Ask Dromund Kaas Beneath Steel Poles and Imperial Banners

[Veles]

.

Dromund Kaas
1834 local time

He walked through the light rain, his hood up. This place reminded him of the lower levels of Coruscant, where he'd lived. Nowadays, he didn't really spend his time around slums, and he generally tries to avoid them. Today was an exception.

Cinere was a discrete person, and he supposed a meeting like this merited discretion. Regardless, he was sure this would be a place where they could blend in.

He was on his way to the spot, 15 minutes early. Cin liked to arrive early to scope out the area. Also, being late made him feel embarrassed.

A few minutes later, he was on the corner and standing there, back to the wall, a cigarette in his mouth while he waited. They had met on the holonet, out of all things. Some app to match Acolytes with Champions, a recent Imperial project. He knew next to nothing about the girl, besides her backstory, which was the only field on the dating app and required great detail.

He just stood there, smoking and looking at the street, observing it.

@Wit

 

[Ashla Ti]

Ashla jogged through the rain, cloak pulled over her head to protect her from it as best as she could. Normally she didn't much mind the rain, to be honest she was rather fond of it. But she had been using that darn app lately, and she had actually matched with someone and didn't want to show up for their first meeting a complete soaking mess.

"Champion Autem?" She spoke up as she finally arrived at the agreed upon spot and found him already there, ahead of time. She wasn't late, but she was later than him. "I.." She was about to say more when her eyes got drawn to a figure across the street, moving towards a shabby looking building. It was a Kel Dor, with a distinct scar running down one side of his face, a scar that she could spot from across the street. A scar that she herself had given to him years ago.

She started taking a step towards him, then remembered where she was. "I am sorry but..." She looked back across the street to spot the Kel Dor walking into the building. Making a quick decision, she grabbed the champion's hand and began dragging him with her. "Let's get out of the rain shall we?"

She started walking towards the building, after the Kel Dor. After the man who she had thought dead. After her Cadre Master.

@vamp

 

[Veles]

The woman arrived shortly after him, greeting him in the street before being distracted by something else. His gaze moved to see what she was staring at, and saw the silhouette of a man entering a nearby building. A confusing situation, but Cinere had nothing else to do all day so he decided he might as well go down whatever rabbit hole this is as she took his hand.

"Familiar faces?" he asked, clearly aware he had seen where they're going. Cinere had no idea what this was about, but he was very curious.

They sauntered down the street to the same door the Kel Dor had gone into. They found themselves in the hall of an apartment building, and the man had just entered the elevator. The doors slid shut just as the two entered the lobby.

@Wit

 

[Ashla Ti]

There hadn't really much chance of the Champion not noticing what had just transpired, she might have fooled any average being in the Galaxy but the Sith weren't really average. As they walked she quickly thought how much to share, and ultimately decided to go with the truth. Or at least a part of the truth.

"I assume you read my profile," she asked as the two Sith came to a stop within the building's loby, "the Cadre project and all that?" She paused as she watched the panel above the elevator slide from number to number till it came to a stop and stayed static. The 7th floor. Satisfied that she knew where to go next, she pried her eyes away from the elevator panel and turned to face Cinere.

"That man was the leader of my Cadre, my Cadre Master as they were called. When my cadre fell everyone but me died, including my cadre mates, including him." She left out the bit where she had been responsible, directly or indirectly, for all those deaths. No sense in sharing that till she knew who she could trust with that information. "I for one would be very interested in learning how he learned to cheat death."

As she talked she moved for the stairway and began climbing up the steps, almost taking them at a run. She lead them to the seventh floor, and once there she knew which door to head for, she could sense him. He had been, for all intents and purposes, the only father figure she ever had. An abusive, sadistic, son of a bantha he might have been, but you didn't pick your family, did you?

She stopped before the apartment entrance, hand almost reaching out to knock on the door, till memories of losing her cadre, of everyone she had ever loved, came rushing back. And indecision froze her where she stood.

@vamp

 

[Veles]

She talked as they ran. Cin listened, and realization dawned on him. It did make sense now, and he completely understood her urgency. This would be an interesting first meeting, where'd he'd see her deepest secrets come to light. The Sith Empire and its members certainly weren't ordinary.

"Reasonable," he agreed, and followed her at the same pace. Oh, this would be so interesting. He couldn't had hoped for a better day. Lately, everything had been so boring and dull. It felt good to do something, to help someone.

They turned the corner, going down a hallway and stopping at the door of an apartment. Though she faltered, he did not. CIn slammed his foot down on the door, breaking it open. He rushed into the apartment just as a man was sitting on the couch browsing tabloids on the Holonet in his underwear, a bag of chips rested on his stomach. He looked up with a dazed, foggy expression as the Sith stepped into his living room. The man paused the show he was watching and put out what looked to be a spice cigarra out on his couch.

"I'm sorry, I told all my clients my normal working hours are 0900 to 1700 every day, no exceptions. If you can't reach me at my office, please don't come breaking my door in. I run an honest business here."

Cinere blinked and looked at the man, then up at the wall of medals and Sith military distinctions on his wall, rewards for scientific achievement and excellence. This was definitely the right guy, but they'd caught him at a bad time.

Ashla's move.

@Wit

 

[Ashla Ti]

Where the young Togruta had hesitated, the Champion had not. He forced his way in, and brought them face to face with a man on the couch, enjoying holo-net programming of all things. He obviously didn't recognize the Sith Champion, as he barked of the regular spiel he must have prepared for his clients. But she recognized him, and as she stepped forward from behind Cinere his eyes widened in recognition.

He began scrambling back along the couch, trying to put more distance between him and her. She did nothing, simply staring at the man, at the monster who had probed at her and her cadre mates all those years. They had been his guinee pigs, and there was nothing they could do about it then. But things were different now. He was used to seeing her drugged and strapped down, not glaring at him with an unlit lightsaber in her hand. She had no idea when she had pulled out the blade, but as she walked up to him she brought it to life.

"Where is he?" She asked, barely able to keep her emotions in check. "Where is the Master?"

As if on cue, a sound drew her attention, and as she looked up she spotted a droid emerge from the doorway that lead further into the apartment. She had barely a moment to react before the droid began firing with the repeaters it held in each hand. She jumped into action at once, running towards the far end of the room, hoping to get cover behind a storage unit. She barely registered the bolts that were meant for her tearing through the doctor, and as she slammed into the wall behind cover she noticed the life leave the doctor's eyes. It should have brought her satisfaction, but all she felt was regret, and anger. He was supposed to die at her hands.

"Child," a voice spoke up from the doorway, and she peeked out from behind the storage unit to see her one time cadre-master standing behind the droid, a smile on his face. "did you really think you had escaped?" The Kel Dor's smile widened as a shadow fell across the entrance of the apartment as another droid appeared there, with another behind it. She had lead them into a trap. Or had been lead into one.

She tore her eyes away from the droids, and looked for Cinere, her eyes seeking answers. Had he set her up?

@vamp

 

[Veles]

If Ashla thought that Cinere had a hand in this, she was gravely mistaken. In fact, he quite simply had no idea what the hell was going on, who the man watching the holo-tubes was, or why a droid had appeared out of nowhere, stepping into the hallway and letting loose a flurry of repeater bolts. The Sith just jumped out of the way, throwing his whole body behind the armchair. Plasma slammed into the body of the man they'd just met, the smell of his flesh burning heavy on Cinere's nostrils as he reached out through the Force, visualizing the droid, and then crushed its head like a tin can. The machine collapsed onto the carpet just as another voice spoke out.

Cinere lifted his head over the armchair and past the corpse to look at the new arrival--an evil-looking Kel Dor, a man that seemed to reek in the Force. His arrival had tainted it even more than it was tainted on this Sith world, leaving a sort of dark cloud hovering over them, tinged with an intensity like thunderstorm clouds charged with the occasional lightning.

And then more droids came, and Cinere almost audibly groaned. Out of all the places where he thought he'd be fighting for his life in this week, an apartment on Dromund Kaas was definitely not high up on the list, and he begrudgingly ignited his lightsaber and stood up. There would be no hiding in the small living room, and at least it was two of them against the opponents.

Ashla looked at Cinere, and he did the first thing that came through his head. He shrugged.

"I don't know him," he declared, breaking the shocked silence that had set. "Do you know him?"

@Wit