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sullustangin · 3 years ago

Note

“this is the opposite of what i told you to do.”

This ended up being a scene from my upcoming Yavin fic. I had the overall plot point in my head, but I hadn't written it yet. So with the prompt, I finally got the vibe I wanted for the scene.

“This is the opposite of what I told you to do.”

“Huh?” Eva cracked her eyes open to see, dimly through her sunglasses, a very, very grumpy Theron standing over her as she reclined in her lounge chair next to the gangplank of Virtue’s Thief. “It’s my day off, if you forgot the rota.” Eva had been up early-ish to deal with the daily war table in the central compound on Yavin, but once that was done, she’s slunk back to the Thief and decided to enjoy the start of her day off-duty. She basked in the early morning sunshine with a nice cup of orange juice.

With vodka. Mimosas were just classier versions of screwdrivers anyway.

“Oh, I know the rota. I made it, remember?” Theron crossed his arms in annoyance. “And this isn’t about what you’re doing now. It’s about what you’ve been doing during the morning Jedi meditations.”

Eva clearly wasn’t awake yet, because Theron normally made sense. It wasn’t like having a conversation with Guss. “To quote myself, ‘huh?’”

Theron huffed. “I asked you to lay off the new arrivals from Tython. Satele took a big risk by arranging their transport to help support our efforts here on Yavin. They acted immaturely, but they apologized for that. I expected that you and your crew would stop terrorizing them, once you got the last word.”

Eva offered up an ‘uh huh’ as she got to her feet and reached for her orange juice on the upturned crate she’d been using as a cocktail table. “First off, they are immature – they’re teenagers, most of them. Secondly, the apology means nothing when it’s either coerced by the bloody Grand Master or done in the name of snuggling up to the very attractive spy who mysteriously has the same last name as their boss.” Eva flipped her sunglasses up to waggle her eyebrows at Theron, who just grimaced at her. Eva let her eyeglasses drop back down. “Third, what last word? As you can see, I’m not harassing the magical minions. What’s the problem?”

Theron pressed his lips into a line, and Eva saw the gears turning. “You really don’t know, do you?”

Eva shook her head.

Theron’s brow creased, and Eva sipped her orange juice, waiting for an explanation. Theron pulled out his datapad to read some sort of report.

At the same time, Eva noticed Bowdaar emerging from the roof hatch. He was up early, as usual.

“After your dust-up with the new recruits last week, a large four-legged mammal was found dead in their little enclave – right where they normally mediate first thing in the morning.” Theron pointed in the general direction of where the new Jedi had set up shop. “By the time Satele had come back from the morning briefing, it had been removed.”

Theron swiped his screen to move on to the next report. Eva could hear Bowdaar on the roof, dragging a case across the roof of the Thief. Theron was too absorbed in his datapad to notice, plus Eva was particularly attuned to what was going on with her ship. “Four days ago, a large reptile dragged itself into the area, dropped dead during morning meditation, corpse gone by the time anyone with authority showed up.” Theron flipped to the last report. “And yesterday, a deceased medium-size predatory bird was briefly seen before again disappearing.”

Eva paused drinking for a second, looked at the remaining orange juice, then offered it to Theron. “You sure they aren’t abusing their newest freedoms and just thinking they see something?”

Theron took a taste and made face, passing it back to her immediately. “Too early for me. And no, no sign of that.”

Eva took back her drink and started to meander away from the ship, just to get a fix on what exactly Bowdaar was doing up there. “Do they forage and eat things they really shouldn’t?”

Theron shook his head. “We asked after the second incident.”

“Could they be camping near some hallucinogenic shrubbery or something?” Eva gestured with her glass in the general direction of the makeshift Jedi enclave. Behind her sunglasses, Eva cast a look up at Bowdaar. She was quickly putting the pieces together as he loaded up a blaster rifle with a scope.

“We’re finding evidence that something had been there. I thought you were trying to get a rise out of them, but – wait, the time stamps.” Theron stopped.

She peered over his shoulder. “I was out on patrol. Or in a meeting. Or with you.”

Yeah, she’d had been far too busy to go terrorize space wizards this week.

“Sorry,” Theron offered, a slight smile appearing as he remembered exactly what they’d been doing.

“You can hold that thought for a minute,” Eva sighed. Theron stared at her, confused, and then they both heard it:

The deep zap of the rifle

The distant screech of some large bird.

Then a few, long moments, of silence before shrieks erupted from the Jedi encampment.

Eva drank the rest of her orange juice in one long continuous swig as Theron whirled around to stare at the top of the ship. “Bowdaar!” he yelled.

“What? I don’t control the migration patterns.”

As Eva headed into the ship to refill on orange juice (and vodka), she heard Theron attempt to give the Wookiee a talking to, telling him to aim somewhere else.

The voices got loud, but the words were indistinct. After 15 minutes, she thought Bowdaar had come back into the ship to complain about that busybody agent. Instead, it was Theron. He stood in her galley doorway, hair slightly mussed from where Bowdaar had likely physically picked him up and put him aside like an annoying child. The Wookiee had likely gone to collect his prize.

Eva used a swizzle stick to mix her screwdriver. “You know how you do that thing, eating at all the good places on a planet?”

Theron, eyes still bright and furious, nodded.

“He kinda does the same thing, but with killing apex predators. You should probably thank him, if he’s right about the Jedi getting in the way of them moving south for the winter.”

Wordlessly, Theron rapped on the galley counter. Eva tipped her sunglasses down to give him a look. Again, his knuckles tapped out an insistent rhythm.

Eva slid her drink over toward Theron and went to work on making herself another one. “Thought it was too early for you.”

Theron drained half of his glass in one go. He came up for air and began to fix his hair with his free hand. “Not anymore.”

#swtor #oc: eva corolastor #swtor fan fiction #wip #theron shan #bowdaar #yavin 4 #theron shan x smuggler #bowdaar x killing stuff bigger than him

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sineala · 4 years ago

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The Old Guard

This post comes to you courtesy of the generous support of one of my Patreon patrons, who wanted to know what I thought of The Old Guard. This post contains some spoilers for both the movie and the comics.

So, a few days after it came out, my wife and I watched The Old Guard on Netflix. Tumblr had said a bunch of good things about it, and both of us basically cut our fannish teeth on Highlander fandom so we already had an automatic buy-in for a story about immortals. I knew it was based on a comic by Greg Rucka, but I had not, at the time, read the comic, although I am now reading it in order to write this post.

The premise of the film is as follows: a four-person team of immortals (Andy, Joe, Nicky, and Booker) makes a living hiring themselves out as mercenaries, fighting for causes that they believe are right. They are successful at this basically because their grasp of tactics appears to be (1) die, followed by (2) come back to life and (3) murder your attackers who are no longer paying attention to you because they think you're dead. Honestly, at this point, you wouldn't really need to be very good at the actual fighting part, I would think, but the film establishes that all of them are -- especially Charlize Theron as Andy -- because presumably it wants you to watch action sequences of everyone being badass, which they are. So, yeah. They take all the good-guy mercenary jobs that no one else can do because it would kill them, which is not a problem for them!

Anyway! The group's routine is interrupted by two major events: the discovery of Nile Freeman, a new immortal, who is a Marine serving in Afghanistan who survives getting murdered; and also the fact that one of their employers, Copley (played by Chiwetel Eijofor, whom you may remember as Mordo in Doctor Strange) has sold them out to the movie's Actual Villain, a Big Pharma CEO named Merrick (played by the guy who played Dudley in the Harry Potter series), who has (as far as I can tell) been given instructions to play this role just like he's Martin Shkreli, who is interested in finding the secret of their immortality, and whom you can tell is evil because he has his name in giant letters on the side of his building.

ME: Look, it's the villain! I've found the villain! MY WIFE: Other than Tony Stark, who actually puts their names on buildings like that except villains? It's just villains, right? ME: Uh. The president? The president definitely does that. (We make horrified faces at each other.)

Because we are Extremely Pedantic, we also spent a lot of time picking at how the characters' names and language abilities match up to their stated background. They all know a lot of languages, as you might expect, and the movie was determined to get through them without subtitles, which is an interesting choice but also kind of left some linguistic plot holes.

For example, Joe and Nicky claim to have met each other in the Crusades, with Nicky as (presumably) a Crusader and Joe as (presumably) a Muslim occupant of the area, although the movie doesn't specify this; Wikipedia gives Joe's name as Yusuf Al-Kaysani, which would at least fit that. Nicky is clearly Italian (as is Luca Marinelli, the actor who portrays him) and when he speaks Italian to the rest of the group we see that he definitely speaks modern Italian as spoken in Rome... which is absolutely, definitely not the language he grew up speaking, given that, among other things, Wiki lists the character's full name as Nicolò di Genova. I don't know if the writer of the screenplay (who I see now is also Greg Rucka) didn't know how much Italian dialects had changed in the last thousand years, if he thought that was good enough to be a nod to the character, or if there's some kind of backstory that didn't make it in where every so often Nicky decides to learn a modern dialect and keep his hand in, and also decides that that's the language he wants to use among his friends who would presumably understand several different dialects.

Also, the reveal that Andy's real name was in fact "Andromache of Scythia" was indeed badass but was slightly undercut by my wife yelling BUT THE SCYTHIANS DIDN'T SPEAK GREEK at the television.

Additionally, I feel like the movie could perhaps have been aware of the ways it chose to label on-screen locations, in which the countries were spelled out in large fonts with the cities above them. Places like LONDON, ENGLAND got their entire names spelled out, as did small French villages whose names I can no longer remember, but I guess AFGHANISTAN and MOROCCO and SOUTH SUDAN have zero cities, huh? However, the end of the movie did take place in PARIS which I guess unlike London is its own country now.

So the actual plot features the group of immortals trying to explain this whole immortality thing to Nile while being on the run from the people who are trying to turn them into Big Pharma, who wants to capture them and exploit the secret of their immortality. This is where it falls down a little for me, because the worldbuilding... gets a little shaky. They dream about each other when they're apart. Okay. Why? Sometimes they just stop being immortal and lose the capacity to heal and are dead in their next battle. Why? Why do they even exist? I just... wanted more answers than the movie gave me, and the pacing where I kept expecting there to be explanations wasn't there. There were a couple of scenes where Nile sat there in silence contemplating the fact that she would outlive her loved ones and my brain kept trying to insert Queen's "Who Wants to Live Forever?" Granted, the Highlander canon explanation for immortality is deeply, deeply weird, but at least it tried. No, I can't believe I'm defending Highlander II either.

The characters, too, could have been more fleshed out. The bulk of the character development is given to Andy and Nile, and I'm not complaining about that -- they were great -- but Joe and Nicky and Booker only got maybe a few lines each. They would have felt so much more real if they'd just had a little bit more to them. Also I didn't understand Copley's arc at all, but saying more about that would be spoilery. I do like that they have definitely set themselves up for a sequel.

But even with what we got, there's a lot to love about the characters. If you're here for canonically queer characters, you will enjoy Nicky and Joe, who have been in a relationship for probably about a thousand years. They are minor characters as far as the overall plot goes, but what they do have is lovely, and there is a romantic declaration between them at one point that is absolutely beautiful and possibly the most fervent love declaration I can remember seeing in a movie since maybe... ever. If you also like your queerness more subtextual, though Andy is never portrayed as explicitly queer, her past friendship with a fellow immortal Quynh was shown as very intense, as is the role she takes here mentoring Nile into the world of immortality. Also she has a double-bladed axe (yes, we kept yelling BRING ME MY MAN-KILLING AXE at the television) and as we all know, the double-bladed labrys has in modern times become a symbol for lesbians. So there's that.

In addition to the characters of color who play important roles here -- Nile was my personal favorite, but there's also Joe and Copley and (in flashback) Quynh -- there's a lot of diversity behind the cameras as well, or so the internet informs me. The director (Gina Prince-Bythewood) is the first Black woman to direct a superhero movie, and the same is true of her editor (Terilyn Shropshire). And, furthermore, apparently 85% of the post-production crew were women. They didn't have to do that, and yet they did. It was nice.

I don't watch a whole lot of action movies these days because I usually find R-rated violence too... violent, but I found myself really liking almost all of the action sequences here. None of them felt gratuitous, and a lot of them really focused on the physicality of the immortals fighting in a way I liked, because I feel like people are probably going to fight differently if they know they can survive every single hit, and I think the movie portrayed that in a way that a lot of superhero comics and movies don't. My favorite fight scene is definitely the one between Nile and Andy at the beginning, when Andy has trapped her on a plane and it's extremely close-quarters fighting and also extremely brutal. They don't stop basically until Nile breaks enough bones that she can't get up anymore, because until then she's going to keep trying, which is both kind of horrifying and a great character note. And they didn't film it like it was a Sexy Catfight! It was so good.

Also, the soundtrack is really good, and I've found myself streaming it on Spotify all week. I didn't know any of the songs in the movie, but there's a lot of hip-hop and -- okay, I don't even know if this is a genre? -- specifically a lot of hip-hop with an electronic/industrial sort of beat, which I thought was really great and livened up the fight scenes even more; "Going Down Fighting" did a really good job getting me in the mood for the final confrontation with the villain, and... yeah, it's all good. Someone made a playlist on Spotify that will come up if you search for it.

So, yeah. It's on Netflix. It's not without flaws (mostly, explaining how the hell immortality works, and a couple of pacing issues), but it's a really satisfying superhero movie.

That's the movie. Onto the comic, which I am just now starting to read as I write these words. Whee!

So The Old Guard: Opening Fire is a 2017 five-issue Image Comics series written by Greg Rucka, with art by Leandro Fernández, and there's also a 2019 sequel, The Old Guard: Force Multiplied, by the same creative team, also with five issues. I have not actually read any of Rucka's work before now because he is mostly famous for his DC work, but I have heard good things about it, especially his Wonder Woman run.

Anyway. The art is very stylized, with a minimal color palette, and it's very pretty but I honestly found it hard to parse sometimes. Many of the characters have very weird noses. Yes, noses. It's basically mostly in Andy's and Nile's POVs, like the movie, and as far I can tell Andy is explicitly queer, because unless I am entirely misreading this panel in issue #1, here she is in bed with a woman in one panel. Whee. Also there are some nice epigraphs at the beginning of each issue.

Okay, so, the plot here is basically the plot of the movie. There is still no explanation of why immortality exists. But even so, there are some fun character moments that didn't make it into the movie -- for example, Andy saying smartphones are too hard to use and she liked the old ones better, only for the rest of her team to say that she couldn't use those either. I think you get a better sense of Andy's world-weariness in the comic. There are also other, now-dead Immortals mentioned, like Noriko, who "went overboard off the Horn." Quynh is not one of them; Quynh basically is Noriko, which is because they cast a Vietnamese actress who asked if her character could be Vietnamese too, which seems perfectly reasonable to me. But anyway, in the comics, she's Noriko. Weirdly, Andy's full name, as she tells Nile when they meet, is Andronika ("man-victory") rather than Andromache ("man-battle," in case you were wondering); I think the movie made a better choice because Ἀνδρονίκα has exactly two attestations in the Lexicon of Greek Personal Names, whereas Ἀνδρομάχη has all that shiny name recognition of being shared by the wife of Hector and also the queen of the Amazons and will ping viewers as a Greek name, and therefore ancient, even if it can't be the name she was born with. (There are five for "Andronike" and four more for "Andromacha" so they actually have about the same number of total attestations, as far as I can tell, when you consider the alpha/eta alternation in how various Greek dialects mark feminine nouns.)

(Yes, you totally wanted a review by someone who looks up character names in the LGPN. Don't lie.)

Plotwise, Andy gets all of the initial exposition in for Nile before they get to the safehouse, which Copley has already gotten to before they get back, so Booker is bleeding on the floor and Nile doesn't get to meet Joe or Nicky at this time, and I am also glad they changed that for the movie. But, don't worry, Joe and Nicky's romantic declaration is still in here. We also get Andy pondering the last time she was in love, with a human who grew old.

Oh, and we get Andy's age: 6,732. And by issue #5 her name has changed to Andromache, because what even is continuity? I guess Andromache is her name now.

So Nile finally meets Joe and Nicky when she rescues them and also, uh, that plot point where Andy might die? Totally not a thing here. Nope. And no "surprise! even more immortals!" end-credits moments either.

Basically, I feel like every change they made to the script for the movie really strengthened the story, and even though I thought the movie could have used more character moments, it's way better than how the characters are separated for even longer in the comic. Nile rescuing the team means a lot more when she has met them before, you know?

So Force Multiplied starts us off with Andy, Joe, Nicky, and Nile, because Booker is still on time-out. They are in the middle of a car chase, and Booker's off getting himself kidnapped by someone who wants to know where the others are. The villain of the piece turns out to be Noriko, who is still alive, whom Booker had never had a chance to meet and apparently had never heard of. So, basically, a lot like the Quynh plot that the movie is teasing.

Overall it's a little less action-filled than the first one, which had multiple splash pages of nothing but violence; this one is a little more character-driven and explores the relationship, such as it is, between Andy and Noriko, as well as Nile coming to terms with her immortality, as well as with what everyone else has done over the years. It does have a bunch of violence at the end, though.

I don't want to spoil the ending, but I definitely wasn't expecting where that was heading. There's apparently going to be a third volume, and I am looking forward to it, whenever it exists.

(Although, now that I think about it, the ending is a lot like a fan-favorite moment of Highlander: The Series, but I think if I said which episode you would know exactly what the ending was.)

So, yeah! The Old Guard! I can't say as I feel particularly fannish about it -- there's nothing that makes me yearn to fill in the gaps in canon -- but the movie was really good and you should see it. And you should read the comics if you're into that.

#posts i actually wrote

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365days365movies · 4 years ago

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January 29, 2021: Mad Max (1979)

I’ve made it no secret how much I love the movie Mad Max Fury Road.

It’s a chase movie through the dystopian Australian desert featuring guys in souped-up, tricked out cars and motorcycles, and Charlize Theron has one metal arm and is a bad-ass, and also this shit.

Look, I’m not exactly a testosterone-fueled basic bro, but...COME ON MAN THIS MOVIE ROCKS. I just love it SO MUCH. So, why the hell haven’t I seen the other movies in this franchise, all of whom are directed by the same person? Well, my answer to that is the same as it always is.

I genuinely don’t know. I just never have. BUT THIS IS ACTION JANUARY! What better time to fill in this missing blank than RIGHT GODDAMN NOW?

LET’S GO. SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

Recap

So, it’s “a few years from now,” in Australia. Given the past year, this has become slightly more realistic, but anyway. A cop-killer named Nightrider (Vincent Gil) is on the loose, and the cops are on the case. Soon, an entire platoon appears to be chasing the Nightrider and his girlfriend. All the while, we get a glimpse of another policeman, gearing up to join the chase.

We get some car chase action, crashes included, with a couple of cars destroyed, a phone booth tipped over, half of an RV demolished, and one cop possibly dead. All the while, a car labeled Interceptor pulls onto the road, ready to join the case.

The driver of the Interceptor is none other than Max Rockatansky (Mel Gibson), who, uh...intercepts. Also...Rockatansky? Is...is that silly or the best last name I’ve ever heard? I genuinely do not know, and that disturbs me.

They drive right into a construction zone, with Max right behind, and Nightrider’s car explodes, and Max stops in time, and we get our first full look at him as he stares on, surprised.

Max goes home to his wife and son, who are totally gonna be alive by the end of this movie, probably throughout the whole franchise. He heads to work the next morning to meet with a colleague, Goose (Steve Bisley), a motorcycle cop who broke his leg in the chase. With a friend, they’ve put together a new car, a Pursuit Special.

This, however, appears to be some kind of plot by two high-ups, Commissioner Laboutache (Jonathan Hardy) and “Fifi” Macaffee (Roger Ward). Seems like they’ve provided the car to keep Max on the force, as he’s their top cop, and yearns to quit the force. I can only assume that it’s because of his wife and kids, who will definitely be alive by the end of this movie. The proof of that just KEEPS PILING UP.

Max appears high in demand today, though, as a group of motorcycling nomads ride into a small town, looking for the body of Nightrider. They’re led by the TOTALLY SANE Toecutter (Hugh Keays-Byrne), and they wreak havoc on the town and its citizens. A young couple try to escape the town, but they soon find themselves chased by the gang, their car is destroyed, and they are...well, they aren’t killed, but it’s not good.

Their fate is soon discovered by Max and Goose. The young man is seen running away, the girl is rescued, and a drugged-up gang member is discovered screaming “Nightrider!” Max and Goose now have an idea of what’s going on.

The gang member, Johnny the Boy (Tim Burns), is arrested and brought back to HQ. Toecutter’s right-hand man, Bubba Zanetti (Geoff Parry), is sent back to get him. To be specific, he sends his attorneys to fetch Johnny. On the day of his trial, nobody shows up, including the young couple. Therefore, Johnny’s allowed to walk. Goose is NOT OK with that outcome, and assaults Johnny and his attorneys.

Back with Toecutter, Johnny Boy is almost killed, as the group find some surveillance devices planted on a...manakin? Yeah, they have this weird sexual fascination with a realistic shop manakin, and the cops bugged it. Not sure what else to tell you, that’s just what happens.

The next day, Goose leaves home, and we see that Johnny Boy’s figured out where he lives, as he’s waiting outside. Goose rides to work, but the wheels of his motorcycle look up, and he FLIES off the highway.

He’s...completely OK? Yeah, like, he’s totally fine. No idea how the hell THAT happened, and the guy that picks him up shares my sentiments. Goose borrows the man’s truck, and heads out, but Johnny Boi intercepts him with a well-thrown brake drum. HA! He stops him with brakes.

The truck crashes, and Goose is still surprisingly alright as Toecutter arrives. Toecutter, violently ant-cop, orders Johnny Boy to set the truck and Goose on fire, as it’s leaking fuel. Johnny doesn’t want to, but Toecutter gets it done anyway. Geez, what is it with action movies and guys named Goose? LEAVE GEESE ALONE, MOVIES!

At the hospital, Max arrives to see his critically injured partner, who’s badly burned and on a respirator. Max is VERY affected by his old friend’s massive injuries, and heads home. He quits, for good this time, although Fifi insists otherwise. Max insists that he’s scared that he’ll begin to enjoy the danger of it too much, and would rather stay rational for the sake of his family. Fifi convinces him to simply take a few weeks off, and think about it further.

So, Max takes the time off, going on vacation with his family. He talks to his wife Jess (Joanne Samuel) about his father, and his feelings for her, and they’re toooootally gonna live until the end of the movie.

They stop in a town, and stop at a shop to fix the car. Jess takes her son to a beach get some ice cream. And also staying at the beach is...Toecutter and his gang…yup. Yup, here we go. They obviously assault, since ME WANT WOMAN OONGA BOONGA, and she escapes with their son. She picks up Max, and they take off.

Feeling unsafe, the family heads to a friend’ s farm to stay safe and fix up their car. Jess goes down to the beach near the farm...and so does Toecutter and his gang. On her way back through the forest (how much property do these people OWN), she finds herself followed by the gang. And then, she…

...makes it back to Max. Huh. I was sure she was a goner. Anyway, Max gets their friend to take her back to the house, and he goes hunting for them. However...their son is still out there. Shit.

Jess, a devoted mother, goes to find him, only to find him in the hands of Toecutter and his men. But damn, they’re SAVED by their friend, May Swaisey (Shiela Florence), who comes with a gun in tow. She fires it, alerting Max to the trouble, then grabs the baby alongside Shields. They flee, with Toecutter’s gang eventually escaping.

Unfortunately, Max never finished fixing the car, and it dies on the highway, with the gang in hot pursuit. Despite May’s best efforts…

Fuck.

Sprog’s dead. And Jess is in a coma, and they say that she’s going to recover. But, uh...yeah, that doesn’t matter to Max. After Goose, Jess, and HIS SON? Toecutter’s DEAD. And Max goes and gets his car at the police station. First stop is the mechanic from earlier, who told Toecutter where they were. And Max ain’t playing around at this point.

Turns out that the group hangs by the beaches in order to intercept fuel trucks, and siphon off their fuel. With that intel, Max goes hunting. And OH BOY, he’s out for blood.

He runs four of them off a bridge, then heads to find more. He goes after more, then sees someone downed in a field. Unfortunately, it’s an ambush, and Johnny, Bubba, and Toecutter shoot him in the leg and run over his hand. Bubba tries to run him over, but gets shot in the process. Johnny and Toecutter take off, as a...falcon begins to eat Bubba?

Yeah...yeah ABSOLUTELY not how falcons work, but OK then.

Max runs Toecutter down in his car, then causes him to ram into an oncoming truck. We get some CRAZY ASS EYE SHOTS (they are weird), and Toecutter bites it...in a really unceremonious fashion, considering that he was the one to kill your son. Anticlimactic, but OK.

Still gotta find Johnny, though, and Max drives all night in search of him, only to find him having killed a man and driven his car off the road. Max meets him at gunpoint, and cuffs him to the downed car as be begs for his life, claiming his own innocence. Doesn’t matter at this point, though.

youtube

And that...is Mad Max. Huh. That was...interesting. And somehow, very different than I expected! But here’s the deal...

No Epilogue.

Yup, I’m tackling ALL of the Mad Max films at the same time! See you tomorrow for the next one!

January 30, 2021: Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior (1981)

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swtorpadawan · 4 years ago

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Six Sentence Sunday

Ugh. Where did Sunday go? Belatedly - I was tagged by @dragonheart-swtor - Thanks so much! Tagging @swtorramblings , @anchanted-one and @greyias if you're interested! __________________________________ “So. You wanted to talk?”

“Oh, you know. Just wanted to see how you were adjusting to everything.”

Theron gave her a charming, boyish smile, one that had probably beguiled dozens of beings the galaxy over, regardless of gender or species.

Kira liked Theron. She liked him quite a bit. And she knew Corellan trusted him completely. But growing up on Korriban and then Nar Shaddaa had taught her when she was being played. The Jedi folded her arms, her right eyebrow rising in suspicion.

“Uh-huh. Want to come clean with me, spy guy?”

Theron feigned a hurt expression on his face, then raised his hands in a gesture of surrender. He reached into his jacket pocket, pulling out what appeared to be a portable holo-device and setting it down on the table. The former SIS agent gave a sideways glance out at the occupants of the cantina that Kira almost missed, then, apparently satisfied, pressed two buttons on the communicator.

“Alright, you caught me. It’s about him. Even now, Lana and I… well, we get worried. About him, I mean. I don’t think we always read him correctly. We can’t tell when he’s pushing himself too hard.”

#swtor #swtor fanfiction #six sentence sunday #small favors #kira carsen #theron shan #oc: corellan halcyon

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greyias · 5 years ago

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FIC: Smoke and Mirrors - Chapter 13

Title: Smoke and Mirrors Fandom: SWTOR Pairing: Theron Shan/f!Jedi Knight Rating: T Genre: Pre-Relationship, Slow Burn Synopsis: Something’s rotten on Carrick Station, and Theron won’t rest until he finds out what. But picking at the frayed threads of suspicion quickly unravels a conspiracy much larger than even the Republic’s top spy can handle on his own. (A mostly canon-compliant retelling of the Forged Alliances storyline, as seen through the eyes of Theron Shan.) Author’s Notes and Spoilers: See Chapter 1.

Chapter Index: 01 | 02 | 03 | 04 | 05 | 06 | 07 | 08 | 09 | 10 | 11 | 12 | Crossposted to AO3

"Hell of a thing,” Jace muttered at the conclusion of Theron’s debrief. “Never thought the Imps would strike Tython.”

Theron shifted his weight, watching as Jace glared at his reflection in the desk. He had no idea if he was meant to respond to that, and if so, exactly what to say to it. It was just the two of them this time, as he was the official SIS liaison on the Korriban op. It was his job to debrief the military on both the Korriban raid and the Tython recovery. He’d already gone over everything with Marcus Trant.

Well… almost everything.

Of all the people in the galaxy to disclose his suspicions to, it made the most sense to do so with his boss. However, Theron knew that the first thing that Marcus would ask for was proof. For the SIS to do anything about Darok, they would first need actual proof he had a role in the attack on Tython outside of the suspicions of one agent. From the Republic’s viewpoint, the colonel was a hero whose quick actions had helped repel an Imperial invasion on one of their Core Worlds. Without evidence, the optics on accusing said hero of high treason were… not good, to put it lightly.

“First Coruscant, now this,” Jace continued on darkly, apparently still mired in his thoughts. ��Hate to see the Order go through this again.”

The level of destruction hadn’t been on the exact scale of the Sacking of Coruscant, but was still devastating from the what Theron had witnessed via holo. Agents had already been dispatched to Tython to gather intelligence, and the Director was redirecting resources to the investigation. Even the mountain of data that Theron had managed to scrape from Korriban’s servers was being pushed to the back burner at the moment. It was possible those records contained information about how the Empire had not only managed to get their hands on isotope-5, but also more troubling, how they had managed to weaponize it.

Theron had done the scouting for the initial mission to Makeb, and had done a recent recon of the Aida Sector. Considering the attack on Tython, his suspicions about Darok, and the fact that there was probably a leak in their intelligence somewhere. It made him wonder how much else he’d missed… more than he was comfortable with. And it had gotten a lot of people killed.

“We’re going to find out how this happened,” Theron finally said, pulling the older man out of his dark train of thought.

“Don’t take it personally, son. Sometimes ops go sideways, it’s what you do next that counts.”

There was a part of him that bristled at being called “son” — although in the moment he couldn’t determine if the moniker had been meant literally or more figuratively. Theron really wouldn’t have appreciated it either way, but squashed the rise of irritation. Any long term relationship with the older man, either professional or familial, was going to take a bit of compromise on both sides.

“This shouldn’t have happened,” he said, failing to keep the bitter note out of his voice.

“You, Darok, and Highwind are why we have Tython back.”

“She’s why we have it back,” Theron corrected firmly. “And her crew. They were the ones on the ground.”

He’d done what he could to help, but… he wasn’t the one that had been in the line of fire. And Darok definitely hadn’t been.

Jace raised his eyebrows thoughtfully. “So, I guess you don’t find her dossier so fictional now?”

“No, she’s very real,” Theron said. “Just different from what I expected.”

“That’s how they get you.” The teasing lilt in his father’s tone was something that was not appreciated. “Take it from me.”

“Uh huh.” Theron didn’t know where Jace was attempting to go with the comment, and had a feeling whatever lay at the end of that conversational detour was something he really didn’t want to explore. So he tried to stay on topic. “She’s capable, I’ll give you that.”

“Capable’s a bit of an understatement — I don’t think I’ve ever seen Saresh authorize anything that fast, much less a Medal of Valor.”

“The paperwork didn’t go through your office then?”

He kept his tone light, as if the answer to his question was really of no importance. Even if he was very interested in exactly how Darok had managed to procure that medal in the timeframe that he had. If Jace had any insight on it, it would chip away a little of the mountain of detective work that Theron had in front of him.

“It was a special case,” Jace said. “I think Saresh wanted to find a way to generate some good news out of this whole ordeal.”

Create a hero before anyone could focus on the disaster too much. That certainly sounded like Saresh. There was another possibility though. That someone else knew that about the Chancellor’s political tendencies, and had someone inside of the Chancellor’s office just waiting for the right moment. If all of the proper paperwork had been filled out ahead of time, an aide might only have to wait for a holocall from Darok so they could fill in the remaining blanks.

“I thought about putting one in for you and Darok, but I figured you’d want to keep a low profile. And Darok refused.”

“Where is the Colonel?”

“Still helping organize the cleanup on Tython. Dedicated soldier, that man.”

An uneasy tingling sensation took up at the base of Theron’s spine, and he studied his father carefully. “Sounds like you know him pretty well.”

“Never served with him directly, but he’s run a lot of operations under my watch.”

Not a close friend, but still had the ear of the Supreme Commander. Made sense. Darok would need the confidence of the main in charge of the Republic military to pull of a hasty covert mission. Even if Theron and Jace had a closer father-son bond like normal families, it would have been useless to mention any suspicions. No. It was obvious Theron was going to have to gather all of his proof before he would be able to bring anyone else in on this. And for that he was going to need to start his surveillance on the colonel.

Jace took Theron’s quick excuses of needing return to his investigation at face value. Although technically they weren’t excuses as he was returning to his investigation — just running a different avenue of it. He decided to head back to his apartment. It would take a little bit of extra work to disguise his electronic trail, but it would be far easier to start a trace on Darok’s activities there. It was considerably more difficult to stay off the radar if he used the main network at the Heorem Complex. For right now, it was best that any inquiries into Darok didn’t show up in official channels.

Maybe it was paranoid, but at this point Theron didn’t know how far the colonel’s influence stretched. Better safe than brought before a board of inquiry (at least before he sniffed out the truth). He still owed the Director an official report on both the Korriban and Tython ops, but that paperwork could wait. Just long enough so that he could lay the groundwork on the real investigation. If Marcus asked, Theron would just say that he could write reports just as easy from his apartment chair than one of the uncomfortable ones in the office.

It took painstaking effort to set up a program to route through the HoloNet and track all of Darok’s activities in such a way that the data trail wouldn’t be traced back to him. The whole process might have gone quicker, but after about the fourth time he coded a line, he had to admit to himself that he was distracted. There was no point in pretending otherwise. With a sigh, he pushed back from his terminal and grabbed the nearest datapad. A few keystrokes later and he’d been able to run a discreet search and corroborate Darok’s whereabouts.

The colonel was on Tython, just like Jace had said. The uneasy sensation that had been distracting Theron’s coding session still lingered, so he made one more inquiry: the current berthing of The Defender and her crew.

Also Tython.

Considering how eager his recruit had been to dig into the investigation, it wouldn’t hurt for him to check in. If she hadn’t run into Darok yet, Theron should give her the heads up — and remind her who was running the intel side of this operation. Without a second thought he pulled up a mail window, and began to write.

To: Greyias Highwind From: Theron Shan Subject: Reconstruction Efforts

I left the other day before I could inquire into your part in the reconstruction efforts at the Jedi Temple. I’ve seen some holos, and it looks like a lot of work. I heard that our mutual friend might be onsite, but also that he’s a very busy man. You probably shouldn’t bother him if he is there.

He stared at the message for about ten seconds before deciding that was good enough, and hit send. Temporarily mollified, he returned to his coding. It was at least an hour, but he was just on the final part of the trace when he heard a ding from his inbox indicating that he had a new message. He muttered a choice expletive, but pulled his attention away from his work so he could read the missive.

To: Theron Shan From: Greyias Highwind Subject: Slow Progress

So this is your address? Had you mentioned before leaving, I would have written to let you know about all of the people helping out with the reconstruction efforts here on Tython. It is slow going, but progress is still being made. Most of the Council was away with the war efforts, and even now not all of them can return. I’m afraid I have not been able to keep an eye on everyone as well as I would like, as we are still searching for survivors amongst the rubble. My friends and crew are helping, although I would not say I am on the “friendliest“ terms with everyone here. There has been quite a lot of activity in the library. Seeing as Doc says it would make a good area for triage, I am planning on speaking to the individuals blocking access. I will let you know how my conversation goes.

Last we spoke, there was also mention of a certain bracelet. I have yet to see this mythical piece of jewelry make an appearance. Let me know if you find it.

Theron nearly missed the last paragraph, as his blood pressure skyrocketed on reading the previous sentence. Without hesitation, he immediately hit reply.

To: Greyias Highwind From: Theron Shan Subject: Patience Is a Virtue

Have you considered that perhaps the library is structurally unsound? It sounds like whoever is up there might just be part of the engineering crew doing their job. Being that it’s on the second floor, wouldn’t it make more sense for your medic to set up in one of the classrooms on the first floor instead? That way neither of us has to stop what we’re doing to have any premature conversations. It’s always good to have proof before you start accusing anyone — of blocking medical access in this case.

And I’m pretty sure I mentioned that the bracelet was hypothetical. So you are correct in your categorization of it being mythical.

He sent the message off without even reviewing it, hoping that it was read before she charged in like a raging gundark and started asking questions. He didn’t bother getting back into finishing his query, not until he was sure that she wasn’t going to tip Darok off to their suspicions before Theron even had a chance to start digging. He watched the seconds pass by on the chrono, feeling tension gathering in his shoulders. This was why he worked alone. It was much easier to control the situation if he didn’t have to constantly be riding herd on others.

Finally, mercifully, his mailbox dinged as another message came through.

To: Theron Shan From: Greyias Highwind Subject: Fine

We’ll use the classroom. I need to go. Someone has just found another body—I think it might be Liam Dentiri. I may have to go bury one of my friends.

Theron stared at the short, clipped message for several long moments, not quite able to untangle the cold sick feeling winding through his gut. He need to stay focused on the larger picture here. If he put too many faces, attached too much emotion to the lives lost he might lose focus. It would be too easy to get lost in the fact that every single person slain in both of the conflicts had a larger, wider effect on the world around them. That they weren’t just numbers. Numbers were easy to look past. Names weren’t. As evidenced by Dentiri’s continuing to pop up, even now. He could still hear the pain and rage in Kira’s voice ringing over the comm. Couldn’t completely banish the image of Highw—Grey—trying to brush away the evidence of her grief.

How many other names were on that fatality list? How many more people were mourning friends or loved ones tonight? With no answers for why beyond the grind of an endless war. No hope for justice or an end to their pain, just the endless call to press onwards.

Theron rubbed his forehead, tension mounting near his cranial implants as he stared cross-eyed at the screen in front of him. He needed to get back to work and finish those last few lines of code, but he couldn’t tear his eyes away from the “reply” button. Finally, he hit it, if for nothing else than to get rid of those four sentences burning a hole through him.

To: Greyias Highwind From: Theron Shan Subject: Condolences

Sometimes I can get too caught up with trying to see the big picture sometimes, and I miss smaller details. Which I shouldn’t, because rooting out the tiny details are part of my job. That came out wrong. What I mean is that you once called Tython your home. It wasn’t ever mine.

What I’m working on will take some time, but I’ll stay in touch. In the meantime, obviously you do whatever you need to do over there.

I’m sorry about your friend.

He hit send and ran a hand through his hair, and the cursor on his terminal continued to blink at him. As if trying to tell him that he still had the last bit of coding to finish. Instead he continued to stare at his inbox, all the while wondering what the hell was wrong with him.

#swtor fanfiction #theron shan x jedi knight #Theron Shan #Female Jedi Knight/Hero of Tython #oc: greyias highwind #otp: adorkable #SoR Fic O Doom #smoke and mirrors #swtor #fanfic #greyfic

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deepseacritter · 5 years ago

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He likes me, he likes me not (the spy can’t lie)

Theron, smiling? What?!: I’m really glad you’re alive. Good to have another ally around here I can trust.

Sith: Sure. Allies. You like me, don’t you spy boy...

Theron: Uh..............[quick agent think of something to say]

Theron: What?! Me? Like you...maybe. I mean, no. No. I definitely do not actually really kind of sort of like you and definitely will not tell you that I actually do. Because I don't. Maybe. How dare...

Theron, with the painted on pants: I'm going to go now. Do the things. Spy stuff. Republic spy stuff. And I won’t think of you at all when I leave here, Sith. Not once. (As he looks back over his shoulder at the Sith)

--Later--

Lana: So let’s talk about Arkous’ plot to destroy the empire and how we can stop that from happening.

Sith: Uh huh. Big plot, very bad. But, uh, Theron...he’s hot am I right??

Lana, who is so done with everyone’s shit and keeps rolling her eyes so hard she now has a headache: Can you not, please...

#swtor #a love story #theron shan/sith inquisitor #plus lana being annoyed #that happens a lot #i really just wanted to post another shot of theron's butt ok #i love one republic sis agent

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eorzeashan · 2 years ago

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Get to Know Me!

Share your wallpaper: oh it's a default ocean picture. I don't even know what it is, but I left it there because I was too lazy to change it.

The last song you listened to: You and Me - Flume

Currently reading: Dresden Files - Peace Talks by Jim Butcher...or I was supposed to but I still haven't gotten around to it OTL I think I planned to read something by Ocean Vuong as well.

Last Movie: Vengeance by B.J. Novak: my mom put this one on randomly and it was quite interesting.

Craving: Ugh....my stomach is irritated right now....but I wouldn't mind the matcha bread downstairs.

What are you wearing right now? grey t-shirt, pj pants. yeah yeah, sloppy. I just woke up from a nap.

How tall are you: 5'8" though it goes between that and 5'9", so somewhere around there.

Piercings: None.

Tattoos: None.

Glasses? Contacts? None.

Last drink: Water as well.

Last show: Dance 100

Last thing you ate: A vietnamese crepe and matcha latte.

Favorite color: Blue :D

Current obsession: SWTOR

Unrelated obsession: FFXIV, Castlevania/Any Gothic Game

Any pets: A terrapin and a Shih-tzu!

Do you have a crush on anyone? Nah.

Favorite fictional character: How am I supposed to choose...this is kinda hard off the top of my head. There's so many! Gintoki Sakata from Gintama, a shitton of SWTOR characters (Theron obviously being one), Ginko from Mushishi, the Medicine Seller from Mononoke...ah curse my terrible memory... uh, D from Vampire Hunter D. *squints* huh. I sure do like mysterious ones.

The last place you traveled: That's private -u-

\\-\\-\\-\\-\\-\\-\\-\\-\\-\\

Tagged by: @ainyan (yay I made it to one of these)

Tagging (no obligation): @space-unicorn-dot, @certified-anakinfucker, and anyone else who wants to ouo)b

#ooc #tag meme

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chaoticstrata · 1 year ago

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Relaxation + Breaking the Rules (Aketheron) either or both for prompts!

Sorry for taking so long anon! Here's a little fic for the first prompt. I actually thought up an interesting AU for the second, but I don't know how long that will take me--since I am a snail when it comes to writing. -dead- Enjoy this fic! ---------------------------------------------------------------

A vacation.

Theron never thought he’d get to be on one--not with being a founder of the Alliance or one of their resident spymasters. Still, there he was on one on Copero, staying in a little cabin set in a mountain resort, relaxing back in a private hot spring with a warm fire roaring nearby. It was perfect…well, almost perfect. There was just one thing, or one person, missing.

“Hey, hun, you gonna join me anytime soon?” he called out toward the cabin door where his husband had disappeared.

“In a moment,” Aketho called back.

Theron sighed and shook his head. “Please tell me you’re not sending off some last-minute instructions to Lana and the others…”

“I’m not you, Theron.”

“Hey, now I-”

“The Nova Blades data.”

“That was one time, damn you!” Theron pouted, sinking further into the hot spring. He was half tempted to slip far enough down to start blowing bubbles in the water--like the full-grown adult he was. And he would have if Aketho didn’t see fit to walk out at that moment, grinning and holding two glasses of amber liquid.

“Uh-huh. You know I have a running list, right?” Aketho chuckled, holding out one of the glasses before stepping into the hot spring and settling down next to Theron.

Theron’s free arm instantly warped around the Chiss’ waist, pulling him closer.

“Yeah, yeah,” the former SIS agent huffed, pressing a kiss to Aketho’s temple. He held up the glass the Commander handed him and examined it. “What is this?”

“Csillan whiskey,” Aketho replied, sipping his drink, “Courtesy of Aristocra Seganu.”

Theron was about to comment on the whiskey when the name of the other Chiss fell from Aketho’s lips. Try as he might, the former Republic spy couldn’t keep his annoyance for Seganu from his face. Theron knew there was nothing to worry about--the former spy had seen Aketho repeatedly shut down the other Chiss’ advances. However, it still irked him how the Aristocra continued to try to butter up Aketho with gifts and pretty words. Sipping the whiskey, he muttered something unflattering about the other man under his breath.

“Theron,” Aketho chuckled, leaning over to kiss his cheek.

“Sorry,” the older spy sighed. He should have known the Chiss would hear him regardless of how he covered it up. “I just…I really don’t like how he tries to flirt with you…in front of me, no less.”

“Jonas flirts with me, and you’re fine with it,” the younger man pointed out. “For the most part.”

“Yeah, but I know he’s just flirting,” Theron countered, sipping his drink again. He hated to admit it, but it was good--despite who it came from. “He likes to flirt; it’s kind of his thing. Plus, I’ve never known him to try and steal away someone else’s partner… it’s just not his style.”

“Hmm, true,” Aketho conceded, snuggling against Theron. “He even said as much…”

The former SIS agent kissed his husband’s temple again and relaxed against the side of the hot spring. As he sipped his drink, a mischievous grin spread across the Chiss’ lips--one that Theron knew preceded some sort of teasing. He braced himself for it.

“Jonas does like to brag, too,” Aketho said, his grin widening. “Especially about past partners.”

Theron sighed into his drink. “I already told you about my time with him…”

“You did,” the Chiss chuckled, leaning in to nibble on an earlobe, “But you didn’t go into detail like he did.”

“Maker, shoot me now,” Theron groaned, head dropping. “What did he tell you?”

“Hmmm,” Aketho hummed into his glass, grin wide and full of mirth. “I’ll let you figure that out later tonight…”

The former SIS agent stared at him for a long moment before looking back at the slowly setting sun. “Do we have to wait till tonight?”

The Commander laughed in amusement and delight.

#swtor #swtor fanfiction #theron shan #imperial agent #swtor commander #aketho #theron shan / imperial agent #i love writing these two #they are just too much fun with their back and forth #sassy and wit are their love language i swear

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chubbyooo · 5 years ago

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A Recipe for Disaster: A Blurred Lines Spinoff Chapter 1: An Enemy Revealed

hey folks so I know we just got back to the main fic but for a while I’ve wanted to tell a side story of how my companions ended up captured for most of Kotfe and it also links in with Blurred Lines in areas so with that in mind here’s the first part of a 6-8ish chapter long spinoff featuring a few of the ocs you know and some new ones

the emperor Vititate has disappeared into wildspace and until recently there was no sign of his location, however Darth Nox met meet Darth Marr on his flagship and soon after word of an attack on theflagship reached the republic. With this knowledge Grand Master Satele Shan has assembled a team of the most adept fighters and thinkers of both governments at least those she could get in touch with to work out what to do next. Kavaraa was quick to respond to the message sensing a great disturbance unlike anything she had felt before.

Kavaraa looked out the viewport as the flagship approached she sensed it something was wrong, something big was about to happen and she had to be ready. She frowned she couldn’t seem to discern the nature of the presence but she could sense great conflict in someone close to her. Still close by what or who it could be was unclear she really hoped it wasn’t a friend, she glanced towards the sith warships littered within the fleet. She had not been thrilled with working with the sith, she’d be the first to admit it had never quite sat right with her not since Master Syo. But the fact they were united against the emperor helped sway her, but having to work with former rivals was certainly a challenge especially those who tried to test her commitment to the jedi order. Still to combat such a foe as Vitiate it was rather necessary, she put the thoughts to the back of her mind Master Satele had summoned her here the least she could do was be punctual.

As her ship docked with the flagship she stepped out into the bustling republic flagship, she had told her crew to stay with the ship just in case. After the rumours she heard about the sith fleet she was airing on the side of caution, she rushed towards the bridge but on the way she nearly crashed into someone.

She stumbled to a stop looking up to see Theron Shan of SIS, she smiled at least there was a friend here that’d make things easier “oh um sorry Theron didn’t see you there” Kavaraa looked away feeling her cheeks go a bit turquoise.

Theron seemed equally flustered “oh um no worries sorry bit of a rush, important meeting and all” Kavaraa nodded cocking her head, if anyone new something it was gonna be Theron the compulsive spy.

She looked quite seriously at him “so what have you heard” Theron looked around gesturing for her to follow to a quieter location.

They moved to a rather cramped storage room causing them to have to squeeze next to each other “I uh I won’t lie to you it’s bad” he whispered although due to the cramped nature it was like he was speaking at full volume

Kavaraa sighed “yeah I can sense something is very wrong” Theron nodded messing with a datapad

he let out a long sigh “the sith fleet is uh devastated, casualties are high but there is little sign of what caused the attack” Kavaraa’s mouth hung open this had to have something to do with the attacks on Korriban and Tython nothing like this was ever a coincidence

Kavaraa swallowed “that is bad what of Marr? is he ok?” Kavaraa didn’t really like Marr that much but she couldn’t deny his military mind

Theron looked away “uh no report of him or Darth Nox as of yet” Kavaraa’s eyes widened they got Kyradia too? this may be more serious than she even thought, she couldn’t remember the last time Kyradia was beaten much less missing. Either they were dead or in the hands of Vitiate, Kavaraa wouldn’t have wished that on her worst enemy and well she had kind of got it anyway.

Kavaraa let out a long breath “wow it’s that bad huh?” Kavaraa didn’t even know what they could do next that was two of their best assets gone. Kavraaa may not have agreed with Kyradia’s methods but Kavaraa out of anyone couldn’t deny her skill with both the force and the saber, even if she was unbelievably cruel

Theron looked around the cramped room “that’s all the information I could slice from SIS” he put a finger to her lips “do not tell anyone I told you” Kavaraa could feel his breath they were so close, after a long pause she nodded quickly and followed Theron out of the room.

They quickly headed to the bridge where Kavaraa could see many farmiliar faces, on the republic side she could see Grand Master Satele Shan, Havoc Squad Commander Ash’shen’tor, Jace Malcom and Jonas Balkar but to her surprise she saw no sign of Jedi Knight Dzûsa she hadn’t heard from him in a while and also hadn’t been able to sense his presence. This had been concerning her greatly as he normally had such a loud bashful presence and for it to be muted meant something was very wrong, she glanced over to see Lana with a similar look on her face. She knew Lana and Dzûsa had been close but she also hadn’t seen him since before Ziost, the other Imperials around the table included Darth Acina (probably in Marrs place), Cipher Nine a big part of imperial intelligence and Moff Pyron someone Kavaraa had been on the opposite end of a blade from.

Theron spoke up “sorry we got caught up I think that’s everyone” Kavaraa looked around the room it certainly didn’t feel like everyone she knew some members of each council were busy with military missions but still. She assumed the emperors wrath was abstaining once again still believing in the emperor.

Satele nodded turning on the holopad “this is the footage of the attack on the sith fleet not 12 hours ago” Kavaraa watched as thousands of ships suddenly came into view and slowly but surely she watched as Marrs flagship was destroyed, her eyes widened were they really gone? she would’ve sensed it. She closed her eyes quickly reaching out with the force she could feel a very faint presence of Kyradia but it felt different somehow

The cold calm voice of Cipher Nine cut through the room “what of Marr and Nox is there any evidence they survived I believed them to be stronger than that” Kavaraa frowned at the chiss he seemed so calm about the idea of their death as if it was just an unlikely statistic. She had fought the man before his tactical ability was something but his separation from care of those he hurt was worrying.

Satele answered the question “although there is little evidence of survival I can still sense his pre-” Satele paused holding her chest and wincing, Kavaraa looked to her but was quickly met with a similar feeling through the force. She felt like a massive amount of force energy was just released, Satele made eye contact with Kavaraa the anguish clear in her eyes “you sense it too don’t you?” Kavaraa recognised the energy it was...

Kavaraa gasped “Marr?” Satele nodded slowly hanging her head solemnly

Theron looked frantically between them “what happened what can you sense?” Kavaraa was completely preoccupied if Marr was in trouble what of Nox? was Kyradia alive?

in the silence a new voice spoke up “I sense it too it is unfortunate but Darth Marr has passed on, how or why are unclear” Darth Acina seemed less phased than Satele and Kavaraa, Kavaraa guessed it was the sith way. Still she had to reach out she focussed trying to sense if Kyradia was out there, whatever was going on was still happening and if she could just get through. She found the presence but it was in flux, changing, she felt almost forced away as it changed and shifted. Kavaraa stumbled back whatever was happening it had to involve Vitiate and if so that did not bode well.

the rest of their makeshift council began to discus how to move forward as Kavaraa steadied herself making eye contact with Lana who had been strangely quiet, “you sense her too don’t you? I’ve been trying to get through to her but her energy... it’s like it’s being changed and moulded” Kavaraa nodded whatever Kyradia was doing she better succeed

Commander Ash’shen’tor spoke up for the first time “I assume we didn’t come here just to speculate what are we going to do about this?” Ash did bring up a good point they could stand around here all day but they needed to take action

Satele sighed “unfortunately without anymore information all we can do is defend our territory and keep searching” Kavaraa hated that but it was true, suddenly however as if to answer Satele the hologram switched to an image of a bald human male wearing a Mask

He pronounced proudly "People of Zakuul, the unthinkable has happened. Our beloved Emperor, Valkorion, is dead - murdered by an Outlander who sought to shake the foundations of our great society. The assassin will receive swift and just punishment, and this act of unprovoked aggression will be answered.” Kavaraa looked around the council as everyone looked at the holo dumbfounded, Zakuul? Valkorion? act of aggression? she had no idea what this meant but it had to be to do with the attack

the figure continued “As your new Emperor, I can promise you this: Zakuul's enemies will face the full power of the Eternal Throne. They will answer for their warmongering ways... and every last one of the Core Worlds will burn!" the was an audible silence in the room for a few seconds before Theron spoke up

everyone looked to him “so that has to be what and where we’re looking for right? that can’t be a coincidence” he was right there, an emperor, an outlander who must be Kyradia it was too similar

Ash rubbed her forehead “I think you are ignoring the more pressing fact that he just declared war on all of us and he’s gonna use ‘the power of the eternal throne’ which I’m assuming is that fleet we saw and if not it can only be worse, either way we need to be ready to defend” Kavaraa was still bewildered but they said they were going to punish the Outlander not kill her that was awfully curious.

Cipher Nine spoke up “miss Shen does bring up a very good point but one thing to note is that the individual on the holo implied the emperor was dead, now this may be a leap of logic but I’m going to assume this was the same emperor using a pseudonym. With the Emperors death taking a defensive position may be rather advantageous” Kavaraa had to admit if the emperor was indeed dead then they may have less on their plate, whoever this new guy was he certainly wasn’t as threatening. “But with that said one of our best assets lies in the heart of their empire on Zakuul we cannot ignore the importance of Darth Nox” Kavaraa hated to agree with that but she knew it was true.

Ash spoke up again clearly agitated “so what we’re supposed to fight an offensive war for one sith that hardly seems worth it” Kavaraa had never been a military strategist and seeing these two sharp minds go at it was fascinating

Cipher Nine tutted “That one sith helped taken down Revan and his cult and anyway of course not I suggest we smuggle a small team in to extract our target, you are correct there is no need to over extend ourselves” Kavaraa looked to the other around the table everyone looked like they had a billion questions

Lana spoke up taking charge of the argument “clearly we have a lot to think about but these two points are very valid, it would be moronic to throw our ships against this fleet we have to play smart not powerful and retrieving Nox could be a big gain” everyone seemed to agree with that

Cipher Nine cut in “I’d advise we make haste upon the Nox rescue mission the more we wait the more difficult it will become” the man definitely had a point there they only had so long until the first attack

Theron frowned “but for that we need to know where Zakuul is and I’ve been scouring everywhere for any information on the emperors location” Cipher Nine gave Theron a coy smile it almost seemed like pity

“that’s because traditional intelligence tends to neglect culture, folk tales and legends however I do not and have managed to pin down a few possible locations of a planet with this name, give me a week or two and I’ll have the location” Theron scowled at the chiss clearly there was some tension between agencies

Acina looked to those on the council “who would be on this mission? I’d assume only the best and most undetectable” Kavaraa considered those around the table and who would fit best for a few seconds

Theron spoke up first “I’d happily go and I think I know who else would be able to fly under the radar” Kavaraa quickly turned to Theron and shook her head

she sighed “Ok no you promised after Ziost not to run off into danger” Theron looked confused “anyway we need you to handle slicing and I’d rather you do that from a safe location

Theron still seemed unconvinced “it’s not the same though I won’t be alone will I, I was gonna suggest you come anyway” Kavaraa considered it for a second but she couldn’t stomach the idea

Kavaraa shook her head taking Theron’s hand “not this one spy boy, subtlety isn’t really your style I’ll at least let you be on comms how about that?” Theron seemed conflicted but eventually conceded

“alright fine but you update me at all times agreed” Kavaraa nodded squeezing his hand

Lana cleared her throat “anyway... who else did you have in mind Theron” Theron turned around looking a little flustered

he turned back to the others “right uh yes well I assume we want people who can’t be sensed well by the force which narrows it down to well Jedi and at least if my information is correct Chiss” Lana frowned at him seemingly disappointed she was left out, Kavaraa knew she would be able to cloak her force ability but a sith like Lana was much harder to control

Cipher Nine nodded “you’re information is partially correct we have no natural ability to cloak ourselves from the force but naturally we have much stiller minds so it can be harder to sense us” Kavaraa looked from him to Ash who seemed to not have a clue what he was talking about

Ash sighed “So you’re saying I have to work with him” Kavaraa was aware of the rivalry between Cipher Nine and Ash it wasn’t quite the level she had with Kyradia but it was certainly intense

Theron nodded “I’m afraid so but from what I know of Cipher Nine he is likely to perform professionally” Ash let out an audible sigh conceding to the plan

Cipher Nine let out a slight smile “so our base plan is to smuggle us into Zakuul and save Nox, rather underdeveloped at the moment it will require some colour and a lot more intel on her location I will do my best to provide them, I assume SIS will do the same?” Theron nodded reluctantly “That still however leaves the question of how we will be able to smuggle ourselves there” Cipher Nine looked to each of them for an answer

Ash let out a chuckle shaking her head “I’m gonna regret this but I think I know a guy” Kavaraa’s eyes widened oh no...

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mrneighbourlove · 5 years ago

Text

Fall of a Dynasty: Ch 2. Friends in High Places

"... fuck. Fucking shit, damn it all to hell, why. I want to know why." Zizi seldom had a reason to curse. Usually if she did swear, it was for one of three reasons. The first was she was mad and wanted to emphasize her point. The second is if she cut herself using the tolls on the plantation. The third, however, was most rare, was due to Zannah. So, this time, yes, it was due to Zannah, but more importantly, due to the fact that the empress was riding right. To. Her. Stall. And she was covered in soot, blood, and dirt. "Why. Me." The Zemlja wondered if it was too late to pray to Zemlja to make her invisible at will.

Rinku, who was at the house to acquire some vegetable supplies, as well as additionally stay for dinner as it stormed outside, looked up from her steak dinner. “Heeeeey now. There be little ones around. What’s got the mother bear angry?”

Zannah, however, didn’t know or care less who’s house this was. She got off her horse, dragging herself to the front door, all the while collapsing to her knees in the mud once in a while to reach it.

"I sensed the mega-bitch." Zizi replied with an irritated sigh. Now, the ruler of the Empire was banging on her door. All eyes looked to Zizi and she ran a hand down her face. Might as well get it over with quickly. "Stay here. I'll deal with this. Or either I'll get lucky and the ground will hold me hostage."

Rinku frowned, cluing in swearing might be common around the household. “What mega bitch?”

Kahli scowled, moving to secure his younger children away from the door, hell, the first floor.

The Emperor herself, pounded on the door, waiting for whatever peasant lived her to open the damn door.

Yanking open the door, Zizi stood there, not even batting an eye.

"... what?"

Zannah froze like a dear in head lights. This was the last person she wanted to see. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”

"I was actually asking my deity why, out of all people, that you have to show up on my doorstep." Zizi said dryly. "So once again, I ask... what? What do you want?"

Fine. No need to stand on ceremony or waste additional time. “Lead me to your sister and brother in law. Right now. I’ve suffered an assassination attempt.”

"Down the street, third left, then go down to your second right, and the castle is right there. Bye." Zizi started to shut the door in Zannah's face, but Manaco stopped her.

"Mom, you know you can't do that."

"I can do whatever the hell I want, you know what that woman did to your father, our family."

"I know that, but... it looks like she needs help."

"She can go kiss Vul'kar's ass for all I care."

"Mom!"

"Look, I'm not being a part of this." Zizi threw her hands up. "Each time she comes around, more shit is stirred up. You want to help her? Then you can. I'm out."

"Mom!" Manaco groaned, exasperatedly, watching his mother stomp off into the kitchen.

“Run off you spineless little—?!” Zannah paused, a part of her trying to recognize the blonde woman step into view. There was a barrier of time from doing so instantly. “Do I know you?”

Rinku was drying her hands from washing her own dish. Looking at Zannah again she was filled with a lonely sense of nostalgia. “Been a long time Princess.”

That title certainly jogged a memory. “Link? Princess Rinku?”

"Yeah, this is Rinku." Manaco did not wait for permission, he simply swooped Zannah off her feet. "Come on. Let's at least get you tended to before going to see my aunt and uncle. Zarazu would freak if you came into her castle that way."

“What? Young man, what are you-ah! Watch it!”

"Now this I got to see." Urboro started to stand, but Grivy pulled her back down by her shoulder. "Hey! I'm not going to choke her or anything, I just want to see what my brother is going to do."

"He's probably going to play knight in shining armor, like he does for all the ladies." Miku rolled her eyes. "And if you're not going to eat your potatoes, I am."

Grievous was, in a sense, shaking. The Emperor being here, in any state, made her extremely anxious for the near future of her family. “She’s trouble.”

Rinku meanwhile pulled up a chair, and sat comfortably into it as Manaco

set Zannah down. “What happened to you?”

“My Theron agents tried to kill me. They set up an ambush in the Ruto mountain path.”

Rinku nodded to herself, as if trying to recall the memory. “I think I remember. Elite, scary black armoured death squads of your brother. Takes me back to fighting in the war.”

"Therons got you good." Manaco placed the empress on a blanket and looked over Zannah, noticing the blood. "Forgive this, but it has to be done." He took his hands and ripped her dress around her legs, and near her back. "We have to get the material away from the wounds or you would risk infection."

“It’s just a dress Manaco.” Zannah couldn’t feel her leg anymore. Not a good sign.

"... this looks worse than I thought." Manaco observing the gushing blood. "Okay, I think you're going to require some energy transference just to keep you stable. Hold up your hands."

“I can’t do that...” Zannah didn’t shy away, but she spoke in a somber monotone.

"... why not?" Manaco asked, puzzled. "My siblings and I do it all the time if one of them is sick."

“It’s because you’re all Waku. I’m an Ocho. Not all Hasai are alike Manaco. In the same way a Vatra has different abilities than a Munja, I do not have the unique ability your father and his line hold. I can’t absorb fire to heal my wounds.” Zannah sighed, her adrenaline starting to petter out.

Rinku nodded, reading the room. “Anyone here know traditional first aid?”

"Mom... does..." Manaco had to grimace out the words. "I think Dad does too. Let me go check, I think the most qualified for this is Urboro. She's the best with the medicinal plants so she probably knows a bit of healing. I'll be right back."

It didn't take long for Manaco to go and ask his sister.

Which was met by a loud...

"WHAT?! ME?!"

Grievous shook stood between her older half siblings, having become aggressively protective of Urboro in a short time. “No. She doesn’t go near her.”

"Look, I don't like this anymore than you do, Grivy, but someone has to help her or else, Zarazu will not be pleased." Manaco felt like he was stuck in-between a rock and a hard place. "I know my aunt doesn't necessary like Zannah that much either after what she did to Mom, but we have to think of the diplomatic relationships. We don't want to start another war."

"... fine." Urboro relented, having a grouchy expression. "... but Grivy comes with me."

“Gladly.”

As they started to head to the Emperor, Rinku already had one hand on the bolt stuck in her kneecap. “When I pull this out, you might feel some momentary discomfort.” Seeing Urboro come in, the elder woman smiled. “You ready to perform kid?”

"... not at all." Urboro looked a little pale but took a deep breath. "All right. This is... this will be easy. Piece of cake." She slowly bent down and hand her hands ready, Manaco knelt down as well to cauterize the wound. "You stop the bleeding, I'm going to wrap it with aloe."

“I know a thing or two about war wounds. You’ll all do fine. Hey Zannah.”

“What?”

“Look at the bunny.”

Rinku flashed a peace sign, completely throwing Zannah off. It was at that moment she tore the metal bolt cleanly out. The Emperor had a delayed scream as the others got to work.

Manaco used his fire to stop the bleeding as his sister instructed. Then Urboro exhaled slowly and breathed life into small aloe seeds, the plant sprouting from her hand and wrapping around Zannah's leg. It was not the work of a Dusa, but it would have to do until Zannah was at the castle's medical bay.

"... since my magic is green, and she is green, maybe I can share some of my energy. Zemljas have a lot more than Vatras do, anyway."

"Says you."

"Uh-huh, says me."

"They do not.

"Do too!"

"Do not!"

“SHUT UP!” Zannah wretched, her pain at an all time high compared to the last few decades of her life. “God! Your voices are infuriating!”

Rinku cut Zannah’s voice off with a hard tie of bandages around her kneecap. “Now Zannah. I know commoners have never been your cup of tea, but be nicer to the kids who helped patch you together.”

Zannah actually blushed from embarrassment, if ever so lightly. “Oh yes. You’re too kind.”

“Say, I don’t think you’re allowed to blush in front of commoners. Or drip sarcasm with the same toxicity as a viper. Does anyone want to here the first time the Emperor here lost her composure?”

The Emperor hissed between her teeth. “Absolutely not.”

"Look who's talking, you're the one who fucked over our family royally, yes bad pun intended, and we're trying to help your ungrateful ass out." Urboro scoffed, putting her hands on her hips. "Sure, Rinku, let her lose all composure, faint in front of us 'commoners' and have a bitch fit. Go ahead, I'm waiting."

"Urboro..." Manaco groaned. "Will you please be nice for once?"

"Nice is for pushovers. Except for when it comes to Grivy," Urboro fist bumped her half-sister. "She's baby."

“Well. It was during the War of Fire. Zannah was conducting the distraction to allow her killer robot to capture my baby sister Kanisa. Well, we were two teenagers, and I sprung into action to engage her in sword combat.” Rinku methodically nodded, recalling the details and slowly speaking them allowed. “Back then, she was an uptight princess instead of an uptight Emperor. And she was a pretty good fighter too. Keep in mind this was our second duel, and she didn’t have a concept of what innuendos and throwing singles meant.”

“Please don’t...” Zannah hated not being able to go anywhere, or have the right to stop this.

“So here was, pushing me towards a ring of fire, having this aura of seductive power. In my haste, I leaned in to kiss her.”

“You what?!” Grievous couldn’t believe that a warrior would do such a thing. Zannah herself blushed more at the memory.

“That’s right. And in a switch, her energy went from dominate to a flustered and shy school girl. Turns out that at age 16 or 15 I think, she hadn’t had her first kiss.”

Urboro made a retching noise for emphasis that she did not like the idea of kissing Zannah. "I feel sorry for your lips, you must have been washing them so hard, they chapped. I think you had a better match in that hottie you were dancing with the other night. She had huge knockers."

"Urboro, we talked about this."

"You talked about it; doesn't mean I'm going to listen."

“Well, we have our histories. Don’t we Zannah.”

“I suppose we do, Link.”

Both the woman’s eyes locked with each other. In Zannah’s was a monotone angry. In Rinku’s, a regretful pity at the experiences they shared. The family suddenly heard the death cry of a horse outside. Rinku was the first to stand up, calmly walking to the rake, placing her boots on. “You kids stay inside.”

"Trouble already? Damn, they're fast." Manaco once again took Zannah into his arms and then said, "Sis, I'm going to need your help. We have to sneak her through the tunnels so they don't see her."

"Really? I really got to do this? URGH." Urboro crossed her arms with a huff. "And I just did my nails... fine... tell her if she has claustrophobia, she's going to have to suck it up."

"No need. This will be over quickly. One way or another. Just stay here and keep them out if any manage to pass my eye." Rinku patted Manaco and took her sword, throwing a green tunic on.

Rinku stepped outside, ready for action. The storm raged outside, with rain and thunder pounding the senses. Despite this, the Arbiter of the Goddess was aware of her surroundings. It was the flashes of lightning against the shine of their armour that gave them away in the rainy dark. When one launched an arrow, the warrior princess ducked low. There went diplomacy.

Theron were surrounding the house, drawing closer. They'd kill everyone inside if they could. What they weren't expecting was a green clothed woman to step out. Too bad that there would be no witnesses. One stepped from behind a tree to fire a shot into her head. What he didn't expect was for how fast she'd move.

After ducking, Rinku drew her sword from her sheath, instantly decapitating the first solider with a clean cut. As his body fell down, another drew a shimmering guardian blade. Drops of water sizzled against the blade. Others in turn drew their own weapons. The princess cracked her neck, staring them down as rain trickled down her hood. "Last chance to leave."

With a violent swing, the Theron closest to Rinku tried to cut her in two. Instead, Rinku rolled around him in the mud, and leap into the air, slicing his backside open with a swing. Her blood cut straight through his armour, cutting his spinal cord apart. With a quick motion, she finished the man off by driving the tip of her blade through the back of his neck, piercing his throat. Taking a stance, Rinku held both hands on the hilt of her blade, waiting for the rest of the Theron to draw close. This cold night they faced the Hero of Hyrule.

Manaco managed to grab a blanket to toss over Zannah and followed Urboro out the back door.

"I'll be back soon, Grivy, got to take the package to the castle." She opened up the earth, rivaling a system of tunnels under the earth. "Can't believe I have to use these to transport her of all people."

"Look, we're doing this for Aunt Zarazu, because we don't want war."

"I know, but that doesn't mean I have to like it." Then, she jumped in the hole, and Manaco followed.

Grievous grabbed Urboro by the arm, shaking her head. Where they stupid or just wanting a death wish? "No! You can't go out-LOOK OUT!"

Sure enough, a Theron was waiting. With a launch of an explosive arrow, Grievous had to intercept it with a fire bolt, but the explosion threw her flying backwards. The Theron had the two young adults and Zannah insight, ready to kill them with another arrow, when his visor exploded with glass and blood. His body fell backwards, and Rinku was on the other side, already having another arrow drawn if she needed it. Her breath was a bit raspy, having finished the last of the attackers. The battle was a haze to her regarding time. Short engagements with tough opponents usually were. "Hey. Get back in the damn house."

Not arguing for once, the siblings went back inside the house and waited.

"She told you to wait. You are always in such a hurry." Zizi was not too bothered by the fact that there were Kikai soldiers outside. Their family had been so much, this did not surprise her too much. She sat there with her youngest one, Zaltana, and watched her draw. "Just let Rinku do her thing, then go."

"Don't look at me, it was his idea."

"Was not!"

"Was too!"

Rinku kicked the door open, helping an injured Grievous onto the couch. She had a fresh head wound now from being thrown by the explosion. When Manaco got close, his half siblings punched him in the arm. “Ass! She said to stay inside! I saved your life! All of you actually.”

Rinku shot a quip as she went back outside to check the perimeter further, “She’s not wrong you know.”

"Ow! Hey! Don't make me drop the cargo here!"

"Sorry, Grivy..." Urboro felt sort of guilty when she saw the cut on Grivy's head. "I just really don't like the idea of being anywhere near her."

“There’s trained killers outside. You didn’t even think!”

Zannah chuckled, her head woozy from blood loss. “Your schooling taught you well.”

"Okay, okay, I was dumb and I rushed into getting mega-bitch like Mom said out of our house, I'm sorry, do you forgive me?" Urboro didn't like Grievous being mad at her.

“Shut up." Manaco grumbled under his breath at Zannah. "Or I will drop you."

Grievous took a deep breath in and out to calm her nerves. “Just... think. For me. I don’t want you dead.”

Zannah herself reached up and flicked Manaco in the nose. “You don’t tell your elders to shut up.”

It wouldn't be soon after that Rinku came back in. “Zizi! Kahli!”

The father came down, nodding. “Yes?”

“Dead horse. Eight dead Hasai. No more in the near vicinity. You, kids. With me as back up, you now have my permission to leave. I’m getting on my horse, and you travel under me. I’ll escort from above to the castle.” Rinku immediately took command of the situation. This was survival. “And we’re leaving before more show up. Let’s move out people.”

Inside the castle, Leere had lost at chess... again. Ralnor was not going to just 'let' his sister win especially when she wanted such a ridiculous deal. He ran his hand down his face as Leere listed off reasons that it would be beneficial to have... that damn snake so close.

"Leere, I frankly don't care what reason you give me," Ralnor told his sister. "Or even if the deities themselves would kiss me for it, that bastard is not getting a room in the castle."

“Ralnor. He’s not going to have a place to at my wife’s ranch. Why the hell cant he have one here? It’s easier access for him, more luxurious, and he’d blend in with all the monsters that guard the castle in Father’s and Covarog’s service. Yes. He’s a pain. Yes. He can act like an ass. But he’s a friend and a partner. We work with Echidnan kind. We have to give them an ambassadors place in the castle.”

"He can stay in the damn wine cellar for all I care, he's drank half of my collection already." Ralnor was not budging on this issue. "You and I both know that if someone else saw Bonegrinder before it was time to act upon the future plans, something could fall apart. There are others out there who want him dead. And the maids here gossip like it's going out of style. The answer is no. He's safer at the ranch, regardless of whether he stays in the barn, under your bed, or slinks around underneath the floorboard." The prince grumbled. "Besides, the damn monster can teleport, why the hell does he need his own room?"

“Wait. That’s pretty good. We can transform your wine cellar into a pent house for him. Because him trying to eat my cows it more costly to my wife than wine you horde to yourself.” Leere flicked her King piece over. “He’s still an organic being Ralnor. He likes to rest, sleep, snugg- forget that last one.” They both knew Bonegrinder’s snuggles could turn rather pushy. “Ah. Here’s my check. Sunny is carrying a baby. There’s no way he’s going to stay at the ranch and possibly startle her into losing my baby.”

"I was joking, there's no way he can fit into the wine cellar, his ass... coils... body---fuck, whatever you call it, is too big." Ralnor scoffed. "And he would not try to startle your pregnant wife. He's arrogant, a prick, and crazy, but he's not going to purposely frighten a pregnant woman. Bonegrinder is an ass, but he's not that much of one."

“He’s not coming to the ranch. It’s too small. The castle is massive. We could stick him in one of the dozens of towers we have.”

"Sure, sure, we'll room him with Vaati, just so he'll get on the wizard's nerves." Ralnor said sarcastically. "And for the record, I don't want him around my kids either, but we both know that if Ukuri is talking about a snake man singing her bedtime lullabies, that isn't happening. So just wait, I guarantee you, Bonegrinder will be telling your little one all kinds of stories too."

“Your kids are fully grown adult strapping Gerudo women. Your first issue to the stop treating him like the boogie man. He gets a tower here, or he’ll be overwhelmingly annoying to us.”

"He stays at your ranch." Ralnor was not budging. "We're not going to discuss this again, I'm not having a 57 foot snake running around the castle---"

KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK.

The prince was interrupted by loud, intense knocking. On the secret tunnel door behind his bookshelf. Irritated, Ralnor hit the switch to move the piece of furniture. "I swear to Hylia, you damn old snake, if that is you listening in on our conversation, I'm going to scale you and make you into a---...?!?! Manaco?! Urboro?! Rinku and---?! ... what the fuck, Zannah?! What are you doing here?!"

"It's uh... long story, Uncle, but can we like, talk later? Mega-bit---Zannah needs medical care."

Leere blinked, surprised by the Emperor’s presence. She was bleeding heavily from her leg, amongst other smaller injuries. It was Rinku, who’s blood covered tunic that worried her, however. “Sis?”

“Leere. Didn’t expect to see you here. But no time for catch up. Ralnor. We can’t seem to find Doctor Boo Boo. And given the high value of our guest, I think our brother should be notified.” Rinku threw her bloody sword onto Ralnor’s floor, becoming too tired to stay up in the middle of the night fighting for her life. And she felt for certain this night was going to become quite the ordeal. If not the near future.

________________________________________________________________

Previous Ch. https://mrneighbourlove.tumblr.com/post/613698270411243520/fall-of-a-dynasty-ch-1-no-negotiations-this-time

Next Ch. https://mrneighbourlove.tumblr.com/post/614058125382844416/fall-of-a-dynasty-ch-3-signing-the-fine-print

Crossover with @ridersoftheapocalypse

#comments appriciated #Crossover #ridersoftheapocalypse #Zannah #Rinku #Leere #Ralnor #Zizi #hasai #Hyrule #Action

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keldae · 5 years ago

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Fictober ‘19 -- Day 17 (SWTOR)

“Still moping over that spyboy?”

Xaja jumped at the sound of Kira’s voice literally right behind her, startling her out of her thoughts. Muttering a couple of interesting words, the redhead Jedi pulled her boots off of the Serenity’s dash and turned to give her former Padawan a frown. “You trying to kill me with a heart attack, Carsen?”

“Nah. We both already know you’re going to die from Jakar shooting you… again.”

“Rude.” Rolling her eyes at Kira’s grin, Xaja shook her head and pulled one foot up onto the seat, perching over it. “Sorry, what was the question? I couldn’t hear you over the sound of my heart trying to quit on me.”

“Better keep that heart in working order,” Kira teased as she flopped sideways into the next chair. “You’re gonna need it to keep pining after Agent Shan.”

“I’m not--!” Xaja looked away from Kira’s widening grin, stared out at the stars through the viewscreen until she thought she had the heat in her cheeks under control, then scowled at the other Jedi. “What makes you think I’m pining over a blasted spy?”

“First off, your ears are red.”

“Are not!” Xaja instinctively reached up to touch her ears, and frowned when she realized they were still hot. “It’s… it’s from you spooking me, twit.”

“Uh-huh. You weren’t blushing until you heard ‘Agent Shan’.”

Xaja scowled at Kira’s unrepentant smirk. “... I am not pining!”

“No, of course not. Just listening close every time you think you hear his name, or getting excited when you have a new message and then getting disappointed when it has nothing to do with him, or watching the news like a hawkbat for any signs of the Revanites or our AWOL allies…” Kira laughed. “It’s like watching a teenager with a huge crush.”

“... I am not that bad,” Xaja muttered, giving up on trying to keep from blushing as she scowled out at the stars.

“Yes, you are.” There was a soft squeak as Kira spun her chair a bit. “For the record, I approve -- he’s way better than your ex. Gotta admit, there is just something about him that I like -- not in the same way you do,” she added with a wink. “Since Doc and I both noticed him checking you out and liking what he saw.”

There was a pause before Xaja glanced back over at Kira. “You think?” she asked, and tried not to sound hopeful. She did not have a crush on Agent Shan -- no, Theron, as he’d insisted she call him -- no matter what her misinformed former Padawan thought on the matter.

“Yup. For a spy, he isn’t exactly subtle.” Kira grinned. “Neither are you, for that matter. You’re really not hiding how much you’re checking him out…”

“Kira!” Xaja scowled as Kira burst out laughing, then shook her head. “It is not my fault that man has a great ass…”

Kira all but cackled as she looked back at her Master. “And I’m pretty sure he was enjoying your admiration… and returning the favour.”

“What? He was looking at--?” Xaja blushed as bright as her hair, then frowned. “What are you talking about? I’m too skinny to have an ass worth mentioning!”

“Pretty sure he’d beg to differ if asked…”

“Kira!”

The taller Jedi just cackled again as she got back up. “I’ll let you get back to daydreaming about that ass, and the rest of the guy attached to it. Hopefully we get a lead as to where they are soon so you can admire it in-person again.”

Xaja Force-threw a wad of flimsi after her retreating Padawan, then frowned at the void of space outside her ship. She was absolutely not pining for Theron, or dreaming about his ass. Her thoughts were focused more on his amber eyes, and his warm tone of voice, and his mou--

That is not any better than thinking about his backside, she tried to scold herself as she firmly shook her head and tried to think about anything that wasn’t connected to Theron kriffing Shan.

#fictober19 #SWTOR #Shadow of Revan #Forged Alliances #slow burn #mutual pining #Xaja's got a huuuuge crush #and won't admit it to anyone #even though everyone else can smell it a mile off #lbr it's a mutual crush #eventual Theron/Xaja #Theron Shan x Female Jedi Knight #Kira's been calling it since Korriban #and now back to your regularly scheduled fandom #there is a story regarding Jakar shooting Xaja #that Corey and I still need to finish writing out for this site #it was hilarious after the fact #but Xaja is still miffed about it #just ask Jakar

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