Private The Blood Is the Life

[Arlo Renard]

Kai had squeezed his eyes shut, preparing for the final blow which never came. He peeked open one eye and realized she’d seen right through him.

<Darn.>

He sighed. <I don't want your deal. I don't want anything to do with you. You're evil. Also, you stink.>

Alina Tremiru​

 

[Alina Tremiru]

"What are you, a child?" The whiplash of this whole thing was clearly getting to Alina. Her eyes narrowed in suspicion. He'd been angry before, and now he was just.. Casually saying she stinks after he'd been brutalized was.. Weird.

"Fine. Rot in a corpse then, wishing to die."

 

[Arlo Renard]

"What are you, a child?"

If the limits of his vocabulary were enough to give Alina whiplash, the sniffle from Kai that followed would decapitate her. The boy was in intense physical pain, which would have been enough to bring anyone to tears. But to his credit, he didn’t break down until the full weight of her words crashed into him. Only then did he begin to regress, showing his age and lack of wisdom.

He had made a terrible mistake, and now he was beginning to pay for it.

Alina threatened to leave. <I wanted you to go away all along!> Kai wailed. <Get out of the camp! Leave Tython! Go crawl back into your cave and don’t come out!>

Alina Tremiru​

 

[Alina Tremiru]

Alina had already turned to leave, but the sharpness of his tone as she was already on her way out gave her pause. She chuckled under her breath. There were rumors of course, about just how old Kai was. She hadn't paid them much mind, but he was a child wasn't he? Or whatever the equivalent for rocks was. Pebble? She shrugged off the thought before turning back to him. Stepping over, crouching.

"You honestly don't mean that, do you? You're so tired of being like this. Weak. You regret your choice. I don't care if you want to act childish or insult me or think of me as some kind of monster. At least be honest with yourself."

Arlo Renard

 

[Arlo Renard]

<Shut up!>

Kai covered his ears, trying to block out the sound of her voice taunting him. He just wanted her to go. Then he could think, could reassure himself that she was wrong.

<I said go away!>

Alina Tremiru​

 

[Alina Tremiru]

"I'm not going anywhere until you can be honest with yourself! You're weak! You hate what you chose!" She reached down, snatching one of his wrists to pull him in the air. Keep him from covering his ears. He knew war. He'd fought in who knew how many battles. She knew that at least. But here he was, curled up against an enemy that he said he'd stop? She grinned. Had to. She hated seeing this kind of weakness.

"What happened to your big talk. You want to stop me right? Stop me from eating everyone like you think I am? You don't have the strength to at all do you? Admit it!"

Arlo Renard

 

[Arlo Renard]

<STOP!>

The ground began to tremble. Clouds gathered and the boom of thunder could be heard.

Glaring at Alina with his lips pulled back from his teeth, Kai’s flesh hummed with a weird energy. The being barely contained within the dead husk began to irradiate its flesh and bone, cracks in the façade appearing like jagged cuts across his skin.

A wave of raw power radiated out from Kai’s center, a hurricane of death and destruction intending to fling Alina away. The cyclone whipped at the nearby tents, tearing the cloth to shreds and even ripping chunks of dirt from the ground. Kai commanded the wind; he was the eye of the storm.

Reaching out his hand, Kai seized his lightsaber again. The shard of Chaldean marble within sang to him in a voice only he could hear, loud and clear. Spirit and flesh were one and the same, body and soul aligned as they had been but once before.

<Leave. Now.>

He didn’t bother to turn on the blade. The crystal sang to him sweetly regardless. If the vampiress wouldn’t go, he would end her.

Alina Tremiru​

 

[Alina Tremiru]

"Now who's underestimating who?"

The moment the cracks appeared on Kai's skin Alina's void returned. An amused grin was all she had. The Force was hers to command now. To say yes or no. She reached her hand out to swiftly snatch his wrist, point his blade harmlessly away from them both. "Without the Force, you're just another helpless human unable to save a single soul. How did Tython go for you? Did someone else have to save you? Protect you? I'm offering you strength to protect yourself. No Sithspawning needed. No need to loath yourself. Just say yes."

Arlo Renard

 

[Arlo Renard]

The Force void hadn’t had such a strong effect on him minutes earlier as it did now. He hadn’t been as vulnerable then, his true nature exposed. The truth was, Kai had always been nothing without the Force. He and the Force were one. His being was cut from its cloth.

Caught in the net of Alina’s strange power, Kai, the last of the Bamarri, began to flicker and die like a candle in the wind.

He knew what she was trying to give him. She wanted to make him into a vampire, like her. But she either didn’t understand her own nature, or was willfully denying the truth.

“I won’t exchange one evil for another.“

Weakening, he fell to his hands and knees, his expression slackening as the glowing lines along his flesh faded.

Alina Tremiru​

 

[Alina Tremiru]

"Isn't it more evil to stand there a helpless coward only saying you'll help people but never using the strength offered?" She crossed her arms over her chest, watching him.. Die. Her eyes narrowed for a moment, more annoyed than anything that he was so willing to just give up. "You're just going to sit there and die. I hate people like you most of all. Don't you at least have someone you want to live for?"

Arlo Renard

 

[Arlo Renard]

Kai at least made an attempt to get away from her, as if he could escape the radius of her power, but he was weakening rapidly. She just wouldn’t stop.

He collapsed in the dirt, consciousness fading and death soon to follow.

Alina Tremiru​

 

[Alina Tremiru]

Alina grumbled under her breath as she watched the heartbeat threaten to stop. And dropped the aura. She'd have to learn how to keep it on different.. Levels? Intensity. How to change the intensity, yeah. She'd have to figure that out at some point, but for now she was just.. Annoyed. At least he scrambled to try and escape.

"Just.. Get up. I don't want you dead, kid."

Arlo Renard