The Axe

"Whoever controls the Axe controls this entire sector."

- Gieg Brillith

 was a strategically important system in the. Home to various rebel factions, including the Vinn rebels and the Misstis rebels, as well as a small base. The system was the site of various battles, the most famous of which was the Battle of the Axe, which took place in.

Description
"This system is the key. When I control it, all my enemies will perish, and this will be the Axe I use to crush those who dare to defy me."

- An unknown warlord, christening the system.

The Axe was a system with seven diverse planets, six of which were inhabited.

Tarn I
Tarn I was the first of the three smallest planets in the system, closest to its star. Tarn I was a barren wasteland, a desert planet scarred by numerous asteroid impacts, with boiling hot days and freezing nights. With a very thin atmosphere, the planet was too harsh an environment for most species, though some small colonies of Sagrats were thought to exist.

Tarn II
Tarn II rivalled its close neighbour for its natural hostility. Another desert planet, Tarn II was plagued by vicious sand storms that swept over the entire planet's surface on a regular basis, while holes in its thin atmosphere led to pockets of extreme heat, with temperatures reaching well over 500 degrees Celsius. Similarly, a number of Sagrat colonies could be found on the planet's surface.

Tarn III
Tarn III was by far the most hospitable of the Tarn cluster. The planet was cooler, with large ice sheets at the caps, and an abundance of water underneath the surface, which was made up mostly of thick salt crystals. Tarn III teemed with life under its surface, with the semi-intelligent Ach Ach taking the role of the dominant lifeform in the planet's vast subterranean seas.

Osis
Separated from the Tarn cluster by an expansive asteroid ring, Osis was the most active planet of the Axe. A lush planet with a wide variety of vegetation, both natural and imported by colonists, it was the home planet of the Oth, who lived in webs high in the trees and were particularly skilled in the construction of starships.

Vinnbrek
Literally meaning "Furnace of the Vinn", Vinnbrek was a small, volcanically-active world that remained under Vinn control after the Vinn empire collapsed thousands of years before the rise of the. Used mainly for the extraction of raw materials, much of which is shipped out to neighbouring Osis for use in ship construction, Vinnbrek is inhabited by many billions of Vinn settlers.

Titan
The "Titan" was the largest planet of the Axe, a vast with a number of barren moons. Titan was the only planet in the Axe that was uninhabited, though the Vinn did extract precious substances found in the upper atmosphere for their own uses.

Misstis
Little more than an asteroid, Misstis was once home to an Imperial base, found in a small pocket of air. Home to no intelligent life of its own, it has played home to a number of groups hoping to evade detection from the galaxy at large, such as the Misstis rebellion, led by former- Bolo Artel.

Oth
The Oth were a race of insectoid, spider-like creatures, with with long, spindly legs and a pair of thick, brutish arms, and pincers. They were very ingenuitive and practical, and were very skilled in the construction of starships and other vehicles.

Ach Ach
The Ach Ach were a race of mermaid-like, humanoid creatures. Little was known about them, apart from that they had oily black skin and large eyes, had four limbs with large, rounded flippers, and communicated in screeches and moans.

Sagrats
Sagrats were a race of dog-like, semi-intelligent creatures, with long legs and thin fur. They were used as servants and guards across the galaxy, and were found in the employ of both the s and various crimelords, such as Gorith.

The particular Sagrats found on Tarns I and II were specifically evolved to have a hardened, shell-like canopy of bone protruding over the back, and eyes that had adapted to the harsh sunlight and violent sandstorms.

Vinn
The Vinn were humanoid creatures with deep red skin, relatively short stature and gills. They were known for being extremely savage, and were though to have been related to the species, who also originated from the.

Discovery
The Axe was first discovered, and christened, by an unknown  at least  before the rise of the. At that time, the native Oth were little more than savages, who were then made "civilised" by their Hutt invaders. The Hutts also brought with them a colony of Sagrat ancestors, who set up home on the first two worlds of the system, eventually evolving (rapidly, due to their extremely fast life cycle) into the Sagrats found there today.

Under Vinn Rule
After several millennia of Hutt rule, the Oth rose up and defeated their masters, declaring themselves independent. However, this independence was not to last. Within a hundred years, the Vinn Empire had spread across the region, and the Axe was taken over by the Vinn. Although they were first put to work as slaves, the Oth eventually became accepted as part of Vinn culture in the system, gaining equal status and retaining the rights to their homeworld, Otis.

The Axe entered the sometime before the rise of the.

Massacre of the Axe
See also: Battle of the Axe

After the rise of the Empire, former Jedi Bolo Artel turned to the Axe as his new base of operations, occupying the abandoned Imperial base on Misstis. At the same time, the Vinn rebellion was gaining ground in the system, and the Vinn forces, led by Konan had established a base on Vinnbrek. Meanwhile, the Vinn mining guild, irritated by the Empire's constant interference, were prepared to fight. In, a small Imperial taskforce, led by Gieg Brillith, who had been charged by to deliver the remains of  to , passed through the system. Picking up a decoy distress signal from Misstis, Brillith investigated and found himself attacked on both sides, by the Vinn rebels and Artel's rebel faction.

With the rebel groups turning on each other, the Imperials were able to gain some ground, destroying much of Artel's fleet and forcing Artel himself to flee. Losing all but one ship, Brillith fled to Tarn I, followed swiftly by Konan, who destroyed the mining guild's vessels and wreaked havoc on their mining facilities. Gathering above Tarn I, Konan and Brillith faced off, with Konan's forces damaged by the surprising power of Brillith's vessel, the prototype Vektek-class stealth cruiser Arconoss, before Konan retaliated and sent the ship crashing down to the planet's surface. Badly wounded, and fearing Imperial retaliation, Konan was then forced to flee the system.