Confrontation

Aittera's gut was screaming at her as she stepped into the tiny apartment and looked around as the lights came up. Something was very wrong. Something had been wrong ever since she'd left the bodega a few blocks away that she'd just come from, but she just couldn't put her finger on it. She never shrugged off that vibrating, sinking sensation that warned her of imminent danger, and it had never been wrong once in her life. It had been a constant for as long as she could remember, since the day it drove her to her feet to run toward a building that was about to erupt in an explosion in a vain attempt to save her fiance.

Warily listening for any small sound that might be out of place, she turned to key the lock to the door before setting the bag of groceries on the nearby table. She reached down to thumb the security straps loose from the holsters holding her blasters in case she needed to draw them fast as she moved toward the only part of the place she couldn't see readily from the door – the bedroom. For just a hint of a moment as she stepped across the threshold, there was an irrational hope that Kol would be standing there beside the bed, giving her that charming smile, asking her if she missed him. But the room was as empty as the rest of the apartment, and she scowled as she turned to walk back toward the little dining area.

That was when a flash of red energy drew her attention back to the front door where sparks were beginning to fling themselves away from the computerized locking mechanism onto the floor. Aittera barely had time to recognize what she was seeing as the tip of a lightsaber before the door was loosened and forced to the side where it crumbled against the inside of the doorway. Darth Ragious's formidable pureblood wife came striding toward her.

Lord Kiabe Eirndeth stood just a few inches taller than Aittera, her muscular frame bound in form-fitting armor that seemed to the observer's mind to refuse to reflect or even acknowledge light. Her black hair was pulled back in short thick braids to frame her serpentine face and seemingly glowing yellow eyes which locked onto the redhead's face as she growled battle lust and rage. Without a word, she stalked toward her prey with purpose, effortlessly deflecting each shot Aittera fired at her with her lightsaber.

“Obviously, you're not here to talk,” the smuggler quipped as she continued to fire, mentally cataloging her surroundings as she tried to see some kind of escape route as she was inevitably driven back into the living room. She knew she was no match for a Sith warrior, and she wasn't stupid or arrogant enough to try.

Kiabe leapt the small distance between them in an instant, bringing her blade down in a sweeping arc that sent white hot agony through Aittera's left arm, severing her hand from her body, catching her by the throat to shove her against the wall with an angry sneer. “No. I'm here to make you pay.”

Aittera's scream was choked short by the fingers closing around her throat, her blue eyes wide with fear and pain as she clutched her arm to her chest. As she felt her feet begin to leave the floor, she knew she was about to die. Frantically, she fought to draw in breath, and her mind suddenly seized on the feeling at her lower back like there was something pinned between herself and the wall. Darkness crept at the edges of her vision as she puzzled for a moment what the familiar shape was, her thoughts racing the inevitable. This was important. This had to be important.

She didn't have time enough to think it through. She reached back with her off hand to tug the object free, only recognizing in that moment the knife she nearly always carried on her – something most often stuck in her boot, but on occasion kept beneath her trenchcoat at the back of her waist as it was now. In the next impossible moment, the vibroblade was protruding from the pureblood's neck and blood was pouring from her jugular. Kiabe's grip on her throat loosened as she fell back, instinct bringing her lightsaber swinging toward Aittera in one final attack in the last moments of her life.

Relief was cut short by fresh pain in the redhead's side, and she crumbled to the floor against the wall, clutching at her side where she found a hole burnt into her jacket before she lost consciousness.