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As Calina reached out to find the source of the storm, she felt a voice in response.
The Mandalorians kept you in jail for half a year, Sith. You were Anaya Fen's pawn, and I was her enemy. I know your name, Calina Ovmar, and reaching out to me could easily have been your final mistake. You're alive for one reason and one reason only. Not long ago, Darth Carnifex tortured someone I consider family.
A small illusion took form, a vision of something Ember had seen and heard only minutes before.
Baiko no Kaho said:
“She wanted to wait. Someone pushed her hand, and from the sounds of Carnifex’s blathering a… Calina Ovmar and some Merrill woman are implicated. Yasha had every intention of waiting until the best time came… yet intent is only one piece of action."
The man was fast, reacting with speed and strength that matched her own, his fist cracked against her throat sending her backwards. There was a distinct wheeze to her breathing now, but unlike others she did not need oxygen to power her muscles, for her muscles were mostly metal. She back peddled further, the swipe at her gut scoring a line across armour plating. Her sword shifted in her grasp, back to a normal grip, left hand snatched a short knife from her belt.
She stepped back in, her movements fluid, without pause. Analysis already updated, threat level increased. Dispatch quickly. The knife swung to follow the trajectory of his strike, aiming to slam the blade into his sword arm. While her own sword sought to carve a line across his other cheek. Symmetry was important after all.
The rest of the room became background noise. Irrelevant until it became useful, or a direct threat.
Anger flashed through her, the voice cutting through her mind like a hot knife, her breath caught in her throat.
Do not paint me with the same colours as you paint the woman I was unfortunate to share DNA with.
The illusion shimmered before her eyes, heart pounded in her chest. Already her hands were moving to bring the shuttle back to life. Comms exploded in a wave of shouts and chatter, asking what she was doing. She ignored them.
I owe you a debt. Whoever you are.
She raised the shield, putting most of their power to front and aft, and kicked the engines to max, gunning for space. She opened a line to Mara, pre-coded encryption worked to keep it as covert as she could.
"They know!" the shuttle trembled under fire from planetary defences, she weaved as best she could. She broke atmosphere and ran headlong into the fleet. Fighters moving for an intercept course. "Kark!" Turbolaser flashed across her hull, shields fell to thirty percent within seconds. "I need evac!"
His reputation as a mindless beast was earned well.
But in the thick of violence Ronan was calm. There was a beat of a heart inside his ears, he heard it amidst the violent crowd because he knew it as intimately as he knew his own. It was the heart he had embraced when it had first been born, kept him up at night, pushed him when no one else could. But Ronan knew that it was an illusion, that it was his fancies guiding him.
Because his daughter could not be so foolish to come here.
At the day he put everything on the line to force a change that the Clans had needed for so long.
The presence strengthened him rather than act as a distraction. He was not worried. It was not in his nature. As Kyra took a step back, so did Ronan. Calm, the wound within the storm. She came whipping back and the knife jabbed against the beskar, that brought her in range and even as Ronan hissed, he stepped to the side and her sword swiped past his face.
Symmetry denied.
Rather the armored crush-gaunt swept in and would curl tight around her extended arm. Tightening down and preventing her escape as the hilt of his own beskad filled her gaze.
Sel smiled as he pulled away the small knife from the corpse, his eyes wandering over the dead body for a moment before he slipped the small sample of genetic material into a sealed vial. He frowned for a moment, peering around the morgue before he drew back.
Briefly he wondered what was happening above him in the throne room, though the thought was a fleeting one.
There were more important things to attend to. He glanced down at the hulking corpse once more, then slowly turned away and slipped the vial into his bandoleer. The guards that normally populated this hall of the palace had been moved to another section, preparation for the meeting that was now taking place above. Sel had known this of course, and that was why he had chosen not to come to the throne room just yet. Briefly he glanced towards one of the other small doors that hid another of his kin.
For a moment he considered.
No. He told himself. This will be enough for now.
Sel couldn't get ahead of himself. In order to do this correctly he had to take it one step at a time. Without another thought he pushed the small table back into it's place, slamming the larger door shut and turning on his heel to exit the morgue. The red of his visor swept back and forth as he checked the hallway, the amphistaff coiled around his body swiveling it's head in unison. After a moment The Butcher emerged from the cold room, stepping into the hall.
Now it was time to adjoin himself to...ugh, politics.
“Thank you, my friend. You should leave today, as a friend. Leave the TSAC’s to me. If nothing has been done to them in a week, I was unsuccessful and make your move. A little trust… a little faith that what you taught her did some good, before you push her hand too far into the fanatics who want us all cured or dead. Carnifex is in the Palace, weaponless and without the Force… perhaps a better target than the chaos of your storm?” Baiko’s voice came at a whisper, as her body faded into the White Current and disappeared.
An illusion cut off by the Bral.
A Bral lumbered within range of [member="Ember Rekali"], shutting off his abilities in the Force. Then another, and another leaving him in the overlap of three anti-force bubbles.
Back in the Palace Baiko slid in beside [member="Gray Raxis"], her hand on his lower back. She nodded to A'tla Farr, one of the Yalilyr, who created a circle of Mandalorians around Yasha and those who stepped in to voice their support. Shields hummed to life around the throne, At'la clicked the safety off her rifle, and began to fire stun-bursts into the violent throng.
"Gray. We have to secure the Palace. Now. Rekali had a Force Storm percolating over Sundari... remind me to stab Munin in the jaw with a stylus after this idiocy."
Throughout Goran's long and eventful life, that had always been the case. Droids were ubiquitous on most worlds, regardless of civility. To the refined palates of the denizens of the Inner Core, they were servants. The roughnecks at the edge of space saw them as little more than workhorses. Regardless of where they went, they were slaves.
No one ever cared what they did or where they went, so long as they moved with a sense of purpose and everything worked just the way it should.
Maybe that was always why they were so shocked when Goran cut them down.
The former Iron Knight had found a home among the Mandalorians, once upon a time. It was as skilled a killer as anyone could hope to find, and Mandos were always willing to open their arms to someone who knew their way around a brawl. That dotard [member="Eralam"] had found the little Shard useful from time to time, but even he, drenched in enough blood to make a Sith Lord squeamish, kept it at arm's length.
The Mandalorians had no such reservations. They thought the idea of an astromech loaded down with enough firepower to stop a regiment in its tracks hilarious. For many decades, they called Goran vode. It spoke the language, and it wore the armor. It was loyal to its tribe, and when Mand'alor called it to fight, it fought. Had it any children, it would have gladly raised them as Mandalorians, taught them the Resol'nare, and in time, perhaps have formed a new tribe, a mechanical tribe the likes of which the galaxy had never seen.
Perhaps that was why it hated these Death Watch types so much. Goran couldn't help that it was Force sensitive, any more than it could help being a Shard. It was a talent it had been born with, that it had cultivated into as effective a weapon as any blade or bullet. Its talents were minor in the grand scheme of things, but to these rat bastards, it was a crime.
Sanctimonious pricks. Goran had been driven from the one place it had ever called home because some zealots got it in their heads that the Force was bad because reasons. It was pathetic.
Mandos were an uncomplicated lot. They were happy with a little food, a little drink, and a target rich environment. If they could get paid to shoot at the targets, so much the better. Once you started throwing religion into the mix, it was only a matter of time before shet went sideways in epic fashion. After that, all you could really do was wait til the fires died down and see who was left standing. As often as not, the new Mand'alor would call the last guy an idiot, buy everyone drinks, and they'd all get back to work killing things for people with more money than courage.
That was exactly what Goran had planned to do when it left Mandalore. Bide its time, do a little mercenary work on the side, and come home when someone with more than two brain cells to rub together picked up the helm. What it had not planned on was falling in with the Dark Lord of the Sith™.
[member="Darth Carnifex"] had, in exchange for services rendered (read: wanton slaughter), given the Shard a place to stay, and paid it to handle the occasional problem. No one paid any attention to an astromech, not even Sith. If someone needed to be killed on the sly, Goran was pretty good at arranging accidents.
Today, Goran sat in the Dark Lord of the Sith's™ shuttle, waiting to see if it was needed. With any luck, once today's business was concluded, it would part ways with Carni and it could go home. On the off chance that the Sith needed some firepower, it was to standby and wait for The Signal. The Shard had no idea what exactly The Signal would be, only that it would be The Signal, and at that point it should head for the palace with as much firepower as possible and shoot anything that looked tempted to shoot at it.
The Dark Lord of the Sith™ was as talented a killer as anyone Goran had ever met, so it figured he probably just wanted some noise and splosions to cover his escape. That was fine. It was good at noise and splosions.
In the meantime, it was to wait on the shuttle and try not to get too bored. Carnifex had a fairly extensive music collection on the shuttle, so it shuffled through the songs, looking for the perfect entrance music.
The Shard picked a song at random. It didn't recognize most of the selections, so random seemed like the best way to go.
https://youtu.be/LOZuxwVk7TU
"What the kark is this?" it muttered. "What other gems do you have hiding, eh Carni?"
The stray dog bared its teeth against the haze and ringing that filled his eyes and ears, shaking his head to dispel the effects of the missile that had blown through the ranks of combatants. Warm arterial spray stained his features, peppered with fragments of duraplast and what he had to assume was Munin soldier that had stood between him and the worst of it. A theory the lifeless husk at his feet would more than attest to. Was this what they had become in his long absence?
Hut’uun that would sacrifice their own?
Wrath bubbled up from beneath the surface.
He hadn’t come here intending to spill blood, but they had forced his hand.
With a wordless roar, he threw himself past @Rach Vizsla and into the oncoming ranks of the Munin clansmen. A fury of faded crimson armour and man, beskad lashing out viciously at anyone unlucky enough to believe they could stall his path. There was no illusion of grace in his charge, for he was never much of a dancer. There was no subtlety, for he simply held no interest in becoming a surgeon. No, there was merely the brutal efficiency of a butcher. A man that had taken to the art of taking living creatures apart, honing his trade across countless worlds until it became second nature and took on a life of its own. Like a beast lurking beneath the skin.
Well, now that beast could run free.
Carving a path of ruinous red rage into the ranks of the clansmen arrayed before them, beskad tearing through throats and sliding between armoured plates. Somewhere in the fray he’d picked up a helmet. His or someone else’s, it was hard to tell through the battle drums that pounded through his head. It made for a good weapon, however. Battering and bludgeoning even as he dove deeper into the reaches of it all.
Today wouldn’t be the end of Aliit Shysa, but perhaps it would be his end.
If so, he would damned if he wouldn’t make a song of it.
Ember snorted. A heartbeat later, the ysalamir fields intersected with the tapcaf's patio chair, and Ember vanished. The package of tea leaves tumbled to the ground. The storm intensified.
And now that the Bral fields no longer covered a good portion of the palace, as evidenced by Baiko using her illusions while in brief walking distance of the throne room, the storm chose its target.
Striking the palace was deeply feasibleand would have been a terrible move. Ember had no desire to unite the schism against Forcers. Instead, his presence was only a voice.
Trust and faith didn't come easy even before I died. I'm not as loose-lipped as you. For example, I'd never have told you my plan if you had a prayer of interfering or delaying it. They went to hyperspace forty minutes ago.
A spear of lightning punched through Sundari's dome and touched the apex of the TSAC pyramid. It carried all the betrayed rage, all the strength Ember had gathered and refined. A trillion joules - instigated by the Force-storm, but otherwise utterly mundane - tore into the pyramid, right down through its ysalamir-shielded foundations.
Steel met steel. Sparks flew as the axe crashed into the beskad. The behemoth of clan Fett held the powerful swing against him before moving one step back to escape the range of the axe and raising his left arm where one of his Mandalorian vambraces were neatly worn.
Hand jerked forward, no aim was needed from this close. Reckless and quite uncaring for his surroundings a burst of flames erupted from his wrist aiming to burn the Mantis.
“Mand’alor?” Ambrose asked, at the words of [member="Koda Fett"].
“Let him go, Ambrose. He’s laid down his challenge. I will prove myself to him, Koda's a Mando to look up to.” Yasha had to respect the Bounty Hunter. He was, after all, a true Mandalorian. He laid down a challenge of proving she was worthy, that she was Mando. His course was one she could dig her talons into with full course.
“And they call me a child.” Yasha rolled her eyes and spoke to [member="Darth Carnifex"] as the throne room burst into chaos. “Excuse me, seems a bunch of Mandos are about to get their shebs kicked. Now I see why Ra didn’t bother with the lot of them and just said ‘I’m Mand’alor, deal’.”
Yasha yanked her buy’ce on, and as the systems keyed up, she gripped her warhammer. [member="Kaine Australis"] and [member="Merrax Quez"] were by her side, loyal and restrained. "Let's quell the crowd, eh?"
They were the sort of Mando’ade who were needed, not this rebellious lot who denied the facts of a situation to further their own goals of violence. Mandalore needed more like [member="Shia Kryze"], [member="Silas Mantis"], [member="Quoron Viszla"].
“You kark-monkey! The frak did you do now, Vivi!? Rrgh! I could throttle you till [member="Briika Tor-Munin"] has to feed you pudding from a tube! How is it two windbags are more important than an immediate deadly plot by the Sith!?” Yasha snarled, rushing in to protect Vilaz’ back. “You… you…. YOU BOOB!”
Yasha swung her hammer and took out three of the attacking clansmen.
“OYA!” She roared and rushed @Ronin Vizsla, swinging her warhammer two-handed vertically upward at his elbow, with the intent of removing it from her bodyguard @Kyra.
“Come make trouble in my house, you have me to deal with.” Yasha growled, using the upward momentum of the beskar hammer to swing back and in toward his chest.
The situation was beyond control, shield had risen around the one they called Yasha. She was designated to protect her.
Dispatch quickly.
Dispatch and pull back for direct protection. Threat beyond control.
Powerful crushgaunts clamped against powerful cybernetics, the incoming strike sailed over as she ducked and stepped in underneath it, the knife sought the soft flesh between the armour plates.
Straight up and under into the armpit of the arm that held her sword hand fast.
Amber eyes widened at the incoming hammer blow from Yasha.
The cyborg was good and his respect for her was increasing by the moment.
Knife lodged in between his plates and he grunted as the tip punched through. The pain flared, but with the way his crush-gaunt was clenching down on her wrist she couldn't quite angle to push deeper. She took a nick, but his armored elbow crashing into her exposed neck would punch her lights out without a trouble. Until the roar made Ronan look up and even Kyra's eyes widened at the approach of the would-be Mand'alor.
Finally.
It only took the entire throne room erupting in a bloodbath for the child to wade herself into the battle. Already her hammer bloody, good. But her youth shone bright as she came rushing in with that hammer.
The words rushing past clenched teeth hinted at the entitlement. Her house. Maybe.
Within that brief moment Ronan did the only logical thing he could do. He waited, pretending like he was struggling with Kyra, but then when the swing was in... full swing and the momentum carried Yasha in? The Vizsla yanked Kyra into the path of the hammer, taking one step back himself and letting the cyborg take the full force of the hammer's swing and weight.
"Your house crumbles." Ronan hissed back before kicking off the cyborg to create room for himself.
There was no solution. All possible outcomes led to this. It was the logical move to make and the cyborg could not stop it. She forced the dagger a little deeper and braced.
Ronan stepped back his movement lurching her a little more over the incoming swing. If she had fear, or even the ability to speak. She might have sworn. She had neither, so she watched the hammer swing upwards with enough force to take a head off. Impact caught her neck and chin, snapping them back with such ferocity, vital cables were torn.
He had seen bouts for Mandalore before. For some reason, it seemed like the clans had been completely split since Azrael be Skirata had vanished from Mandalorian space. Before then a Mandalore was challenged, but with significant support from more than one clan before engaging in combat with the Mandalore or taking a dead Mandalore's place. But it seemed now as if challengers stood up with just their own clan's support, hoping to earn others' support through single combat with the Mandalore. Or a Mandalore candidate assumed they held all of their hearts.
Dorn held no love for the Viszla clan, their notoriety as completely ruthless and dishonor from long, long histories past still kept them an arm's length away from many. Their outburst here showed they still had quite the mean streak in them. Combat erupted from their instigation and Dorn slowly backed away. The rocket threw debris and bits of beskar into his helmeted face and his ears were ringing. But there was something else. A second explosion and then a third as something pierced the dome of Sundari and struck a target nearby. Sounds he had heard only a few times before. Something powerful had just cracked through the dome of Sundari. The combination of beskar supports cracking under a sudden shift in weight and the materials they used for the protective dome shattering was a one of a kind sound on Mandalore, and scaled to the size of the dome surrounding Sundari, it was almost as loud as the rocket exploding a few meters from him.
But the fighting continued. He created an open channel that all within the throne room would hear if they had their helmets on and those near him would hear him shout.
"Stop your madness! Sundari is under attack!"
A shockwave rocked the building. Transparisteel shattered. Dorn was flung through a second window and fell, the white streets of Sundari rushing to meet him.
Amanda had no idea what was going on! One second it was bickering back and forth then suddenly chaos exploded out! She was neat [member="Shia Kryze"] thankfully as she watched the stun guns fire towards the crowd and the shields power up
By the manda, this was madness. Amanda herself even moved forward she would defend her alor to her final breath! If she was to die may it be that she died defending the mand'alor and kyrze'alor!
So the thing thing that seemed viable was getting in front and ready to defend...
Thankfully, Mandalore had more than three Bral. [member="Ember Rekali"] should have known it.
The idea that the Palace could not be covered, while other areas were was erroneous. As the lightning from the Force Storm came to the TSAC, the TSAC’s own Bral was in effect.
So were the lightning rods at the top of the buildings.
While the structure radiated with the storm’s natural cacophony, in the end the building itself remained intact. The damage done was purely, and for the most part, decorative.
“Settle yourself, Skirata! We’re not so easily conquered… [member="Sel Wyrick"]! [member="Dorn Skirata"]! Go investigate! Ambrose, give them Death Watch Rekr and Nexu. Go!” Yasha commanded.
Tamara had come today unarmed and unarmored. She'd come to surrender, to accept the 'cure' required of her by her father, by her Mand'alor. To stop the bleed from one of the cracks, even if it might mean nothing beyond doing what was right to keep peace in her own family. To look her father in the face and tell him that she was sorry, for whatever that was worth. Not much. Not as much as being there and accepting his word as law.
Clan, family, before self, yes?
Wasn't that what she'd been taught since she'd been old enough to hold up her own head?
Unarmed and unarmored- she was regretting that decision now as the full out civil war was erupting before her eyes. A knife, that was all (unarmed for a mando, at least might not be precisely the same as for anyone else)- no Force, she'd felt that fall from her shoulders when she'd entered. It had been a moment of truth, stepping into the field, feeling what it would be like, always.
She saw her father fighting from a distance, across the throne room. People blocked her view but not completely as she shouldered her way through the increasingly chaotic and violent crowd. She saw it in his eyes, the moment before he turned, putting his opponent in the way of the hammer's blow. She had never been a warrior, not the way he was. She learned to fight, as any child of Mandalore did, but it wasn't the same. Not the way her father did, the way he was. She'd always done her best, to make him proud of her, to learn everything he could teach her, to be strong despite deformity. He'd never let her use her hand as an excuse.....
Because the enemy would never let her either.
Tamara dodged a blow that was not specifically aimed at her, a wide swinging elbow. Not far, fire erupted, clansmen to burn clansmen -
And the floor rippled.
She managed to keep her balance but only just, slamming into someone next to her. Even the explosion outside in the distance it seemed wasn't enough to stop the maelstrom within the palace. She drew the vibroknife with her good hand and shoved the person standing between her and her father, not knowing if they were friend or foe but not caring either.
Shia stood among the violence like a statue in a storm, listening to the reports from outside the palace. Watching the squabbling children who called themselves alor, vod who fought with violence when words should have been used. The level of tesosterone in the room was so high she was surprised her environmental filters were not breaking down under the onslaught.
She considered joining in, to draw a weapon that had last been used in this chamber to shed Mandalorian blood and claim a throne. Her families throne, as it happened. This - all of this... perpetual cycle of violence was as pointless and pathetic as the Neo-Mandalorians Pacifism. It seemed some people never learned - Mandalorians particularly.
The TSAC was struck by lightning alarms flared across the city - Ijaat or... no Ember, it had to be Ember, Ijaat would have shattered it from the top down with no storm, no dark side manifestation like that. Meanwhile, in orbit a ship began to take fire from the planetary defences. That one. That was the one, she didn't need her nascent connection to the force, severed as it was by the Braal, to know that.
She turned and automatically cold-cocked a warrior who came for her, then drop-swept another one and throat-stomped her to make sure she would get up, before stalking through the chaos to [member="Darth Carnifex"].
"Your apprentice is in orbit taking fire from the planetary defences, if she doesn't have a back up plan you've trained her incredibly poorly. Are you coming to get her and made good on your sentiments to..." Her visored head turned behind her to look at the room, then rotated facelessly back to the Dark Lord. "... her family, if no one else?"
Kaine remained impassive as events unfolded around him, occasionally moving out of the way of brawling Mandalorians if they came too close for comfort. This whole conflict was wasteful, their senseless bickering weakened the bonds that bound them together as a people.
Under Ra they were unified against a common enemy, but if Yasha was incapable of wrestling control from those who decried her ascension then the Mandalorians would crumble as they had before.
The one known as [member="Shia Kryze"] strode up to him despite the chaos, and spoke of [member="Calina Ovmar"]'s flight from the city. She either wised up to his ruse or decided to cut her losses and hope for the best, but either way she proved herself a traitor to himself and the Empire he ruled. "If I am not mistaken I am still 'elegantly detained' until the matter of Malika Mantis' death could be clarified, nor would we possess the time needed to intercept her before she got clear of the planet. If your security ships cannot capture or destroy her then certainly as it stands we do not have much of a chance either. But now you know her name, you will know her face, and she will live in fear of your retribution."
