The End of the Road [OPEN]

[Kirie]

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Theme:

Spoiler

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLeC8HrAHeQ

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Wild Space. Unknown planet. 1700.

Her boots sunk slightly as each of her slow paces compressed the loose earth beneath her feet. The landscape was wide and flat, astonishingly empty. It was late evening, and the sun had slipped beneath the distant horizon only minutes before. A small wind played with her hair, tousling it with meagre unenthused gusts. It was a little chilly, and Kirie was thankful for the warmth of her jacket as she stepped out of her ship.

The plains extended without end in every direction, short green grass as far as the eye could see, unbroken and unchanging. Across the sky scudded long thin clouds; the grey-white wisps propelled by currents far above this featureless landscape. Solemnly Kirie panned her gaze across the land. Her own vessel stood stark against the backdrop, a single metallic structure in a sea of green. It was disquieting. For a moment, the young explorer felt more adrift here on this oppressively empty planet than she ever had in the depths of space.

This was the edge of Wild Space, one of the countless planets all but lost to Galactic civilisation. If this place had a name, it had long been forgotten. If anyone had ever lived here, their remains were buried under the empty plains. Lost.

To call this place lonely was to sell it short. It felt like stepping out of the Galaxy, or perhaps as if everyone had disappeared and she was the last person around, wandering alone in an empty universe. Truth be told, it felt like Kirie was the first person ever to breathe this planet’s air, the first to feel its soil.

Everywhere else she went, there always seemed to be whispers of presence. Be it from the Force or something else, she could always pick up a certain trail of people. It was a particular feeling, or sense, that filled her as she traversed the ruined cities and forgotten landscapes she’d frequented over the last years. This planet was different, filled with a true emptiness like nothing she’d ever felt. Was it like this on every frontier planet?

Breaking free from her reverie, Kirie found herself leaning against the cold metal hull of her ship, knees hiked up to her chest, staring into the distant rolling plains. She was not sure how long she had been lost in thought, but night had begun to fall, and her muscles were stiff as she rose to her feet.

The chill in the air had begun to creep into Kirie’s flesh, so she fumbled with the door controls to get back into her ship, where she stepped over to the galley to make some caf. As the machine began to hum and produce the richly scented brown drink, Kirie leaned against the wall, still rattled by the strange barren feeling of the planet.

 

[Marina DeVoe]

be de beep beep... Her droid announced, drawing marina to take a closer look at the monitor scanning the small vessel in the middle of pretty much nowhere...

"Let me enhance the band...there!
Hmm...It doesn't appear to have crash landed. It's rightly on it's landing struts."

be de beep... The droid pointed out to the light emitting from a few ports. It were difficult to really get a high resolution imagery of the craft from high orbit, but one thing was certain, it was powered up.

be de do.. Her droid cautioned her.

"I don't see the harm in sending out a transmission...what if they are stranded? It's difficult to gauge from our scanners to see how much fuel they have. They could be out..or not enough to get them back to the expansion region." Marina explained to her otherwise, 'If it's an Unknown, then Leave it Alone' astromech droid attitude TK-1213 had on these long solitude jumps.
yes, marina had named her droid after an Imperial stormtrooper. It had started out a joke, but once it took, it became the droid's call letters.

Marina opened up a common stellar band, one where most of the galaxy's fail safe comms would easily pick up and hailed the vessel on the dark surface. The system's star had already set, casting the planet's shadow on this side of the surface. Yes, it were night as one from the surface would call it. In orbit however, it were just the dark side.

Marina sent out her 'hello' message with an inquiry if whomever were down there required assistance or fuel.

The last repeat attempt to contact the vessel were sent 20 minutes ago and no response back.

be de be be de do... Her droid concluded that the vessel didn't wish to be disturbed and that they should continue on their way.

"Hmm... Maybe you're right. Just that-
Sigh...well, I just need to know. I won't feel right if we just leave and not know if whomever is down there could maybe be incapacitated...you know?" She asked her reluctant droid.

What else were TK to reply with than something along the lines that she tried and that they should be getting on their way again.

"Stop it.... Let me try something else. If someone there is incapacitated or has a problem with their comm, then I'll signal them with a light code. If anything they should be able to flicker the lights on/off in their ship."

With that, Marina dropped out of orbit and got closer down to the vessel, staying enough away to be able to punch her sub-light drives in case the occupants definitely didn't wish for company. She then flashed her high intensity beams in a kind of standard code... a 'hail' of sort to a possible distressed vessel.


[member="Kirie Ito"]

 

[Cedric Grayson]

They've breached the inner sanctum Master Sedaire. I'm not sure what more we can do!" Lucretia shouted over the station intercomms. Alarm klaxons blared throughout the entirety of the Black Library, heralding the arrival of the Sith Empire's finest warriors. How many good men and women had died trying to keep them from getting this far? How many Jedi? Darius shuddered at the thought.

The pain leeching from his arm was excruciating, but it gave him purpose. A lucky Sith warrior had managed to hack off his entire left arm, leaving naught but a bloody stump in place of a useful limb. He'd retreated to the inner sanctum of the library then, instructed Lucretia to attach one of the many cybernetic limbs in storage to the stump, and had risen for battle once again. He hadn't kept count of how many imperials he had slain in the library's defense, but he knew it wasn't enough.

Alone, Darius stood at the doors of the inner sanctum. He heard the sounds of violence just beyond, the death screams of people he had trained since childhood rang in his ears. He could not allow himself to falter, though despair had a strong hold over his heart.

"You can't fight any longer Darius, you can barely stand." The holographic image of Lucretia coalesced in front of him. The AI had guarded the Black Library for centuries, and she knew well how this was going to end. "Take the waygate. I can't promise you just where you'll end up, but anywhere is better than here."

"I can't," he spat, "We can't just give up the library. Not after everyone's died trying to protect it." The knight's voice was thick with emotion. "I'm holding the line."

"You wish to die here?"

"I'd rather die protecting this place then live knowing I abandoned it Lucretia."

Another resounding boom shook the entirety of the station. They would be through the doors soon.

"I can't let you make that choice Darius," Lucretia's voice sounded grave. Before Darius could protest, a small sea of glowing blue light coalesced around him. He was passingly aware that the waygate had been activated, accepted the fact that Lucretia had gone against his wishes, and felt his consciousness slip away as his body was ripped through the very empyrean itself.

-----​

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A hacking cough drew Darius from his slumber. Green eyes fluttered open to reveal a blurry landscape. The smell of dust and ash filled his nostrils, and aching pain rang out across his entire body. He lay alone at the foot of a great mountain, drenched in his own blood and misery. A curse fell from his lips, and with it came several globs of vitae and mucus. He felt nothing but pain.

What had happened?

Darius ran a metal hand over his blood-matted hair and furrowed his brow as he fought to remember. The Sith Empire had finally found the Black Library, and the library's defenders had sprung into action. He recalled the excessive violence that had desecrated those sacred halls, and found himself wondering as to how he was still alive. A moment or so later and the realization that Lucretia had activated the waygate and sent him travelling across the stars dawned on him.

"Where...the hell...am I?" The exile groaned as he struggled up to his feet. His limbs were heavy; gashes in his arms and legs wept blood. He knew well that he would perish of blood loss soon if he couldn't find a way to staunch the flow. For a moment, he considered letting go and letting nature take its course.

He had nothing now: for the second time in his life, the Sith had taken everything from him.

That thought stirred him. He clung to it, felt the fires of hatred burning in his struggling heart. That hate filled his limbs, allowing him to begin slowly shuffling off into the wastes beyond. He called upon it to slow the flow of his blood, though it was all he could do to keep himself from simply dying right there on that mountain.

Mumbling curses as he went, Darius began to shamble toward the only sign of life he could glimpse in the distance: a ship that that had settled what seemed to be a mile or so away. Determined, the exile forced himself toward the vessel - anything else would be to accept death.

[member="Marina DeVoe"], [member="Kirie Ito"]

 

[Kirie]

A winking green light on her instrument panel caught Kirie's eye as she turned away from the galley, a cup of steaming caf warming each of her palms. Frowning, she approached the cockpit, weaving her through the small yet spacious compartment. A message at any time was odd, as Kirie didn't exactly keep in close contact with anyone these days. This, however, was extra strange, as she was on her way back from a job, and nobody had any good reason to be calling her. Kirie narrowed her eyes at the light on the dash. So what was it? A wayward traveller looking for company? Perhaps pirates?

Sinking slowly into the supple leather of the pilot's seat, Kirie deftly tapped a few keys on her instrument panel. Within moments, a holographic display appeared across her vision, rapidly scrolling in a neat Aurabesh script.

Kirie nodded to herself as she read. It was a courtesy transmission. She got them fairly often when she was landed in isolated or less-trafficked areas. She should have figured that was what it was, she'd sent out similar concerned messages herself many times. Being stranded alone in deep space was not a fate any spacer wanted, so generally, people lead by example and looked out for vessels that looked like they were in hot water.

Her face bathed in the blue holographic light, Kirie couldn't help but smile slightly at the random contact. Try as she might ignore the feeling, it was intensely lonely out here. Most days were okay, but sometimes it'd occur to her how long she'd gone without human contact, without even a conversation. Sometimes it was nice just to know that someone is out there thinking of you, even if it was just a passing stranger.

Tapping deftly at the holographic keyboard, Kirie was halfway through thanking the unidentified vessel for its concern and assuring them she was fine when she felt a twinge in her gut. The emptiness was still there, ever-present on this planet of plains and wind, but there was something else there, some sort of presence. Her senses were not quite exact, the Jedi from the MPTC had never had the time to fine-tune her skills, but there was definitely something, growing more obvious.

Kirie rose from her chair, her message sitting unfinished on the screen in front of her. Her blaster pistol was sitting in its holster at the back of the ship, but it felt somehow wrong to retrieve it. Instead, she grabbed her cane from its place on the wall, hefting the weighty object by its middle, and stepping out of her ship.

In the dim light of nightfall, she could see only the endless expanse of plains, but she could feeling someone coming closer.

[member="Darius Sedaire"] | [member="Marina DeVoe"]​

 

[Marina DeVoe]

She were approaching the vessel in a standard arc trajectory while announcing her presence and intentions.
It were what non threatening vessels did when approaching other ships; not come at them direct, but show their side..their markings..type of vessel.
The Mariner IV was of an Old Republic design, a Loronar, a scout ship stripped of armaments and refitted as a civilian transport . But it had been retrofitted with many upgrades including an efficient hyperdrive among many other features, including a fully equipped sick-bay.

Marina were both transmitting the same electronic hail and were about to commence flashing her ship's lights lights, when her droid chirped in.
TK had picked up a slight power surge on the vessel.
"Someone is coming out of the ship?"

be de beep...he confirmed, enhancing the vessel's image on the monitor.

Sure enough the ship's ramp had been dropped, revealing the ship's interior lighting on the grass below it. Someone was indeed coming out of the vessel.

"Ok...well that's a good sign..." Marina replied, keeping her approach speed slow and steady.
Yes, it were always a good sign when one would come out of their vessel to meet an approaching craft.

de de beep de... Tk reminded her that it still had not replied to their hail.

"Right.... so maybe their comm is definitely out."
Marina then commenced flashing her lights in a standard civil code, indicating she were landing nearby.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~​

What was marina doing out here in this far reach of the galaxy?
She had once been part of the Explorer Corp of the FWC, before the sith had taken to destroy that union. But the call of the stars, to explore her galaxy had always been Marina's vocation. Something had drawn her attention and dreams to the stars.

Although the Explorer Corp were no longer in existence, she nevertheless continued on her own. It were the reason she wound up out here in the wild of space. And it weren't a simple matter of just blindly jumping and there you are at the near edge of the galaxy. No.
It had taken several calculated jumps, each consecutively following the last for her ship to derive in this unexplored sector...or at least not classified. So many star systems had been found lost following the Imperial Galactic Wars and then the Gulac. Seemed portions of the galaxy had even reverted backwards...loosing even some portion of the then state of the art technology.

Now once more, the galaxy were revived, expanding again in all directions. And the sith were an even greater part of it. So the exploration of new systems away from the pandemonium of sith expansion, were what drove many factions to the unexplored regions. Marina were no longer exploring for a faction, but somehow following that same old call to something out there wanting to be found.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~​

The Mariner IV put down about a hundred meters from the vessel.

do be de beep... Her droid drew her attention to the occupant who seemed to be walking at a 90 degree course angle from both their vessels.

Chirp..beep...whistle...be de beep de... It were human female and she were heading out into the field under the starlight.

"I....I'm not sure." Marina skedaddled on over to her droid and the monitor. Why was the girl walking....away?

"She's not running away...just heading elsewhere.." But why?

"TK, broad scan the direction she is going." This was certainly odd behavior, she thought. Was there something the girl was going out there to retrieve, as she certainly wasn't running away from them.
All she could do at the moment was to watch and see.




[member="Kirie Ito"] ~ [member="Darius Sedaire"]

 

[Cedric Grayson]

He vaguely registered the second vessel drifting through the afternoon gloom. His vision had grown hazy and unfocused, but the piercing flood lights of the second ship managed to stir him somewhat from his personal thoughts. They were growing more scattered by the second, and he had little doubt that soon enough he would lose all semblance of control entirely. His legs were already struggling to hold up his weight, and the continuing loss of blood certainly wasn't helping his cause.

Was this truly the way things were supposed to end? Did the galaxy's destiny follow the path of darkness now? Such musings filled Darius's struggling heart with despair, even as such eldritch powers kept his organs from shutting down. He, of course, did not register such things. The exile moved entirely on instinct; his desire to survive was paramount above any other feelings.

Shaking fingers brushed the hilt of his lightsaber as he drew closer to the settled vessel. He could make out a lone figure stepping out into the grasses, though he could not discern any details as to what the being might be. Given his current luck, he wouldn't be all too surprised if one of the emperor's inquisitors had come to finish the job. He doubted the Sith had any means of tracking where one was sent through the waygates, but underestimating them was what had gotten Darius in this situation in the first place.

There is no emotion. There is peace.

The old mantra brought the exile a semblance of calm. It did not matter whom this person might be; if they were unfriendly then he would simply perish and that would be that, and if they were, then perhaps his story wouldn't end here. The Force would decide that much.

"Hello?" His voice was choked with pain and blood. The exile shambled closer - close enough that his bloodied figure was illuminated by the second ship's flood lights, casting him in an eerie white glow.

Darius drew to a halt, his legs shaking beneath him as they struggled to keep him aloft. He peered out from his battle-scarred mask at what he now knew to be a woman standing near the landed ship. "Help?" Was all he could manage. His grip over the empyrean was slipping, and with it so too did his higher mental faculties. It was all the exile could do just to stand there, trying not to die where he stood.

[member="Marina DeVoe"], [member="Kirie Ito"]

 

[Mauda]

If there was anything that attracted Orex across the Galaxy like Knowledge, it was Nothing. Orex's core was a turbulent void, intensified by the portion of Nihilus that resided within him. It was, paradoxically, a chaotic and angry pit of Nothing. And it was this that attracted him to the corners of the Galaxy that were devoid of life. Often he allowed himself to drift aimlessly in the darkness of space, meditating, thinking. But sometimes he found himself in places like these.

He had landed The Myrkur in the endless grass expanse hours before. But he had not left it. He remained inside, sat at the helm staring out of the bridge, consumed in thought. He had come here to meditate and so far he had not even gotten up from his seat since he left Mandalore. He was heading to Skism in the Outer Rim but had elected to take a detour and.. address himself further. Before beginning training of his Apprentice. Slowly however, reality was seeping into his mind, his thoughts becoming increasingly transparent as he subconsciously pulled himself from Contemplation.

With a breath, he slowly stood and pulled himself around the pilot's seat, heading out of the bridge. The boots of his armoured cloak traveled along the pristine metallic floors with one resounding thud after the other, only stopping when the boarding ramp whirred open and allowed him to descend onto the endless grass below.

Orex walked straight ahead until he could no longer see the Black Corvette he arrived in. He slowed himself to a stop, lowered, and sat down. He pulled his Lightsaber from his hip and held it above his knees and ahead of his chest with the Force.

Inhale.

Exhale.

Meditation gripped him and he began immediately to fall into himself. Before now, he was contained, but in meditation, he allowed every morsel of his energy to flow. It gushed off him in waves, sweeping over the green like a child let loose. But the green didn't last long. It began to fade and shrivel. Soon, his environment decayed. Like the fading light of the hidden sun, the Grass took on its own darkness. Bathed in the shadow of the evening world, they were now bathed in the physical shadow of Orex, becoming as black as the creeping night sky.

His Lightsaber began to separate. Slowly it fell away and exposed all that it was comprised of, and in the centre floated Decimated Core. Spinning, Orex spoke to it, and it spoke back. In a sense. They conversed, and Orex explored what came crawling up from his own depths.

[member="Darius Sedaire"]
[member="Marina DeVoe"]
[member="Kirie Ito"]

 

[Kirie]

In the dim of nightfall, Kirie stepped out to meet the approacing spectre. She was a dozen steps from her ship when a figure melted out of the gloom, a staggering shape that took on the form of a man as it lurched towards Kirie. Her hands gripped her cane, hefting it so that she held it like a makeshift staff. The lone explorer opened her mouth to speak, to call for the shambling man to halt, but before a scratchy syllable could leave her lips, a blinding white light swept over the pair, illuminating them both in harsh artificial beams.

She spun around, squinting past the floodlight at the ship that was descending towards them, then turned back to the figure in front of her. In the floodlight it was immediately apparent it was a man, and he was greviously wounded. Blood soaked through his clothes and in places dripped onto the green grass, the droplets suddenly cast into a dazzling crimson by the light from above. He walked as if his legs could hold him for only seconds longer, and a peculiar acrid scent surrounded him, as if he'd been electrified, or covered in dense smoke.

The shock of the sight and the sudden sensory overload forced her to step back, but Kirie steeled herself and approached the figure.

A single muttered syllable left the man's mouth, almost too fast for Kirie to translate. Habitually, she repeated it with a flash of her hands, a way of solidifying its meaning in her mind. Help? A question, or a request? Perhaps it didn't matter. Her hair flapping in the wind kicked up by the descending vessel, the baffled explorer made the final few paces to the man's side. Grimly, she met his wild eyes, pressing the cold metal of her cane into his palm. Gingerly, breaking one of her own unspoken and unackowledged rules, she gestured back to her ship, still thrumming away a few metres away, and then motioned for the man to put his arm around her shoulder, so that she might help him get aboard.

Again, she felt something shifting in her gut. This was a new sensation, different to what she now understood to be the aura of the wounded man. This was a roiling, boiling dread she'd never felt before. At the same time, the crystal hanging around her neck grew warm, and a faint blue glow radiated from its interior. Kirie frowned, looking down, but dismissed it. One thing at a time.

Finally, she looked up to the ship, still almost blinded by the harsh spotlight, and waved it down. Perhaps they had a medical bay or a surgical droid, or even better, someone who might explain what the kark was going on here.

[member="Marina DeVoe"] | [member="Darius Sedaire"] | [member="Orex Mauda"]​

 

[Marina DeVoe]

"Oh my...is that another person out there? " She gasped when the sensors picked up the other person in front of the girl.
Her ship's headlights were now spotlighting the woman and it were obvious despite the shadow she were casting that the person in front of her was in some manner distressed.
it were difficult to ascertain not only as to why he were staggering but if there were any immediate danger surrounding the two.

be de beep beep... TK informed her that there were no other life forms of any substantial size and mass that could pose a threat. Sure, there were some scurrying creatures fleeing the commotion her ship was causing, along with the Mariner IV's lights blaring down in the fields this time of evening.
So no, what injuries this other person had sustained were not from the immediate area.

It made some sense now to Marina as to why perhaps the girl that had come out of her ship had not answered her hail. Marina were now assuming that the injured man was with the girl. This would give reason as there had been no time to answer, only to act.

"Power us down....reduce the lights...diffuse them so that they're not blinded. I'll see if I can offer them some help."

Naturally the droid protested and were about to beep and chirp as to why, before Marina cut him off.

"Enough.
You remain here...understood?" She instructed her droid.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~​

She came down her ship's ramp and headed on over to where the two figures were struggling to get back to their ship...so it seemed to her.

"Brrr....." A cold shiver seemed to then crawl up from the grass itself, upon setting foot off the ramp, making it up her sides and back.
Marina stooped for a moment to look back up into her ship. TK were standing there on the top landing beeping for her to come on back up.
"Chill... I'll be right back..."

Be de de do beep...

"Yes, yes... I'll call you if anything's up. Now shut the door....don't want any bugs coming in.."

One... two... then several steps toward the struggling figures, that coldness she had felt before weren't pressing over her as much...yet, it was still there in the warm evening air.
It were like a sliver, a shard of ice caught in the warm evening breeze that seemed to want to grab a hold of her.
Fear?
Yea, she often struggled with fear, fear of the unknown, fear of pain, fear of death... Hell, fear in general. But fear were nothing more than primal instincts that she could push aside most often when she needed to step up. And helping others was one of those times fear were put aside.

"Hey...hello..." Marina tried to announce her presence without startling the two folk.
And startled they weren't one bit. In fact, it seemed that the girl hadn't even heard her. The man on the other hand; well, he had other problems to deal with.

"Say...Hello there!..." She upped her tone to get the girl's attention before she'd ask to if she needed assistance.... "Gasp!..." it were soon after, when the man's figure came out of the woman's shadow that Marina's ship were casting on his person that she caught the full extent of his injuries.

"Oh my God... what hap-..." But before she could finish the man seemed to falter, putting all of his weight on the girl.
Marina rushed over to lend her support, taking hold of his seemingly wet... no, it were a bloody shoulder.
At first she weren't sure as to how to take hold of the poor man without incurring him more pain or worsen his injuries. But she nevertheless did her best and took up a good amount of his weight off the girl to somewhat even it out between them.

" I'm sorry.... I just didn't know how bad your man was injured..." Her lips relayed the words her vocals were sounding out.




[member="Kirie Ito"] ~ [member="Orex Mauda"] ~ [member="Darius Sedaire"]

 

[Cedric Grayson]

It was an odd thing, the kindness of strangers. Darius had made a gamble, and it seemed that the Force had plans for him other than death - he'd won. The exile breathed an audible sigh of relief as the dark haired woman kept him from slumping to the ground. It was only when someone else was helping to carry his weight that he noticed just low little strength he had. The battle at the Black Library had pushed him well beyond his limits.

"Thank you," he managed, his voice a quiet rasp. He felt a pang of guilt for throwing himself onto a total stranger like this, but then when faced with the alternative guilt was a small consequence by comparison. He fought to find his words, but his coherence had begun to fade. He found himself in something of a dreamlike state; the lines between reality and his own mind blurred in such a way that he could not discern what was real and what was not.

Through blurred eyes he watched another woman step down off the second ship. He gazed at her emptily, and struggled to make himself speak. "Sith," was all he managed to say. Should he survive, then he could explain the situation in full. As things were, he wasn't entirely certain if he would be eating dinner tonight, let alone processing and trying to explain the complex tragedy that had befallen his home.

His heavy head wilted this way and that, and the faces of the women morphed into those that were not their own. Darius watched as the dark haired woman's features congealed into that of a dead woman's. Her sharp features were replaced with the angry scowl of [member="Mediha"], and Darius felt his heart sink.

"You brought this on yourself, you know. I offered you a place in the clan, but you had to go off and be a Jedi. I don't think you'll be able to come back to me now, Darius. Always one for broken promises, weren't you?" Something in the back of the exile's subconscious told him that [member="Mediha"] had died on Dathomir years ago, and that she had released him from his agreements years ago. Unfortunately that something was drowned out by the anxiety of a panicked, dying mind struggling to come to terms with its ensuing demise.

"You made evil choices," Darius sputtered to his hallucinations. It seemed he was entirely unaware of the two women holding him aloft now. "Couldn't stay."

The blond woman's visage distorted similarly, only the face staring back at Darius was that of a man who was very much alive. The look of disappointment that the hallucinatory specter of Julius Sedaire affixed him with shattered whatever thin thread of sanity had been keeping Darius's fragile mind together.

The face of his master and adopted father said nothing. The accusatory gaze spoke enough on its own.

Darius stared off into the hills wide eyed as he found a second of sobriety amidst the terrors wrought upon him by his own mind. "I'm seeing dead people. I can't think - help me please. Blood, bacta, something, " He paused, the taste of copper going numb on his tongue. There was a presence nearby, one like those that had done this to him.

"Something cold is coming. It will kill us."

[member="Marina DeVoe"], [member="Kirie Ito"], [member="Orex Mauda"]

 

[Mauda]

Chaos. Raw chaos. Like a dream with no images, only noise. Not shouting, not screaming. Just Noise. Rumbling, intense and relentless. This was where Orex found himself, when within himself. He had navigated to the core of his being, and here there was a Black Hole. A nothing that reverberated with such wrath, it was a chaotic void. His limbs had long since fallen away.His nerves as good as sand. He felt nothing, only heard. And yet behind all this there was that Chatter. The murmuring he heard when something of the Force communicated with him. Often artefacts across the Galaxy, but sometimes these murmurings stemmed from a being. He ignored this chatter, regarding it as nothing more than background disturbance. Whatever entity it was, it could wait.

Still noise, void chaos. He sat in complete silence. And yet it lingered. Those voices were getting louder, clawing their way up through his senses. Orex's face began to contort. His concentration was fading and the chaos was slipping away. He ignored it further, tried to repress these sensory mumbles.

Fading. The chaos was going. During this time, Decimated Core had been spinning violently, often emitting a glow. But now it was slowing, and Orex felt it. He felt himself slipping from concentration while his meditation was replaced by these voices.

..

A sudden wind blew from Orex, grass shaking in response. He slowly opened his eyes to see Decimated Core motionless. The voices of his senses had taken hold of him. Wrenched from his meditation, Orex sat with hands clenched and his back stiff straight.

Anger was an understatement.

His slowly pieced his Saber back together, watching intently as the Crystal pair clicked into place. He first arranged all the essentials so that he could watch as the inside powered up. With a brief click, the core of his Saber powered on and the crystal glowed a faint Black/Red. He felt the draining of his Katak focusing crystal gush over him, amplified by Decimated Core. Pleased, he put the rest of the chassis together. A moment of gaze, then he snatched it from the air and raised himself to his feet.

Those voices weren't coming from across the Galaxy, and they didn't belong to an object. Somebody was here, and the murmurings suggested someone of the Light. Orex gripped his Hilt with anger and strength. Perhaps the only thing worth pulling himself from meditation for, was for a Jedi. He only hoped his assumptions were true and this was not just another figure of light. Immediately, his dark boots pounded across the dead and dying grass in the direction he felt it.

[member="Darius Sedaire"]
[member="Marina DeVoe"]
[member="Kirie Ito"]

 

[Kirie]

Blood, Bacta, Something. I'm seeing dead people.

The Sith. Something's coming.

A dying man emerges from the gloom as another hapless traveller is drawn into the scene. All the while as they run about, dazed and confused, something indescribable is coming closer. What was she to do?

Kirie pushed the neatly stacked packages aside, white containers tumbling from the overhead compartments and spilling their contents onto the floor. Cutlery, condiments and pill bottles fell to the ground as she rummaged through the locker, finally producing a hefty first-aid kit. Well stocked, but not nearly enough to account for the injuries of the wounded man.

Stone-faced, and somehow having managed to not yet utter a single word, she tossed the pack to the blonde intruder standing the doorway of her ship. Introductions and explanations would have to wait. Time was draining away with the blood. Kirie strode past, hoping the blonde woman would get the picture and follow. The wounded man was lying in her cot, having been dumped there by the pair a mere thirty seconds prior. Kirie's own clothes were soaked with his blood, and so was the cot.

Kneeling beside him, she briefly examined the damaged armour, but its design was foreign to her. Her gaze travelled to the saber on his hip, and her eyes narrowed. Jedi meant trouble, no matter where you were, and the bloodied saber leant legitimacy to his delirious ramblings about the Sith.

Where his wounds were concerned, she didn't know where to begin, so she offered the man a tense smile that she meant to be reassuring, and stepped aside to let the blonde do what she could. Spinning on her heel, she strode back up the length of the ship, past the galley to the engine access panel, which she popped open with a kick and bent to retrieve her blaster pistol, which wasn't even loaded, and her Bondar saber.

Moment by moment, the tumultuous presense approached, growing closer and closer to the little island of light in the flat grassy plains and the dark blanked of night.

[member="Marina DeVoe"] | [member="Darius Sedaire"] | [member="Orex Mauda"]​

 

[Marina DeVoe]

Despite not having the full weight of the man, it were nevertheless a struggle to get him to their ship. marina had no idea the man were a stranger to the woman as they both were to her.
Fate had put them all at this crossroad...only for now there were three merging paths. The forth would come soon enough, like the night had come over this world.

Marina did her best to help the girl get her man up to their ship. The Mariner IV was parked at twice the distance so it were without say to reach the closest shelter the other ship.

Marina stepped back a moment as it appeared the woman was scurrying to attend to his wounds. She thought she would be more an interference, than an asset if she got in the way of things. besides, it seemed the woman were ignoring to acknowledge her or her genuine intention to be of help. As thus, Marina avoided eye contact with the injured man whom were possibly her husband or lover maybe. how were she to know that they were all strangers to one another? So she had stepped back and gave the woman some room. But that were for the first few minutes, before she eyed out the interior of their ship. It weren't set up to handle such trauma, but her's were.

It was then that she were tossed what appeared to be a standard vessel med kit. Marina didn't notice that the woman had also armed herself. Hell, the girl had come back with quite a few items... the med kit was what had caught marina's attention.
'A med kit?!... is she serious?...' her thoughts got her eyes to look over to the poor man.

"This...this is just for superficial wounds..." She stated. Again her words were ignored.
Oh hell no, the poor soul was beyond first aid. He needed to be attended in a med bay....her own ship's med bay.

She stepped up next to the woman, as she opened up one of the few kaolin packets that miraculously were in the kit. But there were only a minute amount and the man were still seemingly bleeding from places she could not yet pinpoint. he were literally drenched in blood as she and the woman were too.
How Marina always seemed to get over her squeamishness over such horrid wounds defied even her own reasoning. But she always seemed to step up and put both fear and uncertainties aside.
Yes!...she could see where the worst of the bleeding were coming from and she reached for a good sized clean gauze to wipe as much surface blood away from the open wound to get the content of the coagulants right where they needed to be.

"He...he needs to be in a proper medical bay..." Marina were trying to relay what she thought best, but again the girl was just ignoring her, going about tending to his other wounds.

"I mean...look, I'm not trying to meddle. I.... gulp..." Oh good God of mercy, there was so much blood still oozing from the man.
"I mean, my ship has a fully functional medical bay. " She spoke as she tore open another of the small packets of kaolin-like powder. "You should really think about getting him to my ship when we stabilize the blood loss...you know?" She were talking as she applied the coagulants, but the woman were not making eye contact with her.
"You should really think about getting him there...really."
Marina put the last open packet of the powder on another large wound opening. But that was the last of what had been too little to begin with.
"There's not enough of anything in this kit...we're out of-..."

She were starting to loose her patience, as the woman was obviously ignoring what she were saying. The man... the woman's man, were dying right in front of them and she weren't even listening?

"HEY!!" Marina shouted, then struck the woman on her shoulder to get her attention. It weren't like Marina to ever do that to anyone, but the man was slipping away fast.

"Your man's dying!...My ship is where he belongs in...what's wrong with you!?" had she not heard one word she had been saying?



[member="Kirie Ito"] ~ [member="Orex Mauda"] ~ [member="Darius Sedaire"]

 

[Cedric Grayson]

Lucidity was a rare commodity for Darius.

His mind was adrift on a sea of agony. The hallucinations had grown far more vivid and disturbing in their make, no doubt a remnant of the Sith poison that had been slowly creeping through his veins since the conclusion of the battle. Its heart stopping effects had been walled away via his own control of the Force, and whatever had remained was expunged via traditional medicine. Even still, it seemed the severity of his injuries had compounded the deadly substance's effects on his body.

To discern reality from his mind's fiction was like trying to grab a piece of driftwood at sea in the midst of a hurricane. He fought with every ounce of his being to dispel the hallucinations, to stand and meet the threat that he felt so clearly on the edge of his senses, but his body would not listen to him. The trauma it had endured was simply too much to bear. He could only half-listen as the two women bustled around him. It was clear they were trying to help him, and for that much he was thankful, but something primal within him knew that his being there only brought danger to them, too.

Once again he demanded that his legs lift out from under him. Once again, his limbs denied him entirely. A string of slurred curses spilled from his lips as he reached out to the one thing he knew he still had a semblance of control over.

He reached out, out, out, deep into the depths of the empyrean. He drank deeply of its waters, and allowed its natural peace to flow throughout his body. He envisioned himself as the conduit, and the empyrean's energies as a cleansing bolt that would burn the corruption from his body. The meditation stilled his struggling heart, and allowed some of the pain to leave his limbs. With it went the shadows of his hallucinations, and for a moment, Darius saw with clear eyes. All he felt was pain and guilt.

Struggling to lift himself, the exile ripped off his mask, and stared up at the two women with wild, green, bloodshot eyes. "Leave me here, you both need to go." His voice cracked over every word. "One of them is here, a Sith I think, and I can't hold it off as I am."

A moment of uncomfortable silence passed.

"A single Jedi should be a good enough prize - I think this is going to be where I call it quits one way or the other: no reason you two should too." The words felt like they were being spoken by someone else. It was clear the damage to his system had left him dazed and in a state of shock - indeed if it were not for the Force's influence, he likely would have died half way through the walk here.

[member="Marina DeVoe"], [member="Kirie Ito"], [member="Orex Mauda"]

 

[Mauda]

Footfalls upon the dying grass came to a halt. Orex stopped overlooking the fragment of light. A small ship within which he felt a commotion of energy. Confusion, fear, pain. And what trumped it all was that overriding Light. The energy of a Man dedicated to Peace. Was he a Jedi? Likely. But Orex would soon find out.

The thuds of his boots slowly approached the ship. The ramp still extended and but doorway closed. Orex brought himself to the foot of the ramp and hitched his Lightsaber. A shout came from inside, accompanied by the rapid scuttling of frantic inhabitants. Orex could not discern what exactly they were occupied with, but it didn’t sound pleasant.

He slowly ascended the metal ramp, boots echoing in the crisp night. They came to a slow halt outside the door, and, after a brief pause, Orex’s fabric-gloved hand pounded twice against the door. He stopped with only his vocoded breath to offer sound.

[member="Marina DeVoe"]
[member="Kirie Ito"]
[member="Darius Sedaire"]

(Phone Post)

 

[Kirie]

Her mind was whirling. Her heart not quite beating in her throat, but fluttering with anxiety nonetheless. She peered outside, into the inscrutable dark. Night had truly fallen now, and the waning moon's pale silver glow did little to alleviate the void of black. Sighing, Kirie took a deep breath, it smelled like sweat and blood in here, and the ship felt cramped with three bodies inside.

She considered stepping over to the cockpit and prepping the ship for take-off, but she knew there was no point. There were no medical services this far out. Nobody to help them. Something more than chance had brought everyone to this location, but she couldn't count on the same force finding assistance for this wounded man. Deep down, she understood that he was probably going to die. That his ramblings of approaching Sith were just the mutterings of a man on the brink. The dread-filled feeling in her gut was just the anxiety, the feeling of helplessness, of being unable to do anything for a man about to slip from the mortal coil. The approaching darkness was her imagination, her senses playing tricks, right?

Lost in thought, she did what she could for the superficial cuts and burns on his legs, leaving the worst of the injuries to the blonde woman next to her. Kirie kept her head down, jaw locked. She knew it was hopeless. Even with the two of them working, the blood loss was extreme. She doubted they'd save the man with a simple first aid kit.

A heavy smack to her shoulder pulled Kirie from her reverie, and she spun around to see the blonde woman yelling at her.

Your man is dying... My ship.

What is wrong with you?

A good question. Kirie rapidly signed to the woman to signal that she was deaf, and followed it up with words just in case, the syllables tumbling from her lips in their usual controlled, raspy, and hushed tones.

'You have facilities aboard your ship? Then let's take him there.'

Wasting no time, and unaware of both the pleas of the man to seek safety, and the two resounding thuds against the door of the ship, Kirie strode over to her side of the door and began to pull on the lever, intending to open it fully and allow the pair of them to carry the injured man to the blonde's own craft.

[member="Marina DeVoe"] | [member="Darius Sedaire"] | [member="Orex Mauda"]​

​

 

[Mauda]

His hand returned to his side and a moment later, he was bathed in light. The bright interior of the ship he had approached escaped into the pitch black outside. In those seconds, Orex laid eye on a still woman nearest the door, a blonde covered in blood and rushing around the interior, and a man who looked on the brink of death. His attention fell on the dead man. Lying down, coated in blood and heavily injured, an armoured figure radiating Pain and.. Light. This was who he was here for.

Orex glanced the woman who had opened the door and stepped through, slowly, with his arms by his sides.

[member="Kirie Ito"]
[member="Darius Sedaire"]
[member="Marina DeVoe"]

 

[Marina DeVoe]

It were obvious she had not expected the woman to be deaf, as Marina's jaw dropped, eyes drawn to the woman's orbs. Her peripheral were quite acute than most, recognizing the woman's particular form of sign language.

"I..." Her own words now struggled to reply. But reply she did in both words and motioning to her heart... It were, "I'm sorry...I didn't realize." Naturally her eyes confirmed her sincerity.

"Ahem...
I've a medical bay... surrogate blood stocks too..." Yes, she did have the means and facility on her ship to give this man a good fighting chance.
Marina nodded, pointing to the starboard wall as to where her ship lay just outside.
" It's all equipped to handle trauma.... and bacta...there's plenty of bacta stocked aid in recovery." she quickly stammered on, signing the universal sign for bacta...or close to it. There were literally thousands of variation of basic sign languages based on culture species...etc...throughout the galaxy. Anyone whom had dealt with either the deaf or non-verbal speaking intelligent life forms could easily decipher what one meant, given some time. But right now there were little time, and a man dying right before them ..and...and she best stop talking and do some walking.
The woman didn't hesitate and agreed. To marina's ship then. A slight sigh of relief, shone on marina's features. Then there was a chance for this woman's man. They could save him.
Marina quickly got on the comm giving her droid a heads up to prep the medical bay and ready the surrogate blood. Her ship kept synthetic stock, ready to be finalized to a being's particular type. It weren't like one's own, but it definitely was an emergency solution to re-establish pressure and get needed oxygen to vitals for one thing.

Shrugging off her nervous reaction to want to keep talking in times of stress, as it was her way of getting through it and not falter, weaken, or become skirmish like most would expect her to. Marina was by far not a tough looking girl, but one seemingly pampered.
She motioned for the woman to see about both of them getting him back up and each taking a side to bear his weight, before the woman took to turn. Marina had not heard the percussion from outside the ship's door and had little clue as to why the woman was heading there other than to prepare their exit so that they could bring the man out of the ship unhindered.

Wrong.
By the time she turned to look over after leaning down to the man and hefting his good arm over her shoulder to raise him, the ship's door parted open .
There against the dark background of the field outside, stood a figure lit by the very lights from within the ship.
And this man...this other man had hunger in his eyes. Not for either women, but for the man Marina had her arm around trying to get him back up.

The woman standing there with her back to her, whom were facing the man outside, didn't hear her...nor did the man looking in could hear the silent words leaving Marina's lips, for she were only able to mouth the words...'Oh frak me'




[member="Orex Mauda"] ~ [member="Kirie Ito"] ~ [member="Darius Sedaire"]

 

[Cedric Grayson]

For a few moments, all Darius could decipher was gratitude. He knew well that he was at death's door, but truthfully he was happy not to die alone. Even the company of strangers was preferable to no one at all, and through his hazy vision he could tell the two women were doing their best to preserve him. He made peace with the encroaching darkness, accepting that the presence he had felt was not another entity, but his own mind's fear of death.

All the fire left him. He clung to life by a thread, and that was only by instinct. He had not lived a long life, but it had been one of great pain. Everything he had ever worked to build was crushed to bloody ribbons by the Sith war machine. His father was lost to the stars, his love slain by the blade of an arrogant lord, his library tarnished and the knowledge within burned in the name of conquest. He could not recall a time when he had truly known peace, and that, he decided, was a sad state of being for a Jedi to be in.

It would be easier just to let go. He had done his duty, paid his dues in buckets of his own blood. Now it was time to rest; time to let all the worries that had coalesced into a crushing weight fall from his shoulders. Darius Sedaire's duty was done.

He drew in a long, final, aching breath. Savored it, let it become his very essence, and then -

A single dark figure stood in the grass below. Darius's bloodshot eyes sprang open, and lucidity fell upon him like a frozen sheet of ocean water. It felt as if his very soul had been yanked back into his corpse of a body, and all the pain came rushing back to the fore of his mind. All the calm and peace that he had known was replaced with agony, despair, and darkness.

The exile's chest began to rise and fall violently as he stared transfixed at the figure. Memories of Sith marauders flashed through his mind: of crimson blades skewering the children he had been tasked with protecting, of black gloved hands choking the life from his teacher, of a small, pale woman crying out as a friend slid his dagger across her throat in his moment of triumph.

Whatever peace Darius might have known was replaced with a fury that came from the very core of his being. It radiated through his form with a naturalness that would have frightened him had he been able to focus on anything other than this creature.

A blood soaked hand reached out toward the stranger, his fingers clenched as if to choke the stranger despite the distance. There was murder in his delirious eyes - an overwhelming desire to protect these strangers that had sought to save him refused the merciful death that he deserved.

By unnatural means, Darius managed to find his feet. He stood shakily, though he still relied on the two women for support. It was only the barest fraction of his Jedi instincts that kept him from reaching out with the force to try and snap this man's neck. Even now, in his near-death state, Darius could not bring himself to end the life of a stranger without due cause, even if that stranger reeked of the same stench his eternal enemies did.

[member="Marina DeVoe"], [member="Orex Mauda"], [member="Kirie Ito"]

 

[Mauda]

What was left of a man finally took notice of Orex, and he felt it. Stood in the doorway, Orex had had his hand in the Man's mind, gauging what exactly he was confronting. He was certainly a Jedi. One fresh from something terrible. But that could have been discerned from the outside. On the inside however, peace was beginning to blanket the tremendous pain he felt. He had lost. Horrific Defeat was what brought him here to Death's doorstep, and Orex was here to open the door.

Peace was replaced by hatred and panic. This was their introduction, not an awfully pleasant one. Orex felt the pressure around his throat and watched intently as the Jedi slid from his table and stood, barely. He was fighting to stay alive, but now he fighting just to stand in front of Orex. His eye passed up and down the Jedi's figure, but never made eye contact. Orex was aware of his draining aura, but if he allowed the Mask's Gaze to do its work, the Man would die almost immediately.

Orex slowly approached the Jedi, stopping short before him. He continued to stare just past his eyes, allowing a moment to pass before he spoke. The Jedi was drenched in blood, quivering, and had evidently lost a limb. Something he had remedied hastily.

*Click*

"We both know this is an unfair fight. Yes, I came here to kill you. I will not hide my motives. But I am not looking upon a threat. I question whether I am even looking upon a Jedi."

Orex's Mask vocoded his voice to pass a Baritone, artificial monologue. To kill this man would be like putting a blade to a limbless, paralysed Gungan. It was a fruitless effort.

*Click*

"The Sith, wasn't it?"

[member="Darius Sedaire"]
[member="Marina DeVoe"]
[member="Kirie Ito"]