The Wisdom Botanical (Kaine Zambrano)

[Yasha Cadera]

“Oh.” Yasha furrowed her brow, eyes buzzing from the light pouring into the fray. He was nothing but a shadow in the illumination of the Shaper’s lair. A hazy image juxtaposed on perpetual burning white. The cloth shielding her eyes eaten away by the same bacteria which cleaned the area for the Shaper’s medical ministrations.

​

‘Shh. Quiet, Yaiya. Good girls stay silent.’ ​

The light stung her eyes, and she shut them.​

Her breath came hot and frequent from her lungs, as the Shaper began treating the wound. Sliced, shifted, tore out infested tissue.

‘Hushabye. Warriors stay quiet.’ Her mother’s voice whispered ever repeating, whenever Yasha felt the jolt of physical pain. Her jaw clamped shut as the Shaper worked, eyes clamped tight against the light. Whimpering breaths hashed out of her nostrils, jaw clenched tight enough to crack lesser teeth.

​

‘Ssshh. Survivors are silent.’ ​

The light stung her eyes, and she let it. ​

The sting of the light was infinitesimal in comparison to the rending of her flesh. Amber eyes, bloodshot and red-rimmed craned to view the shadow in the sun, a glimpse of his passive face before the light blinded her. An image in the bright.

“Nnnnnnnggghhh…” Yasha panted, body contorting as much as it was able in the tendril’s cradle. Her mother’s voice returned, the thousand times [member="Aditya Fitz Kierke"] slapped her mouth or whispered to be silent. Good girls, warriors, survivors made no noise in the Netherworld, lest the demons found their hiding places. Their temporary respite from the horrifying monotony of a mother’s fright and a daughter’s rise from infant to child.

The Shaper barked. Yasha panted, holding in any urge to make such an undignified noise as a scream. Pain numbed her mind, stealing any vocabulary or thought but for its’ existence. As the biot was put in place, the activating compound seeping in, Yasha’s body bucked.

Her head swung back in an overwhelming agony.

A piercing and room-shaking scream overcame her inner boundaries, the pain too consistent and too lengthy in application for the Mand’alor to avoid it. Her voice fractured into two vibrations, every muscle constricting at once, fingers and toes clenching…

… and something Yasha remained ignorant of, one small strain in the universe, answered back. A rippling in the waters.

​

Those black, deep waters, which cleansed her soul. ​

The scream continued, increasing in vibrations. It’s call answered, musically concordant and longing for its’ misbegotten and concealed other half.

​

‘Survivors are silent.’ ​

Yasha sank back into the Vong-Shaping cocoon, panting as the light stung her eyes. She let it. The Shaper concluded her ministrations, and Yasha felt the new weight in her arm. The alien flesh writhing and concealed. Her arms and legs released first from the tendril-web.

“…Koemi… where are you?” A shivering left hand swept up haggard new skin, touching on the tender biot and the surgically sutured area. Easing to sit, Yasha reached out with her left hand and for a moment she thought in the lucidity of pain that she could feel where he was, sense a form in the overwhelming and blinding bright. It was a piece of fiction from an overwhelmed mind.

Surely. Surely. Swinging her legs over the side, bare feet hit the coral-like floor. Reached, until she felt the wool of [member="Darth Carnifex"]'s cloak. Without invitation, she pulled the cloak off his body and wrapped herself in it, hissing at the feel of it on her new skin.

“On a scale of puppy hugs to childbirth, this was twins coming at once… but who’s counting?” Yasha panted, her teeth gritted tight. “Koe, I can’t see.”

 

[Darth Carnifex]

The magnetic clamps anchoring his cloak to his broad shoulders disengaged with a snap, his strong hands cradling her while her naked body was covered by the thick fabric. "Saaduemb duaybudr, sazil, I am here." He gently pulled a corner of the cloak back to marvel at her renewed flesh, the fingertips of his right hand lightly running along the pulsating skin where gaping infection had once thrived. His thoughts drifted back to a day in his early career as a Sith, following the Battle of Metalorn. A Jedi, one of those accursed Solos, had taken off his left arm at the elbow when his concentration had wavered. Initially replaced with a cybernetic prosthetic, Carnifex had eventually replaced it with a Yuuzhan Vong biot complements of the Warlord Dredge.

Though different, Yasha's new appendage was very similar to the one he once wore. "Your strength will return in time, you are weary from the surgery." He did not yet comment on the harmonic voices that had wrenched free from her throat during the height of her agony, that was something to contemplate on another day. For now he was focused on her, cradling her as if she were one of his own children that had injured themselves.

He glanced up at the Shaper as she approached, "Your services will be well-remembered, Shaper. Now my friend and I will take our leave." She inclined her head and curtsied, "As you wish, Emperor of the Sith. Should you ever require my services again, I will await your return."

Carnifex scooped up Yasha in both of his arms and began to walk towards the exit, all the while he spoke softly in his native language to assuage Yasha's fears and anxieties.

[member="Yasha Cadera"]​

 

[Yasha Cadera]

Haggard lungs struggled with the warm air in the room. Eyes blinded by light blinked unfocused as Yasha tested the ground. Her last scream echoed in her ears, its’ duet a ringing cymbal her mind neither recognized nor appreciated. Attempting to gulp from a dry throat, Yasha stumbled into [member="Darth Carnifex"]’s chest, halfway because she couldn’t see where he was.

There was nothing but the deep basso voice of him, calling her to soothing thoughts, to calm. She panted as her legs faltered. No ground found her freshly Shapen body. Before she met the indignant floor, Kaine swooped and caught her, cloak and all. He held her up, while she panted. Mind dazed and body raw. The cloak spilled from her shoulder, and she felt the sensation roil on her skin.

“Ow.” Two skins. Biot and Epicanthix. Two separate and identical sensations coiling into her nervous system at once. Yasha gasped, her eyes rolling back as she swooned in the unfamiliar state.

“How’m I going t-to walk without sh-shhhoes?” In the fugue state of her surgical agonies, Yasha barely twitched as the Sith Emperor hefted her up in his arms, cradled against his chest like a child. He spoke to the Shaper, and Yasha reached out before her hand flopped onto her cloak-covered stomach. “Koe… am I still floating on the rack? I want.. want to get off… n-no more. No more… Na’a pali, Koe… na’pali…”

Stifling a hiccupped cry, the medically overcome woman went lax in Kaine’s arms. Soft words, gentle and flowing were the woman’s lullaby while she was lifted out of the Shaper’s Lair. Her head lolled against his chest, the throbbing agony of her surgery making dumb her lips. All she knew was the warmth of the woollen cloak, which cut the frost-ridden nature of the Vong’s Helskan landscape. The sound of a rumbling voice. Warmth of his body radiating heat, like it had under Kaas City. Childlike and innocent, Yasha laid in his arms. Nothing could harm her here, in this safest of bastions. Teeth chattering against the pain and the cold during the walk back to the Emperor’s shuttle, Yasha fell to unconsciousness.

Upon reaching the Shuttle, [member="Ambrose Cadera"] shifted to his humanoid form and rushed to the Emperor’s side. The centuries-old gurlanin scooped Yasha from Kaine’s arms, feeling the weight of her sizeable body in his grasp. Yasha’s head lolled back, the echo of her screams still radiating from her skin.

“Yash’ika… is she..?” Carrying her to the slab where Carnifex previously tended Yasha’s wounds, Ambrose laid her out. Dressed her in her underlayers for dignity, the armourweave bodysuit tied around her waist by its’ arms, so Ambrose could marvel at the new skin of his cub. The child he trained, fed, kept warm on the cold nights of the war. Ambrose lived and would eventually die in Yasha’s name, his fervent loyalty a religious compulsion to whatever end. “What did they do to her?”

Yasha stirred, mumbling in Epicant for someone to save her from the hymn of the black waters.

 

[Darth Carnifex]

"I saved her life, Mandalorian." His head tilted to the side, part of his eye visible as he continued to walk up into the shuttle. "Her own doctors were insufficient, they were disgraceful. Those who I call upon were not." The Yuuzhan Vong were not the only ones that the Emperor had control over, there were many others stationed throughout the Empire that would heed his beck and call whenever it was given. But the injuries that Yasha had sustained required a specialist's touch, and who better to deal with a Yuuzhan Vong infection than the Yuuzhan Vong themselves. No mere Mandalorian doctor could ever come close to achieving the same effects.

"She will need to recover to let the healing run its course, the pain has not yet subsided." The living biot in her arm would fight and devour what remained of the infection, keeping it from flaring up again until all that remained was Yasha. It would not be a pleasant experience, a living thing writhing inside of you devouring corrupted tissue like a wolf tearing at the carcass of an elf. But, by all comparison, her ordeals beneath Kaas City were far more harrowing.

"Secure her in the hold and I will return both of you back to Mandalore, unless there is another world you would rather have her be."

[member="Yasha Cadera"]​

 

[Yasha Cadera]

[member="Ambrose Cadera"] underwent his vigil with a somber sincerity. After dressing the Infernal, he wrapped her comatose body in the Sith Emperor’s cloak. Yasha lingered between consciousness and a merciful sedated state. Her forays into wakefulness increased the pace of her breathing. Aching groans as she clenched her muscles. Legs pulling up toward her chest.

She choked on hiccups. Ambrose set his hand on Yasha’s forehead. He growled softly, the way he and his now departed wife had when Yasha was a wayward child.

“Thank you, Emperor Zambrano... no. Not Mandalore, she’d get no rest there. Make for the Vena System. The Never Again is awaiting Yasha there. Her riduur’e have been… acceptably impatient.” Sceptical to bring up Yasha’s husband and wife, [member="Kaine Australis"] and [member="Caz Australis"], Ambrose toed around their names. He watched the Dark Lord for some form of discernment. A flicker of emotion at the mention of Yasha’s family. Anything other than the fresh reproach of a man, who swooped in. Took the girl for botanical samples, before saving her life.

“They were not accustomed to Vongspores, Emperor Zambrano. What was done to her was beyond us. This is fact. There is less shame in our doctors admitting when an injury was beyond them, than if they had vehemently attempted to continue in useless folly.” Setting a pillow under Yasha’s head, Ambrose knelt by her side, running the back of his fingers across her cheek. Yasha’s back curled up off the palette upon which it laid, a wrack of pain slicing down her spine. Ambrose clucked his tongue, humming softly from his inhuman throat. He hummed songs of Mandalore. Of Qiilura and Panatha. Songs of House Fitz-Kierke, and their surreptitious worship of Nereus and Nussyn, when Nemeroth reigned.

The four hundred year old gurlanin watched over his charge, wiping her brow and at one point cradling her upper body in his lap.

“I have one pup of my own, Dark One… but this child… I first met her covered in the blood of her enemies. eight years upon her. Eight! She was a wild thing. One night in Ra’s war camp, she stole food from my plate. Curled up in my fur for warmth… her father among the missing, mother dead. My mate would not leave her side, not for orders nor meat…. a lost pup.” He seemed consumed by memory, the child Yasha was to the woman and mother she was now. Pressing his hands together, he tapped them on his lips. “What amount of time would fit her recovery? She is due… elsewhere in a mere… 30 hours.”

“K-Koe… Koemi… I miik pi' vehi. Mi' vehi er o uiosil…” Caz knew best how to mitigate and control pain. The woman was gifted. Pure magic. Her head lolled to the side, body curling onto her left shoulder, knees up. Slumbering uneasily, she remained fitful.

Ambrose called the only person left to inform.

“Kaine… the Emperor’s shuttle is returning to the Never Again. He has Yasha, she’s… recovering post surgery. Prep Doc Allard… Kaine? He saved her. Be ready when we come in proximity.” The Mand’alor’s suite on the Never Again would provide the most recovery time before the Mandalorians met with their next diplomatic function. Ambrose waited by her side, checking the vitals, from his HUD readout and holding her firm on the slab.

“Yash’ika… push through the pain. Wake up. You cannot allow the Mandalorians to see you so… weak. Get up.” Ambrose continued attempting to get his charge to wake up, to rise. He would perpetually ask more of her, taking as much as she had, then plumbing the depths for more.

 

[Darth Carnifex]

The Emperor left Ambrose and Yasha alone, moving into the cockpit of the shuttle to stare idly out the viewport as the stars around Helska stretched and disappeared altogether as they entered hyperspace. Vena was a long distance away from Helska, even farther than Helska was from Jagomir. It would take many hours before the Emperor's shuttle arrived in the system, and the Emperor made the most of that time by silently meditating an hour after they departed Helska. Beneath the main hold where Ambrose and Yasha remained was a small chamber large enough to fit the Emperor but little else, a fur-lined rug stretched out across the gray durasteel and held in place by four obsidian obelisks weighed by a turadium core.

In his isolation he gave himself over to the Dark Side, letting it flow through him like water through an aqueduct. His breathing slowed alongside his heart rate, his body temperature dropping as the warmth slipped free from his skin and dissipated into the surrounding room. He needed the frigidity of the Dark Side, the chill cleared his thoughts and gave him full clarity of mind. In this state he could fully grasp the actions he had taken and planned to take.

Yasha trusted him more than any other, a feat that had taken years of careful planning and courting. For the first time in known history the Dark Lord of the Sith and the Mand'alor of the Clans were as cordial with one another as such positions allowed. His goal was at last obtained, a plan he had first laid down with Isley Verd before he had been sidelined in favor of Ra Vizsla. Now Ra was dead, his skull mounted in a place of importance on Bastion, and only the Hell-Child remained. Their shared heritage made it easier to connect, she was more Epicanthix than she was Mandalorian; no doubt thanks to the influence of her previously deceased mother.

Same homeworld, such different destinies. The threads of fate wound tightly around Yasha, she would play a role of such importance that not even herself could fully grasp its enormity. She would in time. He would help her see.

The Emperor's shuttle emerged out of hyperspace hours later, the shudder that vibrated through the decks rousing the Emperor from his meditation. Warmth flooded back into his body, but the ache in his muscles and bones would take longer to alleviate. He emerged into the hold, "We're here." He declared, clearance codes being transmitted between his shuttle and the Never Again. Docking procedures were initialized as the shuttle made landfall in the dreadnought's main hangar, hydraulic steam hissing out to wreath the shuttle's landing gears in a fine fog. The boarding ramp descended to thud against the durasteel plating of the flight deck, the Emperor's booming gait heralding his arrival followed by Ambrose and Yasha, the latter carried out on a hover-stretcher by the a pair of medics.

Dark eyes, one molten and the other a deep emerald, glared out at the assembled Mandalorians that greeted them. "Your leader demands assistance, and I require sustenance." Long bouts of meditation extracted a fierce hunger out of the Emperor.

He was positively ravenous.

[member="Yasha Cadera"] | [member="Kaine Australis"]​

 

[Yasha Cadera]

The Infernal’s skin was pale as the underlayer tank she wore. Ashen, paler than [member="Kaine Australis"] experienced from his bride. Laid lovingly on the palette by [member="Ambrose Cadera"], the medics lifted the hover-bed from the hold as Ambrose stayed by Yasha’s side.

Severe orange eyes searched for Kaine Australis, and upon finding the man, his buy’ce-less face contorted. Concern marred with relief. Yasha’s ribcage shifted in short breaths, as the light struck her eyelids. She hiccuped a groan, as Ambrose dove to put his massive crush-gaunt clad hand over her eyes. Ferocious gurlanin turned cub-parent as he covered Yasha’s eyes.

Armour.

Yasha’s armour was not draped over or upon her. The ubiquitous visor did not rest upon her face. Only a willful removal was possible, Yasha would have fought to the last to keep her beloved armour and visor upon her. Against anyone, absolutely anyone but Caz’ika. But Kain’ik. At some point, the Dark Lord of the Sith through no force or violence, got Yasha to remove her armour. Body still wrapped in [member="Darth Carnifex"]’s feathered cloak against the unfamiliar cold, Yasha appeared a shifting statue of her once-self.

A wisp in the galactic breeze. Usually black painted lips were pink and grey. Her eyelids struggled to wake, left hand twitching as she attempted a flimsy consciousness.

“Shabladay.” Doc Allard rushed the hover-stretcher, taking vitals and barking at the medic staff he’d prepped after he slapped some colour back into his blanched cheeks. The Emperor of the Sith was huge. One never quite understood the scale of an Epicanthix in their prime, until they stood before them. While Allard was not a small man for a human, he stopped momentarily to let his jaw go slack as Carnifex walked by. “His poor fethin’ wives…”

Looking back to Kaine Australis, Allard mentally calculated how close to both Kaine’s he could get without tension breaking across them. A small, calm voice echoed through the landing bay. It was the bravery of a newly minted Mandalorian, draped no longer in the dehumanizing cloth of a slave. Perhaps the one person who had the most to fear of Kaine Zambrano. The rebel wet-nurse. Freed and traitorous slave.

Tamar set a genteel smile upon her face and ducked her head in greeting, hands folded in front of a dress and robe of House Fitz Kierke of Panatha.

“Sovereign of Outside Places, welcome. Please, surely all would be more comfortable with Mand’alor in her bed? Allow me to serve a meal, there must be some story to how Yasha’s condition changed so drastically?” Neck high, Tamar glanced up at Carnifex’s face. Mismatched eyes… battle damage? She breathed calmly, flicking her gaze between Zambrano and Australis. “Co-“

“Mmfh… Kain-ik…” Yasha’s gurgling voice broke Tamar’s concentration. She tried to roll onto her side and failed, limp black hair spilling out of the braid, which by rights, appeared to be done by Ambrose’s hand.

“Oy! S’go! All’ve us! Get your kip after the woman’s off a slab! What... did this? Her flesh, it's not... hers.” Allard pushed past everybody, rushing the hover-stretcher up toward the cleared corridor and the privacy of the Mand’alor’s Suite.

 

[Darth Carnifex]

The Emperor stalked ahead, paying little attention to the pleasantries and formalities thrown his way. Scarlet silk billowing from around his broad shoulders, he moved with an intuition borne of the Force's clairvoyance. It would not be long before he found Yasha's suite, even if Australis and his ilk could keep pace with the towering Dark Lord. His boots, scuffed and weathered by a dozen different environments, rang out like thunderclaps with each step he took; the deck vibrating slightly as it accustomed to the strain of his intense bulk gliding across it.

Like Australis, the Emperor also took to the bar.

Reaching out with one hand he summoned a mug of harsh acrid alcohol, the cork flying off before he brought the rim to his lips and drank deeply. Gulp by greedy gulp he consumed the entire jug, not pausing for breath until it had been completely drained and discarded back where he had called it from. A thin trail of liquid oozed down from the Dark Lord's bottom lip, which he wiped away with a gratuitous flick of his tongue.

"Suitable. What meat do you keep onboard? It's the calories I require."

He then proceeded to stalk all throughout the Mand'alor's suite, gliding from room to room like an unmissable gargoyle. When he had at last surveyed the entirety of the wing did he return to where Australis had sequestered himself with the other liquor and spirits.

"And is the ship's brig occupied? I desire purification."

[member="Yasha Cadera"] | [member="Kaine Australis"]​

 

[Yasha Cadera]

“Eat with you? But your manners.” Tamar smirked with a relieved sigh, letting the companionate and familial bond shine for what it was. She was part of a family born above her, adopted and content in this new and expanded life. “Of course, Kain’ik. What are vode for?”

Squeezing his arm after [member="Darth Carnifex"] turned around, Tamar hazarded a smile and chased after. He moved through the deck like he’d been present a thousand times, only then Tamar’s mind returning to Doc Allard’s admonition.

‘Don’t know how he does it, but he always comes. He always knows when she needs him.’ The thought was banished by Doc and Ambrose heading through to the Mand’alor’s private bedroom, the doctor barking at his staff. Poor Yasha…

“Suitable… is good.” Tamar whispered to Kaine, about to take a sip of wine, when the Dark Lord continued forth. She spoke to both Kaines in the room, “The chefs will make a copious selection. I regret we do not have Mott, but there is a similar beast Mand’alor the Infernal has been breeding on Vena, a hybrid of Mott and the local livestock. It should taste quite similar. I know you enjoy it… Kain’ik, the slavers… are the slavers still in the brig?”

Onward he went, on a tour which no doubt [member="Kaine Australis"] would handle. Bursting through behind them, Tamar’s first and only thought was the children. Adara off at Boarding School, the three boys remained. Reyn, Magnus and Girak. One of the doors opened was the boys’ colossal room, with three beds, nooks, a climbing wall, slide and the accoutrements of three boys’ lives. Toys and pretend guns, bits of trial armour and foam. The boys yanked their heads up from their game, twin boys wrestling on the floor.

“The mountain! Gigi, he’s back! The mountain is back!” Magnus scrambled off his brother’s back with a yelp, galloping after the far speedier Dark Lord.

“Buir! Buir, look! Look! I climbed him! I did, I got all the way to the tippy top and stood on his shoulders and I saw a whole entire world!” Magnus bolted past Tamar’s arms to his father, slamming into Kaine Australis’ leg and wildly pointing behind him at Carnifex. “I did! I climbed to the whole top and I saw the universe, all of it, I really did, Buir!”

“No fair! Why did he get to climb and I stayed with Ba’buir?” Little Girak-Kaine pouted, stomping in behind his much more vibrant brother and pumping his arms around his chest with a huff. “Where’s Buir?”

The five year old glanced from Kaine to Kaine, mind turning with the tensions flickering in the bar. More thoughtful of the two, Girak tugged at Magnus’ shirt. “Maggi, Mags, come pl…”

Swimming dark clung to Yasha’s comatose body. Moisture stuck to her skin, filtered away by the microfibre cloth Ambrose wielded. As Doc Allard fought with the double-genome swathed in Yasha’s recuperating limb, he mumbled without ceasing about shabla miracles and Vong. He turned as Yasha yanked to sit up, shaking her head to clear the visions of dark, consuming waters. The medic staff exploded in chatter, Doc shouting a “Woa there! Dim the lights, dim them! Ambrose!” as the gurlanin shifted.

“Yash’ika, lie down pup!”

Her left hand drifted along her chest, fingers searching from sternum to neck. It wasn’t there. Where… where was it? Ambrose’s hand was tossed away as Yasha felt the cloying black waters reaching, swirling round her. They were hot as steam, without turning to vapor. The waters usurped her vision, lingered down her throat.

Black, bitter waters.

In the distance, for one small inkling, Yasha felt two presences above the waters, familiar. Sunlight and Shadow. She stumbled to her feet and canted into the wall with a hiss. Medics chattered on behind her, some attempting to lead her back to bed or steady her. Stumbling on, Yasha grunted as her left shoulder hit the wall, fingers still clutching at her neck.

“Easy, pup. Easy.” Ambrose cooed, ducking under her left arm to hold her up as they walked to Kaine’s bar. She rocked her head, trying to shake off the blur in her vision. Black, sordid waters.

Girak gasped as he saw his mother leaning on Ambrose in the doorway. He skittered behind Kaine. Peeked out from a beskar’gam-clad leg. Amber eyes staring at nothing, Yasha attempted to clench her right fist, to move some fingers. Anything. Burning eyes fought with the light of the room, diving into her husband’s face. Into Carnifex’s. The black, sordid waters pressed around her, a vision only she could feel, but for the groping tensions tugging at her closed and guarded mind.

“Wh… where…” Her voice croaked, raw still from her medical agony on Helska. “Kain’ik… Koemi… where. Where’s my necklace? Give it to me.”

The Voidstone ubiquitous around Yasha’s neck, had never been removed since [member="Skorvek"] gifted it to her. By a vast mercy, Carnifex removed it for the Shaper to ply her particular trade. Yet now, the crutch and salvation was missing.

“Kaine…” Yasha whispered, back sliding against the wall as her left hand clung into locks of raven hair.

 

[Darth Carnifex]

"Slavers or slaves, it makes no difference."

Growled the Sith Emperor, his visage momentarily softened at the sight of the children. From then on he adopted the mask of the patient patriarch, the faintest edges of a smile creeping across his face as he lowered himself down on his haunches. "And how big the children have grown, what strong blood flows through their veins. Mighty warriors all, destined to walk amongst the stars and shake the planets." Reaching out, the Emperor of the Sith mussed Magnus' hair before the youth ran off to tug at his father's leg, the tension mounting despite the cordial words being passed through the air.

Carnifex rose just as Yasha shambled into the room, drawing the attention of everyone present.

He moved to her side, a blur of shadow across the room. Powerful, yet gentle, hands cupped her body and kept her from slumping down the wall. "I removed the necklace to save your life, Yasha. What you are feeling now is what you were always meant to feel, unrestrained from the limiters placed upon you by the ignorant. Reach out with your feelings, feel the Dark Side. Draw it into yourself and I shall help you overcome everything that is holding you back."

[member="Yasha Cadera"] | [member="Kaine Australis"]​

 

[Yasha Cadera]

“I missed you, Emperor Mountain! Tell Gigi I climbed to the tippy-top! I did, and I saw the universe allll the way.” Magnus was first to clamber over to the kneeling Emperor, flopping full-bodied into his side, before giving ‘the mountain’ a hug. Girak-Kaine hugged [member="Kaine Australis"]’ leg, looking up to his father before teetering out from behind and shuffling forward.

“Did he? … Did he climb to the tippy top? Can you really see the whole universe from up there?” Girak smiled at the Emperor, giving him a wave as Magnus grinned up and pumped his arm muscles.

“I’m gonna be the biggest and strongest Mandalorian ever. SO mighty nobody’ll ever make me sad ever and ever and e-hh!” Magnus let out a hard inhale when Yasha came rocking in, asking for her necklace. Forgotten by the adults in the room, Magnus raced back to Girak-Kaine’s side, and hid behind their father’s legs.

“We have no slaves, [member="Darth Carnifex"]. But you are welcome to the brigands in the brig. They shall satisfy.” Tamar bowed her head out of respect, “Excuse me, I’ll see to it, then.”

Tamar left the room, momentarily putting her hand on Yasha’s shoulder and forehead. Yasha’s skin was clammy, but slick with chill. Ambrose jolted back as Carnifex snapped to his charge, faster reflexes from the Sith Lord than should have been possible with his gargantuan frame. Yasha swayed and lost balance. Her side collided with Carnifex’s hands.

“Koemi… nonsense…” She tried to swallow any moisture in her mouth, failing for the parched nature of her feverish hours since Helska. Her lungs shook. Body convulsing in tremors as she gasped as one coming up from a deep body of water. “N-no…”

Amber eyes grew near-circular, lips trembling and parted. Drained of colour, her skin refused to flush or warm but for the heat radiating off Darth Carnifex.

“No.” She whimpered in denial, voice barely a dream. The black waters chased at her mind, calling her back under the waves caused by a priests’ song. Hand drifting to her neck, she clawed at the flesh empty of its’ crutch. No. The waters were a dream. A nightmare conjured by her experiences under Kaas City. Nothing but the memory, trapped and recorded repeatedly by her subconscious to rectify the image of a monstrous villain…

… who kept her from dying wounded in the cold. Who took her on a botanical sampling outing to Jagomir, after learning she was injured without hope of Mandalorian repair. The monster who held her baby girl in his arms, cooing and whispering of long life, or letting Adara crawl up on his knee, when he decimated Commenor.

Kaine Zambrano was a force of malice and rage in the Galaxy without limit or ceasing. As she glared through the light of her Kain’ik’s beloved den to find his cerulean gaze, Yasha’s eyes glazed over. The look in Kain’ik’s face…

… that hymn to a force she couldn’t see nor feel, which called without ceasing.

“… I’m choking in water I can’t see… tell me it’s a lie. Tell me it’s a lie, Koe. I need… need to stop dreaming it. Kain’ik, tell me… tell me!! I can’t… it’s not…” Unconscious, Yasha’s mind began to open. Yet, the progress was stalled by a group of Ithorian Priests, who refused for the Galaxy’s sake to stop singing.

And eyes long closed began to open.

 

[Darth Carnifex]

He held her up, his large powerful hands gently cradling her smaller frame. Brow knit in thought, the Dark Lord of the Sith hooked one of his arms behind the crux of Yasha's knees and swept the legs out from under her, holding her up as if he would a child.

"She requires the dark."

Eyes never leaving Yasha's own, Carnifex began to walk her towards her room. Supernatural intuition led him directly to it, his footfalls slow and steady as to not jostle the ailing Mand'alor anymore than what was unavoidable. Once he had located the Mand'alors own chambers, he gently placed her down on the bed and returned to the threshold.

"I am to be uninterrupted, there are delicate intricacies involved. Do not open this door, no matter what you hear. One mistake could end your leader's life."

The finality in which the Emperor gave this dire warning brokered no argument, and he closed and locked the door before any could be proposed. Disrobing himself of both cloak, armor, and upper tunic, the Emperor returned to Yasha's side at the long edge of the bed, moving to stand on his knees as he surveyed the Mand'alor and contemplated his coming actions. First, the armorweave bodysuit she wore would have to be removed, it impeded the ritual that he had in mind. With a wave of his hand the fabric caught fire, blue unnatural flames licking away along Yasha's body until nothing remained of what she wore save for a convenient layer consisting of covering undergarments; though she would remain uninjured by his conjured conflagration.

Reaching down to his side, the Emperor retrieved a clay flask with a round body, a long neck, and a flat bottom. Uncorking it, he poured a small dollop of writhing green mist into his other hand. This was the fabled spirit ichor of Dathomir, found only deep beneath the planet's surface. It was what gave the Nightsisters the ability to perform magic and conjure items out of seemingly nothing, a curious manifestation of the Dark Side of the Force. Through his connection with the Nightsisters by his wife Antanasia, the Emperor was able to procure samples of this ichor and bottle it for use.

He carried a flask with him at all times.

Recorking the clay container, the Emperor began to focus on the ichor in his hands, lightning dancing along the fingertips to disappear into the swirling orb of jade fog. It shifted, took on shape and density, and ignited with a blinding flash of light. When the light dimmed, an asymmetrical dagger with a curved winding blade was all that remained. Gripping the weapon by the handle with his right hand, the Dark Lord of the Sith ran the sharp end of the weapon over the meat of his palm. Black, acidic blood bubbled to the surface from where the flesh parted, creating a lightly bubbling pool of writhing shadowy liquid. Placing the dagger on the edge of the bed, Carnifex dipped the tips of his index and middle finger into the blood until they were thoroughly coated, taking that hand and applying the blood to Yasha's naked skin.

Intricate patterns began to form as the Emperor continued to work, runes of the ancient Sith that he had studied for decades. The most detailed and symbolic of these runes were drawn along the body's prime meridian, a series of channels through which the vitality, the Living Force, of the body flowed. When the Emperor completed his task, Yasha's anterior skin was riddled with Sith runes drawn in his own blood. Now he reached out, placing his left thumb on the center of her forehead while his right thumb was firmly pressed against the fatty tissue of her mons pubis.

"Anyumi tauz Nu, gatote ir xratonas anmuxuna: luai is laisvas. Girdeti nun, ir fasona visa anmuxuna udhams je'sae Nun: mazo anas visas anmuxuna iv tave Xeana ir iv tave Isata: sh'jatau tave Gata ir zeprie tave Gata: ant tetkia ir is tave Vanduo: iv Gotreaiji Degonis, ir iv gusis Saud: ir visas Xitka ir Vmotai iv akuyi galez buti udae je'sae nun."

Dark energy coiled and flowed from the Emperor down into Yasha's body, the runes glowing brighter and brighter. Carnifex opened his mouth as if in a silent scream, shadows billowing up from deep in his throat before rushing out and pooling on Yasha's stomach, an incoherent writhing mass of pure shadow. It coalesced into a reptilian shape; a Dreambeast of the Emperor's own creation. Quickly it crept up between the cleft of Yasha's breasts, grasping her lips and slithering inside of her mouth and down her throat.

"Sotezi sis moteris iv ji nyeklas, nuyak zveris. Zinaza tu'saen sh'jatau savimi."

[member="Yasha Cadera"] | [member="Kaine Australis"]​