"I understand, Ardiss, but you're still a security threat to us," says Corliss as patiently as he can. "We'll have to find some way to trace you."
At the suggestion of extra clothes, Corliss cringes a bit. "Erh, yes I do," he says. "It's an Imperial uniform, standard issue. For undercover work, stuff like that. I don't know what would make Ossanlin more uncomfortable." He smiles sheepishly. His comm link beeps at him urgently, and Corliss looks down at it. It's his usual link, not the one he had been using to contact Gaz, and he picks it up--it can only be one person.
"Yes, Myitt?"
---
Myitt almost immediately picks up what Geltran had missed: The glaring presence of an Imperial tracking device, lodged into the living material of her ship's hull. She grabs her comm link and hails Corliss.
<How stupid can I possibly be!> she rages. <Stupid, stupid...should've scanned the damn ship...>
<It's alright, man,> says Tara. <Odds are very good that it was that Seran guy, right?>
<We have no way of knowing,> says Myitt grimly.
<No, but we have a hunch. He wanted us dead in a dozen ways, remember?>
<What if it was the bounty hunter, we didn't exactly make friends with him, either!>
<I bet if we try and trace down Imperial signals in our area and within the nearest Yeerk spaceports to the bar, we can find him. His ship's in bad shape, that'll help us narrow it down.>
--chhk-- "Yes, Myitt?" comes Corliss' voice.
"Corliss, we've got a problem here."
"What, Kara didn't get the presidential suite?"
"Shut up and listen to me, someone tagged an Imperial tracking device on my fighter. Whoever's watching me already knows where the base is, or is very close to finding it. Even with the signal shielding, it will only delay them. Tara thinks it's Seran, he's the last person to immediately threaten to find me. I don't think Ardiss jumped out of the pool and stuck a trace on my fighter."
"Call Reven, tell him to start evacuating," says Corliss. "This is far worse than the threat of some fragmentary memory."
"Yeah, no ****. Our only other chance is if we can find Seran, destroy his computer files, and hope to hell he hasn't sent them out on a long range broadcast." Myitt sits back in the nav seat, looking very lost indeed.
Her ship is already scanning for low energy Imperial ship signals in the area. Nothing, which was why they chose this little corner of space--it wasn't very high traffic. Even the longer range scans...only a Skrit Na trader and, farther out, a Hawjabran patrol. The buzzing energy signal of a small nova. Myitt contacted Reven and updated him on the situation, with orders to stand by--evacuation of a few soldiers and ships would begin immediately.
Myitt contacts Corliss again. "I'm heading back," she says. "I'm going to find this bastard if it's the last thing I do."
"Bad choice of words, mate," says Corliss. "Be careful, alright?"
"I always am," says Myitt, locking z-space coordinates and punching the z-drive engines.
