Igni Irae
OUT OF CHARACTER INFORMATION
Intent: Expand on Tephrike by subbing a rebel character for the Firemane gang to interact with. Create a Vong who defies some of the common tropes associated with that species.
Image Credit: Here.
Permission: Can use Firemane tech because I own the company. ARGH gear available for Firemane per this thread.
Role: Point of view character for the Tephriki rebels, possible ally/frenemy for the Firemane gang.
Links: Dominion of Light, Disciples of the Vader, Into Darkness, After Darkness, Nexus City.
PHYSICAL INFORMATION
Age: 29.
Force Sensitivity: Force Dead
Species: Yuuzhan Vong.
Appearance: Yuuzhan Vong female of average height for her people, which makes her fairly tall by baseline human standards. Her features are human-like, but she has a ridge-like forehead, a short, stub-like nose and pointed ears. Her skin is somewhat rocky-looking and she has a shell-like growth on top of her head. has greyish skin and yellow eyes. She has dark hair, which she tends to wear in a practical ponytail to keep it from getting in the way in a fight. There is a horn-like appendage protruding out of her skull. Her body is covered by many scars. Some of these are the result of ritual scarification, but since she lacks the masochistic obsession of her ancestors with pain most were actually inflicted on her in combat. She has various tattoos on her face. The most prominent one is on her forehead.
Mezha has electrical burns from being struck by Sith Lightning. Her torso has scarring caused by shrapnel, and her left cheek is marked by a vibroblade cut. She is strongly built and quite muscular. As is common for Vong, Mezha is Force Dead, meaning she has no Force presence that can be sensed. She has been endowed with Fighting Claws, a useful tool in hand to hand combat. They can be sent out and retracted as needed. Extending them is painful, but they can cut through steel, energy shields and resist lightsabres. After the loss of her right foot in combat, the shattered limb was replaced with a vua'sa foot implant, including a claw. She has also been implanted with Fire Spitters, which can exude chemical flames or blaster dampener fumes.
SOCIAL INFORMATION
Name: Mezha Krazhmir.
Loyalties: Republican Guard, Viper Company, Red Coral City.
Wealth: Low. Being an insurgent does not pay well and so Mezha is far from wealthy. She lives a very modest life style. She is paid better than the average grunt or milita member, but the Republican Guard is not rich and after four bloody centuries Tephrike's economy is a mess. Thus she has a habit of looting from her enemies. A lot of what earns is used to provide for her daughter. She also uses loot to make extraordinary purchases to make sure her fellow soldiers have what they need.
Notable Possessions:
- Villip, with optional Oggzill attachment.
- Lightsabre. Taken from the corpse of Jedi General Kennobi, who committed suicide after the fall of Fortress Purity. Mezha does not have the training to use it properly, so it is a trophy.
- Cloak of Nuun
- Storm Commando Armour.
- Holdout Bolter
- Tsaisi
- Stealth Field Generator
- Shatter Rifle. She calls it Lana, after a friend she made in the refugee camp.
- MkI Bolter. Gifted to her by Freya, who decided her friend needed a 'real gun'. Includes APE Boltgun Ammunition.
- Her combat diary.
- Holopic of her daughter Nei.
- Corellian Star. A Republican Guard medal.
- Monomolecular Energy Chorded Combat Knife
Personality: Yuuzhan Vong are often stereotyped as technophobic, genocidal religious fanatics who are obsessed with inflicting and experiencing pain. There is a good deal of basis for thus, as their actions during the Yuuzhan Vong war demonstrate. Admittedly that was nearly eight hundred years ago. By the same token, all Twi'lek females are incapable of wearing clothes outside of outfits appropriate for the adult entertainment industry, all Eldorai are narrow-minded bigots with delusions of racial superiority and all Wookiees are honour-bound to a fault. Stereotypes are just that stereotypes, though some have more of a basis in reality than others.
Mezha is a product of a harsh environment. She lacks the obsessive religious zealotry and hatred of technology that characterised her ancestors. Neither of these traits would have been conducive to survival on war-torn Tephrike. There her kind are a racial minority, having been stranded there for centuries. Moreover, two of the three main factions on Tephrike, the extremist Jedi-led Dominion of Light and the Disciples of the Vader, a Sith cult, regard Vong as abominations. To them, the Force Dead are an affront to their religious beliefs. This has pushed many of the surviving Vong into the arms of the Republican Guard, a secular faction of insurgents who opposes the Force theocrats and idealise the old Republic. Her people cannot survive on their own and must build bridges with other groups. Mezha is one of the soldiers that fight in the Guard's ranks.
Growing up on Tephrike centuries after the outbreak of the Gulag Virus sent the planet spiralling into chaos, she has been forced to become self-reliant at an early age. She tends to be gruff, sardonic and reserved except to those she trusts, but loyal to the Guard and protective of those under her command. If she trusts someone, she reveals a brighter nature. Mezha has been a fighter for so long that she has a lot of trouble seeing herself as anything else - or imagining a future where Tephrike is not a war-torn hellhole. She has a soft spot for victims, especially children, but no patience for people who in her opinion do nothing to improve their lot. In stressful situations or combat she becomes extremely focused. The nature of her work requires intense focus, detachment and a certain degree of cold-bloodedness.
True to the warrior spirit of her people, she is disciplined and leads from the front. However, she does not believe in blind, suicidal obedience. The Rebellion does not have the resources to casually throw away the lives of its soldiers. She disdains cowards and showoffs, but encourages critical thinking skills among her subordinates. Due to the multispecies nature of the Rebellion, Mezha is fluent in or able to understand several languages outside of her native tongue. Mezha lacks speciecist biases, having experienced discrimination herself due to her origins and fought alongside members of different species. She has worked with other species such as Gungans, Nautolans and humans without bias. She can be quite inspiring and has the ability to rally her comrades even when things are dire. It helps that they know that she will be taking the same risks as them, rather than hanging back.
Mezha is extremely distrustful of Force-users, viewing their powers as corrupting and destructive. Being a Force Dead, she does not quite understand how the Force works, but she has witnessed the ruinous effect its wielders have had on her homeworld. The Republican Guard has a policy of isolating Force-users from the rest of society and conditioning them to suppress their powers. In that regard, they treat it like a disease. Those who have been deemed cured are released into society. In some cases, experiments are conducted to turn them Force Dead, though this only occurs in extreme cases. From Mezha's perspective, her people are employing harsh but necessary measures to keep themselves safe. She feels strong antipathy for Jedi and Sith alike. Force-Users who act in ways contrary to her experiences might be able to influence or mellow her opinion, but it would be a very difficult road, as she would suspect deception.
Mezha has a strong bond with Synthia Vao, a fellow member of Viper Company. Unlike her, Synthia was born in the Dominion. Indeed, she was one of its clone troopers. However, the callousness with which the Jedi Generals treated their slave-soldiers drove her to defect and seek out the resistance. The two get on well and make a good team. They also often socialise outside of duty. Synthia is outwardly more optimistic and light-hearted than her Yuuzhan Vong friend, but scarred by her experiences in the Dominion. Recently, Mezha and Synthia have gotten to know Sergeant Freya Solveig, a tough Firemane veteran.
The three ran into each during the Second Battle of Fortress Purity, when Freya and her troopers dropped on Dominion militia Mezha and her team were about to ambush. Having been cut off from their own forces, the Firemane squad teamed up with the Vipers. Despite the initial distrust between them, the two groups cooperated well. It helped that the Firemane team was composed of Non-Force-Users and Freya held space mages in disdain. The two developed a grudging respect for one another after taking down several Dominion troopers and Jedi together. The two have formed an unlikely friendship, and Mezha likes her quite a bit.
On a personal front, Mezha has a daughter called Nei. Her father was a fellow Yuuzhan Vong soldier. He was one of the partisans who found Mezha after her escape from the Dominion research facility. The two grew close and bonded. Unfortunately, he was killed in action, which affected Mezha deeply. Her child is still very young and being raised in a creche. This is quite normal in Republican Guard society. The rebel movement encourages people to have children. Since the adults are busy fighting or working they have communal creches run by the elderly and wounded. Mezha spends as much as time with her little one as she can when she is home and always carries a holopic of her on her person. When things get grim, it reminds her of who and what she is fighting for.
COMBAT INFORMATION
Weapon of Choice: Proficient with vibroweapons, guns, explosives, amphistaves and other traditional Vong weapons such as razor bugs and Nang Huls. Mezha prefers slugthrowers to blaster weapons because blasters are more difficult to maintain in the jungle. By contrast, slugthrowers last a lot longer if you keep them clean, are easier for the Republican Guard to manufacture and thus a lot more common. She is very good with sniper rifles. She also makes use of her claws and a Fire Spitter in melee combat. She has taken a liking to the Firemane Boltgun for when she needs some heavier firepower.
Combat Function: Mezha is a formidable commando, skilled in small unit leadership and ambushes. Tough, talented markswoman and sniper and proficient with demolitions. As is common for Vong she is Force Dead, completely void in the Force. She has no presence within the Force and thus cannot be sensed in it (except through use of Vongsense) or mentally manipulated. She is unaffected by most Force powers targeted directly against her. Even a normally powerful telekinetic blast that is capable of launching an ordinary opponent off their feet at high speeds simply causes her either to stumble, or lose balance temporarily. Her Force Dead nature can give her an advantage in combat against Force-Users.
However, while being void in the Force is a great benefit, it also has all the associated drawbacks as she cannot be aided by the Force either. Battle meditation, Force healing and telepathy will all not work on her. Moreover, she is not immune to Force Lightning and can be indirectly affected by the Force. To name some examples, during the Yuuzhan Vong War Jedi were able to cause Vong to suffocate by making the air super dense around them or increase the air pressure to a degree that they were effectively crushed.
Moreover, chucking a boulder obviously still works against Vong because them being a void in no way affects the fact that a giant rock is being thrown at her. For unknown reasons, Force Net also works on the Force Dead. In short, all the Force techniques that work against Vong work against her. It should be noted that her Force Death does not extend to clothes and objects she carries on her person, unless they happen to be Vong biots. Thus it would be possible to affect her indirectly by targeting her conventional equipment. She has a talent for stealth and blending into her environment, especially in the jungle.
Mezha has limited skill with galactic technology. This is not due to technophobia, but a result of Tephrike having regressed during the Four Hundred Year Dark Age. For the same reason she has no skill as a starship pilot, as the few remaining spaceships on Tephrike are mostly controlled by the Dominion. She is a good fighter in melee combat. She is good with knives and garrotes. She has a preference for lightweight armour that gives her mobility and allows her to blend in better. This obviously leaves her more vulnerable to heavy weapons, heavy blasters and high-calibre bullets.
Strengths:
- Stealthy operator. Very skilled in sniping, gunslinging and irregular warfare.
- Force Dead. Completely void in the Force, has no presence that can be detected and is immune to most direct Force powers.
- Force Dead. By the same token, she cannot be aided by beneficial Force powers such as Healing, Battle Meditation, and Telepathy. She can also be hurt through indirect use of the Force, Force Net and Force Lightning.
- Limited skill with galactic technology. She has no skill as a pilot and little truck with slicing.
HISTORICAL INFORMATION
Yuuzhan Vong tend to have a poor reputation in the Galaxy. Being responsible for a galactic war that cost the lives of 365 trillion sentient beings tends to have that effect, though there are counter examples such as Nei Rin, a Yuuzhan Vong Master Shaper who worked with the Jedi and was a key participant in the Ossus Project. Many centuries have past since the Vong War and countless atrocities have taken place since then in which Vong had no role, but the stigma remains.
Mezha had the misfortune of being born on a war-torn, riven planet. Like most worlds, Tephrike was hit hard by the Gulag Virus. Historians may argue what motivated the terrorist Zero to unleash the cataclysmic Gulag Virus on Csilla, but its effects are plain for all to see. However, Tephrike was probably more aversely affected than many other worlds. The planet was isolated from the rest of the Galaxy, its economy collapsed, its technology and people regressed. Moreover, a never-ending civil war broke out.
The Jedi remnant on Tephrike tried to wrest some order from the chaos, but in the process became the very thing they sought to oppose. The Jedi-led Dominion of Light, a repressive theocracy that preached a warped, debased version of the old Jedi Code, was opposed by the slavocratic Disciples of the Vader and the Republican Guard, an anti-Force-user rebel movement that idealised the old Republic.
Vong had been stranded on Tephrike many centuries ago. Mezha's family claimed descent from Domain Krazhmir, which had belonged to the Warrior Caste. Centuries ago, Zho Krazhmir had been the Supreme Commander of the Yuuzhan Vong forces during the First Battle of Zonama Sekot. However, this meant preciously little in the modern era. Even before Tephrike's descent into chaos and madness, its Vong minority population had been discriminated against, with restrictions on jobs and place of residence. Yuuzhan Vong were targeted for extermination by the Disciples of the Vader. The Vong fought back and made common cause with the Republican Guard. Mezha had to learn from early on to survive. Living on a planet where war, plague and famine had decimated the population, she grew up with every day being a battle for survival. She was the middle child, with an older sister and a younger brother. Her father taught them essential survival skills.
Young Mezha was raised in the underground, for her family supported the Guard. The Vaderites wanted to eradicate her kind and the Dominion of Light regarded them as abominations that needed to be cleansed or cured. However, the rebels were poor and needed to acquire most of their resources through raids. The village she grew up in was called Queribus, but she would spend a lot of her life underground. Hers was a hybrid culture that combined Yuuzhan Vong principles with those of the Republican Guard. Unlike her ancestors who had invaded the Known Galaxy almost a millennia ago, her parents did not reject technology.
Life in the maquis was characterised by hardship and struggle. Mezha was young, but was pulled into service at an early age. Before she was ten she could already shoot, memorise locations, read a map and take orders. She learned how to go without food, fight, hunt and help her community scavenge and steal from others efficiently. Children like her were used in secondary roles, such as transporting supplies, manning AA weapons, work crews, scouting, digging trenches, guarding prisoners etc.
For a while she served as a messenger for partisans. Her first fight took place when she helped protect supplies from bandits. It was a tough setting where there was little room for childhood innocence. She was commended when she and some fellow child soldiers managed to locate and shadow a Dominion force. This allowed the partisans to stage an ambush and protect the secrecy of their camp. Some captives were taken, which brought young Mezha into close contact with the soldiers of the enemy for the first time.
However, all was not well. The Disciples of the Vader laid claim to Queribus, demanding submission or death. They needed resources and slaves for a new crusade against their enemies. The Dark Lord of the time was a religious purist. The Sith attacked in full force, deploying Sithspawn and heavy gunships. The village was bombed from the sky. Mezha and other youngsters were among the partisans manning the AA guns.
Mezha was injured during the air strike and buried under rubble, but survived. However, her father was killed in the air raid. There was no time to mourn, as the Sith attacked. To save themselves, some of the villagers gave up information on the rebels who had been using the village as a base. The rebels retreated into the tunnels, where fierce fighting ensued. The partisans had a rather ingenuous network of tunnels and had laid many traps.
Unlike them, the Vaderites did not know the terrain. Mezha managed to get the drop on a Stormtrooper with a monofilament trap, then killed him with a poisoned dagger. However, during the fighting she was attacked by a monstrous Sithspawn. Once it had been a nexu, but Sith alchemy had mutated it into an abomination. Her mother saved her from the beast, killing it with a gun and amphistaff. Unable to take the tunnels, the Sith tried to flush them out with nerve gas and explosives. The rebels and their supporters conducted a breakout. It was a harrowing trek. Mezha and her family tried to stick together, but were separated after the group came under attack during night time.
Mezha was all alone, and forced to fall back on her survival skills. To help keep herself sane she recited the names of her family members and ancestors at night and prayed to the Yun'o. She foraged and hunted wild animals and sometimes stole from villages and military patrols. She eventually ended up in a refugee camp away from the bloodletting. However, here life was hard. Tephrike lacked a Red Cross or a similar institution. For a while the Order of the Blessed Way, a pacifist Jedi cult, offered aid. But the Jedi healers regarded Vong as abominations due to them being a void in the Force and in any case soon returned to their forest, embracing isolationism. Conditions were cramped in the camp and disease ran rampant.
Mezha had to perform menial jobs to get by. For a while she acted as a courier for drug dealers so she could bribe the authorities to avoid being expelled. She also stole to get necessary medications and food. She was chastisted after getting into a fight with other youngsters who had tried to bully her due to her race.What passed for normalcy soon came to an end when a militia allied to the Dominion took over the camp. At first they were only looking for recruits, but they soon began press ganging refugees. Moreover, they went on a witch hunt for those believed to have been tainted by the Dark Side. When refugees defended themselves, bloodshed ensued. Innocent refugees were murdered.
Mezha ended up in the militia's crosshairs as word leaked out that the camp contained Vong. The dealer she had been working for sold her out. Mezha defended herself against her attackers, but was overpowered and separated from her family during the fighting. Subjected to beatings, she was eventually handed over to regular soldiers of the Dominion of Light. However, things did not get easier. The Windian Jedi Order, as the Jedi who held sway over the Dominion called themselves, were eager to figure out what made Vong tick, as they did not quite understand the nature of Force Dead. This was quite pertinent for them because Vong made up some of the elite soldiers of the Republican Guard.
Much like the Guard turned Force-using Force Dead, the Jedi tried to 'save the souls' of Force Dead. The Rebels had become a thorn in the Dominion's side, staging raids and terrorist attacks in their territory. So Mezha was brought to a research facility run by the Jedi Inquisition. There she was subjected to a series of experiments. They were unpleasant, to put it mildly. Her stubborn and rebellious nature contributed to her being punished a lot. One Jedi tried to brainwash her into realising that her existence was unnatural and that she was an abomination in the eyes of the Force. This was accompanied by physical and psychological torture, as she was treated as a thing without rights. From the Jedi's perspective, they were trying to cure her by breaking her curse. However, eventually she managed to escape, making contact with some of her fellow inmates. Though wounded by a Jedi's blade, she managed to overpower her captor and flee into the jungle.
Chatter she had overheard from the camp guards implied that Republican Guard followers had been sighted in the area. By the time she stumbled upon a partisan unit, she was in a poor shape. It was her good fortune that she was not shot by an overzealous sniper. Recognising her nature, the partisans took her in. It turned out that the team was led by her sister, who had taken up the cause believing Mezha to be dead. She shared what information she had gathered about the Dominion's operation. The information allowed them to carry out a raid on the laboratory.
Mezha fought against the Force cultists and their minions with great zeal, turning out to be an adept knife fighter and sharpshooter. Once she killed five enemies in one day as she crouched in a sniper hideout. She began writing a combat diary. To preserve military secrecy, she termed killed and wounded 'reds' and 'blues' respectively in her diary. When a camp they had set up in the hills was bombed by DOKAWs and attacked by Dominion infantry, she saved the life of one of the rebel officers, suffering burns in the process.
Recognising her value, the partisans took her with them when they retreated into rebel-controlled territory. After being posted in the unofficial border zone for a while, she was brought to Red Coral City, which was what passed for the capital of the Republican Guard. To call it a city was an euphemism, as it was closer to being a mix between armed settlement and rebel camp, but it was the centre of their operations. From here the rebel junta led what they considered to be the struggle to liberate Tephrike.
Here she was able to reunite with her surviving kin. She also got the chance to mingle with more of her kind, as the place had a Vong minority. This enabled her to connect with her people a bit and learn more about her roots, though the history she was taught was more than a little distorted due to isolation, inaccurate records and bias. The rebels believed that Sidious and the Jedi had conspired together to foment the Clone Wars so that the Force blind could be brought to heel.
Interestingly, their view of Luke and Leia was more charitable. Both were seen as well-intentioned people who had been duped by the Jedi into continuing the cruel war. According to this interpretation, Luke had gone into exile and renounced the Force after realising the harm Force-users caused. He had burnt the Jedi's sacred scriptures to keep future generations from repeating the same mistakes. Sadly, this was not enough, as Jedi Rey built a new Jedi Order.
However, life in Red Coral City was hard and lacking in comfort. Rationing was in effect, work hours were long while pay was low. Moreover, there was a strong siege mentality. People lived in fear of Force-users and their powers. There was a degree of freedom of thought and expression, but only within certain bounds. Children who displayed Force-Sensitivity were separated from their families and brought to the asylum, where they were isolated and taught to suppress their powers. Mezha felt sympathy for the children who were brought to the Amidala Asylum, considering them victims of something they could not control, akin to Plague victims. However, her past experiences created a strong bias against Force-users.
To put her skills to good use, she was inducted into a commando unit that staged raids into Jedi or Sith territory. It was called Viper Company. Often operating far from friendly territory, she grew self-reliant and independent, acquiring skills as a leadership, an understanding of partisan warfare and low level logistics. However, the brutality of the conflict radicalised her methods, making her more brutal and vicious. Thus she took part in terrorist bombings and reprisal attacks on supposed collaborators. Though committed to the liberation of Tephrike, the Republican Guard's methods were ruthless.
She used improvised explosive devices in population centres to take out supposed Sith or Dominion supporters, extracted 'tribute' from settlements in order to fund the revolution, took hostages to assure compliance and blew up dams and dykes to cause floods in enemy territory. Murder, kidnapping, torture and general intimidation were a routine part of Republican Guard strategy and were calculated to bring the population under control, liquidate opponents, erode the morale of Sith or Dominion functionaries, boost tax collection and propaganda efforts. Mezha was fighting for freedom, but not shy about being ruthless to achieve it.
Captured Jedi or Sith tended to be shot out of hand or hanged. Others were subjected to the Embrace of Pain. Owing to her past experiences, requisitioning supplies from villages left a bitter taste in her mouth, but the Rebellion had few resources and no external backers. When one of her fellow partisans turned out to be a traitor and led them into a Sith trap, she took cruel vengeance. She made a name for herself when a commando unit led by her infiltrated a Vader temple, placing explosive charges to blow it up. Mezha ended up facing a Sith in battle and was viciously scarred by Force Lightning, one of the few direct Force powers that could affect a Vong, but managed to kill him with an explode on impact grenade and a Fire Spitter.
She became a very proficient sharpshooter, specialising in the use of a long-rage slugthrower sniper rifle to kill enemies at range, especially high-value targets such as officers and Force-Users. Her skills earned her a leadership position in the prestigious Viper Company, which she soon came to lead. She grew close to one of the partisans who had found her after her escape from the Dominion research facility. The two had a daughter. Mezha was overjoyed when her child came into the world. She named her Nei after her mother. However, her duties meant that she could only spend a limited amount of time with the babe, who was raised in a creche.
She aso participated in the Hundred Days Offensive, a grand campaign launched by the Republican Guard during the Netherworld Event, which had thrown the Dominion into disarray. The offensive brought Rebel soldiers into the heartland of the Dominion. She was part of a recon unit. During one period she crawled through a muddy communications each day at dawn to a specially camouflaged pit which overlooked Dominion territory.
She successfully employed counter-sniper-tactics against a Dominion cuckoo sniper hidden in a tree, by waiting until dusk when the space between the tree branches would be backlit by sunlight and the sniper's nest became visible. During an operation, an enemy sharpshooter shot her in the shoulder. Though the wound seemed minor to her, she needed an operation and was incapacitated for several days, but returned to active combat as soon as possible.
The initial attacks stunned the Dominion armies, causing them to temporarily lose control over several cities. However, the Jedi Battlemaster rallied them. The armies of Light regrouped, beat back the attackers and inflicted heavy casualties on them. The popular uprisings Red Coral City had hoped for never materialised. Mezha participated in the failed attack on Fortress Purity, where a Republican Guard force was routed. Badly injured in her chest and leg by shrapnel fragments from an artillery strike while shielding a wounded Republican Guard soldier, Mezha was found by two soldiers from her platoon. Fortunately, her comrades evacuated her from the battlefield. Mezha survived, but she lost her right foot. Like the ancient Vong Warmaster Tsavong Lah, she got a replacement from Vong shapers, who fashioned a foot with four claws from the corpse of a vua'sa. Nei's father perished in the fighting, but Mezha had little time to properly mourn him. She channelled her grief into anger.
She was part of General Aruunzeb's force when he held out in Salona in order to buy other Republican Guard forces time to pull back. The Republican Guard used deception to fool its enemies, employing dummies, camouflage and false radio traffic to fool them into thinking that their force was a lot larger than it actually was. But fierce house-to-house fighting ensued in the ruins of the city. In the end the surviving Republican Guard forces had to execute a breakout to escape encirclement. Mezha and her comrades were part of this, using infiltration tactics to penetrate enemy lines and sowing confusion among the enemy to cover the retreat.
Some of her comrades, as well as Dominion citizens who had sympathised with the rebel cause, had been captured by the Dominion. With the help of some other Rebels, Mezha launched an unauthorised mission to raid a prison camp and free them. The operation was a success, but obviously going against your orders was still a crime in any army. No military is fond of mavericks and cowboys, after all. So Mezha was punished for it. Her past actions worked in her favour when she was court-martialled, but she was demoted and reassigned to a distant outpost. There she was ordered to whip a platoon composed of criminals and mutineers into shape. Unexpectedly she did well and the penal unit proved itself during a forlorn hope assault.
She was disgusted by the fact that the leader of the Republican Guard had secretly collaborated with Darth Salus, the leader of the Vaderites. Once named Krieg, Salus had been tried to turn the Vaderites to the light side after discovering a 'lost tome' that told the story of Vader's redemption...though this did not stop him from being a despot. Thus she was pleased when the chancellor lost a vote of no confidence and was replaced by the Gungan Odoh Senks, a former slave and decorated war hero.
However, she was challenged in her beliefs when she discovered that one of her friends, a fellow partisan, had a Force-Sensitive son, whose powers she had kept secret, which was a serious offence in the Republican Guard. Despite their friendship, Mezha had to turn them in. From her perspective, she was helping them. However, her friend disagreed, so there was a fight in which Mezha prevailed. She was given her old position back after this. For a while she was positioned closer to home, hunting down rogue Force-Users who were illegally using the Force. But she and her partisans soon returned to Dominion territory.
As of late, Mezha had heard rumours about people from outer space arriving on Tephrike. These rumours were confirmed when the Republican Guard detected a huge spaceship with a telescope and later came across a foreign submersible in their waters. She was one of those soldiers charged with investigating these outsiders and determine whether their coming will be to the benefit or detriment of the Tephriki. Time will tell what repercussions her missions will have.
It soon transpired that the outsiders belonged to a group called Firemane. At first they attempted to negotiate with the Dominion, but soon open warfare broke out when an extremist faction in the Dominion attacked the Firemane negotiators. Some Firemane-allied pilots, led by Laira Darkhold, were shot down. Pursued by Dominion militia, they had to seek refuge in the wilderness. Viper Company operatives and normal irregulars, led by Mezha, followed the outsiders. When the pilots were being swarmed by Dominion militia, the rebels came to their aid. Ultimately this led to Firemane and the Republican Guard entering an uneasy alliance. It helped that Elpsis Kerrigan-Alcori, the adoptive daughter of Firemane's boss, had been captured by the Dominion.
The Guard shared intelligence on Dominion forces and strongholds with the outsiders. In return, Firemane provided them with food and medical supplies. Eventually it decided to equip select rebel units, such as Viper Company, with some more advanced weapons. Viper Company played an important role in the battle for Fortress Purity, a joint assault on a major Dominion base and a key breastwork on the road to Nexus City, capital of the Jedi theocracy. The Republican Guard had tried to take the fortress in the past, but always been repulsed. Viper Company had suffered heavy casualties in the assault during the Hundred Days Offensive. Thus the mission was personal for them.
Here, the Vipers faced one of their hardest fights. Per the battle plan, the Guard would provide the bulk of the manpower. Firemane would support them with small elite groups of special forces operators and shock troops, air and artillery strikes. There was strong distrust on both sides, as each expected betrayal from the other party. This mind set extended to Viper Company, as the partisans were suspicious of their allies. Nonetheless, this was their chance to deal a serious blow to the Dominion.
Taking advantage of the intense bombardment Firemane subjected the fortress to, the Vipers used a secret tunnel to get close to the Dominion positions and bypass their first line of defence. Their infiltration was a success. However, the Dominion was determined to make the invaders bleed for every inch of ground they seized. Kamikaze fighters attacked the Firemane transports and bombers. Intense fighting raged across the forest. Moreover, the Dominion activated a weather control machine, gravely weakening Firemane's ability to carry out air strikes or land troops in the combat zone.
Viper Company was about to eliminate Dominion emplacements when suddenly power armoured soldiers dropped down from the sky, landing close to their position. They were Reaper Squad, and their commander was Sergeant Freya Solveig. Both units teamed up, with the Reapers providing the hammer and the Vipers the dagger to slip through Dominion lines. Amidst fierce fighting, they overpowered a Dominion artillery crew. Freya and Mezha worked together to take down the Wookiee Jedi Commander, with the former attacking him up front while the latter employed an amphistaff to poison him. Then they turned the mortars on Dominion positions, bombarding them. However, a vicious Dominion counterattack forced them to retreat.
Traps, the Reapers' heavy firepower and the Vipers' sharpshooting took their toll on the Dominion clone troopers. When Reaper Squad used their jetpacks to fly towards the Dominion lines and drop grenades on them, Mezha supported them by sniping enemies. Despite given the chance, she refused to abandon her allies. However, the Rebels and the Firemane soldiers were cornered. They held off a wave of enemy attackers. Mezha and Freya worked together to take out a Dominion super tank. While Freya immobilised it by shooting with her shatterboltgun, Mezha used her Cloak of Nuun to sneak up to it and throw a grenade down the hatch. However, more Dominion soldiers came and the two had to fight for their lives.
When all seemed lost and they were about to be literally run over by a tank, Firemane's Mirage Squadron carried out an air strike, giving the Republican Guard time to deploy reinforcements and stem the tide. Indeed, Mezha and Freya were saved from being rolled over by a tank when the Squadron's Qadiri pilots blew it up. They were reinforced by Rebel assault troops, who saved them from being overrun. The line had been stabilised, leaving the situation a stalemate.
But the Dominion hammered the allied forces with attacks. Republican Guard and Firemane troops were almost overrun. The rebels had to swallow their distrust of Force-Users and fight along side the Order of Fire. After her injuries had been patched up, Mezha returned to combat. After giving a speech, she rallied some volunteers from her unit. Freya rejoined them. The team was given the task of locating and cracking bunkers that impeded the Republican Guard's advance. Dominion mentalists used illusions to conceal small units of soldiers and entrenched defences, enabling them to ambush rebels.
Mezha and her allies received a distress signal from an Andorian Guard platoon that had come under heavy enemy fire. The Dominion had employed a Force Illusion to conceal the bunker and now the unit was being mauled. While Freya and one of her men joined the beleaguered Republican Guard unit and provided covering fire, Mezha and her people used their stealthy skills to get close and lob explosives into the bunker. Said explosives had, ironically, been taken from Dominion suicide bombers.
Then boh groups stormed the bunker. Injured in the explosion, the Jedi illusionist was gunned down by a furious Freya for messing with her mind. After taking the bunker, the team discovered that it connected to a tunnel that seemed to be part of a larger underground complex. Far from being just a mundane pillbox, it was a crucial component in the Dominion's defences. The tunnel provided a way into the base. They contacted headquarters, requesting backup and ground penetrating radar to map the underground complex.
Shortly after making this discovery they ambushed a Dominion patrol and were able to take prisoners. The Jedi leader had been bitten by Synthia's amphistaff but refused to divulge any information. One of the captured clone troopers declared his willingness to cooperate, but the interrogation was interrupted by a Dominion attempt to contact the patrol. The team tried to fool them by compelling the cooperative trooper to lie to his superiors, but the Dominion did not buy it and dispatched reinforcements. Mezha had the captured Jedi strapped with explosives and detonated them as soon as Dominion soldiers approached. Thereafter fierce fighting ensued in the tunnels. The team turned the tunnel into a kill zone, gunning down several Dominion soldiers and Jedi through disciplined fire and improvised weapons. However, the enemy was able to break through.
Mezha faced a Jedi warrior in combat. She was able to injure her enemy through use of a Fire Spitter and blade, but was trapped in a Force Net. Unable to escape the constriction, she was saved by Synthia momentarily distracting her opponent. She broke free and shattered part of the Jedi's armour by setting it on fire and then using a cryoban gun She was able to overpower her enemy and stab her. Having been wounded during the fight, she was brought to safety by Synthia, though she refused to leave the fight. As the Dominion was in the process of overrunning them, reinforcements arrived.
The Republican Guard troops poured through the tunnels and stormed the underground base. Close to the end of the battle, the Dominion unleashed a brigade of Padawans and Younglings to cover their retreat while General Kennobi, the commander of the base, committed suicide. The child soldiers were sent on a suicidal death charge and gunned down by the Republican Guard and Firemane troops. Mezha was among the soldiers who entered the base. Enraged by the massacre and the way the Dominion had hurt her, she killed the remaining Dominion soldiers and functionaries without mercy. The Guard was not in the mood to take prisoners.
She, Freya and Synthia found the body of Jedi General Kennobi, who had committed suicide after sending the Younglings to die. The fact that he escaped justice and the pointless slaughter left her enraged. She took his lightsabre as a trophy. With the battle over, she said goodbye to Freya, after both admitted that they would not mind seeing the other again. The fall of the Fortress was a blow to the Dominion, but it was not beaten. Instead it rallied under a new group of hardliners willing to fight a war to the knife.
Mezha was given a brief respite before she was recalled to duty. The Republican Guard promoted her to Captain. She and Synthia were more committed than ever to overthrowing the Dominion and the Vaderites. In the aftermath of the fighting, Mezha was invited to the Scarlet Destiny by Tegaea Alcori, Director of the Firemane Exploration Corps. Visiting space for the first time was rather unnerving for Mezha. The same applied to being in the company of so many Force-users. However, she managed to maintain her self-control. Mezha was honoured for her actions, receiving a weapon and a commendation from Firemane. Her brief exposure to the outsiders left her puzzled by their ways, but also curious.
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