Galactic Domination Chapter 3: Terror at the Flame Tygah Tavern

GALACTIC DOMINATION

{ Chapter 3: Terror at the Flame Tygah Tavern }

162 ABY, approximately six months before the Darksider invasion on Grand Master Bathors New Je’daii order.

Location: Ryo District, Planet Shikaakwa, Tython System, The Deep Core

{{ Prologue: Pirate Cass Gemini, Captain of the galaxy’s best espionage starship “The Midnight Runner” and her crew have very reluctantly found themselves in the employ of Sith Lord Falkors own personal fleet. A station that the escaped Eternal Sith Empires prisoner of war plans to make very short lived.

Their first mission, to contact the Darkside regime's Master of Shadows at a back ally tavern in the slums of Planet Shikaakwas Ryo District. From there they are to access and raid the New Je’daii orders’ recently discovered Temple of unknown origins on the nearby planet of Ska Gora. The mysterious underground structure's entrance is reported to be on the Eastern Forrest of a mostly uninhabited place called the Vally of Kraau.

After finally gaining access to the Flame Tyga Tavern in Ryo, the dark woman was indeed waiting for Cass, her Nautolan first mate Anmetei M’lo and her charismatic pilot Redman Reed. The Darth, a lightly framed Sarkhai woman shrouded all in black clothing quickly introduced herself as Darth Caecus and outlined a new plan to get access to Ska Gora undetected.

A plan that didn’t involve using the Midnight Runners unique capabilities, but instead involved laying a trap at the crumbling ruins of Ryo Fortress for a young female Je’daii Ranger who had been tracking the Shadow Master on Shikaakwa for several days. Cass and her two accompanying crew mates, it seemed, were set to be the bait. Our Story Continues…….  ))

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It was well past midnight when the Je’daii Ranger Sigrid Ironstrike left the Flame Tygah Tavern in the slums of Shakaakwas old Ryo district. The young woman’s mind was still suffering from the effects of what she had just witnessed moments earlier, was she going crazy? Her stomach churned and she felt like she would vomit all over the dirty cobblestone alleyway. In her twenty five years of life she had not witnessed such a thing and she couldn’t help but replay the sequence of events leading up to the scene over and over in her mind..

The young Ranger, a broad shouldered human woman with a muscular physique for a female stood just shy of two meters tall. Her sandy blond hair which she almost always wore down with two side plaits, along with her sapphire blue eyes were a common physical characteristic among her family members. The Ironstrikes were a hardy clan of weapon smiths and crafters going back over twenty generations on her home world of Ator. Sigrid was no different and had been pressed to learn her family’s most basic craft as a blacksmith's apprentice before the Galactic Civil war destroyed her planet. It was then she had pledged her commitment to join the Je’daii order with the goal to avenge her family. It was several years later that she had finally changed that goal from murder to bettering the Tython system in the name of the order.

She had been on Shakaakwa for almost six days now. It wasn’t her choice of course, she would have rather still been on Tython or better yet Nox if it was up to her. But here she was, her location a result of the Je’daii orders standard policy that active Rangers engage in regular patrols across the Tython system as Grand Master Bathor secures and reshapes it for a brighter and better future. She understood that it was important for her to be here, that the law was upheld and the Je’daii assisted in keeping the peace. She also agreed to what Master Bal Darsten had told her, that spending time among the less sociable places in the system also made Rangers more responsible and resourceful members of the order. But no amount of time out in the lower class communities could have prepared her for a night like this.

Following up on a lead on a potential Sith artefact sale in Ryo, Ranger Sigrid Ironstrike arrived at the Flame Tygah Tavern right before the Cloddogran doorman had begun turning away any more patrons. Not something that was unusual as the tavern did seem rather busy this evening and so she gave it no further thought. The large blond woman had quickly found herself a seat after ordering a mug of fizz water which she made a point of not drinking due to the brownish off putting colour it seemed to have when she was handed the beverage. Instead she scanned the room and opened her senses to any hints of unusual dark energy that may have appeared to help guide her in finding her missions target.

There had been a few times in her stay on Shakaakwa where she had felt such darkness brush against her mind. They were only fleeting however these dark force encounters and normally while she was in meditation and more open to the force. The touches of darkness ranging from a few seconds to half a minute but even still were quite powerful and often she would need to meditate on Ashlas light afterwards in order to maintain her own force balance. Powerful yes, but still nowhere near alarming enough to indicate the presence of an actual real life agent of the darkside. So when she had suddenly heard of a sith artefact being present on the planet, all the pieces of the puzzle had finally fallen into place for her. Or so she had thought.

It had taken around half an hour inside that seedy, smoke filled tavern before she had finally felt what she was searching for. The cold touch of the darkside revealing itself to her once again was like an intense breath of icy wind hitting her skin that made the hairs stand up on the back of her neck. Not dissimilar to the winds of the Ice Giant range she had experienced so often while training at Stav Kesh under her mentor Temple Master Terrogate.

It happened just as a group of three patrons entered the tavern she noticed as she looked around for the possible cause. The trio followed the grey skinned man that had been guarding the door wearing an overly long almost dress length red shirt and an ugly brown cap. One of them, a ruggedly attractive human man with bright blue eyes, broke off from the other two and followed him up the stairs into a private room with a tray of drinks. Odd, she thought as judging by the several females standing around the landing in skimpy clothing that those rooms seemed to be reserved for “pleasurable encounters.” But then again she wasn’t one to judge others' tastes. She herself had an attraction to dark skinned, brown eyed females rather than the blond, muscular white skinned males common of her homeworld. A fact she had closely hidden from her own parents right up until their deaths at the hands of the Sith. Then again, perhaps what she saw was also just a clever ruse.... perhaps that’s where the exchange was to happen? It would be smart to conduct business in private rather out in the open, even if there were only drunken dock workers and local alcoholics drinking away their rent money in attendance, she thought to herself.

Trying her best to come up with an answer on where she needed to further put her investigative efforts she mindfully kept her senses open as she followed the two with her eyes but quickly realised once the door had closed behind them that the dark energy she felt was not coming from the room above, but the tavern level below where she herself was sitting. Towards a corner booth in fact, the very spot the two others that entered with the handsome human man had now gone and had sat down. The two in question, a large white skinned Nautolan male and a smaller humanoid woman with jet black hair. The Je’daii Ranger soon also realised that they weren’t alone.

Sigrid sat looking but without staring at the group and put conscious effort into remaining open to the force. She focused on the corner booth and quickly familiarised herself with the individuals who sat there and their individual force signatures. It was strange however, the dark dressed woman who had seemingly been there the whole time waiting for the two was impossible to read in the force. That in itself wasn’t a cause for any major alarm, not yet at least. There were species throughout the galaxy that gave off no force or life signature she knew such as the Yuuzhan Vong for example, but Sigrid made a mental note of it all the same as it was certainly not normal.

Keeping such a close eye in a small space without it being obvious was certainly not the easiest of tasks, but an occasional glance while pretending to drink her disgusting cup of brown fizz water seemed to do the trick as the three remained locked in heavy conversation for around the next twenty minutes to half an hour. There was still no real evidence for her to act on during this time, but that was of course only until she had finally seen it. It was only partially visible as the woman dressed all in black with her face hidden slid the item that was presumably concealed in her garb from her own hand and into the female wearing a rebreather's hand. It was to others, surely quite a well disguised move but Sigrid's keen eyes had seen it clearly. A parcel wrapped in old cloth, thin and straight. A sith dagger or even a small scroll of some kind perhaps? It mattered little to the ranger what the item was of course, only that it needed to be confiscated immediately and taken to the Je’daii stasis vault at the temple of martial arts, and as soon as possible. After that, the Je’daii and their seers would investigate the trail of darkness back to its origins and snuff out any further threat its evil taint may have created.

It was at that moment however, that something much more unexpected occurred. A sharp spike of darkness surrounded her mind and pulled her attention from the deal going ahead in the corner and to the rooms above. This time was not like a gust of icy wind, but more like a crushing, all smothering blanket of darkness swamping her senses from above. A voice screamed out in horror inside her mind and then was suddenly silenced.. There was death here now she knew, and not a good death. One that was unexpected and born completely of fear and of pain.

A sudden loud slam from a door above immediately got everyone within earshots attention and with the distraction Sigrid took the chance to spring into action. Force jumping quickly up and across the tavern she used Telekinesis to land as softly as a Cathar onto the wooden landing above, but far enough away from the ruckus as not to be seen. She turned just in time to see the back of a male, the same one who had accompanied the Cloddogran making his way quickly down the steps. Against her core instincts however instead of following him she decided to investigate further, and once he completely descended the old wooden staircase she made her way towards the wide open doorway.

The old wooden door was buckled off its top hinges she noticed as Sigrid made her way past it and into the small bedroom. The blond ranger suddenly dry retched from the harsh and unexpected smell that smacked her in the face as she entered. It was so awful and so thick it assaulted her senses without mercy causing her eyes to water and her stomach to try and void itself. A mixture of ozone and burnt flesh and rotting meat. With one hand the Ranger pulled her robe up to cover her nose and breathed through her mouth to try and lessen the effects. The room was as standard as one would expect from such an old and rundown establishment in one of the poorest areas of the system.

The same faded grey wooden timber constructed the walls and flooring and with little to no attention paid to furnishings, housekeeping or decoration. Dull and unremarkable was an understatement, with a single bed pressed against the side of the wall, a chair in the corner and a set of medium height draws with several missing knobs on the far wall. Along the adjacent wall to the draws was the only other door in the room, most likely a private refresher Sigrid guessed, it was closed but clearly unlocked and its light was on.

On the floor in front of her was an upturned tray and several mugs lying on their sides, all around the obviously dropped tray of drinks was what looked to be a small pool of amber ale covering the wooden floor. Whatever had happened here, it happened soon after they had been brought to the room as it was only several feet from the entrance Sigrid deduced. The bed in the corner was unkempt and its uncomfortable looking blanket was thrown back haphazardly. Despite those factors nothing in the room seemed out of place save for a small splattering of fresh blood leading a deep red trail to the refresher door she’d already noticed.

Sigrid approached slowly, the light behind the door shone from the gap around the frame but the ranger was unaware at what she would find inside, although a quick scan through the force reversed that there were no sentient lifeforms present beyond the door. The young ranger took a deep breath then lowered her hand from her robes and gripped her lightsaber. Her other hand reached out infront of her and opened the wooden door with an eerie audible creek. What she saw next would haunt her the rest of her days she knew. Fighting against the stench she turned the iron handle and pulled, opening the door to reveal a refresher room. And inside it two naked yet very dead bodies piled up on the floor.

One of the corpses she immediately recognised as the Cloddogran doorman, which embarrassing enough she now identified as having actually been a woman, not a man like she had assumed due to the deep voice and facial hair. Although, and this was the confusing part, she had only just witnessed the woman enter the room not even an hour prior yet surprisingly this body looked like it had already started to decompose. By at least three or so days she had guessed..

Sigrid continued to inspect the body from several feet away, not wanting to get much closer because in addition to the infinitely bad smell coming from it, a small fleet of black flies had already claimed the space in close proximity to the grey skinned alien body and she had no idea what kind of diseases they may have been carrying. Peering through the swirling cloud of flies she had noticed the wounds were all to the woman’s torso, blackened and cartarised like they were made by a lightsaber… in actuality they were exactly like the wounds from a lightsaber. Sigrid wondered who would have done this to a woman who, judging by the lack of clothing or belongings, was of no apparent stature, worth or power? And why? The woman’s clothes and hat lay in a pile in the corner of the floor and Sigrid wondered why someone would do such a thing after going through the effort to remove them?

The Ranger quickly moved her attention to the second corpse positioned on the floor of the small private refresher room. This one was not grey, but a pinkish tanned colour and looked to be a much more recent kill. Barely an hour or so old and on inspection confirmed that it was a human male however his clothes were nowhere to be seen. His wounds were made from the same weapon it seemed, but unlike the first victim this man had been decapitated, several fingers severed clean off and also missing. While the human man’s body lay motionless on the floor atop the remains of the Cloddogran woman, his head was turned backwards and placed in the nearby sink. Sticky blood and plasma slowly oozed out of its blackened wound and down the drain hole.

Sigrid approached slowly and reached out with her arm in order to identify the severed head. Lightsaber still gripped tightly with her other hand she grabbed the scalp by its short dark hair and lifting it she turned the head to face her. Instantly Sigrid released her grip in bewilderment and took a step backward. The human severed head bounced once in the basin and then rolled onto its side, the man’s dead blue eyes looking up at her were unfocused, wide open and unblinking. The ranger had noticed the nose had also been forcefully broken and semi crushed back into his head. The gruesome kill was not the thing that bothered her the most however. The most disturbing thing in fact was reality that the lifeless face that now was looking back up at her was the very face of the man who had followed the Cloddogran woman up the stairs just an hour prior. And yet, she had also seen him leave this very room and descend the steps with her own two eyes just moments ago.. There was nothing here that made sense to her but by Je’daii order it was now up to her to catch the killer before he strikes again.

Sigrid took another step back, wiped the hand she had used to lift the severed head on her robes and attempted to gather her thoughts. Whoever had killed these people and presumably then taken their identity had done so for a reason. She couldn’t help but to assume it had something to do with the Sith artefact changing ownership tonight. Quickly she turned around, she needed to leave fast and pick up the trail of the one responsible. Or at the very least those with the artefact. Deep down she had a strange feeling that finding one would somehow result in finding the other and so she fled the room with all haste. But as she exited the room and looked down from the landing, she saw that the man and the three previously sitting in the booth below had already left the tavern. The hunt was on.

~\*~

Outside of the Flame Tygah Tavern a few moments later Sigrid took a deep breath and quietened her mind as she stretched out with the force into her surroundings. The young ranger desperately searching for the direction of her targets. All traces of the dark force energy had now completely abandoned her she realised as she immersed herself, the strong dark energies that had hit her like a tsunami now retreated back into the force just as fast as they had appeared. Sigrids hot breath created fog blooms in the cold air as she drew on her training now to locate and keep her focus on a specific being, the life force signature of the raven haired woman from the booth. Her life force read with the sensation of an individual who had lived and then been reborn through immense pain and was unmistakable. Its unique energy guided her like brightly lit beacons amongst the dark shadows of the alleys nearby towering ruins.

Sigrid set off at pace, her muscles aided with the power of the force she moved like the wind through the cobblestone streets of Ryo and snaked her way towards the fortress ruins. Sensing herself closing in she slowed to that of a slow cautious walk, her right hand gripping her lightsaber tight and her mind intent on retrieving the Sith artifact as well the killer.