Private The Dark Lady of Gunfire

[Maple Harte]

Wearing: HH Sniper Armor

Armed With: Synthetic Crystal Lightsaber (Red)

Battle Scout Rifle

Arrived in: The Silent Erika

Planet: Ossus

She had dropped Braze off at the nearest Med-Center on Coruscant and departed without fan fare or drama. Then she had gone back to her life of Darkness. One empty bounty after the next. A dungeon crawl, or two.

All meaningless. Without goal.

Without hope.

Darth Strelok stalked the jungles of this light sided world. Her target was a crime boss worth a couple million. Strelok neither knew nor cared what he had done to get a bounty so high.

All she knew was that unlike Braze, The Crime Boss would receive no clemency.

Strelok had brought out an older weapon for this job. The Crime Boss was insane to hide on a Jedi related world. Just like Strelok, a full on Sith, was insane enough to chase him on it.

It was a semi-auto of her own design that had rarely failed her. It had done so well she had brought it with her on the raid on the Avatar of War at Tython, where she Laertia, and that thing that had assimilated The Amalgam , had fought the entire Mawite army for the fate of Tython. It was difficult to say who had inflicted more damage, who who had finally destroyed The Avatar. The Nuclear Weapons House Io had brought aboard it, the combined pounding of the fleet at Tython, all had played a part.

Maple had hoped Tython might be the turning point. The point where Laertia might finally let go of her grudge against people like Coren Starchaser .

But it hadn't. Laertia had chosen to kick the Jedi by blowing up The Silver Rest on Kashyyyk. Her crime, so soon after having helped save Tython, had cemented once and fur all that Laertia cared for no rule, for no perception of reality other than her own where the Jedi was always the villain.

Laertia doing that was what had finally made Maple snap and nearly murder her, beating her so brutally she had shattered her own hands. If course, the further Brain Damage Laertia had suffered probably hadn't done wonders for her mental state down the road.

It was that instant of pure fury that had drawn Maple into Sith-dom.

It was a day she had spent every day since trying to forget...

Strelok moved through dank sweltering jungle, her tight fitting armor camouflaging her optically. He has a safe house here.

And she intended to be the one to break into it and gun him down like a dog.

She spotted a compound entrance built into a rock face, staffed by B2 Droids.

A thought of rage telekinetically crushed the Droids and ripped the entrance open like it was paper

Strelok came out of the bushes as live mercenaries rushed out and she moved like greased lightning, shooting five dead with her rifle via headshot in a matter of seconds. Her telekinesis helped absorb the recoil, essentially allowing the rifle to function like laser pointer when firing.

Without a word, the Sith strode into the compound, unaware that she was about to have another run in with the boy she had spared...

More mercenaries came out of the passages, firing at her.

She ducked after squeezing her remaining shots in the rifle before reloading, this time with explosive tips.

Men got turned into piles of burned viscera as her explosive bullets hit them. Strelok did not use anything but her gun on the living, hipfiring, scoring headshots or chest shots as she desired every time she did, her natural speed and reflexes aiding target acquisition.

The mother of all slasher villain smiles was painted on her face as she rampaged through the crime bosses men Frank Castle style...

 

[Braze]

TAGS: Maple Harte

Braze wasn't the type to stay down. The work of a Jedi Shadow was never done, especially when someone as dangerous as Eldon Karr chose to nestle deep into the sacred grounds of Ossus. Braze preferred the quiet, quick, and personal approach, each target was an art form in the careful pruning of darkness. Slowly but surely, his list of names grew, each one crossed out as they had been dispatched.

Tonight's mission was pivotal. Braze had come to sever the serpent's head from its writhing body once and for all. Eldon Karr was the poisonous core of the Crimson Coil, a ruthless puppet-master responsible for assassinations, the sabotage of critical peace talks, and the systematic corruption infecting Ossus from within. Braze understood that taking down Karr was essential.

He couldn't afford distractions, not this time. Braze moved through the dimly lit corridors like a ghost, senses heightened, his presence barely tangible. Each guard passed unaware, each camera looped silently by his skilled manipulation of the Force. Every shadow became his ally, and hsi steps were like whispers on the wind.

By the time Darth Strelok breached the outer perimeter in a violent display, Braze had already reached Eldon Karr's quarters which lied at the heart of the compound.

​

As Braze silently approached Eldon Karr's quarters, he extended his hand, channeling the Force to unlock the door with a soft, barely audible click. Inside, the dimly lit room revealed a web of holo-screens displaying clandestine transmissions, stolen Jedi intel, and flickering images of targeted diplomats all proof of the evidence of Karr's sinister operations.

At the center of it all sat Eldon Karr himself, the Zeltron's deep crimson features illuminated by the eerie back lit glow of the monitors behind him. Calmly awaiting Braze, his eyes glittered dangerously, a thin, cold smile on his lips, as though he'd anticipated the Jedi's arrival all along.

Eldon Karr leaned back, his gaze sharp and knowing, as the faintest smirk twisted at the corner of his mouth.

"You're punctual, Jedi. I've been expecting you. Tell me! Are you here for justice, revenge, or simply because you can't stand the idea of someone like me winning?"

Braze lifted one hand, movements fluid and gentle as he curled his fingers inward on the out stretched hand. Eldon Karr's arrogant smirk faded, replaced by sudden confusion and alarm. The Zeltron clutched at his throat, gasping silently as the air was gently, yet firmly pulled from his lungs, leaving him struggling in wordless panic.

The Zeltron moved to stand, but his legs gave out, buckling beneath him. He crashed awkwardly into a chair, sending it clattering loudly across the floor. His hands clawed desperately at the desk, scattering datapads and knocking holo-screens down in a messy burst of sparks and broken glass. Collapsing to the ground, he writhed helplessly reaching a hand out towards the young Jedi.

 

[Maple Harte]

Strelok was busy killing the underlings and had just finished shooting one in the head when she finally sensed another presence and went still.

It couldn't be...

It was that kid! Again! AGAIN!!!

Strelok was so stunned at sensing him here she completely missed a dodge opportunity. The blaster bolt from the nerve that hit her shoulder made her snarl in rage and she compressed him into a pulp via Telekinesis.

She felt a surge of darkness.

Strelok was racing as fast as she could, and by the time she reached the room Braze was in she could feel Karr's life dangerously close to slipping away.

She wasted no time. She had not saved the boy JUST so he could follow her into damnation.

She burst in, knowing killing the man Braze was killing would not help Braze, it would only make him an accessory to murder.

"Boy! Drop him!" Strelok barked angrily keeping the rifle on him.

"You haven't done anything yet that your bosses can't overlook..." she said, seeing Karr was barely alive.

"This is what you do after I spare you? Go and throw away your supposed ideals?" she questioned.

"Don't do it! Don't throw it all away on this piece of garbage! That's what I'M for!" Strelok said to him, not wanting to attack. But she would. She would if Braze would not see reason.

"That's all it takes huh? Getting your face shot off?! How strong ARE your beliefs anyway?" Strelok snorted in derision, hiding how desperate she was to stop Braze from embracing the Dark Side...

 

[Braze]

TAGS: Maple Harte

​

Braze didn't flinch at the voice, nor did he turn or speak immediately there after.

The air still held firm in his invisible grasp, Eldon Karr's struggles growing weaker by the second. The man's life teetered on the edge of unconsciousness—not death.... at least not yet.

But Braze had heard her clearly and well. .

Her voice, was as sharp as finely mono-molecular edged phrik blade, and just as unrelenting, as it sliced through the haze of intent he'd wrapped around himself like a shroud.

"Don't do it! Don't throw it all away on this piece of garbage! That's what I'M for!"

The admission had struck him harder than he expected It would however. She had spared him. And now she was trying, in her own twisted way, to do it again.

A slow breath left Braze's lips.. He didn't want to let go, because this man had earned something far worse than sleep.

His hand opened slightly. Just enough. The grip on the Force loosened though not gone, not entirely, but reduced to a whisper. Enough for Karr to slump into unconsciousness with a ragged gasp rather than silence.

Braze stood over him, gaze unreadable. "He's alive,"

he said without turning. The voice was his own… and yet not.

It came filtered through a vocoder, each word stitched together from fractured recordings—old reports, classroom recitations, clipped answers given to instructors back when he still spoke with something closer to innocence. The cadence was off. The inflection wrong in all the subtle ways that mattered.

It was like hearing a ghost of his past try to imitate him, like something that remembered how he used to sound when he was younger, but not why he spoke that way.

It echoed with a hollow and false familiarity, a grotesque mimicry pieced together from moments he'd long forgotten… or tried to.

It wasn't his voice.... not how it was meant to be. Just a poor stand-in wearing its skin.

"You can put the rifle down."

Then finally, finally, he glanced at her over his shoulder.

"Tell me something, Strelok…"

His voice was still calm, but laced with something colder beneath the surface. "If you're the one meant to fall… then why do you care so much if I do?"

He stepped back from Karr's prone form, letting his lightsaber fall silent as it was extinguished.

"You think I don't believe anymore just because I'm not bleeding mercy all over this room?"

He turned to face her fully, somber jade green eyes still clear. "The Code isn't a leash. It's a compass. And I haven't lost my way."

He removed a set of cuffs from his belt moving to arrest the prone man.

 

[Maple Harte]

Strelok was hesitant as Braze released him.

Her heart pounded, breath quickened noticeably as she stared at her handiwork...listened to his pieced together voice.

What scared her is that he gave the same burned out sort of presence that she was at the start of the original version of The Amalgam stalking her.

She lowered the gun. Slightly.

He asked why she cared.

"Because what you're doing is how it started for me. Easy to tell yourself it's just business. The brutal realities of surviving a harsh, next to impossible to navigate profession. I learned too late that there are prices for surviving no one should be willing to pay...and maybe I don't wanna watch somebody who is virtually the same age when that started happening to me happen to them...the code may be a compass...but like any compass, it just takes something magnetic enough to point it's needle in the wrong direction..." Strelok insisted.

"I did this exact sort of work you just did..." Strelok said. "Only I took it farther right out the gate..."

She finally lowered the rifle.

"I apologize for shooting you in the face." she said. "The apology changes nothing, of course...but I am saying it regardless..."

 

[Braze]

TAGS: Maple Harte

An apology?
Was she kidding?

He huffed out a heavy breath and looked at her with fierce eyes—then looked away. He stepped from the man on the ground and started to pace the room... he looked like a predator in a cage, aggravated and upset at being trapped.

His emotional aura flared to life, immense and overwhelming compared to the silence it had held before—but still only a drop in an entire ocean.

He drew a heavy, sudden breath and sighed, his chest rising noticeably with the motion as he paused and looked at her.
An apology. Those were... yes... exactly... that's exactly what they were for.

"A true apology..." He started.... 'Is not about how the other person responds' ; he thought, before continuing aloud, "Is about acknowledging your own faults and mistakes and taking accountability for them."

He stared directly at her before stepping forward, emboldened by his emotions, feeling the Force gather around him, intensifying his aura all the more.

"So tell me... how... how do you intend to take accountability for this?"

He gestured to his face.

Even with the scars his body had borne before, they paled in comparison to how he looked now. And for a moment, all that rage and hate subsided as those eyes crinkled and filled with hot, glassy tears. He turned away from her again, rubbing fiercely at them.

His whole form began to tremble and shake as he wrapped his arms around himself, stepping away and continuing to pace, but now it was just to get out the energy from his upset, as now he started to feel sick.

He stopped again, head hanging low, voice breaking as it came out as something ripped out from the deepest part of him.

"I didn't grow up in war times... I grew up in lasting peace..."

His breath hitched as he clenched his 'jaw', barely keeping control.

"I rise to the occasion so my peers aren't slain senselessly over millennia-long religious wars. So they don't have to be subjected to the horrors of war."

His fists curled at his sides.
"I've torn men apart so that those I care about can live peacefully—because peace is all they've ever known."

He touched his face, fingers hovering over ruined flesh.

"My body has lost so much in the endless pursuit to be strong enough to protect them..."

He finally looked up—eyes red, face wet.
"...And now I've been turned into a disfigured monster. Well and truly... No one will ever love me as I am now..."