Mihoshi Keibatsu, Proconsul of Odan-Urr, Warmaster of the Vatali Empire, Imperial Princess of Kyataru, stood on the command deck of The Akusho listening to one of the deck officers explaining the current mission. Also present included the Governor of Kaal, Tisto Kingang, and the Knight-Commander, Syrena Valkar. She had worked with both of them in several instances and the situation felt even better with the two of them at her sides.
“Get on with it, Melgon,” she said waspishly to the prattling officer. “Must we have so much extemporization?” Her oddly accented voice was cold but not quite harsh. No one who worked for the small Kyataran ever feared her, but they did know to walk soft if she was in a mood.
“Forgive me, Lady Keibatsu,” the man said quickly. “I merely wanted to make sure you had all the information you could require.”
With a sigh, Miho gestured for the man to continue. The target’s name was R'aoke Adebanyo. A mercenary hired by members of a group called the Collective.
Make a note to look up everything we have on the Collective. Miho mused to herself. Having only recently returned to Brotherhood space, she was still catching up with who everyone was and what they wanted.
Koboh? She had never heard of the planet but the navigations crew had found it with no difficulty. Information said it was a habitable planet with lots of fauna to get in the way. She shrugged slightly at that. The location of the target was known and they were being sent in for one reason.
Termination.
The small woman smiled to herself and gestured to Tisto and Syrena to ask any questions they had. Hyperspace travel always took time.
“If he was hired by the collective,” the governor of Kaal seemed rather relaxed before the mission, “should we be expecting him to have guards that have some of the same nonsense as Collective troops? Would a scan for energy usage not be helpful? The Collective are the ones with those advanced cybernetics right?”
Tisto lounged in his seat, admiring the Warmaster’s ship. He took a sip from a glass of Phattro he held loosely in his left hand. “Some of those might need to be charged at some point. Worst case we then go in with reason to believe he might be using the local fauna and some regular mercs to protect himself. Maybe they are Barabel… I have been meaning to get into a good scrap recently. The Wookies are proving rather difficult to train with.”
The governor sat up properly to refill his glass, doing his best not to catch himself on the cloth that hung from his inquisitorial armor. Despite having owned it for years, he did not seem especially fond of the armor. With his drink refilled he slouched into his seat again. “I hope this poor guy has some solid guards. Would hate to see all of his work come crashing down without much of a fight.”
“Advanced cybernetics…” Syrena mused aloud to herself, thinking on the matter for a moment. She sat down with one leg crossed over the other, lightly tapping the heel of her boot in thought.
“I’ve encountered a few with those items… They were quite the fashion statements back on Coruscant… Although, they did have a great deal of other purposes, when it came to practical application and weaponry,” Syrena stated, spinning her chair around to gaze towards both Tisto and the Proconsul.
Listening in on the conversation, she perked up a bit at the mention of the Collective. As a newcomer to the Brotherhood, and now with the position of Knight-Commander, Syrena had taken it upon herself to delve into various collections of research… A task that resulted in many hours spent buried in paperwork, but one she felt had been necessary to learn what she could.
“When it comes to the Collective… I can understand their want for equality, emphathize with it even… But not at the cost of so many lives, force user or not,” Syrena sighed quietly, with the shake of her head in disapproval.
Sensing her shift of emotion, a pastel pink milicreep droid slithered free from the sleeve of her white robe, coiling around her forearm in a comforting manner. Covered in a soft layer of fur, each strand held faint silver sparkles of electricity, the only clue to the lethal amounts of voltage stored within the small droid.
“Oh! Hello there,” Syrena said brightly, a smile managing to tug at the corners of her lips. “Whose a zappy wappy little cuddlebug?” She cooed softly to the milicreep droid, setting it down beside her.
Tisto shook his head at Syrena’s comments. “I have fought them before. They definately are not in favor of equality so much as domination. They have some good propogandists of course, but when it comes down to it…”
He waves his hands in an uncertian motion. “That being said I don’t think we should eliminate this threat. We don’t have much time until we arrive to start the fight but…. might be worth considering the old carbonite hiest. Turn him over in carbonite for the reward, only to steal him back. Someone who has messed up the Brotherhood this much is someone we might be able to use.”
Miho raised an eyebrow at Tisto. “The contract states he s to be eliminated. I don’t think the would be willing to accept him being frozen.”
She drummed her fingers on one a nearby terminal. There were ways of keeping a useful asset without others knowing. “They don’t require proof of elimination, but we can bring in a less important body part to collect.”
Miho gestures at the ship around them with a grin. “I’m sure we can find some place to store the rest of him around here, hm?”
The small Proconsul wasn’t known for being brutal, but she was pragmatic. And keeping a known enemy in the freezer until they needed to get something out of them seemed like a decent idea.
They would get an informant, the Collective would lose a soldier and maybe - just maybe - they could bamboozle the people with control of the purse strings.
“Do you have thoughts on that, Governor Kingang? Knight Commander? If we do it properly, no one need ever know he still lives except us.”
She smiled at each of them in turn, a smile like the sun coming up over a horizon. She had learned politics at her parents feet before their murder, before their exile.
Practicality had come later.
Tisto nodded, considering the implications of what they could get away with. “I suppose something like that comes with a payment attached?”
He considered the implications as the ship drew closer to their goal. “Let me guess, I need to be very distracting when we arrive? So you and Serena can sneak in?”
The boxer watched Miho for any sign of agreement. He thought he saw the briefest of nods, and found that was enough. It was not much longer before they arrived on Koboh. Tisto made sure he was the first out the door, taking off at a jog towards the stronghold. He could be rather distracting, and it would be better for everyone if they could take out the target before dealing with the mercenaries.
-# Besides, maybe I could hire one or two of them…
“Well if all they seek is domination and not some sort of freedom movement, then I certainly feel much better when it comes to the prospect of… hindering them,” Syrena replied back to Tisto’s words with a slight smirk dancing across her lips. Pausing to listen to the Proconsul, she thought on the matter for a moment before nodding in agreement.
“Sounds like a plan… The fact that he still lives will be our little secret,” She softly laughed with a wink. As their ship came to a landing on Koboh, Syrena readied herself, a look of focus now shimmering in her light silver gaze.
Following after Tisto, she broke into a swift run, though veered away in the opposite direction towards the stronghold. She propelled herself upwards in a swift leap, latching onto the steel side of the structure with sharpened claws from her gloves. Moving in a blur of speed, Syrena climbed until she was perched atop a low platform. She lashed out with the reinforced heel of her boot to land a kick towards an air vent, channeling enough impact into the movement to break through the metal screen.
Drawing a deep breath as she awaited the next move of her teammates, Syrena shifted her focus towards remaining out of view. Perched in a balanced stance, the silhouette of her slim form began to waver before shifting completely out of view.
Miho watched as Tisto jogged off towards the base, watched as Syrena faded from view. She shook her head and smiled. Both of them were more than a joy to work with.
And it was time for her to do her own job. She wondered how long she needed to give the other two on her crew. “Get the freezing chamber ready, please. Just in case there isn’t one on site.”
She assumed there would be a signal. She could have just as easily been the distraction. Well, she wasn’t going to really complain since she got to avoid being groped by drunken louts.
Hefting her shatter rifle, she started off towards a nearby rock face to take up a position. Sighting down on the building, Miho marveled at the sheer number of available windows and other targets. Now all the others needed to do was create some sort of a disturbance to move as many of them into the open as possible.
Or she would just be shooting people to cover their hasty escape. Either would work for her.
Tisto smiled as he approached the stronghold, a pair of Gamoreans standing between him and the door. Their Arg'garoks were perhaps one of the most dangerous things he could be facing down, and he kept that in mind. One of the guards gestured at him, saying something in its native tongue.
||“Leave or we will make you leave!”|| its pig like voice cried out in a language Tisto simply did not understand. The former gang leader wondered for a moment if it would help Hoth to have some Gamorean guards. Negotiations with the Wookies to take up the role of Governors guard had not been going particularly well, and Gamoreans were probably the next best muscle he could think of.
-# Well, maybe hiring both of them would be a bit much. But one… yeah I could use just a bit of extra muscle.
With that in mind Tisto began his jog to close the distance. Negotiating with Gamoreans was always better done when they didn’t think they were stronger than you. The one on the left looked tougher than the one on the right. Something about the furs that one was wearing compared to the plain leathers of the other made it seem like a better target.
His right hook was a bit telegraphed, but he was still faster than the much stronger pigman. Electricity crackled as he connected with the Gamorean’s snout. Still, this Gamorean was more durable than some of those Barabel he had faced the last time he worked for the Envoy corps. It brought down its huge Vibro-axe, the weapon colliding with Tisto’s conjured barrier half a heart beat before it would have chopped off the Kiffar’s head. Seeing the blade just a hairs breath away from his neck sent shivers down his spine, from fear or from the Arg'garoks vibrations he was not sure.
-# You are getting sloppy Tisto. You can’t think these are unskilled brutes. You know better.
Thankfully, the Gamorean seemed intent on trying to push against the Force Barrier instead of taking another swing. With a left upper cut coming under the weapon, Tisto dropped the Gamorean. A surge of heat flashed into his mind, and he dove to the ground, scapping up his arms as he avoided what was surely another debilitating blow. He kicked out as he did, his foot colliding solidly with the other guards leg. The Gamorean took a step back but did not buckle.
“Hey,” Tisto said as confidently as he could while he scrambled up. “Want twenty thousand credits?”
The guard readied their weapon to swing again. With a flick of his wrist a cred chip flew from Tisto’s belt to his hand, and he held it outward. “Twenty Thousand credits, take it and run screaming. That’s all I ask.”
The Gamorean slowly lowered his weapon, taking the chip to examine in. They gave a quick glance to their fallen comrade before offering a shrug. They turned down the path Tisto had come from and ran off, screaming at the top of their lungs. ||“ATTACK! ATTACK! WE ARE ALL IN DANGER! SOUND THE ALARM!”||
With the distraction cleverly laid into place by none other than Tisto himself, Syrena watched as the chaos began to unfold. She had no doubt that somewhere nearby, Miho was prepared, for the Proconsul had always seemed to be one step ahead in the time that Syrena had known her.
Now that the targets were beginning to pour out into the open while sounding the alarm, she dropped her cover and instinctively sprang into action. A pair of silver wings unfolded from her jetpack, and in one swift motion, Syrena glided to the ground, before tucking the wings back against her form.
In the frenzy, she grabbed hold of the item in closest reach– A lightweight seven string hallikset. She swung the instrument like a hammer, applying enough force to use it as a weapon, and brought its steel base colliding against the gut of the nearest guard.
The shimmering silver forms of her wings unfurled once again, and Syrena flew upwards in one swift movement. She took a deep breath, summoning a supply of energy within herself, and began to strum the seven-stringed instrument. With the rippling electric sounds of the first few notes being played, a crackling bolt of white lightning suddenly shot down at another target from where Syrena hovered. The voltage of the strike began to radiate outwards to several other nearby enemies, from its initial point of contact.
“Well, I suppose that works well enough.” Miho said to the air around her.
Sighting down the scope of her shatter rifle, the small woman pulled the trigger.
And nothing happened.
With a soft curse, she tried to clear the jam unsuccessfully for a moment before the rifle fired the round on its own.
Through the cruel twisting of FATE, the round found its mark. In the forehead of the Gamorean running part of the distraction.
Miho looked out over the field with a grimace. That was going to come back and bite them in the ass. She just knew it.
Not wanting to stay any longer in that position, she abandoned her rifle and disappeared into the ground surrounding the rock face and pulled out her sidearms.
“Time to get to work.” On silent feet, the Odanite Proconsul surged forward, heading straight for the base to back up her companions.
Thwack
An Arg'garock smacked into Tisto with the flat of the blade. Between the Gamorean’s muscle mass and the weight of the weapon, Tisto was thrown to the ground. The boxer was surrounded at this point, five of the large green pigmen with their vibro-axes keeping him locked down, and yet he could not help but smile. It had not taken much to convince these thugs they were best served by one on one fights to prove themselves.
Two more Gamoreans over by the door were counting up credits. The gambling was awfully profitable at the moment, and it seemed to be drawing even more of a crowd. Mercenaries from all over seemed to have been hired by R'aoke, and Mercenaries of all types loved to prove themselves. The appearance of a somewhat known boxer challenging them and putting fourty thousand credits to whoever could beat him one on one, that bought him an audience. Some cheered, some booed, and somed bellowed for more alcohol as Tisto stood back up, dusting himself off.
The Gamorean he was facing offered a piggly smile and a grunt, letting him get ready. The boxer raised his hands and went in again. He dodged under the Arg'garock this time, hitting the pigmans meaty thigh with a right hook. The electricity from his gauntlets visibly flared at the hit, and the Gamorean let out a wail, dropping to their knee as they went down. Tisto backed off, honoring the rules he had set in place with these disreputable scoundrels. The pigman dropped his weapon, tapping his leg to signal defeat. Mercenaries grumbled and credits were passed around.
“Alright!” the governor of Kaal waved his hands in the air, egging on the crowd. “Who is next!”
There came a clatter of weapons and fists, as the attention of the Mercenaries were focused elsewhere for the time being. Casting her hallikset aside, the female Zeltron set her sights elsewhere.
She angled the shimmering silver forms of her wings, drawing them close, and dove, using the power of the jetpack to propel her forwards. Spiraling in a blur of speed, Syrena dove through the opening to the facility she’d created earlier, wind roaring in her ears as she made her descent.
The heels of her white boots landed soundlessly on a worn steel floor, the scents of aged metal and cold ash faintly lingering in the air. An eerie silence befell the inside of the stronghold, all except for the sounds of the battle echoing from outside. Somewhere within the building, their target lurked.
There came a sudden whisper of movement, a breath of air disturbed. A pair of piercing orange eyes gleamed from the depths of the shadows, locked on her movements. Watching. Waiting. Sensing the disturbance, Syrena instinctively whirled around.
A surge of energy pulsed through her veins. The air around her form shimmered, crackling with unseen power, until the very moment she chose to release it with the wave of her hand. A blinding white light suddenly unleashed from where Syrena stood, flooding the space with enough brilliance to momentarily engulf each shadow in pure radiance.
A figure that was no longer bathed in darkness began to recoil, staggering in place amidst the disorientating effects of the radiance emanating from the Zeltron female.
“You should know better than to try to hide from us, dearie…” Syrena’s silky voice began to whisper to the target, her silhouette shimmering in brilliant silver light. Seizing the opening, she lunged forwards in one swift moment, before he had the chance to recover.
With a few rapid strikes to his solar plexus in the form of upwards kicks, she managed to destabilize his weight. Quickly dropping into a lowered stance, Syrena twisted behind him, jabbing her fist into the side of his knee. White electricity shimmered along the knuckles of her gloves, infused into the punch. The moment that his balance wavered, in one spinning kick, she sent him crashing onto his back.
R'aoke let out a grunt from the impact, through quickly staggered back to his feet, reaching to his belt in retaliation and blindly swiping a steel dagger in her direction. Though Syrena managed to weave to avoid most of the slashes, one managed to catch the left side of her cheek, and with it, a single wisp of pink hair that gently fell to the ground.
“Why you little…” She began to icily snap, her silver eyes narrowing as she locked gaze with him. Catching his wrist in one hand, she channeled electricity from her gloves into the grip, while using her other free hand to wrench away the blade. Before he could move again, Syrena hooked his arm, spun around to his back, and yanked him into a chokehold. His massive frame thrashed against her grip, muscles straining, but she held on, driving her forearm against his throat in the form of a vice.
“You know, I really didn’t want to have to do this, but you leave me no other choice… You know what they say, time to face the music…” Syrena managed to say through deep breaths, as she placed the palm of her other hand directly in front of both his eyes. Once again, the radiance was unleashed in the form of searing white light, this time directly into his pupils.
Miho’s feet carried her swiftly through the entrance to the compound. Her eyes took in everything around her. Tisto surrounded by a number of mercenaries all intent on boxing. Syrena further in with R'aoke pinned. And before her…
More serious mercenaries armed with blasters, slugthrowers, knives, axes, the whole nine.
The small Kyataran surged forward, the loose overcoat she wore billowed in the wind of her own momentum. The crack of a fired weapon and the first mercenary’s face exploded just above his nose, showering the room with blood and thicker things. Her area of the compound exploded in gunfire, the men with more conventional weapons falling back to avoid the lines of fire.
Blaster fire lanced through the air, leaving the brilliant afterimage leading to a score of marks on walls. Everywhere they shot, it seemed like the small Proconsul just stepped away in the nick of time. In truth, it had little to do with the Force and everything to do with overtrained muscle memory. Years as an assassin, years being trained by her brothers, years of training herself. Miho had become little more than a weapon for decades.
Another crack from her slugthrowers and another mercenary sat down on the ground against a wall, a hole in his chest the size of a small melon. The rounds she used were custom jobs from a weaponsmith on Solyiat. More powder than the round required, heavier materials instead of soft lead and a mushrooming effect on impact made these rounds horrifying for any who saw them in action.
A stray round from one of the opposing slugthrowers grazed her right cheek, which added one more line to the collection of scars that networked down her side. A blaster shot burned through the snow-white overcoat. Several retorts from her slugthrowers claimed more lives until they clicked empty.
Mihoshi ducked behind a pillar, listening to the pained breathing of those wounded, the screams of those dying and the silence of the dead as she bolstered her sidearms, drawing the sword from its place on her hip.
An aethereal, menacing green fire ignited along the blade as she left her cover. Her feet carried her once more into the fray, mercenaries armed with melee weapons dropped them and ran in the face of Death as she stalked towards them. The tip of the sword lowered as she surveyed the room again.
Everyone had turned towards the gun fight and regarded the small woman with a mix of fear and admiration. Pragmatic Tisto looked at her almost approvingly, whilst the mercenaries recoiled from the look. Syrena, the Jedi, regarded her with a look of awe and horror. Perhaps that was to be the end of their newly forming friendship.
Perhaps not.
She raised the point of her sword towards the mercenaries around Tisto, her voice just loud enough to be heard in the deafening silence.
“You can work for us, or you can die.”
Slowly, one by one, they nodded. The fear in their eyes stabbing that deep sensitive place she hid from everyone. Mihoshi Keibatsu, Warmaster of the Vatali Empire, strode towards their target held in thrall by the Knight-Commander Syrena Valkar.
Her blade flashed, removing one of the man’s arms. “Release him and bind his wounds, Commander Valkar.”
The power the Zeltron bore down on R’aoke faded, leaving him blinking rapidly, screaming in pain, falling to his knees.
Miho placed the tip of her sword against the man’s throat, the ghastly flame burning where it touched. “You’ll come with us now. The arm is forfeit and proof of your death.”
R’aoke recovered enough to spit at the Warmaster’s feet. “That’s nice,” she murmured. “Just remember that I want to keep you alive for now. But there are so many ways for a man to die.”
The tone of her voice was matter of fact, no emotion, no inflection. “You can live and work for us and maybe we’ll give you another arm. Or you can refuse and I’ll feed you to yourself piece by piece. I’ll let you think about it.”
With a flash of one small foot, Miho struck R'aoke’s head just under the chin, knocking him out cold. “Tie him and let’s get out of here.”
She pointed at the mercenaries. “Your first job is to guard him.” With that, Miho turned on her heel and stalked out of the compound, looking for a bush to throw up in.