Private And not a soul to hear…

[Serina Calis]

Location: Underground Hideout, Rakata Prime
Tag: Quinn Varanin Kaila Irons
Kirie
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The chamber was still, save for the soft clink of glass against porcelain. The air, thick with the scent of aged wine and the heavy weight of forgotten power, hung around Serina as she slumped further into her obsidian throne. The vast hall, once filled with the hum of activity and the constant vigilance of her guards, felt as empty as her heart now did. She was alone—completely alone in this cavernous, oppressive space. The walls, carved from the deepest black stone of Rakata Prime, seemed to close in on her, the coldness of the stone a perfect match for the icy emptiness that had settled within her.

Her fingers, adorned with glowing crimson gauntlets, grasped the black chalice with a steady, practiced hand, lifting it to her lips as she drank deeply. The wine burned as it slid down her throat, the fire doing little to numb the ache she felt deep inside. There had been too much loss, too much bloodshed. The chaos on Susevfi, the near death of Quinn—someone she had come to care for more deeply than she could admit. That's what she had thought she wanted, right? To destroy, to control, to bend everything to her will. But now, as the alcohol hazed her mind, she couldn't shake the bitter taste of regret.

Her golden blonde hair, once styled with care, now fell loose around her shoulders in disarray, framing her face in waves of softness. But there was nothing soft about the expression she wore—eyes bloodshot, red from a combination of fatigue and sorrow. Her face, still beautiful, was marked with the weariness of someone who had lost everything, yet couldn't find the strength to stop.

The wine flowed freely, the last remnants of her once-immaculate control slipping away with each sip. Her fingers trembled, and the chalice wavered slightly in her hand, but she didn't care. She had long since abandoned any pretense of grace. The shattered remnants of the world she had tried to build around herself now felt like little more than dust in the wind.

Susevfi… it had all gone so horribly wrong. Quinn's near-death, the lives lost, the destruction that had been caused. And for what? What had it all amounted to? Serina had not stopped to think—had not stopped to question the truth of what she had been doing, what she had become. The voice of the Dark Side, the thing that had driven her to this point, had once felt like a call to power. But now? Now it was an oppressive weight that pressed down on her chest, a reminder that she had never truly been in control.

She closed her eyes for a moment, letting the tears fall freely, the saltiness of them mixing with the wine. Each drop was like a small release, a breaking down of the walls she had spent so long building around herself. It was the only thing she had left to feel—this emptiness, this sorrow.

"You're mine, Serina." The voice of the entity whispered in her mind again, familiar, but distant now. She didn't want to hear it anymore. She didn't want to feel its warmth, its twisted comfort. She didn't want to be reminded that she was its creation, its tool, and that her every decision, every action, had been shaped by its will. She was the Dark Side. And the thought made her sick.

Her chest tightened painfully, and she placed the chalice down, the clink of it reverberating through the hall like a final toll. Her head fell into her hands, her fingers tangled in her hair. She could feel the cracks beginning to form in the fragile armor of her mind, the mask she had worn for so long slipping away. She had never truly known what it meant to be free. She had never truly been in control.

In the silence that followed, her mind raced through the events of the past months—her death at the hands of the Jedi, the chaos of Susevfi, the deception of the rebellion, the battles she had fought and the lives she had shattered. She had told herself she was doing this for power, for control, for the sake of the galaxy's future, but it felt hollow now. She had failed Quinn, failed herself. She had thought she could hold everything together, but now, the pieces were slipping through her fingers.

She couldn't even remember the last time she had felt joy. Real joy. It was buried somewhere deep inside her, drowned by the weight of the Dark Side, by her own endless ambition.

Serina wiped the tears away with the back of her hand, her breathing shallow and uneven. She had no answers. She had no direction. She was lost, adrift in a sea of regret and self-loathing. The Dark Side had given her everything—power, strength, dominance—but at what cost?

She could hear her own voice in her head, taunting her, mocking her weakness. "You will never be free, Serina. You will never have control. You are mine. And you will always belong to me."

The thought made her shudder, and she gripped the arms of the throne tighter, as if she could anchor herself to something solid in the swirling chaos of her mind. But there was nothing solid. There was nothing left.

"You are my child," the voice murmured, like a distant memory, like a lullaby that should have soothed her but only drove the knife deeper. "You are my creation, Serina. Everything you have done, every choice you have made, it has been because of me. And everything you will do... will be for me. There is no escape from your nature. No escape from yourself."

The words echoed in her mind, over and over, and she felt herself crack further. Her once-strong resolve, her pride, her ambition—everything she had fought for, everything she had strived to become—felt so meaningless now. She had never been in control. Not really. She had been a puppet, and the strings had been pulled by something far older, far darker than her.

A hollow laugh escaped her lips, the sound dry and broken. She couldn't stop the tears, couldn't stop the sorrow that consumed her. It was a devastating realization, one that tore at her from the inside. She was a shadow of something greater, something that had shaped her, molded her, and would never let her go.

She was the Dark Side. And the Dark Side was her.

The hall was silent, save for the soft sound of her breathing and the occasional sniffle that escaped her throat. The darkness in the room seemed to grow heavier, as if it too could feel her sorrow, as if it too was mourning. She sat there, her hands trembling, her mind racing, her heart broken. The chamber around her, once a sanctuary, now felt like a prison, and she, the prisoner, was trapped inside her own creation.

No one was here to see her, no one was here to hear her. And perhaps that was the cruelest part of all. Even in her deepest despair, there was no one to comfort her, no one to share the burden of her pain. She was alone in the most profound sense. Alone in her throne, alone in her mind, alone in her soul.

The tears continued to fall, and though no one was there to hear them, they echoed through the vast, empty hall like a cry lost in the void.