Ask Tatooine A Good Time

[Darth Malicia]

This was not the first time she'd set foot on sand, but a planet of sand was a first. Her experience on Tatooine so far had been... interesting. There were already a few dead bodies in her wake, but only because they tried to take something from her. Maybe they thought a small woman would be an easy target.

Being small had it's advantages.

It couldn't have been her outfit. Her outfit didn't make her stand out starkly, but it wasn't far off from what a traditional Sith might wear. Black garments, silver accents. A mask that covered half her face.

Her feet sank somewhat into the sand, and the cold night's air nipped at her as she walked the dark desert. She'd heard rumours of a gangs hideout in the direction she was going, and she was interested in possibly taking it over.

That was until something hit her senses. She'd sensed this before. A Jedi. This time however, it was a more powerful one. She didn't rush towards him, but she did change her direction, grabbing one of her lightsaber hilts from her belt on the way. She was intrigued, and he'd likely sense her just the same since she wasn't hiding herself.

When she was in visual range of the Jedi, she didn't stop walking but a smile did curl on her face. "Hmmm," she hummed, tipping her head somewhat as her amber eyes flicked up and down the man. "I wonder. Do you prefer women calling you daddy or grandpa?"

@Nefieslab

 

[Maxims Tionson]

Tatooine was not a place he travelled to often but Max had experience on the planet enough to know that it was a place where things... happened. Things that had no right happening on such a small, insignificant, speck of a planet in the back-end of beyond. Jedi and non-Jedi alike knew that the legendary Luke Skywalker had come from the sands of the terrible little planet - and both Sith and Jedi knew that Darth Vader had also come from the same planet.

Such massively important people in the grand scheme of the Force and the Galaxy and they came from such a desert trap. No, Max knew better than to question the Force as it nudged him to fly to the planet. Instead he'd had his unnamed droid make haste for the planet and he had ensured he had everything he would need.

He wasn't planning on dying of heat stroke or dehydration just because he was going to the sand pit once again.

Hearing about a bandit gang hideout upon landing, he'd decided to head toward it considering the Force wasn't exactly going to give him written instructions as to why he was here. Instead he started heading off toward the base on foot, barely sinking into the sand as he used the Force to make himself slightly lighter just to make the journey easier.

Catching sight of her, he didn't even need to feel the Darkness rolling off of her in waves to know she was a Sith. She was openly carrying a lightsaber and she was wearing all black on Tatooine - no one was stupid enough to wear a colour that promoted the absorbsion of heat on a planet that was literally nothing but sand and suns.

He smirked ever so slightly at her greeting even as he placed a hand on his saberstaff and held it there. Max wasn't going to be the person who started hostilities.

"Depends how bad they've been." he shot back, quick as a whip, "From where I'm standing... seems you've been bad. You can call me Daddy."

He had definitely been hanging around Hannibal too much.

@Dread

 

[Darth Malicia]

The Jedi's response was a lot more amusing than she expected. The others she'd encountered... well... they hadn't had much of a humour. Then again they also weren't as... experienced.

"As you wish, Daddy," she said with a twisted giggle, running her free hand along her thigh. "Hows your stamina?"

With the last words leaving her lips, Demolly suddenly used the Force to push the sand all around the Jedi upwards as quickly as possible. She wanted to make him move, and/or feel the varying sizes of rocks and unnaturally fast moving sand cutting any exposed skin or eyes. The sand on this planet wasn't fine, but it'd likely get into any small crevices.

Of course, as she did she continued to move, although to the side instead of directly towards him. She wanted to make herself a harder target for retaliation. She expected something cunning from an older Jedi, so she'd continue to move or stop as required.

@Nefieslab

 

[Maxims Tionson]

She was going along with the joke and already Max was beginning to regret channeling Hannibal. It was a young man's game to play games with young women after all - older men like him just wanted to get to the point that they both wanted. And, it seemed, that this young lady wanted to have something of a confrontation. He didn't really expect a Sith lady in the middle of nowhere to be accommodating as such but he had hoped to at least not have to batter some woman for having a darker view of the Galaxy than him.

Oh well - the Force worked in mysterious ways.

"Little girl, you have no idea." he declared with a roll of his single eye, "Give up now and I'll slap the chains on you as you so clearly want."

Half sex pun and half not.

Hannibal would be disappointed it wasn't also sassy but he wasn't about to take fully after his friend. Instead he stood his ground as she kicked up the sand and dust of the planet to obscure his vision. His hood was up and one of his eyes was gone so the only potential risk was his eye, which he protected by simply closing it.

Having only one eye meant he was rather accustomed to using the Force to see. Instead of dodging, he instead used the Force to gather more sand than she did from all around him and begin spinning it around him, about a foot out from his body in a cyclone. The momentum of his cyclone would take the debris she had kicked up with it, adding to the density of the maelstrom to the point that it wasn't possible to actually physically see him through the sand and debris.

With a thought, the maelstrom increased in size, the cyclone of sand and dirt growing to almost three feet in width at any point, all of it pulsing out to be two feet from his body. And he waited in the eye of the sandstorm he was kicking up, wondering what she would actually do.

"Careful you don't get it in your eyes."

He couldn't resist.

@Dread

 

[Darth Malicia]

Demolly's crook smile took on a toothy edge when the Jedi spoke again. She enjoyed his threat and his confidence. A dangerous target only made the fight all the more thrilling, and put her predatory nature into overdrive. "Come for me, Jedi. Put me in those chains." she begged, excitement dripping from her words.

When he kicked up the cyclone of sand, he hadn't been moving and she'd seen where he was before. On the other hand, she was moving still, and she doubted he'd be able to see exactly what she was doing with a wall of sand in front of his face. So, the Sith girl ignited her saber and threw it.

With the aid of the Force, the blade spun rapidly as it made it's way towards the cyclone. However, she didn't make it hit directly on. The spinning blade veered around to the back of the storm before entering into it and attempting to hit its target. And it's target? The Jedi's torso.

There was no way sand or debris could stop the rapidly spinning plasma from cutting through. With only two feet, a little over half a meter, between the storm and the Jedi, and the blade coming out at him from behind, she waited to see if it'd hit its target.

@Nefieslab

 

[Maxims Tionson]

A flash of red through the haze of sand and debris from behind him, his awareness extended through the Force, was all the warning he received. That it was all the warning he needed was only because of his experience and time as a Jedi. It came spinning for his torso from behind, at an angle that physical sight would be hard pressed to determine but he was already focusing on seeing with the Force rather than his eyes.

And oh how her lightsaber crystals howled in the Force, their defilement total and beyond the pale of even Rain’s sabers.

Leaning forward at the same time as twisting to the right, he tilted his own saber as he removed it fully from his belt, igniting the rear-most saber of his saber staff so his blade appeared along the edge of his back in a guard. The twist and his own saber meant the saber throw would have been a glancing blow but even that was, narrowly, blocked by his own saber.

Continuing the spin, he ignited the other half of his saberstaff at the same time as he sent the sand and debris away from him in all directions with a pulse of the Force.

He had assumed she was going to be as playful in combat as she was in conversation and it had nearly cost him a score across his back. Literally only his reflexes and the fact that his saber had two blades saved him taking a nasty cut.

And people said saberstaffs were old fashioned.

He kept his awareness outward as he pushed the sand in all directions, including at her, and opened his eye as well, wary of both the Sith and her thrown saber.

“You going to pick your toy back up off the ground? Or does Daddy have to discipline you?”

@Dread

 

[Darth Malicia]

"HAHAHAHAH!" Demolly cackled happily, loudly. "HAH-HAHAHAHAHA!"

As soon as she felt resistance to her lightsaber, she let it go and thrust her hands froward. Fire spilled from both of them in a scary amount, making its way through the grains of sand to engulf the Jedi. If he'd feel the burn was another story, but she wondered how he wouldn't considering what his focus was on a second earlier and what it was on now.

She was aware that her actions left her venerable, however. She never stopped moving, but she didn't have time to dodge the sand the Jedi was pushing back at the same time. Some of it was pushed away by the sheer force of her fire, but Demolly closed her eyes before some sand still hit her. Any pains from the few burns she used to fuel her emotions.

And her emotions were high. Darkness poured from her, feeding off the excitement, the hunger, the promise to inflict pain and misery. Since childhood, Demolly had been taught to embrace the Dark Side. Completely and utterly. Oh, and she embraced it alright, in a totality that even scared her. She craved the darkness, like it craved her.

They were symbiotic.

@Nefieslab

 

[Maxims Tionson]

The first warning he had was the fact that she was cackling kind of madly - the second warning was that, oh god, suddenly there was fire heading his way. Cursing underneath his breath, his spinning movement from before helped him but the trouble with wearing cloth and cloaks and capes and the rest was that they tended to be rather flammable materials. His cape caught fire even as he dodged out of the way of the cone itself, the fire jumping from his cape to the material on his left arm as well.

Throwing himself to the side, he detached his now burning cape with a thought, letting it fall away from him with the Force as he physically tore his burning left sleeve from him. Reddened skin would blister from the light burns even without the fact that it was now exposed to the harsh suns.

Now that visibility was much clearer however, he was able to see her and the sand that had been kicked up was gone. Reaching out with the Force, he ignored the pain of the burns and instead pulled. Using the Force he pulled at the woman's left arm to both pull her closer to him and to put her off balance as he advanced with his saber staff at the ready.

If she resisted he wasn't above dislocating her shoulder.

"How about you just play nicely? Come. Here."

Pain was not something Jedi were supposed to enjoy like Sith were, or even something to be used. But it was still something of an old friend, something he embraced and didn't let hold sway over him.

@Dread

 

[Darth Malicia]

When he dodged, she ceased the fire but didn't miss a beat. She was hyper-focused—fixated—on killing the Jedi and her mind was swimming in the darkness. So as he relieved himself of his cloak she grabbed her abandoned saber that was now in view, activating and spinning it towards the Jedi once again.

But this time, she activated it and it's dual phase, meaning it'd be a rather large target he'd have to continue to dodge if things went the way she thought they would. For the moment, the blade was locked onto the Jedi, aiming for his torso.

When he pulled her, she only resisted it insofar as digging her feet into the sand and leaning to the side. It'd slow her down by a pathetically small margin, but at the same time, like second nature, she grabbed her second lightsaber from her belt and activated it. She'd be ready to stop and do what she needed to do to defend herself if they got into melee.

@Nefieslab

 

[Maxims Tionson]

He was getting tired of the throwing trick.

He didn't give her the satisfaction of seeing him flipping around to dodge the thing because he didn't need to. Even with it's blade extended, it was still a lightsaber which meant it was a bright red target. Making the blade longer just meant he had a bigger target to actually hit. He brought his saber staff up in a spin, batting her thrown blade upward so that it was no longer deadly and coming right at him. His momentum and physical strength would force the blade up, even if she was forcing it down with the Force just due to how momentum worked.

With the same motion he followed through, spinning the saberstaff in his hand to have it's rear-blade cut up into the base of the saber she had thrown and he had knocked off course. The base of the saber being the power supply not the crystal itself, meaning it would shut the saber off entirely without an explosion.

Her crystals weren't unstable so the risk was slight anyway but he wasn't taking any chances.

With her thrown saber dealt with, he would surge forward to bring his saberstaff down at her left shoulder from a higher angle, a downward slash that was deliberately shallow enough that even unguarded it would cut her front but not cut her in half. Max might be in combat but he still refused to go for a kill.

He refused.

@Dread

 

[Darth Malicia]

The Jedi choose to try to block her saber instead of dodge, so she choose to change her tactic. He'd opened up a window of opportunity to utilize a technique: Trakata.

Demolly deactivated her flying saber just as he was about to block it. Without any resistance to his blade, his momentum would be thrown off, which should either prevent his follow up attempt to hit her blades power pack, or slow it down enough to miss.

Either way, it didn't really matter. As soon as her hilt passed his blade, Demolly reactivated it. The blade would reactivate right into the Jedi's left arm and continue to travel down it, assuming it hit.

Since he hadn't continued to pull her, she simply dodged to the side to avoid his strike at her. She'd chosen to place most of her focus on the technique so she didn't do anything fancy with her second blade, but it was there as a back up just in case she needed it.

@Nefieslab

 

[Maxims Tionson]

She had better control of her blade mid-spin and mid-flight than he would have expected. It was because of this that he didn't move his blade for the second half of his counter to her saber throw - the action had always depended on the block after all so without it he didn't go for the hilt. Instead he followed through on his momentum, committing to the lunge and going with the movement he was already doing rather than making an abortive motion to block the blade he knew was coming.

After all, she was hardly the inventor of the technique even if she was using it with a degree of finesse he had not expected her capable of. Leaning to his right, he hissed in pain as her blade reactivated in the spin, searing down the side of his upper left arm and the edge of his left shoulder even with his lean to the right to minimize the damage. That was going to be a scar for sure and already he could feel the pain tugging at his mind, tempting him to use it to slide into rage.

Still, the lunging slash at her left shoulder she avoided by stepping to her right... which he capitalized on. With such a minimal movement, she wasn't out of range of the melee at all. She was just as close to him as before after all, just slightly more to his left. As his downward swing reached level with her left elbow he pivoted in the sand, swinging his left side backward and his right side forward as he grabbed her with the Force in an attempted stasis.

His front blade would slash horizontally across her body from her left elbow-level all the way across to her right elbow. At the same time his pivoting motion would keep her thrown saber in sight and his rear blade close to himself for further protection. With her attention in the Force on her thrown saber, she would be delayed in responding to his own Force hold to force her in place for his counter attack.

The beauty of his stasis was that it didn't even have to hold for very long or even fully - just a delay in reaction and movement would be enough since they were so close in the melee now.

@Dread

 

[Darth Malicia]

Demolly immediately switched her focus when she felt the stasis. Although she'd still feel the beginning of his blade burning into her left arm no matter what, due to their proximity.

Her counter was a simple one. While he was focused on both his saber attack and his full body stasis, she tired to capitalize on his split focus and Force push him away. Her hand was already up from when she was controlling her saber, so it just took a refocus to send a wall of Force to slam into the man so close to her. The intent was to send the the Jedi flying back several meters and put her into a better position.

Pain rushed through her like a wave from his blade however. It burned deeply into her arm, but if the Jedi was pushed back and didn't press an attack she'd laugh loudly. Something dawned on her. "This...is true freedom, isn't it?" she said to herself, flexing the fingers on her wounded arm to cause more pain. Her face grimaced because her mind and body hated it, but the darkness fed off of it.

"Listen Jedi, we the Cadre have earned our freedom, and the galaxy will be ours." She didn't care if he understood what she was saying, or believed it, she just wanted him to know. Just know more was coming. A lot more.

@Nefieslab

 

[Maxims Tionson]

Being Force Pushed was never a fun experience but it was rarely a deadly experience - there weren't any cliffs for him to be launched off of after all. Grunting at the impact, Max skidded backward across the sand, managing to keep his feet under him only because the ground was sand. So the ground kind of moved, allowing him to skid backward rather than go tumbling backward.

There was still an awful amount of sand in his mouth from it. He grunted, spitting out some of the sand as they stood opposed from each other but not engaged. His left arm was a mass of burning sensations from the lightsaber cut to the burns from the flame attack as well, the pain was insistent and only him clamping down on it stopped it from being even worse.

He released the pain into the Force whereas even from a distance he could tell she was reveling in the pain instead. Max raised an eyebrow as she spoke but, hey, he was a talker at heart.

"I'm not here to dispute your freedom." he told her with a small shrug, "Every sentient is free in my eyes - Sith included. But the trouble is that I believe ALL are free."

Max smirked ever so slightly.

"Which means I gotta stand in the way of anyone trying to rule others. No offence, I'm sure you're lovely and all, but that includes you."

@Dread

 

[Darth Malicia]

Demolly laughed, nearly throwing back her head because his words tickled her so much. "What the Order offers is freedom, you fool. True freedom, unfettered by your stagnant morals and laws. Morals and laws that have been forced on countless people, countless worlds. So you see, humanity is already ruled, but it will thrive under ours."

The Sith turned, as if readying herself to move towards the Jedi. Though, his next comment only made her smile curl back into a toothy one.

He was powerful, he was far more experienced, and fighting him was a rather big bite for her—a young Sith— to chew. He could kill her, yet she'd wounded him and still stood a chance. The experience so far had only emboldened her. "Stand in my way? I will only get more powerful and you...." she trailed off for a second with a snicker. "You're almost dead."

She was about to attack again when she felt the ground shake and heard something rumbling in the distance. Without thinking her eyes, for only a second, looked to the side. There was a LOT of men in very large vehicles heading the pairs way. She didn't know if it was one of the many underworld groups—gangs, pirates or other— or people that come to aid him, but it made her hesitate. She stood her ground, but didn't attack yet, waiting for his reaction.

@Nefieslab

 

[Maxims Tionson]

At least she wasn't a humorless Sith like some of the others he had met, even if she was laughing at what he'd said. Was still a less horrifying thing that those who seemed to have given up any semblance of a personality. Honestly, some of them seemed to think that some facial damage, black eye-liner and lack of social awareness made them the best thing since blue milk.

Still, she might have a sense of humor but she was still incredibly naive in his own opinion. He raised an eyebrow.

"Sounds like living like an animal." he countered with a small smirk, "They let you piss and shite wherever you want too? Or do they make you go for walks?"

The canine analogies made even more sense because he swore half the Sith Order wore chokers and collars of some kind. Still, he smiled at her from across the sands. Not an over-confident smirk or anything like that, just a small smile as he looked her in the eye.

"The power you draw on will poison you." he chided her with a small smile, "And I am one with the Force and the Force is with me."

Hmm.

The rumbling of the ground was what gave the approaching group away - but the direction of the dust they were kicking up told him that they were coming from the raider outpost he had been heading toward before this detour. He tutted a little bit as he gripped his lightsaber tighter as they neared.

"Friends of yours?" he asked her with another smirk, "I was on my way to have them answer to the law when you showed up... guess they decided to come to us."

He didn't trust that they weren't her allies so he was poised, almost coiled like a spring, ready to burst into motion should he need to.

@Dread

 

[Darth Malicia]

Demolly's smile was wiped off her face when the Jedi first spoke. Being compared to an animal triggered something sickly dark, something deep, deep inside her. Before she earned her name, she was told she didn't have one. That she wasn't human. That she was no more than an animal. Those memories, and those of her training, were what fueled the most darkness inside her. They gave her power, as much as they spurred her towards the deepest depths of madness.

But even in her sudden shift in mood, she chuckled. It was a slow rumbling in her throat. "I killed my masters," she said in a very cold voice. The world around her disappeared for a moment. Nothing but darkness and the Jedi stood in front of her. "They fancied themselves scientists, they thought they could control me, but only the weak submit. The strong rule."

Even though the rumbling ground first had her attention, that was also gone for the moment. So was the Jedi's question, because Demolly was poised to kill. Her hunger was overwhelming. She didn't even register that the large vehicles stopped not too far away from the pair, but she was snapped out of her focus when a man popped out of one of the vehicles and yelled.

"Put down your weapons!" he shouted. "You both will be taken in by the Suns Eye!"

Demolly didn't say anything, she just brought up her wounded arm and sent a burst of Force lightning towards the man who shouted. Whatever would happen next wouldn't be rainbows and sunshine, or them singing kumbaya around a campfire.

@Nefieslab

 

[Maxims Tionson]

So they weren't friends of hers and they wanted to take them both in to... the Suns Eyes? He imagined that was their raider name but he honestly didn't care too much. Instead of fully focusing on his little Sith friend, he dared to eye them as she sent a blast of lightning at the leader who had spoken up.

He would have been more outraged about it had the target not been such a deserving scumbag.

And if his friends didn't immediately take this as a signal to open fire on both himself and the Sith. They weren't even firing from their rifles either - they had modified weapons mounted onto speeders and the like and they were not afraid to use them it seemed. Max jumped backward to avoid a burst of the heavier blaster fire from hitting him.

Reaching out with the Force, he turned one of the heavier blaster turrets into the side of one of the other vehicles so that it would blast apart the side of the vehicle with friendly fire. He was careful to avoid damaging the people so much as he was damaging the hardware itself.

"I refuse the offer of surrendering to your custody - and I dare say my shocking friend agrees."

@Dread

 

[Darth Malicia]

The Jedi's words had pushed her into something of a Dark Side frenzy. She was bathing in it, and once her lightning made contact she made up her mind. Rather, the darkness made the decision for her. She was going to kill every last raider. The Jedi was still on her radar and she'd take her shot when she got it, but the quickest way to satisfy her hunger was not him.

As the raiders fired she used the Force to move quickly and avoid the shots, but she let one of the raiders on a speeder get close. Close enough to close the gap. And she did close it, leaping towards him and slicing his head off before coming to a stop on the other side. The sound of his head finding the sand barely registered in her mind, but it felt good.

Almost instantly she started to move towards one of the larger vehicles. She continued to avoid the fire and once she got to the side, she jumped on it. She started cutting a hole in it with her saber, wanting in. The familiar smell of the laser melting through metal hit her nose, and it only increased her hunger. She was going kill every one of them in it. She wasn't even talking anymore.

It took a few seconds for the second in command to process their leader was not talking anymore. Eventually he looked out and saw the man passed out or dead, and instantly he started barking orders. "Shoot her! Shoot her! Get her off the side!" he yelled. "And keep that one away!" he added, pointing at the Jedi.

@Nefieslab

 

[Maxims Tionson]

Max wasn't exactly thrilled that the Sith seemed to have decided to go on a murderous rampage but he wasn't about to stop focusing on his own protection to complain about it. He batted away blaster bolts as they came his way but already he could see that the raiders were going to be nothing but meat for the blender that was the Sith if they stayed here. And, in their egocentric view of the Galaxy, they couldn't conceive of the idea of running away from only two people.

But running was the only thing that could possibly save their lives.

Some schools of thought believed that not stopping a terrible deed was not a failing. That the actions of others were entirely their own responsibility and it was the duty of no one else to stand between them and the consequences of said actions. But Max was never one to subscribe to that philosophy and he didn't know a single Jedi who did. Instead he decided it was time to do something rather stupid by the standards of most civilized people and yet something so very Jedi; it was time to save bad people from the consequences of their actions so that they could live long enough to either repent or experience non-lethal consequences.

Max charged.

Not at the Sith but rather at one of the larger transports of people. Some of the people she was targeting currently would be dead before he could get there and others wounded beyond help. As much as it pained him, there were some people he could save and some he could not. Leaping through the air, he landed atop the control panel for a large hover truck, smacking the driver around the face as he twisted the controls, skidding the hover truck away from the Sith.

"Alright time to make tracks boys and girls!"

He locked in speed and steering before leaping from the hover truck as he carried off a group of raiders back to their base on autopilot, going too fast for the passengers in the back of the truck to disembark without killing themselves. A blaster bolt scored off of his chest armour, sending him spinning down to one knee, where he was able to defend himself again.

"Sith!" he roared out to the young woman, "These people are going home and the Law will decide their fates!"

@Dread