Silence surrounded Vette as she finally regained consciousness. It was warm, calm and she felt weightless. She slowly opened her eyes and saw that Quinn stood right in front of her. She reached out and was shortly confused that an invisible barrier blocked her hand, but only a moment later Vette realised that she was in a kolto tank. Quinn pushed a few buttons and the liquid kolto was drained from the tank. A few minutes later she stepped out of the tank and removed the respirator.

"How are you feeling?" Quinn asked and handed her a towel to dry herself from the oily kolto.

Vette ignored the offered towel and hugged Quinn, getting his uniform soaked in kolto. "I feel good actually!"

"Vette! My uniform is stained!" he protested.

Vette gave him a quick peck on the mouth and took the towel. She started to rub herself dry and laughed. "You are so adorable when you are indignant!"

"Well… That is hardly the effect I strife for," Quinn retorted.

"And that is why it is adorable! So, what happened? I guess that Badesh defeated Jadus?"

ooOOoo

Korriban was as unhospitable as always. Vette didn't like the constant raining on Dromund Kaas, but it still beat the barren planet which hosted the Sith Academy. She and Quinn followed Badesh to the main building of the Academy through a valley. Acolytes bowed to Badesh as soon as they saw him and stared at Vette with unveiled disgust. She steeled herself against the scrutiny and tried to look as impassive as Quinn who didn't even bat an eye as they passed a dead body lying on the roadside ditch. Vette shuddered and thought back to Kaon – Badesh had sent a force-sensitive nautolan girl to Korriban so that she could be trained in the ways of the dark side.

She accelerated her pace until she walked beside Badesh. "Is there a possibility to check upon Zinna?" she asked quietly.

"Who is Zinna?" Badesh briefly glanced in her direction.

"The girl from Kaon…"

"I didn't know her name," he answered. "And I won't inquire about a mere acolyte – either she will be among the candidates for the apprenticeship or…" Badesh didn't finish the sentence and a few moments they entered the Academy.

An overseer greeted Badesh and led him into the training halls. About twenty acolytes were fighting each other with vibro-blades. A few of them were already bleeding. Vette scanned the room for Zinna and finally saw her in the farthest corner of the room. And for a short moment Zinna and she made eye-contact before Zinna averted her gaze. Vette felt uneasy and wanted to talk to her; perhaps the opportunity would arise after Badesh's address.

"Listen up, scum! Darth Tenebra is looking for an apprentice!" yelled the overseer. The Acolytes turned their attention to Badesh. Vette registered that only a few aliens were among the trainees; most of them were humans or pure-blooded Sith.

Badesh let his gaze wander before he announced the crowd: "In a year from now only a third of you will still be alive – I will choose my apprentice then. Know that I won't reward laziness or weakness and that I will kill everyone who tries to deceive me about their achievements! Dismissed!"

Badesh turned on his heel and left the room. Quinn followed him suit while Vette fell behind so that she could talk to Zinna. The Acolytes passed her on their way out, some of them stared at her with a dismissive grin, but nobody dared to make gamy comments. Finally Zinna had reached her; she was wearing tattered robes and was bleeding from a small cut above her right eye.

"Vette… I didn't believe that I would see you guys again…" began Zinna, she seemed very calm, but her voice betrayed her desperation. "Life here is horrible… these things we are forced to do… is there any chance that you could get me out of here?"

"I'm sorry, Zinna – Badesh refuses to act and I can't do anything about it," she admitted and felt a bang of guilt.

"Move it, scum!" shouted the overseer and Zinna quickly left the room before Vette could say any more.

Vette exited the room as well and saw that Badesh was standing near the main gate and talked to a Sith, judging from his robes he was at least a Lord. She approached them and caught only the last bit of the conversation.

"… as well. I'm sure that we will come to an agreement."

"That remains to be seen, Lord Arkous," replied Badesh coldly.

Arkous bowed and Badesh strode out of the academy, Quinn and Vette followed him.

ooOOoo

Vette groaned at threw the data pad on the table. "At this rate it will take ages to check upon all these guys! Argh! I need another cup of coffee or I won't make it through the next report!"

Quinn's right eyebrow rose and without saying anything he went to the replicator and filled up Vette's mug. He returned to her and handed it to her.

In this moment Badesh walked into the conference room and sat down on the head of the table.

"The members of the Dark Council are secretive as always – even Sith Intelligence isn't able to track their every movement. I'm afraid that reports won't help us to determine their loyalties," Badesh said.

"So, everyone acting all sith-y – perhaps we should ask who is trying to blend in a little bit too much?" replied Vette and took a sip of her coffee.

"My Lord, Vette is perhaps onto something. Lord Arkous is in the sphere of military offense and just a few hours ago he went through the trouble to greet you in the most civil way…" began Quinn.

"…and he even proposed to pool resources to destroy the SIS in a joint operation. In his files is nothing suspicious – he received several commendations and completed every mission in a very satisfactory fashion."

"My Lord, should we place Lord Arkous under surveillance?"

Badesh simply nodded and Quinn left immediately to arrange everything necessary. Badesh glanced at her and left as well. Vette rubbed her temples and continued to read intelligence reports about the Officers in Imperial High Command. Mostly there were only boring account on the daily routine of some Moffs, but the next she took in her hand awakened her interest: It was the file about Grand Moff Rycus Kilran.

Vette had met Kilran on a few occasions and she got the impression that a man like him was too proud and too… imperial to even think about joining some secret cult. No, it wasn't the prospect of finding suspicious actions that made her curious, it was the prospect of learning how he got his burn scars on his face. Vette skimmed through the file until she found the information she was seeking: A few years back a group of Jedis broke into an imperial prison on the outer rim of the known universe – some top-secret facility which was holding members of the infamous Havoc Squad as well as Jedi and traitorous Sith. Kilran tried in vain to stop them from releasing a Jedi prisoner named Narma and was injured by one of the Jedi and almost burned to death before he was saved by… a rodian slave! Was this the reason why he was supporting Darth Malgus' course to let aliens join the imperial navy?

Before she could ponder further on the subject Quinn returned and briefly brushed her arm as he walked by. It was the utmost he would do while on duty. Vette looked at him and smiled. He kept his upper stiff lip and simply sat down next to her and began to read. It was sometimes hard to believe that she had really fallen in love with someone as… rigid and up-tight as Quinn. But since the first day she had felt a warm coil in her stomach every time she looked at him. Vette leaned toward him and kissed Quinn on his cheek, he looked at her with an almost bewildered expression on his face. Then he smiled at her and turned his attention back to his report.

ooOOoo

In the following weeks and months routine began to set in – Vette and Quinn would read all surveillance reports concerning Imperial High Command and brief Badesh on any suspicious activity. Although they uncovered several cases of bribery and embezzlement there were no news about the Revanites.

Badesh grew more and more restless. Vette had noted that he had started to participate in interrogations and the way he appeared calmer after he returned to them led her to believe that he was acting out his blood-lust by torturing and killing prisoners. Despite his kindness towards her and Quinn she sometimes felt scared – she considered Badesh her friend but she simply couldn't understand his violent outbursts.

After what felt like a particularly long day in office Vette had taken a long shower and was on her way to her room in Badesh's penthouse in Kaas City. When she walked towards the staircase she heard the hissing of the door. Badesh entered and walked towards her, she stopped and simply stared at him: his robes were bloodied and there was a strange smell coming from him – it reminded her of chloride. He also stopped and looked at her a while before he reached up put his hood down and removed his mask. Vette was taken aback by the harrowing look on his face – usually he displayed nothing of this sort.

"Are… are you alright?" she asked.

"I don't know," he replied with a raspy voice.

"Well… what happened?"

"There was this prisoner – a suspect – and I interrogated him to discern whether he was a defeatist. It seems that he had made fun of the Emperor in a cantina… and I broke him." Badesh sat down on a step of the staircase. "Killing is usually very gratifying; sometimes my skin… it is too tight… I feel like I have to rip it from by bones. Seeing blood is calming me down. But today…"

Vette didn't know what to say; Badesh was blood-thirsty and he had mentioned on several occasions that he enjoyed killing and maiming people… but the bluntness of his words left her speechless.

"What am I going to do if even this doesn't help anymore?" he asked and buried his face in his hands.

Vette remembered something Badesh had said once when they were in the cantina on the Imperial Fleet: There were only two occasions in which he was calm; after he had killed and in the company of her and Quinn. She had to reach out to him… She knotted her hands together, unsure whether it was the right thing to do. Finally she overcame her hesitation and stepped towards Badesh who still sat on the step and put her hands on his cheek and guided him down until his face rested on her shoulder and stroked over his black hair. He let it happen and finally put his arms around her.

They remained still for almost a minute before Badesh pulled back and looked at her with a solemn expression on his face.

"Vette, I know… it's not easy for you…"

"Anytime, Quinn and I are your friends, you know that, don't you?" Vette registered that her white bath robe had now small blood-stains from Badesh on it, but she tried her best to ignore them.

"Does Quinn… do you think…" stammered Badesh and averted his gaze, unable to finish the sentence.

She knew what Badesh wanted to ask. Vette had witnessed how he had kissed Quinn after a quite excessive victory celebration on the Fury. Quinn had been out cold, and only then the Sith had found the courage to act on his feelings.

"I'm certain that he likes you, Badesh…"

He stood up and smiled sadly at her. "Then I will take your word for it…" Badesh turned around and climbed the stairs to the upper level.

Vette threw a glance at him as he vanished out of her sight and asked herself what exactly Quinn's feelings towards Badesh were. He certainly had the utmost respect for Badesh, but did he really like him like she did? She walked up the stairs and headed towards Quinn's quarters. Without knocking she entered and let herself fall on his bed. Quinn sat at his desk as usual and wrote a report. He typed for about a minute, put down the data pad and joined Vette on the bed, he groaned as he lay down.

"Sergeant, as your superior I order you to massage my shoulders," Quinn mumbled and turned on his stomach.

"Anything for the Empire, sir" Vette replied and started to rub his tense muscles. "Sometimes I wonder, how did you survive without my tender care?"

"Kolto oil," answered Quinn muffled as he was lying face down on the bed.

"Uh, that sound nice – tell me more! So you rubbed your lean-muscled, naked body with oil, did you? Now that is a picture to dream of…"

Quinn chuckled. "You're so weird, Vette."

"Speaking of weird… do you like Badesh?" she asked boldly.

"That is a strange question," he replied and looked over his shoulder at her.

"Uh… just answer the question."

"Yes, I do – I respect and admire him greatly as…"

"No no, do you like him on a personal level?"

Quinn frowned at her and sat up. "I… I think it is unprofessional to consider our relationship as anything more than…"

"Gee, you're evading again – just tell me whether you consider him a friend!"

"Yes, I do."

"There! Was it so difficult?"

"I thought you were asking if I found him attractive on a sexual level," Quinn retorted smoothly without batting an eye.

Now it was Vette's turn to stare at him. Did she just hear what she thought she heard? "What? No… I mean – do you find him attractive?"

He blushed and averted his gaze. "Yes, I do – don't you?"

"Hm… well, yes," Vette stammered, she was quite sure that her face reddened as well. "That is easily the most awkward conversation we ever had…"

"Indeed." Quinn lay down on the bed again and Vette continued to massage him.