Invasion The Bacta War | Sith Order Invasion of High Republic Thyferra Chapter 1

[Taiia Locke]

//: Allyson Locke //:
//: Darth Prazutis //:

​

Taiia felt Allyson before she saw her. The connection between them had been growing stronger with every step across the ruined ground, no longer the distant pull she had followed from Naboo but something close enough now that emotion bled through it without effort. Fear was there, sharp enough that Taiia felt it beneath her own skin, tangled with anger and something deeper she could not quite place. Then the bond tightened; anger tore through it. Taiia stopped.

"Allyson?"

The name escaped before she could think better of it, but no one answered. For the briefest of moments, there was only the distant roar of the battlefield and the fading echo of something terrible through the connection between them.

Then the Force went quiet.

Not gone entirely, but diminished so suddenly and so completely that Taiia felt the absence almost physically. What had always surrounded her like another sense became little more than a distant pressure at the edge of awareness, faint enough that reaching for it offered almost nothing in return. The bond she shared with Allyson disappeared with everything else.

Taiia was moving again almost immediately, an urgency in her steps now.

The closer she came to the fighting, the worse the devastation became. Smoke rolled heavily across the broken ground, burning debris scattered between shattered defensive positions and blackened earth. One transport had already fallen, the ruined vessel burning where it had struck while bodies lay scattered around it.

Her pace slowed only long enough to understand what she was seeing before continuing through the haze. Whatever had happened here had long since moved beyond anything resembling an ordinary battle. Then she saw Allyson.

Her wife was standing, but there was little about her that looked untouched. Blood stained her clothes, exhaustion pulled at every movement, and even at a distance Taiia could see the strain left behind by whatever she had already forced herself through. Opposite her stood something equally battered, though considerably larger, black armor broken in several places and marked by dark blood where Allyson's arrows had found their way through.

Prazutis.

She continued forward as his voice carried through the smoke, catching the latter half of his words as she closed the distance. Kings. Emperors. Empires that had risen and fallen around him. Titles layered one upon another, spoken with the certainty of someone who believed surviving every age had somehow made his conclusions unquestionable.

Taiia listened to every word. If even half of what he claimed was true, then he had survived things that would have broken most people long before now. But there was something else beneath it.

Pride

He spoke of pain as proof, of survival as authority, and of all those who had fallen before him as though simply remaining had placed him above them. Then his attention returned to Allyson, and something inside Taiia began to harden.

Monster.

Demon.

Dark.

He spoke of Allyson's love as though it proved his point, as though every terrible thing she had done in the name of protecting Taiia belonged naturally beside the darkness he had spent centuries embracing.

"Love does not redeem monsters. It gives them something worth becoming monstrous for."

Taiia's jaw tightened; that was the moment the anger finally found her. Not the all-consuming anger that the Sith would praise her for, the anger that consumed and devoured. The kind of anger that focused, sharpened an already skilled hand. He had spent all this time telling Allyson what she was, telling her what her love meant, turning every fear she carried against her as though he understood her better than the woman who had shared her life.

Then he charged; whatever patience Taiia had left vanished with the distance between them.

She moved.

What little remained of the Force brushed faintly against the edge of her awareness, barely enough to sharpen what she already saw, but she did not need more. His shoulders shifted, his footing changed, Xûl Qarnak came across, and the tremendous reach between them disappeared as he committed himself to Allyson. She charged into the gap between them. Where Prazutis came forward with the momentum of something built to overwhelm, Taiia moved with the grace and agility of a much smaller frame, closing the distance a fraction faster and cutting across the line of his attack.

One white blade snapped to life as Taiia crossed the few steps between them. She did not meet the weapon head-on. She caught it at an angle, turning the strike away from Allyson as she moved with the impact rather than against it, stepping inside the reach of the larger weapon before its momentum had fully carried through.

Her second saber came free almost immediately. White light ignited between them as Taiia rotated through the deflection and drove the counter toward the already damaged armor beneath his wounded shoulder.

Prazutis had met Taiia at her best the last time they spoke. Kind, gentle, and patient as the universe was old, he had met the scholar and the teacher. This was someone else entirely. He did not find the scholar, the teacher. This was a warrior, someone accustomed to war, perhaps not on the scale of the Dark Lord, but she was no stranger to it, and her skill showed it.

"You've said enough."

Her voice was low, but there was an edge beneath it that Allyson had rarely, if ever, heard directed at another person. Taiia held the narrow space between them, one blade still controlling the line of his weapon while the other threatened the opening he had created himself.

"You have no right to tell her what she deserves."

Her grip tightened.

"What loving me makes her."

The anger remained there, carefully contained, doing nothing to cloud her thoughts and everything to sharpen them.

"You have survived kings, empires, and wars. You have outlived people who thought themselves immortal."

Taiia's eyes remained fixed upon his helm.

"Good for you." Her eyes narrowed sharply. "But you have mistaken surviving everyone around you for proof of superiority." Her expression hardened further. "And now you are trying to kill my wife." The white blades hummed between them. Taiia had patience for much of what the galaxy threw at her, but there was always a line that could not be crossed.

Not philosophy.

Not titles.

Not Sith and Jedi.

Allyson

Taiia stepped closer rather than yielding the space.

"You do not know her."

Her voice dropped further.

"I do."

 

[Seren Gwyn]

Objective: 1
Allies: SO and their allies Tobias Dib
Enemies: THR, their allies

Seren followed with considerably less pride involved in the decision than there might have been several minutes earlier. Her shoulder still throbbed viciously from striking the pylon, and although the worst of the darkness had retreated from her vision, every careless movement sent another pulse of pain through the joint and down her arm. When Troigs released her at last, some part of Seren relaxed despite everything surrounding them. She had understood why he had held her and why he had pushed her beneath shelter, but understanding did not make captivity sit any more comfortably against instincts that had spent years teaching her never to surrender control of her own body. His promise that he was honorbound to see her safely to the prison transport caught her more deeply than she expected, however, and Seren looked at him for a moment before her gaze shifted toward Voidstar still hanging from his belt. She had given him her surrender. He had accepted it. Somewhere amid infected water, burning corridors, and things that had once been people hunting through the refinery, those two promises had become strangely important. "I remember." There was little more to say, so Seren stayed close and followed him through the corridor.

When they encountered the broken pipe, she waited exactly as instructed. The contaminated spray filled the passage ahead, striking both walls and leaving nowhere for her to pass safely, and Seren's stomach tightened at the sight. She watched Troigs remove his robe and step directly into it, creating a narrow shelter with his own body and the fabric, and for perhaps half a heartbeat she simply stared. Then sense returned and she moved when he gave her the opening, slipping through as quickly as her battered body allowed without touching the water. Only after reaching the other side did she look back, watching him emerge in soaked armor and rid himself of the contaminated cloth. She didn't thank him, not because she wasn't grateful, but because the words felt strangely inadequate when spoken to the man currently escorting her into captivity. The contradiction was becoming increasingly difficult to ignore. He was her captor, yet since accepting her surrender he had repeatedly placed himself between Seren and things considerably more dangerous than imprisonment.

They continued through the refinery, Seren gradually settling into the strange rhythm of following the Jedi's lead while resisting the instinct to anticipate dangers herself. It became considerably harder when they reached another intersection. Troigs checked ahead while she remained back, and she saw enough in the shifting blue illumination to understand that they had found more of the creatures. Her hand almost moved toward the place Voidstar should have occupied before she remembered that it was no longer hers to reach for. The realization left her feeling exposed, but not helpless. She still had the Force. She still had the shadows that had answered her for years, the instincts that warned her of danger before ordinary senses could recognize it, and the connection to something infinitely larger than the battered body currently struggling to keep pace through a ruined refinery.

Then she didn't.

Seren stopped breathing as the Force disappeared. There was no warning she understood, and no gradual weakening that would have allowed her mind to adjust. One moment it existed around and within her as it always had, threaded through every living thing and filling spaces that ordinary senses could never perceive. She could feel the darkness she had learned to shape, the quiet promise of shadow at the edge of thought, and beneath all of it that vast presence that had accompanied her for so much of her life that she could scarcely remember what existence had felt like before she knew its name. The next moment there was nothing, and Seren reached instinctively before thought could catch up with the sudden emptiness.

Nothing answered.

Her amber eyes widened as she tried again, harder this time. She reached for shadow, for the familiar darkness that had answered her through fear and anger and loneliness, through everything she had survived since walking away from the Jedi, but there was nothing there to grasp. She searched farther, desperately seeking any trace of the lives around her, the malformed creatures approaching through the corridor, Troigs standing only a few steps away, anything that might prove the universe beyond her ordinary senses still existed. "No..." The word slipped out before Seren realized she had spoken, and suddenly her shoulder, the infected water, and even Voidstar hanging from another person's belt seemed insignificant beside the enormity of what had been taken from her.

Her heart slammed hard against her ribs as she reached again, refusing what every failed attempt was telling her. There had to be something. A thread, a whisper, the faintest residue of connection that she could seize and hold until she understood what was happening, but the emptiness remained absolute. For one horrifying instant, Seren wondered whether it was her, whether something inside her had finally broken. She had changed allegiances, abandoned teachings she once considered immutable, touched darkness she had once been taught to fear, and eventually accepted parts of herself that the woman she had once been might never have recognized. Through all of it, the Force had remained. Light or darkness, Jedi or Sith, frightened girl or grown woman, it had always been there. Even when she questioned everything else about herself, that connection had been one certainty she had never needed to examine.

Now she could not feel it, and once Seren understood that she could not feel anyone either, one name rose above everything else.

Varin.

She reached for him without thinking, searching past the refinery and the horror surrounding her for the familiar presence she had come to know almost as intimately as her own. Some irrational part of her expected distance not to matter. If she reached deeply enough, desperately enough, surely there would be something waiting for her. A thread of familiarity, a warmth at the edge of perception, the faintest impression that Varin Mortifer still existed somewhere beneath the same stars. Instead, Seren encountered precisely the same emptiness, and her breath caught painfully as fear found somewhere deeper to settle.

Logic insisted that his absence meant nothing. Troigs stood only a few steps away, and she could not feel him. Creatures were approaching through the corridor, and she could not feel them either. Whatever had happened was too sudden, too complete, and too vast to belong to her alone, which meant being unable to sense Varin was not evidence that something had happened to him. Her fear did not care. Seren had lost people before. She knew the terrible finality of someone being there and then simply not being there anymore, and the emptiness answering her now was close enough to that old wound that reason struggled to separate one from the other. "Varin..." His name barely escaped her, spoken so quietly that she was not certain whether she meant to say it aloud at all.

Troigs was moving toward her now, ushering her backward toward the depression in the wall, and Seren went because she barely trusted her legs enough to do anything else. His whispered instructions reached her through the pounding of blood in her ears. Close your eyes. Find your center. Do not be afraid. Let everything drift away. Under any other circumstances, the directions would have been almost painfully familiar. Seren had spent years learning variations of those same lessons, first among the Jedi and later through practices considerably darker, but every meditation she knew began with awareness. Breath. Body. The Force. The understanding that she existed within something infinitely larger than herself. Now Troigs was asking her to find a center within a universe that had abruptly become terrifyingly small.

He guided her into the recess and placed himself between her and the corridor, his armored body blocking her from whatever approached. Seren pressed herself back against the wall and closed her eyes because he had told her to, because she had surrendered, and because despite everything else she understood that he was trying to keep her alive. Without the Force, however, she had nothing except the immediate physical world upon which to anchor herself. Air entered her lungs and left them again. Her wounded shoulder burned. Her boots remained planted against the floor. Troigs's armor was a physical presence close enough that she could hear the faintest movement from him, while somewhere beyond came the scrape and wet shuffle of things moving through the corridor. Things she could no longer sense coming.

That realization nearly shattered what little control Seren had recovered. Her fingers trembled before she slowly curled them into her palms, concentrating on the pressure of nails against skin because at least that sensation still belonged to her. She had relied upon precognition and instinct shaped by the Force for years. She had felt danger before seeing it, perceived lives beyond walls, reached into shadows and made them answer. Now the darkness surrounding them was merely darkness. If one of those creatures came around the corner, Seren would know only when her eyes or ears told her, and that vulnerability was more frightening than she would ever have expected. She had spent so much of her life thinking of herself through the Force that its absence left her feeling stripped down to something fragile and painfully ordinary.

She had never felt so terribly, completely human.

The creatures passed, yet Seren remained motionless even after their footsteps had faded because she no longer possessed another sense with which to confirm they were truly gone. She had to trust Troigs for that, and the irony was not lost on her. The Jedi who had taken her prisoner was no longer merely the person responsible for delivering her safely into captivity. Without Voidstar, without the Force, injured badly enough that running was questionable and surrounded by creatures that could transform her through something as innocuous as contaminated water, Seren was dependent upon him in a way that made something deep inside her recoil. Still, she did not move. Troigs had given her no reason since accepting her surrender to believe that his promise of getting her safely through this place meant anything less than exactly what he had said.

Eventually Seren opened her eyes, amber finding whatever little light remained in the corridor, but she did not reach for the Force again. She wanted badly enough that resisting became an effort in itself. Every instinct begged her to test the emptiness one more time, to discover that this had been some momentary aberration and feel the universe rush back into all the places suddenly left hollow, but beneath that desire waited the fear of encountering nothing again. "I can't feel it." Her voice was very quiet as she looked down at her own hands and opened them, almost as though she expected the answer to somehow be written across her palms. They looked exactly the same. Everything did. That seemed almost offensive. Something that had been part of her for most of her life had disappeared, and the physical universe had continued without hesitation.

Varin remained lodged painfully at the center of that silence. Seren knew better than to interpret what she could not feel as proof of anything, yet knowing better did remarkably little to help. She had finally allowed herself to imagine something beyond survival with him, something as dangerously ordinary as the home they had spoken of sharing on Carcosa, gardens they could tend together, meals, conversations, arguments over things that did not matter, and mornings when neither of them had somewhere else they needed to be. She had crossed the galaxy for him once because the possibility of losing him had been unbearable, and somewhere along the way she had stopped pretending that what she felt could be contained within anything smaller than love.

Now she could not even tell whether he was safe.

The thought frightened her far more than captivity did. Seren hated not knowing whether Varin was all right, hated that she could not reach toward him and find even the faintest reassurance, and hated the terrible little part of her mind already constructing all the reasons he might never know what had happened to her on Thyferra or why she had disappeared into Republic custody without returning. There were things she still wanted to tell him, promises they had only begun to make real, and an entire future that had seemed almost frighteningly possible before she came here. She had spent so long protecting herself from wanting things she could lose that allowing herself to want that life with Varin had required more courage than she liked admitting. Having even the illusion of connection to him suddenly ripped away made the price of that vulnerability painfully clear.

Seren drew another careful breath and forced her attention back toward the corridor, back toward the pain in her shoulder, Troigs standing nearby, and the immediate necessity of getting out of the refinery alive. Varin was beyond her reach, but she could not allow herself to turn that absence into grief for something she did not know she had lost. Whatever had happened to the Force had swallowed everything around her equally, and until she had evidence to the contrary, she would have to believe that somewhere beyond this nightmare, Varin remained exactly where he had been before the universe went silent.

For now, Seren would have to trust that the silence was only silence.

 

[Daegon Corvinus]

WEARING: This | WEAPONS: Lightsaber
ALLIES: Seraphina Corvinus | Jaun Smyth | ENEMIES: Tobias Dib​

Daegon listened without interrupting, though the Senator managed to say several things that made the exercise increasingly difficult. Multiple pathogens were now confirmed, one capable of twisting living beings into the things Daegon had sensed beyond the bunker, and the Republic's scientists were still searching for an answer that did not yet exist.

Then Smyth called the spread negligible.

Daegon's expression barely changed. The Senator's conclusion rested upon Xucphra's stores remaining secure, which told Daegon more about Smyth's desire for reassurance than it did about the scope of the attack. His corporation represented a considerable portion of Thyferra's bacta industry, certainly, but it did not represent every farm, refinery, independent producer, village reservoir, or municipal system across the planet.

"My stores being secure tells us precisely that, Senator. Xucphra's stores are secure. It does not tell us that multiple engineered pathogens are negligible."

A notification flashed silently across the datapad before him, and Daegon glanced down long enough for the contents to pull his attention away from Smyth. Sith aircraft had broken toward Xucphra holdings in the city, targeting corporate infrastructure directly. Power systems, research facilities, personnel centers, and production assets had all appeared among the incoming target profiles.

The attack had not found an undefended corporation. Xucphra had existed through too many governments, invasions, and promises of lasting peace for Daegon to build its infrastructure around the assumption that someone else would always protect it. Automated countermeasures had responded the moment hostile trajectories were identified, point-defense systems saturating the approaches around critical facilities while hardened shields sealed research and production sites beneath overlapping defensive envelopes. Emergency power grids isolated threatened sectors before damage could cascade into the larger network, while corporate security directed personnel toward protected areas and anti-air emplacements forced attacking craft to contend with a far more difficult approach than their planners had likely anticipated.

There would be damage, because Daegon had expected that from the moment the invasion began, but there would not be devastation if Xucphra's defenses continued to perform as designed. A second update confirmed several attacks had been intercepted outright, others had broken against shielding, and those that reached corporate property had been confined largely to exterior or redundant systems. Production capacity had suffered disruption rather than catastrophic loss, and the personnel shelters beneath the larger complexes remained intact.

Heaven's Gate reported much the same. The mountain estate had been built by a man who remembered what war had already done to Thyferra, and its defensive grid had recognized incoming threats long before they reached the Crystal Forest. Shields settled over the mountain while concealed anti-air systems tracked anything foolish enough to approach, and the armored structure beneath the residence absorbed what little force reached it. Whatever violence moved across the surrounding region, Heaven's Gate remained secure.

Daegon released a slow breath and dismissed the reports before returning his attention to Smyth.

"I appreciate the gunships. Have their commander establish contact with Xucphra security before entering our defensive envelope. Our systems are already engaging hostile aircraft, and I would prefer Republic pilots not discover how indiscriminate automated identification can become during an active attack."

There was no sarcasm in the acceptance. The Republic's support was useful, but Xucphra's defenses would remain under Xucphra authority.

The Senator's next observation was considerably less useful.

Daegon allowed Smyth to finish questioning how two people supposedly removed from galactic politics could know so much about Quinn Varanin before he answered. Seraphina had already explained why they had withdrawn from public life, and Daegon had no intention of making her recount the price they had paid simply because Smyth found their awareness inconvenient.

"You are correct about one thing, Senator. It has been some time since I involved myself directly in galactic politics. The last political office I held was Vicelord of the Confederacy of Independent Systems."

There was no pride in the statement. It was simply a fact.

"Retirement from that arena was a choice, not a loss of capacity. I did not stop understanding diplomacy because I stopped participating in it publicly, nor did I suddenly become incapable of separating verifiable events from political spin. My wife has already explained why we chose to leave that life behind."

The word quibbling bothered Daegon more than the implication that he was uninformed, not because he cared whether Smyth respected his political analysis, but because Seraphina had been sitting beside him trying to understand why her home was burning while people beyond these walls screamed. There was something particularly distasteful about reducing that concern to an inconvenient political disagreement.

"If your concern is that we are attempting to justify the Sith invasion, we are not. Whatever grievances preceded this attack do not excuse what is being done to Thyferra. Acknowledging that does not require us to pretend nothing preceded it."

Daegon left the distinction there. Seraphina had already expressed the more important question by asking whether anything that brought the Sith here could also be used to make them leave.

He did not possess her instinctive faith in peace. Daegon knew too much about the people conducting this war, and perhaps understood too well the kind of ambition capable of bringing an army through the Blackwall once the decision had already been made. Even so, he did not dismiss her suggestion.

"If there is a credible avenue to stop this without feeding more Thyferrans into the fighting, I want to know about it. I do not particularly care whether the solution satisfies anyone's pride. If there is a diplomatic channel capable of shortening this war, use it."

That did not mean surrender. It meant Daegon valued Thyferran lives more than proving which government had the stronger argument.

The sound outside shifted again, automatic blasterfire briefly replacing the pounding against whatever defenses separated the bunker from the transformed creatures beyond it. Smyth's explanation did little to make Daegon more comfortable with what waited there. Seraphina had heard something before they ever reached this room, a body changing without the mercy of dying while it happened, and Daegon had felt the result through the Force.

Now Smyth wanted Xucphra security to counterattack.

Daegon's brow rose slightly.

"You have just informed us that your scientists do not yet understand multiple pathogens, that at least one changes people into those creatures outside, and that a cure does not currently exist. Your next proposal is that I order my personnel into an offensive operation."

His gaze shifted briefly toward the Colonel before returning to Smyth.

"Xucphra security will defend our people, our facilities, and any civilians they can safely reach. They will coordinate with Republic forces where doing so advances those objectives, but they will not be sent blindly into an unknown biological hazard because someone has decided a counterattack sounds decisive."

Daegon was already thinking through what would be required before committing them further. Sealed armor, independent air supplies, decontamination protocols, routes that avoided compromised systems, confirmation of transmission vectors, and command channels that could not contradict Xucphra's own security leadership all mattered now.

"We need to know how these pathogens spread before we increase exposure. Airborne, bloodborne, waterborne, contact, ingestion. I want your scientists sharing everything they learn with Xucphra immediately. If the Colonel wants corporate security involved in offensive operations, then the Colonel and my security command can build something based upon actual intelligence."

Another report arrived, and this one gave Daegon pause. The message had come from Xucphra systems monitoring disruptions near the industrial regions. Emergency infrastructure was behaving irregularly, and water systems had been flagged amid reports of rapid biological changes among exposed personnel. The data remained fragmentary enough that Daegon refused to treat correlation as certainty, but it was enough to alter his priorities.

"Add municipal and industrial water networks to the containment review. I want Xucphra facilities isolated from external water feeds until someone can confirm they are clean. Internal reserves only, and shut automated sprinklers off from shared supply where alternative suppression systems exist."

The precautions would be expensive, but Daegon did not care. He would rather lose facilities to fire than employees to whatever had been manufactured here.

Only then did his attention shift toward the underside of the conference table.

Seraphina had asked about the button, and Daegon had learned early in their marriage that when his wife noticed something he did not, the correct response was not to explain it away. Her world was assembled through information most people ignored, so Daegon simply looked at Smyth and waited for the Senator to answer her.

Another concussion passed through the earth beneath them, and Daegon's gaze flickered upward. The fighting was moving closer. Seraphina had already noticed it, and he trusted her hearing more than any vague reassurance distance might have offered. The transformed presences beyond the defenses still scraped unpleasantly against the edge of his awareness while somewhere above them Thyferra continued to burn beneath a war that none of the people in this room could afford to treat as an academic argument.

There would be time to decide who had been right, to calculate what Xucphra had lost, and to determine precisely who would pay for rebuilding it. There might even be time to revisit every political decision that had brought them to this room, but Daegon wanted something considerably simpler first.

"Contain the outbreak, protect the civilians, and keep the roads to the shelters open. Xucphra will support all three. Once we know what exposure does and how it spreads, then we can discuss how many of my people you would like me to send hunting Sith."

His attention settled on Smyth once more.

"And Senator, as my wife asked, I am also curious… what does that button do?"

 

[Judah Lesan]

WEARING: Robes
WEAPONS: 2 Lightsabers
ALLIES: Lorn Reingard | Acier Moonbound
ENEMIES: Srina Talon | Mercy

Judah discovered there were worse things than being unable to remember what he wanted to say. Being physically prevented from saying it ranked considerably higher.

The industrial filament moved before he fully understood what Srina intended. Thin strands rose around him with an almost delicate precision, and the realization came only when the first length pierced flesh. Judah jerked instinctively, but the invisible pressure holding his head made resistance difficult. The wire crossed his mouth again and again, drawing tighter until his lips were forced together beneath a cruel lattice of silver. The remaining filament wound around his torso and limbs, crossing back over itself until the thin metallic strands formed a tightening mesh around him. Every attempt to pull free only encouraged the wire to bite deeper, turning movement itself into punishment while Srina cinched the improvised restraint around him.

Judah stared at her with an expression that managed to communicate an impressive amount of profanity without requiring his mouth to participate. Apparently she had finally found a solution to both his talking and his unfortunate habit of going places she did not want him to go. He would have been offended if it had not hurt so much.

Eventually Judah forced himself to stop struggling. The wire was already cutting into him, and fighting it without a plan accomplished little beyond giving Srina exactly what she wanted. She had taken his voice and restricted his movement, but unfortunately for her, neither did anything to repair the collection of loose thoughts rattling around inside his skull.

Acier was still speaking, and Judah listened. The younger Jedi did not retreat from either part of himself when Srina tried to choose between them for him. Verd and Jedi. Both. Judah could respect that much. Acier went on to explain what kept him on Thyferra, insisting he was not fighting for the Republic or placing blind faith in the Jedi Order, but for the ordinary people who would suffer if the bacta stopped moving.

That Judah understood, but the concession buried beneath everything else Acier had said about Ghorman remained something Judah could not accept. His eyes moved toward Lorn, who seemed almost impatient with the discussion and eager to return to the fight. Judah did not need agreement from him, nor did he particularly need an explanation. Lorn had killed the woman. Whatever calculation had surrounded that choice did not change it.

Judah looked back toward Acier. If the kid could understand why that choice had been made, then there was still something between them Judah could not bridge with a blue blade and a declaration of being a Jedi. He would have said so, but Srina had made certain he could not.

Then the universe changed.

Judah felt the Force disappear before he fully understood what was happening. There was no gradual weakening and no sense of distance opening between himself and something familiar. One moment the Force existed beneath thought and breath, woven through everything around him even when his damaged mind struggled to touch it properly, and the next moment there was nothing.

Panic came immediately. The connection had only recently begun to feel like his again, one of the few things Judah could still recognize without questioning whether the memory attached to it was real. Now it was simply gone. He reached for it instinctively and found an emptiness so complete that his stomach turned.

For one disorienting instant Judah assumed Srina had found another way inside him, but then he noticed her. Srina had changed. Mercy had too. Whatever had happened, it had reached all of them.

That realization brought another, and this one mattered far more. Srina was gone from his head. Not physically, unfortunately, because she remained plainly visible across the refinery, but the presence pressing against the damaged places in his mind had vanished. The invisible touch holding his head still disappeared, the pain she had twisted beyond its natural limits collapsed back into the injuries Judah had actually earned, and the filament around his body stopped tightening.

The metal did not disappear, and his lips remained sewn shut, but for the first time since Srina had wrapped him in it, the restraint was only metal.

Judah tested the restraint once Srina's control vanished. The filament no longer tightened when he moved, but that did not make him free. His arms were still pinned against his body, his legs remained caught in the metallic weave, and the wire through his lips had gone nowhere.

He shifted his weight and nearly collapsed when pain answered from half a dozen places at once. Without the Force there was nothing helping him ignore any of it. Judah steadied himself against the machinery and looked for something he could use without needing his hands.

A damaged maintenance housing nearby had been split open during the fighting, leaving part of its cutting assembly exposed.

That would have to do.

Judah worked himself toward it a few inches at a time, dragging one foot and leaning heavily against whatever would hold his weight. When he finally reached the exposed cutter, he turned carefully and pressed the filament wrapped across his arm against the edge.

There was nothing elegant about sawing himself free with refinery equipment.

It took several attempts before the first strand parted.

The sudden slack gave Judah enough room to wrench one arm loose. Pain shot through his shoulder when he pulled it free, but now he had a hand.

That changed things.

Judah reached for the maintenance tools beside the damaged housing and found a compact plasma cutter. With one arm free, he could finally start working through the rest of the filament properly, burning through the sections around his torso and legs until the mesh loosened enough for him to try and stagger clear.

His lips remained sewn shut.

That particular problem could wait.

 

[Jaun Smyth]

Senator of Thyferra
Xucphra City - Government Offices​

"Ray shields," Jaun replied placidly, then pointed a finger at the blast door to the bunker beyond which they had heard that atrocious thumping sound. "Just in case."

Another chorus of blasterfire.

The pounding stopped. Again.

The datapad chimed and Smyth glanced at it. "Hmm, the other infections appear to be the technovirus and the Rakghoul plague as well. Thankfully whenever-"

Suddenly, he stumbled over his words as he felt a loss of connection, as though one of his senses had suddenly gone blind. Then his datapad chimed again to alert him that their secret weapon had been deployed to its full capabilities.

"Ah. How serendipitous." Jaun held up a finger to forestall the questions, "I expect the Republic's device - classified before you ask for more information - will render those two strains inert. They are Force borne infections and we are currently without the Force."

More chiming, a constant ping of notifications. Jaun's eyebrows rose.

"Across the entire planet, in fact."

Colonel Varanid approached, side-eyeing the Corvinuses before continuing. "Senator, the counter-offensives are in full effect against Sith landing sites. The Republic relief fleet has arrived and engaged Sith forces in orbit. It appears that the Commonwealth has joined the fray on the side of the Sith, but they have opened up corridors for our civilians and medical supplies to escape. The Sith are now trapped on the planet without the Force, cut-off from resupply, and surrounded by our forces."

The Colonel thumped a fist into his palm. "They're going to pay for all the lives they've taken today."

Jaun smiled toothlessly. "Good. Thank you, Colonel."

Turning back to the two Corvinuses, Jaun's smile remained, "Mr. Corvinus, with the Sith incursion on its way to being snuffed out, I believe you summed up the remaining tasks very well. Contain the outbreak, protect the civilians, and keep the roads to shelters open, yes? Colonel, can you task those gunships to open comms with the Xucphra Corp.'s security?"

Jaun summoned an aide with a handwave.

"Please get Mr. Corvinus' team involved with the checkpoint management, cordon establishment, and containment protocols."

The senator turned back to the guests.

"Thank you very much for Xucphra's assistance. Together, we will be able to save countless lives from these Sith atrocities."

Daegon Corvinus Seraphina Corvinus Mantys Thranx

 

[William Thule]

In Brightest Day
In Blackest Night

ALAZHI FIELDS​

Once that was sent off, he pulled up a message he had prepared in advance to be sent across the members of the The Jedi Order that had deployed here, knowing the artifact had a high likelihood of being activated.

A moment's warning. Just a flash through the Force relayed throughout the Jedi forces already engaged in the field. And then in an instant, William felt the Force vanish. There was an ache in his chest, like the loss of an old friend, as all of his extrasensory abilities derived from the Force simply disappeared. The superconducting loop of his own inner turmoil evaporated.

So too did the darkness conjured by these occultists around them, burning away like fog beneath a system's star's first light. And in the brightness of the day, William watched the Sith come apart.

Dark eyes looked on with a hardness as he watched two of their number collapse, the woman and the masked male with whom he crossed blades. The male rose. The woman did not.

The last of the droids rushed to stand around Him, two standing guard with one firing at the soldiers and another shot towards the Jedi whilst the third knelt down to inspect Him. It reached for its commlink but His gloved hand caught it before it could tap any buttons. "We finish the mission first."

Lina was gone.

William's shock at how weak they seemed without the Dark Side to sustain them turned to pity. In an effort to prolong their lives and accumulate power beyond comprehension, they had corrupted themselves entirely. Without it they were nothing, frail and dying.

Overhead, William saw a flash of movement, heard the whine of engines, and saw the explosions left in their wake as the Republic starfighters strafed the landed Sith forces yet again - stranded now without their shuttles. Blaster bolts continued to exchange between the Republic and Sith forces. William reflexively held up his lightsaber to parry away a bolt of plasma. Foolish.

The bolt winged him in the left arm, burning through his robes and flesh beneath with a searing heat and a pain that he could not dampen with the Force. The Jedi Master let out a gasp of pain.

"Andromeda," he looked to her in his pain, worried for her safety, then saw a beast erupt from the water toward her.

No.

"Omen, help her!"

The Republic sergeant moved up to assist Andromeda, but in the fields all around lay Vratix bodies and some Republic troopers even as those who remained fought on.

Republic troopers opened fire, two of them firing with pinpoint accuracy at the droids clustering around the Sith Lord to gun them down.

William looked back toward the Sith before him and pointed with his blade at the still standing Darth and assumed a stance that he'd learned even from before even the Jedi training, that of a saber rake with his lightfoil.

"Your invasion is over, Darth," William pronounced, his tone full of sorrow and pain as he saw what had become of these Sith even as William angled his body so that he presented his right shoulder and indigo blade only to the Sith.

"Surrender and we will render you medical aid."

Lina Ovmar Darth Strosius Andromeda Demir

 

[Sibylla Abrantes]

​

Zaltin Corporation's Production Facility
Interacting with: Quinn Varanin
Items: x | x | x | x | x | x | x | x | x

Sibylla had seen people die before. The horrors of Corellia where the Imperial Elite @Remova had ensured that. She knew what war did to flesh and what terror did to people when civilization collapsed beneath it. Acier Moonbound had told her time and again of the horrors those with the Force could do to twist and kill and lash out and kill dozens, hundreds. She had lived through the surrealness of the World between Worlds, where Set and Vere had dominated the landscape and almost destroyed a world, but it had been blurred into a series of ethereal flashbacks and memories that felt more like a dream than reality.

But Sibylla had never seen anything like this.

Through the narrow viewport of the barricaded room, Sibylla watched Quinn carve through the dead with terrible precision. Lightning ripped through ruined bodies while the silver point of her spear flashed between them, carrying with it the acrid, burning scent of flesh and copper metallic blood. Then the thin strands of gold spilled from Quinn and threaded themselves through the horde, winding around limbs and throats before sinking beneath rotting flesh.

The sight was grotesque as it was nauseating with stench as the creatures stopped as they seized -- but it didn't prepare Sibylla for the screams. It wasn't just the guttural cries of the infected, but the sort of keening, eviscerating, tortured sound that crawled deep from the belly and made every single hair stand on end over Sibylla's skin and shards of ice dig down her spine in utter trepidation. Every instinct within Sibylla made her want to recoil from the grotesque picture of it all.

Bodies withered where they stood, their flesh a blackened, scored mess against bone. From some, Sibylla could have sworn she saw pale shapes wrench themselves free, clawing desperately at the air as those golden threads dragged them toward Quinn -- into Quinn.

This is the power of the Dark Side.

Quinn's own words returned with sickening clarity, resonating within the shell of Sibylla's ears, unable to help how her own grip tightened around her blaster and comm that was still trying to connect to Aurelian. She would have called what the Sith did to these people sacrilegious, yet Sibylla could find no other word for what she was witnessing now. Whatever remained inside those creatures was being taken from them, and somehow Quinn seemed stronger... no more powerful for it.

And when the last body collapsed into brittle bone, the stench of death, burnt flesh, and sanguine copper seemed to cover everything. Everyone on. For one terrible heartbeat, Sibylla forgot the fleet overhead, the bombardment, even the creatures hunting them.

She simply stared at Quinn... and Sibylla was afraid of her.

The realization sickened her almost as much as what she had witnessed, because now Ace's words echoed in her mind regarding the brutality of the sith... and he was right. Yet this was Quinn. The woman who had saved her on Moorja. The woman who had shielded her from the blast only minutes ago. There was such a cacophony of chaos and tumultuous emotions that there was no way for Sibylla to even linger on just one emotion.

Silence followed, broken only by Sibylla's quick breathing and the distant thunder of war beyond the walls. The barricade shifted and Sibylla's blaster snapped toward the doorway before recognition stopped her finger upon the trigger. It was Quinn, her white blonde hair matted against her face and that formally pristine white armor now slick with black ichor. With death.

"I'm sorry. I just -- "

And as if it was Set playing things into motion, everything stretched into a sickening eternity even as the moment happened far too quickly, each fractured second sharpening into something Sibylla could see but could not yet comprehend. Then instinct struck first, cold and vicious, twisting through her gut before her mind could give the horror a name as she felt her stomach dropped.

The snap-hiss of a crackle of green saber that crackled to life, and how it then erupted through Quinn's abdomen.

"No-o!" Sibylla screamed, but by then Quinn had turned and with a sickening crack the creature's head struck the floor, the lightsaber clattering onto the ground. Whatever fear Sibylla had felt vanished beneath the need to help Quinn, canceling the comm call and clipping it back onto her hip. Suddenly, the roles were reversed.

"Quinn!" Sibylla shot forward, catching her before her knees could completely give way and hooking an arm around the Echani's waist, the acrid scent of smoke curling upward from the cauterized wound.

"It's gone..."

"What?" Then Sibylla noticed just how much smaller Quinn seemed. Her face blanched and her expression was carved with a terror Sibylla had not seen even when the dead began walking. Then it clicked. She meant the Force.

Quinn had been cut off from the Force.

The cold shards of fear and alarm twisted in her belly at the dawning realization that Quinn no longer could feel the Force... wait.. did... this this mean that the artifact was able to expand to such an expansive range? They'd been testing its abilities, but that it could sweep across an entire world and its system was just beyond...

The risk and consequences were unknown.

Suddenly Quinn's accusations returned with considerably more weight.

What about the Jedi? What if Adelle was out there?

And for an instant Sibylla imagined her friend somewhere amid the horrors outside, reaching for the Force only to find nothing there and there was no helping how Sibylla felt her stomach drop. She thought back to how Adelle Bastiel had fought during her Verdgotten. How powerful she could fight with the Force. How the Healer would use it to help others. Part of her, the rational part of her that was struggling, would try to remind her that Adelle was a Corellian but also a Mandalorian. She did not need to depend on the Force, but it was also a part of her as much as Phantom was a part of her.

But that didn't mean others would have the back up skills they needed. How would healers be able to heal mid battle if suddenly they had been cut off. For those injured, for those being defended. There was honestly too many variables to put the time into thinking over right now.

At this time Sibylla did not know enough; she did not know who had ordered the artifact activated, its range, or what Republic Command faced beyond these walls. She would not condemn them upon assumptions any more than she would defend them through ignorance -- and more importantly, right here right now, Quinn was wounded in her arms.

A guttural howl sounded beyond the corridor. Another answered before the facility shook beneath a violent THOOM, dust raining down as the lights died. A heartbeat later crimson emergency illumination flooded the passage.

Quinn's shaking hand found hers as she uttered that as much as she wanted to hate her, she wasn't going to let her die. No one deserves to die like this. That they had to go.

All at once, Moorja flashed through Sibylla's memory. The smoke, the fire, how Quinn dragging her through another world falling apart. Now it was Thyferra.

Whatever Sibylla had just witnessed, whatever frightened her about the woman before her, Quinn had barricaded Sibylla somewhere safe and walked alone into a horde her own people had created... Quinn had come back for her. Again.

"Come on. I got you." Sibylla grunted out to Quinn as she took the woman's hand and then ducked beneath Quinn's arm to hauled it across her shoulders. The sudden weight nearly buckled her knees, but Sibylla gritted her teeth and forced herself upright.

"You have done quite enough dragging me across doomed planets. This time, I am helping you." She uttered out, her free hand lifting her blaster as something scraped against the corridor behind them, and Sibylla sent another volley of bolts as she began to head towards the space pads where her diplomatic vessel had been stationed.

Quinn had wanted an answer about Adelle, about the sacrifices and consequences, and whether Sibylla could live with someone else paying the price for her survival. There would be time for answers if they survived.

"Whatever you wish to accuse me of," Sibylla breathed as she forced them forward, "you may do it when neither of us is actively in danger of being eaten."

A howl answered.

"Move." and they did. As the part struggled along the corridor, their shadowy figures were cast on the foreground of the wide transparent steel viewport, showing the ramifications of the Sith attack as Thyferra burned. Starfighters screamed between evacuation transports while Republic formations collided with Sith vessels overhead. Turbolaser fire cut through the smoke-blackened horizon, and somewhere beneath it all clone forces fought against the infected blight spreading across the surface.

Something lurched into the corridor behind them and Sibylla twisted and fired. Brilliant green bolts illuminated the darkness with their streaks, hitting one creature as it fell, but another kept coming.

"Blast it!" She fired again and dragged Quinn onward, trying her best not to let the agony of not being able to connect to Aurelian Veruna earlier cause her to fall further into panic and fear. But there was no helping how that knock at her throat tightened. Where was he? Was he with the artifact? Was he at Theed? There was precious little seconds to even check her personal comm to confirm or even consider what to do next but think of their survival.

Unknowingly, above Thyferra, amid fleets and fire, Sibylla had no idea her beloved had been the one to fully fuel his rage into the artifact not just as his desperate attempt to turn the tides come hell or highwater, regardless of the consequences and risks -- but because the mere thought of her dying amidst the chaos had channeled the one utmost terrible fear and vulnerabilty the King of Naboo had. One he had in the past not had to even bother considering being a chink in his armor -- one that she now was.

Do the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few? Of the one?

Another shriek echoed behind them and Sibylla raised her blaster, gold flecks glinting in utter determination within her hazel eyes. There would be time later to decide whether Quinn was right. Whether the Republic had crossed a line. Whether Sibylla could ever reconcile the woman who had repeatedly saved her life with the horror she had just watched consume the dead. Right now there was only Quinn's weight against her shoulder, the blaster in her hand, and the corridor ahead.

"Come on."

Sibylla tightened her arm around Quinn.

"We are getting off this blasted planet."

 

["Ariel"]

Reckoning
ON THE GROUND
THYFERRA

Omega Squad Every Day Gear Locations

• [Michael, [Gabriel, [Raguel, [Raphael, [Jeremiel, [Connel [Sariel, [VIGILANT REAPER [
  [Any text in brackets signifies comm-link usage and not face to face conversation]
• 
  Rides
  
  • "Enterprise" Station Ship
  • Vigilant Reaper
  • Null Vector
  • Speederbike
  • Iron Psalm
  Gear/Armor
  
  
  • Gear(“Bodycam” Datapad, UAD Drone, link to Seraphim AI included)
  • Lightblaster
  • Shortsabers (“Night” and “Day”)
  • 5 Throwing Lightknives
  • 3 Force Blinding Flashbangs
  • RI-17 Rifle-w-MS-0412 Grenade Launcher
  SURGICAL - CRYBERNETIC IMPLANTS
  
  • Repli Implants that would be for the limbs
  • Bonemer enhancements to strengthen structure of the body
  • Muscle enhancements.
  • Hemo enhancements for blood flow
  • Hawkeye implants for eyes
  • Advanced Medical Implant
  • Scentzy
  • Injected Nanotech upgrades
  
  
  
• Shadow Sanctuary - Enterprise

The weakest person in the room was usually the loudest.

Connel Vanagor had learned that a long time ago. Sometimes it was bravado.

Sometimes fear.

Sometimes arrogance wrapped around insecurity so tightly that the person wearing it could no longer tell where one ended and the other began. Whatever the reason, truly dangerous people rarely needed to explain how dangerous they were. Nemesis had been talking for a while. Connel listened. He listened to the insults. The boasts. The declarations of inferiority. The insistence that everything had happened precisely as intended. That Omega had been too slow.

Too frightened.

Too foolish. That every atrocity committed across Thyferra could somehow have been prevented had they only behaved the way Nemesis wanted them to behave. Connel's rifle remained against his shoulder. He said nothing.

The Force remained absent.

Nothing beyond the armor. Nothing beyond the room. Nothing except rain striking broken transparisteel somewhere overhead, machinery failing beneath the distant thunder of battle, and the breathing of the people standing beside him. Bren. Gabriel. Raphael. Sariel. Omega. Enough.

Nemesis reached the windows.

Connel finally spoke. [Funny how the weakest person in the room is usually the loudest.] That was it. No anger. No shouting. No attempt to compete. Connel simply tilted his head. [You've been talking a lot.]

Then Nemesis presented Alara Sikair.

Connel froze. Not physically. Somewhere deeper. The name hit harder than the sight.

Alara.

The woman whose voice he had heard begging for her children.

Erin.

Sollemai.

Mikal.

A woman Nemesis had murdered to punish someone else for resisting him. Except death apparently hadn't been enough. Connel looked at what had been done to her. For a single heartbeat, the mask concealed something nobody else needed to see.

Then the creature moved.

Bren saw it first. [CONTACT!]

Alara launched across the room.

Desks shattered beneath her. Ronin rose around the command stations, blades coming free as they surged toward Omega. Nemesis had provided his answer. More bodies. More things between them. Connel's rifle came up. Then Bren's arm hit it. Not knocking it away. Pointing past Connel. [I've got this.]

Connel looked at him. Each of them (save Sariel who carries an , and Gabriel who carried a ) carried RI-17 Rifle-w-MS-0412 Grenade Launchers and 5x FYB 40mm grenades, 2x LPD-24 Fireblast Dual-Purpose Grenade, LPD-30 Flameblossom Cluster Thermal Detonators.

Bren's RI-17 telescoped inward with a mechanical CLACK, shortening immediately for close quarters. Gabriel did the same. Raphael's rotary cannon began to spin. Sariel dropped onto one knee. And Connel realized something. He didn't have to fight this fight. Omega already was.

Bren looked at him. [Go.]

The first Ronin charged. Bren fired. Three-shot burst.

The oversized RI-17 barked hard enough to shove against his shoulder.

The Ronin staggered beneath the impacts. Gabriel moved past Bren's flank, rifle snapping from target to target. One. Two. Move. Cover. No wasted fire. No Force. No problem. Another Ronin came around a workstation.

Gabriel's rifle dropped slightly.

THUMP.

The MS-0412 underbarrel launcher fired. The round disappeared beneath the workstation. Gabriel was already turning away when it detonated. The room erupted. [LEFT!]

Sariel fired. One precise carbine shot crossed inches beyond Raphael's shoulder. Raphael didn't even flinch. [Thank you.]

[You're welcome.] Another Ronin appeared.

Raphael's rotary cannon finished spinning. [Oh, good.]

Bren looked over. [What?]

[I was worried I carried this stupid thing all the way here for nothing.]

BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRT.

The room became light.

Blaster fire tore across advancing positions, forcing anything attempting to close with Omega to seek cover immediately. Sariel changed angles. She wasn't competing with Raphael's volume. She didn't have to.

Whenever someone escaped his fire...

CRACK.

Sariel found them.

Raphael grinned. [Teamwork.]

[Please stop talking.]

[No.]

Then Alara hit. The technobeast crossed the room in a blur of corrupted flesh, machinery and violence. Bren barely escaped the first impact. [ALARA!]

Connel stopped.

Bren immediately corrected himself. [THE THING THAT USED TO BE ALARA!]

That mattered. Connel understood exactly why he'd said it. That thing wasn't Alara Sikair anymore. Alara had been a mother. A woman with three children. A person terrified of dying. This was something Nemesis had made from what remained.

Raphael rotated. [Clear!]

Sariel moved. Gabriel moved. Bren moved. Omega opened a lane.

Raphael fired.

The rotary cannon hammered the technobeast. Not one endless burst. Controlled fire. Short enough to keep the weapon from cooking itself. Long enough to hit like a speeder collision. The creature crashed through a workstation.

Started moving again. Raphael stared. [Okay.]

Sariel: [What?]

[I dislike that.]

Gabriel reached behind himself.Not for another magazine. Something larger. [/COLOR] [Carbonite.]

Bren understood immediately. [Do it.]

Gabriel shouldered the launcher. The technobeast moved again. He waited. Closer. Closer. Gabriel...]

[I see it.]

Closer.

FWOOSH.

The carbonite rocket crossed the room.

Impact. A violent eruption of freezing material engulfed the creature. Frost raced across machinery. Across flooring. Across twisted limbs. The room temperature seemed to collapse around it.

Raphael watched. [Did we...]

Cracking. Movement. [[Nope.]

Sariel loaded something beneath her carbine. [Then stop admiring it.]

THUMP.

A Coldblast grenade joined the carbonite.

Another eruption of freezing vapor. Bren stared. [That enough?]

Raphael's rotary cannon spun again. [Let's make sure.]

Then the entire wall behind Omega exploded inward.

Everyone hit cover. Duracrete shattered. Furniture skidded across the floor. An entire section of interior partition simply disappeared beneath several tons of armored vehicle that had apparently decided architecture was advisory. The REEK came through. Not through a doorway.

Not through an access corridor.

Through the wall.

Its heavy wheels climbed over the remains of the structure as dust rolled around the armored hull. The turret rotated. Jeremiel's voice boomed through the external speaker. [Sorry I'm late.]

Raphael looked at the enormous hole. [You couldn't use the door?]

[I did.]

Raphael stared. Jeremiel continued. [It was in the way.]

Sariel actually laughed. The REEK's rotary cannon turned toward the remaining resistance.

Bren immediately pointed. [Jeremiel, suppress right!]

[Already there.]

The REEK opened fire. The entire character of the fight changed. Omega had entered the chamber as five operators. Now they had brought an armored personnel carrier into the office. Connel looked at Bren. Bren looked back. Then jerked his chin toward Nemesis.

Go.

Connel released his rifle.

CLACK.

The sling caught it against his chest. And he started walking. Straight toward Nemesis. His right hand rose. One finger extended. Pointing. At him.

Around Connel, the battle continued.

Ronin moved. Omega answered. Gabriel's RI-17 hammered in three-shot bursts. Sariel's rifle cracked. Raphael's rotary cannon thundered. The REEK advanced through what remained of the room, turret traversing above them. Bren called targets. [Raphael, eleven!]

[Got it!]

[Sariel, high!]

[Tracking!]

[Gabriel, right side!]

[Moving!]

Connel walked. No Force. No supernatural speed. No precognition. No telekinesis. Nothing mystical remained to carry him across the room. He didn't need it. Step. [You poisoned civilians.]

Another step.

Behind him: BRRRRRRRRT.

Step. [You killed your own people.]

Gabriel's launcher fired.

THUMP.

Step. [You turned prisoners into monsters.]

Sariel's rifle answered.

Step. [You burned a city because people wouldn't give you what you wanted.]

The Reaper passed somewhere outside. Its weapons thundered against another Sith position. The industrial hub shook. Connel never looked away. [And now you're standing here telling yourself it was all some brilliant plan.]

Another step. Still pointing. [You know what I see?]

His hand finally lowered.

Night came free.

Day followed.

No Force brought either weapon to him.His hands did. Connel stopped several meters away. [A man running out of people to hide behind. I’m going to enjoy kicking your teeth in.]

Behind him, something struck the REEK. Reactive protection fired. Jeremiel swore over comms.

Raphael laughed. [Still good?]

[Ask whoever shot me!]

[Can't.]

[Why?]

Raphael's rotary cannon roared. [Busy.]

Connel didn't turn.

Bren's voice appeared in his helmet. [Ariel.]

[Yeah?]

[We've got this.]

Connel glanced back once. The sight lasted perhaps half a second. Bren moving through the center. Gabriel covering him. Sariel controlling the long angles. Raphael owning everything else. The REEK filling what had once been a perfectly respectable command center with armored violence. Omega Squad. Each one of them doing exactly what they were there to do.

Nobody needed Connel.

That wasn't an insult. It might have been the greatest compliment they could have given him. Because he didn't have to protect them from everything. He trusted them to protect each other.

Connel looked forward again. [Yeah.]

His grip tightened around Night and Day. [I know.]

He took another step. For hours, Nemesis had demanded their attention. Artillery. Hostages. Shuttles. Viruses. Bombers. Sithspawn. Poisoned infrastructure. Fake Jedi. Fake emergency personnel. Cyberattacks. Explosives. Cities on fire.

Every new horror had carried the same implicit command.

Look at this.

Omega Squad had. They had saved who they could. Contained what they could. Preserved what they could. Burned what they had to. And continued. Now Regal owned the perimeter. Republic armor continued pressing inward. The Siroccos screened the skies. Reaper hunted above them. SERAPHIM attacked every Sith system foolish enough to expose itself.

Raguel was somewhere making Raphael's bell proposal increasingly reasonable.

Thyferra was still burning. People were still fighting. But none of those things required Connel Vanagor to turn around anymore. Nemesis finally had what he had spent the entire battle demanding.

Connel's complete attention.

Night ignited. SNAP-HISS.

Its strange blade cast darkness and color across his armor.

Day followed. SNAP-HISS.

Ghostfire answered. The Force was gone. The lightsabers worked anyway. Connel looked at them for a moment. Then back toward Nemesis.

Almost funny.

The Vanguard had shut away the Force as though doing so would make Jedi less dangerous. Maybe it did. Maybe Connel was slower. Less perceptive. Less powerful. Maybe whatever fight came next would be harder because of it. Fine. Hard had never meant impossible. Connel settled into position. [You've spent hours explaining how far beneath you we are.]

His blades lowered slightly. Not aggressive. Ready. [How frightened we are.]

A tiny tilt of the head. [How stupid we are.]

Behind him, the REEK fired again. Connel ignored it. [How none of us understand the game you're playing.]

His mask reflected Nemesis's silhouette. [Here's the funny part.]

A beat. [We stopped trying.]

Connel took one final step. [You change the rules?]

Night turned in his hand. [We adapt.]

[You change the battlefield?]

Day shifted.

[We adapt.] His voice dropped. [But every time you changed something...] Another distant blast shook dust from the ceiling. [...we were still here afterward.]

He pointed Night] toward Nemesis. [And every time?]

Another half step. [We got closer.]

The two-hour countdown continued somewhere inside Sith systems.

1:59:41

1:59:40

1:59:39

Connel didn't know what happened at zero.

He no longer cared. That clock belonged to Nemesis. Omega had its own. And this one had almost run out. Connel's voice became quiet. [You said we're beneath you.]

He opened his stance and brought each blade to bear.

[Night.]

Day.

No Force. No fear. No one standing between them anymore.

A slight inclination of his head. [Then this should be easy.]

Behind him, Bren reloaded. Gabriel changed magazines. Sariel acquired another angle. Raphael's rotary cannon began spinning again. The REEK rolled farther into the command center.
And Connel Vanagor waited. Not for another speech. Not for another trap. Not for another atrocity. For Nemesis. The game was over.

Now came the reckoning.

[Right?]

Tobias Dib • ARE • OPEN
Personal Effects - Omega Squad Loadouts​

 

[Mantys Thranx]

ATTN: Makko Vyres Jaun Smyth Tobias Dib "Ariel"

To their good fortune, Mantys' lab remained relatively isolated from the wider grid thanks to the masterful (if slightly shady) slicing efforts of Makko. Never underestimate the skills developed by a street rat who'd struggled to survive!

Double fortunate were for the layers of HEPA and ULPA filters that kept pathogens from entering such a dense space, and water lines connected to their own dedicated sterile supply. The same could not be said for the rest of the refinery, where fallen soldiers from both sides of the conflict mutated into technological horrors of flesh and circuitry. Still, they were running on emergency generators meaning that all power was directed toward keeping the lab's critical operations running. Overhead lighting was gone, about half of their non-crucial terminals went dark, and the break room fridge had been disconnected.

That's the thing about biological warfare, Mantys thought to himself as he paused to watch the gruesome sight unfold on one of the remaining wall-mounted monitors. It's hard to maintain a surgical touch. When you throw in everything including the refresher sink, you're bound to find yourself in friendly fire.

Indeed, several techs gasped as the figures of scrambled flesh and armor began turning on their own allies - or rather, their former allies, as the various viral strains robbed them of their cognition. One assistant in a navy lab coat sprinted away, hand over his mouth after a Sith trooper had his neck bitten into by one beast, and his arm torn clean from his socket by the other. It was like a holofilm Mantys had once fallen asleep during.

Vratix were a logical species, after all. They focused on problems and their solutions, not abstract concepts like morality and justice.

"Faisal," Mantys said, motioning for the closest tech he somewhat confidently knew the name of. A Togruta, it happened. "We still have those sanitation droids, yes? See if you can't get them out into the refinery. Clean up this contaminated water before anyone else steps in it."

Faisal nodded eagerly, montrails whipping in the sterile air as he dashed off to a terminal. The screen produced a map, which soon became crowded with clusters of tiny red dots. Each one corresponded to a certain droid.

Suddenly, the piercing cry of warplanes flying low screamed over the lab. Silent tension held for a pregnant moment before someone nearest to the window cried: "The reinforcements are here! I see the Republic sigil!"

A collective gasp, even a few nervous, reflexive cheers washed over the lab. Mantys made his way to the nearest window in time to witness a rash of clone troopers rush the refinery.

Little compact droids wove between them, ahead of them, sucking up puddles of contaminated water. There had tobe dozens of the gulp garbage droids zipping around, slurping up bellies full of viral cocktails. They'd have to be thoroughly decontaminated, after. Or burned.

Robotic pests had attached themselves to the underside of the garbage droids, tiny computerized bugs no larger than ants. They crawled through the clash, careful to keep to grooves along the tile.

Faisal's screen washed his face in a pale blue glow. One corner of his lips lifted as the little red dots made their way into groups of hostile technobeasts. A push of his button and-

POP! – POP! – POP!​

The little ant droids burst, each releasing an electromagnetic pulse as they did so. Clusters of techno-beasts seized as if they'd been struck by lightning, toppling over on one another.

 

[Andromeda Demir]

ANDROMEDA DEMIR

THYFERRA

ALAZHI FIELDS

WAR O'CLOCK

♫ STORM THE CASTLE — LORNE BALFE

x

x

The sheer number of significant things happening around Andromeda nearly made her head spin. A flicker of warning in the network of Jedi on and around Thyferra heralded something -- a warning -- that Andromeda didn't understand until moments later the Force evaporated from around her. With it, the screaming fury of whatever had been rumbling beneath her feet disappeared. So did the presence of the Sith who were arrayed against herr and William. And William -- the steadiness and solidity she had subconsciously relied upon -- was gone, too.

She snapped her head around to him, her braid whipping around with the frenetic nature of the movement, just to be assured he was still there. Around them, the darkness collapsed, and beyond William's tall figure the woman Sith seemed to collapse, too. She did not rise, while the man, Strosius, struggled. She wanted to press their advantage then, to strike them down before he could get back on his feet, but fate had different plans.

Blasterfire continued from the droids, and she saw William take a bolt to the arm. More importantly, she saw why: However quick their reflexes, without the Force they were still trying to react to a blaster bolt after it had been fired. She made a grim note, turned back toward the swamp paddy, ready to aid Omen and the Vratix, when --

Andromeda! William's voice cut through the noise and smoke, but was immediately washed away by the noise and visual of a swamp creature springing out of the paddy at her. Andromeda instinctively threw her non-saber arm, her left, up against the creature's onslaught, unable at first to grasp what she was seeing. She saw the blood before she felt the hot pain of the punch dagger blade driving into the fleshy part of her outer upper arm. Andromeda gave a startled, wounded cry and stumbled back into the water.

Lucky for her. The intrusive cold of it snapped her into focus, and she disabled her lightsaber and hurled herself into what she thought was a pretty impressive roll for the circumstances. The alazhi paddy was less ideal than the training mats aboard the Pegasus that William had seemed to enjoy throwing her onto during their training, often to see what she would do when put at just such a disadvantage. The man truly thought of everything.

Almost.

Swamp creatures had not been in their curriculum, nor had she been filleted during training. Next time, Andromeda thought with grim humor. The cut screamed in protest as she rolled over that arm, but Andromeda ignored it, lunging forward. Her foot slipped once on the silty bottom of the paddy before the other found purchase, and she drove herself toward the elevated rim of the paddy with great effort. She hit it fast, almost throwing herself bodily onto the raised earth, and let her momentum carry her up and over. One shoulder caught the ridge; she tucked instinctively and rolled across it, converting the collision into an ugly, fast tumble that carried her onto the higher ground, and onto her knees. She hauled herself to her feet, dripping with water and with mud and silt streaking her boots, her arms, her face. It wasn't pretty, but she was still alive.

Her dark hair was plastered to her scalp and forehead, but the braid kept it out of her eyes, at least.

In her dominant hand, Andromeda Demir lit her lightsaber and surveyed the swamp creature from a defensive, high ground position. Beyond A'Mia, William was looking to end the conflict peaceably with Strosius. Andromeda's gaze flicked back to the exotic, rather uncanny beast before her, and she rather doubted she would have that chance. Still, the Jedi way was to try. She heard rather than felt Omen and a few Marines hustle up to her and raise their rifles. Andromeda lifted her free hand in a silent order to hold fire.

"Give it up," Andromeda said, projecting a confidence she didn't feel. She probably looked ridiculous with her tunic sleeve cut through and blood seeping from her wounded arm, slightly out of breath, and half her face streaked with mud. Andromeda's arm gave a vicious throb, undiminished by any of the little tricks of the Force she had once taken for granted. "Stand down, and you will not be harmed. If you continue, you will be destroyed."

If whatever Madrona A’Mia was could be destroyed...

x

x

WITH

William Thule • Madrona A’Mia • Darth Strosius • Lina Ovmar

 

[Tobias Dib]

Aliies: SO
Enemies: THR & JO
Tags: "Ariel" , Seren Gwyn , open


Omega Squad did what they were trained to do. They took out the enemy with precision and skill that belied their stated ineptitude. Even the sithspawn was handled with extreme prejudice because Alara no longer existed within the malformed creature. Their actions and training allowed Connel the freedom to act. And so the Jedi commando crossed the room, his words echoing over the flashes of violence being played out all around them. It appeared the two men finally were free to face each other without distractions. No more responding to events occurring across the surface of Thyferra. The field of battle narrowed until all that existed was the stalwart commando and the massive giant. Both wore armor, and both had two blades, though one set had yet to be ignited. The scene of their inevitable confrontation was set—a reckoning.

The giant turned slowly until he faced the commandos. Despite Connel standing at the fore, his eyes scanned the room to observe that the Ronin and Sith troopers had gone the way of the Sithspawn—extinction through eradication. Would it be merely one versus one or one versus all? Did it really matter? The result would be the same. Every last enemy that stood before him would fall at his feet. But the first one to taste death at his hands would be their leader.

Then, for a moment, the giant swayed. "I cannot feel the Force ... But I do not need it to take care of the likes of you. I have trained my entire life for this. Taught by my masters to destroy what does not bend. And if you will not bend, then I shall break you. This is your only chance to surrender. Do so, and you shall be spared." Armored hands went to the sides of his helmet. A groan slipped from behind clasped lips as the loss of the Force echoed with a deafening silence that affected him. The voice of the masters was gone. "Do you hear it? The quiet. No one to tell us what to do, or how to do it. No guidelines. No commands. Only our own desires."

The giant bent at the middle as though in pain, his arms wrapped around his midsection. A moan escaped him as the helmet turned up at Connel. A plea escaped. "Help me ... I was just following orders. None of this was me ..." Another moan rolled from deep in his chest as his knees bent. However, not enough to drop him to the ground. "I'm not the bad guy here. I didn't have a choice. Can I have asylum?" His form wavered as his feet staggered on the ground, two steps forward as he groaned with arms tight against his midsection. Hidden eyes watched the man before him. Unyielding. After everything he had endured, he stood unbent. His hidden gaze watched the lightsabers ignite. One was a deep, dark blue—the other held darkness.

The duality of every being existed within those blades. But rarely did an individual maintain the balance inside. The deep blue was unlike other Jedi colors. Darker. Almost like it was infected by the stained soul of the man who wielded it. The other represented night. The shadows where unmentionable things bred. The absence of light. This he understood. The man before him was unlike any Jedi the giant had encountered. Not just walking in the shadows but openly flaunting his choices. A smile stretched across the face inside the helmet.

Another groan escaped as his knees bent even more, his center of gravity lowering even more. And then he uncoiled, legs launching him across the room with a single bound as both lightsabers sprang into existence. His right arm pulled across his chest in a horizontal slash for Connel's shoulders, intending to removed the helmet and head from off his shoulders. The left arm pulled across his chest as he lunged forward in a thrust aimed for the other man's heart. Both maneuvers were aided by the strength of his legs as he lunged at his enemy with the intent to kill in stikes that left no retreat. Only advancement until Connel was dead.

------------------------------------------------------​

"I can't feel it."

Troigs looked at the empty hall, all trace of the pack of sithspawn gone. His ears listened and his nostrils flared for the stench of corruption. With his hands pressed against the wall and pipe he felt for tremors of what was nearby. He felt something. Something above them. He eased one hand down slowly to grip the hilt of his lightsaber prepared to spin and attack. And the a face leaned down and he sighed. Mills grinned inside his helmet as he slipped the rest of the way down from his perch. "You have no idea how happy I am to see you."

While Mills lowered himself, Troigs turned back to Seren. "It isn't just you, child. The Force has been negated. Follow us and we will get you to the safety of the prisoner transport." Mills led the way with Troigs a step behind. Both men kept a wary eye on her.

"Who is she?"

"A prisoner. Allied with the Sith."

"She kill anyone?"

"I don't know. She was fighting a Jedi when I found her. But the two seemed to have called a halt to their fighting. I couldn't just let her go. She could kill someone else."

"We'll get her to the transport. We've got several cells at the prison for force users."

"Where's the rest of the troop?"

Mills lowered his head and Troigs knew, even without the Force, they were gone. The Sergeant spoke through gritted teeth.

"They all turned. I had to put them down. But they came back and that was the pack of sithspawn we avoided."

"It wasn't your fault."

"I know that. But this Nemesis character has plans ... I think he pulled the Republic forces in close. The closer we are the less we can see."

"We need to get out of here. Give a warning if we can. Maybe there's something we can do to help."

The three managed to find their way to the exterior of the war torn industrial park. Mills found a pair of shackles and clamped them onto Seren's wrists as he escorted the woman to the prisoner transport. Troigs moved among one of the command posts looking for anyone who had comms with the units looking to engage Nemesis. He found a colonel who opened a frequency and handed him a mic.

"THR and Jedi commandos who are engaging Nemesis. We have reason to believe he is planning another trap for you. Suckering you in and playing a game to lower your defenses. This is Jedi Knight Troigs, be aware, he is planning something where you are. Don't trust him. Do you need backup? Please respond."

A unit of mixed THR soldiers and Jedi waited nearby. If Connel needed, or wanted, backup then they would head back in. So they waited.

Mills brought Seren to the prisoner transport. Half the ships was filled with Ronin and Sith troopers in shackles and covered by several soldiers with blasters at the ready. The other half of the ship was crammed full of the wounded, laying on floors, strapped to chairs, even secured to the bulkheads. War was ugly and Mills knew that. It still couldn't erase the images seared into his mind.

------------------------------------------------------​

The fighters above the capital city swept back into the coverage of the clouds and lined up for another run. They would stay hidden until their target was beneath them and then they would swoop down from the heavens like avenging angels to smite their enemy.

 

[Chomba Womba]

​

Objective: BYOO - Fleeing before things get spooky AGAIN!
Location: Tyferra Docks

Chomba had thought the fungal zombies on Aubergine-Tetra was the worst thing that he would ever have to face in his life but this stuff happening on Tyra was completely terrifying. There were viruses attempting to infect him or just outright kill him. Explosions at refineries that even Chomba had to be concerned about the chemicals that were burning. There was definitely going to be some serious health issues inhaling those for decades to come. Even in the skies, there was the clear signs of war happening in space which was going to make escaping on S.S. Starship going to be very tough, but not impossible. Chomba was the god of piloting of course.

The self proclaimed god of piloting was running to the docks, his body was littering in cuts, burns and several large bruises. It had been hell getting from the village back to the docks. Especially since Chomba got lost for a good couple of hours. "CHOMBA NEEDS A SPA DAY IMMEDIATELY!" Chomba very loudly declares to absolutely no one. He was panting hard as he looked around, his sapphire eyes noticing that there wasn't really anyone around the docks anymore. Clearly people had fled for their lives. "MARKET DAYS ARE NO LONGER CHOMBA'S FAVOURITE DAYS OUT! CHOMBA ONLY ACCEPTS SPA DAYS!" He announced loudly, wondering if anyone would have heard that announcement. But there was again no answer, only an eerie silence.

"Well, Chomba don't like this. Chomba thinks this is how humans die in those horror flicks..." Chomba murmured as he started crouching. Creeping forward, "Chomba must whisper like a wombat." Not knowing at all what a wombat was. Counting aloud the hangar bays, Chomba attempted to remember which one he had left S.S. Starship at. It was either, 42 or 114. Maybe 323? 008? It was one of those ones, maybe. Chomba continued to crouch walk best he could, stumbling half the time and crying out when he fell over and bashed against stalls and shelves, causing merchandise falling very loudly and echoing in the halls. Eventually Chomba found his ship, "Chomba said it was Hangar Bay 3!" He then jumped in fear, "Chomba shhhhhh!" Shushing himself very loudly.

Heading to his ship, Chomba raced in dramatic fashion, not being chased by anything at all, but believing himself to be. Mortal peril was constantly after Chomba. Once he was on his ship, Chomba paused. "Chomba don't like this feeling. Chomba got a bad feeling." Chomba couldn't say what was wrong but something felt very off. Was it the air? Maybe? It was something, something felt different. Gone but not gone. He knew that much.

Spending five minutes, or thirty seconds, racking his brain for an answer, Chomba shrugged. It was not an issue for him. Instead Chomba grabbed the controls for his ship. "Pooter! Chomba needs spa day location now! Immediately Pooter!" Chomba demanded as he smashed around the console attempting to hit it the correct manner in order to activate the ship. Chomba kicked at the console and the whole ship erupted into life once again. "Pooter, done with that?" Chomba turned and looked at the navicomputer that was slowly booting into life. Chomba blinked expressionless at the navicomputer.

After a while, the navicomputer then flickered into the opening screen, "POOTER! Chomba needs to leave! Pooter can't delay!" Chomba growled giving the navicomputer a firm spank, frustrated as he he had to start charting the course offworld by hand. Where? No one knew, not even Chomba. Highers was not safe, Sithie space was suicide since clearly the Sithies had big bounty on Chomba. Mangoes likely had a bounty on Chomba too. Closing his eyes, Chomba picked a planet blindly. Assured that he would find his way to safety like that.

"Pooter needs another ten minutes! POOTER! CHOMBA CANNOT KEEP DOING THIS! POOTER NEEDS TO GET CHIT TOGETHER!" Chomba exclaimed in horror that he would have to do some more masterclass piloting to survive. There was a new timer and Chomba refused to hang around and way for Sithies to realise he was in the hangar and orbital strike Chomba to smithereens!

Chomba had to go to space once again.

 

[Quinn Varanin]

//: Sibylla Abrantes //:
//: Eira Dyn //: CT-312 //:
//: Gerwald Lechner //: Taeli Raaf //: Rowyna Galeway //:
//: Srina Talon //: Mercy //:
//: The Sith Forces //:

Everything hurt more than usual. She was used to pushing herself beyond the limit, beyond what was healthy for her. But that was the strength of the Force. IT made the ordinary, extraordinary. She had felt this before, being cut off from the Force an experience she vowed to never have to feel again. At least, she had measures to help prevent that, her eyes trailing down to the silver bracelet that hummed quietly.

It was the only reason she was capable of being upright, and because the pain was centralized to the wound she had received. She cursed herself; how could she have missed one? It didn't make any sense, but she knew deep down her worry for the woman behind the barricade was the root cause. Quinn had to focus hard enough so that whatever power she drew upon didn't touch the woman.

Unexpectedly though, Sibylla moved, and aided her. There was a horrible gut feeling that the woman she saw sitting beside Aurelian would find reason to leave her to die — or worse, exact revenge for what happened on Weilu. She nodded, quietly wondering if the words from the Zeltron back on Eshan were even true… what she said, that Sibylla wanted to cut Quinn from all her allies, was the same woman wanting to help her.

Quinn exhaled deeply and let the noble woman help her. She leaned against her, letting them balance each other. Chatter echoed in her ear as the device seemed to spread almost planet-wide. Space and the surface of Thyferra were now without the Force.

"Wait," Quinn said after some time. They had created some distance from the horde, still hearing them come up. Her spear would be too dangerous for her to fight with, so she forced it back into its smaller form, allowing her to tuck it away on her belt. Pulling away from Sibylla, she knelt down and grabbed a blaster and extra energy cells for both of them.

"Here, I don't know how much is left in yours." She offered the cell and then turned away.

"You'll understand what I have to do next… What I have to order." She didn't look at Sibylla, putting trust in the woman not to do what most of her comrades, especially her King, would do.

A hand reached to her ear; the small communication device opened a channel to the whole of the Sith Forces.

"Attention all Sith Order Forces, the Republic has done something against the natural order of our galaxy, against Jedi and Sith and those that fall in between. ALL of our lives are in danger." She paused, exhaling as she could feel the wound pulsating, blood drying as the burns cracked against the entry and exit point.

"You have one order." Another deep exhale as she did her best to sound fine, uninjured despite the dread that began to gather in her stomach, the damage from the wound and her body beginning to shut down without the Force keeping it stitched together.

"Find the source, destroy it with extreme prejudice along with any of those involved. They are to be executed for their crime and stupidty."

Another pause as her eye looked to Sibylla; her expression softened as the final words slipped from her lips.

"No High Republic forces… Jedi… and anyone associated with their government are to be allowed to leave Thyferra… alive."

She looked away from the woman, knowing she had just unleashed the monsters, the rabid beasts of the Order.

"Complete extermination."

The channel ended, and opened up to her private line with Eira and CT-312, "I'm fine. Proceed with the new mission perimeters, stay safe."

Her voice was different when she spoke the second time, gentle and caring, but she feared for their lives. Right now, the High Republic showed their disdain for those who fought on their side, who fought against them, and Quinn wasn't going to let her own people be the example of their twisted sense of justice.

"I have to do what I must." Pain surged through those words; she hated the order she had just given. Maybe if she kept telling herself this was necessary, she wouldn't hate herself as much...

She didn't want more people to die just because there was something out there that the Republic didn't fully understand. She had seen the surprise etched on Sibylla's face when she mentioned the Force was gone. This was a move without any thought behind it.

Shaking her head, she winced and stumbled where she stood. Her knees were starting to give out as she shook her head. Quinn blinked a few times to refocus her sight; her guard was up, wondering if her words would elicit a reaction from the other woman.

"You'll be getting off Thyferra, but I can't promise much more for others."

Quinn began to walk, her hand reaching out to grab the woman as they rounded the next curve of the building. She stopped and raised the blaster and fired off a few rounds into the skulls of the remnants of a previous Horde.

There was nothing more for her to say; she wanted to leave this planet. There was so much regret in her words, so much she wanted to tear into the Nabooian woman verbally and physically, but none of it would fix things. A part of her wondered if her original plan had worked; where would she be? Would she have been left to live a peaceful life on Naboo, protected like Dominic had promised?

Would she have been allowed to stay on Eshan without anyone demanding anything of her, without being forced to make any sort of difficult choice?

Quinn couldn't smile; she was tired, exhausted, and every step was a constant reminder that she was going to die. That she might not even get to see 312, or Eira, or even her mother again. As much as she tried, she couldn't stop what happened next.

Tears.

They fell, black with mascara.

She tried to stop them, but they continued to fall in a silence as her mind struggled to grasp the concept of dying again. Last time she had her mother, and a witch anchored her soul to this realm. But without the Force, what would happen? Would she even get to see her mother again?

She cursed herself once more; she was a Sith Lord afraid of death.

Quietly crying for her mother…

A hand shot up and fired off a few more bursts of the blaster; the creatures fell instantly, and she let the arm hang as her weight began to lean more.

"You should get out of here," she said gently. Another thought struck her, knowing that Sibylla was someone important in the Republic…

"Could you end all of this? Stop whatever is doing this?" She paused, her eyes half closed as she felt the sudden desire to sleep, to stop whatever they were doing. Yet there was hope in her tone.

"If it shuts off, I could heal myself and guarantee your safety."

Her eyes looked at Sibylla from the corner of her eye.

"Turn it off, and I'll call off their execution." She knew Sibylla cared for her people just as much as Quinn did. At the end of the day, they both wanted what was best for their governments, for the people that they served. They understood that neither of their choices was their own.

Someone always had to pay for them.

Someone always had to answer for them.

"Or tell me what you know… why is this the contingency plan, Sibylla?"

 

[Makko Vyres]

MAKKO

SHIELD | ARMOR | LIGHTSABER | DRONES | SHIP | PISTOL​

Allies: Mantys Thranx
Enemies: SIFF

"Oh, May-co!" he called as the Jedi grabbed his Jedi weapon. "It appears that the cytology lab on the first floor has been affected with a technovirus. Do spare me at least one, if you can."

Makko rolled his shoulders as he stepped away from the terminals, one hand pressing into the small of his back until the tightness finally eased.

Hours at the consoles had done their work, but so had home. Luciana had taken to crawling across the floor and surfing along furniture. She was stubborn about it too and would complain bitterly if he stopped her. She would also fall regularly if he didn't follow her around and offer a hand to help her move between supporting items of furniture.

He had spent too many evenings bent over after her, scooping her up before she found something she should not put in her mouth. The thought of her was brief and grounding. Then the laboratory lights flickered again and the moment passed.

The Night shrike armor sealed around him as he moved, armourweave and plates settling into familiar weight while the HUD woke across his visor. Thermal and lifeform overlays painted the lower floors in thin, shifting marks. He was more grateful for the seal to protect him from any lingering viruses.

These weapons were out of control. This was an assault from cowards looking to sew chaos. Cowards who did not care if the strategic gain of hitting the bacta supply led to the suffering of millions.

He cursed the malice and cowardice of the sith.

Two Skirton probes lifted from their holsters at his back. The small phrik shells rode silently on repulsors as they slotted into the suit’s encrypted link. He sent them ahead through the stairwell, one in covert scan, the other watching the approach, and saw their returns on the HUD.

Darkfire came free of the magnetic mount at his hip. The primary blade snapped out in violet, then shortened at his command into its second phase, a near-black dagger of light that barely threw a glow. His wrist shield unfolded a moment later, a tall kite of energy locking into place along his forearm.

Makko hadn't been fighting properly for months. He was glad he had stretched. Being out of the fight did not mean he wasn't ready to. Especially when his family was threatened.

The first of the transformed technicians lurched between the benches, flesh fused with dull machinery, and the nearest Skirton marked it before Makko had even crossed the threshold.

He did not give them time to close. The shield took the first wild swing and turned it aside. Darkfire took the neck and shoulder in one short, quiet cut, then the hip of the next as he stepped through. The second drone dropped on a third host and drove its retractable blade through the integrated plating at the spine, pinning the thing long enough for Makko to finish it. Two more came on in a staggered rush. He met them without breaking stride, let the shield absorb the clumsy impact, and put both down before either could finish raising arms that had been twisted beyond recognition.

They fell like machines fell when the power was cut. Each end was heavy and final. He felt no remorse for this act, only for the virus that had taken them already.

The lab went still except for the drip from the ruptured pipe and the soft hover of the Skirtons as they swept the corners. Makko kept Darkfire lit and the shield up while the HUD confirmed the room was clear. The nearest pack was gone. The rest of the building was another matter.

"Cytology is clear," he called back toward the upper lab. "I am not bringing you a souvenir."

Suddenly, the piercing cry of warplanes flying low screamed over the lab. Silent tension held for a pregnant moment before someone nearest to the window cried: "The reinforcements are here! I see the Republic sigil!"

Makko sighed. Military reinforcements would keep the strategic factories safe.

The little ant droids burst, each releasing an electromagnetic pulse as they did so. Clusters of techno-beasts seized as if they'd been struck by lightning, toppling over on one another.

"Just heard some explosions and picked up some EM interference. What was that?"

 

[Lorn Reingard]

Friends: Acier Moonbound | Judah Lesan
Foes: Mercy | Srina Talon​

No amount of warning could prepare Lorn for the sheer, suffocating void of the wave. The moment the Force evaporated, he collapsed to his knees, his golden blade slipping from his grip and clattering against the metal floor. Every drop of adrenaline and deep concentration that had been propping him up vanished instantly. Without the Force acting as an invisible brace, the brutal reality of his injuries slammed back into him. Agony tore through his broken ribs and scorched skin.

Lorn gasped violently for air, struggling to lift his head to check on Acier. The kid was okay. In fact, Acier seemed sharper, grounding himself entirely in his physical senses. The dark side users, however, suffered deeply from the sudden severing. Srina looked completely undone. Lorn watched them closely, wondering if these monsters would finally realize what it felt like to be completely powerless, facing their horrors without a mystical well of power to reshape reality to their whim. He doubted they would learn anything from it.

Then Mercy did something that caught Lorn completely off guard. Instead of using her raw physical size to tear Acier apart, the Titan abandoned the attack entirely to check on Srina. It was an interesting choice. Was it a sign of weakness, or some twisted form of love? Lorn could not tell. The dynamic of this entire family was utterly bizarre, but ultimately it did not matter.

Cold focus washed over him as his trembling right hand reached down to unholster the pistol at his hip. He looked up, his eyes briefly sweeping toward Acier. The moment mirrored the nightmare on Ghorman, forcing the same brutal math back to the surface. Did the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few? Taking a decisive strike at Acier's aunt would likely leave the young wolf deeply conflicted. Stripping away the personal ties, however, made the choice obvious to Lorn. This was the right decision.

He had hesitated once before. Years ago, he had been given a chance to end his daughter's mother after the dark side twisted her beyond recognition. He had stayed his hand then, and he paid the ultimate price by losing everything he held dear. He could not afford to hesitate now. Having spent years rebuilding what little he had left, Lorn knew the galaxy would be a better place with one less Sith Lord breathing, even if no one ever learned what happened in this refinery. Opportunities like this never came twice.

Lorn raised his shaking arm, his grip tightening on the pistol as he aimed at the pair. Mercy wore heavy armor, but Srina was far more exposed.

Breathe, Lorn thought, forcing his mind to quiet as he centered the sight on Srina. In and out. Time seemed to drag to a crawl. Refusing to look at Acier, Lorn squeezed the trigger, sending a bolt of plasma burning straight toward the Sith Empress.

 

[Seren Gwyn]

Objective: 1
Allies: SO and their allies Tobias Dib
Enemies: THR, their allies

For several seconds after admitting that she could no longer feel the Force, Seren remained where Troigs had sheltered her, caught between the desire to reach for it again and the fear of confirming the emptiness for a third time. She had spent most of her life with another sense layered beneath the ordinary ones, something so constant that she had never needed to consciously distinguish where instinct ended and the Force began. Now she heard only the damaged refinery around them, smelled smoke, blood, scorched machinery, and the lingering corruption carried through its corridors, while every shadow remained stubbornly ordinary no matter how desperately some part of her wanted them to answer.

Troigs did not immediately respond. Instead, Seren watched him compensate for the same loss she was struggling to understand, listening to the corridor, testing the wall and pipe beneath his hands, relying on senses that suddenly had to carry burdens neither of them normally asked of. It was strange seeing a Jedi reduced to the same limitations she now faced, although the observation provided little comfort when his hand shifted toward his lightsaber. Seren tensed automatically, following his attention upward without the slightest idea what had alerted him, and the vulnerability of that ignorance sent another cold thread through her stomach. She could no longer feel danger approaching or sense something living beyond the limits of sight and sound.

The face appearing above them startled her badly enough that Seren jerked before she could stop herself. Recognition between the two men came quickly, however, and she released a breath she had not realized she was holding as Mills descended to join them. Troigs's attention returned to her shortly afterward, and the words he offered did more to steady Seren than anything else had managed since the universe went silent. It wasn't just her. The Force had been negated.

Relief struck immediately and almost shamefully hard. Seren closed her eyes for a moment as some of the tension left her, because the possibility she had been refusing to examine had finally been taken away. She wasn't broken. Whatever had happened had not severed something inside her alone, and the emptiness she encountered whenever she reached beyond herself was not evidence that some essential part of Seren Gwyn had simply ceased to exist. More importantly, negated was not the same as gone, and she seized upon that distinction before fear could drag her thoughts somewhere darker.

Her thoughts turned immediately toward Varin again, but this time Seren had something with which to fight the terror. She could not feel him because she could not feel anything through the Force. Troigs was standing directly in front of her and might as well have been on the opposite side of the galaxy to that missing sense, while creatures had passed close enough to kill her without leaving the slightest impression upon it. Whatever had swallowed the Force had swallowed everything equally. Varin had not disappeared. She had merely lost the means by which she might have reached toward him, and Seren clung to that simple fact with considerably more desperation than she wanted either man to notice. She would believe he was safe until someone gave her reason not to.

Seren nodded when Troigs told her to follow them, and she did. Mills took the lead while Troigs remained close behind, and Seren noticed the attention both men kept upon her without needing the Force to recognize what it meant. She was still a prisoner, and whatever momentary vulnerability she had shown when the Force vanished had not changed that. Perhaps it was unreasonable to find their scrutiny uncomfortable when she had been fighting a Jedi shortly before surrendering, but reason did little to prevent the faint tightening in her jaw when Mills finally asked who she was and Troigs answered for her.

A prisoner. Allied with the Sith.

Seren said nothing at first, although there was something unpleasantly diminishing about hearing herself reduced to those few words while standing close enough to answer for herself. The next question bothered her more. Mills wanted to know whether she had killed anyone, and her eyes shifted toward Troigs as he admitted that he did not know. He had found her fighting a Jedi and could not simply release her when she might kill someone else. Seren understood the logic even if she disliked hearing it spoken aloud. From his perspective, she was an unknown darksider encountered in the middle of a Sith invasion, and surrender did not somehow erase everything that had happened before it.

"You could ask me."

There was no hostility behind the words, only a tired edge sharpened by pain, exhaustion, and the uncomfortable experience of being discussed as though she were not walking beside them. Seren did not elaborate unless either man chose to take her up on the suggestion. She had surrendered and accepted that questions would eventually come with captivity, but she was still a person rather than cargo being transferred between two guards.

Whatever irritation had begun forming disappeared when Mills explained what had happened to the rest of his troop. They had all turned. He had been forced to put them down, only for them to rise again as the same creatures Seren and Troigs had hidden from moments earlier. Seren's expression changed as she looked toward the man walking ahead of her. She had already seen enough of the infection to understand what those sparse words concealed, and the memory of surrendered soldiers twisting into malformed combinations of flesh and machinery returned with sickening clarity. Some of those creatures had once been people fighting on her side as well, transformed by something unleashed by the Sith until allegiance no longer seemed to matter to them. There was nothing Seren could say that would make what Mills had done easier, nor was she certain anything she offered would be welcome coming from someone allied with the invading force, so she simply followed in silence while the two men discussed whether Nemesis had planned something worse.

The possibility stayed with her as they continued toward the exterior. Seren knew little about whatever larger design Nemesis might have been pursuing beyond what she had witnessed and what she could now overhear, and without the Force she had no means of reaching beyond the corridor to discover what else was happening. She knew only what she could physically see and hear, and for someone accustomed to the Force filling in the spaces beyond ordinary perception, that ignorance was becoming almost as oppressive as the silence itself. By the time they finally emerged from the ruined industrial park, the prison transport ahead had become an uncomfortable certainty amid far too many unknowns.

Then Mills found the shackles, and Seren stared at them for a heartbeat longer than she intended. She had known this was coming. Surrender did not end with a polite walk to a waiting transport and an agreement that she would remain there voluntarily. She had fought one of their Jedi, she had entered Thyferra alongside the invading force, and Voidstar already hung from Troigs's belt. Whatever trust his treatment of her had begun to establish did not obligate anyone else to gamble lives on her continued cooperation, but knowing all of that did not make extending her wrists any easier.

Seren brought her hands together in front of her and allowed Mills to close the restraints around them. The mechanical click seemed absurdly loud, and she could not stop the immediate pull of old instinct that came with feeling metal settle around her wrists. Her fingers curled slightly before she forced them to relax. This was different, she reminded herself. She had chosen surrender. She knew why she was being restrained. Nobody had dragged her here in chains, and if she remained cooperative, there was every reason to believe the Republic would treat her as a prisoner rather than something owned. Her body cared considerably less for those distinctions than her mind did, however, and the restraints awakened an urge to pull away that Seren had to consciously suppress.

She went where Mills directed her without testing the cuffs, although every instinct demanded she learn their limits. Without the Force there would be no shadow slipping through locks, no telekinetic manipulation of mechanisms, and no sudden call of Voidstar back into her hand. For perhaps the first time since surrendering, captivity was not an idea waiting somewhere at the end of the refinery. It was metal around her wrists and another person determining where she walked, a physical loss of control that sat far less comfortably upon her than the rational part of Seren believed it should.

The transport made that reality impossible to ignore. Half of it was already occupied by captured Ronin and Sith troopers, restrained beneath the watch of armed soldiers, and Seren's attention went to them first. She searched familiar and unfamiliar faces alike with ordinary eyes, looking for injuries, contamination, or any sign that what had happened inside the refinery had followed them here. Mills's description of his own men turning remained too fresh for her to look at the prisoners without wondering whether some had been exposed before reaching supposed safety. Ordinarily the Force might have offered some warning that something was wrong, but now she had nothing except observation and the uncomfortable knowledge that the restraints around her wrists would leave her with very few options if someone nearby suddenly began to change.

Only afterward did her gaze travel toward the other half of the transport, crowded with Republic wounded wherever space could be found. Some lay across the floor while others had been secured to chairs or even against bulkheads, and Seren regarded them with a quieter, more complicated expression. She felt no sudden kinship with them simply because the battle had ended for her. They had come here to stop the invasion she had participated in, just as the prisoners beside her had come to fight for it. She did not wish suffering upon them, but neither could she pretend they occupied the same place in her concern as the people who had fought alongside her. Even so, the sheer amount of blood and injury packed into the transport made the cost of Thyferra difficult to ignore.

Seren stepped aboard when directed, moving carefully with her injured shoulder and restrained hands before taking whatever place remained among the prisoners. Instinct still urged her to reach through the Force, though now it was the captured Sith and Ronin that drew that impulse most strongly. She wanted to know whether there was infection hidden among them, whether any familiar presence remained somewhere nearby, and whether she could detect danger before it revealed itself through something as mundane and terrifying as a cough, a twitch, or a change beneath someone's skin. Beneath all those immediate concerns, there remained another instinct that was considerably harder to suppress. She wanted to reach beyond Thyferra and find Varin.

Seren stopped herself before trying. Troigs had already given her the answer that mattered, and repeatedly reaching into the emptiness would change nothing except how frightened she became each time nothing answered. The Force had been negated. It was not simply hers that had disappeared, and until it returned she would have to trust ordinary senses and tolerate uncertainties she had rarely been forced to endure. She could see the prisoners around her, hear voices and the movements of the wounded across the compartment, feel the transport beneath her boots, the ache in her shoulder, and the restraints closed around her wrists. Those things were real, and somewhere beyond Thyferra, Varin remained equally real whether she could feel him or not.

She held tightly to that certainty as she settled into captivity. The prison transport frightened her; whatever came after it frightened her more, and the continued absence of the Force left her feeling more exposed than the shackles ever could. Yet Troigs had promised to see her safely through the refinery and to the transport, and despite everything that had happened between surrender and arrival, he had done exactly that. Seren could neither sense his intentions nor seek reassurance from the Force, leaving her with nothing but his actions by which to judge him.

For now, those actions had proven worthy of the trust she had placed in him. Seren was alive, Varin was still somewhere beyond the silence, and she would have to learn how to exist without the Force until the galaxy gave her back the part of herself she had never imagined losing.

 

[Bastila Sal-Soren]

One moment, every muscle in Bastila’s body was straining against something immovable. The next, Velda was gone from between her and the pressure collapsed into empty air causing her to stumble through the space the Sith had occupied. Her knee striking the flooded deck hard enough to send stagnant water fanning out around her. Her free hand caught against the floor. Pain travelled sharply through her wrist and up into the shoulder already numbed by the collision, a stark reminder that she hadn’t had proper time to heal since her fight in the Far Reaches.

Behind her, something struck the bunker wall hard. The impact passed through the rusted durasteel and into Bastila’s bones. She heard the lightsaber clatter loose, its crimson light spinning briefly across the darkness before extinguishing.

For half a second there was nothing but the dripping water and the low hum of her own Lightsaber.

Then the weapon tore back through the gloom. Bastila twisted aside as the hilt passed her and slapped into Velda’s waiting hand. Crimson returned with its animal growl, bleeding through the mist rising from the shallow water.

She forced herself upright, told herself to get up off the floor. Each breath arrived shallowly. Something beneath the armour across her ribs had shifted, or cracked, when her own momentum had broken against Velda’s anchored body. The personal shield generator flickered against her side, its damaged housing spitting an occasional blue spark into the water below.

Brandyn’s anger was not an unexpected complication. If Bastila had to guess the growing anger in him was the reason for every word being thrown, every contemptuous glance, every theatrical restraint had been chosen to draw something out of him.

“Bran.” The warning left Bastila quietly, not from hesitation or demand. She knew her brother well enough to understand how little trying to appeal would achieve. It was said as no more than a reminder that she was still there.

This Sith emerged fully from the darkness, circling away from Bastila while the lowered tip of her saber cut through the standing water. Steam curled around her boots. The question she offered Brandyn was almost playful.

Who I’ve taken from you.

Bastila’s grip tightened around her lightsaber. There it was. That’s what this was about, this Sith had something to do with Gianna. She was aiming at grief. Throwing names. Playing on every absence Brandyn carried with him, pulling them out and laying them open inside this rotting bunker until he could no longer distinguish the woman before him from all those he had failed to save.

The receiver within Bastila’s rebreather crackled again with pure static that consumed the entire channel, there was clear communication from somewhere yet it was being blocked by whatever warfare was enveloping the planet. So for Vizion’s message, Bastila heard nothing.

The Force still moved around them. She could feel Brandyn through it, bright and furious. She could feel this Sith’s darkness pressing against the bunker and the distant terror of thousands fighting beneath Thyferra’s poisoned sky.

Then like a slow creeping darkness at the edge of her eyes it all disappeared into nothing. Like someone had flipped a switch the Force just vanished. Bastila’s breath caught behind the rebreather. Her saber dipped a fraction as every living presence around her disappeared at once.

She couldn’t sense Brandyn. She no longer could feel the darkness of the Sith, beyond her the nothingness created a blanket of mystery around the soldiers dying beyond the bunker walls. The endless teeming life of Thyferra’s jungle, each and every root beneath the soil, every insect beneath the leaves, every frightened animal fleeing the bombardment.

All of it was gone.

The absence struck with such totality that Bastila staggered. Her shoulder clipped the rusted support behind her and her saber almost slipped from her hands. For one terrible instant, she thought she had been blinded, struck dumb like some form of cruel trick.

Then it came to her again, she knew this, she had felt it before. Memory opened beneath her feet like the swamp-hole had opened beneath Lorn and her. She remembered the plunge into darkness, the clinging mud, the dead air waiting below. She remembered reaching for the Force and finding nothing there, no colour, no life, no anything. The panic had come quickly then. An animal terror she had been unable to discipline or reason away.

She had been passed out when they had returned from wherever that place was, clearance for what it had been had always been above her level. She had never found out what had truly happened, yet now, here she was in that same nightmare yet, she remained in the reality of life. Her breath had gone ragged and hard not simply because the silence made her powerless, but because the Force had always been there. Before the Order, before war, before she had possessed the words to understand what she was feeling, it had surrounded her. It had connected Bastila to every living thing and assured her, even in her loneliest moments, that she was never truly alone.

In that buried place beneath the swamp, something had taken that certainty from her and now it had taken it from the world.

We’ve made a weapon.

Dread tightened around Bastila’s chest with greater force than any Sith trick ever had. The sensation was the same as it had been below the swamp, but there it had possessed edges. A dead place surrounded by life. Something she and Lorn could escape if they climbed far enough. Here there were no edges, the emptiness continued beyond the bunker, beyond the jungle, perhaps beyond the horizon itself, on and on forever.

“What have you done?..” She said outloud, as she instinctively reached out for Brandyn unknowing if he had also been hit by this phenomena. She turned her head towards him before she could stop herself. He remained there, visible through the crimson gloom, but the familiar presence she had known all her life was gone. The place he had occupied within the Force had been cut out so completely that, had her eyes been closed, Bastila would not have known her brother was standing only metres away.

That frightened her more than any invasion ever could.

OUTFIT: XoXo | TAG: Brandyn Sal-Soren Velda Nar-Donna EQUIPMENT:

​

 

[Master Orik]

Allies: people of THR, Jedi Order, Nemesis
Enemies: Sith Order
Tags: Garus Bushi , Shahar Aksum , Tobias Dib

Master Orik squatted along the edge of the forest. He wasn't alone. Nearly sixty of his brothers and sisters lay in the brush nearby. Once they were members of the Jedi Order in good standing. Once they followed orders. Once they could be counted on to be the shield between the forces of darkness and the light. But when does being a shield stop being enough? This was the dilemma he faced when he was ordered to stand down. And this was what forced his hand to move away from the Jedi Order. Now they were the Order of the Fist. No more would they stand by, being used by the whims of the political powers who held the Jedi Order on a leash, watchdogs until the innocent were under attack. Only then were they freed from their tether and allowed to pursue the enemy at least until their masters called for them to heel and return the leash to their necks.

Master Orik said it was enough. And his brothers and sisters agreed.

As Jedi, their inaction frayed at their consciences. However, their dedication to the cause did balm the pain of watching the Sith horde marching over the land. But just barely. Instead of charging into the battle, they remained cloaked in the dense forest.

Fires ravaged the area along the mountain, down the slope, and nearing their positions at the edge. Sithspawn swept across the plains, tearing flesh from victims before moving to the next. The fallen victims convulsed on the ground before rising as new creatures of darkness. The plains burned around and through the two armies, sparing none of their flaming touch. Rain fell from the heavens, interspersed with the debris from falling ships. Lasers and turbolasers filled the night sky, a devastating light show. Civilians ran from the treelines and nearby ruins of the city, climbing aboard ships and shuttles without a care for whom they belonged to. Their only goal was to escape the war-ravaged surface and survive.

His comlink chirped at his belt, and the gnarled, old fingers retrieved it.

"Fist, this is Father. Respond." The comm hissed for a second before a deep voice came through the distortion. "This is Fist. Do we have a green light, over?" Nemesis closed his eyes and allowed all traces of emotion to drain from his features while he briefly considered the plan, the consequences, the rewards, and the punishments. "You have a green light. Sector twelve is where your target lies. May the Force be with you. Father, out."

With their orders confirmed, he tossed the comlink into the path of the approaching fires and motioned for the Order of the Fist to follow him to the received coordinates. They slipped along the edge of the forest, pausing when civilians drew near, melting deeper into the brush when enemies and allies came too close. After nearly half an hour of stealthy movement, they arrived at their destination. A large group of dead Sith Legionnaires. Another motion and the Order of the Fist filtered out of the treeline and began to strip the fallen Sith of their attire, armor, and weaponry. Soon the Sith Legionnaires stood once more. The Order gathered the Sith dead and drug their corpses back into the treeline where they tossed their robes and weapons onto the pile before one of their number doused them with an accelerant before firing their stolen sidearm into it. Fire immediately began to consume the evidence of their facade. Master Orik, now dressed in the commander's armor and garments, led the Legion to the second set of coordinates. Where their ship waited.

Their plan had now begun.

 

[Allyson Locke]

//: Taiia Locke //: Darth Prazutis //:
//: Attire //:
//: Equipment //:
//: Bow & Arrows //: Cybernetic Eye //: Jacket //: Arrows of Absence x 25 //: Bag of Absencite x 5ea //:

A grin spread across her soot-covered face.

She watched the giant fall to his knees, breath heavy with pain as blood flowed freely from the arrow. He was a demon who terrorized; he was smart, calculated, and she… just a simple archer brought him to his knees. Allyson's lungs burned as she inhaled deeply, never able to properly catch her breath. Her body screamed, telling her how the quick succession of teleports had ripped it apart, how she almost killed herself risking the third. If she had hesitated or even waited a second longer, she would have been torn asunder or worse, crushed.

His words echoed over the field of death. Allyson stood straight as she listened. He mentioned the dead, how she watched them die. Tilting her head, she knew she couldn't save them — there was nothing she could do. They were doomed the moment he decided to kill them.

Allyson wasn't meant to save lives… She was a harbinger of destruction. She uncovered lies and wove stories till those lies became weapons. She shook her head slowly; she knew her place in all of this. Even as a Jedi… she wasn't a bringer of light.

She was the bloodied hand of the council.

Its scapegoat when it was caught.

He sensed her too. Allyson had hoped that because she didn't go to her wife, the one thing she wanted to do. If she could have chosen the option she had wanted with every fiber of her being, she would have. Allyson could almost feel the warmth of the woman, the gentleness in her touch, and how it made Allyson feel like a human… a person worth loving.

Prazutis stood, facing her as he spoke of his accomplishments and insulted her abilities, and she nodded in agreement. She was just a parlor trick, but they were tricks that titans such as himself never expected. There was a reason Allyson Locke was sent to hunt the Beasts of the Empire — she was unexpected, and reliant on things they couldn't wrap their minds around.

She was a curiosity to Carnifex.

She intrigued Raaf.

And was an unknown to Prazutis.

Perhaps that's why he couldn't leave the dangling carrot of Taiia Mataan alone. To know of Taiia is to know the Corellian's Achilles' heel. He continued, and her grip on her bow tightened. Another arrow began to form through the nanotechnology of her archer's glove. The armor-piercing was doing damage, but he was going to be expecting them. Instead, energy burned at her fingertips as she waited.

She didn't speak when he spoke; his words only proved how annoying she had become. A guard walked over, and someone handed him a gun. She recognized it, knowing the stopping power the bolts had. Without Tutaminis, she'd have to be creative to avoid them. Maybe he was going to stay at a distance, but then his stride broke; the Horror moved faster than she expected, and Allyson blinked.

But there was no hesitation. She fired, but missed with his speed.
So she held her ground until he came close enough to swing. She ducked on his first assault, the metal barely missing her head as she stepped into the guard to avoid. She stepped aside, but he did what she didn't expect. Three shots were fired at close range.

"Chit." She murmured as she was able to avoid one, but the second and third burned into her side and shoulder. Without the Force, her once useful jacket was nothing but leather now. It provided some protection, but not enough. With the shoulder injured, the use of the bow was going to be difficult.

His words continued as Allyson smirked, finding a point to interject. "I'll make sure it's on your tombstone, Braxus."

The smirk, the quips, all of it was Allyson. He chanted his accomplishments and the Corellian did her best to dance around his strikes, moving as if she was still the Ghost.

But he wasn't as reckless as she had hoped. The next strike, she didn't read it properly; it was coming down upon her, and she, in that moment, fought to keep her eyes open. She wanted her last moments to be brave, not cowering in fear as the gigantic blade cut through her. She brought her bow up, knowing that it wasn't going to protect her as well as she had hoped.

She exhaled and waited for the pain.

But it never came; instead, her eyes widened at the sight of a woman's white blade and red hair.

Taiia was here. And Allyson's chest tightened as the woman pressed against the might of the Sith Lord. She wanted to push her aside, tell her to go home and to stop what she was doing. If someone was going to get hurt, it had to be Allyson, not Taiia. But hearing everything, Allyson realized something.

Taiia didn't need her protection.

This moment reminded her who she had married. The woman she often threw herself to protect was not weak. Taiia had been an Obsidian Knight; she had seen war and death and survived as many times as Allyson had. Taiia had survived some of the worst events of their lifetime, and she kept pushing forward.

And even now, she was here, on a doomed planet to get Allyson.

Blinking, Allyson went against instinct and surrendered to letting Taiia distract Prazutis. This was her chance, their chance to take down the Titan. Today he would learn that his curiosities were his downfall.

Allyson quickly slipped from behind Taiia, but not before she let her hand graze the woman's back, letting her know that she was moving, that she was safe. Allyson created some distance between the two, their blades locked. This allowed Allyson an opening to strike again at the wound on Prazutis' back.

Another arrow formed in her glove, an energy-based sniper arrow. It was short and would burn upon contact. She needed to distract him, to move from Taiia and give the woman an opportunity to strike as well.

She fired the energy arrow once more towards the wound at the base of his neck.

"Men might not have been able to take you down a few notches." She grinned as she glanced toward Taiia, then back at Prazutis.

"Good thing we're not men, also." She gave him a cheeky little grin. "Raaf sends her regards with her little toys."

 

[Shahar Aksum]

Allies: people of THR, Jedi Order, Nemesis
Enemies: Sith Order
Tags: Master Orik Garus Bushi Tobias Dib

Shahar had spent enough years responding to battlefields to recognize the pattern unfolding before her. Fire. Screaming. People running while soldiers fought over ground those civilians had called home only hours before. From beneath the cover of the forest, she watched another shuttle rise overloaded with refugees while something twisted and unnatural moved through the distant fighting. The Force carried fragments of fear and suffering back to her, enough that she eventually drew her awareness closer rather than continuing to allow every distant death to brush against her senses. Once, she would have told herself that the Jedi would help those people. They would evacuate the wounded, defend the shelters, and stand between the Sith and anyone unable to defend themselves. All of that mattered. It simply did nothing to prevent the next world from looking exactly like this one.

That was why Shahar remained where she was, even as every instinct born of years of rescue work urged her toward the civilians. They had not come here to stand between the Sith and their victims after the attack had already begun. Master Orik had taught her to recognize the difference between protecting someone from a blade and taking that blade away before it could be swung again. She still struggled with where that distinction might eventually lead them, but looking across the burning landscape made the argument for action painfully easy to understand. Whatever doubts Shahar possessed about the path the Order of the Fist had chosen, returning to the forest and waiting for permission from someone far removed from the suffering was not among the alternatives she wanted.

The transmission changed everything. Shahar remained silent while Orik received their authorization, watching him discard the comlink into the approaching flames before falling into position with the others. The following half hour demanded patience rather than aggression. She moved carefully through the forest, withdrawing deeper into cover whenever civilians or soldiers passed too close, until the bodies of the Sith Legionnaires finally came into view. Shahar's expression tightened as she understood the intention. It was hardly the sort of tactic she remembered practicing as a Padawan, but she could not argue with its usefulness. A battle involving thousands of soldiers had one advantage for people who wished to disappear inside it. Most saw uniforms long before they saw faces.

Shahar helped move the dead into the treeline before exchanging her own clothing and equipment for what could be taken from one of the Legionnaires closest to her size. She disliked wearing the insignia more than she expected. The armor itself was only armor, but the symbols upon it belonged to people responsible for what she had spent years arriving too late to prevent. Once everything that might expose them had been gathered and the accelerant caught, she watched the flames consume what remained of their former appearance. Her hand settled against the stolen weapon at her side while she looked herself over once, making certain nothing immediately betrayed the deception. "I have to admit, Master," she murmured when she fell into formation behind Orik, "when I followed you out of the Jedi, wearing Sith armor wasn't quite what I imagined."

The humor was quiet and brief. Shahar's attention returned to their surroundings as the disguised Legion began moving toward the second coordinates and the waiting ship. Beneath the stolen armor she was still herself, still carrying every lesson the Jedi had given her alongside everything that had finally convinced her those lessons were no longer enough. Whatever waited at the end of this deception, Shahar knew there would be no Council arriving to tell them when they had permission to act and no government deciding when their leash could be loosened. This time they had chosen to come before the battle was over. Now she would discover what that choice actually demanded of them.