He hadn’t expected the heat to be this intense. He’d known about Mustafar of course, most who had an interest in the Sith had been told some form of Vader’s legendary rebirth, but he hadn’t expected it to be quite this intense. Even in the environmentally protected storage hanger he was in, heavy gasps of the hot, dry air flooded through his breathing mask, the reek of sulphur defying the filters with every breath he took.
He opened his mind to the wash of the Force around him, letting his eyes wander through the drab, cluttered hanger with its stacks of containers that loomed over him to either side, their contents all but forgotten about in this barely used portion of the mining sprawl. The stacks ran end to end against the side walls of the hanger, and put Kor in the mind of great pillars holding up the roof of an ancient temple. The channel between the stacks was littered with the debris of at least two damaged speeders, their innards spread across the floor as if the effort of repairing them had simply become too much. The scraps of a few broken crates littered here and there, the result of a vicious display of Kor’s telekinetic abilities and a few stray blaster bolts. Among these scraps were the bodies. Five in total, the Mystic let his senses ghost across them, feeling the sharp thrill as he experienced the last tendrils of their life bleed away from them. It had been a short encounter, which had been a blessing in the oppressive heat. They had been expecting their buyer, and although their surprise was writ plain across them when a single robed figure approached they had paid it little mind. They had tried to talk, but the environment had made Kor even less conversational than usual. The first, the armoured brute at the back with the heavy rifle, he’d taken with the container from the top of the stacks. With a simple hand gesture, both it and the mercenary were left broken across the hanger’s floor. Two of them he’d dismembered with his lightsaber, while the final two had recovered from their shock quick enough to draw their blasters and let loose at him. His ice blue blade had flicked out, deflecting the shots back at his attackers with lethal precision. And that had been the end of it.
He focussed his ethereal consciousness on each of the figures in turn, and on the third one, a gangly human with battered scraps of armour, he felt a dark whisper leaking itself into the Force. He knelt by the man, and his hand reached down to the small silver tube fastened to his belt. He began to tremble with anticipation as he unhooked the tube, a hermetically sealed container which held something he’d been tracking down for months; a scroll written by the hand of Exar Kun himself. It had been found by a scout team in one of the ancient temples of Yavin IV, appraised, lost, stolen, stolen again and then finally come into possession of this rabble. They had been going to sell it on Mustafar, hoping the natural sensor shielding and inhospitable environment of this industrial backwater would hide their transaction. Kor had managed to find the intended buyer of the scroll, and persuaded him to reveal the location of the planned deal. The whimpering Aleena had even told him how much he was paying, and offered Kor the scroll afterwards for a fraction of that price if he would let him live. To hear the paltry sum the diminutive curio dealer valued the scroll at had infuriated Kor, and he had lashed out in a fit of rage, severing the Aleena’s neck from his body. But it was done now. He had it. His breath quickened as brought his hand to the screw cap, eager to study his prize, before he brought himself out of his revere and chastised himself for his impatience. Opening the tube on the planet could lead to irreparable damage, and the thought sent a chill down his spine despite the heat. He clipped the cylinder safely to his belt and rose to leave this Force forsaken planet.
It is undamaged then?
Kor whipped round and ignited his lightsaber as the voice flashed through his consciousness. Standing between him and the entranceway, partly shadowed against the dull orange glow emanating from the planet outside was a lean woman dressed head to toe in black, her brown hair just visible beneath her cowl.
“Put that away Kor,” she said with a slightly amused tone.
“How long have you been there Rasilvenaira?” he demanded, dropping his lightsaber into a relaxed position but deciding not to deactivate it yet. He hadn’t even sensed her, not even the faintest flicker in the Force when he had opened his mind.
“Long enough to watch you make another mess. I would have been here sooner, but I had to clear up a dismembered Aleena before I got here. And Imperium always complain they have to clean up Excidium’s messes.”
“You’ve been following me?” Kor demanded, his choler beginning to rise now.
“Actually we’ve been working towards the same goal. Braecen heard about the scroll and sent me to retrieve it. Normally I’d be upset that a member of Imperium beat me to it, but I suppose this sort of thing is more your area,” she brought her hand up in front of her, stretching out an open palm, “I’ll be taking the scroll now, I don’t want to keep the Quaestor waiting.”
Kor tightened his grip on his lightsaber. He didn’t know much about Ras, but he knew enough to see where this was going. She was unlikely to take no for an answer, and even less likely to be satisfied leaving with her mission incomplete. “You know well enough I will not be handing this over Rasilvenaira,” he growled.
Ras sighed as her she brought her outstretched hand down. With slow, deliberate movements she unclasped her cloak and let it drop to the side before unclipping the twin lightsabers from her waist. She stepped one foot slightly back and turned to the side, tilting her head forward as she ignited her two silver blades, angling the right down above her head while the left was brought up in an angled guard in front of her.
“Have it your way Kor. There’s only one way out with that scroll, and that’s through me.”
Kor turned and set himself into a wide stance, bending his knees slightly and bringing his saber up into a tight two handed grip. The two Paletineans stood motionless for a moment, staring each other down as the volcanic winds rumbled outside the hanger, before Kor lunged forward.
