[Again, sorry for the delay, I'm kinda low on energy after several weeks of hard work :(]
With the end-game upon them, the heroes had to pull together every clue, every contact and every resource they had to put the puzzle pieces together.
Things got complicated fast. Our heroes negotiated a cease-fire with Gorka, convincing him that somebody was manipulating him and his operation... which angered him to new levels. He demanded the head of the one behind this.
They went to see Master Barkiss, the only know living jedi from New Duro still available, and met with him on his family farm, on the other side of the world.
The old blind Master shared a lot of interesting info with them, the most important piece is that hundreds of Jedi settled on the world after the Great War, but strangely enough, no new Jedi came out of New Duro in almost a 100 years.
He also shared a book that had info on every single force-strong bloodline on the planet, with which they were quickly able to know that several of those dark force adepts they fought were indeed from the planet's missing force-sensitive population.
Barkiss also suggested to Den that even though she might not follow the path of a Jedi, she might be interested on some formal training, as going at it alone tends to end badly.
With this in hand, Quin contacted Master Rombus, who also invited over Den and Jan to the conversation. Rombus, playful and shadowy, as always, forced them through confusing questions until they got a good picture of what was going on.
They questioned him about Rymobe, about his Master, and about what happened to the mysterious third student... the conclusions were unexpected. Rymobe is dead... and the third student is taking his place, though Rombus left the "why?" on the air for our heroes. Jan is suspicious of the quirky Master, and with reason, as Rombus himself pointed out.
The Republic was in far more turmoil than expected by many. The Military was angered at their loss of power and the shortsightedness of the galactic community, who failed to see that a new "Empire" could pop-up at any minute. Jan checked the net and discovered that Republic Intelligence had several high-ranking officers under surveillance or under monitoring because of their jingoistic and sometimes outright hostile attitudes toward the present situation. The Admiral in charge of the system and an in-system commander were under the "danger" tab.
They tied the pieces together and figured out the following... someone wanted a civil war, a "fake" one if possible, in which the military could regain their lost glory. The different players made sense, some of the Mando's, the dark Force adepts, criminal elements in the city and parts of the military, wanted to form a block and take control of New Duro, using it as a fortress world that could hold it's ground for decades.
They quickly went to Gorka again, and presented the situation, Gorka saw the last pieces of the current puzzle... the Mando's wanted the Red One to take control of New Duro, in a move that could cement him as a candidate for Mandalore, and mentioning that he's stupid enough to fall for that.
As the gang war calmed down, the other players were forced to make a move... the Military commander under surveillance launched without authorisation towards the main control bunker for the planet's defenses. Some members of Red Scythe also moved towards it.
Captain Adrian contacted our heroes and shared their worries with them, their clues only confirmed them and he informed the heroes of the aforementioned move by the bad guys. They quickly jumped into action, Jan was dispatched in a Republic Starfighter to intercept the rogue commander, and Quin and Den took on a speeder to reach the command center as soon as possible.
Gorka also had a plan, he'd send his men to take over the command bunker, and then send his own security force to secure it, thus making his control of the place legal...
Jan blew the traitor from the sky, and convinced his escort to escort him instead. Meanwhile Quin and Den fought the treacherous Mando's on the bunker, with the Red One being taken by surprise by a couple of thermal detonators, which knocked him away and left him so wounded he had no choice but to escape.
The "fake" rebellion had failed to take what they wanted to be their main base of operations, so they executed "plan b" and acted openly.
A fraction of the Military split in two, and the insurrectionist quickly took over the Senate, staging a Coup d'état. Thankfully the Jedi responded fast and liberated the Senate, forcing the insurrectionist to declare open rebellion and a civil war erupted in the Republic.
The heroes stopped things from getting worse, but the stage was set for even more conflict.
