Ex Umbra

[Darth Ophidia]

[member="Ivory"]

Ophidia held her head, making sure Ivory did not dive nose-first into the floor.

As Ivory's body went limp, Ophidia dragged her to the chair where she had first put her, and with a yank, she twisted the Rattataki around to face a tall mirror placed against the wall. Still she held Ivory's head up, making sure she could see.

"Oh it's uncomfortable, I know."

She rested Ivory's head against the headrest of the chair as she pulled a suitcase out of one of the boxes and opened it up. Over the next few minutes, the Sith Lord rubbed different salves on her own cuts to stop the bleeding and begin the healing process. She also did the courtesy of slowly extracting the shiv from Ivory's arm and stopping that wound from draining her too much.

"You are quite a rowdy one." The salves went back into the suitcase "Your scratches leave marks"

The suitcase went back in the box and a smaller case was extracted.

"Still, you only cut so deep."

She turned, an oblong item with little blades at the end in her hand. There was something sick about her smile, and something malicious about how her eyes, still as the grave, unblinking as if long dead. The only sign of life in them was the burning hatred in their ember hue, practically aglow.

"I wonder, will you cut more deeply when I take away your pride?"

She circled Ivory and placed a hand upon her forehead. Her fingers intertwined with the hair, pulling it taut. And then, the buzzing began. The machine cut the strands from their roots at the skin level. In long draws, she removed the precious locks - A rarity among their kind, usually bald as the Rattataki were: Ophidia was making Ivory common.

And she forced her to watch every step of it.

 

[Jairus Starvald]

[member="Darth Ophidia"]

She couldn't move.

Speak.

Scream.

Sob.

Nothing. There was just the impassive numbness holding her body down. In that moment, as Ophidia took the only thing that had been hers away from her, she couldn't even close her eyes. To not see the horror as lock by lock fell to the ground. The tears slipped down first, both of impotent rage and mourning. But... Ivory did not break. The voice at the back of her head (screeching, high-pitched, a whine that went on for hours) was violently pushed down. Locked behind reinforced walls.

The panic in her eyes subsided and then it was slowly replaced by something else.

Determination. Cold hatred.

Whoever this person was (they hadn't exactly swapped names) she'd die. Not today, not tomorrow, but what Ophidia was doing right now? It told her that she wasn't planning on killing her. Or she really had to be a weird one.

This was about setting a standard. A boundary. To teach her her place.

Ophidia would soon find out that Ivory was a quick study.

 

[Darth Ophidia]

[member="Ivory"]

As the last, pale lock fell to the floor, the buzzing seized.

Ophidia brushed Ivory's scalp clean of the remains and leaned down to see as Ivory saw into the mirror. A wicked grin played on her purple lips as she scraped her fingernails along the side of Ivory's now bare scalp.

"Don't cry, dearest"

Her finger intercepted one of the tears brought on by hate and pain.

"There is so much more to do." "So much more I will show you."

Her hand cupped Ivory's chin, keeping clear of the mouth, but seizing her jaw firmly between her fingers. Her grip was stronger than what her slender arms would indicate, inhumanly strong in fact.

"I am going to make you magnificent"