Better This Time

[Arage Bao]

Wayland
Clans Territory.
[member="Arla Balor"]

They looked over the surface of Wayland from the observatory deck of the Dauntless.

“Are you sure this is the place?” Ronan had been expecting these questions. Some might have picked a more temperate location. A place where flora and fauna wasn’t going to try and kill them every step they took, but that was the entire thing of being a Mandalorian, wasn’t it? It was the reason why Wayland had always had such an attraction to them. They thrived in places that would kill others.

“It will keep us strong and our edge sharp.”

They had been looking at the Centrality first. A chaotic place now with only a few tentacles of the Sanctum embedded into it, but then the Clans had called for their help. Agomar had been the tipping point.

Clan Vizsla still remembered.

They had picked Wayland to settle for now, instead of other worlds inside Mandalorian space. Not Concord Dawn nor Gromas, not Roche or Junction… no, Wayland was where they could reclaim their identity once again.

“Where are we settling?”
“Betna spoke of Fort Monroe. It used to be their primary outpost on Wayland, assaulted by the Primeval and then looted… still salvageable. And less work than Dantooine proved to be.”

Vashak nodded. “I am going to see what the mood is, we will be arriving in 30 minutes.”

 

[Arla Ordo]

Okyaab IV had long been the homestead of her Buir Ordo, and the Clans. Arla however wanted more for the clan than the harshness of a world that seemed to take more lives and then help them. She had watched her Buir plow for long hours into a land with an unforgiving nature she wouldn't watch that anymore.

Wayland offered more, a lot more. She had been on Wayland scouting locations would it do for them? Could she convince them to come, and develop this world into what they needed. Sitting at the cabin she was borrowing she thought about a section outside of the lushness of the jungle, something that offered a water source, and land to be cleared and worked for those that desired. Arla worked for MandalTech, the company her buir started.

She could still go there work half the year then come here to Wayland. It would be difficult but it had to be done, or maybe she could convince him to build another location here. Only time would tell.

As she was lost in her thoughts she could hear the wine of engines she looked up but saw nothing. It wasn't uncommon for visitors to come, or for more settlers to seek out land. She had to go check, taking a speeder, and keeping away the redhead went off following the sounds.

[member="Ronan Vizsla"]​

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Arla Balor"] | [member="Hark Vizsla"] | [member="Ra Vizsla"] | [member="Jaiyn Vizsla"]​

---​

OOC: So considering we got a fair few Vizslas now, I am gonna request this thread to be moved to the open section as a faction thread. This story is about Clan Vizsla establishing itself on Wayland, making it their primary home. If you got time, join in and have fun!​

---​

Balor would come across a scene quite unlike she had probably expected from a world known for its hostile wildlife and jungles.

There was a clearing she would enter and that’s where the fun started.

Clan Vizsla had made its landing zone around the wreckage and ruins of the Fort Monroe. Already she would be able to hear a steady press of gunfire deeper within the ruins as the Mando’ade were clearing out the various beasts and critters currently infesting the remnants of the Fort. Parimeters had already been established, but without the electrical fences and mine zones.

A few moments later a duo of Vizsla clansmen were already on the scene. They didn’t train their guns on the lady or her swoop bike, but they were cautious regardless.

This was at the border of the Mandalorian territories, so being careful about things was one of the most important things. That cautiousness went marginally away once they noticed the symbol of Clan Ordo on her - whichever opinions they had individually about the clans as a whole, Ordo’s reputation was beyond reproach, even after the affair with the Sith.

“Su cuy'gar, vod Ordo.” One of them shouted out in greeting.

In the meanwhile the reclamation efforts went on.

The sweeping of the surface would be followed with digging through the lower levels, before they could actually start salvaging the place. It was important to make sure that everything was marginally safe for them here. So they could work without being interrupted by flesh-eating plants and the sort.

 

[Lina Djo]

Mia hung back by the ship, eyes raking over the ruins of the Fort. It was a bizarre feeling, to stand before something that had not only be named after her, but had been ruined as well. A reflection of the damage done to her perhaps?

Turning away, she moved to the noisy pack of young vornskr, tethered close by. She'd met [member="Ronan Vizsla"] on a cargo freighter as he was leading his people away. Mia had joined the clan for a time, following them with her pack and assisting where she could. She touched each of the hounds heads in turn, uttering soft words and bringing their focus to her.

"Pest control ready to be released, all units stand clear of the Fort. These guys are young, I will not be held responsible for someone stupid enough to get in their way." She kept her voice low and calm, knowing that any excitement would trigger the pack. Only when she received the all clear from the units did she release the harness holding them back. "OYA!" She shouted at them watching with a grin as they burst towards the fort, ears flat against their heads.

She made her way to [member="Arla Balor"] and Ronan. "Su cuy Arl'ika" she greeted.

 

[Arla Ordo]

Arla waved and returned the greeting to the members of Clan Vizsla, she smiled when someone called her name. Her green eyes set upon [member="Mia Monroe"] , "Mia" She walked towards the woman who she met on the night she, Verz and Ordo had left Mandalore off on their grand adventure.

Course that was after Verz' defeat by Gil. She suddenly felt a piece of family returning, "I'm really glad to see you" She had not seen her since the Council meeting. She had seen her release the vornskrs since she was not force sensitive she was not concerned yet of being attacked.

She reached out to clasp her sister's arm, "So what is all of this, is that a Clan Vizsla emblem I see." She could hear the 'reclamation' continuing. Part of her was sad by it she as a hunter only killed when she needed to, and even though these were predators she felt bad for the loss.

As she though about, oh "Fort Monroe, Mia Monroe...is there a connection?" Some things took place before she arrived and became part of the clans.

[member="Ronan Vizsla"]

 

[Lyanie Quez]

Well, she couldn't deny her buir a favour. After everything the family and the clan had been through, Joanes Quez was hard at work growing crops, tending herds, and looking at the possibility of expanding the business; it would do the clans well to have their agricultural holdings developed, and who better than him? That wasn't bias. Her buir knew soil and animals as well as he knew his loadout, his gear, and how to take down most anything in one go. And as much as she dearly loved her only remaining parent, the man was also the most intimidating one she knew. He was very much the 'got daughters, have shotgun' type of man, and as the years inched her closer to her third decade, Lyanie found it endearing more than anything.

So, she was here, in his stead, as his eldest child with nary a complaint, to see the prospective world that the aliit'buir saw as the best for the new seat of the clan - an aliit'buir she had never met and didn't know any better than the backside of a turkey - and to fill her buir in when all was said and done. She had his work ethic, after all, and would do everything she could to make the clan home feel like home, "more come," she whispered, eyes disengaging from the crumbling structure and the vode that swept through it that she observed from a distance, to turn to where the voices came from. For a moment, she spied a couple of the other clanfolk through the electrobinoculars, then lowered the device to see the full lay of the land around them.

She had some eye for structure, but that wasn't why she was up here. No, just overwatch, which in the end allowed her to put the remainder of her mental faculties to computations, inefficiences, and fixes. Well, the vornskr were off, so it was time to come down and see who the new arrivals were. Maybe one of them was this '[member="Ronan Vizsla"]', maybe not. Either way, at least one of the pair was easy on the eyes in her opinion, which made the thought of her father sitting on the front stoop of the old ranch house, shining his rifle, stand out in her mind as the crispest image.

"Buir, you sure leave an impression on everyone, whether they like it or not," she muttered as she went to join the small group, "su'cuy!' she said, lofting the hand free of the binocs, and coming to stand alongside [member="Arla Balor"] and [member="Mia Monroe"] a few moments later.

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Mia Monroe"] | [member="Lyanie Quez"] | [member="Arla Balor"]​

---​

"Aye." Ronan replied after the exchange of greetings.

Some skepticism had remained with the alor’e council about his ascension to the council and more importantly Clan Vizsla’s overall role in the Mandalorian Clans after leaving Verd’s Empire. But few could deny that without Vizsla’s direct intervention on Agamar, things would have been way more bloody and that with a core portion of the Death Watch returning to the Clans under Ronan’s brother… even more bloodshed had been avoided.

“Clan Vizsla needed a place to settle, a place to call home. Like Clan Ordo has in Ordo, Rekali in Yavin.” The man took a wide look around. At the jungles, the screeching of the wildlife all around them and that familiar feeling of danger radiating from everything around. “The Alor’e council suggested Wayland.”

A shrug of those shoulders.

“Seemed the perfect place for us.” Deadly. Unyielding. A place to hone their craft and stay sharp.

“You are far away from Ordo, vod, what is it you seek here?” It was then that a fourth voice found its way to the conversation. He turned around and stepped back, to give space for the fourth- hmm, brows furrowed in thought as he tried to place Quez’ face. Dantooine, that was it, her father had been quite the expert on the plain turkeys there.

They had discussed cooperation, before the clan had voted to leave Dantooine and the Empire behind.

“Olarom, sister.” Welcome, he called back.

 

[Arla Ordo]

[member="Lyanie Quez"] [member="Ronan Vizsla"] [member="Mia Monroe"]

"Su cuy'gar Vod Vizsla, I'm Arla Balor, this is my sister Mia Monroe"

It was true they were far from the planet Ordo , "Ordo is harsh and the land unforgiving, much like Okyaab IV where the last Allit'buir had us living. I am thinking of either taking on a huge undertaking and going back to Ordo and figuring out the way to make the land friendlier, or moving to a place like this where the people aren't fighting for each day. And it is good that all the Clans show a unity, perhaps we can help you in some way to settle."

She understood that a harsh place would keep the Clans sharp but they already worked hard at war when home she did not think it should be a battle all the time just to live, they needed to feel they worked to protect more than the desert sands.

 

[Lyanie Quez]

So it was him, she gathered from hearing the man talk as she made her way over. The clan alor had been mentioned a handful of times in passing by her buir, for one reason or another, so she already had his name down to the extent that it wasn't to be forgotten, and now the owner of that name was standing before her.

"Finally, a face to put to the name, Alor Vizsla," she quipped with brief descent of her head and eyes, before carrying on with her own introduction for them all, "I'm Lyanie Quez. My buir sends his regards."

The place was going to need some work, and it was no Dantooine, but this was for the best. The way Joanes talked, he wasn't going to restrict his operations to one world, anyway. It was good to see him living again after the loss of his wife, her ma. 'Nita had been charged with keeping an eye out for him, when Lyanie couldn't do it herself.

[member="Ronan Vizsla"] | [member="Arla Balor"] | [member="Mia Monroe"]​

 

[Lina Djo]

Mia allowed herself a small smile at Arla's question. "Yes, there's a connection." She paused in her explanation as another joined them, the overwatch, though she couldn't recall her name. With Clan Vizsla rapid rise and increase in numbers, she was beginning to lose track of them all. She offered a hand as Arla introduced them. "The fort was built after my death at Coruscant." she continued her explanation to Arla. "The clans didn't know i would be coming back," she paused "nor did I to be honest." her eyes scanned the fort, listening intently as a howl echoed through the ruins.

"How does it look from up high?" she asked [member="Lyanie Quez"].

[member="Arla Balor"] [member="Ronan Vizsla"]

 

[Lyanie Quez]

She crossed her arms about as much as could be managed with the binocs in her hand, and effected a slight backward lean and let her brown-eyed gaze slip over the front of the fort, recalling what she'd seen from above when not watching after vode, a thing in which she hadn't had to resort to using a snipe - far more her father's skllset than her own, but damn, if he hadn't taught her much of what he knew.

"I ain't seen nothin' that'd indicate massive and irreparable damage to the foundations," she then looked back to [member="Mia Monroe"], [member="Arla Balor"], and [member="Ronan Vizsla"], "and I'd think a lot of the remaining bulkheads are salvageable, but roofing's the worst hit. Will have put stress on the bulkheads, by whatever mechanism pulled most of the ceilings down."

Her shoulder rose and fell in half a shrug.

"Salvage what can be salvaged is my suggestion."

 

[Arla Ordo]

Arla nodded understanding, "much happened that year you died [member="Mia Monroe"]." Her green eyes for a moment lingered on Mia, much had happened since then. "Verz has disappeared, and our Buir has retired to farming. I'm afraid the Clan isn't as strong as it once was espiecally after everything with the dark lord" She stopped there they'd had to discuss that later perhaps, much later.

"A direct connection, this must feel odd to then" She looked to [member="Lyanie Quez"] , "you think the structure is strong enough and the roof the only thing to repair, well maybe we can put a roof on it."" One thing her buir always liked working with his hands, she had that too liked working with her hands.

She motioned to [member="Ronan Vizsla"] , "What do you think once it's ready we can rebuild it, give Clan Vizsla a hand" that's what clans were for, helping one another. Though they did seem to have the corner on members right now.

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Arla Balor"] | [member="Lyanie Quez"] | [member="Mia Monroe"]

“Ah, Joanes. Good man, good fighter and the turkeys he breeds on Dantooine are unparalleled.” He nodded towards Lyanie, a second greeting, but this one was born out of acceptance for her place here. It was an acknowledgement that she would have a place here for as long as necessary. Some cultures needed extensive words and sentences turned into stories to settle it, but a Mandalorian just needed a gesture and a few words.

“This is a large planet, vod Ordo. If you wish to settle here as well, you are welcome to it, we can build a home here together.”

There was some pondering behind it, of course.

As she said - Ordo wasn’t in the best of shapes anymore, so this meant that the blunt of the defense would have to be taken care by Vizsla, to ensure the protection of both Clans. But on the flipside: where Vizsla was strong in arms and battle, it was still growing into a secondary role of settling, of engineering and other civilian needs.

They needed farmers and cooks.
They needed scientists, doctors and engineers.

They needed all that and more, if they wished to grow and become self-sustaining. Instead of simply roaming around the Galaxy as sappers, SpecOp executors and soldiers of fortune, so the inclusion of Clan Ordo… this presented a way to gain that in one way or another.

“The second patrol will be here soon to relieve us. Let’s see how Monroe’s vornskr are handling themselves, shall we?”

 

[Lyanie Quez]

Her mouth curved to a positive when her father and his work were acknowledged. Nowadays, he seemed more dedicated to the task of feeding the clans than he'd ever been, once he had come out the other side of grief. How better to honour the memory of her mother, his wife, than to continue the work of their life together, and prepare others to take the reins that it might continue? Still, his skills as a cook were only just passable, so it was either her, 'Nita, or the extended hands of their small clan making sure that her buir wasn't subsisting on something little better than rocks. That had always been the purview of her mother, Mureen.

"Yes, let's." She was amenable to the walk, wanting to get a closer look at the state of the fort. "Now, turkeys aren't the only area of my fathers' work, Alor Vizsla, but they do make up the bulk of it." She mused a moment, "Such a large bird is a delicacy, particularly in the whole package. Of course, when you work with something for as long as we've tended to flocks, it gets in your head in ways."

She glanced sidelong at [member="Ronan Vizsla"].

"He gets ideas, my buir. A little strange, bird-brained, some, but I humour him."

[member="Arla Balor"] | [member="Mia Monroe"]​

 

[Lina Djo]

Mia didn't respond to the suggestion that it felt odd to be here. It did in some ways, and in others she was deeply honoured that they would feel the need to name something after her. Her eyes settled onto the fort as she drifted out of the conversation for a moment, listening to the low growls that rose from its depths. It was only when Ronan mentioned her name that she snapped her attention back to them with a small smile.

"I can relate to that," she spoke as they moved towards the fort. "It's easy to get caught up in a beast's mentality when you spend so long with it. Some of the greatest ideas are based on what nature shows us."

She moved ahead of them, reaching out in the force and identifying each of her hounds. Most were content, she could feel the joy in their noses pressed against the earth absorbing new smells. One or two showed a little more fear than she would have liked, the weakest of the pack. She made a note to reassign them to the breeding programme. Coming to a halt, she amplified her aura in the force and attempt to draw their attention. Putting thumb and fore finger between her lips, she let out a shrill whistle.

"Watch yourself Ronan," she called over her shoulder "They're deep in the hunt and right now, you and I are the tastiest things around."

[member="Lyanie Quez"][member="Ronan Vizsla"][member="Arla Balor"]

 

[Arla Ordo]

Arla turned and looked at [member="Lyanie Quez"] before she looked at [member="Ronan Vizsla"] , "thank you Vod, we will definitely give this thought, we can be of help to you as well as grow ourselves" She looked then at [member="Mia Monroe"], "What do you think of that idea Mia?"

Even though she had not been around Mia for very long her interactions with her and listening to her she knew her to be level headed and speak her mind, something Arla appreciated and respected. As a sister adopted by Ordo she felt she needed to know her thoughts.

Now before Mia could answer she heard lyanie mention turkeys, "turkeys? I don't think I'm familiar with that, what's a turkey?" She had come to learn many things since leaving Tatooine but not turkey.

Now she understood what Mia meant when she said the vornskr were deep into the hunt, she had heard of them, seen them, and read what she could. She was thankful she had no force abilities or association for them to sniff out.

The small group continued on their way to the remains of the Fort. Arla over sensitive however kept her eye on Mia she really wasn't sure how this was affecting her and wanted to be near. Not that she expected her to break out in tears but there were times that just the reassuring hand of a friend made things easier to handle.

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Arla Balor"] | [member="Mia Monroe"] | [member="Lyanie Quez"]​

---​

A nod followed. Ronan was aware of Quez’ loss and it wasn’t surprising that the man had become slightly… eccentric in its wake.

“I have seen men permanently scarred and change after losing those they care about. It is a wound that rarely heals completely or without some scar tissue left.” The man responded after a moment of thought. “All that being said, a man who loses himself in his work to provide for his family while trying to forget?”

“It could be worse, vod Quez.”

He looked up towards Monroe as they approached the Fort. In the distance they could hear the loud whines and barks of the vornskrs - tough opponents in battle, Vizsla had wrestled a fair few of them in his time and even had one as a companion at one time. Proud and loyal beasts, when properly tamed.

“Acknowledged, vod Monroe. Being cautious always pays in my experience.”

The other Vizsla vode were notified to stay clear while the battle-rage of the vornskrs subsided. Monroe could handle himself, the Alor could handle himself, Quez and Balor… they could presumably also handle themselves.

 

[Lina Djo]

"I see no reason why not." Mia called over her shoulder as the first of the vornskr began to appear at the edge of the ruin. "We are always stronger together. Perhaps Clan Ordo and Vizsla can form an allegiance."

She reached out in the force to the pack, seeking the mind of the alpha male as her sauntered towards her, head low and teeth bared. "Oh no you don't." She muttered as he launched towards her. She side stepped his snapping jaws and slammed a fist into the side of his head. "Gev!" She barked at him as he got back to his feet suddenly unsure, a low rumbling growl emitting from his throat.

Again he leapt at her, challenging her authority and again she smacked his attack aside. The growling had stopped and she pointed at her feet. "K'olar." He moved forward head low, dropping on his belly at her feet and rolling onto his back submitting reluctantly.

"That's better." She said with a smile, crouching down to scratch his belly. Putting her fingers between her lips again she whistled once more and the remainder of the pack trotted over, tongues lolling out the side of their mouth. Mia completed a head count.

"All clear, Alor Vizsla." She led the pack back to their transport.

[member="Ronan Vizsla"] [member="Arla Balor"] [member="Lyanie Quez"]