Justice.
A single swing of his lightsaber, a blast of Force Lightning, and the manipulations of the mind, subtle and not-so-subtle. That was all it took to sow the seeds of chaos. A panicked group was a weakened group, like a pack of ports ripe for the picking by apex predators.
Anders and Alaisy fit that description perfectly. Whilst Anders was the cold, harsh, brutal winds of a snowstorm, the Shiny Sith, his partner in this endeavour, was a volcano erupting into the atmosphere, the perfect storm merging into one. Her dark tendrils stretched out across the factory, a terrifying, overwhelming dread overcoming the feeble-minded weaklings that dared attempt to stand up to them.
Justice.
They were fools. All of them. Whether it was a lightsaber or a lightwhip, a blast of the Force, the cracking of necks, the spilling of blood. It did not matter. They had committed a heinous crime and for that, they deserved punishment.
Anders, for a split second, thought he could hear Alaisy cackling with glee behind her visor. Though, it was difficult to determine over the sounds of blaster shots in his ears and the hissing coming from the mask itself.
The darkness made their auras all the more terrifying. Bloodied, twisted, dominant.
Justice.
“STOP!”
The fighting ceased for the moment, Alaisy and Anders standing sude-by-side bmwith a growing collection of corpses at their feet. Limbs were severed, heads missing, blood staining the duracrete. There was a burning stench in the air of electrified meat that would churn lesser stomachs.
“Oh?” Anders raised a brow to the voice. “Negotiating, are we? Where was that five minutes ago?”
“We’ve got you ssssurrounded!” The voice, a Trandoshan, judging by the scaly texture of their features and hiss in their tone.
True enough, the two Sith, were indeed, surrounded. It wasn’t fair. These imbeciles had no grasp of the idea of the dark side.
It was they who were outmatched.
Justice.
There was a fleshy crunch as the latex-clad woman stepped on a man’s trachea. “Stay down.”
“Governor Tir'eivra, what do you make of this? Do you believe we are properly surrounded?” Anderson asked, his voice indifferent to the situation.
“Convenient, when I swing my Besotted, it will coil back in a wave and its lash will unlikely skip anyone behind us,” Alaisy answered equally unimpressed.
If there was ever a duo that could wreak havoc in stillness, it would be Aequitas standing together with Aphotis. The tall woman weaved her prehensile tail around as her aura darkened. While they were in their stand-off she was breaking through the Trandoshan’s mental barriers, sapping away at their morale as unimaginable horrors infested them, feasting on their fears.
With a slight dip into the dark side, the Chiss gently took the path around Alaisy’s slithering mind tendrils and bore into the lizard’s thoughts that now lay exposed. A flash of an image was enough. Snipers behind the Trandoshan and above on well-hidden catwalks, armed with disruptors. Anders raised his curved obsidian-crimson plasma blade and stepped in front of Tir'eivra.
The movement made the thug commander step aside, as expected. A burst dissipated on Aequitas’ lightsaber and he evaded another that followed, burning a hole in the duracrete.
Besotted produced an ear-drum-shattering whip-crack that coiled behind them, biting through weapons, armor, and flesh before anyone could react. The plasma lash folded upon itself and reached supersonic speeds before it was cast forward. It swung deftly past the Vice-Chancellor and fanned out to reach everyone in front of them. .
“It would seem that they are well supplied,” the Chiss replied analytically as his anger coalesced into a cerulean beam of electricity. As it connected, he chained it towards their compatriot before they could hide behind the corridor. Sparks were followed by smoke before one scoundrel dropped down after the other in spasmodic agony.
The Trandoshan had ducked away like a coward, raising their weapon towards the Vice-Chancellor. Alaisy’s whip was pulled back so that Anders could step forward, finishing off anyone still standing behind the duo. With a simple flick of his curved hilt, he sliced the scaly hand off before they could squeeze the trigger.
What came out of the Trandoshan’s throat was unlike any sound Anders had ever heard in his life. It was a mix between a hiss, a cry, and a wail of agony all rolled into one neat little package. It was a curiosity. One that, sadly, he simply didn’t have the time for right now.
Plus, that sound was incredibly irritating.
A short pinch of his left hand fingers almost immediately silenced the feeble creature. They clutched at their throat, gasping, wheezing, clinging onto the life that they didn’t deserve.
With a flick of his wrist, Aequitus sent the Trandoshan hurdling towards Aphotis, only stopping mere centimetres away from her. If her size wasn’t intimidating enough, the aura of darkness, her Garden of Trepidations, that weighed more than a mountain on the poor reptilian’s soul.
“We will make this simple,” Anders stated, keeping his lightsaber raised. “Governor Mallium. Where is he?”
“I-I-I,” the Trandoshan forcibly swallowed the lump in their throat, their voice croaking like a toad.
The Chiss’ eyes narrowed on them. Already he found this waste of space a waste of their time. “Governor Tir'eivra, would you be so kind as to give our quarry a reason to comply?”
“Certainly.”
Alaisy didn’t need the invitation. Her claw-like fingers of one lone hand enveloped the Trandoshan’s skull likeva vice.
The long vibronails dug into the Trandoshan’s scaly skin, a thumb-nail creeping towards their eye. Aphotis knew about their nature and their tendency towards rage and fury, but it was their fierce loyalty to their goddess that mattered most. The loud noise of her mask expelling air was a great imitation of aggression shown by their species.
“You are useless prey, food that is to be consumed. Would you damn your entire species by showing weakness? What would your goddess think if you slithered out of this alive, with wounded pride, a score reset to zero? Give us the whereabouts of Governor Mallium, and I will grant you a warrior’s death!” Tir'eivra’s modulated voice warped into that of a hissing lizard.
Their slit pupils grew larger, not scared of the physical abuse, but they were much more afraid of what their people would do to them, or their goddess. They had been so careful accumulating their points for their Scorekeeper. The choice was easy, they did not concern themselves with mortal repercussions, just their place in the afterlife.
“Sss-through the hall, the atrium, passss code, 999GuvNah6. Finissssh it, I am ready.”
Aequitus watched carefully, crimson eyes unblinking, but found no sign of deceit. He gave Aphotis the most gentle of nudges through the Force.
Justice.
Tir'eivra tightened her grip on their pointily-boned face, with now both hands clawing deeper, strengthened by the dark side. A cascading blood fall seeped from between her gloved fingers as she delved into their skull. Hissing, and gargling, but even a tooth-laden, scaly mouth could show a smile as life ebbed from mortality and flowed into the spiritual.
A shake of a blue-skinned head drew Aphotis’ attention.
“What a worthless sentient to only find value from life in their moment of death,” Aequitas deactivated his lightsaber, placing it on his belt. “Are you not yet satisfied, Aphotis?”
No. No she was not. There was something delectable about experiencing the moment of demise. The feeling of the Force leaving one’s body, snuffed out like a hot candle. The last thoughts of panic, desperation, acceptance, and in some cases denial drove the alchemical amalgamation of a Sith forward in her passions. There was almost nothing more exhilarating than watching their lives flash before their eyes in their final moments. People always revealed who they really were in their last breath. It was beautifully chaotic. Magnificently torturous. Elegantly iniquitous.
“I thought not,” Anders placed his hands behind his back, correcting his posture as he always did. “Come. I do not believe we are finished here.”
When they proceeded down the hallway, they came across the atrium the Trandoshan referenced. Alaisy punched in the code with her dagger-esque fingers, the multilayered doors swooshing open.
A large open space presented itself, with an immense transparisteel dome letting light from the outside in. Metal beams covered the ceiling in between for structural support. The atrium itself was almost completely empty, except for a single chair in the middle.
Both Anders and Alaisy could hear a faint mumbling and a buzzing noise. The back of the seat was facing the duo. Aside from the ominous sounds, speeders were darting around in the sky above.
“Definitely a trap.” Aphotis looked towards Aequitus
The Chiss merely inclined his head at her, raising his hand before she could lift her heeled boot.
“Wait, do you see it too?” He pointed towards a faint crimson flickering just ahead of them.
Squinted eyes from the taller Sith narrowed on where Anders was pointing. There was almost nothing discernable there. Yet, when she focused, driving the dark side to enhance her natural vision, she spotted it amidst the kicked up dust in the room.
Reaching back from whence they came, Aphotis latched the Force onto one of the corpses the two Sith had left behind in their wake. With a flick of her wrist, the body surged forward. Aequitas remained still as the Trandoshan body flew past him. He remained still, steady, like he was observing a keen experiment.
The corpse penetrated the red lasers that stood between the two of them and their target. Klaxons blared, the atrium flashing a crimson, bloodied hue. The whirring of panels in the floor caught the attention of both Sith as numerous turrets ascended with a rapid pace. The quick repulsive blasts of orange plasma pelted the body at all angles and in nanoseconds, it was gone, nothing left, vaporising into hot dust and steam, the stench of a burnt carcass wafting in the air.
The lights stopped flashing as the turrets descended back into the floor.
“Finally, some competence,” Aequitas shook his head indignantly. “It is a pity we did not know about this sooner. It would have made for some decent sport.”
Even from where they were standing they could hear the sound of marching footsteps on the other side of the atrium, behind the massive blast doors.
“We have a whole pile of bodies left, let us make good use of them,” Aphotis drew a line with her clawed finger from the heap of corpses towards the metal hatches.
Aequitas inclined his head, “Then we have to time it just right, I will start the countdown once we have a decent number lying at our feet.”
After they were done stacking up three somewhat equally sized meatbags, they bunched them up and crossed them over each other, and secured them with fibrecords.
“One, two… now!”
Anderson and Tir'eivra stretched out both of their arms and willed the Force to glide the humanoid meatballs over the edges of the floorpanels. In utter silence, they passed the laser grid and descended upon the plates.
The crimson lights lit up like before, but even they seemed to halt their pulsating as the turrets couldn’t lift the weight above them.
“Seems like there is a glitch in their system,” the black-clad woman commented. .
Whirring seemed to go into overdrive until a puff of smoke escaped from the seams of the plates.
“It looks safe enough to enter now. But I can sense a battalion’s worth of scum behind that door,” Aequitas said with a voice full of disdain.
The tall woman click, clacked right into the large open space and pulled a Laser Tripmine from her Envoy kit. She stuck it to the doorpost and retrieved a thermal detonator from the same pouch, placing it right next to the mine.
“Why am I not surprised you used the Envoy kit to store explosives?” His Coruscanti accent seemed to sound like it carried with it a sense of approval, even if he thought it was a crude method.
Aequitas checked the other side of the chair, and unsurprisingly, found no occupant. He then proceeded to scan the area for holocams, but his Inquisitorius Scanner came back with no result, other than the countless of thugs waiting for them on the other side. With a simple swipe, he made sure to jam whatever electronic device they used to keep an eye, or ear on this place.
Alaisy’s mask hissed as she opened the valve to her self-contained oxygen tanks and unclipped two Dioxis grenades.
“After I punch in the code, make sure to hold your breath,” between the sound of pressurized air, there was a tone of excitement in her modulated voice. <@837236610684813342>
The warning was much appreciated, though unnecessary. The dark side was a pathway to many abilities some considered to be unnatural. Darth Plagueis had supposedly created life through his manipulations of the arcane. Bringing death and resurrection during his infamous experiments.
It was time for Anders and Alaisy to conduct an experiment of their own.
When the taller Sith punched in the code, the doors sliding open to reveal the collection of the soon-to-be deceased.
It was little more than what they deserved.
Scum.
They took advantage of others for their own gain. It reminded Anders so much of the injustice he suffered at the hands of the Chiss Ascendancy.
Justice.
Aphotis lobbed the grenades inside. A chorus of exclamations and foul language proceeded before being replaced by coughs.
As instructed, Anders held his breath. He called upon the Force to slow his heart to a crawl. One did not need oxygen when they had the dark side. The Kasiya Governor followed in beside him, the hiss of her mask indicating the protection it provided against her lethal weapon.
With his lightsaber in hand, Anders began to cut down each individual in his path. He struck hard, fast, severing heads, cleaving helpless bodies in twain. More. They needed to suffer. He wanted nothing more than to reach down their throats to pull their still-beating hearts from their chests.
He was pleased to discover his fellow Sith was not being lax. Her own crimson bladed lightwhip was active, swirling like a vortex, just like the darkness that manifested within her. She commanded it with passion, demanding it follow her whim. The dark side was a curse, a drug that came with phenomenal power, but a heavy addiction more potent than the strongest spice.
It was a deal any Sith would take without question.
Anders caught a glimpse of himself in a nearby window. His once regal hair was dishevelled. His teeth were bared like fangs, and his eyes shone like amber suns ready to burst.
Blaster fire was barely aimed at the two Sith in their panic, most of the thugs merely trying to get to safety. A trio seemed to slip away, activating the tripmine, chaining into a double explosion once the fire reached the thermal detonator.
Limbs, blood, and innards were strewn about, blowing smoke and flames further down the hallway and atrium. Their burly Twi'leki leader dropped onto his knees in front of Anders’ feet, begging for mercy, before he could even truly comprehend the death of all of his subordinates.
“Spare me! I know why you’re here, I beg you,” the Twi'lek coughed between words as he shook his hands in forgiveness at the Chiss.
“Pathetic, die with some dignity, scum,” Aequitas sent the message through the Force, boring through the Twi'lek’s mind, unwilling to even open his mouth for this worthless fool.
The gang leader pointed with a trembling finger at a door to their right as the Sith raised his blade, but it did nothing to stop it. His head landed onto the durasteel tiles with a thump, and his Lekku cut in twain. Two more stragglers crawled out from under the dioxis mist and were reeled back in by the dark side and then shredded by a coiling lash of plasma.
A turret at the end of the corridor buzzed and fizzled out as an EMP-grenade made short work of it. .
“Pah! I still have one left. How unsatisfying, oh wait!” Tir'eivra’s tail stood up in excitement as her claw unclipped a stick grenade.
Her electric-blue eyes were fixed on the zig-zag sprinting escape of a Rodian, trying desperately to outsmart the duo. Aphotis cackled, arm stretched out as ice exploded from the device with a crackling puff, shards clattering against the walls. With its bulgy insectoid eyes, the Rodian peered back in fear, its body frozen stiff. A second later, a knife was planted into its skull with a thud and their life drained away.
The buzzing of lightsabers vanished.
Aphotis’s mask hissed between her amusement, her gloves clicking and snapping her second skin as she wiped the organic parts and blood away with the help of her oils.
Anders fixed his hair before he stepped in front of the right-hand door. It slipped open without a code and revealed a well-dressed man bound to the wall in stun cuffs.
The captive’s eyes opened wide upon seeing the bloodied Sith. He mumbled in panic, trying desperately to push his gag away with his lips.
If there were ever a more satisfying sight that the absolute distraught of an individual that deserved it, Anders didn’t know what it was. He casually approached the bound Human, a pudgy man with greying hair in his late fifties. As Anders approached, the Human’s panic only grew, eyes widening, thrashing desperately as if that would somehow bring him freedom.
The Chiss casually removed the gag. “Now, now, Governor. Is that any way to treat an old friend?”
“You!” Mallium seethed, sweat now dripping from his brow.
“Oh!” Anders feigned embarrassment. “Silly me, where are my manners? Governor Tir'eivra, may I introduce Governor Mallium of Kyasis.”
The Human glanced the tall… whatever she was in his eyes, up and down.
“Let me guess… an apprentice?” Mallium asked.
“More like a partner in this endeavour,” Alaisy’s smooth, silky voice scoffed, then vibrated through her mask and sent shivers down the Human’s spine. “Though, one look at you, and it hardly seemed worth the effort.”
“We, as you might assume, have been sent to rescue you. The success of which depends entirely how you answer my next question…” Anders’ smile faded. His eyes hardened upon the blubbering man in front of him as the Chiss placed his hands behind his back. “Where is it?”
Now that caught Aphotis’ attention. As far as she was aware, they were sent just to rescue Mallium from his predicament. Apparantly, Aequitas had an ulterior motive and knew the man.
How interesting.
“I don’t-” Mallium started, but then started to choke. He gasped, wheezing as he turned pink.
“Let me make this clear, Mallium. I have no time for liars. Years ago, in return for your loyalty, my Master Lenora and I aided you in securing your political position. Yet, it appears you have been on the receiving end of upheaval. You were tasked with protecting one of her possessions. If you do not comply, I will simply hand you over to my companion here, and I can assure you, she will not give you a second chance.”
“S-sold it,” Mallium muttered between gasps, unable to catch a breath of air.
Anders’ invisible grip around Mallium’s neck tightened. Metal clanging and the sound of buzzing could be heard.
“A lie, his eyes turned away,” Aphotis jumped in front of the two, igniting her spare lightsaber. A glint of red caught in the Human’s sweat was enough to give away the laser sight aimed at the Governor.
“Spill it, or I will make sure the rest of your spoiled family experiences the same fate!” Aequitas raised his voice as vexation and temptation for vengeance took a front-row seat.
“A-alright,” the pudgy man gasped in despair as Anders let him exhale once.
A burst of energy dissipated on Tir'eivra’s crimson blade. The muscles on her arms trembled as it pushed her backward. Flashes of light flickered wildly in the room as the lightsaber shortcircuited with a crackle.
“Disruptors! Not aimed at us, but this precious Governor, we are out of time!” Aphotis flicked her wrist and commanded the Force to shut the door.
“Hej, hej! tailed thing, the Chiss is hiding some-,” his voice cut off as his neck snapped like a twig.
Aphotis’ tail twitched as she saw his head twist. Electric-blue eyes peered at Aequitas’ balled fist.
What a waste of time. A useless, pathetic, insignificant big of a man that could nor stand on his own power without him. His anger seethed within his soul, the pure ambience of his hatred unbottled and leaking out of him like steam from a geyser. Any Force-Sensitive within a few miles radius would likely be able to sense him now, the raw, unfiltered presence of an Elder Sith in their midst.
It didn’t matter.
He knew where to find it. That was all that mattered. May the Force have mercy on the souls of whoever decided to get in his way.
For he would show them none.
A disruptor bolt nearly crashed into his skull, had it not been for Aphotis’ intervention. Her lightsaber cackled against the deadly energy as more and more flooded the Atrium with them.
Alaisy looked to him, a gaze through her mask asked the question without her needing to move her lips.
She wanted an opening? She would have it.
“You will all yield.”
Anders’ voice rang out against Mallium’s political rivals, rebels, whatever they were. It didn’t matter. He weaved the intricate threads of the Force through all their minds, subjecting them to an acute miasma under his influence. Against so many, he could only sway them for but a moment.
A moment was all Aphotis needed.
He was going to enjoy watching them die.
The black-clad woman didn’t need any further hints as she dipped into the Force and willed it to give her strength. Her hands itched for more blood. The door slid open. The first tap of her heel was swiftly followed by the next as she sprinted out of the room in a blur.
A pair of dazed eyes glinting in the dark attracted her claws like moths to a flame. They seeped in like a knife through butter. The solid texture of the man’s bone was her anchoring point as her fingers latched onto the thug’s skull via their eye sockets. With a powerful swing, she tossed his body at the next group, knocking them over like space-bowl pins.
She raked the stocky neck of a Gran opposite to her with a bladed heel, slicing it with an elegant spinning kick. Warped gargling was accompanied by gushing of blood and a clattering of heavy platforms upon her landing.
Aequitas stepped outside, extending his control over an even greater distance. His mind-strings puppeteered the masses towards the duo, creating a buffer as they were killed faster than they could reinforce the facility. His view of the slaughter only enhanced his grip on the scum. .
Long nails lit up as cerulean zigzag patterns burst out of Aphotis’s hands. A heavy jolt of lightning fried everybody that it could chain towards. All of the woman’s anger and frustration was funneled into the coalesced dark side energy. Thoughts about the mission evaporated like raindrops on Tatooine’s sandy surface.
The sheer pain shook some of them out of the spell, waking to electrified death, unable to reach for their triggers, piled onto each other, screaming. Nothing but smoke and burnt flesh.
The Vice-Chancellor savored the sensation of their deaths to create new strands and weave them around the invaders inside the atrium. Before the first could set foot in the hallway, they were leashed like akk-dogs and cut down by a crimson lash. Like a serpent slipping around the corridor, Aphotis’s lightwhip cracked and slashed off limbs and heads with utter precision.
Some attempted to flee, but Anders would have none of it. He extended his mind to the point of agony. None would escape justice. They would turn back and face their fate.
The cacophony of death was a sight to behold. The slaughter, the destruction, the erasure of scum from the know galaxy was going to help Ansers sleep at night.
Aphotis sauntered towards him, a gene sway in her hips, blood staining the symbiotic suit that clung to her bare flesh.
She stopped in front of him, raspy breaths coming from her mask as she folded her arms in front of her chest expectantly.
“Yes?” Anders quirked a brow.
“Lenora. Darth Lenora,” Alaisy said with finality. “You were her apprentice?”
“You have heard of her?” The Chiss was genuinely surprised.
It elicited a shrug from Alaisy. “Only in passing. She was reportedly killed.”
“Yes. By me,” Anders placed his hands behind his back. “She is a relic of my past that will remain there if I have anything to say about it. However, my old Master was crafty. For all her power, for all her insanity, she was smart enough to create contingency plans for her contingency plans. I, however, found the chink in her armour and took advantageof tbat once I took Draca into my care.”
“And Mallium had something to do with that contingency plan, I presume?” Alaisy had to admit, her curiosity was piqued. Even dead, the mere mention of her name seemed to elicit a response in Anders she found morbidly curious.
Fear.
It was amazing how the ghosts of the past could haunt the future. She made a mental note. This information could be useful later.
“Indeed. Though, that is all I will say for now. It is a private matter. For now, we should leave. I, for one, do not wish to explain the mess to the Exarch.”
The Shiny Sith could not argue with that. She had many questions, but perhaps she could perform her own research, if only to exploit the buried nightmare that lived within Anders’ soul.
Oh, yes. She was going to enjoy this.
=END=