Times Change Once Again

[Haytham Kaze]

Ruusan.
Sith Citadel.

Lightsabre disappeared into its hilt after the Dark Lord of the Sith finished with what he was doing.

In recent times, the Sith Triumvirate had grown lax with the deaths of Orcus, Adekos, and Carach. For this, pirates and criminals thought they could return to the formerly Hutt Space and to sow chaos once more.

Darth Athyssius was the one person in their way to prevent that was happening.

You thought.

Many Sith employed the use of Sith Lightning to torture. Sure, it was effective and made you ugly. Sure it hurt a lot, but this Dark Lord took things to another level in recent times. But most people wanted to survive. And he promised them freedom when he was done with them. Occasionally he felt the need to ask questions. "Why are in Triumvirate Space? What are you doing in Triumvirate Space? Are you a pirate?" And no matter what their answers were, they were punished.

Even those that he could sense were being truthful.

Dead.

It had come to his attention that a certain [member="Matsu Xiangu"] was apart of the Sith Triumvirate. Specifically in the position as a Triumvir. One of the three leaders of the organization. The one time he had heard of the Sith Lord, it had been from the lips of [member="Joza Perl"], claiming there had been a zombie outbreak on the planet. His homeworld. Not that he particularly cared too much. Any inhabitants on the planet were killed due to the machinations of the Mandalorians. A constant rage was maintained within the pit of his stomach. The image of his parents being turned to dust was printed into his mind. There was no avoiding it.

So he hadn't particularly cared about the outcome of the zombie outbreak on the planet. Anyone who mattered on it was dead already. All the zombies did was harass the Coalition, which, he could only admit was good.

Hooking the lightsabre hilt back onto its hook, the man that was strung up had died only moments before he had deactivated his ancient weapon. A bloodied blunted knife was on the ground underneath the corpse.

Athyssius's eyes were barely opened as he watched the pooling blood underneath the body.

He stayed alive for a while.

"Shall I prepare another one for questioning, My Lord?"

Many Sith had secret laboratories in their base of operations, usually they were locked up, this Sith didn't care who entered the room and watched him at work.

"No. How many have I been through today?"

"Ten, My Lord."

There was huff in an exhalation of air.

Not many last long...

Around the room there were nine other strung up corpses, all of them with pools of blood underneath them. Some of them slipping between the cracks of the rock they hung above, or having gained enough momentum on the slightly inclined floor to slide into the sewer. It smelled like death in there.

Was the knife too much?

"Send the bodies to Matsu Xiangu as per usual," he croaks out.

The bodies fell with a single push of a button, limp bodies fell, wet with their own life's essence covering their flesh. Many of them were missing large patches of skin, a several inches of muscle, or fat underneath where said skin should've been. There were no burn marks however, not with the lightsabre. He was a master with his lightsabre. He burned the flesh that he had cut off with the blunt edge. There was nothing pretty about the scene before him. It was messy, dark, and cruel. All of the things he professed to fight against, even when he had been Orcus's Apprentice.

"Let her know that I'll be following after the bodies soon after. I've got to clean up." Others had come into the room while he was caught up in his thoughts, they picked up the bodies and carted them out. Least they were smart enough to use different carts so the bodies didn't get all tangled together. Once his attendant had left, Darth Athyssius, Triumvir, Dark Lord of the Sith and all of his titles looked about the room as he gathered the Force around him and cast it out.

As if the blood itself had a mind of its own, it was gathered, former slow streams suddenly puddles as they surged across the rocky flooring to be sent into the sewer. Stains remained, but cleaners would come through soon enough. Catching sight of the knife teetering on the edge of the hole, he had finally come to a decision.

Yes. The knife was too much.

Clasping his arms behind his back, he exited and headed for Matsu's laboratory.

Few people enjoy eating themselves.

 

[Matsu Xiangu]

“My lady, more corpses from Lord Athyssius.”

Lester’s voice was quiet, designed not to provoke her when she was at her work. He’d long been blind but Matsu had the distinct impression he saw far more than most of those capable of sight. Getting around wasn’t so much as issue for him as he’d managed to train himself in what the Sith Lady supposed to was akin to echolocation. He was the only one that managed to hold his lunch down when in the presence of Matsu’s work - mostly because he did not have the option of looking when all others could not help their morbid curiosity - and therefore the Lady had developed a certain fondness for him. He was unendingly helpful and seemed content to assist her as long as she didn’t hurt him.

“Well, he certainly knows how to treat a lady, doesn’t he?” she joked, watching as the bodies were carted in, one behind the other. She inspected them as they rolled in, running metal fingers along the slit of one cut from which muscle and fat had been removed. Fascinating - it would do well in her endeavors to test exactly how much a reanimated corpse would be capable of when missing sinew. Some seemed untroubled and others struggled, and she was yet to figure out exactly why.

“He will also be arriving shortly himself,” Lester informed her, reaching out to push a corpse’s arm back on its metal gurney as if he were able to see it was askew.

That piece of information was interesting and she paused in her exploration, hand stuffed deep inside the trauma of a mass of excised tissue. To what did she owe the privilege? The part of her that used to crave the social games once played in the One Sith roiled deep in the back of her mind while the rest of her saw potential complication. She’d been careful to avoid either of her fellow Triumvirs since gaining the position - they were strangers and she saw no use in befriending anyone she knew she’d eventually try to incinerate if they got in her way. And that was ignoring entirely the possibility that the visit may not be friendly.

She would deal with problems as they came however, immediately dismissing suspicion. She got to work, pressing both hands to the head of the dead man missing so much significant muscle. By the time Lester interrupted her again her arms were covered in gore, the corpse writhing with some agonizing form of an excuse for life. It was obviously only semi-functional, but Matsu had been working on ways to compensate with her sorcery. It was a slow process but one she felt confident would one day make her armies even stronger.

“Lord Athyssius, my lady,” Lester offered by way of introduction.

The tiny Atrisian lady paused in her experimentation, though she assumed the Sith Lord would not be squeamish if she worked while they talked.

“Welcome - you’ll forgive me if I don’t shake your hand,” she offered with a characteristic humor most usually found unexpected from her, holding up a palm still smeared in viscera despite her best efforts. Her greeting was telepathic. She lacked the ability to speak since Valiens Nantaris had hit her in the face with his lightsaber during her invasion of Dromund Kaas. “To what do I owe the honor?”

[member="Haytham Kaze"]​

 

[Haytham Kaze]

Darth Athyssius strolled through the halls, content with his thoughts until he got to his fellow Triumvir's laboratory.

He knew little about the Sith Lord, but he imagined that this too was a learning experience for her as well, no? He had taken to wearing armour almost everywhere he went. With so many enemies right on their doorstep, whether they be Hutts and their pirate ilk, or the Galactic Republic and their foolish leadership, or better yet the Coalition, they could attack at any minute. Wearing armour? It was justified. Besides, it had only been a few weeks ago when he had dealt with some arrogant 'Lord' who was put into cryo and had come out weakened.

He expected him to return, but when, he wouldn't know.

Dropping his now crimson orbs on her filthy arms, his lips twitched slightly. Whether it was amusement or disgust, she would never know, but Athyssius strode closer all the same.

"I was told you dropped a zombie invasion on Dromund Kaas," he said drily. Turning his head away from her, he looked about at the other carts as he watched the corpses. "From what I've heard, there's nothing on Dromund Kaas, not after the Mandalorians crashed a sizeable rock into the planet. I wanted to know why." His voice was even, measured. He had long ago gotten over the fact the Mandalorians had done that to his homeworld, whether it was on purpose or by accident, it happened, and as a result he loathed the beskar clad warriors. Whenever he laid his eyes on one, something triggered in him briefly.

[member="Matsu Xiangu"]

 

[Matsu Xiangu]

My, he was direct. She liked direct.

She might have smiled had she been capable, but he would most likely feel the soft flush of her being pleased that passed for emoting from her those days. She lived on the edges of people’s minds, even closer to the practice of mentalism as it was the sole way for her to communicate.

Returning to her work, she pondered how to answer him. Clearly either necromancy or Dromund Kaas mattered to him - he hadn’t bothered with niceties or games, and while she didn’t make it a habit of filtering through stranger’s minds it was impossible not to feel the subtle wave of rage that filtered through him at the mention of the Mandalorian’s recent devastation of the once powerful Dark planet.

“Ah, yes. A tragedy,” she said, taking a scalpel to a corpse beside the one she started with and peeling back flesh to make them both match. She wanted to see the difference in muscle connection, if there was some issue of fibers that made one zombie less viable than another when damaged. “It was such a beautiful planet - you could feel the power just from standing on its surface. Of course I haven’t been since my own crusade there, but I’ve no doubt it will rise.” She’d never had any particular problem with Mandalorians except that age-old conflict between the warriors and Sith, but they would have to pay for their indiscretions.

That was the easy answer. Explaining why she’d dropped thousands of undead on an unsuspecting faction of Jedi...that was harder.

“A year ago, I explored galaxies outside our own. What I saw out there...changed me, taught me things…” she explained, running her fingers inside the wound she’d created and noting a knot of muscle absent in the first corpse. “There was one planet on which every creature was more powerful than anyone or anything I’ve ever seen here, in this galaxy we call home. They were ritualistic, primitive - and yet they could have crushed any of us without a thought. They taught me about suffering. They showed me pain is the only way to grow stronger.”

She woke the corpse she was testing, the dead man suddenly snarling and struggling until she willed it to lie still.

“The Silver Sanctum was only the first of many who will see what I now see, to learn what I have to offer. If I make them suffer, the strong will survive. The weak will die. As a galaxy we will become unconquerable.” She’d seen what lived outside their worlds, what might one day come as the Vong had to destroy all they knew. And so many of the Silver Sanctum had been weak.

It wasn’t altruism that drove her, but the need to be better than whatever eventually came for them - to see something so powerful brought so low by her hand.

“And why are you curious?”

[member="Haytham Kaze"]​

 

[Haytham Kaze]

Yes, it was true that you were able to feel the power of the Dark Side emanating from the power itself. It had been bathed in the Dark Side from the day it had become a Sith Pureblood Colony so many thousands of years ago, how could anyone destroy it without a second thought to the unique life and power that it held? Even if it were corrupting, even if it were of the Dark Side, to purge the Galaxy of such history was criminal. Had he been alone, he would've destroyed the entirety of the room just from the thought.

But he wasn't, and it was necessary to maintain the guise of civility. If not for him, he may as well do it for the legacy he professed to live.

"Perhaps it will rise, but not underneath the so caring gaze of the Coalition."

Then she went on to talk about the journeys she had taken outside of this Galaxy. Why? But he remained silent, a mild curiosity rippling off of him in the Force as he glanced down to the body her hands had, or were still in. And then he was snarling, but there was no flinch from the Dark Lord of the Sith. Few things surprised or rather, scared him these days. The only thing that could truly scare him was how far he had gone off of the path that he had set out for himself once he left the Galactic Republic.

So far gone.

But there wasn't redemption. Not for what he wanted and planned to do.

"Dromund Kaas is my planet," he said. "The Triumvirate was meant to be the tool that stripped it from the grasp of the Coalition. We remain idle; stagnant. But I will remain here all the same."

"One day, I will be known as the 'Scourge of the Coalition,'" He claimed.

"What do you plan?"

[member="Matsu Xiangu"]