Built from the shell of an ancient foundation, the Arx Colosseum has undergone renovations to allow multiple new configurations for battle. Its spectator setup remains largely the same, with high walls, tall enough for even the most savvy Jedi to find unscalable that lead up to spectator chairs which are divided into nearly organized sections to accommodate several thousand people. At the center, an elongated platform “box” contains a central throne of stone with various seats of smaller scale lined beside it in both directions. Two large holo-projection screens are set up on each side of the Colosseum, offering different angles of the match bia holocam drones.

Today’s setup is known as The Shanty Town.

Hundreds of shipping containers line the arena floor, some stacked tall, others singular obstacles forming the walls of a complex maze. Each has been converted to function as housing, windows, doors, even furnishments added to further sell the illusion of it being a living town.

While the only real life contained within is today’s combatants, that is far from the only level of danger found within.

Dozens of armed and battle-ready droids hide in wait. Turrets and barricades line the narrow passageways of the town. Expertly hidden mines wait to trigger with every step. Make no mistake, the Shanty Town is ready to kill all who enter it. Embracing its chaos, and surviving is no easy feat.

The Jedi High Councillor rested against a shipping container, eyes closed, as the Force beckoned. The provocative tug held him in place as he fought his impatience. He reached out and could feel the mechanical death machines mounted around the corner. 

He could feel the current flowing through each wire, could smell the rust collecting on the armor plating, taste the oil of the gyro as the strategically placed turrets abade their programming. 

The Jedi had been adept with machinery from a very young age. The Force fed him the insight he needed in order to wade through the complex assortment of parts and functions. Eventually that intuition carried over to people, even though they were much more complicated. 

Surrounding him were containers once used for shipping, built into homes, shops, and various forms of habitation. seemingly abandoned. Emptied of all life but the whirring of droid motivators laying in wait. They couldn't hide from the Techweaver, not when he was completely tapped into his surroundings. Yet even among the comfortable chaos of mechanisms, he picked up on the presence of something else. Something organic, no, someone. Remember, to Gui, sentients were much more complicated. So it was faint. More like a whisper in the dark. 

His hand slid down to the shoto lightsaber at his waist. The carefully selected pontite crystal that fed the tool of the Jedi was ideal for the type of situation he was currently forced to face. 

Taking a deep breath, he stepped around the corner, his hood sliding back ever-so-slightly from the motion. Caught in the cross breeze as he ignited his lightsaber. The blade was a burnt orange color but vibrant as the digitized energy thrummed with excitement. The turrets that Gui had noticed through the Force turned as expected and fired their volley. 

The Kiffar's left hand guided the blade in a way that allowed him to swat away the shots as if they were the annoying Bog-flies of Hutta. Marvelous red beams of light being jettisoned from the tip of the ember blade. Returned to sender as they met with explosive force. Enough to render the turrets heaping piles of slag. 

He grinned as he flourished the blade, not because he needed to, but for flavor, as slow clapping from above caught his attention. His Emerald eyes shifted towards the sound and standing atop one of the containers was an Elder of the Brotherhood. A woman he immediately recognized as the silhouette stepped into full form. 

“The flame of Tarentae!” Gui shouted as he eyed her unique montrals, taking note of her markings and figure. 

Tahiri wasted no time as she reached for her weapon and stepped to the edge of the container. 

“It burns hotter than ever.” She replied, casting a slight smirk of her own. “The new champion.” 

“Is that right?” Gui tilted his head. 

Tahiri relinquished an eerie giggle as she did a backflip out of sight and immediately calmed her Force signature. There was silence. A spooky silence. A lingering silence. He felt her presence softly as it waxed and waned. Complicated.

The Kiffar’s eyes narrowed and shifted to and fro as he tried to lock onto any sign of her presence. But faint footsteps caused him to look one way before being mislead to look another by that same enigmatic giggle.

“Games, huh?” 

“No games.” 

The voice caused him to turn in shock as he simultaneously heard the activation of a lightsaber. As he turned, a red blade stabbed forward, streaking past his face by a mere centimeters. Had he not trusted his instincts, the blade would have burned through that thick skull of his. He stepped back and ignited his main lightsaber, the same color as his shoto, and went to bash her blade. Yet, instead of blocking the attack, she disengaged her saber causing Gui to miss and momentarily step out of balance. 

He looked over his shoulder at her and she simply winked before backing into a thick shadow between two containers. Her signature once again became difficult to read.

“Very well.” Gui groaned, careful not to let his emotions get the better of him as he centered himself and dove into the processors of the droids he could feel nearest to him. “My friend, I need your scanners. Lead the way.” He opened his eyes as the door in front of him flung open and one of the machines once programmed for unbiased aggression turned its head to an organic signature. Gui's eyes followed.

She observed the droid that had come out of one of the makeshift storage container buildings as it turned its head her way.

Well, well. This’ll be a little less fun to play, but he’ll still have to rely on the droid to find me. Delving into the river of the Force, letting it seep into her muscles, she jumped from wall-to-wall to a second story window and opened it. She poked her head back out into the alley for a moment. “Let’s see if you and your new friend can keep up, High Councillor.”

Tahiri sent out a mental message to an ally of her own, Hadzuska, her vornskr. The sleek creature wasn’t too far away and had already been stalking a couple of the droids that were patrolling a few containers over. After receiving his alpha’s message, the vornskr deviated from his current pursuit, taking a slightly different path to meet up with her. Pausing in an alleyway across the way, he watched the tall man and a droid enter one of the three-storied container buildings. Sniffing his surroundings carefully, he waited a moment before following behind, focusing on both of them, waiting for his opportunity to strike when needed.

Quickly and carefully, Tahiri made her way through the ramshackle building toward the roof. Musing to herself as she made her way to the best even dueling ground she could think of at the moment. It had been awhile since she had fought with, or even against a Jedi, let alone one who was in tune with technology. The Adept had researched the best she could, looking through all of the possible opponents within this tournament, knowing that it was possible that she’d be pitted against friends as well as those she was not familiar with.

This Jedi was not a friend, even so, the main points she knew was that; he is the Consul of Odan-Urr, and that he was an obstacle in her path in the preliminaries of this event. Even as things were, she still wanted a good fight, to test her skills and to see what he could do. Keeping to the shadows and watching what he did next was fascinating, especially with him being a Techweaver.

Knowing there was the possibility of finding mines and turrets around any corner, the petite Togruta stayed light on her feet. Hearing the droid and Kiffar coming further into the house and toward her location, the Elder raced up the stairs, mostly ignoring the pressure building in the back of her mind, trying to focus on creating and preparing to project the image in her mind's eye. If it wasn’t for the Force suddenly screaming at her to stop, she would’ve walked into the path of shrapnel and fire as a mine went off three meters from the top of the landing.

She looked over her shoulder and raised an eyebrow, smirking while she called out, “Oooh, I see. Well played. I have my tricks, and you have yours. Just so we’re clear on this, Jedi. I’m aiming to win, not kill. I’d rather not have our best fighters taken out of commission in case the Brotherhood or the clans get attacked again.”

Gui said nothing in response as he charged up the stairs.

Tahiri continued her banter, “you se-” she was cut off as Gui roared upon reaching the top of the stairs. The droid led the charge as a distraction. She yelped as Gui ducked low, taking her by surprise as he wrapped his arms around her waist. Hoisted her onto his shoulder, and leapt through the window she would have slipped through had Gui taken just a moment longer.

The two tumbled out and crashed to a large open area, a makeshift courtyard atop shipping containers. Tahiri was more graceful with her landing as she twisted in mid-air so that she landed in a three point stance. Gui was not as graceful, not as much as he used to be, cybernetics were cumbersome. But his face broke his fall. It was truly a miracle of the Force that he lived to reach his current age.

Tahiri's red blade hissed to life as she was clearly upset by the exchange. The darkside welled up in the form of controlled aggression as her eyes narrowed and became focused.

Gui pushed himself up and dusted off his robe with that sickening smirk that was well known throughout the Brotherhood.

“Gotcha,” he winked, “now we-” the humming cry of the droid caused him to turn as it merely fell out of the window, ever the obedient servant, the sickening crunch made the Consul wince and chuckle.

“Whoops.. now, where were we, oh yes?!” He raised his left hand out to his side and the hilt clipped to his waist fluttered to his waiting palm. He activated the three blades, two made up the cross-guard, and he flourished his blade into a rooted Djem So stance.

“Oh I'm gonna enjoy wiping that smirk off your face, Kiffar.”

“Half Kiffar actually. But it's your move.” Typical of a Jedi, to bait and wait.

Tahiri swept in low using the Force to propel herself forward and just like that. After a block from Gui. A fast paced duel broke out. The blades danced, sizzled, screeched, and popped as heavy thumping music was played through the loud speaker of the VIP box.

The two paused to catch their breath.

“Idris?”

“Idris..” Tahiri huffed.

With dual shrugs, they were back at it as quickly as a Boonta Eve Podracer broke out of the gate. Tahiri was graceful with her approach as she worked her blade in tight coils while Gui, the battering ram, bashed her blade away with brute force and leverage. Yet even as Gui parried her attacks. She was relentless as she was able to quickly redirect into a flow of non-stop counters.

One such counter crashed down from on high but Gui caught it, leaned in, and trapped her blade against his own. He growled as he pressed his attack and the Force tore from his body into a blast that would have sent her stumbling had she not sensed it and spun. His blade followed through and scorched one of the containers. Tahiri, masterful with her approach, sidestepped and with a reverse grip whipped the tip of her blade into Gui's exposed shoulder.

He howled in agony as the crimson blade melted through his flesh like a hot knife through Bantha butter. She could taste blood as she went in for a followup attack but was immediately thrown off as the mechanical maintenance arm attached to his robes flicked out to break her concentration. She growled and cleaved it in two but Gui, like a rising Phoenix, bit back the pain and capitalized on the opening by bringing the butt of his hilt straight up into the Togruta's jaw.

Blasted from her feet by the force of the blow, she slammed onto her back and fought back the stars flashing in her vision. Groaning and rapidly blinking, she focused long enough to get her blade up as Gui swung down on her with a one handed stroke. Her blade hissed as it caught his and stopped it within inches of her body.

“Yield.” He grit his teeth. “It's over.”

Tahiri struggled against his strength.

Seconds felt like an eternity and just as her muscles began to give out. She shifted and disengaged her blade while shouting. “Never!”

Gui's smirk quickly faded as she evaded the inevitable and reignited her weapon outside of his strike zone. The tip of her weapon snaked behind his guard and pierced his side before flourishing into a sweep that caught Gui's hilt and the cybernetic right hand wielding it.

The Jedi, more shocked than anything, slumped backwards just looking at the glowing metal where fingers used to be. The VIP box erupted with claxons as the judges deemed him unable to continue as medical droids clamored out onto the makeshift courtyard. Gui fell flat as discouragement washed over him.

“Maybe next time, kid.” She mocked him and blew him a kiss before grabbing her throbbing jaw. “Was fun.”

Moving and stretching her jaw, she waved off the first medical droid that managed to get atop the containers and tried to come over to check her out, pointing over at Gui, “Tend to him first, I’ll be fine.”

Focusing on the spot where his hilt had caught her in the jaw, the Elder let the healing waves of the Force flow through that area. However, before she could finish, there was a forceful tug in the back of her mind. BEHIND YOU! MOVE! NOW! Diving to her left, she rolled and sprang back to her feet, turning as she simultaneously called her sabers from the clips on her belt. Both crimson blades sprung to life the moment she was in a ready stance. The signature sound of blasters, along with the smell of burnt ozone and metal as the bolts hit the spot where she had just been standing, made the fact clear that the arena droids hadn’t been signaled that the match was over. The Togruta’s sulfuric eyes scanned the makeshift container houses in front of them, finding three droids already targeting her again with their blasters.

Growling, with fluid and swift strikes, the Elder focused on redirecting the bolts away from her body and back towards their source. A couple of the bolts hit two of the three droids, while the last one was hit in the shoulder. A slightly pained mechanical squeal came from Tahiri’s right and behind her as a couple of the wilder shots hit the medical droids tending to Gui Sol. She quickly moved to be in front of the Consul of Odan-Urr and the medic droids, diverting a couple more bolts back and hitting the last known droid in its torso and head.

Pausing for a moment, she glanced over her shoulder, “High Councillor, was that you?”

The Jedi was sitting up, a look of confusion on his face, “No.”

Tahiri’s eyes blazed as she turned towards the VIP judges box, the flow of the Force amplifying her vocals to be heard over the stadium crowd. “IDRIS! WOULD YOU MIND CALLING OFF THE DROIDS. I THOUGHT THIS MATCH WAS OVER?”

Once again she felt another tug, this time however, it came from more than one direction. Turning to the half Kiffar, putting her shoto saber away, she offered a hand up. “Kark it. Gui, seems there’s a bit of a problem with the arena droids. Let’s get out of here, shall we?”

The half-Kiffar looked at her offering, feeling about a dozen droids converging on their position. Nodding, he smiled and took her offered hand up, “Sounds good, Tahiri. Let’s go. I can get us a few allies, if you can create a distraction and opening.”

Flashing her signature fanged smile, “I can do that.”

Both the Sith and Jedi worked together in their unique ways of the Force, Gui connecting with half of the droids to take out as many of the malfunctioning droids, while Tahiri used both her illusionary apparitions and saber skills to get them to one of the exit lifts. They both escape in time to the doors closing shut behind them.They both escape in time to the doors closing shut behind them.