บท 39: Chapter 39: Signal Found
Vancil idly thumbed the grooves on the mask in his hands, his red eyes unblinking as he found himself in a moment of rare respite. He had never been used to it, especially during his time in the Sith Empire, it was always one mission to the next: especially under Darth Ominit. Even during their non-combat missions, it was busy work, and in some ways, it was even busier than the combat ones.
Vancil was a warrior and a soldier. If you pointed him at the enemy either the enemy would die, or the enemy would be injured. He wasn't exactly what you would call the creating type, but that didn't stop Ominit from dragging him along to his many strange and wacky ideas. Like the time he had asked Vancil to forge a Cortosis dagger as though it were as simple as asking Vancil to pick up some groceries. It took him a month to finally find someone who could work the metal, another month to actually find the ore, and then two more months to receive the damn thing. The real kicker though was when Ominit took the dagger without a word and never brought it up again. Not all of the missions were so harmless however.
Vancil's armoured hand reached up to brush against the corner of his deep crimson eyes.
A natural side effect of prolonged use of the dark side was physical changes in the body, with the most notable being the shift to a sickly yellow eye colour. His master had such eyes, as did most other Sith he knew. Vancil also had once been developing into having his own yellow eyes, at least until one of Ominit's hare brained missions.
It was something Vancil had only heard of before, said in hushed tones at the Academy on Korriban: Sith Alchemy. It was simple enough, Vancil was to simply feed force into the alchemical conduit alongside Ominit who would be doing most of the heavy lifting. What wasn't simple was when the conduit suddenly exploded outwards, specifically in Vancil's direction. At that moment he had felt something seep into him, entering his very bones before disappearing from his senses entirely and leaving him feeling no different then when he was the moment before.
It was then that his eyes turned red and… nothing else. There was no change in his senses or combat ability. He hadn't gained a new force ability, and his Midichlorians remained the same they had been. It had disappointed Vancil that the only change was cosmetic, yet Ominit seemed utterly delighted at what had occurred, proclaiming success and refusing to explain further.
A nostalgic feeling entered him. He had quite liked Ominit. The man was an excellent warrior and a brilliant tactician, and was probably the only person in the entire Sith Order that Vancil could say was half decent. Half decent. The man was still a Sith after all, and was quite plentiful on the psychotic madman that made up their ranks.
Vancil's head shifted slightly to look at Kandria, who remained focused on the beeping panels in front of her dictating everything the ship was doing. This time she was driving, and appeared to be hyper focused on her task. It had been about a day drifting through space after the Duchess had informed them, they had to leave, and Kandria had used that time to begin to familiarise herself with the ship. After all, since the owners were dead and it was left to Kandria and Vancil by the leader of the previous owners' planet, there was really nothing refuting their ownership of it.
As for their next course of action, neither really had any idea. His goal of sightseeing, while interrupted by the frankly quite rude terrorists, had been satisfactory for him. He didn't have any more places he particularly wished to see, and Kandria hadn't been quick to offer any direction either. Right now, all he really wanted to do, was be by Kandria's side.
He turned his gaze back to the mask as the desire brought him back to his memories about Ominit. Vancil had learned many things about the man, and his master had even called Vancil his closest confidant. But there was one thing that bothered Vancil about Ominit: Why?
Why was he doing anything of what he was doing? The missions where they fought the Republic and Jedi were almost always dictated by High Command, and even then, most of the time they had to twist Ominit's arm into participating. Every mission that Ominit himself commanded and planned was some strange scheme or search for a material with zero practical use to the Sith Empire. That ruled out his motivations being his loyalty to the Sith Order.
He definitely knew Ominit didn't share Vancil's hatred of the Jedi as, much to Vancil's chagrin, on one mission he willingly let a Jedi escape so that he could collect a strange artifact when they could've just come back for it later. That ruled out his motivations being his hatred for the Jedi Order.
There was only one lead Vancil had on Ominit's motivations. Her.
Who she was, what she looked like, Vancil had absolutely no clue. He knew she definitely existed though. Ominit had the tendency to mumble to himself when he thought no one cared or bothered to listen. Vancil had only caught small parts of his murmurings, but they always included her. He never uttered her name, never said anything about his relationship to her, only that she had to hurry up and 'find him'. It confused Vancil to no end, and when he tried to ask about it, he was shut down, hard.
It was the only possible explanation for why Ominit had done what he did. There was someone out there, someone close enough, or important enough that Ominit had dedicated every single mission into working towards helping that person find him. The methods were strange, and the motivation was stranger, but it was the best Vancil had.
It… reminded him of how he felt about Kandria, funnily enough. He eyed her from the corner of his eye. Maybe if he was separated from her to such an extent that they lost all trace of each other he would follow similar steps to what Ominit had been doing. He mulled over the thought before he looked back to his mask with a smirk.
Like hell that was going to happen.
*****
…CYCLE #9087 COMPLETE
BEACON #487 SUCCESSFULLY REACTIVATED
INITIATING SHORT RANGE PULSE…
NO RESPONSE
INITIATING LONG RANGE PULSE…
RESPONSE CONFIRMED
SEARCHING FOR SIGNAL…
SIGNAL FOUND
LOCATIONAL CROSS REFERENCE COMPLETE
INITIATING CONTACT SIGNAL
*****
Kandria didn't feel bothered as she felt Vancil's gaze on her. She felt quite comforted actually. She was beginning to gain some understanding of her feelings towards Vancil, yet the full truth still remained a mystery. What she did know, was that she wanted to be by the Sith's side, always. She enjoyed his presence in a way she had never felt before.
It confused her. He was by no means a good person. Far from it. He was a Sith, a murdering madman who had very nearly killed her twice. Ever since her departure from the Jedi Order however, her opinions on him had changed, no longer being strictly bound to the Jedi Code. In fact, she found she enjoyed his flaws. The way that he would charge into battle without a hint of fear, the way he held himself as the perfect picture of arrogance and confidence, it was all something new, and something that had come in handy several times already.
He wasn't all flaws either. The man was absolutely vicious in combat, and seemed similar to a rabid beast on the battlefield. And yet, when she was in danger, when she needed him most, he put everything else to the side, putting his own life on the line to save hers.
A slight smile came onto her unmasked face. He wasn't perfect, that much was certain. He wasn't good either, not by a long shot. But that's just who he was. And she was fine with it.
She was jolted out of her thoughts as a beeping caught her attention, louder and more urgent than the others and drawing her gaze to the radio section of the console. Someone was sending a message. She shot Vancil a look of worry before hitting the receive button.
A simple, rotating symbol appeared on hologram. A symbol she recognised all too well. A symbol she had grown to hate and fear. A deep red hexagon, outlined by black with black lines radiating from a smaller black hexagon in the centre.
The Sith Empire
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