Private No Witnesses

[Maou]

Undisclosed Location​

The Assasin had come at a terrible time. When he'd called Darth Voyance after he'd caught the Jedi red-handed with the stolen body of Lannik Dawnstar he'd expected Voyance to call him back to the small burgeoning fleet she was accumulating for further training. Instead, she had gifted him with his own vessel and...A watcher. A babysitter. That had been...Problematic. While he wasn't sure any of the Jedi had the ability, psychometry was a known Jedi skill especially prevalent in Kiffar, much like that dirty spice thieving boy. Ryv, they called him. Paragon of the Jedi and Sword of the Light. What a farce. Regardless of their past though, the boy had probably been able to glean something of what happened that night and this woman...this Assasin would only draw more eyes to him. Even in the shadow of war against the Sith Empire and the ever-growing darkness of Brentaal IV, whatever that was, he had a feeling that this seemingly incorruptible young Jedi Knight would see through the veil and take action against him soon enough. He wished he could accelerate plans, but the problem was there was no plan, at least as far as he could see.

All of these thoughts occurred to him as he floated in the Sith Sphere. That was also a wonderful gift. In her initial call that had given him the location of the warship Voyance had called the Sphere Âzâshlash. Kaito, still un-initiated, only given his rank of Saber for his position within the Alliance and his self-taught combat prowess and connection to the Dark Side of the Force. For him, the Sith language was as foreign as the language of the Chiss or Vong and their traditions as archaic as those of the Jedi Order's. So Kaito had taken to simply calling the Sphere Lash. Fitting for the waves of rage he felt consistently rolling off of its nearly organic hull. The doors of the Sith meditation chamber hissed open, casting light on all of the ancient Atrisian and Sith artifacts he'd begun collecting since his introduction into the Keepers. Much like the light of the Jedi, the beams penetrated even the nearly opaque purple of Lash's single viewport, shining into his closed eyes, disrupting his meditations. He could sense the now-familiar presence of Darth Sinestruss waiting for him outside. His eyes still pinched shut he let a growl escape his lips before floating back down and standing to greet her.

The hull of the Sith Sphere peeled open, dropping a ramp to the ground of the chamber with a wet crunch. The sound of Kaito's bare feet slapped against the ship's alchemized metals and the Masamune's durasteel floor. Despite his appearance in the public eye, Kaito was in great health. Outside of his lungs, which were now charred beyond repair and replaced with cybernetics that made his voice carry like that of a cyborg, his body was fine. Scars ran up and down his body, some from his gangster days and others from more recent trials. They were mostly all on display now as Kaito was clad only in black bodyglove pants. One of his Atrisian droids bowed her head and handed him a warm towel which he draped over his head.

"Kun," he said, his voice reverberating off of the walls of the chamber. Lash seemed to quiver in anticipation. Kill her now. It whispered into his mind. Show your Master that you do not have need of such distractions. She was a distraction, in more ways than one. But she was a useful one, he reminded himself. He didn't trust Voyance. He didn't trust any of the Sith Keepers really, but he trusted his Master enough to not go through all of this effort to recruit him only to kill him and he trusted her enough not to send him a useless tool.

It was time to clean up this mess.

Once and for all.

 

[Darth Sinestruss]

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[MUSIC]​

Spoiler

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Siqsa Kun had been in the chamber for some time. Such was her methods - she had crept in while Maou was entombed within the Lash meditation sphere. Siqsa sat before the steps that led up to the Lash. Adopting Atrisian posture etiquette, she sat with her lower legs folded beneath her thighs and her body resting on the heels of her planted feet, her back arched upright and straight. She did not wear the robes of her Sith heritage, and occupation as an agent of Darth Voyance. Instead she was disguised in the fashions of the Coruscanti underworld. Black trousers with a brown leather accented jacket. Various urban logos plastered about her jackets that mimicked the graffiti of the lower levels. She had fully embodied her new identity as a paid killer of Kaito’s criminal syndicate the Yokai. Her true Sith identity buried beneath this new veneer.

Meticulous care had been taken to merge herself as organically as possible into the complicated webs of the criminal world. She had forged a new identity beneath an Ubese helmet, to the Yokai and to the larger criminal world she was simply known by the alias handle, Mamushi, an Atrisian old word, meaning Viper. She had forged a niche for herself as the trusted dagger in the dark for the great Maou, boss of the Yokai, Kaito Kiyoshi.​

As she waited she ruminated on the fragile position she had found herself in. This Kaito was ambitious and the spark of wickedness that was encouraged by the promises of the Dark Side was prevalent. But, he was not tempered in the ways her master was. There was a raw power and talented cunning, she could see it. But, it waxed and waned with a pulsing paranoid anxiety that muddied the resolve of the talented potential. Potential without the right technique was just fuel for self-destruction later. Siqsa pondered why her master had kept him at arms length thus far. To Voyance everything had its time, for she saw everything in its own time. Perhaps it was not his time yet?​

The hissing of the meditation sphere’s hemispheres separating brought Siqsa out of her pensive calculations. Her golden eyes flicked up to catch Kaito growl her name.​

“Yes Maou?” Siqsa answered in a dead tone.​

 

[Maou]

His cold grey eyes found her glowing yellow orbs and he wondered for a moment what would happen if he struck her down right then and there. Was that the sort of test his master had planned for him all along? Some of the few Sith he'd met seemed to hold him with contempt. They said that he hadn't truly given himself over to the Sit as his eyes still remained that of a 'lesser' being. His grey eyes weren't the two fierce suns of rage that filled every other Sith's sockets, even when he tapped into the dark. He wondered if she thought lesser of him for his eyes as well. In the end, she was his tool and not the other way around. To him, appearance meant nothing if the others groveled at his feet like hungry tooka cats.

"I have a mission for someone of your unique...skill," he started. "I have a few loose ends to cut free of this mess with that dead Jedi. Lanik Dawnstar ," he spat out the words, rage building quickly in his belly and rising through his chest. The cold grey coals that were his eyes flashed with that anger and it felt like a dragon had been birthed inside of his heart. "Here are their dossiers." One of the servant droids had silently glided over to them, a datapad resting in her hands. She bowed and gave the pad to Maou graciously before he handed it to Kun. The list was short, but it was a list of the few people that Lanik had interacted with during his search. A pair of CorSec officers that had found the corpse of one of his assassins, the detectives that had allowed the Jedi to speak with the Yokai underling, even the doctor that had declared him Lanik dead. He wanted them all gone. Vanished. And last on that list..Was Lannik Dawnstar's apprentice.

She had been left in a coma since the battle but should she wake would have all of the cards needed to take Kaito down and remove any influence he had on the Senate. He would lose...everything. She was the top priority and needed to be killed. She was being sequestered in a State-owned facility and was being monitored by the Special Committee on Force Affairs as well as the New Jedi Order on Coruscant. The target was more or less already dead, so the attempt should have been an easy task for the experienced assassin.

"Can you complete this task assassin?"

Darth Sinestruss

 

[Darth Sinestruss]

Siqsa rose from her perch and stepped softly towards Kaito. Taking the datapad, she returned to her seated posture and perused the list of targets. With a flick of her finger she scrolled down the names and tapped them to open data filled side tabs. 'Loose ends...' Siqsa pondered as she studied the targets, their names, occupations, locations, residence, and backgrounds. Her eyes narrowed and she slowed the controlling movements of her fingers. Her scrolling stopped when the readout for the deceased Jedi rose up from the edges of the datapad's metal rims. 'Lannik Dawnstar...' Siqsa's mind echoed. The name was familiar, her mistress, Darth Voyance divulged to her the specifics of a Jedi she had come to "infect" with her presence. 'Is she still with him? Fighting with him in the Force?' Siqsa wondered.

Her scrolling continued. The first targets seemed the most expedient to dispatch. A two CorSec Officers and the Detectives that had assisted the Jedi in their investigations. She had made connections in the underworlds of Coruscant and such a web of scum could be useful for a spider such as herself. They provided the little tugs in the nodes that alerted her to the presence of prey. No doubt she could use some of the scoundrels as bait to lure the fools into her trap. The doctor and the coma befallen apprentice would prove a challenge however. Especially the apprentice. Siqsa was certain her body would be placed under surveillance, guarded by security, and the Jedi would not be too far. The first two could be dealt with by a blaster in some alley. But, the apprentice and doctor would need a more obscured approach.

"Can you complete this task assassin?" pressed Kaito.

Siqsa's looked up and lowered the data pad, resting it on her lap. "Yes Maou," Siqsa replied, "But the Apprentice and Doctor will need special preparations."

"They will be the most guarded targets," Siqsa continued, "Poison from the shadows should allow for a quick and silent death for the Apprentice. Synox, or some concotion of it should do nicely."

"But, the challenge will be coming close to this Apprentice without drawing the attention of the Jedi. I will see if I can arrange the interference of other actors - bounty hunters and the like, perhaps a decoy could provide the window for the strike."

Siqsa paused for a moment. She then eyed Kaito and pressed her lips thin, pausing, as if making some sort of calculation.

"Tell me Maou, have you spoken to this Lannik much? Did he ever speak of...a presence? Something that bothered him?"

 

[Maou]

Kaito turned away from the assassin and made his way towards a small bar where he began fixing himself a drink. Something strong, likely a Corellian mixer of some kind. He listened to the woman's long-winded answer before waving a hand.

"No," he said. "We'd never spoken before," which had been part of the reason he had been so genuinely caught off guard by the arrival of the Jedi. "I am aware that Lady Voyance had some sort of plot in store for him but I was not privy to them." He turned to her and took a sip from his cool drink.

"I don't care how you get it done," he snapped. "Just make sure it is."

Darth Sinestruss