A bit of a transition chapter here. Enjoy and thanks for reading.

I took my time returning to Odessen after escaping my mess on Coruscant. Their security department was probably pulling their hair out trying to figure out why the hell I stole what I stole. It was kinda funny, when I thought about it. I still enjoyed giving people a hard time. Some things never change.

Fortunately, I didn't take anything of any true value, so even if they figured out my identity, they'd have nothing too damning against me. I was almost positive they'd never figure out it was me, though. I was very careful with their automated security and even if I did run into the security officer again, he was probably too awed by being in the presence of an attractive female Jedi that he'd never remember my exact features.

I was just happy mimicking a Jedi was easy, as long as there was no fighting involved. I was next to useless with a lightsaber. I was happy that I took the time to purchase a blue crystal, rather than the original red. Not many Jedi carried red bladed lightsabers, though I made a mental note to get myself a lightsaber with a red blade to carry around on Imperial worlds, just in case. If this trick worked with Republic soldiers, there was no reason it wouldn't work with Imperials, too. It might even work better with them, since Imperials feared Sith.

I decided to stop by Port Nowhere, to confront Rogan about Corso being with the mercenary crew he sent our way. My friend swore he hadn't known. Considering he had only spoken to the leader of the crew, it made sense and I believed him. Rogan had no reason to lie, other than to spare my feelings, but he wasn't the type. He'd rather weather my anger, than hold back information which might make me mad.

After our quick stop, Bowdaar and I returned to the Alliance to find all hell had broken loose.

Rio had successfully captured the Gemini Template and had recruited the mandalorian clans to his cause. The young man serving as liaison between the Alliance and Mandalore was certainly nice to look at, though a little younger than I liked. I made sure to keep that thought to myself. Theron didn't need anything else to worry about, all things considered.

Shortly after returning with the template, Scorpio had thrown Rio a curveball, faking her own demise and taking over the Eternal Throne. It was a fast and confusing series of events and sounded like it had been the treacherous droid's intent the whole time.

So now, I sat as Rio and his advisers discussed what to do next. Scorpio was on the Throne, but didn't seem to desire to attack or cause trouble, at least not yet. Her motives for taking the throne were still a mystery. Arcann was on one of the Eternal Empire fleet ships, along with a small army not being controlled by Scorpio, for some reason. All we could do was wait for one of them to make a move.

Rio continued to talk quietly with Theron, but Lana broke off and walked up to me.

"Well, this seems to be a fine mess." I said.

Lana chuckled. "Seems like all we can manage these days." She looked over at Rio, then back at me. "I don't think it was wrong to bring Scorpio here. She was helpful and I'm not truly convinced she's against us. Whatever her plan is, I think we're only her enemy if we get in her way. Unfortunately, we have no idea what her plans are, so we can't even guess what we can do to prevent her from blowing Odessen out of existence."

"Well, if that were her goal, she'd have done it already." I replied, quietly.

Lana nodded. "My thoughts exactly. All we can do is wait and keep our eyes open. Force only knows what Arcann's doing with his army, though. He still doesn't know about Odessen, but that could change at any moment. I doubt he'll sit idle for long."

I stood, stretching my back. "One thing we can do is get some rest. Staying up, waiting for something that might take days or even weeks to happen, will only make us less efficient when the time comes."

"Again, you seem to read my mind. Your brother won't be hard to convince. He's practical about such things, but Theron…"

"Yeah, I know. One little stim implant and the man thinks he can go without sleep entirely. I'll talk to him."

We walked over to the small group by the main control hub. It looked like Rio was leaving things in Major Jorgan's hands. The soldier had not gone with them during Scorpio's plan, so he was still fresh enough to take over while Rio slept. Rio gave me a reassuring smile as he headed towards his chambers. I stood next to Theron.

"You need to get some sleep, too, ya know." I said. Truth be told, I was fairly exhausted myself. I was looking forward to sleeping next to Theron, after the last couple of weeks on my ship with only Bowdaar. All the sneaking around was exhausting and I didn't like sleeping alone.

"I'll be fine for a little longer." He replied, not looking in my direction.

"No you won't. Everyone else is off to get some rest. You and I need to sleep too and you know I hate sleeping alone." I gave his arm a slight tug.

Theron sighed and turned to me. "You're not going to let me get anything done, are you?"

I smiled up at him. "You know me so well. Besides, I can tell you about my adventure on Coruscant before we go to bed. It'll make a fine bedtime story."

Giving up, Theron logged out of the system he was in and allowed me to take his arm and drag him towards his chambers. When it came to sleeping arrangements, we traded off between my ship and his room. If only sleep was to be involved, we'd stay at his place. If more amorous activities were likely, we'd stay on my ship. Neither of us were very good at keeping the volume down when we were together and my ship afforded far more privacy.

"So, what happened on Coruscant? I thought you were just doing another medcenter run." He asked.

"That was the plan. I did what I usually do, visit a backwater medcenter and do a data dump on their medical supply files. This time, however, I picked a medcenter in Justicar territory, not knowing the area had recently been retaken by Republic security. The medcenter was closed, so I broke in."

"And you got captured." Theron theorized.

"I got discovered on my way out. Fortunately, the security officer was just a kid, probably fresh out of the academy. I was able to talk my way out of the confrontation, but I high-tailed it off the planet, anyway. I needed to be offworld before he reported the encounter to his boss, who would have surely been more suspicious of my actions than his officer."

"So, did you find anything interesting in the data, at least?"

"No, not really. Just the usual restocks. No large requests and no more requests than normal. I'd say it's just business as usual for the Republic. And, there were no requests from Elara Dorne. The trip was a bust, except to confirm nothing obvious is happening. Good thing, too, I'll probably need to stay away from Coruscant for a bit. Not sure what, if anything, would come from an investigation, if there even was one."

"Better to be safe than sorry, especially right now. I'm getting that nagging feeling something big is about to happen and I'd very much like you around when it happens. Not that you need someone to take care of you, of course, but I'll feel better having you near." Theron backpedaled. He knew I hated being treated like a damsel in distress.

"I'm gonna stay local, don't worry." I said. I didn't tell him that I was having the same sense of foreboding, though I have a feeling my uneasiness was coming through the Force. Either way, things were in motion.

To Be Continued...