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Darth Nyrys

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Ailbasí sighed. She had hoped to just explode into the room and for him to just know, like in the fairy tales and romance holos. But this was neither and he was a veteran soldier, both cynical and skeptical, especially of happiness. She needed to dig deeper until the truth was unavoidable. Even with her human nose she smelled smoke and burning meat, heard the wail of fire alarms. He was probably burning her body. She didn’t blame him.

“Did you spare the hairpin that I used to stop myself? My mother gave it to me… But we’ve both had a nasty shock today so I would understand if you didn’t. I don’t know if the body hop was a one time trick or not, so please don’t shoot me. Even if it isn’t, please don’t shoot me, this body is kind of amazeballs and I want to keep it. I need to check in on blue man group and Mister Snuffles soon, but if you want to get acquainted with the new me before I do, go ahead. I know this is crazy, but that’s just how my life is on a daily basis, Ca’Aran.”

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Tremors of adrenaline flushed beneath his skin, and the little hairs across it raised with inspiration. He watched the blue man wheel from a roll, lashing out with two brisk kicks to his mid-section. Curiously, Three controlled his breathing quite well, watching the fluid movement of the other and then admissibly allowing the assaults to batter against him. The reason was not clear, but a smile was slowly seaming across his face. The first kick pounded against him, but Three reacted ahead of impact with his arms in a braced forming against his chest, absorbing the first kick and then the crawling power of the second. The latter strike sucked a bit of wind from him, the foot adjusted just enough to slip between the brace of both forearms. It eased the steam in him a little, the wild intemperance inside of him turning to blatant vexation. Ire spelled out across his facial features, the elitism in his speech was hard for him to understand, especially if he really did mean the word friend. Perhaps it was pity.

 

"F—f..fri"

 

The word he tried to understand was friend, he could feel what it meant, the endearment of the word but he could not understand what it meant to this blue man. He used it, this Drago, but he continued to introduce harm. The lady before, she had left weary and distraught, locking the two within this room. Was it kill or be killed, like the slaves before him? There were too many questions, and time was running out. Panic crept up on his shoulders and a wild impatience took over him. Three shook his head, inadvertently shaking the pain from his mind and then something inexplicable occurred. "Aaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrgghhhhh!" The slave let a rolling thunder come from the bottom of his chest, and up the canals of his lungs. A roar unlike any other escaped his mouth, a howl entangled with a dark energy which bled the tone of it mysteriously. The roar was loud, room shakingly so, and impressively nasty to the ears. 

 

 

Three pounced forward with more life now, rushing forward to spear the blue man from where he stood. 

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With a twirl the slug thrower seated itself back into the kydex holster and Delta let the girl drop from where he was pinning her against the wall. He hooked a thumb to where the towel was struggling to keep the smoke out from her bedroom and shrugged.

“I didn’t much think to rescue it, thermite’s probably not melted it into scrap yet if you want to check. Sorry about the mess, can’t say I was expecting you back so very soon.”

He leaned in and kissed her on the forehead that was now very much without the bristly fur of a Cathar.

“Welcome back dear, I look forward to whatever body you swipe into next.” He winked and stepped back, brushing his bloody knuckles on his jacket.

 

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Ca'Aran

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The shout, that blasted shout, it hurt.  Alot.  It stunned him more then artillery fire going off near by.  He recovered quickly but not nearly as quickly as the strange man only knows as 3 moved this time.  The tackle took the wind out of him.  In a brief moment of panic after he had been slammed into the floor all he could see was an strange purplish red light.  He wasn't use to being in a panic.  It was a strange sensation and he felt that strange sensation he always felt before something unexplained happend.  Strugling to stand while still grappeling with 3 and his ears ringing the fight seemed to have degenerated into a brawl.  As his panic grew so did the uneasy sensation and suddenly with a cry of enough Drago himself flew backward slamming into a wall.  Dazed he wondered if whatever shockwave had just thrown him backwards had also impacted 3.  He hoped so as the wind was once again knocked out of him in the span of less then a minute.

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The sudden impact drove Three reeling in the opposite direction, nothing but open space broke his backward repulse, with his legs nearly kicking too far from underneath him,. His body equalized before he was completely swept, falling forward and balancing on all fours like a ravenous mutt, allowing the tips of his feet and the tips of his fingers to drag across the floor. His unruly white mane of hair steeped his entire face with sweat, sheathing nearly the entirety of his face, save for the brilliance of his tempestuous eyes. These eyes were haunting, dangerously void of thought. The auburn paint inside of them began to seethe, almost frothing with an unknown energy. The upsurge of dynamism in his body seemed to exceed all boundary, yet his breathing was more ragged now, panting with feral unrest. His chest, if he could feel it, was on fire. His heart pounded harder and faster, and these were the tell-tale signs that had left those other slaves mutilated. If his mind was a puzzle before, it was now a labyrinth with walls that were closing in on him. The only thing he understood was if he lost, he would die. The dread of him never knowing the answers, never knowing what he truly was, drove him berserk every time. 

 

"Kill."

 

Instinct pedaled his momentum now. Recognizing the disorientation of the blue man, the hound snarled inaudibly and launched forward once more. Faster, harder, and with reckless abandon. His voracious advance covered the distance between them in no more than the split of three seconds. With his opponent unwillingly slamming into the wall with concussive force in order to break his own trajectory, Three thoughtlessly took advantage and unleashed a relentless barrage of hooks and knees towards the body and face, hoping to completely pulverize the blue man while he recovered his breath. He blindly unleashed, blacking out and seeing nothing but the dark red wash of color in his eyes.  

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Ailbasí nodded, wrapped a garment around her face, and looked into the burning remains of her bathroom. Seeing metal glinting in the flames, she gestured to it and with some tugging it came loose and found her hand. It needed to be cleaned, but at least it was back in her possession.

“As much as I would love to show you the new me in depth, I need to go check in on my scientist and my murder hobo, make sure that they aren’t killing each other. I promise I will be back soon and we can talk.”

She… did her best putting together an outfit that relatively contained her new dimensions, put a black robe on over that, and donned her Sith mask. She may look different now, but that would not compromise her ability to look her role as Sith instructor. The new apprentices would have questions, but that was a good thing.

Darth Nyrys walked into a solid beatdown in progress, She wasn’t sure if it was the juice that she had given Mister Snuffles or if his appearance had concealed a greater talent than she expected, but he was unleashing on the poor Chiss like a proper warrior. Well at least the foundations of one. He would need to be honed, reforged from a blunt instrument into a proper blade.

The chiss, to his credit, had survived long enough for Ailbasí to die, transfer bodies, and return to the ship, so that meant he was made of sterner stuff than most academics. She gestured and Mister Snuffles was forcefully removed from the Chiss before more permanent damage could be done. Then she took back what was left of the vitality she had given him. He would learn how to secure his own supply in time.

“Impressive, most impressive. It’s good to know that we won’t need to dispose of any more bodies today. Although slightly concerning neither of you heard a grenade going off a few rooms over. But that could just be the sound proofing on the ship. I’m not going to hide my situation from you, it’s of value to your education. My original body was a construct and it suffered an integral failure that left me with a choice, murder everyone within a certain radius to repair it or find a new body to serve as a host. While my situation is somewhat unique, the Dark Side will make both of you face similar choices as you progress down the path to power. This is a road of sacrifices, sometimes your own, sometimes the people you care about, sometimes people you’ve never even met before.

There are two truths of the Dark Side that you need to be intimately familiar with as we train. The darkness does not respect those that aren’t willing to both seize control of the situation and suffer for their craft. The darkness will consume you if you don’t respect it’s primordial vastness. You must be ruthless in your self inventory when deciding how much of the Dark Side you can control, or you will be swept away.

Both of you has a speciality that you are clearly leaning towards, but my first goal is to make sure that you survive long enough to get there. I am going to leave a book of sorts with you to study for the night. Then in the morning I am going to attack you. If you overextended yourself to the point of being unable to defend, you will die. If you don’t study it enough, that is a lost opportunity.”

Darth Nyrys placed a black fur bound book on the floor, and gently removed the strap that kept it sealed. She remembered when they removed that skin from her. Crystal pages floated up to form a circle in the room, each one of the ten manifesting a three dimensional image of a body in a different energy color.

“This is a Sith pain map, courtesy of the Cartographers of Flesh in the crucible on Korriban. It will teach you the methods and effects of various strikes and pressure points on the body, but each lesson will require you to experience the pain. It will push you, but you will learn a great deal. I will have my crew bring you both meals since you did well sparring today, but I am leaving you to make your own decisions regarding how to approach this. The crew will also show you to your quarters for the night when you decide to retire.”

Ailbasí left her apprentices to their own devices and returned to her room, and to Ca’aran. She took off the mask and disrobed before hugging him deeply. She stood on the tips of her toes to kiss him on the forehead, this was intimacy on a deeper level than just lustful need. Some things couldn’t be said with words.

“So, I know you’ve been around some pretty pfasked up Sith. And I’ve done some pretty pfasked up things, to get here. But I don’t go out of my way to be mwahaha evil. At first I did what I needed to survive, and now I’m at the point where I do what I need to for us to have the kind of happiness we deserve, but when able I try to minimize the cost, or make the cost come out of people that I feel deserve it. Doesn’t always work that way, but that’s what I try for. Is that okay with you?”

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Body swapping was a trick he had never heard of, even among the legends he had studied of the Sith.  However it made little difference to the current situation.  Walking over to his pack he removed two water bottles and walked over to three smiling in what he thought was a disarming way.  "I must say for a man with no memory and poor physical condition you fight well, I hope there is no hard feelings given that was simply a test.  I admire you ferocity and look forward to learning more about what is trapped in that mind of yours."  Without waiting for a response he set down the one bottle and drank his own.  Learning about pain maps sounded truly interesting but while drinking his water he had to admit that 3's wild barrage had already done some damage.  Going over is body internally there was nothing that wouldn't heal but at the same time that didn't make it hurt any less.  There wasn't much to be done, he would just have to compartmentalize the pain as best he could and move forward, the only other choice was apparently to die at the hands of the Sith.

Slowly walking up to the first of the Crystal images he began to study the complexity of the image and the energy patterns flowing through it.  The patter, while somewhat obscure was not difficult to figure out.  Deciding to use his tried and true method of learning he spent several minutes memorizing the patterns of energy.  The sith had said it would hurt but was also worth the pain so focusing his mind he began to attempt to mimic the pressure points on his own body in an attempt to create the pain sensation that the map showed.  At first it seemed he was perhaps wrong about the energy pattern when suddenly one attempt yeilded a jolt of pain that set his head spinning and drove him to his knees.  After allowing himself five minutes for his head to clear and the pain to stop he repeated the process to the same result.  Two more repetitions with the same result satisfied his intellectual curiosity and memory.  Smiling despite himself he moved on to the next crystal image with a determined glint in his eye.  This knowledge was invaluable even if he failed to become a sith or died in the morning it would be a well cherished memory as it was obviously the work of masters.  It was going to be a long night, but if all went to plan he would at least be able to get 3 hrs of sleep.  Well, perhaps 2.5.

Edited by Kellanderos
spelling correction and adding reference to previous post
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As the Lady Sith went to check on her unruley pack of Sithies, Delta stood awkwardly in her bedroom. His crystal blue eyes slowly jumping from poster to poster which had been plastered on the walls. Random bands that were obscure enough to be cool to college aged kids/ His eyes eventually drifted back to where the red haired slave girl was just waking up from a barbituated daze.

Ta.” He held out a reassuring hand to stop her from getting up.

“You need actual rest, not some drugged up stupor.”

She nodded softly and rubbed at her eyes, but didn’t try to speak, and instead laid back onto the leather couch and was fastly asleep before Delta could warn her about the blood she had stuck her bare feet into. He shrugged and sat down on Ailbasi’s bed, staring at the carpet and wondering what would befall him next.

It was in that state that the reincarnated Sith lord found him some time later. Still staring at the carpet, but he smiled widely at her and patted beside him. Inviting her to sit.

“We have all done things we regret. I’ve killed hundreds of thousands. You ate a sith lord. You know, normal couple things. It’s fine with me Ailbasí. I wouldn’t have it any other way.” He pulled her into a fierce hug. “What comes next for us?”

 

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Ca'Aran

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His enraptured fixation was half-cocked when another had entered the room. He ignored her slight gesture, but his body could not. The full bearing of his weight was wrenched from the blue man and sent backsliding across the hard floor, arresting the mania inside of his mind. Three laid there, slaving each and every breath as hard as he could, heartbeat racing in place. Such a broken mind ran wild, and now the consciousness had returned, memories of the man who had ripped metal from metal with the lift of his hand almost as this one did. Reminiscing brought composure, and his stillness brought a weariness that nearly drowned his physical spirit. Suddenly, the exhaustion he had before was reimbursed, but by tenfold now. Three did not bother to move, and the level of his head evened out across the floor in rest. Something of a lecture was being announced, but three avoided eye-contact because he was surrendered to his depletion. “Sith…” The shell of a word left his lips, interested in what she meant, but too low to hear. It didn’t seem to matter; as abruptly as she had arrived, she had left.

There were now ethereal mirror-like objects that surrounded the room, another occurrence he could not quite understand. She had explained what they were, but this was all too new to him, and the chaos that was his mind would not settle if people continued to arrive and depart in quick exchanges. The only constant for the last bit was the man named Drago, and he was still alive, they both were. Perhaps killing one another was not the intention, and just as those thoughts crossed his mind, the blue skinned warrior approached with pleasantries once more. His words were sincere and kind, and the respect he showed reminded him a little of what he might have been before the other Masters. He was not just an animal. Drago walked off, and Three smiled as well, before his face hit the floor and was light’s out. 
 

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Ailbasí laid down next to Ca’aran on the bed, her head in his lap. The sense of safety she now felt underscored the vulnerability of her new body. It had been a long time since she needed someone to feel safe. In simpler times this feeling of security would have felt nice, but now it ate away at her with nervous energy.

“I feel exposed right now in this new body, weak. So much of my training before was tied to my physicality, and now that physicality is all soft and squishy. If body hopping is going to be one of my natural aptitudes then I need to train in things that don’t depend on me being built like a sexy tank. Which means study and practice for me, not to mention learning how to be a human and not needing to survive on the life energy of others to be healthy. We still need to secure a holding on Cathar, but I have an idea for that. I need new clothes because apparently I can’t go half a standard cycle without having a drastic physical change, maybe we can send your new purchase out to find me some things to wear? Whoever this person was, their wardrobe is a bit too corporate empress for my taste.

You are always welcome to be by my side, but I don’t really know what it is that you do. I mean, are you using up all of your vacation days with Black Sun to be here or are you so well off at this point that you’re semi retired? Or am I getting you in trouble for stealing you away for so long? Does stealing you make me a cat burglar? Damnit, that pun only partially applies now…”

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I am alive?


Slaves that fell to the point of unconsciousness were as useful as dirt, ineffective for the labor required to build for the future. These were the slaves that had their throats slit in their sleep, or were chained and tossed to the ferals as a source of food. The meat on their bones was not much, but desperation drove a countless many to devour without prejudice. A dog eat dog world was what enslavement on these worlds meant, but here, on a land driven by what seemed to be the most feral, he lived. Three cracked his eye open before he shifted, trying to grab a handle on the situation. His senses were a little more crisp now, and although the wear and tear still ate at his muscles, the idea of sleep no longer barraged the clarity of his mind. As he searched the room, slowly adjusting his neck to look around him, he noticed it was still the blue man and himself locked away.

The strange mysticism of those pages that pulled themself from a book, still drifted loosely in the air. Her voice, the dark lady, replayed itself in his head with instruction and warning. She was a shadow amidst men, he could swear she appeared as the creatures of this land once did, but the last he laid eyes on her, her stance and figured had changed. It was the command of her voice that reminded Three of who she was, and even now, she probably hid behind the layers of the shadows that danced in these chambers. "Where am I, anyways?" He looked to Drago, almost to ask outloud, and then the smell of food pulled every inch of his attention.

Three scrambled to his feet, and spun around from where he lay. The crust of sleep contracted in the corner of his eye, while a trail of drool formed at the edge of his lips. This couldn't be another dream, the aroma of the warm plate persuaded goosebumps to rise from his skin. The shaggy-haired slave decided not to pay another second to curiosity, and scooped the venison with both hands before snapping into the meal. His heart, pumped with something he hadn't quite felt before. Perhaps, it was hope.

Drago remained focused on the task at hand, clearly a man dedicated to discipline and tact. Three on the other hand, savored the food left for him, with evidence of the spices stuck in his teeth and face. He stood and drew the length of his forearm across his face to clean his mess and turned to the pain map scattered all around him with confusion comically built into his expression. The one nearest to him was where he would begin his journey. Brushing the folds from his disastrous attire, he marched up to the first page and sniffed it as if that would render any type of answer for this sorcery. It did not. The page was multi-dimensional, projecting crystal clear imagery of the anatomy and apparently highlighting the arm for whatever reason. There was a circuitry, a pattern if he was to guess, but he did not pretend to understand any of it. It was just a magical paper that suspended itself because that witch-lady said so. He reached out to grab the thing, perhaps he could examine it further for some inscriptions, and then it hit him.

The muscles in the same arm were impacted immediately, as if a blade had just punctured skin. The whole of his arm froze over with numbness, and Three startled backwards, clutching at the wound instinctively. He huffed to the pain, muffling a jumble of words that made no sense to any dialect. Whipping his head around, he found no one near him. Drago was too distracted to be playing tricks, so the only answer was the witch-lady. This was her torture, and she was somewhere laughing between this world and the next. The pain was biting though, and did not wash away as quick as the whips from his Masters had over time. The feeling was internal, and bled into his senses. He had become quite accustomed to the abuse, so much so that it became laughable when the others were not watching. This was flinching, squeezing his eyelids shut as if that would somehow make it disappear.

Just then, his mind relapsed for the split of a second. And he saw himself. Standing there, jabbing the air with a swift precision unbeknownst to him. He opened his eyes, with shock and awe. "What was that? It looked like.."

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Ca’aran was silent for some time, and Ailbasí let him know that she didn’t need an answer right away. For the time being, she floated over her datapad and used it to access the Sith’s vast collection of electronically recorded tomes and scrolls. The fear of loss of self still haunted her too much to pursue the path of sorcery, not to mention her unspoken worries that such heavy use of the dark side might cause her body to warp and diminish. In the past when she couldn’t find acceptance or validation amongst her peers being wanted or lusted after had been the closest substitute she could manage, and it had gotten her by. As she continued down the path of the Sith would her ability to connect with people fade so much that she’d have to rely on manipulating desire just for a brief feeling of closeness again?

She dove into texts, manuals, and scrolls on illusionry, finding the principles and methods of the craft to be far more intuitive and natural to her than anything else that she had studied. She devoured the knowledge hungrily and wondered if should have started her studies as an assassin. But the lessons she had learned as a Sith warrior about her own limits and how to push past them were invaluable. An idea for a ritual began to form, and she started plotting it out on her datapad, a flurry of notes and illustrated arcane sigils. She would need to make sacrifices… of other people this time, but it could lead to a more permanent means of protecting her body from the ravages of the Dark. For now though, she would practice the fundamentals, temporarily changing features like eye color and hair color, and temporarily conjuring shapes and symbols.

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Ca’Aran smiled and pulled the woman closer enveloping her in a hug.

“If you have to body jump all the time that seems like a hassle, luckily I have an immense line of credit.” He stuck his tongue out at her and kissed her on the furless forehead. Then he looked up to the slave who was still sleeping on the couch. He gently woke her and informed her of the mission he had set out for her and gave her a thousand credit chip. She rushed out with a nod and Delta turned back to Ailbasi.

“Black Sun is changing away from what it once was. Myself, Mindan, Jacen, Omega, and Kayal made Black Sun into a powerful military force. One that would be reckoned with. We withstood the Sith assault at Coruscant and in the peace time we made ourselves unbeatable. Now our alliances have shifted, the Sith rule the Galaxy, and I am the only one of the Princes left.”

He drew her again into a sad hug.

“So the Black Sun must change to survive. Otherwise…”

He sat down and steepled his fingers in front of him.

“We become a threat to the Sith, and we will be stabbed in the back.”

He laughed softly.

“So we must give up arms and return to what we once were. A Criminal Syndicate. And such a syndicate does not need a Prince of Blood. So I will also retire, lest I am put down in the eventual power struggle. If I get out now, I can secure my assets and money, but that also leaves me aimless and drifting. I imagine I’ll eventually eat the end of my pistol. But that’s a while out.”

He smiled, though his eyes did not reflect it.

“So, what do you want to do?”

 

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Ca'Aran

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Ailbasí exhaled in frustration and left the bed to get dressed. She had enough of her pre-Sith clothing to throw together an outfit that relatively fit her. There were apprentices that needed training and she certainly didn’t need to be dealing with this right now.

“I know what I’m going to be doing, exactly what I told you just a moment ago. I can’t speak for you, but I really hope you get professional help for your survivor’s guilt and or depression that you’ve got going on. We had a nice thing going, and then you tell me that most likely you’d trade that in to eat a blaster bolt? Pfask you! Pfask you, Ca’aran!

I may not be your dead little blue eyed Jedi dream girl, but I deserve a hell of a lot more than being treated like a convenient time waster until you can convince yourself to pull the trigger. I died for you, was it too much to expect that you would try living for me?”

Ailbasí stormed off, not waiting for a response. She doubted there was anything he could say right now to make things better, and plenty of things to make it all worse. She came into the room that her apprentices studied in like a roiling stormfront. Her anger spiked the pressure and heaviness in the room, and there was a pregnant pause before she spoke. There was an intensity in her voice that hadn’t been there before, but it didn’t seem to be directed at anyone in the room, at least not yet.

“Change in plans, I’m going to be teaching you how to use pain to affect the Force and fuel different techniques. Pain isn’t the only way to manipulate or empower the Force, but it is one of the most intuitive, and its intrinsic nature means that you will want to get it right as quickly as possible. Each of you has already touched the Force with my help as part of your training, I want you to see if you can find it now on your own. If necessary, use pain to find it instinctively, but that shouldn’t be necessary. It’s quite like discovering a group of muscles you never knew you had.”

Darth Nyrys placed a trio of spoons on the ground to serve as impromptu training implements and levitated her spoon demonstratively. She touched one of the floating figures and experienced the phantom memory of her arm being rolled up like a sleeping bag, accompanied by a quick succession of bone breaks. She didn’t need the added juice right now, but she wanted to be thorough in presenting the process accurately. The spoon twisted and contorted under her influence before going as molten hot as her anger and spraying across the far wall, leaving small beads of metal smoking in the wall.

“Expectations create limits in our minds of what we are capable of, but pain and dark emotions have a way of pushing us beyond those limits. You will pay for each dark miracle with blood and tears, but heed your ambition and your desires and it will give you everything you want. You may begin.”

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I bared my heart for this?

But his anger had piqued and so he lost it.

“You died for me?” His voice trembled as his voice rose into a roar. “No you died because you were too much a coward to face what a Sith really is! You’ll gladly serve a dark lord that condones worse than simply feeding on some children’s blood. Do you think the aftermath of Onderon or Kuat was bloodless? Children, imperials Jedi alike died in droves to the Sith but you couldn’t even think about coming face to face with what you really are?”

But he was screaming at the closing door. So he added the weight of a thrown datapad after it. Where it smashed into expensive electronic bits on the bulkhead.

She definitely deserved better than a mass murderer, Sith associate, aimless homicidal maniac like him. So he punched the bulkhead instead. Letting the pain from his knuckles slowly overcome the rage and pain of his heart. Until he stood, knuckles bleeding and seething. 

 

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Ca'Aran

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Uncharted was the time, as Three and Drago continued forward in their learning. The two of them shared an amicable silence, but coordinated their experience and understanding to the best of their abilities. Collaboration and trial and error all played a part in their routine, which was difficult because of the verbal limitations that Three suffered from, but still they managed. The lessons were straightforward, keen on exerting a certain amount of energy and physical distress in order to provoke immediate comprehension. In this, the former slave was well acquainted and adjusted quite fast to such drastic indoctrination. Many of his lessons were arduous and beaten into him, desensitizing him to the impression of pain, and alternatively turning such feelings into a narcotic rush. His body seemed well prepared for combat, despite the lack of sleep and nutrition that riddled him even still. There was no time to rest, especially when slave-masters decided to exchange hands. The small snack that the blue man had offered, now served as a torment for wanting more, and his appetite could be felt when before it had disappeared. Still, there was distractions in the mental imagery that these pages imprinted onto his mind, disciplines and movements that were not awkward for his body to try and attempt. Each time that Three had shadowed the applications, a piece of his memories seemed to flicker with a time he felt familiar with. "Perhaps, I was a fighter once upon a time" 

 

The room drew dense, a humid pressure clammed the whole area, and Three stood up to stare at his partner. His expression was confusion, and as he opened his mouth to speak, the door swooshed open once more. There was a pause, and then he noticed just who she was. It was her, the witch-lady. Three closed his mouth as the first of her words were filled with fire, and a hate that he was not sure if he had created. Slave-masters had the worst moods, unruly and violent in most cases, it was a movie he had seen over and over. Three winced at her entrance, and subconsciously took a couple steps backwards. She spoke, and he listened to her instructions. The Force was what she spoke of, it was what Drago had used to repel him and what she had used to pry him from killing his friend. Was it what the man had used to free him back then? This universe was a strange one, but how did this lady thing that he could use it? The combat orientation was manageable because of his conditioning, but this was different. She levitated three spoons, what with her wild magic, and then reached out to grab one. The metal folded in on itself, crumpling without respect to physics, searing hotter and hotter by the millisecond. The spoon exploded, Three ducked and covered his head, as the pieces beaded and punctured the wall across from them. 

 

"Power?" He spoke, the word sounding questionable as it left his lips, as if he was unaware that he was the one who said it. 

 

Three wasted no time, he wanted to do what she had done, he wanted to experience what it was like. His posture tidied itself and he marched towards one of three spoons. The distinct dirty-white mane of his, sloppily covering his youthful features. The color in his eyes animated with curiosity, and he reached out with a tired hand. The entirety of his momentum froze the second the skin of his finger touched the tip of the spoon. He felt it, the hurt crawled up his spine and rattled him from his neck to his waistline, feet and bearing crumbling all at once. He writhed as his hand lashed and grabbed hold of the suspended spoon, which somehow carried his weight from completely slumping to the floor. His body trembled all over, quivering uncontrollably and the color in his eyes intensified into a tearful boil. "Aah.. Ah..." He tried to stomach what felt like a sledgehammer punching into his backbone, raw emotion squeezing into the contours of his face. He looked at Drago for help, completely regretting ever wanting to touch this damn spoon, and then he closed his eyes. The pain worsened, why was it always fire that he felt? There was a burning of his soul, a burning of his mind, and an ignition of rage that racked him from bone to flesh. He could not see it, but the metal that he hung too for dear life, was burning a bright orange, just as the witch-lady had shown..

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The reappearance of the Sith was no surprise, though it felt that very little time had passed.  Admittedly though this was most likely due to the amount of pain he had endured.  The moments of anguish felt like they lasted an eternity though he was only a few minutes at a time.  Watching as she enters the room and pulls three spoons to her, spoons being an odd choice to him, he noticed that Three was also slightly apprehensive.  Then suddenly the one spoon was taken in hand and glowed an intense orange, as though being heated from within.  It was fascinating to watch and attempt to judge just how much energy she was using to do this as the spoon burst.  That was when he noticed Three approach and grab onto one of the spoons.  The pain seemed to be great but as the strange disheveled man held the spoon it to began to glow brightly, no explosion yet but still impressive.

Steeling his resolve Drago approached one of the spoons and reached out to it.  He had to understand this power that sometimes surged from within, it was something to control and to learn from yet to also surrender to if he truly wanted to understand its mysteries.  Grabbing hold of the spoon caused a small sun to explode within his mind as energy swirled and twisted within him.  The pain was unimaginable, and though he tried his stoic façade faded away leaving tears streaming down his face.  The only thing he managed to maintain, barely, was his upright standing position.  He felt bowed by the power yet refused to let it force him to his knees.  Instead he focused on this swirling nova of light and pain and tried to force it into the spoon, hoping it would glow and perhaps even explode, releasing his mind and body from this immense strain.  Hopefully he and Three survived this, there was still so much to learn about the Sith and about the strange man at his side.

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03 was the first to replicate the effect, a surprise in itself since she had only expected them to maybe move or slightly bend the utensils, but his gaunt frame suggested a litany of abuses that might fuel his rage. Even if his mind had been obscured, pain and misery had a way of seeping into ones bones, where they could never be forgotten. Drago was following the principles, but struggling with the execution.

“Visualize what you want to do here, but push here.”

She pointed to his head, then touched his chest in reference to his heart. She knew Drago didn’t like to be touched, this was a measured gambit to spark off a reaction. Her own focus was disrupted by her comm chirping. It was from Lissi, and contained a link to recent news from the holonet. Ailbasí was a student of history, she knew what the final result of the current events would be, what it would mean for her. She sent a highly encrypted query on Sith channels and received a near immediate response clearing her request. Perhaps the Dark Lord truly was following her progress.

The Best Behavior was too associated with her at this point, so she decided to gather what she needed, along with her new apprentices and take her new host body’s ship. Maybe when Ca’aran got over his woe is me, whiny kath, bantha poodoo he could catch up. Or maybe she’d be gone by then. Either way, the Opaline Fox departed because it was time to save the pfasking galaxy.

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It felt the push against his chest by some unknown person or things and immediately had to fight to gain control of his emotions.  Why did other beings insist on interrupting him while he was attempting to focus and learn?  Didn’t they know how vital it was to be calm and focused.

His focus and control began to slip as his anger over the interruption grew.  Without trying he focused his rage into the spoon hoping to regain control of his emotions.  But it was to late, while is conscious mind maintained its principals of control, his subconscious mind however boiled over with suppressed rage.  This was his chance to unlock an amazing aspect of the universe and someone was daring to interrupt him.

The energy surged from Drago’s hand as it poured into the spoon.  The functional control combined with his rage seems to have been enough to force the energy trapped inside his brain out allowing him to suddenly see the spoon in his mind begin to glow and vibrate.

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“No need to carry those damned clothes anymore girl.”

Came the voice of the erstwhile Blood Prince to the slavegirl who had spent the past three hours rushing from shoppe to shop in the Catharan Downtown malls trying to find clothes for her master’s now departed mistress. With a sigh he stood and scanned the sky with his blue eyes. Searching for the speck that would be the Corvette Marie, finishing its downburn to pick him up. His comm had been ringing off the charts about the Dark Sun citadel being under Jedi siege, and it was time to spring the trap they had set some many months before. He laughed when he heard the slap of expensive clothes hitting the permacrete and he could hear the slave kicking them angrily into the gutters. And he winced on the laugh, perhaps an old injury, or the toxic fumes from burning his old lover with thermite. He coughed again, spat, then pulled the girl to her feet and walked her to where the Marie had settled down on its landing skiffs.

Soon they were both gone. Enroute to the next fight.

As that was all he seemed to be good for.

 

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Ca'Aran

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  • 9 months later...

Coming out of hyperspace, the blue and green gem flashed a few quick glints as the angle of the ship's approach made the sunlight appear as if it was dancing across the edges of the planet's atmosphere. Inside the hijacked YT-2400, the Traitor's Gambit, Durose slowly made his way to the cockpit as he felt the ship lunge out of hyperspace and begin to drift.

 

This is it. Let’s get this over with already.

 

Hitting the comms, Ro contacted Dhon as he entered atmo. The unkept Cathar had Ro’s face but a dirty, roughly trimmed mane and two braided strands of mane hair that extended down from his chin on each side. He was what some might call an outdoorsman or what others might consider “wild.” Dhon sneered as he spoke to Ro over the comms.

“I’m where we agreed upon, Ro. This better be worth my time! I dropped a hunt for you. And it was a good hunt. No. A great hunt!”

Ro rolled his eyes. He sighed before replying.

 

“It’s always a great hunt, Dhon. Did you bring what I asked?”

“I even dug the plot.”

 

Those words caught Ro by surprise. He angrily glared at Dhon.

 

“You have no right--”

 

“Save it, Watcher! You have no right! This is my domain! Cathar is mine. And here you are handing out blood bonds and oaths and all this willy nilly and expecting all us to respect them? But I have no right?”

 

“I’m not getting into this with you right now,” Ro roared back. “You know exactly what I mean, you--”

 

The transmission abruptly cut out before Ro could finish his sentence. The response didn’t surprise him coming from Dhon. It still irritated him all the same. But to be fair, Dhon didn’t probably deserve to be the subject of Ro’s ire. It was just easier to ignore the pain he was feeling right now by finding someone or something to be mad at instead.

Planet-side, Roshan carried the body to the ancestral burial pit of his home city. Located at the base of the massive city-tree, Dhon stood there casually waiting. He began ribbing Ro the moment he was within earshot.

 

“So this is what all the fuss was about? Kind of ugly if you ask me.”

 

Ro glared at Dhon as reached the edge of the hole and he held the body over it. Staring down into the darkness, he said a few traditional Cathar blessings and retold stories of this Rose’s deeds, both honorable and dishonorable. Then dropping the body into the pit, he finished with another final blessing.

 

“May your soul be blessed with rest and become one with the Circle of the Force and the city-tree of our ancestors. May your physical body and your remaining life force provide this tree and the generations of Cathar to come the strength to live their life in the manner that you once did. Our bond has been fulfilled but you will not been forgotten.”

 

"So says we all."

 

Cutting his hand, Ro allowed some of his blood to drip down towards the body below. Then nodding to Dhon, the two of them began to fill back in the 2 meter hole with dirt.

“Was she really worth all that?”

 

“She was my Soo’Gah’Wee,” Ro growled. “So yes, Dhon. Yes! She deserved every bit of this ceremony and probably better than she got, too!”

 

Dhon laughed, “Your ritual blessings are a little rusty, bud. That ending was especially rough.”

 

“Thanks.”

 

“I’m just saying,” Dhon shrugged as he shoveled another pile of dirt into the burial pit. “It was pretty sappy, too, bud. But if she was your Soo’Gah’Wee then she must have earned it. We may not be totally alike, but I like to think that we both know what something like that means to Dhonarr and to us.”

 

“Yeah,” Ro replies with a somber note as his eyes drop down towards the pit.

 

“It was a mistake, bud. Humans are too soft and squishy for us. Especially to waste your time mating with.”

 

“We weren’t... we didn’t.”

 

“Ha! Sure you didn’t, bud? I seen the way you look at her even now. I might spend most of my time in the Vast Veldt but I wasn’t cloned yesterday, Ro.”

 

“I’m done with this conversation.”

 

Nodding, Dhon and Ro continued shoveling in silence. When they were done, the two proceeded to head back towards the ship. 

 

“So, Watcher. I’ve waited long enough. Are we going to talk about this offer of yours or what? I didn’t cut short a great hunt just to meet up with you, help you bury some human female, and shoot the breeze.” 

 

Standing at the ramp of the Traitor’s Gambit, Ro finally replied, “I have a deal to offer you. I know you’ve been left behind to watch over, mum. But I need a favor.”

 

“What kind of favor,” Dhon responded as he eyed him skeptically.

 

“I need a co-pilot to Nar Shadda and then delivery of a helmet to its owner on Tatooine.”

 

“Oh? And what’s in it for me?”

 

“Do this and this ship and its droid are yours.”

 

“What’s the catch?” Dhon frowned.

 

“I’ll have to get a new registry for the ship.”

 

“From Watcher to thief?” Dhon laughed. “The Link going bankrupt under your watchful leadership?”

 

“The Link and Coruscant are gone.”

 

Dhon had a witty response already ready to come out but Ro’s words caused him to pause. He gave Ro a confused look before responding.

 

“What do you mean gone?”

 

“Like dead and gone. Destroyed. Massacred,” Ro replied angrily. “Like while you were out here playing wildness tracker billions of people were being murdered by crazed fanatics who believed they were some sort of second coming of the Mandalorian savages of old.”

 

“Wow. You don’t say,” Dhon comments rather casually. “I would have never guessed that. So your cash cow kinda went belly up then?”

 

“You are missing the point, Dhon. Do we have a deal or not?”

 

Dhon laughed. He then patted Ro on the shoulder as he stepped onto the ramp and past Ro.

 

“Whatever you say, bud. But after I fulfill my end of the deal, whatever I do with this ship is my business.”

 

“Deal.”

 

Dhon turns back and smiles, “Then we have ourselves a plan, bud. Times a wastin’. We got a den of scum and villainy to visit.”


((Off to Nar Shadda))
_________


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Telperiën brought her hand down on the table with a resounding ‘crack.’ The durasteel slap dented in result and the screech of durasteel supports from the blow filled the cabin for a nanosecond before she stood up. But he was already gone. She glanced at Hailey for a moment and then followed him aft. 

 

Seeing him and his first mate assembled, she knocked on the bulkhead to get his attention as the klaxons faded from earshot.

 

“Mr Armegedon, you and your men have been pressed into the service of the Sith Lords. There is but only one exit here for you and yours. Death. If you give myself or Lord Awenydd any more lip or defiance, I promise you I will pluck your tongue from your mouth by its roots.” Her voice was an eerie calm as the ship emerged from hyperspace with a tremble. “Understood?”

 

The process of landing and clearance was of little consequence to such a vessel as this and as the ships computer emitted a flight plan and landing codes to the small defensive garrison, Telperiën could begin to feel the faint vestiges of the ancient horror of the mandalorian wars. There was a profound uneasiness in the force in the space around the planet, and its horror called to her. She looked to the dark skinned humanoid, then grinned. 

 

“Tell me Mr Armegedon, can you feel it?”

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…You speak as though your great Sith Empire will never be overthrown. The Infinite Empire was destroyed. Xim the Despot fell to my master’s Hutts. The Old Republic crumbled to dust and tyranny. All great Empires fall, why not yours? How much longer do you think that Spider’s web will last?

 

*****

 

Cathar.

 

The Sith Lord breathed in the recycled air, braiding back her loose auburn locks into a tight plait that ran down her shoulder. She could feel unease in the force, the tenderness of a wound long since scarred over. Entering a flight path into the navicomputer, she analyzed the readouts from the planet.

 

Ocean. Islands. Settlements.

 

The Krath frowned in distaste.

 

Peace. Life. Growth.

 

She didn’t know what she had expected, the war had been millennia ago, but part of her had expected a wasted ruin like the world from which they had just departed. Another breath and revulsion turned to simmering rage.   

 

…What did you expect… For this journey to be easy?

 

Fieldgrey felt it then, a thread of lingering chaos. The disorder that was underlying the unease. She brought Triple Six into a decent towards the coastline of the Ambaryle Sea, a place of only wilderness. She could feel the starship’s subtle agreement to her plan, and she pressed her Wrath into the nature of her ship and felt a shift.

 

Triple Six seemed to roar as it dropped through the atmosphere, and she could feel the chaos buckle with terror. The spirits remembered the clouds parting with the fire of the Basilisks. She set the ship to land on a sandy bluff a kilometer from the ocean and walked back towards the landing ramp. She whistled to the nightsisters and Sith soldiers.

 

“This world has had peace for generations, but this world is the vineyard in which the Mandalorian Crusaders planted the seeds of their own annihilation

 

She licked her lips as the landing ramp unsealed itself, dropping away into sand. The smell of salt and sea-rot was a welcome relief to the stale recycled air.

 

“Set up a camp, secure a perimeter.”

 

To the nightsisters, she spoke seperately

 

"We must find the wound, where the force is scarred and broken."

 

The Sith Lord stepped onto the white sand, letting her leather combat boots sink into its embrace. She stared up at the stormclouds overhead and smiled.

 

...I must find that which was sown in terror and holocaust and reaped in full at Malachor V. 

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Shiro's gaze averted in a semi-horrified look as the Sith mentioned his true last name, something even his comrades knew nothing about. For in the Imperial Marines, he was Shiro Seven of Odik II, and that was who he intended to remain. Turning his gaze away, he smirked toward Dunstan and Saldana, as he finished gathering his things. Within moments, he felt their rocketed decent, the other Sith imposing a horror filled plummet that mimicked the entrance of the Mandalorians of old, likely to intimidate and inspire fear. And as they touched down, Shiro exited the ship with very few words as he passed the first  @Telperiën Ar-Pharazon. "I am Shiro Seven of Odik II. That is all that needs to be known..."

 

His words were not expressed in defiance, but of informance. He withheld his true name but for only a sole purpose. And if this one was that observant, then he wondered how much longer he could keep up the ruse. With his words spoken, he disembarked behind the second with Dustan, Saldana, and the others in tow, the group fanning our at the forefront to gain the advantage should the locals grow intrigued. Two scouts were sent out while the rest remained to set up camp. But his mind echoed of the two Sith, the first's knowledge of who he was and what words she questioned, and the second's elusiveness to his own. What were their true goals here?

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Telperiën nodded brusquely to Corporal Armegedon, he had avoided her question and it had peaked her fury enough to make her wish that she could lash out. Maybe strike for his neck? Gut him from throat to groin? Or perhaps she could possess him. Take his very soul from him, drive it out, and then inhabit him? No, not yet. He still had uses, but her patience was at its thinnest, dealing with his insolence. If the man expected to survive much longer he would need to learn the lesson quickly and without complaining. Otherwise it would be a much more miserable death for him down the road, and the Sith were as a whole much less forgiving than Telperiën Ar-Pharazôn.

 

But Hailey was beckoning her and the others planetside, and Armegedon’s flogging would need to wait until after whatever they found on Cathar. 

 

The planet reeked of rot, deluge and disease. The natural smells of a seaside, but something that Telperiën was hardly used to. The salt at least cut through the putrid air with a stiff breeze that made it somewhat breathable. The Nightsisters grimaced in unison as the mounted the landing ramp, and shading their eyes against the bright overcast light of day, the terrain was nearly hilless and flat save a few peaked dunes that bled away their fine trails of sand over the wild grassland. But behind it all, behind all the smell of the world was the smell of desolation

 

It tingled at her nostrils, cutting through the distractions of her mind, forcing her to concentrate. She took another deep breath, glanced at the maps that were being displayed by Kaiseng’s datapad, then looked back at Hailey. 

 

“South of here is the ruins of old Adun-Levennia. The shattered world stem.” 

 

She pointed to the gorge and canyons that stretched away to the south, white brown rock, from which ran a black river.

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  • 2 weeks later...

…You reek of death; you carry it on your cloak and in your hair, but it is not the odor of viscera or lifeblood spilt, but that of corruption. The loss of life’s goal, you’ve fallen off the path. You’ve died to life and been reborn in true strength. Life be damned. Your darkness holds the power to conquer it all…

 

*****

 

The sand radiated warmth into the blackened leather soles of her boots as the Sith Lord walked. There must have been enough sunlight before the clouds had gathered in order to imbue such heat into the shifting dunes to give it such incalescence. It matched almost perfectly with the passionate wrath that boiled at a low simmer within her skull.

 

The Krath despised the heat, abhorred the sunlight that trickled through the approaching rainclouds. The distant rhythm of the ocean’s waves was the cadence of her loathing for this world. Her sulpheric eyes followed the Nightsister’s hand to where it pointed, the mouth of a gorge from which spewed an estuary of darkness.

 

“Shiro.”

 

The Sith Lord contemplated the fractious soldier with a challenging scrutiny. His failings and haughty disobedience were a blemish she was reluctant to overlook. Fieldgrey condemned it all.

 

“Follow.”

 

The ground changed from white sand to blacked delta with pools of stagnant water. The Sith Lord observed that no life grew here, there were no avians that she would have normally found stalking the swamps where rivers met oceans. It only smelled of rot. The dark loam was pierced by great tree-roots that snaked through the muck and dove into the depths of the ponds. She followed the roots to their distant source; where the gorge ended was the shattered remains of a great tree. Its size, even burned and broken as it was, astounded her.

 

…Adun-Levennia

 

Had the tree been more than a fire-torn stump, it would have stretched 3 kilometers in diameter. As the group approached, she could see that the darkened river swelled at its base, making it almost impassable. The Krath knelt into the muck at the rivers edge, letting herself sink into the putrid mud. She placed her scarred hands into the rushing water, letting the coolness of it clear her mind. There was a great power here. 

 

“Secure the area, we set our camp here.”

 

Hayley let her eyes drift shut and she focused on the river, inviting it to surge around her. The rain began to fall and the firth rose to great it. It came now to her waist, but the Sith Lord only smiled. The knew she could harness its power.

 

“Give me time, and I will tame the waters.”

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This world, it held a bitter darkness to it. Shiro could feel it, taste it, smell it. It almost as if it pulled at his soul. And it waned as of it wanted to swallow him whole. Shiro and Dunstan took point as the group traveled forward, Dunstan seemingly unaffected by the planet's call as Shiro noted. But Shiro remained on guard, ever steady as each step of his foot pressed down into the sands, almost as if he was walking in the steps of another.

 

And follow he did, even as the lifeless void presented its self to them all, his knowledge of this world, this place, unknowing. Shiro had never been one to back down from a challenge, but even this place, the feeling it gave him, told all his senses not to tread. Yet tread he did. If not for himself, for the sake of his men, even as the pain this place carried called to him in echoes of days past, his glowing crimson eyes darting about.

 

Adun-Levennia...

 

This is what they called this place, the darkness running his blood ice cold even as he drew near and first set his gaze upon it. His gaze darted between the two, these Sith and their grave artifacts, digging into pasts forgotten. He heard the tales, but never truly pictured it. The intrusive one knew of it. The elusive one delved in it. And Shiro feared it. An unholy trinity had converged upon it, and through them, awoke it.

 

Swaying his mind away from it, Shiro ordered his men to begin setting up camp, he and Dunstan remaining among the two Sith as Saldana remained with the squad, her gaze carefully watching over the two in secret. But something here drew Shiro's mind, called upon it like a siren's song, and it made him uneased and yet unable to look away. Dunstan saw this and placed his hand upon Shiro's shoulder, bringing the Armegedian back to reality. "Come. Let's leave them to it."

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Adun-Levennia, the mottled stump of what had once been the home of some ten thousand light furred cathari. The intermittent rains, the heat from the reflected sand, had left the old tree’s base not much more than a charred and rock-like preserved stump. The life-giving waters of the the river, which had once been called the Ibel-Luinë in the half remaining language of the old Cathar, was now not much more than a stream of brackish mud. 

 

Either the Mando’ade had been especially good at “salting the earth” of their enemies, or the lack of any vegetation and animals betrayed the reality of this place. The dark side was here, present, in the very waters that the nomadic people had once called their home tree. She stood at the edge of the mud, watching Hailey beginning to search for its power, then she gestured to her Dathomiri and they began to set up camp. She could not bring herself to meditate, not in a place like this, the shadows were unknown, too ancient, and it betrayed her attempts to grasp at it. She would leave such investigations for the much more competent Darth Awenydd. 

 

Taking only Lilia as her companion, she walked towards the beach, crossing through the dark delta that carried no life. Only thick, disgusting mud. But their eyes were watchful, having been raised in such mud to seek for prey, they watched the eddies and flows for any sign of wistful and innocent life. But found none at all, not even an insect could be found, and they walked in silence to the beach whose white sand was being drenched by the resurgent river. It was there, out of the mud that Telperiën and Lilia knelt. The brackish water lapping at their knees. 

 

“Let your mind slowly drop away the peripherals Lilia, concentrate only on what you feel, then peel away each sense until you can only feel the force.” 

 

The girl nodded and Telperiën began to do the same.

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…What do you do when you find weakness in yourself? Do you try to conceal it from the galaxy? Even if it’s shrouded in your very soul, your weakness will be found by that which lurks in the darkness. If you hide weakness, you build your foundation of strength upon a flaw. The hardest battles are fought in the mind…

 

*****

 

The estuary loam was uncomfortably lukewarm as it began to envelop The Sith’s kneeling form. Hayley was a woman of extremes, stim needed to be scalding and bathwater frigid, so the mediocrity of the water provoked her wrath. The anger focused her meditation, and the Krath concentrated it on the misery of the beachhead. The corruption that lingered in this place was like the smog that had choked her slum on Nar Shaddaa, everpresent but ethereal.

 

I can feel the evil... 

 

The Krath tried to grasp it within her mind, yet it slipped away. She beckoned the waters to rise, but there was no change to the rush of the cloudy water.

 

...but why can’t I hold it?

 

The Sith Lord’s pale fingers clutched at the mud beside her, dragging fistfuls of the clay against her chest as she spasmed in an uncontrollable physical manifestation of her frustration.

 

Am I not strong enough? 

 

There was a change in her, an open door; and doubt rushed in. Her eyes were closed, and she could feel the tears welling up from the burning in her sinuses. Had she brought the Nightsisters on a wild Mynock chase?

 

You are a failure. Rotten. Weak. Cursed.

 

A small, pathetic whimper rose in her throat, strangled back by reluctance of a broken spirit.

 

Why are you so fragile?

 

Pale fingers tore into the blackened mud and the inky rush swept her up in a surge of savage power. Suddenly she was choking on silt as the river took her from the shore without even a splash. There was no personification to the barbarous power of it.

 

Go on, feel sorry for yourself, drown in your weakness.

 

Brackish water strangled her, seared her nose and eyes. The currents forced her down to the depths of it. She clawed desperately for purchase. 

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"I cannot." Shiro replied to Dunstan, shrugging his comrade's hand from upon his shoulders as he watched the intrusive one depart, his gaze fixated on the elusive one and the stream she delved in, the familiarity almost toxic to breath as he gripped tight his hands upon the Z-6 he carried so heavily in his hands. Familiar, yet unknown, like a distant memory that did not belong. "I can't explain it, but this place, this pilgrimage, it feels all too familiar. And yet, it is not my own, almost like a dream I was once told but cannot remember who."

 

Dunstan looked at Shiro weirdly, then shifted his gaze at the two Sith before it began to click within his own mind. He said not a word, but nodded with understanding at Shiro when Shiro glanced his way. Dunstan felt there was something special about Shiro, and now it was beginning to slowly make sense. He may not have been Sith, but Shiro possessed their ability whether he was trained or not. It was the only logical conclusion that made sense of his actions, his words, and his luck back at Coruscant. With that, Dunstan turned toward Saldana and the others.

 

Shiro noticed, but left things unspoken as Dunstan began his departure. But as his gaze shifted back to Hayley, she was nowhere in sight. Adrenaline kicked in, and before he knew it, Shiro had dove head first into the darkened water without thought in search of the elusive one. The water was dark, too dark to see, and at this depth, its aura was overpowering. It clawed at his soul, threatening to tear it to shreds, the pressure of the planet's forgotten past grasping at his form, his glowing crimson eyes providing only an illuminated sight.

 

He had been a fool to dive in without thought, his mind wracked with confusion and despair, his form crippled by the darkness that flowed forth from it. It wanted his life, wanted his future, and it was overpowering. And yet, amidst it all, there was a sense of purpose flowing with it, a glimmer of sight amidst its currents that flowed back in time to days of old when a warrior of his lineage walked a very similar path, the silver haired being with glowing green eyes gazing across the same scene as others surrounded him.

 

At the forefront stood a man who's face was obscured, holding a Mandalorian Mask high into the air as the mixed emotions of sorrow and determination swelled with each of the imprinted souls. But for the silver haired man that linked to Shiro, disgust filled his heart as he gazed back in his own memories at his Orders not to follow his commander. There was defiance in his heart at this and a sense of pride swelled within him as he returned to the presence and he watched the man before him adorn the Mandalorian Mask in memory of what had happened here. And in unison, they all dropped to one knee, a pledge of fealty placed in their hearts this day though it was never spoken. Their reason? The Cathar's massacre. And it filled Shiro with its presence.

 

Almost instinctively, Shiro went to grasp at the man's shoulder, attempting to turn him around and to gaze upon his face in full, to know the bearer of this dream, of this memory. But as he grasped the shoulder, feeling the cloth in his hand, he felt his own grabbed and his formed pulled forth from the river with @Fieldgreyin his own. Coughing the muck that had filled his lungs and throat, Shiro's mind remained as confused as it did beneath the waters. Who did he see? What did he see? Why? Climbing onto the bank and gasping for air, his crimson eyes darted about, unsure of what he had just witnessed and what it was he experienced. Shivering despite the blanket he felt wrapped around his form, this place had began to take ahold of him.

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