Relearning Dread: Wrong Neighborhood

[Hozan]

Location: Eriadu
Time: Mid-afternoon (1500)
Participants: @Nefieslab , @Darasuum
Theme: Ain't No Devil <> Andrea Wasse
OOC: Here

The planet was thick with pollution. Planet sized cities usually wise when they reached a certain point of industrial progress. Eriadu was not one of those planets. All they could do was stagnate the level of toxicity in the air. Personally Hozan did not think it had been enough. It was a useful trading post and full of companies, people and useful possibility. But Hozan still wrinkled his nose at the stench in the air as he exited his ship.

The acolyte had come to the planet upon receiving some information. The hybrid had been studying and searching for any trace of the Dread Lords he could find. Now he had been given an address and little else. As far as he had learned it was nothing but an old warehouse that had been paid for extensively in the future but had not been accessed in nearly a decade at least.

Coincidentally there seemed to be a situation of unrest on the planet. A gang had become notorious in the lower levels and even pushed outwards, fighting the law enforcement in the streets and causing chaos. The warehouse was very close to their territory if not inside it so the tall dark sider would have to be wary. Thankfully he was not alone. Another acolyte, Eddard, who had already made some waves recently inside the Imperial Republica. Now the two would at least find some inkling of the Dread Lords or any tools they had left behind.

 

[Eddard Thul Drast]

Eddard had come in his own shuttle but had followed carefully and matched speeds and landing sites with Hozan so that their two ships were parked side by side. The planet itself was disgusting but Eddard had long ago learned that those who stooped, conquered, so he wasn't exactly going to be in a hurry to write this place off just because it stank to high heaven and hadn't managed to pull itself out of it's industrial dark age.

He had his half mask on, the mask covering his lower face, mouth and nose with an armoured white surface that was styled into the shape of a smiling face. Of course it was a Sith mask so the mouth was smiling but it looked like it was in pain these day, as though the smile was a second away from becoming a grimace.

It helped a little bit, even if it didn't actually have any filters built into it - just having something physically in front of his mouth and nose helped with the situation.

As he stepped off of his ship and it closed up behind him, he checked his person mentally. He had his two lightsabers, secured and hidden but the robes of his Sith armour. Tilting his head to the side slightly, he checked at the small of his back and nodded once when he found the blaster pistol was still secured there.

He was getting used to carrying a blaster pistol these days - they were versatile little things.

Standing to the side of Hozan, he raised an eyebrow.

"Let's go and introduce ourselves, shall we?"

@Darasuum

 

[Hozan]

____________

Hozan's arms were crossed when Eddard arrived. He turned his neck to look upon his cohort with orange irises. They used to be yellow but like the rest of his body, had been changed by accepting more and more of the darkside inside of him. The Acolyte had seen many people affected by the dark side in a variety of ways. Some went mad over time with the corruption, others crippled. But in Hazon's case and those he considered effective conduits they were strengthened by the dark side of the force.

Standing at one hundred and eight centimeters tall he was still shorter than Eddard but greater than others of his own species. The hybrid rolled his neck, poping several joints in the process before moving to his jaw and then hands. "Hopefully there will be limited interactions." He said with his deep voice. Hozan did not want to have to fight through gangsters or petty thugs if it could be avoided. They were just a few city blocks away but a lot could change in that time period.

He was only wearing the standard sith marauder armor underneath a cloak. His heavy armor was not needed in this situation and the golden appearance would have drawn a great deal of attention. He was armed with both a hold out blaster pistol as well as the standard pugio side arm that Republica agents used. Other than those he had his lightsabers and that was all he needed.

@Nefieslab ​

 

[Eddard Thul Drast]

Eddard nodded to Hozan.

Some might think it odd, to see a member of the Imperial Republica nobility speaking to a xeno as if they were equals. It might even actually be odd - but Eddard didn't much care. Neither he nor Hozan cared about what race the other was. At this stage they didn't know each other, all they knew was that the other could help them advance either themselves or their chosen cause. And when you thought about it...

There were worse ways to set up a business partnership.

"Well, we know to expect the unexpected." he admitted with a small shrug, "But I happen to agree. I do so detest when people decide they wish to try their luck."

Of course it turned out that it was, in fact, no issue to approach. Indeed, it looked like there wasn't anyway around at all. That was a good thing, undeniably, but it did reek to Eddard.

"There's no one on the approach." he whispered as they neared, "Be prepared... they may have their men in reserve."

Or it may be a trap.

But they were just two Sith in the Galaxy, trying to make their way, so there was no real reason to target them for a trap. Maybe he was just being paranoid again?

@Darasuum

 

[Hozan]

____________

Eddard's advice was sound. Gangs survived by corrupting the very environment around them. If Hozan were a mob boss he would have everyone from politicians to the youngest of gutter rats. They all had their place and uses. A child on a street corner could pick up a commlink and bring intelligence for the small price of twenty credits per call of valid information. They would use that to help their family or buy some sweets. Either way, kids were always hungry for something and that did not change when they went into adulthood.

The two sith would make their way down the street without spotting a single gang member. But that did not mean they were not nearby. He saw the out of the way warehouse. Nothing stood near it for at least three or so meters in every direction. Not even parked service vehicles or transport vans were parked out in front of it.

Approaching the door Hozan reached out to sense if there was anybody inside but he could not detect anything inside alive. Still, that did not mean that there were not defenses. Eyeing the door he used the force to open the portal to gain access. It did not appear to have any sort of lock aside from a simple latch perhaps. But that was not the case as an alarm went off. It was all but quiet. Hozan's back hair spiked up in surprise and dashed inside, hoping there were no active automated turrets. He found a power box and quickly smashed it but killed any chance at internal lighting in the process. The following moments would be silent and he wondered if any gangsters heard from probably what was blocks away.

@Nefieslab​

 

[Eddard Thul Drast]

The warehouse that was their target was, in a word, isolated. Not only was it set away from the nearby buildings but it seemed that no one had left any trash or vehicles nearby it either. It stood out from the rest because of how strangely well-put together it still was, how clean it was in comparison. It sent alarm bells ringing in the back of Eddard's mind as his regular paranoia became slightly more pronounced.

What the hell was going on here?

Nothing was ever this easy and if it seemed that way, it was usually because it was both a trap and a lie. Frowning, Eddard reached behind him and drew his blaster pistol. Maybe it was nothing and he was just being paranoid but that was, in his own opinion, no excuse to be caught unawares.

Having a pistol in hand just meant he would be over-prepared if nothing happened.

It was slightly surprising but there only seemed to be two men who responded to the alarm to begin with. They stepped out of a warehouse across the road, blasters up and ready.

Unfortunately for them, Eddard had already raised his own blaster and he gunned them down with two shots to the chest each that ended them. He entered the warehouse after Hozan.

"We've no way of knowing if they were responding because they thought it was an attack on their warehouse or if they were the spotters for this place." he told Hozan as he frowned, keeping an eye on the door, "Get to looking and be quick - with some luck we won't need to care which is the right answer."

If they had any luck at all they should be fine.

@Darasuum

 

[Hozan]

____________

By the time Hozan silenced the alarms it was apparent that someone had heard the alarm. He was unsure what their intentions were but Eddard did the smart thing and took the initiative by killing them both. They went down without issue having virtually no body armor. But Hozan wondered if anybody would come searching for the source of the blaster shots fired by the noble sith male. fortuntatly for the two acolytes, nobody else had been in ear shot of the alarm or the blaster fire. If they were they would choose to ignore it.

Not taking any more time to waste on worrying about possible new arrivals the hybrid Sith began searching the warehouse. An old air speeder was there, outdated and laying on the floor. Its repulsor generator obviously no longer working. Lockers and crates of various supplies sat covered in dust having apparently never been touched in at least a decade. Hozan sniffed the air but there were no hints of activity or anything save for the smell of rust and the cool air of the dark building.

Hozan went deeper into the warehouse where a small walled off office sat in a corner. From the outside he could see a few small LED lights. Something inside was still powered to a degree. Entering the office he examined what was powered on. A series of data pads, disposable commlinks and outdated technology were on the desks. But there was a terminal with power running to it. The source of the light was a back up power supply. Such a thing was only good for an hour or so at best. They were used in companies and such so workers would not lose data in an accidental power outage and give any technical teams time to power networks back up. But that was in ideal conditions.

The two Sith acolytes did not have time and Hozan for one did not know how to restore power to the whole warehouse without restarting the alarm. But perhaps he did not need to. Pulling out his own data pad he quickly connected the two machines to one another and then also his port scanner. He knew then that it was indeed something he was looking for. Not because he had gathered any information from the device yet but because the level of security the machine had. It was going to take awhile to scan through the high security machine.

"This machine is going to run out of power in probably fifteen minutes. I'm going to try and download everything onto my datapad but it might take a little while for it to get past this security. They have military grade security here. This is definitely no ordinary warehouse. See if you can find anything else."

@Nefieslab​

 

[Eddard Thul Drast]

Leaving Hozan to rummage through the data on his own, Eddard instead moved over to some of the storage containers. Using his lightsaber like a cutting torch, he opened up the containers before tutting a little bit as he found nothing of value within. There was packaging peanuts and straw, of all things, alongside some basic mechanical tools. From what he could see, they were probably tools for repairing speeders - not something he needed considering he had only recently come to possess a speeder bike and it was in fine condition as it was.

He tutted in annoyance.

"Nothing of value." he told Hozan with a small frown, "Whoever owns this place now is not doing everything they can to use it to their full potential."

Including security it would seem. Indeed, he was pushing his senses with the Force as far out as he could and yet he could feel nothing. No ill-intent towards them and no life moving towards them with any kind of urgency. Now it was possible that they were sending droids but battle droids in the streets would cause panic.

And panic was a beacon in the Force.

"No back up either." he reported confidently, "Finish that up and we're done here."

Sometimes missions just went right.

@Darasuum

 

[Hozan]

____________

There was no rushing the port scanner. It was going to take a minute or so. Hozan was under the belief that the device would finish its scanning and code breaking before the back up power supply died. But he did not leave the office. Instead he drew his eyes over to the other items in the office. There were files naming a Southern Star Transportation and Freight company. He murmured and moved onto other documents and devices. There were disposable commlinks. He looked underneath the desk even and found an older . It had been in a holster strapped to the underside of the desk. Well it only made the individual even more curious. Whomever had been occupying this warehouse believed that the simple office workers warranted the means of self defense and a guardian hold out blaster certainly qualified.

mean while a few blocks away an AM 7 Adventurer air speeder was making its way to the area. Inside were two more gangsters armed with vorantikus blaster files and dh-7 blaster pistols. They were fully armored up with their ruffian armor that came equiped with stun prods. These were the more elite enforcers of the gangsters' reach. As such they had been in charge of fast response via air speeder and had better equipment than other simple street thugs. They were the ones that pounded the lesser member's heads together. Now they had come to check in on the foolish two members. When they got close they saw the two dead bodies in the middle of the street Eddard had left and immediatly went on the defensive.

Upon landing they hopped out of the air speeder. One of them called in to their central hub of criminal activity, where ever that was. That meant they were probably getting reinforcements. But they were not going to sit and wait. Instead they moved up the street and closer to the bodies. Their weapons were out and ready.

@Nefieslab​

 

[Eddard Thul Drast]

Ah.

"It seems they've finally sent some friends for us to play with." he declared with a small smirk, "Keep working at it Hozan - I'll deal with them."

Moving quickly and quietly, he checked how many rounds he still had in his blaster pistol as he approached the entrance that would give him line of sight on the enemies. He had fired four times in total to take down both of the previous security officers, which meant that he wasn't empty yet.

Indeed, he had 11 shots remaining in this power pack.

Time to go to work.

Eddard managed to squeeze one shot off, which missed, before the two security guards were down behind chest high cover in a blink of an eye. Swearing, he ducked back behind the door as two blaster posts whizzed right past him. Gods above, he was pinned down by two god damn security guards.

"Pinned down by the two of them Hozan." he reported to his ally, "May require assistance but will endeavour not to need it."

He hoped he wouldn't need it.

@Darasuum

 

[Hozan]

____________

Well this event was quickly loosing the C in covert and instead allowing the local gangster to see the two Imperial operatives. With the hold out blaster in hand Hozan moved out of the office and over to a side door to the warehouse. He had his other sidearm, the pugio blaster pistol, in hand as well. Time to shoot the place up like some holo-vid drama.

Hozan kicked down the side door in a slamming action. Yet the criminal reinforcements did not seem to notice over the din of the blaster fire. Leaping forth from the inside of the warehouse like a wild dog the acolyte raced around the side where the security guards were. He came to a corner and stopped for a half second before pivoting and opening up. He fired four shots from each respectivly just to be sure. three of which perforated the two guards and made them dead for sure. Even so the Dread Lord prospect held both weapons at the read as the sound of cooling metal could barely be heard at arms distance from the weapons.

Hozan would lower the weapons and walk over to the speeder they had come from. It was in good condition but now they had a quick means of escape. He hoped inside and brought it around to the side door he had come out of and landed it so if more enemies came then the two operatives would be able to simply exit and avoid any further confrontation.

@Nefieslab Two turns left before port scanner is done​

 

[Eddard Thul Drast]

Well that worked.

Thankfully, Hozan had managed to get the drop on the guards and had shot true. Eddard was glad that his ally had managed to take them down without either of them having to use their lightsabers. It was so much easier to work on a planet when people didn't know you were a Sith - as soon as they realised you were a Sith they brought in either heavy explosives or numbers, two of the best ways to take down Force users.

He checked the ammo he had left - 10 shots remaining.

"Where are we on the upload?" he asked Hozan as he scavenged some supplies from the dead guards, pocketing a pair of frag grenades from the two of them, "These two were checking back in."

Indeed they were and the enemy were going to respond poorly.

Two technicals could be seen approaching at speed, fully loaded down. Each of the two technicals had a driver, a gunner and two additional man ready with blaster rifles. They were approaching but were not yet upon them.

"We've got technicals! Two!" he called out to Hozan, "Grenade out!"

He threw the grenade but immediately had to duck behind cover as both blaster cannons opened up on him, forcing him to go prone to avoid the shots. The grenade exploded harmlessly to one side.

@Darasuum

 

[Hozan]

____________

"Just a few more moments and we should be able to depart promptly" His accute pronunciation and high class mannerisms giving way to his background at not being a native speaker of basic. He made an effort to talk the proper tongue but most people who spoke basic had their own slang. Hozan did not since he had learned text book basic and only spoke proper basic. Often times he had difficulty understanding the dialects that many people across the galaxy spoke and their accents certainly did not help. However Eddard's words at least came across clearly. Usually Hozan was able to connect the dots.

With the report of more enemies incoming he moved back towards the warehouse where the port scanner was continuing to work its way through the encryption. If it had been a civilain level security system it would have been passed through by now. Unfortunatly whomever actually had, or did, own the ware house had decided to use only the highest level of security.

Two vehicles, full of enemies made their way into view but the shistavanen hybrid would be behind cover by then. As Eddard called a grenade the canine acolyte would already be drawing on one of his own destructive fruit sized ordenances and promptly thrown it. The fragmentation grenade would explode just underneath one of the technicals making it drop to the street and skid for a few meters as the sparks flew on either side. For the moment Hozan would otherwise remain hidden trying to wait fort the oposition to pile out of the vehicle and make themselves exposed.

@Nefieslab One turns left before port scanner is done​

 

[Eddard Thul Drast]

Eddard was getting really sick of this place and right now he wanted to get the hell out of here as quickly as possible. Thankfully Hozan seemed to have better luck than him and one of the technicals was destroyed and the men and women within it began to scramble out of the vehicle to get clear.

This was something Eddard had been waiting for so he waited until they were in just the right place before opening fire, gunning down the entire crew and passengers of the technical with careful, precise, shots.

No mistake this time - this time he wanted them dead and he was going to get his wish.

There was one technical load left and they were both still in cover enough that they weren't in any immediate danger but by the Gods he wanted the day to be over already.

@Darasuum

 

[Hozan]

____________

Looking at his wrist chrono Hozan slunk off from the confrontation to get back to the warehouse where his port scanner had finished working. He ran to the door and then into the office. He had his datapad connected and got as much of the information as he could from the terminal. There was not a lot of information stored the but the Acolyte would quickly grab and disconnect the devices. "I have the data. Let us leave this place." He said over the communications link so Eddard could hear.

After that he did not bother returning to where the reinforcing gangsters were. They could try to defend their losses but that would not matter to him. There was nothing of worth among the dead. he would head back to the ship, dashing down alleys and avoiding lights or the street.

@Nefieslab feel free to end the thread​

 

[Eddard Thul Drast]

Well.

Looked like they were all about done here!

Eddard poured on more fire around the cover with his pistol before straight up dropping the thing when it was empty. He had another on him that he drew to keep himself covered but the last volley would convince the tactical and the criminals that they were still fighting someone.

Instead he nodded along to Hozan as he made his way back into the building.

"Copy that."

Eddard would make his way out the back of the building, dash down a couple of streets and then turn a corner, suddenly not rushed at all as he blended in seemlessly with the other pedestrians.

/End
@Darasuum