The Maze of Darth Phyre

[Syd Celsius]

Maranon followed Willa Isard through the maze, careful to watch for threats, she could feel the malice of the SithSpawn pursuing them.

Maranon, in the past, would not have worried about a SithSpawn like Phyre. Syd in all her incarnations had been powerful, but even Phyre was nothing to a Darth Maranon at full power. Even the magic that altered her into the abomination she was to this day had been stolen from Maranon...


Many thousands of years ago on Katanos 007.

The spirit watched as its beloved knealt in a shrine to the Queen, dead for many centuries now, a single statue depicting the Zeltron's magnificence.

She had been such a treat to the Spirit when she had first explored. She had peaked into her mind by the fiery red headed Atrisian had such magical potential it interfered with attempts to get a proper read of her intent.

But even Maranon, though wary that she was merely another thief had not been able to help but latch onto their similarities. Like Maranon, she was an exile for tapping into the forbidden sciences, unlike her Cidd had the courage to not wait until she was an old woman to try understanding magic potential.

She was intelligent, driven, filled with self loathing. Filled with guilt. She was a deadly two bladed user. She looked like late nineties Tia Carrere. Maranon had not stood a fething chance. She literally couldn't help but be seduced by the woman that would eventually mutate into the Master of Starlin Rand . Though she would not meet him for many thousands of years.

The underground tomb city of Maranon, its ancient walls laden with carvings and thick jewels, glittered in the darkness, the abominations patrolling the halls had kept their distance, especially during all the months Cidd had spent sweet talking an ultimately lonely and crazed spirit, betrayed by Penelope. Where had the green eyed girl went after killing Maranon?

Cidd knealt in front of the red tome, taking in its wisdom through the Force. She had been a firestarter, a minor pyrokinetic with weak, short lived flames. The book was about to set her permanently in John Wick Mode.

She was dressed in a gold and red metallic catsuit, her fiery orange hair curling and long.

"Soon, you will take the knowledge of the Flame Blasphemy into your body. The change is irreversible...not just to your body...but to your very soul..." Darth Maranon had whispered to Syd's mind from her grave which the statue Cidd knealt in front of covered.

"I am ready, my love..." Cidd whispered.

Maranon mentally acknowledged this. Cidd had seduced the spirit utterly, believing only the magic of Maranon could help her save Atrisia from a cruel tyrant. She could taste Cidd's righteous hatred of the Atrisian Emperor for his sadism towards the populace. She desired to topple him from power. Oh yes, they would topple him alright.

Then they would rule together. Over all of Atrisia. It would be Maranon's comeback special. No commercial breaks.

"Are you truly sure? To sacrifice your human nature...it is not a small thing."

"I will be human enough in spirit. The Emperor lacks even that that, though his flesh will be more mortal than mine." Cidd replied, fiery determination in brillant orange eyes that took the spirits ectoplasm away.

Cidd held out her hand to the book, palm opem, using the Force, her strength being reinforced by Maranon, to draw the knowledge from the book into the totality of her very being.

Cidd began to scream as the knowledge flooded her body. Her flesh rippled painfully on her body like silly putty. The agony this caused was beyond what words can describe, but the process was automatic now. Unstoppable as Cidd writhed on the candle lit stone chamber, flesh bubbling and rippling causing tremendous screams and high pitched wails of agony from Cidd, to the delight of Darth Maranon who couldn't help but feed on the pain for sustainance. The wails of agony gradually took on an unnatural, metallic tinge to them. The flesh ceased moving and reset on her skeleton. Cidd staggered up, flesh on her face rippling for the first of many a disgusting time. The pages covering the secrets of flame magic in the book had disintegrated.

Cidd stared in wonder. She had been strong in magic potential--that was likely the only thing that had allowed her to survive the procedure. She felt a hundredfold stronger now. Strong enough to really challenge the Emperor.

(Cutaway of Wolverine getting the Adamantium injected into himself in the giant water tank.)

(Cutaway of Steve Rogers getting injected with the Super Soldier Serum)

(Cutaway of Aldrich Killian fighting Iron Man)

Cidd tested her power by willing herself to hover in mid-air. She marveled at this...she seemed able to fly without effort.

(Cutaway of Zod floating for the first time in Man of Steel)

Cidd then concentrated summoning two massive orbs of flame in her hands.They burned, bright and orange and controlled. Her eyes glittered as the possibilities opened up. The Spirit could see it.

"The experiment was a success, my love..." the spirit of Maranon whispered. "Now, to begin the procedures to ressurrect me.

To sum it up in two words, stripped of fancy exposition: INSTANT. BETRAYAL.

Cidd dropped her mental shields, no longer hiding the contempt she felt for Maranon being a fallen Jedi. The faked love emotion that had fooled Maranon sliding off Cidd's mind like oil.

"I have only one love, Sith..."

Maranon's spirit screamed in rage and disbelief at Cidd's treachery as she began breathing red hot flames from her mouth and blasting the chamber around her repeatedly...

Maranon snapped out of the recollection, pausing at a chamber in the maze containing a number of deadly, tension based wire traps. Any disturbance would trigger poison dart turrets.

"Okay..." one of the Jedi grumbled. "Who the feth builds something like this in a tomb where you're supposed to just put a corpse? I mean, this had better be a 'monster' loot drop at the end of this. I'll be insulted if I get 'only' a thousand XP..." he muttered, betraying latent mental instability in his partial awareness of the posting forum based nature of the universe he existed in.

Maranon stepped forward, concentrating, the first two times were complete epic failures due to her depression, and got nearly sixteen darts to the face for it, all fired from turrets covering the entrances
but on the third, she succeeded in fighting the right tripwire to tug with telekinesis. All the wires went slack, the turrets themselves falling apart.

Maranon pulled all the horribly poisonous darts in her face out, body slowly processing the poison, due to her body's magical nature being disrupted by the Jedi. She felt a strong flare of guilt as she felt Phyre get ever closer.

"Run..." she whispered, heading deeper into the maze past disabled traps...

 

[Willa Isard]

Syd Celsius Maranon

Willa was listening to the woman and the jedi as they were talking and she stood there for a moment. Checking out what she could see and pulled out her adder pistols... the two of them were sleek and strong but she was looking over at a small pair of them and then she saw the darts and moved as she fired the pistols at the traps and the explosive shells functioned to smash and keep some fo them safe before sliding into a crouched position once they were along he other side and her golden eyes narrowed... a sneer coming to her face for a moment before she was moving. and the pistols become a rifle... one of her second sniper rifles before she looked through it and was scanning.

She could sense phyre though and looked down the scope of the rifle as she could take a shot and she had everything ready in case she needed to fire upon her... but didn't want to. She could run even though she didn't like it and waited for the others to get away from her while she was taking up the read and her energy flared as she brought fire to her feet and hands sending her forward more like jets on a starship with greater speeds. This zeltron who had come to help them was dangerous she knew but she had faced Grey... that woman was more dangerous in some ways and Willa had managed to survive her... more then that well Grey and her were complicated to say the least.

She was moving and she allowed the force to reach out while she stopped there and focused on one of the walls letting the flames come out of her hand until the stone started to melt and slag... cherry red to white before drpping away and making a hole for them to get through quickly. She needed to work on it... she needed to be able to fight against it as they were going towards the really dangerous parts of the maze and what could be at the center when she was prepared. "We need to keep going and being on alert." She looked at the jedi and switched her rifle to her back and grabed her smgs which gleamed with black metal prepared for combat.

 

[Maranon]

Darth Phyre stalked Willa Isard and the Jedi through the maze, feeling the more focused presence of Willa, though she had not forgotten the incredibly potent Force Adept that had saved Willa and the others.

She knew she must suffer defeat at their hands ultimately, and be forcibly turned back into that disgusting Syd, relying on her other copy to forcibly turn Syd back to the Dark Side, but there was no reason she couldn't eat a little.

Phyre's flesh shuddered at the mere anticipation of consuming Life Force as she got closer...

And came face to face with Maranon.

The pink zeltron glowered at a smirking Phyre.

"You...you writhe with power... Darkness...yet you are full of doubt and weakness. Strange...have we met before?" Phyre asked.

"You could say that..." Maranon said, forcing herself to focus.

"You are filled with doubt. I can guide you back to the true path...it would be a shame to--"

Phyre was blasted backward by a massive telekinetic wave that deformed her body grotesquely, slamming her backward and cracking into a wall.

Maranon ripped the walls off the Maze with her mind casually, and Phyre was suddenly frantically throwing fireballs to destroy the debris hurled at her at top speed but Maranon closed the distance.

Her Dragon Martial Arts came out, shooting towards her throat and face, but Maranon countered, her blows by turning them aside in a seemingly gentle manner, before savagely delivering focused strikes to her Torso and face that sent the deformed beast bleeding white blood reeling. She tried to burn her, tried to summon flames, but her Flame Magic enhanced nature ultimately derived from Maranon's knowledge, though Phyre didn't realize this, so she was baffled when Maranon whispered protective spells under her breath and Phyre felt her own flames being doused spiritually.

"This is my fault Cidd. I placed you in this torment..." Maranon explained grimly. "The torment of eternal rebirth...let me undo your suffering..."

Maranon proceeded to beat Phyre harder than an Elrond who had spotted free John Wick at a Train Station. It was crazy how Phyre got wailed on, dozens of blows slamming into disgustingly bubbling flesh.

Maranon had to end this quickly, buy enough time for Willa to get closer to the center because her doubt in herself, guilt over what she had done was growing, and once again, her focus was failing...Phyre was actually starting to block and counter the blows, sensing weakness.

"Such magnificent strength in The Force!" The beast hissed. "But what are you talking about? Who is Cidd?"

"It was a long time ago, in what feels like a Galaxy far, far away..." Maranon answered as she attacked Phyre viciously again...

 

[Willa Isard]

Maranon Syd Celsius

Willa was watching the fight and she remained there as the jedi who were with her she focused on them for a momment. "Get out of here noow." She said it and they were heading off as the attack from the darksider was there but Willa didn't let up. Her mind resolved and focused as she thought about what needed to be done and there was always a good way to handle things as she lined up looking down the sights of her smg's and held them for a moment. She fired the bolters from the top of the smg's and let the two explosive shots go loose with a lowerr yield. The bolters were from the proterctorate and had a kinetic discharge for force users... if they were touched it detonated them and it made it more dangerous usually but she could use them to distract while the main shots she fired were to distract and keep Syd on the defensive.

"Syd, I might not be the best one at this jedi thing or redemption but I know how to get a soldier out of an episode... maybe no the best way but I am going to smack that head of yours until you come around to understanding who you are now." She shrugged and allowed the force to guide her as she released pressure and flame to the shots to make them ignite and become like blasts of flame with the rate of fire and she could control the smaller superheated slugs to mess with her. She was mostly trying to get to the one who was throwing chunks of stone and wall at her to get them all out because.... despite the chance to eliminate a darksider it wouldn't be honorable or good natured to let her drop the mountain down upon her. "Us getting out means you too." She said it and movoed quickly using the grapple line.

"The others are getting out and you are going to bring this place down around us." She moved to try and grab and pull Maranon with them, going for it as she holstered one of the smg's and narrowed her eyes towards Syd whom she would have to calm down as well but better her who could residt the flames when she moved to get her and Maranon back activating her comlink. "La Rasa get the RAC into position and ready for extraction we are going to be getting out of here hot." The AI spoke as the stealth ship was preparing to come down and aid her before she was turning back to look at Syd and fired off several more shots lighting them on fire and bending the shots around to make a wall of flame to obscure them.

 

[Maranon]

Darth Phyre snarled as she was distracted, blasted back by Willa Isard and her bolters, pulling Maranon back.

"No! You have to let me finish! I'm the only one who can snap her out of this state. The darkness of the temple has caused a reversion! If we don't undo it now we may never get another shot? You wanna save her soul, Pyromancer? Then help me!" Maranon exclaimed as Phyre snarled, starting to recover.

Maranon drew in her Force Knowledge, vast and terrible, and tried to remember certain secrets of slowing down someone, holding them in stasis. She focused it outward but it was so difficult, due to her doubts about her path, and all she had suffered.

Phyre had grown immensely powerful, and it was a genuine struggle, even for a Sith as skilled and experienced as Maranon, to contain the Witch. She strained, trying to summon that old, Ancient will, derived from too many hours in Jedi and Sith Archives to keep the terrible power of Phyre still. The Darth struggled, but Maranon's will was that ancient. Phyre could not even summon her flames.

"Her other armor, the red and gold suit, give it to me!" Maranon said. "And keep hitting her with everything you have!"

Maranon began to chant pieces of her most Ancient and terrible knowledge. The one magic she knew even Phyre didn't have an immediate response to.

The Kolda-Bratha Calculus. The ancient, Time affecting magic that had made both Maranon and Syd what they were today.

Darth Phyre shrieked as the Rewinding magic hit her,bbut she was far from beaten, her fiery will struggling to burn through Maranon's mental barriers. It took all of Maranon's power to keep her still, hoping Willa wasn't going to take the opportunity to drop them both, because that would suck. Badly.

 

[Willa Isard]

Maranon Syd Celsius

Tempting... she thought about it but that was the vahla thinking... the dangerous side that preferred both a straight fight and to make sure it was face to face when she moved with her guns to the side and would have to handle both of them. The jericho armor though was a symbol to her about what she needed to stand for and she kept the shots going to stun both of them...... they all needed to be abel to get out of here but if the sith could save Syd then so be it she would get the chance she needed while Willa let her and then she would drag both of them out of here and to the Arilani base it was secured enough no one would be able to bother during the debrief.

She moved now. "THen hurry up or I will make sure things happen and drag you both out of here." With the look that was on her face though was one of hard determination. She was styaying at the ready while the others were getting out and into the RAC which landed... the stealth ship using its equipment to carve a path with a cannon carefully pinpointed thanks to advanced AI tracking. her armor was giving off more data before she ground her teeth together and fired the grapple lines from her wrists to get both of them and start dragging them both back towards her to stun and handle the problem her way.

 

[Maranon]

Phyre screamed as Maranon focused her full strength, chanting.

"What...is...this...?" Phyre said. "You...know of the Kolda-Bratha Calculus also!?"

"Know of it? I was the first Jedi whoever dared to use it..." Maranon said, focusing the magic, spreading it throughout out Phyre's body. Maranon pitied her, realized how pervasive her curse was throughout Cidd's very spirit.

She couldn't end it, now that she stared deep into the wretched creature's soul. It had been there too long, had seeped into every molecule of her very being. But she could undo what this tomb had done.

It was the only way she could apologize to her.

Ever since Maple had rejected her utterly, Maranon had often been in a state of doubt and drunkenness. Drunkenness that never lasted long enough due to her ability to heal. This state of depression would come and go, but she was not rid of it, and didn't care if it was unbecoming of a Sith. Unlike James Cameron, Maranon does what Maranon does for Maranon. The Bogan's will can hang itself. Maranon refused to answer to any but herself in the end.

That's what made her so depressed.

Phyre screamed, the flesh peeling off her skeleton and onto the red and gold suit Willa Isard had given her.

"I can't undo your curse. You will just revive as someone else...but I can stop you from being this wretched creature..." The Zeltron Sith said.

Phyre's flesh and muscle ripped off the skeleton, becoming living flame as it made contact with the Suit, flowing into it. Phyre was soon nothing but an aged, decrepit white skeleton wearing a white and gold catsuit. What The Man in White had needed a magic hourglass for, Maranon had done through sheer will and knowledge of magical ritual. She had to Destroy Phyre. Even if it had been the old days she would never have teamed up with Phyre, for she was that incredibly vile.

The living flame became Syd Celsius. Except this time, her emotions were not magically dulled due to the horror of the revelation she had experienced here. She didn't remember anything she had done to Willa or others, only the horrific certainty she had been Phyre before she had been Celsius.

She floated in her red and gold catsuit, staring at the Skeleton of her previous self, it's skull mocking her.

Maranon sighed, and momentarily forgot about Willa.

"Welcome back C-gahhh!!!" Maranon screeched in surprise as the grapple lines hit her and a stunned Syd who didn't even try to fight it as both were dragged away. Maranon tried to, but a sudden flare of doubt over her choices sabotaged her telekinesis attempts to get free and she started swearing violently at the inconvenience of it...

 

[Willa Isard]

Maranon

Willa was a little surprised but it didn't show on her face as she was moving with them, the moment was good and dragging them back towards the ship was an important aspect of getting out of the tomb. SHe pulled with the force enhancing her body and muscles as she couldn't feel the pressure or strain with her bones.. they weren't there as outside the RAC had touched down and the path inside it was cleared. Her eyes flaring with a molten fire once inside and while she didn't like the idea of a darksider on the ship she wasn't going to be too picky about it right now releasing the grapple lines and sealing the bay.

"Rasa.... get us out of here.. I want to be away from the area within the next five minutes and prepared to break orbit." She said it while removing her helmet and some of her equipment but not all of it. She wasn't going to step into the armory station that was installed in the corner for removing the heavier armor just yet as the jedi who were in the ship mostly avoided them. She had a few from redemption squad there who were overseeing the area and securing the ship. "Now if we are all calm and rational we can talk or I can shoot you all with sedatives and we can continue this conversation.... questions... comments?"

 

[Maranon]

Maranon rolled her eyes aboard the vessel as Willa Isard addressed them both. Syd seemed to be in silent shock, so much so that her psychic shell had completely destabilized, causing a half melted appearance at the knowledge she was Darth Phyre, or had once been Darth Phyre. She was in a Force Cage

"Questions? I'm sure you have plenty, Darling..." Maranon replied haughtily, letting her Dark Side enhanced Zeltron Pheremones flood the air, along with her highly persuasive Force Abilities.

"Don't be shy." Maranon cooed seductively, summoning her old confidence back as she reached out to not just the Vahla's mind, but the minds of everyone around her. It took great focus, for they were all Jedi mostly.

"I'll answer a few of your questions..." She offered, leaning forward. Willa was gorgeous. She might make for an excellent distraction later provided Maranon passed all her speech checks (She wouldn't...).

"If you'll indulge me by answering some of mine..." Maranon called out to Willa's mind, trying to make her vulnerable to mental suggestion, and then use her as a focal point to brainwash the crew into letting her go and forgetting tonight's events. For if it was discovered Syd would be ruined. Maranon didn't wish for that.

She couldn't undo Syd's curse. But the least she could do was preserve her second chance...

 

[Willa Isard]

Maranon

Willa looked at the woman as she was walking and stepped into a circle on the floor of the bay... the machines coming to life as she was suspended in the air and the armor released with mechanical arms allowing the plates that were designed to be weightless and protective to drop to the floor into an anti gravity field that another droid collected. The armor quickly being assembled as she wa sin the undersuit of her armor and then out of that allowing the sweat on her body to feel the chill of the air and revealing that she only had hair on her head and eyebrows. She had less in terms of scars though even though she fought plenty... tattoo's along her ribs with names of battlefields... her shoulder showing squads and names she had been in.

"Oh you have questions?" She said it and looked at her standing there and she didn't give a lot of indication one way or the other as her mind was trained... the ember of valh had brainwashed many of her people to serve with the one sith... she had needed to resist and using the lightside of the force had been a strange thing but giving in meant the ember could overtake them all. Willa though walked and stretched out her muscles as she didn't have bones and her weapons were being set up on a rack as her sniper and saber were secured. She looked at Syd though and motioned for them to try and help her bringing some food and drinks. "Syd... you need to focus, whatever happened was devastating but you need to focus on yourself and try to cope."

 

[Maranon]

"Yessssss..." Maranon said seductively, increasing her focus. "Many questions..."

That old hunger to get another to submit to her wiles stirred in the resurrected Zeltron...it was always present, the thrill of seducing another, getting them to crave her touch...

Maranon had thirsted for that ever since she had first emerged from the ancient pool in place of Kerimi Avalon. How she had yearned to finally taste and touch and feel all of life's many pleasures, after having been denied them as a Jedi for so long.

How many had she seduced? She had lost count, but her Charisma was surely at a natural 20. If only she had thought to invest those points into her Constitution the first time around.

Maranon further increased her power upon Willa Isard , trying to compel her to answer her question.

"Where are you taking us, if I might ask?" Maranon wondered.

Syd, in the meanwhile, continued to remain catatonic and unresponsive in her Force cage, huddled into a fetal position in emotional shock.

 

[Willa Isard]

Maranon

She looked at her and if that was the first question this was going to be a long time. As she walked and went towards the doorway. "No idea, there is a lot of places I could drop you off and haven't decided yet." She shrugged though and walked leading the way through the ship as she was heading towards the cockpit of the ship and it was on autopilot with the AI controlling it. THe golden box that contained a small amount of the cosmic force energies allowing something to form that was in the shape of her oldest friend and ally. Willa sat down though and stretched herself out feeling the comforming leather and padding for her body before she half turned to look down the hall and she was able to keep track of what was happening in the cargo area... benefits of a small ship.