Private A Grim Harvest

[Oleander Webb]

TAG: Halketh
INVENTORY: x | x | x
CARLAC

It had been a good while since Oleander had ventured outside of CIS space on personal business, or even professional that wasn't involved with the Confederacy one way or another. Centuries, though not by choice. Being sealed away would do that to you, so it would seem. Yet after spending enough time establishing himself within the Confederacy, making sure he had quarters to return to and credits in his pockets, it seemed fitting he reintroduce himself to the waking world.

There were a handful of worlds he'd wanted to visit, some for business purposes, others out of sheer curiosity. Centuries of slumber had let him behind on a lot of things. As Death given form, the reaper in flesh, executioner above executioners, he was bound by a handful of rules. Where and when he could step into moments of importance, the actions of mortals he couldn't touch and those he couldn't let come to pass.

One world, Carlac, had managed to get his attention. A world locked in near perpetual war, that hadn't bothered him. War was a part of the galaxy, a division that wasn't quite in his wheelhouse and therefore not his problem. He'd just observe the aftermath from afar. But when one side's forces were comprised of the dead walking again, that was when he saw it fit to step in.

And thus, Carlac would see Death himself touch down on the world, in search of the hordes of undeath and whoever it was who created them.

 

[Halketh]

D E A R E S T
H E A V E N L Y
The Aegis of Woe
Oleander Webb

"Love is endless, immortal, they say."
​

His home had become nothing short of a nightmare, a land wrought with terror and rife with visceral, unforgivable violence. The New Imperials had been pushed from its icy shores and cast back unto the sea of stars engulfing it once, but such a defeat did not break their iron wills so easily. Time after time, day after day now, the Iron Sun did its best to breach the endless night on the planet, and shed control back where it had long been forsaken. Where it was rejected.

Where it had been denied.

It was an act of ego that saw the New Imperials sending incursion forces, no matter how many of them were slaughtered and ripped apart in the streets or high up on the mountains surrounding his lonesome fortress, they would send more. Every wrathful task force sent to lie in wait for his inevitable arrival out of sentimentality put down simply meant others would return to replace them. It was a fact he was rather perturbed by, but as much went unexpressed, as he could not find it within the depths of his broken heart to spare any to relay such a message. Through the ruined halls of the Crown of Ice, the Dark Lord of the Sith traipsed, carved masque an expressionless visage which showed nothing toward the broken skeletons, eviscerated armors, and decimated ranks which littered the corridors of his fortress.

Portions of the walls had been destroyed, exposing the interior of the once fine home to the elements of the world, and no longer did it feel as warm and inviting as it had once. No longer did the distant memories of joy and exuberance echo from the rafters. That party, ages ago now it felt like, was but a mere footnote on the pages of this place's value in the sorcerer's mind. It was the night lovers were reunited. The night old friends saw one another for the first time in ages. It was a night friendships had been forged and relationships blossomed; all nurtured and fostered by the tender hands he welcomed them all with. And now, it was silent, save for the howling winds whistling through the shattered windows and sections of open wall.

His was the only ghost haunting these halls now.

Before the sprawling staircase iced over by exposure, Caelitus paused, tilting his head upward to push an emotional breath from his nose, the vapor clouding the frost-kissed features of his masque. A remorseful hand lifted to brace upon the icicle-draped rail and he strode upward, climbing the frigid stairs to ascend through what little memories he chose to cling onto.

Only the sound of his heavy boots tolled throughout the graven fortress.

"You regret it all, don't you?"

He knew he would not be left alone for long, not even to wallow in his own remorse. Her voice called to him from above and with a twist of his head, his false features hung upon her wretched, phantasmal form. Merely she was a light flickering upon the sea, a shimmer, nothing more, even to Sight as keen as his own. Her Presence was fleeting, though it remained to pester nonetheless. The actions he had taken at the top of this spire to attempt bringing The Iron Imperator to his end had shattered the very foundations of the structure, cleaving mighty cracks and sundering out entire sections of the narrowing stairs. Yet at the top of this shattered climb, the greatest ghost awaited him.

"I must say that I do."

"I know," he sighed breathlessly as he stepped over another steep gap between broken stairs, "you always have."

"No, Kezec, I always will. There is a difference."

He found no retort to such a poignant statement and merely added to the growing silence, each step taking him further into the tower.​

 

[Oleander Webb]

TAG: Halketh
INVENTORY: x | x | x
CARLAC

The Reaper was appalled when he descended onto the world. The stench of decay, both literal and spiritual, bled through in such a way it even incited Death's nose to curl in disgust. There was a temptation, though faint, to leave the world right then, return to Confederate space, and acquire the means to reduce the entire world to ash. For surely the life that survived after such an event would be favorable to the dead that shambled now.

But no, it would not do well to add more to the eternal war this planet served as a stage for. And even then, Death was not one for wrath. Why give in to rage when everything would one day return to him? Such was the way of the galaxy, or how it should be anyway.

He appraised the first cluster of undeath he met with a harsh gaze, a brow raising as they took notice of him and began the shuffle his way, as if their mere perception of the Anzat was an insult. "I highly doubt any of you are to blame for your sorry state," he said slowly, not moving to slow the cluster's advance. "Nevertheless, your place here is an anathema."

His fingers moved in a clawed gesture, beckoning one of the walking dead towards him. "However, before I take back what is mine, you shall serve one last time." The force pulsed through and around him, a wave of necrosis sweeping from many of the undead that now surrounded him, drawing the power into his being. The small cluster slumped to the ground a moment later, the one in his grasp remaining.

His cold gaze drifted to the tower. If whoever to blame for this was here, he suspected that is where they'd be. His body gave a shudder, adapting to the essence he'd just absorbed into his being. It was a sickly feeling, not one he particularly enjoyed. Yet it had to be done. "Now, lead me to this thief."

 

[Halketh]

D E A R E S T
H E A V E N L Y
The Aegis of Woe
Oleander Webb

His ascension up the devastated tower saw him pass through the doors left ajar by Rurik Fel's entrance to their fateful duel, and he ventured into the desolate chamber to reminisce on the exchanging of blows that had happened. He could still hear them, the scoring words, the humming warble of clashing sabers, and the Dark Voice's cackles echoing over it all. The phantoms that haunted him in this room were long lost, the last of their strength absorbed and converted into the kinetic blast that ejected the Iron Imperator from the crown, plunging him into the chaos that had all but consumed the landscape.

The Dark Lord sighed, disregarding the prattle of the specter accosting him, shaking his head with the draw of breath that emerged in equal tandem, clouding the sub-zero air with vapor. The hollow thud of his boots carried him across the ruined floors and perched him upon the sundered wound in the wall and floor of the fortress; the entire half of the room had been blasted away. The cold winds gnawed at his masqued image, whistling through the narrow slots in his armor, and sending chills to rush across his flesh. It all felt so distant, though the consequences were still ever-present, looming in the courtyards.

Roaming the streets.

Rotting beneath the star-smothered skies.

His army had grown in considerable number, much of them freshly raised New Imperials spurned to reanimation by his conclave of sorcerers, and they had yet to be evacuated and fostered within the belly of his battlecruiser, whisked away to Exegol to be reoutfitted and bolstered by further corruptive ritual. As his mind's eye stretched beyond his immediate surrounding, he felt a shift in the writhing veil he commanded.

Someone was here.

Sullying his work.

Beneath his masque, scarred lips twisted into a scowl.

The Dark Lord ushered himself to the makeshift throne in the darkened room, lit only by the cold moonlight filtering through the sunder in the chamber. He settled down to wait, fingers steepling before the indifferent visage he wore.​

​

 

[Oleander Webb]

TAG: Halketh
INVENTORY: x | x | x
CARLAC

The slow trudge of the dead leading him about was a nuisance to the Anzat. The creature of shadow was one to linger just out of view. This slow parade almost put him on display if any living were left to watch. The empty eyes of the dead were only marginally better.

He refrained from absorbing more of the undead into him as they progressed. The sickly sensation was slow to fade and spurred on a different hunger, the kind he suspected would be more difficult to satiate on a world of the dead. In time, he fully intended to remedy the infestation of this world. For the moment, however, he would hold off.

Better to deal with the master of this land before he was too far in to clean up.

Oleander gave a short huff when at last they approached the tower. The presence of living up above was a beacon growing brighter as his entourage progressed. Now it was unmistakable. He didn't need another to suggest that this presence was who he was searching for. Turning to his shambling escort, another quick beckon brought the creature toward him. "And now, your service has concluded," he muttered as he drew the creature's essence into himself.

Alone once more, he shrugged off another shudder. "Onwards and upwards I s'pose," he said to himself with a heavy sigh ending in a yawn. There'd be time for a nap after he dealt with the lord of this tower. For now, though, the ascent toward the beacon of a presence up above would begin.