Public Raid on Kattada

[Darth Anathemous]

Location: Temple Grounds
Wearing: Armor
Allies: Raiders
Enemies: Valery Noble

How many Jedi had she known to offer surrender and a death blow in the same breath?

"Did Serina Calis surrender?!" she demanded "Did she even get the chance—"


The air changed, and the world slowed to a crawl.

A seer stone allowed her to keep track of Valery's movement, enough to trigger her powers in time to react. So the sword is aggressive, Anathemous thought, fitting, she fights like many Sith I've fought. The Dark Lord would pivot then, rotating to narrowly dodge the blow. Valery was quick, but Anathemous could match her, fighting in real time while the world around them was lost in time.

As the Sword's weapon came crashing down, Anathemous reached out with her good arm, fingers curling towards the tendon in Valery's wrist to stop the blow mid swing, trusting her remaining Exo-muscle to wrest control of that arm. At the same time, she spun in a half-arc, sending her metal-boned fist in a heavy backhand aimed at the back of her head, humming with the beginnings of a shockwave from the telekinetic master's knuckles.

If Valery was a Sword, then Anathemous would learn to wield her.

All the while, her lightsabers had dropped from her hands, spinning with her in a half-arc to Valery's flank.

​

 

[Mercy]

"You can't convince me this is all nobility. That's absurd."

Mercy didn't pursue him as he created space.

"When did you ever see me try to convince anyone of anything, Til?" She shrugged but kept her eyes on him. Tilon wasn't a joke, he had a way of turning a situation to his advantage when you least expected it. Mercy was a lot of things, but she didn't forge her reputation out of underestimating her opponents.

"I am just saying what I am here for. If you want to try and stop me? Go ahead. But I am not alone here..." Which was an interesting experience. Not being alone, being part of a collective of people trying to accomplish goals.

Made things much easier.

"While we are here, what do you think all those other Sith are doing? No matter if you manage to beat me... those kids will be gone. What's the point, Til?"

Then she took a step forward, just one, testing the pressure.

"If you stopped trying to be a Jedi for a moment, you'd see the obvious way of making sure those kids are safe."

Tilon Quill

 

[Tilon Quill]

"Oh, I'd see about five ways, starting with the nasty ones. And that's assuming your crew even takes any kids." The chaos of the broader battle was more than background noise, it was the wind of fast-moving vehicles, distant concussions, odd bits of shrapnel thunking into the beach. " Mercy , there's half a dozen languages on the airwaves. Kattada's networked to the hilt. Everyone showed up."

This is good. Keep her talking. Longer she talks, the longer the others have to stop the raid, and maybe she just leaves. Longer she talks, longer you've got alive.

But take it seriously on its merits. She'll know for sure if you don't. It'll be obvious.

"Let's say you do take some. Let's say. Yes, I know what you're talking about, I admit it's a possibility. That I should come along. Babysit. Ensure your friends don't dump them straight into the Sith Empire's many, many meat grinders, for as long as I last. Am I reading that right?"

 

[Mercy]

Tilon Quill

Point in fact.

Mercy realized that more likely than not Tilon was just trying to buy time. That was fine. Maybe in this duration one of the other Jedi would finish one of the Sith off and come to his aid. Then at least Mercy wouldn't have any qualms about actually making it a fight the way she had during the Kaggath, no excuses left.

"You got anything better to do? You might learn a thing or two yourself, then you can say fuck off to all of this and go explore the stars. You can't tell me the expedition wasn't much more appealing to you than this cyclical thing."

There had been a reason Tilon had gone all the way out of this galaxy, rather than fight the good fight here.

 

[Tilon Quill]

You can't tell me the expedition wasn't much more appealing to you than this cyclical thing."

"Back at you," Tilon snarled. "You came to Rishi for the same reason you're talking instead of painting the beach with my guts. Sure, I'll defend a nice place against raiders, I'll defend kids from kidnappers, but the 'cyclical thing' — these two human institutions making the universe revolve around them — is boring. And the people who make it their whole identity are boring. And you already know—" He jabbed his finger at her. "—how little you have in common with any of them.

"That's why I trusted you enough to do that expedition with you. Not because I 'saw the good in you,' but because you've got a mind and a sense of self beyond the shavvit that drives the cyclical thing. Stop fucking cycling it so I can get off."

Mercy

 

[Mercy]

Tilon Quill

The force by which Tilon responded told Mercy that she got to him, at least somewhat.

But then in turn Tilon got to her too. He'd know by the way she squinted at him, taking another step towards him, nostrils flaring slightly. The one sure way to get to her was to accuse her of being boring. Of being part of the same old cycle that was made by old disgusting men and their ambitions, but part of Mercy wondered if Tilon didn't have at least a measure of a point.

"Yeah, you know my mind. So you know I am not here to keep the cycle going." Mercy said slowly. "I am here to carve a chunk out of the machinery for my own ends."

Fist squeezed tight.

"So these kids can become what I have become. Strong, independent, with a mind of their own. They will not be thrown into a grinder to fight for old men and their ambitions. I will show them what ambition is and how they can chase it themselves. Whatever direction that is."

But without the years of suffering she had to go through to get there. They wouldn't have to bend the knee to parents that tried to bend them into a shape most appealing to them. Not suffer under disgusting Sith Masters who used them as tools for no other reason than to increase their own power and strength.

She'd shape them into weapons, killers, conquerors, but not for herself. She didn't need an army when she was one by herself. She'd do it because it would be fun to watch. To teach them and then watch what they did in the Galaxy with their own strength.

Mercy had no points in the art of the mind. If Tilon had even a smidgen of talent, he'd see she wasn't trying to misdirect him.

She believed in those words utterly.

 

[Tilon Quill]

That made entirely too much sense. And yet somehow, past the anger and despair and betrayal and all the other feelings of the moment, a path became clear.

It was a bad path. An evil one, even. But whatever else he was — spacer, prospector, and now apparently traitor — Tilon Quill did follow Jedi teachings. The ones that mattered.

Above all else, a Jedi preserved life. In service of that principle, Tilon crossed the line.

"This isn't that," he said. "This is Kattada. Explorer Corps, not child soldier assembly lines like some temples. This temple teaches self-determination and values it. These Jedi don't have arcane hierarchy, they have jobs. I can't fault where you're coming from, but this isn't the place. You'd be taking whatever kids are here from the kinds of lives that both of us would value.

"But I've been elsewhere. Secret enclaves where the Jedi and their followers are killers first and foremost.

"If you take your people and go — if they leave whatever kids they've taken — I'll give you those coordinates."

 

[Mercy]

Tilon Quill

The other hint that Mercy hadn't been playing him was her surprise when Tilon made that offer.

She watched him, carefully. She knew her limitations. Knew that she couldn't peer into his mind and suss out truth from lies. Mercy would have to rely on just his word.

"Maybe." Mercy said after a while. It was true, this place didn't feel like a child killer factory. His presence here only confirmed that, Tilon wouldn't have stood for that.

"The kids can stay. But whatever loot we got, we keep."

A light shrug there, showing that she personally didn't care about whatever they had taken here, but Mercy knew better than to stand between hungry people and whatever loot they had already claimed in their minds.

"And you don't just share the coordinates. You come with me. You show it to me personally... And you help me liberate them."

It was one thing to betray someone with your words. But it was another thing to participate in it directly.

But it was the only thing Mercy could think of as somewhat of a guarantee.

That this wasn't an elaborate trick. That they wouldn't arrive at the coordinates and only encounter either beach or some toxic planet.

 

[Tilon Quill]

The raised stakes there rocked him on his heels. He bit back a total rejection. If the raiders had kids already, and frankly they'd hit fast enough and in such numbers that he had trouble imagining some unwary Padawan hadn't been tranquilized by now...

"First condition's none of my business," he said. "Life comes first. Second one's a mess, and damn you for that, but let me make you a counteroffer that covers, aurek, knowing you can trust me on this, and besh, how much you'd enjoy pitting Jedi against Jedi in the process."

He shut down his lightsaber. He still kept his distance. Mercy remained Mercy.

"Of the three I had in mind, only one's guaranteed to have children. What if I told you I'd already attacked that one within the last year, killed someone, got away with all of it clean, and have it on tape? You release every kid taken here if there are any, give them to me personally, and I give you the coordinates to that one and the tape to boot."

Zero lie, somehow. Mountains of context, avalanches of context, but zero lie. The only thing he'd lost sleep over was leaving kids to grow up there.

 

[Lirka Ka]

Fancy magic tricks, that was the way most of this Galaxy brawled. Lirka couldn’t blame them, it was the crafty ones that survived. Certainly, the Once-Sephi was not beyond her own underhanded maneuvers. Winners didn’t fight fair, after all.

So perhaps what was behind those emotionless slit-lenses was a bemused, callous, sort of pride directed at Alana Calloway - she had excepted the Echani to be a gutter fighter, indeed the Pit aboard the Shackles had seen decent enough example of such a thing. But here, in the fires of a world beset by marauders. There was no grand lesson, just a monster, thirsty to inflict pain upon a being she deemed lesser.

She laughed, that horrible mechanical thing. Humorless, and obnoxiously loud.

“Yes, I suppose enlightenment would seem rather stuck to the dullard’s mind. This isn’t the Pit anymore, Warrior Calloway. First blood doesn’t matter, just the last beast standing.”

The girl didn’t press the brief advantage. Good. It gave the metal brute a few more writhing moments, metal plates shifting as if they were alive. Her mechanisms stabilizing once more after the explosion, she had gotten rather used to the scorn earned by her beliefs. Few truly grasped the cold justness of the Dark Path, and she could not blame the blind. It took a great deal to understand the boons unadulterated sadism could gift to the Galaxy. She spoke with the dull candor of a preacher, as she so often did.

“I am the mother’s guiding hand. She who beckons forth the Dark Path for the worthy, who scuttle in obscurity. So bares witness to the meek and the pitiful, and brings upon them the suffering needed for the transient form. So I shall bite, and I shall struggle. For in my perseverance, I grow mighty. Perhaps there is still time for one more lesson, Warrior.”

She did not bite onto the woman’s taunting, but she graciously accepted the continued bout of violence. Bursting to life once more, Lirka’s machete swung wide - a probing blow, she wanted their weapons to crash. So that all of her mechanical might could rattle through Alana’s blade. Of course, it was but a ruse. Lirka wished to play dirty today as well, for the second she could see a opening suitable: her metal fist would launch out, aiming to blast into the other woman’s chest - hopefully see if she could beat her record for ribs broken in a single blow.

 

[Mercy]

Tilon Quill

"Come now, Til, video ain't gonna cut it. It's true, I can probably trust you. But that isn't the point of the exercise, is it?" Mercy said, her tone one that had a shimmer of sympathy. "It's rather easy to load a weapon and then watch someone else fire it. Remarkably more difficult to actually be the one with their finger around the trigger."

She gestured back to the temple.

"You can get what you want. These kids safe, we will leave before too many people die, just some property damage and stolen goods. But I want a bigger sacrifice from you than some high-minded ideals. If you want to make a deal with me, I want you to offer up your own flesh. I want you to have a taste of it."

The sword was already beginning to withdraw. Slowly though, more an indication of her willingness to be serious about this deal.

"It's a good deal, better than anyone on my side would offer this place, we both know that."

 

[Tilon Quill]

"Shavvit. We do."

A species of panic welled up and he fought it down. This was workable. It had to be, because there was only one way forward he could live with.

"Let's take this out of the hypothetical. Get on the comm, round them up, bring me every captive south of Knight level right here on this beach, let me hand them off to a situation that can keep them safe, and you have that deal."

He gestured down the beach to a place where surface and underwater craft were docked, mostly training vehicles.

"I'd send them off somewhere safe in a submarine. No chaperone complications, just a vehicle any teenage Padawan here would know how to pilot. And make it quick. Neither one of us want to stretch this out long enough that someone like Starchaser or Vodet gets involved."

Mercy

 

[Mercy]

Tilon Quill

Mercy watched him for a moment longer, not responding immediately, instead letting the moment stretch.

Then.

Her finger tapped against her commlink once and the connection woke up between herself and Arris Windrun . Her attention stayed on Tilon, on the off chance he tried any funny business.

"Hey, it's me. Change of plans. Disengage and order all the Padawans that were captured so far to be moved to the beach." A beat and then Mercy continued. "I made a deal with Tilon, but... have the ships above target the beach, if you sense any funny business, vaporize everything." If Arris had any response she'd listen and reply, but otherwise she'd terminate the connection again.

"Trust but have a big ol' hammer ready to respond, eh?" Then Mercy waited, pulling the sword fully back into the depth of corrupt eldritch flesh.

"I admit, it's a nice place you all got here. Ocean, beach, sunny usually I imagine. I might have liked a learning place like this when I was their age."

If it felt weird to make casual conversation with your (former?) friend while waiting for the deal to be sealed, Mercy didn't show it.

 

[Tilon Quill]

"They like it," Tilon said, thinking of the local kids and the translation classes he'd taught. "And if they don't, they'll have options."

The conversation was a useful refuge from the tension — the worry that some Jedi intervenor would arrive at the exact worst time. He watched the skies and their surroundings warily for the people on his own team. Intervention could get children killed.

And anything he did to notify them and keep them away could precipitate that outcome. He had a simple comlink and that was about it. Lightsaber signaling, maybe? Now there was an idea, such a good one someone had to have thought of it before: standardized lightsaber signals. Help, hello, stay away, everything in between. If he made it out of this alive and a Jedi, he'd have to invest some time in that.

Mercy

 

[Mercy]

"They like it," Tilon said, thinking of the local kids and the translation classes he'd taught. "And if they don't, they'll have options."

"Options are good." Mercy said quietly as she glanced past him to the sea ahead. Maybe if Mercy had been given options, her path wouldn't have led her straight here. Did that make the kids lucky or not? Mercy wasn't sure. In some ways her struggle had forged her into the creature she was today, strong, able to affect the world by her own choice.

How many people could claim that?

"I assume you want me to keep the details of our deal quiet. I can't see the grand noble master Valery or the old Starchaser looking at you the same if they knew."

Tilon Quill

 

[Arris Windrun]

Fire-hot biogel splashback was not something you wanted to experience. The globs splattered against the invisible force barrier and recoiled at high speeds back at the actor in question. Arris managed to force her way through the barrier by sheer will - the Dark Side had powered her, of course, but she didn't know that.

The cyborg holstered her empty pistol, as chemical fire burned through synthflesh and slowly melted the surface of her subdermals. Her implants had to release an emergency coolant just to prevent catastrophic overheating.

This is getting out of hand...

She groaned.

That was when a call came through the other end - received via her internal implant, where she could respond subvocally.

"Hey, it's me. Change of plans. Disengage and order all the Padawans that were captured so far to be moved to the beach." A beat and then Mercy continued. "I made a deal with Tilon, but... have the ships above target the beach, if you sense any funny business, vaporize everything." If Arris had any response she'd listen and reply, but otherwise she'd terminate the connection again.

Her brow furrowed. "What?! I--Yeah, okay." She shook her head when the connection closed.

She linked in with the others. "This is Windrun - we're done here. Bring the paddies to the beach and then get the fuck off this rock. They'll have their own pickup. Take the loot if you have it. Wrap up your fights if you must. You're on your own if you get left behind." She ended there.

Mercy Darth Anathemous Vestra Tane Quinn Varanin Lirka Ka Drystan Creed Darth Hydra Darth Virelia Hasuras Na-Gerra

On another line, she made sure the small ragtag pirate fleet of theirs knew the drill. Cover the beach until Mercy barks.

All the while she spoke, Arris had summoned a burst of speed within the Force and used it to leap her way up the rubble. She stood high and looked down at Jared Starchaser with a cold glare.

"You still want a fight, beach boy?"

Said as the flaming gel clung to her body.

 

[Tilon Quill]

He huffed and kept a watch on their chaotic surroundings, wary of interference. "I have work friends who will kill me or put me on trial if this gets out, yes. Valiant warriors and so forth. Or my fuel depot options dry up, or when I send a distress call nobody shows. Full disclosure: I plan on wearing an opaque space suit when I take you where I'm taking you. I assume that's not a deal-breaker."

That was about as far as he was willing to think about the consequences.

"A lot of firepower here today, people who can warp reality a hundred times better than me. But I'm the one who found out your goal and I'm the one who found an answer. I can live with that. Probably even live with what comes next. Sorry if that's a disappointment."

Mercy

 

[Drystan Creed]

KATTADA

The Jedi duo proved a sporting challenge, Drystan's smile flattening into focus as he spun his sheathed blade like a staff. His discerning eye tracked Wuxia Wukong 's attack patterns, dissecting them as the duel wore on. Strikes slipped past his guard, landing grazes that hurt more than he let on, the force behind them dulled only by his armor and his talent for reducing impact—either by shifting so they struck less vital spots, or by guiding them along his sheathed blade to bleed away their power.

To the untrained eye, it might have looked as though he were little more than a punching bag. One might mistake him for a man unable—or unwilling—to retaliate. In truth, he was waiting. Biding his time. He only needed the right moment. Stepping back from one strike, he reached for the hilt of his blade, ready to retaliate.

It was a textbook quickdraw, its perfection obscured by its blinding speed. Crimson flashed dangerously as his wicked blade cleared the scabbard. It was meant to carve into Jedi armor—but the sense of new danger made him adjust.

Mid-strike, he shifted his trajectory, spinning to bring his blade up against the rounds flying toward him. There was no delay in his adjustment, seeming as if he had anticipated defending against the oncoming fire all along. In reality, the fluidity of his movements and the precision in which he executed them allowed for this illusion.

The rounds were large-caliber, their impact rattling his arm, the recoil injecting into his torso, like two train cars colliding against a single point. Sparks flew on contact with his blade, the payload biting with an electrical edge meant to incapacitate rather than kill. If not for the alchemized and engineered strength of his weapon, it might have shattered from his grip entirely.

A new adversary.

He bit back the urge to lick his lips. This was getting good. He couldn't yet draw a bead on who had fired, but someone had just stepped onto the stage—and they had his full attention now.

He heard chatter on his comm device, shooting a quick reply.

"Creed here. Leave me. Things have only started getting interesting and I'm not about to pass up on this fun. I'll find my way back."

Saram Kote Wuxia Wukong Feng Huang Arris Windrun

 

[Mercy]

Tilon Quill Arris Windrun

"It's not and believe it or not, but I am glad you can live with it." Mercy said calmly as she got a confirmation in her ear that her orders were being executed faithfully. Some of the raiders decided to stay. Interesting choice, but Mercy couldn't fault them. Once upon a time she would have relished the challenge and stayed behind herself.

"I don't want you hating yourself, Til. I just want us working together again, common goal, different roads and all that." The first of the padawans were coming down the dune now. A few of the raiders were among them, escorting them. It would dawn on Tilon just how lucky he had been that it was Mercy here with whom he could make a deal.

There were sixteen kids in total. Tough to say if there were more, but Til had to trust Mercy that she wasn't trying to pull a fast one on him... and by joining her he'd be able to verify that too.

"Damn, we got that many?" Mercy asked one of the raiders, who shrugged and paused halfway through, allowing the kids to approach them. "See, Til? I am a creature of my word. Sixteen kids." She lightly ruffled the hair of one of them as they stopped near her. Looking uncertainly towards Tilon and then back at the red-haired giant.

"So, we will do this carefully. You point out the submarine they are supposed to go to and they will go one by one. I don't want to see any chaos or shoving, children."

Voice stern, like she was a teacher, rather than a raider.

"While they are going, Til, send me that video you mentioned, will you? I am curious to see what you look like when you are doing things you didn't think you were capable of." She kept her language vague on purpose. Some of them were old enough they would retain information, or understand it even. Mercy didn't want to get Tilon into trouble.

Not now, anyway.

 

[Tilon Quill]

Sixteen damn Padawans, some who knew him from class. He should've felt relief, maybe, at proof that he was selling his soul for something worthwhile. He felt mostly the dread specific to having just barely dodged a bullet, just barely avoided something unthinkable. With them present, he didn't have the mental space to fight and maneuver verbally anymore. The process took all his focus, that and sending Mercy the footage recovered from the Ashlan power armor far away. But mostly the process. Dribs and drabs and quiet words of direction and encouragement to quell the more resistant ones, making it clear that this was an exchange and they needed to do exactly as told or it'd jeopardize everyone. It wouldn't have worked if he wasn't a known quantity here, a familiar face from classes and the odd mission and the maintenance bays.

In relatively short order, Mercy had the footage and all sixteen were aboard a training sub and away safe. That, too, didn't feel like relief. Death was looming.

"I'll take that ride now," Tilon said. "Let's get this over with."