Lost and Alone

[Zereth Lancer]

Outer Rim, Quelii Sector, the planet Dathomir.

She fell to the ground, a shrill cry gurgling in the back of her throat as she clutched at the smoldering hole burnt through the center of her chest. But there was nothing she could do about it, the hole went completely through her body. There was no blood, because the edges of the wound were cauterized black from the heat of whatever punched the hole in the first place. She struggled for life, her wild eyes searching for a savior, for someone to save her, but her eyes found no one but her imposing killer. She finally succumbed to her injuries, her eyes clouding over and her body becoming limp. A final exhale of air played herald to the end.

And so she laid upon the blood sprinkled grass, brutally killed, but not without company. Around her laid other bodies, all female. Above the bodies stood their killer, an imposing man, a tall man, a muscular man, a dark stranger. His eyes burned like supernovas in their sockets, the light cast by them illuminating his face in the dark. The moon overhead framed him in it's pale light, revealing his dark, loose clothing, tattered red cloak, and long black hair. Yet more light was cast by the sword of burning energy held in his right hand, a blade of light that cast it's blue-white glow over the stranger's body and over the corpses that littered the ground.

The blade disappeared suddenly as it's master put to rest. Kneeling down, the stranger moved closer to the recently deceased woman, his hand stretching out, two fingers extended. Together, they slipped the woman's eyelids down, hiding the gaze of the dead. The hand continued the movement, slipping down the face to caress the woman's cooling cheek, which was sprawled across with tattoos of occult nature. The burning eyes went even lower, to take in the black and red clothing worn by the corpse, along with the occult jewelry and ceremonial blades.

"Rest now sister, for your ambition has led you astray. Rest now, knowing that your heresy has been cleansed. Go now to the deepest pit of hell, to the table reserved for our kind. Send my regards to Lord Naga Sadow," And with that said he stood up, whispering words of passage for the other dozen corpses as he walked away from the clearing, leaving the bodies behind for the wild animals to dispose of.

This was just one of the three cells of Dathomir Witches he'd routed in the last week, having tracked them all down to their various meeting places and slaughtering them before they knew there was an enemy near. They were powerful in the force, but not in the sword. All they required to destroy was speed enough to strike them down before they could cast their fatal spells, and he had not been completely successful in that way. His left arm still throbbed from the fireball that had burnt the flesh along his shoulder. The pain was... acceptable, and would pass with time. His skin, on the other hand, may never never recover. Such a scar, though, would serve to remind him of the great duty he had done here on Dathomir, destroying the heresy of the Witches. Those doth corrupt the teachings of the sith shall be purged by the burning blade.

Without word or or whisper, he made him way in the direction of where his ship awaited him. He had many more cells to destroy, and he preferred not to allow himself any free time. Free time gave birth to free thinking, and free thinking caused him to think about her, and that was the last thing he desired to think about...

[Neo-Genesis]

It had almost been too easy. He had gotten sloppy and forgotten to hide his trail. People who would sooner forget him found themselves doing a whole lot of remembering, at blaster point. So he followed the planet jumps from Ord Mantell until he finally ended up on Dathomir, a planet was was less then hospitable to him. Slinking around town, he heard tale of the secret sects of Darkside Witches disappearing. The entire planet was abuzz, although secretely. They did not wish to have the Empire hear rumor that the Witches were active again, lest the Inquisition came sailing in to uprehend them all. Humans fear what they do not understand. It had two weeks to go to Corellia, come back to Ord Mantell, and then travel about before arriving on Dathomir and learning of Lancer's existence. Who else could be killing these witches?

It had taken a few more days to finally locate Lancer's ship, the Star of Oblivion, and attach a tracking device. And then he had waited until Lancer left the city and went out into the jungle, and Neo-Genesis followed in his own ship. Hiding his ship, he took up position on top of Lancer's ship and waited for the return of the self-proclaimed Sith Lord.

[Zereth Lancer]

His ship, The Star of Oblivion was just through the trees. He could catch glimpses of the transport vessel now and again through the thick foliage. Pushing through the last branch, he entered the small clearing that his ship occupied completely. It was just big enough for the long body of his ship. He was not an masterful pilot in anyway, so he was rather pleased with how well he "parked" his ship. But that was enough time wasted admiring himself, now he had some sleep to catch up on. He could feel the bed in his quarters aboard the ship calling his name almost telepathically.

But then again, something was wrong, something was off. It was quiet, too quiet. Not the kind of quiet created by a lack of sound, but the empty silence created by someone trying not to make noise. Someone was out there. His eyes began to rove through the landscape, looking into shadows with his augmented night vision. His hand slipped behind his head to grip the hilt of the katana. A whisper of steel sliding over steel was all that marked the fact that he had pulled the blade free. A lightsabre would not avail him here, it would just give him away.

Crouching down, he held the weapon out to the side, ready to dart in any direction for safety or attack. Whichever came first. He stretched out with the force, looking for the life essence of another. He found animals in the tall grass and in the trees, and something else, something almost human, but not. What was it...

And then he realized he'd felt it before.

[Neo-Genesis]

The game was no longer cloak and daggers, as the target clearly knew he was there. Tactical simulators could not quarry in the effects of the force and thus were now obsolete in this situation. Pity, Genesis would have so liked to just kill the target now instead of the using "black knife" tactics. But such was not a choice anymore, but it was not going to give up now, nor ever. Fight first, live the moment of heat, and then resort to other methods when you are broken and bleeding, on the verge of death and there is no other way. But not before then.

A flick of Genesis' fingers adjusted the barrel setting of the unique blaster it carried. A flip of a switch reverted it back to a standard firing mode, as opposed to the "wide" blaster rounds it normally used. Deep, penetration damage was what would prevail against such a foe as Zereth Lancer. Nothing else would suffice, to say the very least.

Darting to the edge of the starship, Genesis began raining hell down upon the head of the so called "Sith Lord". The weapon fired as quickly as it could recycle after each pull of the trigger, which was, with Genesis' augmented reflexes and advance weaponry, quite quick. A quick succession of fire fell from the sky. Bright golden globs of pure energy capable of burning through flesh, muscle, and bone. Nothing could withstand it.

[Zereth Lancer]

Gritting his teeth at the familiar sight, Zereth jumped backwards, maneuvering out of the way of the first volley of laser fire, keeping him out of the way long enough to activate his lightsabre and bring it up to bare. Laser fire reflected off the red energy beam. He aimed the redirected rounds back at the assassin cyborg to the best of his abilities, but for the most part only hit the broadside of his own ship. Such would not benefit him at all. If this was any other creature, he would just reach inside it's head and squeeze it's brain till it died, but he could hardly feel the cyborg at all. Instead, he focused on the metals that composed it's bodies and tugged heavily on these with the force, pulling the cyborg off the top of the starship and then applying more pull to drag it down bodily into the ground as fast and hard as his telekinetic powers allowed.

[Neo-Genesis]

It was so sudden. One moment it was standing atop the vessel, and the next it was plummeting to the ground at speeds normally acustomed to meteors and blaster bolts. The ground came up too quickly for reaction, and Genesis' strategy index was scarce to come up with an action to this situation. It was too new, but was logged for further analysis, should it actually survive such a fall.

The impact was wet, due to the moist grass and moss on the ground where Genesis fell. Damage was light and it was back on it's feet in a moment. Disorientation was not something that plagues a mechanical mind, so it was already bringing it's weapon up as it rose, bringing it level with Lancer's torso. The finger slipped around the trigger.

[Zereth Lancer]

But Zereth was prepared for it. The blaster came up, the finger slipped around the trigger, and then a massive amount of telekinetic energy enfolded the weapon and began bending it backwards and downwards, so that the metal began wrapped around the cyborg's hand, making both it's weapon and it's primary hand relatively useless. One small victory, but the droid was ambra-dexterous, able to use both hands at the same level of skill. With one hand down, it was still capable of finger. So he jumped in, taking the Cyborg by surprise as he kicked it in the chest, right along that welded scar, and knocked it backwards against the hull of the ship. Then he grabbed it's shoulder and threw it to the ground before it could respond. Clearly it was not used to such treatment.

Stomping on it's back, Zereth pressed it to the soft ground and lifted his sabre, ready to remove the cyborg's head, and then it spoke...

[Neo-Genesis]

".We have the girl."

The lightsabre blade, a virtual sword blade constructed of pure, burning energy capable of cutting through just about anything, stopped just before it's neck. It's internal sensors shrilled, notifying Genesis of the increased temperatures on it's neck, face, and upper torso regions. Silencing the alarms, it prepared for plan B.

".We have the girl, and if you do not comply, she will be destroyed."

To prove it's claim, it grabbed a holodisc from it's belt and activated it. From the emitter pad appeared the image of Ashe, bound to a table and looking quite distressed. It was more then enough to convince the sith.

[Zereth Lancer]

Teeth grinding together, Zereth stood up and moved away from the droid. The evidence was unfalsifiable. Ashe bound to a table. Damn, how had he been so blind as to think they would not use her against him. It was amateur to overlook something that simple. And now he was going to pay for it. Dearly.

The blade deactivated, the energy beam disappearing back into the hilt. The weapon was then replaced to his belt, where it would remain. Not even for her life would he give up his most precious possession.

"Take me to her."

[Neo-Genesis]

".Acknowledged. You will follow my ship. Detour but a moment and the female will be destroyed."

Without another word or action, Genesis turned and walked off into the forest. It took only moments to wade through the foilage that seperated it from it's ship. The ship itself was a perfect sphere with engines mounted on the back. Quite odd and very unique. Such was the mind of Zanon O'hara. As it approached, a door appeared in the unbroken surface and Genesis stepped up into the cramped cockpit.

Slipping behind the controls, the cyborg engaged primary power, fed energy and fuel to the engines, and fired up the undercarriage jet boosters, which propelled the ship into the air till it was high enough to engage it's sublight engines. Genesis only checked it sensor screen once to make sure the Star of Oblivion had also taken off. Whether Lancer followed or not was the sith's problem, not the cyborg's. The female would die if he did not follow, and that should be enough to ensure that the sith followed.

Pushing the throttle bar forward, the sphere starship shot off and headed out of orbit.

[Zereth Lancer]

Zereth watched the cyborg walk away, like there was no danger at all. The very act welled up fury within Zereth's soul. He wanted to chase the droid down and sever each and every one of it's limbs from it's body in alphabetical order. But no, he resisted himself and let the creature walk away with a clang and a hiss. Rather then beating the thing to death, if death was possible, Zereth instead turned and walked toward his ship. A wave of his hand depressed the button just inside the sealed door into the ship, and it opened right up. Rather then activating the landing ramp, he simply jumped up into the opening and walked inside, closing the door behind him.

He headed to the bridge of his ship, the Star of Oblivion, and fired up the engines. Locking on to the spherical ship leaving orbit, Zereth lifted off from the surface of Dathomir and followed after the alien vessel. He had no inkling as to where it would take him, but right now he was willing to do anything to save Ashe.

And he had no a clue as to why he would risk everything to do so.