Dark Side #5: in which we killed murderball and framed the Sith for it

[lilairen]

When we left our heroes we had just taken our opportunity to retreat from a kettle of Sith who were having a chain of command discussion with Darth Postcard Impending With New Name.

Dramatis Personae reminder:

* Aurun'ijaro, called Aurun, hotshot tramp freighter captain, ex-assassin, recently revealed Force sensitive
* Aaron Selig, demagogue ship's engineer, mad gadgeteer
* Tereez, senior Imperial Knight, ex-Sith infiltration specialist
* Valis, junior Imperial Knight, healing and body mod specialist
* Tsavor, called Hissy, Barabel ex-gladiator hunter-seeker Jedi

NPC:
* Elon, Jedi healer, did not take Sith threat seriously until a friend died, still a softy


So, we were making our way back to base on Taris, discussing how to improve our probes of the evil planet seed using pooled skills, when Tereez gets an impression from someone he thinks he recognises that really, we ought to take cover. So we found a place to hole up and hunker down, and that was, well. Valis didn't manage to hide very well on the Force level. But it was a nice warehouse with crates and machinery and cover and such.

But they weren't there for Valis.

One of them came in bellowing for Tereez. Who has too many ex-friends, apparently.

Six Sith. One recognised as the Master we had attempted to track when we thought the Taris disaster might be preventable. One recognised as the Terrifying Blind Swordsman aforementioned. One - the one doing the shouting - being Garleon, the bully of Tereez's Sith academy class.

"Does anyone have smart ideas on how to engage them here?"
"Nope. We're screwed."

So we got into position - bunches of us up on the crates, our Trooper escort in place, if muttering about, you know, Sith are kind of above their pay grade. And the Sith came in.

Garleon was very clear that this time he was totally going to show Tereez what was what. And the Sith started to spread out through the boxes of crates in search of targets. Elon got one from behind that was going after Tsavor and pulled him off into combat; Tereez dropped onto another's head. The unknown master leapt up to engage Valis. Blows and shots were exchanged.

There was the sound of rending metal, and a pair of holes ripped into the floor, and there emerged some Frankenstein's-monstered zombie flesh golems, of which we highly disapproved, so Aaron drove a forklift into one of them. Also, a zombifying teleporting dragonet manifested.

More combat happened. The Sith fighting Tereez said "I will be well rewarded for this!" Tereez responded, in a somewhat baffled tone, "… for dying?" Elon was clearly getting the better of his minion Sith. Tsavor was giving all impressions of being a terrifying Jedi master, taking on at one point Garleon and one other Sith, one of the flesh golems, and the dragonet without taking a scratch. One of the golems grabbed one of our Troopers, and Aaron popped it into stasis with one of his special grenades until we were done with the rest of the fight. The troopers mostly shot at the evil dragonet, as did Aurun and Karka, who hates teleporting zombificiation dragonets with the sort of passion only a fifty-thousand-year-old death droid can muster. The Blind Swordsman located Tereez and went after him, meanwhile.

Valis was having very little success against the master, but then Tereez's friend - armed with a silvery lightsaber - dropped from the ceiling onto the guy's head and they started dueling. This freed up Valis to run over and drop on the head of the Sith minion that Tereez was fighting, to great effectiveness and a literally fatally effective boot (and lightsaber) to the head.

"Thank you! Now I only have a master-level Sith to deal with!"

One of the Sith leapt over to try to engage Aurun on her roost on top of a crate stack, failed to Force-shove her off, but she took the acrobatic leap down to ground level and continued sniping at the dragonet. (At which point the Sith basically said "Fuck this noise, I'm going to go attack Stormtroopers, I'm pretty sure they're actually pushovers.") Tereez's friend and the unknown master started throwing force lightning at each other in the Terrible Dragonball Combat Lock way.

One golem went down. Elon killed his dance partner. Things were starting to look less bad. Tsavor took a swing at Garleon and Garleon started to retreat.

Valis leapt up and took a swipe at the ankles of the force-lightninging Sith master, which the Sith dodged, but that meant that he was blasted off the crates by the lightning. Tereez leapt up to the top of the crates and threw lightning at the blind Sith, who parried with his saber, and they wound up locked in telekinetic pushback combat. A hail of EMP weaponry drove the dragonet to retreat.

Valis, seeing Garleon trying to run past him, held out his lightsaber for a clothesline attempt and hilariously the less competent than ideal Sith actually took an injury from it. However, Valis then had to parry an attack from the master, who despite being locked in combat with Tereez's friend did in fact know how to use his double-bladed weapon.

Tereez called after the fleeing Sith, "Where are you going, Garleon? I thought you were going to SHOW ME this time?" Garleon did not respond for some reason.

Aurun dodged something that wasn't there, spun, and fired square into the chest of the dragonet that had tried to materialise its claws directly through her chest. The thing went down with a metallic screech, and she informed its corpse that it had made a poor tactical decision. The Sith that had tried to take her out may or may not have noticed that before he dodged a rage-flung forklift, prepared to take a charge from a furious Barabel, and vanished in an incendiary grenade.

Valis took the opportunity of the Sith master being locked in combat with a Jedi master to matter-of-factly impale the evil guy.

The blind swordsman determined that he had no more allies and it would now be wise to depart.

Most of the party went to go deal with the remaining golem when it unpaused - Elon and Valis positioning themselves to sever the grappling limbs before they could do their thing and everyone else loaded for damage - while Tereez pursued Garleon. Fortunately, this did not all end in tears. The trooper was rescued, and Tereez stabbed Garleon thoroughly, took his lightsaber, and said, "The Sith will do worse to you than I ever could," and left him there.

Bets on whether he will return as a cyborged lightsaber-wielding brain in a box that is completely unhinged can be placed at many fine Hutt establishments.

We were introduced to Tereez's friend, who was revealed as the person who helped him escape the Sith Academy and here for his own purposes which we could not assist. He revealed that the blind swordsman was an assassin known as the Knight Hunter who he had tangled with in the past.

As we were sorting out the aftermath, we got a call from base, saying that someone wanted to talk to Tereez on one of his secure communication lines. "You have too many friends," Aurun told him. He made a face and took the call.

It was from a Rhodian (Heyun) and a Bith (Gavner), and we knew the Rhodian as being someone who worked with the potentially ethical or at least not currently terrible Hutt on Nar Shaddaa who we had spoken with before, Aruda. They needed our help urgently. They said they had something they thought the Empire and the Alliance (and incidentally as an afterthought the Jedi) might be interested in, and we had something they were interested in.

Tereez indicated that, you know, we're a bit in the middle of something, can it wait a minute? "As quickly as you can." So we went eesh, and returned to base, made sure the current round of loose ends were cleaned up, and built out the probes we were going to implant in the evil planet seed, using Aaron's tech skills, Tsavor's familiarity with Vong technological processes, and Valis's biomanipulation. We discussed feeding the thing a shielded nuke, given we could make a capsule to contain it out of the armour looted off the dead Sith, and decided against in case it made it more likely to eliminate the probes. We can always try that later, after all.

We got a good night's rest and packed up and headed off to Nar Shaddaa, where we met with our friends there, in the nightclub whose original name has been lost to the mists of gaming group wiseass humour and which is therefore now referred to as the Dancing Rancor. And they talked about the increasingly violent and horrible reprisals being used as part of a crackdown on what is effectively Weaponised Terrorist Anonymous, which included things like sweeping up innocents off the street and throwing them into the gladiator pits to be slaughtered. Murders will continue until morale improves, etc.

Our friends asked for us to do several things for them: infiltrate the game and protect as many of the innocents as possible, humiliate the opposing Huttball team, and assassinate the league owner in a showy sort of way. "We understand if public assassination is not something Jedi are comfortable with," they said.

Aurun the ex-assassin said nothing. She was already plotting how to do the strike. She really does not like slavers at all. And also nobody in the party gave her sidelong looks.

The Rhodian mentioned to the team that, you know, he would really appreciate it if we could add to our goals list "make sure his daughter is not killed", as she was one of the ones caught up in this sweep.

So there was discussion of how to divide up the team, and Aurun noted that as the person who recently revealed that she is in fact an ex-assassin, she should probably be the one put in position to do the assassination part.

NPCs: "You have to get to Agrima."
Aurun: "[sigh] I can get to Agrima."
NPCs, staring at her: "…."
Aurun, in exceedingly long-suffering tones and also, you know, unattractive spacer overalls: "I have never known a Hutt to have a problem with another Twi'lek dancing girl."
NPCs basically at 'okay, you have a point there' even if she does not look like a dancing girl.

So we worked out a plan. Aurun asked our friends for a poison that worked on Hutts, and they said, "… we were hoping something a little more obvious than poison." "Oh, don't worry, that's the plan, but I like having backup plans." She got specs on the layout and the guards and so on and spent a bit researching Hutt physiology, because hey, never killed a Hutt before.

Our friends mentioned in passing that Militarised Terrorist Anonymous had mentioned to them that they were interested in making a statement, but their idea of making a statement was bomb the entire arena. They had been discouraged from making their statement. Aurun asked if we had a plan in place if they decided to try a mic drop anyway, which was determined to be, "Fuck, if we get that sort of situation we'll just scramble to deal with it somehow."

Also we determined what the payoff would be for this: the location of Han Solo.

Valis spent a bit of time altering everyone's appearance - himself and Tereez to resemble two of the Sith we had killed on Taris two or three days before, and Tsavor to some other large angry combat lizardman. Aurun was retinted purple and slightly facially modified; she commented that her major issue with the assassination was that the person who trained her as an assassin might well be looking for her and this is really rather public. However, the methodology chosen was outside her training, which made it much safer, really.

So: Aurun infiltrated, adopting a role of someone who is not so much a murderball fangirl as a fangirl of the sort of people who are powerful enough to be movers and shakers in running murderball. Using a combination of acting, sex appeal, and dance she demonstrated that she was qualified to join the entertainment in the sky box. The conversation among the dancing girls was approximately stultifying, but she made nice.

"I'm used to assassinating people in more intellectual surroundings."

The three trained Force users infiltrated their end by the method of being picked up by some sympathetic police, who attempted to convince them that really, going to play murderball as part of the slave horde thrown up against the elite Bonebreakers team was probably not a good life choice. They suggested that they knew what they were up to and Tereez gave them a little mood enhancement about it.

Aaron set up nearby in the getaway car, hacked into the local systems and working to establish control over the grounds of the murderball field so that we could use it to our own ends. And also, as the least combat-ept member of the party, safely not about to be shot.

Elon, who looked entirely queasy at the situation, parked in the stands primarily to be part of Aurun's backup for escape and emergency backup for other sorts of plans going south.

In the holding pen for the slave horde, Valis managed to locate the Rhodian girl and obtained her a pistol when the weapons were distributed. She was very much at "I've never shot at anyone before! Daddy tells me not to get involved with gangs!"

Tereez, meanwhile, spotted an old friend of ours. Specifically, the Mandalorean whose power armour we had snagged when we were last on Nar Shaddaa; presumably he had fallen on hard times and gotten picked up by the police, but we did not get his backstory. Tereez angled over to him and struck up a conversation that went something like:

"Hey. You remember when you misplaced your power armour?"
"*sidles away from current conversation* Do I know you?"
"You did. Then."
"You got a plan for getting through this?"
"Maybe. Got picked up on the street. Going to take out a few of them."
"I don't give a shit about the opposing team, I intend to get out. Alive. Got a plan."
"What's the plan?"
"Any of your friends here?"
"Maybe one or two."
"Huh. Well. For horde night they don't really pay attention to the ball, it's all about the bloodshed. So we're going to run it."
"Sounds like your plans and mine are compatible. We'll see about helping each other out."
"Good."

The Mandalorean joined his conversation with the street-tough jock set, looking moderately more confident about his prospects of seeing another day.

The Bonebreakers came out like a rock band backed with Wookiee death metal, with their captain, Kaulikk the Shaved Wookiee, rallying the crowd. This guy, being a crazed murderous monster, was also explicitly on the 'the world is better off without you' list, but he didn't tend to actually come out onto the field in the first couple of rounds, the better to make a grand entrance.

Valis, the biomanipulator, had a plan involving the Shaved Wookiee.

"If I get close enough to punch him he will suddenly erupt with hair. Whack! FOOMPH."

When seeking to embarrass the enemy, go for the schtick.

Eventually they let people set up for the so-called game, and we got our Force users on the front lines with the Mandalorean and his jock friends, along with a broad assortment of terrified civilians with scrounged weaponry.

The games begin. The Mandalorean hooked the ball out of the acid pit with a polearm and hucked it over to a teammate to work the point. The Force users charged. Tsavor, a member of a species known for finding it the height of humor to beat someone to death with their own severed tail, snagged an enemy team player and used him to defeat a guy with a flamethrower. The flamethrower itself was also a fatality. Tereez managed to acquire a minigun. Valis managed to really annoy a guy with a rifle by throwing a knife at him and mocking him relentlessly, and also managed to disarm a guy with a vibroblade using only a cheap throwing knife. He did not get to the point of taking out the rifle guy before the first point was scored, though, and the game reset to start.

"I'm intending to take down the rifleman with a knife. Under the principle that he brought a gun to a knife fight."

In the interlude between the points, the dancing girls were called upon to perform and circulate, and Aurun started to plant stasis bombs on the guards in the skybox. One of the guards she got to managed to critically succeed his perception, but not having the context on what he was seeing just responded with a, "Hey. After the game." So what does one do but say, "Of course, big fella!" and sashay on, blowing kissyface at the guy every so often afterwards.

"So he critically succeeded on his perception check and critically failed on his perception check at the same time."

(Aurun, despite hating actual assassination in many ways, cannot help but enjoy using the skills and doing them well. And also the target was utterly vile, and she always got through assassinations by reassuring herself that the galaxy is better off without some beings.)

Tereez handed off the minigun to the minigun-specialist Mandalorean, who felt that the world was thereby much improved.

After the second round - in which it became clear that the field was malfunctioning when an autoturret fired off a second time to take out a Bonebreaker - the Hutt in charge sent for people to go figure out what was wrong with the field. Having a Hutt-speaking assassin in the box means that "They're sending in tech support!" can go out over the comms.

One of the Bonebreakers fired off a shot and killed one of the civilians between rounds, which got a, "Ooooh, illegal killing, that's the penalty box!" and the guy was dragged off by combat droids. "Penalty box can be viewed on channel 406!"

Charming.

The mess continued. We lost a few civilians along the way, but mowed through the Bonebreakers collectively. Tsavor tended to charge the guy with the heaviest weapon, often cleaving it with his big fucking axe. Valis took guys out, took their weapons, handed off the weapons to people on the horde side, and returned to always using the knife. Tereez remembered he had a bow and exploding arrows, and generally worked on obtaining more heavy weaponry.

"Flamethrowers attract giant lizards. Do not use. Lizards like it warm."

After another round, the Bonebreakers got so annoyed that one of them chucked a javelin up into the skybox. The announcer bellowed, "Taking a shot at the announcer, PENALTY BOX FOR SURE." And the guy was dragged off by doom droids.

Overall, the team managed to basically embarrass the enemy murderball team approximately to death, while the jocks racked up the points. With the score 4-0 on the side of the Horde, and casualties on our side to a comparative minimum (a few traps we couldn't control in time, some bloody mayhem, and so on), finally the Shaved Wookiee makes an enraged appearance.

In full armour. Which he doesn't do. Because the schtick is, well, shaved.

So here we have the final act of the play. We set up, figure out who has the heaviest weaponry, and so on.

And the floor trembles, and the engineer manages to delay the 'floor flips up and dumps you in the acid' trap just enough that Tsavor and Valis used it to launch themselves into leap-in combat.

And the red staff-saber lit up.

The game was on.

Valis waved his hands at the Wookiee.

Valis's player: "I run up and say 'Fuzzy!'"
Me: "You are attempting to make a ... weirdness attack on the enemy boss...."

The Wookie's hair regrew, much to his bewilderment and the amusement of the crowd. He took a swipe at Valis with his greataxe.

The red saber lit up, the axe breaking on the blade.

Tereez lit up a red saber as well, and charged in.

"Some of the crowd is laughing, the others are Very Quiet, because someone just lit up red lightsabers...."

In the main box, things were getting more and more chaotic. The Hutt was flipping out more than a little at Dark Jedi being lurking in his murderball game, and how much money was he going to lose anyway. He sent in the doom droids to restore disorder.

Which information was passed over to Aaron, who managed to get into the droid control systems and convince them that really they all wanted to shoot doom droids.

The doors for the doom droids opened. Fireballs spouted out as the droids inside obliterated each other messily.

The Shaved Wookiee flipped his entire shit.

"He's all-out attacking."
"... with his arms? That I can parry? With a lightsaber?"
"You may have gotten the impression this guy is a little unhinged?"
"... I parry? He's... disarmed?"

There was general cleanup on the field, and the Hutt declared that it was time to flee and let the authorities handle the cleanup.

Aurun hit the button on the stasis fields she'd planted on all the guards, and they froze. And then she dropped the simpering dancing girl act and advanced on the Hutt, all slink and death and smug. "For your service to the Dark, you are now paid in full," she said.

The Hutt insisted he could set her up for life, for fifty lifetimes. She considered, pausing, and said, "Give me the account numbers and information."

The Hutt babbled numbers. She passed them to Aaron. They didn't clear immediately.

She shrugged, circled the Hutt, and planted the injectible bomb at his brainstem.

(If we get money out of it we'll donate it to people who were harmed by the murderball situation. Not without a certain amount of "Damnit, can't I get a percentage? Fraction of a percent?" thoughts from Aurun, mind, which she is not going to share.)

She left the announcer alone. And the dancing girls. It's important to leave witnesses for a good show.

Then she sashayed out like a fucking boss, met up with Elon who had a nice hooded cloak, and they worked their way out.

Meanwhile, down in the arena, Tereez informed one of the surviving Bonebreakers, in the process of attempt to surrender, that he never wanted to see him in this sort of situation ever again. Valis snarled at another, "If you knew anything about strength and power you wouldn't play at it," and killed him, partly on the 'rabid dog' principle. Tsavor solemnly picked up the ball from the middle of the field and spiked it from there into the endzone.

Five points. Game over.

The Mandalorean eyed the team with a certain amount of wariness, to which Tereez responded, "Not everything is what it looks like."
Mandalorean: "Prediction, I don't see any of you ever again."
Valis: "I can guarantee you won't! Several of us are already dead!"

After a little, one of the civilians sidled over and said, "… … … are you here to help?" "Yes. Run." "… the door's locked."

So they went and opened the doors with the stolen Sith lightsabers, and stepped out into the ring of waiting police vehicles.

The police decided the better part of valor was perhaps not getting involved in this situation. Valis congratulated them on their good service, rounding up civilians for the slave pits, good job, good job, keep it up, in the 'I'm high fiving you with one hand and holding a red lightsaber with the other' kind of way.

We collected the girl we had successfully protected and took her home, where our friends eyed us with a sort of wariness suggesting they had their hands on their weapons. "We hope you don't want more payment, uh, because we don't... have...."

Valis replied, "We do. Teach her to use that." He pointed at the pistol. "Keeping out of the gangs is one thing, but she still needs to know how to defend herself."

The wary allies stared at us a lot, and then handed over the datacard.

Oh, to be a fly on the wall when the Sith crowd learns that someone disrupted the Huttball league using their faces and lightsabers. Because no Sith would stoop so low, of course.

And it sort of blows the lid off the "there are no serious Sith threats in the galaxy these days" thing.

The news should be very exciting for a bit.

"Warships ambushed by claimed Sith in deep space."
"This is too serious, give me sports."
"In sports news, Huttball game on Nar Shaddaa was entirely disrupted by Sith who assassinated league owner Agrima the Hutt."
"… weather?"
"On Taris, the weather is atmospherically disrupted with a chance of Sith...."

And that is how we framed the Sith for rigging a sportsball game and destroying the league.