NAR SHADDAA
It was only a few days since Mercy summoned her for that conversation... the Galactic Champion meant to move onto bigger things... and passed Arris her authority on Nar Shaddaa. It was a new game for the cyborg, as crime tied the knot on her life, all the way from Talus to the big time.
Arris received anything but a warm welcome when she arrived to pick up Mercy's pieces. The thugs she encountered were hard and twisted. It wasn't that they were not right in the head, but there was an underlying obsession -- a perverted kind of zeal -- meant for one woman alone, not this upstart they saw stroll in, even if their Star-Arm said so.
A few of them surrounded her inside the dimly lit room, while others stalked from the sidelines.
One pulled a blaster and aimed for the Talusian's back. She sensed his intentions, the mood he poured over the weapon. It felt compelled, it yearned - not for the kinetic activation of his finger pulling the trigger, but his singular desire in the moment to kill her, and the rapid buildup towards fulfillment. The technopath reached the blaster through the Force to scratch the weapon's violent itch before he could.
"Melt."
The power pack began to glow red-hot, then exploded. He screamed like a tormented thing, more out of shock than pain, as he saw the smoldering flesh where his hand no longer was. Arris turned to face him, and he looked at her with anger and panic, his teeth gritting so hard that she could hear them scrape.
Mercy had made each of them complacent under her leadership. Not because she was bad at it, but because when you learned to fear a woman like Mercy, you forgot how to fear anything else.
The others quickly drew weapons of their own, but so did Arris, and one found themself staring down the end of her revolver. This was the only way they'd understand her point, and it did cow them long enough for her to continue.
"There's a long line of people who aim to kill me, and you sure as shit don't make the list."
She pushed her way past them and towards a giant's chair at the end. She may've given them pause, but she knew intimidation alone was not enough.
She sat and leaned against one of the large armrests. "Mercy doesn't care about you anymore! She's got nothing to feed the likes of you..." She emoted with an indifferent hand that held something small and metal.
"So, maybe hold off on trying to put me down before you even have a taste of what's in my hand, yeah?!"
It was a datachit with plans given to her by a traitor within the High Republic, and it stole all eyes in the room.
Okay... Maybe Mercy was right. Maybe this is exactly what the depressed cyberpsycho needed after all. Those solo punches were starting to feel light; they no longer satisfied... but this? Arris settled in with a grin. She felt like she could break something again.
"Yeah... This is good."
The shadows in the room surrounded her, with expectations left unsaid, but the message was clear: they were hungry for what came next.
