Trapped Under Ice

[Lief]

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| [member='Itash Mecetti'] |​

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Tundra.

As far as the eye could see.

How long she had been traversing this hostile and unforgiving landscape Aerin could not say. It had been hours at least since she exited the compound in snow trooper armour, smuggling herself out of the vast prison-like structure she had known for over a decade. Right under their noses. Sometimes it paid to be one of the few Force Sensitive individuals on site.

The helmet had long since been abandoned, left behind on one of the rocky outcrops close enough that she could discover it again if - or more, when - she returned. As for the armour, well... She found it was warmer than the alternative, though she did have her robes beneath so that was something.

Windswept, chilled to the core, yet determined to press on, she continued to traverse the ice and snow with no destination in mind. Sometimes this was a necessity, to be away from the general hubbub of the compound, to feel the frigid breeze against her face. It roused her slightly from the waking nightmare which had become her life, gave her space to breathe. Of course it wasn't condoned, even after all these years she remained on a very tight leash.

But what they didn't know couldn't hurt them.

Besides, who knew what creatures were laying on this Force forsaken planet? Samples to take back to base, experiments to be had. In the end it would only benefit them to have her somewhat rejuvenated and inspired.

Well... As much as that was possible, all things considered.

 

[Itash Mecetti]

[member="Aerin Akun Mereel"]

Soon enough part of a structure began to show itself.

A structure of white cutting through the air like a sickle. It rose high and stood deviant against the elements, the wind buffeting it, the snow covering and trying to choke it, it remained as it was. it was the bridge of an ancient Star Destroyer and it must have been here for a long time by the way the snow covered the rest of the ruins. They seemed to be abandoned now and no trace of life in sight. That didn't mean there wasn't anything though, but with the way the snow covered everything?

Any footsteps would have been erased within a moment's notice.

The only way in seemed to be the exposed engines and thrusters. They gave immediate entry to the inner works of the gargantuan wreckage, looking at the way it sloped downwards, it was clear that most of the super-complex went on for a long time beneath the 'ground'.

---​

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Tash crouched down by some of the exposed wiring.

It was less cold here strangely enough.

He had noticed that the moment he had entered the innards of the star destroyer. Maybe some parts of it, ancient and archaic, were still operating to this day? Maybe some chemical reaction was at work here. It was difficult to say, but as his fingers brushed the casing of the durasteel wall, the wiring hissed and static discharged. "Mm." It gave a light shock, but after what he had been through with [member="Darth Filiae"] that seemed minor child's play at best.

A little probe-droid was floating by his shoulder and making high-pitched beep boooop noises.

"Yeah, map this area, Three-Six. I think the armory is on the other side of this wall." It recorded the patterns of his voice as it started scanning the environment. "Should be, but structural damage doesn't let us in."

Something triggered Three-Six in the middle of its operation.

It whirled around its axis, until it was facing north... in the direction of the makeshift entrance and the engines. "Three-Six?"

Beep. Boop. Beeeeeep.

"Visitors, huh?"

By the way of some mental prodding a little creature crawled out of his pocket. A 3-7B unit, this one's name was Third, and it was the first unit that had an extended lifespan. "Third, I want you to fly back, stick to the high ground and watch for whoever is poking around here, can you do that for me?" [member="Cassandra Paige"] had done an excellent job with these critters. It zooomed and then flitted away, very eager to please The Dark Man and receiving a treat.

For some reason every 3-7B unit referred to him as the Dark Man without fail.

Odd, that.

 

[Lief]

| [member='Itash Mecetti'] |​

​

At some point along the way she had torn off the outer layer of the armoured gloves, leaving just the mesh underneath to keep her hands from facing too much of the elements. She ought to have felt bad for the poor sod who was now without their suit, if they knew that pieces of the uniform were scattered across the tundra she wondered how pissed off they would be. As it stood they'd be in for a grilling if nothing else. Once upon a time she would have minded, but these days Aerin was all about her own survival and well being.

She wasn't exactly surrounded by saints, after all.

It wasn't until the sight of a Star Destroyer loomed on the horizon that the woman truly began to pay attention to her surroundings. Glancing over her shoulder she wasn't surprised to discover that the compound was nowhere to be seen. Even if she hadn't been walking for hours she knew it was too well blended into the landscape for her to pinpoint it. Still, this ship which had sunk into the snow... That was, without a doubt, the most interesting thing she had come across in a very long time. An anomaly in a snowstorm of similarities.

The back end was facing toward her. Curiosity was in her veins, a natural part of who she was, and so without much extra thought she began to venture into the structure. After all, what was the likelihood that it was housing another lifeform?

Slim to none, if she had to guess.

Imagine her surprise, then, when a particularly swift creature zipped through the air around her. Had she not been looking in the exact direction it had come from she doubted she would have noticed it at all, and even now she struggled to find it again in the air. She just heard the flutter of its wings.

"Huh," she mused aloud, not bothering to expand upon her surprise with words. There was nobody around to hear her, and even if there had been she doubted she would have spoken anyway.

 

[Itash Mecetti]

[member="Aerin Akun Mereel"]

Third flittered back and fro to watch the strange big woman struggling through the snow and the tight corridors of the star destroyer.

She had seen it!

But because Third was smol and fast, she hadn't been able to keep it in sight. The Black Man would be happy, it could already feel the glow of appreciation streaming softly in through their bond. It made its wings flutter even faster for a bit, before it started pecking at its wing- oh! Right. A nudge was all it took to send it flying back to Mereel, following her through the corridors.

An idea started to push itself into the foreground of its thoughts.

Hm.

Then it zoomed straight past the woman's face and disappeared again. The second time it swept past her ear, before finally hovering a few meters in front and above her, allowing her to see its majesty.

Third pecked at some dust on its wing, before turning around its axis in the air and disappearing deeper into the star destroyer.

Letting the woman follow it.

 

[Lief]

How unapologetically strange.

The little thing zipped past her once, twice, then paused right in front of her. Now that she could see it a little more clearly, Aerin couldn't help but wonder just what manner of creature it was. It looked like a rodent, albeit a very cute one at that, and yet it had the wings of a butterfly and colours so vibrant that it screamed unnatural.

She could practically smell the laboratory on it. Probably helped that she was more at home in such surroundings than anywhere else, of course.

Reaching out toward it, as slow as she could muster so as not to frighten it, she attempted to stroke at its feathery-fur. Of course the little thing had other ideas, and soon enough it was zipping back through the heart of the Star Destroyer, leaving her at quite the impasse.

Was it... Trying to get her to follow?

Surely not.

And yet during the time that it had sat hovering midair infront of her she had seen clearly how it stared at her, it saw her there, it had come whizzing past her thrice now.

Against perhaps her better judgement, Aerin began to venture deeper... Down through the semi-sunken vessel, the distant sound of dripping water leading her on even when the darkness descended around her. Her eyes were quick to adjust, how many months had she spent in solitary? Locked away from all beings, from all semblance of normalcy, at the mercy of those who sought to break her?

Darkness had become her shield then, her cover.

And so she followed through it, until that darkness gave way to a shimmering light - and at its center a man.

[member='Itash Mecetti']

 

[Itash Mecetti]

[member="Aerin Akun Mereel"]

He saw her, before she saw him.

Such was the way Third's personal connection worked with him. The little creature was sitting snugly on Tash's shoulder now, almost seeming to hug the line of his neck with its nose sniffing at the jaw. "Did good??" It whispered softly in his mind and hoped for a treat. Mecetti pulled out a little sugar clip, prepared by GenPals, and let the little one nom at it while Aerin carefully approached.

"You were exquisite, Third." It murfled (a sound that seemed to be between a spinning hum and a little giggle) and kept nomming on the sugary bit. Only then did Itash shift his attention towards Aerin.

"I didn't expect to find anyone else in this wreckage." That did not make this an unpleasant surprise, but a surprise nonetheless. "I am Lord Itash of House Mecetti."

He approached, slowly, one step at a time.

An hand extended itself to put hers in it, if she accepted it.

"Who are you, if I may ask?"

 

[Lief]

She could see the curious little creature nestling against the man's shoulder, and without even trying she could sense the somewhat intimate connection between the pair.

That intrigued her.

Taking just a couple more steps into the chamber, she waited for the man to first speak and was surprised by the tone of voice. He had appeared roguish to begin with, yet his words and the accompanying titles suggested otherwise. Or perhaps he was simply a more rebellious noble.

"Lord [member='Itash Mecetti']," she mirrored, extending her own hand into his by way of greeting, "I'm Aerin..."

For a moment she faltered. She knew there was more to her name than that, only it had been so very long since she had utilized it that her mind drew a blank. Almost as though she was purposely keeping herself from remembering who she was. Who she had been before coming to this Force forsaken pit.

And then it happened. A flicker of remembrance across her gaze, genuine despair for but a moment or two before she grasped back onto the reins of her sanity. He did not need to know of her situation.

"Aerin Akun. A pleasure to meet you."

She could not allow any more of herself to rise to the surface, no more thoughts of the family she had been torn apart from. No.

"It is strange to find Outlanders in these parts. What brings you to Ziost, Lord Mecetti?"

 

[Itash Mecetti]

[member="Aerin Akun Mereel"]

The pause was not missed.

Neither was the extensive damage to her mind.

It showed up as whispers to Tash, brushing against his mind, fragmentation. Someone had done a real number on this one. He calmly brought her gloved hand to his lips, not entirely touching and instead letting the imprint brush against veiled knuckles. Who knew what she had been touching with that glove? But it was Tapani tradition and she was quite lovely to boot.

Broken and shattered, but those things only increased his interest.

"I assure you, the pleasure is mine, miss Akun." Tash murmured before letting her hand go and shrugging pleasantly a moment later. "On the job. Ziost has been the site of many battles over the years, the Empire has requested my company's assistance with pacifying some trouble around these parts." Crazed force clones, most of them had been destroyed or inactive.

But they were seemingly propping up again.

"My scouts found this place a few days ago, once they determined it was abandoned I decided to explore it, see if there was anything of use here."

Now his attention and focus shifted from explanation to curiosity. "What about you, miss Akun? You... seem rather troubled, if I can say that without offending you."

 

[Lief]

There was some part of her, deep down, which felt disgusted by the title she had been given. Miss... Why did that sit so poorly within her? Her nose wrinkled, as once again she was forced to swallow back the cause of her distress, the memories which arose to the surface and were just as quickly snuffed out, of a man, and children, and a life away from all this ice and snow.

Dreams, Aerin. They are not real...

They couldn't be, because if they were then that meant...

She let out a small sigh, and plastered an easy smile upon her lips. He had done the typical Noble thing of bringing her knuckles to his lips, just another sign that looks were deceiving, and afterward her hand returned to her side.

"Oh, so you're a Lord now and a C.E.O? Anything else I should know, Lord Mecetti?"

Some might think that repeated use of a title was condescending, or sarcastic, yet each time she said his name it was surprisingly with the utmost respect. Almost as if, once upon a time, she had been in a similar boat. Not that she could fully remember as much, of course. No, all she knew was the snow and the durasteel walls of her laboratory prison.

"An old wreck such as this? It ought to hold something of use, no?"

For the time being she dodged his question, instead turning her sights to his little companion which was still nibbling away at some sugary treat.

"I daresay I've never seen anything quite like that," she murmured, gesturing of course to the little creature, there was nothing natural about it, Aerin worked with such creations on a daily basis, and she knew the tell tale signs of such. What claim would she have to her position if she couldn't?

"Such exquisite work; if I may be so bold as to inquire, who created it?"

Her hands drew behind her back then, fidgeting some as she knew that she had yet to respond to his question. It wasn't the question that posed the problem of course, but the statement which was attached to it. Still she could not put it off forever, and while her own curiosity had proven enough to give her time to think, that time was swiftly coming to an end.

"I like to feel the wind on my face every now and then, that I came upon this place at all was mere coincidence."

No talk of her confinement, nothing which could really get her into any trouble. From the sounds of it he was contracted, not apart of the Empire himself, and that served her well enough. He had no obligations to bring her in, even if he did find out the truth.

Or so she surmised.

[member="Itash Mecetti"]

 

[Itash Mecetti]

[member="Aerin Akun Mereel"]

The distaste was noted.

Bit by bit, every little piece that she gave him freely, Tash took note of it and filed it away for later. Why she would find the honorific disagreeable but wouldn't actually mention why was beyond him. Before the Mecetti scion could think more of it, she already guided the conversation away and that was noted as well. It seemed she was uncomfortable with discussion certain... things.

There were flashes coming from her shattered thoughts.

Nothing that gave him specifics, but Tash had a rich imagination and the shards were enough to send his mind to wonder. "Oh, now that would be telling, wouldn't it?" The 3-7B was not a secret in itself, but it was an order that would never be available to the public. Only for Didact usage and that meant that the less people knew of it, the more effective it would be.

"This little critter is mostly a pet. A smart one, aren't you." It purred in response to the sudden shift in inflection. As if it reacted only to the change rather than the words themselves.

"You will feel more than just wind out here, miss Akun." Again that honorific, now that he knew she didn't like it, Tash employed it more. Exercising control and pushing her boundaries. After all, she hadn't said anything verbally and that gave him a suitable deniability. "The snowstorms are treacherous and dangerous out here. You can speak truth with me. Are you in need of assistance?"

Tash seemed so trustworthy, helpful, just a calm presence- luck in his appearance when it came to her situation.

 

[Lief]

"Does it have a name, at least?" she continued, just as persistent, it was obvious by now that she was genuinely intrigued. Usually things which were created in a lab tended to be on the more gruesome side of things, especially if the Force was involved though in this case she couldn't quite deduce whether it was or not. Not without getting a little more up close and personal with it. "It's absolutely divine."

It did not take long for the conversation to be turned once again, and that same title ran from his lips. She realized shortly after why it was exactly that it bothered her so.

"Miss is never a title I bore," she informed him. She looked up, into the depths of this once great ship, and tried to pull from the tattered remnants of her mind what it was she had been known as, back before all of this. Alas she could not provide him with a better alternative, and thus with a soft sigh she shrugged it off. "Aerin will do, I assure you."

"The weather here does not bother me, Lord Mecetti, it allows me to feel alive, if only for a short while, I'd rather that than stagnant nothingness. Wouldn't you?"

Suspicion ran over her expression when he asked if she required help. What was to say he hadn't been placed here specifically to catch her? Somebody could have seen her leave, tracked her trajectory, sent him out in a ship to intercept her.

And yet she knew that wasn't the case.

She simply knew.

"Assistance, me?" She laughed, though it didn't quite sound genuine, "I doubt there's anything you could possibly help me with, good sir."

Not if he wanted to remain in good standing with the Empire, at least.

[member="Itash Mecetti"]

 

[Itash Mecetti]

[member="Aerin Akun Mereel"]

Oh, she was persistent alright.

Which only served to amuse Tash and made Third just a little bit curious about the woman in front of them. It stopped nuzzling the Dark Man's jaw (didn't stop nomming the treat though), to focus more intently on her. It coed just a bit in response to something and then refocused its attention towards the sugary treat. Unless stimuli forced it to, it didn't really have the focus for a very extended time.

"Oh, its name is Third." That made its ears wrinkle just a bit in pleasure. It seemed to like it when someone said its name. "Aerin." Itash tasted it in his mouth for a bit, before shrugging softly.

"If you prefer that then Aerin it is."

Oh, Itash enjoyed pushing her already, but once she made it verbal that was a different story. There was no point in being overly rude as far as Tash was concerned. That was reserved for different occasions. There was still that shatter in her, the worry, fear, pain, she wanted to accept his help. But for some reason she couldn't quite vocalize it outloud.

"I wouldn't be too sure of that, Aerin, considering I have a private army at my back and the wealth of noble blood propping me up."

When he spoke her name Tash calmly reached out- carefully, slipping through the cracks of her broken pysche and slowly reinforced the potential for trust. He looked trustworthy, his smile was pleasant as were his eyes, there was nothing... dead about them. "Please, if you are in trouble you only but need to ask, my honor as a Lord of Tapani is in danger otherwise."

 

[Lief]

"Third?"

She had heard stranger names out there, that was true, it didn't seem like a name someone had actually chosen to call it, giving more weight to her theory that it was lab-made, but the little love certainly did not mind. It seemed practically over the moon to stand alongside this man and that was what mattered.

He gave up on trying to force miss down her throat and for that she was grateful. Being inside she had the urge to take off the gloves which lined her hands, but truth be told it was almost colder in the shell of this ancient vessel than it was outside, no doubt the metal hull having something to do with it. She did so anyway, pulling them off and stuffing them into the pockets of the armour before rubbing her hands together to warm them up. Though well groomed they were far from manicured and it was obvious she was someone who actually worked with her hands. There were notable scars there too, which carried up on her arms - at least as far as could be seen - but they didn't look too recent.

After a few more moments she put her hands inside her pockets and looked back to Itash, almost as though just realizing he was still there. Of course he was, explaining how easy it would be for him to help her if she allowed it, if she only lowered her defenses, and she felt as though his words held weight.

"You say that you are working for the Empire, at least here... Know that interfering with me could ruin that for you, if anyone ever figured out who let his plaything go."

She had said too much, more than she ought to, more than she meant to, but you couldn't exactly take words back once they were spoken and so she merely let them sit there on the air between them for a little while.

"Besides, it's not as though I've anywhere else to be."

That was the truth... Sort of... Maybe. She didn't know, she couldn't recall much before being here. That was the way it had been intended to be.

[member="Itash Mecetti"]

 

[Itash Mecetti]

[member="Aerin Akun Mereel"]

Plaything?

Tash raised his eyebrows a fraction.

Now that was a very odd way of describing yourself. "Is this he Kaine Zambrano, Dark Lord of the Sith? Darth Prazutis, his Shadowhand? Lord Inquisitor Saarai of the Saaraishash?" Tash asked with some interest, because that information would determine just how much risk he'd be going through to annoy the Empire. If it were one them... he'd most likely avoid something as overt as liberating the object of their play.

If it wasn't?

Then it was good business as far as Itash was concerned. A Lord of the Sith who couldn't protect or hold their own belongings wasn't exactly someone that the Empire would go out of their way for.

"What are your duties? What are your talents?"

Oh, she was a scientist alright. This Tash knew from the fragments he felt, from her interest in Third, but how much farther did it go?

 

[Lief]

Aerin thought long and hard for a moment, before ultimately shaking her head. No, no he was not. Nobody quite so high ranking as those that ran the Empire, to be sure, but that didn't mean trouble would not come from it. At least in her mind.

She did not look upon the Tapani Lord, instead focusing her attentions on Third in an attempt to avoid the situation that was playing out before her. She wasn't a coward or a craven, or even someone who usually avoided confrontation, but this felt odd to her and she didn't fully know how to react. It wasn't as though she could afford to get her hopes up, after all.

"My duties?" she finally responded, mirroring his questions, and only then did she look to him. A question she could comfortably answer.

"I'm a Doctor by profession, here I work as his personal physician and geneticist. Rearrange DNA, splice things together..." She offered just the slightest shrugs, it wasn't what she had wanted out of life, to dissect things and see what made them tick, to create abominations, no she had gone into her field to save lives. The only lives she saved these days were those belonging to monsters. "Much in the way I presume your wonderful Third was created, experimentation. All manner of unnatural things, though as I've said already this one here" she nodded to Third but there was obviously no doubt who she was talking about, "Is such a wonder to behold. Far different from anything I've conjured up. It has its innocence..."

[member="Itash Mecetti"]

 

[Itash Mecetti]

[member="Aerin Akun Mereel"]

Itash nodded.

If it weren't any of those names then this was free-for-all as far as he was concerned.

There were a few rules when you operated in TSE space. One of them was to not kark with those names, but other than them? It didn't really matter as long as you got away with it without being very obnoxious about it. Third purred at the nice things being said about it, but kept clinging to Tash, it wasn't very comfortable mixing with strangers and there wasn't anything stranger than Aerin right now.

"A doctor?" Tash sniffed, before eyeing her a little bit. "Not just a scientist, if I am correct. You smell of the Force."

It was easy when you were actively of the mentalism path.

You could sniff out the little hints and she wasn't actually doing anything to suppress her presence within the Force. It was unrefined, but there was potential within it, if cultivated correctly.

"How would you like a job? Money, vacation days, the whole load."

 

[Lief]

He was sharp.

Then again, if he was so bold as to mingle with the likes of Sith she supposed he had to be lest he run the risk of losing his head. She offered him another loose shrug, her hands fidgeting in an absent-minded fashion as she listened to what he had to say.

"You would be correct, I am also an alchemist. I'd say the Force was my ally, but I daresay that's hardly the truth of it. It certainly helped once upon a time, when I was more focused on healing than mutating, but what can you do?"

A very slight smile worked over her lips, not quite meeting her eyes, as her inner cynic made itself briefly known. Her eyes drifted between Third and Itash, somewhat envious of the connection they held. How long had it been since she'd had real company, much less companionship? Far too long. Sometimes the grim faces of her experiments manifested themselves as such, the dead and unconscious were fantastic listeners after all, but that hardly counted.

When the offer was laid out on the table between them, Aerin could not help but still doubt whether or not this was a trap. A trick of her Master to test her loyalty. He had done similar during her first few years here, the first two times she had been stupid, naive, and she had suffered greatly for it. After that point though she had become wise to his schemes.

This did not smell the same.

"What kind of job do you have in mind, Lord Mecetti?"

It didn't hurt to ask.

[member="Itash Mecetti"]

 

[Itash Mecetti]

[member="Aerin Akun Mereel"]

"I operate Didact Defense Solutions, Aerin. A private military corporation with quite some reach within the Corporate Sector and beyond." Itash informed her patiently, while letting that sink in a bit. "My offer is simple- I take you away from here. In return I'd like you to consider a job at Didact. We have a close work relationship with some biochemical concerns." GenPals operated by a fascinating woman. One who had managed to capture his attention and curiosity in ways that few women had been able to for any extended period of time.

"You will work in a lab operated by Didact and one of these concerns. You will utilize your expertise in the genetic sciences and alchemy to help us achieve... interesting results." He was sure [member="Cassandra Paige"] would be most interested in an alchemist in their employ.

The meeting with Cerbera had surely made her interest in having alchemists of their own.

At the very least to level the playing field a bit. "In return you get a steady income, many benefits and most importantly... your freedom." Tash didn't particularly care about keeping her locked up or anything. Maybe before Cass he would have wanted to play with Aerin. She was quite interesting, after all. But there were deeper and larger concerns now.

"Choice is yours."

 

[Lief]

One word above all else stuck out to her, something which made her more inclined to trust him, to take him up on his offer, and even to ultimately work for him.

Consider.

There was no forceful tone, no expectations, just a simple request in exchange for being brought away from this hellish tundra which had been known to her for several decades now. To consider his proposal for work. A real job, one with pay and benefits and time off... As opposed to a position where she was effectively a slave to the system, fed the bare minimum, provided with little in the way of funds - outside of research funds, of course - and unable to leave unless she managed to sneak away as had been the case today.

Freedom was so close that she could practically taste it, and even all of her concerns, even the brainwashing she had been subjected to, was incapable of breaking through to her in that moment.

"Please..." she finally said, after what felt like an eternity, and her voice was so quiet that it seemed as though she had not meant to say it aloud at all. She was a strong woman most of the time, she put up with a lot, but with such a stark change now on the horizons how could she possibly be anything less than tremulous? He held her future, her fate, in his palm, and if he wished he could turn it all on its head. Return her to the monster.

The last thing she wanted was to reexperience his methods.

[member="Itash Mecetti"]