Private March of the Sithspawn

[Arlo Renard]

It amazed Kai, how easy it was for him to escape the Jedi Temple. Be it the darkest part of night or broad daylight, he could slip away and leave the guards who were supposed to be watching over him none the wiser.

In the absence of a speeder, Kai used a makeshift grapple constructed from his own malleable flesh and swung from building to building amid Coruscant’s vast cityscape. With Kal in tow, the Doppelganger thus made his way to the Reef, Damsy Callat ‘s burgeoning Sithspawn sanctuary.

From the outside, the hideout didn’t look like much: an abandoned old factory in a smog-choked part of town. Kai passed through a hole cut in a wire fence, approaching the shelled-out remnants of an elevator shaft. He gestured for Kal to follow, then reached one hand up to grasp a rusty beam and lowered himself into the depths. His elongated arm eventually disappeared, fingers prying away from the beam and dropping down into darkness. No doubt Kal would have an easy time descending, since he could fly.

The actual hideout was found through a gap in the elevator shaft. Beyond that Kai and Kal would find themselves in the “reception” area, part of an old lobby. Since Kal's introduction to the Reef was spontaneous and no announcement had been made beforehand, no one was actually there to greet them.

Kai went about fixing that. <Hello!> He sent out a telepathic call to anyone who could hear it within a certain radius. <Damsy? Forerunner? Arisso? Nineveh? I brought someone!>

Kal​

 

[Kal]

The transition from splendid temple among the glittering skyline to decrepit pit was sharp, but such was the nature of the great beast that was the Galactic City. Wealth atop mediocrity atop poverty atop despair, untold layers stacked onto each other until the once-green surface seemed more distant than the furthest stars in the sky.

It was a personal failing, then, that his efforts to understand organics had largely focused on the cream of society. How could he hope to understand the nature of man without seeing him at his worst?

<Not very accessible, is it? How do less agile lifeforms make their way here?> It would be a sorry excuse for a sanctuary if only the most athletic of individuals could find passage - unless that was their intent.

A haven for alchemically-altered gym rats?

Arlo Renard | Whoever else.​

 

[Damsy Callat]

Between everything—Jedi business during the day and Sanctorium business at night—Damsy hadn't had any time to finish up that dejarik game with Arisso for weeks. Not until today, this afternoon, when she decided to push off all the responsibilities of a budding social justice leader for a few hours. Or, at least most of them. Nurturing morale was definitely one of the necessary duties too.

Though the table in the qabbrat hadn't saved their previous data, at least the holoprojector still ran alright for as junky as the whole thing was. Kind of beggars by circumstance, though more like fugitives who only deigned to live in the Core, couldn't be choosers.

Arisso moved his Mantellian Savrip towards the opposing Ghhhk. A second and an animated attack later, it had fizzed out of view. "Haha! Got you now, Damsy."

"I've still got my Ng'ok," she said simply, slowly unlacing her fingers from behind her head and bringing a hand down to the board in preparation of taking her turn. "He's gonna pull me." She seemed ready to go now, the sometimes-tactician sometimes-improviser forged by the fires of many wars, but another voice gave her pause.

<Hello! Damsy? . . .>

She was getting ready to telepath back a response along the lines of 'yeah, bud,' but then:

<I brought someone!>

A smile broke across Damsy's face and she amended her response, <Hell yeah, bud!> She wondered for a moment where, who, and how he had gotten them, but then pulled her head from the clouds to get up. "C'mon."

The reception area was where Damsy went, followed by Arisso and led by Kezi (who had woken up and uncurled from Damsy's lap a moment before she began to stand), since the insinuation of him bringing someone implied entrance too. She bet her way out of the control room doorway with a plastic drape instead and then descended the short scaffold stairs down to the lobby area. Running along the pipe railing, Kezi bounded onto her shoulders. "Welcome back," she offered to Kai, then added for the newcomer a "Hey there. I'm Damsy.

"You're a friend?" she asked seamlessly, meaning Sithspawn. Admittedly she knew, or was fairly certain, he was, as she had asked all Reef residents to not bring non-Spawn visitors down for what should have been obvious reasons. There might have to be exceptions made in the future, but she'd cross those bridges case by case when she got to them.

When they got to them.



**
Arlo Renard | Kal

 

[Arlo Renard]

<They’re putting a ramp in. Have to, ‘cause Nineveh gets around in a hoverchair,> Kai explained.

Damsy arrived shortly after Kai pinged her, introducing herself to Kal. She was followed by Arisso, the giant mechanical-organic Sithspawn she had recruited from Korriban. Kai couldn’t remember what their kind were called. There was also Petyr, the Sith Changeling, and Erictho, who rode on his shoulders, and a host of other Spawn.

The Sithspawn community in the Reef was still pretty small, its growth sporadic rather than steady as refugees arrived in fits and bursts. But as to be expected, they were a diverse lot sourced from dozens of different species and worlds.

They even had a pair of sketchy saboteurs in their midst, but nobody knew that, of course.

<This is Kal. He’s a friend.> Kai announced to everyone. Then, he privately told Damsy, <He won’t say whether or not he actually is a Sithspawn, but I think he is and is too embarrassed to admit it. Or maybe in denial. Or maybe he just doesn’t know.>

Last to arrive was Nineveh, floating into the room in her hoverchair. “‘Sup,” she greeted what appeared to be a floating ink-person with glowing white eyes. She was long past the point of being surprised by the many forms Sithspawn could take.

Kal​

 

[Kal]

An elevator would have been preferable, given the steepness of the descent, but that was somewhat more difficult to make happen without drawing attention. Not that planning committees couldn't be bribed or otherwise suborned.

<It is a pleasure to meet you all.> His words were relayed broadly, so broadly that even those who did not speak Basic should understand the rough intent, as was quite possibly the case with the adorable creature perched atop the group's leader, or at least the individual they seemed to defer to. She was subsequently the target of a personal message.

<Depends. I'm not inclined to scorn those of an 'unnatural' origin, if that's what you're asking. Quite the contrary, really.>

As if to emphasise the point, a brief flood of images and sensations accompanied his words - Shadows forming spirits from 'thin air', Grey Ones gestating in pools of luminescent sludge... Kal proudly watching antlered owls hop about.

Damsy Callat | Arlo Renard​

 

[Damsy Callat]

It was less of a planning issue. The stenohaline Shifter was already paying rent, so she called it, to just about every tenant of the above Veshok Terrace Apartments to keep them quiet. Money was stretched thin from that alone, but she was sure she could manage scrounging up a covert construction fee from somewhere, though that wasn't going to be cheap either.

But Damsy didn't want an elevator.

If a Jedi came happening along her Sithspawn hideout, she wanted them to have to work to get down into it.

And when an attack came, preferably one by one.

Her eyes widened. "You, uh," she took a beat to swallow, and also smooth her facial expression of surprised wrinkles, "...create, then?"

She had meant to hold the newcomer's gaze, but eventually nerves shifted hers over Kai's direction. Anyone who knew her at depth would know her troubled history with Alchemy and the opinion it had informed—@The Doppelganger certainly included.



**
Kal

 

[Kal]

Her reaction was not unusual, but it was unfortunate.

<Not like the Sith, but yes.> Accompanying his words were further flashes, more personal experiences. Carefully altering gelatinous forms as they drifted through pools of mystical liquids, slowly reshaping the owls from before until they suited his fancy. <I have yet to Change a sentient being - certainly not an unwilling one.>

The last part seemed almost indignant - as if he found the perceived implication most distasteful.

Damsy Callat | Arlo Renard​

 

[Arlo Renard]

Kai stood in uncomfortable silence as Kal defended his… hobby? from the concerns Damsy raised. The doppelganger didn’t particularly like the idea of experimenting on animals either, but if a line was to be drawn, he supposed it was better than the alternative.

If the others in the Reef leaned far enough into their identity as Sithspawn that they would accept the creation of more alchemized beings, or even participate in alchemy themselves, then Kai was an outlier. At this point in time he understood himself to be an unnatural being that by all rights should not exist. He continued to live because he must, but he would not usher in the birth of another, sentient or otherwise, that was like him.

Nineveh only smirked at the conversation. Ever the practical one, she asked Kal point-blank. “Can you alchemize us a money tree?”

Kal​

 

[Kal]

Pinpricks of light swivelling towards the slender girl in one of the levitating chairs favoured by the lazy or disabled, Kal seemed to consider the question, even if it was likely a joke. <You jest, I'm sure, but altering a tree to draw in high-value elements from the air and concentrate it in, say, its sap, is not beyond the realm of possibility.>

Amusement and a trace of smugness accompanying the statement, he continued.

<That said, I dare say curing male pattern baldness is a much more profitable endeavour. People are willing to pay truly absurd sums to cover up their insecurities, or so my associates tell me.> Nevermind the fact that synthetic hair was likely cheaper than his concoctions; it seemed the egos of many a man was tied up in 'the real deal'.

Perhaps he should look into enhancing other body parts.

Arlo Renard | Damsy Callat​

 

[Arlo Renard]

“I jest not,” Claudia—formerly known as Nineveh—was quick on the draw. “We have a garden. A money tree planted there would be very helpful. Here, let me show you.” She headed down a corridor, Kai and presumably Kal in pursuit.

The Reef’s garden was located within the factory’s only functioning coolant reactor. A large chamber, it took up a comparably small area of the room. The plants grew in rows of potted soil like in a greenhouse, supplemented with lamps that mimicked the sunlight of a dozen different worlds and fed with water siphoned from the same hydro lines used for cooling.

Claudia weaved between the rows in her chair, skilled enough in her operation of the vehicle that she didn’t bump into anything along the way. “Right—I think it could go right there,” she said, pointing to a spot on the ground. “We break up the duracrete floor a little to give its roots some room to grow, fill the hole with soil…”

<Damsy won’t like you busting the floor,> Kai pointed out.

“Well, trees get to be bigger than any pot I know of… unless you want to grow it in a different room… what about the other coolant reactors?”

<The condemned ones full of toxic mold?>

“Yeah, those.” She smirked at him. “You know, if it’s that bad, we really shouldn’t be living here in the first place. Toxic mold spreading would certainly explain how stoopid some of you people are.” She made a face and rapped her knuckles against the side of her head for emphasis.

<'You people'?>

"In terms of intellect, I am clearly vastly superior to other Sithspawn. Just look at this majestic garden I have cultivated, while you spend all day swinging a lightsaber around."

<That's like telling a yo mama joke to your sibling. It's your mother, too.>

"Well, yo mama was a tree that got compressed into a rock over millions of years, and yo daddy was a lightning bolt that came and went, so there's no equating you to me, clearly." She paused. "Oh wait... Nevermind."

Smiling, Kai shook his head and turned to Kal, not noticing how Claudia’s gaze lingered on his face just a little too long. <So, you said you could make a plant that harvested high-value elements from the air?>

“Oh yeah, because we’ve been breathing a fortune all this time. Tell you what; how about you just alchemize a ‘tree’ that’s really made out of something else? Like, uhhh… precious gems? Those are just minerals when you get down to it. We’re on Coruscant, so make a thing that produces corusca gems until we eventually crash the market and reduce the price.” She didn’t get halfway through all of that before she cracked up, but it wasn’t a bad idea in principle. “And if it’s just a tree-shaped rock, I won’t have to worry about busting the floor and making Miss Damsy angry.”

Despite all their joking around, it was hopefully plain to Kal that they were serious about this money tree business.

Kal​

 

[Kal]

Normally ever so talkative, Kal seemed more perplexed than anything by the situation.

<Let me see if we're on the same page. You are in desperate need of funding and your preferred solution is to have an entirely new form of arboreal life created to produce valuables in your secret hideout, only to secretly sell it?>

It was clear that the Shadow felt it was wildly impractical compared to more sensible options like theft and real estate investment, but perhaps it was not completely unfeasible, with some common sense modifications.

<I was mostly joking, to be clear; the quantities in the air are small enough that you would need a forest - or more practically, a machine tied to the air planetary filtration system - to even break even. If you really must have something like this, perhaps a plant that produces high-value pharmaceuticals inside its body? That or drugs.>

Arlo Renard​

 

[Arlo Renard]

Claudia snorted at the suggestion, but Kai’s eyes widened in alarm. <We can’t sell drugs! Those are bad!>

“Yeah, no illegal drugs in my garden,” Claudia agreed with a dismissive wave of her hand, even though she was still smirking. “I mean, I guess we could grow valuable plants. There are some rare species out there that are in high demand… but we don’t have the money to acquire them in the first place. And no, stealing them is not an option.” She hadn’t read Kal’s mind, but she could predict where he might take the conversation next, if he was willing to seriously suggest they grow and sell illegal substances.

<Can’t you just make a magical plant?> Kai asked, not very helpfully. Despite his alchemical nature, he didn’t really understand how alchemy worked or what the limitations of it were—or maybe it was his true origins as a Bamarri which made the Force seem so much more boundless than most other beings could perceive it as.

“Or you could just give us money,” Claudia suggested. “You’re a wannabe genie, most problems could be solved by just giving the wisher some cash. Oh, and real quick, I have a question for you—” Moving closer to Kal, she held out her hand and wiggled her fingers along the edges of the black smog that formed Kal’s side. “Does it tickle when I do this?”

Kal​

 

[Kal]

<It does not, no; my physical presence is negligible, it's mostly smoke and mirrors.>

As if to illustrate the point, Kal briefly faded from view. It was not invisibility, not like other Force Users - he had to exert himself, however mildly, to give himself a visible form, not the other way around. On this plane of existence, anyway.

<'Magic plants' are certainly possible, though the market is somewhat niche. Claudia is correct that money is often an easy solution to mortal issues; I have certainly solved a request by throwing enough credits at it more than once.> There were few limits to what was purchasable, with the right connections - same day shipping improved the situation further.

<Generally there is some element of give and take, of course, especially with strangers.> His own kind, on the other hand, could expect prompt assistance without any concrete expectation of repayment.

Arlo Renard​

 

[Arlo Renard]

“Ah, so we’d have to have special weapons if we needed to kill you later,” Claudia said, an amicable smile on her face as she retracted her hand from Kal’s side. Maybe she was being serious, or maybe she just had a funny sense of humor.

Kai looked warily at the Shadow. If the idea of creating a plant was off the table now, in favor of a simpler business arrangement, he wanted to be sure it was a clean one. <If you’re going to give us money, it better not be dirty money. Nothing stolen or illegal or sneaky or—or mean-spirited.>

“I agree,” Claudia said, raising an eyebrow as she glanced over at Kai. He certainly didn't seem to think very highly of Kal. “Crime just makes things more complicated, not to mention dangerous. When we ask you to make us rich, black genie, don’t turn us into drug lords or anything like that.”

<And you better not ask us to do anything bad for it.> The two of them had no idea what an incorporeal spirit-being might want, so it was up to Kal to come up with an offer.

Kal​

 

[Kal]

It was hard to tell, but for a moment the Shadow seemed almost offended by the implication that he was lacking in the ethical department; he was, as far as he was concerned, consistently fair in his cloak-and-dagger undertakings.

<I will have you know, I am not some common thief; at most I relieve the guilty of ill-gotten gains.>

Few would dispute the morality of robbing a slaver blind, though there were certainly those who would demand that the seized wealth be returned to the victims or given to charity - but then how was one supposed to earn one's first million?

He had certainly never been inclined to flip burgers for a few decades.

<Worry not, however. I always intended to procure the credits from legitimate enterprises - albeit with a fair bit of money laundering, unless you want to inform the tax authorities of your little organisation?>

Waving an ephemeral hand dismissively, his reply was cheerful. <Hardly, I'm not that kind of spirit. Information will be plenty, you seem the kind to keep an ear open, by necessity if nothing else?>

Arlo Renard​

 

[Arlo Renard]

<You really think stealing from bad people makes it okay to steal?> Kai replied. His gaze was fixed on Kal with an uncharacteristic (or perhaps just rarely shown) intensity. <Maybe if you took what they had stolen and gave it back to the original owner. But that wouldn’t make you rich.>

Claudia cleared her throat. “As far as I’m concerned, the Alliance can suck it. Taxation is theft. We need the money, let’s do it.”

Kai crossed his arms over his chest. <What sort of information do you want?>

Kal​

 

[Kal]

Kai's comments would be met with the equivalent of a slightly confused chuckle as if to emphasise their difference in perspectives and priorities. <Whyever not, it's just money. Money used to perpetuate suffering, no less.>

Surely taking it and keeping it would be better than inaction, no?

At least Claudia seemed mostly unconcerned.

Eyes gleaming with sudden hunger, the Shadow's response was swift. <Every kind.> Returning to normal within the blink of an eye, his usual calmness resumed. <That's vague to the point of uselessness, of course. Arcane lore is particularly advantageous to me, while my associates are always eager for politically exploitable information.>

Eying the pair thoughtfully, he seemed to consider an alternative approach. <Stories are also valuable, to my kind. You seem the kind to have lived interesting lives. Something to consider, at least.>

Arlo Renard​

 

[Arlo Renard]

<That’s real rich, coming from someone that doesn’t actually need money, yet still takes it from others,> Kai shot back.

Kal was a spirit. He had no belly to be filled, no body to be clothed, no need for shelter. He didn’t know what it was like to struggle to survive, and he probably never would, unless he somehow became trapped in a mortal form. He had no need for anything, really.

Claudia had been joking when she called him a “wannabe genie”, but Kai saw it as an apt assessment. Djinni were godlike beings with no investment in the lives of mortals. They only played with them, toying with their lives for their own amusement. Kal’s ludicrous request for information in exchange for money only highlighted how little he truly cared.

Kai’s growing dislike of and resentment toward Kal was rooted in his own fallen state. He had been like the Shadows, once. Free of needs that had to be met, able to exist in a perfect state of harmony. Yet this being who was above all mortal concerns still concerned himself with mortals, and for ultimately selfish reasons.

To be honest, Kai was starting to hate Kal. Or maybe he was just very, very disappointed in him.

<I already told you my story. And we don’t know anything about politics.> Even if they did, Kai would rather eat Kal’s brain than give him or his cohorts a chance at that kind of power.

“Or arcane lore,” Claudia added, figuring Kai was just being moody. He got like that sometimes. “Normally I’d say ‘pay up first, story time later’, but I don’t really stand to lose anything by telling my story, so whatever.” Having said that, she still heaved a sigh and fiddled with the edge of the blanket draped over her legs before gathering up the courage to speak.

“I am, or I was, the granddaughter of a Sith Lord. His name was Messala. He was an alchemist, but not a very good one. Or maybe he just liked to cause chaos and wreak havoc. Anyway, he experimented on me and all the other children he adopted or raised, altering our bodies in various ways. Only I didn’t start to change until I reached a certain age…” She lifted the blanket up to show Kal. “And then this happened.”

Instead of growing straight, her lower limbs were twisted and gnarled. Her flesh had hardened like tree bark, and her skin was covered in bumps and rough patches. She couldn’t stand because her legs had fused together at the ankles and feet and were starting to meld at the knees as well, the delicate bones entangled in a mass of tissue.

“If it was just my legs, I could’ve gotten prosthetic replacements,” she muttered, covering herself up again. “But the problem is a lot deeper than that, and it’s spreading. I’d rather not upload my brain into a droid body—that’s not really living. So I just manage the pain and do what I can.”

She spoke rather frankly for someone who had essentially been given a death sentence. “Right, that’s my life story. Where’s my money?”

Kal​

 

[Kal]

Tilting his head sideways, Kal projected a sense of amused confusion towards Kai.

<What exactly do you think I spend money on? Blackjack and hookers?> The implication, of course, was that the money went to sensible things like bribery, research funding, and trading with people like them.

Only negligible amounts went to drugs, really. Negligible in the extreme.

Listening attentively to Claudia's story, the Shadow leaned forward slightly as her legs were revealed, monocoloured orbs scrutinising them. <How curious; this Messala fellow seems like quite the prick, from what I have heard.> Eyes gliding up and down, he continued. <Nasty business. Not much to be done about it with normal methods.>

Alchemy, submolecular reconstruction, body-hopping. There were ways, but not easy ones.

<Give me an account number and it shall be yours, though for the record stories are worth far more with imprints of the accompanying memories. So much easier to immerse oneself in.>

Arlo Renard​

 

[Arlo Renard]

<I think that you hoard wealth, like a dragon in the old stories,> Kai replied, stony-eyed. <I think that you justify stealing because you think you are better than the ones you took from, and keep it based on the potential of its use. But it’s only a screen for your pointless avarice—a delusion.>

“We stand to gain some of his money, Kai,” Claudia said, her tone gentle and seeking to soothe. “That’s a good thing, isn’t it?”

Kai shook his head. <You are a spirit, Kal—you might want things, but you don’t need them. If you really were better than the ones who perpetuate suffering, you would give what you gain to those who need it. Freely, without striking deals or bargaining.> The doppelganger’s expression changed, and a strange look came over his face, like he had just come to a bitter realization that he could barely cope with. The reopening of a wound that had just begun to heal.

I am not like you, Kal of Kaas, he thought, but did not project the idea outward. He kept it to himself, curling up and nursing that bleeding wound. I am not like anyone. I am alone.

Still not sure what was going on inside Kai's head, Claudia nonetheless took his hand and gave it a squeeze. “We need this money. If not now, then later we will need it.”

The subject of the conversation shifted to Claudia’s legs and Messala’s crimes. She cleared her throat, as though she could swallow the tangle of emotions brought about by Kai’s outburst that way. “They all were,” she replied with a wry smirk. “All of the Sith alchemists in the Empire were pricks. Well, some of them were she-pricks.”

Her smile broadened briefly, then all but disappeared. “Even the ones who claimed to be ethical in their experimentation, only practicing alchemy on willing subjects. If there was no one insane enough to be their guinea pig, they would’ve done it anyway on someone less willing. They were that hungry for knowledge, power, and control.”

It had already occurred to her that Kal might know a way to “fix” her. Claudia also knew that she didn’t want whatever he might be selling in that department. Asking for something as simple as cash was one thing; asking the black djinni to make her a whole new body was another.

“Maybe if you could make me the richest woman in the known universe, I’d consider giving you access to my memories,” Claudia replied, shaking her head at the suggestion.

Kai stood now almost with his back turned on Kal. His arms were folded across his chest, and he seemed contemplative. But the hardness returned to his stare at the Shadow’s request, and his reply was curt.

<No.>

Kal​