"Thirty minutes to Arrival." the voice announced over the internal communications array in the dropship.
Atretes had come a long way since he began this life. Since Druckenwell, since the Fall. So much had happened since then. Promotion in both skill and title. Since he'd broken the threshold to Knight status, he'd made leaps and bounds in his ability. No longer was he the poor boy who only wished to stay alive. He was more, now. Someone else. Some
thing else. He looked to his hand as he sat at the fore of the passenger bay, his Force sight allowing him to watch the very outline of his hand shift with the power he'd gained during the Fall. Sigma's presence manifested... it was a magnificent but frightening thing, and he planned to use it to its fullest today. He turned the mask to his armour in his hands. It wasn't anything special -- the standard Obsidian Cure armour -- but the way he wore it made it his own. Most wore hoods over the armour, but Atretes fashioned it into a full helm in the shape of a skull. The cloak he wore as a scarf, and from use it and the hanging robe-like clothing had tattered slightly. He could have repaired it, but there was a certain level of effectiveness intimidation brought, and he looked like Death.
"Twenty minutes." came the alert.
Atretes sighed quietly, collecting himself for the coming Battle, and then he rose in a fluid motion and took a step forward. The clank of his hard boot on the durasteel grate underfoot drew everyone's attention. He looked to them all. All Obsidians. All bore the blood red armbands emblazoned with the Systems Authority insignia over their armour, left arm. It was a memory of the oath made to Rhoujen upon the Fall. Of blood spilled on Roon exterminating the Templar scum. His eyes closed and then reopened with a fire that ignited every time he was preparing to kill. They knew. They could sense it. The hum that suddenly filled the air. The energy that Atretes gave off that kept them going when the tide went sour on Roon. They were growing excited.
So the Knight Commander stoked the fire.
"What is Betrayal, Knights Obsidian!?" he called out for all to hear. The final word had barely exited his mouth, before the resounding reply came.
"DEATH!"
Atretes nodded and felt his resonance with the Force seem to grow.
"Though she betrayed the Confederate Dogs, [member="Feena Mason"] resides as Queen of Naboo," he said, "Yet still she spreads slander about us. She acts against the Authority as though we were still Confederate, she still acts as a
betrayer." he growled, and the Knights in his vessel protested this, verbalised their detest to the actions of the Naboo Queen. They were getting anxious, and they too began to hum with energy as the moment drew nearer.
"Ten minutes."
"When we land, we
will take Theed," Atretes continued with conviction in his voice, "and we
will slay the Queen. This battle will echo for light years around, it will be the testament that the Confederacy was weak. It was nothing. We are the Systems Authority, and we will have Naboo!" he cried out to his Knights Obsidian.
Little did Atretes know, the pilot had heard him talking and switched on the channel to broadcast to all Authority ships. Rhoujen's speech was being broadcast to the entire assaulting force. So too did the response from the Knights aboard with him. The resounding war cry from the assembled Obsidians echoed through the speakers of the Authority Fleet and any other friendly communications array, the beginning of chanting "ASA" able to be heard in the undertones of the cheer. The Knight Commander turned on his heel to look out the front viewport and saw the hyperspace vortex dissolve into lines and then Naboo was laid bare before them.
"Bring me that world." Atretes' voice was a dangerous tone, nearly a snarl, that the pilot obeyed readily.
