“
They do not see the idiocy of their own questioning. All revolution does is bring stagnancy… stagnancy means death.” The words were uttered beneath breath bated by wariness and discipline, two things that Telis Taharin had that
Vaulkhar
, so shamed by his bloodline that he hid under a metal mask, lacked. It was almost embarrassing to stand in the same room with the shunned child, and while perhaps such anger could’ve been directed more appropriately with the right training in etiquette towards something productive, but all it did was stir up the crowd of the gathering, like a vast amphitheater full of bees. He could feel that each person was more than anxious to fight for or against the Emperor or their other beliefs. To Telis, however, he much preferred it to stay peaceful - charred ash and blood simply never washes out of Kushiban fur, and he couldn’t stand having to throw away the outfit he so meticulously prepared for the event. T’would be
quite the shame indeed.
In his traditional manner of clothing, Telis wore a robe-like black suit jacket, the long tail fitted with a series of fiber-optics that ran up the length of his back and shoulders towards his collar, the optics shining gold in the same manner of his eyes. Every small movement accompanied the jacket with a shimmer of light, reflecting even the dullest amount of open light in the room, and giving his jacket an almost gold and red shimmer overtop the deep, onyx black that made up his pants ants and swooping, hemmed jacket. It was a style that Telis had grown to love - a mix of Coruscant and Naboo traditional styles for formalwear, and only made more impressive with the fact that the entire collar had been trimmed from white Kushiban fur, and underneath the jacket came bright red designs, like fire etched into his skin, shining through his clothing and outlining the subdermal network that raced across his skin, some of the vagrant light escaping through his collar and bleeding onto his neck. He had gone the full length in terms of preparing for the great gathering, and every inch of him displayed the quiet grandeur and desire to be noticed that was synonymous with Telis Taharin’s whole being.
For a while, Telis listened without too much focus as the Sith went back-and-forth after the Emperor’s initial speech, a division between the traditionalists of the Empire and those that remained loyally stalwart to what the Sith were now. With an opinion that was only quelled by his status as a Sith Knight, Telis vastly wished to wholly castigate those that called themselves ‘traditionalists’ - the
Sith’ariqo - for the foolish ideals they held. Perhaps there was a semblance of sense in what they wished for, and after all, there is comfort in tradition, but whether they could see it or not the only way forward is exactly that: forward. To spend resources and time moving backwards would only put them in the spot that has led to the extinction of so many other Sith Orders before them. To move backward is to die. To stand still is to risk death. To move forward is to spell survival.
But, Telis, like the good businessman, held his tongue. Insults never got anybody anywhere, even if they were, at times, well-deserved.
The conversations continued forward from there, until Vaulkhar’s interruption and radical bravery, which in turn led to a new focus in argument - a shift that Telis was far more invested in. The matter of whether the Emperor deserved to remain as the leader of the Sith quickly became the focus, and with attentiveness, Telis listened only to dismiss the thoughts of those that went against the Emperor, and agree with the thoughts of
Khel
and
Kascalion Giedfield
. As the pair of them made their arguments against Vaulkhar, once more Telis drifted back into absent thought, looking about the room for anybody else to focus on. Above, Telis spotted
Cara Dorniarn
in her perch, an interest crossing his face that quickly faded as he tried and failed to read that of his partner, before focusing once more on who else he could find to distract him from the boringness of the discussion at hand. When he felt a gentle buzz come up on his thigh, Telis looked down at his choice of high-end communicator, holding back a small chortle as the betting process came up. Of course, Telis was far beyond such childish things (betting only a measly 50,000 credits each on Vaulkhar and ‘Blood and Spittle’).
Returning his gaze up from his communicator, Telis finally landed his sight upon Kascalion Geidfield, observing the Devil-Lion’s proxy with interest and admiration. He was envious of the Sith Lord’s presence and ability to dominate a room. The man was practically godlike in every sense of the word, being not only a genius, but a master in the dark arts and a master in combat. He aspired to reach such a height one day, but for not, it was a thought that laid dormant in his mind, his focus starting to fray as he realized just how many things there were to focus on throughout the whole assembly gathered. Telis thrived in chaos, but this, to him, felt like chaos without any progression or progress forward - it was chaos for the sake of chaos. It was only when
Darth Immortuos made his interest that Telis’s mind came back to the present debate at hand, though alongside it came the fear of just how many plagues and illnesses were carried by the shambling corpse of a Sith.
Telis almost had the courage to speak up louder; but fear silenced him. He was afraid of everything that Darth Immortuos was, and so he sat in silence, waiting for the opportunity to utilize his voice if it was ever offered to him by his master or another who opened the way for Telis to verbally strike back against Vaulkhar. In the long and short of all things, Telis continued to sit and listen, doing his best to decide and decrypt the various opinions and voices throughout the room, and deciphering who was misguided in their opinions, and who stood in the right. At the end of the day, Telis Taharin was out for himself, but forwarding the strength of the allies he had and the nation he was in would only serve to better him in the end. Like a rather bright serpent, Telis kept his venom stored… for now.
Hailyn
spoke, Velok looked back and forth between her and his datapad with growing excitement. One massive claw trembled as it pressed a strategically placed square marked BECAUSE I AM A THOUSAND YEARS OLD.
