Private Bloody Water On The Sands

[Itzhal Volkihar]

| Location | Ordo, Outer Rim Territories

Shrieking wind surged through the train cart, winding its way through countless cracks and crevices like a mournful spectre. It whistled and screeched, echoing off the metal walls and creating a haunting symphony, reminiscent of the sharp inhale of a cavernous maw filled with shattered, jagged teeth—a creature unbroken by the wounds delivered upon it. It shook not with undeniable pain, but with a fathomless rage that pushed the train onwards, straight towards the twirling wall of dust and sand.

Itzhal sheathed that which he named Oath, leaving his hand free to press down on the durasteel surface, pushing past the debris and rubble that wished to unsteady his rise. He cared not. It would take more than a collision to stop him. Slowly, he rose to one knee.

Vibrations thrummed through the tips of his fingers, the tether to the repulsorlifts, seeping through his bodysuit and the skin beneath. It would not stop—it reverberated deep in the marrow of his bones, a unified call.

The job was far from finished.

Mandalorian Iron pressed down on his shoulders and hips, a heavy burden, made all the worse by how his veins pulsed with sluggish energy, desperate for a moment's rest. Muscles strained against the flex of bruises contained by the fluid shell of kinetic gel. His lungs filled with air, an inhale of oxygen, slow and steady.

Itzhal rose to his feet.

The speeders outside darted forward.

Drexan filled the air with a haze of blaster bolts, unrelenting.

Itzhal raised his arm, silver scars scratched across the surface of his gauntlet.

Blue light flickered over his visor, the silhouettes outlined in a glowing haze of red; swoop bikes attached to dangerously powerful engines tore through the distance between their previous positions and the thunderous stride of the train, rattling over repulsorlift hooks buried in the sand, speeders followed behind, slower, but more heavily armoured and with less potential of a catastrophic failure. It wouldn't matter. It wouldn't save them.

Wireframe schematics of the vessels overrode reality—a vision of technical expertise: engine blocks, fuel lines, power cell batteries, repulsorlift generators, and structural frames, to name a few of the pieces he saw, identified by the energy readings picked up by his sensor rig. Alternative options for a simple problem.

The raider's charge needed to be blunted; their assault could not be tolerated.

The answer was simple.

His arm raised, Itzhal stared over the dunes and the approaching wall of sand; the looming shadow that floated above, twisting the sensor readings around it into uselessness.

Enclosed in a shield of metal and transparisteel casings, the vehicles were designed to protect their fragile components, the weaknesses hidden beneath their armour. In time, they could be defeated and destroyed, but it was time wasted. Sometimes, it was simply easier to strike at the weakest point.

"Ha'rangir," and with a whistle of steel, blood poured over the sands once more.

Tags: Drexan Ordo​

 

[Drexan Ordo]

L E A D E R​

Location: Ordo, Outer Rim Territories

The storm broke all at once.

Drexan felt it before he saw it, the subtle change beneath his boots, the rhythm of the train’s motion faltering for half a heartbeat. Then came the flash below the forward viewport: a cluster of compact charges clamped directly onto the rail spine ahead.

“Tracks!”

The detonation wasn’t fire.

It was light.

A violent blue pulse surged outward in a widening sphere, racing along the rails and through the repulsorlift grid. Systems flickered. The engine howl choked into a dying whine as consoles sparked and died. The train lurched violently as stabilizers failed, momentum dragging it forward into a grinding, uncontrolled slowdown.

“EMP! Feth! The systems are compromised!”

Emergency backups struggled to respond, lights dimming to a dull red glow as the train ground forward, wounded and slowing in the open desert.

The bandits surged immediately.

Speeders peeled away from escort positions as the armored hauler’s rear hatches burst open. Figures poured out, not raiders scrambling for scraps, but a strike team advancing with purpose.

And at their center,

A giant.

The Houk boarded first.

Nearly a head taller than any Mandalorian present, his massive frame encased in layered plating crudely bolted over thick cybernetic limbs. One arm ended in reinforced servo plating, piston-driven strength hissing with each movement. Optical implants burned a dull amber behind a scarred brow ridge.

He did not fire at first.

He simply advanced.

The first Mandalorian to meet him swung a rifle into position. The Houk seized the weapon mid-raise and tore it free, smashing the warrior aside with a single mechanical backhand that sent beskar crashing into the bulkhead hard enough to dent steel.

Another stepped forward.

The Houk drove a cybernetic fist into the warrior’s chest plate, lifting them clean off their feet before hurling them into the wrecked wall.

Behind him, the rest of the team spread through the train, disciplined and ruthless, blasters cutting down resistance as they advanced.

Drexan steadied himself at the breach, pistol rising again.

The Houk’s gaze locked onto him.

Onto Itzhal.

Recognition, or challenge, flickered in those artificial eyes.

The giant began moving again, stepping over fallen Mandalorians as if they were obstacles in a road.

Drexan’s modulator rasped low.

“Target leader identified.”

His stance widened.

Pistol steady.

“This ends here.”

The Houk kept coming.

Itzhal Volkihar​

 

[Itzhal Volkihar]

| Location | Ordo, Outer Rim Territories

Static crackled over the Mandalorian's T-Visor, blue lines darting like errant sparks and interposing fragmented images that dissolved into a blinding flare of light. In its wake, the HuD flickered, a distorted haze, pulsating rhythmically in a wave of malfunctioning sensors and warning prompts that filled Itzhal's vision. Forks of crackling lightning shrieked over the surface of his beskar'gam, each sharp jolt of energy flickering briefly over the beskar plates before they dissipated, chasing the last glimmers of the blue haze as it vanished over the distant horizon. In his hands, Oath and Honour emitted a low, mournful whine as they trembled with residual energy; the capacitors strained under pressure, while the energy cells vibrated ominously with the sharp pop of overloaded containment batteries.

Itzhal's boots ground into the duarasteel surface, toe pressed deep into the shape of a pockmark carved with crimson fire.

Around him, the train buckled against the rail, metal screeching beneath the cart—their vision reduced to the faint glimmer of light from holes bored in the sides of the walls, and where the ceiling bowed inwards to allow a soft glow to seep through the cracks. Repulsorlifts shattered under the strain, momentum carried it onwards, a lumbering beast lurching in its death throes.

The last wave struck.

Shrouded in a dull red glow, the titanic form of metal and flesh prowled forward—blaster frames bent, bones shattered, and pistons hissed with every torturous movement of a beast more machine than man. Against the tide of beskar, it stomped down, crushing those lost beneath its wake, the discarded bodies left behind, trophies to be reclaimed at a later date.

Itzhal's hand lowered to his belt, the soft click of his beskad detaching as he observed the approaching threat.

Underneath the Mandalorian's feet, the tread of his boots scraped against the debris-laden floor, sinking deep to find purchase in the durasteel; his legs coiled, then, with another thunderous step of the approaching giant, Itzhal pushed forward, closing the distance in the blink of an eye, sharpened beskar skittering over their outstretched arm.

Wind tore through the space his head previously occupied, ducked low, pivoting through a slice that cut into their leg—oil splattered over the ground, as he retracted the blade, his elbow following in a sharp jab against the adam's apple of a bandit, then slipping past them as a backhand turned their chest to paste.

Another red bolt shot over his shoulder, skittering past, to splatter over the walls as he continued onwards, one hand slamming down on the pommel as he tore the blade through a shoulder joint; letting go to grasp the handle of their blaster, flicking it up, straight into the chin of a female Weequay who stumbled backwards, before their torso was peppered with burning plasma.

Behind him, he heard the sound of shrieking metal, torn asunder; pivoting back to the original threat, Itzhal flexed his knees, ready to move, only for the remnants of hard-packed timber and outline metal to slam into the side of his chest-plate. Momentum slammed him into the nearby wall, timber shattered, and his body followed through the hole that formed behind, though not before he got a glance of the bodies crushed beneath the thrown door.

Muscles whined under the strain, his hands and knees scrambling for purchase as he attempted to stand again.

With one less foe, the Houk reached towards the ceiling; steel claw, tearing through what remained of an exit hatch, as light bloomed through the gap, blinding in its terrible glare. In a flurry of movement far quicker than its size suggested, the hatch was launched straight towards Drexan, and a crack of displaced air followed.

"Waaaarden," the corridor shook with the boom of the giant's mechanical voice. "There is good money on your head."

Tags: Drexan Ordo​

 

[Drexan Ordo]

H O U K​

Location: Ordo, Outer Rim Territories

The hatch came like a missile.

Drexan saw the motion a fraction before release, the shift in the Houk’s shoulders, the hydraulic tension winding through cybernetic joints, and he moved without thought. The slab of torn metal screamed through the corridor where he had stood a heartbeat before, shattering against the bulkhead behind him in a violent explosion of sparks and twisted steel.

He rolled through the debris, boots finding purchase as he came up low and already advancing.

The Houk was still speaking.

Drexan didn’t answer.

The pistol snapped back into its holster in a single motion, his off-hand already drawing the vibroknife from his belt. The weapon came alive with a sharp harmonic whine as he closed the distance, cloak snapping behind him in the hot, smoke-choked air.

The giant turned to meet him.

Too slow.

Drexan drove forward, shoulder low, blade flashing in tight, efficient arcs meant for killing. The vibroknife struck first at the exposed seam where plating met flesh along the Houk’s side. The energized edge bit deep, cutting through cabling and thick muscle alike in a spray of dark blood and hydraulic fluid.

The Houk roared.

Drexan twisted the blade free and struck again, aiming higher, toward the joint beneath the cybernetic collar where reinforcement thinned. The knife punched in hard, the vibration screaming as it chewed through synthetic fibers and scarred tissue.

For a moment, the giant staggered.

Then the cybernetic arm caught him.

The Houk’s grip clamped around Drexan’s cuirass with crushing force, pistons hissing as mechanical strength overwhelmed leverage and balance alike.

Drexan tried to wrench free, driving the vibroknife upward again, but the Houk hauled him bodily from the deck.

And threw him.

Drexan hit hard, beskar striking durasteel with a deafening crack that drove the air from his lungs. The world jolted sideways as he skidded through shattered timber and twisted plating before slamming into the bulkhead in a rain of debris.

For a moment he did not move.

Then a gauntleted hand planted against the floor.

The Warden of Ordo forced himself back up to one knee, vibroknife still clenched tight as the modulator rasped harshly with his breath.

Across the wrecked corridor, the Houk advanced again.

Drexan rose to meet him.​

Itzhal Volkihar​

 

[Itzhal Volkihar]

| Location | Ordo, Outer Rim Territories

Splintered timber and contorted metal debris warped around the groaning figure of Itzhal Volkihar, his Buy'ce firmly pressed against the once pristine floor, his fingers dug into the scorched remnants of the carpet, which lay in tatters, exposing the crumpled, scratched durasteel beneath. Faint footsteps clattered over the rubble, nearing closer. There was no door remaining, only the absence of a wall, from which a Trandoshan stepped through, their scales covered in a light dusting of golden sand, and the fluttering of fabric that covered their armour. In their hands, an ugly slab of metal in the shape of a shotgun was raised.

With a boot pressed into the twisted fragments of a wooden bench, Itzhal pushed off, launching himself forward—a bracer slammed into the barrel of the slugthrower, a thunderous roar inches from their visor, severed cables and shattered pipes rained down upon the clashing pair, as they slammed through the wall and out into the corridor.

In the midst of the chaos, the weapon clattered to the ground, lost among the wreckage. Fists flew through the air, colliding with swift precision, a hectic exchange of blows countered in a frenzy of movement. Razor-sharp claws slashed against resilient beskar, skittering off plates, catching on the armour weave between the gaps. An instep slipped behind the bandit's heel, and swiped through their footing; the world twisted horizontal, before the Morellian's armoured elbow drove them into the ground. Scales cracked under the impact, their head bouncing off the cold, hard surface. A groan slipped from their throat, silenced by the skitter-snap of sharpened metal that speared out of Itzhal's gauntlet.

Vibrations humming across the length of the metal, crimson flecks flicked off the blade with a twist of his wrist, his steps carrying him away from the carnage; his boot stamped on the butt of the discarded slugthrower, tilted upwards, his hand wrapped around the frame, pulling it into both hands, he pointed towards the nearest foe, a humanoid figure covered under flowing layers, left in tatters when shrapnel tore through their back. Their body collapsed to the beat of a metallic clunk, clearing the chamber of the expended cartridge and loading the next slug.

Itzhal aimed, his stride undaunted.

Dozens of metallic shards tore their way out of the barrel, a wave of furious steel descending upon the cybernetic monster, their war cry deafening the corridor. Armour crumpled; lightning lashed outwards with sharp, echoing cracks across the plates, crimson blood, tainted black and purple, seeping between the cracks. The Houk stumbled, leaning forward, their clawed appendage tore through the side of the wall for support, stalling their fall, another step allowing them to push onwards. Anger burned in the glare of their optics. Their next step tore the remainder of the wall away—a handful of the structure sprayed forward.

Clunk.

Itzhal aimed, then pulled the trigger.

Clack.

Grinding down the inside of the chamber, metal clashed against metal, a short puff of smoke leaking from a port in the side; pulling back the handguard with a crack, the weapon jammed. It clattered to the ground a moment later, discarded for the handle of a blade half-buried in the timber wall.

One hand wrapped around the hilt, close to the handguard, the other grasped the pommel and twisted, slashing through damaged wood and revealing the blade that gleamed under the sunlight from above. His body angled forward, arms to the side, he started to run, building up momentum as the distance between himself and the melee brawl closed.

Itzhal lunged, blade raised high.

Tags: Drexan Ordo​

 

[Drexan Ordo]

R E C O V E R​

Location: Ordo, Outer Rim Territories

Drexan stayed down for a moment.

The impact still echoed through his bones, a deep, dull tremor carried beneath the beskar plating of his armor. His gauntleted hand pressed against the durasteel floor as he forced air back into his lungs. The corridor around him was a ruin, splintered timber, twisted plating, and the fading glow of blasterfire reflecting across drifting dust.

He could hear the giant before he saw him again.

Heavy steps.

Servos whining.

The grinding breath of a machine wrapped in flesh.

Slowly, the Warden of Ordo lifted his head.

Across the corridor, Itzhal had already risen again, relentless as the desert wind itself. Drexan watched the exchange unfold in fractured moments, the Trandoshan collapsing beneath the Mandalorian’s blade, the thunderous roar of the slugthrower tearing into the Houk’s armor, the creature staggering beneath the storm of metal.

For the first time, the monster slowed.

Drexan pushed himself upright.

His hand closed around the grip of his blaster.

The weapon cleared leather in a smooth motion as he steadied himself against the wall. The modulator in his helmet crackled faintly as he drew a breath, visor settling on the massive silhouette now bracing against the ruined corridor.

Then he saw Itzhal move.

The Morellian surged forward, blade raised high, charging straight toward the towering brute.

Drexan didn’t shout.

He simply fired.

The first bolt cracked across the corridor and slammed into the Houk’s cybernetic shoulder joint. Sparks erupted as the shot struck exposed servos, forcing the massive arm to jerk sideways.

The second followed instantly, driving into the damaged plating along the giant’s ribs where Drexan’s vibroknife had already carved a wound. Hydraulic fluid burst outward in a dark spray.

“Now!”

The modulated voice carried low and sharp through the chaos.

Drexan kept firing as Itzhal closed the distance, each shot placed with cold precision, one into the exposed cabling of the cybernetic spine, another into the reinforced thigh joint to slow the giant’s movement.

The Houk roared in fury, optics blazing as he tried to turn toward the new threat.

But the moment was already gone.

Because Itzhal was upon him.

Itzhal Volkihar​

 

[Itzhal Volkihar]

| Location | Ordo, Outer Rim Territories

Swooping through the gap between take-off and descent with an elegant arc, the Morellian twisted his body, transferring power through his hips and shoulders as the sharp-edged blade of Mandalorian Iron scythed through the air with a swish, with only the sound of the shifted vacuum to reveal a trace of its passage.

Silent, honed, yet ultimately, evanescent.

Turadium alloy, gleaming silver across the length of the bandit leader's neck, interceded with the precise swipe of the beskad's passage. A second later, Itzhal's treaded boots clattered against the ground, the end of his arc taking him past the surprised Houk, to land in front of them. Another moment passed in the flicker of the eye, too quick to be a second, too long to be instant.

Itzhal pivoted to face the bandit, his blade dripping crimson.

An oily mess of purples so dark to be black and a vivid red, spurted in a ghastly spray that painted the side of the carriage, rupturing outward from the clean divide of shorn metal, their hand reaching up to try to contain the flow that seeped between their clawed fingers.

With a flick of his wrist, the fine sheen of Itzhal's beskad shimmered through the air, discarding the thin veil of blood that splattered against the floor and wall.

Durasteel shuddered beneath the hulking weight of the Houk's collapsing form, their knees buckling in a discordant mess of faltering cybernetic parts and a body only beginning to realise it was already dead. Twisted debris and shattered remnants of the once-luxurious cart surrounded them, the aftermath of their disastrous assault, highlighted by the harsh glare of the sweltering sun above. Dust swooped through the gaps in the sides of the train, and the ceiling above, a hazy veil, that did little to hide the pain that lingered in what little remained of the bandit's organic parts—a faint stretch of their nostrils contorted in agony, frown lines imprinted in their forehead quivering with a measure of realisation.

Itzhal stepped forward, a hand on the grip of his blaster pistol.

"Who sent you?" He asked, short and sharp.

Red optics glowed with malice, radiating a conviction that would have seared a lesser man to the bone, as they stared at Itzhal with absolute disdain for his existence. A seething hatred lingered in their gaze, an insatiable urge to reduce everything to a case of us versus them in a world full of threats—and the inevitable desire to reduce all that could not be theirs to ashes and ruins, in a world engulfed in flames.

They chuckled through the gaping mess of their throat, "I-i, have, no-o, mast-t-ter, mu-tt."

Smoothly, with a flicker of movement that was almost a blur, Itzhal drew his pistol and fired, as the sounds outside trickled to nothing more than the lonesome howl of the desert.

In the quiet, the solemn visage of the Morellian's T-visor panned across the carriage, a faint gleam from the rays of sunlight seeping through the gaps in the ceiling speckled over the transparisteel, holes of various sizes painted every inch of the walls, with only the vague outline of the cart's frame remaining. His steps echoed without the hum of repulsorlifts reverberating beneath his feet. "Can we get the train moving again?"

Tags: Drexan Ordo​