Face walked around the TIE fighter parked in the hangar, surrounded by the Nexu's Uglies, giving it an appraising look. Finally, he gently kicked the bottom of the righthand solar panel. 'Yep, he said to Luna, 'that's a fighter, all right.'
Luna rubbed her eyes wearily. Face could be so obtuse sometimes. He came to stand beside her, grinning, pleased with himself. 'What do you think of her?' he asked her.
Luna herself then looked over the fighter, though she didn't deign to kick it. Maybe it was the fact that she was so familiar with the shape, from history, from training, from real life battles, but the whole thing, inert and unmoving as it was, seemed to ooze evil. She shuddered. 'Pretty,' she said at last. 'When can Kai blow it up?'
'Oh, we're not going to blow it up,' said Face, then bobbled his head, as if rethinking. 'At least, I don't think so. We're going to fly it. Specifically,' he turned to face her, 'you.'
'What?' she exclaimed, startled.
Face grinned wickedly. 'We're in a precarious position right now, and we can't rely on repairs or new equipment from the New Republic,' he paused, 'if it still exists. We need to make do with what we have. I have a feeling we may need to adopt disguises along the way, pretend to be First Order.'
'Such a lovely thought,' said Luna sarcastically.
'I'll say,' he replied, and then tilted his head behind him. 'And on that note, follow me.' he walked out of the hangar and into the main hub. Luna took one more look at the TIE fighter, grimaced, then followed.
They wandered around the complex, Face deflecting Luna's questions, until they found the twins in the bottom-most room, which was filled with a large generator, which purred gently.
'How are things looking?' Face asked them.
'Awful,' said Garan morosely.
'What's wrong?' asked Luna, alarmed.
'Her.' said Garan, poking a thumb behind him. 'She wants to...to...modify it. It's working perfectly fine, but she wants to tinker with it,' he shuddered.
Face laughed. 'Well,' he said, 'I have a project I need both of you to handle, so no modifying.'
'You promise?' Garan asked hopefully.
'I promise,' said Face, and then, with a sly grin, added, 'for now.'
'You mother-' Garan started, but was interrupted by the arrival of Rana.
'What's happening?' she asked.
'Oh I was just being told about your plans to modify this beauty,' said Face, 'but', he continued, as he saw Rana's face light up, 'that will have to wait. I need you two to come with me.' and off he went again. The twins looked at Luna for an explanation, who shrugged. All three followed him up to the control room. When Luna was hovering over it in the Nest, it looked small, but inside, perhaps because all but the back wall was covered in glass, it seemed bigger. Several of the Nexus were lounging by the consoles and they gave Luna and the others odd looks, but Face ignored them as he wandered over to the right hand wall and looked out. He pointed to the heap of rubble that was the transmitting tower. 'Stupid question,' he said, 'but entertain an old man. Can you guys fix that?'
They all looked out the window, calculating. 'I'm not sure we have the parts,' said Rana, 'but I think we could scrounge parts from around the base. Might have to "borrow" some stuff from our neighbours though.' she grinned.
Face nodded. 'And how long would that take?'
'Couple of days, maybe. A week?'
'But after that we'd be able to continue transmitting along First Order channels?'
'What do you mean, "continue"?' Garan asked.
'Well,' he replied, 'this is a listening outpost. They take what they hear and pass it along. The people who receive that information are going to wonder why we've suddenly gone quiet. We need to keep up the act, just for the time being.'
'Uh, Face?' interrupted Luna, quickly realising the implications. 'You mean we're going to actively aid the enemy in wiping out our own people?'
Face looked at her steadily. 'I'm not happy about this,' he said evenly. 'But we haven't got much choice in the matter.'
'Surely there's another way?'
Face sighed. 'Say we don't,' he said, 'and say, in a week, maybe two, a patrol comes along to see what's up. They look at all this damage. We can maybe persuade them that we were attacked by pirates or New Republic or Re- or others. But then they'll come with repair crews and maybe even more stormtroopers to keep us safe. Pretty kind of them, but it does put a cramp on our plans.'
'Mm.'
'But say that doesn't happen,' he continued. 'At the very least, they'll be on the lookout for any malcontents in the area. Which means we can't malcontent in peace.'
'I still don't like it.'
I'm not asking you to. We need to do this.'
Luna hummed again, trying to think of another way out, but it was a solid argument. 'In that case,' she said, 'we can't wait a week. What if we used the Nest to transmit our reports?
Face frowned, then turned to the twins. 'How doable is that?'
The twins shared a look, silently communicating to each other. 'It's doable.' Garan said reluctantly. 'The thing about military transmittions is that the equipment itself often aids in the coding. We can tune into the correct channels just fine. But if someone takes too close a look, they'll notice something off.
Face stroked his moustache, then turned to the huddled mass by the consoles. 'Zatt! Fenn! You there?'
Two face popped up from behind a console station. Face gestured them over.
Face filled them in with the plan as they joined. 'How difficult do you think it'll be to emulate that built in coding? And not just that, but to exactly copy transmission protocols?' he asked. 'We need to be undetectable as long as possible.'
'They didn't exactly leave a manual for us to copy,' she said, letting out a long sigh. She bit her lip. 'It might take me a while to slice through their encryptions. But I think we can do it?' Fenn, beside her, was looking at their boots, as was their usual habit, but they nodded slightly.
'Great!' said Face. 'You have one hour.'
'What!'
'Just kidding.'
