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[Mercy]

Quinn Varanin

Maybe if Mercy had understood the full implication, she would have reacted differently.

That the Phobis Core was Quinn. And that the one she was speaking to, was simply Quinn's other side, rather than a distinct entity that had latched itself onto her childhood friend. Instead Mercy assumed this was a similar thing to what had happened to herself. When an eldritch parasite had tried to use the tattoos made by Skeevi in an alleyway as a gateway to crawl out of the Otherworld and into this world.

Using Mercy's body as a channel.

She had managed to snap its spine in half and turn it into her own tool, but it had taken great force, sacrifice and some quick-thinking, turning two hive-minds against one another.

That and it was being dismissive to Mercy. Arris Windrun had been right all along, the true way to vanquish a Mercy who craved a fight, was to walk away.

Just like not-Quinn was doing right now.

"Anything else concerning you?"

"Just one thing." A beat. "Baby?" Sweet voice.

And as not-Quinn turned she'd just about see Mercy's golden fist speeding towards her face.

"My permission is always needed."

 

[Quinn Varanin]

//: Mercy //:

It seemed the conversation was over. Quinn decided it was and returned to the chaos at hand. Each life snuffed out became fuel for the Echani as she inhaled deeply, taking in the precious essence of their life. As she had stepped away from the Empress of the Core, the woman spoke. At first, Quinn thought nothing of it, almost wondering if she was going to press the matter further on the idea of possession.

She wasn't going to give Mercy any more of her time, but the moment her tone shifted and the word left her lips… everything changed. Quinn heard it, the soft, sweet tone that was never in public between them. A tenderness that she often longed for from the woman. Their history was an anchor that kept the young Queen from moving forward.

It's a trick.

Don't listen.

Stop!

Quinn ignored the voices urging her forward. Turning, the sense of danger echoed in her mind.

Stupid girl.

Mercy caught her flat-footed, but the Force roared to life around the Echani, who now looked at the Mountainous woman in the eye. The space around them slowed; Quinn stepped back as she focused everything on creating a stasis pocket that Mercy moved into. She knew she couldn't stop her; nothing could stop Mercy once she decided something.

The golden hand, the star-arm, all of it was the maddening power of Mercy. Quinn jumped back to create the space between them again; being in close proximity to Mercy would make things difficult.

As her feet touched the ground, dark constructs bloomed around the Echani. A technique taught by her mother, several dark spears formed, then lanced through the air towards the hopefully still-slowing Mercy.

Dark Sheer had become a power Quinn increasingly relied upon, empowered by the Core's darkness and the lives she had drained only moments earlier.

"I need no one's permission, Mercy," Quinn reiterated.

The storm above them answered. Black clouds folded over one another, swallowing what little light remained as veins of crimson tore across the heavens. Each flash lingered a heartbeat too long, revealing twisting walls of cloud before plunging Tira into darkness. Thunder no longer rolled — it cracked with enough force to shake the ground beneath their feet.

The Core drank deeply, feeding upon the woman's endless well of power, and the storm hungered with it.

"Not yours. Not my Mother's. No one's." Her voice carried beneath the roar of the tempest, calm enough to be heard all the same.

"I am a Sith... and I will prove it to all of you."

 

[Mercy]

Quinn Varanin

And Mercy got caught in the stasis field exactly the way Quinn had foreseen it.

She snarled there, nostrils flaring and teeth baring, but her movement had slowed. The issue was that Mercy could magnify her speed to an inhuman scale. What should have frozen her into place, only made her move slower, but she was still coming closer... much closer to Quinn than she might have expected it.

Even still, she was a sitting duck as she traversed that divide between them.

The dark spears launched at Mercy and while her attention was towards getting closer to Quinn, it wasn't on the projectiles. They ran through her, several of them, piercing through flesh, burying in deep into meat.

Making Mercy growl in pain, but by now her eyes were golden and she was immersed so deeply into the Dark Side, that her body simply drew from those blasted projectiles stuck inside of her. Even as they cut her, her flesh was regrowing, faster now. And with that additional energy lacing through her body?

Suddenly her speed multiplied even more - ushered on by Quinn's power, drained from the spears. She burst through the stasis field to slam her fist into Quinn's face.

"Don't talk as if you are her, filthy parasite. I will beat you out of her, even if I have to break every bone in her body."

That was the one thing that people could never do with Mercy. They couldn't blackmail her with her loved one's suffering.

She'd rather make them suffer than allow their freedom to be lost.

 

[Quinn Varanin]

//: Mercy //:

Mercy's fist crushed against her face; never before had Mercy ever hit her there. So many times before in their spars, Mercy purposefully avoided hitting her face. It was an unspoken agreement; her face was where she weighed her worth, her beauty and influence. To feel bone and cartilage crunching under the weight of the titan's fist was unreal.

Quinn was thrown back, the momentum forcing her into the rubble of the durasteel door. Pain surged through her body, her face no longer the only thing that felt broken. Yet, she didn't cry out as her hand covered her bloody face. The sound of her facial structure healing echoed in her ears; she grinned through the blood.

"Parasite?" her voice echoed through the laughter. The hand fell from her face, flicking off the ichor clinging to her fingers.

Mercy wasn't the only being here that could heal rapidly; Quinn's face had fully mended — only the blood that clung to her features being the only evidence that something had happened. The Force fed her; the passive draining of the lives that she consumed healed the damage the goliath Empress had inflicted.

"You don't understand." Quinn shook her head; screams of terror still serenaded the pair as she drew more of their life to heal the rest of the damage of the blow.

"I am no parasite; I am just as much her as she is me." A hand waved; this was a fight the core knew it would lose. If Mercy wanted to rip it out, she could… and she would.

"You remember the power on Coruscant, that helped fuel you, protected your mind from their traitorous kind? That was me, the rage and sorrow of what had happened… she gave me control to inflict everyone around her the same pain she was feeling." A devilish little grin plastered itself on the small Echani's face.

"I protect her, she protects me, she feeds me what I want, and I give her the power that is her birthright. I'm not a parasite, Mercy; I am the reason she exists."

The spear she carried slammed into the ground as the terror reached a crescendo. Thousands of voices cried out, and in a wave of the weapon, the tower was silenced. No more voices, no more gunshots, nothing but the heartbeat of the two Sith who stood left.

Quinn exhaled; she had fed on the damned souls of those who protected this building.

And now they were gone.

"I'm the side of her she is learning to accept. We are just two sides of the same coin. The girl you know, and cares for you. She's still here."

She mused over the thoughts, knowing how careful she had always been to keep this part hidden, tucked away so no one would know until she was ready.

Until she was capable of controlling it and protecting herself from those that wanted to use it.

"I think she's starting to enjoy it."

Pausing, the spear spun and disappeared into the small pin on her chest, and she exhaled.

The storm above them calmed, and Quinn stared back at Mercy.

"So you know the secret now. I have a phobis core inside of me. It's the same one… my mother… Spencer absorbed during the Dark Harvest conflict."

Quinn wiped the blood from her face, disgusted at the sight of it. Still, she didn't know how to completely feel, having Mercy now know the secret her parents and guardians had done their best to keep hidden.

"For me to be created, they needed an anchor, something so rooted in the dark side it could sustain life. So I am a phobis device, an ancient weapon of terror."

She walked towards Mercy, a hand running gently through her blonde hair as she groaned, already feeling the effects from the one punch that the woman had hit her with.

"I'm a Sith; I've accepted it. So now, I just need to get stronger, to control it." Quinn paused as she stood and looked up towards Mercy.

"What happened to not hitting the face…? That really hurt, you know…"

She pouted.