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One good catastrophe deserved another. Seemed to be what was on the menu, anyway. Astra stood to her feet and stepped forward to place a hand on the short wall as her burned eyes looked out over the city.
In one fluid, sharp motion she pivoted to depart with her jacket cracking the air behind her. The commlink drawn again, she shifted the frequency. "Shadow to Legion. Echo Charlie Tango Twenty." No time to evacuate all the potential servants -- certainly not while they trembled in fear in the dark places hoping the Mandalorians would pass them by. But she could get the key resources out of harm's way. And they'd had the nerve to question why an evacuation plan had been included in their discussions. To think it would be needed so soon.
Her boots thunked down ever step she'd ascended not long ago. The blade's hilt was hastened to her leg once more out of sight.
"Shadow to Scholar, multiple Storm fronts moving in. I'm moving to you. Any opposition in your area?" Naturally Astra had her own business to conduct in coordination with Lysander, but that didn't mean she wasn't aware of certain other pursuits in progress on the planet. Under the circumstances, meeting with Corporate Executives was out of the question. Even they weren't dense enough or greedy enough to ignore what was happening. Survving came first. Which meant she might as well lend a hand with the Other Thing Anet Raine
was overseeing.
The challenge had been laid bare as the Mandalorian's helmet was removed and hit the ground. Clearly, another predator who craved the hunt as much as the skill. Kasir's met that gaze in a ways the choking atmosphere around them and the Force storm above could not touch. Perhaps that was why he stood there in silence, savoring the moment. Whether there was meaning to wrest from this chaos, they would soon find out.
He saw the gauntlet snap forward like a hammer through the air, and so his saberstaf bit into the armor. The grinding shudder traveled in tight ripples. Sparks bloomed in fine arks; the space between them filled with scorched alloy. Strange it was to stand so close and observe how Beskar drank heat and spit back defiance.
But there was no frustration. Only fascination. A new pulse of hunger. A barrier so absolute was a rarity. Though the phobic device washed over all precognitive senses, he welcomed it all the same. This was honesty in its purest and rawest form. A fight stripped down to willpower.
A mirror reflecting the core of a warrior’s truth.
Then the jab came with a mountain of torque behind it. The shockwave was sudden, ribs flexing under that impact. A hard breath ripped from the Sangnir's lungs, followed by an involuntary grunt. Half animal, half dark machine, his boot scraped the ground several inches. But the pain was a dark nectar to fuel the emptiness inside.
Kasir’s knee coiled, hips pivoting; it was a full body strike. The tightening fired through his core. The movement erupted upward, a sharp spike driving his knee toward the Mandalorian’s abdomen region. When bone met Beskar, the jolt traveled back up his own femur. And the same moment of collision, Kasir twisted that momentum, wrenching the crimson blade free. Without pause he pivoted off the back foot, rotating to spin the saberstaff. The Mandalorian’s flank was the target but death was not the intent. Not yet. Just a disruption that would throw him off balance. From there, he would move for the follow-up.
It was quite a bold choice—but one that was frankly welcomed by the Crusaders of which accompanied him. As if energized by the thought of more lively opponents. “Reform the lines! Foes beckon at our flank, and I shall see them obliged!” He curtly ordered through helmet-comms. It was a decisive movement from his unseen foe. As good as one could make in such a chaotic environment- but he had faith in his warriors. “Forward squads, I need more of those anti-air guns down!”
In the corner of his eye, he had already noticed the figure that had flung a wreckage at the formation was subdued by The Arkanian
. That was strange... the woman had surely attacked first, yet was dispatched so quickly? Had he been at such an impass himself, it would've surely been a potential for a prisoner if one could even be managed amidst this chaos. Unfortunately, he could not give any verdict regarding the matter—he had bigger fish to fry upon the battlefield. They were in a makeshift warzone, after all…and a leader’s place was with their troops, at the head of the charge. Or, in this case, repelling the enemy’s charge. He had fought as he always did—and the rigid, frenzied movements were often outpaced and outmaneuvered by his own flow between one fatal strike to the next. Frenzied troopers’ strikes and bolts were subverted by swift weaves, pings! of blaster reflecting off of armor, and the redirection of blows turned into deadly ripostes.
What was originally a skirmish line had evolved into a battlefield of its own right. Some Mandalorians took flight, bombarding frenzied troops from above and every-which-angle. Others stayed on the ground and met them head-on, opting for blaster and melee, of all things, and finding equal footing to be their foe. More than a few made usage of anti-tank rockets, though would have difficulty penetrating the hefty armor of the Juggernauts. Carduul, with shortened bursts of movement, was something of both. What was a slow, unerring march forward by those under his command had most certainly been thrown off by this action...but the fight was far from over. Yet as he moved through, it could not be helped but to notice one particular figure, reeling back an arm to quickly put another weapon into a Mandalorian’s heart, barking aloud for the commanding figure. A softened scoff escaped his lips, brows furrowing as there was no choice but to acquiesce.
He had interposed right as Meliant
was poised to take another of his warriors' life. The shriek of a jetpack made itself audible, as there was a blur of motion towards his newfound foe to cleave the poleaxe downwards, aiming from the side to hew into a shoulder as the figure was mid-stride through the violence. “You shall be sorely disappointed in your sport, cur.” A venomous hiss of breath to elicit, as soon as his blade made contact. Though, Meliant was given little time before his weapon’s stance swiftly twisted from downward cleave into a vicious ranged thrust towards the abdomen in but a shift of posture.
“What manner of leech am I fighting today, hmh?” Whoever they were, they were fighting on the side of the Sith—and that was good enough as any reason to cleave their head from their shoulders. “I imagine this was once a proud city. It will be that way again, in time- and it shall be all the better the more of your filth I cleanse from its surface, today.” Words were, in many ways, goading. After all, his goal was to garner attention. Suffice to say, it seemed he had procured it—and a good thing, too. Who knew what the slaughter that could’ve happened if this armored detachment had gone rampaging to find lost recon teams? Better that the eager, able-bodied soldiers deal with this than injured scouts.
So with every strike, every breath, he would fight to buy those precious few seconds- and to burn away this rot with every felling blow of his blade.
Seva Beroya's voice came through the comm in a burst of static and clipped authority. She ordered him to leave the Spirit Breaker's descent to the fleet and aid the vode already deployed aboard it however he could. Then the channel closed with a firm declaration.
Yolaghun’s jaws parted as he prepared to answer. The acknowledgment was already forming somewhere behind his teeth before he caught himself. Beroya had not asked him a question. She had not left the channel open for a reply. She expected her order to be followed, and every moment spent confirming that he understood it was another moment wasted.
Action would be confirmation enough.
His talons released their grip upon the Spirit Breaker’s scarred hull. The falling Star Destroyer continued to drag itself toward Humbarine beneath him, vast enough that even Yolaghun felt small beside it. For a moment he drifted away from its armored skin, wings spreading instinctively against a void that offered no wind to catch them. Then the repulsorlifts built into his armored form answered his intent and carried him clear.
Other vessels were already moving into position. The Copad broke away from Beroya's formation and angled toward the wounded destroyer while ships from the Hammer-Hand's fleet pushed forward through the surrounding battle. Pale distortions rippled across the Spirit Breaker as stasis webifiers came online and began to take hold. The massive vessel still fell, but more slowly now, its descent fought by machines built for a task no single creature could accomplish through strength alone.
Yolaghun turned away from it. Beroya had given him another duty.
The Basilisks were already tearing into the Imperial fighter screen. Their turrets flashed in rapid bursts as the war droids twisted between streaks of laser fire, attacking from different angles and forcing the TIEs to scatter or be caught between them. One Basilisk rolled sharply beneath an incoming fighter and raked its flank with cannon fire. Another lunged after a damaged interceptor with its claws spread wide, more beast than machine in the violence of its pursuit.
Yolaghun folded his wings close against his armored body and surged toward them.
A TIE broke away from one of the Basilisks, banking hard to escape a stream of turret fire. Its evasive turn carried it directly across the young dragon’s path. Yolaghun struck it from above. His talons punched through the fighter’s hull with a shriek of tortured metal that he could feel through his armor even if the void refused to carry the sound. Momentum carried them both tumbling through the debris around the Spirit Breaker until Yolaghun twisted his body and hurled the ruined craft away.
Another fighter moved to settle behind the Basilisk that had driven the first into his reach.
White-blue plasma erupted from Yolaghun’s jaws. The breath weapon carved a brilliant line across the darkness and swallowed the approaching TIE before it could fire. The remaining fighters broke apart around the blast, scattering into the wider melee as Basilisk turrets followed them with fresh volleys.
Yolaghun accelerated after them. His answer to Beroya would not be carried across an already crowded comm channel. It would be written in plasma and torn metal, in every enemy fighter forced away from the boarding route, and in every additional moment he bought for the vode still fighting inside the destroyer.
Then something changed beneath the Spirit Breaker’s armored skin. The warning did not come from his armor. Not at first.
The void carried no scent, but Yolaghun’s mind gave the sensation one anyway. Hot metal after a lightning strike. Charred spice. A sharp, almost sweet edge beneath it, like something left too long over an open flame. The impression pressed against senses older and stranger than the instruments built into his armor, subtle at first but growing stronger with every passing moment.
His display flashed a heartbeat later. Reactor temperatures were rising rapidly. Radiation bled outward from somewhere deep inside the destroyer in steadily increasing levels.
Yolaghun turned his head toward the falling ship. For one brief moment, the surrounding battle seemed to narrow around that strange sensation. Something instinctive stirred within him and reached toward the heat before conscious thought caught up with it. The feeling was akin to recognition: an unspoken understanding of the unstable power gathering beneath the destroyer’s hull and the certainty that it was becoming far more dangerous than the ship’s descent alone.
He pushed the instinct aside. For now.
His vode were still aboard the Spirit Breaker. The incoming fighters were still trying to reach them. The fleet could slow the falling destroyer, but every moment the boarding teams remained inside was another moment spent beneath the growing pressure of its failing reactor.
Another cluster of hostile signatures cut through the debris field ahead of him.
Yolaghun bared his teeth and hurled himself back into the fight beside the Basilisks, white-blue plasma gathering once more behind his jaws. Behind him, the wounded Star Destroyer continued its descent toward Humbarine while the strange scent of scorched metal and burning spice lingered at the edge of his senses.
The Spirit Breaker was no longer merely falling.
Objective: 1 - Slaughter the Mandalorians
Armour: Marwolaeth Ddu
Armour Configuration: War
Equipment: Lethal Pursuers, Vibrosword
Tag: Brent Warnel
Her prey was fleeing. Cute. But she was not going to drop her pursuit. The woman had accepted the opportunity to hunt for this precious beskar and figure out who these Mandalorians were and what they thought they could achieve with pointless and failing wars against the Sith. History did not seem a top class for these fools. Clenching her fist, Eira charged the whistling birds for a second round, it was the last round of them but Eira liked to prepare two lots. Sometimes the first round was not enough.
Hearing the engines of ships attempting to escape from the Sith's wrath, Eira grinned. Lifting her hand up, Eira moved her hand in slow rotation to the dark clouds above them. Her hatred, her fury and the power of the Dark Side burned deep within Eira as it focused her mind and focused on controlling the weather. Claiming ownership on nature itself as she darkened the skies further until they turned into thunderclouds under Eira's cruel influence. "None escape the punishment of the Sith." Eira declared as sharp, powerful deep purple lightning bolts shot from the clouds towards the fleeing ships. The Sith was making sure to demonstrate the power she was achieving thanks to her Master and how cruelly she wielded such power.
It was the first time she was successful with such a powerful display of the power but Eira was feeling her most powerful in the moment so it made sense.
Entering the building, Eira's senses tingled with danger and she activated the buckler shield once again to absorb the shots being fired at her. The explosion from the grenade hit Eira from behind. She was fortunate that her armour absorbed the kinetic blast well. Causing her to only stumble a little but otherwise seemingly unfazed but the explosion. The armour was designed to make her seem demonic and that was always how she was going to portray herself in the armour.
Pulling out her daggers, "what fun tricks Mandalorian... Let's see how you handle mine." The two daggers scratched against each other and the room exploded into unnatural darkness. Intending to blind her target temporarily. Then after quickly pouring some Force energy into her legs, Eira dashed with dangerously fast burst of speed. Aiming to approach the Mandalorian from behind and leaping in the air, the assassin aimed to stab both daggers downwards into his collarbone.
Meliant had some Mandalorian junior by the skull, his hands glowing red as he consumed the life from him. It wasn't exactly a full meal, but it was always good to top off the tank periodically during the battle. The young man was withering away rapidly, aging decades in mere moments, eyes sinking, turning brittle and grey.
Something brushed against Meliant's mind. He let the poor fellow drop, gaze turning slowly until it settled on Koda Fett as he beat an artful path through the carnage. Meliant tilted his head. Who was that supposed to be?
<Beware. . . another soul gives chase. . .> She sought to tell Meliant . The warning whispered among the currents of the Force akin to a lost petal upon the wind, weakened by spilled blood, misery, and the ceaseless acheing within her skull.
WHO IS THIS WHO ARE YOU DON'T BOTHER ME WHILE I'M KILLING PEOPLE YOU'RE DISTRACTING ME DON'T DISTRACT ME THANKS!!!
The response could not have been more at odds with her outreach and was loud enough - telepathically speaking - to produce a brief cluster headache behind the right eye-socket.
But then the bond was severed, and that was that.
Meliant shook his head as if regaining his senses. Great, whoever that was threw off his groove. The meal had grown cold, and even a decade in the microwave wouldn't heat it back up. He ripped his sword out of its sheathe and was poised to simply execute the commando, when out of the hazy sky fell...
Meliant brought up the blade and was forced to brace it with his other hand to absorb the blow. A harrowing clang! rang out as beskar bit into cold, Sith steel. The Sword of the Heron King glinted in the open air, though there was hardly any light to catch it.
He maneuvered the blade to intercept Carduul's follow-up thrust, but the strength of the blow nevertheless sent Meliant reeling. He took the momentum rather than resisting it, performing a snappy little backflip that put a few strides worth of distance between the two.
Meliant rose slowly to his full height. And he laughed - the cackling hyena-sound carried further than it should have over the battlefield, and it chilled the blood to hear.
"Let's see... Complete sentences, big stick..." Meliant's hand shot out to one side, fingers bent like a claw, "...You must be the leader!"
An unseen snare closed around Koda Fett's jetpack. Bad luck. Probably for Meliant too. The Sith Lord wrenched himself, turning his torso as if to put his full weight into a throw. With that motion, the whole bounty hunter might be ripped from his feet and flung like a little beskar missile straight into Carduul.
The transmission ended. Seris blinked once. Then snorted. Fifteen minutes. Someone else's problem. The data store room could already be burning for all she cared. Whatever intelligence hid inside wasn't nearly as interesting as the people she could be killing.
The Sith warrior rolled her shoulders and continued pacing the corridor. If the ship exploded around her, it exploded around her. At least it would be exciting. The chuckle came first. Low. Amused. Dangerously delighted.
Red light bathed the corridor as Seris watched the Mandalorians pour through the breached compartment. Blaster bolts filled the air around them, dozens of shots converging on her position. Her crimson blades became a blur of motion, batting aside lethal fire in showers of sparks as she advanced several confident steps. Then she actually counted them. The grin on her face widened.
"Oh." She came to a sudden halt. "There are three of you." The observation carried none of the caution it probably should have. Only excitement.
The first warrior reached her from the left. The second from the right. Two beskads converged simultaneously. At last. Seris laughed. One crimson blade snapped outward to intercept the first strike. The second saber flashed down and across, catching the low attack from the opposite direction. Sparks exploded around her as beskar met lightsaber. For a brief moment she stood between them, one blade dedicated to each sword-brother, holding both attacks at bay.
Her yellow eyes gleamed between them. Then something enormous hit her.
"Hah!" The sound escaped as surprise rather than pain. Hammer-Hand's shoulder crashed into her center mass like a charging rancor. The world spun.
Both sabers extinguished instantly as Seris was hurled backward across the deck. Her body struck durasteel and rolled with the momentum instead of fighting it. One shoulder hit. Then a hip. Then she tucked and converted the throw into an athletic recovery that carried her back onto her feet.
The crimson blades reignited immediately.
SNAP-HISS.
SNAP-HISS.
The twin weapons illuminated the corridor once more. Seris settled into a low stance. Then tilted her head. The grin never left. Her gaze lingered on Hammer-Hand. Then on the two sword-brothers. Then back again. "Three against one?" She laughed.
"Careful." The Sith took several slow steps forward. "You keep looking at me like that and people might get the wrong idea."
Her eyes locked onto the Mandalorian warlord. "Though I admit..." The grin sharpened. "...I've had worse introductions."
The deck shuddered violently beneath her feet as another impact echoed somewhere deep within the dying Star Destroyer. Her smile only grew. "Not much time left either." No strategy. No retreat. No concern whatsoever for the self-destruct countdown. Only violence. Seris launched herself forward with the Force.
Twin crimson blades carved through the smoke as she exploded into motion, charging directly at the trio. One saber lashed high toward Hammer-Hand's weapon arm while the second swept low in a vicious follow-up meant to force all three warriors onto the defensive before she could lose momentum.
The predator's grin remained firmly in place. Let the ship die. Let the stars burn. For the next few minutes, all that mattered was the fight.
With the assistance of the jetpack the Mandalorian just about managed to avoid having their helmet (and skull) smashed in by Mercy’s fist. The momentum took her forward and instead said fist slammed itself into the floor, causing thick duracrete to shatter underneath her force. She whirled around and was about to come after him again, but her further movement was arrested when Srina joined her at her side.
This stilled the large warrior as her fellow Empress touched her. She breathed in sharply as Srina’s power surged inside of her again.
It was a familiar sensation, but that didn’t make it any less joyously painful. Her eyes, already a shade of sulfur, grew even more pronounced in a hue of amber. It was only then that Mercy noticed the white smoke billowing out from the Mandalorian.
While Srina used her rebreather to avoid its effects, Mercy… smiled.
Weak cretins constantly were trying to remove her connection to the Force. On Coruscant it had almost caused the death of Srina Talon
. And since that day Mercy had started to acclimate her body, forcing it to evolve, pushing it to endure through the various anti-force appliances that existed in the Galaxy. Including directly inhaling anti-force smoke over, andover, andover, again.
When the smoke reached her, Mercy looked the Mandalorian dead in the visor and… inhaled it with a smirk.
“Thank you, poppet. I forgot to bring my pipe along.” Even as the smoke attempted to kill her connection to the Force, it would find her cells adept at maintaining the bond between her midi-chlorians and the Dark Side.
Mercy was quite content to let Srina do the talking while she kept an eye on not one, but now two Mandalorians popping out of nowhere.
She hissed as her battle-sister forced even more strength through her. It was… delicious. It crystallized the world around them. With this much Force running through her, she could taste the heartbeats of the two Mandalorians in front of her almost as well as she could feel the blood running through Srina’s veins.
“Mm, and I always keep my promises to you, do I not?” Mercy finally said, leaning in and kissing Srina on one eye, then the other and finally her forehead. The three things more or less uncovered by the armoring.
Then her vision blurred again as she moved with such alacrity the wind itself sharpened across her skin. Mercy did not care however, because she was already upon them within a blink of an eye.
Such speed that when she punched next, an after-image appeared, rushing forward towards Siv’s chestplate even as her next punch already moved to take his son through his knees.
Laughter filled her head, a maniacal noise loud enough to drown out everything else and Lily latched onto it because it was something solid, something loud enough to give her focus. But it did not give her a reprieve.
It gave her agony.
Csilla, Panatha, Korriban, Byss. Planets torn asunder, trillions of lives ended in war or in a blink of unimaginable power. Death and decay engulfed her, tearing at her very being a thousand times over in the space of a breath. Blood trickled from Lily’s nose, her breathing ragged as it ended and there was suddenly just a girl, blood running down her face, claws marks surrounding an empty eye socket, bodies around her that Lily dared not look at, not when the child smiled the way she did. Unease gripped her stomach and she tried to pull away, the maniacal laughter chasing her as the rest of the noise flooded back in.
Lily reached for Vess as she dropped beside her, her hand grabbing at her knee, fingers digging into the fabric of her trousers, trying to find her in the noise, trying to find something familiar to latch onto. But she’d never looked in Vess’s head, she’d never wanted to dig.
Instead she found someone else. A predator, tearing through his prey without mercy, unrelenting in his focus on the violence he carved through the troopers. Familiar and yet…not. Warmth rose from beneath it, golden light dancing off a girls smile, dark curls framing a face that she knew…but also didn’t. It vanished beneath the growing darkness.
She retreated, snapping away from him like she’d been burnt.
Pain slammed into her, not like, she felt it without truly feeling it as Varin was swallowed, he lost his purchase and fell into silence, tumbling out of reach as something else reared where his mind should have been, hungry and powerful, smoke trailing from its body. Starlight filled eyes looked at her as its maw opened wide. Heat drove her away, a fire like she’d never felt before, her fingers digging deeper into Vess’s leg.
“Vess.” she choked out, her voice hoarse.
A soft hand touched her head, familiar and grounding. Lily finally looked at her, strands of dark hair tumbled around her face, eyes closed but Lily could feel her fear. She felt the tremble in her fingers, in the unsteady weight of her hand on her shoulder as the noise pressed in. Lily had brought her here. She had brought her into this, into a den of monsters. She was supposed to be protecting her and yet she was crumbling beneath the weight of everything.
"Easy there," she said, her voice a softness against the scratching corruption. "You can't push it. All you can do is turn your back to the storm and let it carry you."
The technopath extended her reach across the whole building. "This is power. Our power." Doors unlocked, turrets at every zone turned against the imperials, fighting with a level of intelligence that went far beyond their programming. "Wield it."
Lily felt the darkness in her own mind shift, felt its hunger and need to be free. Her power, the one she refused to wield because all she ever saw from it was death and destruction. Her hand lifted sliding over Vess’s, fingers interlocking with hers as she looked back at the slicer, the one person in the galaxy that somehow made her feel safe. The one person she needed to protect and was failing at this moment to do so.
The powers that be would tell you that you're too weak to be Sith, your family would tell you that you are Sith by blood, but I will tell you the truth. You're Sith because you've lived hard. Because unlike most you know what it's like to be at the bottom of the food chain of the universe." He paused, looking back up at her. "And you'll do whatever it takes to keep yourself from sliding back down that chain. Won't you?"
Lily took a breath, eyes lifting past Vess's shoulder as a Death Trooper rounded the corner. She stopped fighting the noise, and started weaving through it. Like a needle she threaded through the cracks in his mind, not caring about what damage she did on the way in, only that he stopped his advance. She found the part of his mind that controlled motor function and ripped it away. He hit the deck, forgetting how to walk, how to hold his gun.
She found more, turning them away from the depot, away from all of them. They stepped into the firing lines of turrets, they pulled pins on grenades and forgot how to throw, they turned their guns on their friends. All of it they suffered, because they had dared to come for Vesss.
Lily was done running.
Her name was Lillian of House Marr, and it was time the galaxy learned who she was.
Lily's eyes moved back to her slowly. "I'm okay." she said quietly, darkness thrumming through her as she reached a hand to brush her cheek. "I'm okay, you can let go. I've got this."
She got to her feet pulling Vess up with her, and drawing her into a tight hug, she placed a kiss on her cheek before drawing away, lacing their fingers together as she followed Arris into the control room.
"Varin and Tamsin are compromised." she told Arris, matter of fact, like she hadn't just been on the floor screaming, like their wasn't blood still dripping from her nose. "Ace is going to need help."
The smoke had no apparent effect. The slimmer of the two had somehow morphed her simple cloth attire into a battle armor, complete with what looked to be a rebreather. The other one merely stood, inhaling and exhaling, and smiling. Siv mumbled a curse under his breath as he shifted his stance, the open air to his back. Things were about to get really nasty for him soon. Suddenly, the tell-tale thrust of a Mandalorian jetpack picked up on his long-range audioreceptors. There was a crunch as a warrior in all-too-familiar beskar'gam landed at his side.
His orange-red visor turned toward the two women, moving from one to the other before settling somewhere between them. "What is this, a double date or something?"
Siv's stance eased, though it did not relax, but boosted ever so slightly in confidence, his muscles suppled, becoming more elastic and more responsive as his heart rate slowed. "Took you long enough," he growled. To Sahan, who knew him so well, it would come across as affectionate. Father and son were reunited in the least likely of places. His attention remained focused on the women in front of him. The slender one's yellow Sith eyes were fixed on him, piercing, although Siv noted that her expression was not yet angry.
The words hung there for a moment before her head tilted slightly, lengths of silvery hair stirring in the cold. Her confusion with this scenario was genuine.
"I never expected—" She breathed, the stale, metallic air of the rebreather. "—To see Mandalorian warriors choose to die for the sake of Imperials."
Siv hated how arrogant their kind were. He had maybe half a second to hate that before she moved.
He triggered his vambrace, the whistling bird missiles launching directly into the monster-woman even as her own blow connected hard with his chestplate. The wind was knocked out of him, although if it were not for his beskar plating and inertial dampers, it would've been a blow just as likely to have completely caved in his chest cavity. Instead, he was knocked far out of the tower, propelled into the air by the kinetic force of her blow.
His jetpack ignited, flaring hard out of the exhaust as Siv fought against the momentum that had blown him into the air. "Daab!" Siv barked at Sahan through his comms, trying to warn Sahan, but the few seconds that had passed were too much already. Siv exhaled, trying to contain the fury building within him. He needed to trust his son, he reminded himself. His attention snapped to the other, the armor-clad. He noticed Frost had begun to cover the tower unnaturally, a vortex of chilled wind emanating from her.
Overhead, the sky continued to darken. The eclipse neared totality.
Siv's beskar vibrospines extended from his vambrace as he dove at the silver-haired woman, extended as a self-defense precaution should either of them get too close. He drew within three meters of her, enough that she was in range of the concealed disruptor pistol in his right vambrace. His blaster was trained on her head, his arm stable despite hovering in the air; yet it was his right vambrace that he was truly aiming. On his left, his whistling bird launcher had already cycled for another volley and primed itself with another happy, aggressive chirp. "Not here for Imperials," he growled. "I'm here for the Sith. For you." He paused a second, staring the woman straight in her eyes, beskar meeting amber. A sudden memory flashed across his vision, from a hunt years ago. "You should cover your face," he added with a snarl. "Leaving their eyes unprotected didn't go so well for the last Sith."
The entire starfighter rattled around her as she dove headlong into the Force Storm, navigating solely by visuals.
It was insane and Ar Nine let her know, its screams and beeps a constant reminder of the danger she faced with the crackling of lightning and rumble of the unnatural clouds.
Then she punched out of the cloud cover and emerged under the Force Storm that continued to roil ominously overhead. Her fingers trembled on the controls and she felt cold sweat trickling down her back.
No sign of the bandit, must have lost him.
Now what?
Her thoughts turned toward the Mando they left behind and she immediately pushed the comms.
"Alor Warnel, this is Strill 6. Do you read me? I'm back to get you out of here. Give me your coordinates."
***
Back in orbit, the rest of Strill Squadron successfully made it to the hangar bay of one of the Mythos Fleet carriers. Bigbird 6-4 touched down and immediately began offloading wounded and recovered recon commandos, while the pilots of Strill sat anxiously waiting for the ground crew to rearm them for a second sortie.
Tag me in the OOC if there's an issue with my post. Thank you for your communication and patience! NPC RESPONSE: Iris Beroya
| IRON COVENANT Force Hydra
A bolt of crimson lightning struck down from the sky, separating the Baron from his target. The sudden low pressure pulled up his TIE Avenger, away, and indeed it might have seemed that was that...
However, the imperial ace punched back down through a dark cloud. He kept looking around, trying to find where his quarry had disappeared. Had the storm taken them? That would be a dull end.
Meanwhile, half of Null squadron closed in not on airborne transports, but on those landing or landed, in a series of coordinated strafing runs. The other half broke in pairs, joined by Rancor Squadron, flying circles through the airspace to counter enemy air-superiority aircraft and interceptors.
The Baron - still searching - saw a blip on his heads-up. "Ah, there you are." He breathed.
His Avenger soared at full burn on intercept - close enough that his targeting computer leveraged a lock. His thumb pressed gently, releasing a missile.
Targeting alerts chimed in Iris' cockpit and Ar Nine screeched again.
"I know, I know," she muttered, punching chaff and flares as she pulled evasive maneuvers, weaving in and out of the skyscrapers of the side.
Iris juked left behind a tower and the concussion missile tried to follow before it punched into the skyscraper and detonated, killing whoever knew how many imperials. Assuming they hadn't abandoned the city already at the first sign of giant titanic beasts crushing everything.
Whoops.
Decelerating rapidly with her starfighter that had been designed at the turn of the century, Iris used her craft's superior turn rate to nearly instantaneously pivot around on the TIE that came in at full burn.
"Mistake," she muttered, then depressed the triggers, sending all six laser cannons chattering at the pilot in a slew that he would shriek right into on his current trajectory.
She kept listening for a reply from Brent Warnel
.
AMIDST THE BLUE SKIES, A LINK FROM THE PAST TO THE FUTURE.
THE SHELTERING WINGS OF THE PROTECTOR This is an NPC Story Emissary of Strife
| Seva Beroya
Ghest and Svaper squadrons, supported by the two basilisks from Darkwolf, tore into the enemy starfighters like a pack of rabid vornskrs. They might have been outnumbered two to one, but their starfighters were faster, more heavily armed, and - most important of all - they had the beskar armored basilisks causing absolute carnage.
Meanwhile, half of Null squadron closed in not on airborne transports, but on those landing or landed, in a series of coordinated strafing runs. The other half broke in pairs, joined by Rancor Squadron, flying circles through the airspace to counter enemy air-superiority aircraft and interceptors.
Ghest 4
«Whew did you see that? Turbolasers on target. Take that Titans!»
Svaper 3
«Focus up, they're going for the transports.»
Ghest 4
«Not on our watch.»
Darkwolf 1
«I'll handle this.»
Darkwolf 1 and 2 screamed in and unloaded unmitigated obliteration upon the starfighters of Null squadron who sought to strafe the transports that were so doggedly guarded by Ghest and Svaper squadrons. Each basilisk unloaded six concussion missiles on the enemy starfighters, then followed up with their rotary particle cannons. The semi-sentient A.I.s inside the two basilisks made sure that every shot seemed impossibly accurate, achieving near Force User like precision with their fire.
AWACS Watcher
«Watcher here, stop those TIEs.»
Ghest Lead
«Working on it, Watcher.»
Svaper 3
«They keep climbing. Do they not see the storm?»
Ghest 2
«Don't worry about what they see, keep them away from the shuttles.»
Darkwolf 2
«Imperials thinking they're a match for mando'ade. Tch.»
OBJECTIVE 1: BELLY OF THE BEAST LOCATION: Humbarine City | Belltower ALLIES: Siv Dragr | Iron Covenant ENEMIES: Srina Talon | Mercy | Sith Covenant
The eclipse had swallowed what remained of the daylight, leaving the broken belltower illuminated by intermittent flashes of crimson lightning. Cold wind scraped through the open side of the tower, carrying smoke and the distant violence of a city tearing itself apart. Sahan had to admit that the Sith knew how to set a mood. It was one of the few points of grudging respect he afforded them.
FACIAL MATCH: MERISYA DANTON ERISTO
KNOWN ALIAS: MERCY
MATCH CONFIDENCE: 99.8%
FACIAL MATCH: SRINA TALON
MATCH CONFIDENCE: 84.6%
CAUTION: MULTIPLE BIOMETRIC COLLISIONS DETECTED
Mercy moved.
Sahan was already moving.
His body reacted before the warning glyphs had finished flaring across his HUD. The low strike swept toward his knees with enough force to cripple most opponents before they understood what was happening. Sahan did not try to meet that force head-on. A sharp pulse from the micro-thrusters built into his armor carried his legs just outside the path of the punch as he turned with Mercy's momentum rather than retreating from it.
Retractable blood-crystal vibrospines snapped outward along his forearm. He did not swing after the rushing Sith. He simply brought the vibrating blades across the line she was already crossing, Devaronian blood poison coating the sharpened points as her own momentum threatened to carry her through them. If they found exposed flesh, they would not leave a clean wound behind. The spines were positioned to rake rather than stab, opening a line for the poison to enter the blood beneath them.
The ND-013 came alive in the same instant. It did not flare outward across the whole tower. Sahan kept its projection tightly compressed, driving the transmitter's maximum output into the few meters immediately before him rather than flooding the chamber and catching Siv in its reach.
This was not another attempt to smother Mercy's connection to the Force. There was no smoke for her lungs to endure and no bond for stubbornness to preserve through sheer force of will. The transmitter did not touch the Force at all. Its signal drove into the midichlorians threaded through living tissue, inducing apoptosis cell by cell: a microscopic command to self-destruct. The namesake white noise followed with it, a shriek from the living bridge between body and Force as that bridge began to turn against itself. Pain tolerance might help someone remain standing through the consequences. It could not make this the same kind of pain she had endured before.
Siv's warning reached Sahan's helmet as the movement was already completing.
<Saw her.>
His father had been thrown clear of the tower, but his jetpack flared outside the open wall almost immediately. Siv redirected himself toward Srina with his own vambrace spines extended, trusting Sahan to deal with the larger Sith without needing to say anything more. Sahan let him go. The two Dragrs had already divided the room between them.
A thought through the neural interface sent a pair of Irya'kadir grenades thumping from the launcher mounted to his jetpack. They skipped across fractured stone before bursting into fresh clouds of smoke. Srina's rebreather might protect her from the aerosol's more interesting effects, and the cold wind gathering around her might clear the air again given time. Neither gave her clean sightlines for free.
Sahan's orange-red visor remained fixed on Mercy through the spreading haze. The ND-013 stayed narrowed around her for the moment, its maximum intensity compressed and concentrated on the redhead.
The Mandalorian’s flank was the target but death was not the intent. Not yet. Just a disruption that would throw him off balance. From there, he would move for the follow-up.
He barely had time to turn his body. His armor was another weapon, another formidable tool for the Sith to contend with. However-
His jetpack was not.
The terrible red blade screeched across his back, a shower of sparks and fuel igniting in the air! It didn't hurt Feydrik in the slightest, the jetpack's thrusters barely activating for a moment before dying out. It was seared and destroyed instantly, and Feydrik- for the time being, would not be able to use it in their fight.
He was not affected by the goings-on so much in the way the Sith was, but even in Feydrik's mind, there was only this battle. Not any other. The Mandalorians around him pushed forward toward their objective, another anti-aircraft battery to be knocked out to leave a gap in the Sith's defenses. Another line broken, and their orbital cannons and anti-air network would have just enough of a gap to allow for follow-on attacks and more importantly, escape.
But truthfully, that mattered little to Feydrik now. His communication was cut short by the breakage of his helmet, and his ability to escape quickly was undone by the damage to his jetpack. So the Sith had forced him into a precarious, albeit wonderful position:
Fight, or die.
Feydrik screamed, charging the Sith, ducking under a swing and a cleave that would've bisected a lesser man. The Sith came up in a defensive grab, intending on enveloping the Sith and stab downward. He was an experienced warrior, a great one. Feydrik would have done the same. However, Feydrik operated differently, fighting with the whole of his body, his hands, elbows, arms, legs, hands, blades. And in that distance, the space between two men who wanted to kill each other with naught their bare hands... Feydrik found himself thriving, wondrously so.
He grit his teeth wrapped a hand over the Sith's left arm and bicep, pulling in, catching him off balance just enough. Then, another hand at his other bicep to prevent that terrible blade from wreaking havoc on his otherwise un-lightsaber'd body. Feydrik, however, didn't want to strike out with a headbutt, no. He dropped the weight at his hips, pulled a foot in and pushed it against Kasir's chest as he fell-
And threw Kasir with all of his terrible might over him as he rolled.
He stood up, smiling as the Sith tumbled away. It wouldn't hurt him much, true. Infact, it wouldn't hurt most fighters. But it did give him space, and options. And perhaps enough of a discombobulating effect to get him further ahead in the fight. But mostly Feydrik wanted thing above all else:
He wanted to hurt his pride, hurt his ego. That jetpack was special to him. It was a tool, true, and tools broke and needed replaced. He liked it however, and he wanted the Sith to know that.
Jericho did not advance directly along the fractured transit avenue. The garrison had built its position to dominate the obvious approach, overlapping fields of fire across the open road and the wreckage scattered through it. He slipped into the deeper shadows cast by the surrounding towers instead, passing through the broken remains of a storefront before emerging into the narrow service passage behind it. The eclipse had already swallowed most of Humbarine's daylight. Smoke and drifting ash obscured what little remained, turning the district into a maze of dim alleys, shattered windows, and intermittent flashes of distant weapons fire. The reflec painted across his beskar'gam drank in the darkness around him, reducing his movements between cover to fleeting distortions whenever the light caught him at all.
The soldiers holding the southern intersection had prepared for an assault from the avenue. They had not watched the ruined structures behind their position closely enough. Jericho settled the M.I. Model 38 against his shoulder and fired twice in quick succession. The first sentry fell before he could turn. The second managed half a warning before a controlled burst silenced him. Jericho shifted immediately, passing through a doorway and crossing the abandoned interior of the adjacent building before return fire began striking the place where he had been standing. He did not remain in one position long enough to trade shots. Every movement carried him toward another angle. Every pull of the trigger removed another obstacle between the trapped vode and the extraction lane.
Gold's voice broke across the private channel as she descended deeper into the district. ://: I found the first pocket. Six vode alive. Four can move. Two need carrying. :\\:
<Take the two aboard,> Jericho replied. He leaned around the edge of a cracked support column, fired a short burst into the upper window of the checkpoint building, and withdrew before the soldiers inside could answer accurately. <Keep the others moving south. I will give them a lane.>
://: That sounds suspiciously like finishing everything before I get back. :\\:
<Only the necessary part.>
The sky flashed crimson before Gold could reply. Jericho paused beneath the fractured overhang of the checkpoint building and tilted his visor upward. Beyond the canyon formed by Humbarine's towers, thick clouds rolled across the eclipsed sun as unnatural lightning split the darkness apart. The thunder followed with enough force to rattle loose debris from the damaged structure above him. A transmission cut across every Mandalorian channel.
Jericho's fingers tightened once around the foregrip of his rifle. He did not answer the broadcast. Around him, the storm darkened the avenue further and narrowed the visible sky between the towers, but he felt nothing beneath the thunder. No unnatural dread. No unseen weight pressing against his thoughts. Whatever influence rolled outward from the storm did not reach him. He registered it for what it meant to the mission: reduced visibility, hazardous flight conditions, and Sith somewhere within the city. The word altered the arithmetic. It did not change the task. The wounded still needed a road out.
Gold's voice returned, quieter for a moment but no less focused. ://: I heard. The flight lanes are getting unpleasant. :\\:
<Stay below the storm. Use the towers for cover.>
://: Already doing that. I am very good at this. :\\:
<I know.>
A heavier burst of fire tore through the wall beside Jericho and filled the passage with dust. He dropped behind the rubble, waited for the volley to spend itself, then shifted to the opposite side of the ruined room while the garrison remained fixed on his previous position. Three precise shots passed through the firing slit ahead. The repeating blaster on the other side went silent. Jericho advanced before the defenders could reorganize, crossed the service lane at a low sprint, and slipped through a breach in the checkpoint's outer wall. By the time the remaining soldiers realized that he had entered the structure, he was already firing from their flank. A short burst struck one soldier across the chest plate and forced the others away from the avenue. Jericho allowed them to retreat deeper into the garrison block. Clearing the corridor mattered more than pursuing enemies who no longer threatened it.
://: I have the wounded. The walkers are moving south behind me. One is insisting that he does not need help. He is limping. :\\:
<Make sure he gets it anyway.>
://: I like this assignment. I get to be helpful and bossy. :\\:
The corner of Jericho's mouth twitched faintly beneath his helmet as he emerged from the checkpoint and scanned the avenue. Gold swept low between the towers with the worst of the wounded secured aboard her, cannons trained toward the surrounding rooftops as she screened the retreat. Four armored figures followed through the smoke below, one leaning heavily against another as they crossed the newly opened intersection. Jericho remained near the edge of the avenue with the rifle held ready, watching the windows and rooftops while the vode passed. One of them slowed briefly when he recognized the reflec-painted beskar'gam beneath the drifting ash.
"Jericho."
He inclined his helmet in acknowledgement. "I should have been here when the mission started."
The words carried more weight than the moment required. He had known the reconnaissance teams were deploying. Under ordinary circumstances, Jericho likely would have been among them. Intelligence gathering, infiltration, and quiet work behind enemy lines were where he belonged. Yet Siv Dragr had already been assigned to Humbarine. Jericho had told himself that forcing his presence into Siv's orbit during an active operation would create a complication no one needed.
Sahan had adopted him as a brother while Siv was missing, during the same years that had taken Obran, Volo, and Suvi from the clan. Siv had returned to find his adopted brothers dead, Volo's daughter gone with them, and a new Dragr standing beside Sahan: a stranger carrying the family name without Siv ever having known him. There was an irony in that which Jericho could not ignore. Obran and Volo had once been Siv's brothers by adoption, much as Jericho was now Sahan's. Perhaps Siv understood that better than anyone. Jericho had never found the courage to assume that meant he was welcome.
There were only three Dragr left now. Jericho did not know whether Siv truly counted him among them. Standing in the smoke of Humbarine City with wounded vode retreating through the corridor around him, caution felt uncomfortably close to cowardice.
The Mandalorian in front of him glanced briefly toward the ruined district behind them. "You are here now."
Another voice came from farther down the avenue, roughened by exhaustion but carrying a trace of humor. "And you brought the Basilisk. That helps."
://: Not just any Basilisk. The best! :\\:
The limping Mandalorian laughed and gave his ironheart a brief tap as he passed, the closest thing the retreat allowed to a proper greeting. "Good to have you with us, vod."
Jericho's visor followed him for a second. "Get clear of the district. There are more still inside."
Blaster fire struck the ferrocrete behind the retreating vode, but the remaining garrison troops had been pushed too far back to prevent their escape. Gold banked between the towers and continued south with the walkers beneath her cover. Jericho stayed at the intersection until the last armored silhouette disappeared into the smoke.
The first group was getting out.
Only then did Jericho check the tactical display on his HUD. More friendly transponders still flickered deeper within Humbarine City. More routes remained blocked. Somewhere beyond the towers, crimson lightning split the sky again as the storm continued to gather above the battlefield. Jericho turned away from the cleared avenue, stepped back into the shadows between the buildings, and disappeared into the dark.
It wasn't that they'd become aware of the giant leviathan, they'd already been aware of that for some time. No, what Xorvyrnog referred to was that the Mandalorians had become aware of the rider, Carnifex Himself. It was an anticipated outcome, and one that they'd purposefully been planning for. Mandalorians were predictable in this regard, especially when the Dark Lord intentionally made Himself known to them.
Who among their ranks would not yearn for vengeance?
The pair continued on their path, trudging through more of Humbarine's ruined city as the Mandalorian figures grew more distinct in the distance. "The stunted children of Manda'yaim cry out for restitution, they know not else. Folly heaped upon folly." He reached up towards the sky with one hand, and the clouds began to blacken. The unnatural swiftness of the gathering storm was baffling to any form of atmospheric sensor systems, having appeared to come out of nowhere and without warning.
Lightning danced across the air, wild and erratic. It swirled about the Mandalorian formations and in the air above them, an ever-expanding miasma of Dark Side energy infused within the storm itself. Carnifex and Xorvyrnog lent their combined strength to the storm's conjuration, though for now it only continued to gather and grow rather than directly impact any of the Mandalorians.
There was then a vicious crackle and thunderclap, and from the blackened clouds a heavy rain began. A fog accompanied it, hugging close to the broken city around the leviathan and the Dark Lord, slowly enveloping all in haze.
The elite pilots of Rancor and Null pit their cream-of-the-crop talent and wartime experience against artificial intelligence and Mandalorian courage. The TIE Hunters, though an old design, were still tremendously fast and no slouches when it came to their punch. Null Leader and his pilots were challenged, but not overwhelmed, allowing their strafers to continue, albeit with limitations, as they had to avoid dying. Their numbers would be slow to chip away - likewise with Rancor Squadron.
But that wasn't the center of their story.
The Baron was hellbent on having his fun, another victory to paint the hull of his Avenger. He wouldn't allow his sparring partner to shake him so easily this time. Matching maneuver with maneuver, dancing between the skyline. There was no hesitation, no flinch from the baron, not even as they evaded his missile.
An impressive ship, he thought of the Mandalorian war machine, but technology had been a stagnant art in their galaxy. Basic Academy material told him the plague hadn't helped much in that regard either - his Avenger, based on what was once a state-of-the-art prototype designed to steal virtually every performance record to conceive of, was no slouch and more-or-less matched the Jai'Galsaar in speed and maneuverability. He caught wind as the enemy pivoted, and did the same, sacrificing a new firing line, but protecting himself from theirs, as he fought to regain his advantage.
"Sir! They are doubling down on their jamming efforts." Announced an ensign.
The Vice Admiral stroked his clean-shaven chin in consideration. He knew that jamming capabilities largely worked by bombarding known channels and frequencies with junk data, noise, if you wanted to be simple. While he had no doubt his enemy's capabilities were impressive, Glacier also had faith in his own operators, both on the ground and deployed across the fleet. The advantage may very well be to the Mandalorians in this one, but their success and the rewards to follow would not be immediate.
A thought that passed, as his attentions shifted to the holographic readout of the battlespace. Enemy ships attacked in every direction... expected, given the multidimensionality of their battlespace, but the sheer aggression of their movements suggested confidence, or desperation, if not both.
"Where are our ground-to-space weapons? Why aren't they firing?" He asked calmly, though it was a forced coolness born of experience.
"There's a storm, sir." Another crewer answered.
The Admiral gave a puzzled look. "When has a little rain--"
"It's not just rain, sir."
Glacier approached the viewport and saw the dark clouds and crimson thunder. He had served in the Core Wars before this, and had seen firsthand the power of the Dark Side. It didn't take him long to determine the nature of that storm, but none of the Dark Side Elite had defected to the Governorate, so who?
"Call command."
An operator obeyed. But something was wrong. They tried again. "It's... Declined." Her surprise was palpable.
The admiral glanced at her. "What?" He couldn't believe it either. "Try again."
"I have!"
Just what the hell was going on down there?! In the vacuum of space, he wagered his Defense Fleet might fare one out of five with this enemy force. In orbit of Humbarine, he felt he had the advantage, but that was counting on the hypervelocity guns and other ground-to-space weapons. Now, he had to consider what strategy might get him closer to fifty-fifty. An admiral reduced to gambling.
He took a deep breath, and his eyes closed. Glacier steeled himself, as a decision had to be made with cost. The fast frigates were well ahead, creating gaps in the enemy formation, but they would need fighter support to keep at it. "Pull back all wings." A chill fell over the room, but they obeyed.
The Imperial fleet chose to sacrifice momentum, instead consolidating around something between a defense and a blockade of their own planet. The bulk of their spaceborne squadrons would focus on picking off Mandalorian ships landing and leaving the planet. Their predictable trajectories made them a vulnerable target to the speedy and maneuverable TIEs. Meanwhile, the heavy ships of the fleet formed a defensive wall of firepower. Any Mandaorian ships in bombardment range of Humbarine would now face an onslaught of batteries.
It was in time for Glaive Squadron to enter the scene, only to find themselves swarmed by enemy squadrons. Colonel Draltia, leading her TIE Defenders, cut underneath the retreat of the Defense Fleet's lighter fighters. One of her handpicked pilots, however, was delayed and paid the price. His ship was torn to pieces before the predators arrived to flank the pursuers.
---
Aboard the Spirit Breaker, Imperial Marines held a defensive foothold at the reactor room - destroying the bridges with tactical explosives.
OBJ1:
Null and Rancor are trading punches in the skies, while a portion of Null continues to run strafing, sacrificing a little efficacy.
OBJ 2:
Acknowledging active suppression. I will portray the effect as something that gradually happens over time, between the nature of how jamming works, and the ability to mitigate, as I imagine the wealth of imperial military doctrine over time would account for the need to cycle frequencies/channels in the event of such EW strategies.
HDF is sacrificing its forward momentum and some fast frigates to pull back into a more defensive blockade around Humbarine. Most fighter squadrons are pulled back as well, instead focusing their effort on Iron Covenant troop ships and other vessels entering and leaving the atmosphere.
Glaive Squadron is delayed as they shake their pursuers, now intercepted by predator-class fighters.
Aboard Spirit Breaker
Imperial Marines are blowing the bridges directly by the doors to the reactor rooms.
Thank you all again for your patience. I have been trying to keep my responses to one post at a time for convenience, so it'll be a little long, and there's always the possibility that I may miss an action. If I do, let me know, and I will include it in my next post!
The destruction and carnage flowed through the Demon, every action Varin and Acier took fueled her. The Carnage in the city she now felt as her web grew fueled into her. The energy of Phobis Device seeped into her veins. She fed on it all as the building and everything around them began to crumble under the weight of battle.
In this moment she felt like she could walk on the surface of the sun and not get burned by it. She poured more power into the device, and the overloaded weapons went off. A loud deafening THUMP not a bang went off.
For a split second it would feel like the air from your very lungs was sucked out, and you would float in the air. As the gravity got displaced and disrupted in about one-kilometer radius. As you floated there, you would feel a slight pull towards the Tensor weapons as they imploded in on themselves.
Tamsin body got pulled in a bit, but the demon knew what to expect and only had a split second to react. As time slowed around her reaction sped up, she looked to her side through the wreckage of the armory. Then she looked out of the corner of her Tamsin's eyes to pathetic beings.
The demon cared not for life; it was just a figment of the twisted reality fate had constructed. It was meaningless this existence, she had already broken its chains. She could see through fate's construct, she knew there was something better beyond it but the only way to get to it was to destroy everything.
So, what stopped her at that moment, why would something that never cared about anything hesitate. A voice spoke out to her, that girl inside her.
"They deserve a chance."
The voice was mild, barely a squeak in the demon's mind. Yet her voice, a much younger version of her voice. Tamsin was a version of the demon; one created by its hand. Not exactly her but just enough to remind her that she was once innocent too. That everything she could have been was ripped from her, that every bit of humanity in her had been stripped away. That this existence had been nothing but cruel to her, it had only spit on her even as she had gained power. She had always been looked down on, despised, and thought of as nothing. She had never been shown mercy and only learned cruelty. In turn she had returned that cruelty tenfold lashing out at reality itself for dealing her a bad hand.
The demon growled through Tamsin's lips.
"I will show mercy this one time, child. To prove to you one thing. That all you will get in return is cruelty. Look at your friends faces, the man dragon who can not control his rage and will turn on his allies. Look at the one that despises you, because he despises the blood that runs through his own veins. Look at the cyborg, who sees you as disposable, fodder for her power. Look at the two jedi on the edge, one who is falling over right it now, they can't even hold to their own convictions. They like me only know or only will know cruelty; they will be your downfall. I told you, you didn't need anyone yet you still cling to your sister's ghost hoping someone else will show you a kindness. They will not."
Tamsin's eyes closed and the demon reached out across the web as the gravity bomb went off. Incasing herself. Arris, Liliy, Vess, Varin, and Acier in a stasis field slowing their movements and creating a protective shell around them to protect them. As the Implosion reverted and twisted exploding outward with a furious vvvVVIPBOOOM!
Gravity came slamming back into the area with immense pressure shattering and destroying things in its wake. The building itself would be ripped apart, some of already shattered duracrete floor would turn to dust. Armor and bones of the dark troopers would snap and shatter.
The Demon came slamming back down to the ground as the gravity returned unscathed as the barrier around her shimmered. Her eyes still on the dragon boy and the lost boy.
"Well, that was FUN!" She let out a maniacal laugh. "We should do it again!"
The detonation covered Brent's tracks for several seconds as he began to withdraw from the alleyway and back into a large building that rose several stories into the sky. He poured more fire into the area his foe had been, hoping he could get lucky and knock them out as he pulled back, his comms buzzing.
"I'm engaged by what can only be a Sith," he replied to Iris Beroya
, "Disengagement will be tricky. My comm is open, track my signal, I'll try to meet you on the roof."
Brent forgot how much Sith liked to talk. He only had a moment to think about it as the room exploded into an unnatural fog, its thick edges attempting to break through the nullification field of the Yossubi gas cartridges stowed in his hard pouch. While it didn't overly affect him personally, anything outside the edge of the null zone was a sensor dead zone for his armor.
He walked deeper into the residence, heading for what he hoped were the stairs that led to a higher level from which he could access the roof.
The scanners in his helmet were on a full 360-degree scan, their sensors reaching a few feet into the null-zone and giving him at least a half-second of warning.
As he ventured deeper into the building, that half-second alarm came in handy as his foe leaped from the fog, two daggers flashing toward his collarbone. Brent, already on high alert and a warrior of several decades, was able to spin faster than most, shrugging himself forward and to the right, trying to roll with the blow as it impacted him.
While they didn't impact his collarbone, the daggers pierced his bodyglove just below the collarbone and ripped down his shoulder toward his armpit, leaving a large gash weeping blood.
Brent continued to roll, spinning his body around and raising his left elbow, aiming for a strike at the Sith's armored head. Whether it impacted or not, Brent continued the momentum, dropping his pistol with his right hand and following up the elbow strike with a vicious right hook, vibroblade extending from his wrist, ready to stab deep into the Sith's upper abdomen.
Anet Raine
was overseeing.
