Wings of Omens

[Xevek Nekonis]

Coruscant. Formerly the sprawling city planet had been the seat of the One Sith Empire's power, the superpower's thrown and its cradle. However, when the rot had begun to infest the One Sith, weakening and killing it from the inside out, Coruscant had fallen to the hands of the Galactic Alliance - a hypocritical group that proclaimed peace through conflict; peace was nothing more than stagnation while conflict was evolution, the two could not mix. However, despite the fact that it was no longer within Sith hands, that did not mean that Lykos found much difficulty infiltrating the supposed security of the Alliance. After all, in the depths of the city where shadows and a quick word and even quicker hand ruled over order and control, it was easy for one to blend in, find themselves hidden from notice of those that patrolled the upper levels.

The fact that it was so easy for him to find his way into obscurity upon the planet - a fact that was only helped by the fact that he did not require anything more than the Force to arrive planet-side let alone a ship that could be tracked - did not mean, however, that he was happy to be back on the planet. For him, an Iridonian, who had an already naturally sensitive sense of smell let along one that had been honed to as to be able to utilise it in tracking prey, the scents natural to the city planet, scents that worsened the deeper you dove, were foul and disgusting. Overwhelming in the presence, the pungent, ever present scent of sweat, grime, soot and something that could only be described as metal.

Only one had been able to call Lykos back to the foul planet and that had been duty. For, above being Darth Lykos, he was the White Assassin and Aspect of Conquest. Such titles were titles awarded to him due to his position of authority within the Sith Assassins and, one day, they would be awarded to another, but, for the Iridonian, they were more than titles. For him, they were purpose and life in equal measure. He was Oblivion and Conquest, a Shadow for the rest of the Galaxy only to glance at. And, even within that glace, it would be uncertain as to whether or not they were seeing the truth of him. And that was how he liked it.

So, when his duties as an Assassin had required him to come to Coruscant, he came to Coruscant. When his duties required him to eliminate a group of thugs who had, by pure chance, stumbled across a Sith artifact left over from the Sith's time on the planet, so as to ensure that the secret of the Artifact did not reach the Alliance despite the bragging of the thugs, then he left behind slowly cooling bodies. Such was the Lykos' life; an agent of Nath.

However, despite his duties as an Assassin, that did not mean that Lykos never needed to rest. Compounding the fact was that his ability to see into the Force to compensate for the loss of his right eye and the strain it was placing upon his left eye could not be kept up continuously. As such, these two facts meant that, his hands - one cybernetic, the other flesh and blood - wrapped around the handle of a self-carved wooden cane concealing a hidden blade, Lykos slowly made his way through the crowds of one of the more middle levels to a bar he recalled from his time stations on Coruscant as an Acolyte. Dressed in simple clothes, it was only the malicious gleam of his amber hued left eye, the wrappings covering the right side of his face and the cane he held, that caused him to stand out from the crows. But, even then, his skills at disappearing from sight meant that the unfocused eye would skip over him despite his oddities.

But, despite the fact he was taking the time to rest did not mean that he forgot the fact he was, technically, within enemy territory. Quey'tek Meditation and Force Stealth, along with a small inclusion of Art of the Small, had been a part of the Iridonian's morning ritual for years, their effects constantly renewed every day so as to leave himself with the smallest and most obscured Presence within the Force as he could accomplish.

It was by pure chance that, as Lykos settled himself into one of the chairs lining the back wall of the bar - "The Halfway Retreat" - that he had chosen to peer through the Force to search for any potential threats. As such, it was by pure chance that he gleamed a soul that was marked in a way that roused his fascination. Wounded and not whole, the soul rested within a female whom the Dark clung to. But, most fascinating to him, was the tethered bond that seemed to leech upon the remnants of the soul, a bond that stunk of the scent of a wonder that he had found himself studying with fascination in recent times. The Netherworld.

Reaching out, Lykos brushed a tendril of his Presence across the woman's mind, enough to draw her attention and nothing more and awaited her response; amber gaze locked upon her.



[member="Irajah Ven"]

 

[Kuzo]

Irajah liked to wander. She liked old familiar favorites as much as she liked new experiences. The Halfway Retreat wasn't particularly close to her labs, but the places that were, well, she wasn't entirely certain she trusted them. With [member="Carach"] busy that evening, stopping for dinner between work and home was simply a given, and this was on her slowly shrinking list of 'new' spots she hadn't yet tried.

Perched on a stool at the bar, she'd ordered absently, as always the local 'special'. Her attention was on the data pad in her hands and the files that had been uploaded to her from that day's clinic patients. The fact that most of the Sou Clinic's doctors had no idea the records were going elsewhere, well, she planned on taking good care of the information. Not every patient file made it's way to her pad of course. That would be ridiculous and time consuming.

No. She only really cared about how they had marked off the box about 'Next of Kin.'

With one elbow propped on the bar, chin cupped in hand, the petite woman wasn't paying the most attention to the goings ons around her. While she'd left her lab coat behind, she was dressed in navy slacks, fitted white button up- and a tie she'd stolen from Carach's side of the closet. Long dark hair hung in waves down her back, hazel eyes focused and brow furrowed slightly as she pulled the newly topped off cup of caf toward her-

And then she froze, mug halfway to lips. She went from a not particularly noteworthy, probably workaholic on her way home from the office to the stillness of a coiled snake in a heartbeat.

Slowly, deliberately, she placed the datapad on the counter, her fingertips lightly on the screen and turning it off. Caf was set, just as carefully down. Only then did she look up, scanning the room with an air of casualness that in no way resembled her actual feeling on the matter. It wasn't until she caught his gaze, hazel meeting amber, did some of that relax.

Wariness still, yes, but also a quirk of eyebrow. Oddly, the fact that she did not recognize him was far less fraught than if she had. This, then, the brush across her mind, was no more rude than a stranger plucking at her sleeve on the tram. Well, slightly more personal. She took in his appearance, the bandages, the cane....

And came to a very different conclusion as to what he wanted than what his actual intention was.

Tucking the data pad under one arm and retrieving her caf, she slid off of the barstool. Threading through the slowly filling bar, she paused not far from him, considering him without reservation, the frank evaluation on her face clear.

"You know I have office hours," she finally said. "But I don't usually take walk ins."

It was not immediately clear if she was joking or not.

[member="Darth Lykos"]

 

[Xevek Nekonis]

The blatant and completely frank evaluation of him was written easily along the curves and lines of her features, absolutely no attempt to hide it being made at all. However, rather than choosing to take any offence from this, Lykos instead chose to only raise a brow in curiosity; even then he saw no need to actually express and emotion, leaving his face emotionless and stoic. However, the emotionless that grasped him shattered, purposefully, as the woman's words pierced through the background murmurs of the other patrons. A sly smirk pulled at scarred lips, twisting the mass of scares that wove their way along his features and deepening the shadows that lived within the grooves left behind by old wounds.

How refreshingly amusing this situation was. How could he do anything but chuckle? The woman, a Doctor, felt someone brush against her mind in the middle of a bar filled with smoke and sweat scented air and the stench of stale alcohol and rather than choosing to take such actions as a threat, as grandstanding, she, instead, chose to see it as a cry for help by someone seeking to circumvent office hours. Of course, even then that required her not to be joking, a fact that Lykos could not tell immediately; something else that served to only make the whole situation all the more amusing for him. How long had it been since he had met someone new whom he couldn't read with ease and little to no effort? How long had it been since he met someone new who could occlude their emotions of intent? Yes, he was being fooled on whether or not the woman was joking, but, a mundane as that might be, the fact that he could not read the truth behind her words was a novel experience.

With his smirk still present on his lips - the harsh, rumbling growl of a sound that were his chuckles fading away - Lykos gestured for the woman to take one of the empty seats at his table. As he did so, he chose to reach outwards with his mind so as twist the thoughts of the bartender with an unnatural ease, making no efforts to hide his actions from the woman and only her.

"I assure you my dear, while pain is present and my wounds are many, I have no need for medical attention. I wear these wounds as lessons, badges of my failures and encouragement for my successes. I feel no shame in them."

As he finished speaking, a service droid came to a stop at the side of the table and set down a bottle and two glass tumblers before turning and retreating back behind the bar. Taking the bottle into hand, ignoring the sound of metal on glass as the hand he had chosen to use was his cybernetic hand, Lykos poured a small amount of the amber liquid into one of the tumblers before setting the bottle down and swiping up the tumbler. The woman would watch as his silence resumed as he went about slowly swirling the drink around the glass, stopping after a few seconds to take a quick sniff of the drink - lips curling in distaste - before he took a sip and set the glass back down.

"Swill compared to what I prefer, but, it is what it is I guess. A shame, really. But, then again, do feel free to help yourself, m'dear." He nodded towards the remaining tumbler and the bottle. "Now, might I ask the name of the one who, if you will permit it so, will be providing a pained man with company this evening?"


[member="Irajah Ven"]

 

[Kuzo]

"Call me 'dear' again and I'll tear out your throat with my teeth."

She laughed, smiling brilliantly. But there was a certain glint in those hazel eyes. She wasn't joking in the slightest.

Of course, she was more inclined to cut with care and precision, careful in her work, but that didn't make the same thing clear. His assumptions of kind Doctor were very, very inaccurate, after all.

"And don't mistake my curiosity for offer of company."

So far, she wasn't particularly impressed. When someone exhibited traits as condescending as this in the first interaction, she had rarely found reason to get to know them better, after all. Overly familiar pet names, the comment about the drink as though it mattered that she knew he was accustomed to better, but most importantly the need to explain his situation to a stranger all offered an image of a man who needed to prove something, rather than of one who knew himself and accepted it to his core. By telling her these things, he showed that he felt, whether consciously or otherwise, that he had something to prove.

Whether that was true or not didn't particularly matter to Raj. But in her experience those traits usually panned out the same.

She didn't sit, certainly didn't pour herself a drink. But she stood with the casual friendliness of someone with nothing to prove, because what he thought of her?

Meant less than nothing.

"But if the reason you went wading into the shallows is interesting, then," she smiled again, a little more teeth than necessary in that expression. "Well, then perhaps I'll join you."

[member="Darth Lykos"]

 

[Xevek Nekonis]

Masks and personas might as well be Lykos' trade, interchangeable voices and attitudes dropping in and out of reality as easily as smoke could curl across a canvas. No one, beyond his former Master, had truly seen the true person beneath it all and, even then, Ophidia had not been able to glimpse the being that was the true Lykos - The Unseen Shadow that was Xavka Duquo-Rakama. To the galaxy as a whole, he had been lost a long time ago, consumed beneath the storm of Darkness that had ravaged the young Iridonian, dragging him first through the trials of slavery and then the trials of the Sith. However, the truth was not that. With so many masks being recycled, employed and created it was important that he remember who he truly was, that Lykos know completely and utterly what lay beneath all the lies and spun tales. It was important that he be honest with himself even if every word that dropped from his lips had the potential to be a lie more than the truth.

It was that self-directed honestly that lead Lykos to recognising the fiery glint that had flared to life within seas of hazel. A ruthlessness that burnt so strongly and fiercely, a rage of self-assured confidence that did not border on arrogance. A ruthlessness that spoke of darkness that coiled within hidden hearts, concealed away beneath a mask of normality, a mask of norms that existed within the general public only. It was his self-directed honesty that lead to him acknowledging that that rage and spark of darkness stirred a sense of attraction in him, a small ember smoldering into existence in the regulated, icy fury of his hearts. However, just as much as the sun would shine upon a rock and have no effect upon the rock, the smoldering ember had no effect on his stone hearts.

Honestly and self-knowledge dictated that he acknowledge that spark of attraction. But, control born of frozen chaos dictated that such a spark could not continue to smolder, the ember lessening and dimming until it existed as nothing more than a speck upon a canvas. Near indistinguishable from the coiling mass of tempered ferality that stirred within him. Of course, such a tale was a lie, but it was a lie that he knew of and purposefully crafted with the intent of confrontation during meditation, during the time that he distanced himself from the knowledge of the physical. A lie that was not truly a lie. A lie born of the necessity of hiding the truth of himself.

None of what had transpired between one beat of his hearts and the next reflected on his face, the self-imposed freezing on that ember, as his thoughts had span and ran in organised chaos. Instead, his features had slowly slackened from the smirk that he had worn to a near emotionless face. The curved smugness that had shadowed the contours of his face evaporated into nothing, a sense of stoic seriousness taking its place instead as he bowed his head slightly; a form of recognition of her words - spoken and unspoken.

"I see no name was offered" Meaningless words spoken because the masses seemed to believe that the spoken word was required. Words spoken because it was dictated by the norms that they must be. But, words that were spoken without care. A habit pursued for the simple fact that it made things easier, not because it broadened interaction. "I am known as Blaidd." A false name to accompany false politeness and personality, but, a false name that was indicated as such by the twitch of the corners of his lips. But, also, a false name given with a truth. He was, after all, known as Blaidd to some.

It was unusually, Lykos had to admit, that he ever saw potential in other, enough that he was willing to shed a few layers of falsities and speak with a voice closer to his own than many others got to hear.

Silence would fall upon the Iridonian once more, however, there was no twitch among his features or fidgeting of his body. Silence, for Lykos, was his home and he saw no reason to experience discomfort among where he spent his hours. Throughout it, his eye was fixed towards the woman. Never staring or blinking too much, but, instead, looking as if he was seeing beyond her to something out of view. But, eventually, the silence would be broken. After all, so many others found it uncomfortable to sit within the welcome embrace of thought and silence even if Lykos himself did not. "What would you have me say? What tale would you have me weave?" This time, no seat was offered. If she chose to leave, then so be it. His amusement among the general public would have to be found elsewhere. "Or, perhaps, the question that must be asked: Do you wish to hear a lie or a truth?"

The drink he had obtained lay ignored and forgotten, the persona that had wished to possess it gone and forgotten. This woman did, after all, intrigue him enough that he was willing to drop a few layers of masks.


[member="Irajah Ven"]