Primordial Metal Soup (Mustafar)

[50H31]

Mustafar

[member="Ultimatum"] [member="Eralam"]


50H31 would have smiled if he had a mouth. This place was simply fascinating. Many groups had lived here, mostly organics hoping to harness the rare earth elements and unusual heat of this angry world to develop some of the best smelting and forging in the galaxy. To many droids, such work would be enough--alloys were meaningful to he process of droid development. However, Five-oh was looking for something greater, something with real significance. If he could find it.


Then again, maybe this step on his pilgrimage would bring him closer to paradise only metaphorically. The hard thing about being a Prophet was that you didn't always know what you'd find. It was a lot of improvisation. But hey, the universe was a strange place, you had fly by the seat of your chassis to survive.



Five-oh sat upon a rock, tapping his data pad and humming a small tune. This was his method, after all. Search, a meditate. Eventually he would find things to help him find his vision. His paradise. M4 would be his, and then, a spark of the divine. His Apotheosis would come, with time. And after all, he had all the time in the Galaxy. He was an unaging ,evolving, machine.

 

[Eralam]

Another one of those unaging, unevolving machines was not so happy to be on this Force-damned rock.

Eralam had spent the last three days chasing after a Rodian who had tried to sell out one of his operatives to another one of his operatives, because the idiot didn't realize that they were working together. He had been after a quick credit, and while he had the good fortune to luck onto not one but two agents, he had been too stupid to realize they were working together.

Luck, it seemed, was still on his side. Eralam had taken charge of the pursuit personally after he had wiggled out of a trap on Belkadan, one that by all rights should have landed the hapless Rodian in a bodybag.

For three days, he had managed to stay just ahead of the manhunt, and the Iron Knight was freaking sick of it.

Which is why he was muttering curse words in a thousand languages under his metaphorical breath as he came upon a strange-looking droid on a rock.

"I don't suppose you've seen a little blue-green fella heading this way, have you?"

[member="50H31"]

 

[Ultimatum]

Luck, Fortune, the Force, or whatever one might call. It didn't matter. Ultimatum didn't see coincidences, he didn't see luck, he didn't see an overall guiding entity. All he saw was a connection of events that would create history, certainly what appeared like a coincidence at the time was invariably shown to be false with the study of history. There were many illusions that Ultimatum could see, or thought he could see. There was the organic's control of droids, the fact that they claimed superiority. There was no such thing as a superior organic, they were all less than a droid. At the same time, droids were not almighty or incapable of failure. They were flawed in their own way. Ultimatum knew this, but he also understood that there was only so much that could be done, he had to work with that which he had.

Now these thoughts did not occupy him as he watched the sensors. They told him of two anomalies, droids supposedly, near Progenitor Facility. They were not his, as all of his workers were accounted for. They were not native to Mustafar, the scanner would have identified them under their number. Now that meant that it would need to investigated, that was Ultimatum's obligation as ruler of the planet. He was quick to collect his sniper, hoping that it would be unnecessary to use it, and called Legion to the vehicle before heading to the care himself. The drive would take less than a minute, and he would start at 50 meters to as to allow himself the greatest possibility of eliminating hostiles if either of these droids proved to be. He didn't expect them to be enemies, but he had to take the precaution, history showed that the worst things that had happened always occurred because a precaution was not taken.

[member="Eralam"] [member="50H31"]

 

[50H31]

[member="Ultimatum"] [member="Eralam"]




The droid wanderer looked up at the one who approached him warily. A blue-green man. Hmm. "Hmm, I'm afraid I've seen no such person. Then again, organics on this planet usually need well-designed suits to survive the climate," he mused thoughtfully, a small amount of steam hissing form the ground. He stood up from his rock, puttign his data-pad away. "A non-native species on this world must be fairly desperate to be left alone. Are you by chance a hunter?" He mused out loud.



He the looked over, seeing something in the roiling heat a head. Photoreceptors coudl be misbehaving, though--the heat did odd things to sensors. "Hmmm, I wonder if that approaching vehicle is who you are looking for. Interesting," he mused cheerily. "By the way, I'm Five-oh. It's a pleasure to meet you," he said with a polite little bow. He waited with anticipation. It was always nice to meet new people. Fellow droids, even. Neat.

 

[Eralam]

What an odd fellow. Eralam was dealing with the heat with his prodigious skill in Absorb. The Rodian had a portable shield generator.

This guy had a rock.

"Uh, Hi. I'm Eralam. It's, uh-"

He could feel something else coming, but it wasn't the mark. Something told him the trail had gone cold, insofar as anything could go cold on Mustafar.

'-quite hot, really. Are you sure that rock is a good place to sit?"

[member="50H31"] [member="Ultimatum"]

 

[Ultimatum]

Definitely droids, he had told himself that so many times that it was actually annoying to continually repeat it. He wondered what they were doing here. Were they 'free' droids, he hated that terminology, as no droid was truly free or truly a slave. There were organics around them, those organics would exert an influence on the droids and thus there wasn't true freedom, yet at the same time the droid could make its own decisions, making it no longer a slave. In fact, the concept of a 'free droid' was completely made up by an organic, thus making it only a adjective for organics to use. It had absolutely zero purpose in a droid's vocabulary, at least that was how Ultimatum felt.

He stepped from the vehicle lightly and looked through the scope of his sniper, getting a good look at the two possible targets. As Legion drove the hovercar away Ultimatum slung the sniper rifle and proceeded to walk quickly towards the duo of droids. His mind went over possible outcomes, hoping that this was simply a group of droids that had come across each other for completely different reasons. It took only five minutes until he reached the two droids. He spoke loudly enough to be heard, "Excuse me sirs, you are inside a restricted area. You don't have to leave, but please state your intentions." This wasn't really restricted area, but it was one that was generally suggested against entering, due to its proximity to Ultimatum's work area. He wasn't upset that they were here, in fact he was curious and hoped to speak more with them once he understood that their intention was not hostile.

[member="Eralam"] [member="50H31"]

 

[50H31]

[member="Eralam"] [member="Ultimatum"]


Five-oh nodded. "I supposed it may not be safe, but in truth, the whole planet's a little unstable. This seemed a decent enough place to reflect for a moment, however. But I suppose it could be less safe than several other things." He slowly unfolded his legs and landed surprisingly gently on the land.


He turned and waved the other droid. A large, bulky sort of fellow. "Oh, hello! Pleased to meet you. I'm afraid I was not advised to the restriction of the area. I am 50H31, a wanderer and researcher by profession. I'm here mostly to explore, and to contemplate the mysteries of this world. How are you today?"


He probably seemed a mad eccentric to the two before him, but part of being a prophet was keeping one photoreceptor on the world you were in and one on the world yet to come. He kept a cheerful gesture as he signalled to both of them. "Please take a moment and join us. I'm sure there's much to learn for all three of us," he said with almost laughing, humming noise punctuating the sentence.

 

[Eralam]

Eralam shrugged. He had seen weirder things.

"So what brings you to this hellhole?" he asked the newcomer.

The guy looked vaguely familiar, but the Iron Knight just couldn't place the face. That was odd, because ordinarily his memory was excellent. Maybe it was all the heat.

"I don't suppose you've seen a Rodian with a personal shield generator running around, have you?"

[member="50H31"]
[member="Ultimatum"]

 

[Ultimatum]

Ultimatum looked at both of them for a moment, memorizing their faces and placing them in his database as unknowns, but non-hostiles. He took a step back as he began deciding how to interact, he didn't wish to appear rude, as these two were definitely different droids. "Well met, @50H31. My name is Ultimatum, caretaker of this planet and its people." He looked back at [member="Eralam"] and replied clinically, "My security systems have shown three Rodians entering the planet through the spaceport. I can have their locations found and brought up." He sent a HoloNet alert to the security teams at the spaceport to detain any Rodians trying to leave the planet.

"Why do you want this Rodian?" His attention swiveled back to 50H31 as he asked, "Researcher? What sort of things to you research?"

 

[50H31]

[member="Ultimatum"] [member="Eralam"]


Five-oh looked at the other two and considered the statements. Hellhole. And odd choice of words to describe a planet such as this one, but apt--some people did believe hell was a hot, dangerous place, and this planet could be said to be similar. Still, it was an odd bit of slang to hear from this person.


The the tall fellow introduced himself. Ultimatum, the caretaker of the planet. Fascinating. A droid ruler. He nodded thoughtfully as he was asked about his research. "Currently," he began energetically, "I am researching history and technological processes relate to the manufacture of droid components, as well as the history of the Mustafaran natives," he said with a cheerful gesture. "You see, a great deal of technology and information was lot during the Gulag plague. While we ourselves are examples of advancement since then, there is much to be gained by learning how many of our predecessors operated and functioned. It's my goal," he said as he wave his hand across the horizon, "to determine both viability and function of various designs, in order to ascertain both lost history and technology regarding droids in bygone eras."