Crushing Slavery

[ToKola Bakari]

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Location: Rodian Jungle | Time: Late Night | Tags: [member="Lilith Vox"]​

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Darkness fell over Rodia. Months ago The Confederacy had received reports of slavery plaguing it's borders. The Rodian government had devolved into idiocy and incompetence, leaving the many clans that inhabited the planet to descend into chaos and lawlessness. Murder, rape, theft, and worst of all slavery had returned to this planet in droves, threatening to destroy the very foundation of structure that The Confederacy had instilled. So when chaos ensued, who better to assault the planet than the Knight's Obsidian? Namely, the Dominus Prime.

Cardinal had shrouded himself in darkness and shadows. Utilizing the Force to hide his form from the patrol that slowly approached him. The tree he'd been hiding in was strong, strong enough to uphold the monster of a man. A warrior descended from the Sandali, his massive form would have been hard to see in the darkness of night. Even now, he would likely not have needed the aid of the Force to destroy these men, but a warrior utilized all skills to destroy his enemies.

He wore a simple black tunic and matching pants. His Obsidian Strike Armor had been destroyed in the invasion of Eshan, leaving the warrior with simpler coverings. It was better this way. As he thought back to Eshan, he considered how his armor had done little to protect him from defeat in the end. "Six men...." The man muttered, his hands clasping his tunic. The fabric stretched and tore under the tension, until finally it ripped open, allowing him to let his bare chest feel the kiss of the night air. Better.

He held the tattered tunic in his arms, gazing out at the men who approached. His eyes were a deep sunburnt orange, as if a star had become trapped within his pupils. Those eyes focused on the men closely before his lips formed a tight smile. "Yibambe..." He muttered, releasing the tunic into the night air.

The tunic flew down to the men below, causing the lead man to hold up a fist, halting his unit. "Wait!" He called out, staring at the black cloth that floated down into the dirt below him. He bent down, his star-like eyes peering over the trees that surrounded them. "What is..." The alien's metallic voice muttered out as his eyes rose into the trees. Cardinal allowed his cloak to falter, letting his form bleed into reality. "Who are you?!" The Rodian called out. It was too late. The Dominus Prime had descended down onto them.

His massive form slammed into the ground, each of the men raising their blasters in challenge to him. His lips spread into another tight smile.

~~~​

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When it was all over, Cardinal stood over the patrol of men, his Warspear in his hands as he rolled his neck softly. They had not been much challenge, even with the Dominus recovering from his wounds he found them easy prey. His spear came over his shoulder and he set his eyes to the darkness ahead. So many more patrols, so much prey.

Cardinal was painted in blood. His warspear was not like a lightsaber. It was not quick, not clean. As Cardinal wiped a spray of blood from over his eyes he felt....right. Yet there was more hunting to be done.

 

[Lilith Vox]

Rodian Jungle | Location​

Late Night | Time​

[member="Cardinal Vi'dreya"] | Tags​

“You are free. Now go.”

A black-gloved finger pointed to the skeleton of a doorframe. The door, or what little remained of it, lay scattered on the charred earth like dust, blasted clean off its hinges and into smoking oblivion. Four dirty children huddled together in a corner of the crumbling edifice, trembling from matted head to mud-caked toe. “Wh - what if the other masters find us?” stammered a wide-eyed girl, the oldest and bravest of the wretched troupe.

“Tell them that the Devoratrix has come to Rodia. Tell them that she is hungry.”

The children nodded and were gone. Lilith watched them disappear into the treeline. “Good,” She murmured, then cut her razor attention to the ground. The bloodied and broken figure of a Rodian lay crushed beneath the heel of her leather boot, whimpering. “Do you know who I am?” Lilith asked, her amaretto voice smooth and cold. “. . . please, have mercy,” sniveled the pathetic creature, shielding his bulbous face like a sinner confronted with God. Lilith smiled. “No.”

Blood sprayed, a panoramic mist of glorious red. The slaver might have screamed, were his larynx not presently being severed, but all that issued from his anguished mouth was a gurgle. Even that was soon silenced. Lilith, adrenaline coursing hotly through her veins, lifted the Rodian’s neatly cloven head high into the air.

“HEAR ME AND BE WARNED!” She cried, seizing a splinter of twisted metal from the wreckage and driving it into the ground like a stake. “This is what the Dark Mother does to slavers!” A sickening gush accompanied the subsequent impaling of the head atop the sharp metal point, a grotesque sigil for all to heed. For a moment, Lilith could only catch her breath. The soft curve of her chest rose and fell in time with her feverish pulse, then slowly settled.

In a swing of obsidian locks, she turned over her shoulder and set out into the night.

---​

Lilith moved like a cat through the darkness, silken and small. Standing no more than an even five feet in height, she did not make a formidable figure, but what she lacked in stature, she compensated for with other advantages. Stealth was one of them; her link to the Force was quite another. The young woman was a practiced disciple of the Sith, learned in telekinesis and the dark arts, though no one might have suspected it of her upon first glance.

She was a disarmingly feminine thing, delicate but womanly, and would just as soon cut a man for saying so. Her features were doe-like and dusky, with golden-olive skin and espresso eyes that resembled a fawn’s. Long, dark hair spilled from the top of her head like a fountain and curled all the way down to the small of her back. A black bodysuit hugged her like a second skin, and from the pronounced flare of her hip, the cylindrical hilt of a lightsaber swung.

From the moment she touched down on Rodia, however, the lightsaber had remained sheathed. Lilith did not intend to gift the slavers with a clean death. Her grievances against them were personal. She once had been a slave herself - orphaned, separated from her sisters, and sold as motherless property at the age of two. It was neither only petty revenge nor glorified vengeance that drove her mercilessly from one slave planet to another.

It was poetic justice, and only a bloodied blade would suffice.

She paused, making to wipe the crimson liquid from where it spattered the hollow of her neck and the slope of her cheek, but just as soon froze. Someone was approaching. The physical silhouette, and its imprint in the Force, were both titanic. Lilith drew her blade and lifted her chin like an expectant queen. “Stop,” She commanded. “Not another move.”

Something unusual prodded at her senses. Lilith arched a slender brow.

“You are not a slaver. I can smell their blood on you. Tell me who you are.”

 

[ToKola Bakari]

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[member="Lilith Vox"]​

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The beast cloaked in darkness took one of the corpses into his hands, lifting it into the moonlight with the ease of a titan. His eyes, which shined an inferno, peered up at the man with a certain discontent. Slavers. Their kind had been the personal vendetta of Darth Metus and by extension his hand, Cardinal. The Force wrapped itself around Cardinal as he focused on the body in his arms. Everything was imprinted on by The Force, to the point where the force hid some hidden message within everything that existed in reality. These bodies told the story of others, preparing to refit and arm themselves before disappearing into the Rodian jungles. "There are many more patrols but what are they guarding?" He asked, the darkness that surrounded him.

When a voice, reminding the Dominus of a summer song, called out to him he released his hand on the Rodian body. It fell lifelessly to the ground, slamming into the dirt as the man gazed out at this woman with the arch of a brow. Did she intend to command him? Who was this woman who rose her voice to the Dominus Prime like this? The glimmer from his spear would show as he turned to her, arching a brow at the woman.

In one, swift moment the Force would bear down on the woman in a massive wave. Cardinal searched her with a keen eye, as he reached out to her with the Force. His mind would attempt to breach all barriers, searching for the truth of her presence. "You are a Sith." He said, knowingly yet simply. He could sense the darkness upon her, so much like water dripping from a body fresh out of a lake. His spear would rise only to fall over his shoulder. He eyed her own blade, gazing at the crimson liquid that tipped it closely. He approached her, each massive step bringing him closer to her as his eyes searched the trees behind her.

"No. I'm not a slaver. I'm actually here to kill them." He said, his lips drawing into a thing smile before he said two simple words. "Wanna help?" He asked. He knew the blood on that blade to be Rodian and the only ones who were in this area were slavers. Either she was hunting them or she was taking the night to claim lives, either way she could be of use to the Dominus Prime. "This planet belongs to the Confederacy, who have outlawed slaving. So I've come to cleanse the slavers from this world." He told her, standing over her with a noticeable height difference.

 

[Lilith Vox]

Rodian Jungle | Location​

Late Night | Time​

[member="Cardinal Vi'dreya"] | Tags​

A powerful darkness coursed through the man’s rope-like veins, so much that Lilith could hear it the same as if she were standing at the edge of a mighty river. There was something else attached to the darkness, but it was much quieter, a droplet among crashing waves: pain. Lilith sensed it as she and the stranger collided their energy in the Force; at the same time he reached out to her, she reached out to him, and for a moment, their probing minds seemed almost to battle for dominance.

Neither of them submitted.

“You are a Sith,” The man finally observed, his voice as deep and molten as a planet’s core. “So are you,” parried Lilith coolly. Even without sensing his darkness, or his deep-seated pain, the color of his eyes were the ultimate tell: two ocular infernos, glowing down at her like twin suns in the night. As he slowly approached, his heavy footfalls might have shaken the earth; and once the rest of him came more clearly into view, Lilith understood why.

The man was a titan. A cursory estimation told her that he outsized her by nearly two feet in height and close to two-hundred pounds in mass. Melanated skin stretched taut over an arsenal of death-dealing muscles; his hands alone, if he had chosen to wrap them around her slender throat, could have crushed her like a rose petal. Yet Lilith was not afraid. As he drew closer, she stood motionless and poised, holding herself beneath him like a small empress who did not know that she was small at all.

She lifted her chin in challenge.

“I work alone,” Lilith countered, looking up to him with discerning fawn eyes that were as sharp as they were soft. “Why should I help you?”

What she did not say was Why should I help a man?, but the sentiment burned at the fringes of her question. Lilith harbored a deep mistrust of men that bordered on outright animus. It was the tragedy of her enslavement at male hands - hands that had whipped and violated her in unspeakable ways, when she had been nothing more than a child. Her skepticism of the man who towered high above her head now was a means of survival. At his next words, however, something changed.

“I see,” Lilith replied, considering him carefully. “Then you must belong to the Confederacy as well. ‘Freedom, prosperity, and independence,’ isn’t it? I’ve heard of your lot.”

There was a distant note of approval in her tone, though nothing about her feline expression had changed. Lilith was not the sort of woman who demonstrated her acceptance of things and people with flattery, but rather with action. There was work to be done and no time to waste; and so, with nothing more - not even a Well, let’s be off! or an I guess we can work together! - Lilith turned in a stream of endless black hair and expected the man to simply fall into place.

They set off.

“What do they call you?” She asked from down at his side, looking not unlike a kitten prowling in a lion’s shadow. “I am Lilith, but I am known elsewhere as Electra. My business here is personal. Do keep up.”

 

[ToKola Bakari]

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[member="Lilith Vox"]​

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There was a moment of silence before the woman answered Cardinal's observation with one of her own. A Sith? No. Not in the sense that the woman may have thought. The Dark Side did indeed wrap itself around Cardinal in a way that could make him appear as his brother, a Sith Lord. In reality he did not utilize his emotions as a catalyst for his power, merely focus. He took in a deep breath, drawing in her scent as it spilled from her. He drank in her essence as he continued to impose his will over her, finally it would come to an end when his lips spread into a small, thin smile. "The blood of the Ancient Sith runs through my veins but I do not follow their teachings, not as you do." Cardinal had been trained by his brother [member="Darth Metus"], and when it came time for him to decide he turned away from the darkness. He feared it, feared what it could turn him in to. Though Isley had escaped it's total corruption he was not his brother, his will was not so strong.

When she said she worked alone, Cardinal nodded silently in return. He did not care to debate the technicalities of the situation. The reasoning was simple. "You are here with a purpose." He said, lowering his spear from his shoulder to gesture out to the woman's own bloodied blade. "As am I." He said, simply before his eyes took to the moon that had just now bled over them, illuminating the very ground they stood on. "Work with me or do not. In the end the result will be the same."

His words, at some point, seemed to fall on open ears as the woman's demeanor softened. His feet impacted the ground as he turned back to the grouping of bodies that laid in the clearing behind them. "I serve the Confederacy, yes." He told her, kneeling down to check the pulse of one of the corpses. When his sunburnt eyes rose again he could see the woman making her way deeper into the forest. She moved with purpose, yet the air around her had changed, it had accepted the man's offer to work together. So with nothing more to be left here, the Dominus turned to follow the woman, his own long legs quickly bringing him to stride alongside the woman. When she asked what they call him, he glanced down at the woman for the briefest of moments. He had no reason to give this warrior, this outsider, his name.

"I am the Dominus Prime of the Knight's Obsidian. We are the protectors of The Confederacy." He did not care to respond to her name, as it gave him no second thought, though she herself was keeping his mind very occupied. She moved closely with him, yet the man walked in an odd pattern. He strafed through the forest with a natural stride, one leg in front of the other as he easily negotiated the terrain. If the woman was perceptive she would notice he was dodging an enemy she may not have known they had. Every flash of moonlight was a chance to be revealed, so the large man did his best to stick to the darkness and embody the shadows. Even his massive steps seemed to be as quiet as as a feline's prowl.

In no time at all the Force washed over Cardinal. There was a cold chill that had coursed up the back of his spine and a bead of sweat had built on his brow. A life, somewhere nearby, had just met its end. The Dominus Prime's eyes focused on the thick brush before them, eyeing it closely before looking back to the woman he had partnered himself with. "Keep going. I'll be close by." Bending his knees at his waist, he launched himself into the trees. The path above would be easier walked than that before Lilith, at least for a man of his size. When his massive form took hold of a branch, pulling himself onto one of the great trees, he could see what laid before them much clearer. A road laid behind the thick brush, and what was on it was something that caused the Dominus to scowl.

It seemed as if there had to be at least fifty of them. Chained together, moving as slow as their shackles would allow. The guards who escorted them down the road barely numbered twenty, if they were composed of that many men. The Rodians in chains seemed exhausted, weary, as if they had been walking for days. Some collapsed and each time they did it meant the entire column would stop. Cardinal watched as the weakest of this pack was pulled from the others, almost immediately a blaster bolt had been laid in the alien's temple and he fell to the ground, dead. Cardinal produced his war spear, holding it out at his side before he looked down at Lilith.

He held out a hand for her to pause any attack. Surely she would see what laid on the road and hopefully she had the sense to stay hidden, at least long enough for Cardinal to provide a distraction. His eyes danced around searchingly, examining the area for all things that could be of use to him during this assault. While he found no significant advantage, his eyes shimmered at what hung loosely over his head. A thick, green vine hung invitingly before him. When the man's eyes traced the vine to the tree across the road, the large man took hold of it eagerly. It was alive and strong, and as thick as a well woven rope. He glanced down to Lilith and nodded his head so she would know to begin her attack. Cardinal, would enter the fray another way.

Stepping off of the branch, he felt the cool rush of air on his chest while he descended down towards the road. There had been two Rodians standing on either side of the slave column, harassing the people and ordering them to continue. When the Dominus descended onto them, they were ill prepared.

His blade found the first slaver's neck as if they had been destined for each other. A crimson rain sprayed over the area, soaking his partner and a few of the slaves who stood beside them. Almost as quickly as Cardinal had appeared, his massive form disappeared into the jungle on the other side of the road. As the Rodian fell to the ground, slamming into a pool of his own blood, the rest of the slavers turned their attention to the jungle around them, shouting out commands as they prepared to fight to protect their cargo, their slaves.