{"id":38,"date":"2008-06-03T16:17:48","date_gmt":"2008-06-03T20:17:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.auroraforce.org\/blog\/?p=38"},"modified":"2009-04-18T00:00:52","modified_gmt":"2009-04-18T04:00:52","slug":"vong-war-annals-dusty-old-castle-60308","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.auroraforce.org\/blog\/?p=38","title":{"rendered":"Vong War Annals – “Dusty Old Castle” 6.03.08"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The trip had been long, though in the best way possible.\u00a0 Conversation had been a constant, filled with many great laughs and bonding between Kiiara, Kal’or and Jeir.\u00a0 It made Jeir’s heart heavy to realize there were but a handful of happy tales Kiiara could tell, and even then those she spoke of were either dark in their nature or not actually that funny at all.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 They had spent a few hours getting through customs at Wayfarer station, in orbit of Xenen.\u00a0 With the increased hostilities in the Vong war–which they were all as familiar with as they could be now–security precaution measures were at an all-time high.\u00a0 Kal’or disliked the thorough checking of their backgrounds…or what could be found of them, at least.\u00a0 Eventually they had been cleared to pass through, reminding Jeir he had no official military position anymore on Xenen, and they had shot off to the planet below.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 He had done a flyby of Shay Memorial Base, paying mind to the no-fly zone around it as to avoid unnecessary confrontation with the base.\u00a0 Jeir was sure they would be going there soon enough, either for business or leisure, and the last thing he needed was to start that future trip off with a bad mark on local record.\u00a0 Kiiara had liked seeing the place while Kal’or bitched about the lack of noticeable armament from the sky.\u00a0 “Big guns to scare them away,” he had said, “saves ya from having to fire them.”\u00a0 Jeir was sure the guns were there, just more discreet than the Mandalorian way would have them.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 As the flew over the thick Daraval Forest below them, Jeir closed his eyes and smiled.\u00a0 There was nothing particularly amazing about Xenen for someone that had traveled much of the galaxy, yet it was the closest thing Jeir had known as a home.\u00a0 He had technically lived on Coruscant longer than Xenen, but he had been a child back then and what he remembered was several years less than he had spent secluded in his castle.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Castle…he smiled at the name.\u00a0 He hadn’t set out to make the place a castle, didn’t even think of it as one until Les had called it that.\u00a0 Jeir had a large fortune stashed away, primarily the result of dozens of bounties he had fulfilled and invested wisely.\u00a0 His inheritance from his Mother’s business on Coruscant had certainly helped, though he kept that in a separate account as his backup funds.\u00a0 Other than his ship and exotic firearms, Jeir had never spent much of anything and had enjoyed spending millions building his castle.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Companies from all over the galaxy had been contracted for different parts of the place, the master design of the base of the castle done by a Selonian architect named Maronea that had left the comforts of his sept for bigger and better things.\u00a0 Selonians being a burrowing species by nature, Jeir had felt Maronea was a perfect choice to organize the main part of the castle that was inside<\/em> of the mountain.\u00a0 The exterior was finished by a local firm, and out of well-learned paranoia Jeir took great care to not let any one company handle much of the work of his home.\u00a0 He collected the majority of the original plans discreetly after the work was completed to avoid the possibility of anyone knowing the secrets in his home.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 There were two separate hangars connected to the home, both hidden from plain sight though not necessarily kept a secret.\u00a0 The first was on the mountainside itself, built into the cliff’s face and disguised by a synthetic covering on the bay doors made to look like the cliff side, which he allowed personally invited visitors to land in.\u00a0 It would never hold up to close scrutiny, though it did the job of diverting attention from the secondary hangar Jeir used for his own ships.\u00a0 That hangar was disguised as a wide-open courtyard, the hangar doors covered in concrete and heavily reinforced against attack and sensor sweeps.\u00a0 While many knew of both hangars, the difference between the first and second hangars was no one but Jeir would ever enter the second hangar.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Until now, of course.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Reaching out through the Force while slowing the Adenn Senaar<\/em> down, he let this mind wrap around memories of the hangar and the internal controls inside of it.\u00a0 While much of the castle had places only a user of the Force could find or operate, the hangar’s controls had a physical operations station inside which doubled as the only method of opening the courtyard-disguised bay doors.\u00a0 Any non-Force user could open the hangar if they had made ti that far inside of the castle, and only a Force user could open the doors from the outside.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 A lever twitched and the slipped into position in Jeir’s mind, his eyes opening and resuming visual control of the ship as is rose up above the mountains and came gliding to the castle.\u00a0 There was a delay in opening this hangar’s bay doors, as the many statues and decorations were pulled under the ground to make the surface flat for the opening.\u00a0 They could see the courtyard now, the VCX-280 pulling into a hovering position as the repulsorlifts kicked into gear and the main engines died down.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 “What’s happening?” Kiiara’s voice sang beside him, his daughter unbuckling her chair’s restraints to look out of the viewport easier.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Jeir smiled, having forgotten how awesome the sight had to be for her.\u00a0 “This hangar is my personal hangar at the castle, it’s entrance is hidden and only a Jedi can open it,” he explained.\u00a0 “Everything on the courtyard’s deck is pulled down into the actual bay doors, then the doors slide open under the gardens.”\u00a0 The garden was far overgrown and poorly kept he could see, several of the courtyard’s planters tearing overgrown limbs off of the plants as they sank into their hiding places.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 There was a pause, then the doors parted with a speed that looked impossible.\u00a0 That part always unnerved him, you expected things of such mass to much slow and with great effort, not so quickly.\u00a0 By the design, however, as they parted to the left and right respectively they also sank down several meters so that their weight helped them open swiftly.\u00a0 Of course, that made closing up slower though that was usually of little concern to him.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 “Home sweet home,” Kal’or huffed as he stood in the passageway to the rear of the ship.\u00a0 The VCX-820’s cockpit was smaller than most Corellian ships, only having seating space for the pilot and co-pilot as the majority of the systems have been slaved together for smaller crew requirements.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The Adenn Senaar<\/em> came down with practiced effort, gently touching down before sinking onto her landing gear and hissing air out of the hydraulic exhaust ports.\u00a0 Jeir willed the hangar bay’s opening lever back to it’s original position, the room shuddering as the doors began their closing sequence.\u00a0 “Welcome to Katarn Manor,” Jeir joked.<\/p>\n

“:)
\n–Jinx<\/p>\n

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