The Final Days...[Cessation of Selvaris]

[Reverance]

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"I have heard the languages of Apocalypse, and now I shall embrace the silence."​

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The cogs move behind the face, ever churning, steadily unstable. Not long ago had this planet known the grip of the One Sith, only to be turned over to a far more deserving benefactor. The Legion. Amassing, amalgamating everything into its fold, to make it all more worthy. And yet, it would have never been enough. As Tsavong had stated once, in a Grashal lit by night light, the Yuuzhan Vong deserved more. Used, misled, polarized towards the purpose of holding up the weight of false gods and prophets and mystics, it had all been for nothing. Shapers and Warriors alike, they tasted the blood of combat and that visceral victory, just to believe it was all for the purpose of waging. A war that wasn't their own, taken to the task simply because. Hrosha-Gul, Legion Yun'Do, this wasn't enough and it never would be. So long as the Yuuzhan Vong stood subservient to the Dark Lord, entity not beholden to the Yun'O. The truest directive of the Yuuzhan Vong was life, even in the destruction of it.

"Can you feel that, doctor?" A lone crimson eye placed view upon voxyn hand against the breast of a clone, a likeness not unlike his own brother. Hopefully dead by this point.
"Readings have shifted, the planet has approached a tipping point. What have you done?!" Old fingers scrambled across console, as they always had.
"What I should have done, so long ago."
"Your betrayal..." He stood with an open jaw, stepping back against the console in retrospect and misstep. "The One Sith wont forgive this. They can't!"

"Pray tell, Dr. Neist. How would they know?" The shipwomb had obtained information, sent by Alset, that had attempted to relay information back to Coruscant in regards to the recent shift in planetary tectonics. Information obtained by holonet blocking interceptors, biot modifications to the dovin basal, all set in place to prevent it disruption. News hadn't spread, quiet whispers lost in orbit. "Have you been...mmm...tattling on me?" The Sith Lord smiled, a tilt of his head as he cornered the man and all this rampant betrayal. Lifting true hand against face, he sighed in caress of the old cheek bone, shaking against the touch. "Don't worry. You wont be inconvenienced..." Eyelids turned to narrow slit for the blood hued view. "...For long."

A plunge forward, a grip, a twist, and a yank. The trickle of blood through white goatee as Reverance remove his voxyn hand from the doctors abdominal cavity. Organs twisted about finger with another gasp to exemplify the consequence, another reception of a grimace, as the man slumped down in acquiescing tones and exhalation. Reverance, all along, had a warm smile upon face, the gesture was one of charity in his mind. "You will fade slowly, my old friend. To the applause and celebration of a planet, heralding our departure. Know that I have always cherished our time together. Your..." He looked for the word. "Your tinkering. It has endeared you to me forever." He placed a kiss against the mans now clammy forehead, dragging the neurotoxin finger nails along the mans throat, drawing rivulets of blood that would quickly mix with the poison. "Don't die too quickly. Let the pain carry you now."

He grunted as Reverance stood quietly, an expression painting the Warmaster with a job well done. The Gramuteks had been in place far too long now, all but a few descending into the core of the planet with Chom-Vrone guiding them into the abyss. The sub terrestrial lab, built during initial shaping of the world, was set for a similar time line. One that couldn't be undone now for the simplistic nature of the planned eruption.

Snapping his fingers, the Vonduun skittered across the floor before descending up his legs. Then his abdomen and back, until the former suit beneath was hidden in gray shell. He winced as pincers stabbed into the flesh, forming the seal and pulling skin taut for holding.

"You...you can't possibly expect to survive." Words spoken with a subsequent cough of aerosol red.
Reverance turned, laughing quietly. "Oh...I live now without such mundane things as expectation. In the here and now, Doctor." Eye shifted to the ceiling before depressing the lift switch, tunnel leading up to the corresponding Grashal on the surface. "Exhilarating, isn't it?"

The world wasn't quiet anymore, never truly had been since the very beginning. With the indigenous population completely removed by the sacred hand of the Yuuzhan Vong, it was now up to the domains left to evacuate before the world turned back over on them. Another trial, another cleansing, the truly deserving would survive and grow fierce from such madness. Pure, fires from the very depths, spewed out in contest of who really controlled Selvaris.

He stepped on to the lift, his former friend lying nearly dead upon floor, clinging to life in his final moments. The doors shut, he would usher in a new era for the Yun'Do, one removed from this place. By hand of the Gramuteks, set against them.

~~~​

OOC: If you aren't tagged, please PM before joining.

Spoiler

While this is a faction thread, we'd like for characters to be here that actually make sense for the purposes of the story. No information has made it out from Selvaris that would indicate the shift in the planet, originally put forward in this thread. If you wish to join this thread, either on planet or in the sky, and you are unsure of whether it makes sense for you to be here, please feel free to private message myself or [member="Vrag"].

Tags: [member="Vrag"] | [member="Khallesh"] | [member="Kur-gal Kwaad"] | [member="Ratih Lah"] | [member="Zulia Kwaad"] | [member="Darth Pyrrhus"] | [member="Darth Ophidia"] | [member="Isamu Baelor"] | [member="Galanoth Kaal"] | [member="Durzo Qinvah"] | [member="Sage Bane"] | [member="Matsu Xiangu"]

 

[Vrag]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtL2bftUznI​

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A leader forgot what destruction meant, removed from the act behind some great screen. It was easy giving orders to your underlings, and they to theirs until destruction took place. Far away from where you were lounging in an expensive leather chair. Sipping expensive alcohol. Pondering what expensive cigar to light.

It's why she'd always made a point of being where destruction was. When she gave an order, she was the first to carry it out, and the last to look upon its consequences.

Oh, she was a killer, but she owned every second of it.

A grin, mirroring the perpetual rictus of her mask that had become her synonym. A Baphomet, crowned with horns and clad in black. She haunted every battlefield from Csilla to Contruum, sowing fear in the hearts of men. Even here, before those who fought with her, and not against her. The taste of terror was pungent on her tongue, as strong and intoxicating as the first time.

If it said something about Vrag, that even her allies were afraid of her, she couldn't hear it. Even if she could, she wouldn't care.

“Do you know why you're here?”

Parkeljni stood before her, mirroring the mirror. Tall, proud, and deadly.
Afraid.

Their silence was their answer.

She stopped in her languid pacing, like a predator before the pounce. They tensed, anticipating the final strike, but it never came. No final blow, no words of absolution. Only the Hand, the Supreme Commander of the Legion, haloed with red by the fires in the distance. Something was aflame. Maybe the horizon, maybe the world itself. The heat was beginning to creep up from the wasteland the marshes long dried up. Husks of perished Vonduun lay cracked and open in the water's wake. It gaped like a cemetery full of hollow graves, watching and waiting. For those who were too old, too stubborn, or too loyal to a God who never loved them back.

She raised her palms in the air, flexing the clawed fingers before looking up to the warriors before her. “There used to be twelve of you. After today, you are no more.”

Just like that.

“You're free to go. Do what you will. Eat. Sleep. Frak. Kill.”
“Run along, now.”

Eleven of them did. One remained, as if rooted to the spot. Vrag approached with measured strides, crushing skeletons beneath her chitin boots as she advanced. Another cry of bone and marrow in the ever-growing cacophony of screams. A music so natural to her ears that she paid it no mind.

“Lena,” she spoke. “It’s always been you.” Most loyal. Most devoted. Most… “You remain.” Another sentiment that Ygdris did not understand, and exploited regardless.

“Come.”

Lambs to slaughter, one last time.

 

[Khallesh]

Spoiler

Khallesh Val was not afraid of Vrag. She had found fear, terror even, in her short life. Yet she would never waver when facing down a deadly, or even insurmountable physical challenge. Every single one was a test from the Yun'O. She would overcome them, or she would fight to the last breath and meet her glorious death. Through either action she brought honour to her Domain.

Today there was a sense of trepidation in her heart. Priestesses Emere and Hahk stood before her, their hands worked quickly as they adorned her armour in appropriate ceremonial patterns for a gathering of such importance. Today Khallesh had to speak before her peers. A word out of place could bring shame on her and Domain Val. Khallesh was not afraid, but she was unsettled.

Warrior-seer Edorah Val approached the group, in her wake followed a male with his head hanging low. She stepped aside to gather several items from a container formed of coral. Emere turned away from Khallesh, moving to a bowl contained a bright green fluid. Lifting a natural sponge laden with the fluid she approached the male and started to swab the centre of his chest, muttering some words under her breath. Hahk looked up to meet Khallesh’s gaze, then turned her eyes to the ground. Her right arm came out, palm facing to the skies that were thick with dark cloud.

Khallesh waited a few moments before handing her ceremonial couffee to the priestess. Hahk and Edorah now both approached the male. Edorah held a wide brimmed bowl and stood to his side, whilst Hahk stood square on. With the exception of the morning and evening prayers, every petition for the approval of Yun-Yammka required a sacrifice.

The male held his head high, his jaw set as Hahk closed the distance between them. There was a wet thud. To his credit the sacrifice stayed on his feet and a torrent of slick obsidian blood followed the extraction of the blade. Edorah held forth the bowl to gather what she required for her auguries. There was a limit to what even a Yuuzhan Vong could endure and after a few moments the sacrifice took a knee and then slid to the ground. He never once cried out.




Khallesh slipped down from her mount, rolling her shoulders to try and loosen up some of the stiffness from the journey. Edorah Val came down to the ground behind her, falling in to step. It was entirely appropriate to bring her seer to the gathering. Perhaps the Yuuzhan Vong were being overly dramatic. Perhaps the situation just appealed to their world view, as rooted in sacrifice as it was. To have such a momentous meeting – where the fate of most of their people would be laid out – at the summit of a flat-topped mount whilst the world died beneath them. The sky itself burned now. Thick black scars ran from horizon to horizon where it had been scoured by the fire of the world.

There were members of the Legion; those exiles like Domain Val who had tried to return to New Yuuzhan’ar; there were the leaders of those Domains forced out of Techno Union space over the last decade. Many had come for this gathering.

 

[Kur-gal Kwaad]

Once dismissed, the Dragon made his way quickly across the corroded plains, through abandoned ghost towns of grashal, towards the towering, crumbling spires in the distance. They were like sharp talons of the dead piercing the crust of the dying planet, corpses clawing free of their ancient tombs to come consume the world before the fires could.

They reminded Kur-gal distinctly of the sharp fingers of the Shapers, and how they had cut him. A thousand times, it must have been, or more. He'd lost count at some point, until the moment his cocoon dehisced and spewed him out onto the cold floor; a child unwanted, spawn of the unholy marriage of science and religion.

The towering Slayer shuddered, and his spikes along with him, but his stride never wavered, and soon enough, he reached the cut-off hillock where their fates would confer with the Yun'O.

Quietly, he climbed the gentle slope, mingling into the unusually quiet crowd surrounding the smooth plateau. In the middle of it, an altar, pulsing with thick veins shaped to the form of the Gods' honor. By the virtue of being a head taller than everyone else, Kur-gal could make out their individual symbols with ease, but it brought him no joy. Deciever though Yun-Amon might have been, the Dragon could not deny that some of his teachings held… a truth to them, however obscure and convoluted. It made him uneasy; a feeling as alien to the giant as the love Shai felt for pain.

His piercing eyes – increasingly closer to the color of Selvaris, these days – settled on the insignia once more, and with great mental effort, Kur-gal Kwaad sought comfort in those sinuous lines as they beat in sync with the slowing heartbeat of the world.

Yun-Yuuzhan, forgive my weakness of flesh.​

Yun-Yammka, accept my blood in sacrifice.​

Yun-Harla, remove the cloak that blinds me.​

Yun-Ne'Shel… Yun-Ne'Shel, take my body as your own.​

Yun-Txiin, Yun-Q'aah, forgive my weakness of mind.​

Yun-Lingni, allow me to speak your name.​

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Yun-Shun… forgive me.​

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[member="Khallesh"]​

 

[Khallesh]

Voices rang out across the plateau as the discussions began in earnest. So many different Yuuzhan Vong cultures had developed as their people scattered over a millennia. It was not just the world dying beneath their feet that led to high tensions. Different castes and domains attempted to find common ground without direction from a single Supreme Overlord.

“Heresy!”

“Dear Commander, if you're going to interrupt this meeting every time you hear heresy I fear we may all die before we reach and consensus,” came the sing song tone of Master Shaper Jun Phaath.

“I should cut your tongue from your mouth for such a tone!” hissed Commander Hassal Pekeen, taking a step forwards. There was a subtle shift in the crowd and then another again as another figure took a single sideways step.

Commander Khallesh Val didn't stand directly between Jun and the Warrior, but her shoulder was now across half the Shaper's body. The signal was clear. The tension suddenly ushered in a silence where before there had been a constant patter of voices.

Hassal paused, looking at Khallesh. She raised her chin just a fraction. It was no formal challenge, but it was a daring him to issue one. In the background was a quiet rattle of Vonduun as many Warriors shifted. Khallesh knew what they were doing; they were looking to see where to move to make space for the inevitable conflict.

It did not come. “Shuun used to stand for tradition,” he stated.

“He did,” Khallesh replied. Shuun had been one of their greatest. A hundred years old and never defeated in personal combat. Not until that night, where against a backdrop of a lighting and thunder, Khallesh had struck him down. She had lost her leg, and been somewhat fortunate. In the end playing on his overconfidence. Yet all here were only certain of two things: Shuun had been great; Khallesh had defeated him.

Hassal did not take a backwards step. Commanders did not step back from a fight. Yet he did not step forwards. The silence was telling.

“We need to answer the big question,” Khallesh called. “This world will be gone tonight. The Republic and the Techno Union...” she said to a chorus of muttered curses. “...have ousted our people from their homes.”

“We were happy on Rodia! Had you not all followed the false avatar on your crusade our people would have been left alone!” called another. Khallesh looked up to see Prefect Ga’drak repeat a rhetoric he had used many times this night already. He represented many of the refugees from the South Systems. Those most despicable of infidel creations - battle droids - had been used to burn their colonies to the ground.

One of the Legion's Prefects raised both hands, signalling for calm. Ga’drak shook his head but stopped talking.

“We need somewhere to go,” Khallesh stated.

“We can stay mobile for five months at most,” Jun Phaath added. “We've carefully calculated food supplies and our numbers. We can maybe extend that to seven if we steal from…”

“We are not leaches!” Hassal shouted. “We do not live off the scraps of the infidels!”

Khallesh looked up to meet the eyes of the Warrior who had seemingly found his voice again. Yet this time she gave a subtle nod, entirely agreeing with his sentiment.

“Then we need a new home. We find one…or we take one.”

 

[Yurzhoc Shai]

Hot venom from the ground, gnawing and gulping as it spewed into darkened clouds and atmospheric bellows. Lightning, red and demanding, struck the whirlwinds as ash filled the air. Such madness, such destruction and overwhelming contempt, had they not treated this planet fairly? Had it not been given the righteous inevitably to which all planets aspire? No, this wasn't Zonama Sekot, this planet didn't live and breath and think and thrive for consumption. It was a foreign thing, given a mask to appease with the likeness of Yuuzhan'tar, without ever having been so.

Calloused hands, mammoth strength, he felt the swirl of Stebbles as the amphistaff snuggled against the vonduun, finding rested position upon rondel of the shoulder chitin plate. The meeting was taking place, just as it had time and time again, big mouths speaking words loudly for the sake of making noise. The danger was inherent, imminent in destruction of the soil beneath their feet. The Glas were burning, the bog fields were dry and cracked, and the Grashals were hollowed out with the shrills of the weak and cowardly. A pause for thought, that was all that was needed, to usher in new strategy. A term polarized for the Warrior, as much as he was at odds with waiting, he knew nothing good can come from haste.

He arrived to this congregation just in time to hear words and plans and curses and everything in between. Bringing blood to a boil, he felt the hardening of the amphistaff in anticipation of a brawl. The likes that would truly give tribute to the heralding of a new time, a new path for the Legion and for the Yuuzhan Vong together. Black eyes darted out through the crowd, searching quietly for distinct conquest and offering. Who would the Yun'O favor for adequate sacrifice, so that they might be pleased in tribute?

Revealing sharpened teeth behind thinly split lips, he dragged his finger nails against the prominent scarring ridge across forehead, listening to the ideas of the opportunists and those stuck to a path they had no choice in. He hadn't the choice either, but he hadn't felt the need for belly aching since feast of crab was interrupted upon battlefield by magicians and falling troopers.

"Do not forget about the Sith..." He interrupted these plans and ideas with the quenching appeal for further hatred. "Where are they now, where offered planet decays beneath our feet?" It had shown him one thing. Whether this was betrayal by the Sith or just negligence, they had been ousted in their entirety, not a community left that treated them well beyond utility of war. There was no one left to not blame. But that wasn't the Yuuzhan Vong way, amphistaff washed in running crimson, two coats. No, war was their place but now, survival turned into priority. A thing the Yuuzhan Vong thrived on, if not for the sniveling beings that dragged their feet along the way. "Suggestion of return to Rodia? As mindless as the Vagh Rodiek itself!" He nearly screamed, the idea of stepping back in time an insult to what they had accomplished. "Is happiness all you seek, Tsup!" Pools of black took on an imagined fire, reflection of the burning world in the background, as he bore down on the prefect.

 

[Reverance]

The lift ascended from the depths of planet, pushing bile up from a scalding esophagus. Metallic fixture held in the breast of skin and flesh and hollow grashal, the doors shuttered as the stop preceded the cold interface between biology and heresy. Hidden behind a sphincter, it opened with a breath of malice and disdain, rolling over itself in invisible smog. In his hand, he clutched hard on the golden hilt, mouth of a dragon symbolizing the future extinguished life that would lie beneath it. Not Chom-Huun, not Reebas or the stolen Roecnar. No, he felt the draw of death and hateful intent through coursing fingers, wrapped tightly around the Soulsaber. Every inhalation drew in the power that chimed out from the object, the darkside pouring from the fount, unending.

Stepping off the platform, the sphincter closed behind him. The blade ignited in a menacing spray of deep violet, core of black, with specks of blood riding down the length in suspension and submission. With a spin, he cut across the threshold, exposing flesh and metal alike and with multiple swings, the mechanized device and grashal sang a tune in tandem. One of despair and ache. Fire spilled over in billows, pressurized convection giving embers vigor and charring the inner workings of the Grashal. Reverance stepped away, reflection painted in orange upon red iris as the damage spilled out. Blood and fire, life and death, he smiled as he stepped out from the grashal, the organic building folding over like a balloon punctured and given slow release.

[What is that, what have you done!?]

A warrior of some name, questioning the works of a Warmaster. Quaint. Brave. Stupid. Vong. The blade kissed the mirrored extension of the floor, still remaining after the collapse, as the world was enflamed from the release. Soon enough, there would be nothing but the quaking obsidian sphere, belching for the consumption of such small and petty things.

[What I must. Would you stop me now, Subcommander?]
[You will die for this!]

Betrayal soaked the words in lacquer, soon to be ignited all the same. Reverance merely smiled, hoping he would find this death somewhere along his path. The warrior struck first and with haste, but he fought against a Warmaster far beyond his years and empowered with battlemind. The Amphistaff struck ground in a misstep, the battle ended before it began. Reverance, overwhelming capable of this particular dispatching, side stepped before driving the saber deep into the armpit. The frosty frigid resolve would be felt even by the Yuuzhan Vong, energy cutting through Vonduun and flesh beneath me. The amphistaff, feeling essence pulled away, coiled out from the point of deflection and slivered towards the collapsing structure, as Reverance pulled the warrior towards him. Lightsaber contained within lightsaber resistant armor, free to shred the flesh beneath.

[Beneath all that armor, beneath all that pain. You are but soft thing.] He paused, crooking his head as he inspected the armor, weeping blood of it's own as it began to soften from the wound. [Weak! Be of use now!] Grabbing the Vong by his armor, Voxyn hand reeled back before launching him into the lambent fields. With a tumble and explosion of dirt and debris, fields dry and decrepit, overbearing Harvesters clacked against each others territory before finding the dying man. Picking him apart, they began to fight one another over the slowly encroaching domains, forced by sweeping fire.

"Pathetic..." He felt the inkling of betrayal creep in. How dare one of his own question the decision? This was right for the Yuuzhan Vong, he knew it, and those who were incapable of such foresight would be left in the wake of this decision. Destiny. It chose some and abandoned all others.

[member="Vrag"]​

 

[Vrag]

It was somewhat like watching a slowed-down supernova, she supposed. A massive superstar, gorged on the waste of its own making, bloated beyond usefulness; a final conflagration, a burning crown to commemorate its passing as it burst into a million particles, disseminating its knowledge throughout the Universe.

Ejecta.

"You ever wonder what comes after this?"

She turned her mask slightly, angling the perennial grin towards Lena Sarl. Darth… Something. Vrag didn't remember, and in a few hours, it wouldn't matter. It wasn't like the poor girl existed outside of Ygdris' rapidly fading memory; the exact reason why she was accompanying her to the very top of Uulyn Gal-tu Yun'O. It was only proper, after all, that after all the faithful years of service and sacrifice, the Hand give as well as she had taken. Perhaps some of the Yuuzhan Vong ways had rubbed off after all this time, or perhaps it was merely more convenient this way.

"No, not really. I always figured I'll see when I get there." For there was no doubt in her mind that death would find her, or she it. Either way, immortality had never been on the table.

Their manner was decidedly more familiar than usual, but there was something about witnessing the death of a world that made a person reconsider their priorities. Unsurprisingly, etiquette wasn't particularly high on that list. The second reason, Vrag suspected, was that Lena felt, deep down, what was coming; that this wouldn't only be the death of Selvaris, but hers as well, and Ygdris appreciated her lack of futile resistance.

Another good choice on her part, indeed. The best sacrifice was a willing sacrifice, and the firrerreo had made sure that the Sith idolized the idea of the Hand enough to accept that there could be no life without her. After that, offering her a death was not only an option; it was an honor.

Ah, loyalty. The quality of men in early graves.

The summit was closer now, its dark and uneven shape black against the hell raging in the distance. She wondered how soon the fires would reach their little corner of the world, dismissed the thought, and bit into the slope.

The other exemplar presiding over this particular ritual – heretic, anarchic, iconoclast – was already waiting on her, at the very top. His hunger spilled in waves down the mountain, washing over her like a weak breeze and nearly knocking Lena over.

He tasted like madness.

[member="Reverance"]​

 

[Reverance]

Would the sky crack open now, finally consume him, as it had always promised? Would he be given the ever eternal promise of blissful pain, body racked in rapture and ache, or would the universe but swell in disappointment once more? A bloated corpse too long adrift, careening down the rapids, only to find happiness in the steady open waters of the bay. What of those who sought such turmoil and strife, would they be given their due?

Blood for the Yun'o, crimson eye gazed towards the like minded horizon, dripping in black and blue and red. The crackle of thunder, the promise of a kiss, depleted passions sent frolicking across the open world, bleeding and hemorrhaging from a wound that wouldn't be healed. He lifted his hands to the sky, the feeling was electric, vows of passion built in the stern semblance of static, raising hair across the flesh. Relocation of pressure, the winds shifted, flinging hair across his back as he mounted this mountain free of helm.

Lowering his hands, content for the sweet whispers that might precede the fall, he turned his vision to the presence that had come to share this birth with him. Another in her presence, a meager offering of simple nothingness, an ant beneath his crunching heel. If he so willed it. He might, he knew not where his mind gained such vigor for the spontaneous, but he relished in its production of energy.

"We have brought many planets to their knees, have we not?" He screamed over a gale of wind, the taste of soot and ash and burned bodies feeling his nose. A tone he savored, he turned his head with a quiet inhalation, cherishing the coming euphoria with closed eye and appreciation. Opening his eye, he dropped his arms to the side, the flick of the Soulsaber equaling his mania in presence and power. "But never with such fervor!" Just then, in the distance, a tunnel formed by Gramutek exploding in spewing black and orange. The power of the shock sent buffeting force, in the form of pyroclastic clouds, in every direction. Far in the distance, they were beyond its reach now.

"We stand upon sacred place now, Ygdris. Will you question me now, too?" He lifted the beam in her direction, accusing, taken in by the moment, the power, and the sight of her and all those particular memories. A grin, complimented by the flutter of hair, revealed the hungry canine teeth lying beneath thinly parted lips. "Or will we ride down this world, together...to its demise?"

[member="Vrag"]​

 

[Vrag]

Climbing the slope was a trial in and of itself, soil slipping, rocks tumbling, winds howling. Even for a killer with such a long list to her name, Vrag had yet to witness the end of a world while standing in its heart. It was one thing, ordering an execution from a bridge of a lumbering Star destroyer far up above, but it couldn't hold a candle to the sweeping euphoria and weight of the act committed on Selvaris.

Oh, the earth would crack and burn, until nothing but an empty, cold shell would remain in this dead corner of space. Life, eradicated. Hope, quashed.

Everything… gone.

And the closer she got to the peak of hillock, the nearer she got to that reality. It seemed like all color was draining from the world around her, like blood from a gaping wound, leaving the flesh pale and blue. A short glance down, to the rubble shifting beneath her boots, and Vrag acknowledged that the hill was already saturated with more blood than one single summit deserved to gorge on in its lifetime.

His voice carried with the wind like the cries of an angry god, and the firrerreo felt herself smile. A few long strides more, and the Hand rounded the swell of the hill, Lena Sarl but a few steps behind. Without a word, she held out her fist, and the last sacrifice Gal-tu Yun'O would ever see stopped in her tracks.

A well-trained attack dog, nothing more.

She left the girl in the rising dust as she approached the Wrath, his title never more fitting than in the moment when he was shedding it. The taste of iron and irony in her mouth, but Ygdris smiled still, cold gaze flitting from the rictus premanently fixed on his face down to the black saber in his hand. Waves of oppressive dread, pulsing down its length and reaching towards her with greedy tendrils, like dead wet fingers grasping at her armor.

"When have I ever questioned you, [member="Reverance"]?" Those were words, though only by a margin. Ever since that evening of blood upon a forsaken space station, Ygdris teetered ever on the edge of thought and speech when it came to him. A shudder ran down her spine, and she knew it was awake. Roused from its sleep by his presence, no doubt.

"Put that thing away, Rev," softer, now, with her hand extended in invitation. "We have other blood to spill." Black, and red, and green. This world would sizzle before it burned, and it would cry and sigh until the very moment it collapsed.

Rebirth and death were only a blade apart.

 

[Kur-gal Kwaad]

If a scowl weren't a permanent fixture on his face – or the face of any other self-respecting Yuuzhan Vong, for that matter – it would've become rapidly obvious that Kur-gal was regretting his decision to attend the moot. Well, moot was perhaps too generous a term for the haphazard congregation that had clambered on top of the hill, either by force or choice. For all the battles he had seen, the Dragon could not recall his people ever producing so much noise, with so little purpose.

Everything was simply maddened shouting, high-pitched cries for attention that would not be given, interspersed with a healthy dose of death stares and puffed chests. Everyone wanted to say their part, and whether they had something to contribute was irrelevant.

It was utter pandemonium.

The call of a Commander, crisp and clear, cut through the cacophony, and Kur-gal felt his shoulders relax. He'd become tense – on the verge of barreling away, or maybe bashing someone's skull in – without even realizing it. With a vestige of relief glimmering in his soulless orange eyes, the Dragon turned his gaze from the forgotten altar to the Yun'O to the owner of the voice. [member="Khallesh"]. He knew of the Huntress, though he'd never had the honor of fighting beside her.

She delivered sharp order where there was none, and though a part of him reveled in chaos, the Dragon had acquired a taste for discipline; from cocoon to Parkeljni, it was all the Slayer had ever really known. If the Gods bid them attack, they did. If the false Gods bid them attack, they did too.

"We need to leave," he finally spoke, a slow, lumbering timbre rolling from the long cords lining his throat. It gave the listener a gravely incorrect impression that the man himself was as slow as his mode of speech, and if any of the surrounding Yuuzhan Vong would treat the impression as truth, they would soon find it was the last mistake they'd ever made.

"Wherever we decide to go… we can't stay here." With a bodily shove, the tall creature pushed his way to the fore, silencing the would-be protestors with a searing glare from the deep-seated coals of his eyes.

"Look around you, people of Yun'Yuuzhan!"

His massive arm nearly knocked down a Warrior on his right as he gestured to the fields, and the marshes, and the forests, all reduced to ash. All aflame.

"We need to leave."

There was an urgency in his tone now, though not borne out of a sense of danger; no, Kur-gal Kwaad wanted to leave because the Galaxy held so much more than the war he knew, and he would not linger any longer on a planet that offered him only death.

[member="Yurzhoc Shai"]​

 

[Khallesh]

[member="Kur-gal Kwaad"] [member="Yurzhoc Shai"]
Khallesh left Prefect Ga’drak to his own devices. Yurzoc Shai seemed to have taken his meaning in a different manner. Yet after hearing the Prefect complain that it was aiding the One Sith in war that had led to the exodus from Techno Union space she found herself with distinctly little interest in standing up for him.

Instead she turned to the Slayer that now towered over the group. They were an odd breed. There was very little in common between the different batches of Slayers that had been created over the years. Only one thing was in common: they were all created by the Shapers to serve a particular purpose.

“We had noticed,” Khallesh replied.

“This is not the time for practising your sarcasm Khallesh,” Jun Phaath hissed in her ear. Khallesh shrugged. It would go over his head unless he'd spent much time among the infidels. Khallesh had crossed that bridge now, all part of some plans she had yet to fully comprehend to infiltrate and undermine their society.

“How long have we got?” Khallesh asked.

Jun consulted a biot, it's surface rapidly changing colour. “At least an hour,” she replied, this time loud enough for the assembly to hear.

Faces were suddenly framed in a scarlet glow. All turned to the source of the sudden flash of light. In the distance, with a lethargy that showed the scale of the destruction, an entire mountain erupted outwards. Khallesh started to count in her head.

Yet it was not just sound that struck them. Several stumbled and Khallesh had to brace herself as the shock wave hit. There was a palpable silence for a few seconds. Awestruck faces watched the scale of destruction. At least seventeen kilometres away, Khallesh reasoned. That had to be Karta Peak. Those rocks gracefully arcing back towards the ground were the size of Yorik Trema.

Khallesh was first to break the silence, turning to face Kur Gal. “It seems the Yun’O saw fit to accentuate your warning. Then let us all agree at least one thing. Do we reassemble the fleet in deep space or at what remains of New Yuuzhan’Tar in the Outer Rim?” she asked. They had no allies left and many enemies. They needed to move their people to safety before considered their next move.

 

[Kur-gal Kwaad]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S4OeATEFeck​

His split upper lip twitched, the flanges flaring up not unlike a humanoid's nostrils. Kur-gal was massive, strong, and ugly, but he wasn't stupid by a long shot.

The burning orange eyes narrowed to mere slits in the deep shadow of their sockets, and the Slayer took a deep, long breath as he clenched his fists. Tendons stood out against the mottled gray of his skin, bulging the tattoos spanning the length of his arms and body, and the looming man ground his teeth until he could taste blood on his tongue.

Then he slammed his foot down in a display of unexpected quickness, horns curling skyward as he heaved.

"An hou— "

Mid-yell, the man was brutally interrupted by the only thing louder and bigger than him; Selvaris. The earth moaned and shook beneath them, and not a breath later the shockwave hit them with the force of a Tsii Q'aah, nearly bowling the towering Slayer over where he stood. He stumbled, readjusted his footing, and continued staring as a whole mountain collapsed under its own weight, shorn apart at the seams that were now all that remained of the once proud Karta peak. Four gleaming lines of red trickling down the broken slope; the planet, bleeding.

His planet. His home.

His smoldering gaze dimmed somewhat when the Commander turned to face him, posing the intimidating question in the lasting quiet ruling the asssembly after the Yun'O had slammed down their godly gavel in demand of silence. In the distance, something else came undone, though this time they were spared from the sight and repercussions of it, obscured by some mountain range or the other. Not like geography of Selvaris mattered much anymore.

Kur-gal Kwaad let his gaze wander away from [member="Khallesh"] and to the burning horizon behind her, neck craning ever so slightly as he followed the greedy tongues of flame upwards.

Reach for the stars.

"We've been anchored for far too long. Bound," he spat the word as if it were poison. "No more chains!"

With a mighty bellow, he turned to face the rest of their people, and his throat seemed to tighten for a moment. Thousands of black eyes alight with the fires consuming their world, staring at him, and the sky, and the Galaxy.

As the world crumbled around them, the complexity of everyday life seemed to drain away along with the magma slowly rolling down the slopes of beheaded mountains. Questions that no-one could ever answer before suddenly resolved into the simplest of solutions.

"We reassemble the fleet."

[member="Yurzhoc Shai"]​

 

[Khallesh]

[member="Kur-gal Kwaad"]

Khallesh nodded slowly. In her time New Yuuzhan’tar had been glassed by the Moross Crusade. Even after vongforming just small settlements existed. The colonies in Techno Union space had been eradicated. Alderaan was back in the hands of the Republic. Now Selvaris was in its final death throes.

She had a sad expression on her face as she turned towards Kur Gal. Yet her eyes belied the rage that was burning away beneath that layer of regret. Much like the outer crust of Selvaris, there was a limited time before it broke out. Something would burn when that happened. They were a species on the brink of extinction. Those who left with Zonama Sekot had now been seen in a long time.

“Everyone home we have had has been taken from us,” Khallesh said, her voice clear and crisp. “We either rebuild the Worldships or we reassemble and cut a swathe through the Infidels until we have carved out our own corner of the Galaxy.”

 

[Kur-gal Kwaad]

The Slayer regarded the Commander with a flinty expression, a dark silhouette on a burning backdrop save for his eyes, nothing more than holes cut out in the jagged black shape. If they were windows to the soul, his was on fire.

As [member="Khallesh"] spoke, Kur-gal hung his head, his gaze sweeping over the thousands trailing up the slope of the peak. Eyes of glossy black, of yellow, of blue and red; there was convicition, in others determination, while still others would not meet his stare. For fear, but fear of what?

He tipped his chin skyward, to the stars once more, and wondered if among those twinkling jewels nailed to the firmament, there was one where they could settle down. In peace. Was there such a thing for the Yuuzhan Vong? Peace?

"We've cut swathes before, Commander," he replied quietly, turning to face her again. Her body and face spoke of many a battle, of honors received and bestowed upon the Infidels. Did she enjoy it? Did she crave it? Or was it simply who they were, made to wage war until the universe imploded?

All those questions, and Kur-gal knew the answer to none. His flanges twitched in frustration, and his fists flexed at his sides, an angry red glare shot towards the quiet pulse of the altar at the very top of the mountain. No word from the Yun'O, as ever.

"If we rebuild the Worldships, we at least won't be stationary targets." Well, there it was; the ingrained mentality of aggression and war, bleeding through even in such dire times. "And there's not so many of us left that we can afford angering the Galaxy, Commander."

[member="Yurzhoc Shai"]​

 

[Reverance]

He lifted his upper lip, revelation of blood stained teeth, hungering in reflection of his presence, straight rows of tombstones bleeding. Lifting the hilt upward, he dragged the black blade across his open palm. Just enough to scorch the skin, the taste the frost bite and peripheries of madness once more. He lifted his chin and resonated with manifestations of euphoria. Eye rolled back, twitch of the lip, that cool exhalation. Flicking the blade away, nerve bundles tantalized for the mere moments teasingly, he laughed as he looked towards Ygdris. "What if it's that questioning that I want? That he wants?"

Casting charred fingers into the distance, accusatory pointer admonished a silhouette standing vigilant. Or leaning. Propped against sharp stone, body covered in blackened scars, hurt strewn across the threadbare flesh like art. Menacing, docile, the sort of presence that demanded nothing. Wrapping his hand around the neck with the outstreched presence, ticking mania, he pulled the limp thing to him. And with an extinguishing of the blade, the claws of the armor gripped the dragon embellishments with frustration, feeling the chill against the bone. Vong arm freed for the meddling, he dragged the claws against the chest that now separated him from the woman before him. "What is it, that he wants?" The body breathed in and out, consciousness given at the last moment before the eruption of the lab, an imprint of his brother that once so easily escaped his grasp. "I think...he wants to be like me."

Fingernails of the voxyn, they scurried up the body. Skittering, as a spider would ascend siding, until it found the eye. Brown and open, blinking, the rest of the body was paralyzed but for the sensation of feeling. Everything, the fire and the flames and the hurt and pain, he would know it. Pressing his middle finger and thumb in, he slowly retracted the right eye, scooping soft ice cream from the barrel. All to the sound of quiet screams, elicited through clenched teeth. Until nothing but a cord remained and with the snap back of the wrist, rupture and rapture came two fold with the flare of his nostrils. Reverance drew the twin forward, breathing in his pain, as the blade ignited once more, to prove just how capable the weapon might be. Knife through cream, it pushed through the stomach and back before tearing out his side.

Nearly cleaved in half, blood soaked the stones beneath them, sizzling from the heat, as he tossed the corpse away. It rolled unevenly, one portion lagging behind the other, as he leaned down to pick the eye ball up. Thumbing the saber, the voxyn mouth opened before being given the eye as sustenance. With the shared glee of satiation, Reverance brought his fingers to his tongue, licking the blood away, before tilting his head towards the fellow warrior.

"And what blood may I spill now?"

[member="Vrag"]​

 

[Khallesh]

[member="Kur-gal Kwaad"]

Golden eyes watched the Slayer from behind a mask of intricate tattoos. Each marked a significant moment from her past. Yet it was the many scars she bore than were the watermarks of her past. As young as she was for her position, the last decade of war had provided ample opportunity for glory.

Her lips turned up, threatening a snarl. She was frustrated. Khallesh was not a long term planner. She didn't like devising plots that stretched out into the future. Khallesh Val liked the problems right at hand that could be solved with strength, skill and wit. The plight of her people was not a subject to be resolved by the scheming of Khallesh Val.

The Slayer was remarkably vocal for one of his caste. Yet there were general murmurs of agreement at his statement.

"We don't have the numbers," Khallesh heard Edorah Val admit. In her periphery she saw Jun nod.

Hey eyes turned from the Slayer, following where his had been a moment before: the skies. She was not prone to dwelling on her problems. Sadness was not an emotion that came to her often. At times she had felt sorry for herself during particularly arduous escalations, as much a betrayal of her upbringing that was. But looking to the myriad of sparkling pinholes in the ochre stained canvas of the Selvaris sky she was struck by how large the Galaxy was.

So many worlds. Yet none where her people were welcome. None where their culture, their religion, their way of life would be embraced. That icy pit in her stomach dissolved to be replaced with fire once more.

Damn them all. She silently cursed.

Eyes returned to the Slayer. A delicate bob of the chin acknowledged his position.

"The Yammosks must be protected. We have too few. We assemble the fleet in deep space and then the Shapers and Indendants can work out what the Warriors need to take for our survival."

So few who embraced or even tolerated their ways... Khallesh was as prone to sentiment as she was to allowing herself to feel downcast.

Her eyes narrowed as she looked to Kur Gal. The others were in broad agreement, the Priests were drawing the meeting to close in the sanctioned manner.

"Where is Vrag?" Khallesh asked directly. He had been one of her honour guard after all.

 

[Vrag]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ifZly0YiJgk​

She watched.

She listened.

She bore witness to the downfall of a man, a warrior, that she had known for so long, and wondered what had cracked inside him. The fire in his eyes had never been so unrestrained, his movements never this wild and uncontained. He had always been… marginal. Hell, they all were. On what edge, she didn't know, and didn't care to find out, but they definitely walked that fine line between sanity and madness.

[member="Reverance"], it seemed, had finally crossed it.

Her gaze followed his jerky finger, and wordlessly, the Hand watched him rip and tear at the familiar flesh.

"You cloned yourself," she mouthed, dryly. At this point in her career and life, Vrag had come to realize that nothing really shocked her anymore. Once you've waded through an ocean of blood and corpses to get to the top – an ocean of your own making, no less – very few things remained in the Galaxy that could give you pause.

Seeing a man, a living man, skinned and shredded to pieces like cattle by the butcher, was not on that list. Even when the Wrath pinched the gelatinous orb with a surgeon's precision and extracted it with a psychopath's care, Vrag stood unblinking a few paces away, regarding him with a mixture of amusement and exasperation. The world was dying around them, and he was playing doctor with an abandoned pet project?

"Lena," she addressed the last of the Parkeljni without removing her eyes from Reverance, "stay back."

"Yours," her voice was hard as she advanced, her proffered hand long fallen to her side again. He'd never been one to be swayed by conventional means, and if she had to break all his bones to convince him to leave, she would.

She'd likely enjoy it, too.

The woman strode closer, nostrils flaring as the oppresive aura radiating from his blade washed over her, and Ygdris – both of them – growled in annoyance at the sensation. There were few things that angered her, but invading her headspace was one of them, and the glowstick in his grasp was doing just that.

A gnashing of teeth followed as she soldiered on in spite of his grin, in spite of his red-stained dagger, of his burning sword.

"Let it go. Let him go."

She nearly whispered to his face as she came to a still mere breaths away from him, her gaze boring into his crimson one down the jagged, cracked length of the skull. The seas of flame lapping at the foot of the mountain grew ever closer, and she could feel Vrag washing away with the tide. In the span of a blink, Selvaris and everything upon it turned to ash, swept away by wind and time, until the boiling earth cooled down to a flinty steel, once again unmarred by the touch of man. She could see herself, both of them, crumbling to dust along with the world, encased in stone and forever doomed to stand watch on the husk of a planet.

With what could only be described as gentleness, Ygdris reached up to cup his scarred cheek, claws resting harmlessly against the mottled flesh.

"We have a freer life to lead."

 

[Quietus]

What steps through the ether, from the distant and chaotic realm of the Nether, had brought this creature here no thought could share. From shadows, through rivers run red, along sands of swords and spirits as ancient and corrupt as she, lethal claws passed along ash and soot. It was the fire, perhaps, that drew the eyes and the pit of the stomach that had gone wandering bereft of sustenance for an uncountable passage of time.

Hunger. A deep and seething need to feast. The creature scoured the molten valley, melding through the lick of fire pressed away from body by sheer will of Force alone, following the trail of roasted flesh as it drifted along the winds. Brief pauses taken to inspect charred remains, the painful clench of starvation demanding attention of every fleshy piece left behind. The creature picked along carcasses with feverish abandon, ripping and twisting to the song of flash-fire and snapping sinew.

Not enough. Insides clawed insatiably, giving way to a painful baying of the hound along the cliffs of the mountain that evolved into a grating roar as if the peaks could voice their agony. Someone answered. Above from the rocky tops that reached towards whatever holocaust heavens remained someone conjured the spilling of blood and shared it to the skies. With desperation and an aching for flesh the creature tore straight up along stone incline, claws shearing rockface, tail snapping, tired and wasting muscles rippled under armored hide. Rock gave way to dirt like silk and sand under paws but still it persisted, stilted movements coiling and strangling the terra beneath to pull it up and into the peaks.

There were bodies. Warm bodies. Moving geists within the gale of smoke and soot. The creature heaved haggard, snarling breaths as it turned its nose to air and followed the scent of ichor, circling beyond the reach of those gathered. There in the shale and hot earth it found the split remains of the discarded clone and laid immediate and fervent claim to this feast. Jowls filled with elongated fangs clamped around an extended limb, bones cracking dully beneath rendered flesh, blood welling through maw. The hound tugged backwards towards the slopes, intent to steal away with this meal evident with every determined lash.

[member="Vrag"] [member="Reverance"]

 

[Kur-gal Kwaad]

"So it shall be, Commander," he gave a curt nod, one Warrior to another. They had both been created with a purpose, and it was not to create things. As he glanced down at his hands, clawed paws made to crush skulls of Infidels, Kur-gal wondered if there would be a place for spawn like him in the wandering fleet of Yun'Do.

"God's woe," he whispered under his breath, the syllables of their tongue slipping like a betrayal through his teeth. The Warmaster had been right in branding them in that manner. The Dragon was not intellectually gifted enough to ponder on whether or not [member="Reverance"]'s choice of name was a self-fulfilling prophecy, and even had he been one to linger on such musings, they hardly had time for that now.

He was still standing off to the side, jutting out of the crowd like a sore thumb with a thousand years of cultural stigma bearing down on his back like an overwhelming weight. Now the only thing he'd ever had, the only place he'd ever called home, was burning down before his eyes.

Something cold and misshapen constricted in his chest, and the Slayer averted his eyes from the flaming vista.

He would not cry.

[member="Khallesh"]'s voice pulled him out of his reverie, and his flanges twitched as he rose his gaze to meet hers. Jaw set, horns curled back, chest heaving. He felt no lingering loyalty to the Supreme Commander, not after today. The beast-woman had released them all from her service, and the Dragon did not relish his time spent in it so much that he would be held back in sentiment.

"Uulyn Gal-tu Yun'O," he uttered, a low rumble that could easily be mistaken for another shudder of the earth beneath them.

What business the Huntress had with the Hand Kur-gal did not know, and did not care to know.

Without another word, he brushed past her and rejoined the Warrior-seer next to the altar to say his last goodbyes to a world that would soon cease to exist.