He snuck through the reactor, eerie green lighting casting odd shadows on his face, his suit, his blaster. Rog ducked beneath a pipe that transported...something... that was so hot that steam rose off of it as it sat there. He narrowed his eyes, letting the bright color slip out from under his heavy lids as he tracked the sound beyond.

Rog let the half smile cross his lips as he spotted the shadow of his pursuer. Leveling the blaster, he squeezed the trigger and a row of bright lights erupted across the room, tiny explosions and a man sent reeling.

The response was quick, a barrage of explosions erupting all around Rog. He watched, almost as if it were slow motion, as a bolt tore into the steaming pipe. It exploded, his shirt catching flame as he felt himself rocketed away. Tucking and rolling to his feet as he landed, he tore the flaming shreds from his sculpted torso and sneered.

"Is that all you got?"

"CUT!" The voice came from everywhere and nowhere, thanks to hidden speakers and a megaphone.

The human was so pale, he could almost pass for rattataki. "More emphasis on the that, Derc. We need more intensity. The girls won't be paying attention... too busy watching your abs, but the guys want to see the rage. Give them the rage! We'll try again after lunch."

Derc tossed down the prop blaster with the personae of Rog, heading for the caterer's tables. He waved at one of the aides as he moved, motioning with his hand as one brought him a new shirt.

"Derc Kast!" The woman shrieked, shoving past a security guard and running toward him with a holocamera, a dozen security professionals hot on her heels. "Derc Kast!"

Derc turned on his heel, watching the young girl with too much makeup barreling toward him. He dropped his weight, stepping back and turning his body sideways out of habit.

It was only a second later that they caught her by the arms, the holocamera slipping from her grasp and skidding to a rest at his feet.

"Just one question!" She screamed, kicking at the guards. Derc crouched for a moment, picking up the camera, then stood and strode over to her and the two huge guards. One was human, the other...well, human-ish. Derc smiled at her, and let his thoughts soothe the three of them. She stopped struggling and the guards quit dragging her.

The sneaky reporter regained her composure. "Derc Kast, you've been out of the public eye for almost twenty years and you've been signed to one of the biggest budget holofilms of the year. Where have you been? Are you going to be acting more? Are you back for good? How much are you being paid?" She paused for a second, taking a breath as she noticed his physique. The final question rushed past her lips in almost a hushed whisper. "How do you look exactly like you did twenty years ago?"

Derc handed her camera back to her. "I thought you only had one question, pateesa."

The gutteral and deep voice of the guard interrupted her wordless protest. "We'll put her back outside with the others, sir. It won't happen again."

Derc smiled, dismissing the guards with a hand wave. "I think she'd rather have an interview." The charm oozed from him in palpable amounts, moistening the reporter's mind.

---

Loira sneered as he slid into the booth across from the white-haired man. His apprentice barely looked up at him, focusing instead on the glass of ruddy liquid in front of him.

"Ollie?" Loira almost growled the name, barely audible ove the sounds of the busboy at the next table clearing spent glasses and plates of unfinished food.

The white haired man looked up, strands of dark hair obscuring his forehead, half his face. Loira tilted his head, his mind weighing what he had seen, what he percieved around his apprentice. Too many years in the dark, languishing among the shadows. The taint may never wash completely off as he had hoped.

"They say that they'll be ready." Ollie picked the glass up, mumbling the words over the top of it.

Loira nodded, pausing to wave off the waitress as she walked past slowly. "When do we move?"

Ollie leaned forward in the seat. "Now, it is my turn to preach patience, master."

---

Taigikori would have sneered if the connective tissues weren't cut off at his jaw. He didn't pretend to understand all of the Grand Master's plan, but he had hoped to at least understand the parts where he was involved. This was one of those parts. The Headmaster moved through the empty walls, watching droids plaster over the durasteel frames with flame retardant materials.

The sound of repulsor-carts hummed up from below. His ear could barely make it out, but the sound was unmistakable. He reached out, feeling along the ties that bound the universe together. There wasn't another living being for miles, the fear of radiation from the war a few years back keeping people at bay. This wasn't as remote as Lyspair, not by a far shot, but Taigikori couldn't sort out the rationale for out-of-region construction. He didn't even have the blue prints for the building yet.

The Headmaster sighed as the repulsor-cart got to his floor. He stepped closer to the droids pushing the materials around. These crates were very different from the building materials. Magshielded and heavy, the crates were locked with triple keys until the Headmaster wove a strand of the Force into the tumblers, popping them open with savvy that any thief would desire. He lifted the lid and pushed aside some packing materials to see the contents.

Taigikori grunted. Now he had no idea whatsoever.

---

Halcyon motioned to the pilot, bidding him to pull back on the throttle, slowing the transport as it made another pass on the site. He turned back to the transparisteel, peering down on the curved construction. The ancient site was cleared out three months ago, and the droids were working on it constantly since. The Sith Lord understood the need for secrecy in such matters.

The transport arced back around, pivoting high in the sky over Antei before swinging back toward the elongated walls that led to the coliseum.

"Lord?" The pilot's vocoder was tinny in the confined quarters of the transport ship. Halcyon waved him off, dismissively. He wanted to inspect the progress at this stage in the game. There wasn't even a month left.

---

Welcome to another Grand Master report.

First things first, we are rapidly approaching Exodus Day, and with it the Independence Games. Held on Antei, these events will test your skills in a variety of events, gaming, fiction, graphics, and others. Those of us too new to have experienced an Independence Games will be glad to know that they do have a variety of very rare first level crescents as prizes in addition to unique participation seals for taking part in the Games.

With only about two weeks left before the start of the Games, you'll want to brush up on your game. With a variety of Monthly Topics and Fist Training events, that'd be a great way to get your skills dusted off.

Look forward to a number of neat developments on or around Exodus day. It should be an interesting time.

With Halcyon taking the role of Deputy Grand Master, the position of Voice was left open. There were a variety of great applications for this position, and it took a few days of discussion to come down to just one applicant.

Vodo Biask Taldrya will be replacing Halc as Voice. I chose him because he had a wonderfully insightful plan for fictional development going forward, and the willingness to work his face off to execute said plan. Halc liked him because 'Bias' is part of 'Biask'. :P

On a separate, yet related note, the position of Combat Master had to be vacated by Vivackus due to his real life constraints. Viv has served as CM admirably, but the perils of RL have been taking up more and more of his time, so it was decided that it was time to seek a new CM. In his spot, Timeros will be taking up the mantle. Tims prowess int he ACC is not unknown, having served as Combat master previously. Halc and I both believe that Tim is the most suited to keep the Combat Centre running appropriately.

You may have seen it in the various email chains, but the DC (namely Kir) is in need of a person who is fluent in Spanish for a translation gig. If you're fluent in written spanish, please shoot Kir and I an email.

Orv is also working on migrating the Forums to a new software. This will not affect existing threads, I am told, but the new software is a fair bit more up to date than the old stuff. Orv has also discussed some updates on the Wikipedia that will (hopefully) result in much faster performance of the Wiki. He'll keep us posted as he gets everything lined up/tested, etc.

Shikyo has been working on some really cool stuff for possessions (yes, Everyone is still working on this, we have not forgotten), and we're starting to lay the groundwork and plans for next Herald Style Hannukah. That goes to show you how much work goes into that little event.

I'd tell you what Taigikori is working on, but I don't want to steal his thunder. It's pretty cool though. Also, he's been working with his staff to get teh Grind Path actualized. Between the content generation (i.e. the courses and answers set up) and the coding,t his is a big project that will have monumental changes in how we deal with our new members and journeymen.

Ask the GM! Mirado asks: "What's the first thing you're gonna buy when posessions come out?" I'm not terribly sure. If I had to guess, I'd probably spend a crap-ton of credits building up my lightsabers and tweaking them to where I want them. With so much stuff to buy, there's likely to always be something more I'd want to buy.

Ronovi asks: "What advice would you give to anyone who aspires to be a member of the Dark Council?" First, I guess I would encourage someone to determine what it is that they are good at, and develop the skillset for that. Not everyone springs from their mother's womb a code god like Orv, or a graphics guru like Shikyo. But if you work at developing your interests, that's a good start. The Next part would be to start working to improve the club. This doesn't really take that much to get noticed. If you have a solid work ethic and a good skill set, you'll find yourself on a DCer's staff in no time. If you continue to work hard and develop your skills further while on a DCers staff, you'll eventually be bumped up to Praetor, which is de facto DCer-in-waiting. I think that the biggest things that get in between people and their goal of being on the DC are a lack of patience and a lack of work ethic. Some people have an inability to wait for their shot at it, get demoralized and turn cynical. Honestly, it's a very rare situation when someone gets a position from out of nowhere. The lack of work ethic is another issue. It's not so much that they don't want to do work, but that they only want to do it on their terms. That kind of attitude will preclude people from the big show altogether. So yeah: get skills, get gig, train up, get DC.

TL;DR *Independence Games coming soon. *Halc = DGM *Vodo = VOICE *Timeros = CM *if you read/write Spanish fluently, email Kir *Orv updating forums soon.

And that's about all I can say this time around. If you need anything or have any questions, feel free to shoot me an email or a PM on IRC. Have fun,