Justice for All... (Dominion of Chalcedon LotF)

[Arage Bao]

[member="Ashin Varanin"] [member="Matsu Xiangu"] [member="Lucianus Adair"]

Team A

It felt good to have Varanin in charge again. I ain’t much of a follower these days, but nobody could contest the fact that the Fringe wasn’t what it was back in the heyday - had been considering a coup, but decided against it in the end.

Too many variables, besides… I had too many hats back then. Emperor Ovmar sounded all good and well, but I doubted I would have been able to put out enough.

When Varanin stepped back, I filled the void and braced myself against the tide. Wasn’t a fighter, ‘least not with a lightsaber, so I fought the only way I knew how. My mind lashed out and fed the hatred and jealousy the slavers felt for each other.

This wasn’t an army, or even a brotherhood of pirates. The only common goal they had together was blood, blood and torture.

Didn’t take much to break ‘em, a pulse rippled through the Force and suddenly the slavers were fighting each other - not only in this room, but the rooms adjacent to us were filled with betrayal.

Sweet betrayal.
In the corner the astromech was still busy slicing into the system, wouldn’t take much more before we could make a grand sweep of the area with a few pushes of the button.

 

[Yasha Cadera]

Did [member="Lady Exedō"] tell me to be careful? Yes. Yes she/he did. I blink. My shoulders raise and I realize what I was doing: I was trying to mentally project a sinkhole line to my own brain to the Eater of the Dead. "Oh yikes! Sorry, Shinju! Have fun with your daughter and your chainsaws." I say over comm.

How were the rest of my people doing? Team Three was finally getting to fulfill its function and from the chatter across the other teams I come to a couple of dearly costly realizations: [member="Jared Ovmar"] is down there and he's causing mental havok, [member="Ashin Varanin"] is an excellent leader, Shinju can't wait to use chainsaws, and good old [member="Livia Maddox"] loves commanding the space lanes. I'm glad she found her way to the Fringe and glad she's found a job that doesn't make the woman feel even more self conscious than she already is about that leg of hers.

Regardless, I should stay focussed on my own team but if I don't have a line on the bigger picture, my team isn't going to succeed. "Team Three, check in."

 

[Ashin Varanin]

TEAM A

[member="Jared Ovmar"] [member="Matsu Xiangu"] [member="Lucianus Adair"]

Ovmar's fratricidal fury took down everything in one direction (no, not that One Direction, more's the pity, though you're now making me imagine how Ovmar would off a boy band). Xiangu locked down another direction. Adair had slunk off with a lean and hungry look, which was basically how Adair lived, let alone fought. Doubtless he'd show up with a bloody grin a mile wide, picking his teeth with a combat knife.

Ashin picked a non-Ovmar, non-Xiangu direction, which basically entailed the walltops above a set of small docking cordons. A ship trembled, choking its way through an abbreviated preflight, and she entered through the top hatch with her sabre as a can opener.

 

[Velok the Younger]

[member="Livia Maddox"]

Backed by the Divya and the Fringe escorts' fighter contingent, Rave and the Lethewalker proceeded to the opposite end of the planet at flank speed. For long stretches of time, that was a bad idea. For something as short-range as circumnavigating a world, flank speed was perfectly fine, contrary to One Sith tactical doctrine.

The light frigate bore down around the planet's curve and got line of sight on the fleeing transports. Rave had been a little straightforward with Maddox: Her guns were deck cannons, paired ions and mass drivers. She was just using them with the mass driver part disengaged. The ion discharge thrummed through the superstructure as the guns smashed out.

 

[Lucianus Adair]

TEAM A

[member="Ashin Varanin"] | [member="Matsu Xiangu"] | [member="Jared Ovmar"]

Despite Adair being oblivious to the thoughts of one Ashin Varanin, she was mostly right except for, well, he used proper toothpicks. Let it never be said that he was uncivilized, even if his propriety could be a tad extremist - he took heavy exception to manners being left unused, on occasion. That being said, there were times where he was brazenly uncivilized with the manner in which he dispatched the living to their maker, afterlife, or decomposition.

There was rarely anything civilized about murder in the first place, even if he was going about it with some degree of quiet and concealment, in a few cases, revealing himself right when he was on top of them in others, and... otherwise leaving the stuff of nightmares as their final sights. For the most part, this was a 'SBD' job that employed a large margin of skill in assassination acquired in an era long past.

Was it predictable that he would regroup with the others, an incredibly satisfied look painted on his face? Perhaps.

 

[Livia Maddox]

"Helm, change heading oh-one-one-nine."

"Heading oh-one-one-nine, Captain."

"Tactical give me twelve more gun batteries on the port bow and lock target."

"Target locks preparing. . . . port batteries one, four, six, twelve and nineteen engaged. Batteries two, three, five and nine coming on target lock. . . locked, Captain!"

She leaned forward with her hand grasping the armrest as if it and it alone maintained the gravity of the ship. "Fire!" A volley thundered from the cannons, jutting forward to the incoming ships.

As the Vi'Nu scythed through the space above Chalcedon, the booming shudders of her guns thundered into the vacuum and Livia felt saddened she couldn't hear their roar as it should have been in atmosphere. Fire, ionized energy and the shudder of their attacking bogeys was her pay off and it would have to do. "Scramble the Tirta's fighters, have them patrol the skies. Sensors, report on Lethewalker! Comm, I want those ships hailed again!"

"Channel's open, Ma'am. They're not responding."

"Enemy vessels you have neglected to answer our transmission with the powering down of your weapons and the lowering of your speed. We are taking this as an overt attack and will continue to fire at you until your bodies are bleeding into the solar system. Power down! This is your last and final warning! Tactical, fire on my mark in ten . . . . nine . . . eight. . . "

Captain Maddox continued counting down as the incoming ships from outside of Chalcedon's space fired down at the Vi'Nu and Tirta. Their Idents came in as Chalcedon's own berth, Maddox utterly refused to dignify their response with peace. She would have none of it, Chalcedon was the Fringe's now.

And will be for as long as she was breathing, which given her propensity to exercise and eat well was a great amount of time. "One. Fire!"

The lead ship canted to the side, shrapnel jutting from its incoming quarter. "Fire again on my Mark. . . M-"

"Captain! They're surrendering."

"Officers, report. Likelihood of this being a ruse? Give me data."

 

[Matsu Xiangu]

It was somewhere between cleaving one of the pirates in two and catching another to fall on her saber that Matsu felt this is what it had been like and what it would be like again to call the Fringe home. It was a machine – efficient, determined as they swept the port with the Empress’ words galvanizing them. She didn’t miss a step as she cleared the room further, an indiscriminate swath that seemed appropriate for the message they were trying to send.

She could feel her Master’s manipulation in the Force, smart in its simplicity – use the weakness already present, much more effective. She caught a glimpse of Varanin making work of a ship attempting to leave, the predatory stalk of Adair as he slipped off to kill. The light chatter of Sivas’ team moving in with precision was a backdrop to the sound of her breathing, the slow hum of concentration. She knew her apprentice was somewhere in the fray there as well.

The sound of a speeder roaring to life to her left caught her attention, a bid for freedom cut short as she scooped up bits and pieces of spilled tools left askew by panicked spacers in the port with the Force, throwing them to cut through the vehicles' intake and send the would-be escapee to an explosive death.

By the time she’d cut through the men brave or stupid enough to run somewhere near her, she made her way up in to the control room and out of the path of the turrets suddenly rotating to take aim at the surrounding area. She wasn’t much for getting shot.

[member="Ashin Varanin"] | [member="Lucianus Adair"] | [member="Jared Ovmar"] | [member="Anders Sivas"] | @Bundori​

 

[Bundori]

[member="Matsu Xiangu"]

Bundori ran after her mommy out of the ship and looked around standing in her dress as she held her sword. The chainblade revving and there were people around her for a moment. Bundori looked up with wide eyes at all of them and pursed her lips letting them tremble slightly before she moved forward and swung the sword, it resisting as it dug into his chest and came down finally going through. Bundori wondered where her master was... Matsu was here somewhere wondering around which was a fun notion as she skipped about. She wanted to show her how strong she was as Bundori grabbed a piece straining to drag it behind her while she danced. "I like to mvoe it move it.... I like to move it move it" She looked at one of the men laying there without a leg. "He like to move it move it." Bundori swung around again and caught another person in the leg as she started moving into the barracks to stop them from going after the others. "She like to move it move it." Then she was looking and bouncing up and down in place giggling excitedly with all the people in there while she could just image what was going to come next. "Move it."

 

[Ashin Varanin]

[member="Livia Maddox"]

Surrounded by a crew of dead slavers, Ashin scrutinized the transport's sensors. A full scale.fight had broken out in orbit. Intel had been sloppy, it seemed, if the slavers had this many offworld assets or allies willing to tackle a Fring Star Destroyer.

"Vi'Nu, this is Fringe Actual requesting sitrep."

 

[Velok the Younger]

[member="Livia Maddox"]

Beyond the curve of the planet, and out of direct sensor contact with the larger Fringe vessel, the Lethewalker surged ahead of the pack. Ion cannons put the escaping easels in a parabolic skid.

"Do they have escape velocity?"

"Plotting orbital endpoints now, ma'am. And...onscreen."

Rave hissed through her teeth. "Third ship. Let's get tractor on it. We're smaller, so I'll need full burn."

"Ma'am, that'll rip the tractor beam right off the superstructure. We'll have a hull breach."

"Leave that to me.". Rave stood. " You have the bridge, Captain."

 

[Livia Maddox]

"Captain, the second ship is powering up."

"Maintain targets, lower our z-axis 12% and fire one. Prep two, target their engineering section."

"Yes Ma'am. Gunners prepping now."

"Open Comm to Fringe Actual."

"Fringe Actual Comm open, Captain." As the comm opened, the second ship peeked from behind its' buddy shield and fired across the Vi'Nu's underbelly. Her crew began citing off minor reports on hull integrity and the state of the departments.

"Fringe Actual this is Vi'Nu. Sitrep. Yes, one moment. Tactical, fire. Comm coordinate with Tirta, bring Nelvaan Squadron, send them on a strafing run close and personal on that second ship, let them know we're on to them and in control." In control. Those two words defined Livia Maddox's outward stature and the clipped nature of her enunciated words. The Naboo native leaned in her Command Chair and watched the glorious view from the glassteel panoramic ports and gave her report. "Sitrep is minor lift-offs from Chalcedon's surface, all ships are being disengaged and detained. [member="Rave Merrill"]'s Lethewalker came waltzing in much to my glee and has taken ownership of the other side of the planet. I sent the assault carrier Divya to her aide. The Vi'Nu and the assault carrier Tirta are handling these three yahoos that thought it was a good idea to swoop in, neglect powering down and attempt to 'save the day' for slavers everywhere. Another fifty seconds and we'll have them dead in the water, Ma'am. So far sensors have detected upward of 500 slaves in the detained ships. From the trajectory the belligerent ships took coming in here, it appears they were already in hyperspace coming home from elsewhere. Fantastic timing for us to leave them drifting until they catch my drift. Sorry Fringe Actual, that was a horrid pun."

 

[Ashin Varanin]

[member="Livia Maddox"]

"Acknowledged, Captain. Call in once they're taken care of." She redirected the slave craft's sensors to get a better idea of the ground situation. Nothing here seemed to be in the mood to take off, or else [member="Jared Ovmar"], [member="Matsu Xiangu"] and [member="Lucianus Adair"] had taken care of it.

Whether [member="Lucien Cordel"], [member="Brom Burnside"] and their associates were similarly on the ball was anyone's business.

"[member="Anders Sivas"], sitrep on Team Three."

 

[Yasha Cadera]

"Fringe Actual [member="Ashin Varanin"], this is Sivas. [member="Lady Exedō"] and [member="Bundori "]are replaying Telos Chainsaw Massacre and the rest have yet to check in, but so far we're zero on casualties for the Fringe and Shinju's got enough chaos going to keep Objective Three running. If I don't hear back from the others in two clicks, I'm sending my EMBU's Tyr & Tus in to help Shinju clear out the slavers' forces."

I tap my fingers across the bulkhead of the command ship and wait for the others on my team to check in. [member="Brom Burnside"], [member="Gavin Ovmar"], @RC 212. . . the guys are probably knee deep in gore. The chatter from Maddox is as welcome as the chatter from Team One. "Fringe Actual? Sitrep on Team One, please. So I can coordinate my own." Tell me about [member="Jared Ovmar"]. Please, why can't I feel more than a glint of his penchant for causing others distress in battle? It doesn't sit well, I try and push the thought out, more about the mission and less about the lover who left with a gaping chasm of silence.

Guess that was both our faults. For the longest time I thought Jared might have died. Disappeared. But no, he just left. As I watch the work of the teams on Command's sensors, I push my mind out away from Shinju and closer to where I'm feeling brother-against-brother killing each other. Does Jared lie at the centre of the storm, and if so, was this what he protected me from in all those battles he denied me entry to? "Bucket, prep Tyr and Tus."

"Sure thing, boss. . . Stop touching your blaster pistol's hilt. You're not coming."

"What? Oh. Right. Yeah."

"Boss? Do you want me in there, too?"

"Yeah. Light them up so I don't have to."

 

[Ashin Varanin]

[member="Anders Sivas"]

"Acknowledged. Wait one."

She spun, lightsabre flaring to life again, as a scarred Barabel lunged out of the ship's guts. Ten messy seconds later-

"Fringe Actual to Sivas. Objective One is contained. Estimate full neutralization in five."
[member="Jared Ovmar"] [member="Matsu Xiangu"] [member="Lucianus Adair"]

 

[Velok the Younger]

[member="Livia Maddox"]

With the Divya and a doubled fighter contingent coming up in her wake, Rave should have felt something like invincible. As the Lethewalker closed in on the fleeing vessels, however, she felt nothing at all in the direction of her existence, no sense of self. Instead, she felt the metal.

There had never been, so far as she was aware, a wholly alchemized starship, and she certainly wasn't intending to make the Lethewalker invulnerable. But the ship full of slaves on its ballistic downward trajectory, and the Lethewalker's solitary tractor beam, presented a structural need that a Haran'uliik-class simply didn't meet. Full power to tractor beam and engines would have ripped the beam projector from the superstructure.

She'd alchemized large volumes of metal before -- the Fett Kal knives, the Dauntless swords, Zaiden's desk, the security room of the Red Ravens' casino -- but this was something else entirely. Kneeling in the cargo hold above the tractor beam projector, she planted her palms on the deck and got to work.

 

[Yasha Cadera]

"Roger that, Fringe Actual. Thank you." I say to [member="Ashin Varanin"] and keep my head in Team Three's game. Bucket's taken off its fedora hat and grabbed its favourite scattergun and an LL-Rifle in Assault mode. I feel bad for the slavers, before I get another sick interpretation of Shinju and her daughter's dance moves coming through my emotional connections.

The droids will be a mercy. "Tyr, Tus. MASH. Roll out." Bucket says, tipping its head and leaving for Team Three.

The two twin Echani Mimic Battle Droids have their electroswords and personal shields, MASH is carrying its field medic array and I put a hand on my forehead. "Dissero, Sitrep. I'm sending Bucket, Tyr, Tus and MASH down now. Don't be alarmed the droids are mine." [member="Brom Burnside"]

Within two minutes I can hear the sound of Bucket's Viscera Scattergun rocketing off to the heady death screams of slavers, their bodies falling with wet slaps to the ground. I bite my cheek and hold on to the command bulkhead in front of me, now's not the time to let death effect my judgement. "Fringe Actual, Bucket and the EMBU's are on the ground."

 

[Livia Maddox]

"Oh I'll be singing a chorus of praise for my crew's efficiency in handling the lunatics soon enough, Fringe Actual. Maddox out." Captain Maddox perched on the front edge of her chair and cleared her throat.

"Don't leave the good Grand Admiral waiting, lads! Slowest section to get complete their objectives gets double duty for a week!"

"Captain, the Lethewalker is trying to tractor a barge. I don't think its hull integrity is sound enough, Ma'am."

"Can we assist the Lethewalker, Lieutenant?"

"No, Ma'am. We'd never make it in time."

"Then let [member="Rave Merrill"] focus on her problems and focus on ours. Put Nelvaan Squadron on my holo, get Tirta to report on the confiscated slaver ships and their holds. Prep a landing zone on planet to send them back to. Viciously and in a ball of smoke if we have to, although I'd rather they go of their own accord. Tactical, sitrep."

"Their hull integrity is reading 54%, Ma'am."

"Bring it to 32% and chime me. Fire when ready. Dasha! Ready a boarding party."

"Yes Ma'am."

"Comm, tell me they're surrendering."

"They appear to be cursing green streaks, Ma'am."

"Blue streaks. Cursing blue streaks."

"So they are, Captain."

"Hail them again, relay the inevitability of their cold dead bodies flinging toward the object with the most gravitational pull in ninety seconds if they don't power down and comply."

"Yes Ma'am."

"Jolly good." Captain Fury sat back again and put a hand to her ruined left knee. Ninety seconds.

 

[Velok the Younger]

[member="Livia Maddox"]

Palms flat to the deck, eyes shut, Rave kept it up.

'It' was a concept that didn't translate well into Basic, certainly not layman's basic. At one level, this degree of metallurgical alchemy involved smoothing out the crystalline lattice of the durasteel around her, removing flaws and solidifying welds. At another level entirely, her focus rested on enhancing the strength of intramolecular and intermolecular bonds.

And at a third level entirely, she touched aperion. If the Force had subatomic particles or fundamental divisions, aperion was certainly the most crucial to alchemy. Aperion was the aspect of the Force, or perhaps of midichlorians, that controlled time, mass, gravity, molecular bonds, electromagnetism, physics. Every Padawan touched aperion when they generated a Force push, applying a vector to an object's atomic forces. But none of them knew what they were, in truth, doing -- why their will affected the universe.

Like a reporter asking a physicist for a definition, students and customers and employees often asked Rave to explain this or that. But in the end there were no words for the effect that swept through the Lethewalker's bones.

 

[Ilias Nytrau]

Team Two - [member="Lucien Cordel"] | [member="Inger Strömfire"]

Just as she could be present, she could just as easily make herself unremarkable, unmemorable, but that was not how she was dressed - no, she dressed to the very station she had left behind on Corellia, and in the process easily matched the Sith Lord in whose company she acted this day. While pushing along with Lucien (with whom she was already acquainted) and Miss Strömfire, she had said nary a word, speaking with little more than her eyes, the tilt and turn of her head, and the odd gesture when needed, and had rode along as such, mute. All the better to hear more, see more, my dear. When the butler came for them, she thought Lucien's clipping of the older man an appropriate act, in character, if not in fact. She said nothing, but gave the man of service a look with her bold blue eyes, eyes that said nothing as intended.

The ascended the staircase, displeasure wafting off the group in perhaps less than subtle waves, and it was in this moment at the top of the stairs that she stepped forward, placing a hand on Lucien's forearm, and giving him a look that said without a doubt to allow her to handle this. Then she pulled the doors open, and advanced into the inner domain of this filth. It was here that three men sat - one tall like a beanpole and almost sickly pale to match the comparison, to his left a squat, rouge-cheeked man comparable to a tomato, and one to the skinny man's left that was, for lack of better words, pear shaped.The beanpole stood, and placed his palms flat on the desk he sat behind, and looked right at her with his beady eyes.

"Good evening, sir, madams."

His voice was laden with the grease that he might as well have been made of. She could easily deduce exactly where on her body he was looking.

"I am Yurgat Borgas, and these are my associates Oliff Ileg, and Kork Qy. If you would come, and have a seat, we can get down to business."

The Corellian Blonde ignored the perversion of the man's gaze, looked back to her companions, then forward to the man.

"I prefer to stand, Mister Borgas," she replied, smoothly and plainly as she stepped closer, the low heel of her shoes clicking softly on the volcanic glass floor, "and not waste my time sinking into comfort when we can, as you say, get down to business."

Borgas' wide mouth curled into a grin.

"Very well," he said, holding a hand out to Ileg who handed him a datapad, which he then held out to her. She gently took the 'pad into her hands, looking it over only long enough to take in every detail possible before delivering it into the hands of Lucien, as Borgas continued to speak, "these are the revised terms, which I imagine you'll find agreeable."

Sel turned back to Borgas, any smile on her face having evaporated.

"Perhaps I would..."

If you weren't a sleaze.

"...after we talk some more, Mister Borgas. I'd hate to think you weren't giving us a fair deal."

And it was as such that they went into negotiations... all the while, with her 'ear' on the Force, awaiting the signal that would soon come, without a doubt.

 

[Lucien Cordel]

(Sorry works been a *insert expletive here * recently)

Lucien smiled "So it begins My lady" he whispered down the receiver to Ashin"see you on the other side" He felt a hand on his fore arm and Lady [member="Selinica Miriya Cailis"] stepped before him, they had indeed met before and Lucien understood her message loud and clear she would handle this. He followed into the room behind her, elbowing a farther eager geust in the process. A prime distraction to greet one of his agents at the door. A tap on the wrist was all it took and Lucien could transmit a mental message "see we are not disterbed" then Lucien moved on with a simple growl and a glare. The three stooges playing host that evening didn't instill much aprihension in Lucien. He had seen far worse ... He would certainly enjoy seeing them grovel however. He looked the one with the voice over once then tutted and walked forward "your hospitality leaves much to be desired ... and then cretin you employ as a butler should be flayed"

Lucien was not so frugal with his time as to remain standing and thus took a seat indicating Inger stand behind him. He looked up at the slavers as the tall one engaged in a veiled confrontation with lady Cailis. Lucien decide his tongue should be removed as soon as circumstance allowed.

The data pad was offered to him and he snatched it away from Selenica ... Before immediately apologiesing mentally. Lucien very much regretted having to be rude. He looks over the revised over. Lucien made a few afermative noises "Mr. Borges ... And you two quiet ones " he mused " I have yet to view any of these items nor have I been allowed to inspect them for lice ..." He looked up with a grin " I trust you intend to rectify this immediately, then we can begin the talks the lady so very desperately needs"

Lucien kept his eyes fixed on the slavers whilst speaking to his two team mates over the force "I have a few men here ... The door man and two of the waiters some six more are outside ... I'm ready to strike when you are lady Cailis ... However perhaps if Lady Strömfire can gain access to the pens we can deploy the slaves and even the odds some what ... I leave it up to you."