This Dream is Not O-Kei

[Kay-Larr]

What a day! The meeting with the Emperor of the Sith Empire was difficult at best. At least she was only dealing with a holo and not facing the man himself. And if it weren't for her position as a monarch, she would probably be dead. That fact provided little comfort however.

Kay spent the last hour soaking in a hot tub to ease the tension in her muscles. She didn't talk to anyone, like she normally would have. These days she didn't open up to anyone and she could see the worry for her in their eyes. Instead she'd pretend to not notice and carry on, despite the emptiness that she had felt ever since her seperation from her husband. But at least others were happy, some of them getting married, all of them carrying on with their lives. And that was a good thing.

The aftermath of a hot bath was always nice. It left her relaxed and would allow for sleep a lot easier. After putting on her nightgown, Kay slipped into bed and nestled herself under the covers.

Within moments, she drifted off into a blissful sleep.

[member="Kei Raxis"]

 

[GhostOfProtocol]

It required energy.

Kei had missed his target, he knew that. He was pretty sure he'd gotten caught by his own weapon, the weapon he'd used for years. He couldn't essence transfer out, he'd used so much energy to get into the weapon and he didn't have the energy to essence transfer out. He would have however, he had a plan on how to build up his energy and free himself from the weapon, into a new body and a new tool that he could use.

For the plan to work, he needed two people ready and waiting to collect him. It had taken him a while to think of who to rescue, the sentience within the crystals forming a plan. He had made friends, he had made enemies. Both friends and enemies would be able to help him in this, would be able to save him and rebuild him. Essence transfer was always a dodgy process, he didn't know how he would end up after it.

He had very little energy, but he had enough. He just knew that he would have to be patient. This would take time, however it could be done alongside his manipulation of [member="Adron Malvern"], the man who held his weapon. Kei was reasonably sure that Adron was the man who had delievered the final blow, however he couldn't prove it. He wasn't surprised that someone had killed him, he just didn't expect it so soon.

The energy he did have was converted into force power. That was shot across the galaxy.

The queen was asleep. Kei needed to get into her brain, appear to her in a dream. It was telepathy, very difficult and requiring lots of energy but he would be able to do it just enough to get the message across. He would need to do it every night, there was no way that Kay would move first time. Kei didn't want her to, he needed her to wait because he needed time to manipulate Adron into providing him the energy required.

"Kay. Help me"

His voice would appear quiet to her, it would fade to nothing by the end. For the night, that was all he could do. He needed to rebuild his strength and try again.

[member="Lady Kay"]

 

[Kay-Larr]

Well the sleep started off as blissful. Kay was dreaming of many little things. The scenes always changed; moving from being at the Palace, to being at her Estate. Her kids were both infants and teens throughout the course of it. It was more of a mixture of memories replaying than anything new.

That is until the voice of [member="Kei Raxis"] came through. It was strange in the way that it had appeared. It was startling, startling enough to wake her from her sleep.

"Kei?"

She sat up in her bed and looked around her bedchamber. It was silly to think that he'd be there. Kei was dead. [member="Adron Malvern"] informed her as much. It was an act of mercy, he said. But even then, it still saddened her. Although they had their differences, their arguments, Kei was her friend.

Did he really need her help? Was he really reaching out? Perhaps it was only her imagination.

Kay lay back down and closed her eyes. More than likely it was just another part of her dream.

 

[GhostOfProtocol]

The connection was cut.

Kay must have awoken. He had to keep trying until she came to help him. All of his energy was getting funneled into getting specific people into a specific place so that they could free him from the grasps of the lightsaber that he had been stuck in for so long. Manipulating three people was tiring, especially when he was syphoning energy to keep himself alive as well as manipulating three people to be in specific places.

Then he felt the connection.

Kay must have woken up, assumed she was dreaming and fell back asleep. He needed to try again, he needed to try to get her to be aware he needed help. He focused his everything onto getting a full vision through to Kay instead of just a voice. He was aware he would probably go without energy for a while afterwards, would need to rebuild enough energy to actuallly sustain himself. It would hurt but it would be bearable.

Her dream would be overwhelmed with his face, then his voice. Quiet, fading but there.

"Kay. Help me"

[member="Lady Kay"]

 

[Kay-Larr]

Kay did indeed fall back asleep. That was the easy part.

This time instead of going back and forth in between different memories and thoughts, she was walking in the woods. Perhaps it was the Force guiding her dreams this time, for she didn't hide her signature while asleep. Or maybe it was some spark of a connection that the two had due to their friendship. Either way, the dream was different than before.

The woods were strange in that they carried no sound. They were just a visual. Kay followed the path along it, not yet realizing what was happening.

That is until she saw the face of [member="Kei Raxis"] , massive in scale and blocking her path. Again that same message came through and with it this time, she felt a strange pull. "Kei?...Kei where are you?"...

 

[GhostOfProtocol]

He heard her.

But he couldn't answer her. He was exhausted. He needed her to see, and she was almost there. She knew that something was going on, that was a good start. He was getting her to see, he was almost there. He was suffering from exhaustion, he couldn't carry on. He needed to regain some sort of energy, he could feel himself fading. He would die if he didn't get free, he knew that and he knew that he needed to fix it and soon as he could.

He faded from her, exhausted. He knew he would have to wait until tomorrow, building energy from the lightsaber, from it's master and from the surrounding area. He would build energy from the force that tore it's way through his body, it's veins. It powered him, but he couldn't use it until he was finally free from the trap that he had accidentally trapped himself in. He was stupid, he knew he made a mistake my ending up in his weapon.

So he waited. He let time pass, building his energy. He would try again tomorrow.

[member="Lady Kay"]

 

[Kay-Larr]

It faded almost as quick as it began. Kay spent the rest of that dream searching the silent woods, but finding nothing.

When she woke the following morning, her day was spent in slight distraction. Her thoughts were all on [member="Kei Raxis"] invading her dreams. For a moment she had wanted to tell [member="Adron Malvern"] about it. Yet the man was already going through enough with having murdered Kei. Maybe this dream was just her own sense of guilt for letting Adron go. Or maybe it was something else.

The following night she went to sleep. It took a little longer for her to drift off, partly due to the anticipation of coming across Kei again. But she managed to get there in the end. Only this time instead of a forest, she was in a cavern. A cavern with floating orbs of light that nearly looked like stars.

 

[GhostOfProtocol]

He didn't pay attention to the passing of time.

He had no way of knowing how much time passed, he had no eyes. He couldn't see the sun in the sky, he just guessed the time of day by what people around him were doing, what he could feel them doing. He spent most his time just transferring energy from anything he could, fueling himself and his soul so that he could continue to twist and manipulate his friends and enemies into rescuing him from his final place, wherever he ended up.

He wasn't expecting Kay to fall asleep, but he was prepared non the less.

It was a cavern this time. He had always wondered what people dreamed of, his wondered why Kay dreamt of a cavern. He would never know, he knew that he wouldn't let her dream reach the place it was intended. Instead he used the force to twist the dream, placing a figment of his own in the corner of the cavern. It was the Kei that she would recognise, long hair and less scary Sith armour. It was the Kei he once was.

"Kay. Help me"

[member="Lady Kay"]

 

[Kay-Larr]

The floating orbs in the cavern were indeed like stars. Some were close and some seemed far away. It was like walking through a holo-image of a map. Is that what the cavern was?

Kay looked down and noticed that she was walking on sand, illuminated by the glowing orbs. Her feet were bare, the grains of sand moving around her toes with each step.

And then it changed. The soft sand instantly became hard stone, cold to the touch. Looking around and turning full circle, she found herself staring at [member="Kei Raxis"] . Her breath caught in her throat for a moment. This time he didn't seem to disappear.

"Kei...where are you? How can I help you? You died..." Surely she must be dreaming. Yet her dreams were often so lifelike that she couldn't tell.

 

[GhostOfProtocol]

"I don't deny this"

He grinned softly.

He was burning through his energy, but he had enough to get the massage across while still throwing in some of that humour that made him who he was. He couldn't see Kay and in turn she couldn't see the true him, only what he wanted her to see. That's why he chose to appear to her as the Kei she knew, so that she knew it was him. It also had something to do with the fact his body was missing a head thanks to his murder.

"I was killed. I escaped my body using the darkside of the force but got caught in my own lightsaber crystal. I'm currently working on getting free but I nee..."

He went silent. Kay would lose any vision of him, he'd burned through his energy. He would have to wait until Kay fell back asleep tomorrow. He would need to use the next twenty four hours to rebuild and regain his strength and energy. He knew that it would take a while for him to get the message to Kay, he had waited this long and therefore he didn't mind waiting a month or so more. He had a rush to get back to a body, but he could wait a little more.

[member="Lady Kay"]

 

[Kay-Larr]

Kay smirked as [member="Kei Raxis"] made his little remark about being unable to deny being dead. Leave it to Kei to maintain his sense of humour even after his passing. It made her wonder if she'd be drinking imaginary tea if she was ever to become a Force ghost.

She raised a brow at what he had explained further. Escaped his body? Stuck in his lightsaber crystal? As far as she was aware, Adron had his lightsaber. Kay hadn't heard of anyone doing such a thing before. But that didn't mean that it never happened.

Before she could respond, Kei had disappeared, leaving her to be standing there alone briefly before waking up. "Oh gosh, Kei...if this is real..." She let her thought trail off.

Next night she drifted off to sleep, however it took a little longer than normal. She anticipated seeing Kei again, but wasn't so sure. This time her dream took her to her estate in the mountains where she found herself cooking, of all things.

 

[GhostOfProtocol]

He hated the moments of silence.

He understood that he needed the silence, the chance to rebuild his energy so that he could keep forcing his way into Kay's dreams. It was a time consuming process, using the force to talk in her mind to try and persuade her to enter hell to rescue him. Most people would just think they were insane, hearing voices in their head that told them to go to hell. Kei had to assume Kay was different, that she would understand he needed him.

He was almost happy when he felt their connection. She was asleep.

A kitchen this time. Kei assumed they were in the mountains, he'd always heard that Kay had an estate out there although he'd never been invited. He sure hoped Kay would rectify that someday, in the same way that he would get around to inviting her to his own on Corellia. His estate had a much more impressive kitchen, then again Kei assumed it was more modern that the estate of the Queen of Commenor, although he couldn't be sure.

Commenor, Corellia. They both sounded the same.

He appeared sat on the edge of the counter behind her, watching her dream cook. He wondered what the dream version of Kay would cook, probably something involving tea. Were tea cakes a thing? Tea soup? Tea on toast? Tea roasted bantha? Actually, Kei didn't mind the sound of the last one, tea roasted bantha just sounded like a good roast meat to serve at a large dinner party. If he had arms, he would have made a note.

"Hell. I'm in hell"

[member="Lady Kay"]

 

[Kay-Larr]

To the surprise of [member="Kei Raxis"] , she was indeed cooking a bantha steak; one of her favourite meats. It wasn't until a little later that the smells would kick in as she basted the steak with an assortment of butter and herbs. Oh for sure she was going to wake up hungry!

But in the meantime, she heard Kei's voice. At first she was quite surprised, having momentarily forgotten about everything except for the task at hand.

She turned from the stove and looked for him. "Hell? What are you doing there? And how am I supposed to help you? It's not as though I could take a shuttle..." As far as she knew anyways. Were there shuttles to hell? Kay wasn't entirely certain. But this was afterall....just a dream....

 

[GhostOfProtocol]

Of course she didn't know any entrances to the Netherworld.

That'd be too easy. Kei knew that, he almost expected it. Nothing could be that easy. He knew he had limited time, limited energy. He knew he wouldn't be able to appear to Kay again, he knew he had to make everything clear to her. He had other people to focus on, other people to get into the Netherworld to help him. Kei had only heard stories of what it was like, he wanted as much support as he could get, someone to guide him back to a gate.

"Netherworld, also known as hell. It's where I'll end up when I free myself from this lightsaber. Kay, I can't get out alone, I won't know the original path in. I've only heard specific stories, I don't know what it's like or where gates are located. I need you to do the background research and find a gate, send the co-ordinates to an Asaraa Vaashe with the Silver Jedi Order. You'll need to work together. Most importantly, do not loose track of the gate. Netherworld will tempt you, will twist you but you can't loose track of that door otherwise we won't get out again, I won't get out again"

And then he went silent. The connection was broken.

[member="Lady Kay"]

 

[Kay-Larr]

The Netherworld. Kay had heard about gates to such a place popping up in various places in the past. But she wasn't near any of them at the time. Surely there'd be some kind of record of their locations somewhere?

The words of [member="Kei Raxis"] warning her of the dangers of such a place filled her with dread. There was a chance that she could be stuck there? What about her people? Her family? A few of them had to be aware of what she was up to.

Just in case...

"Alright Kei...Alright." Oh he was going to owe her BIGTIME for this. But first, there was steak to be had. A yummy and delicious bantha steak cooked to perfection...mmmm