Invasion The Day of Revenge | BotM Invasion of GA held Empress Teta and Foerost | TETA PART ONE

[Kralmus Orr]

The Hunting of the Chancellor
​

Location: Teta, Starport
Tags: Aerarii Tithe | Auteme

Spoiler: TL;DR

• Kralmus is entrapped by Auteme's cocoon
• He burns his way free with his flamethrower
• Delayed too much to check whether he killed the Chancellor, he makes his escape

Boom. What a beautiful sight. Kralmus sighed contentedly as he took it all in.

The starliner, landed and thus unshielded, had reacted exactly as he'd hoped to his missile hitting its fuel tank: explosively. See, physics can be fun! Plumes of thick, black smoke rose from the wreckage, making it impossible to see the full, glorious extent of the damage... but the tongues of flame flickering within that dark cloud, and the maimed civilians slowly dragging themselves out of the blast zone, proved pretty conclusively that there had been enough destruction to keep the ship from going anywhere ever again. The question that remained, of course, was this: had the slippery Chancellor been caught in the strike, or had he once again slithered out of the jaws of death?

Kralmus had little time to enjoy the sight, or to try to confirm his kill; the Jedi, though thrown to the ground by the explosion, quickly regained her feet and came after him. Rather than rush to confront him directly, she performed some strange witchery, conjuring up strange little orbs and throwing them in his direction. See, this was the trouble with sorcerers: you never could tell quite what they were doing. Were the little things grenades? Sensors? Spirits summoned to attack him? The cannibal had no earthly idea, and his uncertainty about their purpose would only work in their favor. They came at him fast, so fast that even his well-honed combat reflexes could not evade them.

The Mandalorian managed to meet the first one with a sweep of his axe, pulling it from his back and swinging it through the little globe in one smooth motion. There was no detonation, per se; instead it seemed to swell, as if he'd just sliced open a spider egg now swarming with a billion escaping young. He had little time to contemplate this development before the other two struck him head-on, one taking him in the shoulder, the other in the abdomen. These two also swelled up like rotten fruit, then expanded over him, covering his armor in a bizarre woven cocoon. He felt his arms being bound to his sides, and his vision went dark as the strands closed over his visor. Well, chit.

He certainly hoped he'd killed the Chancellor in that first strike, because now he was... seriously inconvenienced.

Kralmus found that he couldn't move his arms or legs, or even turn his head. He could, however, manage to squeeze his fist, and that was all he needed. His gauntlet flamethrower roared to life, igniting the sticky strands at point blank. Had he been wearing anything but his beskar'gam, he would have roasted himself alive, but his armor could withstand the surge of heat as the cocoon burned away all around him. Sweat poured down his skin as fire surged around him, an ironic echo of the fate he'd inflicted on the starliner's passengers... only he had come prepared, and would survive. The tight bonds of the cocoon weakened, and with a mighty jerk of his powerful muscles he tore free.

By then, though, his window of opportunity had closed. No time to confirm the kill; he'd taken his shot, and needed to leave.

"Safe travels, Chancellor," the cannibal mocked. Then he activated his jetpack and streaked away.

 

[Caltin Vanagor]

” Empty words almost echo within themselves.”- Cecelia Ahern ​

“Empty words…” Maybe. Though he was a bit of a talker at times, the big guy was never one to mince words or let them ring hollow. He would often say what he would do, and do what he says, but that is a conversation for another time. Right now Vanagor was watching a deadly revelation, a blade as large as the Sith holding it and possibly as powerful. The electrical tendril current flowing to and from was like some magical highway transporting energy in a roundabout. The weapon was not a lightsaber, but it did not need to be. Judging by the runes on it, and the energies permeating its blade and hilt, this was an imbued war sword, even if little more than an illusion.

The electrical constructs were impressive but meant nothing to him, displays were displays and he would not fall for any verbal or mental trickery. That was not to diminish just how powerful the Sith before him was, Jax was no slouch and he was being toyed with as if he was. It just meant that Caltin was one for mind games himself and could see them coming. Even Rannan Kol who had gotten into his head had little effect, the big guy just never left himself fall out of his gameplan (that far) once he had one set. The massive Jedi Master did not put his weapon away, Conservator was down to his right side as he cupped his left hand.

Slowly, the big man let the currents form and build in strength, soon a sphere of pure power was slowly spinning on an axis. Vanagor indeed could not clap swords out of his hands, but he could do other things. Other things that could distract his visual inspection of that weapon. It looked like one of legend, maybe not to him, but to the Sith at least with those markings on it. The threat of no one surviving on the planet was as empty to him as his words were to the Dark Lord, Caltin had no qualms about “destroying the town in order to save it”, these things happen. Things can be replaced, people cannot.

Jax coming to was a welcome sight. He had to come to the realization of what he was on his own, there would be no words of direction to him, and the kid didn’t need it. There would be little more than a wink and a nod of acknowledgment to the Jedi Maverick. The massive Jedi Master may be more experienced, but this was the Maverick’s fight and he deserved the chance to finish it. The big man would simply be there to secure the room.

Feels good, doesn’t it Jax? To come to the realization of who you are?

Vanagor was concerned that the Dark Lord was indeed telling the truth about his Descendant’s lineage(It’s a long story if you don’t know, look it up) but in the end, he was not worried. This man steeling himself, standing next to him was a man of honor, principle, and courage. He was indeed a Jedi and more deserving of that title right now than he had ever been, which said a lot considering his career. This was indeed his fight, and so Caltin stood back. He could initiate “Battle Meditation”; but the big man was not certain how to approach this with his new connection to the Force he had yet to really perform the task, not to mention falling into a meditation would make him vulnerable as well.

Force Valor would work though.

Show him “Jedi Weakness”.

The problem with opening a can of worms is… you just opened a can of worms…

TAG: Allies - Jax Thio Iris Arani
TAG: Foes - Rannan Kol , Carnifex-Demiurge Thalia Senn

 

[The Mongrel]

Objective 1A: The Iron Titan​

Location: Teta, City Streets
Tags: Ishida Ashina | Keilara Kala'myr

Spoiler: TL;DR

• The Mongrel debates philosophy with Ishina
• Her kick lands, denting his chassis
• He tries to break her extended leg with a swing of his metal arm
• He pushes on their locked blades with his other arm, trying to throw her off-balance

The new blade was baptized in Jedi blood.

It was a glancing blow, if a painful-looking one; it split the skin, but not the woman's spine. The follow-up met with a deflection, the metal sword holding up well in its first impact with a lightsaber. Ishida's blood sizzled on its razor edge as the white-hot laser-sword batted it aside. Despite her wound, she was far from out of the fight. She sucked in a breath through her teeth, betraying both pain and indomitable focus, and kept her grip tight on the hilt of her weapon. This one was battle-hardened, just like him. A worthy foe in all respects.

But still naive... perhaps moreso now.

"It doesn't have to be. Call off your war hounds. These people don't want to be a part of your cycle." The Mongrel regarded his foe, the blank cybernetic lenses that were his eyes judging her. "You have changed," he said, and his rumbling voice was oddly somber and reflective, if only for a moment. "I remember you as a destroyer, not a protector." She had been so full of righteous fury the last two times they had met, obsessed with eliminating evil no matter the cost. And yet here she was, making an appeal to him on behalf of others.

"Your Jedi teachers must be proud."

Perhaps they mirrored each other in that way. At the beginning of this war, he had been little more than a mad zealot, frothing at the mouth in his hunger for blood and destruction. The Heathen Priests had left him with nothing but hate and faith, and those had kept him alive as a mere frontline grunt, carried him to glory and the ranks of leadership. But experience had changed him. Becoming a commander with a fuller view of the battlefield than any mere soldier, helping to direct the course of the war, had tempered his insane rage.

And like a tempered blade, he'd become more dangerous.

Perhaps the Jedi, too, was reaching her destiny.

She came at him with a jab, drawing out his blade, trying to force it to the side. Though he recognized her purpose, he followed the steps of the dance she'd laid out, allowing her to move his sword to the side and accepting her kick. Any ordinary mortal would have broken her heel trying to damage his reinforced metal chassis, but she had her Force magic with her, protecting and attacking in the same moment. Rather than splintering its own bones, her foot dented the armored plates of his midsection, driving him two steps back.

It would've knocked the wind from him, if he still breathed.

But he did not, and the impact - though powerful - registered to him as little more than a dull thud and a squeal of metal. Taking advantage of her closeness, and that their blades were both trapped across their bodies, he let go of his sword hilt with his off-hand. Raising his mighty durasteel fist, he lashed out at her extended leg, trying to smash into her kneecap and crush it backward in a brutal break. At the same time he pushed up on their locked blades, using his cybernetic strength to try to break the clash and throw her off-balance.

"But it doesn't matter what they want," The Mongrel told the Jedi, even as he struck. "This isn't the Maw's cycle; we are only a part of it. This is the galaxy's cycle. These people cannot opt out of the laws of nature. They cannot deny reality just because it is cruel." Did she think that The Mongrel had chosen this life, had wanted to be a weapon in the quest to burn down the galactic order? No, he had been chosen. And if it were not the Brotherhood rising to challenge Jedi, or if they failed in the end, it would be another force.

Nature abhors stasis. Nothing can remain forever.

"Change always comes, and it is ugly, full of fire and blood. But when all has been cleansed in violence, better things will grow." Ashes and corpse-meat were among the galaxy's best natural fertilizers, and if that did not reveal the truth of the natural order, what did? All this suffering, all the overly complicated hierarchies that "civilization" had cooked up to separate rich from poor, Force-user from ungifted, species from species and culture from culture, had to come to an end. It was time to begin again, with a clean slate.

In time, of course, those vile systems of control would return...

... and then another Maw would burn them once more.

The cycle of ages, now and forever.

Relief flooded the warlord as Mercy's mental voice reached him. ~ Good, ~ he whispered, a grateful smile curving onto lips he possessed only in his mind. ~ I'll be there soon. ~ Nothing would keep him from returning to her side, for it was not yet the time he had seen in his dreams, his Day of Dying long foretold. But that day was coming, swiftly now, the time when his end would set Mercy free and undo some small part of all the harm he had done. He wanted change for her, too, a rebirth of a kind: a life without the chains he had put on her.

But until then he would treasure the time he had left with her.

Just as Kallan did, deep inside the vault of their conjoined minds, laying in the soft grass with Keilara beside him. The speeder mechanic shut out what The Mongrel said and did with all his might, trying not to feel the harsh reality of the physical galaxy. He anchored his mind in the illusion around him, focused on the love he felt for the woman who had brought him back from the brink of oblivion. One day, they might be free together... or he might meet his end when The Mongrel did, just as the dreams foretold. But not today.

~ Our day, ~ he echoed, and kissed his love.

 

[Kyrel Ren]

Location: Palace
Objective: 1
Engaging: Rika Hiro


Kyrel’s frog like tongue reached for the Atrisian who almost gouged his eyeballs out. Even with one eyeball hanging out, Kyrel screamed in a blind rage, the frustration and pain only continued to fuel him while shoving his fists into the wall. He could even go as far as to smell, even taste the fear coming off of her. The black tongue cracked with each flick, only managing a taste of her glacé, drops of blood graced his tongue and for a slight moment his tongue fully retracted so he might savor the taste. “So sweet.” He spoke of her blood in the most spine chilling way.

Pieces of the wall kept falling, the more his tongue lashed out, the corrosive effect of blood caused the wall to slowly melt. The taste of her blood, so intoxicating the tongue attacks started to become more frequent. Like an Oogdo Bogdo it didn’t cease, as he felt the fear ever increasing in an attempt to run from him. Even with vision clouded in one eye it didn’t stop his advance towards her. Unlike her panicked attempts at running, his steps were slow as if not to hasten the thrills of the kill.

Every move she made was followed by a flick, when she staggered a flick and advance. No words came, only terrifying frog like flicks determined to truly taste Atrisian delicacy. When he felt that he was so close, she threw a large rock towards him. His tongue midway caught the rock, causing it to go into his gaping maw of a mouth. The rock made his jaw stretch out, before slowly breaking under the corrosive liquid and with one chomp he started to eat the rock. “Tastes a bit… rocky.” He said spitting out what little pebbles remained.

The distraction unfortunately made it closer the Atrisian could escape. He growled slowly quickening his pace. When he found her in the next room next to a window, a way out he shot his tongue out. This time the tongue aimed directly for her throat in order to take her head off before she could run.

 

[Faith Organa]

Location: Residential District
Currently walking house to house looking for evacuees

Her shoulder hurt and it shouldn't. A blaster shot should have seared everything with no bleeding but that had not happened while the team had given her the needed medications for her condition she felt herself weak at times shaking as she took the steps needed to move through this neighborhood.

She couldn't help but look around and be reminded of another home another place where the people wanted to live without interference and where they though everything would be ok, if you just cooperate. It was naive and wishful thinking on their part but Faith understood it. She at times like to put her head in the sand to and pretend it was all great.

Another door shut to them saying no they were staying. It wasn't hopeless but the sounds of invasion were everywhere now she had glimpsed a holo report in one home giving updates on what was happening.

There was a school in another sector that was being evacuated to the ship. Orphans from across the galaxy who thought they found refuge on Empress Teta.

There were no words really, "Let's go into the next one, let's not give up until we can't stay any longer"

 

[Jem Fossk]

Spoiler: The Story

DARK LORD OF THE SITH | VOICE OF THE MAW
Jem Fossk
Cinnagar, Empress Teta

​

"Beautiful." The Dark Voice bellowed.

Powerful gusts tugged at his robes violently, the air was thin, the view however.. spectacular.

Vroom!

A single hypersonic roar flooded his senses, a single Eradicator class starfighter screamed by. The single vanguard of an encroaching storm not long behind. Mawite fighter craft and dropships carrying the zealous holy crusaders and fierce tribal marauders peeked through the clouds. Streaks of exhaust spat out in their wake as the sky thundered with their approach. It would not be long before green and red bolts of luminous laser fire would flicker back between earth and heavens above.

Glorious.

The Dark Lord stepped forward, leaning closer towards the 'edge' of his vantage point. Soon the vast cityscape of Cinnagar was in plain view. He could see the palace, the Great Library, and soon…

Rumble! Shake! Thunder!

"Ah, there it is."

The city quaked, there was a symphonic shockwave that melodied from the heart of the old capital. It percussioned a cloud made of duracrete and glasteel, crescendoing to the rise of the Iron Citadel. Soprano cries of terror, baratone wallows, and harmonic crashes filled the chorus of the Krath.

With the power of Sith Sorcery, their return was boldly broadcasted to the pretenders occupying the Tetan throne. They bore with them a gift, a secret long buried that ignited with eerie luminance filling the ancient ruin with a sickly emerald glow. The hypergate had opened.

"The time has come, daughter."

The beast roared beneath them.

​

Be a pool of water.

Like a lake...

cool... unmovable... without ripples...​

Jem forced herself to envision it. The jedi meditation practice had once been a security blanket. Now its ragged form kept slipping through her fingers. Calm was not something Jem typically embodied but she stood at her father's side and force herself to remain still.

It was becoming harder every day to manage it.

Her father's corrupting measures seared through her veins and she suffered for it. Every moment was a battle inside her own mind. Every breath was effort-- a cognitive task of control.

She ignored her father. She ignored the city, she ignored the pending war. She was running out of ti--

A familiar presence cut through it all. Her attention jolted outwards, a pained gasp escaping through her lips. It only took a moment for her to make sense of the presence.

Not even the darkside could make her forget her master.


Her own presence was weak, barely identifiable amongst the corruption that threatened to swallow Jem whole. A warning image jolted through the tentative bond they still shared, powerful as it tried to drive itself like spikes into Dagon's mind.

Her father was coming. He was more powerful than ever before.




Jem winced and released the reigns from her grasp. The metal had warped under her fingers. "Yes father."

She let herself free fall to the ground, disembarking to... she no longer knew. She no longer asked questions. Her strength was conserved for one thing.

I am a lake.
​

Dagon Kaze Darth Solipsis Ryv Corin Trenor

THE DAY OF REVENGE
THE GREAT ERROR vol. III
Issue #4 w/ Jem Fossk & Corin Trenor
Ryv Darth Solipsis

The Sith are a superstitious cowardly lot.

From day one it has been so. The resurgence of the New Sith over the corpse of the old and decrepit on Thule. A pattern Solipsis had followed religiously throughout his crusade to warp and change reality itself. Logistical lines, strategic locations, all rational military targets had been delegated to the 'simpler' minds of the Final Dawn. Instead, he'd waged war against the hearts and minds of the galaxy, against the sole existence of the Jedi.

From torching to ash the Enclave at Jakku and the pilgrimage of Jedha to the massacres in the Sith Worlds and all the way to the heart of the Jedi, the home of galactic civilization - Coruscant. None could forget the Sacking of Coruscant that had driven the New Jedi to the edge of extinction.

This was no war of occupation, no war of tangible strategic value or anything of the sorts.

No, this has been an existential war. A war of life itself against the forces of entropy, of death.

A war to forever change the hierarchy of power and the natural order of the universe.

Forever.

The coronation on Teta - home of the legendary Krath, a dynasty known for its historical roots with the Sith. Where and when else could he have attacked? To make a point. To demonstrate true power. Symbols and superstition.

And yet, as predictable as Solipsis may have grown to be in the eyes of the Jedi, the question that truly held importance was neither where or when but could he be stopped?

Once more, they came in droves. Springing from the depths of an ancient, long-forgotten hypergate and cutting through the skies; a dark curtain enveloping the light and casting an impregnable shadow over the world.

The heavens hung in black.

In that unending sea of darkness converging in the skies, a behemoth of Sith Magic stood out. A creature born solely for the purpose to destroy and annihilate and atop it he could sense it. Not the twisted nature of the beast and neither the malicious maw of death that its master was. No. Her presence may have been like the sound of a nail falling into hay but to him... it was all he could hear.

"Jem..." he heard himself mutter, eyes narrowed unto the behemoth from his vantage point atop one of Cinnagar's many high rises cutting the clouds. A warning shuddered the rusty bond between master and apprentice, wedging itself into his lobe. Strong enough to force an involuntary step back.

It bore no threat, conveyed more like a friend's caution.

A moment later it abated, replaced by the malice of corruption which enveloped the sender and the weight of guilt upon the recipient.

It was time to move.

To act.

As always.

He caught her lithe form freefalling from the skies, an enviable feat she hadn't truly mastered before. Even this distant from her, Dagon could feel the power her father had provided her with. The shortcut. The easy way. A clear sign of his own failings as a mentor. It dug deep into his heart.

"Corin, we move to intercept her." Dagon said, unnatural gloom besetting the usual easy-going bravado he was known for. Solipsis would never send her away on a menial task. No, she was his key. The single soul in the whole wide galaxy he would trust.

The heiress of Apocalypse.

"Time for you to meet my... former apprentice."​

DARK LORD OF THE SITH | VOICE OF THE MAW
Jem Fossk | Dagon Kaze | Corin Trenor | Ryv
Cinnagar, Empress Teta

WRATH

​

The beast's roar rippled through the skies of Cinnagar like a hurricane wind. Smoke and fire spilled out as far as the eye could see as the battle for the soul of the planet began in earnest. A quick glance to his daughter saw her off as she made her way towards the edge of the floating behemoth. Without a hint of fear or doubt, the apprentice gracefully stepped off.

The Dark Lord of the Sith pressed his right foot forward and dug in, eyes like daggers following the trajectory of his kin. He hissed, extending his right hand forward, palm opening in gesture as the psychic connection between man and beast intensified. The Summa Verminoth groaned and dipped, diving towards the cityscape with it's tendrils extended out.

​

A typhoon tugged at his robes relentlessly, fierce winds powerful enough to uproot him threatened to remove the Dark Voice from his fortified stance. He would not budge, the gusts were like waves breaking against the unmoving rock. Twin orbs of sulfuric hate glared down as the beast savagely slammed into a nearby tower, cleaving through an entire story.

Vroom!

Wherever the massive beast loomed, dust and debris followed in it's savage wake. Buildings partially collapsed if not outright crumbled under the weight of the apex predator. As the monstrosity circled, the Dark Voice lifted himself and cast off. Touching the empyrean, he gathered the Force and leapt from the dome of the Summa Verminoth, descending in a slow controlled fall.

He came down, eyes casting a terrible glare down towards the landing site of his kin. The Sith'ari's black robes enveloped around him, an umbral shroud that defied physics floating down. The Dark Voice lowered, drifting into a dust cloud kicked up by the rampant destruction around them. Smoke and ash filled the air, his form vanished completely, lost in the chaos.

"You may think this is suffering. No."

"It is salvation."

The Dark Lord emerged from the fog of war, the smoke and dust rolling off his midnight cloak as the winds pressed against him. He advanced, eyes honed and ready.

"Dread it all you like. Run from it if you have to. The facts remain the same… huh.."

His gaze twisted away, immediately drawn to the final obstacle in his daughter's training and full conversion as a Sith.

"Time to let old things die. You know what you must do, do not hesitate."

THE DAY OF REVENGE
IDENTITY CRISIS vol. III
Issue #1 w/ Dagon Kaze Jem Fossk Darth Solipsis Ryv

​

His new Master had felt distant at times, as if an extended arm refused to allow them to become as close as some other students he had been. It wasn't as if Corin had not been all too aware of the Padawan that came before him, but he failed to realise that it was fear; fear of failure had seen the two remain focused on the business-end of their connection, to find interests outside the Jedi Order and their mission... that fear of loss. It never seemed to settle in Corin and at the mere mention of Jem, had Corin frowned. Not for his Master, but for himself - his mind lost all focus, all that he needed was lost as he turned into the second born to the favoured star.

He had too much to lose.

She could succeed into her father's embrace, or fail into her Master's.

Corin shut himself off from the chaos, and a breath followed in an effort to find some composure. To no avail.

The Padawan nodded towards Kaze as the world crumbled around them. He had no words for all of this, and followed his Master as the two traversed the ruins of Teta, of the same ones that continued to increase in destruction as each second came and went.

Some small amount of calm had found itself returned to Corin, but that sliver was tested once the distant two came into view and both Dagon and Corin came closer and closer. He was better than her, he assured himself, he was not so weak as to crumble onto a traitor's road and abandon all that he knew.

Jem fell without feeling. Lakes didn't enjoy the thrill of free falling through air. Lakes didn't care that buildings were exploding and lives were ending around it. Lakes moved for no one. Well...

Except pebbles. And wind. And feet-- and...


She followed his gaze, her gray skin loosing luster as she caught what held his attention. "I'm not running," she asserted quickly, trying to bring his attention back to her.

"I accept this-- I'll not--"



Her stomach fell out from under her. She was forced to meet her father's gaze, his very presence demanding her acknowledgment. She wanted to melt into a puddle. Those seemed less noticeable.

"Yes... father..." Stupid, stupid Dagon.

Her feet felt like foreign objects. They obeyed her father and moved her towards the one thing she did not want to face. She couldn't stop them, but she could control the speed. She moved with slow precision onto the roof ledge... she... braced... and arched gracefully through the air, from one roof top to the next. He had taught her that. Dagon. The idiot with a death wish. Every step towards him felt like shifting through cement, the bags under her eyes growing deeper as she hoped without hope that her father would look away.

She brace... and jumped again... the skies above crackling with streaks of red. She saw a tuff of black hair and stopped on that roof ledge.


"I gave you a chance to leave," she hissed, her voice reaching the figure masked by the shadows. Up close she was unrecognizable. Her once hearty, gold-tone complexion was now colorless and hallow. She had not slept nor eaten in days, sustained by the corruption that consumed her, and it showed. She was lifeless and frail, but she rippled with unmistakable power.

"You should have taken it. Master."

Dagon Kaze Corin Trenor Darth Solipsis

There was a time before the bliss.

Those times and places were distant things, left to fade away into obscure stories told by hardened veterans and displaced refugees. Some found hope in those tales, while others looked upon them with abject hatred. When foreign and abstract ideals drove a boy to become something more. A monster who militarized an Order of masterless children and turned them into killing machines not seen since the times of Revan or Lord Hoth. Or maybe a hero, a symbol of unshaken hope that stood unbowed against the flowing tide of darkness.

A time better left in the past. Before the arrival of a loving family and nights spent in peace, where the greatest of toils were beer poured and food served.

Memories of pain, interwoven through the years by a sense of purpose.

Ryv sighed.

He looked up past the city limits, his gaze locked on the distant horizon. War came for him again. It appeared in the form of someone in need, as it always had. War promised him an end. A bloody one. Trapped, alone, away from his family in his final moments.

The tension in his chest, the storm of chaos that buzzed about the air like a swarm of starved locusts. He knew this place better than any other in the galaxy—a battlefield. Where the brave marched off to their death, and the foolish went to live.

There was a time when the kiffar longed for this feeling.

Now, Ryv yearned for the cozy armchair in his bedroom, where he would read to his children or tell them stories of his legendary exploits. It was a safe place. The memories dulled with the passage of years. War could not reach them there on Denon, not in the heart of his home. His territory.

But here on Empress Teta, within the city of Cinnagar, it had found him. War crawled closer, driven forth by the machinations of a mad man changed by alien designs the sane could not begin to fathom. A demented beast thundered towards the city. It hungered for innocent blood, to feast upon the dying breath of hope as pawns of light and shadow fell beneath its bulk.

In another time, on another world, the battle to determine the galaxy's fate would be fought.

Ryv paced across the flat top of a towering starscraper. He stepped up onto the ledge meant to separate him from a fatal plunge, his eyes never leaving the monstrous behemoth as it lumbered closer to its death.

"Fossk," Ryv uttered the name in a whisper, infused with subtle power. The words found the great empyrean like a smooth stone skipped across a calm lake. Power rolled through the ethereal, cutting through the ghostly echoes of battle between the Sword of the Jedi and the dreaded Sith'ari. "Surely you've waited long enough for this confrontation."

Darth Solipsis ​

THE DAY OF REVENGE
THE GREAT ERROR vol. III
Issue #4 w/ Jem Fossk & Corin Trenor
Ryv Darth Solipsis

The sky above crackled with fury and laid its vengeance upon the world. Threads of life cut short by the pestilent hand of the Sith quivered as ripples throughout the ethereal. The air reeked of plasma and burnt flesh, filling his nostrils with that all too familiar stench of war. It dug into the very skin you wear and no moments of peace nor joy could ever wash it away.

Dagon wrinkled his nose. The New Jedi Order, baptized in the flames of the Stygian War, learned that reprieve was a luxury they could neither have nor could they afford.

Reprieve had filled the gutters of the galaxy with the blood of its sons and daughters. It's the only lesson the New Jedi ever learned from their absent masters.

The Jedi duo's traverse came to an abrupt end, cut off by the appearance of a hollow shadow standing in their way. A grey shadow of a once colorful past and fateful future. Grey like the skin of a dying man, dry as a funeral drum. And that drum banged loud, beating into a crescendo of grief and regret.



"You know I like beating my head against the wall." he dryly responded, the hilt of his saber materializing in his hand. It had come to this, hasn't it? The pinnacle of his failures and mistakes shaped the monster that stood before him. That had taken his apprentice away from him. But the corruption -- as tight as a tourniquet around her -- could be broken. Blood does not dictate fate, only what we do defines us.

He'd prove it to her.

Or die trying.

The Knight's eyes narrowed sideways at Corin, a plan of action on his tongue but never uttered. How could he? After all, the infallible chemistry he'd built was with the one standing against them, "I'll go low, you go high." he whispered. A simple stratagem indicating the fledgling progress they had made. Then hoarsely reminded, "No killing."

The proverbial bell rang with the snap-hiss of his blade and the Force surged through his feet sending him darting at her. His body folded into a crouch as the cerulean saber sought to make contact with her legs.
​

DARK LORD OF THE SITH | VOICE OF THE MAW
Jem Fossk | Dagon Kaze | Corin Trenor | Ryv
Cinnagar, Empress Teta

W R A T H

​

His daughter had accepted the dreaded task given to her and asserted herself ready. She was not, no one could ever truly ready themselves to make 'the Sacrifice'. It was spiritual collapse, a rebirth of identity as the last vestige of compassion was killed off along with those dearest to you. To complete her transition into a Sith, she had to cut the last link holding her to her former life as a Jedi.

She had to kill Dagon Kaze .

The Dark Lord had intended to follow and see the job done before his very eyes, to watch the life leave the Jedi as he fell at the hands of his very own apprentice. The one he fought so passionately to save, to redeem and bring home. He never understood the truth, she was home, where Jem belonged. Her destiny was intertwined with that of her Father's, she was the heir to his legacy and the key to the future he designed.

Alas, his attention drifted elsewhere. Caught unawares as the silent speech of the Sword saturated his thoughts from the empyrean wind. His eyes widened, orbs of incalculable wrath glistening in the shadow of Cinnagar.

"…The Sword of the Jedi."

The Sith'ari cooed.

"You should of remained in exile."

The Dark Lord of the Sith stretched forth, hand reaching out across the expanse, his mind probing the depths of battlefield. He uttered a savage hiss before muttering in the 'Old Tongue' an unrecognizable command.

The earth shook, the skies thundered, and throughout the city streets a monstrosity glided overhead. The Summa-Verminoth groaned violently as it made haste in the direction of the valiant Sword. Earth and Heaven moved before the apex predator as it turned towers into turmoil.

The Beast lumbered on, carried by it's master's command to seek fresh meat.

THE DAY OF REVENGE
IDENTITY CRISIS vol. III
Issue #2 w/ Dagon Kaze Jem Fossk Darth Solipsis Ryv

​

He stood there, so disconnected from the core of the situation as the former master and student made their remarks to one another. He was the extra, the added addition, the one that came after, the one to find himself cast aside should Jem be returned to his side. His features scrunched and narrowed, from the creases on his forehead to the clench of his teeth. Corin was tense, and it remained so difficult to discern whether it was the nerves of a true test of skill or the fire that storm that near-thundered beneath the surface.

Corin returned a similar narrowed look back towards his Master, he readied himself to follow one command and still remained so unsure of the other. Had their success as two ensured his own loss as one? He wished he had all the chance to dimiss all the intrusive ideas that flashed before him, but there was no time but the here and now.

His weakened resolve had turned him into a moldable mass of flesh and bone.

In a silent rush of his own, Trenor mimicked Kaze as the blue blade hissed into existence. Beside the other Jedi, Corin bounced into the air and made the motion of an overhead attack, as if in effort to rid the fresh Sith of her arm.

He had finally hardened his heart to her. No more begging. No words. He had finally accepted the inevitable. She should be relieved, but his resignation burned like salt on a wound.

There really was no going back now. Her face hardened as he descended, her own saber jumping to her hand in turn.

She caught both the blades with a powerful upward strike-- forcing Dagon's up and entangling them both with the third before it could reach her shoulder.

"You're really going to make us do this?" She accused. "All the energy I've put into keeping you alive, and you're going to make me kill you." They remained locked for a moment in a power struggle, the tip of her dead jedi saber pointed at the ground. Darkness flexed through her muscles and she did not budge, her control over it balancing on a pin point.

"Do you have any idea what you're doing to me?" Her pain was palpable. She wanted nothing more than to pretend she had never sat on that corrupting throne, but her father pushed her further every day and her master...

Her attention fixated on the jedi fighting besides him. She had dismissed Corin Trenor and his tangle of black hair as a cousin or even brother of Dagon's, but it struck her then that didn't make sense. The jedi-- the boy-- was her own age. She was Dagon's only connection.

Her resistance slackened with shock.

"Who is this?"

Dagon Kaze Corin Trenor Darth Solipsis

THE DAY OF REVENGE
THE GREAT ERROR vol. III
Issue #4 w/ Jem Fossk & Corin Trenor

"You can try." he retorted as the two Jedi's blades locked a cross with Jem's parry. "If you can't step back into the Light -- I'll drag you back." he could feel his flesh squeeze his hilt tighter and tighter against Jem's newfound strength.



An eyebrow slightly arched up, "Wh--"



That was for Corin to respond. Feeling the resistance of her parry begin to falter, Dagon stepped back and to the side seeking to flank her followed by a horizontal slash of his blade across her arm. Had Jem been the one on his side, he'd known she would've followed to flank their enemy on the opposite side. Just like they had trained. Just like in the good old days.

Oh, this divine irony of it all.
​

THE DAY OF REVENGE
IDENTITY CRISIS vol. III
Issue #3 w/ Dagon Kaze & Jem Fossk

​

He was no Jem.

Far from it.

But now, of all times, he resembled her current state most of all. Even as the Master of the three shifted out, a clear chance for himself to do the same, Corin elected to remain and in an effort to hold her there, to be better than her. It was all he wished for now, he was unable to ever confess otherwise, least of all as he leaned further into his own blue-bladed saber and his features contorted in order to be more tense than ever before.

"I'm Corin," he mustered between all the exertion, "Your replacement."

Jem flinched in understanding.

Pain came at her every which way. Grief ripped away her sense of self and replaced everything with searing anger. That was what her father had wanted her to experience, and he had won. That fact haunted her as she stared at the source of her undoing. He struggled against her blade, weak an unable to overcome her in a simple stand still. And yet ... he was her now. He why Dagon hadn't even bothered to try this time.

Something in her cracked.

Her lips coiled with malice. "You will never replace me."

She stepped to the side the exact moment Dagon's blade descended into her arm, releasing all of Corin's kinetic energy into its path. Her own skin burned and bubbled by the closeness, but it wasn't her that would feel its true impact.

"His apprentice would know that was coming."

She kicked at him, holding Dagon's gaze.

Dagon Kaze Corin Trenor Darth Solipsis

THE DAY OF REVENGE
THE GREAT ERROR vol. III
Issue #4 w/ Jem Fossk & Corin Trenor

His eyes widened, stupified by the remark. Jem's rebuke hit back like lightening and the black haired padawan tumbled into the Knight. Dagon hastily deactivated his blade to prevent a costly accident of impaling Corin and stepped to the side, then caught the padawan by the collar of his jacket to prevent him from losing his footing further.

"Really had to say that, huh." he quietly murmured to the new apprentice, then reactivated his saber once more.

The Knight brought his feet at hip-width, shifting from his easily recognizeable Ataru form to that of the defensive Soresu. A form he'd relied on much during his early days as a padawan before embracing his innate talents with Ataru.

This was no longer the Jem he knew, at least for the most part.

He needed time. Observe her moves, witness her newfound strengths and newborn weaknesses. Assemble every piece, every cog of the machine Solipsis had created.

Then take it all apart.​

"You never trusted me."

Her whole body quivered with emotion. Up until this point she hadn't actually raised a hand against them but she struggled to remember why that was. She was no longer a lake, she was a raging storm threatening to explode. What that the darkside or what that her pain? It was impossible to fuss out and she wasn't trying to. The betrayal took her breath away.

It took everything away.

Jem fell into a pool of darkness. In its cool embrace nothing mattered, not even her own agony as the light inside of her snuffed out. "No," she decreed, taking a step towards them. Darkness billowed off of her, bending the force around her and dragging it in. Like a black hole.

"You're not allowed him. You don't deserve him." She crept towards them, her path unclear as she forced her way deeper onto the roof. "You will never have a padawan again."

She charged, not on him but on the boy that had taken her place. An abrupt overhead leap would put Corin between them-- affording him no easy protection from Dagon as she slashed for his neck.

An attempted kill shot.


Dagon Kaze Corin Trenor Darth Solipsis

THE DAY OF REVENGE
IDENTITY CRISIS vol. III
Issue #4 w/ Dagon Kaze & Jem Fossk

​

The Jedi Padawan -- the second student that seemed to be on a route to suffer a similar fate as the first -- had felt the onset of a fall. His stomach swirled, the sudden butterflies had risen into his chest and then his throat as those once determined features shifted into that of shock. In awe, Corin stared into the abyss beneath him whilst time slowed, the same stared lasted mere moments before it shifted towards the behemoth of a beast screeched. Had this been it, he had no time nor chance to entertain the idea, his arms flailed as if in a bid to see himself fly. It was as if he wished for one final look before he fell, Corin twirled on his toes to see no more than the hand of Dagon reach out and snatch his collar.

No time for so much as a look of relief, Corin was raised onto his own two feet and stumbled forwards into a roll once the Jedi pulled him forwards.

His brow furrowed at her words, overhead as he scrambled onto his feet and a sense of dread entered him. Corin had seen no more than her swift descent on him, the blue blade rose in a flash in an effort to meet her own as his stance was far from firm; the force of her fall had been all that she needed to knock him from his stance, even as the blades clashed and fizzled, and Corin fell onto his back. He made an effort to tuck and roll backwards, and his feet extended outwards as if to use that momentum and kick the Sith off of him as he further rolled back onto his feet.

He had no words, only laboured breaths.

THE DAY OF REVENGE
THE GREAT ERROR vol. III
Issue #4 w/ Jem Fossk & Corin Trenor

"You never trusted me."

"Repeating it isn't gonna make it true, Jem." he retorted, eyes narrowed at her. Was he lying to himself, though? Indulging in comforting fiction was a pitfall even Jedi were not immune from. Surely, the Knight had been cautious with her, too cautious even to the point it seemed as if he was reluctant to grant her more responsibility, give her that so much needed space to spread her wings.

And as surely it was construed as mistrust.

But that guilt could not weigh him down. Not now, at least.

The Jedi needed all his bearings together for this fight.

Her threats stung like a scorpion's poison to erode his resolve but he persevered.

Or rather - had to.

Jem leaped over him and unto Corin, effectively pinning the teenager between a rock and a hard place.

Forcing him to become a meat shield in Dagon's service.

Abrasive.

How far had her father's corruptive claws dug in?

She was no frothing at the mouth monster, removed of all thoughts like a mindless thrall.

No, each move, each word was surgical. Much like her father's natural killer instinct.

And much like her father and every Sith in history -- it all boiled down to superstition. To symbols. To the irrational.

The unnatural.

But it's one thing identifying the problem, and a whole other thing solving it.

With a short leap of his own, he covered the ground into an intimate distance with his former padawan putting himself between Corin and her. His slash was direct, easily expected and heavy. More of a taunt than anything else. She still held the initiative, he wanted her to. Only way to piece her out was to take the brunt of the assault.

"Your fight is with me!" he growled. "Leave him out of it." he added in an attempt to provoke her.

​

"I had no fight!" She screeched, shrill and crazed by the insanity of it all. "All this time I've been trying to help you, but you think I chose this. You think I wanted this." She descended on him with viscous slashes full of power and brute force.

She use to be a precise fighter, more skill than power. That had changed. She beat him back with pure strength alone, descending on him with single minded focus that aimed to cut him down quickly so she could move onto the next threat. Her father's lesson had instilled that in her. It had been that or die.

She kicked at his gut, using every opening she had to wail on him.

"You wrote me off. The first doubt you got--" She shook her head, her pain swelling forward and overwhelming her with the darkside. When she opened her eyes they were cold and unfeeling. Yellow had bleed into the whites, it was the only color on her ashen complexion. She snarled at him and raised a hand.

"You can't have him." The force wrapped like a vice around Corin's throat and lifted him, cutting off any air.

Corin Trenor Dagon Kaze Darth Solipsis

THE DAY OF REVENGE
THE GREAT ERROR vol. III
Issue #4 w/ Jem Fossk & Corin Trenor

"Help--??--"

"--wha--??" the bewilderment on his face lit up by the continuous barrage of Jem's slashes. Dagon could not understand, and neither could he allow himself the reprieve to try and figure out her words riddled with much more questions than they were with answers. Not when he was busy fending off the tempest born of her rage at him.

He wasn't any weaker than yesterday but she was far stronger -- beyond recognition.

The sudden lapse of focus cost him the air in his lungs as her kick landed with a heavy thud in his gut. He stumbled a few feet back, his blade instinctively en garde for her follow-up.

But it never came.

Her hand seized the empty air and the dark side heeded her call. It wrapped its tendrils around Corin's throat like a serpent, the muffled chokes barely escaping his lips. Dagon's nose wrinkled, nostrils flared open as he snarled, "I said -- with me!" the air cracked beneath the palm of his hand before darted open in Jem's direction sending a push through the Force to interrupt her attack.
​

Jem went flying and cracked into the roof's stairwell. Both apprentices dropped to the ground in sync, her body throbbing at the impact.

She groaned and wiped a trail of blood out of her eyes. The world burned around them. The beast she had flew on groaned, it's death throes rocking the building on its foundations. It wasn't safe up here. It wasn't safe anywhere but she didn't care. Nothing in this whole world could pull her attention off the roof top.

She glared at Dagon and lifted herself back up off the ground.

"You are suppose to care about me." Dark energy crackled through the air, building with each word she gritted through her teeth. "You're suppose. To protect. ME." Lightening shot out from her blood stained finger tips and raced straight for Dagon.

Dagon Kaze Corin Trenor

THE DAY OF REVENGE
IDENTITY CRISIS vol. III
Issue #5 w/ Dagon Kaze & Jem Fossk

Beneath Corin, his knees threatened to buckle onto the scarred surface of the roof. He keeled over, one hand fell to a knee as the other rubbed at his throat, and several short retches followed his movements. It was terror that told him to remain there, removed, so far outmatched. His Master had not defeated Jem, the two locked in a duel, of what worth was Corin this bout, he wondered. Fear ran into his veins, and all that offered in return was blood that boiled.

"No!" Corin cried out between laboured breaths as those flashes of wild streaks struck out ahead of him towards the Jedi Knight. He could not stop them now, but there was the chance to stop her.

It was with a Force imbued rush into the air that Corin had sent himself forwards, the blue blade of his own saber came to life and the unmistakable hum neared Jem in the middle of her own assault on the Jedi. He treated it as if it were the heaviest of all swords, reared over his shoulder and slashed out in front of him, towards Jem's midsection, with force.

He remembered the order Kaze issued, but that hadn't mattered now.

Fire burned in her eyes, the yellow growing more pronounced as Dagon took the brunt of hit. The static hadn't even cleared from the air when Corin Trenor descended on her. He protected his master with the same fervor that she once had. He didn't know how wasted that was. Dagon would walk away from him just as quickly too.

She might have pitied the kid for playing the fool as she once had, but that was wasted space. Pity wouldn't make Dagon pay.

She caught the blade and twisted, directing the force of his attack to slide down her own and smash with sparks into the ground. Her elbow rounded up to smash into his face and her arm came back down to try and smash through the hilt of his saber. She could have taken off his hand or ended him in that moment, but she didn't. That was something she wanted Dagon to see.

She reached for his hair and tried to jerk him to her.

Dagon Kaze Corin Trenor

THE DAY OF REVENGE
IDENTITY CRISIS vol. III
Issue #6 w/ Dagon Kaze & Jem Fossk

It all went south so fast.

In an instant, his attack had been deflected and so too had the momentum of his entire set of movements. His effort had been thrown into a bid to maintain his stance, and in that moment had an elbow struck him centre face. Corin was forced on the backfoot, his feet shuffled backwards with haste in that same effort as before but now all too concerned he was left in the clear for the same kill-shot he made on her.

It was what he deserved now; life for life.

So came the downsides of a wild life, one that demanded all that one had on offer. It was that need to show that one was worth all that time and investment that could make them the best, it should sicken him, but rather he fell victim to it. Jem too, it seemed.

But as one strike landed on his face, another cleaved into his saber hilt and severed it in two. It fell from his hand and no more than shock and some amount of fear held onto him then, rendered near defenseless in the moment. If not for the lessons of the Matukai, that was. It should do, Corin needed to believe.

The Padawan's features tensed and narrowed, a bitter hate all too noticeable across them. Terror had been cast aside, for now. He motioned to counter the extended arm that reached for his hair, to offer a firm hold on he wrist and hold it there as his other hand rushed forwards in a fist towards her throat.

She let him.

Her left hand remained trapped in his right-- her throat squeezed by his left-- he appeared to have the upper hand. Except for one thing. Her saber thrummed to life between them, the heat searing his skin as it hovered a mere inch away from his throat.

Check. Mate.

She raised a brow, her eyes watering in the pain of the choke hold. One wrong move and that saber would go through its mark. One moment more and she would kill him anyway.

She turn to check Dagon was looking...

Corin Trenor Dagon Kaze

THE DAY OF REVENGE
THE GREAT ERROR vol. III
Issue #4 w/ Jem Fossk & Corin Trenor

Hanging.

Hanging to the last threads of composure against the crushing tide of calamity. Jem had fallen. The dark side had encapsulated her within a web of bitterness, disappointment, and resentment long fermented in her heart. How could he have been so blind? They were practically inseparable. On Denon and beyond. They say you can't read the label when you're inside the bottle. And now that bottle lay broken into a hundred fragments of their shattered trust. Pieces as sharp as daggers Jem now wielded as weapons.

Hanging onto the edge of the rooftop with a barely responsive, electrocuted hand bearing the full weight of his body. The oomph of the lightning blast had sent Dagon flying like a ragged doll into the abyss moments ago, its crackling power scorching cloth and flesh alike over his chest. Sweaty raven locks poked at his eyes as he held for dear life and scrapped at the very bottom of his will to muster the strength to get back up. The skin of his fingertips peeled off as the Jedi pulled himself up onto the rooftop again.

The battered figure of the Knight staggered up to his feet. The famed New Jedi leather jacket hung tattered upon the last few remaining threads. It was ironic. A hundred battles before and it only took one clean strike of his former apprentice to tear it at its seams. Solipsis would call it a prophecy.

And what an omen that was. To see two of his apprentices locked in a lethal scuffle was the definitive culmination of his failures as a master. He struggled to find words, struggled to meet Jem's gaze, struggled to find a breath in this blood-ridden air. The blade fell extinguished on the cracked rooftop floor and his head slumped down.

"Solipsis wants my head... not his -- take me but spare him."​

​

THE DAY OF REVENGE
IDENTITY CRISIS vol. III
Issue #7 w/ Dagon Kaze & Jem Fossk

It was Jem's moment of confidence and Corin felt the burn; if not for the rumbles of war, he was certain to have heard the fizzles of those faint hairs too.

In the face of his own cruel demise, the Jedi maintained his tense hold on her throat. He witnessed those tears well in her sockets, the idea that one more second was all he needed to see her crumble to the shattered roof flooded into his mind, and it continued at each second that came after. Just one more, it was all he ever needed. He could then be the victor, then be the winner, the better. Beneath the obstruction that had been the sweat-filled strands, Corin seemed to lessen all the strain once his Master had risen to his feet and offered his for Corin's own.

Had that been the bar of truth the teen had needed? Had it been all that he wished to be true, to feel that worth? It seemed to have calmed him for no more than a moment before the shift in stakes altered the war within. His then loose hold hardened, his other hand shifted across in order to raise her saber arm from his throat. Corin motioned forwards with his might and an attempt to sweep the leg, with every intention to follow her to floor and continue that choke.

His fire had not been fuelled from all he learned in his lessons, no matter the intentions behind it.

It didn't hit right.

Dagon's defeat-- his surrender-- it wasn't what she wanted. The intangible need hovered at the edge of everything, tarnished by the sickening sensation of seeing her master crack.

Had she done that?

Her falter was all Corin needed to turn the moment. Something in her saber arm snapped, the broken limb releasing the weapon before it could take his life. He had her downed and pinned, her brief awareness chased away by the sharp fear of sudden death. She keeled and gasped desperately, not unlike a wild animal as her nails carved lines across his face. The darkside thrashed and swelled with her fit, screaming out into the force.

She didn't want to die. No amount of her father's torment had taken that fight from her yet. Her eyes bulged as she forced her broken arm to wrap around the hilt of her dagger and thrust up the blade up...

One hit was all the agony she could bare, but one breath was all she needed... her lips gasped hopelessly... blood vessels popping along ... her... face...

Corin Trenor Dagon Kaze

 

[Corin Trenor]

THE DAY OF REVENGE
IDENTITY CRISIS vol. III
Issue #8 w/ Dagon Kaze & Jem Fossk

It was far from his most Jedi moment, that much was true; in all the blindness this war within caused, Corin had no chance to so much as notice. In a time of self-reflection, oh there was bound to be so much shame and more.

In his vice-like hold over her throat, Corin reeled his own head backwards in all the attempts to avoid the unavaoidable claws that were her nails

Between his hands that closed similar to that of a vice, her throat felt an inch from a total crush. Broken. In his efforts to avoid the unavoidable nails that reached for his face, Corin reeled his head backwards and found no small number of cuts embedded into his boyish features - red marks and blood lined his face, his own skin then under her claws.

His eyes had shut, fearful of real blindness. His bitter resentment carried him forwards until that sudden shockwave entered at his side; "Gah!" He cried out, an in a flash had returned to his knees, able to witness the blade as it exited him. Both hands shuffled across to the slick attire turned crimson before he fell backwards, entirely disconnected from Jem. Corin clenched his teeth and scrambled backwards, his feet all that was able to see him slide across the roof.

 

[Jem Fossk]

Spoiler: The Story

DARK LORD OF THE SITH | VOICE OF THE MAW
Jem Fossk
Cinnagar, Empress Teta

​

"Beautiful." The Dark Voice bellowed.

Powerful gusts tugged at his robes violently, the air was thin, the view however.. spectacular.

Vroom!

A single hypersonic roar flooded his senses, a single Eradicator class starfighter screamed by. The single vanguard of an encroaching storm not long behind. Mawite fighter craft and dropships carrying the zealous holy crusaders and fierce tribal marauders peeked through the clouds. Streaks of exhaust spat out in their wake as the sky thundered with their approach. It would not be long before green and red bolts of luminous laser fire would flicker back between earth and heavens above.

Glorious.

The Dark Lord stepped forward, leaning closer towards the 'edge' of his vantage point. Soon the vast cityscape of Cinnagar was in plain view. He could see the palace, the Great Library, and soon…

Rumble! Shake! Thunder!

"Ah, there it is."

The city quaked, there was a symphonic shockwave that melodied from the heart of the old capital. It percussioned a cloud made of duracrete and glasteel, crescendoing to the rise of the Iron Citadel. Soprano cries of terror, baratone wallows, and harmonic crashes filled the chorus of the Krath.

With the power of Sith Sorcery, their return was boldly broadcasted to the pretenders occupying the Tetan throne. They bore with them a gift, a secret long buried that ignited with eerie luminance filling the ancient ruin with a sickly emerald glow. The hypergate had opened.

"The time has come, daughter."

The beast roared beneath them.

​

Be a pool of water.

Like a lake...

cool... unmovable... without ripples...​

Jem forced herself to envision it. The jedi meditation practice had once been a security blanket. Now its ragged form kept slipping through her fingers. Calm was not something Jem typically embodied but she stood at her father's side and force herself to remain still.

It was becoming harder every day to manage it.

Her father's corrupting measures seared through her veins and she suffered for it. Every moment was a battle inside her own mind. Every breath was effort-- a cognitive task of control.

She ignored her father. She ignored the city, she ignored the pending war. She was running out of ti--

A familiar presence cut through it all. Her attention jolted outwards, a pained gasp escaping through her lips. It only took a moment for her to make sense of the presence.

Not even the darkside could make her forget her master.


Her own presence was weak, barely identifiable amongst the corruption that threatened to swallow Jem whole. A warning image jolted through the tentative bond they still shared, powerful as it tried to drive itself like spikes into Dagon's mind.

Her father was coming. He was more powerful than ever before.




Jem winced and released the reigns from her grasp. The metal had warped under her fingers. "Yes father."

She let herself free fall to the ground, disembarking to... she no longer knew. She no longer asked questions. Her strength was conserved for one thing.

I am a lake.
​

Dagon Kaze Darth Solipsis Ryv Corin Trenor

THE DAY OF REVENGE
THE GREAT ERROR vol. III
Issue #4 w/ Jem Fossk & Corin Trenor
Ryv Darth Solipsis

The Sith are a superstitious cowardly lot.

From day one it has been so. The resurgence of the New Sith over the corpse of the old and decrepit on Thule. A pattern Solipsis had followed religiously throughout his crusade to warp and change reality itself. Logistical lines, strategic locations, all rational military targets had been delegated to the 'simpler' minds of the Final Dawn. Instead, he'd waged war against the hearts and minds of the galaxy, against the sole existence of the Jedi.

From torching to ash the Enclave at Jakku and the pilgrimage of Jedha to the massacres in the Sith Worlds and all the way to the heart of the Jedi, the home of galactic civilization - Coruscant. None could forget the Sacking of Coruscant that had driven the New Jedi to the edge of extinction.

This was no war of occupation, no war of tangible strategic value or anything of the sorts.

No, this has been an existential war. A war of life itself against the forces of entropy, of death.

A war to forever change the hierarchy of power and the natural order of the universe.

Forever.

The coronation on Teta - home of the legendary Krath, a dynasty known for its historical roots with the Sith. Where and when else could he have attacked? To make a point. To demonstrate true power. Symbols and superstition.

And yet, as predictable as Solipsis may have grown to be in the eyes of the Jedi, the question that truly held importance was neither where or when but could he be stopped?

Once more, they came in droves. Springing from the depths of an ancient, long-forgotten hypergate and cutting through the skies; a dark curtain enveloping the light and casting an impregnable shadow over the world.

The heavens hung in black.

In that unending sea of darkness converging in the skies, a behemoth of Sith Magic stood out. A creature born solely for the purpose to destroy and annihilate and atop it he could sense it. Not the twisted nature of the beast and neither the malicious maw of death that its master was. No. Her presence may have been like the sound of a nail falling into hay but to him... it was all he could hear.

"Jem..." he heard himself mutter, eyes narrowed unto the behemoth from his vantage point atop one of Cinnagar's many high rises cutting the clouds. A warning shuddered the rusty bond between master and apprentice, wedging itself into his lobe. Strong enough to force an involuntary step back.

It bore no threat, conveyed more like a friend's caution.

A moment later it abated, replaced by the malice of corruption which enveloped the sender and the weight of guilt upon the recipient.

It was time to move.

To act.

As always.

He caught her lithe form freefalling from the skies, an enviable feat she hadn't truly mastered before. Even this distant from her, Dagon could feel the power her father had provided her with. The shortcut. The easy way. A clear sign of his own failings as a mentor. It dug deep into his heart.

"Corin, we move to intercept her." Dagon said, unnatural gloom besetting the usual easy-going bravado he was known for. Solipsis would never send her away on a menial task. No, she was his key. The single soul in the whole wide galaxy he would trust.

The heiress of Apocalypse.

"Time for you to meet my... former apprentice."​

DARK LORD OF THE SITH | VOICE OF THE MAW
Jem Fossk | Dagon Kaze | Corin Trenor | Ryv
Cinnagar, Empress Teta

WRATH

​

The beast's roar rippled through the skies of Cinnagar like a hurricane wind. Smoke and fire spilled out as far as the eye could see as the battle for the soul of the planet began in earnest. A quick glance to his daughter saw her off as she made her way towards the edge of the floating behemoth. Without a hint of fear or doubt, the apprentice gracefully stepped off.

The Dark Lord of the Sith pressed his right foot forward and dug in, eyes like daggers following the trajectory of his kin. He hissed, extending his right hand forward, palm opening in gesture as the psychic connection between man and beast intensified. The Summa Verminoth groaned and dipped, diving towards the cityscape with it's tendrils extended out.

​

A typhoon tugged at his robes relentlessly, fierce winds powerful enough to uproot him threatened to remove the Dark Voice from his fortified stance. He would not budge, the gusts were like waves breaking against the unmoving rock. Twin orbs of sulfuric hate glared down as the beast savagely slammed into a nearby tower, cleaving through an entire story.

Vroom!

Wherever the massive beast loomed, dust and debris followed in it's savage wake. Buildings partially collapsed if not outright crumbled under the weight of the apex predator. As the monstrosity circled, the Dark Voice lifted himself and cast off. Touching the empyrean, he gathered the Force and leapt from the dome of the Summa Verminoth, descending in a slow controlled fall.

He came down, eyes casting a terrible glare down towards the landing site of his kin. The Sith'ari's black robes enveloped around him, an umbral shroud that defied physics floating down. The Dark Voice lowered, drifting into a dust cloud kicked up by the rampant destruction around them. Smoke and ash filled the air, his form vanished completely, lost in the chaos.

"You may think this is suffering. No."

"It is salvation."

The Dark Lord emerged from the fog of war, the smoke and dust rolling off his midnight cloak as the winds pressed against him. He advanced, eyes honed and ready.

"Dread it all you like. Run from it if you have to. The facts remain the same… huh.."

His gaze twisted away, immediately drawn to the final obstacle in his daughter's training and full conversion as a Sith.

"Time to let old things die. You know what you must do, do not hesitate."

THE DAY OF REVENGE
IDENTITY CRISIS vol. III
Issue #1 w/ Dagon Kaze Jem Fossk Darth Solipsis Ryv

​

His new Master had felt distant at times, as if an extended arm refused to allow them to become as close as some other students he had been. It wasn't as if Corin had not been all too aware of the Padawan that came before him, but he failed to realise that it was fear; fear of failure had seen the two remain focused on the business-end of their connection, to find interests outside the Jedi Order and their mission... that fear of loss. It never seemed to settle in Corin and at the mere mention of Jem, had Corin frowned. Not for his Master, but for himself - his mind lost all focus, all that he needed was lost as he turned into the second born to the favoured star.

He had too much to lose.

She could succeed into her father's embrace, or fail into her Master's.

Corin shut himself off from the chaos, and a breath followed in an effort to find some composure. To no avail.

The Padawan nodded towards Kaze as the world crumbled around them. He had no words for all of this, and followed his Master as the two traversed the ruins of Teta, of the same ones that continued to increase in destruction as each second came and went.

Some small amount of calm had found itself returned to Corin, but that sliver was tested once the distant two came into view and both Dagon and Corin came closer and closer. He was better than her, he assured himself, he was not so weak as to crumble onto a traitor's road and abandon all that he knew.

Jem fell without feeling. Lakes didn't enjoy the thrill of free falling through air. Lakes didn't care that buildings were exploding and lives were ending around it. Lakes moved for no one. Well...

Except pebbles. And wind. And feet-- and...


She followed his gaze, her gray skin loosing luster as she caught what held his attention. "I'm not running," she asserted quickly, trying to bring his attention back to her.

"I accept this-- I'll not--"



Her stomach fell out from under her. She was forced to meet her father's gaze, his very presence demanding her acknowledgment. She wanted to melt into a puddle. Those seemed less noticeable.

"Yes... father..." Stupid, stupid Dagon.

Her feet felt like foreign objects. They obeyed her father and moved her towards the one thing she did not want to face. She couldn't stop them, but she could control the speed. She moved with slow precision onto the roof ledge... she... braced... and arched gracefully through the air, from one roof top to the next. He had taught her that. Dagon. The idiot with a death wish. Every step towards him felt like shifting through cement, the bags under her eyes growing deeper as she hoped without hope that her father would look away.

She brace... and jumped again... the skies above crackling with streaks of red. She saw a tuff of black hair and stopped on that roof ledge.


"I gave you a chance to leave," she hissed, her voice reaching the figure masked by the shadows. Up close she was unrecognizable. Her once hearty, gold-tone complexion was now colorless and hallow. She had not slept nor eaten in days, sustained by the corruption that consumed her, and it showed. She was lifeless and frail, but she rippled with unmistakable power.

"You should have taken it. Master."

Dagon Kaze Corin Trenor Darth Solipsis

There was a time before the bliss.

Those times and places were distant things, left to fade away into obscure stories told by hardened veterans and displaced refugees. Some found hope in those tales, while others looked upon them with abject hatred. When foreign and abstract ideals drove a boy to become something more. A monster who militarized an Order of masterless children and turned them into killing machines not seen since the times of Revan or Lord Hoth. Or maybe a hero, a symbol of unshaken hope that stood unbowed against the flowing tide of darkness.

A time better left in the past. Before the arrival of a loving family and nights spent in peace, where the greatest of toils were beer poured and food served.

Memories of pain, interwoven through the years by a sense of purpose.

Ryv sighed.

He looked up past the city limits, his gaze locked on the distant horizon. War came for him again. It appeared in the form of someone in need, as it always had. War promised him an end. A bloody one. Trapped, alone, away from his family in his final moments.

The tension in his chest, the storm of chaos that buzzed about the air like a swarm of starved locusts. He knew this place better than any other in the galaxy—a battlefield. Where the brave marched off to their death, and the foolish went to live.

There was a time when the kiffar longed for this feeling.

Now, Ryv yearned for the cozy armchair in his bedroom, where he would read to his children or tell them stories of his legendary exploits. It was a safe place. The memories dulled with the passage of years. War could not reach them there on Denon, not in the heart of his home. His territory.

But here on Empress Teta, within the city of Cinnagar, it had found him. War crawled closer, driven forth by the machinations of a mad man changed by alien designs the sane could not begin to fathom. A demented beast thundered towards the city. It hungered for innocent blood, to feast upon the dying breath of hope as pawns of light and shadow fell beneath its bulk.

In another time, on another world, the battle to determine the galaxy's fate would be fought.

Ryv paced across the flat top of a towering starscraper. He stepped up onto the ledge meant to separate him from a fatal plunge, his eyes never leaving the monstrous behemoth as it lumbered closer to its death.

"Fossk," Ryv uttered the name in a whisper, infused with subtle power. The words found the great empyrean like a smooth stone skipped across a calm lake. Power rolled through the ethereal, cutting through the ghostly echoes of battle between the Sword of the Jedi and the dreaded Sith'ari. "Surely you've waited long enough for this confrontation."

Darth Solipsis ​

THE DAY OF REVENGE
THE GREAT ERROR vol. III
Issue #4 w/ Jem Fossk & Corin Trenor
Ryv Darth Solipsis

The sky above crackled with fury and laid its vengeance upon the world. Threads of life cut short by the pestilent hand of the Sith quivered as ripples throughout the ethereal. The air reeked of plasma and burnt flesh, filling his nostrils with that all too familiar stench of war. It dug into the very skin you wear and no moments of peace nor joy could ever wash it away.

Dagon wrinkled his nose. The New Jedi Order, baptized in the flames of the Stygian War, learned that reprieve was a luxury they could neither have nor could they afford.

Reprieve had filled the gutters of the galaxy with the blood of its sons and daughters. It's the only lesson the New Jedi ever learned from their absent masters.

The Jedi duo's traverse came to an abrupt end, cut off by the appearance of a hollow shadow standing in their way. A grey shadow of a once colorful past and fateful future. Grey like the skin of a dying man, dry as a funeral drum. And that drum banged loud, beating into a crescendo of grief and regret.



"You know I like beating my head against the wall." he dryly responded, the hilt of his saber materializing in his hand. It had come to this, hasn't it? The pinnacle of his failures and mistakes shaped the monster that stood before him. That had taken his apprentice away from him. But the corruption -- as tight as a tourniquet around her -- could be broken. Blood does not dictate fate, only what we do defines us.

He'd prove it to her.

Or die trying.

The Knight's eyes narrowed sideways at Corin, a plan of action on his tongue but never uttered. How could he? After all, the infallible chemistry he'd built was with the one standing against them, "I'll go low, you go high." he whispered. A simple stratagem indicating the fledgling progress they had made. Then hoarsely reminded, "No killing."

The proverbial bell rang with the snap-hiss of his blade and the Force surged through his feet sending him darting at her. His body folded into a crouch as the cerulean saber sought to make contact with her legs.
​

DARK LORD OF THE SITH | VOICE OF THE MAW
Jem Fossk | Dagon Kaze | Corin Trenor | Ryv
Cinnagar, Empress Teta

W R A T H

​

His daughter had accepted the dreaded task given to her and asserted herself ready. She was not, no one could ever truly ready themselves to make 'the Sacrifice'. It was spiritual collapse, a rebirth of identity as the last vestige of compassion was killed off along with those dearest to you. To complete her transition into a Sith, she had to cut the last link holding her to her former life as a Jedi.

She had to kill Dagon Kaze .

The Dark Lord had intended to follow and see the job done before his very eyes, to watch the life leave the Jedi as he fell at the hands of his very own apprentice. The one he fought so passionately to save, to redeem and bring home. He never understood the truth, she was home, where Jem belonged. Her destiny was intertwined with that of her Father's, she was the heir to his legacy and the key to the future he designed.

Alas, his attention drifted elsewhere. Caught unawares as the silent speech of the Sword saturated his thoughts from the empyrean wind. His eyes widened, orbs of incalculable wrath glistening in the shadow of Cinnagar.

"…The Sword of the Jedi."

The Sith'ari cooed.

"You should of remained in exile."

The Dark Lord of the Sith stretched forth, hand reaching out across the expanse, his mind probing the depths of battlefield. He uttered a savage hiss before muttering in the 'Old Tongue' an unrecognizable command.

The earth shook, the skies thundered, and throughout the city streets a monstrosity glided overhead. The Summa-Verminoth groaned violently as it made haste in the direction of the valiant Sword. Earth and Heaven moved before the apex predator as it turned towers into turmoil.

The Beast lumbered on, carried by it's master's command to seek fresh meat.

THE DAY OF REVENGE
IDENTITY CRISIS vol. III
Issue #2 w/ Dagon Kaze Jem Fossk Darth Solipsis Ryv

​

He stood there, so disconnected from the core of the situation as the former master and student made their remarks to one another. He was the extra, the added addition, the one that came after, the one to find himself cast aside should Jem be returned to his side. His features scrunched and narrowed, from the creases on his forehead to the clench of his teeth. Corin was tense, and it remained so difficult to discern whether it was the nerves of a true test of skill or the fire that storm that near-thundered beneath the surface.

Corin returned a similar narrowed look back towards his Master, he readied himself to follow one command and still remained so unsure of the other. Had their success as two ensured his own loss as one? He wished he had all the chance to dimiss all the intrusive ideas that flashed before him, but there was no time but the here and now.

His weakened resolve had turned him into a moldable mass of flesh and bone.

In a silent rush of his own, Trenor mimicked Kaze as the blue blade hissed into existence. Beside the other Jedi, Corin bounced into the air and made the motion of an overhead attack, as if in effort to rid the fresh Sith of her arm.

He had finally hardened his heart to her. No more begging. No words. He had finally accepted the inevitable. She should be relieved, but his resignation burned like salt on a wound.

There really was no going back now. Her face hardened as he descended, her own saber jumping to her hand in turn.

She caught both the blades with a powerful upward strike-- forcing Dagon's up and entangling them both with the third before it could reach her shoulder.

"You're really going to make us do this?" She accused. "All the energy I've put into keeping you alive, and you're going to make me kill you." They remained locked for a moment in a power struggle, the tip of her dead jedi saber pointed at the ground. Darkness flexed through her muscles and she did not budge, her control over it balancing on a pin point.

"Do you have any idea what you're doing to me?" Her pain was palpable. She wanted nothing more than to pretend she had never sat on that corrupting throne, but her father pushed her further every day and her master...

Her attention fixated on the jedi fighting besides him. She had dismissed Corin Trenor and his tangle of black hair as a cousin or even brother of Dagon's, but it struck her then that didn't make sense. The jedi-- the boy-- was her own age. She was Dagon's only connection.

Her resistance slackened with shock.

"Who is this?"

Dagon Kaze Corin Trenor Darth Solipsis

THE DAY OF REVENGE
THE GREAT ERROR vol. III
Issue #4 w/ Jem Fossk & Corin Trenor

"You can try." he retorted as the two Jedi's blades locked a cross with Jem's parry. "If you can't step back into the Light -- I'll drag you back." he could feel his flesh squeeze his hilt tighter and tighter against Jem's newfound strength.



An eyebrow slightly arched up, "Wh--"



That was for Corin to respond. Feeling the resistance of her parry begin to falter, Dagon stepped back and to the side seeking to flank her followed by a horizontal slash of his blade across her arm. Had Jem been the one on his side, he'd known she would've followed to flank their enemy on the opposite side. Just like they had trained. Just like in the good old days.

Oh, this divine irony of it all.
​

THE DAY OF REVENGE
IDENTITY CRISIS vol. III
Issue #3 w/ Dagon Kaze & Jem Fossk

​

He was no Jem.

Far from it.

But now, of all times, he resembled her current state most of all. Even as the Master of the three shifted out, a clear chance for himself to do the same, Corin elected to remain and in an effort to hold her there, to be better than her. It was all he wished for now, he was unable to ever confess otherwise, least of all as he leaned further into his own blue-bladed saber and his features contorted in order to be more tense than ever before.

"I'm Corin," he mustered between all the exertion, "Your replacement."

Jem flinched in understanding.

Pain came at her every which way. Grief ripped away her sense of self and replaced everything with searing anger. That was what her father had wanted her to experience, and he had won. That fact haunted her as she stared at the source of her undoing. He struggled against her blade, weak an unable to overcome her in a simple stand still. And yet ... he was her now. He why Dagon hadn't even bothered to try this time.

Something in her cracked.

Her lips coiled with malice. "You will never replace me."

She stepped to the side the exact moment Dagon's blade descended into her arm, releasing all of Corin's kinetic energy into its path. Her own skin burned and bubbled by the closeness, but it wasn't her that would feel its true impact.

"His apprentice would know that was coming."

She kicked at him, holding Dagon's gaze.

Dagon Kaze Corin Trenor Darth Solipsis

THE DAY OF REVENGE
THE GREAT ERROR vol. III
Issue #4 w/ Jem Fossk & Corin Trenor

His eyes widened, stupified by the remark. Jem's rebuke hit back like lightening and the black haired padawan tumbled into the Knight. Dagon hastily deactivated his blade to prevent a costly accident of impaling Corin and stepped to the side, then caught the padawan by the collar of his jacket to prevent him from losing his footing further.

"Really had to say that, huh." he quietly murmured to the new apprentice, then reactivated his saber once more.

The Knight brought his feet at hip-width, shifting from his easily recognizeable Ataru form to that of the defensive Soresu. A form he'd relied on much during his early days as a padawan before embracing his innate talents with Ataru.

This was no longer the Jem he knew, at least for the most part.

He needed time. Observe her moves, witness her newfound strengths and newborn weaknesses. Assemble every piece, every cog of the machine Solipsis had created.

Then take it all apart.​

"You never trusted me."

Her whole body quivered with emotion. Up until this point she hadn't actually raised a hand against them but she struggled to remember why that was. She was no longer a lake, she was a raging storm threatening to explode. What that the darkside or what that her pain? It was impossible to fuss out and she wasn't trying to. The betrayal took her breath away.

It took everything away.

Jem fell into a pool of darkness. In its cool embrace nothing mattered, not even her own agony as the light inside of her snuffed out. "No," she decreed, taking a step towards them. Darkness billowed off of her, bending the force around her and dragging it in. Like a black hole.

"You're not allowed him. You don't deserve him." She crept towards them, her path unclear as she forced her way deeper onto the roof. "You will never have a padawan again."

She charged, not on him but on the boy that had taken her place. An abrupt overhead leap would put Corin between them-- affording him no easy protection from Dagon as she slashed for his neck.

An attempted kill shot.


Dagon Kaze Corin Trenor Darth Solipsis

THE DAY OF REVENGE
IDENTITY CRISIS vol. III
Issue #4 w/ Dagon Kaze & Jem Fossk

​

The Jedi Padawan -- the second student that seemed to be on a route to suffer a similar fate as the first -- had felt the onset of a fall. His stomach swirled, the sudden butterflies had risen into his chest and then his throat as those once determined features shifted into that of shock. In awe, Corin stared into the abyss beneath him whilst time slowed, the same stared lasted mere moments before it shifted towards the behemoth of a beast screeched. Had this been it, he had no time nor chance to entertain the idea, his arms flailed as if in a bid to see himself fly. It was as if he wished for one final look before he fell, Corin twirled on his toes to see no more than the hand of Dagon reach out and snatch his collar.

No time for so much as a look of relief, Corin was raised onto his own two feet and stumbled forwards into a roll once the Jedi pulled him forwards.

His brow furrowed at her words, overhead as he scrambled onto his feet and a sense of dread entered him. Corin had seen no more than her swift descent on him, the blue blade rose in a flash in an effort to meet her own as his stance was far from firm; the force of her fall had been all that she needed to knock him from his stance, even as the blades clashed and fizzled, and Corin fell onto his back. He made an effort to tuck and roll backwards, and his feet extended outwards as if to use that momentum and kick the Sith off of him as he further rolled back onto his feet.

He had no words, only laboured breaths.

THE DAY OF REVENGE
THE GREAT ERROR vol. III
Issue #4 w/ Jem Fossk & Corin Trenor

"You never trusted me."

"Repeating it isn't gonna make it true, Jem." he retorted, eyes narrowed at her. Was he lying to himself, though? Indulging in comforting fiction was a pitfall even Jedi were not immune from. Surely, the Knight had been cautious with her, too cautious even to the point it seemed as if he was reluctant to grant her more responsibility, give her that so much needed space to spread her wings.

And as surely it was construed as mistrust.

But that guilt could not weigh him down. Not now, at least.

The Jedi needed all his bearings together for this fight.

Her threats stung like a scorpion's poison to erode his resolve but he persevered.

Or rather - had to.

Jem leaped over him and unto Corin, effectively pinning the teenager between a rock and a hard place.

Forcing him to become a meat shield in Dagon's service.

Abrasive.

How far had her father's corruptive claws dug in?

She was no frothing at the mouth monster, removed of all thoughts like a mindless thrall.

No, each move, each word was surgical. Much like her father's natural killer instinct.

And much like her father and every Sith in history -- it all boiled down to superstition. To symbols. To the irrational.

The unnatural.

But it's one thing identifying the problem, and a whole other thing solving it.

With a short leap of his own, he covered the ground into an intimate distance with his former padawan putting himself between Corin and her. His slash was direct, easily expected and heavy. More of a taunt than anything else. She still held the initiative, he wanted her to. Only way to piece her out was to take the brunt of the assault.

"Your fight is with me!" he growled. "Leave him out of it." he added in an attempt to provoke her.

​

"I had no fight!" She screeched, shrill and crazed by the insanity of it all. "All this time I've been trying to help you, but you think I chose this. You think I wanted this." She descended on him with viscous slashes full of power and brute force.

She use to be a precise fighter, more skill than power. That had changed. She beat him back with pure strength alone, descending on him with single minded focus that aimed to cut him down quickly so she could move onto the next threat. Her father's lesson had instilled that in her. It had been that or die.

She kicked at his gut, using every opening she had to wail on him.

"You wrote me off. The first doubt you got--" She shook her head, her pain swelling forward and overwhelming her with the darkside. When she opened her eyes they were cold and unfeeling. Yellow had bleed into the whites, it was the only color on her ashen complexion. She snarled at him and raised a hand.

"You can't have him." The force wrapped like a vice around Corin's throat and lifted him, cutting off any air.

Corin Trenor Dagon Kaze Darth Solipsis

THE DAY OF REVENGE
THE GREAT ERROR vol. III
Issue #4 w/ Jem Fossk & Corin Trenor

"Help--??--"

"--wha--??" the bewilderment on his face lit up by the continuous barrage of Jem's slashes. Dagon could not understand, and neither could he allow himself the reprieve to try and figure out her words riddled with much more questions than they were with answers. Not when he was busy fending off the tempest born of her rage at him.

He wasn't any weaker than yesterday but she was far stronger -- beyond recognition.

The sudden lapse of focus cost him the air in his lungs as her kick landed with a heavy thud in his gut. He stumbled a few feet back, his blade instinctively en garde for her follow-up.

But it never came.

Her hand seized the empty air and the dark side heeded her call. It wrapped its tendrils around Corin's throat like a serpent, the muffled chokes barely escaping his lips. Dagon's nose wrinkled, nostrils flared open as he snarled, "I said -- with me!" the air cracked beneath the palm of his hand before darted open in Jem's direction sending a push through the Force to interrupt her attack.
​

Jem went flying and cracked into the roof's stairwell. Both apprentices dropped to the ground in sync, her body throbbing at the impact.

She groaned and wiped a trail of blood out of her eyes. The world burned around them. The beast she had flew on groaned, it's death throes rocking the building on its foundations. It wasn't safe up here. It wasn't safe anywhere but she didn't care. Nothing in this whole world could pull her attention off the roof top.

She glared at Dagon and lifted herself back up off the ground.

"You are suppose to care about me." Dark energy crackled through the air, building with each word she gritted through her teeth. "You're suppose. To protect. ME." Lightening shot out from her blood stained finger tips and raced straight for Dagon.

Dagon Kaze Corin Trenor

THE DAY OF REVENGE
IDENTITY CRISIS vol. III
Issue #5 w/ Dagon Kaze & Jem Fossk

Beneath Corin, his knees threatened to buckle onto the scarred surface of the roof. He keeled over, one hand fell to a knee as the other rubbed at his throat, and several short retches followed his movements. It was terror that told him to remain there, removed, so far outmatched. His Master had not defeated Jem, the two locked in a duel, of what worth was Corin this bout, he wondered. Fear ran into his veins, and all that offered in return was blood that boiled.

"No!" Corin cried out between laboured breaths as those flashes of wild streaks struck out ahead of him towards the Jedi Knight. He could not stop them now, but there was the chance to stop her.

It was with a Force imbued rush into the air that Corin had sent himself forwards, the blue blade of his own saber came to life and the unmistakable hum neared Jem in the middle of her own assault on the Jedi. He treated it as if it were the heaviest of all swords, reared over his shoulder and slashed out in front of him, towards Jem's midsection, with force.

He remembered the order Kaze issued, but that hadn't mattered now.

Fire burned in her eyes, the yellow growing more pronounced as Dagon took the brunt of hit. The static hadn't even cleared from the air when Corin Trenor descended on her. He protected his master with the same fervor that she once had. He didn't know how wasted that was. Dagon would walk away from him just as quickly too.

She might have pitied the kid for playing the fool as she once had, but that was wasted space. Pity wouldn't make Dagon pay.

She caught the blade and twisted, directing the force of his attack to slide down her own and smash with sparks into the ground. Her elbow rounded up to smash into his face and her arm came back down to try and smash through the hilt of his saber. She could have taken off his hand or ended him in that moment, but she didn't. That was something she wanted Dagon to see.

She reached for his hair and tried to jerk him to her.

Dagon Kaze Corin Trenor

THE DAY OF REVENGE
IDENTITY CRISIS vol. III
Issue #6 w/ Dagon Kaze & Jem Fossk

It all went south so fast.

In an instant, his attack had been deflected and so too had the momentum of his entire set of movements. His effort had been thrown into a bid to maintain his stance, and in that moment had an elbow struck him centre face. Corin was forced on the backfoot, his feet shuffled backwards with haste in that same effort as before but now all too concerned he was left in the clear for the same kill-shot he made on her.

It was what he deserved now; life for life.

So came the downsides of a wild life, one that demanded all that one had on offer. It was that need to show that one was worth all that time and investment that could make them the best, it should sicken him, but rather he fell victim to it. Jem too, it seemed.

But as one strike landed on his face, another cleaved into his saber hilt and severed it in two. It fell from his hand and no more than shock and some amount of fear held onto him then, rendered near defenseless in the moment. If not for the lessons of the Matukai, that was. It should do, Corin needed to believe.

The Padawan's features tensed and narrowed, a bitter hate all too noticeable across them. Terror had been cast aside, for now. He motioned to counter the extended arm that reached for his hair, to offer a firm hold on he wrist and hold it there as his other hand rushed forwards in a fist towards her throat.

She let him.

Her left hand remained trapped in his right-- her throat squeezed by his left-- he appeared to have the upper hand. Except for one thing. Her saber thrummed to life between them, the heat searing his skin as it hovered a mere inch away from his throat.

Check. Mate.

She raised a brow, her eyes watering in the pain of the choke hold. One wrong move and that saber would go through its mark. One moment more and she would kill him anyway.

She turn to check Dagon was looking...

Corin Trenor Dagon Kaze

THE DAY OF REVENGE
THE GREAT ERROR vol. III
Issue #4 w/ Jem Fossk & Corin Trenor

Hanging.

Hanging to the last threads of composure against the crushing tide of calamity. Jem had fallen. The dark side had encapsulated her within a web of bitterness, disappointment, and resentment long fermented in her heart. How could he have been so blind? They were practically inseparable. On Denon and beyond. They say you can't read the label when you're inside the bottle. And now that bottle lay broken into a hundred fragments of their shattered trust. Pieces as sharp as daggers Jem now wielded as weapons.

Hanging onto the edge of the rooftop with a barely responsive, electrocuted hand bearing the full weight of his body. The oomph of the lightning blast had sent Dagon flying like a ragged doll into the abyss moments ago, its crackling power scorching cloth and flesh alike over his chest. Sweaty raven locks poked at his eyes as he held for dear life and scrapped at the very bottom of his will to muster the strength to get back up. The skin of his fingertips peeled off as the Jedi pulled himself up onto the rooftop again.

The battered figure of the Knight staggered up to his feet. The famed New Jedi leather jacket hung tattered upon the last few remaining threads. It was ironic. A hundred battles before and it only took one clean strike of his former apprentice to tear it at its seams. Solipsis would call it a prophecy.

And what an omen that was. To see two of his apprentices locked in a lethal scuffle was the definitive culmination of his failures as a master. He struggled to find words, struggled to meet Jem's gaze, struggled to find a breath in this blood-ridden air. The blade fell extinguished on the cracked rooftop floor and his head slumped down.

"Solipsis wants my head... not his -- take me but spare him."​

​

THE DAY OF REVENGE
IDENTITY CRISIS vol. III
Issue #7 w/ Dagon Kaze & Jem Fossk

It was Jem's moment of confidence and Corin felt the burn; if not for the rumbles of war, he was certain to have heard the fizzles of those faint hairs too.

In the face of his own cruel demise, the Jedi maintained his tense hold on her throat. He witnessed those tears well in her sockets, the idea that one more second was all he needed to see her crumble to the shattered roof flooded into his mind, and it continued at each second that came after. Just one more, it was all he ever needed. He could then be the victor, then be the winner, the better. Beneath the obstruction that had been the sweat-filled strands, Corin seemed to lessen all the strain once his Master had risen to his feet and offered his for Corin's own.

Had that been the bar of truth the teen had needed? Had it been all that he wished to be true, to feel that worth? It seemed to have calmed him for no more than a moment before the shift in stakes altered the war within. His then loose hold hardened, his other hand shifted across in order to raise her saber arm from his throat. Corin motioned forwards with his might and an attempt to sweep the leg, with every intention to follow her to floor and continue that choke.

His fire had not been fuelled from all he learned in his lessons, no matter the intentions behind it.

It didn't hit right.

Dagon's defeat-- his surrender-- it wasn't what she wanted. The intangible need hovered at the edge of everything, tarnished by the sickening sensation of seeing her master crack.

Had she done that?

Her falter was all Corin needed to turn the moment. Something in her saber arm snapped, the broken limb releasing the weapon before it could take his life. He had her downed and pinned, her brief awareness chased away by the sharp fear of sudden death. She keeled and gasped desperately, not unlike a wild animal as her nails carved lines across his face. The darkside thrashed and swelled with her fit, screaming out into the force.

She didn't want to die. No amount of her father's torment had taken that fight from her yet. Her eyes bulged as she forced her broken arm to wrap around the hilt of her dagger and thrust up the blade up...

One hit was all the agony she could bare, but one breath was all she needed... her lips gasped hopelessly... blood vessels popping along ... her... face...

Corin Trenor Dagon Kaze

THE DAY OF REVENGE
IDENTITY CRISIS vol. III
Issue #8 w/ Dagon Kaze & Jem Fossk

It was far from his most Jedi moment, that much was true; in all the blindness this war within caused, Corin had no chance to so much as notice. In a time of self-reflection, oh there was bound to be so much shame and more.

In his vice-like hold over her throat, Corin reeled his own head backwards in all the attempts to avoid the unavaoidable claws that were her nails

Between his hands that closed similar to that of a vice, her throat felt an inch from a total crush. Broken. In his efforts to avoid the unavoidable nails that reached for his face, Corin reeled his head backwards and found no small number of cuts embedded into his boyish features - red marks and blood lined his face, his own skin then under her claws.

His eyes had shut, fearful of real blindness. His bitter resentment carried him forwards until that sudden shockwave entered at his side; "Gah!" He cried out, an in a flash had returned to his knees, able to witness the blade as it exited him. Both hands shuffled across to the slick attire turned crimson before he fell backwards, entirely disconnected from Jem. Corin clenched his teeth and scrambled backwards, his feet all that was able to see him slide across the roof.

Oxygen burned.

She sucked it in in desperate fits, her body scrambling to lift itself up and peel back. She could feel the collapsed structure of her throat. She coughed, blood streaming out of her mouth with each pained hack, yet despite it all she remained standing. The darkness preserved her. She leaned into it, no longer shying away from its chill. Ruby-red eyes leveled coldly on her replacement.

"You will never be me," came the gravely, broken words.

The force slammed into the boy, corrupted and cold. Her would feel her agony as she twisted the force against him. It's foul form attacked his mind and body alike, trying to toss him from the roof while simultaneously trying to break his mind. Just like her father had done to her all those weeks ago.

Months?

A year?

She no longer remembered who she was. She no longer cared if Dagon was watching. Corin would know darkness or he would die. Dagon would have no one but her ever again.

Dagon Kaze Corin Trenor

 

[Iris Arani]

"Empress Keto and the Senator are in danger,"

Iris gritted her teeth. They weren't the only ones in danger. Domxite was here. Just there, in sight. In pain. The Padawan gripped her own saber, staring at the hilt. Could she get Domxite back from Thalia Senn ? Would Master Tekka kill Domxite by cutting apart their housing? "I'm not leaving!" Not this time. She lifted her blade, ready to jump in. Get Domxite back, stop Thalia.

"She has my friend."

 

[Thalia Senn]

Enemies: Zark San Tekka | Seto Du Couteau | June Pepperpetal | Elena Lowe
Allies: Joseph Torson

The Cost of Freedom
​

"Idiot girl," Tempest said between grit teeth. She pulled away from the clash of lightsabers and glanced warily at both of the Jedi. She could use this. She only wished she could be around to watch the realization that Iris was the reason Master Zark would be dead today. She didn't wait for the Master to reprimand the rebellious Jedi padawan. She shifted her focus to the weaker target. She was like a pride of Pamarthen Lions separating the weaker, younger whale from its pod.

Her lightsabers fell on the youth in a violent rush one after another. She kept her stance open enough to respond to an attack from the Jedi Master but her focus seemed to have shifted. Surprisingly, Iris' appearance had cleared some of the rage fog from her mind and she could think clearly again. She still did not have much to say to her battlefield stalker though. She was tired of this sick pup always chasing her and screaming about her stupid lightsaber. Maybe, if she was lucky, she could join the Jedi Master. He wouldn't leave her alone to fight alone against her would he?

 

[Darth Solipsis]

DARK LORD OF THE SITH | VOICE OF THE MAW
Ryv

​

The mighty beast collapsed with a roaring cry of anguish, viscera and remnants of the Great Eye scattered to the four winds. For a brief moment the very sun eclipsed with the darkened silhouette of the Summa Verminoth as it fell into the cityscape chasm below, decimating this structures that caught it’s free fall. As the dust settled, through smoke and fire the Dark Lord of the Sith approached. Black robes fluttering in the scorching winds.

Yellow orbs like bright beacons pierced the fragile veil as he peeled behind the curtain and into the light. His face was full of anger and malice, eyes fixated on the Sword of the Jedi as he approached without relent.

There was no words, no quip to be made. It was clear the Sith’ari had been caught off guard by the appearance of the Sword and his ease of bringing down the great beast. Size matters not, it seems. No matter, Jedi or not nothing would sto..

An explosion rippled the duracrete between them, a monumental crack as the building rooftop began to cave in. The Dark Lord furiously looked to his surroundings as his half of the building collapsed inward, falling away from his opponent who was now out of arms reach.

Cold eyes glared venomously as he fell, eyes like death itself.

They would meet again.. soon.

 

[Dagon Kaze]

THE DAY OF REVENGE
THE GREAT ERROR vol. III
Issue #4 w/ Jem Fossk & Corin Trenor

The gruesome crack of a bone broken, the sharp gasps for air through dry lips like the scratching of a quill, the thick blood staining the grey rooftop tiles—two bodies in a stagger for life and death formed the effigy of his total and complete failure as a Jedi.

The prospect of death had never been more enticing.

A selfish victory to liberate him from this self-made hell.

He'd only been this broken once before -- when he'd discovered the dark fate of his twin brother.

And now even that seemed to pale in comparison.

The stupor encapsulating both body and mind cracked as his eyes caught Corin's figure helplessly falling over the edge of the rooftop.

He held no control of himself and yet he dashed after the boy. An insensible, dead man, who through some trick, some unexplainable magic, was still able to run and leap into the abyss below. No glance found itself on Jem, nothing seemed to exist other than the leap.

The leap. That was all there is.

But for the first time in his life -- he wasn't certain behind its intent. Save a life or end his own.

A distant hand reached for the padawan's arm as the other, imbued with the Force, cruised through floors of steel and duracrete until their landing ground to a safe halt.
​

 

[Vaux Gred]

(Sorry)

 

[Vaux Gred]

(I’m and idiot. Sorry guys)

 

[Vaux Gred]

(I’m and idiot. Sorry guys)

 

[Seto Du Couteau]

Senator Seto Du Couteau
Location: Empress Teta, Cinnagar Palace
Objective 1: The Invasion of Empress Teta
Actions: Fight to the Last
Outfit (Ruined)
Armour (Destroyed)

​

​

Seto kept his calm even as he felt the speeder controls grow rather erratic, this wasn’t helped by his Force senses alerting him of dangers slamming against his speeder. Even though he could detect enemy fire, it was an entirely different ability to evade the attacks while piloting the speeder. It wasn’t until a relatively large explosion, that Seto barely managed to project a Force shield to soften the blow, did his speeder finally blared alarms that it could no longer sustain flight. ​

​

A few moments after impacting the ground below Seto coughed to get his bearings, his eyes blinked as his HUD indicated the armor’s systems were all online. He smiled wearily as he crawled out of the cockpit and tore open the door to let him outside of the speeder. Seto glanced around, sensing no imminent danger but as he gazed ahead he saw the main city square that sat in front of the palace. He turned around and saw a bit way the Princeps engaging with more Maw forces, and the sounds of combat of whatever remained between the Palace guards and Alliance military support. ​

​

They had not prepared themselves for a siege, but Seto doubted that any length of time would have prepared them for this kind of attack. Carefully he began to scan for Communication frequencies of any friendly Alliance forces but noticed a bit of interference that worried him. He switched over to the Maledictum’s Comm Frequency and sighed in relief that the connection seemed stable, ​

​

“-Maledictum, this is Du Couteau, I’ve managed to escape the Palace but have moved further from your location. . . I have nearby Alliance signatures that I'll meet and coordinate, there are still plenty of Civilians that need evac. . . I’ll find my way off planet with the Civies.” Seto spoke, his hands wrapped around each of his lightsabers. ​

​

He of course had not picked up any local Alliance military frequencies, but that was the problem because he felt through the Force the fear and desperation of the many innocent civilians of Cinnagar. There were little options for him to choose and Seto leapt forward to the nearest group of Civilians in need of rescue and a path to escape out of the city. ​

​

~~​

​

Seto breathed heavily as he threw his lightsaber directly into the next Maw Zealot, their mangled and chaotic screams only added to the sounds of battle. The Mawite collapsed into two halves as his lightsaber returned back to his left palm. Seto swiveled around, his right snapped outwards to kick back another Mawite wielding a sort of blunt weapon, and three more charged forward with their blasters firing at full auto. Seto’s lightsabers barely caught them all, but before he managed to deflect each bolt back to its owner, two laser bolts struck true and degraded his shoulder and upper chest armour. ​

​

His HUD flashed a warning before Seto quickly had it turned down the alarm’s visual once again. The Mawites' advance had stalled for a moment, but Seto knew it would only restart shortly, so he waved towards the group of huddled civilians and a pair of Noble Guards to head through where Seto had come from, knowing that the path was mostly clear. The Alliance’s retreat was resilient and formidable, but the Maw’s attacks were ceaseless and never ending. Seto couldn’t keep any path clear for long, and unfortunately needed to stay in a forward position to keep check the relentless advances of the Maw. ​

​

Distance roars and yells snapped back his attention, Seto breathed in deeply and readied himself for another assault. His armor already looked rather ragged from his forearms and shoulder armor plates, but it still was holding together and Seto intended to push himself until it broke on him. Hopefully when I’m further back and closer to the retreat. ​

​

~~​

​

Seto unleashed a Force shield to guard both his flanks, but couldn’t maintain it for long. He thrusted the Force to shove the pair of Mawites on either side of him to fall off the building and focused the rest of his attention on a rather heavily armored Maw enemy. It dashed forward with speed that it had no right possessing and slammed into Seto’s lightsabers with its own Vibrosword. The slam though possessed so much strength that it forced Seto’s armour’s suit to expend its dwindling power supply to increase his strength just to stay standing. ​

​

Gnashing his teeth, Seto broke off and sidestepped the Mawite’s next attack, for the moment Seto didn’t need to worry about his flanks so he pushed forward and focused on his next two attacks. His right hand swung upward, his lightsaber caught the Mawite’s own vibrosword but with another quick slide and with help from the Force his left hand struck into the Mawite’s side. His left lightsaber sunk in deep and with a flick of his wrist it cut through and away a large portion of the Mawite’s side. ​

​

Seto though had no chance to celebrate as he felt himself getting careened to the left as a large energy bolt slammed into his right arm. Whatever armour that remained had dissolved due to the blaster bolt but sadly that was the least concerning detail at the moment, the heavily armored Mawite in front of him was still very much alive and very very angry. He tried to swing his right hand up to block the Mawite’s attack but Seto strangely couldn’t feel his lightsaber on his right hand, and a moment later the burning sensation in his right arm had disappeared, instead he felt a stinging sensation closer to his right shoulder. ​

​

The Mawite grinned through its mask and before it could continue its next attack it’s grin turned to shock as it felt itself getting launched up and over the side of the building. Seto ducked as another energy bolt slammed into the ground where he had stood, his eyes locked on to a Mawite with what appeared to be a bowcaster of some design but before the Mawite could fire another shot Seto sent out his left lightsaber to cut into the Mawite’s head. Instead the saber smashed into the Mawite’s weapon and a considerably large explosion ended that threat permanently. ​

​

Seto screamed in pain as he collapsed on the ground, his helmet’s HUD flashed a warning that his armor’s integrity had fallen far below what was considered combat effective. Any further down and it threatened to not act functional anymore. With a few extra moments of painful gasps of breath and combined with a string of curses, Seto calmed himself and slowly focused his mind on the Force. It had been far too long since he had trained his Force Healing abilities, but he did remember enough to focus on subsiding the bleeding and keeping the pain from reaching to extreme to a more almost mild painful sensation. ​

​

He breathed in deeply several times, his left hand outstretched to catch the recalling the emerald lightsaber he had thrown but nothing came back to his open palm. Confused Seto tried again the familiar feeling of his lightsaber was nowhere to be felt, the same went with his ruby lightsaber and his right arm. Alone on the roof with several death Mawites and other assorted crazed Zealots, Seto’s confused gasps of air turned to an apathetic low laugh. ​

​

Slowly he stood back up again, his HUD continued to display several inactive Comm Frequencies, no doubt the retreat was already too long of a distance from his position. But thankfully he hadn’t felt any more trapped Civilians, or maybe it was unfortunately rather, who knew how many were dead because Seto couldn’t reach them in time. ​

​

~~~~~​

​

Seto slowly moved to a nearby collapsed support beam, his left hand steadied himself but ultimately he leaned against the metal beam and took a moment to breathe evenly. He looked around with his natural eyes, his helmet and the majority of his armor had been discarded several blocks ago. It had been far too damaged and the onboard battery was completely out of power. He only had his cape covering his stump of a right arm but for the initial moment it disguised the fact that he was fighting with only one arm. The moment of surprise was all he needed to deal a decisive blow to any enemy. ​

​

Or at least that was what he had hoped, Seto was already running on fumes and the last few engagements with the Maw enemy forces had nearly left bleeding on the floor dead. I’m nearly there myself as is. . . Seto strained for a few seconds before collapsing on the ground to give his legs a moment of rest and reprieve from the constant dashes and hard landings. He gathered himself for another moment before slowly standing back up, the sounds of howls and other animalistic growls prompted Seto to once again stand up into a fighting position. ​

​

Seto raised his badly chipped sword, no more could he expend the Force energy to imbue the weapon further. It was all he could do to barely dodge close attacks with the aid of the Force, and now he wondered how much longer before a lucky hit landed. Shaking away the bleak thoughts he raised his weapon up and readed himself once more. Just take one more enemy down, just one more. . . . The only thought he had left with every fight, one less Maw Enemy for the Alliance to fight against. With a grim determination Seto tightened his left hand around the hilt of his sword and narrowed his focus on the first approaching Maw zealot. ​

​

His cape billowed for the last time. ​

​