Endless Knight
Allies: [member="Ryndrae Talon"] | [member="Ajax Crowe"] (Can't see you yet...) | [member="Lucien Rayne"]
Enemies: [member="Rhaegar Nemesis Dib"]
Person of Interest: [member="Kyle Whir"]
Though Lucien could not see her expression from behind her Obsidian Mask he would feel her less than amused stare nonetheless. The no-nonsense woman had no time, or patience, for one that constantly seemed to desire the last word. Right or wrong. “Listen twice as much as you speak.”
“Our orders are to follow, observe, and protect [member="Alkor Centaris"]. There are many moving parts in a war. The sooner you understand what cog you are—the better.”
Still, at least, when she told him to focus he seemed to obey. There were worse apprentices to take on within the Confederacy but there were times when she wished he were a little less willful. He had too much fire in him, whereas she, was slowly calcifying to stone. Her heart had opened once. Recently. No more. Never, again. There was only work. Duty. Of which she would attend to mercilessly.
By the time they came upon their missing Ex-Savage he was already engaging with a force of enemy combatants that were comprised, mostly of Mandalorians, but there were a few exceedingly pale faces speckled here or there. Echani? It was disturbing. Were the Echani not a proud, loyal, and culturally evolved species? Would they not avenge their own? Would they truly accept the rule of people that had orbitally bombarded their world? It was nonsense. Absolute, nonsense.
The Echani male that she had spotted on the sidelines responded to her request that he depart. His words were, truthfully, what she expected. The Knight began to press forward as Lucien asked what was happening. She made sure that he remained behind her so that she could provide a barrier between him and the metaphysical storm that was rising. Her presence would spread, a cooling wave, in comparison to the insanity the seeped from Aklor. It would condense and coalesce protectively around Lucien. Her student; her problem. “This is the Force. I was not informed that Centaris was so…Well-versed.”
From there the Knight answered the Echani. [[member="Ryndrae Talon"]]
‘Acknowledged—I understand. The Confederacy has come to set things right. Mind your attacks. Not every Mandalorian present serves the Infernal. The red mist…I know not what it is but it can’t be anything good.’
“Centaris!”. She called for the man, feeling the deep, moving dark that grew in him. He hadn’t seemed to notice that they’d arrived. Had his connection to the Force made him blind as well as deaf? He knew that the Exarch had ordered his escort specifically. She could already see his Dauntless forces engaging in a small skirmish and her lips pursed together as she noted three Echani approaching from the flank.
Echani? Why?
“Stand down!”, Naedira snapped out at the trio, reflexively reaching behind her back, where hilt of her Electro-Chain Whip was located. “We don’t want to harm you!”
They didn’t seem to hear her. Or, they didn’t care. Her sword came free from its anchors whilst she twisted her wrist forward so that it became level for defensive tactics. ‘Watch our flanks. We are outnumbered…’, she warned her student, feeling more than a little uneasy, due to the circumstances. Naedira moved swiftly and parried the first strike with a downward swipe, before raising her hand, to release a telekinetic burst to shove the group backward. “Please. Do not make us.”
Her words fell on deaf ears. Chit. She hated fighting Echani. The young woman had fought Srina Talon many times and had lost. Every, single, time. Regardless…She did her best to occupy two of the warriors but she couldn’t keep the last from advancing on Lucien. Naedira fell into a defensive stance and could feel her teeth begin to grind together every time the rapier version of her weapon clanged against a long vibro-blade. The Echani kept trading out. Keeping each other fresh. Testing her.
She was thin, lithe, and extremely quick. Despite her crisp movements—they were faster. Naedira didn’t have the same flow they did, like water, and had to once again utilize the Force when they began to advance more aggressively. They had seen her weakness. She was only human.
Naedira was forced to move just slightly out of range and created just enough of a threat with her weapon to force her opponent to reorient. Just as she moved to take another step, the Echani on the left, leaped forward, blindingly fast, and struck at her, aiming for the chest, before he backed off quickly to cover himself from the possibility of an after blow. The Echani to the right moved in to try and catch her off guard but Naedira cut in mid-attack. Their swords bound with Naedira controlling the center.
The lock was broken, swiftly, by the entrance of another vibroblade whirling past her mask. The sensors in her helmet were having trouble following the flurry of motion that seemed dead set on liberating her head from her shoulders. When Naedira swung next she managed to strike one of the Echani in the side, just before, the other slashed a line across her chest. Her armor deflected most of it but she still felt the impact. Naedira spun around, ready to strike again—but that was when light and fire hit the sky.
“Look out!”, she shouted, mostly, to anyone that could hear her. Lucien. Centaris. The Echani that were so determined to fight. It took no more than a breath. In that time—[member="Adron Malvern"] filled her psyche. Not too many words, but enough of him, that her focus and strength overflowed.
Her arms flew outward, sword dropped, and instinctively she raised telekinetic shielding faster than most would have accomplished with very little time. Her ability wrapped around the blast that headed toward them. It protected not only herself, but her apprentice, and the Echani they’d been fighting. She couldn’t save one without the other. When the inferno stopped she continued to mold the flame…Bringing it back down. Holding it. One palm rest over the top and the other held it below.
The Echani seemed to have been blinded. She couldn’t say that her eyes, or ears, were any better. Explosions on any scale were not made to make anyone feel comfortable. When she looked ahead she could see that somehow, Centaris, had survived. His men had not. The glow from the sizeable ball she held was noticeable. They would not know that her eyes were filled with the amethyst Sith Corruption of one of the Confederate Exarchs. Her voice would expel from the mask coldly. Quietly. “Leave and live. Stay, and die. That is all I can offer you if you truly side with the Clans.”
The trio looked at each other. The orb of flame she held made them more than a little nervous. Her body language did not seem threatened. If anything—after the display of power she looked stronger. Not weaker. They backed away. Not gone, perhaps, but at the very least to regroup.
Naedira turned and focused on [member="Alkor Centaris"]. He was…Incensed. A beast tearing apart Mandalorian scum. Her hands had begun to shake from the force it took to maintain all of the destructive force and flame that had barreled their way. She crushed it. Taking from it the energy that she needed, she made it smaller, made it nothing, until a lack of oxygen made it as if it never was. “Keep your eyes peeled Rayne... They’ll likely be back to strike when we aren’t looking.”
The Knight held her hand out for her sword and it leaped to her grasp. The severe female strode across the burning field on the outskirts of the city with wary eyes. The bombs had done their intended damage. But, why had the Dauntless turned? Something foul was afoot. As she passed the burning shield that Centaris had created, at first, her mind did not want to see. Then it did. And she couldn't unsee it.
She was glad to be wearing a mask—If only to spare the likely unbearable stench.
The Sith woman snapped her wrist and her sword broke into pieces. She let it swing forward, over the shoulder of the beast, and snapped a Mandalorian warrior around the neck. It stopped whatever he had been about to do, mostly, because the plasma filaments were starting to stress the armor at a weak point. “Let us aid you, Centaris.”
Just as he threw a grenade at an open window. Squinting, her gaze narrowed when she felt it too.
