Star Wars Saga: The last, best Hope [AU] - IC

[Liliedhe]

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Well, I wondered if I should be a pain now and drop another batallion of Stormies in your way... But hey, it's not like you would be in trouble^^. Let's just get the story on, right?

Rathe runs down the stairs and into the corridor... There's a heavy blast door at the end, supposedly the computer center is behind it. But that isn't as important as the five rooms on the left side of the corridor. Each of them has a steelglass window and a heavy plaststeel door...

[Moral Wiz]

Rathe doesn't break her stride as she hits the corridoor, she simply keeps walking down the corridoor, her face set.

All right. Somewhere around here...

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(1d20+17)[31]UtF to sense her friend...

[Liliedhe]

He is in the third room. The first two are completely empty, containing no furniture or anything else. The third one holds a hovering bed, lots of medical equipment with blinking lights and a pale, thin, almost corpselike young man, who lies motionless on the bed, his eyes closed. Rathe recognizes the setting of her vision... The door into the room is locked.

[Moral Wiz]

Rathe's saber rises as she comes to the door

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(2d8+6)[15] damage
(2d8+6)[10]
(2d8+6)[9]
(2d8+6)[18] subsequent slashes, if the first doesn't break it

[Liliedhe]

She cuts the door down...

Inside, it is deadly silent, only the soft beeping of the machines keeps it from being a grave...

[Moral Wiz]

Rathe's lightsaber clutters as it falls from her hand. Rathe's far too distracted to even care. She makes up a final burst of speed to get herself across the room, and is bent over the limp form in a second.

Whie?! It's me. Hold on..

She starts to take a look at the machines that thread through her friend, frenziedly looking them over, trying to work out what they are, and how to stop them...

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Don't know what roll that'd need. And Rathe finally comes up with the name.

[Liliedhe]

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That would be either Knowledge (Life Sciences) or Treat Injury.

He is just lying there, face pale, hair almost shorn off, a scar covering his forehead and the side of his head. His eyes are closed. There is no reaction to Rathe...

To the others, if they are feeling like intruding - they recognize the shape your contact wore on the last meeting...

[Moral Wiz]

Rathe doesn't stop. She's on the verge of tears now she sees Whie at close quarters

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(1d20+6)[23] Trent Injury. Not that she's probably going to get anything, but...

[Liliedhe]

As far as she can tell, the machines are doing nothing to him. They are only monitoring his lifesigns, which are stable. Only one monitor, the one hooked up to his head, shows flatlines.

[Moral Wiz]

Rathe is in tears as she looks the monitors over. Several of them receive a slap at Rathe's hands as she gets ever more frenzied, looking for something even as she knows there is nothing, that that little scar in his head.

No. No, no, no....

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Ok. Now, I stop hogging the scene. Sorry, guys.

If no one does anything, Rathe'll act. But it'll take her a little while.

[Ascension]

Rissa glares with contempt at Teese.

"Now do you see what you've been guarding all this time? What horrors you've been an unwittin' accomplice to? You've got to be a particularly low brand of scum to treat a sentient being like that. Poor kid's already dead, least his brain is, but your mistress keeps him breathin' just so she can keep puttin' his body through the wringer. That goes beyond murder. It's takin' all the self-control I can muster not to show you how it feels to be brain dead right here right now with this blaster. Maybe that'd give you back some of the empathy the Empire tried to scare out of all you stormies. Well, in the nanoseconds before it killed you, at least."

She turns to Rathe.

"C'mon. He said Arbor was up on the upper level. Let's go find the bitch and teach her some manners. The hard way. Any woman who can do somethin' like that ain't fit to lick the shoes of a ten-penny Mon Cal whore."

[Moral Wiz]

Rathe's breathing heavily. She's all but reduced to sobbing over Whie. It's almost as though she doesn't hear Rissa, but slowly, she quietens.

Give me... a few seconds.

Silence. Then, slowly Rathe picked herself up, and started to walk towards the door

She didn't seem to be looking at Rissa and Teese though. As she got there she, slowly, deliberately, and physically bent down to pick up her light saber

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Chance for someone to interviene...

[Ascension]

Rissa simply stands by in silence, glaring at Teese. It's a way to distract herself from watching what she's sure Rathe is about to do.

[Moral Wiz]

Slowly, Rathe walked back across the Room. Her Lightsaber is firm in her hand. It is the only thing that is. She feels dizzy, uncertain, unbelieving as she walks across...

The Lightsaber ignites as she stands over Whie's near lifeless form. Blood red. Rathe closes her eyes, in a vain attempt to stop the tears, as her blade...

Be at one with the Force, Whie Malreaux.

Her voice is ... emotional. Near broken, as the right light flew...

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If possible, Rathe will spend a destiny point here to make it an auto-crit, and thus a clean, gentle, painless kill.

[Liliedhe]

The Stormtrooper melts away from Rissa's reproach, but wisely just keeps silent and tries to be invisible.

As Rathe takes the weapon and goes back to her friend to set him free, suddenly the monitors begin to beep frantically, and the flat lines of his brainwaves spike - then, Whie opens his eyes...

"Rathe...", he groans, struggling to sit up.

[Moral Wiz]

...

Whie?

Rathe just stand there, silent. Her lightsaber falls from her hand, clattering once more upon the ferrocrete... she is simply shocked. Her tears haven't stopped...

Slowly, a tad unsure, she moves to help him up...

[Liliedhe]

"I knew you would come... We have little time."

He begins to unattach the wires, not caring if some of them leave little bleeding sores. "Did you follow the droid here?" He is very weak, his body trembling badly even from the small exertion of sitting up.

[Moral Wiz]

Rathe snaps to as Whie starts speaking. She immediately rushes to help, working almost as quickly as she was earlier, in her frenzy.

Droid? No. We saw a shapeshifter using your form, but no droids. Except QT, but...

She actually laughs, if only slightly.

You're not doing so good, you crazy. Here.

She puts a hand gently over one of the small wounds, attempting to transfer some small measure of vitality to the near dead Whie...

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(1d20+17)[21] on UtF, in an attempt to heal Whie via transfer vitality.. Also spending a force point, and destiny point, to get him in the best condition possible.

Why do I suspect it won't make much difference?

[Liliedhe]

"Don't." He gently tries to push her away, but the wounds close.

"The shapeshifter was a droid... A special one. But that's not important right now. We don't have much time - soon I will go back, and this is the last opportunity I get. If you have questions, ask them now."

[Moral Wiz]

Go back? But...

Rathe's smile fades quickly...

[Liliedhe]

"You do know of my dreams, right? Where I see the future? It was always like I got trapped in my future body, incapable of doing anything but watching. Ever since this happened" - he points to the scar on his head - "I can act, because there is no future 'me' left... But this is the last vision I'll have. So I have to make it count, before it is over and you set me free."

He gently puts his hand on Rathe's. "Please. This is important... I think your Alliance will depend on it. The boy told me he would lure you here, but then it would be up to me to make you understand."

[Moral Wiz]

Rathe's biting back tears now. With an effort, she rallies.

All right. What are you suposed to say? Who is this "boy", and what has he to do with the Droid that's giving infomation to the Alliance?

[Liliedhe]

Whie takes her hands and looks her intently in the eye.

"You know the boy as well as I do. He was with us then. He sent the droid, but couldn't trust it."

A shudder passes through him, and for a second his eyes close. Sweat streams over his face, as he fights to hold on.

"The Emperor is obsessed with seeing the future. That's why he didn't kill me after I failed. He had other Jedi with this power cloned, and he wanted to use them to get the drop on the Alliance, but they all died. For some reason, he believes that his takeover was not as successful as it could have been because of Skywalker's abilities."

Rathe can feel his grip loosen and has to hold him up now. "I don't really see, I only walk between my bodies, but one of the clone children did. You must get the data about his visions, and the messages he left in his room..."

[Ascension]

Rissa just stares blankly, stunned to silence by the sudden revival of the young man on the bed.

[Moral Wiz]

Rathe moves quickly, holding him up as best she can, all else beyond her right now

Easy... Which room is it? Do you know?

[OldSchoolGamer7]

QT-86

Most people treat droids like furniture, so QT was used to fading into the background. He made no reactions, no movements, nothing. This is the Jedi's choice, regardless of what happens. I cannot interfere.

"I must say, this news of a shapeshifting droid is quite disturbing. Though I am not pleased that it exists, I am glad it was never, to my knowledge, in the hands of the CIS. I'm all for equal rights between droids and other sentient beings, but that takes it a bit too far. It would be dangerous in the hands of assassins.

"So, I guess it looks like I'm going to be downloading a lot of data. I hate to ask, but if you want it all, you may need to buy me time with a diversion. It is rather difficult to defend ones self when one is hacking a network...and, believe me, I've got a feeling this won't be easy."

[Liliedhe]

"It's the last of the 'cages' in this corridor..."

He lurches forward, his mouth now next to Rathe's ear, his voice a faint whisper: "Tell Yoda... Tell him what happened. In the end... I just couldn't be a candle. Goodbye Rathe... Please set me free now, Jedi..."

His body relaxes, and slumps into her arms. Suddenly the feeling of his presence is gone again, and all she holds is an empty shell...

[Moral Wiz]

Rathe

Rathe is sobbing at Whie's final words. She can barely get her own words out, her own last farewell

Goodbye Whie. You... well, without you, I wouldn't be here now.

She stands there a bit, even as Whie's spirit leaves it's body, simply holding her oldest friend, eyes wet. Then, slowly, she laid him down on the hover bed, kicking the instruments away, leaving just the hoverbed, and the limp form of the Jedi upon it. Like a funeral pryre

Once more Rathe picks up her lightsaber. Once more it ignites. Once more...

There is no Death, there is the Force. There is no Death, there is...

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Sorry. It's dramatic!

[Liliedhe]

Her lightsaber strikes quick and true. A last breath escapes Whie's body, then he lies still, his suffering finally ended.

For a moment the room fills with his presence, and an overwhelming sense of gratitude... Thank you...

Then he fades away into the Force... And the room is silent and empty once more.

[Moral Wiz]

Rathe is silent there, standing still in the center of the room, her eyes streaked with tears as she looked at Whie's limp form.

He called you Jedi...

No. Jedi don't kill...

Then, she turns around, face red but set firm. Her voice... quiet. Cold.

Well, new objectives. QT, can you get that Blast Door open somehow?

Irrespective of the response, Rathe strides out, heading over to the final room, lightsaber out, ignited, glowing red. It meets the door lock with a hiss of energy on steel.

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(2d9+6)[14] Damage