Private The Malevolent Command [ _Closed]

[Darth Caedes]

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<< For millennia, Korriban's Castle Varanaros stood between the continents of Xerthûl and Thalassar as a bastion of defense and a headquarters for war. Now, that same superstructure represented an embassy and gathering place for the planet's militarized undead and Sith warriors. As Korriban's cities were rebuilt and refilled, as visionaries and royal families flooded the conquered streets of recently disemboweled cities, as historians and architects raised community centers and urban districts around the world, Darth Caedes ordered that the garrisons and strategic military points world-wide receive none other than the highest priority in their simultaneous resurrection. Now, Castle Varanaros stands as the hosting grounds for thousands upon thousands of the Jen'ari zombie horde. >>​

— Darth Caedes, ruminations...
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• Outer Rim Territories | Esstran Sector​
• Korriban Surface | Sunset​
• Castle Varanaros​

The red glow of furnace-fires spilled into the streets and washed up against obsidian walls, filling the ring-like lanes of Castle Varanaros and transforming its many concentric baileys into smoldering rivers of shimmering heat. The industry of war had come to Korriban once more, lighting its forges to shape weapons and menacing armor from blackened metals and upon sorcery laden anvils.

Towers like tombstones rose up against the setting sun, silhouetted beneath its chilly rays and occupied by Caedes' darkly clad undead Dread Knights; powerful Sith necromancers in life, useful servants in death, directing the sea of zombies through the Force and according to the will of their Lord.

Penetrating the stronghold's defensive walls and connecting its interior with the outside world, a singular, massive thoroughfare led to Varanaros' uppermost bailey and central tower. Along this walkway, lining the wide promenade in richly adorned, white-wrapped linen bandages and golden, ceremonial jewelry, thousands of muscular and mummified undead stood statuesque in restless vigil, awash in the glow of Korriban's forges. Their risen corpses were covered entirely with ornate wrappings, artfully cloaking each figure in the style of old Sith-tomb burial shrouds. If not for their hideous presence in the Force, a palpable sensation they gave off of unending hunger and unyielding pain, they could have been beautiful. Crude long swords and hammer-beaten spears were gripped tightly by boney fingers and held aloft in salute along the entirety of the promenade's outer lengths; sharp tipped spears and blades angled inward, directed almost casually at he who approached. It was, after all, as much a display of military might and control for the Emperor as it was mental play for Darth Caedes— who rode through the minds of vast millions and watched as a silent and passive observer through their eyes. Already, that form of dominion had become instinctual to him, swimming through the ancient hordes of undead as their will, like a meditation, like thinking his own thoughts and moving his own limbs.

None of the living breathed here or for miles, none save for Darth Caedes himself and the highest echelons of his innermost circle. None, therefore, would know of the Emperor's visitation to this place.

Darth Caedes, Heir to Korriban, stood tall at the base of Castle Varanaros, flanked by the decorated undead, his black robes crackling like whips in the turbulent wind, awaiting the arrival of the Sith's Emperor. Already, the sky smelled of storms and thick clouds rolled in like battle cruisers across the distant horizon. Korriban's vast leylines swelled and whispered to Caedes of a coming power in the Force. He closed his eyes and relished the turbulence created in the Emperor's approach. Darth Caedes wore not but his own skin, revealing thickly scarred and grey, radiation-melted flesh, the corrosion of the dark side laying waste to an already ravaged physical vessel.​

Welcome, he sent into the Force and to the storms. Welcome, Lord Emperor.

Darth Empyrean

 

[Darth Empyrean]

Lightning flashed, deep and crimson, an iconic staple of Korriban's great desert storms. A wall of dust encroached on the horizon, amidst it static building so profoundly that shocks miles across were common place - while the distant echo of thunder, of a rolling tide, seemed ever constant. It was for this reason these storms were so often known as 'Rumblers', by locals who knew so little as to the reasons why this world took so much and gave so little.​

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The Emperor appeared in a coalescence of smoke, missing the ship he had become known for - the Mors Mons. Often it was only a moment away incase the Emperor required it - but in this moment he did not. His staff, his presence, the visage of the Corpse cursed upon his vessel - it was often all the Emperor required to keep the Sith in line, amidst a thousand assassinations a day, and a million more planned.​

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His steps sprang from authority, the click of his staff's pommel against he ground announced his arrival - an echo in the Force as a response to the 'Welcome'. The great castle awaited him, for the great Lord of the Galaxy had come to make its new master's acquaintance.​

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Darth Caedes​

 

[Darth Caedes]

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• Outer Rim Territories | Esstran Sector
• Korriban Surface | Sunset
• Castle Varanaros

As the Emperor approached, the dead bowed down. In waves by the hundreds, the Jen'ari legions took to one knee and pressed fists and crude weapons against chests. Only the Dread Lords remained standing in their vigil, black-void-gazes following Empyrean's approach, their sleek and blackened, ritually stained Saarai-kaar longswords buried in the bedrock and sand of Korriban's surface.

Bowing himself at the neck, Darth Caedes gestured towards the ascending stairs behind them, and beyond to the castle.

"My Lord," he surmised, and joined the Emperor in his climb to Varanaros.​

Displays of supplication were valuable only as currency to the insecure, and would hold little value here.

Lightning ripped through the sky and cast each Lord in the starkness of silhouette, then boomed as thunder made the world shake.

"Your presence is welcome on Korriban," Caedes said.​

"At last, our Order spans the galaxy with real strength." In many ways, the reclaimed world spoke for itself, shrieking of its return to darkness, to evolution, to power.​

Like arcing solar flares, tides of the Force reached out to caress this new Lord, Empyrean.

"Though it is but the first budding of a seed long at slumber, I believe what I have already will impress even the greatest among us."​

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As if old acquaintances, Darth Caedes strode alongside Empyrean with a sense of belonging, almost a casual relief. Scaling the Scarlet Stride stairs to Varanaros, many hundreds of stone steps infamous for their pivotal role in an ancient coup (c. 7800 BBY), Caedes spoke of his great work. Matter of factly, he detailed to the Emperor the cunning and intelligence of the Jen'ari hordes, recounting their greatest victories in the quelling of the Ashlan resistance, as well as the usefulness of their Jen'koshû shepherds.

Like this, they entered Varanaros and became engulfed in the annals of ancient Sith history. Ebon-stoned architecture from the ancient Korribani housed within it an intricate maze of spider-like winding staircases, overlooking balconies, and treacherous looking sharp edges. At times indistinguishable from the warped noise of the planet's storms, desperate screams and coarse-throated bellowing pleas echoed from far off places, as if emanating from the castle structure itself. Even still, the Jedi suffered for their hubris. Where once they had been lost, in search of service, Darth Caedes envisioned for them a greater purpose.

"The continents of Thalassar and Xerthûl have been successfully and thoroughly repopulated. Industry and society are soon to spawn from this long abused world, and great mysteries of the Force poise in readiness to be revealed. Though I digress, Lord Emperor, I did not beckon you here in order to boast of economic successes. Rather, what I have to show you dwells firmly in the realm of our more militant pursuits. Acquisition, Lord Emperor. One more tool for the taking of the rest of the galaxy."​

Pausing to pass by a room of rituals wherein priests silently attended to gagged and restrained prisoners of all ages, Caedes grew silent for a time. Force Sensitive each of them, the victims were enveloped within the castle's stone floors like so many bodies floating in water. Together in a lonely silence, they shook in fear and damnation as barbed and steepled crystals grew up through their abdomens and chests. Theirs would be a deathless dread, for dying here was but to be given a new beginning in service of that same fate.

"Tell me, Darth Empyrean," Caedes resumed once the room had passed.​

"Do the death-rattles of Ophidia's cult occupy our Order in its totality, or are we yet capable of looking beyond and to greater horizons, where upon our true enemies lay, belly up, in the light."​

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Darth Empyrean ​

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[Darth Empyrean]

Empyrean was wordless as they walked, simply striding forward. His head did not waver, did not turn, he seemed to not even notice what they passed by - but there was a sickening feeling he saw all of it and more. When finally Caedes asked the Emperor a question did he look towards him.​

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"Her cult already breaths its last - the core awaits us, as the Mandalorians strike first. Fitting, so that they may blood eachothers noses before our arrival. Why?"​

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Darth Caedes​

 

[Darth Caedes]

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• Outer Rim Territories | Esstran Sector
• Korriban Surface | Sunset
• Castle Varanaros

Caedes smiled, showing signs of sharp teeth.

Together ascending to Varanaros' uppermost heights, the pair emerged from a spiraling stairwell atop the structure's roof, all of a sudden buffeted by high altitude winds, the air smelling earthy and sickly sweet. Robes whip-cracking around him, Caedes pushed on, undaunted, until the toes of his boots slid to a halt at the tower's far edge. Now elevated by some 200 meters (approx. 656 feet), one could see for countless miles here, into the deepest horizons of Korriban's distant deserts.

"Why?" Darth Caedes replied, sounding excited, cooing.​

"Why-because the hunger of Korriban stands ready to devour entire worlds."​

Around them, for as far as the eye could see, stretching into near-total obscurity against the planet's gathering storm and distant horizons, the war machine of Korriban lay bare and exposed for the Emperor to see. Legions of the Jen'ari dead milled about like millions of ants, organized colloquial swarms directed by their Jen'koshû Lords, and each of them in possession of a bite capable of turning victims in a matter of seconds. Sprawling shipyards built experimental vessels of war which hung about in the dozens, silent in the sky. Each of them were massive enough, despite their relative distance, to appear almost planetary in nature, almost eerie to look upon, as if one were able to feel their gravitational pulls drawing them up off their feet. Mummified beasts and chimera-stitched monstrosities roamed in packs throughout the horde. Strange, misshapen Sithspawn born from alchemy and demons made from smoke and fire turned up to face the Emperor, Empyrean, and their maker, Darth Caedes. Beyond them even, in the plane of the Mist-Beyond, the Netherworld of the Force, swarming like moths to the light, were untold thousands of wraiths and specters who peered back through the veils and beheld the two Sith. Together, they moaned and swayed as if all constituent parts of some greater consciousness, witches holding hands as they danced 'round fires with long hair quivering as if alive, and servile ghouls which scurried about in snake-like, winding channels— once-children and small beasts, now clambering on all-fours between bodies and beneath marching feet of millions. ​

"I recall a time when the Sith ruled from the Galactic Core and it was the Jedi who clung to the Rims, divided by ideology and consumed from within. Soon... this hunger will be sated. I need only your decree that I continue now, on behalf of Korriban, according to my own design. Grant to me your faith, Lord Emperor, that I act on behalf of the betterment of our Order, as well as the power to move unchallenged in both will and command... and I will deliver to you the galaxy." ​

His fingers curled into fists at his side. ​

"... and the Jedi... as broken lights tossed like trophies at your feet." ​

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Darth Empyrean ​

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[Darth Empyrean]

The Emperor looked upon Korriban with metal eyes befitting a droid more than a man - yet they held no iris, no photoreceptive lens, only the carefully carved metal of his own design. They saw more than one could imagine, brokering on the undefinable - the eyes of a God, dead as he was. He looked upon each of the fiends Caedes had made, his expression flat and befitting someone apathetic. The Emperor was dead in flesh and expression.​

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"You offer much from the seat of a sole planet - and you offer it to me, and not your Lord Carnifex. Why is that, Darth Caedes ? Does deceit and ambition drive you to bite the hand that feeds?"​

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He turned to look at him then, perhaps for the first time in its totality.​

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"Should I expect your loyalty to bite my hand, as well?"​

 

[Darth Caedes]

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• Outer Rim Territories | Esstran Sector
• Korriban Surface | Sunset
• Castle Varanaros

Darth Caedes met the gaze of Empyrean, then gestured a casual, almost friendly dismissal with a flick of his fingers.

"There is no deceit, my Lord" he said, matter-of-factly.​

"I will not hide behind my relations with you, nor will I deny them to any Lord of the Kainite. I may observe and respect the quarrels of Darth Carnifex without embodying them nor becoming the man myself, may I not?"​

Darth Caedes paused a moment to study Empyrean, his expression shrewd and unreadable.

"Besides, I do not broker myself to you, now, as a mere servant. Rather, an investment; one from which you and Carnifex may draw reward from mutually."​

He turned back out to face the hordes, hands clasped at his flank, back straight.

"I'm sure it would not surprise my Lord to hear that Carnifex maintains contact with the other Lords of Kainite. Korriban," he gestured to the stormy horizon with open arms, "moves to deny this... division which tears so persistently at our Order. It was not taken by Kainite, but by the collected powers of Sith from every philosophical background. That diversity was strength, my Lord, one I wish to cultivate; surely not something to let break us."​

Caedes exhaled and looked back over his shoulder, taking in the visage of the Emperor.

"Must our support of one another come at the cost of Darth Carnifex? There may yet be enough cleverness shared between the two of us to find the right exceptions."​

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Darth Empyrean ​

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[Darth Empyrean]

Empyrean watched him speak, fanciful and boundless with his words and offers - of fertilizing the seeds of independent thought and freedom of expression. These traits were truly one of the more foundational elements of Sith philosophy - the freedom to take and decide what is best on one's own terms. The issue was, that the Philosophy of the Sith, to be an island in a storm, was the antithesis to a healthy Empire. Just as it had always been, their greatest strength, and their greatest weakness.​

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"Fostering dissent is not something to brag about, Lord of Korriban. Would every King's man think himself a king in turn, there would be nothing but an empire of paupers galivanting in circles about their right to rule the others. A tiring affair.", he concluded.​

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"'Diversity', as you so purposefully name it, is the reason every empire has fallen since time immemorial. Homogony is the key to power - you undead abominations, do each think for themselves? Do they have the authority to rebel should they decide your command is not to their liking? To do so would be diverse, it would be an accomplishment in itself for the dead to think independent of their creator.", he mused.​

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"And yet - it would mean you had an army that could turn on you at any point. An army bound to you by nothing but the fleeting nature of fear... respect... love. These things do not a leader make, nor are they eternal. Bandy your words as you may, but do not misunderstand me - nor should you play politics with your Emperor."​

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Like stars falling, his eyes landed on the man with a great and terrifying intensity;​

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"It is the skill to end a threat before it begins that makes an empire last. Preemptive action - tactical applications of force and influence. It is these things that create the temporary variables of opinion - but it is how one leverages their strength that matters in the end. That is all that ever matters. Learn this, and you may yet succeed - fail to do so, and you'll simply fall as every Sith who thought themselves a god, or who's people thought themselves one... Until they fell."​

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His presence relaxed as his corpse form seemed to twitch, silently cracking as it came back under his will.​

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"For the sake of the Empire, action must be taken to quell your Lord's influence in the vassal region. Your indepedence from him is a boon to me, for now - but it is in what sort that will matter in the long term. I reward loyalty greatly, Lord of Korriban, and I am not an enemy one should make. If you promise me an army, an army to ravage the Jedi, I will take it. And yet, I would ask more - You would serve me across the galaxy, a foothold for Eternal Strength in the Holy Worlds. Far from Jutrand."​

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Darth Caedes​

 

[Darth Caedes]

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• Outer Rim Territories | Esstran Sector
• Korriban Surface | Sunset
• Castle Varanaros

Caedes met the gaze of his Emperor and swallowed down its terror. He bared sharp teeth in a Clawdite's fiercely reptilian gesture of tentative submission, then lowered his gaze. His grin however lacerated his face like a scalpel's cut, grimly content beneath glittering eyes.

"Then we have an accord, my Emperor."​

Rising once more and turning back to the oceanic legions of undead, Caedes clasped hands together behind his back and drew near to the tower's edge, his robes buffeted by chilly updrafts.

"Let the Will of the dark side be done unto the Jedi's precious core worlds. I will direct a creeping normality like a sickness spread throughout the cracks and empty spaces of this galaxy. Gradually, I will lower this... 'Galactic Alliance' to their knees, directing their gaze to follow the hand we wave before them."​

Caedes glanced over his shoulder.

"I mean to move along the Daragon Trail, my Lord. Let their noble Alliance not breathe, not recover from the crisis over Elom and the displays of Darth Carnifex . Let them break upon our anvil here in the Holy Worlds, grow sick and tired and fatigued by war, all while our true blade draws nearer to the bleeding heart at their core."​

He turned to half-face his Emperor, shrewd gaze scrutinizing the Corpse from atop one shoulder.

Darth Empyrean ​

 

[Darth Empyrean]

"All that and more, Darth Caedes .", Empyrean said as he pulled a small datashard from his robes, offering it to him like a decrepit old man. The sufferings of his corpse made it all the worse, the discognition of knowing his strength but seeing his fraility.​

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"Within this is the location of a vault that holds the information you will use on the Jedi. Information on the undead, plagues, and how deep they can go. I'd have you release this into the Jedi, and watch the disease break their war effort before it even begins."​

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On the datashard was infact, a location not far from Korriban - a frozen planet known as Odacer-Faustin, and upon it marked a deep vault hidden beneath the snow and ice for millenia and millenia more. Distantly, the symbol of the Sepulchral glowed great and large in nearby lake, then faded into nothing. Most bio weapons such as these, even their information, had been quarantined in the Order - mostly by Taeli Raaf , and Caedes would know this.​

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The Emperor gave him a weapon, information, the opportunity to begin a war effort all his own; but in that same gift, there was a target to be painted on his back by the Order who followed their mutual laws, who had long accepted a limit to their weapons. The Gift was a choice, in the end, if he would fight for his advancement or his preservation.​

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Empyrean watched his choice be made, closely.​

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Darth Caedes​

 

[Darth Caedes]

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• Outer Rim Territories | Esstran Sector
• Korriban Surface | Sunset
• Castle Varanaros

Caedes palmed the data-shard without complication or retort, disappearing it into his voluminous and draping sleeves. Indeed, he knew already of Odacer-Faustin and its many, hidden vaults. For months, he'd carefully laid bread-crumbs for the Galactic Alliance to find and pick up, carefully exploiting their information networks in order to paint a picture which was to his liking. Grown fat and prideful, the Alliance was bloated with their own self-importance, a weakness which could easily be turned back upon them in order to spell ruination.

Caedes left his face unreadable, turning back out to the undead legions and blanketing his presence with a cold obscurity fit to baffle even the investigatory senses of an Emperor.

"We are of one mind," he said, returning his hands to one another's embrace along his back.​

"Already the pieces are in place. Already the gluttonous Jedi and their... self indulgent Galactic Alliance follow like hungry beasts down the path of my choosing. The trap is set."​

As if to punctuate his words, millions of the undead below beat fists against their chests in a synchronized movement, the effect sounding like a thunderclap as sound traversed desert sands and up the tower's length at differing intervals, washing against the King and Emperor like white-waves breaking against jagged rock.

"... Their doom is inescapable." ​

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Darth Empyrean ​

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