#*liio

He had been standing his ground against a taller man, with a smaller gun. A human. Brow thick and furrowed, short beard sparse at gaunt cheeks, and a ponytail of long, dark hair sharply marked by white strands, which made his scarred face look twice as old as it may have in more compassionate lighting.

The private side room of this Dromund Kaas cantina had a cold, dramatic ambiance: weak, colorless lights low along the walls cast the features of all three of them in shadows like silhouettes, dark-edged and desaturated.

The luminous base of a large holo-projector in the table at the man’s back outlined him in an ethereal blue, making some details clearer and others more difficult to read. There was a pock-marked, uneven texture to the skin on the right side of his face and neck, a long-healed but vicious-looking mark of another old wound pulled together in a jagged shape across the left of his forehead, and dark circles under his unflinching, dark eyes.

Kallir’s eyes were trained to gather all available information, and they adapted easily to environments darker than this.

He observed the subtle displeasure hinted at by a tighter frown. The way the stranger’s glance abandoned him for just an instant once he’d left himself open to be fired upon—no longer poised to return the favour—with his own two-handed blaster rifle aimed toward the ground.

The agent held this stance in silence, less troubled by the mundane barrel of a pistol than the approaching Sith’s vermillion eyes. The color was vivid in an uncanny degree, with a waver of orange like a heat-aura at the edges.

Circling the table, watching the human and ignoring Kallir for the time being: a young pureblooded red sith, his handsome face pierced with gold down the ridges of either side. Not much older than the agent himself, potentially.

He moved with confidence, but had chosen less ostentatious clothing than what some Sith Lords used to signal their self-importance. A front-fastening shirt with starched lapels and half-rolled sleeves would be appropriate for anyone in this setting—though Kallir did have the fashion-fluency to recognize a kind of simplicity that wasn’t based on a limited budget. At least one of the rings on those sharp-nailed red fingers looked like something a museum would display in a place of prestige on a bed of velvet; a specimen of exceptional skill from artisans of a fabled, glorious past, when every noble family had been so visibly been a product of the ‘true’ sith lineage.

At the stranger’s waist, a pair of twin lightsabers hung clipped to the left and right of his belt. Both were wear-marked, with the appearance of being well-maintained.

This wasn’t a warrior only of words and subterfuge. If he were, Kallir reasoned that he would be more likely to recognize him. He didn’t. 

Though it was easy to judge by the few words the Sith had spoken that he didn’t have the accent of Kaas City—possibly not even the broader region of the Dromund sector. When it came to noteworthy individuals outside of his local sphere, Kallir usually had a chance to consult their file in the archives ahead of time.

The human was decidedly not local, which had been a point of relevance: he wasn’t Imperial at all.

That fact was something Kallir had been made aware of before a face-to-face meeting, when he’d been directed to locate this potential spy. He couldn’t guess what information an unknown Sith might have about the situation. The range of potential scenarios was as broad as it was unnerving. 

But he’d marked Kallir for an operative of Intelligence, and the hierarchy of their relative stations was clear: whatever a Sith Lord wanted with an infiltrator at the heart of the Empire still took priority over his own assignment.

“You’re from the Republic,” the Sith confronted the foreigner with confident interest, confirming one piece of shared knowledge.

The focus of both their attention, resigned to admit that much, answered without so much as wavering his aim or turning his eyes again: “Yes. Who’s asking?”

Being still pointedly targeted by the human’s stare (as much as his blaster) the zabrak agent felt this question equally addressed to him as to his superior. He said nothing. Nor did he break eye contact, keeping his back toward the door, standing as neutral as a soldier at his station.

Kallir assumed the Sith wouldn’t have any concerns about someone making a run for the exit when it’d be so easy to stop them with one gesture and a thought. Blocking the way might have a psychological impact on the human, though—if he can be immediately persuaded they’ve trapped him here, he might stay engaged in the confrontation without wasting time.

The Sith, in fact, acted unconcerned with any aspect of the scenario outside of the conversation he had initiated. He did cross his arms at his chest in a casual, habitual gesture of challenge—as if to warn the tall, dark stranger against escalating aggression. It should be easy to see who among them would be the clear winner if it came to violence. 

Kallir didn’t envy the position the human was in. But then: the immediate disadvantage would be his, as the most likely to be shot first.

No one held a blaster in quite the way this man did unless they were well-versed in firing one. As one professional evaluating another, Kallir was confident they were dealing with someone who had experience—and had used the skill to deadly effect, often enough.

Not one to be distracted entirely with contemplating his potential imminent death, Kallir took his observations while continuing to take in the words of the exchange. . .