Eavesdropper

The Eavesdropper was an IGV-55 surveillance vessel was a listener ship in the service of the Imperial Navy in the years leading up to the Galactic Civil War. It was commanded by Captain Tyrthan Barnuck and later Captain Kirk Bermont.

This ship also maintained a compliment of armed Viper probe droids that carried out short-range reconnaissance for the Eavesdropper's crew.

History
The Eavesdropper was one of many Gozanti-class cruisers that were recommissioned by the Imperial Navy and refitted to serve as surveillance craft, sacrificing most of its armament for advanced sensory, scanning, and communications equipment designed for long-range reconnaissance and surveillance missions. Immediately after the Clone Wars' end, the Eavesdropper was deployed to the Corellia sector and worked with the Imperial Security Bureau to investigate terror cells that operated in the area; the ship was successful in this mission, providing information to local agents that resulted in the terror cell's dissolution - this performance proved that the IGV-55 model was successful in its designated role, leading Imperial engineers to call for dozens more to be commissioned.

Soon after its mission in Corellian space, the Eavesdropper was redeployed to the Mandalore sector and served as the "command ship" for Imperial intelligence agents operating in the area as part of the destructive Mandalore campaign. It provided intel that led to many raids on insurgent strongholds across Mandalore and Concordia. While carrying out a reconnaissance mission in the Vorpa'ya system, the Eavesdropper was ambushed by Supercommando gunships, who managed to disable the craft and board it, killing many crewmembers and the ship's captain, Tyrthan Barnuck, before escaping with critical intel. The infiltrators set up several explosives across the ship to destroy it as they escaped, however the explosives malfunctioned and the ship's surviving crew managed to flee the system with what remained of the Eavesdropper. The ship stopped at an Imperial repair station above Gargon, where Kirk Bermont - a deck officer aboard the Eavesdropper whose leadership skills saved the ship's survivors following the attack - was promoted to replace his predecessor as captain of the vessel. Under Bermont, the Eavesdropper returned to the Vorpa'ya system to finish their mission before traveling to the Concord Dawn system to gather intel that led to an important raid on a Mandalorian stronghold. Although they successfully collected intel about the target on Concord Dawn, they were soon after attacked by a fleet of privateers (which agents later concluded were sent by a government outside of the Mandalore sector), who managed to finally destroy the Eavesdropper and everyone aboard.

In honor of this vessel, another IGV-55 surveillance ship was named the Eavesdropper II, which carried out various intelligence missions across the galaxy during the Galactic Civil War before being destroyed at the Battle of Jakku in 4 ABY.