Private Poor Unfortunate Souls

[Wrenarias]

Rattatak was a dry, desolate planet. The beige ball of dust hung suspended in the darkness of space before the Doashim. Wrenarias leaned back in her seat, sighing quietly as she stared irritably at the over-sized brown rock. As much as she didn't want to go down there, her information made it clear there were slavers prowling the surface -- one of which was likely a sith apprentice. Nothing was confirmed, unfortunately, which meant rushing in without much preparation was essentially the only option.

It left Wren on edge.

She turned slightly to look at Talival out of the corner of her eye. The lethan twi'lek was quietly checking over her rifle and prepping her gear.

"This trip could be trouble. I want you and the others to stay with the ship once we touch down. Something tells me we're going to need to make a quick escape. If there is a Sith down there, I'd rather you three stay out of harm's way." Wren instructed as she pushed herself to her feet, double checking to make sure that her lightsaber was safely tucked away inside her jacket.

"You sure zhat is wise?" Talival asked in her thick Rylothian accent.

"No, but it's about the only plan I've got right now." Wren retorted with a dry chuckle, slinging a bag over her shoulder.

"Mmm... well, you should still take zhe droids, no? Zhey will be better zhan nothing." The lethan replied insistently, gesturing to the pair of battle droids that escorted the ship.

"Yeah... you're not wrong. Can't hurt."

​

As Wren begrudgingly anticipated, the planet's surface was miserably hot and brown. Everything in sight was some shade of tan or beige -- even the sky had a dusty hue to it. At her side, the two battle droids Dorian had given her along with the gunship trod over the caked mud that covered the ground. It was a long walk to the coordinates that she'd been given.

In the back of her mind, Wren ran over the information again and again. The source was fairly reliable, but she worried this might have been some sort of setup. Why else would it be so easy to waltz up to a sith's hideout? She tried to put her worries at ease, after all... she'd already killed one Sith Apprentice years prior.

The visceral memory caused the twi'lek to grimace slightly, shaking her head. She needed to focus on the here and now... not the past.

Cresting the ridge, she could look down onto the compound grounds below, just as her source had said. That was a decent sign, at least... but she wasn't sure if it signaled trouble or not. Lowering herself down onto her belly, she pulled out a pair of binoculars to take a better look around without attracting too much attention. Everything matched up with the imaging she'd been provided. So far, so good... she wondered how long that would last.

She looked to the two droids and gestured towards the building to the far left of the small cluster of civilization. "That's the slave housing, if our intel is any good. They're our first priority... let's move."

Beatrice Govan

 

[Beatrice Govan]

It was perhaps morbid to return to the place of one's untimely demise. Irrelevant. For living beyond death was itself a very definition of morbid.

Evelynn Zambrano had not come here for nostalgia's sake, there was no sense of tragedy held in that monstrous heart. It was a motivator, a reminder of what can happen when one is so foolish and weak, but those scattered desert bones were far from the woman that stood there on this day. Wicked and flippant desire was the drive no longer, replaced now by a sense of purpose, a need for the strength and power that had eluded such a pathetic former existence.

It was here she would train.

She stood in a former quarter for slaves long abandoned since the fall of the Sister Queens of Rattatak and their theatre of death which had been known as the Cauldron, it made the perfect place for the task at hand. Sparsely decorated for little distraction, spacious enough for her purpose and best of all steeped in horror.

For those that could feel a room through the fingertips of the Force would find it hard to ignore the abject horror that painted those walls. The former home of those whose lives were forfeit, who lived every day under the thumb of abject cruelty, never knowing when such suffering would finally end. A tapestry of unanswered prayers for the end wrote across the low ceiling in pure emotion.

For a Sith such atmosphere feed all the right engines. Fear, anger and pain all swirling in perfect cataclysm, it could be taken and used, focused down into what gave the Dark Side its power.

The woman was flanked as ever by two of the Crownguard, a signature of the Zambrano bloodline, they stood impassively at the back of the room, vibro-voulges in hand. Faceless beings. A simple precaution needed to be taken in the Sith's period of vulnerability so-to-speak.

A variety of five different species also stood in the room. A twi'lek, a lasat, a wookiee, a togruta and a human. Slaves. Each one equipped with a suitably cruel slaving collar. Having been murdered by her own slave rebellion in the past, this measure of security was more than demanded. Fear made such creatures do peculiar things, this was the perfect deterrent for that.

The last thing present within the room was a medical droid, an absolute requirement for this manner of training.

“You. Here.”

The togruta was summoned before her with a single notion of a finger and obedience was, of course, prompt.

“Run out of this room as fast as you can. Now.”

No hesitation would be needed on such a command. Were there a chance to get out of the room, there would have been a chance to get out of the building. Then maybe...

The familiar snap-hiss sounded as the daughter of the Emperor ignited her lightsaber, a sound which spurred on the correct kind of fear, driving the alien to indeed, run as fast as it could. So close, so close. Just maybe. The red blade so typical of a Sith was thrown by her right, spinning in a horizontal arc across the room towards the target, her left hand manipulating the weapon's direction to boomerang back to her.

A piercing shriek and a heavy thud followed as the lightsaber easily cleaved through the running creature's left calve, completely severing the limb.

The weapon returned still in its arc, caught back by the same right hand that it threw it. There was improvement there, that she was pleased with. In the early days of this practice, the catching had been somewhat cumbersome and had mercifully been done with a training saber, which explained why she still had ten fingers.

Yet there wa-

“Stop screaming,” the diminutive blonde woman ordered, her voice laced with nothing but impatience and contempt, she turned to the droid and pointed at the creature still writhing and wailing in agony, “sedate it and keep it alive. The creature has plenty more limbs and it will not expire until I deem it so.”

Yet there was still glaring issues with her technique. Evelynn had aimed at the knees and had wished to cleave through both legs. Perhaps trivial. In battle, an incapacitating strike like that would be invaluable, but she demanded perfection, from herself more than anybody else.

A grimace, and then she turned to face the human slave.

“You. Here.”

It did not move, that familiar look frozen upon its face. The horror, oh, she knew that look well. All in the whites of the eyes, there was something positively feral about it. Still, it was disobedience and would have to be punished accordingly.

Fragile fingers flicked to a small device attached to the woman's wrist giving the screen a quick tap and administering a swift, hard shock to the human who could only naturally scream and spasm, grasping at the collar around its neck.

“I will not command you a second time, slave.”

Wrenarias

 

[Wrenarias]

The silence was broken by a visceral scream, one that was impossible to tell whether it came from a man or a woman. Wrenarias was familiar with such shrieks of the damned, the screams still haunted her dreams at night. Something horrible was happening down below. Even from her perch up on the ridge, Wren could sense the malicious presence and the terror of the slaves they kept. Her thoughts momentarily drifted to the words of Cedric, P Placeholder 0128 , even the darkest of souls can be saved. He'd told her that after she confessed to throwing a man who enslaved her out a window. It left a bitter taste in her mouth. Some people weren't worth saving, some people needed killing.

Powerful emotions were practically a physical manifestation for an Empath like Wrenarias. The colors, as she called them, hung thick in their air like miasma that surrounded the Source. Sickly yellows of fear and dread, the vivid crimson of rage. She winced, the emotions washing over her. There'd been a time when intense sentiments like these would have overwhelmed her... but years embroiled in violent conflict quickly taught her how to let such things simply pass with indifferent awareness. She could experience the emotion without losing herself in it, at least, from a distance she could.

She took a breath and then gestured further down the path to the droids. "Get into position behind those rocks and cover me. I'm going to try to get the slaves freed and send them to you two. Once they're freed, I'll need you to escort them back to the Doashim. I'll try to deal with the Sith." She whispered in a low tone to the droids. "Don't make yourselves known, unless absolutely necessary."

Both droids nodded in silent agreement. Their programming was so exact that it was almost unsettling. In the back of her mind, Wren made a mental note that she would need to modify their personality matrix in the future, if she survived this encounter. The two droids turned and scurried down the hill, moving as silently as a shadow. If she ever saw Dorian again, she would have to commend the design of the droids.

Wrenarias took a single breath to gather her courage before she made her way down the hill towards the sound of the wailing -- as she grew closer, she decided that it was likely a woman screaming.

As she drew closer to the side of the building, she screams turned to pitiful mewling and then silence. Wren crouched down, touching a hand to the exterior wall as she waited. Something was coming.

The medical droid that came around the corner, pushing a hover cart with the delirious togruta, had no time to react before it practically ran into the twi'lek lying in wait. It moved to step back, to call out to its master, but Wren was faster. Her hand shot out towards the droid and then her fingers clenched down into a tight fist. In an instant, the droid's body crumpled like a tin can, crushed by the Force before Wren slowly lowered it to the ground to keep it from clattering loudly as it fell.

She stood and hurried over to the cart, looking the sedated woman over. Her leg was missing from just below the knee down, a clean cut that'd already been cauterized by the blade that severed it. Seemed the Sith apprentice had her lightsaber then. Wren sighed softly then reached up to tap a compartment on the side of her prosthetic lek -- where she kept a small device that gave off miniscule EMP bursts, which allowed her to deactivate slave collars.

The purple togruta groaned, unaware of what was going on around her.

Wren quickly grabbed the trolley, rushing the sedated woman over to where she knew the droids were in hiding. "New plan, take her and get the hell out of here, she needs medical attention immediately. I'll deal with the rest of this."

Once again, both droids nodded together in acknowledgement, then hurried off with the unconscious togruta in tow.

She waited long enough for the droids to make it back up the ridge and disappeared from sight, before she turned back towards the building. As she stalked across the dusty ground to the entrance, she reached into her jacket and pulled her lightsaber free from the hidden inside pocket. It was unlikely that this confrontation was going to go peacefully.

Someone else was screaming inside. It was time to put a stop to this madness.

"That's enough." Wren called out sharply as she stepped into the doorway.

Beatrice Govan

 

[Beatrice Govan]

“Evidently not,” Evelynn muttered under her breath as an intruder suddenly made themselves known.

If her methods of self-training had been enough then she would have been sharp enough to sense the brazen twi'lek long before she was in the very same room as the Emperor's daughter. Frustration was turned inwards, knowing that once upon a time such a trifle of sense would have been second nature. A mental note was made of this glaring flaw, as being ambushed was rarely a treat.

The Crownguard behind her shifted, suddenly at the ready to protect the fragile Zambrano but were halted by woman's raised hand. Growth would not come by allowing others to solve her problems. A fail-safe but not a solution.

Rather curiously, Evelynn chose to disengage her lightsaber. A lot of Sith chose violence as an immediate remedy to their problems. Simple, yes. Effective, not always. As much as it harmed her pride to admit, she was at least aware of her own current limitations and was not wholly prepared to limp home having being battered by some lekku-headed twit.

A withering gaze traipsed over the alien as she took a step forward, an eyebrow cocked in impatient curiosity as the intruder was sized up. A small tilt of the head, and then a frown as if the woman had encountered an unfortunate smell.

“Now, what is your purpose here, twi'lek,” came Evelynn's sharp and irritated tones, “no, no, allow me to guess first,” she continued taking another step forward, “you're here to liberate the slaves and apprehend their cruel master!”

The woman's face and voice twisted on that last sentence into a mask of faux-tragedy and mockery so acidic that it could have dissolved durasteel.

"Or maybe you'd rather join them? Hm?"

Wrenarias

 

[Wrenarias]

As Wrenarias stared the sith girl down, she felt a familiar calm settle over her. Fighting is what she knew, the only time in her life where she felt some semblance of control. She had no intention of talking her way out of this, she didn't come all the way to Rattatak to have a snarky conversation. There was no rage burning in her chest, no fear twisting in her belly. Either she would die in this fight and her struggles would come to an end, or she'd survive to fight another day.

The sith taunted her, but Wren didn't take the bait.

She clicked the actuator on the hilt of her lightsaber, causing the device to extend out so that it was easier to wield with both hands. The jade colored blade of light hummed to life. A pale green light filled the room around Wren as she stepped further into the chamber.

"Oh, no." She said with a hint of amusement in her tone as she turned to the side and raised her saber towards Evelynn. "I'm here to kriffing kill you."

Before the Sith could react, Wrenarias leapt forward, swinging her saber towards the woman's throat.

Beatrice Govan

 

[Beatrice Govan]

Well then.

No time for witty retorts, or even thoughts about witty retorts as the twi'lek launched herself and her green blade at the Sith Apprentice. The instinct to not be beheaded dictated Evelynn's choice to do a trust fall with the floor, the lightsaber swinging perilously close over her face as the blonde fell backwards. Using the momentum from the fall Zambrano rolled backwards and into a crouch, for laying at the feet of your would-be murder was perhaps unwise.

“Now now,” she spat as she stood up, fingers immediately moving to the sadistic machination upon her wrist and with a mere few taps on the screen the room erupted into screams. Every slaving collar had suddenly burst into life, sending a torrent of horrifying electricity through the bodies of the four remaining slaves. Not a single shock either, but a constant torrent that refused to cease.

“While I do appreciate your forwardness, I've grown rather attached to living of late,” Evelynn crowed loudly over the group anguish, “so might I suggest taking a moment to think.”

There was a chance this wouldn't work, might have bred a sense of urgency instead of consideration but at the very least the sudden outburst of suffering might have offered her briefest of respites. Still, in the event of impulsive murderous Jedi the Emperor's daughter did at least deem it wise enough to reignite her red blade.

“Shall we be civil and talk like adults, hm?”

Wrenarias

 

[Wrenarias]

Had Wren not suffered through countless battles, all of which were inundated with suffering, the sudden onslaught of agony and fear might have overwhelmed the twi'lek. While she was concerned for the slaves, she knew there wasn't anything she could do to help them now -- not in the middle of a fight. She had to put an end to this first. Stopping would mean giving the Sith an opening, one she would no doubt take an advantage of. Wren knew that if she fell, the slaves would still suffer. If she yielded, she would join them in their suffering.

There was only one way forward.

One thing did change, however. The fact that the sith was using her slaves in attempt to distract Wren, only pissed the twi'lek off. Her eyes flicked to the wrist that Evelynn had tapped, then back to the woman's face.

"You talk too much." She growled, keeping up the relentless assault as she lunged forward to close the distance once more. As she rushed towards the Sith, she tossed the discharger to the cluster of slaves writhing on the floor. She couldn't help them yet... but perhaps they could help themselves. Feinting to the left, Wren sought to put Evelynn off balance, before she swiftly swung her blade towards the limb that had the slave-collar control device affixed to it.

Beatrice Govan

 

[Beatrice Govan]

There was the briefest of moments, where a small part of Evelynn had to respect the sheer willpower and determination in the name of murder. An admirable quality in her eyes. Slightly less admirable when she was the death's chosen, but the sentiment was still there, if only for a moment.

A lifetime of inexperience in physical combat left the Sith regrettably falling for the twi'lek's feint, a flash of green reflecting in widened sclera as the lightsaber cleaved through her right forearm with ease, sending both wrist and hand to the floor with a soft clatter, fingers still clasped around the hilt of her own deactivated blade.

Stillness, for but a second.

A stiffened jaw. Eyes wide. Expectation deemed the loss of a limb a debilitating injury. It demanded a body to go into shock. It called for an guished screAms and complete and utter hOrror.

Expectation did not account for Evelynn Zambrano.

The cauterised stump sent dec apitated nerve endings aflAme in a unique a g o n y that oh, she had felt before. Not the first hand she'd lost.

Nor the sec o n d.

NOT eVeN t h E T H I r D.

Twin lifetimes of sufFeRing. Her BREAD and BUTTER. Learned to SURVIVE IT. L o V e it. DEPEND upon i t. CrAVEiTNeEDit The m a n t r a. OH. HOW DiD IT G O AGAI N?

P l e A s U R e I N p A i N.

No. N O. NO LONGER. Not HER. NoT AnyMorE. BET T ER nOW FATHE R.

P O W E R I N P A I N

She trembled, lower jaw shuddered outwards bearing t e e t h as an already gaunt face grew taut and stiff as eyeballs r o l l e d upwards, and eyelids took to spasm. The whispering malicious signature within her exploded as A G O N Y fuelled DEPRAVITY'S engine.

With startling suddenness, Evelynn's remaining hand reached out to snatch the twi'lek's wrist in a skeletal vice grip, head snapping to stare at the alien in the eyes with a primal malevolence so unexpected from her prior demeanour.

“AND YOU TALK TOO LITTLE.”

Wrenarias

 

[Wrenarias]

Death was a common presence on a battlefield. Wren had sensed the hollow echo through the Force many, many times. She knew the sensation well. For her, it was as easily recognizable as the scent of vanilla. Death had a color and touch entirely its own.

That same sickening aura surrounded the Sith that now latched on to her wrist.

Only now... it was far. more. pronounced.

It was twisted, demented in some way. Rot, decay, wretched maliciousness.

One of the slaves managed to get their collar deactivated with the device Wren had tossed in their direction. The young man scrambled to grab the fallen arm as it tumbled across the stone floor. Blood coated the device that was still strapped to the wrist, making it difficult to properly operation the mechanisms. After fumbling several times, he managed to turn off the continuous shock that was tormenting the others.

The slender bones in the twi'lek's wrist screamed in protest from the force of Evelynn's grasp, straining to withstand the crushing weight. It was a valiant effort, but one that was inevitably in vain. Wren felt her wrist shatter beneath Evelynn's grip, though the scream of agony caught in her throat. It wasn't the worst pain she'd ever endured, but it still caused her stomach to roil into her chest.

It was difficult to breathe.

"RUN!" Wrenarias bellowed to the slaves, still grappling with Evelynn.

She felt the Force recoil in reaction to the connection between herself and the Sith.

Her emotions seared into Evelynn. The heartache, fury, loneliness, sorrow, and frustration all churned together into a cacophonous maelstrom. It felt as if the Sith's mental state, her drawing on her own power through the Force, was amplifying Wrenarias' abilities.

"Let GO!" She screamed at the Sith, not in pain; but in concern for what would happen if she continued to feed into the storm that manifested between them. Wren could feel herself pouring into the Sith, and the Sith's essence sapping into her.

This had never happened before.

With Dorian, she'd felt something, a connection between them. She could see into him, and him into her. But this... this was different. It was as if her soul was being torn asunder and then rapidly stitched back together, only for the process to repeat all over again.

It was excruciating.

Beatrice Govan

 

[Beatrice Govan]

The slaves were now inconsequential. Would it annoy her later? A touch. Escaped slaves were an irritation on the same level as a hangnail. An inconvenience. As long as there weren't enough to warrant a rebellion it was perfectly fine. There would be new slaves, just as faceless and nameless before. Besides, there were more pressing issues at hand.

Like the i m mense satisfaction of CRUSHED bone within her grip, stoking the flames of suffering that lived beneath her skin. There was n o t h i n g better. NOTHING sweeter. nOthIng stronger than pain.

Then something changed.

A wave that came crashing down upon her. Emotions, and not her own. They were deafening. Screaming their way into her psyche with such ferocity that the woman's maddening features shifted with shock. Now, wasn't this a surprise. Such tragedy. Such grief. Such hatred. Such suffering. These emotions that poured forth from the twi'lek were staples of Sith power.

Curious.

The experience was far from enjoyable, the point of such emotion was being able to control it and bend it to your will. This, this was wild and untameable. It rampaged within her soul, ripping, tearing and wailing throughout Evelynn's being. Logic and instinct wished for it to cease, but...

“NO.”

Still gripping the shattered wrist the Emperor's daughter attempted to pull the alien even closer, so they were directly face-to-face, so thoughtfully twisting the limb in the process.

“I FEEL YOU.”

This wasn't one way. If it were only detrimental to Zambrano then she wouldn't have wanted it to cease, surely. Did this woman taste her death, the maddening horror of two decades spent in the Netherworld, in the void absent of all?

“I KNOW YOU.”

Was she infected by her own lifetime of pain? Her own sorrowful story traded for one of lunacy, both as needlessly cruel but oh-so different? HOW DOES IT TASTE? Evelynn's body was trembling, still-wild eyes having welled up through the overwhelming nature of the process. A smile was offered, demented and wide with teeth clenched furiously together. Without warning the Sith moved forward again, trying to touch her forehead against the twi'lek's in a sickening effort to get even closer.

“I HAVE BEEN YOU.”

Wrenarias

 

[Wrenarias]

S t i l l n e s s.

Dark.

Drowning...

They were water of two r i v e r s.

For a single, heart-shattering moment there was nothing but the two of them. Their consciousnesses coalesced into singularity that rippled with their every emotion, thought, and memory -- shared between them, as though they were one. It became impossible for Wren to distinguish who she was, who she'd been, and where she ended. The lines all vanished between them.

There was pain. She could sense that much, but it was like a distant itch at the back of their mind.

Their mind.

Intertwined with the agony of existence there was madness, excitement, joy, heartbreak, pleasure, sorrow, uncertainty, resolve. It all was coherent, but nothing made sense.

Voices whispered. No. Their voice spoke. Jumbled sentences with no ending or beginning, a string of words that bled into one another.

L a u g h t e r.

One pleasant, another maniacal. Warmth enveloped with cold.

Her eyes opened. Their eyes opened, peering into their collective soul.

It was a thing of tragic beauty, of uncontrollable chaos. Two spirits bound as one. Their colors seeping into one another.

Green and Lavender, blending together to form a muddled shadow of G R E Y.

​

Everything happened in an instant, as soon as Evelynn's forehead was touched to Wren's. The Force recoiled around them, shuddering under the strain. Air rushed around their forms, as if being drawn in by some unseen power. Shrieks echoed off the stone walls, though it was impossible to tell if the sound originated from one of the women or the winds.

As suddenly as the maelstrom started, so too did it end. A deafening silence resounded throughout the chamber, as though Rattatak herself was holding her breath. And then everything ...

e x p l o d e d.

A massive shock-wave burst out from the two women, slamming into the guards that lingered nearby and throwing them against the far wall with enough force to shatter bones on impact.

Stone walls, thousands of years old, buckled beneath the brunt of the explosion -- each cracking into hundreds of pieces that slowly started to crumble under the weight of the temple.

Wren collapsed to the floor.

Beatrice Govan

 

[Beatrice Govan]

Once more she ceased to be.

This was not the V O I D of the Nether, the very barest of existence robbed of all senses, of all thought, drifting through nothing. No. This was the opposite. It was E V E R Y T H I N G. A VIOLENT and blinding cacophony that SCREAMED through a shared consciousness. Lasting for but a moment and for all of i n f i n i t y all at the same time.

There was no Wrenarias Sabel.

There was no Evelynn Dorn Zambrano.

There was only the Force, and in all of their infinite chaos, it exploded.

Then nothing.

Individuality returned with a sudden jolt, as Evelynn was returned to consciousness by stimulants administered by one of the Crownguard. Whispers of foreign emotions rippled throughout the Sith's mind in what could only be the aftershock of their encounter. Alarmed and disorientated, Evelynn lashed out at the armoured mook with her stump as he dutifully backed away in silence.

Dust mingled in the air, as the integrity of the building continued its guaranteed downfall. It grumbled, and groaned as increasingly large bits of debris dropped from the ceiling.

What had happened?

Sitting up, the woman stared at the prone form of the twi'lek with two parts uncertainty and one part anger. The vicious opportunist within urged to dispatch of the alien right there and then, her remaining hand reaching to her boot and pulling out a small ornate blade.

Evelynn crawled over to the woman, fully intent on finishing such foolishness with one deep cut but just as the knife was poised above her throat...

No.

“Take her,” the Emperor's daughter suddenly barked, her stare livid and voice clearly perturbed by her own lack of throat-slitting, “and my hand. We're leaving.”

---

A few hours later and Evelynn Zambrano was sat upon a grey plasteel chair within a severe grey room upon her ship, expression terse as she stared forward. Her newly acquired stump now dressed with the appropriate bacta patches. No pain relief was necessary as the Sith chose to steep in the ache of the healing wound instead, using it to try and clear her head of prior events.

Alongside her in the room was a plain table, decked in what could only be described as tools of torture. These ranged from the simple, things to cut, crush and burn to the more complex, with vials of ominous liquids sitting alongside complex technology and even Yuuzhan Vong creations. The clean and sterile nature of such equipment suggested that such things were only present as decorations to intimidate but it was very likely that her charge would know better than that.

Especially after their shared experience.

The focal point of the room at which the seated blonde stared at was the still-unconscious form of the twi'lek, who was now strapped into an upright interrogation chair, her form only being held up by the restraints around her wrists, ankles and midriff with her head left to droop forward. A collar was affixed around the woman's neck, its purpose to dampen her connection to the Force as to prevent troublesome behaviour.

Troublesome, yes. That was the perfect word.

 

[Wrenarias]

Before she even opened her eyes, Wren knew she was in trouble.

The bitterly familiar feel of a collar clamped around her neck was the first thing she noticed. From there, her consciousness spread down her spine and out along her limbs. She was restrained in some sort of chair.

Maybe if she just kept her eyes closed it would all just go away. It was a ridiculous thought, but one she was tempted to cling to. She wouldn't have to face the reality of her situation if she never saw it.

Rage flared in her chest.

The Sith had collared her. Even if the intention had been to distort her connection to the Force, the implication of a collar was enough that Wren wanted to tear the woman's pretty little throat out with her teeth.

Slowly, she raised her head and then opened her eyes -- which were entirely wrong.

Where there should have been white, there was a smokey darkness. Her lavender irises were now a brilliant, almost glowing, pale grey. Not that she could tell the difference. But she could feel there was something... off about herself.

Such visceral fury was unlike her.

She strained against the bindings on her hands, lunging forward towards the woman seated across from her. There was a distinct satisfaction when she saw the stump of Evelynn's arm.

The cruel tools nearby didn't go unnoticed, but her focus was affixed firmly on Evelynn.

Her thoughts replayed through their fight, remembering the Sith's shrieked words of "you talk too little." Silence would likely irritate the woman more than anything Wren could say.

Instead of speaking, the twi'lek tilted her head ever so slightly and smirked.

Beatrice Govan

 

[Beatrice Govan]

A small cock of the head.

Astonishing.

Even before the twi'lek had opened her eyes there was an acidic fury bubbling within her. It was peculiar, less so the source of such rage but the very fact that Evelynn could sense it so clearly. When the slaving collar designed for Force users had been activated the woman herself had felt a slight numbing in her own sensation.

This was troublesome on its own.

Back straightened and brow lofted as the alien finally chose to look at her grim reality, the surprise upon the Sith's face not hidden at the very sight of those corrupted eyes. Blackened sclera accompanied by brilliant granite. Was this wild creature aware of this? Or had something gone very awry during their little moment?

Silent contemplation was offered towards the animalistic rage that attempted to break out of its bonds as if the Emperor's daughter was considering a work of art rather than a living being.

Of course, one couldn't sit around and observe all day. There was purpose here, and concern.

Finally standing she approached the subject, who had replaced fruitless struggles with defiant silence and the eye roll the Sith gave in return was practically withering. Lightsaber duellist she was not, this much was evident but this realm of suffering was her studio and the twi'lek was her canvas.

“Just so you know,” Evelynn offered helpfully, her remaining (now) gloved hand hovering over her tools, “when you spit on me,” no, far too soon for the evisceration spoon, “and you will spit on me,” yes, a small scalpel, perfect, “that the briefest glimpse of satisfaction garnered will be swiftly lost and never remembered.”

A small control panel upon the table was used to tilt the interrogation chair backwards, so that the twi'lek would be laying down for the next step, a magnet at the back of the collar activating as to keep the head still.

“You do not wish to talk,” the Sith continued, her delicate voice laced with glacial tones as she approached the woman's head with the scalpel in hand, “I understand. In such predicament, it is the small victories that matter, no?”

Carnivorous eyes looked down upon prey, the smile offered on the surface polite but beneath the surface full of nothing but malice.

“Allow me to help,” she said with a faux-brightness, tenderly pressing the flat side of the cold and sterile steel against the woman's cheek, “I will rid you of any future temptation to speak by removing your vocal cords right now.”

The scalpel was moved to her throat above where the collar sat, eager to spill that first drop of precious crimson as it pressed gently against green flesh.

“Try not to thrash around, this requires precision.”

Wrenarias

 

[Wrenarias]

As the chair reclined and the sith started to gloat, walking around and taking her time, Wren's mind had a chance to wander. It was incredibly difficult to focus, like there were incessant whispers in the background that she couldn't quite make out. She wondered if a situation like this befell Kalina after they were separated.

Her mentor had vanished after the battle, along with the Sith Lord that attacked him -- though he left without his apprentice. Wren had seen to that.

Everyone lost someone that day.

Memories flitted about like wisps. One whimsically darting off into another, though all of them involved some disappointment. Dorian would have no idea she was even alive. Neither would Cedric. Anyone who'd ever known her, except for Soloman Priest and Sam, thought she was dead. That'd been the entire point. Fake her death and disappear.

Now no one knew where she was.

Alone. Just like always.

She realized that Evelynn was talking to her and she blinked, looking back to the Sith. There was a scalpel in the other woman's hand and it was pressed menacingly against Wren's throat.

Wait, what happened?

Wren's consciousness re-centered itself once again and she was quite suddenly well aware of her surroundings. The Sith was threatening to cut out her vocal cords, but why?

Her mind felt fractured somehow, a thousand tiny pieces all trying to put themselves back together. It was a messy process.

Evelynn gave her something to focus on. With her head forced down, Wren set her jaw and grit her teeth together. Her situation was entirely in the hands, well, hand of the Sith.

Some sick, twisted part of Wren almost hoped Evelynn would follow through on the threat. She didn't know where it came from though.

Beatrice Govan

 

[Beatrice Govan]

Still, the twi'lek refused to speak! This summoned an incredulous expression upon her severe features before the eruption of peculiar hollow laughter as she observed staunch gritted teeth in the anticipation of suffering.

Incredible.

Also entirely infuriating.

Evelynn wanted to talk, and not just in a manner of typical Sith gloating. They had shared a horrifyingly unique experience through the Force, and the seriousness of such transcended their urges to murder and maim one another. Well, it did at least for Evelynn. The lekku-headed twit before her was content to be mutilated in silence.

“My compliments to your last Master,” she commented with a scathing sneer, having to make a (fairly safe) assumption regarding the alien's past, pretty twi'lek with a soul full of suffering and a desire to save slaves, “what a good and well-behaved girl.”

She couldn't back down on her threat now, it would have shown weakness. Improvisation was needed instead, and quite fortunately, the Sith held quite a hand of creativity in this realm.

Evelynn inhaled slowly, the air drawing through her nose as if it would steady her hand for the procedure, eyes travelling down to her throat. She made the anticipation last, lifting and placing the blade back upon her throat with the slightest of micro-adjustments for half an agonising minute.

Then with a startling suddenness she took the scalpel and jammed it through the twi'lek's chin, the blade erupting through the floor of her mouth.

An immediate wave of nausea hit the Sith, the satisfaction of causing such harm damped by the overwhelming urge to vomit upon committing such cruelty. Not only that but in conjunction with her strike, the woman's own chin and mouth echoed the wicked sentiments of pain. That had...that had never happened before. The flash of horror upon Evelynn's face was hopefully ignored by her prisoner, who likely had other things on her mind at that moment.

Something had gone terribly wrong.

“Ah!” Evelynn exclaimed, forcing herself to gather some modicum of control and composure despite the alarming irregularity, forcing a venomous mask that bared a vicious tooth-filled smile, “I do apologise! You see, I'm not left-handed.”

Wrenarias

 

[Wrenarias]

If Evelynn wanted to hear Wren make a sound, she certainly wouldn't be disappointed by the guttural scream that clawed its way from Wren's throat. Blood burst from her mouth in a spray of gore, her tongue partially impaled by the wicked blade that had pierced her jaw. Mind rending agony seared through the twi'lek's synapses, blinding her to the world around her.

Even with the collar on, however, she could feel her own pain mirrored in Evelynn. She'd felt it too.

Blood started to rush down her throat, choking her. But with the scalpel lodged in her jaw and the magnetic collar holding her down, she couldn't turn her head to the side to keep herself from drowning in it.

Her arms jerked against the restrains on the table, desperately trying to free herself.

No matter how much she screamed, however, there was no one to help her.

Beatrice Govan

 

[Beatrice Govan]

A scream was a start.

Although it couldn't really be savoured given the circumstance. In fact, instead of observing and enjoying the beginnings of what would become a great suffering Evelynn moved back to the table of tools, leaving the scalpel lodged in the twi'lek's chin and grabbed a small mirror. Tilting her head upwards, she inspected the underside of her own chin and indeed found that while it burned there was not a mark to be found.

How curious, it would seem that they shared pain. This was...

“Oh. Now you wish to make noise,” Evelynn snapped, turning her head to leer at the alien who she had left to drown in her own blood, “when I'm trying to think.”

Placing the mirror back down she once more returned to the control panel, rotating the interrogation chair so that the alien was once more upright, even being so kind as to tilt it forward slightly and release the magnet of the collar so that the spilt crimson could flow freely from her mouth and pool upon the floor.

“You only have yourself to blame,” the Sith stated honestly, with a rather carefree shrug, “all I ever wanted to do was talk, even in the face of my mutilation at your hands,” she continued, her words holding varying degrees of truth as wicked vengeance had indeed been on the cards this entire time, “this is not the hill to die on, silly girl.”

She approached once more from the side, her gloved hand gripping the handle of the scalpel before giving it a playful wiggle.

“There's a far bigger picture here and I need you to see that,” Evelynn said in tones that suggested a greater degree of severity, “so perhaps you should rethink this course of obnoxious bravery.”

Just as savagely as it had been plunged into her flesh the scalpel was pulled out again, a small fluttering of that prior unpleasantness lurking in the back of her mind.

“Do you understand?”

Wrenarias

 

[Wrenarias]

The little wriggle of the scalpel while it was still embedded in her jaw was excruciating, forcing the twi'lek to groan incoherently. Her vision faded in and out, blurring from the immense pain that made her want to vomit. When the blade was ripped free, she gave another agonized gasp and her head slumped forward with blood pouring from her lips and more running down her throat from the hole on the bottom of her jaw.

Her eyes were unfocused as she stared absently down at the floor in front of her. Was it really bravery at this point? She thought it more spiteful than anything.

Ironically, even if Wren had wanted to talk, the injury she'd just sustained would likely make the task impossible. She wasn't sure she could force her tongue to move appropriately to form the words.

Fractured memories swirled through her vision as she nearly blacked out from the pain.

'Atta girl. You took that one like a champ. She heard a familiar, warm voice in her mind. Marcus. Now. Y'just gotta learn to dodge the next one.

When her eyes opened again, she wasn't tied to a chair; she was kneeling in an empty space of a cargo hold. Her face was bloodied from a busted lip, but she was smiling up at a tall, scruffy man. His duster was laying over a crate with his ridiculous wide-brimmed hat on top of it. He was still smoking a cigar while he watched her, a proud glint in his dark eyes. Again, he said and offered her a hand up.

"Do you understand?" The Sith snarled as Wren's consciousness shifted.

She coughed a few times, red spittle falling from her mouth. The blood she swallowed a few moments prior left her with a profound nausea that caused her throat to constrict. Each breath was a strained gasp.

"Could you... r-repeat that?" The twi'lek managed to weakly stammer, her words slurred from her nearly crippled tongue. It was telling that she used what strength she had to fight through the agony of speaking... just to utter a jest.

Beatrice Govan

 

[Beatrice Govan]

For about half a minute Evelynn just stood there, her reaction a blank silence as if it were taking her time to process a response, leaving a chilly air and the sounds of rasping breath the only thing punctuating the room. A stare was levelled not at the woman, but rather through her as the Sith ran her tongue across the back of her teeth over and over again. It was evident that she was thinking, but what was not so evident was the contents of such contemplations.

Finally, a stare was directed towards the creature, the green ire of her gaze making it perfectly clear that the Sith was far from impressed. It could have that small victory.

“No. Shan't.”

The bloody scalpel was considered carefully for a second before it returned back to its home upon the table. They already had the first cut, after all, and there were so many other methods that ought not to be neglected.

She observed her own stump, rotating the limb back and forth before looking to the right arm of her prisoner and then once more back at her own stump. One might have assumed that Evelynn was considering an active replacement at that moment if one wasn't being terribly difficult and having fever dream coping mechanisms to avoid polite conversation.

It was both an incorrect and ridiculous assumption but if the creature did indeed notice, she wouldn't be correcting such an assumption.

Another approach as Evelynn came around to the right side of the alien, a gloved finger manoeuvring around the restraint and coming to settle upon the upper wrist. She had shattered it in the fracas before, no? The finger pressed down upon the flesh, confirming that indeed the limb had been broken.

Wait.

Did she just feel...?

A great curiosity compelled the Sith Apprentice to grab the creature's index finger and with little hesitation began bending it back until it snapped and again there was a further notion of unpleasantness in the place of pleasure but it was largely ignored...

“Oh.”

...because she felt it, in a limb that she no longer possessed. The phantom pain both baffled and fascinated her, as she looked to where her right hand would have been with a certain degree of demented curiosity.

“Best to be sure,” she declared softly before she grabbed the middle finger and began the process anew.

Wrenarias