Dominion The Abyss (OPA Dominion of Tibrin)

[Janick Beauchamp]

Objective: 2
Allies: Jic Drow Loske Treicolt
Enemies: Vong

Now that Janick was done donning her wetsuit, with her black lightsabers holstered to it, she could then start the dive towards the samples the Vong were seemingly after, realizing that coral grew like kudzu around these parts. Since coral seemed to grow fast here, some water samples should also be collected. Perhaps part of what made the coral interesting was tied to the water or the continental shelf. Hopefully someone else would realize that and collect water samples, while someone else on the team had access to the radiance data from Tibrin's star, she thought, also realizing that the distraction provided by one Jic should not be wasted. However, coral was a delicate entity, so great care should be exercised while she was sampling the various coral varieties - because there were more than one to sample and test once they returned from that place.

 

[Fulcrum]

"Revenge?" the devaronian laughed at Tiland Kortun , "You think I went to all this trouble for something that petty? We don't hold grudges. Isn't that right Deacon? No, this is about business."

"Just like Fondor, right friend?" Deacon scowled.

"I proved myself useful to Mistress Raaf," Cygnus shrugged, "And she let me walk away. Not about to apologize for seeing which way the wind was blowing. But you're all so stuck in the past."

He clapped his hands once the the bulkhead behind them slid open. An opulent looking Hutt slithered in along with several more hired thugs.

"The slavers you lot ousted on Karazak had powerful friends. Your little rebel outfit has been making a nuisance for my benefactors for some time. You might say I represent a Shadow Collective..."

Force pikes hummed to life. Amea Virou , Peyton Steele , and the others were prodded from behind towards a watery grave.

" Servant , if there was ever a time to wreak a little havoc..." the agent muttered to himself.

 

[Amea Virou]

Everything went quiet. Tension spread from Amea’s teeth down to her fists. A high-pitched noise spread within her mind accompanied by nothing but the sound of her own heartbeat as she struggled to maintain the barrier that at this point could just barely hold against the torrent of repressed emotion. Amea knew better than to give into pain, to anger and hate, but the idea was ever so tempting. The SIS had taken everything from her, and now instead of taking the life they would have logically taken it was hers they were gunning for.

It went to show that even in the end, in death and resurrection, the past would always come back to bite them.

The word had barely ‘execution’ passed through the man’s lips before the seconds started to feel like minutes. This wasn’t right, this wasn’t how it was meant to play out. Her fist began to shake more and more violently before it simply stopped. All it had taken was a single crack to that facade, one small dent to weaken the dam before it burst. Amea became the person she needed to be, the person she wanted to be.

Her hand grabbed for the force pike. It hurt and burned against her hand, but there was no turning back from this point. With a fierce tug the gamorrean thug that now stood before her lost his grip on the weapon. All too soon would he realize that it was already too late by then. Struck along his cheek by his own weapon he would fall to his knee. Trying his best to recover he threw his hand out to catch Amea by the leg but was met with nothing but a brief crack and then nothing. The tumble of a corpse and the sound of another losing their footing would seemingly echo around the room.

Amea’s hand had extended towards another man, locked in place he drifted across the room towards her and away from the older man’s back. He struggled, he tried to break free of the effects, but much like his gamorrean thug’s friend his survival impeded upon Amea’s own. Way she saw it, the world would be better of if she it wasn’t hers that was lost.

He met the powered end of her newly acquired force pike, his throat roaring into a pained screech before his unconscious body fell limp before the girl who had been pushed far past her own acceptable parameters.

Deacon // Tiland Kortun // Peyton Steele // Servant​

 

[Tiland Kortun]

"Business?" Tiland said, surprised. "I must say I do not see how my tea steeping has any impact-" He trailed off as the man spoke and the Hutt and guards began to arrive. "Ah," he said at last. A shadow collective. Sounded ominous. Certainly very dramatic as well. "One for drama, I take it." Tiland shook his head as they talked about Thyferra and the like. He knew who the Raaf was. She had been the grandmaster of the New Jedi Order and a sleeper agent for the One Sith.

He shrugged and undid the unlocked cuffs from his wrist and let them drop. "Unlocked the rest of yours as well," Tiland said simply. Beside him, a woman broke into desperate action, seemingly channeling the Force to utilize the enemy pikes against them. Worry grew in Tiland but he let it slide into the Force, grabbing the pike of the Gamorrean behind him. "I will be needing this more than you." Tiland spoke carefully, waving his fingers gently, and the alien grunted before letting go and ambling off.

It was heavier than he preferred but otherwise functioned much like his own quarterstaff. He thumbed the switch off and stepped aside as another lunged clumsily towards him. Tiland pivoted on one foot and raised an arm, just enough for it to slide under his shoulder. He dropped his arm down again, trapping it in place and pivoted with his legs, yanking it from the opponent's hand, before pivoting back to smash it against the man's side.

The alien went down, clutching the broken bone. Tiland grimaced at the thought, but didn't stop. Instead, he kept moving, flowing like the water around him as he slid and evaded the strikes.

 

[Servant]

Maneuvering the war-machine to its desired location had taken a substantial amount of effort on the part of the machine mind. Typically, it operated using primarily non-combative Host forms which were able to easily slip in and out of populated places with relative ease. Organics had a tendency to avoid such devices as a rule, subconsciously deciding that they were altogether beneath their perception unless they made a point of interrupting their routines. The Intelligence had grown quite capable of infiltration by using this social blindness to its primary tools, though that had unfortunately meant limiting its battle abilities.

The acquisition of the Imperial device from the clutches of the Sith Empire had proven to be a significant bolster to the armory of the device, allowing it to finally engage potential threats with direct force as opposed to the subterfuge it often utilized, though, there had been no reason to assume control of the Host in recent times. The survival of affiliated organic agents seemed to hang unsteadily in the balance now, though, and so it had become necessary to rouse the Host to activity and dispatch it to the location of the captured allies.

Bribes had been paid out with increasing rapidity the closer that the device neared its destination, some to the cargo technician who had caught the machine being unloaded, some to the bongo driver who allowed for its transportation under the condition that he be paid extra in advance, and some to the passing patrolman who happened to stop the droid for fear it was inbound to an assassination or terrorist plot. That one had been bribed post-incapacitation in order to soothe future operations in the area, and in the hope that the awakened officer would simply return to their place of dwelling instead of pursuing the machine.

While the Intelligence had not bothered to re-establish Host control over the mouse droid, it had dispatched further orders to tail the organics once they had been led away from the rave to their site of execution, and was thus able to simplify what would have been a resource-intensive tracking process. Just beyond the walls of the structure wherein its allies lay stood the Imperial machine, analyzing data being sent to it in real-time by the tiny mouse hiding within the confines of the room, having slipped in amidst a number of dramatic speeches and interrogatives. The Intelligence bided its time, guaranteeing that it had a firm grasp on every actor within the room and where they stood so that it could engage with perfection, minimizing the chances for retaliation.

Even with its hyper-active mind, there were a number of factors to consider, and the device had not managed to maintain all of the suitable connections which had enabled the arrival of the Host as well as the install of predictive targeting programs into the Host meaning that any such considerations had to be painstakingly considered on an individual basis with only general knowledge available on the typical movements of organics in danger. Altogether, the analysis was far less effective than it would be in another five minutes, but it seemed unlikely that the allied captives possessed that amount of time. Furthermore, the actions of a pair of the captives had turned towards active resistance, complicating the locations of known actors in their general vicinity, though it was not necessarily harmful to the efforts of the machine mind as it did mean less targets to consider overall.

Acknowledging that it needed to act rapidly, the Intelligence positioned the twin heavy blaster cannons of the wardroid at two distinct points on the wall, and promptly fired at a pair of relatively stable actors. The cannons penetrated the wall with exceptional force, the swirling balls of heated plasma zooming across the room with a crack, landing directly in the vitals of two hostile thugs. There was a whistling whine like that of a teapot at full boil as their blood steamed on contact, shrieking out of the hole created by the cannon-fire, though it was unlikely that either of the thugs ever had the opportunity to acknowledge it.

With a crimson iris, the war-droid promptly blew down the remainder of the wall, allowing itself entry into the facility and stepping inside, blasting at enemies all the while as its shield provided protection from danger.

Tiland Kortun | Amea Virou | Deacon | Peyton Steele

 

[Arbiter]

"It was not an accident."

Caedyn Arenais looked at him like he expected more details. Did all Jedi communicate so frequently? He ignored the young man and kept moving towards the crash site at a rock steady pace. The U-Wing had been nearly split in half and scattered wreckage was still smoldering but with no oxygen to sustain them the flames had long gone out. Arbiter ripped off its passenger bay door with his bare hands and climbed on board in silence.

"Two dead inside," he reported in the same emotionless tone, "I have retrieved the flight log."

ANALYZING TERRAIN.

"Blood trail," the machine pointed at the ground, "Broken seal."

He didn't need to run the probabilities to know it would lead them underground. Caves made for natural shelter. That was good. It would save him the effort of convincing the Jedi Knight to abandon his foolish quest. Any crash survivors would not have lasted long. Caedyn could only sense a vague impression from here but Arbiter knew there was something else down there waiting for them.

Something alive.

 

[Fulcrum]

The execution chamber exploded into violence and Deacon was doubled over with another punch to his gut. Time seemed to slow down as the zabrak brought both hands swinging down in a clubbing motion that would surely have laid him low. His attacker exploded in a cloud of viscera before he got the chance to follow through. Agent Darksword was thrown clear and caught a glimpse of what could only be Servant while sailing past like a ragdoll.

While the security bulkhead was metal the rest of the chamber was not. Shrapnel and stray blasts punctured several holes in the surrounding hydrostatic bubble, sending miniature waterfalls raining down on the combatants and slowly beginning to fill the room. Tiland Kortun and Amea Virou were nevertheless taking caring of themselves. In all the pandemonium he noticed a single horn making for the far exit.

"Going somewhere?" he grunted after just barely cutting the devaronian off, "End of the line, Cygnus."

"Let's talk about this, Deke. Don't make me kill you."

Deacon laughed, spat blood, and fired his needler.

Cygnus stared down at the tranq dart, mouth half open in a mixture of surprise and confusion. He looked back up at the hapan, smiled almost in relief, and fell back through the shield gap into the watery depths.

 

[Amea Virou]

Deacon // Servant // Peyton Steele // Tiland Kortun

A hole had been punched through the doors that had up until then kept the captives from escaping. Through the hole barged war-droid that by all accounts stood out to Amea. Something about it was off, but she couldn’t quite tell what it was. Regardless she had little to no ability to truly think about it. Shrapnel from its entry had hit the walls and water began to flood the chamber. Amea’s firm grasp around the force pike in her hands began to soften as piece for piece slowly disassembled and fell to the floor.

She threw the rest that lingered in her hands as far as she could and turned to make her way towards the exit. There were only so many words she cared to use right now with so many questions burning if not searing against the back of her mind. None of them were pleasant, none of them were things she wanted an answer for, yet were questions that she knew that she needed an answer for nonetheless.

Amea stopped dead in her tracks, pulled a hand through her hair as she tried to calm down to no avail.

“WHY?” She practically shrieked at the top of her lungs towards Deacon. “I was fine! I had moved on. But even after the end, the SIS keeps pulling and pushing, and taking!”

Her fingers curled into fists once more. Her arm shivered but she let it go. This man represented everything she had hated, and everything that she had lost. Even if in a cruel twist of fate unbeknownst to her he was the one that had kept her from losing the one thing that at one point had meant the most to her.

 

[Caedyn Arenais]

Objective: Stranger Things.
Location: Tibrin, Space.
Starship: The Repertoire.
Inventory: Spacer Attire, CS.38 & Lightsaber.
Arbiter

"Two dead inside, I have retrieved the flight log".
​

This wasn't looking good for the exploration unit, whatever they had been researching, something had gotten the jump on them and as Caedyn followed the stranger also on the hunt for whatever was responsible, it wasn't difficult to confirm the man's assumptions. "Damn it..." Caedyn cursed under his breath, turning his attentions to their surroundings out of caution and the desire to ensure they weren't being watched by whatever culprit was responsible for these killings.

"Blood trail, Broken seal".
​

The young Knight turned back and looked to follow in the direction Arbiter was searching. A Comet the size of the one they were positioned upon, yeah there'd be no surprises to find a cave system embedded within. This space rock was massive...

"Is it just me or do these markings not look...Like your typical scrap. This wasn't a firefight and the way their clothes are torn up..." Caedyn noted the tear's and gashes in the material weren't clean cuts but jagged and messy, ripped rather than sliced by the likes of a vibrosword or your typical melee weapon. If he had to guess, the giant rock was inhabited by something else entirely. The crew could well have died in the impact, and their clothes could have suffered for it but the state of the transport and the feeling Caedyn got from the sight of it all, it was too clumsy and seemingly improvised to be a planned ambush by the likes of pirates for example.

"Let's find the rest of them then..." Caedyn spoke up after a moments silence, moving to follow alongside his peer, his left hand resting upon the holster of his CS.38 while his right hand never strayed far from the hilt hanging from his belt.

 

[Tiland Kortun]

Tiland slipped to one side to block his companions from the sudden burst of blaster fire tearing through the walls. The room lit up with the sudden influx of plasma energy. Yet none were aimed their way. He stepped aside from a vibroblade that cut past him and rapped the wielder hard on the wrist. There was a crack and the blade bounced off the floor as the attacker sank to his knees. Tiland spun around, stolen Force-pike held across his body.

But that seemed to be the end of it. A combat droid he didn't recognize strode in, weapons still hot from the sudden onslaught, but it was on their side. Which is what surprised him more than anything else. He didn't think OPA had combat droids. But with all this talk about SIS, who knew? He had run across them a few times but had never been involved with their activity. He was a Jedi, not a spy. Yet here, it seemed he had been drawn into some years old espionage plot. And he wasn't the only one. Someone was angry.

The monk took a few moments to catch his breath and wiped his hands on his robes. "Such is the galaxy, I suppose." He gave her a gentle smile. "Life takes and takes, regardless of what we try to do for placating fate, luck, or whatever one calls it."

 

[Fulcrum]

Deacon blinked at Amea Virou and wiped the blood from his mouth.

"Lady, look at me. I'm dressed like a pirate," he glanced over to Peyton Steele , "Sorry about that by the way."

"You think I haven't looked for a way out? There is no moving on."

He remembered feeling something strange the first time he saw her. A verbal glitch. They were getting more common. Fragments of memories corrupted by experimental implants that were never meant to last this long. She could have been very dear to him once. Now she was just like anyone else. Random access memories.

"You want to kill me? Kill me," Agent Darksword stared her down, "I didn't set this trap. I didn't ask you to come here. Sorry you got in the way. Now you got about five minutes to decide before this entire place is underwater."

Ocean water flooding the chamber was already up to their knees.

 

[Amea Virou]

“I was not the one who had get out.” Amea hissed. She was practically face to face with someone who represented everything that had gone wrong at this point. Her fingers spread out in a claw-like shape that shook with tension. It would have been so easy to just act out, to do as he said and kill him right here and now.

But he was not the one who had set the trap, and there would be nothing to gain from it. His death would do little more than add another weight to the load, and as much as Amea would seek catharsis this was not the way for it.

Her arms eased up before she shook her head and turned away from Deacon. “Allyson was.”

With a sigh she let the topic go before she began to walk away. As she approached the door that the droid had blasted open it was clear that this exit had proven to be far more costly than one would have hoped. On the other end of the small corridor that led to their death chamber was another door, although it was sealed for reasons that everyone around Amea would understand.

She put her fingers to the door and closed her eyes. The people on the other side of this door would have to forgive her, but as far as dying stuck underwater went, Amea was not feeling the appeal. Slowly but surely heavy clicks and clangs would echo into the chamber as Amea began the procedure of reversing the lockdown, building an understanding of the mechanisms as she went.

Deacon Peyton Steele Tiland Kortun Servant​