Private A Pale Tongue

[Yuria Braay]

​

Detention Centre, Federal District, Coruscant
Even through all the pain the Sith's words pierced through Yuria's skull. She buried her face into the floor but the words continued, an oppressive barrage of threats that only made her feel smaller and smaller. As the Sith grabbed her throat she struggled to breath, heaving in and out. She grasped his forearm weakly, a paltry display of defiance. But what alarmed Yuria most was how cold and clamy his hand felt, like a corpse.

As she was tossed against the floor she let out a cry as another jolt of pain shot through her shoulder. She nursed it with a cybernetic arm, remaining in a crumpled heap where she was thrown. The Sith now loomed over her and the pain gave way to fear, a terror and loneliness she had not felt since she was child. It was all consuming.

"Please... no more... I'll behave..."

Darth Nexion

 

[Darth Nexion]

Nexion suddenly laughed. Not his usual one, but one that sounded more like he was laughing a joke told by a friend. He nodded and began to move away, using the force to flip the switch and brought the wall back between them, placing his test subject back in her pen. He sat back down and faced the window with a smile.

"See, wasn't so difficult was it? Now, onto a quick lesson."

He pulls a reinforced vial from a machine into his hands, though he clearly had no sense of caution with it as he began to toss it up and down will continuing to face the prisoner.

"Now this, is a nanogene spore. One I may have... borrowed from a lady called Darth Arcanix, I don't think she ever realised part of her research and supplies had gone missing in transit. Regardless, this little thing is what causing the changing of organic material to droid parts. Normally, the change results in lobotomization and lose of self. However I, being the kind and merciful Lord I am, have applied my own alterations to this strain of such a virus. As a result, the subject has no need for worry regarding their mental faculties."

He wasn't being completely dishonest. He had made alterations to it, and he had removed the lobotimizing effects the spore had. He'd even gone so far as to prevent it from being transmittable. He'd done all of that... for the most part. But, that was a surprise he felt more satisfied in revealing after the process.

"With it, you'll be able to morph your body at will. Once it's settled, you'll even be able to give yourself better limbs than you ever had before. Better internals as well. Well, little beast, aren't you excited?"

He placed the vial into a machine on the wall, one that seemed to be primed to dispense the spore into the cell is gaseous form.

_________________________________________________________________

Yuria Braay

 

[Yuria Braay]

​

Detention Centre, Federal District, Coruscant
Yuria despaired as the wall returned between herself and the door, freedom was slowly slipping from her fingers. She propped herself against the bedframe, wincing as she heaved herself up. She turned her focus back to Darth Nexion. She hadn't gleaned much from the lessons so far, the Sith lore was all so alien to her and she struggled to attach meaning to what he said. Still, she knew danger when she saw it and her eyes followed the vial as he tossed it up and down.

"Merciful lord..." she scoffed under her breath.

Organic material to droid parts. It made her skin crawl. She felt herself not only nursing her wound but feeling along her skin, feeling the sensation of metal on flesh.

"This sounds too good to be true." she replied, her words separated by shallow breaths.

 

[Darth Nexion]

"To a simple beast, it probably is. But, everything I say is true. I haven't the time for lies, they're a needless invention in my mind. Why bother with lies when all too often, the truth is a much harder pill to swallow? No, lies are not something I employ unless I am going off false information. In such a case, I am usually telling the truth as I know it."

He inspects the vial, ensuring it is securely fitted in place before raising his hands to it. Green smoke leaked from the pores on his hand and surrounded the vial, the nanogene inside changing to a pale green while doing so.

"Maggot of metal, rust, and rot. Sith life draws breath, old life does not."

With the incantation for Mechu Deru Vitae spoken, the nanogene was ready for implementation. He grinned the oh-so-familiar-grin his subject had probably come to recognise all to quickly as he looked to her in her pen.

"Well, my little beast, any last words before we begin the procedure? After the nanogenes enter your body, you'll likely go unconscious for a time. When you wake up, you'll feel like a new beast."

_________________________________________________________________

Yuria Braay

 

[Yuria Braay]

​

Detention Centre, Federal District, Coruscant
Despite the mockery, the humiliation and the defeat her Kuati pride remained and it demanded she stand to meet whatever was in that vial. With a groan she pulled herself to her feet, she tried standing to her full height but the pain in her shoulder prevented her. Slightly hunched would have to do. She watched as the vial shifted colour, as the Sith whispered his profane magic.

He made an offer for last words. She didn't like how that sounded, the finality of it.

"I hope to see the day when you find yourself standing where I am now." Her last defiance reeked of defeat but it was still defiance.

 

[Darth Nexion]

"Hehehe, ah, fighting words. You really are a little beast. I'm almost tempted to keep you in a cage in an estate I own, could be the start of a zoo. But, I am a man of my word, sometimes to my chagrin."

He pressed a button and the nanospore was released into the cell, the whole room filling up with a thinly veiled layer of pale green mist. Nexion kept an eye on the vitals of the subject, happy to see everything was stable so far. It didn't take long for the entire vial to be emptied into the cell.

"The spores should be entering your body any moment now, little beast. You may feel a few shocks or burns, some mild pain overall, but you should fall unconscious soon enough."

He looks to a clock on the wall and sees the time, rubbing his hands together and smiling like he wasn't forcing mutations upon somebody.

"Well, I think I'll go grab a quick bite in the next room over. I'll be back in a bit to check on you, little beast. Oh, and don't bother trying to leave now. Should you somehow escape, leaving before the process is complete could have side effects even I'm not sure on. Enjoy!"

He slipped into another room while leaving his subject to undergo her procedure, keeping an eye on things on the security camera he had.

_________________________________________________________________

Yuria Braay

 

[Yuria Braay]

​

Detention Centre, Federal District, Coruscant
She watched as the spores entered the room, at first like a mist, floating aimlessly in the air. She held her breath, a fruitless action but she had no other options left on the table. Then it coalesced like a swarm of bees. It darted from corner to corner looking for a new host.

"Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck." she swore under her breath.

It wasn't long until the swarm came for her. She tried to swipe it away with her hands but it was no use, the spores had sunk their teeth into Yuria now. At least the Sith said there would only be mild pain.

She dropped to the floor as her legs lost power and the agony commenced. She felt every fiber in her body twist and shift in ways they were not designed. Her hands mutated, fleshy growths shifted to metal and back, disappearing in and out of her body. She screamed as her body contorted, flesh ripped from bone melted to steel then back over and over again. She looked to her broken arm, watching it regrow before her very eyes, made from a patchwork of metal and flesh. No matter how much she cried the torment would not stop.

Soon the pain came for her mind as the spores reached her cybernetic brain. Her mind began to shatter, each time it reassembled only to break into a thousand pieces again. A profane language echoed in her head, words of the ancient Sith. Her eyes rolled into the back of her skull as the pain became too much and Yuria passed out. By then the virus had done its work, leaving the girl motionless on the floor, twitching ever few seconds.

It had felt like an eternity of pain. The clock had only registered ten seconds from infection to unconsciousness.

Darth Nexion

 

[Darth Nexion]

Quite some time had passed, a few days actually, and Nexion entered his lab to see his subject still unconscious. He knew she wasn't dead, he tried resurrecting her to test. When she didn't get back up, he figured she was still alive, and the vitals he took confirmed it. If he had to guess, he figured she'd wake up soon. Fully organic people may take longer to adjust, but seeing she seemed to be nearly 50% machine anyway, he thought it'd take less time.

"I'm looking forward to seeing the results, little beast. When you awake, you'll find yourself more than you ever thought you could be. Should you decide to get too rowdy, I always have insurance, if only to make things less of a hassle."

He leaned back in his chair, closing his eyes for a short nap while he continued to wait for her re-awakening.

_________________________________________________________________

Yuria Braay

 

[Yuria Braay]

​

Detention Centre, Federal District, Coruscant
The muted grey of the durasteel ceiling greeted Yuria as it always did every morning, contrasting so sharply with deep blues and azure oceans she dreamt about. Except this time the oceans hadn't been blue but a dark obsidian black. Instead of the usual morning grogginess she felt something else, something wrong, something eating away at her.

Yuria shot upright as she began to remember what happened. Her eyes darted around the room and she spotted him. Sat in his chair with the same dead smile that she knew and despised. She felt the rage building inside her, a burning desire to slice that smug look off his face. Then she felt it, something shift under her skin. The pain came back and she watched in horror as her hands began to twist into blades.

Anger turned to horror and everything in her mind screamed for it to stop. And stop it did, her hands became her hands again. Except they were not the hands she remembered. The metal of her arms seemed to always move, like an ocean's tides shifting and churning.

"What... what did you do to me..." her voice trembled with fear.

Darth Nexion

 

[Darth Nexion]

"Oh, you're awake. Glad to see you haven't lost your bite while asleep."

He stood, walking over to the window, his gaze piercing straight to her. The elation on him was practically unmissable, he was clearly pleased with the outcome of things. She seemed to have taken to things quite well.

"As for what I've done, I did as I said, little beast. I've given you a body, with power, unlike anything you've had before. What you do with it is your choice. Unless, you've come around to the idea of staying under my... care?"

He teased her, trying to get a rise at of her. He wanted to see if she would show him, and herself, what she was now capable of. The only way he felt he could do that was by getting her angry. Naturally, that was something he was always good at.

"I imagine if I present you to the Sith, I'd gain good standing. Maybe a nice fortune as well. Imagine, the whole galaxy seeing my pet project, and me with my own pet. How does that sound, little beast? You want that life, or do you want to see if you can get at me now?"

_________________________________________________________________

Yuria Braay

 

[Yuria Braay]

​

Detention Centre, Federal District, Coruscant
Pet. The rage began to well up inside of her. Beast. She didn't care anymore, that she was monster, that it hurt every time she mutated. All that mattered was tearing Darth Nexion apart. Her arms began to shift again and her eyes rolled into the back of her skull. Her eyes twitched as she endured the agony of it all. An aura of dark side emitted from around her as her hands turned to hammer heads.

She stood motionless for only a brief moment before she launched herself at the glass with terrifying speed. She struck it with both arms.

Thud.

The duraplex glass was of decent make, designed to stop criminals in psychosis from reaching their interrogators. She struck it again.

Thud.

This time the slightest crack appeared on the glass. Her hands warped again, this time joining to make a single hammer. She swung again.

Thud. Crack.

The crack widened, spreading across the width of the pane.

Darth Nexion

 

[Darth Nexion]

Nexion tilted his head in joy and fascination. Already a marked improvement. Wake up from a days long coma and already has the strength to start breaking down a reinforced wall. Brilliant.

"That's it, my little beast. Show me what you can do. I'm right here for the killing, unless you want me to continue tormenting you. Come on, pet, come one!"

It only took another swing for the wall to break and for her to leap at him again. She was faster than the days prior, so much so Nexion was using the force to amplify himself. He was no fool. She was faster than him before when he was not doing anything to protect himself. He knew she'd be stronger than she was and responded accordingly.

"You almost make it seem like you want to tear me in two. Can't say I've thought of dying that way before, but it may be interesting. Too bad my little beast is too weak and sloppy to kill me. Almost like you want this to never end. Hmm?"

His smirk was as wide as it could go, and his eyes lit up with joy upon seeing the test subject attack like a wild animal. However, he figured this state of animalistic aggression wouldn't last forever. She'd eventually come to her sense enough to really think things through, plan and strategize. Even so, she was already proving to be a success. Even still, he doubted she'd manage to kill him, especially with the few trump cards he has up his sleeves.
_________________________________________________________________

Yuria Braay