Captain and Commander strode with purpose down the ship's boom corridor, engineering behind them. They had just left a meeting with the Chief Engineer, Darktrayn, about the data recovered by Dr. Bolex. They weren't pleased with what they had learned.

The Captain was already planning. "Wolfe needs to be notified of this right away. He'll pass it up the chain."

"We can't wait that long though."

Auriga drew a breath. "You're right, we can't. The Empire surely knows we've got all this data, especially on where the last of the missing Rebel ships are waiting. If they haven't been moved already they certainly will be by the time Wolfe gets back to us to have us go after them."

"We've been in close contact with the Sundiver. She'd be perfect to send to the Cron Drift after the ships."

"Agreed. Captain Cavanaugh can handle whatever they have waiting as cover."

"Which leaves us to deal with ... the Judicator."

"Precisely."

A few moments of silence passed, filled only by their footsteps and the hum of the ship.

"So they really were supersoldiers in those tanks Rince and Draco found," Arkwright said,

"I wouldn't go that far," Auriga replied. "The term Darktrayn said kept coming up was 'elimination of flaws and weaknesses.'"

"Well, yes, but physical ones. Whoever Vader has assigned as project leader is just going to stick them in armor and give them blasters anyway. The end result's the same."

"Agreed," Auriga said again. "Smart move on their part to move the center of research to a Star Destroyer, though. Now what the hell are we going to do?"

"Dunno. We got ourselves into it, though, when we let the Balyn III op get out of our hands. When they evac'ed everything in the Judicator they probably just decided to keep it there."

"Would a direct attack be successful?"

Arkwright shook his head with no small amount of irritation. "Out of the question. We barely survived the run-in with the Judicator when we were attacking Vondur station, and didn't put a scratch on her."

"Well, we go for stealth then."

They passed through the wide circular entryway to the boom corridor into the forward section of the ship, continuing down the main corridor.

"There's something I don't like about that conversation we just had," Arkwright said at length.

"With Darktrayn?"

"Yeah. Like he had a gaffi stick lodged somewhere uncomfortable while he was briefing us about the data disks."

They stopped at the door to the bridge and exchanged a look.

"You know, it caught me when I was reviewing his bio how little detail there was surrounding his departure from the Empire," he added.

"Are you saying you think he's a double agent?"

"He'd be at the top of my list. Imperial background, keeps to himself ... "

Auriga suppressed a sneer. "So he's above the mysterious McCathan on your list?"

"Conall's not on my list, Cap. He's served on this ship as long as I have, as my first officer in Security, then as our MarDet leader. He's a bit of a polecat, but he's rock solid. Any of the long-standing marines will tell you the same thing."

"McCathan's a former Imperial too, not to mention an infiltration expert. And I don't see him around much except for war room sessions. And, Darktrayn doesn't have an unexplained absence to account for."

"Draco's trustworthy," Arkwright said firmly, stabbing the button next to the door with his thumb. Turning back to the Captain he added, "Trust me."

With that, they cleared their expressions of the dispute and walked onto the Bridge.

"I'll raise Cavanaugh and give him the lowdown," Auriga ordered as they moved to their stations. "I'm sure he'll cooperate. Then I'll join you in planning this infiltration."

"Aye," Arkwright said absently as he took his seat, Auriga making for the comm station on the lower level of the ship's nerve center.

They needed some way of getting inside the Judicator and stealing as much information as they could. Doing more damage probably wouldn't help that much - not only would there be duplicates of any research all over the ship, but blasting up the place would almost certainly get their asses handed to them on a plate within minutes. This was a Star Destroyer they were talking about. Any sane Alliance captain still turned and fled the moment one was sighted. Even the sizable MC-80s the Rebel Fleet was slowly incorporating didn't dare take one on. 'Plan B' was always written just for the potential arrival of one of these behemoths.

So, there would be as little shooting as possible. Word of the Karah Wind's dashing exit from Bestine probably hadn't made it through the Imperial channels yet, and if they had they wouldn't be too high on the list. Rebel activity in that sector was typically sporadic. She probably had a couple good uses as a Trojan horse left in her.

To keep the Imperials from blowing the CEC-616 out of the sky as soon as she was sighted, though, they'd have to pass her off as something worth capturing. The fact that she was bristling with four quad laser turrets and a railgun would make that a rather difficult task.

Then there was, of course, the actual difficult task of tooling about inside a Star Destroyer. Flynn went over the tactics he'd learned in CorSec in his head, lips pursed in thought. The first was to always know the layout of the target.

The data banks had given them some idea of where in the Judicator would be a good place to look, but he needed somebody that knew the inside of an ISD well. An expert on its systems, its security routines ... its weaknesses. Ideally, someone who'd served on one, who could still fire a blaster.

Arkwright felt his face crease in a wide grin.

Darktrayn. He'd served on a Star Destroyer, was a defensive systems expert, and had weapons training. Best of all, acting as a guide for the strike team would make for an excellent test of loyalty.

Peering over his console into the command pit, he spotted Auriga, caught a hologram of Captain Cavanaugh winking out in front of him.

"Captain?" he called. "I've got a plan."