Murlesson works in Celcius because the Empire uses metric. And hey, I managed to recycle something from Tatooine (even though I replayed that months ago so I don’t have any of the actual dialogue). I just thought it would be more interesting to do it this way than to blandly exposit ‘rumours’.
Next chapter is slowly taking shape but it’s still taking some time to sand the less-good corners off everything.
Part 15: Insignificant Haircut
Part 16: Out of the Cooler and Into the Freezer
Belsavis was the weirdest planet he’d been on yet. As Revel had described to him, massive three-to-four-hundred-metres-high glaciers blanketed most of the planet, thanks to its orbit on the outer side of its star’s habitable zone. But the planet’s huge, hot core had, via volcanic activity, melted giant gaps in the ice, leaving them free to be filled with rich, thermal-powered jungles. From space, the planet looked like it had green acne. Charming.
And within the jungles were Republic installations. Apparently they were pretty sure that anyone who escaped the high-security jails would get eaten by the imported feral acklays. And anyone who escaped the acklays would freeze in the ice, because there wasn’t much else here.
The actual prison break, even though it didn’t go completely smoothly, was nothing to write home about. Murlesson had arranged for false identities for Revel, Ashara, and himself, a Republic transponder for the Viper, and new clothes so they were less obviously a pirate, a Jedi, and a Sith waltzing into one of the most secure facilities in the known galaxy. Even Kessel paled in comparison to this place, from what he understood.
Their entry was unremarkable; Revel knew exactly where his targets were from whatever intelligence he’d gained on his prior expedition, and led them there directly. And then there was a lot of Force manipulation, and a lot of fighting, especially when a random Jedi got nosy and tried to stop them. But an hour later, they were alone in their target prison building except for the prisoners, and the compound-wide alarms weren’t going off. Nice.
One by one, Murlesson hacked the doors open and the prisoners walked out, looking around suspiciously; apparently getting freed by a Zabrak Sith in a Republic uniform was not something they’d expected. But when they made their way down to the main office area, now in a state of chaotic destruction, they saw Revel, and he felt their fear and hatred rise. Most of them.
Revel looked at them all grimly, but then his gaze fell on the last one, a woman with short black hair, and he grinned. “Caseyyyy, good to see you, babe.”
“Son of a motherless Kowakian monkey-lizard, Andronikos!” The woman smiled back. “You didn’t come down here just for little ol’ me, did ya honey?”
“Not entirely,” Revel said, giving the other pirates a dark look. “Mostly, but not entirely.”
She shrugged. “Figured as much. You were never the sentimental sort. ‘S what I liked about ya.”
“Revel,” said one of the other crew; about half of them were getting worked up, Murlesson could feel it, getting ready to attack. “Should’ve killed you when we had the chance, I guess.”
“I wouldn’t try anything yet if I were you,” Murlesson said idly, examining his gloved fingertips. Lightning was a bit hard on the leather, and he kept having to replace his gloves. This pair a cheap approximation of Republic guard gloves, so he’d already blown out the fingertips. “I could kill all of you in a heartbeat without really trying. I just don’t have a reason to yet.” He gestured around the room at the chaos, the Republic bodies. They could draw their own conclusions about how they died.
“I wish they would,” Revel said, glaring. “Show ’em what happens to folks who cross you, y’know? But I won’t make you take ’em out. They don’t deserve that. I’ll do it myself. Show ’em what happens to folks who cross me.”
The Casey woman tilted a carefully groomed eyebrow at him. “I hope that doesn’t include me, after all the work I went to getting word to you.”
“Casey, you traitor!” shouted one of the pirates, a big stupid-looking human who needed a shave. “I thought you were my woman! You ditched that pile of druk!”
“I’m no one’s woman, Wilkes, and definitely not yours, you gormless gundark. So? Gonna shoot me, honey?”
“Nah, you come stand over here by me. Better yet, ya want one of my blasters? Let’s do this together, like old times.”
Murlesson waved at Ashara. “Let’s go. We’re not needed anymore.”
She stifled a sigh. “Okay.”
They were outside before the shooting started, but he still dimly felt the furor in the Force, the anger, the fear, the death, Revel’s dark satisfaction.
Ashara sighed openly now as they trudged to the top of a nearby hill. “Man, pirates are less fun in real life.”
He shrugged. “I hope that isn’t surprising to you.” The Force was abundant here, and Dark-tinged, and yet it felt repressed somehow.
“Well…” she thought for a minute. “Let me amend that. Andronikos is fun when he’s just chilling. But when he’s being piratey, less fun. I admit he has cause, but… Murder isn’t really fun whether it’s pirates or not.”
“I think you’re on the wrong ship if you want to avoid murder,” he said.
She snorted. “I guess that’s true.”
“Your consolation should be I don’t usually do it for fun.”
“Don’t you?” She folded her arms, looking angry. “Maybe you don’t. But so many Sith do. There isn’t going to be proper peace between the Empire and the Republic until they stop!”
“And Jedi do kill people on occasion,” he pointed out, slightly sarcastic.
“I guess that’s true too. But we try to just kill people who deserve it! To protect others!”
“I was going to say ‘who made you the judge of the galaxy’, but then I remembered, so do I,” he said. “The difference between us is, I’m pretty sure almost everyone deserves it…” A sharp mental pain jabbed him with guilt, and he winced. He hadn’t been thinking of the worst moment of his life until he spoke…
“I’m pretty sure you’re lying,” Ashara said; she must have caught his twinge. “You just think you have to kill lots of people because other Sith do it.”
“Holomarker NotAllSith,” he retorted for the sake of annoying, pedantic accuracy. “Aristheron doesn’t kill lots of people. I kill people because they’re in my way.” He couldn’t say why other, more average Sith killed so much, but he guessed it was because killing was… addictive, being so deep in the Dark Side, though he didn’t like to admit it. He was more strategic than to indulge himself in an addiction he couldn’t afford to develop.
“So they deserve it for that?”
“Yes.”
She huffed. “You should stop it. You’re a jerk.”
He made a sarcastic bow. “Why yes, thank you, that is me. The galaxy’s a frakking jerk, so we’re even.”
She looked out over the jungle; he could feel her uncertainty, her attempts to centre herself. “You’re so sure of yourself, always. How do you do it?”
He hadn’t been expecting that conversation turn. “I wasn’t exactly intellectually challenged as a slave. I had to find my own mental stimulation. I had lots of time to think, while I drudged away cleaning and serving. I figured out my core philosophies then, and now I follow them.” He hesitated. “Was that the answer to the question you asked?”
“Maybe? A little? Didn’t you ever find your philosophies challenged by putting them into practice?”
“Yes. But since I had such excellent role models, I’ve managed to… mostly… stick to them.” Although it was a lot messier now that he had to deal with actual politics, different kinds of people, different kinds of relationships, instead of just ‘slaves=allies, guards=enemies, Netokos=kill’.
“’Excellent‘,” she muttered sarcastically under her breath.
He ignored it. “You’d do well to develop your own philosophies outside of the Jedi code.”
“The Jedi code is fine,” she said.
“I’m sure it’s fine, but it’s a bit simplistic. There are many ways to apply it. What’s yours?” How are you going to reconcile your sunshine-and-rainbows view of the universe with travelling with me and the things I do?
“Huh,” she said, looking inwards. “You may have a point there…”
Murlesson looked down the hill, where Revel and the Casey woman were approaching. “Hey, kid.”
“Just once, I wish you’d call me… I don’t know, ‘boss’, ‘lord’, anything but ‘kid’,” Murlesson groused. “I know annoying me is hilarious and you’re too valuable to zap, but please.”
“Yeah, whatever,” Revel said, and Murlesson huffed and folded his arms. “Anyway, Casey has something I think you’ll be interested in hearing.”
The woman smiled brightly. “Casey Rix. I used to ship alongside this guy when he was captain of the Sky Princess.”
“Then what happened?” Murlesson asked, idly curious. “Revel’s never told me the whole story.”
She looked up at the cloudy sky, tilted her head in a thinking pose. “Eh, the first mate mutinied, managed to get more than half the ship on his side. I managed to keep my head down, although the idiot got it into his head that I liked him just because he made himself captain… so I played along, because manipulating him was way too easy. After they dumped Andronikos, we kept on pirating, but… Wilkes was never half the captain Andronikos was.”
“Aww, babe,” Revel said fondly.
Murlesson looked between the two of them flatly. Wasn’t there a better-than-even chance that Casey had helped sell out Revel, even if she’d communicated to him on this occasion?
Revel caught the look. “I know what you’re thinking, but whether it’s true or not, Casey’s good for this time. She didn’t just arrange for me to come break out the relatively-innocent and punish the wicked ’cause she was in trouble. She’s got info to buy our help with, and I think you’ll like it.”
“You know of a ghost for me,” Murlesson said.
Casey grinned. “Right on! One of our last jobs was to the ice planet Hoth. But… weird crap kept happening while we were there. Spooky crap. And we weren’t the only ones to see it. I heard there’s things that can’t be explained, unpowered doors opening and closing, storage crates moving when no one’s around, and supposedly someone blacked out once and started speaking in tongues. Could be snow-madness or just tricks of the environment, but…”
“That sounds almost comical,” Murlesson said. “Are you sure it wasn’t just drunken pirates playing pranks on each other?”
“I’m sure,” she said. “Just thinking about it sends chills up my spine, and it wasn’t from the cold.”
He stared at her, then sighed. “I suppose I don’t have any better leads. I’ll look into it.” He turned away and waved his hand dismissively. “I’ll be on the ship, once you’re ready to leave. Take whatever time you need.”
“Be right there,” Revel said. “See, I knew he’d be interested, Casey babe.”
Revel arrived back on the ship about half an hour later. “Well, that’s all taken care of. Thanks for the support! Breaking into Belsavis ain’t a walk in the park for most people.”
“What’s happening with your former crew?” Murlesson asked as Revel settled into the pilot’s seat and began warming up the engines.
“Most of them, nothing much,” Revel said with a dark chuckle. “Wilkes and his lot are all dead. Casey’s got the Sky Princess out of impoundment, and what’s left of the crew will follow her.”
Murlesson looked at him with some surprise. “You didn’t consider going with her?”
“Of course I did. I loved the Princess. Still do. More’n I love Casey, in case you couldn’t tell. But you’re my boss now. Sure, I could hand in my notice, but… eh… I think ya need me.”
Murlesson blinked, his mouth slightly open. “That’s… generous of you.”
Revel shrugged, flipping more switches. “Don’t worry about it, kid. This ship is good times. There’ll always be time later to see if she wants me back.”
“Casey, or the Princess?”
Revel grinned. “Yes.”
“Not that it’s any of my business, but what is your relationship with Casey, anyway?”
“We’re casual,” Revel said. “She was never one for ‘romantic’ commitments, and frankly neither am I. They’re too likely to go haywire and explode. So I guess you could say… ‘friends with benefits’.”
“I see,” Murlesson said. “Very practical.”
Hoth was a new kind of discomfort he’d never known before and would have been perfectly fine with not knowing. Hadn’t they just been on what was technically an ice planet? Why did they have to go to a worse one? But whatever his suffering with the cold, he was fine compared to his companions. Ashara whined and shivered, her sensitive lekku puckering with goosebumps. And the Empire’s human-centred stores didn’t have much that could help. Eventually she grabbed about five or six scarves and disappeared into the women’s refresher for twenty minutes, coming out looking ridiculous… but slightly less pathetic. Khem Val didn’t complain, but he was still wearing next to nothing. Did he not feel the cold, or was he just being grimly stoic? Revel had put on a hat.
Murlesson just pulled his hood more firmly over his head and lowered his head against the wind on his rented speeder bike.
They’d been roped into aiding the local Imperial base in their fight against… mostly pirates, actually. There was a Republic presence on the moon, but everyone had a quarrel with the pirates, and the pirates had a quarrel with everyone else. He wished Aristheron were there, this was right up his alley. But they’d fought enough Talz that Murlesson wouldn’t be missed while he went to meet with the contact he’d located – a Lieutenant of the Imperial Reclamation Service, which was a fancy government term for ‘graverobbers’. He was fully prepared to be unimpressed with their work. What could Force-deaf straight-laced Imperials know of Sith tombs? They probably just went to pick up the artefacts their masters told them to without ever having an inkling of what it all meant.
He came to a stop outside a crevice in the ice. Supposedly his contact was in there, and the Imperial gear and guards outside suggested he wasn’t wrong. He left his speeder and continued on foot, all three of his crew behind him.
Deep into the crevice, they found it transitioning to stone, stone marked with signs of ancient construction. The ice might have shifted overhead for the past several thousand years, but whatever lay in this mountain was still intact. Modern cables swooped along the ceiling, dangling bare-bones light fixtures. Up ahead he heard echoes of men’s voices and saw a steady light. The Imperial Reclamation Service was close.
He turned the corner into a large chamber and a blaze of floodlights, and a flurry of careful, painstaking activity. They were taking holos, making notes, measuring locations, brushing ice and debris from artefacts with soft brushes… they weren’t just graverobbing. They were actually, for real, doing archaeology. He’d never seen professionals in action before – Zash hardly counted, she hadn’t done anything like this when she had taken him on expeditions – and stopped to stare in appreciation.
A small man was standing in the middle of it all, moving from worker to worker, leaning over them to see their progress. “Easy does it, boys. We must respect history as we find it, no sense rushing what’s been here for hundreds and thousands of years already. Rogers! No cutting corners! And don’t forget the salt!” He smiled with excitement at Murlesson as he approached. “Salt’s not the best solution, but it’s the only thing that doesn’t freeze out here, and solid footing is a must.”
“Better than the typical off-the-shelf chemical-replete antifreeze for dealing with artefacts,” Murlesson answered, blinking down at him, trying not to loom. The man was short, and prissy, and looked about as strong as a wet noodle, but he was bursting with energy, and totally unafraid of him, a keen light in his eyes. “I’m looking for Lieutenant Talos Drellik, of the Imperial Reclamation Service.”
The man gasped happily and bowed. “Lord Murlesson Kallig, I am honoured. I heard you single-handedly unearthed several artefacts of the great Tulak Hord in the last few months. I’m a Naga Sadow man myself, but I’d love to compare-”
“You are?” Murlesson interrupted, his own pulse quickening with excitement. “So am I! Would you consider joining my service?” Ashara burst out laughing behind him. “What are you laughing at?”
True, on second thought, he ought to be more wary. What better way to lead him into a trap than to entice him with someone with whom he shared a strong interest? How had this Drellik learned about his artefact-recovering missions, how had he recognized him in the first place?
Drellik seemed taken aback, but he certainly didn’t seem offended. “Er… I shall certainly consider it, my lord! Now, what brings you to Hoth, and how may I be of service?”
Right, his goal. “I heard that a ship carrying artefacts from Yavin 4 went down over Hoth some years ago.”
“Hmm, a ship? Not usually our line of work, but let’s hear it. Maybe we can help.” He gestured over to a small prefab shelter with several folding seats set out in front of it.
Murlesson explained everything, leaning forward onto the small camp table, and Drellik sat back, a hand on his chin, taking it all in. “Hmm. A bit new for the Reclamation Service… but artefacts! And a ghost! I’ve heard that the dead talk down in the tombs, but to see one! I wonder if it’d be possible to make a holo-image…”
“I imagine it would depend on the light,” Murlesson said.
“Yes,” Drellik mused, “darker would be better…” He got up and waved at a skinny man with a shaved scalp. “Engineer Sorrel! Do we have any probes that aren’t frozen solid?”
“Shalora works as good as any in these conditions, sir,” said the engineer, brushing his gloves off and striding over to a crate near them. “She may not look like much, but she’s got heart.”
“Aww!” Ashara cooed over the droid as the engineer powered it up, and it floated into the air to hover a metre off the ground. “She’s got a good heart, yes she does!” Revel snickered quietly, but Ashara didn’t seem to care.
Murlesson ignored them. “What are we scanning for?”
“If my guess is correct,” Drellik said, “the captain would’ve launched a distress beacon before the crash, which should give us a line on the ship. I’m afraid I must finish up with the documentation here, but you can head out straightaway with Shalora, of course. But beware, my lord. The cold’s master out here. My boys and I are going to shift camp tomorrow morning, try to get a better communications setup going, but let us know if you find anything!”
“You’ll be the first person I call,” Murlesson assured him ironically – who else would he call?
The icy wastes were vast, blank, eye-searing whiteness, broken by the regular ridges of stony mountain peaks, and the irregular ridges of interminable glaciers. Murlesson was fairly certain this was some form of hell; the temperatures were in the negative fifties and it was sunny out. If they all died here, at least it would save Thanaton the effort of disposing of them. They’d simply vanish into the frozen desert, their bodies lost but preserved for centuries, any remains stark reminders of sentient life’s hubris in coming here in the first place…
Which was a depressing thought, but the whole thing was a bit depressing, wasn’t it?
It would have been nice if he could at least have read something while travelling by speeder bike, but he needed all his attention just to make sure he didn’t fall off the occasional unexpected cliff, and the vehicle’s design wasn’t conducive to holding a datapad and still going fast. It was also too noisy for conversation, so even listening to an audio file was out of the question. So he was incredibly bored, and the sweeping landscape seemed to numb his mind, so he couldn’t even scheme properly. Sithspawn, he hated this planet.
He’d tried to send at least two of his companions back – while travelling alone was the height of stupidity, there was no call for all four of them to freeze together – but they’d all refused. Khem was looking for Tulak Hord’s bones, which he’d dreamed were here, though what they were doing on Hoth, he couldn’t say; Revel wanted to be on hand in case of pirate attacks, and Ashara wanted to help with any supernatural happenings. He also sensed she just didn’t want to be left behind, on the ship, all alone, which would have been a perfectly acceptable state for him, but apparently she found that nearly as depressing as the actual planet.
It took far too long to discover where the distress beacon had landed, but when he did, he called Drellik immediately, who assured him he would send out Engineer Sorrel right away. Murlesson was glad of that, as the playback mechanism was jammed. He’d figured out how it worked, since it was designed to be easy to activate even by the most tech-illiterate Trandoshan, but it was jammed with ice over time and he didn’t want to damage it.
So they set up a small shelter and waited for Sorrel and his escort to arrive. The engineer had the device in working condition in fairly short order.
The holo was of a Chagrian male in Republic uniform. “This is Captain Quellon of the Starrunner. SOS, I repeat, SOS. We are caught in Hoth’s gravitational pull, and falling fast. Strange events date back two weeks. Yavin Four artifacts believed to be the source. Something has taken control of the ship. To whomever finds this message: burn this vessel. Don’t look inside, don’t touch it. Burn it.”
The recording shut off abruptly. “Well, that sounds incredibly promising,” Murlesson said. Let’s not burn the ship. Gimme gimme. “Is there anything else recorded on the beacon? Coordinates, perhaps? A hint of where the ship may have fallen?”
“Not as I can tell,” said Sorrel. “Might take a good going-over in the lab. But what are those tracks?” He pointed at some small dimples in the snow that Murlesson had seen but not taken much note of before, and got out his comm. “Lieutenant, sir, we’ve found the beacon but no ship, as you expected. There’re some light tracks, though: appear to be a few days old.”
“Have Shalora zoom in, Sorrel,” Drellik said. “I’ve been studying alien tracks since I was old enough to know a Twi’lek from a tuk’ata.” Sorrel went over to the droid and adjusted its scope to focus on the tracks. There was a long pause – allowing for the data to transmit, and for Drellik to make sense of what he was seeing- “Ortolan. I’d know them if they were six days old and covered in jam. Those are Ortolan tracks.” He sounded so pleased to have figured it out.
Murlesson raised an eyebrow at the lieutenant’s choice of words; Ashara giggled. “I’ll be sure to look for you next time my ship’s galley is invaded by a pack of Ortolans.”
Drellik chortled in return. “Ha! That’s a good one. I’ll have to remember that next time the Imperial Reclamation Service trackers’ committee meets.”
“You have a committee- Never mind.”
Drellik appeared to have remote control of Shalora now, panning the scope about to a small divot in the packed snow where the tracks converged. “It looks like those Ortolans dug something up – possibly a clue to the ship’s location. Sorrel, where’s the nearest Ortolan camp?”
Sorrel pointed east. “It’s a ways beyond the next outpost. But the tracks look headed in the right direction.”
“Might be time to put on your best diplomatic face, my lord. Ortolans don’t like outsiders much, but it looks like they’re the key to finding our ghost.”
“What I’d like to know is why the Ortolans moved now, just when I arrive on the planet,” Murlesson said. ‘A few days old’ would put it at the exact time he arrived. “Surely they’ve had years to hide the ship’s location.”
“You think they’re deliberately hiding it?” Revel asked. “Not just randomly salvaging bits at an inconvenient time?”
“The timing’s too inconvenient,” Murlesson said. “It’s suspicious. …I wonder if the ghost sensed my presence and my intent, and is trying to make things difficult for me.” Revel shrugged, not buying it. He didn’t know the power of the Force.
“I’ll have Sorrel bring the beacon to the base. Between it and the Ortolans, we’re bound to have a breakthrough. We’ll be there when you’re through dealing with them.”
“Very well,” Murlesson said. “Kallig out.”
“Lieutenant Drellik really is something else,” Sorrel said cheerfully as he brought over a cargo sled, big enough to hold the metre-wide beacon and any other remaining debris nearby. “Could find a wampa hair in a snowdrift, I bet.”
“Have you worked with him long?” Murlesson asked.
“Oh, several years, sir. He’s a funny little fellow, but an excellent boss. He knows what he’s doing, sir.”
“I believe it. Khem, help the man with the beacon.” He could just lift it himself with his mind, but what was the point of having heavily muscled minions then?
The local Imperials were nearly so bloody disorganized that he left them to fend for themselves with the Talz… nearly. The saving grace was Captain Yudrass, who was thoughtful, methodical, and cold-bloodedly ruthless. He was a far better collaborator than his superior, Commander Tritan, who blustered and bumbled about, making a lot of noise without much substance. Murlesson had been ignoring him as well as he could and going off of Yudrass’s intelligence as much as possible.
When he returned to Dorn Base in the evening, a junior officer hurried up to him. “My lord, if you have a moment to speak with Commander Tritan, your presence would be much appreciated.”
“I suppose I could,” he said, affecting superiority and heading towards Tritan’s office. He entered without knocking.
Tritan and Yudrass were there, as usual, but they were speaking via holocomm with a Moff, so said the uniform. Probably their superior. “And you say this Sith held off the entire Talz force single-handed?”
“It sounds incredible, to be sure, but here, I’ll let you talk directly.” Tritan turned to him and bowed. “My lord, we cannot express our gratitude.” Maybe if he were less incompetent, he wouldn’t have needed to express so much gratitude. “May I introduce Moff Braynor, overseer of the Hoth system, among others. Moff Braynor, Lord Kallig.”
“It’s an honour,” Murlesson said, cautious but trying not to show it. He didn’t know what else this Moff had heard of him. But if he hadn’t heard anything bad, maybe he could be a potential ally.
But the Moff was generous, apparently. “If not for you, Dorn Base would have been lost, and all the outposts that depend on it. It is for that reason I ask you your opinion. Would you say Commander Tritan or Chiss Captain Yudrass was more instrumental in the base’s defence?”
Murlesson hadn’t missed the slight emphasis on Yudrass’s species, certainly hadn’t missed that it had been mentioned at all. There was no need to point out Yudrass was Chiss. Braynor was another frakking humanocentric bigot. And if that were the case, an unreliable potential ally, given how he himself was Zabrak.
He gave him a cool stare. There was only one option, for anyone who had a functioning brain. “Captain Yudrass’s advice formed most of our key strategies. We relied on him heavily.”
“That is as I expected,” Braynor said, and Murlesson detected a shade of regret. It wasn’t surprising, even if it made him surprisingly angry. The Empire was full of kriffing hypocrites who professed meritocracy and then preferred to elect incompetent members of their own species. “Very well. Captain Yudrass, you are now Colonel Yudrass. I am putting the base’s welfare in your hands until further notice.”
Until he can find some way to replace him with a human, Murlesson thought darkly. “Congratulations, Colonel. You have earned it.”
“I… Thank you,” Yudrass said, sounding pleasantly surprised. Murlesson hoped he didn’t expect it to last. “This is unexpected.”
“I don’t believe I’ve heard of a Chiss ranking so high before.” He probably ought to leave well enough alone…
“It is unprecedented,” Braynor said, sounding like he was forcing the words out, “but Captain Yudrass is well-known for his skill and judgement.” Then why wasn’t he promoted before, you oafish dewbacks?
“Sir, if I might ask…” Tritan spoke up. “Do you think the enlisted men will have a problem taking orders from Colonel Yudrass?” Will you have a problem taking orders from Yudrass?
“You mean will they refuse orders from a Chiss?” Braynor smiled a little. “They will at first. Then they will be made examples.” Ha, so his bloodlust was stronger than his bigotry. If he ever needed to manipulate him, that would be two interesting buttons to push…
“Yudrass would find your assistance very helpful, I’m sure,” Murlesson said to Tritan, going for a hint of steel in the back of his voice. “Model the appropriate behaviour, help to win the men over… and make it clear what happens to the disobedient. But you already knew all that, of course.”
“Of course, my lord,” Tritan said in a voice that told him he hadn’t thought of any of it… and that he was disappointed to be playing second xantha to an alien – or at least to be passed over, Murlesson would be generous. “I will begin immediately. Thank you, Moff Braynor, Colonel Yudrass.”
“That will be all,” Braynor said, and vanished, probably glad to be away from the scary filthy aliens.
“Well… that went better than expected,” Yudrass said, looking at Murlesson with a slightly stunned look.
Reading his Force-sense, Murlesson was wondering if he’d done the right thing after all. Yudrass didn’t actually seem that happy to be recognized. He affected a remoteness. “Is that all you require of me?”
“Things do seem to be under control here at present,” Tritan said, not entirely happy about that either. ‘Under control’ meant ‘no action’ for his violent, impatient nature, though it was a petty nature, perfectly happy to let others do the suffering and dying, preferably with as little stress to him as possible. “At least we don’t have pirate problems here… Captain Revar at Leth Outpost lost a reactor substation to the White Maw Pirates.”
“We have asked much of you, but Captain Revar has not,” Yudrass said. “His soldiers are in desperate need of relief at Leth Outpost. We shall of course send what we can now that we have defended our position, but should you have the time and the inclination, my lord, please look in on them.”
“Perhaps,” Murlesson said. Really, he just wanted to continue looking for his ghost, and talk with Drellik as much as possible in case he never saw him again, and not waste his time further with the Imperial military… what did he care about these planetary politics? Surely the Imperials wouldn’t be driven off Hoth altogether, no matter if he interfered or not, and if they were, so what? It was only a snowball.
But… brownie points with his future colleagues. And perhaps Revel would like shooting some pirates. “I bid you good day, then.”
The Ortolans hadn’t given him exactly what he was looking for, not even when he sneaked past their front lines, slaughtered their ‘finest warriors’, and glared at their chief. But they had given him some interesting intel anyway. Or rather, the ghost possessing the Ortolan chief had.
The ghost he was tracking down was named Horak-Mul, supposedly the right hand of Ludo Kressh. Ha. Ludo Kressh? Naga Sadow destroyed Ludo Kressh twice over. And this idiot had been murdered by Naga Sadow’s assassins, the Sadow’een. And even more coincidentally, there was a temple to them on Hoth.
“No offence, but why can’t you Sith just become one with the Force when you die?” Ashara asked sassily when they got back to Leth Outpost, looking for Drellik. Revel and Khem had stayed in the commissary, more intent on hot drinks than history.
“But that sounds so… utterly boring,” he said dryly, and she snorted a bit of a laugh. “Well, to put it more seriously… what I’ve noticed of Jedi is that they’re taught to give up… just about everything. Material possessions, power, even desires. And thus, if it goes properly, they will achieve some sort of peace – of fulfillment – in this life. Sith require all of that – possessions, power, desires – to survive. We will never achieve fulfillment in any life, so how can we but linger, seeking to complete the incompleteable?”
“That’s so sad,” she said. “I keep wondering how anyone can become Sith.”
“Certainly, because just anyone can become Jedi,” he retorted sarcastically. “And stop pitying Sith. They don’t deserve it.”
“You’re right, on both counts,” she said, and sighed. “And I hate that you are.”
He peered at her for a moment on the threshold of Drellik’s assigned conference room. Why was that so depressing to her? More importantly, why did he care so much? Why did he care what she thought at all?
Oh Force, he liked her-
Drellik, over by the desk, coughed, and he recalled himself and strode quickly into the room. Plenty of time to figure that out later, on these interminable speeder bike rides. “I met the ghost.”
Drellik became even more animated, if it were possible. “Ooh! Did they say who they were?”
“Horak-Mul, servant of Ludo Kressh.” Before Drellik could get even more excited, Murlesson went on with a frown. “He needs me to get inside an ancient temple.”
“Then it’s true!” Drellik exclaimed. “My peers in the service laughed when I said it was on Hoth, but now… yes! It’s the only thing that makes sense.”
Murlesson snorted. “It still doesn’t make sense. What in the name of Korriban’s tombs do the Sadow’een have to do with Hoth? Let’s not get carried away.”
“Not get carried away? Impossible!” Drellik began pacing quickly. “This must be the greatest discovery since my mentor Auselio Gann unearthed the wing of Naga Sadow’s own fighter on Yavin Four! We’re talking about the fabled Sadow’een, Naga Sadow’s personal order of assassins – myth made real!”
“I never heard of them having a connection to Hoth, and I’ve read everything on Naga Sadow,” Murlesson countered. “Unless you have another source I’m not aware of…”
“Ah, well, I don’t have it with me… I believe it was ‘Blood in the Sanctum of the Lost’ by Irviean Yardlok-”
“I haven’t read that one,” Murlesson said, eyes aglow. “I need a copy. Where did you last see it?” Ashara giggled. “Stop laughing at me.”
“Sorry, it’s just really… um… it’s absolutely not adorable.” He glared at her, and she shrugged innocently.
Drellik chuckled himself. “I’m sure I can track down a copy. To be sure, it’s not really about Naga Sadow, he’s barely mentioned at all. So I could imagine it being overlooked even by the most ardent of enthusiasts – which clearly you are! At any rate, finding this temple has been my life’s goal… for the past five years.” He’d been freezing for the last five years? The man was dedicated.
“Then I regret to inform you that this ghost wishes me to destroy the temple,” Murlesson said heavily.
Drellik stopped abruptly. “Oh. Ah. …I understand. I should have expected that, of course. I shall gather my team so that we may document everything first, if that wouldn’t upset the ghost.”
Murlesson frowned again. “I’d rather locate the Starrunner by other means if at all possible. The question is how long would it take, and how long it will take Thanaton to try to take me out again. He’s been very persistent so far.”
Drellik resumed pacing, more soberly. “Well, I regret to report that we found no clues from the beacon. We really have nothing else to go on except that the ship must be within a hundred kilometres east of the beacon’s original location, judging by the state and location of the debris around it. And that’s a very large range for what I’m told was a relatively small ship.”
Murlesson sighed long. “Try anyway. I’m not about to just do what a ghost tells me to.”
Drellik perked up. “I shall do my best, my lord! And… thank you, for protecting history.”
He shrugged. “It often can’t protect itself. Is there anything I can do while waiting?”
“I’m sure the local unit would be very glad of your combat assistance… oh! You meant to help search. I hesitate to treat you as an ordinary member of the Imperial Reclamation Service…”
“Then don’t,” Murlesson said. “Consider me an extraordinary member, and send me to do anything you consider too dangerous for your men.” He didn’t want to beg. He also didn’t want to sit by being bored when he could be actively making the task shorter. Just sitting on his ship in orbit, being warm, reading in his bed, was enticing, and incredibly useless. Also he wanted to be involved in the archaeological community, to find out more about what it really was. He didn’t care if it was supposed to be beneath his dignity as a Lord of the Sith.
He didn’t know how to say any of that.
“I want to help, too,” Ashara said, taking a step forward.
Drellik smiled warmly at her, and she smiled warmly back. “You must be Lord Kallig’s apprentice, yes?”
“My name’s Ashara!” Ashara said, and Murlesson noted with amused approval how she sidestepped the question. She was learning. “It’s nice to meet you.”
“Likewise!” Murlesson cleared his throat, trying to remind Drellik that now he had two volunteers of considerable combat ability, just waiting for direction. “V-very well, I will try to find a task of suitable importance and danger for you, my lord. Er… by your leave.”
“I really like him,” Ashara said, as they left the building, heading for the temporary quarters to rejoin Khem and Revel. “He’s so enthusiastic! It’s great! And wow, he has so much patience and dedication to his craft. I could never do that.”
“Says the Jedi,” he retorted, and she snorted. Did she really like Drellik…? No, she couldn’t mean like that, he shouldn’t jump to conclusions. Jedi weren’t supposed to have particular feelings for anyone. Which was disappointing- he couldn’t think about that with her right beside him.
She shook her head, laughing. She did that a lot, which he’d noticed from very soon after she’d joined, and yet suddenly it took on new colour. “Me, patient and dedicated? I still can’t get myself to meditate every day.”
“You manage to find time and opportunity to exercise every day.”
“Yeah, but, um, meditation’s hard. Um… anyway, he’s cute. He reminds me a lot of you, except the opposite of broody.”
“Does that mean you think I’m cute?” he asked, like an idiot. First of all, he already knew she thought he was cute, and second of all, didn’t he hate being called cute?
Somehow it didn’t seem so bad if she was saying it.
She blushed and walked faster. “I-I just meant you’re both giant history nerds, and I think you should definitely talk a lot about things I never heard of and I will just be nearby, basking in your brilliance.”
“That’s not a sop to my ego at all,” he teased her. “But I intend to do just that. I imagine someone with his passion and talents is rare, even in the Reclamation Service.”
“I’m still shocked they made archaeology a military thing,” she said. “That seems weird.”
“What’s even more unusual is that it’s mostly separate from any Sith archaeological endeavours. The Force-deaf of the Empire have, I suppose, decided to compile their own repository of history so that they might be useful to the Sith who have no ability to do research.” He put his head back and sighed. “Which means ultimately they answer to Thanaton, as he’s the head of the Sphere of Ancient Knowledge, but fortunately he doesn’t pay much attention to the non-Sith military. They’re beneath him or something.”
“Huh,” she said. “Well, I imagine Drellik won’t sell you out. Remember how excited he was to meet you?”
“I remember,” he said, which reminded him – he had to ask how Drellik had known him. “It actually leads me to believe the opposite.”
“Oh, come on, I’m sure a sweet man like him wouldn’t just hand you over…”
“To a member of the Dark Council? Who would he be to say no? This is why Jedi walk into traps so often.”
She pouted. “And this is why Sith have no friends.”
“Who needs friends when you have power?” He tried to leer, failed because she was being too cheerful. He didn’t know about himself, but she was pretty damn adorable.
“Who needs power when you have friends?” She grinned at him and poked his arm. “C’mon, let’s get some hot chocolate.”