Some might have said insanity was the true stroke of genius. Some of those people might
also be monumentally, completely, and utterly crazy.
Lirka had certainly found quite a degree of enlightenment about the happenings of the universe in those dark days when her grip on the natural world began to slip and the decay of her wretched form set in on body and mind alike. A crucible few would match, so it certainly came as little surprise to her that
Jacen Breska
was perhaps less than...understanding...of the divine work she did in this Galaxy. The nonbelievers were an endless horde after all, but it was Lirka's lot in life to guide all to the Dark Path - if they accepted or not? That was up to the individual.
"Ah, yes. I suppose one of your...stature would view it in such a way. I do forget how short-lived the humanoid kind can be. Perspective is a powerful tool."
Half-measures. Lirka Ka did not deal in half measures, hers was a binary - success, failure. The spectrum of success just happened to be a particularly wide one when dealing with a creature as self-centered as Lirka. She certainly considered that whole debacle a success, if the official records did? Well, she didn't much care what the records said. Moridinae had been the catalyst of her journey, a foolhardy venture born from the memories of a ghost that had brought her to the touch of Primordial Darkness. Cemented herself among the Kainate, cemented herself as one of the Siths' butchers.
"Enemies are important. Without enemies, the Sith will simply eat each other like rabid Akk hounds. Yet what good is a weak enemy? It offers no challenge, no obstacle to overcome. Yet I am a woman of great empathy, I seek to better the Galaxy as a whole Warrior - to show them the way."
Empathy and Lirka Ka? She didn't even try to lie particularly well. Lirka's empathy was a cold, cruel thing. Nothing like what the normal folk of this Galaxy felt, but Lirka's emotions were all an alien thing. The only things she felt that were remotely relatable were those quintessentials of Sith-hood. Wrath. Hatred. Rage. Calls to extreme violence. The usual suspects.
She debated in her mind briefly, before deciding to offer some modicum of honesty. What did she have to fear telling her beliefs to a mere trooper? If he became something of note, he'd have "leverage" of her own little heresies. If he died? Well, it would simply be another bit of lost information in the muck and mire of endless war.
"At a base level, as I do not wish to bore you with the vastness of specifics, Primordial Darkness is the emptiness that upon which all reality has begun and that which all reality shall eventually return. It is the force that compels the end of things, the decay and destruction of all things. The death of worlds. The end of empires. The extinction of species. So on, so forth."
Of course, poor Jacen had asked just the right questions to force Lirka to indulge in specifics. The droning of a mad preacher.
"Of course, such a force can be resisted through great effort, as we propel ourselves to great heights in the wake of extreme suffering. I can assure you, while it is a force separated, my duty to the Emperor, and the Sith in their entirety, are more often than not linked to the perpetuation of the necessities of survival."
Oh Lirka most certainly had some eccentric ideas about the way things worked. What a handful of years stuck on the hellhole that was Rhand did to someone, one could suppose.
"The surviving rats, I like to think, at least to some minor extent, are worthy of existing considering they didn't get added to the billions."
How kind of her.
Lirka lived for the whys. Why was the everything that compelled this Galaxy. Why was the ultimate power of understanding, and Lirka craved understanding more than anything in the Galaxy, for knowing why was sweeter then the best batch of Neutron Pixie imaginable. Belief was a powerful thing after all.
Dear Breska shared belief readily, and she drank it up greedily. She took her time to strum over the warrior's words, dissecting his belief within her mind with the same careful precision she did the many fleshcrafting surgeries she partook in during her free time.
"Fascinating. Far from unwise, though perhaps naive. The alliance is certainly a doomed gaggle of fools, for they strive for peace. Yet what are the Sith if not the monsters consigned to their worlds, are we not trapped within the Blackwall? Do the Lords and Ladies not squabble for power? Sinners within your eyes, nay? An Empire built upon the back of the controlled chaos of cartels and crooks, do not be so quick to dismiss the criminals of this Galaxy warrior. For what better crucible is there than the muck and mire of the Underworld after all."
She kept a cool face, and the mask certainly helped, his belief disgusted her. So ignorant. So foolish. The misguided ideals of youthfulness unburdened by the great suffering that enlightenment gave. Admittedly, Lirka was disappointed.
"What value is peace? Peace is stagnation. Peace is the end. To accept peace is to wither away, what are we without struggle warrior? Struggle is everything. The Emperor knows this. You preach so highly of him, you almost sound like you would have been better off as a Kainite. Have you read the Sith Dialectic before, dear Warrior? I have before. It is a fascinating insight into the Eternalist church, perhaps you need to attend more sermons."
There was a razor's edge of amusement behind her words now. Lirka the theologian.
"War in all things. Eternal conflict. Hopeless war against fate itself. Does that sound like peace, Warrior? "Each war begets the next. Each Sith must be surpassed." The Sith believe peace is a lie, warrior. Do not let the hubris of their authoritarian beliefs fool you, there will never be peace."
She paused, briefly.
"There is little to fear in such a fact. War is the garden that upon which worthy life is grown, covet war dear fighter. You have fought, you have lived. Exalt in the killing, because what else is there to do? Retire? Defect? Give up? You do not enjoy it but it will never end! Another war! Another murder!"
A fire began to burn within her chest, the passion of belief rising high. She stood now, the glint of madness behind her words that could only have been born from a monster that had fought, killed, and murdered for over a human lifetime. The sort of...meager defeatism from Jacen was enough to drive her into a frenzy.
"What good is ambition? What good is ambition!?"
She paced now, back and forth in barely contained energy. In another life, Lirka may have made for a very...intense...motivational speaker that made far too little credits.
"Ambition is everything! So many of the Sith would lie to us, denigrate the cretins untouched by the Force! Yet we are the bulwark! We build the Empire, not them! You, with blaster in hand, you who perpetuate endless war! If life had progressed the way it was meant to!? You stand here because reality has progressed exactly as it was meant to! What hope!? We do not hope! Hope is the first step on the road to disappointment, boy! We do! We struggle! We who are untouched, we who are unburdened!"
So, she decided to offer an example. The best one she could think of that wasn't entirely self-centered - she may have had...feelings...about the woman but she certainly served her purpose today. Dear old
Madelyn Lowe
"Minister Madelyn Lowe, she who perpetuates the Order you adore. Who burns away those crooks that would wither this Empire away, did she rise here because ambition ended because she was incapable of the Force? Nay! Strength, warrior! We must be strong, the outsiders, those so many of the Sith would not even regard. Strength of body! Strength of mind! Strength of spirit!"
Yes. His life was as likely to end now as it were any other day, but Lirka would not disregard him so quickly. From somewhere in her mad pacing, a knife appeared from somewhere on that metal form and with the whir of servos the metal thing was slammed into the table, buried within the material with savage might.
"If you die in this room today, Warrior. You will die fighting. The Empire does everything for you, you just don't see it yet. It lets you fight. It lets you kill! It enables you to become strong in ways the false paragons of this Galaxy would never! I do not care about lords. I do not care about ladies. I care about the future. I care about what is to come, I care about the bulwark, I care about us little things that slip between the cracks in the eyes of those-who-declare-themselves-gods."
Lirka understood the curses of sorceries. The burdens that the Sith brought upon themselves because of their misguided delving into the Force as the price of power - at the end of it all. They were the future. The unburdened ones. Those who could embrace belief without the shroud of the Force over their eyes, who saw the Galaxy for what it was not the quibbling of the eternal war of Sith-and-Jedi that this most current of Emperors would enable unto infinity.
Lirka had suffered the empty words of those who believed nothing mattered upon Rhand. Idiots and fools who embraced nihilism on that distant world, Lirka would never. She would defy. She would fight. Nothing mattered? Impossible.
"Nothing matters more, warrior. Here, now, living, surviving. There is nothing more important in this Galaxy than to walk the dark path of strength, for as long as Primordial Darkness claws at the back of your beings, ready to drag us into oblivion the moment we slip into stagnant weakness. If service was all, you would be replaced with a droid. No, warrior. The mind within your head, the capability to become more. To understand the simple fact, you, me, all of us in the Legions, those who do not bear the fancy titles and self-serving names. We are all Sith."
