SWTOR Character Tales: Rise of Mamine KOTFE 7-9

Welcome back, my beautiful freaks, to the Assassin's Den! It's time to lead into the Alliance with the Rise of Mamine!

Mamine and Koth entered the bridge and saw Senya standing there, back to them.  Senya plainly said that she knew they had concerns, and she was right; Koth about her loyalties, and Mamine was concerned that she might be a Child of the Emperor after what she had learned from Kira and Anstrisil. Senya may be a sleeper agent for Valkorian without even knowing it.

Koth ranted about Senya and her willingness to fight her children, Senya saying that she accepted responsibility for what they were doing, and also accepted responsibility for being a good parent and stopping them.

Mamine, however, said they were ignoring the bigger threat; Valkorian himself.  Koth balked at this notion, saying he brought "security and direction to Zakuul", and Mamine replied he tried killing every living thing in the galaxy.  And in case Koth wasn't paying attention, Mamine said, that included Zakuul.  He also mentioned, when Senya brought up how cold Valkorian had gotten toward their children, that was the exact timeframe when Vitiate was ramping up his plan to do just that.

Koth still did not believe the notion that his "Immortal Emperor" was a monster, though Senya, who had been close to him, was more willing to accept it.  Thankfully, before the argument could continue, HK informed them that T7 had found intel on "The Lady of Sorrow", who had been searching for information on the Gravestone, and wanted to meet Mamine.  Mamine took Senya to the shuttle, since the zone they were headed, the Old World District, was controlled by a Force Sensitive cult called the Heralds of Zildrog, and Mamine figured a Force user would have an easier time getting through there than anyone else.

Before they could depart, however, Lana pulled Mamine aside and gave her summation on the situation; that right now, trust was hard to come by, and Mamine needed to put in the effort.  Mamine gave Lana her assessment; Senya, so long as they continued to work toward stopping her children, would continue to help, even with the plan to destroy her ex-husband. Koth, however? He was not on board with destroying Valkorian, and Mamine was worried that he may try to hinder that.  Lana, who knew Koth, said that he desired peace more than anything, and after enough time, she'd be able to convince him of Valkorian's danger.  When they were done, Mamine headed down to the shuttle bay to meet Senya.

During the shuttle trip to a drainage tunnel going to the swamp from the city, Mamine heard Senya humming a tune she didn't recognize, and upon landing, she was fully singing it.  And by the context, she thinking about her "romance" with Vitiate as Valkorian.  This dampened Mamine's spirits, because she knew that she'd need to bring up the ritual Vitiate performed on both himself and her Pureblood Sith companion, Scourge.

  Senya told Mamine that the Old World District was very much like Nar Shaddaa, a haven for criminals, but mentioned that she did like the aesthetic, praising Valkorian's vision for Zakuul.  This piked Mamine's curiosity over Senya's relationship with Vitiate-as-Valkorian, and it would have been heartwarming if it wasn't for the fact one of the parties was a monster who was faking all emotions to manipulate the feelings of a young woman.  And it was even more tragic when they had children; they begged for the approval of that emotionless monster, and received none of it.  It was no wonder that Arcann was overwhelmed with jealousy and Vaylin was driven to insanity.  Moreso when Senya told Mamine just how powerful Vaylin was at the start, and what Vitiate did to get her power under control.  The family was broken even before it was formed, and it tore at Mamine's heartstrings.

Senya continued to tell Mamine about how, when she finally realized the kind of monster she had married, she chose to leave, and take the kids with her. And they laughed at her; Arcann and his twin Thexan called her weak, and when Senya tried to take her daughter, she stayed where she was at, even though they were, at the time, torturing her.  So, Senya chose to leave on her own, working in the outer parts of their territory, having no contact with her children since.

It was this moment when Mamine chose to place the final nail in the coffin of her relationship with "Valkorian"; she told her of how, around 1500 years ago, Valkorian, in his original Pureblood Sith body, enacted a ritual that drained all the life, even the Force, from the world of Medriaas, and made his soul immortal at the expense of all emotion, save for fear and anger, the two emotions that fed the Dark Side within him.  No joy, no sadness, nothing but emptiness. And Mamine said she knew this because of the ritual that was performed on Scourge was the same, giving him the same experience.

Senya turned away from Mamine, attempting to process his words, but Mamine had to ensure that Senya understood that she wasn't trying to hurt her; she said "For what it's worth, you have my sympathy when it comes to someone you love that doesn't love you back.", and related how she had unintentionally played with Doc's heart during her journey to stop Vitiate, thinking that their relationship was purely physical, only for Doc to develop feelings. Mamine said that this was one her her greatest shames, and she wouldn't wish that feeling she forced upon Doc on anyone else.

Thankfully, T7 rolled in to the room, distracting them and getting their minds back on the task at hand; finding the Lady of Sorrows.  Mamine was glad to see her old droid companion, and asked if T7 had heard anything from their friends, though unfortunately, T7 had not. He'd been working for Lana for years now, and Kira, Doc, Rusk and Scourge had all gone their separate ways before that.

Once actually getting out of the sewers and into the district, Senya went to meet a contact, so Mamine and T7 went off to use some terminals to triangulate the location of the Lady by tapping into surveillance feeds.  And at one point, when T7 went to meet a droid contact of his, Valkorian appeared and tried talking to Mamine, but Mamine initially refused to respond.  Valkorian pushed, knowing that Mamine was thinking of Senya's reveal, and Mamine responded with "You're still taking a cruel delight in the suffering of others."

After tapping into a few more surveillance feeds with T7, Senya called on Mamine's holo and told her to meet Senya at her current location. T7, who had more objectives to complete, left Mamine to her own devices, and Mamine followed the map she was given to a bar not far from where she was at.  She was met by several lightsaber wielding thugs who utilized the Force in battle. Senya mentioned they were called the Heralds of Zildrog, once a local cult that was now more violent gang vying for territory.

Senya went up to her contact and began to interrogate him, and Mamine recognized the Force technique she was using; it was a way to cause pain in a target without doing lasting harm.  It was meant for children, to teach them how to handle the pain, and wasn't meant to be used for the purpose of interrogation.  Mamine stopped Senya, and said "there are better ways of getting information out of someone", walked up to Senya's contact, and used the Force to dominate his mind with a quick "You will tell us what we need to know.", and the bartender immediately gave the information that Senya wanted and directed them to another contact; a human woman named Mona Gale, a gambling promoter about a few hundred meters down the road.

Senya began questioning Gale upon their arrival, and Mona chose to mock Senya, and demanding to know who Mamine was, only for Mamine to reach out to the Force and touched the mind of Gale, saying "You don't care who I am, and you want to tell Senya what she wants to know", and Mona gale immediately complied. They had just gotten far enough away to not be immediately recognized as Arcann made an announcement about "the Outlander that destroyed a power planet that knocked out power to many city blocks and her accomplice Senya", an announcement that also showed holos of them.

The two fought through Breaktown before being stopped by Koth, saying that the Heralds would respond better to "regular people" than a Knight of Zakuul.  Mamine's thoughts, however, were about getting through the sector; the Heralds had shown themselves to be trained Force users, and based on what she saw, Koth lacked the specialized training and equipment needed for a Force blind to combat a trained Force user; no lightsaber resistant armor, no fire or electricity based ammunition, and no sniping ability. Koth wore average clothes for a spacer and wielded a slightly modified blaster rifle.  Mamine politely told Koth as much, stressing that Mamine was thinking about Koth's safety more than anything else, and led Senya into the district.

After a few dozen fights, Mamine and Senya finally met the leader of the Heralds, a human male filled with Dark Side corruption they called "The Exalted". Mamine knew that, when dealing with slaves to the Dark Side like this, she'd need to show a bit of strength in order for them to understand her power in any negotiation.

The interaction went as Mamine expected; Senya threatened the Heralds, the Exalted threatening Senya, and Mamine doing her best to defuse the situation while still maintaining an aura of strength.  She could tell that lightsabers were about to be drawn when a Nautolan appeared on holo, demanding that the Exalted stop, and showed that The Lady of Sorrow had captured his son, and told Mamine where to meet them.  Mamine, who thought it strange that a Nautolan was living on a human world this far from her home planet, was ready to head off, but still remained prepared for the expected treachery from these slaves to the Dark Side.

And she wasn't disappointed the Exalted, who, despite being ordered not to by the Nautolan, ordered his men to kill Mamine and Senya, and they were force to fight their way out and toward the Lady's base. On the way, they were met by two of Senya's former brethren in the Knights; one of which Mamine recognized the voice of.  Apparently, Vaylin had killed his original partner, and it was driving him to the Dark Side, as evidenced by his yellow eyes.

Mamine and Senya dueled them, with Mamine once again noticing the same flaws in their technique that Vitiate brought with him into this insular society, and dispatched her opponent quickly because of it.  However, instead of killing them like the fallen Knight expected, Mamine simply had them tied up and knocked out while she and Senya rode the turbolift up to the Lady's penthouse apartment.

Once there, they were met by Koth, whom the Lady had shown to have captured earlier on the holo, and a droid model that confused by the appearance; it had a strange crown and female features.  The droid, SCORPIO as Mamine learned, recognized Mamine as the Battlemaster of the Jedi Order, killed the Exalted with a shock from her systems and then asked what Mamine would do with his son, whom she had captured to lure the Exalted himself to her.  Mamine was torn; by his red eyes and pale skin, the boy as as much an unrepentant slave of the Dark Side as his father.  On the other, she also knew that a being could be corrupted to the Dark Side by no fault of their own, as had been done with Leeha Narezz, Tol Braga and Warren Sedoru many years ago.

Mamine said that no one was beyond hope of redemption, something that amused SCORPIO. SCORPIO agreed with Mamine's choice, but let him go for her own reasons, and told the Nautolan, now revealed as "Thea" to continue her operations in her stead, leaving SCORPIO free to join Mamine. SCORPIO revealed two reasons for joining; one, she wanted to talk to the Gravestone, and the other was that Arcann had "taken something of her's."

The return to the Gravestone bridge was as unpleasant as Mamine expected; Koth argued with SCORPIO, HK-55 threatened to shoot SCORPIO, tempers flared.  Mamine got frustrated with it and walked out of the bridge, and Lana followed, informing Mamine about the people offering to ally with Mamine now that it was known that she was awake.  Mamine joked that it might be fun to have people not looking down on him for once, but before the conversation could continue, Lana got a comm from the Scion Heskal, telling Mamine to come alone once they landed on Asylum.  Mamine headed up that way with her faithful companion T7-01, and were met by Heskal being held in place with the Force in the middle of the room they had fought days earlier.  His body was then tossed aside, revealing that Arcann was there.  Arcann revealed that Heskal had betrayed Mamine to Arcann, and Arcann offered a peace agreement; he'd let the people Mamine had gathered go, but Arcann got the Gravestone. Mamine, in the meantime, would be returned to carbonite while his people researched the means to remove and destroy his father.

Mamine knew the truth, however; Arcann had no intention of removing Valkorian from Mamine's mind. He wanted his father as a trophy now. Mamine "agreed" and was given a moment to "tell her forces to stand down".  Mamine turned around and activated her comm, but instead of telling her forces to stand down, she warned them that Arcann was here and ready to fight.  Mamine spun around while drawing and activating her lightsaber, and prepared for battle.

The battle went the way Mamine expected; Arcann exhibited the same flaws in his style that his father did on Dromund Kaas and Ziost, though he chained Force abilities into his attack sequences more freely than his father. But with Mamine's strong telekinetic barriers protecting her from being tossed around, and what she didn't think her barriers could protect, she knew to dodge. It wasn't long before Mamine managed to out duel Arcann and tossed him through the wall as the roof collapsed.

Mamine and T7 made their way back to the docks, only to see Heskal being dragged by a couple of Knights. Mamine struck them down, and Heskal said, as he lied there dying, that "everything was happening as forseen". This upset Mamine; he stated that according to the Jedi, the future was always in motion and that no vision was ever absolute.  "You doomed people for a possible future, not an absolute one."  Heskal, however, continued to smile as he died, justified in his vision of the "glorious future".

Mamine and T7 continued down toward the docks, only to find out she had to head back up to unlock the docking clamps.  She was forced to flee when Senya challenged Vaylin in order to fight her way up to the docking clamps. Shee and Lana were eventually met by Koth and former Havoc Squad member Tanno Vik and his gang.  Lana stayed behind to defend the entrance while Mamine and Koth headed up toward a warehouse landing pad for a transport ship that would take them up to the tower they needed to get to.

Unfortunately, Koth again showed his loyalty to Valkorian when he asked if he had any tips for Mamine. Mamine again condemned Valkorian, and vocalized her worry about Koth still worshiping a monster even after Mamine and Lana telling him what he did and what he tried to do on a galactic scale.  Koth said "He was always good to Zakuul," and Mamine replied with "A serial murderer who is a good father to a favored child is no less a serial murderer."

After landing, Koth and Mamine stopped at the tram needed to get Mamine to the docking controls, and Koth and HK-55 stayed at the start of the tram to defend it.  Mamine reached the platform and let loose the Gravestone, only for her Force enhanced senses to alert her of Arcann's presence. Mamine dodged Arcann's strike and activating her own lightsabers to begin this final duel.  She continued to exploit the weaknesses in Arcann's style, while HK-55, who had taken the tram up to assist Mamine since she was taking too long, fired upon the Zakuulan Emperor as they fought. Eventually, Arcann got fed up with the droid and used his power to destroy it.

It was this poing when Valkorian chose to offered Mamine his power, saying she risked death if she didn't take it. Mamine knew that Valkorian was only trying to manipulate her, again denied the power Valkorian offered, but when Valkorian disappeared, Mamine noticed something different; Valkorian had her frozen in place. And this gave Arcann the time he needed to reach out with the Force and grabbed Mamine, and pulled her toward Arcann, impailing Mamine on his lightsaber.

Arcann took that moment to taunt Valkorian, shouting "Feel that, Father?", but Mamine just grinned.  "He doesn't feel anything, Arcann. Not pain, not joy, nothing." And while speaking this, Mamine gathered telekinetic energy and and thrust her hands forward, and pushed herself off the blade and pushed Arcann off the platform with the Force and into the depths below.

It was then that Koth made his presence known, helping Mamine down to the docks, where she passed out on the bridge.

She woke up many hours later, surrounded by the allies he had gathered, save for the destroyed HK-55.  Her allies had recovered the droid's body, but his memory core had been destroyed. They also told her where they were and informed her of the allies they had gathered. Moment took a moment to look at Koth and told him that, if it hadn't been for his Immortal Emperor, they'd have been able to capture Arcann before this war had even started, and explained exactly what happened before Koth found her.  Mamine did not relent and stated that, as long as Valkorian was in her mind, she'd be unable to defeat Arcann unless it directly benefited Valkorian's plan. This took Koth aback, trying to rationalize the benevolent Emperor that he knew with the actions he had taken during this battle with his son, and how it prolonged the coming conflict.

After leaving the ship, Mamine indeed saw the gathering of the people there; Republic, Imperials, Jedi, Sith and all sorts of criminals and mercenaries. Mamine looked around for something to get everyone's attention, and found it with a giant drill they would use to create an entrance for the facility that was partially built behind them.  She activated it, and started in on a rousing speech of how they needed to work together for a better future.  Once she was done, she went off with Lana, Koth and Senya to begin to make plans for this new Alliance base and the structure; there would be a Commander of the Alliance to make executive decisions about the path they would take, a circle of advisors for the Commander, and people to run the day to day operations.  Mamine didn't know the role she was going play in this Alliance, but she assumed s he'd be some kind of rallying figure at the very least.

In the coming days, Mamine met some of the members of the Alliance, including some old friends and allies.  She met Master Anstrisil, last member of the Jedi Council, though he'd been unable to rally anyone to his cause save for the people he had direct relationships with thanks to Republic distrust of his species. He said he was tired of conflict, and hoped that the Alliance would finally offer something different. She was also introduced to Anstrisil's mercenaries, Hardatt and his wife Azulini.  They had been working for Anstrisil for quite some time, and had even been involved in the rescue of Yokonari and Casek.

Yokonari and Casek, however, had been in bad shape. After Revan had outed them as Light Side, it wasn't long before their entire White Knight sect was discovered by the Hand of Jadus. The Hand of Jadus had let an assault on their estates, captured the Empire's Wrath and Darth Imperius and destroyed both of their families and the entire sect. For four years, the two of them had been tortured in and permanently scarred before the Rattataki Mercenaries sprung them; Casek's jaw had been repeatedly shattered and was unable to talk without cybernetics, and Yokonari required extensive cybernetics to get herself back to the physical capabilities she was at before. Both were filled with rage over those that hurt them, and both had fallen completely to the Dark Side.

However, not everyone's fate was as dark as those three's. Once the construction was nearing completion, Lana informed Mamine that the last of the Alliance inner circle had arrived and wanted to meet er; Theron Shan, former SIS operative.  They spoke for a while about things that Lana didn't have the answer to, and Theron showed Mamine another thing he had retrieved; her old Defender starship.  And out of the Defender bounded a young Cathar girl that Mamine swore looked familiar. The Cathar girl ran toward Mamine, and she finally recognized her as Suthazi, the youngling that she had bonded with during her redemption.


Suthazi told Mamine of what had happened to her over the past five years; she got a Master and was made a Padawan, but during a mission to Alderaan, a Zakuulan assassin was trying to kill a member of House Organa to destabilize the peace efforts and Suthazi was forced to leave her Master, at her request, to protect the Organa, leaving Daashla Myr to die in combat. With nowhere to turn, Suthazi decided she was going to help any Padawans displaced by this war and gather them all in once place to continue their training the best they could. Currently, she had about a dozen members of her "Padawan's Collective" at verious stages of training, but without any means of building lightsabers thanks to a lack of safe places to get Adegan crystals. Mamine said she'd get them all trained by the Jedi here, and Suthazi said she wanted Mamine to be her master. Mamine initially denied this due to her feeling unworthy to teach anyone, but she came around to the idea when Suthazi explained that Mamine had learned the dangers of the Dark Side the hard way, and understood better than anyone the signs of falling to the Dark Side. Mamine relented, and took Suthazi as her Padawan, promising that she'd try to be a good example for this young woman.


It was shortly after that when a young Pureblood Sith came up to Suthazi and introduced herself to Mamine; Brosra, the last of house Adas, the oldest noble bloodline in the Empire. It was she who had been funding the Padawan's Collective, which included their food, clothing, fuel and other supplies a Jedi Training vessel required, in exchange for a berth on Mamine's ship and protection from her enemies.



Once this was done, Mamine met the leaders of the specific aspects of the Alliance; Admiral Bey'wan Aygo of the Republic fleet, whom she had served with during the battle of Kuat, as the the one in charge of her military, Hylo Visz, who was in charge of getting supplies and funds, Doctor Oggurrobb, the Hutt who helped her on Makeb in charge of science, and the Voss Mystic Sana-Rae in charge of matters pertaining to the Force.  Mamine was hesitant was introduced to Sana-Rae after what she had done on Voss all those years ago, since Sana-Rae had no idea about what Mamine had done,she accepted this Voss woman as her Force advisor.  From here, Mamine was told that there was a party going on in the cantina upstairs and that Mamine was asked to make an appearance, she agreed, figuring that it would be a good idea for their rallying figure to be seen as a "woman of the people".  From here, she took Theron aside and continued her conversation from earlier.  Once they were done, the party was winding down, Mamine headed back into the facility to find Senya standing by her ship's hangar, musing about the future. She told Mamine what Vaylin told her while on Asylum; that her other son, Thexan, wasn't killed in battle in the Core Worlds. It was Arcann who killed him out a fit of jealousy and rage.  This affirmed her desire to stop her children before heading off. It was then that Valkorian made his presence known, and asked Mamine what kind of future she saw for the galaxy, and Mamine was blunt, saying "A future without you." and stormed off.

She received a message from Lana to meet her in the military hanger.  Once there, Lana led Mamine back to the main area of the base and told her that she was now the Alliance Commander herself.  She was not only the rallying figure for the Alliance, but the one calling the shots. She joked that she thought Lana hated titles, who replied that she hated having them, but enjoyed giving them, before turning her attention to her people and gave them a rousing speech.

As before, I'm going to do an interlude chapter where Mamine gets to know what's happened to the White Knight characters, gets to know Brosra a bit, gets to know the Rattataki Mercenaries, and takes Suthazi to gather the Alliance alerts.  I'm also going to update the lightsaber form post again with some new ideas I had a couple nights ago. Look forward for those chapters over the next couple days, and stay beautiful freaks!