Galactic City

The airspeeder ride seemed to take hours to the ship's crew. Some were visually shaken, and others were crying. Everyone was afraid of what horrors would face them inside the Imperial Capital from the days past. Perhaps, they had some previous run-ins with the guards in the past. By now, stories have swirled around space about the mysterious First Order and the happenings of the Capital.

Some claimed that the First Order was nothing more than a group of religious fanatics who then formed the foundation of the now-Government of the Galaxy.
Others claimed that it was made by the wealthiest families in the Galaxy, and was secretly controlled by a corrupted few.
Strangely, she seemed to be completely oblivious to it all.

Captain Phallanx was sweating beside her as they made their way through the city to the Police Station, lodged deep in the heart of the Imperial District. He yelled something at the others before they were all separated into their respective interrogation rooms.

Want to tell me anything? I heard it's your first visit here, it could be a very short stay here on Coruscant, or it could be as long as you want. All up to what you might know about the others...

She didn't answer his question. Instead, she asked him one of her own.

"Why am I here? This has to be some sort of misunderstanding."

Based on the report we got from Mr. Corrend, I have no doubt this started as a simple misunderstanding and overzealous Guide. However, the fact the ship you were travelling on was carrying smuggled goods has altered the situation somewhat... Either you are the one who hired them to smuggle the goods, you're an accessory to it, or maybe you are just a simple bystander. I have no doubt the good Captain will try and implicate you on this, whether you are involved or not... Stand here please.

Ren’Xing complied with whatever Captain FN-505 did. She merely sat there quietly as he asked his questions while Captain Phallanx looked like he was nearing the verge of a mental breakdown. Perhaps she did have the answers to save crew? She looked like she was lost in thought, as if she was carefully formulating her answer.

“I don’t know anything. They picked me up off of Eshan.”

Have a seat... So, if you know anything, tell me now. Smuggling is a serious charge and Captain Phallanx and his crew are going away no matter what. It's just down to whether they take you with them or not.

The camera would attempt to take her picture, but strangely, the image would come out mildly distorted as if camera was malfunctioning. Her face and features would be distorted, at best she looked like a white and grey blur. Every so often, the camera would sharpen her features, but it would quickly distort again. Any other biometric scans would yield a remarkable lack of information in their data bases. If she had a past, it was limited. It only listed her planet of origin and presumed birth date. No listed parents. No past employment. No previous associates. Nothing.

It was as if this person never existed in the databanks until very recently.

“I already told you, Captain. I don’t know anything. Am I under arrest? Can I go now?”

Ren’Xing looked at him for a moment then back at the table.  She seemed to be thinking hard for a moment. She looked as if she was weighing the pros and consequences of her actions. 

“In that case, if I’m under arrest then I have nothing to say.  You can put me back in my cell now.  I have nothing to say, I don’t know anything.” 

She seemed to be ambivalent to the Captain’s questions.  

“what’s going to happen to the others?”  

She eventually asked him after a few terse moments.  

=Captain FN-505=
“ I thought you didn't care what happened to them? But it'll be the same thing as you. Someone else will cave, might even be the Captain himself eager to make a deal. Maybe you'll get lucky and they'll ship you off to the punitive facility on Kuat... Otherwise I hear Ilum is pretty cold this time of year...”

Ren’s face contorted into an uncomfortable scowl. For a moment, she seemed to be genuinely concerned about the crew.

“I-I suppose you’re right. I was just wondering what would happen to them. You don’t think that the captain will tell, do you?”

She shifted uncomfortably in her seat, but otherwise sat there quietly.

Her face was unreadable.

She seemed to be lost in thought. Her eyes looked straight ahead of her, staring at nothing. She was focusing hard.

In her mind, she began to weigh out her choices. The interrogation rooms were solidly built. It would be a bit of a challenge for her to break out with brute force. But she had broken out of such rooms in the past.

She could always splice the computer systems, over run them with a hint of -magic-, but that option was too simple. It would be something they’d expect from a novice or an acolyte.

‘Oh, I know!’

A pleasant thought crossed her mind. Perhaps Captain Phallanx was still of use to her. Beneath the table, she began to move the fingers of her left hand in circles. She muttered words in an ancient, forgotten tongue under her breath. Filaments of red light began to trail from her hand.

Elsewhere in the interrogation center, Captain Phallanx was beside himself.

“I told you all I knew already! I found her on Eshan. She gave us credits to transport her here! I don’t know anything else about her. She never talked to any of us. Kept to herself the entire voyage. I don’t know what those things are in the storage!”

Oversized sublight engines trailed vapour as a crimson coloured Amphibious Interstellar Assault Transport/infantry descended through the sky, following a navigational beacon to a private landing pad purchased with more credits than the dreaded draconian would have otherwise liked to part with. Dragus felt humiliated having to don the dirt brown commoners robe he currently wore over his glossy obsidian scales, a far cry less fashionable than the exotic attire he was used to. As the amethyst gem of the rakatan ocular implant in-place of his left eye radiated a brilliant purple light, he was reminded he was never truly without accessory. He also had his trusty saber-cane, the Gorgon's Eye, crafted with intricate detail by his own two claws. He rested a palm on the ruby red meltmassif orb cabbing the hilt of a single handed lightsaber plated in pure electrum, studded with flame jewels from the sea of Roon. He tapped its cortosis tip on the deck as he entered the communications suite in the Bad Bantha's lower deck, taking a knee with an audible crack as his battle worn joints groaned in protest. His scaled lips peeled back to reveal a forest of sharpened daggers that filled his terrible jaws, glinting under the dim deck lights, stained pink with blood. A sour note expelled from his open maw, heavy with the stench of carrion from the rotten morsels of rancid meat stuck between his teeth.

Resting his saber-cane across his knee, he leaned forwards and extended his right index talon, activating the hologram projector as Squeakers in the cockpit transferred a long-range communications signal bounced around from the far reaches of the Outer Rim. A dark shrouded figure seated on an onyx throne banded in gold and encrusted in gems appeared before the kneeling Famine Lord, Dark Apothecary in service to the luminous figure projected in front of him. He played the part required of him because it gave him access to the resources and knowledge he needed to complete his mission. The Eye hungered for the souls of Dragus' current Sithly Order. In the same way an unnatural hunger afflicted his corporeal form, slowly stealing his physical existence a little more each time he fed his insatiable appetite, the Eye craved the stuff of souls. There was no sweeter flavour than that of stolen ethereal essence. For now, service to this arrogant imposter provided what he needed. Their auras waged a silent war against one another. The Supreme One projecting infinite power versus the Famine Lord who presented a filthy ink blotch on the fabric of reality.

He-Who-Hungers raised his crocodilian snout, jaws spread wide enough to see ropes of steaming salivation drip from his fangs and run down the scales of his chin, soiling the front of his robe. A constant buzzing of flies provided a chorus to his presence. Dragus' forked tongue flicked out front of his open maw, misting the air with crimson flecks as he spoke with his reptilian rasp, his voice a wet gurgle from the blood trickling down his throat as he hissed.

"Sssupreme Leader. A pleasssure." He bloody right eye focused its slit black iris on the projected image, daring to look at the unquestioned ruler of Roon. "How can thiz humble Sssith be of ssservice?"

It was rare of the Supreme One to request anything of the Hungering One. Without issuing a single command, the Dark Apothecary had expanded the borders of their small empire more than any other servant of this enigmatic creature, all to his beneficiaries gain. That these acts were entirely self serving didn't seem to trouble the Eternal Master, so long as Dragus continued to display his obedience.

:: I have felt a stirring in the Force. Another to serve my will is close to your current whereabouts. You will seek them out. In my visions I have seen a woman with silver hair, echani, possessing a hidden strength. Bring her to me. ::

Eh, what nonsense was this? There were plenty of potential servants in darkness all over this planet. One need only look to the Imperial Palace where flocks of Imperial Knights honed their warrior skills day and night. What made this woman so special? Hmmm? Wait, he said hidden strength, why did that sound so familiar? The Great Devourer had known many a mixed soul over his long years terrorizing the stars, but the only one who had ever managed to hide anything from him was his precious Fallanassi pet, Major. The last time they had spoke, about a decade ago if his memory served, it had been on this world. Could she still be here? More so, was he prepared to offer her to the Supreme One? Heh. Could he even? It mattered little until he located this woman that glowing fallacy spoke of. Besides, he couldn't recall Major's hair ever described as anything other than seaweed.

Dragus' lips curled upwards into a freakish grin that stretched impossibly beyond the borders of his scaled face, exposing rows upon rows of serrated incisors that seemed ready to snap shut with bone crunching force before shredding its victims to scraps of ripped meat. His overlong tail capped with a sinister spiked blade rose up behind his head, swaying back and forth to impress that it was his pleasure to serve.

"She soundz charming. I'm sssure my winter rossse Assstera will make quick sisterz with her." The reprehensible reptile flexed his claws in a series of sinuous pops that snapped audibly like cracked kindling. "I'll find her and I'll bring her to you az desssired, but I want sssomething in return."

The bulkheads shook around the kneeling alchemist as the Supreme One extended his influence beyond the fathomless distance of space, rattling the very walls around the mad apothecary. To his credit the Famine Lord maintained his composure, narrowing the scaled lid over his crimson orb as he glared back into the face of one he detested so.

Damn you, my brothers. If the villainous velociraptor's older brother Bacca wasn't sleeping away this age in cryo-stasis, or even if that pterodactyl of a Vor god Seleevan Khar hadn't up and vanished, Dragus would have had the resources he needed. Always far too obsessed with his experiments to properly oversee an empire, he was woefully ill prepared for the challenges of the galactic economy. He was far too scatter-brained a saurian Sith to focus on such unimportant distractions as brewing insurrections when he was utterly focused on peeling back the greater mysteries of the universe through the greatest of arts...alchemy. It was his passion, his reason for existing. With his claws he created monsters, artistic visions pulled from the most horrifying of nightmares, given mutant flesh through his craft. He was an artist.

:: You dare ask anything of me? After the rakghoul outbreak aboard the Nullus Beacon, or in the sewers of Nime? Your careless security measures have cost the Sith Eternal a wealth of credits. And what's this I hear about you eating the future Sith apprentices at that Academy I paid for that you named after yourself!? ::

"I may have eaten a few apprenticez out of necesssity, but I'll have you know I haven't ssso much az nibbled on a ssstormtrooper in at leassst a month." Dragus threw his claws up in defeat. "I admit, I've made a few...mmm, miscalculationz, along the way. All of which I am ssso terribly sssorry about. The guilt eatz me up inssside. I can barely find arousssal in frolicking among my furry flock." Better get to the point. "I was sssimply going to asssk that she be allowed to accompany me on an errand before returning to Dragusssbli...uh, to Roon. I have wish to tessst the sssea leviathan I created on Kamino. I believe Naboo will provide a sssuitable tesssting ground."

The walls ceased shaking and the lights stopped flickering as the Supreme One's power receded back into the void. The luminous projection of the seated figure appeared calm.


With a click the holoprojector shut off as the connection was severed on the other end. With a slight grimace, Dragus slowly rose to stand, once more resting his right claw on the ornate head of his saber-cane. With his other claw he stroked the scaled chin of his snout, contemplating his next course of action as his gunship, the Bad Bantha, continued to fly along its prearranged path over the Galactic City.

The amethyst gem of the Dark Apothecary's rakatan ocular implant flared with a malevolent brilliance as he peered through a haze of smoke inside the Bad Bantha's cockpit, as narcotic wisps of darkside altered ryll spice burned in the bowl end of a long stemmed pipe, held between the black scaled barabel's thumb and index talon. He puffed away, take deep tokes from the fluted end of the primitively carved smoking implement, a gift from one of his night ewok paramours. As the concoction of hallucigenic drugs mingled with the dark web he wove in the fey, his ethereal senses were put on the trail of the woman the Supreme One had seen in his vision. The ruby red meltmassif orb topping the saber-cane held in his other claw glowed with an inner fire, forming an abyss black iris slit down its center, showing the saurian Sith the way.

"There." The scaled brow above his remaining natural right eye narrowed as he spotted something down below, removing the pipe from his black lips to indicate what looked like a prisoner transport shuttle that had just lifted off from the nearby space-port. He briefly diverted his gaze to the contained fiery orb of his saber-cane, the Gorgon's Eye, confirming the direction it was looking. She had to be in that shuttle.

Dragus' chauffeur, the blind bear Lil'Havok, pressed forwards on the steering yoke and they began to descend. The milk eyed pilot leveled them out as they came in behind the prison transport. "Arm a dissscord misssile and fire when ready." Hissed the devilish draconian as he leaned over the co-pilots chair, supervising his ranat assistant Squeakers as the rodent carried out his instructions.

Now for the moment of truth. A wicked smile split the twisted terrorsaur's horrific jaws as the targeting computer chimed, confirming a target lock on the prison transport. Squeakers squeezed a gnarled digit against the trigger and a discord missile fired from the warhead launcher above the fuselage, streaking towards the engines of the prison shuttle where it erupted in a shower of angry buzz droids.

"There! Did you sssee that? Take uz in." Snarled the devilish draconian, bearing his mouthful of daggers as he directed a claw at the cockpit viewport, his ocular implant catching the movement of a figure leaping from the back of the prisoner transport. Lil'Havok eased up on the throttle, slowing their approach as he lowered the Bad Bantha's nose, dropping them closer to the roof. Twin strobe lights lanced from the bottom of the AIAT/i, flashing over building tops as the silent ewok with cataract crusted eyes manoeuvred them closer to the one the black scaled barabel currently hunted.

Sliding down the stairs from the back of the cockpit to the lower deck, the saurian Sith stalked towards the rear hatch and slammed a scaled fist into the door controls. A hydraulic whine sounded as the boarding ramp dropped, the deafening rush of air and the gunship's oversized engines dulling his senses. He blinked the discomfort away as he bounded the last few steps towards the platforms edge, leaping from the ship, turning end over end as his brown travelers cloak clad form front flipped down to the end of the very same roof top Ren had landed on. His bestial knees dropped into a crouch as he touched down, legs absorbing the impact before rising to stand at his full height of a little over six feet. The inconspicuous brown robe he wore flapped in the breeze created by the gunships passing overhead. His last instruction to blind little bear in the pilot's seat? Circle the block. With the hood pulled up only the end of Dragus' snout was visible, nostril slits flaring as he expelled wisps of poison breath, scenting the echani female across the roof.

His unaltered right eye saw her in the thermal spectrum as all barabels do, an orange blob on a blue background, while the amethyst gem set in his left saw nothing at all. Odd. He could certainly smell her, his olfactory senses several folds more powerful than his vision, but he couldn't detect her in the fey. It was if she were hiding in plain sight, her presence obscured somehow, no different than the roof tiles upon which she stood. He-Who-Hunger's right claw was wrapped around the ruby-red orb capping his saber-cane, mostly a length of charcoal stained Pzobian oak with a pure cortosis tip. The saurian Sith seemed to lean on the device as though requiring it for support, appearing to suffer some chronic injury despite the so-recent acrobatic display.

The corners of his scaled lips peeled up into a twisted smile, stretching impossibly beyond the borders of his face as he put his open maw full of gleaming incisors on full display. "Hello, poppet." He rasped in his reptilian manner, his forked tongue flicking flecks of blood with every stressed syllable by his lizards lisp. "I've been looking for you." Droplets of steaming salivation beaded at the end of his fangs, occasionally dropping in drooping ropes to soil the front of his robe. Even with most of a rooftop between them, the rancid carrion reek of his breath was heavy on the air.

Crossing his left claw across his chest, Dragus dropped his snout and lifted the right side of his robe with his claw still holding the saber-cane, performing a sort of serpentine curtsy. At the bottom of his bow he lifted his snout, meeting her gaze with his mismatched own.

As He-Who-Hungers took a step forwards from his perch on the roof's edge, his terrible toe talons that were curled like a raptors claw, carved furrows in the tiled surface beneath his scaled soles. "You have drawn the notice of my current benefactor. They have an eye for exceptionally talented individualz." Reaching up to the hood of his robe, he pulled the covering back to expose his wicked visage in all its savage presentation. The amethyst gem set in his left eye pulsed with an inner light, as though possessed by witch-fire. Lifting his left claw, he scraped the chin of his crocodilian snout ponderously, causing old scales to flake away as he studied the woman like a blurrg rancher inspecting a cleft hooved mare. "You don't ssseem like much at a glance, but there mussst be more than meetz the eye if the Sssupreme One pulled me away from my current tasssk to come fetch you."

Slithering out from beneath the backside of his robe, the villainous velociraptor's overlong tail rose behind him and began to sway back and forth behind his head. Capping the end of his fifth appendage was a sinister serrated spike that glinted with an oily sheen, almost hypnotic in its near perfect rhythm. He took another step forwards, tapping the tip of his cane on the roof top as he came a little closer. There was no mistaking the twisted terrosaur's allegiance, his presence in the Force was a dark stain that threatened to swallow everything and everyone around him, drawing the very warmth from the air. A prevailing sense of utter wrongness permeated his scaled form, as though his aura were at odds with the world around him.

The scaled brow over his bloody right eye furrowed as a thought occurred to him. "Ah, forgive me, my dear. Thirty yearz trapped in Otherssspace and I have forgotten my mannerz. Allow me to introduce myssself." Hissed the drake lord, inclining his snout. "I am Famine, Sssith Extraordinaire and Massster of the Alchemical Artz. But pleassse, call me Draguz." He took another step forwards, flexing the obsidian talons of his empty left claw in a series of sinuous pops. "And what might I call you, hmmm?" Another step closer and the clink of clattering glassware could be heard coming from a reek leather satchel of alchemical supplies resting against his left hip.

A low growl sounded in the reptilian throat of Dragus as Mal'ize referred to the Supreme One as Dragus' master. It rankled him, the current state of his personal finances. After a ten year long hiatus from the galaxy, he had returned impoverished, absent the former wealth that kept his Sithly activities afloat. His business mogul of a cyclops brother was in cryostasis, and the now destitute draconian could not for the life of him remember the pin code for the family account. Thus in a moment of desperation he accepted an offer of servitude to the Supreme Leader of the Sith Eternal. It was more of an employer/employee relationship, or at least that's how he considered it. Sure, the mysterious ruler of Roon had proven that he could squash the fiendish Famine Lord like a bug if he truly wished to, but a High Lord of the Eye did not bow. Figuratively of course. He bowed all the time. Dark blood spilled over his lips, misting the air with crimson flecks with every hot exhalation of breath, as his teeth grit hard enough to slice into the black gums of his mouth. He swallowed back a wet trickle of blood, his long glistening teeth now stained pink when his lips slid apart.

"I couldn't sssay. He isssn't much of a sharer, you sssee." His lips twisted into a sinister and quite insincere smile. "And the Sssupreme One iz my benefactor, dearessst Mal'ize, not my massster. Oh, a Lord of the Eye understandz ssservice well enough, but to a higher power, you underssstand. Not to sssome Outer Rim demagogue, however illustriouz the title." Reaching up beneath his snout, he stroked his scaled chin with his left claw, nodding to himself as he conceded. "It'z a rather good title, even I mussst admit, and I have more than mossst."

It was quite an extensive list: The Famine Lord, Scaled Scourge, the Hungering One, the Dragon of Pzob, Leach Lord, Blood Wyrm. In Tusken mythology, according to his darling daughter Wart who happened to be an expert on the subject, the Sand People referred to him as the Hakusar, the Demon Drake of the Dune Sea. The pure hearted ewoks of Bright Tree Village knew him as the Night Spirit. Among the ranat warrens of Dragusblight he was known as the Great Devourer. The abominable snowoks of the Lost Tribe on Hoth cursed him as the Feaster of Worlds. Those were only naming but a few. Dragus had titles coming out of his wazoo.

Being a little bolder, he took another two steps closer, to the point where he could feel the the rhythm of her pulse and smell the scent of her blood through her skin. The black scaled barabel was every bit the predator he appeared. His toe talons tapped on the ground, pricking the roof beneath his scaled feet.

"But he doez foot the bill for my resssearch, which haz quite the overhead cossst, ssso you will underssstand why I mussst insssist you come with me." His dragged his forked tongue over his lips before parting his slavering maw. "I promissse I don't bite. Well..." He scratched his chin again. "...I do, but I won't. Sith'z honour." His left claw slid behind his back, talon crossing over talon. "Besidez, I couldn't posssibly eat another thing after that customz officer I had. I mean, I sssuppose I could have a light sssnack. Wait, no, Draguz. It iz nearly bikini ssseason on Draggle Rock and you are on a ssstrict diet of no sssnacking after sssupper."

Ren had no way of knowing it but this bizarre behavior, especially the talking to himself, was pretty characteristic of the saurian Sith. There was a reason most of his comrades in the Sith Eternal kept him at a distance.