SLAYER 7 (Chrysalide Hive)

[Nightmare Moon]

(Open to Jedi and GA affiliated characters)

Few of the resident's of the small town noticed the sick man wander in out of the wastes. He wasn't one of the fierce predators that occasionally attacked from the wilderness so the townsfolk left the strange green encrusted stranger be. Subsequently no one noticed when he fell down one of the towns wells and blissfully disintegrated ending his own suffering but causing the doom of all others who resided there.

Several weeks later the townspeople began to get sick and started to display strange emerald growths on their bodies. Some of the wandering beasts that stalked the townspeople took this as a sign of weakness and attacked. Several hours afterwards they had developed the same stigma and had joined the townsfolk in whatever strange enterprise they had now dedicated their existence to.

Finally the great green dome rose up above the desert encrusted tendrils shot out and caught all that flew above and roots burrowed beneath the earth drawing forth nutrients. The Chrysalide was tainting and warping all around it. If left unchecked the mutation would spread to more and more creatures till it became a full blown outbreak and severe measures would have to be utilised.


Rhathru flexed his neck as he sat in the back of a L.A.V driving across the desert his new armour was comfortable enough and fit well over his natural plates. Reports had come in that some form of strange biomass had been discovered by satellite in the location of what previously was a small but rather important mining town. Upon several Jedi masters seeing the incident it had been identified as the work of Chrysalidedation an ancient alchemical practice used by the Sith purebloods to create hordes of monsters and later adopted by the more modern Sith of the Empire. Something this virulent was uncommon in this day and age however and the event certainly demanded swift attention.

The Maelibus Jedi could spot the hive looming in the distance. The mission would not be easy fight their way inside and plant explosives after collecting a sample of the core hive tissue.

A sharp noise caused Rathru to turn his head something was circling above. Something ready to dive at the truck they were on. Drawing Jotun Rahtru aimed up one of the forms at it swooped. BOOOM. One of the creatures fell from the sky in a shower of lime coloured feathers. Another shot across the trucks hood talons ripping the armoured metal with surprising ease.

Ahead of the vehicle large cable like tendrils burst from the ground and began to flail towards the Lav hoping to tip it before it's occupants made it to their destination.

One of the mutated Raptors tried to peck at Rathru's face and was met with a punch that could kill a Barabel.

 

[Saul Perth]

Saul was adjusting to his borrowed suit of Esquire Slayer armor far better than he expected. On the whole, it only weighed about fifteen pounds and restricted his movements far less than he expected. His only gripe was the reduction in his field of vision due to the helmet, and in any other situation he would have simply not worn it. However, when ancient Sith mutating viral plagues are the lesson of the day, air filtration and complete skin coverage win out over peripheral vision. He was running over the information he'd received about the giant green dome that loomed on the horizon when his thoughts were interrupted by a screech from above.

Activating his lightsaber, Saul took a tight defensive stance, as he had little room to swing without endangering anybody else riding with him. Two of the mutated bird creatures swept down, attempting to make a dive at him. In a similar manner to deflecting blaster bolts, he intercepted the creatures with his blue colored blade. One of the creatures carcasses had landed on the floor by his feet, still keeping his defenses, Saul took a moment to inspect the creature.

Even if you considered a vulture, or whatever type of bird this used to be, beautiful, this was ugly. It's body was grossly deformed and covered in large sores, colored a sickening, unnatural green. Some of the sores were ruptured, spilling a disgusting green ooze onto the floor of the truck bed. Saul made sure to give the creature, even when dead, a wide berth. He was also glad he chose to defend himself with a lightsaber, rather than a force blade. There was no telling what that ooze could do if it touched you, and fatal wounds with a sword could produce showers of it.

 

[Necris]

Gol marvelled at his new suit of Esquire-Class slayer armour, he flexed his fingers in the new gauntlets as he made his approach looking at the helm laying in the seat beside him on the speeder seat, he looked at it as he turned the speed towards Rathru's locator signal. He'd considered a suit of the heavier Paladin armour but when he'd seen the specs for the armour he'd been concerned that his style of fighting would be restricted he favoured highly mobile flexible acrobatic combat so the lighter suit had been favourable, he was eager to fully test it in battle.

He looked to the collection of weapons beside the helm a pair of lightsaber his former masters and his cyan bladed lightsaber fashioned by his own hands a third hilt lay beside them similar in asthmatic to a lightsaber hilt the weapon was in face a force blade, the blade part of the sword a telescopic edge that extended to present a fifty inch single edged blade, he had spent many hours designing the blade and only the master forge smiths of Tython had been able to fashion it for him the weapon was a wondourus thing perfectly balanced to his hand, gene coded so only he could deploy the blade and with a slight blued finish it was considered a piece of art, he slowed the speeder as he approached spying the truck and climbed from the smaller vehicle collecting his weapons he hung his lightsaber from his hip and fixed the force blade to a clamp located at the small of his back, he held the helm under his arm as he joined the others his eyes turning to a new face.

"Saul, I hope you're not here because of my stories when we travelled to Ilum."

He turned to regard Rathru.

"The new armour suits you."

There was little time for more talk as a flock of raptors swooped from the sky towards them and tendrils erupted from the ground before them he lifted the right arm of his new armour utilising the inbuilt blaster he sent a hail of shots through the air ruining the crystalline winds of a trio of them before turning to the tendrils.

"Can you two deal with them?"

He leapt forward high into the air he drew his lightsabers the orange and blue blade arcing as he fell on top of the nearest tendril.

 

[Nightmare Moon]

"Aye Gol we shall make short work of them."

Rathru's gun grasped by the power of telekinesis made it's way through the air and into his holster. And out came the force blade wreaking skyward devastation with each swing the swords fiery aura burning the beasts to ashes even as it cut. On the ground the emerging tentacles lashed and writhed at Gol though such methods were of little effect on one who had the level of experience that the Duros had managed to acquire and he cut through the fleshy limb easily causing viscous ichor to ooze forth onto the ground.

Rhathru noted his students' precise strikes dispatching the avian abominations with controlled movements.

"I commend you on your form Saul. Swinging wildly runs the risk of cleaving your allies in combat and afterwards finding oneself alone and surrounded by enemies. Of course the Sith with their lack of control are prone to such behaviour and with some subtle goading they may in fact defeat themselves."

Rathru's speech was cut short as the vehicle beneath them was taken out from below by an emerging tentacle. Reaching out with telekinesis once more Rathru drew the explosives to himself as he flew through the air shaking the ground with a heavy thud as he landed on his knees.

"I think it's about time you stopped holding off getting your knighthood so you can bring your own padawan to worry about Gol" Rathru joked looking to see how the crash affected Saul. He doubted it would be anything major the boy's reflexes were good enough to spot It coming.

As they were closer now to the hive the structure began to spew forth it's second line of defence. The mutated townsfolk. The moved in low swift strides and though their demeanour was zombielike their speed was anything but. The leader of the attack covered a being so thickly in the green Chrysalide it looked like tainted jade armour leapt a full thirty feet across the sands for Gol while the others swarmed for Rathru and Saul.

 

[Saul Perth]

"I commend you on your form Saul. Swinging wildly runs the risk of cleaving your allies in combat and afterwards finding oneself alone and surrounded by enemies. Of course the Sith with their lack of control are prone to such behaviour and with some subtle goading they may in fact defeat themselves."

Saul had just opened his mouth to say 'thank you' to his Master, when the truck was flung into the air from below. Despite the power of the blow dealt to the truck, he managed to maintain his footing, watching as his master jumped to safety. Being airborne was nothing new to the Padawan and his Ataru style, and rather than immediately jump free, he stayed put for a split second more.

Having time to gauge the rate the truck was spinning, Saul leapt from the vehicle. Using it's rotational momentum to propel him into the air, he managed to dispatch two more of the bird creatures before deactivating his blade and transferring it into his left hand. Nearing the ground, he tucked into a tight ball and rolled smoothly along the ground, transferring the impact force into forward motion. He emerged from his roll on his left knee, right arm leveled with his wrist blaster firing into the oncoming horde.

"Worry about me?" Saul joked, "I just held up to make sure they didn't follow you down into the crater you made and get you in the back."

 

[Necris]

He smiled back at Rathru as he cleaved through the tendril.

"Maybe I will put in the request if we make it out of this one."

He looked towards the dome in the distance rolling to one side as the leader landed before Kim swinging his arms down in great crushing arcs.

"That's a long way, maybe I should carry the bombs I'm faster than you."

His sword flashed up taking the wrist of the leader but it hardly slowed the clubbing attack which a sent him rolling across the floor his lightsaber blocked the second attack fracturing the crystal limb and obliterating the warped flesh beneath, he twisted to his feet and put the sword through the unfortunates throat twisting the blade he released the grip as a second attack came for him turning away he swapped his lightsaber and ignited the second one slashing up through the woman's groin, she parted up to the chest where the crystals were the thickest before tumbling from the blade.

Altered to the leader behind him he turned the force shield activating on his left arm the small disk of energy taking the full force of the powerful blow before shorting out while his feet scored lines in the ground the ground where he was pushed back.

A crystalline blade formed from the exposed stump of the leaders intact arm as it turned to face him, he dropped into a low ready stance blades wide as it came towards him. It swung the grown weapon at him crashing it against his lightsaber sending shards of crystals showering from it some of the peices narrowly missing his face.

"Damn wish I was wearing my helm, but its under the truck now."

He sidestepped kicking the leader in the midsection before using the force to pull a second enemy into the path of the leader who battered his comrade aside splitting the male open with the crystal blade.

"I could do without losing my other eye."

 

[Nightmare Moon]

"Catch"

Rathru hurled the bomb towards Gol. There was little danger in the deice going off prematurely as it was both made of reinforced and insulated durasteel and activated only via a eight digit number inserted on the control panel which the slayers had memorised before the mission.

There was little time for Rathru to congratulate himself however as the horde began to mill about him scratching and biting at his armour with their claws. Breaking ones torso and head into small chunks with a well placed kick he stabilised himself and then swung cleaving three of the mutants in half at the torso. He was just about to turn and do the same when something behind him struck him with a great amount of force. With a grunt of frustration and pain Rathru swung with his pommel knocking back a huge figure overgrown with green crystals to the point of being unrecognisable. It was larger than a human in any case and clearly wanted a piece of Rathru. It charged him again and he put his sword deep in it's side. The growth seemingly with a mind of its own started to travel up Rathru's sword at an alarming rate attempting to engulf his hands. A quick flare of the blades flaming aura both evaporated and purified the substance in seconds. Unfortunately Rathru received a pile driver like blow from the arm attached to the unharmed shoulder knobbly emerald growths adding to the force of the hit. In his helmet Rathru tasted his own blood feeling a tooth become loose in it's socket.

In response Rathru activated force valor enhancing his already considerable strength to a supernatural level and divided the monster first horizontally then vertically.

Stepping over it's remains he faced his next batch of opponents.

 

[Saul Perth]

While the wrist blaster was a neat toy, it proved mostly ineffective against the oncoming horde. Saul's hail of blaster bolts hardly managed to bring down one of the mutations before he was forced to cease fire and draw his lightsaber. To prevent being swarmed he kept himself in constant motion, these creatures were fast, but so was he. A rough estimate from the vantage point of the apex of a Force jump suggested about one third of the creatures had begun to follow him off to the side, this was good, a little bit more positioning and he could have a straight shot to the dome, whenever Gol decided to break for it.

In the meantime, Saul focused on further thinning the ranks about him. With more space availible, he was finally free to utilize more standard Ataru attacks, striking down or dismembering monsters in pairs or more with quick combination slashes while still maintaining his distance. As the creatures began to catch up and draw closer, he relied on the time tested maneuver dubbed 'Saber Swarm' by the old Masters of the form. Keeping his blade in constant, quick, circular motions to attack rapidly without sacrificing defense. Finally it seemed their numbers were beginning to thin, at times he could see Gol or Rathru fighting through the mess of bodies. He kept a close eye on Gol, ready to break for the dome when he did.

 

[Necris]

The lightsabers flew from his hands twisting in the air they cut through a throng of enemy as he charged the leader leaping he planted a foot square in his chest rocking him back but that was not the point of the attack his hand clamped round the force sword and he twisted as he sprang over the cyrstaline creature the blade shone blue as it cut shattering the face and skull as he landed he summoned his lightsabers back to him he ducked another attack and dispatched the enemy with a vicious reverse slash cutting it in half.

A third enemy charged him and he lifted the creature from the floor holding it a distance from him he charged forward using the unfortunate as a ram to force though a hole before casting it into a formation of what appeared to be three people merged into a great hulking beast he sprang up foot slamming into what appeared to be its head his sword hacking aside a limb as it lunged toward him, he leapt past it leaving it to Rathru and broke into a spring his form becoming a blur as the force surged through his limbs powering his dash.

Clearing the enemy he slowed his legs burning from his surge forward he leap for the dome point of his sword angled down to smash through the crystalline surface.

 

[Nightmare Moon]

Rathru became a maelstrom delivering devastating blows with his blade turning all the mutants that came near him into little more than steaming piles of entrails and corrupted flesh. Two more of the larger aberrants came for Rathru and began to try to beat him down. Force speed , Valor and an adrenalin rush that would kill a Sabrak however meant that he did not even feel the blows and he half cut half bludgeoned the spawn into suppression. With Saul and Rathru's efforts the ex townsfolk had begun to thin majorly and the remainders sensing their hive was in danger began to dash and scarper back to their nesting ground as fast as they could.

Inside the dome like structure light filtered down from above glistening through translucent panelling that resembled stretched skin. Beneath the floors one could see newly forming mutants still trapped in embryotic fluid. But this was unimportant to Gol currently. Two thing in the room were about to impact his destiny firstly the pillar containing the core biomass where the sample woud be collected and the bomb places and the Hive guardian a 20 foot long serpentine being with four scythe tipped arms that slithered across the floor towards him making no sound as it glided across the fibrous floor.

It's eyeless head turned towards Gol and it spat forth a glob of super heated plasma towards the Duros warrior. The substance was highly corrosive and would certainly be deadly if not well evaded.

Outside Rathru having caight up took his blade to the side of the wall tearing a sizeable gap for himself and Saul.

 

[Saul Perth]

After finishing off a few stragglers, Saul caught up to Rathru just as he was cutting a hole in the wall of the dome. As the final cut was made, he dipped under the colossal blade and entered the dome, grabbing the mechanism used to collect the sample from his master's belt as he passed.

His plan was to make a straight run past the giant creature and collect the sample. But priority one was getting the explosives planted, and the monster had Gol occupied. They would have to bring it down before they could finish their work.

Attempting to draw the creature away from Gol, Saul opened fire with his wrist blaster. The creature didn't seem damaged, but it sure seemed angry. It closed the distance remarkably fast as Saul readied himself. A massive talon slashed through an embryonic sac with ease, the strike missing him, now perched on the deflating sac, by mere inches. Dodging another strike, he lept from his perch into the air, managing to sever one of the creature's talons.

In a rage, the creature delivered a crushing blow with the remainder of it's upper right arm, knocking Saul out of the air and slamming him against the dome wall. The sheer force of impact left him hanging on the wall temporarily, before falling to his knees. Darkness encroached over his vision as Saul struggled to remain conscious.

 

[Nightmare Moon]

Watching his padwan take a crushing blow from the hive guardian Rathru knew he had to move fast. The serpentine creature's focus was now entirely on the human padwan. His plan had worked even though the fruits of his action were far from pleasant (In Rathru's experience they very rarely were) but now the danger was immense as the youngster was dropping in and out of consciousness. Something drastic had to be attempted to prevent tragedy.

Rathru focused.

The strength of a Maelibi was already a great and terrible thing to behold but the alchemic beasts of the sith possessed a level of fortitude that defied all natural laws of the universe. Drawing his titanic sword up Rathru knew that this would be either a terrible failure or a deed worthy of song. He needed to put his trust in the force and let loose with everything he had.

And thus Rathru did pouring every ounce of strength he had into the blow and activating the skill force valor till it was physically painful to do so.

The blade seemed to erupt into life moving with the speed and force of a comet it's golden flames kindled into a wild inferno.

The chrysalide flesh seemed to melt before the blade even touched it disintegrating entirely as the swords body passed through. And swiftly there was nothing left to show the beast had even existed save for the massive scorch marks that dug gashes into the floor of the hive.

His breathing laboured Rathru grabbed for his padawan's arm to drag the boy from the place. Medical attention would be necessary. The Maelbus turned to leave from the hole.

"Gol - get the bomb off and we'll meet you back at base"

Rathru spoke before exiting the hive. Rathru knew that heavy trauma was far more lethal to humans (especially younger ones) than his kind and that if unchecked it could cause severe problems later on. Saul had shown a good deal of valor during the last fight however and Rathru was proud of the padawan. Drawing the enemy even at your own expense was a sign of true courage and should be commended. With that sort of spirit Saul would be able to easily resist the temptations of the darkside and make a name for himself in the process. But he needed to survive first and thus Rathru departed the scene trusting the demolitions to his old comrade and friend.

 

[Saul Perth]

Drifting back and forth from the waking world, Saul was barely aware of what was going on around him. He could see the ground sliding below, although he knew he wasn't moving under his own power, he couldn't completely process why he was moving before darkness took him again.

The next time he awoke, he noticed the ground was different. He was out, out of where, he didn't know. He couldn't shake the thought of the color green. That was it, he was out of the green. His vision began to fade to black again, but this time he forced the darkness back from where it came, he had to think. What was green? An egg? No, a dome. Why was he in a dome? As he began to think harder on the dome, hazy thoughts began to form, then suddenly, it all came back to him.

His memory returned with the image of the massive creature striking him before his eyes, clear as day. He coughed up a bit of blood as his body remembered something else, pain, alot of it. It hurt to breath, his chest felt like he didn't have a single rib left unbroken. A horrible pain, managing to even distinguish itself from his ribs, emanated from his left shoulder, at best dislocated. Saul caught a glimpse of Rathru's armored boots and felt a small amount of calm as he slipped back into unconsciousness. He was safe for now at least.

 

[Necris]

He tucked his weapons away they were only a burden to him now as he surged forward leaping over obstacles he landed at the root of the hive kneeling he placed the charge and activated the device syncing it to the transmitter built into his armour he stood to make his escape following Rathru and Saul something appeared in the corner of his vision and he turned.

"Oh..."

He pitched back with enough force to crack his armour the suits warnings bleeping insitantly at him as the seals were broken he landed hard feeling the filtration plugs on his ribs pulling painfully but they held he regarded the guardian with narrow eyes audit turned its attention to the bomb.

He pushed himself to his feet as it reached for it with long crystalline pincers turning to guage the distance to the opening which was sealing shut even as he regarded it he turned and ran pushing all of his force power into his legs surging himself forward his visage became a blur as he sent the signal to the bomb and leapt the sucking air of the detonation pulled at him but his momentum was greater and he passed through the hole rolling as the explosion erupted fire engulfing the inside of the dome, he landed in a roll coming to his feet he could see Rathru in the distance with Saul and he angled his run towards them as the dome cracked and collapsed in on itself, a secondary explosion sounded and this time the force of the blast took him from his feet as the dome was utterly destroyed, dust and splinters rained down around him and he coughed through the grime as he picked himself up again and staggered in the general direction of the transport.