USH'S GAME EPISODE V- 'MAUSOLEUM'- DARK SIDE AREA

Avalar, Orbital Mining Platform

“Status check?”

“Everything is normal,” came the reply over the com-unit, obscured slightly by the dialect of the Mon Calamari. “Laser is still operating at 98% efficiency.”

“Any problems I should know of?”

“None.”

“Good. Keep it that way, Quint, or… you’ll answer to me!” Galder turned off the com-unit and lay back in his chair, observing the empty wastes of space beyond. “I’m SO bored…” he said. He flicked the unit to interstellar mode and tries to make a connection. “Come on, Faylar, you bastard, answer me…” The door to the bridge opened, and Takuan came in.

“Having trouble?” asked Takuan. Galder starts, almost guilty, and turns to speak.

“Still no word from Jaglon Beta,” he says. “I have NO idea what is going on out there.”

“You’ve been looking through the stellar database again,” says Takuan. “What are you trying to find out about Kuylen’s movements?”

“How the hell do you know that?” asks Galder.

“I…” starts Takuan, and then stops. “I don’t know. Where the hell am I?”

“Uhh… the bridge?” says Galder.

“Bridge? Bridge where? What is this place?” Galder pointed to the large white planet visible at the base of the port window, the glow of the mining laser slowly burning away at it, the trail from the sun to which the planet is drawing perilously close snaking beautifully around it.

“Same place as always Takuan. Avalar is still out there. Are you feeling ok?” Takuan blinked.

“This is the mining platform Kuylen used to excavate the monastery on Avalar!” Galder clapped.

“Yeah, well done,” he says. “You amaze me with your astonishing powers of deduction. I KNOW where I am, Takuan! Stop being weird.”

“This is all wrong,” says Takuan. “I was never here. We hadn’t even met yet. You even TOLD me how Kuylen left you in charge of this place alone!”

“I guess now you put it like that it does seem a little weird,” says Galder. “Oh well, what do I know about things? Kuylen never tells me anything, he doesn’t even trust me worth a damn, not until he brings me to Damagran.”

“How do you know that?” asks Takuan. “And besides, he left you in charge of this place, didn’t he?”

“Only because he didn’t have anyone else with him at the time,” says Galder. “Actually, yes he did, he had Saar, so what the hell was HE up to during all this, that’s what I want to know!”

“This is insane,” says Takuan.

“Oh well, go see Kuylen, he’ll tell you what you need to know. He’s waiting for you on the surface.”

“You just said you couldn’t contact him.”

“Did I? Nonsense, we’re nearly done! Kuylen wouldn’t be away if we were nearly done! We are all here. Quick, go get a shuttle, he’ll get annoyed if you are late.”

“I… uhhh… yeah…” said Takuan, backing out through the door, which opened behind him.

-

You see a vast, underground city, and something deep in the mountains that slips away from you when you try to see it… Someone screams a terrible scream of pain…There is fighting… fighting everywhere… you are surrounded, a dozen sabres ignite, their bearers wishing you death…Chion laughs insanely, a blue glue reflected in his face… nearby, a Sith Lord in black robes raises his arms and chants something as two enormous doors shake on the other side of the chamber, and Jedi come to stop him…

-

“Do you know where the shuttle bay is?” asks Takuan. “You see, I’ve never been here before.” A woman, who looks remarkably like Trinity out of the Matrix, jumps guiltily and drops a hyperspanner.

“You scared the hell out of me, you cretin!” she screams. “What are you doing skulking down here? This is the laser control room! Like, DUH, how dumb, are you?”

“You… you wouldn’t be overriding the safeties on those controls so that the laser destroys the entire complex on Avalar, would you?”

“No…” she said, unconvincingly

“That’s insane, why would you destroy Avalar, your only possible path to true power?”

“Oh, poodoo to THAT!” says the woman. “I don’t believe all that mumbo-jumbo, I only cared about the money and Faylar offered me a lot more!”

“But… You are Krisha, aren’t you? I never even met you.”

“Hah! Sucks to be you then!” she said. “Meeting me is a wonderful gift to any man.”

“But you are dead!"

“Oh really? And what about you?”

“I’m not dead!”

“No? Maybe you are on a path to death already. Maybe you should be careful what you do and where you go, little Orphan of the Force, lost and confused…”

That does not sound like Krisha.

“Uhhh…” said Takuan. Krisha pointed behind him.

“Docking bay is that way. Now, get out of my face, yah? Scram!” Takuan backed away again as Krisha got back to work, and the door closed…

-

Many voices merge

“We can do that part of the plan now whilst we wait; gather your forces/…/This isn’t WORKING, Kuylen! It’s a complete disaster!/…/If there is one thing we have learned over time it is that you should never trust the word of a Jedi/…/I have no problem in killing any of you now if you stand in my way/…/The doors are opening. We’re in/…/ You do not need to tell how much of a threat the Sith are/…/We are but one step away from ultimate power and all YOU need to do is keep your damn heads!/…/My Master Kuylen orders you dead!/…/Your trial will be this evening. Your execution will follow at dawn/…/AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

The scream portends something terrible.

-

At the landing platform, Takuan was cold. This planet was freezing, even inside the habitable area. Kuylen was there.

“Kuylen, PLEASE tell me what is going on,” asks Takuan.

“You know my style, Takuan, better for you to learn things the hard way,” says Kuylen. “Maybe I should have brought you here after all, but I was worried that your unrestrained talent and this place… would not go together well.”

“Then you know what is going on?”

“Of course. We’re moving out. This place is doomed. We must hurry.”

“But this is all wrong!” bemoaned Takuan.

”Work it out then,” said Kuylen. “Now. Go and get the gold! Quickly! We shall need it when we move on, and there is not much time!”

Takuan ran on through the fissure in the ice through to the dark halls of the Monastery on Avalar, the great stairway either side.

Sabres clash as Lance and Galder come tumbling into the room, fighting each other ferociously. Evenly matched, they clash blow after blow after blow after blow.

“You think you're some hotshot, don't ya'? I've been plagued by the Jedi all my life: on Naboo, Hoth, my parents...” says Galder, furiously. Takuan stays at the sides of the room, making his way gingerly past the fight and onwards.

Takuan came to a blank corridor, blocked at the far end by what looked like a concave black disk, like a 3-d mirror… the mirror test!

“I knew I felt something,” said the girl, walking out from the mirror.

“I saw you before…” said Takuan. “I sensed you on Belseraphon… you are Edna.”

“That’s me,” she said, smiling. “I sensed you there too.”

“But how? That hasn’t happened yet.”

“You’re kind of slow there, Takuan; this isn’t really being done in real time, yeah?”

“But… you can’t have sensed me, sensing that you were there!”

“No… but I sensed that you were GOING to be there… you aren’t the only one who tried to use the Force to solve that problem. And I knew it was going to become your problem instead of mine so I left.”

“What’s going on? How are any of you talking to me?” Edna smiled.

“None of us are talking to you! The Force is, through thing and people you understand. You are seeing and getting insights on what people thought and did. The Force shows you MANY things, past and future.”

“But none of it makes sense!

“No, well, you have my problem, you see. You have the Force, but you cannot control it. You cannot understand the Will of the Force. But it is trying to tell you anyway. You seem quite into it, friend. I think the Force is trying to tell you something VERY important!”

“Then tell me!” Edna laughs.

“I cannot do that, only you can do that. But I can tell you this…” as the Monastery begins to shake. “I would get out of here if I were you; it is about to become very dangerous and there is nothing here for you.” She runs down the way Takuan came. “Goodbye!”

“But…” begins Takuan. The mirror is gone, his way on is clear. Takuan stumbles on through the collapsing Monastery as the mining laser starts causing the ice to collapse and crush everything, and Takuan comes to the outer sanctum, to one side the false archive, to the other side the glorious map room, where Kuylen and the others gathered the astronomical data to use with the astrolabe. The gold. FOCUS! Takuan moves on through another secret door, through to the inner sanctum. The Archive. Takuan stares in wonder at the glory of this place- endless stone bookcases, stretching upwards for hundreds of metres, each stacked with stone tablets containing the secrets of the Sith… just how much WAS there in this place, compared to how much Kuylen got?

But these tablets do not appear to be stone, they are golden. And as Takuan watches, the chamber begins to collapse. The tablet falls to the ground, each one dissolving into nothing as it does so, and Takuan is showered in gold dust which itself disappears at the ground Takuan dives around, trying to save the tablets but he cannot, until FINALLY he gets one in his hand, and he is left alone in the cold dark room… looking at the tablet, he places his hand on its back. And letters form on the front side, lighting up green, in Sith. One at a time. And Takuan, able to hear screaming in the background, can read each word as it appears.

WE

WILL

KILL

YOU

Takuan turns, and there is a tall figure, flashing a red lightsabre towards Takuan, cutting him in two…

A scream… a bright flash, and you are blasted back with the power of the death screams of a billion people...

Kuylen's Base, Dordellus

Here, then, is your base on Dordellus. Dordellus is the most horribly inhospitable planet. It barely qualifies as habitable. All attempts to colonise Dordellus have failed with the loss of life of all the colonists. No-one really wants to come here any more.
It is cold, wet, swampy, poor in mineral resources and available food. There are worst places than that to live, but the biggest problems are the Arthropods. These vast swarms of flying insects speed over the surface of the planet and destroy everything in their path- plants. Clothing. Flesh. Weapons. Spaceships. There is nothing they cannot seem to eat through, in seconds. Such a predator makes life uncomfortable for the other natural life-forms on Dordellus, who have formed their defence in the form of high-pitched sound that drives the arthropods away. Working on that principle, when Kuylen constructed his base- a prefabricated refit of a cave system on the planet- he set up powerful sonic vibrators all around. Should the arthropods come near, the activated vibrators will create sonic waves that kill them in their millions, giving humans no more than a bad headache. The whole complex is also covered by a holographic field that makes it all look like the same featureless swamp that surrounds it. A detailed investigation might see through that deception- but who the heck would want to take a second look at this hellish place?

The letters indicate the following:

A- The first of the domestic quarters. This is Kuylen’s room, and his alone.

B- Jolanta’s room, and once Krisha’s. A concession to female modesty means she gets this alone as well.

C- Galder and Takuan’s room

D- Chion’s room. No-one WANTS to share with him. His bed is more like a torture device.

E- Saar and Rah’s room

F- Dak and Wraith’s room.

G- The hangar bay. Here you park your ships. Here also are the ships of unwary travellers you have captured over time. You kept the travellers.

H- Just outside the main entrance, the graveyard. Five graves of people like you who did not survive their training. If they did not displease Kuylen before dying, he gave them a decent burial.

I- This room goes on for considerably further than the map- it is your enormous fuel depot.

J- Droid training. Aside from the inevitable remotes, there are a number of humanoid-like droids here that you can use as target practice for any weapon

K- The Duelling room. This featureless, squash-court style area is for you guys to practice duels with each other.

L- The Fear room. Here you learn how to experience and control your Dark Side emotions. You do not like this place.

M- Main entrance.

N- System control annex

O- Storeroom

P- Medical centre. Built like a military hospital, access to this place has cured all of you of any injuries you had before the story started- Galder is still sleeping here at night instead of his room, as he is kept under observation.

Q- Power generator access

R- Power turbines

S- Main communications transmitter

T- The Arena. Here you may fight against the slaves and captives you have made other time, of which there are many. The slaves are provided with a lavish armoury. The deal is this- if a slave ever kills one of you, that slave is freed. It is a powerful incentive as you are given opponents desperate to kill you and with nothing to lose. Just to make life more interesting, Kuylen has given them ‘anti Jedi grenades’ Before you wonder, they are useless to you. They are proximity grenades with a sensor inside. The sensor is sensitive to the power signature of a lightsabre. When it comes within one metre of one, it explodes. The slaves, equipped with these, keep you on your toes. It is fighting in this place that has given people like Galder and Dak their honed combat instincts, and each of you has had to fight here at least once. The bit to the left is the viewing balcony.

U- Where the smooth lines give way to the rough lines is where the prefabricated structure gives way to the natural cave system, leading to nowhere important, though you let the slaves run around there sometimes- free-range slaves!

V- Holding pens for the slaves, many of whom have cybernetic limbs having lost the originals fighting in the arena. Obviously, the slaves are only given their weapons just before they enter the arena!

W- The cave here ends in a river which is your water supply

X- Main command and control room. Here, Kuylen plans his destiny- and yours.

You are not planning to stay here long and may never return. Kuylen and Saar are taking time to analyze the Astrolabe with the star maps to confirm the Mausoleum’s location (if any of you were not told the Mausoleum story beforehand, you have heard it now), and Jolanta is running various computer analyses of the info. Chion has been using the arena, though is not right now. The rest of you may make use of any other facility you wish- up to four of you may fight practice duels in the duelling room. Those of you who have not met may now become acquainted.

Right now, though, it is morning, and Kuylen is at the door to Takuan’s room, where Takuan has just woken up.

“Takuan, are you well?” he asks. “You were screaming.”

I hope you like the hi-tech computer graphics there...

Anyone except for Takuan can ignore the first post if they want. Apologies to the other players who at first had bit parts in it, but space requirements meant I had to cut them. Maybe on the DVD...

Galder stomps out of the medical center, stretching his arms...or arm, as one is fake. His left arm, the cybernetic limb, was repaired as well, having been damaged by deflected blaster shots from Persis. He had been sleeping long and hard, deprived of sleep by his rigorous mission earlier. Looking for something to do, he heads for the droid training room.

Well, you can mess around with the remotes, or with the easy hack-and-repair dummy droids- kind of hi-tech childs dolls, really...

Lots of fun gear in here; grenades, mines, spare sabres, emp guns, large knives, crossbows (Kuylen is a classicist sometimes- though you will be surprised what he can fit on a crossbow bolt), rocket launchers, plasmathrowers (flamethrowers, but nastier), shield guns (used on Kuylen's homeworld- these weapons have an energy shield built in, like the shields the Gungans use, allowing you to shoot with quite a lot of safety from return fire- very battery intensive though), even ballistic weapons (e.g. guns using bullets), which again Kuylen has adapted...

Galder looks around the armory, running a hand over the guns and weapons. "Good to be home," Galder thinks, choosing things he'll be loading into his ship when it comes to the time when they evacuate the base. He grabs two large knives and a plasmathrower. He picks three droids and sets them for hand-to-hand combat, and lets them dash out ahead of him before marching out after them. He readies the two large knives, both held in a back-handed fashion.

The droids have only the most basic combat programming. They advance and attack with simple and relatively slow swings.

Galder runs at one and jumps over a few of its swings before jumping up and kicking it in the head, sending it backwards. He then spins around and kicks one in the back of the kneecap, sending it to the ground.

"I wish Kuylen would update these..."

Kuylen does not like combat droids. For serious training he likes combat against the living- hence the Arena. These droids are just for target practice. Oh, and he likes you to put them back together when you are done with them, but that is easy, they are built that way.

"You must die," says the third, coming at you with a jab to your chest.

Galder leaps over the droid and thrusts the knives into it's arms, disconnecting them at the shoulder joint. He switches the droids off and puts their heads and arms and legs back on.

He decides to go pay a visit to one of the others, tossing the knives casually back onto the racks. Maybe an argument with Saar or a conversation with Kuylen...

Kuylen will talk with Takuan first, then he might show off a weapon or two...

Saar is in the C&C room.

I come out of my room, working the kinks out of my neck and stretching my tail. I walk into the C&C room, not bothering to check who is in there.

"I'm bored as hell... remind me again why we are here..."

It's easy to tell I am edgy, and annoyed...

Takuan quickly jumps from his bed after looking around, confused.
He grabs his temples to stop the head ache....
"the most peculiar vi...dream..." he says.

After modifying his sabre so that it can be split into 2 seperate blades Rah spends some time meditating on the force in the fear room.
Afterwards he seeks out Galder to see if he will help him with some duelling practise using 2 blades...

Oh good, because I was going to say- if anyone wants to duel they had better start soon so we can get it done in time.

C&C is filled with bank after bank of computers and an enormous star map covering one wall. Hung all around are various embelems of the Sith- and THIS is the place to where Kuylen has brought the Sith artifacts he has accumulated in his career, his version of Ascar's collection.

"Haven't you got that thing working yet?" asks Jolanta, who is typing one-handed on a keyboard, resting her legs, clad in knee-high boots, on the next computer monitor down.

"It's VERY complicated..." says Saar, who is making minute adjustments to the Astrolabe. He looks up at the people entering. "Morning," he says.

"Why are we bothering?" asks Jolanta. "We HAVE the co-ordinates!"

"Because it always pays to check PERSONALLY," says Saar. "We don't rely on others."

"At least Takuan has shut up..." says Jolanta. He woke all of you up.

(and when Dak asks his question)

"Making preperations for the most important journey of our lives," says Saar. "It is well enough to be prepared for it."

-

"Are you ok now?" asks Kuylen, simply. "Any problems?"

(Oh, and you have a new player joining you once I have his template sorted)

"Ah, hello Rah. Trust you slept well?" Galder asks. He guides Rah to the dueling room. "So, you want some pointers from me about using two lightsabers, eh? Easier done than said," Galder says with a grin.

Wraith jumps out of his bed, following Dak to the control room. He listens to the chatting.

"Makes sense to me to be prepared," he remarks. "And checking the Astrolabe is not a bad idea. Ascar duped us on Malastare and nearly got me killed, so how do we know he gave us the right coordinates?"

"Indeed," says Saar.

(BTW, Wraith- do you wear that armour when walking around here as well?)

"I wish he had given us an instruction manual, though."

"Have you got anything from it at all?"

"I have the basic principle but the Sith were so obscure about things... Avalar's orbit is decaying, it has changed a lot in the last thousand years."

"But we aren't LOOKING for Avalar!" says Jolanta. Saar sighs as if talking to a small child.

"The Astrolabes were designed to guide you from one Sith location to another. You can't just use it from anywhere. It is only any good to us at all because we know where Avalar is, and we can calibrate it from there to find the Mausoleum! Problem is we are not sure where Avalar WAS a thousand years ago and these maps are so ridiculously coded that trying to account for that variable, tiny as it is compared to stellar distance, is tricky. It's like they think I am trying to do it from a nearby moon or something."

"So you haven't got anything at all?" Saar stays silent for a moment.

"It's in the same galactic quadrant as Ascar's co-ordinates."

"Great, that's only countless thousands of worlds..." says Jolanta.

Ok, are Baylin and Galder going to duel?

Yes, I think that was the idea...