So I'm writing a Star Wars fic. There's a character named Com Narcom who's a wanted man. His adopted daughter Leela wants to fight with the local rebellion and he doesn't. Koss is the inspector general of the sector. Koss was once Narcom's warden, then served under him when Narcom was prime minister under the alias of Aberon Halmath. When Narcom was outed, he escaped Koss's clutches and Koss lost him. Koss has moved on and been promoted to inspector general when an old colleague and protege, the planetary inspector of Pasir, shares with him the details of an incident involving a man matching Halmath's description. Koss travels to Pasir to investigate when an insurrection breaks out. A big red shield goes over a district where the Empire Day parade is supposed to pass through in the morning and the area is barricaded. Koss volunteers to insert himself into the insurgents and spy on them. He is caught by Leela, which causes him to realize Narcom is in the rebel camp. Leela escapes his clutches, to his great disappointment, but he has a tracking fob lent to him by an associate in the Bounty Hunters' Guild set to Com Narcom's chain code, so Koss begins to follow the signal. However, Leela joins Enfys Nest's Cloud-Riders to get off-planet and away from Com, who is trying to bring his rebellious daughter home so they can pack their things and escape from the Empire to a remote Outer Rim world. Com catches onto Leela's plan just in time and stows aboard the Cloud-Riders' shuttle. Once the Cloud-Riders' carrier leaves the system, Koss's tracking fob goes dead as Narcom is now out of range. So he needs to find out where the Cloud-Riders are going so he can pursue Narcom. An Ugnaught tells him to keep an eye out for a spy in the rebels' midst (unaware that Koss is the spy in question) and Koss asks if he knows where the Cloud-Riders are headed. The Ugnaught directs him to a few of the Cloud-Riders still planetside, and Koss tracks one of them down. However, when he asks about the supply mission, the Cloud-Rider tells him that's need-to-know information and asks why he needs to know. And that is a very good question that I can't think of an answer to. How can Koss convince this Cloud-Rider to tell him where their ship is going?
If it were me, I'd find another way for Koss to discover the information, besides asking directly for it. Does he really want to leave a trail behind him ...of people he spoke to, etc? Can he listen in on the Cloud-Rider communication system instead? Without their knowledge?
Perhaps... I’m not sure exactly what the Cloud-Riders would need to communicate to each other when the ship only took off half an hour ago, though.
Well, it's one of the things to think about. Maybe they needed to ensure the escaping ship had a clear path?
I feel like they would have researched and calculated that beforehand, since they knew they were going to be doing at least one supply run for this campaign.
Could the previous conversation still be in the communications network's memory? You know how when you send an e-mail, you get a reply and your original message is still attached? I think this is called an "e-mail chain" and I assume something similar exists (or could exist) in the star wars universe. Does your character have the ability to hack into these communications or the opportunity to hire someone to do so?
Hm. Well, I assume a lot of the planning for this mission would have been verbally discussed. But the hyperspace calculations would be in a computer. Unfortunately, said computer would be on the ship that's already left, so that's not much help.
