NationStates Jolt Archive

OOC:
I tried starting this a long time ago, but got caught up in RL issues and had to drop it. I'm hoping to restart it now. My idea would be that someone would RP the government of the planet my character's on, or other citizens, but that's open to change. Please TG me with your ideas before posting. I'd prefer to keep OOC posts in this thread to a minimum.

IC:
One hundred and forty years of training, six hundred years of Black Ops work, a nondescript man thought, and I’m reduced to sitting in a bar, drinking the local swill and pining after better days. Hell, I don’t even know what planet I’m on. Not that it matters. Nothing matters anymore. Is a man without a purpose still a man?

It wasn’t the first time he had asked himself that question. In the past thirty years he’d had plenty of time to consider his peculiar situation. Once, he’d been a warrior, a soldier, a killer. Nothing had mattered but the mission. Get the job done, he’d always told himself. Everything else was secondary. Now where did that leave him? He had no mission, no cause. For perhaps the first time in his life, he was simply…himself.

Problem is, I don’t know who I am. he thought suddenly. How can I be myself without an identity? His job had always required him to be nobody, to be invisible. He’d gone through more false identities than there were people in this city, most likely. But none of them had been him. “Who am I?” He mumbled to himself. “No longer a soldier, but still a killer? A killer with no one to kill, perhaps.”

Suddenly he stood, an expression of distaste on his face. “This stuff tastes like shit.” He began walking for the door, but the bouncer, a large man with muscles that looked like corded steel, barred his way.

“You didn’t pay,” the man growled. The killer looked at him, his eyes unreadable. Kill him. The voice came from inside his head. It was the voice of his past, the voice of his training. Anyone who gets in the way of your mission is an enemy, and must be removed from the equation.

But he had no mission. Well, no matter. He wasn’t about to pay for that disgusting drink in any case. His right arm shot out, grabbing the man by the throat and hoisting him without effort into the air. The gems of the twin rings on his left hand suddenly popped off, revealing hidden blades underneath. He gave the man a vicious smile. “Did you know that the human eye pops when you stab it with something sharp?” The bouncer’s eyes widened in fear as the man’s left fist came flying toward his face.

The killer reveled in the blinded man’s screams of agony as he walked down the block away from the bar. This, he recalled, was why he was no longer Black Ops. His superiors had begun to suspect he enjoyed the violent part of his work more than was appropriate. They had been right.

bump

Inquisitor Ostarte looked over the security records of the assault with a mild look of worry on his face. He looked toward his apprentice, a Seeker Estrella, to gauge her reaction. Hers was a look of concern, seemingly more for the mental welfare of the culprit than the physical health of the victim. This sympathy was all that kept her from becoming a true Inquisitor of the Holy Empire. The officer who presented the replay paused the hologram as it showed the man leaving. "What do you suggest that we do, sir?"

"We make an example of him," Ostarte turned off the hologram and turned his gaze upon Estrella, "we show the world that the Holy Empire of Orthae Velve will not provide refuge to brutes and heretics. Seeker Estrella and I will track him down personally."

Estrella and the officer saluted and spoke in unison. "We will spread the light through the black of night."

"Seeker Estrella," Ostarte made his way toward the door, which opened automatically to the main hallway of the Peacemaker Headquarters on Bella V, "we should get our equipment ready while this officer increases security at the starports. We must remain vigilant against the darkness, no matter what form it takes."

Bella V, a cantina near a secondary , primarily bulk freight starport.

The dark robed figure sat quietly in a ill lit back booth, a tall glass of something cheap and local half empty at hand. The cantina was mostly empty this time of local day, just the hard core regulars. They were all to involved drowning their own misieries to pay attention to the silent stranger who had settled in their midst some weeks ago.

*Perigrine they are tightening security around all the ports. As it originates with the Inquisitors, out of Peacemaker Headquarters I believe it to be the result of a criminal act, rather than anything political...though one can never tell* The message sounded silently in the back of the dark figure's mind, courtesy of the matrix link.

Sha'Do ended news with a sniff as only an A. I. can. She'd long since cracked into the Orthae Velve's cybersystems. It was what she'd been created, sentienced, to do, and she did it very well. The A.I. wasn't keeping continuous watch over every sub set, only the interesting ones. And the Peacemakers definitely qualified with their quasi religous overtones that made most outsiders definitely uneasy.

And Perigrine Omega, was definitely an outsider here. An outsider that had the technology and abilities to make sure her ease was restored. Violently if need be, but far more generally with keeping an ear open for any and all interesting information.

*Keep Shadow Dancer on full stand by, shields in secure mode. Our contact still hasn't shown.* Perigrine replied silently through the link

The Shadow Dancer, nominally an small high risk cargo Free Trader, waited un noticed and un remarked in the leased launch space. The tim starcraft looked elderly but maintained, armed with just enough 'bite' to chase off small time 'jackers. The Dancer's true abilities were carefully hidden both to visual and scanner inspection. Her shields would keep any one but Perigrine out, and any sort of probe off of the hull.

Cool amber eyes, all that were visable under the concealing headdress, veil and robes, swept the bar once again. The tiny vid that hung over the bar, it's hologram image blurry with static reported nothing in the way of large scale criminal activity, accidents, or sudden political upheaval. Though the Nietzschean wasn't sure if it would. Censorship was a usefull tool in keeping the populace docile.

In the week following the incident in the bar, a series of unexplained murders began to plague the city. Some of the victims were killed in ways that indicated an attacker of seemingly impossible physical strength, some in a manner that made it clear they never even saw their attacker coming. There were only two things that linked the murders together. The first was an occult looking symbol carved into their foreheads that was not linked to any local organization and had local authories baffled. Second was that all of the victims were known to be involved in less than legal activities. Merchants who cheated their customers, drug dealers, even a few corrupt politicians. Clearly, the police had a vigilante on their hands.

-----------
Eight days after the bar:

The killer stood silently over the body of his latest victim, still mentally basking in the man's dying screams. It was so exhilarating, so empowering, to take a life. The ecstasy of it left him trembling. This one had been a common street thug, scum of the streets. There had been others...many others.

And there will be more. The killer gloated to himself. I will continue my crusade until I have cleansed this city of the corruption that plagues it, and then I will move on to a new city and start anew. I will wage my own private war on the filth of the universe. Who will stop me? Who can stop me?

He reached into his coat and pulled out a long, curved knife. He would mark this one, as he had the others. Mark them for what they were. Unworthy. He reached down and made three swift, precise cuts, slicing deftly into the skin of the dead man's forehead, leaving behind the Guanyan symbol for evil.

Evil that I have eliminated. Evil that I have vanquished.

Wiping his blade on the corpse's clothing, the killer turned and vanished into the night.

"Seeker Estrella, what progress have we made in pinning down the killer?" Ostarte and Estrella were overlooking a map of the pattern of attacks within the area. The killer stayed within the city, but beyond that there was no geographic pattern.

"I've set up ambushes based on his target profile. False targets have been planted under hidden guard of a Warden, a Templar, and four Conscripts." Estrella pressed a button on the control panel, revealing the names and profiles of each team member.

"Conscripts I can understand, but I hardly consider calling upon Wardens or Templar." Ostarte actually could understand calling upon the military veterans of Othrae Velve, but they must act as escort to the wielders of the personal field technology that made Velven infantry famous.

"Judging by the crime scenes, one can estimate that the culprit is physically superior to the average humanoid. Conscripts probably would not be able to bring him down, let alone take him alive."

Ostarte easily avoided showing his suprise, but he was impressed. "Very well. However, we are going to need to take lengths in order to prevent the populace from panicing."

"Or siding with the vigilante."

"The trademark scarification makes it likely the murderer is some form of heretic. The only support to be gained will be foreign, which are more likely to be victims than cohorts."

"Inquisitor, should we work with the trappers?"

"Indeed. I will be with the group planted in the port district. You will take the low level district nearest the last reported crime scene. We cannot afford to let this... vigilante continue his killing spree."

Perigrine followed the investigation of the serial killings through both the public and Peacemaker cyber systems. The Tanaran agent's interest in them was only minimal. Nietzschean's didn't fall prey to that particular insanity. There were more important things to trouble oneself with than the easy slaughter of a few criminals sloppy enough to get found out.

However the continued non appearance of the contact was becoming something that would need to be looked into. The schedule, a nearly two month window, was coming to an end. The original cover, that the Shadow Dancer needed some particularly scarce replacement parts, would end when said parts arrived. And they would arrive soon.

Perigrine made sure that a part of each day it would appear to any watching that some minimal work progressed on the star ship. More time was spent becoming intimately familiar with the port and those who populated it. The canitna was the most regular stop, where hours were spent nursing fewer drinks than appearances might suggest. Nietzschena physiology handled far more alcoholic injestion with ease, but the appearance of drunkness made others assume.

OOC: My intention was for one of you to make the initial contact with my character. If you have other ideas, TG me and we'll figure it out.