Faction Litanies of the Dark Side: Spoils of War

[Dreadheart]

The air was thick with ash. In the far distance, occasional noise of cannonfire could be heard, though the violence had dissipated after three days of mayhem. Finally, there was an outworldly calm, with the occasional cry of enthralled alien, and the collapse of burned structure being the only disturbance of what had become of Omwat; Once an intellectual and technological centre of the Republic, turned into a fortress of Defiance; And now, a wasteland of broken hope and dying proof of the Republic's own decay...

The city streets were littered with the aftermath of the destruction of the Proton bombing. Radiation was still heavy in the air, causing an itch to the nostrils upon inhaling. The Athysians, and the numerous pirate underdogs, seemed careless of that reality, the former occupied in herding the survivors of the carnage into the shuttles to be driven into slavery onboard the Raider Fleet, the latter invested in looting whatever was left in the ruins of what once was a jewel of civilization.

Most of the crimson-clad corsairs spoke a tongue foreign and archaic, matching perfectly the backwater and bewitched technology used by the dark warships that loomed over the planet, kept together only by the sheer investment into occult magic, beaming from deep within each of them. What was strange, was that most, if not all of the Athysians, those crimson-clad warriors, were Force Sensitive. The pirates that came along with them, expectedly so, not.



Anthiphone paced down the ash-covered streets in seeming ignorance of the catastrophe around her. Her eyes, far too deep in the Dark Occult, scanned the corners of the passageways and defiled crossroads with cold precision, looking for what she was after. Her hands wrapped in black leather, while silver rings were passed through her fingers, mounted with oval Kyber crystals, perhaps the shards of lightsabers that had befallen to her possession. The crystals themselves bled in protest, strongly contrasting her dark essense with a glimpse of Light, yet remaining within them, causing a presistent irritation that turned the pale of her fingers black, around the rings.

She did not mind. Though initially infuriating, she grew to favour the sensation, for it was it what reminded her of the task at hand; Reminding her not to indulge to the urging whispers of the Dark Side, and lose her path once more, especially now, in the presence of a God.

"Lord Hegemon"

Her voice carried a deep twist, as if polluted by thoughts that were otherwise banished from mind, after decades of harsh discipline of nature both physical and mental, yet now looming in the void of her hollow mind, no longer carrying enough weight to twist themselves into action.

Her eyes quickly fixating to the man. She offered an ever-so slight bow of the head, completely disregarding the pale-haired woman next to him.

"The Belerephon has entered the system." she reported.
"The Blood Spear, too..." she continued.

 

[Desmundor Alcademon]

Desmundor halted his pace as soon as the bald woman appeared on his way. So long after the battle, the aura of Darkness had almost completely faded from the man, leaving an aftermath of hollow being. The farther time moved from the battle itself, the more the dark Nexus around Omwat lessened, like candleflame running out of wax to consume. This was no Dark Crusade fleet. There was little madness in their wake, while the drive that seemingly kept the Raider Fleet going was faith, and Desmundor's iron fist through which he led the Athysian warhosts.

As soon as the strange woman bowed her head, he answered by doing the same notion.

"Theocha" Desmundor intoned, in acknowledgement. "Signal the Belerephon to join us in the atmosphere."

Desmundor turned to the woman by his side. Her pale hair a source of distaste, for Theocha, as if she could see something in her naked eyes could not.

The two had not exchange much ever since their fateful encounter in the bunker. Desmundor did not speak much. He would, if addressed, but on his own, he chose to speak less, for his words to carry more weight when spoken. Especially in the case of that woman. He did not care of her breed. She was of no noble birth, this much he could tell by a simple gaze. But he could not deny her valor, all the same, something that made the impact of her words back then all the more strange.

Athysians never gave up.

Even those of the Salt Desert....

Words of encouragement, or inquiries to what led her to her state, Desmundor was not going to indulge in. His role was not to know, he argued with himself. His purpose was to inspire. To rally. To lead. And so he did, even in this most unexpected an occasion.

"Take this one to the Hounds" he said, nodding to the woman by his side, as he addressed Theocha.

Theocha's eyes switched to the woman, though her head did not motion. Her glare piercing like a ray of plasma, as if she could see through her very skin, to the hollows where her soul should have been. The very look offered a chilling sensation.

 

[Valia Muqai]

Valia had absolutely no idea what to expect from the strange group she had chosen to follow over allowing herself to rot with the dead she had caused. The man was not openly hostile at least, to the point she could sense his dark aura began to gradually fade to nearly being undetectable, it seems that the end of battle finally brought some measure of normalcy back to the Force. Nothing dulled the aching pain in Valia's very soul, though that could simply her untreated wounds festering.

The man asked her no questions since they left the bunker and Valia asked him none as well. She was not in a conversational mood as one would imagine. Still, she remained observant of whatever or wherever they went to. At least this army were no mindless sadistic killers like the Dark Crusade, they had the discipline and structure that one would expect from an army. What they intend to do with her was another matter entirely.

Take her to the Hounds, the man said. Valia allowed herself a rare snicker that, it was either another language barrier issue or they did indeed want to kill her as she had thought. She no longer cared, they could kill her all they like she thought.

She met Theocha's eyes. As apathetic as she felt, Valia couldn't help but feel a touch of anxiety at the strange woman's gaze. Feeling as if she's looking at her most intimate secrets. Not that she resisted them much.

 

[Dreadheart]

Theocha eventually turned to Desmundor once again, offering a slight nod.

"It will be done, Lord Hegemon" she acknowledged. Her leather-wrapped hand gesturing forth, under the crimson cloth worn above, turning her piercing eyes once again to the woman, hinting to walk forth, along with her.

Theocha's head never lowered. The immense feeling of pride and supremacy overflowing from her, matching perfectly the discipline the Athysian host was defined by, regardless of their nature. Each and every one of these pale humans was marked by the distinct black veins, contrasting on their pale skin, hinting to the Dark Side's corruption being widespread across the army.

"You have no place here." she spoke. Her eyes onward, offering no look upon the woman. "You are lost, Red Child. I sense you still crave for a path long lost."

 

[Valia Muqai]

Valia offered no resistance nor protest at wherever they intended on having taken to. Whether it was to her death or not, she was willing to accept whatever it may be

"You are right. I have no place here, but here I am all the same." She muttered as a response to Theocha. It was not an attempt at wit, just simply her direct answer to the other woman. Valia did not know how to respond to her otherwise, though she did feel a tug of curiosity as she followed behind the woman.

"What path I want doesn't matter anymore. I suggest you disregard whatever you're 'sensing' there." Valia did not ask any questions yet. Her words were sharp, but the tone was just that of someone who just exhausted.

 

[Dreadheart]

Theocha shook her head to the sound of Valia's words.

"Our wants never mattered, Red Child." she said. "The seed does not choose where it drops. So long that it does, it makes due with what the wind has offered."

She halted her pace, turning towards Valia in a glare of contempt. Pitty, even.

"Roots are a blessing. And you only wait for the axe's hack as if it mattered where they told you rooting means anything. Life is not a priviledge. Its a mission. You have not yet found yours."

For few seconds, she looked at Valia, as if her dark eyes scanned her very being, evaluating the essense that hid behind her pale flesh. There was no hate in Theocha's stare. There was calibration, as if each moment had purpose for her, however unclear. There was no denying of reality. But a strange clinging onto a will that gave drive to her kind. A sense of purpose, in otherwise a meaningless act.

"I sense you were high above, and then crashed down below. You have been disregarding what you sense long enough, have you? It must have worked well, up until now..."

 

[Valia Muqai]

"Just..."

The utter exhaustion she felt and the pain of her battle wounds were beginning to feed into the frustration she felt at Theocha's words. It felt that was all she was constantly ever told, a bunch of riddles and cryptic messages that remain unexplained. Questioning only ever gave increasingly complicated answers or straight punishments for the lack of blind obedience.

"Sense what?! What am I supposed to sense? I've felt every god's damned sensation in the known universe. Nothing makes sense, I don't frakking know shit and likely never will at this rate!"

It was likely not wise to snap so readily at her present captors, though ever being herself, consequences were an afterthought.

Valia sighed deeply, resting a hand to her forehead. "Look, I don't know anything. I don't know what you are all, I don't know what I am, I don't know what I'm supposed to sense, feel, or whatever. Nothing, I know nothing. Throwing me cryptic riddles don't help, and I have no energy to decipher them."

 

[Dreadheart]

In the face of such an outburst, any a Sith would respond with harsh words, or more often than naught, physical punishment, to restore the seemingly broken hierarchical balance between master and pupil. Theocha, however, was no Sith. She would not waste effort, or energy, to revalidate the position she had no interest claiming over who she perhaps knew too little, or too much about, matching perfectly the inexplicable, for now, trend of predestination her kind adopted to a religious zeal.

Her smirk reappeared, as Valia bursted aloud. She observed her outrage, as if an interesting outcome of years of frustration, discovered by Theocha barely moments before the fact.

"It is infuriating, I know. Faced with will above yours." she admitted. Her voice sharp, yet carrying a strange intimacy buried beneath a lifetime of discipline enough not to break character long since adopted.

"Blind before what you cannot see, yet must face. It is maddening. Unless you start believing. There is a path for each of us. The more you resist, the harder it will get. I, too, faced this truth. I know you once had a purpose. You believed in something, perhaps stronger than most. That gave you purpose. That gave you reason to continue."

A strange aura surrounded Theocha. There was no tension in her, though wrapped in a veil of Darkness, the forced discipline dominated over the feral nature of the Dark Side.

"And you now lost it. A mind without purpose wonders in dark places. You have been in the Dark far too long, I sense. You run but cannot hide. You scream but cannot be heard. I can scent the mark of the Sith within you. Only they break one's mind so deeply. But you are among them no longer. This is no Sith Horde. This..."

She extended her hand to the view of the ruined city. Her palm gesturing towards the scattered crimson-clad warriors pacing back and forth, pursuing unknown tasks, or seeking loot amidst the ruins.

"Is an Athysian Warhost. While the Sith crave to break the chains that bind them, we see them for what they truly are. A path. None has chosen to walk it. But accepting the will of the Gods is a purpose in and of itself. Our drive is not one's self, but one's Hegenika. One's bloodline."

She returned her gaze to Valia, offering a few moments of silence.

"You cannot see meaning behind my words, now. But soon, you will, when the time is right. For now, you can sail with the Hounds. To find your path, you must track your pacing from the beginning. Then, when you have found your purpose, then you will come to me, and I shall answer. You have something many of us never did. You have lost everything. It feels like a curse, to you. But know each curse can be a blessing. When you have given up everything... Then... Then you can have... Anything."

 

[Valia Muqai]

After her outburst, Valia expected some form of immediate retaliation. Insults, yelling, physical retaliation, whatever show of power that a Sith master would choose against an unruly captive. Yet, it never came, Theocha simply listened and responded in a way that Valia hadn't expected.

For once, instead of being stubbornly dismissive, she listened and understood. It still felt difficult to accept... everything, so much of it all after such little time. How long had it been since Karideph, she wondered. That time felt so distant and so recent all in the same time. From Karideph and the Jedi Order to the Dark Crusade to Omwat, then to the Athysian Warhost. A group she hadn't even ever heard of, but was swept up by them all the same.

"One's bloodline, huh... What happens when I don't have one? I have no living family. Not here, most especially." An odd question from Valia. It would be something she'd have no interest in inquiring about had her circumstances been different. She had no family or bloodline, yet the group that had taken her was driven by that. Strange situation that was, she thought.

"What path will go on then?"

 

[Dreadheart]

Theocha's smirk faded gradually, as if no longer was she faced with a discovery, but rather, an interaction anticipated.

"If you have no bloodline, you do what not many can." she replied. Her palm unfolding in a choreographic manner, towards Valia's abdomen, as if gesturing towards her.

"You make one."

Her voice natural, and her words coming out with so little an effort, it was a near-obvious answer to the question, for Theocha.

"You cannot know your path, until you are shown it. But you can read through the omens the Gods offer. You are alive. And you are among us, before the Red Harvest. Sometimes, the path is as obvious as the sun, at Dawn, and yet we refuse to accept it."

Theocha turned, and gestured to Valia to walk along with her. A strange feeling of intent growing from within her, as she walked down the street. Ahead, one of the smaller ships that loomed above, had anchored barely a dozen meters above ground, in a site that once served as a square, now flattened and littered with numerous crates and piled weaponry looted prior. The shadow of the blood-red hull hovered with numerous wires and chains, while a handful of shuttles, designed in the same fashion the thin, long warship was, had made landing, and served as posts for the numerous corsairs that had set up the makeshift camp...

Barely any of them, however, matched the pale-skinned human appearance of the rest of the Athysians. These were no human at all. Weequays, Nautolans, Duros and Rattataki, armed and dressed partially with a plethora of equipment that bore no resemblance to the red-dominated armours of the Athysians.

Pirates.

Among them there were about a dozen of the Athysian warriors. They seemed to hold no real connection to the pirates, who had perhaps their own commanders, while the Athysians coexisted in a tense, deeply separated manner, manning the same vessel.

"Your path, I cannot see. I am no Eyerhea; I see what I see through the omens offered, I do not speak with the Unseen. But what I can offer you is something you need more than a path. A purpose. Until the Gods decide to show you otherwise."

 

[Valia Muqai]

The answer seemed blatantly obvious in hindsight. If she had no bloodline, then she should go on make one. The thought made Valia chuckle bitterly. It was an unthinkable possibility for her to have offspring as a Jedi, and it continues to be even in her new twisted life.

Valia walked up beside Theocha, shaking her head. "Create my own bloodline? That will never happen, especially after all the punishment this damned body had gone through. It will never carry life even if I wanted to, which I do not. After everything that's happened to me, even just considering that is absurd." She spoke as if Theocha would have any clue on what she had experienced.

Eventually, they reached what Valia assumed to be their destination. A makeshift square filled with cargo, various pirates, and personal ones who looked similar to Theocha. It stung to see the enemy that Omwat held against for so long now had freely claimed it in a landslide victory, no doubt helped by Valia's own mindless actions.

"Whatever happens, I'll just figure it out. Not much for me to do otherwise."

 

[Dreadheart]

Theocha shook her head to Valia's statement.

"It is absurd up until you account factors you cannot control. You only speak of what you know, which you have admitted is minimum."

She needed not speak any further on this. She knew that Valia had understood, regardless whether or not she acknowledged thusly.

When they approached the camp, Theocha walked to one of the Athysian corsairs. Her head tall, her eyes quick to fixate on the man. His armour was marked by several dots that could be distinguished as blaster marks, not powerful enough to pierce through the crimson and black Cortosis armour that claded his body. His face was scarred, a tell tale of the many battles fought through, while his eyes burned with the taint of the Dark Side.

The man was seated against a stack of crates, drinking from a leather flask.



"Priestess" he spoke. His voice was surprisingly high pitch, considering his tall posture. Blood could be seen inbetween his teeth as he spoke.

"What do we owe the pleasure of the Crimson Star?"

"I am here to see the Captain." Theocha demanded.

"I see..." he tilted his head, sealing the pop of the flask as he switched his gaze to the woman next to Theocha. He looked at her for few moments, before standing up and walking towards the camp.

Theocha turned to Valia and nodded towards the ship hovering above the camp. There were large holes of melted durasteel, adorned by black shade, and numerous smaller hull breaches that dotted the vessel's main body. On many of those, corsair crew members had been hoisted down using small cranes and makeshift lifts, already welding and removing torn pieces, to conduct repairs.

"These are the Hounds, of the Hemstagon Hegenika. They are the lowest one can find...." she admitted, turning to look up at the vessel. "But their alpha knows about losing one's path. Besides... They have suffered enough casualties in the orbit to welcome a new addition. Especially one with your skillset."

 

[Valia Muqai]

Valia could only roll her eyes as her final response to Theocha. Indeed, she knew very little of everything, but she was still confident of speaking on her body at the least. Unless the woman knew something she didn't? That wouldn't surprise Valia anymore.

She looked at the man with apprehension. Already so quickly being passed onto a different group, and one reportedly to be the lowest of the bunch. It seems like even the Athysians didn't really want her all that much. Even more perplexing why the man from earlier even bothered to take her if he had no intention of keeping her around anyways.

"What do you think my skillsets actually are? You've not known me even for a single hour, let alone know what I can do."