Consolidation Litanies of the Dark Side: Souls of the Damned [DC Dagobah Hex Defence Upgrade]

[Dreadheart]

@Valia Muqai
​

Act I
Corruption

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

The noise produced by the monitor was making the beeping of the sensors injected beneath Valia's skin almost innoticeable. The peripheral venous catheter fixed on the top of her hand smelt of alcohol, with just few black shadows formed on its metallic needle, perhaps wounds given by lightning. The sensor at its end beneath the skin vibrating in synchrony with Valia's blood pumpting in the vain it had invaded.

"Specimen 4-2-6, stable. Pulse: Normal. Protocol: Green."

The voice belonged to a cyborg. The extensive cybernetic engineering conducted upon the poor soul made it hard for anyone who beheld it to identify any racial origins, prior to its doom onboard the cursed ship. Its very voice result of a voice chip inside the tinny console that had replaced its face beneath the nose, affixed with tubes and wiring. Its front, where the mouth should be, now was a small holoscreen that flickered a greenish light, depicting the soundwave that was created due to speech. Its hands an amalgam of flesh and machinery, the boundaries of each barely recognizable. Its one hand replaced with a circular bearing socket, currently having a scanner affixed to it, with which it routinely performed said scans on the woman. The red thin lazer line that marked the focus of the scanner irritating to the eye.
It must have been several hours of checking and rechecking, adjusting the various poisons and mockeries of medicine put inside the synthetic bottle that fed the tiny flexable tubes that led to her veins. Her shoulders were packed with synthetic plasters of bacta. A pulp substance, held together by a membrane pierced in several places to leak its content upon the burns, held in place by the arachnid droids that had climbed on the woman.

The medbay looked different. Where once was gore and coalgulated remnants, the durasteel catwalk of the deck was now visible, cleansed of the past horrid memories of operations. The column by the consoles monitoring the life signs of the single other creature that found itself in this most dire a place, was cleared of blood, though here and there tinny droplets of the splattered liquids remained as reminders of what had happened. A grim indication, none of the past memories here were part of nightmares, instead bound in reality...

"Pressure bellow normal."

The bald scientist intoned. His gloved hand pointing to her chest, where several electrodes were placed. His gaze never straying from the holopad held at hand.

"Tissue has accepted the implants well. Minor adjustments will be required, on the bones. Cortosis has not been rejected yet."

He paced towards the main consoles.

"Specimen 4-2-6, stable. Pulse reading, normal." the cyborg reported.

 

[Valia Muqai]

It was not easy returning to the very place that, as far as Valia knew, was the beginning of the nightmare of being on the ship. Even when the medbay now looked far cleaner and less horrific than from what her fragmented memory retained, assuming it ever looked like that at all, it was still a terrible and painful reminder of what had transpired. Walking back into there made her nothing short of terrified and horribly anxious, enough that some sort of calming drug had to be administered early on for the sake of safety and convenience, owing to previous.... incidents.

The drug did calm her... mostly, with the minor side effect of making her drowsy and sleepy, but it was enough to keep her completely compliant through the testing and treatments without being horribly stressed in the process. Although it was not enough to lull her into actual slumber, especially with the constant poking, prodding, and talking. Worse of all, the concoction dripping directly into her veins from the intravenous line on her hand made her feel utterly terrible, it felt like the veins from her hands all the way up her arm were burning from within. She could hardly move her arm and hand due it.

And it went on and on for hours. The only way she could tell the time at all was from the pronouncements by the droid... cyborg creature assisting the dreaded creature that called himself a doctor. Valia kept her eyes closed, hoping that sleep would come in some way and to drown out the blinding lights of the room, but to no avail. After such a long time, it was becoming utterly irritating.

"Why is any of this necessary?" After spending almost the entirety of her time there being silent, Valia finally spoke up, though her voice still hoarse and quiet. "You've treated my injuries and medicated me. This has been going ongoing for hours, what do you expect to see or happen?"

"And not rejected yet?!" She had known her ribcage had been replaced since her confrontation with the Dark Lord, learning it was replaced with cortosis of all things was something she learned as she laid on the table. that and her lung had been replaced too. It answered the reason behind the strangeness she felt with her breathing. Valia was not particularly happy with the news either way.

 

[Dr. Eolai Vein]

@Valia Muqai
​

"You have been administered Ysalamiri essense" the doctor replied. His voice cold, processed mechanical noise generated by a voice chip. He did not care enough to gaze at her, continuing his study of the monitors. "It takes a certain duration until your system casts it out in the form of urine, or sweat. Until that happens, the body is susceptive to genetically oriented alterations of tissue and midichlorian ratios. Studying the aftershock of such an intervention is key to determining future dosage and operational capacity."

The doctor pressed on the monitor. He tapped twice or so, before he shook his head in disappointment, identifying the gored blood as the reason why the touch sensors of the monitor did not react. He reached out to the nearby operation bed, picking a piece of torn clothing. He poured a liquid transparent solution to it, before wiping the monitor.

"Yes-yes. Cortosis has a tendancy to rapid corrosion due to the oxygen trapped in the bloodstream. Unfortunatelly, we do not yet have supply of Transparreplaster membrane to coat it, before implantation."

He tossed the piece of cloth on the catwalk behind him, before again tapping on the monitor. After a moment's malfunction, the screen projected a series of graphs and real-time tracing of Valia's vitals.

"Hmm..." the doctor pondered, his cybernetic eyes fixated on the screen.

A sudden caugh came from the occupant of the other operation bed, amalgamated with crude life support tubing and electronic wiring. The cyborg operator of the medbay walked towards there, quick to perform scans.

"Specimen 4-5-1 unstable. Protocol: Yellow. Internal bleeding. Lung Area."

 

[Valia Muqai]

Valia frowned at being reminded of that particular event. She was conscious only for a fraction of it, but to lose her abilities in the force felt terrible all the same. The memory of it stung as much as the scalpel used to cut her flesh during it. It was a good thing that the calm inducing drug still flowed through bloodstream then, otherwise she'd not be able to stop herself from panicking.

"I was sent here to be healed. Not to have you use me as your lab rat for a drug you likely intend to use against me in the future." She did not look at him as she spoke, her sight firmly fixed upon the dull metal ceiling of the medbay if she did not have her eyes closed. From an outside perspective, it may look as an of indignance or even arrogance. In reality, it was Valia's way of attempting to keep herself calm and that she could not bare to look at the doctor at all. To say she hated him was an understatement, she feared him on an instinctual level that she could not yet control.

"Why use cortosis at all then? This is ridiculous, and cortosis does not have such tendencies! This is nonsense..." The thought of her forcibly replaced body part now being slowly corroded away by her own blood and immune system upset her deeply. It only further added to the atrocity that had been done to her. It made her want to weep, only stopped by her refusal to allow the doctor the satisfaction of seeing more of her tears.

 

[Dr. Eolai Vein]

@Valia Muqai​

"Against you?" the doctor inquired, his cybernetic eyes finally turning to Valia. Few calculated steps brought him closer to her. His gloved hand reached to readjust the tinny electronic sensor at the far end of the vein catheter's tubules. The flow of the transparent liquid decreased. His augmented face, although deformed enough by cybernetics, emitted an unnerving sense of tranquility. What he did was no longer medicine. It was research. The mad scientist let the word hang inbetween the two before talking again, silently marking its significance.

"My work is not for pleasure. That, I gain from the success at the end of the jump. Your lung was severed by plasma. This filled your lobes with blood. Your lobar bronchus was melted by the temperature of the plasma, with its fructured drops solidifying like glass, on several segments of the organ. By attaching cybernetic implant valve on your trachea I was able to adjust a mechanical bellow equipped with filtration systems of which the output links were bound to synthetic implants that fed your blood stream with clean oxygen cells."

His artificial voice was deprived of any colour. His cybernetic eyes denying glimpses to his wicked soul. And yet, the passion for his work bled from him as if the Force itself witnessed his patents in awe.

"Your Cortosis rib will provide additional support and protection for the implant."

It felt he did not acknowledge her comment for the last topic. Whether it was pride, or his disturbed mind saw no meaning in the engagement was a mystery. He turned, walking to the monitors once again. His cybernetic eyes quick to scan the data projected in such a chaotic manner, perhaps a match to his mind's thinking patterns.

"You were chosen. Just like all others onboard this ship. If you were found lacking, you'd be sitting besides him." his hand gestured to the creature lying on the surgical bed in the distance, a horrid pot of wires, tubes and cables deforming whatever the specimen once was into a miscreation of foul engineering. The doctor himself did not care enough to turn his gaze to it.

"Consider that a victory. Although your readings suggest your vitals would make fine subjects for transmachinization. Your midichlorian count certainly would be a very interesting study..."

The doctor pondered on the monitor, as if continuing his already horrifying speculation in silence. Calculations running in his mind, contemplating the probability of success and the potential outcomes such a scenario would yield. For a moment, he was actually living it... Alas, altering the past was yet among the few mysteries he had not unlocked.

 

[Valia Muqai]

Valia tensed, inhaling sharply when she saw him approach from the corner of her eye, briefly fearing some form of retaliation for her comments against him. She relaxed somewhat when he merely adjusted the connected line to her hand. The decreased flow of whatever medication was being pumped into her alleviated some of the burning sensation she felt. Though she doubted that was a deliberate act for her comfort.

"Not for pleasure? It's clear that derive some sort of pleasure from the deliberate suffering you cause. What you did to me..." The mere thought of it made her grimace in pain, even if nothing was physically causing her such. "All of it was on purpose. You did everything without any form of anesthetic. None at all."

Continued discussion of past events was clearly having an effect on Valia, progressively appearing increasingly stressed and restless despite the calming drug that had been administered, though it could be beginning to wear off.

"A real victory would be me being long dead, permanently, the moment I fell on my own blade. Though it seems like neither you nor him will allow me that privilege. I did not ask to be chosen." Valia was practically hissing the words at him. She did not look at the specimen he gestured towards, or at him, for that matter.

"And you will NOT do that to me. I am not your plaything to turn into more of a machine than you already have."

 

[Dr. Eolai Vein]

@Valia Muqai​

"Oh, but you are..." the crazed scientist uttered, barely after she claimed against it. His voice artificial, yet the wickedness of the words strong enough to trump the voice chip and hang like looming threat waiting to be unleashed. The subsequent moments passed, as he turned slowly to face her. His cybernetic eyes sparking with desire to express, trapped behind wiring and the weight of metal flooding the socket like a parasite. So perfectly aligned with his body. So perfectly crafted to transmit the scanned signals received by its lenses. And yet, it failed horribly in a single most vital and yet disregarded by him function of any an eye:

Expression.

Emotion.​

Passion.
​

"You had no power over your fate ever since He laid eyes on you. No one has. His will has bled worlds dry and made demons of the purest champions." The doctor took a step closer, pointing a finger to her, further emphasizing his words.
"You tried to escape. You tried dying. But He did not allow you Death. You tried. But you were Blind to the truth. Blind to the prospect He offers. Blind to the pointlessness of resisting. Blind to think there was ever a path determined by you..."

his hands slowly moved up, his palms pointing to his cybernetic eyes as he spoke the words, slowly, letting their meaning sink.

"I was too."

His cybernetic eyes fixated on her. Their scanning constant, feeding the doctor's brain with the vision of Valia. An empty shell, in his false eyes, lost in the labyrinth he too had found himself in. A damned soul, trapped in the hellish cage of the Dark Crusade. He himself did not acknowledge the zeal the Sith and cultists stored for the cause set by the Dark Lord. He explained it, of course, through psychology and make-belief, as means of cooping with the horrors they went through. But the Force, and the narrative of the Sith Code?

He was a man of science. With enough knowledge, no higher powers could really dictate the universe... And yet, he was not one. He was a piece of the massive puzzle that spanned across the million worlds, in hundreds of light years galactic plain....

 

[K-2]

@The Adjudicator (ADJ-100)
​

01000001 01000100 01001010 00101101 00110001 00110000 00110000 00101100 00100000 01000010 01101111 01101111 01110100 01101001 01101110 01100111 00101110 00101110 00101110 ​

ADJ-100, Booting...

The electric energy surge suddenly blazed the internal circuits alife, sensors spinning as they transmitted a million different signals in the mainframe of the droid. Oceans of binary flowed like water from a cliffside, blending in manner incomperhensible for any a mortal being, until the coding and signals became so frequent, the artificial senses of the droid became stable, acknowledging the surrounding environment.

A whole list of oxygen, sulphur, carbon and numerous other foul gases were detected. A mixture of artificial origin, recognizable by the polluted materials flying in the microcosm of the unseen life support that fed the chamber. The catwalk on which the droid stood vibrated, hinting to the heavy machinery operating belowdeck. Heavy. Unceasing. Hyperdrive engine. The existence of gravitational anomalies at a minimum, suggesting the ship was not in Realspace. They were sailing. Hyperspace. Validity, uncertain.

The dim red light of the chamber dwarfed by the burning of the white blaze targeted directly at its vision sensors, making it hard to adjust to the location.

"Status: ADJ-100//Activated. Generator Capacity: 100%. Mainframe: Engaged. Confirm."

The voice belonged to the one casting the light. With a quick scan from the vision sensors, the information about the figure, though vaguely recognized quickly connected to the droid's control mainframe.

Type: Killer Droid.
Codesign: K-2
Origins: Unknown

A fellow droid...

 

[The Adjudicator (ADJ-100)]

He awoke with a jumpstart. With every nanosecond that passed any sliver of confusion about the happenings around him were quickly vanquished.

He knew immediately what he was: a droid. He was activated on a ship that was currently coasting through hyperspace. The room he is in is sterile and consumed. By a concoction of molecules, which, according to the percentages, would be desirable and necessary for sentient life to operate in this ship. Conclusion: sentients must be on board whatever this vessel is.

His sensors are quick to focus on the other voice: another droid. Specifically a K2 killer droid model.

He slowly sits up, vision sensors locked onto the droid as he does. He quickly scans the room around him, noting points of interest, before refocusing on the droid.

“What is your designation and function, K-2 Unit?”

Tag: @Dreadheart

 

[Valia Muqai]

"Oh, but you are..."

Valia exhaled sharply, feeling anger rise within her chest, a feeling becoming all too familiar to her within the Dark Crusade. Every word from the mad scientist only served elevate her anger more and more. The same spiel she had heard from the Dark Lord, every whisper within her mind, even when she had submitted to the dark side, she still hated it with a passion.

"I lived because of you! You and the wretched surgery you did on me!" She snapped, finally turning to look at him. If she had done so at any other time, the mere sight of him would have made her blood run cold, and her very breath catch at her throat. Anger gave her newfound courage that she otherwise wouldn't have had in the moment and she did not even fully realize it so.

"He is Sith Lord, but he no god. If I wanted myself dead once more, it WILL happen, whether he wills it or not. He can think he holds fate itself in his hands all he likes, that does not make it true."

A small part of Valia realized that her loud, angered ranting was entirely unlike herself. One who used to be quiet and subtle in her speaking. It is not something she would have done in the past, but did that even matter anymore? Her own identity was in shambles and she no longer knew what to make of her very self anymore.

She carefully pushed herself to sit upright on the bed, mindful to not accidentally rip away any wiring. The act made her head feel light and healing shoulders ache, the one with the venous catheter attached to her hand especially.

"You've spent who-knows how long having me scanned over and over, pumping whatever poison this is into me." She gestured to the line connected to her hand. "I am here to be healed, not to be experimented on by your or for you to imagine how you can butcher me even further. I refuse to hear anymore preaching about your cursed Dark Lord. Now, what treatment do I actually need to have done? "

 

[K-2]

"Designation: HLL-222"

The K-2 spoke. Its metallic head nodding to the ADJ-100 unit. Its hand, claw of twelve fingers edged by blades, sharp and curved like razors. The K-2 were killer droids, units manufactured to deliver brutal battle in close quarters, though not limited to melee programming. Their circuits allowed them to patternize their foes and develop their own internal algorithms of combat, with ability to tactically chart action, serving as mobile command posts for the frontlines.

"Function: Killer-Commander. You are assigned to unit K-2S1TA in replacement of casualties sustained. Acknowledge."

K-2 produced a small datachip, offering it to ADJ-100.

"Internal Communication Device. Confirm connection to K-2S1TA. Unit to preserve ICD at all times. Acknowledge."

The droid remained motionless. Its vision sensors scanning and rescanning the ADJ unit consistantly, perhaps evaluating its operational capabilities while it proceeded the formalities.

"ADJ-100 to be tested for Combat Readiness."


@The Adjudicator (ADJ-100)

 

[Dr. Eolai Vein]

The doctor shook his head to what he perceived as ignorance from Valia. He reached out and pulled the catheter from her hand, seemingly careless of any pain or discomfort caused by the violent act.

"You are young. You were terminated too much for your brain to process effectivelly."

He turned and picked the tubule, resting it on the very same metalic pole the synthetic bag with the liquid injected into Valia was, as if preparing it for the next victim who would find itself in his care.

"I have ran necessary tests on you to determine the level of deviation on your midichlorians by the injected essence. The dosage was not calculated for your count, or for your weight on that matter, openning potential of defects and mutations. I respect my work. I must know the effectiveness of my methods and their errors, to perfect them. Your midichlorian count is stabilizing, I would have you know. But a percentage of them remains inactive, which means you will observe yourself lacking in what you otherwise had gift in. It is not clear as transparesteel, when and how it occurs, but it must be recorded and monitored. Your Medcount... This "Force" you cultists speak of, is among the reasons you survived. The rest, was me."

The doctor was not easy to taunt. His voice masked by artificial tone, difficult to distinguish emotion through it, if any of such was left inside the mad scientist at all...

 

[Valia Muqai]

Valia winced from the pain, gripping her hand. A small amount of blood dripped from the needle-sized wound. She glared at him for this act of spite and it did nothing to alleviate her gradually growing anger at him.

"Terminated too much? What do you mean by that?" She asked, beginning to pull off the electrodes connected to her chest. seeing that they will no longer be needed any further, much to her relief.

She listened to him, allowing him to finish his explanation before responding. Discerning the emotion in his voice was impossible, nor did he emit an aura of malice much like the Dark Lord that. Not that it mattered to her, she cared more about what he had done that how he actually felt at any given moment. Her eyes rolled at his labeling of force users as cultist, the irony of the mad scientist doing so after singing praises for the Dark Lord was not lost on her.

"Tell me what percentage still remains inactive." Her tone, surprisingly, had a hint of command behind it. Not fully, but certainly testing the waters, whether intentionally or otherwise by Valia. "Nonsense, if I had no will to live then the force will not keep me alive, even if with medical intervention..." Her thoughts drifted off as she spoke. It was based on what she had been taught, and learned of about the force. It certainly could be used to keep someone alive against all odds, but she wouldn't have done so herself...

 

[Dr. Eolai Vein]

"Your heart failed you four distinct times, two more it would be if it wasn't for the manual pumping deviation bellow that gave me necessary time to scan the organ. It appears it was only blood loss and high pressure that resulted to it. Your mind should not have more than 2,43% permenantly damaged areas. Recovery was conducted within time limits of optimal cardiac arrest recovery."

He never used the word itself. Death. Foreign as it was, to him, regardless the religious zeal that everyone else seemed to store for it, the mad scientist simply translated it through the lense he had seemingly mastered, for the better or worse: Science.

"Your midichlorians are unstable, as of yet. Normal reaction to the essense." he explained. It seemed the interaction did not cause him any stress. This was his expertise. He took pleasure in reciting the workings of his craft. That needed no effort to recognize.

"Your will to live." he pointed out. "That was the stimulus of your natural response towards termination. Organic life, for the most part, has no tendancy towards ceasing. This is why those who pursue it, usually present a strong pseudophilosophical explaination that, in their eyes, explains the unnaturality of their behavior."

He halted, turning his cybernetic gaze to Valia.

"You call it will. The Sith call it code."

 

[Valia Muqai]

Valia was both appalled and somewhat shocked by the knowledge that, she had died not just once, but four times, denied her wish of death in all four. Whether through medicine alone or otherworldly forces she did not know. The mad scientist's explanation made complete sense from a scientific angle, but Valia was not one to attribute everything to science, unlike him. She had willed herself to die and that was what happened four different times, she was just forcibly pulled back.

It did offer a partial explanation to why she seemed to have not regained her full vitality yet, despite the long bacta tank submersion. Though it could be a dozen different compounding reasons, she has not been in her best physical and mental state at all.

"Damn you!" She hissed at him, feeling herself angered once more. "Your effort at keeping me alive has done nothing short of physically ruining me. Without considering my lack of will to live, you subjected me to pain so bad I couldn't comprehend it, and did nothing to lessen it with any sort of anesthetic. It is no wonder my heart stopped as much as it did."

She moved to sit at the side of the bed, not standing up quite yet. Resting a hand against her head as memories of previous events forcibly resurfaced, but managing to keep her composure regardless. "I'm sure you'll have some petty excuse for it all."

 

[Dr. Eolai Vein]

The mad scientist simply stared at the woman, perhaps calculating her temper and whether or not her mind was functioning as per the latest graphs yielded by the scanners. Her vitals seemed normal, given her state. His cybernetic eyes' scanners passivelly provided his mind with fresh results on lifesign readings. Her heart pumped faster. Her neural connections in her mind showing increased electric activity.

She remembered...

"You are alive." he reported. "You will require time to process."

He let few moments pass, tilting his head to the side as he observed her. There was clearly something intriguing his mind. He was contemplating.

"Do you remember that pain? The neurolink signals tend to collapse, during periods of excess shock."

He asked in the same artificial voice, seemingly untouched by the experience he inflicted upon her. He was an artist. She, his art, made in flesh and cybernetics. Though he wanted to speak, something within him drove his mind into following a different pattern, chosing instead to wait for her reply before proceeding to the conclusion perhaps too obvious to him, after years of practice and, perhaps, perfection of his foul art...

 

[Valia Muqai]

Valia took slow, deep breaths. A habit she had been taught to do when she was a jedi when she experienced strong emotions, as a way to temper her mind. Even when she had been so forcibly torn away from that life, the habits and techniques she had learned still remained. It still helped, not as much as it did before, but it was enough to keep herself from falling into a pit of fear and panic as the memories were forced onto the forefront of her thoughts.

"Of course I remember the pain! Every inch of it. I remember the beginning vividly, you cutting me open. After that, only splintered fragments. My chest felt heavy, cold, as if it was being crushed and I couldn't breathe." She hung her head low, closing her eyes. Gradually sorting through her own memories as opposed to letting it all flood in and overwhelm her. It was not the full extent of her memories nor the most accurate descriptions, that would have been too much.

"I remember when I awoke again later. Choking on the tubes you had down my throat, you only took one out of however many. You showed me a syringe in your hand, I choked you. You injected me, and I felt cold until everything went black again." She grimaced in pain, even if nothing could have physically caused her such in the moment. The feeling was not as intense as it was before, yet she can still feel a shadow of what had been done, radiating across her chest. Her breathing gradually quickened the more she dug through her memories, though still maintaining a measure of control.

 

[The Adjudicator (ADJ-100)]

"Designation: HLL-222"

The K-2 spoke. Its metallic head nodding to the ADJ-100 unit. Its hand, claw of twelve fingers edged by blades, sharp and curved like razors. The K-2 were killer droids, units manufactured to deliver brutal battle in close quarters, though not limited to melee programming. Their circuits allowed them to patternize their foes and develop their own internal algorithms of combat, with ability to tactically chart action, serving as mobile command posts for the frontlines.

"Function: Killer-Commander. You are assigned to unit K-2S1TA in replacement of casualties sustained. Acknowledge."

K-2 produced a small datachip, offering it to ADJ-100.

"Internal Communication Device. Confirm connection to K-2S1TA. Unit to preserve ICD at all times. Acknowledge."

The droid remained motionless. Its vision sensors scanning and rescanning the ADJ unit consistantly, perhaps evaluating its operational capabilities while it proceeded the formalities.

"ADJ-100 to be tested for Combat Readiness."


@The Adjudicator (ADJ-100)

ADJ-100’s optical sensors flashed red in the blink of an eye as its system logged the designation HL-222 into its systems. It continuously scanned the K2 Unit, noting its blades digits as well as its adaptive combat capabilities. This data might prove useful later.

“Function accepted: Killer-Commander. Assignment acknowledged: I am to replace the decommissioned K-21STA unit.”

Its head snaps to the data chip as soon as it is produced. A servomotor whirred as ADJ-100 extended a limb to receive the datachip. It interfaced without hesitation—metal touching metal, a brief pulse of light transferring connection protocols.

“Internal Communication Device integrated. ICD integrity confirmed. Link established with unit K-2S1TA. Directive received: preserve at all times. Directive acknowledged.”

A surge of information would wash over its database: many forms of tactics, information about the ship around them, and the dealings within, and great amounts of footage of successfully deleted targets. It was incapable of feeling any emotion, but if it could, then it would feel a sense of elation and eagerness for more data chips to assimilate to itself. In fact, it began to wonder how much more it could upgrade itself past the clearly defective K2 unit whose data chip it inherited.

At the mention of combat readiness examinations, its servomotors engaged again; as it turned and dismounted from the table it had been reclining on. It stands face to face with the K-2.

“I require weaponry to be produced for enhanced combat performance. Acknowledge.”

Tag: @Dreadheart

 

[Dr. Eolai Vein]

The scientist remained still, observing Valia as she spoke. His expression lost in layers of augmentation and efficiency, processing her behavior to what he viewed as a well-predicted conclusion. Nothing of what she said had a meaning, for him to hear. It was never for him. In his mind, she was talking against her own conciousness, attacked by memories and defended by stubborness and anger, too latched on the fear of what she went through to see the four steps ahead, to acceptance.

"You are correct." he nodded. "You went through all this. Can you think of anything more horrifying than that? The pain? The knowledge? The memories?"

His inquiries, like poison, injected into her mind without even the necessity of tubules.

"There is little else that can top that. You are right to hate me, and expected to do so. But sit back and consider... Does the body weep when the nails are cut? When the hair shaved from the head? It does. Alot. It is only natural. But after, it grows again, ever stronger. Such is the nature of organics, and the function of creative destruction in the universe around you. You were hurt. Traumatized beyond comperhension. But that, you overcame. You are alive, and sane, which is quite rare, given the extend of the operations. This was a necessary evil to keep you alive. And now, rewarded for your pain, you will feel pain no longer. No blade can mimic even a fraction of what you went through. No threat daunting enough compared to what you already remember. I made you whole, again. And you have made yourself invincible."

 

[K-2]

K-2 observed as ADJ-100 familiarized itself with the newly loaded programming... Droids adhered to a much more complicated command structure when compared to most organics. There was no simplistic versions, nor alterations of necessity, or adjustments for ease of action. They were made by the one they acknowledged as the Father, a man who handcrafted each of them into perfection. They were unmatched by even their own kind, outside the grim genious of innovation and technology. And, with no restraining bolts or sophisticated systems to hold them back, they were aware of it. And their skill...

"K-2 to ADJ-100, connection established."

K-2's voice did not manifest in any audible way. It took the form of zeroes and ones, streaming in the main dataframe of the ADJ-100 unit, sourced by the datachip connecting the two.

There was no point for formalities. Within barely a moment, both droids became aware of every detail in eachother's datacore. The K-2 having taken a single second to brief the new unit of the latest operations. Karideph... Ptosis... Shesharile... Dazakh... Each battle a detailed report made in binary, consumed within instances and loaded into the finest detail as experienced by K-2. There had been many a Jedi. Many a Sith. Cultists. Unidentified hostiles flagged for termination. The list only kept going.

Data for future use.

"Acknowledged." K-2 transmitted. The sole indication of communication between them, the beeping light over the K-2's chest, hinting to active commlink transmission. With channels coded and secured, it was increasingly harder to slice, unless one of the droids was captured and sliced itself. If that were the case, K-2 enforced communication silence, operating on audible vocal commands, to maintain cohesion and avoid compromise. In battles, the two systems were used quite often, though in assassination missions, K-2 never employed sound.

"ADJ-100 requires status confirmation. Combat Effectiveness, questionable." K-2 turned on its heels and started walking forth, beyond the narrow chamber. "Proceed to Fighting Pits. Combat: Active. Follow."