Forest Ghosts [Sarge, Complete]

[Fabula Caromed]

During her long and lucid walks around the Morte Clan palace, Fabula had started to make a sort of game for herself using the murmurs of slaves as her rules. Every creature, enemy, rebel, or monster that the slaves spoke of in hushed whispers formed her personal scorecard. She had actually made a program on her datapad expressly to keep track of crazy things that she hadn't yet obliterated from the forests and mountains around her mother's territory.

Normally, Fabula didn't hear this kind of chatter and make new entries in the middle of the day. But then, this was not a normal day. She'd run out of training slaves very early on, and pushing any of them any harder would probably kill them. The rancors had migrated down to the Misty Valley for the game this week, so she couldn't play with the children and hope she bonded to one of them. And, most importantly, the slaves were mumbling in fear about some kind of haunting.

Ghosts were silly superstitions. Everything could be explained through the Force. But after listening to one or two stammered explanations, Fabs had a pretty good idea of what it was she was looking for. Men could be tracked, fought, defeated. This would have been nothing more than a distraction for her normally...but it was so rare that she got to fight a human skilled enough to avoid Allyan pursuit.

Pushing her way through the underbrush of woods she'd walked through for her entire life (two weeks, give or take), Fabs smirked and pushed some of her hair from her face, keeping the sweat out of her eyes. 'Come on out, little Ghost. I need to see if I can kill the dead.'

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

A freeman for saving the life of a Witch, Sarge was free to wander about Dathomir as he saw fit... mostly. He was a male offworlder, and so he did his best not to step on any toes, or ruffle any feathers. It was more peaceful this way.

To this end, his time on the planet was spent guarding the forests, and he'd recently picked up the scent of a clone somewhere near the Sisters territory. Everyone had their own unique smell, but fresh clones tended to smell of the vat long after they left it.

It was this that drew him toward Fabula.

Sarge was a ghost. An ephemeral shadow. His camo-cloak baffled sensors and mimicked his environment, while his being Force Null guarded him from that method of detection. Having learned to soldier in forests, he left no tracks, and made so little sound as to be unnoticed.

He was, for all intents and purposes, a ghost.

A ghost with a blaster rifle and a bayonet that is.

Around her, wildlife kept singing it's merry tune, hardly interrupted by the passage of Sarge through it's midst. He was apart of the scenery, they paid him little mind. He gave to nature what nature gave to him, and their symbiotic relationship made life here easier. The animals rarely disturbed him, and they were never violent.

A series of rustling branches and scraping leaves sounded out his reply to her. "Leave the Dead to their peace, for it is the Living you seek." There was no voice, just the wilds speaking to her.

 

[Fabula Caromed]

Blinking, Fabula smirked when she heard the response. "I find the dead better company at times." As subtly as possible, she checked the left side of her utility belt to make sure her lightsabers were secure, their little charm-chains dangling silently beside the hilt. "After all, the dead are our past, and there's much that can be learned from them."

Of course, Fabula had the practical need to keep up conversation to pinpoint where she was hearing the voice from, but she had a much more important motivation. There was no reason to be antisocial to someone (or something) that was formidable enough to hide entirely from her Force-charged perceptions. The strong were always worth associating with, and though battle was the ultimate conversation, mundane speech held its own value.

"You certainly do have a taste for theatrics, don't you," she continued as she brushed her hair back behind her shoulders. "Few can maintain such an impressive disguise in the presence of a Nightsister. You're a credit to your non-existent species, Ghost."

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

Lips curled upward as the predator circled it's prey, or, more accurately, the guardian watched an interloper. Despite the way her breasts would likely make fighting difficult for her, she seemed to be... violent. Not in the 'I'm going to murder everyone sense', but in that she seemed to savor the idea of a good brawl.

There was nothing wrong with that. That is, until you ruined Sarge's drinking night. Then there was a problem.

But this was Dathomir. There were no taverns. It was a world of small clans with little villages who had been cut off from the galaxy for four hundred years. This was the Wild West. Untamed. Uncharted. Uncivilized.

Nothing here but the Law of the Strong.

"I really don't have a taste. The woodland spirits just work with me.", he says from directly behind her, a chuckle passing through the air. He was just far enough away that she couldn't turn and hit him, but close enough to startle if she wasn't expecting him.

"Besides, my species is very existent, clone." Where the voice was coming from stood no-one. Just thin air. It didn't mean he wasn't there, just that he wasn't visible. "In fact, I'd dare say we're alike... you and I. Minus the whole 'new body' deal."

 

[Fabula Caromed]

The direction of her quarry's words didn't startle Fabula, nor their proximity. When she jumped and spun towards the voice, there was no fear in her gaze. She had nothing to fear in this place. It was her home, her world, and she was as comfortable in the deepest forests as she was in the lounge of the Morte Clan stronghold. Instead, her eyes held something much more dangerous.

At the mention of "clone," they flashed with Rage.

It only lasted for a half second before she brought herself back under control, and anyone who was mildly Force-sensitive would've felt the tiny little ripple of Dark energy push out from her spirit. It wasn't, however, enough to alter her mood. "It's a strange world where ghosts and clones are anything alike." She turned to rest her back against a nearby tree, offering the side from whence her lightsabers hung to the man she couldn't yet see. "Or then again, maybe not. A spirit without a body, and a body without a spirit. Neither whole, neither complete. Alone, even when among allies."

Shrugging, the Nightsister crossed her arms (how she could do that under her brick-house-bust is anyone's guess) and leaned back with her eyes closed. "Maybe we have quite a bit more in common than either of us understands. Perhaps, even without the Force, it was destiny we met this day."

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

"It's hardly destiny if you come looking for me.", he retorts dryly, making sure that she'd say the way his boots left imprints in the grass. It was purposeful, a test of trust. As soon as they'd appeared, he stopped making them. She was, however, like him.

She dealt in philosophy and in death. The two were intermixed, and there was a reason soldiers were often just as much renowned poets as they were medal-wearing combat veterans. Death and Creation were intertwined, after all.

"So, to whom do I owe the pleasure of this talk?", he begins slowly, having noted the faint hint of a fire to her eyes earlier. She had her angry.

But she, like him, fought to keep it on a leash.

 

[Fabula Caromed]

"Fate deals in destinations, my friend, not in origins." Fabula's head arched to one side, and once again she tried to feel out into the world around her. If his Force presence was masked, it would take much from her to be able to find it, but it was almost impossible to mask the spark of life itself. Her lips found their way to a pleasant smile. "I'm Fabula, only daughter of the matron of the Morte Clan. And, as you've already pointed out, I have some issues with that ancestry."

She felt nothing. At all. No life apart from the normal breath of the forest, the animals and plants that comprised it. Either he really was a ghost, or she was searching for the wrong thing. Maybe, if he was devoid of life, she should search for a lack of spirit. Instead of searching for souls, she looked further, beyond it, into emptiness. Of course, she couldn't keep herself from talking. They'd be fighting soon enough, and she had to be properly acquainted.

She reached up to move her hair behind an ear. "I try to keep an ear out for tales that impress me. Slaves are superstitious creatures, easily moved to gossip and prone to...well, theatrics." Fabula emphasized the last word with a smirk. "Normally, I find myself chasing fairy tales, but every once in a while, they have a grain of truth. A real creature behind the legend, a glorious entity that makes for magnificent battle."

There! A hole in the fabric of the forest. Fabs was certain that was her new friend. She couldn't make out anything at all precise, since it was a bit like trying to pinpoint a pile of stale fish by their smell. Instead, she raised her hand and pointed in the direction of that hole. "And you, my kindred Ghost, have one of the most impressive tales of all. Disappearing from the watchful eyes of a Dathomiri hunter is no inconsiderable feat."

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

"The entire Nightsister Coven, actually.", he corrects. It wasn't a boast, it was a fact. The entirety of the Coven had been searching for him and his partner and failed. Several times over, actually. But that was the thing about legends, they got skewed through time.

Chuckling faintly, the black hole gave a name in kind. "I'm Sarge - or at least, that's what people call me." There was a brief rustle of cloth as he shrugged, but still nothing.

"So, you're one of them that gets off on battle, 'eh?"

There was no response to the pointing at all.

 

[Fabula Caromed]

Fabs grinned (a little psychotically) and gave a little giggle. "Yeah, pretty much. The other girls in the club tend to prefer subjugation, dominance, that kind of crap. I mean, it's fun to boss people around, I guess..." Bringing up a hand, she gripped a fist hard enough and with just enough Rage behind her to send a few subtle sparks flying up her arm. "But there's absolutely nothing as viscerally ecstatic as the rush of combat."

She relaxed a bit, the Dark Side gold fading from her eyes with the absence of Rage. "And there's no reason for me to be ashamed of that, I've come to learn. If there were half as many Nightsisters who prescribed to my train of thought, we wouldn't be exiles, and they could have their precious dominance." Giving a bit of a dismissive wave, Fabula leaned back against her tree again. "But none of that matters. Their way is their own. Changing the flow of a river is as difficult as it is dangerous. A single drop out of place causes more pain than a thousand soldiers."

Her expression softened, relaxed when she faced his voice again. "As is your way your own, Sarge. I'm not here to affect any alteration to you. But maybe, when we're done here, you'll find reason to change yourself."

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

He snorted, the 'other girls' tended to all look like supermodels and sex goddesses with the plastic surgery to back it up. Then again, Fabula had a 'fabulaus' set of jugs on her too, so there was always that. That was one thing he'd always wondered - what they fed the Sisters to make them look like this.

Dismissing the train of thought as ultimately irrelevant he gave her a curious glance, lifting his head enough for her to see the lower portion of his face. She'd find rounded cheeks, the right of which was pockmarked by shrapnel scars, with a jaw covered in a thick, bushy brown beard that looked completely natural given the man's apparent love of the wilderness.

But, above all else, he was clearly human. "In five centuries I had little cause to change myself, and it's left me damaged. Broken. Battered. I don't see that changing."

 

[Fabula Caromed]

There he was. Technological cloaking. When (not if) she coaxed him into a fight, if he still had that up, she'd have to short it out with a quick blast of lightning in order to have any chance of actually hitting him. Still, it would be fun to try to use her senses to fight him. Senses other than vision and the Force, on which she normally tended to rely.

Her expression didn't change. Still as soft and unaggressive as before. While she needed to fight him, Fabula wasn't currently attempting to kill him, nor was he attacking her. There was no reason to be unpleasant. Her voice was just as soft. "Some wounds aren't meant to be healed, but instead teach a lesson. In learning, we do change. And I feel that we both have much left to learn."

Finally, she changed a bit. Fabula's eyes flashed again, her own thoughts disturbing her calm. "I can definitely tell you that I've had my own trials over the last few hundred years. Apparently, I've been dead. My original body is long since worm food, and now I've got the stink of a cryo-tube on my skin, and a freighterload of potholes where my memories should be." Wincing, she clenched her fist again, preventing herself from boiling over. "Full body, empty soul. I'm as dead as you...and I hate it."

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

"I met a woman like you not too long ago - goes by the name Sky. Brought back by a loved one, I'd imagine. Not the point though.", the man says with a faint sardonic upturn of his lips. He begins to move, pacing faintly, face always pointed towards her.

Jaw working a little, he laughs. "Yes, 'full body'. You'll find the galaxy quite receptive to that. Me, less so. I appreciate a fine woman, but it's not my sole priority like the majority of the population of this universe." There was a hint of jaded anger to that. He didn't like that everyone's goal was to get laid as often as possible and hit on everything that moved.

Ironic considering how lucky he'd been getting recently.

"But... do you know how she handled her memory loss...?", he continues, backpedaling the subject a little. "She sought to make new ones. Explore. Discover. Re-learn. She didn't hate it. She embraced it. And I dare say the carefree attitude it gave her lightened the weight on my shoulders a little, if only for a day."

 

[Fabula Caromed]

Fabula ignored his sexual comments. They meant nothing to her. She was enjoying the introspection. "That's the entire reason I'm out here, Mister Sarge. To form new memories to make up for the ones I've lost. Or, more accurately, the ones that were never mine. I'll never be the daughter my mother once had. I can never live up to her expectations." She fought a frown as she looked down. "I only need to keep myself from failing long enough to surpass her. And everyone else."

'Enough moodiness.'

Pushing herself off of her tree, Fabs reached up and grabbed her shoulder, rolling her arm around to stretch it. "And, in the process, I'll become someone different. Maybe I'll fail. Maybe no one will remember me. But at my core, I'll be complete. That's all I can ask for."

Fabula's hands reached down, and with a flick of her wrists and a tremble of the Force, she snapped both of her lightsabers into position. Their twin, orange blades flared and sliced through the forest air with a high-pitched hiss. "I'd prefer my memories to be violent. You're the most formidable creature I've yet discovered on this planet, and it would be my honor to pit my mettle against yours, to entwine our souls in the song of battle."

She wasn't actually going to take no for an answer, but Fabs expected she wouldn't have to.

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

There was a rustle of his cloak as it split open down the front, revealing black carapace armor covering just as black cloth. In rough, dirty hands was held an ancient DC-15A with a shortened barrel. Set under the barrel itself, though, was a curious sight.

A bayonet.

A thirty centimeter one. Made of duraplast with cortosis weave, he'd carefully chosen his metals for the double edged blade. Cortosis would allow him to, briefly, short out some lightsabers. But it was brittle. It needed something to strengthen it.

Duraplast was perfect. It was tough enough to be used for starship hulls and heavy armor and had it's own inherent resistance to sabers and even explosions. So far as he was concerned, it was perfect.

Shifting the blaster in his hands, the man begins to circle, holding a ready-made quarterstaff in his hands. "I take it I can't say 'no'?"

 

[Fabula Caromed]

The moment he moved, Fabula's feet moved with him. Mirroring him, reflecting like a still pond. Every single thing he did showed up in her mind, crystal clear. The world around her melted away. There was no need for it any more. Battle was upon her. Nothing else mattered. Her voice took on a lower, huskier tone as she responded, just a little bit sultry. "You can always say no. It doesn't mean I'll listen."

And with that, with no further warning, she charged. Her eyes gleamed with Rage, her spirit bolstered by it. There was no reason to falter, after all, when she had purpose. Fabula's feet skipped quietly across the ground, steady but not heavy, and she held her blades out in a wide, open stance. Untrained, but the intent was to leave her plenty of options for angles and responses. Everything about her was untrained. She didn't have Forms, or styles, or schools. She didn't have years of training. Just natural talent, a little bit of practice, and overwhelming Rage.

When she was close enough to slash at him, she gave a quick swing towards the center of his gun, attempting to disarm rather than kill. There was no need for death right now, and she could keep her frenzy in check at least until she started bleeding.

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

He snorted. Typical woman.

Sending herself flying towards him, he mentally shook his head. Always let your opponent attack first - gives you a chance to counter. She'd probably be going for something to put him at a disadvantage. And there it was, a rotation of her shoulder that would angle her down onto his blaster.

Stepping into her guard, rotating to have his back to her, he blocks the slash with his bayonet and sends a kick straight backwards and towards her gut - size ten and a half wide meet stomach. Stomach meet size ten and a half wide.

In order to stop the inevitable counter slash with her other saber, he begins pivoting again to ready himself and face her.

 

[Fabula Caromed]

Getting kicked in the stomach tends to disorient. For Fabs, it was more like she'd just taken her first breath of life (even as her actual breath left her lungs). Pain was an important reminder of mortality. Anyone who thought they could fight without it was sorely kidding themselves. She recoiled backwards, sliding as much as she could. The traditional follow-up would have been a counterattack, especially from someone with two independent arms. She didn't give it to him.

Instead, she strafed slowly to the side, looking for another "in." His guard was too secure. Not a single step that she took went unnoticed. She wouldn't be able to out-technique this one, simply because she had no technique to call her own yet. Instead, she decided to use what she had available. What One-Tusk had used against her only a couple of days prior. She applied overwhelming force.

Charging again, Fabula waited until she was almost close enough to smell his hair before she brought in her arms from the wide, open "stance" (if you could even call it that) that she had been in before. A flick of the wrist for the first, more an attempt to catch his defense than actually hurt him. In the course of the first attack, she brought up her off-hand lightsaber for a quick slice upwards, again trying to keep from killing and instead just going for the disarm.

She was wise to the kicking thing. Prepared for it. It was difficult to know how much else to prepare for.

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

Not attacking gave him a moment to collect himself and prepare for the next assault. She was the type to break herself upon the rocks time and time again in the hopes that eventually the rock might develop a crack. Most forgot that while beating your head against a wall could, feasibly, make a hole given enough attempts... it didn't do you any good if the wall was made of concrete.

She made towards him again, arms wide... but she wouldn't be that stupid. And just as anticipated, she brought herself away from that horrid manner of fighting. But a man who's blade could resist a lightsaber wouldn't be so foolish as to make an entire blaster of something that would cut like warm butter to a saber.

Letting her think she'd caught him, the knife blocked the first attack. Then the stock came up to block the second - duraplast met saber and started, faintly, to melt. But it held firm for the moment. It would have to cool quick, otherwise repeated blows there would ruin the stock. Snapping his head forward in a headbutt, he sought to unbalance her and then bring his bayonet diagonally down her chest in a slash.

Smirking, he flicked the blaster to stun and the second the barrel was pointed at her... he pulled the trigger as a fluid part of the diagonal downward strike.

 

[Fabula Caromed]

Not wasting the backwards momentum of being headbutted, Fabula knew she'd need to get inside his guard one way or another, and that he was probably going to counterattack. All of these things she figured out while under the influence of being smacked in the head with someone else's head. How she didn't jumble up her thoughts, the world may never know.

Using the momentary backpedal from being smacked, Fabs brought herself back just far enough to get a good view of what was happening. When her opponent's bayonet closed in on her, she shoved both of her lightsabers into an upward cross, scissoring the frustratingly lightsaber-proof weapon and forcing it upwards. Who in their right mind would be stupid enough to let a blaster barrel near their heart at point blank range?

With his weapon disposed of, Fabula gave him the same kick he had given her...although he was wearing armor, and she was quite a bit smaller, it still wouldn't be a butterfly far. Rage tends to make your body strong. She followed through on any recoil he found himself in by bringing her right sword off of his rifle, holding the other in place while she darted out with a light cut to his chest. Having her main hand free allowed her easy parrying, attacking, or almost anything else.

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

She used both sabers to halt his blade... he was puzzled. But that didn't stop him from taking advantage. Giving a flick of his wrist, the blade came out of the lugs holding it. Swinging the blaster up and around, the stock moves to strike her under the chin.

The blaster is then pivoted again so that the barrel was pointed at her finger tightening on the trigger again just in case he was able to snap off a shot - if he couldn't, he wouldn't. Simple as that.

The blade went up as she pushed it upwards, and then a foot came towards him. Well this was awkward. So this left them both doing... what? Moving backwards.

She was cutting air at that point. He'd still be trying to shoot her.