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IC: Sith archaeologists
Ruins of Ur, far side of Korriban, dawn
The band of archaeologists sat huddled around the fire, staring into its flickering malignancy as it crackled and hissed, flicking tongues of flame spitting sanguine sparks like a cobra spraying poison. Their hoods were lowered against the chill, tightly clenched fists holding the folds of black fabric in place as the cold wind snarled around them, threatening the integrity of the flame that gave them the last vestiges of warmth in this gods-forsaken land. Their eyes, reflecting only yellow, dared not stray from the fire's hypnotising glare.
The sun may have been rising, but the shadows still grew long and tall, and they dared not survey the darkness. To look at it, to do anything but deny its existence and forget all about it, was to invite evil eyes to stare back. What was about them but the ghosts of decadent decay, spires and citadels hewn from blood-soaked rock crumbled into ruin before a thousand revolutions of Korriban about baleful Horuset, full of dead corners and umplumbed depths where blasphemously surviving nightmares lay in wait? No, no, best to stare at the fire and only the fire, wait for the sun to climb high to noon, and then, and only then, proceed into the ruins of Ur, hoping that the writhing shadows of Korriban would wilt beneath the starkness of day.
The archaeologists did not account that the shadows might find them first.
The fire flickered, its sinuous tentacles weaving towards Ur as if tilting beneath a gust of wind, and it hissed ever more fiercely, serpents protesting being trodden upon, a nest of vipers awakening. The lead archaeologist frowned, poking at the kindling with a stick, while the five others glanced around uneasily, feeling no strengthening in the already-stiff wind to account for the fire's behaviour. No answer provided itself within the two seconds before the fire died.
"What the kriff..." the leader muttered, standing. It was considerably darker, now, the desert stretching before them a black sheet silhouetted against the furious sulphurous sky of violet and gold. His vantage point, however, meant the glare of the fire no longer obfuscated what was approaching.
He yelped in alarm, seeing the two shadows approaching. "Kungrath, Silens, get up!" he shouted. "Must be guardian spirits!" His blaster pistol was in his hand in an instant, and he raised the scope to his eye and took aim at the larger of the two shades. He depressed the trigger, flinging packets of crimson across the bleeding sky of Korriban towards Darth Cruor; two of his companions followed suit, taking aim at Draconis, but the three others were already running in the opposite direction. They knew if Telathon was right and these approaching nightmares were the infamous spectral guardians of Korriban's tombs, blasters would be utterly ineffectual.
Telathon was not right.
What was approaching was far worse.
On the other side of the Valley of Ur, the statues that had so raptly claimed Tarle's attention stood as they had for ten thousand years, unresponsive to her ethereal inquiries. There were easily two hundred, in all, arranged in lines and columns like the legendary Bronze Army of Axium. Unlike most Sith statues, which raised their tentacled countenances proudly into the shrouded heavens a hundred feet or more above their colossal bases of stone, betraying no hint of the subject's scale, these statues were clearly life-sized depictions of the ancient Sith purebloods, with the shortest a squat mutant Grotthu no more than five feet tall, and the tallest a hulking Massassi even more massive than dread Cruor.
The statues were composed of a strange, grainy grey rock distinctly different from the drab brown that formed most of Ur's mountainous terrain, although such a hue was common in the subterranean tunnels and tombs that honeycombed the distant Valley of the Dark Lords.
The statues bore the clear signs of great age, many of their faces eroded beyond recognition, some with heads and extremities missing, torsos chipped, chunks taken out of shoulders. All of them were buried in sand at least to to the shins, suggesting the pedestals on which they stood, if they indeed stood on any, were below at least two feet of wind's dusty deposits. As such, although otherwise uniform in their formation, the statues sprouted from the sand at odd, uneven angles.
The mounds beyond, meanwhile, were too distant to observe, and they too were silent in answer to Tarle's probe.
SIDE STORY: UR
IC: Darth Havok
The Inverted Pyramid, Yavin IV
“There should be some kind of defence mechanism in this chamber," Volcryn whispered, surveying the dark chamber. "Whoever this is, he is cautious enough to have put in multiple hindrances; it would be supremely reckless to leave this chamber completely unguarded." From his utility belt came both his knife and his lightsaber, one igniting with a sanguine snap-hiss, the other skittering across the floor with a clatter of metal on stone, baiting the jaws of the trap that surely lay in wait.
But when at last the knife skidded to a stop near the base of the oubliette, only silence rang in the air.
No vicious guardian beast leapt from the shadows.
No hidden turbolaser turret discharged.
No blade swung like a pendulum from the cracked, tiled ceiling.
It was as if the builders of the pyramid had wanted the secrets of the chamber to be found. Undaunted by the seemingly inauspicious invitation, Havok carefully crept forward, lightsaber extending to his left and to his right, bathing the caliginous corners in blood. Again, there was nothing revealed but stone and more stone, weathered by the ages, yet unremarkable. There were no additional exits, at least not visible to the naked eye. Only when he was immediately in front of the altar did he dare voice his appraisal. "We're safe," he said, back straightening, yet shoulders visibly relaxing in relief. "I believe the Tuk'ata was the only obstacle." He placed his hands on the cool grey surface of the altar, leaning over to examine what stood upon it.
After a moment, he reached forward, and pulled loose a yellowed piece of parchment from beneath the clay pot of the black orchid. His eyes, gilded with greed, scanned over the jagged lines of glyphs. "This is it," he hissed between his sharp Iktotchi teeth, his intake of breath seeming to suck warmth from the air. "I found it." He turned, holding up the parchment so that Volcryn could see; although the individual lines were too small to make out from this distance, the header proclaimed its contents. "Mirak sis Morghul terriban." The Ritual of Eternal Life. "The missing piece," Havok continued, turning the parchment back to examine it further. "The prisoner keeps the orchid alive... crush the orchid in the beaker... brew... yes, yes, blood... of course... The tubes insert the alchemical mixture into the body..." He looked up again, grinning a carnivorous smile, facial muscles contorted in the rigor mortis of madness. "Immortality!" he shouted in elation.
"I have the final ingredient! Come, Volcryn, come! We will take the orchid back to camp, and brew the concoction in the tent!"
CLOSED STORY: Yavin Temple
IC: Darth Venomis through Darth Persevus
Holding cell, the Ninushodojinyaut, hyperspace
One second.
The Ancient One dodged in a manner that more resembled the space between spaces warping and undulating, its possessed form twisting like putty in its hands. The stream of scorching plasma went wide, chewing into the bulkhead behind it, and promptly piercing through with a screech of molten metal. The holding cell was not nestled against the hull of the black ship - there were two cells between it and the exterior - but the cannon was sufficiently powerful to breach the other bulkheads in short order, arcing plasma into the fathomless whorl of hyperspace.
Immediately, a horrible, hissing sound screamed into being, a maddening noise of orgiastic chaos and the unearthly call of the void, the teeth of hyperspace ripping the air from the room with such violence that any organic's lungs threatened to collapse. Kint Dranlor's incendiary grenade exploded, a muffled pop against the deafening background roar, but the fire gushed out the rupture in the bulkhead instantly, jetting through the other two cells and into the atomising whirlpool beyond. The body of Persevus instantly flew back, smashing into the punctured bulkhead, and Kint's momentum towards the adjoining bulkhead was arrested mid-flight, the pull of pressure instantly overcoming the pull of gravity and pinning him against the breached bulkhead mere feet from Venomis' vessel.
Hypnos, Raspir and Lemmy, too, were yanked forward towards the two with terrifying speed.
The tentacles that had extruded from Venomis' slackened maw had liquefied into oil upon missing their target and collapsing upon the deck, and Hypnos passed directly over them as hyperspace tore him from the floor, the immense heat radiating from his body instantly setting alight the pool. Immediately, the fire raced back across the rivulets that led to Persevus' feet, shooting up his legs - but not making it to his open mouth, for Kint had succeeded in severing the tendrils mid-strike. This now worked against them, for the essence of Mnngal-Mnggal within Persevus did not burst into flame, and a flicker of his will expunged the flames licking at his feet, turning to telekinetically crush Kint against the bulkead -
And then control was lost.
Hypnos' nanovirus had taken over the cerebellum. Persevus, mind and body, was his. Recognising defeat, the brackish fluid of Mnggal-Mnggal sought to escape its vessel's mouth, but it was instantly pulled out the crack in the bulkhead along with the remaining oxygen in the room, sluicing into the screaming void. Even the power of a god was no match for the power of the cosmos, and the spray of fluid was reduced to its constituent atoms within a millisecond of exposure.
The bulkhead began to buckle.
All five occupants were seconds away from annihilation.
TAGSET: Ninushodojinyaut
IC: Ermir Marcus
Sept of the Sith, beneath the Sith Temple, Korriban
"You know," Arcane began, smirking, "three days is a long time to not be able to relieve one's self." Ermir simply rolled his eyes. Of course he had relieved himself. He had considered pissing into the time dilation field, if only so as to bother Arcane while he was trapped, but had instead relieved himself in the moat outside. Unless Arcane meant three days was a long time for Arcane to have not relieved himself, in which case, the acolyte clearly didn't understand his body had experienced the passage of only seconds.
"You said there were fish?" Arcane asked, licking his muzzle with delight. Ermir said nothing, merely throwing Arcane his intended supper, and the disgusting Cathar instantly began tearing into it like an untamed street cat. Ermir sat down on his haunches as the acolyte ate; he had accrued an appetite, as well, but the noises of the Cathar tearing into the meat were rapidly turning his stomach, and so he did not bother to pluck another fish from his little stack of three.
Finally, after several minutes of silence, Arcane finished, flicking the bits of leftover flesh from his teeth using the fish's rib bones as toothpicks. "Now, Master Marcus;" he sneered, "how can we get through something we can not see?" He stood and brushed the bits of dust from his fur. "What about...water? What if we were to throw water in all directions? Would it be stopped by time long enough for us to figure out where the force field ended and our time began?"
Ermir stroked his chin, fingers brushing over the bristles of three days' of unshaven growth. Arcane glanced at him. "So?" the Cathar prompted. "Worth a shot?" Ermir shrugged his shoulders and stood. "Worth a shot," he replied. "Your telekinetic ability is hardly developed," he continued, "and water is a lot heavier than you think - a mere cubic meter of water weighs one ton - but I should be able to lift enough for our purposes." Ermir turned, and leapt down the hatch to the passageway below without another word.
Several minutes later, a roiling, churning sphere of water rose slowly into the chamber from the hatch, followed by Ermir, one hand extended before him to grip the water in his telekinetic grasp. Sweat was beading on his brow, and an expression of intense concentration was written on his face, brows twitching as he guided the ball of water closer to the approximate edge of the temporal field.
The ball began to split into three smaller balls, one in the center, one towards the left, one towards the right, and then Ermir raised his other hand and flung both hands outwards, a cascading wave of Force power scattering the water in all directions. Immediately, the spray and droplets were suspended in midair, like frozen rain. But not all. Some of the water sloshed on the ground, marking a pattern on the ground in the form of wet stone. A way through the maze.
Ermir wiped his brow, and smiled broadly. "Excellent idea, acolyte," he said, momentarily forgetting to call him a dunderhead and a peabrain and other such insults. "You solved it!"
CLOSED STORY: Sept of Ramage
COMBO WITH VOLSHE
IC: Darth Dreadwar
Bridge of the Wrath of Vader, en route to Dantooine
The bridge of the Wrath of Vader was a dark, crooked thing. Cruel metal socles curved from the rusted durasteel deck like teeth, stained by the bloodshine of pyramidal holocrons that sat atop each, spilling dim sanguine light that provided the only illumination in the cavernous chamber besides the baleful green glow of the galaxy map scintillating lonesomely near the front. Beyond, the vast viewports provided a terrifying vista of the emptiness of space, devoid of the transparisteel planes that might protect one securely against vacuum; oxygen was kept in the superstructure purely by the barely visible sheen of atmospheric containment fields.
In the abyssal crew pits, macabre, rotting forms worked infernal machinery, swaying to and fro like crewmen upon some ancient sea-faring galleon on Rishi, mad spittle dribbling from rabid toothed mouths beneath the hollow sulphuric glow of yellow eyes. Sitting above them, beating the ceaseless drums of war, was their hortator, staring straight ahead into the outer void.
The shadow of the Emperor grew long and tall as it extruded unnaturally from the entrance, portending the arrival of the Wrath of Vader's black captain, Darth Coatlec in tow. The ancient wraith strode in awash in arcane energy, darkness spreading from him like contagion as he made his way between the twin crew pits towards the stars that were his to claim. From his rippling empty hood came the seething, hissing whisper, echoing throughout the entire bridge with an impossible volume that eclipsed the dreadful drums. "Hyperlaunch, Commodore. See us to Dantooine with all haste."
A horrifying ghoul jerkily nodded its head, turning to drag itself with uneven steps towards the ceaselessly-drumming, grinning figure seated above the crew pit. "Hyperspeed, hortator," it hissed. As the hortator relayed the command to the deathless crewmen below, Dreadwar turned to Coatlec, cloak framing him like the wings of an avenging angel before the void, gesturing with his gauntlet of rusted cortosis towards the distinctly feminine figure standing waiting. "This is Helvara," he whispered.
"She is an experiment in repurposing Belia Darzu's arts of mechu deru vitae, which I had found strikingly similar, upon reading of it after my awakening, to my own pioneering work in the technique of Tsaiwinokka Hoyakut." A chill wind passed through the bridge. "A failed experiment, but I saw fit to condemn her to a lifetime of servitude upon the Wrath of Vader, for the loss of her master's work was disruptive to me. So long as this ship yet roams the stars, she shall be a ghost within its machinery, and I have bonded her mind to the ship's computer."
Dreadwar turned, crossing his powerful arms and staring out into space. "You may go to your quarters, Lord Coatlec," he hissed. "We shall be arriving at Dantooine within two days." Dreadwar said not another word, content to stand as he always did, without need for sleep or relaxation, before the stars he ruled, awash in the currents of the dark side. As his hood affixed upon his stellar kingdom a gangrenous glare, the stars stretched into lines, the hull gave a mighty shudder, and the Wrath of Vader vanished into the non-realm that was hyperspace.
Two days later, Dreadwar standing in exactly the same spot upon the bridge, the Wrath of Vader reversed from lightspeed, its angular tip rupturing the veil of realspace as the behemoth materialised into being six lightminutes from Dantooine.
On the ground, meanwhile, Erastus Sallacine was clambering into the back of the first of the two speeders waiting for Viscretus' unauthorised team. Dantooine was a beautiful world, but he remembered it differently from his expeditions for the Reclamation Service; where was the buzz of insects in the grass? The chattering of children playing upon the permacrete beyond the estates? The whirring of settlers' machinery, as they plied their skills to their fields?
Now, not even a kath hound barked, and the sky, although laden with puffy clouds, brought with it an eerie still air, with no winged brith to be seen riding the currents of the flagging wind. It was as if the entire planet were under the pall of Viscretus' malevolent control. Just how powerful was the Head of Sith Intelligence? Certainly more powerful than its previous mistress, Darth Maladi, but this... this was approaching the sort of legendary feats ascribed only to the Emperor and his triumvirs. "Where are we going, milady?" Erastus queried, strapping in the crash webbing.
Viscretus looked about, cautiously so. Only the Mandalorian woman and the Chiss acolyte had managed to emerge from the shuttle.
“The Palace,” she answered simply. A dock worker’s possessed frame lumbered to where she had stood, as she herself got into the front of the waiting speeder. Her eyes met his briefly, but they were glassy - glazed with the effort of maintaining such hold on every soul of the planet. Her breath even seemed unnatural. A strangely synchronized rise and fall that was mimicked by all the personnel around them. “The others will follow behind. Their delay will have recourse.”
She cast him a vacant smirk as she noticed him buckled in. “Do you not trust my driving?” They lurched forward the moment she finished her response, not giving him time to react, nor time for Etami to climb in as she had desired. The driver relaxed from his severe posture a moment later, and they raced off into the streets of Garang.
The palace was not far. Minutes, at most. It rose into the sky as they left the spaceport behind, tucked into ridge and hills, a sprawling courtyard visible before they even arrived. The rest of the group - Voidwalker, Erik, Nannley - would be ordered to follow the waiting Chiss into the speeder as they emerged from the shuttle, and be swept away minutes behind Viscretus. Etami could write with her crew in their own speeders, or join the rest of the team in the second speeder Viscretus had brought forth.
"I don't trust anything right now, milady," Erastus said cautiously, hoping not to offend, nor presume to be too familiar in his bearing with the Sith Lord. "This is all rather... eerie."
“I think it is rather peaceful,” she replied, leaning back in her seat, the palace approaching on the horizon. “Not even a single threat, such a luxurious landscape...” She trailed off, empty gaze scanning the horizon. She snorted a laugh before half-turning, back to him. “I have not been in the Palace for a half-decade, you know. I hope they have not utterly defiled my architecture.“
"Well, the banners display the noxious symbol of the Federation," Erastus said, pointing at the vast waterfalls of blue fabric flapping and fluttering in the flagging breeze. "So I imagine that's just a start." He turned back, looking over his shoulder through the haze of dust kicked up by the speeder's passage. "Where are they?" he squinted. "The acolytes and the others? Seem to be taking their sweet time disembarking."
"They are rather garish, aren’t they," Viscretus replied. "I thought plum a much better compliment to the golden fields.” She did not shift, nor pause, nor peer back. The acolytes concerned her not. “That is their issue. There will be someone waiting to give them instruction to follow behind, and if they do not follow that instruction, they will find themselves in a rather uncomfortable situation.” The speeder lurched slightly, turning into a massive shaded roadway - directly leading to an even larger courtyard. Marble walkways, dotted with fountains and silvery-leaved trees. Archways and soaring facade lie just beyond, reminiscent of both Theed and Coruscant’s Imperial palace combined. Most striking was the gilded detail upon the pale stone, shining in the glare of sunlight.
People still ambled about, but their walks were as unnatural as every other movement thus far. The wind fluttered through the branches as they slowed, then coasted to a stop. Viscretus wasted no time extracting herself from the speeder, heels clacking against the stonework as she landed. Her hand waved not to steady her, but in some odd fashion. A smile had crept across her face. Amused, not malevolent.
Two Imperial Knights emerged from the left, making their way to her side. She glanced back “Come along, Sallacine.”
He opened the door to the speeder and stepped out, glancing warily at the crimson armour and chrome lightsaber hilts - mercifully unlit - that ordinarily betrayed the most lethal manifestation of the enemy. The Imperial Jedi bodyguards of Empress Marasiah Fel; her political power may have been largely ceremonial, now that the Federation had been established as a democracy through three years of bloody civil war, but her power in the Force, and those of her disciples, was very real. "So, why are we coming here, exactly?" he asked, struggling to keep up with Viscretus' haunting, weird steps. "Do you really expect to find the secrets to this Mitth'res'pheie prophecy in your old palace?"
“If there is utterly any hint of the prophecy on Dantooine, it will be here,” she replied, pondering to herself. Her paces curved slightly. “The acolytes can review the entirety of the archive. Now that the Reclamation Service is entirely...” She trailed off, paused for a moment. A sudden energy shift. Her eyes squeezed shut. And then she reopened them, continuing forward briskly. “Now that the Reclamation Service is under my command, they will certainly accomplish it with ease.” She spun back, abruptly, searching the horizon. “If they ever arrive.”
Erastus was no fool, and he could read between the lines. "So, am I to take it we... are not going to the Archives?"
“I see no reason to,” Viscretus replied, continuing towards the massive doors. The door-guard had already opened them with deep, deferential bow. “Even though they are a kilometre below ground, I can still command the officer that accompanies them.” They stepped past the threshold. She did not slow, turn, or anything of the sort. In fact, she distanced herself from him. Her hand tossed her hair. The turquoise fabric fluttered around her shoulders.
They were in a great hall, of pristine marble flooring and ornate, glossy molded walls. Scroll and flourish were carved into each panel, golden sconces adorning the windowless walls, all mimicking the Palace of Naboo. Sunlight shone in through an enormous paneled skylight, one of a few modern touches. It was more than elaborate, it was opulent - though as they proceeded it was evident the Federation had made shifts. Her heels slid to a stop and she regarded the entirety of the hall, the Knights stopping awkwardly the same.
Viscretus frowned. The stained glass had been replaced with plain panels, despite the only recognizable inlay being traditional design. It seems they wished to remove as much of her culture as possible. She idly wondered if the flooring elsewhere had been shifted due to its utterly tiny print of her insignia. She motioned to a doorway at the very opposite end of where they entered from. Her smile was innocent, though mischievous. “There is a room I would much rather visit.”
"Milady," Erastus said warningly. "We are here on a mission. If we are not seeking the Mitth'res'pheie prophecy, why are we here? Will not the Emperor..."
Speak of Gorog, and she will come, was the common saying on Alsakan, referencing the mythological insect god that had allegedly given the world to her spawn before the dawn of time. No sooner had Erastus spoken of the Emperor, and a sudden shadow stole over his heart, a coldness filling him with dread. Apollyon may not have taught him much in the subtleties of the Force, only that which was necessary for an archaeological assistant who was required to navigate the dark side traps of Korriban's tombs, but he could well recognise that chill wind that breezed through him, rather than around him, permeating his very soul. "He has arrived," he said, looking up towards the ceiling in spite of himself.
“The acolytes can very well deal with the legwork, once they decide to arrive,” she responded, stopping just before the doors. She turned back. Her words trailing off.
She could feel the darkness, the sudden shift of swirling void that surely Erastus had felt. But she did not so much as move, not acknowledge. Viscretus continued on. Her focus seemed entirely lost, as wisps of cloud in the sky above. “I am searching, now. There are thousands of miles of terrain, thousands of minds. And not one present knows anything...”
She stopped, abruptly, her brow furrowing. It was not the Emperor’s arrival which alarmed her. It was someone else entirely. Her hand fell from the handle of the wooden doors before them. Her breath hissed out.
"What is it?" Erastus said, concern thick in his tone. Concern she was going entirely off-mission, concern at what had caused her intake of breath.
“Someone, here, on the surface. Not the Emperor,” she replied, shaking her head, though her hand was rather abruptly trembling now. Her sifting through minds had shown her the mind of one she had not expected, present somewhere in Garang. Not the Palace, but nearby... “He...” Her voice was unsteady, and though she had enjoyed her escapades thus far, she suddenly wished the Emperor and his entourage be present. Her skin felt clammy, the wind a threat against her flesh, sudden claws of ice. The swirl of impending doom originating in the cosmos above aided her none.
She shook her head, still obviously distressed. “We must hope...” She swallowed. “We must hope the archive holds our answers in some format. I cannot find evidence anywhere else to solve our conundrum, and searching every inch of ground, every library, that will take months.” She was leaning against the door, now. Head tilted up, breaths deep. There was creeping terror on the fringes of her vision, and she sought to control it, for it was entirely irrational. There was no harm to come to her in the present, save for the Emperor’s judgment. For whatever reason - perhaps insanity, perhaps logic - she did not fear such. But her mind was suddenly enraptured in a violent past.
"Apologies, but you haven't explained, milady..." Erastus said. She was fearful, and doing a poor job of hiding it. She hadn't explained who she had sensed.
“Perhaps I do not feel like explaining.” Her head snapped down - her eyes cold, though with fear, not ire. “Perhaps you ought not to question matters that do not at all concern you.” Viscretus took a sudden, deep breath and tugged the enormous wooden door open. She had slipped through before the heavy greelwood had so much as opened halfway. Her footsteps carried across the polished, pale pink stone, hurried and irate. Erastus followed her in, wondering why they weren't turning back given the Emperor had now arrived.
She did not stop, nor slow, for a few minutes, winding through the soaring corridors of pristine marble and panels of ornate moulding. Chandeliers hung, dotting the ceiling with golden light, sconces illuminating the ground in between. They had been replaced with more modern fixtures, something that would have normally caused Viscretus some irritation. Her mind was focused merely on her destination and maintaining control. It was monumental task, one she had almost slipped her grasp on.
At last, her heels came to a stop - in the throne room. It was not where she intended to end, there was a room tucked away behind the panels and spiraling columns. But she could not resist the call of the throne in the moment before she proceeded on. Four stories above, archways soared, hung with golden branches of light. Perfectly sculpted to mimic the Palace on Naboo, adorned with crystal and corusca that sent shimmering light from its facets. The throne, carved from white and decorated similarly with gold...metres between her and its pedestal.
She remained frozen. Her shoulders heaved as her body recovered from the ordeal of bustling through the palace, her eyes searching the room for every familiar aspect, her hands clasped at her waist. And then, at last, she stepped towards the dais, and took her rightful seat.
Erastus stared, slack-jawed. The architecture was beautiful. The enthroned Sith Lady was divine. Even though the Federation had replaced so much of the decoration, Erastus was still left in awe of how the palace's design made the occupant of the throne seem like a living god, haloed in a complex scintillating pattern of light, skirts pooling like a waterfall of molten gold over the ivory facade.
It looked so right that Erastus knew, at once, this palace was not the work of Roan Fel, or any earlier leader of the New Galactic Empire. No, this was the handiwork of the former Empress Volshe herself, there was no doubt about it. "Milady...?" he said hesitantly, not even knowing what question he was trying to form. Perhaps he was just speaking to break the awkwardness of his stare? Stained glass bathed her in fractured rainbows of light, surprisingly unaltered given they portrayed Vahlan sigil and herself. Violet, gold, crimson, cerulean, all scattered across the pure white, dancing upon her skirts and ivory skin - as if she herself was an artifact preserved within its walls.
“Yes?” She replied, daintily leaning onto her arm. Her legs crossed, skirts lifting slightly to show her lower calves pressed against the cool marble behind them. “I am sure the Emperor will have realised by now there is no Federation to contest him.“ An officer emerged from a suddenly shifting panel just beside the throne, wielding two datapads. She took the first, smudging away dust with her sleeve. The other was offered to Erastus. “The Federation still does not even know that exists.” She pressed a finger to her lips. “The entirety of my Reclamation Service’s reports can be accessed through these datapads. The acolytes can retrieve whatever we require. Or perhaps His Majesty will come down and lend a gauntlet.” She smirked, ethereal gold and blue flickering in her irises.
"I see," Erastus said, accepting the datapad and beginning to scan over the information, intermittently looking up at Volshe to keep chatting. "Milady, shouldn't you come down from there before the others arrive? Lest they... put two and two together?"
She folded her hands in her lap. The datapad rest beneath them, screen still on. “My only concern would be the Emperor, and he is rational. He knows I would not be so blatantly, openly seditious. I would not serve him in any high capacity were I that utterly foolish.” She waved her hand and peered down again, clicking aimlessly through panels of data for a keyword. “Besides, I do not believe His Majesty recognizes the ‘sovereignty’ of one occupying this throne. To the Sith, it is merely an elaborate chair. One I would certainly burn,” she glanced around her, to the ornate architecture surrounding them, “no matter how displeased that would make me.”
"I wasn't concerned about the Emperor, milady," Erastus said. "I was concerned about the acolytes, who might recognise your former identity... which I gather you still desire to be a secret."
“Oh. Not a worry. They will not be coming in here,” she replied, not admitting to him that she had not so much as considered that possibility. She chose to blame it on the strain her mind was under. “They will be escorted by the loyal guard around to the southern grounds, to the archive’s entrance. And-“ she leaned closer, her eyes aglow with mischief, “regardless, they will find they remember very little about the day’s details.”
"What..." Erastus said, wariness creeping into his tone. "Why?"
“Would you let acolytes recall one of the most well kept secrets of your time?” She raised an eyebrow. “With what is in there, it is safer for the Galaxy - and us - that they forget.”
"But aren't they meant to be helping us search for the prophecy? I don't recall the Emperor issuing any instructions to mind-wipe them..."
“Helping, yes, not getting ideas, or stealing artifacts that would cause utter chaos.” There was a pause. It was not one of thought, but of meaning. “Come here,” she instructed, her finger bending to summon him closer.
Erastus nodded, and took two steps closer. Just two. All his body language was angled towards the door, his eyes flicking to the side, as if the Emperor's imminent arrival were pulling him backwards.
"Yes, milady?"
“Here,” she repeated, finger now directed to the marble dais on which her feet rest.
"Oh," Erastus said, thinking he understood what she wanted in that moment. He knelt down, then leaned forward, placing his hands on the dais and lowering his head. He dipped his lips to her foot to kiss it, before raising his head, but remaining kneeling. Her face immediately flushed a vivid scarlet, and she struggled to keep her expression as serene as it had been. “Er-...oh-.” For a moment, there were no words to express the confused squall of feeling his abrupt gesture had invoked. Her voice found purchase just abruptly. Her face was turned, an attempt to hide her blush with a cerulean facet of light. “Sallacine. On your feet, if you will.”
He duly did so, still thinking he had paid homage to her former royalty exactly as she had wished. "Yes, milady?"
“That...was entirely unnecessary. I am not the Empress any longer.” Her tone was thick, attempting to not waver with her fading discomfiture. Less so with the gesture, but moreso with the awkwardness and concern the Emperor would have appeared at that moment. She leaned forward, her hand reaching to his cheek, then her fingertips cupping his jaw. It was not immediately threatening, but firm. “I, however, am the Head of Sith Intelligence. What I believe should be hidden remains hidden. Should I believe the acolytes must forget, then they shall forget. The Emperor entrusts me with such. Is that clear?”
Erastus swallowed. "Yes, milady," he said, sounding duly chastised. "I apologise if I offended you. I thought you were indicating obeisance, and you're sitting on a throne and pointed at..." He trailed off, glancing away awkwardly, fully aware that he must appear very weird right now. I am not into that, I am not into that, he repeated in his head, initially as a litany to himself, and then increasingly with the hope that she would hear him telepathically, and know nothing else than adherence to royal protocol was intended. His eyes remained firmly affixed on the wall to her right. She was breathtakingly beautiful - no doubt that had influenced his cringe-worthy lapse in thought - and he feared if he looked at her again, he might end up doing something similarly foolish.
She rose and simultaneously released him, hand trailing his tunic briefly. “Focus,” she instructed, knowing through his tumultuous repetitions she had made that exceedingly difficult - but caring little. “The Emperor is nearby, you know very well. We must focus on the task at hand.” She moved from the dais, descending the four steps and turning to the yet open panel in the wall. Only paces from the throne. “Follow me,” she called, already heading down the durasteel staircase that had been concealed within. Her conference rooms and a database, a level below the main floor, all constructed of a starkly different metal and glowing lights that were far more reminiscent of the Galactic Empire than Naboo.
Erastus duly followed, not once considering Viscretus might be acting beyond the scope of Dreadwar's orders. Her authority had supplanted that of Darth Maladi, and as Head of Sith Intelligence & Assassination she was a supreme magus bearing the seal of the Imperium. How could he even entertain thoughts otherwise? "Where are we going, milady?" he asked, keeping his eyes on the train of her skirts, and attempting to stop his brain from recycling the episode of mortification before his mind's eye again and again and again.
TAG: Volshe , @lordjania , darthvoxyn , Darth Voidwalker , darthkain7 , Sedriss Nathemus the Conqueror
TAGSET: Dantooine
IC: Captain GederpDeparting the Triumphant
, Gunninga Gap, Unknown RegionsCaptain Gederp entered the hangar bay with six Imperial Knights in tow, their perfectly polished crimson armour reflecting the gleam of their silver lightsabers they levelled at the three prisoners they escorted. Entheos, Derriphan, Nix. Rhandites, all, captured during the recent battle, and retrieved from the brig on Empress Volshe's orders. Some had even volunteered. Some had claimed they were under the influence of Rhandite nihil smokestone, the mineral of mental transmission that the sorcerers threaded through the brains of their pawns, but Gederp didn't believe them for a second. Not just due to innate Chiss skepticism, oh no, but due to the simple fact that none of these Rhandites looked like victimised slaves. Indeed, they looked like victimisers, ghastly horrors spun out of legends.
"Milady Hand," Gederp bowed towards Shira A'dola. "I was instructed to retrieve these three cultists from the brig. The logic, I suppose, is that they will be able to guide us through the... satellite below, as our initial scans indicate extremely hostile terrain, and, with no sun, that's extremely hostile terrain in complete darkness, at that." He turned, and waved a hand as if introducing guests. "This one is called Entheos," he gestured towards the man on the right, if it could be called a man any longer, for beneath the tattered black robes and wicked horned helmet was only darkness of the pitchest black, entropic energy swirling within the visor with all the emptiness of the cosmos. "A mutant Defel, perhaps," Gederp said, attempting to explain the unnatural being as being one of the living shadows of Af'El, a stealthy canine species from the Periphery who were colloquially known as "wraiths."
Gederp pointed then to the figure in the centre. "Derriphan," he said. The Rhandite was an Erphae, a splinter of the elven Sephi species with silver skin and white hair. There were certain similarities to the Vraeling, but there was an extraordinary sinister aspect to the Erphae's appearance, as if the figure were hewn from sheer ice and brought with him the cold of death and dying.
"This one insists on being called the Nameless," Gederp said, pointing to the last cultist. A dark-skinned woman with eyes pitted through with void, iris and sclera as black as her pupils. She was veritably covered in bone jewelry, giving her a tribal, demonic appearance. Gederp turned back to Shira. His commander may have looked human, with her dirty-blonde hair and smooth, alabaster skin, but to an eye that had served the Hand for so long as Gederp's, there were subtle indications she was not. Her hair could hint faintly at red, gold and platinum, depending on how the hangar's stark halogen light fell on the strands. Her glasz eyes shifted chaotically between a mixture of grey, blue and green. And ultimately, it was the delicate, vine-like alabaster patterning dancing along the surface of her skin that gave away her near-human differentiation: she was of the planet Vrael, and Gederp knew the language of Sindarin reigned there.
It was a tongue known to the more discerning denizens of the Unknown Regions, and Gederp had learned it during his studies on Csilla. It made for an excellent secret language with which to converse with Shira, when ears as unfriendly as the Rhandites' were listening. "Between you and me," he said in Sindarin, "I do not think these orders particularly wise. I expect they will try to escape. Nonetheless, I believe the true reason they are being sent with us is so that we can then use them as leverage against whatever natives we encounter if they are hostile to these 'sorcerers of Rhand,' or as hostages, if they are allies." Unbeknownst to Gederp, however, Tanek Derriphan, being of originally Sephi heritage, had a high chance of understanding the language perfectly.
Gederp gave Shira a meaningful look, hopeful his command of Sindarin had been sufficient to convey a message of such import, and then he turned back to the guards, instructing the Imperial Knights to begin herding the three up the boarding ramp of the
Sigma-class long-range shuttle, and to ensure the tips of their lightsabers were hot upon the backs of their necks. "Let us be off, milady," Gederp said. "I believe Lady Tano will be joining us later." He fell into line behind the Knights, pausing to gesture to his fellow Chiss, Captain Vlloth of the late
Servant of Geth, to go ahead of him. Gederp would take the controls, but having another naval officer to copilot in case anything went wrong was comforting. Adding extra protection to the prisoners, yet with unreliability enough to perhaps make him deserving of the brig himself, was the most benevolent of the refugees rescued from Odessen - and that was saying something - Knight Nox Talus.
Not five minutes later, and the
Sigma-class shuttle blasted out of the
Triumphant's primary hangar bay in a wash of cerulean plasma, arcing towards the shattered hulk of a planet that waited below.
Its vast craters stared up at the shuttle like the cavernous eye sockets of a skull, and baleful green lightning flashed with unnatural brilliance across its shroud of shadows. They were one lightminute from the corpse-world when the shuttle's engines abruptly deactivated. Within the cockpit, Gederp exclaimed as shrilly as the alarms that began sounding. "We've lost power!" he shouted, ordinarily calm demeanor breaking like ice beneath the sanguine glow of flashing emergency warning lights. "We hit some sort of energy field, projected from the planet!" A defense system for the planet itself, or the space station beyond? No time to ponder the matter now. "We're going down!"
IC: Darth Apollyon
Jungle clearing, Yavin IV
The rainforest was limitless, radiant, and ancient. Its canopy was contested by mahogany, gaboon, and balsa, and ample openings let through dancing beams of light to play across the bright blueleaf shrubs that sprouted from the crunchy layer of twigs, mulch and detritus below. Bundled branches dangled from columns of purple-barked Massassi trees and palm, framing medleys of flowers which saturated the scintillating light with vibrant colour.
The morning fog rolled back, and a disharmony of wild sounds, most of which were varmint, reverberated through the air, echoing all across the vast primordial expanse of the ancient valley. She crept forward, leaves and soil crunching beneath each bootfall, mindful of the subtle slope downhill towards the clearing where she had seen the
Raider-class disappear beneath the canopy. There were obstacles in the way of her path; upon the jungle floor lay the trees of yesteryear, fallen in storms long forgotten. The seasons must have been harsh, she mused, stripping away the bark and outer layers, yet rendering them all the more beautiful. They were soft, damp, yet her caramel fingers, lightly caressing them as she gingerly climbed over, came away dry.
A low moan interrupted the melodic lulls and bursts of birdsong. Pausing as her foot met the ground over the last log, she cast her eyes warily to the left and right, clutching briefly the talisman of protection that hung around her neck; the gift of her master, bearing a shard of Nilrebmah.
A tropical bird fluttered away in a flicker of bright plumage.
She hesitated a moment, but continued onwards, and thankfully, no great monster wrought of nightmare pounced from the jungle around her. After a minute, the birdsong resumed, and she allowed herself a sigh of relief, as the
Raider began to come into view through the thick trees. At last, the team saw her distinctive form, clad in trousers and body armour of black leatheris with epaulets of patterned silver, break away from the treeline. "Hello, Lord Catalyst," Apollyon said, gingerly stepping over a large log, leatheris tightening around her sculpted thighs and calves with the movement.
She took in the vessel that lay before her. It was truly impressive, up close. Small for a capital ship, she supposed, but for a ship with landing capabilities... It was a testament to Yavin's jungle that its trees stood taller, for the
Raider-class was truly a behemoth stretching nearly 500 feet from end-to-end, trees flattened beneath it in the clearing. But it was not the impression on her that was of import; it was the impression it would leave on the Jedi. The landing of such a vessel would no doubt be heard for miles around, and although Yavin was a vast moon, and they were reasonably far from the Jedi Praxeum, it was not impossible that natives loyal to the Federation could be prowling the jungles.
She smiled politely at Neoplix, Robyn, Xirr and... Samael and Kat Tento, if she recalled? She was not as familiar with the Devaronian or the Nautolan as she was with the other acolytes, for they had not been with her in the tomb of Sadow, but she had seen them around the Academy before. Probably even taught them in classes a couple of times. "Well," she said, "good to see we all made it, although myself by dint of circumstance." She did not bother going into detail; she would save word of Viscretus' arguably treasonous breach of decorum for her master's ears, for Lord Dreadwar would punish the blonde witch in ways Inquisitor Catalyst, ostensibly under Viscretus' thumb in Sith Intelligence, could not.
"So, what exactly is the plan?" she asked, figuring Lord Catalyst would have had more time to brainstorm an infiltration than she. "I take it this corvette doesn't possess a cloaking device, or I wouldn't have been able to see this thing land. Don't you think the Federation might have noticed?"
