Star Wars Roleplay: Chaos

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Private Soil Once Stagnant

ᴋᴀɪʟᴀ ꜱᴛᴀʀꜰᴀʟʟ

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Location: Temporary office, Nar Shaddaa
Wearing: Suit
Tag: Anet Raine Anet Raine
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The balance of power was shifting, she could feel it.

Sith raiders outside the Blackwall, the Jedi fractured, Black Sun expanding.

Anathemous closed her eyes and took it all in. Anet would be here any moment now, summoned from her studies on Desevro where the First Conclave had changed everything. There was a future now, ambitions long rooted piercing the soil of stagnation to reach for the sun.

The office she'd been summoned to was smaller than the Dark Lord's holdings on Cantonica, humble and lacking decoration save for the rare plants the Sith had moved here. Stranger still, they were a few floors above the night club she owned, and shared this floor with other offices belonging to mundane business in the area. Far from glorious, but Anathemous knew it wouldn't last.

Peering through the blinds at the neon smog outside,

She smiled.






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She would arrive by air taxi, procured through an agency reserved for wealthy clients. There were, after all, perks to privilege for women like her, in juxtaposition to the reasons she was summoned to Nar Shaddaa.

There was a little view screen on the back of the seat she faced. HoloNet news, 'curated' advertisement, and select sources of local entertainment.

"Witness a legend! Pantoran superstar YIARA returns for her first galactic tour in more than..."

The door closed behind her as she stepped out onto the street, just across from her destination.

A nightclub? "That's a surprise."

She began to walk across the slick, wet street, through the crowd, and towards the angry-looking bouncer on the other side. The acolyte hoped this wasn't already the first part of some test, but at least the weather suited her mood. She actually quite liked the way puddles morphed and muddled the reflection of neon signs.

World-spanning cities like Nar Shaddaa required artificial weather generation to filter heavy pollutants from the air. Otherwise, most species would be unable to breathe, at least without their internals melting out of whatever orifices they have. The storm above produced relatively clean water to wash away harsher substances in the air, collecting chemicals and poisonous metals as it drained down and became a toxic drizzle for the world below.

Still, up here, Anet could appreciate the--

"Raine. You're on the list. In you go... Next!"


Inside, the air was dry, and the music deafeningly loud. A catchy buzz of crowd-pleasing noise, undoubtedly designed to keep partygoers engaged and coming back for drink after drink. Anet slipped through the back and was let up a series of stairs. The next guard didn't ask for a name. They quietly stepped aside and gestured her into the Sith's temporary office.

She looked around without a thought to be read on her face.

"You aren't going clean, are you?" A calculated jest to bait a glimpse at the Dark Lord's mood if nothing else.

The half-pantoran slipped around a table and paced in the open space between it and the desk.

"My Lord," she muttered.

Darth Anathemous Darth Anathemous
 
ᴋᴀɪʟᴀ ꜱᴛᴀʀꜰᴀʟʟ

Wearing: Suit
Tag: Anet Raine Anet Raine
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"Hmh."

"Quite the opposite, Acolyte." the corner of her mouth turned toothy.

The Dark Lord pushed herself from the wall, splayed her ever-gloved fingers over the desk. She looked proud of herself, golden eyes alight with restrained excitement.

"We'll be working with Black Sun now, buying up the rest of this building, monopolizing the red light sector's night life, fighting rings, the whole shebang. They'll get a cut of course but it's a small sacrifice really."

Controlling herself a moment, Anathemous stood, arms folded behind her back.
Glossy lips thinned into something more serious.

"The Emperor... has vanished."

"My contingencies are going according to plan, our powerbase is being relocated as we speak."

A pause.

She watched Anet's pacing, wondering if she were deep in thought or merely anxious.

"We are free now, Anet." she murmured.

"However, we must be strong to maintain that freedom."

"How goes your training on Desevro?"






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Pale eyes followed the Dark Lord's movement.

Black Sun? Lids pulled back showed her surprise, then narrowed again.

"I'm sorry, My Lord, but I fail to see how this..." Her words trailed off as Anathemous continued. "The Emperor?

"Wouldn't that just mean power games - is this not what the Sith want?"


She interrogated for a deeper motive. However, that interest was quickly superseded by mention of her master's contingency plans. Was this all planned then? The scholar wondered, and if so, why the Black Sun? Anet wasn't so ignorant as to be blind to potential. Even in the past, the underworld and the Sith have always had a... special relationship. Certain ideals carried over, as did the opportunity to extract power from the shadows.

At this point, Anet stopped pacing and found herself peering out the office window and at the street below. A large holodisplay paraded the arrival of Yiara.

Anet was quick to turn on her heel, and her anger rippled through the Force.

"We are free now, Anet." she murmured.

"Free?" Her words snapped like a string. "You're playing the table deep in the heart of the house, Ana--My Lord."

Anet took a deep breath, ending with a sigh.

"My 'training' has been nothing but mind games and exercises in avoiding death. I am under the impression that your collaborators are more interested in training soldiers than teaching Sith, but who am I?"

That anger swooshed like crashing waves on a rocky shore. "A girl in over her head?" Plainly unconvinced.

Her eyes looked for an anchor in the room, from desk ornament to exotic plant, until they braved and dared to confront the Dark Lord's suns with an icy morning beneath a faithless brow. Arms stretched outward in grand gesture, then fell to her side in defeat. Her chin fell too, but her eyes tilted up; they would not flee.
 
ᴋᴀɪʟᴀ ꜱᴛᴀʀꜰᴀʟʟ

Wearing: Suit
Tag: Anet Raine Anet Raine
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It had become clear since Serias that Anet was growing a spine.

Anathemous couldn't decide if she liked it or not.

"Then drown." she rolled her eyes, "or leave the water, go back to reading about Sith while the rest of us live it."

The Dark Lord sighed then, circling the desk until she stood by the same window. She opened the blinds without lifting a finger, giving the option for a better view, although her eyes would remain locked with Anet's until one of them backed down.

"Or... you let me teach you to swim."

Her brow rose, as if to illustrate the point.

"There's no power worth playing for inside the Blackwall, acolyte. Isolated, cut of from trade, complacent."

"It exists only to control us."

"I refuse to be leashed, ever again."

Freckled cheeks creased and breathes were carefully managed.

Finally she turned to the window, sharpening her gaze on the parade far below.

"The Syndicate is a cover," she confessed.

"To mask our activity. Our wrongdoings become their wrongdoings."

"They'll supply us and The Covenant with raiders, which we will spend gleefully, and we will make..."

"...connections." she said, turning again towards Anet.

"Can you handle this sort of life? Can you learn to?"







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"Drown or swim?"

Like master, the acolyte too decided to roll her eyes. Indeed, things had changed on Serias - perhaps more than the Sith Lord ever knew. As Anathemous found herself occupied with war and contingency, Anet revisited the ancient ruin they had sacked and the perverted temple erected around it.

She spent time studying the symbols and the mechanism within the central chamber. There was a lot learned, but so much more left to understand. It changed her, as did the Conclave, as did her first trial at the academy. The acolyte even heard a rumor that the instructors were shaping up to abuse them all further. All in the name of 'preparedness' apparently.

"I refuse to be leashed, ever again."

Her head tilted at that. Psychology was a small passion of Anet's university career. That training jerked at the possibility of her master's past hidden within the words. A lockbox of context and leverage. Anet was learning what it meant to live as a Sith.

She bowed her head. Not an apology, but an acknowledgement at the outburst and a knowing of her place beneath the Dark Lord.

"I will trust your judgment on this, My Lord. Believe it or not, I have no problem with this... life."

Those same pale eyes briefly glanced towards the window before they flicked back to Anathemous.

"It's just..."

Her barely muttered words trailed off.
 
ᴋᴀɪʟᴀ ꜱᴛᴀʀꜰᴀʟʟ

Wearing: Suit
Tag: Anet Raine Anet Raine
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The Dark Lord's features softened.

A sidelong glance given to Anet displayed a level of newfound understanding.

While the Acolyte had certainly questioned her, perhaps it was merely to express her frustration. She'd been kept in the dark since their first meeting, this was all so new and harsh.

Kaila turned her vision to the storm outside, let the sound of rain hitting glass sooth.


"It's just..."

Her barely muttered words trailed off.

An expectant pause.

"Speak, acolyte." she said, softer than before.

Followed by another sidelong glance.





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"Nar Shaddaa is the last place I want to be."

There were specific reasons for that, but none that the half-pantoran felt eager to share. Some concerns and fears were best kept in the dark. That is what Anet believed, anyway. A bit ironic for a historian who regularly worked to bring things to light.

Her demeanor had shifted from anger to melancholy passed off as coldness.

"Especially parts like this," she gestured vaguely. "All to keep you distracted. To drain your attention, your bank account, your fucking soul if they could have that too."

Perhaps a bit of anger remained. "I see the picture, My Lord, even if through a pinhole. I am sure your plans are grand and prosperous," said with a bit of sarcasm.

"But..." There was a pause before she continued. "I will not be useful to you here."

Darth Anathemous Darth Anathemous
 
ᴋᴀɪʟᴀ ꜱᴛᴀʀꜰᴀʟʟ

Wearing: Suit
Tag: Anet Raine Anet Raine
x3GLgCKd_o.png


Kaila would tilt her head.

Something about the force, it felt gloomy around Anet, and something... else.

"Better our pockets, than someone else." she said almost mournfully.

"Here, under this roof? It's their choice to make, we just provide the space, the drinks."

Another pause.

Her lips pressed into an unimpressed frown at the incessant sarcasm, but it was not the burning anger from before. Kaila couldn't decide if Anet was avoiding something specific or merely doubted herself.

Blonde curls fell across her shoulder, as she reached to give the pantoran's shoulder a gentle squeeze.

"And where would you be most useful, Miss Raine?"

"W
hat will stoke your passions?" she whispered.

She let go then, arms folding behind her back.

"If not here, and not Desevro, I mean. Perhaps I am pushing you too quickly."

"Building criminal empires is the work of a Master and an Apprentice, not an Acolyte. We'll return to basics."

Her brows creased, and Kaila looked at her in realization.

"Why do you want this power, Anet?"






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Anet withheld her sigh. She didn't like the idea of doing business with the Black Sun, especially knowing the things that she did. While Anathemous surely had more insight into the underworld than she did, Anet understood why the underworld existed as it did. It was hard not to, given who her father is.

Scratch that - she sighed anyway and rolled her shoulder as soon as the Sith Lord touched it.

"What will stoke your passions?" she whispered.

The scholar turned herself around quite defensively and stared at the Darth with scolding eyes. Or maybe they were just defiant. The crinkle between her brow told no lies, however, and Anathemous would undoubtedly feel the friction ripple through the Force.

She could feel it in the Dark Lord's words... her hand closing into a tight fist wrapped around an invisible leash that ended at a pale blue neck.

"Why do I want it?" She scoffed in a way only a rich girl could. "Why does anyone want anything? Because it is there to be had, it is meant to be taken, but it doesn't get to pick or choose who takes it. We do. That is the only reason we have thought..."

Not the only reason. She could go on, in fact, but it was a suitable absolutism for the moment. She was defensive, and she would dismiss nuance just to put her foot down.

Her voice went low. "And where is your apprentice, My Lord?"
 
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ᴋᴀɪʟᴀ ꜱᴛᴀʀꜰᴀʟʟ

Wearing: Suit
Tag: Anet Raine Anet Raine
x3GLgCKd_o.png


"Ah, that stubborn defiance." she hummed.

"Not a direct challenge, more about tone than words."

Her tone was dry, quiet but retained that faint edge. Golden eyes settled, heavy lidded, nearly apathetic.

"Do not think it goes unnoticed..."

Then a pause. She looked out the window, lights slowly warped by streaks of rain down the glass, she seemed to be thinking a moment before parting her lips at last.

"Power is a tool, Acolyte, not only a goal. Power for power's sake is a pitfall which has killed many Sith."

"A pitfall of the many Sith I have killed."

"Find the end, or meet it."

A breath then, another pause to examine the pantoran's words.


"...which apprentice?..."






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"I respect that you are very good at killing, My Lord."

She was sure to stretch the honorific with that same bit of 'defiance' as it were. Was it stubborn? Maybe. Anet wasn't in the mood to agree over that.

"But," she continued, "I am not sure I trust your..." trying to find the right word, "... philosophies."

There was no galaxy in which Anet had more experience in the way of living Sith than Anathemous did, and she knew that; they both knew that. However, the historian was raised, taught, and expounded upon the works of academia - methods, discovery, intellectual discipline. These were her tools, and she grew to trust them well. Her studies of the ancient Sith had not only enlightened the past, but they also opened up doors to possibilities that few would take seriously, and those who did mostly saw threat and fear behind them.

The Dark Lord did not, of course, and yet...

Anet sighed.

"...which apprentice?..."

"Hm, what?" The question caught her off guard. "Vestra, of course. Who else?" Unaware that there was another, or others.
 
ᴋᴀɪʟᴀ ꜱᴛᴀʀꜰᴀʟʟ

Wearing: Suit
Tag: Anet Raine Anet Raine
x3GLgCKd_o.png


"Your trust is irrelevant." she said without skipping a beat.

"It will remain such until you've earned my own. I give what I get, Raine."

"And my patience has been very generous."

Anathemous thought of the others, how... cordial they'd been, relatively speaking. Was it the juxtaposition of Tamsin Starfall Tamsin Starfall 's unwavering loyalty to Anet's attitude which caused them to chafe or merely her own hatred of upper class culture? she did not know.

Either way, she'd come too far and fought too hard to tolerate this insolence.


"Hm, what?" The question caught her off guard. "Vestra, of course. Who else?"

"Did you think I'd give my hydra only two heads?" she hummed, almost playfully.

The Dark Lord wondered if Anet would feel the same disappointment she felt, learning her Master had many.

Had.

"Vestra is handling syndicate business elsewhere. This is her home turf, her skills will be invaluable."

"You will meet Tamsin in time. She's about due for a knighting, but we will benefit from her continued alliance."

"And one other..." she muttered, almost questioningly.

"A prospect, at least. We shall see."






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That first response was far from surprising, but it earned a twinge of confidence.

That was the way Sith were.

Still, it did not satisfy the open wounds of deep frustration that Anet felt, which would show themselves as the conversation continued to unravel.

"You seem well supported then, my Lord. You have Vestra to help handle Syndicate business... This Tamsin is ready to earn a higher place in the galaxy.

"And this... prospect? I am sure they must cover an additional base."


Anet took several heavy steps towards the Dark Lord, and again her eye contact was smoldering.

"So what am I doing here, My Lord? I cannot fight. I am not a criminal... What I can do is dig, My Lord, but not here... There's no history for me to find here. No revelations - no relics - no power here that speaks to me, My Lord. Perhaps it speaks to you, but not to me!"

She said while pointing at herself, and made a habit of leaning in with every harshness in her voice. Her heartbeat had picked up, her expression shifted from anger and frustration to a woman at the point of breaking, and the Force ate it.

"You do not know how to use me."

Darth Anathemous Darth Anathemous
 
ᴋᴀɪʟᴀ ꜱᴛᴀʀꜰᴀʟʟ

Wearing: Suit
Tag: Anet Raine Anet Raine
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"Hmph."

Anet would get to her point eventually, she was sure.

And when she did, the Dark Lord's lips smoothed into faintest smile.

The air tasted of anger again, anger and potential.

When Anet leaned in for the final step of her approach, the Sith did not turn from the window, there was no warning. She seized her by the collar and yanked her closer in one fluid, uncanny motion.

Her grip was iron tight, straining that handful of fabric.

"...fascinating..." she held in a chuckle behind grit teeth.

"Your confidence would be so beautiful, if only it were earned."

Hot air passed between her lips, and golden reflections stared back at her with an intensity that shone so harshly against otherwise calm features.

"I can think of many ways to use you, Miss Raine." she said, fingers tightening around the fabric.

"But it will not make you Sith."

Finally she turned the intensity of that gaze upon Anet, yanking her close enough that there was little else to look at.

"You accepted my offer because you are afraid of your own weakness."

"There is no shame in it... only in staying weak."


"
And right now, Anet?" she breathed, barely above a whisper.

"
You should be very ashamed."

Anathemous let her go, folding her arms behind as though nothing happened, giving both women a pause in which to collect themselves. Only when her own shoulders loosened did she continue.


"If your only passion is for dirt, I will find you dirt."

"BUT." she raised one finger.

"You will learn to fight, as all Sith must. You will suffer, as all Sith must."

Ah! she finally understood why the pantorian frustrated her so much more than the others. They'd all suffered unspeakably, they knew the galaxy as no one else could.

She closed her eyes, and muttered.

"And I will teach you to pick up the pieces again, and make them stronger."






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