The doctor stood and listened to the discussion over recent developments. As the engineer made a pointed comment about his 'machine gods' the mustelid's facemask shifted almost imperceptibly before resting into a neutral expression.
"It would seem we have far more variables than constants in this equation. What's worse is we don't even know where these variables belong. How discomforting." His facemask shifted into a look of concern. "We need to consider everything we know about this Torrentus and Admiral Arai as well. One must examine both sides of a coin to understand it as a whole."
"All we know of Darth Torrentus is that she is Admiral Arai's Force-Sensitive duplicate - created when some sort of spatial anomaly hit whatever ship Arai was on and duplicated her. We can't say how exactly this happened nor what specific kind of anomaly it was, but so far, Torrentus has been more or less dormant - she has so far not attacked anyone's interests, and in fact, seemed to have dropped off the galactic grid," Trask explained. "Admiral Arai, however, we have had several clashes with - so we know a considerable deal about her. She was once Tal Shiar, and was responsible for the destruction of Unity Starbase, a joint project between the Klingon Empire and the United Federation of Planets. However, her plans were unraveled when a Starfleet Officer - man by the name of Darion Heath, now a retired Admiral living on Sol III - beat her at her own game. Arai was arrested, tried for multiple attacks on Federation interests and theft of top-secret Federation technology, convicted, and sentenced to life in prison... only her prison transport never arrived. It was found adrift in space two weeks later, with Arai nowhere to be found. It was speculated that elements of the Tal Shiar that remained loyal to her - after most branded her a traitor for her failure - disabled the transport, killed the crew, and rescued Arai. But she was never found, and her file ceased to be a concern after the Hobus Disaster. She only resurfaced in the weeks following the death of the leader of the Tal Shiar, Colonel Hakeev - she took up the reins of the Tal Shiar, and has been a thorn in our side ever since; we know she was behind the eradication of the Borg, which she tried to use as a method of slandering the Dragon'taan Marauder Corps by sending in Borg ships to stage an 'attack' and then sending in Tal Shiar ships to play hero."
Trask took a deep breath as he finished this explanation. "I'd be surprised if Arai isn't involved in this in some way," he stated. "She's always looking to break up the alliances of the galaxy, and the attack on the ISC Industrial sector sounds like something she'd do - but the Cameras on board that observatory caught Torrentus in the act of murdering our contact, and I can only speculate that she set the trap that sent that probe into the star; it was meant to wipe out anyone who came to investigate... which brings us back to the question, what is Torrentus up to, and to what end?"
Ray spoke, as he stood slowly and dusted himself. "A Force-user attacked our contact before we could get our information. Our user also had laid a trap in hopes of removing us. This is all I know." He sighed. "Had I more time, I may have extracted information from our slain contact." He glanced at the mustelid before continuing. "The machine gods would have blessed the contact and I with a link, but I had no time."
Trask looked to Ray and raised an eyebrow. "Next time we come across a corpse and need information from it, remind me you can do that," he said. "That kind of thing would be handy."
Seconds after the reply from the Steel Avenger, the wolf emerged from the darkness of the small room and headed outside. The canine was in a fairly flat, secluded area, and figured landing would be easy. Setting down his duffel bag, the wolf withdrew a small smoke grenade from his side and pulled the pin. Tossing it before him, Victor watched as the grey smoke billowed up into the sky above him.
Assuming it would take a few minutes before he was found, the wolf gently lowered himself to the ground and rested on his back. Placing both his paws behind his head and crossing his legs, the canine nonchalantly waited for the drop ship. Reflecting the sight of the sky and smoke from his lenses, Victor simply relaxed and waited.
Victor wouldn't have to wait long; a drop ship could be seen heading his direction.
http://vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net/halo/images/8/85/H2A_Render_Phantom.png/revision/latest?cb=20150620052630Rylou waited as the drop ship flew past out of the docking bay before entering. Seeing no welcoming party there he took the elevator to the bridge. "There's bound to be someone there."
While there was no "Welcoming Party", Rylou would see the ship full of mobile, sentient holograms of various races - none of whom seemed to pay him any mind. The turbolift would stop at one point, and the doors would part to allow a holographic Romulan to enter. He nodded to Rylou respectfully, and spoke, "Bridge." The turbolift resumed it's ascent, and the Romulan, not turning to face Rylou, asked, "The Marauder Corps bring you in on this op, too?"