Public Relations Nightmare

[Moonfire]

Clad in only the finest and most ornate robes, Bellinda Maskrr appeared very small behind her stylishly minimalist desk. Devoid of knickknacks or any sort of comforting memorabilia the whole office, while finely furnished had a rather barren feel to it. Not that the tiny woman had much issue with it, being blind... Well, blind in the traditional sense. Wind chimes tinkled besides the vent of the climate control, set to a pleasant warmth despite the brightness of the lights and the oppressive warmth of the desert planet. Datapads piled up in one corner, and a holo-comm blinked with waiting messages in the corner, making a rather annoying chime periodically to remind its owner.

Long, spindly fingers drummed across the desktop watching as the two people in her office, for two entirely different seasons sat seemingly uncomfortable and disinterested. Gods, Bellinda hated working for the Sith. Mindless. Destructive. Arrogant. Perhaps it was time for her to take Sebastian up on his offer and just run for public office in Corellia? But those were thoughts for another time.

"Master Aurelius, thank you for joining me today. Lady Renata sends her best. Wine?" Her hands waved over to the stand holding the perfectly chilled wine, a nice Ruusanian vintage she kept for just these sorts of occasions. The bottle floated without waiting for his answer, lifting with the force to pour out two precisely filled glasses before the guests.

"I was told to consult a Master in these sort of matters, and I'd rather not waste Lady Renata's time. We have a little bit of an issue."

Turning to address the young woman, who from her files was stated to be new to the Sith but already utilized for a few missions Bellinda smiled, her voice full of gentleness. "I'm afraid during a certain mission on... Balmorra, was it? A space craft was destroyed in the dock during one of Miss Atia's missions. Normally this would be something I could easily pin on gangsters or the cartel, but the nephew of an aristocrat was on board and theres clear video footage on the dock of Miss Atia and her group. Needless to say the aristocrat is out for blood and I'm afraid that such sloppiness in a mission really can't be tolerated."

Bellinda's fingers drummed against the table quietly, flicking the bottle to pour herself a glass. "I can have the footage altered or destroyed pretty easily, but the issue of this loud, angry aristocrat is much more bothersome. I don't think he'll be easily paid off either. Shame, seems it was fairly attached to that nephew, Republic ties or not." A shrug of her bony shoulders as she sipped delicately at the wine.

"So my question is, how do we wish to proceed from here?"

[Rugs]

Nieraan lounged in his seat without an ounce of professional pretext. He’d been summoned to this sparse little office, with the implied understanding that Renata’s hand was somewhere in said summons, to deal with one of the Sith children making a mess.

The only problem was that Nieraan did not care about the Sith children making messes, and he had a sneaking suspicion Renata knew that. I swear if Danica’s gotten that woman in on her attempts to ‘civilize’ me…

“Wine?”

Nieraan started to mutter something in protest, but Bellinda was already pouring the liquid out into a cup for him and the Sith who sat next to him. Nieraan sighed.

The facts of the matter were simple enough. Atia had gone off on a mission and made a mess. Normally not something the Sith concerned themselves with too much, but this particular mess happened to end with an aristocrat’s relative dead. Without authorization.

Oops.

Nieraan was all for killing aristocrats — he was typically one of the first Sith dispatched for the job when such a need arose — but ticking one off unnecessarily could present some obvious problems.

“The aristocrats are an interesting bunch,” he muttered, sounding bored. “Have to keep them in line, but we also can’t have them going off and raising too much of a fuss.” He glanced at the Echani girl beside him. “Especially when they have an actual reason to.”

Not that he really cared, of course. But his rank came with responsibilities, and much as he was loathe to engage in them, a Sith Lord had to take up small matters from time to time.

“Seems to me,” he went on, “that if this aristocrat, Lord…” he picked up a datapad with the man’s name on it, “Eldrin, is so upset, we can have the one that made the mess fix the problem. Let him use her as a body guard for awhile for free. Something like that.”

[Danee]

Litin sat down in one of the chairs in front of what looked like a rather clean desk without much things on it and the woman behind the desk probably kept it that way as she could not see anything. Litin glanced over to her right and looked at the sith Master apparently named Aurelius. The Echani folded her arms and tilted her head, her silver hair contrasting the pitch black robe she always wore even before she joined the Sith. For some reason she had been called into this office because of her last mission, which in her eyes, had been fulfilled perfectly fine.

So what if she had destroyed a space shuttle had been destroyed and some spoiled kid had died? The way he had acted he wouldn't have lived for much longer anyway, all Litin had done was to speed up the process of killing him. As the woman in front of her poured up a glass of wine for her she moved it to her nose and sipped the red liquid, shrugging and then sipping it slowly whilst the master next to her talked and suggested that she was to be his bodyguard for free.

Litin turned her head and glared at him. "I have a better idea, why don't I just kill him too? Problem solved." She said coldly and then sipped her wine, turning back to the blind woman in front of her. "So what? Some spoiled kid got burned alive and someone complains about it and I have to be the one working for free? Pfft..." She said and sipped the wine again and put down the glass on the desk.

"I'd say it would be better to reunite him with his nephew, if the rest of the family complains, gut them too."

[Moonfire]

The tapping beat of Bellinda's fingers drummed through the comfortable, if barren, office. Nieraan, despite his slight indifference to the whole affair had made a fairly obvious suggestion. W'hore out the Sith involved as a show of good faith, a token amount of credits from the funding would have to come with it as retribution of some sort, she'd have to sort out exactly how much that relative was worth to Eldrin but that'd be fairly simple.Really what she needed here was compliance. In fact it could all be tied up in a nice little package if Litin was intelligent. From the indignant swirling of the Echani's aura this was not the case.

Compliance that didn't really seem to be on the agenda of this petulant sith. Bellinda smiled winningly, the red-painted corners of her lips tilting from beneath the silk blindfold as she allowed the woman the explain just exactly what she thought of Aurelius' suggestion. Tipping the wine glass to her lips Bellinda took another sip, making a little noise of pleasure as she pulled the glass away, setting it back to the desk.

"Tell me, Miss Atia, why do we bother with the aristocrats? Wouldn't it be easier to just not even bother with them?" She asked, voice cordial as her fingers continued the anxious beat.

"Oh certainly, I'd say my position here would be much easier if I didn't have to listen to the incessant whining of the nobility and clean up the messes of young upstarts who've managed to forget their delicate place here in the Temple. But tell me, Miss Atia, do you know where all of this comes from?" Bellinda made an expansive gesture about the room, motioning out the window to the construction and development of the ground of Korriban.

"Money. Credits. Everything you see out there costs something. Every bit of food you eat, every ship you use in a mission, the bed you sleep in. I'd suggest that your robes as well came from our finite funds, but from the smell I'd say you've been using them for far longer than you've been with us," The little woman's lips twitched again, amused.

"Now, do tell me, how many Sith initiates do you know who have the available funds to buy naval fleets and supply lines? Lord Eldrin and his family support the Sith for a current total of 3.4 billion credits. Do you have 3.4 billion credits, Miss Atia? If so, I'll happily make the arrangements for your most generous donation to the glory of the Empire. Oh--wait. Don't tell me, you don't? Oh. How unfortunate." Bellinda shifted some, smoothing the embroidered red silk of her Naboo-style robes with a light touch.

"In that case, Miss Atia I suggest you learn your value to the Sith right now. You are a tool. A glowing sword in the dark. And you're not worth 10 thousand credits, let alone 3.4 billion. So unless you'd rather I'd make the arrangements of having your head delivered to Lord Eldrin, I'd suggest you be a little more open to the very limited options at your disposal." The polite tone completely unwavering, as though discussing the weather. With a bright smile the petite little woman turned to Nieraan.

"Do you disagree, Master Aurelius?"

[Rugs]

Nieraan chuckled as the conversation and clash of ideals unfolded between the two women. Truth be told, some part of him that existed apart from the needs and complications of his position within the Sith Order, agreed with the girl’s sentiment. Why not just kill them all? Cut of the whining and babying and continue on with their lives.

Unfortunately for Nieraan the free spirit, life with the Sith wasn’t necessarily so simple. Belinda made the reasons why painfully apparent, though Nieraan wondered if the little Sithling really grasped the reason for the force behind Bellinda’s words.

“Perhaps I can make this clearer for you,” Nieraan muttered, still slouched lazily in his chair. “You have not been with us long. Your master has already angered a one of the Inner Sanctum. You, for better or worse, are expendable.”

He waved lazily in her direction, a dismissive sort of gesture. “If you are assigned to protect the man and he dies, well, don’t think your protected from being kicked out of here upon your return.” He paused, allowing a significant silence to fall over the sparse little office as he shifted in his chair. “Or from having your corpse left to rot in the Valley as a cautionary tale. You’ll find that sabotaging the war effort isn’t exactly smiled upon here,” he finished with a sardonic smile.

Nieraan wondered if his words of warning—a rarity, coming from him—were wasted. The girl seemed stubborn, and being stubborn himself, he knew that words could only move a person so much. But survival and advancement in the Sith were about playing the game. She’d learn to play it, or she would fail. Nieraan hoped for the girl’s sake she could learn it better than her master seemed to be.

“Now, as for moving on,” he said, turning to look at Bellinda over his still untouched wine, “what will you recommend?”