Ghosts. (Hutt Mission, ASK-INVITE)

[Darth Ganondorf]

An experimental battle station in the Outer Rim has been under work for some time. Recently, the Hutts received no transmissions back. The exploration team they sent did not return. They are sending in another team of some of our best to find out what happened and report back. I am part of that second team being sent to the battle station. Zak sat in the transport ship. The main passenger room was rectangular, with rows of seats against the long sides of the walls.

There was about twenty seats, with only one other occupied. Zak noticed the Veteran Assassin in a seat adjacent from his. Apparently, this man is a soldier of cunning skill. Zak wanted to be sure to impress him, to be promoted in the Hutt Army. The ship was moving, and a small humming noise could be heard. The was the only sound until the loudspeaker crackled on. On the loudspeaker, the pilot spoke.

'We are approaching the station. ETA is six minutes.'

 

[Gambler]

Such innocuous missions usually didn't interest Jaiden, but this one had a small attention grabber in it. Mystery and mystic gave such missions that little extra edge of fun. Just like hunting Alsakans. Those bastards were unpredictable in the terror Jaiden could impose on them just by telling them who he worked for. Whether it was someone trying to kill him with a grenade or a battle rifle, that little push towards the occult made it all the more interesting. Disappearances were mysteries until proven otherwise and no one knows exactly what happened until the bodies of the original crew was found. For truly, why would someone merely go in a kidnap the exploration team sent in to investigate? Jaiden was pretty sure that he would find their lifeless bodies sprawled out of the ground pretty soon.

He found himself wondering coldly if he should simply dispose of the man to his right. The corporal sitting in the row of seats next to him was all in all an average looking man to the assassin. Average enough to be an Alsakan. With an inaudible hiss of contempt, Jaiden fingered the dagger at his belt and wondered for the first time if killing his teammate would compromise the mission. He was pretty sure that the man would die quickly if he ever tried anything on the assassin, but that didn't stop Jaiden from wondering the best ways to kill him. One slash across the throat opens the jugular and ensures a swift death, but a single bullet to the brain is far faster, He contemplated wordlessly, hand moving to touch the muzzle of his sniper.

The pilot's voice over the com broke his concentration and left in place a sense of boredom. Truly, what was more boring than sitting in a seat doing nothing but thinking of ways to kill the pilot and the human sitting next to him? Well, admittedly, Jaiden found a certain pleasure in contemplating their deaths. He hated humans even though he was one. They were imperfect. They were evil. They required judgment. And who was better to do that than the former Alsakan soldier turned rogue on his own race? Who was better to cull the human race one by one than the man who hated everything they held close and dear?

Jaiden deserved to pass that judgment.

He killed indiscriminately, mercilessly. He didn't care who he killed because in his eyes they all deserved death or worse. And to think, it all started with his friend, a man he had once respected before the man became a brainwashed clone for the Alsakan ranks. He had lost all individuality to serve as a warrior. Lost his morals to hero a cause unworthy of life. So Jaiden killed him. That one pebble set events into motion and his hatred for his own kind multiplied a hundred times over. His pale eyes flashed in anger at the thought.

The ship slowed to a halt as it finished its approach. It lumbered in the deep vacuum of space, oxygenized gas pouring out from vents, causing clouds of bioluminescence to dissipate harmlessly, propelled away by the continuing motion of the ship. Not a sound could be heard from the com. The pilot was trying to contact whoever was up in the docking facility, but all that answered him was silence. Deathly cold silence so heavy and palpable that men of lesser stature would be afraid of what it foretold. Finally, the automatic docking procedure took over, sedulously working to safely dock the transport without injuring its sparse crew of passengers.

Standing up, Jaiden walked over to the cockpit and grabbed the pilot by the shoulders, roughly dragging him to his feet. A sneer was on the man's face, wiped off by the cold glare in Jaiden's pale blue eyes. "Stay with the ship. If you are attacked or see any motion besides ours on the motion sensors, begin lockdown procedures and hope to god that you live. We need a pilot to get back," He hissed at the captain, his voice slithering like that of a snake's across the smooth sand of the desert. The man nodded, trying to adopt nonchalance as Jaiden let go of him, allowing him to sit down again.

Slowly, Jaiden walked back to where Zak was.

"You are to listen to my orders. We go through this place silently. If you hear or see anything, shoot first and don't worry about the questions that come later. If you by chance hit one of the survivors and they die, oh well, we'll figure out what happened by ourselves. Otherwise, I wanted you to question him and find out what happened. Do you understand?" Jaiden asked in that grating hiss of contempt. Without waiting for an answer he walked off towards the ramp, his feet touching soundlessly against the metal ground. He walked down as if expecting without caring that Zak would follow. And indeed, as he had contemplated the man's death minutes before, he didn't care about the human.

 

[Darth Ganondorf]

Zak nodded to the Veteran Assassin, even as the assassin had already left down the ramp. Zak unbuckled the straps off his seat, and stood up, stretching his body from sitting in the seat for a few hours. After he was done, he picked up his assault blaster rifle and checked it. The blaster packs were good, the power cell was working, and the rifle itself in clean and perfect condition. It was the same rifle used by Republic military men, the same rifle he used against the Alsakans. Now he was working with an Alsakan for the Hutts. Zak began to wonder if they ever fought each other in any battles.

But that was the past. Zak turned the safety off the rifle and began walking behind the assassin. From what Zak could tell they were in the main hanger of the station. The lights were either dimmed or off. Zak turned the small flashlight on his rifle on. He quickly assessed the hanger, looking for any lifeforms. He saw none visually or on his scanners. What the hell happened here? He then began walking to some armory crates. He looked inside and saw they had been stripped empty. He looked on the ground and saw shells of a blaster shotgun and a blast shotgun itself lying on the floor. Zak motioned for the assassin to take a look.

 

[Gambler]

Expression blank, Jaiden sauntered over to where Zak had looked into the weapons crate. Shells and power packs lie strewn over the ground stripped by what looked like could have been scavengers or just a hasty arming of the people onboard. Kneeling down, Jaiden saw something that caught his eye. A fragment of metal less than a centimeter in diameter lie on the ground close to the crate. Without speaking, Jaiden gave it a closer look. It was a piece of a sniper shell. Hollow, just like the ones he carried. But there would have been more than one shot. The others would be using solid shells to get through armor and headgear. Then if it was a sniper shot then it would have eaten through whatever it hit and went straight through to the... wall. Moving swiftly, Jaiden felt the metallic wall, feeling for anything uneven or flaky. Ah, there it was. A dent almost half an inch deep scarred high up in the wall at head level for most men of average height. Looking behind him, Jaiden surmised that the men who were in the hangar had hastily tried to arm themselves, but were taken out ruthlessly from across the hangar up by... the observation deck?

How the hell would whatever took this place over get up there?

Unless they were already here. Or if they were cloaked. Having no way of knowing, Jaiden knelt down, motioning for Zak to follow suit. "This is a fragment of a hollow sniper shell. The same make as the one I carry on my back though mine are a mix between hollow and solid. There were others shot though they were solid to get through armor and bone. Compound, good accuracy and deadly power. The men in the hangar were killed efficiently before they could arm themselves completely. Oddly enough, the scars from this battle are hidden and barely visible. A trace of blood here and there yet there are full shells and a few blasters lying about. Whoever killed them took the time to strip the corpses and clean up their mess," He said, pointing out the signs he found along the wall and ground. But that didn't explain the blasters...

In his kneeling squat, Jaiden picked up the blaster shotgun to examine it. At first he saw nothing out of the ordinary and then... ah, there was a hole straight through the barrel of the gun, almost invisible on the side it was laid on, but the other side was ripped as is hit with an exploding round. Only the slight traces of burn on the ground around it showed that the blaster was dropped after being shot. Standing up, Jaiden thought for a few seconds. What came in here? What killed whatever men were here? This was obviously not a long battle but an unexpected skirmish cleaned up to dispose of the bodies and stripped of all ammunition. Something had been in here, probably docked days before. That something must have brought others with it.

Looking around, Jaiden corrected his observation. No, only one thing came before and it was sent to the medbay or somewhere similar as a quest or survivor. This creature had sent the docking codes and coordinates to others of its ilk, but the hangar would have to have been cleared in the process. Once its allies had landed, the original creature had shot off a few sniper shots at the mechanics and guards down here in the hangar to buy his allies time to mobilize. Once they exited the ship, the creature's allies slaughtered the people in here. Some had tried to set up other weapons or reload but had been shot down by two different snipers. One was over by the ships while the other was up on the observation deck. From there... well, Jaiden didn't know yet.

"Something went on here. There must have been at least two other ships, but where are they? Whoever took out the people of this station wouldn't have abandoned it. No, this is a valuable resource to whichever party can claim it as their own. Let's continue on; there's more to see," He said in an icily calm voice. With his right hand, Jaiden fondled his sniper, he put a hand next to the trigger as if longing to take it from his back. But he knew that it would be useless right now. Leading the way, Jaiden walked over to the doors to exit the hangar. There were a few more bullet holes, burn marks and dents in the wall, but he ignored them and kept walking until the door was in front of his face. He motioned for Zak to open it.

 

[Darth Ganondorf]

Zak was examining the site alongside Jaiden. It seemed as if a minor skirmish had occured here. But where are the bodies? A few traces of blood remained, but the corpses are gone. No drag marks were visible on the floor. A chill went down Zak's spine. He did not know why... during the Alsakan Crisis, he and other Republic soldiers got "dirty" and performed actions against the Alsakans that were "not in Republican policy." Zak shifted his rifle across and saw more weaponry, empty shells, and a few hits of blood on the floor.

He then noticed Jaiden equipping his sniper, and heading for the exit hanger doors. There was dents and bullet holes near the walls. Zak assumed whoever was in the hanger was firing at individuals coming out of this door. But who? Perhaps their investigation would go by more smoothly with a manifest of ships that have came through the station, that would be in the hanger office most likely, on the observation deck. He noticed Jaiden was waiting for Zak to open the doors.

"Perhaps we should make our way to the hanger control office on the observation deck. Check the computer for a ship manifest, to see who has been here."

Zak then pressed a control panel to open the doors, and they slid open.

 

[Gambler]

Step by step, Jaiden took the lead slightly, moving into the exposed hallway. The dim emergency lights were the only illumination available in the hallway, but it was enough for even Jaiden's weak Alsakan eyes to see that the hall split off in three branches, each side ending in a doorway less than twenty feet from where they were standing. The doors webbed off into open rooms, large with lights high on the ceiling, making it impossible to judge distance or size from this far away. For a moment Jaiden paused, picking a hallway. Then, with a shrug, he walked forward as if he didn't care which way they went. And indeed, no matter which way they went the rooms would probably connect later on before they reached the main deck and other facilitations.

Life was a never ending hurricane with sentient life being mere pebbles.

Reaching the door at the end of the short hallway, Jaiden continued on through the open door, not bothering to take a look at why it had been opened prematurely. When he first saw what lie littered about the floor in neat piles, he almost laughed even before all but being choked by the stench of decay. "Well, looks like we found where the bodies were carried to," He said, trying not to breathe too much. Still, there were supposed to be at least twenty people on the station at a time, not including a varying amount of guards. Where were the rest of the bodies? Not in here. Nothing was in here but the stench of decay and the dead.

Exactly how everyone ended up, eventually.

"There's nothing to see here unless you want to inspect the bodies. Let's move on before-" The slightest bang of something against a metal wall alerted him to the fact that they weren't alone. Someone was watching them. Shadowing their every move. From above. Glancing up, Jaiden motioned for Zak to look around as well, but nothing was there. Nothing could be seen or heard again. But... Jaiden unstrapped his sniper and fitted a hollow tipped bullet. Not very effective against metal, but it would rip into it as it hit. He fired the gun and the shell exploded outwards, up into the catwalks. Immediately, the sound of hasty footsteps could be heard as whatever was up there fled, unwilling to be killed for being spotted.

"Dammit. We're walking blind in here. If whatever is in here can shadow us like this than they could already have planned to ambush us. This entire station could be liberally filled with whatever these creatures are. Be they human or whatever, they're here," He growled, confirming his own suspicions. Placing his sniper back against his spine, Jaiden walked towards the door, ears perked up to catch even the most minute traces of sound. But he heard nothing. Nothing besides his and Zak's footsteps as they exited the room.