Chapter 7- Taris
"Greetings Master Jaq." Said the Sith officer as I entered the Sith Base on the UpperCity levels of Taris. "We've been expecting you." "And I your hospitality." Figured it the right thing to be polite. "The prisoner is over in the holding cells this way." The officer walked me to the other end of the Sith Base. The building wasn't too big and was still under construction.
Soon we arrived in the holding cells. There I found myself face to face with an imprisoned male Nautolan Jedi. He and his sister were the targets. He, like the intel on his sister suggested, had green Lekku. They were shinier than most other Nautolan's head-tails, this was a clear sign of adolescence. Twi'lek suffered the same infliction, the same infliction of being young aliens. I hated aliens, almost as much as I hated the Jedi. Zabrak were okay, they were brutal and required little training in becoming a Sith. Tomen, a Zabrak Assassin died six months ago while I was on my mission to Coruscant. Tomen faced a whole platoon of Republic soldiers and successfully butchered them all. He died on that mission, in self respect and admiration he boasted by leaning on a wall. Only, there was no wall, only a massive twenty five thousand mile drop. His mission was on CloudCity, and I am quite unsure whether there is even a ground in that world. Wait! I'm getting off topic.
"What is your name?" I asked him. He slumped down inside his force cage. His foot touched the walls and he was zapped with a sharp shock. He flinched and curled up against the back of the cage. "What is your name alien?" I said, much more forcefully this time. This Jedi was no Padawan, but recently initiated. He was far stronger than any Jedi Padawan we Assassins were ever going to face. His sister, who was not present, was supposed to be far more dangerous.
"Look you alien slime, if you don't respond to me I will proceed to execute you slowly and painfully." This treat made the Nautolan look up. "L…L- Lorak. My name is Lorak." He stared at my, not fearful but nervous and guilty. Guilty for what I wondered?
"Where is your sister?" I asked. The Nautolan ignored my question and considered to stare. The officer commented. "The prisoner made no mention of a sister." I looked at him and proceeded to Force Push him into the corner of the room. A sharp crack signified the crack of a skull on the wall. He was awake, but silently in pain. His expression and weak willed mind revealed everything.
"Alright Nautolan, if you refuse to tell me there apparent whereabouts of your slimy alien sister, I will find her, I will capture her, and I will sell her to a Hutt for a …pet." The Nautolan stood aggressively, knocking his elbow against the wall of the Force Cage. "No! Don't hurt her! If I tell you, you'll kill her anyway. As a slave at least she'll be live." "Not exactly. I'll ensure she lives, yes, but she will endure all kinds of suffering that will allow to feel as though she preferred death. Especially when I reveal to her that you sold her out and set up the whole exchange with the Hutt before turning to the Sith." "No! She's down in the Undercity where the Rakghouls are! I sent her there to escape! She's probably trying to find a cure or something!"
I turned towards the red and green panels on the wall. I switched all to red. Behind me the Force Cage's liquidation attribute initiated and the Nautolan slowly burned to a crisp. I was now going to head into the Undercity in search of the woman.
The officer had contacted two checkpoints, he had said, the first guarded the elevator from the upper city to the lower city and then the second guarded the elevator to the savage lands below Taris.
"Good day to you, sir." The first soldier had said to me, his shiny silver and metallic armor was a sight to be seen. A sight that should invoke such a force upon a person – they should be glad to be Sith I remember saying to myself. "Thank you. Should I expect trouble on the Lower Levels?" I asked pleasantly. "Affirmative. The swoop gangs have engaged the Black Vulkars and are slowly taking back lost territory. The Black Vulkars are firing upon everyone who goes down there, civilians included." "Well it would the civilians faults for going down there." "Yes sir." "Have you warned the people about the dangers?" "No." He replied feeling somewhat guilty. "Don't bother, let them die if curiosity gets the better of them."
I continued into the lower levels. I walked slowly, enough to show any thug that I was not afraid. And because of that, no conflict occurred. At least until the Bounty Hunters had gotten involved.
"Hey, you!" A voice had called from behind me. I stopped, obviously. There was no need to turn and see who was shouting. I new the smell of him and the Force told me everything that it needed to. He was a bounty hunter, a good one at that. He wore a blue and orange bounty hunter outfit and flight goggles over his eyes. A corny look but he was currently the most feared bounty hunter in the Outer Rim. He was… Calo Nord.
Calo Nord was a legend in the business of hunting. It would only take him thirty seconds to flush out a hive of Duros mercs with dual blasters and a thermal detonator. The new ECD models had been tested and bought by him on the black market, it was known. The ECD detonators could blind a man before incinerating them with a thousand individual bolts of electricity. One detonator would kill me and I wouldn't be able to defend nor recover after that. Yet, I had to do something.
"Hey, I'm talking to you." He was smiling, I could hear his smugness in his voice. A smugness similar to that of my last Coruscant target. "What brings you down here, Nord?" "So it's true. You are a Jedi, how-" I interrupted. "I am not a Jedi. I am much worse." "There's a bounty on your head Jedi." "I am not a Jed-" This time he interrupted. "The Republic are paying me to take your head. They want you alive but they'll be willing to make an exception." "Did they tell you I was a Jedi?"
He stopped, possibly to think. Through the Force I felt him, I saw him tilt his head. "No. I figured. I figured you'd gone rogue." "Then you figured wrong. I was never a Jedi scum. I am an Assassin trained in the Dark Side." Now I stopped. There was something wrong. Something in the Force had changed – the detonator. The Boma had activated a detonator.
I turned to him quickly and noticed a detonator hurtling towards me. With the Force I grasped it in mid air. Before throwing it back at Nord it exploded. The vision left my eyes and replaced itself with a wash of whiteness. I felt a few stray bolts of electricity course through me. I was thrown back but only realised when my spine hit the ground. The ground shook and I heard rocks shattering as the impacted on something. I assumed the roof of the tunnel had caved in. So as I stood and my vision blurred a launched a Force Repulse at the rockslide and cleared the access way. No doubt Calo Nord survived, but at least he wouldn't be coming back anytime soon.
Soon I reached the next Sith checkpoint.
"Halt! Who goes there!" shouted the next soldier. The man was surrounded by approximately eight ground and rooftop turrets. These were the Geonosian Models, they could tear a whole through a hull of a ship – though that was unlikely due to it's close range firing and it's lack of damage against ship shields.
"Sith Agent Atton Rand. My code sign is Alpha-Rancor-oh-four-Beta." The Sith looked down at his datapad. "I'm sorry, you can't be." I was stunned. "What?" "You're an imposter, we let you in just fifteen seconds ago."
A pretender had taken my place. "Who is this pretender?" "You!" "No, who was the person you saw?" "A Nautolan woman claiming to be a Sith came up ten minutes ago and returned with a vial so I let her down. That was about twenty to thirty seconds ago. Now, if you don't have the proper authorization papers please move along." Now I was angry.
I activated my lightsaber. The sound was ever so comforting. I spun the blade around violently and sliced his chest open from his left breast to his right hip. His right arm popped off with the slice and left a fountain of oozing blood to squirt out his socket. Blood never satisfied enough anymore. Now blood from an enemy was comforting but the addiction was now wasted.
The turrets in the vicinity all turned to me and after a few seconds opened fire. I rapidly spun my lightsaber vertically around the outside of my body and deflected all bolts back at the turrets. No damage was done to the turrets so I found no alternative but to slip into the elevator behind the bloody mess of a corpse at my feet. As I stepped in the doors closed and I was on my way.
Since the establishment of the Upper City on Taris no alien was allowed in the apartments above but were reduced to the deadly lower city apartments where about eighty percent of the populace resided. Another five percent reside in the under city where the land is overgrown and the people are refugees who live in camp sites. The area is populated with beggars and thieves, all considered part of a tribe. The Under city is also home to the plague known as the Rakghoul Plague – this was a disease that infected sentient beings with a virus that would slowly turn them into a carnivorous and cannibalistic wild monster known by the same name as it's disease, the Rakghoul. The plague had boxed the camp in to the elevator to Taris.
"Welcome. Do you have any food? Any credits?" Asked a woman at the entrance. I felt no sorrow or sympathy for her, instead only anger that she persisted in irritating me. I wanted her dead. However, if I started to murder these beings than the Nautolan would flee. I would find her and then kill these pathetics.
I pushed the girl over. Yes, she was a girl. Six in age.
I approached an older man. "Excuse me, have you seen a Nautolan anywhere around here?" I asked him. "Why yes, I am the Chief of the tribe here. Welcome, friend." "Thank you greatly for you hospitality. Is there anything I can do to help the situation here?" "Actually yes. There are a few stragglers lost in the savage lands under attack from Rakghouls, they may be dead, but they hold resources that we need to survive. You could donate. Of, and one of the tribal elders has some datapads referring to the PromisedLands but I- No, I apologize for putting you under this. Don't worry about it." "No, I'd like to help. I will." No I wouldn't. "In that case, feel free to ask around. Who was it you were looking for again, sorry?" "A Nautolan woman. She's an old friend." "Of course, Doctor Sheada's by the South Gate. She has stumbled upon a Rakghoul Cure and has brought it down. She's curing four of the citizens now." "Thank you."
A conversation that wasted time. I approached the South Gate. Inside where no hostiles but was an extremely small space that appeared no bigger than three holding cells. There I caught sight of a Nautolan injecting a woman. The third subject, two others sat against the back wall and a fourth stood beside the Jedi now.
"How do you feel?" she asked the subject being injected. "Nervous. Are you sure this cure will work?" "No." she said guiltily. "I am not sure, but no matter what happens you will be safe." The syringe was removed from the woman's elbow and the subject placed herself beside the other two.
"Doctor Shaeda?" I asked. She stopped and left her final subject, the second woman, waiting for her. "Not now," she began. "please not now." I growl was heard to the right of me to where the three were sitting. In front my eyes the first of the injected began to turn. His skin turned pale-green and spikes began to protrude from his spinal column. Teeth tore from his jaw and punctured his skin. He was no longer human. The beast turned to his right and ripped off the head of the second subject in his monstrous jaws. A fountain of satin fluids spouted from the second subject's neck. The woman screamed and ran towards Shaeda.
"No! This compound increases subject's susceptibility to the Rakghoul Virus!" With this the Jedi turned to me and activated her Lightsaber, an orange crystalled saber. I pulled it out of her grasp with the Force and dove back past the South Gate. I punched the console and the gate shut, locking her in. She tried to pull the gate open with the Force but I held it down. Behind her the other two women were murdered by the Rakghoul. One of the women even became one.
The Nautolan screamed and ear piercing yelp. The Rakghouls jumped her and she collapsed, a spray of blood splurted on the grass and the gate. The blood on the grass was the same color of her skin. Her skin had changed in coloration to a bright red. She became a shiny demonic Rakghoul. An abomination amongst abominations. The red Rakghoul dove over the metal fence and after killing two villagers leapt into the savage lands leaving the two green Rakghouls behind the fence. Again I hit the console and gas poured behind the fence and extinguished the Rakghouls. They collapsed and bubbled away until they were no more than a puddle of goop. And now there was no more Rakghoul poison left. If anymore of the beasties attacked the tribe it would be unlikely that the people would be able to defend themselves.
I continued to walk away, and in slow motion too. Behind me a Rakghoul hit an ion canister (I recognized the sound) and the whole thing lit up like a Geonosian Spitter's Gloop. As the fires and explosions burnt half of the camp to the ground I couldn't help but feel how badass I was. This feeling of happiness and amusement was simple… yet very familiar. It was a feeling I had felt before but must have repressed. It would be another part of me I would have to rid myself of. Memories can be dangerous. Memories can be a weakness.
Sleheyron's Bishop awaited me by the docks of the Sith Base. The Sith officer I had previously choked welcomed me. However, I was in no mood to comply. I was intrigued – this memory. Where had it come from? It would have to be ridded of, but only by time. I mustn't let it get to me, I remember telling myself, it will no doubt lead to my downfall. Back on topic, the mission was a success. I had killed the first of the two targets and the second I had turned into a beast and one of which would haunt the dreams of Tarisians for years. I had created a legend.
Post debrief I returned to Malachor V where I was greeted by my old friend Khar. He was enthused by the accomplishment of his mission. He had only recently blown up an oil refinery on Voss and tracked the Jedi who escaped the facility all the way to Ord Mantell where he was brutally cut down outside a Republic Fort. My friend, Khar, was my most loyal of companions in the years to come.
Over the coming months I would assassinate 41 more targets.
My next target was on the dusty planet of Muunilist. I had led a platoon of Sith Soldiers and my own Astromech Droid to the frontlines of battle. We had marched for days, the Anti-Aircraft Turrets protected the city of Davesh. I ended up having to sacrifice my men to charge down the sights of the heavy repeater laser turrets guarding the city's bombshelter. My men died while my droid, X8-10, and I navigated the city's shops to look for an exit that led to the bunker. We succeeded and the Utapaun Jedi Master was killed.
My next after the Utapaun was a Twi'lek/Human hybrid that went under the title Jedi Master, Jedi Master Nolan For the. He was a trader, he, an old Dark Jedi turned traitor and began trading Sith holocrons and crystals over to the Republic. So I killed him.