Lord Saltaeon: IMPERFECTIONS

[CAIN]

LORD SALTAEON: IMPERFECTIONS

Drommund Kaas, 7:46am. 

She had found the list buried between sheafs of unused velum and pots of ink. It wasn't exactly hidden, no locks or bars to prevent access, but neither had it been on display; it took a while for her to put together exactly what its contents had described, but when she had, the solution to its problem had become obvious. There was an imperfection in the world, and now she had to put it right. 

Joslae Saltaeon, Lord of the Sith, walked unafraid through rain-slicked streets and under the neon bright holographic lighting of Kaas' underbelly. She had dressed down for the journey, eschewing visible armour and the marks of her rank and position in favour of a cowled robe that hid her features in the morning gloom from any passers by. The location she was moving towards seemed strange to her - a prestigious place known only to the wealthy, buried like a single gem in the festering wasteland of one of the few poor districts of the Imperial capital. The Empire hates to acknowledge the destitute and unloved which nonetheless make up parts of its population; these were the people with enough money to house and clothe themselves, yet not enough to be civilised. They lived on the very brink of becoming slaves, though many of them were already over that line in indentured servitude so severe that slavery might be a less stressful experience. 

The place stank of the Dark Side, and Joslae breathed it in deeply. The Sith knew the truth; the suffering generated by the revolting population here was like a battery of the Dark Side, fuelling the Sith who called the planet home. They were necessary. 

They were also stupid. 

She sensed the men waiting for her in the alley ahead. The trap was so obvious she didn't even need the Force, though that helped; the scent of their fear cut through the otherwise unpleasant odour of the alley in a way indescribable to anyone without the sixth sense of the Dark Side. She could easily have taken another route, doubled back or even gone overhead via the rooftops… but she was Joslae Saltaeon, Lord of the Sith, and fear was almost as alien to her as pity. 

"Well well," the first of them sneered as he stepped into her path, a shadow brandishing a metallic shard of a knife in her direction. "Din't you 'ear there's a tax round these streets?" 

Joslae didn't speak - she simply glared at him. Already she could feel the instinctive rage boiling inside her waiting to be unleashed, a tame fire that roared against the inside of her chest. But she quieted it, patient; letting its hunger grow. It would be more satisfying this way.

Another figure stepped in behind her with another gleaming knife, giving a throaty chuckle. 

"Iz a simple tax," the second one buzzed. It sounded like his nose had been broken so often it was almost flat against his skull. "You pay uzz every credit in your pockets. Or we tax your life, zee?" 

For the first time she spoke. "There is a third option."

The men glanced at each other. This wasn't right - their victims were usually afraid, terrified of them at this point. This woman, with her bearing tall enough to be in high heels and the fineness of her clothes, should have been a weeping puddle. 

"There ain't no third option! Hand it over, n-" 

She cut him off. "The third option is the one where I leave you both choking to death on your own shattered skulls. Of course you might not die. You could continue living in agony for a long, long time."

Again they glanced at each other, and she felt one of them shuffle a step back. There was a noise from above - a tiny shuffle of the sole of a boot on duracrete. The third member of their little mugging party was perched some way above, wedged between an air conditioning unit and a power conduit. His legs were getting tired. 

A flash of danger sense made the world slow to a crawl around her. Joslae could see every detail of the scene clear in her mind's eye, the three muggers, the alley, even the drops of rain as they shattered against the ground and the hood of her cloak. She wouldn't need weapons for this. 

Reaching behind herself as she turned, her hand found the wrist of the hand thrusting a knife towards her kidneys. Startled, the mugger tried to pull his arm free but her grip would make a vice weep with envy. Joslae continued her turn, using it to lever herself before she pulled on his arm as hard and as fast as she could. 

With a sickening wet pop! the arm was wrenched free of its socket, dislocating instantly; the noise it made as she ripped the arm clean off his body was rather like damp cardboard. To her strength, it provided about the same amount of resistance. 

Now she was armed. A bitter, ironic sense of humour flashed briefly through her mind, but only for a second before she whirled the bloody stump of an arm around in a perfect Shien strike, breaking the mugger's jaw with an audible crack. 

The whole motion took less than a second. One down, two to go. 

The first one, now behind her, wasn't stupid enough to go for the same wide open lunge that his companion had - he swung his longer knife through the air, using its weight and the length of his gangly arms to create momentum. But the move was so open and telegraphed she could have caught it blindfolded. 

Joslae leaned back and widened her stance, letting the blade pass just over her head without clipping her hood. The man stumbled, overbalanced, and Joslae snapped her back leg out in a kick that turned what had once been a knee joint into bone shrapnel. 

The mugger howled with pain and collapsed to the floor, clutching what had once been a functional leg. His knife clattered away, forgotten about. 

Before she could finish reaching for his head to snap his neck, the third assailant fell on her - literally dropping from above to land on her back, arms wrapping and grasping to try and lock around her neck to choke her out. This one at least was fighting smart, attacking when she was focused elsewhere, using his position to his advantage. He could maybe have been a soldier. 

Reaching back over her shoulder she grabbed him by the collar and wrenched him over her shoulder - throwing him into the alley wall hard enough that she heard some unidentified bone break. Probably a rib. The mugger managed to get back to his feet, no small feat, and swayed towards her with a closed fist punch.

One-handed she simply swatted the punch aside, technique not even considered when her strength outmatched her opponent so thoroughly. With the same hand she made a fist, drew back, and punched clean through the center of the mugger's chest. He froze, alive enough to look down at the wrist protruding from his midsection before a spray of blood coughed from between his lips. He went limp and Joslae let him slide off her hand, flicking wet blood from her clawed fingertips.

The first attacker was still alive, still sobbing and pleading - something about letting him live. Joslae ignored him, placed a boot against his neck, and stepped down until he stopped moving. 

She checked the time on her datapad - the place would be open now, and now Joslae felt envigorated. 

There were no signs or holo-displays to mark the store she entered; no declared opening hours or even an indication of what it sold. The door shut behind her and she let her eyes wander around the room; every surface was lined with books. Not a single space was free of them, every table, shelves lining the walls - these were not the modern glowing databooks which were common in the Archives of the Sith, but genuine paper books with real binding. Josale breathed in the scent of leather and paper and dust - and for a fraction of a second… he was there with her, like a lingering hint of his presence in the air. Then it was gone. 

"May I… help you?" An old man stood behind a counter, peering at her over tiny reading spectacles. 

"Yes," Joslae said tersely, stepping towards the counter. "There was a book on order. This one." 

From within her robe she produced the list and placed it on the counter… only then remembering that her hand was slicked to the wrist with red blood. It left a trail on the counter and the folded vellum sheaf of the list. 

Gingerly, the man picked up the vellum and unfolded it - glancing nervously up at her from time to time as he did. "Hmm. Yes, I recall this one… a very particular collector wanted it. Unfortunately he… er, never came to collect it."

"I am aware," Josale growled in a voice like stone. "I am here to collect it now on his behalf. I will pay whatever is required." 

The old man swallowed. 

"Um… yes… you see…" he started to say, quavering under her intensifying stare. "I'm… afraid that this particular tome… was sold on to another collector. Store policy, you see. I can only hold a book that rare for a few weeks… um…"

Incomprehensible rage boiled the blood in her chest and filled her head with red mist. It took every ounce of unconquerable will for her to restrain her every murderous instinct down to a simple shift in the tone of her voice.

"Where. Would I find. This collector." 

"H-he didn't give a name, or address - collected by hand, I… I am sorry, this isn't exactly a… a stellar operation, you know…" 

The countertop broke under her hand with a sudden snap. Joslae hadn't even realised she had swung her fist until the act was done, and the floor was covered in books and wood splinters. She tried to choke out words, but rage tightened her throat until she could barely breathe. Without another word she simply turned and strode out of the store, the bloodied list clutched in one fist. 

So close. She had been so close. 

Every other book on the list she had found, hunted down and ferreted out from collectors or sellers, the exact editions and bindings and authors that had been noted down, all except this one. This last one that was so apparently illusive. Even he had taken years to track it down, years to secure a deal to purchase it. 

Finishing the list had felt like the right thing to do, it had felt like a whisper from the Force itself guilding her and saying - this way. Closure is here. The pain will stop if you just finish this one thing.

But now the pain was worse than ever, the aching loss like a flame snuffed that left the world dark and cold. Every damn book but the last. Every single one. 

Perhaps one of the others will know where to find the book. Perhaps she will ask. There are others who know the archives, others who collect. 

Resigned, Joslae wiped raindrops away from beneath her eyes - and walked off into the tear-streaked streets to return to her empty home.