I've got your second dev thread right here, buddy.

[Tefka]

[member="Smeg"] [member="Darth Mierin"]

Tsavong was out of practice.

He had been cooped up in his TITAN tower for far too long and with far too little company. The beast was out of shape and beginning to put on weight. It was time to find a training buddy. Tsavong started off his his usual routine, jumping jacks with all four arms, but after a while his arms would start to get numb and start flailing all about like a wild helicopter, hitting himself in the face and it just got a bit chaotic. Now he chose a different routine, something that would confuse his muscles a bit more and get the beast into more of a relaxed, escalating physical exercise that might motivate him for more.

But he needed a partner... and well... not too many were around these days. The beast had killed most others after his pain and rage fit after losing his arms.

So he had invited Smeg. The Fat Rat King.

Surely he could use some exercise, and he really doubted the Rat would openly ignore his summons. While he had provided the creature with a private entrance into Titan Tower so he wouldn't be publicly seen with the filthy monster, he did set up the living room so that the couches were near the back of his main office and there was plenty room to maneuver infront of his High Definition Villip Center.

Handing Smeg a Vii remote when he walked in, Tsavong would begin.

And so the Vii Tennis match began.

 

[Smeg]

It'z too brite, boss...

There was no denying it, Smeg openly despised leaving his literal rat's nest.

It had no smell, no texture, no character and most of all it was just too damned bright. However the Rat King at least had half a brain and knew that declining the summons of Tsavong was on the whole, a terrible idea and was just asking for the beast to come down to him. It wouldn't have been pretty.

Coruscant's vast sewage system was his in, his method of both travel and stealth as he made his way upwards. He didn't climb all the way up, of course. Gosh no, that would have taken forever and Smeg was far too unfit for that. Elevators used by the sewage workers of the noble cityscape took him upwards and sprawling tunnels took him to Titan Tower.

So here he was, stinking up the strangely pedestrian living room of Tsavong, a Vii remote in hand. As if he knew what to do. At first he simply copied the behemoth but after losing the first few sets he found himself a new tactic, the most noble tactic of all. Random flailing and button mashing.

The Skraal wobbled about the living room, half-tail whirling about, occasionally whipping Tsavong's legs. He couldn't doubt the technique, it had actually won him a set.

“Lookz...hff...pff...Boss! Smeg wonz....hff....one!”

[member="Tsavong Kraal"], [member="Darth Mierin"]

 

[Tefka]

Tsavong dropped his remote on the floor and glared at [member="Smeg"] with the fire of a thousand burning suns.

"I'm late for my meeting with [member="Darth Mierin"], let's go."

Sweat still beading on his forehead from his insufferable defeat by the Rat King, Tsavong left to go down into the basement laboratory of the TITAN Tower where he would perform the autopsy on the remains of what Darth Mierin had brought him, and possibly provide a solution so that the Gods may grant him some ability to combat it on the field.

He intentionally stepped on [member="Smeg"]'s tail on the way.

"Whoops, sorry." He growled at the rat.

 

[J3C0]

[member="Tsavong Kraal"] [member="Smeg"]

Mierin waited in the basement of the tower.

The armor that she had worn on Alderaan lay on a table before her, her mechanical fingers thrummed on the side of her arm as they crossed over one another. She had now been waiting here for nearly ten minutes, and was getting slightly fed up with doing so.

Unfortunately for her she had no choice but to wait. Tsavong and his shapers were the only ones who could fix this problem of Baffor Pollen, and it needed to be fixed before the next engagement with the Republic. They were aware of this weakness, just as the One Sith were now aware. Her lips turned down in a slight scowl, the swelled up pieces of the armor still contained some of her lost limbs, a spot of blood still told as much.

That fact made her uncomfortable.

 

[Smeg]

The look that Tsavong gave to Smeg after his glorious triumph actively caused the Skraal's little rat nards to shrivel up slightly.

The name Darth Mierin didn't mean much to the rodent, his participation in schemes that delved into Sith territory was absent. The Filth King didn't realise that the only ones under the Dark Lord willing to deal with the Skraal were in fact Tsavong and his ilk. Let's absorb that heartfelt sentiment for a moment.

A loud squeak erupted from Smeg's putrid mouth as his tail was trodden upon by accident.

“Right...hff...behindz you, boss...” he hissed, as he followed the behemoth down to the tower's basement.

 

[Tefka]

"Scalpel please," he said, walking in the basement laboratory of TITAN tower as his shapers were prepping for dissection of the armor. He nodded to [member="Darth Mierin"] as he entered the lab.

"Excuse my tardiness, how's the arm?"

He smiled again, and a Shaper girl giggled. Darth Mierin smelled bad, so Tsavong didn't like her. It was extra funny because... Yuuzhan Vong didn't have scalpels. He was, in a weird way, making fun of Mierin's culture.

Yuuzhan Vong didn't have a great expansive vocabulary when it came to making humor and jokes.

One of the Shapers began collecting a substance into a vial and showed it to the Tyrant. He held it close to his eyes.

"The catalyst," he said, looking to [member="Darth Mierin"]. "I think I've seen this before." He leapt backwards towards his table and looked through his expansive collection of Qahsas. "Yes, here it is." Rumored to belong to Nom Anor.

"Ithor," the Qahsa spoke in the voice of Nom Anor. "We have encountered an allergen on Ithor. It seems only the Vonduun Crabs are allergic to it and will seize up immediately upon exposure. The fifth shaping protocol is in dire need of an addendum to remove this substance altogether ... as the Domain Shai proposed... or if Jamaane will listen to my proposal, which I know he will not... we categorize an immunization protocol."

Tsavong continued to listen to the recording, intrigued. He looked at Mierin.

"I knew I've heard of this before. Couldn't quite place it." He nodded to the Shapers, and continued to listen to the voice of Nom Anor, gaining knowledge from the recording.

The creature Smeg kept leaping over the counter to see what he was doing, and Tsavong kept pushing his face away.

 

[J3C0]

She really would need to kill the creature eventually, perhaps crush its throat with her new arm. Her hand flexed close. Yes, that would be amusing, show him how technology was superior to his freakish creations. It would take time however, Tsavong was still useful, the creations were still useful. It gave them an edge over the Jedi, gave them something that was unpredictable.

Her nosed crinkled when she noticed something else.

A small rat scurried into the room.

Almost out of pure reaction she moved to crush the creature completely with the force, only stopping herself when she realized the thing was a...companion, to Tsavong. She scowled, her stomach turning down as the smell of the creature filled her nose. She tasted bile in her throat, though she managed to suppress it, at least for a moment.

“Taking on a new mate, Tsavong?” How disgusting.

 

[Tefka]

Tsavong walked over to his vials of creature and picked out a particularly small ngdin, something that ate blood, a little parasitic creature. "This will do."

He brought it over to the table as he continued to listen to the Qahsa and continued pushing Smeg away with his foot.

"The ngdin are waste crawlers. Despicable little creatures, but they get the job done." He turned to Mierin. "And they're immune to the bafforr pollen. We'll introduce them to the pollen, have the pollen become a regular part of their diet, and begin to shape them into viral carriers that will bore into a organism to provide it's immunology. A parasitic relationship in exchange for immunity."

He handed the ngdin to his shapers.

"Begin your work," he turned to Mierin. "I suppose a few weeks for testing, and another week to begin introducing the carrier into our work. We'll issue a recall of all currently deployed Vonduun Skerr series suits and begin introducing the parasite into the Vaghrokka's diet. Everything else we'll get to after we've completed these steps."

"I assure you, lady Hand, this will not happen again."

 

[Smeg]

The banter was above him, actually most everything was above him. Smeg was pretty short in most departments but especially in brains and in physical stature.

There were words exhanged, boring words about things that the Skraal could scarecely understand. Ithor. Vonduun Crabs. Exposure. Protocol. Addendum. Actually, how about we don't list the words that the rodent could understand because it's a given that he couldn't understand most sophisticated Basic words.

The red human, like most frightened him. Although like most females that he lay eyes upon Smeg considered her as a candidate for his Queen. Internally he shook his head, he didn't like those flaps upon her face. Although, they could always be gnawed off.

Tsavong denied him any real participation in this event, actively shoving him down with his giant brute hands smooshing him by the face back down onto the floor.

"How you like to be Smeg'z Queen?” Smeg winked, clearly not so scared by Tsavong's red slave.

 

[J3C0]

Mierin panned over to the filthy creature for a moment. She lifted her hand, picking up the creature with the force and throwing it across the room into a nearby wall.

That was all the consideration she gave him.

Slowly the Sith Pureblood turned back to regard Tsavong, listening to his proposed solution to the Baffor Pollen problem. Such a thing would take time, but it always took time. There was no way to speed it up unfortunately, however with war brewing against both the Republic and the Protectorate, and with perhaps even the Mandalorians joining in, this would be needed. Quickly.

“You have three weeks.” Mierin said turning away from Tsavong and leaving the filthy room, the rodent stench had filled it quickly.

She regarded the rat one more time, then flicked her wrist. A metal tray flew through the air towards Smeg's head. “Washyour pet.”

Then she left.

 

[Tefka]

"Quiet, smeg."

Tsavong brought over a parcel to another Shaper and offered a treat to them all in the forum of McYoda's new Brisket Rib combo platter. Man, how Tsavong loved McYoda's. He then turned to Mierin in conclusion for their time in the laboratory, which seemed relatively short but was actually quite a long time.

One hand shot out and caught the tray before it collided with Smeg. His devil tongue darted out quickly after he looked after Mierin with distaste. He shared a glance with Smeg and then resumed his work.

"Time for you to leave us, Smeg."

"I'm sure the Rat King has other things to do."

 

[Smeg]

As he flew across the room, an ear piercing chalkboard squeak erupted from the Skraal's plague-ridden maw. His rotund form bounced harmlessly against the wall and he landed on his considerable bottom with a soft thump. Poor Smeg, he was always going to be the butt monkey in this crew.

Before he could get walloped with the flying tray one of Tsavong's hands came in to save the day. Probably a mistake, as it would cement the notion that the behemoth was his buddy rather than his boss.

He hissed, violently at the notion of being washed.

Of course, then he was told to leave. Whatever, this place was too clean from a rat like him anyway. “Az you say, Boss...”

Smeg scurried off out of the room and into the shadows, where it was at least safe and definitely a heck of a lot less hostile.