OOC Disclaimer: Fair warning, this thread includes graphic depictions of violence, sexual material, and other potentially harmful material.
Cassie Samia had survived the twenty months since the destruction of Requiem SIV aboard Guardian - her fateful decision to abandon the crew aboard one of the long-range shuttles of the destroyer looming on the back of her mind. She could barely even remember some of those crew - Markus Salvador, Vii'Nogai, Trip, the others - but her current job was just fine. Far removed from the toils of serving as a medical officer aboard some covert military mission, she enjoyed life here on the frontier. The fourth moon of Taorun VII was a dustball, to be true, but life was certainly never boring. Enough people shooting each other, getting in accidents, or being roughed up by the local wildlife that Cassie found excitement in treating every case that came by.
"Hi Kyle," she greeted warmly to a 6'1", dusty-haired man who walked through the wooden doors of her doctor's practice.
"Ay Cas," the man replied gruffly.
She had none of the expert equipment that the Requiem had been stocked with, but it wasn't all bad. The wooden buildings, the ramshackle shops - it created a sense of community. Far more tight-knit than any doomsday mission, that was for sure - and she really needed a break from all that kind of excitement.
"Whatcha need today?" she called out loudly, rounding a table full of instruments and supplies.
"Got nicked up out by the quarry," Kyle responded with a thick accent. "Rock wolves. We scared 'em off good but they tried to chew up a few of us. Reckon they'll be back."
"Oh, well that's a downer, huh?" Cassie soothed. "Here, lemme check you over."
"'Preciate it."
Cassie ran a soft tanned hand down the miner's backside as he grunted - a shallow wound back there. Nothing too serious...
"Aw, it's nothin'," Cassie played. "Lemme just get you -"
"Everybody! Look!"
The call came from outside - and Kyle was already off the table and walking slowly out the door. Cassie could never keep them still, yeesh...and it was probably just something minor, like a meteorite or comet or -
THWANG! THWANG!
A metal harpoon glowing a faint shade of red smashed into the ground not ten yards from Cassie as she walked out the door, causing her to recoil. Three other harpoons, attached to lines, had hooked into the ground as another had missed and slammed into a building - blowing a gaping hole through the run-down structure.
"Get the women and children inside now!"
An inevitable scramble began happening around Cassie as she rushed inside for the one piece of her life aboard the Requiem - a Republic-standard needler pistol. It was beat up and older, but it would work for...was it pirates? She guessed pirates. A threat out here that she hadn't faced yet, but the former military doctor figured they would come around eventually to such a remote colony far off the beaten path. Make an example or two and they'd probably leave - heck, maybe even the men of the colony will have finished one or two of them by the time she even walked out of the clinic.
When Cassie emerged back into the late afternoon sunlight, she saw that was clearly not the case.
Something sickly - it almost looked human, or if it had maybe been human, except with far too many limbs and weird protrusions emerging from the face - shredded the miner, Kyle, in half with a single swipe. His torso exploded, ripped out with such a force that his consciousness flew from his body at the point of impact. Another one of the beasts emerged off a harpoon like a zipline, different in appearance and wielding some sort of weapon. With a blinding flash, it launched a sort of spear through the stomach of a nearby woman - pinning her in a bloody mess against the side of a building.
"Oh my God," Cassie exclaimed, backing into her clinic to try and avoid being seen.
It was hanging above - some sort of monstrosity. Maybe a kilometer or more long, a giant ship had fired more than a dozen of the harpoon lines down into the colony town and was deploying more and more of the beasts to the surface. Flaming red pellets zipped out from apertures alongside its brown underbelly, starting fires and igniting buildings and people alike.
Too late for Cassie - the wooden doors to her clinic blew inwards as something with three or four human-like heads dove into her establishment. She fell against the wall, cradling her knees with her lips trembling. The beast roared, taking a running jump off two powerful rear legs.
"Please God," Cassie cried as she hit the needler's trigger.
Twin cobalt slivers ripped out, spearing the beast in its head - and did nothing to stop it. It screeched, swinging a massive paw at Cassie's head.
Her vision fell off into an abyss...
* * * * *
Talasea
Expansion Region, Republic Space
Five Days Prior
"Oh, you never had nobody gave it to you like that before, huh baby?"
Will Brand was having a bit too much of a good time with himself. He was a repo-man - charged with taking back what wasn't paid. Didn't matter what - possessions, land, organs, what have you. Made great money, and hey - he got to see parts of the Republic he didn't know existed. Even better, he got to shoot people he didn't know existed - who now no longer existed.
And he got to do things like this in his off time.
"Oh, yes."
The woman beside him in bed was strikingly attractive. Her flowing brown hair laid in bunches, now lit up by small spherical beads of sweat. Her dark blue, almost violet eyes were euphorically half-closed in pleasure, nearly naked except for a blanket beside Will. His chiseled form reflected a sheen of sweat, dripping from his potent pectorals down to his abs. Will's arms, well defined in triceps and biceps, laid low at his sides as he relaxed in a state of raw joy.
"Well, fuck," Will exhaled, his hand sliding over her hip. "I'm saying we go for round two, ya know...can't end our meal with just an appetizer."
"You gonna give me the main course?" his woman smiled deviously.
"Well shit, ain't you hungry," Will laughed. "I guess I can get my kitchen going again...your tab is gonna be running pretty high though-"
"Oh shit."
A recognizable shhhnk of the front door sliding open and shut reverberated throughout the apartment.
"That's my husband."
A loud call rang through the house: "Hey honey, I'm back."
"Well dammit, get me somewhere to go," Will hissed.
"I don't know, this is a small-"
"Who the fuck is this?"
A rather small man was standing at the door of the bedroom - easily a head shorter than Will, but toting a small pistol.
"What the fuck are you doing with my wife?"
"I, uh..." Will stammered. "I fucked her?"
"Baby," the woman said, now shaking and shivering. "He...he..."
She burst out crying: "He raped me."
"Oh, come on now," Will replied. "That's bullshit."
"GET OUT OF MY HOME."
A pistol shot hit the floor next to Will as the man dove for cover - hurling a lamp against the nearest window. It shattered open with ease, allowing him easy access to escape the residence.
"Shit, shit," Will said to himself as another shot rang a mere inch from his foot. "Where the fuck are my clothes?"
He snatched the blanket off the bed and proceeded to hurl himself out of the window - taking a three-story dive straight onto the patio covering of the apartment outside, and rolling to the ground off of it.
"You stay away or I'll kill you!" the man from the apartment screamed out, ringing another shot into the air.
"Fuckin' hell," Will sighed.
He was pretty much naked - except for the long bed blanket he proceeded to wrap around his waist.
"Well..." the repo-man observed. "I guess I should probably go do something else now."
* * * * *
Ceti Iota VI
Republic Rim
Nadié Droma stood stoically at the window of the conference room. Technically it wasn't "hers" nor had she reserved it - but the dead Theron by the door for the hall that could comfortably seat 45 spoke enough as to whose room it really was. His stomach was marred by a blackened, charred hole - evidence of what Nadié did when bored or irritated. He had been entirely no challenge...what a waste.
"Water."
The young woman's voice carried to the speaker in the room, where there were any number of vendors looking to sell her products on the run-down trade station. The old joint orbited an even older small gas giant around a white dwarf, providing low light into the fairly bland room - but Nadié was no high-maintenance girl. She had plans of her own.
Two weeks ago, the Republic operative had deployed hundreds of drone couriers across the galaxy - searching out, in her terms "the best." They had gone off in seemingly random locations, but she had a plan for them. They would end up finding the best...finding out those who would join this little venture of her own making. There was no programming to send them to designated coordinates where anyone would lie in wait, but statistics could never tell the whole story. Nadié knew a greater hand in this - she had sent the comm probes to said random locations in space where she knew there would be people. Combine time, a little luck, and whatever feeling this girl who commanded far too much power had, and she would find those to join her.
A short, stocky Baragwin with a cancerous tumor on his right shoulder wattled in, setting down a pitcher of water before belching loudly: "Payment."
Nadié refused to even look back, instead brandishing a pistol, swinging it off her thumb, and firing it backwards in one fluid motion. A pulse laser floored the reptilian vendor, striking straight through his head and flattening him to the floor. An easy kill - dead before he hit.
"Thank you, I was thirsty," the operative flatly stated as she picked up the pitcher with one hand.
Each courier drone had a simple message - a set of star coordinates and a single quip. "You won't find what you are looking for, but here," greeted each who opened up the probe - and that would be it. Nadié simply had a feeling - they would be found, they would come, and they would join this message. With a snap of her fingers, the young woman brought up loud, yet soothing, music - playing throughout the station, increasing in volume as it approached her conference room. The station's inhabitants were perplexed, but they had other things to do - Nadié knew only those who wanted to understand would come to find her.
Destiny brought the best together to decipher the mysteries inherent in this life...
OOC: To join along, see the OOC thread: viewtopic.php?f=5&t=75072&start=0
