A/N: in an attempt to space out the events on rishi a bit, I had a timeskip that takes place after chapter six. I was originally going to just jump right back in, but it was a bit too abrupt.
the two sections aren't necessarily related, but take place in the ~week between chapter six and what's coming up in eight


"It looks as if I've won again."

Rei surrendered her cards with a groan, beginning to wonder if it was still worth trying to beat Lana. Or anyone, really, at that point; she'd been unfocused all day, ever since receiving an update from Acina that morning. She'd prepared a preliminary report for the Council on the status of their research on the Revanites' cyborgs and the Rakatan implants they used, which Rei had yet to look over. She had, however, skimmed through the (considerably shorter) update on their teams on Manaan.

The Republic is sending representatives, and the Jedi have gotten involved. At best, we'll be forced to simply send in a covert team to salvage as much as we can. At worst, the Republic will manage to successfully cover this up. We already know they were involved in collapsing the facility — if we can prove it, there will be unavoidable political fallout. A secondary objective, of course, and it may force us to implicate our own team in the process, but it's something to consider.

Of course, considering that Rei's original purpose had been to find additional information on the Revanites, the outcome of the Manaan situation no longer mattered to her. She had already committed resources, though, and a continued partnership with Acina could prove useful.

But Council work was the last thing she wanted on her mind, and had decided instead to waste the entirety of her afternoon losing at cards.

It had been Kaliyo and Andronikos that had gotten the game started, though they'd eventually left for the cantina. Rei, Lana, Theron, and Temple were still playing, though Ashara had given up a few rounds in; she sat on the couch beside Cori, who had spent the past half hour trying to style Kira's hair into an elaborate braid based off a holo she was holding up.

The day had been nothing but relaxing, and yet Rei couldn't have been more tense.

She jumped when her holocomm chimed, answering it automatically and expecting Zaara's image to appear. Instead, it was Acina, datapad in hand. She offered Rei a pensive look. "Darth Nox. You received the Manaan report I forwarded?"

"Acina. Yes, but, ah—" Rei glanced up, finding all eyes on her.

"Have I caught you at a bad time?"

She cleared her throat. "No, your timing is wonderful, actually. I… have company, is all. If it's important, I can take your call in private."

"I see." Setting the datapad down, Acina explained, "I've come across some interesting information regarding our recent efforts and simply wished to discuss how to proceed. More importantly, we've caught some unwanted attention, though I'm beginning to think it may prove advantageous."

A list of names flitted through Rei's mind, a handful of councilors and other influential Sith she and Acina had determined could pose as threats to their joint operations. She wasn't in much of a mood to deal with nosy Sith, but knew it was likely in her best interests to deal with the situation before the next council meeting, especially considering she wouldn't be attending in person. "Agreed. Give me a few minutes and I'll call you back." As the call ended, she rested her arms on the table and stifled a frustrated sigh. Anywhere else, a report on Manaan would seem unimportant, but she was certain everyone in the safehouse would make the connection.

She had finally begun to earn the trust of their Republic allies — Theron, specifically, since they others seemed mostly content to take Zaara at her word — and this would do anything but help.

It was Lana who spoke first. "Well, I suppose it doesn't come as any surprise that the Dark Council is investigating."

"And I'll bet they have some pretty specific information on the Republic team, yeah?" Kira asked, her half-finished braid coming undone as she leaned forward out of Cori's reach. "Stuff you just conveniently knew?"

Rei sat upright, crossing her arms. She and Acina hadn't actually done anything that would harm the Republic — the technology would, if they could ever get their hands on anything substantial, but that was irrelevant, in her mind — though she doubted anyone would believe her. After all, she would be suspicious if it were Cori or Major Sohms leading an investigation into Imperial activity on Manaan.

"First off," Rei began, "I have no reason to justify myself to any of you — but I will, out of respect for this little alliance. Second, I was concerned with the Revanite activity in the facility, not the Republic's. Third, why would I tell them about any of you? It was bad enough when I tried to convince them Lana wasn't a traitor," she scoffed. "You can imagine what the Council would've thought if I'd told them she was working with the Republic."

"They probably already knew about our involvement," Cori pointed out carefully, running her fingers through Kira's loose hair as she began braiding it again. "Remember what Master Satele said? About sending Master Neiri to clear things up? It's hardly a secret."

Assuming that was the Jedi mentioned in Acina's report, Rei nodded. "It's not you the Council knows about, it's all the other teams the Republic keeps sending. So," she challenged, "if, in the future, you'd prefer I sat on my hands instead of using my considerable influence against our enemies, please let me know."

Kira rolled her eyes. "Alright, alright. Sorry I asked. You've made your point."

"Believe it or not," Rei added, "some of us do want to keep the Empire safe. For the moment, that means destroying the Revanites. Republic or not, betraying our allies now would be counterintuitive."

Whether they believed her or not, she had no reservations about working with the Republic — it was a means to an end, like anything else, and she figured they were less likely to turn on her than another Sith would. As far as everyone else seeming uncertain whether or not to trust her — she'd dealt with worst, and she'd just have to be more careful about not giving them any reasons to doubt her.

After assuring Ashara, Raina, and Kira she'd be back by that evening — the three of them were determined to find a decent stretch of beach where they could waste a day or two lounging in the sun without pirates or debris — Rei left the safehouse, scrolling through her datapad as she made her way to her ship. She knew she wouldn't be able to get through the entire report, but she could skim the important-looking parts.

The more she worked with Acina, Rei was discovering, the more she actually liked the woman. Unlike some of the other council members, who liked to fill their reports and agendas with pretentious, overinflated language and technical jargon that Rei could hardly muddle through, Acina's messages were always relatively short and straight to the point.

None of that knowledge is power which means using twelve pages and words like "copacetic" to give a simple status report nonsense.

Rei continued to look through the datapad even as her ship's holoterminal flickered on, Acina still waiting with her hands folded in her lap. "No company, secure connection, all that." She glanced up from her datapad. "What's this new information?"

"I believe we underestimated the Republic."

Rei snorted as she set her datapad to the side. "I wasn't aware that was possible."

Acina's lips pressed into a thin frown. "It is. Some of my sources have informed me that the Republic military not only was successful in rebuilding the Rakatan cyborgs from Lehon, but attempted to actively utilize the technology in a small number of their soldiers."

"Attempted?"

"Considering we've heard nothing, it may have been a failure. However," Acina qualified, frown deepening, "considering how difficult it was to get even this information, it's more likely they're simply doing everything they can to keep this project a secret."

Rei crossed her arms, her brow furrowing as she thought. There were still too many questions that she doubted Acina had answers for — How many soldiers? Were the cybernetics fully integrated into the soldiers, or only partially? Was it a success? Were they planning more? — but they couldn't simply sit and wait. She rubbed at her eyes, sighing. "You said before that we could have working prototypes by the end of the year. That has to happen sooner. Is it a matter of research or resources? I can stop by the facility on Manaan myself, if it's just information we need."

"It would certainly help. I've got teams from the Science Bureau working non-stop on this, but there's something we're missing." Acina paused for a moment and looked away, lips pursed in thought. "This doesn't really concern you anymore, Darth Nox," she pointed out, the words more curious than threatening, "but there is something else you could do. Darth Zhorrid is fond of you, isn't she? She must have some Intelligence agents within the Republic who could find out more about this cyborg squad. And if she doesn't know, someone else will."

Almost managing to hide her grimace, Rei nodded; Zhorrid was only fond of her because Rei had, on more than one occasion, sat through her tirades and rants. It wasn't something she necessarily enjoyed, but Rei had singled out Zhorrid as a potential ally fairly soon after being appointed to the council. Some coddling and an overpriced dinner or two later, and she'd practically ensured Zhorrid's loyalty. "I'll speak to her," she sighed. "Dinner and tickets to some concert should be enough to make her agreeable."

"Good. We can hold off reporting to the rest of the council until you've met with her. How soon will you be back in the city?"

Rei laughed; their current situation was far too absurd for her to even guess how much longer she'd be on Rishi. "You'll know as soon as I do."


Considering all that had already happened on Rishi, Theron supposed lunch with Nox shouldn't have stood out as much as it did.

She'd barged into the safehouse, asking where everyone else was before storming back out. Not that Theron would've had an answer for her anyway; Zaara and Vector had left the evening before, and she'd explicitly given the rest of her crew the day off. Cori, Lana, and Kira had left to train that morning and hadn't been back since. It had been a fairly uneventful morning for Theron and T7.

Until Nox had returned, that is, sweeping through the room like she was searching for something, mumbling to herself something about ruining her plans. After checking the couch cushions — twice — she'd stood, surveyed the room, and announced they would be taking a break for lunch.

Especially you, Theron — do you ever actually stop working?

It hadn't seemed like a terrible idea at the time — and still didn't, if he was being honest. Nox was surprisingly good company even without Ashara or Andronikos or Zaara to keep her in check. She'd rambled off about a dozen different things — the latest season of some Imperial holonet show, the quality of the food at the Rishi markets, the inconveniences caused by reconstruction on Korriban — before turning to T7 and needling the droid with questions about its previous masters, watching with wide-eyed curiosity as she listened.

"Hang on. Wait." Nox set the bright orange drink she'd been sipping at on the table. "When you say Jedi, you're talking about Cori, now?"

T7 gave a little beep of confirmation.

"How long have you been working with Cori, then?" Theron asked.

T7 = with Jedi almost five years / Jedi = was still a padawan

"Perfect. You know what five years is a great time for? Starting over. Maybe with my crew this time."

"Nox, that's never going to work."

T7 = loyal to Jedi

"See?"

Nox shrugged, absentmindedly stirring her drink with the pink straw. "Never hurts to try." She opened her mouth as if to say something more, but simply frowned and looked away for a few moments. "See, I was going to apologize for this," she finally admitted, voice cheery and her expression brightening, "for dragging you both away from whatever terribly important work you were doing because I'm a social creature who wanted to be around people and couldn't find anyone else and council business is really stressing me out right now. But that would require, you know, apologizing."

Apology = accepted

"Very funny."

Theron wasn't certain which impressed him more — the considerable amount of sarcasm that T7 had managed to convey, or the apology that Nox had almost made. Her point was moot, anyway; he'd mostly just been checking over any data that SCORPIO had either intercepted or decrypted, since he wasn't as willing as Zaara to trust the droid. "Don't worry, I'm not sure we'd believe you even if you did apologize."

Nox rolled her eyes. "Comedians, the both of you. Though really, you should be thanking me, considering I put incredibly important council work on hold for this. Actually — speaking of the council," she added, giving her head a thoughtful tilt, "I'm half convinced this whole Revan thing is just an elaborate attempt to take us out one by one."

"How so?"

Nox pushed her drink to the side and leaned forward with a conspiratorial grin. "Soverus, in the Academy, then Arkus on Rakata Prime, and now you've got me out here ignoring work on Rishi. Get Marr out here and the Empire will practically collapse."

Theron held up his hands in surrender, trying not to pay much attention to how much Nox seemed to enjoy the idea. "You got me. It's all fake. Revan's in on it, and this whole thing was Teeseven's idea."

She laughed. "I knew it." Taking a loud sip of her drink, Nox was silent for a moment before adding, "You are making my life rather difficult, you know; with every councilor we lose, my stress levels double. And council meetings these days—" she gave a melodramatic sigh, "—they physically age me."

That wasn't exactly news — not about the council, at least. They'd lost over a half dozen members at the hands of the Republic in the past year alone — three of which Theron had played a part in eliminating — and though the Empire had suffered for their losses, they'd also managed to remain relatively stable. He didn't imagine that stability came easily, though. "Lots of late nights playing politics?"

"It's… There's a lot of empire for one council to run," she offered stiffly, clearly unwilling to get into specifics. "I'm sure it's easier for the others, with their family legacies and private schooling and connections and humanity, instead of being thrown into it all when—" She stopped abruptly, clearing her throat. "I'm just going to go get another drink."

Theron watched as Nox left, stalking through the crowd to the shop where she'd bought her first drink. He wondered — not for the first time — about her past; the files the SIS had on her had only gone back to when she'd joined the council, and there was nothing before that. Thrown into seemed to be an adequate term if she hadn't even caught the Republic's attention prior to then. Still, with as meticulous as Imperial record keeping was, there should've been something, and the only real explanations were either that she wasn't Imperial — unlikely — or that she'd originally been a slave — slightly less unlikely.

Sith = not so bad

Glancing down at T7, Theron shrugged. "You don't think she's a bit… intense?"

The droid shuffled backwards and forwards, as if debating how to answer. Temper = unfortunate / Sith + T7 = still make good team / T7 + Apprentice = can calm Sith down

Theron wasn't certain he'd call Ashara's influence on Nox calming — the two seemed locked in some perpetual argument — but he couldn't deny that Nox had a soft spot for T7. But before he could answer, the Sith in question rejoined them, sitting down at the table with a heavy sigh.

"It's not just the council," she admitted without pretense, wiping at the condensation that was already forming on the outside of her drink. "This morning I learned a good friend — a mentor, if you will — had to go into hiding because he was being watched. So now, I'm paranoid about that, and stressed about the council, overwhelmed with some personal projects, and, oh," she scoffed, jabbing an accusatory finger first in Theron's direction, then in T7's, "the Republic has completely ruined my latest crusade. It's almost like we're at war or something." She sighed again. "But lunch was nice, at least. Surprisingly so. I'm glad at least one thing has gone right today."

Not quite willing to agree with Nox — despite how nice lunch had been, Theron hadn't quite shaken the odd feeling that came from spending time with Nox, which only worsened every time she brought up the council and her position — Theron gave an exaggerated shrug. "You never know. It's not too late for something to go horribly wrong."

"In that case, I'll just go ahead and blame you now."