First chapter of the background story for my Sith Assassin on Lord Adraas.

 

EDIT: A few minor changes based on feedback.

 

Part I: Born Under An Ill Star

 

The girl’s first victim was her own mother. Unsurprising, given the unusually-developed bone spurs on her face. A human was just never meant to give birth to one with the features of a full-blooded Sith.

 

Despite her crimson skin and impressive bone spurs, everyone knew the girl was a half-blood, and thus only useful as a slave. Before she could even speak, she was taken to slave quarters and reared there. Her assigned family had been slaves for generations, descendants of captives from the Great Hyperspace War. The Sith Purebloods who sentenced the infant to a lifetime of servitude gave her only as much thought as it took to come up with an appropriate name: Annash, roughly meaning “worth in cash.”

 

It was only a few days after her fourth birthday, which passed with only the notation that she was now one year older, that she began her life as a slave in earnest.

 

It was a bright, crisp, cold morning on Ziost, as many were. The clear sky and bright, bright sunshine ironically portended a colder-than-normal day. A commotion in the courtyard of the slave quarters drew Annash’s attention moments before a thin human man in a dirt-caked cold weather utility suit barged into her “family’s” hovel, flanked by two armored soldiers. He wasted no time, pointing at Annash and looking at the Twi’lek who had raised the girl. “How old is this youngling?”

 

The woman, who Annash knew only as “Nanna,” replied immediately, fear cracking her voice. “She turned four a few days ago.”

 

The man looked over the young girl, then stomped toward her. Instinctively, Annash recoiled, only to be caught by Nanna and pressed forward, allowing the stranger to look down at her. He knelt, and gripped the girl’s arms, squeezing her flesh to feel the bones beneath, then grabbed her hands, studying her fingers. “She’ll do,” he said as he stood, turned, and walked out of the house. The two soldiers approached, and Annash looked up at Nanna with terror in her brilliant yellow eyes.

 

“It’ll be alright,” the woman lied. “Go with them, do as you’re told, and everything will be alright.”

 

Annash kicked and screamed as one of the soldiers effortlessly picked her up and threw her over his shoulder, her tiny fists and feet banging impotently against the plasteel plates of his armor. She was carried to the middle of the courtyard, where a dozen other children her own age were gathered, and unceremoniously dumped in the midst of them. She was not the only one bawling.

 

“I think that’s the last of them,” one of the soldiers said to the man who’d invaded Annash’s home.

 

The man nodded. “Good enough for now. Load them up.”

 

“You heard him, move!” one of the soldiers yelled, making all the children shriek. When they didn’t follow his nebulous command to his satisfaction, he gestured at four other soldiers gathered about, and they began hoisting the children into the air, and tossing them in back of a hovertruck like sacks of grain.

 

Once all the children had been loaded, the truck took off, cruising over the frozen desert wastes of Ziost. The younglings looked at each other, each terrified, lost, confused, and overwhelemed. Many of them continued crying, and few new ones began to start, as their comrades’ own emotionality wore on them, or the situation itself grew too much to bear. The only attention paid to their hysterics were gruff shouts from the accompanying soldiers to “Shut up that racket!”

 

Eventually, they pulled to a stop, and the doors of the truck opened, and more soldiers, or perhaps the same ones, ordered the children out.

 

Hesitantly, cheeks stained with tears, they left the hovertruck.

 

A gigantic temple loomed over them like a stone monster prepared to devour all who drew its baleful gaze. Spread before the temple, the snow, ice, and dirt of Ziost had been carefully sectioned and scraped away, layer by painstaking layer. Men, women, slaves, and droids all bustled about the site, going about tasks for which the slave children had no frame of reference.

 

The man who’d taken them called another man in similar outfit over. “Get these slaves working,” he commanded as the other man approached. “I want all three of those burial chambers mapped by the end of the day. Is that understood!”

 

“Yes, sir,” the second man replied, and watched as the first man stormed away.

 

“You!” he shouted, making the younglings jump in startled terror. “You are slaves. You are here to work. You will do what you are told, when you are told. You will not question, you will not complain, you will not refuse. You will work when we say you work, you will rest when we say you rest, you will eat when we say you eat. And do not for a moment think that we will send you back home because you do not perform as we command. Going home is your reward for obedience and service. Resistance and laziness will be punished. Am I understood?”

 

The younglings didn’t respond.

 

Picking one child at random, the man grabbed the boy’s jumpsuit and hoisted him high in the air at arm’s length, shaking him twice violently. “I said, am I understood!”

 

“Yes!” the boy shouted. “Yes, yes, I understand, yes!”

 

Still holding the boy high in the air, the man looked at the rest of the younglings. “Am I understood?”

 

There was a chorus of assent.

 

“Good!” the man dropped the boy to the ground. “Now follow me.”

 

The terrified younglings followed the man into the temple, where yet more work was going on. Finally, he led them to a passage blocked by a cave-in. As he began to speak, he fastened a device around each child’s wrist. “Younglings, your job is to worm your way through that rubble to the passages beyond. There are chambers back there we want mapped. You will carry such devices with you, and report what you see. Do not touch anything, do not take anything. We will know if you do. Now move!”

 

Hesitantly at first, the younglings began to use their small bodies work their way into the blocked-off passage. Annash was the first to make her way through.

 

The children wandered off, exploring the different rooms and passages. Annash found herself in a chamber with a large, stone slab in the middle, surrounded by gems, precious stones, and oddly-cut crystals of red, green, blue, yellow, and purple. She reached out to study these before she recalled the overseer’s warning, and shoved her hands in her pockets. She wandered the room for a time, recalling what the man had said about mapping, before leaving to wander more passages and chambers.

 

After a few hours, the device on her wrist beeped, summoning her back to the overseer. Annash and several other children met up at the barricade and crawled their way back through, though the girl couldn’t help but notice that three or four young faces were absent.

 

The overseer downloaded the collated data from the youngling’s transponders into a collected map of their explorations. Numerous gaps shown in the holo.

 

“Good,” replied, “but not good enough. Get back in there, and finish mapping. Now!”

 

Weary and covered in dust, dirt, and minor scrapes and bruises, Annash and the others had no choice.

 

***

 

Annash and the others were given only two rest breaks that day, both times to eat a meager meal of ration cubes. But they had completed their task, and produced a complete holomap of the burial chambers. All it cost was the lives of six of them.

 

“Excellent,” the man who’d originally rounded up the younglings said as he surveyed the map. “Tomorrow we begin excavating. The scans show a treasure trove of crystals and Sith artifacts in those chambers!”

 

“But sir,” one of the other men replied. “We can’t move that stone blockage until the labor droids arrive, and they won’t be here for another week.”

 

The first man looked at his exhausted workforce. “No reason to stop just yet. We can begin retrieval of some of the smaller items.”

Edited January 31, 2012 by ErikModi

Great opening sentence and opening paragraph. Nailing an introduction is an art and I rarely see intros this attention-getting.

 

Suggestion: This part seems to be from Annash's point of view. Given she's four, would she know that her nanna lied when she said "It'll be alright?" I might change 'the woman lied' to 'the woman said' or something like it.

 

Great pacing of dialogue and description, really breaks up the visual flow and makes the story easy to read. Good movement of action, dialogue, action too.

 

Another suggestion: You might give a sentence or two to Annash's interaction with the other children on the truck ride or at least her observation. It's the first time since capture that she's left alone by the soldiers and left alone with the other kids. Even superficial might add a bit of appropriate flavor.

 

The Sith are appropriately brutal, rough, uncaring of children but not ridiculously evil. I approve. The depiction of how they use these slave kids feels authentic and believable.

 

What a great first chapter. By the end, I'm hooked and keen to know what happens next. You have solid writing chops. Thanks for posting it!

And thank you for the detailed and creative feedback! I really appreciate not only the support, but the notations of what you as a reader would like to see more of. An excellent critique, well received!

Great opening sentence and opening paragraph. Nailing an introduction is an art and I rarely see intros this attention-getting.

 

Suggestion: This part seems to be from Annash's point of view. Given she's four, would she know that her nanna lied when she said "It'll be alright?" I might change 'the woman lied' to 'the woman said' or something like it.

 

Great pacing of dialogue and description, really breaks up the visual flow and makes the story easy to read. Good movement of action, dialogue, action too.

 

Another suggestion: You might give a sentence or two to Annash's interaction with the other children on the truck ride or at least her observation. It's the first time since capture that she's left alone by the soldiers and left alone with the other kids. Even superficial might add a bit of appropriate flavor.

 

The Sith are appropriately brutal, rough, uncaring of children but not ridiculously evil. I approve. The depiction of how they use these slave kids feels authentic and believable.

 

What a great first chapter. By the end, I'm hooked and keen to know what happens next. You have solid writing chops. Thanks for posting it!

 

 

I have to agree, Kinda waiting for more. I don't suppose you could give my story a verdict, criticism welcome, I'm thinking it might need a little more depth but I'm not sure where to start. thanks

 

To op I await your next entry

More is coming

I expected this chapter to be more of a thing but. . . oh well.

 

EDIT: Muse struck, and it is a bigger thing.

 

Part II: The Magic Of The Crystals

 

The following day saw Annash returned to the dig site several hours earlier than when she had first arrived the previous day. She was given a secureseal sack and shown images on a datapad of the kind of small objects the archaelogical team wanted retrieved. Then, she and other younglings were once more sent through the rubble into the chambers beyond.

 

Annash returned to the first chamber she’d explored, and began to scoop up items she had seen on the datapad screen. As she wrapped her hands around several small, faceted red crystals, she felt something, a tingle up her arm and through her trunk. She opened her hand, looking at the small, oblong gems within. They glittered in the wan light of the ruin, almost as though glowing from within, casting specks of brilliant red light onto the red skin of her palm. She was entranced by their beauty.

 

After a time, she shook herself out of the spell, stuffed the crystals into her pouch, and continued her looting of the tomb until her bag was full. Once more, she clambered through the rubble. The overseer awaited.

 

“Good job, youngling. Take these to Tarvil. Go!”

 

Annash went.

 

***

 

She found Tarvil in a small tent, occupied mostly by a large table with neatly arranged rows of bits and fragments of artifacts. Tarvil was a tall human, with steel-gray hair fading to white at his receding hairline, darkening to black as it fell to the collar of his shirt. He turned as Annash entered the tent.

 

“Ah, good, you’ve brought me new things!” He indicated another, small table. “Show me what you’ve brought me, young one.” Annash obediently dumped the contents of her sac on the table. Tarvil smiled as he picked over the small items she’d brought. “Yes, yes, these are excellent. Well done, young one! Thank you!” He stood, and plunged a hand into his pocket. “Now, don’t tell anyone. . . but here.” He quickly withdrew a small item and dropped it into Annash’s hand. She looked at it quizzically, having never seen anything like it before. Finally, Tarvil smiled. “It’s a candy. Here,” he uncoiled the plastic wrapper, leaving the hard, brightly-colored oblong resting in the girl’s palm. “Pop it in your mouth, quickly,” he said. Annash complied, and smiled as the sweet, tangy flavor spread through her mouth. Tarvil smiled, too. “That’s a good girl. Bring more finds like this, and I’ll have more like that for you.”

 

The girl nodded eagerly, and turned to leave, but something stopped her. Tarvil looked at the girl. “You have something to say? Please, speak.”

 

She nodded, and spoke with trembling jaw, voice quaking with fear. “I. . . was wondering,” the pointed at the beautiful red crystals on the table. “What those were?”

 

Tarvil smiled, and picked up one of the gems. “These are lightsaber focusing crystals. They are one of the primary components in building the fearsome energy weapons used by Sith, and their Jedi opponents. The color of the crystal determines the color of the blade, so this crystal, installed in a lightsaber, would create a red blade. Some crystals occur naturally, and some are baked in intensely hot furnaces, and the Sith of old learned special techniques to create extremely powerful synthetic crystals.”

 

The girl nodded numbly, still spellbound by the crystal’s beauty. “When I picked them up, I. . .” she trailed off.

 

“What?” Tarvil asked. “You felt something?”

 

Annash nodded again, and Tarvil smiled.

 

“Before they can be used as the focusing gem for a lightsaber, a crystal must be attuned with the Force. The Sith – and Jedi – who construct lightsabers use the Force to bring the weapon together, especially to imbue the crystal with energy. In this way, the lightsaber becomes an extension of the maker’s. . . soul, if you will. These crystals were used in the lightsabers of long-dead Sith, but they still have some of that Sith’s Force imprint upon them. This is what you sensed when you held them: the ancient spiritual fingerprints of powerful Sith Lords.”

 

Annash nodded, watching the light from the crystal play on the old man’s face as he turned it in his fingers. “It’s beautiful,” she said.

 

Tarvil smiled. “That it is. But it is not for the likes of us. The Sith will be wanting their prizes soon. Go, now, before the overseer gets cross with you.” Annash turned to leave the tent. “And be careful, young one. Remember I have many more candies for the bright young girl who brings me more valuable history.”

 

Annash smiled, and darted from the tent with youthful enthusiasm.

 

***

 

Annash spent many years crawling through tiny passages of rock and ice, looking for anything of value. She recovered many small trinkets, and lead the archaeologists to many substantial finds. Since the dig teams worked for the Sith, their primary focus was in finding artifacts of import to the Sith. Many examples of refined natural and synthetic lightsaber crystals were found, as were old lightsabers and earlier weapons, imbued gemstones, amulets, and relics, along with innumberable other treasures.

 

The girl learned a surprising amount during this time. To better identify objects of value, Tarvil taught her not only what was worth retrieving, but why. She studied the crystals and relics she uncovered, learning about how the gems worked when placed within the almost-magical lightsabers the Sith carried. She even pocketed several small stones, not valuable enough to excite the excavators, for her own collection.

 

As Annash grew up, Tarvil grew old. The white of his hair slowly crept down his long locks, the black eventually vanishing completely, followed by the steel-grey. His face, already lined with years and the cold harshness of Ziost, grew thinner, more deeply creased with age and the elements. His slender body grew thin, shorter, hunched. Annash watched the man she’d come to regard as her true father wither slowly over the years.

 

Annash had blossomed into a beautiful young woman by the time Tarvil breathed his last. He died in his sleep, and his body had been disposed of before Annash arrived at the dig site that morning. She had never even gotten to say goodbye.

 

Numb with loss, Annash flitted from job to job at the site, her mind nowhere near on her work. It wasn’t until she felt the tingling of her slave collar’s lowest, “attention-getting” setting, and saw an unfamiliar man holding the remote, that she realized she’d been sold.

Edited January 31, 2012 by ErikModi

The last two parts.

 

Part III: Serving At The Pleasure Of Others

Annash’s new owner was the proprietor of a nearby cantina, servicing the dig crews, overseers, bureaucrats, Imperials, and low-ranking Sith who kept the digs in this region of Ziost running. Visiting the dig site, he had seen the beautiful young woman, and saw instantly that such a creature could be put to far better use than rooting around in the dirt. Two days of training, and Annash was serving refreshment to the patrons of her new owner’s cantina. The shapely young woman proved to be quite the attraction among the cantina’s patrons.

 

For her part, Annash found the life of a serving girl slave both better and worse than a work slave at an archaeological dig. The work was less physically demanding in most ways, though spending so much time on her feet, darting from one table filled with increasingly-intoxicated patrons to the next could prove equally exhausting to clambering through ancient stone shafts or painstakingly brushing dirt away from a fossilized remnant. In the cantina she was out of the cold and biting wind of Ziost’s barren wastes, and the air was recirculated and refreshed. To get out of the elements on a dig site meant going into a tomb or ruin that smelled of thousand-year-old stale air and death. Having grown up with that scent, Annash reflected, on occasion, that she actually missed the musty smell, and sometimes preferred it to the stale sweat and sour breath of a drunken letch.

 

What she did mind was the clothing. As a work slave, she’d been fitted in functional jumpsuits; worn and well-used, certainly, but warm and protective. As a serving girl in the cantina, she wore scant, clingy outfits that her owner claimed displayed her charms to their fullest advantage. Having as much of her voluptuous crimson flesh exposed as possible would result in better tips, not that Annash was allowed to keep any of the money she earned. By definition, slaves did not get paid.

 

Another facet of her revealing costume made itself known one fateful evening.

 

It was a slow night at the cantina, only one group of five males occupying one table. They all leered at Annash’s exposed skin and delicious curves, growing less and less subtle as they imbibed more and more intoxicants. They’d been there for several hours when the nominal leader, a Pureblood Sith with a lightsaber as his belt, grabbed Annash about the waist and pulled her into his lap. She fought the reflexive urge to struggle; she knew from personal experience that she would be punished harshly for any customer complaints she earned. The Sith pressed his nose against the curve of her neck and shoulder, inhaling her scent. “Tell me, my dear, how a Pureblood beauty like you wound up wearing this.” He nudged Annash’s slave collar with the tip of his nose.

 

Annash swallowed. “I am not a Pureblood, my Lord. My mother was human.”

 

The man sighed, his hot breath rushing across Annash’s skin. “You could have fooled me. Here I was, thinking you’d done something incredibly naughty to earn a slave collar.” He wrapped his arms around her, feeling her soft skin and supple body. Finally, his lips grazed against her ear as he whispered, “How much?”

 

Annash was confused. “I’m sorry, my Lord, I don’t understand.”

 

The man turned her so he could look into her eyes, and read her genuine confusion. He smiled broadly. “Go back to your owner, and tell him I’m interested in purchasing your services for the night. Ask him how much that would be, and come back and let me know.” He firmly pushed Annash off his lap. “Now go.”

 

The slave did as she was told, relaying the Pureblood’s request to her owner. He looked Annash up and down, critically eyeing her form, then looked over at the men at the table. “One hundred per hour,” he said finally. “Or five hundred until dawn.”

 

Annash returned, relaying the information to the Pureblood, who smiled, and once more grabbed Annash by the waist, yanking her to him. He walked to the bar where her owner stood, and slapped down five one-hundred credit chits. The owner nodded. “Up the stairs and to the left, my Lord. Enjoy.”

 

“Oh, I will,” the Pureblood replied, and guided Annash to her own small slave quarters, a room only slightly larger than the bed which occupied it. Annash trembled as the man took her in his arms, the naïve young woman unsure of what to expect.

 

The Pureblood finished with her relatively quickly, but didn’t want to waste the time he’d paid for. In an uncommon display of generosity for a Sith, he shared his purchased time with his friends.

 

Part IV: Slave No More

Shortly after that first night, Annash was officially added to the cantina’s menu, with her enterprising owner writing up a full price list for her, based on how much time a customer wanted and what services he desired. As Annash grew more and more skilled, her prices climbed steadily to reflect her growing experience.

 

It was some months after she had first been “rented” that another night with a customer would change her life forever.

 

This night was fairly busy, and word of Annash’s services had spread, with many customers expressing interest as they first arrived. Early in the evening the inquiries were cut short as a young human, dressed in the armored robes of a Sith warrior and wearing a lightsaber at his belt, purchased what Annash’s owner referred to as her “full-service” package. Many of the patrons watched regretfully as the human removed the slave girl from contention.

 

Annash had been furnished with a room three times larger than her previous one, to facilitate her entertainment. Once within her room, Annash found this human to be substantially less pleasant company than any previous. She tried asking him to slow down, to be more gentle, yet if he heard her, he gave no sign. He was rough, and he was hurting her.

 

As her pain and fear rose, Annash began crying out, pushing against him, trying to make him stop. Emotion boiled within her, until finally she pressed her hands to his chest, focused on only one desire: STOP!

 

Arcs of purple-white electricity shot from her hands into the man, hurling him across the room and pining him to the wall. As they dissipated, he slid to the floor, his half-undone robes smoking from the energy that had coursed through his body.

 

As shocked by her outburst as he was, Annash climbed off the bed, hands held out. “I. . . I’m sorry. . . I didn’t-“

 

“You. . . you SCHUTTA!” the man cried, extending his hand. “I’ll kill you for this! I’LL KILL YOU!”

 

Sudden pressure closed around Annash’s throat, cutting of her air. She reached for her neck, trying pry off whatever was choking her, but there was nothing but the slave collar she had grown so accustomed to, she didn’t even notice anymore. As her airway was steadily, inexorably collapsed, she choked and gagged for air. Her vision began to grow dim at the edges, then black, her world collapsing into tunnel vision focused on the man who was slowly killing her. And he was well within his rights to do so; all he had to do was pay her owner her worth in cash. As the blackness shrouded all but the man’s hate-contorted face, she wondered idly how much he would have to pay.

 

A noise sounded in the room, but Annash couldn’t make it out past the thudding of her own pulse in her ears. She knew she was on the verge of unconsciousness, and that death would soon follow. The noise was repeated, then there was a different noise. The pressure around the young woman’s throat suddenly vanished, and she collapsed to the ground, gasping, her brain unable to process anything but the taste of oxygen. After what seemed like an eternity, she was able to hear again, and someone was talking to her.

 

“I said, are you alright, slave? Answer me.”

 

Annash tried to reply, but her response was swallowed by a coughing fit. She cleared her throat, worked her jaw, and tried again. “Yes, I’m fine. Thank you.”

 

The speaker was a woman, likewise wearing Sith robes, with a lightsaber in her hand, the blade centimeters away from the human’s throat. “Good,” she replied. “What happened?”

 

Annash shook her head as she slowly climbed to her feet. “He was hurting me. I tried asking him to stop, but. . .” she couldn’t adequately put words to what had transpired.

 

The woman seemed to know. “You were scared, and angry, and you lashed out, to make it stop, yes?”

 

Annash nodded.

 

The woman now spoke to the man she held at saberpoint. “And you. This untrained slave spontaneously unleashes a powerful Dark Side technique, and your response is to try and snuff out her life?”

 

“My Lord, she hurt me-“

 

The woman’s lightsaber flicked, the man yelped, and a slight, thin burn appeared at his throat. With supernatural precision, she had cut him just enough to get his attention. “What is the law, boy?”

 

The man sighed. “Anyone demonstrating potential in the Force must be sent to the Academy.”

 

“Very good. You nearly broke that law. Return to your master and explain the situation. I’ll check in to make sure you are punished properly.” The lady closed down her lightsaber, and watched the man scurry out of Annash’s room.

 

“As for you, slave. Come with me.”

 

Annash followed the Sith woman back into the cantina proper, where she approached Annash’s owner. “You. Give me the key to this woman’s slave collar.”

 

The man nodded. “If you’re interested in purchasing her, I’m sure we can come up with-“

 

“I am not interested in purchasing her. She has demonstrated aptitude with the Force, and is no longer a slave. Give me the key to her collar, now.”

 

Annash’s owner began to sweat. “My Lord, surely there’s some mistake. We could-“

 

“There has been no mistake,” the Sith said, extending her hand, and cutting off the man’s own air supply. “You will turn the collar’s key over to me now, or I will take it off your corpse. Am I understood?”

 

The owner reached into his pocket, still choking, and produced the tiny electronic device. The Sith plucked it from his fingers, let him choke for a few more seconds, then released him. “Thank you for your cooperation,” she said, turning to Annash. “Turn around.”

 

Annash did so. The key clicked into the lock, and the collar fell from Annash’s neck. The collar had been with her as long as she could remember. The feeling of not having it on was. . . strange.

 

“You are a slave no longer,” the Sith said. “You will report to the shuttlepad tomorrow morning. There you will board a shuttle to Korriban to begin training in the ways of the Sith. If you try to run, I will personally hunt you down and show a whole new meaning of suffering before I finally snuff out your life. Am I understood.”

 

Annash nodded.

 

“Good.”

 

***

 

As she rested that night, the last night she would ever spend in her slave’s bed, Annash smiled. Soon, she would be something. She fondled one of the red crystals she’d obtained so long ago at the dig, one that had been given to her by Tarvil. It was of no use to anyone, he had said, so she could have it. She watched the facets of the crystal cast spots of dim light against the walls and ceiling of the dark room. She recalled Tarvil’s words from so long ago, about the power of the crystals and strength of the lightsaber, the extension of the one who wielded it.

 

That power would soon be hers, Annash knew. And no one would take it from her ever again.

Edited January 31, 2012 by ErikModi

I liked the story, but chapter 3 and half of chapter 4 it became a porno, which I knew was going to happen eventually, from the first paragraph of the first chapter it was obvious it was coming (no pun intended ), but still, it was a good story so far, hope to hear what happens now

Yeah, that was the obvious direction. I tried to be subtle about it but. . . let's face it, Female Body 4 in a slave collar, what did you THINK was going happen?

 

As for what's next. . . well, that's what I've been playing TOR for I don't really plan to add more, though I may if the muse strikes.