Public Remember When: The Clockwork Rebellion (835 ABY - 29 Years Ago)

[Jend-Ro Quill]

OOC/ Some events and also Events have shaken the galaxy, but many of our writers weren't around for them and many of our characters didn't exist yet. This thread is a dumping ground for vignettes or unconnected little stories that take place twenty-nine years ago during the Clockwork Rebellion. Where was your character, if they were alive at this point? What were they doing? How did the Clockwork Rebellion affect them? If they weren't alive, what was happening to their parents, teachers...? If this thread gets traction, there's plenty more where it came from. Resources:

• Event announcement (2013)
• Event thread (2013)

All across Coruscant a massive droning broke the sky, and the cloud began to rain down on the world of Coruscant. Millions of droids fell from the sky, swooping down and beginning a slaughter of untold proportions. Coruscant was not the only world however. Every major capital began to swarm with droids. Dromund Kaas, Corellia, Fondor. Every world with a size able population met the ire of Omni. Trillions of droids streamed into the galaxy like a black mass rending the heavens.

IC/

JEND-RO QUILL, JEDI PADAWAN
FORMERLY QUILL SAGGET OF THE RASKAVA
<1 YEAR AFTER THE UNITING/FOUNDING OF THE MODERN JEDI ORDER

Living on Coruscant hurt at the best of times. Master Boolon understood, and so they went offworld frequently, giving Quill the solitude he craved. A trillion lives blinded and deafened him.

So when terror united them, their resonance in the Force became a tsunami against the sandcastle of Quill's self-control.

Boolon Murr's Ithorian shuttle had been a diplomatic vessel until just hours ago. Now it was an evacuation transport packed to the gills with the newly united Order's first crop of Jedi younglings. Kids roughly three to twelve years old, all steeped in fear that they didn't have the experience to control. Quill knew just how they felt. Executive function had failed him: he was curled up in the copilot's seat, catatonic and useless, all too aware of everything.

The shuttle slewed as a wave of descending terror droids splashed across the cockpit. It had good inertial compensators, so no chorus of shouts rose from the kids in the halls and the cargo hold, but the radical disconnect between Quill's inner ear and field of vision gave his stomach a lurch. Boolon twisted the shuttle again, shaking off the droids. Metal fingers left parallel clawmarks in the transparisteel.

"Quill," said the Ithorian Jedi Knight, without his usual patience but without judgment, "I need you. I need you for several things. Please, Quill, snap out of it."

One long-fingered hand disengaged from the controls just long enough to grip Quill's shoulder in solidarity. The Force flooded Quill's mind and body, cutting through the paralysis of the panic attack. Quill's body relaxed of its own accord, even the painfully knotted muscles in his neck and shoulders. He took a shaky breath and found some measure of control.

A droid thudded against the cockpit and clamped down. A cutting torch punched into the transparisteel, shockingly close. Quill flinched as a new wave of terror and death rolled over him. Not far away, a skyscraper was coming down. But Boolon's gift, healing of a sort, gave him traction with himself.

He had no lightsaber of his own yet; as a former Raskava Darksider, he wasn't trusted with one yet, at his own insistence. Boolon's saber flickered to Quill's hand. The sky-blue blade sheared through the damaged cockpit panel beside the cutting torch. Without artistry, Quill shoved the saber through the droid's face. It fell away from the evac shuttle, into murky depths that were starting to blossom with fire. That left two adjacent, glowing holes in the transparisteel.

"Patch kit," said Boolon tersely, steering through the gap between falling skyscrapers, and Quill - to his own deep surprise - got to work.


OOC/ Again, this is a place for vignettes - I'm not looking for interaction with Quill.

 

[Ashin Cardé Varanin]

EMPRESS ASHIN VARANIN, DARTH DESMIUS, MID THIRTIES
EVACUATION OF DROMUND KAAS

There was no joy in cutting through the waves of droids; she barely had time for fear.

Their claws skittered off her alchemical plate and cut harsh lines in its taozin lacquer. Their mass crashed against Force shields, overwhelmed them, grated on the armor, threw her to the broken ground over and over. And not just droids, but some of her own people, either opportunists or infected by Omni's mind-control nanobots. Only minutes ago, Darth Apparatus had urged her to evacuate rather than waste her power on a spiteful Force storm, and he'd been right. If she'd done that she would have died. Only minutes ago, her vizier Kaine Zambrano had revealed that he was infected, a pawn of Omni, and had attacked her. Kaas City was a gaping hole that vomited attackers. The few remaining skyscrapers were a tilted ruin around the pit, like broken teeth.

Failure. Crushing failure. She couldn't let it show in her stance, face, voice, mind - or these Sith Lords would never forget. Show weakness and they'd turn on her. Even once the dust settled, if she still had an empire - even then she'd be vulnerable.

She was, after all, the first Dark Lord of the Sith in six thousand years to lose Dromund Kaas.

 

[Caltin Vanagor]

Caltin Vanagor was frozen in ice. No one had found him yet. He had been here for a while

.

 

[Kuxirra Tano-Bonteri]

Zenda Dillonnass watched in horror at the destruction around her. She was only seven, and although this was her first time on Coruscant, she knew this wasn't normal. Nearby, Leehak Tano-Bonteri, also Togruta and seven years old, watched as well. He had been to Coruscant before with his parents. He came from a long line of Jedi, and thus had training from his parents. Both were Force-sensitive, and as they turned to look at each other, their eyes locked, his green eyes meeting her blue ones. "Do you think we'll survive?" Zenda asked hopefully.
"I hope so," Leehak said.
"Zenda Dillonnass." She said, extending a hand.
"Leehak Tano-Bonteri." He said, shaking it.
Little did they know how powerful this relationship would be...

 

[Zark San Tekka]

ZARK, JEDI PADAWAN
ERA OF JEDI UNITY

It was his first time on Coruscant.

Everywhere he looked he saw devastation. Held aloft like a torch his lightsaber's golden yellow blade cast broken foundations in a radiant haze, its hilt slick with black oil. A Jedi's duty was to protect the innocent but not even a fully trained Jedi Master could hope to make more than a trifling difference at the world's end. He was only a student. Now it seemed that he would soon discover the Force's greatest mystery of all.

"Master Hexyra!" Zark risked calling out, "Can you hear me?"

Xylon Hexyra was a Krevaaki sage and one of the wisest Jedi he'd ever met. They resided together within the Kyber Temple on Jedha along with a small enclave. This was to be their first journey into the Deep Core since the Jedi Order's galactic reformation. Although he wouldn't admit it to his master the padawan had been excited to see Galactic City. Things hadn't quite gone according to plan.

He received no reply that he could hear but a slight tremor in the Force washed over him.

What he could not clear away by hand Zark struggled to lift with his mind. He and Master Hexyra had been separated early on in the pandemonium. Part of this level had collapsed not long after. Now he could barely sense the krevaaki's presence. Yet the deeper he went the stronger that feeling got. He tried to follow it as best he could.

"Ah, padawan. You are unhurt. This is good."

For a living creature impaled by a steel rod, Xylon's voice was surprisingly calm.

"Hang on, master!" there was a frantic edge in the young Jedi's voice, "I'll get you out of there."

"I am afraid I am dying," and yet he certainly didn't sound even perturbed by it, "Nothing can stop that now. You must leave me. Go. Escape. Survive."

"I can get you to a healer. Or you can teach me-"

"Do not disobey," Hexyra raised his voice for the first and only time Zark could remember, "This is my last request. Honor your master's wishes."

Climbing back out was the hardest thing he'd ever done. When he reached solid foundation this droid apocalypse had somehow gotten even worse. Another cloud of winged automatons descended slaughtering every living being in their path. The young Jedi glanced around for an escape route yet he could not bring himself to move his feet. Not while Master Hexyra was still down there. Maybe still breathing. It would not take the rampaging machines long to find him and they would show no mercy.

"Forgive me, master. Here's as good a place to die as any."

When rescue teams pulled him out of the rubble days later Zark was barely alive.

Jedi Master Xylon Hexyra's body was recovered intact and cremated in a traditional funeral pyre.

 

[Jerec Asyr]

CORONET CITY
CORELLIA

Crouched in the basement of his foster parents' house, Jer did his best. Right now that meant keeping the sobs down to a gentle hiccup, and not getting snot in his stinging eyes when he wiped his face. A kid his age wasn't supposed to break down like this. He hadn't even liked them. But they'd shoved him down the stairs and died before he could even get the door closed. Feth alone knew why the droids hadn't killed him on the spot. He replayed it in his head - had the droids been looking the other way? What kind of field of view did those blank eyes have? Or maybe they'd just figured he'd die when they leveled the house.

The basement ceiling shivered under the weight of the jumbled wreckage. Dust came down, and dangling bits of spiderwebs. Jer squeezed way back under the staircase. It'd been all day and all night since, and he was painfully thirsty from all that crying. But he still stayed quiet.

That was the goal. It shattered when the door did. Boots tromped down the stairs, stunningly close to his head. He squealed or shrieked or gasped - some formless sound that fit all of the above - and someone dragged him out by his shins into brilliant light.

"Guns down, guns down. Feth, kill that light." The one who'd dragged him out let go and squatted. "Looks what, six?"

He was eight and wiry, but he couldn't very well protest with his pants full of day-old shit and his heart rate hitting escape velocity.

"Well, this spot's as good as any. Mugg, get the kid cleaned up and fed. Might make a decent runner once he gets sapient. Skav, get back upstairs and lay down a sensor pod. Pretty decent bolthole here. Uh, the area around the top of the stairs was the kitchen - see if there's any food left..."

 

[Geist]

It wasn't every day a mechanical overlord rose up from he ashes of obscurity and took control of the center of the Galaxy. It also wasn't every day that Geist had a contract that would cover his operation costs for the next five years right in front of him.

"Hmm," he imitated. They hated when he acted like them, like a meatbag. The fat Twi'lek scurried back away from the droid screaming bloody murder. The holonet had crashed just before he made his entrance into the board room of whatever company this slime ball worked for. The guards were easy to dispatch as whatever this Omni was ravaged the net and infiltrated systems. Outside it seemed like Coruscant was burning, melting down the centuries of durasteel and lies that this "Republic" had been founded on.

It illuminated this encounter quite nicely.

"You're lucky," he stared, his voice oddly resonant and easy to listen to, "That the Hutts want you alive, Waxy." His hand began to vibrate and hum as the vibro motors activated. Like this his hand could cut through nearly anything. "Or your head slugs would have become very closely acquainted with my hands." Waxy flinched again, raising his hands instinctively in front of his face. Geist rolled his photoreceptors and reached down to grab him and-

They were falling. Something had just blasted the high rise building they were in, cutting it in half. No, that wasn't it. Black droids, the likes which he'd never seen, were falling from the sky. He could see the sky now. They had fallen straight through the building, cutting it away with lasers as they passed, causing nothing but utter destruction. One such droid had blasted a hole right through his prey. Geist cursed loudly and raised his weapon to one of the droids and pulled the trigger. The high powered blaster bolt fried its red eye and turned its insides to slag.

Apparently, its friends didn't like that because in moments he was set upon by its friends. Their vibro arms, much like his own, cut and pierced him, tearing his red cloak to shreds and Geist to scrap. He tried to scream but he had no mouth and they had destroyed his vocabulator. His head fell, clanged off of the 40th floor of StrongZ Intergalactic and landed with a soft thud. He only had a single photoreceptor left, most of his body was scrap. His one single eye stared up at the Omni droids, a fire like one he hadn't felt since he killed his old master, and reached up as if to fight back. The droid, a different one from the horde that had torn him to shreds, looked down at him curiously. It cocked its head then opened its mouth, revealing a weapon of some sort, and fired turning Geist to slag.

He awoke almost immediately afterwards, his old Kaleesh vessel where he held his other platforms. He screamed in anger, tearing himself away from the wall mount it had been on before. He swept his arms aside, scattering repair parts to the floor and startling the repair drone that had been maintaining his platforms when he'd gone offline. He HATED war droids.

 

[Thalia Senn]

​

Mikael Senn pulled his control yoke in hard as his XA-5 struggled to turn him into mush. Where had these droids come from? Why did they fly like...Well, like pilots? The X-wing craft screamed as it flew mere centimeters from the side of a skyscraper. Coruscant's skylines were a mess now. Even after his near death experience with a wall now he was dealing with civilian speeder traffic? They were flying everywhere with no regard to the safety of others.

"Spark 9 you alright? SPARK 9! By the Red Seas of Knores, if you don't-"

"I'm 'ere woman!" Mikael replied. He winced with how much heat had been in his words. "Just-" He spun around a skycar, "-a little," swerve. "-busy!" He pulled up and over a flaming tanker.

"Oh thank the Force! Senn I thought I'd lost you, I-"

"Cut the chatter love birds," came the rough voice of Spark 2, Mikael's squadron leader. "I know you two just got married but keep the mushyness to a minimum. We're sort of facing a Droid Apocolypse here?" Mikael chuckled at that.

"Copy Spark Leader. I'll try my best not to-" Something slammed into the canopy of his starfighter. "What in the-" He looked up. His astromech was screaming loudly over his private com and the translator board was going crazy as it attempted to translate the incoming stream of binary. One of the black droids was on his ship, and it was pounding away at his canopy.

"Oh spray," he muttered. He pulled hard to port, screaming around the corner of another block of buildings. The droid hitching a ride raised its claw for one more strike but was cut clean in half by the corner of the building. Coolant and some other black ichor splattered across his viewport. THe auto clearing function sprayed foam over it and the muck was gone in an instant...and then he saw it.

It was like nothing he'd ever seen. A droid nearly as large as the skyscraper lumbered through the Works. Fires were everywhere, the flammable materials and fuel catching light as droid footsoldiers battled it out with Republic troopers.

"Senn! You've got two on your tail!" The warning came too late. He was too stupefied by what he'd seen. His cockpit went up in flames around him. All he could do was squeeze his eyes shut in pain as shrapnel pierced his beck. Somehow though his astromech had activated the eject. Immediately he felt the heat of the burning Coruscant air. The botched eject sent him hurtling through the air. It was all he could do but to hold tightly to the sides of his chair. He tried to get his shute to activate but it just wouldn't. It didn't matter though, his chair crashed through the transparisteel of a nearby building. He slid down the floor of the crumbling building, his chair sending up sparks. He could feel his brain rattling inside of his skull and he wished he was dead.

His movement came to a stop when a sharp pain ran up his right side. He screamed a scream he'd never knew he'd had in him. Not on a thousand sailing accidents had he felt this sort of pain. He blacked out. When he came to he looked down to see that a rod about the circumference of his fist and as long as his femur had cut through his arm, though cut was a bit of an understatement. There was no way he was making it out of this alive. He looked down and noticed his left leg was a mangled mess as well. He swallowed back tears as he thought about his newly wed wife and soon to be widow.

His head hung and he began to sob. He was sobbing so loudly he didn't hear the three Omni droids turn the corner and level their blasters at him. He did hear the snap-hiss of lightsabers though which grabbed his attention. The skirmish was over in an instant. The droids were scrap and the two Jedi ran over to him, one of them reaching into their robe for a comlink. The one on the com was a tall, beautiful Devaronian who stood almost regally among the chaos. The other was a small but lighthearted Chandrafan with a heart-shaped nose.

"This is going to hurt," she said in their species' trademark squeeky voice. A needle plunged into his thigh. "Not that part," she quipped, "That is a sedative so you don't accidentally bite off your own tongue."

"W-what are you gonna-" There was no warning, just searing hot pain and two quick strokes of the small Jedi's lightsaber and both his leg and bad arm were cut. He blacked out again.

*******
​

Sometime after the initial attack
Republic Medical Frigate Tristan of Corellia

Maya felt like she hadn't slept in days. Her body was sore all over and she smelled like feet wrapped in leathery, burnt, bantha bacon. But it was nothing compared to what her Senn was feeling. Her fingertips touched the cool transparisteel of the viewing glass that looked into her husband's room. She had been right there with him. She had been his wingmate. How could she let this happen?

The Chadrafan Jedi was standing on a box to peer in as well. She had been with her ever since she'd learned of Mikael's fate. The Jedi had said she felt somewhat responsible. A part of Maya resented the Jedi for what she had done, though she doubted there was much else that could have been done in such a situation. She watched as the doctor and their Wing Commander gave their regards to Mikael and walked out of the room. With those two out of the way she could see him fully now. He was burned and cut, bacta gauze around his two stumps. He was looking out of the viewport with a blank expression on his face.

She saluted the Wing Commander when he exited and dashed inside, the Chadrafan right behind her.

"S-Senn?" He flinched at the sound of her voice.

"They won't let me fly again," Mikael said after a long silence. "Said that a pilot with my skill and my record, might've been able to swing it if I had one prosthetic, but two is too much of a liability for my squadron." This was what Maya had feared most. She felt her hand go up to cover her mouth, tears welling up in her eyes. Mikael turned to face them, his eyes still vacant and a sad expression on his face. It was clear he'd cried all he could.

"I won't be up there with you anymore Stormlight," Maya shook her head and fell on his chest, bawling into it. Mikael's eyes fell on the Chadrafan, not filled with hate or malice, but gratitude as he hugged his wife close with his one good arm.

"It is my deepest apologies and sorrow that I have caused you this pain," the Jedi squeaked. "I swear by the Force and all that is Light that if I had known-" Mikael shook his head to stop her.

"What is your name, Master Jedi."

"I'm not a Master yet," she sheepishly corrected, "But my name is Thalia Gran. Jedi Knight." Mikael closed his eyes and breathed in a sharp breath, touching his forehead to his wife's.

"Then that will be our first daughter's name," he said. "As thanks for giving me my family back to me and saving me from that terrible place." The Chadrafan gasped and started to say something in protest but Maya too looked at her with a smile and nodded.

"I can only hope our Thalia is as brave and selfless as you were today. Thank you for bringing my stormlight back to me."

"You honor me with this Mikael Senn, Maya Senn. I hope you all live a peaceful life."

 

[Cassus Akovin]

Triam Akovin
30 Years Ago
Zeltros

"Kark kark kark!" Triam screamed as the flames of atmospheric re-entry licked its way across the hull of the Junk'd Up Ship.

"WE ARE THE HARBRINGERS OF YOUR EVOLUTION."​

A massive droid roared from the back of her ship, the one responsible for blowing out an engine block, but thankfully wedged and vacuumed sealed so tightly around the hull as to be utterly immobile. It's own thrusters on the outside of her hull must've been firing too, either that, or its back end was creating an incredible amount of drag against the atmosphere. Hopefully the rising temperature was enough to melt it into her ship, and hopefully she still had enough fuel that wasn't leaking out to correct for the disturbance in her flight path on their downward descent... otherwise spinning out of control would be the understatement of the past century.

All around her these swarms of similar droids were descending into the atmosphere of Zeltros, like evil space-locusts. The rest of them weren't paying her any mind. It was either because they assumed she was doomed already, and/or she looked like one of them due to her impromptu passenger stuck half way through her freighter. Whatever the reason, she would have time later to be grateful to the grace of the universe for such unlikely circumstances coming to pass, right now she was still spewing out a constant stream of curses as she put everything into her mediocre piloting skills to hopefully control her descent into a non-lethal trajectory.

Suffice to say, it didn't look good, and the landscape was an utter nightmare... or least the landscape she could see through the hellish flames obstructing her view in the cockpit. Cloudcutters crumbling, fires everywhere, death and destruction on a scale not even her fathers "war stories" could do justice to. Looking for a body of water to land on (and hopefully skim across instead of scattering into debris on the surface), she tried to steer the great hulking fireball that was currently her home, trying very hard to ignore the terrible sounds of her unwanted companion through this awful journey to Zeltros. It looked like she was going to make a controlled descent, coming over a city into a large body of water. Her speed was slow enough now that despite the drag, she was no longer on fire... but then, there was a small explosion and her fuel dropped immediately to zero.

"Oh no," Was all she could manage before her ship began to plummet. "Oh no," Her elevation control went completely out of her control but thanked the force that there was still some steering capacity. "Oh no no no!" She exclaimed as it appeared she was nose diving towards a pair of cloudcutters. She tried to steer one way and it failed to respond, then the other way, and she realized her steering wasn't going to be fast enough to miss them. "Feirfek!" She screamed as she had to make a decision with only moments before it could kill her. She steered the one way that she could, and aimed for the gap between the half-desolated buildings. She had no idea if she was going to survive this, but she let out a prayer to whatever would listen before the scraping impact rocked her world into unconsciousness.

​

The view over the city and the sea was incredible, if not for the terrible scent of burning flesh and toxic fumes wafting its way even thousands of meters high as she was. Fires still burned, every so often a building would collapse, drones still flew, blasters were still going off far in the distance... but Triam was alive. Stuck, trapped, and without a safe means of escape, but alive.

"WE ARE THE HARBRinGERs oF YOUR EVOLUTIon."​

So was her passenger, unfortunately. Or fortunately, depending on how she looked at it. She'd made a pros and cons list while observing it, having little else to do, stranded in the precarious situation she was in. On the plus side, if the Omni-droid hadn't impacted her ship the way it had, the other droids may have opted to destroy her, and if it wasn't around now the Omni-droids would have likely found her ship to snuff her out of life. All they had to do was be curious around her ship, and she was sure it would come loose and tumble the rest of the way to the dead streets of Zeltros. On the con side...

"WE ARE THE-"​

"By the hells, shut up!" It was a bit overly talkative, and not terrible creative with its choice of conversation piece. Also, it was primarily responsible for her current position in life. She had considered at least a dozen times every hour the benefits of shooting out the brains of this infernal contraption, but every time calculated it as too great a risk. Change any single factor in her position, and it could lead to a swift and terrible demise. This ship was her home, she didn't want to inadvertently make it her tomb because she couldn't deal with a chatty killer droid.

The best she could do, was hope she could survive long enough that this crisis might resolve itself. She imagined the Republic had to respond, Zeltros had a significant civilian population, surely they would answer its plight. Assuming they even received a communication from Zeltros, the droids may have blocked out communications ahead of their invasion, and then killed anyone who could do any contacting. Triam briefly considered the origin of the droids, if they might be created by the Sith Empire. She decided against it after getting brave enough, to approach as close as she dared to her mechanical terror. It gave its usual missive as she inspected it, and determined despite its lack of creativity and heavy damage, the droid was of a highly sophisticated nature that she doubted any nation leaving the Dark Era held the industry capable of producing one, let alone the thousands, perhaps even millions she saw clouding the skies of Zeltros.

Over the course of a week, she continued to study the machine, gradually getting braver with her closeness, marking off how far she had dared go. Even in the dilapidated state of her ship, she was thankful that most of the kitchen had survived, and that her supplies would more or less last her for a long while. Still finite, and something to be conserved, but at least she wouldn't die thirsty or hungry. As her fear lessened, and her boldness increased, one day, she got a little too close to her curiosity...

"Gah!" She recoiled away as a huge gash formed on her prosthetic arm, which she had brought up to protect her body from a tentacle she had believed to be inert all this time. Counting once again her lucky stars, she ran to the front of the ship, and observed her now damage prothesis. In the open mechanical wound she saw... movement within, though she couldn't make out the individual nanites, she recognized the liquid-like metallic sheen of material seeping in and around her mechanical hand, and slowly felt herself losing control of it. Fear gripped her heart, so she detached the limb as quickly as she could manage before losing total control over it. As it lost power disconnected from her body, she watched in amazement as the nanites seemed to mend the gash in her prosthetic over the course of an hour.

"Fascinating." She exclaimed to herself, before she risked picking up the repaired prosthetic with a pair of tongs and placing it into a containment box. She brought it to a workbench for further study and observation. Seeing the nanites work, she reasoned that was how the Omni-droid's previously inert tentacle had come alive. These micro-machines were capable of repairing the droid, and even her prosthetic (a design they likely never encountered previously to their exposure). A curious thought entered her head ominously wondering if the same could be true of flesh. Looking at the stump of her arm, and remembering the loss of control she had with the prosthesis quickly banished the thought away. It was an absurd thought, it couldn't be possible. But you could make it possible.

​

"It's been two weeks now, I think I've successfully pulled out the source-code for the Omni-nanites, and re-configured them into a more useful form. I've been sitting on the innovation for a couple days now, because I'm not sure exactly what they will do, and I'm short of any subjects to test it on. Other than myself. I'm running out of time, however, as I'm pretty sure that my companion, whom I've come to calling Cyclops, is starting to repair itself more thoroughly. I may not have enough time to wait around to see what it does, before Cyclops moves the wrong way and causes us all to fall to our deaths. Or at least mine, anyway. I'm also running out of useable water. I've been getting by with rain water buckets, but I'm pretty sure the rain has been toxic since the invasion now, not been feeling too well lately, almost like I'm not entirely myself. Foods going to run out soon too, if I don't ration it even further. Any hope of the Republic coming has been lost, so either they realized intelligently they can't face this threat and it's localized to Zeltros for some reason, or the whole galaxy has been effected and the Republic is gone already."

Triam was talking to herself, and to anything listening. She didn't have a recorder, but felt like she needed to speak what she'd come to terms with out loud. If nothing else but to sooth herself with the sounds of a human voice that wasn't loudly obnoxious about its artificial mission. Trying to sleep through that was a nightmare, but she managed after the first handful of days without sleeping. Why did she bother anyway, she should just let the droid kill her, all hope was lost.

"I mean, at this point what do I really have to lose? I'd say there isn't anything much better to do except die slowly, why not go out doing something no one else has done before?" Hesitantly, and a bit weakly considering her survivor circumstances, Triam lifted the containment of her Prosthesis. As if what it contained was a great evil to be treated with respect and care, she lifted and applied the arm back to its rightful place. As power was applied to the device, she felt a surge of energy pour into her body through the prothesis. Terrible images flashed through her mind and pain filled her body. She became aware of a greater consciousness than herself, the reality of a galaxy-sized brain slaughtering billions and billions of people, while other powerful minds joined the collective. Omni is everywhere. Omni is everything.

As the pain left, the weakness she felt before her left as well, and in its place there was a strength like never before. After so many days of not feeling herself, under the gaze of Omni and its subtle guidance directing her experiments with Omni's nanites, her intellect was put to its best use and felt like herself like never before. She felt the flow of nanites within her, repairing her faulty organic body to the peak of health, and looked to the machine she had called Cyclops with renewed understanding. An evolution had occurred, and she had it to thank for it. She felt the nanites flowing between her prothesis and the rest of her arm pause for a moment, as if awaiting command. Interpreting the mechanical hesitance, she realized there was the question of whether or not she needed the prothesis any more. She could have her "real" arm back if she wanted, to restore what was taken from a Jedi. With a smile, she halted their progress. The arm she possessed was her real arm, the distinction between organic and machine didn't matter any more. For Triam Akovin, it was one in the same, and the shiny chrome of her digits represented to her a symbol, the acceptance of Omni's gift of life.

At this point, her Supreme Intelligence indicated to her that what she had modified in Omni's nanites could do so much more than simply repair her body, and that she would be needed soon to assist the Great Evolution. This precarious position simply wouldn't do. In a sudden massive burst of energy she outstretched all her limbs and a swarm of nanites flowed from her like the flames of a phoenix and began to put the old Freighter back into order, pushing out the Omni-droid but keeping the ship aloft nonetheless between the Cloudcutters.

"Zztsyaaaa!" Triam screamed suddenly, with pain across her entire conscious being, as Omni - an almighty intelligence spanning almost the entire glaxay -ceased. Her ship plummeted and Triam along with it, and there was a sense of impact.

Then absolutely nothing.

​

"Ma'am, are you alright?" A voice greeted her for what felt like the first time, as she opened her eyes to a bright sun overlooking the horizon of a vast sea. She shielded her eyes from the light with a chrome hand, and smelt faintly the scent of death, but also strangely a sterile smell mixing along with it. She recognized the armor the owner of the voice carried, she began to recall. Where was she again?

"Ma'am?" They question her again. Right, I'm a woman. She thought.

"I'm-" She struggled with a name. Tr... Tri? That wasn't quite right, so she settled for letting them know that she felt... great actually. Like she was waking up from a nap. "I'm okay."

Triam Akovin. She recalled finally, but seeing the insignia on the medics uniform, she realized that probably wasn't a good idea to let them know. Why? Why shouldn't she... former Republic Soldier, A.W.O.L. Right, that was why. Though she felt that they probably had bigger priorities right now.

"Can you stand?"

"Yeah, I can thanks." As if to prove the point, she stood herself up, and realized that her clothes stuck to her damply. Looking down she recognized dried blood, and lots of scratches. She looked behind her and noticed a ship, a freighter... Junk'd Up Ship. That was her ship, and it looked like the way she had left it, if not a little worse for wear.

"Come with me, we need to evacuate the area in case the buildings collapse. We're looking for survivors, do you know of anyone else who might be in the area with you?" The medic soldier asked her, and she couldn't recall. She didn't really know how she ended up here. She vaguely recalled some kind of disaster, and it must have caused her to go unconscious, but she couldn't remember. She intuited, however, based on her history, that going on their medical care due to mental issues was not in her best interest. If she were able bodied, she could help them maybe, and they wouldn't ask her too many questions.

"No, I was alone. That's my ship over there, I think I just fainted from all of this... destruction." She gestured around. "Sorry for worrying you, I guess my stomach wasn't as strong as I thought when it comes to this stuff... if you need help, I can offer up my ships services to ferry survivors out of here?" The soldier looked hesitant for a moment, and then looked around to the rest of the medics scattered about rummaging through the ruble, or pulling out scanners looking for signs of life. Medical frigates floated in the air, and hover vehicles were all around. There weren't too many in the immediate area though. Finally, they turned back.

"We have the situation covered, but if you're ambulatory, and level headed, fly this out of here. I'd hate to see your transport get buried for nothing. Try to keep your fluid intake high, don't need you fainting in any place weird again." After a few more words exchanged, Triam was able to get back on her ship and take off from Zeltros. If she could help it, she would avoid the planet for the rest of her life. Hopefully to avoid gaining any more memories of such an unpleasant event...

A few years later, after the Tournament of the Cauldron Finale Duel between finalists Mikhail Shorn and Triam Akovin...
​

"What a fight. I thought for sure she had him at the top of that building."

"Ye, damn shame fer me wallet. I put my vacation savin's on 'er winnin'! Now lookit 'er."

"She lived up to her name though, she never stopped moving even after it was clear she was dead. Not till that final moment. Relentless to the end."

"Whatev'r, just get her body to the pile, like the others. Still gotta get to deconstructin' that arena stage-"

"Water." She said.

"WHAT THE F-" She didn't catch the last part as she was dropped into the dirt. She slowly tried to press herself up with her hands, and felt pain shooting up her arms, her face meeting the ground again.

"You-You--Y-yer 'posed to be dead!" One of the exclaimed.

"I feel like it. Water, please." She said in the dirt. She'd figure out how she survived later.

Now, 864 ABY...
​

Grey sky. Rain. No sun visible. Sky cars zip by. The scent of refuse.

Sirens blare in the distance. Pain pokes in the back, the legs, and both arms. Little scrapes cut the flesh.

Breathe enters suddenly, filling lungs which feel fresh and new. The heart pumps audibly in the ears. There is a dampness around the stomach and breast. It feels bare, open to the wind.

She lifts up from the garbage, pushing away the refuse piled on top of her body and climbs out as if her legs were new to her. She impacts the pavement, the splash of a puddle cooling her face. She lets her face drip as she looks in the puddle. The ripples go on for some time, but she sees a face in it. She waits till the ripples subside enough to see who is looking at her.

The face of a woman appears. The colors are muted and hard to make out, but she is blonde, with light colored eyes, and fair skin.

"Who are you?"​

 

[Dex Jusior]

CORUSCANT, SOMEWHERE IN THE UNDERWORLD
The sound of the frantically running of the two men echoed off of the mesh flooring of the cluttered corridor. A blaster shot rang out as it slammed into one of the access panels, the device sparking and flashing with light as the door next to it slid closed quickly, the drones swarming behind it, their red eyes shining a crimson light through the scratched glass of the blast door. The running stopped as the two men caught their breath, sputtering and clutching their stomachs.

"That should keep em busy for a while." One of the men remarked. "Yeah, it should..." another one of the men replied breathlessly, shifting his hands to his hips as he exhaled loudly. "I'm glad I'll make it out." The man slyly moved his hand to rest on the handle of his holstered blaster, the sound of it's activation masked by the reverberating banging on the closed blast-door, the manic droids's decelerations of "WE ARE THE HARBINGERS OF YOUR EVOLUTION." overlapping and drowning out each-other as they said it over and over, repeating like the slamming against the door.
"Yeah, me too. Wait, what do you mean-" Another blaster shot rang out, echoing through the cramped corridor as it if was a massive cavern, the sound soon joined by the man's yells of pain. "YOU SON OF A queen, W-WHY'D YOU DO THAT?!" The man screamed through bouts of groaning and yelping, a pool of blood slowly forming around the wound on the man's gut. The other man crouched down to face his "friend", a wicked smile creeping across his lips.

"Because," he paused and looked at the drones slamming against the door, they would be inside in a few moments. "This will keep them busy too."

Dex rose to his feet and dashed over to the elevator at the other side of the corridor, slamming a button covered in cob-webs and plastered with grime, the button creaking as it did so. The lift doors slowly began to draw closed, the loud creaking noise drowning out the other man's groans of pain. Dex watched through the crack in the door as the blast-door opened up and the drones flew in, the man screaming, the mechanical horrors upon him.

The doors fully shut before Dex saw what happened, he was glad. He didn't want to see a blood-bath, even if he didn't care about the man. Dex's smile turned into a smirk, there was doubt in his mind. Doubt that even with his distraction that he would survive. These thoughts plagued him as the elevator jolted and began to move downward, even deeper into Coruscant's underbelly, a place he knew all too well.

 

[Romi Jade]

Romi Jade, Jedi Youngling
Ession

Stuck on an overlook -- her eyes burned with with distant embers. The chaos brought her to silent tears and she couldn't move.

"R-Romi! C'mon." Cedric Grayson , about the same age as her, tugged her along and she wouldn't, couldn't move. Where was Veiere? He sent them along and promised he'd be behind them. When she finally gave, she stumbled through finding her footing before taking his hand.

"Children, come!" the aid commanded their attention.

Crouched in the corner of the bunker, he did his best to calm the youthful blonde. She'd never been the cryer of the two, but right now the roles had switched. Silently she tamed herself, the water trails traced her face down to the hiccup. "It's ok."

She didn't know if she believed him. For the first time she was scared.

She rolled her little eyes before she even knew what it meant, and she sat and stared at the entrance for what seemed like days. Did she blink?

There was nothing. That distance whine of conflict had settled, and the dark wasn't so scary anymore.

Her eyes worked through a slow flutter -- she had worn herself out crying, and Cedric had moved in front of her promising protection; sleep befell her.

And when she thought to give in and dose off, she jumped at the sound of the door bursting open.

Wincing in fear -- "Young lord!" she'd become familiar with the muffled voices the royal guards had.

"Lord Regent sends for you. Both of you."