Starchaser

Okay, sorry about the delay. I couldn't get logged on yesterday because it was all acting funny. Well here it is. I am on chapter 4 at the moment and I hope to get it finished soon. Then I'll be posting it here. Hope your all enjoying the story so far!


Chapter 1

Ryqik woke up early. Something seemed to compel him to move, to get out. He slipped out of bed and dressed quickly, taking no notice of the fact the clothes were rather dirty. He padded out of his room and along the short corridor to where his sister slept. He knocked softly on the door and got no response. He opened it, the door creaking softly on its decades old hinges. He peered inside. Nakita was curled up and resembled a furry cushion. He crept inside and clamped his hand paw over her mouth and nose. She whimpered softly and sharp pain shot through his fingers as needle sharp teeth nipped him. He drew his hand back in surprise, like a someone touching a pan that was too hot to be handled and let out a yip of pain.

"Kita!"

Nakita's orange yellow eyes flicked open. Ryqik clamped his uninjured hand over her muzzle and gestured her to be quiet. He removed his hand and she whispered "What is it?"
"We have to get out of here. Hurry, get dressed."

Nakita took a little more time over choosing something to ware than her brother had. Ryqik stepped over to the window and opened it. He clambered up on to the window sill and jumped down out the other side, landing with a thud on the ferrocreate. A few moments later, he heard the scrabble of claws as Nakita followed suit. He caught her smaller body as she jumped down and with his arm still wrapped about her waist, he led her to hiding behind a pile of rubble just as a repulsor lift truck showed up. He felt her tremble in fear against him as a squad of Stormtroopers began piling out. A large Shistavanen male followed the Stormtroopers out of the vehicle and looked over in the direction of their hiding place. He sniffed the air a couple of times, detecting no scent and turned back to the Stormtrooper squad. She struggled against him.

"Mother and father are still inside!"

It took all his strength to keep her from running back into the building.

"We can't do anything, Kita."

He clung to her protectively and sensing he was right, Nakita sank back into him, still trembling in fear, hoping their parents would find away out as the Stormtroopers filed inside. She felt like screaming as she heard blaster shots fired inside, but didn't, knowing that if she uttered a sound now that they would be dead too.

***

The servomotor of Kopek's mechanical arm whirred as he dropped his hand to his hip and drew his broadsword. He marched through the lounge ahead of his Stormtrooper squad and came up on Nykit standing in the doorway. He heard the soft padding of a running female heading down the corridor.

"There is no where for you to hide, traitor."

Nykit made no reply as he swung his sword at Kopek. The Shistavanen warrior blocked it, steel clanging on steel as the sword blades met. Kopek's face creased in a snarl, his teeth glinting in the low lit corridor. A low growl escaped Nykit's lips as he drew back his heavy blade and crossed swords with him again. A Stormtrooper tried to attack Nykit, only to have the Shistavanen bring the hilt of his sword smashing down on the helmet, shattering the man's skull. Kopek roared at the Stormtroopers to pursue Nykit's mate.

"This one is mine!"

The two Shistavanens circled each other like a pair of strutting wild animals. This time Kopek chose to take the offensive, charging forward, pressing his opponent up against the wall of the corridor. Nykit brought his blade up to intercept the stoke. They broke apart almost immediately only to make contact again, testing the other's strength against their own. Saliva dribbled from Nykit's mouth as he stared into the eyes of Kopek. He saw nothing but cruelty there and a desire to kill that would sicken even a predator. Somewhere in the maze of corridors there was the sound of shots being fired.

***

Lyet searched Ryqik's bedroom desperately. She flung open the door to his wardrobe, used the Force to levitate the bed. Nothing. Ryqik was no where to be found. If she had just stopped one moment to think, to calm herself, then she would have found both her children and got away, but her panic made her thoughts irrational and erratic. She forgot the Jedi calming techniques her brother Flik had taught her.

She was still searching the room when the first of the Stormtroopers appeared at the door way. She dropped to the ground and rolled to avoid the first shot before coming lighting to her feet and activating her silver blade. It hummed and cracked as she swung it effectively through the air to block the next blaster shot and sent it ricocheting back at the trooper who had fired it.

She moved forward on nimble feet, defecting the next shot fired at her before cutting through her next assailant. The corridor was clear of enemies now and she stepped over the two bodies. Perhaps Ryqik had gone to Nakita's room and perhaps that was where she would find them both.
She encountered another pair of Stormtroopers on her way to her daughter's room, cutting them down without thought or feeling, her only concern getting to her children and protecting them from harm.

***

Nykit drew first blood, slashing Kopek across the chest with his blade. Kopek howled in pain and anger, swinging his sword with such force that it shattered both swords on impact. Kopek kicked with all his power at Nykit's midsection, knocking him to the ground. Before he could recover, Kopek drew his blaster set on full power and fired at point blank range a couple of times.

Fire washed over Nykit and he struggled to hold on to life. He tried drawing in a deep breath but his lungs wouldn't respond. He gargled as blood poured into his throat and dripped out of his mouth.

Kopek shot him once more for good measure, just to make sure that he was in fact, indeed, dead.

Joy flooded Kopek's bitter and twisted soul, though he would have loved to make his victim suffer a slow and painful death. He laughed hysterically as he went off in search of Nykit';s mate.

***

Lyet howled in anguish when she discovered the absence of her children. Then she spotted the open window and the scent of her little ones leading up to it. Pain ripped through her mind as she felt her mate die. She lowered her head and closed her eyes to shut out the pain. Just as she made her mind up to leave, she felt fire sting her back.

She turned, anger making her strong. She lifted one Stormtrooper up off the floor with the Force and flung him with all her hatred against the wall.

Her pups were gone and her mate was dead and all because of these. She had nothing left now accept her desire for vengeance.

She cut down the last of the Stormtroopers just as pain and grief over came her. Her knees lost all their power to hold her on her feet and she collapsed to the floor. She was not aware when Kopek entered the room behind her. He padded up behind her softly before seizing the scruff of her neck with his mechanical hand. His artifice fingers pinched the back of her neck. He tilted her head up as he drew his vibroblade, stabbing it into her neck. Lyet died instantly, her body disappeared before his eyes, leaving only a pile of clothes.

Mission accomplished.

***

Kopek sank down into the nerf hide covered pilot's seat of his ship, the Bloodied Scimitar. He tore off the patch that covered his left eye and poked the holo cam replacement with the index finger of his flesh hand. He had lost the eye in a fight as a child, when he was training to be an Archetype, a caste of elite warriors and hunters whose soul purpose was to protect the Senator for Uvena III. It was Nykit who had been responsible. Part of him was satisfied that he had finally gotten his revenge for making him a freak. At the same time, it was also discovered that he had an allergy to bacta when doctors used it to treat him. Kopek had almost died.

The Senator during the Clone Wars "betrayed" her people and lost the loyalty of her protectors, or at least most of them anyway. Nykit had been one who had stuck by her and for that he deserved death. After much searching, Kopek had found his hideout.

His arm he had seriously in a fight with Flik Sivrak, another of the so called traitors. Because of his allergy to bacta, he couldn't get it treated and had to have the thing amputated and replaced with a mechanical one.

In many ways, his enhancements made him more powerful. His mechanical eye allowed him to see in light wavelengths that he wouldn't see with his real eye and his mechanical arm was twenty times more powerful than his flesh one. On the other hand, they also made him a freak, an oddity. This made social situations difficult for him as very few Shistavanens had mechanical enhancements. As for females, they tended to shy away from him. Not even his status as an Archetype gave him any advantages there.

His only purpose was to hunt the enemies of his brother, Za. He was bitter and violent, cruel and merciless. Not because he had set out to be like that, but because others treated him as inferior, as useless because of his affliction. They inflicted pain on him and he liked inflicting pain on others. It was the only thing that gave him any real satisfaction. When the world was bitter and brutal to you, isn’t it only fair that you return those feelings by being brutal back?

***

It was a long time before Ryqik found the courage to emerge from the rubble and re-enter the building. Nakita had cried herself to sleep and he left her there. He didn't want her to see what had happened to their parents and he had to check to see if they were still alive. He peered cautiously inside the hall way. The scent of ozone, blood and death was strong and he swallowed his fear. He had to know. The lounge looked like a proton torpedo had hit it, broken furniture and other objects scattered everywhere. At least one thing was intact. A hologram of their family. He picked it up and wiped the grime and dust off it before pocketing it.

He found the blackened body of his father in the doorway to his parents' bedroom, his shattered broadsword, ineffective against Stromtrooper armour in his hand. But still, he had fought bravely, giving Ryqik's mother time to check on her children, to try get them to safety. He passed the body, the sight and smell of it making him feel sick. He caught his mother's scent and found it led to Nakita's room.

He discovered five dead Stormtroopers and a pile of clothes belong to his mother, but no body. Beside the pile of clothes, he found a chrome cylinder. He picked it up in his hand and depressed the button on the side and a silver shaft of light sprung from one end, passing through the remains of Nakita's bed.

He had heard enough legends of the Jedi to know what it was, but a part of him didn't want to believe it. His mother a Jedi? No way!

He depressed the button again and the shaft disappeared. He had to get back to Nakita. He didn't want her to wake up scared and alone, thinking she'd lost him too. He did a quick search of the house and other than finding some crusty, nasty tasting survival rations and a warm blanket, he found nothing useful.

He throw up the contents of his stomach when he left the building, sinking down with his back pressed up against the wall while he recovered his faculties. He spat out the foul taste of bile, glad that Nakita hadn't seen what he had.

Nakita woke when he re-entered their hiding place and they ate a survival ration each before curling up to sleep together under the blanket, body heat and the scent of their bodies keeping them warm and giving them comfort on their first night alone in the galaxy.

***

Night had fallen over the city of Terhan, the capital of Uvena III. Terhan was composed of three main sectors. The government buildings, such as the palace and the Archetype Council building. These were raised above the rest of the city like some ancient sleeping monster. Once the symbol of freedom and justice for the inhabitants of Uvena III. Now, it was the heart of a corrupt and evil regime that had Uvena III in its grip. The greed and darkness of Palpatine had stretched far in the galaxy and like trees striped of leaves in winter months did hope barely cling to life.

In the centre of the government plaza, was a giant statue of Palpatine standing twelve metres high. Once, a statue of the Senator Mizet had stood in its place, next to a statue of the Jedi Master Raqak. But after their betrayal of Palpatine's new order, the statues had been torn down and replaced by the one of Palpatine.

Most of the Archetypes lived in the palace, in the lower levels of its megalithic structure, but Kopek lived apart, on the border between the government sector and the trade sector. Most of the trade sector was run down now, the result of heavy taxation and the abolition of ship building on Uvena III, imposed as a way of subduing the Shistavanen opposition to the Empire. Some lucky individuals had gotten contracts for space exploration, searching for rebel settlements but after a few scouts had defected to the rebels, that activity was outlawed and even those who had gotten off the planet were out of employment.

The largest sector consisted of housing for the civilians and weapons factories for the Empire.
As Kopek left the A.C.B, he was torn between heading for home or to one of the small cantinas in the civilian sector. The cantinas seemed to be the only places that did well in the city. Everyone needed to forget their problems and the best way to do that was to drown themselves in alcohol. Kopek had to agree with them as he decided on the latter.

After spending the best part of twelve hours being interrogated by the Senior Archetypes and getting ridiculed for loosing his whole Stromtrooper contingent by the Aide of the Imperial overseer, Kopek needed to wind down.

Get into a couple of brawls, maybe and if he was really lucky, find a female to spend sometime with. He walked to the cantina, making his way through the winding streets, thinking. He liked walking the streets at night. There were so few to stare at his mechanical arm. That was what people usually saw when they met him. They didn't see him as a warrior, only as a freak with machine for a limb.

He entered his usual hunting ground, a cantina run by a human called the Drunken Ronto. Silly name, really, but he didn't go there for that. He liked the live band, when they had one and the Lomin ale was excellent and inexpensive. The other reason he liked the place was because it was frequented by bounty hunters, smugglers, mercenaries and the like. There was always something to keep him amused. Then there were the occasional rebel, whom he just loved to dispatch, because they were there. Rebels.

With his mechanical eye, he didn't need to stand at the top of the stairs for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. Smoke from several intoxicants made grey trails in the air. On the far wall, a holoscreen played a tacky drama from twenty years ago. No one was paying it much attention. Tacky holodrama aside, there was one other reason he liked to visit the Drunken Ronto.
Then there was her. That golden furred Shistavanen wolfwoman. The authorities wanted her dead or captured because she was a smuggler and a suspected rebel sympathiser.

He wondered if she was there now as he wondered over to the bar. Most of the patrons moved to get out of his way. When he got to the bar and waited for his drink, he noticed the golden furred Shistavanen sat at a table in the corner talking with a known rebel.

As an Archetype, he was familiar with rebel suspects.

He sipped his drink slowly, glancing every so often through the corner of his eye, to make sure she was still there.

***

Cyhen recognised Kopek as soon as he'd walked in. The mechanical arm and the fake eye gave him away. She didn't know him by name but by the fact that he had shown an interest in her previously and Cyhen suspicions were only heightened when he got to the bar and looked in her direction.

"I think we shall have to leave this for another time," she said to her companion.
The human nodded his agreement.
";I'll contact you by the usual means," Cyhen told him as she stood up and left. Cyhen knew him only as Darkmoon, which was obviously a code name.

She stayed after her companion left, not wanting to appear paranoid and studied the cyborg in more detail. There was something about him that she found compelling, attractive even, but she sensed a brutal-ness about him. Not that she was a Jedi or Force sensitive in any way. She'd just had enough experience to recognise a psycho when she saw one.

She took note of the behaviour of the crowd about him. Humans and other species gave him a wide berth, unless they themselves were large and powerful and felt like they could take him on in a fight. Other Shistavanens avoided him too, not because they were afraid of him like the others, but because of his differences, notably, his prosthetic arm. Most people aren't bad to begin with. Most have it forced upon them by their circumstances or because of being hurt in the past. Some rise above it, some don't and others have never known any different and so don't change.

Cyhen had no love for the Empire. During her childhood, her parents had been massacred by the Clone Army during the Clone Wars. Her "Uncle" an aging Archetype who had retired and who had trained her father, had raised her. When she was about fourteen, she returned home to find her uncle murdered and her home in ruins. She'd buried his body and planted a sapling on his grave that while in life, he had grown from seeds gathered in the forest. She'd constructed a barrier around the grave to stop wild animals from damaging the sapling and left the ruins behind.

After a year doing what ever work she could to survive, she joined up with some mercenaries, learning the art of fighting and survival. When she turned sixteen, she became the lover of their leader, a male Shistavanen called Byak. The group disbanded after one of their members betrayed them to a rival band. Byak had been killed and she inherited Byak's ship, the Starchaser.
Cyhen finished her reminiscing of the past and finished her drink. She decided to leave then and draped the shapeless cloak over her head and shoulders as she left her seat.

***

From his place at the bar, Kopek noticed her leave and a dark figure follow her. This tugged at his curiosity and he rose from his stool to follow her, leaving his drink half finished. He kept a distance of ten metres between them.

Outside, the stars had been obscured by clouds and a light drizzle was falling from the sky, wetting the wiry guard hairs of his dark grey pelt. His mechanical eye picked up the small indents in the grit covered road left by the sharp claws of their feet. There were two distinct sets. A small set, obviously the golden furred female’s and a larger set which indicated a male slightly smaller than himself. He sniffed the air and recognised the scent of one of the Archetypes. It was weak, the scent obscured by the drizzle and the invisible trail of pheromones left by the female.

It was Jahen, a young arrogant male whom Kopek couldn't stand at all. He smiled to himself as his hand moved to the disrupter holstered on his hip. Then he changed his mind and opted for his vibroblade. He couldn't risk hitting the golden furred female by accident.

He could find a use for her, perhaps even-

No, she'd never go with him.

He forced himself to focus on the task at hand.

***

Cyhen knew from the moment she stepped out of the cantina and into the night drizzle that she was being followed. The cloak protected her from the rain and she was glad of having the hind sight to bring it out with her. Mostly it was to disguise her unusual fur colour. Golden fur was not common among her species. It was mostly dark brown, black, dark grey or a combination of the colours. A pelt of only white fur was also uncommon except in the regions close to the poles. Albinos were almost unheard of.

There were few walking the streets at this hour and the closeness of the buildings made her feel uneasy, like prey that knew it was being hunted and had no way of knowing from where the predator might strike.

She didn't head for the shoddy flat that over looked the spaceport where her beautiful Starchaser was docked. To go there would be like inviting a krayt dragon home. She didn't want to be out of control of the situation and decided to choose the strike herself.

Her hand dropped to the blaster at her hip and she turned suddenly to fend off her pursuer. The large male reacted before she could fire, kicking the blaster from her hand with practised ease before knocking her forcefully to the ground.

Cyhen held her hand in pain as she watched death approach her. The large male hefted his broadsword and Cyhen closed her eyes, waiting for the blow to take her life, but it didn't come. She opened her eyes and her attacker lay dead to one side, killed by a vibroblade hurled at the base of the skull.

Standing over her was the male with the prosthetic arm and eye. The rain had begun to fall heavier now and fell in large, heavy drops that not even the cloak could protect her from. He held out his flesh paw to her and helped her to her feet.

"Thank you," she murmured as their eyes met. She looked away nervously.

"No problem" he knelt down in the rain to retrieve his vibroblade and then turned his disrupter on the body to destroy all evidence of his death.

"We'd better get out of this rain. My flat isn't far from here," Cyhen said.

The only evidence that anyone had actually been killed there was the blood that was washed away by the rain.

***

There wasn't much in Cyhen's flat accept things that made it liveable. She was away a lot and found little time to accumulate things that she didn't need for survival. In fact, her ship the Starchaser was more comfortable, but at least the ceiling didn't leak when it rained, like it was doing now.

The pokey kitchen opened out into the lounge area that consisted of a chair, a holovid and a table. The only other rooms were a bedroom and a bathroom. Cyhen had moved in shortly after Byak had been killed.

From the floor where he sat, Kopek watched Cyhen who had changed into a tight fitting purple top and trousers make a warm drink to chase away the chills brought on by the rain. Kopek was draped in a blanket while his clothes dried on a radiator. Cyhen returned from the kitchen with a pair of steaming mugs of hot chocolate in her hands as the wind bashed droplets of rain so hard against the window that Kopek thought they would shatter. She passed one to Kopek who took it from her with his flesh hand.

Cyhen set hers down on the table as she sat opposite him.

"It looks like the rain will be here for the night. You can stay here, if you wish."

Kopek nodded. Part of him wanted to go, but he forced himself to stay. He'd had enough of running away from things that might make him happy. Perhaps this was going to be a good night after all.

"Why did you save me?" Cyhen blurted out suddenly.

Kopek considered his answer. The most obvious and truthful one that came to his mind was that he found her attractive and wanted to spend the night with her, but that wouldn't do. So he told her the first of his half truths.

"I couldn't let Jahen kill you. He was intruding in my sector and I couldn't allow that."

Cyhen looked at him confused. "I don't understand-"

"I'm an Archetype. So was he."

Cyhen nodded her understanding. "That's why you destroyed the body, correct?"

"Yes"

Cyhen regarded him sceptically for a moment. "I thought you was a bounty hunter," she said, trying to trap him. She'd been hunted by bounty hunters before and from what her uncle told her, Archetypes just didn't go round killing each other, but then that was before the Empire!

Kopek creased his lips up to reveal his long canines in amusement. "In a way, we are."

Cyhen still didn't know what to make of him, but he had saved her life. Cyhen leaned forward and deliberately ran her hand over his mechanical arm. It was cold to the touch. Kopek stared into her eyes. His prosthetics didn't repulse her.

Cyhen suddenly felt tired and she finished the rest of her drink.

"Sure you'll be alright out here tonight?" Cyhen asked him. She still felt shaken over the attack and felt she could do with the company of someone.
"I'll be fine, Cyhen," Kopek said, cursing himself for his own stupidity.
"You know where I am if you change your mind."

***

Cyhen lay awake for almost an hour waiting for Kopek to appear in the doorway. The sound of him snoring, a load rumbling sound mixed with the occasional growl reached her ears through the thin door. She sighed and turned over on to her side before finally dropping off to sleep alone.
 
Chapter 2

A growling stomach woke Nakita from her sleep. For a moment she wondered where she was and then remembered all the events that had occurred the day before. The fear, the loss of her parents. Part of her didn't want to believe it, part of her couldn't believe it. The ground was hard and her back was stiff.

She got up to stretch, her movement waking up Ryqik. He rolled on to his back and sat up before heaving himself up from the cold ground.

"What do we do now?" Nakita asked.

"I don't know, Kita. Find food I guess."

He took hold of Nakita's hand and they wondered out into the streets. It soon became clear that without money they wouldn't get anything to eat and short of getting lucky and finding a lost wallet, they wouldn't get any money. Most people just ignored them, seeing that they weren't worth bothering about because they didn't have anything. Store owners shoed them away from their establishments because they didn't trust street urchins. No one gave them a sympathetic glance. They had no time for them, or just didn't care and in a place like Nar Shaddaa being unnoticed was probably the best strategy for survival, because if you did call attention to yourself, that usually resulted in getting your brains splattered. They wittiness one such unlucky thief fall foul of that.

By midday, neither of them could stand the hunger anymore and they perched on a ruined wall, watching, waiting, looking for a chance. One street vender selling fried dewback ribs was getting a lot of business. The problem was that the owner was a Gotal. But with all the sentients around, then surely one of them could get close enough to sneak something away without being noticed.

A plan was already forming in Ryqik's mind and he quietly communicated it to Nakita. Nakita left the wall and pushed her way through the press of pedestrians until she was close to the stand. Ryqik went to the opposite end of the stand and accidentally on purpose bumped into a vat of cooking oil, spilling it all over a nearby Aqualish. The enraged Aqualish took a swing at him with his fist, which the lithe twelve year old Shistavanen was quick enough to dodge. The Aqualish's pouch connected with a Trandoshan instead and a fight ensued.

In the following confusion, Nakita pilfered two portions of dewback ribs and slunk away before being noticed. They met up a couple of blocks away.

Ryqik grinned at her. "That was fun," he said. After a few minutes of searching, they found an abandoned apartment to eat in. The lower levels of Nar Shaddaa were honeycombed with old abandoned and forgotten hideaways that were the homes and refuges of street urchins. Ryqik found some old rags and blankets that he made into a comfortable seat and they settled down to eat their stolen meal. Yes, it had been fun but they both felt frightened and alone and both wished they could go home but knew it was impossible. Ryqik had not told her what he had found in their old home. He told her the bodies of their parents had been taken away. There was no need to upset her unduly.

After eating, Nakita went to sleep. Ryqik watched her breathing until he himself became tired and slept himself, wondering how they would get through tomorrow.

***

Za looked out of the window to the giant mountains in the north. He could look at them for hours, loosing himself in the rocky features. The tops were so high that they were constantly obscured by clouds. A deciduous forest grew at the base of the range and slowly turned into a conifers forest the higher up in altitude you went. In the winter, the deciduous line was barren and devoid of colour but the conifers line retained the green all year round. Then as it became too cold and dry for trees to grow, short stubby shrubs grew in cracks sheltered from the battering wind until even they couldn't find a foothold and the mountain became just bare rock and ice.

Part of Za's training had been to climb the mountain and to survive with no contact with the outside world for six months. Not all the trainees in his group had survived. Some fell victim to loose rocks and plummeted to their deaths, others starved from lack of food (if you didn't catch anything, then you didn't eat) and the cold was too much for some.

It had all been necessary to protect her, Mizet, the betrayer. Za himself had not escaped unscathed from the ordeal. His mate had been among those that had died. As he looked out at the mountains, he thought of her.

Soon, it would all be his. All he had to do now was eliminate Mizet's son and then dispose Rivik, the head of the council and then all of Uvena III would be his.

He turned from the window and took the private turbo lift down into the basement where he practiced his fighting techniques.

***

He wasn't surprised to find Azet meditating in the basement. Azet was his right hand, when he needed subtlety to meet his ends. Kopek was good for bullying, threatening and cracking heads but sometimes the best weapon he needed was information about what his enemies were up to and Azet was the best way of getting that information.

She had been a frightened sixteen year old when he'd found her, just after the fall of the Jedi Temple. She was just a padawan at the time, being hunted by Palpatine's minions to eradicate all traces of the Jedi. Za had saved her from all of that, seeing a way he could use her skills to his advantage. He'd given Kopek the task of finding forbidden Sith artefacts for her, so she could learn the ways of the Sith and get vengeance on those who had killed her friends.

From her Jedi training, she knew the fighting techniques of lightsabre combat. Za and Kopek had taught her the techniques of the Archetypes and Azet had blended the two together to form a style that was her own.

However, it takes more than skill with a lightsabre and hatred and anger to make a successful Sith or Dark Jedi. You needed patience and subtly, an ability to deceive and manipulate while at the same time appearing honourable and the champion of good causes on the outside.
That is what makes a Sith a dangerous foe.

Azet had been working to eliminate Za's rivals among the Archetypes. First, she searched for an indiscretion, such as a connection to smuggling, treason (working with rebels or plotting to dispose Palpatine to put themselves in power) anything dark or devious that would result in their down fall. Sometimes she didn't find anything and when that occurred, she'd fabricate something or trick them into doing something illegal.

So far, she'd never killed anyone directly. Most thought she was just Za's lover or something and they were right.

After several long minutes, Azet rose gracefully from her cross legged sitting posture and turned her intense yellow-eyed gaze up on him. She had jet black fur with silver tipped hairs on her face and hands. She was dressed in a tight top and short trousers that ended just below her knees, the way she always did when training.

She regarded Za and bared her teeth at him playfully before using the Force to float a steel sword into her hands. Without saying a word, Za drew his. They circled each other for a moment before clashing their blades together, Za relying on the power of his muscles to win the fight.

Azet fought with speed and manipulation, trying to lure Za into making a mistake that would cost him his life in a real fight situation. Za didn't fall for her deceptions easily. He had practiced with her, trained with her and knew most of her tricks by heart.

Azet became a little frustrated as Za counteracted every single one of them, she was becoming predictable, it seemed and she hated that. She also knew that to loose her temper completely would be her down fall, in that she would take a stupid risk in her frustration and end up loosing the fight. That was exactly what Za wanted her to do. Perhaps Za wouldn't have made a bad Sith, if he had been Force sensitive.

She continued being predictable for a while, deflecting Za's heavier blows, leading him into an over confidence that would be his undoing.

Za's face was a mask of single minded determination, not revealing the joy that he felt inside. He was winning, or so he thought.

He swung his sword at her, putting all his body and strength behind it, hoping to cast away or at least shatter the sword in her hand. Just before the swords connected, Azet stepped aside so that he would over balance and she gave him a little shove that sent him tumbling face first to the floor.

She stepped on to his hand that was holding the sword disarming him. He let out a groan of pain as the bones in his hand cracked but didn't brake. She straddled him and nicked the surface of his skin with the tip of her sword, just deep enough so that it would bleed, but not heavily.

"Do you yield, Za?" she whispered softly in his ear, half harshly and half seductively. She had him just where she wanted him. With the claw tips of her free hand, she tickled him behind his ears and they twitched in response to her touch.

"You win, this time, Azet," Za yipped playfully.

Azet bent her head and flicked her tongue out to taste Za' blood, growling softly. Azet used the Force to float the swords to the other side of the room, away form them. She slackened her hold on him and as she did so, Za suddenly pinned her to the floor. Force lightening crackled at the tips of Azet's fingers, an instinctive reaction to defend herself. She cut it off when she realised there was no threat, but not without giving Za a mild electric shook. She grinned at the pain that creased his face.

"Serves you right," she growled softly. She could feel his excitement mounting in his tense muscles and emotions as his muzzle came ever closer to hers. Za could feel the hurried beating of her pounding heart beneath him. Her eyes shone like twin suns set against the blackness of space as their fangs locked together. Za's comlink buzzed and he rose stiffly and angrily from the floor as he switched it on.

"This had better be important!" he barked into the receiver.

"Forgive me for disturbing you, but Governor Riyadah requests your presence immediately!" squeaked Laej, the greedy, overweight pile of blubber that consumed food like a Neimoidian accumulated credits who was the Governor Riyadah's aide. When he wasn't stuffing his face, ogling females that wouldn't touch him with a barge pole or ridiculing Archetypes for their "incompetence" he was scuttling around like a scared Womp rat. None of the Archetypes liked him and all would gladly blast his head off if the Governor didn't execute anyone for treason if they did.

Azet retrieved Za's sword using the Force and Za caught it in the air before sheathing it.

"I'm sorry Azet. I have to go."

Azet sighed as Za left and she headed for the quarters she shared with Za. After showering and changing into a silver gown, she entered the secret chamber that housed her Sith artefacts. Among them were ancient documents and a necklace set with a red lifestone that enhanced the Darkside's power.

At times like this, she wished she had another to train, to share the secrets of the Force with. She wondered for the hundredth time why she didn't have a child by now, to train, to be with when Za wasn't around. It wasn't for the lack of trying.

Her hand curled around the most important and rare artefact of all, the Sith holocron, before going back out into the bedroom.

Outside, she could see the statue of the Emperor and loathed it. It was he who made her be alone, he'd who'd destroyed her friends, her home, her reason for caring about anything. She cursed Za for saving her, she should be dead along with the rest of the Jedi. At least then, she would no longer know the pain of being alone, having to hide what you are, not showing others your true self and having to keep them away in case they found out what you were and betrayed you or worse, feared and reject you. Even Za only kept her around for what he could get out of her and the only reason she stayed was because he was her only chance of no longer being alone and her best chance of getting revenge on the one who made her feel this way.

The statue was a daily reminder of her pain and loneliness and she wanted to turn it to dust the way it had turned her life to dust, but she would get more satisfaction of killing the real Palpatine and taking away the thing that mattered most to him. His power.

She activated the holocron to learn the secrets of her foe, so that she could know how to defeat him.

***

Za was in a foul mood when he entered the office of Governor Riyadah and this turned blacker when he learnt that Rivik, the leader of the Archetype council, Nidet, the only female Archetype on the council and Captain Jed Darkfyre of the Imperial Star Destroyer, Dauntless were going to be at the meeting. Darkfyre complained about the loss of a regiment of his Stormtroopers during Kopek's raid on Nar Shaddaa. As Kopek was nowhere to be found, Darkfyre held Za personally responsible for the disaster. Za sat down and cut himself off from the Captain's tirade and thought pleasant thoughts about Azet.

***

A strange scent rose Ryqik from his sleep. He shook the fogginess from his head and woke Nakita. She yawned sleepily and sniffed the air.

"Company?" she said and Ryqik nodded.

Their eyes quickly adjusted to the low light levels and they were in the process of sneaking past the group of drunken street thugs when Nakita tripped up and sent containers clattering to the floor. The two Shistavanens looked at each other with trepidation and froze, hoping the darkness and the intoxicants would work to their advantage.

"What was that?"

Light from a glow rod was pointed in their direction and they tried to make themselves as invisible as possible.

"There's nothing there, you moron."

"I tell you I heard something-"

The two thugs argued back and forth and traded insults until their leader silenced them.

"There is something there. I can smell it."

The leader, a Cathor male inched forward, pushing his minions aside. His light sensitive eyes picked out the shapes of the two young Shistavanens.

He let out a laugh, a spitting, mewing sound. "Well, well, look what we have here. A pair of lost puppies."

Ryqik placed himself protectively between his sister and the gang of thugs advancing on them. He realised too late that the abandoned hideout belonged to the street thugs. In the darkness, he saw the flash of light from one of the few remaining street lamps reflecting off a vibroblade as it was drawn and heard the soft, pulsating thrum of its activation. He could smell Nakita's fear and he feared more for her than for himself. He didn' want to loose her. She was his world.

"You know what happens to stray puppies, don't you? They get put down," the Cathor continued and his companions laughed at their leader's sick joke.

Ryqik got a good whiff of the Cathor's breath. It was laced heavily with alcohol and another substance he couldn't identify. It was that which was making them act this way and a sense of perverted enjoyment of seeing others suffer pain.

He quickly realised that they weren't much older than himself, two, maybe three years older. Still, that didn't make them any less dangerous. He reached inside his pocket and emitted a low, throaty growl. His fingers curled around the handle of the lightsabre. He brought it out and depressed the switch that activated it and the room was illuminated with a silver glow.

Ryqik stepped forward and swung his lightsabre at the thug with the vibroblade, slicing him in two before he even realised what he was doing.

The rest turned and fled. Ryqik switched off the lightsabre and turned to Nakita, a mixture of fear, relief and amazement on her face.

He smiled at her, warm and friendly and she threw her arms around him for the second time in two days, cried out her fear. When her trembling ceased, Ryqik took her hand in his and led her out into the night.

"We'd better get out of here."

***

Azet made her way through the dark forest. Everything seemed larger, more real than it was, but there was also a dreamlike surreal-ness to her surroundings. Through the trees, she could see a pale, silver light. She made her way towards it and as things were with dreams, she suddenly found herself at the edge of a clearing, even though when she'd first seen the light it had seemed kilometres away.

In the middle sat a large male Shistavanen with his shirtless back towards her, staring at the blade of a silver lightsabre. Through his fur, she could see the knotted muscles made powerful by a lifetime of constant fighting though he looked to be only in his early twenties.

There was something familiar about him and a name of a Jedi she once knew came to her mind. Shirak. But it wasn't Shirak. Shirak had never wielded a silver blade. His had been green and he would have aged now, if he was still alive. This one was young, just starting out on his life's journey but even so, he had the look of one who had known more suffering than many sentients three times his age.

The vision faded and Azet was falling through the darkness of space. A star loomed dangerously close before her and she was being pulled into its fiery maw by its gravity.

Azet felt hot, hotter than she had ever felt in her life before...

***

Azet sat bolt upright in bed, almost disturbing the sleeping Za at her side. Her mouth felt dry and caused her to let out a small cough, but that didn't help. She pulled back the covers and swung her legs out of bed before reaching for the velvet robe that hung on the door of the wardrobe. She slipped it on and tied the sash at her waist before walking bare foot into the kitchen to get a glass of water.

She didn't feel like going back to bed and decided to take a stroll in one of the walled gardens. The palace was over five hundred years old and displayed much of the original designs, art work and culture that had defined the Shistavanen people before the Empire had arrived. Much of it was centred around the hunt but they were also a curious species, wanting to explore and find new places just for the excitement of being somewhere that no others of their species had ever been before. The palace was the only thing left of those old times but even that was overshadowed by the statue of Palpatine. He didn't need to be physically there for the inhabitants of the palace to know his presence. The statue did that much pretty well for him.

Her claws clicked on the stone as she padded her way down the corridor to the steps that led out into her favourite garden. She came to the large hardwood door that opened out into the gardens and paused for a moment before opening it.

Her nose was assaulted by the scent of night blooming flowers and the night insects buzzed and hummed in the foliage. Much of the vegetation was native to the planet. The Shistavanens didn't believe in choking up their environment with things that didn't belong there. Much like the Imperial occupation and the statue of Palpatine. A non native plant would compete ruthlessly with the native species and if left unchecked would eventually cause the extinction of native plants and the diversity wildlife would diminish because of it. That was what was happening to the Shistavanens at the moment. They were in a war where their way of life was being choked out by invaders and would eventually die out or worse, exist in a cage, like the last specimen of an endangered species and slowly dying because they couldn't fulfil what they were meant to.

As Azet made her way through the starlit garden, she heard voices. She recognised them as Rivik and Nidet. She peered through the screen of carnivorous starflowers and saw the silhouettes of the two Archetypes.

"Lyet was our last best hope for freedom. Now that she is gone-" Rivik was saying.

Nidet took Rivik's larger paw in hers. "We will find a way. We need to find Shirak," she mentioned the name of the Shistavanen Jedi that had been Lyet's twin brother. He had disappeared and no one knew if he was alive or dead, or even if he was still a Jedi anymore.

"No. The Jedi are gone. If we are to fight Palpatine it must be us and us alone, because we can't rely on anyone else. There isn't anyone else."

"That was the way Senator Mizet thought," Nidet pointed to the statue of Palpatine, which was just visible over the garden wall, seemingly glaring down on the disloyal traitors like an angry god regarding blasphemers. "And that's what happened! We just aren't powerful enough."

"I will speak to Za and the -"

"Speak to Za?! He just wants to take power for himself! Why do you think he had Lyet killed anyway?"

";Ok. I'll not speak to Za. There are others who will want to taste freedom. We'll finish what Mizet begun and if we are destroyed in the process then it's better than living under the shadow of that," he indicated the statue.

Nidet nodded. He was right. They must fight back, even if doing so meant they met the same fate as Mizet herself. To do nothing would mean the Empire would win anyway. Nidet rose up on her claws and kissed his muzzle before turning to go back into the palace.

Rivik watched her go and followed a few moments later. He yelped in pain when he stubbed his toe on something hard. The moon appeared from behind a cloud and he looked down to see what had hurt his foot. It was a fragment of stone. He bent to pick it up and held it in his paws. On closer inspection he found that it was part of the lightsabre handle from the destroyed statue of Raqak. Rivik smiled to himself. The Jedi might be gone but their legacy still lived on. It felt like even now, the Jedi guardian was still there in spirit, still looking out for them.

Azet watched Rivik disappear up the steps and into the palace. She was confused. A Jedi her people needed, not a Sith. But a Sith is the only thing powerful enough to beat a Sith. If it was otherwise, then why were the Jedi extinct?

A fluttering movement caught her eye. It was a moth, attracted to the starflowers by their scent, a promise of sweet nectar. But as soon as the moth landed, the petals contracted around it and Azet watched in morbid fascination as the trapped creature died and the digestion process begun. Azet smiled to herself. The sight pleased her.
 
Chapter 3

Six months later...

Cyhen decided to meet the rebel Darkmoon in another cantina. Kopek was tracking down a rogue female Shistavanen scout called Lakah Vete. She didn't entirely trust Kopek, even after he'd saved her life. He was part of the Imperial Regime that ruled the planet, even if, like most other Shistavanens, he wished it wasn't there.

She was wearing the same cloak that hid her unusual fur colour from the crowd as she walked through the busy streets. It was a hot day without a cloud to mar the blue sky. Cyhen didn't like being too warm but resisted the urge to take off her cloak.

Imperial presence seemed to be every where and there were a couple of times when her hand hovered on the butt of her blaster pistol when she passed a group of marching Stormtroopers. Finally, she found the entrance to the cantina in a dark alley that most beings avoided even during the day time. The door had no remarkable features and the only indication that the place was a cantina was the neon sign in the shape of a mynock. Cyhen bared her teeth, remembering the time with Byak when the Starchaser had been infested with the pesky things. She turned the door handle and entered. It didn't take long for her eyes to adjust to the darkness inside.

There was gambling going on inside, illegal gambling. Now Cyhen understood why it had been so hard for her to locate. As she came up to the bar, she shrugged off the hand of a drunk that thought he could have a "good" time with her. She bared her teeth at him and growled menacingly and flashing her blaster. He seemed to get the message and suddenly found his drink more interesting.

She ordered a draught of lomin ale and looked around for Darkmoon. She located the human male in a booth next to next to the Jizz Wailer band whose high pitched music hurt Cyhen's sensitive ears. She cut through the crowd, avoiding drunks and trying not to spill her drink. Finally, she sat down in the on the bench opposite him and drew back the hood of her cloak. No one seemed to pay them any attention, which Cyhen was grateful for.

Darkmoon murmured an obscure greeting which Cyhen uttered the appropriate answer to before lapping at her lomin ale. After a few moments, she said, "What exactly is this shipment you want me to take?"

"Food, medical supplies, weapons, the usual stuff."

Cyhen pricked up her ears. "Nothing illegal?" she asked with a soft yip.

"No. Just make sure you aren't followed," he passed her a data disc. "The co-ordinates are on that disc and the landing code so you don't get shot down."

Cyhen nodded and secreted the disc inside her pocket just as a squad of Stormtroopers burst through the door, doing a raid on the illegal gambling. Cyhen grabbed an handful of Darkmoon's shirt and kissed him. The Stormtroopers, though probably disgusted at the sight of a human and a Shistavanen pashing, ignored them completely as they rounded up the illegal gamblers. Once they had gone, Cyhen released him and Darkmoon sat back breathlessly. Cyhen flattened her ears back in apology.

"I'm sorry. Couldn't think of any other way to distract them."

"That's okay. My people will bring the cargo round this afternoon."

"I'll see you then."

***

Cyhen's ship, the Starchaser, was reminiscent of the old Naboo starships common in the last days of the Old Republic. Elegant in design, it was just as deadly as it was beautiful. Unlike Naboo starships, however, it was a metallic blue in colour instead of chrome. She had to wonder how Byak had gotten hold of the ship in the first place as she accessed the boarding ramp.

She made her way to the cockpit and draped her cloak over the empty co-pilot's seat. It was early evening by the time the Starchaser was loaded. The sensitive stuff, the weapons were placed in a scan proof compartment in the body of the ship. She used that when she occasionally smuggled ryll and glitterstim for the Hutts.

She ran down the pre-flight check before lifting up into the atmosphere. She always loved the sight of the capital and its surrounding countryside from above. The contrast of the mountains with their forests, the city and beyond that rolling down to the sea were the great grasslands teeming with herds of a hundred different species of grass eating ungulates and their predators.

The sun was sinking lower in the sky, turning the sea to a bright orange red colour. It always felt like home and even the Empire could not take that away.

Cyhen left the surface of the planet behind and after she left the atmosphere, the ship's comlink buzzed. Looking out the main viewport she saw the ominous triangular shape of the Imperial Star Destroyer, Dauntless.

"Prepare to be boarded for cargo inspection. Failure to comply will result in your destruction," came the arrogant sounding voice of an Imperial deck officer.

Cyhen swore under her breath as she resigned herself for inspection. Cyhen's ship was caught in a tractor beam and brought into the belly of the much larger Star Destroyer.

***

"As I have already told you, lieutenant-" Cyhen deliberately misread the rank insignia. "-you will find no illegal substances on board my ship."

"That's Commander. I'll be the judge of that."

Cyhen scowled at him. "I have quotas to fill. I can't hang around here waiting while you look over every bolt and circuit connection on my ship!"

"We have to stick to Imperial procedures," the Commander looked at her condescendingly. "Dont give me an excuse to lock you in the brig for resistance to inspection."

As if you need an excuse to arrest me, Cyhen thought to herself as she watched him lead the inspection team up the boarding ramp. She crossed her arms over her chest and glared at the squad of twenty Stormtroopers all pointing blaster rifles at her like she was seriously contemplating ripping them apart with her bare hands. And she would have too, if there weren't a hundred or so more waiting to blast the head off her shoulders if she tried something like that. She had to wait for what seemed like an eternity before the inspection team reappeared.

"There is nothing amiss this time," the Commander said, seemingly disappointed that he hadn't found anything sinister. "Don't expect to be so lucky next time."

Cyhen snapped at his face as she walked past him to go up the boarding ramp. He flinched and Cyhen allowed herself a little chuckle. She paused at the top of the ramp and turned around.

"Thank you, Commander!" she put emphasis on the word Commander and gave him a mock salute before entering her ship.

Aliens! Oh how he despised aliens, especially cocky female ones like her. The Emperor should just give the order to wipe them all out.

As the boarding ramp closed behind her, Captain Jed Darkfyre came to stand by his second in command.

"Did you plant tracers on that ship?"

"Yes sir. The tracers have been planted as you ordered."

***

On her way to the cockpit, Cyhen noticed something wasn't quite right. Near the floor in a crack beside the bulkhead just outside the cockpit, she spotted something flashing red. She bent her knees and looked at it closely as her forehead creased in a frown.

She bared her teeth as she recognised it for what it was. A tracer! She resisted the urge to pull the thing away and rose to her feet. It looked like this trip was going to take a little bit longer than she'd anticipated.

***

Lakah Vete was on her way home from the Mos Eisley Cantina. She was debating to herself whether or not it was time to move on, before the Imps tracked her down. After she had fought on the side of that Wookiee colony against those Imperial slavers, she'd been on the run, unable to allow herself to relax for a moment.

Still, it had been worth being made a fugitive for. The grateful Wookiees had given her six months supply of Thikkiian brandy which she still had most of the supply of because of its potency. Just a mug of the stuff sent her to la la land and helped her forget her problems for a short while. However, it had not been for drink that Lakah had gone to the cantina for.

She was trying to make contact with the Rebels, so she could join them. This time she was lucky enough to get contact information for one cell on a planet on the Outer Rim. She felt a little sleepy as she rounded the corner of the alley that led to her home.

She caught a strange scent on the air, a male Shistavanen, but there was also the tangy odour of metal. Something was not quite right here.

Her hand drifted to the familiar and reassuring weight at her hip which she drew before entering the apartment. She did a quick sweep of the entire place, expecting at any moment to get jumped by something, but there was nothing or no one there. She was completely alone.

Lakah laughed at herself for being so paranoid. She left the blaster on her bedside table and went back to close her front door. On her way back to her bedroom, she went into the kitchen to fetch a bottle of the Wookiee brew and a tumbler. She undressed and poured herself half a glass of the drink. It helped her to sleep when she felt troubled, as she did now, but too much didn't agree with her and irritated her stomach. Sometimes, it even made her throw up.

She drank the brandy and within a few moments she was asleep.

***

Lakah suddenly woke, her mind feeling hazy as she tried to remember where she was. Mos Eisley. She sniffed the air and strained her ears to pick up what had awakened her. The strange whirring of something mechanical reached her ears, as did the scrabbling of claws on stone. Fear gripped her for a moment and she reached for the vibroblade she kept under her pillow. There was only one way out of this place and that was through the door behind which her hunter was.

She cursed herself for being so stupid. She should have trusted her instincts, even if they had seemed a little paranoid. Now it was too late to do anything but wait and prepare to fight.

Kopek smashed his way into the room and Lakah hauled the tumbler at him which missed and shattered against the wall. Before she could get to it, Kopek picked up her blaster and she stabbed at him desperately with her vibroblade that clanged uselessly against the metal of his prosthetic arm. His artificial hand clamped about her waist and he squeezed so she would drop the vibroblade.

She howled in pain as the delicate bones in her wrist shattered under the pressure. He placed the barrel of the blaster against her head and pressed his face close to hers. Saliva dripped from his teeth as he spoke. "One more attempt at resistance and you will be dead!" he snarled.

Lakah snarled back, but the seriousness in his eyes told her that he would carry out the threat if she didn't comply. She considered smashing the bottle of the brandy over his head to knock him out , but she would be dead before she completed the action.

She lowered her ears in submission. "Good," Kopek said.

***

Nidet made her way down the clean corridors of the Imperial Star Destroyer, Dauntless. She was heading for the detention block that was holding her childhood friend, Lakah Vete. She had not seen Lakah in years. The last time she had seen her had just been after she'd helped the Wookiee colony repel the Imperial attack. They'd had a heated argument over the incident. At the time, Nidet had been a strong supporter of the Imperial occupation but after seeing atrocity after atrocity inflicted upon her people, she had begun to change her mind.

She was a little nervous about seeing her. What if she rejected her? Nidet still counted her among her friends, even though they were still seemingly on different sides but to Lakah, Nidet was an enemy, as much apart of Palpatine's evil oppression as the Emperor was himself.

The detention block officers eyed her suspiciously as she entered the detention block command centre. "I have clearance to be here, from Governor Riyadah himself," Nidet showed them the clearance document and the commanding officer snatched it from her hands and took a long time pouring over it, checking for any slight inconsistency in the document that would allow him to deny her access.

"This all checks out," he said and gestured to one of his underlings. "Accompany the good Archetype to cell 1X59."

The underling saluted "Right away, sir."

Even though the officer seemed to be showing her the respect she deserved, part of her couldn't help but think he would much rather blast her head off than speak civilly to her. Nidet didn't mind. She felt exactly the same way about him.

The guard led her down to the end of the cell block before stopping at the last door and stood at attention. Nidet drew back the viewing panel and peered inside. The sight that met her shocked her. Lakah was unable to open her left eye as the skin around it was puffed up and caked in blood. There was mattered blood around her mouth and when she bared her teeth to snarl at her, Nidet saw that she had lost several teeth and that was where the blood was coming from around her mouth.

She was dressed in a prison uniform, a brown one piece flight suit type garment and was clutching her untreated shattered left wrist. It had blood stains where wounds on her body had bled. Nidet ordered the guard to open the door and Nidet stepped inside featureless cell.

Lakah greeted her friend with a low, pain filled growl.

"Surely they haven't started interrogating you already?"

"This was not inflicted by your Imperial Masters, but by the one who captured me. Thought he’d have some fun," Lakah replied. "Come to gloat, have you?"

"No - I," Nidet searched for the right words to say. "Whatever disagreement we had in the past, I still remain your friend, Lakah."

"Save the lies for someone who would believe you!"

"I want to help you, Lakah."

"I want nothing from you. Not your pity, not your help, not your friendship!"

In spite of her pain, Lakah suddenly leapt up form her sleeping bench and launched herself at Nidet, digging her sharp claws into her face and raking her hands down her face. She pushed Nidet to the floor and tore at her with her sharp teeth. The guard stunned Lakah with his blaster and Lakah slumped unconscious. Nidet rolled her former friend's body off her and got to her feet, dark red blood staining her Archetype's uniform.

***

Nidet washed off the blood from the scratches to her face and the savage bite to her shoulder. She stared for a moment at the pool of diluted blood and wondered, for a moment, just how things had gotten this bad between her and Lakah. She winced at the pain in her shoulder as she patted at the wound with a sponge but it was nothing compared to pain caused by the rejection form her child hood friend.

The wound and the scratches would heal but the emotional scar was permanent and would remain with her always. She sighed but she wouldn't allow herself to waste energy on hate. Hate only made things worse. She sniffed, taking one last look at herself in the holographic mirror before putting on a robe and heading out to the refresher to get a glass of her favourite wine, a beverage only found on Uvena III. She thought about the many times she and Lakah had gotten drunk together and it made her smile, if only for a moment. She lifted it to her lips to lap at it with her tongue.

As she entered the lounge, the door buzzed and she set down the glass on the coffee table before answering it. Rivik was at the door when she opened it and she felt a mixture of happiness and self-consciousness when she realised that she wore nothing underneath her dressing gown, which she'd even forgotten to tie close with her belt, but it wasn't her body that caught Rivik's attention.

"What happened?" he asked, bringing up his hand to touch the four deep parallel scratches.

"I went to see Lakah. She became angry and attacked me."

He rested his paw heavily on her shoulder. "I knew you'd be upset, so I came to see you as soon as I'd heard of her capture," He looked past her and spotted the glass of wine. "Mind if I come in?"

"No, come in,"; Nidet moved aside and he walked past her to sit on the couch. Nidet closed the door and sat opposite him. Rivik switched off his comlink so that Laej wouldn't be able to bother him. He decided to be honest with her.

"Once they've gotten all the information they can out of her, she'll be killed."

Nidet snuffled loudly and tried to keep the tears form forming at the corners of her eyes. She knew since the last meeting that would be the result, but she couldn't bring herself to believe that her friend would die. "There has to be a way to save her-" she rose from her seat and looked away so that he wouldn't see the tears that began to roll down her muzzle. She felt Rivik's arms encircle her as he crushed her to him.

"There is nothing either of us can do without revealing ourselves and being put to death with her. We must live, to carry on her fight," he said, his voice getting quieter until it was nothing more than a whisper in her ear. "But you won't go through this alone. I'm here, if you need me."

"I need you, Rivik," she turned in his arms and kissed him. Rivik responded just as strongly and Nidet forgot all about the glass of wine.

***

The Starchaser came out of hyperspace in the Alderaan system. The blue and green planet looked peaceful as it hung in the blackness of space. She opened a channel to request permission to land her ship. She gained it and brought her ship down to land in the spaceport of Aldra City, the capital city that rose up on an artificial platform within a shallow sea. Alderaan was not her true destination. She had landed here so she could remove the tracers from her ship.

She hoped that the spaceport authorities wouldn't do a through check on her cargo as she was carrying weapons and any type of weapon was illegal on Alderaan, even if she was supplying the Rebellion that the planet supported! While she had been in hyperspace, she had hidden her blaster and other weapons she carried in a scan proof locker that gave out false readings when scanned.

The planet was one of the most beautiful places she had ever been, untouched almost, by artificial construction. She wondered however, if the planet had been home to any species other than human if the planet would have retained much of its natural beauty. The Empire was notorious for exploiting and polluting worlds that belonged to non human species.

She lowered the ramp as the search team approached the ship and she met them in the cargo hold.
"Are you the captain of this vessel?"

"Captain, owner and pilot," Cyhen replied. Even though his demeanour was totally different to that of the commander on the Dauntless, she wanted to deal with them quickly as she was getting fed up of inspection teams.

"What is your business here?"

"I'm just stopping to refuel. Will this take long? I have perishable food items in those crates. If they don't get to their destination on time, my client will loose money and I won't get paid."

"We're just doing our jobs, Captain. We'll try to inconvenience you as little as possible."

"Be sure that you do," Cyhen flashed him an intimidating smile.

"What is in these crates?"

"Food items, medical supplies. I have the inventory here," she passed him a data pad with the inventory displaying the food and medical items. "You will see that everything checks out."

Cyhen decided that she'd had enough of spaceport officials and left while they did their jobs to take a walk around the city close to the spaceport.

***

Azet stared unseeing at the scarlet blade activated in front of her. Her mind was elsewhere, on a battlefield from another time, another place and what seemed like a life time ago. She was eleven at the time.

Geonosis, the Arena. She'd not taken part in any of the fighting but her Master had been called there urgently to help in the rescue attempt of Obi - Wan Kenobi and to destroy the army of the Confederacy, not realising at that very moment they were turning the course of history forever, fighting for the man that was secretly betraying them, but for Azet that wasn't the most significant thing that occurred that day.

She'd witnessed the death of a friend, the young Bothan male Kish, Padawan to the Shistavanen Jedi Master, Raqak. Raqak's son, Shirak, had tried desperately to save the young Bothan, but he was dead before Shirak could do anything. Azet witnessed Shirak's pain and she felt it herself.

In the long moment that followed, Shirak was almost cut down himself, saved successfully by his Master Naja. Naja paused to reprimand his student for lowering his guard for a brief moment, before turning back into the fight.

Raqak, a wall of fur and barely contained fury, didn't allow the death of his Padawan to distract him for a moment. Mourning would come later.

Safae Boda, Azet's Master, fought like the nexu.

But the small Jedi army were soon out numbered and began to fall back towards the centre of the arena. Azet moved with them, so she wouldn't get cut off from her Master and the other Jedi. Just when they thought everything was lost, Yoda and the fleet of Republican Gunships descended to rescue them.

Azet was in danger of being left behind. Shirak spotted her and ran towards her so she wouldn't get left behind. He grabbed hold of her arm. Laser blasts from Droidekas chased them all the way to the Gunship, Shirak blocking the blasts effortlessly with his green light sabre.

Raqak and Naja helped the two padawans board, while Safae Boda issued orders to the clone troopers.
The three male Jedi slumped to the deck of the ship from emotional exhaustion. Shirak passed Kish's lightsabre to his father that he had somehow retrieved during the battle. Little did Azet know that the loss of Kish was only the first of devastating losses brought on by the onset of the Clone Wars...

Azet's meditation was interrupted by the buzz of her comlink. She deactivated her crimson bladed lightsabre and rose gracefully to her feet.

***

When Lakah came to, she found herself strapped upright by her wrists in an interrogation room. The straps binding her wrists were so tight that she couldn't feel her hands . Her stomach felt like a herd of wild banthas were throwing a party in it. Ignoring the pain in her head, she looked up at the reinforced transparisteel glass above her which she guessed was a veiwport but she couldn't see inside. There was a door at the top of a metal stairway that led into what could be best described as an observation lounge.

Lakah gasped in fear when Za and Kopek entered, carrying various instruments of torture designed to intimidate her. Za leaned forward and pressed his face close to hers before grinning at her wickedly. "You will tell us the location of the rebel base we know that you are hiding from us," Za said.

Lakah grinned back at him. "I know of no rebel base-"

Za moved back and circled her as Kopek punched her until her nose bled.

"Don't lie to us, little bitch. Kopek saw you talking with that rebel contact, whom he has already dispatched, by the way, in that den of villains in Mos Eisley. We can do this the easy way, or the hard way, but don't think that we are afraid to use force to get the information out of you-" Za paused for a moment, considering his words as he scratched at his chin with his sharp claws. "No," he yipped. "Resist, little bitch. Make this more fun for us-"

As he spoke, Kopek flicked an energy lash at her that caught her across the torso. Lakah gritted her teeth against the pain and refused to cry out. Instead, she only snarled viciously at Kopek, who only stuck out at her again for her trouble.

***

In the observation lounge, Azet licked her lips as Za back handed her across the muzzle. Azet watched the defiant female in fascination and reached out to sense her with the Force. There was a lot of anger in her, mostly directed at the Archetype Nidet, who had not even shown up to witness the interrogation of her former friend. Rivik had been un-contactable as well. None of this was in fact necessary as Azet could just rip the information from her mind anytime she wanted, but Kopek and Za had to have their fun, didn't they?

"Surely an Interrogation Droid would be more efficient than this display of savagery!" the overweight Laej commented.

Azet glared at him like she was going to rip his head off and eat it. "Trust me, Za knows what he's doing."

Only too well, Azet added for herself. She remembered experiencing his brutality herself, that was until she learnt to fight back and he learnt not to mess with someone who was more powerful than he was in ways that he could never match physically.

She hated them, playing with the defenceless prisoner like a cat torturing its cornered prey, before going in for the kill, accept that they wouldn't kill her, not until they got tired of her being their defenceless plaything and Azet went in to rip the information from her mind.

To Lakah's credit, she just faced up to the torture, refusing to let the pain show, refusing to let them know how much they were hurting her, even though in her mind she screamed and Azet was the only one who knew it. Part of her wanted to stop it but she loved it too.

It was a shame that she Force sensitive. She would have made a good Sith apprentice.

Finally, the pain and blood loss were too much for Lakah and she passed out. Za and Kopek ascended the stairs and entered the observation room.

"Did you learn anything?" the Governor asked.

"Not yet, my lord. She is very stubborn but we must wait until she regains consciousness," Za replied.

***

In the end, Cyhen found three tracers in all and planted one on the hull of a commercial liner bound for Coruscant. Placing the tracer had been difficult as she'd had to doge spaceport security and avoid the security guards of the liner. The rest she had destroyed. She just hoped that the people on the liner wouldn't get killed by some over zealous Imperial commander being trigger happy.

After she had watched the liner blast off into orbit, she returned to her ship and got clearance from space control to leave. A few minutes later she was heading up into orbit. Part of her was sad at having to leave the world behind. She had never felt more comfortable in her life going through the streets of Aldra that circled the spaceport. She had not felt that way in a long time, not since the days of her childhood. Thinking about that time brought a twinge of emotional pain in her heart. She missed her uncle. She had no memory of her real parents.

Cyhen forced herself to concentrate on the moment and pouched the co-ordinates for Yavin and waited while the navi computer did the calculations for the jump into hyperspace, the verdant world of Alderaan hanging in space below her.

She eased the ship into position for the jump to light speed and checked the time left for the jump. Thirty seconds.

Just as she was about to pull the lever back to enter hyperspace, the Starchaser detected the strangest craft she had ever seen. It was spherical in shape and was the size of a small moon. As she stared in fascination, trying to work out what it was, her expression changed form one of curiosity to pure terror as a powerful laser beam was emitted form the northern hemisphere of the craft and obliterated the defenceless planet she had just vacated. She glanced at her holocam and sensor board, making sure she was getting as much information as possible. She stared at the asteroid belt that had once been Alderaan in shock.

Only the warning klaxon that sounded as her ship was being fired upon by TIE Fighters brought her out of her trance and she flipped the lever back.

After the stars elongated and formed the haze of hyperspace, Cyhen played back the recording on her monitor. She had encountered destruction before but never on such a large scale and never with such callous regard for life. It was such a display of destructive power that it would be something she would carry with her for the rest of her life, no matter how much she wished she could forget it.

***

"Hold her, Za" Azet instructed. Za used his body strength to hold the beaten Lakah on her feet. She was unable to do so on her own power and she felt limp and weak in his arms. She was conscious enough to comprehend that something was going on, but she was unable to struggle or work out just quite what it was.

After the last interrogation, Lakah had been taken to one of the cells in the underground dungeons below the palace. They were damp and cold, water droplets dripped from the ceiling and formed puddles on the floor. The only light was cast by torch light which had been unchanged for thousands of years. The cell doors were made of huge iron bars about as thick as Azet's wrists.

Lakah recovered enough of her senses to snarl at Azet. In retaliation, Azet sent a controlled burst of Force lightening through her as a warning which glowed an eerie whitish-blue in the darkness. Azet's sun yellow eyes burned into Lakah's mind and she gave up all resistance.

Azet placed her hands on either side of Lakah's head, digging her sharp claws in deep enough to draw blood that formed little rivers that dripped to the floor at her feet. Lakah felt like her skull was being crushed like an egg but that pain was nothing compared to what was to come.

Azet probed Lakah's mind with the Force, forcing her way inside and tearing and ripping it apart as she searched for the information she wanted. She skimmed through the memories Lakah had of her friend Nidet and her ill feelings towards her childhood friend began to evaporate, dissolve. Azet probed deeper, harder, tearing into Lakah's mind with the ease of a pack of battle dogs tearing apart their prey. This time the pain was just too intense as Lakah screamed in pain as her mind was torn to shreds.

Za looked at Azet, whose eyes were closed in concentration but the sickening smile on the Dark Jedi's face sent a shiver down his spine. He had never seen her like this before, taking such perverse joy in causing pain to another, but then he shouldn't be surprised, really. She was his mate.

Azet fed on Lakah's pain and anger and fear. It made her strong and powerful. It made Azet feel good that for once someone else was feeling pain instead of her. It didn't even matter that they shared the same enemy in Palpatine and the Empire. All that mattered was that someone else was hurting more than she did.

For Azet it was not long enough. For Lakah, it took what seemed like an eternity. Azet's eyes flicked open and she took her hands away from Lakah's skull.

"Did you learn anything?" Za asked.

"Yes. The rebels are on the planet Rogja."

Za let go of Lakah, who slumped to the floor, seemingly unable to stand upright, clutching her head in pain and confusion. They left the rebel there, destroyed more thoroughly than any Imperial interrogation could achieve, but alive in a nightmare that was worse than death.

***

Azet spent the rest of the night in mediation, recalling the time she had set foot on the planet Rogja. After a year of travelling the space ways, loosing herself in the various spaceports of a hundred different worlds, she had finally ended up on the backwater world of Rogja, a planet not far from Uvena III. As a result it had been one of the first worlds outside the Uvena system to be colonised by Shistavanen explorers.

Many of the denizens of the spaceport her transport ship landed in were Shistavanens. Perhaps she could hide among them from Palpatine's Jedi hunters. Every planet she had been to they had been there, pursuing her. She no longer carried a lightsabre, deeming it to be too dangerous to do so. They were too easily recognised by even the most stupid of thugs and all would try something, just to get money or brag in the cantinas that they had taken out a Jedi! Discarding her lightsabre made her more vulnerable to attack and she could never be seen to use the Force openly as that would reveal her to be a Jedi and then the relentless pursuit of bounty hunters and Jedi hunters would start all over again. Hopefully, this time if she didn't reveal her powers and blended in with the general population. Then she could perhaps live a normal life.

No one trusted the Jedi anymore, not even the people they were supposed to protect. There might be one or two still sympathetic to the Jedi, who still remembered them as the guardians of peace and justice in the galaxy, but most were only too happy to betray them, sometimes out of hate or greed, but the one that hurt most was fear. Almost everyone seemed to fear them and not only those who had a reason to fear them, but ordinary people.

Sometimes it was through ignorance about what a Jedi was really about, like reading their private thoughts or something, but it was a person's feelings they sensed, not their thoughts and even when a Jedi communicated to another Jedi through the Force, it was telepathy. It was just feelings that were more controlled.

Sometimes the reason people feared them was through Palpatine's propaganda and this seemed to be everywhere. Palpatine took people's real concerns and fears about the Jedi and blew them all out of proportion so that it would turn to hatred so that the people would be only too happy to eliminate his main opposition to power.

Whatever the reason, Azet needed to defend herself from attack and this sometimes meant she had to give into the very anger that her dead Master had warned her against.

She was fearful of rejection, of getting close to people in case they found out about her powers. So she pushed them away, living a lonely existence. What was hardest was that since her Master's death at the hands of Darth Vader, she had no one who understood her powers.

She didn't even realise that she was falling deeper and deeper into the dark side of the Force as time went on. Vindictiveness, lust for power, lashing out in anger are the obvious paths of the dark side, but loneliness, fear, pushing people away, self loathing and self doubt are all harder to recognise and are probably more damaging because you don't even realise it's there until its too late.

Azet was on the planet for a month before more of Palpatine's Jedi hunters caught up with her. She was in a bar, drinking away her troubles when a squad of six showed up. That was how she had met Za and Kopek. The two Archetypes were pursuing a criminal and decided to give her an helping hand. The fight was brief and bloody and ended up in the death of all the hunters and the wounding of Za. Azet, grateful for his help, used the Force to heal him until he could get proper medical treatment and everything else was history.

***

"How's your shoulder?" Rivik whispered in Nidet's ear. He stroked her good arm, passing his hand down it until he came to her hand, which he gripped in his own. After making love, they had fallen asleep and it was now early morning.

"Still hurts, but it will heal," Nidet replied as he kissed the finger tips of her hand. He had made her forget about Lakah for a while but it all came rushing back to her now. There had to be a way of helping her. Rivik leaned forward over her protectively and licked the dried blood off her face from the scratches. The minor wounds were still sore but she still enjoyed the sensation.

Nidet reluctantly swung her legs around and sat on the edge of her bed. How ever much she wanted to spend the day in bed with him, she knew that couldn't be. She had work to do and she needed to see Lakah again. She felt a little nip on the back of her neck that sent a shiver of excitement down her spine. "Do you want me to accompany you this time?"

"Yes. I don't want to see her alone."

Rivik checked the dressing on her shoulder and applied a new bacta treatment. It was healing quite well but the emotional wound was still open and there was nothing he could do about that.

As her shoulder was still sore and tender, Nidet chose to ware a tight sleeveless nerf hide body suit that wouldn't interfere with the dressing or make it worse by rubbing against it. Rivik had to make do with what he had worn the night before.

For the most part, the palace was deserted accept for Imperial guards and the odd Archetype apprentice carry out guard duty. Lakah was now being held in the catacombs underneath the ancient palace, inside one of the dark, damp cells. No one questioned them as they were a familiar sight about the palace.

The closer they came to the cell, the more anxious Nidet became. She was nervous about what Lakah would say to her when they met and she worried about the state they would find her in. If she had gone through interrogation...

"Lakah!" Nidet said when she first saw her. She looked worse than she had previously and when Nidet crossed the cell to knell down beside her and take her hands in hers, Lakah didn't recognise her. Nidet turned to look up at Rivik. "What have they done to her?"

Rivik sniffed the air and wrinkled his nose before setting his face in an hard expression. The air was strong with the smell of blood and death.

"She's dying, Nidet. There's only one thing we can do," he drew his vibroblade.

Nidet bared her teeth at him. "You can't. I won't let you!" she snarled at him like a mother willing to die to protect her young. Lakah had been hurt too much already.

"Nidet, please. The best thing we can do is stop her suffering. Even if we did put her in a bacta tank, it is likely that she would die. If she lived, there's not enough left of your friend to save."

Lakah didn't even react to the debate over her death. Nidet glanced at Lakah, then at Rivik and her gaze settled on the cruel edge of the vibroblade.

"Besides, it will save her the humiliation of a public execution," Rivik added. He knew all about those. A few years ago, his brother had been falsely accused of being a rebel and the Governor had ordered him killed.

"Just give me a moment, ok?"

Rivik nodded and Nidet looked deep into Lakah's eyes.

"I'm sorry, Lakah. I don't even know if you can understand me. The last time we saw each other, you hurt me in more ways than you can imagine. I don't want my last memory of you to be like that. I will miss you, my friend, my pack-sister!" she kissed Lakah on the forehead and just for a moment, her pain filled eyes cleared and a flicker of recognition lit up her eyes and then it was gone again.

Nidet rose and left the cell. He lifted her to her feet and held her. Rivik didn't hesitate one moment. To do so would make him loose his nerves. "Forgive me, Nidet," he whispered before plunging the blade into Lakah's heart. Lakah choked for a moment before slumping limp in his arms. Blood trickled out of the wound as he retrieved his blade, forming a pool at his feet.

He cleaned his blade and left the cell, into the waiting arms of Nidet.
 
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