The Artifacts

For most information it would have been spoken to the council of True Sith on the holocron, but this message was not to be heard by anyone or thing that did not need to know details. This treaty allowed them to rebuild and fortify but there came some problems. Certain Sith looking for their peers to show some form of weakness. And what had just happened was enough to be shown as such weakness. Now why would such a message be sent to the True Sith, they had a Master and Apprentice aboard the ship that had gone missing. It was in the interest of the True Sith to take care of this problem as it was in the interest of the Sith Lord that sent this request to the True Sith.

Sadly the message had little to say, and the messenger who had delivered it had vanished as quickly as they had shown up. What the message had explained was that all communication of the Freighter had disappeared, even links through the force suddenly severed. What was on board the ship simply said Sith Artifacts but nothing in detail, be it that there was no real detail or the details where a need to know basis. All that really remained was ideas on what had happened. The message spoke of believing that smugglers with the aid of Jedi had found and attacked the ship, killing those on board and stealing the cargo. The goal was to find the ship, check for cargo and survivors, eliminate all enemies of the Sith Empire and obtain the stolen cargo and bring it back.

Now in all fairness this was already known to the small group of True Sith that traveled together on a single ship heading to the freighter's last known location, a vacant part of space that had no real patrol from either side. Why did they send a small group? To be honest, it was what they had at the time. As other Agents, Sith and Bounty Hunters make it back from their current missions, they will be informed on the mission and hastily sent on their way. Aside from this something important was moving towards the crew. It was an escape pod from the Freighter the crew was after, and for those Force sensitive could feel the presence of a Sith on board.

It wasn't a very big room, but then again, this wasn't exactly an interstellar cruise liner. This was a ship of efficiency and business, so it was only to be expected that the quarters weren't extravagant or anything. Even for one of the Sith Order, the only thing special was the fact that there were actual walls and privacy, while others had to make do with sharing bunks or even military style barracks. And for this privacy, the young apprentice was most grateful. Many in the republic knew that the Jedi were famous for lengthy meditation, sitting peacefully with eyes closed in deep contemplation, seeing through time and space within their own minds and divining the future therein. But what many in the Galactic Republic did not know, was that members of the Sith Order also used meditation, though often in many... different fashions.

Jaron himself was utilizing one of the more peaceful methods of Sith meditation. In front of him, held perfectly vertical, was his lightsaber, the blade ignited and subtly lighting his face in an orange glow as he stared into the white hot center until it seemed to engulf the entirety of the galaxy within it's seemingly infinite depth. He had been staring at it unblinkingly for hours, the stinging of his dry eyes only sharpening his focus as he waited for something to resolve itself, some image or hint of knowledge. He'd been doing it almost every day of their voyage, trusting in the force to show him what it was he wanted to see, to reveal to him more about their mission than he had already been told, but it had yielded little fruit indeed, aside from a few dirty looks from his fellow crew mates the few times he went out to get food, but those were nothing new.

His arms ached as he entered into his seventh hour of statuesque meditation, the lightsaber not even wavering a millimeter in any direction. Finally, he felt something niggling in the back of his mind, a familiar little tingle that signified something stirring in the force. Exhaling deeply, Jaron held his breath, or rather the lack thereof, and watched carefully as something started to take shape in the bright inferno that was his weapon. It was... a ship? No, an escape pod... And... There was someone in it... Someone... A force sensitive... A Sith! Jaron inhaled and shut off the blade, the afterimage burned into his retinas staying for a moment until he blinked it away. One of the missing Sith was in an escape pod, and they were getting closer. The apprentice stood and left his quarters, moving down the corridor towards the bridge. He wanted to be there when they made visual contact.

Darth Romana sat deep in the command chair on the bridge, the cold expression on her face was one of intense frustration, the Council had received the message and she had taken control of the situation, much to the annoyance of her peers, but the contents of the message was less than pleasing. As always she was dressed extravagantly, her elaborate headdress sat upon her head with not a hair out of place, next to her stood her ever loyal apprentice, Jace Fel, intense boredom was a match for her frustration. The crew of the bridge went about their duties, officers at control consoles, the vessels captain leaning over the navigating officers shoulder, everything appeared perfectly normal.

The system in which they had arrived in was in disputed territory and an Imperial capital ship would draw the unwanted eyes of the Republic so they had taken a far smaller corvette to locate what was left of the freighter. "My lady" the captain called from across the room, "we've located an escape pod"

"I can see that captain" she looked disapprovingly at him, "a being of Force sensitivity is alive; a pity..." she left the sentence open, she new it was unlikely that the artifacts would be present, but the pitifulness of the fact that all was left was one sentient was disappointing, failure did mean however that there may eventually be no survivors. "Get a tractor lock on it"

The heels of Romana's boots made a defining tap against the metal floor as she paced from left to right, assessing the apprentice who knelt before her. "I find it disturbing, that the survivor the operation was a lone acolyte; no Master, no soldiers and.... no cargo" the cargo she spoke of was obvious to those in the know, but she wasn't about to reveal secrets to those unworthy of hearing them "how ever it is impressive that you managed to survive at all, considering the threat posed to you. Tell me.." she singled at him to rise, "what became of Lord Tamsus, assuming you hung on long enough to find out"

*I'm not a regular RP guy so I hope I did an okay job of inserting myself into the story if I didn't let me know.*

Atrer sat in his quarters thinking about the current state of the Empire and whether or not it's leadership was efficient enough to keep it from falling into decline. He had seen it a million time despite his young age. A leader starts out all well and good but eventually the success turns arrogance and arrogance leads to mistakes.
He thought about what he would do if he found himself in the Emperors seat. He knew he wouldn't end the war, in all actuality he thought he would end up a conqueror. He thought that he'd take the majority of his forces from the outer rim and move them forward, push them into the heart of the Republic. Regardless he thought, this kind of thinking had no place at the moment.

A few days earlier he found himself in the middle of a battle with a Republic cruiser but his small personalized ship was no match and was badly damaged. He found Darth Romana's ship, his superior, not far off and landed there while awaiting repairs. She provided him a small room on the lower decks. It's poorly lit and the air smelled of decay, it would suffice however. As much as he admired the art of observation he felt like he needed to act, he wanted, he needed a mission.
However, he knew that requesting one would make him seem too eager so he used the force to turn off the lights, he then crossed his legs, closed his eyes and waited. Waited for one of his superiors to contact him.

Arf'axdi'nuruodo, Faxdin for short, was laying down on his cot and staring at the cold, grey durasteel walls of his cabin. His cot was not soft in the least, but it wasn't all that uncomfortable either. Faxdin stood up and walked over to the small bookshelf that was the only decoration in the room, well that and the small computer in the left corner of his cabin, and grabbed one of the thicker books titled Chiss Expansionary Defense Force Hand-to-Hand Combat Manual. He opened it up to Chapter 3 and began reading.

Chapter 3. During the early years of the CEDF, most instructors did not teach hand to hand combat. In fact in some areas of the military it was looked down upon as barbaric and-. Faxdin stopped reading and threw the book on the floor in disgust. "Why my father sent me this book is beyond me. These popular history books are never correct in the slightest. I swear the Chiss are getting dumber and dumber." he mumbled in dismay.

Faxdin picked up the book and set it back into its spot on the bookshelf. Just then a fellow Chiss walked in and Faxdin immediately recognized his friend Xixd’istas’abosen, or Distasa for short. Distasa was Faxdin’s closest friend. At 2.8 meters, Distasa was a fairly tall Chiss. One of the most unusual things about Distasa was his skin pigment because unlike most of the Blue-colored Chiss, Distasa was white!

"Faxdin." Distasa said earnestly. "Yes." he replied. "I've heard rumors that Darth Romana has found a Sith in an escape pod." Distasa said excitedly. "Well I guess we won't know definitively until, actually unless, Lady Romana announces it to the crew." Faxdin replied coolly. "Always so stuffy Faxdin, but I guess you are correct. Well I'm going to go to sleep." Distasa said. With that he laid down on his cot on the other side of the room and promptly fell asleep.

Faxdin stared at Distasa for a couple of moments and climbed onto his own cot. He tried to sleep, but he couldn't stop thinking about what Distasa had said about the Sith apprentice. Maybe Lady Romana will tell us about the Apprentice at our briefing. That brought up another thought. What is the briefing about?

Romana ran her hand through her intricately styled hair, "Interesting" she responded after a moments thought, before walking past Strieter toward the door indicating for him to follow. The other Sith and Imperials on the bridge went back to their stations at she left the bridge. As Romana arrived in her temporary living quarters she gazed out at the vastness of space from the large window, infront of which she took a seat to wait a further explanation away from the eyes of those on the bridge. "Speak" she ordered coldly after a brief but disconcerting silence as they made there way from the bridge.

Romana nodded taking it all in, "Lord Tamsus is a fool, he shouldn't interfere with what he cannot comprehend" she said with venom in her voice. "The creatures can not survive without the spirit within Tamsus, however it seems that the spirit would not die at Tamsus' demise, it must be isolated and trapped with in the artifact", she took this all on assumption based of her knowledge of alchemy and Sith spirits - it was entirely possible that she was incorrect, that however was rare.

"If..." she looked up and saw her apprentice standing in the door, "what is it?"

"My lady" he dropped to the ground and bowed his head, "we've located something you may be interested in"

Romana sighed and stood up, but remained silent.

"Master?"

"Follow" she responded to both Jace and Streiter as the headed toward the bridge.

(not exactly sure where i'm going with this)

Zelus had made his way out of the doorway in the corridor a moderate distance away from his liege and the master-less acolyte, he unfolded his arms and slowly etched away from the wall the faint green glow of his prophetic eyes could be seen across the bleak hallway the long mile through to the bridge breifly interupted as we walked a few paces towards the dark lady, he paused a smoothly arched fowards coiling his arm under his chest in a bow; "my lady..." as per she never wavered or faltered she continued to carry on her goals set on the bridge of the ship. Zelus allowed her to pass by and turned to follow the dark lady a set distance to her left, he didn't even notice the lowly presence that was the acolyte as he was not even worth a glance to him.

As the group advanced all the while the dark lady's cold glare shot through the hallway never tittering, Zelus decided to break the silence by asking..."With the utmost respect my lady is there any new information about this mission the cowering acolyte reeks of fear it seems this simple operation is more than it makes out to be my I enquire?" he boldly went on to add..."are sure we are all needed I'm certain that there isn't a need for the amount that is present among us a mere two of our organization would be plenty enough", however Zelus new not to pry as his opinions are bluntly stated he new his place. As they headed to the bridge there was a further silence it pried at his chest as he waited on an acknowledgement, he knew all to well his tendency to speak out of term even if he only wanted a better idea on the mission he wondered if he could get anything out of the young blood behind him yet it was obvious that Romana saw a need for his presence still he kept a respected silence for the remaining paces they had yet to make toward the bridge the hollow echo of the footsteps was all that could be heard amongst the hull of the ship, Zelus subtly caressed his gloved left hand as they advanced followed by gripping each hand behind his back as he followed stride for stride in the dark lady's hollow steps followed by the acolyte who had respectably made space between the behind him as the group proceeded onwards without tilting he called at the one behind him "acolyte..your name boy?".