Several hours passed before an airspeeder arrived to zip Captain Trutzig away to secluded military base on Felucia. But the woman had declined transport, instead deciding to follow the airspeeder in a CG-10 transport off her ship. While the Felucians initially protested, her offer to allow both Methe and her guard transport to the facility appeared to smooth things over. The Centaur surged over Felucia's bizarre landscape, filled with a bewildering number of primite plants. Her eyes drank in the sights of the jungle world before the starship dropped down into a river valley. Hanging tightly to the crash webbing behind the pilot's chair, she watched Felix's rays glint off the jungle river, while the airspeeder ahead of them glided over the same waters. The walls of the valley began to rise again and just around a river bend, the Confederates saw a large cascade of water falling hundreds of meters to meet the sapphire blue waters of the river. Abruptly, the airspeeder jumped through the waterfall and disappeared. Frowning, Trutzig glanced down at the console, but she was too unfamiliar with the layout of the controls and the sensors to get an understanding of the readings before the transport also crossed through the falls and into a subterranean passage. The passage quickly narrowed before widening again as the entrance of a massive cavern. The airspeeder set down in front of them, which the Confederate pilots endeavored to set down their own craft behind. The tiny voice of Methe squeaked out from behind them.
“Welcome to Rainfall Base, Captain Trutzig.”
Trutzig followed the two gossam outside of the transport and waved for a pair of C1s to accompany her. The dank air clung to her skin and brought with it the dueling scents of decaying plants and fragrant spices. Meters later, they rounded a low-hanging formation of gigantic stalactites almost reaching the round to emerge into dimly illuminated hollow which appeared to serve as the command center of the base. Dozens of gossams quietly chatted and manned a number of consoles displaying sensor data as seen from dozens of satellites which orbited the planet. Yet she noted a couple of species she hadn't recognized before among them, including another saurian-like species which was noticeably bottom-heavy, and a half-dozen blue humanoids taller than herself whose faces appeared to be covered in masses of swaying tentacles.
“You must be Captain Trutzig.”
She glanced down to a Gossam standing in front of her. He appeared to be wearing similar garb as Methe's guard, but she noticed some fancier emblems pinned to his collar and a couple of extra medal tabs sewn over where a human's heart would be. Trutzig curtly nodded.
“Captain Trutzig,” informed Methe with a wave of a hand, “this is General Miin, commander of security forces.”
“It is an honor sir. Methe if you could give the two of us a few minutes by ourselves.”
Methe's luminous yellow eyes glanced at both the general and the captain, but the officers remained so still and plain-faced that she quickly glanced downward.
“Of course, I will await for you by the transport.”
“Methe,” suggested General Miin, “perhaps you would enjoy some refreshments in the cafeteria. We won't be long I imagine, and I would like to take a look at your ship. We had some good views of it coming down the river from our remote sensors, but it's not quite the same as it seeing it in person.”
Trutzig, her guards, and General Miin strolled back out of the command center and into the impromptu hangar. Trutzig glanced upward, suddenly noticing racks holding some sort of diminiutive starfighters, not unlike the setup traditionally used on star destroyers to hold Tie Fighters. Miin noticed her glance.
“You've probably never heard of our ships,” stated the gossam, “not that it matters. I hope we never have to use them.”
“War is not a pretty thing.”
Miin snorted, “Not when your craft are as outdated as our own. But your ship looks strong enough to drive the Mandalorians out of orbit.”
“That is what I wanted to talk to you about. I can't seem to get a straight answer out of your fellow Felucians...”
Striding forward on his squat little legs, Miin sighed, “When General Zell left our world just after the end of the Clone Wars, all of us who inhabitanted this world had to come together to throw off the Empire from our world. But it wasn't easy between us gossam, the Felucians, and the Jungle Felucians. I like to think my fellow gossam soldiers quickly adapted to galactic standards to easily integrate with everyone else's type of thinking, but I think you'll find that my fellow gossam, still isolated in their communities and unexposed to little else from the galaxy at large, will come across as a little more circumspect.”
“You still haven't answered my request.”
“Indeed,” replied the alien, running a couple of digits across the hull of transport, “I haven't. I am still a gossam, nor can I inherently overcome all tendecies of my race. I'm just one more forthcoming than the others. The Neo Death Watch hanging above our heads represents the greatest chance of war my world has seen in years. They didn't come here to fight the Reavers, though we are lucky their paths managed to converge at the same time. But for all we know, the Reavers could have followed the Death Watch here. No, the Death Watch is here for tribute. They call it protection money to help keep the sector clean of Reavers. It is if they summoned the Reavers here to prove a point.”
“You didn't have to launch your ships?”
“The Death Watch was already in orbit. They destroyed them.”
“The very Reavers I was tracking,” mused Trutzig.
“The Confederation is operating in our sector now?”
“The Confederation is trying to get a hold on this menace whenever and wherever we can. It means tracking a lot of them down into areas that aren't necessarily Confederate territory.”
General Miin turned his dinosaur-like head around to look up at the woman, “It must be hard operating so far from home and such distant bases.”
“Sometimes,” admitted Trutzig.
“Perhaps we can help each other out,” started Miin, “you've doubtlessly seen that the civilian leadership of our world wants to keep you here.”
“I take it to stave off any potential Death Watch threats?”
“Yes. But the Death Watch is not wholly wrong, there are Reavers that cross in the Thanium sector going from here to there, but only in small numbers. But enough that such a threat could spread if we were unlucky. Our ships are not suited to those sorts of fights, we only have short-range interceptors, but a Confederate fleet based here would have the ability to go out and destroy the Reaver threats in our area.”
“The Confederation won't send out a whole fleet just for that...”
“I agree.”
“What?” questioned Trutzig.
“Which is why it would have to be a Felucian fleet within the Confederate navy. An asset to be jointly useful to us both for our purposes. To fend off the Death Watch and the Reavers.”
“Is that why Methe had a dozens of officials lined up to talk to me?”
Miin nodded, “Such an alliance would be advantageous to both of us...”
“I'm not authorized for such negotiations,” advised Trutzig, “but I can forward it to someone who can. In the meantime, as a possible member of the Confederation, Felucia will fall under my ship, as little as it is, and my protection.”
“Excellent.”
