Private A Noose Gently Slipped

[Kascalion Giedfield]

Against the burning lights of Bescane, he is a living void. One who produces no light. No happiness. Nothing but silence. Grim silence like a dead beach against a colorless tide. He feels the cold stones against his skin as he sits in that wet sand, watching as the horizon forms itself into a gaping mouth of madness from which tendrils of an esoteric power reach toward him. The Curse. Even without the sword, he feels it. Even outside that body, he feels it. He hears it.

You love me. You hate me. You need me. A drug to guide you through the Great Empty. You have seen what lies beyond the edge. A vessel of experimentation. That maw. That mouth of madness. You’ve seen it. Lived it. Tasted it. Now you are here. ​

He knows why he is here. To kill a traitor. To decapitate her. To rend her soul from her fleshy host and send her into that maw. To rid the world of another NIO scum.

“A traitor from this world of decadence and villainy. Bescane. Industrial. Prodigious. A world of no natural environment. What do you make of it?” he asks no one in particular, yet knowing it would respond to him.

Clank. Clank. Clank. Rap. Rap. Rap. Do you hear it? The whirs and the taps of the machines. The grunts of the poor workers. Do you taste their sweat? Do you long as they do? For the flesh of their lovers, of their affairs, or their families? They work and slave as you did. So long ago. Under them, the creatures of metal and liquid. You feel it as they do. You felt it as they do. The death of joy. Industrialization of the foundations set by The Ancients. Here you are. Bleak. Obsolete. Void of personal connection. Just how you like it. Since she died. Now you are here. Away from what you fear. From what you cannot see. And what do you see? What do you see?​

He sees grey construction zones and metallic obelisks honoring the enigmatic overlords a thousand planets away. He sees people without faces, without any personal connection to him and to who he is. To what he is. His cloak protects him from their knowledge. They cannot recognize him and so they see right through him. Like a wisp. Like a nothing. Like a mouth of madness they cannot perceive. A maw. With those people walking past him in their monotonous way, he sees a road upon which his feet, clad in black boots tipped with solid steel, thud with every step in rhythmic beat with his heart. His heart beats in rhythm with the movement of his eyes. Slow and calm and away from the fear of seeing what he cannot see. Just how he likes it.

What he sees is the home of a traitor, of a woman whose parents live in objective harmony. They would never see the transmission their sweet Lyra had tried to send them. Kascalion had seen to that once his broker, of whom he never took the name, informed him of the in-bound message. Decrypted and reincrypted and stowed away. A heartfelt note of doubt and resolve becoming yet another numbered entry in Kascalion’s menagerie of stolen mementoes. Only to be viewed once more and then never again. Many within the New Imperial Order suffered this fate, never knowing that their loved ones received their last messages. Never knowing that after they fell to the Devil Lion, their loved ones would be slain, imprisoned, or exiled. All they were to him, were numbers. Sweet Lyra would just be another.

Months of this. Hand of Carnifex. Assassin. Murderer. How many to list? How many more until you feel judgement has been passed? Who are you to judge?​

“When they all die.”

His eyes, silver like two pressed coins, gaze up as his feet stop, settling on the large habitation complex designed for the Imperials of the world. This bothers him, even though he will not admit it. Sweet Lyra’s parents, still Imperials. Still loyal. He refuses to admit that it bothers him, because it does not. It should not. It can not.

You refuse to admit that it bothers you. Why? Suppression of rage, of fear that you are wrong. Does Sweet Lyra deserve this? To be skewered? Flayed? Ripped apart by your anger? For her betrayal?​

He steps inside the complex as the ringing in his head begins to chime like rapid church bells. His voice is low, guttural, bile filled, “They all do.”

It bothers you. Sickens you. Loyalists. Part of your trap. Part of your game. None have been this way. All worthy of your blade. These ones? It bothers you.​

“It does not bother me,” he swears as he steps in front of the administrator of the building.

“May I help you?” the woman, so respectfully carrying herself, asks the man dressed in all black.

He said nothing as her eyes met his silver coins. The air dissipates for a moment as she tenses up, lost into the void that he, for a moment less than that moment, shows her a fathomless oceanic depth that she could not contend with as a mere mortal. And yet, the weight of this power on her is feather-like, and her mind is easily melded to his whim and his will. She simply turns back to her console and lets him pass to the turbolifts that ascends him to the top levels of the complex, the 20th floor.

Empty air. Empty heads. Empty hearts. An industrial world, overlooking craft and scum and despair. A normal world in the Galaxy. Another Nar Shaddaa. Another Coruscant. Another Bastion. Another…guards. Look at them. Standard complement for places like this. What to do?​

Nothing. They let him pass, compelled by the aura he let slip just a touch from his cloak, a tip of the dagger in the shadows. An edge of the axe waiting to drop. The door, marked 2077, now stands before him like a spotless reflective shield, a blockading knight of solid perfection defending his charges. His right fist, gloved in taut leather just as his left, rises and pounds against the door.

Once.

Twice.​

Thrice.​

When they would open the door, he would smile and bow his head only slightly, and he would say: “Salutations. My name is Colonel Jurgan Hanz Lugeros, representative of the great Sith Empire. I am here to discuss a matter of great importance that I am afraid affects you personally. May I come in?”

Lyra 'Sybila' Voikryt

 

[Lyra 'Sybila' Voikryt]

Location : Sith-Imperial Space, Outer Rim Territories, Obtrexta Sector, Bescane

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The day could be labeled as non descript until the words flowed from the strangers mouth to the woman’s ears..There were few things that would even draw the attention of the lowest levels of security from the residents of 2077, but the sudden appearance of the man, Jurgan.. An overwhelming confusion, inkled by fear permeated from the mousy woman, half hidden behind the durasteel door. Social parameters that had been ingrained like fine wiring were the only thing that saved her from gawking, standing aside and let him in.

“Of course Colonel Lugeros, it would be our honor-please,” the woman answered steadily, standing aside. The woman was modeled under the strict air of Imperialism but at one glance, was softer, much too warm compared to his quarry.

In the shadow of the woman’s mind, unspoken questions dogged her-had their waiting come to an end? The state of the living space secondary, they hadn’t had a guest in so long.. A life uprooted all because of a simple warning from their own daughter, reallocated funds into a cramped complex home. If intuition served well, this would not be a meeting of pleasantries.

They had been expecting a simple holomessage perhaps, a plain few sentences informing them of a death. What more could it be? There were certain things a parent never wished to hear, and a standard cycle living in the dark had left the aging couple in limbo. Assumptions were always more terrifying than the truth though.

The faint aroma of something clean filled the modest space, all sleek cut steel and furniture with little personal effect to be found upon its walls, a single photo seemed to be their crowning jewel. A familiar face depicted behind scanlines, Lyra herself in her Legionnaire Officer’s uniform smiling-younger then and free of the mass of scars she carried. A shuffling noise that echoed through the home as classical music played softly-the peace interrupted by a man’s voice.

“Darling who was it?” the source, a gentleman with salt and peppered hair appeared in Jurgan’s line of sight. His expression curious bordering surprise amidst the interruption, a data pad in hand-seemingly caught in the middle of his own work.“Oh-”

“Mason, this is Colonel Lugeros. A representative from the Empire, there are some matters to discuss” the woman explained gently, excusing herself.

“I see, apologies we weren't expecting visitors..It is good to make you acquaintance Colonel Lugeros, you are quite welcome in this home. I am Mason Voi'kryt,” the man recovered, any troubling thoughts pushed aside. He had appeared to want to raise a question ever staunch chose instead to cross the distance to greet Jurgan with a firm handshake; a tight smile resting on his lips. “You’ve met my wife Selma, she will bring out some tea if you would like. Please have a seat while she fixes that, what can we do for you?”


Across the Braxant Run, at some undetermined time there was a soft beeping that had drawn the Commander from her stupor. The dark void the Phantom had melded into made them nigh invisible at first pass, drifting through the stars in Sith-Imperial space. Alone in her own assigned quarters, the cold seeped from the view port she had absently mused over. Waiting, she was waiting. It was what the woman did now most days, a operative strike long put behind her and filed under reports for Command to deal with. They stood in the clear after a handful of hyper jumps, ensuring they had not been followed. Waiting for a single transmission for recall. The strike team was still picking themselves up from the last fight, egging for another like the Order organized.

It's success had yet to be determined and Lyra lingered over the chance fight on the water world, the bruising fresh and in bloom across her body.

Caught up in her thoughts, Lyra had to shake her head to focus herself. The beeping growing insistent. The emergency beacon was always on her person, and the one thing she had hoped never would stir with life. It had taken her a dreadfully long minute to fully understand that it was what was now sung. Her servo fished it from the gap of her armor, turning the disk over between the digits; a steady red light flashing drew the eye. Her heart stammered naively, fear was never far from her mind these days. A lull in order and direction making it a favored playmate, and a harsh breath escaped her.

No one should have those codes realistically,they shouldn’t have a need for them. The timing, and the simple stress of, why now-of all times flooded her. Lyra hunched over shaking the disk, weighing the options before her. This simply could not be happening, and the Commander knew she had made up her mind the moment the beacon was activated. She was selfish in that regard, and did not pay mind to the questions or arguments brooked when the ship made a change of course. She had ordered a black out protocol, consequences be damned and if it were a trap..? Come what may Lyra had no control over her life but this.

Kascalion Giedfield

 

[Kascalion Giedfield]

The Devil slides into the home of the pious unknowing like a black serpent slithering into the hole of a rodent asleep. His face is hard as stone, yet conveys an emotion as soft as silk. His eyes are like pressed coins about to be stained with the bleaching of pure sunlight as they dart across the room, taking in each piece of evidence he can use to confirm the information given to him by the broker. The music is dulled in his ears for he has no care to listen to it. He is instead focused on heartbeats. On sweat. On the clean air. It is too clean. Too free of mistakes and greed and anger. Too Imperial for Imperial's sake.

He begins to envision killing them as Lyra draws near, which she would very soon. He could not confirm that, but could only hope. He envisions the old man's head split in two at the jaw, arms snapped at the wrists and elbows and shoulders. He envisions the old woman, shunted out of the building like a torpedo to crash at the floor below, splattering like a rotten vegetable falling from the table.

This is your design. A killer's design. A Sithly design.

This is my design.

They are warm and gracious to him, like any loyal servant of the Empire should be to an Imperial. Yet, their hearts bear worry of his presence. His heart in particular. He can smell the freshly clogged air in his throat, the tight smile on his face signifying some dread, minuscule of course and truthfully inconsequential to the entirety of the situation. Yet, he can smell it like a dog on the hunt. Entranced by it, his eyes quickly shoot to the picture that hangs on the wall like a portrait of a missing person would hang outside a local law enforcement building. Dressed in the skin she had discarded for a traitor's shroud. Is there a worry that he was reporting her death, he wonders. In a way he is, but it is a death yet to come. A death he is preparing to consume at the table of sin with the rest of those he has punished, bloodied meat peppered with weeping.

The picture on the wall. Another grain of sand in that dead beach. All pictures of loved ones. Gone. It is confirmation. It is penance for what you shall do. You shall look upon it and grieve. Grieve that you could not stop what they had done. And she was here. She lives here in a day at a time in the past. You cannot avoid it. Subject her. To the Maw.

He turns back to the old man and gives his own tight smile, bowing his head like one would to a gentle courtesy, "I would love a cup of tea. Three sugars if possible."

He takes his seat in their living room, removing his hat and sighing heavily, and lets only a sliver of the fathomless ocean within him drip out of his aura, "Even at this rank it is...it has proven difficult to discuss the matters I am about to discuss. I find it particularly unenjoyable both professionally and personally. I must first...ask you to confirm your identities and relation before I continue on. I am aware of who you are, but for the sake of paperwork, I must ask. You are the parents of one Lyra Voi'kryt, yes?"

Buying time. Buying time for her to get here. She will come. They always do.

Lyra 'Sybila' Voikryt

 

[Lyra 'Sybila' Voikryt]

Location : Sith-Imperial Space, Outer Rim Territories, Obtrexta Sector, Bescane

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The man, Mason, chuckled acquiescing to the Colonel’s request. They shuffled through the home, and air of discomfort wrapped itself around the couple. Selma reappeared within a few short minutes with a polished tray, a facade of the gracious hostess as she set out the steaming cups-serving Jurgan. The faint rumblings of the city just beyond their glasteel windows behind them, a harsh orange light painting the city as the afternoon settled in. If the man knew when he was being watched, then it was no hidden sentiment.

A shadow of doubt creeped along the edges of the woman’s visage, Selma choosing to settle down beside her husband as the niceties faded away into business. There was a robotic nature as she retrieved her cup, occupying herself as the Colonel began. Mason was rather entrapped by the man’s sudden appearance, placing a steady hand at his wife’s back when she joined him, attentive but something shrewd behind his eyes. Though it was difficult to miss how they both reacted at her name, leaning in if only a fraction.

“Of course, I quite understand the formal requirements. We are both the parents of Lyra Voi’kryt, we have a record if you must be thorough,” Mason answered thoughtfully, sharing a look with his wife; a silent conversation between the pair. He gently set his data pad aside and they traded a tilted head, and a twitch of the nose-a stoic exchange. It ended with Mason turning his attention back to the Colonel, “Does this meeting have to do with the security breach our daughter was trying to rectify some months ago by chance? We’re under the assumption many families under the Empire were affected by it.”

A beat of silence followed before the woman shifted, following up with her own question.

“With all due respect Colonel Lugeros, I would prefer it if we were straightforward. Is my daughter dead and if so how?” Selma, though hunched over unto herself-cradling her cup to her chest, had a steeled resolve. Her eyes glassy but scrutiny plain upon her face...

The airspace of Bescane had changed, but the sight was wasted on the pilots. Silver skylines of durasteel and monoliths had grown across it’s surfaces, but the metallic smog still choked the world. Lyra had been the shadow at their shoulder monitoring their approach, feeding through codes as they approached through the dark side of the planet. The Phantom shuttle disappearing to the naked eye, speed of the utmost importance. Their descent was marked by the fiery hues that engulfed the ship’s form. They could not outright enter the Capital sector, but the factory fields would offer a base to touch down. Toxic fields and mostly flat cement slabs, waiting for development.

When her boots had hit the white slabs, docked in the shadow of the gasworks. She had used to race out here, and the memory pained her. Lyra tossed one haphazard glance over her shoulder at the crew. They had their orders to hold, even if she could sense the tension. The fire team fanned out past her, cameras shot out and the loney space outside the layers of scrap and city was secured. Lyra ascended into the rising industrial beast alone, there was no guarantee here. She was just whipped enough, she’d tell Tavlar was she had done. He was the only one she answered to, even in reluctance. This went against the grain, and could be considered going awol. A misuse of resources..

Her heart was an irregular hammer that fell in and out of tune with each step. Lyra knew the main sector like the back of her hand and she sleuthed through the trash line allies, going in by foot and trading between public transport. Cutting any corner she could, an invisible clock ticking down in her mind. At some point the sky disappeared-to many platforms stretched over head like a web until it was all just metal. A good soldier ought to follow their orders, under the Empire's banner they were suppose to be untouchable but Lyra tortured herself with the vision of a blaster pressed to the soft crown of her mother's head.

It wouldn't matter, the rule of Command would not be kind-she didn't want it to be. Lyra only needed to make sure her family was safe, weakness or not. There was a loyalty of blood, an oddity on a planet that was bred by business and the cut throat climb. It was the ironworks that had forged her here, her nails had never dug in to the grime but she could look back now and understand. Above all the gun smith her father had led, the simple truth-Shoot straight and know what you're hitting. The woman's fists balled at her sides. Pushing further past the common man and industro rat.

Lyra’s helmet and bars stood a head higher than those on the mission, she was it’s handler and shaper-she decided the here and now but she knew there would be repercussion. The city was alive in the only a way Bescaney knew, faint echos and quakes from foundries, the skyline dotted by sparks and rising steam. It was easy to fall into the crowds, flowing with the workers until they too thinned out. Her helmet had been discarded-tucked under her arm. Face bare to the world, the fumes a long forgotten ilk on her tongue and she breathed in the city. Her most damning insignias cloistered under the long coat, eyes shielded behind obsidian lenses. She was drawing close.


Kascalion Giedfield

 

[Kascalion Giedfield]

She comes now. Heart pounding like the rap, rap, rap, tap, tap, tap of the factories. Mind set. She comes. Prepare the table. Prepare the feast.

He looks to the parents with furrowed brows and runs a hand back over his white hair, pressed coins locked onto their faces. They are calm, collected, yet there is a stiffness in the air and in their posture. Is their daughter dead, they ask. Does it have something to do with the security breach, they ask. He can tell them so much about why he is there, why he is reporting on their daughter, and who he is. He can do so much in this moment to make them know the extent of Sweet Lyra's betrayal, but he waits. He waits because she will enter soon and she will be forced to sit at his table and partake in his feast.

He looks to the window allowing the breach of orange light from the afternoon sun. For a moment, the pressed coins flash a bronze color as the light reflects off the polished floor. It is a humanizing moment, perhaps, for the old couple. Proof that he is not some figment, something of smoke and mirrors, but they still do not know what he truly is. That he is something worse than a figment and smoke and mirrors. He is a demon of a time long forgotten, a demon forced to do what needed to be done for the glory of this new Empire.

His left hand tightens into a fist as his right claims the cup of Jurgan, once more looking to the man, "I am afraid...Mister Voi'kryt...and Misses Voi'kryt...that it is far worse than a security breach and death. This...is about loyalty." He takes a sip of the drink, slowly, watching for the emotions to break through their Imperial stoicism, waiting for them to begin grasping at the threads of realization. The drink is smooth and scorching and burns the soft flesh of his throat. An enjoyable sensation. Reminder that you live, that you can feel. "I am certain you have heard the recent news of the Empire's schism. The New Imperial Order they call themselves. A foolish name."

He sips his drink more and rises to his feet. It will appear to the couple that the room seems darker as if blanketed by a great shadow and the man himself much larger, or perhaps he was always that large and they simply did not perceive him that way. He walks to the window and gazes down to the city below. She is there. Approaching you. Do you feel it. Not a simple heartbeat is it? No. No, this is something else. Something you could not expect. I did. You did not. That is the difference between you and I, Kascalion. I am Kavar. The All-Seeing. You are Maledictus. The Pawn. Enter the Maw with me. And become whole. Only then will you see what I see.

Get out of my head.

Never.

His face grimaces and he places the cup on the couple's stainless metallic table, his back still turned to the couple. He stands there in silence for several minutes, simply staring into the orange light, his skin bathed in a color it no longer possessed. "...Order...what can a band of rebellious traitors know of order. Order breeds loyalty, Mister Voi'Kryt. Loyalty is ingrained into each of the Empire's soldiers. Each of its agents. Each of its men and women."

He turns around, his face shadowed with disdain, the fathomless ocean within threatening to break free, "Loyalty...is all there is at the end of the day for them. Disloyalty is a sin for them. A sin only committed by the cretins, the vermin, and the scum. It is a sin that I cannot abide by. You of course...were not aware of this disloyalty...until now. I must apologize for deceiving you and your lovely wife. I will see to it that you die quickly and painlessly by this day's end. If I have timed this encounter correctly, and I most certainly have...your sweet, lovely daughter, whom I assume you have many questions for, will be arriving shortly. Now, I must request that you stand up and take your place at this table. There will be so much more to discuss when the guest of honor arrives."

She arrives.

Lyra 'Sybila' Voikryt

 

[Lyra 'Sybila' Voikryt]

Location : Sith-Imperial Space, Outer Rim Territories, Obtrexta Sector, Bescane

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Lyra hadn’t ceased, each turn and twist-shoulder catching the poor man or the side of a building. Physical discomforts were seldom noticed by a soldier, her focus wholly set upon who or what was dangling this bloody bait. The adrenaline that laced her veins spurred her on like a black muck engine. Roaring under her skin, but each movement was clipped; her hand shaking. Scaling the city’s levels to find the ugly block of durasteel engulfed in the fiery light. Brighter than the sector’s sun, black lenses reflected the building as she approached.

There was no heat in the late afternoon, not at this placement of the planetary rotation-instead the air carried a foreboding chill. Sweat built on the back of her neck and she craned her head, Lyra stared down the long lane of identical buildings, her boot heels scuffing as she all but fled down the road. This had never been their home. The concrete stretch was dotted by artificial greenery, the long avenue oblivious to the unrest within its own backyard. Not that the average Bescaney was unaccustomed to the stray blaser fire or bout of violence.

She didn’t need to check the number, her hands snapped against the glass doors-throwing them open as she pushed in to lobby. Something smothering-something sour assaulting her senses-she felt the snap and long line of sorrow in her chest, it beckoned her forward with one curling finger. The wave of emotion threatened to send her toppling into the tile floor, she could feel the apprehension-the fear and all too distinctively the presence she ought to know. One that had spelled warmth once upon a time.

Purposely opposing them at sixteen had been one thing, but disappointing-being reviled in their eyes. That was a harder pill to swallow.

“Ma’am are you alright..? Do you require some assistance?”

Lyra closed her eyes, letting it wash over her. Just another mouthful of ashes to join her growing hill of failures, ankle deep in the skulls-blood slicked hands. She had made a career out of it, living failure. What had caused this she wondered? She knew death in the Force now, had been emerged and hailed by it-unknowing as her parents took their seats stiffly as the unorthodox began the final cue. Her servo curled tightly, the hum of the machine-a weapon for a hand that reminded her of the greater mission. She only wished she was braver, wasn’t burdened by this fear.

“Ma’am..”

A vacant and distant gaze fell upon the secretary. A cold clean smile passing over her stained lips, Lyra reached into her coat retrieving the blaster. The woman tensed but blue bolt flashed through the air, a non lethal execution of a petty problem. She left the woman to slump over to a hollow thud, disappearing into the lift.

Keeping the steel clamps over the turmoil was nigh impossible, the blast doors hissing shut. It was a seal that was compromised-she was compromised. Nails scraped along the edges, seizing the white noise that buzzed along her skull; she needed silence to operate. She had always felt too much, a miscalculation in her caste. The fluorescents flickered and her eyes wandered up, the floor numbers flickering by in blue on the panel. She counted each one under her breath, servo grazing her glasses. When the lift door chimes sliding open, the barrel of the blaster glided out. The hall was long and plain, she had never condoned civilian casualty but witnesses could be dealt with gently. Her eyes searched from the crevice to the ceiling for threat, the space between begging for her to put a bolt. She slid up along each corner, dipping into the next hall like a phantom. It was too quiet. Each step silent until her boots led her to the door etched with the marker 2077.

A heavy hand slid over the lock, not a sound as it turned but Lyra could hear movement within the lonely flat as she slipped in. She picked this place out just before her last promotion, entertaining the idea of coming home. It just had never been the right time, would she be in this position if she had come back? Had attended that dinner party her mother invited her to.. Maker help her, she should have. This was supposed to be her home, but it had been pad locked and turned into a prison. Her heart hammered in her throat, and Lyra shut the door behind her softly. A decade..

Grab them and run as far you can..

Did they even get her message, were they going to be mad, or was she going to round the corner and find their hanging bodies. The woman lingered there, pain turned liquid lining her eyes. The moment of the truth, she’d rather be facing the jump on Muunilinst again then this. A deft finger sliding over the switch of the weapon, to red, to kill.Her form broke and Lyra emerged around the corner, breath ragged and blaster leveled for the head-staring down the interloper, her own parents. No words came to fruit, cold eyes behind the lens accessing..
Kascalion Giedfield

 

[Kascalion Giedfield]

She enters with purpose and resolve, like a raven-haired warrior wraith against a raging storm wall. Yet, despite this, he can feel even through the sunglasses that her eyes are frantic and fearful, windows to the anxiety inside her as she looks for her blood, to ascertain that whatever threat had entered their sanctuary had not gutted them, shot them, ended them. He marvels at her dedication to her relations, almost clapping as the blaster was aimed at his head, set to kill.

A sliver of a fanged smile is cracked across the serpentine lips, a sign of the shattering barrier hiding whatever evil was within him - no, whatever evil comprised him. She will know here for certain that he is not human, no matter the appearance he has taken this day and all previous days. He is something else, something abstruse to the Galaxy of the present era - something arcane and enigmatic. He ensures this as he lets the waves of the fathomless ocean within him begin to seep out like liquid in a straw, splashing onto the floor in imperceptible masses, inching towards the traitor in root-like motions.

A coercion of power for the power in her? Or another pointless threat?

The question comes to him unexpectedly and without reason, but he ignores it. The voice is wrong as it usually was. This is a simple killing - nothing will change that. Yet, he has gone through the trouble of setting up this scene and, in a dark way that he cannot ignore, he does not attack. Instead, he beckons.

As such, his face, once again stoic and expressionless, and this escaping power makes one thing clear immediately: he will not give her a chance to take her shot if she tries to take it. The gun will not fire if she pulls the trigger. The gun will instead fly out of her hand into the wall like a fly being swatted by a hand. He will establish his power and control of the situation. But first, he will speak and place a caring hand on the shoulders of the traitor's mother and father, stiffly seated at the table, forced to look straight ahead of them and not at their returning loved one.

"Lyra," he says, the dull steel of his eyes beginning to brighten with pink and purple and red. His voice is sweet like hot chocolate, yet bears a grating like old bread, and his quick welcoming smile is warm yet promotes an obvious Devil's lie. "Lyra Voi'kryt. Or, rather, Legion Commander Lyra Voi'Kryt, brave soldier of the New Imperial Order - yet, you are also a former soldier of the Sith Empire. You received high marks in the academy as well as Stormtrooper training in quick fashion, did you not? Officer's training as well. Yes...I know the basics about you, which why I am so glad that you could join us today so I can learn more about you. I am afraid that no dinner has been cooked yet, but I am certain we can come up with something."

He lets go of the traitor's loved ones and straightens his back, letting the darkness recede back into him to lessen the pressure.

Is it to lessen the pressure? Or is it because of what you notice about her?

His eyes focus, losing their color and becoming cold steel once more. He stares at her for a long moment and cocks his head in observation, intrigued gaze locked onto the deep scarification of her face. He signs and in the blink of a half-second, he is in front of her, a monolith of bone and muscle and fear and tempered rage wrapped in black. She will feel the Force encircle around her like an iron rope, locking her in place. Unable to move yet cognizant of everything. He has the opportunity to kill her from the speed at which he moved and the trap he has placed upon her, but something stops him. A subtle energy around her - inside her that is locked away, but only slightly. A good push would unleash it from its rusted chains, whatever it is.

This makes you curious and worried. Curious about what this could mean about the mission at hand. And worried that I am right. Curiosities are your bread and butter. She has now become a curiosity, has she not, Kascalion? Let her live in this moment. Let her speak her peace. She is more than you are willing to admit. Drop the blind hatred...and see the truth before you. It is the only way I will allow you to control these events.

A gloved hand reaches up and traces the air of these honors earned in battle. A desire to throttle her burns in his mind as he does so, but he resists, or is forced to resist by what is in him. A scoff escapes his throat on instinct as he turns away. If Lyra is as attentive as Kascalion's knowledge told him she is, she would notice the scoff was insecure and choked. It is a minuscule insecurity, but that is enough for it to be noticeable for the Devil Lion. "I suppose you are not as useless as the rest. Mere babes barely out of their swaddling clothes when I cut their throats. You have earned your keep. I respect that. Unfortunately, it changes nothing. Take a seat at the table, Lyra Voi'kryt."

Lyra 'Sybila' Voikryt

 

[Lyra 'Sybila' Voikryt]

Location : Sith-Imperial Space, Outer Rim Territories, Obtrexta Sector, Bescane

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He was a beast with no other name, the overwhelming stench of something-no this was a matter of the Force. A split second and she could practically see the pure foulness dripping from the form of a man. Lyra could barely breath in the face of the overwhelming aurora, a black hole lined and rippling with a fiery power-out of place amongst the furniture and simply evil. She refused to shy, eyes narrowing behind the lens. Her scant encounters had never been laced with such Force. Her finger slid over the trigger just as he cracked the maniac grin, a ruthless snarl bubbling in her throat. It was not different then getting the jump on the enemy in the field. Her eyes, her attentions falling on her parents caught amongst the throes, looming over them like the headsman's axe.

She didn’t need to see to shoot. Her mother was cowering at the table and something shook at the cages in her chest. No golden smite rung out though, the blaster snapping and her wrist lame. A noise of disbelief escaping her-she should have known better. The unnatural ripping at the weapon and tossing it aside and her arm jerked aside following-stumbling after it like a child in search of a discarded toy.

They could be killed, she reassured herself-hand flying to her blastplate where the hilt of her vibroknife lay in wait.

Lyra stared at the pistol on the metallic tile-this was not a battle for the fool hardy. Her hand stalling-feeling the flooding of power-the roar of the ocean as the wave receded. A Sith, true and terrible. There were numerous protocols to follow in the face of a hostage situation, diffuse-Lyra tensed as her name rolled off the lips of the chimera. So long as he spoke there was a measure of safety, ego-centrism, she pulled the word straight out of the holo description. This is the kind you belong to, the voice ripped into her silently. They were the wild card to her safely designed ‘protocol’.

“Former Colonel, thank you,” Lyra uttered carefully, behooved to lay her cards out. Discarding her last shreds of self preservation as she straightened. If he had set the stage, and made the first move-she had to catch up. Something was changing constantly, a warped perspective that surrounded the man and her hands curled at her sides; waiting like a soldier in parade. He had come to pick her apart, and had begun so clean and methodically. Lyra didn’t want to overestimate herself but amidst a security breach..This man a hunter, and that synonymous with an Inquisitor.

The woman knew she had bitten off far more than she could chew. Distance never amounted to safety but when he let go of her parents shoulders Lyra was already calculating. Her father reaching out to grasp her mother's hands-they weren't looking at her. They knew..or there was in fact a lack of knowledge surely. She had failed before she had even begun..Fear and his close friend, panic began to trace their claws up her body. Her attentions split, his serpentine behavior lost in part on her. A premonition she could see him and Lyra could not lurch back, only in a blink of an eye he stood there before her.

She was a fly caught in the trap, seized by the force he commanded. Such control that she could not hope to mirror. Not a muscle would respond, quivering in her own bones and if not for the better part of her rationale she would have truly panicked, no Lyra seethed; grinding her teeth. A statute amidst the household. Her glorious master had subjected her to this, but part of her waited for the final stroke-the end. She couldn’t even reach her emergency beacon. She expected to be cut down there and now, but she refused to close her eyes. Forced to look upon the man and his steel gaze, Lyra’s lip curled up-her only physical sign of defiance to him.

She had gotten his attention at the least, a scoff. He had to know, but that didn’t scare her. Let him wonder she had to drive a knife and extort anything, though the rise and fall of the machinations of the Sith offered little guarantee.

"I suppose you are not as useless as the rest. Mere babes barely out of their swaddling clothes when I cut their throats. You have earned your keep. I respect that. Unfortunately, it changes nothing. Take a seat at the table, Lyra Voi'kryt."

"It changes everything," she challenged the moment she felt the invisible binds lessen, opening-pushing for negotiations. She had just enough tenacity to try. Even with the fear grasping around her very heart, there was a shadowing of doubt. He was something else, far to dangerous. Lyra wondered, even if she let herself slip amidst this development, if it would be enough. A raw storm, but could that even ward off this demon. She was just desperate enough to try..It took a moment to steady herself, tilting her head as she gestured toward the table.

"Be my guest."

 

[Kascalion Giedfield]

He watches her act with defiance with a gaze that could wither grass and entice a Lich in seconds. She is already something different compared to the rabble he has eradicated in days past. She is fearful of his power, but is she fearful of the man himself? This is the question he asks himself as they both take their seats at the table, ready to consume the course laid out for them. She had already taken a step in the dance he readied himself for, his shoes squeaking as he takes his own misstep to match her unexpected timing. A surprise to be sure, but a welcome one.

"I am going to assume that you and your dear parents are unaware of who exactly I am, same as those before you. My name is Kascalion Giedfield, but you may refer to me simply as Kascalion, Lord Kascalion, or Darth Maledictus. Whichever you feel is best suited for your final moments alive."

He clasps his hands together and turns his steely gaze to the mother who still remains frozen in fear. Silently, he encourages her to bring out the finest food she has readily available along with more tea. If this was to be the last meal of this family, he has enough decency to let them enjoy it. Lyra's step in the dance has at least ensured that, he decides. As the mother would go about doing that, he turns to the father and sighs heavily. It is a grumbling and disappointed sigh, much like a saddened friend or even a saddened parent, but he remains silent otherwise. He enjoys the silence for it allows him to read the room and gather what he needs to know and further plan what will occur this day.

He readily concludes that the tension in the room is thick, thick enough to deflect a blaster bolt or even a lightsaber. His preferred tension for his chosen prey. And what a prey Lyra has already turned out to be. Something inside her tells him this as his gaze shifts back to her. Something locked away in chains, screaming to be broken free. A power that seems minuscule compared to his, of course, but a power that he can tell is begging for development.

Tell her of the void. Tell her of the chains trapping you for so, so, so long. Tell her of the dead beach. And the Maw.

I will.

"You are unique. I will say that with the utmost...respect, perhaps," he finally utters in a silk-smooth tone. "Highly intriguing at the very least. Tell me, Miss Lyra...when you realized you were sensitive...did you not think to go receive proper training? Did it pass your thoughts like a leaf during a dry season? Or did you actively decide to keep it locked away like a dog in ropes? You would have had so much potential in our Empire had you...come forth to the Sith...like a loyal servant. Like a soldier. But you ran with your tail tucked between your legs like a mongrel. And you run now with a pack of mongrels. A pack of thieves and miscreants."

He does not look to the father, but addresses him all the same. His tone when he speaks has a layer of legitimate respect and admiration for the father of a traitor. Perhaps this would surprise Lyra or perhaps it would only infuriate her. He does not know, but he is curious all the same as if he were testing an ancient gewgaw or bauble, biding his time patiently until the mechanism springs under the pressure of manipulation.

"Tell me, Mister Voi'kryt...what are your thoughts on your sweet, perfect Lyra, so young and impressionable, falling to the wayside and joining the horde of treasonous, poisonous, heretical thugs? Do you still love her? Are you still proud of her? Were you even aware that she was sensitive in the power that creates this Galaxy? That she was far more than a simple soldier? Did she ever tell you that?" His eyes, still the color of pressed coins, are locked onto hers, waiting to see a response. A yearning to see that locked thing inside her break free begins to build, that he cannot deny. Yet, as he speaks and he delves further into her being, sensing the pure depths of her potential, there comes another craving that he shall not admit until it is beating against his throat.

A craving to teach her his ways. Such a thing is foolhardy for she is a traitor, and traitors are only dealt with in death. She is not exempt from that, of course, but even the great Devil cannot fully escape the Sithly greed of apprentices, especially one who could serve as an insider into the New Imperial Order. A traitor turned traitor turned loyalist.

"Now that is a desire," he utters aloud and oblivious, perhaps unaware that he has done so.

Lyra 'Sybila' Voikryt

 

[Lyra 'Sybila' Voikryt]

Location : Sith-Imperial Space, Outer Rim Territories, Obtrexta Sector, Bescane

---

---

“Then Darth Maledictus will suffice,” Lyra chose, having slipped into the cold metallic seat. Her spine was made of steel, the seat creaking under the weight of the tenebrae. She did not bother to hide, slipping the coat from her form-a trooper through and through; leaning back in a mockery of comfort. It was always the smiling man with the knife waiting behind his back, smooth talking and clinically insane.

She counted every weapon on her person with a blank slate face, nothing to tell nothing to give.

Her parents were at either side, so close yet still out of reach; they three were cornered. Gently placing her gauntlets on the table, she smoothed the white synthetic cloth draped across the surface. It had been sixteen years since she had sat at the same table as them. From her peripheral view she watched her mother who trembled, she knew the taste of fear in others. Such a budding gift and damming gift all the same. The sun set the room aglow as her mother stiffened and rose-the simple nigh robotic action drew concern.

The woman only tore her dead gaze from the Inquisitor to watch the woman go, the faint echoes of dishes and that of the kitchen drifting down the hall. A theoretical clock was ticking now. Reaching up, Lyra’s fingers closed around the edge of her dark lens, weighing her-their options. Her father was watching her, she could feel his burning stare. The aging man did not seem to fare well, his hands curling to fists atop the space before him. They had been beguiled.

Hesitating, she allowed herself a moment before she pulled them off; eyes screwed shut. Considering the killer at their table. Like the ones who came before, it could mean many things but because she sat here today..in this very situation. Lyra had to wonder who else had begun to rip out root and stem. Set the table and die kindly..a narcissist through and through so detached. Their comfort in this was a false courtesy and he was mirroring emotion.

How old..to whom did she sit with now. He had his hands bloodied in the game much longer than she could fathom. Men were just men..it was the beyond that stirred her worries. Death perhaps would be kinder, all whom she had left was sitting in this room. She folded the lens up neatly, setting the sleek pair of glasses down at the center of the table. Her mother had returned, grey like the walls and tray shaking as she set out plates.

Selma, her mother hovered around her shoulder, the faint noise of a cry something strangled dying in the woman’s throat. Her mother began to serve the meager feast of scones and what finger foods might be summoned for a last luncheon. The tea was poured and Lyra had no appetite. None of them did. Fishing out a smoke slowly from her armor, running the filter across her lip to wet it before considering her company before producing her lighter. Her father made a disgusted noise.

A deft hand swiping over the emergency beacon hidden closet to her breast where she stored the small cylinder before the flame clicked and she lit up. The smoke wafted through the air and she took a long drag from it, if she pleaded-if they broke there would be no hope. Even though survival crawled under her skin and was begging her to lash out. Her consciousness whispered, to be left for dead forgotten here in the throes of the war machine-how tragic. Finally then opening her eyes and turning her infernal gaze on the Sith Lord. He had yet to force a dark hand truly, and she began to stack silent bricks up in her mind. Avernus had tore through her mind and pilfered as he pleased, this one could not be allowed to know.

As he continued to speak-threatening them in their own home, it only continued to drive the furthering wedge in Lyra’s heart, another failure. She had warned Tavlar there would be repercussions, a bitter whisper, and she blamed him now for this. He could shoulder this blame and it stoked the fires that waned and grew erratically in her. This man though had taken the stage and set the narrative, turning her parents against her in the same stroke.

Waiting, and glancing at her father as the Sith wove his sad story. Her father’s brows were furrowed, shifting uncomfortably with these so-called revelations and perhaps her visage just the same. She had always looked at him and tried to be anything but cold and distant, rebelling in the streets. She had ended up just like him, trapped and head bent to the missteps of their life and career. Slaves to it, the factory worker and the soldier..Her eyes glassed over and Lyra swallowed thickly, straightening her shoulders. Though a gasp interrupted all,

“Lyra..your eyes..what..what has happened to your eyes?” her mother’s voice captured her grief and encapsulated it and Lyra exhaled heavily. So they could see it and Lyra smiled sadly toward her mother. It had been difficult to explain the scars once upon a time, she should have the decency to be ashamed but she couldn’t summon the feelings. Lyra had refused when Tavlar had made his sentiments clear. This was who she was afterall.

The longer the Lordling talked-the longer she could string this out however. Focusing herself, though there was little hope in the endeavor. Maybe the strike team would reach them in time, a lot of people were going to die at the end of the night and Lyra took a final drag off her smoke before extinguishing it in her tea. It was funny though, the only part of her that truly stood with the Order now was with the men fighting in this war: for Nima, for Agrippa, Ravraa, Davis, and Waylon.

She had pondered the sorrow of a lost career over one man, one commander. A soldier always follows their commander-in the beginning at least..They were her waning purpose, maybe she could run damage control. Her plan thus far on a theoretical and average day-she would console the simple soldier, tomorrow report the failure in action, and the day after that, die. There would be words she could never let come to voice, her doubts, she was supposed to be a Commander. She was just waking up everyday to go to work.

Focus.

“My lord, you can do me the respect of addressing me by Legion Commander or Darth Sybila,” Lyra said, turning her attention to the Inquisitor. A new weight settled upon her family’s shoulders. Husband and wife trading looks, they were bystanders and victims in this. Lyra could only imagine what flitted through their minds. There was no absolute love for the Sith in this household, but that was nothing a self respecting Imperial would be caught muttering either in gossip. Ignore and persevere. The pale irises she had bore in the holo clips of her last farewells he had so cunningly stolen were gone, and in their stead was the tell tale sign of corruption of yellow. Some will challenge it, so it had been guaranteed by her red devil; her nose flaring slightly-her only tell. Let them challenge it.

“It passed my thought like one faced with a bad stench in the beginning. I was twenty three, two months prior to the discovery, I was fighting pointless battles on the front. Our glorious leaders in all your power couldn’t keep clone riots under control and I got blown up for it. I think it was..an amplified scream? I was scared. I'll have you know you’re not all that you chalk yourselves up to be I assure you, nasty reputation really. This man here put a gun in my hand, and made me a marskmen so perhaps you can imagine how I was not all that eager to give that up in place of what..a lightsaber? Though here I am now, I didn't want this but we don't choose our fates I suppose, forgive any hypocrisy. But Maledictus, lets focus on you..please you really should clarify. If we’re loyal servants, dogs, or..soldiers,” she said, voice like gravel. Interrupting her father who had words bubbling in his throat. Give and take.

Cutting him off, she did not look at the man who had raised her. Lyra did not want to bow her head in shame, she was tired and trained to think objectively by their glorious Empire; it was simply her job to do this. Get out alive.

“Let me detail something for you, there are very key differences I assure you. Soldiers have commanders, not masters. Dogs, if kicked and beaten enough will turn and bite. Surprise. Loyal servants are earned. We will not kid ourselves, you haven’t earned much from the galaxy at large. You look at me and see a mongrel, filth-rearing their ugly head. Whatever,” Lyra’s face was etched with fatigue and she shrugged simply. “Every night you have families killed-how many others have you slaughtered since the declaration? Your prowess is likely undisputed, tell me did I make the job for you hard at least? Though before we get to that, shall I point out the glaringly obvious issues of this machine?”

Lyra gestured lazily, to the very idea of the Empire. Her breath was steady despite her heart, and she continued to fight the feeling of the Predator’s gaze. She shouldn’t be the one paying the price now.

“The slaves by the thousands, or the worlds subjugated, failed hierarchy, where is the substantial...Honestly though-who do you think we learned this from? This chaos? Let me paint you a very clear picture though. The Legionaries were taught to be a cohesive unit, to survive-to never waste our lives. To live to fight another day but the moment we come home, you’re slaughtering us. Who gave you permission to murder and main? The unending cruelties and this disregard for life.-Do you want to fight, that’s why you’re here isn’t it? How about you and I step outside. Your fight is with me after all. Come. Kill. Me.”

Lyra leaned back, throughout the growing monologue defending what their glorious Imperator had built. She tapped her blast plate upon her final three words, a finale- a welcome to something violent. Separate, maybe he’d take the bait. The deepest recess of her mind welcoming it, she truly had no hope and dying would in fact be kinder. People and good soldiers were dead, she had stood aboard the Dissident as the war raged over Muunilinst, her nerves were all too shot.

“Lyra, when did you-” her father, Mason snapped. Reaching out to seize her by the arm, as if that would temper and Lyra looked at her father. His eyes falling to her hand, and the servo clenched into a fist on the table before them. She wasn’t their sweet little daughter anymore.

“I really fucking hate that name,” she whispered, letting something slip. She licked her lips-shaking her head as; gauging the man in black.

“Why!” her father shouted and Lyra shut her eyes, demanding answers-disregarding any decorum shaking her arm as if that might wake her from this stupor. Lyra knew he was confused, anger and fear. Could feel it like the rain dripping down over her the sadness and the storm and she sat through it…”Did we not raise you-she was raised to be a self respecting Imperial. This was your nation-This isn’t..we never knew..You never have considered your actions, you’re still a bloody child. Do you know what you’re doing?! You've thrown your life away! This New Order, they’re terrorists! Good people have been displaced and killed, did you not see the reforms, the Empire is growing. You are my daughter, how could-”

Lyra’s lip quirked up and she smiled softly to herself drowning him out, her mother reaching out to join this pleading. They were mourning her, but she had learned that if you fought something you clearly cared about it. Another consolation prize for going to war. That and she could always bet on her father to save his own hide. She shook her head to herself, surrounded but numb-staring at the devil himself waiting; cocking a brow. He had gotten her good, and Lyra was wilting. It had taken her less then thirty minutes to trapeze the city, but she was a native-the team would not make it and she carefully reached out to grasp her mother's hand. Holding her near, the other resting on the utility belt- laden heavy with the tools of her trade with a careful hand.

"You're right, good people are dead and I know each and everyone one of their names," Lyra said, meeting her father's icy stare as he let her go. Looking her over in all her plate and she gently unhooked a sphere off her belt. Her father stretched fists and glancing between herself and Kascalion. "I am terribly sorry that you both were caught up in this."

"Now is not the time for apologies Lyra-"

"That wasn't an apology, only an expression of guilt," her mother hoarsely whispered, cold and collected.

"I'm not apologizing..not truly. It's not my fault," Lyra looked to the Sith as she spoke, detached,"good soldiers just follow their orders."

Kascalion Giedfield

 

[Kascalion Giedfield]

It was almost a frightening thing.

As he weaved his story, the Devil had felt a touch of genuine joy watching the woman remove the lenses covering the proof the family needed. The proof that their sweet loving daughter had long since fallen to the same path of the Devil now haunting their lives. Her eyes were screwed shut, of course, not allowing them to see the glaring yellow of the Dark Side, but he knew at that moment that she was indeed like him. And she is ashamed of it. This made him feel quite happy for it was a target that he could focus on, for whatever purposes needed. It was...progress.

The mother’s reaction to her daughter’s visage was a sure sign of that.

He had cracked a knowing smile at the concept of shame in between his words and reached for the first scone the mother had brought to the table. It was flaky and crunched under his perfect teeth and tasted quite buttery, overly so. He told the mother this in a silent manner, simply wondering how she would react. The tea he drank after was hot, but not as scorching as the first drink he had gulped down, and tasted very bitter without sugar or milk. This, he told the father in the same manner, adding that he did not mind, for the mere expressions on the three faces before him added enough flavor to the meal.

And then he finished his tale and let the seeds of his work begin to grow into beautiful orchards of despair and decay.

“I will address you as such, per your request, Darth Sybila,” he muses at the beginning of her turn to speak. Whatever it is that she has planned, he can feel the anger and frustration in her heart, the desire to lash out and strike him down. A foolish thing to want for he can end them all in a half-second, but she has earned her right to answer his questions. The issue was this, however: he could still not answer himself why she had earned this right.

The woman’s declamation is as apologetic and admirable as it is defiant and abhorrent. Her words humor him greatly and perhaps could have even been capable of drawing a chuckle in another life. Yet, they mildly sting like a tiny insect’s bite as well. It is a curious thing, he decides, that her words can spark such a dichotomy of emotions and opinions within him, especially when considering this is the first time he has ever met her in his entirety of the war.

“Why was this?” he wonders silently in his own non-conflicting thoughts, another query for the legion of others.

The cigarette, or smoke, that the young woman had produced during his own story was an amusing gesture, when Mister Voi’kryt’s reaction is considered. The Devil himself contemplates that perhaps the bluntness of the cigarette was too lowbrow for a man of such esteem and ranking, or perhaps it was the impudence of Lyra’s action. Regardless, he concludes that he can do the same as her.

From the velvet-lined pocket on the left side of his pitch-black jacket, he too produces a smoking apparatus: a long pipe with an oaken bowl and silver-plated stem/lip. From the right pocket, a tin of fine carababba tabac harvested from the fields of Alderaan. Packing the substance into the bowl, he snaps his fingers loudly and produces a flame from nothing to light the pipe. The smell of the smoke is sweet. Perhaps too sweet. He takes a few test puffs, lets the flames die out, relights it, and takes a slow drag, blowing the plume of smoke purposefully towards the woman as she speaks.

She is a feisty one, is she not?

She has potential, but it conflicted. She knows not what to do with her life. So much suffering. Can you feel it?

He can. Even without the added context of her words, even through the walls she is trying to build to keep him out of her, he can feel the suffering she has gone through. Death and pain and heartbreak and betrayal and torture. The events that caused such emotions remain hidden to him, but he can discern the effects. They are a raging inferno inside her very being, fueling the thing locked away. Anger, frustration, confusion, fear, hatred, love.

All the makings of a Sith, yet she remains adamant in her words. The Sith, the Empire, are her enemies. She disputes every claim he makes, attempting to justify her actions. In some ways, he can understand why she does this, but at the end of the day, she was forever marked a traitor. Something her father seemingly agrees with in her rage and disappointment.

Something Lyra herself seems to agree with with a single request: come kill me. It is a jarring request at the time it was given, but not wholly unexpected in the grand scheme of the situation at hand. A request that seems more and more prudent as the tensions between sweet Lyra and the distraught couple begins to boil over, culminating with a statement that causes the Devil to break out in a fit of laughter so thunderous it nearly shatters the windows.

“Go...Goo...Good soldiers just fol...follow orders,” he barely wheezes out, dropping his pipe onto the floor and slamming a fist into the table, denting the perfect steel. “Good soldiers...follow orders. My dear, sweet Sybila...my sweet, that is why we are here, is it not?”

He prepares to continue on his planned path and is more than ready to grant her request of de-

The rules have changed. Do not kill her.

What? That is why we are here. She is not exempt from what we have been doing.

She is special. You can feel it. Something is different. Look closer. Can you see it?

He does. It catches him off guard and he cannot verify it without delving too far, something he had not the time to do.

I see it.

Stick to the original discourse. Work her. Brutalize her. Do whatever you can, but do not kill her. Unlock her.

Are you sure?

The more chips in our game, the better chances we have of winning, my dear Kascalion.

His eyes darken suddenly and his jubilant tone falls to a gravely tone that could have been unearthed from the depths of Korriban itself. It is an horrific voice that he utters without warning and reason, a voice that does not match his visage nor any visage one could possibly imagine living in this Galaxy. “Because you...failed...to follow...your orders. Thousands, hundreds of thousands of your friends and family and brothers and sisters lay dead because of you and millions more will lay dead. Trillions more. Fighting a useless war of attrition that will ruin what we have spent so long to build. Because you failed to follow your orders of loyalty. Because of the actions of that weak, cowardly fool Irveric Tavlar and his sycophants and because you followed him.”

The Devil rises to his feet, casting a winged shadow as black as the blackest void in the space outside of space. “You witless, imprudent, foolish queen! Do you have any idea - any single, solitary understanding of the magnitude of what you and your New Imperial Order have done to EVERYTHING we have worked towards for centuries? For millennia!?

He looks to the faces of her parents and nods curtly, a sadistic chuckle escaping his throat, "You understand. Of course you do. You want me to kill you? You want me to end you? So you can escape the guilt of what you have done, the guilt that your mother so astutely deduced. That is it. Is it not? Child, let me inform you of something. We live in a Galaxy that has walls and those walls need to be guarded by warriors. Nothing else but warriors. True and honest and loyal WARRIORS.”

The Devil moves with a speed as quick as light and approaches the defiant woman, his eyes blazing with rage. But there is something else, something perhaps she would not catch: intrigue. Intrigue on how his words would push her, on if it would unlock what he himself now craves to see. The release of those emotions. The final fall.

Do IT.

“You sit there and you weep for those killed in this war and all wars before this one, and you curse the Sith. You curse the Empire. You have that luxury amidst war. You have the luxury of not knowing what we know - that their, that your deaths, while tragic, saves lives and ensures security. And that our existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves lives and ensures security. You soldiers that we kill are not FIT to be the warriors this Galaxy needs. They are not FIT to fight the wars to come. I have lived longer than you can possibly fathom, I have seen things you cannot even begin to comprehend. I have seen the edge of the Galaxy and beyond. I have seen what waits after death. If they died by our hands, they died because they were not FIT to live and fight THAT. And you know that I am right."

The Devil steps back, heaving with sweat beginning to form on his forehead, eyes wide and feral, teeth bared, fists clenched. He raises a gloved hand and points at the woman before him, "Do you want to prove me wrong? Do you want to vindicate yourself and the cause you have chosen to betray us all for? Fight me then. Take the first shot. Unleash your anger, your hatred, your wrath, your fury. Unleash what you have bottled up inside and prove to your parents that you are not a completely abject and utter DISGRACE.”

Lyra 'Sybila' Voikryt

 

[Lyra 'Sybila' Voikryt]

Location : Sith-Imperial Space, Outer Rim Territories, Obtrexta Sector, Bescane

T h e m a t i c

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---

Lyra had etched her own name into the powercell, and the woman craned her head to look at her father. His grey eyes withering and she had to tell herself it mattered, and only wished he might understand. Anger was ran along the long lines that spoke his age.

“You raised me to do nothing less, then what I have done,” she assured him with a waning voice.

The smoke the Sith had cast across the pristine luncheon still permeated, and she had enjoyed the scent. A single eyebrow etching higher at his choice, the taste was far too sickly sweet. They would have had a field day trying to categorize this man in Academy, but it did not summon any fond memories. To hear the name on the lips of a stranger was vindicating but it was an affront just the same; a call to arms. It was outside the realm of the soldiery persona she had long built, it made her feel just dangerous enough to see this through. An Inquisitor, she could not feel the claws digging into her mindspace yet but he could read her and her eyes narrowed every so slowly as their narration continued. He had known something, as faint as it might prove to be-all it took was a drop of blood to attract the wolves after all.

A terrible breath escaped her when his laughter began to peel through the lonely little flat. It was no good sign, and it was unnatural to witness something greater and terrible. It was not the cold amusement she expected from an opponent, the kind that had rationale to spare..Her servo hissed mutely as she squeezed the grenade resting in her lap. The sun was setting and the light dwindled, the fiery warmth creeping over them like a curtain call.

The woman had the faintest idea when she was being sized up, but Lyra couldn’t place it-there was something more...Their time was trickling down though, and the dent alone proved as much-her mother had jumped; nails digging into her armor. They were whispering something above her head, just their names-the simple weight behind their sentiment leaving a gnawing bitterness in her chest. Her parents with such fear...so much fear. Maker help her because she was scared too. Her tongue ran along her teeth, testing the edge as her shoulders tensed first.

The moment his eyes darkened Lyra knew, rigid as a statue in the seat she all but ripped her mother behind her-sending the woman stumbling back. Calculating the space that lay between them and him. His words reverberating in her skull and damning. It was as if he had stolen all the light from the galaxy and Lyra could hardly tear her gaze away.

“If this is a war of attrition, then why hasn’t the greater force-the Empire won?” Lyra demanded, something vicious tailing her words- all but interrupting him. Something alight in her eyes, burning. In the most simplistic form, the crimson blade should have crushed them. Such thoughts still found a way to dog her, it would have been easier had they never left at all.. Something slick fell down her cheeks, tears and she poised herself, the seat groaning. Waiting on baited breath as he pressed on into his unholy tirade. She didn’t think they could take the Braxat Run, people were fighting for the so called good and end all of the Galaxy..but if this so called greater mission was a worthy cause. The woman had to wonder why they were so alone in the fight.

A shadow of doubt fell over her weighing the blood on her hands, and she rose to her feet carefully. Irveric Tavlar was many things, terrible things that made her blood boil but a short scoff escaped her lips. Her head slowly tilted as she shook her head, weak was unfortunately not amidst his traits. She had heard of the cunning and ambitions of the Sith and their faults, and could clearly see them-even as she dressed herself with their title.

Lyra feared miscalculation, and that fear prevented her from seizing any ounce of power within. She understood this blindness now why the unfettered were so strong; it was intoxicating of a notion. Even if the form which presented itself was an enemy. Reaching out a dark gauntlet, Lyra grasped her father by the shoulder; metal digits digging in as she held him steady. The line was being drawn across the sand. Such was the nature of the Sith, escalation-a rising lift that sparked and screamed, tearing at its cables, the always looming whistle of bombardment. She felt it in herself as the malicious being casted itself unto the walls.

Survival was just as blinding as panic. Lyra could not bare the weight of demons drag her down yet, the words cutting like knives still-navigating through the haze and sheer wrath radiating like a fire. Perhaps, she faintly considered, his words could have inspired her but such sentiments were outweighed, resistance faltering on her tongue. Reacting only and stepping back and forcing her father to follow, she blinked before the Inquisitor had closed the distance between them. The tidal wave of energy building, foreboding and threatening to drown her.. and for a second time she found herself facing the avalanche, with only two hands to shield herself. The devil was coming for them. Her head whipped back and forth violently, shaking her head as the simplest of words ‘no’ tumbled off her tongue. The ravings of a mad man and she bore her teeth at him like a dog for stepping before her. Something sadistic bubbling within her, to see him hurt.

“A broken man..and true zealot,” the cold lips whispered into her ear, disgusted-the voice..her voice always linger in the back of her mind all too familiar. A cold sweat breaking out across her skin, influenced..overwhelmed by the energies that something deeper in her stirred. Her shoulders rose and fell, sucking in a deep breath. It was similar but far deeper than Korriban..then Phaeda. She could not turn her head, a physical force something familiar and herself forced her to look at the tyrant. It’s hand steady on her shoulder keeping her there. “See how his mind reels like a broken projector. You should put him out of his misery.”

This..man she loathed to call him even that was so deranged and outraged alone by the Order..she found it truly pathetic.


It struck a chord in her and an indigent screech hissed and escaped her throat, on instinct Lyra raised her boot all the while, expecting the blade, the knife, worst yet the call of lightning to smite her but she persisted. In one swift move Lyra kicked her father aside, sending him toppling past even the couch-such was augmented by the body suit. It should have pained her, hearing his grunt-his pain as he flew aside laid out on the ground, sliding away; just far enough maybe. She debased with only the mind of the simplest form of efficiency. Inhaling sharply, Lyra had her body between her and her mother still-that was enough and she he little black mynx, the grenade she had palmed..Lyra thrusted out her servo with it in hand, throwing herself forward. Her guilt had split her down the middle but that had blurred its lines.

“Fight him, destroy him.”

"Do you want to prove me wrong? Do you want to vindicate yourself and the cause you have chosen to betray us all for? Fight me then. Take the first shot. Unleash your anger, your hatred, your wrath, your fury. Unleash what you have bottled up inside and prove to your parents that you are not a completely abject and utter DISGRACE.”
Lyra 'Sybila' Voikryt

“It was nothing personal,” Lyra snarled, it was simply the truth-after all she didn’t even know him..but he had made it so incredibly so daring to play theses games. Unaware he was stringing this out like one might an orchestra, but she played her part. The woman simply couldn't care, detonating the void-stone grenade between them. A flash so disorienting erupting with an a sharp and ugly bang, the pin didn’t even hit the ground before the black dust burst in hand; clouding the room-choking them. Facing the brunt of the blast..it had to be enough..the mission itself at the forefront of her mind. The steel nerves wired through it aching as it exploded. Cutting herself off willingly. He shouldn’t have underestimated her pick of poison, she was smarter then to bring forth her rage and let it manifest..yet..

Kascalion Giedfield

 

[Kascalion Giedfield]

Theme: X
The burst comes unexpectedly in place of the Force, in place of what he was expecting. Pain courses through his chest where the orb of explosive material had been placed between them. It is a sharp pain mixed with a terrible blinding flash, like being hit directly with a pure bolt of lightning during a raging sea-storm. The pain is only exacerbated when he, out of sheer instinct the moment the flash began to form, uses the Force to shunt himself backward, unintentionally adding to the base wave of pressure from the orb. This combination of impact flings him back into the kitchen behind him like a rag-doll of feathers. His body collides with devices and accouterments and shelves and cabinets and counter tops - a grunt for each collision within the two seconds that he falls and flails before finally resting on the now soot covered floor.

He awakens to find himself on the Beach once more. The dead sand sticks to his palms like clay and refuses to let his legs stabilize as the colorless tide washes in. He struggles to move, get to his feet and escape before the Maw appeared. There is a new weight pressing down upon his shoulders, a great mass of doubt and fear that refuses to release its victim. He growls and groans and moans and tries to shift his body to knock the mass away, but he cannot.

He only barely manages to look up at the tide to see a man step in front of him, and another, another, and another. Multiple people rising from the ocean's tide. His eyes are unfocused, but he knows who they are when he gazes upon their faces. They are him, and he is them. They are who he was and still is. The proxies of the Empire's scientific cretin. A monolith of meat and muscle and albinism. A jawless mutation hidden in shrouds of black with an aura of crimson sin. A blood-lusted raven of nobility. A man of raw, unmitigated power. A knight of honor and glory. And finally, his current self. The man of mystique, of intrigue and guile, of mythology and dead gods - the one who has neared the goal he so strives for.

But something else comes for him from the waters. As large - no, larger than any other form he has inhabited in the current age, a creature of power and fury, yet temperance and wisdom. It walks on long hoofed feet yet it does not sink in the sand. Its grey skin meshes in the air as if it were made out of it, but its tattoos and bindings of a color out of space contrast so greatly they almost blind the sand-trapped Devil. It is regal and deviant. It is brawn and brains. Infinite and limitations. It is all that Kascalion Giedfield, Hand of the Emperor, was and is and could be.

It speaks in the voice that he has been hearing for months, and his mind strains to comprehend its words, "All you must do, now and forever, is free yourself of these chains and become me. Become yourself once more, Kavar di wer Kepesk Vemcini."

The Devil growls as his bones begin to ache from the weight and he feels the compulsion to respond against his will, "How...how do I do this...I am lost against the tempest of this time. I speak of knowledge I cannot remember gaining. I have existed longer than these people can possible know, yet I cannot recall where and when. I rant and rave, yet I fail to understand what it is I am ranting...and raving about."

The thing and all bodies near it kneel down to the slumped man and speak in unison, an amalgam of terrible tones and vocals, "Such is your curse of separation. I have imparted upon you slivers of all that you know, in hopes that you would remember on your own accord. Each body, each form, I granted something new. Extra. Yet, you have not remembered entirely because of this...this vendetta you have sworn yourself to."

The Devil responds clearer and with less strain, "They betrayed us. They betrayed the Empire."

The thing scoffs and rises once again, "Your loyalty to the Sith and comrades alike is great and respected, but you do not owe them such righteous vengeance on their behalf. Taken you into their borders, they may have, but I have kept you alive, powerful, and enticed at reclaiming a glory you could not fathom while you slaved and served. And you have slaved for and served enough lords since my death. The Sith. The Jedi. The Koignalteth. Admirable warriors, but you do not bow to them. You do not owe them your wrath. You are a Warrior-King, Kavar. You are their equal - no, their better."

The Devil slowly begins to rise from the dead sand against snapping muscles and cracking bones, "If you...are asking me to leave...because I owe them nothing...I will not. That is betrayal. I will not...betray my comrades. I will not betray my people...I will not leave them to follow the words of specter."

The eyes of the thing flash in annoyance, "I say not to betray them, child of wrathful temperament. But there will come a time when you must leave them, even if only temporary. Your Consortium will need a leader, Kavar. A true leader."

The Devil now stands against the weight, his face contorted into an expression of confusion and pain, "And just how...will I know when this time comes?"

The thing begins to encircle the Devil in the sand, slow methodical steps that resonate with thunder, "There will be a day where this corporeal agent you have so masterfully crafted will die. It is a day soon. And when that day comes, you must give yourself to me, for it is the only way you will survive. And a day beyond this event, you will find yourself fighting once more alongside me and my power, on the streets of your Empire's Bastion. And on both of these days, you will fight and you will slaughter and you will reach power untold among the pain you will suffer. And then you will retire to Conviction. To home."

"How will I fight on Bastion...if I am to die soon?" he asks with worry, eyeing those before him rather than the thing circling him, remembering the fate each form had faced.

"The depths of your castle upon Credence holds the secret even you have forgotten...the secret as old as stone."

Realization hits like a dreadnought crashing into a sun. The thing upon Credence underneath his home. The creation he could not name. "The...body on Credence...in my laboratory...it is yours. It is mine. Thus...to leave the Empire...and achieve these goals you so claim are of import...I must serve and slave and die until I am too damaged to keep fighting?"

"Until you are forced to heal and lead your people. This vendetta must not continue beyond the Empire's Bastion, not until you have become yourself once more."

The dead beach begins to fade into the colorless ocean like loose leafs on a windy road. His vision begins to brighten and the weight begins to lessen, freeing his muscles and bones. He looks to the thing as it recedes back into the ocean, "What of this woman? This Lyra child."

The thing stops and turns only slightly, "You will know in time. For now...survive her storm."

The Devil awakens not seconds after he had been careened throughout the apartment by the explosion and slowly rises to his feet despite the great pain shooting throughout his nervous system, telling him to stop moving and to rest, his magenta-gem eyes still locked onto those still with him. "Lyra Voi'kryt...that was not very cordial of you," he chuckles with a smarmy grin.

 

[Lyra 'Sybila' Voikryt]

T h e m a t i c

---

---

The flash ate away her sight and senses and Lyra stumbled back, the remaining scrap of the flash bang falling to the floor. The smell of explosives burning ripe on the air. The assault was enough to send her careening blindly back, tipping on her heel. In a heap of armor she hit the carpet of the home, the breath knocked out of her; a pain shooting through her neck as her head hit the ground.

..Lyra had stood uneasy among the other replacements…

..Just three men over from her, a private was getting berated, the stench of fear and sweat choking the transport, at least she hadn’t been the one caught quivering..

.. Those scum, degenerates-taking stance she laid into any shadow that emerged. She caught one of them but something shook the air; whistling... Dirt sprayed her vision and went dark. Lyra was airborne, her feet stolen out from beneath her and a percussion punched through her chest..

It was the broken holoclip she had watched, as if they would produce the results she had desperately needed in the wake of battle. Lyra remembered something and a hoarse cry escaped her there on the floor. How odd..that the memory would finally be returned, such had been on the mind and a long slumbering demon. Her ears screamed, a high pitch ringing and reberating through her skull and teeth, at least she wasn’t spitting blood. Through the haze of the black grit she could barely make out the ceiling fan spinning faintly above. The force was scattered now, like mixing oil in water.
Lyra had not seen where the beast himself had flown, his reaction that of a whip crack. She could only hope he too suffered now in this discombobulated frenzy.

The hum, that was always there gone again. Lyra blinked rapidly, forcing her chest to constrict and inhale; raising her hands out making out their shaking forms. Lyra could not reach out through the unknown and see a speck of life, she was alone with herself in that moment. The voices had stopped screaming and there was a void..a different kind of silence. Something pried from the back recesses of her mind if only temporarily and she could breath easier. Rolling over her cheek kissed the carpet, the light burned into her retna from the flash dancing across her vision as she saw a polished heel.

The chairs had been knocked over, small personal effects tarnished and broken on the ground. Trailing up the limb to find her mother sprawled out, her form still and Lyra’s heart seized a harsh exhale following. She stirred and Lyra dug her arms into the floor, pushing herself up and stumbling back to her knees. Something desperate behind her flight, Lyra reached out and seized her mother’s arm. Not her not now.. The dark cloud choking out the room, what last scraps of red light poured through the windows were diminished..

Lyra’s head swarmed and she turned the woman over, the slightest movement stirred from her. Their eyes met and Lyra stared, gently raising her servo moving to touch the aging temple cut and bloody upon her mother’s head. The blast had been enough to harm the woman and Lyra’s guilt mounted.

..Her mother ran her hands across the black uniform lapels, smiling tightly and Lyra beamed at the woman. The Officers ceremony was short and simple but the class celebrated with a certain mirth, tame as it was the small amphitheater was packed..

..”Dad didn’t come?” Lyra asked, the corner of her lip fell even as she stood ready for parade..

..”No he wasn’t able to..don’t worry though, we’ll take pictures alright?” her mother assured..


No words were good enough and she did not hesitate to haul the woman up, fighting the stupor. Any care she might have taken secondary to the nigh zero time frame allotted by a flash pan move. Her armor creaking as she held the woman aloft, dragging her away from the ground zero that had been their cherished dining room. Casting a glance over her shoulder, Lyra searched for the Inquisitor.

..Lyra..

The echo of a voice there, but it sounded like ten different people uttering the name. It wasn't her name, not truly anymore. With eyes wide, attune to every movement and breath, like a prey startled. Her legs carried them three full strikes before her mother started to find her footing. Lyra dared to snag her helmet off her hip with her free hand. Slipping it messily over her head, hair caught in the seal. Muttering a series of commands under her breath, the A.I sprung to life with cerulean lines racing across the screen. Her comms crackled and the ventilators hissed, filtering out the particles. Relaying her position and SOS across the line, she risked a second glance over her shoulder-meeting the vivid stare of the Sith Lord; ice coursing through her veins.

It was time to run, they could disappear in the crowds..She had a thermal to follow up with, the vibroblade on her back if needed. Lyra turned to haul her mother down the living room, servo twitching with a ghost pain. She only needed to grab her father and they might just escape the devil himself. Her fear now was her's alone, the desperate kind that came from the hunt. When she looked back though, toward the hall and exit..Lyra found herself staring down the barrel of her own pistol. Her father wavering behind it, pointing it at the nose of her helm so close it kissed the screen.

Kascalion Giedfield

 

[Kascalion Giedfield]

Theme: X

---

It is the choking that comes with it that bothers him most about Void Stone. The swelling of his esophagus, physical and spiritual, and the near-rupturing of his lungs. The lack of air that he can inhale, the irritation of his windpipe, the bronchial tubes that scream in pain as the black smoke curses them to deficiency. His eyes painfully redden and run with bloody tears as he struggles to maintain a standing posture. Each step and lurch is a grapple with his weakened body to reach the woman before she escapes. Each sharp, crackling breath is contention with his throat that yells 'you are dying' despite his willpower to live.

"Da-ned...Vo...d...Gre-des..." he chokes as his gloved hand braces on the damaged wall, his knees shaking and bringing his body down once more. "Why...do...hav-em?"

He rises once more as he looks at the woman seeking to flee. He shuffles forward to stop her, instinctively reaching out with the Force to grasp her leg, but all the comes with the attempt is a stabbing pain coursing throughout his entire right arm. He feels it as if it were removed by a blade, a phantom limb that he can see and move and touch, yet it is not there. It is just skin and bone without power. Nothing is there but weak, floppy flesh being prepped for a dinner table. Season with the black salt of the Void.

"Ly...a...bas..t'rd...girl...you...sne-ky runt," he mutters before falling face first against the stained couch, shooting back up and stumbling into the archway of the kitchen, back to where he started, sliding down against the wall.

His entire body is hollering in utter agony as he writhes on the floor, sneezing and coughing and vomiting tea and scones. His mind tells him that his spine is broken and in shards, his arms are twisted, and his knees buckled. Never has he had to suffer the effects of the Void Stone this long. Every previous time resulted in his usually immediate death. Decapitations, bisections, dismemberment, vivisections. No matter the era, no matter the body, it was always there. The allergy and the death. Lyra had not killed him - had not even approached to do so. She left him to suffer, intentionally or not. It was almost humorous to Kascalion. In the span of less than an hour, this woman has turned out to be the exact opposite of what he had expected.

He had expected a child, someone he could slay and move along with nary a second though. But this voice inside his mind, so confounding and contradictory of itself, had told him to wait and to not kill her. Made him see what was within. All to convince the Devil to stay his hand. And yet, only just now it had told him to decide what to do with her amidst its rhetoric. Was the voice he had heard prior to that vision truly the thing he saw on that beach? Or was it merely a psychosis of conflicting identities? He cannot begin to guess as he rises once again, umbrage breaking through his snarling, bile and blood coated face.

Spare? Kill? Spare? Kill? Spare? Kill? Train? Torture? Train Torture?

For once, the voice does not reply and there is only the humming silence and throbbing pain in his veins and structural weakness in his bones. He slouches and slumps and shuffles and shambles and staggers towards his target, his goals broken, wonderment and awe in their place, plans thrown out the broken windows. He wants to grab her by her neck, to pull her to the ground with him and shriek in vexation, to dominate and hurt her as a true Sith. To send electric judgement into her cranium and heart and diaphragm and make her feel what he feels. He cannot do that for he is still weak, and she is maintaining her stren-

The Devil stops in his tracks mere inches from the woman when he at last sees the emotionally charged father blocking the exit, weapon raised at his own sweet Lyra. A surprise to be sure, but is it a welcome one? The Devil is unsure.

 

[Lyra 'Sybila' Voikryt]

T h e m a t i c

---

---

Lyra’s servo rose to seize the barrel of the blaster, careful not to startle him. Her father’s grip was shaking-she wondered if it was age or if he might actually regret putting a gun to head. His eyes were narrowed, desperate and every nerve twitching. A short scoff, one that spelled defeat escaping her throat-unheard and her acknowledgment that the galaxy was just fucked. She heard the devil behind, echoes ringing in her ears as she rested her helmet against the barrel with a soft click.

"I'm your daughter," she pleaded, and he flinched. So this man had claimed, and it was put to the test. Abandoning them, defying them, terrorizing them..Her crimes so simple that could be written off as ungrateful. They were never meant to see eye to eye, Lyra was not a woman who saw eye to eye with anyone and that painted her habits far to favorable to begin with..

The worst recesses of her mind hoped he might do it, one silences bolt and it'd all be over. She had come home. That had all she had wanted, wasn't it? Reaching under the blast plate, Lyra kneeled there unmoving under his judgment. The retrieval team could find them, but she wasn't going to be leaving here so easily. Mason..her father didn’t say anything, speechless wasn't appropriate-he was still making up his mind but she ripped the chip out from under her armor. Wires straining and snapping and a short hum dying..but she held her hand up like and offering. If they never wanted to speak-to look upon her again if they made it out, Lyra reasoned she could live with that. Desperation bred tears in herself and she shook it in her hand, silently begging him to take it. There was no more time left for debate, the blue light steadily blinked. He did not move reach for the piece of scrap, but she did..all out forcing into his curled fist at his side-until he ripped his hand back. Lyra passed the homing beacon over to him though.

“Please..just go” Lyra uttered, the voice module cracking. There was faint pain rising from the back of her skull; washing over her.

Down every aging line on his brow, stretching down his eyes to jaw-Lyra could see her fathers struggling. He was disgusted with her, the twitch at his lip that bordered an ugly sneer. She was tired of waiting for others to speak, and she wretched his hand aside. Disarming his was a second nature, and she delivered it with a cold meticulous motion. Once upon a time, she had been scared of him but he had hesitated now.. In her minds eyes, he had forced her hand in turn. Gritting her teeth behind the helmet, the A.I flashed as it radicalized it’s sensors. A pain noise escaped him, her father’s wrist tweaked by motion-rocking back on her heels. They clung to their ideal no better then she did.

She had learned plenty from them in the end.

...An Officer stood a head over her, scrutinizing the I.D chip and company card she had stashed away. Inspecting every inch of the cerulean screen, trying to find some error; anything. All her bravado had led her to this one moment, mascara running down her cheeks as she cornered the man in the conversation. They wanted any reason to bag them and throw them in jail for the night, Lyra’s nose flared at the thought. The street was cast in red and blue lights all around the lower sector, the shrill noise of an alarm that would send the cautious bystander on their way. Just the wrong street at the wrong time, maybe they had been a bit too loud. Sisse’s own magnetic hands may have gotten them into this too..but Lyra would get them out. There were so many eyes watching them, and it made the girl’s skin crawl.

“Your father is on his way miss Voi’kryt, we will be taking the young man in the cust-”

“For false charges? You’re letting Sisse go but Deacon is the son of my father’s associate, he lives only one level below me. You’re causing yourself more trouble than you think sir,” Lyra argued, her arms crossed in front of her. Fighting every urge to fidget at the fraying cuffs of her coat, maker help her-her feet hurt. They had been walking for hours and the fatigue was eating at her patience. Tears of frustration slipping down her face, fear bubbling in her gut knowing very well she was deep in shavit and lying on top of it.

They had just wanted to watch the concert, that’s what she’d say.

Lyra pressed and whittled the Officer down until her dad had come to collect her. She was gonna put up a fight if he tried to drag her off, and she stared at his back all the while clinging to her friends hands. He was angry, wearing a grim expression-half disheveled woken up well past one in the morning for..this. It made her cry harder when she caught his eyes from across the street. The pair of sleazy cops had talked until she heard her father start yelling at them. She wasn’t sure how, but in the end he gave them one stern gesture-holding open the door to the small cruiser. Sweeping them out of the gutter. That trip home in the airspeeder was spent in sheer deadly silence, her father took her home first and she could hardly put up a fight. She was riddled with confusion, angry after he returned home-clearing out her personal effects and trinkets. He still never said a word on it; just doling out her punishment…

“Run,” Lyra urged them, the only thing standing between them and the Sith.

Her mother shrieked, and every hair on her body stood. She barely tilted her helmet over her shoulder when she felt the stench of the Inquisitor breathing down her neck..The hands wrapped around the bars and the cage shook again. Twisting her body, her armor creaked and she ripped her elbow back-raising her arm high as she moved. Turning around with a fury the woman threw her gauntlet, no questions to ask-she wanted to commit violence against this man. He who had driven the wedge down the center of a precarious crack, a shout-border screech bubbled in her throat as she descended upon Kascalion.

Kascalion Giedfield

 

[Kascalion Giedfield]

The hit to the face connects hard and is accompanied by the loud squelch of his noise being slightly shunted to the left of his face. The pain was barely noticeable compared to that of the Void Stone that still wreaked havoc across his body, but it was still enough to send him tumbling back in surprise.

Was it the impact of the hit or the fact that she had landed it? He does not know, but he does not care. The shrieking of the woman's mother infests his ears like pins and needles, a throbbing migraine forming from the pressure building on his drums.

"Stop sc..rea..m-ming," he grunts as his back connects with the ground. Rough. Hard. Definitely cracking some ribs. "Stop...screaming."

His eyes lock with the woman standing over him. Nary a second has passed since he fell victim to the hit, but it feels like an eternity. She moves slowly, as does her father and mother. Molasses sinking in a tar pit. The world around him hums, hums and squawks like a gull scavenging for food. An annoying sound.

Aggravation. Pins and needles. Need to focus. Need to silence the noise.

He groans as he rises to his feet, a snail on honey. He knows the woman will attempt to beat him down, defend her parents. But she cannot. Not both of them. Not all of them.

The screaming continues, shrill and banshee like. It is an unneeded distraction that keeps drawing his attention. A result of his temporary heightened sensitivity - negatively so - to noise, most likely a result of the black smoke.

Aggravation. Pins and needles. Stop her.

Time resumes as he throws his body forward after reaching a standing position, moving past the woman and colliding with her father headfirst into his chest. Both men fall out of the doorway into the hall where the mother continues to holler and scream at the sudden change in events. The Devil snarls at the ringing in his ears which now threatens to burst into his skull. He wastes no time and begins crawling towards the woman like a feral rat - frothing at the mouth in pure agonized rage.

"You are insufferably loud," he proclaims with spittle and froth.

He reaches her before she can escape his grasp and flee the immediate area, rising mere inches away from her face. A hand wrapped in tattered leather finds her throat.

Squeeze. Pull. Lift. Flesh collapsing in on itself, threatening to tear. Trachea snapping. Voice box crunching. Vocal cords shredding.

The screaming becomes shriller and shriller. The woman's arms flap and flail against his chest, beating and fighting to survive.

End it.

A sudden sharp swish and hiss echoes in the hall and the screaming stops. A stump of a gurgle replaces it and is followed by a deafening all-encompassing silence. A purple beam pierces through the woman's stomach and up through her ribs. Two smoldering orange holes mark her body as the life flees from her glistened eyes, her arms falling to her sides - limp and dead.

The Devil laughs, but it is not a proud sound. Instead, it is dissatisfied, laced with shock. Shock at himself? Shock at his actions and brutality - perhaps even...regret? He acted on a pained instinct, a drive to end the noise and continue the goal.

The voice - no, he himself - had told him to do whatever he deemed necessary to the woman and her family. Was this death a mere step into drawing his foe further into an irredeemable existence? The voice is himself, and he is him, but whose goals are the truest in this moment? Fight until a set point and depart for his true home or stay as a Sith and gain an apprentice. Both are ideal - at least, if the Devil were to fully believe the voice that is himself.

Both. Why not...accomplish both?

The words of a man he cannot remember careen through his mind: "You must fight not to accomplish a single thing in life. You must fight to accomplish everything in life, no matter the challenge."

Fight for both. Grieve for the woman, call them out. Drive the wedge.

He disengages the lightsaber he had swiftly pulled from within his coat in the moment and carefully lays the woman down onto the hallway floor. Her death was relatively quick, but not painless like he had intended. Perhaps that is what grieved him. Unintended suffering. If her family looks close enough through whatever hatred and grief must be blinding them, they can possibly see a phrase silently uttered by the Devil. An unthinkable phrase for him.

"I'm sorry."

He rises to his feet and curls his lip as if he had just drank curdled milk. Turning to the man he had knocked to the floor, the Devil practically whispers: "Look at what you made me do."

Lyra 'Sybila' Voikryt

 

[Lyra 'Sybila' Voikryt]

T h e m a t i c

---

---

She was unpracticed in the ways of the force, the snap and the refined fluidity. The corporeal of courage was draining and Lyra wielded her rage clumsily. The silver metal of her gauntlet had kissed the devil’s visage, painting her knuckles in crimson-snapping the flimsy bones. She had wrought this insult upon her Master well before, consequences be damned but this...this was only the start. The noise between her ears was static. The jolt of contact ran through her arm and the crack threw her from her stupor. Lyr-Sybila loomed over the bloody mess of a man and felt powerful.

She wanted to stretch open his jaw and plant it upon the curb and deliver a thousand more punishments, this was her home. The screams of her mother bleeding in the strike force’s radio calls, ETA..ETA...ETA.. Sybila didn’t listen to any of it, her shoulders rose and fell with each heavy breath, reality itself came rushing back as she stumbled forward. The woman seethed, and she stared at him from behind the polarized screen. The ventilators of her helm hissed and she winded her arm back as he stood. Sybila was too slow, senses lagging and she remembered the cost raising the wrong hand to the wrong man.

Cast aside in his mad charge before she could hope to wrangle him, his speed-he was practically a bullet and her hip hit the furniture and she was sent tumbling over. Armor crashing into the pieces, the glass of the table and the chairs clattering aside. There was the faint inkling of pain, but it was nothing like the percussion of a blaster shot or the nerve binding electricity scouring her. She hit the tile, metal scraping and tearing apart the surface and she slid to a stop before the long of windows. Dusk was settling outside and the room quickly was diminishing in the shadows-Lyra scrambled to pick herself up.

The dark cloud he exuded was there just out of sight and she was following the invisible cord that tugged her along. Slapping her gauntlet on the floor she propelled herself up with a strained groan. The woman raced around the last standing piece of the room, slipping around the corner to keep on his tail. Her heart in her throat as she rounded the hallway. The form of her father tossed aside, slumped at the base of the wall-clutching his midsection as he tried to gather himself. Her eyes darting from him to the dark figure in the hall, the terror of her mother reverberating on the walls.

“Get your hands off of her-” a scream caught in her throat, interrupted as her mother’s name was shouted. A desperate cry from her father raised, begging for him to stop. In one fell swoop, Lyra took three lumbering steps, she wasn’t close enough. Close the gap. Her hands digging across her belt-if he wanted to play these games...

Her horror mounted as she recognized the cylinder in his hand and Lyra surged forward the last few steps just as the blade ignited. The purple hue lighting of the hall, illuminating the fear etched upon the face of her mother. The sizzle cut short and fear permeated the air and Lyra’s hands shook. Her mother’s form seized in the hands of the Inquisitor, black gaping holes smoking from where he had stabbed the elder. Lyra’s body jolted, breath stolen from out her lungs. She was dead and Lyra felt the snuff of life disappear. The presence she would of known in the dark-the comfort of her mother's kiss on her brow-her steadiness. Gone.

Momma.

“No-,” the woman screeched, something sundering down the middle of her chest-the snap of the force rippling through the air. Not her, she had never raised a hand-Momma. The Force boiled in her blood, through the fog of the void stone’s own disruption.

No he couldn't have-

The power was drawn upon subconsciously, the cage in her chest shattered. Hot tears unseen slipping down her cheeks as she raged, she couldn't breath as she sobbed vocal cords shredding as she screamed an octave higher. Her helm's audio cracking, she was deafened by her own distress. Catching herself as she slumped to the cold ground before him. His theatrics were lost on her. A vortex drawing in upon her as the breath hissed in one sharp intake. The abhorred creature’s lips were moving but she heard nothing, as if he hadn’t just robbed her-her mother's body laid out in the hall. She had died terrified. Lyra’s vision ran red and her body shook, her wrath mounting and she recovered her buckling knees.

This wasn't suppose to happen, that should of been her-they should of never-

Lyra threw herself forward and the scream that strung out only mounted, the air growing with tension. Not her-The shrill noise echoed through the lonely home and drew the Force into unbeknownst to her. The noise twisted and unnatural as it only grew, her base instinct-to kill- driving her. The tables shook, the holo pictures clattered to the floor, and she brought the storm down upon him. Her gauntlets raised out in front her as made to tackle Kascalion, to wring the very life from his neck; to send him to his make. Every glass window down the row of the dwelling behind her shattering inward, shards dancing through the fluorescent lights.

Kascalion Giedfield

 

[Kascalion Giedfield]

Theme: X

He hated the sounds her mother had made, for they were grating and drum bursting and drove him to an act he did not want to do - another nail driven into the coffin of his descending sanity. This sound that the old woman's daughter now makes as she lunges for him in a blind, blood cell bursting rage, was acutely worse. He instinctively grasps his ears to deafen the noise, but it does not help. The glass shards seem to follow and beat her in the race towards him, piercing him like tiny spears, as the building bucks and bends under the impure emotions of this new aspect of rage.

The Devil only slightly gasps - more so grunts- when the woman's tackle reaches him and connects without issue, partly out of shock towards her ferocity, partly out of the impact, and partly out of glee and joy. The clatter of his lightsaber resounds as it is sent flying down the hallway. Her hands wrap around his neck - charred and torn from the damnable Void Stone attack earlier - the screaming echoing through his hands into his head. Blood begins to trickle between his leather-clad fingers as his palms moved from ears to offending wrists. The Devil attempts to remove the blasted woman's grasp, only to find that his strength has yet to return in full. Empowered by the Force and emotions, the woman is stronger, even if for a moment only.

That moment is all the Devil needs for his plan.

The world around him begins to go dark, darker than the darkest pit he has seeped himself in. The woman's snarling visage fades in this dark as he claws and scratches at her wrists as her mother had done to him. Rapid breaths become ragged and shallow as his throat begins to compress and swell shut once more. His feet kick and flail against the shuddering floor, heels cracking stone, and metal supports. The sounds of his gurgling breath drown themselves in his slow demise and his frantic movements cease. There is nothing around him now, nothing but a void.

Every fiber in his being screams at him to fight back and keep the woman from killing him, but something deep in his heart and his mind allows him to accept this encroaching defeat. The first defeat he has been so willing of. The step she needs to enter that irredeemable existence and become his as so many others have. She will be a follower, a killer under his fist. All she must do is take this first step, and he must let her.

What are you doing? Stop her! FIGHT! FIGHT!

Kavar! Save yourself Kavar! She is a weakling! Kill her!

Show them your power. Rise from the ground and beat her into submission!

Why are you letting this happen!

The Devil laughs, logically expecting the ocean to appear before him, ready to take him into its waves as it has before.

But it does not. In fact, it never comes. Not one speck of the colorless water fills his vision or his lungs as he takes the lessening number of breaths he has left. His heartbeat quickens in worry - fear, perhaps. The ocean was how he always returned. With every dive under its murky depths, he rose anew on the dry land, in a new corpse walking under the guise of living.

"Where are you?" he whispers. "Where are you?"

Something now appears in the distance, encroaching upon his position with rapidity. No, what appears before him after what feels like an eternity is something different. Something that drives fear into his dying heart.

It is a grey mist, shifting and molding like slime as it draws closer and closer, a single light in its center that pulses with painful brilliance. Tendrils of nothing blades quickly shunt towards the floating Devil, piercing his skin, and his muscles, and his organs, and a face takes a distorted shape in the grey. Kascalion rears his head back in pain and roars as the mist envelopes him, the nothing blades digging deeper and deeper to draw out his blackened sinful blood. His roar turns to screams of agony, which he can only discern as an orb of something, touches his chest, burning through his clothing into his chest.

"What...are...?"

A boom - wild and violent - shakes his body as the nothing blades threaten to separate ligaments from his torso. The mist shudders and shakes and compresses around him like the ocean depths. Bones crack, shatter, and snap through his arms and legs.

"What are you?" he cries out once more, screaming at the top of his collapsing lungs, watching as his blood pours out of his wounds in rivers and oceans of their own, so drawn into his fearful stupor that it does not dawn on him that the blood turns increasingly red from oily black.

"Stand up," the mist whispers in broken echos. "Be better. Fight. Be foolish...no more. Take...claim...not wait...not blame..."

As he would later realize on the streets of Bastion, when he encountered this blinding mist once again, this was something necessary for his survival. As he would later learn within the library of his home on Conviction, this was in fact something he never knew existed. Something near and dear to his heart. Something that, for the first and only time in his life, he truly and completely loved.

His vision inexplicably returns. Only seconds have passed since he had fallen to the ground with the woman seeking to slay him - the last thing on his mind now.

Clawing hands turn to furious fists and careen towards the sides and stomach of his foe, emerald green electricity sparking between his bloodied fingers. The mist, whatever it was, was right. If he wants this fearsome girl as his apprentice and his killer, he must take her forcefully. Sometimes, he finally decided, going about plans with his deceased's brother's methods of brute force worked better than schemes and tactics.

Beat her into submission. So be it.
Lyra 'Sybila' Voikryt