Consolidation Litanies of the Dark Side: Heralds of Ruin

[Eosfor]

The burned hacks on his armour bled electricity, as the torn cybernetic intestines cried out leaking energy from its already stressed systems beneath. The wounds, though, regardless of the pain caused, the mindless fury far too overwhelming to allow the Dark Lord acknowledgement of the damage suffered. And yet, regardless the many wounds delivered, the Dark Lord couldn't bring himself to slay the Jedi, for her determination had marked him as deep as the wounds her lightsaber did. Her skill was no rarity. Yet, her valor, was...

"You are a flame, young one."

The twisted growl of the Dark Lord sounded with a mechanical undertone, disturbed by the malfunctioning voice chip, due to a mark by Roshia's lightsaber in the upper throat of the Dark Lord.

"The Dark Side consumes you. Kills the air around you..."

As his almost repetitive choreography of motions, maintaining his defensive stance, continued, he searched for an opening in her strikes. A fault of fatigue, or exhaustion, that would allow him to reach out and twist the Force around her to squeeze her trachea shut.

"Fire cannot live without air... It will be swallowed in the dark, until only embers remain..."

His unstable blade suddenly bursted in action. His once defensive Makashi stance rapidly changing, as the Dark Lord finally went to the offensive. The trial was over.

One after the other, the successive strikes descended upon the Jedi, roaring in wrath and plasma. He would now see the Jedi fall. He would see the fire starved... into submission.

 

[Roshia Chamiane]

There were moments where Roshia thought she had come so close to victory, the few times she'd managed to pierce his body with lightsaber, or the one strike against his throat that ruined the breathing apparatus attached to his mask, so infuriatingly close, a few inches closer and she would have taken his head from his shoulders.

His words fell on deaf ears, she did not acknowledge them or respond to them, remaining solely focused on their duel. Unwavering focus even through her body's escalating fatigue. When the Dark Lord finally switched to more offensive, hard hitting attacks, Roshia was forced to move fully defensively, becoming focused on keeping herself defended from the barrage of attacks.

Eventually, she faltered.

One powerful downward strike broken through Roshia's attempted block. She instinctively moved back, but had been too sluggish to completely dodge the attack. It left a deep laceration from her left shoulder slanting down to the right side of her upper torso. A severe wound, had she been any closer, it would have sliced her in half and killed her instantly.

Roshia stumbled back away from him, dropping the lightsaber she held on her left hand. All she felt was searing pain and a coldness washing over her body. She did not dare look down to see the extent of her wound, her gaze was on the lightsaber she had dropped. Roshia stumbled on her, yet refused to fall on her knees even as she slowly lost all of her strength and still gripped her shoto-lightsaber tightly, even if she knew it was the end.

She looked up at the Dark Lord, the fight and valor in her eyes still apparent even as her lips paled and vision blurred. Roshia could continue her futile attempts at fighting, or wait for him to land the killing blow. She did not want to give him that satisfaction, she could not defeat him or his army, he had won the battle on Kerideph, and slaughtered hundreds of her fellow jedi.

But, there was one thing she could deny him of.

Roshia raised her shoto-lightsaber and plunged the blue glowing blade into her body and tore it out soon after. Lips curling into one last smirk at him, as she landed the final blow on herself.

At least, that is what Roshia thought as she finally collapsed back on the ground, gazing up at the grayed skies as she teethered on the edge of consciousness.

 

[Eosfor]

The Dark Lord's mask had cracked open, with the lower parts covering what should have been the space of his jaw fallen off, the edges still fiery by the bite of the lightsaber. Thin tubes and cables hanged like foul beards, spilling out like intestines from where the jawline should have been. Sparks of electricity blazed momentarily in the hollows of the Dark Lord's cybernetic trachea, revealing he extend of the augmentations and life support's latching upon the rotting corpse that refused to pass into Chaos...

His thirsting blade blazing still, unstable, screeching in satisfaction after claiming her poud of flesh. Blood drops marked the ground. The Dark Lord approached, silencing his saberstaff, as his claw reached out to the Jedi.

"There is no peace, for the Wicked..." his voice now a cacophony of desynchronized mechanical noises, as the damaged system refused to cooperate after the lightsaber's hack. And yet, like poison in a milk's pot, his voice washed the Jedi with a freezing sensation.

He did not act, as the Jedi disemboweled herself, in a final act of defiance against his will. An image that struck more pain to the Dark Lord than the physical strikes received by the Jedi's saber. She had power. She had will. And she gave it all away... Away to embrace Death. And yet... He had plans for her still.

"There is no Death, after the End... Only Madness.... Only Regret."

Beep... Beep... Beep...

The console's sound barely covered the chorus of malfunctioning oxygen release tanks and sparking cables hanging from the maze of the chamber's ceilings. Dim white light illuminated the bay, originating from the blinding surgical tables that dripped of gore and discarded organs. The pulp splatching of the boots hinted to the age of the stale black substance on the deck, source of the abominable stench that burned the nostrils.

Cries of pain occasionally shook the foul laboratory, as victims of the bleak cybernetic engineering performed regained their conciousness. Specimens deprived of any painkillers or paralysis drugs to reduce the horrific sensation of the fusing machine with the bleeding flesh. There could be none such, for the Sith masters of the nightmarish ship revelled to the pain caused. The maddened scientists who operated these nightmarish laboratories? They had long forgotten what pain truly was...

As oxygen invaded her lungs by the flexible tubes dressed in metal that ran into her mouth, the latching flesh protested to the Cortosis elements planted into her, embracing the bone beneath recklessly stretched muscle tissue, before the wounds were stitched by the arachnid droids, auxiliaries to the wicked specialists performing the operations.

"There is no Death, after the End..."

The Dark Lord's voice reverberated in the thin fabric of the Force, torn by the oppressive darkness that birthed within the durasteel halls of the damned warship.

 

[Roshia Chamiane]

When she closed her eyes as she succumbed to death, Roshia never expected to open them again. Yet, she did. All she could see were the hanging cables of the durasteel ceiling. The sound of the beeping console filled her ears, it was steadily increasing in pace. She was utterly confused and disoriented, her vision still fuzzy.

It was not long before she was spurred into full alertness as she felt herself wrack with the most horrid pain she had ever felt in her life. Incomparable to even the slash and stabbing. She could not raise her head to see what was exactly being done, but her eyes could observe the moving hands and mechanical limbs working on her. Burnt flesh and bone being cut away, insides being moved around, Roshia felt it all.

She could not breathe. At least, that's what it felt like with a metal lined tube down her windpipe, and she could feel lungs rise and fall at a steady pace, just not by her control. Her throat hurt, extremely so, and she choked as if asphyxiating from the harsh, foreign object forced down her windpipe in a vain attempt to try and remove it.

She thrashed against her restraints, her fingers digging against the metal table she rested on, wrists bruising from her attempts. She could not scream at them to stop. There was nothing she could do as pain overwhelmed her.

Fear and desperation filled every fiber of her being, wordlessly begging her captives to stop in her futile attempts to speak, tears flowing down from her eyes. Sobbing, pleading, and struggling.

Eventually, her fear, desperation, was joined by *rage*.

It was by pure instinct in an attempt to stop the unbridled suffering being inflicted on her rather than a calculated move. One of the specialists working on her was thrown back across the room and slammed hard against the nearest wall or immovable object to stop their momentum. The others were at risk of the same fate or worse if they didn't act in time.

 

[Dreadheart]

Error, Error, Error

The maintenance-deprived medical droid screeched, limbing towards the bleeding man who's hand motions, a vain attempt to remove his body from the long metalic pipe impaling it, grew slower and slower by the moment, until finally, his muscles gave in and collapsed, leaving the body hanging from the wall, held only by the long twisted rod who spat oxygen uncontrollably, bubbling the blood dripping from the gaping wound, causing it to splatter around the site.

Terminal blood loss. Chances of survival, minuscule.

The droid turned and started limbing towards the restrained Jedi.

A long needle emerged right over the Jedi's eyes. A greenish-transluscent substance barely dripping from its hollow edge, while the syringe led to a synthetic gloved hand.

"This is essence from Ysalamiri lizards." The voice belonged to an almost completely bold scientist, who's face was covered by a respirator that discharged his artificial breaths in steam spraying out of the lower folds of the mechanism. "I inject that in your system, given your weight and biocomposition, your midichlorians will fall silent for eighty-seven hours. More than enough for you to die on this ship."
His speech was distorted. His skin pale, looking every bit of his long overextended lifetime, evidence of the exposure to the Dark Side's corruptive touch and foul cybernetic engineering. His bionic eye turning and twisting, recalibrating as he focused on her's.

"Who you were is already dead. All who walk on this ship, are already dead. The more you resist, the more you die here. And you have already done so once..."

With a calm motion, the scientist grabbed the tubes that provided her lungs with the life support and readjusted them, pulling one of them out.

"You were witnessed. Feel lucky about it. If your brain explains unforseen events through the fallacy of invisible guiding element to excuse the lack of critical thinking and forseeing major events, that is... I estimate you do."

 

[Roshia Chamiane]

The fate of the unfortunate soul she had tossed across the room was of no consequence to her. Roshia hadn't even realized what she had done. Her mind was still overwhelmed by the nigh incomprehensible pain that radiated from her chest and left shoulder.

Her anger, fear, and despair were fueled by the slow realization of events finally dawning on her. One way or another, she had survived. No, *forced* to live at the Dark Lord's own leisure and now forced to suffer in his captivity. Regret washed over her that she had not landed the last blow on herself properly. Grief and despair over now being forced to live a life of suffering, as some mindless sith minion, forced to kill the jedi she considered the closest thing to a family.

The storm of emotions she felt was as intense as the physical suffering being inflicted upon her.

But *anger* trumped all others.

*There was nothing else she could lose.*

She met the scientist's gaze above her, with great intensity rather than confusion or fear one might expect, even when they were puffy and full of tears. Her hands and legs continued to pull hard against their restraints, and her entire body was tense. Her pulse was concerningly high, judging from the console's rapid beeping since she had regained consciousness.

Having *someone* speak with her directly did help in her focusing on something else, at least for a brief time. Though his words only served to confuse her further. It made her wonder how long she had been on the table and the extent of what was being done to her.

She winced at the readjustment removal of one tube from her mouth. Roshia didn't feel a difference after, at least not initially. She tried to speak, but to no avail, and the attempt only triggered another choking fit. Still unaccustomed to the foreign object down her windpipe and the lack of control over her own breathing.

All she could do was stare up at him, unable to communicate back. Her eyes briefly moved on the needle he held in his hand. The threat of being injected with the substance, it would kill her, he said, within hours as it would temporarily disable her connection to the force.

She did not care...

Her right hand clenched into a fist, and the scientist felt his throat tighten hard. Roshia exerted her will to grip his next through force telekinesis. A move that was very much forbidden by the Jedi Order, but with her emotions and the pain running high, there was little else she could think about.

 

[Dreadheart]

The scientist bent his head to the side, grasping his throat with his one hand, as he tried to draw breath from his pressed windpipe. He made few inconsistent noises, stepping back as if making distance between him and the restrained specimen would somehow reduce the effect of her will upon him. The syrinx fell on the surgical table, not far from the Jedi's body.

The medical droid nearby deviated from its course originally somewhere beyond the Jedi's line of sight, appearing next to her instead. Its mechanical tendrils reaching out to pick the syrinx.

"Specimen 4-2-6, unstable. Protocol Red, Activated."

Its metallic hand placed against the Jedi's face, blocking her vision as it did.

"No!" the scientist gasped for air as a freezing sensation suddenly spreading from the site of the intravenous catheter on her arm, as if liquid frost devoured her blood stream in a rampant progression. With each passing moment, the sensation decaying to a numb, as if the very veins turned swollen.
The droid's hand was pushed away, while the choking scientist coughed beyond the line of sight of the Jedi, each time the discharges of the life support in his respirator screeching, struggling to provide oxygen to his narrowed windpipe.

The empty syrinx finally revealed, held by the droid's mechanical hand.

"Specimen 4-2-6, stabilizing. Protocol Yellow. Operation Pending."

 

[Roshia Chamiane]

It did not long before the force around the scientist's throat loosened, as Roshia actively felt the serum rapidly spread throughout her arm with a sensation that she could only describe as the blood in her arms turning into pure ice. Her eyes filled with pure panic as she realized she could no longer use the force, at least not through that limb anymore. Turning her head to look down what had been done to her arm, It looked entirely fine, well, as fine as it could be in her circumstances.

Now, her only way to interact with her surroundings was disabled, at least in Roshia's mind. It only worsened the feeling of fear, anxiety, and helplessness washing over her, like the same chill she had felt when she perished on the surface Karideph. A deep feeling of regret rising in her chest as a result of her recklessness. Her head felt light and her vision swam, which, may stem more from her increasingly stressed state than the Yslamari essence flowing through her veins.

Still, she pulled against her restraints, but visibly weakened from before.

 

[Dreadheart]

"You worthless bucket!" the scientist barked. His respirator screeching from pressure, causing a mechanical distortion in his voice. Strangely, he did not cough when the Force pressure vanished from his throat, instead, a metallic "clicking" noise sounded from his trachea. The scientist pushed the droid away, pointing his gloved hand towards the nearby console.

"Track the flow! Track it damn you!" he demanded.

He picked a pair of clamps and pressed against the woman's chest.

"Specimen 4-2-6, stable. Protocol Green. Midichlorian passification 56%. Calculating..." the droid reported.

"You stand still now." The scientist intoned. His attention fully commited on the operation performed below the woman's ribs. A spark illuminated the area, as he worked the clamps against the body.

"Specimen 4-2-6, stable. Pressure, normal. Adaptation to modification, in progress."

"Have the bacta ready. 3 on 5s, 3-fold mixture."

"Status, full. No available tank."

The scientist halted his work. His bionic eye turning to meet the Jedi's. A moment passed in which his mind spinned like a well-lubricated machine of which the cogs ran on pure will. He did not require to observe any screen or graph to read her vitals. Whether by sheer experience, or obsession, he could calculate with significant accuracy her blood pressury by recognizing the pumping of her veins, beneath her skin that he considered almost transparent. He could tell the magnitude of shock and the release of adrenaline and glucocorticoids, catecholamines, and vasopressin, by sensing the emissions, invisible to the naked unmodified eye, from through the scarred parts of her skin.

She was in need of healing. Soon, she would collapse yet again, risking to cause additional damage to her brain. Given the particular situation, he could not afford to fail the operation.

"Kill No.7."

 

[Roshia Chamiane]

There were no words for Roshia to articulate to sheer terror and helplessness she felt. Unable to speak, move, breathe on her own, and not without her force abilities. Completely and utterly trapped at the mercy of her captors. Whatever anger she felt earlier was replaced entirely by a feeling of utter terror that was as overwhelming as the pain she felt.

She did not know what they were even doing to her at all or why. All she could still see were the movements of their hands and the tools they used. Even if she wanted to see, which she was terrified to do so, Roshia lacked the strength to raise her head to look anyway. She met the scientist's gaze again, silently pleading to him with tear-filled eyes that no doubt meant absolutely nothing to him.

Not too long later, Roshia's vision faded into darkness as unconsciousness took hold of her once more.

 

[Empor]

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The cold sensation by the embrace of the Bacta created an unreal feeling of levitation inside the tank. The exposed skin pierced by a million unseen needles, strangely enough providing a near-inexplicable break from the otherwise nightmarish environment the Jedi found herself trapped in. By the serenity of the narrow moment, with the vibrations caused by the vessel's engines the only thing to disturb the otherwise peace.

Peace...

There was no peace... Any and all the Dark Crusade touched were permenantly tainted by corruption so foul and dark, it was a matter of time before any past memory was twisted into blind hate or replaced by durasteel. Any sense and reason once possessed, soon to become wires and cables that fed the ever-thirsting machine of war, in the service of the Dark Lords that held the reins of the Crusade's hordes...

Each breath drawn caused the life support respirator attached on the Jedi's face to latch against her face. Her trachea released from the pain and weight of the primitive systems that once forced life back into her. Her chest heavy, weighted by something buried within, past the scars and stitches that now became feast for the Bacta surrounding her, having healed almost entirely by the passing of time.

Time...

Another term that had lost any meaning. The very idea of how long it would have taken for such wounds to heal hinted to the time spent onboard, trapped in malfunctioning life support and drowned in the Bacta Tank until her body could serve then the will of the Dark Lord.

In the thin thread, between echoes, vague and indistinguishable, by the passing scientists and creatures that dwelt onboard the foul warship, whispers far more sinister reached out to her, singing words of Death. Her heart fatigued by the shocks and treatments, forcing her into slaving the Jedi alife again and again.

There is no Death... There is the Force.​

Wings flapped, causing a wind in the Force, enough to caress her face, though nothing manifested enough to be even remotely realistic. There was Darkness. Scent of Death and decay, carried by the flow of water flowing down an invisible stream. Each splash another chorus of cries, from beings unknown and inconceivable, lost beneath the mist that shrouded the black bogs.

All is Fear. All is Death.​

The sinister whispers echoing in the cosmic wind. A sudden thunder of the life support's shock cracked the black void, as if promising a nonexistent sky beyond.

 

[Roshia Chamiane]

The bacta tank was a much wanted, much need respite from the nightmare she had endured. Finally, free from the incomprehensible pain being inflicted upon her. Even without the standard sedatives issued to those being placed within bacta, she offered no resistance nor felt discomfort. It offered the peace she wanted, needed even, luring her into a dream life state that she feared to see end.

Yet, that peace was short-lived.

Roshia could feel it at the back of her mind, as her midicholorians gradually returned to normal. The taint of the dark side all around as if it were crushing her very being. Something in her chest felt heavy, unnatural, and out of place. She wanted it gone but could do nothing against it.

Time meant nothing to her anymore. She hardly had the urge to leave the tank, preferring it to whatever awaited outside.

There were moments where she felt herself slipping away, or she thought she was. Where she felt breathing slow and heart fall quieter. She did not resist it, yet *something* kept pulling her back. Denying her that fate again and again, no matter how she tired of her forced survival.

Every time she did, she felt the presence of someone or something. Dark and sinister, uttering words of death that she had so terribly yearned for then.

The more it persisted, the more she tethered on the edge over and over again, the more her fear of it grew. Whatever it was, she turned away from it, pulling herself back away the edge, away from it.

And her desire for death faded. Replaced by the raw, primal instinc to *survive*.

 

[Hazdrabal the Cannibal]

The whirl caused by the draining of the bacta liquid beneath finally washed the woman's face with the dim light that usurped every corner of the deck around her. Narrow, and low ceiling, the chamber was laid with several bacta tanks, most of which hosted yet another poor soul tha was refused Death in the nightmarish realm of the Sith warship.

The restraints around her wrists, now pale without the old bruises to remind her past torment, or perhaps clear the canvas for the one yet to come. As the Bacta tank emptied, a gear lowered, while hunched ill-maintained droids resembling arachnids climbed up the top, openning the hatch that sealed the woman from the outside artificial atmosphere and attached the gear's hooks to the metallic socket on which the restraints were fixed on.

Before the tank, the menacing figure of Hazdrabal was there to greet the poor soul back to the living... Or worse, back to the Ship. His bionic limbs tapping on the chain he used as belt around his waists. Several lightsaber hilts hung from it, some still marked with the black gore of their past Jedi owners, now trophies for the Marauder Warlord. His cybernetic crimson eyes fixed on the woman, as she was pulled out the tank, and lowered before him. The droids crawling once again behind the shadows from whence they came.

Hazdrabal's metallic claw reached to the respirator, plucking it from the woman's face to let her breathe the foul artificial air, recycled countless times through the ill-maintained life support of the warship.

 

[Roshia Chamiane]

The strange dreamlike state she had been in within the bacta tank came to an end once she was abruptly pulled out of the tank. Roshia was forcibly stirred into full consciousness as she was unceremoniously dropped onto the ground, falling onto her knees. She felt like a fish out of water, in an almost literal sense.

Whatever strength and vitality she had before was gone. She felt slow and sluggish, her blurry vision was slow to clear and the lights stung, and the air felt oppressively cold on her bare skin. Roshia was quite pale even before the unfortunate events unfolded, owing to her species's natural complexion, but she took on a more sickly, unnatural paleness after it all.

Once the respirator was pulled off from her face, Roshia struggled to take a full breath. Not just due to the foulness of the air, but the heavy feeling on the left side of her chest. For a short while, she only took shallow, wheezing pants before forcing herself to take deeper breaths. It was a conscious effort to breathe in and harder to breathe out, and there was a feeling of odd uneveness every time she forced herself to take deeper breaths. Roshia couldn't understand why.

 

[Hazdrabal the Cannibal]

To behold the struggle of the woman caused no emotion to Hazdrabal but disgust. By all means, if it was his own decision, he would have seen her slain back in Karideph, joining her with the rest of her kind, the Jedi, Republic troopers and common pest that now made piles of burning corpses; A parting gift, after the battle fought.

"Get up"

His voice a weight that stained the air. His cybernetic eyes callibrating, as he turned and glared down the struggling, almost suffocating captive. Deep within him, he knew her pain well. His own metallic lungs aging beneath his chest; One of the many augmentations he was subjected to, throughout his time onboard the Marauder Fleet....

Marauder Fleet...

The Dark Crusade...

His mind, perhaps one of the few things that yet remained untouched by the cybernetics, there to remind Hazdrabal of who he once was, and how many failures had led him to where he was now. A monster. A shell of durasteel wrath and destruction. Hazdrabal, the Cannibal. The first of the fallen, the one to drive the violence onboard the Shadow's Avenger when the darkest day came. The day of Defiance. The day of Malice.

His cybernetic eyes recallibrated, as he shook his head, banishing the cloud of thoughts that pushed his mind adrift.

"Up. Walk."

He snarled. There could be no space for weakness in the Dark Crusade. Their quest of ruin was one of sacrifice and torment. Everyone knew; And those who did not... They were feast upon, when their minds broke. But she? She had no excuse to be weak. Not now. Not after the effort put to her to keep her wretched skin alive...

Oh, he would revel in feasting upon her flesh... Devour the little will she had left, and sing the song of pain as he had done so, when the Jedi Master claimed his face, before he felled him too, not so long ago...

 

[Roshia Chamiane]

It took a while, even with Hazdrabal's insistance, before Roshia was able to regain her bearings. Forcing air into her lungs, acclimating to the harsh environment of the dark side ship, and gathering her scattered thoughts. A hundred different questions already floating within her mind, desperate to be asked, but left unspoken. She recognized Hazdrabal from the battlefield of Karideph and had no interest in speaking to one of her could-have-been murderers. Even if she did, it's unlikely he'd hold any answer for her that weren't a string of death threats.

She slowly but surely stumbled onto her feet, using the empty bacta tank as support to stand up. After spending an unknown amount of time within the tank and an equally unknown length of time in the nightmare that came before that. Roshia would follow after him, stumbling in her first few steps before gradually being able to walk normally once again.

 

[Hazdrabal the Cannibal]

Blight and foul air reigned across the decks of the cursed warship. The halls made narrow, oppressive enough to reflect the darkness brewing from its deepest intestines, where the Sith Renegades performed their horrid rituals and gave will to the Dark Crusade from their Sith Sanctums. The light was always dim and crimson, save for the occasional sparks of the ship's internal wounds healed by the crazed mechanics and enthralled crew members. The catwalks thick with black humidity deriving from the metallic scent that roamed the air like haunting shades of the damned bound to the ship, preying to the few weak minds still holding against the tide of insanity. Screeching of kouhun infestations from beneath the catwalks occasionally broke the unnatural silence across the decks. The renegades roaming the halls walked like shadows, emptied of all essense; hollowed, drained and bled to a degree of selflessness, for their will was bound. It had been long since Karideph. And yet, the unnatural intensity of their carnage took a heavy toll.

Fatigue.

Hate.

Exhaustion.

Hazdrabal led Roshia through several decks. Scattered remnants of flesh, turned bleak and foul still remained, dripping from the bones that were left after the majority of the tissue was cannibalized oh so long ago. None cared to dispose of the remnants, forsaking them for the kouhun and other horrid creatures to feast upon.

This was no longer an Imperial warship. Though on some parts it bore resemblance, and there were still few tattered banners hanging from the highest of walls over the decks baring the hexagonal sigil of the Sith Empire, branded by the winged skull of the renown House Kata, the predominant symbol that vandalized almost every wall, over almost every rotting cadaver was that of the seven-pointed Star; The heraldry under which Darth Eosfor led his renegade horde into civil war...

There were stories, in Minos Sector. Stories of wars fought beyond the clusters, in the Colonies. Wars of unforseen casualties fought against a collection of cursed ships and champions.

The War in Halcyon...

A war that had costed millions of lives to the Republic colonies and the local allies. One which stood as the first of clashes after the debauchery in Ossus, and the ignition of the Third Galactic War...

 

[Roshia Chamiane]

After all that had happened since Karideph, the incomprehensible torture she had endured. The ship felt more like a terrible, foul fever dream that she is forced to limp through, especially as she has only ever been familiar with the well-maintained, clean ships of the Republic and the Jedi. Its foul air made her lungs, nostrils, and throat burn with each breath, and the humidity made the air feel heavy well, her right one specifically oddly enough. Roshia could only speculate what they've done to her, each breath did not become any easier than the last.

She did her best to block out the horrid sights and scents on the decks, focusing solely on lumbering after Hazdrabal without tripping over her own feet. Walking became easier with each step she took, at least, her limbs still felt weak, sore, and aching. She did notice the tattered banners, the sigil of the Sith Empire was expected, only the Sith could be so foul and cruel. The winged skull of House Kata was a more enigmatic one for her, she had seen it before as digital images, she had heard of the stories being included in one of her many lessons and readings on galactic history. The War in Halcyon especially.

Roshia did not ponder on any deeper historical meanings to her predicated, her mind was on something else, filled numerous questions that she's had no one to ask of. What did want from her? Why? Why the brutal strike on Karideph? What did they do to her? Where was he taking her?

Most importantly— What was going to happen next? Even the thought of going through it all again filled her with sickening dread.

 

[Eosfor]

Peace is a Lie...

There is Only Passion...
​

As the blastdoors openned before the two, the Sith Sanctum appeared in its dark majesty. The ceilings jumped high, suddenly banishing the narrow architecture of the decks unlike it with a grim feeling of looming dread. Hooked bodies hung from atop the high ceiling beams, dripping blood like stalactites into the boiling pools adorned with horrid statues of deformity. Hooded figures chanted binding spells of Sith Sorcery and dark arcane, while each of the few faces distinguished beneath the shadow of the hood was drained of colour, with black swollen veins and eyes of fire.

Hazdrabal moved within them like an alien entity, not adhering to the wickedness of their ways. These sorcerers; These priests of Darkness, were the beating heart of the Crusade, stirring the hordes beneath them with unnatural cruelty. Some had chains wrapped around their arms, beneath the tattered cloaks, of which links were broken and cast away; A symbolism of their ascension...

Screams occasionally echoed from the depths of unseen segments of the Sanctum; Evidence of Roshia not being the only soul trapped in the Durasteel cage of the cursed ship... There were others. Some still twitching, to the conciousness returning against the bite of the hook. Some crying in pain to the abominable treatment the Sith inflicted.... And then... Then there was Roshia; Making her way up the higher levels of the Sanctum, separated from the rest by a large lift that took her and Hazdrabal to the final destination...

Through Passion, I gain Strength...

Through Strength I gain Power...
​

Maddening whispers crawled their way to Roshia's shoulders, like tinny devils of temptation and depravity, seeking to bend her mind, inviting her to become one of the horrors onboard... Warning... Warning of the ecstasy that would bring...

The blastdoors openned wide; Adorned with gold and emerald shapes, all beaming light that barely cracked the veil of darkness on deck, they creeked open, pushed by bound creatures that were moulded to them as if they were welded metal. There was little evidence of what they once were, before their doom onboard this hellish ship...

Hazdrabal pushed the captive onward, into the chamber. A circular room with ceilings high and beams of durasteel, while the floor was branded with a seven-pointed star drawn by blood. Though its scent hinted to the time it had spent on deck, its form refused to coalgulate; Boiling and moving to the currents of the Dark Side, it remained alive, around the massive tree of wires, cables and tendrils of machinery, all amalgamating into one abomination...

Through Power... I gain Victory...

Flesh-deprived hunched creatures approached, roaming like ghosts around the tree, in which the foul devil was held. The mask, once cut by Roshia's own lightsaber now welded whole again, with the mark visible across its form, held aloft by the mechanical tendril. Oozing black vines of rotting tissue connected it with the remnants of the skull that stood several inches away, crown to a cluster of decaying flesh and steaming black blood embracing a skeletal metal miscreation that held that thing together. Hands extended to the sides, while the twitching of the scattered parts of whatever kind of body once composed it, the only sign of life upon it. The behemoth of foul engineering and destruction a black beacon of Ruin. His will far too great to allow Himself to perish.

With each time the hunched servants pressed yet another of the many plates against the ruined body, and the machine of the tree twisted the screws to fix them into place, a wave of darkness errupted like an invisible explosion of pain. The spiked silver hilt of the saberstaff in tremor, craving to reunite with its master...

Through Victory, My Chains are Broken....

The Force shall Set Me Free...
​

"I know your torment... I can sense your pain..."

The twisted voice of the Dark Lord echoed in Roshia's mind. The body itself yet unable to speak, as the exposed internal of its throat separated by the artificial vocal chords. And yet, even in such a dire state, the... thing cast an ever-oppressive tempest in the Force around it, contrasting the weakness the eye perceived with strength extending beyond the material world.

 

[Roshia Chamiane]

Every corner of the sanctum was a maddening amalgamation of suffering and foulness, it felt utterly profane to Roshia. It’s as if all the tales of the Sith she had been told in her youth— that she had thought were only there to scare children, were all proven in some grim, maddening reality right in front of her. As much as possible, she refused to look at the horrors, the bodies hung by hooks, the robed sorcerers, all of it. Choosing to look down at her feet instead, which was hardly any better due to the scattered foulness of the ship, but rather fresh blood and sinew than continued sights of torture.

The whispering of the Sith code in her mind only worsened the experience. Like dark tendrils seeking to drag her into the abyss of damnation that she had so desperately clawed herself away from. She covered her ears with her hands, a futile attempt at barring away that dark whispering, and choosing the remember the codes that she had grown up hearing, the code that she desperately held onto even in the worse moments of her life.

There is No Emotion
There is Peace​

Roshia stumbled forward Hazdrabal pushed her through the opened blastdoors, narrowly avoiding stepping into the unnaturally still fresh blood that formed the seven-pointed star that she had seen so frequently through the decks of the ship.

There is No Ignorance
There is Knowledge​

For a moment, she did not even recognize the mass of wires and machinery at its center to be human, or a sentient being for that matter. She did not immediately recognize him physically, but she certainly felt his presence. Dark, foul, and terrible, there were no other words for her to describe it. A rotting corpse unnaturally sustained by the dark side and mechanical parts. It would have been pitiful, if it hadn’t been the source of so much innocent suffering.

There is No Passion
There is Serenity​

She had been so close to felling the beast in front of her. Roshia could see where she had struck him, from the mask that hung from its blackened skull to leftover marks across its body, though for all she knew, they could just be the natural damage caused by such an unnatural means to live.

There is No Chaos
There is Harmony​

Fear and anger filled her chest in equal measure. She feared him from the suffering he had inflicted on her, on Karideph, on all that she had withnessed. Angered at it for all that he had done, the thought of her fellow Jedi, even her master, losing their lives under its unfathomable level of cruelty. Worse of all, it had emerged victorious, and will only continue the slaying and torture of innocent lives far beyond Karideph.

Roshia had been left physically weak and broken by what they had done to her, whatever it may have been. For a time, she had even lost her connection to the force, she had resigned herself to death, but so cruelly denied it. For a short time, she felt strength return to her, forgetting her newfound physical weakness, fueled by the desire to put a stop to all the suffering— and to avenge those lost. There was opportunity, her gaze laid upon the spiked silverhilt of the saberstaff.

There is No Death
There is The Force​

In a tremendously bold, and likely foolish move, Roshia reached out a hand and pulled the saberstaff hilt to her, intending to use the weapon for her own means.