Caught In Chaos | Unknown World

[Darth Caedes]

​

Darkness | Act One | Chapter Two​

​

"There are many paths which lead to the dark side, Nejaa, and few which return thereafter. You must learn to seek out the correct path, the right path. But... right for you. A decision must be made first in your own heart before you can begin thinking about the greater good."​

​

Caught In Chaos;
Unknown World;
Crash Site;
[member="Cryax Bane"].

It was cold here, though not by ordinary standards, cold in the force. Even while flames no doubt lamented around him in ferocious licking curls, the broken box of a shelter-room skewed and broken from its ordinary axis. In turn, both Nejaa and Cryax were sitting at a heavy angle, turned all of the way sideways and kept in place only by the safety belts. It took a second before the ringing in his ears wasn't the only noise, longer still to register the pain his body was undergoing. All of him was tossed to the side, too weak and too tired to attempt righting himself for the sake of appearances. And currently he had no objective beyond catching his breath, assessing his injuries, the state of his weaker companion. A stumbling groan writhed through overly pinched lips, not yet able to think clearly or prioritize his actions. In breathing there was no pain, likely no internal injuries of note, only bruising and the searing pain rooted at the stem of his neck.

"Cryax," he managed.

Nejaa almost missed it, almost continued with his nervous surveillance of the blue creature- the sound of fire. Just as he had expected, a low whirr of dying engines, or engines long dead and now further deteriorating into something dangerous. "NnngCryax, get out," his voice a sputter, "undo... yer'belts." In a meek fashion he made gestured to his own belts, pointing to the buttons one presses in order to engage the release but not actually undoing any of his own. Moving his arm had come at the cost of a digging pain along his shoulder joint, forcing a hiss through gritted teeth. So the other arm moved, awkwardly swinging from under his body weight and bending as necessary so as to release the first and second belts. Freeing himself up, Nejaa swung for another pass, this time removing all two... one...

Nejaa's body lurched and fell forward, a bitten squeal and he flailed as much as he could in order to avoid disaster. Not yet used to having dominion over only of his left arm he struggled, only managing to right his descent in the last moments and fall with his feet facing the ground. It didn't matter, uneven surfaces in dark slopes caught him off guard and sent his knees crunching in on one another. His face hit first, forehead smashing into the edged corner of the metal supply kit- of course- hot, sticky blood ran down and quickly into his eyes, making him blink to no avail. "Gaahhh...!! hhHHhhhnnggk!!" The beginnings of offensive expletives with origins in numerous languages, though cut off by irritation and pain mixed together. Towards his upper thigh, where the muscles of the groin join those of the leg, his stolen pair of lightsabers had dug in deep temporarily freezing his leg in a pain solved only in the hope of time's healing.

"... Careful... the groundhhh... uneven..."

 

[Cryax Bane]

"Cryax,"

Cryax heard the voice first. Soft and pained. His head lolled around on his neck like a slack marionette. Then a gasp fled his lips, as his head shot up, red eyes widening, but unfocused.

"Huh, wha? Where?" groaned the Chiss. His brain cells malfunctioned like a broken motherboard. What was this nameless place? And why was there pain in every nerve ending of his body? Like a Holo film that had been cut and paste together in the wrong order, the events of the last day came flooding back to him, filling his nervous system with a barrage of confusing emotions. Nejaa in the morgue. No, not the morgue. The courtyard on Kashyyyk. A narrow escape in his Sith Infiltrator. A giant cobalt ball, a mystery planet that eluded the ship's radars. What little food he had eaten in the last twenty-four hours threatened to rise into his gullet as it dawned on him. He and Nejaa had crashed.

Nejaa. Cryax gritted his teeth at the thought of him. The beautiful, but karked up Jedi, with his wide set brows and strange accent, had brought him nothing but pain and indignity. To add insult to injury the boy couldn't even keep his ship in the air. It served Cryax right for trying to make a toy out of a tiger.

Cryax stared at Nejaa slackjawed as the boy signalled to his belt, ordering him him to get out, a feat he wasn't quite sure how to manage. Right now his everything hurt. The thick smoke that choked the air and threatened to violate his lungs spurned him into action. Controls were fumbled with, then the Chiss tumbled out of his seat.

"Urrrrrrrghhhh..."

With a thump, Nejaa joined him on the floor of the cabin. The boy was hurt and bleeding, but Cryax shrank from him, feeling the acute urge to flee well up like a tidal wave. Moaning, Cryax began to crawl away from Nejaa. Away from the flaming cabin. From this whole fething situation. Being stuck with a Moactan Teel who detested him, who only wanted to keep him alive to punish him over and over for what he did to his helpless captive at the Happyland Morgue. Bane could escape. He was wealthy beyond belief. He would offer someone a ridiculous amount of credits to take him back to the seedy shadowports of the Coruscant Underworld.

Ahead, there was a hole in the ship that he could climb out of. It was right within his reach...

...but the ground was thousands of feet away.

[member="Nejaa Niynx"]

 

[Darth Caedes]

Caught In Chaos;
Unknown World;
Crash Site;
[member="Cryax Bane"].

Nejaa's... counterpart... had similar luck in dismounting the strap laced seating, falling more than anything else and catching himself on the odd and uneven angles. Of course Cryax hadn't found the only unpadded surface in the pod as Nejaa had, and therefore only soft walls and flooring would catch him. Nejaa cursed under his breath, a testament to his own frustration, eyeing the chiss in a rather predatory way. Here, like this, he couldn't unleash any form of wrath, nor beg for mercy against whatever fate this was. Even while the blue alien writhed for a torn apart make-shift exit, Nejaa moved for the main hatch's control panel, slapping a beaten open palm against one of the four dimly lit buttons. Sssshhhhhh. Faster than he had expected the door shot to one side, catching on something so as to stop it before completing its movement. The dull pull of the door's motor voiced its failed efforts to open the door further- though the result was an innate puttering out, accompanied by a meager trail of light colored smoke.

"C... Cryax..."

Something in Nejaa's voice was different, as if without emotion, as if without anything beyond earnest dread. "We need to," he began again, "we really need to move," his head fell back wide eyed. "Make'yer steps light." The suggestion may have seemed out of place but it would all make sense when Cryax saw what Nejaa had. Above them both, as if looking up through the throat of some being, was the wide gaping tunnel of the Scimitar's main infrastructure. Enough damage had torn away most of the exterior shell, leaving only an open ended hole. Thick bars of crude metal stuck through the hull, puncturing in on what was left of walls. Darkness lay in wait, disrupted only by the uneasy swaying motion. They were hanging, hanging from something, some structure. The sound of shifting masonry outside meant their current situation might be highly impermanent. The both of them needed to move now. Letting the alien move of his own accord wouldn't be fast enough, so Nejaa pulled through his right arm- the useless arm, barely letting it rise. Absent fingers curled, willing the force to take hold of his weaker link and quickly, if not jerkily, raise and drop him at a higher elevation. Where the flooring evened out a bit more, closer to the holes opening. But not all of the way at the top, god forbid Cryax be the first to embrace whatever unfortunate world they had fallen in on. Giving pull to whatever hold he had, Nejaa yanked himself upward and through, climbing with but one arm until he had caught up to the chiss and pushed quickly beyond.

Outside lay wreckage of the less desirable sort. Stonework, bricks, thick synthesized materials and industrial metal framing. Most of it had already been collapsed, more than likely, none of it looked new. Vines and plant life, dirt in small deposits and numerous layers of newly distributed dust gave the inside of the dark room an ill mannered first impression. Nothing looked to be inhabited, or like it had been inhabited in ages. The fauna looked relative to that found on worlds like Endor, or Alderaan, green leaves and deeper green mosses. Flames bit through the darkness in low, moving light, barely giving vision to a series of burnt out doors and collapsed desks. Old technology. The night air was cold, sending rushes of shivers up and down his spine. Almost louder than his ear's ringing was the deafening silence- the strange, sour-musty smell to the air. He spoke in forced whispers without reason, every muscle in his body flexed and in the ready. Beyond the physical, his senses tingled with a more putrid awareness- an anxiety which didn't come with explanation.

Like something... or many somethings were watching them...

"Don't try eni'thin... you're safer with me, Cryax."

 

[Cryax Bane]

As he slowly squirmed through twisted metal, Nejaa's voice was a far away vibration, background noise. Cryax was hellbent on liberation, the only order was his adrenaline telling him to go go go. Pretending the Jedi wasn't there, his fingers sought out spaces that weren't jagged, iron-hot, or sloping into a fiery doom. He felt those invisible claws grab him, and yank him back. NO. The Chiss began to complain.

"Grawrrrrrgh!"

He was lifted up again into the air, his feet dangling helplessly, as he was deposited where Nejaa wanted him on the more even section of the floor.

"Stop!"

A flashback came unbidden into his mind. A small blue child on Soontir, pushed down into the dirt and kicked by older, stronger boys. The boy had been made a mockery of over and over again, and only punished more severely when he stood up for himself. Bane wrinkled his nose, grunting away the painful memory.

Once he felt the release of Nejaa's ethereal grip, Bane lost it. A hiss of breath shot through clenched white teeth. His red eyes flashed with a deep and murderous spite. Cryax ran after Nejaa, ignoring the chilly night air of their new surroundings. The Chiss put a trembling hand on Nejaa's shoulder and whirled the boy around to face him and with flecks of spittle jetting from his lips, screamed.

"DON'T TOUCH ME AGAIN!"

Bane's face was dripping with rage. All of his mixed emotions came flowing out like the jumbled code of a virus.

"I was a sucker for your pretty face," he growled. A finger jutted out to press into the Jedi's chest. "That was my biggest mistake. You're a more horrific monster than I am, by far. You're...you're..." He couldn't find the words. In his mind there was simply a flood of red. He shook his head vehemently, as his movement would stir them out.

"You're ugly inside, Nejaa."

[member="Nejaa Niynx"]

 

[Darth Caedes]

Caught In Chaos;
Unknown World;
Crash Site;
[member="Cryax Bane"].

Bane's insanity pushed nails through Nejaa's mind, his words like crazed blasphemy, the desperate blast of intangible logic and strung together half truths. The devil, pointing at him, blaming him for the misery Cryax had brought onto himself. Nejaa had shrugged it off in its origin, but as Cryax continued to spit ill informed curses at the youth he grew less and less able to quell the rage beginning to boil deep inside his gut. That which kept Nejaa alive for all of these years screamed for him to focus, urged him to take note of his surroundings, gain location, save the pair. The other half, the pit of passion capable of terrible things wished to eternally silence the beast he had been chained to. It wasn't enough to have the inept organic strapped to him, he had to be clawing at the idea of escape, writhing in misplaced anger, accusatory and confused. Even with the odd confession, the demands not to be touched, Nejaa remained silent. Remained present. They weren't on any world he recognized, nor could he properly identify any of the trademark styles of various cultures. Being taken out of hyperspace in such a forceful way left him anywhere, theoretically- but this. It was ruin, decaying stone structures, odd chunks of conformed metal which looked equal part machine and toy.

"You're ugly inside, Nejaa."

Fingers gripped into a fist, tight enough nearly to draw blood where nails dug into the exposed flesh of his palm. He tried, but his efforts were disintegrated before they had even finished their pleading grown. Spinning round and throwing his fingers towards Cryax, Nejaa spat back with enough venom to melt through the composure of even the Jedi Order's Grandmaster. "You know nothing of which you speak, beast." He didn't call on the force, needed not torture the fowl excuse for sentience. His oncoming verbal assault drew him ever closer, coiling with that ever present storm of dark side energies. Powered by a hatred which rivaled no others.

"You... you who would beat me down, strip me of my dignity. Prey on me under a slumber of your creation, steal my body without my permission, tear me from the vows I lived my life to upkeep. You who would touch me, think yourself worthy to subjugate others around you on your whim. You... who put this explosive in my neck, and ravaged my connection to the force by use of your fething tricks and collars..."

By the time he had finished Nejaa was close, close enough to reach out and crush the chiss with his single, outstretched hand. Seething, his face was bent into a wrinkled, near misshapen expression. His eyes did not only see through the chiss, they burnt everything within, literally enveloping the man opposite him in the corrosive feed of pitch black energies which could almost be seen even in the night.

"You have no right to demand anything, no right to protest, no right to express whatever pain I inflict upon you. What I am capable of is punishment, and it's punishment you deserve in far more forms than I have the patience to administer myself. Unfortunately, because of your curse, I am tasked with keeping you on the cusp of life-- what I do, I do to protect you, Cryax Bane. When I move you, when I command you, it's because that is how you'll live... that is how I'll survive."

Nejaa spoke that name as if it shouldn't be given voice. Like a forbidden word which pained him to hear. He might have continued, the anger meeting infinite support as it spewed from his curled lips, but he was interrupted by a deafening crack. Around the base of his totaled starship the floor began to sink into deep depression and splits in the earthen material were growing rapidly larger. With a dawning feint of realization, and in dramatic irony, Nejaa reeled his hand in a backwards shot and tugged Cryax by the loose collar of his shirt. "Move, get out," but he couldn't even speak fast enough. Below them both the flooring groaned before all at once caving in. A screeching array of metal sounded as the Scimitar was levied from its hold and dumped out of the skyriser's side to plummet to the ground below. He couldn't focus on it all, and the war to battle his instincts left him in delay, unable to prioritize his or Cryax's safety before the other. A violent push sent the blue skinned man bouncing roughly into the safety just out of reach of the floor's collapse... while he fell. Chunks of infrastructure much larger than his own body crushed anything and everything around him. In a maddening twirl of his body and kicking attempt to right himself, his screams drowned under the tough booming of chipping duracrete, Nejaa landed and several piles of debris landed atop him. Shielding his face with the pathetic guard of cross shaped arms, the boy was covered.

Cryax, still on the floor above, would have landed just on the other end of a now half fallen apart doorway, the door long since having broken down into a layer of compose now lining the floor. Belching clouds of thick sediment had been kicked into the air, dust and other, less pleasant smelling fumes as well. Even as the thudding waterfall of bricks and blocks ended, the descent of their transport, the Sith Infiltrator, echoed as it hit the ground below. Glass shattering as it hit the buildings side and tumbled finally to meet its end.

There... in the distance... the noise was met with another. Like insects in the night, a single high pitched wail let loose into the night. Then another, and another, then, all at once, an army of voices bellowed in primitive response. Distorted, sweltering roars, angered, interested. Hungry. It wasn't human, it wasn't even sentient, it was overwhelming even through such a distance.

They weren't alone here...

 

[Cryax Bane]

The look on Nejaa's face as he chastised Cryax for a what seemed like an endless amount of time, made his skin crawl. His head was flooded with an image, Vong bodies, slick with blood and viscera, heaped in piles on the ground of the courtyard on Kashyyyk. Bane knew what Nejaa was capable of if you pushed him over the edge. Although he fumed inside, glaring back at the Clawdite with a knot of hurt making a deep crease in his handsome blue brow, he did not make a retort. It was useless. It was going to be Nejaa's way or the highway, until Cryax escaped. And he would escape.

Despite Cryax's cowed posture and pouty expression, the Clawdite continued to denigrate him. The snarling boy was now an unstoppable harbinger of wrath. The young man's rage-infused face loomed closer and closer until it seemed as if Nejaa were about jump right into Bane's skin like a demon that needed a host. When Nejaa spit his name as if it were sacriledge, Bane looked away. His fingers clenched, forming fists. If the fething brat didn't shut up, Bane was going to smack him. He could just feel it.

Suddenly, there was a crack and a long, unearthly groan from the belly of the Scimitar. Or the scraps that were left of it. Fire had weakened the durasteel frames of the ship, and the vessel began to tip forward. Bane's arms shot out as he began to slide downwards. Nejaa tried to hold onto him, grabbing at the collar of his shirt, but like a ragdoll, the Chiss was tossed around amid descending pieces of ship and building, all falling victim to gravity's change of plans. When the dust settled, Cryax opened his eyes to look down and see Nejaa lying underneath a hillock of debris. Was he...ok?

Something else drew his attention. A strange sound coming from below, one that got louder and louder until it reached a sickening crescendo. The Chiss' red eyes pierced through the dust and haze left in the Scimitar's wake and saw them.

Thousands of eyes staring back at him.

Hooking his blue hands around the edge of the hole, Cryax lowered himself down, his legs dangling precariously under his torso. He landed with an oof, and then turned to work on removing the rubble. A hand was gently placedon Nejaa's head, a light tousling of his hair to try and rouse him awake. Then came a hurried digging as he began to desperately try to free the boy.

"Nejaa! Wake up. C'mon, Nejaa. Wake up!"

If there was ever a time that Cryax needed the Jedi Knight, it was definitely now.

[member="Nejaa Niynx"]

 

[Darth Caedes]

Caught In Chaos;
Unknown World;
Crash Site;
[member="Cryax Bane"].

Dirt clogged Nejaa's ears, layers of nearly ancient sediment covering his tightly closed lips, lining the entrances of his nose. Should he attempt to open his eyes, they'd be covered in rough sands or miniaturized chunks of stone. His hands were warm, pressed over the lower part of his abdomen without having thought about it. They were very warm. Wet and slippery, and he was in pain. Something stung. Something else had fallen heavily atop Nejaa's leg, pinning it place and eliciting a quickly muffled scream. In the end luck had kept him alive, as the heavy metal support beam which should've fallen on him was propped up and set askew at an angle by something else larger than, and close by to Nejaa. In fact in the end it was this oddly formed barrier which had shielded Nejaa from the other weighty debris. Attempting a groan, he found that his throat stung. At first he couldn't make sense of what happened around him, why things were moving, and what that noise was. His mind was caught in the delusion of shock, only fully recognizing where he was and what he was doing when he heard the familiar voice. He felt a hand on his face, and through his hair, and again that something wanted words with him, but Nejaa could offer none of those. More weight was lifted from his torso, from over his legs and the left shoulder. Someone was helping him, or something had found him.

"Cryax..."

Again, Nejaa tried to raise his arms, but he couldn't. Not effectively at least, his movements were like those induced by drunken stupors. "Hel," he gasped, a gaping word as if speaking hurt and he couldn't complete 'help.' Another hand lowered through the central lines of his torso to where he had suffered some form of laceration. "Help me-- nngck-" He clutched randomly for the chiss and ended up catching his arm just above the elbow, holding on without much conviction. "M... my... mm'leg." The darknes which presented itself around them was lost to Nejaa, the cackling gibberish of distant, gurgling cries. The stench of the dark side and ordinary head splitting pain of disturbance. He hadn't near connection enough to accomplish a passive vision through the force. And so he hadn't sensed it, them, those things. Whatever they were. Whatever they could be with noises like that- noises only the chiss would have heard. His breathing was formed by coarse tones and his hand wouldn't let go of Bane's arm unless the blue creature shook it off.

 

[Cryax Bane]

The voice in Cryax’s head that whispered the mantra of escape had quieted down, and was now a petulant muttering. Self-preservation always at the forefront, the Chiss knew that he’d never make it on this planet without the powerful Jedi Knight. But there was something else, something he wouldn’t readily admit. Bane’s heart was tainted with several different poisons. Sith magic. The syrupy corrosion of abuse. The sight of Nejaa buried and mangled, tugged at whatever was left of it. The cacophonous chattering of the creatures outside faded away as Bane’s focus was pinpointed on freeing Nejaa from the wreckage. A blue-skinned hand covered his mouth as a thick miasma of smoke clouded his face and clogged his lungs. He began to hack and sputter, ejecting blackened phlegm. By the Maker, don’t pass out now. He felt a gust of night air hit his cheek and turned to gulp it down. Dropping his gaze back to the clawdite, he put a hand on Nejaa’s forehead and brushed it across his brow.

“Hang on, Nejaa,” came the soft quavering tenor. “I got you.”

Wary of making Nejaa’s wounds worse, Cryax gingerly cleared the dust and rubble off the Jedi’s face, then began to work on his body. It might take longer than it would were Bane gifted with the Force, but he would extract the Clawdite from this prison.

Beads of sweat dotted his forehead as he dug. When he heard the boy cry out about his leg, the Chiss turned to see a triangle-shaped piece of debris laying atop his leg. With a grunt, Cryax gripped the piece of wreckage and hoisted it slowly off the Clawdite’s leg. His eyes widened with horror at the pulpy flesh that lay underneath it.

After a few minutes of digging, the exhausted Chiss finally freed the Clawdite. Sweating profusely, Cryax hooked his hands underneath the Jedi’s arms and pulled him to his feet. The heat and smoke were threatening to overwhelm them both, and despite fears over further injuring Nejaa, Cryax draped his arm around the boy and began to help him hobble out of the wreckage.

“Can you walk?” he asked, a deep knot of worry in his brow. He gazed out over the writhing sea of beings that amassed about a mile away.

“More importantly. Can you fight?”

[member="Nejaa Niynx"]

 

[Darth Caedes]

Caught In Chaos;
Unknown World;
Crash Site;
[member="Cryax Bane"].

Each rock removed was replaced with a boulder, each slate of wood, three more. Or so it seemed. Cryax's inability to use the force, his bind to such weak physical heights, it was more horribly evident here than ever before. And even while he did try, Nejaa understood this burst of energy came only from the natural fear of losing one's life. Nejaa related more than he'd care to admit, though such adrenaline wouldn't fix him now. The force lay in shambles around him, unable to rise and take claim of power through such a wounded conduit. Debris which he could have easily picked up and tossed aside in good health now crushed him with lethal, blunt force. In gasps of pain, Nejaa aided Cryax with instructive shouts jumbled together in half words and broken phrases, some of which weren't pretty. Don't touch that, my arms, careful, and last, my leg. He was gnarled, bent forward in his valiant efforts to rise. At first he tried leaning on things, but nothing was stable enough to process his weight, all shifting inanimate objects which had only seconds ago pledged to kill him. Bane, the devil, was the exception. Whatever army of inhuman wailing voices rang a wave of chaos around them, far off echoes sounding as different groups reacted to the incoming noise at delay from one another.

"Help me."

Nejaa commanded bluntly, almost falling forth into a series of unsure stumbles. With shaking composure, Nejaa slung himself onto Cryax's frame, one arm around his shoulder, relying on him to hoist his more injured side. He did this instead of answering, forcibly ignoring Cryax's questions. He didn't have heart enough to give the truthful words, that he couldn't fend off much anything. The force worked in tandem with one's own mind and body, especially in the far off or less known systems of study he'd undergone. The beasts, or, whatever they were, howled again, another long term bellow of chanted quacks and gawks. Nejaa's vision was fleeting, eye lids dipping in one each other, dust and sand tearing atop pupils and causing boiling tears Nejaa could only hide by avoiding eye contact altogether. With each new noise, new pitch of strained note or product of deformed vocal chords, his heart sunk further into his chest. Blood already washed the inside of his mouth, the backs of his lips were already too torn to begin chewing them- and his teeth sore from one too many blocks of duracrete falling over his face. A swath of further cuts and aesthetic gashes lined his face and body, tearing clothes and staining them with dirtiness. Only moments ago pounds of dust had been dumped on him, dust which had accumulated over time enough for rock and infrastructure to be violated by plant and wild life, erosion and sinking deformities. Whatever surrounded them, it was coming closer- they. Far too quickly to outrun in their state.

"We must move."

Although the incapable one, Nejaa insisted on forward movement. Much of the building was cast in similar rot. The technology wasn't ordinary, instead ancient. Instead of turbolifts, or gravlifts, there were only stairs, much to Nejaa's dismay. Terminals which sat atop wooden desks, with screens, some of which were broken. In many rooms the desks had broken or fallen apart, their respective terminals laying in pieces which had for years been incorporated into the ruin's odd biome. Under their feet were inches of flimsies long soaked and dirtied to mush for stepping on, mosses, a dryer top layer of sediment. Another shriek sounded at the second to last step of their third collective stairway causing Nejaa to flinch and cling fingers round Bane's no doubt fatigued shoulders. "Feth, they're fast." The howling continued this time, sounding as if whatever torn apart sea of stalkers hunted them had finally caught up, and they were thrilled by the idea of giving chase. Nejaa swore again under his breath, something technically derived of hutt dialects though a common enough explicative, then something from his home world.

"Yrrgona sleth, chūpid e'koni."

Then, "we can't out run them, we'll never make it." As if in contested answer, there was another moan, lower than most of the other noises, but so, so much closer. The noise came not as a distorted far off, and instead filtered in from somewhere inside- all specifics and details bounced around the room and into impossibility. There was too much dull, numbed darkness around them for Nejaa to see through whatever evil surrounded them, certainly unable to detect individuals among it. Tugging Cryax's arm and shifting his weight, Nejaa pointed with one weak left arm. "There, go there." They had come out and into a larger room, lined with the entrances to more, smaller rooms and whatever they led to. It could have been a shopping center before, or a mall strip, hundreds of years earlier. Nejaa pointed to one of the branching rooms. A metal fence had long since guarded the room's interior, despite it's weave of intersecting black diagonals one could put your arm through. Perhaps whatever creatures still thrived here no longer possessed interest in what lay beyond such points. It might have suggested a lack of intelligence in their opponents, but Nejaa had already told himself nothing so readily able to project such savage noises could be sentient.

"Mh'lightsaber. We'll cut through. We have to hiide--"
"Guuaugghaaauuaakkkkssthh."

They had to hide.

 

[Cryax Bane]

The environment that trapped the two men was strange. Where were the turbolifts? The Holocallers? The maintenance droids? The doors to the building's different rooms had strange hand levers instead of wall terminals. A good deal of the furniture was made of wood, not unlike the kind seen on the planet of Wookiees.These anomalies began to make Cryax feel somewhat dizzy as reality suddenly did a turn. Don't scream. Don't scream. Don't scream. Don't scream. Focus on keeping Nejaa alive. The boy's body had been crushed badly, leaving only a trace of the man who had been there before the crash. Even the tone of the boy's orders had lost some of their authoritative tone. The Jedi's voice quavered, and there was a wet, croupy sound in his lungs everytime he breathed in. Cryax didn't like it one bit.

"Hang on. I got ya," said the Chiss, keeping his voice upbeat and soothing, in order to somehow offset the graveness of the Jedi's injuries. He slung his arms around the wounded Jedi as the boy draped himself along the Chiss bony shoulder. He was now Nejaa's life raft. As he tried to ignore the wicked jabbering that whispered through the air, he only hoped he could stay afloat himself.

As they made their way through the many-roomed structure. Cryax saw movement behind a strange wooden bench in the middle of the structure. It sat opposite circular, concave slabs of duracrete that seemed to once have contained a many-tiered fountain. There were wooden benches all around them, and Cryax gingerly deposited Nejaa on one. His eyes trained on the dim shape he saw behind the bench, Cryax crouch-walked over to a pile of debris and grabbed a slightly bent metal pole that had a pointy, jagged end. His adrenaline spiking, he made his way to the bench. Suddenly with a loud gargling sound, the creature showed its face.

It was a female Twi'lek, or had been anyway. Most of her was markedly unlike any Twi'lek he had ever seen. Instead of eyes that sat in the middle of her face, she had round orbs that stalked out from the place her eyesockets would normally be. Her eyes were bloodshot white orbs that sat atop the waving stems. The creature's arms were normal, as was her torso, but where her legs should have been there were thousands upon thousands of tiny tendrils, like a sea anemone. They branched out like feelers, turning and rolling upon one another, carrying her quickly towards the Chiss. A jaw unhinged itself to show row after row of long, needle- sharp teeth. The mutant Twi'lek grabbed Bane, holding him with a preternatural strength, and leaned her head, trying to tear a gash into his neck.

With a grunt, Cryax raised the pole high over his head and brought it down right in the middle of the Twi'lek's torso, impaling her. He kicked out with his boot, at the same time pulling back on his makeshift weapon, and released it from the middle of her chest cavity, which began to ooze black blood. Her body fell backwards with a thump, her head lolling to the side, eyes like a dead fish. He had speared her right in the heart on the first try.

[member="Nejaa Niynx"]

 

[Darth Caedes]

Caught In Chaos;
Unknown World;
Crash Site;
[member="Cryax Bane"].

The galaxy wasn't meant to give birth to such a creation, the twisted face and blue sack-like tendrils of swollen and inflamed flesh. At first Nejaa hadn't given the abomination any particular origin species, so it came as a sickening moment of realization when he saw what Cryax had so instantly identified. Before all of this, before infection and mutation, the thing had belonged to a designation he knew well- it, she, was a twi'lek. Hissing an unnerved whimper of caution to his companion, Nejaa shrunk backwards against the bench as if in hope that doing so would further conceal him from his surroundings. Here, in the open, he felt exposed, and even though he couldn't see them, he felt eyes scouring his body. Looking at him, staring through him. Hungry and obsessed. "Careful, Cryax!" He managed in an effort to shout, though managing little more than a hushed whisper. The chiss was no combatant, not in the ordinary methods at least, but this creature fell before him nevertheless. Its dying shrieks gave wake to another awful upheaval of voices from below and around, warning that they were seconds away from being surrounded. In fact in places too far off and obscure for light to reach Nejaa could already hear rustling noises, feet, and dragging torsos.

"Hide, we need to hide, now!"

Bane was no fool, returning quickly and dropping the metal weapon he'd fashioned in favor of Nejaa's sunken body. Directed by more than a few directional gestures and quick, flying suggestions, Cryax ignited the green emerald blade of Nejaa's newest lightsaber and opened a gap just small enough to shuffle through in a gated shop entrance. But nothing was fast enough, not with the cumbersome weight of a limp body laden on Cryax's shoulders, so as the metal fell away to clang loudly on the duracrete ground their predators groped and grasped into view. Horrible creatures, blues and greens made dark without light. Before Nejaa issued the rushed command to withdraw the lightsaber's blade, he had seen hundreds of beady eyes turn to behold the two. Food, such delicious food. In horror, Nejaa pushed backwards, fingers gripping on the black clothes he had given Cryax not hours earlier. In truth, not seeing them was no better than beholding what monstrous hostiles mawed, tugged at and even bit the metal gating. Crunching noises issued through darkness, teeth against metal, teeth breaking and falling to the ground. Once sentient moans, now nothing recognizable.

"What the..."

Nejaa pressed tightly against the blue man, fingers never leaving his clothing, tempted to hide his face in the open canvas of Cryax's back where pride held him back from doing so. Behind them, all around them, pitch blackness. Once or twice, he could have sworn something moved just behind them but nothing ever came to claim his sweet flesh for its own. "What... what do we do," Nejaa stammered into Cryax's ear, only hoping that the beasts would dispel themselves after boredom left them clueless. To hear them speak would be to remind such fiends that they were in fact still there, or at least that's what Nejaa had told himself.

 

[Cryax Bane]

When the morning light crept up over the horizon, it burned against the closed eyelids of the Chiss, waking him from a fitful sleep. His head pounded, his body felt cold and broken, and one of his cybernetic legs was dead. There was another figure pressed up against him with his arms hooked together in a death grip around Bane’s torso. It took him a moment to realize it was Nejaa. Nejaa detested Cryax, so he found it odd that the boy would cling to him, but then again, there were ravenous freaks of nature out there. Stranger things had happened, and were happening here on this planet without a name.

Cryax gingerly moved Nejaa’s arms one at a time, extracting himself from the other man’s warm embrace. The Jedi’s skin was still mottled with bruises and dried blood. After the attack by that abomination, the Chiss had found garments to tear into makeshift bandages, and had wrapped some of Nejaa’s wounds. If those wounds got even the tiniest bit infected, it could be bad for the boy. Bane shoved those thoughts out of his head, focusing instead on his rumbling stomach. It was silent in the corridor, too silent. Crouching like an animal, he looked left and right, listening for any of the jabbering creatures that tormented them the night before. They all seemed to be gone.

He crawled away from Nejaa and struggled to his feet, precariously balancing on one leg. Cryax began to shuffle through the large hallway, dragging his dead leg behind him, combing the area for anything that resembled rations or food of some sort. His leg made a schup, schup, schup sound as he hauled it across the floor, and it made him cringe each time. It was starting to feel like he was either going to eat or be eaten out here.

In his exploration, Cryax happened upon a family of Jerbwats nesting in a large pile of debris. Jackpot! Before they all scurried away, he managed to scoop the little squeaker up in his hands, twisting its fragile neck until it broke. It wasn’t going to be tasty, but it would feed them for a while. With his quarry in hand, Cryax shuffled back to the cul de sac where he and Nejaa had slept. The Jedi lay so still that the Chiss hitched a breath. Don’t be dead. Don’t be dead. Don’t be dead. Still holding the limp body of the Jerbwat, Cryax very gently tried to shake Nejaa awake.

“Nejaa, wake up.”

[member="Nejaa Niynx"]

 

[Darth Caedes]

Unknown World;
Morning;
[member="Cryax Bane"].

Sleep hadn't come, but, like the sticky blood which now dried over his torn skin Nejaa had slipped into some form of crusted slumber. A state of half vigilance, the more primitive sub conscious keeping him alert while the rest of him yearned for real rest. At some point the creatures had lost interest, and some time later the light had come to banish those who remained, sending them each slinking back into dark places. Again, at some point the sun had come in through broken windows with enough potency to illuminate the landscape around him and Cryax. Both had remained rigid and still for most of the night, exhausted and drained more so than either could likely imagine. The gate which had protected them reliably was now covered in chunks of flesh and the rotten stink of bile, blood, and gore. Teeth, fanged, pointed, and flat molars alike lay in reckless abandon along the flooring just beyond his reach- some of which had been torn from the roots, connecting them to a series of decayed roots and long dead nerves. Even worse, husks of what could only be fallen victims lay crumpled in on themselves just beyond their gated room, the hapless and barely recognizable remains of those who had been all but shredded and thrown about in the creature's maddening rush for food. Entrails covered the ground in black, red, and purple bloods. Fingers sprawled like spiders, detached from their respective hands, some of which had many more digits than normal with long, broken nails.

Nejaa hadn't made a noise, nor physically argued with Cryax as he peeled the young Jedi from him and rose to leave. Even while Nejaa knew in his heart of hearts that allowing the chiss out of his sight was a dangerous idea, he hadn't the motivation to fight it. Both had seen their enemies, both understood what lay in wait should they make mistakes or display a clumsy survival effort; he needn't remind the blue man himself. Nejaa didn't even check to see if Cryax had taken the loose lightsaber with him, nor could he had brought himself to care either way.

Something sticky covered his face, glueing one eye closed and forming a hardened pus over the other. Each arm arched, each finger burned. His breathing was slow, his heart slower, and his legs unmoving. It could have been hours before Cryax returned, dragging himself over the carnage and bringing them "Is that... food?" Nejaa asked in disgust? His usual venom was gone now, replaced with resignation. As Cryax drew nearer and bent to enter their slated domain, Nejaa recognized the average sized animal for what it was- or had been. Unlike the humanoids from the night before, even these creatures weren't completely free of whatever mutation had swept through this unsuspecting world. There were no major deformities, no additional legs or third eyes, only a rampant loss of hair which cleared the rodent's left flank to expose ribs. In truth, he couldn't imagine eating, even when he knew it would be required if he hoped to upkeep his strength.

"I hurt Cryax... I... I can't move my arm..."

It sounded more like a child's plea to their welcomed parents during a time of sickness, his rounded eyes beckoning his companion with a new fondness. At least he wasn't trying to eat Nejaa. Not yet at least. Groaning, Nejaa tried to lean forward and into a better posture but had to bite back a howl of pain which crippled his back and left him falling back again.

"Gggkk, blast."

 

[Cryax Bane]

“It’s all we have,” Cryax gently explained, relieved to see Nejaa alive, even in his sorry state. The yellowing pus that glued the boy’s eye closed was concerning. Even just a tiny infection could turn deadly without bacta, but medicine couldn’t be more scarce in this dreadful place. Bane dropped the dead Jerbwat next to the young man and holding his dead leg out, took a seat next to him on the floor.

Nejaa made the mistake of trying to hoist his injured body up, and let out a shriek of pain.

“Shhhhh, don’t try to move,” warned the Chiss, laying a blue-skinned hand on his arm. He reached over to ball together the scraps of clothing, leftover from shredding into bandages, and made a sort of pillow for Nejaa’s head and neck. Then, with his hands gripping Nejaa’s biceps, he lowered the other man back down. There was a protectiveness that took hold of Cryax as he looked after the wounded Jedi. The boy was as helpless as a newborn kitten until his injuries healed. If they healed. Bane’s eyes flashed around to the disembodied hands, feet, and fingers that littered the hallways. Without him, Nejaa would suffer the same fate.

The Chiss began to wordlessly gather some splinters of debris, and fashioned them into makeshift kindling. The Jerbwat was speared on the end of a stick. The rodent’s green tongue lolled out of its mouth, and ribs poked out of the creature’s skin. He grimaced at the carcass, and held back a surge of bile that threatened to spew. He dropped his gaze to the Jedi as he stiffly held the Jerbwat kebob away from his body. His brother, Sage, had told him the story of their battle, and showed Cryax the burn marks on his skin from the boy who wielded fire.

“Nejaa, can you make a flame?”

[member="Nejaa Niynx"]