Faction House Io: Securing the Past (PM to Join for non House Members)

[The Battalion]

RELICS FIT FOR THE TAKING

IN THE AFTERMATH OF THE COLLAPSE OF THE MAJOR FACTIONS, WHOLE SWATHS OF SPACE HAVE YET TO BE SECURED.

HOUSE IO WARSHIPS OPERATING FOR MONTHS ON END WITHOUT CONTACT ALONG THE DARAGON TRAIL HAVE SET UP THE SCOPE FOR A MASSIVE OPERATION WITHIN THE VALLEY OF THE DARK LORDS ON KORRIBAN, LEFT UNDEFENDED AND UNSECURED IN THE WAKE OF THE ASHLAN'S COLLAPSE

HOUSE IO MOVES TO MAKE THE UNPRECEDENTED STEP OF ATTEMPTING TO SECURE KORRIBAN'S LOST RELICS, AND POSSIBLY SETTING THE STAGE FOR SOMETHING LARGER AGAINST WHOEVER COMES TO TRY AND TAKE IT.

OBJECTIVE 1: VALLEY OF THE DOLLS

OVER SEVERAL HUNDRED CHAPLAIN NUETRALIZERS HAVE BEEN ASSIGNED THE TASK OF BREACHING AND CLEARING AS MANY OF THE TOMBS STILL UNTOUCHED AS POSSIBLE. JOIN THEM IN THE DEADLY TASK OF CLEARING OUT SITH TOMBS, FACING OFF AGAINST SITH SPIRITS. YOU MAY BE FORCED TO CUT A BARGAIN WITH THEM, OR WORSE, THE CAPRICIOUS GOD YOUR HOUSE WORSHIPS

OBJECTIVE 2: BLESSINGS
KORRIBAN IS A HOLY WORLD OF THE DARK SIDE. RECENT BLASPHEMY BY LIGHT ADEPTS HAS TRIED TO WEAKEN ITS DARK NATURE. YOU HAVE CAPTURED OVER TWENTY FIVE HUNDRED CITIZENS OF THE GALACTIC ALLIANCE AT THE VERY FRINGE OF THEIR BORDERS, ALONG WITH OVER FORTY TWO JEDI, TO SACRIFICE IN A GRUESOME, PAIN FILLED RITUAL. ASSIST THE BRAIN DEMON CULTISTS IN RE-CONSECRATING KORRIBAN IN THE NAME OF THE DARK SIDE (DO NOT GET GRAPHIC, RELY ON THE GORY DISCRETION SHOT)

OBJECTIVE 3: CONVERSION

MANY SECOND GENERATION HOUSE TEENAGERS ARE TAKING THEIR FIRST EVER STEPS ON AN ACTUAL PLANET BY COMING TO KORRIBAN ON A STATE SPONSORED FIELD TRIP! SECOND GENERATION CITIZENS ARE YOUNG, IMPRESSIONABLE, AND HAVE FULLY ACCEPTED THE IDEA THAT ALL CULTISTS ARE FAMILY MEMBERS MORE THAN THEIR PARENTS HAVE. IT IS SUSPECTED A GOOD NUMBER WILL BE SEEKING OUT CULTISTS TO BE BAPTIZED IN WITCH BLOOD. HELP THESE SOULS FIND THE DARK EMBRACE OF THE BRAIN DEMON BY CONVERTING ANY WHO ASK ALL WHILE TAKING THEM ON A SCENIC TOUR OF KORRIBAN LANDMARKS!

OBJECTIVE FOUR: TO HELL WITH JEDI!

A LARGE NUMBER OF JEDI KNIGHTS HAVE LANDED ON THE SURFACE SUPPORTED BY ESSIONIAN REMNANT FORCES. HUNT AND FIGHT THEM, PREVENT THEM FROM DISRUPTING ACTIVITIES ELSEWHERE (THIS IS FOR JEDI CHARACTERS WHO WISH TO BE IN THE THREAD.)

OBJECTIVE 5: BYOO
​

Wearing: Channeler's Skin

Consort's Ring

Armed With: Elaine Tear's Lightsaber (Corrupted)


Objective: Mixed.

Earlier, Trade League Space


The Battalion's red blade smashed against that of a Sith Master. Her thirst for his blood was already at a fever pitch, her brutal combo of Djem So and Makashi up against his use of Pure Juyo. She hammered her blade against his in a savage frenzy as they dueled on Korriban. He had brought an entire company of heavily armed Sith Troopers with him. They were deeper in the valley, having set up a large FOB.

Her stepsons, The Model 1's, had volunteered to go in. The Battalion had declined, having not engaged in a brutal slaughter in weeks and desperate to slake her innate need to inflict pain and suffering on others.

Plus, she wanted to impress her wife.

Red blade clashed against red blade in the desert wastes, the Witch howling in delight as she inflicted faster and faster slices and stabs, the other Sith Jumping back and attempting to Force Choke her. The flesh on her neck deformed as her air way cut off by she staggered to him, even as her chest cavity collapsed in on itself from a crushing telekinetic attack, acidic white blood erupting from the fissures that opened across her body because of the crushing attempt. He was very strong.

But some of her acid blood hit the armor and some parts of his hilt, and rapidly began burning through. It couldn't affect flesh, but inorganic material was a much different story. He backed away, saber malfunctioning as the mutilated Battalion stepped closer, face and neck and chest crushed, sustained by the power of her suit and her hatred of her opposition.

She reached out deep into the Corrupted Aura of this earth...and began drawing strength from it's silent bones greedily into her own body, which began vreversing the damage.

"I have a special connection with this world..." The Battalion hissed through a shattered Jaw. "I once helped save it..."

"It will make for an excellent tomb then." the Other Sith snarled, garbed in spiky black armor, a contrast to her skintight white and black catsuit.

The Battalion leapt for him, Force rage swelling her muscles to body builder purportions as she ruthlessly battered her blade against his again and again, until she finally ripped it out of his grasp, going out of her way to avoid killing him as she slowly dismembered him, feeding on his suffering and hatred of her to accelerate the healing of her injuries. Soon, it was as if she had suffered no damage at all, muscles deflating disgustingly and resetting to their initial size, the nexus of Dark Power that she had attuned with during the Major Factions attempt to annihilate Korriban making her stronger than usual here as she took off into the air at high speed with the Force, flying through it towards the Forward Operating Base The Sith had set up, wreathing her body in purple flames as she prepared to rain fire and despair from above--

A glint of metallic slammed into her and she tumbled from the sky, blocking the Lightsaber blade on instinct as she crashed into the desert floor, multiple bones breaking as she hit the ground, white blood leaking from her, flesh grinding off her face and torso, exposing the pearly white skull and bones, slick with white blood and rotted looking yellow muscles. The Battalion's jaw hung loosely from her head, dangling by a few bits of muscle as she spies the other catsuit clad figure floating above her."

"Ah..." The Battalion hissed as her jaw lashed back onto the rest of her head. "The ex."

She concentrated and the powerful Korriban Nexus flooded her cells, massively aiding in regeneration as Syd Celsius landed across from her, orange blades activating.

"You're the monster that corrupted her."

The Battalion took a bow.

"I can't take all the credit of course." The Battalion smirked as her body repaired itself fully. "After all...in your own way...you helped me..."

Syd Celsius frowned, clad in her Blue and Gold Suit.

"Perhaps...but Laertia's choices were ultimately her own..." Syd spoke.

"I suspect that is the only thing we agree on." The Battalion replied. "I was recreated from the Tissue of Darth Phyre. I do not fear you."

"Then you will die braver than most." Syd replied coldly.

The Battalion chuckled, brandishing her crimson Lightsaber blade.

"Do I detect a hint of vendetta?" The Battalion chided. "If you had been more hands on, more assertive, I might not have managed to seduce her. Perhaps she might have come to her senses, by your perspective."

The former Elaine Tear grinned savagely. "But that's not what happened is it? You ran, like a coward. You fled from her like you fled Starlin Rand . All that amazing, city destroying potential in you and you run. It boggles the mind!"

The pair circled each other in the desert.

"I should never have left her. Or him..." Syd said remorsefully. "If I had known...if only I had known."

"Hindsight is a perpetual motion curse in this industry..." The Battalion conceded. "Why have you come? To kill me?"

"The thought had crossed my mind."

The Battalion shrugged. "Everyone dies. Even Amy. Even you. Kill me and another qualified Cultist would take my place as her Wife. We are all married to her, Syd."

Syd narrowed her eyes. The Battalion could tell innately that Syd hated her.

"Makes you wonder, who really cared about her more..." The Battalion taunted, preparing to strike.

"Are you comparing yourself to me?" Syd asked, disgust evident in her features.

The Battalion rubbed her chin in mock thoughtfulness.

"I suppose you could interpret the question that way, couldn't you?" The Battalion mused.

"Well, it's obvious I cared about her more." The Battalion sneered. "But I was speaking more of your Sith self in comparison to your current self.

"That thing that had taken over The Amalgam was not me." Syd snarled.

"But it was spawned from you. When you briefly reverted to being Phyre." The Battalion taunted. "Think about it: the copy of you never abandoned Laertia. The copy of you never once questioned it's support. The copy never betrayed her to her enemies the way you have tried to. The copy helped save a Planet. Who loved her more, Syd? You? Or You?"

Syd flung herself at the Battalion savagely with a battle cry and the Battalion was barely able to fend off the chaotic series of slashes and stabs that taxed the limits of her ability. Syd tried to roast her alive but the Battalion's Force Armor protected against the severity of the assault. Continually, she fed on the power of Korriban to replenish herself, but even then, Syd nearly killed her multiple times.

It was one of the most exhilarating duels she had yet experienced in this era. To her delight, Syd had proven every bit as deadly as she imagined, even managing to slice open her Torso more than once, even swiping off a quarter of her head, which stunned her, allowing her neck to be snapped violently by Syd, which stunned her further.

But the power of her enchanted suit, bolstered by the natural Nexus of Korriban, kept healing these brutal, normally fatal wounds at astonishing speeds.

Syd realized that what held true for the Amalgam at Krayiss 2 in her duel against Starlin held true here also for this Witch, in that so long as such a potent Dark Side Nexus was present, the Battalion was almost impossible to kill while on its surface. She had an astonishing attunement to the Nexus, from Syd's observation, a rapport with the planet itself through past struggles.

This was not a battle that could be won through conventional means.

Force Light flooded out of Syd's Mouth, and the Battalion let out a screech as she was driven backward, flesh and suit burning at the exposure.

Hate welled in her, and a severe blast of purple flames escaped her throat, slamming into a screaming Celsius who struggled to genuinely disperse them, as they were both powerful naturally, in addition to being Enhanced by both her suit and the Korriban Nexus.

She had barely gotten free when The Battalion's Lightsaber was barreling down on her face. She barely managed to get her staff up in time as The Battalion attacked her in a savage, graceful series of Form 2 attacks. As Syd preferred Form 2 herself, this was another indicator of how deadly The Battalion was...how how terribly obsessed with Syd on some level that Laertia still was...or was it Phyre Laertia was attracted to?

Gods this was so confusing sometimes.

"You were a fool to come here." The Battalion hissed in contempt. "I have become more powerful than you by a large magnitude. Even were we not in this great Nexus, I would still be your superior."

"I'm not dead yet, schutta." Syd snapped as their blades locked together."

"No..." The Battalion sneered. "Not yet. But I'm going to correct that shortly."

"Come and get me, you diseased maniac." Syd snapped.

The used the Force to shoot up into the sky, still slashing and stabbing at one another with their blades. The flight upwards allowed The Battalion to get a birds eye view of the landscape and she howled as she tackled Syd, going to Maximum Speed as they careened to the ground, crashing into an ancient ritual sight, Syd having used a burst of Force Light from her mouth to melt the Battalion face off and through off her flight.

Syd, went cold as she realized where the cunning beast had flown them.

It was an ancient ritual site, enchanted to interfere with the bond between Master and Apprentice so when the Jedi in question was assimilated into the Cultist for long term imitation, any distress they felt, any horror at the excruciatingly painful death assimilation entailed, wasn't transmitted through the bond.

Syd was stunned, heavily injured. Starlin wouldn't feel it. Starlin wouldn't feel it.

The Battalion had recovered first, and tackled Syd to the ground.

"You were good in your day, Syd..." The Battalion said with a cold smirk as her hands grabbed a struggling Syd's face, containing Syd's power through sheer will, preventing her from using it.

"But it just stands to reason..." The Battalion hissed, minds already reaching deep into Syd's.

"That when it came time to cash in your chips..."

Syd's flesh started to bubble and shudder violently against her will.

"That this...diseased maniac..." The Battalion continued, flesh starting to bubble just as violently as she began to drain Syd's mind. Syd's flesh began to swell, veins threatening to burst through it, eyes and tongue beginning to bulge out to grotesque purportions as Syd made hidious gasping and choking sounds, as she felt a wide swath of herself go into this beast.

"... would be your banker..." the Battalion snarled as her face warped into that of Syd's.

Fissures began to erupt across Syd's squealing body, building to critical detonation.

"Mind over Muscle..." The Battalion spoke, and began to will the body of her rival to explode. Syd's deformed body swelled even further, steam erupting as it built to critical detonation.

A massive blast of Electric Judgement slammed into The Battalion who was sent horribly deforming across the ritual site by Nathan Bloodscrawl, in his typical black biker gear.

The Battalion rose up as Nathan activated his saberstaff.

"Why, Morris!" The Battalion said. "Fancy running into you! Are you with her?"

"Believe me, I wish I wasn't." Nathan replied coldly. "Hello, Elaine. I see you were in the process of becoming Darth Phyre."

"You can stay and watch if you like. I've already absorbed the vital parts of Syd, there's nothing guiding that body there hardly, just whatever personas clinging to whatever fragments of her memory they can hold together to keep from busting apart at the seams..." The Battalion gloated, Syd's body completely deformed into a lumpy mass of screaming faces, her now shapeless, bubbling head a lampreys mouth of noses and eyes and teeth from every personality inside of her, multiple arms and legs of the witches in her growing out of her arms and legs, writhing on and squealing like a pig.

"Tell me..." The Battalion said, smirking with Syd's face as she and Nathan circled each other. "Did you wait, just a little, to see who would win?"

"I got here as fast as I could, Elaine." Nathan responded grimly to her.

"Admit it, Nathan..." The Battalion remarked, pointing her red blade at him. "You do prefer me this way, don't you? Looking like your wife's killer? You don't have to think about it. Don't have to think about the role you played in my recreation...you can just fight me to the death, and get two forms of closure for the price of one." she taunted.

"You disappoint me, Elaine. I thought you too much your own spirit to go happily replacing your own face with that of another on a permanent basis."

"Why not? You remember that Star Destroyer of Darth Thezan argument? If you slowly replace part after part of the Destroyer, until every part has been completely replaced, is it still the Star Destroyer of Darth Thezan?"

She gestured to the flailing, squealing body of Syd.

"Just think if that process had taken its full course..." The Battalion teased. "I'd have completely replaced her, imitated her, and her poor student would have been none the wiser. But since I wear Darth Phyre's face and act as Darth Phyre would act...and I have full access to her command of flames, and her command of Magic, The Force, the Lightsaber...who is to say that Darth Phyre has truly expired at all? Who's to say she was even replaced?" The Battalion inquired.

"You still aren't Darth Phyre." he pointed out.

"I took a lot of puzzle pieces..." The Battalion joked. "I'm sure I can figure out the rest. Even if you do manage to save her, she won't ever be 'quite' the Syd her student knew."

"Why is it so important you become Darth Phyre, Elaine? It's not enough you're married to my daughter, you gotta look like her ex girlfriend too?"

The Battalion frowned, Syd's knowledge and power filtering into her Brain more .

"That was a low blow, Morris." The Battalion said with Syd's voice.

"There's something I've always wanted to ask, given the hindsight I am currently afflicted with...I'm worried you'd laugh though. Or wouldn't laugh. I can't decide what possibility causes the greatest revulsion in me towards you." Nathan admitted.

"That sounds like you have an actual serious question and not some morality based interrogative like so many Jedi resort to." The Battalion replied, deeply curious. "I'm actually intrigued. Ask."

The Battalion, even with all the wisdom and power she had absorbed from Syd, was not prepared for the question.

"Tell me, Elaine...at any point during our interactions in the Plague...were you in love with me?"

The Battalion, stuck with Syd's face, felt her mouth go slack from shock at the question.

"I...I..." The Battalion trailed, mind going haywire at the question.

The Battalion snarled as multiple heavy bolts of Electric Judgement smashed into her Torso, blasting large chunks of it off as she was sent spiraling into a nearby ravine.

The Battalion screeched in pain as she fell into the darkness.

Nathan looked up, spotted the red headed Woman in a skintight black catsuit, green lightning arcing from her fingers.

"She'll be back." The Reflection spoke quickly. "You should have said something when we first met. I'd have happily aided you against the Cult."

Nathan, well aware of what The Amalgam had looked like before being infected by a copy of Phyre's Personality by this point, only scowled. He hadn't let on what he knew. He had simply approached her, and told her he had decided he needed the full on experiences of a Witch.

Keep friends close, and enemies closer.

The Reflection had been seemingly happy to oblige. She kept quiet about what she may know or not.

"Well, can we save her?" Nathan asked.

The Reflection knelt down, stretching a hand over the lumpy, squealing mass.

She closed ocean blue eyes.

"The Battalion took a massive chunk of her mind. Lots of core memories are gone. What's left are fragments. Impressions. Mental scaffolding mostly. She can still think and feel, but barely. And the other remaining personalities in her are losing juice now that most of the "server farm" has been ripped out, so to speak." The Reflection stated. "Battalion got her good. What the hell was she thinking, coming here without back up?"

"I'm told she's been targeting the Cult as as I have. She must have thought she could handle The Battalion." Nathan mused.

"She was incorrect." Nathan grumbled a second later. "Wouldn't be the first fething time she was either from what I have learned."

"Grab her legs." The Reflection spoke. "House Io vessels are due to arrive in the system any minute now, and it will be very difficult to escape a blockade once established."

Nathan grumbled and they began hauling the deformed Syd off to the ship the Reflection brought, a stock freighter.

Later on...

"What do we do to heal her?" Nathan asked, sick to his stomach at needing to spare Syd.

"You can't. The main host has been almost totally removed. It's like being lobotomized. The other personalities need a fully functional server hub, so to speak." The Reflection asked, staring at the deformed, badly injured but still alive body.

"There must be a way."

"Only one." The Reflection spoke.

"I'm already not liking where this is going..."

"I merge with her..."

Nathan stared.

"What would happen? To you? To her?"

The Reflection folded her arms.

"I take over the scaffolding. Merge any remaining memories she has with mine to let her--me--think clearly. But I won't be purely me ever again after that. And Syd will never be purely Syd."

"I am wary of making you more powerful than you already are." Nathan spoke.

"You always could have left me in the Sword Demon's realm." she replied calmly. "But then where would you be in this scenario?"

"Up a creek." Nathan replied.

"No paddle." The Reflection purred in agreement.

"I don't trust freaks like you normally. This is difficult for me."

The Reflection did not take offense to his use of the term. She knew it was not an unfair assessment of her Abilities.

"I could have turned on you a thousand times, Nathan, during the trip here. I wouldn't need Syd's level of power to do you in. You know that. This is why you should be wary of asking the help of strange witches you don't really know."

"I know enough." Nathan replied in a terse manner. "I know you were derived from the Witch that used to run the Cult. I know you possess a similar fixation on Laertia and the one called Maple Harte. And I know that were I not around, you would have already been infesting this body."

At this, The Reflection gave pause, and nodded .

"Guilty."

She put her hands on her hips.

"So. You gonna trust me, or not?"

Nathan stared a moment and then mildly gestured to Syd's barely moving body.

The Reflection stared, and flesh began bubbling hidiously, pig like squeals escaping her and Syd's throat as the flesh on both their bodies started to warp.

The Reflection's original body burned to disgusting rancid ashes , burning through her suit as it tumbled the floor in while the flesh on Syd's body deflated and began resetting, her horrible deformed head reshaping itself not into the red headed Atrisian Force Spawn that had just had her face stolen by the Battalion, but into the nigh impossibly beautiful woman that had merged with her.

Syd Celsius shot up, panting and screaming in shock and pain and surprise, clutching her head.

"Owwwww....owwww..." Syd gasped, horrified as her mind was still scrambled eggs. The only thing that gave her any solace, were broken memories of a young boy she had trained. What was his name?

"Starlin." she breathed, not fully remembering. She was only 25 percent "her", 75 percent someone else.

"What... where's Starlin?"

"You got bigger problems than your missing student." Nathan spoke irritably.

She saw him and recoiled, one of her only clear memories were him trying to cave her head in.

"Yes... bigger problems than even me..." he said tersely.


Meanwhile:

The Battalion eventually staggered out of the ravine she had tumbled into, the first of the House vessels in the sky.

"I am Darth Phyre..." she said with a smirk, and began flying to the nearest landing shuttle to meet whoever of her citizens awaited...

Percival Io

Akemi Io

Alessandra Io

Draco Miles

Naivia Neryn

Altima Io

 

[Lady Venge]

OBJECTIVE 2: BLESSINGS

As an honored guest of House Io and a practitioner of Sith alchemy and sorcery, Venge found herself being asked to help in re-consecrating Korriban to the Dark Side. Twenty five hundred citizens of the Galactic Alliance, along with over forty two Jedi, had been selected for sacrifice. High on a cliffside overlooking the Valley Of The Dark Lords, a sacrificial altar had been carefully constructed by Brain Demon cultists to Venge's exact specifications.

It had been ages since Venge had killed anyone, and the bloodlust roaring in her veins begged to be given an outlet, to be sated.

"Bring me a Jedi," she commanded one of the Cultists.

"Which one? We have three and a half dozen," the Cultist replied with an insane giggle.

"Just bring me a Jedi. Now," Venge ordered, her voice taking on a 'don't f@#* with me' tone.

A few minutes later, a lone Jedi was dragged before Venge and forced down on her knees. She stared defiantly at Venge.

"Do you know who I am," Venge asked, pacing back and forth in front of the Jedi while casually twirling a Sith sword around and around with her right hand.

"You're the one Alex StormWolf often speaks of...Venge."

"Ah, so you know Alex, do you? Tell me...how is he doing?"

"He's gone missing, no one's heard from him in weeks."

"Perhaps I can bring you up to speed, before sending you to the netherworld," Venge said. "Alex is alive and well, but..fallen."

"What have you done to him?!"

"Nothing. Nothing at all. He himself surrendered again to the darkness that's been within him all this time. And yet...he still defies my call, still denies himself his rightful place at my side."

"Then you've failed, Venge. There's still good in him."

"You who are about to die...dare speak to me...of failure?..."

Losing her patience, Venge lifted the Jedi with the Force, flinging her over the side of the cliff with as much effort as it would take someone to flick a bug off a tabletop.

"For all their powers...Jedi never figured out how to fly, apparently," the Cultist said with another insane giggle as he glanced over the edge of the cliff.

"Don't make me send you to join her," Venge warned with a snarl, her eyes blazing menacingly.

TAGS- OPEN

 

[Alessandra Io]

Location: Approaching Tomb of Darth Eirie, Arctic Volcano Regions - Korriban
Objective: Valley of the Dolls - Retrieve the Holocron of Fire and Ice
Tags: Open

A fresh tomb.

By all indications, the structure had been laid down towards the tail end of the Tenth Sith Empire’s reign—constructed not only as a tomb to honor a Sith Lord who had been slain during the Battle of Bastion, but also as a hidden refuge and a vanity project funded by a wealthy patron. It had since been abandoned, the entrance hidden by a maze-like terrain and its dark aura concealed by Sith Runes to shield the location from the prying gaze of the Ashlan Crusade.

However, such measures had failed to hide it from the Brain Demon Cult.

The increased sightings of Sithspawn patrols in the distance told Alessandra Io all she needed to know. She was close now. No doubt, an ambush was imminent. Unfortunately, due to the hazards of the terrain, she had no choice but to press through the teeth of the Sithspawn force that would be set against her.

“Prepare for an ambush.” Alessandra said, addressing those who had accompanied her through the dangerous, maze-like volcano terrain. “These Sithspawn await the return of their masters. They will guard this tomb and the holocron with their lives.” She continued.

“Let us make ready. For the Matriarch!”

Spoiler: Loadout

• Eversor Bodysuit
  
  • Energy Shield
    
    • Phase III “Force Avenger” Energy Shield
• Eversor Rings
• Tönn Rándýrsins | Fang of the Predator (2)

 

[The Battalion]

After securing the initial sites, the third Darth Phyre had flown off to her original objective of annihilating that enemy FOB.

She descended from the sky wreathed in violet flames, flesh shuddering as she landed and made a crater.

A blast of purple flames from her mouth and she was waving it around very easily after it exited her throat engulfing more soldiers in burning flames that drove them mad with despair. Her red blade snapped to life as she waded through her attackers, cutting them down without mercy in a vicious frenzy, her stolen face slick with blood and savage glee at the killing.

The Battalion already felt more of Phyre's knowledge seeping into her, threatening to overwrite her own persona, absorb it completely into itself. A tight iron discipline allowed her to flex her own will over that dark knowledge and personality slowly filtering into her brain as she redirected blaster bolts with her human self's corrupted Lightsaber, descending on her enemies with animal howls of delight as she dismembered people in as painful and lingering a fashion as she could manage, going out of her way to chop apart a Sith Trooper slowly, savoring his torment as his life was ended in the most hidious of ways. Blasts of flame from her throat spread across the base, engulfing fleeing survivors as the Dark Lady of Obsession went wild with the slaughter, blood splashing against tents, Equipment melting from the heat of her flames.

She meditated in the aftermath, kneeling amidst the depraved carnage, flesh shuddering as she spread the suffering out through the air invisibly.

"Elaine? Batty?"

The sound of her wife's words drove Darth Phyre's eyes wide open, no distinctions between her love and Elaine's.

The Host was indeed a proper vessel.

Phyre rose up, smiling as The Parliament, known to the Galaxy as Laertia Io , floated down in a white catsuit.

"Julia..." Phyre said, floating over to the shocked countenance of her spouse.

"Like the new look?"

"What happened? I felt you in combat with Syd. Got here as soon as I could. Did you...consume her?!" The Parliament asked, shocked, yet pleasantly so at her wife's success.

"Most of her. All the vital bits. I have reclaimed the face and knowledge of myself completely from the Jedi. I am Darth Phyre. Reborn."

Laertia got very quiet, and stepped over to her, cupping her face in her hands.

"Is my Elaine still in there, Phyre?"

"Would it matter if it was?" Phyre asked.

"I love Elaine. As much as I love you. So is she in there?"

Phyre smiled. "Figure it out for yourself..." she answered, drawing Laertia in for a kiss.

When their lips touched, The Parliament seized her wife by the waist and pulled her closer, her arms hooking around the Parliament's shoulder. The Parliament felt Elaine within Phyre, their minds caressing even as it blended with Phyre at the seams. It was a hungry kiss, firm, seeking.

Phyre pulled back.

"I trust that answers your question, Darling?" Phyre asked.

"I am pleased at your rebirth, and that you are at my side again once more, Lady Phyre." The Parliament replied, grinning as she ran her hands through Phyre's hair, dark like Elaine's hair rather than the firey red the infected Amalgam had sported when using Phyre's face.

She knelt before Phyre. "I rededicate myself to your teachings, Master. Again and again, you cheat death and find a body. Maybe you don't come back exactly the same, but considering this is the third fethin' time you've come back, that's damn impressive. You are a very great Sith Lady."

"No." Phyre said, raising the Parliament to her feet to stare into her eyes.

"Do not kneel. Not to me. Not any longer. You may have been but a learner. Now you are the Master, and we shall face the future of our House together as Masters. Let there be no further talk of who is subservient and who is not. You have no need to rededicate yourself. You live my teachings now." Phyre assured, caressing her wife's cheek and kissing her again.

"Tell me, how much of you IS still Elaine?"

Phyre playfully touched her wife's chin.

"When we have some proper alone time you'll find out first hand how much I'm still Elaine..." Phyre promised lasciviously. "And how much I've become me."

"Now..." Phyre trailed. "I do believe Lady Venge is here as an honored guest, helping us reconsecrate Korriban. Let's check in on her."

"Whatever you say, Elaine." The Parliament replied as they both took off flying through the sky, soon descending on the clifftop, where Venge was pulling the classic Sith Yeeting technique with a Jedi by throwing them to their death.

Phyre walked past hundreds of innocents, all stripped naked and prepped for getting their hearts cut out. Adults, younglings, it didn't matter. They were the enemy to The Parliament, captured at the edges of their borders, and they would be sacrificed simply to enrage their Jedi Protectors, who did not understand this was payback for leaving the southern systems to the Bryn'adul for her. Even now, The Parliament was driven by her vendetta with the Order in all she did.

Darth Phyre, for her part, was happy to be along for the slaughter once more.

"Lady Venge!" Phyre called out walking up to the blood lust filled Sith.

"Delighted you could join us! I'm Darth Phyre. You might know me better by my Cult name, The Battalion..." Phyre spoke, well aware the un-initiated could be greatly confused by the unexpected change in appearance from a Witch in the Cult. Sometimes you had to reintroduce yourself.

"Excellent form, by the way!" The Parliament complimented. "We're so pleased by your enthusiasm. By all means feel free to make the sacrifices suffer! Are you thirsty? Ritual sacrifices dry the throat, I've found, I can have some water brought up, if you like. Are you low on ritual paints? Alchemized blood?" she asked as though this was a day in the office and the sticky notes were running low. Which for a Brain Demon Cultist, it was.

"An excellent venue. You can really see 'em tumble as they are thrown." Phyre remarked, lifting up a Jedi by the throat with the Force.

Phyre smirked, crushing his bones silently, but leaving him alive as she hurled him into the ravine.

"If he flips four times in the air before he hits we're having spaghetti tonight. Deal?" Phyre asked the Parliament.

"Deal." her wife replied playfully.

The Jedi only managed three and a half flips.

"Drat." Phyre sighed. "What're we having?"

"Live Octopus."

"Ooooo..." Phyre said, intrigued. "Infants?"

The Parliament nodded.

"Always thinking of me." she joked, lifting up another and hurling her into the ravine, cackling as she heard her scream on the way down.

 

[Lady Venge]

Venge nodded in acknowledgement of The Battalion. As far as she knew, it was the first time they had met.

"I'm pleased to make your acquaintance," Venge stated. "and I thank House Io for allowing me this opportunity. It's been far too long since I've been able to kill anyone."

Listening to the playful banter between The Battalion and The Parliament, Venge came to realize that the two were an item.

"You never told me you were married," Venge said to The Parliament with a grin. "Then again, I never really asked did I?"



The Battalion
Laertia Io

 

[Percival Io]

Location: Entering Tomb of Darth Eirie
Tags: Alessandra Io

M I S S I O N A R Y M A N​

Percival followed Alessandra into a Tomb which was rumored to contain a famous relic: the Holocron of Fire and Ice. Surrounded by other Chaplain Neutralizers, he was just another body in the army descending upon the ruins.

Against the Sithspawn they encountered guarding the Tomb, Percival wielded the Edge of Judgment. The slaughter helped to keep his mind off of other things. Since rejoining personas with Galahad and Lancelot, he found his thoughts frequently wandered down strange paths. He no longer knew himself.

But his power had expanded, taking the experience of all three brothers into account when he fought. Despite his best efforts to blend in, Percival wound up standing out due to the sheer skill with which he dispatched his enemies, mowing down everything in his path. He could deftly evade a strike like Galahad, deceive and play with his opponents like Lancelot, and finish them off with Percival's efficiency.

He found that he savored his kills more. At first he thought it was Lancelot in him, but this particular sensation felt... fresher. Perhaps it was some new scaffolding in his mental architecture. What it would build up to, he did not know.

Eventually he came upon a chamber of the Tomb which was vast, expansive, and suspiciously empty. <<Trap up ahead,>> he informed the others via technopathy. The question was, what was the trap—and how would they get past it?

 

[The Battalion]

"I know, so therapeutic, isn't it? The rush of a heartbeat in its final moments..." Phyre remarked. "And it is a delight to have you with us. Empyrean was a fool to make an enemy of you."

"That corpse is gonna drive the umpteenth empire into the dust before the next two decades are over, mark my words." The Parliament said matter of factly.

She then grinned at the observation Lady Venge made of them being married.

"It was the will of the Dark Side that we were bound together. In spite of logic and the universe screaming otherwise. In spite of the person I used to be."

"And in spite of the fact I had murdered both her grandparents AND her parents." Phyre remarked in an embarrassed manner. "Oh. My. God. It was so awkward when that came to light."

"I was pissed, admittedly..." The Parliament added scratching the back of her head awkwardly. "But I came to accept that the Dark Side, that it's avatar, The Brain Demon, knew it was for my betterment. And I had become better."

The Parliament swept her hand over the sacrifices being conducted.

"All I am I owe to the Dark Side. All that I have, The Dark Side showed me the way to it, gave me the strength to attain it, and at times it dragged me to where I needed to be, with me kicking and screaming."

"Evolution is a painful process..." Phyre remarked, casually snapping the neck of an old woman nearby.

"But as you've been demonstrating with the ravine, Lady Venge, there are ways to unwind..."

The Married Couples flesh shuddered and warped at a genuinely vomit inducing level as they descended on a Jedi Knight. I won't describe what happened. It's too awful. Some Joaquin-In-Clownpaint-level crazy chit.

"And there are the occasional feasts as perks." Phyre added playfully as her sagging, warping flesh reset to an unblemished state along with her spouse.

"Plus..." The Parliament trailed, having a colonist woman in her twenties loaded onto a catapult she had personally built for trolling the victims by the cackling acolytes who weren't Force Users.

"Stuart, Launch!" The Parliament ordered the Acolyte manning the catapult firing mechanism.

"YESTH, MASSTHUR..." he replied in a large ham lisp and a cackle as The Parliament grabbed an Assault Radiation Blaster.

He launched the screaming woman who had been stripped to her underwear with an insane cackle, and as she screamed and flailed helpless through the air, The Parliament locked onto her and fired, and it smacked into her head, killing her.

"Sith Skeet Shooting..." The Parliament grinned.

Phyre scoffed. "Lightweight...watch this..."

Phyre ordered another Civilian, this time an old man into the Catapult. The Cult had cursed his flesh to amplify whatever pain was inflicted.

Grabbing a Thermal Detonator and a common golf club , Phyre activated it, planted it daintily on a rock, wiggled her butt slightly as she lined up a shot, and hand signalled Stuart.

"Learned this trick from a Model 3 at Kerest..." Phyre explained, watching the screaming old man fly through the air. At the apex of his ascent, and with eight seconds left on the timer, she swung the club and watched the Thermal Detonator sail through the air, smacking into him dead center on his chest as he fell at just the right time, and the Detonator went off at a safe distance.

"Behold, Sith Skeet Golfing." Phyre boasted with a mockingly haughty smirk at her wife.

"Hilarious and murderous. It's a golden combo." The Parliament joked. "Lady Venge, would you care to try something fethed up with the Catapult?"

 

[Lady Venge]

"Something fethed up with the catapult? Hmm," Venge pondered for a moment. "I'm not sure I really can top you two for the fethed up factor, but I'll give it a try."

Venge waited while another victim was loaded into the catapult and flung into the sky above the cliffside. With a flick of her wrist, she sent her Sith sword speeding towards the unfortunate soul like a lethal discus. Guiding the sword's flight with the Force, Venge cut the body into several pieces before it began to fall into the valley below.

Calling the sword back to her hand, Venge turned towards The Battalion and The Parliament with a sadistic smile plastered on her face.

"Sith Sword Disc Tag?"

Studying the sword in her hand, Venge found herself getting nostalgic.

​

"Years ago, I found this in one of the tombs down there in the Valley Of The Dark Lords. I'm led to believe it's one of a kind, because I've never seen another one quite like it."

The Battalion
Laertia Io

 

[The Battalion]

"Nice execution, I give that a nine." Phyre complemented.

"Parly..." she called out to her spouse. "I think Lady Venge here might be on to something... it's also much gorier than either of our methods were."

The Parliament rubbed her chin.

"Well we do have repulsorlift equipped energy swords." she mused. "Drawn some rules up...yeah...maybe."

Phyre knew instantly what her wife was thinking.

"Lady Venge, I do believe you may have just invented a new national sport for our house..." Phyre complimented.

Phyre and the Parliament listened as Venge went into detail about the origins of her sword.

"Oh, what a wonderful piece!" Phyre complimented, examining it.

"It's such a unique example I'm actually having trouble placing the era..." she remarked idly, the archeology knowledge she had absorbed from Syd going to work.

"Some elements look like it would date back no further than the Exar Kun War, while others suggest early Republic Dark Age...but it's the handle that provides more clues. See?" she noted pointing at the hilt. "I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say it's...at least a few years or so after the fall of Palpatine that this was created. See the little notches and styling on the handle here? That's very reminiscent of any Sith Sword made post Galactic Empire. Most older examples have much smoother, more uniform hilt designs. The blade design itself suggests a Sith Alchemist of..."

Phyre mulled it over in her head... "Dromund Kaas training." she said finally. "It's a very wonderful piece, Lady Venge. I've always preferred Lightsabers due to my delight at watching flesh become ash, but I would definitely carry this around as a second option. I have a collection I would be delighted to show you some time. I've encountered a surprisingly high number of them from Krayiss Two, interestingly..." she remarked idly.

Just then a Mercenary Droid in black and blue House Colors ran up to the sacrifice area, saluted The Parliament, who nodded in acknowledgement. It seemed to do a double take at Phyre when it realized she wore the Battalion's Catsuit.

"Didn't you get merc'd?" it asked in a shocked tone, recognizing The Battalion's current face from it's databases. It's voice was like that of a Fett Clone. (Morrison, not Baker)

"I was, but I un-merc'd myself about two hours ago. Ta-da!" Phyre joked, breaking into an extravagant pose for a split second.

The Parliament leaned towards Venge and whispered, comically shielding one side of her mouth.

"I cast the previous version of her into a singularity. Long Story." she whispered.

"There's a short version?!" The Droid sputtered, it's audio sensors having picked it up.

The Parliament rolled her eyes. "Yes, but I'm sure you didn't come up here to listen to it, soldier."

"I dunno. Seems kinda interesting...but anyway, we got trouble in the south valley, Boss. Site 12X."

Phyre perked up at that.

"Please excuse us a moment, Lady Venge." Phyre said, gesturing for the Parliament to follow her into the sky.

The Parliament followed her into the air. They flew very high up, not at a high speed, a comfortable pace.

"What is it, Elaine?"

"Site 12X...I'm gonna have to handle that one personally, Honey." Phyre replied in both her voice and The Battalion's.

"Why?" The Parliament asked.

"Well, this morning, before I was me again, I had gotten a report from one of our scouts that Site 12X had the remnants of what looked like a Fermata Cage. Why do you think those other Sith were here? You were busy on that moon, corrupting that cave of Kybers and I couldn't get through to you due to interference from the cave."

"Fermata Cage?"

Phyre shrugged. "I'm not surprised you don't know what it is. I myself didn't learn of their existence until the tail end of the Plague. It's like an Oubilette, but it freezes time on the inside, trapping whoever or whatever is in it eternally without the Dark Side to free them. I wasn't actually certain it was there though. But chit went so crazy in the past few hours it completely slipped my mind until the Merc Droid ran up."

"What kind of trouble? I can help."

Phyre shook her head. "No, Dear. I'm afraid this requires the touch of one who's had experience with them before. They're rarely found intact, and their malfunctioning can be...very dangerous."

The Parliament nodded. "Alright Elaine. Contact me if you need anything."

Phyre gave her wife a peck on the cheek.

"I'll be fine. But Honey...what do we tell Percival?"

The Parliament thought a moment. "Can't you simply retake your old face a while? Because I know him; he's just started to go into his rebellious phase. He's got all kinda little hangups now 'n' chit. I love him, but things...are strained.

Phyre shook her head. "I'm sorry Honey, but it doesn't work that way. You can't take back Syd's knowledge the way I did without consequences. With the other me it was different...I had turned your master into a False Persona for my use so I could switch between faces and minds at will. But because I absorbed the knowledge this way...like I said, I'm me again."

The Parliament nodded. "I'll break it to him gently."

"I'll try and be back in an hour! Don't sacrifice the younglings without me! Hugs and Kisses!"

Phyre flew off and The Parliament chuckled before floating to the earth and back to Lady Venge.

"So sorry Lady Venge. Phyre had to depart due to an emergency. Stuart! Load us up!" She ordered.

"WOULD TTTTHE MASSTHUR LIKESIES AN ADULTSIES OR PADAWANSIES?" Stuart asked, cross eyed and in a hooded black cloak.

"Padawan!" The Parliament replied joyously. She went back to the Merc Droid.

"Samuel, right? Go tell the others Lady Phyre is on her way. And keep quiet about her new appearance."

"Oh sure, like I wanna dip my grubby little Droid mitts into whatever the feth is going on there..." Samuel The Merc Droid muttered. "You got it, Boss."

The Parliament playfully touched the underside of Samuel's B-1 Droid skull.

"You're a peach, Samuel. Ta!"

The Droid nodded and took off running as a screaming, crying Padawan was loaded into the catapult and The Parliament picked up her rifle.

"Let 'er RIP!" she ordered.

Stuart cackled as he launched the screaming Padawan into the sky.

 

[Lady Venge]

Venge quirked an eyebrow at The Parliament after she returned, wanting to be certain she had heard her statement correctly.

"Did I hear you correctly when you said something about having tossed someone into a singularity?"

Venge was certainly capable of being exceptionally devious in her own right, but it would appear that House Io's level of deviance went places that even she had never delved. It was definitely better to remain allies with such people. Venge didn't want to know what sort of things House Io would be capable of if she were their enemy.

The Battalion
Laertia Io

 

[Alessandra Io]

Location: Tomb of Darth Eirie, Arctic Volcano Regions - Korriban
Objective: Valley of the Dolls - Retrieve the Holocron of Fire and Ice
Tags: Percival Io

The Sithspawn set themselves upon the small team in a flurry of violence and war cries. Sprinting Carvers wielding heated vibroswords and lumbering Hammerers hefting massive vibro-greatswords rushed out from the tomb and the surrounding environment, with some even leaping out of the lava itself to ambush the intruders. One of the Hammerers emerged from the lava just behind Alessandra, an earsplitting roar on his lips as he swung his vibro-greatswords crosswise in an attempt to rip the Chaplain in twain. It was only the acuity of her synthetic senses which saved her from such a fate, compelling the gynoid to launch herself a few meters forward, before pirouetting mid-air and blasting corsucating discharges of electricity out from her hands, striking the massive Tnikatah in his armored chest. The monstrous Sithspawn initially sought to advance in spite of the attack, but the sheer shocking power of the Chaplain’s electrical blasts fried his soft insides, causing smoke to puff out from his facial orifices.

No more than two seconds from the initiation of the Chaplain’s counterattack, the Hammerer collapsed unceremoniously to the ground, his form thoroughly cooked.

As the Sithspawn collapsed, Alessandra turned around, her synthetic senses flaring as a trio of racing Carvers charged her from behind. Her dovin basal heart suddenly quickened its beat, generating a swell of gravity that lifted the three Sithspawn into the air, where their footspeed was no longer a factor. All the while, the Chaplain’s photoreceptors turned an ominous cyan hue, before projecting twin beams of cryogenic energy towards the floating Carvers, boring into their skulls.

Just as quickly as the Chaplain had lifted them up, she cut them down.

As the frozen Carvers fell to the ground, their heads shattering on impact, Alessandra found her attention briefly seized by the artistry of the slaughter inflicted by her brother. She knew him well enough to recognize the vestiges of Lancelot and Galahad in his fighting style. A bloodthirsty Carver fell for a feint—Lancelot. A roaring Hammerer realizing that his target was now behind him after the Chaplain darted between his legs to evade the blades of his vibro-axes—Galahad. A gurgling Angel of War dispatched with a surgical slash across the throat—Percival.

A tear slipped unbidden from a photoreceptor.

The rasping snarls of something massive approaching drew Alessandra’s attention back to the fight. A howling abomination with multiple mouths, legs, and heads roared a challenge, raising its bladed arms in the process. As the rancor-sized monster closed the distance in a ground-shaking sprint, Alessandra initiated her attack, throwing one chakram, then another to sever two of its arms. Nevertheless, the monster continued ahead, forcing the Chaplain to will the specialized organs in her arms to manifestation—igniting a pair of magenta energy blades charged with nonharmonic plasma. Then, Alessandra flew upward to meet the monster’s charge, before letting gravity carry her form down the ground to slide across the snow as her plasma blades slashed through the Sithspawn’s many legs.

A series of tortured howls tore free from the monster’s throats, before the Chaplain silenced it forever in a blinding sequence of decapitations, severing its four heads in precise, surgical fashion.

With the last of the Sithspawn neutralized or forced to retreat, Alessandra made her way into the tomb. Allowing Percival to take the lead, he led the way to a large chamber, one bordered with various statues depicting what to the untrained eye might appear to be chaotic, angry masses of eyes, tentacles, and pseudopods.

However, Alessandra knew exactly what the statues depicted—female Pylantians struck in various suggestive poses.

“Darth Eirie was likely a male Pylantian, then.” She spoke up. “I believe we can rule out any traps linked to the statues. Their purpose here seems purely erotic.”

Spoiler: Loadout

• Eversor Bodysuit
  
  • Energy Shield
    
    • Phase III “Force Avenger” Energy Shield
• Eversor Rings
• Tönn Rándýrsins | Fang of the Predator (2)

 

[Percival Io]

“Darth Eirie was likely a male Pylantian, then. I believe we can rule out any traps linked to the statues. Their purpose here seems purely erotic.”

Percival blinked, then looked the statues up and down, appraising them. "... Oh," he mumbled. "Oh my."

He turned his attention back to the room itself. As a test, he took a piece of lightweight cloth and tossed it forward to see if it would trigger anything. The strip of fabric fluttered in the air... and fell to the ground in pieces, having been sliced to ribbons.

"Invisible wiring," he murmured. "Made from... svolten rhyolite, perhaps?" And no doubt alchemized to make it even sharper and undetectable to Force Users, among other things.

None of his scanners were picking up the wiring. His photoreceptors were able to track where the cuts were made in the cloth, but it hadn't gotten very far before it fell apart. They needed something which would expose the thin, invisible strands, lest they be sliced and diced on their way across the room.

"Does anyone have any fine powder?" he asked. At least the powder would coat the metal, making it visible to them. Then they might find a way across...

Alessandra Io

 

[Akemi Io]

Communication "verbal" <<technopathy>>

Location: Korriban
Objective: Dungeon Delving
Tag: Alessandra Io Percival Io The Battalion

Loadout:
Loralora interceptor swoop
Two handed repulsor assisted hammer
Gei Borugu Electro Spear
Light Saber (peony colour blade)
Q7 encrypted data-spike

Spoiler: Fleet Assets

Alita-1 Alita class star cruiser

Carrying

• Two squadrons of 24
  Ashwing superiority drones
• One squadron of 8
  Q-carriers

Akemi walked behind her brother and sister as they entered the temple, trying to use her sensors to probe for any intelligent or malicious software. Her hair was coloured Ashen to best match the environment and in her hands she carried a hammer, made of phrik and equipped with repulsors that would accelerate the head the moment before impact. She typically favoured her spear, but had calculated that even factoring the minor adjustments to her fighting style, the blunt trauma of the hammer would be more effective against the foes predicted to be down here.

Akemi marvelled at the way that the other two fought, Percival Io was a gifted swordsman and Alessandra Io was just.... Alessandra, fast, graceful and just gloriously violent. She ducked her own head as one of the lava monsters swung for it and brought her hammer around and up into its chin. The repulsor flared and with a loud clash, the front part of the rock like creature's face was all but removed. Continuing the movement of the hammer, Akemi swung it now sideways across the beast smashing into its chest, destroying whatever vital structures it might contain and sending it reeling into a heap.

It wasn't long before they stopped at a room that appeared to have some kind of security device across it, as evidenced by the ribbon being cut by an invisible edge in the air.

"Does anyone have any fine powder?"

Akemi grinned "Fine powder? My filters have been pulling quartz and silicate powder out of the air since we got here." she pulled her outfit down to expose her side. Her perfect skin parted at her command and two rotary particulate filters slid out of her torso. She opened one and poured the collected volcanic powder onto her hand before replacing the filters. "This should work"

By rapidly modulating the repulsor in her hand, the powder began to re-aerosolise again and with a breath she sent a sparkling cloud towards the wires. Percival's plan was sound and in seconds, several of these butcher's strands were glimmering with microscopic crystals. "Fun trap, looks like something mother might design" niche in its application but exquisitely viscious. The little HRD shrugged as her heavy hammer magnetised to her back and she drew her peony bladed light saber to begin cutting a path. "Pay attention as you cut them, no doubt they are under a lot of tension" she added as she saw one of her ever present butterflies be bisected by the wire and then digitally reform.

​

 

[Alessandra Io]

Location: Approaching Tomb of Darth Eirie, Arctic Volcano Regions - Korriban
Dialogue Legend: <<Technopathy Link>> │ “Verbal”
Objective: Valley of the Dolls - Retrieve the Holocron of Fire and Ice
Tags: Percival Io Akemi Io

He turned his attention back to the room itself. As a test, he took a piece of lightweight cloth and tossed it forward to see if it would trigger anything. The strip of fabric fluttered in the air... and fell to the ground in pieces, having been sliced to ribbons.

"Invisible wiring," he murmured. "Made from... svolten rhyolite, perhaps?" And no doubt alchemized to make it even sharper and undetectable to Force Users, among other things.

“Thank you, Galah-” Suddenly, Alessandra fell silent. A rare, if even impossible mistake for a being of her precise, synthetic nature to make. Her features reddened with shame, but when one of Akemi’s butterflies landed on her shoulder, the Chaplain managed to hold back a tear as she turned around to face her love.

“Thank you, both.” Alessandra said, before offering Akemi a brief, sidelong gaze as a loving smile came over her features.

With that, the Chaplain ignited her plasma blades and began to cut through the wires, taking extra care to watch for allies in the vicinity due to their tension. Once she arrived at the door at the head of the room, she quickly scanned to search for another layer of traps. Finding none, Alessandra willed it to open via a tractor projected from her left hand, her photoreceptors glowing an intense hue of pink as she did.

The next room was a large, expansive chamber, inside which six droid-like figures sat hunched in deep meditation before a statue, warblades attached their backs. The statue itself depicted a masculine figure with a double-bladed lightsaber in hand, Olympian features chiseled from steelcrete in an artful, yet sensual style.

Darth Eirie.

Upon registering the presence of intruders, the droid-like figures directed their synthetic gazes towards the trio of Nuetralizers. Then, as one, the figures rose to their feet in perfect sync, warblades drawn in sudden fashion as they slowly began to advance towards the three intruders.

<<I will take the two in the middle.>> Alessandra transmitted to her siblings.

Without warning, the Chaplain unleashed the opening salvo. Twin beams of searing pink energy tore out from the gynoid’s photoreceptors, causing the cloying scent of tibanna to fill the air as one of the two constructs Alessandra had claimed for herself brought its blade up to defend against the gynoid’s attack, while the other launched itself skyward to close the distance.

Spoiler: Loadout

• Eversor Bodysuit
  
  • Energy Shield
    
    • Phase III “Force Avenger” Energy Shield
• Eversor Rings
• Tönn Rándýrsins | Fang of the Predator (2)

 

[Percival Io]

“Thank you, Galah-”

Percival instinctively turned toward her as if responding to his own name being uttered. After all, he was Galahad, just as he was Lancelot. They lived on in him now. Only after she had broken off and he saw her cheeks flush with embarrassment did he realize what had happened. She believed she had made a mistake.

"It's all right, Sister," he said softly. "You may call me any name you please."

"Fine powder? My filters have been pulling quartz and silicate powder out of the air since we got here..."

Percival watched as Akemi used her filters to reveal the wires, commenting that it was like a trap their Mother might devise. He nodded in agreement. Had the trap worked as intended, it would've resulted in a spectacularly gory death for them. Drawing his lightsaber, Percival joined his Sisters in cutting through the wires.

After passing the trap unscathed, they came upon another chamber. Six constructs knelt before a statue depicting a terribly beautiful man. Darth Eirie, naturally. The constructs rose to their feet and drew their weapons, moving to attack the trio. Alessandra leaped into action, claiming the middle two as her opponents.

<<Left,> Percival said, setting his sights on the pair of Nether Knights in that direction. He lunged forward, Judgment in one hand and Jasmine in the other, engaging them both in a duel so swift, it would be difficult for mortal eyes to follow their movements. One managed to slash Percival's face diagonally from hairline to jaw, sending the Chaplain staggering backwards. Silver blood leaked from the wound, trickling down into his right eye, yet Percival fought on, plunging back into the fight and cutting off the sword arm of one of the constructs.

Akemi Io Alessandra Io​

 

[Akemi Io]

Communication "verbal" <<technopathy>>

Location: Korriban
Objective: Dungeon Delving
Tag: Alessandra Io Percival Io The Battalion

Loadout:
Loralora interceptor swoop
Two handed repulsor assisted hammer
Gei Borugu Electro Spear
Light Saber (peony colour blade)
Q7 encrypted data-spike

Spoiler: Fleet Assets

Alita-1 Alita class star cruiser

Carrying

• Two squadrons of 24
  Ashwing superiority drones
• One squadron of 8
  Q-carriers

A smile from Alessandra Io could melt Akemi quicker than a plasma bath and she smiled back as the trio began to slash through the wire trap, progressing quickly until the reached the next room. It was a large space and heavily guarded, her siblings pounced forwards, taking two each leaving a pair for the little fixer. Her lightsaber was deactivated and she pulled out her other weapons, the large repulsor hammer in one hand and her Electro Spear in the other, extended to only two thirds to allow it to be used more easily in one hand.

She charged at the droids and one of them charged her. She span and smashed her hammer into the charging droid. Her dovin basal heart increasing her mass to compensate from the huge impact of the phrik hammer that sent the droid reeling and that would otherwise have also thrown her across the room. The enemy droid began to roll and the jumped over, bringing her hammer down hard onto its carapace with a loud clang that dented it and sent sparks flying.

Suddenly her temperature warnings flared and fire engulfed her side from the other droid, this one appeared to have some form of sorcery and the perfect skin on Akemi's face bubbled and peeled against the firey attack, stripping away chunks of her hair before she was able to dodge our and launched her spear across the room into the armpit of arm of the caster, breaking its concentration and abating the flames. <<Oh dear, i look awful>> she sent as a joke to her siblings after catching a glance of her oartially melted face and burned hair in the carapace of her attacker.

By this time her first opponent had stood and recovered himself. His right arm was non functional from the hammer attack, but his left brought his heavy sword down onto Akemi from above, she only just blocked the strike with the haft of her hammer and a spark danced in front of her again.

The connection Akemi had to her spear told her the sorcerer droid was trying to remove it as it discharged its electrical energy into its circuits, she send a mental command to it to overload the power pack and shunt all of its energy into ionic discharge at once. There wasa crackling of energy across the room as the droid convulsed for a few seconds and then dropped to the floor. Akemi's spear smoked where its power-packed had overloaded, but she could replace that. Hopefully he would stay down as the other one armed droid continued its assault. Akemi felt her ulna crack as he landed a blow that she struggled to block. It would temporarily incapacitate her own arm but would repair shortly. The fight was frantic, and Akemi was not sure that she could win, being less combat inclined than her siblings, but she was still a nuetralizer and extremely competent in battle.





​

 

[The Battalion]

"Yes, I hurled the previous version of her into a singularity..." The Parliament explained to Lady Venge as she skeet shot another Knight in mid-air. "It was part of my final test for mastery. Was married to that one also."

The Parliament smiled fondly. "My own personal yandere always finds a way to cheat the Reaper. It's inspiring, really. She's a very great and powerful master of the Dark Side. And I...I..."

The Parliament shrugged.

"I was blind before. I didn't want to accept what the Dark Side was telling me. So you know what it did? It used an entire war to educate me. I formed House Io because I was dissatisfied with the incessant squabbling of the Major Factions. How they refused to unite in the face of the Bryn'adul. I tried to force the Jedi to the negotiating table by inflicting hard losses. The Jedi of course, would not budge no matter how many civilizations the Bryn'adul were destroying. That taught me that all their talk of safeguarding the Galaxy was lies. It was about maintaining their own power. Their own prestige, at the expense of everyone around them."

The Parliament's core being, which was still comprised of a maddened, violent Laertia Io , made her clench her fist.

"It's the exact sort of self destructive attitude that doomed all those Sith Empires...which I wasn't fond of either..." The Parliament muttered, shooting another drugged, captured Jedi from the sky.

"So you can imagine how used I felt. How much of a fool I felt like, upon realizing I had dedicated the best years of my life to an organization just as happy to let billions die as most Sith Orders would have. The Cult of The Brain Demon's motives were hardly pure, obviously, but ultimately, we see ourselves as tenders in a Dark Side Garden, and viewed both the Maw and Bryn'adul as a scourge that had to be stopped, lest the whole garden die. And it's clear to me the Jedi are in that same category given what they allowed."

The Parliament frowned, as it was clearly a sore subject.

"Most of the refugees who eventually became my citizens came from worlds abandoned by the Jedi during the Bryn'adul crisis, who went off to fight Carnifex. There are reasons this House possesses a blood hatred towards Jedi. It's not out of the blue. It's not even based on some Millennia long feud like it is with most Sith. It's based on being exposed to who they really were when disaster struck. How easy it was to justify letting their worlds get destroyed all to fight the Sith Lords."

She paused thoughtfully a moment before blasting the head off a captured Knight as he sailed through the air.

"Mind you, this opinion is coming from someone who's gotten a taste for skeet shooting the bastards." The Parliament quipped playfully. "Stuart! Load another!"

"YES MASSTHUR..." Stuart the Acolyte exclaimed.

Meanwhile.

Darth Phyre, a little more merged with Elaine than she had been a few minutes prior, landed in the deserts of Site 12X, a tomb built into the rock itself and was quite bewildered at what she saw.

Over a dozen House Citizens were frozen in various positions at the mouth of the tomb entrance facade. Phyre touched one, hissing out a Sith Spell that broke it's effects on him.

He stumbled about, looked at her, eyes wide with alarm because he had seen that face being worn by The Amalgam before, and he didn't calm down untill he realized she wore the Consort's catsuit.

"Uh...Consort?!" he called out hesitantly.

The Elaine in her responded smoothly.

"At ease, Citizen. I have come to resolve the matter." she assured him. "What happened?"

"The Cage...we were transporting it out in Nullification Resin. Standard Protocol. But there was a tunnel collapse. Part of the tomb ceiling smashed open the resin casing...damaged the cage."

"Any deaths?" Phyre asked.

"No. Not yet, anyway...we...we take full responsibility." The Soldier said, steeling himself.

Phyre scoffed at this. "Please. These tunnels are death traps. Setbacks like this are to be expected. I'm honestly amazed no one is dead. I'm baffled you even got as far as you did. Relax."

The Soldier sort of relaxed, but not quite, because he was in front of the Consort, who herself possessed a reputation for horrifying violence long before taking on the face of Phyre. Sure, that violence had never been visited on a law abiding citizen of the House--but he wasn't gonna be stupid and take that for granted. There was a first time for everything.

That being said, this was a far more generous reaction than he would have gotten from a typical Sith. It was what made the Cultists so bizarre to deal with--they were perfectly polite, affable, even, to allies and friends. Yet to victims you could meet only a few more savage and inhumane than your typical Cultist.

And make no mistake, The Battalion was pulling the strings behind that face. It's just that she was also the strings she was pulling at.

Phyre turned to the entrance. A hissed spell freed the other citizens from their frozen state, and they all staggered about, disoriented.

"Use your anger to focus you. You'll recover faster." Phyre advised cheerfully. "Now, I need all of you to clear out of here and report back to what's left of the Valley of The Dark Lords. Tell everybody to stay back until I call."

"Consort, we would gladly accompany you to aid you."

Phyre shook her head. "Spirited of you to offer, but a malfunctioning Fermata Cage is quite simply beyond your current abilities. Really, you're faultless. Run along! It's fine!"

The Citizens looked at each other, a few shrugged and began gathering their Equipment to return to Base. Darth Phyre then walked up to the tomb entrance, her flesh shuddering as she got closer to the dark power that pulsed from within. The flesh on her face bubbled back and forth between her old face and her new one as she got closer, flesh now violently warping everywhere.

She placed her hand on the collapsed entrance, and calling on the discipline she had absorbed from Syd, made the stone burn and melt away and she stepped inside...

Percival Io

Akemi Io

Alessandra Io

 

[Lady Venge]

Venge could certainly sympathize with The Parliament's views on the various factions squabbling for control of the galaxy, or the decline of the Sith Empire from the Golden Age long past.

"My own master was content to hoard his knowledge on a dead and forgotten world, waiting for the current Sith Empire to burn itself out from within. I wanted make my mark on the Galaxy, take what was rightfully mine while I was still young enough to enjoy it. We often clashed because of our differing views in that aspect," Venge reminisced. "Then again...I'm still alive and he's long dead. For all his knowledge and his cunning, he couldn't stop a mere boy from destroying everything he worked to achieve...."

Venge's thoughts turned to Alex StormWolf, remembering his wrath as he destroyed the Black Hssiss Order for the genocide they had committed against his family, corrupting his memories and making him one of their own. At his full potential in the Dark Side, Alex was a force to be reckoned with. If only she could find some way to break him to her will.

"There's a certain Jedi who's been a thorn in my side for nearly the past 30 years. He's conflicted, and the darkness often whispers to him still. And yet, he still manages to resist me, denying himself his rightful place at my side. I hate him...and yet...part of me still longs for him as he once was, before he returned to the Light. Doesn't make any sense, does it?"

The Battalion
Laertia Io

 

[Laertia Io]

"Oh, Lady Venge ..." The Parliament remarked as another Knight went sailing through the air, screaming in an undignified manner as she no-scoped him as he tumbled into the Canyon from the hip without looking.

"It makes all too much sense..." she emphasized, rotting yellow eyes taking on a wistful stare. "His story sounds very much like my own. Now, I don't know the full story between you and this Stormwolf--"

Stuart loaded a screaming Alliance Civilian onto the catapult and launched her into the air. The Parliament No-Scoped her from the hip as well.

"--so I don't know if what I say next would be feasible to your desires. But the approach my master took with me was this. There was no torture--not on me anyway--and there was no incredibly complex, sick strategem like placing my friends in danger or killing them or causing me pain. None of the typical head games you have no doubt been exposed to in your career."

Stuart launched another Civilian and she pulled off four impressive shots, taking off every limb save the head before the Civilian fell.

"You see, what my Master had come to understand--and this is absolutely to her credit--was that if she had pulled that chit with me, then I, being the stubborn fething Bantha I was, would absolutely have dug in my heels and doubled down. So she didn't try it. She instead took the Palpatine route. She was patient. I don't think anyone, even the ones in my house who genuinely appreciated how dangerous The Amalgam actually could be when pressed, understood the patience she exhibited, despite playing the part of the clown, which I now realize was her attempt to make others underestimate her."

Stuart gestured to the Catapult again and The Parliament shook her head.

"Enough for the moment, Stuart..." she said to the acolyte.

Stuart nodded, and eagerly began to check on the ritual paints on the victims to see if any of it had started to run.

The Parliament refocused on Venge.

"So what did she do? She waited, and let the Jedi Order prove all the points she was making for her. Granted, my turning was slightly more involved but that was the major chunk of it. Another large part was simply letting me decide she was right based on how many times I listened to my own darker instincts... though she never failed to point out each time I did something bloody and cruel. She reasoned with me."

The Parliament stared into Korriban's sun without blinking, folding her arms, silently feeding on the suffering around her.

"That was the deciding factor. I don't know if that could work on Stormwolf, though. But if you want to have a better shot at getting him back, if you...miss him, for lack of a more Sithly word to describe it..." she trailed a moment before turning her gaze on Venge. "Then try to find some way to prove to him that you are more legitimately concerned with his fate than the Jedi Order are. If he gives into his darker instincts facing you, don't even comment on it. Make each encounter one that creates the conditions for giving into his instincts easier and easier. Not with big high stakes, but smaller stakes, like a...a death of a thousand cuts type scenario. It is not truly some big, grand decision that sees a persons feelings in the Force change towards light or dark, but a series of millions of tiny, seemingly insignificant at the time choices that often add up to a major change. Like how an avalanche of snow on a mountain starts."

 

[Lady Venge]

"I suppose I ought to start from the beginning," Venge stated. "Many years ago, my Master had a personal vendetta against the StormWolf family. He managed to track them down to Yanibar. Only two seasons there on that desolate dirtball, hot or cold, take your pick. For some inexplicable reason, he spared Alex after he had already slaughtered every other member of the family. My Master manipulated Alex's memories, making him believe that it was the Jedi who had betrayed his family. At his full potential in the Dark Side, Alex was a force to be reckoned with. I was drawn to him like a moth to a flame, for lack of a better description. For awhile, I was content, if such a thing is even possible for a Sith. Eventually though, Alex came to his senses, and destroyed our sect. To this day, I'm still uncertain how I managed to survive. So...that's pretty much it in a nutshell, we've been circling each other for years, like two stars orbiting a black hole."

Venge paused for a moment, idly twirling her Sith sword.

"Not long ago, I felt a disturbance in the Force centered around Alex. It seems that he's been infected with poison from a Sith Spawn. Now might be the time to strike, while he's compromised. One of the last few times I encountered him, I placed a Force Bond on him. I can sense his presence anywhere in the Galaxy. Finding him wouldn't be too difficult."

Laertia Io