The Destroyer's Axe

[Sear Gaalsien]

Hutta Town, Nar Shadaa
"Smuggler's Moon"

It came as little surprise to the Gaalsien captain that the lair of bounty hunters, mercenaries, cartel bosses and smuggling rings was just the place she'd find her contact. It wasn't the first time she'd have to work with the darker end of the galaxy's spectrum of citizenry, and to be fair, alliances had been made on shakier grounds before. It was business as usual, but this hunt's prize was worth more than the lives of a thousand aruetii. It would be the treasure for generations to come and her clan's claim to greatness - the relic of a lifetime, and one of the prides of her people.

It was a dark and wet evening on the smuggler's moon as she stepped into the cantina from the rain, her black steelcloth fatigues dampened slightly and her duraplast padding glistening with moisture from the humidity otuside as she walked past a few tables, paying no mind to the other patrons as she headed for the bar counter, quietly taking her seat and ordering herself a glass of Corellian ale. Some of the other scoundrel scum and other bounty hunters easily recognized the rarely sighed but nonetheless regular to the cantina - a hardline Mandalorian raider from the mystic and minor Gaalsien clan - a kith as miniscule as it was shrouded in mystery and legend. They were the ghosts of the desert, wraith-like warriors who fought from the shadows of the dunes. Their reputation had yet to catch up with them however, at least to anything tangible beyond the realm of myth and urban legends of stoic bounty hunters and marauding pirates that seemed to phase in and out of existence as they disappeared back into the shadows as quickly and abruptly as they first appeared during a raid.

The tattoos on both sides of her head drew attention in and of themselves - the exotic markings giving away this raider's Kage heritage. Her body seemed lithe and wiry under the steelcloth fabric, but one could also easily discern the two Westar blasters holstered around her waist. There was no Beskar'gam on this one, but to the numbered that recognized her, they were shrewd enough to know that she didn't need it, and kept her distance. Wearing the armor would only draw more attention than she already did as a notorious merchant convoy raider, pirate, gun for hire, bounty hunter, and "liberator" of premium artifacts. The gunslinger could draw either of the blasters and put a hole through anyone faster than they could unholster theirs, yet the reality was that without the armor, she was just that much more vulnerable.

Sear silently sipped on her drink, occasionally looking from side to side to observe the dozens of tables with patrons sat around them. Pazaak players, alcoholics, smugglers, the lot of them. The smell of a myriad different Corellian liquors and spirits and death sticks filled the air, and the slight tinge of spice was just enough to dance under one's nostrils and make the presence of the substance known. She said nothing, simply waiting for her contact to single her out and sit next to her as the bounty hunter's informal code described. The middleman who served as messenger between the two was very particular to mention her tattoos - her one of a kind aesthetic that set her apart from the rest. She was easy to spot if one was intentionally looking for her, but hopefully her low-key appearance allowed her to blend in with the rest of the cantina scum on this moon.

[member="Darth Abyss"]

 

[Zef Halo]

Nar Shadaa.
Home.

It had been years since he could be a regular patron to the cantinas on Nar Shadaa. Far too long but now he was back, back to his previous life. Had he run again ? It all depended on the perspective. For the first time, Zef did not see it that way. He was not running, not this time. Was it permanent ? Temporarily ? The scoundrel did not know nor did he dwell on the question to seek an answer. Zef just knew he needed this.

And once again, the bottle of Corellian whiskey stood tall next to the half full glass that the smuggler held. A standard noisy cantina that he was honestly surprised to see a lot of patrons that he actually knew. They were just what ? Twenty ? Thirty years older. Good ol' Karn, the bartender and owner of the establishment, was no longer the middle-aged intimidating men behind the bar. Sure, he kept his sharp and rather dreadful features but gray hair and wrinkles had substantially taken the hold of him.

"It's been a long time, Halo." Karn muttered as he sipped an oddly colorful liquor in a glass for a customer. "Back home for a longer time, now?" The bartender kept his eyes on the scoundrel who in return was with his signature nonchalant facial expression. Zef knew perfectly well what the man was asking.

"I am back in business, yeah." He replied straightforwardly. "The galaxy's in a perfect condition to make a man some creds." Zef took a sip and then a drag of his cigarette. "Can't miss on that now, can I ?"

"Definitely not." Karn nodded, a very slight smile appeared on his face for a moment. The man was glad Zef was back before his eyes shifted sharply towards the entrance of his establishment. "Reminds me. We've had a rather regular patron-to-be recently." He paused. "Mando."

Zef's head very slightly turned to follow Karn's eyes to a rather young woman with warrior-like physical characteristics. "Don't know her." The smuggler turned back to face his drink once again.

"She's a Mando though."

"With no armor ?" Zef raised his eyebrow and smirked. "That's an odd Mando, Karn." He took a drag from his cigarette. "What's her deal?"

"Don't know much. Hunts things is what I know. Comes here to find informants."

"Interesting." The smuggler muttered with a tone hinting the exact opposite of what he had said. And another sip from his Corellian whiskey.

[member="Sear Gaalsien"]

 

[Darth Abyss]

The best thing about a bar on Nar shadaa was that a man in sith attire, a cybernetic leg, pale corrupted skin and a mask to hid his face still wasn't the strangest sight to be seen there. His robe was completely wet, water still dripping on the ground as Darth Abyss traversed in the inside of the cantina. Wordless he walked between the tables, his eyes completely ignorant to anyone else that the woman he was to meet here. He figured which of the bars guest she was with one look on her, her hair and tattoos were hard to miss.

His face as stoic as always he took place besides the table, a tradition used by many people involved in shady business. Sure nar shadaa was basically a world without real rules and laws, but there were still more than enough lowlifes down on their luck that would try to steal and robe anything if they saw an opportunity. Not that their chances would be particularly high against him, but the smuggler moon was still a neutral zone filled with anyone from alliance members to mandos so as a known war criminal he still preferred to keep suspicions as low as possible.

"I heard you are looking for something. I might can help you with finding it ... but it will have its price."

He knew that she already had figured that the information she required would cost here, but he was pretty sure that she hadn't figured yet what it was. Money didn't interested him, he had more than enough of it, but a option to preserve the past was above any payment. For her the axe would be nothing than a relic, a piece of her culture, but to him it would speak, it would show him parts of the past that still remained undocumented.

[member="Zef Halo"] [member="Sear Gaalsien"]

 

[Sear Gaalsien]

[member="Darth Abyss"] [member="Zef Halo"]

As much as she could, Sear herself kept trying to avoid eye contact with anybody - such body language could get one into a world of hurt on this moon. Even if the person next to you was staring you down, if you wanted to keep your kit or your limbs, you just let it slide. For the most part she wasn't minding the much larger, older looking scoundrel down the counter. A bigger, no doubt more experienced patron returning home, no doubt. With her peripheral vision it didn't take too long either before she noticed his generally greasy getup. From experience however, either the man was a real hotshot with the blaster in his holster, or he was just an old soul passing by. Regardless of which one it was, she could respect that, at least for now. Another swig of Corellian, and she took her mind off the much larger, gruff personality.

A few more moments passed, and finally it seems the contact she'd been waiting for showed. A wonderfully and spectacularly inconspicuous thing - a man in a cloak. By appearance they were a credit a piece, but a robed man with a hood could tell you so much. A pickpocket? A smugger? Scoundrel? Gang member? Mysterious wanderer from Wild Space? The possibilities were endless.

She made no eye contact still as the man sat beside her, being shrewd enough not to feign body language that would even remotely suggest it was a meet-up. Who knows who else could be listening in? Sear kept cool - casually holding onto her glass and gently swinging it from side to side, watching the ice cubes clink around the clear container and the purple to indigo liquid inside flowing about. It had to be him, she thought to herself. He just seemed to sure to be another conman. No goons seemed to trail him either, or at least her senses didn't pick up anything.Hunched forward though as she was and keeping to herself, she finally turned her head slightly to the hooded figure and discreetly acknowledged his arrival.

"'Bout time you showed up", she said with a thick Mandalorian accent. A small smile appeared on her face as she raised her hand. Her arm bent at the elbow so it'd be enough for the bartender behind the counter would notice, but without the fully outstretched arm that'd just look absurd. "Another drink here barkeep", she then said with a smug pursing of the lips, briefly looking back at him and grinning before turning back to her contact. It took only took a few moments before Karn poured both her and the hooded man each more Corellian ale, and simply walked off again back to the good ol' scoundrel seated two stools down the counter.

"You know what I want", she continued, leaning in close to hush her voice and holding her glass close. She took a quick gulp before speaking on, "I had to kill men to get to you; some of them actually good men. Name your price."

 

[Darth Abyss]

His face formed the smallest of smiles, a thin almost unnoticeable line in the face of the sith knight. His hand clinging around the cup, and brought it to his mouth, downing the beverage in one sip. Since the fall of his empire he had developed a bad habit concerning alcohol, drinking more and rather frequently to sedate his mind. For today it would be his only drink, the task at hand would require his senses and mind to be clear. Turning his head ever so slightly he gave the woman another look from the edge of his vision. A few months back he would have rather plunged his own lightsaber in his heart instead of working with a mandalorian, but the times had changed. The sith had returned to shadows, and to survive any of them would need allies. While some decided to band together with one and another, Abyss saw that his best bet was to have friends inside the groups that still held power in the galaxy.

"I do not want money. My desire is of a more ... academic nature. I can tell you where to find it, and I can help you get it, but if I do I want the right to use the object for my research before it will be handed over to you."

Many sith hoped to live forever, trying to use the force to continue their lives far beyond death. His knowledge about history gave him more than one example of these experiments having severe drawbacks, so he had no desire to follow in their footsteps. Instead he would leave something behind that would live on, a legacy composed of the ancient knowledge he had discovered and would discover. He was sure that the axe of mandalor would tell him many thing not yet documented that would get him one step closer to becoming a source for historic knowledge for generations to come.

[member="Sear Gaalsien"] [member="Zef Halo"]

 

[Sear Gaalsien]

"A scholarly type, huh? I didn't make you to be the one for that."

The Gaalsien raider almost let out a chuckle as she simply grunted in reply. Hmph, she sounded, as if telling herself "go figure". She tried to make a friendly gesture, oblivious of how it might be construed outside the context of Mandalorian culture. With a simple nod of acknowledgement to make it clear that she'd heard what [member="Darth Abyss"] said, she poured him a little of her ale from her own glass - little more than a sip, but it was one of many little customary gestures that one went through in the course of breaking bread and sealing deals. The expression on her face changed little; not even an eyebrow raised or a probing question. People always had their reasons she figured, and if someone got off of studying the past, well that was their ride, not hers.

Sear tried to peek a little under the cloak, but inwardly frowned after realizing a mask hid her contact's identity away from here. Guess he'd have to remain an anomaly for now - so long as the lead information he brought her was legitimate. Discreetly she pulled out a little handheld holo-display, and upon activation it displayed in a toned-down red hue grid overly a tall, rather lean and austere looking weapon - an axe, about the same height as a prototypical Taung warrior from ages long past. To those not interested in relics the thing looked unremarkable - no ornate craftsmanship, decorative jewelry or precious gem to the naked eye. But to those with a love of history, or a vested interest in anything even remotely Mandalorian, it was the jackpot. The Gaalsien didn't have to explain what it was - by now her contact would know exactly what the holo displayed.

"Now I'm not sure what you'd want with starship scrap and cortosis, but that weapon is very important to my people, and it's imperative that I reclaim it. Fine, you can do what you want with it, but don't dismantle it or anything. I need the thing intact and as it was - how it was meant to be." She wasn't threatening or anything, but she wanted to be stern and clear as day on that part. Her eyes stayed intently locked on the shaded mask just under his cloak for a while, as if trying to size him up and understand his game before pulling back - gently tapping the bar counter and sighing with a small toothless smile - a subtle pursing of the lips.

"Other than that", she continued, "we have a deal." She took another gulp of her drink, and set the glass back down.

"So, what do you know?" Sear then quickly deactivated the holo and it disappeared again under her black garment.

[member="Zef Halo"]

 

[Darth Abyss]

Abyss ignored her comment about the fact that he didn't seemed like a scholar on the outside. He had heard it before over and over, and none of these times he felt the need to react to them. One day or another they would learn, the day he would finally finish his book and leave something to the galaxy that would still command respect long after his death. Without a second look his hand moved to the ale, again downing it in one sip. He knew that the habit he was slowly developing would become a problem if he wouldn't stop soon and that it wasn't the way of the sith to drown ones frustration in an intoxicating and mind numbing substance like alcohol.

His eyes moved to the representation of ths artifact the woman was looking for. He already had seen it before, when he began his research about the object, after he got a message that someone was looking for it. Normally he only searched for objects that belonged to sith or jedi, but this axe, belonging to the famed Mandalor, the Destroyer could tell him many stories and he hoped that most of them were still unheard.

"I have far to much respect for the past, so I will do my best to keep the artifact intact. My methods of research require nothing more than a simple touch."

He was well aware what the axe meant to the mandalorian culture, and he had no interest in damaging or dismantling the relic, and his skills would make any method that would require these actions obsolete.

"A friend of a friend told me that the object has gone through many hands in the last few years. As of now, a Hutt recently acquired it on the black market. The price he paid tells me that it will not be simple to get our hands on it."

[member="Sear Gaalsien"] [member="Zef Halo"]

 

[Sear Gaalsien]

Sear's eyes squinted slightly - part doubt, part curiosity as the man spoke of this strange ability. Initially she didn't know what to make of it, but outsiders could be as strange as they come - proud as she was, she knew her place: narrow was the corner of the universe in which she dwelt, and there was much more to life than what one could find within the filial realms of the Mandalorians.

"Can you now?", she rhetorically asked with a tilt of the head. Admittedly, the prospect of such an ability put her off somehow, and if anything, made her just a little more suspicious. Call her narrow or simple-minded, but usually men who spoke with such mysticism or vague eccentricity had a good trick or two up their sleeve. Guess she'd just have to see it through to see the karking thing for herself. A last, finishing gulp of her drink, and she pushed the glass away on the counter as she rest one hand on its surface, the other held up against the side of her lower black fatigues - pressed against the seams of her thigh as the little clandestine meet-up continued.

"A Hutt, why is it always a Hutt?", Sear almost whined with a rolling of her eyes and an exasperated sigh. She expected [member="Darth Abyss"] to understand - the oversized, overfed space slugs, somehow, always got their grimy hands on some of the galaxy's most precious items. How exactly eluded her, but that was irrelevant for now.

"Here, on Nar Shadaa? Or elsewhere?", she continued prying, as one of her boots slowly tapped against the counter below.

 

[Darth Abyss]

"You doubt my abilities?"

In his voice was no hint of pride, not because he kept it to himself but because he had none. He couldn't care less if this woman believed him or not, he had nothing to prove and no desire to do so. Still if the two were to steal the artifact out of the hands of a Hutt, she would have to understand what he was able to do. The skill to see the past almost as clearly as the present opened up more options than simple research. His right hand moved the cup she had been drinking from in the air, and he closed his eyes to listen to the echoes.

"You said no word since you came here, not even to the Barkeeper when you ordered your drink. You sat here quietly, only looking around you while trying to remain as unseen as possible."

He placed the cup back in the table, his eyes now open. With aid of the force he had been able to precisely follow her actions from the point the barkeeper poured her the drink.

"The Hutts are a fascinating species. They have secured their positions over centuries by nothing but manipulation. It is not surprising that many of them posses the wealth to collect things of worth."

From his robe he gathered a small data chip, and placed it on the table. Stored on the device was all information he was able to collect before this meeting, including the place they had to get into, and some basic Intel about its security and composition. He shuffled the chip over the table towards her, so she could take a look for herself.

[member="Sear Gaalsien"]

 

[Zef Halo]

Last one, I promise.

Zef had ordered one more of his favorite Corellian malt whiskey and took it head on when the rather enigmatic hooded figure entered the establishment. Karn's eyes shot up straight at the man along with a scowl on his face. The smuggler knew at that moment that it was not a regular patron and may very be not someone from the area. Karn's Place wasn't a cantina where new people came and when the figure sat next to the woman they had been discussing earlier, Zef knew there was something going on.

He sharpened his ears and blessed his proximity to them to be able to discern words from their sentences. Where he could not comprehend a word, the scoundrel very well understood human behavior and tone. That's how one survived in the underworld. Suspicion and diligence seemed to follow the Mandalorian girl's voice while the newcomer's tone was as his appearance - mysterious. Was it hesitance as well that Zef found in the hooded man's voice ?

"Caught somethin'?" Karn's voice broke his concentration and Zef shifted his eyes from his drink to the bartender. "Somethin' goin' down ?"

"Maybe." Zef replied nonchalantly as always. "You might turn out right."

" 'bout what?"

"She might be a Mando, alright. Or a wanna-be." The smuggler motioned with his head at the girl discussing things with the hooded man. "There's somethin' goin' down for sure, though. You can bet your ass on that, Karn."

"Lots of chits?"

"Perhaps or none at all."

"Would you karkin' give me a straight answer, boy ?"

"Yeah. I will find out soon enough." The scoundrel smirked and remained until he heard more of the two's discussion.

Then he will make his move.

[member="Sear Gaalsien"] [member="Darth Abyss"]

 

[Sear Gaalsien]

For a moment, she seemed actually impressed. "Where'd do learn that?", she paused to ask with that same half-cocked smile while taking the data chip off the counter. "You know what, if I didn't know better, I'd say you were a Force User. That's a mighty fine trick, mate.", she continued on in her Mandalorian-accented Galactic Basic. A quick slide into one of her holo's data slits, and the little device began loading it up. "Makes you think there'd be more Sith Hutts, huh?", she absent-mindedly joked with a chuckle and a grunt, "I'm not saying I'm not impressed. But you know how these things are mate, you find a Hutt somewhere, and there are four dozen hired guns around his apartment, estate, whatever."

A few seconds later, and the holo finally activated, lighting up a little red 3D interface between the two of them at the bar. Sear kept it a little closer to her, as not to hold it out in the open for everyone to see, but any smuggler or scoundrel worth his weight in credits would know it to be a map. It began with the sector, and then zoomed in onto a planet, then closer into a city, until finally exact spatial coordinates were laid out. Sear was impressed - whoever this man was, he knew his stuff. The information was thorough, down to the exact block address.

"Taris, huh?", she mumbled softly as she kept looking. "It's in the city's lower levels. No doubt the slug'll be holed up there too with his lackeys - should be a fortune kept down there." Sear then quickly deactivated the device, having seen all she needed for now. Personally she was more a bounty collector than a scoundrel who broke into restricted areas for the next big break, but while she was something of a pirate and was accustomed to raiding convoys jumping between planets, a few guns for hire on a starship deck was an entirely different story from a small company of thugs all in one place. She sighed and kept the holo away.

"If you'll want to study it, I assume you're coming along. You got a ship?" She left a few credits on the counter for Karn, and then started to get up. "'Cos if not, I've got one. We're leaving right now before something goes down. I'm sure we both know how it is here on Nar Shadaa."

"We go immediately, It's a three day run to Taris, so we'll have plenty of time in between to work out a plan."

[member="Zef Halo"] [member="Darth Abyss"]

 

[Darth Abyss]

"Hutts, against what their appearance suggests are predators, and alike the sith in many aspects. Still only few join ou ... their ranks, as many lack a connection to the force and even those who do have it are more comfortable in the ranks of the many cartels and organisations that belong to the Hutts."

He almost said "our ranks" when he talked about the sith, a slight stumble of his tongue that had been hard to notice for anyone but himself. Telling her what he was already would be a mistake, the mandalorians were notorious for their dislike of force users across all orders and organisations, so if he wanted this to work the way he anticipation than he would to keep his identity hidden until he earned her trust.

"I agreed, if we go in the direct way then we will meet heavily resistance. But there is another option, one that requires us to stay silent. There will still be the possibility of resistance, but stealth and surprise gives us an advantage when outnumbered."

His master, Darth Ophidia, was known as the Pale Assassin, a queen of the shadows that could walk past them in this moment and would still remain unseen. He had not reached the mastery of the shadows like her, yet his skill was still above that of many. If they would spend sometime observing the hutts hideout and collect some information about the movement and timing of the guards they would have a far more easier time getting in and out. They would have enough time to plan it out once thex would be on their to talos.

"Depends. My ship, can be easily hidden in the masses, an old corellian freighter that looks like any other, but its systems are faulty and it lacks any comfort. Your decision."

[member="Sear Gaalsien"] [member="Zef Halo"]

 

[Zef Halo]

"You scrubs have no idea what you're getting into."

Zef's voice rang at the two mysterious patrons that more or less, out of excitement or pure amateur skills, were not good enough to hide their manners and plans good enough for the old scoundrel not catch them. He still remained focused on his drink, not looking at them, while enjoying his cigarette. Those two were green as they could get when it came to the world of crime. Hell, why did he even bother alerting them of his presence. Was it the ringing of credit chits ? Nah, his greed was left behind in his youth.

"You'd know to keep your tongue behind your teeth better when discussing harming Hutts." Zef turned his nonchalant look at the two figures sitting on the table close to him. Karn's eyes were immediately piercing the old smuggler, Zef could feel them digging into him like claws. "Then again, I'd also doubt any of you have the skills or the ship to escape successfully." The Corellian scoffed before his face turned into a scowl. "No one beats the Corellian Bolt."

"65-35, me being generous, and you get a higher chance of surviving the stupid thing you got planned."



[member="Darth Abyss"] | [member="Sear Gaalsien"]

 

[Sear Gaalsien]

"You reckon you have a way we can stealth-walk right into the estate?", Sear asked [member="Darth Abyss"] as she prepared to stand up. The choice of ship and every man's loadout for the mission would be critical - come underprepared and you hit a snag, come overburdened and being discreet becomes a cumbersome and challenging affair. Unlike raids, which were pretty straightforward so long as one had the element of surprise on their side, a Hutt and its small army of thugs weren't going anywhere. There were a few, subtle differences between assaulting a moving, dynamic convoy of merchant vehicles and caravans, and assaulting someone's home - the former was akin to wrapping your hand around a fish, in the sense that timing and the element of surprise were key. The latter - like dislodging a bursa from its burrow. "Correlian freighter?", she continued, seeming impressed, "You aren't by chance talking about the YT-1300 are you? Bantha's blood, that's a good ship. As comfortable as a tin can but as flyable as a fighter."

She was halfway to standing up from her seat already; just getting ready to push herself off and back as the gruff-looking stranger behind them suddenly spoke up. Instincts immediately kicked in, and Sear's hand drifted to the grip of one of her blasters in a heartbeat. She turned around to look at [member="Zef Halo"], at first almost scowling as she remained on guard and ready for a fight. She bit down on her teeth and her muscles tensed momentarily, but at the mention of the Corellian Bolt, at which her eyes widened, almost as if in disbelief.

"The Corellian Bolt? You don't mean the Jai'galaar?"

She stood up completely, one hand still resting on the grips of one of her Westar's as she took one half-pace forward towards Zef.

"The Shriek-Hawk? That's a smuggling vessel, isn't it?", she asked with an eyebrow raised. "Who are you?"

 

[Darth Abyss]

Abyss stayed silent, patiently sitting at the table, his eyes observing both the mandalorian woman and the unknown, run down scoundrel that had just interfered in the planning of what was ahead of them. The man wanted money, so he couldn't have heard the whole discussion between the two, as it had been already talked through why they were doing this. Cultural pride on one side, academic interest on the other, but no desire for material wealth just for the sake of it. Not only that, but the man telling him that they would need his help to get inside and out was just laughably ridiculous. Abyss could get almost invisible in the blink of an eye, move without making any sound and toy with the minds of others.

"I am a man without pride, so I will hold back with telling you about what skill I exactly posses, but let me assure you that they are more than sufficient to get in an out of a hutt hideout. Also, as much as it pains me to tell you, we are not doing this for money, so there is no reason to interfere with our business."

He could feel his anger brooding under the surface, but there was no sign of it his expression. Under other circumstances he would have simply ripped apart the lowlife that had the nerve to belittle him, but making noise and drawing attention was something he would rather avoid even if it meant to let the mans word slide.

[member="Sear Gaalsien"] [member="Zef Halo"]