How Vile He Was [Salacious Vile]

[Boethiah]

Deep within the Chiloon Rift there lies a derelict station haunted by the spirit of a deceased Sith Lord. Previously used as a training ground for Anja's apprentices, it has since been abandoned and left untouched. Yet now it was time for Boethiah to face her own fears... Training in the footsteps of her predecessor, unaware of the power within her, this shall be a stepping stone to unlocking them; and subduing the fears that seek to consume her alive.

A dropship approached the hangar, vital systems were all that remained active aboard the station which was only maintained to be operation. Which made it far from livable. Little did Boethiah know -- or anyone else for that matter -- that before Anja's death, the Host Lord's most important prisoner had been abandoned there, an eternal punishment for his treasonous crimes. How little did Anja realize that events this has stirred, and that retribution would be served in an entirely different way than intended.

The dropship touched down in the hangar, leaving Boethiah off on her own with limited supplies. The officer walked back up the ramp and into the vessel which pulled away, promising to return in a week's time. Just enough to prove whether or not she'd succeed, or succumb to eventual insanity.

 

[Zickery]

So much noise.

In the center of the twisted confines of that labyrinthine station laid a room. Sealed and insulated, it was horribly perfect in its imperfectly shaped walls. Each and every surface of the place had been designed for but a single purpose: the complete and utter isolation of its occupant. It was an isolation chamber, and it held only one occupant. In darkness laid Salacious Vile, and his screaming went unheard.

Not that there was anyone left to hear it. The station had been deserted long ago, abandoned by everyone still sane. Even those insane who had once dwelt within its abysmal confines had fled from its depths. Despite this, it was not a quiet place. Agonized howls and prayers unheard reverberated down corridor after corridor; it was a symphony of the damned playing for the corpses of those who had never left alive. It was no chorus, though. All the echoing cries had but a single source. While only a few of the monitors that had once spied on the Umbaran's cell remained operational, every single speaker connected to that wretched cell still functioned. Every single speaker had- in unison- come to echo Vile's screaming like so many twisted sirens. Though whether it was due to some twisted shift in fate, simple technological malfunction, or the handiwork of cruel and capricious spirits, no one could tell. Nowhere in that hellish place was spared from Salacious Vile's endless wailing.

The station had been deserted long ago, abandoned by all who had once dwelt within its abysmal confines. While it drifted within the darkness of the Chiloon Rift, horrors and years uncountable had come and past. During it all, Salacious Vile had suffered alone. He was sustained by the station's barely operational technology. It was not a kindness, for in his room lurked countless silent and whirling machines. Each had put a sole purpose: to cause suffering. Vile knew their cold and callous touch far too well, for many of these machines he had designed. That was the greatest cruelty of all that had been dealt to him. He had been placed here to be punished for his failure by his triumphs.

It was a testament to why one should not anger a Host Lord. As retribution for failing Anja one too many times, he had been locked within these dark depths. For untold years he had suffered, kept alive by grim and uncaring machines. In the darkness he had first screamed for vengeance, then he came to beg for mercy, and eventually his pleas turned into prayers. Between every other scream had come a prayer, not to any of the Primeval's gods, no. A prayer to Anja that he might be forgiven for his sins. Yet in the Chiloon Rift, no god listens.

Yet he did not go entirely unheard. With each and every scream a laugh accompanied his spasms and his twitching. With each and every plea for mercy came a chastising and snide insult. In his head, he was not alone. Alongside each prayer he heard a foreign echo in his thoughts. After all these years, Vile was no longer himself. First he had been reshaped by Anja, and then he had been torn apart once again. In the darkness of this station, he had been reshaped again in agony, silence, and faith. A thousand confused names drifted through his head, and even he could be no longer certain which had been his first before he had been Vile. In time, he had even grown to love the constant pain just as much as he hated it. It was a reminder that he was still alive despite the suffocating darkness.

It was in a sense, an awakening. A nagging voice tore at his attention, ripping him away from pain and silence. Its echo filled his thoughts, crushing him with their unending weight.

"We are no longer alone."

So it would be that just minutes after Boethiah boarded the vessel, the screams came to be replaced with laughter.

 

[Boethiah]

Laughter radiated throughout the station by way of its speakers. Boethiah's steps halted, even recoiling a few steps back as her head looked in every which way, attempting to spy the source of this laughter. A laugh unrecognized, but somehow familiar as it rang throughout her ears. The young witch's heart skipped a beat, but only for a moment before she managed to regain her composure. It wasn't the threat of danger which frightened her, but rather the unknown that seduced her.

Without words she began her paced stride down the long, drawn hall which many had walked before. In fact, scratch marks trailed down the walls to a mummified corpse of one of Anja's unfortunate students who died due to the madness which consumed them. Such a path once walked by the much more successful [member="Kiber Dorn"] who managed to flee the station with his life. Although they had yet to meet in person. Instead of having any semblance of concern, she rather seemed to have an abundance of eagerness. Her pace quickened, small steps echoing down the halls as she explored the place; searching for all of its secrets.

For a moment the laughter from before had escaped her thoughts, as the very station itself had now become the target of her curiosity. She entered a large room at the end of the corridor, control consoles with darkened, blank screens littered the walls. A few were shattered, others were in pristine condition. For a derelict station, there was a surprising lack of dust.

 

[Zickery]

And on those screens, Salacious Vile was suspended.

What was complete and utter darkness for the Umbaran registered in bright light on the other side of the monitor, and Boethiah could see clearly the grisly scene denied to Vile's gaze. For what was suspended in that room could barely be called Umbaran, let alone a living, breathing thing. In the center of that isolation chamber hung a bloody and desiccated form, something that should've been dead. It was impossible to tell where flesh began and blood ended; it was entirely covered in dried gore from years past and freshly spilled blood. Around it hung instruments of torture so horrifying in their twisted creativity that the exact function of most was indeterminate. It was a private and personal hell, designed to function for eternity without interruption.

Since Boethiah had entered the observation room, there had only been silence. Then the broken body stirred. Its neck twisted, and pitch black eyes gazed towards the distant camera. It gazed out of the viewscreen as if it could see Boethiah before it. For a brief moment, it did nothing. Then its flesh split and its lips cracked as its face bent into a smile. The snap and click of muscles and bones moving within its face was audible even to her, registered and transmitted by the speakers with disturbing ease. Vile's smiling face would remain for but a moment on the monitors, and then it would flicker. One by one, every screen went dark.

Snap. Click. Pop. Ssss...

Yet the speakers remained functional, and for a few moments there would be the sound of fumbling, scraping, cracking. The sound of something breaking. Then there would be only the sound of heavy breathing, radiating outwards from the speakers and filling the air like the buzzing of a hive of bees.

 

[Boethiah]

The screens lit up within a split second, offering no time to react to the whirring buzz as they came to life. Her attention was immediately caught by the display of a strange being, she spun on foot slowly to see each and every one -- even the broken ones in their own attempts -- displaying the same image. Then came the sound, she knew not the nature of this. Nor that it was happening aboard the station. Her heterochromatic eyes remained fixed, not even her eyelids disobeyed her will to see.

For the whole duration of this brief event, she watched without a word or further movement. Then it went dark, the whirring buzz halted after the screens went back to their original states. A few of them sparked, having been unable to handle the sudden jolt of power after being disconnected for so long. Boethiah remained in place for nearly a minute, before finally renewing her exploration of the station. This time she headed northward, towards the command station; though she remained unaware of this destination.

It was insatiable desire that drove her forward, but for what she did not know. The witch continued, and there was no guidance to support her steps. Merely a vessel commanded by wills that were not her own, but perhaps one day she would be the one commanding them.

 

[Zickery]

The sound would not leave her as she traveled. It followed her throughout the station, emanating from corner after corner of corridor after corridor. In fact, it seemed almost as if the ship's entire broadcast system was devoted to echoing the sounds of that depraved cell. The sound of metal being rent apart, objects crashing against each other, and walls buckling. All would reach her ears. Each would be ominous, a harbinger of what was to come.

For Vile, it was nothing else if not a sign. A sign that Anja had sent him a savior at last. It was not his will that broke apart his restraints, it was the will of that cackling and malevolent voice that hid inside of his shell with him. It was one of many voices in his thoughts now, all equally hateful and all equally twisted. He fell to the floor as the machinations that brought about his suffering shattered, and his legs buckled as they met the metal grating. They had not moved in so long that he could barely feel them, yet move they did.

He was not sure if it was his own will or the will of something else that let him walk, although he was certain that the force that broke through the door was not his own. At some other point of his life this might've concerned him, but it no longer did. All he felt was a single, driving compulsion blocking out the lingering pain. An urge to find the wayfarer visiting the station.

So his feet carried him through half-remembered corridors, and in his wake he left the hallways drenched in gore.

 

[Boethiah]

Boethiah's ears still rang with the horrifying sounds emitted by the speakers, yet from time-to-time she felt if she heard it directly from the source, yet it was far too confusing for her to properly pinpoint. Unfortunately the concept of speakers were still confusing to her. She understand that sound came from them, just not how or from where. Without any reason to investigate that aspect of her adventure, she maintained course for the command room which was only a few more steps away.

Walking into another sizable room, this time with exposed viewports looking out at the many nebulae surround the station, Boethiah was taken aback by the cosmic beauty. Her attention stolen completely by it. Even the sounds around her were drowned from her mind, for a moment she lacked any connection to this reality, and imagined herself walking through space and amongst the stars. If only she could touch those white, puny lights; command the fire that caused them to burn hot.

She continued this trance without end, the sounds emitted by the speakers no longer enough to keep her mind occupied.

 

[Zickery]

Even though Vile's mind was tired and befuddled from years of suffering, he was not a foolish creature. He knew these stations well, and his finger scraped over every control panel as he passed, entering a detailed and elaborate series of commands. It was a barely conscious action, but it was a dangerous one nonetheless. Around him, uncontrolled, the walls bent outwards beneath the fury of the raging maelstrom that was gradually beginning to consume his thoughts. In the flickering lights of the hallway, he could see now what he had become. There was so much blood he was uncertain if he even had that much within his body.

Gradually, blood and gore began to accumulate, rising almost like a slow flood around his ankles. It poured through the hallways, slowly filling the station with the stink of death. It gurgled forth and came from hidden conduits and pipes, and it spread. Responding to Vile's input, the systems of the station began to finally roar back to life. Lights blazed on, screens flickered forth with new life, and the whir of ventilation fans began again. In a few minutes, the once silent structure had begun a beacon of noise within the void.

As he went, Vile left more and more blood in his wake. He would find the newcomer soon, and if he didn't, he would find her vessel. Either was fine with him.

 

[Boethiah]

The station returned to life in such a way that Boethiah had yet to comprehend. Everything came online in succession, and like a storm it rushed towards her until the very room she was in lit up. Turning around, she backed herself up into one of the officer's chair, pressing her back into its metallic form. Two uneasy eyes darted to and from the screens which displayed various pieces of information concerning the station's operations and vitals. Incomprehensible in nature, it served well to distract the witch from the darkness that began to surround her.

Pushing off of the chair, she stumbled forward before collecting her footing. Her posture was fluid, she shifted quickly and loosely in her movements towards the opposite hallway from the one she had came. For she knew it was useless to return to the hangar. Boethiah was stuck for a week, and at odds with technology and that which lied within. Her steps were quieter amongst the noise and ambiance of the station's lively operations. Oxygen began flowing through the various vents throughout the corridors, changing the atmospheric pressure within the station's hull. The popping in her ears began to agitate her greatly.

That which rushed throughout her mind led her hands to her head, placing pressure in a desperate attempt to drown out the pain.