Set Me Free

[Arage Bao]

The burning tail forewarned him of the event and yet as he perched on the hilltop Vheissu was still amazed at the brilliance of the moment.

The fire burned, radiating the rolling hills for many miles to come in the darkness of the night. If not for the distinct feeling of death, destruction and mania radiating from the burning transport, Vheis would have considered this a moment of glory. Nature showing itself on its primest, but the moment was ruined by the emotional touches of the human spirit.

They were everywhere these days, do not feel amazed by this fact.

It did not take long for Ireles to make his way from the hilltop and approach the burning wreckage of what seemed to be some kind of transport. His eyes studied the environment, but it did not seem as if this was some kind of trap, some lure for him to take.

Fire was roaring high, but that did not stop Vheissu Ireles, the flames was not something to fear he had learned a long time ago. Some men would have waited for it to grow colder and more safe to enter the wreckage and see if there was anything of worth in there.

But those men are not the Holder of the Flame.

Breathing in and out, he started to make intricate movements with his arms, flowing in and out of stances that had been established by the Kro Var millennia ago. Bit by the heat was funneled away into the sky, steamrolling away and Ireles descended into wreckage.

The Gods had sent this ship, of this he was sure.

[member="Jemmila Kyrgen"]

 

[Zola]

Ink-black darkness. Gagging smoke. The crackle of fire. The terse screeching of a jungle creature. A warm breeze on her face. Then, pain. Jaw-clenching, nerve-wringing pain.

Jemmila Krygen opened one eye, then another. She examined herself first and felt a wave of relief. Thank the Force she was whole. The Hapan apprentice of the Obsidian Order found herself in training clothes, a tank top and loose pants, hanging in tatters off of her bare and bruised skin. All around her was metal and durasteel twisted into something barely recognizable as a Corvette.

His Corvette. Her captor, a Sith Lord who had attacked her in the Crystal Caves on Dantooine. A captor about whom she didn't remember much else, but the opposing desires he unleashed in her. Snatches of light peeked out from slits in the broken hull. The sun was either coming up or going down, but she couldn't tell which. Branches of the Force reached out beyond the wreckage, searching for signs of life.

She felt an aura of someone, an energy that spoke of heat and earth. It was a signature very unlike that of the Corvette's owner. The question was, was that a good or a bad thing?

[member="Vheissu Ireles"]

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Jemmila Kyrgen"]

Ireles was not a man who hurried himself, there was a plan in every little motion, economy in the swiftest movement and gesture. Why should one hurry himself when you have the favor of the Gods? When the spirits themselves support you with every breath you take and ever life you sacrifice to their glory?

No, there was no need to make this go any quicker than it had to go. And so the shaper of fire would simply move around the broken wreckages, pausing here and there to pick up a discarded item and pocketing it if it was something worthwhile to have.

The spirits were restless in a particular corner of the ship, as his feet followed the screeching forms his journey ended at the body of a young woman.

She was in pain, weak and durasteel laid over her. Making it impossible for her to move out of the way herself. Some radiant knight of justice would have helped her, made her feel better and escorted her back to safety.

But Vheissu just snorted and started looking for other discarded items that might have been laying around here. The girl wasn’t going anywhere, and if she managed to escape from the rubble? It would only prove her worth to him.

He had no need for weakness.

 

[Zola]

As Jem felt his musky aura grow stronger, thickening the air around her as it mingled with outpouring of black smoke, she snapped her eyes shut. She held onto the dim hope that if she played dead, he would pass by her by. She needed to get free. If she didn't, then he might return to repossess what had become his property. If he hadn't perished in the wreckage of his downed ship, that is. She doubted she would be shedding any tears over it.

His signature grew stronger still, dominating the crash site, and finally she opened her eyes and let her gaze rise to the bearer of the aura, a bronzed, powerhouse of a man. He seemed unconcerned by her presence and simply rooted around the wreckage looking for spoils. Perhaps now was her chance to make a move.

Jem's heart beat like a jungle drum as she called upon the dark side of the Force, coaxing it to fill every molecule in her body. She focused her mind on the object of her intentions, the durasteel sheet that buried her. The metal sheet began to wobble and then floated up and into the air, releasing her from its weight. Jem dropped it a few feet away, as gently as she could, but as it landed, it still made a sound like cymbals crashing into one another. She let out a cry of pain as she lifted herself up from where she lay, and then rolled over onto her hands and knees. She would escape, even if she had to crawl all the way back to Coruscant.

[member="Vheissu Ireles"]

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Jemmila Kyrgen"]

Never make sudden movements when dealing with a wild animal, would be the lesson Jem would learn the moment she send the durasteel sheet crashing down and tried to make a run for it. Because Vheissu was no God, he knew not what her intentions were and so the warrior reacted in the only way an attacked animal would in a situation such at this one.

He swiftly turned around, his leg sweeping across the floor and as it made an arc over the durasteel flooring… heated, compressed air would be sent crashing into the form of Jemmila. Some men could break people’s minds, others could conjure up demons and there were a few that could send skyscrapers crashing.

Ireles had never tried that last one, instead he opted for the more… personal-approach. He would raise himself up from his kneeling position, hands balled in big fists and waiting to see what else would come from this wounded girl.

Perhaps she was worthy?

 

[Zola]

It seemed that the sound of the metal sheet hitting the floor had spooked him like a wild animal, a wild animal with the powers of wind at his fingertips. A blast of steamy, hot air suddenly hit Jem like a geyser, sending her tumbling into the jagged shards of metal behind her. "Ow!" she spat, almost angrily, as her nerves sang out in a chorus of pain. Her porcelain brow narrowed, eyes flashing with irritation. Lifting herself to her knees, the Hapan Padawan winced as she studied her foe carefully for a moment.

His eyes were like fiery gems in his skull, gleaming with mischief as they bore into her, taunting her into giving him more. Jemmila was not one to back down to this particular type of challenge. Her gaze never wavering, she lifted her bruised arms slowly upwards, and as she did, a sheet of metal on either side of the man rose into the air. Jem violently pushed her hands together. With that movement, the two sheets would presumably come together to bash his head in.

"Go away!" she shouted as she attempted to crush him beneath the two durasteel sheets.

[member="Vheissu Ireles"]

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Jemmila Kyrgen"]

Fiery as fire, fast as the wind.

The longer you fought with the spirits of nature, the more they became a part of you. The more they controlled you and through it you could control them, combat was an art of economy. Swiftest movement and the least amount of gestures to create effect, but this woman had not learned from the Kro Var and their shamans.

Instead she gave him enough opportunity to see what she was planning and before she executed her move, Vheis dropped himself to the ground with his feet aimed at the young girl.

As the durasteel sheets punched together, shrapnel escaped them and rained down on Vheissu, cuts all over his body.

He used that pain to channel his fury into a blast of compressed air from his feet.

Boom.

 

[Zola]

The last thing Jemmila saw before the blackness returned were the tanned and handsome stranger's feet. She heard a loud whoosh, felt herself flying backwards, then the sweet caress of darkness.

When she awoke, her head felt like a lead balloon. An indignant groan escaped her lips as Jemmila found herself tied up, wrists to ankles, with some kind of rag in her mouth. The injustice of it surged up inside of her, boiling her blood. She could tear him in two with her bare hands for trussing her up this way.

Instantly, the Hapan apprentice drew on the power of the dark side, pulling it into her body as she focused her mental energy on her restraints, hoping that a lever could be toggled or her gag could be untied. In the meantime, her large brown eyes searched the room. She seemed to be bound in some kind of small cabin with animal skulls hanging on the walls and a matty fur rug underneath her. Where was the dark shaman who wielded the power of the cyclone? Was he just a porter delivering her to a creature more horrifying?

Either she was the butt of some cosmic joke or the universe was testing her. Force knew it worked in mysterious ways.

[member="Vheissu Ireles"]

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Jemmila Kyrgen"]

She would soon find that the restraints were vague in the Force, almost as if someone had put a ritual over it to make it untouchable by the Force, perhaps it was made of the skin of a Taozin or there was something far more obscure going on. Either way, the bindings would not be easily thwarted by the manipulations of the mystic and the arcane.

That would defeat the purpose.

If she bothered to shimmy around her balancing point, she would eventually reach a vantage point where she would see her captor. He was sitting in a comfortable leather chair, adorned with the fur and skin of some animals- probably ones he had killed himself.

In his hands was a knife and it seemed he was cutting up a piece of wood.

His eyes left the wood, taking note of Jem, before grunting to himself and continuing to work on the object. It seemed he was an artsy person, in his free time.

 

[Zola]

Well, the restraints certainly weren't going anywhere anytime soon. Jemmila gave up on them and used her Force powers to branch out and find his signature. They didn't have to go far. Like a brick wall, her senses ran right into his, and she almost reeled from the primal aura that blasted her like a rogue meteor. She did a clumsy, squirming shimmy, turning to face him. She blew a lock of hair out of her eyes, and scowled at her captor. He lounged in a chair amid some ratty furs, and he was definitely not bound like a pig for the slaughter.

She took a moment to examine him fully. He had long black hair, tied back in some sort of braid. His eyes were a dark mud-brown and ringed with some kind of kohl. Then there were his muscles, muscles the likes of which Jem had not seen since...Her face twisted into a smile at the thought of Darth Carach.

His face full of indifference, the tanned elementalist let out a grunt when he saw her. Then he returned his focus to his woodworking. It was humiliating. As if crafts were more important than a living, breathing woman? Jem's eyes narrowed as her rage resurfaced. In a demanding tone she spat two question at him in quick succession.

"Who are you? What do you want with me?"

[member="Vheissu Ireles"]

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Jemmila Kyrgen"]

Whispers circled around the room as the spirits took note of the item being crafted, they needed to be coaxed into a state of curiosity. Their power was great, but their attention span? Not so much. Yet Vheissu was an experienced Shaman and he knew the tricks, how to shape a being and capture the visage in the wood, how to perfect the lines, bind the essence of the creature into the wood.

A Vornskr.

And as the whispers centered around the wooden canine, they would align themselves with the essence and brand their identity into it. An item of power was forged, and it would help Vheissu hunt his prey wherever he went.

It was only then that those amber eyes found their way back to the woman.

“Property does not speak.” those same eyes seemed to look right through her and her haughty manners, they seemed to see her for what she truly was.

Spirit sight?

Who knew what the Shamans of old had brought in terms of knowledge and experience. Vheissu put down the object on the table, leaned back against his seat and closed his eyes. A hum escaped his throat, spirits of a different kind were being attracted by it.

Then Vheissu asked; his voice suddenly shifted. There was power in that voice, a hot-edge just waiting to escape, it commanded respect and more importantly? It commanded to obey.

“Where did you come from, child?”

 

[Zola]

You didn't need to be an astrophysicist to tell that the man was in no mood to answer questions, but Jemmila let out an indignant gasp when he called her "property." She was a Dark Jedi Padawan of the Obsidian Order, the apprentice of esteemed Master Adekos. She was noone's property. If there was any entity she belonged to, it was the dark side of the Force, and even then, Jemmila would rather be its Master than its Servant.

She let out a soft grunt as the young Hapan struggled angrily against her bindings. Of course, the restraints weren't budging. When the elementalist asked her where she came from, she whipped her head around to look at him, her eyes flashing with rage, a look that could sink ships. Inhaling sharply, Jem called the Force into her body and concentrated on the chair in which he lounged. She bit her lip and squinted her eyes, attempting to send the chair flying backwards with him in it.

"I thought property wasn't supposed to speak," she reminded him with a haughty glare.

If he wanted a slave, she was not planning on making things easy for him.

[member="Vheissu Ireles"]

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Jemmila Kyrgen"]

Coincidentally some of the skins that made up Vheissu’s chair was also alchemically-treated Taozin nodes that blurred and made the Force a less effective entity, but that wasn’t how Ireles viewed it of course.

It were the spirits who protected him and his property against the mysterious ravages of the Breath that lingered all around them, a heretic would never understand such a thing of course. They were far too busy with their technology and through it had lost sight on what truly mattered in life.

The way of the animal, to be the beast.

The chair got pushed a few inches back nonetheless, perhaps a testament of her strength and yet there was only amusement flashing up in those amber eyes of his. Amusement… paired with the resolve to do what needed to be done.

Vheis slowly raised himself from his chair, the woodwork abandoned on the table next to him and the Elementalist approached his property.

“Property…” Ireles whispered softly, as his footsteps brought him to the tied-up girl. “answers when spoken to.”

He kneeled next to her and his hand suddenly rested on that beautiful, unmarred face of hers. The same hand… started to- it felt almost as if it was heating up, slowly she would feel heat radiating onto her skin.

Not yet scalding, but close to it.

An open threat? Maybe.

 

[Zola]

"Property answers when spoken to."

The phrase elicited an audible gulp from the Hapan, followed by an angry huff of air. Yes, Jemmila was afraid of her captor, but ultimately her stubbornness eclipsed it, just as it had on the Machinator. Attacking Adekos out of the blue. Stealing a shuttle to fly off for a respite of freedom with a seductive Sith Lord. All of these things made her the stormy sea of a woman who now lay bound, like chattel. His chattel.

He placed a gigantic hand on her face, fingers smelling of splinters and sweat. Then the shaman's hand began to burn her lovely face. Jemmila wasn't the vainest person in the galaxy, but she rather liked her unique looks. Her large brown eyes, high cheekbones, and heart-shaped face that epitomized the fair people of the planet Hapes. She knew that someday her skin would sag and become spotted with age, but right now she was not ready to be marred with flaws. Her beauty was a gift that would not be stolen from her. Not at this young an age.

"Stop! Please!" Jem begged, her voice cracking with anguish. She looked straight into his eyes with a fearful crinkle in her brow.

"I will speak to you like property should."

At that moment, she would have said anything to stop her skin from blistering underneath his palms.

[member="Vheissu Ireles"]