Private Ja’ak

[Darth Solipsis]

DARK LORD OF THE SITH | VOICE OF THE MAW
Monument Mori
Darth Mori

​

The time was nearly upon them, he could feel it. Csilla had always been just the beginning, the opening salvo to the Great War that currently raged around them. War, Death, Rebirth. The galaxy knew well these words as of now, the Dark Three and chief tenets of the Hidden Maw fanatically carried across the board spreading the gospel where they went. The democratization of fear, the cold reality of life laid bare to the unworthy. Even so, death is all that mattered, an ending to the cruel tale of Light and Dark, a hard reset to a galaxy begging for release.

That was his purpose, that was his goal.

The inhospitable sands swept up with the radioactive gust of wind, a scorching gale that bit at him. His tattered midnight cloak fluttered against the breeze, he approaches with slow strides along the stone bridge facing the statuesque carving of the Shi’ido overlooking the entrance. A haunting omen to those who’d enter here, a chilling reminder of the monster that dwelt within. The elder hissed audibly, he wore the trappings of a mystic or dark prophet, arriving with none other than himself and yet there was an aura about him, a nihilistic emptiness, a vacuum, a black hole.

Dig deeper.

No, not empty. There was something there, something that when touched would spring to life in a crimson storm. Waves crashing against a lifeless sea crackling with lightning, the Dark Side, a gateway to it’s supposed splendor. A gateway to eternal pain.

Crack!

The massive stone doors opened slowly, the figure stopped just short of it’s opening as an attendant stood at the ready.

The hooded male rose his gaze, a haunting reflection of the sulfuric hate he carried. A terrible glare fixating forth upon the wretched servant with an aura of palpable dread radiating from the figure. The Dark Lord spoke no words, he merely stared for a time in silent study before uttering a single phrase.

“Mori.”

 

[Vesta]

To create was tantamount to destruction, it took the end of one or many other things to cause a resurgence as something both new and old simultaneously. Metal from hewn stone mixed with ash and fire, a sword was as much a length of steel as it was the rock it came from. Sith, their lords and acolytes alike, were both entirely different people from who they had entered this existence as well as the dark figures they had become. Like a blade they were forged through the fires of pain, of tribulation, temptation and regret, carved out of an unworthy society as a person made better, improved upon, by it. As with the sword, however, they were still just as much that little lamb they had been before their road to ruin had started.

Reducing creation to nothing and crafting a new one, a better one, in its place was perhaps the simplest way one could describe the convergence of Darth Solipsis and Darth Mori's goals. Their reasonings, their roots, and further motivations may be different, and perhaps they were entirely different kinds of people altogether, but the single greatest facet of Mori's personality was her willingness to ignore those differences, no matter how subtle or overt, in order to achieve the ends she was after. It was why she was there when Solipsis spoke her name, rather than some sycophantic obligation or attempt at placation.

"Solipsis." She answered, one which could be interpreted a great many ways - none of which either occurred to her or mattered to her if they did.

The man had been preparing for so much over such an abbreviated period of time, assaulting world after world, but she had been preparing for just one occasion. It was her nature, to place so much more importance upon moments which carried her the furthest forward. Tython was that moment, now, and with the Dark Lord of the Sith's arrival it meant that it lingered just beyond the horizon. How soon, how long, it didn't matter - only that now things were coming to pass and every machination she had made to make it that much more sweet was paying off. It was where she would take from the galaxy what they had deprived her of from the moment she was born.

Hope.

 

[Darth Solipsis]

DARK LORD OF THE SITH | VOICE OF THE MAW
Monument Mori
Darth Mori

​

"Solipsis."

The Dark Lord stepped beyond the threshold, entering the domain of M O R I as his long tattered cloak dragged along the stone surface into the foyer so-to-speak.

"The time is quickly approaching. Can you feel it?"

The Force was a tool more powerful than any could imagine, it held the secrets of the past, present, and future at it's disposal. It carried Fate, Destiny, and Deliverance. The Force was the river in which the galaxy drowned, those too weak to change their predetermined course. The Sith were river-breakers, one's who took control over their own destiny and thus the Force itself. Power. It was not something that could be drawn from the Force, but only something that was channeled from within by taking control over it. An individual must aspire to break their chains, the Force could free them.

They need only walk the path.

"There is a shatterpoint approaching, one far larger and more powerful than I have ever encountered."

He paused for a moment, halting his stride as his gaze lifted over his shoulder to Darth Mori at his side.

"I promised you 'true' freedom. The time has come for you to begin carving out what that means for you, I can show you the door but it is you who has to step through it."

His stained eyes glowed as his lips pressed together, a short pause a dark look of study overlooking the powerful Sith Lord.

"Alone."

 

[Vesta]

The man that stood before her, like so many others, had a clear purpose, a clear area in which he exceled over others - she had watched him and the others before she had approached him on Ziost, before he'd offered her a way into his order, not in an effort to discover some secret or motive nor to uncover an opportunity to usurp the, then, future sprawled out before him, but to understand why or perhaps how Darth Solipsis knew so clearly who and what he was meant to be. He was traveling down a single road, a winding river, the path either of his own making or of destiny's design - until now she only partially realized what it was that made the two of them so different, believing it to be his foresight that illuminated the best way forward.

That was what she saw in the planet next on the chopping block, a way towards the future that gave her the greatest chance to achieve whatever it was that she was either intended to or seeking out to. It was what she thought he had perceived, only to realize - perhaps lamely, even - the truth of the matter as he spoke. "There is a shatterpoint approaching." He had said, and the words he spoke resonated with the curiosity she had been feeling for so long. Uncertainty abandoned her as she realized that the myriad futures she could walk along were not mere idle fantasy, but the craquelure illuminating the possibilities she could take when presented with the right opportunity. Their next target, as he had said, was indeed one such important flaw in the nearly seamless façade of galactic normalcy, but the implications of it meant much more to her than whatever the ramifications that their success in the impending campaign would be.

She was in the middle of wondering about those very implications when he continued to speak, herself silent as she both thought and listened. As ever, she was at a crossroads in her life where either decision she made was bound to heavily affect her life in a way that was both to her benefit and simultaneously as a detriment. There was the strange situation she had found herself in with Quinn Varanin and the burgeoning distance she was beginning to feel between herself and her increasingly independent apprentice, but there was also the fierce hunger welling up within her that she could not restrain for much longer.

"Alone." He said.

"I have always been alone." She remarked, not needing to put much thought into the reflexive reply. The idea of freedom then, in that moment, rang oddly hollow to her - like she had always been exactly what she desired, just unhappy with what she'd found - but the weight bearing down on her shoulders informed her that there was still more to break away from until she would find herself truly free. "I never expected you to just hand me what it is I am after, when the time comes I will take what I want by force." Mori added with a dip in her lips that nearly made her serious look into a frown of displeasure. She wondered, then, if perhaps the shatterpoint he was anticipating wasn't the planet at all - a thought which she quickly abandoned as she remembered her company.

"How much of it can you see?" She asked, genuinely curious. The hunger within her stirred, like a second mind that was equally as interested. "They say it is possible to perceive a shatterpoint without realizing what that singular thing.. moment.. whatever.. is exactly."

She turned her head and glanced towards him.

"Do you?"

 

[Darth Solipsis]

DARK LORD OF THE SITH | VOICE OF THE MAW
Monument Mori
Darth Mori

​

"I have always been alone."

The Dark Lord slowed his stride and lifted a brow. Her words had caught his attention, a statement so heavy he of all those in the galaxy could relate to. Such was the price of power, the cost demanded by creed. His head shifted over his shoulder as her words flowed, the twin orbs of stained sulfur gleaned out in the umbral hall. A sneer escaped his lips as he halted altogether mid-stride.

“Will you?”

Slowly, the Sith’ari turned to face the personification of death with a cold gaze. His grin filled with dark grimace, his eyes piercing like twin daggers.

“You misunderstand. I have nothing to give you without cost, without suffering.”

One foot after the other, he stepped around the Sith Lord with his eyes fixated on her own as he circled her.

“To share power is to dilute it. You of all know this truth, the foundation our new order is built upon. I intend to hand you nothing, only show you the way so that you can slip and fall or ascend.”

He approached,

“How much can I see?”

The Dark Lord let slip a vile grin, his face contorting from ear to ear. “At Thule, when you found me. I saw a collapsing star ready to implode, a hunger that would consume all life in a supernova of hatred. Raw, untamed power surrounding a single source. A soul yearning for freedom, true freedom.”

His hand opened up in gesture, “We are river-breakers. We do not abide by the predetermined course of fate, but set our own course. The balance has shifted, our hand rests high ready to seize the galaxy by the throat.”

Squeezing closed into a tight fist, the Dark Voice retracted his hand back to his hip.

“The power to remake the galaxy into any image we choose rests in the palm of my hand. It is yours.. when the time comes, but only if you are ready. Ready to accept the terrible cost. The sacrifice.. for the freedom fit for gods.”

He leaned in.

“Tython is a nexus of choice. The galaxy will not be the same.. we.. will not be the same, but our Grand Plan must carry on.”

 

[Vesta]

Life was suffering.

Waking up every morning to find nothing has changed, knowing that the day would lead to nothing, that the future held nothing, was defeating in and of itself. To be bound and gagged by the very pursuit of freedom to the point that the only passing moments that resembled what she was after had been lies and delusions. Lies to herself, lies to others, delusions of impossible success where all else had failed - it was always the same, it always would be the same, and despite the insanity of it all she persisted.

Alone.

Her father wasn't standing at her side, despite his attempts at maintaining his status as such, her old paramour wasn't around to mend a heartache that she'd caused for both of them, and there wasn't a soul around, dead or otherwise, that was willing to help her get anything without wanting something else in return first. The moment she had discovered that there were no different people, that everyone was entirely the same with only slightly varied desires, was the moment that Vesta Zambrano had truly learned to grow into adulthood and willingly let that innocence inside of her die.

"Yes, I will." She insisted, though with less vigor than she would have liked - the knowledge of her solitary journey was a somber one, not a passionate one.

She knew by his reaction, however, that he knew exactly what she was referring to, or at least close enough to it that it was pointless to play smug. He knew she wasn't satisfied with where she was and she knew that honeyed words and empty promises of something bigger were just as empty and full of hot air as his ego - just like her cousin, just like her father, along with every other Sith that had walked the stars. What she wanted wasn't as small and petty as revenge, though it tasted so sweet, and it wasn't as deep as love and a chance to have it again with the hindsight not to spoil it - evil to the bone, but hating what she had been born to be, Vesta desired one thing above all others and was far beyond the point of no return to turn back.

"There is no price too great for what I am after, you can save your warnings for people who are too complacent to understand what is just around the corner."

She gestured to herself, a figure swiftly changing into the emaciated form of a woman that looked closer to death than should have been possible to stand, and choked out the next few words solely through what must have been sheer force of will alone.

"We take what is ours, nothing is given."

A glimpse into the tortured existence within, under the façade of horrible beauty.

Darth Solipsis