Hey everybody, been a while. I took a break from writing for a while. I was unable to write for about a month due to being out of town and away from my computer. After I got back though I was just going to take a break for a bit and before I knew it 2-3 months had passed by without me uploading anything, sorry about that.
I started up the next chapter for RotEA but only have a few hundred words written and I wanted to give you guys something to read after so long so I'm uploading this chapter that's just been sitting on my hard drive for a while now. Chapter 4 is also completed and sitting there so I might upload that too, we'll see how I feel.
This is an early version of chapter 3. As such it is subject to be changed at my whim in the official release. It has not been thoroughly proofread so please excuse any mistakes.
Enjoy!
P.S If certain motivations or plot points seem contradictory to earlier chapters it's because when I write, I write under the assumption that I already went back and rewrote the early chapters even though I haven't done that yet. If you read this and aren't sure what I'm talking about I mean our MC's motivation at the end of this chapter. It's nothing big but if you remember the other chapters it might throw you off a bit, just remember that these are rough draft chapters.
Crossroads: Rough Draft of Chapter 3
"Woah!" I exclaimed as I narrowly dodged my head to the side to avoid an incoming blaster bolt. Those extra levels I had managed to gain were really coming in handy when it came to premonitory warnings about incoming danger.
Oh, I had checked on the way to the satellite control tower and I was now level 11. Still far behind where I needed to be for Balmorra but at least I felt somewhat safe during this fight. Also, Vette had done an amazing job switching out the plates. She quickly painted them black to match the rest of the armor and they looked great.
They did feel like they weighed a bit more, but nothing too substantial. Besides I'd deal with any extra weight knowing that I was far more protected from blaster fire and lightsabers then I was before.
"What are you doing?" yelled Serenity towards me. I looked up from the console I was on and saw her just finishing cutting up 4 droids at once. As cool as it was, I didn't have the time to admire her as another 8 droids rolled forth down from the Satellite Control Tower's hill to attack us.
"What does it look like, I'm side questing!" I yelled back at her. "You just keep doing what you do best. You're looking great out there!" I gave her a thumbs up.
"And this is what you do best? Also, fuck you," she said before she leapt into the new pile of droids, smashing, and cutting her way through them.
I figured while we were in the area that I could pick up a few more quests. Ran into the probe droid nearby, I named him Probey, who wanted us to overload 4 command towers nearby. The command droid would come afterwards, and we we're supposed to collect their CPU chips and then return them to Imperial Command for a reward.
Only one problem… I had no idea how to work most of this technology. But I had a very perfect solution for this.
"No this is what I do best! Vette!" I called out.
Vette stopped her covering fire for Serenity and ran over to me, firing aimlessly as she ran. Even still, I saw one of her shots nail a droid in its head. She's a damn good shot.
"What?" she asked as she took cover behind the command tower, I was working on.
"You know how to overload things, do your magic on this tower."
I stood up and brought out my lightsabers, holding them defensively in front of me.
"You called me over to be tech-support?" she asked in aggravation.
"Well yes," I said shrugging, "but in my defense you're really good at this kind of thing."
"Fuck you," she said before she dropped to one knee as she started working on the tower.
"You know, if both of you keep this up, you're gonna hurt my feelings eventually," I said loudly trying to raise my voice over the sound of blaster fire.
I saw out of the corner of my eye Vette just give me the finger. Off in the distance I heard a familiar, "fuck you", before the sound of droids being destroyed continued.
Ahh the words may be harsh, but they were comforting to hear, nonetheless. It felt good to feel companionship like this.
I saw a stray blaster bolt coming my way. Seems like good as time as any to test out deflecting shots. I raised my main hand saber into position. The blaster bolt hit the saber and reflected harmlessly into the dirt at my side.
A good start but nowhere near deflecting bolts back at their attackers. I'd have to practice with it, and luckily it seems one of the droids was volunteering for the duty.
One of the droids had broken off from Serenity and the carnage she left behind her. Seriously, that girl flowed through the battlefield like water. She made it look effortless as she stabbed, ducked, and weaved her way through hordes of enemies without so much as taking a scratch.
The droid opened fire upon me. Once again, I deflected the bolts, but they merely went flying off to the side. Wanting to try and redirect the shot back at the droid, I swiped my lightsaber at the next blaster bolt that came flying in. Successfully I was able to deflect the bolt in a new direction. Unfortunately, that direction was almost directly behind me towards Vette.
The bolt impacted a piece of metal casing a few feet to the top right of Vette's head.
"Hey! Watch it, will you?" Vette cried out at me.
I winced at that. "Sorry, sorry," I said raising my offhand in a placating gesture. "That one's on me."
The droid was preparing to fire another volley at me when it was suddenly lifted into the air and forcefully thrown before it impacted a metal barricade and exploded.
"Got it!" Vette said immediately afterwards.
I heard what sounded like a lot of electrical discharges coming from the tower.
"Nice job Vette! See, you're the best tech support."
I deactivated my lightsabers and put them back on my belt as the battlefield had grown silent and I could Serenity walking her way back to us.
"I'm not sure if that's a compliment or not," she said as she stood up.
"I'd take it as one."
Just then I could hear the sound of a jetpack and saw a droid fly in before landing about 10 feet away from Vette and me. It was a bulkier droid than the ones around here on guard duty and it had a massive cannon with multiple barrels on it that were now aiming our way.
"Is that-"
"A giant machinegun?"
As I finished the sentence for Vette the cannon started spooling.
"Move!" I called before I grabbed Vette from behind around the shoulders and dove us over to the side. We rolled along the ground as blaster bolts started impacting where we had previously been standing.
I recovered first and stood up, lightsabers in hand ready to try and deflect best I could to protect Vette. I didn't fancy my chances. With the amount of firepower that gun was capable of spewing out I was voting for the machine gun in this case to come out on top, but I had to try.
The droid rotated and locked onto its target's new location. I saw the gun start to spool up again but before it could fire, a crimson lightsaber came sticking out of the face of the droid.
The droid collapsed as Serenity pulled the lightsaber back out of its head and just watched it fall to the ground.
I put my lightsabers away and pulled Vette up from the ground.
"Wonderful timing," I said to Serenity.
"Is this what we're looking for?" she asked nudging the droid she just killed with her boot.
"Yes, but we care for what's inside it. Oh Vette~," I said in a singsong voice.
"Why do I have to be tech support," grumbled Vette.
"Because the tech support gets paid lots of credits?" I helpfully supplied.
Vette gave me a mock salute. "Tech support Vette reporting for duty!"
I rolled my eyes at her antics.
"Just get over there and pull out the chip."
Vette nodded and ran over to the downed droid. After she recovered it, she brought it back to me where I stored it in one of my pouches.
"Is that it?" she asked as she handed it to me.
"Almost. Now we just gotta do this three more times!" I said cheerily.
Vette groaned.
"We have a spy to take care of," Serenity said trying to remind me of our objective.
"The other towers are all really close by alright. Won't be going anywhere away from here and after we have the chips we can walk in the front door and take care of this tower alright?"
Serenity said she was alright with it as long as the mission got done soon and she got to keep killing things.
We were tearing our way through the complex, or more like Serenity was, as we pushed to get to the central control room of the tower. I was just kind of hanging back with Vette taking care of any stragglers that got by Serenity and that didn't get shot down by Vette.
Don't look at me like that. When I have my full range of powers or are at least over leveled for the planet I'm on, then I'll be the first to lead the charge. Until then I'm playing things safe.
Serenity lifted the last droid in the air and crushed it inwards upon itself. It fell to a crumpled heap onto the ground. As it impacted the ground though I flashed out another light, not nearly as bright as the other times.
"That wasn't nearly as bright as before," commented Vette.
"No, it wasn't," I said in surprised affirmation.
I pulled up my experience bar and saw that I was somehow now halfway through level 12.
"That doesn't make any sense," I muttered. "We didn't even complete a mission…" I trailed off as it hit me.
Bonus quests! There should have been one to kill a certain amount of the droids in this complex, which we must have just accomplished. Strange, usually you would get credits with the quest completion, but I guess the world can't just drop the credits into my lap.
As I was thinking that a droid that had been cut horizontally in half by the torso suddenly lifted its blaster and fired off one more shot at Serenity before it depowered and collapsed to the ground. Serenity easily moved out of the way of it, feeling a warning from the Force.
The shot hit an electrical panel behind her. The panel sparked and the wall tile next to it exploded outwards off the wall.
That can't be a coincidence.
I walked over to the hole in the wall and peered inside. Looking in, I found a small cloth bag propped up on top of a bundle of cables running perpendicular to the wall. I pulled out the bag and emptied the contents into my hand.
"1100… 1200… 1300 credits!" I said as I counted the amount. Thank you, benefactors, for bonus missions.
"What?" Vette said as she came rushing over to check it out.
"Yeah, sometimes I actually like my benefactors."
I picked out three hundred credits and handed them to Vette.
"Here, this is yours to do with as you'd like."
Vette nodded and pocketed the credits I gave her.
"Thank you," she said.
Looking over to Serenity, I saw her with her arms crossed, impatiently tapping her foot as she looked at me.
"What?" I asked.
"I thought you said you only can get your power back on mission completions," she answered.
"For the most part that's still true," I responded. "We did complete a mission, just not one I realized we had. You see sometimes our missions will have optional bonus objectives that we aren't told about. If we do them, I gain some power and," I held up the credits in my hand, "some credits!"
"And who set up these optional missions? Your benefactors? Because there is zero chance, they were able to set everything up in here to make it, so you got those credits. They would have had to have been planted there when this place was built."
I shrugged in response.
"I don't have any proof, but I suspect they're the ones responsible for it."
"They couldn't possibly do that."
I shook my head in frustration at her. It wasn't her fault, she couldn't possibly know, yet it was still undeniably irritating.
"They easily could, and I suspect they have."
"Do you understand how crazy you sound? You talk about them like they're gods."
I found myself pondering the same thing. Were they gods? Was there some power even over their heads? Why send me here, out of everybody?
"For all intents and purposes, they may as well be," I said coming back to reality. "I know our relationship is still in the trust building phase but trust me when I say that these are not individuals who you should ever dream of messing with. If I tell you they can do something, then you better damn well believe they could."
She didn't answer right away.
"As much as you might want me to, I find it hard to believe," she eventually said.
"And I pray you never have to have it be proven to you. Now let's keep moving, we're burning daylight," I said before I marched over to the elevator that would descend us into the lower level.
While riding the elevator I went back into the interface editor. This thing really was a jumbled mess, but I was just looking for one specific thing if it was available. Eventually my eyes caught sight of just what I was looking for, the quest tracker.
Marking it as visible I moved into the top right corner of my vision and added it to my preset. I came out of the editor and could see the small quest log there in my top right.
It listed the side quest that we had completed outside and that it just needed to be turned in back at the outpost. It also listed our main quest, to plant the charge in the Satellite Control Tower. I didn't see anything about the bonus quest, though if they did appear here, it might not pop up considering it was already completed. I'd have to check back in on this during another quest.
I switched back to the default profile just in time for the elevator to stop its descent on the lowest floor. We stepped off the platform and continued our way through the base. The only droids here were of basic quality and level so it was nothing too difficult.
We reached the central control room, and after clearing the room of hostiles, planted the charge on the terminal. Almost immediately afterwards Serenity received a holocall from Quinn.
"My lord, I mark your progress, and see that the charge is armed. I will detonate once you are at a safe distance. But first, I have Darth Baras on holo for you. I will retreat and leave the line secure for the two of you," he said before the holo dissipated before reforming with Baras instead.
"Apprentice, all your dallying may have actually paid off," Baras said as a backhanded compliment. "I've received intelligence that Commander Rylon's son has been captured and is awaiting interrogation. The lowly ensign, named Durmat, knows of Rylon's secret identity. He confided in him his true identity, and for that, must be silenced, permanently."
"Telling his son was foolish. All he's done is place in him danger now," said Serenity.
"The one chink in his otherwise flawless armor. Move swiftly, the Republic must not learn of his true identity. Quinn will relay you the rest of the details," he said before he cut off his connection.
"My lord, Ensign Durmat is being detained in the brig of a Republic crater outpost, awaiting questioning by the mysterious agent Baras has me tracking. I'll keep you alert of the investigators whereabouts and if they appear to be heading there. I assume you wish to get to Durmat before she does?" asked Quinn.
"My mission is none of your business, Lieutenant, just do your job," Serenity answered.
Not going to lie, it felt kind of good seeing Serenity being a dick to Quinn.
"Of course, my lord." Quinn quickly said. "I will leave you to your mission, and only contact you under the direst of circumstances. Good luck, my lord."
The holocall disconnected and left the three of us standing around.
"Well, invading a Republic outpost huh. This will be a first for me," Vette said.
"Me too," I responded with. "Should be interesting."
"I'll give you 15%," I said to Vette.
We were currently driving a taxi over to our destination and I was the driver. It wasn't really all that different from driving a car back home. Still had pedals and a steering wheel only this time you could change your elevation.
Before we had gotten a taxi, I had turned in the quest we got from Probey. What came next was a nice hunk of experience, which was enough to get me part way through level 14 with the experience we got when we finish the Satellite control tower mission.
Also, it included a grand pay day of 3000 credits, which Vette wanted a cut of, which leads to our current debate.
"25%," she counter offered.
"Vette, stop squirming so much," Serenity said annoyed. Vette was currently in Serenity's lap and was moving around as she bargained with me. You see the taxi only has two seats and seeing as Vette is the smallest of the three of us, she got stuck sitting in the passenger's lap.
Now normally that would be me, and I would have been all up for volunteering to ride passenger. Especially because Serenity does not like it when she doesn't get to be in control of the speeder, but I had a plan, so I needed to drive.
"20, and that's the final offer. The only reason you're getting as high an offer like that is because I like you," I told Vette.
"Hmm," she said while pouting.
"Not gonna work Vette," I chided.
"Fine," she threw her hands up into the air then crossed them over her chest. "I'll take 20%."
I gave her a cheeky smile. My helmet was currently off and resting in my lap. I liked the extra visibility while piloting, plus the wind felt nice.
"Knew you'd see it my way," I said.
"Vette if you don't sit still, I will leave you unable to walk," Serenity threatened.
"Hmph," Vette said as she stilled in her seat. "All my Sith overlords are mean."
I flew past the outpost that we were supposed to land the taxi at and took the speeder even higher up into the air.
"What are you doing? You missed the landing zone," Serenity asked.
"Not using that one."
I flew us up onto of the mountain ridges and hovered us above the ground as I soared ahead towards the Republic outpost.
"Please tell me you're not taking us where I think you are," Serenity said worriedly.
"You know it."
"You can't just fly us in there!"
By this point we had come over the edge of the mountains and cliff edge and were right above the giant hole in the ground that was the Republic outpost.
"And why not?" I asked not seeing the problem. We were here a lot faster now then it would have been to walk.
"Because they'll have anti-air guns!" she screamed out. Right as she said that a shot hit the engines of the taxi and we began free falling towards the pit.
"Shit! Hold on!"
I tried pulling up on the steering wheel, pressing the pedals, but nothing was working. The controls had either locked up or been fried.
"We need to jump!" I said as we were still falling with the ground fast approaching. I quickly threw my helmet on over my head and heard the magnetic clamps lock into place. "Go for one of the platforms!"
"Are you crazy?" Vette yelled at me, but Serenity was already onboard with my idea. She wrapped an arm around Vette and jumped out right as we were crossing by one of the platforms.
I quickly climbed over to their side of the vehicle and jumped trying to make it to the same platform but was too late and missed it. And now I was freefalling towards the ground probably somewhat 100 feet below me. On the bright side I saw that Serenity and Vette had safely landed on their platform as I passed them.
As I was falling, I noticed the speeder luckily crash into one of their defense turrets, destroying both in the process.
"Shit shit shit!" I said as the ground was rapidly approaching.
Okay you've seen Jedi land safely from falls much further than this. You just gotta figure out how in the mere seconds you have left.
Trying to will the Force into slowing me down and levitating me didn't work. I figured it should, in theory, considering I would basically just be casting telekinesis on myself instead of another object, but I think my lack of practice combined with the stress I had from not wanting to go splat wasn't helping.
I was out of time so, having nothing left to lose, I embraced the fall.
"Time for something stupid," I muttered and put as much Force energy into my hand as I could. I put my hand out in front of me to impact with the ground. Luckily if this doesn't work, I don't think I'll have to bear the pain of my broken hand for too long considering I'll be dead immediately afterwards.
I felt my hand impact the ground followed by my body landing in a crouched position but I didn't feel any broken bones nor my death so that was a good sign. Then, as if time had stopped as I landed, a massive shockwave rippled out around me.
It sent dirt and debris flying everywhere. I was more interested in the system message that had popped up though.
Overload ability learned
When I looked up the dust had settled, and I could see Serenity and Vette dropping down platforms making their way to me. I saw the entrance to the outpost ahead in front of me, along with the bodies of multiple dead sentries piled along the walls.
It seems my shockwave hit them and sent them flying back so hard they died from the impact of hitting the metal wall. I felt kind of bad. It was a bad way to go.
I tried to stand up but faltered as I rose. I think I may have used up too much energy as I felt really tired. Eventually I was able to fully pull myself up and stand up just as Vette and Serenity arrived.
Vette ran over and immediately had me put my arm around her shoulder as she attempted to help me stay up right.
"Are you okay?" I heard Serenity ask.
"I don't know yet. Ask me again in a few minutes if I'm still here," I slurred out.
"How did you do that?" Vette asked me incredulously.
"I'm still figuring that out. Right now, we need to get inside of there, before more reinforcements come…" I trailed off at the end growing tired.
"Hey, stay with me," I heard Vette say. "Are you okay?"
"Fine, just tired. Let's finish this up so I can get a nap."
I unraveled my arm from her shoulders and willed myself to stand up straight. I switched profiles to check on my health and Force bar. Looking at it I could see the Force bar was empty and my health bar had been drained to halfway. Both were rising, albeit slowly, so I knew given enough time I'd be alright.
The fall may have been too much for the Overload ability to compensate for. It seems like it drained as much Force energy as it would need for a fall of that distance and when that ran out it switched over to using my health bar instead.
"That would explain why I'm so tired and everything hurts," I mumbled out quietly.
"What?" Vette asked me with a concerned look in her eyes.
"I'll be okay, I just overexerted myself. Give me enough time and I'll be right as rain."
Serenity came over to me and looked me over. There was a fire in her eyes.
"What you did was really stupid! You could have gotten all of us killed!"
"Believe me I know," I said weakly. "You were right, and next time I'll ask you for advice before I follow through on a plan of mine. I'm sorry. Would you mind waiting to tear me a new one until we're somewhere safer though and I have some energy back?"
Serenity gave me one last look over before she gave out a hmph and turned her back on me.
"Fine… and I'm glad you're not dead," she said, the second part being quieter than the first, as she walked towards the outpost's entrance.
Vette didn't move as she kept staring at me making sure I wasn't about to fall over.
"I'm okay Vette, truly. Go on ahead," I said with a wave of my hand, "I'll be right behind the both of you. But thank you for worrying,"
Vette gave me an uneasy nod but walked quickly to catch up to Serenity. I trailed behind them a decent distance but always made sure to keep them both within sight range.
Time went funky as we, or should I say Serenity, made her way through the outpost. It felt like I kept blacking out and when I would wake up, I would be standing further along in the outpost.
Honestly, I don't remember how but I ended up standing here in the prison cells with Serenity in front and Vette and me behind her as we stared down the warden named Zixx. Durmat was in the cell behind him. Serenity's voice cleared my head and brought me back into the moment.
"You may want to bring a change of clothes for our prisoner here warden, I think he may have soiled himself."
"I'll make sure to get him a spare set as soon as he finishes telling me all about this Imperial spy planted here on Balmorra," Zixx said.
I took in the environment, noticing the empty jail cells all around and then my brain started to fire back up. I remembered where we were and what was about to happen.
I leaned in close and whispered in Vette's ear.
"We're about to have company. I need you to slink back towards the door and set up a trip wire trap, can you do that?"
She looked at me strangely but when I raised an eyebrow in lieu of asking again, she nodded and quietly slipped away back towards the entrance.
Zixx never noticed as he was too busy keeping his focus on Serenity. Vette finished up her work and quietly slipped back in next to me.
"You're awfully cocky aren't you Sith," he spat the last word out as if it was poisonous to even utter the word.
"Funny I was going to say the same thing to you. Except my cockiness is earned, yours isn't."
"So, the Sith says but you didn't even realize you were being played. The entire time we've been talking reinforcements have been making their way here."
Serenity didn't turn around, but I did to look at the entrance as two squads of Republic troopers ran through the door at the same time. Unfortunately for them, nobody seemed to notice the trap.
There was a small explosion and suddenly there were no longer any Republic squads standing behind us.
"You were saying?" I heard Serenity say and even though I couldn't see it, I knew she had a smirk on her face.
Zixx screamed out as he reached for his vibrosword to try and avenge his dead colleagues. Serenity merely reached out and grabbed him in a Force choke before she snapped his neck.
Zixx's lifeless body fell to the floor in front of Durmat's cage.
"Zixx… Zixx. Come on, talk to me, Zixx… get up, man…" said Durmat.
"I don't believe Zixx can hear you right now, and getting up may be beyond his skill set," said Serenity.
"Wait, wait, I know why you're here," Durmat stammered out quickly. "The Republic's investigating my dad… and an agent's coming to put the screws to me, but I won't break… I promise. Let me live and my dad's secret is safe with me… I-I'm a rock."
"Ensign I heard you give up his secret as I walked in the room here," she said softly.
"I-I know that looks bad, b-but my father's done so much for the Empire. And maybe the apple fell far from the tree but the apple's still… please, just don't kill me."
"It's okay, it's okay," Serenity said soothingly, "take a deep breath." Durmat didn't listen to her at first and so Serenity gave him a gentle smile and said "well, go on."
Durmat closed his eyes and began breathing in deeply. At first the breaths were short and shallow but eventually they grew longer as he calmed.
"Feeling better?" she asked him.
"Yeah… yeah, I'm feeling better," he said, and it must have been true as he didn't stammer that last line out.
"Good," she said. Then she took out her lightsaber and stabbed it through Durmat's heart. She moved so quickly that Durmat didn't even have time to reopen his eyes before his body fell lifelessly to the floor.
"Poor kid," I heard Vette say and I agreed with her.
Serenity had put her lightsaber away but stood there staring at his body, not moving. I walked up and gently put a hand on her shoulder. I saw her startle slightly before she relaxed.
"Hey, everything okay?" I asked.
She turned my way and my hand fell from her shoulder back to my side.
"Yes, apologies. Let's start trekking our way back to Sobrik."
I gently stuck a hand out in front of her before she could leave.
"Are you sure you're alright? Nothing you want to talk about?"
She turned back and looked towards Durmat's cage contemplatively.
"How many children have suffered the consequences of their parent's actions? So many dead through no fault of their own," she said quietly. She shook her head as she broke her contemplative state.
She turned back to look at me. "I apologize if I worried you, wasn't my intention."
I didn't respond. I was at a loss for words at the honest rendition of her feelings.
She took a deep breath, and I could see the mask slide back in to place on her face. Gone were the eyes that conveyed emotion, the frown that marred her face. Instead, they were replaced by eyes that gave nothing away and a stoic face.
"Now, considering we don't have a speeder anymore thanks to a certain somebody, we're going to have to walk back to Sobrik. And I for one would like to return before nightfall, so we need to get moving."
This time when she tried to leave, I didn't stop her.
Vette followed her out of the room. I took one last look at Durmat's body.
"Rest easy kid."
I left the body and jogged to catch back up with the others.
"And?"
"And I'm sorry that I was an idiot and lost us our speeder. How long are you going to keep holding this over my head?" I asked Serenity.
"It's still fresh and I'm still reveling in your stupidity so… a while," she said chipperly.
She had been enjoying berating me as we walked our way back to Sobrik. It was making her happy and to be fair I kind of deserved it, so I just let her have her way.
Along the way my regeneration had gone on long enough that my health and Force bar had been fully restored and I felt good as knew again. That last experience was a good enough warning for me not to let my Force bar drop that low again.
The walk back was fairly boring. Vette wasn't saying much. I think all this walking we were having to do was annoying her and the only fights we got into were creatures who thought we looked like a good meal. Now their bodies were meals for other scavengers but that's the circle of life.
We were almost back to the outpost I was supposed to have landed the taxi at originally. On the way though I noticed a lone trooper, crouched down behind a fallen tree, scouting a cave.
Well, this is a side quest if I ever saw one, but which one is it? Is this the one with generators and refugees that rely on it? Oh well it doesn't really matter, I guess.
"I mean only a fool would think-" Serenity began another sarcastic jab at me before I cut her off.
"You can get back to making fun of me, but for now hold that thought. There's a side quest," I said before making my way over to the trooper.
"Solider, what are you doing?" I said in my best attempt to be commanding.
The trooper turned around and upon seeing the lightsabers hanging from my belt stood up straight and gave me a formal salute.
He was clad in a standard set of Imperial scout armor and had a vibrosword attached to his back. He was a dark skinned man who was mostly bald except for two long patches of brown hair that were evenly cut, separated down the middle, and went along from the front to the back of his scalp.
"My lord! My commander has put me in charge of scouting out this cave ahead of the rest of my battalion before they arrive."
"Why?"
"Imperial Intelligence believes the rebels are moving highly valuable cargo through this cave system. I'm supposed to scout out what the cargo is and if it is worth our time, but this place is so heavily defended I can't get in. Whatever is in there must be valuable as they moved one of their most elite squads in to guard it."
Is this a heroic quest? It's starting to sound like a heroic quest but if it was, I feel like I would remember it then. As it was now, I was drawing a blank as to what this quest was.
I heard Serenity and Vette finally catch up as they walked up behind me.
"My lord!" the solider said after seeing another Sith walk up.
"We could scout out the place for you, for the right price," I said.
"Uhh… I'm sure my commander would be happy to compensate you if you could assist us in this matter."
"Great, one scouting report coming right up," I said.
"Wait I haven't given my permission yet to-" Serenity started to say.
I quickly pushed on her back and started ushering here towards the cave entrance. She didn't put up much resistance to my move.
"Don't mind her, she just hasn't gotten her afternoon killing in yet and gets a little grumpy. We'll be right back, make sure your commander is ready with that reward," I said to the soldier as we moved further away from him and towards the cave entrance.
I thought Serenity would be the first to protest my impromptu quest pick up, but it was surprisingly Vette.
"Do we have to do this? We've been walking for hours, can't we just take the rest of the day off," she said.
"Vette, you'll get paid a lot of credits," I said in reply.
Her attitude changed on a dime after that.
"Well, why didn't you say so," she said with an extra skip in her step. "Let's go, this cave isn't going to scout itself."
"Hold up," Serenity said and for the first time resisted against my pushing. "Is the only thing you two care about credits?"
We all came to a stop a few feet away from the cave entrance. Vette and I looked at it each other and shared a brief moment of understanding between one another before we both turned back to Serenity and answered "Yes" at the same time.
"You two are unbelievable," she said before letting out a sigh. "Very well, let's do this."
She started walking, without needing my intervention, and headed towards the cave.
"Wait," I called out. She stopped at the cave entrance and turned around to look at me.
She raised one eyebrow as she stared at me. "Yes? Is there a problem?"
Her whole quick acceptance of the situation was throwing me off a bit.
"No, not a problem per say. You're just being very… understanding is all," I said carefully trying not to upset her with my words.
Serenity seemed to grow bored at my words and brought a hand up to her face as she examined her nails, making sure they were all still in pristine condition.
"It's not like I can prevent you from going off and doing these sorts of things so I may as well embrace it and help you out with it. It will help me out too in the long run after all."
"That's very… pragmatic of you."
"Quite, now may we get moving? I would like to have some free time to spend on board the ship before it gets too late."
I motioned ahead of me with my hand towards the cave.
"Lead the way."
She nodded and entered the cave. Vette came up next to me as I hadn't moved to follow.
"Am I the only one who's scared at how cool she's being right now?" she asked me.
"You're not the only one. I honestly don't know if I prefer her when she's angry at me and despite her words, I feel like she's angry at me."
"Who knows? Maybe she's actually not pissed off right now," she said but didn't look too confident when she said that.
Then we suddenly heard the sounds of blaster fire going off and people screaming and begging for mercy.
"Okay so maybe she's angry," Vette said in concession at the noise.
"Right, well at least the anger's directed at others instead of me right now."
"We should probably get in there," Vette said as the sounds of battle continued.
"Yes, of course, that would probably… be a good idea," I said and reluctantly started making my way into the cave with Vette following behind me.
Vette and I made our way through the corridors towards the sounds of blaster fire and death, but it always seemed to get further away the further in we got. Along the way we passed plenty of corpses of Republic troopers with lightsaber scorch marks marring their armor.
The sound of fighting quieted down and we hurried up fearing the worst. Our fears were unfounded though as when we turned the final corner and caught up with Serenity, she was nonchalantly standing there choking out the last living Republic solider.
She turned her head slightly and took notice of our entrance.
"Nice to see the two of you finally caught up," she said before she snapped the man's neck and his body fell lifelessly to join the other bodies surrounding her.
"That scout was right. This place is heavily guarded for some reason, time to find out why," she said before she marched further ahead into the cave.
We were in a large open room, there were a few terminals scattered along the walls, and a ramp that led up to a large elevator that I assumed went down into the deeper levels of the cave.
I didn't remember what this quest was supposed to be about when I got the description from the soldier outside but for some reason this room jogged my memories. There were force sensitive refugees hiding out here, trying to escape the Empire.
Serenity was making her way to the elevator. I looked around the room for a terminal with a holoprojector and found my mark.
"Wait!" I called out to Serenity before she got on the elevator.
"Now what is it?" she asked impatiently.
"I know you want to get back and relax so I figured I'd save us some time. Vette, could you please come here and call back the last person who called?"
Vette walked over to the terminal and then gave me a death glare after she looked at it.
"Seriously?" she asked annoyed.
"What?" I asked not understanding what she was upset about.
"You couldn't be bothered to just click the button here that is for calling back the last connection?"
I rubbed my hand over the back neck plates of my helmet.
"Sorry, I didn't know it said that."
"How could you not know, it's written right above it," she said pointing to the button and the writing above it.
Serenity had walked back over and was standing next to me now.
"Yeah, about that… I may have forgotten to mention that I can't read or write that language."
"You're illiterate?" Vette and Serenity asked simultaneously, both flabbergasted.
"Ok well hold on, I could read and write my language, so not illiterate, just not that one."
Vette's mouth opened and closed as she seemingly couldn't find the right words.
"But this is Aurebesh! You're speaking Basic! This is your language!" she eventually screamed out.
"Look, what are we speaking right now?" I asked her.
"Basic!" she exclaimed, the shock from earlier still not having worn off.
"Yes, but where I'm from they would call this English. English uses a different alphabet, but uses a similar grammatical structure," I gave as a basic explanation.
"You think we're speaking this English right now?" Vette asked.
I gave out a sigh.
"In a sense. I know you're speaking Basic but to me…" I trailed off after seeing Serenity standing there impatiently tapping her foot. I knew she was growing annoyed and just wanted to get back and soak in a bath.
"Look we can continue this later and I'll answer any questions you want but our dear master here," I said motioning to Serenity, "wants to get back as soon as possible and take a relaxing bath so let's finish up here first."
"Oh, come on!" Vette said as she looked towards Serenity. "You can't tell me this is boring you, can you?"
Serenity let out a light sigh.
"Apologies, while I admit that this is fascinating to listen to, he is correct. It's been a long day and I would like to just get back and relax in the bath…" she trailed off at the end.
Serenity stopped tapping her foot and looked at me.
"How did you know I wanted to take a bath?" she asked me.
"I don't know I just did. Good guess maybe," I said waving her off. I truly didn't know how I knew but I didn't think it was that big of a deal.
Serenity narrowed her eyes as she starred at me but then they relaxed, and her vision fell to the floor.
"So much research to do," I heard her mutter quietly to herself.
She raised her eyes back up to Vette and motioned for her to do the call. Vette pushed the button and few short seconds later the holo projection of a middle-aged Republic general popped up.
"Hunn here. What do you need Amber cavern?" asked the general. "Hold on, how did you get in here?"
"I can be very persuasive when I feel like it general," answered Serenity.
The general shook his head. "No need to go into detail, I can imagine. Look Sith, the people in this complex aren't of any consequence and are certainly no threat to the Empire."
"Bullshit. You don't send highly equipped and trained military personnel as an escort for people of no military value. Try again," Serenity said.
"I'm telling the truth. They're Force sensitives, and the law on all Imperial planets is that all Force sensitives must be trained as Sith."
"Seriously?" I asked Serenity but she just motioned for me to quiet down.
"Yes seriously," the general answered. "If you don't train, you're executed as a potential threat. But not everyone would make it as a Sith. Some people discover their sensitivity when they're too old or they just don't have the will. So, they go into hiding with us."
"And you expect me to believe you don't send them over to the Jedi to be trained by them?"
"We don't I swear. We take them to Republic planets and get them a job farming dirt of making hyperdrives or whatever. But the Emperor keeps making laws that say they have to die."
"I'm sorry but the laws are what they are," said Serenity.
"Woah okay, I'm stepping in now," I said butting into the conversation. "General I'll take care of my friend here; we won't go after the refugees. I'd recommend you begin evacuation procedures."
"Hey, you don't get to decide what-" Serenity started to say as she turned to heads towards the elevator, but I wrapped my arms around her waist and pulled her back.
"I see you're going to have your hands full with her. Thank you, the people in there owe you their lives," he said before he disconnected the call.
"Let go," she snarled out quietly as she struggled in my grip. I have no doubt she could have broken out of this if she wanted to but doing so would require her to hurt me and I was banking on that I had maybe built up enough good will to prevent that.
"Only if you calm down and listen to what I have to say first."
She calmed in my arms and when I saw she wasn't making any attempt to escape I released her and took a step back. She turned around and looked at me.
"Speak," was all she said.
"I figured I'd do what I could to get you back as soon as possible. If you want to kill these refugees, then just tell the soldier outside what's in here and he can send in his battalion to take care of it. I don't care one way or the other which decision you make."
"You don't?" asked Vette looking somewhat heartbroken. I guess she really wanted to save these refugees.
I gave out a sigh at her sad face.
"No Vette, I'm sorry. Look personally I would just leave them alone. They haven't done anything to justify this. I'm fairly certain I've said it before, but I'll say it again. I don't care about the Empire. I would happily let it burn to the ground but if she wants to uphold its laws then that's on her."
"Hmm," was all Vette said solemnly.
It looks like I didn't exactly make her feel better with that, but I was just trying to be honest. When I looked back towards Serenity her face was still, but her eyes were slightly downturned.
"Your reasoning was good," she said when I finished turning around. "Thank you for thinking ahead for me. Let's get out of here."
She turned and left back towards the cave entrance. I followed after her with Vette following behind me. Vette didn't say anything more and just kept her head down as we back through the halls, stepping over the corpses Serenity had left in her wake.
The walk back was silent until we reached the cave entrance.
"You truly would leave the refugees in there alone?" Serenity asked me.
"You felt bad for Durmat because he was forced to bear the consequences of his father's actions. I guess I feel bad for them because they shouldn't have to bear the consequences of a government that they don't even want to be a part of."
"Hmm," was her sole response and then the silence returned as we made our way back to the scout trooper.
"My lords, good to see you've returned unharmed," he said as we arrived. He raised a hand to his earpiece.
"Major? Yes, the Sith I told you about have returned. They secured the tunnels. No, I contacted you immediately, sir. He wants to know what was in there?" asked the scout.
I said nothing and merely turned to look at Serenity letting her know it was her decision.
She took a step forward, indicating she was going to be the representative for our little group.
"There were… The cargo that was in there had already been moved. The troopers in there were just finishing up before they were about to move out. The cargo's a no go but the troopers have been eliminated," she said.
"Sir? We've got dust. Uh-huh, I'm certain, sir," he said into his earpiece. He removed his hand from his earpiece.
"He's cursing about Imperial Intelligence again. Give it a moment, he'll finish soon."
After a few moments he raised his hand back up to his earpiece.
"Sir? Yes, sir. I'll pass the word on. He apologizes for the unnecessary danger. It looks like our battalion is going to be searching the other caves."
"Sorry we couldn't get there in time," Serenity said.
"We appreciate the assistance anyways. You're in the major's good books. He's sending you a sizeable reward for helping the battalion. Your credit chip if you don't mind my lord."
Out of nowhere Serenity pulled out a golden card the size of a credit card. He took it and seemed to just stare at it for a few seconds before he handed it back to Serenity.
"Very good my Lord. The major will have the 3,000 credits transferred into your account before the end of the day. It's been an honor my lords," he said with one final salute before he sat back down behind the tree and got on a call with his commander.
Serenity started walking towards the Imperial outpost that we could see in the distance. Vette seemed to have a little more pep in her step as we walked. Once we were far enough away from the trooper, I asked her why she did it.
"Enough people have been punished for things that aren't their fault. Those people aren't a threat to the Empire, there's been enough bloodshed for one day."
I nodded in acceptance and said nothing more. She turned to look at me when I didn't comment further.
"What? No comment about how you're proud of me? Nothing about how I'm doing the right thing and I should feel good about it?"
I'm still trying to figure her out, but it seemed like, if you looked past her sarcastic jabs at my silence, she was actually looking to hear a modicum of approval out of me.
"Serenity," I said gently but she ignored me.
I reached out with my left hand and grabbed her right and tugged so that she spun around and was now facing me. I kept our hands connected as she looked at me and reached up with my right hand removing my helmet from my head. Once the helmet was resting in the crook between my torso and right arm, I locked my eyes onto hers.
"I hope you didn't make that choice out of some misguided idea that it would make Vette or I happy. All I ever want from someone is for them to do what they think is right. Not what society may say is right, or what they are ordered to do, but what they feel inside is correct. If that's what happened when you made that decision, then I'm proud of you. I'm proud that you were able to do what you thought was right."
I saw her try to break our eye lock as a faint blush rose to her cheeks, but I didn't let her.
"But if you made that choice trying to appease Vette or myself then I'm sorry. Don't ever feel the need to change yourself if the pretense for it is for others. If other people don't like who you are then fuck them. Find the people that like who you are already and associate yourself with them. All that matters is that you like who you are, I know I do."
The blush on her cheeks grew more apparent and honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if it was also showing on my face. I got a little too into that impromptu speech and said more than I intended to.
She seemed to give my hand a squeeze involuntarily as when she realized what she did she gave out a fake cough and removed her hand.
"Thanks," she whispered.
"You're welcome," I whispered back, too caught up in the moment.
We were just two feet apart and couldn't seem to break our eye contact. I felt the urge to just grab her and pull her close but before I could I heard the sound of someone nonchalantly whistling and it broke me from the moment.
Turning around I saw Vette staring up at the sky as if it was the most interesting thing in the universe. The sun had already begun to set, and it was quickly getting darker by the minute.
Serenity noticed this too after she came back to reality. She cleared her throat before speaking aloud.
"We're almost to the outpost, let's keep moving. Nightfall is fast approaching."
She quickly started her way over to the outpost. I snapped my helmet back on top of my head and followed after her falling in pace with her just a few steps behind her.
Vette caught up and walked side by side with me.
"The sunset was beautiful. Did you manage to catch it or did something else have you distracted?" she teased out at me.
I was glad the helmet covered my face because I could feel the blush growing on my cheeks at her comment.
By the time we had gotten back to Sobrik night had fallen. The city was dark with streetlights illuminating the main walkways. The night sky was near pitch black but lit up every time an artillery shell hit the shield surrounding Sobrik.
We dropped by Quinn's place. Quinn stepped outside while Serenity went to go talk to Barris over his holocom. I stayed hidden in the next room. I had checked my experience bar before coming in and I was just below hitting level 15 after completing the mission at the Republic outpost and that side quest at the cave.
While Serenity dealt with her master, I contemplated learning my new Overload ability. I was lucky that I was high enough level to use it at the time. If I wasn't… well this story would have ended a lot sooner than I would have liked.
What was important though was what this meant for me learning new abilities. If I had the level requirement, could I just start using new abilities? Did I have to learn them first? I didn't learn slam beforehand, but I could have just been able to use that because it was an emergency situation.
Wanting to test what abilities I may be able to use now I tried to activate invisibility again but was met with an interesting pop up.
Invisibility is unavailable. However, requirements for its lesser version Stealth have been met. Would you like to activate Stealth instead?
I didn't see a button to click on the prompt, so I instead tried thinking yes to myself. I saw my hands turn translucent followed by the rest of my body. There was an outline around myself, like how there was for the people I designated when using Invisibility.
Unlike invisibility though I could see tiny speckles of light dancing all along my body every few seconds. If I moved, they seemed to shimmer more brightly in relation with how fast my movements were. I deactivated Stealth and saw my form return to its normal transparent state.
While certainly nowhere near as effective as Invisibility was, Stealth could still come in handy for sneaking past very unaware individuals. I doubt it would do much to a more powerful opponent. They would notice the light reflecting off of me if I tried to sneak up on them.
What other abilities could I use? My main class was the Sith Inquisitor even though I had chosen dual lightsabers for my weapons, so I should have access to all of the Inquisitor's abilities.
I remembered the Inquisitor had a way to give themselves a speed boost, albeit temporarily, but it could come in handy if I was able to do the same.
As with all my abilities I focused on willing the Force to do what I wanted it too. I closed my eyes and imagined myself looking like how it looked in the game, with the gusts of wind flowing behind the character as they ran, and mentally thought Force Speed to myself.
I opened my eyes and craning my neck I could make out faint, almost invisible lines, coming off my backside. Grinning I turned back and looked at the wall adjacent from me. It was only a mere 15 feet away. Normally I could sprint that distance in two maybe 3 seconds tops.
Mentally, I tried to keep a timer going as I readied to sprint towards the wall. Turned out I didn't need it though as the millisecond I took off I had already slammed straight into the wall and was now lying on back in pain.
"Ahh… at least I'm faster…" I groaned out as I rolled in pain along the floor.
From where I was, I could see Serenity in the next room on her call with Baras. She turned my way after hearing the impact sound.
Her eyes met mine as she saw me rolling on the floor. She looked at me for another second or two before I saw her roll her eyes and turn back to Baras.
"Something wrong my apprentice?" I heard Baras ask.
"No, my master. I merely thought I heard something, but it turned out to be nothing. I'm sorry for the interruption, please continue."
Painfully standing back up I made my way back to my original starting position. For curiosity's sake I checked my health bar after hitting the wall and saw that I had actually managed to drop it 4% from the impact.
"Guess this is as good a time as any to test out healing now," I hissed out as I could already feel a bruise starting to form from where my shoulder impacted the wall.
Taking my left hand, I placed it over my right shoulder and tried to use Dark Heal on it. I saw my hand glow a feint green for a few seconds before the color dissipated. Checking my health bar, I saw I was back up to 100% and when I tried rolling my shoulder around, I no longer felt any pain in it.
So far so good at least. I had gained the ability to heal and a speed buff. I knew I already had the power to cast lightning, but I wanted to double check on it.
I made sure to choose a wall that was plain and had nothing on it. Shooting out what was supposed to be my full Force lightning attack I immediately noticed a difference from earlier.
First, the lightning bolts were bigger in size. Whereas before they had been thin zig zag strands, they had widened out to be about double their previous size. They still weren't the size of the lightning bolts I remember the Inquisitor shooting out in the game or what Palpatine could shoot out in the movies, but they were at least improving.
The second thing, and the one I found more interesting, was that the color of them had changed. Originally my lightning had started out as a dark purple, but now the bolts had lightened slightly. They were a slightly brighter more vibrant purple, and it was hard to make out considering the speed of the lightning, but every once in a while, I swear I could see just a flicker of white.
I cut off the lightning and winced when I saw that my newfound power had left some scorch marks on the wall.
"I'm sure they can buff that out…"
I saw Quinn reenter the building and head towards where Serenity and Vette were. I took that to mean her call with Baras had ended. I followed after him and entered the room in behind him. I walked over and stood next to Serenity.
"Your final target is the Balmorran Arms Factory. The resistance forces recently captured it and made it their headquarters. An incursion into the Arms Factory will be a monumental feat. I'm excited by the prospect of you laying waste to that place my lord."
Quinn handed her a datapad which she began scrolling through. Looking over her shoulder the datapad contained what looked like blueprints to me. I assumed they were of the Arms Factory.
"Assaulting a place like this will take planning," Serenity said as she looked over the blueprints.
"If it is acceptable with you my lord, I will start putting together a plan to assault the factory and can brief you on it tomorrow. It is getting late, and it is important for you to be well rested," said Quinn.
I rolled my eyes at that. God he was such a kiss-up.
I noticed Vette staring at me out of the corner of my eye. Turning my head towards her I saw she a grin on her face and was doing her best to contain her laughter.
"That sounds like a good idea Lieutenant but do be sure to get some rest too. You're no good to me if you can't function straight."
"Rest assured my lord that I would never do anything that could potentially harm you. There is one last thing. That investigator the Jedi sent has been concentrating her activity around the Arms Factory. I have her under minute-by-minute surveillance and will keep your abreast of her actions."
"Very well in that case you're dismissed for the night. We'll meet back up to go over your plans tomorrow."
Quinn gave her a formal military salute before the three of us left and start heading back to the ship for the night.
We had gotten back to the ship and stepped into what I liked to call the living room of the ship. Serenity stopped in the middle and connected her hands above her head as she begun to stretch.
She arched her back out, the joints cracking, and you could see the relief and pleasure fall onto her face as she relaxed after a long day's work.
I couldn't help but find myself a bit mesmerized by the sight of her curves being accentuated and ended up staring longer than I should have, my mind beginning to wander in a direction it shouldn't.
"What?" Serenity asked after noticing my gaze.
I felt Vette elbow me to reality after I had gotten a bit star struck at the sight. I came back to reality and tried to say something quickly.
"So, you going to go relax and take that bath now?" I asked.
Why did I say that! Was that weird? Because it felt like kind of a weird thing to say as it was leaving my mouth.
She tilted her head to the side slightly and looked at me with slightly narrowed eyes.
"That among other things," she said after a second. "But as much as I would like to continue… whatever this is," she said sarcastically motioning with her hand to the space in between us, "I'm going to turn in early, so I bid you both a good night."
She walked over to her room and closed the door behind her. I watched the whole way there.
After the door shut, I turned to head towards the crew quarters and saw Vette leaning there along the wall. A hand curled over her mouth, attempting to hide the smile that lay beneath it, but not doing a very good job at it.
"Yes?" I asked.
The hand dropped from her face as she stood up from the wall.
"Oh nothing," she said before descending into little giggles as she skipped along the hall towards the crew quarters.
After we got into the quarters Vette asked if she could take a shower first. I obliged and after she was done took one myself. Stepping out of the bathroom I saw Vette had opted to lay down in the bunk above the one I had unofficially chosen as mine.
"You know there are many other bunks you could have chosen?" I asked her.
"I know," she replied, "but this makes it easier to talk to one another."
I walked over and sat down on my bunk. Her lekku's came into view first and then her face as she leaned down over her bunk.
"And what are we talking about exactly?"
"You said back in the cave that I could ask all the questions I wanted about you being illiterate-"
"Not illiterate," I interrupted but Vette continued on like I said nothing.
"-and calling Basic this English language."
I gave out a sigh at that.
"I suppose I did say that. Fine you can ask anything you want to know," I said.
"Really?" Vette asked gaining a predatory smirk.
"Really," I said feeling like I was walking into a trap.
"Hmm," she said in mock thought. "First question then, where are you from and what were you doing locked up in the Dark Temple on Dromund Kass."
"First, that's two questions. Second, what does that have to do with the English language?"
"You said I could ask anything, so I did," she said proudly.
While I did in a sense say she could do that I wasn't about to give her any important information.
"Let me amend my previous statement. You can ask me anything you want to know when it comes to the English language."
Vette got a frown on her face after that.
"That's not what you said before."
"I'm altering the deal. In fact, I'm altering it once more. I'll answer any questions you may have about my language and if you're interested, I'll even help teach it to you, but in return you have to teach me Aurebesh."
"That is a lot different than what you said before."
"Take it or leave it Vette."
"Fine, I accept," she said near instantaneously. "Vette's Aurebesh teaching school opens for business tomorrow. In the meantime, though I have questions…"
I stayed up with her for a bit answering questions about English and our alphabet. She had many more that we didn't get to, but it was late, and I was tired, so I told her she could ask more later. She was resistant at first but eventually she relented after she yawned.
Tomorrow I'd start my lessons in learning Aurebesh. I lay awake for a bit scared after thinking about how my life had changed.
I was in a fictional universe in the middle of what will turn out to be a massive galactic war between the Empire and the Republic. And then following that it will be the galaxy against Zakuul and the Eternal Empire. I was quickly learning how to fight, how to kill, how to lie to accomplish my goals.
Yet in the middle of all this I was here, befriending Vette, befriending Serenity. Serenity and I's relationship may have had a tumultuous start, but we were at least starting to find solid ground between one another.
And as for Vette, we were quickly growing close. It may have been unusual, but I was quickly growing very protective over her. When that merchant made her cry, I really did want to just rip his spine out of his back, and I knew I could do it without consequence if I wanted to and that was a scary thought. And now I've agreed to share lessons between Vette and I as we teach each other a new written language.
The fact that going around into warzone's, killing whoever got in our way, and then coming back to be taught school lessons by Vette felt right, was scary. The fact that this place was starting to feel like home and that I didn't want it to end? Well, that was terrifying.