Suffer Unto All [Arthos]

[Lief]

There had been nothing she could do as she was cast aside and the blade worked its way into the subtle skin of the boy she had tried so hard to keep alive. Her mind tore open, enhancing every single emotion that she felt, that she drew from her surroundings, until she could sense every being in the compound, feel their every desire, the rush of blood as they touched another and their pulse quickened. More immediately, however, she could feel the life draining from the boy.

She didn't even know his name.

Jyn dropped to her knees, in agony, in desperation; he was being eaten alive from the inside, acid working its way from the stomach... And Jyn felt every painstaking millisecond of it. She became so disorientated that her head span and her eyes fogged over, yet she somehow managed to press her hand over the wound. Like that was going to change anything.

Her eyes rolled back, breathing laboured as she felt on the very verge of death. She didn't even notice the collar snap around her neck, nor the fact that the boy was dragged from her reach and placed upon a repulsor-gurney. Words had been spoken, but none of them reached her understanding. Instead she panted, exhaustion already seeping in as she fought off everything she was feeling. So many people in such a small space, so many emotions to draw upon.

Lust, greed, pain, rage.

Jyn screamed.

Dragged from the room, feeling each and every bump along the way, Jyn was pulled through the estate she had never had a chance to explore, disorientated. She continued to writhe in pain, her mind ablaze; she had always been a very gifted empath, she had sensed the death of thousands at Belkadan while in orbit over the planet. And now that what little shielding she did have was broken, now that her mind had been torn open, it was as if the very weight of the Galaxy was oppressing her. As if she had been set alight from the inside out.

At some point she had been strapped down. An IV had been placed into her arm, though the drip was far from standard. Jyn did not realise this. All she knew was that her mind was wide awake and alert, when it wanted to simply shut down against the assault it was receiving. Jyn was blubbering like a babe at this point, and from the sounds of things Arthos hadn't even begun to get started.

And then he did something she didn't think possible.

He tore at her mind even more, and invited all manner of horrors to the party.

[member="Arthos Vynea"]

 

[Arthos Vynea]

The smell of fear permeated the room, he could feel it like a beast that roamed the room ready to rend flesh from bone. It soon would. He motioned for the first prisoner to be moved out and brought to the nearby table to be strapped in. His tools arrayed before him he glanced over at the girl one last time, she'd forced his hand, and he didn't make empty promises. Before he started he wormed his way into her mind its defenses stripped in the pain of what was going on. He highly doubted she'd even feel him in there at this point, she felt everything anyway who's to say what was real and what wasn't. His voice echoing inside of her was completely clear, perhaps the only point of clarity she'd receive in it all but pain. Submit and it all ends. Submit yourself to me and I will end this. Refuse and see if you can endure.

He selected a long thin blade as his first instrument and so the night began. Flaying a human was much like any other animal really, and he was almost bored while he did it. He kept his connection on her mind solid, a single hope to end the pain if she but submitted. He was however very careful to shield and protect the connection as to keep her empath feelings out of his own head. The next seven all died in various ways, each death long and painful in the extreme. In his private opinion the slave who now lie burnt to ash had it the worst, the gas mask preventing a simple death by asphyxiation. It would all stop if she but simply broke and submitted to him. She would either way in time if her very mind didn't crack first.

At long last the night past and he stood surrounded by true depths of depravity and evil, things he himself was in all honesty was not comfortable with. He'd told her the consequences though, and she'd forced his hand, as far as he was concerned it all lay on her. He reinforced that belief through her mind as he delved in deeper, this was her fault, she should have submitted, and she still would. She would learn to obey.

Walking from the room he left her in silence though his mind still touched hers, no reason to let her regain complete control of it outside of him now that he was in. "Remove the drip and let her sleep, when she wakes bring her to the ship and alert me."

[member="Thédus Lorr"]

 

[Lief]

The mind of an Epicanthix was fortified, but there were somethings even they could not defend against. Arthos had played at her weaknesses, pulled at the smallest tear in the fabric of her mind, and with that the rest came tumbling down. They were not, as many may have thought, completely invulnerable. Especially not as their emotional state weakened and their sense of self crumbled. No racial trait was so strong.

So it was that Arthos was able to crawl through the tear and worm his way into her mind. It would be slow going but entirely possible, her mind would automatically engage and try to force him back, but it had been weakened. It could not resist for long.

Her vision cleared just a little as his voice boomed in her mind, a focus point, a haven of clarity amidst corruption and aberration. The room came into view, the sight of the slave bound down, the tools which would no doubt be used against them. Against her. Jyn tried to shake her head but it felt heavy, her mind hazy. She tried to scream, but her throat was raw to the point that any further strain might have caused lacerations.

She was told to submit. But she didn't know how to. The words just resonated over and over and over in her mind. A stuck record, buzzing as if it had been scratched. There was no way for her to submit, no way for her to have it end, though there was no way Arthos could realise that even with the mental connection. She wanted it over but her mind was too delirious, her body too weak. And as he made the first incision with the flaying knife fire engulfed her oncemore. She was past the point of no return.

Jyn experienced death eight times over that night. She felt her skin burn as another's was flayed, living through their experience. Dying through them. She felt asphyxiation, she felt fire, her skin melted, eyes popped, the agony was incomprehensible. Throughout it all she struggled and writhed where she was bound, her eyes rolled back, fogged over, her head bobbed as much as it could, she lost complete control over her body. In the end there were just subtle twitches. Outwardly Jyn was already gone, even if her mind was awake. Even if she was still made to watch.

Internally, however, her mind was as loud as ever, increasing in pitch and decibel as the methods of torture and death became even crueler. He had a way of dragging the life out of the person, slowly and surely, until they begged for the end, and even then it was denied. And when they did die it was a moment of sweet relief, wherein Jyn thought it was finally over.

It made the next time just that bit worse.

Not many people could say they had experienced what it was to die eight times in one night. Not many could say they had been flayed alive without losing one ounce of skin, burnt until the body no longer had nerves with which to receive pain and body reduced to ash while remaining terribly whole and untouched.

That night Jyn had seen true evil.

She had felt the embrace of death, the lure of hell itself, and she had begged and begged to be dragged asunder. The Force did not answer her calls. The Force never came when she needed it. The Force was nothing to her. It had always been nothing.

And then inexplicably it all ended. There was nothing as her body instantly shut down following the removal of the drip.

Physical trauma would do that to a person.

[member="Arthos Vynea"]

 

[Arthos Vynea]

She hadn't submitted The thought ran through his mind over and over in his room the only truly private place of the entire compound, and unending chain of simple unacceptable thought. He'd been so sure she would give so quickly, at least move to save them from his acts, but she hadn't. Standing he began to pace as his thoughts moved trying to find a point of understanding, and in the end simply returning to the same thought. He was failing somehow, failing at all of it. He didn't understand why she didn't want to be free of it all, at the least free of him. He'd committed atrocities on a scale he could barely swallow in his mind, and he'd endured nothing of them. Yet she hadn't submitted.

His rage had been poured out, and he was empty now, the unleashing of it left him nothing but doubts. He'd all but begged her towards the end to submit, but it was to a mind no doubt that was beyond hearing the echos of his thoughts in her head. Even shielded he could feel something inside her, something on a level his mind couldn't make peace with. His plan from here was simple, a short trip to Kessel would provide her with the alternatives, then certainly she'd submit rather then live that life. Then again, he never thought she'd make it through the flaying. Only in his rage had he pulled though himself, his guards had frequently excused themselves from the room, he was near envious of it.

He had no choice though, his die was cast was it not? It was too late for doubt, besides he'd warned her of the cost of defiance, he'd even saved the boy and the mother for her as a gift. Surely she could see that? Finally as his doubts moved to consume him his anger grew from it once more. Was he her chain, or she his? Without knowing where he was going he walked down the stairs to her room, his actions unprepared and ill thought out. She lie there still asleep but for a twitch once as he stared. She hadn't submitted, but why? He just wanted to free her, to see her free herself. It would all be for the greater betterment of her of that he was sure. As he looked at her he was suddenly angry at her, his rage spiking for a moment at her defiance and refusal to surrender to him. For the doubts she created in him, and most of all for exposing his failure.

Moving to the wall he didn't sit on the bed this time but slid down to the floor near the door simply watching for her to wake. Closing his eyes he reached out again to her broken mind a tentative movement was all he manged, and yet even ti was too much. The pain was overwhelming his stomach heaving before he could even stop the reflexive action. Yet he did not allow it to end there, if he was going to discover the source of her strength, her defiance he could not. So he again lowered himself into her mind, and there he nearly lost himself. It was overwhelming, he couldn't even grasp at the Force to use the pain as fuel it was simply too much. A storm that left nothing in its wake, he had no words for what was going on inside of her mind, what he'd brought on her.

Then with a gasp he realized he was out, his connection with her mind broken as he lost hold of the Force from her mind. He didn't attempt it again, he was no master of the mind and he knew it. He knew it would hurt but he was no empath he hadn't imagined such pain was possible. It was too late now though, there was no forgetting what he'd done. There would be no forgiveness. He thought then of sitting there until she woke, of speaking with her and attempting to explain, but it sounded hollow. There were no words which covered such acts, no explanation. So he thought back, he thought of her, or her teachings. He'd wanted it all so badly, begged for it like a dying man who found the source of life. This one wanted none of it, she was here because he forced her, but it was for her own good was it not?

Finally he gave up on thought and sat there alone in his thoughts as he stared at the frail forming sleeping away. He'd done this to help her, to train her, and to free her no? Then why had it all failed so badly, had not his Master burned the code on another's soul once? He'd tried to be nice, offered her the slaves lives, and taken care of her well, but she'd refused him. Insulted him even. When she awoke perhaps then she would fight or submit, if there was anything left of her to do either. Perhaps he could still show her, free her, and perhaps one day she'd understand. He didn't dare touch her mind again though, and it was in that moment he knew he'd failed in that as well. He could not take the pain away he'd given her, it was done for good or ill to his cause.

Still he sat there the thought unbidden in his mind as he ran though every lesson his Master ever gave him. She'd told him to slave had she not? To catch sensitives for vision, but she was gone and her vision with her. Sitting there still he waited perhaps one more opportunity and she'd submit. If not, well he knew his own plan, breed enough pain, hate and fear that was the way no? Then again, when had she ever truly bred those in him? He wanted to say his feelings to that were overwhelming as his mind struggled though it, but not now. What could free her now from the chains he'd bound her with?

Closing his eyes he left his rage behind, it was easier then the sorrow, but it was less then it as well. Steeling himself he touched her mind once more delving into as he held onto the Force with all he had. The pain burned at him and stabbed, this time though he could use it as something else. Staring into her mind he knew he couldn't heal it, but there was one thing he could do. The rend in her empathy was a tear in her mind, another scar he'd left on her for her refusal to submit. He'd thought he could simply patch it up as easily as he'd torn it, but that only showed how little he knew. Still he tried as he pulled through the Force his own mental shielding into her, the giant storm she'd shown him to create in his mind to defend it.

It wasn't of the girl though and would not simply sit like a band aid on the wound, still he pulled at it slowly knitting the shield around her mind dulling it to the sensation of the tear. His emotions fell and rose as he sat there the beads of sweat that dripped down his face unrecognized. For a moment he nearly lost his hold as he struggled for air her mind overwhelming his own, but he held. The patch held over the rend he'd created in her mind and would until it healed on her own or she pressed it to much. Her dreams of pain were an entirely different matter though, he torture had not ended with sleep. Her defenses had crashed though and pushing his own mind he suppressed her thoughts, something he should have done at first if he'd known better.

Pushing them down his unskilled mind attempted to find a memory or a thought to replace them, it was too much for him though to hold back both the dreams of pain and finding something of her own. Instead he simply sat there with her, uncertain of what to do with her. There was no Code written on her soul, he was not her. He'd never wanted to be her though not really, being her's was enough, even when they had walked away it was enough. He doubted this one would ever be free like that, he'd chained her soul, and for what? His own desire to free something like he could no longer free himself?

[member="Thédus Lorr"]

 

[Lief]

Jyn twitched.

Her mind was in torment, even during its torpor. There was no rest, no time to repair, her dreams were as vivid as the waking nightmare she had experienced only now there was no respite in the form of darkness. There was no cut off point. She had experienced death, now she was reliving it.

The Reaper stood at her side, her sole companion, her sole friend. He watched on in disgust as the events replayed over and over in the child's mind. Even he could not bear to watch for very long. Even he turned away, aghast.

But Jyn did not have such a luxury. Jyn could not simply close her eyes. They were already closed, yet nothing had changed.

There was no warning ahead of time, no way for him to prepare himself, as all at once the girl sat bolt upright and screamed. Her eyes were open, set straight ahead, and the horrors shone through her iris'. It was more of a screech really, shrill and lingering in the air long after her throat had become coarse and her lungs ached for air.

Her body simply trembled. She felt hot and cold, perspiration wet her brow and her shirt was drenched in sweat. Oddly enough, there was blood there too. Her nails dug into her skin, dragging along her arms in a repetitive motion leaving lines of red. She clawed at the very code he had burned in her, eyes glazed over as if still lost in her nightmare. As if she hadn't really woken at all.

And then her body was ablaze. Literally, like lava pooling through the crevices, coursing through her veins, red and ashen beneath the skin itself. The howl of pain which left the girl was like no noise any human should ever have known how to make. The very Force contested her attempts, the Darkness which had been seeped into those words, into the burns, bit back with all the ferocity it could muster. Only the left side of her face was spared the gruesome ordeal.

Back against the bed the child writhed in pain. She was scorched internally, though like the dreams there was no release. No respite. It would not kill her, or cause any physical damage, but there was no doubting the immense amount of harm it provided. The room increased in temperature exponentially, so much so that the window pane cracked and shattered glass found itself strewn across the room as a fierce breeze swept into the chamber.

You dare to reject us?

Eerie words, ghostly even, carried on the wind. Audible to even Arthos should he try to listen.

You dare to defy us still?

She had been contended with the darkness inside her for the entirety of her life. Her existence had seen this sole purpose. And now the very core of it contested her attempts.

Jyn arched back on the bed, an unseen hand tightening about her throat. It was the only point which soothed the burning, this ghostly grip which was as cold as the air on Korriban.

Know then that your bed is made.

All at once the tension in the air dropped. The wind itself seemed to diminish. The girl's torment, however, was not so easily stifled. She continued to writhe, breathlessly murmuring as she tossed to and fro upon the bed. Sheets lay crumpled, half off the bed and sprawled upon the floor. Beneath her skin the endless fire continued to burn.

What had he done to her?

[member="Arthos Vynea"]

 

[Arthos Vynea]

He stared at his scrapping away from her mind his efforts coming to naught and it surprised him little, he simply wasn't that strong. He could feel the energy in the room though as she woke with a start, it touched at his own corruption encouragingly. It bathed in his darkness as much as it burnt her, but his doubts these last hours as he sat and watched it gave no love to. Instead he felt it burn them away, their rage increasing his own, their hate increasing his own. They could not quench his doubts though, and as he heard the voices he smelled it in the air. It was all over so quickly from there as they vanished, her skin where he'd written the code on her. That which he'd scarred her with.

Mouth agape he stood as he approached her regret in his heart, he hadn't meant for this, none of it. The thought caused pain inside of him as the darkside bit into him, pain bloomed across his mind and replaced itself with rage. He could feel it moving across him like an ocean current, he'd escaped most dark side corruption for so long, and yet now it fought to consume more. He'd cursed them, cursed them both. Anger came unbidden now like a reservoir he'd never known existed within him. He'd always followed the code has a philosophy, but the whole religious side he'd never truly taken stock in. Now he wondered at that, could it all be true?

Looking down he felt his mind at war within himself as he reached out to lift her back unto the bed. He felt both a deep satisfaction at the enforcement of his will, and the utter disgust at what he'd done. Reaching for the Force to steady himself he found it difficult, his mind was lost to himself, the Force nearly impossible to grab in the darkness. Stepping back he wanted to run from it all, run until he couldn't remember her in this moment. There was no running from this though. It hurt inside his head as he whispered it, but he did it all the same, to both of them. "I'm sorry." He'd been so certain he could do it, so certain he could train her up and break her chains. So certain he even knew what her chains must be. He'd only made it worse, for both of them.

Moving to the corner of the room he sat in a chair and watched both uncertain and certain of what to do. Something inside him laughed cruelly at the girl who defied brought so low and so destroyed she would never defy him again. The other half wept, he deserved the damnation he felt creeping on him. He should have just stayed there, a simple life he'd shared at the end with her. It was too late now though, even she would be disgusted with him now.

[member="Thédus Lorr"]

 

[Lief]

For hours she lay there, skin ablaze yet her mind not even so much aware of it at this point. She slipped in and out of consciousness, the occasional whimper escaping her lips.

She hadn't reacted when he lifted her from the bed, though even he would've been able to feel the severe heat which radiated from her - not enough to burn him, but enough to make itself known. She had curled into the bedsheets, which were cool in comparison, and given into the respite of sleep as her body chose to shut down once more.

Finally she woke.

The embers beneath her skin remained, though they had diminished in comparison to how they had been. Only fitting since her mind had been blank. Her eyes flickered and set up ahead to the ceiling.

Her lips were cracked, throat parched. She needed something to ease away the pain. But she could not speak. The words wouldn't even form in her mind, much less on her lips.

[member="Arthos Vynea"]

 

[Arthos Vynea]

The warmth of her skin was unnatural, her skin broken by unnatural heat, and what he could only assume had to be pure dark Force energy. What else could act so alive under her skin? As she slept he shook himself out of his own doubt and misery. He as usual wallowed in his own emotions while the girl suffered before him, his mind so wrapped up in his own pain he'd refused to see how truly insignificant it was next to her's. It was the thought that broke the hold of the rage on him as he watched her curled into the sheets like a trapped animal praying for release. None of this had been what he wanted, she was not free, and nor was he, now they were just chained together.

Standing he slowly walked over to her forcing his eyes to survey her as she lay there, the dying fires slowly turning to embers, but he knew they just waited to burn once more. Moving to the bathroom he set her a bath, lukewarm water enough to cool, but not put her into shock. He could feel their link clearly now, and his rage would only burn her flesh more. He didn't know how he knew it was true, but inside he knew it to be true. So he refused the Force, refused the calling of the darkness within him that was now so full of strength. Instead he set a cold wet cloth on her head, and waited.

As he eyes opened he dipped a fresh cloth in cold water and pressed it softly against her lips letting them suck in the moisture. After a moment he lifted her partially up before offering a cup to her lips and letting her drink. "You're body has borne great punishment, some my doing, but this, this is beyond me. It was not what I intended for you, but I think I understand some bit of it. You must learn the Code, you have denied it and it has punished you for it. I believe if you accept it, you may free yourself in time. You've no reason to trust me, and every reason to hate me, so I will be as honest with you as I can. This was not my intention, perhaps I stretched beyond my wisdom, but it no longer matters. The rage will make it burn I fear, and perhaps refusal just as much. Instead simply learn, learn and obey. Nothing is forever, even this. I'm going to put you in the bath now, once you're ready we'll train. Once you're finish you may leave, you may take a ship and simply go. Until then though learn and obey that you may understand what it is that is inside you."

Lifting her up as gently as he could given her condition he moved her to the bath and slowly set her into the water. Laying her down finally he released her and stood over her for a moment as the water soaked into her clothes. He didn't have the answers for this, but he understood the principles. If it was the code itself he believed there was a way out for her. If it was the very dark side of the Force it was far beyond him. Whatever it was he simply didn't understand the how of it, but intentions didn't matter when the results were so plain to see.

[member="Thédus Lorr"]