Nei paused for a moment to collect her thoughts, trying to weigh how dangerous he was. He is presumably very high-ranking if not the head of the Black Sun. Should I feign ignorance? No, that would not do well. The truth, then. "Well, to be honest, you're security is quite complex as it is. If it had not been for the particular program I used, your database would not have been compromised. I was trying to find information on Mr. Pell's speeder crash and sent a complex search program that inadvertently infiltrated your database. I can help your slicer design a security specifically against my program. Or I can sincerely promise not to slice through your database. I have never broken my word."
"Oh, no, my dear," the noble said. "I need you to fill whatever holes in my security grid that you found. If you are agreeable to my terms, I can get you started right away."
"What are you terms?" Nei asked hesitantly.
Darro settled into the oversized back of his chair and placed his hands on his lap. "In return for your arms remaining attached to your body, you will upgrade my security grid as much as your abilities allow."
Nei thought for only a moment. "If I can work with your slicer, I am sure our combined effort will provide a very strong security grid."
"Agreed," said Darro as he held out his hand to Nei.
Nei reached forward, but paused, "What happens after your security grid is fixed?"
"That depends on the quality of your work," Darro said as he motioned Odon to take Nei away. "Take her to Ellors and see if she can do anything with him."
"Khrad and Odon…" Zhar'sara said as she tilted her head as if trying to recall the names. "I can't place them, but our organization is large, and I don't know every associate by name." A datapad appeared as she pulled it from a compartment in her desk and she began typing into it.
""Wait, you mean you aren't all friends on the holonet?" Dex said sarcastically.
Liora just sat listening patiently while Dex was gathering useful information.
"Do you have any logs with names, that we can go through? any records?" Dex asked.
"You are free to use my system to access it. Just don't do anything that will get me into trouble, Dex."
"I never do anything troublesome."
"Sure," the Twi'lek winked as she passed the datapad to Dex. She stood up and walked to the door. Looking over her shoulder she said, "I have to go check on things in the bar, but make yourselves at home." With that she walked out of the office and the door slid shut behind her.
Dex took the liberty of sitting back at her desk. He grabbed her datapad and leaned back, resting his legs on the desk. He took a glance at what it was that Zhar'sara had typed before leaving hoping it was a message.
Careful, Dex, they are Darro Orden's top torpedoes. Dex had just enough time to read it before the message dissolved, and the datapad showed a standard interface screen.
Liora scooted her chair closer to Dex so she could see the datapad. "What did you just read?"asked Liora.
"Hmm? Oh, no its just a picture of Zhar'sara. But there's nothing on here, lets try the library." Rising from the desk, Dex set the datapad down.
"Alright." responded Liora while following Dex's lead and stood up to follow him out of the office.
They left the club, and got into a new taxi. Dex instructed the driver to take them a block away from Darro's apartment.
Odon took Nei to a room that had some of the most impressive equipment Nei had seen in a while. It was dark, or would be if it weren't for a dozen or two screens and holo projectors lighting up the room. In the center of all of it, a thin human sat.
He was facing away from the door, but as it opened he said, "Hey, Odon, is this the slicer that got into my system earlier?"
"Don't give me that, Ellorrs. You know who she was. You probably heard the entire conversation." Turning to Nei, Odon said, "Nei, meet Ellorrs Trehalt. He's the best slicer Mr. Orden has been able to hire. Once you get over his skills, you'll find he's just a cocky kid."
"A pleasure as always, Odon." Ellorrs said as the door closed a little early on Odon. "Sorry about that, I'll have to get that bug worked out!" he yelled after the door shut. "I like to mess with him, he can be a bit stuck up," chuckled Ellors. Turning around, Nei could see that Ellorrs was wearing a pair of custom data-goggles. The slicer took them off and looked at Nei for a second. "Hmm, you're prettier in person than the HoloVid."
"Thank you? HoloVid's are usually not the best relayers of tridimensional images, although Professor Allacorps has made surprisingly effective strides in that field. Did design your data-goggles yourself? What filament did you use?"
"Why yes, I did build them. They use a Tramar Siquil filament," Ellors said as he turned the goggles over in his hands. "Come on, let me show you the system."
"Indeed. We should begin. Your security grid is one the most impressive I have encountered!"
"Thanks, wasn't quite good enough though," Ellorrs said.
"Nothing is ever perfect, especially technology."
Turning to the nearest holo readout, Ellorrs began touching it. "This is the primary system control," he continued, tapping an orange box in the hologram which expanded until it engulfed the whole hologram. "Here is the firewall array. This one," he pointed at a red one, "is the one that you breached. I built and coded them myself. 90% of the hardware are Cyrim 569.2s, but I cross-compiled them for the Yanar Digital 2208 processor."
"Impressive! I'd like to take a look at the source code. Perhaps I'll be able to see something that can be optimized," Nei pulled out datapad and attached her Omwati interface.
"What's that?" Ellorrs asked.
The taxi came to a rest in an expensive neighborhood, and Dex and Liora stepped out. Darro Orden's skyscraper was visible towering over all the other buildings around. Dex and Liora got out of the taxi (Liora paid the driver, while Dex stared off into the distance). Once the Taxi had taken off, Dex spoke, "Those goons work for Darro Orden. That skyscraper is Darro's, his apartment is inside. don't mention his name, or black sun. There's a chance Nei is in there.. or dead. and it's likely we'll be dead if we go in there and say the wrong thing.. or look at the wrong person. you ready to go rescue our friend from the tower of doom?" Dex gave Liora an unenthusiastic half smirk. "How about I just keep following your lead. Since, ya know, I know nothing about dealing with this level of rabel." Liora quietly said to dex.
"Here's the plan, we walk in like we know what we're doing, all confident like. Once inside we'll figure out what to do. when someone tries to attack, we'll just kick em in the face.. wait no thats a horrible plan. let's just stick to looking like we know what we're doing."
"Face kicking, good plan!" Liora replied with a laugh. "Sure we totally know what we're doing." Liora retorted sarcastically.
as they were about to enter the building Dex suggested one last tip, "oh and dont have any negative thoughts." He then opened the door and walked forward while casually surveying the layout.
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