Episode 3.08 Kanter's War, Chapter 8 Report
General Summary
Calling the situation ‘fluid’ was generous.
While Vanya, Vance, Captain Kolene, her droid, and myself took on the last of the pirates in the Council Center, So'Zen went after the raid leader, a Trandoshan named Gruk Equitch. What I know from here is secondhand from security holovids and Jedi explanation.
So’Zen used his own skills that Togrutans have with sensing direction to get a general area where Grut was. The Trandoshan was out in his cloaksuit hunting… mostly going after Kunla the wookiee. Once he had a rough idea where the Trandoshan was hiding, So’Zen used the Force to kick up a dust cloud to coat the Trandoshan in dust.
The Trandoshan went after So’Zen the moment that dust frakked up the cloaksuit.
Inside the Council center, between the group of us, we brought down all but one of the pirates. That last one used some sort of wrist gadget to keep himself up and going. I thought it was a stimpack until his eyes went yellow and Vanya got a lot more serious about taking this guy down.
When Vanya goes all ‘I sense darkness in you!’ I’ve learned that’s the time to makes sure I’ve extra power cells for my blasters…
Turns out the bracers, which all the pirates are wearing, are a custom stimpack. Sure there’s probably some sort of bacta in there, but Vanya says the chemical has Dark Side tainted spice, too. We collected every one of those we could find and stashed them inside So’Zen’s R2, Bishop.
Meanwhile, Reese was hacking at the town’s droid control systems. It didn’t help as well as he planned. But it got Bishop fixed back up from some blaster shots. Reese also got in touch with another mentat here in Chausid Station, an old friend named Rocky Elroad.
I really think we could drop Reese on an abandoned mining colony and somehow… he’d find a mentat he trained with.
After a quick conversation, there was something about a set of scanned flimsies from a ‘Tenocron Codex’ the pirates got from someone. A bunch of blueprints for a ‘Saber-Carapace Armor’. I’ve heard some stories about that power armor, nothing good. Lots of ‘Dark Side Alchemy’ and ‘the wearer getting possessed’. I’m good with my ARC “Crusader” armor, thanks so much.
After Reese shared that intel, I saw him come running through the Council Center to head upstairs. Most likely to take another whack at disabling the other comm jammers in town.
As for So’Zen and the Trandoshan, Gruk? From what I heard over comms, So’Zen actually talked the guy down. They wound up in a nearby cantina to discuss the ‘philosophy of the holy hunt’. There was something about a Trandoshan holy drink called T’gath and So’Zen order some stout drinks to go with that.
My guess? He got the pirate drunk, or is trying to. Frakkin’ good plan. That ties up one objective. No one said the Killian pirate raid leader had to be sober when captured.
But that wasn’t the biggest problem we had coming. That was two full on, life size, Saber-Carapace Armor wearing pirates coming down the street for us. Blasters mounted in the armor and some sort of sword that could throw energy bolts. I’ve seen nothing like it. Not sure I want to again.
Best chance would be to take them on one by one. Vanya was going to play distraction while I ambushed. Maybe drop a building on the guy, who knows?
While we were going to take this walking tank out, Vance threw on a disguise and headed for pirate HQ on the East side. Once there, he’d muck up whatever the pirates were doing and free the captured Freedwolds troopers. Hopefully.
That just left the other Carapace armored pirate. Captain Kolene took out after that one on her own. If she’s willing to take someone wearing that on by herself, she must have a plan in mind. Again, it may drop a building on the guy, but a plan is a plan!
