Circling Vultures

[Arterius]

LOCATION: SOMEWHERE ON THE FRINGES OF MID/OUTER RIM
TIME: UNKNOWN​

A thunderous explosion rocked the frigate as a lone Jedi Knight sprinted down corridor, bathed in the ominous red of the emergency lighting. The power was gone, carved away surgically by that... thing... that had emerged from the black of space a silent as the grave and as fast as light. The only thing keeping the most basic of systems going now was the emergency power supply, but no doubt that would peter out faster than it could be truly useful. He had to make it count, he had to, and he drove with all his might towards the communications room. Of all the places hit it was relatively untouched... one unscathed patch among a body slowly being filled with cavities. The thing that did this two them had left, but what it left behind, well, they were picking the corpse clean.
There was screaming and blaster fire all around him, voices on every deck and down every corridor, firing at the unseen. The Knight had lost his saber in the melee as the children of their attackers piled in with inhuman resolve... but the most terrifying thing about them? Their absolute silence. Amidst the screaming there they were, wordlessly moving deck by deck room by room, reaping the crew squads at a time. Their blasters, for all their power, were too late to save them. Not even the Knight's Lightsaber could repel them forever, not that it mattered, he had dropped it in his desperate bid to reach the comms room. That was the only hope now. There had to be hope. He had to get a message out.
Finally closing the distance he leaped into the room and sealed the blast door behind him, and collapsed to his knees in fearful exhaustion. His heart hammered faster than his feet could carry him... even with the assistance of the Force... and now he could barely stagger to the Communications System. The emergency lights began to flicker. He had to move quickly, and he opened a Jedi Channel.

"This is Jedi Knight Kral Levo, stationed aboard 'The Fiery Light', we are under attack! We are under attack by an unknown enemy- we've never seen anything like this before! We responded to a distress call only to be ambushed, we didnt see them coming. There was one at first, a vessel as black as the abyss and faster than we could see... it blew out our engines and several of our guns, and before we could track it and fire it was gone! But it wasnt alone, there were others there all along but we couldnt detect them! They're all over the ship, please, send help-"

Instantly he went rigid. A moment passed, a moment that filled Kral Levo with a fear he had never known... how could have not noticed?
How could he not notice that the entire ship was now unquestionably, damnably... silent.
This is it, he thought, this is the end.

"They've found me"

Suddenly there was darkness, and it fell upon him like broken glass. The dying vessel shuddered as the last vestige of life left it, groaning as the power perished... now close to absolute darkness, Kral Levo could only feel deathly nothingness. Striking up an small light upon his person he stared at the blackened room, and almost jumped out of his skin as he heard the blast door screech with movement. With one loud screech it had been forced half open, and as though taunting him it remained that way only for a few painful seconds, before with another jerking screech it flew open entirely.

His light went out... and as he stared out into the pitch black corridor, he cowered, unprepared for the dozens of unflinching white eyes, glowing with nightmarish intensity, staring back at him.

----
TWO DAYS LATER
ASTEROID OUTPOST KIRA II​

Sat within the communications station, one of the Jedi Knights there was surprised to find one of his Padawans unnerved as they approached him, only to give him the weakened transmission. He wasted no time, and quickly sprinted away to report it to his superiors.

 

[TAC]

The Grand Master hollered loudly over the comms channel as the small Jedi starfighter soared past the exploding target. Several bouts of laughter followed as the man evened out his craft, making only slightly alterations to avoid the deadly asteroids that littered the space around him. "Well, Reland, I don't know what kind of recruiting methods you use to get Jedi into Exile Squadron, but it's okay if you want to take a video of this and use it." The man's banter was followed by a chuckle as Reland's X-Wing pulled in line with him.

In the distance, the Jedi Taskforce Fleet could be seen, idling just outside of the asteroid field that held one of the Jedi's two outposts. Kira II had been an extremely convenient location for the Jedi as well as a convenient staging point for their fleet thanks to the absence of visitors. Larik had been a bit rusty on his starfighter flying, and he asked the leader of the Exile Squadron and the Jedi Mobile Base, Master Reland Gil, to accompany him while he practiced.

The two had been practicing on targets for nearly an hour, and they had just refueled and were back at the scattered targets. Reland had over two times the amount of hits that Larik did, but the Grand Master had always been one enjoy a bit of playful banter. He had no illusions about who the better starfighter pilot was. Before Reland could respond to his bait, however, the long-range comms broke the channel with static.

"Master Novan, this is Knight Goodrich on Asteroid B219, come in." Larik glanced over to his fellow Master in the X-wing before responding. The Jedi Knight did not have a good tone. "Knight Goodrich, this is Master Novan. Go ahead." There was a few seconds of static as Larik skirted past an asteroid, weaving back into the line of reception from the Jedi outpost on the asteroid.

"Master Novan, we've received a two-day old encrypted transmission from Jedi Knight Kral Levo. We think you might want to hear it." The Grand Master braced himself and indicated they should play the transmission for himself and Master Gil. The man focused on evading asteroids, the dark space beyond dotted with the brilliance of trillions of galaxies. The transmission did not sound good, and while Larik had only met Knight Levo once or twice, he could hear the fear in the Jedi Knight's voice.

"Transmission received," the Grand Master said, his ship already angled towards the asteroid base. "Start up the Sundance Maiden," he ordered the Knight, "and punch in the coordinates to the Nav computer so it's ready when I get there. Master Gil and I will go to investigate."

 

[Raydo]

Reland's canopy flooded with light as he flew through the explosion of the target that Larik had just destroyed. They had been going back and forth for the last hour practicing, and while nothing was official, there was a clear competition between the two. A competition that Reland was clearly winning, but he was gracious and only returned jabs occasionally when Larik would provoke him. Reland let out a hearty laugh pulling into formation with the Grand Master when a transmission came through. Reland returned Larik's concerned glance when the transmission began playing. The tension in the Jedi's voice and his apparent desperate situation made Reland's heart sink.

He had never met the Jedi Knight who had sent the transmission, but it was clear that he needed help. Reland had already banked his X-Wing into a turn when Larik gave the command to load the coordinates to his ship. Reland flicked his communications over to the Exile Squadron's channel. "This is Reland Gil, mobilize the next patrol ship. Me and Master Novan are having to leave the station." he said only having to wait a brief second before his command was acknowledged.

Both Reland's and Larik's star fighters were heading towards the asteroid belt when Reland opened a secure channel to the Admiral of the fleet. He waited until he the Devaronian acknowledged him before speaking. "Admiral Grumoc, Me and Master Novan are responding to reports of a Jedi Knight who has been attacked. We aren't sure who the attacker was, but it did not sound good. I am afraid I don't have any other information. Perhaps it would be best to be ready to move the fleet if need be. Perhaps it is nothing...I hope it is nothing. Reland out."

Perhaps he was being paranoid, but it he wouldn't chance this many Jedi lives. It was better to be cautious and be ready than be caught off guard. He closed the comm channel as they docked the star fighters in the hanger of the asteroid base. Reland jumped out of cockpit as soon as his fighter touched the ground. He followed closely behind Larik as the boarded his personal ship.

"What do you know of the Jedi Knight?" he asked as they finished walking up the entry ramp of the Sundance Maiden.

 

[TAC]

The two Jedi Masters flew out of the asteroid fleet as quickly as possible, meeting up with the Jedi Order Taskforce Fleet who were stationed just outside of it. The radio crackled as Admiral Grumoc responded to the Jedi Fleet Commander's update.

"Commander Gil, this is Admiral Grumoc. Understood. Unfortunately, we just had a sighting of a large force of pirates near Indupar. We've been asked to mobilize and come to one of the crown world's defense as they attempt to defend against the pirates. What are your orders?" There was a moment's pause as the two Jedi Master landed inside of the asteroid base.

"Admiral, this is Grand Master Novan. We'll handle it." Reland was already halfway out of his ship, a bit younger than Larik, more ready to throw himself off of his fighter, and he probably missed the Admiral's reply. Larik exited his starfighter, a little lower to the ground than Reland's X-Wing, and started for the Sundance Maiden.

"The fleet is temporarily pre-disposed," the Corellian said to his counter part as they boarder the Maiden. On the way up Larik hit a button on the control panel next to the ramp's entrance to the ship, and the ramp started it's ascent into a fixed and space-worthy position. Sliding into the Captain's chair the man stated flicking controls and the hum of the engine greeted the two Jedi. After a minute or two of check-ups the craft was in the air. The coordinates were off the beaten path, and it was only as Larik swung the Maiden out of the main hanger that he replied to his fellow Master.

"Not much. Kral Levo is a young human Knight, about 22. He has only been a Knight for about a year or so. He's not one of mine, from Arbra, I can't really remember who he came in with." The man shrugged, flicking a few more buttons and then pressing a lever forward to make the jump to hyperspace.

"But I've got a bad feeling about this."

 

[Arterius]

LOCATION: LAST KNOWN CO-ORDINATES OF JEDI KNIGHT KRAL LEVO

'The Dirt Nebula'

There would be a terrible sight to behold the moment the Sundance Maiden exited Hyperspace and into the cold dark void once more... what according to galactic maps should have been worthless empty space was in fact far from it, and in the place of nothingness was something far more ominous to look at, and drenched in an essence of woe and fear. Before them there resided a dense and murky cloud, nebulous and foreboding, and drifting throughout its mass there were hordes of what looked like asteroids- until the Masters in their sturdy Vessel drew closer.

Those unassuming pieces of harmless space rock where not as they appeared... but rather they were small pieces of spacecraft debris. They came in all shapes and sizes bearing the ruined remains of various unintelligible insignia's, many were old, and some were alarmingly new. The Sundance Maiden would have no choice to push forward, and as its engines pushed it onwards the shattered pieces of craft that lined a vague road deeper into that dirty cloud would welcome them. The crew within would hear the ghostly knocks and thumps as the debris would collide across the skin of the Maiden, and roll across her hull as she drove to the heart of mass.

A few minutes of thick haze was all that could be seen... before it happened. A low static whistle coming through over the comms on the emergency channels.
The garbled noise grew louder, and louder, until words could be heard, voices screaming... but not just in one language. In Many. Soon the bridge would be filled with the mangled cacophony of pleading voices, all begging for help, some outright howling in fear- and as it peaked, the Sundance Maiden would break through the Membrane and the core.

The vision they would find was one of a truly forsaken nature... for as they made their breach inside they would find themselves surrounded by husks of dozens of spacecraft, some huge, some small, but all frightfully torn apart and ruined. It was here in this abominable Graveyard in the centre of the nebula that a name began to repeat across the screeching transmissions of the long since damned; "The Black Shrike".
The transmissions of ghosts would continue without end unless they were muted, constantly looping... but as they would push ever inwards, one more voice would join the choir of the lost, and his co-ordinates in the charnel house of lost ships would accompany it.
Kral Levo's.

The cold and dead husk of what was once the "The Fiery Light" drifted before them, split in half and riddled with great cavities, the metal stripped from the frame like flesh from a carcass. It would be here that they would need to venture to... there was only one problem.

A battered hulk was falling towards them at alarming speed. Their entrance into the core disturbing some of gravitational fields that held some of the larger ruins together... and as the hulk descended upon them, its hull was breaking apart, slowly transforming it into a meteor shower of cold metal.

Alarms began to blare within the Sundance Maiden, the corridors within alive with the steady and repeating booms of automated blaster cannons as they tracked and destroyed what debris they could. With a thunderous boom the Sundance Maiden would fully engage its engines, flying forward at tremendous speed. The hull was being pummeled, the cannons only able to hold back so much.

The two vessels moments from collision, the Maiden just escaped the Hulk, which screeched across their engines as it fell into the abyss. The engines began to splutter, idly pushing the Maiden forward... but they were safe... and the Fiery Light lay before them.

Scans would indicate that it had massive hull ruptures and pressurization failures across all decks, with very little of it's inner structure retaining gravity or life support. But it could be boarded.
Though according to read outs, there were no signs of life either.

With their own engine damaged, it would become clear that not only would they need to investigate for Kral, but also find a suitable part to fix the damaged engine... or else they too might join the Graveyard.​

 

[Raydo]

As the screams blossomed into a full chorus of horror, all of the hairs on Reland's arms and neck stood straight up. He could almost feel something crawling on skin from time to time. The Jedi Master shot a glance over to Larik. Realnd strained to make sense of the transmission, but after a few brief seconds, he slammed his hand down on comm station, causing the computer to mute the transmission. The silence that replaced the screams was in many ways, more unnerving.

"What is this place?" Reland asked allowed as they continued to creep forward. The place had an aura of darkness that Reland could feel pressing down upon him.

Alarms across the ship began to sound. They were sensors indicating something was on an impact course with them. Reland looked up and out of view port and saw the wreckage come closer as automated turrets tried to break apart the wreckage. They did their job, mostly. The ship wasn't ripped apart, and for that Reland was grateful. There was along moment where the remaining debris scraped along the outside of Larik's ship. The hull moaned in protest as the two ships slid past each other, and then they were once again in utter silence.

And there it was, the ship they had come looking for. It was obvious the shipped had been ripped open in multiple places, but Reland ran the scans anyway. There was nothing. The ship had lost almost all of its atmosphere, Only there very core of the ship retaining any type of breathable air. The scan completed. Nothing. Reland ran it again. Nothing.

"I realize we have to go check out the core of that ship, but I would like to go on record and say this is a terrible idea." he paused "So how should we go about this?" he asked as he stood up.

 

[TAC]

As much as Larik was a Jedi, a defender of peace, he had always embraced the part of that job that called upon him to be a solider. He had been raised in a CorSec family, fought in countless battles as a Jedi and as a member of the Galactic Alliance Special Forces, but the graveyard that he and Reland approached was the most unnerving place he had ever had the misfortune of finding himself in.

The transmission that grew louder and more violent as they approached the core of the graveyard was in itself a tremendous horror, only adding to the growing feeling of alarm. He heard the face of the fallen Jedi Knight overlayed with hundreds of others, although for some reason a bit more discernable, as if because his addition was so recent. He neglected to mention that fact as his fellos Jedi slammed the transmission off. Larik wasnt broken up about it.

The turrets did their work as their first obstacle appeared, and Larik could do little more than try to sit calmly and remember to breath as the Maiden was almost ripped in half. He quietly let out his pent up air after the danger bsrely scrapped by. Reland went about doing a scan of the ship in front of them while Larik ran his own diagnosis check on his ship. Every beep of a negative read from Reland's scan set Larik's face into a grimer and grimer expression.

"I think the expression is 'I have a bad feeling about this,'" the Jedi responded absentmindedly, finishing his own scale. "But it gets better. Engines arent pushing out more than 20-25 MGLT and the hyperdrive went into auto-fail-safe and shut off. We'll have to shut everything off and let the engine cool before we can see about fixing it up, and the hyperdrive will take awhile to reboot."

The Jedi Master's face was extemely grim. "And better yet, it looks like long range comms are out." The man flipped a few more switches and scanned through the technical readouts that popped up on his screen. "So while the hyperdrive reboots, we can take a walk outside to look around to find out what happened and get the spare parts we need. Ive got two suits in the back." The Jedi Master turned his grim look into a smile as he looked over to Reland. There wasnt much they could do about anything now, the Jedi knight was nowhere to be seen. Better to collect what information they could and get out of there.

After powering the ship down Larik headed back for the hold, got suited, and he and Reland were soon launching themselves through space and towards the derelect ship only a few meters away from their own.

 

[Arterius]

It was thought impossible to reach a level of cold that surpassed the great black of endless space... and yet here, in this aberrational nebula, it had sunk that extra level lower into the frozen depths of hell. As Larik and Reland carefully sent themselves out into the shadows of that nexus of burnt out hulls and mangled ships, they'd be hard pressed to keep track of their target, even though they inevitably waded towards it.

In the Graveyard nothing felt like it simply drifted, so thick was the darkness here that it was like swimming through the blood of the Force, leaking in from the Wound that with every ship only got larger and larger splitting the skin of the universe. It was a zone in which no life thrived, only a tremendous sense of... nothingness.

And yet in the corner of Reland's eye, he would slowly begin to see something dire and undefinable float through his peripherals... and yet if he were to look towards its eldritch shape, he would see nothing at all. There was a sense that something Other was here in this frozen maelstrom, but no matter where either master would look, there was only metal carcasses and dead space to be seen.

An airlock upon the side of Fiery Light was still intact and presented itself to them as the front three quarters of the ship span with painful slowness to face them- almost invitingly. True that with so many holes and barbaric rips in its hide they could've entered anywhere, but this airlock was special. This airlock was still somehow connected to a pressurized deck. As Larik set the airlock activation sequence in the dead vessel, bereft of soul and energy, it spluttered as it tried to summon the last vestiges of its spark to do as they bid.
Suddenly and loudly those doors flew open a foot, blasting dead air out into Reland's face.

Like a Mandalorian's punch it hit him, sending him with a yell of surprise flying from the airlock, his grip upon its frosted over frame not enough as those padded fingers slipped away from the metal. Everything began to spin, the air giving a momentum he wouldn't be able to stop; the abysmal nebula that surrounded them and the chunks of rotten ship would all begin to blur into a relentless collage of a baleful gunmetal grey and filthy brown.

Then suddenly there was stillness instantaneous... and a pressure about his ankle, only to look down to spot his comrade, Master Larik, clutching his boot.
But in that horrible stillness, he saw it, to him it was upside down and drifting towards them, and though a husk, it would not settle with either of the Masters as the corpse-ship passed by over head, bathing them in shadow.

The husk spiraled as it drifted above, allowing them to view its entire gnarled form. It appeared a truly frightful thing, its front was mounted with two long arms like that of a Mantis, while its body resembled something akin to something not seen since the Clone Wars, a LAAT/i. Riddled with blaster marks it evidently had lost its fight long ago, and like the countless other ships in the Graveyard, simply submitted to become a spent ruin.

As they entered the airlock, allowing it to seal behind them and pressurize, they'd be able to witness the strange husk's haunting float away, floating like a body downstream towards the Sundance Maiden.
Now inside they would still require their suits, but for this deck at least they still had working gravity.
The main issue now was the fact that they had absolutely no light from the ship itself, and would require the limited span of their own to navigate the ruined deck. With no other choice the Masters would activate their choice of illumination and be greeted to a frightening sight.

Nothing.
Only dust and broken panels.
Whatever happened here, it had swept through this vessel like tsunami, taking everything with it. The only thing, the only testament to any struggle from the crew, was the blaster marks all over the walls.

Now both Larik and Reland would have a choice... proceed to the bridge to investigate what happened, or proceed to the core. The Force was kind to them, as the bridge was on this deck, but the core, it was several decks below, and it's housing had been torn wide open and exposed to the umbra maw of space. In the bridge they would find logs of events that transpired, but in the core, they would be able to organize the retrieval of any parts required.​

 

[Raydo]

"Thanks" he said as Larik finished pulling him back down. The thought of free drifting in a place like this unnerved Reland more than he already was. They both entered the ship, and the doors closed behind them. The ship creaked, and the various clangs could be heard as debris from outside struck the ship.

Reland, keeping his voice quiet, turned to Larik just inside the door. "We have to try and find the boy. If he his hurt..." he words were cut off by a loud bang somewhere near where they were out. Reland's lightsaber was in his hand in a second. He waited a long moment before continuing. "I guess we don't know where on the ship he sent the transmission?" he asked

Reland looked into the total blackness for a second before clicking the light on his helmet. The sight reveled that ship had been beaten up just as bad on the inside as the outside. Reland placed his finger on one of the scorch marks along the wall. He couldn't shake the feeling that something was out just out of site of the two Jedi. He couldn't sense anything, but he couldn't shake the feeling.

He forced himself to take a step further into ship...and then another...