Stars and Bones (Complete)

[Kuzo]

New City​

Maena​

Irajah stood on the balcony, leaning on the railing and simply taking in the night. From this high up the city glittered beneath her, a thousand pinpricks of light. Beautiful. Distant.

Cold.

Oddly, it was almost a comfort for her in that moment. She had spent the last few days wrapping up her affairs here on Maena. Disposing of the last of the Gideon samples and test subjects. Making certain her labs were scoured of any potential danger that could be left here. She would come back- there was a grim determination there- she was not saying good bye to this place or the people she had come to care about here. [member="Matsu Xiangu"] knew the risks of what was coming on the horizon for the dark haired woman. She knew that there was a greater than zero chance that Irajah would not come back from what she, [member="Carach"] and [member="Cerbera"] intended.

But this wasn't good bye.

This was simply good house keeping. Making sure that the series of events that had led her to this place could not be replicated if something did happen to her. Denial of the reality of it all would serve her not at all. The safety of Matsu was far, far more important than hope. Slender hands circled the railing with a certain grim determination, as if the cold metal beneath her palms could somehow ground her further.

Rather than stay in her own apartment out in the city, Matsu had invited her to stay in the comfort of her own towers. She had accepted without hesitation, glad to be closer both to the work that needed to be done, but also to the Sith Master herself.

Of course, Irajah had no illusions that the time would be spent just the two of them. She knew and accepted that the other woman was busy with her own business and needs. So there was no bitterness at being alone here tonight. Neither of them laid claim to the other in that regard, and though they enjoyed their time together in any capacity, both came and went as satellites, passing through each other's spaces in arcs and turns before moving on again.

Here, at least, as with Carach and [member="The Slave"], Irajah moved freely. Dressed simply yes, but not covered from neck to finger tips in dark and heavy fabrics. Here, her bruises, the scars, were open to the night air and she didn't care. If she ventured out into the city tonight as she was contemplating, then she would change. But for now, in this space, there was nothing she had to keep hidden. Those places were few and far between, but cherished.

For now, the stars joining the glittering city below, for now Irajah stood there in a certain comfortable silence with herself.

She wasn't afraid any more.

| [member="Reverance"] |​

 

[Reverance]

Doors didn't have the habit of closing for him. And when they did, he simply found ways to bust them free from the hinge. Though nothing had ever felt off-limits in regards to objective ownership between he and [member="Matsu Xiangu"], it still felt appropriate to gently tap on the door. Perhaps that was the reasoning for him coming to Maena. Worlds colliding, factions warring, and he missed the aura of her presence. Too long had it been since they had collided, since the chaos of his life seemed to freeze for just a moment and he knew exactly where he belonged. Beneath heel.

Like being consumed by the presence of a perpetually dying star, her embrace was a remarkable thing. Yet he was left feeling not the notions of contentment, but instead the lingering tones of curiosity. The woman with the raven hair, with glances that were unrepentant in such fixation. Among people of such power, such disregard for insult or opinion, what harm could be done in a gaze that sat too long upon a singular place?

He wondered if it would be a surprise for the woman when he strolled out to find her, leaning against the railing. He had met her in that vintage bar, he donning an outfit that fell far from his accolades. This day was not much different, the sort of wardrobe that gave way to his own scars and tattoos and the living prosthetic arm that was grafted so crudely to the shoulder. A mixture of flesh tones and blackened skin gave way to an arm that was all but slicked in the pitch tones. But perhaps his most unique trait was the scarred and swirling flesh where his eye used to be, or how the intensity of his other eye might make up for the absence.

"You skin tells a story..." He gripped the railing as he leaned against it, looking up towards the sky. The stars were there, winking and greeting him with a certain illumination. "Pain...suffering...change." He couldn't be more of a fan of pain than he was, there, standing in the low light. But more than her pain, he failed to understand the appeal. The attraction that could have been had between God and mortal. He wished to understand it, to appreciate the virtues that could bring about what he assumed were episodes of mutual admiration. He willingly acknowledged that he held this curiosity, likely, for the shared resemblance of his own relationship with the Atrisian.

Turning to look towards her, in all the silence that might envelop them, he posed a single question. "What makes you so special?" And its utterance, he wondered if she would take that question as an insult or as a compliment, the latter being the truer sentiment.

[member="Irajah Ven"]​

 

[Kuzo]

Perhaps oddly, not only was she not surprised by him, but part of her had been expecting him.

The connection he was so interested in flowed both ways between the two women. And through it, Irajah had caught a glimpse of the one that yawned between he and Matsu. The fact that it ran deeper, the weight of a shared history and more than their own did not, in the slightest, engender a sense of jealousy or longing. A curiosity, perhaps not equal to his, but existent, yes. But only that and a certain happiness, contented that such a bond laid ready. In case....

It was one more way that Irajah knew that there was not a single worry in her for Matsu, if all of what was to come went wrong. A certain bittersweetness in that, but it was good, ultimately. If this went wrong, and she did not come out the other side, well, Irajah would prefer to know that those she cared about had others.

Hazel eyes flickered over to him as he leaned, head tilting slightly to one side. She didn't even try to hide the appraising gaze, just as he didn't hesitate to point out the visibility of her own story, so too did she read his.

"Yours as well," she replied quietly. Acknowledgement. She did not, however, pry beyond the surface. She had a thousand questions she wanted to ask him, yes. About things that had nothing to do, however, with the star they both circled around. And this hardly seemed the time. Maybe after. After.....

While his presence didn't surprise her, his question did.

Irajah blinked.

"I'm not-"

And then, for perhaps the first time, she actually thought about it. All of it.

Everything that had happened, even before leaving, before fleeing from her dead homeworld. Every unlikely experience, every too important interaction. Time after time, moment after moment, events coalescing into far more than they had any right to. There was a litany of important names that shadowed her life. Some, like Matsu, like Carach, as friends. Allies. Lovers. While some had become a darker balance to that. Vrak. The Zambranos. The opportunities that had come, some offered with affection, others offered with ties and strings not always visible at first. She had been given a hundred things that most people could never even dream of, by people who, by all accounts, should not have even noticed her beneath their feet. And not once. But again and again and again.

Instead of continuing with her initial answer, Irajah chuckled and shook her head.

"I don't know actually," she said with a certain self deprecating amusement. She spread her hands out in front of her. It wasn't pride, or false modesty. Irajah knew what she was good at. It just didn't seem nearly adequate to explain.

"I'm a doctor. A survivor. I don't......" she paused, smiling self consciously and looking down for a moment. "I don't quit. But beyond that?"

She shrugged, gaze moving back over the city. It had not been a specific question, about Matsu, but still she knew that was ultimately what he meant.

"I appreciate her. For everything that she is. I don't pick and choose. She is beautiful and terrifying. Gentle and dangerous. One minute that cool distant laugh, and the next crush someone like an insect with as little regard. Cold and warm, attentive and perfect as she so coolly disdains to destroy you and you know- you know you would let her if she wanted. I don't know how I'm special. But I know how she is. I see her." And maybe that's how I am special was left unsaid. A pause. "And I see you."

Thought she still faced the city beneath them, her eyes cast to the side, to him.

"You showed up at a good time. She'd never say it, but she missed you."

No need to clarify who 'she' was. Really, there was only one possible person it could be who mattered to them both.

[member="Reverance"]

 

[Reverance]

He thought back to his confession, about why he had sought her out in the first place. To make her suffer, to make her family suffer, largely out of boredom and perusing the ethereal. Perhaps that had always been her nature, a black hole that constantly tugged at him, expanding and yawning and consuming as she saw fit. No matter how far he traveled, causing chaos and disruption across the universe, he always felt her pull. What, then, would these two be? Celestial bodies caught in the orbit of something bigger than them, fated to eclipse one another as their paths coalesced? Or spaceships, passing in the night, in transit between where they existed and where they lived?

Are they not made important by proximity? That they had impact on the universe, it was of no doubt in his mind. But that was ephemeral impact, quickly forgotten for the bias of recency. When they were gone, would they be recalled by the governments they guided or by the deity they pleased in these passing moments?

He could spend days on end, preaching the dogma of appreciation for the tether that bound them. But that wasn't his purpose here today, not directly. It was the reasoning for his question and curiosity and inevitable end game, but this was a brief purchase of time in the sea of eternity that would inevitably lead to his demise. The one that involved the Spider looking down, eyes filled with darkness that spanned the universe, and teeth covered in his red and gushing lifeline.

"I would let her end me...I long for it." He was a machine pushed by the audacity of ambitious purpose with cogs lubricated by the cessation of life and the illusions of chaotic impact. Acting as an instrument of chaos, he was perpetually striving to enact the natural entropy that went so coarsely against the grain of governance. But it was a loud life, one brought to cacophony by his own mania. The maelstrom always dulled in her presence, where he felt clarified and refined by the euphoria of revelation. Revelation in sudden realization of purpose, temporarily lost in the sea of conquest and death.

With a slow push away from the railing, he half circled around Irajah, voxyn hand moving to hover just far enough away from her bruised and scarred flesh - to feel the warmth of remnant pain. "You see me. I see you." Even without the powers of the voxyn hand at his disposal, the powers of psychometry were prevalent throughout. And across her flesh, he could feel the imprints of a life filled with variety and experience. But the tones were muddied and muffled, further mystified by his own apprehension to make contact. Instead, his hands found grip of the railing on the other side of the raven haired woman.

"Not knowing whether you are special or not...it does not preclude you from obtaining it. Perhaps blindly or without intent. Stars shine in the depths of space, even when we can't see them." He pulled his crimson gaze from her to the world below, of Maena and the planet that Matsu and Onley called home.

"And what I see is a woman...on the precipice of something significant. What is the change that you stride towards?" He was searching for what Matsu found, both in this women and in this world. If he couldn't find it, he would simply have to wander.

[member="Irajah Ven"]​

 

[Kuzo]

She didn't move when he did. Tensed, but didn't flinch away from the near touch of black and clawed hand. Tensed, because of the promise of an unfamiliar touch, but not from fear or revulsion. She waited, frozen with him there for a heartbeat, two, and then the hover of implicated touch withdrew unfulfilled and she let out a breath she hadn't known she'd been holding.

Any shared moment with Matsu, there had been a spectre and a shadow. The ghosts of connections that the other woman had never opened, and to which Irajah had never reached out. They were black, hungry flames, and without an invitation she would not run her fingers through the heat. But there were glimpses, impressions, as reflections in a glass just at perception when one is trying to gaze at what lies beyond, instead of what lurks behind. Reflections she would have needed to readjust her focus from, away from Matsu, to see clearly. And who would chase a ghost of a reflection, when finger tips could brush the glass itself?

Despite the weight of his presence, his words actually brought a smile to her face. He was..... reassuring her of something that required no reassurances.

"The potential of 'special', or any lack there of causes me no anxiety," she murmured, a self deprecating chuckle falling on the city beneath them. "I am. That's all that I need. Special is not a goal I strive toward. I have had more..... pressing matters to concern myself with."

She watched him out of the corner of her eye as he settled again, words picking out just the thing that had weighed so heavily on her for so long. How had it taken her so long to come to this choice, to this place? The things she had sacrificed had been so hard won, and yet, now that they were gone, there was no wound to probe by having cut them out. She had not removed parts of herself, her oaths or the very base of what she had once thought constituted Irajah Ven. Instead she had shed weights placed on her by a galaxy that offered nothing but weights. Rather than feel as though she had lost a part of herself, coming to this moment, she had instead stripped off the dead that bore down. The cold hands of duty, of decency, demanding, always demanding more and more. One more sacrifice to what one ought to do, what one ought to give.

"You wait for an end," she said softly, head tilting slightly away from him, still watching him from the corner of her eyes. There was no judgement in that tone, simply acknowledgement.

"Whereas I refuse to let mine be the end."

She turned her gaze fully back to the city beneath them, gaze thoughtful but distant.

"There is a sickness in me," she said simply. The bruises, the alabaster paleness beneath them, the too thin frame. "One that will end me. And I have decided to politely decline the offer to simply give into it. To give up. It has allowed me to strip away what could not survive the pain, down to a solitary essence, but now it would shatter what remains and I refuse to give it permission to do so."

She realized, in that moment, a sharp and coldly glittering epiphany, that she was grateful to Gideon.

Because without it, she would still be weighted and wanting, unmarred yes, but also unlived.

It could not be considered a warm and comforting thought. But there was a certain satisfaction in the cut of it.

"So I will say good bye to this body and let it be consumed. It will not be my end. Because I am not done here yet."

And then she smiled. But it was more a baring of teeth, a promise, a passion, rather than any gentle joy.

[member="Reverance"]

 

[Reverance]

A sickness in her. Something he could sense, an aura that enveloped her small frame. Perhaps her size and bruising gave it away, the light indication of wounding without any sign of trauma. Pain and ache permeated from her flesh, coming in waves that could be felt and seen. Like the shimmer of heat across the top of duracrete, or the way a dull agony was born from even the shortest walk across the sun kissed sands of a desert.

"I don't wait for the end. I rush towards it." He was several hundred years in the making, surpassing what memory he could contain. He had seen the rise and fall of empires, the life and death of lovers. He had watched as children turned grey and to ash while he stirred, in anger, and thrived with the touch of the darkside forever gripping his chest. There was a tightness there, the sort that no Sith or Darksider would ever admit, that caressed the ribs and reminded them of the cost of great power. That he might live forever, he suffered in ways that went unseen. A hollow sort of thing, now, as the trickle of insanity dulled the expectation of vital repayment.

But none who practiced in this form of power went unscathed.

"Pain is a tool of infinite worth. The most important tool, a whetstone for the weak and a reminder for the strong. That no matter the gap between the two, they can still feel the same sensation and falter. Or prevail. And then, true strength is determined." He stood up against the railing, placing his non voxyn hand along the rail. Within inches of the woman, his palm aimed towards the dimly lit sky and volcanoes that surrounded them. It was on Manaan that he first used this on Matsu, drawing the pain of dismemberment from her body and taking it on as his own. Some might say that it was a selfless act but in truth, it was as far from that mentality as possible. If he could share it with others, he would. But without that preferred alternative, he would happily resort to thieving.

"Your pain interests me. I wish to know what you have endured...what you still endure." Know such a thing, intimately. He had been known to chase people down, on the battlefield, to experience their unique interpretation of painful stimuli. Each persons synapses fired off differently. Between two people, the potential for disproportionate response was vast - a discovery that left him more hungry than sated. A curiosity that festered, when he wasn't given the pain he desired. In such cases, he would search it out and know it through other means. "Let me see your pain." His gaze drifted down to her arm, bruising and runes apparent. Slowly, his eye lifted to meet her countenance, pale and translucent visage given light by the overhanging balcony lights. "Please."

As far as he was concerned, personal space didn't exist. But Irajah held considerable meaning to one of the select few people that existed in his realm of concern, that held any worth to the former Wrath. One on Maena, one of Point Nadir. This was, for the time being, domain that demanded a softer approach. The sort that when compared to war and battle, seemed to contrast thoroughly with his standard proclivities.

[member="Irajah Ven"]​

 

[Kuzo]

[media]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BVXTmav24Wk[/media]​

Please.

There it was. A corner, at least, a step of that endless corridor she had only ever glimpsed from a distance and through the curved lens that was [member="Matsu Xiangu"]. It could be said for so few these days, but her trust in the other woman was absolute. It went beyond a proving of self, reaching instead the point of faith. She had seen only the barest shadow of black fire that waited at the end of that connection, but she took the step without hesitation.

Only in the leap from the Lion's head.....

She had to turn to face him fully to offer her left hand. The right, false, a simulacrum, crushed and shattered and taken. Perhaps it was part of why, when he asked, when he said please, she could so immediately respond. It was easy to give when it was a choice. And while she did not understand the full extent of what he sought, when asked, Irajah had the capacity for bottomless generosity to those she considered worth her time.

Perhaps that, at it's core, was what Matsu saw in the dark haired, bright eyed woman. It was impossible to consume something that had no end. For now, that trust, that faith was transferred to him by virtue of that shared connection, both orbiting a shared star.

Smaller palm laid against his, dwarfed and delicate but firm, and holding nothing in reserve.

For most people, pain is transient. Either it exists in a single moment, or else lingers for hours. Days. Weeks perhaps. Oh, it might repeat, it might draw and cut and wrench over and over again, like the hands of a familiar lover, but there would always be a breath between peaks, the valleys that most people considered the place they lived from day to day. There would always be the alternation of the quality of the pain, room between to fill with whatever their normal was. They did not live on that mountain peak, only experienced it as visitors. As tourists and sight seers- happily returning low to a place where the air was not thin and their chests did not struggle to draw breath and their heads did not swim.

Irajah lived there.

It is one thing to explain, clinically, what the Gideon Virus did to a human body. To speak of blood cells, heavy with the fruit of the infection, of the way it moved from organ to organ, not consuming but shredding in its passage. The stories of fever, of hemorrhaging because the viral bodies treated the inner systems of a body as nothing more than wet, red tissue paper. How, if someone was lucky and they were weak, they would die of raging fever as meat fought unto suicide rather than be taken by an outside force turned internal. The unlucky lingered. Until their immune system battered itself to shards against the jagged palisades and knives of Gideon, and the virus smiled. ​For the lucky, it was hours of pain as heat burned their brain to a cinder. For the unlucky, it was days while more than merely blood seeped from eyes, from ears, from every pore until, finally a sigh and the gift of death.

For Irajah, it had been a year and a half.

A year and a half since she had woken up, surrounded by dead, staring, blood covered faces. Since she had gasped, subconsciously clawing herself away and sequestering Gideon in a cage of the Force within herself. Not enough to stop the rending of the virus- never enough for that. The trial and error as she learned to move it through her system, from organ to organ, Gideon taking bites every time she did, leaving minute internal bleeds that blossomed to the bruises on her flesh to mirror the holes within. Even contained in a single place, it raged and marauded in its cage, tearing, rending- never consuming because it cared not a moment to feed. Lines of fire traced the path of the virus, breadcrumbs that crisscrossed the crossroads of her body, left behind. She would keep it caged as long as she could, a day, more, and then move it again to allow the hollowed out and ravaged system to heal as much as was possible before whispering choked apologies she had to bring it back again. Every time, she could repair a little less. Every time, while the cage itself grew in strength, the organs within weakened, requiring more time between housing Gideon to heal.

Time that she simply didn't have.

Wounds half healed before Gideon came back in, the firestorm burning it raw again. Liver. Kidneys. Lungs. Pancreas. Heart. The stiffening of the pathways between, hardening as scar tissue tried to repair, to grow over, only to be ripped apart again and sent as shattered plaster circulating back through her system.

There was not a breath she took that was not pain. The pain of an animal's frenzied gnawing at the bars of its cage. A cage of flesh and blood and bone, gnawing simply to shatter it because that was, ultimately, its nature.

Blood pooled where it had no right to settle, trying to rot within joints, above the inner curve of abdomen. And she would flush it out when she found it, but not before it could clot, to stiffen and press. More bruises, more pain.

Gideon sang a hymn, vibrating against muscle and bone. It echoed through the hollow spaces of her body, the architectural wonders that the virus had created where flesh should be. But instead the harmonies moved between the slender latticework of a musculature that could barely support it's own weight. One mistake in her timing, one faltering moment where that cage slipped, and it would shatter, collapsing.

And then, only when it had won, would Gideon feast.

A year and a half of burning, of gnawing, of the feeling of her very organs and veins shredded from the inside. And somehow, she had smiled. Loved. Hated. Lived. By any metric, the pain itself should have made her lie down. Give up. Say 'enough, I have had enough and my watch is over.'

There were other pains, beneath that. The burn of electricity. The crunching, shattering of bones, of blood arcing in projection spatters from the backswing, not of a knife, but of her body. The silence of the methodical tracing of runes into her flesh. They all lived beneath the immediacy of Gideon, available but, ultimately, mundane in comparison. Familiar. Pedestrian. Shadows in the cave. There, if he reached, if he wanted them.

 

[Reverance]

Larger and tanned hand, scarred and forever coated in the blood of those who laid behind him, wrapped around pale fingers and palm. He had suspicions of prosthesis, given the discontinuity of bruising that stopped at the arm - her choice of hand only further fortified his suspicion. There was an unforgivable quiet that lingered, his thumb moving to rest just at the divide between hand and wrist. Taking a deep breath, it would take only a moment for the pain to cross that divide, between her skin and his own.

As it happened, he turned from the railing to her as she faced him, his head drifting down. Perhaps he was focusing on her hand, perhaps he was focusing on her, perhaps he was focusing on nothing at all. Zoning out, with the dilation of his pupil, he found a particular crack in the balcony and hyper fixated on it.

He recalled a memory, or a collection of them. One that began in a metal chair, an old Arkanian standing over him in a gown of white that was spattered in red. He recalled that on one side, the pain was excruciating and on the other side, it was euphoric. He couldn't recall if that man had caused the confusing infliction or if Reverance had just always been that way, when two souls were merged around the same coil and forced into cohabitation. With that parasite gone, nearly cast away into the fires of Selvaris, there was no more confusion. Pain was a drug, the most addictive substance he could find, the sort that couldn't be distracted with drug use or carnality. No matter how hard he tried.

Each type of pain had a particular taste or inflection, like a note of caf in whiskey or the hint of pepper in a sauce. Each subtraction or addition could change the flavor altogether. Perhaps in one of the more advanced forms of synesthesia, further compounded by the second set of sensors in his hand that could see force auras, Reverance was practiced in categorizing others by their own interpretation of pain. And en route to such a conclusion, his own interpretation laid a certain measured sense of bias.

His brother, who cried out when he ripped their eye out, was forever painted in bleak translucence and the flavor of sickly sweet. Matsu, who knew just the proper way to cut without shortening life, was a the sort of red flavorful heat that demanded return, knowing full well that he could never truly take it. Aver was something else, entirely, given her ability to both give and receive pain, and to heal so quickly. The taste and tones of silver and gold were the sort that could sustain him, keep him centered. He even recalled chasing down a particular woman, though never given full exposure, and her pain was akin to caramelized sparkbee honey. Smooth and thick.

But those were temporary experiences of pain, or those of mental anguish. This was the physical embodiment of chronic pain, the sort of ache that couldn't be controlled. The sort of the fire that needed no stoking, the charge that needed no generator, the shadow that was always just moments behind. His body felt like it was soaked in it, like it was a soft trickle of energy, giving him the sensation that every joint was a tongue that was actively licking a battery. A smile crept across his face as he slowly cracked his neck, letting out a slow sigh.

"Mmm..." He let out another breath, as if he was intertwined with a high that wouldn't let him down. "Now I see." The feeling came with memories imprinted across her skin, the connection formed as flesh touched. The way memories seemed to fade, yet the feeling remained. Perhaps it was the fogging affect of time, that she knew she had been in great pain for so long, but couldn't articulate exactly how it felt except in these present moments. Or there was simply an issue in the connection, a lack of closeness that sapped the interpretation. "You have known a lifetime of pain in such a short time. Endless. Pure."

He was gathering control of himself though still intent with his hand enveloping hers, in his action of pulling the pain away from her. If he could, he would take it all and persist on it. "No joint, no nook or crevice, can hide from this..." Was he interpreting her pain or his, and the pleasure rendered from it. "It has made you the person you are. But..." He met her gaze with his own, deep set in blood to offset tones of hazel. "Do you still need it? Do you still want it?"

[member="Irajah Ven"]​

 

[Kuzo]

He didn't cross the divide. Rather than move into and through, he drew what he sought toward him. Not merely a zone of negative pressure, but an active inhalation of breath to draw a scent or a mouth sucking poison from a wound. It was not, strictly speaking, a physical sensation. Not at first, and yet she stepped toward him, the dark crown of her hair beneath his own bowed head.

She didn't know what he felt, not through the lens that he experienced it at least. If anyone understood the notion that pain was a deeply personal experience, it was Irajah Ven. A Doctor, a specialty in emergency medicine, she had spoken in calm and logical tones with patients who were dying from grievous wounds, only the following day to be resisting the urge to roll her eyes at the caterwauling of the need for a single stitch. Her own experience with pain outside of her own was clinical. Distant. She could catalogue, quantify- there were over fifty different, diagnostically relevant words to describe a particular element of pain. Dull. Sharp. Gnawing. Stabbing. Pressured. Burning. Twisting. Each one could tell her with an increasing exactness just what occurred within a patient's flesh and how to respond to it.

Gideon in its cage clawed harder in response to [member="Reverance"] and that draw. She clamped down harder on that beast, blinking open hazel eyes and looking up at the other.

There was still a certain equilibrium, the gentle draw of an outgoing tide against someone only ankle deep in the waters. The draw palpable but not intrusive in the slightest.

"I don't know," she whispered. "I don't know what I am without it anymore. But.... I'd like the chance to find out."

For her, she meant the horizon that was swiftly approaching. To sheer off the remainder of this dying flesh for a new beginning, to cut rotted meat from a crystalline center and leave it sharp and glittering.

Reverance, however, took her at her word in this moment.

Irajah made a small sound in her throat, her fingers curling now around his wrists as if to find purchase. Like an ocean being drawn back before a tidal wave, the pain receded, drawn out and away. It left in it's wake miles of exposed sea bed, raw and empty but for what could seem like an eternity as the impending wave gathered beyond the breakers- silent, peaceful, unbeaten by the crashing of glass and shell shattering waters.

Pupils blew wide, the black devouring out to the farthest ring of hazel, and her knees buckled. But that grip on his wrists didn't waver. In truth, it was the only thing that kept her standing.

It wasn't pleasure.

It was relief.

 

[Reverance]

He found conflict in her answer, delivered amidst the torrent of exposure. The soft yet persistent chime of pain, scrutinizing the vigor of every muscle and bone, roused a concern that seemed to question the very integrity of his logical parameters. In his heart, he knew pain to be the greatest and purest force in the universe. Through its lens, all were equal and treated fairly. Those who persisted were worthy of life, those who didn't, weren't. But was it fair, to be given pain persistently, throughout life? What of those what lived lavish lifestyles, having never known the true impact of consequence and pain. For the latter, he was such an agent that he might equalize the field to re-balance what had been offset by advantage.

But for the former, he couldn't find the requisite reasoning for believing her weak or frail - for trying to shirk away such pain. He knew all too well that the mentally insane were incapable of acknowledging their mental condition, otherwise that would land them in another domain altogether. He knew something was different about him, in how he perceived pain. He may have not been entirely insane, but perhaps he was broken. Maybe he was the broken thing.

No.

It wasn't him who was broken, sentience had defaulted to a weaker condition. His reversal of experience made him particularly suited for conquest, for overtaking those who were weaker than him. But was Irajah weak, for no longer wanting this pain?

As her knees buckled, Reverance braced himself. Though with his enhancements, it was hardly needed, given the weight of the women - a characteristic that he assumed was a component of her sickness. In another life, in another time, she may have appeared much different. But pain had a way of ripping away the things that are unnecessary. His voxyn arm moved to stabilize her, doing his best to keep her from smacking the railing or falling against the balcony.

"Pain...agony..." He whispered, suddenly sensitive to her disposition, should such a thing exist. "You have endured while others live freely, without concern or reminder of the inherent exterior weakness. You are frail not because you are weak, but because you are strong. Not many could have withstood for this long." He smirked. "That means you aren't really frail at all." It wasn't that he had suddenly grown a softer side, though his treatment of her did originate from the connection between Irajah and Matsu. But in his own form of exploratory research, he had found reason for admiration.

A statue of clay was set too close to the shore. Through the waves or storms, the figure was eroded, until all that was left was wrought iron beneath - the likes of which gave the statue form. Tough and rigid, without a full base, it was left to falter in even the slightest gust. And now he stood, a man content to feel the breeze and storm surge, blocking the wind for the smallest snapshot of time. But even he knew that nothing was stopping the final push.

Her demise was evident, even for a man who couldn't read thoughts. Carrion was far from present but the vultures circled in anticipation. And he seemed content to benefit from it, to learn her story before the end. There was never such a thing as needless pain, except in perhaps the rarest of moments. He wondered if this met the criteria, if even he could consider the extreme side of pain.

"If this isn't your end, than what is it?"

[member="Irajah Ven"]​

 

[Kuzo]

There was no denying the inevitable. The wave would fall. It would not simply cover the sea floor that it had abandoned, but would come for the shore, devour the far dunes and toss up only the barest of driftwood bones as an offering in return. But for the moment, she stood in the lee, his body blocking the biting salt wind and the distant view of the water's hands looming.

She leaned on his voxyn arm without comment or hesitation. Just as the Zambranos, just as Matsu had looked for her discomfort when she had first arrived in these centers of the darkside, and been surprised by the innate comfort there, despite no hint of the darkside in the woman herself, so too was the blackened remnant of the Vong simply accepted. Familiar and comfortable, even if she was not consciously aware of the why.

Irajah drew in a great, shuddering breath, a shiver coursing through her body.

She could measure her life in two eras. Before and After Gideon.

And before? Before she never could have even conceived of this unbearable lightness of being.

Without the pain, this gift from such an unexpected source, could never have been appreciated. Never savored. As sure as a drug, that pull of the tides, drawn by the passing attention of the other satellite as it revolved around their shared point of existence, elevated and buoyed her.

Alive? No. The withdrawal of the pain did not do anything to punctuate that feeling of living. The pain itself had come to fill that role, a pointed reminder that each day of pain was one more in which she lived. That she existed and fought and saw another sunrise. Another sunset. The cessation of pain did not make her feel more alive. It couldn't possibly.

If anything, there was a moment where she understood, on a feral, brilliant level, why [member="Reverance"] ran toward his end.

His words had sunk in, a surprising warmth and pleasure coming from them, from the recognition that few enough could see. Irajah didn't seek power in any sense of the word. But his response set him in the tiniest subset of people who did not look at her and see a being that merely existed to take advantage of. They had tried, and always been surprised when she had resisted, as if she could not possibly have the strength to not acquiesce to their desires settled as weights upon her. Because they had not seen.

In that moment, Reverance ceased to exist there, beneath her hands, on the sufferance of borrowed faith. Between those twin gifts, he earned his own, the spark of it at least. Time would tell if it grew into the conflagration that Matsu embodied, or if it would be snuffed by his own actions. So few flames of faith grew beyond the flicker of a candle too soon smothered.

His question took a moment to parse, however. What was her end?

No.

What was this, then, if not the end?

She'd been looking up at him, but not really seeing his face. It took a heartbeat, two, for those nearly black eyes to focus on his face. Slowly, like a clouded dawn, a smile broke on her face.

"It's a beginning."

She paused, blinking, and then suddenly, laughed, joyful and bell-like and light.

"Tell me. Do you dance?"

​As simple as that she asked. As if it was not an entirely ridiculous question given what had transpired on the balcony as dusk had fallen. As if this were joyous and normal.

 

[Reverance]

Perfection existed in the eye of the beholder, in the moment of perception, upon whatever precipice the viewer dictated was significant. To gauge a fish on its ability to fly or a bird on its ability to swim was faulty logic, except from the eye of the fish or the eye of the bird. For the bird, that which flew gracefully was perfect. For the fish, flight mattered little. And for Reverance, pain was of greatest import. Whether she knew it or not, a chunk of hardy and pure ore rested where brittle and pliable rock once stood. There may have been many things she wasn't good at it, but enduring pain wasn't one of them.

A fish that could swim.

A bird that could fly.

A being that could endure. The criterion of a crimson lens, set to a particular focus.

Do...I dance?

He couldn't recall the last time he had danced, not in the traditional sense. But he could recall numerous occasions where he was immersed in the foreground of dance. In one instance, it was over correspondence, the likes of which led to a small war between the One Sith and the Black Ravens. An unfortunate circumstance of a broken table and crime lords not knowing their place. The other time, it was with [member="Aver Brand"], and it ended in death and pain and rapture and all the things that made him whole. For the moment of introspection, he was left with two moments that both seemed to benefit him greatly. Point Nadir was laden with such terraces for entertainment, the thump of bass always present over the sound of crime and speeders racing through open thoroughfares.

"Perhaps...in some ways I do...dance." The choreography of war, the battle in the hull of a ship, or the way fighters tangoed in the starlit night - all where forms of dance. Partners, engaging in the commerce of give and take, the flicker of a weapons shadow leading each step, the sparks of weapons that were far more literal for the relationship than the more romantic interpretation. Hate, respect, love, lust, pain. In a way, his form of dance seemed the extreme version of the traditional connotation. "...it doesn't often end well, for those involved." He tilted his head, suddenly in realization of her giddy attitude, the recharge of her pain not keeping pace with the siphon of his consumption. "But I do enjoy watching, from time to time."

He was in perpetual search for trouble. Perhaps it was from the static of the high, discharging moving currents through the flesh. Or perhaps it was because hands had grown just a tad too clean. Like a moth to a flame, so was trouble to his presence. He had a way of finding it, even when hidden from the towers on high. And what better place then were mass groups congregated, saturated with vice and alcohol and drugs. Where egos ran as thick as the faux fog that shot across the floor, lights flickering across the room to obscure vision. There was no better place to come down.

"Why, did you have something in mind?"

[member="Irajah Ven"]​

 

[Kuzo]

Irajah didn't search for trouble. She was a magnet for it. So while she couldn't promise him an evening with her words, the very nature of how the galaxy turned meant that it was a promise.

Her smile widened, eyes flashing the too bright of the sun reflected at high tide.

"Well, if you'd rather watch, at least come with," she said.

"I don't know..." she paused, the ghost of a frown flickering over her lips, but it couldn't settle there for long. Every time she moved, every breath she took was like floating, and there was nothing that could weigh that down.

"I don't know what you did, exactly. But... it's temporary." It wasn't a question. Gideon itself still curled through her, angry and brittle but for the moment impotent. She didn't thank him. There was enough of a thread between them now that she knew it hadn't been done out of any sort of altruism. Which didn't bother her in the least. It was straight forward in its way. Something done 'as a kindness' had become suspect after too many times turning sour, too many strings and weights and conditions only slyly offered after the fact.

"I'd like to take advantage of this feeling while I can."

She still hadn't let go of his hand. There was a playfulness in her eyes and voice that hadn't been there before.

"And the least I can do is show you the city while I do."

*****

New City had multiple layers. The layers that mattered..... and the ones that didn't. Bars, nightclubs, glit dens, dance lofts and more speckled the upper city. But even in the higher layers, not all of the darkness sunk into the depths. On a planet like Maena, cloaked and steeped with the Dark Side, it wasn't truly possible. Even in the 'better' areas, the filth bled through. Even in the better areas, it still wasn't good.

Nor, for a moment, did it pretend to be.

Irajah hadn't changed. In this state, she didn't care if the bruises, the scars, were visible. And if her current companion didn't mind them in the slightest, that was all the encouragement she needed to stay in the delicate lines and low back of the dress [member="Matsu Xiangu"] had given her.

"Pick something," she said, her arm in his. If she still leaned against him, well, Irajah was beyond the sensation of drunk- of high. If she leaned on him, it was because her feet barely touched the ground, and he was the closest thing to a foundation to tether her that there was.

"My treat."

[member="Reverance"]

 

[Reverance]

Idle mind thought towards notions of rapport, to notions on how it was formed. Was it the flash in the pan that he had always envisioned it, an explosion that brought to life a powder keg - the sort that couldn't be contained? Or was it the slow process of hollowing out underground caverns, just to set fire and watch the coal burn for an eternity? For Matsu, it was the former. From the moment he had seen her, he knew what he needed and that would never change. For Aver, it was the latter. Years spent in the time between, destroying and killing, as blood and death were the picks and axes and shovels from which their relationship found form. Both were suitable results, both were a form of harmony he could have never expected.

He considered what sort of rapport this was. Or what drive continued to leave him in this place, petite woman clinging to his arm. He couldn't deny that the exchange was nothing to gawk at. In fact, it was likely some of the best and persistent pain he had ever known. But the universe was filled with pain and as much as he could chase this high, there were waves that crested higher and trenches that dipped lower. Was he content for the cruise, speed set to a constant and pleased with the notion of simply moving? Or was recency impacting his perception, convincing him he had known something more extreme?

Was it her...? Was it the thing that Matsu had seen, or all the others for whom he felt the imprint of their affect? Was she her pain, was her pain her? Or were these two separate entities, the likes of which he would be pleased to discard to obtain the other? Was he separate from his own pain? Was it fair to apply that very judgment to others and not to himself?

If so, then what kept him in place...

"A treat..." Is clinging to my arm.

Gaze drifted out towards the crowd, his arm lowered to make the act of walking less cumbersome. Neutral expression, perception dulled by the recharge, moved about as he took a moment to sense out their location. While he had recognized her own awareness from the moment he saw her sitting next to Matsu, he knew it to be something more natural and less trained. Unless that was her intent, to give out such a impression in an act of deception to force underestimation. He assumed that happened quite often for her. But where his mind took him wasn't to any particular venue - bar, club, show. What mattered more was the culmination of presence, the densest mass of persons they could find. The sort where it was easy to find offense.

"She carries adoration for this planet. Assuming such extends beyond your presence..." He gave not what could be categorized as a smile as much as an expression of warmth, uncertain that his assumption was correct. "...I'd like to know why." He nodded towards a door in the base of a large tower, plastered in holographic advertisements that detailed random activities - shows, performances, sales. But that didn't interest him, not as much as the large gathering of people several floors down, just beyond the entrance. "That seems like a good place to start."

[member="Irajah Ven"]​

 

[Kuzo]

"That's a sweet idea. Wrong. But sweet."

They drifted in the direction he indicated.

"Matsu's adoration of Maena has been in place since before I met her. It has nothing to do with me," she elaborated as she paid the cover for them both without really thinking of it. If the trandoshan taking the money gave the pair a double take, and Rev a triple take, well, that could be expected.

"You haven't felt it yet? Well," she murmured with a small, low smile as she turned back to him. She was a few steps ahead now, moving backward into the edges of the crowd, her hand drawing him on. "If you can't figure it out by the end of the night, I'll tell you."

And then, as if the music had lulled purely to allow those words to reach him, it came crashing down like a physical blow, and the crowd swallowed them.

It was like the breathing of a great beast, a heartbeat that subverted all other rhythm and corrupted the internal metronome. Darkness, interrupted by flashes of red and yellow, hard lines and angles above them. But here, in the space between the entry and the stage, that beast moved with a thousand grasping hands and curving hips. Hungry, panting, it beat upon its own breast, nails clawing as though it could find a way to crawl within its own self and devour the endless beating of its heart.

Hundreds of bodies moved, if not in unison, then in an agreed upon and shared dissonance. The floor vibrated, and if Irajah had felt like she were floating before, now the illusion was complete. She had danced in the last months, and enjoyed it. But this was different. Unhobbled by pain, she moved, and there was nothing to give it pause.

[member="Reverance"]

 

[Reverance]

It was a breathing thing, as all moving and squirming things were.

An ocean of hands, of creatures caught beneath the fog of desire and ambiance, left to move and shove against one another. The chop of a thousand different oceans, all stuck in a slow and rhythmic confluence, fated to move only where they were afforded. The flick of lights, of strobes and glittering spectacle, danced across the room like the shimmer of an oceans surface in the dynamic sunlight. With each turn, another spectrum of color was offered for those unfortunate enough to be blinded by it.

This wasn't the sort of place for the meek. For those that couldn't swim, they were best left upon distant shore where the barnacles and vines gathered in ocean spray. The woman with the raven hair, determined to make use of this high, dove into the tumultuous crescendo of waves as they smacked against one another, riding slipstreams through the undercurrent. She was accustomed to this activity but for the brief glimpses he caught, of her moving through the various bodies, she seemed weightless.

He felt the bass in the center of his chest with every low timbre of the singers voice, like a sirens words muffled by leagues of sea and the distance between. A crimson gaze followed his dance partner until there was no image left of her, only the sense of her impression as it moved through the noise. This place was a fruit, the sort that hung low and was ripe for the picking. Egos and their aura, caught adrift in the sudden gales, were as easy to pick up as the scent of a prey for a shark that stalked in anticipation. Blood for miles, he merely sniffed it out.

Bodies move against him and he did little to push them away. Quite the opposite, for those who fell within his grasp, they found a nick or cut that drew a rivulet of blood. Impossible to see in the dark, impossible to feel amidst the high of drugs, they would hardly notice his presence as he waded by. It would only take moments for them to notice the effects. Species were all affected differently. Some would break down into convulsions, others would know the slow decay of aches that pressed across the entirety of the body - the likes of which might bring to mind his companion. Some would simply and slowly fall to sleep, only to wake many days later. From curiosity, a certain obsession was born - he couldn't wait to see how each person would take the voxyn neurotoxin. Time would tell, the sort that passed in the midst of sound and beat.

​

As he pushed his way through the crowd, he found her moving, breaching from the wake of her own pain. He neared, not truly committed to the idea of dance as much as actively taking part in the watching, and got close enough to not have to yell in order to communicate.

"An end to the night...there is no such thing."

Despite what she might have known of him, his deeds surpassed a certain level of infamy that perpetually held bounty. He had noted several who carried themselves as bounty hunters and mercenaries, and the way they had stared as he walked in, he could only assume they recognized him. And by the way he had noted their movement in his wake, he could only feel confident in his assumption.

That even in Maena, he wasn't free to show his face without consequence. The club would quickly become interesting, just as he hoped.

[member="Irajah Ven"]​

 

[Kuzo]

Here, near the center, the crowd was a beating heart. Expanding, contracting, gripping, releasing, individuals propelled withing invisible pathways that existed only in the subconscious spaces a beast like this shared without true awareness.

Despite the throng, oddly homogenized as they were by the pulsing undertones, it was impossible to lose track of [member="Reverance"] . He moved in a cadence all his own, and just as she hadn't been surprised by his appearance on the balcony, she knew he was there before his voice filled her ear from behind. The level of noise, the pulsing so hard it shook the floor, meant that discussion was intimate or shouted- no middle ground possible. She turned to face him, the smile on her lips almost sly in its curve. She leaned in, standing on her toes. Finger tips pressed lightly against his chest so she could bring her mouth to his ear, words as much actual sound as vibration against flesh.

"Sounds like a very long night then," she replied, her tone serious but eyes sparkling.

Behind him, at the edge of the crowd, someone drew, slowly, to a stop. He opened and closed his mouth, once, twice, still swaying but no longer with the music, but instead to the rhythm of the voxyn toxin as it curled through his system. A prick of pain, only barely discernable beneath the high of the drugs in his system. The toxin piggybacked gleefully, following the lines already traced through blood and heart, racing at joyous speed through him.

He was the first, but not the only. The press of bodies farther in held up another as knees gave out. Another's partner did not even notice that she was no longer actually dancing, but convulsing.

A trail of breadcrumbs to find his way home.

Those with their attention on him, however, needed no trail. From three directions, they converged, caring as little for those they removed from their path as Reverance himself had. They weren't there to protect the denizens of this club, the writing mass of thoughtless youth. The music didn't move them.

Blood and credits moved them.

The sound of blasters being unholstered, the hum of the charge of a sonic weapon were below the thrum of the requiem already playing for those he had left behind. Blades unsheathed, but only for the moment, intent to find a warmer home. Shoulder, flank, thigh, the vibrating beat pinned to the chest- the blade itself didn't care, contentedly merely to drink and spill and rend.

 

[Reverance]

A long night indeed...

He would have been happy with the way the night was going, momentarily removed from his true intentions. But the sound of foot steps, all upon a different tone and proximity and purpose, roused him from the temporary distraction of hands against his chest and a devilish smile. The beat of the room changed around them, the way the DJ might shift to something that was more characteristic of this particular act. Killing on the dance floor.

A blade glimmered in the strobe lights, oil glistening across the surface. This was something cared for, something the wielder held in certain regard. With a descending arc, the aim was the meat of Reverances shoulder. What it found, instead, was the center of his left palm. Metal cut through skin and ligaments with ease but the mercenary found it far harder to retract as fingers curled around the hilt-deep handle. Reverance's right hand, with the strength of cybernetics and vong shaping, shot upwards and bent the strikers elbow upwards and out, nearly severing the arm at the joint with sheer force.

That was enough for the attacker to release the blade, staggering back with a yelp that was all but muffled by the sounds of the beat overhead. Reverance stepped back and ducked down, just as the stun baton flicked across the horizontal access - smacking the knife wielder right in the chest. Stepping forward, Reverance placed his weight forward and down, crushing the baton wielders knee with a stomp. Pulling the baton from his hand, Reverance flung it out to his right, cracking another mercenary right across the left side of his head. Dropping the baton on the final phases of the arc, he reached down and smoothly grabbed the blaster. With a spin, the baton wielder still reeling from the cracked knee, Reverance placed the barrel to the bottom of mercs jaw and pulled the trigger.

The shot was silent, the flicker of the energy cut through flesh and skull like contained fireworks in a jar, lighting up the mans mouth and nostrils and eyes with a brilliant hue of blue. Though, for anyone not truly paying attention, the attack was but passing moments that were drowned out by the sound of dance club vibes.

He reached towards his left hand and pulled the knife free from the palm. Stepping towards Irajah, he handed it to her, handle first. "Hold on to this, you might need it." With a press of his hand against the small of her back, turning her if needed, he guided her towards a tunnel on the south end of the room. The place, itself, was a mixture of catacombs and larger domains that were interconnected by sound and meandering people. Reaching over to his sleeve, he ripped the cloth quickly with his teeth and wrapped it around his palm. It was an ad hoc solution, quickly manufactured to slow the bleeding. Stretching his fingers as he wrapped, he noted full functionality as the blow was deliberately deflected to avoid permanent damage.

"Stay close to me...but not too close." He said as they moved into the dark tunnel. Ahead, another dance floor, another song.

[member="Irajah Ven"]​

 

[Kuzo]

[media]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSX2o7EhtcE[/media]​

Some combination of the force and the subtle reflection of the wrong kind of movement in his sole eye gave Irajah the warning she needed to step just far enough out of swinging arms to watch but not interact as the scene unfolded.

Irajah was no stranger to blood, to violence. She had seen them often enough, twin animals, domesticated in her lab or running free and untamed. But it was clear in that moment, the bridged heartbeats, that he was them, and which breed flowed through his veins. It was not a dance, but the movements were smooth and sure without hitch or hesitation, not even a flinch when the blade cut into his palm.

In part, it was the high. But in part, it was just who and what she was. She watched and catalogued. And what she saw was magnificent and utterly unique. She had seen people who could *fight*, who moved like well oiled machines and who treated their bodies as such- something to be cared for and treasured. Not domesticated, never that, but at least with the veneer of civilization, and in truth, a certain clinging to the comfort of it. As though it could be shucked off at any moment, but like a cat on a windowsill, why would they? There were comforts to be had, and while they could be given up...... why?

This was the feral- not uncontrolled, no, though it could be in a heartbeat. A beast with jaws that could crush bones, but also claws that sliced with precision when needed. And if it did not rip out your throat?

It was only because it was disinclined to in that moment. If the claws were sheathed, it was due to nothing the creatures below had done, but because it pleased him to do so.

Instead of watching a wild animal from afar, she was in the cage with it. And there was no where else she would have chosen to watch it take down its prey from.

She accepted the blade from him with a nod. Slender fingers curled around the hilt, her grip sure but unpracticed. There wasn't awe, or wariness in those eyes, still dominated by dark pupils and reflecting the dull light of the club back at him. But there was interest. Appreciation.

"I understand the appeal, what they see in you," she said quietly, shooting him a glance out of the corner of her eye as she fell into the step his hand on her back indicated. "But I assume that wasn't an attack of passion and jealousy."

Was.... was she *teasing* him?

In truth, anything that had occurred in the galaxy prior to a year ago, Irajah was deeply ignorant of. Largely because she simply didn't care. She'd had more important things to occupy her time with since leaving the distant shelter of her homeworld. She knew certain grand sweeping ideas, but the small colony world had been isolated and insular. Other than what she had seen personally of him, of the glimpses through the connection with Matsu, she knew nothing of his history. It hadn't particularly mattered.

It never did.

She watched him wrap his hand as they moved, but now was not the time to offer to stop and deal with it. When they were clear.

Calm. There was nothing else, no other way to describe her reaction to this. And it had, in truth, very little to do with the high she was currently riding. She had never felt more present. More in the moment, so distance offered her nothing here.

If the hunters had alerted others in the labyrinth of the club, they had no way to know that yet. Neither assumed they were in the clear as they stepped into lights that moved like water. Ripples of blue and green could have drown them beneath the heavy, almost languid tones of the music here. Everything moved slow, drugged on either spice or pheromones and letting the weight of the DJ's desires bring them somewhere beyond that moment and towards the very smallest and most transient of deaths.

There was nothing small, however, about the death that walked among them now.

"There should be an exit behind the stage, to portions of the building the staff uses," she murmured, keeping the blade tucked close to her body.

And yet, she got the feeling that leaving wasn't his goal.

[member="Reverance"]

 

[Reverance]

Crimson eye reflected thought as he looked towards her, facial features shifting to reveal a sideways smirk - emphasized in the intermittent strobe light as they approached the next dance chamber. Perhaps it was the claw at the lower edges of her back, or the way she gripped the knife with some sense of foresight. Or maybe it was the teasing compliment, the sort that scratched at the hard surface of what brought these mercenaries to their front door.

"I tend to draw attention to myself..." He spoke in response to the reasoning for why these men were chasing them. In truth, he had various outstanding bounties on his head - by the Mandalorians and the Republic, both of which were long departed and replaced by shadows of their former self. Despite that fact, the currency that backed the bounties was likely still in place, ranging anywhere from 10 to 50 million credits. If the One Sith were aware of what he did, how he betrayed them, he would have expected bounties from the old relics of that faction as well.

He had a special knack for making the best sort of friends.

"As for your staff exit...at the back..." He looked forward, leaning over to whisper through moved locks of her raven hair. In another circumstance, this act may have lead to something else spoken in such intimate proximity. "Three in front, two behind us. Once cleared, we'll make our way to it. Keep count, I expect you to lead the way."

He moved away, dragging his blackened hand from the pale and bruised tones of her back, stepping heavily out into the dance floor. He was impressed with her, the way she didn't look away from the death or the blood or the violence that seeped from his pores. She had stated that she was a doctor, that she was approaching the end and would opt out. But when faced with the brutality of multiple ends, he found the darkened orbs of her gaze fixed. On him, on them, on the scene that unfolded. Studying, anticipating, perhaps even finding some enjoyment in it.

A wolf, cursed with lambs clothing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_3sdIEhkNA​

A one eyed man of old testament fashion, clutching similar proclivities of pain and judgment, parted the moving and swaying sea. Before him, three figures stood in clothing that barely removed them from the rabble of the streets of the Underworld. Dressed in rags, they moved upon him. All fists with holstered blaster pistols, likely retained to prevent killing too many people in the multi-layered club. Too bad for them that their bounty held no such concern.

He stepped back as the first punch swung forward, moving past him. The blackened arm moved out to cut a long line across the offending tricep before he spun and kicked the figure into the two assailants that had trailed the duo. Another caught him across the back, the punch landing flatly against the meat of his shoulder blade. He moved on instinct, grabbing that hand and breaking something important. Driving a knee into the stomach of the man, the assailant crumbled to the dance floor. And then, Reverance felt an all too common sensation.

Stepping back, he placed the voxyn hand on his own ribs and felt the wet trickle from an open slit. The last attacker held a gleaming knife in his hands, dripping in blood, that displayed a vibrant reflection when struck by the beaming lights. The palm carbuncle licked at the wound, drawing a split tongue at the red seep. Reverance closed his eye as he vanished, the force called to aid in his movement as he disappeared from view. Upon convergence with normal speed, he stood before the blade wielder. His wounded hand stood flesh deep in the attackers throat and with a yank, he relieved the man of his vocal cords.

Rasping and dying slowly, just as Reverance would have it, he tossed the sac of flesh across the floor as it left a dull wake of blood behind it. Stepping over to Irajah, he picked at the bandage on his hand, before looking towards the back of the stage.

"We better move before they get back up." Their presence was known now, more than he would have liked. But it was hard enough suppressing his more esoteric abilities. For now, he was interested in seeing where this door of hers would take him - if they would continue to tumble down this lively rabbit hole.

[member="Irajah Ven"]​