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As the demon’s form dissolves and the weather clears, Jadnura lands the gunboat and ushers everyone on board before more jinsul reinforcements have a chance to arrive. Linet’s team, now freed from their bindings, gather their gear and the pile of loot that was part of their sacrificial offering and climb aboard. Jarduna easily pilots the gunboat back to the main ship, where Luwazi Elsebo and the dispatch team prepare to escape into the Drift before the jinsul military returns from the Scoured Stars and catches wind of what happened.
With the Starfinders successfully evacuated to the safety of the Perfect Silence, the First Seekers arrange for medical care for the recent captives and for you. The medics make a big deal and fuss over how much damage Staar took, and they tend to Smiley’s wounds as best they can with Aravon’s help.
After everyone is sorted, and the flagship is in the Drift away from Rax, Jadnura and Luwazi request that you join them for a debrief. Linet is there, too, though she’s quite subdued and offers little except for an account of how they were quickly captured shortly after crash landing.
The joint First Seekers document everything you tell them about the jinsuls, the Tear they received from the Scoured Stars, and the “deathless leaders” who broke it open to steal the divine energies inside. The First Seekers take particular interest in your reports about Kadrical’s herald, Dhurus, who Jadnura realizes was responsible for organizing the jinsul military and whipping the jinsuls into their fervor over returning to the Scoured Stars. The Starfinder Society inadvertently opened the route for the jinsuls to reclaim their lost world, and now Luwazi fears that Dhurus is planning to forcibly relocate the other Scoured Stars natives back to their ancestral homelands. They agree to continue preparations for a final push against Dhurus, and ask that you all be ready to join them.
As you file out of the conference room headed to the mess hall for some hot chow and/or a well deserved drink or just to your berths for a good long sleep, the First Seekers stop each of you in turn.
Jadnura pulls Aravon and Tokno aside to express how impressed he is with your ability to improvise in the field, ensuring the safe evacuation of the captives. He then turns to Darin to compliment the dwarf on his impressive driving skills and thanks him for getting everyone through the horde safely.
Luwazi stops Gammer and Ceolor on their way out. She tells them specifically how proud she is of their proficiency interacting with the otherwise hostile jinsuls, particularly with how they handled the situation with Ekkerah. It isn’t lost on her that without Ceolor’s command of the jinsul language how much more difficult that whole encounter could have been.
Staar almost manages to slip past all the hubbub unnoticed, but Jadnura catches her elbow just as she reaches the door. ”You and your team did an amazing job down there. The power you wield in your graviton mote is most impressive, and I would be happy to work with and train with you int the future. Please, come see me any time that you are near Absalom Station.”
He then turns to all of you. ”That goes for the rest of you, too. I think I speak for my fellow First Seeker when I say that we look forward to working with all of you again.”
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Tokno is very pleased by the praise from the First Seekers, and expresses his eagerness to help out in future missions.
As he leaves the debriefing, the gnome begins chattering with Tune-Bot in Gnomish, dictating notes about the seeds of several songs that this mission has inspired. Over the next few days, his fellow Starfinders are treated to some early drafts of these new works as the fleet makes its way through the Drift back to Absalom Station. They're pretty good, even in this rough form, and are sure to earn the talented gnome some pretty credits--and to help burnish the Society's recruiting efforts, too.
During that return voyage, Tokno seeks out Ceolor to request some tutoring in the Jinsul language, as it seems a very useful skill to have when and if he encounters this foe again.
He also tries to spend some quality time with Smiley and Aravon, as his experience befriending the jeskraal on Rax has prompted him to consider acquiring a companion of his own. He has very limited experience caring for and training animals, however, so values any and all pointers the expert is willing to share in their limited time together.
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Gammer is a bit disappointed he did not get to set off his explosives against the demon but the team took it out and saved their fellow Starfinders and that's the important part.
As the briefing ends, Gammer responds to First Seeker Luwazi Elsebo, "My services are always available." He nods his head acknowledging Jadnura's statement.
To the rest of the group he says, "May your journeys always lead you safely home." He departs to get some food from the mess hall.
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Ceolor gives a few blinks as the demon disappears and the sun instead shows it's blazing rays. "THAT was IT? I was expecting something much much worse. Huh. Glad that was easy." Brushing the dust off his armor, Ceolor releases his solar weapon and reliquishes the other gun to some junior Starfinders, before shifting into translator/writer modes and gathering information ideas for a future novel while making sure almost everyone can understand each other. Before completely leaving the planet and reach of it's infosphere, he sees if he can't download some samples of jinsul music and literature to get a better idea of their tastes and customs.
Ceolor helps out on the ship as he can, making notes of how people are doing and helping out here and there where he can, but sometimes disappears back into his own room to write.
At the briefing, Ceolor nods at Luwazi's compliments, brushing off most of her praise. "I'm just glad I had the chance to pick up the language from my past missions."
When Tokno first comes to see him on the way home, Ceolor gives a small look of surprise, "I wasn't expecting that anyone else would even want to learn the language, but sure I can tutor you! How much do you know of Izalguun? Also if you want I got a handful of interesting songs from their infosphere, there's a good deal of heavy metal esque songs but surprisingly there's what I think is a love song too... "
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Ceolor gives a few blinks as the demon disappears and the sun instead shows it's blazing rays. "THAT was IT? I was expecting something much much worse. Huh. Glad that was easy."
Well, if you're disappointed remember these're the dregs. Darin says as the gunboat moves to land. When we head right up against this Dhurus' fleet, sure you can get some tighter scarps out of it.
The dwarf smiles thinly, but inside fumes at his own incompetence when the time came to rescue the other Starfinders. Even after...after, still not prepared enough. Looking right into a spider-reject's flasher. Too slip-shod to remeber to snap a targetting com into the suit. Lucky the others're up for it Darin. Otherwise would've been more lost...
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Aravon departs gladly from that forsaken planet. He does not regret that the demon has fallen, he prefers easier combats when he has a choice.
He removes his heavy armor when they are in vast space. He salutes Jadnura for his kind words and goes to spend time Tokno and Rax. Rax is not responsible for Jinsul actions and was a lovely animal.