Three years and a lifetime ago

[Silfe Sosuri]

There was something to be said about being at home, in the comforts of one's own space in preparation of their new little life coming into the galaxy. But there too was a very real appeal in going now to Zeltros and spending months more time in bliss and out from under the thumb of her father. The kiss was enough to convince her. Honestly, just the idea of having more alone time with Pandeima was enough before they were both filled with the duties of being parents.

"Well," She said against her wife's lips. "There is always remote ways of designing the nursery and having it built while we are away." She laughed softly and submitted as always to her wife.

As she had suspected, her father had been furious though he had not shown it on their video conference call from Zeltros. He acted pleased that they would have more time together and promised that Cyrillia would miss them both. After the call was done however, he strangled one of his servants until she passed out, took advantage of her prone state and then left her there, a mess for someone else to clean up. He had to get control of this situation. Meanwhile his daughter was getting oiled up and doing that whore of a wife as though she were Silfe's entire world. That definitely had to stop. He began to research reputable Sith Assassins and began to plan. The baby would be here in a few months. Then a few more weeks for Silfe to recover before he taught her who the hell was in charge here.

 

[Onrai]

[member="Silfe Sosuri"]

Vanessa and Silfe were able to enjoy the time they had together over quite an extended period. They enjoyed oiled massages, rests in hot springs, and even the comforts of Hologram Fun World. But while they enjoyed their time together, Vanessa was scheming. She expected that this would be the final straw to Silfe's father - it was likely he was already planning on doing something about either Vanessa or Silfe herself when they returned. So it was that Vanessa would in her spare time get a lightsaber constructed, allowing her to be ready in the event that bad things occurred.

Assuredly they never would.

 

[Silfe Sosuri]

The baby was born after many hours of intense labor Silfe was only too happy too endure for Pandi and the life they were creating. They held tight to one another as waves of pain and exhaustive effort brought forth life. The moment Silfe held the pale green skinned baby in her arms, reassured that this was normal by Pandeima, she felt a surge of love. The little girl squirmed until she was placed on her chest and though as if she recognized her mothers voice, she relaxed and snuggled close. She cried and kissed her wife in utter joy. The baby, a tiny girl who they named Alraune, was healthy and took to his mother's breast for nourishment easily. After a few weeks, they went back home to Cyrillia to begin their life together as a family.

The nursery at home had been prepared in their absence. It was a fairly large room, connected to Silfe and Vanessa's master suite through a door. Two nanny's were on hand to assist, having been picked by Pandeima and Silfe themselves. Neither trusted her father's input. The nursery was filled with creams and softest pastels to be gentle on baby's brand new developing eyes. The crib was large and round. A bed was set up nearby with optional railings for if Mommy and baby sleep together. An incredibly comfortable overly stuffed rocking chair, big enough for the two mommies to be together with the baby simultaneously lay near the crib. Everything was soft surfaces, velvets and light lace. Natural light flooded in the massive floor to ceiling windows. When it was time for a nap, they could be covered with electronic descending shudders. Outside those doors were handpicked guards, just in case.

Her father, when they got home seemed overjoyed as they exited the ship, coming down the ramp with baby in Silfe's arms. He was smiling ear to ear and even Vanessa would not have detected any dubiousness within him. He just wanted his grandchild. Oh so carefully with Silfe's permission, he took the little bundle from her arms and cradled it in his own. "A little girl?" He frowned a bit but it was quickly gone. "Of course. The first of many. She shall rule the household like a queen no doubt."

[member="Vanessa Vantai"]

 

[Onrai]

“Certainly.” Vanessa responded positively, deliberately attempting to go with the facade despite circumstances. “When Silfe has recovered from birthing this first child, I will plant another in her - and another after that, until there are plenty of her offspring to manage Cyrillia.” Her move would be made soon, that was certain - her influence over Silfe was not absolute, and she did not want it to be, but it still very much did hold sway and she did not want the elder Sosuri to harm her.

“I’m sure that the two of you would perhaps like to talk some more?” She asked, looking at her wife for a moment, Eye twinkling - this would be the excuse she needed, when she knew he would harm her, to deal with him once and for all.

[member="Silfe Sosuri"]

 

[Silfe Sosuri]

The time, didn't come. Silfe smiled and left with her father and when she returned later that evening, she was all smiles and completely unharmed. Alecard had been cautious, only talking about how happy and proud he was. He had been nothing but the supportive father he should have been. Later that night, two more women went missing. Bodies wouldn't be found until years later, mutilated, violated, and left to the elements in some manufacturing facility used only by droids who couldn't tell the difference. There would be many bodies found that day... many.

At the six week mark, when Silfe had fully recovered and the baby was satisfactorily growing, he came to visit her. By this time, he had been seemingly serious about being a good grandfather and father to Silfe. He had said so many times in Vanessa's presence, expressing remorse and the hope that everyone could move past his old ways.

Silfe had taken to staying with the baby through the day while Pandeima worked on developing the embryo that would become their second child. She was laying in the rocking chair when her father came to visit. She smiled up at him but hushed him as the baby was sleeping in her arms. He smiled in return and whispered. "Where is Pandeima?"

"Oh she is in her Lab working on your second grandchild." she said and stood to put Alraune in her crib safe and sound.

"Well, I would like you to come spend some time with me. Let the nanny take the baby for the day." he suggested.

Silfe smiled warmly and nodded, sending a message to the nanny that she wished to go out. After her arrival, Silfe and Alecard left. The idea she got to spend time with her father, after he had been treating her so well, was a good one and Silfe had been flying high when she got on the ship. It was a surprise he said as they left home behind and Pandeima locked in her lab concentrating on important things....

And yet, he still did not raise his hand to his daughter. He held onto the remote but he did not use it. Instead, they toured some of his new manufacturing facilities and he told her of the plans he had. When they returned home 6 hours later, she was happy and refreshed and Pandeima would be left wondering just what Alecard was up to.

[member="Vanessa Vantai"]

 

[Onrai]

The change in Alecard's personality was quite queer. For a man of surprising cruelty to alter how he behaved so suddenly was extremely unusual. After Vanessa had completed the creation of the second Vinithi embryo - this one a boy to contrast with the girl Silfe had borne previously - she would get in touch with Silfe and Alecard, calling them in an attempt to inform her wife of the circumstances.

"I have good news. The second embryo is ready for implantation. I have made sure this one will be a boy." Indeed she had - after all, it was nice to have a family balance.

And if Alecard had hurt her...

[member="Silfe Sosuri"]

 

[Silfe Sosuri]

Silfe answered the call when Pandeima wanted to alert her of her success. She smiled wide and shared the news with her father who seemed so happy for her. A boy. A little baby boy. Silfe said goodbye to her father and left immediately to go home. She had enjoyed the last implantation process and expected this to be the same. Silfe greeted her wife overjoyed and unharmed. Alecard had not touched her at all. No bruises, no marks of any kind. It would be at least two days before Silfe allowed her wife to emerge from their bedroom save spending time with their baby who was still sleeping in small batches. She didn't care that she was tired. It was all worth it to let her wife know how happy she was.

Now Alecard continued to plan. Let the boy be born. Let Pandeima continue to see his "improvement". All would be satisfaction in the end. He would get them both back and then some and then his assassins would kill Pandeima and he would kill Silfe and the children would be his.


[member="Vanessa Vantai"]

 

[Onrai]

[member="Silfe Sosuri"]

When Vanessa implanted the new embryo in Silfe, she was certain beyond the shadow of a doubt that she would be invested in the lives of these children. They were precious creatures, each formed within the womb of the one Vanessa loved so much that she had married. She would embrace and love her wife greatly over the next several weeks, all the while placing some of her loyal ex-Imperial followers around the planet, conveniently near Alecard's holdings. When the moment was right, Alecard would be destroyed as a man and a governor. Vanessa would pillage all he possessed in order to gain the necessary resources. But over the time she spent with Silfe as the second child grew inside her, Vanessa greatly appreciated the normalcy she now had.

It was... peaceful.

 

[Silfe Sosuri]

Indeed it was peaceful. They were wrapped up in each other, ignoring most anyone else and while her father's anger grew about that, Silfe was oblivious. He acted as though it was never a problem. That he fully understood the honeymoon phase. He spent time with them together, apart, with the baby and without. No doubt he loved the little girl as she grew. Silfe, was completely a slave to being a mother.

She loved her little Alraune who she called Allie from time to time. She spent her days with her, helped her to learn to start talking and walking. She taught her hugs and snugs and mommy kisses. Her heart ached with how much she loved the baby. Her hands stroked her belly as it grew, knowing she would love this one just as much. She spent her nights with her wife. The pleased each other, they lived for each other. Pandi was just as attached as she was, Silfe was sure. No one could love and lust so intensely as they did. The first few months were harder on Silfe this time. Significantly harder, but she pressed on, insisted that she was fine and that she wanted this baby. The next few months were still hard, but not as much and she felt herself turn the corner to something better. She was uncomfortable far more than before. Her body was slower to heal from things. She didn't eat as much. She had fainted on several occasions for no reason that could be found. She slept restlessly unless Pandi had worn her out in bed beforehand. Something was troubling Pandeima's wife but even her wife didn't know or understand. And this pregnancy, though just as loved as it could ever be, had been so much more work.

When Silfe was 9 months pregnant, Alecard sent out word through some of his most trusted contacts to find a sith assassin... or two, or ten.

[member="Vanessa Vantai"]

 

[Onrai]

Vanessa had grown worried by the change in Silfe’s behavior. In contrast to how smooth and succulent the pregnancy she had initially was, this one seemed to leave her drained, hungry, and generally restless. It was bizarre - Vanessa focused on trying to keep her wife pacified, keeping her calm and relaxed so this birth would be as good as the other, but it was proving difficult.

Her planning, however, was not. Approximately half the crew of the Ablution, all loyalists to Vanessa and servants of nearly two decades of service under her in the Sith Empire and elsewhere, were positioned and living lives around Alecard’s own facilities. They waited for Vanessa to give them the message - then all he owned would be taken from him and become hers. Well, and Silfe’s too. She couldn’t leave her wife with nothing, after all.

[member="Silfe Sosuri"]

 

[Silfe Sosuri]

This time, Silfe felt too exhausted to go off planet for the birth. So when the baby came, it came in the facilities that Vanessa had made her lab. Silfe felt comfortable there as much as she had on Zeltros. As long as she had Pandeima, she was happy enough. Her wife had been such a source of comfort and love during the nearly 10 months gestation. Now as she cried out, pushing to get the baby out, the months of pain and sickness didn't matter. Pandeima had wrapped around her and was encouraging her with every push. After well over a day of labor, it was finally happening. As the baby came into the world, Silfe laughed and cried and just as she had with her first child, she held him to her breast with all the loving care a child could want.

The baby, a boy this time named Aspen, was another joy in her world. Her father had, during this time, been exactly what a loving and doting father and grandfather should be. He showered them with gifts, showed worry when Silfe had had difficulties with this pregnancy, took care of Alraune from time to time. When they brought home the baby boy, this time Silfe was not standing, but sitting in a hover chair and looking ill, he had been just as happy, maybe even happier.

Recovery this time took longer. Even after 6 weeks, she was not sure she was ready to have another pregnancy. What if it was going to be like the last? Would she be able to handle it? She confided in her wife that she would need more time to recover this time, but not too much longer surely. She wanted another baby. She wanted more laughter and love in her home. Truly her life had been so wonderful the first year of Alraune's life, it would just become more wonderful with more. So after 9 weeks instead of right after the baby was born, she asked her wife to begin work on the third child knowing that in the time it took for the embryo to be made, she would have recovered enough to have the third implanted.

Once again, her father decided to take her out on a celebratory trip. He smiled and waved to the babies as he took her on his ship and the nanny took them back to their nursery while their mother Pandeima worked in the lab. Only this time, Silfe did not come home happy or otherwise. Hours passed and night time fell on Cyrillia and no word from her wife came, no update on the trip, nothing.

From the nursery, a sound was made. The babies were fast asleep, having just gotten their bottles only an hour previous. It was a soft sound, like something hitting the floor. It could have been a toy but the nannies were both so good about not making a sound while the babies slept.

[member="Vanessa Vantai"]

 

[Onrai]

Vanessa had grown worried when Silfe did not respond to her messages. It was a horrifying thought, imagining what might have happened to her. But the sound in the laboratory as she was working on the third child - this one intended to be a true Sithspawn, an abomination of the mightiest and most lethal form - caused her to immediately bring the lightsaber to her hand. She remained quiet and focused, feeling through the building for any sort of sign of another individual's presence. Regardless, she still began to head towards the mursery, her feet not making even a single sound.

[member="Silfe Sosuri"]

 

[Silfe Sosuri]

A second sound much like the first followed. Both nannies lay sprawled across the soft carpet of the nursery, throats slit and blood everywhere. They were not to kill the babies, but the three Sith knew it would only be a matter of time before Vanessa came to investigate. Only one had remained in the nursery. The other two spread throughout suite quickly so that when she came running in, she would only have seen one of the three assassins sent to kill her.

Then before any of them could move, Silfe's scream, both there and not shattered over Pandeima as something broke, or maybe came to life within her wife a thousand miles away. The pain heard in that scream had only come once in her life, when Vanessa had broken her mind so the Sith woman would recognize the true agony being inflicted on her wife while she was in front of a Sith sent to kill her.

[member="Vanessa Vantai"]

 

[Onrai]

There was not much to say or do - Vanessa brought forth her lightsaber and swiftly sliced through the first assassin before he had the opportunity to get his knife in an aggressive posture. The other two assassins would attempt to intervene, but Vanessa soon slaughtered them as well. She would summon a nurse droid to come and take care of the children(and to clean up the mess) while she decapitated the fresh corpses, taking their heads and putting them in a bag. A message was sent to her loyalists - now was the time to take action.

Vanessa would get on board her ship and travel to the location she sensed Silfe in as quickly as she could, nearly melting down the speeder's engine as she hurried. When she arrived at the location, Vanessa would take the bag of severed heads with her, lightsaber in her hand and quite visible though disabled. She would force her way into the building, a rage built within her lithe frame that could barely be contained. In fact, she was unsure as to whether she had even felt this way regarding anything before.

One thing was certain. Alecard would not be coming back.

[member="Silfe Sosuri"]

 

[Silfe Sosuri]

Alecard and Silfe were deep in the manufacturing facility in a small chamber. They weren't alone. Two women lay on flat surfaces, probably dead or dying, bleeding and naked. Silfe was hung just as naked, from a chain. The chain itself was wrapped around her wrists and blood had fallen in trails down her arms and down her body. It was hard to tell what all had happened to her. Blood was everywhere and she was crying. Her mind was breaking, pain and pleasure from his remote doing enough damage on its own. And due to that damage and the now intense 16 hours of torture, that small part of her that still remembered the monster he was, that had nearly been wiped from her memory by Vanessa during her conditioning... it had begun to emerge slowly. Her father was laughing as he flayed another place on her hip where he had been concentrating for the last twenty minutes. it was slow and sharply painful. She didn't move so it would not be worse.... she had learned within minutes of leaving her home on Cyrillia, that movement made everything oh so much worse.

"You and that queen Sith will die today. Or rather... she will die and you will be my torture puppet until you die from exhaustion and exposure and pain. You deserve it after you have ignored me, placated her. SHE IS NOTHING." He shouted in her face, spittle showering her cheek. "I sent her to destroy your mind. YOU ARE MY PUPPET. MINE! You will always be mine. I will always have power over you and you will never be able to do anything about it because of what SHE DID. You think she loves you? Of course she doesn't. You were her experiment and no more important than anything in her lab." He gritted his teeth and stabbed her in the abdomen. Her scream came again, shrilly blaring up into the facility and lost to the world by the sounds of a droid plant.

[member="Vanessa Vantai"]

 

[Onrai]

[member="Silfe Sosuri"]

"I'm sorry, I could have sworn someone was slandering my good name." Vanessa said, voice echoing through the chamber. She had come in on an upper catwalk overlooking the floor of the chamber. Before Alecard would respond she would throw down the bag containing the assassins' heads, which rolled out of it and to his feet as Vanessa herself jumped down from the catwalk, rolling forward as she did so. "I must say, you were clever, if for but a moment. Kidnapping my wife. Torturing her while I was worried sick about her." She looked over at Silfe. "And then you had the audacity to try and send three amateurs to kill me. I've butchered thousands, Alecard. Directly, like I did to these men, and indirectly, like my men are doing to every last piece of infrastructure you own on this planet. All your servants will die before today is over. All your information, all your materials - they will be mine." She hit the button on her lightsaber, looking at Alecard with a sick smile.

"Get on your knees and beg if you want any chance of saving your worthless life. Now."

 

[Silfe Sosuri]

Alecard looked up sharply as he heard Vanessa's voice from above. Down tumbled the heads, landing in a splatter of their own blood before rolling towards him. The one thing that Alecard Sosuri was, was arrogant. He shrugged off the killing of his assassins as though it didn't matter. It did though and he felt the first real pangs of fear that he likely ever felt in his life. He was not stupid. He watched her as she came forward.

Silfe finally realized someone else was here when Vanessa landed near her and rolled to stand. She looked at her wife and then down at the floor, remembering what her father had been telling her for 16 hours. He had told her the whole truth about killing his mother, about raping and killing a multitude of women whenever something had not gone his way. It had been her fault that he had killed so many, as she had vexed him so. And he had told her the truth about Pandeima, how she had come and taken money to turn her own memories against her so that she would forever stay by his side but that all was ruined when she took SIlfe as her wife. He had no longer had her full attention and he had barely been able to enjoy having his daughter back before she was constantly away from him to be with her wife. He had hoped it would be different, but it had not been and he had been making her pay for more hours than she could count.

He growled at her, gnashing his teeth in anger as she told him of his business's fate. And for a moment, he considered attacking, but realized quickly how futile it would be. Darlyn had challenged him in much a similar way on Commenor and Alecard had been smart enough then to bow to him figuratively. He got on his knees here before Vanessa and begged despite his desire not to. He wanted to live and he would say and mean anything to enable his life to be spared. "I am sorry. I didn't realize. I made a mistake in thinking she was just an experiment to you. I see that now. Please spare me. I am begging you. Take what you want. I won't protest. I can be useful to you. I can always make more money and assist you."

[member="Vanessa Vantai"]

 

[Onrai]

“Don’t worry.” She said, placing a hand on the top of his head and patting it. How reassuring she was - before the blade came and took his head from his shoulders. She kept holding it and looking at him as the life would slowly drain. “I have much more resources available to me. I don’t need you, and definitely not after doing this. Goodbye, Alecard. It was a pleasure doing business with you.” She would then drop the head and kick it into the corner of the chamber where he would inevitably lose all awareness and die.

Vanessa would, after finishing talking to the beheaded Alecard, quickly move to cut her partner down with her lightsaber. As Silfe fell, she would end up in Vanessa’s arms, the woman’s casual clothing stained and smeared by the blood. Vanessa would hold Silfe close, gasping. “It’s okay, it’s okay...” She said. “We need to get you cleaned up.”

[member="Silfe Sosuri"]

 

[Amber]

Wrong account

 

[Silfe Sosuri]

Alecard didnt see anything coming. Somehow, even after knowing there was no way out of this, he still thought there had to be some escape so he believed that she would spare him if he made promises. He was wrong. When they found his body days later in the aftermath of bombings, hostile corporate takeovers and many of his associates dead, they found over 300 women's bodies left to rot in various places throughout the property.

Silfe watched her two faced Sith wife behead her father. He deserved it and there was no sorrow in her now as she watched it happen. She was cut down and caught by Pandeima. Even though she knew her happiness at seeing Pandi, of being held and reassured by her was false, she couldn't help but still feel reassured and she sobbed softly into her wife's shoulder. It wasnt the loss of her father or the pain from hours of torture that made her cry so. It was the true devastation of the knowledge she held. Her life would never be the same. Her children's lives would never be the same.

All the while, inside her mind, the brainwashing and scrubbing of her memories was reversing itself bit by bit.