Questing at Maximum Effort Pt 2

[Miss Blonde]

Location: Coruscant Underworld
Objective: Head eastbound straight down.

Most people thought when you hit the underworld of Coruscant that was it, that was the worst of the worst. What with gangs, killers, crime lords, mercenaries, every little bad bit of evil that there was. However that just wasn't true, believe it or not there was a level bellow that, rock bottom. That's where the monsters lived, and by monsters it wasn't like serial killers or evil people, well those existed too down there. But there were literal monsters down there of all sorts of varieties, but there was something else to. A lightsaber that belonged to a particular Sith Lord.

Now as of late [member="The Black Hat"] had started to grow on Miss Blonde ever since she met her on Dredd in that prison cell, since then she's been with her on Demonsgate, and most recently the dark zone where some serious shit went down. She had become somewhat of her apprentice, and not in the sense of the force but rather how to take care of and run a criminal organization. So in a bar called "The Edge" Miss Blonde wore her reclaimer armor system and sat in a booth with the teen.

The girl had been tracking the spending habits of a cult that lived at the bottom of coruscant and every now and then they came out for food. Tracking a pattern of what store they used Miss Blonde's people were able to hit one with a tracking device. So they had their lair and now it was time to strike on the cult of freaky sith loving bastards.

"You ready for round two kid?" Miss Blonde asked with her helmet at her side as she sipped at a cocktail.

"Cause we're about to go to a pretty fun place you and I." Miss blonde polished off her drink then set it aside.

Grabbing two sub machine guns the woman placed them on the table along with a few credits for the waiter.

 

[Miss Blonde]

There was a slight pause then Patricia began to laugh a bit. A joke of course, the woman would never allow the sixteen year old girl down into the very depths of Coruscant. But there was someone that she would go down there with, someone like her business associate The Runner.

"I'm just messing with you kid." Miss Blonde said as she grabbed her weapons.

"Stay here, we'll be back to pick you up in a bit." Blonde said as she stood up and left her credits on the table.

Placing her helmet on her head the woman walked out the bar and towards the cliff that lead down into the darkest of darks. The absolute rock bottom of coruscant, where you needed the thermo body glove in your armor to stay warm without shelter. There was evil down there alright, and she was going to go down there and get what she needed.

"Runner, get you ass over here man. We got killing to do." The woman said as she cocked back her two submachine guns.

All there was to do was wait for the infamous spacer to show up so they could make the jump down and kick some ass. There were bad people with valuable stuff down in the deep, all and all it was a pretty simple plan to go down there, kill the shit out of them then take what they needed.

[member="James Justice"]

 

[James Justice]

James was drunk. Off his sorry spacer ass. But that would come as no surprise to anyone since he generally showed up in a state of semi- to total intoxication. It was like his trademark, only much more enjoyable. The half-Zeltron walked in what was a very strait line, considering the level of alcohol he had imbibed in the hour. You had to love having two livers. Except when you didn't.

"Aye, whatever," he grumbled, leaving the barstoll he had been on.

What was he doing at the bar, you wonder? A soul who knew the Runner from his early days, and most of his existence would have assumed he was flirting with a female. However, since Anara had come into his life, James found his interest for other women just didn't satisfy. He wanted her touch, craved her touch, he everything. No one would ever do. His whole life he had a strong love for dark women, and for women with scarlet hair. Little did he know he would find the perfect package in her.

He shook thoughts of his lover from his head. She would probably feel him thinking of her. And while it was creepy, it was also very sweet. James looked at Miss Blonde, "Well we gonna go down or we just gonna be standing here until the sun goes down?"

Without waiting for an answer he stepped off the chasm and began falling in a hard dive down, down, down.

[member="Miss Blonde"]

 

[Miss Blonde]

[member="James Justice"]

Patricia sighed at James' antics then gave a small chuckle before jumping into the void as well. The darkness devoured the two and Patricia switched her visor to night vision so she would be able to see the rapidly approaching ground. The two would fall for a few more seconds before she activated her jetpack to land safely on the ground. Now it was time for the fun part of the operation, navigating your way in the dark to find a bunch of creepy sith cultists who didn't want to be found all while trying not to get eaten by whatever monsters lurked down here.

"Lets go, Black Hat has our waypoint marked. Target is two hundred meters north." The woman said with a professional voice.

Grabbing her machine guns she lifted them up as if she were master chief and started to walk towards the objective. All around her on the scanners there was movement, creatures and thralls that had been left in the lower levels. The unwanted and dangerous, so that was rather uncomfortable to say the least.

"We've been doing business for a while now right Runner?" Patricia asked the man as the crossed the fifty meter mark now with a good hundred and fifty left.

"I feel as if I can trust you with sensitive information." the woman pointed her weapons over towards the right at a dart of movement.

 

[James Justice]

The not-so-subtle secret of James Justice was he was an adrenaline junkie with few equals. The moment before he was too far gone, he rammed a button on his wrist controls and the jet boots he had on roared to life, slowing his descent just enough to keep him from crashing with a bone-shattering impact. He let out a wild laugh and stood to his full height, drawing a 9 inch vibro dagger from his boot and his DeathHammer from his holister.

He took a deep breath and closed his eyes, letting the world around him come into view with his Force Sight. It was a skill he had learned the hard way after being blinded during a torture session and having to escape blind. His vision had returned, but the skill had lasted, it had never ceased to aid him in tight spots like this. James was not about to go in and out quietly. He was not about the stealth when he was intoxicated. However, he wouldn't go charging in hog wild, even when under the influence.

He nodded at Miss Blonde's remarks, "Aye, Miss, I been doing my thing for a while now, ye can trust the likes of me," he chuckled, "I'm a crimelord, not a good-for-nothing amateur."

[member="Miss Blonde"]

 

[Miss Blonde]

[member="James Justice"]

"Well from one crime lord to another I feel as if it's best to get to know one another." Miss Blonde said as she stayed low and at the ready.

"It's clear that you are James Justice, I mean it's pretty obvious. Just out of professional courtesy I've remained using our code names." They crossed the hundred meter mark and the small home came into view.

The building had various torches in front of it with two armed cultists holding blaster rifles at the front of the door. The light of the collective torches only went out a good thirty meters and Patricia and James would be shrouded by the darkness. Moving up a good ten meters Patricia would drop one of her machine guns and crouch into a low firing position.

"It's like a lame super hero putting on glasses to fool everyone one." Patricia said as she began to screw a silencer onto the end of the barrel.

"And I'm sure you'd be able to piece together who I was if it wasn't for the facial reconstruction." The woman slapped on an RCO sight then aimed it at the guard on the right.

"I'm Patricia by the way. And yes, that Patricia" The woman said then squeezed the trigger.

The round hit the cultist dead in the chest killing them instantly. The second looked over and he quickly caught a bullet in the eye causing him to lean back against the post he was on and slide down dead as a door nail.

"Move up." she said as she dropped her sight down.

 

[James Justice]

"I ain't no hero," James grumbled at her comment.

He knew that anyone who knew anything could tell that he was James Justice. It was quite clear, and it wasn't exactly like he was trying to hide it. If he had done what he normally did when he wanted to go under the radar; grow a beard, add prosthetics, dress differently, use a different accent, then perhaps he would have been able to hide. But he did not of that.

As the bodies dropped he gave the woman a glare. That Patricia. He felt anger, but it had made sense. She was rich, strong, independent, pretty much everything that he had heard the Patricia was.

"I killed ye clones," he said as he marched to the door. He was sure she already knew that; there were the videos, the rumors, the sheer volume of thing that he had done. It was the moment he had gone from being somewhat known in the outer rim to famous. And it just kept getting better. "Butchered them."

He wasn't about the stealth, so--

James kicked the door down, the four cultists stood for a moment, shocked. James' knife rammed deeply into one by the door's skull as his DeathHammer fired, tearing a hole in a second's chest. He turned slightly, blasting the third's abdomen open. The sole survivor drew a short sword and charged at James, he easily dodged, bringing his own knife upward, into base of the cultist's skull. The body collapsed at his feet.

James looked back to Patricia, "They came for me things. They threatened freedom. I dun't think ye can blame me."

[member="Miss Blonde"]

 

[Miss Blonde]

[member="James Justice"]

"I'm aware of what you did, personally I don't care." Patricia said as she took the silencer off the weapon and then the sight, placing them back into her side gear bag.

"They were trained with with the possibility of being captured, tortured, then executed. As long as you're comfy killing people who didn't have a choice due to inhibitor chips that's between you and your God." Patricia said as she picked up her other weapon.

With James hitting the front door the woman dove through the side window crashing and rolling into the main room with James as he started killing a few of the cultists. Shouts of anger began to storm through the hallway near them and coming up from her roll the woman was crouched as she turned her body towards incoming cultists.

Lifting up both her weapons to aim down the hallway the twin machine guns riddled the hallway with bullets dropping a good four cultists who ran down them wielding various sith swords and other items that would surely do a fair amount of harm if ever used.

"Sorry about that by the way. Gen was an old friend of mine, went way back to the days before she was a politician. She went psycho, ordered the clones to take assets and as you know they didn't have a choice in the matter." The woman said as her twin barrels smoked.

"I'm still picking up life forms, and the motion sensor has more incoming from the outside. Maybe thralls. I'll grab the saber, you take crowd control." She said as she stood up and headed towards the main alter to root around for the artifact.

 

[James Justice]

"There ain't no god, and there ain't never been one," James muttered, "But dun't be sorry. That fething bith got what was coming to her."

He nodded at her order and moved to the door. The sensors were right, a host of about a dozen beings were coming at the door, wielding their melee weapons over head like a savage hoard. Their reason and will to live was overcome by their religious devotion. The spacer spat in disgust as he holstered his weapon and unslung the slug thrower from his back. The first zealot swung its crude blade at James, screaming in fervor. The 12 gauge round blew a massive hole in its stomach, the body jerked to the ground in a gory display.

"Shut up," James grumbled as he ratcheted a new round in the chamber.

Bam, bam. Twin brothers went down in a sadistic display of blood, their short and meaningless lifes were ended in what was an act of mercy. A wild-eyed woman, smudged in grime and soot brought a jagged wooden club around in a blow towards James' head. The spacer easily ducked, retaliating with a skull-crushing blow from the butt off his shotgun. Pivoting the barrel around he blasted a hole at point-blank range through her husband's neck. Their teenage son was hot on his heels, shoving past his dead father's carcass, he came in face-contact with James' boot. A single shot put him out of his agonizing existence. (FIVE(

James let out a snarl of pain as a thralling cultist managed to bring his blade in a slice along his thigh. Furious, he grabbed the attacker's mangy hair and bashed the being's head on the duracrete wall. Again. Again. Again. Blood sprayed across the wall, droplets splattered on James' leather Jacket. Diseased Fingernails gripped along his throat from behind, James felt rage overcome his last senses and he lost what little control he had left. The butt of his shotgun went back in a brutal srike to the groin. Pivoting on his heel, he blasted one shot into the man's stomach, sending his intestines splaying out in a brutal display. As the body fell he ratcheted as second shot that opened its chest cavity wide, soaking James in more gore. The Spacer's last shot went into the chest of a charging man in rags, spewing his entrails across the ground and sending the body face-first to the floor.

It wasn't about the lightsaber for him now. It was about blasting as many of these devils into the Void as he could.

[member="Miss Blonde"]

 

[Miss Blonde]

[member="James Justice"]

Everything was going positively nuts and Patricia and James were caught dead in the middle of it. While James was going savage the woman set one of her weapons to her side clip and began to root around the alter for what she was here to grab. There were multiple bowls filled with various items for what seemed like sith sorcery, other items here such as flesh and blood scattered about as the woman continued to root for the item.

"I got more incoming!" Patricia reached around her side and grabbed a thermal detonator.

Priming it she tossed it outside towards a horde of thralls running towards the small camp, if they kept this up much longer each and every creature that went bump in the night would be here the show. A few seconds past and the explosion went off sending various body parts exploding into the darkness.

Another cultist ran towards Patricia and with her weapon hand she aimed up the automatic little effort and sprayed the man with a burst of slugs. With him dead the woman looked over and saw exactly what she was looking for, a lightsaber.

But not just any lightsaber, the lightsaber of the legendary Sith Lord Darth Bane. These were his cultists they were murdering after all.

"I got it! Make us a hole!!" Patricia shouted as she tucked the saber away.

 

[James Justice]

With the shells spent, James' shotgun became a club, a makeshift club. He twisted, battering the brains of one savage as his free hand grabbed another's throat. Force Rage flowed through the spacer's veins as he hurrled the man into another, snapping his neck and the other's spine. His slughthrower's butt cracked a savage's knee, cripping it low enough for James to easily snap its neck in a brutal twist. One clambored to the top of a building, waving a makeshift blaster like it was a trophy as he prayed to the sith gods. James hurled his weapon's barrel through the devotee's throat, ending the prayer in mid sentence. Three of the other cultists sprang, their grimy hands taking hold of his leg, torso, and arm. His mouth dug into the first's throat, ripping away vital flesh and leaving the victim gasping for air with wide, terror-filled eyes. His hands gripped the other two's skulls, shattering them on each other.

"Make us a hole."

"Got it," James shouted back, spitting blood and flesh from his mouth. He whipped out his matching DeathHammer pistols and began carving a path of carnage, his reflexes heightened by the Force and years of practice in these scenarios. "Stay close, this is gonna get hot," he shouted bolting ahead.

Both of his blasters in his hands screamed death as his legs pumped across the clearing. James blinked twice, bringing his HUD contacts up. The map of where they had to go, and where they were overlayed across his field of view. Years of practice kept him from being disoriented in the miliseconds he assessed their location with. He slid to a stop in front of an industrial-grade lift to the surface. His hilt slammed against the control panel before slagging yet another cultist. How many were there in this hell hole?

[member="Miss Blonde"]

 

[Miss Blonde]

[member="James Justice"]

"I'm on your six!" The woman said as she grabbed her second machine gun from her side.

Popping in two fresh magazines the woman trailed behind James as he began to shoot everything in his path. Anything that he missed or was left alive Patricia finished off or killed with the duel automatics. The entire bottom level was going wild and Patricia could see something big coming their way, whatever it was the monster stood at least twenty meters tall and was possibly something of Yuuzhan Vong make by the way it was shaped on the scanner.

"Run faster!" the woman said as she dropped her two guns to increase her speed.

Now in a dead sprint the woman charged into the lift and watched as James quickly hit the button. Shooting up at once the lift barely missed the claws of the massive creature as it swiped at them. Patricia now breathing deeply put her head against the back of the lift and sat down. With a heavy sigh she looked over to James and gave him a thumbs up.

"You alright?" She said to James as she looked up at the dull light that was the oncoming undercity.

Reaching into her side she grasped the lightsaber of Darth Bane and chuckled a bit, it was just another day in the life of a crime lord. Well crime lords like James and Patricia anyway, they weren't really the types to send others to get the job done.

 

[James Justice]

James dove into the lift after Patricia, as they went up he holstered both of his weapons and did what any drunk would do in his shoes, give the assailants they left behind the bird--with both hands. Slumping to sit beside her, James began catching his breath, "Aye, I be alright."

He wiped sweat off his brow, trying to decide what to do from here. Not just with the saber, but in the long run. What to do with Patricia. She was the person who was partially responsible for Kay's unemployed state. She had helped make the army that had ravaged the republic and helped speed up its demise. But--she was also the one who by that standard had helped make James the man he was today. He was unsure whether he should blame her or thank her. Perhaps both?

He decided to forget it and set it aside. As far as he was concerned she was as good as family now. If she hadn't told him that, he still would have been willing to work with her, to be an ally and a friend. He could easily put her past behind him, like she had and like he had tried to do with his own.

The lift opened at last, not on the upper levels but on one that was more criminal and less savage than the one they had been on. He stood and offered his hand to help her up, "C'mon, I'll buy ye a drink."

[member="Miss Blonde"]

 

[Miss Blonde]

[member="James Justice"]

"That sounds nice right now." The woman said as she stood up.

Her body ached and Patricia sighed as she placed the saber in her secured bag. With that in her pocket the woman looked over to James and smiled beneath her helmet, he was a decent guy under all the leather and anger problems. But it wouldn't subtract the fact that he was still dangerous, she cared for him deeply like almost like a brother at this point.

But if it came down to it, if he went too far off the edge, she'd have to put a slug into him. As much as she would regret it sometimes that was a necessity. Sometimes good friends always had to plot how to kill or disrupt each other.

"Let's go get that drink." Patricia said as the gate opened to the bar they recently had entered.

Patricia walked out from the turbo lift and quickly walked into the bar to get herself a drink, the two of them really really needed it.