Lehon's Terrain

While hardly a mother's instinct to protect ones child, there was a certain sense of ownership the Shaper Adept felt towards her creations, that of a divine creator in some respects. She had given them life, they therefor belonged to her. She did not want them to die.

She watched as the Executor imbibed his narcotic slime, somewhat disturbed by the blatant use of the restricted substance, especially given his sour mood. Seizing the moment, she glided forwards towards him, her heeled feet concealed by the long skirt of her oozith gown. Loraine reached forwards and attempted to rest a hand on Nem's shoulder, for comfort and possibly to pierce his throat with a finger spear if things didn't go her way.

"And it would be a waste, Nem. To me, these are no different than any of the other creatures we have bred, save perhaps that these are far more lethal. You may not see it yet, but they may well have some future purpose that neither you or I can currently fathom. They deserve a chance at life. For too long our people have been obsessed with death. I understand your hate, I really do. That's why I plead to you for compassion. Let something good come from this."

Her mqaaq'it narrowed suspiciously. Did he know something already? It had been Shareed, Nem's own domain mate, who had originally put Loraine to the task of recreating the slayer project. She could certainly deflect some of the blame by indicting the Prefect, given that it was his orders she was following, yet what would that change? Nem had already claimed that he would spare her creations, so there was little gained by making an enemy of the other intendant.

"This was my doing, Executor, and no one else's."

Ah yes, the task she had been assigned. It was far less interesting than the slayer project, but she understood the usefulness of it. Still, it felt beneath someone of her talents. Though she was only an adept, she was skilled beyond her years and the Executor knew that. He should have assigned the job to one of the lower shaper ranks beneath her.

She motioned to one side of the lab with a gentle sweep of her naked arm towards another series of tanks that seemed to contain balls of flesh. Gliding over to the tanks, she stroked an outer reflex on the surface and waited as the nutrient fluid filling the tank was drained until only a wet molted ball of flesh remained. She opened the tank and reached inside, picking up the ball and bringing it over to the Executor.

"It is already done, Executor. I have created a flawless rakata ooglith cloaker. Only a deep penetrating biological scan could detect the difference between a Yuuzhan Vong wearing this and an actual rakatan."

Loraine rolled her eye implants. It had been annoying already to be put to the task of creating one of the ooglith masquers, and now he wanted her to make more? For Yun-Ne'Shel's sake. Again she heard the term 'assessment', without the objective being truly explained to her. It was irritating. She took back the prototype and returned it to the nutrient tank. Once it was sealed away, she stroked the tank's reflex and watched as it again filled to the brim with fluid.

"Perhaps if you would explain to me the point of our efforts here, I would be more motivated in my work. For what purpose are we assessing this civilization or this planet? I know you filled in the other intendants, but they are as tight lipped at you. If I am going to spend my time on this then I deserve to know."

Expanding their intelligence gathering operations, that certainly made sense and had the Executor's name written all over it. The idea of colonizing these worlds surprised her somewhat. From a logistics standpoint it made sense. When they had first arrived in the galaxy they had numbered in the billions, if not trillions. Now there was barely two million of them left on Zonama Sekot. They needed to increase their repopulation efforts before they dwindled from existence entirely. Still, that left a few questions.

She shook her head, clearly confused about something he had said.

"I don't understand. If you intend to colonize this world and others, why go through the effort of infiltrating the population centers and studying these people? Would it not be simpler to bombard them from orbit and start with a clean slate?"

She was right from the start. Nem was insane. How could their people be expected to coexist with the infidel races of the galaxy? They were utterly different, too dependent on their mechanical heresies. Most of them still harbored hatred in their hearts for the Yuuzhan Vong, admittedly their own fault, but still it presented a huge problem. This was the height of hubris.

Mouth agape in shock, Loraine snapped her jaw shut and smoothed the wrinkles forming in her oozith gown. She couldn't meet the mad gleam in the Intendant's eye.

"What you expect of us is equal parts foolish and illogical. Coexistence is not just improbable, it is impossible. At the very least we should enslave the rakata population so that they do not rise against us, if you are unwilling to remove them as a potential problem."

How could he compare the two? It was hardly the same, a few similarities aside. If anything the failure of the Yuuzhan Vong Empire to maintain their hold on the galaxy after conquering almost all of it was more a result of poorly made decisions by the leadership than anything else. If Supreme Overlord Shimrra Jamaane had allowed the Slayer project to take place earlier, closer to the beginning of the invasion, the infidels would have been wiped out entirely. Imagine an army mainly comprised of them, they would have been unstoppable. Or wasting precious resources on terraforming a polluted technological hellscape like Coruscant into their own capital...foolhardy. Nem should find fault in himself before laying blame on her, though she would not say as much. He was far too temperamental.

"You've spent too much time amongst the infidel races, Nem. It has skewed your judgment of them. You speak of emphasizing with the enemy like they are worth our compassion." Her mqaaq'it flared. "They are not. Most would prefer to see us dead, so why should we not treat them the same?"

Loraine Zun-qin was left with a bitter taste in her mouth after the unexpected meeting with the Executor. She busied herself in the shaperate, continuing her work on the slayer project despite having directly sampled Nem's ire over it. In her spare time she saw to the efforts of mass producing her rakata ooglith masquer design, but that task was easily left up to the other shaper caste under her command. They even had some of the worker caste doing most of the actual labour in that regard, which was good in its own way. It gave them a purpose, she thought. In her dazzling satin oozhith, she walked past rows of nutrient tanks, running the additional fingers of her shaper hands over the transparent surface. They were growing almost to maturity now, soon they could be awakened from their slumber and educated in the ways of their people.

Heresy or not, they were hers.