Ask Ahch-To A Most Annoyed Droid

[Sabatha Sayall]

According to the Jedi Archives, Ahch-To was "one of the potential birthplaces of the Jedi Order" and "where Grand Master Skywalker trained with the Force." Sabatha wondered why so few seemed to visit when it seemed so important.

The answer, of course, was because it was on the wrong side of the Galaxy and had little on it but tiny creatures and too much water. Still, there were ruins scattered around and that was where the potential lay. Master Drow Venn had been seeking some help on a retrieval mission and Sabatha quite liked the idea of being away for a short while. If only to stop the other padawans hiding her charm bracelet.

The rain lashed on the ship as Sabatha stepped out, heading down the ramp as her boots squeaked. From beneath her hood, she peered around the rain-lashed island for any sign of what they were looking for. "The ship scans showed something underground, but I'm not sure I can see where there'd be an entrance," she called out. There wasn't much to see there aside from a few crumbling walls and a whole lot of plant life.

I should take a cutting back to Yavin.

Her waterproof cape blew back in a gust of wind as she shivered, clutching her satchel bag close. "I'm not entirely sure anything could last so long in this weather!" Sabatha called out, her soft voice near overpowered by the howls of wind and roiling crashes of the waves.

@Fantasy Liver

 

[Drow Venn]

The last time Drow Venn had been to Ahch-To, it had been under less pleasant conditions. A Sith and his army of droids had tried to kill him, steal a very ancient X-Wing and the Sith had gotten away to boot. Granted, Drow had been able to save the X-Wing and scrap the droids but it had been dull work repairing the historical X-Wing and overall, he had not had a very nice first outing to Ahch-To

The weather at least had been nicer than today though.

But, as miserable as his last trip had been, his time on the island had taught him something. He'd uncovered some clues that pointed to the existence of some kind of Jedi artifacts on another far-off island. It had taken some time to decipher the clues at the Yavin IV library, especially with the war going on but Drow had finally found the coordinates and had enlisted the aid of a Padawan named Sabatha Sayall to assist him. He remembered how lost and out-of-place he'd felt as a Padawan and liked extending opportunities to the younger ones to make them feel confident in their abilities and that their presence in the order was welcome. Plus, in these violent times, it was just nice to go out and do something non war-related for once.

Drow touched down on the island in question in his signature Y-Wing, telling his astromech Sparky to stay on the ship. The island was vaguely star-shaped, small, and surrounded by numerous ruins. The ruins were in various states of disrepair so it was hard to tell what exactly the buildings had been looked like or used as back in the day. Over the sounds of the rain, waves, and the curious porgs on the island chittering, it was hard to make out but Drow felt certain that he actually heard the sounds of a lightsaber coming from inside some of the ruins. He closed his eyes and focused. Yep. There was no mistaking the signature snap-hiss sound of the ancient Jedi weapon. Once Sabatha had touched down, he motioned for her to come to him silently.

"Hear that?" he whispered. "Let's approach quietly. Make sure they're friendly."

With that, Drow pulled out his blaster rifle instead of his louder saber and approached. With Ahch-To being Ahch-To, it was entirely possible that the sound could be from a Jedi or a Jedi-sympathizer who had found one of the blades. But since he'd run into a Sith the last time, he went here, he wasn't taking any chances. He gingerly approached the ruins, trying his best to remain quiet.

@Charndley

 

[Sabatha Sayall]

She certainly had heard that. Even amongst the loud chittering of the porgs, she heard it. Her attention snapped to where she'd heard it, approaching carefully. Even with her hood up, the rain lashed hard at her. Her eyes narrowed as she approached the ruin, trying to stay a little behind Drow. He had the weapon, after all. A nasty looking blaster rifle that Sabatha doubted she could carry, let alone shoot.

Nearing the entrance to the ruin, Sabatha could hear the swish and hiss of a lightsaber blade cutting through the air. Very curious. Peering through a couple of cracks in the structure, she noticed a very distinct green-ish glow.

"Seems like a Jedi colour, no?" she asked Drow before she carefully approached the doorway. A half-eroded passageway coiled around the main room, with the sounds and slashes echoing against the stonework. Taps of metal against stone too, which sounded awfully peculiar to Sabatha. Crouching beside an opening, she heard something.

"Protocol 13F-D.... engage youngling development... shadow programming accepted..."

Various hodgepodge statements intercut with static and what sounded like broken droidspeak. Sabatha looked back at Drow, a little confused.

"D'you think it's safe to go in?" she asked uncertainly, tempted to stare and see something.

@Fantasy Liver

 

[Drow Venn]

"No I don't. But I think we got to anyways." Drow said exasperatedly, motioning for the Padawan to wait before following him inside. He steeled himself for anything and was still surprised when he walked through the entryway.

"Hello! My name is Drow Venn and I'm a Jed-" Drow began before a very angry looking droid of a model that he did not recognize jumped him and swung his saber directly at the Ishi Tib's face. It was only Drow's training and instincts that saved his life as he ignited his own saber and caught the droid's blade. He was so surprised that the Jedi Master was actually forced a couple steps back, focusing on trying not to get beheaded.

In his time studying with Cin Drallig's Holocron, Drow had become quite familiar with all the major forms of lightsaber combat from the defensively minded Soresu to the aggressive Vaapad. But the style the droid was using was entirely new to him. It had a lot of resemblances to Form I - the most basic of the styles. But there was something almost primitive and unrefined about the form. Drow probably could have found a way using one of the more refined techniques he knew to overcome the shortcomings but he simply didn't have any time to stop and think.

Complicating matters was the air cannon attached to the droid's forearm that it fired at Drow. The air blast was so powerful and concentrated that it sent Drow colliding into one of the ruin's walls. As he hit the wall, he was struck by how similar to a Force Push the air attack was and was struck with the realization that it was probably designed to be a training droid to teach Jedi what it was like to fight against Force users. This theory was even more supported by the lightning gun that was attached to the droid's other wrist that sent a very painful blast of electricity coursing through Drow's body.

"Engaging....engaging...the development is....the wisdom of the Council...Protocol 13F engaged" the droid continued in its broken droidspeak. By the sounds of it, the poor thing had just been left on or left alone for too long. Maybe both.

@Charndley

 

[Sabatha Sayall]

Sabatha had been expecting something droid-like when she'd heard the babbling from before. However, this was quite a surprise. She heard Drow's speech get cut off as she gasped, wondering what to do. There were hisses, snaps of sabers, blasts and smacks. Sabatha had to do something. Summoning bravery, she moved past the doorway and through...

She saw the strange droid turn towards Drow and fire lightning at him. Driven by adrenaline, Sabatha reached out on instinct and tugged at the droid's leg using the Force. It toppled quickly, screeching it's programming into the air as the lightening arced away from Drow, towards the roof. The droid scrabbled on the stone floor, metal scraping against stone.

Sabatha rushed towards Drow, looking over him. "Are you okay, Master Ve-," she began to say, before she was interrupted from behind.

"Disorientation achieved... resetting... resetting... difficulty upgraded..."

With a teeth-grindingly loud sound, the droid's metal legs screeched against the ground in a series of quick pushes, managing to put itself upright. It instantly turned it's attention on both Jedi.

"Master Venn?" Sabatha called out as the droid looked at her. Half a second later, a hard wall of pure air smashed into her, slamming her back into the wall behind them. A crumble of ancient plaster and brickwork fell over her as Sabatha saw stars around her vision.

"No saber.... low threat... No saber... low threat..."

@Fantasy Liver

 

[Drow Venn]

"...euugh...'mallright, kid..." Drow reassured Sabatha groggily as he got to his feet, grateful for the save. Unfortunately, the Padawan's quick thinking and Force Pull weren't quite enough for the two Jedi to win the day quite yet as this annoying droid was still very much on his feet. Having fired a blast of air at Sabatha to knock her down, the droid was now in a prime spot to kill the Padawan.

But not if Drow could stop it.

He was just about sick and tired of letting a droid push them around and now that he was on his feet and the element of surprise had been lost, he had a better plan of attack. He yelled, drawing the droid's attention away from Sabatha and charged with his saber. Predictably, the droid sent a blast of air his way but Drow sent his own Force Push to dissipate it. Not wanting to trade saber blows with an opponent with obviously superior physical strength, Drow instead just swung at the bot's saber arm, hoping to sever it. Unfortunately, his lightsaber just bounced off; evidently this droid's designer had made his joints out of saber resistant materials too.

Damn.

"Kid, find this thing's off switch!" Drow yelled at Sabatha, now locking blades with the droid in order to keep it distracted from the young girl. He wouldn't be able to lock blades forever and holding its other arm cannon down was also proving quite taxing for the older Ishi Tib, even with how strong he was.

 

[Sabatha Sayall]

Her vision swam, colourful swirls of light dancing upon the chaos in front of her. Sabatha blinked rapidly to try and get some sense of herself back. Adrenaline filled her as she noticed Master Venn attacking the robot, watching his saber bounce off with a gasp of shock.

It was quite clear that this was not going all that well.

Sabatha managed to get to her feet, taking advantage of the 'distraction' to approach from behind. Up close, Sab could see all the twisting, ancient parts that were groaning together, countless years of wear and tear making the droid's operations quite precarious. Sabatha stared for too long, looking for an obvious 'off switch.'

"I can't see a switch anywhere.." she muttered, as the droid took note. Angrily, it's head span around in a 180 degree circle to notice her, eyes flashing. It tried to wrench it's cannon-hand from Drow's grip.

Thinking as quick as she could, Sab grabbed a rock from the floor and jumped, yelling as she wrapped herself around the droid. Cold metal pressed against her as she drove the rock into whatever exposed bit of electronics she could find. The cracks and crooks between the plating and innards, the holes where erosion had worked it's unfortunate magic, Sab shoved and smacked and pressed the rock into them, trying to open them up even more. One arm held tight around the droid's neck, like she was trying to strangle it, as her legs wrapped around it's waist.

@Fantasy Liver

 

[Drow Venn]

Smashing an ancient piece of Jedi technology may not have been Drow's first choice of plan but he certainly couldn't say it wasn't effective. A couple of whacks and the robot went from trying to kill the both of them to slumbering like a baby. A baby who happened to be made of metal and with a deactivated lightsaber in its hand.

"Well. Wasn't expecting that. Nice thinking kid." Drow said as he deactivated his lightsaber and paced around the room, looking for clues as to the origins or nature of their mysterious droid attacker. He passed by a couple of ruined statues before stumbling onto a wooden chest that was almost rotted through. As such, he didn't even need to break the lock to pilfer what was within. Among lightsaber hilts, Jedi robes, there was a couple of scrolls and one of them seemed to be schematics and notes for this droid. Though the scroll was stained and worn with age, Drow was able to read most of it.

"It's hard to make out but it looks like this bad boy was handmade by some ancient Jedi Master. Master Bortola? Boronga? It's hard to make out but it looks like this Master designed it to provide him with more of a challenge than what he'd been facing in the other Jedi training droids." Drow remarked to Sabatha, kicking the droid softly to make sure it still wasn't moving. It wasn't.

"I think we can both attest that it definitely did what it was programmed to do. Only question is what do we do with this thing now? Seems a shame to just leave it to rust over." Drow asked the Padawan.

@Charndley

 

[Sabatha Sayall]

All it took was a couple of hard whacks and the robot stopped, power instantly removed from it's limbs. It collapsed down just enough to dislodge Sabatha. The jolt through the droid's metal frame loosened her grip, making her fall off and land right on her back. She stared up at the ceiling, taking a breath as she let the rock roll right out of her hands.

"I... I didn't kill it, did I?" she asked once she'd gathered herself, standing up and brushing herself down. The dust covered everything and managed to work it's way into every little crook and cranny of her jacket. As Drow went towards the crate, Sabatha investigated the droid itself. She'd managed to shove quite a hole between it's shoulders and neck. Inside, she saw sparks between a couple of roughly severed connections. That must've been it.

"So, something like an advanced training droid, perhaps? One meant more for Knights and such?" She knew little of Jedi history, but she was sure there'd been times when the Jedi faced open warfare on several fronts. When droids like this one would've been necessary.

"Well... I think the Order would like the lightsabers, if only for the historical value." She looked at the one in it's hand, briefly trying to take it. No use. The droid's fingers were wrapped round it, tighter than tight. "For the droid itself... uhm... perhaps someone else in the Order can work with it? I must confess that I'm not very good with electronics, as you can no doubt imagine."

@Fantasy Liver

 

[Drow Venn]

"You haven't met our engineers yet? A while back, I recruited a few Junker engineers when I was putting together the Yavin Temple Security Force. Handy and crafty but ruthless sons of Hutts. You'll like them!" Drow explained, nodding in agreement at Sabatha's assertion that the Order would probably want the droid back.

"I'm no great shakes with droids either but I figure the Junker crew will be more than capable of splicing him back together. Might even be able to reverse engineer some schematics out of him and see if we can't make more of him. If our Knights and Masters were training with these things, I think fighting the Sith would be a lot easier." Drow told the Padawan, still panting at the effort it had taken the two of them just to subdue this one droid who was barely coherent and almost rusting away.

"I can tow the droid back in my Y-Wing to the Temple unless you have more room in your ship?"

@Charndley