VIII. Face of the Enemy

The crew, reunited, prepares to meet the person behind the mysterious bounty on Rigel.
Rigel and Feena, having passed the plans for the new Imperial ship to the black market, have returned to the Redshift Runner to await Melba’s return from delivering her first bounty to Minerva on Takodana.
Soon, the crew will receive their destination from the bounty hunter Nuvral, where her unknown client is awaiting Rigel for a meeting that could have deadly ramifications.
Only someone has no wish to let them arrive… 
----Melba drags Aingus Cevil until she finally reaches Minerva, the woman who put the bounty on him. Minerva, however, seems only passingly interested in the man, and immediately brings up the recovery of the credits that Cevil had appropriated. Without missing a beat, Melba lies and says the credits were untraceable. With the exchange done, Melba leaves her card, and prances back to the ship proudly after finishing her first real bounty hunt. She's met with Capa, who tells her that Feena and Rigel are out shopping. Nuvral is also present, relaxing on the landing pad with very cool-looking drugs. While discussing the present circumstances, Nuvral mentions that she expects that Rigel will be let go after he makes his 'meeting'. As Melba's personal conflict in the situation resurfaces, Nuvral advises that the neophyte bounty hunter get her priorities in order before it's too late.
Feena and Rigel return without much to say about their own errands. With everything taken care of on Takodana, the Redshift Runner and the Good Citizen take off. With no more stops on the way, Nuvral names their ultimate destination: Feena's home planet of Ryloth! Despite her time away, Feena seems rather unfazed by the idea of returning. She left because there was no opportunity for her there, and she doesn't expect anything is waiting for her.
Knowing that the Redshift Runner is being targeted more than he is, Rigel explains about his friend Tinian, the actual owner of the Redshift Runner, who is currently laying low after some high-profile capers. Melba brings up the concern that maybe the crew should consider alternative options to the Redshift Runner considering the uncertainty of its fate on Ryloth. Rigel and the Redshift Runner are both somewhat upset by the idea.
The ships land in the capital city of Ryloth, Lessu. After the negotiations with the ship and with Capa, which are rapidly becoming customary on every landing, the crew descends the gangplank and are met with local guards. Melba the bounty hunter and Rigel the quarry were quite expected, but they have questions about Feena coming along. She smooths the situation over with such ease that one might think there had never been an issue in the first place. However, once the three of them step away from the ship, clamps seize the gangplank and stormtroopers rush in! The Empire is investigating the ship on smuggling charges, but with confidence that they've disposed of any illegal cargo, the crew puts up no resistance to a search, and they leave to their meetings.
Inside the embassy, an old, unpleasant-looking Twi'lek grabs Rigel. Melba tries to slip Rigel his pistol but can't find an opportunity to make the handoff without being seen. Someone mentions that the person summoning Rigel is Irrica the Hutt, a crime lord close to the Empire. Meanwhile, it's time for Melba and Nuvral to get their payday, and Melba is having second thoughts. Nuvral continues to be tired of Melba's lack of dedication, but with the end of the hunt just a few paces away, she doesn't push the matter. Melba gets a taste of her own past on Kinyen when she meets a star-struck clerk named Si'laag, who obsesses over the glamor of the bounty-hunting career just as Melba is learning to see past it.
In another meeting room, Irrica dines accompanied only by a small protocol droid. After some classically uncomfortable Hutt introductions, he accuses Rigel for the murder of the hutts Hanka and Malto! He at least says he believes Feena when she tells him what Rigel really did during the attack on The Searchlight. Still, the crew took their money and ran without settling up the end of the deal, and that's a bad look. Irrica has one demand, and he will consider it square: he wants Rigel's medical droid.
Wait, what?
Irrica says that Rigel is in possession of a 1B-series medical droid★ called 9-1B. He's quite confident that the stormtroopers, whom he calls his agents are seizing the droid at the moment. The droid supposedly has information valuable to the empire. Rigel and Feena are entirely clueless, but they're sent off to a shabby sitting room that is closer to a cell. Out with Melba, Captain Velkar bursts in with some stormtroopers. Melba leaps for cover. Si'laag the clerk mentions that the captain deals a lot with Irrica. Melba's hiding attempt seems to work out pretty well, and once they're gone, she hands the bounty over for Nuvral to split. Distracted and frustrated as she is, Melba pays no attention to what share Nuvral takes for herself, but there's a cool 6,000 credits left in the box when Nuvral is gone.
Feena and Rigel hear Captain Velkar shouting at Irrica outside the room they're waiting in. It seems that his search has turned up nothing. Feena barges into their meeting and accuses Velkar of killing the Hutts on Nar Shaddaa. Irrica is hardly swayed by her claims, but he's amused enough to spare her a kindness. He tells Velkar that taking pressure off the Redshift Runner for a time will get him better results. Still, if the crew can't produce this mystery droid, things will turn sour again soon enough.
The crew is back together, but sadly, it seems like the Redshift Runner is still impounded. Feena manages to wheedle one of the stormtroopers into calling Velkar, who is apparently not actually going to let them go. Also apparently they seized Capa. Rigel sits down to talk to the Redshift Runner. As soon as he mentions 9-1B, he gets a very bad reaction. Finally, the stormtroopers give them permission to take off because they have collateral…a way to disenfranchise Feena's entire family.
Feena takes some time to call her family and update them. Her father, Fajam'ersu answers the communicator. He's rather happy to hear from her, neither displeased with her choices nor happy that she's left her home life behind. When Feena mentions the Empire and Irrica's machinations, Fajam is rather surprised to hear any of it. He's had few relations with either, and hasn't heard any whispers. It doesn't seem that there's much to do, so with a loving goodbye, Feena returns to see what her companions are up to
With the Redshift Runner's past becoming a much more immediate concern, Rigel cobbles together a custom display for the ship to communicate its thoughts directly. With the crew gathered, the Redshift Runner reveals its past. The mind now residing in the Redshift Runner was previously the droid 9-1B. Tinian transfered the droid brain into the ship's computer with a difficult and novel procedure in order to hide the information contained within: the location of three secret Rebel bases in the Inner Rim! And with the body destroyed, the crew has nothing but the intel to hand over to the Empire.
With the Empire and the Hutt Cartel following them closely, the crew is faced with a difficult decision: sell out the only people doing any good in the Galaxy and maybe get a clean slate, or hand over the data to the Rebels themselves and hope for a big enough reward to keep them one step ahead of their foes. With urging from Rigel, the crew agree to try for the Rebels this time. The problem is, their intel only gives them systems to search, and the Rebels could only survive in Imperial territory by being nearly impossible to find. Why can't doing the right thing ever be easy?
Category:SWR-Ep