Two Sides of One Coin [Luke & Lilith - Part 4]
19 Jan 2017Luke3107
Luke stared out his cockpit, hands raised in surrender as though he had an actual gun against his headLilith sat across from him in hers and made sure the weapons were locked onto his life support before sending out a voice comms request, which she could see was reluctantly accepted.
"I have no Cargo. I use this ship for long distance travel, that's it." Luke said.
"Idiot! Like I wouldn't already know that." Lilith spat back. "It's not Cargo I want, it's information. Turn your shields off."
Not one to take things lying down, Luke seriously considered responding to that with a snarky comment regarding a visit to a nearby stations GalNet feed. He thought better of it though, and did as he was told. His shields were still low anyway from his encounter with the Cutter. This woman was holding all the cards after all, he'd do well to not give her an excuse to scratch her itchy trigger finger.
"You mentioned Earl Macruik. Where is he?" Demanded Lilith, watching Luke roll his eyes at her as he responded.
"This... Fucking... Job..." Luke grumped, exasperated, burying his face into his hands in frustration. "He's dead... I presume so anyway... I found his ship wrecked near Yakabugai." He looked up into the cockpit of the Python and watched as the pilots face contorted from dismissive, to anger and then rage.
"He's WHAT?!?" Lilith shouted, pounding her fist on the arm of her seat. Fuming, she sat drumming her fingers, unsure of what to do now. Her only lead towards finding those responsible for the invasion of her mothers cruise ship, now dead. Like his remains, the trail now ice cold.
Luke, in the meantime, sat patiently, wondering if he was free to go now or not. Although he wasn't going to leave unless the other pilot said so. Judging by her reaction though, he felt he'd be lucky if she left him alive. Best he could do was wait, and hope her temper didn't extend to him.
A few moments passed in silence as the two pilots stared at each other. Well... Lilith stared daggers, Luke glanced everywhere that wasn't the other ship.
Thinking about how she found him, Lilith decided to press for information.
"So who were you meeting?" She asked, calmly but sternly. It was important she remain in control or he might become uncooperative.
"No one. I mean. No one I know." Luke stated. It was true, but he was entering dangerous territory. Give away too much, he could find himself running from the Empire. Tell this woman not enough, she'll probably open fire. Either way he was pretty screwed.
"You make a habit of meeting up with strangers?" Lilith scoffed.
"Sorry, I didn't realise we" Luke emphasised pointing his finger back and forth between them, "were previously acquainted." He replied sarcastically.
"You can act smart or be smart. Your choice." Lilith scowled at him. "Why were you meeting them then, and what do you know about Macruik?"
"I found his black box, it told me to find them and tell them he's dead." Luke rattled off. Trying to give away as little as possible.
"Uh huh... Don't they usually send you to a station?" Lilith countered. "Try again. This time with a touch more honesty"
"Well... Yeah... I wish it was that easy." Luke leaned back in his chair, resigned to his fate. "But it wasn't so now here I am."
"Indeed..." Lilith sensed he was holding out on her. But it was obvious they were likely to hit an impasse soon so she decided to switch tactics. "Tell you what... You have information, I need information. You want to go on your way, I can let you on your way. So lets trade. That black box... It will have left some trace data on your systems right? So send what you can, and once it's here, you can leave."
"And how do I know you won't just shoot anyway?" Luke replied cooly.
"You seem to have mistaken that for a request. I can always just take the data instead..." Replied Lilith, the unspoken threat quite clear.
Luke thought for a moment. Given the amount of weapons she had attached to her ship, she'd likely destroy his FSD before he could get it warmed up. Especially with his shields down. But then, hadn't that message statred if he ended up in this situation, he was on his own? So, that would mean they had no trace on him right? Regardless, it really didn't seem like he had a choice. It was either, give her the info, and be either blown up now or later when the Empire hunted him down, or refuse and definitely be blown up now.
"Alright, fine!" He threw his hands up in exasperation. "Lucky you, I hadn't had a chance to erase the files yet so here's everything. It's their fault I'm here anyway and I'm already sick of their Cloak and Dagger bullshit." With that he began pressing buttons and began another data transfer.
Liliths screen lit up, notifying her of incoming data which she accepted, and after a few moments the transfer was complete. A grin spread across her face as she opened the file, but it quickly returned to a scowl when she read through it. It made no sense, the data was just a jumble of symbols, numbers and letters. There wasn't a coherent word to be found. She went to run a de-encryption program but was simply greeted with a large error message:
===ENCRYPTION KEY NOT FOUND===
"You think this is some kind of fucking joke??? Send me EVERYTHING!!!" She shouted at the man. Watching his reaction go from impassive to confusion.
"I did. That's everything. What happened??" He replied
"You know damn well you conveniently forgot the encryption key. Last chance... Send it or be prepared to get very cold very fast." She growled.
"I swear I didn't forget anything. That's it, that's the lot!!!" Luke began frantically clicking around his computer, hoping to find whatever he missed. Finding the access point to the files that had caused him so much trouble he selected it and was met with a series of progress bars that rapidly filled up.
===OPENING FILE===
===COMPLETE
===CHECKING PILOT RANK===
===COMPLETE
===DECRYPTING DATA===
===COMPLETE
===GREETINGS SQUIRE===
"Oh I get it now..." Luke smiled. Finally, a bit of luck. "It seems you require a certain rank to access the files properly. Judging by your demeanour, you probably aren't exactly an Imperial Official are you?"
Lilith seethed... Of course!! How could she be so stupid. It was commonplace for factions and superpowers to restrict access. It's obviously the same system used to program ships with restricted access to certain systems. Like how, since she left, she can no longer fly back into Sol without first licking Federal boots. There could be exceptions of course, family visits via transport ship, but those were unlikely to extend to someone who was bordering "enemy of the state" status in their eyes.
"It appears the tables have turned then." Luke mocked. "You need me alive or you lose all chance of accessing those files." He fought back a grin at how things were going.
He instantly regretted that decision as he was greeted with the sight of the Pythons multi-cannons spinning up and the pulse lasers beginning to glow.