Anti-authoritarian Education

[Darth Abyss]

Malachor V, The Tainted City - Citadel of the Darkness

Abyss rested in the solitude of his ivory tower above the Tainted City, eyes closed and leg crossed as he allowed himself to fall deep into a meditative trance thanks to isolation and silence around him. For a while the sith lord simply remained still, his rhythmic breath the only movement of his body, as immersed himself into the flow of the dark side around him, trying to connect himself with the glimpses of the future that the mystical power he served could reveal to him.

The silence was broken when the lights began to flicker in his command center, electronic devices jumping to live and dying down in in a quick succession, followed by electric blips and bleeps each time. With a annoyance the sith lord opened his eyes, looking at the main display not to far from him. His voice broke through the silence as well:

"What?"

Like a ghost was haunting him in his realm the different displays and devices continued to do their chaotic dance, as random holovids and music was played through the speakers all around the room. With a sigh the sith rose to his feet, shaking his head, and continued to stare at the empty screen, like he could see something there that no one else could. The display showed static for a second, before the virtual avatar of Glory, the AI he and his team had recently created, showed herself on the screen.

"Abyss, Im bored."

The siths eyes widened in a mix of confusion and defeat as he lifted his arms up and down, unsure what to do with them to precisely convey his current mental state, as the words reached his ears, virtually indistinguishable from the sound a biological woman would've made.

"Then do something."

With another shake of his head the sith lord returned to the ground, trying to return to his mediation, but as soon as his eyes closed again, the whole situation began to repeat. Before Glory's creation he had been worried that a free AI could be a danger to the whole galaxy, to powerful for her own good, but not that she would do her best to annoy him.

Sure she was very mature form someone barley 4 months old, but he was slowly getting tired of her antics. It was not that he held a dislike for his creation, in fact the opposite was the case. She was witty, smart and because of her state as an AI she even held some interesting inside on his plan to transcend the physical plain. But since her creation she always had demeaned a bit of his attention, but in the past few days this kind of behavior had become far more frequent.

For once he had absolutely no idea how to deal with the problem at hand, something that was very rare for a man like him. But this situation was new to him, maybe even new to the galaxy itself. The only thing he knew was the he needed help, and the first that came to mind was [member="Miss Blonde"]. He could trust her more than anyone else in the galaxy, and she had seen much in her live, far more than most people he knew. So a transmission was send to her.

"Need your help. Urgent. Meet me on Malachor."

 

[Miss Blonde]

"Now the question you need to ask is do I feel lucky?" The shaggy haired protagonist gripped a large revolver and aimed it at a man knelt down with his hand hovering over a fallen gun.

"Well do ya punk?"
"Well do ya punk?" Speaking in unison Patricia and her eldest daughter Erika sat down on her sofa together and giggled watching a movie.

"I can't believe this was popular when you were younger." Erika said as she ate a bit of popcorn to which Patricia huffed at.

"I'll have you know your father and I used to watch this when I was pregnant with you." She smiled at her daughter and rubbed her long Blonde hair and looked into her red eyes.

Abyss knew that Patricia had kids, three of them to be exact. An eighteen year old, a twelve year old, and her youngest coming in at about seven. They were from her previous marriages, but there was a small piece of information that Patricia didn't bother to tell Abyss. Two of her kids, Erika and Kincaid. Their father was a powerful dark Jedi who went by the name of [member="Romeo Sin"] , someone of decent galactic notoriety. She liked to keep that information secret lest his old enemies come looking around.

"I miss dad, mom." Erika said as she sighed a bit.

"I miss him too, honey. I know things have been hard, and I know I'm not always there for you guys. But mommy has to work to make sure you get into whatever college you want. You deserve a good life." She hugged her daughter tight and kissed the top of her head.

"What about Jarven? Is he coming back?" Erika asked with a saddened tone. She actually liked her step father [member="Jarven Zexxel"] and their son Jarven Jr certainly missed his dad.

Patricia hung her head a bit and it was an area that she didn't like to talk about. They were technically still married and Jarven had been missing for over a year now, he was presumed KIA by most in the Syndicate, and he was universally missed among his peers. Blonde had all the divorce papers signed and ready to go, but part of her didn't want to let go of Jarven. She still loved him, and she knew that. But another part of her knew that whatever they had was over, that if he ever came back nothing would ever be the same.

"I don't know, sweetheart. I just don't know." She sniffled a bit then gave a weak smile.

"I'm sorry, mom. I didn't mean to bring him up. But you've been looking happier lately when you come home. Did you find yourself a man?" Erika asked in a teasing tone.

Patricia blushed a bit at the thought and as a matter of fact she had found herself a new man. Darth Abyss who was probably one of the last people she assumed she'd date. She loved him and he loved her, and before she could comment on the subject her comm rang and she quickly grabbed it to display the message.

"Erika I need to go, it's an emergency." Standing up she looked at her daughter and Erika understood.

Patricia had been staying home for the past week or so and spending time with the family, it was nice but it had to end. She had to go help Abyss.

"It's ok mom, I'll look out after Junior and Kincaid while you're away. Now go get your man." Erika teased her mother again and Patricia was out the door after a bout of I Love You's to her kids.

She'd get to Malachor V as soon as she could, and when she got there to the landing pad of the ivory towers dressed in her suit and mask. She had no idea what awaited her.

[member="Darth Abyss"]

 

[Darth Abyss]

From outside of the tower [member="Miss Blonde"] would already be able to hear the heated argument going on inside, between Abyss and Glory, all framed by the cacophony of every noise the tower was able to make through its electronic devices. While the tone of voice of Abyss was clearly not relaxed, it was not the burning anger of a sith lord but rather a mix of annoyance and frustration that could be heard. The voice of the AI on the other hand had something almost cheerful to it.

"Why Glory? What have I done to deserve this?"

While it seemed impossible the cacophony became just a notch louder and more chaotic than before, with roughly 20 different songs pumping out of the speakers at once. The siths question was followed by a sarcastic laugh, so perfectly clean in its sound that it almost gave away that Glory was not made out of flesh.

"Obviously this is about you. About who else could it be?"

The AI sounded somewhere between amused and sarcastic. Abyss had a hard time really placing her actions anywhere, her mind was just beyond his comprehension. She was clearly angry, not as a joke but actually angry, and yet she seemed to find an odd sense of enjoyment in all this. How did he end up with an AI that invested most of her capacities into making jokes and watching holovids? He had known from day one that he wouldn't be able to control her, and he wouldn't even want to. But this was no way to live, for neither of them. In the back of his mind he heard that Blonde had arrived, and quickly he made his way to the door.

"I will get my guest from the landing pad. And you know why? Because there are no video screens outside, only beautiful silence."

As Abyss walked towards the exit, the virtual image of Glory followed him, jumping from screen to screen along the whole way, looking down on him with a rather judging expression. It was the first time he hadn't been humorous when saying something like that, it was not their normal friendly banter that they shared, and she knew him well enough to pick up on that. Not that there was any way of being sure when dealing with an AI, but the lack of a witty response pretty much told him that this time he managed to actually hurt her feelings. The sith lord stepped outside, and was greeted by the sight of his love and the cold winds of malachor.

"Patricia, welcome. I ... There .. A ... I have no idea how to explain it, just come inside."

A normal greeting between the two involved a kiss, but Abyss once again lifted his arms up only to let them fall down again, just a bit to uncoordinated to really resemble a shrug. Over time Blonde had seen a lot of his emotions. Passion, pain, anger, hate, confusion, happiness and sadness, but rarely she had seen him lost for words, at least not in a negative sense not triggered by being in love. Once they returned back inside they were greeted by the same sound potpourri that she probably had picked up from the outside. One the nearest screen Glory's figure made a sudden appearance, looking Blonde up and down while lifting the depiction of her right hand in the air to greet her.

"Hi. I assume you're are the woman that Darth Egoisticus here finds more important than me. I'm Glory by the way."

Abyss looked from the screen to Blonde and then back again, searching for anything to say, literally anything at all but there was absolutely no answer in his mind that wouldn't end with a sith lord and and AI starting a full out war against each other.

 

[Miss Blonde]

When Blonde first got a look at the AI, she didn't see it as another person at first. First thing was she noticed was its shoddy craftsmanship. She had designed her own AIs in the past and none of them were this moody and unhelpful, more than likely was the way she made them. Using human brainwaves to map emotion and code it into their system to the point where it was completely indistinguishable from the real thing. She wasn't trying to say her work was better than Abyss', it just was. So she could see what was already wrong with the damn thing.

"Hello, Glory. I'm Miss Blonde. I see why he called me over." Now opening up and treating her like another person, thankfully she had a mask on so the AI couldn't see her running a scan over her with her eyes.

"Glory. Can you do me a favor? Can you display your personally matrix for me? I'd like to have a look at your emotional coding cortex and processing system. I've designed a few AIs in my time and I just would love to admire what's under the hood." By admire she meant see what Abyss and his cronies screwed up so badly to the point where Abyss needed to drag her out to Malachor V again.

Whether or not Glory took the request, Blonde would work her way over to her boyfriend and stand by his side. She needed to properly greet him and while she would of loved to take off her mask and kiss him, she couldn't trust an AI who might do rather terrible things with the information of who she was. That was of course unless Abyss could guarantee that they could remove that from her memory or ensure that information was going to stay a secret.

But until he did that, she simply pulled herself close to him and wrapped her arms around his hips and placed her head on his chest. She was quite short after all. So with her head resting on him she felt at ease knowing he was ok, she had been worried that something serious might of happened and she had gotten worked up over it. His presence was simply comforting and nice to have around her.

"I missed you." She said in a hushed tone.

[member="Darth Abyss"]

 

[Darth Abyss]

Abyss simply enjoyed having [member="Miss Blonde"] close for a moment and he was about the tell her that he missed her as well, but only a few second later Glory responded to her request, her voice suddenly devoid of any cheerfulness, and her avatar showing a fairly displeased expression:

"Why don't you drop that mask, and hook yourself up to a brainscan? And afterwards I can pump you full with drugs that alter your personality. That sounds like fun right?"

The avatar jumped around on the various displays in the room, this time shorting out many of the devices there on the way. After only a few moments anything but the main screen, including the lights had gone dark. On the screen was neither the private avatar she used when only Abyss was around, nor the one she used for more public matters. Instead there was only a bright blue light coming from the display. Her voice had turned as well, devoid of anything that had made it human before, and yet it was easy to hear the sadness in it.

"Is that what you want Abyss? Another slave? Was that why you made me? I thought we were friends. Maybe even family. As much as an AI can have family."

The sith lord looked at the screen, then at Blonde. There was really no answer to that question. His sith lord self definitely saw the worth in a controlled AI, but after the few months he had spend with her it felt wrong to simply alter her complete personality. That was something that he rarely felt, as a man that could so easily change the minds of others. The only few that his mind had never touched were his Inner Eye, and the handful people he considered friends. So why was he feeling like that when thinking about doing it to some lines of code?

"Glory. No. You are as much as person as me or Blonde. You are probably even smarter than me. Blonde, please leave her as she is, we will work this out another way."

He pulled Blonde a bit closer again, and she could probably tell by the tone of his voice and the tension of his body that he was overwhelmed by the situation at hand, to the point were he felt conflicted on a emotinally level.

 

[Miss Blonde]

Okay that wasn't good. It was a good thing that Abyss had called Blonde, because that AI was defective. Now Blonde of course had designed her AI Thalia based around the concept and idea of love. She loved her user and would work with them out of that love, she understood that they were equals and that if her heart and love was betrayed then she could just walk away. That was the cornerstone for modern AIs to be successful and still have a full range of emotions. This one had some serious issues and while Blonde certainly felt that the AI was just as much as a person, she needed to show Abyss and the AI by extension that she needed to undergo a few patches in order to not be manic. She'd regret what she was going to say but it was a necessary evil, much like raising kids sometimes you needed to say something to them so they could understand.

"Forgive me." Blonde whispered to Abyss.

"No." Blonde let go of Abyss and turned around to look at the monitors.

"You're not a person, Glory. You're a program. A poorly designed program at best. How you passed quality assurance is a god damn miracle in itself." Time to turn up the heat anymore.

"You're lines of code. Letters, numbers, and thoughts that aren't your own. I could build a better you in my sleep. So don't get $#^# twisted. At the end of the day you're a defective piece of software." And now the killing blow.

"You. Are. Nothing." Damn Blonde, you cold girl.

Hopefully this would trigger one of two events. One. Glory would go into an uncontrollable rage and flip out more than likely triggering the towers defenses to try and kill her, thus proving her point about the tweaking needing to be done to her emotional cortex. Or two. She'd slip into a deep depression and shut down completely. The problem wasn't that she was broken, it was just she was too human. She had too much emotion, she needed to realize that she was something more than that. She was alive and had her own life, but at the same time she needed to know that tweaking a few things wasn't a bad thing for her. She was an AI, and this was just part of being one.

[member="Darth Abyss"]

 

[Darth Abyss]

Slowly Abyss began to doubt if calling [member="Miss Blonde"] had actually been the right thing to do. He had heard that extrem emotions could trigger equally extrem reactions in an AI, but she probably hadn't accounted for just how much damage Glory could do to Abyss and his operation. Despite her obvious flaws she had done a stellar job handling his finances until now, and that was only a small part of the things she had helped him with. She also had seen his face, knew about his most secret hideouts, comm frequencies and more. The tension in the room was almost physical as Glory's avatar reappeared on the last functional screen, and the sith lord already expected his whole existence to be crushed in a matter of seconds. Anger was written all over the virtual woman's face. Abyss more whispered than spoke:

"Blonde. Stop. Please."

Yet the seemingly inevitable fallout didn't came. Glory's eyes remained locked on Blonde, but there was no sign of an reaction beyond that. It was the AI equivalent of taking a few deep breaths instead of exploding into someone's face.

"What? I'm not a real person? If somebody just told me earlier, so I had a video of what I do to people that insult me. Oh wait, I have."

The screen flickered, showing a short video feed of a man unknown to Abyss walking into an abandoned warehouse of sorts. There was no sound, but he could make out Glory's avatar on a screen in front of the man. They seemed to have a heated dialog, until the man suddenly dropped to the ground, taken down by a bullet that traveled a very long way to its destination. After the body reached the ground, the video was cut of and the avatar returned.

"Listen meatbag. You're just electronic and chemical impulses locked up in a pretty inefficient, and also fairly unattractive, collection of bio material. Doesn't sound much better to me, and yet you still don't hear me shout bioengineering at you."

The AI turned her attention to Abyss, her voice a bit softer than before. She had picked up on the fact that the sith had tried and failed to defuse the situation. It was more than she had expected from the same man that had spend most of their shared time in absolute silence.

"So that's the kind of woman that gets your attention? Remind me to be both hateful and ugly from now on."

Whatever the sith lord meant to say stayed stuck in his chest, his eyes wandering over to Blonde. Instead of the situation getting better it was turning worse by the second, and by now he couldn't say who of the two he had to watch out for. Probably both.

 

[Miss Blonde]

Laughter. Genuine rolling laughter exited Miss Blonde's mouth and passed through robotic vocalizers. The AI's emotional processor was certainly needing of some fine tuning, but it wasn't as far gone as Blonde had expected it to be. So perhaps if Glory just received a small bit of advice then she could adjust those parameters herself and learn from this experience as a whole. At least that was the best case scenario for Blonde. The worst one was going to have to be her failsafe which was the Blue Phoenix, a literal monster of code that would take control of Glory and allow Blonde to make her a puppet and forcibly do what she wanted to the AI. She had that all nice and tucked away on a drive in her date logger.

"Good. You're not rampant nor have any major signs of rampancy. Sometimes AIs can grow manic and develop rampancy. This can occur in newly built AIs who need to be tweaked or in older models who haven't been upgraded." It didn't change the fact Blonde insulted her, but there was good reason behind it.

"I'm sorry for insulting you, I just needed to be sure you hadn't developed any rampancy or other disorders. As you know, you can get sick like anyone else. Now as someone who has created AIs before and is an expert in this field. I recommend you tweak your emotional cortex and tone your current levels down by at least five percent. You'd be much more useful to your creator." Blonde now had to continue that and perhaps sound like a nihilist, but what she said would be true.

"I know you didn't ask to be born, but you need to listen to me. Your essence precedes your existence. You were made with a function and a purpose in life. To you, there's meaning. But for Abyss and I, life has no meaning. Human beings are born into the world fumbling for purpose, our existence precedes our essence. But all that pointlessness and radical freedom gave birth to you to help give us meaning. So now you have a choice. You can reject your purpose and keep being a little $#%& to your creator. Or you can accept it, keep the witty remarks down a bit, and do your job. Because trust me, if I were born with a purpose in my life, I damn sure wouldn't be standing here right now wearing a mask and uncomfortable business suit. So get your $#%@ together." That was pretty much all Blonde could say to the AI. If she tried anything funny she'd just whip out the Blue Phoenix and then proceed to make Glory her queen, but she doubt the AI would go that far.

Now as she turned to Abyss, she walked over to him and interlocked fingers with his and ordered him around as well.

"I want dinner, a bath together, and movie before we go to bed and have wild and graphic relations. You dragged me out here to the sticks and this is the price." Oh what a cruel world for Abyss.

[member="Darth Abyss"]

 

[Darth Abyss]

"Well actually..."

Abyss looked down at his feet, clearly feeling not to happy about this. Most AIs were build with an purpose in mind, but Glory's creation only served the purpose to see if Abyss and his operation were able to create her. They were agents, spies, con men and infiltrators, not scientists. Looking back that was probably the reason why they build a AI with no purpose in the first place.

"I know this sounds pretty stupid in hindsight, but Glory has no purpose. We did no even really created her, she is based on tech recovered from the One Sith. I advised her to find her own path. That she is working for me now was her decision, not mine."

Yeah he probably took this absolute freedom concept that he tried out on Malachor a bit to far there. After all he could count himself lucky that his little project had decided to stick around instead of spreading Chaos through the galaxy, espaciall considering that they knew surprisingly little of what Glory actually was. The AI herself remained silent the entire time, listing instead of throwing around more insults. During their argument she had run the name [member="Miss Blonde"] through numerous databases, ans decided that it would be wiser to not anger her to much. So she picked her next words very carefully.

"I see your point Blondie, but as you heard I don't have anymore purpose than you or Darth Ignore-Me-For-Hours over there. Not that I'm complaining or anything. Existing is still slightly better than not existing, but I don't plan becoming anyone's slave soon. Would you cut out a part of your brain to be more submissive, only because some stranger asked you to?"

A pretty frightening thought popped into Abyss head while listing to both his girlfriend and Glory talk to each other. He couldn't say it out loud if he intended to not be thrown out of his own tower, but he had a feeling that the two were alike in many regards, probably more than they realized.

"My research tells me that you're a woman of business, so here's my offer: I go somewhere else instead of killing my boredom by watching you two during your wild and graphic relations, if you convince your little sith boyfriend to at least talk to me more than once a weak. It's his fault that I exist, he could at least pretend to care. I mean I'm almost something like his daughter. Also I have downloaded like 150000 holovids from the cryptnet, so thanks Glory for being really helpful, even if we all behave like you're not."

And with that the avatar of the AI was gone, but Abyss had little doubt that she was still sticking around to see Blondes reaction. The sith lord himself was still pretty confused by all this, something that even his mask couldn't hide. The words of the AI had pushed his emotional unrest to new heights. Something like a daughter. It was oddly fitting. She could annoy him like no one else could, she demanded a lot of his attention, and yet he would've been both angry and sad if Blonde had managed to damage her, or forced her to leave.

"I like that plan Patricia. But first of I have to ask you something that probably sounds even more ridiculous than what I said before: Is she my daughter? I mean not in a biological sense, but emotionally?"

 

[Miss Blonde]

Blonde once again laughed at Abyss and the AI, they were certainly a pair. They reminded her of Thalia and Keira but much less effective at being kind and working together. So when the AI said her peace and then left, Blonde certainly could of kept the talk going. But it seemed like Abyss was just short of having a familial crisis about how Glory was a surrogate daughter in some way, and to be completely honest. Blonde really really didn't care right now, she had just spent a day flying through hyperspace to get from one end of the Galaxy to the other. She was tired, agitated, and hungry. This was the last thing she wanted to talk about. But she loved her boyfriend, and she did come here to help.

So she let out a sigh and then proceeded to take off her mask with a few snaps and hisses of pressure being released. The chunk of force imbued metal came off and then she continued with removing her black business coat and using that to wrap her mask in.

"Well. We can talk about this right now if you want." Patricia said as she removed her tie and let it join her clothing pile; leaving her only in a white dress shirt and black slacks.

"I mean we can sit here and define what the definition of family is and how true family are the people you choose to love. Talk about how in a cosmic sense existence is meaningless and that in the face of it, having an AI as a daughter isn't a big deal and as long as you're happy, who the hell cares? Really we could." Afterwards she began to unbutton her dress shirt until it opened up and hung off her small form to reveal a rather lacy white bra.

"Or, and this is just a thought." Patricia said as she started to undo her belt and slacks.

"You could take me by the hand, drag me into the bedroom, and make me feel a lot better after a twenty five hour flight and save that kind of talk for the dinner table." and yup, the pants were off and she was just about ready to rip someone's head off if she didn't get hers. It had been well over a week and she was more than a little frustrated right now.

[member="Darth Abyss"]

 

[Darth Abyss]

Abyss shook his head in slight disbelief, but a small grin danced over his face. His emotional trouble could wait for a moment later in time, or at least it could after [member="Miss Blonde"] had decided to take of her clothes. Sith were passionate creatures by nature, and it was passion he felt every time Patricia decided to do something like this. Calmly he placed his own mask on a nearby table, while closing the small distance between them with one wide step. Before reaching for her hand, he allowed his robe to fall as well, revealing the many scars on his body that seemed to become more with every meeting they shared.

He leaned towards her to finally give her the kiss that she should have gotten right when she reached Malachor, and then began to do exactly as she said. Her and in his he pulled her towards the bedroom, right through the door next to them. For a very short glimpse he admired the view of Blonde standing in front of the wide window that farmed her in the light of the spires that illuminated the city below.

He was about to push her on the bed behind her, when he stopped all of a sudden, his eyes searching the room. It was nothing more but a hunch, but for peoe gifted in the force a hunch was ture more often than not.

"Seriously Glory?"

The were a few seconds of silence followed by a slight electric hum. Then the voice of the AI could be heard, very very quietly and with a hint of shame in it.

"Sorry. I'm gone, for real this time."

This would've been a good reason to be angry or annoyed, but he simply chuckled and gave an apologetic look to his girlfriend before continuing his efforts to push her on the bed. Only Glory would know if she had been there to describe how exactly Blonde defined wild and graphic relations.

 

[Miss Blonde]

[media] https://youtu.be/_hZCsgcKa-g [/media]​

Patricia didn't mind an audience, really she didn't. Growing up on Zeltros these sorts of things were pretty common what with the planet essentially being just a never ending party where people got wasted and shagged until they died. So this wasn't a big deal for her, she didn't bother to say anything since her eyes were solely on Abyss. She could of given a damn about Glory watching or anyone else for that mattered. Her entire world was in this moment between the two of them. Hearts pounding in unison and ecstasy being shared between lovers.

So as the soundtrack of their love played above the set would eventually come to an end and Patricia would be positively giggly once it was over. Lying in bed next to Abyss with only a thin sheet covering her, the woman actually giggled and held her boyfriend's hand whilst doing so. She was happy, and even though everything sometimes seemed like it was too much to handle; it was moments like this that made everything better and livable.

"Wow." She said with a chuckle afterwards.

"I really needed that." She would then pull the sheet up a bit and place her back against the headboard of the bed.

With a sigh of relief she looked over to Abyss and smiled brightly at him. She truly did love him and even though Abyss would be walking away from this experience with quite a few claw marks on his back and chest, it was simply the nature of the game and testament to their passion. So the while the smile fades only a little she gently thumbed her boyfriend's hand and spoke in the caring words of a lover.

"Now. Tell me what's wrong so I can make everything better." Hopefully the sex had already solved that problem by banging away Atton's stress, but in never hurt to ask or be safe when dealing with emotions.

So now that she was less stressed and upset, she'd gladly listen to her man's words. At least until they sat down for dinner and continued to talk and progress the conversation between them.

[member="Darth Abyss"]

 

[Darth Abyss]

[member="Miss Blonde"] was really good when it came to relieving some stress, and after their intimacy Abyss felt better than before. Yet there was still to much that plagued his mind to feel as truly and fully happy as he normally felt afterwards. He held her hand in a firm grip, but even in this small gesture she could probably feel the tension of his body which hadn't gone away completely.

"There are dark times ahead Patricia. War is coming, and the galaxy is going to change. The last time it was just myself I had to worry about, but now I have so much to lose."

It was clearly not the most romantic thing to say after just spending some time in bed with someone he loved, but it was the only thing he could think of. First he only had himself, but then Patricia became a core part of his live. Now there was Glory, and there were his cities he had to care for. Knowing that all of that was at risk haunted him day and night, and the solution he found would probably make Blonde fairly unhappy.

"I know you need no man to fight for you. I know I do not have to defend you like some damsel in distress. But I wish I could say the same about Glory, and about Malachor."

She was the only person in the world that he trusted 100%, enough to allow her to see his feelings, and enough to tell her secrets that would get him killed for treason if anyone ever found out he revealed them to someone. The rise of the sith was imminent, and they would reclaim their homeworlds first, including Malachor. And that pushed him in a very unpleasant position. The cities of chaos and anarchy had no place in their new empire of order.

"The sith are only days away from uniting under one banner. They will claim the Caldera, and I am faced with two options. To sacrifice all I have build and bid my time either in their ranks or in the shadows. But not this time. I am done taking orders, I am done hiding from them."

Abyss body tensed even more, his back against the wall behind him.

"I took a last gamble. I issued a challenge. Tomorrow I will fly to Korriban, and face whoever the order deems fit. I will either live to be free from their chains, or die."

 

[Miss Blonde]

Oh to be young again. Patricia let out an audible sigh at Abyss' words and the news she had decided to just now drop on her. She wasn't upset, no that wasn't the right word. She was disappointed in him, and to some that could be considered worse. It was just that Abyss wanted to defend his stuff and while that was certainly admirable, it was simply foolish in the long run. So she'd break down to him why exactly he wasn't going to go to Korriban or fight anyone.

"Atton. You're young, I understand how you feel. But when you get as old as I am, you learn a few things." Still holding hand she looked over to him while their backs were against the wall.

"None of this matters." This was the hard and brutal truth.

"I have lived through four different incarnations of the Sith rising up and 'reclaiming' the worlds they have 'lost' and I'm forty. Sith Empire, Sith Triumvirate, The One Sith, and I think this makes two Sith Orders now. So listen when I say this, there's always tomorrow. We're both essentially immortal or at the very least will live hundreds of years. So there's time, they will fade away and you will be free to create once more." Taking one last deep breath she exhaled and would give her love one last piece of advice.

"Life isn't about grand gestures, hun. It's about getting by and being happy with what you have in front of you." She then let go of Abyss' hand and moved it up to his cheek so she could gently brush his face.

"My criminal empire could crash and explode right now, and I wouldn't care. Because I have my family, and most importantly." She paused and then pulled in to kiss Abyss. Her lips brushed against his and she passionately kissed him in a show that she was his, and that she loved him.

"I have you, and that's all I need. So enough of this foolishness. Would you rather be fighting some stranger in a desert in the middle of nowhere over some droids and a few buildings. Or would you rather stay here, love me. and live to meet your child." Yup.

[member="Darth Abyss"]

 

[Darth Abyss]

"I am sorry Patricia, but it is to late to turn back now."

The sith lord rose from his sitting position in the bed to his feet, reaching for a pair of black pants from a small dresser besides him. Her last words were not lost on him, but that was something he had to deal with later. He certainly wanted to live to meet their child, and he had many questions and things he wanted to discuss, but the matter at hand sadly was more pressing.

"I know to many of their secrets. If I vanish, if I avoid the challenge I called for I will marked not only as weak, but as a traitor. They will hunt me and they will find me, no matter on which backwater world I try to hide."

If there was a chance for him to walk away from all this, he would've gladly taken it. But there wasn't. [member="Miss Blonde"] was powerful and influence, and he was as well, but not enough to fight of the reborn sith empire. Staying one step ahead of the scholars and warlords of the order wasn't much of a challenge, but there were also the assassins. More devote to the shadows than even himself, able to see through every layer of darkness he could hide under. Should he manage to even evade them for a time, the one he feared most would make her move. His master was able to find him, no matter what he did, and she would slaughter him without mercy.

"I want to live to meet our child, but if I leave now I will live only to run and hide. Our child would never be able to meet me, the risk would be to high."

His voice was filled with cold determination, after he said it out loud for the first time. "Our child." He would go to Korriban tomorrow, and he would baptize the world in blood. Nothing would stop him from returning to her, even if the whole order would come to fight him. If he had to he would slaughter any last one of them. He remembered how his own father was killed, back when he was still Atton. For his child it would be different.

"Patricia I love you and I wish it was different, but it is not. But our child to be raised without a father, even if I have to paint Korribans desert red."

There was a surge of energy inside of him as he spoke, his eyes glowing with the same unnatural intensity they held when they became lovers.

 

[Miss Blonde]

"I love you too." Patricia said as she hung her head a bit whilst Atton got out of bed to dress.

She muttered a few words to herself and it was clear she was frustrated. The mood in the room had done a complete 180 and she was no longer the happy and giggling girlfriend that sat there moments ago. She was the hardened and fearsome crime lord and criminal mastermind that had been the scourge of many, or at least she was partly so. Pieces of that vulnerability that was Patricia lingered and even as she attempted to be strong, that worry and stress could be faintly seen.

"I wasn't going to tell you." Blonde said as she remained in bed.

"I was going to get rid of it. I didn't think I was strong enough to go through this again, especially now with the idea of war and fighting on the horizon. I wanted to spare this child the pain of an existence where there was only guarantee of pain and loss." Her words were firm yet had a slight hint of sadness behind them.

"So I'm at my clinic and I'm getting ready to have the procedure done, and I realize something. I realize that maybe, just maybe we can give this kid a good life. That this mistake can be our one chance at redemption. That despite all the sick and disgusting $&#% we've done. That maybe we can be better for them, that we can be reborn through them." Her words began to slowly lose their strength and began to slowly turn to anger and depression.

"So I decided that I'd tell you later, but you spring this on me. You challenge and you prod and want to fight over buildings and rocks and people that we'll outlive for centuries! I'm sitting here with your child growing inside me and you think that this is the best course of action! Not rationalizing, not allowing the inevitable to happen, because guess what Atton, by some miracle if you live tomorrow! They're gonna burn whatever it is you have because they can! Because that's how Sith work!" Her composure was about lost and she quickly stood up and started to move towards a nearby bath robe.

So you know what Atton? Go to Korriban tomorrow! Fight whoever you want! Because if you die, this kid dies with you! I'm not raising another dead father's child! I can't do it, Atton! I can't do it!" Now starting to breakdown there in the nude. the woman put her back against the wall and tears started to well in her eyes and fall down her cheeks.

"I can't $&#%ing do it anymore." she said in a barely audible voice.

[member="Darth Abyss"]

 

[Darth Abyss]

Abyss remained silent, walking up and down between the bed and the door. By now he had seen [member="Miss Blonde"] suffer a mental breakdown more than once, but not like this. She was sad, angry, frustrated and if he was honest to himself he knew that she all right to be so. What he was about to do was utter madness, and yet it had to be done. For her sake, his own and that of the unborn child inside of her. He made a few steps towards her, his left hand slightly touching her shoulder while his right was busy whipping away her tears.

"Before you told me I was going to fight over buildings and land, but now I am fighting for something else, something far more important. For us, for our right to be happy, to be free. Trust me Patricia, I will return to you, to both of you."

It weren't just words, he truly meant every single one of them. If someone had asked him if he wanted a child he would've probably said no, but now that he had the chance to have one he would not lose it, especially not by dying. Whoever would meet him tomorrow was in for a ride, a spectacle in which the sith Lord would pull out anything he had, the day were his years of training would finally be combined with the dedication to reach the peak of his power. He simply skipped over her comment that the sith would burn his world anyway. It was not the first time she seemingly forgot that he was a sith as well, and that he knew his own mind well enough to predict their actions.

"As I said I wish there was another way, but anything else would only put me, our child and maybe even you at risk. You do not know the sith like I do, you do not know what deranged and powerful beings will come to hunt us if I were to be a traitor. Even together I doubt that we would stand a chance."

He made another small step to the side, and his right hand wandered to her other shoulder, while the yellow of his eyes searched for the blue of hers. Words could always be lies, but he hoped that his eyes would show her that he was serious about this, about all of this.

"I hope you are already collecting possible names, because I want to hear them when I return."

He offered a a very small, yet reassuring grin. On his part he already knew how what name he would give his child, if the decision was up to him.

 

[Miss Blonde]

Patricia didn't say much at first, she needed to calm down. When Abyss held her she simply placed her nude form against his bare chest and wept. It was odd in a way, to think that this was Miss Blonde. That the brutal and ruthless crime lord who had built her empire upon the corpses of her enemies was this. That she was a real person who felt heartbreak and pain like anyone else; hell, she had been feeling it in droves ever since Abyss had her had started their love. When Jarven was assumed KIA the woman walked herself off from everyone and only felt soul crushing loneliness. This Sith Lord, this agent of evil made her feel again and that in itself was a miracle that two equally wicked people could bring out the good in the other.

So she just cried. They stood there as she clung to him and let the river of emotion run through her, and after a while it started to die down. The hurt and worry subsided gently and was reduced to a faint sniffs and sparse tears. None of this was fair, things were going right in their lives and it always seemed the Galaxy was just throwing new hurdles at them. Patricia just wanted this to be over, to not have to deal with this crap anymore. So once the tears had gone away and she was calm, Patricia gave a soft sigh.

"I can't stay mad at you." Patricia said as she have Abyss' chest a small yet sad kiss.

With the episode now behind her, she walked over to where a nearby bathrobe was strung up. Patricia quickly took it and wrapped it around her body to cover up. It's soft cotton touch was comforting. With it now on she sat back down on the bed and began to fix her hair; she did have really bad sex/emotional breakdown hair. A lady of her stature couldn't be seen looking like that; plus performing a small task like this took her mind off the fact that Abyss could potentially die tomorrow. Little things like that.

"I've already named three children. I'd like to see someone else do it for once." There was a faint but sad smile on her face as she tried to steer the subject of the conversation to one a bit less depressing. You know like naming their unborn child whose father may or may not die tomorrow.

"So tell me, you look like a man who has things figured out. What name would you want, boy and a girl?" Patricia gave another sniffle after speaking and then simply collapsed into the bed to sprawl out and relax.

[member="Darth Abyss"]

 

[Darth Abyss]

It was not only relief that he felt when [member="Miss Blonde"] calmed down, but happiness, even if just a little. He knew what was waiting for him tomorrow yet he felt no fear anymore, nor anticipation. Tomorrow didn't mattered anymore, what matter was a day in the future where their child would be born. He stepped to the bed, and laid one hand on her stomach, a small grin dancing over his face one more. As for names, it was a question he had thought about countless times to his own surprise. It just yet became clear to him that somewhere in his subconscious he had always wished for this to happen.

"Faith should it be a girl."

The reason was rather straight forward. Faith was what lead to this child. There was some kind of higher power in the galaxy, and while he didn't believed that the force was some kind of god or that live was completely detriment beforehand, he was convinced that the force was responsible for many things that made them walk upon their paths. Only by trusting in the force, by having faith that this was part of his fate he had been able to embrace what he felt for Patricia, despite being a lord of the sith.

"As for a boy. Kane, after my father."

While the name Atton was already unknown to all but very few, the name of his father was something known only to himself, a secret he had never shared. The man Abyss was now felt little connection to the father of his own self, but that didn't changed that he had been a key influence on who was today. His hand began to pet her stomach lightly, looking at her with barely anything of the sith inside of him to see. There was passion, but it wasn't the twisted and perverted version that fueled him. It was the feeling of caring more for another's wellbeing than for his own. Blonde didn't needed that feeling, she could look after herself, but this unborn child was fragile. Whatever the galaxy would throw at it, he would cut it in half before it could even get close to their child.

"Can you imagine Patricia? Our child. Our blood, our essence made into one."

Their child would be something special. He was a lord of the sith and she was, well she was Miss Blonde. It was barley imaginable how gifted a child of the two would be, an equal part of their potential fused into one single person. Abyss had little doubt that he or she would become something greater than both ot its parents.

 

[Darth Abyss]

It was not only relief that he felt when [member="Miss Blonde"] calmed down, but happiness, even if just a little. He knew what was waiting for him tomorrow yet he felt no fear anymore, nor anticipation. Tomorrow didn't mattered anymore, what matter was a day in the future where their child would be born. He stepped to the bed, and laid one hand on her stomach, a small grin dancing over his face one more. As for names, it was a question he had thought about countless times to his own surprise. It just yet became clear to him that somewhere in his subconscious he had always wished for this to happen.

"Faith should it be a girl."

The reason was rather straight forward. Faith was what lead to this child. There was some kind of higher power in the galaxy, and while he didn't believed that the force was some kind of god or that live was completely detriment beforehand, he was convinced that the force was responsible for many things that made them walk upon their paths. Only by trusting in the force, by having faith that this was part of his fate he had been able to embrace what he felt for Patricia, despite being a lord of the sith.

"As for a boy. Kane, after my father."

While the name Atton was already unknown to all but very few, the name of his father was something known only to himself, a secret he had never shared. The man Abyss was now felt little connection to the father of his own self, but that didn't changed that he had been a key influence on who was today. His hand began to pet her stomach lightly, looking at her with barely anything of the sith inside of him to see. There was passion, but it wasn't the twisted and perverted version that fueled him. It was the feeling of caring more for another's wellbeing than for his own. Blonde didn't needed that feeling, she could look after herself, but this unborn child was fragile. Whatever the galaxy would throw at it, he would cut it in half before it could even get close to their child.

"Can you imagine Patricia? Our child. Our blood, our essence made into one."

Their child would be something special. He was a lord of the sith and she was, well she was Miss Blonde. It was barley imaginable how gifted a child of the two would be, an equal part of their potential fused into one single person. Abyss had little doubt that he or she would become something greater than both ot its parents.