First Reply A Harrowing Urge

[Darth Aion]

​

Nothingness.

As his hand fell, coming to rest limp at his side, he felt nothing that could be considered a semblance of sensation. His fingers moved, his hand rose and fell, all an orderly natural, but the nothingness remained. Or perhaps it wasn't nothingness at all. Were it nothingness, emptiness beyond comprehensible understanding, than he would be rid of the incessant gnawing he felt with each body he siphoned from; each pliable well of essence with which he could sate the gnaw that pulled inwards within his very core.

​

With difficulty he pried his mind free from the thoughts mingled with the sensation, turning himself wholly away from the body that now slumped over on it's knees behind him and once again towards the expanse of the room in which he stood. It was then that he took into account the number of bodies he had left, drained and left lifeless whilst his body moved of it's own accord. It was in moments of clarity, the essence of others flowing through him into the void within that he recognized the aftermath.

Though the emotions necessary to care for such an outcome were lost to him. Eroded away much akin to his own body.

Then, as he made the effort to carry himself from where he stood, it hissed at him again from the depths of his mind. It was a gross simplification at best to justify the voice that had taken root within his mind. Less of a voice and more whispers that he knew only to be goads and chides that pressed him further to sate what it referred to as The Hunger. Even in his lucid mind he could not fully comprehend it's purpose, discern it's meaning. Only that it accompanied the gnawing he felt and the unceasing urge to draw forth the essence of others for his own gratification.

"Silence." He uttered in an almost hushed rasp, his fist gripping instinctively as though attempting to choke out the source of the voice. "I do not need you to educate me."

No sooner had he protested with his willed manifestation of resistance did the whispers crescendo in a pitched crashing of pained disapproval before tapering off. Again leaving him in silence. Again leaving him to contend with the emptiness of his thoughts as he once again began to move across the room and towards it's exit. It became rather apparent to him then, as he made his way through the hall riddled with husks, that he had missed the ornate detail of the building in which he was in. While he did not recognize the decorum, the architecture and artwork escaping his present knowledge of the galaxy, he had enough sense to realize that it was easily bearing of high status.

It was the insignia at the peak of the doors archway that affirmed this moments before he stepped through the heavy metal doors and into a welcoming but empty city space. Large buildings spread tightly as far as his eyes could see, a low hanging haze filling the air that indicated it to be a far more populated environment than a singular sweep of the eyes would have been able to assess. Whichever city or planet this was, it had been carefully selected.

Lifting his hand once more, pulling against the urge to let it hang, he probed the cities limits. As loud as the gnawing was, the tug of void within threatening to drown out his senses to render his attempt moot, his lucidity granted him enough sense to feel that what little life remained had retreated itself far from his location. Whoever inhabited this city had quickly become aware of his intentions in spite of what, if any, precautions he may have taken upon his arrival. Though it stood as fairly unfortunate that only so much of the city stood between him and it's border; conveniently home to the energy which he sought.

Lowering his hand to his side once more, returning it to the comfort it so desperately desired, he pressed himself to move. Each step felt like an eternity, a rise and fall against a grain he'd become less and less familiar with and each joined by the returning hiss in his skull.

As the gnawing grew, propagating a tremendous ache, his mind fixated only upon one thing.

His hand raised once more, angled and held aloft at his side, and drew upon the very essence within the soil itself. It would suffice, if only for a time.

 

[Revna]

Darth Aion


She felt a ripple of darkness through the Force…a disturbance she had never quite felt before, all the way from her private quarters on Alvaria. Something terrible had happened on a nearby world. Something far more…profound than a skirmish, or a war. It captured her attention instantly, and filled her with a sense of curiosity.

What could have possibly caused such a ripple of death?

She had to find out. But she needed to be careful; she was only an Acolyte, still growing, still blooming in her powers. Whatever she might find at the center of the dark disturbance could be far more than what she could handle. But she didn’t let that deter her.

Revna followed the trail left in the ripples, the ship she was on piercing through the atmosphere of the planet and touching down at a spaceport within the city limits. When she disembarked, she felt surrounded by shadow, by a powerful darkness that almost threatened to suffocate her.

Somewhere out there, was a void. She could sense it, whatever it was. There was incredible power echoing through the Force, and a warning danced in the back of her mind. She needed to tread carefully here.

The city around her was quiet…empty. Lifeless. She traversed a path, moving silently as she had been trained to do so, following the presence of the void as she drew ever closer to it. What could it be? -she pondered to herself.

A stronger, more urgent warning fell over the young Sith woman, and she stopped in her tracks. She now felt…threatened. Like the void was now aware of her presence, though she still could not see or tell what it was. A trickle of fear danced over her spine; had she made a mistake in coming here?

Probably.

She was torn: did she return to the ship and flee? Or did she stay to see just what this darkened void in the Force was?

She had to know. She had to satisfy her burning curiosity…even if it landed her in grave danger.

 

[Darth Aion]

​

Nothingness.

Each step he took echoed through the empty streets. He did not hear the sounds, however, of heavy footfalls meeting the gravely dirt beneath his feet. Nor could he barely feel it as it accompanied, with minimal resistance, the ache that rippled up through from his legs to his spine as he walked. The only semblance of sensation fueling his almost eerie automation being the gnawing from within that coerced him towards the nearest source of life that rung more potent than the very earth his hands drifted over. Were he aware of that inconceivable state of his very being none presently upon the planet where he found himself accounted among that number; and if they did they were long departed.

​

And then he felt it.

As a burning ember upon a pile of dusted ashes it became apparent to him. Hot as a saber blade to the chest was the presence of a new and far more potent life than those that lay crumpled about the cities remains. And while he could not see it, he could feel it as though it lingered mere yards from him as his body ceased it's uncanny ambling. With a twist of his torso and a tilt of his head his cloaked form jolted into a slow shift towards the direction in which he felt the essence most potently. Could she see him only the faintest glint of bone could be seen amidst an amalgamation of black that enveloped his body, the burning red of his eyes the only other color that seeped forth though it could have easily been mistaken as a part of the masks ornate design.

"You do not belong here," he uttered, his voice carrying into the faint wisps of wind that carried the corporeal affirmation of the death that surrounded him. "You should not have come." He continued and with a final jolt twisted his body completely into the direction the burning radiation of raw essence rooted itself. He could not see her, could not hear her, knew not who she was, but he could feel the raw potential that swelled within her.

A presence that only made the hunger grow. More ravenous than before, as he'd pried every drop of life from the various inhabitants of the city within which they stood. Hunger he knew not how to contest as he reached out with his hand and began to pull with his disparaged connection to the Force, the gnawing void within him fueling the wrenching draw in a way that he himself could not muster alone.

A step and then two, a loud hissing of promises, urges and ravings echoing maddeningly through his mind, and the hunt began.

Revna​

 

[Revna]

Darth Aion


The weight of the void fell over Revna even further, and though she couldn’t see who or what the void was, she could sense its vision upon her.

A bare whisper carried on the wind, slipping into her ears, into her very mind.

A bone chilling warning that Revna quickly found herself agreeing with: she shouldn’t have come here. She needed to leave. Now.

She turned around to make her way back to the ship she’d come in on, then felt something…tug on her. A pull towards whatever the void was, a link that told the young Sith that this black hole in the Force was an entity with power far beyond anything she’d encountered thus far.

And now all of its attention was focused on her. She could feel its gaze upon her…from somewhere…maybe even everywhere.

Instinct made her pull her own Force presence as close to her core as possible - enough so that most others wouldn’t be able to pick up on her signature unless right beside her. It wasn’t true Force cloaking as she still hadn’t quite learned that yet, but it would have to do for now, or so she hoped.

Now to put as many obstacles between her and the dark void that was now coming for her. She was far enough away from the starship that she knew this entity, creature…whatever it was…would catch her before she got back to it. Her only chance at escape was to hinder its progress as best she could. So the little Sith woman slipped into the shadows of a nearby building. As she slipped her way into a darkened building, she came across some crumpled lifeless bodies which brought her to a standstill. She gazed upon the husks as a cold chill wrapped itself around her.

Was the void she felt out there responsible for this?

Revna cast her gaze over her shoulder, looking at the wall behind her. She wanted to understand who or what this creature was, but her instinct told her that only death awaited her if she stayed any longer. Self-preservation won over her curiosity, and the little Acolyte pushed onward through the building, passing by more bodies along the way.

She knew she was being hunted now. But if she played her hand right, she could escape with her life…and with one hell of a story to tell her friends and family.

 

[Darth Aion]

​

A ravenous hunger.

It was all he could usher to sense. The only feeling he could muster to comprehension. It fed his lurch for the essence he sensed, his hand still outstretched beyond sensory facilitation, pulling wantonly for the sustenance the void craved. It's visage eluded him, only it's nature within the Force indicative of how potent he understood it to be. This being, his prey, was attuned to the dark much like himself though this was a distinction that went unnoticed as his feet began to carry him once more. Step by step closer to the blazing beacon of energy that stood out like a fresh brand upon fetid flesh. The void craved it and the gnaw, the whispers, ushered him forth.

​

Only for it to withdraw further, quieter. Eliciting a response from him that could only be described as a hideous and pained rasp into the scattered winds. Lowering his hand towards the ground, the gnaw pulling at whatever it could to ease the emptiness that followed, he drew upon the essence within enough to gather his lucidity to better comprehend the nature of the lifeforms reaction. It was clear to him that it had sensed him, understood his presence, and that it now made a well practiced effort to escape from him. From a death that his lucid mind would have understood all too well.

Lurching forth once more, his feet carrying him almost haggardly, he once again honed in upon the essence where it had sought to move. Following it like a hound on the scent of blood as his body moved like a ghost through the shadows of the desolate city. Each step bringing him closer as the being moved erratically in flight, it was a game that the gnaw patiently tolerated despite it's protests to his thinking mind. A patience that faltered as his hand rose once more to pull into the abyss at the being that foolishly brought themselves to his feeding ground.

This time, the second time, it was stronger. Pulling but also probing, drawing forth from everything it could as it sought to draw back the prey that fled from it. The inclination alone was enough to bring him awareness of life that he had not previously sensed upon his arrival. Pockets of life littered about the city that had previously gone unnoticed in the gnaws fixation on the more potent wellsprings of essence that had drawn him to the planet to begin with. They were paltry pickings to abate the void from feasting upon beings that were far more precious to the host that had given him his access to the galaxy again.

It was by chanced misfortune that he momentarily turned his attention to the ship she had arrived in. The being within it, though nowhere near as commanding in it's connection to the sustenance the void craved, presented itself as a meager substitute for the other's essence. Sadly and swiftly snuffed out before his attention turned to the hushed call of the potent essence once more.

He knew not that he had trapped her there. Only that it was one less being for her to seek for aid.

Revna​

 

[Revna]

Darth Aion


The tug on Revna faded once she pulled her Force presence closer to herself, and though she knew she wasn’t hidden completely, she felt that she was invisible enough to make her hasty retreat. The little woman slipped from shadow to shadow, moving through buildings and winding her way through alleyways to put as much distance between her and the entity that she knew was still attempting to trail her.

She stayed calm and alert to her surroundings, keeping her mind clear of distractions so she could think clearly on what she should do next. Her primary goal was to reach the starship and leave without a trace, but she didn’t want to get there in a straight line, just in case whoever was following her caught up to her.

Despite her calm demeanor, she felt a sense of danger begin to take root within her. There was much death around her, and even now she could feel life vanishing inside the void, inside a darkness from which there was no escape. The very ground she tread upon almost trembled within the Force itself, seemingly weakened by whatever had consumed the spirits of the people who lived here.

Revna made a mental note to tell her Mentor about what she had come across, if she survived, even if it did get her into some trouble with him for sneaking off again.

She had just rounded a corner when she felt it again…the pull on her through the Force, but this time it was far stronger, and she felt as though a bit of her energy was pulled from her, causing her to stumble briefly before catching herself. A brief spell of dizziness washed over her, but she shook her head to clear it away and continued with haste towards her awaiting starship.

No one was around when she reached it, and she made her way to the ramp and back inside, calling to the pilot to get them both the hell off the planet…but there was no response. Coldness trickled over her skin as Revna approached the cockpit and found the pilot slumped over, his flesh having the same hue as all the other corpses within the city. Swallowing hard, Revna checked for a pulse…but found none.

“Kark me…” she muttered as the first spike of genuine fear pierced through her. Her eyes frantically searched out of the window, looking for the entity…the void…that had done this. It, he, her…whatever it was…had trapped her here. She couldn’t fly the spacecraft on her own.

Revna silently cursed her ever hungry, burning curiosity that had led her to this point. If only she had ignored the insatiable need to feed her curious nature, feed her desire for more knowledge, more information, more things to cram into her brain…

“Chit…” she breathed again softly as she grabbed the pilot's communicator and sent a distress signal to the closest place where she knew her allies were, and a message for an emergency pick-up. She didn’t know if anyone would get it in time, however.

The draw upon her grew stronger, grew closer, and she knew she had stayed too long in the ship. She turned around and left the dead man behind, feeling more like prey than predator as each moment passed.

Who…what…was this thing? Revna wanted to see who it was, but she knew that to do so would give it the same opportunity to see her…and that could prove fatal. She needed to put as much distance between her and the moving void as possible, enough so that she could disappear from its attention, hide out until help arrived to pick her up and deliver her from her own foolishness.

The little Acolyte practically sprinted towards the closest gathering of shadows, moving with haste as she wound her way through the maze of streets and roads and buildings…she didn’t stop until she couldn’t feel the pull on her anymore, choosing an underground complex to hide herself in…pulling her presence as close to herself as she possibly could in her effort to go invisible. She had a feeling it might be the only way she could prolong her life until help arrived.

She waited there, in the darkness of the underground garage, to see if the hunting void out there would locate her again. If it did…then she would have some choices to make, and none of them looked good to her in the moment.

 

[Darth Aion]

​

The gnaw persisted.

If not as a constant hindrance to his conscious thoughts but as a lingering reminder that each movement he made was driven by the void within him. It lurked within his mind amidst his fractured memories, behind a shroud of hazy recollection that masked itself from rational comprehension, as though it sought to remain indecipherable as to it's true nature. Though it's true nature failed to stand as the present concern to him as he pressed onward, the gnaws desire to consume and erase the being that once again fled from him the only pertinent thought he felt permitted to fully comprehend. In the shadowed darkness of his mind even lucidity could not pierce the whispering parasites disguise.

​

Movement captured his gaze as he once again brought himself back to the reality that lay before him. His body had continued to move, the hungering void absently honing in on the burning essence, but once again was rejoined by awareness as the sight of a cloaked figure skittered across the cityscape before him. It clung to the shadows as a hunted animal would attempt to remove itself from the focus of the predator that sought it. Only it was her presence within the Force that betrayed her even as she sought to pull herself as far away from his lure as possible. What he understood was that she was a clever creature and would be a much more difficult sustenance to apprehend; though her options were wearing thin.

Not long after she had retreated into the underground complex, her presence in the Force diminishing to near non-existent, his cloaked figure would pursue though the hollow streets. The dirt beneath his feet crumbling away with each step, the occasional body literring the ground a reminder to a small fragment of his mind of what had trasnpired there even as his focus remained on the faint flicker that remained unsnuffed by the beings knack for Force manipulation. He knew not how long it would take him to reach her, the time transpiring far different in his mind than any other sensation that currently gripped him, though even that consideration would have fallen as inconsequential.

His conscious thoughts a blur and his sight narrowed into a fixated tunnel vision as he reached out into the Force once more to probe for the being that dared to present itself. That had dared to flee no sooner had it discovered his presence. Though, once again, sensation escaped the hollow machinations of his body the flicker of essence revealed itself to him against the deadened environ in which they both found themselves. The sensation of her life trickling through his fingers and arm as he drew closer, akin to a homing beacon as it pinged the location of it's desired target again and again from the darkness of space. Until finally, as his eyes scanned an disheveled garage, he came to stand mere feet from her with his rasped breathing filling the thinned air.

"Cease this pointlessness," he uttered hoarsley as he continued to scan the room with his eyes, his arms falling limp at his side while something much darker began to stir within him. Though she would not feel it at first, the void within him muddling his own presence within the Force, it would soon become apparent that the very air in the room began to wisp away as an aura of death began to creep forth from where he stood at the center of the shadowed room. What little light trickled in from machines that littered the room began to flicker, the hum of elecrtical current puttering away into nothingness, and a true darkness fell over the room as his figure began to twist.

Amidst this display, the liklihood that her eyes would fail her in the culminating darkness becoming more and more likely, she would see a faint glow of red begin to form where his head would have been. A glow that would drift, sway and then fix itself where she hid herself as it flowed with his movements, becoming a pair of red orbs piercing the darkness towards her small form. As the deathly waves permeated the room, causing the earth around them to shudder and groan, her essence had become the only lumination and it, dim as it were, it had led him right to her.

Oddly, however, as he closed the distance between them and came to loom over her small form the darkness and deathly air began to bleed away. For how long she felt it, how long it afflicted her being, would remain unclear to him as something else came over him while he listened to the whisper echoing through his skull. He hesitated, froze and lifted a single hand slowly to grasp at the mask that adorned his face. Moments passed, then prehaps a minute as the glowing orbs flickered, granting her an uncanny reprieve before they focused once more. Unbenkownst to her it struck even him strange though only briefly.

"Why," the only word that escaped into the returning, though thin, air on the grating waves that she'd recognize as the same hoarse voice that had reached her upon her arrival. "Tell.. me... why."

Revna​

 

[Revna]

Darth Aion


It was only a matter of time before the void which was hunting her found her hiding place. After remaining in the darkness and stillness for a few long moments, Revna tried to find a way out of the basement garage and into the building that rose many stories above her head, but the only entrance that would lead her upward was locked.

She could sense the approach of the yawning void in the Force, a black hole that shouldn’t have been, and the young woman realized that she had stupidly trapped herself in the underground garage. Revna took a deep, steady breath and exhaled slowly, turning to face the entryway to the darkened basement. Her sharp eyes pierced the shadows and she saw an even deeper shadow, and she knew that it had arrived.

The young woman went still and quiet, barely breathing as she watched the darkness intently. She kept her Force presence tight against her, hoping that this entity wouldn’t notice her hidden within the shadows …but she had a strange feeling in the back of her mind that it already knew she was there.

She heard it - him - speak, a hoarse rasping noise that slipped its way into her skull, freezing her in place. Everything about this darkened entity screamed death to her; she’d seen powerful Sith Lords up close and personal; danced with the Sith Empress, stood in the same room as the Emperor himself…yet this being stood out to her in a completely different, far more potent, manner.

Memories of her life flashed before her eyes, of thoughts and dreams that had yet to take place…but now seemed unlikely.

The little Acolyte remained frozen in place, and for the first time in a very long time…she sensed that fighting her way out of this was not an option. Perhaps she could appeal to this void, this creature…whoever this was, but she doubted it would work in her favor.

Revna felt something…strange…occur within the space that filled the basement. A chill of dire warning raced over her skin, causing her hair to stand on end as the stale air of the basement itself seemed to vanish and die as an invisible aura of death began to spread out from where the tall, shrouded entity stood. The little woman backed further away from the creature, away from the insidious grasping tendrils of destruction that sought her out like a thirsty man reaching for water in the desert. Light from various machines and terminals within the basement flickered…then died.

She blinked, noticing the figure warping in her vision, somehow shifting and contorting…before everything turned to impenetrable darkness that her eyes couldn’t pierce through. She backed away further, moving in near total silence, until her back hit the cold duracrete wall behind her. The fog of death was creeping closer to her, and she knew instinctively that its touch would spell the end of her…everything she had worked so hard for, everything she had struggled and fought for…all gone in the blink of an eye.

All because she had given in to her curiosity to understand what had happened in this city, on this planet. Now she knew, and all she tasted was bitter regret.

A red glow caught the young Sith’s eyes, and her vision locked onto it, watching as the red shifted and waved before it settled directly upon her. The red glow became two red orbs, and she could feel his gaze piercing through her, locked onto her.

The gig was up. There was nowhere left to run or hide.

She could fight back, but she knew she wouldn’t get far.

The area around the two of them shuddered and groaned under the might of the creature’s power. Revna felt an icy sensation begin to creep up her legs, as if her blood was slowly turning to ice. With it came a weakening sensation, and her heart fluttered in her chest, its beat erratic as the weakness persisted and then steadily mounted. She leaned back against the wall behind her, bracing herself so she didn’t collapse.

Strangely, all she could do was stare at those red orbs, knowing that the shrouded entity was the one responsible for making her feel this way. She now knew how the many dead souls she’d passed by had met their fate; in a way, she felt a measure of comfort in realizing that this was her end.

The touch of death was cold, but painless. She didn’t beg for mercy, she didn’t fight back, she didn’t speak…she just existed for what few precious moments were left to her. Sadness and sorrow filled her heart; she would never get the chance to tell her Mentor what he meant to her, never get to see her friend Zachariah again, never see her cousin Malum…

The tall void approached her in near silence, coming to tower over her as her knees finally gave out from underneath her and she sank to the cold damp duracrete beneath her, at the creature’s feet. She gripped her consciousness and held onto it in a vice-like grip; though weakened and tired, she wasn’t ready to give up quite yet.

Then…much to the little woman’s surprise, the aura of death began to fade and the chill slowly withdrew from within and around her. Revna tilted her head up to look at the creature who loomed above her, and blinked in silence at the pale white death mask that adorned its face.

She…she recognized it.

Icy cold dread filled every single part of her being. How…how…was this possible? He was supposed to be dead…gone, for many thousands of years.

…yet how was the Lord of Hunger standing before her now? And if this was indeed Him…how was she still alive and breathing?

The red orbs flickered briefly, before returning their malevolent gaze upon her. She remained on her haunches on the cold ground, and she tilted her head slightly when the creature spoke, demanding a ‘why’ from her.

Revna frowned in confusion. She opened her mouth to speak, but no words came forth for a few moments. Finally, she found her voice and summoned her courage to speak.

“...what do you mean, ‘why’? What do you want from me…?” came her soft whisper in response to his grating voice as she cast her gaze back to those lurid red orbs. “In fact...how...why...am I still alive?”

 

[Darth Aion]

​

A low hushed whisper.

Hushed it had become as he stood over the woman now crumpled on her haunches at his feet. It whispered incessantly against the recesses of his mind as he fixed his gaze with hers, a startled curiosity gripping those orbs that he now saw his own red glow reflected in them. Curiosity that readily masked other feelings and ambitions he had tasted upon her essence as it continued to course through into his core before it ultimately vanished, leaving only a hollow memory of an understanding of her in it's wake. Where he did not find fear he had found a measure of desire, understanding, knowledge and hunger; a palpable hunger that would have brought a twisted semblance of a grin to his face were any sensation still possible.

​

In the moments that followed her question, her retort to his own baseless inquiry, he found himself faltering for the words to answer her. Not due to the hushed voice that echoed within his mind, nor the immeasurable confusion that gripped her eyes as he stared into them, but rather his own failing understanding of just what he was. A shattered recollection of who he and what he was as he stared through the holes in the mask that adorned his face; a mask that he knew all too well whom he understood it to have belonged to. Only one name came from his fractured memory as his conscious thought traced a crooked path into his past.

Nihilus. The Lord of Hunger. The very issuance of the name into the forefront of his mind caused the glow of his eyes to brighten and the entirety of his mishandled form to shudder. How could he have forgotten the name of the whisper that clung viscerally to his mind? Have forgotten the urge that drove him to end the lives of each being that had lived on the world he and this small woman stood alone upon in isolation. Only there was no answer. No feasible reasoning that could be gleaned from his psyche that could manifest an explanation for the circumstance. A single word easily presented as a solution to his ponderings but one that he would not parse his tongue with even if he strained him so. Consequence.

Reaching up with one of his hands, the deadened sensation absent to him as he did so, he brushed his fingers against the bone white mask as he considered his thoughts. A gesture met with an unexpected sensation as his fingers, for the first time in over a century, tingled as they were grazed across the surface of what he had donned so many years ago in an effort to measure himself with the power of the Dark Lord he poured centuries of his life into understanding, into succeeding. Images of himself chanting the forbidden tongue, of him radiating unadulerated darkness into the mask and his own fingers bringing it to his face filled his mind. Only to be swiftly dismissed in the very same haste with which they had appeared, a mighty but recognizable reprimand of the whisper he now understood to be his knowledge of the Lord of Hunger within his mind.

"You... are different." He rasped, lowering his hand from the mask and to the space between the two of them as he harnessed the Force around her. What followed would have been a cold sensation as he once again probed her essence. Not to draw forth any further from her, an act that would most certainly have ended her, but rather to once again feel those same feelings that had stimulated his mind just minutes earlier. Her desire, her knowledge, each bringing a coursing vibrance to his core as he delved. It was the hunger however, her hunger, that again brought him to a halt as his attention was again brought back to her gaze. He did not understand how one so young, so restrained, could know such a hunger. Yet it matched his response to her in kind.

"I am... different." He echoed ever still and with a visibly fluid motion lowered himself to meet her gaze more clearly. His cloaked figure moving closer to her as if it was studying her like a scientist did an experiment in their lab. Though this study one that was far from what would be considered appealing with grant for the dire circumstance she found herself in. For the whisper again called to him, urged him onward and craved for him to bring an end to her existence. To draw what little essence she still contained and let her lifeless body fall to the floor.

A notion that fell on deaf ears however as memory of her essence brought about his lucidity once more.

"Tell me... child." He breathed in the same hoarse rasp that she likely had become all too familiar with. "What can you... exchange for your life?"

Revna​

 

[Revna]

Darth Aion


Silence followed Revna’s questions.

For a few heartbeats, there was no movement from either her nor the tall shrouded figure that towered above her. She still did not understand or comprehend how or why she was still breathing, and truthfully she fully expected to die once this creature’s sudden curiosity or muse vanished. She’d sent the distress signal and hoped that it would reach someone who could help her, especially Darth Strosius .

But she had a feeling that by the time her Mentor received the message and came for her, if he did, she would be cold and unmoving - her spirit long departed from this life.

It was a very odd thing to acknowledge in the moment: for all her budding power, her growing strength…she was nothing before this being and was utterly at his mercy. The fact that his mere presence had brought her nearly to the edge of unconsciousness and death was enough for her to understand the precariousness and fragility of life.

Cold, shallow breaths escaped her lungs, its presence wisping away from her with each tired exhale. She tried to summon the strength to rise to her feet - since she loathed to be at the feet of another - but she was just too weak, too tired, to do so.

Movement caught her attention and she refocused her eyes on the silent entity, watching as he lifted a hand to that pale, familiar mask…seeming to contemplate something, or perhaps even relive memories that Revna didn’t have the faintest clue about, and likely never would.

Finally, he spoke…the same rasping voice that sent chills over her cold skin, and answered her question as to perhaps why he had let her live. He felt she was…different? A difference enough to catch his attention, enough to spare her life for the moment at least. Her amber hued eyes, now darkened with exhaustion and fatigue, watched warily as one hand lowered to the space between them and she tensed when she felt his Force presence probe her own, a cold sensation dancing across her skin as he seemed to read her and test her.

Something must have caught his attention, for he looked back at her before speaking again in his hoarse voice, lowering himself down to almost eye level get a better look at her. It was a very disconcerting sensation, feeling so…scrutinized by a creature that held her very life in its grasp. He had said he was different, and it made her wonder…

Clearly…this wasn’t the Lord of Hunger of old. So who exactly was this being, this entity?

How had he come by that familiar bone white death mask that He had been so known for?

His voice drew her attention back to those red orbs that seemingly stared right into her soul. She felt like she could hide nothing from him, and her heart stuttered when the last of his words descended. She felt her blood, as cold and sluggish as it was, drain away from her face.

He wanted to know what she could give in exchange for her life. What was she willing to give up in order to be allowed further existence? Her mind went blank as she tried to think of a reply, a response. She had to be careful with what she said next; her response would either allow her to live, or would seal her fate and destroy her.

What…would a creature such as this even accept in return for allowing her to live? Revna swallowed the lump forming in her throat, its constriction painful.

“What can I offer to a being such as yourself that could take whatever it wants, whenever it wants? I am nothing before you.” she murmured, knowing full well that he could hear her.

“...what would you be willing to accept in exchange for letting me live?”

 

[Darth Aion]

​

The silence was deafening.

Against the small woman's haggard breathing and his own hollow breaths, the silence within the chamber that had almost been her would be tomb hung over them like a dismal ambience. Unheard yet screaming into their ears as if it desired to render them unable to hear anything more than the words that fell from their mouths. He had spoke his issuance, uttered the question that now stood for her to answer, but the words did not echo beyond the space between them. Lingering on the thin air like a somber lament that was ceremoniously met with her own that reeked of desperation; of submission that he felt grated upon the very fiber of her being.

Her will was remarkable, soundly embellished by the taste of her essence that had passed through him into the void within. Thus the words she spoke did not take him by surprise.

​

Once again he withdrew himself into a silent contemplation. His figure slacked from it's closeness to her and appeared to fall into a brief state of cold, callous observation. The orbs remained upon her but his thoughts drifted deeper into his subconscious as they sought for even the most meager of rational response to the inquiry that she had turned on him. He had not considered the possibility that she would issue a response. He shrugged away the air of desperation, chewed apart the slightest trickle of indignant resistance that came in the form of her own belittlement of self, and instead focused upon her words. What was he willing to take?. It was a question that once again ushered forth the whispers that rang from the corners of his mind.

Nothing. Was it's initial response as his figure shifted back forwards again, this time with his hand coming up to brush itself against the cold flesh of her face. A gesture that ended as quickly as it had begun as his hand retreated violently to his side and he stood at his full height once more. There was little she had that he desired, let alone that she could offer him, outside of the essence that coursed through her body. While dim as it was in that moment, his orbs practically seeing the low flicker of it through her death-ravaged visage. Yet the query clung to his mind in a manner that he would not readily cast away despite the protests of the whispers that bade him heed their call. It would have been easy to snuff her out, but he had tasted her ambition, rage and hunger.

And he desired to taste it again.

"Show me... your resolve." He rasped as he once again shifted his body and jolted a hand forth to pull her to her feet. It was a reckless gesture, one filled with an intent that could not be mustered without difficulty against the ailing condition of his limbs. He had not the strength that he once knew, the power coursing through him fed only by the life he had drained from the unfortunate souls that riddled the cities limits. Yet he did not falter in his attempt to bring her out of the pose he knew her to be so violently opposed. She desired strength and power but she lacked both in measure to oppose even the likes of him, though she did not lack the potential and resolve to seek it.

"Show me... and let me... taste of it again..." He continued, his orbs glowing brighter as he sensed the essence within her beginning to swell in the absence of his siphoning hunger. The whispers demanded her death then and now, but rationality demanded that patience ready itself for something far greater. A rationale that beckoned forth the very idea that perhaps one day she could feed him something, or even someone, far stronger than the small and frail woman that had barely managed to escape his power. She was not wrong in her assumption that she was a semblance of nothing before him, but that injustice did not define her. Nor would he let it.

"Even... nothing can become... powerful." His hoarse voice uttered finally as he took a step back to allow her a modicum of space to breathe, every fiber of his being screaming to draw in once more and drain away the precious life that brandished itself against the muted wall behind her. "I would... taste of that... power."

Revna​

 

[Revna]

Darth Aion


Once again, the entity that stood before her did not speak nor answer her immediately, but seemed to contemplate in his own way the response she had given him. Curiosity began to further build within the young Acolyte as she went between looking at him and averting her gaze; as dire as her situation was in the moment, she found herself wanting to know more about this creature, who he was, and what his motives were.

He had been so still that his sudden shift of movement startled her briefly, though Revna remained frozen in place as a black wrapped arm and hand reached out and she felt the briefest of touches against the skin of her face before he almost recoiled away as if he’d been burned, and returned to his full imposing height to peer down at her.

Revna waited in silence for his response, still as a statue - almost as if she was too afraid to move in fear of pushing him to tear what was left of her life force from her, but she also had the notion that if he had wanted her dead, then she would be.

That grating, rasping voice issues forth again as he seemingly had settled upon an answer to her questions, and much to her further startled surprise, he reached out and took hold of her, hauling her to her feet so that she was no longer sitting in such a lowered position before him. Her knees tried to buckle again and she had to catch herself on the cold duracrete wall behind her, but her strength and vitality were returning quickly and she found herself able to stand on her own feet unaided. Revna had sucked in a breath when he had reached for her, her heart almost coming to a brief stop before it raced away in her chest. She internally chastised herself for revealing such fear before this being, but it was the only response she could summon forth in reaction to the entity’s presence with her.

The little woman, so small even compared to his height, blinked at his response: he wanted her to show him her resolve?

Before she could respond, he spoke again and his words further chilled her as she digested what he had said, noticing the brighter hues to those glowing red orbs that almost seemed to reflect off the white mask that adorned his face, casting an almost lurid glow over its surface. He wanted to see her resolve, the very thing that drove her onward, so that he could…feed from it again?

The ghostly memory of his invisible touch of death ever so lightly danced across her mind, a reminder of the fact that he had nearly killed her in his attempt to pull that resolve, that vitality within her, into himself. He would have succeeded without issue, had he not stopped at the last moment possible, for reasons that she still didn’t understand.

The shrouded entity moved back away from her and gave her some space, speaking as he did so, a response to her choice of words when she said she was nothing before his own power. Revna blinked again, her mind churning as she processed and evaluated his statement.

Nothing could become something, could become powerful. She could become powerful. And she was determined to be so…if she lived to reach those heights.

The creature’s final words settled in over her mind, provoked her thoughts, her own ponderings. She wetted her rather dry lips, and drew in a shuddering breath and exhaled sharply, feeling more of her strength return to her as each moment passed. The haze of exhaustion was slowly ebbing away, and clarity was returning to her mind. The wheels turned within as she weighed the words spoken to her, the decisions that lay before her.

Choices she had to make here and now.

Revna regarded the shadow, the bone white mask, the red orbs that stared back at her without emotion, and she tilted her head to the right in calculation of his words. Her golden eyes narrowed slightly as thoughts danced through her mind, and connections were made. She saw someone, something, of great power before her…surely he contained knowledge and secrets she desperately wanted to know, hungered to learn, to absorb and make herself stronger.

Surely…what he asked of her was a small price to pay in return for what she could possibly gain from him.

“My…need…to become more than what I am now, will not let me rest until I attain the strength, the power, that I seek. I will do what I must to attain that.”

Revna paused briefly, averting her eyes for a moment before looking back at the dark, hungering void that stood so still and silent before her.

“I will offer…sacrifice…my own vitality, to you whenever you desire it…if you let me live, and if you help me attain the power, the knowledge, that I hunger for as well. What say you, Dark One?”

She hoped he would agree to her offer; it was the only thing she had to offer in exchange for her life. It was a beneficial symbiosis that could work for them both. She waited fearfully for his response…for she knew his answer would decide if she lived or if she died within the next few moments.

 

[Darth Strosius]

​

"And just what would you know of power?"

Meditation in his spare, and decidedly sparse, moments of relaxation was a matter of dual purpose. For one it allowed him to clear his mind and focus on his own power and presence with the Force, sensing the depth and aspects of himself that only he would ever be privy to. And the other of course would be that it allowed him to expand his sense of the Force to a far greater degree, enough to notice a disturbance halfway across the galaxy even. A disturbance that had made his eyes snap open and his concentration break as he moved to investigate at once.

One shuttle ride later and he had touched down in what was decidedly a dead city, the only possible cause of the unnatural silence being the powerful yet oddly hollow void within the city itself. He had been cut off from the Force before, where it was completely absent, but this was far different. Rather than outright lack of the Force this void seemed to be consuming it, drawing it into itself. He himself knew how to draw power from another Force User but this was something else entirely.

He chased the source of the void down empty streets and alley ways but he wasn't sure what he would find when he finally caught up to it. Despite that unknown factor, he was still caught off-guard as he found the culprit and found his apprentice right alongside them. And seemingly in the act of placating it no less.

"Or of the hunger for it?"

Darth Strosius felt his lightsaber slide into his hand almost without him needing to actually summon or reach for it at all., his thumb already hovering on top of the activation switch by the time he realized that he was holding it at all. "Your youth clouds your judgement Apprentice, we shall have a long discussion about reaching too far for that which lies within your grasp already after this." His hidden gaze then shifted from Revna to the living void before her, narrowing as his fingers reaffirmed their grip around the hilt of his weapon.

"And as for you, I do not take kindly to seeing my Apprentice cornered and threatened." As if in order to fully take the void's attention off of the younger Sith, the masked man rolled his shoulders and threw the mental covering of his power as he did so. An aura of pure wrath and pride poured from his being as the crimson blade in his hand ignited before being brought to point at the being before him. "Nor do I enjoy you donning such a poor imitation of the great Darth Nihilus. Explain yourself, now."

Darth Aion / Revna

 

[Darth Aion]

The echoed whispers grew louder.

Even as the silence of the room hung over them, leaving only her words to reach him, they grew louder and louder still. Understanding escaped him as his form shuddered backwards a half step and visibly jagged about away from her as separate thoughts clung to his shattered psyche. He contemplated her words, the answer she had given him and considered deeply the offer that she had made in exchange for her life, while another much darker consideration gripped a part of him that compounded itself far more deeply as it sensed something else before even he had. His form shuddered once more, the glowing red orbs of his eyes dimming and then receding to nothing as it happened and it would have felt as if his very essence had shifted.

Slow but more pointed movements brought his form back to face the small woman as it's empty eyes fixed themselves on her. As another power revealed itself, careening towards them as a sharp blade would into unprepared flesh, this thing ushered itself forward to meet it. Not as a defense mechanism of his own mind, the clear and violent chaos echoing off of him indicative of that, it was more of a response to much greater power. A power that made itself known as the snap hiss of a lightsaber ignored the looming silence of the chamber, splitting the thinned air with it's heat as words echoed through the chamber to it's ailed ears. This woman's master had come for her and now sought to confront him. Them.

​

The words that escaped the figures mouth were unclear at first. Jumbled echoes and hoarse uttering of a language that the trained Sith ear would have understood to be the ancient language of the Sith. ur-Kittât. It spoke chidingly to the new arrival, it's clear disrespect for it's apprehension and disapproval apparent as it slowly and, with a sickeningly inhuman gait, twisted about to face him. Unlike the glowing orbs that had met the smaller woman only dead hollow eyes met the Sith Lord before it. Instinctively it's hand reached up and clenched to bring the Force around the small woman where she stood. A singular remaining effort by a part of him that sought to honor the bargain she had made, as the new creature that stood in his place faced down the new arrival.

Again it spoke again, though this time a few choice words became clearer for the mind to interpret them. The langauge remained the same, twisted and ushered into the blackness that it encouraged.

"Krataa tok midwanottoi," it echoed into the wisps of air between them, it's own free hand twitching at it's side as it palmed for the lightsaber that laid there unused. Gripping it, fraily at first but with a bolstered intent that it fueled by drawing upon the essence it had drawn from this world in the prior hours, past days, the creature stood down it's would be challenger as its words continued to ring in it's mind as a chiding disparagment. It knew the name. He spoke the name. It understood the name. He was far from the truth but much closer to it than he could likely have known. Or at least that was what the creature wanted them all to believe as it stood amidst them, this new vessel decidedly effective yet mutable in it's condition.

"Nu-anjat," It spoke again, this time it's words using his voice, decidedly attempting to reach the Sith before him in a different manner before it's voice hollowed and again uttered it's natural intent. "derriphan." It echoed, practically screamed with an unsettlingly calm hush to the hollow proceedings of its tone. A tone met, itself, with the snap hiss of the lightsaber it gripped in it's hand and lifted with hungry intent to the space between them where it loomed with a warm hum beside the other that was pointed into the space between them. A notion that was met coldly by a new feeling as the entity began to passively siphon upon the essence of the earth beneath them through the crumbling duracrete, desperately seeking to bolster itself against the power before it.

"Show... nun," it echoed again, as its head eerily and coyly tilted to once side. "midwanottoi."

Revna / Darth Strosius​

 

[Revna]

Darth Aion // Darth Strosius


Several things happened almost all at the same time.

First, Revna noticed the reaction the entity had in regards to her words, and she had been waiting for his response - to either accept or deny her offer - when she felt and noticed a shift in his presence, his…essence. Those red orbs faded, only to be replaced by dark orbs of nothingness.

The change brought a cold wave of warning over Revna…something was different, something was…wrong. The entity that turned to face her now was somehow not the same, and she didn’t understand what had happened for it to change. For a moment, she thought for sure her doom had arrived, and she sucked in a breath as she prepared to feel that icy cold sensation stealing her life away again…

But then, she felt something that made her heart race with both trepidation and relief and her knees grew weak again as the familiar presence made itself known to her and the void who had her cornered. She didn’t have to physically see her Master to know that he had come, and she could have cried with the emotions that washed through her all at once: relief, fear, regret, joy, guilt...

Darth Strosius’s words reached her ears, and she cringed slightly. He didn’t have to yell at her for her to know she was in trouble. That relatively calm tone of voice and the assurance of the long chat he promised to have with her told her everything she needed to know. She wanted to retort back to him, but she wisely kept her mouth shut.

She had gotten herself into this mess, after all. She would have to face the consequences as well when this was all said and done.

The masked Sith’s attention then turned to the void, and she could feel him project a powerful aura of fury and pride - as if to distract the tall shrouded figure and draw its attention away from her. She stood frozen in place as her Master’s aura filled the space all around them. She knew he was powerful, but he had kept such tight control over his power, his presence, that when he released it like this it was enough to take her breath away. It filled her with both a sense of delight, as well as dread…especially when the crimson light of his saber filled the darkened space around him, casting a lurid glow through the area.

Tension built within and around the young woman; her Lord was displeased, and a fight seemed imminent. But fear also wove itself into that tension…if this creature cast its aura out again, it could easily kill both of them. Revna had no desire to see her Master die, nor did she fancy dying herself.

The entity turned to face her Mentor, and as it did so she felt the Force enclose around her, almost as if she was wrapped in a bubble. It wasn’t of her doing, and she assumed it was emplaced by Darth Strosius in order to protect her from whatever was about to transpire.

Strange, guttural noises seemed to flow from the void's mouth, sounds that turned into words though young Revna knew not what they meant. It was an ancient language, and she did somewhat recognize it as ur-Kittât, though that was as far as her understanding went.

The entity ignited a lightsaber of its own, and seemed to accept the challenge from Darth Strosius. The little woman held her breath as her eyes reflected the red light of both sabers, and there was fear and uncertainty there in her gaze. Her foolish curiosity had brought her here, and if this encounter led to her Master’s death…she would blame herself for it for the rest of her life.

Just like she blamed herself for her mother’s execution.

“Please don’t fight…I don’t want to lose you too…” came her whisper as the words fell from her lips. She wasn’t even aware that she had spoken at all, so lost was she in the memories from her past.

 

[Darth Strosius]

​

Darth Strosius clicked his tongue as the figure spoke, initially little more than incoherent ramblings and sounds in a dead language. The language of the ancient Sith to be precise, one that he had spent half a lifetime learning and bringing back into usage for his cult. They had never fully grasped it and made use of it as one would with Basic but they understood enough to listen to sermons spoken in the Sith tongue. Of course his own understanding far surpassed that of his followers. It was only fitting in his mind that Sith know the language of their birth.

"Tu aras tuscias." His response was simple yet it served as a perfect reflection to the other masked Sith's remark. Where the void spoke with hollow and echo the zealot boomed and filled, his words laced with a simmering wrath that burned brightly as if to challenge the drain around him. "Tu valia vartoti nuyak asmenys, zveris." He spat as the figure ignited a blade of its own. Darth Strosius adopted a tense and prepared posture, both hands grasping the hilt of his lightsaber as he held it in front of himself. Perfectly lined up with the center of his body, the red glow dancing across the dark metal and glass of his mask.

If this Sith had indeed taken inspiration from Darth Nihilus, as the presence of the void would suggest, then any duel would prove very difficult indeed. Attrition normally wasn't a factor for him to consider, between his regeneration and his physical enhancements he could duel for days on end if need be after all. But to battle against a constant draining force was something else entirely. Something that he had little to no experience in countering effectively.

His apprentice was still in threat though, and that he could not abide. Regardless of the consequences. "Tegu nun parod tu tiesa midwan." In a flash of movement that would have impossibly quick for most others to accomplish, Darth Strosius practically flew towards the void in a mad dash. While he couldn't hope to match it in regards to its draining capability he could still siphon what power he could from the energy that the void itself was drawing in. He had a feeling that any boost in power would be sorely needed as he thrusted forwards, seeking to impale the figure in one swift motion.

Darth Aion / Revna

 

[Darth Aion]

Hushed whispers roared into hoarse echoes.

Such was the dance that the Sith lords played. A dance macabre between monoliths within the voluminous wellspring that was the dark side of the Force. One that often found apprentices, students and peons standing sideline in an inadvertent display of powerlessness as these beings clashed. Regardless of whether it was mind or matter, wits or blades, these events were tantamount to staples for the ever flowing conflict that tested the passing of time. Where one had power another would always seek to either ursurp it, destroy it or contest it. Such was the way of the Sith and their creed.

This instance, however, was both similar and far contrast to that notion. As the master of the woman he had pursued stood across from him with words boasting prowess and contention, the entity chose to simply take it in stride. What had likely been intended as a mockery, hollow eyes drooping momnetarily to the blade positioning itself between the two of them in both the other Siths hands, came as nothing more than a recognition of its own perception. It expected nothing less from the master of it's perceived nourishment and gripped the saber in it's hand in turn with the motion of aggression that began to form; a gesture met with the lowering of its free hand away from Revna as it was accompanied by a hostile tone.

​

His opponents movement was swift and deadly, both in precision and execution. Aimed to impale with the vigor and force of something akin to a mad mans desperate dash at cataclysm. An attack that the entity compensated for with a twist of its black silhouette to it's right as the seething blade made purchase against the fringes of it's robes, the red glow bringing a vibrance to the bone white mask that adorned its face. Had his movements been any less apt, his siphoning of the earths essence slower, than it would have found its mark. This hardly made the attack any less troublesome as the silhouetted entity moved with a now fluid motion to counter what it knew could be a potential following strike.

Ducking beneath the blade, moving towards the left of where it had previously stood, the silhouetted entity executed a snap shuffle of it's blade from it's left hand to its right before the afforementioned hand rose into the space between them. Red, spectral tendrils burst forth from its palm and lashed towards the Sith that had made himself its opponent, its free hand rising outward slightly as it poised itself to deflect the Siths blade were it to once again seek purchase against its form. It dared not underestimate such furious intent but it cared little for the contempt it held in the face of its very nature.

For had he cared so much for this small woman he would not have allowed her to stray so far away from him. This was his consequence for a suggestably apparent neglect.

Revna / Darth Strosius​