Private 2300

[Kaelon Virex]

Kael's grin faltered as she spoke, her laughter still echoing faintly between them. For a moment, he wanted to ride that sound forever — that warmth, that chaos that only she could summon. But when she said don't pretend nothing's happening, something inside him stiffened. He could feel her eyes searching his face, trying to dig beneath the charm, the confidence, the shields he'd mastered long before she'd ever touched his life.


He took a slow breath, fingers tracing idle circles against her wrist before he finally met her gaze. The humor was gone now. What remained was raw, unguarded honesty.


"You're right," he said quietly. "I'm not sleeping easy. Haven't been since the last run-in with Baird."

"Truth is," he continued, voice rougher now, "I'm scared. More than I'd ever admit out loud. Because if Baird gets to me… it's not just about dying. It's about him erasing who I am. Everything I built, every version of me I've ever tried to be—gone. He's the kind of man who kills you twice: once in the body, once in memory."

He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, eyes shadowed by the dim cabin light. "And Ecks…" He shook his head, a low exhale escaping him. "He's worse. Baird plays with muscle and menace. Ecks plays the long game. Cold. Calculating. He doesn't need to hit hard—he just waits until you destroy yourself."

Kael turned back toward her, the faintest smirk flickering as if to soften the blow. "So yeah," he murmured, "we're up against two bastards who don't miss. Baird and Ecks—different weapons, same result."

Then, softer still: "But that doesn't mean I'm backing off. I've got skin in this now."

 

[Scherezade deWinter]

Scherezade wasn't sure she understood. Well no, that wasn't true. She understood that something was amiss, and that for some reason Kael was afraid of what'd happen if either of the two shmucks won. What she didn't understand was the killing twice part. Memory didn't work the way she thought he was meaning, but she also didn't want to interject with silly comments while he was opening up about it.

So she remained quiet, close to Kaelon Virex , close enough that he could still feel the heat from her skin. She wasn't planning on leaving or mocking him for any of it.

When he finished speaking, she pulled him back into the bed, entangling their limbs and the sheets. It was a movement of intimacy and closeness, just wanting to feel the warmth of his body, the echo of his beating heart.

"You've got me in this," she smiled when she finally stopped just inhaling him with glee, "I don't think you.. Or they, really understand what that means just yet. But you will, once we're done with those two smucks."

 

[Kaelon Virex]

Kael nodded in quiet agreement, the corner of his mouth lifting slightly as her words settled into him — not just comfort, but conviction. You've got me in this. The warmth of it lingered longer than he expected, pulling him from the cold edges of that nightmare and back into the soft rhythm of the Glitterdust's hum.

Outside the viewport, the stars were fading into streaks of green and blue as the freighter cut through the upper atmosphere of Endor. Clouds swirled below like silver cotton, dense and alive, masking the thick forest floor beneath. The distant light of the moon's twin suns filtered through the haze in soft, amber beams that glimmered against the ship's hull.

Kael exhaled slowly, fingers drumming against the control panel. "Endor," he murmured, eyes narrowing as the terrain resolved on the screen — endless woodland, fractured by mist and shadows. "Peaceful from orbit. Too peaceful."

He stood, pulling on his jacket as the freighter began to ease into a low hover pattern. The sensors showed no nearby settlements, no broadcast signals. Just static. Yet something… pulsed beneath it.

"Look here," Kael said, gesturing toward the holo-map flickering above the console. The topography shimmered in greens and golds, with faint geometric indentations scattered across a valley ridge. "Those patterns—see the way they loop? That's not natural erosion. It's deliberate. Carved into the treeline."

He frowned, tapping to zoom in. "Territory markers, maybe. Or a route. If Ecks is running a bloodsport down there, he's got to have an entry network. Hidden trails, drop points for the competitors. This could be his way of guiding the ones invited—or the ones being hunted."

Turning toward her, Kael's expression was equal parts wary and determined. "Once we touch down, we'll keep low. Find one of those carvings, see where it leads. Ecks doesn't host anything without a stage."

 

[Scherezade deWinter]

Endor too peaceful? Scherezade, clad in her armor and usual array of weapons, walked into the cockpit, leaning lightly against Kaelon Virex 's back of the shoulder, looking out through the viewport. She had visited the planet numerous times in the past, but she'd hardly call any of those visits peaceful. When she was there, it meant battle or war was ensuing. This time would be no different.

She paused. Wait. Been there so many times? No, that wasn't right… She'd never… The Sithling cursed. It had been a long time since her mind couldn't tell apart a memory that belonged to her, and one that had belonged to grandmother that she'd merely been given access to.

She listened quietly to Kael's explanation, knowing that she would not have noticed those marks on her own unless they'd been drenched in blood. Besides. This was Endor. She rarely took care to note a lot of things there because usually all the things there wanted to just eat her, and she had to show them she was a worse predator. It was a simple life, really.

"Once we touch down, I stay low," she corrected him. They had agreed. "You can't come out of the ship until you're a thousand percent sure you can do it."

After all, Eck's had demanded only her presence. He had not even mentioned Kael. But since Ecks had managed to infiltrate her systems, she had no doubt he knew of Kael's presence, and would more than likely be expecting her handsome devil to try to pull a few stunts of his own.

She glanced again at the planet, and chewed her lip a moment.

"Last time I was here, I befriended some Wisties," she grinned, "I wonder if they're anywhere around here."

Again she paused. Nope, that was her grandmother's too. But now, she did wonder if she could find some other wisties to make friends with to assist in the fight against the butthole.

And with that, she leaned down to plant a warm kiss on Kael's cheek, "I'm off to kill the guy. Please make sure and be alive and in one piece when I return," and with that, she spun around, and left the cockpit, exiting the ship a handful of moments later.

 

[Ecks]

Clouds thickened as she left the Giggledust, folding the sky into a low, leaden lid that swallowed the sun's edge. The world smelled of wet loam and something metallic—rain not yet fallen but promised—and each breath tasted of moss and old things. A wind moved through the trees like a living thing, carrying with it the soft creak of branches and the distant, constant whisper of the forest itself.

The clearing they'd touched down in was a bruise of mud and flattened ferns. Footprints—too many to be casual—mired in the soft ground and led toward a narrow gorge where the trees bent inward and the shadows pooled. Lanterns hung on the lower boughs, their glass panes clouded by salt-spray and time, little islands of dull light in the dim. Beyond them, the path narrowed into a throat of rock and root.

From that throat, a radio voice crackled—tinny and half-swallowed by distance—stitching a nervous rhythm into the quiet. The broadcast sounded like a checkpoint call sign: interval pings, clipped replies, the practical chatter of men (and women) on duty. It gave the place the air of something patient and practiced, like an animal that'd learned how to lie in wait and make it look polite.

Around the cave entrance itself someone had set a strange, almost ceremonial perimeter: tiki-style torches—workmanlike scaffolds rather than festive ornaments—flickered in the damp air, their flames guttering with a scent of resin and old oil. The torches lit the carved rock face in an uneven, twitching glow, casting the black shapes of leaves like teeth against the stone.

A sentry stood sentinel beneath that light. He was an imposing silhouette: broad-shouldered, stance casual but ready. Across his chest, stitched into the dark fabric of his armor, a patch read 001 in stark white numerals. At his hip hung a standard-issue blaster, muzzle polished and thumb-worn from practice; hands never far from its grip. The most unnerving thing was his mask—black with a deep crimson stain that caught the torchlight and made the angles seem alive—an echo of the voidstone facets Scherezade had seen before, only rougher, more utilitarian. It hid expression entirely, but it didn't have to; posture and stillness said enough.

He watched the tree line with a patience that bordered on predatory, listening as the radio crackled and replying in short, confidential phrases. The torchlight painted him in fits and starts, making the red of his mask pulse like a slow heartbeat. For anyone who knew the language of menace, the combination of carved markers, prepared lights, and an armored figure bearing the number 001 was less an accident and more a deliberate statement: the path was mapped, the thresholds guarded, and someone—some ones—had thought through how to shepherd visitors straight to where they wanted them.