Exile .5 and .6

.5 Stepping slowly down the extending loading ramp Anduil Siron smiled dimly as he saw his friend Ikeeriot coming up to greet him, waiting just beyond where the ramp sunk into the sand. "Did you get anyone?" Ikeeriot asked, wiping his forehead of sweat and sand. Anduil frowned and shook his head slowly. "A few prospective Jedi, but most of them are still dedicated to the Order, Iker. What’s worse is that you won’t let me explain our position at all." Ikeeriot turned and looked back at their small hovel, which was inlaid into a small smooth but rocky depression in the sand. The sweltering blades of sunlight that cut down from the sky took away the wetness of his throat. His answer of dry and rough, "The fact that so many died there that day should be reason enough to launch a full-scale investigation without our prompting, Anduil." Anduil nodded and stepped onto the sand. He put a hand on his friend’s shoulder, which was tense as always—Ikeeriot was losing confidence faster each day now that he couldn’t find his place in the Force. Anduil had seen his friend’s shape dwindle from a fledgling Jedi Knight to a whither figure without position in a matter of only a few days—it hadn’t helped that he had scolded Ikeeriot at length for falling to the Dark Side. Now Anduil felt instantly guilty any time he used the Force around Ikeeriot: the young man had been somehow stripped of the Force, whether or not it was him in some way or the Force’s overall will exerting itself over him. "I know what you think of the Order, Iker. I think we’ve been through it enough times that I understand." Anduil said. Sweat already breaking out on his back and the roots of the hair on his head soaked. "I know that you understand," Ikeeriot cut in. "It’s that you believe in my cause or even agree with it that I’m concerned with." Anduil stared at Ikeeriot for a moment and shook his head with a wry smile. His friend was growing more paranoid then ever these days without the Force to aid him in sensing others thoughts. "No, Ikeeriot. No matter how hard you try to do so, I don’t think you’ll ever get rid of me—even if I didn’t believe in our cause. Which I do." "Good." Ikeeriot nodded. "I’ll make the next recruiting trips. I know how you absolutely love them. I’m no use here anyway." Anduil nodded with a frown. "Did you see Master Ub—?" Ikeeriot responded by turning his back and heading for the hovel. "We should get inside. Cooler in there." Anduil muttered. An hour later, over the meager remains of what they had rationed from the ship they’d commandeered from Xolatis, they turned their thoughts toward their occupation of the planet. "I think I may make a run into town tomorrow," Ikeeriot said, referring to Anchorhead. "I think we should pick up a moisture vaporator. Maybe two." Wiping his face and quietly licking the displaced food from his fingers, Anduil watched Ikeeriot respectfully. "Are you sure we have enough credits? How long do you think we’re going to have to stay here, anyway?" Ikeeriot shrugged. "However long until we get the numbers we need." Again, a reference to a plan Anduil had heard nothing of in the last three weeks. He’d told Anduil to send word to a Xolatis politician to be aware of Darchind’s situation, but Anduil had gotten no reply. In fact, Anduil had gotten a message just the opposite from the Jedi Order on the way back to Tatooine. "Ulic Quel-Droma sent me a transmission, ordering us both back to the front to fight against the Mandalorians, Ikeeriot." Ikeeriot looked blankly at Anduil for a moment, but regained his thought. "He doesn’t need us. The war will be over soon." Surprised by the sudden insight, the hope in Anduil grew visibly. "The Force? A feeling in the Force you have?" Ikeeriot paused and said dismally, "No. It’s something worse. Just intuition of a sort. I haven’t felt the Force since I tried to take revenge on Darchind." Anduil’s eyes grew downcast and took another bite of his food. "Should we even reply then?" Ikeeriot shook his head. "Quel-Droma can handle it. You haven’t heard from the politician then?" Anduil shook his head. "No message back." "In the meantime I think we should go over some kind of a plan." Ikeeriot added. "You . .didn’t already have one?" Anduil asked. Ikeeriot shook his head. "Only a few thoughts here and there. It’s too hard to think about it without thinking about . ." Ikeeriot breathed hard from his nose and glared at the food he was eating. "Without thinking about the last battle." "It surely wasn’t the last." Anduil replied. "What thoughts do you have?" Briefly, Ikeeriot smiled. "Deep infiltration. I need someone to play Wamprat with the Krayt though." He looked carefully at Anduil. "I’d like you to be the distraction. Maybe pull some political strings behind this . .Locke character?" Anduil was shaking his head fervently though. "I don’t think that’s a good idea. How are you going to go undercover as a Sith Initiate if you can’t touch the Force?" Ikeeriot sneered happily at the hovel’s hole of a door as the wind began to kick up and howl. "By the time we do this, I’ll have already gotten back to it or worst case, I’ll go into Darchind’s militia and work my way up. He’s going to have his arms tied that way. Not enough people on one planet, unless he advances his campaign while the Jedi have their heads in the—." "Which is all good and fine," Anduil cut in. "However, I think he might recognize you." Ikeeriot cleared his throat, shaking his head. "He never got a clean look at me, but in any case," he itched his scraggle-laden face. "He won’t recognize me." "Anything else?" Anduil asked. Ikeeriot shook his head again. "Only numbers. We need numbers." His head twitched a bit. "I think we may have a visitor, Anduil." Anduil started to stand but stayed with his knees bent, remembering how many times he’d crashed his head onto the low ceiling of their shabbily made hut. His hand darted down to his side, clasping his double-bladed lightsaber. A dark shadow occupied the hovel’s entrance and put his hand up in defense. "I come with good tidings," he said. Anduil let out a relieved sigh. "Narsayl. It’s good to see you." "Please, don’t let me interrupt in your feast." Narsayl smiled good-naturedly at their meal. "Hopefully you brought your own." Ikeeriot said sourly, settling back down against the wall of the hovel. "I’m afraid I’ve brought more then just food." Narsayl said evenly, hunching back out of the hovel. Anduil genuinely looked confused toward Ikeeriot and followed after Narsayl. Ikeeriot sat stubbornly for a moment but put his food down and followed. Probably brought more equipment to stuff our little thing with. Just what we need— Ikeeriot’s train of thought was stunted by two more ships landing around the hovel, and a third in the distance. "What is all this?" "Sympathy for our cause." Anduil spoke, surprised. He turned to Narsayl. "How did you get all these to come?" Narsayl snorted happily. "Don’t get too excited it’s only four people. Not too many would venture from the front for nothing more then a curiosity." A determined look was washing over Ikeeriot’s face. "It’s enough to start us off." Another hour passed, and as the twin suns set over the horizon the two ex-Jedi and the three Jedi Knights who had joined them assembled into a pentagon. "Before we get too far into the planning, I want to make it clear all of what we’ve just told you is embellished zero percent. There are Sith on Xolatis, and it is true. If you don’t believe me, well . .frankly, there’s no one else to believe." Ikeeriot said. Narsayl nodded to this, while the other two Jedi Knights, one a lizard species: Barabel and another, a Noghri took it in neutrally. The Noghri, named aptly for her stealth as a warrior: Sha’dowa finally replied with only the lightest of growls. "I think such a story couldn’t ever be dreamt up by someone anyway, Ikeeriot. Not to mention your honesty of slipping into the easy way." The Barabel, Toba nodded and sissed at that. "The Hunt is much like you described the feeling of taking revenge. This one admires that you did not leave it out of your story." "As you said though, you can no longer touch the Force?" Narsayl interjected. Ikeeriot nodded. "I’ve been making progress slowly." "What kind of progress?" Narsayl asked. Ikeeriot paused, questioning how exactly to relate his experiences. "It—the Force, I think it left me after I Forced it out with the Dark Side on Xolatis. It’s coming back little by little. I saw Uban earlier . .but only fleetingly." "Uban?" Anduil asked, eyebrow arced. "You didn’t tell me about that." Ikeeriot shook his head. "I wasn’t sure I should. It might have been a mirage." Anduil gave out a deep sigh and nodded. "In any event, I think I should say something more." Ikeeriot said, looking from each new Jedi Knight to another. "Before you go any further, I want you to know that if you choose to come with me, in all likelihood the Order will denounce you as well as our cause. So I ask all of you here to denounce them before they can do it to you." Suspicion washed over Narsayl’s face, "Hey wait a second—." "Wait." Anduil stopped him, clamping a hand down on his shoulder. He could feel the Force in Ikeeriot. It was a faint tingling, but it was there. "If you should join me and Anduil, you’re no longer Jedi Knights. We work as Jedi Wraith, of the Jedi Out-caste. We won’t work outside the Jedi Order—we work completely seperately of it. We work for our cause and we do not obey their orders. It is our job to find prospective Wraiths within the Order and ask them to join us. If we can contact what is left of the Paladins or Warriors-for-Justice, we might be able to draw numbers from them as well. Is this understood?" Narsayl finally spoke, waiting for Ikeeriot to finish. His face was flushed, not from the heat of the planet, but from his attitude toward Ikeeriot. "This is ludicrous Ikeeriot! We can’t work away from the Order! We need their help against the Sith! It is our responsibility to alert them." "As apart of the Out-caste of the Jedi Order, we needn’t involve ourselves with them, unless it is to recruit like-minded people who do not want to fight the war against the Mandalorians as soldiers. We are fighting against Evil from now on—the Sith. We are the ones guarding peace and justice—and we not the Jedi, will be the ones to vanquish their play at power." Narsayl sighed dramatically. "You’re beginning to sound like a Sith yourself, Iker." Ikeeriot sighed and shrugged his shoulders. "If being sure of my side is being a Sith, then label me what you will, but be sure of this—I am neither Jedi nor Sith. I am an Outcast. If you want to join our Outcaste then you’d better be prepared to be sure of yourself as well. Alec Uban taught me that it doesn’t always matter if you use the Force aggressively—just as long as you’re sure it’s for the right, no, the good reasons. To defend." Narsayl looked to the ground and shook his head slowly defiant. "I will join you, if not only to keep you in check." Ikeeriot smiled and turned to Anduil. "I’m afraid you’ll have to be second-in-command in that department." Anduil felt a shiver go down his spine. Ikeeriot turned to the other Jedi Knights, who were already nodding toward his invitation. The first Wraith of the Outcaste, Ikeeriot, Anduil, Narsayl, Sha’dowa and Toba watched the twin suns pass below the violet horizon. After all had adjourned to sleep, Ikeeriot remained outside, feeling the familiar cooler of the desert night whisk his hair up from his forehead into the air. He brushed it away absentmindedly. Earlier, when he’d been speaking for his self-proclaimed Outcaste, he’d felt the familiar tinge of the Force pass over him twice. When Ikeeriot looked out across the dark desert, he felt the same familiar twinge calling him—tugging him. Ikeeriot didn’t know whether it was the Dark Side, lulling him into a peaceful state to be slain by a caravan of Tuskens, or whether it was the Force, calling him back to where he’d began, far before the days he now spent on sandy Tatooine. He gathered his things slowly, feeling doubtfulness as well as the Force in himself, but set out slowly on the Swoop, careful not to push the engine loud enough til he was out of the camp. Ikeeriot joined the night in search of the Force. .6 Gazing out the transparisteel viewport of Mandalore’s Hammer, Darchind and Seknem took in the scene expectantly. Distant footfalls became closer and closer. They stopped a few feet behind the two men and Lord Darchind was the only one to turn to regard their visitor. He was greeted with a nervous smile from his Sith Apprentice, Valecka. Her long blonde hair was tied back into a tight tail and the black Sith cloak that she wore fit to her form easily. "Master," she regarded him, going down to her right knee, bowing. "Rise, young apprentice," Lord Darchind said, raising his upraised palm in the air. He smiled beneath the cloak. All is going according to my plan. "As per your instructions the second and third ground divisions are now upturning the East District of the capitol in search of the Jedi." Valecka said. Darchind nodded. "Infiltration is our first problem—this demonstration of my new army’s power is a multi-pronged attack, young apprentice. Can you tell me what it will accomplish?" Valecka’s eyes narrowed and a squeamish look came over her face as it paled. She took a deep breath and gave it her best however, and Darchind regarded that as better then he might have ventured. "I can think of a few things this will accomplish master—if there are actual Jedi still onplanet, they will be roused from their shadows and dealt with accordingly. If not, the Sith Initiate you planted on patrol will serve his purpose," she paused and grinned at this, "and will attack the troops once he figures out he has been duped. This will give the illusion to the civilians that the Jedi indeed are against us. Against them." Darchind clasped his hands and squeezed them softly, feeling the cold in the crevices between his fingers. "Had I the time, I would applaud. One thing however, you missed. How would a Sith initiate be identified as a Jedi had I not—?" "Given him the a Jedi’s lightsaber they left behind," Valecka corrected her small misstep in a interjection. "My apologies for having not seen it sooner." "None needed." Darchind answered briskly. The next thing would seem like a punishment to the learner, but a small thorn was still in his side. "Valecka, before you go, I also wanted to ask if you supervised the emplacement of the wide-range jammers." Valecka caught the nuance and nodded silently. "I did, my master. Before I go where?" Darchind tried not to sigh. Perhaps he was not as impervious to speech cues as he so thought. "I am sending you on a mission to tie up a few loose ends that my spies have told me have apprised me of. You are to go to the desert world of Tatooine and observe if there are any remnants of those who escaped the attack on Xolatis." "Master, I thought they were being put on trial as we speak?" Valecka asked, her voice turning weak. Darchind shook his hooded head. "Not all will come so easily. We are currently bringing in more members of each Jedi Brigade, but they are voluminous in their own small orders. This mission is not for them." "I was not aware that you believed any Jedi escaped?" Valecka tried. Darchind shook his head again. "I am fairly aware that none did, however given the proximity and relative seclusion of the planet Tatooine these reports could be true." Valecka turned her eyes to the floor. "I understand." She murmured. "I want you to go right away, and spend only a day to look for any that might have escaped. The reports I’ve been given indicate that the suspects frequent the settlement called Anchorhead. If you find anyone of the like, kill them." "Understood." Valecka answered flatly, turning on her heel and walking fast out of the Bridge area. Seknem cleared his throat from behind his mask, which was accentuated through the proximity to the helmet’s inner walls. "I am not so sure about that one. She seems far too timid to be apart of our new order." Darchind ignored the man’s thought. "Let me ben concerned with her Sith training, Mandalorian. I would not give you advice on how to teach your men." Seknem fell silent behind his helmeted head. A nod, and they turned back to the viewport and watched the shifting fleet of three Mandalorian ships. "Soon they will come?" Seknem asked after a long silence. The taps of fingers against keypads and keyboards were all that he could hear in reply from Darchind for a long moment then, "Yes," the Sith Lord breathed behind his hood. "Soon they will come." Sitting in his ‘command chair’ above the recently made Galaxy Destroyer class Frigate, Erad Katoor certainly felt worth more then he probably was. His slicked back, jet black hair matched his dark uniform almost as unquestionably as his crew followed him. He was returning to the battle over Ryloth, fighting the Mandalorians fiercely with all he was given by his planetary government, his home, of Eriadu. The long gray frigate shaped like a dart sprang out of hyperspace and the communications was immediately hit by a blast of static, then a holovid playing on a loop. Nearly spilling out of his own command chair Erad covered his ears and cringed, yelling for the tech specialists to get on the audio problems they were having. When the static disappeared he let out a sigh but then looked up at the holoprojector, which had flipped on all on it’s own. Great, he thought confused, just another problem this new ship is having—I think I should have gotten the warranty . .or just wait for those new Dreadnaught series ships to be created . .however long that’ll take the ship arch’s. "Someone get the blasted audio dampeners and get the volume down!" Erad yelled. Three men ran in three separate directions, one spilling over a female working at the main audio console. "Sir!" Someone yelled. Spinning, trying to find the voice, Erad slipped and fell on his back. He let out a gasp as the air left his lungs and in a dizzied state got himself back up on his feet. "What?!" Suddenly the volume on the transmission lowered. "Finally!" Erad yelled disproportionately loud. "What? What is it?!" "Over here." A technician by the holoprojector waved at him. "You should take a look at this." "I should take a look at this." Erad muttered, hurrying over to the projector. "I’ll tell you what I’ll look at and when I’ll look at it," he grumbled. "Well," he said, glaring at the man. "Turn it back up a little, I’m not that young." "Yes, sir." He could see Jedi fighting at first, with those whirring fire blades that Erad detested. Oh, but when the Republic has a problem that isn’t war, they’ll go to those crazy old-men! Those saviors who prided themselves on peace and justice . .he’d just been chewed out by one for not following the last battle plan in his old ship, The Insulator. He shook his head, remembering the whole incident with the naming of the old hunk of space junk—it was supposed to be The Incinerator, but when the damn techs had encrypted the name onto the ship’s holo-tags they’d screwed it up. Just a big joke—just a big funny joke at Erad’s expense. Meanwhile the Jedi chewed him out for not following their Force. He was beginning to distrust them more and more—they always thought they were right! He steadied his thoughts on the holoprojector and listened. " . .these Jedi attacked and slaughtered most of my peaceful order of monks, all in the name of Republic justice," a voice narrated. "When I retalitated with my secret security guards, they destroyed half of our planet’s city, fleeing back to space," a holocam footage showed an insidious grin on the face of a cloaked stranger, placing a detpack onto the base of a building’s innards and then a bird’s eye view of Xolatis’ smoldering city, half of it crumbling to the ground from a massive shockwave billowing out from a bomb’s epicenter. Immediately Erad’s jaw dropped in amazement. "Keep playing it back . ." He said. "Keep playing it back and try and see if that footage is doctored—if it ain’t then well, I’m not sure I feel like fighting with the Jedi anymore." Erad said. There was a concerned look on the tech’s face but he busied himself. Erad started to go back to his seat but turned back. "Try and see if anyone else is getting this too—open up channels to all the warships in the area." He re-thought the order. "Not the Jedi ships though. I’ll get to the bottom of this soon enough." Behind Erad half of his bridge-crew rolled their eyes, but continued in their work. It wasn’t that Captain Katoor was too stupid to run a battleship—that idea was absurdly underdeveloped—it was that Erad had been bought into his rank by his royal family. Meanwhile Erad continued to mull the Jedi being so ruthless. He’d grown up around a few, taken a liking to a girl Jedi too, but that had been stopped right in it’s tracks. The Force forbid their be any mixing of non-Jedi . .he had snapped at her. She’d left Eriadu the next day. He was hearing new information on the holoprojector as it headed over and over through it’s automated loop. A new planet, Xolatis. Of course, he thought, they thought they could just push them around ‘cause they were new to the Republic. Erad Katoor shook his head in disbelieve and distaste. "I can’t believe they’ve gone that far," he mused under his breath. "A call to arms . .please aid the Xolatis cause, we want nothing more then to defend ourselves against the encroaching armadas sent against us from the far reaches of the Republic capitol, Coruscant," a small and vague image of a vast group of battleships entering a planetary system that Erad could only figure to be Xolatis. "Will someone get me a channel?!" He cried, feeling a simmering anger gather beneath his skin. "We can’t seem to open any channels—." The tech stopped short. "Scratch that out, I think we can piggyback this signal—it turns out it’s being sent to all ships in the local system—possibly the whole system itself. "I don’t care how you do it, techie! So long as it happens!" Erad yelled back. "Yes sir." Came a grumble in return. A few moments later, "I’ve got it!" "Patch me through!" Erad answered ungratefully. No reply to this, just an order followed. "This is Captain Erad Katoor of . . The Incinerator . ." He started. "If you’ve gotten the news I’ve just been informed of, I’m sure you’ll agree with me in switching your next hyperspace coordinates for Xolatis . ." A hundred systems were bombarded with the same set of messages at first, then a hundred more. The answer to the Xolatis’ frantic call for defense would be answered in full in the following few days.