Memoirs of a Keisei

[Sawa Ike]

[member="Maple Harte"]

Sawa stayed moving into the ship and she could see it as the familiar setting was something she fell back into. Walking around and she could see and feel maple. the togruta and the two guides who were with them. As they managed to close the doors and secure them. Sawa didn't speak just brought her hand out in the darkness turning on the lights and one of the consoles. Thousands of years could drain it but they had followed all procedures to hide it and restoring power as it was preserved would be easy... getting it to be able to well fly and move could take some time though as you needed to be able to check each section of the ship itself.

She stopped going into one of the rooms and it wasn't like the others, what remained of sentries who had remained behind to ensure nothing came for as long as they could. Sawa crossed her arms over her chest though listening to well anything that was within the ship. She couldn't let these hunters defile it while she came to one of the consoles and brought up the screen of the ship. "It was kept mostly preserved with minimal to no power except to check security systems and automatically recycle the air using the outside." She said it while turning on the lights to see in the dark and activating internal countermeasures to intruders as she activated a scanner.

"Visual identification logs will track us and not activate defenses to attack."

 

[Maple Harte]

Maple creapt through the interiors of the ship, watching the smiley face of the ship A.I. pop up and stare on every screen they passed by. She could feel Maranon's presence in her mind, felt the burning, invisible mark of the dead sith's crown on her forehead and didn't feel quite herself.

The sad truth was...

She was enjoying this. All of it. She wanted the thrill. The Darkness. And it shamed her. Maranon sensed this.

Don't fear it, Maple. Its wonderful... Maranon cooed as Maple followed her senses to the deep of the ship. Think of how miserable, how helpless you were before when you were retired...

Maranon's strength was somehow her strength at the moment and the feeling of darkness in her atoms energized her soul.

Blankly, she recalled that obsidian dagger [member="Sawa Ike"] had given her, and, not fully in control of her self, took it out...

The Togrutan woman who followed perhaps should not have followed quite so closely, for as they neared a small tram that would take them deeper into the ship, Maple, not fully in control, stabbed the woman, brands from the blood spell hidden in her mind by Maranon burning onto the left sleeve of her dancers outfit. The Togrutan screamed as the glowing brand of a crown appeared on Maple's forehead, Maranon's evil laughter echoing both in her and Sawa's head as she snatched the injured, screaming Togruta into the tram and sped it ahead, without Sawa or her guides.

Maple, near totally under control by this point as she watched the crying alien, could only start to use the blood on her knife to start writing down the incantation, even as part of her fought within desperately to get under control...

But for the moment, it was hopeless as Maple and the injured alien went deeper into the facility, Maranon's spirit beside itself with delight as it echoed in Sawa's head:

First Maple...and soon you...go...follow 'my' consort, Sawa. Lets see if the old Ike magic still has any juice to it...

It was a trap, whatever it was...Maranon had clearly planned this...but the end goal was not known...

 

[Sawa Ike]

[member="Maple Harte"]

Sawa was surprised for a moment, something in her head and she resisted allowing her mental shields to continue to strengthen the area around her and then the togruta was being stabbed and she felt something darker from Maple. Seeing her leave quickly as the energy vampire remained there for a moment surprised and stunned but then she was moving quickly. "What the...." THere was a snarl to her voice and her fangs were barred in anger before she was moving and motioning to the other two. "Move quickly." THe ship was quiet once again and Sawa sneered while she started to move remembering the way and opening one of the rooms to march through going through some of the capsules of sleeping psy-pyres. THey had been here until she spoke. "We shall see what she can do though, don't harm Maple but don't touch anything here. If they wake up it will not be friendly."

 

[Maple Harte]

Maple, during the tram ride, had used the bleeding out Togrutan's blood to paint the walls and floor around her in a spell she did not recognize, while using the obsidian knife to cut the same spell into her arm after pulling off a glove.

She didn't recognize the spell. Then again, she wasn't actually in control. Maranon was. Somewhat...and whatever had merged with Maranon...also somewhat.

Maple was struggling to regain control, but she chanted something unholy, and that unholy something kept her from breaking free of the hold Maranon had over her spirit.

Maple swooned, continuing to chant, eyes fluttering. The Togrutan began to scream, the area in the tram filling with an ambient green light as the Togrutan screamed. Maranon cackled in Maple's head.

The Kolda-Bratha Calculus shall repurpose her tissues...as for her soul...who knows where it will go? Maranon spoke, but now with two voices. Oh, I wish you could understand how beautiful you are to me...how you could be so much more. Should be so much more...

The Togrutan's shrieks grew louder as her body bubbled and broke down into a moving, shifting red paste, that soon coagulated into a lanky, bubbling creature that sprouted unnaturally long spindly arms. Its faceless head soon twisted into a crude facsimile of Maranon's which smiled wickedly, the monstrosity of a body punching its way out of the tram doors as it came to a stop.

Maple dropped to her knees.

"Everybody loves Maranon." Maple spoke mindlessly.

"They used to say that about a guy named Ray...Ray-something too, until I imprisoned him with a Force Demon. Now nobody loves him. They all love me..." the creature gloated, striding into the cryo-preservation section, walking past all the frozen Psy-Pires on display,,some in brown, Atrisian armor styled after Yovshin swordsman.

"Now to enact the second phase, my dear sweet Maple..." the blood creature with Maranon's face hissed as they walked through the dark, lonely section of cold hissing gasses and Atrisian banners depicting a blood red Atrisian Tiger.

"Rawr..." the Maranon construct joked as it approached the elaborate, elegant chamber containing Nine Lives, sleeping fitfully in cryostasis, a nuetral expression on her face, clad in flowered green robes with a white rose embroidery.

Just then men in trenchcoats and black armor with a sun symbol on their chest stepped out of hiding, followed by the grizzled old man Maple had met at the bar of [member="Sawa Ike"].

"Miss Udinia. Miss Udinia's...evil blood creature...a pleasure." Patrick Keitel observed distantly.

"Okay, I gotta admit, that's kind of a hardcore response to seeing something like me..." Maranon joked. "We must have arrived just before they did, else these psy-pires would have been shot through the tanks."

Patrick held up a thermal detonator.

"Either of you makes a funny move, this entire section goes." he told them crisply, eyeing them.

"Ugh...I hate standoffs..." Maranon huffed...a gesture made all the more sickening by her body's nature...though inwardly she was pleased. Patrick was playing right into her hands...he'd be an excellent distraction for Sawa while she prepped the next phase...

 

[Sawa Ike]

[member="Maple Harte"]

Sawa was watching more of it... she could check through the screen and knew where to look first and foremost. She was looking at the chamber with Ni-Ne in it and she could see all of them there. Eyes narrowing as she spoke looking at the two of them with her. "You two remain here and report to me anything that might happen." SHe got nods of agreement and leaving the room she closed the door making it so it would only open from the inside and her biometris before the sith lord moved through the hallways. She moved fast and quietly as her mind focused back to what had been here.. entering one fo the rooms and looking at containers filled with clothing she touched it and sneered.

"You look like you never expected to come back here." THe voice was in her mind as she spun around. the deep resonating sounds.. the rich smooth inflections and she knew who it was... who she was thinking about as looking in a reflective surface on the wall. THe polish letting her see the man standing behind her. "What are you doing here?" She said it with a snarl and the glowing of her eyes was silver but he seemed to chuckle and it was a resonating sound she remember in her head. "I am here... because you are possibly going crazy... this is your delusion after all." She sneered walking and spoke. "I killed you to get you out of my head."

He seemed to be laughing as they were moving and he spoke. "Oh but I always will be, I gave you a new life my little princess... I took away the pain that girl gave you, I protected you from the emperors wrath and I taught you.... I trained you and I gave you a world." His voice was there and deep down she realized it was her own mind telling her this.. she was arguing with herself and this place.. the power, the danger and the memories were bringing him out compared to what would normally have kept him buried deeper deep within her mind. Sawa was moving quickly as she allowed her mind to stretch out and she snarled coming into a room.

"You are keeping that zeltron's influence at bay aren't you?" THe figure stayed next to her and grinned to himself. "Something like that, hard to influence a mind when you have been trained but sometimes you need a mental image to project to be a manifestation of it." She sneered at hima nd went into the room with her eyes rolled prepared for a fight. She needed to get to Maple and Ni-Ne.... it wasn't just her being awakened... it was going to be a whole thing and she was not certain she would be able to fight out of here if the whole ship started waking up.. even she had limits... they were higher then most and she had worked to push them but she still had limits without her combat armor or Onna.

 

[Maple Harte]

Maple felt Maranon's control relax slightly as Patrick gave his ultimatum.

Shoot them, lovely Maple. Shoot all of them! Maranon whispered mentally.

"Yes, my queen..." Maple whispered.

Maple, back in the days of The Marksmen, and been a quick drawn, and that lethal hand-eye coordination Uri had honed came into play, the focus provided by Maranon allowing her to force pull a pistol from Patrick's holster. Her breathing sllowing down as her reflexes kicked in, unaided by the force. Patrick had a Mandalorian heavy blaster. She'd worked with these.

The world slowed to a crawl for her, watching the panic spread on their faces as their weapons raised. Only Patrick seemed to be going faster than the others, which is why Maple shot him twice in the chest, then shot two others behind him with assault rifles, then another six that had leveled smgs at them. Bolts hit them square in the face but one nine millimeter round grazed her armor.

The thermal detonator rolled out of the still living Patrick's hand, inactive. Patrick coughed, pulling out an electronic trigger.

"Doesn't matter..." he coughed, pressing the trigger..."This...vampire scourge...won't escape this cavern.

He paused, waiting for the distant sound of the blast from those charges he had planted close to the lake bottom. But it didn't happen...

Maranon, in a bout of foresight, had ionized the circuitry on the device the instant it had been pulled out by the dying hunter.

"Oopsie..." The Maranon Construct mocked the dying man.

In desperation Patrick pulled out a concealed blaster in his right sleeve, only for a four bolts to go through his face. Maple collected the thermal detonator and swooned and the bloody construct of Maranon clapped slick, disgusting hands, having drawn strange symbols over Ni-Ne's stasis chamber while Maple had been busy killing them.

"Saaaaaawaaaa...oh, Saaaaaawaaaa...come out to plaaaaaaaayyyy..." Maranon called out to [member="Sawa Ike"] as she chanted over the dead bodies, their skins and clothing literally ripping off the bloody corpses underneath, leaving a gore soaked mess of flesh ripped inside out every where that arranged itself in a pentacle, the skinless corpses serving now as guardians, silent as they encircled Maranon and Maple...

 

[Sawa Ike]

[member="Maple Harte"]

"Boss there is something happening." The one Raz spoke into the colink as Sawa continued to walk down and she was searching but not quite rushing to find Maple. She could feel something happening to her... feel something corrupting and powerful having taken over her mind and body... it wasn't exactly something you should rush headlong at to attack without mentally preparing. She could feel Maranon and the idea of her being back or in Maple was... infuriating.... to say the least. She wasn't looking to fight maple if she had too and the idea that it might endanger Ni-Ne... in her tube or wake her up was not appealing.

"Yeah I can feel it, mak sure the ship is secured from the room and start locking down what you can. I want you both safe." She said it and the image of Xavier was gone from her mind.. he wouldn't come back fi she could help it. Buried deep and she needed to rather try and face the problems slipping into one of the adjoining rooms and she could feel Maple, Maranon and Ni-Ne there underneath it all. She sneered and snarled almost working herself into a frenzy as the energy vampire felt the force going into her limbs and enhancing the muscles to let her move faster and she slipped dark sister from her hip and the blade didn't activate but she came into the room. "What is the meaning of this."

 

[Maple Harte]

The Maranon Construct chuckled as [member="Sawa Ike"] entered the fray. It pretended to look at a non-existant watch on its wrist.

"Tick Tock, Darth Shojo...you're slipping a little..." Maranon remarked. "Had Maple here wrapped around my finger right under your nose. I haven't forgotten our little scuffle on Katanos...you remember that mild disagreement we had don't you? Y'know, where you FETHIN' ATE ME YOU BLOODSUCKER?!" Maranon shouted, blood born fists clenching in obvious rage. Despite Maranon's ability to turn on the charm, it was obvious beneath it all, she could get as infuriated as any real Sith.

"You're too late, Sawa. Maple is mine...I shall give her a grand place at my side, and you? You will be taxidermied." the Construct of blood snarled.

Maple's eyes fluttered in her skull, leveling her blaster at Sawa against her will. The snarling, skinless corpses all advanced towards Sawa.

Maple, lost in her ensnarement to Maranon didn't see Maranon, and didn't think of herself as Maple.

She instead saw Ursula Sandraven, clad in her white bodyglove the Twi'lek smiling crisply.

"Uri..." 'Ursula' asked. "Would you tear apart this annoying Sith?"

Maranon didn't actually expect her new consort to succeed, but she'd be enhancing and directing her to bring Sawa ever closer to the gorey pentacle in front of Ni-Ne's chamber. At the very least, she'd tire Sawa out enough to let Maranon try something.

"Yes, Master Sandraven." Uri answered mindlessly opening fire at Sawa's direction, dug out of the snow of Maple's mind and forced to fight.

There was a frightful accuracy and anticipation as Uri bounded towards Sawa with the Force Pike. This was not an ex Shadow feeling her age. This was Uri Udinia in her prime. This was Uri at her absolute worse, and her staff attacks came down with a swift and shocking viciousness aimed at Sawa's skull.

 

[Sawa Ike]

[member="Maple Harte"]

Sawa moved and looked at Maple... then the constructs and she spoke with a tight lipped grin on her face. "What can i say.... pretty woman and all that." THe snicker was there in her mouth as she activated her saber and while not wanting to hurt Maple... she also didn't and couldn't spare letting herself get attacked. There was a whole lot more to do when she brought her blade up to defend against. She stilled herself and went into a djem so stance pulling the force into herself and her blade blocked the force pike. She looked at Maple and pulled on that cord... energy vampires drank and could feed power but it was a connection through the force more then anything... what made them dangerous and able to control if they wanted to but she didn't need to dominate Maple just shock her as she used djem so to defend and make a counter attack mentally of images of them over and over. "SNap out of it." She was leting the images play and replay with all of their glory but her mind focused on Maranon and she had eaten her.... she took that energy and power and sneered a little letting the darkside and force edge her making it stronger while her hand slid to take hold of Shojo... the blade itself hungered for destruction and a ghost could work just as well as anything.

 

[Maple Harte]

If it had been purely Maple that [member="Sawa Ike"] had been battling, her mental trick might have worked, but this was Uri Udinia Sawa was fighting.

Uri The Golden Eye. The Ice Cube. The one in the Marksmen who, when pulling the trigger, felt only the recoil and nothing else. Uri Udinia, currently under the sway of a Dark Adept even older than Sawa herself, and had no context for the salacious imagery Darth Shojo tried to fill her head with, merely assuming it to be some kind of sick game on the Sith's part, and brutally sweapt aside Shojo's counter-strikes, the stabs and slashes of her force pike increasing in speed, the fleshless zombies trying to attack Sawa's flank.

Uri Udinia has a very interesting face when attempting to kill someone. Its not that gritted teeth look some warriors get. No. This is a glassy stare. It is the stare of a raptor flying from up high, and diving after its excellent eyesight spots a rodent. Uri had that look in her eyes as she struck repeatedly at Sawa to keep her attention on her and off "Ursula Sandraven", whose likeness Maranon used callously to trick the addled bounty-hunter into attacking the cute Vampire.

All she had to do was keep Sawa moving to the bloody pentacle...she could feel her tapping the darkness to fend off Uri. Maranon uttered a spell to try and dampen Sawa's reflexes from afar, give her new consort more and greater chances to attack...

She did hope Uri at least managed to injure the vampire. Maranon was petty and spiteful like that. Worse still, she never tipped when ordering food in a restuarant, in addition to all the unpleasant qualities of her nature as a Sith. One would think someone who could make a magic ritual out of piles of humanoid flesh wouldn't behave in such a manner, but there it was. So uncivilized. The not-tipping part, that is. All the other stuff, the zombies, the blood, the evil rituals thrown together like a summer barbeque, insidious brain washing of an already mentally unstable person, the cackling, that was typical Sith, and hardly worth commenting on. Even if it had been worth it, it wasn't like the criticism would take. This stuff happened all the time now. It'd have been unusual if something like this wasn't happening on a regular basis somewhere in the galaxy, on at least a bi-monthly schedule.

Maranon waited to see the results of the potent reflex-slowing spell. Would it take? Or would Shojo find a way to negate it? She'd grown powerful and wise from her youth, after all. She couldn't see the prefect anymore at all...

 

[Sawa Ike]

[member="Maple Harte"]

Sawa was watching and she could feel the influence on her mind... feel Maranon pressing against her now more then ever and sneered a little as she dodged. It brought something up that she hadn't felt in a long time..... anger... pure anger at that. Like something she had buried from her childhood and it just made things rise up. She moved quickly and still didn't attack Maple instead she moved back a moment and dodge towards a wall to work and try to jam up the weapon being used. She crouched lower and moved to the side with a crab walk as the display of Maranon came to her and she snarled shaping and pulling at the metal ore of the ship.

Meanwhile Rava and Akala were remaining in the room and had faced some of the hunters who tried to get in. One using a vent to sneak or at least try to as the two of them stood over the body. They weren't fighters completely... defense was something they could do and they worked well together that was why they were a team. Akala moved her hand and grasped interlacing her fingers with Rava's when they looked over the screens and found their master.. boss whatever you wanted to call it as her neck tingled. She could remember when the two fo them had been lowly scouts in the employ of Atrisia for some of the older worlds... sleeping in the dirt.

There was a difference between being lower class and poor, in most of the cities the lower class just meant you did jobs tht weren't as educational heavy... you could make plen ty of credits being savvy with it. Many fished and raised cattle that got sold off for great amounts of wealth... Being poor meant you took the jobs for mining companies wanting to scout new locations that could be dangerous and Ukiyo was a dangerous place.. THey had been hired to scout the coast and find tunnels where the Taeki were not holed up and there were no beasts to possibly make safer trade routes or landing pads.

Then they had met her.. she was doing something several years back and had taken pity on them... snatching them and whisking the pair off to her kingdom in the mountains. THe Onna were just one of the things she had few understood and they had thought they would be new servants but instead they were treated well... even the servants she kept in her room... a marvel of a place. Marble pool with a bed in the center on an island that had statues carved. They had been given dresses and learning that they were blood slaves... servants who fed the master it had been something that brought the two fo them together.

She shook her head looking at the screen when she was trying to think of a good way to better help Sawa as she thought about it. They could see the body that was behind and near the stasis pods holding what they were supposed to be preventing being awakened. The pair couoldn't leave they had been told not to but... they could work some of the systems... mostly the intercom and were looking at the exterior cameras of the ship. Rava was speaking into the intercom. "Attention all intruders, there is a security breach on level three. Taeki have entered the ship... I repeat security breach Taeki have entered the ship."

Watching the hunters on the one screen turn to try and see if the breach was closer to them or just somewhere on the level was enough. Akala had been working to overload one of the smaller conduits as power and electricity arced into them. Akela looked up and was able to motion seeing Sawa as she moved crab walking against the wall btu she wasn't in trouble. She was letting Maple use her attacks and use her energy up. The energy vampire knew how to lech the power and draw out more with a look. "Is she going to need more help?" There was the question hanging in the air but.... "No I think she might be angry but if we attacked the woman she'd direct that at us."

Sawa though pulled and draw at the energy, her bite of Maple meant a few things... trying to control her well could be possible if they weren't attacking but drawing at that energy itself. She pulled at it to mentally drain her and bring her back to it or at least drain enough she might shake herself out of the mental domination. All she needed was time and sneered looking at Maranon again with her hand coming up to twist some fo the metal making it into a strip she could try and wrap around the arm of Maple and pin her to the wall for a moment. "You might be strong but there is something you have forgotten dearie.... I have learned a lot more in the time since you have been dead."

 

[Maple Harte]

"Oh, you may have picked up a few tricks, [member="Sawa Ike"] but not nearly enough..." Maranon gloated as she tried to restrain Maple with a piece of metal, and sap her will at the same time. But Maranon was an expert at getting into someone's head and staying there. But Sawa was far stronger than that hot academy prefect that had once gotten dear Ni-Ne into such a state. It was actually quite difficult to fight off Sawa and interrupt her mental techniques, Maranon succeeding solely by having had slightly more experience. Slightly. But the process of keeping Sawa from drawing her lovely consort out of hypnosis had taxed her greatly, and she knew she had to end this soon. But Maple was still pinned. Maranon hissed another incantation upon the metal restraining Maple, drawing on her knowledge of the Kolda-Bratha Calculus to age the metal to weak scrap that the ex-shadow broke away easily from, and resumed attacking Sawa determined, in her own misguided way, to protect "Ursula", who, no matter Maple's bitter feelings, was still as much a mother as a mentor. Ursula had been one of Uri's few soft spots, and the idea of anyone truly wanting to harm her was intolerable to the assassin buried in a snow of madness deep in an addled, contradictory mind, and Maranon knew enough about her to exploit this.

She'd obsessed over Maple, ever since first feeling her presence from all the way in that old stronghold of hers on Haruun Kal, feeling her lovely power and madness and passion...Maple was everything Maranon had once secretly wanted as a Jedi but could not have, and had sought in both men and women ever since her fall, but could never keep, due to a narcissism and selfishness that would always interfere...even when Maranon actively hadn't wanted it to.

Maple, in truth, reminded her of the one that killed her...the one she had really liked, with the pretty green eyes...a woman named Penelope. She had died staring into Penelope's betrayed face, poison burning out her internal organs...

Penelope's betrayal, not just of her, but of her other mistress, the Jedi Adra Divv, as well as her entire royal harem of men and women, had hurt Maranon in death. This was quite possibly because beyond Adra, her Jedi prize, Penelope had been one of the few Maranon actually loved, in her own limited, selfish way. Penelope's betrayal had actually made her spirit go silent for nearly two centuries in contemplation.

Seeing Maple, seeing her fight, seeing that lethality in wet green eyes and defiance even in the face of doom...it was all the things she had loved Penelope for.

She would not make the mistake with Maple that she had with Penelope, Maranon vowed, watching as Maple attacked from all sides in an unrestrained frenzy assisted by Force Speed trying to drive Sawa ever closer to the blood pentacle...the old Atrisian had her energy, and Maranon would take great pleasure ripping it out as she watched her lovely consort battle Shojo...

 

[Sawa Ike]

[member="Maple Harte"]

"I don't want to have to hurt you Maple.' She said it in her mind while she was moving and dodging. Her blade coming up as she sneered a little and allowed the force to flow into her body as she snarled a little at Maranon.. drawing at the energy and pushing her mental influence around like a thick soup. Maple had given her blood and more in terms of energy... she didn't like the idea of outright controlling her but she pressed it more to get her to resist and break free. Sawa herself was pushing it as she could hear other things... in the force but also in the metal of the ship. Boots on the metal of the ship where people had gotten in and the intercom. She flashed back more digging itno the energy she had absorbed and moved towards the symbol but remained on the edges of the room itself. She pressed against the wall and used it more to obstruct and shield as slashes would go into the wall and give her a chance to slither and move around.

Meanwhile Raza and Akala remained on the screens and could see things being shot up and others being slashed. One of the Onna had gotten in and opened a door as some dropped down. They had gone through the jungle to some of the areas above. They were dropping in and the Onna stood in silver armor as they fought some of the hunters and Taeki who had come after them. They were flooding in and the pair opened doors and sealed some others to funnel the enemies to meet the blades and blasters of the Onna. Where the two could look though they stopped. "Is there anything else that we can do?"Raza was looking at her and she shrugged turnignt he camera back to look at their master and she spoke. "We could and should focus what energies we can... the master is facing a threat from someone she doesn't want to kill so she is holding back." They looked at each other and well feeding their master from a distance was something rarely done but they knew what to do as Akela ensured the doors were sealed and it was safe. "Lets begin."

 

[Maple Harte]

Maple was not fighting [member="Sawa Ike"] at the moment. In her mind, she was, for some reason, fighting that strange woman with the dead purple eyes and black hair, wearing an outfit that seemed unusually cyberpunkish in design from that old bunker on Dantooine. At this point in Maple's life, she didn't know who that woman was, or the pain she would cause Maple, but it was telling her mind gravitated to that vision.

Drive her closer, Maple...you've almost got her... she heard Ursula Sandraven's voice, in actuality the voice of Maranon, whose Blood Construct body shook with each evil chortle.

Maple obeyed Ursula's will, as she always had, her ability to commit brutality at Ursula's urging something that bothered Maple after she had left. But Ursula wanted the purple eyed chick dead so dead she would get.

The purple eyed woman got closer to the wall but Maple wasn't playing it. Using Maranon's strength on instinct to fuel herself, she concentrated, trying to focus the Force on her opponent, to send out a large powerful wave of telekinesis that might finally hurl her into the bloody pentacle Maranon had prepared to harvest her power back from.

Maranon, at the same time Maple threw out a wave at Sawa, decided to use Telekinesis in that exact instant, to hopefully catch Sawa as she either tried to escape Maple's wave or try and take the brunt of it. But this fight had dragged on dangerously already and Maranon knew for every moment Sawa remained standing was another moment Maranon was at greater risk.

And is Sawa won she would tear the lovely confused Maple away from her, and Maranon detested the very notion that she would get beaten by a former school prefect. The very idea--!.

Maranon uttered a Sith magical curse under makeshift breath, trying to slow Sawa with the dark so she could not react fast enough to their attacks. It was now a matter of whether it would work or not. Sawa, despite all indicators, truly did impress the old queen with how savvy she had gotten.

But Darth Maranon's admiration for a rival, especially a rival for the affection of another, only went so far...

 

[Sawa Ike]

[member="Maple Harte"]

She felt more of it, something encroaching on her mind, something pressing to slow her body and she sneered. Vicious, primal with fangs snapping into place more like a snake. Saliva and spittle coming like venom almost as her eyes shifted towards Maranon and she could feel something... well two things. Raza and Akala were sending her energy and power... making her stronger down that cord she used to connect to her servants. It made her skin warm, gooseflesh appear almost and a purr come from the back of her throat. She was allowing the force energies to flow throughout her body. Feeling the muscles relax itself.. feeling the power itself when she was standing her ground.

She was letting her memories loose, letting them go and tried not to get sucked itno her own head but there was somethign itching at the back of her brain. Something she was forgetting and it wasn't just because Ni-Ne was here... not because she had attacked her before and taken thoughts... memories from her. No no no... something was there as she looked at Maple who was for a moment faltering and then attacking again. She wanted to grab her, crush her... she wanted to stop her but still she couldn't harm her while she held her head.... "Ahh." She snarled it as her mind flashed back and she remembered xavier using it.

She had felt something like this before... power and darkness. Xavier had used it on her before and she remembered when he tried to beat it out of her. That fear, that timidness. He had been kind but he was cruel.. he was ancient and.... and she had been there. Her eyes flicked towards the form and she hissed. Mouth closing and eyes burning wih golden fire. "You." She knew her... she remembered her crouching lower to avoid Maple and she lept with the force uncoiling within her body as she could feel everything within her body letting loose before she came down in the pentacle slashing at Maranon with talon like hands.

 

[Maple Harte]

The instant [member="Sawa Ike"] landed in the pentacle, Maranon could only chuckle in delight, the blood construct clapping its hands, using Maranon's smirking face as an energy barrier seperated them, the magic going into Sawa, ripping out every bit of energy that was still Maranon, transfering it into the blood construct, living red liquid becoming rosy pink skin and muscle as the construct kneeled, muscles and facial structure fully forming. She hoped it was as painful leaving Sawa as it had been leaving her. Maple fainted. And even if Sawa was still standing, she'd likely not really have the energy to fight after this sort of ordeal.

"Ah, suckers..." Maranon leered, her body reconstituted to its prior voluptuous nature, her long black hair cascading in curls down a nude frame. Sawa was still trapped in the pentacle when Maranon rose, her sulpher eyes raking Darth Shojo over with a gaze best described as being vengeful and lustful.

"Oh, I can't figure out whether or not I want to torture you or not..." Maranon joked, leaving Sawa in the pentacle as she went over to the unconscious Maple. Maranon developed an introspective look to her as she ran her fingers through Maple's hair. Maple seemed to be in a nightmare.

"Oh, this poor woman..." Maranon observed quietly, lifting her with telekinesis, circling her. "All she's ever known is violence...it makes for strong Sith but abysmal life. She doesn't have the benefit of time as we do...were you going to turn her? Wait, on second thought don't answer that..." Maranon quipped, staring at Maple's face and remembering Penelope. Maranon was sometimes troubled by how much Penelope's betrayal hurt still.

But Maple...Maple was worth the risk it would all go bad...such power...but more importantly, Maranon needed company. Thousands of years alone with brainwashed slaves and monsters had taught her the value of an actual equal as well as a companion. Maple had defied her. Fought her. Sure Sawa had been there to back her up, but Maranon had seen into Maple's heart (Pun-Tacular!) and knew Maple would have fought her to the end even without Sawa. She would have lost, but it would not have stopped her from trying. Maranon knew at that instant she had found someone worthy, even as Sawa devoured her, and only Maple's mercy kept her from complete destruction. Maranon had not forgotten the gesture. It had made her want Maple all the more, just for the chivalry.

But with what Maranon was planning...she'd need a few days to properly convince her.

But what to do with Sawa?

Screw it, take Sawa too, get a nice couple of torture sessions going. Couldn't hurt. She was going to be out of it anyway.

The naked Maranon, her very prescence seeming to create a surge of desire in the air, turned to stare at Sawa.

"You are going to pay, vampire..." Maranon sneered at her. "For every hour my essence spent in your digestive system, I shall inflict a dozen different really cool and, more importantly, badass forms of torture. Y'know, the kind of chit no one thinks about doing anymore, like...like...like sealing you in a really cool looking statue and lighting a fire under it... no...no...that's too extreme. Spiders? Everyone hates spiders. Put you in a spider casket..." Maranon mused, rubbing her chin. "Yeah...nice big spider casket. Watch you flip out when they start biting you...and then make out with Maple right as you are dying."

Maranon paused at this...

"On second thought...getting that many poisonous spiders without that backfiring on me is gonna be a hassle. Screw it...I'll make out with Maple after I've gotten her all darksidey...that will be your torture." Maranon decided. "Oh, and standard torture of course...but first..."

Maranon set her new, fully restored will on Sawa, fixing the ability Malachiro on Sawa, to induce a stasis like effect on her. Then it would be a matter of fighting Sawa's remaining helpers...

Maranon set Maple down in order to focus fully on knocking Sawa out...


OOC: Let me know if I should change something, Matsu.

 

[Sawa Ike]

[member="Maple Harte"]

She lifted her head feeling it, a scream dying in her throat as warmth flooded out of her and she dipped. Muscles tight, contracted and yet they were like boneless limbs. Where she would be unable to move looking up and listeningt o the sith herself. The pain was intense and she couldn't gather energy fast enough as her mind flickered towards the stasis casket that was holding Ni-Ne. Akala and Raza, where they were now she couldn't be certain but she could feel them down that invisible line. Down that cord of her energy before she was trying to draw enough energy to survive but also warn them to get away.

She couldn't move... she couldn't sit there....she couldn't stand. her palms were on her thighs downward facing. Her breathing slow and her head heavy. Eyelids dropping down before she was moving or trying to move. She couldn't see much at the edges of her vision as Maranon was speaking to her.. she was threatening her and had Maple there as Sawa slumped forward unable to keep herself upright. What had been taken from her was a lot right now and she would need time to recover as she looked to sleep. Falling forward and unconscious as the force powers took effect on her mind and body. "Ni-ne."

Akala shifted, she felt something, a hunger in her gut... she was looking up and moving for the moment as she looked at the screen of the room. Her hair over one eye and Raza curled up in her arms. "What is it?" She said it and Akala was staying there for a moment as they could see Sawa slumped over and trying to figure out what the two of them would be able to do.. they were pretty much trapped here in the room she she got up. "We need to move quickly, tell the guards what is going on and start tracking them wherever they go." She looked calm compared to everything else that was happening around them.

"You seem calm." Raza said it and stood there next to her getting their weapons in case they had to fight. "I am, we have a great many problems but we have survived worse." She said it and their past as homeless, barely surviving on the streets or in jungles like this because they didn't have support or each other... "You know we can get out of here sweetie." A smirk played on her lips though while she wasn't going to the door but was feeling it out and seeing Sawa fall unconscious. "Get itno the vents, we'll get outside and up one of the lines." She got a nod and they started to go to work, using taozin flesh nodules to conceal themselves in the force.

Sawa though was awake... she felt the softness of the silk sheets around her, the cushion of water and gel that let her relax. Her hair long and in small braids a black curtain that framed the pillows around her. The scent of morning dew on the flowers around the room. The steam coming off of the waters around the bed something even more alluring as she listened and felt something. against her back. The scent was there, the familiar sensation of muscle embracing her and keeping her safe. She rolled over and looked at her, the black hair, closed eyes and the skin. A smile creeping onto her face while the sounds of Atrisia came through the window.

The scents were different... less industrial as she wanted to nudge her awake.. as she wanted to just lay there and enjoy seeing the curves, the lines of her face. The blood tiger... her blood tiger... it was all there and she was moving through the sheets of the bed. Slipping out and walking around the bed as she slipped from one of the rystal and gold posts her robe. SLiding into it... letting her hair cascade down her back when she walked across the small raised bridge with a smile on her face. The doors opened as she walked through and could see some of the servants here around the palace. They had moved after everything.

"Master." Two of the servants said in unison moving towards her, one was a zeltron an exotic species that had come to Atrisia with some of the new visitors and stayed. Serving in her household. She was beautiful but from all of the readings their entire species were beautiful. The bodies naturally charming and they could exude pheromones that attracted others. Then there was Maple.. a young servant who had come to them and now she wore some of the finest silks. Wrapping hands around her as they helped the atrisian into a kimono. Maples hand lingering for a moment but then it was over and the feeling in her stomach went away.

She didn't know when Ni-Ne would awaken from her slumber, after everything that had happened with Xavier and the Emperor dead his sister had come back to help stabilize the empire and government. The two of them hadn't needed to run with the jedi master. He had sacrificed himself to let them escape here into the mountains. The fortress palace was theirs and in time they were forgiven... honored even which let the two of them live their lives. "THank you." She stood there looking in the mirror. THe kimono black with crimson stripes, dream silk something new they had learned about before she started walking away.

"Your Lady Ni-Ne is awake master." A servant said as she and another came into the room. Handmaidens for Ni-Ne was were dressing her and she looked at the woman who came next to her. Wearing a pearl white kimono with jade flowers. "You weren't there when I woke up." She said it and came over as she was standing there on a balcony overlooking the valley. Even Midori had calmed down, with her father dispose her aunt hadn't killed her she had exiled her but Ni-Ne and her took her in... Midori was just as hurt a Raza and Akala who had come to be around them. THeir own little family here in the mountains of Atrisia.

 

[Maranon]

As a famous and famously flamboyant industrialist Maranon had met once put it:

It feels good to be back

With the defeat of [member="Sawa Ike"] and Maple, Maranon had a moment to herself in the aftermath of the brutal, bizzare fight that had just occured. She could not stop running her hands over everything. She could feel again, though she would have been greatful to feel almost anything feel beyond the growing despair in her own tomb, Penelope's betrayal and the horror of sensory deprivation. A millenias long nightmare had finally come to an end for her. She had been putting on a haughty, arrogant face for Sawa. On the inside, she was barely keeping her composure as the full weight of being alive again hit. She wanted to see, to feel all the new things this galaxy could now offer. Regaining her royal status, if she even actually wanted it at this point, could wait. There was so much to do.

Both were now completely asleep, Maranon cracking a grin as she partly sensed what Sawa was dreaming about (albeit with considerable strain) due to her extremely powerful Force Empathy.

"Oh, lovely Sawa...you crave the domestic life even now. A holdover of your human side?" She asked herself more than Sawa, as Sawa was out cold.

The rose skinned Zeltron beauty knew she could not stay here. It was just too dangerous. She would have to secure transit, that would be the easy part. The tricky part was finding transport that suited her fine tastes. She briefly considered trying to seize control of Castle Morpheus but that was more Ni-Ne's ride. Speaking of Ni-Ne...

Maranon went up to the stasis casket, stared at the ancient monitor next to it. Maranon checked the due date.

"Oh my...you aren't due to wake up for another decade. We can't have that..." Maranon smirked, chanting something evil sounding under her breath and the monitor glitched, the timer lowering the release date to a matter of months.

"You're welcome, gorgeous..." Maranon smirked as she lustfully ran a finger over the casket. She lifted both Sawa and Maple up with telekinesis and proceeded to head out of the chamber, heading back to the tram where Maple had been brainwashed into horribly killing the poor Togrutan...

She would find a way off Atrisia with these two. She would get someone to help her. She wouldn't even need the Force...

After all...Everybody Loves Maranon...

Everybody except Penelope, a small voice in her head bitterly reminded her as the tram sped to where they had first arrived. She didn't like to push past her own vanity often but there it was: Her most serious failure at love.

Maranon didn't smile quite as much as she thought of the green eyed beauty...the green eyed beauty who had told her to go to hell harder than Maple did...with Synox...

Meanwhile...




The soul of the sacrificed Togrutan, altered by exposure to the Kolda-Bratha Calculus, tumbled through past, present and future, ripped between what-ifs and never could be's and in eternal pain. Its confusion and distress at being betrayed by Maple warping into obsession and something approaching hatred but not quite. She forgot her life, for got her friends, forgot her loves. All that mattered was Maple and how she had damned her. Eventually even that left, replaced only by the memory of green eyes.

Her soul was ripped apart by time, then put together, back and forth, each rip tearing into even its minds ability to find refuge in insanity. Always suffering, never relief in the void.

And then...she was tumbling, falling from a great height, naked and whole, her soul in pain, and all she remembered was green eyes. Green eyes that stared into her soul...She hit the waters of some ancient lake and was coughing, struggling to swim to shore. She pulled herself up to shore at night time, under a crescent moon, not knowing where or who she was, only that she was Togrutan and purple and she needed to know why she could only think about green eyes...

The Togrutan, fit and curvy, rose up, staring at the robed men and women around her. She got nervous.

"Where am I?" was the curvy, purple skinned woman's first question.

"You are on Ryloth young one. Jart told us to journey here..." one of the men answered. "Where did you come from? We saw you fall from a great green light above."

The woman paused..."I...I don't know..."

She then perked at a name the man mentioned. "Who's Jart?" She asked, blinking dark eyes, lips a dark purple.

The hooded man spoke. "A great and wise spirit. He guides us, along with the spirits Lylek and Doashim. You have been sent here through a magic we know not. I sense...something about you..."

The woman looked hesitant. "What do you mean?" she asked, drawing back.

"If you come with us, we would be happy to try and understand what has happened to you, and how you might regain your memories..."

The Togrutan looked hesitant. But it was cold and she was naked.

"I...I could use some clothes..." the woman said nervously.

The hooded man gestured for her to follow and the Woman left with the large group to the deeper desert...

So began the new, if ultimately short life of the woman who eventually became the Brain Demon.

 

[Sawa Ike]

[member="Maranon"] [member="Maple Harte"]

She felt something moving her like a uzz in the back of her mind as she stood there. Hand wrapping around her waist and she sank into her chest. Ni-Ne was much taller then her still.. a mountain of a woman and a strong warrior as she inhaled the scent of everything around them. THe world... Ni-Ne and the underlying scent of blood... they were everything here and she turned around in her arms looking up to touch her neck and then breathe in the familiar scent. Underlying... blood and power... violence as she felt her eyes roll back into her head a little. She kissed along her collarbone and reached up to her tip toes smiling.

"Oh I love you more and more each day." She said it and felt something... something of a pang in the back of her mind... there was something she was missing but she couldn't bother with it. She didn't want to bother with it as the sun was cresting... the light starting to come through large swaths of the valley and village below them. "You say that every morning." Her words came out and they were more... more wonderful. that rolling sound that sweet taste that seemed sinful to want to have... everything about her pushed her to that happy place. "Because every morning I wake up to you and every day I am reminded that we've always picked each other."

She was thinking about it... strange but she couldn't think of what had been... them staying like this... a life... a great tale and there was something still beneath the surface. She was allowing the whispers in her mind to reach out and she felt something in the distance.. muddled... dangerous but it was there. Someone was trying to reach out to her and she just stood there. She looked over at Maple and Maranon, Raza and Akala and there was someting there.... a shifting as Maple seemed to be covered in blood and crazed for a moment. Then it was back to normal and her body ached. "Ohhh I feel sore all of a sudden."

She felt hands on her, holding her close and it was warmth as Ni-Ne and Maple. Maranon, Raza, Akala was there laying her down. The silk sheets seeming to pull her down deeper into the bedding and it was almost like a coffin.... the lights flickering as above she could see so many twisted sights. Maple with Maranon... Ni-Ne was twisted with glowing eyes and blood all over her... she was being buried alive.... then she was back to laying on the bed and she could feel her body protest everything here... feel it try and keep her from getting up and away. She thought for a moment she was being carried somewhere by Maranon and MAple was there by her but then she was back in the vision.

Raza and Akala had gotten through the ship, through the vents as they moved around. Some oil and climbing outside one of the vents while they moved along the rocks below the ship. Climbing and scrambling along as they got to one of the waterfalls going down. The pair lept getting into the water and putting the rebreathers into their mouths as they shot through and focused going through the water to the open stream. FInally they came out within the cenote.. a massive sink hole and Raza rubbed at her eyes moving them to the sides. An emergency beacon going off as the pair of them huddled together.

"What are we going to do? The master is captured and we left her there." She said it and was looking around worried about anything that could be a creature or something. "We'll tell them what happened but if we hadn't gotten out of there we'd be dead or captured and no one would know what to look for. That being on the camera we can at least identify." The two of them laid there as something was coming overhead... a black ship and the landing ramp was coming down. Whoever it was they didn't think they were going to like the problems that might be arising now. Akala though was ready and had something of a makeshift knife from their gear.

Aoi had felt it.. something was attacking her mother and the first instinct was a sort of morbid joy that she was being killed but then if something was able to attack and overtake her then it was a danger while she moved. Her eye patch gleaming and catching the light. Her smiling eyes which held humor something dangerous when she had black hair with pale skin. THe golden iris of her eye was checking out was was around them. She had set the ship to move faster when they felt it and stood there now as the ramp was coming down looking at the two bodies in the sand of the cenote. The massive sinkhole was something few could really climb down or even back up.

"Report." Her voice came out a little heavy from the smoke she had on her hip. A slender pipe packed before she was looking over at it. SHe knew these two to be servants of her mother and as they entangled themselves from each other for warmth she motioned for them to get covered up. "We were with your mother and something happened her companion went crazy... released some monster and when she fell over and was taken." Aoi listened to them and glared as she looked at the mountain itself and where they were. She knew Ni-Ne... she knew what was here... one of the few who had seen her father when she was younger but he had been killed.

"Ni-Ne." SHe said the words and almost wanted to spit them.. that demon of a woman was a menace and her mother never thought clearly when it came to her... no if she was going to be running around again she would ensure she was crippled or dead now. It would be better in the long run as she slid her sword from its sheath and her fangs gleamed. "Get on the ship... we will find my mother and make sure Ni-Ne is not free." There was a sneer though as she looked at the two of them... she didn't judge her mother but surrounding herself with servants like this was... different. Aoi walked around as she motioned for the golden armored Onna to head towards the caves.