Voice of Freedom
When I had journeyed half of our life's way,
I found myself within a shadowed forest,
for I had lost the path that does not stray...
[MUSIC]
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Unknown Location, 16 BBY
This had been the site of a great temple once, but it’s age was long since forgotten. Lost to time. Now, only eroded shapes remain of the once intricate patterns and imagery that had decorated the chiselled pathway through the snow capped crags. Heavy winds funnel through the cliffs occasionally, each gust stirring the light snow into a blizzard.
A figure braces against the howling torrent as they ascend, their movement heavy and sluggish. A young man - no older than 25. His dark hair is shaved close to the scalp, but an unkept beard is beginning to grow. His bruised face, fully exposed to the elements, looks to have once been kind and gentle; but is now hardened by the scars of battle. The man's simple clothes are notably ill-suited for the journey, and each item appears tattered and filthy. A once tan tunic is soiled by dirt and old blood, and his loose-fitting trousers are without a left leg entirely. Only several stained bandages protect the limb from the cold. Two lightsaber hilts bounce against his right thigh with each strained step, held in place by a fraying rope that acts as a belt.
The last step is daunting, but the battered Jedi manages it through sheer willpower. His knees quiver and nearly buckle from exhaustion, but he rises to the top of the crumbling stairway to stand before the mouth of a cavern; a narrow, jagged fissure in the rocks that stretches high above with a large bronze disc nestled deeper within. Idle for the first time in what feels like eternity, the pain of his body catches up to him and he topples forward into the rockface. He stays there for a moment, leaning on it, breathing heavily.
"Get up, Aeris," a disembodied voice encourages flatly "these are the final steps." He begins to cough, clenching his gut and doing his best to deny a wince of agony with each contraction of his abdomen. "The Force is with you."
A second voice joins, that of a woman. "And so are we."
The Jedi chokes when he hears her, muttering a weak response aloud "Aus're..." Their words serve to reinvigorate his body, if only slightly, and with some struggle he finds himself back to his feet.
Supporting himself with a hand against the stone, he staggers toward the featureless disc blocking the path forward. When he reaches it the Jedi transfers his hand from the cavern wall to its smooth metal surface, putting his weight on it to stop himself from tripping over his lazy footing. With only a short pause to collect himself, he closes his eyes and tilts his head back. His brow twitches and the veins in his forehead swell. His chest and arm become tense, the strenuous action clearly bringing him great pain. Sure enough, just as he can’t bear anymore, a resounding clunk of machinery is heard from beyond the stone walls. The man lets out a pained gasp as he snaps out of his concentration and stumbles back from recoil.
The sounds of grinding metal and rock fill the cavern, shaking loose stones from the walls and dropping pebbles and dirt from the ceiling. Too tired to shield himself and already too dirty to care, the young Jedi simply cedes to accept it wordlessly. As he stands there, layered in all manner of filth, the bronze disc shifts and begins to roll to the left, out of the way and into the cavern wall. The domed room that is revealed comes as a stark change of scenery. Untouched by time, the perfectly carved rock is still smooth to the touch. A thin layer of water covers the entire floor, projecting a mirrored image disturbed only by the ripples and splashes of the Jedi’s weary steps as he trudges toward an altar at the center.
Floating gently above it is a small cube, spinning softly in place. The sight appears to distract the man completely, offering him respite from his pains and woes. The device’s gentle glow illuminates his face as he steps up to the podium, observing it in complete awe. Cautiously, he brings his left hand to grasp it from below. The tired Jedi’s panting wavers when his fingers finally touch its tarnished metal surface, as if it was just now finally real. A stifled laugh escapes him; the relief and emotions he had held back finally breaking free. He raises the back of his right arm to his face to rub the dirt and sweat from his brow, and to catch the welling tears in his eyes. The first one to escape falls to his cheek and traces the line of an old scar, but the rest seem to come quicker. The man’s jaw clenches in response, and his shoulders begin to shake in unison with muffled sobs.
“Well done, my Padawan,” the voice from before resonates around him, startling the young man and prompting him to sniff and attempt to compose himself. Through his tears he smiles and moves his arm from his face. On the opposite side of the altar platform the transparent form of a Cerean man in traditional Jedi robes stands stoically, watching him.
The Jedi nearly drops the holocron as he falls forward in shock, catching himself on the podium with a loud grunt. Dismissing the pain, he calls out to the apparition “Master!”
The Cerean steps forward, placing a weightless hand onto his apprentice’s arm. “Be calm. You have been through much,” the Master answers softly. He was always so calm; so capable of reminding Aeris to pause and collect his thoughts when things seemed impossible.
“I can help you now. Both of you. I can bring you back,” his voice is tremulous.
The woman’s voice speaks up once more, this time from behind him, “Yes, Aer, you’ve done it.”
The Jedi spins himself around to be presented with a similarly manifested image, though this one of a young woman bearing similar features to his own. He weakly holds out a hand to her, lips trembling in her presence. Barely able to speak, he stammers out the word “Sister…”
The Master interrupts their moment, “The time has come, Jedi.” His tone is overlaid with another, darker voice, he had never heard before. Caught off guard, the young Jedi shuffles himself back around to face him. Where the Cerean had once been, a new entity stands in his place. A thin, towering shadow, rising all the way to the ceiling. It arches forward, gazing down upon the man with fiery, green eyes. The Jedi lets out a shriek and stumbles backward off the altar platform, tripping and falling with a splash into the shallow water.
“Master Sen-ro!” he cries out in horror, still taken aback by the imposing darkness incarnate before him. The eyes continue watching him, dancing within the shadowed form like flames.
“No,” it answers, it's thunderous voice encompassing the room entirely. Aeris grits his teeth and clenches his fists while he slowly manages to pick himself from the floor, trying his best to hide the chattering of his jaw and shaking of his hands.
Concern and fear were rising inside of him now, and he raises a hand to point at the monster accusingly. “What did you do to them?!” he shouts, the panic evident in his voice. The shadow is unmoving, offering no physical reaction.
“Nothing,” the voice booms, the deepness of its tone rattling the Jedi to his core. “They were dead. Dead they remain.”
“No!” he spits back like venom, clearly deeply cut by the comment “You’re wrong! They’re with the Force, but I can bring them back. They’ve guided me! Shown me how!” He holds up the holocron in defiance of the being’s logic, “I will not be made a fool by you, demon.”
The room quakes in response and for the first time the darkness that makes up the entity stirs. It disperses throughout the room, shrinking the featureless form to stand roughly 2m tall. It drifts forward, passing straight through the podium unimpeded. Desperate, the Jedi grips one of the sabers at his side, but resists drawing it. The spirit stops nonetheless, looming only a few feet away. His hold of the holocron tightens, expecting the vile manifestation to try and pry it from his grasp. A shadowy appendage extends from the mass with a gaseous movement, elongated fingers uncurling to point down at his challenger.
“You have been guided, yes. The actions that have led you here have been the consequence of your own naivety,” it’s eyes flicker, the emerald flames that form them licking upward in a sudden flair of life. The Jedi’s body begins to ache under the strain of the manifestations presence “you stand before me now, fooled only by your own desperation.”
The Padawan’s body shakes as he hopelessly struggles against an onset of paralysis. His hand lingers on his weapon unable to draw it, and his legs seem frozen in place. His eyes move frantically as the spirit leers down upon him. “Only I have brought you here, boy. There is nothing for you but me.”
It’s umbral claw taps at the holocron gripped firmly in the young man’s hand, making an echoing clank. Horrified, the man watches helplessly as the cube withers away until his fist closes upon nothing but dust. Aeris’ eyes go wide in complete disbelief and his teeth grind as a primal force swells up from deep within him. Vibrant hues of yellow and orange snakes from the edges of his dark, umber irises and his chest begins to rise and fall with erratic, heavy breaths. A scream of pure agony and rage erupts from him, frying his vocal chords as he succumbs to everything he had suppressed on his grueling journey. Everything had been an orchestrated lie; his hope and effort had been for nothing, other than to lure him to this vile manifestation of shadows. He had been nothing more than a puppet, his strings the love he had for those he’d lost.
Still bellowing, his body bursts from the invisible shackles holding him. In a flash of motion, a cyan blade ignites and the fallen Padawan lashes forward with nothing but hate to fuel him. The saber passes through the specter, dissipating it’s form into a mist momentarily. When it begins to reform unharmed he slashes at it again, and again, continuing until his anger and frustration erupt into a shockwave of force energy around him.
The walls tremble and the floor beneath him shudders and cracks. Small chunks of the stone ceiling crumble and fall, splashing down into the water below. When the dust settles, the man is on his knees at the center of the blast. Although barely able to remain conscious, he still grips his ignited lightsaber while seething through his teeth. With no time for the false hope of a victory, the darkness begins to creep back toward him from the edges of the room.
Taking no form this time, a bodiless voice surrounds him. “Do you truly wish to bring life back from beyond death?”
Aeris’ newly amber eyes struggle to see through the blood pooling on his lids. Through the haze of his approaching death, only the dancing darkness swirling around him can be seen. His saber retracts and the hilt slips from his fingers, falling to his side. He can feel the spirit’s violent cyclone of energy around him as his eyes grow heavy.
An answer barely escapes him, “Yes… I... can still help… them.”
When his words leave him the room begins to rumble furiously. The shadows circling the Jedi’s body stretch upward and the pooled water evaporates as a fiery, burning glow pierces the stone floor. Slowly, the ground starts to crack and sink beneath the earth while smaller pieces burn away like paper in the wind until all that remains is a single pillar where Aeris rests limp on his knees. As the column finally shows signs of crumbling under his weight the shadows arch inwards, collapsing down upon the Jedi and forcing him into the churning vortex that had formed beneath the surface.
In this final action the ceiling gives way, collapsing the dome upon the chasm that had formed.
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Brentaal system, 860 ABY
Brentaal system, 860 ABY
Visible to the naked eye from the surface of the plague-stricken planet, hundreds of dazzling, splintered tendrils in vibrant hues of pink and red fracture outward from the site of the developing spatial anomaly. A pulse of light follows shortly after, bright enough to stun any who may have been looking up to regard the event in confusion or awe. Finally, the space itself seems to tear asunder at the heart of the star system and reveal a twisting miasma. Arcs of raw, chaotic energy reach out from the maw, licking at nearby starships and violently crackling against each other.
“Do you understand what you must do?” a spidery voice surrounds an armoured figure as he rises to his full height. The hulking, seven-and-a-half foot figure stands bearing cruel and jagged carapace armour with the helmet gripped firmly in it’s left hand. His face is pale and gaunt, and locked into an expression of deep fury. Even still, it is recognizable as that of the young Jedi, barely touched by the centuries that had passed by. He lets out a guttural groan as an acknowledgement of the question.
A shadow rises from behind him, stretching up to become a tall and featureless shape “It all rests on you, now. Everything we have worked toward; everything you have sacrificed.”
The armour-clad warrior’s breath grows heavier and louder as the looming spirit continues to speak “The time has finally come. Abaddon, let loose your hatred. Release your pain. Free us and you may free them.”
With rage burning within, the titan lifts his barbed helmet and slams it down onto his head. From the two, shadowed sockets in the faceplate, his piercing green eyes cut through the darkness, wide and manic. He marches forward with heavy steps, leaving the shadow behind to approach an overlook a few meters away from them. From here, it becomes apparent that they are upon the back of a void beast that could easily rival a star dreadnought in size.
Below him, a force of horrific, mutated monsters and humanoids of various builds and sizes stand eager and rallied together, unaffected by the void. They begin to screech, cheer, hiss and roar as they notice the warrior’s presence high above. He allows their war cries to wash over him, but shifts his gaze upward. In the distance, in sharp contrast to the blackness of space, the mirrored end of the mangled portal awaits their arrival. From either side of the leviathan, other colossal space-faring creatures follow in their advance.
Looking back down upon the masses before him, Aeris reaches to an old hilt that still dangles at his side. He unclips it with his right hand and raises it above his head. The crowd of screaming reavers and beasts stir in anticipation, growing louder as they struggle to contain their thirst for the violence to come.
A snap-hiss overlayed with a grinding static rumble announces the sabers’ activation. The weapon’s cyan blade ejects, now mixed with crackling verdant energy. The unstable boon extends beyond the weapons typical dimensions, making it longer to accommodate for the wielder’s augmented height while giving it a wider, flattened edge better suited for heavy, sweeping blows.
He stands silently, watching the horde cry out in response.
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Brentaal system, ISV Radiance, Bridge
Brentaal system, ISV Radiance, Bridge
“We’re detecting a massive power surge from the center of the anomaly, Sir!” the Junior Sensors Officer’s voice calls from across the bridge of the I.S.V. Radiance with great concern. From the head of the command deck, High Admiral Callaesar is cast in a multitude of vibrant colours as he watches the twisting portal in silence. His hands grip each other firmly behind his back as he contemplates what might come next. No amount of training, Anaxsi or otherwise, could prepare someone for an event like this. It was simply beyond the scope of any reasonable anticipation. All around him, the other officers of the battlecruiser appear similarly awe-struck.
“S-Sir?” the 2nd Lieutenant acting as Cassius’ steward nervously approaches, but his eyes remain locked on the sight beyond rather than the Admiral “What are your orders? What do we do?”
Cassius furrows his brow and takes in a slow, deep breath. “Have the Chief Navigation Officer dispatch one of our Avalons to return to Anaxes immediately. We must rally the rest of the Battlefleet.”
The Sensors Officer shouts out once more, “Something’s emerging!” He rises from his post and tosses his headset down on the control panel in front of him, looking away from the readout on the displays to watch the portal directly. Violent bolts of green a purple energy strike out from the center of the tear in space.
Finally, the gnarled and wide-stretched maw of the colossal leviathan breaches through to reality and begins to emerge from the depths of the gateway.
Cassius can’t help but mutter to himself in it’s presence, “Gods…”
“What the hell is that thing?!” a voice shrieks from somewhere behind the High Admiral. The steward covers his mouth with both hands to mask his horrified gasp. From all throughout the bridge cries of concern and worry start to build.
“Enough!” the High Admiral’s command silences the room. He falls silent again, his own eyes still lingering in disbelief as the abomination continues to materialize. “We have a job to do.” He turns and begins to march to the opposite end of the command deck, toward the massive holo-display where other junior officers were gathered around attempting to coordinate the movement of their small response fleet.
“Move the Shieldships into a defensive formation and launch all fighter squadrons. Send all available gunships to the planet’s surface to assist the ground forces.” He looks to his shaken Steward. “Go, dispatch that Avalon. We must evacuate whatever forces we can from Brentaal IV. We will hold this - whatever this is - as long as we can.”
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CHAOS RISING
Pt. 1 - Abaddon's Gate
Chaos has arrived.
The Force has guided us here; elected us as the shield of humanity. We must hold our lines and strike back until evacuations are complete and orbital bombardment can commence. We must show these demons the unwavering strength that Ashla provides.
Vile and unholy bio-ships are descending upon the planet, deploying bloodthirsty hordes of aberrant monsters and warriors from bulbous transport sacks. Clawed fiends, mutated corpses, hulking brutes and all sorts of dreadful entities have rallied from the depths of Chaos, ready to bring forth carnage and suffering upon the living. As their warriors flood the streets, wraith-like creatures and serpentine horrors sweep the skies, diving down from the growing mists to pluck soldiers and civilians alike.
At the heart of the star system, void-beasts the size of starships are engaging our naval forces. Starfighters have scrambled to intercept, but have been met with swarms of smaller, faster void-spawn. The remaining Lines of the 1st Anaxsi-Imperial Battlefleet will be coming to reinforce, but it will take time.
This is not a Dominion, so there are no formal objectives outlined. Use what’s detailed above as a guideline of the unfolding situation to help place yourself, but anyone is welcome to bring and weave their own personal arcs & stories into the events transpiring. This thread immediately follows the events of Overture | GI Dominion of Brentaal IV Hex & is the first part of the Imperium’s CHAOS RISING faction campaign.
CHAOS RISING
Pt. 1 - Abaddon's Gate
Chaos has arrived.
The Force has guided us here; elected us as the shield of humanity. We must hold our lines and strike back until evacuations are complete and orbital bombardment can commence. We must show these demons the unwavering strength that Ashla provides.
Vile and unholy bio-ships are descending upon the planet, deploying bloodthirsty hordes of aberrant monsters and warriors from bulbous transport sacks. Clawed fiends, mutated corpses, hulking brutes and all sorts of dreadful entities have rallied from the depths of Chaos, ready to bring forth carnage and suffering upon the living. As their warriors flood the streets, wraith-like creatures and serpentine horrors sweep the skies, diving down from the growing mists to pluck soldiers and civilians alike.
At the heart of the star system, void-beasts the size of starships are engaging our naval forces. Starfighters have scrambled to intercept, but have been met with swarms of smaller, faster void-spawn. The remaining Lines of the 1st Anaxsi-Imperial Battlefleet will be coming to reinforce, but it will take time.
This is not a Dominion, so there are no formal objectives outlined. Use what’s detailed above as a guideline of the unfolding situation to help place yourself, but anyone is welcome to bring and weave their own personal arcs & stories into the events transpiring. This thread immediately follows the events of Overture | GI Dominion of Brentaal IV Hex & is the first part of the Imperium’s CHAOS RISING faction campaign.
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