Before anything, I'd like to thank everyone for their support. It's been hard having my home life finally come crashing down on my head, but to be honest, it's been tearing at the seams for years, and with my mom in particular, this has been a thing since long before I was born. Very scary watching someone you're supposed to respect turn into, well, that, but she's finally admitted that she has a problem and is seeing a therapist now to get help.
Moving away from my personal business, Halo Infinite came out recently and I've been having a blast with it. Runs seriously smooth, and the campaign is a joy, except with the problem of not being able to replay missions, which is, uh, questionable, since there is missable content like skulls and audio logs which can render 100% completion impossible if you're not staring at a guide half the time, and, y'know, spoilers.
Now that that's out of the way, read and review.
Lexi prowled the rooftops of Noridar, looking for her mystery Rakata. Day was beginning to break, and the morning rays of the sunrise were ever so slowly starting to creep over the city. Regrettably, she didn't have time to admire the beautiful sight, and had to steal herself away inside of an attic that had the window to it open. Quietly shutting the window, she moved and hid herself to the side, still sitting in the shadows.
Turning her cloak off, Lexi took stock of her temporary shelter. There were a couple boxes sitting underneath the window, a stiff, uncomfortable looking couch positioned opposite of where Lexi was sitting, and on the other end of the attic was a simple bed, lacking anything fancy except for a straw pillow. Everything had a very thin layer of dust on it, meaning she was probably safe for the time being, so long as she kept quiet.
Pulling her bag off, she quietly unzipped it and pulled her datapad out. Making sure it was muted, she woke it up, navigated to whatever garbage writing program had been installed on it by the Helljumpers, and started typing out the first part of her report.
'Arrived safely in Noridar. Receiving end of the teleporter is either a resistance base or a homeless camp. Looks to be abandoned, but I would use caution in the future.' she started, idly tapping away at the screen as she thought about what else to include. 'Teleport facility leads out to some sort of maintenace hub underneath the city with droids flying around the tunnels. Ask the Rakata, maybe they'll know more.' she continued, pausing briefly to listen in on what she thought was someone waking up downstairs, only to realize it was just the house creaking, and she returned to her work. 'Guard patrols when I came to the surface were surprisingly light, but I wouldn't count on it being that way for long. Discovered Nax when I went to investigate what sounded like an angry mob.' she went on, separating that section from the rest of the report.
'Nax is currently being held as a prisoner of war, and is being stoned by the Rakatan public, presumably to sate Dantinian's bloodlust. He is chained to the wall of a building in one of the major plazas, near the border wall of the first and second level of the city. There are multiple machines positioned below him that feed wires and tubes into his body that pump vitor into him every time he is injured, and, presumably, there is some resemblance of a medical team to keep him alive past that, but only just.' she slowly wrote, feeling progressively more sick as she thought about what they were doing to Nax. 'Damage to his body is extreme. His eyes have been removed, either surgically or through being destroyed by stray projectiles, and his vocal chords have been removed, although to what extent, I am unsure. Additionally, there are many wounds across his arms, legs, and torso, many of them open and exposed, with the machines only doing a token job of healing him." she finished, saving her work and shutting the datapad off.
Lexi simply stared at the black screen, her own dim reflection staring right back at her. Then, anger slowly washed over her. She had seen terrible things happen to the most innocent of people – friends and families ripped apart by death sticks and other stims, bystanders getting shot in gang wars, more terror bombings than she could count, and so on, but this was by far the cruelest thing yet. Nax had scarcely done anything to deserve his fate, and yet Dantinian was treating him as a torture toy, something to be damaged and fixed, over and over again. And for what? To get at Kyra?
Lexi collected herself after a while and put the datapad back into her bag, before grabbing one of her ration bars. Pulling it from its packaging, she began to eat, failing to notice one of the floorboards lifting up from where it was set. When she finished, though, she noticed it, and spotted a pair of curious eyes staring at her. Lexi instinctively reached for her blaster, and the board quickly dropped back into its place. Wondering who was hiding there, she walked over and carefully lifted the board up, keeping her blaster out, just in case.
What Lexi saw surprised her. Hiding beneath the floorboards was a family of five Rakata – the parents, and three little ones. The parents spotted the blaster in her hands, and Lexi immediately saw fear in their eyes. The clothes they had on were tattered, practically ruined, and they looked underfed.
Deciding they posed no threat to her, Lexi holstered her weapon, making sure to show them her now empty hand. "Easy, I'm not going to hurt you." she said softly, her voice barely above a whisper. The parents clearly still didn't trust her, but at least they knew she wasn't going to shoot them. Lexi glanced down into their little hole. "Looks pretty cramped in there. Come on, I'll help you out." she said, offering them their hand. The parents gave each other an unsure glance, before the husband took Lexi's hand, and she lifted him out, and he did the same for his wife, before she grabbed the kids and brought them out.
"...Who are you?" the husband asked quietly, still wary of Lexi and her intentions. "You're not one of us, so that rules out Internal Security." he noted, before looking to the open window. "And you're obviously not supposed to be here, otherwise you wouldn't be sneaking around."
"My-" Lexi started, catching herself. The entire reason Nax had been treated the way he does was because Dantinian had almost certainly found out about his relationship with Kyra. If she were to give out her name, there would invariably be some link back to Nax. "...Call me Clihx." Lexi said, having decided on using her old street name as a slicer. She hadn't told Nax or Kyra about that, so it should help to conceal her identity.
The kids were still interested in Lexi's presence, but were hiding behind their mother. "Then answer this for me, Clihx – what are you doing here?" the husband asked, curious as to her reasons for being this deep inside of Dantinian's territory. "You're a long way from your ship, that's for sure."
Lexi sighed. "I'd love to tell you, but I can't." she admitted, and the husband seemed disappointed. "I do need something from you – I need to get into contact with the resistance. Rebels. Whatever they are." Lexi said, not sure what the proper term for those within the city limits fighting Dantinian was to the Rakata. "I'm not asking you to put me in contact with them," she clarified, glancing at his wife and children, who were listening very intently on what she wanted, and the wife wanted none of it. "-just a way for me to identify them."
The husband visibly hesitated for a while, but he grabbed a piece of wood with a slightly sharp edge to it, dug it into the flooring, and started to carve out a rough shape. It was an hourglass, although from a certain perspective, it looked like the horizon of the rings. The corners of the hourglass had some sort of claw-like protrusion jutting out, and the top and bottom pieces had a circle in their respective centers, with a line struck through vertically. "This is their symbol, a jev'lu." the husband said, with Lexi's translator failing to accurately translate the last word the husband said, leaving her to wonder. "Any place associated with their clan is marked with this. The tunnels below tend to come to mind."
Lexi grabbed her datapad and took a picture of the symbol as a reference, triple checking to make sure that she had saved it to the internal drive. "...Thank you." she said graciously. "You've been a big help, and I hope you and your family live to see the end of this war." she continued, before gathering her things and making for the window, pausing to think of something else. "...Oh, what was it that she says..." Lexi openly pondered, before a look of realization crossed her face. "Right. May the Force be with you." she finished, before activating her cloak again and jumping out the window, leaving the family impressed with the display of technology they had just witnessed.
Quite a bit of time had passed with their little conversation – the streets were still fairly sparse, but more people were out. More guards, too. Utilizing the sparse shadows to her advantage, Lexi ducked past what was most likely a postmaster's office and into a back alley, with the towering buildings providing ample shadow for her to hide in. Keeping her guard up, she seamlessly slipped by a couple of youths kicking a ball around in a makeshift court, and ended up near the opposite end of the alley.
There was the distinct smell of smoked meat in the air. Lexi wasn't sure where it was coming from until she spotted smoke coming out of an open window in the alley. Curious, she walked over, and, using a metal box as a booster, looked inside.
It was a restaurant, that was immediately obvious, and a fairly conventional one, too, judging by the way the kitchen was set up. Two chefs were working, taking oddly colored sausage links and smoking them. At that moment, they were switching out one batch for another from their smoker, and the links that had been finished were now a golden-brown color. To Lexi, they smelled like nothing short of heaven, and when one of the chefs put them near the window she was at and turned his back, she quickly snatched one that had separated from the rest of the links, removed herself from the window, and ate it. It was hot, yes, but it was some of the best damn meat she had ever had.
Unfortunately, she wasn't able to linger much longer, as one of the chefs quickly noticed the missing link and started shouting. She heard his heavy footfalls rapidly approach the window, and watched him poke his head out of the window above and shout at the youths further down in the alley. He was yelling in such a thick accent that Lexi's translator didn't pick up a word that he said. When the youths realized they were being yelled at by the chef, they stopped their game, glanced at the chef, collectively made what Lexi assumed to be an insulting gesture with their hands, and resumed the game, which only served to further incense him, and he started mumbling as he retreated back into his kitchen.
Finally able to move again without being spotted, Lexi moved to the edge of the shadows, just a few feet from the exit of the alleyway, when she heard two sets of footsteps to her left. "It's too early for this kilk." someone said in an annoyed tone, and Lexi froze again. "Seriously, do their parents not feed them or something? It's not like ration coupons are hard to come by, let alone actual food." the voice questioned.
Rounding the corner to the alleyway were two guards, both wearing light patrol equipment. They both had modular protective vests on, a basic beige uniform with an official-looking insignia on the shoulders, and a belt with a handblaster, a stun baton, and a couple of restraining devices attached to it, and Lexi's heart practically jumped into her throat with how close they were – nearly within arm's reach. The slightest movement could tip them off to her presence and blow her cover.
"Don't care, not my problem." the other officer replied nonchalantly. "Petty thieves are still thieves." he continued, before reaching for his stun baton and unhooking it from its belt, while his partner gave him a look of surprise as the thing clicked on, sending a slight spark of electricity near Lexi's foot, and it took all her strength to not jump.
The pair started walking towards the youths, and Lexi felt an immediate sense of regret for what she had done. "They're kids, Kilikh." his partner protested, evidently hoping for a peaceful resolution to the problem. "If you do what I think you're going to do, the Executioner is going to have your ass in a noose." he cautioned.
Whatever was about to happen, Lexi wanted none of it, and now that the cops were far enough away from her, she could freely move. Heading to the edge of the alley, she poked her head out and looked both ways, checking for potential threats. In an incredible stroke of luck, nobody was coming her way, and the street was too narrow for a vehicle to get through, meaning she had a very good opening to get the hell across the street. Checking one last time, she jumped into a dead run, flying across the street at a blistering speed she didn't even know she was capable of.
The second Lexi's boot touched the shadow, she dipped off to the side, trying to catch her breath. Her heart was fighting to break free from her chest, and it took a minute for her to calm down and let the adrenaline burst subside. Once she was ready, she picked herself up and proceeded deeper into the alley, mindful of any surprises that might be waiting for her, at least, until she found another maintenance entrance to the tunnels.
Lexi prepared to pop the manhole cover, and just as she got her fingers underneath it, she spotted a small carving in the wooden wall – the symbol of the resistance. She was on the right track. Lifting the cover up as quietly as she could, Lexi slipped inside, pulling the cover over top so it was like she was never there, and she finally disengaged her cloak, feeling relative safety below the surface.
Dropping off the ladder, Lexi drew her blaster and descended down a flight of stairs, identical to the one she had used to reach the surface earlier. Said flight led out into a much smaller maintenance tunnel than the last one, only wide enough to fit a group of three if they were shoulder to shoulder, and the ceiling was incredibly low, so low that it was almost touching her head.
The tunnel's lighting was virtually nonexistent – there were red emergency lights on, but nothing bright, and when Lexi turned her low-light on, it barely improved things. There were only two ways she could go, aside from back up the manhole, and picking the wrong way could get her lost for hours, potentially days. The metal of the tunnel showed little actual wear, so if the resistance was down here, she couldn't tell which direction they were in.
Deciding to bite the bullet, Lexi drew her knife and scratched the symbol for aurek into one of the walls in the tunnel that led back to the manhole, intending to go down the alphabet until she found signs of resistance activity. Once the symbol was finished, she chose to head down the left tunnel, knowing she had a long walk ahead of her.
Kyra and Sawei stood in the workshops of the Odynaro, marveling at the myriad machines that surrounded them. The entire infestation had been cleared out thanks to Knockout and his team, and the level had been decontaminated and chemically purged nearly twenty times over, just to make sure the thing was dead and gone, and that it could never happen again.
The machines in the workshop were huge – many were as tall as an AAT, and while they had obvious slots for input and output, had no immediately clear way to access them. That, thankfully, was a problem solved by a B1T Foreman had sent down to help assist with operating the machinery, which apparently was otherwise impossible without the requisite knowledge and a droid.
"If you two are done gawking, I'd like to get this done. Today." the droid remarked impatiently towards the pair, who promptly acknowledged the complaint and walked with him to the first machine they would need to use to draft the lightsaber. Visually, it was just a giant block of metal, with no external detailing whatsoever outside of panel lines. That changed when the droid approached it – one of the panels slid off, and an arm with a datapad and scomp link swung out. The technician droid pulled a scomp link from within his arm and plugged it in. The machine clicked, whined, and the datapad spat out an error in protest – multiple errors, but the droid messed with something, and the errors ceased.
After a brief wait, the side of the machine closest to Kyra and Sawei pulled apart, revealing an intricate looking supercomputer hidden within the casing. A big monitor was situated above, displaying a bright blue screen, while at waist level there were a couple oddities, chief among them an exposed vial of a white, clear liquid that connected to a hand-sized hole, situated to the right of the keyboard to operate the machine.
"Alright," Kyra started, approaching the machine. "How does this work? Do I just draw the thing, or…?" she questioned, giving the technician droid an appraising look.
The droid glanced at what Kyra had in front of her. "You are to stick your hand inside of the hole while I get the machine ready." he answered, remaining focused on them momentarily while he worked. "You'll feel a slight prick while the computer interfaces with you."
Kyra blinked twice. "I'm sorry, interfaces with me?" she questioned, her mind going in about a million different directions as to what that could possibly mean.
"It's going to jab you with a handful of needles so that it can connect with your nervous system." the droid clarified. "Best way of translating inputs from the brain into digital form. Unless you'd rather have it stabbed into your neck?" the droid offered, sounding particularly serious.
"...I'll pass, thanks."
Sawei cast a fascinated look at the machine before the droid gave the signal. "When you're interfaced with the machine, all you need to do is think about whatever you want to make, and it'll create a blueprint for you as you go. Materials, too. Just a fair warning - the sensation might be a bit much, but it'll calm down after a bit." the droid instructed, before checking something again. "Computer's ready for you."
Sawei approached Kyra before she put her hand inside the slot. "Remember what I said, Kyra. You don't pick and choose how you want your lightsaber-" she started, and Kyra nodded.
"-The Force chooses for me. I know." she responded, giving her a reassuring look, before she turned to the computer and hesitantly put her hand in the slot. "Ready." she said, and there was a nearly instant shock of electricity running through her entire body that absolutely jolted her awake. When the feeling normalized, her mind was running faster than she could consciously think.
Kyra grappled with herself to control the feeling, and, eventually, got her bearings. For what it was, the sensation was more akin to radio static all throughout her body, like when one lays on their arm too long and gets up. Focusing with the Force, the sensation was compounded by what was effectively two connections, one largely physical, and the other, mental.
Kyra continued undeterred, and managed to effectively nullify the sensation of her connection to the computer, leaving only the Force, with her mind firing on all cylinders. Sawei watched with bated breath as the internal components began to take shape on the screen. It seemed fairly standard in construction – energy chamber and power cell, focusing crystals, three pairs of energizers around the energy channel, and so on. The only thing that caught Sawei's attention about the lightsaber was that the emitter had been attached to some sort of ball joint, and the electronics had been appropriately changed to accommodate this. There was also the beginning of some sort of latching system at the pommel, without an immediately clear purpose.
A second lightsaber appeared on the screen, following the exact same conventions of an otherwise standard lightsaber with the same minor modifications that Kyra had put onto the first lightsaber – ball joint emitter, latch system on the pommel, and the control surfaces being to the sides of, and above the power switch.
There was a third part of the lightsaber that appeared on screen – a connection joint, and Sawei immediately recognized that Kyra was making a saberstaff. Immediately growing hesitant on letting Kyra proceed alone, she decided to hold back until the schematic had been finished. Curiously, aside from the necessary internal components to make the connection between the two sabers work, there were changes made to the entire joint that would enable telescoping, theoretically enabling the blade to become a lightsaber pike.
With the internals completed, Kyra moved on to the exterior appearance. The metal casing was a blued duranium, with three pairs of thick golden lines distributed equally around the weapon running the entire length, emitter head to emitter head. Said heads were shaped roughly like a chalice, curving outwards, running parallel for a short distance, before curving back in. Both heads had six triangular holes around the lower curve, likely to either vent excess energy, or serve as a crossguard – possibly both.
Directly below the emitter head was the ball joint, clearly made out of some soft rubber that concealed the internal components. Finally, the grip was comparatively basic – it was a ribbed rubber grip that wrapped its way around the connecting joint and the bases of both hilts, periodically being interrupted by the golden strips.
The projection of the lightsaber changed from the monitor, to an actual hologram positioned just in front of Kyra, who opened her eyes and took a deep breath, before looking at her creation. She regarded it for a time, and seemed… impressed? Sawei wasn't sure what the right word was to describe Kyra's expression. "It's… beautiful." she eventually remarked.
"It's also damned expensive." the droid commented, looking through the materials that would be required to build the lightsaber. "We have the materials to fabricate the electronic components and the rubbers, but finding duranium up there is harder than it sounds. Focusing crystals are a pain, too." the droid continued. "You're on your own until you can get a two kilo chunk of duranium and the focusing crystals."
The sensation of being connected briefly returned for Kyra, only to stop just as quickly as it had resumed, leaving her with a residual numbness. When the connection broke, the hologram went with it, and the droid had a small datacard in his manipulators. "Could you at least tell us where we'd be able to find the materials?" Sawei questioned as the droid handed Kyra the datacard with the blueprint on it.
The droid paused for a short while after Kyra took the datacard and rubbed her hand, still reeling a bit from the sensation. Then, the droid pointed upwards without saying another word.
Sawei read over the checklist Lexi had left behind on making the Knight flyable again. "'Breaches sealed, shield output low but functional, engine complains but is theoretically outputting enough thrust to break atmosphere...'" she read off, before putting the datapad down. "Kyra, I don't think she's in flying condition." Sawei commented.
Kyra had her head partly stuck underneath the communications console, with Arfive connected to the console next to her. She pulled out of the console and gave Sawei a disappointed look. "You think?" she asked, and Sawei nodded. "I figured as much – good thing I called ahead."
Sawei raised an eyebrow as Kyra reached her hand out onto the top part of the console to paw for one of the tools. "Who'd you call?"
Kyra resisted the urge to crack a joke at such an innocent question. "The pilots that took us up to the Odynaro, Dav Foss and, uh… Bolthead." she answered, pausing to fight with a particularly resistant piece of equipment, only stopping that when she heard a banging at the entrance ramp. "That's them now, actually." she commented, sliding out in full and getting up to let them in, with Sawei following after her, and Arfive quickly disconnecting to join them.
There was another series of bangs at the door, and Dav, who was evidently the impatient one, was clearly ready for a third round of strikes, only to immediately put his fist down when he saw Kyra. "You ready to go?" Dav asked, casting a half-attentive glance to Sawei.
Kyra nodded, before reaching down to the side of the doorframe and grabbing a large, overstuffed duffel bag of supplies and throwing it over her shoulder. "What's that?" Bolthead questioned, eyeing a few bulges in the bag.
"EVA equipment." Kyra replied, raising an eyebrow at the question. "What, you think we left the Core for fun, Bolthead?" she questioned, intimidating Bolthead slightly. "We planned on being out here for a long while, and we'd have been screwed if we had to do emergency repairs out in vac without EVA."
Dav gave a bemused look to Bolthead, and shrugged. "Hey, at least you had the foresight to buy that junk – most freighter crews just slap it into a port and call it a day." he remarked, before motioning for the group to follow. "Come on, speeder's just outside."
Descending the ramp, Kyra heard the telltale rumble of idling repulsorlifts and whining engine turbines, and spotted a heavily modified X-34, presumably, Dav's personal speeder. The top had been closed off, and the windows tinted so that one wouldn't be able to look inside, along with a whole bunch of other, unnecessary and downright ugly aesthetic changes, like a huge spoiler that went over the cab, and a series of struts that connected the turbines. In other words, it was a spicer – all flash and no practicality to any of it. At least it sounded like it was running quieter than Nax's old one did.
With a wave of his hand, Dav opened the speeder's doors, and as the icing on the cake that was his horrible aesthetic tastes, revealed that he had gull-wing doors installed onto the speeder. "Pretty cool, huh?" Dav said, confident that they liked it.
Sawei, who had been mostly silent this entire time, finally spoke up. "Foss, I'm going to be honest with you." she started, walking to get into the speeder. "I've cut down battle droids prettier than this thing, and I've scrapped a lot of battle droids." she remarked, and Dav instantly shrank, his ego crushed for a brief moment, before he just as quickly hid it, pretending it didn't bother him.
Kyra had to restrain herself from laughing at the comment as she and Sawei entered the back seat. "I was going to say something, but you didn't need to just light him up like that, Sawei!" Kyra shot back, trying to hide her amusement.
Bolthead and Dav got in the front, shut the doors, and spooled the turbines to full. "Kyra, when you see one spicer, you've seen them all, and believe me, I've seen a lot. Never got the chance to tear into a driver, though." she replied as the speeder took off for where Dav's ship was.
It was quiet for a few brief minutes, aside from the rumble of the turbines and repulsors. Then, Dav looked at Kyra in the rear view mirror. "So, Kyra, I know you want us to take you up to the graveyard, but would you mind filling me in a bit more on what exactly it is we're looking for?" Dav requested, slowing down to avoid colliding with a few construction droids working on building an apartment building. "Would hate being up there without being told what it is you need."
Kyra looked back at Dav, locking gazes for a moment. "I need to get about two kilos worth of duranium and a set of focusing crystals." she answered casually, as if this were a grocery run.
Dav visibly cringed when Kyra gave her answer. "...You, uh, do know what that stuff is, right? This ain't a run for blue milk." he commented, unsure of what Kyra needed it for. "I don't think your ship needs that anyways, even with all that aftermarket crap. Maybe for that big turbolaser that tears the shit out of your power-" he started to ramble.
"It's not for the ship." Kyra suddenly barked, drawing surprise from both Dav and Bolthead.
Bolthead turned around in his seat to look back at her. "If it's not for the ship, then what's it for?" he questioned, wanting to know what possible use she would have for the material.
Sawei, without missing a beat, pulled out her lightsaber, and both smugglers immediately put two and two together. "...Holy shit." was Dav's only response. "You're a-"
"Yeah, surprised the hell out of me too when I learned it." Kyra replied, and Sawei put her lightsaber away.
The smugglers were both still in absolute awe. "Forget what I said about Lostur wanting you for a ransom from your family – that's probably why he wanted you in the first place!" Foss said in disbelief.
Kyra huffed. "Yeah, well, if it was, he did a damned poor job of making sure I was still capable. A Jedi that can't use the Force isn't exactly valuable, no?" she questioned, rubbing the front of her head, leaving the two to scratch their heads in confusion as to what that possibly meant. She did have access to the Force, right?
Regardless, the conversation ended when the speeder pulled up outside Dav's 2400, and the group got out and boarded in short order. "Feel free to switch into your gear in the quarters, we'll get the ship warmed up and in vac in about twenty minutes." Foss said as he shut the boarding ramp, before splitting off with Bolthead to make preparations for takeoff.
The interior of the ship was, predictably, very flashy. Not necessarily ornate, but it wasn't an ugly piece of sin like the landspeeder was. Sawei and Kyra made their way to the crew quarters, only to bump into an agitated little R3 unit, whirring and squealing like crazy – Arlo, if Kyra remembered right.
Arlo had a chromium shell with gold tertiary components on his shell, and the tasteless combination even extended as far as the internal components, visible thanks to his transparent dome that also exposed his droid brain. Kyra had grown accustomed to Arfive's incessant chattering, but Arlo was blabbering so quickly that she could barely keep up, only catching bits and pieces of what he was saying – something about urgently needing Dav for something important. "Dav should be in the cockpi-" Kyra started, and the droid cut her off by flying between her and Sawei and down the corridor to the cockpit.
"What a strange little droid that one is." Sawei commented. "I've certainly met stranger, though. There was one Jedi, Master Skywalker – his astromech was certainly something. Very blunt, very sassy. Kind of like yours, come to think of it." she briefly mused, before remembering that Skywalker had likely not survived the purge. "Come, let's change into our gear." she said, preferring to change the subject.
The pair took their gear from the bag and split off into the separate quarters to give each other privacy, and, just as a safety measure, broke the cameras in the quarters with the Force. Slipping out of her clothes and into the undersuit for the EVA suit, Kyra realized something – zero-G meant that her hair was going to basically blind her once she was in vac. Thinking briefly, she decided that keeping it down with the Force would be too much effort. Gathering up her hair and holding it in a makeshift ponytail with her hand, Kyra grabbed her knife from her duster, and got rid of the problem in one clean cut, reducing her hair to just above shoulder length.
Kyra tossed the clump of hair into the nearby disposal unit, and, deciding to completely resolve the problem, put the remainder of her hair into a fairly tight bun, grabbed a nearby bobby pin, and fit it into her hair, keeping it from floating about. Kyra grabbed the rest of the suit and slipped in with relative ease, before sealing the suit proper and mounting the oxygen tank to the back with the Force, connecting it to the suit's internals. One final check on the power systems, and all Kyra had left to do was slip the helmet on and seal it. Stepping back out into the corridor, Sawei followed not long after. "You cut your hair." she remarked.
"Yeah." Kyra replied, brushing away a small strand of hair that fell in front of her face. "Not exactly the best haircut I've had, but I'd rather not have it floating up in my face." she opined, before fixing a small tangle in that same strand. "Besides, if I'm going to be fighting at close range with a lightsaber, I don't want to get grabbed by my hair and just have that be it."
Sawei shrugged, and the pair proceeded to the cockpit, where they heard Bolthead and Dav in a very heated argument about… food, of all things. "...No, no, Ryll sandwiches aren't actually sandwiches, that's just what some laserbrain from the Mid Rim called it after he had one. It's a burrito." Foss opined, adamant that he was correct.
Bolthead gave Foss a look. "Man, I have no idea what your parents fed you as a kid to give you a viewpoint that warped. Burritos are wrapped, Ryll sandwiches aren't." Bolthead quickly retorted as he ran down the final checklist before takeoff. "Ryll sandwiches are one hunk of bread with a cut down the middle to put the ingredients in, therefore, they're hoagies."
Dav turned to face Bolthead, but noticed Sawei and Kyra had returned. "Well, if you think you know so much, how about we ask the Twi'lek?" he said, clearly eager for Sawei to take his side. "Are Ryll sandwiches burritos or hoagies?"
Sawei gave a disbelieving look to the smugglers. "I wasn't born on Ryloth, so I never had an actual Ryll sandwich, at least until the Ryloth campaign in the Clone Wars." she half-answered, only to realize that wouldn't settle the argument. "It's a hoagie, but you can only get a real one wherever Ryloth fauna exists – anything else is tourist bait." she swiftly corrected, wisely choosing not to pour gasoline on an already burning fire by telling them both that they were wrong.
Bolthead had a small grin grow on his face as he quietly returned to his work, while Dav fumed for a bit, before pulling the boarding ramp in, locking the ship up, and taking off. The computer console in the cockpit, situated to Dav's left, made a series of warnings and squeals as the defense network interrogated the transponder, before all alarms instantaneously ceased. Dav turned the ship upwards, and Kyra and Sawei quickly buckled themselves in.
The repulsorlifts whined as they were kicked to full, and the 2400 rapidly left the Dropstorm's airspace for the void. Piercing through heavy clouds that were moving into the area, the ship's interior rumbled and creaked as the ship picked up speed, only slowing down the higher they got, before stopping outright. When the ship stopped sounding like it was going to fall apart, Dav kicked the propulsion over to the sublights, before steering the ship into the graveyard.
Pressing several buttons on the console to his side relating to the sensors, Dav half-looked over his shoulder to the Jedi. "Now, anyone have any preferences for where to look first, or should I just throw us at the biggest ship we find?" he asked sarcastically.
Sawei got up from her seat and stood between the two smugglers, leaning forward to look out the viewport. "The Providence-class destroyers from the Odynaro's escort fleet would be a good place to start. The emergency shutters on the bridges are made of duranium. As for the focusing crystals..." she trailed, pulling out her datapad and keying some information in. "We could look for one of the Dropstorm's sister ships – the Fool Me Twice, the Steel Rain, or the Pale Rider, all of which had SPHA-T artillery pieces mounted to their ventral hangars, which we could salvage for their focusing crystals."
"Works for me." Dav replied, before bursting through the debris field at top speed, while Bolthead tuned the sensors to locate the ships. Once they were above the field, Dav pulled out a small, ancient Corellian coin, mouthed something, and tossed it in the air, catching it and slamming it down on top of his right hand. Peeling it away, Dav had a little smile, and he put the coin away without another word.
"Buncha Confederate destroyers to our eleven o'clock, low." Bolthead called out, his full attention focused on the sensor readouts. "Scans say they're in bad shape – all torn up from the inside."
Dav acknowledged the assessment. "Taking us in to the one on the far left." he said, before the ship lurched down back towards the field. "We'll swing further right until you get what you need, then we'll move to the Venators."
There was an eerie quiet in the cockpit as the ship slid through the debris field, slipping between the hulks of battered Munificents and shredded Carrack hulls, with the burnt wrecks of CR90s, Consulars, and Arquitens littering the area, occasionally punctuated by pieces from a Victory-class.
Kyra was extremely paranoid about what was lurking in the fields, hiding just out of range of their sensors. The last time she was in the graveyard, it ended up with her in a coma for several days, and the Knight ruined. There surely wasn't a third Raven up here, at least, not one without updated IFF. The same couldn't be said for any Vulture droids, Tri-Droids, or Hyena bombers still active. Battle droids were also a possibility, but were more unlikely to still be running – stock B1s didn't exactly have the best battery life, after all.
Sawei, meanwhile, was quietly watching the hulks of the 52nd's ships pass by, her mouth hanging open slightly. She was obviously there for the battle that caused this, but to see the resulting destruction again after so long must have been disturbing.
There was a break in the debris, and they came to the first of the destroyers, faced directly with its bridge. Miraculously, the transparisteel viewports were undamaged, but there were obvious signs of decay, probably a result of the life support slowly shutting down after the ship was disabled, along with maybe a coolant leak. There was also a large hole in the back, which was clearly formed by a heavy impact from a kinetic round. "Woah, did one of your ships do that?" Dav asked, pointing towards the entry hole.
"No." Sawei flatly answered, turning and glancing at a bit of the ring that was still visible in the field. "The ring's defensive system did. It shot at both sides of our battle indiscriminately, mostly at the capital ships." she answered grimly, crossing her arms. "Lighter ships caught in the way got dusted."
Bolthead fiddled with the sensors again to create a more detailed layout of the ship. "Well, unless you want to work in open space, you're gonna have to go inside. Closest access point is fifty meters aft of the bridge, and you're going to have to wiggle your way into a turbolift shaft to even get in." he read off, analyzing the layout for another way in, only to find none.
"Taking us in." Dav replied, kicking the sublights back on and slinging them past the bridge, up onto the dorsal part of the ship. Circling around for the access point, Dav was constantly looking between the scan and what he was seeing in front of him, and eventually slowed the ship down, landing it just near the access point and engaging the maglocks on the landing gear. "All yours." he nonchalantly commented, kicking back in his chair while Bolthead slaved away.
"Hey," Bolthead suddenly said, turning to face the Jedi just as they were about to leave the cockpit. "I'm reading a bunch of small energy signatures inside the ship. Not sure if they're droids or emergency power, but mind yourselves, yeah?" he cautioned.
Sawei and Kyra nodded, before they headed to the boarding ramp, passing by Arlo on their way there, who was no doubt headed to the cockpit to agitate the two smugglers. After slipping their helmets on and making sure the seals were on tight, Sawei turned around, letting Kyra mount the oxygen tank to the back of her suit and connect it to the internals, before turning a valve on the top. Sawei gave a thumbs up as the hiss of oxygen flowing into her suit confirmed the internals were functioning. Kyra turned around and let Sawei turn on her internals. The Twi'lek briefly messed with the oxygen tank's mounting, tightening it up, before she opened the valve and the oxygen flowed into the suit, and Kyra gave a thumbs up.
"Comm check." Sawei uttered over their commlink, coming through loud and clear on Kyra's end.
"Check check." Kyra replied, before checking to make sure the suit's magboots and zero-G repulsors were functional. "Your suit good?" she questioned, and Sawei nodded. "Dav, you reading us?" Kyra questioned.
There was furious typing from Dav's end of the comm, and then a quiet gasp. "Dav's gone to the 'fresher, Kyra, but I'm reading you just fine." Bolthead answered through the comm.
"Got it, cycling the airlock now." Kyra said, before sealing the door to the boarding ramp and hitting the button to cycle the air out. There was a rushing wind as the air was sucked in, and then… silence. The ramp dropped, unceremoniously hitting the hull of the Providence, and a sudden feeling of weightlessness kicked in, to which the pair responded by immediately activating their magboots, clamping them to the floor, with a thud only felt in their suits.
Sawei was clearly very used to working in EVA conditions, effortlessly moving down the ramp and onto the destroyer, while Kyra, meanwhile, was struggling with her boots, having to fight to get them to release every time she took a step. Sawei turned back, looking over her shoulder. "Kyra, is there a problem?" she questioned, watching her struggle.
"Kinda, yeah. My boots aren't big fans of releasing their maglocks so I can, you know, walk." Kyra answered over the comms, trying to demonstrate her issue to Sawei.
"...You're using too much force." Sawei said simply, already knowing the root of the problem. "These suits are SEVA 2s, they come that way. It's to prevent getting thrown out into space by stray debris, but they work just fine if you're gentler with how you move." she explained, demonstrating by attempting to force her leg to lift up, having no success, and then lifting it much slower and deliberately, with the magboot easily disengaging.
Kyra stared at the Twi'lek briefly, before taking a few baby steps forward and finding that Sawei was, in fact, correct. "Wild." was Kyra's only comment, and the pair resumed the spacewalk. EVA was… awkward, even with the amenities afforded by modern technology, but Kyra would rather have her feet on something solid, as opposed to drifting forward to the access point, at the mercy of the void.
That said, being so close to the stars had a kind of haunting beauty to it. Having grown so used to being planetbound, or, well, ringbound in her current circumstances, she never really thought about what was up there much. It was then that she remembered something Kelah had said to her back on Tatooine. "...Each and every star up there has people living there, each with their own hopes, dreams, and their entire lives ahead of them. From newborn babies, to their parents and grandparents. Orphans, refugees, freedom fighters, bounty hunters, smugglers and soldiers – all of them. The galaxy is beautiful in a way I can't quite describe, let alone understand, but I'm okay with that." Kelah's ghostly voice said, echoing in Kyra's mind.
Beautiful indeed.
And then there was the rings – cold and alien as they were, there was something beautiful about them, too. Perhaps it was that they were the last creation of a dying empire, aimed at preserving the few survivors of their kind, along with their finest minds, and on such a scale, too. The only things comparable in the greater galaxy were the myriad ecumenopoli – Coruscant, Nar Shaddaa, Taris, and even those would fall short in the face of the rings, impressive as they were.
Kyra, having been lost in thought for the duration of the spacewalk, failed to notice that she had stepped over the access point, but a gentle tug on her arm from Sawei snapped her out of the trance. The access point wasn't particularly large, but was wide enough to fit a small landspeeder through it. Two sets of hermetic doors blocked their access – the top door had been partially opened somehow, but the other was still sealed tight. Kyra was about to start splitting the doors open with the Force, but Sawei was already ahead of the curve, and had both open, all without saying a word. "No way we're going to be able to walk all the way down there." Sawei noted, before hitting a button on her suit's wrist device to activate her repulsors, with Kyra doing the same.
Moving with the zero-G repulsors wasn't as bad as Kyra had initially assumed, and the pair went down the access port, drifting past exposed machinery and electrical wiring, they realized the access port was clearly a last minute addition, and would barely pass safety standards. Then again, did the CIS even have safety standards?
Guided only by the dim red emergency lights, the pair reached the bottom of the shaft to find themselves near the top of a turbolift shaft. Floating side by side, Kyra peered over the edge, rapidly regretted her decision, and looked up towards their destination.
Sawei gently pushed herself out of the access point and into the turbolift shaft, before using her repulsors to accelerate upwards. Kyra, meanwhile, grabbed hold of one of the pipes and launched herself upwards, speeding past Sawei and latching on to the side wall of the shaft, pushing herself further and further towards the bridge, grabbing parts to stop when she picked up too much speed. "...I don't like how quiet it is." Kyra commented after taking a pause to wait for Sawei to catch up.
"That's just what EVA is, Kyra." Sawei replied as she slowly drifted upwards. "You're totally deprived of every sense other than sight and touch – you can't hear or smell anything that isn't in your suit." she continued, stopping up where Kyra was. "Bridge isn't too far from here."
It was too dark to see further up the shaft, so Kyra activated her helmet-mounted glowrods, illuminating the rest of the shaft, and, unfortunately, revealing that the bridge's access door had been blocked off by a turbolift car. "Looks like we're out of luck for direct access to the bridge. Do we-" she started, only for to Sawei to interrupt her.
"It's just a turbolift car, Kyra." Sawei reminded her, gently patting her lightsaber as she floated up to it. Pulling it from her belt, Sawei activated the weapon, which lacked its signature snap-hiss in the void, but it bathed the area in a blue glow nonetheless. Thrusting the blade upwards into the turbolift car nearly to the hilt, Sawei began carving out a wide hole that they could fit through. Once the cut was complete, Sawei pushed the chunk upwards, taking a bit of molten slag with it, and Sawei went through, Kyra following after.
The turbolift car's doors were wide open to the rest of the bridge, and battle damage was evident all over the place – a series of internal pipes had ruptured and exploded across the entire bridge, leaving the floor a torn mess. Deactivated MagnaGuards were scattered about, mixed with the B1 bridge crew, but the most interesting droid was another Super Tactical Droid, almost identical in exterior design to Foreman, save for a few changes, namely in regards to his 'face' and paint job. The tactical droid's photoreceptors were four lights arranged in a diamond pattern, with a similar 'mouth' found on 3PO-series protocol droids, and much of the plating was painted in a faded black and white splinter camo.
Kyra drifted closer to the droid, examining it out of curiosity. There was a series of letters and numbers laser-etched onto the back of the droid's head – STCOM-PARA-042. It was obviously a manufacturing ID of some kind. STCOM probably meant Super Tactical Commander, and 042 was likely the unit number, but PARA had her stumped. Choosing to ignore it, she pressed further into the bridge, floating past dead EWAR consoles and navigation computers. "So," Kyra started, looking out the viewports at the debris field. "Got any ideas for how we're going to get the shutters down?" she inquired, glancing to the Jedi.
Sawei cocked her head, looking at one of the smaller floor viewports. "Considering the power's out?" she started. "We'll just use the Force to rip the shutters down and compact them for transport." she offered, briefly reaching out and, presumably, testing the waters with a shutter. "Easy enough." Sawei commented, before drifting towards one of the bigger viewports out front.
Kyra floated over to her side, and the pair reached out towards the top ridge that connected the viewport to the ceiling, feeling around for the shutter. "On three." Kyra said, and the pair prepared to tear the thing clean off. "One… two… three!" she yelled, and with the combined power of Sawei and Kyra, the shutter slammed downwards, shattering the central transparisteel viewport, sending most of its shards out into open space. Whatever bits remained inside were quickly set aside, and the pair again reached out to the top of where the shutter came from, and began to pull down on it in short order.
While the shutter itself had dropped down with relative ease, the same could not be said of where it was attached to. It seemed like it had refused to budge entirely, and the bridge having already been decompressed meant there was noise to indicate how close it was to breaking free. Straining and trying their hardest to break the shutter free, the shutter finally began to flex and bend downwards, taking some of the ceiling with it, until it finally snapped free, flying out into open space. After quickly grabbing the shutter with the Force to prevent its loss, Kyra and Sawei worked to bend and compress it into something they could transport, ending up with a decently sized cube, which absolutely had more than enough duranium in it to make the lightsaber.
"Foss, we have the duranium. Come pick us up at the bridge." Sawei said over the comms, only to get a long burst of static in response, quickly followed up by another, shorter burst. "Repeat last, Foss." Sawei requested.
"Wh… ad… you..." was the only thing they heard, before the comm cut out completely. Jammers.
Kyra rolled her eyes. "Love to find out we're being jammed. Just the best." she sarcastically remarked, before glancing at Sawei. "Do you want to do it, or should I?" she questioned, and Sawei shrugged in response, leaving Kyra to take the initiative. With a sigh, Kyra reached out through the Force to Dav's mind. "Sorry about the intrusion, Dav, but we've got the duranium. Something's jamming our comms, but come to the bridge and pick us up. Drop the cargo hold lift when you do, too."
There was a burst of panic in Dav's mind. "What the absolute sithshits? Moryne?" he thought, possibly saying it out loud to Bolthead. After a moment of contemplation, it seemed that Dav had accepted her message, and was starting to spool the engines back up, disturbed as he was by the very personal privacy violation.
While that was happening, something tingled at the back of the minds of the two Jedi. Something dangerous was coming, and fast. Sawei activated her other lightsaber, and Kyra drew her blaster, staring directly down the corridor to the turbolift.
Droids began to move from where they had been floating, starting towards the entrance to the shaft. They weren't reactivating and moving on their own, it was more like something was pushing them. Kyra took aim with her blaster, slowly tracking each droid as it moved. Finally, she caught a break – a slight shimmer in the corner of her eye betrayed the intruder, and she immediately drew her blaster on it and fired three shots.
The intruder's active camo flickered out, and it lunged for her. Using the Force, she stopped it dead in its tracks, holding it in midair while it uselessly flailed around. Lining up a fourth shot, Kyra didn't need another, and their attacker, which was apparently a droid, immediately stopped moving.
After waiting a while, they confirmed they were clear, and Dav had arrived with the ship, hovering just off the bridge with the cargo lift down. Sawei and Kyra loaded the duranium in short order, before turning back to grab both the assailant and the tactical droid, intent on taking them back to Foreman so he could figure out what to do with them.
As the pair drifted back over to the cargo lift and loaded up their haul, the tingling returned. Instead of choosing to stay and fight what they assumed was an identical copy of the assailant, they quickly finished their work, boarded the lift, and hit the button to ascend back into the hold. Their view of the destroyer quickly disappeared, and when the lift sealed them into the hold, the gravity kicked back in, with atmospheric cycling in not long after.
Immediately making a run for the cockpit, Kyra blew past Arlo at breakneck speed. "Dav!" she shouted, halfway there already. "Dav!" Kyra yelled again. Busting out into the cockpit corridor, Kyra pushed aside Bolthead, who had evidently gotten up to find out what was going on. "Dav, we need to move, right the hell now." Kyra pushed, and Dav looked over his shoulder at her, confused.
"Bit pushy considering you just invaded my mind, but, you know, it's all good." Dav hissed, clearly unhappy about that little invasion of privacy, before he reached for the throttle, pushing it up. The ship rapidly accelerated away from the battered hulk, and Kyra was about to relax, only for that brief peace to be broken by an ominous thud coming from back towards the cargo hold. "What the hell was that?" Dav questioned, glancing over to the ship's external sensors, noticing that the rearward sensors were detecting something crawling along the top part of the ship.
"What we were trying to get away from." Kyra replied, before moving out of the cockpit and towards the gunwell, passing by a confused Bolthead on her way out. Climbing up into the top turret, Kyra seated herself in the controls, sped through the startup, and swung the turret towards the rear of the ship, keeping her thumbs just above the triggers.
Just like the first attacker, there was a visible shimmer as it moved across the hull. A chance glance at the turret's readouts revealed something to Kyra – the stock laser cannons had been replaced with rapid-fire slugcannons, and they were fully loaded. Depressing the triggers, there was an electric whine as the motors spun up, and then an all consuming rumble in the turret as the slugcannons opened up. Sweeping side to side, Kyra saw a flicker, followed by several sparks and a small explosion, marking the end of the attacker. Keeping watch to make sure there wasn't a third one, Kyra could finally relax, and she slipped her helmet off, sitting back in the gunner's chair.
The intercom crackled briefly. "So, care to explain what that was, Kyra?" Dav requested impatiently. "More importantly, why you just wasted a quarter of that turret's ammo supply for one boarder?"
Kyra pressed the comms button. "Come to the cargo hold and we'll show you." she answered, getting out of the chair and sliding down the gunwell, before heading to the cargo hold, where Sawei was already hard at work disassembling part of the assailant's chassis with a fusion cuter she had borrowed from a nearby toolbox. "What are you-" she started, only for Sawei to hold up a set of small set of translucent crystals, stripped out of a power pack located in the droid's chest. It was a full set, enough to focus both ends of Kyra's lightsaber when it was finally made.
"Don't have to go for the SPHA-T now." Sawei remarked, before snagging an empty hardcase and carefully storing the crystals inside and locking it up. "Figured that he had something good in him since he had active camo. Surprise, surprise, our lives just got a lot easier."
It was then that Dav entered the cargo hold and took stock of what they had brought aboard – the entirety of the duranium shutter, compacted into a cube, the intact Super Tactical, and the partially disassembled assailant, which, now that they had proper lighting, was a strange looking construction. The base of the droid looked to be a MagnaGuard, with parts and equipment salvaged from other droids haphazardly welded to its body – a wrist rocket launcher here, a set of color mismatched BX legs there, and a MagnaGuard electrostaff with a BX vibrosword mounted to the end of it as a melee weapon. More interesting, however, was the droid's total lack of armor plating, which explained why it had been so easily destroyed after just a few blaster pistol shots. "That is what was chasing us, Dav." Kyra said while Sawei tried to put the droid back together as well as she could, before deciding she didn't care any more, leaving the body as it was.
Dav raised an eyebrow and gently nudged the droid's arm with his boot. "This piece of slag is what had you spooked?" he questioned in disbelief, before looking at Kyra with disappointment in his eyes. "This is what you got into my head for?" he scoffed, before finally stomping off, without giving either of them a chance to explain themselves. "...First and last time I give a Jedi a ride. What a waste of perfectly good ammo." he muttered under his breath as he headed down the corridor.
Sawei and Kyra just gave each other a look – Sawei seemed amused with Dav's anger, while Kyra was more than perturbed by the multiple outbursts Dav had had by this point.
After what had felt like hours walking in nearly complete darkness, Lexi finally heard voices. They were distant, and it was too hard to clearly make out what was being said, but they were voices – of that, she was certain. Pushing past several intersections and heading straight ahead, the voices slowly grew louder and louder, and Lexi could finally make out three distinctive voices – a female's, a male with a deep, heavy voice, and… a child? Lexi was initially confused, but then thought that the resistance couldn't be choosers with who they brought on – they were probably bordering on scraping the barrel, if anything.
"...We need to inspire the people, not waste time chasing old myths while our brothers and sisters chafe under Dantinian's terror, Venta." the male argued, sounding somewhat agitated by this conversation, probably having had it multiple times in the recent past.
Lexi pushed closer to the voices, eventually finding a false wall that had been cut into the corridor, and she would have missed it without the voices to guide her. She brushed her hand against it, and a small card reader popped out in front of her hand – no access port otherwise.
Beyond the door, the conversation continued, and the female, evidently named Venta, sighed. "I know that, Shu'ul, but what good would a revolution do us if Dantinian could just turn on the Worldshaper and kill us all?" she pointed out, sick of having to defend herself. "With the Interlopers waging full scale war against Dantinian, we actually have a chance to find out where the Worldshaper is and destroy it before it's used against us."
The kid finally chimed in. "I wouldn't be too sure about that, Venta." he opined, and there was an audible series of clicks coming from the room they were speaking in. "News from the front says there's a huge shakeup in the military. Major purges, meant to keep operational security up for some massive organizational and tactical overhaul. Anything we do would need to be done fast." he pointed out, before clearing his throat. "Speaking of operational security – we have a visitor. Motion sensors are going off like crazy."
Lexi's heart jumped into her throat when she heard that, and realized that she didn't have her cloak on. Scrambling to activate it, the false wall slid down, and Lexi caught a glimpse of one of the trio, just before whoever it was sucker punched her with the force of a magtrain, knocking her clean out and sending her to the floor.
And that's that. Again, sorry about the wait, but my own shit comes first in times like this.
Now, for anyone about to bring up the fact that Kyra is remembering Kelah's speech from Chapter 6 wrong, you would be correct, it's not the same speech. I've mentioned a rewrite of Tatooine before, unless I didn't in the A/Ns and have only talked about it in messages to other people, but that line is a revised version of the original speech. I was actually going to just Ctrl+C, Ctrl+V it from Chapter 6, but I looked at it and went, "What the fuck, I wrote this? This is dogshit!" and had to revise it to sound a bit less, uh, forced? Less cringe, too.
While the Tatooine rewrite is nowhere close to actually coming out, that's a rough idea of what you can expect to actually see from it when I get around to it after Pulsar Company proper is done. Superior dialogue, better characterization, and some retcons (ie, the rebels employing Nax and Kyra instead of that derpy ass forced conscription thing I did. Seriously, what the fuck was I thinking? Also, the witness protection program thing eating shit.)
Anyways, moving to Kyra's lightsaber, you have no idea how many fucking iterations that thing went through. While Kyra was to be Force-sensitive from the start, I had constantly deliberated on whether she should get a lightsaber or not. Ultimately I decided on 'yeah sure fuck it might as well', which I believe was midway through Coruscant.
Now here comes the fun part – initially, her lightsaber was to be a dueling saber, akin to Dooku's, because I had planned Kyra both being nobility very early on, and her using Makashi due to the connection to fencing, and its historical association with European nobility. I then thought, 'what would a dueling saber look like with one mounted to the other end?' and ended up basically making the energy sword from Halo. After some digging around on lore forums on what lightsaber style would fit with the energy sword and figuring out that none of them would work, I ended up deciding to make her lightsaber modular, which went from 'yeah the emitters can be rotated around, neat huh?' to 'this is a saberstaff, lightsaber pike, dueling saber, lightsaber dagger, and a standard lightsaber all in one'.
Designing space wizard weapons is one hell of a drug. You guys are lucky I don't do this shit with the air vehicles.
Yet.
Anyways, that's all for now.
I hope you all had a merry Christmas, and see you all next year when Pulsar Company turns three years old. Fuck me dead, it's been a ride.
-Tweak