Open Nar Shaddaa What Lies Beneath

[Talak Rand]

The Arcanist had returned to Nar Shaddaa, and it hadn't improved in his absence. He'd wanted to use his old gear, but that wasn't what this was about. He didn't need the attention drawn by that mask or the baggage it carried with it even if it was comfortable. Instead, he wore a helmet with a built-in rebreather, but quite different than what he'd used in previous eras. In fact, to most who saw him, he looked like a Ubese bounty hunter, which wasn't enough to draw attention from... anyone on this world. That was precisely the goal: to blend in. A pair of bracers covered his forearms and hands just in case, a DC-17 pistol was on his thigh, his utility belt, and a satchel containing binders, sedatives, and syringes was slung over his shoulder to round out the look.

The lightsaber hidden within the satchel was the same blood red of the Sith, kept from his days of old and unpurified along with the vibroknife that he normally kept. Memories of this place came flooding back. Shortly after joining the Jedi, he and Hannibal had tried and failed to extract people from the quarantine zone and away from the flesh-eating creatures that had run rampant on this world. Though the bodies had been cleaned up and cleared away, the echoes of the screams continued to ring in his ears.

He forced the thought aside in a flash of anger as he put his mind back on the task at hand, heading toward the deepest levels of Nar Shaddaa's multi-level system. If the smuggler's moon itself was bad, the underlevels were worse. There was no light, nothing but despair in the Force, and the air was stale. Poverty was at its deepest here, and this wasn't anywhere that the Arcanist wanted to linger for long.

 

[Trini Halrixien]

Trini Halrixien, archaeologist, pilot and general adventurer, tugged at the straps of the bundle she had strapped to the back of her rented T-13 Skydiver's front seat. She checked an old datapad in one hand, nodding to herself as she checked items off a list with a mismatched stylus.

"I don't know, Trini, I think you forgot something."

The little Amaran shot a look at her airspeeder's single boxy passenger. ZZ-4A4 was secured to the rear seat with crash webbing; the little Incom flitter had not been designed with droids in mind. He was surrounded by lashed-down bags of provisions, excavation gear and other equipment, with only his angular cranial turret visible above bags and boxes.

"Laugh all you like, Zeezee, but when we're 500 levels down and all the local shops are run by some kind of mutant hive-gang, you'll be glad we brought all this."

Trini glanced around at the parking deck that surrounded her. She had to give Nar Shaddaa one thing; nobody looked at you strangely, even when you were packing supplies for what looked like an expedition into darkest Endor onto a rented speeder in the middle of one of the most densely populated moons in the Galaxy.

"I'll tell you what we should have brought instead of half this stuff; one of those YD droids the rental agency wanted to give us. You may be kidding about mutant hive-gangs, but you might not be far off the mark, you know?"

Trini rolled her eyes, clambering up into the pilot seat of the little airspeeder.

"D'you know what the deposit was on one of those things? Plus, we would've had to rent a bigger speeder to bring it along!" The Amaran reached back to pat a bag of about 10 spherical objects that rattled metallically. "Besides, we have the remotes; all we have to do is turn them loose and they'll shoot at anything that isn't us. We'll be fine."

Trini reached down to finger the scatterblaster tucked in beside her seat as she brought her hand back to the controls. She knew the stories of Nar Shaddaa's depths, and secretly wished that she had taken the option on a proper security droid.

But there was no going back now.

"Now then, off we go!"

Trini pushed the controls forward on the little craft, and it eased somewhat sluggishly off the parking deck, weighted down somewhat by the bags and crates lashed to it. Nevertheless, it flew smoothly out over a precipitous drop that Trini stared down into with a gulp.

Reluctantly, she feathered the repulsor controls, and the airspeeder began to descend into Nar Shaddaa's lower levels...

@Phoenix

 

[Talak Rand]

He didn't like this place. Nar Shaddaa was bad enough, but down here it was even worse. After the infection, it looked like the literal apocalypse had come through here. What houses were still occupied were boarded up, decomposed bodies littered the streets, and the smell was indescribable.

The fact that no one had ever come down here to clean this place up or flush out the remaining creatures was... shameful. But what could one expect from a world that was run by criminals?

His hand rested on the blaster at his side as he walked through, reaching out to the Force as he crossed near a landing pad that was devoid of life. There was no equipment or personnel coming or going, and he wondered if the plan was to simply let the creatures down here die out.

At least he thought it was abandoned until he heard the humming of engines as a speeder descended. He frowned, wondering who or what it was that was coming down here. Some scavenger perhaps looking to make a name for himself? Someone who actually lived down here? Probably not. @AutoFox

 

[Hera "The Joyful" Albion]

The underlevels of Nar Shaddaa were cold, which certainly surprised Hera. She believed the closer one got to the core of a world, the warmer it would be. In Hera's mind, the cold could only mean one of two things. Either this world's core had cooled to a dark and dead planet, or the sheer amount of city stacked upon city far exceeded what the young Jedi thought possible. Either way, it was cold, and terribly dark.

But Hera would have it no other way. Her body was made for the cold and her eyes, free of the blinding goggles she normally wore, could see easily in the darkness. Although her reasoning behind coming to Nar Shaddaa rested in the good will of attempting to learn about the virus that ravaged this place, there was another reason as well. The death, the destruction, the sheer oppressive force of the dark side was almost overwhelming here. Hera desired to experience the pain and suffered left behind by the devastation, she felt she needed to embrace the suffering of the universe through the Force so that she might better learn how to keep it from drawing her down.

It hurt, yes, to open herself to the pain. But it was necessary. Feeling out through the Force, she accepted that which she could not change as she stepped over a decaying body. Something surprised her, however, as there seemed to be someone else alive in this nightmarish hellscape. She sensed it before she saw it, but there was another reaching out near one of the many abandoned landing pads. Moving closer towards where she believed the other life to be, she kept her eyes peeled for the gentle glow of their body heat through the walls.

@Phoenix @AutoFox

 

[Trini Halrixien]

Trini had heard rumors about what had happened on Nar Shaddaa, had even seen some footage taken by the media, but seeing the aftermath in person was an altogether different experience. Aiming a glowrod at the refuse-choked streets below, she swept the beam over decomposing bodies and the aftermath of a titanic struggle, the denizens of the under-city pitted against creatures straight out of a horror-holo.

She shuddered, wondering if perhaps it had been a mistake to come here.

"Trini, this was a mistake." Said Zeezee, seemingly reading the Amaran's mind. "Even if this wasn't the next worst thing to a Mimbanese trench, what makes you think the thing you're looking for is even still here? It would have to be thousands of years old, and this moon has been built over... well, just look around!"

Trini swept the beam of her glowrod across the architecture of the smuggler moon's ground level, noting the cyclopean masonry overlaid with rusting machinery and conduits that formed the foundations of many of the structures that towered overhead. Nar Shaddaa was an old world, older than many people realized, in fact.

"Something you have to realize about cities like this, Zeezee; for most of this stuff, there was no architect involved. The people who built a lot of this stuff probably just started adding floors on top of existing structures; it's something you see on any ecumenopolis. There are districts on Coruscant whose basements are actually pre-Old Republic fortresses!"

The Amaran swept her light over an expanse of particularly interesting masonry. Early Hutt architecture; old, but not quite what she was looking for.

"What we're looking for was solid; they wouldn't have bothered to tear it down when they could use it as a foundation. Probably, nobody even remembers what it was before they started building on top of it, if anyone even thinks about anything this far dow-"

At the edge of her glowrod's beam, Trini caught a flash of movement. The fur on the back of her neck went up as she swept her light to track it; it was the first sign of life she had seen since descending to this level. She brought the speeder to a hover, scanning around her.

"Probably just a local..."

"Or a mutant hive-ganger!"

"Shut up!"

@Phoenix @Black Noise

 

[Talak Rand]

He'd been using the Force to navigate in the darkness, but with the approaching of others, he flipped the glowrod on the side of his helmet on and it shined directly back at the others who were here. They were a species he didn't recognize, but he was surprised to see... well, anyone down here.

What are you doing down here? he asked, stepping out into the light of the other's glowrod. He hadn't yet noticed the Jedi that was down here as well, but, again, he was surprised to find anyone down here, not just some scavengers.

You don't look like the type to want to take on flesh eating creatures, he said. Perhaps they were tougher than they looked, but they didn't have the look of the bounty hunters or thugs he might have expected of people down here. @Black Noise @AutoFox

 

[Hera "The Joyful" Albion]

Hera, seeing the new arrival and the one she tracked through the walls, decided to wait out the situation and see what exactly was occurring down here. It would be good practice for her to remain hidden as well, learn something new without imposing herself publicly on every situation that she came across. Withdrawing herself through the Force, she relied solely on her infrared vision as she dipped into a nearby, condemned apartment just down the street from the landing pad.

Of course, infrared vision did not mean 'x-ray' vision as some might think. She could not see the exactly who was arriving, but she could make out that it was some kind of speeder from the warmth coming from the engines. There were two people in the cab, though perhaps one was droid given that some 'parts' of its body were cool and, therefore, not easily seen. However some parts were hotter than she would expect from a humanoid. The other seemed to be normal, as did the one she felt through the Force. As to whether he was Jedi or Sith, or perhaps simply well attuned, she could not tell.

Unfortunately for Hera, she would need to stick relatively close to them if she wanted to keep a eye on them. Through one wall she could barely make them out among the rest of Nar Shaddaa as it was, more than that would be impossible. Then there were the bodies. A pang of pain and grief echoed through Hera at the thought of them, what suffering and horror they felt in their last moments. But that was one of the reasons she was here, to experience this and move on from it. Hopefully to add to that experience she might learn of how this horror might be prevented in the future, or even cured.

A thought crossed her mind, lingering only but a moment, but she wondered if these humanoids were here for the same reason as herself.

@Phoenix @AutoFox

 

[Trini Halrixien]

Trini shielded her eyes and gave a noise of surprise as the newcomer's glowrod beam shone back at her from the darkness. As her eyes adjusted, she looked back, and was thankful for the distance provided by her speeder hovering several meters above the street.

The little Amaran blinked at the newcomer's remark.

"What are you doing down here?!" She retorted, her hand resting instinctively on the grip of the stowed scatterblaster, though she did not yet draw it. "And I thought the plague ran its course! Aren't those things all... y'know... dead??"

"Some debate as to whether they were ever actually alive, Trini."

"Not now, Zeezee!"

Despite her snappy retort, Trini felt a shiver run through her. There was something about this place; a cloying, oily sensation, highly reminiscent of the apparent Sith she and her friends had faced on Coruscant during the Sector Ranger Headquarters bombing.

But anyway, if the creatures that had overrun this place were still - for lack of a better term - alive, that could impact her plans considerably. She had planned for sentient threats, certainly, but not ravening monsters who craved the flesh of the living.

"H-Have you-... have you seen some?"

@Phoenix @Black Noise

 

[Talak Rand]

He gritted his teeth together. There weren't supposed to be civilians running around here anymore. But perhaps it was just better for him to leave them to whatever they were doing and go about his own business. Something nagged in the back of his mind, asking him what Trys would have wanted him to do. Well, she didn't babysit people, he tried to reason, but he knew that what he was doing down here wasn't something she would have wanted.

He tried to shove the thought aside. You need to do this, he told himself.

I doubt it, he replied as they asked if the creatures were all dead.

Not yet today, he said, but he'd just gotten down here. He'd seen them firsthand in the past. He'd watched them tear up an entire crowd of people. He'd very, very nearly been killed, and it wasn't a fond memory.

Look, do what you want, he said with a wave of his hand, turning to walk away and feeling that same nagging at the back of his mind.

It wasn't until he started walking away that something else grabbed his attention. It wasn't quite a sense of danger, but it was danger-adjacent. When he was a Sith, being watched meant someone was trying to kill you. He had that sensation now, though he couldn't place who or where. @Black Noise @AutoFox

 

[Hera "The Joyful" Albion]

As the pair began walking, Hera began moving. Her body lithe and quiet, she moved through buildings and around decomposing corpses with a cat-like precision. Not a cup crushed underfoot, not a body bumped, and not a table toppled near Hera. Looking through walls, she watched the heat of their bodies like a snake watches a mouse that it might consume for dinner. Her own body, colder than those of most near humans, provided no distraction as she moved.

But something else did distract her. It was far off, or she believed it to be far off. But its evidence could still be seen. Warm footprints in the darkness, warm claw marks on the walls, warm blood drops mixed within the cold. Something or a group of somethings were still alive down here. Hera cursed her misfortune. She would have preferred to tail these two for longer, see how they interacted, perhaps gauge if they were enemies or not.

But she did not have that luxury.

Watching the light of their glowrods, Hera positioned herself in an adjacent building to the street that the pair walked down. It would be barely a minute after they started moving that the Jedi would show herself, stepping out into the street and greeting them solemnly. "I apologize for my intrusion, but it would seem that we are being hunted. Or, perhaps, we are hunting something. I hope for the latter." While Hera attempted diplomacy, she moved with full preparation to defend herself if they panicked and attacked her.

Smiling, she offered a hand out to the pair. "Hera Albion, Jedi Knight. I mean no harm." Of course, she also offered her hand a full ten feet away from the two. A precaution, to make sure the hand that approached to greet her would be open and free of weapons.

@AutoFox @Phoenix

 

[Trini Halrixien]

Trini blinked as a second figure emerged from the shadows, a female near-human with reddish hair. The little Amaran waved hesitantly to the newcomer in acknowledgement, although she was still not sure how to take her arrival.

"Trini, this is getting out of hand." Piped up Zeezee, the droid's head turret swiveling to take in Hera. "Now there's two of them!"

Trini hushed the droid, in time to hear the newcomer introduce herself as a Jedi. The Amaran visibly relaxed; she had met Jedi, and their reputation was mostly good; again hesitantly, Trini lowered her vehicle closer to the ground.

"Master Jedi you have no idea how nice it is to meet you in a place like this." The Amaran declared. "I'm Trini Halrixien, uh, freelance archaeologist, I suppose... I'm looking for ruins, I suppose."

She looked between the two strangers.

"Er... neither of you have seen any permacite foundations with a double sunburst on them, have you?"

@Phoenix @Black Noise

 

[Talak Rand]

A Jedi?! Talak thought to himself. He couldn't believe his lousy luck. Was this some sort of sign from the Force that he shouldn't be doing this? No, that wasn't how this worked.

The fact that he was even asking that, though, was probably its own issue. His mind turned to Trys and Crix. What would they have thought if they knew what he was doing? No, it didn't matter. Trys wasn't waking back up and Crix... he'd be fine with Hannnibal, wouldn't he? Though look at what had happened with him so far.

Thankfully, the thoughts were forcibly shoved aside as the question of what was coming after them came forcing its way to the front. And yet it lingered in his mind.

What are you talking about? he asked Hera before turning his attention back to the... adventurers? Oh, no, apparently they were archaeologists?

Archaeologists? You know this is basically a warzone? he asked in shock. Well, they were in it now, so there was no way out. If there was something down here hunting them... then they needed to deal with that. Was he procrastinating what he'd actually come here for? @Black Noise @AutoFox

 

[Hera "The Joyful" Albion]

Hera's eyes, the green barely visible beneath the thin white veneer through which she observed the infrared, never left the force user's body as he spoke. She was sizing him up, trying to see what she was dealing with. He didn't offer up himself as a Jedi when she introduced herself, nor did he ignite a blade in preparation for a fight as Hera would expect from a Sith. Was he an independant force user? A rare breed, if so, but it was still more likely that he held concealed ill will. Therefore, she would be wary.

Looking away for a moment, Hera tracked a fast fading set of footsteps through the street. Perhaps, if they moved fast enough, they could be the hunters. Speaking to the force user, she answered his question, "Don't kid yourself, you know we aren't alone down here. I know you cannot see it, but something hot moved through this area not too long ago. It's moving away from us, but I'd rather see what it is before it investigates us."

Turning back to them, Hera caught herself. She was getting too aggressive. Even though she felt deeply that they were in danger, it would not help her case to unnecessarily combative with strangers. Smiling, she put on a happy face and continued, "You do not need to hunt it with me, I merely believed it would be best if you were aware of the danger and proceeded accordingly with caution." Looking to the Amaran, "Please forgive me, it is an honor to meet you, Miss Halrixien. I have seen a great number of symbols down here, perhaps even that which you seek. Though if I have, it did not make a deep enough impression upon me. Now, my apologies but I feel I must-"

Looking back to where she saw the footprints, Hera muttered a curse. They had faded, the grounds cold temperature overtaking the energy of heat. "Kriff-" She muttered before turning back to the group, "It seems I shall accompany you a little longer, my tracks have 'gone cold.'" Hera laughed at her own joke, a joyless, fake laugh that one might perform before children in order to relax them in the face of an unknown danger that scared even the parent.

@AutoFox @Phoenix

 

[Trini Halrixien]

Trini's ears drooped as Hera described the... creature? That she was pursuing. The little Amaran rested her hand on the grip of her scatterblaster, looking around. Idly, she remembered a biology class which had talked about the way certain species could see into the infrared spectrum; it was an ability which was still retained by Amarans to some degree, but however much Trini strained her eyes, she could not make out anything distinct.

Her keen senses of hearing and smell was a more useful tool for tracking in most situations, although down here the latter was almost overwhelmed by the miasma of death and decay that clung to the streets. Nevertheless, she sniffed the air hesitantly, her large ears swiveling. Yes... there was something there. Not substantially different from the other smells, but fresher.

Trini gulped.

"Th-That's okay. It would be easy to overlook down here. Um..."

She turned nervously in the direction the scent came from.

"...what... exactly are you chasing? Because... I-I think..."

She pointed.

"...I think I smell something, that way."

@Phoenix @Black Noise

 

[Talak Rand]

Talak could practically sense the conflict within the Jedi. She wanted to be forceful and aggressive, but held herself back. It was actually a rather familiar sensation to him as it was what he'd struggled with a great deal during his time with the Jedi. This was all a waste of his time, wasn't it? He needed to get on with what he was here for not chase one of potentially hundreds of mystery monsters.

Maybe it will be a better target for you, he reasoned silently, knowing full-well that that wasn't a genuine explanation for why he was considering it.

What exactly are you doing down here anyway? One Jedi isn't going to be enough to clear out all the remaining infected, he said.

Talak turned to listen to Trini when she mentioned that she smelled something in a specific direction. Out of instinct, he reached out to the Force, but everything down here was... garbled. Nevertheless, he sensed danger. It was unmissable, but everything down here was like that.

Rather than discus further, he simply turned and started walking in that direction, hand resting on the pistol at his side, eyes scanning over the buildings on either side. The stench down here was bad even to him, and many of the buildings looked as if they'd been ravaged by fires. Had someone tried to burn the infected out? He couldn't be sure. @Black Noise @AutoFox