to take the procedure. That is all.||

Should anyone decide to take her up on her offer and head to the sensoriums, they'd find a clean, clinical-looking white room with a dentist-style chair (sans scary drills, of course) in the middle.

||Please, take a seat.||

[OOC:Instructions.]

[Bendytimed to the morning after this post]

Tycho had slept for a very long time indeed- obviously he'd need a lot of recuperation from Arha's healing. After he finally awoke, he got on the com network and sent messages to those people he knew, letting them know that he was okay.

Now, he had been ordered to stay in bed until the doctor came to check up on him again, so he sat, with the head of his bed raised, data pad in hand, looking over the numbers from the latest Rogue Squadron training exercise.

He's honestly not paying that much attention to what he's doing. Won't you come in and bother him?

[bendytimed to directly after this thread]

It was the oddest sensation, nothing like entering hyperspace- nothing like anything Tycho had ever felt before, really. But one moment, they were sitting in the corridor, the next moment the world seemed to close in around them and suddenly, Tycho was sitting on the floor in the medbay. His ears popped, and he shook his head to try to clear it before taking in their surroundings. Tycho practically sagged in relief- well more than he was already sagging, anyway. He honestly wasn't sure he could have made the walk all the way to the medbay on his own power. "Thanks, Rhiow," he rasped, "you're a real life-saver." Best to not think if that was merely rhetorical or not. The slashes weren't that bad, they just weren't, but he had been bleeding for a while ... Gingerly, Tycho tried to push himself up, intending on looking for something he could use as a bandage- he had to take his hand off his chest to do so, pushing on the floor, and almost slipped on his own blood. "Sithspawn," he hissed, as his chest knocked against his knees. The whole front of his orange flight suit was soaked with blood now, but Tycho didn't pay it any attention. Gritting his teeth, he tried to stand again, this time even more carefully.

<<This is Rogue Three, ready for launch.  Update needed on the current situation,>> Arha said over the radio, making sure her chin strap was securely fastened and her helmet was properly sealed.

<<Rogue Three, you are cleared for launch.  Please be advised--it is messy out there.  We have a frigate down.  They will need evac.  Escort Evac Shuttle 1 and 2 to the given coordinates.  Heavy enemy fire incoming,>> came the clipped voice of the communications officer on duty.  <<Stay sharp, Rogue Three.>>

<<Copy that,>> Arha snapped, <<primed and launching.>>

There was a certain thrill that came with a proper launch and she did it the way she'd been taught--nice and smooth.  The two shuttles were flanked by several other fragments of wings.  It was their job to shoot down any missile fire either ship took.  Arha sidled up to Evac 1, taking its wing as the rest of the formation solidified.  It was an uneventful run until halfway back when missiles started coming in like worms on a shield.  Arha grit her teeth as she shot down another and twisted away to go after an enemy fighter intent upon ramming Evac 1.  She wasn't satisfied with the near miss at all and struggled to maintain formation, shielding the shuttle craft with her X-Wing as well as shooting down anything incoming.  She worked with the pilots, her mind racing to predict and interpret from her Jed-Eye and Bene Gesserit senses.

Arha had no idea how long she'd been at this, but it was getting to the point where she was actually sweating--something she rarely did thanks to her control of her body.  She cursed in Fremen as a swarm of TIE fighters closed in.

New Canton training grounds. It was a decent camp, full of find memories of Independent soldiers going through basic training as the War for Independence kicked off. Gwen had spent a good deal of time stomping and marching over every inch of the camp from the mountains off in the distance to along the river bank to the east of the barracks. The place she had picked for the testing of explosives was where her cavalry unit had tested our their tanks, their skiffs, their mortars, and pretty much everything they had ever used to go boom with. It gave the red head a giddy feeling as she wheeled the red sorrel horse around for another run at the targets she had asked Stacy to supply at the ends. A small sprint for the animal, yes, but the challenge was getting the required number of shots off in the target zone before hitting a certain mark.

Gwen was really going to have to do this more often.

Wheeling the horse back around she urged the mare forward bringing up her g-36 rifle to her shoulder popping off two rounds as she hit the first mark. Three more as the second passed, and a final try as the horse came within distance of the last. Carefully the red head pulled back on the reins while the horse chomped at the bit in her mouth, encouraging her to move over to the target. That was when Gwen scowled- shy on the last shot of hitting inside the zone. The others were sound enough for a kill shot, but that last one? She was going to have to try it again. Giving her chrono a glance she figured there was enough time for one more round before Kyle or Tycho were to show up. With a hoot and a hollar the red head wheeled the horse back around grinning like a fool. Yep- one more round.

Characters: Samuel Henderson, OPEN
Location: Corridor outside the Obs Deck, a bit out of the way
Time: Immediately following the explanation of the current state of affairs re: the Ohm, worlds, and whatnot.
Summary: Sam loses it. And nearly himself in the process.
Warnings: Definite blood warning, and anyone that tags may be attacked. Poke me on AIM (girlnamedlance) or via OOC comment if you want to work out something specific. Generally, I'm open to anything, I just don't want any kind of long lasting damage. And I'd like a little chaos to ensue before Spike, Leon, or anyone subdues him. And if he ends up in the brig awhile, I totally understand. Lastly, multiple threads are a-okay. 8D

( It would be easier to let go. )