New Blood [Blue-Eyed Devil]

[Meira]

She didn't get this enough these days.

Mo stood at the small entrance to the temple that she had found so long ago. Behind her, she could hear Si'bul zipping up his jacket and Tiny grunting at his pack mates. In front of her, the forest loomed over the small clearing. The sky above was a clear blue and the air hummed with the songs of thousands of insects. She took a deep breath. Not nearly enough these days.

The sith had been relentless, and far more cruel than usual recently. Innocent civilians had started to suffer at their hands any time the DLA made a move. Eventually, it got to the point that they had to go underground and silent, for fear of risking more lives. Even the hunting and gathering trips had been scaled back as much as possible. Today was the first time in weeks that Mo had been able to get out of Homestead. She wouldn't waste it.

"Be still." Si'bul growled as he tried to attach a camera collar around Tiny's neck. The Kath hound was not cooperating.

"He'll just scratch at it until he breaks it off 'bul. You'd have better luck putting it on one of the others."

As if to demonstrate her point, Tiny reared and then pushed his bulk against the squatting teen, sending him tumbling backwards. Mo did her best to hide the chuckle. Si'bul was prone to anger these days, especially when embarrassed. She suspected it had something to do with the whole puberty thing. Resigned, Si'bul moved to one of the more submissive hounds, Bo, and secured the collar around its neck. Bo shook and scratched a few times, but then gave up and accepted the strange contraption.

"There we go." Si'bul said as he brought up the camera feed on his datapad.

"We ready?" Mo asked, but didn't wait for a response.

She set out into the trees, Tiny trotting behind, and then racing ahead with his pack. They'd track down some larger game, if it could be found. Mo and Si'bul would hunt birds in the mean time. She slung her bow over her shoulder, knowing it'd be no use until the hounds cleared out and silence could settle back down around them. She was pleased to see that Si'bul was doing well moving quietly through the undergrowth, just as she'd taught him.

---

They'd managed half a dozen birds, nice and fat, when they finally heard Tiny's howl. Si'bul brought up the feed on his datapad. Mo had to admit that the tracking feature made meeting back up with the pack a lot easier than trying to guess where Tiny's howl had come from. Perhaps that raid on the tech convoy hadn't been a total waste of time after all.

"This way." Si'bul said, taking the lead. Mo followed along behind him, a slight smile on her features. If only it could always be like this.

[Blue]

He knew this world. It was all he knew, if he was being honest to himself. He had tread its plains and its many groves for so long that he would sometimes dream that he had grown roots from the soles of his feet, down into the soil of Dantooine itself. He knew every plant, every creature, every temper of its weather. His uncle had once said that to be a hunter, a real hunter, he would have to breathe Dantooine, feel its heart beat alongside his own. That meant that he could feel its scars, too.

Klem sniffed the air, waiting. In his mind's eye, he recalled what he had seen during his search of this place. Farms burned. Groves decimated. Earth cracked and broken. Carcasses laying where they had fallen. Rotting. Animal or sentient, not a one deserved that fate. It should have been quick. Clean. Most had... lingered. It had been by design. They had been played with. Anger whipped up in his mind again like a fire. But cold. Klem was not like them.

He would make it quick and clean.

There was a crack. The iriaz did not even have time to cry out before it died. Klem slipped down the tree he had concealed himself in and advanced on the remains of the animal. It's neck had been broken. Instantaneous death. Quick and clean. Reaching for his belt, the hunter glanced at the sky for a moment before unclipping a leather pouch and pulling out one of the numerous knives that resided within. As he worked, he continued his recollections.

A tattoo and a leaf from a Dantl Bush. That was all he had to go on, but it had been enough for him. He was left clueless in regards to the tattoo, but the leaf was something he could follow. He knew where they grew and where they did grow. It had been a long search, but he had been lucky. He found what he was looking for on the forth attempt, a mere fortnight since he began. Or at least, he was fairly certain it was the right place. Hidden, guarded well. He had seen it only from afar until today, through the lenses of his Macrobinoculars. But now... now he took the plunge.

He had noted the pack of kath hounds and deduced that they needed food somehow. Hunting was the obvious choice. Buying consumables in large amounts would be dangerous if they were who Klem thought they were. So he did what he did best; he watched and he waited. It paid off. On the other side of the large grove, the pack was hunting prey with two of their handlers, slowly making their way to his location. Another glance at the sky confirmed the direction. The scent would already be on the wind.

Finishing up, Klem pulled a length of rope from his pack and tied the dead iriaz's feet together. Throwing one end above him and over a convenient branch, the young man hung the skinned remains high, far from reach but close enough that it would tantalize the hounds. Blood dripped steadily onto the already stained ground. Moving to a small, nearby creek, Klem washed clean his knives, hands and upper arms before rolling down his sleeves. The scent did not bother him much; it would pervade throughout the entire clearing, filling the noses of the hounds and drowning out his own, much weaker smell.

Going to collect his pack, Klem paused at the hanging bait. He deliberated to himself for a moment before making a decision and scribbling something down on a scrap of paper, pinning it to the remains. A quick look around gave him a decent hiding spot, and a few tweaks of his camo-cloak would make him as hard to spot as he usually was out in the wilds.

Within fifteen seconds, the only sign of Klem's passing was a dead iriaz hanging from a tree. Not a single broken twig or blade of grass hinted to how it got there. As the kath hound's howl went up, getting closer by the second, a slightly stronger breeze passed through the clearing. The strung up carcass turned, revealing a note pinned upon it, somewhat bloodstained at this point.

It simply read: "FRIEND"

[Meira]

They moved at their leisurely pace through the woods with a comfort that came with knowing as place as home. Even with the DLA in hiding, these regions of Dantooine never truly felt invaded. The Sith had little interest in the forests, at least not now. If their occupation lasted long enough, Mo had no doubt that they would slowly spread out, increasing the size of the cities until the whole planet was consumed. She'd seen holovids and images of the city-planets of the core. She had no love for such to befall Dantooine. She was no native here, but it was more a home to her than the planet she'd come from which she could barely remember. She might not have been born on Dantooine, but she was born for it.

"Mo...?"

Si'bul had stopped and Mo had to retrace a few paces to see what had halted him. He was staring at his datapad and she had to step around him so that she could peer over his shoulder. On the screen, a live feed from the camera he'd placed on one of the hounds showed the pack had halted in a small clearing. They jostled and bumped each other, making the video footage almost impossible to make out at times. Tiny's howl echoed through the woods, followed mere milliseconds by the same sound produced through the datapad's speaker. The pack seemed to settle slightly and the camera moved less, revealing what they were all gathered around.

Hoisted into the tree and suspended by ropes, an iriaz carcass dangled just out of reach. Mo dropped the line of birds she was carrying and quickly grabbed the datapad from Si'bul. At the corner of the video feed, a small area was dedicated for tracking how far the camera was, and in what direction. Mo's eyes moved from the screen to their surroundings, quickly gauging the direction. It wasn't far.

"Contact Homest-" she stopped abruptly as the image of the carcass rotated to reveal a piece of paper tacked on. But the hounds would not stay still long enough to make out what was written there.

"Contact Homestead." she repeated, handing the datapad back to Si'bul, along with the birds she'd been carrying. "Tell them someone has been snooping around and to send some backup."

She took her bow from her shoulders and quickly notched and arrow. She could see Si'bul's eyes light up as he tapped away on the datapad. She knew he wouldn't like what she was about to say next. "Stay here, find a place to hide and wait for them to come." The continued quickly as he was about to protest, "DON'T argue 'bul. Just do it."

She turned away from him and moved, now much more carefully, through the underbrush toward the pack. She debated moving into the trees, but they were too widely spaced in this area. With her earth clothing and her own green skin a natural camouflage, Mo rarely needed more than to step lightly through the brush to move undetected. But she wasn't going to go anywhere near that clearing. Not yet anyway. She slowed and sank down into the underbrush as soon as the sounds of the pack caught her ears. From a pocket, she took out the hound whistle used for calling the pack during a hunt. She blew, but the note issued was too high in frequency for her ears. The hounds, however, fell silent at once. She blew again, and the woods filled with the sound of them crashing through the undergrowth toward her.

When they arrived, Tiny muscled past the others toward her, sniffing her hand as she held it out to him. She snapped her fingers and he stilled, almost like a soldier coming to attention.

"Good boy." she said in a low voice. The other hounds stilled as well. She waited a moment, to ensure they were all alert. "Flush 'em out." she said, circling her hand around over her head. At once, the hounds moved, bounding off and spreading out to tear through the undergrowth.

Mo moved slowly after them. They maintained a radius around her, never moving too far from her or from their packmates, but missing nothing in the spaces between. She continued toward the clearing and, once it came into view, slipped up into a tree. Finding a comfortable perch, she looked toward where the carcass hung. Now she could see the paper. Friend. Mo wasn't so sure about that. Until proven otherwise, any presence within the forest was a threat. Her eyes now moved over the surrounding area, watching for any movement and waiting for the hounds to locate anyone who might be lurking nearby.

[Blue]

Oh.

Well.

That did not go as he had expected it to.

It had not taken the kath hounds long to catch the scent, as he had expected. They tore through the scenery and went crazy, bounding about the clearing trying to get at the remains of the dead beast that lay just out of their reach. From his hiding place, Klem noticed that one of the hounds had something attached around it's neck. The hunter squinted, but could not make out what it was as the pack jostled each other about in their attempts to reach the tantalising prize.

They suddenly stopped.

A frown flickered across Klem's normally blank face until he realised that the kath hounds had a leader. They had probably called for them via a whistle. His deduction appeared to be proven correct when the pack turned tail and tore back through the trees, presumably towards the direction their sentient leader was located.

Klem knew that the bait he had dangled on the branches to lure someone towards him had achieved its purpose. How the sentients knew, he was not sure. Perhaps that collar was a locator, or had a camera installed in it, or a combination of the two. Whatever the case was, they knew that something was up now and the meeting that he desired would soon be upon him. But it had occurred to the young man that perhaps this method he had concocted might not have sent the message he had intended it to.

Perhaps a bloody carcass with the note "FRIEND" pinned on it had not been the way to go?

Thinking quickly, his grey eyes scanned the treeline. If they knew about the remains, they would undoubtedly investigate the scene. This was their hidden base. They would be careful. They were hunters, too. As his brain flickered through several thoughts, his hand reached down and pulled a fistful of earth up from underneath a bush. Still thinking on his next move, Klem rubbed the clump all over the camo-cloak that covered his body. A second handful did the same job on his face after he applied a little liquid from his waterskin, the dark dirt jarring with his pale skin. He even put some in his hair and on the beret that sat atop his head.

Confident that his scent was sufficiently covered and checking the wind direction favoured him, Klem set about ensuring the hounds would not bump into him. Retreating a bit further back (scooping up a stone as he did), he swung himself up a tree. When relatively comfortable, the hunter pulled his macrobinoculars out once again and began scanning the area.

He spied a familiar form. Just. She was good. He doubted that most people would have been able to notice her. He was not most people, however, and he had been trained since he could walk to see things that others might overlook. The colours of her clothes broke up her image and her skin natural tones help her meld with the scenery around her, but the pattern of the hunting hounds as they charged through had betrayed her. It had hinted at her location, after which it was a simple matter of keeping a close eye. And here she was, clambering up a tree. Just like he had.

Klem pondered his next move. There was a hunter missing; there had been two. He or she (the young hunter had not been able to tell the sex of her compatriot at a distance; indeed, he had thought that she had been human at first) could be trailing behind her in case she was attacked, or laying in wait somewhere else. Possibly they were sent back to base or currently calling in reinforcements. He did not know. Sentient reaction was not something he excelled at. Probably why he was currently hiding instead of talking to someone right now.

One thing was certain: he would need to draw the kath hounds away if he would have any chance of speaking with anyone without being torn to pieces first.

Hefting the stone he had snatched up before climbing his tree, Klem judged the wind direction once again, then felt a tingle in his palms. Changing his aim a little, he chucked the rock as hard as his arm was capable. It flew a good distance away, causing a racket that, as a lucky side effect, set off a small herd of iriaz that had drawn close into running in the opposite direction. Probably drawn in by the scent of one of their own dead.

Klem set his eyes back onto where his fellow hunter was, in her mind, hidden. He heard the kath hounds cry out at the sight and smell of panicked quarry. Would they chase? And if so, how would she react? Would this flush out her comrade?

And right now, who was really hunting who?

[Meira]

"They're on their way. I'll come to you."

"No." Mo replied in a harsh whisper. "Stay back. Wait." Her eyes continued to scan around the underbrush. She could hear Si'bul exasperated sigh through her ear piece. "I have to draw them out 'bul... or at least locate them. THEN, I'll call you in."

There was silence, and then... "Fine."

The corner of her lips twitched in amusement, and then her face returned to the near perfect stillness of a true hunter. Whatever game these mysterious people were playing, she didn't like it. There was always something that felt inwardly wrong when she had to stalk after other sentient beings, even if they were Sith patrols. It was a bastardization of hunting, a corruption of it. In their situation it was a necessary evil, but that didn't mean she had to like it.

A rustle of branches some distance away drew her eyes upward. But then a louder crash and the subsequent startled bleats of a group of iriaz drew her attention away. The hounds were drawn as well and as one cried out, they all set off in that direction. Mo's eyes quickly shot back to where she'd heard the first sound. They're in the trees too, she thought. She'd never encountered a Sith patrol that had the habit of climbing trees. Was this some hunter too? Maybe even a bounty hunter?

There. Just the slightest catch of light. Binoculars? It was hard to hold her eyes on any one feature at this distance. But there was something there. Instinct told her, if nothing else. She re-knocked the arrow she'd been holding, and with slow movements she lifted the accelerator up on its hinge. She would not need it here. Taking a few deep breaths to steady herself, Mo then allowed the muscle memory in her arms and hands to take over. In one swift motion, she raised the bow and drew back, taking only a fraction of a second to adjust her aim. No sooner had she reached full draw, she loosed, the arrow disappearing through the trees and leaving behind the muffled thwum of the bowstring as it came back to rest. She quickly had another arrow knocked and ready.

The arrow found its mark about a meter or so above where she'd suspected her adversary was perched. After waiting the second or two to be sure her arrow had arrived, Mo decided it was time to stop with the pretense. With her arms ready to spring into the next draw, she shouted.

"Prove it!"

[Blue]

The kath hounds gave a cry as the iriaz caught the attention of their primal senses, enticing them to run, hunt, kill, feed. Even domesticated beast were, in the end, still beasts. The moment you forgot what they were was the moment that you lost a hand. His uncle had driven that particular lesson home with quite some vehemence. Klem wondered if old Luddy had been just talking about kath hounds.

In any case, the animals had given chase an-

thunk

Too well trained to make any sudden movements that might catch the eye, Klem slowly tilted his head up. In a branch a few meters above his head, an arrow quivered slightly. A voice called out from across the way where the young hunter knew the woman had taken to hiding, asking him to prove his intentions. How had she found him? He was good at what he did. He was confident that his form was obscured enough to...

Glancing down at his macrobinoculars, a slight smile pulled at his lips. Stupid, stupid, stupid. It had to have been the lens. It would have been faint, but to someone trained to picking out irregularities in the landscape it would have stuck out like a sore thumb. He would have tipped his hat to her if he was not so sure that the movement would give his exact position away. He did not feel like becoming a pincushion today.

Klem pondered upon his next course of action. It was a tough one. She knew his location, or at least the right area. She would be watching like a hawk for any signs of movement, now. Unslinging his rifle from his back and taking aim would pose the same issue that had resulted in the arrow landing above his head; the light glinting off the scope would be like waving his arms in the air. Besides, the whole reason he was here was to find the people that his uncle had been working for, or with, or whatever. Aiming a blaster at one of them would have a detrimental effect at any attempts of diplomacy.

So. Violence was off the table. Moving about might get him to safety, but could just as easily ruin his chances of getting into proper contact with his uncle's compatriots. She had asked him to prove his intentions. Perhaps talking was the best option? After a moments pause, he opened his mouth and spoke... then realised a few words in that he was talking too quietly to be heard. Well, it has been a while since I had to actually raise my voice. Clearing his throat, he tried again.

"I, er... I guess the note wasn't convincing enough, then? No? Okay..." there was a pause as Klem thought, then he continued. "Well, if I was an enemy, would I have gone through the effort of finding you and your friends, only to let you know that I was here and that I knew? I mean, wouldn't I have just left and told someone about it?"

Another pause. A nervous cough.

"I-I haven't, by the way. Told anyone, I mean", he clarified.

[Meira]

The silence that followed her words was the loudest silence she'd ever known. She was so acutely attuned to any sound that her own heartbeat was a muted drum beat. The wind through the trees reminded her of the water that lapped at the ocean entrance to Homestead. The birdsong sounded like it came from a whole flock perched in the tree with her. And even in all of that chaos of quiet, she knew that she would hear this person, if they chose to respond. And she was ready. The tips of her fingers were barely touching the bowstring, but she could pull and release in the blink of an eye.

"I, er... I guess the note wasn't convincing enough, then? No? Okay..."

A man... young. And right about where she thought he was. The corner of her mouth twitched. He continued, presenting his case. Yes, she thought, you could lure us out and capture some of us... use us as bait. Then you wouldn't have to storm Homestead.

"I-I haven't, by the way. Told anyone, I mean."

"Well, what a relief." she mumbled.

From the direction she had come, Mo could hear the faint, distant whine of a speeder. Not a moment later, Si'bul's voice in her earpiece confirmed that their backup had arrived. The time to stall was over. Whoever this guy was, she couldn't just let him leave. He was far closer than any non DLA member had ever gotten to Homestead. If he led the Sith back here, it would only be a matter of time before they found the base, and then it'd all be over.

Mo took the arrow she'd been ready to loose off the string and held it in her teeth as she slung the bow over her shoulder. Taking the arrow from her mouth for a moment, she called out to the stranger.

"Come out then. I will too."

Replacing the arrow in her mouth, Mo quickly climbed down from her place in the tree. Once she was on the ground, she readied her bow and arrow once again, and quickly blew another blast on the kath hound whistle. Between the hounds and the backup, this man would be hard pressed to get away, even if he managed to kill her. Taking calming breaths, she approached the clearing, but hung back in the trees until she saw movement on the other side. Slowly, she moved out from the cover of the trees and undergrowth, bow poised, but pointing downward for now.

"Who are you?"

[Blue]

Klem chewed his upper lip nervously. The person opposite had asked him to come down and see her, out in the open where there was no cover, nowhere to hide from view. His dull grey eyes flickered up to the arrow that was still embedded in the bark of the branch. That was not a concept he was all too comfortable with. There were quite a few things that could end badly here. Maybe she had already decided that he was an enemy and wanted a clear shot? No... if that was the case, she could have simply shot him when he had spoken and given away his precise position. He still did not know where her friend was. He had probably been sent to get reinforcements. If the Zabrak had been out there waiting to snipe him, he most likely would have done so by now.

The young hunter could hear the sounds of his attacker as she made her way down to the floor. It would be hard to aim any weapon while climbing; with a bow, it would be impossible. Reaching up and pulling the arrow above him free, Klem began his own descent. Better to do it now while she was too. If he waited for her to hit the ground first, she would be able to draw a bead on him while he was clambering down. Barely a leaf or twig rustled as he slipped silently down the trunk of the tree. His uncle would have been proud. Probably. It had always been difficult to tell with him.

Shifting the strap that held his hunting blaster across his shoulder, Klem carefully made his way toward the clearing. He paused a moment to watch as he saw her make her way through the brush. She was fairly young; if he had to guess, he would say that she could not have been much older than himself. She was dressed appropriately for a hunter and she moved with the same kind of purpose that Klem was all too familiar with. She was quite pretty, too. The young hunter suddenly found himself rather uncomfortable. He had always found it difficult to speak to women in a social way. He was going to have his work cut out for him if he was going to persuade her he meant no harm without making himself look stupid.

Knowing my luck I'll do neither.

Knowing that she would be waiting on him to show himself, Klem slid into view with the same quiet movements that had been drilled into him since he was old enough to walk. Bright blue eyes locked onto him and he hesitated for a second before raising a hand sheepishly in acknowledgment, almost plucking his eye out with the arrow he was still holding in the process.

"Erm... hi."

A few more awkward seconds passed, after which the Mirialan asked who he was.

"My name's- that is, people call me- er, I'm Klem."

Tick, awkward, tick, so awkward, tick...

"Nice to meet you?" Klem continued, adding, for reasons beyond his understanding, a questioning inflection to the statement that he had no intention of putting there.

So long, first impression. It was nice knowing you.

[Meira]

If the clothing and the smudges of dirt hadn't been their own giveaway, the way the man moved was. He was a hunter. The kind that hunted animals, though she still wasn't going to rule out other sentient beings as well. But she saw in him the precise movements of someone who knows exactly how difficult it can be to sneak up on prey whose whole evolutionary track had molded them into fine tuned detection machines. When he moved to raise his hand, almost stabbing himself with her arrow -kind of him to retrieve that- Mo got the feeling she could rule him out as a hunter of people. If it was a ruse meant to lower her guard, she had to admit it was a good one. It was almost painful the way he stammered.

"Nice to meet you?"

Mo arched an eyebrow.

Through the underbrush came the unmistakable racket of the kath hounds returning. Mo's head turned only a fraction toward the sound. Her eyes never left this... Klem. "Don't move," she warned, "or they'll tear you apart."

Not a moment after she'd finished the statement, the hounds came bounding into the clearing. Instinctively, they moved toward Mo, until they became aware of the other being in the clearing. In that instant, they all shifted, squaring their frames toward this outsider. Their hackles raised as they lowered their heads, growling, and they moved in unison to surround the stranger. From the pack, the largest hound emerged, placing himself between Mo and Klem. For a few moments, Mo allowed the hounds to take their places. She then blew a sharp whistle, this time with her own lips rather than the inaudible instrument. The hounds paused, but they all remained tensed.

"Easy now." Mo said. "Tiny, lock them up."

The largest hound grunted and stamped his feet.

"Hey! Lock them up." she repeated.

Tiny growled, then snapped at the hound closest to him. The pack, as one, stepped back. Then, Tiny lifted his head and sniffed the air in Klem's direction. He snorted, produced a confused whine, and sniffed again. He turned his head, whined again, and started to walk toward Klem. It took Mo a moment to recognize this behavior. When Tiny had started toward Klem, she had stepped forward as well, ready to call the hound off. But then she realized what was going on. Klem must have had some of the Dantl on him. But how could he have known?

"Where did you come from? How did you get here?" she asked, raising her bow slightly as Tiny circled the man.

In her mind, she was running through all the names of the different people who ventured beyond Homestead, of who might be out of the base now. The list narrowed and narrowed in her mind until it was only a small handful of names. One in particular stood out. He was a hunter... a damn good one. Never really stayed in Homestead... was a loner; he preferred to be out in the forest. She hadn't seen him in a long while, but that wasn't so out of the ordinary. As if to confirm her suspicions, Mo's eyes caught sight of the hilt of a knife. The shape and the color of it was unmistakable. Now she raised her bow to aim squarely at the man's chest. She drew the string back in the same motion, past the strong resistance until it slipped into the full draw rest where she could hold it easily.

"Where'd you get that knife?"

[Blue]

"Don't move... or they'll tear you apart"

So, this was going well. Well, well-ish. She had not shot him the moment he had revealed himself, which was a good sign, right? Not having an arrow embedded in his chest was certainly a good thing for him. When the kath hounds barreled into the small clearing, Klem began to reassess that thought. They encircled the young hunter, snorting in that warning like way, as if to say 'if you give us the smallest reason to, we will eat you and with great enjoyment'. He almost sighed in relief when the woman in front of him ordered them to stand down.

Okay, we're still good, we're still good...

The biggest of the hounds then started making it's way towards him, sniffing the air and whining.

This doesn't mean anything bed necessarily, we're still good, we're still good...

As the big kath hound paced around him, occasionally snuffling at his cloths and hands, the Mirialan huntress began to ask him questions. Klem paused a moment to clear his throat before speaking, attempting to get a little saliva into his suddenly extremely dry mouth. Being surrounded by big trained beasties led by a bow wielding warrior woman made him somewhat nervous. Somewhat very nervous. Tense, even.

"I, err... well, I come from a- whoa whoa whoa!" Klem began, before the woman suddenly drew her bow and trained it on him again. He raised his hands halfway into the air.

We are no longer good, repeat, no longer good!

His mouth opened and closed several times, trying to spit out words that might deflect the inevitable incoming pointy death, but she spoke up again. Asking him where he got the knife he had strapped to his belt. Confusion rippled across his normally blank features. "The knife?" Klem started to reach down instinctively to the weapon before pulling himself to a halt.

Yeah, because reaching for a sharp, pointy object when someone else is pointing a sharp, pointy object at you is a great idea.

Realisation dawned, finally. He had suspected that his uncle had been doing... something. When he found his remains, all he had to go on where a tattoo, a cutting from a Dantl bush and the fact that his uncle had been even more distant with him than usual. Perhaps old Luddy really had been doing what he had began to suspect; fighting the Sith occupation.

But back to the point in hand, Luddy had apparently known this woman, well enough that she was able to recognise his knife in a single glance. That needed to be addressed.

"It's my... It was my uncle's. My Uncle Luddy's. He was a hunter, like me. Like you too, I'm guessing." There was a short pause as his mind gained more traction and confidence. "As for your first two questions: I come from a small bit of land with a smattering of villages, where he raised me. And I got here, ma'am, through the process of elimination. There's only so many places where the Dantl bush can grow native. It was one of the few things he had left on his... on his body when I found him."

Klem caught a phantom whiff of burning, heard the echos of the screams. He cleared his throat again.

He also continued trying to ignoring the big kath hound that was still persistently prodding him roughly with it's nose.

[Meira]

When she raised the bow, Tiny and the hounds tensed up again. Tiny, at the man's back, was ready to pounce and Mo wasn't immediately in the mood to command him otherwise. The man moved his hand toward the knife, but then thought better of it and instead raised both of his hands up in surrender. Smart. She listened as he stammered out his explanation, her jaw tight as the fought the urge to loose the arrow and be done with this uncertainty. But that wasn't what they were about in the DLA. Killing just to be sure... that was a Sith thing. They were better than that.

"It was one of the few things he had left on his... on his body when I found him."

"When you found him?" Mo echoed.

What had happened? They hadn't heard from Luddy in a long while, but that was nothing out of the ordinary. He was known to show up and leave randomly. He never went on any of their raids or their more aggressive missions. He hunted and foraged and sometimes scouted, that was all. Not that it wasn't enough. They all played their parts and his was a valuable as any. Mo swallowed. Luddy didn't talk much, but she'd hunted with him more than a few times. He was a good man. She had no way of knowing if this Klem was telling the truth. Luddy never talked of family. Mo had assumed he'd lost everything in the invasion, like she had... like so many of them had. When people didn't talk about it, you just assumed the worst and let it alone.

Could she believe this guy? He did have Luddy's knife. That's not something Luddy would have just given away. She never saw him without it. And he'd taken the clipping of dantl leaves. In all their time fighting the Sith, no one on the enemy side had ever seemed to even notice that, let alone know where to go looking if they had. He had to be native then. But that still didn't rule Klem out as an enemy. The Sith had managed to convert or otherwise coerce some natives to work for them. If that was the case, then he'd gotten too close to be allowed to go. Mo shifted her grip on the bow. She didn't know what to do.

"Mo, they're here. four bikes and a cargo sled. Where do you want us?" Si'bul's voice sounded eager in her ear. Mo got the feeling he'd be pestering them to let him start going out even more now.

"Hold for now." she said, turning her head so that Klem would know she was not speaking to him, though she kept her eyes trained on him. "Stay ready."

"OK." he replied. She could hear his disappointment.

"Weapons on the ground." Mo said, this time to Klem. "Slowly." she added. She shifted the bow, letting the string slacken and lowering it slightly. "What happened to Luddy?"

[Blue]

Well, he was well and truly in it now, one way or another. The Mirialan looked just about ready to shoot him on the spot and feed him to the kath hounds, and by the sounds of it there were others on their way too, if they were not here already. Klem had little doubt that they would be just as edgy as his new green-skinned friend, maybe more so. They seemed to be taking their cue from her from the sounds of things, so that would mean she was in charge, or at least high up the chain of command than they were. If these people even had a chain of command. Not that he was one to talk, he barely understood what "chain of command" meant. He only knew the term because Luddy made a joke once that, back in his bounty hunting days, it was the chain he would beat people with until they understood he was in charge.

His mind was brought sharply back to the situation at hand when the woman ordered him to slowly place his weapons on the floor. Well, he was not in a position to argue right now. He knew a little about fighting, but you did not need to be an expert to understand that an arrow pointed at your face and very big animals just a pounce away meant that you did as you were damn told. Keeping his hand away from the trigger, Klem very bloody slowly unslung his hunting blaster from his shoulder and placed it very bloody slowly onto the ground. He proceeded to do the same with his knife, also very bloody slowly. Once his weapons were on the ground, he raised his hands back into the air like he very much did care.

This seemed to please the she-beast of a sentient, as she lowered her bow. A little, anyway. Klem was fairly certain that if he did something stupid, such as run or make a grab for his weapons, he would get an arrow in the eye for his trouble. Or mauled to death by her adoring pack of hounds. He was beginning to realise that he was not well equipped for dealing with people. People were scary.

Apparently satisfied, she asked what had happened to his uncle. Klem's pale face flashed a grimace, an echo of pain. He did not want to talk about it. Not any of it. His hunt for the meaning of the dantl leaves had occupied his mind completely, as did ducking and occasionally ambushing the odd Sith patrols his inevitably encountered. He had not dwelled on that night and had no desire to now. But when someone had a weapon trained on you, as well as reinforcements probably just as eager to kill him as she appeared to be... well, it payed to be adaptable.

"I... I'm not sure, exactly," Klem began haltingly. "I mean, I told you that where we lived was just a few scattered farms. But the Sith, they... they attacked in force. Burned every home. Everyone... I... I think Uncle Luddy got to our house and saw it burning and... I think he thought I was still inside because he still had his rifle on him but he was in the open, like he had charged the soldiers that were there and they... just gunned him down."

He paused and bit his tongue. His eyes were burning. Just the memory of the flames, he told himself. That's all.

"I arrived, what... probably a few seconds after that, on the opposite side of the clearing. I saw... his... his body, and the two soldiers just, just standing over him. I think... I think I heard one laugh."

Another pause. He did not need to go on. He had told her what had happened. He did not need to go on. But more words came, regardless, like a dam breaking. Now he was thinking about it he could not stop.

"I sighted them down my scope from the underbrush. They must've been the last ones around, because nobody investigated the sound of my shots. I stayed until the flames died out to... deal with the dead. I... I couldn't even re-recognise most of them. They were too charred up."

Klem had begun shaking; memories of the graves he dug, all alone with the dead. He blinked, looking up at the green woman. He suddenly felt utterly lost.

"We weren't soldiers! Most of those people had never even fired a blaster before! There were... families!" Klem raised a hand to his mouth in an effort to stop either sobbing or vomiting. He was not certain which was more likely. His voice cracked and trembled. He remembered the little graves. His knees felt weak. "Oh stars.. the little bodies..."

[Meira]

He hesitated at her question. He practically winced. Mo's eyes narrowed as she watched him. He looked pained, but it could all be an act. The whole damn thing could be an act. How was she supposed to know for sure? They hadn't managed it yet, but it was only a matter of time before the Sith weaseled someone into their ranks. They were like poison gas; they filled the air and crept into every nook and cranny of this planet, poisoning it. They had to be on alert all the time. Mo could feel the knot coming back. A twisting coil of pain had, in recent days, begun to build at the back of her head, right where her skull and spine met. Some days, it was blinding. Today, she'd almost managed to forget about it.

Klem finally found his voice. Haltingly, he began to speak and instantly, Mo knew the story. The smoke, the fire, the dead. The Sith were consistent, if unoriginal. She watched as Klem's eyes began to redden, as his voice trailed off at parts. She nodded her head. She understood. But then, after a moment, he continued. He'd killed them. Good. And buried the bodies? Mo's brow furrowed.

Hadn't she heard something about that? One of the scout groups had gone out not long ago and come across a grouping of homes, burned and empty... and graves. The Sith didn't do that. They preferred to leave the bodies to the wild animals, or to whatever poor soul found them. They had assumed a survivor had done it, buried their dead and headed off toward a settlement or something. Well, Mo supposed they weren't wrong. She opened her mouth to speak, to tell him she believed him, but he shouted out.

"We weren't soldiers! Most of those people had never even fired a blaster before! There were... families!"

"Hey..." she said, removing the arrow from the bow string and putting it back over her shoulder into the quiver. "Take a breath. It's alright." She stepped forward, lowering her bow to the ground and holding her other hand out to show she wasn't going to attack him.

"Oh stars.. the little bodies..."

Mo stopped, feeling a chill run through her. The look on Klem's face, somewhere between being sick and sobbing... that was real. She'd seen that face, on others and in the mirror. That face had fallen on every single member of the DLA at some point since the invasion.

"Klem." she said, then shifted so that she might catch his eyes. "Klem. It's ok. I believe you." She placed one hand over her chest. "I'm Mo. I knew Luddy. I didn't know he had any family. He didn't really talk about that... or anything. I'm..." it was her turn to feel her eyes burn, "I'm sorry. He was a good man."

There was a silence after that. She wasn't exactly sure how to fill it. She quickly stowed the emotion that threatened to spill out of her. She wasn't exactly inclined to share a moment a grief with a stranger, even if she'd determined he wasn't a threat. Looking around, her eyes caught sight of the iriaz that had started this whole encounter. She certainly didn't want a nice kill like that to go to waste.

Whistling, Mo straightened up slightly and looked toward Tiny who stepped out from behind Klem. She made a gesture toward the hound and said "Patrol." With one final sniff and growl at Klem, Tiny complied, leading his pack away from the clearing and disappearing into the woods. Mo's hand moved to the small of her back, unclipping a hunting knife there and revealing it.

"I suppose that's what you meant by the note then?" she said, trying out a small smile. "Luddy tell you about us?" She moved toward the iriaz, careful to keep Klem in her line of sight. She might have believed his story, but that didn't mean she had to trust him just yet.

[Blue]

The mental images kept flashing through his mind's eye, all the scenes he had fought against thinking about slipping out. It was all he could do to stop himself breaking down and collapsing to the ground there and then. The woman, who called herself Mo, was speaking in a different way now; there was empathy in her tone rather than the suspicion and aggression of before. Klem looked into her eyes and saw the same pain there that he felt spreading through his heart. It seemed that she finally believed his words, or at least a part of what he had said.

After she spoke, a silence spread between them. He used the momentary pause in the questioning to swiftly wipe at his eyes and try to pull himself back together. It was not easy; he just felt so damn tired. It was as if telling this green-skinned women, this Mo, his story had drained all the energy from him. The urgency of his task, now complete, was no longer propelling him forward and he could feel the sleepless nights and restless days catching up to him all at once. With some considerable effort, Klem grabbed everything and put them back into the box in his head and shoved it back down so that he could deal with it at some later, more convenient date. He was good at that, most of the time.

Mo herself seemed to have pulled her own head back on track, whistling some order at her kath hounds and moving off slowly, asking him something. Klem followed alongside her (although keeping a safe distance away to avoid her wrath), pausing only a moment to consider picking up his weapons. He decided better of it. He doubted that his companion trusted him enough at this point to let him re-arm himself and after all this, he did not want to get killed now. The young hunter swung his weary mind back into focus; they were hunting, it seemed, following after the iriaz, and she had asked him a question. He resisted clearing his throat, despite the lump that still resided there. It would not do to scare off their quarry.

"Well," started the pale young man, his voice cracking a little as it pushed passed his still somewhat tight throat. "Actually, he never said anything about you or your... friends?" Klem tucked some loose strands of his pale blonde hair back into the band of his dark green beret and pulled his camo-cloak a little tighter around his frame. His pace was measured, each tread careful. He made virtually no noise as he walked other than the sound of his voice. His uncle had taught him well. "In fact, he was very specific in his instruction that I was not to associate with any sort of group or organisation that might involve me with fighting. Very specific. But he left for longer than he usually did, with no word about where he was heading, and would not answer me when I asked what he was doing. I sort of... put two and two together.

"After... it all happened, I wanted to find out where he'd been going, what he'd been doing and who he'd been with. Get some answers? And I'm somewhat decent at finding things. My uncle taught me all he could." Klem's voice, lowered almost to a whisper, faltered a little bit when he mentioned his uncle but evened out again quickly. Back in the box, deal with it later. His hands unconsciously traced the bone of the kath hound jaw he kept hanging around his neck.

"As for the note, I thought... maybe... if I could pull a couple of people away and explain what I was looking for... maybe get those answers... I don't know. The more I think about it, the more stupid I feel. I'm sorry. I'm just... I've never, you know, been very good with people and I... I haven't been getting much sleep. Or any, really."

Klem stopped moving suddenly, leaning his back on a tree. A hand raised to his dull grey eyes and rubbed at them, the dark rings that haunted them pronounced against the pale flesh. A short, quiet laugh came from the young hunter, holding little humour in it.

"I never really had dreams before. Now I'm too afraid to sleep for fear of them."

[Meira]

They walked across the clearing toward the iriaz that Klem had strung up as a peace offering. With the adrenaline now slowly filtering out of her system, Mo was able to appreciate the gift for what it was. Klem was obviously a hunter like his uncle. And to a hunter, a gift like this was a true gesture. While Mo wasn't exactly ready to show the man her back, she got the feeling it wouldn't take too long to get to that point.

"Well, if he taught you half of what he knows, you're better than anyone I know by half." It wasn't empty praise. Luddy had been a rare sort, and they'd all be worse off without him. They'd manage of course, but his loss would be felt.

Standing under the hanging iriaz, Mo squared herself facing toward Klem. She wasn't going to let him go. Even if he was friendly toward their cause, he knew too much and had come too close to just let him go off and possibly get captured by the Sith. He was going to have to come back to Homestead with them. Hopefully, he would decide to join up and add his skills to their own. If not, then they'd have to find a way to relocate him somewhere he couldn't do them any damage. He came from a small community... maybe he wouldn't mind one of the far flung ones that they maintained contact with. They were entirely off the grid, but Mo got the feeling that wouldn't bother Klem too much.

"You were right to wonder about Luddy." she said after a pause. "He was helping us. And by coming to look for answers, you've managed to get closer than anyone else to a few things we'd rather not let people know about. So... you're going to have to come with us. I'm going to call my friends in now. You don't have to worry. Just keep your hands visible."

Mo touched the comm in her ear and gave the word for Si'bul and the others to come. It would only take a few moments for the sounds of the speeders to reach their ears. "The iriaz was a nice touch." she offered, hoping to ease his obviously socially overtaxed mind. "We're just a little paranoid." she smiled, hoping that might help as well.

Soon, four speeders came into the clearing at the opposite side from where they stood. One, pulling a cargo sled, crossed toward them. From it, a sandy, teenage Zabrak jumped and came to stand next to Mo. He held a blaster rifle, pointed downward, but ready.

"Who is he?" Si'bul asked, not taking his eyes off the stranger. Mo's smile faded as she watched the serious expression on Si'bul's face. He was so eager to be part of this whole thing. All she wanted was to keep him as far away from it as possible. But it wasn't possible. Not anymore.

"Can't you read?" Mo said, popping the boy on the chin with her fingers so that he might look up. Si'bul pulled back from her, frustrated to be handled like a child, but followed her prompting all the same until his eyes landed on the piece of paper tacked to the carcass. He rolled his eyes and settled back into his guarded stance, watching Klem.

"Could be a trick." Si'bul said.

"He's Luddy's nephew." Si'bul, and two of the others looked at Mo, disbelieving. "Get this loaded onto the sled." she said, not wanting them to start asking the same questions she'd already subjected Klem to. "There's more not far off. Tiny will lead you." She then gestured for one of the other speeders to come over, and for its driver to get out.

"Klem..." she said, as she rummaged through a storage compartment. "You're coming with me. These guys will bring your weapons." Finding what she was looking for, she waited for Klem to come stand beside her. She showed him the cuffs and he black bag. "Sorry about this, but I'm afraid I must insist." She cuffed his hands in front of him, and then covered his head with the black bag. She guided him to sit down in the speeder and then moved to take the driver's seat.

"Welcome to the Dantooine Liberation Army." she said, then revved the engine and sped off.